#and that's because he was very much still traumatized from the streets where good behavior was a matter of survival

[layzeal]

an important note on wwx's characterization that i think is important and sometimes people will get wrong, is that wwx doesn't have low self-esteem ("i'm stupid, i'm ugly, i'm annoying, i'm bothersome, nobody likes me") nor does he have low confidence ("i can't do this" "i don't know this" "i can't do anything right"). in fact, both of these are extremeeeely high in his personality as a teen and young adult

what wei wuxian does have, however, is low self-worth, specifically when it comes to his own needs and well-being compared to other people. couple that with his high confidence and urge to pay off debts of gratitude, and you get his extremely self-destructive behavior ("it's fine if i lose my core as long as jc has it for the good of the sect, i can survive without one", "it's fine that i'm being forcefully kissed by a stranger because she's nervous and i don't want to embarrass her", "it's fine, it's all fine, as long as it's me, because i can take it")

#it's also why i think lwj's worry that wwx slwpt with him out of gratitude was very well based #bc let's be honest. if wwx DID remember his confession.... i don't doubt that's something he could do #he has zero concept or worry for his own bodily autonomy as long as it benefits someone else. it's fine. it's all fine #this is just a note from smth i had been thinking about! it wasn't prompted by anything #just remember: wwx. especially teen wwx. had a self-esteem and confidence as high as the sky #the only time he worried over being bothersome was as a lil kid when he was first brought back to LP #and that's because he was very much still traumatized from the streets where good behavior was a matter of survival #once he established his place as head disciple? he became a MENACE #modao #lace speaks

[kvnex]

PART 1: THE BASICS

What is your full name? Kane T. Franklin

Where and when were you born? Sept 7,1997 Memphis Tennessee

Who are/were your parents? (Know their names, occupations, personalities, etc.) His morthers name is Kayla Franklin, she’s unemployed because he takes care of her. In the beginning she wasn’t much of a nurturing type of mother. But over time she developed this personality where she only wanted the best for her children and the best is what she did. She did whatever she had to do for Kane and his sister and for that he’s thankful. She’s a bit on the rough side she’s been through a lot a she’s seen a lot so she can tend to come off a bit more harsh at times but it’s all love. As for his dad his name is Maurice Halsten, didn’t know him, didn’t like him, didn’t care about him.

Do you have any siblings? What are/were they like? Yes he has a younger sister, she’s very sweet and nice almost too good to be true in so many words. She’s the complete opposite of Kane but she stands on business when it comes to her big brother.

Where do you live now, and with whom? Describe the place and the person/people. Bel-Air, big ass house nice yard neighbors kinda far apart. Lots of rooms, lost of space, basketball cout all of the things a bel air mansion would have.

What is your occupation? He's a Rapper

Write a full physical description of yourself. You might want to consider factors such as: height, weight, race, hair and eye color, style of dress, and any tattoos, scars, or distinguishing marks. 6’0 tall, don’t worry about his weight, it’s enough. Black male, brown eyes with black hair. He likes to think of himself as a hood rich dresser, he can jump fresh any day of the week with just a simple fit to throw on but he likes to have things that others dont tend to have so that it sets him apart a bit from others. Tons of tattoos on his arms and hand and neck. A scar on his face that’s fading but it’s from when he was younger and got cut in the face by a glass bottle.

To which social class do you belong? Upper

Do you have any allergies, diseases, or other physical weaknesses? He's allergic to oranges but will risk it cause he likes orange juice. No diseases or any other phyical weakeness

Are you right- or left-handed? Right

What does your voice sound like? Deep but not Barry white deep, like regular deep southern drawl or should I say a Memphis accent.

What words and/or phrases do you use very frequently? I’m good or it’s whatever, what’s that word shortly

What do you have in your pockets? Money and a lighter.

Do you have any quirks, strange mannerisms, annoying habits, or other defining characteristics? He has an obsessive behavior but at the same time he plays it very nonchalant when he feels like people playing on his head top. But at the same time he can be very nonchalant or not care which tends to annoy people.

PART 2: GROWING UP

How would you describe your childhood in general? His life wasn’t sweet at all actually, it wasn’t the best but it could have been a lot worse. He lived in the hood so we all know what that’s like, shoot outs, gangs, drugs and jail things that he seen on a daily basis. But his grandma tried her best to keep him on the right path even though it didn’t last too long because he still ended up doing what he wanted.

What is your earliest memory? Seeing his uncle get shot…traumatizing.

How much schooling have you had? High school diploma

Did you enjoy school? NO

Where did you learn most of your skills and other abilities? Life skills were taught by the streets.

While growing up, did you have any role models? If so, describe them. My cousin Tat, he was a get money type of nigga, he had the respect of the hood and I wanted everything that he had. I always looked at him as a bigger role model than all these other people, because tat was getting money, he wasn’t just a regular drug dealer tat had the south really in control. He was powerful and I wanted to be exactly like him until he got shot, then I just lost all hope on who I wanted to be like because he changed his whole life after that.

While growing up, how did you get along with the other members of your family? Yea his hating ass uncles and Aunties.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? A drug lord

As a child, what were your favorite activities? Football

As a child, what kinds of personality traits did you display? He was a jokester, always the funny bad lil kid no matter where I went.

As a child, were you popular? Who were your friends, and what were they like? He was very popular due to him clowning all the time and mostly his cousins, he didn’t have many outside friends. Niggas was frauds for real.

When and with whom was your first kiss? Middle School, Tati

Are you a virgin? If not, when and with whom did you lose your virginity? No, Tati

PART 3: PAST INFLUENCES

What do you consider the most important event of your life so far? Most important…probably going on my first sold out tour a few years ago.

Who has had the most influence on you? Currently? Nobody, everybody cool though.

What do you consider your greatest achievement? Sold out shows, best feeling ever for an independent artist.

What is your greatest regret? Not trying hard for what he knew he wanted, things could have been way different.

What is the most evil thing you have ever done? He's not a evil person but life happens and you gotta survive it so yea.

Do you have a criminal record of any kind? Yea, assault charges and some other things.

When was the time you were the most frightened? Couple of years ago, he was spiraling out of control. Unable to really see life and the bigger picture, he was living and thinking for in the moment. Could have ended badly but reality kicked in.

What is the most embarrassing thing ever to happen to you? Nothing

If you could change one thing from your past, what would it be, and why? He would listen more to the things that people were telling him to better his life. So being less hard headed.

What is your best memory? First real vacation with his mama, grandma and sister. They didn’t go far but they went to New York and his grandma was hype as hell. She always wanted to go, so when he was able he took her. Brought her everything she wanted, she was happy as hell so for him that was all he needed to see.

What is your worst memory? As a kid seeing his uncle get killed, nothing tops that bad memory.

@la-resources

#kanedevs #L.A.task100

[the5n00k]

Ollie Chen and the Concept of Identity and Self Worth

Not as long as the other analyses so I won't cut it this time

Quite a few people have boiled down this character's entire arc to prejudice and unlearning taught behaviors but I refuse to believe that is all there is to this character. Especially after one of his biggest episodes came After his redemption arc and explored his insecurities. Which is where I come in and lay them out for you in a long, convoluted, half asleep essay detailing what makes this character so interesting and personally relatable to myself! (Sadly)

Ollie is a good kid. He was raised to believe and build his entire personality and life off of the idea that he is the good guy and ghosts are the bad guys. He's disappointed in himself when he thinks he's failed the "greater good" of Brighton by losing the story sprite in Book Marks the Sprite. It's not hard to see he has a major hero complex and believes that if he's not saving the day himself, he's disappointing everyone. It's not ever spoken but it could be a product of his father.

Ruben Chen is ALSO very goal oriented and on a one track mission to rid the world of ghosts with more passion than his other family members. He's the one that single handedly convinced the entire family that ghosts are bad because of a traumatic experience. By failing to capture a ghost, Ollie is failing his dad. Everyone at some point in their lives has wanted to make their parents (or somebody they look up to) proud. And it's devastating to him to believe that he doesn't. He reminds me of Varian from Tangled the Series in that aspect, trying to make his father proud and putting on a persona when he's just a scared little kid. (Another character I was skeptical about joining the main cast of characters I was familiar with only to fall madly in love with his character arc)

Another thing he's built his life around is the title "research specialist". He's the so-called "expert" on ghosts according to the GCC metube introductory video. So during A Frightmare on Main Street, when Molly, the first person he bonded with in this new town, the first person he told about their ghost hunting, his CRUSH, tells him he knows NOTHING about real ghosts?

He is DEVASTATED.

His whole life, his title, crumbled in an evening. Faced with the reality that he had been misinformed since birth and that him and his family are the REAL bad guys. He denies it, (multiple times before this too, so much so that Molly was so fed up, she finally said what she had been feeling about his family's ideology for MONTHS) obviously that is one difficult truth to just suddenly accept. But he eventually comes to terms with it. Happy ending, right? He's not a bad guy anymore! Well...

Here's where the self worth comes in. If he's not a ghost hunter and isn't part of a team doing good anymore, who is he? He was the research specialist, he had a mildly successful metube channel with his family (who still hunt ghosts btw!), if he's not useful to them, what's his purpose?

They don't really explore this aspect very much aside from visually showing it to the audience in the episode The Unhaunting of Brighton Video. He's seen not quite keeping up with the rest of his new group, The Ghost Friends. He's awkward, out of sync, doesn't understand their inside jokes, he's almost completely excluded for the first part of the episode. Scratch even voted against him joining the group to begin with. (Apparently Libby voted for him with Molly, I wish we could have seen that exchange and dramatic gasp of betrayal from Scratch) It doesn't help that the ghost is yelling at him for most of the episode for being a screw up despite being a screw up himself.

Honestly Ollie and Scratch have more in common than you'd think in terms of reinventing yourself and being afraid of your past but that's a post for another day.

The next episode I get this read from is Let's Play Turnipball. In it, Ollie plays a very convoluted and confusing local game along with Molly's coaching. And right away you can tell he is Not confident and that she is totally overselling him. He knows he's going to let everyone down because he can't remember any of the stupid rules. He tries his best and for the most part is successful until he loses them the game by accident. (While Perfektborg is actively trying to lose, hope Molly didn't tell him that) He kicks, curses the game, and walks away to go mope about his loss. He just wanted to prove himself in this new town he's still unfamiliar with. He wanted to be useful otherwise he would have just told Molly he didn't want to play anymore. But he didn't want to let anyone down.

But then, the entire town embraces him in a celebration!

He's... confused. But excited! And accepts the town's appreciation. It was so nice to finally see him get a dub for once.

My conclusion for this? Ollie was raised misinformed and misled for his entire life, yes. But that affected him beyond his anti-ghost agenda. He became reliant on being the hero (A Frightmare on Main Street) and stubborn in his beliefs, believing everyone else wrong. He's TERRIFIED for most of the season because of this, by far the jumpiest member of the ghost friends. He's traumatized by horror stories and insurmountable expectations of saving the world from a supernatural threat that isn't even there. Unless you count the frightmares in which case, yeah, sure, I'll give you that. So when all of that was ripped away from him and turned on its head, his entire self image SHATTERED.

I almost wish we had an episode to explore that but it doesn't seem like we'll get that. But this scared, confused boy is finally coming to terms with the fact that he doesn't have to be The Ghost Hunter or Molly's Hero to be useful. Heck, he doesn't even need to have Molly to be in the show. (UNLIKE SOME LOVE INTERESTS COUGH COUGH WENDY COUGH COUGH WASTED POTENTIAL)

He's becoming his own person outside of The Ghost Chaser Chens. And I'm excited to see how they'll react when they find out.

#the ghost and molly mcgee #tgamm #tgamm season 2 #ollie chen #tell me this makes sense #im half alive at work at the end of my shift #i just really wanna put it out there how good Ollie is as a character #and that his arc goes beyond him liking ghosts #he's not boring or basic to me #but it's fair if you like the other characters a bit more #i relate to him a lot in terms of overcompensating to attone for the sins of my past #and it hurts when people say there's nothing to him #so i really wanted to put this out there #i hope all five of you that bothered to read this enjoyed it

[moon-light-jukebox]

Germs [Reid x Reader]

this gif isn’t mine

Summary: Reader is sure the resident BAU genius doesn’t like her, but she’s not sure why. But even if he did like her, he’s a germaphobe, so he wouldn’t be comfortable with the things she wants to do to him...would he?

Pairing: Spencer Reid / (Female) Reader

Word Count: 5.6k

Rating: Mature 

Category: Fluff and Smut 

Content Warning: Brief mentions of torture and violence, usually criminal minds stuff, nothing explicit. Light choking, oral sex (female receiving), penetrative sex, fingering, language (maybe?) 

A/n: I have come out of fan fiction writing retirement for this one. Let me know what y’all think!  masterlist

y/n - your name

y/l/n - your last name

italicized text is Reader’s sassy inner thoughts

---

I’m not sure if I believe in hell, but if there is a hell, I’m sure it feels exactly like Louisiana in July. Every time I walked outside I felt like I was walking into soup. Gross. I couldn’t help but feel guilty over my sigh of relief when I walked back into the local precinct the team was currently working out of. Young women are dying, and I’m worried about a little bit of heat.

But, fuck, it was hot.

Speaking of heat, I thought as I threw open the door to the conference room only to run smack into the hottest thing I’d ever encountered.

“Shit,” I exclaimed before I thought better of it. “I’m so sorry.” I ran my eyes up, up, up, all the way up his body until I met his eyes; those beautiful honey brown eyes that threatened to have me acting like an idiot if I stared into them for too long.  

Dr. Spencer Reid’s cheeks were tinged pink, his posture stiff, his fingers clutching the file he was carrying for dear life. “Don’t worry about it, Y/n,” he sounded uncomfortable, which made my stomach drop. “My fault.” With that, he quickly maneuvered around me and headed off to complete whatever genius task he had to complete.

My eyes followed him until he was out of sight before I mentally shook myself. ‘C’mon, this is pointless,’ I thought. ‘He doesn’t even like you.’ Which I really thought was true, the good doctor went out of his way to avoid me whenever possible. ‘Plus, he’s a germaphobe.’ This thought was confirmed true. He didn’t shake people’s hands, the only people I’d seen him touch during my time at the BAU were members of the team that he’d known for years, and some of those even seemed reluctant.

Admittedly, I didn’t know a lot about germaphobia; since I couldn’t ask the only genius I knew, I did the next logical thing. I googled it. Every person I’d read about seemed to experience germaphobia differently. Some people could have sex, but others were grossed out by the very idea. Knowing my luck, Spencer Reid and his beautiful hands, and his soulful eyes, and his cheekbones that could cut glass was in the repulsed by sex category. Which is fine! Right, it is fine to not be interested in sex; the only problem was I was very interested in every part of him.  

Maybe he thinks I’m gross. Maybe I stink? Maybe he’s just repulsed by my very presence. Regardless, I couldn’t see Spencer Reid ever shoving me against a wall and fucking me senseless.

I sighed, making my way over to the conference table, pulling out a chair before I flopped into it. I could feel the exhaustion settling into my bones. We had been in Louisiana for almost a week now and we were still no closer to finding our unsub. He was a white man, he worked in a lower-paying job, and he hated women. Obviously, that didn’t narrow it down much.

The unsub was targeting women in clubs and bars, following them outside before he bashed them on the back of the head. After that, he threw the girls over his shoulder and took them to his car; he moved them to a secondary location before he tortured them. The first two victims had survived. They were traumatized, but they were fighters; they both said the same things, ‘he kept my eyes covered the entire time,’ “I never saw his face,’ ‘I did whatever he told me to do.’

We thought the killing of the third victim had been an accident, but that accident had excited our guy enough that he changed his ritual; the killing was crucial now. We had 4 bodies, 2 live victims that couldn’t tell us anything, and no leads.

Sighing, I leaned forward, bringing the heels of my hands to my eyes. I hated feeling helpless. The answer to who this fucker was is in this evidence somewhere and I will find it. If it’s the last thing I do.

The doors swung open again, pulling me from my thoughts. Hotch lead the parade of people, followed by Morgan, JJ, and Dr. Reid. Our unit chef looked gravely serious…not that that necessarily meant anything, in the 6 months I’d been with the behavioral analysis unit I hadn’t seen him have any other expression.

Morgan pulled out his phone, hitting what I suspected was speed dial number 1. “Hey baby girl,” he said, without his usual swagger; even he was tired. “You’re on speaker. You’ve got me, Hotch, JJ, Reid, and Y/l/n.”

“And I have the always wonderful Emily Prentiss, and the dashing David Rossi on the line, effectively putting my favorite people together again, as they should be,” Garcia quipped. I don’t think she meant to include me in her list of ‘favorite people,’ but it made me smile anyway. “Okay, crime fighters, what’s the play?”

“We’re still no closer to finding the unsub,” Hotch began. “He’s highly organized, methodical, and paranoid; but he hasn’t killed in 3 days, this is a break from his escalation pattern. He’s going to strike soon.” Hotch leaned over resting his palms on the shiny fake wood of the conference table. “Our best chance is to send an agent out there as bait.” There was a general murmur of agreement before he continued on. “Garcia, we need you to find all of the night clubs, bars, and whatever else you can think of in the updated comfort zone.”

The sound of keys clicking made its way through the speaker. “Assuming we’re excluding the places he’s already hit, that leaves us with 3 possibilities.”

“So far he hasn’t struck a place twice,” Prentiss chimed in. “Do we think he’s going to hold to that pattern?”

Reid moved over to the board where the map of the county was displayed. “I think so. This guy is too careful to risk going to a place where he’s been before. The chance of him being recognized is too great, especially when everyone is on high alert.” He gestured to the area he had circled on the map. “His pattern seems to be focusing in on this center point right here,” he said, placing a pin in the map. “This area means something. Garcia, what is the closest club or bar to the intersection of Washington Avenue and Harrison Street?”

“That would beeeeee…The Blue Fox.”

“That’s where he’ll be,” Dr. Reid said confidently, his eyes moving to Hotch’s face.

The older man nodded. “It’s our best lead so far, we have to run with it.”

“It’s Friday night,” Rossi pointed out. “We’ll have to act soon.”

Hotch nodded, seeming to be lost in thought. “We need to send agents in there tonight. We know the victims were all on dates or flirting with a man right before their abduction. He targets women that are happy with their companions then waits til he can separate them.”

“Who are you planning on sending in, Hotch?’ JJ questioned.

“Y/l/n is the youngest, she fits the build of the previous victims the best.” His heavy gaze rested on me. “What do you think?”

Like it was even a choice. “I’m in.”

Hotch nodded, accepting my answer. “Good. You’ll partner with Reid.”

“What?!” I squawked, much to my embarrassment. I cleared my throat before I continued. “But, Reid and I…I just thought Morgan would be the obvious choice.” Fuck, I’m just digging a bigger hole.

Morgan gave me an easy smile. “You’re just saying that because you wanna see my moves, little mama.”

Hotch cleared his throat, bringing our attention back. “Morgan is too intimidating; the unsub might not move in if he feels too threatened. You’ll go with Reid.” When he was met with silence he continued on, “alright, let’s get to work.”

-

And that is how I wound up in a club in Louisiana on a Friday night, in a tight black dress, with Spencer Reid beside me. After he walked into the club holding my hand. He doesn’t hold hands, I cringed internally at the thought. He must feel so uncomfortable.

He waved the bartender over, ordering a drink for me and a water for himself before turning to me. “I thought a drink would loosen you up a bit. You look nervous.”

I am nervous. “Right. Thanks.” I drummed my fingers on the bar, my gaze sweeping around the club for anyone who seemed out of place and especially creepy. Most lone men at clubs and bars were creepy, but we need especially creepy.

“Is that because you don’t think I can have your back?”

My head snapped back around. “What?”

Spencer paused to accept the drinks from the bartender, sliding him the money. “In the conference room. You seemed upset that Morgan wasn’t going to be your partner,” he stated matter-of-factly. “Is that because you think I wouldn’t have your back?”

Fuck. I blushed to the roots of my hair. “No, Spencer! God no! It’s not that, I know you’d have my back.” I took a sip of my drink before I said anything else. “It’s just that…you don’t seem to like me very much, and I know you have a thing about germs, and I thought maybe that’s why you didn’t like me.” I was babbling; I was absolutely babbling. “I just didn’t want you to be uncomfortable, that’s all. Morgan has never seemed uncomfortable around me, so…” I trailed off lamely.

The corners of his lips quirked up in amusement. “So, you didn’t want to partner with me on this because you didn’t want me to be uncomfortable?”

I nodded, fidgeting with the straw in my drink.

Spencer moved closer to me, his right hand coming to rest on the small of my back. He seemed as calm as he could be, meanwhile I suddenly had trouble breathing.

It’s for the case. He has to do this for the case. Calm down.

"What do my issues with germs have to do with this?" he wondered, leaning closer to me. I could feel his breath on my neck; my skin broke out in goosebumps.

Double fuck. “Well, we’re supposed to be…together. And you think I’m gross. What if you have to kiss me?” TRIPLE FUCK. “Not that we’d have to kiss,” I tried to backpedal. “But we might, you never know. And I just didn’t…I don’t want you to dislike me more than you do.”

The teasing smile slipped from his face, the fingers on my lower back flexing slightly. He regarded me with a tilt of his head. "You're serious?" At my shaky nod, he continued. "Y/n, I don't think you're gross."

