#he never learned how to cope with loss

[taplaos]

[ OC- Marlin Present ]

The Past is just giving some brotherly advice.... Not the time

#Marlin Present #literal seconds after Rosemary death #also I heard this quote and went #DAMN this is so Marlin #Marlin is a emotional wreck for eons #he never learned how to cope with loss

[rockheadcd]

thinking about how much roark has never truly been alone because his parents gifted him an egg for his birthday to take care of when he was a lil dude since he loved fossil mons and just dinosaurs in general so much he REALLY wanted his own buddy like dad had basti.. ramses' egg was as big as him for the longest time and took a couple of months to hatch, but he tried to take that egg just about everywhere like his lil towel cape...

and when ramses finally hatched the first thing lil rock did was throw his arms around him and proceeded to get bit because ramses wanted some fuckin lettuce but y'know what it was the best day in roark's life because his best friend was finally able to see the world with him and mom and dad were there to make sure he learned how to properly take care of him. hilariously enough, it didn't take long for ramses to be able to listen to either parent, and he still will obey requests from byron to this day as well. as long as roark trusts a person, ramses is willing and able to as well ( it's easier than trying to think about it himself ).

roark really never felt loneliness even when asago fell ill and wasn't able to keep up with him as he was heading into grade 4 and 5, but ramses was there by his side. children were easy to distract when there was something equally energetic to occupy their time in the outdoors—and when the outdoors was a whole forest and steelix tunnels that have since been rebranded as caves, it was far too easy to escape in the most literal sense ( and it's not like either of them truly understood the gravity of the situation, for asago would do anything to be herself with her only son ). even the few times roark has played with volkner during league administration meetings did he not really understand the concept of loneliness, having figured he was shy for shyness sake, unaware of the strained relationship volk and ira had. ramses was happy to play with the both of them, no less. volk wasn't lonely with both of them there, right?

truly, roark didn't really understand until asago passed. he was alone quite a bit, but he wasn't lonely. he had his best buddy. he still had asago's team. he had some of byron's with him at home. basti, as far as he was concerned, was a timeless artifact and she would be around for his whole life. birdy had graced him with his precense and he'd found a new stretch of family to watch over him and talk to him. and ramses was still there, he was finally taller than him, and they were inseparable. it was quieter in that period of his life. he figured that was part of loneliness. he wasn't wrong, but he had a routine that wasn't terribly affected by the loss. he was sad, because he missed her, but he was beginning to understand it was more than just a lack of noise at home.

sits down and puts my head in my hands. all that constant buffering never really left him process the survivor's guilt because he rarely had the chance to be alone long enough to get through the long-standing damage, just the short, painful worst of it. he took after and modeled himself after his dad, 'mons and all, occupations and all, because he figured he was fine with what he was surrounded by ( as opposed to pretend, he didn't pretend he was fine, he genuinely thought he was fine ), because they have always been there. and then volk happens and he finds a reason to want to offer all of that to someone. and then he's gone, missing, when that normalcy is there, and it all comes back tenfold. he went too many years feeling fine and that the missing pieces were just a part of life and paying less and less mind to it ( liar, his habits are an exact reflection of the ways he hurt ), and suddenly he can't keep up and for once he feels so, so lonely. it's silence, it's the inability to connect without the confirmation he's on the other end. volk may as well have been his first real, personal connection to someone that wasn't his family and it hurt for so long he really has no idea he managed for a decade the first time around. this boy can fit so many repressed feefees and fears because he knows what's next. he doesn't know what he's going to do when it's byron. he really doesn't know what to do when it's ramses ( he refuses to think about a life without his first buddy ).

#🗻 ━ 𝗍𝗁𝖺𝗍'𝗌 𝗐𝗁𝗒 𝗍𝗁𝖾𝗒 𝖼𝖺𝗅𝗅 𝗆𝖾 𝖺 𝗋𝗈𝖼𝗄. / roark hc. #🌙 ━ / worldbuilding. #long post #hi welcome to (chilis) a stream of conscience abt roark. again. except tangentially about his brother in dino arms. #just.....ramses has Always been there. both a blessing and a curse. but it's not like roark would change that for anything. #it's not ramses' fault that roark fell into this notion of “im not alone so im okay” even when he's laying wide awake at night - #- with this horrible sense of loss he's never had the emotional maturity or the words for. ramses has protected him from the worst by - #- simply just. existing. but as punishment that means roark never learned how to cope heathily. so he defaulted to what byron does. work.

[burnthybread]

oh Ho Ho extreme anxiety moment (now that I’m done writing all that don’t read if you don’t mind ! I know that by posting it i shoukd assume it’s gonan be read but it’s just a 17 y/o freaking out and trying to ground themself 😊)

#it 2 am and it’s first day back after a week off tomorrow yippie #and I’m worried about the stupid piece of shir person who cheated on me… cheating on me AGAIN yippie x2 #and I’m still grieving #and I made the choice to distance myself from my friend group because they’re shit to me Yuppie #and I’m up in four and a half hours Yippie #I’m mostly just writing this out because i really hope I can feel better #OH AND I HAVE EXAMS NEXT WEEK LMAO ! #but yeah maybe writing this shit out will make me feel a little better. i need to sleep and I need to sleep well #and I also need to learn how to cope with the extreme anxiety in regards to the person. because it’s not worth it and it’s severely #affecting me. who cares what he does. he’s already proven himself a lame piece of shit and just because I value him as a friend doesn’t #mean he has any affect on me #I need to learn to not rely on him. it’s not good it’s an issue I can’t jus rely on one person (or people in general(not in a emo way!)) #what was I saying #I need to learn not to place my entire self worth on how people feel about me #because people are always going to leave one way or another (not EVERYONE ALWAYS LEAVES I mean loss is just inevitable. it comes w love) #ok that’s good I’ve isolated that #I just need to force myself to put worth in myself #and that can be hard because I have no stable footing. no family means I’ll find this stuff difficult #but I’ll always have Charly. he’s my rock. he’s always gonna be there for me and I know he’ll never abandon me #i know he’ll always have my corner #okay what I’m saying here sounds like the whole ‘placing my entire self on another person liking me’ but like most people have Family who #Love Them. most people have that rock from birth. i dont. i have a Charly #I know it goes against everything I aid but I need that. i just need something to cling onto while I find my footing #like a rock!!! but this time like rock climbing. i like analogies #see I was going to say Josh (not cheater #sorry put comma. not cheater. my friend) said I was real good at analogies but instead of saying that I said #I Like analogies!! see I’m not placing my self worth and image on what another person says/feels guys #i am a terrible person #But terrible people are still alive and alive people need to function so even if I’m terrible I have to Function #and functioning includes all of the above

[swingingthehatchetnow]

Pete always averted his eyes around the homeless man downtown. Whether it was because he got awkward around social interaction or felt unwarranted guilt about the man’s situation, he’d never managed to look the man in the eyes before. He couldn’t describe his face if he tried.

That changed after Jägerman.

The things that used to be uncomfortable really weren’t anymore. After holding court with the Void, a man on the street really doesn’t seem all that intimidating. Ruth and Richie would’ve made fun of him if he was scared of the little things after the whole ordeal, he knew. It helped him to imagine their reactions. Coping and whatnot.

His walk home was lonelier. As were his study sessions and social life. But the walks home were when he really felt their loss. Even though Pete and Ruth lived in the opposite direction, they’d walk with Richie to his place, and then cut through downtown to get back to the other side of town, where he and Ruth would part ways near the Coldstone, both going to their respective homes.

He still followed that route. Coping. And whatnot.

It was just after noon. Pete had his AP statistics final in the morning, and had no class in the afternoon, because his teachers were proctoring other exams around the school. So here he was. Peter Spankoffski, walking through downtown Hatchetfield, alone. Steph had a full school day, so he wouldn’t see her until later.

“Excuse me, do you have a minute to talk about saving our planet?”

He turned. The Green Peace girl was at it again, with a wide smile and a clipboard in hand.

“It’ll only take a minute of your time,” she continued, now holding out a brochure. Trying to reduce the amount of time he had to talk to her, he took it wordlessly.

“I, um—” his voice cracked, and his face flushed red. Nobody else his age was still having voice cracks. He cleared his throat. “I’ll take a look at it. Saving the world and all.”

Not like he hadn’t done that once already.

The Green Peace girl smiled even wider, and did a little bouncey turn on her heel. The way she bobbed off reminded Pete of Steph when she was in a particularly happy mood. This thought relaxed him a bit.

He tucked the brochure into his pocket and continued walking, though he didn’t get far before he was cut off by someone else.

“Spare change for the homeless?”

Of course he knew that voice. Anyone who spent more than five minutes downtown knew about the homeless man.

Before he even looked at the man in front of him, Pete reached for his wallet. He’d just gotten a bonus at work, so he figured he had a few dollars to spare. Besides, his movie theater job paid surprisingly well.

He grabbed a $5 bill and turned to the man.

“Here you—”

He knew that face.

Older, sure, and a little lost-looking, but there was no doubt about it. Pete was looking at…

“Teddy?”

The 20 year age gap between the Spankoffski boys left them with an interesting dynamic. It was hard to feel like brothers sometimes when one of them was coming home from kindergarten while the other was getting a full time job at CCRP.

But they had their moments. When Pete was learning how to drive, Ted would let him use his car, even though he hadn’t gotten his license yet, or the night before freshman year, when Ted gave Pete his ‘Spankoffski guide to charming the ladies’ guidebook.

Hand trembling, holding out the $5 bill, Pete looked into the cloudy eyes of his older brother. His older older brother.

Somehow, some way… Ted was standing in front of Pete, a shadow of his former self.

“That’s way cool, man,” he said, taking the $5 from Pete. No sense of recollection could be seen.

“Ted, what happened to you…?” Pete watched Ted pocket the money. And then Ted… walked off. Just like that.

“Ted, wait!” Pete called after him, but Ted didn’t turn around. He simply tugged his hat down over his ears and walked off.

With trembling hands, Pete reached for his phone. He spent no more than 3 seconds looking for his brother’s contact info and hitting the call button.

One ring.

Two.

Three.

Four…

“Aren’t you supposed to be in school?”

Pete sighed in relief at the sound of his brother’s voice on the other end of the line.

“No,” he said, “my AP exam was today. Ted, I—” he paused, realizing he had no idea what he was going to say. How do you ask someone if they know that they’re the homeless man from downtown.

He lost his nerve.

“…I was just wondering if you want to hang out later. I— I got a new game, and—”

“Yeah, sure whatever. I get off work at the usual time.” A sound came from Ted’s end of the line, fabric shifting, like he’d adjusted how he was sitting. “Is that all? Because I was about to pull the ol’ Spankoffski charm on this barista that Paul is trying to snag.”

The familiarity of the conversation was enough to ease Pete’s worries. Sure, he’d held court with the Void, lost his two best friends, nearly got shot executioner-style, and ran into what he was certain was some version of his brother in the streets… but all that didn’t matter because somewhere in downtown Hatchetfield, Ted Spankoffski was fine. And so was Pete.

“I don’t say it a lot, but I’m glad you’re my brother, Teddy.”

“Sorry, I was talking to Charlotte. Did you say something?”

Pete smiled and hung up.

Maybe the universe was bigger than he knew and could ever understand.

So what.

#npmd #nerdy prudes must die #starkid black friday #tgwdlm #the guy who didn't like musicals #team starkid #starkid #pete spankoffski #ted spankoffski #hatchetfield #this might be bad #I wrote it in one go at 3am #I just wanted to get it out of my brain #Parker’s Hatchetfield fics

[fun-k-board]

Hey again 😄😄😄

Thank you so so much for the smoke headcanon I really enjoyed it, I was wondering if you could do it again but this time with reptile please ??

Syzoth / Reptile Friendship / General Headcanons

Note(s) : You're a regular human and not a champion, it's implied you're friends with the human kharacters and meet Reptile through them.

Reptile is extremely anxious around you at first because you're not a champion, you're just an Earthrealmer with no fighting skills or prior knowledge on Outworld, and he finds himself a little confused on your presence most of the time.

As such, he finds himself explaining to you a lot of things that he would believe are just common sense. He doesn't get annoyed though, because he realises his constant questions on regular human ideas must be strange too.

He's still a Zatteran despite his ability to shapeshift into a human form, and so, any human social cues you've mastered will probably be strange to him, and vice versa.

Syzoth will typically eat bugs like cockroaches, spiders, flies, and forgets that some human cultures don't have that normalised, but he's extremely overjoyed when he finds out that certain places consider bugs a delicacy. He basically begs you to take him to those places.

If Johnny invites you to be in a movie, whether acting or stage hand, Syzoth, and by extension a large chunk of the Kast, will a million percent also be there after being coincidentally, also invited by Johnny! He's interested in Earth culture, and after watching Predator, which scared the daylights out of him, he wants to know the process behind movies.

Hundred percent asks to see movies with you, apart from horrors, never show him a horror movie, he will not be able to sleep for weeks.

Movie nights are incredibly common, a lot of other non Earthrealmers join in as well! It becomes very cramped very fast in your house, let's hope Johnny is nice enough to lend you all his mansion for the night.

He's a big fan of superhero media, there's always an invisible person, although he finds the fact a lot of them have to strip incredibly strange, or some type of half human half animal hybrid, he feels at home a lot of the time watching those types of superheros.

He can't stomach human food, so if he ever stays at yours for a sleepover or just to hang out for a day, he'll be an exterminator for you and eat any bugs he can find as his lunch / dinner. It's very helpful during summer.

Speaking of summer, he always wears his usual attire even in unbearable heat, he's uncomfortable with his human form and he feels awkward to show more of it. Besides, he likes to keep warm because he gets cold too easily, and when he's cold he gets slower which is impractical and annoying.

After the death of his wife and children, he's been looking for a distraction, he needs some form of comfort and he feels talking to you and his other friends is a huge help. Especially if you've experienced a close loss before, even if you don't know ways to help cope, you can always find ways to help each other heal together.

He tries to ask you for dating advice with Ashra, this most likely goes over well no matter how horrible your advice is, because Ashra and Syzoth are the best couple and are so wholesome nothing could offend either.

Syzoth is always awkward around dinners, whenever he's invited to Madam Bo's by one of the Kast of you, he sort of just sits around and tries to talk instead of eat. Reptiles learned after a while that it's impolite to humans when you just eat bugs out of the air, which he doesn't understand, and so refrains from eating at most public dinners.

He really wants to bring you to Zattera, but he knows far too well that they don't take kindly to warm blood, and while he understands his people's reason, he's still disappointed.

Luckily! He can visit your home in Earthrealm.

He does unfortunately get a lot of stares when he visits your home, your family and even strangers on the street always assume he's a cosplayer.

After he gets roles for a few of Johnny's movies, he becomes a micro celebrity of some sorts, including you if you decide to star in them. People recognise him on the streets and he gets rather embarrassed, but also very appreciated, he feels a lot of love around fans.

Apart from the weird ones... He tries to tell people that he's taken, with a wonderful girlfriend who'd he'd never betray, but... He needs you to chase them off a lot.

I imagine at first, your family and friends might think he's really weird, like, not even 'wow that was strange' weird, but 'never invite this man to be close to my vicinity again' type weird.

He's always looking around suspiciously, eyes wide, sweaty, sometimes he looks like he's going to speak but then holds a hand over his mouth, always when there's a fly near...

But, it only takes a day of knowing him for them to switch up and genuinely adore him.

They invite him around all the time, he's sweating buckets and terrified of messing up, but they're so taken aback by how goddamn sweet this guy is they don't notice.

Once again, you become his saviour and help him whenever they get too talkative about where he's from. They don't know about Outworld, and Liu Kang would prefer it if you didn't spill to everybody.

He finds human fashion a bit strange, but he actually really likes hoodies, especially the ones with short sleeves, they feel comfortable and he can move around a lot without it being a hassle of detangling and annoyance. He also likes wearing fingerless gloves everywhere.

Introducing him to Earthrealm music is... Interesting, to say the least. He really enjoys a lot of them! Especially classical, they're closer to what he knows from Outworld, but, he's also surprised at how much he likes a lot of modern music.

I'm spreading my Britney Spears fan Syzoth agenda and you can't stop me.

#syzoth #reptile #mk1 reptile #mk reptile #mk1 syzoth #mk1 #mk1 x reader #mk1 x gn reader #mortal kombat x gn reader #mortal kombat x reader #mortal kombat 1 x reader #mortal kombat 1 x gn reader #syzoth x gn reader #syzoth x reader #reptile x reader #reptile x gn reader #syzoth headcanons #mortal kombat headcanons #mk headcanons #mk1 headcanons

[petrichor-idyllic]

MINHO

MASTERLIST

CONTENT WARNINGS IN GREEN

○ FLUFF | □ SPICE | ● ANGST | ■ SMUT |• HEADCANONS

◇ FEM! READER | ☆ GN! READER | 《》 MASC! READER

□ LONGING FROM AFAR ◇

↳ Minho has always been cocky and self-assured. That is until a girl arrives in the Glade. A girl he's had some interesting dreams about.

Contains suggestive content and spice.

• SOME HEADCANONS ◇

↳ Just some headcanons about our favourite Runner.

Contains suggestive content and spice.

□ FIRECRACKER ◇

↳ Minho finally agrees to teach you how to fight after weeks of pestering him. Though, things take an unexpected turn.

Contains suggestive content and spice.

○ SAFE PLACE ◇

↳ After you narrowly escape the vicious actions of another Glader who couldn't take no for an answer, you find refuge in Minho's hut - and his arms.

Contains references to sexual assault but there's nothing explicit.

○ UNDER THE INFLUENCE ◇

↳ After the Greenie Day celebrations leave you a little bit intoxicated, Minho takes care of you and keeps you safe.

○ HIDE AND SEEK ◇

↳ You're training to be a Runner and, as the Keeper, Minho is made to look after you. Though, things take a dramatic turn as Minho is forced to save your life.

LET ME MAKE YOU FEEL BETTER ◇ ➤

□ PART 1 | ■ PART 2

↳ Somehow, you end up giving your best friend a massage. Things go about as well as expected.

Basically porn with plot. 18+

□ INAPPROPRIATE WORKPLACE BEHAVIOUR ◇

↳ You miss out on the Bonfire to stay to help Minho with the Maps. Unfortunately, he's a little distracted.

Contains suggestive content and spice.

□ AFTER THE CALM ◇

↳ Joining the group from the scorch, the Gladers take a blow after losing Newt to the Crank Palace. So, you help cheer Minho up.

Book-based fic. Contains suggestive content and spice.

■ REWARD AFTER A HARD DAY'S WORK ◇

↳ You try to spend as much time with your boyfriend as you can. So, when he finishes his long day of running the Maze, you decide to join him in the shower.

More porn with very little plot. 18+

□ BEYOND THE OTHER SIDE ◇

↳ Despite your feelings for one another, you and Minho have decided it's best to stay friends. But, after you nearly lose him to the clutches of the Maze, and he says some choice words to Gally - you decide enough is enough.

Book based fic. Some suggestive themes.

● ALL YOU HAVE ◇

↳ Minho has always had you by his side. He doesn't know how he'd cope without you. Well, now he might have to learn how.

Bro, you die. Rip.

WARMTH IN COLD PLACES ◇ ➤

○ PART 1 | □ PART 2

↳ You are an undercover agent for The Right Arm working behind enemy lines in WCKD's headquarters. Your simple intel gig ends up being the least of your problems as you're suddenly put on the front lines of a rescue mission. It doesn't help that the boy you're pretending to keep prisoner is pretty cute.

□ BEHAVE ◇

↳ You're obsessed with your boyfriend. It's just so hard to keep your hands off of him - even when he's working.

Contains suggestive content and spice.

□ MIRAGE OF THE PAST ◇

↳ Despite never seeing Minho before, you swear you recognise him. That's why you're always staring. Well, and the man is fine. Now in your place of refuge, the Safe Haven provides you with a home, and a new sense of freedom. A bit of flirting can't hurt, right?

Contains suggestive content and spice.

○ IT TAKES TIME  ◇

↳ You were immediately attracted to Minho when you met him in the Scorch. Now, after six months and many losses, you're reunited.

○ STAY CLOSE 《》

↳ Your dream of becoming a Runner is crushed time and time again. But that doesn't stop you from running out into the Maze to help Minho and Alby. Though, that doesn't mean you're the only one willing to risk your life to protect those you care about.

□ FRIENDLY COMPETITION ◇

↳ A friendly game of capture the flag turns heated thanks to yours and Minho's competitive spirit.

Contains suggestive content and spice.

○ SOFT AT HEART ◇

↳ Soft, sweet and caring; you're the mother of the Glade.

■ FIRST TIME FOR EVERYTHING ◇

↳ Your's and Minho's first time.

Some fluffy smut. 18+.

○ BLIND EYE ◇

↳ Minho has a crush on you. You're oblivious. He's losing his mind.

○ DECEPTION IN LIBERATION ◇

↳ You're from Group B. Meeting someone in the middle of a prison break is one hell of an introduction.

□ HIGH SCHOOL NOT-SO-SWEET-HEARTS ◇

↳ High school AU. Minho is popular and sporty. You're quiet and smart. It's a stereotypical high-school romance, except Minho is the one tripping over himself for you. And, well, you don't believe him.

Contains suggestive content and spice. Minho won't accept your rejection.

○ HOW TO WINGMAN (POORLY) ☆

↳ Everyone in the Glade is sick of watching you and Minho dance around your feelings for each other. So, they decide to do something about it. Well, they attempt to, at least.

○ DIE FOR YOU ☆

↳ Song fic based off of "Die for You" by The Weekend.

ON YOUR OWN ◇ ➤

○ PART 1 | ○ PART 2 | ○ PART 3

↳ You were put in a Maze all on your own, with nothing but your dog. The isolation is one thing, but what'll happen when you finally escape?

