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vixensofsorrow · 2 months

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Demolition Lovers - Ⅳ i'll hang myself in lights and I will glow for you

DISCLAIMER: This fic is a long slowburn with multiple chapters, still being updated. also on AO3 my masterlist (all the chapters are linked there) PAIRING: young!Carol Denning/fem!reader OVERALL SUMMARY: An exploration of your and Carol's relationship through the years. CHAPTER SUMMARY: The argument won't leave your mind, and you need to take care of it ASAP. CHAPTER TAGS: fluff, angst, developing relationship, argument, hurt/comfort, complicated feelings A/N: I absolutely suck at the chapter tags thing

You dreaded the thought of going to school tomorrow. You spent the whole Saturday in your bed, puking up Fridays’ regrets into a bucket, with a pounding headache and a tight knot in your stomach.

Even though it was a Sunday night, some consequences of excessive drinking still hadn’t worn off, but you weren’t exactly sure if it was anxiety, a hangover, or an awful combination of both. Your parents had their suspicions, but you and your sister made a great team when it came to lying to them, and food poisoning was the most plausible excuse. Dana could tell that you were in a bad mood, but you blamed it on the alcohol.

You couldn’t remember most of what happened at the party, and you only found out about the argument that happened between you and Carol when Gina called yesterday to check in on you, but when you asked her about the topic of the fight, she said that all she could recall was all the yelling, crying, and swearing, and not what it was actually about.

You wondered if Carol also forgot about what went down. Most likely not, since she didn’t ring you at all, but you’ll find out tomorrow. The urge to call her with an apology for whatever you did was overwhelming, but so was the dread.

You gulped and reached over to the spruce-blue landline on your end table, inputting her number on the keypad. Halfway through, you stopped and put the handset down.

One time, Jennifer advised that “ No one should trust themselves after 9 PM ”, and perhaps she had a good point. Maybe for now, you should go to sleep obliviously and not relive the childhood flashbacks of confusion and desolation.

The bell rang, and English class was dismissed. Carol didn’t show up to school at all today, and you couldn’t help but wonder if it was your fault. Thankfully, you’ll have a whole hour to linger on it, since it was lunch period.

You slowly walked down the traffic-jammed stairway, resisting the rude urge to cut in front of others, as you gave stern looks to the freshmen who still hadn’t caught the hand of the unspoken school etiquette. After what seemed like forever, you reached the ground floor and made your way toward the cafeteria, but frankly, you weren’t even in the mood to eat right now.

The overpowering stench of frying grease, tomato sauce, and overboiled broccoli wafted around in the canteen, and with that, the rest of your appetite disappeared completely.

Most of the long, beige-laminate rectangle tables were still empty, with most people waiting in line with their trays.

You nipped over to the vending machine, before a line could form there as well, and bought yourself a coke. As you expected, the grody machine swallowed your twenty-five cents, without giving you the item. Shit, you must’ve been cursed, because everything that could go wrong, went wrong. You just hoped you wouldn’t majorly fuck up at practice today.

You sighed and repeatedly banged on the dispenser to loud snickering coming from one of the groups, which caused you to turn around. Typically, you’d ignore it, but all your patience already run out. You didn’t have to look for long to find the perpetrators of the hyena-like laughter, of course it were the wannabe Valley Girls, but with a new addition to them; a thin, tall girl with sharp cheekbones, wide mouth, brown perm hair, and a fringe.

Strangely, she reminded you of somebody, but you brushed it off, blinded by irritation. You made eye contact with her and walked away from the vending machine, flipping their table off with a fake smile as you passed by on the way to where you always sat.

You plopped down on the plastic seat facing Rachel and stretched out your arms on the table with a groan. Fortunately, your lunch period aligned with hers, Gina's, Kristen’s, and now Carol’s, too.

“L/N, you’re that upset over a can of Coke?” Gina teased, probably exactly knowing what you’re actually upset about, poking around in the food with a fork, as Rachel ate the soggy mozzarella sticks and Kristen counted coins she pulled out of her pocket.

You looked up at her with a poker face, sucking in your cheek. “Uh, you know what, I’m upset for a different reason, but yeah, let’s go with that.”

Kristen peered up from her stack of coins and joined in on the conversation, her soft eyes analyzing your expression. “You wanna talk about it?” She had a caring and comforting aura, making it very hard to resist venting your heart out.

“Not really. I’m curious though, do any of you know what, like, actually went down between me and Carol at Nicole’s party?” You cracked your knuckles and took off your jacket, tying it around your waist while you waited for an answer. Rachel furrowed her bushy ginger eyebrows, still chewing her food, switching her attention from you to Gina, the only one who vaguely knew what happened, to confused Kristen, who put the coins back in her jean pocket, and then again back to you.

The goalkeeper broke the silence as she swallowed the fried cheese. “Enge, what? Are you talking about that girl you were with? The one with the glasses?” She gesticulated.

Gina raised her brows and looked away, forming her dark red lips into a straight, thin line.

“Okay, yeah, so nobody knows what really happened, fuck.” You groaned and leaned back in the chair, pushing back your cuticles. “Also, yes, I am talking about the one with the glasses. ”

Gina rested her elbows on the table. “Listen, from my point of view, I heard vague shouting and cursing, and then you bro-”

You cut her off in the middle of the sentence. “You told me all of that already, thanks.”

“Well, then that’s your only clue, L/N. Unless you want to walk around asking half the school about it.” The defensive-midfielder snapped back with her raspy voice.

“Rachel, what about you?” You continued searching for an answer, even though you were aware that she most likely didn’t know anything. Still, you held onto a sprinkle of hope.

“I was taking care of ‘Ronica the whole time, sorry.”

Kristen joined in on the conversation, and your eyes immediately lit up. “Actually, oh gosh, well, probably this won’t even help you…but” The blonde-haired defender was about to break into a long, detailed narrative of what she saw.

“Okay, so, I was hanging out in the kitchen, and I dragged Jason to the party with me, and we were sitting there together, talking, whatever. Gosh, he’s such a dweeb, but in a good way, he started writing down lyr-”

“Get to the point, Kris.” Gina reminded, gently laying her hand on Kristen’s shoulder.

“Right, right, sorry. So there was that and in the middle of us talking this disheveled girl with huge glasses and a blue flannel stormed in, I had a realization like, hey, I think she’s the new girl from Art class, but anyway…”

You were sure that she was indeed talking about Carol, and you sat up straight in your seat, listening carefully. The whole table focused on Kristen and the story.

“…And I’m talking disheveled , her face was red and puffy, and she was sniffling, I could tell she was hyperventilating too. Man, I felt really bad for her… Anyway, she pushed away some people who stood in front of the sink and just put her entire head under it while the water was still running, I think she might have been crying. Yeah, and then she leaned on the counter, the water was dripping everywhere, and well she vomited and then ran away.” She took a bite of broccoli that she dipped in marinara sauce. You thought that maybe she would provide some more useful information, but it was better than nothing, and you were desperate.

“Huh, well thanks, Kristy.” You forced yourself to smile swiftly, as a sign of appreciation.

Rachel tilted her head and put her fork down, as her mouth fell open and she squinted her green eyes that pierced right through you. “Hold on, is the girl with the glasses that Carol? Childhood best friend Carol?”

“Yup, that’s her.” The girls oohed in response, and you sighed while dropping your shoulders down.

Everyone on the team knew the lore behind Denning and you, for better or for worse, and surely some of them shared classes with her too.

You contemplated the description of the state Carol was in after the fight you had, and you really didn’t want to believe it, because then, you must’ve done something truly horrible for her to let people see her weak and emotional side. You didn’t want to believe that you abandoned your wasted friend in the middle of an overstimulating party full of people she didn’t know, left by herself in such a moment of vulnerability, surrounded by tons of drugs and alcohol.

The worst kinds of scenarios flooded in, such as someone taking advantage of her, roofing her drink, beating her up, Carol overdosing, or even someone kidnapping her - what if that’s what happened and she was too scared, or embarrassed, or upset to come to school today? What if she couldn’t come at all? Your fingers traveled to the pimple on your cheek, maniacally picking at it.

Perhaps, leaving her be - because it seems that’s what you did, was even worse than the actual argument, with much more serious consequences, and you just let it happen, for whatever idiotic reasons your drunken self had.

Blood began to seep out from the scratched-up acne onto your fingers as Rachel snatched your hand, murmuring, “Stop that” before you could go too far. You shook your head, trying to make the thoughts go away, and Kristen handed you a tissue.

You ran up the stairs as fast as possible, nearly tripping because of your wet shoes. The door almost fell off its hinges as you burst into your bedroom, carelessly throwing the duffle bag away. You swiftly grabbed the note with Carol’s address and phone number written on it, and immediately rushed outside. The cold rain poured down from the gray, cloudy sky as you took off for her house on your bike, still in the soccer uniform and backpack on your shoulders.

This whole situation was bothering you the whole weekend, even more, today, and you were going to figure out what was going on.

It couldn’t go on for another week, or two weeks, or longer, or your brain would eat itself alive with the overthinking. It already was in the process of doing so - you couldn’t remember the last time you did so badly at practice, and you wouldn’t forgive yourself if you fucked up State Championships for everyone because of your anxiety over a childhood best friend.

The wheels hit the puddle potholes, and rainwater mixed with dirt of the streets splashed on your sneakers. The wind blew away the hood of your soaked jacket, some warm-toned leaves brushing past you, your faintly blue-hued fingertips gripping the handle. You had a feeling this adventure would end up with you catching a cold or an unbearable strep throat. The American landscape of gas stations, parking lots, diners, and fast food chains illuminated the streets. You passed by a crowded Domingo’s and made a final right-turn, riding in the middle of a long road full of houses surrounding it from both sides, looking out for Carol’s place. Almost no one was outside except for children playing in the heavy rain or exhausted yuppies returning from work. The street was remotely quiet, except for shouting coming from one of the houses.

During your time scoping out the surroundings, a middle-aged couple walked out of one of the buildings, the man yelling at whoever was standing on the other side of the door as it got shut close aggressively, along with a kid - most likely their daughter, who was talking with her mom. You looked at the address on the paper, and the house number matched the one you just observed, now aware that the parents and favorite child of the Denning family just reversed out of the driveway. You waited for them to drive past you and when they did you immediately got off your bike, charging towards the front door as it hit the lawn, the wheels still spinning, along with your head.

Out of nowhere, heavy trepidation filled your whole body, and a lump formed in your throat as you stood on the porch, almost glued to the oak floor. All the confidence you had went away with the snap of a finger, and the dropping levels of adrenaline brought you down to earth, but your heart was still pounding. Turns out, you weren’t ready to find out the truth, but you couldn’t back out now. You slowly raised your numb, cold hand and knocked repeatedly, until the door swung open, and when it did, your head jerked back and brows furrowed, slowly morphing into high arches as you crossed your arms.

“Um, hi? Oh, it’s you.” Barbara chuckled, with her hands in the pockets of her pants. “You’re mental, how did you even find my house?!”

“Hey, Barb…” Shit, this is awkward. She parted her lips as her tongue darted around inside the mouth, her wide eyes looking you up and down. A smirk grew on her face, and you could tell that some childhood memories came back to her. “...Uh, is Carol home?” You stammered, discreetly cracking your knuckles.

Miss Congeniality scoffed. “Oh my gosh, Y/N. I would’ve never guessed in a hundred years that you, of all people, would be on a high school sports team! I always took you for the artsy type.”

“Right, well, y’know, those two don’t exclude each other… Is Carol home?” You repeated.

“Ugh, yeah.” She stepped aside, letting you in, grimacing as she noticed water dripping everywhere. “Second door on the right.” Barb tilted her head in the direction of the upstairs as she closed the door. “Thanks…” You whispered, slowly walking up, tightly gripping the sleeve of your jacket.

Thank the gods you were drenched from the rain - you didn’t have to worry about the tremendous amount of sweat trickling from your forehead. You took a proper breath, the first one since you got on that bike, and knocked on the poster-covered door.

“Fuck off, Barbie!” Carol yelled out, her voice was weirdly strained and creaky. You debated if you should knock once again, or just walk in. You landed on the first, and heavy footsteps along with a loud groan and a “What the fuck do you want now?” followed towards you. Maybe you should’ve gone with just storming in; the hostile tone stiffened your muscles and you were so pale that if not for the racing heartbeat, you could’ve sworn you were dead.

She unlatched the door at full tilt, the sudden airflow cooling your wet, wincing body. As she saw you, she immediately shifted from being truculent and aggressive, to calm and collected. Carol leaned on the doorframe, squinting her red, puffy eyes as she took in how much of a mess you were. It took you longer than you’d like to admit, to notice fresh, oval-shaped bruises on her upper arm, which you kept on dwelling at until she rapidly hid the arm behind her back. You wanted to ask her about it, but you couldn’t utter a word.

“You look like hell, Engie.” The use of the nickname caught you off guard. How did she even know it? Carol turned her head away for a second to brush away something on her flushed face.

“How do you even-” You stuttered, shaking your head and blinking rapidly.

“What do you want?” She cut you off in a stern tone. Her jaw was slightly quivering.

You sighed, sucking in air through your teeth, still holding onto your jacket. “Carol, do you, do you remember what happened between us at the party? Or just anything?”

Carol scoffed, and her eyes darted around alongside a puffy pout in a mocking manner. “Well, I do remember. Quite a lot, actually.” She looked you up and down again, clenching her jaw with a now serious expression. “Looking at the state of you, and the fact that you had the audacity to show up at my fucking house, you probably don’t remember shit.”

“Yea, that’s why I fucking asked in the first place, Denning.” You let go of the sleeve and made eye contact with her, even to your surprise, retaliating her attitude. You were fed up and truly did not want to argue, but it seemed like that was the only way to make things clear.

She raised her brows and chuckled. “Alright. I’ll tell you how it went. You were drunk out of your mind, and so was your little best friend Vee, and some ginger girl was there too. You went to help her, and you left me all alone. That was a shitty move, Y/N. Then you came back and started comin’ at me, being all mad that I didn’t help too, or some other bullshit, and when I tried to tell you that I wasn’t feelin’ good too, you pulled out the childhood trauma card, blaming everything on me. And hmm… I think that’s it. Oh, and you also told me to fuck off before storming off and getting even more fucked up. I think you might have a drinking problem or somethin’.” Carol gritted her teeth and smiled at you with narrow, brown, glassy eyes. “Is that enough?”