“You don’t?” I squeaked.

He lifted his hand from my back then, sliding it up to my shoulder, his free hand moving from the bar to rest on my hip. Spencer brushed my hair back before he leaned forward. Slowly, slowly, slowly, I felt his lips touch the tender skin of my neck. My eyes fluttered shut, unable to suppress a gasp at the contact. Spencer Reid’s beautiful lips slid down to the place where my neck and shoulder met, then I felt his teeth nip the skin before he placed another kiss there. He worked his way back up towards my ear, the hand on my hip moving slightly so he was almost grabbing my ass. “I don’t think you’re gross,” he breathed, causing me to shudder. I could hear the smirk in his voice. “Germs don’t bother me in that way, especially around people I know. I wouldn’t have a problem kissing you, baby.”

I was going to need new panties after this. Spencer Reid, awkward, sweet, Dr. Spencer Reid just called me Baby.

“…Oh.” Really, y/n. Oh; you went with oh?

The good doctor pulled back, his face close enough to mine that I could see that he had freckles under his eyes and that those beautiful eyes got more golden towards the center. "Oh."

-

Michael Watkins was the name of our unsub. He was a short white man with a receding hairline and a bad temper. His last relationship had ended 3 months before the first attack; Spencer was right to pick this bar. Shortly after he tried to make my pussy combust with his neck kisses, Reid suggested I walk to the bathroom, assuring me he’d be watching if anyone followed.

Watkins’ hand was in my hair, dragging me outside before I made it to the ladies’ room. I felt a jolt of fear as I struggled to escape, strands of hair being ripped from my head. I shouldn’t have worried, because no sooner had the outside door opened than I heard the velvety voice of Derek Morgan. “FBI! Put your hands where we can see them.”

He attempted to run. Why would anyone try to run from Derek Morgan?  

After the medics confirmed I was okay, I was sent back to the hotel while the rest of the team went with the local police to book Watkins and try to get a full confession.

“Good work,” Hotch said, his hand clapping down on my shoulder.

The highest praise I’ll ever need.

I hopped into the shower right when I got back to my room, not wanting Watkins’ touch on me for a moment longer.

Spencer’s touch, however,…That was a touch I wouldn’t mind having on me. But he’d barely looked at me once he made it outside. I knew he was being affectionate in there because of the case, we were playing a role. I knew that. I still couldn’t stop the twinge of hurt I felt.

But he doesn’t think I’m gross. That had to count for something.

I had just got done blow drying my hair enough so that it wouldn’t look too crazy when I woke up when there was a knock on my door. Figuring it was Emily, I didn't consider the fact that I was in my pajamas, and my face was scrubbed free of makeup.  

It wasn’t Emily. Spencer Reid stood on the other side of my door, his eyes running down my body before he met my bewildered stare again. “You look comfy,” he commented with that damn little smile on his lips again.

“Oh. Yeah. I took a shower.” Way to go, y/n, you’re really killing it tonight.

“I see that,” he said, his cheeks going a little bit pink. “Can I come in? I thought we should talk.” Was he nervous? Why would he be nervous?

I ushered him in, shutting the door behind him. He sat on the bottom edge of my bed; his body angled towards the headboard. I briefly debated about where to sit before I joined him. Don’t make it weird, y/n.

He cleared his throat before he began. “I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable tonight. I just wanted to make sure we got the guy.”

Right. “Oh, it’s okay, Spencer. I get it. I wasn’t uncomfortable.” I picked at the frayed edge of my sleep shorts, my eyes dropping so he didn’t see anything on my face that betrayed how I was feeling; you can’t be too careful around profilers.

His hand reached out to cover my own fidgeting hands, one of his hands covering both of mine. His hands were so big. His fingers were so long, the veins in his hands were so pronounced. I bet those fingers would feel really – FOCUS.

“I’m also sorry you thought I didn’t like you.” His thumb had started to move slowly over the back of my hand. “I do like you. I like you a lot, actually. I just…” I brought my gaze back up to meet his eyes. “I just get nervous sometimes.”

“You didn’t seem nervous in the club.”

“No,” he chuckled. “I wasn’t nervous then because it was my job. I wasn’t worried about misreading a signal…doing the wrong thing…I’m not the best with social cues.” I had noticed that about him before. “But I am a really good profiler.” And he’s humble too, apparently.

“I know that you couldn’t fake your reaction to me in the club. Your breathing became quicker, I felt your pulse jump under my lips when they were on your neck. I saw how blown your pupils got." He shifted closer to me then, bringing his other hand up to push my hair behind my shoulder like he did earlier in the night. "Just like they are now."

He leaned closer to me, his voice was lower, and it made my stomach flutter. "You're clenching your thighs together, Y/n. Your shirt may be baggy, but I can see how hard your nipples are too." His tongue ran out to wet his lips. "If I'm wrong, just tell me now. If I've misread this, I will leave right now, and we can pretend this never happened." Spencer brought both his hands up to cradle my face; despite how wet my panties were, how tight my nipples are, how badly I wanted him to touch me, this gesture made me feel special. He was holding me like he actually cared about me like I was precious. "But, if I'm not wrong, and you want this too, Y/n, tell me. Tell me you want this too and I won't stop touching you until you scream my name."

I let out a soft whimper then. Like it’s a choice. “I want this,” I leaned into his touch. “Please, Spencer.”

His thumb brushed over my cheek, his eyes never leaving mine. “Please, what, baby?”

“Kiss me.”

No sooner had the words left my mouth than his lips were on mine. His lips were softer than I imagined, they were firm and almost…questioning. When I nipped at his bottom lip, something seemed to break free inside of him. His lips slanted over mine with a hunger I had never felt. His tongue ran over my bottom lip before I opened for him. Spencer’s tongue moved into my mouth while his hands moved; one hand moved back to grip my hair at the base of my skull, tugging firmly, the other moved down to my neck, not applying any pressure, just resting it there in a gesture that felt possessive.

The need for oxygen broke us apart, his lips moving across my cheek to my jaw, then down to my neck. “How could you think I didn’t like you?” he mumbled into my skin. “You have no idea what you do to me. None.”

I threw my head back when he sucked on my pulse point, a moan ripping from my throat. “W-what…what do I do?”

Pulling back from me, he gripped the bottom of my shirt, looking at me for consent before he pulled it over my head. His eyes were firmly on my chest, his lips parted, his breathing heavy. He pushed me down slowly on the bed; I was on my back and he was hovering over me. I felt his mouth place hot, wet, kisses from my collarbone down towards my breasts. His right hand landed on my breast, his thumb brushing back and forth over my nipple while his lips moved closer and closer to my left. I tangled my hands in his hair, urging him forward.

“You want to know what you do to me?” he raised his head slightly, making sure my eyes were on him when he flicked his tongue over my nipple, causing me to gasp. “What do you do to me in your little skirts, with your little smiles, and your little laughs?” He gave my nipple a sharp pinch. “You’re all I fucking think about, y/n.” With a growl, he finally took my nipple in his mouth, teasing it with his teeth and tongue. He switched to the other breast while he adjusted himself over me, bringing his pelvis down to rest at the seam of my body between my thighs. I shifted restlessly under him, trying to grind my pussy against him. He was so fucking hard.

With a groan, he lifted his head and started kissing his way towards the middle of my chest, moving down to the curve of my stomach. “Do you know how many times I came back to my hotel room after spending all day with you and was so hard I had to cum before I could think of anything else?” he peppered kisses down my body as he spoke.

My eyes shot open at this confession that he seemed to think was no big deal. “What?” I couldn’t believe this. “You…you touched yourself and thought of…”

He hooked his fingers into the waistband of my shorts and panties, taking my raised hips as an invitation to remove both from my body. "You. I thought of you." He threw my clothes on the floor, pulling my legs open. His eyes moved over all of me, his Adam's apple bobbing when he swallowed hard. “I thought about kissing you. About making you squirm for me.” He ran his fingers up and down my thighs, his mouth running slowly over my inner thighs. Spencer’s hands hooked around my upper thighs, moving me to where he wanted me. “But, most of all, I thought about this pretty pussy.” He placed a kiss on my clit, chuckling at the wanton moan that came from me and how my fingers tangled in his soft brown curls. “I thought about all the different ways I could make this pretty pussy cum all over me.” With that, he ran his tongue up my slit before flicking it over my clit.

Dr. Spencer Reid was good at everything, so of course, he was good at this too. His mouth moved over me, watching my reaction to see what I liked best. His tongue moved in circles around my clit before slipping down to my opening. His tongue plunged inside me, fucking me, while his thumb came over to rub my clit.

“Spence- fuck- Spencer, please.” My hips tried to shift restlessly, but his arms were iron bars holding me still. He slowly moved his left forearm to rest across my hips, bringing his right hand down to my throbbing pussy. He pulled his mouth away from me, much to my dismay. He pushed one finger, then another into me. My head thrashed wildly, and my thighs started to shake. “Spencer!”

He just smirked and curled his fingers, hitting the spot inside me that made everything in my body pulse. “What, baby?”

My breaths were coming in gasps, my voice was a needy whimper. “Make me cum, Spencer. Please, please make me cum.”

He needed no other encouragement. His fingers continued their steady thrust in and out of me while his mouth covered my clit again. He alternated between flicking my clit with his tongue, then circling it before pulling it into his mouth, sucking lightly.

“Spencer.” I felt my orgasm rising. “Spencer don’t- don’t stop. I’m gonna cum, please make me cum.”

He kept his pace steady, sucking on my clit, moaning at my words. His eyes had been closed, but at that moment they opened and met mine. Then I felt his teeth ghost over my clit, I saw the want in his eyes. That was my undoing. My back arched, my mouth hung open in a silent scream. I heard myself say his name over and over again. Spencer pushed his fingers inside me, massaging me through the most powerful orgasm I had ever had. With one final kiss on my oversensitive clit, he withdrew his fingers, putting them into his mouth to suck my orgasm off of them.

He kissed back up my body, and I tried to respond, but I was still so shattered. I had never felt anything so powerful before. He cupped my face in one hand and kissed me slowly. I returned the kiss, moving my hands to the buttons of his shirt.

Spencer broke the kiss, pulling back to look at me again. “Hang on, baby.” His hand came up to still my own. “We can take a second. It’s okay. Just breathe.”

This beautiful man smiled at me then. I felt my heart flutter when he leaned down to pepper soft kisses along my jaw, his thumb coming up to wipe a tear that fell from the corner of my eye that I hadn’t even noticed.

I don’t know how long we stayed like that. He shifted to lay beside me, whispering reassurances to me while I came back down. This was just one of the ways that Spencer was so different from every other man. I didn't feel rushed, or pressured. I could feel how hard he still was, I could feel the tension in his body, but he simply kissed me while he cupped my jaw.

He made me feel…cherished.

I moved my hands to tangle in his hair again, deepening our kiss. He didn’t move my hands away when I started to work on the buttons of his shirt. The fire that I thought had been calmed by my orgasm had come roaring back. Spencer moved his hands to his belt while I finished with his shirt. His shirt came off, tossed in the same direction as my clothes. I pulled his pants and boxers down his legs, watching his cock spring free.

Everything about him was painfully beautiful. His angular cheekbones, the jaw that looked like it was carved from granite, even the toned muscles of his body. He had a small trail of hair that went down from his belly button to his groin. His cock laid against his stomach, the head glistening with precum.

“You’re beautiful,” I whispered, kneeling beside him, running my eyes over his body.

His soft hand came to grab mine, pulling it to his lips. He kissed the back of my hand, smiling softly at me.

I moved to straddle him, lower on his thighs. I took him in my hand, moving up and down, twisting my wrist as I neared the tip, swiping my thumb over his head.

“Baby,” he groaned. “Y/n, as much as I want you to do…whatever the fuck you want with me, I’m so close. I feel like I’m going to explode.” I bit into my bottom lip, unable to totally stop the smile spreading over my face. “Please, I need to feel your pussy wrapped around my cock.” He moved his hands to my hips, urging my body forward.

I raised up on my knees, taking him in my hand again, lining him up with my entrance. The tendons in his neck were strained, his fingers gripped my hips so hard I knew I was going to have bruises tomorrow. As I slowly started to sink down on his cock, Spencer let out the sexiest groan I had ever heard. His eyes were fixed where our bodies were joined, watching his dick slid deeper inside of me.

“Come on, baby,” he whispered. “You’re doing so good. Just a little bit more.”

He was so long, he wasn't overly thick, but just thick enough to cause a pleasurable stretching when he breached me that was almost painful. I gasped out a sound that might have been his name when he bottomed out inside me. I slowly circled my hips, adjusting to him. Spencer’s nails dug into my hips as he forced himself to stay still.

“Please move, y/n. Please. You’re so fucking tight.” He groaned as my walls fluttered around him. “Do you like it when I talk to you? Does that make your pretty pussy wetter?” He smirked at my whimper as I tightened around him.

I began at a slower pace, trying to tease him. Spencer quickly lost patience with that; he thrust his hips upwards, meeting my movements, his hands pushing me down onto him. I leaned forward, bracing on hand on his shoulder, the other on the bed. He pounded into me while I tried to match his pace. Spencer’s hand moved from my hip up to wrap around my throat. I nodded, forcing my eyes to stay open as he moved inside me.

His fingers squeezed slightly, pulling my face closer to his. Our lips met in a sloppy kiss. My thighs burned from matching his movements. “You feel so fucking good, y/n.” His grip on my neck tightened ever so slightly, which only heightened my arousal. “I want to feel you cum on my cock. Can you do that for me, pretty girl?”

He flipped us over quickly, never pulling completely out of me. Spencer moved to push my legs further apart, the change in angle allowing him to fill me deeper than I thought possible. His hair was sticking to his brow, his cheeks were flushed, his breathing erratic. He was the most fucking beautiful thing I had ever seen.

One hand held my leg, the other went down to my pussy, his thumb moving over my clit at a rapid pace. “Tell me what you need, Pretty Girl. Tell me how to make this pretty pussy cum all over me.”

I whined at his words. “Spencer, I-“ my voice broke off. I was so fucking close. "I need you." He seemed to understand my broken plea. He brought his body down, his chest flush against mine. He rocked into me at such a fast and hard pace. His hand still in between us rubbing circles around my clit.  

I felt his lips ghost over my ear. “I want to fucking hear you, y/n.” His speed increased, his thrust getting choppier. He was close. “I want this whole fucking town to hear what you sound like when I make you cum. When you cream all over my dick, I want you to scream my name.” With that, he moved his mouth down my neck. He bit the same tender area he had kissed in the club, where my neck met my shoulder.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck yes, Spencer!" I felt myself begin to splinter apart. “Please make me cum, fuck please.” My babbling finally broke as my orgasm tore through me. I couldn’t hear his deep groan when I came, my scream was too loud. I felt the vibration against my neck. It was only as I started to float down that I realized my nails were dug into his back. With a few last thrust and my name on his lips, I felt Spencer pulse, cumming inside me.

We lay there for a few minutes, just breathing before he rolled off of me. I felt overwhelmed, so I was relieved when he tugged me over to him. He wrapped his arm around me when I laid my head on his chest. I felt his lips on my forehead. “It’s very important for women to urinate after sexual intercourse to avoid UTIs, but you have another minute or so before that becomes more urgent.”

I couldn’t control my laugh at his comment. "Thanks, Doc." I kissed his chest. "Only you could make me cum so hard I almost blackout, then go back to being…you." I slowly untangled myself from him, going to the bathroom to handle business. When I returned, I found Spencer where I left him, his eyes were fixed on the ceiling, one hand resting behind his head, the other over his heart. He looked so lost in that moment.

“Spencer?” I asked, crawling on to the bed. “What’s wrong?”

He didn’t pretend that something wasn’t bothering him. “When you said that I just go back to being me…Do you not like that?”

My heart broke a tiny bit at the question. “Spencer, no! I love that! I love your little facts and statistics!” How did he not know that? “The best part of my day is listening to you talk. Just being with you is wonderful.” I cupped his face, bringing his gaze to mine. “Sure, I like what we just did; but I liked you before that. I want both.” Fuck. “Assuming you want me,” I rambled quickly. “This doesn’t have to mean anything, I know that it doesn’t always-“

He cut me off by pressing his lips to mine in the sweetest kiss I had ever felt. It was filled with hope and promise and…Spencer.

“It means everything to me, Y/n.”

-

I didn’t see the rest of the team until the next morning when we all boarded the jet; I was so ready to go home. I personally didn’t think anything appeared that different. Spencer sat beside me on the couch, but that wasn’t weird…right? We were just co-workers, sitting beside each other super casually. Had we spent most of last night and a little bit of this morning screwing each other’s brains out? Certainly. But you couldn’t see that…right?

Morgan’s chuckle is what confirmed I was so wrong. “Hey, y/l/n,” he called, smiling so hard it looked like his face would split from his amusement. “You missed a spot.” He pointed towards his own neck.

There was a beat of silence before Hotch snorted. SSA Aaron Hotchner, the man who never found anything funny was laughing at me.

I felt myself turn tomato red, angling my body towards Spencer’s, burying my head against his shoulder, away from the rest of the team.

“I bet you’re glad pretty boy was your partner now, huh?”

I may have wanted to melt into the floor in embarrassment, but it was sort of worth it to see the blush on Spencer’s cheeks.

--

#spencer reid #dr spencer reid #Dr Reid #Spencer reid fic #Spencer reid smut #dr spencer reid smut #dr spencer reid fics #criminal minds #criminal minds fan fic #criminal minds smut #Spencer reid x you #Spencer reid x reader #Spencer reid x y/n

[ask-hunterxhunter]

What the main four from hxh would be like with their one and only child after death of spouse how do they cope and as Parents what is their attachment style what boundaries and freedoms does their child have ?

Gon

For a long time, Gon would end up as an overprotective father, due to the trauma of losing his beloved (and, regardless of the circumstances, blaming himself for not doing something even if there was nothing he could have done). It would be one thing if the child was still a baby, but with an older one, things would get a little complicated as Gon’s behavior started to become suffocating (not helped by the fact the child would also be mourning). It would be a very delicate situation.

Note that the “overprotective” and “suffocating” behavior is not the “desperate” type or the “father will force the child to wear three coats when it’s cold and follow them with a GPS”. It would be subtler, but no less intense protection. At first, the boundaries would seem normal: No playing on the street if he’s not there, no going out with other children unless Gon has met them and their parents… It would be more on the way Gon does things… And if left unchecked, then yes, there would be other things: Gon would want so much to see his child happy that he would try to protect them from their own failings or problems (solving it in their stead), becoming a little irresponsible while, at the same time, his interest in their lives would reach the micromanaging point. Again, subtle, but it’s still there.  

 Frankly, it would be even a little tragic. Gon would worry all the time (even more than parents normally do) and his fear would slowly interfere with his behavior. Sometimes he would check the child sleeping at night, then go to his room and cry (especially if he lost his spouse in a traumatic manner).

 Things would get better eventually due to his friends helping around and getting Gon to face what happened. Much of his “mistakes” would be due to his attempt to overcompensate and to protect the child from more pain. It would take time until Gon calmed down, but facing the root of the issue would help.

 He would still worry more than normal (if the child is ten minutes late when coming back from an outing, he would be calling them!) and insist a little too much on “family bonding time”, but it wouldn’t reach an unhealthy level.

 Killua

Besides dealing with the pain of losing his spouse, Killua would already be dealing with fears of repeating his family’s behavior with his own child (even if unconsciously). Add the death of his loved one and Killua would likely fall into a deep state of depression. For a time, he wouldn’t know what to do and while he would try to focus on his child, he would risk ending up neglecting his own mental state as a result (especially if the child is too young). He would try his best to hang on, to remember his child needs him… But depression has a way of eating you alive.

 If the child is a little older, it might help. They would go through this together and the child’s love would give Killua the strength he needs… Because there is the risk that things would get to the point where Killua would start to become a recluse and, eventually, be barely able to talk to anyone (even his child) if they didn’t take the initiative. No, I’m not saying the child would have the responsibility to help, but being able to talk with each other would already, by itself, offer some support (and so would the child insisting that they go out at some point). Hell, even the child asking to sleep with Killua at night would offer a push towards recovery.

 Another good thing is that Killua’s attempts to say that everything is alright wouldn’t fool his friends (thank God) and their support would also be essential for his recovery… Killua’s pain would be so great that he might end up locking himself in a room, barely functioning. So, cue Gon breaking the door down and sitting at his friend’s side, in the silent support that he needs. Killua would need to be reminded that he is not alone and that he doesn’t need to go through this alone.

 Eventually, he would recover, but he would need some time to get to his feet again. He would try his best to balance boundaries and freedom when it comes to his child. He would be very much attached, wanting his child to grow up knowing they can trust him. Perhaps he might be overprotective with one or two things, but hey, what parent isn’t?  

 Kurapika

No matter how much time passes, Kurapika would always miss his spouse, and the first months, perhaps even years following the death would be very hard for him. If the spouse was killed by someone, well, may God have mercy on the murderer’s soul because Kurapika will not.

 While Kurapika would always be protective of his children due to his fear of them being killed by his enemies and the trauma of losing his clan, this would become more severe with the death of his spouse. It would be a strange mix since Kurapika would also instruct the child on how to defend themselves (given they are at an appropriate age for such, of course). If the child is already training by the time Kurapika’s spouse dies, Kurapika would become more strict for a while, demanding more from the child (without even realizing that he’s doing it). Yeah, it would not be fun.

