#i wrote this in like an hour and a half after a thirteen hour shift so if it sucks no it doesnt

[virescent-v]

“i don’t like being told what to do unless i’m naked” with em? 👀

Bossy

Summary: Emily's been a bitch. You fix her attitude. ;) Warnings: smutty smut smut, my normal tbh. quick and easy, like em Word count: 2.3k A/N: A little short thing to get me back into writing. Thanks Katt for the prompt :)

Emily was pissing you off. Ever since this case crossed JJ’s desk, Emily’s been uptight, more so than usual. You’ve seen her get overly invested in cases before, but something about this one was making her - for lack of a better word - crazy. She was hounding the local police more than normal, squashing peoples’ new ideas and theories before listening, and being short with anyone who tried to talk to her. 

She’s snapped at you multiple times today alone, glaring at you anytime you tried to talk about one of your theories. You’d take it personally, but she was acting like this with everyone on the team. It was causing everyone to give her a wide berth, finding excuses to not be in the same room with her. 

At the end of the day, Emily had frustrated every member of the BAU (including Penelope who was back in D.C.) and half of the local station to their limits. 

And, of course, you were the one who had to room with her this trip. Lucky you. 

The ride from the station to the hotel was tense, silence interspersed with the hum of tires on asphalt. The longer the quiet dragged on, the more angry you got at her behavior. 

Emily and you had become fast friends when you joined the BAU a few months ago. You had meshed well with every member of the team, but your dark humor and sarcasm bonded you with the raven-haired woman. You’ve spent countless hours with each other, both at work and outside of Quantico. 

You felt your phone buzz in your lap. 

JJ: You have GOT to talk to her. She’s driving everyone insane!! 

You: Why does it have to be me??? It’s bad enough we share a room! 

JJ: Because she likes you most! 

You: You’ve known her longer! 

JJ: Nose goes! 

You looked up to see JJ holding her pointer finger on her nose, sticking her tongue out at her. You rolled your eyes at her before typing out another message. 

You: Fine! But you owe me coffee and lunch tomorrow! 

JJ: Deal! Just make her Emily again! 

You locked your phone, glancing up at Emily driving. Her jaw was tense, as if she was grinding her teeth. Both of her hands were white knuckled on the steering wheel. You bit your lip, trying to think of a way to bring up her behavior over the last few days. 

*** 

Entering your shared room, Emily started pacing in front of the beds, her lower lip caught between her teeth, her hands fidgeting.

You sighed. “Em, are you okay?” 

Her eyes shot to you. “I’m fine,” she gritted out. 

You rolled your eyes exaggeratedly, making sure she saw. “No, you’re not. You’re frustrated about something. And it’s driving everyone crazy. So, again, what’s wrong?” 

Emily stopped pacing, glaring at you. “What do you mean it’s driving everyone crazy? I’m fine.” 

You huffed, shaking your head. “You’re not. Look at you,” you said, your hand gesturing at her body, every muscle tense, her hands picking at her nails. “You’ve been short with everyone, shutting down theories for stupid reasons. You’ve yelled at every single one of us today and you’ve managed to alienate half of the local cops. Whatever’s wrong needs to stop, Em, I swear, or it’s going to make this case even harder to solve.” 

Emily scoffed, not liking being told off. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.” 

Now it was your turn to gape at the brunette, your eyebrows twisted in annoyed confusion. “Em, I have spent the last few months getting to know you. Late nights in the office, movie nights on our couches, shopping trips. I don’t know what it is about this case that’s getting to you, but it needs to stop. You need to get your head out of your ass, Prentiss, before it causes you to get benched.” 

You watched as Emily stomped across the room to you, her nostrils flaring, her eyes darkening in anger. Her fists were clenched at her sides as she angrily whispered, “I don’t like being told what to do unless I’m naked, so you better watch what you say to me.” 

Emily had moved closer to you than she ever has before, her outrage and annoyance palpable in the air. You could feel her huffed breaths on your cheek. 

You shook your head, chuckling darkly, barely audible. Emily had never intimidated you before and it wasn’t going to start now. “If all you needed to calm down and be yourself again was a good, hard fuck, all you had to do was ask, Em,” you said, smirking as her eyes grew wide. 

You watched as she took in a shuttered breath, her throat bobbing from the nervous swallow. 

You could see the indecision in her eyes, the want and the nerves. How she wanted it, needed it, but didn’t want to cross that line with you for fear of wrecking your friendship, your work life. 

You brought your hand up, pushing some of her hair behind her ear, taking note of the small shiver that ran through her. “Let me help you, Em. We’ll cross tomorrow when it gets here.” 

Emily closed her eyes for a second, taking a deep breath. When she opened her eyes, they somehow had gotten darker, her pupils blown. She’d made her decision. “Fuck it out of me, please.” 

You tilted your chin up a little, settling into the role Emily needed you to fill. “Strip. Slowly.” 

Emily exhaled slowly, her hands grasping at the hem of her shirt, lifting it inch by inch. She watched you, but your eyes never strayed from her face. When she dragged the material over her head, your eyes never left her face. It furthered your in charge position, making Emily’s breath quicken in anticipation. 

The brunette slowly dragged her bra straps down her shoulders, slowly exposing her modest chest. It took a lot of self control on your part, but you still refused to look at her body. You could tell that it was starting to get to Emily, but she wasn’t going to say anything, excited to see what you were up to. 

As she drug her pants and underwear down her legs and stood back up, you made another few seconds of intense eye contact with her before letting your gaze slowly glide over her body. 

You’d be lying if you said you’d never thought about her like this. She was beautiful, striking in a way that made your breath catch the first time you met her. As your relationship with her grew, you were conflicted about thinking of her like this. You’ve come to cherish your connection with her, but you couldn’t help but want more. 

You took your time looking her over, trying to memorize every inch of her in case this was the only time you’d be able to see her like this. 

Emily’s toes started to dig into the carpet, her anticipation growing to a head, the nerves starting to creep up. 

“On the bed, on your back.” 

Emily didn’t need a second to think this time, eagerly moving to the mattress and laying herself across it. She settled her head on a pillow in the middle of the bed, awaiting further instructions. It was something that was exhilarating for you, unexpected. You didn’t think she would be this compliant, but you weren’t going to question it. 

Your eyes dragged across her body again, watching the way that her skin started to flush at your attention. “You’ve been a bitch the past few days.” 

Emily went to open her mouth, to argue. 

“No, no. That wasn’t up for debate. You have been. You’ve let this case get to you.” You started to crawl across the bed, your body between her legs. You remained clothed, the fabric of your pants sliding across her bare skin and causing goosebumps to erupt across her skin. You held eye contact, loving the way Emily’s dark eyes seemed to get darker, deeper. You could feel yourself getting lost in them. “I don’t know why, and to be frank, I don’t care.” You let your hands trail across her shins, up to her knees, pushing her legs further apart. You could feel your own heartbeat speeding up, fluttering inside your chest. “I’m going to fuck your attitude out of you and then we’re going to solve this case and go home. Understood?” 

Emily swallowed, her head nodding briefly. 

“Good,” you said, letting your eyes fall to her bare body. You licked your lips as you looked at her exposed pussy. Through her coarse curls you could tell she was wet, wetter than you expected her to be since you’ve not even touched her yet. 

You leaned down, your eyes back on her face as you gently blew across her sodden lower lips. Emily’s eyes closed, her back arching slightly, her hips trying to push further into the sensation. She was sensitive, something you were going to enjoy. 

Before her back could make contact with the bed again, your tongue made contact, licking quickly from her entrance to her clit, loving the way her voice got stuck in her throat. You decided you didn’t want to tease her, wanting her to get off and relax. Your tongue made a few more passes up and down, enjoying each sound you could pull from her. When she got used to the movement, her body expecting the up and down licks, you switched to swirls around her clit, sucking lightly, before moving down to her hole, entering her with your tongue. 

You paid attention to the sounds she made, the way she whimpered when your tongue made quick circles around her clit, how a moan would get caught deep in her chest every time your tongue entered her. You ate her out passionately, intensely, taking out your frustrations from the past few days on her. 

You could tell she was getting close, the way her leg muscles started to tense, how her hands started to fist in the sheet beneath her. With each swipe of your tongue against her, you could feel her get closer and closer to the edge, the both of you desperate to push her over. As she started to moan more often, gaining volume, you reached up your hands, grasping a breast in each. With perfectly timed pinches to her nipples, Emily came undone against your mouth. You continued to lap at her pussy, swallowing down everything she had to give you. 

Before her body had a chance to relax, you pushed in two fingers, enjoying the way Emily choked out a harsh gasp at the fast pace you set immediately. “You’ve got one more for me, Em. Give it to me,” you commanded, surprised at the strength of your own voice. 

Emily’s bottom lip was caught between her teeth as she struggled to keep up with the thrusting of your fingers. You pushed up her body, using the thumb of your other hand to pull her lip free. “Uh uh, baby. Let me hear those pretty noises.” 

Emily whimpered, her eyes catching yours, a million words being shared between you two. Respect, thanks, lust, love. 

Your wrist was starting to cramp at the position, but there was no way you were going to stop. Not with the sounds she was making, not with the way that Emily was looking at you. With each thrust in, Emily grunted, with each thrust out, a moan. On one particularly hard thrust, Emily’s back arched, her hands fisting into the shirt on your back. Figuring you had found her sweet spot, you focused there, watching with almost primal glee as her head tossed back in pleasure. 

With her throat exposed, your lips made contact to the skin there, kissing and biting at the tender flesh. You trailed your lips up to her ear. “Do you think two orgasms is enough, or should I fuck you into a third?” 

Emily’s only response was a garbled moan, her hands trying to scratch at your back through your shirt. 

You smirked against her skin. “We’ll see if your cunt can take another one after you cum hard on my fingers.” You curled your fingers at that, feeling the spongy spot inside her that caused her to sob in ecstasy, her legs tightening against your hips. On each thrust you made sure to hit that spot. You moved your head back, wanting to watch her come undone. 

You could feel her walls tightening around your fingers, it becoming harder and harder to move within her. You brought your other hand up, wrapping it around her throat, squeezing enough to send a euphoric rush through her. 

“Cum for me, Em, now.” 

She hadn’t disobeyed you yet. 

Emily moaned your name loudly as her walls clamped down on your fingers, forcing you to stay within her as she rode out her orgasm. Her hips undulated against you, riding each wave, reveling in the high.

You worked her through it, easing as her body started to come down. Gently, you removed your fingers, taking satisfaction in the whimper she let out at being empty. You brushed some of her hair out of her face, smiling a little to yourself at the blissed out look on her face. “Feeling better?” 

Emily started laughing, a true belly laugh. “You’re ridiculous.” 

You smiled, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Hey, you don’t get to be sassy to the person who just fucked you back into a good mood.” 

Emily rolled her eyes, her hands caressing your shoulders. “Thank you,” she whispered, her eyes expressing even more gratitude. 

You lightly kissed her, the first of many. “Don’t mention it. Next time, don’t wait until you’re a raging bitch before asking for what you need,” you smirked. 

Emily pushed at your shoulder, shaking her head lightly at your antics. She pulled you down, relaxing under the weight of you, feeling herself drift off to sleep. 

If anyone noticed Emily’s improved mood the next day, or the hickies on her neck, they didn’t mention it. The fact that you two solved the case before the day was over was good enough for them. 