Your stomach sank. You didn’t want to believe the words that just came out of her mouth. You understood now why she didn’t want to talk to you, after that, you wouldn’t talk to yourself either. She has been back in town for barely a week, and you already fucked it all up for you both. You had a feeling that you should just apologize and walk away now, but you were concerned about what happened after you stormed off, the bruise, and what happened for her to be crying before you even arrived. You might’ve left her alone that time, but you won’t do it now - no matter how much she asks you to.

You clenched your fists, nails digging into your palms. “Carol, listen. I’m bad at apologies, but I’m sorry, I was drunk, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I was worried sick on Saturday, and Sunday, and today. I’m, listen, please, just tell me if I did that to you. ” You pointed at the arm she held behind her back.

Denning averted her eyes from you and stared through the floor. “No, Y/N, it wasn’t you. You feelin’ better now?” She turned away, went over to the pile of clothes on her chair, and put on a sweater as you walked into her bedroom, closing the door behind you. Barb probably eavesdropped enough on that topic.

“No, not really. Did some asshole do this? Zach? Kevin? At the party? Is that why you, uh, you know, the kitchen thing…” You stood in the middle of her room, with boxes scattered around in the corners.

Carol groaned as you said “ the kitchen thing ”, running a hand through her hair and grabbing it by the roots. “God, you’re not gonna let this shit go, won’t you?” She sat down on the bed, and took off her glasses, tapping her foot and chewing on her lip. “It was an asshole, but not at the party, okay? I didn’t get raped or anything. And I told you, I also felt like shit, but you didn’t listen, seems like you’re not listening now either… But that’s why I puked, in that fuckin’ kitchen. Who even told you about this?” Her voice got weaker with each word, and she wrapped her arms around her knees.

A heavy weight lifted off your shoulders when she said that she didn’t get hurt at the party, but concern still lingered around. “Oh, Kris told me. Blonde hair, funky makeup, said you share Art period with her.” You leaned against her dark wood drawer chest, lightly picking at your face. “You know, you can te-”

She could tell where you were going with that and interrupted before you could continue. Maybe it’s for the better not to push the topic today, she was already in distress.

“Oh, her. She’s sweet.” Carol uttered.

She wasn’t angry anymore, her voice was dull and she gazed off into the distance, avoiding you, like something would snap inside of her if she caught a glimpse. Her shoulders slumped forward, almost as if she took on the burden that just fell off yours.

The sudden, longer-than-usual hollow silence, only broken by raindrops hitting the window, filled the room with a painful aura of vulnerability and, strangely, nostalgia. You kept on looking at an almost catatonic Carol, unsure of what to do, a childlike confusion, similar to when you see your parent crying for the first time. It’s been so long since you saw her like this, and every idea that came to mind just seemed wrong.

You could remember that she didn’t like pity, but also that she loved to be held. You sat down cross-legged next to her on the plaid blanket, and before you could do anything, Carol rested her head on your damp shoulder, holding her knees close to her chest, sniffling. For a while, you were kids again, and life was simple. Nothing could hurt you as long as you were in each other's arms.

#oitnb #orange is the new black #carol denning #fanfiction #fanfic #lesbian #ao3 fanfic #carol denning fanfic #carol denning x reader #oitnb fanfic

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nonhumanresources · 9 months

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Normalcy

Alright y'all, gonna start posting my writing here I think! Starting off with one of my personal favorite stories. I wrote this one a while back and iirc the ending is rough but it was well over the assignment limit oops so here we are lol. I'll streamline the formatting and such as I go so it's not all this clunky.

Summary: Laney is a dragon, which is a new experience for her. Fortunately, dragons can still operate cell phones, so at least she can tell someone else.

What to expect: dragon post-transformation POV, "how does a giant lizard navigate inside of a household," several questions about glass eyes, government agents, poor choices in drinkware, and a few space werewolves.

Length: 5.6k words

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Laney was a dragon.

That was not normal.

She knew normal, somewhat; it was driving a truck, picking up groceries, sitting with friends, watching TV and complaining about corporations ruining TV then watching it some more, buying cheap meals at the lab cafeteria. Being a dragon was exactly none of those things, last time she checked.

The only light in Laney’s room was the bluish glow of a cell phone, flashing on and off. Shards of glass were all over her head from when she’d tried to stand and slammed a horn directly into the lightbulb. Her tail slapped the ground in frustration as the phone shut off again, leaving her in darkness but for the sickly streetlamp glow behind her curtains.

Laney was a dragon, but she wasn’t panicked. She wasn’t. Things were going to turn out okay, she told herself. Over and over. Just like a not-panicked person would do. Okay, maybe a little more than that, but that was just nervousness. It was understandable to be nervous. If she could just get the dang phone to stay on, then things would be alright. The remains of the bed groaned as she shifted side to side, haunches settling into a slightly more comfortable position, reaffirming the discovery that a small room was not, in fact, that most comfortable place for a dragon to sit.

Rest of the story is in the read more! If you'd prefer to read it in a more convenient fashion, the google drive link is here. As always comments, questions, and thoughts are always appreciated.

Lots of discoveries were coming to light, actually. The aforementioned dragon-in-a-small-room theory; the weight limit on a standard Ikea bed frame (plus mattress and mattress pad); and most distinctly, that dragon claws did not, in fact, work on a modern touch screen device.

Growling came from deep inside her sternum, startling her. Another discovery! Laney was finding out so much - her bosses at the lab would be proud, as long as she wrote it all down, of course.

She shook her head. Being decidedly not panicked was getting distracting. She had to keep focused.

The phone screen illuminated the sharp curve of her snout as her claws, many times bigger than the small device, managed to snag the power button. That was a small success - now she just needed to follow it up. Her tail rose up from its position wrapped around her paws, a quick swipe across the screen bringing up the keypad for entering her password. The tip of her tail worked somewhat with a touchscreen - it just required careful precision to actually push what she wanted.

Laney snagged her tail tip in between two fingers, paw curled awkwardly to accomplish the feat. Caution was key, here. The paw shook as she tried to manipulate her tail into pushing the keypad. Lower… closer….

The top of the screen lit up with a glorious, wonderful 5, and Laney nearly roared in triumph. First success, after half an hour of fruitlessly trying to even reach this point! Next was a four, just a touch to the left….

“Oh, GOD wh—”

Laney was a dragon. She was also speaking English. Needless to say, that was more than a little shocking, and she just about choked on her words, letting out a massive, hacking gag, like an oversized, hissy dog. How did that even WORK?

Wh… whatever. Didn’t matter that an enormous reptile was somehow speaking a human language perfectly; if she could just open her phone and contact the lab, they’d help her. Sure, she was just a delivery driver, but they were working on some pretty advanced stuff - there was bound to be something that could… could help….

Her thoughts stuttered as she glanced back down and realized her phone had shut off.

Another discovery: being a dragon did not, apparently, limit Laney’s use of swear words.

It took another fifteen minutes to get back to the lock screen. Granted, five of those were spent panicking as a sharp crack rang out, then calming down as Laney realized it was just her bed frame, and not the phone. Right now, that was way more important.

She took a deep breath, chest almost ballooning outwards, scales rattling against each other. Laney held it for a moment, surprised, before letting it slip out, whistling between teeth and out the sides of her maw. Being a dragon was so… odd. Or something. Laney realized she’d unconsciously been suppressing her physical feelings, or at least forcing them to the back of her mind. Air trickling over her back as she shifted her wings; the wings themselves, like an extra, unruly pair of arms with a rubber flap; her paws on the carpeted floor; her tail shifting and swaying, soft scales on its underside slithering over the carpet. It was all so alien. Some things were familiar, but even brushing a paw against her front, where she expected to feel something like a hand on a stomach, it felt like her old skin was… stretched over this new shape, brain awkwardly trying to reinterpret nerve signals to fit her narrow view of life.

Laney glanced down at her lifted paw. Its green scales gleamed dully in the almost-darkness. It almost didn’t feel like hers.

She looked downwards and almost punched her tail right through her phone screen as it darkened, about to turn off. Too many distractions; she needed to call someone, now.

Focusing hard, she hunched over her phone intently. Using her tail like a stylus again, Laney managed that first five again, and even the four after it, with little trouble. Nine was next; an accidental six showed up, but she managed to hit the delete button this time, snagging the nine with the softest touch from a scale. Just a two left….

As her phone flashed and took her to the home screen, Laney nearly shrieked with joy. It worked! Finally! She was almost saved! The cellphone app was right at the bottom of her screen - another careful tap, and there was a list of contacts. One swipe, two, all the way down to S - and there was the prize: Stentson Laboratories, Inc. She immediately poked it, sighing with relief.

Luckily for her, although she didn’t realize it, she missed. Her phone displayed a name at the top, and it was decidedly not Stentson Laboratories, Inc. It was Sula Reiner. Laney groaned. Sula was a good friend - and also not who she needed right now. She couldn’t risk hanging up, though - obviously, the less actions on her phone, the better. It would go back to her contacts after the phone call went through; besides, it was nearly two in the morning. There was no way Sula would answer this late, so it was totally safe. She could relax for a moment, and—

“Hello?”

She almost choked on her own tongue, again.

“Laney? Everything alright? It, uh. Definitely sounds like you’re choking.”

“F-fine,” Laney choked out in response, clearing her throat (although it sounded more like a cat hacking up something behind the couch). “I’m fine, not choking.”

Sula laughed, her light voice coming through the speaker with a tinny quality. “Good, good. What’s up, then? You need something? You sound kinda sick”

“I…” What were her options, really? Laney was basically stuck in her room, covered in scales, with nowhere to go, and she couldn’t even operate her phone properly. Calling Sula was a mistake—but having someone else to help out… maybe that would be better. Sula was a pretty open person; maybe she’d be able to do something?

“Uh… yeah. It’s a lot to ask, but can you come over and help me? I’m… well, you’ll see. It’s not a prank or anything, promise.”

“Sure, I’ll be over there in a minute. Need me to bring anything?”

Laney blinked, staring at the phone as if by doing so she could see Sula’s face. “Wait, seriously? Just like that? It’s… I mean, it’s important, but—”

“Oh, yeah, no worries. I’m not getting any sleep anyway, trust me.” Sula sounded conversational, but that was a little odd. She acted as if she was nocturnal or something.

“Okay. There’s a key behind the mailbox on the wall.” Laney felt apprehensive, but the more she thought about it, the more this felt like the best solution.

“Be right there.” Click.

The dragon sighed, settled in, and waited.

—

Sula hummed as she walked through the dark towards Laney’s house. Streetlamps and the odd house light threw molten globs of light in all sorts of shades of yellow out onto the sidewalk. Her and Laney lived closer to the edge of town, in the rural neighborhood where they’d grown up. Sula had the patterns and shapes of the streets ingrained in her memory, the way the straight lines bent around the park and its surprisingly large lake.

Lately, though, she was more used to seeing them at night. It was her element—more so than most college students her age staying up late, working on essays. Their taste of the night came from breezes in windows and fleeting jaunts after sports games and club events. Sula had dove into the night head first, becoming a specter in the fleeting lights, a ghost to the daytime world.

That’s how she liked to think of it, anyway. It was a lot more interesting when she thought of it that way. Not that the truth was boring; it was really quite the opposite. ‘Alien by contract’ was a serious job title, but it wasn’t quite the aesthetic she was going for. Plus, she knew she wasn’t really a ‘specter to the daytime world.’ That implied people seeing her; that hardly ever happened, because most people were sensibly asleep at two in the morning. Not to mention she was wearing her oversized pajama top with a bunch of cute rabbits and a fleece bottom. That kinda took away from the whole specter look

The hum became a whistle—she was a great whistler—that echoed off the garage doors and vinyl siding of the neighborhood. A near-perfect rendition of the opening song to an anime she liked bounced off lawns and doors and into the sky. It petered off, though, as Laney’s house came into sight.

All the lights were off, which wasn’t really unusual for this time of night, but Sula already knew Laney was awake. Maybe she was just in the basement? Her parents were gone for the week on a business trip, so it was just her friend there at the moment. Still, her feet slapped against the pavement a little faster, her hands shaking slightly as they lifted the hanging mailbox away from the wall to snag the key underneath.

Maybe nothing was wrong, and it was just a panic attack, or something? Sula knew Laney’s tendency to clutch her emotions tight like they were birds trying to escape, and when one got away, they all erupted into the air in a storm of tears and feathers.

Yeah, it was probably nothing to worry about.

—

It was definitely something to worry about.

When she heard Sula yelling her name, Laney called out from the bedroom. She crouched down in front of the door, trying to look as nonthreatening as possible. Her paws shook - what if Sula….

Stop thinking of what if’s, she commanded herself, gulping a big breath of air and breathing it out slowly. I’m calm. I’m not panicked. I’m calm.

Sula’s ungodly screech upon opening her bedroom door nearly pushed her into being not calm.

“Sula, I—”

“LANEY! ARE YOU IN THERE?!” she screamed over her, hands held up warily, but thankfully not running away yet.

“Yes, I’m—”

“I’M COMING IN THERE!” Sula gritted her teeth, glaring right into Laney’s eyes so fiercely that Laney recoiled, shocked. Was she about to try and fight her? She was… oddly flattered, but no no no this was bad.

“Sula! It’s me! Stop!” Laney’s cries made her friend hesitate.

“I—well yeah, I certainly hope it’s you! I’m gonna come save you from the dragon that’s in your bedroom!” Her voice wavered a little. She was unsure, hovering in the doorway, eyes gleaming. She looked… wild. And the pause was because of Laney’s request, not because of the dragon.

Laney began to question a few things about her friend.

“No, I mean—Sula, I’m the dragon, don’t punch me, okay?” Her voice cracked a little on the word dragon. The smoldering, blue-green heat in Sula’s eyes burst alight into crackling curiosity.

“You’re the dragon?”

“Yes.” Laney hoped she sounded convincing enough.

“And this is… not normal?”

“Of course it isn’t normal, Sula! Are you high?!”