○ SOLIDARITY ◇

↳ Minho is used to being the tough guy; but he doesn't know how to react when he meets someone tougher than him.

○ LIFE BEFORE DROWNING ◇

↳ You're from one of the many alternative Mazes - and yours happened to be full of water. Though, you only realise how weird your Maze was when you reach the Safe Haven, and meet a certain Runner, who feels weirdly familiar.

○ SAVIOR COMPLEX ◇

↳ You're a new Runner, and a disobedient one. So, when you get stung, Minho is left to play saviour. And doctor. Though, as he looks after you, he starts to think you might not be so bad.

○ IN ADVANCE OF GREIF ◇

↳ Getting bitten by a crank is never fun. But, you're from a Maze, so, you'll be fine... right?

□ EXPOSURE ◇

↳ In an attempt to comfort Chuck, you confess an embarrassing secret about something you did back when you were crushing on Minho and before you started dating. Unfortunately, your boyfriend isn't as heavy of a sleeper as you originally thought.

Contains mild suggestive content and spice.

□ SPARKS ◇

↳ Now in the Safe Haven, the sexual tension between you and Minho has turned into a twisted game of restraint. Though, it's hard not to break when you finally catch a glimpse of Minho's lightning scars.

Contains suggestive themes and spice.

□ BEST FEATURE ☆

↳ You can't stop staring at Minho's arms.

Contains suggestive content and spice.

• INDOCTRINATION ☆

↳ The first time you ever met Minho in the WICKED facility, and the corrupt childhood you briefly spent together before things take a wrong turn.

#🌿 petri's masterlist #tmr fanfiction #tmr imagines #tmr minho #minho the maze runner #minho tmr #minho maze runner #minho tmr x reader #the maze runner

[genderkoolaid]

So I read this interesting post from the MensLib subreddit, about how men's issues are always blamed on men themselves and never on society. The post itself as well as the comments are a very good read in digging in to antimasculism & the ways in which feminism has failed to critically examine men's suffering under the patriarchy. For example (all bolding by me):

Here again, the problems predominantly affecting women are addressed by changing society, while those predominantly affecting men are addressed by changing men (or by telling men to change themselves). The difference is not that one approach is right and the other wrong; they are both 'right' in the sense that they highlight genuine issues, but the approach to men's problems is more superficial. When dealing with men's problems, we focus on the immediate cause, which is usually the men's failure to cope with mental strain ("he should have gone to therapy", "he should have learned to open up more"); in contrast, when dealing with women's problems, we focus on "the cause of the cause", and try to remove the systemic social issues causing the mental strain, rather than telling the victims what they should have done to better cope with it.

I think this is a great point, and something we really need to tackle. OP also goes on to talk about self-repression, comparing girls avoiding sexual harassment and boys avoiding bullying:

Boys (and men) are notorious for repressing their emotions. They have a good reason: in boys' peer groups, a failure to control your emotions is almost as shameful as a failure to control your bladder; it is a sign of weakness, and any sign of weakness makes you a target for bullying and ridicule. So boys learn to wear a permanent mask of aloof toughness to avoid inadvertently revealing any sign of weakness or uncontrolled emotion, and many keep this habit into adulthood. It is generally well recognized that suppressing emotions is unhealthy in the long run, but it seems to me that the commonly proposed antidote is misguided: boys (or men) are told to "just open up more and be vulnerable" or to "learn how to cry", as if their reluctance to show emotions were some kind of irrational emotion-phobia, rather than a perfectly reasonable, perhaps even necessary, defense against the ridicule, contempt and loss of respect that society inflicts upon those who can't keep their emotions in check in the proper "manly" way.

It's something we don't really question in mainstream feminism. Women's issues have a societal root, and men's issues are issues that men put on themselves, and therefore men just need to fix it themselves and change.

And while yes, we all have a responsibility to unlearn harmful societal teachings, just saying "men need to fix their shit" doesn't help anyone. I've been annoyed for a while at how people will react to men suffering under the patriarchy with "UGH they need to go to therapy", as if

Needing therapy is a sign of failure or a bad thing, and someone not going to therapy when they need to is them being an asshole on purpose and not potentially a sign of them not feeling safe enough to go to therapy, feeling too ashamed, not having enough money or time, etc.

Individual men getting individual therapy will solve the societal problems of forcing boys and men to repress their emotions and view themselves as only valuable if they can perform manual labor and have a lot of sex with women. It's a problem that is only perpetuated by men themselves and if they just stopped doing that, then the problem would disappear.

No self-respecting feminist would ever react to a woman obviously suffering from the patriarchy with "ugh, she needs to go to therapy and fix herself." Yes, therapy would be helpful most likely, but that's not going to actually fix the underlying cause of her issues. So why do we, as feminists, think that "men just need to fix themselves" is an okay response to societal suffering under the patriarchy?

Who does this help? Who benefits from us ignoring these issues? Why do we assume that men's experiences under the patriarchy are so one-dimensional and that we have no responsibility for unlearning our societal biases around men and masculinity?

Someone in the comments also added this quote from the "perpetually relevant" I Am A Transwoman. I Am In The Closet. I Am Not Coming Out essay by Jen Coates:

Have you noticed, when a product is marketed in an unnecessarily gendered way, that the blame shifts depending on the gender? That a pink pen made “for women” is (and this is, of course, true) the work of idiotic cynical marketing people trying insultingly to pander to what they imagine women want? But when they make yogurt “for men” it is suddenly about how hilarious and fragile masculinity is — how men can’t eat yogurt unless their poor widdle bwains can be sure it doesn’t make them gay? #MasculinitySoFragile is aimed, with smug malice, at men—not marketers.

And then another commenter left this (and referenced bell hooks' work on men!!):

"Do you agree that we tend to approach women's problems as systemic issues, and men's problems as personal issues?" Yes, and there's even a name for this: Hyperagency. Individual men are assumed to be immune to systemic pressures because the people at the top of the hierarchies generating those pressures are also men. "And if you do agree with that, do you think this difference in approach is justified, or do you rather think it is a case of an unfair bias?" It's pretty clearly not rooted in reality. The idea that billions of ordinary men aren't beholden to the social constructs under which they were raised is just plain silly. I'd blame the empathy gap, but honestly I feel like it's more than that. Patriarchy hyper-individualizes every struggle a man faces as a way to shield itself from critique and gaslight ordinary men. The motivations there are readily apparent. However, we see the same blind spot appear even in more academic Feminist spaces (taking for granted that "Feminist" spaces on social media are hardly representative of the cutting edge of Feminist thought). bell hooks once postulated that some Feminist women are deeply afraid of acknowledging how little they understand about men, let alone taking the steps to broach that gap.

Another person explained hyperagency by saying "Every single individual man is a hyper agent who is just expected to bootstrap his way out of the patriarchy through sheer force of will."

#m. #antimasculism

[lurkingshan]

Last Twilight Episode 12

A month ago, I never could have predicted that I’d be sitting here trying to assemble some thoughts to explain how on earth this show went so badly off the rails. I am truly taken aback by where this story landed, and I advise anyone who wants to think of it fondly to just pretend it ended at episode 9, and even skip the finale if you haven’t watched yet. Before I get into it, let me just start with a word of praise for the cast, who did a great job with their performances and kept this show afloat when the writing fell apart. And boy, did it fall apart.

In my view, this narrative had three main threads it was addressing: 1) Day’s journey to accepting his disability; 2) unresolved family trauma; and 3) Mhok and Day’s romance. And in the end, it failed on all three of them. I am going to dig into this and I am not feeling particularly nice, so if this is going to hurt your feelings I suggest you stop reading now. 

Day’s Journey

Just…wow. We have been afraid of this turn the entire time and trying to hold out hope that the show would not go there, but here we are. I started laughing out loud when we got to the end of part 3 and Mhon’s phone went off with an alert for a new eye donor, and then just stared incredulously at my screen as we time skipped AGAIN to a Day whose vision had been restored for years (last week I joked to @bengiyo and @waitmyturtles that once a drama starts using time skips it becomes addictive and they never stop, and—welp!). What was this entire show for? Why did we spend twelve episodes with Day grieving his vision loss, learning how to cope, and finally accepting his blindness only to completely undercut it at the end? The first part of the finale was so much about how he was thriving—finding a new career for himself and becoming self-sufficient and growing so much on his own—only to give us an ending that implied he could not actually have his happily ever after without his vision restored. 

And this is in fact the message they sent by coupling the return of his vision with the return of he and Mhok’s relationship, and giving us a happy ending rooted in his contentment at having his sight back. They even went back to the Last Twilight mountain to completely tarnish the thematic resonance of the original scene. Calling back to the beautiful memory of Day “seeing” the sunset and experiencing “a moment so good that you feel like you can live there forever” as he accepted his disability with this scene of him seeing the real sunset with his restored vision was so hurtful to me that I actually got angry. Day didn’t need his vision back to get a happy ending, and I absolutely hate what this communicates about disabled people’s capacity to live happy and fulfilling lives. This show has created many writing sins but this is the most unforgivable to me.

Family Trauma

The show began dropping the ball on this one a few weeks ago, but this finale put the nail in the coffin. We spent most of this episode at Porjai and Night’s wedding, an event that might have felt meaningful if the show had let us see any of their romance. I’m grateful to Mark Pakin and Namtan Tipnaree for their beauty and charisma because it’s the only thing that made me care about those scenes at all. Rather than actually being about them, however, this wedding was used primarily as a clunky vehicle to deliver heavy-handed messages about “second chances” to encourage Day to get back together with Mhok (more on that in the next section). 

I did enjoy the brief nods in this episode to the brothers continuing to have newfound harmony in their relationship, but where the show really lost me was in their attempt to bring Night and Day’s dad back into the mix and imply some sort of resolution between him and Mhon. Mhon, a woman whose perspective on their split we never actually saw, whose motivation for her choices and behavior toward her sons were completely elided by the narrative, who was forgiven and made peace with offscreen during a time skip. I was never given the chance to understand her or what this relationship meant to her in the first place, so why would I care about these scenes with her making her peace with this man? I continue to be so confused about where this show chose to spend its time, and why someone with Aof’s track record on developing strong and narratively important familial relationships dropped the ball so much with her. 

The Romance

Okay, let’s get into it, and remember what I said about not reading if this is going to hurt your feelings! My criteria for considering a romance successful is I have to believe the relationship is mutual, beneficial to both of the pair, and that the couple is prepared to weather future challenges. Last Twilight’s romance fails on all three fronts, and it all comes down to the total imbalance in the relationship that persisted right through the final scenes.

This entire narrative has been Mhok bending to Day’s will, giving Day what he needs, forgiving him for everything, and letting him make all the decisions about the relationship, and the finale was regrettably more of the same. In episode 11, Mhok made a mistake when he lied to Day about turning down the job in Hawaii. But he made that mistake out of grief and fear, and Day didn’t care—he unfeelingly rejected him and his pain and ended their relationship without a second thought. That was potentially forgivable as a momentary lapse borne out of instinctual hurt, and could have been repairable had Day reconsidered soon after and extended Mhok some grace. But in this episode, we find out Day blocked Mhok and refused to communicate with him again after that night, and has left Mhok completely in the cold for three years after he failed to be perfect one (1) time.

And this episode? Was on Day’s side in this conflict. Mhok is the one to return and start pursuing Day again. Mhok is the one to broach the topic of their breakup. Mhok is the one to thank Day for breaking his heart and tell him he did nothing wrong (y’all, I almost threw something at the screen). Mhok’s grief and trauma go completely unaddressed in this finale until they try to play the Rung card for one last moment of sentiment. Day cries to his mother about how he just doesn’t know if he can forgive Mhok. And in the end, Mhok makes the grand gesture, missing his flight to go to Day and stay in Thailand with him despite the successful life he has built in Hawaii.

The cognitive dissonance I felt watching this play out was extreme. I rarely see a writer misunderstand their own characters and relationship conflict so thoroughly. In order to believe in this romance we needed to see Day finally show some empathy for Mhok, take responsibility for his own mistakes, and be the one to make an effort this time. We needed to believe that Day has the capacity to be a supportive partner to Mhok even when he’s struggling. But Day didn’t demonstrate any of that, and so I simply don’t believe in this relationship. I don’t believe Mhok can trust Day not to abandon him again when some other major life event intervenes and Mhok is less than perfect. And that’s a shame, because the show really almost had something here with these two. 

And that’s all I got. What a disappointment this show turned out to be. If you need me, I will just be over here in my little corner imagining the Night and Porjai romcom that we never got and pretending the rest of this show ended several weeks ago.

#last twilight #last twilight the series #thai bl #shan shouts into the void

[gglitch1dd]

The Affair Pt 2

Context: What do you do when your husband cheats on you with your Head Alphas Omega? You marry the Head Alpha of course? What’s better than revenge served with a wedding ring and an ultrasound photo?

<PART 1> <PART3>

Chapter Summary:

Eijiro needs you and it seems like you both need each other. And Kane needs someone too.

Warning: Omegaverse!, Infidelity, Cursing, ex-communicating, Children, “Dammy” - GN term for Mommy, Katsuki being a bitch, Smut, biting, claiming, Breeding Kink, BLOOD!!!!, Sex with feels, crocs

You cleared the table, putting all the cups and cutlery in their places. The brightly lit dinning area for Pack A smelt of spices and savoury foods of the dinner menu that you had planned. You had stepped up a lot in the pack and it was very much appreciated. The sound of soft music playing in the air made you hum slightly at the warm atmosphere. It was just after dinner and everyone was wrapping up and going back to their separate homes.

You looked up from placing down the last fork in its tray. The pups were running around playing a last minute game of tag amongst each other, happy to have had another pack dinner. You smiled gently, missing Asahi. He was at his father’s place for the next week, taking intervals of being with you and with his dad every two weeks. The divorce wasn’t a struggle and you even got a whole lot of money you didn’t even want half of, but the custody battle was something similar to war. Midoriya was adamant about having more time with his son but you wanted to keep Asahi considering he was full-time ProHero and you were Asahi’s dam. In the end it was split almost 50/50 with any other extra weekends leaning to you. At the end of the day, you were just glad it was all over.

The last six months had everything settled down more. You were finally sleeping more and thanks to Kirishima you got your house renovated and redone to make it feel less like how it was back then. The pack had fallen into how it was back then, minus the heavy empty three spaces that were now present. With much thanks from the pack femmes, it was easier for you to cope with the divorce and with learning to take care of yourself again. You think you were getting back something of what you were before the divorce.

You hoped.

Yet you still felt so empty most days, especially when Asahi wasn’t home. You tried doing as much as you could for the pack since you had a lot more free time. You visited your parents, you visited Inko who was so ashamed when she saw you and started crying instantly the moment she saw you, you got some time to truly mourn through the loss of your marriage and yet you felt empty without anything.

You looked up and noticed Kirishima was talking to Iida. Kirishima had come a long way despite all the business he had to deal with. He had to deal with the splitting of the DynaRiot agency as well as his own divorce that was made much too messy due to his ex-husband. It was a train smash half the time and Kirishima just wanted it over and done with. From money situations to the Agency to the trust fund, everything felt like it took unnecessarily longer than it should have for Proheroes. Then there was him also having to deal with new responsibilities having to do with the Heroes Commission. However you were pretty sure that something died in Kirishima that day. His smile never reached his eyes nowadays and if it did, it was fake.

You needed to talk to Kirishima, but you weren’t sure how to go about it. The both of you had gotten closer since finding out your partners’ infidelity with one another. Talking to him had become easy but with what you needed to discuss it was going to probably be a bit uncomfortable. You walked over to him.

Iida’s gaze flicked over to you before Kirishima noticed you were approaching him. The redheaded Alpha turned his eyes towards you. His eyebrows raised in slight surprise but he gave a small smile. “Y/N.”

“Good Evening, Head Alpha.” You bowed your head towards him. “Deputy.” You nodded to Iida before turning to Kirishima. “Head Alpha, may I talk to you?” You asked.

Kirishima perked up, noticing how it was something more private. He nodded his head. “Of course,” He turned to Iida with a nod of his head. “I’ll talk to you more tomorrow, Tenya.” Kirishima took you off to the side away from earshot from others. Once the two of you were away from others walking towards your home, Kirishima turned to you. “What’s going on?” He asked you.

You hesitated for a moment. You felt heat move up your face realising what you were about to ask him. You cleared your throat as you tried pulling yourself together. “I’m sorry to bother you about this but… my… my official heat is coming up and I’ve never spent it without someone because I always had-” His name caused your words to stop in your throat and for your throat to close up. You looked down away from Kirishima as shame climbed up inside you. Kirishima frowned slightly, stepping closer to you, placing a hand on your shoulder. You smiled up at him as you cleared your throat. “What I’m trying to say is-”

“You’ll be spending it with me.” You looked up at him in shock at what he had just said. Kirishima had a serious look on his face. The both of you stood in front of your front door. “I was meaning to talk to you about it actually. You are an unmated Omega,” you lifted a hand up to your neck rubbing over the slowly fading mating mark on your neck. “which makes you my responsibility. My rut is also due soon so it solves a problem I have myself. Also… I’ve been meaning to talk to you about something.”

You tilted your head to the side. “What is it?” You asked.

He hesitated looking off to the side for a moment. He watched the pack wrap up and start to disperse, going to bed for the night. You opened your front door and allowed Kirishima inside. You led him through your house, leading him to the kitchen where you only kept the light on there. You moved to fetch him a glass of red wine you had in the fridge. Kirishima leaned against your counter top, he happily accepted the glass of wine that you gave him.

“So what is it you need to talk to me about?” You asked him, sliding up to sit on the counter.

Kirishima looked down at the wine in his glass. He swirled it around for a moment. “Our pack’s reputation in the political and hero world has taken a hit since the affair happened. It’s been… hard trying to bring up the pack and deal with all of it over the past few months.” You nodded your head, understanding him. “I’ve, somehow, managed to retain my status as Head alpha of this pack and I’m being offered a position on the Hero’s Safety Commission board.”

You nearly spat out your wine at that as you looked up at him with wide eyes. “Oh my God, Eijiro.” He chuckled at your expression. You put down your glass. The board was a group of members that decided everything that happened regarding heroes and the safety of public concerning them. They were essentially a group of highly paid people that could put the actual government to shame. “You’ve been working so hard for this. Congratulations!” You smiled brightly, happy that he got such an esteemed offer.

He chuckled. “Thank you,” He bowed his head. “However, it comes with a few requirements…” He looked to the side. “Some of which I’ve already met but there’s a few I haven’t. One is that I have to resign from all on field work and basically retire from it.”

You furrowed your eyebrows at that. He would need to stop being a hero? “Is that what you want?” You asked him.

Kirishima let out a breath as he looked up at the ceiling. “I’ve been a hero since I was fifteen, nearly twenty years of my life and unfortunately I’m not getting any younger. Retirement for heroes nowadays is around forty with all the new fancy quirks that people have now in the new generation that’s coming up. I would miss the field work but if it’s for something as big as this, I think it’s worth the loss.”

You hummed but nodded your head. You understood his reasoning. The position that he would take up would make close to double a hero’s salary and it would be less physically straining on him. “I understand. What is the other requirement?”

Kirishima’s ruby eyes flicked up to you and for a moment you almost felt as though he was looking over your entire being. “I… I need a family. I need to be settled down. Especially since I’m a head Alpha without a heir or an omega.” He expressed to you as he put the wine glass he was holding on the counter beside him and out of his hands. Kirishima held the counter with both hands. “Iida told me that the pack needs good news, it needs stability, and it needs something from me that I can’t give them on my own. So… that’s where I thought you could come in.” You didn’t need much more of what he was saying to understand what he was asking of you. Kirishima quickly pushed himself away from the counter. “You don’t need to say yes of course. You could say no. I could always-”

“Do what? Get surrogate?” You asked him with a raised eyebrow. “Find a commission regulated Omega to be your new Omega?” You both stared at each other for a while, it becoming silent between the both of you. You closed your eyes thinking about it for a moment. You opened your eyes as you furrowed your eyebrows. “What’s in it for me?”

“Security.” He let out with a sigh as he leaned back. “You’ll have me and the whole Kirishima family in your debt, as well as it would be a good place in the pack for your son.” That peaked your interest the most. Kirishima knew it would. In this pack, family status was one of the most important things. It wasn’t out right stated but it was important. Just by his sire being Midoriya and all that he had done to you put you at a disadvantage, especially since he was all you had tying you to pack A with Midoriya gone. Asahi was all you had keeping you in high society and the good life with Pack A. And yet even now, all you were known as was Midoriya’s ex-wife and the dam to his pup… one of the dams to one of his pups.

You furrowed your eyebrows. It wasn’t something you wanted to be known for so you would have to change that. If being with Kirishima is what got you back some power in high society, power in this pack and power against your ex-husband, if it got your son’s spot in this pack to be safe and guaranteed, you would do it. “I’ll do it.” You told him honestly, looking back up to him.

Kirishima looked at you shocked. “You will?” He didn’t expect you to say yes. He half expected you to slap him across the face.

You nodded your head, folding your arms over your chest. You let out a breath. “Yes. I don’t think either of us deserve to feel alone. It’s… it’s a horrible feeling.” Kirishima and you were the only ones in the whole pack who could truly know how it felt like to live in silence, to go home and feel void of purpose or people. No one else understood that other than him. You looked down to the ground. “If… if being with you helps the pack and helps you, I don’t mind. I don’t think I could date either way. Besides… I think we should think of it more like… revenge.”

“Revenge?” Kirishima asked with a raised eyebrow, but before you could explain it to him, his face lit up understanding what you meant.

It might seem rather petty and maybe even absurd, but if he were to mate with you and take you up as his New Head Omega, there wouldn’t be many people who could stand against that. He would be in a powerful position of being a member on the Hero Commission board, with the ex-wife of the Number One ProHero of this country as his wife and as the dam to his pup. Nothing would be better revenge than moving on from Bakugou and Midoriya like that. Nothing would be more satisfying than seeing the look of their faces at the sight of the both of you.