#emily prentiss x reader #virescent v fanfic #emily prentiss fanfic #emily prentiss #emily prentiss x you #no use of y/n #welcome back to the emily prentiss smut fest #except this time emily is a bottom hehehehe #i wrote this in like an hour and a half after a thirteen hour shift so if it sucks no it doesnt

[psiroller]

Stop Smoking, We Love You

I wrote a little thing based on @unkat's chilaios EMS AU, which has consumed my little pea brain. you don't need a whole lot of context though. 1k words, cw mentions of medical trauma, smoking, drugs. title comes from the car seat headrest song which makes me misty eyed thinking about my stupid boys.

Chilchuck relished the icy cold breeze on his sweaty face as he burst out into the rear parking lot of the hospital, the one for the employees that visitors still park in. He patted himself down until the sharp corner of a fresh pack of Newports hit his palm, and he remembered he’d been trying to use the inside pockets after he’d accidentally dropped a pack during a call and wasted thirteen bucks and tax before he’d even opened the damn thing. He was fortunate enough to have remembered his lighter, too; Senshi’s visiting family this weekend and he has no one else to bum a light from. He’d gotten in trouble the last time he asked a patient out of desperation.

He flicked his zippo and lit it in one smooth motion, a party trick that had long worn out its novelty and was just about to put it to the menthol-cool cigarette between his lips when two large hands entered his vision. One clapped the zippo shut and the other pinched the cig by the filter, tugging both out of Chilchuck’s grip.

“Yoink.”

“You mother fucker—”

Laios laughed as Chilchuck lunged after the precious nicotine clutched in his big hands, held just out of reach.

“This doesn’t look like twenty feet to me,” Laios grinned.

“I was going to hold it in until I reached the grass, fuck off, alright?”

“Then you won’t mind if I walk with you?”

Laios returned what he’d taken, and Chilchuck snatched it back. “Fine, fine, whatever. Come freeze your ass off with me.”

They crossed the parking lot, stepping carefully across black ice and hopping the curb to stand in the grass, a foot beyond the premises. Chilchuck made pointed eye contact with Laios as he stuck the cigarette between his lips and flicked the lighter open and shut, taking a long drag. He debated breathing it in Laios’ face, but decided to turn away. He blew a thin plume of smoke that caught on the brisk wind and whipped away. “Happy?”

“Not exactly,” Laios admitted. “You shouldn’t smoke, Chil.”

Chilchuck scowled. “Oh, here we go… listen, it’s my right to poison my body however I want. Just look at our patients.”

Laios fought a grim laugh and failed. “Hey, you asked.”

“What’s it matter to you anyway?” Chilchuck asked, slurred around the filter. He took another long drag and tapped out the ash into the frozen grass.

“As a medical professional, I prefer not to watch people die.”

Chilchuck released the smoke through his nose, rolling his eyes. “Preference doesn’t matter much to us, does it?”

“I guess not.”

Another long drag. He’d somehow blasted half the cigarette already. “You sound like my youngest,” Chilchuck breathed, with a fondly exasperated smile. Laios shifted around, his cheeks going pink in the cold. “She’s in the middle of some kind of health course and it’s got her all freaked out. ‘Daddy, don’t smoke those, they’ve got rat poison in ‘em!’” Chilchuck said, affecting a raspy falsetto. “It was kinda cute, but she was pretty upset,” he sighed. “She was crying. Must be a pretty heavy-handed program.”

“I had that growing up,” Laios said. "They had a cop come in and everything. Showed us pictures of tracheotomies.”

“Is that what they’re doing?” Chilchuck hissed. “She’s nine! She’s too young for that shit. I’m gonna complain to the PTA.”

“Hey, it kept me off. Do you want her on it?”

Chilchuck’s mouth drew into a long, thin line. “I guess not.”

They stood there, Chilchuck smoking, Laios doing fuck all with his hands in his pockets. Chilchuck wondered why he was out here at all if he hated cigarettes and smoking so much. It was biting cold, blustery, damp. It was a holiday weekend and there was only a matter of time before they got another Narcan call, he could be catching a nap before rush hour, but he was here.

“Does it help?” Laios asked. “With the stress, I mean.”

“Gives me an excuse to step out,” Chilchuck shrugged. “Gives me something to look forward to. Gives me a reason to breathe in and out for a few minutes that isn’t that dippy yoga shit.”

“Have you ever done it? That dippy yoga shit?”

“Hell no.”

“You want to try it? I can show you a few poses.”

Chilchuck choked on smoke, something he hadn’t done in twenty years. “You? Yoga?” The ass definition suddenly made a lot of sense.

“I don’t take classes, but you can learn a lot from YouTube videos.”

“Hm.” It had been the class aspect that turned him off the most. It felt somehow more embarrassing than just rocking up to the gym at three in the morning and dissociating on the treadmill for a few hours. “I’ll think about it.”

“I think it’d be fun,” Laios said, and Chilchuck almost believed him. “And it’s helped me, you know. After rough calls.”

Chilchuck sucked down the last of his cigarette and blew it upwards, a brief break in the wind allowing it to coil in upon itself in midair, minute particles glittering in the warm, flickering glow of the light post and simmering down in his lungs. He leaned down to smash the smoldering filter into the curb, putting the butt in his junk pocket to avoid being further nagged.

“Alright,” Chilchuck relented. “Why the hell not?”

Laios beamed at him. Chilchuck could think of a thousand reasons against meeting up with his boss to do anything that didn’t involve getting a beer, but looking at that self-satisfied grin gave him one very good reason in his favor. “It’s a date.”

“No it’s not!” Chilchuck squawked. Laios skipped away. Skipped. “It’s not a date, Laios!”

“See you then!”

“Nice HR violation!” Chilchuck screamed. “Mother fucker.” He muttered to himself, tapping his pack angrily against his palm and flipping up a lid for one more, just to spite him, and looked down at the neat rows of little paper cylinders, pristine and fresh.

Chilchuck crammed the box back into his pocket and trudged inside.  

#dungeon meshi #chilaios #ficroller #idk what demon has possessed me but im having fun

[impyssadobsessions]

Phoenix Down

T w T story wouldn't leave my head for months so i wrote it instead of new chapters LOL but I hope y'all like it too~ Here's an excerpt below ~

The rain. It didn't matter where it rained or how heavy, Dick didn't like it. It made jumping off buildings more risky, visibility low, wrecks more likely to happen, and worse of all... it made him panic. Every time he was caught out in the rain, he felt his chest tighten. An uneasy chill in his spine that wouldn't go away. His stomach would churn and it took all his mental power to focus on anything else. This time wasn't any different. Or at least he thought. He stood perched on the edge of a rooftop, staring down below at the lights blurred by the heavy rain and mist. He was doing everything in his willpower to focus on the few moving lights. Keeping his mind blank as his hair stuck to his face. Just a few more hours, and then it will be time to head home. To a warm shower, and cool bed. Just to wake up in a couple hours and head off to his day job. No rest for the wicked nor for the vigilantes that fight them, as they say. Well, as they should say. Dick flinched, as his eyes saw movement in corner of his eye. There was a grayed out figure on the rooftop of one of the abandon buildings below. Small and staggering. He furrowed his brows watching the figure, as it stumbled closer to the edge of the roof. No. That's not good. Dick stood up from his perch, he took a step back and leapt forward off the roof, diving to the building below. He curled his body in the air to flip himself around, using his grappling hook to grab onto the billboard sign just above the building. Slowing his descent and landing onto the rooftop with a roll. The figure seemed startled as it fell back onto its bum. Water splashing as they hissed in pain. Nightwing smiled apologetically, as he took in the other's form, now that he could see it better. He couldn't be older than fifth-teen if he was being generous, though he looked closer to thirteen or twelve even. His hair was black and scruffy, and his eyes were piercing blue. Striking and clear despite the heavy fog and mist. He wore a torn hoodie, holding his arm to his chest. It was bandaged with ripped fabric. Presumably, from another article of clothing. A backpack was slung around one arm, looking just as worn as the rest of him. “Sorry for dropping in, but you look like you could use a hand.” Nightwing forced a grin, kneeling down as he offered his hand out to the boy. He didn't mean to scare the kid. Just to stop him from potentially dropping himself. He half-expected to be cussed at, after all, Nightwing was not well liked here. Neither was any vigilante. Instead, he was greeted with an annoyed glare, and quick wit. “I already have two, thanks.” The scruffy teen showing off his hands, letting go of his injured wrist for a moment. He then hissed in pain and returned to put pressure on his injury.

“One and a half.” Dick pointed out, still keeping his distance. He didn't want to overwhelm the teen, but he really hoped he let him look at his arm. “An extra pair, wouldn't hurt?” “No thanks, I can make do with less.” The teen scooted back from him, before shifting to get up on his knees. His feet ready to push himself up and run if need be. “Doesn't mean you have too.” He couldn't let him run away. His eyes glanced back at the injured arm. Nightwing offered, “At least let me clean up your arm.” The boy glared at him suspiciously, keeping his injured arm to his chest. “Its fine.” “The fabric is soaked in blood.” Dick pointed out, which seemed to be the wrong answer as the kid panicked down at his arm, hiding it away from him. Strange. Nightwing peered, trying to get a better look at the arm. At least he knows it wasn't self-inflicted by the way he reacted. Or at the very least, not intentionally created to be as bad as it was. Maybe he was running away from the gangs? They didn't have any problem hunting down a teen who was struck with bad luck, or anyone really. If only he could inch.. just a little.. closer-

The teen glared at him, moving back even more. Nightwing held up his hands, with a sheepish grin. “I concede.”

Way to mess up. He had to be patient. Think. “So water wing, why did you come up here all by yourself?” “Water wing?” The teen repeated with a raised brow. “It's raining, and you're holding your arm like a broken wing.” Dick tried to explain, when really he was just trying to think of what to call him on the spot. He doubted “kid” would receive a good reaction. “Unless you have a name for me to use?” “That's fowl.” The teen stuck his tongue out, but his response made Dick grin. “A real quack way of asking who the heck are you. Normally people, I don't know, start with their own name before they ask someone else's.” Name. He could do that. “Nightwing. I'm here to help you.” Dick held out his hand, hoping the teen take it.. or at least shake it. The teen raised a brow at the hand, then stared hard at Dick's face. His face trying to hold back showing his expression, as his mouth stressed trying to keep in place as he thought. Then his eyes widened, muttering. “Duck.” “Duck?” Nightwing uttered before he could register what the Teen meant. “Not so far off. It is a waterfow- “No. DUCK!” the teen lunged forward into Nightwing.- read rest on a03

#dick grayson #nightwing #danny fenton #danny phantom #dpxdc #dcxdp #dp x dc #dc x dp #crossover #fanfic #ao3 #phoenix down #was gonna wait til I had more chapters ready but T w T i couldn't LOL

[weepingvoidpenguin]

Unfortunately Yours

Summary: When you and Bucky successfully infiltrate a HYDRA auction, you’re told to stay another day due to max capacity on the jet. But how are you going to survive a night alone with this insufferable Super Soldier? Especially considering the miniscule size of the room and the obvious dilemma presented; who gets the bed?