Sula barked out a laugh, to Laney’s chagrin, then put her hands back down to her sides and stepped up to Laney’s snout. “Weird things happen at two AM, dude. For some people this would totally be the opposite of a problem.”

Laney growled. “Doubtful! I can’t see why anyone would view this as anything but directly negative! I can’t even get out of my room!” Something about Sula’s presence kept her talking, as if this were an everyday conversation. Sula did that to everyone, she’d noticed - something about her made it feel like you could let your guard down, for a bit, and talk about whatever weird topic she was obsessed with this week.

“Yeah… this was, uh. Not the greatest place to change, huh?” Sula reached out a hand, hovering it over Laney’s snout. “May I?”

Laney snorted, but nodded. “Obviously not. And sure. Look, I need some serious help.” She felt her muscles tense as Sula’s cold hand lightly ran along the scales on the bridge of her snout, from her nose all the way up between her eyes. She ran her knuckles over it, harder this time, and Laney felt an intense shiver rattle her spine from head to tail. Her scales clicked and clacked lightly against each other like change in a pocket, and she could feel spines bristle across the center of her back. She felt like… how she imagined a cat, or something.

Sula just kept talking as if she didn’t notice Laney’s tail slapping the ground happily (a physical sensation Laney was not feeling emotionally). “Help… yeah. Why’d you call me for it?”

“B-be… becah… S-Sula, ssstop!” She yanked her head up and away from Sula’s hand, who let out a soft eep and stumbled backwards. “I can’t think when you’re doing that, geez… I didn’t mean to call you. You’re just right under the contact for Stentson and I misclicked it with my tail.”

Sula drew in a sharp breath. “Oh. Okay. Thank goodness I’m here and not them.”

“What? What’s wrong with Stentson Labs?” Laney tilted her head, what felt like a natural response to confusion in this form. “You worked there for a month or two last summer - it’s not like they’re THAT bad. Uptight, sure, but….” She trailed off as Sula shook her head.

“Nah. Nah, they’re bad news, Laney. I’d bet a whole lot of money that they were the ones who caused this—and that they’ve got someone sitting at the phone, waiting to pick up when you inevitably call.” Sula sounded… grim. It was unsettling. Laney could feel her scales rising again.

“You… you don’t know what you’re talking about. Just get my phone and, and call them, okay? Please?”

“This happened tonight, right?”

“Sula.”

“So yes, then. And you’re still on delivery duty—what were you delivering?”

“Sula!”

“Something important, then.” Laney stomped a paw, frustrated. Why couldn’t she have less stubborn friends?

“Yes! Fine! I’ll play your game!” Laney snapped, knowing it would be the only way to get Sula off of her tangent. “It was a new experimental compound we were shipping to the military again. It’s a government run lab after all. Probably just some new high-efficiency civilian eliminator. It’s not my job to care about it.”

“Did you like… spill it on yourself, or eat it, or something? Stentson has weird stuff going on behind closed doors, Lan.” Sula using her nickname was uncommon, these days - it was all she’d call her back in high school.

“Yes, Lu. I’m sure. We transported it in one of the freezer boxes. I had to take it out to replace the ice, but it’s not like it spilled—those capsules are air and water tight. I should know, my water bottle is one of the decommissioned ones.”

Sula opened her mouth to respond, then snapped it shut with a clack. “Where’s your water bottle?”

“If I tell you where it is, will you drop the silly idea?” Sula nodded. “Okay. Thank goodness. It’s next to the kitchen sink. I was gonna wash it later.”

Sula slipped out, shoes knocking across the wooden floorboards. She always walked so heavily. Laney’s mom used to tell her that was going to stomp so hard she broke right through the sidewalk one of these days. Well, those days, now.

Sula’s stomping came back in a moment, and she reappeared, illuminated from behind by the hall light, a large, pill-shaped hunk of metal in one hand. “You’re not gonna like this, Lan.” She tapped a finger on the side of the capsule, reading from a label. “3M E.C. (aq). Probably ‘Three molar aqueous Experimental Compound,’ if I had to guess, since scientists aren’t known for creative naming.”

“Give me that!” Laney shifted her weight, holding out a paw. Sula dropped the capsule onto it, and she curled her claws over it, turning it over to read the label herself. 3M E.C. (aq).

Great.

Sula spoke softly. “Did someone do this to you, Lan?”

Laney growled, a deep primal noise. “No.”

“Are you sure…?”

She sighed, nodded, and smacked her head on the ground. “Hopefully that military base appreciates the can of Monster they’re getting in the mail tomorrow.”

—

What a stupid mistake. Laney knew she hadn’t been getting enough sleep, but a slip up this bad could have cost her her life! Drinking out of random laboratory containers—aargh, just thinking about it made her want to slap her past self.

Sula was sitting against her side, humming. Laney’s declaration had caused her to burst out laughing, to which Laney politely requested she shut up for a minute and let her deal with this. Sula apologized and politely did so.

It was just… this mistake might have actually cost her life, in a different way. Laney was officially some sort of lab mutant now, ripe for experimenting on. She knew better than to believe sci-fi movies - she wasn’t going to be immediately dissected or something. That was a token comfort, though, against the reality that she would be locked in a secret lab (which were very much real) and run through test after test after test. More than likely to develop a weapon. That was one thing that sci-fi got right: the US was always looking for another weapon.

More than anything, she just felt… stupid. Her wings drooped on either side, trailing over her ruined bedroom’s floor, and even her tail had stopped moving. She had laid flat on the ground “to pout,” according to Sula.

Sula’s humming stopped. “May I speak now?”

Laney took a deeeeeep breath, in and out. “Permission granted.”

“Nice!” Sula pushed herself off of Laney’s enormous side and up to her feet. “You’re suuuper warm, by the way. I dunno if you can breathe fire, but I’d believe it. Now,” she said, walking over to Laney’s snout, hands on her hips. “Up! Let’s go!” Laney rolled her eyes.

“Where are we going?” she drawled.

“The park!” Sula sounded much too eager about this. What was she trying to do?

“I’m not going to the park when I can’t even make it out of the doorway.” Laney tried to make her words sound as dully disinterested as possible.

“You’re a lot longer than you are tall, Lan. Besides—I’m helping!”

“How.”

Sula winked, and Laney rolled her eyes. “Let’s just say that you’re lucky you called me instead of Stentson.”

“Look, Sula, I appreciate you coming over. I really, really do. But I don’t see how—”

“I’m a werewolf.”

Sula talked over her. Like, actually, honest-to-god just interrupted her mid sentence. She never did that. Not only that—it was also nonsense.

“Sula. Don’t.”

“Lan, you gotta stop being so dreary.”

“Sula, my whole body and life just got upended!”

She had the audacity to shrug. “You get used to it after the third or fourth time.”

“Stop trivializing this!” Laney growled again, the sound rattling hollowly through her throat and chest, powerful and menacing. She started to push herself to her feet - then ground to a halt as something large and furry slapped down on her snout with a wet plap!

Sula tried to keep talking conversationally, but Laney could hear the grin in her voice. “It’s contractual, but it totally wasn’t the first time—”

“Damn it Sula, what the—”

“It’s a pretty nice gig, really—”

“Sula what the ACTUAL hell is on my face?!”

“It’s my paw!” Laney could see where the fur thinned and lead into Sula’s regular, definitely human arm.

“It’s your—SULA. EXPLAIN RIGHT NOW. WHERE IS THIS FROM AND WHY IS IT SOAKING WET.” Laney had to force the words out gruffly, one at a time. This was too much. This… no. What was even going ON?

“I told you. Werewolf. Full shapeshifting, the whole jazz. Plus, I’m an alien werewolf, which is even cooler.” Sula pulled her paw back, revealing glowing green pads on her palm as it quickly turned back into an underwhelming human hand.

“Alien… excuse the hell out of me?” It was gibberish. Nonsense. She was crazy. Laney was stuck as a dragon with her insane friend. Or she herself was crazy. Because that was so… so absolutely, utterly, undeniably dumb.

“It’s awesome,” Sula stated.

—

“Let me—urf—get this straight,” Laney grunted, chest tight as her hind claws scrabbled against the wall of her bedroom, trying to push her sideways through the doorway. It was the only direction her shoulders could hope to fit.

“Go ahead,” Sula replied, splayed out like a starfish over Laney’s back on the other side of the wall, keeping her wings tucked in tight.

“You got abducted and turned into an alien… wolf… squid… thing.” Laney let out a yelp as the shoulder on bottom caught against the doorframe, forcing her to scoot backwards and wrangle it back into position.

“Correct.” Sula’s head poked through the doorway, around the bulk of her shoulders and chest. “Call me a specter of the night, if you so please.” Laney threw a derisive glance at her cheeky smile, and Sula took the hint, popping back into place.

“And the aliens were… rouge scientists.” Gods above, that sounded stupid every time.

“Correct again.” Sula shoved at Laney’s body, succeeding in helping her get one arm through. That was progress.

“So you made a contract with them.” Laney bucked herself upwards and slid the arm through, collapsing onto her side, panting, her whole upper body successfully extricated.

“Yep. Taught them the concept of a long term study, and then offered to participate if they stopped kidnapping people.” She slipped her head back through the doorway again. “It sounds way more noble than it actually is. I just can’t stand bad science.”

That was something Laney understood. They were both STEM majors, and she was just as frustrated by malpractice as Sula. Laney, however, was not insane like her friend apparently was.

Stay calm. No big emotions. They’ll get away from you.

Deep breath. OW wait okay maybe not that deep - she nearly snapped a rib pushing it against the doorframe. She skittered forwards like some sort of awkward crab. Luckily, the hallway split halfway down - if she maneuvered her top half into the split, she could pull her hips and legs through despite their awkward shape, then maybe… pull her top half back, bunch up like a worm, and she was home free. Or free from home, rather. The back of the house had a sliding glass door - it opened wide enough to carry a table through, and was, by extension, wide enough for a dragon. Perhaps not the intended use, but she wasn’t about to complain.

“And now… grk… we’re heading to their lab. Which is a giant fish-spaceship.”

“The Fiship, yeah.” Laney groaned, and Sula giggled somewhere near her tail. “Love calling it that.”

Laney shook her head. “Stupid….” Pulling herself forwards another few feet, she bent her upper body into the L of the hallway, her head pressed upside down against the floor. She was pleased to find that pulling her legs through the door was the one easy task she’d had all night, although she felt like a yoga instructor. While steadying herself after both hind paws made it through, Sula left the bedroom, skirting the wall beside the lengthy dragon.

“I’m gonna go make a path, move anything breakable.” Laney nodded, and Sula placed a hand against her neck, letting it slide along her scales until she was too far away and it slipped off.

They’d been friends since either one could remember. Laney and Sula, or Lan and Lu, or Loony and Sucker, depending on who you asked in middle school. Laney remembered her dad always saying he was shocked they stuck together - he could never tell if they were fighting or not, he said. In fifth grade, Sula called it their “forever-bond” and refused to explain what that meant. Sula’s parents encouraged it, even as Laney’s were skeptical, but neither one could disagree on the positive impact this weird child was having on their poor, shy little thing. Everyone tried to explain the friendship between the two seemingly incompatible children.

Sula never referred to her as a poor little anything. That was good enough an explanation for Laney. She was a chemist, not a psychologist.

Inching her way down the hall, trying not to scratch the paint on either side, Laney was surprised to see Sula before she heard her. Before she could comment on that, though, Sula held a finger to her lips and gestured behind her.

“We got company,” she whispered.

“Stentson?” Laney asked. Sula gave her a thumbs up. “Oh, great….”

“Listen—I’ll distract them.” Sula looked more scared about that than she had facing an actual dragon earlier. “You get yourself outside. Go through the Black’s backyard and turn right, it’s the fastest way to the park, if you shortcut through the irrigation ditch next to Teddy Morris’s house.” Laney was surprised by the detailed instructions, but nodded affirmatively.

“Got it. Stay safe.” What she wanted to say was Thank you, please don’t get hurt, this is my fault, I’m so sorry.

Sula kissed her palm and planted it on Laney’s snout, gave another thumbs up, smiled in a way that crinkled her blue-green eyes, staring back into Laney’s—oh. She… didn’t know her eye color anymore.

She blinked, and Sula was already heading back up the hallway as the front door rang with three sharp knocks. Laney had a sneaking suspicion that somehow, Sula knew exactly what she was thinking, and had already accepted and forgiven her apology. That girl….

Laney let a shiver run from her snout to her tail, letting herself feel her form again, for a moment. Sides brushing the wall as she breathed in and out. Long, forked tongue that picked up the taste of the air. Eyes that pierced every shadow. Powerful muscles flexing and relaxing under her scaled hide. Long, sinuous tail curling and uncurling.

As soon as another, louder knock hit the front door, Laney began to move.

—

Sula faked a yawn and tugged open the door with the slow, contemplative weight of someone who wasn’t always awake at three in the morning.

Cars with lights pointed at the front of the house lined the driveway and road. A man, dressed in a military uniform of some sort, a pair of dark sunglasses on his face, stood stock still on her porch, left hand rest near a hip holster. Sula could see the puff of a bulletproof vest under his shirt.

“Yyyeah? Wuzzat?” she mumbled, eyes half-lidded. The soldier looked her up and down.

“This is the Geralt residence?” he said in short, clipped syllables. It wasn’t a question. Sula let herself ponder what must be going through this man’s mind - stalling, and acting like a tired, mussy-haired student.

“Ma’am?”

“Oh! Uh. Think so, yeah.” Sula’s drunken slur was a direct opposite to the sharply-spoken man.

“You… think so,” he said, raising an eyebrow, hand drifting away from the holster. Good. Sula wasn’t worried about getting shot—the xenocanids had solutions for that sort of thing. She was more worried about Laney’s parents coming home to bullet holes in the walls.

“Thas’ wha’ I said, yeh?” She swayed against the door, clutching it, and spoke again as soon as the man opened his mouth. She saw his eyes crinkle with displeasure under the sunglasses. “Pretty sure, at least. Was las’ time I checked. I can go ask, if ya want…?”

Shades shook his head. “That won’t be necessary. Are you Laney Geralt?”

Sula shook her head. “Why would I be a Geralt? Sssay… wha’s with those shades, anyway? Moonlight too bright for ya?” She hiccuped and giggled, then—hearing the sound of something getting knocked over—broke into a full laugh. Shades tapped his foot impatiently, waiting for her to finish. Finally, wiping her eyes dramatically, she sighed and fell silent.