 Like in Killua’s case, this effect of his loss might pass eventually (especially with friends offering support) as he learns to deal with his grief and, if the child is a little older, a conversation between them may help Kurapika realize he’s letting his pain take control of his life. If the child is too young, his friends will help him before said training starts, so while in both cases Kurapika would need time to learn to balance things out and be a single father, it would happen before he ended up as a military-type father (and risking his relationship with his child in the process).

 Would he still be protective of his child? Yes, but since he’s the last of the Kurtas and his “issues” with the Phantom Troupe, you cannot blame him. Yes, he and the child would argue at times, but Kurapika wouldn’t become the type of father that appears to want to lock his child in their room until there are forty. In fact, Kurapika would be able to balance being a father with being his child’s best friend.  

 While Kurapika would always need, from time to time, to be alone when he starts to miss you too much, that wouldn’t be as often as to become a risk of neglect or something that would eventually drag him back to depression. It would simply be necessary, one of the ways to deal with how much he misses you.

Leorio

At first, Leorio would be completely lost. Losing you hurts him in a way he never thought possible and he is not sure of what to do, especially when it comes down to the child. He doesn’t know how to be a single father and all the insecurities seem to fall on him all at once. He would manage his own emotions the better he could, but there would be moments when his grief would mix with fear. Even as Leorio tries to take deep breaths and control himself, he would feel as if he was drowning.

 At first, Leorio may try to cope by dedicating himself to his work and studies as never before, balancing this with his new role as a single father. Many factors contribute to this reaction, including his desire to be a good parent, almost to compensate for the absence of the child’s mother, in a way. However, there is always a risk that the person may become a workaholic in order to avoid dealing with the grief or because they want to tire themselves to be able to sleep. While the risk of Leorio becoming a negligent father is low, the existence of those two others might be a little… Worrying.

 Deep down, Leorio wants to make sure he becomes a great dad, that he can afford to care for his child. Remember that he grew up in a very poor area, so he knows several stories of parents being unable to give their children what they needed or wanted. Besides, there is the matter of Leorio wanting to be someone his child is proud of… Yeah, it’s not just one thing or another, but everything together that pushes Leorio into trying a little too much.

 Thankfully, this probably won’t last for long. The support of his friends aside, Leorio may hear his child calling to him, look at them and suddenly realize he has been using his work as a drug, then seeking other methods to deal with what happened. In the end, what Leorio would need is some reassurance that he is a good father and that, though raising a child on his own might be hard, it is not impossible and he won’t fail.

#headcanon #hxh headcanon #parent #dead s/o #hunter x hunter #hxh #Leorio #kurapika #Gon #Killua #Killua Zoldyck #Gon Freecs #Main Four #hxh main four #Kurta

[weirwoodking]

I have a small headcanon that Sansa has already skinchanged into a bird without her knowledge once before. This passage about Marillion in the sky cells in particular:

“When she closed her eyes she could see him in his sky cell, huddled in a corner away from the cold black sky, crouched beneath a fur with his woodharp cradled against his chest.”

What do you think?

Oh, absolutely. I do think that she’s experienced her powers in some way, she just hasn’t thought about them.

George does leave these little subtle hints in the text that point to the Stark kids abilities, the earliest being in chapter one:

Halfway across the bridge, Jon pulled up suddenly.

“What is it, Jon?” their lord father asked.

“Can’t you hear it?”

Bran could hear the wind in the trees, the clatter of their hooves on the ironwood planks, the whimpering of his hungry pup, but Jon was listening to something else.

“There,” Jon said. He swung his horse around and galloped back across the bridge. They watched him dismount where the direwolf lay dead in the snow, watched him kneel. A moment later he was riding back to them, smiling.

“He must have crawled away from the others,” Jon said. (Bran I, AGOT)

While on horseback, and halfway across the bridge, already far away from where a mute direwolf puppy was, Jon was able to “hear” him. Obviously, he didn’t hear Ghost, he sensed him. Already, he was bonded with Ghost, even though this was about a year and half before Jon had his first “true” wolf dream. And furthermore, it takes a while before he’s able to clearly remember these dreams:

The wolf dreams had been growing stronger, and he found himself remembering them even when awake. (Jon I, ADWD)

So, yes, I definitely think that Sansa could already be having skinchanging dreams with a bird/birds. She just might not remember it. Also, she doesn’t have to have been having direct dreams, but moments of using the bird’s senses. Not fully in the animal, just sharing it’s space for a moment.

Unlike the sh*w, where skinchanging is an on/off switch (you’re either inside the animal or not inside the animal), skinchanging in the books is more nuanced. Jon is able to brush his hand up against Ghost and tap into the wolf’s senses, without fully warging him. He can even taste blood in his mouth after Ghost kills, and he can feel the wolf’s hunger. The most notable instance of this “one mind in two bodies simultaneously” thing is with Arya and the Braavos street cat:

That night she dreamed she was a wolf again, but it was different from the other dreams. In this dream she had no pack. She prowled alone, bounding over rooftops and padding silently beside the banks of a canal, stalking shadows through the fog. (Cat of the Canals, AFFC)

The tavern was near empty, and she was able to claim a quiet corner not far from the fire. No sooner had she settled there and crossed her legs than something brushed up against her thigh. "You again?" said the blind girl. She scratched his head behind one ear, and the cat jumped up into her lap and began to purr. Braavos was full of cats, and no place more than Pynto's. The old pirate believed they brought good luck and kept his tavern free of vermin. "You know me, don't you?" she whispered. Cats were not fooled by a mummer's moles. They remembered Cat of the Canals.

[...]

The Lyseni took the table nearest to the fire and spoke quietly over cups of black tar rum, keeping their voices low so no one could overhear. But she was no one and she heard most every word. And for a time it seemed that she could see them too, through the slitted yellow eyes of the tomcat purring in her lap. One was old and one was young and one had lost an ear, but all three had the white-blond hair and smooth fair skin of Lys, where the blood of the old Freehold still ran strong. (The Blind Girl, ADWD)

"It is good to know. This is two. Is there a third?"

"Yes. I know that you're the one who has been hitting me." Her stick flashed out, and cracked against his fingers, sending his own stick clattering to the floor.

The priest winced and snatched his hand back. "And how could a blind girl know that?"

I saw you. "I gave you three. I don't need to give you four." Maybe on the morrow she would tell him about the cat that had followed her home last night from Pynto's, the cat that was hiding in the rafters, looking down on them. Or maybe not. If he could have secrets, so could she. (The Blind Girl, ADWD)

While Arya is not fully outside of her body and in the body of the cat, she’s able to use the cat’s eyes as her own. And she isn’t even aware that she’s doing it, it’s just occurring naturally. I do believe that the same cat she dreams as in AFFC is the tomcat that she sees through in ADWD.

So, yes, I do believe that Sansa could be looking through the eyes of a bird. She’s just not aware of it.

It does seem like the Stark kids are much more powerful than the average skinchangers/wargs, immediately bonding to the wolves without realizing it, and already connecting with other animals. Arya is able to warg Nymeria from an entirely separate continent, which probably isn’t standard behavior, especially not for someone who doesn’t even know what they’re doing and has no training. Even Varamyr, a man who has mastered the control of five animals, recognizes Jon’s power:

The gift was strong in Snow, but the youth was untaught, still fighting his nature when he should have gloried in it. (Prologue, ADWD)

So, the Starks seem to be pretty powerful. And that includes Sansa, as GRRM has confirmed that she is still a skinchanger, meaning that he’s definitely going to have a bond with an animal at some point. It would make sense for him to have already been leaving little hints about it.

A very important component to Sansa’s character, which could be affecting her skinchanging powers, is her memory. The way that Sansa’s mind has coped with her trauma is by suppressing and rewriting certain distressing, scarring, and confusing memories. This is something that all the Stark kids do, in different levels. For example, Bran believes that Rickon intentionally suppresses the memory of Ned being dead:

"Tell Robb I want him to come home," said Rickon. "He can bring his wolf home too, and Mother and Father." Though he knew Lord Eddard was dead, sometimes Rickon forgot... willfully, Bran suspected. (Bran V, ACOK)

Bran himself does this as well:

The dream he'd had... the dream Summer had had... No, I mustn't think about that dream. He had not even told the Reeds, though Meera at least seemed to sense that something was wrong. If he never talked of it maybe he could forget he ever dreamed it, and then it wouldn't have happened and Robb and Grey Wind would still be... (Bran IV, ASOS)

Sansa does this the most out of her siblings, it’s her primary coping mechanism. One example is how remembers (or tries not to remember) Jeyne Poole:

Sansa did not know what had happened to Jeyne, who had disappeared from her rooms afterward, never to be mentioned again. She tried not to think of them too often, yet sometimes the memories came unbidden, and then it was hard to hold back the tears. (Sansa II, ACOK)

She tries to not to think of her, because it’s too traumatic for her to do so.

Another example is how she’s trying to process the situations she’s in at the Eyrie.

I am not your daughter, she thought. I am Sansa Stark, Lord Eddard's daughter and Lady Catelyn's, the blood of Winterfell. She did not say it, though. If not for Petyr Baelish it would have been Sansa who went spinning through a cold blue sky to stony death six hundred feet below, instead of Lysa Arryn. He is so bold. Sansa wished she had his courage. She wanted to crawl back into bed and hide beneath her blanket, to sleep and sleep. She had not slept a whole night through since Lysa Arryn's death. (Sansa I, AFFC)

He is serving me lies as well, Sansa realized. They were comforting lies, though, and she thought them kindly meant. A lie is not so bad if it is kindly meant. If only she believed them...

The things her aunt had said just before she fell still troubled Sansa greatly. "Ravings," Petyr called them. "My wife was mad, you saw that for yourself." And so she had. All I did was build a snow castle, and she meant to push me out the Moon Door. Petyr saved me. He loved my mother well, and...

And her? How could she doubt it? He had saved her.

He saved Alayne, his daughter, a voice within her whispered. But she was Sansa too... and sometimes it seemed to her that the Lord Protector was two people as well. He was Petyr, her protector, warm and funny and gentle... but he was also Littlefinger, the lord she'd known at King's Landing, smiling slyly and stroking his beard as he whispered in Queen Cersei's ear. And Littlefinger was no friend of hers. When Joff had her beaten, the Imp defended her, not Littlefinger. When the mob sought to rape her, the Hound carried her to safety, not Littlefinger. When the Lannisters wed her to Tyrion against her will, Ser Garlan the Gallant gave her comfort, not Littlefinger. Littlefinger never lifted so much as his little finger for her.

Except to get me out. He did that for me. I thought it was Ser Dontos, my poor old drunken Florian, but it was Petyr all the while. Littlefinger was only a mask he had to wear. Only sometimes Sansa found it hard to tell where the man ended and the mask began. Littlefinger and Lord Petyr looked so very much alike. She would have fled them both, perhaps, but there was nowhere for her to go. Winterfell was burned and desolate, Bran and Rickon dead and cold. Robb had been betrayed and murdered at the Twins, along with their lady mother. Tyrion had been put to death for killing Joffrey, and if she ever returned to King's Landing the queen would have her head as well. The aunt she'd hoped would keep her safe had tried to murder her instead. Her uncle Edmure was a captive of the Freys, while her great-uncle the Blackfish was under siege at Riverrun. I have no place but here, Sansa thought miserably, and no true friend but Petyr. (Sansa I, AFFC)

Sansa knows deep down (not even that deep, just down) that Petyr is untrustworthy. She knows he’s fed her lies, but she wants to believe them. She wants to be able to trust him. She wants to feel like she can be safe with him. She wants to be safe. It bothers me a lot whenever people say Sansa is “stupid” for trusting Petyr, or “uncaring” for not thinking often of Jeyne. She isn’t stupid or uncaring, she’s a traumatized thirteen year old whose brain is trying to cope with what she’s gone through and what she’s currently going through.

So, she has built a wall. And behind that wall are the memories of Lysa’s death, the truth about Jon Arryn’s murder, and Jeyne Poole. I think it would make sense if skinchanging, something that involves the mind, is also something that she’s subconsciously repressing. I talked about this sometime a while ago, but I believe that a big moment for Sansa in TWOW is going to be her confronting her memories. And most significantly, confronting Baelish about what happened to Jeyne Poole and exposing the truth of Jon Arryn and Lysa’s deaths. Thus, defeating Littlefinger, the mockingbird.

It would make sense if this coincided with her skinchanging abilities truly awakening. As her mind opens, her powers become stronger. I’m pretty deadset on Sansa’s bird being a falcon, not just for the House Arryn connection and because she’s gone hawking with a falcon before, but also because of the symbolism. Falcons symbolize “vision, freedom, and victory. Hence, it also connotes salvation to those who are in bondage whether moral, emotional, or spiritual”. I think that Sansa bonding with a falcon and “flying free” would be perfect for the conclusion of her caged bird arc.

Sorry, this got really long, it just kind of turned into all my thoughts about how skinchanger-Sansa might come to be in TWOW. I think it’s going to be an important part of her story, as you don’t just give four of your POV characters the ability to control animals with their minds and not have that matter. (And, it’s already an important part of Jon, Arya, and Bran’s stories, so it most likely will be for Sansa, too.)

#asoiaf #asoiaf meta #sansa stark #twow #the winds of winter #twow speculation #asoiaf speculation #long post #ask #jeynearrynofthevale

[ptitelidio]

Secret Mission in Marley:

Involving: Petra Ral and Levi Ackerman.

Summary: the scene takes place when the survey corps infiltrated Marley undercover some years after Eren and his friends reached the sea. In this version, the special operations squad (or Levi squad) didn’t die and won against the female titan, the major difference is that Levi isn’t their captain and squad leader. It is instead Petra squad; she is a veteran soldier whereas Levi is an Eldian from Marley living in the continent. The humanity’s strongest soldier in Paradis is Mikasa Ackerman whereas the humanity’s strongest warrior in Marley is Levi Ackerman. They didn’t know each other until the survey corps leader Hanji Zoë sent their best hope to infiltrate the Marleyan recruits, Petra Ral.

Point of view: Petra’s.

-> Italic font = flashback

PS: I drew something for one specific moment, hope you’ll like it!

Hanji sent me a letter yesterday, they said it’s important to remember who we really are. I think she is right; identity is the exact reason for which the human VS titan war began a long time ago. To know who we are, where we belong, and where we go makes the difference to such a point that people are ready to die for it.

War is awful. And yet, here we are. Repeating the same old mistakes again and again. I should say that Hanji’s opinion is incredibly brave, I saw them overworking to prevent direct conflict, they always preconized discussion. Unfortunately, it’s not the most common opinion, it’s so much easier to give in to fear. That’s why Hanji sent me here, in Marley, I have to find a way to stop that war. I know it’s not a one-person job but little by little, step by step we will find a solution. I’m looking forward for a bright future.

I remember the very first time I came here in Marley, we were all startled. We saw things we never could have imagined in Paradis. It was a brand-new world full of possibilities or that’s what I thought because I learned that even here terror was reigning. I fully experienced it when I joined the Marleyan warriors two months ago, it was very complicated to make me enter but Hanji managed to get an accomplice from the new Eldian Resistance Group and with their help I could join the recruits with a yellow armband. Soon enough I got to get along with Marleyan and honorary Marleyans, they were not that different from us. We had the same dreams, the same histories, we were human after all regardless our origins. However, this was something Marleyan people couldn’t accept for many reasons… the main being power.

I didn’t think my life would change briskly but it did happen. One of the nine original titan owner died, he was named Porco Galliard and I was selected to inherit his titan overnight, it was 2 weeks ago. The jaw titan. It was one honorary Marleyan Captain who handpicked me, Levi Ackerman. He has that peculiar expressionless face you can’t forget for sure. The thing I noticed about him is that he wears a red armband which means he’s also a titan shifter. But which one I still don’t know. I remember what he said back then to his higher up when he pointed his finger at me

“I want her in my team. I think she is able to get Galliard’s titan.”

I remember how the man he was talking to didn’t argue and congratulated me for my efforts. After handshaking, I experienced one of the most traumatic thing in my life which was to eat someone as a titan. That’s when Captain Ackerman kind of took care of me when I joined his team.

Thanks to this, I was becoming even closer to my goal even if it meant deceiving him and the other people I met, I had no choice; my fate was already decided, and I couldn’t give it up right now.

“That’s weird.”

“Uh? What are you talking about, Captain?” I answered.

“You seem pretty quiet today, that’s not like yours. You’re usually such a crappy chatterbox.”

“Oh, don’t worry. I was just lost in my thoughts.”

“Well…”

The thing is, I just remembered the first time we walked here together. The situation was… a mess, actually he nearly discovered who I really was.

As we were taking a strolling together in city, I couldn’t resist observing everything around me to the point it got suspicious. It was my first time in here. Liberio was lively, and people were preparing the fair looking forward the head of the Tybur family speech in a few days.

I didn’t notice at first, but I felt Levi’s glare on me as if he were thinking of something about me. I should say ever since I entered his team, he’s been keeping an eye on me as if he suspected something, but I hope I’m just being paranoiac. The second following that mere thought happened to answer to my question.

Without the time to think, I was carried away in a narrow street, Levi blocked me against the wall holding a knife at my neck. Was he… intimidating me?

“Okay ginger, you’re gonna tell me every single thing about you.” He said with a threatening voice.

“Eh… I mean… if you want to get to know me better… there are other ways… you know…” I nervously laughed. I was totally in distress because I knew he knew something but I couldn’t… no I didn’t want to admit it.

“Don’t play dumb with me… who are you? I’ve been watching your awkward behavior.” he kept asking.

“I’ll tell you if you promise to not kill me.”

“Why would I f*ucking do that? To leave you wandering around with bad intentions. No way. I could put an end to your life right now and no one would know.”

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Do you forget I have the jaw titan? Besides, I don’t fear death. You’re too late.”

“Whoever you are, I promise to discover it as soon as possible. Now walk.”

After a moment of reflection, Levi pulled me out of the wall by griping my collar and made me walk toward the principal avenue. He hid his knife from people’s glare pretending to be unharming.

Fortunately that day he spared me… well he never told he knew I was from Paradis, but I still think he keeps suspecting me anyway. Suddenly Captain Levi stops himself and I look back to understand what was going on. Without asking, Levi lifts up my chin and says

“Stop driving attention to us, Eldian”

Eldian? Did he say Eldian? Then… he finally guessed after all. It was useless to deny it right now.

“Y-yes…”

“The way you kept saying “soldier” instead of “warrior” was a hint ya know… but you successfully deceived us all. Congrats.”

“Well… what are you going to do with me now?”

“What am I gonna do of your shitty ass? I really don’t know.” He finally said after a long sigh. As we resumed our little stroll, I couldn’t resist to ask

“You could have denounced me a long time ago. Then why?”

He didn’t answer as if he didn’t know what to say either. But then he lifts up his eyes toward the sky with a pensive expression.

“I actually suspected you from the beginning, but I didn’t want to believe it. Besides, I was the only one. You’re good at it I guess…”

#shingeki no kyojin #attack on titan #rivetra #petra ral #levi x petra #levipetra #levi ackerman #aot #petra x levi #marleyan warriors

[august-persona]

More Witch Week Epiphanies (I'm losing track at this point)

Some time ago, I wanted to write a little essay (I feel weird calling it an "essay," makes this sound scholarly and not at all like the ramblings of a hyper fixated 15-year-old, but that's what it is) on the queer-coding in Witch Week. I got very busy and sort of forgot about it. Recently, I've been thinking about it more, and realizing just how much mental health plays into the themes of Witch Week as well as homophobia.

In the world of Witch Week, you cannot tell a witch just by looking at them. Witchcraft is not tied to any ethnicity, sex, religion, etc. Anyone could be a witch and you'd have no idea unless they told you. Of course, some people seem to be more obviously a witch than others. Everyone assumes Nan is a witch (and they are right), but even then they really have no way to be sure. There's also the way that witch history is banned, stifled, twisted to fit a certain narrative. The book asserts that this is all very wrong. Witches cannot help being born witches. It's simply not healthy for a society with so many witches - a society where witchcraft is intrinsic to so many people's lives - to persecute that witchcraft so harshly.

Now replace the words "witch" and "witchcraft" in that paragraph with "gay, queer, lgbtq+."

The themes of Witch Week are very relatable to the lgbtq+ community. You cannot tell that someone is gay or otherwise just by looking at them. There are people who are assumed to be queer based on how they act or look (and you might be right), but there's no way to be sure. Anyone of any ethnicity, sex, religion, etc., could be lgbtq+.

Lgbtq+ history, similarly to the history of witches in this story, has also been frequently banned, stifled, twisted to fit a certain narrative by society at large.

Homophobia is harmful. It hurts everyone living within a society where these bigoted mindsets are the norm, even straight and cisgender people.

Now, onto the topic of mental illness. It was no new revelation to me that many - if not all the kids - at Larwood House have, or at the very least exhibit some symptoms of, various mental disorders. The book even says at the beginning that Larwood House is a school for witch orphans and children with "other problems." Nan is schooled at Larwood House because she is a witch orphan; Charles is schooled at Larwood House because his parents sent him there, presumably due to his "other problems." The book was a bit vague on this. It mentions Charles becoming standoffish after his encounter with the second witch, and his parents being concerned that he was a bad influence on his siblings, but there are certainly more elements at play.