Warning: S M U T , the smuttiest thing I’ve ever written, language, spit kink, daddy kink, ptsd symptoms, slight voyeurism, slight exhibitionism, hate-s e x, rough, more like enemies-to-lovers kind of thing, gagging, m!receiving, f!receiving, lots of receiving lol, 18+, M

Word Count: 10.6K (Whhhyyyyy)

   Your body burned with exhaustion and the sheer weight of your extremities felt enough to drag you to the floor and mirror a coma with the length of your hibernation. You no longer had the minimal strength required to pick up your feet properly which resulted in the sound of shuffling to fill the small, and by small you meant miniscule, room you’d been assigned to. 

   Well, you and Bucky had been assigned to.

   You’d both played your parts well enough over the course of the last few hours. You’d sauntered into the ran-shacked looking bar with Bucky’s arm tossed lazily over your shoulder, his distaste for the assignment evident on his face, but he’d cleared it away the second his foot crossed the threshold. He pulled you in tighter to his body and raised his chin into the air, emitting the energy of a man not to be trifled with. You’d portrayed your role as a damsel just as, if not more, convincing as Barnes’ opposite. Your shoulders hunched over and your steps were small and quivering, the wig on your head a tool used to curtain the hair in your face. 

   You were the lamb to this White Wolf.

   Word had traveled through the dark and twisted grapevine that a certain showing of sorts took place tonight and a high-ranking target was rumored to be amongst its audience. You and Barnes were on the first flight to Germany within minutes.

   Bucky had pulled you through the crowd moving along to the thundering music in the background and halted at the edge of the bar. His grip on your shoulder tightened once he’d caught the man’s attention and you winced, his fingers digging a little too deep for your liking.

   The bartender scanned you over and took in your frame, making you feel smaller than you had already displayed yourself to be. It took him a while to conclude but when he took in Bucky’s domineering gaze, a look as if to say Deny me, I dare you, he nodded once and wrote something down on a napkin, sliding it over to Bucky.

   Scum. All of them. 

   You nearly blew your cover trying to throw Bucky a look but you refrained from the hellfire clawing its way out of you. You had to be perfectly in control, emotions and beliefs aside. You were a damsel and you had to make certain they believed that. You knew they were watching; they always were.

   “Relax,” Bucky hissed, pulling you under his arm and bringing his lips to your ear.

   “When you pretend you’re the one being put up for auction, then you can tell me to relax,” you muttered, never looking up from the ground.

   “I have been.” When you paused your movement, he pulled away to scan the room, “Nothing’s gonna happen to you. I promise.” He led you backstage and turned the corner to a dimly lit hallway, barren of any decoration in sharp contrast to every other section of the building, “Besides, once they realize how insufferable you are, they’ll be begging me to take you back,”

   He opened an iron door and pushed you into the room, sending you tumbling down onto the carpet. He tsked, stepping over you and not looking back after shutting the door behind himself. You counted thirteen pairs of feet and judging by the way some of them were turned towards you, they had to be watching. You observed your hands for a second, counting slowly until you figured you’d stalled long enough and sent your trembling gaze to the exit. Bucky let out a low chuckle and clasped his hand around your upper arm, launching you back onto your feet and twisting your body to face him.

   Oh, darling, German fluently escaped his tongue and you nearly rolled your eyes at the condescending tone settled in his words, You know better than that, don’t you?

   His hold tightened and you winced, holding back the whimper in your throat. If you saw any hint of a bruise forming on your arm, you would give him hell later . . . and possibly even if you didn’t.

   You bit your tongue and let him lead you towards a leather chair before he pulled you swiftly down onto his lap where his hand remained on your thigh, brushing the inside softly. Had you not been so annoyed, you’d have been humiliated at all the stares devouring the scene unfolding before them. 

   Good girl, he drawled and pressed your back flat up against his chest where he could put you on display.

   You knew you should’ve been annoyed, or at least settled so into your role as his temporary whore-for-sale that the sensation coming alive between your thighs shouldn’t have made an appearance. But sometimes, the way Bucky brought his voice down real low and cooed an insult or jest your way just had an affect that your body would not deny. It kept you awake a lot.

   Instead, you swallowed hard and let yourself be splayed against him. You ignored the scent of sandalwood in his cologne.

   Your body trembled from the cold breeze floating around in the room and you shifted in Bucky’s lap to block everyone’s sight from the way your chest reacted to the change in temperature.

   Don’t be shy, he murmured and removed your arms from your breasts, letting the thin, practically see-through fabric show you to the world.

   “Buc-” You started, your panic creeping through the cracks at the cheshire sneers sent your way, but at the first sign of your discomfort, he retracted his hands and twisted you around gently, throwing your legs over the side of the chair and spreading them but forcing your upper half to face him. Effectively, cutting your chest off from their line of sight.

   You trembled out a sigh and he grabbed your face tightly, drawing your eyes to his. He examined you, his hardened gaze shouting words he couldn’t currently say. But you understood. He could be a jerk, but he wasn’t a bad man.

   Your body instinctively leaned into him for warmth as another breeze engulfed you, resulting in a shiver that made its way up your spine. “Are they still looking?” you inquired and he gripped your neck with a ferocity that made you squirm in his lap. Fuck.

   He pulled your ear to his lips and licked the helix. You whimpered. “No,” he whispered, running his thumb along your jawline, “But if you don’t quit fucking squirming you’re gonna have a problem, Doll,”

   You opened your mouth in question when you felt a sudden twitch on your backside and you swallowed. Hard. He never broke eye contact with you, instead choosing to raise a brow in mocking. Your chest heaved up and down and how you could feel his breath grazing on your cheek almost had you rubbing your legs together for some form of desperate friction. No, you had to keep yourself composed, keep the act going. But he’d seen it. All of it.

   You nod your head and slowed your breathing down until he released his grip around your throat and turned his attention towards the dim stage. You leaned back into him and followed suit, making sure to keep your attention downcast and appear disheveled. 

   “There,” Bucky whispered after a few minutes and you lifted your head only to find the man you had come all this way for walking straight towards you.

   Like a moth to a flame.

   “How much?” The older man inquired, his grotesque gaze settled on your spread legs.

   Bucky looked up at the balding man as if this was the first time he’d noticed his presence, “I guess you’ll just have to wait and see, won’t you?” 

   The man lifted his brow, or what would’ve been, and smiled wickedly, “I’ll give you double your price if you give her to me now,” he offered, his eyes slithering up to the apex of your thighs and this time you didn’t have to fake the shiver running up your spine. 

   A small smirk formed on Bucky’s face and he waved his hand dismissively at him, “Get in line,”

   The old man sneered but Bucky was right, most everyone had their attention fixated on what was happening currently and it was apparent there was, indeed, a line. 

   Bucky rested his gloved hand on your upper thigh and gripped tight, whether to refrain from hitting the guy or just to touch you, he wasn’t sure but he couldn’t keep you away when the man said, “I’ll give you four times the asking price but I want her now,” 

   Bucky’s grip on your thigh tightened and you squeaked at the pain, jumping slightly in his lap. “How about I give her to you for free for ten minutes and you tell me if you can handle her,”

   You jerked your head towards Bucky and furrowed your brows. Free? Dick. You nearly scoffed.

   The man gripped onto your calf and you shifted to kick his hand away when Bucky’s own shot out and and ripped his off of you, “Don’t touch my stuff,” he spit and the man let out a yell but that only spurred Bucky on and he tightened his fist, “Until terms are agreed upon, she remains mine to do with as I please. Understood?”

   The man nodded hastily and Bucky threw you off his lap when he stood up. “Anyone else?” Bucky shouted to the room, daring others to test his limits when it came to you. After a few moments of silence Bucky scoffed, “I didn’t fucking think so,”

   Bucky’s grip on the man remained and he stared down at the hunched figure, “Now, you,” he addressed and the room remained silent. This was allowed here. 

   Normally, merchandise couldn’t be touched until it was purchased. No buying before the auction, no discussing what you’re offering, no negotiating but most importantly don’t try to steal from anyone. These are criminals and that being said, they handle things amongst themselves. They know the rules and the risks they take breaking them.

   So, when Bucky drags the poor bastard away, you follow right behind him. Not a protest to be heard. Bucky throws open the door we entered through and finds the nearest room before chucking the HYDRA agent inside and locking the door behind you. 

   The room was brightly lit, with all four walls a dull cream color and dark brown couches strewn casually about. There’s no real order to this place. All cement corners and LED bulbs. Pure business. 

   “Let ‘em know,” Bucky orders and you turn around to argue only to find the man pulling a gun out of his jacket pocket.

   You jerk suddenly and kick Bucky square in the stomach, launching him towards one of the couches just as a shot rings out. You blanch at the sound, the noise filling your head and drowning everything else out. You hear yelling but you can’t make out the words, only the panic intermingled within them. Your hand reaches out around you and you grip the small button lined into your thin clothing, pressing it four times how you’d been instructed.

   Everything moved slowly and people began filing into the room. How did they get here so fast? No. It wasn’t possible, they were a quarter mile down the road, there was no way they were your backup. 

   Hands began flying in the air and you were picked up and dropped multiple times, each time landing harder than the last. You tried to blink back the spinning but the blows landing on your face and torso made it all the worse. 

   Instinctively, you threw your hands up to protect your face and fought to find some footing to help. Bucky was good but he wasn’t a God, he would need help. When the first blow met your forearms you reached out to grasp the hand and used your other to drive your fist right into the person’s nose. The bone crunched under your blow.

   You took a hit, then another when you managed to analyze the enemy’s fight pattern and waited until he left himself open before driving your knee into his rib cage. He bent over in pain and you grabbed him by the hair, hearing another crack when you shoved your elbow upwards against his nose. 

   You heard a shout and whipped your head over to see Bucky on his back, a looming figure with a gun aimed straight towards him. You galvanized towards them and threw yourself in the air, using your weight to kick him off of Bucky when another shot rang out. 

   Bucky shot up and crushed the gun with his metal arm. You scoured the room for the familiar HYDRA agent but found him nowhere. You shot out of the room, knocking into an opposing wall as you turned the corner and ducked when the sound of a bullet whizzed past you. 

   This is not going good. You had lost your target and rummaged through room after room until you’d become lost. Fuck. Where the hell did he run off to? You winced after breaking out into a sprint but pressed on, not allowing yourself to slow down. There was no way you were going to fail this mission, especially after coming so close to success.

   Sweat trailed down your face and your muscles screamed at you to halt, their exhaustion beginning to wear you down. Your breathing grew rapid and your vision blurred and just as you went to lean on a wall to rest, your shoulder exploded out in pain and you collapsed with a cry.

   “Dirty whore,” the HYDRA man seethed, a cane raised over his head. He brought it down and you spun to the side, feeling the air breeze past your ear.

   Your hand latched onto the cane and you shoved it into his gut, pushing him away. SHIELD wanted this guy alive, so alive they would receive him. That didn’t mean he had to come in one piece though. 

   You tore the walker out of his hand just as he tumbled onto his ass. You stood up, grunting along the way and hovered over his body, fear sprawled along his features. 

   “You can either stay still or get beat with your own cane, it’s your choice,” you offered, aching to bring the walker down onto his face. “Please test me. Please.” You begged.

   His gaze shifted between you and the weapon and he brought his trembling hands up in defeat. He must’ve been an agent of some Intelligence branch because his fighting abilities were evidently subpar at best.

   You sighed, sad to see the opportunity go but brought the cane down none the less. “That’s unfortunate,”

   You turned your attention to the sound of running coming around the corner and moved to drag and hide your captive in a nearby closet only to roll your eyes when Bucky came ‘round. You tossed the cane back and forth between your hands and smiled proudly towards the agent on the floor.