“If you must know,” Shades said, voice abrasive and irritated, “these are prescription. As it turns out, some people are judgemental about my lazy eye.”

“Oh.” Huh. Sula had figured it was just some sort of… intimidation tactic. “Ssorry, dude. You c… considered surgery? I h-HIC-heard there was a good one developed lae’ly.”

Shades tilted his mouth in a curious frown. “Wait, really? Where do they…” he seemed to catch himself, straightening back up and clearing his throat. “If you’re not a Geralt, what are you doing in their house?”

Sula heard the unmistakable sound of a sliding glass door slipping closed. Anyone in the neighborhood would have recognized it. She grunted, putting on a look of feigned surprise.

“Y… oh, you know what? You’re totally right. I don’t live here. My bad.”

And she slammed the door closed in Shades’ face.

—

Laney paced back and forth on the lakeshore, not caring who saw her. Where was Laney? She’d been waiting for over fifteen minutes. Which didn’t sound like a lot, but she was tired and stressed and NOT PANICKEDand it felt much longer than fifteen minutes, alright?

A splash in the water behind her. Laney spun, growling, and watched as a figure emerged from the water. “Sula?”

The only reply was garbled nonsense.

“L… Laney, don’t mess with me.”

“Grrrlllbrbb,” went the figure.

“I WILL bite you!” Laney yelled, backing up as four glowing green eyes opened along the creature’s vaguely canid face, fins framing it on either side. Its form was shambling and awkward on land, feet hardly more than two masses of tentacles, paws glowing and grasping, hunched over, odd looking tendrils curling from its back.

“Bbbllrbbb,” was her reply.

Laney was about to make a break for it when she heard Sula’s voice calling out. She whipped her head around, hissing, still stumbling backwards away from the monstrosity.

“WHERE WERE YOU?” Laney nearly roared, dragon lungs panting and huffing, smoke pouring from her nostrils. So I can breathe fire, then….

Sula ran out of the treeline, towards Laney and the monster. “Sorry, I had to give a bunch of grunts the slip!” She stopped and smiled that constant smile of hers once she was a few feet away. “And I see you’ve already met Nthrya!”

“Nith-what?” Laney growled, glancing at the monster, which had stopped in place. It was… waving at Sula. “You know this thing?” she asked, incredulous.

“Yeah, it’s Nthrya.” The word came out strange and hissing. It sounded like ‘nith-ri-a’ to Laney, which meant jack squat.

“What is a nith-ra?” Laney questioned. Sula wasn’t listening, though - she was staring at the monster, who was garbling at her.

“Nah, she’s not a normal creature. Yeah, that’s why you haven’t seen her. Yes, she’s a she.” It was like a one sided conversation, interspersed with garbling nonsense. “Yeah. Yes. Oh, yeah, it’s good to see you too! Look, Nthrya - we’re in a hurry. Can I bring her on the ship? I’ll explain it. Please? Yeah, you can.” Sula clapped her hands and turned to Laney. “That’s that, then!” She paused at the blank look on the dragon’s face.

“Oh, I forgot you, uh. Can’t speak their language.” She rubbed an arm sheepishly.

“Not at all,” Laney said dryly.

“Yeeeah. Well, he said you can spend some time on the ship, and they’ll work on a way to help us out. It’s even docked right now!” Sula pointed at the lake, which was very clearly empty.

“...Sula.”

“Oh! Sorry. Uh, these guys see in a different spectrum - the ship is pretty much invisible to you, but it’s right there saying hello for us. Just, uh….” She walked to the lakeshore, then out onto the water, floating above it. “Here, I’ll just guide you in.”

Well. It’s not the weirdest thing to happen tonight.

Laney was standing halfway on an invisible fin before a thought struck her.

“Wait, Sula, you can turn into one of those… things?”

Sula’s grin was as expected as it was cheesy. “I’ll show you sometime. It’s super gross.”

Laney couldn’t help but give a weak smile back, her emotions starting to cave in. She was gonna break down and cry, she thought.

At least Sula was here to let her.

“I’m sure it is,” she said, taking a deep breath and pushing forwards into the Fiship.

Laney was a dragon.

And that wasn’t normal. But it was alright, for the moment.

#writing wyrms #transformation #dragon #dragon tf #writing #fic #post tf #space woofers #sula reiner #laney #she doesn't get a last name <3 #I need to beef up these tags to get more readers tbh #I sincerely apologize #my writing #my stuff

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lance-space-mommy · 2 years

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F***ing Chair

Izuku was best friends with his guidance counselor. Inko knew about Izuku’s mental health and Izuku had no problem speaking his mind. Izuku had been hospitalized on a number of occasions because he told Inko. The guidance counselor was aware of Izuku being open with his mom which lowered the stress of betraying Izuku’s trust.

Izuku was incredibly depressed and struggled to cope with the bullying. Being able to wear a facade all day was exhausting as well. It was nice to walk into the counselor’s office and vent. While Izuku was open, he did hide it around his mother. He didn’t want her to worry more than she already was. Seeing the school counselor was the only option considering therapy was far too expensive.

Izuku had Major Depressive Disorder, Social Phobia, Attention Deficit Disorder, and was showing signs of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder more and more with every encounter of bullying he endured. It was clear the physical and mental abuse he received day in and day out didn’t help. There was no escape when he came home. Cyberbullying was just as severe.

During lunch, milk had been pored all over Izuku. Much to everyones shock, Izuku slammed his book shut and stormed out of the cafeteria. Katsuki scowled, irritated by Izuku’s dramatic reaction. The brown haired bully jumped, not expecting the retaliation. The other bully watched him leave, bewhildered before smirking.

“Let’s get him while he’s in the locker room!”

Katsuki didn’t have a problem with it, wanting to put Izuku back in his place. The other bully tagged along, lauging about how he was going to mock Izuku. They chased after him.

When Izuku’s three bullies spotted him down the hall, his shoulders were tensed, a milk trail following him. His book bag was in one hand and his notebook in the other. There was something about the aura he was radiating that made them uneasy. Midoriya stormed right up to the guidance counselor’s office, threw open the door and let it out.

“Do you know how much I want to fucking pick up a fucking chair and smash it across their fucking face?”

Katsuki stopped in his tracks, eyes wide in surprise. That went straight to his dick.

“Shit. Izuku’s told on us?” whispered the long-finger bully.

“That’s what you’re worried about? He sounds like he wants to kill us,” exasperated the brown haired bully.

Katsuki had more concerns than that. In that split second, he came to the realization he knew nothing about Izuku. He didn’t know Izuku cursed. He never would’ve guessed Izuku got angry. Katsuki wondered if Izuku already was telling the adults at school, was he telling Inko? In a matter of seconds, he realized his entire future lies in Izuku’s hands. Something about that made him oddly hot, feeling flustered by the information.

The guidance counselor didn’t even sound surprised by his outburst. “Oh I know you do. Thankfully you didn’t do it.”

Izuku took a sharp breath before slamming the door behind him. The building shook from the force of the slam, causing the three to share a stunned look. They all crept to the door to listen, needing to know more.

“I’m leaving my stuff here. I’m going to the showers and I’ll be back. I’m skipping next period,” informed Izuku. His tone was sharp, unsteady, and clearly still holding a lot of rage.

The counselor shook her head, fixing her notebook’s position on the desk. “Very well. I’ll try and dry off your things while you clean up.”

“Thank you.”

“No problem kid.”

The bullies booked it to a janitors closet down the hall to avoid getting caught. Izuku came out a couple seconds later, fingers flying on the keypads on his phone. When he disappeared down the hall, the group chose to part their separate ways and head to class.

Katsuki sat at his desk with a scowl. He was frustrated by his feelings. As much as he wanted to hate Midoriya and unleash his rage to make up for extreme weakness he was feeling, he truly didn’t want to. There was some deep fondness resonating within him. He was terrified and that excited him.

Izuku reappeared a period later with a drained expression. His hair was dry, his clothes were completely changed, and his bag and notebook looked perfectly fine. While the trio were mad their stunt didn’t leave any long lasting damage, they were glad their actions didn’t cause him to be so pissed off that he’d kill them.

None of the idiots wanted to be hit in the fucking face by a fucking chair.

#bnha #mha #izuku midoriya #midoriya izuku #mha deku #middle school bakugou #middle school deku #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #deku angst #badass deku #aldera junior high #bullying #fight back #intrusive thoughts #bakudeku

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yaoifag · 1 year

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the underpayed struggling school cafeteria girly watching me fail to type my id number into the keypad for the third time this month:

#i’m so sorry …

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i-just-had-a-dream-that · 11 days

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I don't remember the full thing but I was at school and the layout wasn't like my actual school it was more like monster high and the Addams family house type layout and i was on my way to guitar class and on my way there, there were other guitar students and new teachers who had those effortless toy like electric guitars that had detachable necks and like keypads instead of frets and no tuning pegs and they were showing them off and I was so confused on how they even worked that I missed my guitar class and had to go to physics, and then my friend was hungry and didn't have a snack so I gave them some cranberries that I thought were pomegranates and they liked the cranberries so much that they grabbed my arm pulled me into them and kissed me on the cheek a few times and it was wet and a little odd but I appreciated the gesture so I hugged them back and started walking to lunch and had to fight somebody in guitar hero on the cafeteria TV and there was this homophobic dude that was so scared of me that when I walked into the lunchroom to get the lunch he got blown back into the wall because I walked past him and then suddenly I was in the mlp equestria girls universe at the dance

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columbianewsupdates · 4 months

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Alphatechs USA Introduces Innovative School Cafeteria Keypad with QR Scanner

http://dlvr.it/T1cL3h

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desmoinesnewsdesk · 4 months

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Alphatechs USA Introduces Innovative School Cafeteria Keypad with QR Scanner

http://dlvr.it/T1cKv0

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missanthropicprinciple · 5 months

Note

I would like to read the Hermann jacking it to Newts calculations fic please 😇

Took me a while because I went to a used bookstore and then spent too long going through my old calculators. Can’t find my high school calculator that actually works, but I fired up one I found in the trash at work. This is filthy smut. Avert your gaze if you don’t like it. (Dead Dove: Do not eat)

“Hey Hermann, my phone died. Mind if I use your calculator while my phone charges?”

“I have a whole drawer full of them, Newton; you may choose whatever you like. I believe most of them are still functioning. Bottom right drawer.”

“Functioning,” Newt chuckled at the accidental pun. “Thanks dude.”

A few minutes later Newton put the calculator on the desk instead of in the drawer.

“You could have put it back where you found it,” Hermann said as Newton headed to the exit.

“I’m going to the cafeteria. Want anything?”

“No, thank you,” Hermann replied.

Hermann wondered to himself why Newton chose the Casio S-V.P.A.M. and not an TI-84 Plus. Newton could have just used a search engine on his computer if he did not need a graph calculator. The thought occurred to Hermann that the man chose it because of its similarity to “Final Pam” and a image of Newton laughing to himself, his brown eyes shining with mischief, entered his mind. The calculator Newton chose was a Visually Perfect Algebraic Method which allowed him to input mathematical expressions as they are written. Did Newton know that he could input expressions that way into a VPAM?

“The calculator interpreted his keystrokes,” Hermann thought to himself, touching the keypad.

Keystrokes.

Strokes.

“Oh dear, I feel some stirrings.”

Hermann ran his fingertips over the calculator where Newton’s, no doubt, grubby fingers had touched the keys. But the calculator appeared to be clean. He looked around to make sure Newton had not returned and swiftly exited the laboratory, taking the calculator with him.

“I wonder what he was working on,” he thought as he closed the door to his room.

He doubted that Newton would bother to save the results of such a simple calculation but Hermann retrieved whatever was there. He pressed keys.

[RCL]

[A]

8,933

“Oh it’s a prime number,” Hermann breathed.

The number was only divisible by one or by itself.

“Much like Newton and myself,” he mused, setting the calculator on top of the toilet tank, giving into the inevitability of impulsive human actions. (He would work out that probability at a later date.) He unzipped his trousers, freed himself, gasping at the feel of the cool air on his “raging boner” (he could hear Newton say those words in his head), and leant on his cane before taking himself in hand.

“Oh,” he whispered as he imagined Newton pressing the shift key and then the RCL key in order to save the number. It could not be something like the Hardy–Weinberg principle, he thought as he stroked himself languidly with a gentle touch. If that were the case, the saved number would be one. No matter what genetic probability Newton was calculating, it would always equal 100%.

“No doubt, 8933 is a random population of some vile creature he’s studying,” Hermann said, increasing his grip as he moved his hand more swiftly.

“What could he be working out? If he knew the population size already. He must be double checking a simple equation,” he thought as he was driven by instinct, allowing him to posit freely as he pleasured himself.

“He doesn’t know how to save formulas; how endearing,” he said aloud, his breath becoming ragged.

If Newton knew how to use saving functions, perhaps Hermann could teach him how to use formula functions on the calculator more efficiently. Surely, he must have learnt how to use mathematical equations for his biological research. He stroked himself faster.

“By Jove,” he said, tilting his head back slightly.

He imagined Newton typing in the numbers, perhaps slowly.

“Oh.”

He thumbed the head as he teased the frenulum. Newt had pressed the shift button. Hermann touched himself as light as he could stand it.

[RCL]

Hermann had no choice but to lick his palm and caress himself more fully.

[A]

The thought of Newton holding the calculator in his hand and feeling the buttons press down beneath his finger pads, the numbers appearing on the screen, the man successfully saving the number - it was too much. Hermann encircled the corona with a single finger to heighten his arousal before working himself with great speed until he was spilling. The very sight of it caused him to pulse several times and he could not help but cry out.

He stood breathing heavily, composed himself, and washed his hands before putting the calculator into his pocket. The lab was still silent and uninhabited. As he returned the calculator to the drawer Newton walked in with some containers.

“I brought you some soup, the kind you like,” Newt said cheerfully.

“That’s very thoughtful of you, Newton.”

They sat down at a table on Newt’s side of the lab.

“You got some color in your face,” Newt said.

Hermann nearly choked.

“You look pretty good. I’ve been worried about you lately because you looked more pale than usual. That’s why I brought you some soup because it has some nutrition in it.”