Along with being queer-coded (more on that some other time) there are many instances in the book where Charles is obviously in a dissociated state. Charles often references this 'other part' of himself, which splits away from him when he is distressed. Sometimes Charles floats away while the other part of himself does the talking and walking and such; in other instances Charles is present but aware that a split has occured.

Charles clearly has a personality disorder, one which is probably the result of his traumatic childhood experiences and further exacerbated by Larwood House's awful environment. He has no good friends, and his emotional needs often go unchecked by teachers and peers alike. Charles often wonders how no one ever seems to notice when he 'splits.'

You cannot tell that someone is mentally ill, or neurodivergent (some mental disorders aren't so harmful to one's life that they are ill) just by looking at them. Anyone of any ethnicity, sex, religion, etc., could have a mental disorder. Of course, some people seem more likely to have a mental disorder than others based on the symptoms they exhibit, but even then you may not know for sure what exactly is going on.

The only time anyone realizes something is up with Charles, is when he self-harms in view of the boys in his dorm. Even then they only conclude that Charles must be pretty stupid to do such a thing to himself, and think not much more than that.

Then there's the ways in which mental disorders have been demonized (and more recently romanticized, but that's a whole other beast) and twisted to fit narratives in mainstream culture which are often harmful to people with those disorders - should the concept of mental disorders and neuro divergence even be addressed in the first place - in order to cater to a neurotypical audience and a society which would often like to promote the idea that people with trauma and mental turmoil should simply choose to be unaffected by these sufferings, and should the "mentally ill" ever display symptoms or behavior deemed to be inconvenient due to their disorders, it is a moral failing on their part and not a failing of their caregivers and authority to provide them with help.

Or, that the mentally ill simply need to be locked up because they are no use to society; or even done away with entirely because how could they be any more than inconvenient, and quite possibly dangerous.

In cases of people whose disorders are not harmful to themselves or others, there is often an idea that their unusual behavior must be 'fixed' (got rid of entirely) to prevent inconvenience.

These are attitudes often applied to lgbtq+ folks as well. That queerness is a moral failing, or that queer people need to be locked up, or that their queerness must be 'cured.' If not considered a sin, homosexuality was considered a mental illness for a very long time. 'Homosexuals' were thought to be dangerous, and best kept locked away or done away with. Then there's the "trans women are actually just predatory men" storyline that's been unfortunately popular lately.

Parents are still kicking lgbtq+ kids out onto the street, telling their own children they're going to hell. Lgbtq+ kids are still being sent to conversion camps in some places. Lgbtq+ people are still bullied, killed, arrested, executed, around the world.

Mental disorders and neuro divergence is a present aspect of many queer people's lives. And no, not because homosexuality = derangement - but because some people with mental disorders just so happen to also be queer; or due to the fact that queer people tend to be more susceptible to trauma, end up developing mental disorders more frequently.

What's interesting about Witch Week is that Charles' disorder is not linked to him inherently being a witch, but to how his witch-phobic society traumatized him and led him to develop his disorder.

That's pretty neat. Consider the sheer quantity of media which depicts queer and queer-coded characters as being deranged. Even when the narrative does not outrightly state "gay = psycho," the connection is still made in the viewer's mind, overtly or subconsciously. And rarely is the distinction made that the Evil Psycho Gay ended up mentally ill not because of the fact they're gay, but because of the way their homophobic culture traumatized them.

Then there's Witch Week, a book featuring a subtle but excellent portrayal of a child living with an unaddressed personality disorder in the character of Charles; a character who also happens to be queer-coded; a character who is not the antagonist, but one of the protagonists; in a book which makes it altogether very clear that it is not the fact that any of these characters are inherently witches (witchcraft = lgbtq+) that they lash out in ways that are harmful to themselves or others, but that these harmful behaviors are perpetuated by the bigoted society they live in.

#diana wynne jones #dwj #chrestomanci #witch week #witch week epiphanies #lgbtq #mental health #the chronicles of chrestomanci

[padawanlost]

What do you think of ObI Wan's forgiving Maul in rebels? To me- I dunno, it just seems too easy and a little inconsistent. I get that what Vader did was worse and his betrayal in some ways more personal, but he really struggled to forgive Anakin, also his identifying with Maul as a victim since childhood makes no sense, as he should've known Anakin was groomed by Palpatine from childhood, but he didn't even try to find out what caused his fall.

Before I say anything else, please keep in mind that I never watched Rebels (I only watched a couple of scenes/episodes) so I might not have all the details.

Now, that being said, I don’t think Obi-wan ‘forgave’ Maul.

Obi-wan’s ‘kindness’ when killing Maul wasn’t the result of any personal bond between them. it was the expected behavior of any wise Jedi: never start a fight and don’t be cruel. Those are basic Jedi precepts.

If I remember correctly, Obi-wan only ignited his blade after Maul realized he was protecting someone important (Luke) so his actions were motivated by his committed to the greater good (the galaxy and Luke), not his personal feelings towards Maul.

Besides, that was nothing to forgive because Obi-wan wouldn’t keep any (personal) ill feeling towards Maul – beyond him being a threat to the galaxy – because that’s not the Jedi way. Obi-wan, on paper, doesn’t hold grudges. He mourns Satine but he doesn’t hate Maul for killing her.

I think people are mistaking Obi-wan with Anakin, especially Obi-wan’s relationship with Anakin. Now that was a personal relationship that turned violent and bitter because of it. Unlike Maul, Obi-wan couldn’t ‘let go’ of Anakin, whom he loved.

If that final duel had been personal to Obi-wan, it would have gone very differently. It’s the difference between Obi-wan vs Maul in TPM and Obi-wan vs Maul in Rebels. One is fulled by personal, emotional responses. The one isn’t.

As for Obi-wan idifitying Maul was a victim, I don’t know where that comes from. Obi-wan knew nothing about Maul’s past and what he endured growing up. and even if he had, I don’t see that making much of a difference. Obi-wan KNEW Anakin was manipulated by Palpatine and it had no influence on his behavior towards Anakin. we have to keep in mind that until Vader’s redemption, the Jedi believed the dark side was a one way street. Once you took that path you’re lost, regardless of who you *used* to be.

Why had he turned to the dark side? When did it happen? The Anakin he knew and loved couldn't have done it. Something had twisted in him, and Palpatine had exploited it somehow. Obi-Wan knew it wouldn't change anything to know, but he couldn't help going over the same events, again and again. The chances he'd missed, the things he'd seen, the things he hadn't. [Jude Watson – The Last One Standing]

That was where Obi-Wan kept returning. That vision of hatred. Because no matter how Palpatine had corrupted Anakin, no matter how the dark side had taken him over, no matter what decisions he'd made in his heat and his fury, he was Obi-Wan's apprentice and he ended by hating his Master. And that was a Master's failing. [Jude Watson – The Last One Standing]

Obi-Wan said, “I should have let them shoot me …” 

“What?”

 “No. That was already too late—it was already too late at Geonosis. The Zabrak, on Naboo—I should have died there … before I ever brought him here—” 

“Stop this, you will!” Yoda gave him a stick-jab in the ribs sharp enough to straighten him up. “Make a Jedi fall, one cannot; beyond even Lord Sidious, this is. Chose this, Skywalker did.” 

Obi-Wan lowered his head. “And I’m afraid I might know why.” 

“Why? Why matters not. There is no why. There is only a Lord of the Sith, and his apprentice. Two Sith.” Yoda leaned close. “And two Jedi.” [Matthew Stover. Revenge of the Sith]

Obi-wan was completely aware of Anakin’s traumatic past and further manipulation by Palpatine and yet there was little sympathy for him once he became Vader. Now, why would he show such sympathy for someone he knew very little about? For someone who, unlike Anakin, he only knew as a Sith? It doesn’t make sense, imo

The man he faced was everything Obi-Wan had devoted his life to destroying: Murderer. Traitor. Fallen Jedi. Lord of the Sith. And here, and now, despite it all … Obi-Wan still loved him.[Matthew Stover. Revenge of the Sith]

Obi-wan knew Anakin, LOVED him and still, Anakin’s tragic past made very little difference when it came to Obi-wan’s reaction to his most evil and cruel actions. that’s why I don’t see him going all kind and soft on Maul, whom he knew very little of beyond his ability to destroy innocents and commit crimes.

I’ve talked about this before but the gist is Jedi don’t forgive Sith, they kill them. that’s why the wanted Luke to kill his own father and tried their best to convince him that there was not good left in Vader. It’s not because they were evil, manipulative pricks who wanted Anakin dead. It’s because the truly didn’t believe that it was possible for a Sith to redeem themselves. So for Obi-wan to go all ‘aww poor Maul’ would be out of character, borderline on plot hole.

It’s not like Obi-wan wanted Maul to suffer or anything like that. Clearly, that was not the case at all. But it’s a pretty big leap from ‘I don’t want my enemy to suffer’ to ‘I totally understand why he’s like that and forgive him for it’.

I mean, if Obi-wan didn’t let Maul suffer because he understood his past how does one explain Mustafar and Anakin’s immolation?

#ask #anon #sw meta #anakin skywalker #obi wan kenobi #darth maul #meta: anakin #meta: obi wan. meta: maul #txt

[herstarburststories]

you and me and the devil makes three.

Pairings: Dean Winchester x reader, Demon!Dean Winchester x reader, past Lisa x Dean

Summary: Dean is a demon, he will take whatever he wants.

A/N: This got darker than I expected. I wanna make it clear I don't condone or engage with Dean's acts on this. This is my submission for @jawritter 's Make Me Cry Challenge. Congrats, honey! Hope you like it. Dividers by talesmanic and gif credit here

Prompt: I guess I should have been more like her.

Warnings: non consensual kissing, language, UNHEALTHY BEHAVIOR, non con (kissing and touching but no sex), dirty talk

Dean Winchester was a dreamer.

In the rawest way of the word, the meaning in the dust-collecting dictionaries and not the idealistic form. His eyelids shut close and, just like magic, Dean’s head was as haunted as the home he swore he’d never come back to in Kansas. The ghosts of the past, not ever so very friendly, coming to greet him at least three times per week. Sometimes they were happy films he could never starre in real life, his mom singing or a picnic with a lover saying that they needed to hurry up to get their kid at the baseball. The nightmares were sleepy visions of flesh and blood, mostly about his time underneath, Sam hurting, or his father spilling out his worst fears at his face. 

Maybe it was how the eldest Winchester’s brain compensated for the lack of bedtime tales and docile affairs growing up. The own way that his brittle soul discovered and molded not to let him collapse, or to always keep him on red alert. 

Good and bad deals are mostly a matter of which side you are betting your money on, really.

Because yeah, Dean did wake up feeling like he had shut his forest eyes briefly for twenty minutes instead of hours when he dreamed, but he also had never spent so long trapped in a better place. The green eyed hunter didn’t know which one was worse: the good dreams or the horrific ones. After all, he had went through all the atrocity and made it out alive, but the engulfed craving for light-hearted scenarios was suffocating. The hunter could never have it all. Trust him, he tried. Then, which is more agonizing: to have everything you ever wanted for a couple hours and have every scrap of it taken from you, or to undergo the calamity that accompanied your breaking point? 

Dean didn’t know, he didn’t even know what to tell Sam when he wondered what his brother had dreamt about to wake up sweating and screaming, all the light and stupid apple pie desires and the sharp brutality crawling out of the back of his mind. He made a joke, Megan Fox really liked knives, man. He kept it in, shoved down a good amount of alcohol, and mocked the worry of doing the lawn. Ready for another day. 

But now he was a demon, and apparently whatever he was made of - sulfur, cruelty, and black eyes under garden ones - wasn't worthy quiet reliefs in the middle of the night, or even frightening figments of memory. He became his worst dreams and all the dreams slipped beyond his reaches because of that. Demons, those unholy creatures, didn’t get the human peculiarities. You know what? Fine by him.

Who needed dreams when you don't need sleep, anyway? Even better: who needed dreams when you don't care about what you gotta do to put your greedy hands on the prize you had been eyeing for years? 

Dean Winchester was finally free. Free for the first time since he was a four years little boy who watched his mother burning with a terrorized expression, ironically mimicking the one Mary wore on the ceiling. His dad’s shouting for him to grab Sammy and run, take your little brother and run, echoing through years and years. There was never time for Dean, for his grief or his questions or whatever the child frozen in time under his rib cage could come up with. They said, stupid psychologists with their fancy degrees and malicious bartenders with a unfriendly grun under the counter who learned a little too much, everybody said that when someone was so traumatized as a kid, that person would tend to get frozen at that age. Therefore, how tremendously alleviating was to kill any reminiscing emotion of the whiny child he used to be. 

The kind of freedom that no traveler longed for; when one’s ruined and damaged enough not to care, and just take and take and take like hunger itself. Dean was an evil thing now, what else could he do but act on the figments of the worst intentions?

And feel so fucking good when doing that. 

‘’Where do you think he's going?’’ Your eyes raked over the street, darting between the asphalt under Baby’s wheels and Sam’s weary features.

‘’I don't know.’’ He sighed, attempting to organize his thoughts. Even as a demon, his brother wouldn’t just run miles and miles away by himself for no apparent reason. There had to be something you and Sam were missing out, some unseen clue or a hidden meaning. ‘’What the localizator says?’’

At least you had managed to put a tracker in his boots during your last encounter. Whatever Dean was thinking of starting there, you and Sam wouldn’t let him.

‘’Still Cicero, Indiana.’’ You sighed. Sammy furrowed his eyebrows, a long forgotten memory rising. ‘’What?’’

‘’We had a case there once years ago.’’ He explained, opting not to elaborate. Your and Dean’s relationship was troubled enough with his new self. Sam didn’t want to blow it up completely. His brother would need you once he came back to himself. The look on your face, though, reported how you weren’t buying his cheap excuses. The long haired hunter sighed. ‘’Did Dean ever tell you about that?’’

‘’No.’’

He stepped on the accelerator.

To find the woman was excruciatingly easy. The freckled demon couldn't believe he opened his computer many times and gave up before today. He glanced through the glass window and there she was, standing in all her glory with a body that seemed to forget how to grow old. Her tan skin still glowing, as appetizing as ever. Brown eyes shining so bright, tiny hands that always seemed to know where he wanted to be touched. She was laughing like there was no tomorrow, holding a glass of wine with one hand and her cellphone with the other, while her dark hair was falling so perfectly over her shoulder, like waves against the rocks in the sea.

Dean can’t wait to smell her again, to taste her, to prove her. His fingers were tingling, begging to touch what was his as he hopped off the car, walking towards the porch. He had been gone for a long time, but now he was back. 

He will destroy that quintessential, sequin woman so good.

The Winchester buckled in front of the white door, graced with the sound of the female giggle. Thin walls, he thought, those will be useful to make sure the neighbors know who’s back home. Her steps on the wood floor growing closer and closer as he heard a goodbye, probably aimed at whoever she was on the phone with. It was almost like the caramel skinned woman knew that whoever was on her doorstep wasn’t gonna be a hustled visitor. Or so the demon’s arranged mind said.

‘’Hey, Lis.’’ Dean’s voice lacked any cherishment as she opened the door, who would know that the absence of a soul wouldn't be gelid, just dry? As for her, Lisa’s face was drained of love. For all she was aware of, he was a stranger who knew her name. The male let out a chuckle empty of joy. She really didn’t remember, huh? ‘’Whoa. Cass really fucked up your head, huh? At least he did one thing right.’’

‘’Excuse me?’’ The man with dirty blonde hair and perfect teeth smelled like alcohol. She wasn’t having any of this tonight. ‘’Listen, I don’t know who you are and--’’

‘’Don’t worry.’’ He tranquilized her, although the lopsided grin on his lips held anything but good intentions. ‘’I’ll make you remember. I have a spell. You won’t believe how much you missed me.’’

The mocking laugh that left her lips utterly aggravated him. ‘’I don’t know you. Please leave or I’ll call the police.’’

Dean didn’t need a crowd for that part, a bratty woman in need of a firm hand should get a particular lesson. 

‘’You always liked a little cat and mouse.’’

Speaking of, the demon pushed the door wide open without any effort. Lisa jumped at the sudden move, every instinct inside her deciding that man was a threat and not some harmless wasted guy. Her body was quickly erect, thinking about ways to run and get help, but Dean swiftly pushed her to him and kicked the door closed-- her small figure collided to his chest.

Human savagery was cut in urban ways, molded to civilize the animalistic instincts. Imagine meat. A dead animal on a silver plate, and we couldn’t wait to chew every inch of it. We couldn’t wait to eat it, put that dead thing inside us and hope it’ll be enough to control the predatory hungry. Humans will always be animals, but so will be their rests that constructed the demons. 

Dean may not be a hunter anymore, but he’s still a predator who can't wait to taste his prey. He could small it, the fear in Lisa’s sweat making his mouth water. How much she tried to fight against him and scream other names when his was the only one he wanted her to need tonight. The resistance of a poor human barely made the monster shiver.

He closed his hands around her arms, throwing her against the wall like someone tossed an old toy away. There was no space for delicaly. In that moment, Dean Winchester was a tiger, a lion, the big bad wolf attacking the omega. Lis winced, her back hurting as her fibers. She couldn’t believe this was happening, that man was about to do something so terrible and disgusting to her in her own house, the place she was supposed to feel warm and safe. Why did he seem to know her? Why did he say she was gonna remember? Was he crazy, hallucinating, or drugged? Why was he so satisfied with how frightened her tiny body looked? How could she use all that information to somehow push him away?

‘’Let me go!’’ She demanded, her legs kicking the demon with ferocity. ‘’What’s wrong with you? LET ME GO NOW!’’

The brunette’s skilled body moved itself desperately, and the act of resistance only brought a hysterical laugh out of Dean. The wrong kind of goosebumps washed her skin, she had to run away for her life. This man was mad.

‘’FIRE! FIRE!’’ Lisa started to scream. Well-aware that people were most likely to come around and help a woman screaming if she said fire. ‘’THERE’S A FIRE. SOMEONE HELP ME!’’

One of his hands went to her neck, wrapping his fingers around it to shut her up. That was rubbing him off the wrong way. Lisa Braeden used to beg for his touch, how dared her not to want him anymore? Now that he was better, stronger, and thicker.

The brown eyed girl went quiet, probably scared by his brutal behavior. Dean smiled, a blood stained grin that carried mischief and pervertment. He licked the tears savoring the salty horror coming from her. Just like the day he was a vampire who almost gave in to drinking every drop of her luptuos blood. She may not remember but he did and he couldn't wait to get inside her, those tight walls squeezing his hard cock.

‘’You’re gonna do as I say, Lis. And I won't hurt you… Much.’’ He risped, crooked nose stroking her wet cheek. She whined. ‘’Don’t worry, honey. You loved it. Bet you’ll scream so much once I fuck you good.’’

‘’Please, don’t do it.’’ She begged as he coaxed his body against his. That man was stronger than her, she had no other choice but to plead to his human side. If only she knew.

‘’Begging already?’’ Dean lifted his head, smirking at her. Lisa just wanted to cry and close her eyes until everything was done. How could someone do that? ‘’I told you, don’t worry. I’m gonna make a lil’ spell that will give your memories back and you’ll remember everything. And then we’re gonna have so much fun, Lis.’’

His last murmur was finished with a kiss. A harsh, ruthless kiss. Actually, she wasn’t even sure if she could call it a kiss; teeth against each other, his vicious mouth pressed to her weakened lips, his tongue invading her like a robber and showing an unrequited dominance.

‘’Dean!’’ Your voice resonated stridently, louder than the door Sam had stormed open. You couldn’t believe what your eyes witnessed. ‘’Stop it!’’

Dean groaned, as if you and Sam were stepping on his territory. He simply turned his head to you two, not pulling away from Lisa. You couldn’t see her face, your boyfriend’s large shoulder and tall body covering her up. His eyes were still green, which set the scene in an even more atrocious light. 

Your thoughts were racing. How could he come to her, crave her so badly that he drove away miles and miles as a demon? He was supposed not to feel a thing. You prepared yourself for a cold man, not an obsessive one. Apparently, a heart hidden under the black smoke. Choose if it's a gift or Pandora's box. Sam told you their history. Of course he would want that and not you. Dean never left Lisa because he fell out of love for her, he was ripped out from her life. You were so pissed at yourself; how could you picture playing the woman in his veins? How stupid were you? He may be a demon guided by wants and not emotions, but what was love but an amount of outrageous desires laced up with some pretty words and flavored with dependency?

‘’Y/N and Sammy--’’

Love was the wrong word here. Anyway. Go head and unwrap it.

‘’Please help me!’’ Lisa’s voice came to life once more through her quiet cry. Dean hardened the hold around her throat, making her cough a little.

Suddenly, your body is frozen. That, whatever that is, whatever he’s doing to Lisa. It wasn’t love. She didn’t want it. When his frame moved to face you and Sam, you caught a glimpse of her face. She was petrified, her delicate features contorted in wrath and fear and beg for help.

‘’Quiet.’’ Dean howled, glancing at her rapidly before his eyes fell on you and Sam again. ‘’You two are such killjoys. I told you to let me go.’’

You couldn’t believe what you were witnessing. You wanted to puke your guts out.

‘’And what? Kill your ex? Or do something even worse to her?’’ You elicited with disgust.