   “Look who I caught,” you toyed and were met with a grunt.

   “Only because you let him get away,” he retorted, pulling the balding man up to his feet.

   Everything began to slow and the hellfire you’d kept under mounds of ice had finally melted through its freezing cage. “What?”

   He turned his back towards you and trudged the hesitant man behind him towards the exit.

   “I said,” you hollered, not caring how the halls carried your echo, “What?”

   “I heard what you said,” he called back to you, not bothering to turn around.

   And there you were left, frozen and dumbfounded for five solid minutes before you could pull yourself together enough to stomp your way back towards the rendezvous point. You remained hazy for the most part while debriefing. You tried to recount everything but the way your anger engulfed you in its flame obscured your memory so you kept it short. 

   It was quickly brought up that SHIELD captured more HYDRA agents than expected and were gonna be at max capacity so you and Bucky had to stay at a base a few miles down the road. You grumbled in compliance but Bucky didn’t respond, not even a godforsaken grunt.

   What SHIELD had failed to mention though, was that this bunker was clearly meant for one. It barely counted as a room. There was a small bathroom in the corner just big enough for a shower and toilet. No sink. And a small counter with just enough space for a stove, microwave and radio. If you were to lay down vertically or horizontally you’d nearly be touching wall each way. Not to mention the singular bed.

   And that’s how you got to where you were now. Miniscule room. Exhausted body. Drained mind. Patience long gone. 

   You huffed and dropped your bag in front of the entrance before walking to the bathroom and turning to slam the door closed. You turned the faucet on and ripped the wig off, discarding your clothes in a pile before stepping into the shower. The warm water was nice and welcoming but your body already felt aflame so you twisted the knob and held your breath when the cold stream trickled down your body. It was difficult to breathe at first, but your body soon adjusted to the temperature and you began wiping the muck off your skin with the bar of soap supplied. But that’s all the was supplied. Clearly, this place was meant to be a quick pit stop. 

   You sat on the hard floor as the water streamed onto your body. You could nearly fall asleep to its rhythm; It was only when your head hit the wall that you realized you were so you begrudgingly stood up and shut off the water. You grabbed the only towel in the bathroom and pat yourself dry, noticing just then that you left your clothes outside.

   You let out a long sigh and twisted open the doorknob to find Bucky toying with the radio on the counter; not even purposefully, just looking for something to do while he waited. 

   You opened your mouth to ask him to hand you your bag but after what he said to you earlier you’d sooner eat hot coals than ask him to do anything for you. You stepped out of the bathroom, towel wrapped neatly around your chest and you bent over to open your bag. The shuffling on the radio stopped. 

   “You could’ve at least left me some warm water,” he grumbled and you rolled your eyes.

   You searched in your bag for the fresh clothes residing there only to turn around when you found them and have the bathroom door shut in your face. 

   “Are you fucking kidding me?” You shouted, pounding your fist against the door.

   You could hear the water running and you groaned, pounding harder. The door opened for a split second and you were hit in the face with the clothes you’d left inside only for it to instantly be slammed shut again.

   You punched the door with all the frustration built up over the past few hours and felt the wood crack with your force. Why did this man have to be incredibly baffling? You were not nearly paid enough to deal with such an unbearable partner. He would have you bald from stress before you knew it. 

   You spent the next few minutes grumbling to yourself after you changed and scribbled your frustration onto a small notebook you took with you everywhere. It was only when you heard the water shut off did you remember something. You still had the only towel. A villainous smirk tugged at your lips and you placed the folded towel on the edge of the bed, away from the door.

   Then you heard the creak. “I will walk out naked if you don’t give me the towel,” Bucky threatened.

   You shrugged despite him not being able to see you from your position on the bed, “I’ll just laugh at your dick,” 

   “You weren’t laughing earlier,” he shot back.

   Oh. So he did remember. Good. You thought he’d gotten amnesia within the past few hours, maybe he was just too ashamed to mention it.

   “Too disgusted to insult. Plus, I was playing a character,”

   “Fine,” he responded and quickly came into view, haughtily sauntering over to your side and you shouted.

   “Dear God!” You held the towel up to block your sight of his barren body. It was disgusting. He was all wet, hair dripping onto his muscled torso, water gleaming off his taut skin, 5 o’clock shadow drenched and straight out of a wet dream. Jesus.

   “Prude,” he commented, snatching the towel from your grasp and wrapping it around himself. 

   “Respectable,” you corrected, crossing your arms and shoving him away. “You get the floor,”

   He lifted his duffle off the ground and rummaged through it. “Then I get the blanket,”

   “You get fuck all,” you stated, flipping off the lamp beside you and snuggling into the warm cot.

   When the shuffling stopped and the bathroom light was shut off, you shut your eyes and let the wear of the day grab at you, lulling you into the beginning of slumber. That is, until the blanket was hauled from around you, damn near throwing you onto the floor. You shouted out and caught yourself last minute. 

   “Barnes!” You yelled, steadying yourself and reaching over the edge to grab the blanket back. Your hand fisted at the faux fur and you pulled with all your might to no avail. 

   He swatted you away as though you were a pesky fly and reached over to turn the light of the lamp on. You glowered at him and stood, wrapping the blanket around your arm and pulling upwards. Your arm strained to its capacity but the man on the floor didn’t budge. Only turned his back to you and shut his eyes. You reached over yourself and flipped the switch of the lamp, once again immersing yourself in the comforting darkness. 

   Bucky stiffened and opened his eyes then turned and froze you in your spot with his stare. He reached around and lit the lamp, slowly retracting his arm and daring you to turn it off again. So you did.

   He yanked the blanket from your grasp and threw you back onto the bed, bringing light into the room. “Light stays on,” he growled.

   “No! You’ve had your goddamn way since you stepped foot into this room. Light goes off and I get the blanket!” You shouted, not concerned about anyone else hearing considering the room was soundproof.

   “No. You get the bed so I get the blanket. Tell me how that doesn’t make sense,” he countered.

   You didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of admitting that it did, in fact, make sense. The floor here was wooden and clearly uncomfortable, plus he hadn’t even argued about the bed situation. 

   You retreated, “Fine, light still goes off,”

   “No,” 

   “Yes,” 

   Silence fell between the two of you but you weren’t budging. Barnes had faced plenty of monsters, he could handle the dark. 

   “I need the noise to fall asleep,” he admitted and it was then you could hear the slight hum the bulb emitted.

   You didn’t speak for a while but reared back and pulled out your phone, “What do you want to listen to?” You scrolled through a few sounds you had stored on your phone, “We’ve got: nature sounds, frequencies, guided meditations, etc. You name it, but I’m not sleeping with this forsaken light on,”

   Bucky studied you, his expression changing a mile a minute but the one of indifference conquered, “Rain,” 

   You nodded once and selected the audio, placing the phone face up on the nightstand and turning the light off for the last time. Hopefully. You hunkered down into the thin mattress and reached down, grasping at the thick blanket. When you pulled, there was some give. He’d let you get just enough needed to cover your body if you laid at the very edge and your hand hovered in the air when you laid your arm over the side.

   Minutes flew by with your eyes shut and the exhaustion slithered over your body but your mind ran wild with the events from earlier. You tried not to get angry or sad or . . . bothered. Your breathing deepened when you began to succumb to your body’s fatigue and you drifted inch by inch into the welcoming void lulling your name.

   You didn’t hear when he shifted, only managed to register the faint tracing of his fingertips on your hand before finally giving out.

   You weren’t sure what time it was when you opened your eyes for the first time that night. This regularly happened. You’d wake up multiple times during the night to shift positions or throw off the sheets, no matter how insignificant the desire, your body always found a way to wake you for it.

   You opened your eyes slowly to a hazy vision and blinked at the sitting figure on the floor, “Bucky?” You croaked, bringing a hand up to wipe at your face, “What time is it?”

   “It’s almost one, go back to sleep,”

   “What are you doing?” You persisted, ignoring his demand and sitting up slowly, “Why aren’t you sleeping?”

   “Couldn’t,” 

��  A heartbeat. Then another. And another. He didn’t care to elaborate.

   “Do you want the bed?” You offered, stretching yourself out and already placing yourself down on the floor, “It’s too hot up there, anyway,”

   His attention turned to you for the first time but you’d already began closing your eyes, not really having the energy to argue with him. You could hear shuffling from his spot and the ground disappeared below you, strong hands grasping your body and lifting you up to place you gently back onto the cot.

   “I prefer the floor,” he insisted, wrapping the blanket around you, “Besides, you’re a horrendous liar,”

   You didn’t hold back the singular chuckle, your haze still enveloping you. “Then why aren’t you sleeping?”

   He sat at the foot of the bed, his hand hovering over your leg in hesitation, “It’s complicated.” He dropped his hand to his side.

   “Isn’t the rain helping?” you mumbled, your sight now adjusting to the dark.

   “Yes,”

   “Then what?” 

   “I just . . . don’t want to wake you,”

   “Well, I’m already awake if that makes you feel better,” you jeered, a small smile forming on your lips.

   “It doesn’t,”

   “Nothing does,” you retorted, the inevitable annoyance you always felt when conversing with him already made its way up into your tone.

   He scoffed and stood from the bed, placing himself in the same spot on the floor with his head leaned up against the wall and his arm resting on his perched knee. 

   “Oh, so now you can’t handle a little attitude,” your tone came out incredulous, “You didn’t have any issues earlier when you blamed me for that guy’s escape. Which, he didn’t even get to do, might I add,”

   “I was projecting,” he replied, gaze still focused on the door opposite to him.

   You blinked, “Are you so tired that you’re actually admitting to being a dick?”

   “I know I can be a dick, but you threw yourself straight into the line of fire twice today. So I don’t really give a shit if I was mean to you,”

   “I only did that because you almost got shot twice today. Don’t take your anger out on me for your incompetence. Just say ‘thank you’ and move on already,”

   “Incompetence?” His head jerked in your direction. “What was incompetent was that you couldn’t keep yourself composed,”

   You sat up. “What in the hell are you talking about? My behavior is what got our target to basically give himself up to us! It was me that trapped him, not you!” His composure tensed and you crossed your arms over your chest, “You’re just mad your dick got hard so if anything you’re the one who couldn’t keep their compos-” His hand was wrapped around your throat and you were pinned to the mattress before you could finish your sentence.

   “Shut the fuck up,” he hissed at you, his face mere inches from yours.

   “Why?” You spoke hoarsely around his tightening grip, “Does the Big Bad Wolf not like that he was turned on? Who’s the prude now?”

   “Turned on?” He spat, his free hand resting by your head to cage you in, “You think what you did earlier turned me on?”

   You grasped at the hand around your throat and pried slightly to speak, “Fight me or fuck me, Barnes. But stop lying to yourself, it’s getting old,”

   The room seemed to freeze over and Bucky paused. His hesitation was enough to elicit the fire from earlier and your legs squirmed a little underneath him. God, you hoped he chose the latter.

   Then his lips crashed against yours. 

   You squeaked at the sudden onslaught but threw your arms around his shoulders and pulled him in tighter against you. He dropped when you intertwined your legs, his full weight pressing against you deliciously. You ground up against him, your core aching from the previous hours and the small friction elicited a moan from the both of you. 