Kirishima’s eyes darkened in realisation as a soft smirk went to his lips with a hum. “I guess it would be revenge… wouldn’t it?”

“It would.” You nodded your head. “I’ll be your Head Omega, Eijiro.” You stepped forward close to him, looking up at him. The smell of your scent becoming more apparent. It was sweet and heavy, something he found almost as if he could taste it on his lips. Kirishima stepped forward, becoming chest to chest with you. You looked up at the giant Alpha in front of you. “I’ll be your partner to ensure the success of this pack. If you can value me, respect me and give me purpose again…” You took his hand and placed it against you. “I’ll give you an heir and a spare if you wish.”

Kirishima stared down at you for a moment. He furrowed his eyebrows. “Good. You’ll need to stay near me so that you can adjust. It shouldn’t take you long though, considering you already had a pup.”

“It won’t.” You assured him. You reached to his side and picked up his glass of wine, sipping from it. “So…” You smiled up at him. “When do I move in?”

Moving in with Kirishima was something you were actually excited about because it meant you didn’t have to be alone anymore in your house and it gave you someone to bother, someone to keep your mind off of other things. It was interesting at first, trying to fit your lives together but it wasn’t particularly hard falling into a rhythm that consisted of coffee in the mornings, a fierce war of playing cards and falling asleep on the couch watching one of his many crimson Riot movies he wished to show you.

With Kirishima being Head Alpha you never felt uncomfortable with him and so you didn’t feel particularly pessimistic about this whole arrangement. It was a necessity for the pack. It was an agreement and it wasn’t because of love or some mutual feelings. Kirishima needed a pup, he needed a family, you needed security and something to keep you in high society and save face for your pack. It was the perfect arrangement.

But then came one potential small problem.

Asahi.

The five-year-old looked up at Kirishima with wide eyes as he held onto your legs. He looked at Kirishima for a hot minute before looking back up at you as you both stood in Kirishima’s house. “Dammy, why are we here?” He asked confused.

You kept your hands on his shoulders with a soft smile. Kirishima took a step forward, opting to explain it and let your son hear it from him and not from you. It would be better for him to hear it from him anyways. Kirishima smiled gently, his ruby red eyes looking over to your son who seemed very protective over you as he held your leg with a frown on his face. “I wanna take care of your dam, Asahi.” Kirishima clarified to him. “That means that your dam is going to be spending a lot of time with me. Now I know that you are the big masc in their life so I’m asking for your permission to court and look after your dam?” He spoke to Asahi professionally almost as if he wasn’t talking to a five-year-old.

Asahi looked up at you and then back to Kirishima. He glared for a moment with a low almost miniature growl that sounded more like a hum than anything. You gave Asahi a pointed glare. “Asahi, be nice.” You chastised him but he didn’t seem to care much.

Asahi let out a huff as he stepped in front of you. “Okay… but if you eat dammy’s chocolate or hurt them, I’ll bite your knees!”

You had to cover your mouth to stop the laugh that would have escaped you at his threat. Kirishima raised his eyebrows in surprise, an amused smile on his face. He nodded his head. “Alright.” He lifted his hands up in surrender to the green haired pup that glared up at him. “I promise not to hurt your dammy or eat their chocolate.” Kirishima promised.

Asahi looked the large Alpha up and down. He huffed in agreement before turning back to you. “I want pancakes.”

You chuckled and nodded your head picking him up. “My big strong boy gets all the pancakes, standing up for me so bravely.” You praised him, littering kisses on his cheeks which only made him chirp.

“Does this mean I can bother Uncle Eiji now?”

You let out a laugh. You sat him down in the kitchen and before you could even respond, Kirishima nodded his head. “Yep. You can bother me all you want to, little man.” He ruffled Asahi’s dark green hair making the pup giggle. You knew that having Asahi here might have made him a bit uncomfortable with the fact that Asahi looked so much like his dad, but Kirishima didn’t show it in the slightest. “Hey Asahi, have you seen one of my crocs? I’ve been missing one of my red crocs for a while.”

Asahi shook his head. “Nope.”

“Huh.” Kirishima scratched his head in confusion. He must have lost it in the move of everything. “It’s alright, how about I get us ice-cream, huh?”

Asahi gasped, his eyes widening with a sparkle. “Ice-cream!” He shouted. He turned to you with wide eyes and a pout, silently begging for permission.

You gave Asahi a pointed look as you went to get everything ready to make mid-day pancakes. You looked over to Kirishima with a look as he took out a tub of cookies and cream and already had a serving spoon held between sharp teeth. He turned to you confused but you couldn’t help but laugh at the look on his face. Asahi looked at you surprised to see you laughing again. He turned to look at Kirishima. He started giggling too.

Kirishima didn’t get it. “What?” He asked muffled by the big spoon in his mouth. “Is it the ice-cream?” Kirishima put it down on the counter. He motioned to the bucket of ice-cream. “Does he like mint or something?”

“Uncle Eiji,” Asahi giggled. “There’s a spoon in your mouth.” He pointed out to the giant Alpha.

Kirishima tilted his head. “Huh?” That only made Asahi giggle even more. You smiled at the sight, deciding to leave their ice-cream adventures today (although you would have to keep an eye on Asahi now that he knew where the ice-cream was).

When it was the week that you and Kirishima would experience your heat and his rut, Asahi was luckily with his father so you didn’t have to worry much about him. Both you and Kirishima went away for a while deciding to go and spoil yourselves at a resort. It was mostly because of the Bond package they had that provided rooms specially designed for shared Heats and Ruts for couples. It seemed like the perfect decision to leave for there for the week.

When the both of you arrived, having taken a flight to get there, you could tell that Kirishima was nearing his rut. You could tell by the way he refused to let go of your hand and he looked as though he wanted to kill every masc that acknowledged your presence. You didn’t question nor get bothered by his Alpha’s paranoia. You understood it and were actually quite relieved by it.

When you had gotten into your room, thick walls and all, Kirishima let you nest while he made sure you had enough water bottles and premade food to last you the entirety of your Heat and his rut. In truth, you were very nervous about nesting. You hadn’t nested since before the divorce. You hadn’t nested for an Alpha let alone yourself for a while. You just never felt the need to until now. Most of the clothes that was brought by the both of you were mostly for nesting purposes, not like you would wear much clothes anyways.

When Kirishima came into the bedroom he noticed you just finishing off the nest. You sat in your underwear as you chirped happily at the nest you were building. He stayed quiet till you acknowledged his presence, just opting to watch you. Bakugou almost never nested unless he was in a bad heat, or when he gave birth to Kade. It was strange watching nesting. He was unused to the sight of it.

You paused as you looked back at Kirishima who was silent. He had more of an inquisitive look on his face than any negative emotion. You looked up at him with wide eyes, the both of you just staring at each other. You motioned to him. “Shirt.” You pointed at it and then opened up your palm as if telling him to give it to you.

Kirishima chuckled but he didn’t argue with you on it. He took off the clothes that he had on and handed them to you, moving closer to your nest. You chirped in gratitude before finding a spot for each item of clothing somewhere, keeping all the softer items at the top. Once you seemed satisfied you turned back to where he stood, refusing to look anywhere below the waistband of his boxers for the time being even though you were pretty eyelevel in where you sat.

You motioned for him to come closer. “You… you can come check my nest, Head Alpha.” You requested from him, your voice soft.

He looked over it silently as he took a hesitant step inside. You scooted over allowing him space in the nest. Kirishima looked around the nest, finding it almost weird that he was there. That he was allowed inside it. However, his Alpha seemed more than pleased with the outcome of your craftsmanship. It smelled like the two of you. An odd blend but a necessary one nonetheless. It was nice. He liked it. He smiled at you and nodded. “It’s beautiful.” You felt a flush to your neck and cheeks but you smiled, a cute little smile that made Kirishima’s just feel a little more real. “You did a good job on it, thank you. We still have time, we should rest while we still have it.”

You nodded your head in agreement. “I could use a nice nap.”

The both of you settled in, getting used to the feeling of his body while your mind wasn’t drunk on pheromones and sex. He was warm. Really warm and big. You were glad that you took that into account whilst building the nest. Kirishima allowed you to find a comfortable space in his arms. He knew it was going to be a bit of an adjustment for the both of you but it didn’t seem like it would be hard.

Napping was probably the part you loved the most.

However, when Kirishima woke up again, delirious, and tired all he could truly notice was your whining. He opened his eyes looking over at you as you twisted and turned pushing at everything around you because you felt too hot. Needy whines came out of your mouth as you twisted and turned. It was then that Kirishima was hit with the most delicious smell to grace his nose. Sweet slick. Heavy savoury slick that was pooling in your underwear tempting him. He let out a groan, his cock already heavy and aching just at the smell of you.

A louder whimper escaped you. “Head Alpha.” You whispered as you placed a hand on his bicep. Kirishima turned around, caging you underneath him, looking down at you. You were pulling at your underwear trying to remove it to allow yourself to be bear in front of him. You keened and your encouragement was taken well by the redheaded Alpha as he ripped your underwear off your body, throwing them to God knows where. You immediately squeezed your legs trying to get pressure to your glistening sex that was leaking. “Help. Alpha, help.” You begged with tears in your eyes. “It hurts so much.”

Kirishima shushed you sweetly as he moved his forehead against yours. “It’s okay, just breathe.” He whispered moving his hands to your thighs and brushing the inside of them. “Just breathe, I’m here.” He instructed you. He parted your legs, allowing him space between them. Kirishima dragged his finger up your slit making you gasp.

He held down your thighs, keeping you bared in front of him. His pupils dilated as he stared at your sex, dripping in slick and clenching on nothing. Without much thought on the matter, he dragged his tongue up your slit making you moan as you bucked your hips up. With a groan, Kirishima dove in like a man dying of thirst. Every lick and suck making your legs shake and your moans only increase. You were withering underneath him.

The pleasure felt so good and yet also so foreign to you. You hadn’t felt this good in ages and it showed with how sensitive you felt. You felt the knot in your stomach only tighten. You bit back a moan as you turned your head, your thighs shaking “E-Eijiro…” You stuttered.

“Fuck.” He growled against you making you have to choke back a scream. “Cum for me.” He urged, slipping his fingers inside you. Your back arched off the bed in pleasure as you came on his face. You squirmed as he continued to guide you through it. He didn’t stop until he heard you whimpering, trying to close your thighs around his head to get him to stop at how sensitive you were.

Kirishima let out a satisfied hum as he leaned back, licking his lips with a low rumble from his chest. You laid back, trying to catch your breath as your body had a second to relax before the painful twist of your heat came back. Kirishima was already leaking through his boxers wishing to be inside you instead. Kirishima gripped at his boxers, hardening his hands and tearing them off not having the patience to slip them off.

Your eyes fell down his large figure, below deep sex lines. You felt yourself clench on nothing as you looked down at his thick cock. You nearly got scared at the sight of it. He was so much bigger than you thought. However your Omega seemed to greatly approve of him, squirming at the sight of him and releasing more slick at the deep and savoury pheromones he was releasing.

Going against what he normally did, Kirishima kept you facing up at him as he leaned down over you, a hand holding him up above you. He dragged a hand up your slit, taking slick and dragging it over his cock before angling his cock to your entrance. Kirishima looked down at you, his ruby eyes locking with you more pupil than iris. You moved your hand up to hold his intertwining your fingers.

You gasped as you arched your back just as he pushed his cock inside you. A painful whimper escaped your mouth as you moved your other hand to hold onto his torso, dragging your nails over his skin, piercing tanned skin as you tensed. Kirishima growled lowly at how tight your sex was gripping his cock. He pushed in, his cock bullying your cunt, forcing you into the shape of his cock.

Kirishima paused once he heard sniffling. He looked up at your face, noticing more tears than usual as you were crying. “Hey, hey…” He shushed you softly as he wrapped his arms around you, taking you into his arms as he tried to calm you down. A deep rumble came from his chest as he tried to soothe you. “Shh I know it’s painful, I’m sorry I-”

You shook your head. “Alpha don’t want me.” You cried as you kept your eyes closed. You turned your head away from him. “Not worthy. Don’t want me.”

Kirishima furrowed his eyebrows confused, and then it hit him. He softened his shoulders as he understood you. He rubbed your back gently. “I’m scared too.” He whispered by your ear. He buried his face in the crook of your neck. “So scared…” He breathed out as he tightened his grip on you. “But I want you, if you want me. We can be scared together.” He assured you as he kept you close to him

You turned to look down at him, the both of you switching positions, you being on top of him. You looked down and all you saw was fear. He was scared. His ruby eyes filled with so much insecurity it was like looking in a mirror. You gave him a sad smile as you joined hands with him. You clasped your hands with his larger hands. You nodded your head. “Scared together.” You assured him. You hesitated for a moment before moving your lips to his.

Kirishima let out a heavy breath, before leaning up to take you deeper. You hummed as you felt your hips move on instinct, your knees support you as you slowly grinded your hips on top of him. A groan came from the both of you. The feeling of him inside you, felt amazing and something you wanted to savour and yet keep inside you. He moved his hands down to your hips, helping you ride him as you moved up and down his cock.

You moaned as dragged your hands down to his chest, supporting yourself on top of him. You moved your ass up and down as your cunt gripped onto him like a vice. Kirishima groaned lowly, gripping you tighter. With all the strength in your thighs you moved up and down his cock, trying to get everything you could from it. You closed your eyes as you allowed yourself to feel good for the first time in over half a year. This was something you weren’t going to leave up to chance because of insecurity.

You choked on a moan as Kirishima fucked up into you now. Your whines and moans only spurring him in his endeavours of claiming you. You gasped as you held onto his pecs trying to stabilise yourself as he fucked into you hard and fast. “Fuck! Head Alpha!” You cried out in need. “Right there!” Just as he slammed into your cervix did you feel yourself cumming on his cock. “YES!” You shouted up to the heavens in need. Your legs were shaking. You bit your bottom lip as Kirishima fucked you through it.

You tilted your head to the side, exposing your neck towards him. Kirishima’s eyes widened at the gesture. “Are you sure?” He asked you surprised.

You nodded your head. “Please, get rid of him.”

With a growl Kirishima sat up and his teeth were on your neck. Instantly you screamed, the painful tearing of flesh and the burn of your mark being erased and covered with his own. Your nails dug into his skin, red marks being left on his back. Kirishima groaned at the taste of you on his tongue. He dug into the gap between your neck and your shoulder trying to override the claim that Midoriya had on your body. Your thighs were still shaking as he bit your neck. Soon pain became pleasure as you felt your body sink into his lap in submission. You rested your forehead against his shoulder with a heavy breath.

Kirishima licked over the new big mark on your scent gland. It was beautiful and big and it was prominent. He rubbed your lower back supportively. Just as you managed to raise your head off of him, you saw that Kirishima turned his head away from you, allowing you access to his neck. Your eyes widened as you looked to his neck. He held you securely as he nodded his head.

You moved your mouth over his scent gland on his neck. With a hum you used your canines and you bit into him, as hard as you could. A deep growl came out of him at the feeling of his old bond tearing and a new one forming between you and him. Blood trickled into your mouth as you bit as hard as you could into him. Kirishima put his head in the crook of your neck as his body began to shake as emotions overcame him once again. You tightened your arms around him. You let go of his shoulder, licking over the new mark.

Before you could check up on him, Kirishima flipped the both of you so you were back on your back. Without giving you a minute, you felt him fuck into you hard and fast. You moaned as you grabbed onto your chest. Your body jostling underneath him as he pitoned up into you. “Alpha! Alpha breed me! Pup me! Make me yours!” You begged as he growled deeply. He kept you underneath you. You felt his knot press against your entrance, threatening to slip in. You keened, wanting him. You reached up to his face Kirishima closed his eyes, tears slipping out of them. You placed his forehead against yours just as he pushed his knot into you. You both choked back a moan as you felt him cum inside you. He wrapped his arms around you, holding you so tight as if you would fly away from him. You wrapped your arms around his neck as you both were overcome with emotions.

You felt sobs escape his body as you held him. “Y/N.”

You cried in his arms as you put your nose against his chin. You placed kisses on his head, holding him as tight as you could. You were both tied together, a bond that you both decided to take up and by the way he was holding you, he was begging that you would stay. “I’m here Eiji… I’m here.”

You both spent on your heat and his rut together like that. Wrapped in each other’s arms and holding each other as if it would all be one cruel dream. It was a flurry of mess of emotions, lust, anger and sadness and yet by the end of it, you were both satisfied.

Kirishima held you to his chest, your back against his front as you looked out the sliding door at the setting sun over the ocean. You leaned against him, tired and exhausted from the week you had both just had. You kept a hand over your lower abdomen as you tilted your head up to look at him. Kirishima watched the sunset dip under the horizon with a blank look on his face, before turning to look down at you. You smiled up at him, moving your hand up to his thick red hair.

The redhaired Alpha seemed to ease at the sight action. “How are you feeling?” He asked you softly, a hand rubbing your hips.

“Good.” You replied as you nudged his jaw with your nose softly. You relaxed back into bed as you closed your eyes briefly. “I’m good. I’m going to miss this view though, but to be fair, I didn’t look at it most of the time.”

Kirishima chuckled at your comment. “You don’t have to tell me.” He looked down at where your hand lay on top of your lower abdomen. He furrowed his eyebrows slightly.

“Hey.” You moved Kirishima’s head so that he would look at you and focus on your face. You gave him a soft smile. “One thing at a time, okay.”

He nodded with a smile as he dropped his head with a breath. A deep rumble came from his chest as he fell back in bed. He pulled you against him. “Sorry.” He mumbled against your skin.

You chuckled and shook your head, silently telling him not to apologise. You turned in his warm arms. “Don’t apologise, Eiji. I get it.” You whispered.

“Thank you.”

The front door opened allowing you to see inside. “Asahi buddy, you’ve got to clean up after you’ve eaten.” Your ex-husband said from the opposite you, talking to one of his son’s behind you. When he turned back around to see you, his eyebrows raised in shock to see you standing at his front door. His green hair was in its normal mess of curls on his head but he looked like how he did when you both first became parents. The tenseness in his shoulders and the slight dark bags under his eyes showed you that much. He looked at you blankly for a moment. “Y-Y/N… You’re here.” He let out softly.

You nodded your head. “Yes. Yes I am.”

He leaned against the doorway. “Sorry, I’m just surprised. You never usually come up to the apartment when picking up Asahi.” He expressed, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion as he scratched the back of his head.

You motioned behind you to the elevator. “Should I go back down?” You asked him rather nonchalantly.

“No!” He quickly told you. He shook his head. “No, don’t. Please.” He stepped to the side allowing you access into the house. “Come in. Asahi already packed his bags so I’ll just fetch him.” He told you.

You stepped inside the penthouse apartment looking around. The pristineness of it all making it look really luxurious. You were not the least bit surprised considering the two of them were the nation’s top two heroes. “Nice place.” You acknowledge. “It’s really pristine, are you sure children live here?” You teased although it sounded more like a critic than anything else.

“Yah,” He said scratching the back of his head. “Katsuki prefers stuff like this. He likes to keep the place nice and clean. You know how Katsuki is.”

“Unfortunately.”

Midoriya hesitated for a moent. He cleared his throat as he motioned to the side down a hallway. “I’ll go get him.” You raised a hand to stop him. You approached him carefully. Midoriya stiffened as you came closer to him than you have in months. You dug in your bag and pulled out a baby wipe, you wiped his cheek of what looked like chocolate. You scrunched it up putting it in a mini plastic bag that you kept in your bag. Midoriya watched you speechlessly for a moment before softening, that loving look in his green emerald eyes telling you everything. “Thank you.” He motioned to the living area. “You can make yourself comfortable.” He notified you.

You gave him a brief smile before turned away from him. As Midoriya disappeared, you turned your attention to the rest of the living area. You stepped further into the apartment looking around. It was indeed beautiful. Deep in the city an close enough to their hero agencies. It was a rather advantageous place in the city.

As you walked around, something caught your eye. Underneath the dining table was a small… nest? You tilted your head to the side in surprise. A bunch of pillows and a blanket were there. Peaking his head out of the small bundle there was Kane. He seemed hesitant to peak out at first. His crimson eyes widened in surprise at the sight of you. “Aunty Y/N…” He let out in surprise; his voice quiet.

You furrowed your eyebrows slightly at the odd sight. From what you remembered from your interactions with Kane, he never nested, at least not on his own. “Hey there, Kane.” You crouched down next to him, giving him space and not interfering with the little safe space he crafted for himself. “How are you?” He shrugged not answering you as he looked down at his lap. You furrowed your eyebrows. “What’s up, sweetheart?” You asked him.

Kane didn’t answer you immediately at first. “The pups at school are still mean to me.” He spoke in a low voice.

“The pack pups?” You asked him in slight surprise.

He shook his head. “No. They’re all still nice to me. Aunty Momo packs extra tinkies in Sonomi’s bento for me and all the others try to play with me whenever he can.” You smiled at the sound of that, glad that the pups didn’t stop being friends. His chubby hands fiddled with one another. “But they can’t play with me all the time the else the other pups in class get mean to them too for being with me. The others call me mean names cause they say what happened between you and Uncle De- I mean… dad, happened because of me.”

You shook your head. “No, no it’s not because of you, honey.” You sat down next to his little nest. You took his small hands in your own and gave them a gentle squeeze. “Your sire and I…we-”

“I know it has something to do with Poppa.” He told you, his eyes down casted as he spoke. “It’s okay, you don’t have to hide it.”

Your heart broke for the little pup in front of you. “Yes but that’s adult problems. You don’t have to worry about all that.” You assured him. “Listen honey, I know it hurts what the kids say, but you’ve got to tell your teacher about it. Okay? What does your dam say?”