Hermann, still slightly flushed, thanked him and consumed his soup in silence.

#newmann #ficlet #not sfw #my fanfiction #my fan fiction

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paulcales · 1 year

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Mob Assist

Los Angeles, CA 2015

"Security, safe assist, room 864," crackles over my hotel-issued cheapass radio. Are you kidding me? I don't have time for my job now; I'm downing shots of espressos and surfing the Internet. While ESPN loads on my ancient computer, I pray for my supervisor to finally roll out of bed and come to work.

"Security, do you copy?" the radio loudly howls. I replied without emotion, "Copy, 864, in route," mimicking a phrase I picked up from the years wasted watching Law & Order.

Jumping up, I chomp down a handful of lint-covered mints I find in the pocket of my suit jacket. I grab my bag of professional safe-cracking tools and head out of the cluttered security office. I ran up the rusted metal stairs, stopping to appreciate the thick marijuana smoke filling the staircase. I wonder what carbohydrate-laden morsels the hotel's cafeteria will be reheating today.

Moving across the empty lobby, I'm struck by how incredible this establishment must have been a few decades ago. In step, I throw out cheerful greetings like hand grenades at the tired hotel zombies looking for caffeine. Each explosion produces sleepy smiles or the murderous scowls of zombie killers.

I hit the elevator alley and push the worn, undefinable button. Courteously, I hold the door for a group of foreign guests running towards the elevator. They drag designer luggage large enough to store an economy car. The shiny elevator door closes on the tiny space filled with happy faces illuminated by large cell phones. The adjacent elevator opens, and I jump into a prison of encapsulated methane gas. I fight to stay conscious.

Gasping for breath, I burst out of the elevator, searching for a toothbrush. I cruise down the quiet hallways looking for my destination with the whitest teeth in Los Angeles.

Knocking on the hotel's room door, I whisper "guest services" quietly so as not to disturb the other sleeping guests. Seeing that somebody in the room has blocked the light from the peephole, I adjust my suit and put on an award-winning bullshitting smile.

The door swings open. The spicy smell of last night's dinner punches me in the face. Staggered, I try not to pass out. A sweaty, hairy, and tall-as-wide man in his sixties stands before me. He wears only a tiny white hotel towel.

"Come in here," the man growls with an east coast accent from a suburb where they kill people for a slice of pizza.

"Good morning, I'm Paul; how can I help you," I utter as I enter the hot and humid hotel room.

Pushing open the closet door, he points his sausage-thick fingers to the wall safe, "Dis thing ain't working; I gotta get some shit out."

"No problem, this shouldn't take long," I answered while putting my tool bag down and kneeling in front of the wall safe. I place the red plastic sensor under the keypad and check for any tension on the door. The huge man eases in closer; his pointy towel barely inches from my face. Sweat flows from my forehead, or is it raining?

The bathroom door swings open, and out barges another large naked man in a towel, followed by a typhoon of Roman steam that raises the room's temperature by a thousand calories.

"Whose dis?" he pointed to me. "It's the' guy from da' hotel. He's here to fix the safe," the other sweaty man interjects.

Looking up, a prison wall of fat, hairy men wearing postage stamp-sized towels surrounds me. My fingers become numb; I fumble with my digital screen key. It's not working. I rerun it, and nothing happens. I restart the machine, praying for a magical fix.

"What's takin' so long?" the bathroom man bellows. Reaching under his towel, he inches closer to me. The towel is millimeters from my face. I squeak out a feeble excuse about the physics of hotel safes. I pound the code into the keyboard over and over again. I feel faint.

The safe pops open. I audibly praise the Lord before bags of white pills explode into my face and cover the floor. I stare until my jaw slaps my knee. Putting the tools back into the bag, I slowly stand. My eyes never make contact with the gentlemen.

Stepping out of the quicksand of pills, the bathroom man, his hand still under his towel, mutters, "We got a problem here?"

I look down at the mound of pills and up at the two men. The man pulls his hand out of the towel with a wad of cash larger than a spare tire. I fear what he might pull out next. He peels off a hundred-dollar bill and slowly slips it to me.

"Like I said, we gotta' problem?" he barks a few octaves higher and six inches closer.

Grabbing the damp bill, I shake my head, "No, um . . . . No problem here sir. Have a great day and please don't hesitate to contact me if you need anything."

I open the door and exit out to the hallway, closing the door behind me. In the stillness of the empty early morning hallway, I take a deep breath of fresh air. I smile and pocket the tip.

I head down to the security cage, and my radio pops to life, delivering my next raffle ticket of hotel excitement.

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alphatechsusa · 18 days

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Specifically designed for US school cafeterias, AlphaPad is a classic pin pad allowing students to type in their ID code.

#alphatechsusa #school cafeteria pin pads #school cafeteria keypads #cafeteria pin pads #keypads #cafeteria keypads #school lunch keypads #alphatechs usa #cafeteria keypad #custom keypads #AlphaPad

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odxrilove · 3 years

Text

☆ 3:35AM

pairing: idol!huening kai x f!reader

genre: fluff, friends to lovers, idol!au

wc: 1.35k

a/n: huge thanks to xie for beta-reading this!! love you lots <3

synopsis: in which you're having some trouble with a choreo and huening kai decides to keep you company all night long.

sweat ran down your neck and temples, staining your top and coloring the fabric a shade darker. you groaned as your head pounded, the song from earlier still replaying in your mind. as you half-closed your eyes in exhaustion, your feet brought you to the cafeteria's vending machine, resulting in you bumping your hip on one of the tables.

"fuck" you cursed, mumbling to the table "you're just always in the way"

you let your head hang low for a few seconds before bringing it up to look at the snacks and drinks. you scanned them one by one, hesitating while searching your pockets for cash.

it was late and the cafeteria lights were turned off, leaving you in the dark with the only source of light coming from the hallway. you're once again staring at the rows of snacks, biting your lip in concentration as you hesitate between the two most unhealthy snacks of the machine, when a mouvement from the corner of your eye suddenly catches your attention.

you turn, staring warily at the hallway. when silence overtakes the room, you turn back to the machine in front of you.

after deciding which snack you would take, you pushed the coins in the slide, hearing them clinking. with an ache in your shoulder, you pressed the buttons one by one, slowly so as to not mess up the order. pushing the final button, your eyes travelled up from the keypad to your long-awaited snack, watching it slide towards you before falling down-

and getting stuck against the glass.

you whined loudly and closed your eyes in frustration, bumping your head on the glass repeatedly to make it fall.

"hitting your head won't help but continue if you want some pretty bruises on your forehead."

you shrieked and jumped, your body crashing into the vending machine harshly. a chuckle echoed of the walls and as your eyes landed on the person, you sighed in relief. "god kai, don't scare me like that ever again," you spoke up, leaning against the machine.

he chuckled again and walked towards you, stopping right in front of you as he leaned down. you could feel his breath on the side of your face. "need any help?" he asked.

a nod from you was enough for him to stand up straight and hit the side of the machine with his fist. you pulled yourself together and turned around to see your snack fall down. the tall boy leaned forward once again, opening the little drawer and retrieving your snack before handing it over to you with a smile.

you smiled back and blushed, thanking him before looking away.

"are you done for the night?"

you shook your head, "not yet, i'm having some trouble with some choreo. you?"

this time, it was his turn to shake his head, lips in a thin line, "if you're having some trouble with choreograhpy, i'm not letting you spend the rest of the night here alone."

you only giggled. he was going to be exhausted tomorrow. though you had to admit that you didn't mind him staying with you. he looked puzzled as you laughed freely, which made you laugh even more. "dumbass" you said between giggles.

he stopped walking and turned his whole body towards you, tilting his head to the side, "dumbass huh?". you put your hands on your hips, leaning forward to whisper, "yeah dumbass."

a mischievous smile adorned his face and less than a second later, he had stolen your oh-so-precious snack from your hands and started running up the stairs, giggling like a kid the whole time. you ran after him, trying to catch up, "hey come back here! i swear, i meant it affectionately! don't make me run after you!"

but the boy already was two floors above you, cackling and shouting a "come catch me, lazy!" from the staircase.

instead of being the mature person of the story, you let your inner child free and followed him, running up the stairs with haste, you called out for him, because in the end, you could never say no to huening kai.

–

with your hands on your knees, you try to catch your breath, lifting your head slightly as to send a death glare at kai, –who's trying his best not to laugh at you.

"huening-kai, i warn you, you have five seconds to give me back my snack." you speak up as you walk over to him, throat dry from the running.

kai looks at you from his seat on the floor, back pressed against the wall mirror of your practice room, as he smiles sweetly. he starts to crack up when you begin to count to five, holding onto your snack in his hoodie pocket.

just before you can say five, a hand wraps itself around your wrist and pulls you down quickly. you finish with your butt on the ground and a chuckling kai next to you. you groan and pout as he begins opening the plastic, unwrapping the cereal bar and breaking it in two, handing you a half and stuffing the other in his mouth.

you look at him baffled and he turns his head towards you, smiling widely at you with crumbs on his lips. you playfully push his face away, hand pressed against his left cheek.

"hey, you have the bigger piece!" you protest. "which is really unfair as i paid for it!"

he swallows the snack before throwing an arm around your shoulder and bringing you closer. "don't worry, i'll pay you back. i promise."

you quirk a brow, "and with what may i ask? you're always the one saying you're broke!"

he laughs again but this time, it's softer and it lasts only a few seconds before it dies down. he looks down at you and smiles softly, brushing a stray of hair out of your face. he blushes slightly and whispers almost in embarrassment, "with my love."

your voice gets caught in your throat and your cheeks and the tip of your ears turn red. kai hides his face in your neck and you swallow hard. it's silent for a few seconds and you try to focus on your own heartbeat, –which is going wild, instead of his heavy breathing in the crook of your neck.

when you realize he's waiting for an answer, your eyes widen and you clear your throat awkwardly. you look at the strings of kai's big hoodie, pulling on one of them as you keep your head low. taking a deep breath, you lift your head up and gently take kai's face in your hands, gazing at him with hearts in your eyes.

he's suddenly very shy and instantly looks at the floor instead of you. you sigh softly and rub your thumb over his cheek, making him close his eyes as he leans in the palm of your hand.

you bite your lip again before breaking the silence with a whisper, "i would like that, yeah".

kai's happy as he smiles widely at you, face inches away from yours. he wraps his arms around your waist and pecks your nose quickly before wrapping you in his arms, chests pressed against each other as your giggles fill the room.

he leans back against the mirror with you huddled in his lap, your face pressed in the soft and warm material of his hoodie. your fingers grip onto his arm and you nuzzle further into him, already feeling sleepy.

his phone beeps in his bag and he knows it's his hyungs, but when he hears your little snores, he decides that it's not worth waking you up. you look so peaceful and cute in his lap.

kai looks down at you one more time to make sure you are comfortable and secure before kissing the top of your head and closing his eyes, whispering a small "we have a deal then"

he falls asleep with you in his arms, your slow breathing filling the room.

taglist: @0x1lovebot @itsyaapollochild @sunshinelixie-lee @fairybinie @meraniki

please do not copy, steal or repost any of my work. all content belongs to @odxrilove

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yeosatinyngz · 2 years

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Chapter IV

“Exchanging Numbers”

➼A/N: I’m sorry if the pacing seems a little rushed to you, this is a short series so it was hard for me to pace certain events. Especially since I wanted Izana and reader to be acquainted asap😅 so please bear with the terrible pacing

Previous | Next | Masterlist | Bonus Chapter

You were in the cafeteria with Nobara, Megumi, and Yuji. You all were just talking about stuff and Nobara was doing your hair. “And there, done, how do you like it?” Nobara says while you took your phone out to check how it looked with the help of the camera app. She put your hair up in space buns. “It looks so cute, thank you!” Nobara had no time to reply back because Izana interrupted your conversation. “Hey come with me, we’re going to work on our project” “Wait-” he didn’t give you any time to respond and dragged you away from your friend group to his table.

You were greeted by the sight of the Haitani brothers and Kakucho. “Hello Rindou Kun and Hitto San.” They both said hello back to you. “Oh and hello Haitani San” “Hey sweetheart, just call me Ran, and your hair looks almost as cute as you” he sent a little wink your way. You froze up and a tiny dust of pink covered your face. “Thank you” you shyly let out while avoiding eye contact with the older Haitani. Izana interrupted any further advances Ran could pull by saying “give me your phone” you turned your attention towards him “uh ok” You handed him your phone. You have the raise to wake feature turned on for your phone so as soon as Izana got ahold of your phone your lock screen popped up. It was a picture of you happily hugging an unimpressed Megumi and you noticed how Izana’s eyes narrowed while looking at it. “Ah sorry, lemme open up my phone, why did you want my phone anyway?” “So I can put my number in it, how else are we suppose to talk to each other regarding our project” “Ah good point” You open up the phone app and clicked on the keypad button and handed it to Izana so he could enter his number in. He then handed it back to you when he finished. “So how should we start our project?” “I don’t know, I’m no longer in the mood to work on it now.” Bruh, is this dude serious? “Oh if so, I’ll take my leave then.” “I didn’t say you could leave.” This not only caused confusion for you but the other boys as well. “Huh?” “Since we’re going to be working together, might as well get to know each other” SIR WHAT?! I DON’T WANT ANYTHING TO DO WITH YOU- The Haitani brothers and Kakucho all look between the three of them. Something is up with Izana They all thought.

➼Taglist: @sunahyejin @cryszus @soushswag @gabytodd @wakasagurl

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thenatashamaximoff · 3 years

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Back To You

Summary: What are the chances that a nuclear attack threatens New York when you decide to take Tony’s newest Iron Man suit on a joy ride? Very high, actually.

Pairing: Wanda x Reader

Warnings: death, panic/anxiety attack

Words: 9,840

Check out my masterlist!

requested by @sapphiclyartistically

"Access denied."

You groaned in frustration at the voice, smacking the keypad with your palm and listening to it beep under your touch. You tried your pin once more, throwing your hands up in the air when the voice repeated her statement. You chewed your lip, lost in thought as you stared at the keypad, seemingly screaming at you louder than the voice, ACCESS DENIED, like you didn't get it when the voice said it out loud. You knew it wasn't going to work, but you pulled against the door anyway out of desperation. It didn't even budge.