   “So impatient,” he scolded, bringing the hand from around your throat down to your hips and pressing you into the bed. “What a whore,”

   His breath danced along your cheek and you mewled at his words. Gods, he was going to be the death of you. Or the beginning. 

   You breathed in deeply, his sandalwood scent intoxicating you in a manner that alcohol never could. When you drank, you were just drunk. But when you took a sip from the tall glass that was Bucky, it brought you to life. Your body sang melodies wherever you were plastered against each other and your skin burned with need.

   Touch me, your body screamed, touch me.

   “Fuck off,” you groaned and Bucky jerked your head to the side, exposing your neck for him to scavenge.

   The goosebumps that danced across your skin when he ran his warm tongue up from the curve of your neck to the bottom of your ear brought an arrogant smirk onto Bucky’s face. You ran your fingers through his hair and tugged when he reached a particularly sensitive spot that had your legs shaking when he kissed it sloppily. 

   Your mouth hung open in silent pleasure and your breaths were short and rapid, your body betraying all forms of control you previously had over yourself. The hand that wasn’t residing in his hair trailed down his muscled arm and you gripped at the brawn this man possessed. His skin reminisced lightly of silk despite the rough texture of his hands. 

  The same hands that now made its way into your hair and tugged at the strands at the base of your neck, jolting your chin higher into the air. Your grip tightened around his biceps and the strength they emitted sent a pool rushing to your core. You continued hunting until you found the hem of his black, cotton shirt and you made your way up his taut abdomen. You let out a sigh and he jumped lightly at the sensation of your cool fingertips across his scorching skin. It was a nice contrast for him. 

   You gripped at the shirt and hastily ripped the cotton upward. Bucky broke away from his descent down to your chest to let you remove the fabric and you’d suddenly wished you’d turned the lights on first. He mimicked your action and tossed your shirt in a deserted corner of the room to potentially be abandoned. You gasped when the cold air of the room grazed upon the perked mounds of your breasts. 

   His lips returned to their spot on the dip of your neck and his tongue slithered down in between your breasts. Your breath hitched when his wet muscle made its way up to the apex of your chest. His right hand mirrored his tongue and swirled around your nipple, his teeth pulling eagerly every so often and you hissed at the delectable pain. Your eyes devoured the scene unfolding on your chest and you reached over to flick the light on, desperate for a clearer image.

   Bucky halted and his metal arm reached over to switch the light back off but you swatted his hand away and he backed up lightly, his irritation evident on his face.

   “I want to watch,” you grumbled and shifted up to bring your lips back up to his. He let you. He pushed back lightly with his own lips and leaned in sync with your movements. He parted his mouth slightly and you followed suit, letting him lead his way into yours with the same muscle he’d just had flicking across your breasts.

   The light went off.

   You pushed him away and shot towards the switch but metal met your wrist firmly enough to keep you in place. “Bucky.” You wrestled against his hold and turned your full attention back to the figure hovering above, “I want to see you,” 

   Despite the darkness, you noticed his mouth twitch but his grip on your wrist remained solid. You sprawled back onto the bed and wrapped your free hand around the back of his neck and pulled him down onto you, pressing his surprisingly soft lips onto yours. You broke apart, his lips a hair’s breadth away from your own. “I want to see you,” 

   He didn’t move, only scanned your face over a few times and you brought him back down into a kiss. This one wasn’t like before. This one was warm, soft, patient. A ballet compared to its previous mosh pit. He danced along with you, an admission hidden somewhere in his tenderness.

   You hadn’t realized you’d been freed of his hold until you were wrapping that arm over his shoulder and the sound of a light humming began.

   “Fucker,” you jeered and the previous gentleness dissipated.

   “Shut up,” he ordered, pinning you back onto the bed and resumed his ministration on your breasts.

   The moan slipped past your lips at the sight and your chest heaved upwards, desperate for more stimulation. You licked your lips at how his mouth encased your nipple, his tongue flicking against the perked skin and you dropped your head back, shutting your eyes. You centered all of your attention anywhere that his bare skin touched your body and rubbed your aching clit against his v-line. 

   Your chest was pressed against the mattress before you could register what happened and the hard smack that met your ass evoked a yelp. Bucky pressed fully against your backside and he ground his dick down into your ass. He groaned at the sensation and you raised your ass onto him. You yelped again when Bucky ripped your leggings down and smacked the exposed skin on your ass.

   “Try something like that again and I’ll gag you around my cock ‘til you’re crying,” he growled, “Understood?”

   You nodded, wide-eyed and a mewling mess from the threatening promise of this God. 

   “Good girl,” he cooed, rubbing at the raw skin. “Now stay still for Daddy,”

  Bucky’s hand lingered on your reddening ass and the mattress dipped when he shifted to your side. He traced gentle circles onto your backside and pressed his lips on your shoulder blade, the butterfly kisses making their way down towards your spine and then lower. Your breathing grew uneven from the sheer amount of restraint you displayed. Your grip on the edge of the bed tightened when his tongue dragged from the point where your thigh and ass met all the way up to the bottom of your spine.

   “Fuck,” You shuddered, white-knuckling the blanket beneath you.

   Your skin blazed when you were met with another harsh slap. You mewled at the sensation, loving the fire that spread across your flesh and relaxed when his metal hand cooled the area. 

   Then his teeth bit into the cooling flesh and you jerked away despite yourself. Bucky tsked lowly and you chuckled at the hint of fear sprouting in your chest; you did not want to see whatever sinister expression resided on his face. 

   A strong hand gripped the roots of your hair and hauled you up. You followed his direction and knelt onto the ground between Bucky’s sprawled out legs, settling in your new position.

   “Oh, Doll,” he chastised, “you were so close,”

   “That shouldn’t count,” you retorted while Bucky pulled the blanket off the bed and lifted you up with his metal arm, shoving the barrier between your knees and the hard ground.

   “But it does.” His hands dove into his underwear and sprung his cock out onto your lips. “Now get to work,”

   Your eyes widened at the sight before you and you had to physically hold back from gulping. You were ashamed to admit your mouth watered in anticipation. You lifted your hands from his sculpted thighs and wrapped them around his length, enveloping just the tip past your parted lips. Bucky sighed and twitched in your mouth.

   You welcomed him in fully, or as much as you could anyway, and got straight to work, not bothering to act abashed at your desire. Your tongue swirled around his tip and you leaned into him until he hit the back of your mouth but you continued on, gagging around him when he’d gotten inside your throat. Bucky groaned when your throat tightened around him and he threw his head back, using his flesh hand to guide you up and down his shaft, showing you what he liked and didn’t. 

   “Fuck, Doll,” he groaned, “Just how I imagined your mouth would feel,”

   You pulled off him to comment when he shoved you all the way down to the hilt and you threw your hands up onto his thighs to hold yourself back. He used his metal arm to hold himself up and thrusted up into your salivating mouth desperately. He continuously hit the back of your throat and thick saliva coated his cock. Just as he promised, tears prickled at the corners of your eyes and he didn’t stop until your cheeks were drenched in the liquid.

   You let your jaw hang open, your tongue no longer swiveling around meticulous spots that you knew would make his legs buckle. No, you let him have the reigns. Let him fuck your mouth ‘til your throat grew bruised and jaw ached with fatigue. You committed his cries of pleasure to memory, the sounds euphoric to your ears. 

   He lifted his head and stared down at you with half-closed eyes. He was in heaven and you knew it. He watched you, how the tears trailed down, how your hands gripped at his thighs, how you stuck out your tongue just as you’d made it to the base of his cock to lick his balls in the most intoxicating way. Fuck. You were the intoxicating one. You brought out this side of him. This carnal desire that became him until he’d had to step out of the room just to compose himself. And he didn’t like being out of control. That’s why he always kept you at an arm’s distance.

   But now, watching as you sat between him with your mouth agape like the good girl that you were for him, he knew he’d never deny himself this pleasure again. Especially since you were so fucking good at it.

   He groaned, pulling you off his cock and grabbed tightly at your cheeks, nearly pinching your mouth together. “Tongue out.” He growled, waiting for your compliance.

   Your jaw ached with exhaustion but you managed to stick out the wet muscle as he pulled you closer into him and watched when he parted his lips above you, letting the saliva trail down from his mouth into yours. 

   “Swallow,” he ordered.

   But it was already done, and you left your mouth hanging open for more.

   “Jesus fucking Christ,” Bucky grumbled, putting his face right up against yours and feeding you once again; this time with a sloppy kiss that coated both your mouths in saliva.

   He brought you up from the floor and tossed you onto the bed before settling between your legs. The excitement in your eyes grew and he indulged in every minute of it. Bucky’s hand trailed down from your lower abdomen right above your pubic bone and pressed his palm into your neglected clit. The cry you let out was the unholiest thing he’d ever heard. 

   He slid his finger under the waistband of your underwear and flitted his gaze back up to your eyes, “Can I?”

   You nodded eagerly, dumbfounded that he would even ask and fought the temptation to grab your phone from the nightstand and record everything that was about to unfold. 

   At the first nod, Bucky slid your underwear down your legs and made a show of bringing the material up to his face. Your own went red hot and you hid behind your hands, poking through every millisecond to shamefully watch. He threw the panties into his open duffel and you squirmed in anticipation.

   “Remember the rules?” Bucky asked, brow lifted and already descending to your inner thigh.

   You nodded again.

   “I need to hear it, Doll,” he mumbled, kissing the inner part of your thigh, each placement closer and closer to where you needed him most.

   “Yes,” you whimpered out, “I remember the rules,”

   Bucky wanted to dive right in, he really did, but the way you sprawled yourself out so vulnerable for him, it incited a new pace that he wanted to follow. So, he did. He looked at you for a few moments, watched how the anticipation danced in your eyes, how your legs shook in wait and how you were already so goddamn wet for him.

   “This all for me?” he teased, mesmerized at your desire for him.

   You dropped a hand down to your side, near where his hands were wrapped around your thighs to keep you in place - and against his face. He cocked his head to the side, waiting for your answer.

   You nodded sheepishly and when he lifted an eyebrow in mock confusion you said, “You. Just you,”

   Like music to his ears. Just him. You weren’t for anyone else. He thought he felt his heart palpitate.

   He lowered himself down to your core and kissed your lip, drawing a desperate plea from you. You couldn’t wait anymore, couldn’t deal with the teasing. You were wet enough, needy enough, ready enough to take him, all of him. You’d been ready damn near the moment you first laid eyes on his arrogant smirk.

   “Buck - please,” you cried, drawling out the final word.

   The first kiss placed upon your soaked cunt erupted a sigh of relief and you laid back on the pillow, your eyes closed and mind gone with the sensation of those sloppy kisses blessing your needs. He flattened his tongue on your lips and licked upwards, stopping when your hips twitched into his mouth.

   “Sorry!” You apologized, fighting the desire to grind into his wet muscle. He’d just gotten started and you certainly didn’t want it to end so soon.

   He lifted his gaze up to you and you bit into your fist at the view, using the extremity to hold back your moans. He flicked his attention down again and repeated his motion, lapping at your fluids ‘til his beard was soaked in it. He shook his head into your cunt and his nose rubbed along your clit. The mewling that left your mouth urged him on and when you felt his muscle prodding at your entrance you threw your head back.

   “Please, Bucky.” You begged, bringing a hand up to tease your nipple.