Kane wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “He just told me to tell them to stop and be strong, but Y/N…” You noticed small tears come to his eyes as he bit back a crippled whine. “I don’t like being strong.” He whispered shaking his head.

You frowned and offered him a hug. Kane pushed himself off his pillows and moved to wrap himself around you. Small little distressed yips escaped him as he held onto you. You rubbed his back with a soft comforting purr from your chest, trying to be supportive and comforting to him. Midoriya walked into the room but paused at the sight of you and Kane. He stepped back for a moment not wanting to interrupt. He noticed that Kane was down and tried his best to talk to him but Kane didn’t seem very eager to talk so he gave his pup some space. Midoriya was glad that he could at least seem to talk to you.

Kane pushed himself back. Rubbing his eyes. You quickly pulled out a tissue from your bag and wiped his nose helping him. “Thank you.” He said softly. He reached back amongst the pillows and pulled something you never thought you would see him hold. In his arms was a huge croc, too big to be his own and was blood red. He handed it over to you. “Please give this back to Daddy.” He whispered. “I took it without his permission, so tell him I said sorry. Poppa said I can’t keep it anymore.”

You took the croc from him and put it in your bag. “Okay,” You smiled. “I’ll give it to him.”

“Kane.” Instantly the pup tensed as he looked up past you. You turned your head to see walking through the entranceway in all his glory was Bakugou Katsuki. His eyebrows furrowed as he looked down at his pup. Kane shrank back. Bakugou put one hand on his hip as he dropped his work bag on a nearby couch. “What did I say about nesting under the dining table?”

Kane lowered his head. “Sorry, Poppa.” He apologized with a soft mumble.

Bakugou let out a soft breath. He motioned for him to get out of the small space he was under. Kane carefully crawled out, moving to stand next to you, away from his nest. Bakugou motioned to the nest with a well-manicured fingernail. “Clean it up, Kane. You know that Poppa doesn’t like messes.” Kane nodded his head slowly, doing as he was told and carefully taking a pillow into his arm. He was about to waddle away to put it back where he found it when Bakugou stepped forward and took the pups face in his hands. He looked over the smaller version of himself. He frowned. “Were you crying?” Kane didn’t respond. “Go wipe your face, Kane.”

Kane nodded his head. “Yes, Poppa.” Without another word, the little blond walked away to put the pillow back on the couch.

You furrowed your eyebrows before you turned to look up at Bakugou. “You didn’t have to do that Katsuki. He feels comfortable under there.” You pointed over to the dining table.

Bakugou rolled his eyes as he looked back down to you. Smokey red eyes looking down at you with such superiority in them it almost made you sick. “What are you doing here, Y/N?” He asked.

You furrowed your eyebrows and stood up off the floor. “I’m just here to fetch Asahi.” You told him.

He let out a hum as he looked you over. Then something caught his eye.

“Sorry guys,” Midoriya said as he walked in with Asahi. “Asahi lost one of his shoes, we had to find it.” He expressed as he held hands with the small five year old. “See you later, bud.”

“Bye Daddy.” Asahi smiled up to him, before turning and running into your arms. “Dammy!” He shouted.

You chuckled as you opened your arms, accepting him into your arms with a laugh. “Hey there, Asahi.” You smiled broadly. “You enjoyed your time with Dad?”

He nodded his head. “Yep. Let me just go say bye to Kane.” He told you, leaving your embrace to go to the pup that was busy holding a blanket in his arms and moving it back to his room.

“Y/N…” You turned towards the blond Omega who stood where he was. He furrowed his eyebrows. “You sure move on fast.” He stated motioning to the week old mating mark on your neck. It was then that Midoriya noticed it. The large mark on your neck that wasn’t there last time he saw you. It was clearly new and fresh and made something stir inside him as he tensed his jaw.

You motioned to him. “So did you.” You stated. “Faster than me, actually.” You reminded him with a smile.

Bakugou smiled venomously. “Who’s the lucky Alpha?”

You looked to Asahi who was giving Kane a hug, saying something you couldn’t hear. “Does it matter?” You asked him with a raised eyebrow. Luckily, just in a nick of time, Asahi came walking back over to you, taking your hand in his. “Ready to go?”

He nodded his head. “Mhm.” He told you.

Midoriya had turned his attention to Kane, having offered to take the blanket back for him. He waved a hand to you with an absent minded smile.

“Uncle Eiji!” Asahi shouted as he entered the house with a smile.

Kirishima chuckled as he looked at the little green haired pup. “Hey there, little man.” He put a hand to Asahi’s curly hair. “Have fun at your dad’s place?”

He nodded his head. “Yup, I made macaroni art at school!”

Kirishima laughed. “Alright, how about you go drop your bags in your room, okay? Then we can play Monopoly.” With a happy cheer, Asahi raced upstairs making you laugh as you closed the door. Kirishima turned to you with a smile. “How was it?” He asked as he leaned against the counter of the kitchen.

You put your bag on the counter. “It was alright. They seem to be doing good for themselves, I assume.” You told him as you went to wash your hands in the sink. You grabbed your apron and wrapped it around your waist.

“How’s… how’s Kane?”

You turned to look at Kirishima. He looked to you very concerned for the blond pup. You eased as you walked over to him, leaning against him. “He’s… he’s struggling.” Kirishima’s eyebrows furrowed even further. “The pups at school are making life hard for him.” Kirishima was silent as he thought about it. It worried him and yet he knew there was nothing he could do. He had no right or stance for that pup and yet it hurt hearing that he wasn’t okay. You moved to fetch something out of your bag. You handed it over to him. Kirishima looked down and his eyes widened in surprise. “That’s from Kane. He apologized for taking it from you.” You put your head against his shoulder. “He misses you.”

Kirishima raised the croc closer towards him in surprise. He frowned. “Kane…” He whispered.

“Kane.” The little blond pup looked up from where he sat on his bed. He held a little dinosaur in his hands. Midoriya smiled as he looked into the room. One bed was done neatly and left untouched in the room. Asahi’s. Midoriya stepped inside with a decorated box in hand. “This came for you, bud.” He placed it in front of him. Kane’s eyebrows raised in surprise. He pulled the gift closer towards him, looking over it. He moved it around. “Do you need help opening it?”

“Where’s Poppa?” Kane asked looking up from the gift. “He said he would be back to give me a bedtime story?”

Midoriya opened his mouth to speak but hesitated he shrunk back slightly. He let out a breath as he took a moment. “He… he wanted me to tell you that he got into a last minute meeting at work and he won’t be back for a story tonight.” Midoriya watched the disappointment play on Kane’s face as he nodded his head, understandingly. Midoriya frowned, knowing that Kane needed someone. He hesitated thinking back to his schedule. He had a lot of paperwork to do and before this whole fiasco, you would always handle Asahi before bed giving him a moment to say goodnight to Midoriya before putting him to sleep. Midoriya looked at his watch before looking back at Kane. “Hey.” He smiled broadly. “I just gotta make a quick phone call and grab something. I’ll be right back, okay buddy?”

Kane nodded, as he watched Midoriya leave. He was left once again alone in bed with his nightlight on. Wiping his eyes, he pulled open the wrapping paper of the present. It was a shoe box. Kane tilted his head to the side as he looked over the box. On the top of it, there was a written note for him.

To: Kane

So that we can match.

-E.K

Kane tilted his head to the side confused at who E.K was. He opened the box and moved the paper to the side. His eyes lit up with a gasp. Looking up at him was a pair of red crocs with a bunch of little buttons for him to put on the holes. Kane smiled brightly as he lifted one of the crocs. When he put it to his nose he noticed that the smelled just like his dad. That’s when he remembered what E.K stood for. He smiled down at the box before closing it quickly. He lifted his head, noticing the footsteps in the hallway. He pushed all the wrapping away and put the box underneath his bed before quickly getting back within the covers.

Midoriya peaked back inside. “Sorry about that Kane, I had to make a call to my PA real quick. But which one do you want to read?” Midoriya brought up two story books. “The Red dragon and the prince, or the Green Bunny pastures?”

Kane furrowed his eyebrows for a moment before looking up at Midoriya. “But why, don’t you have work?”

“Yah but… it can wait for one story.” He told Kane as he moved over to sit on the bed near him. He smiled gently at the blond boy. “Besides, these stories are much more interesting than boring paperwork.” Midoriya stuck out his tongue and shook his head. “That makes me sleepy just thinking about it.”

Kane let out a soft laugh at the gesture. Midoriya smiled watching him ease slightly. Kane pointed to the green one. “The green rabbit please.”

Midoriya grinned, a dimpled smile. “My personal favourite.”

-Glitch1d

Head over to the AO3 Page of this fic. It gets updated there a few hours before here.

Taglist:

@aviesnapkindoodles @lovecatsreal @skylunar2k @bakusquadobsessed @toxicberrie @surprisemodafakas @sleepilysworld @trashgirl0-0 @sparky-n-smiley69 @5sos-wdw @erensbbg

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#bakugou x kirishima #kirishima smut #kirishima x reader #kirishima thirst #alpha kirishima x reader #dad kirishima #alpha kirishima #alpha kirishima eijirou #alpha kirishima x omega reader #kirishima eijiro #izuku x reader #midoriya izuku angst #izuku midoriya x reader #katsuki x izuku #bakudeu #izuku angst #bakugou katsuki angst #alpha izuku x reader #mha x y/n #bnha omegaverse #kirishima angst #tw infidelity #omega bakugou #omega bakugou katsuki #omega reader #alpha deku x reader #alpha izuku #alpha izuku midoriya

[dindjarindiaries]

DIN DJARIN ONE-SHOTS

Each story below focuses on Din Djarin, with pairings for each story indicated along with summaries.

Stories marked with an asterisk (*) contain sexual, though not explicit/graphic, content.

My ratings are as follows: G (all ages), T (13+), M (18+)

Last updated: March 17, 2024

main masterlist • series • drabbles • prompts

the “heat” of the moment • reader The heat goes out on the Razor Crest and you’re the only one with an electric blanket to keep yourself warm.

my cyar’ika • fem!reader You and Din find yourselves in a marketplace lush with life, and you lose yourself in the fun while Din tries to keep you safe throughout it.

just fine • reader Din comforts you after you suffer through a tumultuous nightmare.

everything i wanted • reader You’re trapped inside a Din x Omera love triangle, struggling to get to your lover who’s entranced with your new host.

riduurok • reader This is the story of how you fall in love with the Mandalorian bounty hunter, Din Djarin.

home • reader After the child is reunited with his people, Din takes you to a place that’s unfamiliar to you but all too familiar to him: his home.

when stars align• reader You spend an affectionate morning awakening beside your Mandalorian, who you have just recently married.

more than words* • reader On the evening of your marriage, you and Din show your deep love for each other in a manner that goes beyond words.

the challenge • reader After winning a drinking challenge, Din returns to the Crest much later than expected in a state of mind much different than usual, leaving you to deal with him and whatever words spill from his mouth.

don’t blame me• reader In the weeks following your marriage, you and Din are desperate to make up for all the physical affection you’ve missed out on—leading you to do whatever you can wherever you can.

said and done • reader With Din being injured from a past fight, you’re the one in charge of the hunts for now—and Din realizes he likes having you in control.

behave* • reader After a grueling hunt, you and Din celebrate your success at a local cantina, both ending up with a little too much that leads you to do things that are a little too risky.

nothing so perfect • fem!reader You and Din think that you’re adding on to your family, only to learn there’s been a mistake—and now you’re both left to cope with the loss you never expected.

next to you • reader It’s been long enough since Din’s promised return for you to assume that he didn’t make it, and now you yearn for the life that could’ve been.

forever and always • reader When you and Din finally find the child’s home, it’s time to say goodbye—but then Din realizes he can’t.

reverence • fem!reader Following the birth of your daughter, Din spends a night marveling at the little life and the way you provide for her.

transmissions • reader When Din’s away on a long job, he gives you a holotransceiver and sends you transmissions to keep you both at ease.

purpose • fem!reader As the daughter of an Imperial senator, the Mandalorian’s hired as your bodyguard—but with the twisted ideals of your father putting you at risk, he becomes so much more than that.

irrevocable • reader After a hunt goes wrong and Din gets captured, you go after him and save him, but you find that they’ve removed his helmet and have done him personal damage that will last for much longer.

mine* • fem!reader With tensions rising not only in the galaxy but also in your relationship, Din proves to you in a new way that he’ll take care of you.

never alone • fem!reader In the aftermath of a bad nightmare, Din receives comfort from an unexpected source: his daughter.

tresses • reader When Din’s hair becomes the object of your and the baby’s affections, he decides it’s time for a trim—although he’s hesitant for a reason you must discover.

enervation • reader Din returns home from his new job as exhausted as ever, begging you to join him in sleep—and trying to make it happen at all costs.

take care • reader After Din sustains an injury on a job, you have to help him take care of himself—something he grows more and more fond of.

affliction • fem!reader When you and Din get recognized at an Imperial gala, you’re both taken into custody, where they begin to use Din to get you to talk—and lead you to do something completely unexpected.

take it off* • reader Your new ally extends his hospitality a little too far—and now Din’s determined to remind you of what he alone can provide you with.

cozy in the cockpit • reader After the Crest suffers through an intense chase and crash, you and Din must figure out how to survive on a freezing planet—your low odds causing your mutual feelings to come to the surface.

beneath the surface • reader You and Din get double-crossed when trying to find other Mandalorians, putting all three of you in deep waters.

touch it softly • reader When you invite Din to play with your hair, you both get a little more than lost in the moment.

alleviation • reader You continue helping Din recover from the traumatizing removal of his helmet, trying to make him understand that it’s okay to not be okay. (part two of Irrevocable)

the right thing • reader Din returns to you on Nevarro after the mission on Moff Gideon’s cruiser—without the child.

ni ceta par gar (i kneel for you)* • reader When Mando needs emotional release, you seek to fulfill your pining by offering something neither one of you can resist—something that could change everything.

in my head • reader The thought of Din plagues your mind—and it won’t be long until it’s forced onto your lips.

hold me in hyperspace • reader After a long hunt, you think Mando just wants some rest—but really, he just wants you.

ner yaim (my home) • reader After a day of work, you get to come home to Din, who’s fitting into his new role well.

mureyca (kiss) • reader The story of the different ways in which you share a kiss with the Mandalorian.

torrent • reader When one of Din’s worst fears is revealed, you’re left to do whatever you can to put him at ease.

bloom • reader With your relationship now in full blossom, a flustered Din takes you on your first date, where he does everything he can to tell you how you make him feel.

before i go • reader Imperial occupation of your covert as well as your mind lead to a devastating confrontation between you and your past Mandalorian lover.

favorite crime • reader When your ex-partner-in-crime and past lover enters your life again, you find yourself looking back on fond memories with a tremendous desire to chase them again.

solace • reader Din reassures you when your perfectionist tendencies catch up to you.

intemperate • reader Mando’s indulgence in liquid courage leads him to say things you never thought you’d hear—and will never forget.

scars • reader When Din shows unprecedented hatred for his battle-worn body, it’s up to you to reassure him of everything you love about it.

seeking serenity • reader Mando, overcome with anxiety in the aftermath of a risky event, needs you to bring him back to reality—and asks for much more along the way.

liberation • reader You lead a mission to free Din from an Imperial hideout, only to discover that he’s in need of you much more than you originally thought.

contrition • reader Din comforts you after you do something drastic to save his life.

bring me home • reader You reunite with your Mandalorian lover after a long separation and realize much has changed since you last him.

safety net • deaf!reader When you and Din are reunited after a hunt that goes longer than expected, your mutual feelings for each other finally bubble to the surface—regardless of the fears you’ve both buried deep within.

selfish • reader Din, who’s helplessly in love with you, is forced to watch you and your partner until he’s forced to come to terms with his feelings.

united we fall • reader Din’s unable to control the Darksaber and accidentally hurts you with it, leaving behind a deep scar on your body and his mind.

of bounties and bartenders • fem!reader The mysterious Din “Brown Eyes” Djarin returns to visit you after a job, but trouble is the last thing he’s left behind.

astronomy • reader Crossing paths with a seriously injured Din forces the two of you to come to terms with your relationship.

stardust • reader You finally reunite with your Mandalorian lover, just to learn a devastating truth.

fine line • reader Din tries his best to comfort you in the aftermath of your torturous capture.

scarlet promise • reader Vengeance consumes you when Din’s put at risk, causing him to have to pull you back to reality.

what sits in the silence • reader Your bounty-hunting rival turns to you in his time of need and brings along more baggage than you planned on handling.

when a house becomes a home • reader A new home brings new responsibilities, and there’s only one person who can teach Din how to cook a proper meal: you.

takes one to know one • reader Bounty hunters aren’t supposed to fall in love and you were okay with that. So was the Mandalorian.

love me louder • reader Your secret romance with the Mandalorian is put at risk when you find yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time.

shattered • reader When an anxious day gets the best of you, Din seeks to comfort you.

the broken who blossom • reader At long last, Din’s returned home to the covert, but he’s brought a lot more home with him than anticipated.

in sickness & in health • reader Din does his best to comfort you when you become anxious about your health.

doomsday • reader You and Din are interrogated by Moff Gideon, who has quickly realized you’re the best weapon he has to use against the Mandalorian.

i still see you • reader In the aftermath of the Morak mission, Din’s faced with a crisis you only hope you can help to resolve somehow.

fight for me • reader When Din starts to get harassed at a cantina, you can’t help jumping in to defend him at all costs.

dead to me• fem!oc On the verge of death, Twila takes off Din’s helmet, later having to face his wrath and leave his ship—even though she’s pregnant with their unborn child.

the marshal • fem!oc Din covers his face. So does she. Shrouded in mystery and unable to admit their shared intimidation, the two must work together to save Mos Pelgo—for both their sakes.

aftermath • omera After his quest has been fulfilled, Din returns to Sorgan, needing the comfort and support of someone he could never forget.

stay • omera Din wrestles with his feelings for Omera and tries to tell her how she feels—but has to let her in first.

a warrior’s purpose • daughter Din returns to the planet where he’d left his riduur many years ago to find her again—but instead, he finds someone else.

enterprise • cassian andor, k2so When Mando’s quarry offers him a better deal, he finds himself getting involved in more than he originally bargained for.

malevolence • grogu Din experiences the ghastly side effects of wielding the famed Darksaber.

foster • obi-wan kenobi Obi-Wan comes across an orphan named Din that he can’t help taking under his wing.

as it was • din djarin’s parents The living waters beneath Mandalore bring Din back to a place—and a people—he never thought he’d see again.

people watching • grogu Observation was a skill Din Djarin had mastered for his own safety, but now it sets the scene for his very own destruction.

main masterlist • series • drabbles • prompts

#din djarin #the mandalorian #din djarin x reader #din djarin x oc #din djarin x original character #din djarin x omera #masterlist #masterlists #dindjarindiaries

[cirtusmistress]

Hurricane

Authors Note: I wrote this about two years ago and posted it to AO3, and never cross-posted it to Tumblr. But given I want to get back into writing, I may as well start by posting what I got! So enjoy my first fic, two years late.

Ship ~ Brahms Heelshire x GN Reader

Tags ~ Comfort, Canon-Typical Violence, Reader is Competent, Storm prep, Brahms is Scared of Storms, Touch-Starved Brahms Heelshire, Reader Replaces Greta Evans, Minor Injuries, Doll Brahms Heelshire, One Shot, Gender-Neutral Pronouns

AO3 Crosspost

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“A storm? Like, a thunderstorm? Or is it worse?” You asked. You’d been working for the Heelshire’s for around two months now. And though they’d left you with very detailed instructions on how to care for their beloved son, they had never brought up things such as house care. Honestly, you hadn’t planned on staying this long. Not into Autumn.

“A full on hurricane.” Malcolm answered, setting the last of the grocery bags down. He continued, “The worst one we’ve had in years apparently. They’re predicting outages and downed trees. I can help you secure the windows and doors if you’d like?” He offered. A sweet gesture. An olive branch of friendship. But you knew better than to take it.

During your short time at the Heelshire estate, and caring for Brahms, you’d learned a great many things. The most crucial being that whenever someone stayed around too long and stole your attention away from the doll you cared for, there was hell to pay. In one instance you found the dining room in complete disarray after simply inviting Malcolm in for tea, during a rare social moment for you. The worst case was when a friend of yours stopped by. They were a globetrotter, and seeing as you already had residence found it simpler to just stay with you. A mistake. One night was enough to send Brahms into the worst tantrum you’d ever seen. Multiple rooms destroyed, a window had been broken, and he had stolen your friend's passport. Your friendship didn’t last long after that. After all, who was to believe that a doll could cause so much harm?

“Thank you, Malcolm, but I’ll be fine. I’ve dealt with a few storms in my life, I’ll manage.” You replied. Malcolm studied you for a moment. Likely trying to read you, sniff out any signs of dishonesty. But, there were none. Just that warm smile that could melt anyone's heart. He gave a sigh of defeat and nodded.

“If you say so. Just give me a call if you need anything. I’ll come check on you when the hurricane passes.” With that he gave you a wave and headed back to his truck. You muttered a soft thanks, finally returning to your chores.

Brahms sat in the kitchen where he’d been waiting. Like he was listening to your conversation. You’d grown used to this odd job of yours. Caring for a doll as if it were human. Though you’d always figured there was more to this situation then most believed. You’d heard of people using dolls to cope with loss, the concept wasn’t lost on you. But for a couple well into their later years? And there were just.. Too many small things. Even in the rules. Playing music loud, reading in a loud clear voice, leaving food in the freezer. Food which you knew was going missing.