"What are you doing?"

Your throat clenched as you gasped, jumping up on your toes as you twirled to look at whoever snuck up on you, holding a hand to your heart when you saw Wanda. The smile on her face sent butterflies through your stomach as you settled down, crossing your arms over your chest and pouting. "That was not cool," you stated bitterly.

She released a laugh, tilting her head at you. "That doesn't answer my question."

"Tony locked me out of the lab," you expressed, throwing your thumb towards the door behind you. You knew Tony’s code, but he made it so he gets a notification whenever someone uses it. You don’t know why he just doesn’t change it. Probably because he enjoys catching you in the act all the time and watch you try to squirm your way out of it. That sick sonuvabitch.

And then you raised an eyebrow, a smirk crawling on your lips as you stepped closer to Wanda.

She saw where this was going immediately, crossing her arms over her chest to block you as she shook her head. "No. I'm not going to get in trouble because you want to play in his lab. He took your access away for a reason."

You took another step to her, your hands finding her wrists and tugging her arms free from her chest, wrapping them around your waist and grabbing the back of her neck to pull you close to her. "Please, baby?" You brushed your nose against hers before moving your lips to her neck, hearing her sigh when they made contact. "I'll do whatever" - you kissed a spot on her neck - "you" - another kiss, your lips trailing alongside her and you couldn't help but smile as her head tilted, giving your more surfaces to kiss - "want later."

She absentmindedly pulled you flush against her, her hands roaming up your back as you continued dragging your lips across her skin, going up her neck and down her jaw. Your lips eventually brushed against hers and her breath hitched in her throat.

"All you have to do," you whispered, "is enter your pin."

Still connected to you, she gave up all logical thinking and stepped towards the keypad, hastily throwing in her pin. The laughter coming from the back of your throat vibrated against her jaw and she released a soft moan as you pulled her tighter against you. Her mind was fuzzy, willing to do whatever you asked as long as you just didn't stop, but the second you heard the door unlock, you peeled yourself away from her and pulled the lab door open.

She stood there for a moment, dazed, before following you in. You knew you were going to pay for that later, but for now you were going to enjoy the moment in the lab.

"So, why did he restrict your access?" Wanda questioned as you made a beeline towards one of the computers. You pointed towards a wall, Wanda following your finger to see a giant hole going through it to the outside. "Y/N, what did you do?"

You laughed as you sat down in the chair, waking the computer up. "It's not my fault. Tony left one of his Iron Man gloves out so I did the most reasonable thing anybody would do and tried it on." You shrugged. "I'm sure you could imagine the rest of that story."

Wanda lingered a few feet behind you, watching you type away on the computer. She loved watching you when you got into work mode like this, your eyebrows slightly pinched in concentration and the tip of your tongue jutting out as you pressed it between your teeth. Your foot never seemed to sit still, bouncing your knee as you focused on the screen in front of you. This was how she had first met you. She was new to the Avengers and you were sitting in this very lab, not giving her the slightest bit of attention when Tony tried to introduce the two of you. You were way too focused to pay attention to any outside sources, not allowing anything to interrupt your work. Tony seemed proud at the time, unlike a normal person who would be annoyed at your behavior and consider it rude. That was when Wanda knew she had to be able to hold you in her arms as you slept.

She managed to find you in the cafeteria later that day, being able to introduce herself to you properly rather than watch you in the lab from afar. She fell hard for you the second you smiled at her.

"There it is." Your voice cut through her thoughts and her eyes wandered to the screen in front of you. She walked the rest of the way to place a hand on the back of your chair, leaning over your shoulder to get a closer look at the screen. "Tony's newest suit." You saw a brief glimpse of the blueprints yesterday, before getting distracted by the glove. He caught you before you could go back to it, having heard the giant blast and running. The look on his face when he saw it, disappointment.

"This is all you wanted?" She laughed as she straightened her form. "And here I thought you wanted to blow something else up."

You looked up at her, eyebrows furrowed. "I'm not a teenager anymore, Wanda," you declared proudly. "I am an adult and a very responsible one at that."

She looked towards the hole in the wall and back at you, a small smile on her face as her eyebrow quirked upwards.

You rolled your eyes. "That was so long ago. I don't even know why Tony hasn't fixed it yet."

"I'm pretty sure it happened just yesterday," Wanda declared. She was in here less than 24 hours ago and she would have seen the eye sore in the wall.

"Yesterday is a long time, baby," you countered, placing your hand over hers on your shoulder as you turned your attention back to the computer. You quickly decided to change the subject. "Look, this suit is his best one yet! It has nanotech!"

She smiled at your giddiness, looking away from the computer to watch your face light up. She was so busy staring at you that she didn't take note of the quick flash of your finger pushing down on the spacebar. She didn't even bother listening to a machine whirring to life somewhere behind her until you stood up and stepped away from the computer.

She turned around to see a prototype of Tony's arc reactor coming out from the top of a table, a light shining down on it as it rested in the middle of a small pedestal.

"Y/N, what are you doing?"

The smile on your face didn't waver a single inch as you walked past her to the arc reactor. "This is Tony's newest suit," you told her, ignoring her question. "He hasn't even tested it yet!" You laughed as you reached for it, but was pulled to a sudden stop as a red glow surrounded your hand. You looked at Wanda, eyebrows furrowed.

"I'm not letting you blow another hole in the wall," she stated.

"Fine," you said. "I won't touch it."

She searched your eyes, looking for even the littlest hint of a lie, but she couldn't find one. When she released her hold on you, you took your hand away from the arc reactor and she let out a breath of relief. "Let's get out of here before Tony comes in."

"Let me put the thing back," you stated bitterly as you made your way back to the computer. "Don't want him to know we tampered with it. Well, almost tampered with it." You sat back down in front of the screen as both of your phones emitted a beep. She pulled hers out as you remained focused on the computer. She felt her worry simmer down as the pedestal made the noise to go back into the table, hiding the arc reactor out of sight.

"There's an emergency," she said, "and they're calling for us."

You waved your hand. "Go. I have to clear your pin to hide us ever being in here today."

"Y/N-"

"Wanda, I promise I'm not going to blow anything up in the lab," you said, looking at her. Your eyes were pleading as she stepped towards you, the worry etched on her face as she reached for you. "I'm just trying to avoid a grounding." You accepted her hand, bringing it to your mouth and pressing a soft kiss on the top. "Plus, they'll be even more suspicious if we both show up late."

She smiled as she leaned down to plant a soft, deep kiss on your lips, however brief. She straightened up and placed a hand on your cheek. You found yourself leaning into the touch, your eyes fluttering close as she stroked her thumb across your skin. You could stay like this forever, her touching you so gently, but when your phones released another impatient beep, she pulled away from you.

"I'll see you there," she said and you nodded as she walked away. You turned back to the computer.

The lab door closed behind her, sending a glance towards it. She wanted to stay with you, a feeling in her stomach and a tiny voice in the back of her mind told her to go back in, her hand even reaching out to put her pin in the keypad to go back in, but when her phone beeped once more, she seemed to snap out of her daze and leave the lab behind, ignoring the feeling and the voice.

Reaching the conference room, she noticed all the Avengers were waiting patiently. Tony was distracted by something on his phone, Natasha and Clint were lost in conversation, Bruce was minding his own business by keeping his head down, and Steve was standing at the front of the room, arms crossed tightly over his chest as he waited to start the meeting.

"Where's Y/N?" Steve questioned.

Wanda glanced at Tony, noticing that he was still too busy on his phone to focus on Wanda's answer. "She's running a bit late," she said, looking back at Steve with a smile as she moved to sit down. "She said we can start without her. She'll just be bored throughout this thing anyway." It wasn't a lie. You could never get through a meeting without sitting still or changing the subject, much to Steve's displeasure. And she couldn't help but smile, knowing you do it on purpose.

He'd be trying to talk about the kidnapping of the president and you'd somehow seamlessly transfer the topic to how bees have two stomachs. That would get everybody arguing, Steve trying to get their focus back, but it was too late. The damage would already be done.

Steve shrugged, silently agreeing with her statement, and cleared his throat loudly. Everybody hushed down, Tony picked his head up and tucked his phone away. "The Pentagon has been receiving mild threats against the States," Steve started. "It started out with controllable things, such as delaying the subway or changing the routes of flights."

"They couldn't handle that?" Tony questioned. Wanda looked down to hide the smirk growing on her face, seeing where you had gotten your attitude from and it shows. If you were here, you would've said it instead.

"They did handle it," Steve defended. "The threats stopped for a couple weeks. They figured it was just a bunch of kids having fun."

"A bunch of kids who can hack into government systems," Natasha added.

Steve sighed, knowing he was losing this battle in defending the Pentagon. "Well, now they're back and they hacked the nuclear missiles."

That seemed to get everybody's attention, Bruce picked his head up with a face contorted into worried confusion, Tony leaned forward in his chair. Natasha's form tensed and Clint rubbed his face. They all seemed aggravated, wondering why the Pentagon is just now doing something about it. Tony was thinking why they didn't change their security after the first time. Bruce was wondering why he was here - there's nothing the Hulk can do about nuclear missiles. Clint and Natasha were claiming the same exact thing: they didn't get paid enough for this. Everybody but Steve seemed annoyed.

"They're threatening to launch unless they get over 27,000 in bitcoin by three o'clock," Steve said.

"That's 1.5 billion dollars," Tony clarified.

"By three o'clock?" Clint scoffed. "That's less than five minutes."

"The Pentagon can't hand over the bitcoin, which is why they contacted us," Steve explained. It's not that they can't, it's that they don't want to. They know that the second they hand over the money, they'll just up the price. They need to make an example out of these attackers.

"We can't stop a nuclear attack in less than five minutes," Bruce spoke up. "We can't stop a nuclear attack at all."

"We did it once," Steve retorted, placing his hands on his hips, "we can do it again."

"No, actually, I did it once," Tony corrected.

As everybody started arguing, Wanda's attention was drawn to the window behind Tony, eyebrows furrowed when she saw a flash of Iron Man's suit fly by, wavering all over the place unsteadily. She looked at Tony, then back out the window. Tony was right here, why is one of his suits out there? Unless it's malfunctioning. Looks like that could be the case considering it can't even fly in a straight line. There's the off chance that someone hijacked one of his suits and decided to take it on a joy ride, but that's highly…

Wanda's eyes widened in realization and she was on her feet immediately. The "oh, no" that came out of her caused the argument to die in everybody's mouths, all heads turning to her. Her mouth propped open, her eyes wide, she sucked in a deep breath. "I just realized that I… have something I have to do." She made her way to the door.

"What's more important than a nuclear- And she's gone." Steve sighed.

"There goes one of the people who can actually stop this thing," Clint stated.

Tony stood to his feet and followed her out of the room.

"And another one," Natasha added.

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Ten minutes prior

"I'll see you up there," Wanda said, walking away after you nodded. You turned back to the computer, listening for the door to close shut before typing on the computer, a wide smile crossing your features as you watched the arc reactor prototype make a reappearance.

When your phone let out a third annoying whine, you took it out of your pocket and threw it on the table, leaving it behind as you crossed the room to the arc reactor.

You marveled in it's beauty, running your fingers across the smooth, glass top. You breathed out excitedly as your hand drew away from it, remembering the promise you made to Wanda. The last thing you wanted was to break a promise with her. Your relationship was so good, you didn't want to add unnecessary pressure on it because you couldn't control the engineer inside of you.

And then you remembered wearing that glove yesterday, the excitement coursing through you as it glowed to life in your hand, the feeling of power when you accidentally blasted that giant hole in the wall. You didn't even bother trying to hide it from Tony - there was absolutely no way you were going to hide a hole that size. He saw it Immediately and grounded you from the lab for a week. It's only been a day and you were already going through withdrawal.

"I promise I'm not going to blow anything up in the lab." That's what you said. In the lab.” You can still keep the promise and have fun. Because if you wear the suit outside the lab, then you won't blow anything up inside the lab. What a genius loophole.

Without another moment to waste, you snatched the arc reactor prototype off of the pedestal and pushed it against your chest, feeling the nanobots crawl over you as a suit of armor formed. Your heart hammered against your chest with a high you couldn't feel anywhere else, not being able to sit still as you became Iron Man.

Everything was in 4k when it was all said and done, the screen inches from your face scanning everything in the room when you looked at it. In the corner of the screen you saw the battery this thing had, seeing that it was just barely over 50%. The least Tony could've done was charge the thing.

Now, the question was: how were you going to get out of the compound without attracting the attention of all the SHIELD agents out there? When you looked up, you almost smacked your forehead. This was definitely a sign you couldn't ignore. This is what the universe wants. And who were you to refuse the universe?

You positioned yourself a few feet away from the hole, moving into a sprinting position, your palms facing out behind you as you anticipated the thrust of the jetpack, but when nothing happened, you straightened your posture.

You clapped your hands together, even tried to snap your fingers, but to no avail. You groaned, shaking your hands. Nope, didn't work.

"How the hell do I fly this thing?"

You were suddenly launched forward, smashing through the wall a few feet to the side of the hole that was already there. So much for keeping that promise. The thrusters stopped working and, being on the top floor of the compound, you were plummeting three stories down to the ground.

Panic rushed through you, regret just the cherry on top of that as you twirled through the air, your stomach dropping to your feet as you realized… what a stupid way to die.

"Fly, fly, fly." The thrusters in your palm went off at the perfect moment, landing flat on your stomach on the ground safely. You climbed to your feet, looking around to see a couple bystanders staring at you.

"Hi, Mr. Stark," one greeted and you sent him a friendly wave. "Are you okay?" You held up a thumb, gave him a salute, and flew upwards. You couldn’t talk, they would know something’s up when it was your voice and not Tony’s. As if they’re stupid enough to not know something’s up when Tony didn’t say anything - he always says something.

You zoomed around the building, unable to keep your balance as you soared through the sky. You pictured Tony flying through the air and copied his movement, straightening your form and flying steadily as you flew further and further away from the compound. Laughter escaped the back of your throat, followed by a victory yell as the outside world flew by you.

"Good evening, Mr. Stark." The voice came out of nowhere, scaring you and making you lose your balance for a brief moment. You looked down, trying to fix yourself, but when you picked your head back up, you gasped when you saw a building a few feet in front of you.