   He prodded some more, his tongue gliding up from your clit and back down to your entrance, poking through enough to frustrate you. He wanted you to break for him. To lose all composure and control and just let him. He wanted you to submit to him but it wasn’t just that, it was more that he wanted to destroy you for any future experience you may have without him. He wanted you to come back to him, to need him, to beg for him and leave you with the understanding that nothing - no one - could compare to him. He wanted you. To himself. 

   So, when he could no longer refrain and had to use his metal arm to hold your hips down from squirming beneath him, he slipped two thick, rough fingers into your begging cunt. And the sound you emitted caused that carnal instinct to claw at the barriers caging it in.

   Your hand shot down, tangling itself into his hair and pushing him harder against you. He allowed it. Your thighs held him in place, crushing him with your soft skin and he groaned at the warmth you gave off. You pulled your hand away from your mouth and grabbed at his metal one resting on your pubic bone, pulling it up to your chest and wrapping his fingers on the sensitive bud for him to tease. He slowly retracted from your chest and brought it back down onto your hips and you huffed in annoyance. You looked down at Bucky but his eyes were shut, completely engrossed in the feast before him. You bucked when his fingers glazed across that sensitive spot inside your velvety walls.

   “There!” You cried, your fist tightening in his hair when the all-too-familiar wave of ecstasy began to pool together, waiting for its release.

   Bucky complied, dragging the pads of his fingers up against that spot over and over again. Your legs caged him in tighter as his tongue swirled over the hyper-sensitive bundle of nerves and you cried out at the way your body tensed.

   “Fuck,” you cried, your hands desperately grasping onto Bucky’s metal wrist and tugging at the roots of his hair. Bucky’s groan of pleasure was what tipped you over the edge.

   You gasped when the pool building released, your body shaking with euphoria and the flood crashed down onto you. And apparently, onto Bucky as well. He pulled his mouth away but continued rubbing at your clit when warm liquid squirted onto his face and his expression of surprise mirrored your own.

   When Bucky looked up at you, your face burned with embarrassment and you threw your head back, using your hand to cover your countenance. Not to mention the sight of him with your juices all over his mouth was one of the hottest things you’d ever witnessed.

   Bucky chuckled at your sheepish apology and removed your hand from your face, bringing his soaked mouth up to yours and having you taste yourself. You devoured each other, your arms wrapped tightly around the other, pulling so fiercely at the innate desire to become one in shared pleasure. He could feel his pride swell at your hidden confession. You’d never squirted before and he was lucky enough to be the one to give you that experience for the first time. 

   You clawed at him, divulging in the warmth his body radiated and intoxicating yourself in everything that was Bucky. You couldn’t get enough of it, of him. It was nearly too much.

   His hand trailed up to your gaping mouth and he inserted his fingers, “Clean them,” he ordered.

   Your hand gripped his wrist and pulled his fingers deeper into your mouth, never breaking eye contact with him, loving the way he ate up everything he was seeing. You noticed the way he swallowed.

   He retracted his hand and wrapped it gently behind your head so you were resting on him. He brought his full weight down onto your body and a warmth emanated in your chest when he brought his lips up against your forehead, each kiss closer and closer to your lips until they met their destination. When you parted your mouth against his, it wasn’t merely an action of carnal desire, it was like you were exchanging life forces. Merging and meeting in a manner that had your body exploding and crying out for more of the faint familiarity. Like seeing an old friend for the first time in years.

   Bucky looked down between your bodies at where you were about to connect before staring back up at you, taking you in as if he would never have this opportunity again. His thumb brushed your cheek and came to a rest on your bottom lip. “Ready?”

   You chuckled, “Fuck me,”

   He shoved inside in one clean motion and a breath of pleasure slid past both of your lips.

   “Fuck,” he groaned, his hand tightening slightly around your neck and he pulled out slowly then shot back inside and you moaned.

   You were still so sensitive from your previous climax that every brush against your clit sent you into a whirlwind of pleasure, the sensations shooting through every nerve in your body. 

   “Bucky,” you whined when his pace quickened and the sheer force of his thrusts drove you deeper into euphoria.

   He filled you just right, his girth and length impressive and you wondered why you hadn’t tried to screw him earlier. He slid past your tight walls, each thrust causing the room to echo with the sounds of skin slapping and moans of ecstasy. 

   He kept his actions controlled, not wanting to build up to something so intense just for it to fall short and end fast. No. Despite how good you felt wrapped around his aching and swollen cock, despite how warm and welcoming you were, how you spread yourself out for him to consume, he had to leash himself. This was going to be just as good for you as it was for him. 

   He kissed you one last time before gripping the back of your knees and bringing your thighs up to your chest, a shout of praise falling off your lips. He was drunk on the sight of his cock going in and out of your cunt and he threw his head back with a groan.

   “What a fucking pretty pussy,” he breathed out and you whimpered, biting your lip at the welcome profanities.

   At this angle, he was fucking against your g-spot and using his pubic bone to rub against your clit and watching the thin layer of sweat sheen off his skin was all too much to keep yourself put together. His eyebrows scrunched together and you caught him taking in your form, watching how your pleasure displayed itself on your face for him to bear witness to. Only him.

   He growled at the intrusion of thoughts that came to him. He pictured someone else in his position, someone else witnessing you so vulnerable and open to them, someone else fucking you and making you beg for them. It disgusted him. He brought his torso down and latched his teeth to your neck, biting down hard enough to have you tearing up.

   “Mine,” he growled into your ear and lulled his head forward when you tightened around him.

   A sinister smirk came to his face and he licked the shell of your ear, your breathy moans feeding him, “You like that?” He asked, pistoling further into your cunt and you shouted at the increase of pace, “You like when I tell you who you belong to?”

   Your mouth hung agape and the one arm wrapped around his shoulder pulled him closer to you, your desperation for his warmth taking control. “Fuck . . . off,” you hissed between breaths.

   He pulled out and yanked you up by your hair, twisting you around and pressing your torso into the wall but keeping your ass propped up for him to admire. You hissed at the pain when a sharp smack met your ass and your hands gripped at the wall for any way to ground yourself and prevent from becoming putty in his hands.

   Another hard smack met your ass and you lurched forward to get away from the sting. Bucky kept your head pinned to the cement, his hand holding your cheek from scraping the wall but applying a pressure that had your tongue lolling out of your mouth. 

   You moaned at the intrusion in your pussy and he plummeted in and out, a mix of your grunts and groans bouncing around the room. His pace constantly changed. One second it was fast, the next it was slow but filling, going so far as to hit your cervix a few times and leave you a crying mess under his hold. Your shoulder scraped along the wall and you fought to push away only to have your chest slammed harder against the cement.

   You brought a hand out, reaching behind yourself and grasping for Bucky’s hip, pushing him deeper into you when he slowed. Your nails dug into his flesh and the sound of his hiss shot straight to your core. 

   “What a goddamn whore,” he spat, bringing his teeth down onto your neck and you gripped at his hair.

   You laughed at his statement, “You’re the one that can’t get enough of this pussy. Why so desperate to claim it? Afraid I'll fuck someone else?” Bucky pulled you back and slammed you against the wall with vigor, causing you to flinch

   He stopped his thrusts altogether, “My patience only goes so far, Doll,” he threatened, tugging at your hair and you bit back a cry, “Choose your words wisely,”

   You nodded hastily, the rough texture of the wall digging into your cheek and splitting skin. You wriggled up against him to continue moving but he retracted completely and flipped you over so he was laying on the bed and you were straddling him.

   “Move,” he ordered, his hands digging bruises into your waist.

   You leaned over, pressing your chest against his to lift your hips up and down on him but he pushed you back up and held your arms behind your back to keep you in place. You whimpered but the cry quieted when you rubbed your clit against him and your pussy clenched at the friction. You moaned out a breathy fuck and swiveled your hips around his, noting how much deeper he filled you in this position.

   “Buck-” you huffed, eyes glued to the glistening abs beneath you. “I’m gonna cum,”

   “Already?” He jeered, an eyebrow raised in amusement.

   You’d lost all energy to sneer at him, your focus solely on how the sensation grew and began pooling in your cunt. “Cock . . . so good,” you breathed out, barely able to keep yourself from melting into him.

   “What was that, Doll?” He stilled your movements and you groaned in annoyance.

   You wriggled in his hold and you could tell by the furrow of his brow that he was fighting to keep control as well. You leaned over him, your lips hovering over his, “Mine,”

   His grip flew to the back of your neck and he crashed your lips onto his, giving you full reign again. You bounced your hips on his dick, slamming down vigorously and rubbing your clit in effect. It didn’t take long for your climax to build again.

   “’M gonna . . .” you whispered and Bucky placed you back up, gripping your hips and swiveling you around how you were earlier.

   “Cum, Doll,” he allowed, “Cum all over this cock,”

   You cried out, your toes curling as the dam in your core snapped and your climax washed over you. You hadn’t realized your fingers were intertwined with Bucky's until you came back down from your high, your chest heaving for breath.

   He sat up slowly and pressed his lips against your neck. “You’re beautiful,”

   Your body tensed at his words and you pulled away to give him a look of confusion. But he didn’t take his statement back, only slipped his hands around your back and gently placed you onto the bed, hovering over you.

   He moved with caution, like his gentleness might scare you off if he touched you too tenderly or stared too long in admiration. But he couldn’t help it, he did admire you.

   He spread your legs open and nestled between them, pushing into you slowly until your hips met and you both breathed out. His movements weren’t nearly as brutal as they were earlier, these thrusts were slow and deep and full of intention. He brought his torso down onto yours and you wrapped your legs around his waist, bringing him closer to you.

   He ran his hand, the only one he allowed himself to touch you affectionately with, through your hair and stared down at you, waiting. His gaze shifted between your lips to your eyes and he ran his thumb delicately along your mouth.

   You looked at him then, really looked at him with fresh eyes and your heart leapt into your throat at the realization. “Kiss me,” you whispered and he lowered himself onto your lips, setting off an explosion in your chest.

   “I’m yours,” he whispered, not able to bring himself to look at you, “I’ve been yours,”

   You opened your mouth to respond but he silenced you with a deep thrust and a moan erupted instead. He quickened his pace, watching where you connected and pushed deeper and harder, your cries of pleasure driving him. He had to fuck you, he couldn’t love you, he couldn’t make love to you, just fuck. That’s it. He couldn’t allow himself to replay your look of shock at his confession, though the scene would surely be on loop for the next few days until he could get over it. Just fuck. Nothing more. Not with that look of disbelief on your face.

   He held himself up with his forearms but you pressed him against you and wrapped your legs tighter around him. “Harder,” you whispered and he complied.

   He groaned when your tits bounced and brought his mouth to a nipple, the faint taste of sweat lingering on your skin. You brought his metal hand up to your chest and made him grip the flesh there but he pulled it back and placed it beside your head instead.

   “Bucky,” you whimpered and grabbed his hand again, bringing his open palm up to your lips and placing delicate kisses on the metal. “You can feel with it, right?”

   He nodded, hesitance sprawled on his face.

   “Then touch me,” you urged, bringing the hand down between your bodies and pressing the cold metal against your clit, “Feel me,”

   His brows furrowed slightly but the look of your certainty forced him to dismiss his own perceptions of his body; or rather, that arm. And when he began rubbing circles into your bundle of nerves the expression on your face made him hate it a little less. Only a little.

   You stared up at him, his pace growing erratic and sloppy and you knew he was close. “You wanna cum?” 