But the biggest tell was an accident. It had been about a month into the job. You’d actually begun to believe Brahms was a child's spirit trapped in the doll. What with him moving around on his own, and leaving you little offerings, and once saying your goddamn name when he was upset. But then, just by accident as you were putting Brahms to bed, you hit your foot against the wall. It had hurt so badly you thought you’d broken a toe. But what stood out in your mind even now was the sound the wall made. It didn’t make the thud you knew from stubbing your toe time and time again in youth. The wall sounded hollow. There had been an echo. Now you knew some older houses had hollow walls. Normally the cavities between the two layers were used for insulation. But that echo.. That wasn’t a normal hollow wall.

After that you’d started paying closer attention to the house and Brahms as you went about your day. Watching and listening. Countless nights where you’d lay in bed and just listen. You’d hear shuffling, the rare footstep like someone had stumbled. Once you swore you heard breathing. You noticed how many rooms had large paintings or cabinets, your size or larger. For a while you thought you were going mad. There was no way in hell that an elderly couple had been keeping their son in the walls for twenty years. But then you learned of the Heelshire’s deaths. Suicides. So many things pointing to something you didn’t quite know how to feel about. On one hand, you were now basically the sole guardian of a doll who was actually a stand-in for the hypothetical twenty-eight year old man in the walls. On the other, Brahms was now completely alone after twenty years of isolation. Alone, save for you. Sweet, kind, loving you who treated a porcelain doll like a real boy. Who read to him every night and tucked him in with a kiss. You couldn’t just leave him. No matter what Brahms was.

“We’re in for a storm, Brahms. I guess that means we’re having a slumber party downstairs tonight.” You cortled, putting the last of the groceries away. You took note of how little perishables Malcolm had dropped off. Thinking ahead. You wouldn’t be able to cook for however long the power was gone, if it did go that was.

You turned back to the doll, scooping him up and taking him with you. You figured the downstairs office would be the safest place. The windows were relatively small and were less likely to break. It would do for your purposes. You sat Brahms in the corner and got to work moving the desk out of the way. You’d have to lay down blankets and things to sleep on. You doubted the old fashioned Heelshire’s were going to have something like an air mattress.

You spent a good hour doing basic storm prep. Dragging some old blankets and comforters out of wardrobes and laying them down on the floor. Filling up buckets and the tubs with water. Getting crossword puzzles and cards. By the time that was all done, it had begun to rain outside. The calm before the storm you supposed. The last thing on your storm checklist was lanterns. This was an old house, you were certain that the Heelshire’s would have oil lamps somewhere. Naturally the first place you wanted to check was the attic.. But you knew better. After all, if your theory was right you didn’t want to scare the poor man by invading his space. So you settled on checking the cellar first.

Only issue was, you really couldn’t bring Brahms. You knew he was never meant to be alone but taking a fragile doll into a dark cellar was too risky. He’d have to stay upstairs. You were hoping he wouldn’t be too upset.

“Brahms, I’m headed to the cellar. I’ll be quick, I promise.” You hummed. With that, you headed down alone. You had been right, it was dark and musty and damp. You started to wonder if there was mold down here. You flicked on the old dingy light which surprisingly still worked. You began digging through the clutter. Old things like furniture, clothes never worn since the sixties, even some art pieces. It was like a time capsule. You didn’t have time to walk through history though, you needed to find anything that could give light without the use of electricity. Lower and lower you went through the piles, until finally you found something. A pair of old oil lamps and a small can of oil to go with it. You muttered a soft thanks, pulling them out from beneath wicker chairs. But what was behind them gave you pause.

The bricks were singed. Dark burn marks that showed age. Your eyes followed the marks. The furniture in here had covered them, but now they were exposed after your rummaging. They flowed over the bricks going upwards. They almost looked beautiful. But that beauty hid a tragedy that plagued this home. You knew why they’d been hidden with so much clutter.

Your thoughts were interrupted when something crashed behind you, making you scream and jump. When you turned you saw one of the mirrored vanities stored away had been smashed. The mirror shards now littered the floor. And on the steps sat the Brahms doll, staring you down. It took you a moment to catch your breath, realizing your error. Brahms didn’t want you uncovering his painful memories. And he’d made sure you knew that. Gathering yourself, you pushed the lamps aside and began to put all that you’d moved back into its place. Covering those painful memories back up, letting them remain hidden and forgotten. Once finished you picked the lamps and the can up and approached Brahms. Kneeling to his height you gave an apologetic smile.

“I’m sorry Brahms,” you spoke with such a genuine tone of sincerity, “I shouldn’t have snooped around. But look! I found the lamps we’ll need!” You held up the lamps, jostling them a little so they clinked together. Of course the doll remained frozen. But just faintly, almost missable under the sound of rain pouring down, you heard panting. Like someone coming down from a rage.

“I’ll clean up the shards, then we’ll head back upstairs, okay?” You’d started speaking to Brahms out loud more after you’d learned about the walls. Feeding your own delusions some would say. You held your word, starting to pick up the larger shards and resting them on top of the vanity. The smaller ones you just brushed away with some loose fabric you found. You didn’t really plan on coming back down here anyways, not after that outburst.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You always found time moves slower when there was a storm. The day seemed to drag on as the storm became worse and worse. The wind had picked up and those raindrops just kept getting larger. It was loud, even on the bottom floor. You had settled on just simple sandwiches for dinner, making sure to put a ‘spare’ in the freezer. And after that you’d just settled in to do a crossword. It was.. Probably the first time in weeks where you felt safe. There was something about the dim lighting and blankets that just felt right. Secure. Warm. Brahms sat under the covers and you’d even given him a crossword book of his own. Slightly cruel, knowing he couldn’t move with you there with him. But at least you’d been talking to him. Funny, you always struggled talking with real people. But this doll turned you into a chatterbox. Maybe it was the simple fact no one was attempting to speak over you. Like someone was actually listening.

Your tranquility was disrupted by a large gust of wind, followed by a crash that made the manor shake. And what sounded like a scream. It had come from upstairs. Something inside you just knew. That crash was in the attic. You were running upstairs before you even had time to think. Up the stairs, and finding the attic ladder down. You were unsure if it had come undone itself or if someone had moved it. That didn’t matter as you climbed up. It was your first time in the attic but you didn’t get a chance to explore. A branch had flown off a tree and crashed through the wall, opening it up to the elements. You could only act, no time for clear thoughts. You grabbed a nearby blanket and started to desperately try to cover the hole, but another gale blew you back. There was nothing you could do to patch it right now, not unless you wanted to risk injury or worse, death.

Your rattled mind returned to the scream you had heard. Or at least you thought you had heard. Looking around you didn’t see a body but there was a bed up here. A tv, a sink.. Someone was living here. You didn’t have time to celebrate your theory being proven. Where was Brahms? Your eyes flitted around, finally landing back on the ladder. Somehow you had missed the very clear bloody handprint on it during your panic. But if Brahms was bleeding.. Oh God, how badly was he injured? Quickly you descended the steps, trying to find any sign of him. You were too panicked to even fear this man who was hiding from you for so long. All you knew somewhere in this house he was hurt and bleeding.

“Brahms?” You called, starting to check every room. Could he have climbed back into the walls? Fearing you discovering him? You checked everything on the top floor and worked down, calling his name in a more desperate tone with each exclamation. But finally you found him. Turning the corner back into the downstairs study. There he sat, in place of the doll. It wasn’t what you expected to see. The mask was shocking at first glance. You were momentarily stun locked. He was bigger than you anticipated, even sitting down. Finally you snapped out of it when he looked at you, and held out his bleeding hand. It had a sizable gash across the palm.

“It hurts,” He spoke in a child-like voice. The voice you’d heard months ago. His head drooped a touch as he spoke, “Can you fix it?” He asked. Finally, after another beat, you nodded. Your mouth felt dry. Too dry to speak. In the kitchen you found the first aid, and took it back with you. He hadn’t moved from his place on the makeshift bed. You knelt beside him, and carefully took his hand in yours. Up close you could see the burn scars that ran along his entire right side. Suddenly his outburst in the cellar made much more sense.. Carefully you applied some rubbing alcohol to the cut. That made Brahms whimper and pull his hand back. The look in his eyes behind that mask was murderous.

“I’m sorry, Brahms, but I have to.. To clean it.” You choke out. Your mouth is still far too dry. You hold your hand out for his again, giving him those warm eyes again. He would trust you wouldn’t he? After all, you had been the one to care for him all this time. He looked at your hand, then back to your face. For a moment Brahms almost seemed entranced by your eyes before conceding and resting his hand back in yours.

“Good boy..” You said, starting to clean the wound. He made a noise akin to that of a moan at your praise. You supposed you were the first person to touch him or give him praise in years. He was likely touch starved. Once the cut was clean, you grabbed the bandages and began to wrap his hand. He kept watching you. His breath was heavy behind that mask.

Finally you were done, and you let his hand go. Brahms examined your work, how carefully you’d wrapped him, and the cute little bow you’d tied it off with. As he studied his hand, you studied him. Despite the childish voice he put on, he was very much an adult. You could see his beard poking out from beneath the porcelain. He was actually rather handsome, you’d admit. The rain picked up again, and the lights began flickering. Brahms jumped and quickly moved closer to you. Before you knew it his head was hiding in your lap. Apparently he was afraid of the storm. Made sense, it had attacked him after all. Carefully you began to stroke his hair in an attempt to soothe him.

“We’ll be okay. Just a little wind and rain, that’s all. Maybe we can play cards? Or I can tell you a story?” You offered. Just trying to find anything to distract him from the weather outside damaging his home. Slowly he nodded, not lifting his head from your waist. Actually his grip seemed to grow tighter. You could feel him inhaling a little too deeply, and his hands started to squeeze your thighs as he held tight. You felt bad thinking how unsurprised that made you. But he had lived in the walls for twenty years.. And you were likely the first person he’d had stick around.

You settled back on to the makeshift mattress, Brahms never letting you go. He shuffled up a bit, so his face was resting against your chest. You kept stroking his hair, picking your brain for a story to tell. Something romantic as you had a wild feeling that was right up his alley. You recounted the story of Pride and Prejudice, not skipping any details of the classic story. Brahms seemed all too enthralled by the tale. He even began to kick his feet in the air when you recounted the climax between Elizabeth and the beloved Mr.Darcy. Just before you could finish though, the lights finally gave out. Brahms tensed up against you and again hugged you tight against him. You let out a wheeze. You needed to get the lamps but he seemed content just smothering you until the lights came back themselves. Finally you managed to sit up as he continued to cling like a baby koala.

“Brahms, sweetheart, I need to light the lamps.” You manage to get out. But that seems to make his grip tighter. He shakes his head, face pulling your shirt back and forth.

“No. No lamps. I don’t want any fire in the house.” He whimpered. Your heart broke a little. That night seemed to have never left Brahms.. You stroked his back soothingly before trailing your hands to cup his cheeks.

“Brahms, we need light. It’ll be okay, I can work an oil lamp-” You were cut off as Brahms slammed you back down against the floor. Even with the cushioning it knocked the air from your lungs. Your hands fell from his face beside yourself as his own gripped your shoulders.

“No fire in the house. Never again.” His voice was no longer that high falsetto. Instead it was deep, aggressive. He sounded his age. You gasped for air, before nodding. Tears had pricked your eyes. You felt a twinge of guilt as you questioned whether or not he’d hurt you.

Finally you found your voice again, “Okay Brahms. No lamps, I promise. Do you want another story?” You asked in a feeble attempt to calm him back down. Lucky for you it seemed to work. Brahms grip on your shoulders loosened, and he returned his head to your chest. He nodded and urged you on to tell your story.

A shaky sigh escaped you. You thanked your lucky stars that you could calm him so easily. As you began telling another story, the rain and wind outside crashed into the manor. You knew Brahms would never harm you. Not you. Not his caretaker. But you began to wonder. How long would this storm last? Suddenly, in the dark, the room no longer felt secure.

#brahms heelshire x reader #horror x reader #slasher x reader #brahms heelshire #brahms the boy #x reader #gn reader #gender neutral reader #sfw fanfic #comfort #minor injuries #canon typical violence #tw violence #one shot

[probablyhuntersmom]

The scenes towards the end of the finale were like an intersection of multiple characters experiencing the loss of father figures, in different shades:

Luz's relationship to her late father took on a different form, after King's own father passed on and his glyph magic was gone for good. Manny gifting her the Azura books before his death, and Papa Titan offering her glyph magic before he too passed on, helped Luz find her place in the world and defeat Belos.

Apparently this scene is what made Sarah Nicole-Robles bawl in the recording studio, right after she recorded the lines.

When these changes happen - when we experience the loss of a person, when our ties with them are wrangled into a new form, against our will - it can be devastatingly painful. Change and transformation make for fancy, dramatic scenes in fiction, and they always incur loss in some form, painful or not. It also made me so emotional when seeing how much 18-year-old Luz resembles Manny, and how her enrolment in the university is linked to both her biological father and Papa Titan.

King's experience of seeing the majesty of his father, however brief, left him in awe and exhilaration. He can rest in the beautiful knowledge that Papa Titan was watching over him the whole time too. The message that his dad left him, relayed by Luz, is something he'll hold dear forever.

Hunter will never be truly harmed by Belos ever again. But he can't discard the memories of Belos granting him attachment: even if the attachment ended up not being real in a sense. However, like what can be applied in real-life therapy, he can get guidance on how to rescript those memories.

Belos's lies about having good intentions don't change how it felt real to Hunter all those years ago. Hunter was a young child when receiving this 'love', and in a twisted way...the mission given to him by Belos kept him alive up till he could escape the Coven, because the mission gave his life meaning despite the circumstances being awfully terrible. A child cannot survive without attachment, and needs attachment even if the experience of attachment has been horrendous and scarring. And holy Titan don't get me started on how at age 16 (before the timeskip), he had yet to learn more grisly details about his predecessors - whom he might view as older brothers and fathers whom he never met - and the generational trauma in his Golden Guard family tree:

which would have definitely been explored before he could experience that amazing hard-won serenity and peace at age 20.

Even Philip's arc is inextricably tied to his manner of coping with how he murdered Caleb, who was the closest thing he had to a father, given how these two brothers were orphans. In the end, Philip meets his end while Luz gazes upon him the same way Caleb's ghost did. Philip won't be haunted by Caleb's ghost again, and he joins the person who was essentially his father figure in death. Till the very end, he was projecting onto another person because he didn't want to recognize the same traits in himself. He was the one responsible for his father figure's death.

But grief doesn't mean the relationships in question have ended altogether. It's kind of like what this post about the finale (link) says, and it even extends to the relationship between us fans and the show itself.

The cliché "5 Stages of Grief" is the most commonly mentioned grief model, but I follow the development and advocacy of a newer perspective on grief that challenges it. In fact, the 5 Stages was originally just intended for terminally ill patients, but it was taken out of proportion. I began a serious investigation into the newer models after I went through something that parallels Hunter losing Flapjack...eerily, it happened to me two weeks before TTT's release date. No wonder I feel so close to Hunter as a blorbo, I guess.

Unlike what the 5 Stages of Grief says, grief and linear time don't mix well. Without "stages" to follow, there isn't an expectation of some deadline or permanent end of a tunnel in the newer models. Such pressure wouldn't be honoring the sacredness of connections between us. Instead, less famous grief perspectives like the dual-process model and continuing bonds model, are a better fit to honor relationships that mattered, since they aren't given an expiry date.

I wonder how Luz would be feeling on the day she graduates from the Wild Magic University, and how King feels each time he unlocks his own new glyphs since he is the new Titan to supply the Isles with magic. And I wonder how Hunter felt when his coven sigil was replaced with the Flapjack tattoo, and how he feels when he sees the Gravesfield town seal and Wittebane statues.

There are ways in which they can get creative to integrate their grief (notice I didn't say "get rid of", "remove", "erase" or even "manage"...the pain is what is to be managed, not the grief itself) the best they can. In canon, we have examples such as the Hexsquad agreeing to get their Flapjack tattoos together. Luz letting go of the light glyph sheet here:

is also a fantastic representation of rituals like sending off a message in a bottle at a beach, tying a message to a balloon and letting it fly away (this happened in Reaching Out, didn't it?), or burning a message in a campfire to let it float up towards the sky in the form of embers.

It is a common recommendation to have exercises like letter-writing where the griever writes to the lost loved one. What many may not know is you can also do the reverse: you writing as your lost loved one, to yourself. Because the griever takes a piece of the lost loved one with them, that the griever has shaped within themselves. This is especially good if you need to extend forgiveness to yourself. An example from a book called Bearing the Unbearable:

The author felt responsible for the stillbirth of her child, but had a "happy accident" where she intuitively asked for forgiveness and then received it, by invoking the love that her child would have shown to her in a world where said child had remained alive.

I think Hunter in particular could benefit from something like this, writing to himself as the uncle whom he saw as genuine and nurturing, and gaining ownership of that part of him even though Belos was a liar and is now gone for good. It can help him move forward especially since he won't be spared from nightmares in which his loss is re-enacted. With this kind of rescripting, historical accuracy doesn't actually need to matter. After all, our own minds lie to us at times and mess with historical accuracy anyway, like Luz's thoughts telling her she was as bad as Belos, and how true that felt.

A physical loved one is lost to death, and it can feel just as painful - only in a different way - if people become estranged or separated without a literal death having occurred. But the connection to them isn't lost, it is only adapted. The bond continues. For better or worse.

I believe the pain in grieving is connected to each moment when we remember all over again that the one we loved isn't coming back.

It's like the needle of a gramophone getting stuck in the loop of an unpleasant-sounding record scratch noise. It's a bit like what C.S. Lewis says in his book A Grief Observed: "In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out." I can't find the other part but he later said something like, therefore if a friendship is lost, the part of you that only that friend could bring out, is also lost. Something in you is locked away forever, though new things can also be unlocked after the loss.

It wasn't shown onscreen but I wouldn't be surprised if it's regular for Luz to come across a meme and be freshly reminded of her dad's absence, because she can't show him that meme. King would be wishing that a new funny cat video he discovers is something his dad could also laugh at along with him. Hunter would be hoping that Flapjack, the previous Golden Guards and Caleb are watching as he brings back palismen.

Bereavement, and any grief that is significant enough to alter our personhood forever, are the forms of love that can never really grasp how time flows in a linear way. They can't be reasoned with, only experienced.

"...the howling at the center of grief is raw and real. It is love in its most wild form" - Megan Devine.

#I'm applying some of this to how I'm grieving the end of the show. our relationship with it has just changed..not ended #toh analysis #the owl house #luz noceda #king clawthorne #toh hunter #philip wittebane #caleb wittebane #manny noceda #papa titan #grief in The Owl House #loz writes a meta #death mention

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Hello! In one of your previous posts you mentioned the game purposefully hiding the faces of figures who play a significant role in each OB boy’s trauma. So do you think this applies to Idia's parents as well (they have masks to cover their faces and they don't even have separate sprites but the default STYX members' sprites)?

[Referencing this post!]

There’s a lot to unpack here, so I’ve put my thoughts under the cut!! I hope you enjoy reading ^^

***Note: Many spoilers for books 6 + 7 of the main story!!***

I definitely wouldn’t put the Shroud parents into the same category as like… Mrs. Rosehearts, who was basically the origin from which other issues stemmed. The Shroud parents themselves were not the “root cause” for Idia’s trauma, the “cause” was Ortho’s death and Idia feeling immense guilt and shame about it. Not once has Idia blamed his parents or implicated them for this misfortune (not counting the Shroud curse, which is really the fault of their ancestors and not the Shroud parents in particular). I guess where some fans feel there is an issue is the implication that the Shroud parents did not seem to be there emotionally for Idia or offer him healthy coping mechanisms for his issue??

Before I give my thoughts on why the Shroud mom and dad obscure their faces (and how this does or doesn’t fit into the “purposefully obscuring the faces of those significantly related to each boy’s trauma), allow me to offer a different perspective to those who find fault with Idia’s parents. Firstly, consider that we know very little about the period of time between Ortho’s death leading up to Idia enrolling at NRC. Even then, most of what we know of this period comes directly from Idia, which provides us with a biased and limited perspective. Idia views most things negatively and does not seem close with his parents, so it makes sense that he would describe them in an inflated and unflattering way.

I think where a lot of the initial thoughts about the Shrouds being bad parents (a sentiment I myself had prior to their book 7 reveals) predominantly comes from them not being present in Idia’s post-OB flashback and Idia stating that his parents care more about results than their son’s feelings. We also learn from later that the family used to go out a lot as a group, but those trips stopped after Ortho died. These heavily imply his mom and dad were not there for Idia after the… incident. But let’s back up for a moment; where does the flashback pick up after Ortho died? Over two years later. That’s a large gap to not be knowing what the Shroud parents were doing during it. The STYX employees present also state that Idia has “completely withdrawn” ever losing Ortho, and this could be inclusive of the parents. So… we don’t really know for sure if, during this expanse of 2 years, the parents never made an effort to reach out. Even if they did, it seems highly likely that Idia rejected them. It’s possible that the flashback didn’t feature the parents because Idia largely shut them out of his life or did not deem them to be deeply linked to his trauma; he laments only the general family curse and the loss of Ortho, he does not direct hate at either parent in the flashback.

What we also have to remember is that it wasn’t just Idia that lost a brother that terrible day. Mr. and Mrs. Shroud their sons; Ortho literally (he passed away) and Idia figuratively (as he started to emotionally distance and isolate himself). That’s tough for any parent, but the world cannot stop for them just because they experienced a tragedy. Unfortunately, life moves on and the Shroud parents are in such important positions that they need to work. This is especially true of Mr. Shroud, who oversees all of STYX operations and is burdened with a curse that demands he constantly be surrounded by blot or else the curse will start to chip away at his own magical energy. They need to do this while juggling their own sadness over losing Ortho. There’s only so much time the Shroud parents can try to comfort Idia when they have work, their own emotional trauma to work through, and their surviving son who doesn’t seem to welcome any efforts they put in. You could even theorize that the Shroud parents (particularly the dad) threw themselves into work to try and bury their own feelings. The Shrouds do obviously have a responsibility to Idia as his parents, but parenting is not so easy of a task. They’re still individuals who have other things to balance alongside parenting and they realistically cannot dedicate 100% of their time or energy to Idia.