"I don't know how to turn!" you screamed as you braced for impact, your eyes squeezing shut and your hands going up to cover your face.

Your flying came to an abrupt halt, opening your eyes and lowering your arms to see the building mere inches from your face. You floated in the air, standing up as you looked around.

"You're not Mr. Stark."

"F.R.I.D.A.Y." You sighed out in relief. "Let me down." You wondered if she was still salty about you locking her out of her own system that one day long ago.

You had wanted access to Tony's blueprints. He mentioned he was giving Peter Parker an upgrade on his suit and you, being the nosy engineer you were, wanted a peek. F.R.I.D.A.Y. wouldn't let you see it and, no matter how many times you warned her, she wouldn't listen. So, you locked her out of the system for a measly little five minutes. Suffice to say, she wasn’t very happy once you let her back in, giving you an attitude whenever she had to say something to you.

"Y/N," F.R.I.D.A.Y. greeted and you groaned. Yep, she was still salty. “Setting destination.” You watched as the screen changed in front of you, seeing that she was planning on putting you in autopilot mode to send you back to the compound.

“No. No, no, no, wait.” The suit forced itself to turn around. “Let’s talk this out, F.R.I.D.A.Y. Look, I can give you an upgrade Tony wouldn’t give you. Just name it.”

The suit laid flat in the air, the rockets thrusting you forward as you made your way back to the Avengers compound at a reasonable speed.

“What do you want? Uh, I can give you missiles!” An AI with missiles? What kind of bribe was that? That's like asking a kid if they want to do taxes. Panic engulfed you the more you got closer to the compound, your thoughts racing to try and weasel your way out of this. F.R.I.D.A.Y. was such a vindictive machine. The love/hate relationship the two of you had was always leaning more to the hate side. “You know, you’re not so innocent yourself!” Suddenly, the suit stopped flying and straightened itself. You laughed, nodding your head as you said, “That’s right. I know what you did.”

F.R.I.D.A.Y. remained silent and you wondered if that was her cue for you to tell her what you know. And, if you’re going to be honest, you didn’t know anything. You just said it out of sheer panic, thinking it wasn’t going to hold much ground for the perfect AI, but it apparently did. The sneaky bit-

“Threat detected.”

“What now?” The suit spun you around to make you face the threat, your eyes widening when you watched the screen zoom in on something that was very far away. “Is that a…”

“Warhead? Yes.”

“Now is not the time for sarcasm, F.R.I.D.A.Y.”

“What would you like to do, Y/N?”

You watched the screen display the small nuke, watching it grow bigger and bigger as it flew towards New York. “What do you mean what would I like to do? There's only one thing we can do." You sighed, shaking your head. "Looks like we’re going to stop a nuke, F.R.I.D.A.Y.”

Keeping autopilot on, F.R.I.D.A.Y. flew you towards the oncoming nuke. And the closer you got to it, the more you realized… what a dumb idea! But you kept going, only one thought on your mind: Wanda lives here.

You remember Tony dealing with a nuke the first time the Avengers got together, watching it on the news as he guided the warhead to outer space. It seemed so easy, minus the part where he almost died coming back down to Earth. And the new upgrade on the suit would let you breathe in space, so that wasn’t an issue.

“30% power remaining.” F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s voice pulled you from your thoughts.

“Thanks, F.R.I.D.A.Y., because that's what I want to hear while flying towards a nuke,” you stated. Well, this is just great. If you do this right, that would leave you with just enough juice to come back to Earth, though it’s going to be extremely close. And you’re not going to have a Hulk to save you.

Your speed increased as you flew towards the oncoming nuke, not a single doubt in your mind as you realized that F.R.I.D.A.Y. took autopilot off a few minutes ago and you were flying perfectly. You grinned, proud of yourself for figuring out how to properly fly seconds before coming in contact with a nuke, but the grin quickly washed away when you felt a force pull against you, stopping you in your tracks.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y., how do you expect me to save New York if you keep stopping me?"

"That's not me."

You looked down towards your feet, eyebrows furrowed in confusion until you saw the all-too familiar red aura swirling around your ankles. You lost control of the suit, being forced back to the ground and gently landing on your feet in the middle of one of the busiest streets in New York.

You turned to look at Wanda, pursing your lips together. You were so busted. The angry look on her face told you that you were going to have a hard time talking your way out of this one. You didn't want to take the helmet off, better off not letting her see your face in the middle of your first ever real argument with her. She'd see how truly terrified you were and you didn't want that. You needed her to think that you were okay doing this.

As if F.R.I.D.A.Y. read your mind, the helmet removed itself and you huffed. You're being personally attacked by an AI and you don't really know what to do about that.

"Wanda, listen, I'm-"

"Trying to get yourself killed? I'm aware." She crossed her arms over her chest, her eyes narrowed with anger and a smidge of betrayal. How dare you leave her behind to do something so reckless?

You sighed. How could you even possibly be annoyed at her? She has gone through so much for someone who gave a lot to the world, she just doesn't want to lose anybody else. But she'll lose everything if you don't stop this missile.

"Baby, you need to let me do this," you said, stepping towards her. You managed to conjure up some courage, looking in her eye and knowing that if you didn't do this, she would die. "I promise nothing bad is going to happen." You knew that it was going to be a broken promise, especially the longer you stand here talking to her with your battery running low. You weren't going to mention that and you definitely couldn't think about it. Instead, you focused on her. You just let her fill your thoughts while she dug through them, trying to figure out what could have possibly possessed you to do this idiotic charade.

You replayed memories of her. The way her eyes would crinkle when she smiled, the warmth that spreads through your veins whenever she laughs. She was the brightest of light on the darkest of days and you wouldn't want anybody else by your side… except for now. For now, you couldn't have anybody by your side.

You tried to take off, but you didn't get very high up before she stopped you, slamming you back down to the ground rather harshly. You landed on your feet, bending your knees to reduce the impact, your hand using the ground to prevent you from falling forward.

A true superhero landing.

"Wanda." You stood up, looking at her. Her head tilted, challenging. "What are you doing?"

"Missile approximately three minutes from impact," F.R.I.D.A.Y. said in your ear and it kind of scared you. She was so quiet, and you didn't even have the helmet on, so you didn't expect it. But other than the slight flinch Wanda didn't notice, you didn't react to her statement. You were too focused on your angry girlfriend.

"I'm stopping you from dying," she snapped. You furrowed your eyebrows, stepping towards her. Of all the things she's sacrificed to save the world, she didn't want you to be one of them. She didn't want to wake up in a life where you no longer existed, but that's the same reason why you're doing what you're about to do. You'd rather her live a full life than have it end in the next two minutes.

Your mind drifted away from Wanda, trying to figure out a play to get away, to stop the missile. It was clear she wasn't going to just let you go, but the two of you standing in the middle of a street in New York, causing a traffic jam, there were multiple things you could do to get her attention off of you and onto something else just long enough for you to fly away.

She closed the distance between you and her when she saw what was going through your mind, your features softening as she grabbed onto your hand and held it against her chest. You would've been able to feel her heartbeat if it wasn't for the Iron Man suit.

She sighed, using her free hand to cup your cheek and you found yourself leaning into the touch. "I love you," she said, her voice a bit softer than it was earlier, "and I don't want to lose you."

"Approximately one minute from impact." Leave it to the resentful AI to interrupt a beautiful moment. You had to move now. You couldn't think about your next play, you had to just do it.

"I'm sorry," you whispered.

Her eyes searched yours, her mind sorting through your thoughts to see why exactly you were apologizing, but the only thing she could see were all the memories of her. She got lost in your thoughts, enjoying the memories replaying in your mind. From the first moment she saw you to now, the love shown in your mind formed a tornado of butterflies in her stomach.

The hand against her chest twitched, the high pitched noise of the suit's repulsor making her come out of her daze, confusion crossing her features just moments before she flew away from you, the blast of the non-lethal blast making her break through the glass of the building behind her as the helmet covered your face once more. You sent one last look towards Wanda, guilt being the only feeling you feel until F.R.I.D.A.Y. began counting down from thirty in your ear.

You flew up into the air, finding the path of the missile thanks to your favorite AI. You ignored F.R.I.D.A.Y.'s warning for 15% power as you gently pushed up against the nuke from the bottom, arching it up into the air. The missile pushed against you, the auto-lock mechanic fighting to go back to it's target, but you kept it steady. You flew straight up, the city of New York getting smaller beneath you, reading the calculations displayed on the screen.

They weren't in your favor.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y.," you breathed, soaring higher and higher into the air, "call Wanda." She was unconscious, but you could still leave her a voicemail. Maybe that'd help her come to terms if you don't make it. That this wasn't her fault, but your own stupidity.

"Contact not found." You sighed as she displayed a small screen off to the side, the only name under it was Pepper's. To be fair, this was a prototype. Tony probably didn't consider it being used to guide a missile into space.

You could've connected F.R.I.D.A.Y. to your own phone, downloaded the contacts wirelessly, but you remembered that you had left your phone back in the lab. So, that plan was out the window. And you don't memorize her number, so now with less than 15% battery remaining, the possibility of making it out of this alive was slim and that last thing you heard from Wanda was I love you. Whereas the final words you breathed to her were I'm sorry.

Your stomach twisted with regret, but you were far too deep into this situation to pull back now. You already miss her, knowing just how mad she's going to be. She's never going to let you live this down. You don't know how long you're going to have to suck up to her until she forgives you, knowing she's going to string it along to get as much as she can get. And you smiled, knowing that you were going to enjoy every second of it.

That's on the assumption that you're going to make it out of this alive.

You passed the clouds, flying up with the missile on your back. The blue sky disappeared, being replaced by the darkness that is outer space, sprinkled with millions of stars. If this wasn't a vital situation, you would've stopped to enjoy the new scenery.

F.R.I.D.A.Y. tried to warn you of your new battery percentage, but she barely got a word in before she faded away. You sighed, thrusting forward to get yourself as far away from Earth as you could. You didn't want to look at the level of power you have left on the suit, fighting everything within you to not let your eyes flicker to that corner.

The missile on your back stopped fighting you, the auto-lock mechanism not working this far out in space. The only thing you could think of is Wanda as you released the missile, watching it continue to drive itself forward, seeking a new target, anything to hit so it can do what it was designed to do.

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Five minutes earlier

Wanda's eyes fluttered open, grunting in pain as she stood up. Pieces of glass rolled off of her, scattering to the ground and crunching under her feet. She shook herself out of the daze, momentarily confused as she walked out of the building she was blasted into.

She felt herself breathe out in relief when Iron Man landed in front of her, her eyes glossing over as she walked towards you. "Y/N…" she sighed, reaching out to you, but she froze when the helmet was removed to reveal that it wasn't you.

"Where is she?" Tony questioned. Wanda placed a hand across her stomach, a wave of nausea crossing over her as she used her other hand to point upwards. Tony sighed heavily, his eyes going into the back of his head in frustration before looking back at her.

She knew the significance of saving the city - what's one life compared to millions? - but she would've kept you over them. She had failed in preventing you from doing this reckless stunt and she couldn't breathe. Her chest was pushing against her, her lungs trying desperately to get air in them, but she just couldn't. And Tony saw it, the sadness in her eyes, dejection in her slumped shoulders, the misery written clear across her face. He could see the love she held for you, the slow grief coming out of her as she slowly but surely realized that she's never going to see you again.

"Come here." She made eye contact with him, eyebrows furrowed in confusion as he held his arms out wide. His fingers flapped, gesturing for her to come over to him. She cleared her throat, looking around for a moment before feeling herself give in.

She crossed the rest of the way to him, folding her arms around Tony's suit of armor as he held onto her. Tears slowly, quietly streamed down her face as she breathed in the metal and oil from his suit, knowing this wasn't nearly as good as a hug without the armor, but for her at this moment, at this time, it was close enough. This was something she needed.

"I'm going to get her," Tony whispered in the silence, making her step away from him so she could see his face. The determination in it should've settled her uneasiness, the confidence should've made her agree to his plan, but the suit he was wearing did not stand a chance to the cosmos. She knew that, which is why she shook her head.

"No." On the small chance that you do make it back to Earth safely, she couldn't risk Tony - the man you look up to, the man you idolize, the only reason you had worked your ass off to become a part of this team - going into space and not coming back down. You would be completely devastated.

But when he pursed his lips together and tilted his head, she made no attempt to stop him when his helmet recovered his face. She didn't move when he launched himself upwards, letting selfishness take over her as he chased after you.

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"Well, F.R.I.D.A.Y.," you said, barely a whisper, barely a breath. She couldn't hear you, she was here, but you pretended she was. With 1% power remaining, floating aimlessly through space, you knew this was going to be the end. "I'm going to… thrust back towards Earth. It's going to use up all of my power." Let the lack of gravity levitate you back to the Earth's atmosphere, let it drag you back to New York or wherever it let's you land.

You liked to pretend that the AI wasn't interested in what you had to say, thinking she was giving you the silent treatment. It was better than to accept that you're alone up here, in your time of dying.

You had to get back to Wanda. Just the thought of her made you use the last bit of the suit's power to thrust you forward, watching as the screen in front of you flickered off as the suit died. You watched through the two little slits as the Earth came closer to you, releasing one last breath before you fell into darkness.

Tony continued climbing the sky, soaring up as fast as his suit would let him. His flying faltered, sputtering to a stop when he saw something coming at him from above. He squinted his eyes, F.R.I.D.A.Y. zooming in on it for him and he felt his chest become light when he saw you coming down, but that feeling only lasted for a moment when he realized that you weren't stopping.

You flew past him at a speed he wouldn't be able to stop, the suit being engulfed in fire due to the friction from the air. Despite knowing he wasn't going to be able to stop you, he flew after you, boosting in an attempt to reach you, but you were going too fast.

He watched as you continued to escape his reach, your body twirling along with the speed and friction. He gritted his teeth as the city continued coming up at the two of you impossibly fast, desperate to catch you.

He couldn't reach you as he watched you hit the ground, landing safely on his feet as dust blew up around the impact. He felt his breath leave him as he stumbled forward, his helmet coming off and his eyes searched through the smoke as he walked into it, instinctively swiping it away from his face.