‘’She’ll come around eventually. Just playing hard to get. You know how frisky women are.’’ The corner of his lips curved into a barbaric grim, one of his hands touching Lisa’s cheek. The victim winced at the touch. ‘’Besides, I’m not just gonna take her. I’ll make her remember and she’ll want me.’’ He shrugged, unbothered by the horrified looks of everyone in the room. ‘’Are you really worried about Lis, Y/N? Or are you just jealous that I didn’t go for you?’’

‘’Enough, Dean.’’ Sam groaned, holding the gun up. It felt oily. ‘’Let her go. And come with us.’’

The demon tossed the brunette away with a simple sleight of hand, pulling his sleeves up with a marred beam. His eyes switched from starry green to black, showing his true facette. It was a peculiar relief. It wasn’t Dean. It wasn’t Dean. It wasn’t Dean.

Yet, Dean’s gruff voice said in a twisted playful tone:

‘’Come get me, Sammy.’’

Dean Winchester was cured. For most people, to heal is to let go or to learn with things. In the doctor’s case, healing is leaving a bruise to cover up a wound. Everyone believed the war started and ended, and that was it. But when something so ravaging is gone, you gotta deal with the trauma.

He was a trauma. Cured from a sickness, drowning in sorrow and waves of woe. All the worst things Dean ever did, he knew now, weren’t to himself or to the monster he so proudly killed. His unspoken acts were against the people he cared about.

The hunter never thought his hands, his bruised and tough hands could ever hurt Lis. The woman who was his lifeline when Sam died, who allowed him to be a father and live in his dreamland of suburban life. All she ever did was to love him, and what did she get for it?

He was disgusted with himself. What almost did to her was enough to hunt him and make him sure he was going back to hell, very deserving this time. Threating to do that to a woman, and enjoy it… Dean couldn’t bear driving into memories. He was selfishly glad he didn’t remember about that, only Sam’s explanation was enough: he went to Lisa, he kissed her without her consent, and Sam and you stopped him going any further. Would his unscrupulous, demon self go ahead? He was too scared to wonder, even though his brother said that he apparently had a spell to make Lis remember and wasn’t planning on just taking her. A forced kiss was disgusting enough. He just wished Sam had put a bullet in his black eyes right there.

You walked in the bathroom that you once shared with the eldest Winchester

She was everything he ever wanted, all the suburban dreams and acceptance of hunter reality without being in it. Lisa loved him completely and you could only love him sideways-- you never wanted to be a mom, or to have a family or live in a suburb. Those were valid goals, just not yours. You thought you and Dean were on the same page about it, but this other side, not only the pervert demon but the domestic man, hadn’t been shown to you until a couple days ago. Sam had cured his brother, his dirty nature washed away with holy water, but you couldn’t help the bruises that came from the dog days. Lisa had her memory erased by Cass again, you didn’t have the same unfair luxury.

‘’Dean.’’ You said, making him look up at you. Bags under his eyes and wrinkles more evident than ever. ‘’We need to talk.’’

He sighed and wiped his face. ‘’Y/N, I don’t want to talk right now.’’

‘’You never do.’’ You scoffed, gaining an incredulous glance from him. ‘’I know that what happened was disgusting and sick and the worst thing you could ever do, but we need to talk.’’

He took a deep breath. ‘’What do you wanna talk about?’’

‘’You went to her.’’ You stated as a lawyer in front of a jury. Dean furrowed.

‘’What?’’

‘’Lisa. You went to her.’’ When the arrow hit someone so damaged, it was like an animal with his teeth there that wouldn't let go. Yeah, his human soul wasn't the same brittle glass as before but it lingered in his demon self in the shape of delusion, and it was distorted by whatever he was made of, violence and darkness, and turned into something disgusting. ‘’You love her.’’

‘’Love?’’ The word burned his tongue, Dean didn’t think he had the right to ever use it again. ‘’I was a demon, Y/N. I didn’t love or feel anything. What I did--’’

‘’You didn’t do anything.’’ You interrupted, loyal as a soldier.

‘’I forced a kiss on her and wanted to bring her memories back to have sex with her. That’s disgusting and I did half of that.’’ He pointed out aggitadly, plump lips moving fast and voice deeper. ‘’It wasn’t love. Leaving her years back was love.’’

You didn’t miss how Dean didn’t even dare to say her name. ‘’So you don’t think about her? Not even once?’’

He scoffed humourless. ‘’Are you kidding me?’’

‘’I guess I should have been more like her.’’ You hugged yourself, glancing at the wall. You didn’t want to cry in front of him. Not again, not for another woman. That wasn’t even your cicatrix to ache. 

‘’Y/N, what the fuck are you talking about?’’ The fully green eyed man raised to his feet, glancing at you with disbelief. He couldn’t face how messed up it was. ‘’I can’t believe you are jealous of what happened. I thought I was the broken one here.’’

‘’I’m not her.’’ You two shared it, the glance that only two women who were hurt by the same man could. You both understood that when he got inside you, it was like the syringe in an eutanasia. Once you were happy because you loved him, now you were scared and not so sure this was what you wanted. ‘’I’m not her and you knew it. When you became just instincts and selfish and did whatever you wanted, you didn’t come to me. You came to her.’’

‘’I hurt her.’’

The next words fly out of your mouth, as weak and totaled as you felt: ‘’Why didn’t you hurt me?’’

‘’This is the most unhealthy shit we ever went through.’’ Dean’s right. You have her expression mesmerized on your brain. Dean was the man on top of her, teaching her how to hate. How to fear. You can’t trust yourself. ‘’I can’t believe you.’’

‘’Neither can I.’’ You were so sick. How ravaged and annihilated one had to be to wish to be a demon's object of obsession? To get jealous that another woman almost died in the arms of a beast that cried his blood out once he came back to being a man and saw what he had done? ‘’I hate it. I hate feeling like this. I was there and I saw how scared of you she was, how all she wanted was to push you away and run because she was so disgusted--’’

‘’Stop.’’ He groaned, but it came out more like a whine than anything. ‘’It wasn’t me. I would never hurt Lis. I would never force her to do anything! I--’’

You gave him a sad smile. ‘’You love her.’’

‘’I love you.’’ Dean approached you, fumbling in despair to fix yet another thing his hands destroyed. If Rome was built in ruins, he was a kingdom. You pulled away before his tough hands landed on you.

‘’But you love her too.’’ The hunter stopped on his spot, unable to answer. ‘’I ruined myself for you, Dean. I can’t-- I won’t do that again. You are right. This is unhealthy. The fact that you’ve been pining for her for so long, pushing down those feelings to the point they are twisted into something so cruel and disgusting. You need help.’’ What kind of ugly you have to have inside you for a monster to love you? And, even worse, what kind of sickness you have trapped, written in your blood to want it to be spilled out in his name? ‘’You really are venom. If this is how you love, it’s scary as fuck.’’ When you loved a broken man, you were never sure if his shattered pieces would glisten or cut your hand once the light came in. Here’s your answer. His parts crawled inside you through pulled up scars, scraping your insides to make into ruins, but you never liked Rome much. You had to be better than that. ‘’Goodbye, Dean.’’

He couldn’t bring himself to go after your steps.

Once again, it’s the kind of freedom no traveler wants. When you lost it all and didn't have any person or place to cling to, when you had to leave because you were becoming the girl you swore you’d never leave, when you walked away willingly without a map.

Still, it was all you had. You’d make a good use of it. You’d be okay. No more ugly emotions or sentiments that made you unrecognizable. No more knives that cut both ways, or situations so complicated you weren’t sure where your morals could rely on.

You’d be okay, healthy, and happy.

You’d be okay.

Comment & reblog. Feedback is magic! Check my masterlist ♡ Tags in reblog!

#dean winchester #dean winchester x reader #jensmakemecrychallenge #demon!dean #demon!dean x you #demon!dean imagine #demon!dean x reader #dean x reader #dean x you #dean winchester x you #dean x lisa #demon!dean x lisa #tw dubcon #supernatural #spn #dean winchester imagine #supernatural imagines #spn reader insert #dean winchester headcanon #dean winchester imagines

[fangirlincorporate]

Happiness Doesn’t Last Forever

Just a little fic I wrote. I normally don’t post this kind of stuff on my tumblr page. I like to keep it on my AO3 but I’m really proud of it. I think it’s cute and wanted to share 🥰 so if you like Yatori fluff here ya go! Added the link as well just because.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/33487336

*warning my writing isn’t the best. I write because it’s fun not necessarily because I’m good at it*

Hiyori walked behind Yato and Yukine, bouncing along behind them in her half-phantom form. The two were arguing over something silly, but it still brought a smile to her face. She had offered to take them out for dinner now that school was over. Unfortunately, she lost her body along the way so Yato had to carry her. She enjoyed these little moments with her friends. Cherished them even more than before since the traumatic events that occurred recently.

After the fight with Rabo, Hiyori's thoughts were constantly on the fact that she had forgotten the two of them. Guilt filled her chest every time they smiled at her. Despite knowing Nora had everything to do with that deep down she had a fear she really would forget them. She couldn’t bear the thought of it.

She didn’t even mind that Yato hadn’t fixed her body. Hadn’t brought it up for weeks. She was immensely happy that she could have more time with them. More time with him. A blush crossed her face, and the two boys ahead stopped to look back at her in concern.

“Hiyori?” Yukine asked, a small frown on his face.

She hadn’t realized she had stopped and was now standing in the middle of the sidewalk. Her eyes met Yato’s striking blue ones. She sucked in a breath like she did every time. Momentarily she forgot Yukine had even spoken. Not wanting to worry the two she plastered a smile on her face claiming to have gotten lost in thought rushing forward to catch up to the two. By the look on Yato’s face, she knew he didn’t buy it, but he played along.

His shoulder brushed hers in what she hoped was for reassurance, and she nudged him back ever so slightly. This has become a frequent thing between the two of them. She had been the one to initiate it. Despite having lost her memories she remembered how desperate he was to get her to recall those same memories. She has yet to forget the look on his face that day he stopped her in the crosswalk. Those blue eyes were filled with not only desperation but fear that rocked her to her core. She knew that Yato could disappear if he was forgotten. If he no longer received wishes. Kofuku told her about it.

In an attempt to reassure him she started to hang around more. Touched him more than she had before. Fixing his jersey even when it didn’t need to be. Brushing the hair from his eyes. Lingering closer than what was necessary. When he started to reciprocate that’s when she started to realize that it was her fear that had sparked the interactions.

She was terrified that he would just be gone one day. That something else would come around and kill him for good. Hiyori wasn’t sure if Yato had caught on to her feelings yet, but there was something in the way he would look at her that made her feel that he knew. He was an “all-knowing” God after all.

She watched them eat, and for just a moment allowed herself to relax. Glancing out the window having already finished her food she watched the birds in the trees.

Yato had brushed up against her leg sending shivers down her spine. Her eyes drifted in his direction, and she had to swallow a lump in her throat. They sat there staring for a moment, legs resting up against each other.

He was still here. Little did Hiyori know that the God in question was thinking the very same thing. Yukine had finished his meal looking between the two. Groaning as he rested his chin on the table stretching his arms out in front of him.

“If you guys want alone time you can just say so.” He mumbled. A red tint to his cheeks as he glanced away from them.

Hiyori’s face heated up in embarrassment. Of course, Yukine would notice the change between the two of them. She stared at the table long enough to burn a hole through it.

“It-It’s not like that!” She squeaked out.

Yukine rolled his eyes. “Sure, and I’m leaving now.”

Yato hadn’t said a word during the interaction watching as his Regalia left. His knee pressed ever so gently against Hiyori’s.

Yato opened his mouth to speak, but fearing what he might say, Hiyori beat him to the punch. “We should go after him.”

Rushing up to the register to pay for their food Yato followed behind. Not really caring where Yukine had gone, Yato knew he would be fine. Yukine was right about him wanting some alone time with Hiyori. There was something bothering him about her behavior, but he humored her and followed her along as she went looking for Yukine.

At some point the God started to lose his patience. Now they were on the outskirts of the city walking through a park. Yato was about to grab Hiyori to get her to stop walking when she tripped. Before she could hit the ground though Yato had pulled her into his arms.

She clutched his jacket tightly dazed for a bit. He still hadn’t let go, and Hiyori didn’t mind when he held her just a little tighter. Taking a deep breath to calm her racing heart, his sweet scent filled her senses. Enveloping her entirely, and he didn’t mind when she leaned closer resting her forehead against his shoulder. He was intoxicating.

They stood under the light of a street lamp. The sunset grew darker as night drew closer. “Hiyori.” Yato called her name, and she would be lying if she said she didn’t like hearing him say her name like that.

She pulled away to look up at him, and her breath caught in her throat. Those eyes were the same ones she saw standing in the crosswalk. The eyes she never wanted to see again, but there they were. Staring into the depths of her soul. Electric blue meeting her own magenta ones. She reached up, putting a hand to the side of his face. Subconsciously he leaned into her touch wanting it just as much as she did.

“Don’t look at me like that.” Her voice was just above a whisper.

“Like what?” He asked, his voice tight.

“Like you’re scared. Terrified. Desperate. Like I’m going to forget…again.” Her voice dropped, and all her guilt bubbled to the surface once again. “I’m not going to forget you. Ever.” She whispered the last word, dropping her hand back down to her side.

“Is that what has been bothering you?”

She nodded her response, already feeling tears forming in her eyes despite every effort to stop them. She didn’t want to cry. Not now, and not in front of him.

“Hiyori, what happened wasn’t your fault.” Yato put his hands on her shoulders. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“I know.” She whispered, “but it scared you didn’t it? Yukine too.” She blinked, and one of the tears she was holding back slipped down her cheek. Yato wiped it away with a stray thumb.

“Of course it did. You’re the only human who has remembered me. The only one who has seen me.” A lump formed in her throat at those words. “However, I believe in you. I believe you will remember me and continue to. So don’t cry Hiyori.”

“You’ll be sad though.”

“What do you mean?”

“If we stay friends, Yato. I’m going to grow old and die. I’m going to leave you eventually.” Hiyori clutched his jacket. “I don’t want to leave you knowing you’ll be alone again.” She gripped his jacket so hard her knuckles turned white. Her own desperation shining through her tone.

“I know.” He said resting a hand on her head. “And that’s okay too.”

Her eyes widened in shock at his words. She looked up to meet his eyes. Finding a sadness there that she couldn’t fathom. “Human lives are fleeting compared to us immortals, but I could disappear at any moment. I’m a nameless God. Hiyori, you have brought a light into my life that I wouldn’t pass up for anything.” He cupped her cheeks pulling her just a little closer. “I’d rather be by your side and be sad later on than walk away now only to regret it for the rest of eternity.”

Did he really mean that? Her heart fluttered at the thought. She was enamored by him, and everything he was. He captured her heart with those words, and she was left speechless. A God was confessing he would give anything to stay by her side. Her, a mere human.

“You’d give anything to stay with me?” She smiled cheekily at him. His words made her guilt fade to nothing.

He seemed to realize what he had said. He nearly stumbled back blushing furiously. “W-Well just about…anything.” He mumbled turning to the side so she couldn’t see his face.

Feeling a surge of confidence Hiyori reached up to his face, pulling him down gently. She stood on her tippy toes to place a light kiss on his lips. She spun on her heels turning away from him so she couldn't see his reaction. Her embarrassment overruled the confidence she had as her face heated to new levels. Meanwhile, Yato stood with his mouth hung open in shock staring at Hiyori’s back.

“Let’s go find Yukine.” She called back to him, turning to glance at him over her shoulder.

Yato stood with his fists clenched, and a blush dusting his cheeks. He couldn’t believe she kissed him. He wasn’t upset, he just wished he had been the one to kiss her.

While the moment was still fresh Yato tugged Hiyori into his embrace, lifting her chin, and returning the kiss. The kind that left your lips bruised, your mind hazy, and your body craving more. She leaned into the kiss grasping fistfuls of his jacket to steady herself. One of his arms snaked around Hiyori’s waist pulling her flush against him. She sucked in a breath of surprise which granted him more access. Hiyori was a little overwhelmed by the kiss, but didn't want him to stop.

Not sure what to do, she followed his lead. Their tongues danced, and she grew hot from the new sensations. Subconsciously she started to grind on him in her haze. He pulled away breathless and his own body started to feel the effects of kissing Hiyori.

“Let's-” He cleared his throat. “Let’s go find Yukine. He is probably at Kifoku’s by now.”

“Yeah. Let's do that.”

The two were blushing furiously as they walked in the direction of their friend's house. Hiyori wanting to hold his hand, but too afraid to ask. Yato, thinking his sweaty hands would gross her out, kept his in his pockets as they walked side by side. Every so often they would bump into each other only to turn red once more.

#noragami #yatonoragami #iki hiyori #yatori #yato x hiyori #anime blog #anime #fanfictions #fanfic #fluff #angst #bittersweet #too cute

[bi-naesala]

Demonstration

Fandom: Yakuza Rating: E Warnings: / Relationships: Kasuga Ichiban/Zhao Tianyou Characters: Kasuga Ichiban, Zhao Tianyou Additional Tags: Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Established Relationship, Rough Sex, First Time Bottoming, Nonbinary Zhao Tianyou Summary:

Ichiban demonstrates to Zhao how he felt about him the first time they met.

(Also on AO3)

Every time Ichiban and Zhao have been intimate, they’ve always kept things quite simple, gentle even.

They never thought about it too much; it’s just that they enjoy each other, nothing more, and they don’t really care about what they do, as long as they are together and have both a good time.

It’s almost weird considering how their first meeting went. Of all things, Ichiban would’ve never imagined that he was going to end together to the person who threatened to kill him with a smile on their face, but so is life, and he couldn’t be happier about it.

“Oooooi earth to Kasuga-kun!”

Contrary to what Zhao might believe, Ichiban doesn’t jump hearing their voice calling out for him. Nope. Not at all.

“H-Hey! Zhao! What is it?”

Zhao shoots him an unimpressed look. “You haven’t been listening to a word I said, haven’t you?”

“Huh…” Ichiban smartly replies. “Sorry?”

“You’re unbelievable,” Zhao mutters, shaking his head, but despite their words, there’s a smile on his face, finding Ichiban’s behavior endearing. “And what were you thinking about that was so important that you’d stop in the middle of the street like a lunatic?”

Oh right! They went out grocery shopping for the barkeep. And here Kasuga was, lost in his thoughts…

“Oh, nothing much, really…”

“C’mon, I’m curious now. Pretty please tell me?” Zhao insists. Oh hell, Ichiban can’t resist that tone of his.

  “Just… Wait,” he mutters, taking Zhao by the arm and guiding him away from the main road, entering in one of the smaller streets. If he truly has to answer to Zhao, he’d rather do it in a place where they can get a modicum of privacy, which would usually be at Survive, but this is close enough. At least there’s nobody there for the moment.

Zhao hasn’t said anything about Ichiban’s behavior, not even a little word of teasing, for which he’s grateful for.

“Should I get worried?” he asks though. Considering how Ichiban’s acting, it would be safe to assume that this is something serious.

“Oh? Oh no! Not at all!” Ichiban’s quick to reassure him. “I was just thinking about… well… about us.”

Now Zhao looks extremely curious. “Us? And what about us were you thinking about?”

“About how funny it is that we ended up together, considering how we met and what I thought of you…”

“Ooh?” Zhao perks up. “And what did you think of me?”

Were their relationship still in its early stages, Ichiban might’ve felt so embarrassed about what he’s about to say that he would’ve tried to find an excuse not to reply, but now he replies calmly, accepting the challenge hidden in Zhao’s tone: he uses his bigger stature to tower over the other, reveling in the shiver Zhao isn’t able to suppress at the motion - though they don’t look intimidated at all.

“That you needed to be put in your place,” he growls then, voice low and gaze dark.

“Ohohohoh~” Zhao’s voice sounds more like it did when they first met: dangerous. “That so?”

Ichiban nods.

“Well then…”

Zhao stretches a hand towards their partner, cupping his cheek. “Feel free to put me in my place anytime.”

Oh, he’s into it. Ichiban can tell. Those glasses of theirs can’t hide shit from him, not when he knows them so well; there’s no other way he can interpret the shine in his eyes.

    After that revelation, of course, Ichiban hasn’t had a way to clear his mind enough to think about anything else that isn’t him putting Zhao right where he wants to and taking him the way they deserve.

How are they supposed to do it, though? They share a room with so many other people that they can't possibly put themselves in a situation where they would most likely traumatize someone!

This requires a solution, because as much as Ichiban could easily let this go and wait for the proper occasion, he has no idea how long that would take, and he wants it so bad. Usually, in the bedroom, Zhao’s the one leading, so changing things sounds very interesting, and Ichiban can’t deny that he’s curious to see Zhao’s reaction if he lets him get away with what he wants to do, so no, he can’t wait at all.

  Mmmh what to do…

Wait! He's just got an idea that might work!

    It’s harder than he thought having to save money, since he’s an impulsive buyer, but he manages because this is too important for him to ruin everything. Thankfully he makes enough as Ichiban Holdings’ CEO that in about a month he’s managed to get enough so that he can finally put his plan into motion.

What does his plan consist of? Renting a room at a love hotel, of course! Yeah, it doesn’t sound that fancy, especially considering that Ichiban’s been saving for this, but hey it’s not like he swims in money! Neither of them does!

At least like this they can be as rough and loud as they want to and, especially, they won’t have to be quick, because nobody’s supposed to walk into them when they least expect it.