   He nodded, his hot breath coming out haggard and strained. You placed your hand on his cheek and brought him up to your kiss.

   “Then cum,” 

   He shook his head, “You first,” he swirled his finger around your swollen clit and you gasped at the force of his thrust.

   Your body tensed and you centered all your focus on his ministrations, “A little more pressure,” you directed and he quickly found a pressure that had you wobbling in the knees. “Close,” you murmured, gripping Bucky’s side and bringing your lips up to his neck to pepper the skin there.

   He groaned and judging by the way his dick twitched inside you, you knew he wasn’t far behind. 

   “Bucky,” you whispered, pulling his attention towards you and his gaze brought you closer to the edge, “I’m yours,”

   He blinked and his pace faltered for half a beat. He examined your facial expression, like he didn’t believe the words you’d spoken. Not like he couldn’t believe them, but like you’d said them just to appease him. 

   You placed your forehead against his, closing your eyes and taking a deep breath to center yourself in the haze of this fucking. “Yours,” you repeated, all the emotion residing in your chest poured into the singular word. 

   And then he was back to drilling you into the mattress, a new vigor fueling his thrusts. You cried out and Bucky pressed his sweaty torso flat against your own and it felt like the essence, the being, in your chest intermingled with his own and all the climaxes you’d previously experienced couldn’t hold a match to the flame, the intensity, the rawness of the one that washed over the both of you in that moment.

   Bucky moaned out, his hips bucking into yours and you rode out both of your highs. The sensation consuming and overwhelming and welcome on both ends as it flooded through your bodies, meeting at your point of contact.

   His arms flexed above you with the ferocity of his climax and the display had you writhing beneath him, already desperate for more.

   “Buck,” you whispered when his breathing evened out after he collapsed onto you.

   He didn’t respond, afraid it had all been a dream, a trick, despite still being inside you. He didn’t want to move, didn’t want to shatter the perfection of this moment. What if you’d only said that to get him to finish faster? What if you’d only fed him what he wanted to hear? What if-

   “Buck,” you repeated, pulling him from his daze and he lifted his head only slightly. You gripped his chin lightly and forced him to look you in the eye. “You’re . . . mine?”

   He wanted to shake his head, to tell you that he got caught up in the moment but instead he said, “Yours,” because he knew anything else would be a lie and he was tired of lying.

   You studied him and nodded, “Yours,” you stated, already rolling your eyes from the smirk forming on his face, “Unfortunately,”

   He brought your face to his and planted a tender kiss on your lips. He started shifting his position and grabbed the underwear he’d been wearing earlier before pulling out and using the cloth to clean the mess pooling out of you. But not before taking a mental picture, of course. 

   After a few minutes of laying together, his hand playing with a few strands of hair, you felt the warm welcome of sleep beginning to drag you into its embrace. You opened your eyes groggily and looked up at Bucky who was already looking down at you, a small smile tugging at the corners of his lips.

   “I know about your night terrors,” you whispered and his actions halted momentarily before returning to brush through your hair, “I hear you sometimes. And I understand why you don’t want to go to sleep but,” you sat up slowly and placed the thick blanket down on the floor, dragging the pillow down with you and patting the open space beside you, “you should rest. I’ll be here to calm you or stay up with you. Whichever one you need,”

   He didn’t move at first, his ears drowning out any thought he could have while processing what you’d said. He’d stayed silent so long you’d thought you’d crossed a line.

   “I can always sleep on the bed if you’d prefer, though,”

   Bucky shook himself from his thoughts and edged closer to the floor, slowly descending into the available space and wrapping the blanket around the both of you as much as he could. “No,” he said, “I want you here,”

   You hummed in response and snuggled into his waiting arms, lightly wrapping your own around him, making sure to kiss the part of himself he hated the most before fatigue swept you up into its clutches. Bucky followed soon after. 

#SMUT #bucky #Bucky Barnes #barnes #james #James Buchanan Bucky Barnes #james buchanan barnes #the winter soldier #the white wolf #fluff #enemies to lovers #love #hate #one-shot #one shot #imagine #imagines #x reader #x you #bucky x reader #bucky x you #bucky x y/n #bucky imagine #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x imagines #the winter soldier x you #winter soldier x reader #winter soldier #yn #y/n

[poptod]

Cyber Security (Elliot Alderson)

Description: An online ad leads him to you, though in reality he has little interest in your ad. What interests him is how you accidentally doxxed yourself and how oblivious you are to that fact.

Notes: idrk what to say about this one its one of those things that i wrote at midnight after almost falling asleep to a fantasy and then realizing it could work as a fic. like i did this same thing with ‘close your eyes’ that one was also a before-bed-to-get-to-sleep fantasy. this is also not a particularly romantic interaction, though it can be read as such WC: 2.2k

+

Sweat drenched his sheets, bathing him in the cold wind that breezed past his only air conditioner lodged in a nearby window. He stared blankly upwards, half shivering and half overheated, as he once again found himself in a familiar predicament—the practice of sleep.

It was no secret he had trouble calming himself down, and that aspect of himself reached into the evening, as well. He already downed three melatonin pills hours earlier, along with smoking a joint that should’ve put him to bed. Unsurprisingly, that did not work.

“Xanax,” he mumbled to himself, hearing it bounce back from empty walls. “Need to get xanax.”

In the meantime he raised himself to his feet, padding across freezing floors to his computer. With a click of a button the white screen buzzed to life, shining bright onto his sleep-heavy eyes, that did their best to acclimatize to the sudden change.

Hypnotization—strange as it might’ve been—had worked a couple times before. Not all the time, but decently enough to give it a try. He had work in the morning and he didn’t need to be more miserable than usual, especially since he hadn’t slept almost the entire weekend.

sleep hypnosis

The blinker flickered for a moment before his fourth finger slammed down on enter, the last step in calculated movements. What popped up first was a video titled [ SLEEP HYPNOSIS ] 8 Hour Loop with a screencap of a spinning black and white screen. Below that, however, was something he hadn’t seen before—a YouTube video titled exactly what he’d typed, lacking the caps just as he had. The title screen appeared to be some sort of poorly-drawn painting.

Curiosity overcame his hazy, aching head, and he clicked, finding a playlist of videos containing what could be the titles of songs, along with several different poorly-drawn title screens.

The first video began to play before he could realize it. What he first noticed was it was bereft of ads—that meant the publisher made no money off the album.

Sat in the presence of God

whose name means filthy old fraud

Captions had been manually added by, he assumed, you. The author. There were three views on the video, no comments, and no likes, leaving few other options.

Maybe it was the melody—maybe the lyrics, who talked of a world plagued by aristocrats. But he found his eyelids heavy, dropping dark eyelashes in his vision that blurred the screen. By the third song, reciting verses of an Islamic poem, he was slouched in his seat.

He slid down to the floor, crawling his way back to flop onto his bed. The music continued to play till the first ad popped up, at which time he opened his eyes, seeing a music video from Katy Perry, at which time he promptly reached over and unplugged his computer. He wasn’t sure which cord he pulled out, but the screen still went black. With that, he just barely sneaked into his covers, dozing until the morning.

It was far too easy to get information on you. Your full name was stated clearly in your youtube bio, alongside several different social media tags leading to instagram, tumblr, and facebook.

Facebook alone provided him the means to your address, and he didn’t even have to go looking for it. Your most recent post was an ad, searching for someone good with computers to aid you in your recording process, which you noted as ‘dismal’.

Are you fucking kidding me? He thought to himself, reading the ad once more.

Your address, your real, physical address was stated as the place you wanted to meet those interested in helping you. On the internet. You had doxxed yourself after less than a year of being online.

Okay, he thought, clicking on your listed email. Someone needs to be taught a lesson.

Three days later—after about two weeks of listening to your echoing voice every night—you replied, sending a cheerful email detailing when you would be available to meet him. After shooting a short message back, the date was organized.

Two more days and he was standing at your doorstep, his neck craned upwards as he scanned your tall, narrow home squished between two other apartments. He just barely knocked before the black door swung open, revealing a familiar face belonging to a stranger. Elliot was dressed in his black hoodie and jeans, a stark difference to your long, colorful robes, coming out of a sort of fantasy world.

“Hi,” he said, his voice grating with how low and quiet he kept it.

“Hello,” you said with a smile that did not match his hunched posture. “Are you Mr. Alderson?”

“Elliot,” he corrected, his chin just barely raising to meet you. “Elliot Alderson. Elliot works.”

“Alright,” you said, nodding. “Come inside? I was just making tea. Do you like tea? Or do you prefer coffee?”

“I... I’m fine, thanks,” he said softly, scooting past you when you opened the door wide enough for him to enter. He sucked in a breath as his chest brushed yours.

Your home was modern—far fancier than Elliot’s own apartment, with large windows flanked by soft grey curtains. A small, upright piano was in the corner of the living room, set upon a reed mat lined with Korean symbols. The couch was clinical, made of a sort of black plastic leather that matched the grey skies beyond the window panes.

He sat down, shifting his feet closer together as his fingers dug into his palms, continuing to scan the room in its’ entirety until you returned with your own tea.

“What kind of experience do you have? School counts,” you said, setting your cup down on a tiny plate whose decorations matched your teacup.

“I’ve been... experimenting, with computers, since I was around 9,” he said, mumbling the words out as his shoulders hunched awkwardly down. “Have a job at a cyber security firm. Started a while back.”

“You still have that job?”

“Yeah,” he said with a small nod. “Jus’ thought this would be... fun.”

The dead look on his face indicated no humor whatsoever, but you took his word as it was.

“How’d you find the ad I put out?”

“I... I listened to your music,” he answered honestly for once. “Helps me fall asleep.”

“Oh,” you said, clearly taken aback. Your face grew warm as you glanced away with wide eyes. “I’m glad I could help.”

“You’re not very good with technology, though,” he said in his usual low, grating voice.

“Not really,” you chuckled sheepishly. “That’s why I put out the ad -“

“No, not that,” he interrupted you. “You put your physical address on the internet. You doxxed yourself. Do you even know how dangerous that is?”

The lyrics of your songs pointed towards a kind of brilliance, balanced against emotions felt thoroughly on pages and screens. It didn’t match your actions at all.

“What’s doxxing?” You asked.

Elliot had to physically stop himself from sighing and leaving.

“You want everyone to know where you, a minor celebrity, live?”

“I’d hardly call myself a -“

“I could’ve been a murderer,” he said, reaching into his bag.

He looked you in the eye as he pulled out a gun, clicking on the safety before he pointed it at you.

“This is how easy it would be to kill you.”

As expected, you stiffened at the sight of the iron barrel, your fingers withdrawing to your chest. Your lips pursed as you met his gaze once more.

“Please put the gun down,” you whispered, your voice cracking.

He did as you said, resting the gun on the table.

“That’s a hell of a way to start an interview, Mr. Alderson,” you said quietly. “Please get out of my house.”

His heart sank. What had he expected? For you to fall to your knees and sing to him as he desired you to do? He threatened you with a gun to teach you a lesson, and you reacted accordingly. Calmer than others would.

Elliot stood on shaky legs, sliding the pistol into his backpack before he zipped it up. Throwing the pack over his shoulder, he swallowed through a tight throat, shuffling as he delayed his departure.

“Keep safe from people like me,” he said in a strained mumble. “Take that ad down. Meet people from the internet only in inhabited, public areas.”