Now, please do not misunderstand me. I don’t want my words to come off like I’m pointing fingers or victim blaming. What I’m trying to say here is that it isn’t Idia OR his parents’ fault that they grew distant; to me, both parties were busy dealing with their own complicated emotions and their coping methods didn’t seem to align (because different people can have very different trauma responses) and ended up hurting Idia even more in the end. Making mistakes is human and normal. We've seen other characters also falter with their past actions and what they were or were not able to do at the time (Trey not standing up for or to Riddle, Lilia acting callously towards his children, etc.). This by itself is NOT necessarily a bad thing or something to hate on them for; I'd argue that what matters much more is how those matters were dealt with and what the results of those efforts have been. In the case of the Shroud parents, they do not appear to have bad blood with Idia or Ortho in modern day and the game has really done little to indicate that the Shroud parents should be viewed in a morally grey light. They've welcomed Ortho as a part of their family, openly refer to him like a third son, supported his official enrollment as a NRC student, and worry about his safety when Ortho tries to rush headfirst into danger. As for Idia, though he sometimes grumbles about his parents and tends to their actions as coming from a place of not caring, his peers have pointed out that being scolded is proof of his parents’ love for him. For example, Idia complains that his parents have sent him back to NRC so they don’t have to deal with a “nuisance” like him. He also says that there has been public interest in STYX and demand for accountability, which has specifically put his father under fire. We could view the situation like Idia has—that has parents wanted him out of their way. However, as Rook so tactfully pointed out, Idia’s parents must hold deep affection for him. This implies that the Shrouds chose to send Idia back to school for his own safety, and Mr. Shroud was willing to take the full brunt of the heat himself rather than let people suspect his son, whom Mr. Shroud must know is socially anxious. Idia has plenty of other stories about how his parents punished him for dangerous tech modifications he made, and how they’d take away his gadgets as punishment. Again, because they care about their children and their safety, even if they (especially his more stern and work-oriented father) may not show it in conventionally affectionate ways. Idia has pessimistic views that color his parents as annoying and isn’t as close to them anymore as he used to be, but this doesn’t condemn the Shrouds to the eternal hall of bad parents who never ever learn or refuse to change their ways.

Now, about their outfits! Mr. and Mrs. Shroud wear the same robes as NPC staff at STYX. This much is true!! … But I don’t think there is any deep meaning in this, seeing as Idia too wears the same robes?? I believe this is just the default work uniform for STYX researchers, regardless of the position they’re in (so this uniform detail does not technically contribute to the “intentional obscuring” of the Shroud parents’ designs).

We don’t really know what the reason for them wearing the helmets is, and nor is there very strong implication as to why. There have been plenty of fan speculations and theories including but not limited to: special personal protective equipment, magical enhancement gear, general Shroud family shyness, cost/time saving measure for the devs, etc. I can’t really say one way or another which is the “most correct” idea 🤷‍♂️

What I will say is that I do not think there was an intent to hide the Shroud parents’ faces for the same reasons that Mrs. Rosehearts’ face was. Why? Well:

Their faces are not censored in the same way as Mrs. Rosehearts was in the manga; she has her face shaded out by black, but we can still see the details of her outfit. The Shrouds, meanwhile are making the conscious decision to wear helmets—and highly personalized helmets at that. (Mr. Shroud’s helmet is different in colors and design than Mrs. Shroud’s.) This indicates individuality and wanting to make the Shroud parents stand out, not to homogenize them as anonymous black blots at which the OB boys’ trauma finds its roots.

To build off of my previous point, the comment about purposefully obscuring the face of the "source" of Riddle's trauma was ONLY said in the context of the manga, NOT the game. Therefore, in-game assets cannot be considered reliable for "the Shroud parents wear helmets to hise their faces; hidden faces = source of an OB boy's trauma" theory. If you doubt this, then please refer to each boy’s post-OB flashback. In the game, it is not just the sources of their trauma that are blotted out in black, it is literally every character (even the ones with positive memories or experiences associated with them). This includes Trey and Che’nya, whose younger form faces ARE openly depicted in the manga. So again, the “obscuring the faces of characters who are major trauma sources” thing only applies to the manga and the game does not follow this.

The Shrouds are largely depicted in a positive light. The negative aspects of them tend to come from Idia, who tends to have a pessimistic slant to his perception of the world and other people.

Idia’s personal accounts and even his post-OB flashbacks do not attribute or credit his parents for any aspect of his trauma. Much of the guilt and shame he feels is self-imposed and directed at himself.

As I’ve pointed out earlier in this post, we are assuming a lot of things about what happened in Idia’s life following Ortho’s death. The downside to this is that it doesn’t grant the parents any grace and takes everything we see (as little as it is) at face value without considering alternatives or how the parents could have changed in recent years.

Again, we don’t have a lot of information on why the Shrouds wear the helmets. I don’t think it’s wise to assume it’s for a bad reason when most of the canon has indicated we are supposed to “like” the Shrouds (or, at the very least, they’re supposed to be “redeemed” compared to the initially negative comment we were given of them).

In conclusion: no, I don’t think Idia’s parents are wearing their helmets because they’re associated with their son’s trauma. To me, the helmets feel like something they must wear for some in-universe purpose such as additional protection or to indicate their role within the organization.

#twisted wonderland #twst #Idia Shroud #Ignihyde #Ortho Shroud #book 6 spoilers #book 7 spoilers #disney twisted wonderland #disney twst #notes from the writing raven #question #twst theory #twst theories #twisted wonderland theories #twisted wonderland theory #twst manga #twisted wonderland manga #Trey Clover #Che’nya #Chenya

[srgntjamesbuckybarnes]

Hiii I just wanted to let u know that I absolutely ADORED ur fic (Doctor's Order) and was wondering if you could maybe (ONLY IF YOU WANT) do a PT2 and tag me in it? Alg if not

Doctor's Order (2)

Summary: Y/N sprains her wrist; Bucky is the only Avenger to understand.

Rating: Everyone

Pairing: Bucky x Reader

Warnings: None

Word Count: 1.5k

A/N: Not Beta'd. I hope the person who requested the original is feeling better!

Previous Part

Part 2

The bandage on Y/N’s arm had finally been removed. The yellow smiley face had long since deflated; the crumbled face mocking her at the end of the bed. Previously, Y/N had been counting down the days until she could use her hand again. Currently, the balloon was a reminder that her time with Bucky was coming to an end.

The super-soldier had been attentive while she had been injured. The way he lingered nearby but never hovered over her was just the beginning. The ex-assassin was trained in reading people, a skill that allowed the pair to remain in a comfortable silence often. Y/N never felt like a burden, she never felt weak, like she had to ask for something. She didn’t. Bucky always knew what she needed. Perhaps it hadn’t been the skills he picked up as an assassin, but rather the memory of his time right before becoming the Winter Soldier. The human part of him that had to learn to cope with the loss of an appendage, of his identity.

With her injured hand, Y/N’s fingers rubbed a silk rose petal in the vase beside her bed. Another gift from the team, according to Bucky. Y/N had expected the white petal to detach beneath her touch, but the flower remained as strong as the day they appeared. Y/N knew Bucky was the one caring for the flowers considering he checked on her and the flowers at the same time. She would have been impressed by the soldier’s green thumb if the flowers hadn’t lasted months.

Like clockwork, there were three steady knocks before the door creaked open. Despite the routine, Y/N’s hand retracted with a jolt nearly knocking the vase over. Fortunately, the super-soldier was quicker. His Vibranium had strangled the neck of the vase before the water could splash out.

“Thanks,” Y/N mumbled. Her cheeks flushed as she sank into the fluffy pillow behind her back.

Bucky stared down at her through his nose with a tight-lipped smile before turning his back to her. The vase hit the nightstand with a thud. “You’re still in bed.” Bucky noted as he began to rearrange the roses.

Subconsciously rubbing her weaker wrist Y/N nodded. She had grown comfortable with his daily visits. She didn’t want to go back to the way things were before. She didn’t know how to. Y/N cleared her throat when she remembered he couldn’t see her nod her head. “I’m supposed to take it easy, start exercising the muscle.”

Bucky side-eyed her over his shoulder. The truth was, Y/N had never taken it easy before. She expressed her desire to heal as quickly as possible to get back to her old self. This was new for Bucky. “You’re not exercising.” Another observation.

Y/N shrugged. “I was stretching the muscles. See.”  Bucky fully turned to face her; his arms stretched across his chest as he watched her opposite hand press the back of her hand toward her forearm.

“How’s the grip?”

Frowning, Y/N slowly curled her hand into a fist. She could feel the disappointment flowing from the man standing beside her. Or maybe it was concern. Either way, it wasn’t pleasant.

“Where’s the stress ball?” Bucky asked, his eyes darting around the room for the orb.

Y/N squeezed one eye shut as if bracing herself from an impact. “I got frustrated and threw it. I think it rolled under the bed, but I couldn’t move it with one arm.”

Bucky eyed the narrow gap between the bed frame and the ground. There was no way his arm would fit underneath it. Without a word, Bucky held his flesh hand out to Y/N. She lightly placed her injured wrist in his as she slipped off the bed.

The man was careful not to squeeze her hand and injure her further. His Vibranium hand gripped the wooden bedframe yanking it off the ground.

“Bucky,” Y/N hissed. He might have dropped her hand out of instinct had he not felt the light squeeze she gave his palm. Even though he was a super-soldier, he knew the squeeze was weak for an average person. The hiss wasn’t one of pain, it was emphasis to get his attention.

“Do ya see it?” Bucky questioned, one hand bent by his ear holding the frame, the other outstretched intertwined with her hand.

“Drop the bed!” Y/N shrieked, eyeing the veins bulging in his bicep. “I don't even know if it’s under there. It was a guess. It rolled somewhere.” Surely lifting the bed, one handed wasn’t enough to injure Bucky, but Y/N wasn’t ready to test the limits of a super-soldier.

With a huff, Bucky extended his Vibranium arm above his head, to peek beneath it. Blankets and pillows lightly plopping on the ground on the other side of the mattress. Strands of Bucky’s shaggy hair danced in front of his eyes as he dipped his head to get a better look.

Y/N’s eyes widened, grimacing as she waited with a bated breath for the bed frame to slip and crush him. As the anticipation grew, she squeezed Bucky’s hand once again. Her attempt to pull him back was weak, but it was all she could muster with one hand at the moment.

When Bucky was satisfied beneath the bed was empty, he lowered the bed carefully. As he stepped back, he chuckled at the stunned expression Y/N sported. “Guess that would have been more fun if I left you on the bed, huh?” Bucky joked.

With a dramatic eye roll, she subconsciously squeezed his hand once more. “You’re insane.”

Bucky’s eyes drooped to their hands still laced together. The grin wiped from his face. She was extremely weak. If it wasn’t for his heightened senses, he wouldn’t have noticed it.

“Buck,” Y/N said softly. She knew his mind was sensitive since his time with HYDRA. She didn’t mean to upset him. She shouldn’t have made the joke. “I was just joking. I didn’t mean-”

“You gotta do your exercises, doll.”

Y/N furrowed her eyebrows, taken back by the change of subject. “The doctor said I need to squeeze the stress ball every once in a while. I lost the stress ball, it’s no big deal. I’ll get another one on my next visit.”

Bucky shook his head, lifting their hands between them. “Squeeze my hand as tight as you can.”

Y/N scoffed; her tongue pressed against the inside of her cheek but complied.

“Tighter,” he demanded.

After a few seconds of struggling, Y/N dropped her hand and hung her head with a huff.

Bucky's jaw tightened. He wished he had a chance to rehabilitate his arm the first time around. He had been through many repairs as the Winter Soldier. Each time his metal arm was damaged in battle it was a reminder of what he lost. He had come to terms with what happened to him. He lost his arm when he fell, it was an accident, but he wouldn’t stand by and let her neglect herself.

Silently, Bucky plucked the blankets and pillows from the floor and tossed them back onto the bed. Then, he grasped her injured hand and lightly pulled her toward the mattress.

“Bucky,” Y/N began to protest. She didn’t want him to lecture her. She was aware of her lack of exercise. If she made one phone call to Tony, she was sure there would be a hundred stress balls outside her door in minutes.

Bucky ignored her, pulling her back into his chest. He blindly groped the nightstand until his Vibranium fingers found the remote. The second the screen lit up, his Vibranium arm wrapped around her waist, his flesh fingers woven with her injured hand.

“What are you doing?” Y/N craned her neck to catch a glimpse of the super-soldier.

Bucky lightly squeezed her hand, “Following the doctor’s orders. Just squeeze my hand.”

“And if I don’t want to?” Y/N teased, but she was appreciative of Bucky’s constant effort to wordlessly provide her with everything she needs.

Picking up on her tone, Bucky grinned. “I suppose you could always arm wrestle me for it.”

Y/N giggled. “That would go against the doctor’s orders.”

Bucky hummed, resting his chin on the top of her head. “Well, how about a date then? So, I can hold your hand in public too.”

Y/N’s face flushed. “I supposed the doctor wouldn’t mind. As long as you bring more white roses before these ones die.”

Bucky’s eyes widened. “You know?”

“Of course, I know. Flowers don’t last forever, Buck.”

Glad that she couldn’t see the embarrassment on his face Bucky, nodded. “Okay, so flowers and hand holding. I can do that. Anything else?”

Bucky glanced down at the end of the bed. Much like him, the crumbled-up balloon that Y/N refused to get rid of every time Bucky visited had seen better days. No matter how deflated Bucky felt at the end of each day, he always visited Y/N. She always put a smile on his face. He just hoped she would keep him around longer than the balloon.

“I don’t need anything fancy. Just you, Buck.”

One hand squeezed his hand, the other squeezed his heart.

#bucky fluff #bucky x y/n #bucky x female reader #bucky x you #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky fanfic #bucky fic #james bucky barnes #james buchanan barnes #bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #bucky #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x you #bucky x reader #bucky x reader fluff #james buchanan bucky barnes #bucky x you fluff #bucky x female reader fluff #bucky x y/n fluff

[clotpolesonly]

thinking about Declan and the moth again

it HAUNTS ME that the moth is one of the few times that Declan seems to lose his self-awareness completely. like, yeah, he's the ultimate king of repression, but he's usually very conscious of what he's repressing and the fact that he's repressing it. he knows his issues.

he knows that he forces down his emotions in an unhealthy way so that he can be the adult in the room at far too young an age. he knows he can't form healthy relationships because of a lifetime of danger and insecurity. he knows he dehumanized his mother as a means to cope with their batshit family situation. he knows he's competing with his father's ghost for a place in Ronan's life. he knows he resents Matthew for being the primary factor in his parentification and loss of opportunity in life. he knows he loves his father no matter how much he tries to convince himself to hate him. he knows he feels trapped in the life he's leading, doesn't see a way out, and likely wouldn't take it if he did because it would be at the expense of his brothers.

all of these things, Declan acknowledges openly, either to himself in narration or out loud to others. he may delude himself about how well he's coping with his issues, but he has no illusions about what his issues ARE.

except for the fucking moth.

it's such a perfect, on-the-nose symbol that it almost strains credulity for Declan not to acknowledge it as such, and yet not once does he ever look at the moth and feel the way he did about the black string art exhibit that made him recognize how trapped he felt in his life. "how the moth had beaten against the walls for those first few days, until it had learned it could not escape."

the learned helplessness of it - there's no point fighting to get free, just lie down and accept that this is your life. know what you're allowed to do, and have, and be. know what you're not. a creature of his father's making, confined by his father's hand.

and not even something as eye-catching as a butterfly, no, but a quieter subtler moth with eyes like glittering purple-black marbles that will never get to live a life because Niall made it so.

and the symbolic parallel of the display case and the townhouse. the rigid real world structures that Declan himself requested, because they made him feel more secure than being surrounded by dreams, and that his father provided in a well-meaning but ultimately short-sighted attempt to accommodate him. things that Declan only recognizes much later as the cages that they were.

Declan now regrets demanding his dad make the display case by hand, and when he puts himself through Ronan's bad-feeling security system at the end of the series, the memory it hits him with is inheriting the sterile alexandria townhouse that was exactly what he'd claimed to want.

these are symbols of Declan's complicity, in a manner of speaking, in the whole tragic mess that was his upbringing. at some point, quite early on, Declan's oppression became a joint effort, something that he participated in (because a complete lack of control in the situation would have felt worse). it reminds me of Declan struggling to remember which of them first decided to lie to Matthew about what he was, whether that was his dad's idea or if he'd done that of his own volition, just following pattern.

did dad trap him, or did he build the walls himself? or was it both?

but, for once, none of this is acknowledged by Declan in the text. this artistically-minded chronic overthinker carries the moth around with him - one of the two dreams he will never sell, alongside the gift from Ronan - and he stays so uncritically sentimental about it that he releases it on his wedding day with happy/nostalgic tears in his eyes, and it just boggles my mind.

this is the man who looked at a bunch of string and had the immediate revelation that he was utterly miserable and trapped in a spiderweb of a life precariously balanced on a knife's edge where one wrong move could get him and everyone he loved killed, but he looks at a direct, uncomplicated, one-to-one representation of himself and somehow does not recognize that it is not something to think of fondly. that, yes, it may be a symbol of his father's love for him, but it's not good.

#this goes hand in hand with Niall's characterization 180 in this book #uncritical thought is REQUIRED in order to maintain the rose-tinted view of him as a good father #Declan cannot look at that damn moth with his usual level of discernment and empathy or the whole arc falls apart #Declan Lynch #Niall Lynch #TRC #TDT #tags by me

[peanutpinet]

hihi!! really love the mini nct-mafia universe that you’ve created 🥹 i was hoping if you could write jaemin next..i was thinking of jaemin being a little cold to others but only soft towards y/n (and of course jeno)..i’ll leave the plot up to you but i thought it’ll be cute if there’s a scene where y/n helps to undress jaemin to take care of him..so like angst/fluff/suggestive all blended in one! thank you and i’m sorry if it’s so specific 🥲🥲

Trauma - Mafia! Na Jaemin x Innocent! Fem Reader

A/N: Hi anon!! Thank you for requesting the fic! I actually was already planning to write for mafia Jaemin and since you requested him as well, it motivated me even more to write!

Also, apologies if I took way too long and if the story isn't how you actually want it to go but I do hope that you enjoy it as much as I wrote it. There are lots of heavy trigger warnings that you have to pay attention to!

Trigger Warning: trauma experience, character death (not MC), grief, revenge, murder, blood loss, torture (excessive), explosion. -> I'm sorry if this isn't all but I will try to update it in case I missed anything

Synopsis: Being the son of the famous Nam Goongmin came with a heavy price to pay for Jaemin. Though Taeyong managed to get Jaemin out of his father’s mafia business and helped him to heal, there was still some trauma that Jaemin had yet to face. Until he came across a girl that he would soon learn that he can't always run from his problems

Water to Fire. Winter to Spring. Sunshine to Rain. They were all opposites of each other yet people kept on saying that opposites then to attract one another. Jaemin had never believed such things until he saw his parents. His father was the ruthless mafia whereas his mother was a kindhearted school teacher. Despite their contradicting characteristics, they were like magnets and attracted each other in a good way just like sunshine and rain coming together to create a rainbow.

Though Jaemin knew that his father didn’t have the best job, being one of the most feared mafia in South Korea before NCT became a thing was a reputation that Jaemin had to live for years until his mother passed away; and not in a peaceful way.

Jaemin knew that with the amount of power and wealth his father had, came all the enemies as well. Enemies who either wanted his father dead for hundreds of different reasons. Murder. Fraud. Stealing. Jaemin didn’t know how far his father was in crime because his mother made sure that he wouldn’t have to see his father at one of the most gruesome scenes that might as well come from the action/thriller drama that he watched.

Sadly, those moments were all but just memories to Jaemin. Everything happened as quickly as his memories could remember. One sunny morning, the day before Jaemin’s 18th birthday, he was going off to school and the same evening he went back home, it started raining but he still went home smiling knowing that he got a perfect score on his biology test, a recommendation letter from all of his science teacher and that his mom promised that they would bake today.

But when he arrived at the front door, Jaemin knew that something was wrong. Quietly, Jaemin took off his shoes and took the nearest thing that he could use as a weapon and went in. Though Jaemin was sheltered from the gruesome life of his father, the old man actually taught him every self-defence technique he knew. From hand-to-hand combat to even using a gun, Jaemin knew it all. But what his father had not taught him was how to cope with his feelings or a life that he took with his own hands.

That day will forever haunt Jaemin’s memory as the day of his first kill, the day of his mother’s death, and the day that he knew that he was his father’s son. When Jaemin’s father came home that night, he was just as distraught as his son. Both instantly mourn the loss of their beloved wife and mother. It was the first time that Jaemin’s dad actually let Jaemin into the horrifying world that he lived in.

Out for revenge, Jaemin had no mercy for anyone who would prevent him or his father from getting back at the one who took the light out of their dark thoughts. But even when Jaemin finally got a taste of revenge. It didn’t satisfy him and instead, he quickly realised his actions before it was too late.

His mother taught him better. His mother always taught him to never hate anyone as most people who do evil things were also once good. So Jaemin did what he could do. Run. Jaemin ran away from all his dark side; his father.

Jaemin knew that no matter how far or fast he ran, his father would always find him. But it seemed that his mother must’ve sent some guardian angels because right as Jaemin was cornered by some of his father’s most trusted men, some other men came and saved Jaemin, killing his father’s men in the process.

It was that day did Jaemin joined Taeyong into NCT and became one of the core members of NCT. But unlike the other members who also have daytime jobs, Jaemin prefers to just stay at the base and stand by whilst studying medicine with Kun. Though Taeyong still forces Jaemin to go follow Jeno along because Jeno was one of the only members that Jaemin talks to and eventually Jeno manages to convince Jaemin to at least intern and later work in NCT’s hospital under Kun on the early morning of weekdays.