  It takes him nothing to convince Zhao. They’re on board as soon as he mentions the love hotel part.

“Oh yes please,” they say, and is Ichiban dreaming things, or does he sound very eager? Eh, he supposes he’s been waiting for this for a while - though if they have, why hasn’t he ever mentioned it?

  During their ride - there’s no way they were going to walk all the way there, so they’ve taken a cab - Zhao hasn’t pulled away from Ichiban not even once, holding his arm tightly and whispering pure filth in his ear.

“I bet you can’t wait for it, can’t you? Are you going to make me scream? Are you going to make me beg for it? How long ‘till I’ll be able to walk again?”

On his part, Ichiban does his best to ignore what they say, even if the more time passes, the more difficult it becomes, especially when Zhao begins to lavish at his neck, like they’re not sitting inside a taxi and there isn’t a clearly uncomfortable driver.

“Z-Zhao… Please, not here…”

In response Zhao looks at him with such an innocent gaze that it almost makes Ichiban believe that he truly doesn’t know what they’re doing wrong. Ass.

  At least after that they calm down, not trying to rile Ichiban up anymore. Not that they needed to continue, since he did manage to get Ichiban going, even though there’s nothing he can do about it at the moment. Once they get to the hotel, though…

Ah. So this is why Zhao’s been acting the way they were acting: getting Ichiban so riled up that as soon as they were alone, he was going to explode.

Well, if that’s what Zhao wants, then Ichiban will give it to him, and with interests…

    Ichiban might be moving things along a bit too fast once they get to the love hotel, to the point that once he gets the key to their room, he almost runs towards it. He doesn’t only because he doesn’t want to appear too eager, though by the way Zhao’s looking at him, they must’ve caught it either way.

  Once they’re inside, they take a moment to study their surroundings. Huh, classic love hotel stuff: tacky pink everywhere, enormous bed, even bigger mirror, cabinet with lube and condoms… yes, the usual. Not that Ichiban has been to many love hotels…

He gets distracted when Zhao presses against him, circling his back with their arms. “Soooo Ichi, how are we going to do this?”

Seeing that Ichiban doesn’t reply, he begins kissing up from his neck to the corner of his mouth. “What? Cat got your tongue?”

  Before he can react, Ichiban grabs him by the waist and throws him on the bed, making him land with a loud oof.

“Hey, what the hell?!”

Before Zhao can complain further, Ichiban has found his place between his legs, pressing him against the bed.

“This what you wanted?” he asks, grabbing Zhao’s chin with a hand, sending a shiver across their spine.

“Huh-huh,” Zhao nods, looking at Ichiban with feverish eyes.

Oh god, they’re already get going… and Ichiban would lie if he said that this isn’t having an effect on him as well.

  He kisses Zhao hard, forcing their lips open with his tongue. The objective is to be as overwhelming as possible and, judging by the way Zhao is holding onto him, he must be doing a good job at it.

When they pull away, Zhao’s already panting hard, and his face looks even more debauched with the glasses that are threatening to slip off at any second. Ichiban takes hold of them and puts them aside, so that they won’t risk bending or breaking them - that would certainly be a mood killer.

He licks Zhao’s lips, taking then their lower lip and sucking, before biting it. Zhao gasp, body twitching against Ichiban.

“That all you thought about when you saw me? Kissing me?” they provoke Ichiban then, even though his voice doesn’t sound as confident as they’d like to appear.

In response, Ichiban grabs Zhao’s shirt and rips it open, making the other gasp as buttons come fly all over the place. Zhao doesn’t think he’s ever been so wet in all his life.

  Ichiban’s so glad Zhao didn’t feel like binding today; that thing is always a bitch to take off.

Like this, instead, he can already hold Zhao’s chest in his hands, squeezing it. His fingers are rough when they find Zhao’s nipples, twisting them in a way that makes Zhao whine.

“I-Ichiban…”

This is so different from what Ichiban usually gets to see, or hear, but he’d lie if he said that he doesn’t like it.

He lowers himself so that he can take one of Zhao’s nipples in his mouth, licking and sucking at it like he’s never done before, but when Zhao grabs onto his hair he pulls away, grabbing Zhao’s wrists and forcing them on the sides of their head.

“Stay still,” he orders then, but even after Zhao nods and Ichiban goes back to what he was doing, he still keeps his wrists in his hold. It would be easier to use some rope, or handcuffs - there must be plenty of those in here - but Ichiban has always preferred holding them down with his body, no need for anything else.

“Fuck…” Zhao moans when Ichiban bites down on his nipple, his whole body jolting at the sensation.

Ichiban raises his gaze towards him, and Zhao has to bite his lips to stifle a moan having that heated gaze on him. That, and also he looks so fucking hot while sucking on his tit like that.

If only Ichiban wasn’t between his legs he would try to rub them together, anything to dampen the wet sensation he feels between them. On his part, Ichiban doesn’t seem to care at all, at least for now, focusing only on their chest.

  They test Ichiban’s hold by trying to move his arms, but the other doesn’t budge.

“What did I say?” he scolds them. He usually sounds so gentle and careful, but Zhao hears nothing of that now. How much was he holding back all the times they’ve had sex?

“Sorry…” they mutter, though they don’t really sound that sorry.

Ichiban scowls, but apart from that it seems that Zhao’s apology is enough for him, because he begins kissing a line up to Zhao’s mouth, capturing his lips once again. He at least stops holding Zhao down, but just because he begins slipping his now thorn shirt off, and then going to their waist, thumbs caressing the exposed skin.

At the soft moan that leaves Zhao’s lips, however, they don’t stay still for long, and soon Zhao’s pants and leggings say goodbye as well, getting thrown on the ground with the shirt.

They pull away again, and god if Zhao doesn’t feel like a piece of meat from the way Ichiban’s looking at him. So hungry…

“You’re overdressed,” he points out, instead of saying anything about that.

“So?”

Zhao rolls his eyes. Ichiban has never defied them so much, but he supposes this is what’s fun about what they’re doing today. “C’mon… pretty please?”

It seems that his act does convince Ichiban a little, because he sheds his jacket, and then his shirt, so that Zhao can admire his body. Unfortunately, however, they don’t have enough time to stretch their now free hands to cup his chest because Ichiban drags him forward by the hips so that he’s resting on his knees, open and exposed.

  Ichiban looks down at them, and then a smirk appears on his face.

“Wow, you’re really into this…”

“Huh?” Zhao mutters, confused, but then they realize that there’s must be a pretty big damp spot between his legs. He nervously chuckles then. “Yeah… I am.”

Besides, it’s not like he can’t feel Ichiban getting hard against them. He’s into it as much as he is, and Zhao reminds him by grinding their crotches together, making Ichiban hiss.

It doesn’t last long, however, because soon Ichiban takes back control and pushes Zhao down, holding him still with a hand on their stomach, while with the other he travels down on Zhao’s body, until he reaches his pussy.

The fucker teases his clit just for a moment before lowering his fingers further, down to Zhao’s entrance. At first, he slowly gets only one inside, but seeing how wet Zhao is, he easily slips another one.

He doesn’t bother with being gentle, and thrusts his fingers in and out, in and out, getting the wettest sounds out of Zhao as he does. Holy fuck.

“Yeah… fuck! Ichiiiii!”

“Something tells him you’re liking it…” Ichiban grins, slowing down his movements. “But I bet there’s something you’d like more.”

“God, yeah,” Zhao moans in reply, knowing what Ichiban’s talking about. “Fuck, I need it…”

“Do you? ‘Cause I can keep going like this.” Ichiban twists his fingers up, and Zhao arches his backs against him as a loud moan escapes their lips. Oh yeah there, right there.

Ichiban doesn’t stop, making Zhao edge closer and closer to the orgasm, and all they can do is to hold onto him, scratching his shoulders with his long nails, unable to stop him - not that he wants him to stop. Holy shit it’s so good.

“I’m gonna… Ah!”

They try to warn him that they’re close, that they’re gonna come if he keeps going like that, but Ichiban doesn’t give him the time, going so fast that Zhao reaches the orgasm before he can even finish that sentence. His body tenses up at the sensation, arching and twisting in order to get it to last longer, just a moment longer but then, just like it started, it’s over.

  Ichiban pulls away, and Zhao already misses the feeling of having something inside him, though from the hurried way Ichiban’s unfastening his pants - he doesn’t even bother cleaning his fingers, the idiot - they suppose it won’t be for long.

Indeed, once Ichiban’s as bare as Zhao, he grabs their ankles and pushes them down, on either side of his head. He takes a moment to admire his lover under him, so pretty and flexible, at least until Zhao speaks.

“Again already?”

“You don’t sound upset about it,” Ichiban points out, and he can’t help but to smile, before remembering that he’s not supposed to do that, at least not during this particular occasion.

He distracts himself by kissing Zhao so that they can’t speak anymore, except for a few moans they can’t hold back when he begins to grind his cock against his pussy, getting it wet with all their juices.

He wouldn’t mind getting off like this, if he has to be honest, but he knows how good it feels inside Zhao, and he wants to get back there once again, so he temporarily lets go of one of Zhao’s ankles in order to better guide his cock, holding it as he begins to slide inside. Zhao hisses at the sensation, but otherwise he clenches around Ichiban, almost like he wants to suck him in.

“H-Hey, slow down!” Ichiban exclaims at the sudden stimulation, and he begins to thumb at Zhao’s clit in spite, knowing that it’s still oversensitive.

As predicted, Zhao shouts, body instinctively trying to pull away, but there’s nowhere they can go with Ichiban pressed against him like that, and it’s not like he’s giving him any mercy.

“Fuck! S-Sorry!” they try to apologize, but it still takes a while for Ichiban to stop, leaving Zhao a mess. They feel like a puddle, unable to move a muscle on his own.

  Only when Ichiban begins moving, Zhao manages to get partially out of the state of drowsiness that has been taking over them, body jolting awake at the pounding they’re receiving.

Ichiban’s going completely all out. He even makes the bed rattle with them, hitting the wall countless times. Had they been more coherent, Zhao would’ve wondered if they were going to make a huge hole in it, but with things being as they are, they don’t really care if they do, as longs as Ichiban doesn’t stop.

Usually they’re pretty quiet in bed, but this time they are unable to hold back his voice, moaning and screaming each time Ichiban sinks in. He swears he can feel him get deeper and deeper at each thrust; it’s like he’s drilling him open.

Their vision is cloudy, though it’s hard to tell if it’s just because they’re not wearing his glasses, or if there are some tears that are threatening to run down his face, but Ichiban’s close enough that he can see him pretty decently. He looks focused in a way that Zhao doesn’t think he’s ever seen him.

  Despite the fact that they’ve come recently, Zhao can feel another orgasm building up inside him. Once Ichiban notices - he always begins to tremble when he’s close to coming - he reaches down between his legs again, rubbing his clit with the same roughness from before, but at least it’s had some time to recover, so even though it still hurts a bit, it’s the kind of hurt that Zhao likes.

They feel a bit of drool trickling down their chin, but they don’t have enough strength to lift a finger and do anything about it. Besides, they barely have the time to think about that when Ichiban captures his lips again. It’s obvious by the erratic way he’s moving that he’s close as well.

“Zhao… Can I come inside?”

Zhao almost laughs. Really?

In a way, though, it’s sweet that he still asks.

“Please,” they say then, because he needs it, he needs Ichiban to come inside him so bad.

  Thankfully, it doesn’t take long for his wish to be granted.

God, it feels like Ichiban’s never stopping coming, which in turn tips Zhao well over the edge too, coming with a last shout.

Everything feels intense and not enough at the same time, and Zhao wonders if they've hit their head somehow for him to feel this way. He almost feels feverish.

  Soon Ichiban begins to slow down his movements, until he stills completely. He takes a moment to catch his breath, forehead gently pressed against Zhao’s, then he pulls out, making the other twitch at the sensation of sudden emptiness.

“Fuck…” he very eloquently says then. It makes Zhao chuckle.

“Indeed,” they reply, lazily dragging Ichiban in another kiss, this time softer and much slower than the ones they’ve shared until now.

When they pull away, Ichiban looks at them with badly hidden concern. “Are you okay? Does it hurt anywhere?”

“You fuckin’ destroyed me,” Zhao chuckles, but before Ichiban can begin fussing over them, something they’d frankly hate, they continue. “But that’s exactly what I came here for.”

“So it’s fine?”

Zhao nods. “More than fine I’d say.”

  “So… You liked it?”

Zhao raises an eyebrow at him.

“What do you think?” he asks, instead of replying.

After a moment of silence, Ichiban sighs. “Yeah, alright. Dumb question.”

  He lays down close to them, and immediately they drape themselves over him, holding him close. Ichiban hums contentedly, and returns the hug.

All that rough stuff is fine and all, but if he has to be honest, he prefers this “mushy shit” - that’s how Zhao would call it. This is simply how he is as a person, and nothing can change that.

He begins to idly caress Zhao’s back, fingers barely brushing against their naked body.

“Hey,” he says then. “Shouldn’t we take a shower?”

“Gimme a moment,” Zhao replies, voice a bit strained for the effort from before.

Ichiban nods, and waits until Zhao feels good enough that he can get up, because Ichiban knows that’s the problem. He’d offer to carry him, but Zhao would say no and maybe even get offended, so he stays silent.

  It’s not a problem, he can wait a bit.

Actually, with Zhao so close to him, he can wait more than just a bit, as long as they remain here.

“Yeah, take all the time you need.”

#yakuza #spicy #ichizhao #ichiban kasuga #tianyou zhao #my fics #mine

[jamiemackenziefraser]

All That Was Fair

Chapter 9: Terrors and Delights of the Great Unknown

Chapter Summary: Claire gets her first taste of the human world.

Read on AO3

Read chapter 9 below the cut

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Chapter 9: Terrors and Delights of the Great Unknown

***

Claire clung tightly to his hand as he led her through the streets of Inverness. Her eyes were huge as watermelons, pupils blown wide as she tried to take in all the sensations assaulting her. 

Jamie thought the buildings were the first shock she was trying to come to terms with. Her neck craned up to look at them, glancing nervously at their looming presence all around them. She’d seen Jamie’s house, of course, but that was nothing like the crowded buildings of the city. Her eyes glanced upward toward the sky— likely grounding herself with the one familiar aspect. Much to Jamie’s delight, she then glanced toward him, and peace flashed across her face. 

If Jamie’s nearness offered comfort akin to the sky, he could die happy. 

The buildings were quickly overshadowed by the disconcerting nature of the people around them. She shied toward him— her body pressing to his side like it was her refuge— every time another person passed, even if they were meters away. Some of the passersby gave her strange looks, apparently seeing her odd behavior (not to mention her attire) which completely unnerved Claire. In addition to never having interacted with another human save Jamie, she was used to being invisible to them. The puir wee thing trembled at his side, but bravely continued on. 

“Dinna fash, they’ll no’ harm ye,” Jamie reassured quietly. 

She gave him a wordless nod, lips pressed tightly together, and continued to meld herself to his side. She no longer stared like a deer in headlights at every person close by, but he could tell she still snuck wary glances at those who wandered near. 

As they continued to walk on the cobblestone street, passing by shop windows with elaborate decorations and advertisements, Claire’s anxiety gradually subsided. She began to sneak peeks at the shops as they passed, and Jamie smiled to himself. As the trepidation was replaced more by curiosity, she melted inch by inch. Soon, her death grip on his hand became one of simple connection. She would pause every once in a while to study a shop window, tugging on Jamie’s hand to get him to stop. 

He catered to her every whim, even when she wanted to stop and run her hands reverently over the bricks of one building for several minutes while he struggled to explain the basics of construction. 

During their (very slow) progress down the street, a broad smile gradually formed on those bonny pink lips. Her eyes now wide with intrigue, Claire was coming alive. 

It lightened his heart immensely to see her beginning to enjoy herself and overcome her apprehension. At first, he’d worried to himself that it would all be too much for her— that maybe he’d scare her away from the human world with this single traumatic experience. But that wasn’t the case, and his own anxiety had eased along with hers. He delighted in watching her explore the world with endearing enthusiasm. 

He was pulled to a stop once again as Claire peered into the window of an ice cream shop. 

“What is this place?” she asked in wonder. 

“Och, ‘tis a place where they make food— a special kind called ice cream that humans particularly enjoy.” Jamie was starting to get better at his explanations, trying to boil them down to the simplest things she would understand. (That was more difficult than he would have imagined, mind, because a usual explanation for ice cream would have included descriptors such as “dessert” and “sweet”, but Claire of course lacked the background knowledge for that to make any sense.)

She nodded at his words but didn’t tear her eyes away from the displays of colorful ice cream inside. A smile spread across his face as he watched her take it in, his heart swelling with affection yet again for his strange lass. 

“God, I wish ye ate. If this were a movie ye ken there’d be a grand scene where I take ye inside and ye’d experience ice cream for the first time, yer world lightin’ up the instant ye taste it,” he said to himself. 

She did tear her eyes away then, to give him a furrowed-brow look of bewilderment. 

“What?” 

Jamie laughed and shook his head. “Dinna mind me, Sassenach,” he dismissed with a chuckle. 

They continued on at their snail’s pace, but before long, Jamie was nearly hauled off his feet by Claire abruptly stopping in front of a trash can. 

“What’s this?” she inquired as she reached a hand toward the nearly overflowing bin. 

“Dinna touch it,” he pulled her back rather forcefully by their joined hands, and he felt bad when she instantly latched onto his side again, thinking it harmful because of his forceful response. Her fingers were clutching his shirt in a white-knuckled grip.  

“It’s no’ dangerous,” he quickly amended, “that’s jes’ what humans do with waste. Things that arena good any more or they dinna need.” 

“Why don’t they need all these things?” Claire asked in confusion, squinting her eyes at the contents. 

Jamie wasn’t sure exactly how to answer that. “Weel, did ye no’ have things that once served a purpose but then no longer did?” 

She peered up at him and gave a shake of her head. 

“The Earth provides what we need, and when we’re done, it returns to the earth to be used again.” 

“Aye, that’s a good way to live,” Jamie murmured. 

Claire still seemed disturbed by the trash as they began walking again, but she soon forgot all about it as more things caught her attention. A passing bicycle brought up a whole new conversation, and Jamie had to chuckle to himself imagining his graceful faerie bumbling around the pedals and clinging to the handlebars. Maybe someday… 

Finally— after taking more than three times the amount of time it would have taken the average person to go this short distance— they arrived at the wee thrift shop, tucked on the corner. 

Jamie knew the owner, a Mrs. Fitz, who was a very distant relative of his. Although to be fair, everyone in the highlands was practically related. As Jamie pushed open the door and led Claire inside, the little bell rang in welcome and Mrs. Fitz instantly popped up from behind a rack of clothes, her face shining with enthusiasm. 

“Och, Jamie, lad!” she exclaimed, “it’s sae good t’ see ye!” 

She clasped both her hands over her chest in delight and gave him a wide smile. The shopkeeper quickly bustled over to him, arms outstretched for a hug. But as he tried to withdraw his hand from Claire’s, she stubbornly refused to release him, so he was left giving Mrs. Fitz an odd, one-armed side hug. 

Drawing back, she seemed to notice Claire for the first time, and blinked at her for a second. 

“Ah, and who is this ye have wi’ ye?” she asked Jamie. She looked pointedly down at their clasped hands, up at Jamie, and then back at Claire. 

He looked on in amusement as Mrs. Fitz truly took in Claire’s appearance— the wee lass standing there in his huge jacket, sagging sweatpants, and feet clad in socks and sandals. Mrs. Fitz’ eyes seemed to bulge as she looked at her, and Jamie realized he’d better give an excuse before the shopkeeper combusted. 

“This is my… friend, Claire. She’s visitin’ but lost her luggage, and we need tae get her all new stuff. Could ye maybe help us out?” 

Mrs. Fitz’ agog morphed quickly into a motherly look of sympathy. 

“Ye puir thing, of course we’ll get ye everythin’ ye need.” 

She made toward Claire as if she was about to hug her and then lead her toward the racks, but Claire hastily took a step away, bumping into Jamie in the process. 

“No’ a hugger I see, no problem,” Mrs. Fitz said accommodatingly with hands raised. 

Instead, she simply turned on her heel and headed over toward the first rack in sight— jeans. 

Claire was quiet, looking around the room abstractedly and not paying the slightest bit of attention as Mrs. Fitz prattled on about the pants, speculating about Claire’s size and which might best suit her. Jamie was trying to answer the questions on her behalf, but was distracted by the look on Claire’s face, which had suddenly lit up as something caught her eye. 

For the first time the entire trip, she let go of Jamie’s hand. (The moment felt absurdly monumental, and he found himself feeling empty without the sensation of her hand clasped in his). He resisted the impulse to gape at her with an open mouth as she wandered across the room with rather astounding boldness. Then, he spotted exactly what it was that had caught her attention. 

A gauzy white dress hung on a display hanger, it’s hem fluttering just in the slightest from the air vent above it. 

“I like this,” she announced, halting Mrs. Fitz from her perusal of the jeans. 

“Och, a dress lass, are ye? Well I think that’d suit ye jes’ fine. Why dinna ye try it on while I grab some others I think might work for ye?” 

Jamie quickly thanked her and took Claire’s elbow, steering her in the direction of the dressing room. 

“Ye can change into it back here to be sure it fits,” Jamie murmured into her ear. 