Once the dust settled, relief flooded through him when he saw a red bubble surrounding you for a brief moment before it disappeared, Wanda falling to her knees next to you. She used her powers to rip the helmet off your face, her hands gently caressing your face, your lips blue and your skin pale.

"Please," Wanda begged as Tony joined her on the other side, her hands glued to your face, her thumbs running circles on your cheeks. Tears streamed down her face as she leaned forward, Tony's hand resting on your chest. She couldn’t feel your heartbeat underneath her fingers, sucking in a shaky breath. Where was your heartbeat?

She connected her lips to yours, breathing air into you in desperation. Her sob cut off her CPR attempt, crying into you. You left her and she'll never forgive you for that. Her chest felt heavier, causing her to fall deeper into you. Her stomach twisted, making her feel nauseous. Tears blurred her vision completely, but she didn't mind that. It prevented her from seeing your dead, cold face.

Tony cried silently next to her, covering his mouth with his armor-covered hand to prevent the sobs that were building deep in his chest from escaping. He couldn't tear his eyes away from face, scared that if he looked away, he'd miss your eyes opening. He waited for a smile to tug your lips, your laughter as you look between the two of them and declare it as an impractical prank. Sure, he'd be pissed, but you'd be alive.

And that's all he really wanted.

Then everything halted when she felt you breathe one long breath against her cheek, pulling away to look at your face with wide eyes. Tony placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder, sending her a nod when she looked at him as his hand slid off your chest.

And she laughed.

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Your eyes slowly opened, squinting against the artificial lights hanging above you for a brief moment before adjusting to the brightness. There was a steady beeping next to you, turning your head slightly to see a heartbeat monitor. You picked up your arm, feeling a lot heavier than usual, and seeing all the necessary needles and equipment attached to you. Your arm fell back onto the mattress with a thump, pulling the attention of Tony.

He looked up, tossing a magazine onto the bedside table with a slap and moving to sit on the edge of his seat. You sighed, seeing that disappointed glint in his eye as you turned your head away from him. You caught sight of Wanda laying down on one of the hospital's foldable beds, not looking comfortable at all. She was sleeping, her eyebrows scrunched together and her nostrils flaring. You wondered if she was dreaming about yelling at you. It didn't seem to be a peaceful sleep. And you wanted to join her on that thin, crappy mattress, hold her in your arms.

Tony clearing his throat made you look back at him. You sighed, your head falling back into the pillows as you stared at the ceiling.

"I should be dead," you stated absentmindedly, staring through the ceiling and picturing the dark skies above you, "but I'm not. How?"

"It's an actual miracle," Tony answered softly, not wanting to wake Wanda up just yet. "I'm not complaining. We needed a few of them these days." You looked at him, turning your head against the pillows. He released a sigh, placing his elbows against his knees as he leaned forward.

"Let me guess," you started, "I'm grounded from the lab for another week."

He grinned, laughter hiding behind his cough, an attempt to not laugh at this serious situation. "No, I talked to Pepper and she talked me out of it. But I think you learned your lesson."

You nodded. "Yep, no more Iron Man suits."

"Good," he said, smiling. You watched as he stood up, moving to sit on the edge of your bed. He clasped his hands together, keeping his back to you. "I was actually thinking about making you your own so you can stop stealing mine. And you could help me design it, of course."

Your eyes widened, a smile growing big on your face. "Really?"

He chuckled at your excitement as he looked over his shoulder at you. "I already built it as a surprise for you, but we can make some modifications," he answered. "I was thinking… Iron Lass."

He laughed a bit harder when the smile faded from your face almost immediately, your eyebrows raised in shocked surprise. "Tony," you expressed slowly, making sure he gets every single syllable into his brain, "I can tell you right now that that is never going to happen."

"Well, we have time to figure it out," he assured you, shrugging nonchalantly. "It'll take you a while to fix those two holes in the lab. And then we can start designing the suit, build it, and begin your training."

You were so happy that you didn't even care that his true punishment lied within the great news - fixing the two giant holes wasn't the worst thing in the world. But the look he was now giving you made all signs of happiness fade away from the room, eyebrows furrowed in concern.

"You gave me a real scare, kid," he stated, sighing. He ran a hand through his hair nervously and a soft smile landed on your face as you reached out for his free hand. He looked down at the contact, wrapping his hand around your tightly, afraid to let go. "And I can't really be mad at you, can I?"

"You gave me the idea, Tony, so… no, I don't think you can," you confessed, chuckling. "So, why was there even a nuclear attack on New York anyway?"

He sighed thoughtfully. "A couple college grads decided it'd be fun to hack the Pentagon and get into the missiles," he explained, placing his other hand over the top of yours, ultimately squishing your hands between both of his. "They made it really easy for F.R.I.D.A.Y. to track them down and find them, but not before they managed to launch a missile at the deadline. They're serving a very long sentence." You rolled your eyes at the AI's name, Tony seeing the gesture. "What's the beef with you two?"

You breathed out a heavy breath, shaking your head. "It's a long story." It actually wasn't. You had just gotten out of a huge punishment - or what would've been one if Tony hadn't talked to Pepper before you woke up; thank you, Pepper. Now that you know Tony wasn't aware of the whole F.R.I.D.A.Y. situation, you weren't going to mention it just yet. You were actually surprised she hasn't ratted you out. "You know what, I'm actually quite thirsty."

He stared at you for a seemingly long time before finally blinking. "And you think I'm going to get you a drink?"

You laughed and nodded, feeling him squeeze your hand gently before getting up. You watched as he left the room, the door closing behind him with a click. Turning your head towards Wanda, your heart squeezed in your chest in fear to see her standing right next to your bed. She grinned at you as you slowed your breathing.

"Why do you do that?" you questioned and she laughed gently. The smile remained on her face, even after the laughter slowly faded away, but her eyes were holding a different story. You took her hand, rubbing your thumb across the top of it as you stared at them. "I'm sorry."

She was quiet for such a long time, the weight of the silence pushing against you uncomfortably. You sucked in a deep breath and released it before picking your head up to look her in the eye. "You shouldn't be the one that's sorry," she said softly, biting the bottom of her lip nervously. "I was thinking selfishly. You saved the city. You're a hero."

You sighed. A hero. Would you call yourself that when you were thinking selfishly, too? The only reason you saved the city was to save her. And if you were going to be honest with yourself, you hadn't even considered the millions of people living here. You had only considered the one.

"So, you're not mad that I shot you?" You sent her a cheeky smile when she raised her eyebrow, her head tilting just slightly.

"That's a different story, Y/N," she answered and you laughed as you tugged her to you, making her climb into the bed. You wrapped your arms around her, her head resting against your chest, humming along with your beating heart, the heart that only beats for her. "But I guess we can talk about it later."

You held her for a moment, letting her listen to your heartbeat, smiling softly as she sighed with content. You cleared your throat, breaking the moment, before saying, "I was… terrified."

Her humming stopped, focusing on your words, holding her breath as you stared at the ceiling, neither of you looking at each other.

"I was so alone." Not even a hateful AI to keep you company. "There was the tiniest chance that I was getting back to Earth… back to you. And that's all I wanted, Wanda. I just wanted to get back to you."

She breathed out, squeezing herself into you. "Next time you go off into space with a nuclear missile, take me with you." You laughed, her head tilting up to look at you. "Because then I wouldn't have to worry about you making it back to me."

You leaned down, your lips brushing against hers. "I promise I'll always make it back to you," you whispered before connecting your lips to hers, the kiss holding a force of desperation as you deepened it, wanting to feel her.

She pulled away from you, your face following her for a brief moment. She raised her hand, cupping it against your cheek and you leaned into the touch, your eyes fluttering close. "I'm so proud of you."

You smiled at her words, your heart fluttering. "Want to know why I really did it?" You opened your eyes to look at her, your smile challenging. "I had to one up Tony."

She laughed, her hand flying away from your face to playfully smack your shoulder.

You groaned condescendingly, laying your head back into the pillows. "He had a portal and a Hulk," you stated. "Only thing I had was a very angry girlfriend."

"Yeah, well, that very angry girlfriend saved your life."

You looked back at her. "And I am extremely grateful for that girlfriend." You leaned down, your noses rubbing against each other. Your lips were so close, you could feel them brush against each other, soft and warm. "I should call her to thank her."

You could help but laugh a little bit when Wanda pulled away, an eyebrow quirked upwards, just daring you to continue this little joke. You placed your hands on her shoulders, rubbing them affectionately. You laughed lightly at her expression.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Were you thinking I was talking about you?" You laughed harder when she shrugged your hands off her and stood up. You breathed in when she made her way to the door. "Wa- Wanda," you called out and she stopped, her hand on the doorknob, looking at you over her shoulder. She waited for you to continue as you sucked in a deep breath. "You're going to get my phone, right?"

Your laughter followed her out into the hall, nearly bumping into Tony with a cup in his hand. She lost her composure and smiled, your laughter still coming from the room behind her.

"She thinks she's being cute," Wanda explained before Tony could ask. She crossed her arms over her chest as she added, "I'm going to go get some food and let her think she messed up."

Tony laughed as he patted her on the shoulder, passing her to enter your room.

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Led Zeppelin blasted through the room, dulling the noises of the electric tools, and you couldn't help but bob your head to the beat. Tony was somewhere behind you, his nose stuck to a tablet as he hummed along with the song. He chose the music, you didn't have a choice in the matter, but you weren't exactly complaining.

"You're doing it wrong." The volume of the music was lowered as you stepped away from the wall, eyebrows furrowed as you looked over your handy work. It was done, one of the two holes had been covered and it took you hours with Tony watching over your shoulder, silent the whole time.

"How am I doing it wrong?" you questioned, gesturing towards the perfectly covered hole. Okay, it was obvious there was a hole, but you'd just need a few layers of paint and boom. But other than that, you think it's one of your best works.

Tony made eye contact with you from where he stood, crossing his arms over his chest and an eyebrow quirking up. "You're rushing.'

You scoffed. Of course you were rushing. He said when you're done with the wall, he'll give you your suit. "Tony, I helped you build a couple of your earlier Iron Man suits, I'm sure I know how to fix a wall."

"It's not sturdy."

"It's plenty of sturdy," you declared defensively, crossing your arms over your chest protectively. "I didn't rush."

He chuckled, shaking his head as he argued. "Y/N, it's clear that it's not." He leaned against the tabletop, a smirk growing on his lips at his stubbornness. You remind him of himself so much, sometimes it's funny. Other times it's terrifying because you're going off into space with a nuclear missile attached to your back. "Here, I'll help you."

You held your hand up, smiling at him. "Tony, it's fine," you stated, looking back at the wall. "I'm so confident in my work that I could even lean agai-" You leaned against the wall, shoulder to the patch, but you felt it begin to give in underneath you and you didn't have time to react before you were going through the hole.

You felt someone grab onto your wrist, leaning out of the hole and looking down three stories beneath you. You were quickly pulled back into the room forcefully, spinning around to see Tony standing next to Wanda several feet away from you.

Wanda rolled her eyes when you sent her a cheeky grin. "You are very lucky I walked in when I did, Y/N. Why is it that I'm always saving you?" she questioned, crossing her arms over her chest.

"I'm pretty sure this is what you signed up for," you countered, making her smile but she quickly forced that smile away. Tony walked past you as you made your way to Wanda, gently placing your hands on her face. "I love you, pumpkin." You planted kisses onto her lips, moving to her cheeks and putting more across her face until she broke and smiled.

She laughed, pushing you away. "I love you, Y/N, but if I have to keep saving you like this, it's going to kill me."

You shrugged, stepping closer to her. "We'll die together then," you declared, "and, in a new life, we'll find our way back to each other."

You connected your lips to hers, a longer kiss, deeper and more intense than your little pecks earlier. She moaned softly into it, pulling you closer to her, wanting to get as close as she can to you.

"All right, you two." Tony's voice made you laugh, ultimately breaking the kiss. You sent her a smug smirk and a wink as you stepped away, turning to face Tony. "Here." He handed you a box, small and black. You looked up at him, already having an idea as to what it is. He grinned at you, proud, as you looked back down at the present.

You popped the lid off the box and reached inside, pulling out the smart watch, your heart hammering in your chest as Wanda stepped up to take the box from you, letting your hand be free.

"Figured you worked hard enough on your sorry excuse of a wall even though you cut the actual time in half," he stated, grinning as he gently took the watch from you. He wrapped it around your wrist, tightening the strap and securing it. "I am not responsible for any injuries that can occur when using the suit."

You were too busy toying with the screen on your watch to notice the deathly glare Wanda sent Tony, making him shrug innocently.

You pushed a button on the watch, watching nanobots begin to crawl along your skin, forming a suit of armor similar to Tony's. You couldn't help but laugh in excitement as Tony and Wanda took a step backward, giving you space.

"This is amazing!" you declared once the suit formed, spinning on your heels to face Wanda. She smiled wide, enjoying seeing how excited you are. Like a child getting a new toy. "There are so many features!" The screen inches away from your face scanned Wanda, giving you details about her past that you already knew, turning to face Tony to see the same. Facial recognition, check.

"Wait until we get into the air." Your mouth propped open, eyes wider than saucers, you breathed out excitedly. Tony chuckled, already imagining the facial expression you're making under that helmet. "Yes, Y/N," he said, double tapping his arc reactor, his own suit covering his body, "training starts now."

He flew out of the room, flying through the hole and you were hot on his heels. Wanda was excited for you, truly, but she couldn't help it when her shoulders slumped, placing the gift box onto a table. There was a pout hidden in the small smile on her face, sighing as she turned to leave but freezing when she heard someone come back into the lab.

She turned back around to see you walking towards her, your helmet down as you smiled. "Y/N, what are you-" You cut her off by connecting lips, pulling away shortly after and shooting her a wide grin.

"I didn't want to leave without kissing you," you told her.

A faint red colored her cheeks. "You'll come back to me, right?" She couldn't help but feel worried - the last time you wore a suit like this, you went into space and barely made it back. She didn't want to say goodbye like that again.

"I'll come back to you," you promised her, stepping backward towards the hole. "Always."

She followed you as you flew away, stepping up to the giant hole to watch you and Tony soar through the sky together, a wide smile on her face. She knew you would come back to her.

Always.

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