For the most part of Jaemin’s life in NCT, not once did he ever complain. Not once did Jaemin want something more like his friend Jeno who is a famous racer. Not once did Jaemin ever go against NCT’s leader, Taeyong, like sometimes Haechan did. Though Jaemin has become more social than his first year in NCT, Taeyong has yet to completely understand Jaemin.

In reality, Jaemin stayed with NCT because he hoped that one day if he were to have to face his father again, he would face him without being scared. After years of being with NCT and even becoming a surgeon in Neo Hospital under Kun, Jaemin slowly finds a new routine and he slowly finds that by helping other people, it relieves a part of him that remembers all the bad things his father had done towards multiple innocent people.

As days passed, Jaemin has slowly forgotten about meeting his father again. Instead, Jaemin wants to avoid having to meet his father ever again if it were possible. Jaemin was content with the life he has now and wants to continue to just live his life without the constant worry of having to deal with his father or the mess he made; at least, until a recent patient that he had to deal with.

It was in the middle of a weekend night, right when Taeyong suddenly dismissed him and told Jaemin to just go back home despite Taeyong just finished torturing a guy who kidnapped the intern for Neo-Tech and helped build the Satellite tracker.

But right as Jaemin was about to go back to his place, Jeno suddenly called him and said that there was a sudden accident right when he and his girlfriend were on their way home and some weird men were chasing an injured girl.

“I got no idea why they were chasing them but I figured to call you not only to help the girl but I also feel that you should know. Those weird men mentioned that they were under your father’s name” Jeno mentioned, making Jaemin stop in his tracks

“I’m on my way. I’ll call the nurse to handle it before I get there. Just drive to the emergency entrance” Jaemin replied, turning off his call with Jeno, going into his car and rushing to the hospital

Along the way, Jaemin called the nurse in his hospital and told them to go to the emergency room and help a girl that Jeno was bringing. Jaemin also told the nurse to ask for Kun to help before he arrived there.

Within minutes, Jaemin arrived at the hospital and immediately went to get changed and head to the surgery room. Before going in, Jaemin saw Jeno who was bloody with his girlfriend sitting by the entrance. “Jaem…” Jeno called out to his friend who was just about to head into the surgery room.

“You should take her home. I can handle it here” Jaemin replied but Jeno seemed hesitant. “Your girlfriend is practically asleep, Jen. You’re also covered with blood. Plus I’m not alone. Kun-hyung is here. Go” Jaemin reassured Jeno who stood up, carrying his sleeping girlfriend

“Call me if anything happens. I’m not just a member. I’m your friend, too” Jeno mentioned before Jaemin went into the surgery room

In the surgery room, Jaemin apologised to Kun for being late but Kun didn’t question him. “I’ll question you after the surgery. Jeno came in here bloody and said that you wouldn’t want anyone outside of NCT to know about this” Kun mentioned

“Probably for the best” Jaemin replied and immediately got to work with Kun

Because Jeno managed to stop the bleeding by using a cloth and putting pressure on it, Jaemin and Kun managed to stitch up the girl with no problem. But aside from the deep wound, Jaemin noticed that the girl also had several bruises all over her body, a cut lip, and even a few fractured bones.

After moving the girl into a secluded patient room, Kun and Jaemin went into Kun’s office where Kun made a cup of warm tea before getting into the talk. “I won’t tell Taeyong if you don’t want me to” Kun reassured Jaemin who has been quiet since the surgery

“She’s related to my father” Jaemin mentioned, making Kun stop drinking his drink and look at the younger one. “Not in a way that you would think. Jeno said that she was being chased by some men. When Jeno got to her, she was already bruised and everything. Jeno thought that he was just helping someone but didn’t realise until too late that the men were working for my father” Jaemin explained

“You know. You’re not really obligated to actually find out about her or her relationship with your father if you don’t want to. You can always just ignore her and think that you never met her” Kun mentioned. “I’m not saying that you should run away from your problems but…” Kun added but Jaemin stopped him

“I know that someday I’m going to have to face him again after all these years. If so, I might as well get it over with. Thanks hyung, but I’m going to try and find out and maybe face my father. All I ask is to not tell Taeyong-hyung about it until I’m sure that she truly has something to do with my father” Jaemin mentioned, leaving Kun to see the girl

Jaemin’s POV

Reaching the girl’s room, I went in and received an overview of her profile from Haechan. “You owe me big. Taeyong-hyung almost caught me for this”. Going over her profile, I noticed that the girl, (y/n) has gone through a rough childhood.

“3 different foster homes in the span of 20 years?! Geez. Either she was trouble or those foster homes are actually as shitty as I know” I thought to myself, glancing over (y/n) who was sweating and whimpering.

Turning off the screen to my tab, I walked closer. Grabbing a soft cloth, I started to wipe the sweat that was building up on her forehead until I was close enough to hear her whimpers.

“p-please…” (y/n) whimpered. “leave my mom alone. Let me go” (y/n) suddenly screamed, jolting from the bed

“Hey, hey, no one is going to hurt you” I mentioned, looking at (y/n) who was now sitting, her chest was going up and down faster than normal

“You’re alright but I would suggest you to rest again. Let’s put you to sleep again” I mentioned, coming closer but she flinched when my hand was just reaching her shoulders

Sighing, I pulled my hands away and tucked them into my pockets. “Look. I’m a doctor here. I’m not going to hurt you or anything. If I was going to hurt you, I’d done it already” I bluntly mentioned as (y/n) just eyed me from top to bottom

“Jaemin…” she read my nametag. “You look like him. I, I thought…” (y/n) finally said a sentence

“Who? Who do I look like? What were you thinking if I look like someone?” I asked but (y/n) didn’t utter another word. “Do I look like Nam Goongmin?” I asked, the name felt foreign that my voice cracked a bit but luckily, I got some kind of answer as (y/n) nodded

“You’ve met him before” I mentioned. It wasn’t a question

Another nod which made my next sigh rougher than the previous one. “Look, if you have anything to say to me regarding him, just tell me. Or if you know about him. Or if you’re involved with him. I’m not a mind reader” I rambled

“He mentioned your name before” (y/n) finally said something again but I didn’t cut her off. I wanted her to keep talking. “He mentioned that I reminded him of his son. How I wasn’t considerate and thankful that he helped me find a foster home b-but…” (y/n) started to cry

“He helped you look for a foster home? But why? Sorry for being blunt but I doubt that he would let himself get involved with someone like you unless you or someone you know is involved with him” I mentioned

“H-he, he killed my dad and then my mom. He killed them because they worked for him but eventually cut ties with him” (y/n) cried, probably remembering the dark times she had to face

“What do you remember?” I asked, handing a clean cloth for her to wipe her tears

“My dad was his colleague. He helped supply the things that Nam Goongmin couldn’t easily get his hands on. But when I reached a certain age, my dad just cut ties with him” (y/n) added

“Were you home when your parents were killed?” I asked and (y/n) nodded

“My parents hid me, along with files of Nam Goongmin. Files that if they were to be released to the public, would ruin everything that he had built” (y/n) replied, perking up my interest

“When was the last time you saw him?” I asked, wanting to know more

“Months ago. He found me while I was working at a convenience store late at night. I didn’t know who he was at first until he brought up my parents’ name” (y/n) replied. “At first, he didn’t ask the files. He just told me about his history with my dad which honestly shocked me. I was so scared that he would do something to me but instead, he just left”

“But you mentioned that you were in foster homes? Did you run away?” I asked

“Ever since my parents passed away, which was when I was 14, I was put in an adoption center but turns out I was put into foster homes. At first, I didn’t notice anything strange until one night in my first foster home, I heard him again. I ran away after finding out. I was then put into another foster home at 15 but it was the same thing. I found out they were associated with him and ran away. The last one was the most brutal one. They didn’t sugarcoat anything and I was treated like a slave until I told them where I hid the file. When I saw a chance, I ran away once again. I managed to hide from them for the past 2 years because I ran away by the time I reached 18 years old and started working part-time in a few places. Up until now at least” (y/n) ended her story

“So, where did you actually hide the files then?” I asked as (y/n) just looked at me

“Don’t you think it’s only fair that I ask you after explaining to you, not knowing if I can trust you or not” (y/n) mentioned

“Nam Goongmin…he’s my father” I mentioned, shocking (y/n)

The next morning rolled around quicker than I wanted. I ended up not going back home and stayed in (y/n)’s room since I was the one who booked her the VIP room. While (y/n) was sleeping, I checked on all the files that Haechan sent me just to double-check her background because she could be lying and actually working with my father.

Jeno came along with Renjun and Haechan, bringing something for me to eat which I realised that I hadn’t eaten anything since the surgery the other night. The four of us sat in my office as I told them about what happened the other night.

“So her story and what Haechan sent you checked out? She’s not lying?” Renjun asked, munching on the burger that he bought upon coming to the hospital

“As far as I read the background. Yeah. Unless you have something else up your sleeve, Haechan?” I asked, looking over to him who was stuffing his face with french fries

“That’s all I found. And I’ve used the big bois. Perks of having parents that used to be in the mafia I supposed. Can manipulate what information would be put out there well until they were dead at least” Haechan shrugged

“What are you planning to do then, Jaem? I mean, you used to say that you don’t want to get involved with your dad ever again. What changed?” Jeno asked but I too didn’t quite have the answer yet

“Part of me doesn’t like the idea of what dad has become. Regardless, he was still my father and he honestly raised me well. He was there for my childhood. It was truly like he wanted me in his life. But when my mom was killed, guess that’s when he went haywire and made a killing spree. I want him to atone for what he did. Killing innocent people is wrong and he had never done it until my mom passed away” I mentioned

“So, you want to put him behind bars?” Haechan asked

“It’s more complicated…” I mumbled when a knock was heard. “Who is it?” I asked, standing from my seat, eyeing my members who suddenly went serious mode

“Dr Na, your patient is here to see you” the nurse exclaimed, making my members sigh of relief

“Yes, of course. Just bring her in” I mentioned and the nurse brought (y/n) on a wheelchair into my office. “I’ll handle it from here, you can leave” I told the nurse

“So this is the famous (y/n)” Haechan smirked while I instantly eyed him, helping (y/n) into my office

“Ignore him, he’s always that playful. I’m Renjun, that’s Jeno over there” Renjun mentioned, giving a smile at (y/n). The same goes for Jeno

“You’re the one that helped me!” (y/n) exclaimed as Jeno nodded. “That would be me. I’m glad that you’re alright now. Also, I know Jaemin might seem cold and unapproachable but he’s pretty nice” Jeno mentioned, making me groan

“I never got to thank you. Thank you, for saving me. If you hadn’t, I would’ve…” (y/n) rambled but Jeno shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. Thank Jaemin as well for saving you. I just helped a bit. He’s the saviour here. I mean, he’s dubbed the miracle doctor here because the amount of times Jaemin has been able to save people who are in critical condition is crazy” Jeno mentioned, which honestly made me flustered

“I think I’m just lucky this time, to be able to meet kind people to help me” (y/n) shyly stated

“It’s not luck. No one deserves to die honestly. Anyways, you can trust my friends here. They, they know about my history with my father” I stated. “You can tell us where you hid the files and we’ll help retrieve them. I promise that there’s nothing to worry about. You’re completely safe here” I added on, making (y/n) smiled

“Thank you” (y/n) uttered. “But I’m sorry that this might seem like I’m asking a lot but actually, I hid it at my old house. The one where I used to live with my parents. I figure that it would be the best place to hide it since Nam Goongmin wouldn’t think to look at an old abandoned house where he killed people that he probably don’t remember” (y/n) explained and I looked over at Haechan who was still stuffing his face with food but his face was serious as he was typing away on his computer

“Is this the house?” Haechan asked, showing us all his laptop that showed a house. “Y-yeah, how did you?” (y/n) asked but Haechan shrugged. “It’s one of my many talents”

“Alright then, we should leave tonight. It’ll be easier so we won’t be seen” Jeno pointed out and the others started to pack their things. “I’ll also fill in Yangyang and Shotaro on our plan so that they could help with the file. Haechan, you, Renjun and Shotaro should prepare on the equipment we need. I’ll ask Yangyang for a vehicle and…” Jeno added but (y/n) cut him off

“Is, is it alright if I come along? I mean. I’m the one that knows where it’s hidden. Plus. I, I want to get something from the house” (y/n) asked

“Honestly, I don’t think it would be the best idea for you to come. You’re still injured and…” Jeno replied

“I just want to get my old family photobook. I promise that’s it” (y/n) argued

“I think it’s alright if she goes. We’ll all be there and I’ll keep a watch on her and then get her out as soon as she gets her photobook” I added on, making Jeno sigh

“Fine. But we have to move quickly. Taeyong-hyung doesn’t know about this and even if he does, we have to be fast, alright?” Jeno stated and everyone nodded

After the short meeting, I brought (y/n) back to her room, making her rest up a bit more while I went back to my office and changed into my nightwear mission gear and taking the female clothes I asked someone to buy for me to (y/n)’s room; telling her to change while we wait for Jeno to come.

“Just asking. How long have you been doing this?” I heard (y/n) asked

“For a few years. I was found by my now leader at 18 and ever since I was taken in, was taught everything I know and was given the opportunity to be something that I’ve always wanted as a kid” I told her, remembering the early days when Taeyong-hyung and Jeno first found me

“Do, do you guys like, I don’t know, kill people? Sell drugs or human trafficking?” (y/n) asked, making me chuckle at her thought. “Wh-why are you laughing? Is this all just a trick and you’re actually working with…” (y/n) rambled but I stopped her before she could say that man’s name

“No. We’re not like him. Not every mafia is bad. At least not us. I used to think the same until my leader brought me in. We’re considered a mafia group because we deal with other dirty crime organizations through some illegal methods which to the public, it might seem wrong but basically, we help the government do more of the dirty work. But we never went as far as killing. Torture? Yes. I’ll tell you that upfront. Especially to those who betray us” I explained, looking at (y/n) who looked nervous

“Don’t worry. As long as you’re not involved with the people in our wanted list, there’s nothing to worry about. Are you ready to go?” I asked as (y/n) slowly nodded

“Alright, come with me then” I mentioned, nudging (y/n) to walk right beside me. “Whatever happens there, I’ll be by your side and I expect you to do the same. Don’t walk ahead, don’t walk behind. I have to make sure that nothing happens to you, got it?” I stated as we walked into the private elevator and (y/n) nodded

Arriving at (y/n)’s house, Jeno told Haechan, Renjun and Shotaro to stay hidden as he, Yangyang, (y/n) and I go into the house and find the files along with the photobook that (y/n) wanted. Because (y/n) was the only one who knew where both the items were, we stuck close to her, practically forming a human wall around her to make sure that there weren’t any threats.

“Haechan, any sign of anyone nearby?” Jeno asked. “Nope. It’s all clear. Unless you count some stray cats nearby which they’re very big and chubby” Haechan joked

“Jaem, you accompany (y/n). Yangyang and I will stay downstairs, just in case. Once you’ve gotten the files, toss it to me and I’ll have Yangyang hand it to Haechan and the others, kay?” Jeno instructed and I nodded in acknowledgement

(y/n) and I went upstairs, and I noticed from some of the ripped, broken images that (y/n) seemed to be an only child and that there weren’t really any other family members except for her parents. “D-do you not have any like uncles or aunts to take you in at the time?” I asked as (y/n) rummage around a room that seems to be a master bedroom based on the size and linked bathroom

“Unfortunately, no. As far as I know, my parents are both only childs and even if there were, I doubt they want to take a burden in” (y/n) chuckled dryly, making me feel bad for asking

“I’m sorry to hear that but you should know that no one is a burden. Especially those under 18. You didn’t ask to be born. None of us asked for it and you shouldn’t push yourself because of what happened. This universe might’ve fucked up some things in everyone’s life but the moment you’re given just one chance to change your fate, take it. Exploit it if you can as long as you hurt no one. You deserve to enjoy your life” I stated, trying to cheer (y/n) up

“You know, I lived my life in uncertainty and everything changed with my mom was killed and I thought that this universe hated me until my now leader and Jeno found me. They gave me a new life and I’m doing much better now. Why don’t you come with us when all of this is over?” I offered, catching (y/n)’s attention

“I doubt that you guys would want me. I don’t even know what I’m good at” (y/n) replied, her voice became much softer than before

“Don’t worry about that. Everyone doesn’t know what they’re good at because they just simply were never given the chance to. But I promise you that as stone-cold as some of my members are, they are all caring for each other and would always help one another. Just consider it. And if you decided you want to, I’ll talk with my leader about it” I replied, offering (y/n) a smile, making her smile back

“T-thank you, Jaemin. Really. No one has ever offered me this far” (y/n) mentioned, making me frown

“That’s probably because they don’t understand the pain you go through; especially after losing your parents. Let’s hurry and find the file and your photobook then we can continue this conversation” I stated as (y/n) nodded

(y/n) quickly scrambled to the bed of the room and went underneath the covers, ripping it and taking something out of the mattress which turns out to be the USB. “Is that the files?” I asked as (y/n) nodded. “Yeah, I kept it here because this room and bed reminded me about my parents. How I would crawl into their room in the middle of the night because of nightmares when I was younger. And eventually sleep between them” (y/n) replied, making me smile

“Can I take the USB from you? I promise that my members and I will bring justice to your parents and all the innocent people whose life were ruined by Nam Goongmin” I stated, extending my hand as (y/n) handed the USB over

“Jen, I got it. We’re upstairs in the master bedroom. (y/n) is looking for the photobook” I stated in my earcom. “I’m going up” Jeno replied

Jeno then came within seconds and took the USB. Jeno told me to take care of (y/n) while he went to Haechan and handed the USB over to check the files before going back to the base. I told Jeno that he and Yangyang could just go with the others because (y/n) and I were only finding the photobook.

Despite being unsure of my request, Jeno eventually compiled and told me that if anything were to happen, I should just call him or the base; regardless of whether Taeyong-hyung knows or not. Because in the end, whether I like it or not, I will have to tell Taeyong-hyung about this.

After Jeno left, I continued to help (y/n) find the photobook she was looking for. We eventually turned the already messed up house into basically a destroyed ship. But luckily, we managed to find the photobook that (y/n) was looking and I instantly told the others that we were done and were going to head back to my place.

As we went downstairs, I suddenly heard a clock ticking. I looked around and saw an old grandfather clock that was ticking. Which was strange because I swore that when we all went into the house, the only noise that could be heard were our voices, the sounds of our shoes on the old hardwood floor, and even our breathing. But not once did I hear any ticking noise.

Not wanting to find out, I quickly wrapped an arm around (y/n) and dragged her out of the house. But before we could get out, the clock struck 3 am and instantly, everything became a blur. One moment I was reaching the door handle to open the door and the next, I was having a hard time breathing and was lying on my back.

Blinking several times, I tried to regain my vision after almost blacking out but everything was still a blur. My nose smelled some smoke and as I used my hands to try to get me up, I noticed that the house behind me was in flames.

Regardless of my weak state, I called out to (y/n) and tried to scan my surroundings with whatever vision I had but I felt everything spinning around and was suddenly met with a fist on my cheek; making me fall to the ground and cough up blood.

Suddenly, I felt two people holding each of my arms respectively as I was now kneeling on the ground. I tried to fight them off but knowing my weak state from the sudden explosion, I couldn’t do anything. But what caught me off-guard was the person who walked and stood right in front of me. The man who made me have my first kill, the man who I thought was good because of how he loved my mother, the man who shared the same DNA as I did. My father, Nam Goongmin.

“I thought I told you manners on how to greet your elderly, Na Jaemin” my father chuckled, grabbing a chunk of my hair, roughly pulling my head back, making me look at him

Even though my vision was still blurry, I could recognize that tone and sinister smirk from anywhere. “You don’t deserve any manners or respect from me” I coughed up, spitting some blood that landed on my father’s suit and face

“You still haven’t changed, have you? A doctor now are you?” my father stated, not really asking me

“W-was the least I could do, after what you’ve done. You can try to kill as many innocent people but I’ll be the one that’ll save them” I argued back, my father roughly letting my hair go

“Oh, you might want to save that breath of yours because you’re going to need it” my father uttered, I could feel his breath by my ear. “You and your little gang have something that I’ve been looking for years” my father whispered as I turned to eye him

“Let’s test how eager you are to save a life, shall we? That troublesome girl will be your time limit. Right now, she’s practically as injured as you are. The difference is. You’re going to be rescued by your little team while she gets to hang out with me” my father stated, making me try to release the grip of his men

“With every second you don’t come back, I’m going to draw her blood out of her. Slowly. With each day passing and you do not give me back those files, I’ll have to find out which organ I want to sell to the black market first. And if those files ever get released to the public? I’ll give you a little present. For all the years that I’ve been gone from your life” my father stated when suddenly I was injected with a sleeping drug and the grip on each of my arms were gone as I drifted off to sleep, and my body unconsciously fell to the ground with the thought of (y/n) in my mind

NCT Base - 8:25 pm (still Jaemin’s POV)

The sound of a beeping monitor slowly matched with the beat of my heart as I slowly woke up from my slumber for who knows how long. When I opened my eyes and slowly scanned the room, I noticed that I was in the patient room back in the base.