In one fluid motion, he opened the curtain of the dressing room, shoved the dress into her arms, herded her inside, and then closed the curtain again. Every second Mrs. Fitz wasn’t studying her made it more likely they’d get through this without arousing too many questions. 

It took Claire a rather long time to change, he thought. Although she did have a lot of layers to peel off. While she was still inside the changing room, Mrs. Fitz returned and deposited an armful of dresses into Jamie’ lap, all in the same size as the one Claire had picked. 

The shopkeeper was just about to open her mouth to ask him something when the bell over the door rang and she scurried away to greet the other customer. Jamie breathed a sigh of relief. 

It was then that the curtain flew open and Claire emerged, clad in her white dress. 

Jamie nearly had a stroke on the spot. 

She was divine. The white dress fit her perfectly, clinging to her curves down to her waist where it flared out into the draping of the skirt, the hem falling to just below her knees. A hint of cleavage teased at the neckline, skin creamy-white and looking oh-so soft. She swayed gently back and forth with a faint smile, and the gauzy material of the skirt flowed around her with the movement. It was as if the dress had been made for her. 

Under the bright lighting of the shop, Claire’s glow seemed muted to him, although certainly still there. It seemed to accentuate the perfection of the white dress and her dark hair that flowed down her shoulders in sharp contrast— giving her the air of an angel. 

Jamie was astounded. 

Unaware of how speechless she’d left him, Claire asked shyly, “do you like it?” 

He had to swallow three times before his dry throat was capable of answering her. 

“Ye look beautiful,” he forced out. 

She beamed, twirling around in excitement— which made the skirt billow up around her— and then suddenly she was launching herself at Jamie. Claire hugged him tightly, bare feet on tip-toes as she tried to reach up to be closer to him. 

“Thank you, Jamie,” she breathed warmly. 

He was ecstatic that something as simple as a new dress could make her this happy. 

Mrs. Fitz chose that exact moment to return, her footsteps pattering over and barging in on what Jamie considered a rather private moment. 

“Oh, my dear!” she exclaimed as Claire and Jamie parted, “ye look breathtakin.” 

Jamie couldn’t have agreed with her more. 

Claire flushed, eyelashes lowering demurely, and quietly thanked her. She had barely gotten the words out when Mrs. Fitz began shoving a couple pairs of shoes into her hands. Then, just like the whirlwind she was, Mrs. Fitz breezed off again. 

Jamie handed Claire another dress to try on and took all but one pair of the shoes from her. Then, he sat back down to wait. 

When Claire next emerged, she was wearing a black sundress with a floral design. Although the hem was above the knee, it wasn’t quite as form-fitting or astonishingly perfect for her (although he thought everything suited her, of course), so Jamie managed to better keep his composure this time. 

But the moment she turned around to show him the back, Jamie’s heart stopped beating and his blood ran cold in shock. 

He all but tackled her inside the dressing room, falling in after her and then frantically slamming the curtain closed. Once Claire was safely behind him in the privacy of the fitting room, Jamie peeked out a little to ensure no other customer had seen. 

Then, he very slowly turned back toward Claire, whose big honey eyes were staring up at him in question. 

He didn’t address her. Instead, very gently, he placed his hands on Claire’s shoulders and turned her so he could look at her back again. 

The sundress had a low back— a very low back— which exposed the two delicate appendages there.  

Wings. 

Transparent, beautifully fragile— wings. That laid perfectly flat against her back and shoulders. 

Jamie reached a finger out, mesmerized, to gently trace the outline of them. 

But the second he made contact with the edge of one, she let out a little squeal and jerked away. 

Jamie withdrew his hand as if he was burned, clutching it to his chest in shame. 

“I’m sorry, I shouldna have—” 

“It’s alright,” she said as she turned to face him, “I just wasn’t expecting… Is that why you shoved me in here? My wings?” 

Jamie blinked several times, trying to get his brain to catch up to the situation. 

Of course she had wings. She was a faerie after all. 

The sound of his name jerked him back to reality, and he realized he’d never answered her. 

“You have wings!” he exclaimed daftly, still failing to answer her question and merely staring at her, open-mouthed with astonishment. 

“Oh,” she said, glancing behind her at her back casually, as if checking to see they were still there, “of course I have wings. Purely decorative though, I’m afraid.” 

Jamie was still struck dumb, but he longed to look at them again. The dressing room was too small for him to be able to walk around her, so he simply reached out and turned her a second time. 

They were beautiful. Heartbreakingly delicate looking. He could see through them everywhere except where the veins laced through, like a butterfly’s wing. The edges curved gracefully up toward her shoulders, ending in a point. It took all his willpower to resist the urge to touch them again without permission. They laid flat against her back, and he wondered distantly if she could move them. 

As if sensing his curiosity, they suddenly fluttered back toward him— nearly hitting him in the face— and Jamie jolted backward with a surprised laugh. 

Claire shot him an amused look from over her shoulder, and fluttered them again in demonstration. 

“They’re… beautiful,” he breathed reverently. 

“Thanks,” she replied bashfully, “I always thought them dull, really. Some fae have much grander wings, mine are rather small.” 

Jamie couldn’t bear to hear any disparaging remarks aimed at the perfection that was Claire, and he made a Scottish sound of derision deep in his throat. 

“Everythin’ about ye is perfect,” he stated firmly. 

Her wings had settled back flat on her back by this point, and Claire turned around to face him, cheeks adorned with a becoming blush as she adjusted the straps of her sundress over her shoulders again. 

“Well…” Jamie said, eying her up and down, “as bonny as ye look in this dress, I’m afraid we canna buy it for fear of exposin’ ye to the world. Ye’re no’ exactly verra inconspicuous...” 

Claire bit her lip, perhaps embarrassed about forgetting that minor detail when she’d showed him outside. But he was quick to reassure her. 

“Dinna fash, Sassenach. No one saw ye earlier. Yer secret’s safe wi’ me.” 

He tried to give her a wink, which he was aware was a skill at which he was woefully inept, and she burst out laughing at his attempt. 

In that moment, he wanted more than anything to lean down and press his smile to hers. 

Before he could do anything foolish like act on the impulse, he quickly ducked out of the dressing room, eyes still fixed on Claire. 

He slipped backward through the slit at the edge of the curtain… and right into Mrs. Fitz. 

Stumbling away from her, he whirled around to find the shopkeeper with her hands on her hips, face red with admonishment. 

“James Fraser,” she uttered in a menacing voice that indicated he was in big trouble, “I understand that ye’re infatuated with yon lassie, but I canna believe that ye’d engage in— in— such depravity. In my shop!” 

Jamie fell back a step, hands raised defensively. 

“I wasna…” 

But Mrs. Fitz wasn’t having any of it. “I wilna condone such behavior, especially not in public when other customers are around. I’m appalled by your behavior, Jamie Fraser—” 

When she paused for breath in her tirade, face growing redder by the second, Jamie took the opportunity of the minute gap to jump in, “I’m sorry, Mrs. Fitz, but I promise we werena doin’ anythin’ untoward. Listen, we’ll take the lot and be out of yer hair.” 

Jamie gestured frantically toward the pile of dresses and shoes, then reached into his pocket for his wallet. He produced a wad of cash and held it out toward Mrs. Fitz like a peace offering. 

She looked him up and down for a long moment, eying him and the money with narrowed eyes. Jamie thought for a second that he’d be taking Claire home empty handed, but then Mrs. Fitz reached out and snatched the cash from his hands. 

“I want you out,” she said curtly. 

Jamie nodded frantically and instinctively backed away a step. Without breaking wary eye contact with Mrs. Fitz, he called into Claire, “get dressed, a nighean, we’re leaving.” 

With that, Mrs. Fitz turned on her heel and stalked away, as if she couldn’t stand to be in the presence of such a depraved lecher for one more second. Jamie sighed to himself. All of Inverness would be hearing about this within the day… no way he could hide Claire from Jenny for long. 

A minute later, Claire emerged from the dressing room, clutching the jacket to her chest. 

“Jamie, what—?” She started to ask. 

But Jamie cut her off by simply taking her hand and tugging her toward the door, his other arm juggling their purchases (which of course he had no bag for since there was no way he’d push his luck asking for one). 

Once they were safely outside in the Scottish gloom, Jamie slowed down— realizing he had been dragging the puir lass nearly off her feet in his haste to be gone. 

“What—?” She tried to ask again. 

“Nothin’ tae fash about, a nighean,” Jamie assured her, “it was only a wee misunderstandin’ wi’ Mrs. Fitz. But hopefully these dresses will do.” 

Claire, bless her, tended to take Jamie at his word, and so she didn’t press him for any more details. Quite honestly, her trust in his dismissals of things was a breath of fresh air in contrast to his sister Jenny’s stifling desire to wring every last bit of information from him. He wondered distantly just how long Claire’s innocence on this front would last. But for now she was content to let him take the lead with all things human, and he was happy to take it. 

Jamie’s strides were still long and hurried as he brought Claire back toward the car. Thankfully, she was unresisting— she’d probably had enough exploring for one day. Although Jamie knew he hadn’t actually done anything wrong (save going in the dressing room with a fully clothed lass— because she had wings for pete’s sake!), he still felt like a young lad caught with his pants down around his ankles. He wanted to be away from the shop and the talk that surely would be following in their wake. 

The stream of thoughts that occupied Jamie’s brain was interrupted by Claire tripping and nearly toppling over onto the cobbles stones. 

“Woah, lass,” tumbled from Jamie’s mouth at the same time as the pile of clothes on his arm started to fall to the ground. 

With an impressive feat of juggling, he managed to pull Claire upright with one hand and only lose a couple dresses and one pair of shoes with the other. 

“Sorry,” she mumbled, letting go of Jamie’s hand so she could stoop down and pick up the fallen items. When she straightened, she pulled at the legs of her sweatpants in frustrated illustration as she said, “I keep tripping over these.” 

“Weel, ye needna suffer them any longer, a nighean,” he laughed, and he lifted the shoulder holding the new clothes, “let’s find ye somewhere tae change.” 

The “somewhere” Jamie settled on was an old bookshop. It was right across the street, so Jamie simply herded his wee faerie inside, trying to make his armful of items look as discrete and nonchalant as possible. 

The bookstore was old and musty. Something about it had a feeling of another time, as if the world stopped the moment you stepped in. The bookshelves were crowded, with only narrow aisles between, and every one was stuffed to the brim with books. The lighting was rather dim, and Jamie had to squint his eyes a bit as he took it all in. Spotting the front desk, he brought Claire over to it. 

Attending the shop was a woman nearly the same age as Jamie, with long red hair that cascaded down her narrow shoulders and over a name tag that read “Geillis”. When she looked up at them, he saw that she had the most startling shade of green eyes. Almost like a cat’s, he thought distantly. Something about her prickled the tiny hairs on the back of Jamie’s neck. 

But she greeted them quite warmly. 

“Good day, how can I be assistin’ ye?” she asked with a bright smile. 

“We’re jes’ needin’ a place tae change, do ye have a loo?” 

The lass, Geillis, eyed him up and down for a long moment before her gaze flicked to Claire. To his astonishment, the lasses made steady eye contact for a long stretch of time, green meeting whisky, and then she suddenly broke it to smile politely at Jamie. 

“Of course,” she said, “we canna have yer hen paradin’ around Inverness in that outfit, can we? It’s on the far side.” She pointed helpfully in the direction. 

“Thank ye,” Jamie said, and quickly dragged Claire off. 

After seeing her inside the bathroom to change into her white dress and new shoes, Jamie took to perusing the shelves. All the books were old, likely this was a secondhand shop, and mostly titles he didn’t recognize. He became absorbed in the looking, though, so much so that he nearly jumped out of his skin when a figure appeared beside him. 

“Find anythin’ interesting?” Geillis asked. 

Jamie quickly composed himself after the fright, and answered, “eh… jes’ lookin’. Quite an assortment of titles ye have here.” 

He ran a finger over the spine of one of the books. 

“Quite,” she agreed, “I take pride in procuring the selection.” 

“Ye own the shop then?” Jamie asked. 

A nod in confirmation. “My name’s Geillis Duncan, nice tae meet ye,” she said, extending her hand. 

Jamie took it, shaking amicably, and replied, “James Fraser.” 

“It appears ye and yer lass have had quite the… adventure…?” She said with raised brows and a glint in her eye. 

“Oh, she’s not my—“ but Jamie cut himself off, finding that he didn’t have it in him to deny the thing he so desperately wanted. Instead, he finished lamely, “aye, we have.”

He wasn’t exactly sure what compelled him to admit it, but he suddenly added, “honestly, I’m at a bit of a loss.”  

At that moment, the door to the washroom opened, and Claire emerged, clad in her white dress. As she made her way toward them, a book was suddenly shoved into his hand. 

He looked down in surprise, and then up at Geillis. 

“This one is on me,” she whispered, drawing close to his ear, “read it carefully, fox.” 

Bewildered, he didn’t have any reply. And apparently he didn’t need one. Because he had glanced over at Claire, and when he looked back toward Geillis, she was gone. 

“Ready?” Claire asked as she reached him. 

Jamie shook himself out of his startlement at the shopkeeper's abrupt disappearance and gave Claire a smile. 

“Aye, lass.” 

Hand in hand again, they walked out of the shop, the book Geillis had given him still tucked under his arm. 

*

Next

#all that was fair #update #claire x jamie #outlander fanfiction

[toflyandfall]

I just saw a photo of "What persona. Dick Grayson isn't a mask. Not like Bruce Wayne is" from Detective Comics #725 and I find it interesting that Dick and the rest of the bats, with the exception of Bruce, don't wear "masks" per se. They are who they are with or without the domino mask/helmet. The only time I can really think of Dick faking things is when he pretended to be an incompetent BPD cop. How was he able to avoid creating and living, half the time, through a "persona" like "Brucie"?

Oooh, this is a lovely, meaty question.  There’s a lot more analysis of Bruce than I planned because let’s be real, it’s kinda weirder for a guy to run around with half a dozen personas than for someone else to run around as himself.  I hope you still find it interesting, but if you want to skip straight to the more Dick-centric stuff, head under the readmore.

A simple but significant factor is that Dick thrives on the company of people in a way that Bruce does not.  I suspect if you talk honestly to many introverts, you will find they too have an extroverted ‘mask’ they put on to the larger world, though probably not quite so extreme.

Another factor is that the civilian social circles Dick and Bruce travel in are vastly different.  Though they each have a reason for being in those circles, that difference itself enables Dick to escape much of the scrutiny that Bruce’s public identity undergoes, because he doesn’t frequently associate with the much more media-hounded elite.

An interesting thing here is that the large difference in social circles between their civilian lives is actually caused by their own personal similarities: they are 100% committed work-a-holics.  It’s just that they have differing civilian approaches to their goals.

I want to start with Bruce because as you point out, his use of persona is distinct among the bats and his reasons for using them in part explain why Dick and the other bats do not.

Bruce is a child of privilege, he has always lived a lifestyle of privilege, regardless of the tragedies that have occurred during it, and his default view of the world, through no fault of his own, is natively that of the extreme upper class.  This drastically influences his perspective and approach to change, and changing the world is his perpetual goal, the reason he put on the suit in the first place.

Bruce works a top-down society approach toward systemic change, and he works it all the time.  This is actually my favorite but woefully under-emphasized part of him: he is not just someone who punches people on the street ‘for justice’, he uses his company, his money, and his social position toward substantial systemic change. This post does a wonderful job covering the ways he does this through his corporations and personal wealth, as does this one.  I cannot recommend either enough because I constantly want to push even the most casual Batman fans to understand: Bruce Wayne is not just a violent punchy puncher man.  He is a traumatized person genuinely trying to use all his resources including himself to make the world safer.

Detective Comics #725

Bruce has many personas he maintains, and he uses all of them according to what suits his need--Batman for places the law can’t go, Bruce Wayne the CEO pushing for systemic changes, Matches Malone for street information, and Brucie the society high roller for society information and social influencing.  He is rarely ever not in a persona and simply ‘Bruce’.

His top-down perspective of enacting change are what dictated the usage and necessity of these personas. He has the means and capacity to basically disappear from society if he so chose--he in fact does so to train during his younger years so successfully they don’t even know how long he was actually gone. 

The Batman Files

So he doesn’t need the personas.  Not Bruce Wayne, CEO, or Brucie, or any of them really, to protect his identity.  That tells us that Brucie is a deliberate choice he made at some point.  He could have been a recluse billionaire Batman indefinitely.  Even though he fully has the status and means to not maintain a job or a persona or, let’s be frank, a life outside the mask at all, it’s his own work-a-holicness that led to the creation of his public personas.  He’s an obsessive strategist, so if Brucie is a choice, that leads us to why?

Bruce does many philanthropic things with his money, but he isn’t the only rich person around, especially not in a city as old and corrupt as Gotham.   But he’s one of the very few ones doing good with it.

The comic you mentioned has a very beautiful moment where Bruce touches on that, and in full context you can feel how consumed he is by this goal of creating the Gotham his parents would have wanted.  Batman mentions he never sees himself in that place, and the morbid interpretation is that the city kills him before he reaches it, but the hopeful interpretation is that in that shining city, Bruce Wayne and Batman and Brucie and all his masks will no longer be needed.

Detective Comics #725

Back in the old days they’d call it noblesse oblige: the inferred responsibility of privileged people to act with generosity and nobility toward those less privileged. Thomas and Martha Wayne ingrained this feeling of responsibility into Bruce by example, and as all things related to them, he obsesses over it.  It urges him to fulfill expectations within segments of society he finds onorous for the betterment of society as a whole in order to carry out their unfinished works.

Enter Brucie.

Brucie serves a two-fold purpose.  Since Bruce has chosen to maintain personas among society, it becomes a false face to justify any oddities Batman might bring into the life of Bruce Wayne by setting himself up as a eccentric, popular social scion.  But that persona itself also allows him to manipulate the upper crust of society.

I have some insider perspective on the kind of society events Brucie attends.  They’re all about the who’s who of making connections, name-dropping and networking, and unspoken class-based elitism.  Charity events among the upper class have these things at the forefront and the cause is the background.  You don’t get your hands dirty, you don’t go out and make change yourself, you pay money to be socially seen and sometimes it happens to go towards a philanthropic cause.  If you want to raise money from the rich and keep people with deep pockets coming in the door, you have to have social currency yourself. This is where, and why, Brucie comes in.  I believe Brucie ws crafted to maintain Batman’s cover but still attempt to carry on his parents’ legacy to grease the wheels of the rich in the directions he chooses: one of generosity towards those less privileged. 

Superman/Batman #51

The inevitable flaw of Bruce’s approach to his personas and their philanthropy is that in a city rife with corruption, money distributed from the top has many opportunities to disappear well before it reaches the bottom.  As in many of ways they are complements to each other, Dick’s approach balances that out, because his approach to helping his fellow man starts out at the street level...literally.

Nightwing #153 (Nightwing: The Great Leap)

Dick, we know, does not come from privilege.  His mother was from a middle class family before she joined the circus, and despite being world famous athletes, most circus workers are lower to middle class.  The people he grew up with, was comfortable with, were all working folk who expected everyone to pull their weight right alongside each other.  He enacts this everyone-together approach in almost all aspects and phases of his life. 

Batman #615

Even once he had settled into being Robin and adapted to living at the manor, he didn’t feel belonging to a culture of privilege, materialism, or high society. He preferred shotgun in the limo to chat with the driver to riding fancy in the back.  Once he was able to start making his own decisions about where and how he lived, despite having both Bruce’s money and then later inheriting a substantial amount of his own, he chose mostly lower-class communal places.

Batman Black and White #6

Dick also doesn’t see the value of throwing money at a problem when there is an option to fix it with his own hands.  We see this frequently, from building his own car instead of buying a finished one or outsourcing the work, to deciding the best way to clean out the BPD was to start at the bottom and work his way up (literally), to quitting college because his classes never got prioritized over crimesolving.  Most of his day jobs ended for similar reasons. 

Nightwing #153 (Nightwing: The Great Leap)

Despite the showmanship training, he gravitates away from spotlight on the rich and wealthy, who are notoriously the kind of people who do not get their hands dirty or go out and take care of things themselves, and prefers to find or build communities around the kind of people who do.

Finally, Dick is an extrovert.  He doesn’t need to act extroverted as Brucie does because he is extroverted.  He likes people and likes being around people.  Whether by conscious choice or not, he tends to put himself in situations where he is surrounded by people in nearly all aspects of his life.  He chooses apartment buildings whose occupants frequently pass each other on the stairs; jobs that involve interacting with many co-workers, patrons, or students; and collects superhero teammates like Boy Scout badges.  And all of these behaviors come very naturally to him.  

He doesn’t need a mask or a role or a persona for those kind of interactions; his mask is pre-supplied as “neighbor” or “co-worker” or “teacher” by the situations he puts himself in.  It helps make him an exemplary leader, because just by acting authentically to himself, he automatically builds up little communities around him any time he arrives somewhere.

Bruce, on the other hand, is an introvert.  For him, interacting with people isn’t easy, automatic, or comfortable unless it has a purpose, but as a strategist, he knows the necessity of human interaction as a catalyst to achieving dynamic change. So he adapts personas to suit people’s expectations.  Extroverts have more social currency; the life of the party can generate more resources than a brooding wallflower.  

So, it boils down to just a few elements: Dick believes in living and interacting at the street level to accomplish the things that he wants to, and he is extroverted enough that the level of social interaction that entails is not a burden to him.  He surrounds himself with the types of people he is more familiar or perhaps more comfortable with, which happens to keep him further out from the media’s eye than associating with the upper crust does. The lower profile is more incidental than intentional, but it lessens his need to have a cover story for every single bruise and lets him get away with even less of a ‘persona’.

Bruce, on the other hand, is introverted and follows a more classist view that systemic change needs to be effected from the top down.   His personas are more of a self-assumed duty than a necessity, as a way of trying to carry out his parents’ legacy.  Any of his children could have chosen to follow his path in business or the high society limelight, but the sense of obligation toward it is something personal to him that most of them don’t share.

#bruce wayne #batman #dick grayson #nightwing #character analysis #dc #comics #meta #o.c. #bruce wayne analysis #bruce + dick #asks #anonymous #cover stories

[shih-coulda-had-it]

37. NanaHiko, please

37. “Because I love you goddammit!”

Consider this my sourdough starter for a Nanahiko Die Hard AU. If it ever comes into a fully-realized oneshot spectacular, well. Maybe for Christmas. Anyways, this is, believe or not, a break-up scene.

//

Fighting with Sorahiko is never pretty.

To clarify, Nana doesn’t mean physical fighting. They’ve honed that particular aspect of their partnership to near-perfection (always room for improvement), and when Nana has extricated herself from a fight, sometimes she has enough time to watch Sorahiko work his brutally efficient magic on loose ends.

That kind of fighting is pretty from a professional point of view.

Anyway, what Nana means is—having an argument with Sorahiko. It’s not the first time they’ve engaged in a war of cold shoulders and barbed words, digging up old insults and humiliating stories, resolved to leave reconciliation to the other party.

Nana has always thought it boded well that it never took a mortal injury to get either her or Sorahiko to apologize. 

She is, however, very close to inflicting a mortal injury.

Sorahiko also looks close to committing partner-cide. They are spending a break from patrol by cooling their heels on a rooftop no employee bothers to spend a cigarette break at, and for the past ten minutes, have been politely exchanging words like, “Please do this,” and, “Fuck doing that.”

A full month has passed since Nana digested the whole conspiracy theory about a supervillain controlling Japan’s underground. En’s transferral of One for All had been traumatic for all parties involved, even if Sorahiko didn’t have to witness the horror that was the shoulder socket gushing blood and the half-buried body. Why? Because the first time Nana tested out her new Quirk, she had broken her notoriously hardy partner’s arm.

… It’s been a scary month all around.

“I’m not,” her partner grits out, “going to just quit being a pro-hero.”

“I didn’t say you should ditch the license,” Nana says reasonably.

“You might as well have!”

She rolls her eyes. “Splitting up for a solo career would probably mean better pay for you,” she reiterates. “Better pay, more taiyaki. You’d be a treat by yourself, Gran Torino. Any high-profile agency would want you on the payroll.”

“The salary isn’t the point,” Sorahiko snaps. 

“And you shouldn’t conflate your position as a pro-hero with your position at the Eyrie! Don’t let the agency limit your ambitions!”

“What ambitions?”

“You know,” says Nana, gesturing aimlessly. She’s trapped herself with that useless encouragement. Sorahiko is so thoroughly unambitious, he would let a pet rock win an election to Prime Minister. “Whatever made you get into heroics.”

He stares at her.

“Get out there,” she adds. “Chase your dreams.”

“You’re being stupid,” he says.

“Don’t start.”

Sorahiko starts. His mouth twists into a snarl, eyebrows drawing together under the mask, frustration creeping into his posture. He is madder than she’s ever seen him, and Nana once witnessed Sorahiko yell bloody murder at his landlord. The landlord had been reduced to tears, and furthermore, had reduced the rent for the entire complex.

Nana does not intend to yield.

“First you inherit a transferable strength Quirk that knocks you out of commission for a week,” he says, “then you get all weird about tanking hits you know I can take, and now you’re advising I leave the Eyrie by myself? For my own good?”

“Yes,” she says, already feeling miserable.

“Are you on some kind of power trip?”

“No!”

His gloved hands curl into fists, mirroring Nana’s, or maybe she is mirroring him. Another side-effect of being friends for so long; she can’t imagine what kind of pro-hero she is without Gran Torino next to her. 

A pro-hero that won’t drag their best friend into the worst conspiracy theory to come true. 

“I won’t quit until you do,” Sorahiko swears. “Are we partners or not?”

“Partnerships dissolve.”

He flinches back for once. “You don’t mean that.”

“People sometimes grow in different ways. It doesn’t mean they’re abandoning their partner, it’s just… You don’t have any obligation to hold my hand for my entire career. If there’s a roadblock ahead, and you see it, you should be able to jump out of the car, right?” 

“Shimura. Shut up.”

“I really mean it,” Nana continues doggedly. “One for All attracts way more attention than we agreed we should aim for, so if we split paths now, you don’t have to suffer all the cameras tracking and recording your moveset. Did I say cameras? I meant henchmen of some evil bastard. You didn’t sign up for this.”

“Don’t tell me what I did or didn’t sign up for,” he hisses.

“Well, I have to guess,” she says, “considering I never saw your origin story, haha!”

His face goes a blotchy pink, starting with his ears. Sorahiko’s jaw visibly clenches. Nana, however, is one-hundred percent serious. Despite being friends with Sorahiko from primary school up till now (excusing the few years of junior high), Nana still has no idea what drives Sorahiko to be Gran Torino.

Reuniting in Class 1-A of U.A. High had felt a bit like fate. 

“You have to guess?” he grits out, sounding slightly incredulous.

“You’re a very private person. Ah, don’t tell me I’ve somehow forgot it.” Nana puts her hands at her hips, trying to drag this fight back into friendly banter. “Not for the applause. Not for the legacy, assuming the Commission ever gets their memorial site set up. Are you sure it wasn’t for the money?”

“Shimura.”

“C’mon,” she says coaxingly. “What’s the dream-goal, Gran Torino? Why heroics?”

“Shimura.”

“Don’t worry about harming my feelings! Oh! It’s for your namesake, huh? Ah, Sorahiko, you really gotta let that one go, I don’t think you’d have any fun driving around these streets. You’ll just scare all the pedestrians into throwing tomatoes at your precious baby—”

“Because I love you goddammit!” Sorahiko shouts, barking it loud enough to frighten some voyeuristic pigeons. 

“What,” Nana says. She has to process his words even though they ring in her ears. His confession is a curse. Typical Sorahiko, Nana thinks hysterically, except this is not typical at all. Torino Sorahiko, admitting to love? 

Torino Sorahiko, not being done yet, rails on. “Because you’re my best friend, and I like myself when I’m with you, so stop trying to cut me out of your life! If you—if you hate me, then just say it! Say I’m annoying! Clingy! Useless! Don’t just tell me to step out the front door and leave you behind!”

Oh, he’s properly mad now.

Thing is, Nana’s mad too.

“Don’t you use that against me,” she says, fury seeping in, because how dare he? Like confessing to loving her settles this argument, some deus ex-machina device that will defuse Nana’s very sincere attempt to prevent Sorahiko from being murdered. She can’t believe the nerve of her partner, trying to manipulate the part of her that’s a hopeless romantic. “Don’t lie.”

“Lie?” Sorahiko echoes, enraged. “You think—?”

“I think you would do a lot of things to win a fight,” Nana seethes.

“You’re impossible.”

She wants to punch his stupid face so badly, but Sorahiko’s hands are already scrabbling at his domino mask, ripping it off. After blinking several times to reorient his senses, he refocuses his glare at her.

“What part of that confession sounded fake?” he demands, crumpling the black silk-composite in one fist.

“The timing. The whole concept. Everything!”

“You don’t think I’m capable of it?”

“I didn’t say that,” Nana objects, but her immediate gut reaction had been to say, I’m not worthy of it. She has a name for Gran Torino’s behavior now—his loyalty, devotion, affection—he tied himself to her so long ago, and Nana never even knew she was holding a leash. How unfair to him, how stupid and shortsighted of her.

Sorahiko takes a step into Nana’s personal bubble. He persists. “Say you hate me.”

She can see where Sorahiko wants to take this.

“Do you hate me, Shimura?”

Nana bites her tongue from its reflexive denial; when she tries to lie, it sticks in her throat.

“Do you really want me to go?” Sorahiko asks, and without his mask, he looks vulnerable. Pale brown eyes catching the sunset, gleaming gold. How much of Sorahiko’s life has been deferring his dreams to follow hers? What has he given up that Nana’s never asked about? Does he have any commitments outside of heroics? 

“I think,” Nana finally forces out, “we need some time apart.”

One beat of silence. Two.

“You’re not joking.”

“No.”

Sorahiko breathes, a steady and barely audible sound, and Nana finds herself mirroring it. She crosses her arms and looks to the horizon. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Sorahiko slowly uncrumpling his mask, smoothing out wrinkles with his forefinger and thumb. Methodical for a nervous tic.

“It’s not that you’ve done something wrong.”

“Spare me the bullshit,” he says. The bitter tone sends a chill through Nana’s heart, but she steels herself. “How long?”

“Long as we need,” she deflects.

“What’s the goal here?”

Nana glances at Gran Torino, notes the grim set of his expression, and restrains herself from poking at the down-turned twist to his frown. Instead, she says, “You said you like who you are when you’re with me. I don’t think you’ve ever really been without me, so… Figure yourself out, Gran Torino.”

“And Sky High?”

“We’ll shelve the idea for a later time,” says Nana weakly, as though running an agency together hasn’t been their—her?—dream since high school.

He grunts in acknowledgment.

Together, they survey the cityscape. They will finish the day’s patrol. Gran Torino will, for the first time, clock out early and storm home.

And Nana will quietly file her two-week notice.

There’s an international pro-hero exchange program being organized with the United States, and Nana intends to join. The probation period is a year; if Nana can make it through that, then she can apply to be a mentor to aspiring pro-heroes, all the while cultivating One for All on the side.

(She doesn’t mean to forget the confession. But then again, who knows if that’s really what Sorahiko felt for her?)

#bnha #nanahiko #shimura nana #torino sorahiko #gran torino #shih.txt #asks #anon #diehard!au #and YES sorahiko is cast as holly #and nana will show up in a few years #wearing a cool leather jacket #to the HPSC's Holiday Party #toshinori will also be present but he will unfortunately be made to stay in the car

[dreamer213]

Broken machines: Lights the dark

Chapter 2 Beautiful Night

In dark quiet room a young man sits atop his bed waiting. The room itself is opulent and pristine, a queen size bed with silk sheets, oak wood floor, a gorgeous antique armoire full of designer clothing, a full length mirror, silver trend curtains, an ornately detailed desk, bookshelf filled with materials on business, culture, and the arts and even a bath en-suite. Truly a scene ripped straight from a magazine with it’s presentation and uniform coloring. Nothing but dark blues, grays, and whites as far as the eye could see, it gives off a very chic and vintage feel but such a cold color scheme leaves little room for light to enter. With darkness of night sky peeking through the window It is as though the room itself becomes like snow, beautiful and magnificent in appearance but cold and devoid of life. The same can be said for the boy, smooth white hair set neat and tidy in a simple but elegant cut, a long and slender figure with good posture and a gorgeous face with high cheek bones, full lips, a perfect jaw line, long lashes, and beautiful deep blue eyes. But behind those beautiful eyes lays a cold and empty stare, no youthful joy or warmth to speak of, just the cold stare of empty soul. If not for his breathing and movements he could be mistaken for a porcelain doll, left in it’s display never to be moved or play with but to be held up and admired. But that is not important right now. No, what matters right now is if Weiss’s found the back doors they left open for her and made her escape yet.

It’s been a while she should be long gone by now, if she hasn’t left yet it won’t be long before Father finds her then Gods know what he’ll will do. I mean getting caught trying to escape the city after nearly killing a defenseless woman at a public event over some unkind remarks. Cleaning up this mess is going to be hell on its own but if Father finds her trying to run away He’ll-

Whitley tenses up and grips his biceps through his sleeves, there’s a dazed look in his eyes. He closes his eyes, takes some deep breath, and calms himself.

No, I can’t think like that now. I have to believe that she followed through, that she ran away pre her usually sanctimonious behavior. I mean what did she think she was going to achieve by acting like that. Did she think that was going to change their minds? Did she really think that screaming like a child and losing control of her powers was going to do anything but cause chaos. If General Ironwood hadn’t been there we all could been killed by that monster. But no, even after fighting Grimm and seeing how terrifying they are first hand, she still never once gave a thought to what the consequences of her actions would be for anyone but herself. But then again that just might be who she is now. Doesn’t matter if she to her if she’s right or wrong, if she feels attacked she’ll just lash out either physical or verbal. With all her talk of restoring our family name I never thought she would do something like this. I never thought she would go this far but then again I never thought she’d treat me like an enemy. I try my best to engage with her whenever I could and she accuses me of wanting to her get disinherited and acts like I’ve stolen her role away from her. Really? She thought I would want the life both she and Winter ran away from the first chance they could. Seriously? What do I gain from her failure, living at home with a drunk for mother, a tyrant father, and a staff of people traumatized from working with them. Having my every move monitored and commanded by a man who cares more about money than human life. The enormous amount of work that comes with preparing to take over a company of such great magnitude and whatever grunt work Father doesn’t feel like doing. OH! Let’s not forget the fact that you’ll never truly be in charge as Father will surely keep you trapped under his heel until the day he dies! A life as puppet to a man whose dragged our family name through the dirt trapped in a house colder than the coldest of blizzard. Yes Weiss, I so desperately wanted you to run away to live your dreams so I could live your nightmare.

“WHERE IS SHE!!!” “WHERE DID THAT WORTHLESS BRAT GO!”

Whitley hears his father screaming down the hall, the screaming continues for almost an hour until it’s becomes clear that Weiss has escaped. For moment everything’s quite as though the entire manor has become frozen in time. But not long after the silence there’s a crash then another and another. The commotion grows louder and louder with every passing second until the shirks of manor staff become just loud as the havoc Jacques Schnee is wreaking.

Whitley: Looks like it’s time to clean up the mess.

Whitley gets up and walks out of his room towards the commotion. As he gets closer and closer as follows his father’s path of destruction. Broken glass, fallen paintings, and décor pieces smashed and scattered across the floor the halls are in shambles. When he finally reaches his father the situation is much worse than he expected. Jacques has completely lost his composure, he’s throwing things, screaming wildly, his face is beet red and his eyes are bulging. The servants are trying their best to calm down while trying to avoid getting hit. They try and try but nothing they do seems to calms him. As this struggle continues Whitley approaches them, he quietly walks up behind them. He stands there waiting for an opportunity to grab his father’s attention.

Jacques: AFTER EVERYTHING I’VE DONE FOR THAT UNGRATEFUL BITCH SHE DARED TO DEFY ME LIKE THIS!

Whitley: Father please, you need to calm down the stress isn’t good for—

Before he can get another word out an object goes flying past Whitley’s head. It was a small antique clock a gift from a business associate. His father Jacques Schnee, who was now facing him, had thrown it within an inch of his own son’s head. Jacques stalks over towards Whitley, getting closer and closer until he is standing over his son and stares directly into his eyes.

Jacques: What did you say?

Whitley: Stay calm, stay focused, you have to see this to an end before things get worse. I said you should calm down you shouldn’t be stressing yourself over such a minor issue. It’s not good for your health.

Jacques: And do tell me Whitley, how is your sister running away a “minor issue”.

Whitley: Well she’s already been disinherited and made a public spectacle of herself, there’s no real need for her to be at the manor anymore. That and when people ask about her and how she was punished you can say she was kick out and thrown to the streets for her awful behavior. For most that were present at that party the very idea of being cut off is the stuff of nightmares, hearing that the heiress to Schnee dust fortune got herself thrown out for her reckless mistakes should help calm the ruckus Weiss created.

For a moment everyone pauses, they hold their breath waiting for the elder Schnee’s reaction. After what feels like hours Jacques puts his hand above Whitley’s head. He brings it down and begins to slow pat his son’s head.

Jacques: Good job Whitley, you always have your mind in the right place when I need you to.

Whitley: Of course Father, I’m always thinking of what’s best for the Schnee legacy.

Jacques: Good, now then get this mess cleaned up I need to go have a talk with Klein. I just know that dog had a hand in this.

Whitley: Yes Father, I’ll have the staff get this up right away.

Jacques gives an approving nod then walks away. As soon as his step can no longer be heard and he is out of earshot the servants all breathe a sigh of relief and start cleaning up. Whitley walks down the hall, searching for someone. After roughly half an hour up and down the second floor Whitley finally finds the person he’s been looking for, Mary Shellor.

Mary Shellor has been working at the Schnee Manor for several years. When she first arrived no one expected her to last very long but to their surprise she acclimated to the environment rather quickly. She was also a very diligent worker, never making a mistake more then once. And because of her skill, not long after her hiring Mary was promoted to one of the most important and most difficult positions in the manor, Willow’s personal maid. She’d become Willow’s shadow following and serving her wherever she may go unless dismissed. During her first year as Willow’ maid also sought out and obtained another role, or rather a long term investment. You see after observing the family for a time it became clear to Mary which child would inherit the family fortune. The children, Winter, Weiss, and Whitley, had been raised quite incorrectly for their natures. Like wolves raised as show dogs ,they were trained to be obedient, intelligent, and outstanding but because of their strong willed and fierce natures they could never truly be tamed. First and second born were allowed enough freedom to want for more and seek an end to their captivity even if it meant losing everything. Eventuality they were able to beard their fangs and break free of their chains. But the third born, the son, was not allowed such opportunities, No Jacques had learned from his past mistakes he wasn’t letting this one get away. Whitley was kept closer, his chains made tighter, and cage made much smaller then his predecessors. And yet Mary could still see the wolf in him, though different from his sisters it was still there. Unlike his sisters he couldn’t attack or run from his situation so the boy did the only thing he could and did it well, he played along. He played the role of Father’s loyal dog so well that even his sister believed the act without question but unbeknownst to her or their father beneath that mask Whitley’s fangs were growing strap, he was waiting. Whitley knows when he’s at a disadvantage he knows when to act and when to retreat, he knows how to play games, the game of Atlas politics, his father’s games, and the games of the business world. The day Whitley would strike would be the day everything would be returned to a true Schnee, one who knew how to survive in this world, who knew the mistakes of the past and how not to repeat them. Mary wanted to be on the right side when that day came and so she became Whitley’s eyes and ears in and outside of the manor as long as he promised to keep her in mind when the time came. That was their argument one Mary never doubted would play out in her favor.

Whitley: Mary where’s Mother?

Mary: The Mistress has retreated to the library. After the shouting started she ran inside and hid. I asked her if there was anything I could do and she dismissed me.

Whitley: Thank you Mary, stay here I’ll be back in a moment.

Mary: Yes, Young master

Whitley walks pass her towards the library, once at the doors he pulls them open only to find that the lights are off and the scent of alcohol is heavy in the air. Whitley follow the scent deeper and deeper into the library, gagging slightly the closer he gets, as he draws nearer to the source he finds a trail of wine bottles.

Whitley: They’re all empty, she’s close.

He picks up the bottles as he follows the trail until he finds a blanket covered figure sitting on the floor tucked into a corner. Whitley puts the bottles down and slowly approaches the figure, small sobs escape it as he drew closer, he kneels down in front of them with his hands on his knees. He then gently pulls the blanket off the figure to reveal his mother Willow Schnee, sobbing and trembling beneath the blanket she’s wrapped herself in.

Whitley: It’s over Mother, Father’s gone back to his office. You can go back to your room now he won’t be coming out for some time.

Whitley holds out his hand towards Willow, with a shaky hand Willow grabs onto her son. Whitley grabs onto tightly, wraps his free arm around her shoulders and pulls her up. He steadies her as she gets on her feet, and guides her through the darkness and into the hallway. Once they’re out out of the library he hands Willow off to Mary.

Whitley: Take her back to her room she can barely walk, make sure to leave a bucket by her bed. And don’t let her have anything else tonight she has too much in her system already. She’s also left a good amount of empties on floor again, have someone clean those up before Father’s next reading hour.

Mary: Of course Young Master, we’ll have everything clean and in order before Master Jacques get up for breakfast.

Whitley:Thank you Mary , that will be all for tonight.

This was why Mary chose to put her faith in the boy, for as cold and defensive as Whitley was he was also incredibly loyal. Whenever the Master flew off the handle the Young Master would do everything in his power to calm him down and keep him calm for as long as possible. At first Mary thought this was more his loyal dog act but after a few more incidents it was clear what he was doing. Whitley would never sacrifice another’s safety for his own. His true purpose for playing the Master’s game was not to obtain power but peace and freedom from the chains that bind this manor and the people in it.

With that Mary and Willow depart towards Willow’s bedroom while Whitley retreats his own. Once there he closes the door behind himself and pressing his back against the door. He takes a deep breath then slumps down the door, gets into the fetal position and starts to sob. He cries and weeps for a long, long time, until his face is red and his voice horse. Once he finally he stops Whitley gets up and goes to his ensuite to clean himself up. After a long bath he puts on his sleepwear and lays down on his bed, he stares up at the ceiling until he finally succumbs to his own exhaustion and falls into a dreamless sleep.

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