When I closed my eyes again, I remembered my father’s threat and immediately jerked on the bed. “Shit Jaemin, are you okay?! Let me get Kun-hyung” I heard Jeno stated but I managed to grip his wrist. “How long was I out?” I asked

“About more than 12 hours. Not long after we left, I felt something was off. I tried to contact you through our earcom but it was muffled. I told Haechan to just go while I drove one of our emergency borrowed cars and went back to the house. By the time I arrived, the house was in flames and you passed out on the ground, bruises and blood everywhere. But I didn’t see (y/n) at all” Jeno explained

“Shit. My dad. H-he caused the explosion. He knew that we would go to the house. He knew that (y/n) must’ve hid the files there and would have to retrieve it. Where’s the files right now?” I asked, trying to get out of bed but Jeno stopped me

“Woah. I know that your dad is insane and we should save (y/n) but you’re injured pretty badly right now. You gotta rest. Especially since you have to face…” Jeno ranted but we heard several footsteps coming into the room

“Is he awake?!” both Jeno and I heard Taeyong-hyung’s voice and suddenly the door was slammed open and Taeyong-hyung along with Kun, Mark, and Doyoung came in

“Tell me why the hell is there a 150ml of blood bag with your fucking name on it arrived at the hospital when the blood is clearly not yours?!” Taeyong-hyung demanded, showing me the blood bag

“Shit. He’s actually serious. Fuck. Hyung, where’s the files?” I asked back but Taeyong-hyung didn’t budge. “Who is he, Jaemin?! You’re my member. My core member. And Kun received this right as he finished handling another patient. So no, Jaemin, I won’t let you know anything about the files until you explain yourself” Taeyong-hyung growled and I was trying to put together some words to not make the situation worse

“He’s back isn’t he?” Taeyong-hyung stated, sending chills as I remembered the incident

“He’s after the files, isn’t he, Jaemin?” Taeyong-hyung asked as I slowly nodded. “Everyone but Jeno, out” Taeyong-hyung stated as the others left the room but Jeno. “You know something as well, Jeno. I’ll deal with the other 00 boys later” Taeyong-hyung added

“Tell me everything, Jaemin. What happened, how did you get those files, whose blood is this and what did Nam Goongmin threaten you” Taeyong demanded and I told him everything that had happened. From when Jeno brought (y/n) to the hospital to going to her house and even facing my father on my own

“I know meeting him would not end well but this?! This is out of my prediction” Taeyong-hyung grunted, messing up his hair before slicking it back again

“We can’t release the files. (y/n) would be instantly killed” I argued

“I know that. But we need to find where your father is first which Jungwoo is already in the process of finding through the satellite tracker. In the meantime, Haechan already duplicated the files and we’ll hand the original file back” Taeyong-hyung mentioned

“You figured it out when I was passed out, didn’t you, hyung?” I asked back when Taeyong-hyung explained on the current situation he’s handling which always amazed me

“I keep tabs on my members. I know about your father coming to find you because that was the reason why he sent someone to kidnap the intern under Jungwoo. But I wouldn’t expect another person outside of NCT to be involved. Guess I should’ve expected it since it already happened with Jeno and Haechan” Taeyong-hyung chuckled

“I’m sorry. I didn’t want to worry you. I also didn’t expect my father to have everything figured out and was basically a step ahead of me” I grunted

“Jaemin. Whether you like it or not, your dad was in the mafia way before me and the other oldest members in the group. He might be out of touch with the current generation unlike us, but he always has that sinister, manipulative mind that somehow always manages to turn the situation around. No matter what, your dad is not someone we can take on lightly like Jeno or Haechan’s situation” Taeyong-hyung stated when suddenly we heard a knock on the door, revealing to be Jungwoo

“Hyung. I found him” Jungwoo-hyung stated and Taeyong-hyung told him to come and show us

Jungwoo-hyung came in and showed the exact location of where my father was and it turns out, he was back at my old house. The house that I abandoned since my mother was killed. “Of course he would be there” I growled

“That’s not all, Jaemin. As I found him, there was a sudden file that was delivered to me. I didn’t want to open it until I see Taeyong-hyung” Jungwoo-hyung mentioned, showing us the mystery file that he received

“Open it, Jungwoo” Taeyong-hyung mentioned and upon opening the file, I could feel my stomach twist and nearly puke upon seeing the file because it was a video of (y/n) who was unconscious and tied to a bed, getting her blood slowly drawn out and a figure coming behind her and slowly picking up a scalpel before the video went black, showing several numbers.

“Hyung…” I grunted, Jeno taking a bucket and shoving it towards me. “Go ahead, no one is going to judge you” Jeno tried to joke

“It’s a countdown” Taeyong-hyung stated. “Looks like your dad still isn’t a patient man. Are you okay to go?” Taeyong-hyung asked

“I have to. I’m not letting him kill another innocent person. Not when I can actually do something about it. I failed to protect my mom and spent the past few years to try and atone for what my father has done. I’m not going to sit this one out just because I have a few bruises and injuries” I stated, getting up from my bed

“It’ll most likely be a trap. Your dad would instantly kill her upon seeing the rest of us but if you go alone, there’s no telling what will happen. Your dad could have mercy on you but not on the girl or he might be very merciful and spare both of you. Either way, I won’t sit tight and let you handle everything alone, alright?” Taeyong-hyung stated, patting my shoulder

Jaemin’s Old House - 1:38 am

Right as my car came to a stop, I took a deep breath before walking out and facing the very problem that I’ve been running away from for the past 6 years of my life. As I slowly opened the door, memories of what used to be a happy childhood slowly flooded back but this time with the smell of dirt, trash, and even blood mixed in.

Standing by the door, I was met with multiple other men with their guns all loaded, pointing at me as I looked up at my father who was standing on the 2nd floor, looking as sharp as I remembered him from the day when I last saw him. The last day that I ever agreed to do anything with him. To get revenge on my dead mother.

“I’m assuming you come here with what I requested?” my father asked and I pulled the USB from the inner corner of my jacket, raising it up to show him

“All the files about you. About what you’ve done. About every corrupted person you have helped. Every innocent person you have killed. Every track of your dirty money in and out. Every weapon and drug you own and sell. They’re all in here” I stated, none of my father’s men lowered their weapons

“Hand over the USB and put down every weapon you have” my father instructed me. “Search him just in case” my father added

I handed the USB to one of his men as I took out my guns, knife, pepper spray, and every other weapon I had in hand. Two of his men held me by the arm and another searched me completely before taking away all of my weapons, telling my father that I was already clean.

His men who took the USB went upstairs and handed it to my father. My father then took it and plugged it into the laptop to check every single file personally. “You really have turned soft, haven’t you, Jaemin? All this information for just a girl?” my father questioned

“Just a girl? You killed her parents. She didn’t deserve to continue her life like that. She had no one. No one deserves to live like that. Just because you were like that, doesn’t mean someone else should” I argued back and without warning, my father fired a bullet that grazed my cheek

“Know your place, boy. Remember it was me that helped bring you to this world. Without me, you wouldn’t be alive or breathing right now. Her father wasn’t as innocent if she ever told you the truth, that is. His father was associated with me as in they were the ones that sourced all the weapons and drugs that I sell. So, regardless, they weren’t all that good” my father argued back as well

“Doesn’t mean you should kill them. No one deserves to be killed” I stated but what my father said next hit me more than a bullet would. “Yet your mother was killed”

“If you recall, your mother was murdered, Na Jaemin. She didn’t die due to some illness or of old age. She was murdered cold-blooded. She did nothing wrong yet she was still murdered. You’re only partially right. Not everyone deserves to be killed. Some do” my father stated.

“As shitty as some people are, including you, no one still deserves to be killed” I stood my argument

“You sure about that? Don’t you remember the time when you practically forced yourself to come with me to find your mother’s killer? That you wanted to pull the trigger yourself. Yet, it didn’t satisfy you enough, did it? If anything, you’ve always been a coward. I taught you everything. Yet, you never dared to go above and beyond” my father complained

“My mother never taught me to do anything bad. Plus, she was the reason why you were also soft at some point in your life. She would be disappointed with how you’ve changed. At least I’m trying to atone for what you and I did” I taunted, making my father’s demeanour change. His gaze got darker and scarier.

“Don’t talk about her as if you know about our history. As if you understand what it feels like to have someone part of you being ripped away after all that you’ve been through to change for them” my father admitted; a side of him that I didn’t really know of

“Who says?! My mother is a part of me. Heck, 50% of my DNA is from her. She was my number one supporter and she was my everything. The first woman I love. You and I are the same in terms of looks, some of our traits, and our love for the same woman. The big difference is how we cope with that loss” I mentioned. “As much as I hate the man you’ve become, it saddens me more because no matter what, you’re still my father. So stop this nonsense and just turn yourself in” I tried to reason but instead, my father let out a rather maniac laugh

“There’s another difference between you and I. Your mother might be your first love. But she’s my first and last. Like you said, my parents weren’t really there for me and when I met your mother, that’s when I actually knew what love actually is. Until she was murdered that is. So, Na Jaemin. You want to understand what it feels like to go through what I went through? Let me show you then” my father stated, confusing me

My father went into one of the rooms and not long after, he came back, dragging a way smaller yet weak figure than him to his side which made my whole body shudder as I saw (y/n)’s paled and injured face was being held between one of my father’s hand.

“You said that you wouldn’t hurt her if I gave you the files” I growled, punching and kicking both men who were holding me down, finally breaking free of their grip and immediately there was smoke covering the entirety of the house

Within seconds, each of my father’s men was knocked out by my group and Taeyong-hyung’s additional reinforcements. Once the smoke cleared up, everyone pointed their weapon towards my father as Taeyong stepped into the scene.

“Nam Goongmin. I didn’t expect for us to ever meet again ever since you nearly killed your own son” Taeyong-hyung mentioned. “Let the girl go and turn yourself in. You promised you wouldn’t kill her”

“I only said I would kill her if those files were released. Nothing more. But since you’re all here, you broke the agreement first, Jaemin” my father stated, making my jaw clench. “You want to understand my pain? Then let me show you” my father then stabbed (y/n) in the back and immediately pulled the scalpel out, making her bleed even more blood

Immediately, I rushed upstairs and shoved my father away, catching (y/n) in my arms when suddenly my father shoved me again and started a fight with me

Thankfully, Jeno, Shotaro, and Jaehyun-hyung came and helped bring (y/n) away from the fight between my father and I. Though I was already trained in combat and my father had already age, he still managed to get me out of breath.

My father’s aims were sharp and strong which made me have to go into defence mode until I saw an opening and kicked him on the side of his ribs, which made him stumble backwards. Immediately, I took my chances and threw several more punches which hit and eventually, I managed to pin him on the ground, using my knee to pin his chest down, making it hard for him to breathe while my left arm was right on his neck, barely allowing my father to even speak.

“I think you should be by her side, doctor. Unless of course, you want to feel the exact pain that I felt” my father managed to choke out, tears somehow forming in my eyes

“Jaemin!! You have to operate on (y/n) right now. She already lost so much blood and while we’ve stopped it, it won’t last long” Taeyong-hyung stated as some of his reinforcements came and handled my father

“You should listen to your leader, doctor. Unless you want to relive the time when you couldn’t save someone” my father taunted and Taeyong-hyung covered him from my sight. “Go. I managed to bring a decent amount of tools for you to operate. The guys also managed to find the same blood type as her. I’ll deal with your dad” Taeyong-hyung mentioned, ushering me to quickly go

“Hyung. Thank you. And don’t kill my father. As shitty as what he did, I still stand my ground. I’m not going to kill him and no one is allowed to kill him. He’s still my father after all” I mentioned, looking back at Taeyong-hyung then seeing the other men take my father away

Rushing to the room that my members brought (y/n) in, I immediately put on a mask and gloves before getting to work. Though not all of my members know how the surgery procedure works, I’ve done operations on other people alone before.

I saw the monitor that checked all of (y/n)’s blood condition and they were all very low. First things first, I had to do the blood transfusion quickly before operating on the wound. After setting up the blood bag and putting the IV into (y/n)’s blood vessel, I told Shotaro to eye the blood bag and tell me when it was running low so I could give another blood bag.

As the blood transfusion was happening, I immediately got to work with the wound. I made sure that none of her vital organs were hit before actually stitching her up. I didn’t know how long I was stitching (y/n) while also giving her blood transfusion but at some point, the monitor suddenly beeping like crazy which made me worry.

“Jaem…her blood pressure is decreasing and so is her heart rate. Are there any other scars or wounds she has?” Jeno asked and I instantly scanned her entire body once again and the tab about her past conditions but nothing checked up; it was as if her body was giving up on its own

“Nothing, Jen. She has no wounds, no allergies, no sudden reaction. Her body, its slowly giving up. I’ve only heard several cases of patients whose consciousness just shut down their whole body. I, I didn’t think I would see it happen in front of me” I stuttered, my hands were now shaking

“Jaemin, I know this might sound crazy but you have to talk to her. She might be unconscious but her consciousness is alive and she could most probably hear you. You have to convince her to fight through it” Jaehyun-hyung mentioned and I was a shaking mess

Putting my tools down, I stood right beside (y/n). I grabbed one of her hands and leaned down by her ear. “Hey. I’m not sure if you can hear me but I just wanted to tell you that you shouldn’t give up. I know that we barely met but when you told me what happened to you, I felt that no one was ever able to understand you unlike I do. When you told me what my father did to your family, it made me feel obligated to take care of you. It might seem that I’m doing this to repay what my father did but honestly, I want to help you. You weren’t ever given the chance to enjoy your life” I held (y/n)’s hand with both of mine, squeezing it

“I know that I’ve told you this before but I want to say it again, I want to remind you if you feel that you want to give up. I was at that point as well. I was truly lucky to be able to have a leader and friends that helped me find a new purpose and that alone drove me to help others. You want to know what I want to be a surgeon? It’s not to only save people but I want to give them hope, to give them a second chance in their life when no one else would. I want to help them heal from their trauma just as I want to help you. So please, don’t give up just yet. Let me take care of you and give you the life you deserve. Let me be the one to heal your trauma just as my members healed mine” I rambled, hoping that whatever I said actually got to (y/n)’s consciousness

Somehow, as crazy as Jaehyun-hyung idea was, my voice somehow got through (y/n) and the monitor was suddenly stable once again. Letting out a sigh of relief, I looked at (y/n)’s calmer face and looked at Jaehyun-hyung and Jeno who both told me that I was good to continue.

Thankfully, throughout the rest of the operation, (y/n) was stable and I finished operating on her quicker than usual. Not long, we had some backup to help bring (y/n) and my father’s men back to our base.

Back at the base, everyone cleaned up but I immediately made sure that (y/n) was taken care of. I didn’t even care that I was still in my uniform and covered in dirt, scars, and blood. What matters most is that (y/n) was in a comfortable room, being treated and stable.

I even waited for Kun-hyung to confirm that (y/n) was indeed stable and that all she needed was some rest before actually being dragged out of the room and shoved into our shower room to shower by Jeno.

“You finally done?” Jeno asked as I got changed and dried my hair

“Yeah. You wouldn’t even let me leave until I actually freshen up” I grumbled, annoyed that Jeno and the others wouldn’t let me stay until (y/n) was awake

“Because you reek. You really think (y/n) would want to be next to you when you look and smell like blood, sweat, and tears?” Jeno sarcased

“How is she? Stable right?” I asked, putting my uniform to the dirty basket for laundry later

“Yeah. Kun-hyung actually mentioned that her fingers were moving a bit which means she’s going to wake up soon” Jeno mentioned as I hummed. “What are you going to do with your dad though? Taeyong-hyung practically chained him up and well, the usual. Taeyong-hyung didn’t hurt him too badly, if that’s what you’re worried” Jeno rambled

“Honestly, I’m not sure yet. I don’t want to kill him that’s for sure, I…” I replied when the door was flung open and Renjun came in panting. “She’s awake and Taeyong-hyung is with her”

Within seconds of Renjun coming to tell us that (y/n) was awake, I wasted no time in rushing to her room and seeing Taeyong-hyung beside her. “Relax. I’m not tormenting her, Jaemin. Excuse him, he sometimes look into things a bit too deeply” Taeyong-hyung mentioned and I heard a soft chuckle

When I walked to the side, I saw (y/n) sitting on the bed, her face looked brighter and fresher than hours ago. “Hey” I called out to her, offering a soft smile which she replied back

“I’ll leave you both alone now. Jaemin, when you’re done, my office, alright?” Taeyong-hyung mentioned before leaving me with (y/n) in the room

I pulled a chair and sat next to (y/n). “How are you? How are you feeling? Any parts of your body that hurt?” I asked and (y/n) softly shook her head

“I’m okay. Thank you” (y/n) stated, making me smile. “T-thank you, for saving me” (y/n) uttered out and I immediately took her hands in mine

“No, thank you, for staying strong. I’m not sure if you heard what I said to you when you were unconscious but I promise you that I’ll help you get back up. I’ll help you get the life you’ve wanted. Not because I feel obligated for what my father has done but because you deserve it and maybe because I can relate to you. Only if you allow me to help you, that is?” I rambled on and (y/n) held my hand tighter

“I’d like that. But I also want you to share your burden too” (y/n) uttered, making me smile wider, pressing my forehead onto hers. “As long as you let me take care of you and your trauma” I replied. For the first time, I felt calmer and more at peace since a long time.

NCT Prison - 12:18 am

Though I’ve been through these empty halls, I typically walk through them with my members to torment one of our prisoners. But this time, walking alone felt foreign. It reminded me of the day I left my home on my own. When there was no one to help me at all. But this time it was different. I wasn’t the same boy who ran away from his problems.

No. I decided I was finally going to put an end to it. By going in and facing the man who was both someone I used to look up to and someone that I despised.

“I’m amazed that you actually came. I thought you’d let your leader and other members do as they please with me” my father stated, locked within one of the cages of the prison

“I wouldn’t let them do that. Unlike you, father, who almost killed their own son, I would never let you get killed by my own members. As much as I despised you, you’re still my father. You said it yourself. I’m your son” I started out

“So then what? Are you going to torture me now? Your leader already has my files and most probably he’s going to release it tomorrow along with a statement that I’ve fallen and been captured. Then are you going to kill me by yourself? Is that why you’re not letting your members kill me?” my father questioned me

“I’m not going to kill you. Sure, my leader is going to open up and give a statement regarding his recent findings about you. But I told him that whatever he tells to the public will just be for the public because…I’ve already lost one parent. I don’t intend to lose another” I uttered, my father finally looking at me

“You might not be the best father but at some point, you raised me well. I know you love mom so much and you miss her just as I do but I know that mom would have never wanted us to be like this. She would have wanted both of us to be able to move on and live our lives. Not hating each other. Not chasing each other. We don’t even have to like each other or what we do but I know that mom would have wanted us to just try and get along. And that’s what I plan on doing” I ranted

“You can think that I’m weak or anything you want. But I hope that someday, you’ll be able to see me as your son who only wanted his dad. Not his father. I hope that you will be able to go back to the time when you were happy with mom but this time with me. And I hope that one day, you’ll admit your mistakes and apologise for what you’ve done. Not to me. I’ve gotten over that a long time ago. But to those who you’ve hurt and traumatised” I rambled on before slightly bowing to my father, about to leave but stopped upon hearing my father spoke

“You’re wrong, Jaemin. You’re not my son. You’re mine and your mother’s son. And whether you think that I was going to kill you that day. I wasn’t. Just like you, I was angry at what happened. And was pissed that you cowardly left me. But never did I ever think to kill you. Even now. I would have never killed the one person who reminded me of what your mother and I were like when we first fell for each other” my father finally spoke in a softer tone, making me turn to face him

“But you’re right. I was a shitty father when I should’ve been more of a dad to you. For that, I’m sorry. But I’m glad that you got more of your mother’s side. I’m glad that you grew up well. Your mom might hate me but I know for sure that she’s proud of the man you’ve become” my dad stated, actually smiling a bit which made me smile

“Thanks. I’ll um, talk to you again soon. I hope you do reflect on your mistakes. See you soon, dad” I uttered, leaving my dad, finally getting over the trauma that I’ve been holding onto for years

A/N: hopefully you guys enjoy this other long mafia fic of mine. I swear I will make a whole mini mafia series masterlist. After my 100th post which will be coming in December. I'm sorry that I've been slow on my stories and have only been posting like once a month but somehow, I ended up writing this mini mafia series which while fun, takes quite a while to write as I want them to somewhat interconnect with one another. Alright, before I go, I'm gonna give a mini sneak peek at my 100th post which will be another mafia series. Thank you all, have a great day and stay safe xoxo vinet

Sneak Peek for 100th Post

“Yo, John, doesn’t she look a bit too young to be working a a club?” Jaehyuna asked, looking over to a young girl wearing the waitress uniform, serving some drinks to old sweaty men

Johnny who was just trying to drink and enjoy his night eventually followed Jaehyun’s gaze and landed on the girl that Jaehyun was describing.

Sure, Johnny might’ve opened his own bar with Taeyong’s permission but that doesn’t mean that he allows just about anyone to work in his bar. And while he doesn’t deal with all the miscellaneous work in the bar, he surely memorises his staff and the girl Jaehyun pointed out was never in any parts of Johnny’s memory.

Instead of confronting the girl, Johnny immediately called another waiter to get the current manager and question the girl whom he learned was technically legal to work in a bar as she was 21+ and the manager mentioned that she was only a part-timer on the weekends since they needed more help.

Right when the manager was explaining to Johnny, he saw one of the old men put their hands on the girl’s bare thigh which scared the girl. Angered at the behaviour, Johnny stood up and stomped his way to the scene before the man could go any further.

“This is an exclusive bar and I make sure that all of my staff are always on their best service. But that doesn’t mean that you could just harass them like this” Johnny growled, gripping the older man’s arm tightly that the people nearby could hear a bone crack

“Especially when it’s an old man harassing a young girl” Johnny grunted, pushing the man that he fell off his chair; the other men around the table started to get up, about to put up a fight when Jaehyun came beside Johnny, shielding the girl

“I suggest you all sit your old sweaty asses down unless you want your old bones to be broken” Jaehyun taunted. “Or shall we call Taeyong? Because he’s the co-owner of this bar and I don’t think he would be pleased that his supposed business partners were in his bar, harassing a girl”

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