You tapped your fingernails on the table for a moment, chewing on your bottom lip. Suddenly you stood, tugging on his sweatshirt sleeve to get him to face you, instead of staring at his feet.

“Alright. If you’re really so good at the internet -“

He ignored your incorrect grammar.

“- and... if you actually do want to help me with my songs,” your tone softened, “then you’ll be able to find my real name, not my stage name. If you do.. I’ll hire you.”

“Alright,” he said monotone, knowing the battle was already won.

Even though he knew your name already, he turned away and left to his apartment, immediately going to work on figuring out everything he could about you. If you willingly still offered him the job after that, he knew it would take a lot to scare you off. He could impress you.

It was, after all, the only thing he was good at.

Two days later he showed up at your apartment again, quietly thanking you when you let him in. The clean floors and walls remained unchanged since his last visit, and you led him to the same table, sitting him down on the same seat.

“Your name is (Y/N) (L/N),” he started with. You already appeared to be surprise. “You grew up near LA and you’ve had a chronic illness all your life. At eleven you saw your first therapist.. that must’ve been when you first got diagnosed with depression... and anxiety.”

“Killer duo,” you muttered.

“Your parents split when you were thirteen, which came at the same time as your dog, Penelope, died. Or... sometime that year. When was that... 1997?”

“1999,” you said quietly.

“Your mom homeschooled you,” he continued. “That’s probably why you don’t know how computers work. Rather eclectic, in a.. boring way... an ex-Amish, right?”

You nodded and his heartbeat tripled. Everything was right thus far despite a two year difference in his guesstimate of your life’s timeline.

“Then there was your dad... logger in the Redwood forests. Burly guy. Not a great man, from what I saw,” he said.

“He was fine,” you said with a small shrug as you looked away. “Didn’t ever hurt me, or anything.”

“Abuse isn’t always physical,” he said faster than he could think, dizzied by his own memories playing behind his eyes.

“I know,” you murmured.

You went silent, so he continued, hoping to pry more precious words from you.

“Your favorite color is yellow,” he said, leaning closer to you. “On Valentine’s you get chocolate strawberries, and on easter you get kinder eggs.”

Nothing.

“You studied mythology as a kid, and you made paintings of the forest you lived in with your mom. Santa Cruz mountains, I think.”

“Yeah,” you said. “I miss the forests.”

“I know. You want to visit Ireland again because it’s a land of faeries and moss, it’s a breeding ground for your song lyrics.”

“How did you find all this out?” You finally asked.

“You use the same password on everything,” he said, though that was far from the actual answer. “Your web browser tracks all your movements and you don’t try to stop it, or hide ads, or stay away from sketchy websites. Your parents aren’t much better, either.”

You chuckled, shaking your head as you brought your hand to massage your brow.

“You’re way too smart to be helping me,” you said with soft laughter, blushing with your smile.

“It’s better than working for E Corp,” he said, huffing out a laugh that was hardly humored.

“E corp?”

“My.. uh, place of work,” he brushed off his slip. “My point is... I’d rather work with you and do easy work than work with my current fucking coworkers.”

You laughed, truly and fully this time, curling into a little ball that shook with the force of it. Your feet tucked into your tiny chair, making you even smaller.

“Bad people or just annoying?”

“Stupid,” he chuckled. “Don’t let me wear my sweatshirt.”

“Ooh, now it’s my turn,” you suddenly interrupted him, earning a strange look. “I’ve noticed things about you, too. I couldn’t learn anything off the computer, but you, you have anxiety too. Probably some childhood trauma.. maybe a dissociative disorder of sorts or a form of PTSD. Your jacket is like your home, and... you have sensory issues. Few types of fabric, don’t like to be touched, if I had to guess I’d say you might be autistic.”

“Blunt,” he said after a full minute’s silence.

“Do you mind?” You asked.

“No, not really.”

“Good. Then you’re hired,” you said with a smile, extending your hand for him to shake. “If you still want the job, of course.”

He watched you with evident apprehension, but took your hand after much thought, shaking with a firm grip.

“When do I start?”

#elliot alderson x reader #Elliot Alderson #mr robot #rami malek

[griffintail]

The True One

A/N THERE ARE SPOILERS FROM RECENT LORE STREAM! DO NOT READ THIS FIC IF YOU DON’T KNOW!

Summary: Reader learns the truth.

Pairings: Parental! Tommy x Teenage! F! Reader

Warnings: Mother Fluffing Angst. Death. Mentions of Exile. Swearing. 

Part 2

A/N: This is not canonical to Lost Ones! It has elements from the storyline but it’s not canon. And yes, I’m dying on the inside because of the stream. That’s why I wrote this.

Ps: (F/L) means first letter of your first name. I forgot to put this original.

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

        (Y/N) was thirteen when she first thought her father died.

        Dream wouldn’t let her stay with him. Tommy had to serve his punishment.

        But being told no was never in an Innit’s vocabulary. She snuck into his exile every day she could, avoiding the likes of Dream and going behind her Uncle Tubbo’s back, who had taken over her care.

        At first, everything was fine and Tommy always enjoyed her visits. Then something changed…

        She had begged anyone that would listen to go with her to her father’s exile. He had begun to worry her. All of her life, Tommy had told her to never trust Dream. He often cursed Dream’s name to the wind and his face and she often cursed his name in the wind with him. Now, he called Dream friend.

        No one came though, not even Tubbo, always claiming they were busy.

        She never relented though and tried to make her visits more frequent; unfortunately, being so desperate made her sloppy. Tubbo caught her sneaking into the Nether and followed her.

        This time though, he listened! He went with her, saying only because he was free and they were already here.

        She had rejoiced as she practically skipped down the path to Tommy’s. Stepping out of the portal, her heart dropped though. Logstedshire was smoking and in ruins.

        “Daddy!” (Y/N) screamed as she ran towards the dying embers of the fire.

        Tubbo was frozen by the edge of the path over, looking at the hastily built pole.

        “You wouldn’t Tommy,” Tubbo whispered. “Not with (Y/N) …”

        “Daddy!” She screamed again, tears in her eyes, snapping Tubbo out of his shock.

        Tears were in his own eyes. He had lost his best friend…

        “(Y/N),” Tubbo muttered to her, going over to her carefully.

        (Y/N)’s mind was racing. What had Dream done? Tommy couldn’t have done this. He wouldn’t leave her here…

        Dream did this, but it could have been stopped. He…

        Tubbo put a hand on her shoulder but she whipped away from him, glaring daggers at the older male. Tubbo was surprised, having never seen (Y/N) give anyone such a look.

        “You didn’t care.” She spat out venomously. “I TOLD ALL OF YOU! HE NEEDS YOU! I TOLD YOU!”

        “(Y/N), I—”

        “IT’S YOUR FAULT!” She shouted before running off into the woods.

        Tubbo had stood frozen, unable to process what happened before it was too late. He shouted (Y/N)’s name for hours in the woods but she had, had a good teacher. Tommy taught her everything he knew and while he wasn’t the stealthiest man, it was enough to hide from Tubbo.

        She stayed at the ruins of Logstedshire, unable to leave or accept her father was gone. He wouldn’t just leave her, he’d come back.

        That’s where Technoblade found her and she most certainly could hide as easily from him. But luckily, he didn’t take her back to L’Manberg, she brought her to the one thing that mattered.

        (Y/N) followed behind Techno quietly, intimidated by the man that told her to just be quiet and follow. They got to his base and he opened the door to the lower level before going down the ladder.

        “Tommy!” He called, making (Y/N) freeze from where she was watching him go down.

        “What do you want?” Tommy groaned, coming out from his base in the floor.

        (Y/N) grabbed the sides of the ladder and slid down. She hurt her feet at the bottom but didn’t care. Tommy was startled by the other person present before grinning widely.

        “Little (F/L)!” He threw open his arms. “Sorry I haven’t gone to see—Ooof!”

        He became winded as she slammed into him with a hug.

        He was back.

        Life went on again as (Y/N) went back to the belief; nothing could bring her father down on his last life.

        She was sixteen when the final battle occurred. She lived with Tommy once again in their old home.

        She woke up and stretched only for a note to fall off her chest. Frowning, she picked up and read her father’s handwriting before sprinting up.

        It was a possible final goodbye from Tommy and Tubbo.

        She had her sword and axe clipped on her belt as she was hastily putting her armor as she went out the door. She was at the Nether portal when said pair came out, Tommy’s arm around Tubbo’s shoulder grinning.

        “WHAT THE FUCK?!” (Y/N) screamed at her father and he winced.

        It took a lot to calm (Y/N) down that day…and the next.

        She had really become a lot like him in her sixteen years of life. She often spoke her mind and was not afraid to hold back. Her swordsmanship wasn’t half bad, having been taught by both Tubbo and Tommy. She, of course, also had a passion for rare discs as well. (Y/N) was her own person, but people often called her small Innit as she resembled her father so much.

        She was so much so like him, when she calmed down after the final battle for the discs, Tommy gave her a gift.

        “Here.” He smirked, holding out a (F/C) piece of fabric.

        “What’s this?” She questioned, taking it.

        “Your own bandana, I was going to get you a red one but, thought you should try to be your own woman.” He shrugged.

        She stared at it before hugging her father tightly, making the man laugh as he hugged her back.

        “Thanks, dad.”

        “Eh, you’re my kid, I kind of have to be nice to you.”

        She punched his shoulder before putting it on as Tommy laughed.

        She wore it every day with pride.

        …

        She was visiting Tubbo when it happened.

        She didn’t need her father to survive, but he had “important business” and said he’d come to get her from Tubbo’s after to celebrate. At the time, she thought he was just improving the hotel.

        The day ended though and there was no sign of Tommy. She was worried but Tubbo assured her that Tommy could have lost track of time or his business took longer than he meant. She stayed the night in Snowchester and went home in the morning. When she got home…there was no Tommy.

        “Hey dad, you there?” She called on their channel.

        No answer.

        She shifted nervously, before going to the construction site. Sam Nook might have kept him busy.

        When she got there, Jack was putting up a large, cloth sign with hastily written words painted on it over the main sign.

        “Jack, what are you doing?” She frowned.

        Jack whipped around, before grinning. “I’m putting up my sign for my new hotel!”

        (Y/N) blinked once. Then twice.

        “What did you say bitch!” She shouted.

        Jack rolled his eyes as he came over, his hand twitching towards his axe. “I’m the last worker here. Tommy’s not going to be needing any more, so now it’s mine. So, get off my property.”

        (Y/N) had noticed his hand and watched him carefully as she put a hand on her sword handle.

        “What do you mean he’s not going to be needing it?”

        Jack grinned wickedly. “Tommy’s been thrown in jail.”

        What? No, he didn’t do anything!

        “You’re lying.”

        “No, he’s in there…”

        “Stop lying.”

        “And he’s not getting out…”

        “Stop lying!”

        “He’s done some pretty horrible things.”

        (Y/N)’s sword hit his as he reacted quickly in shock at the teen’s rage.

        “I said stop lying you fuck!”

        Jack’s eyes had darkened and he went to strike the girl when a new body went in front of (Y/N) and a shield blocked the attack.

        “Get off the property or I will have to dispose of you.” Sam Nook told him.

        “This is my—!” Jack started shouting.

        “This is my property!” (Y/N) shouted, sword at her side. “It’s the Big INNIT Hotel. As an Innit, I demand you leave.”

        Jack growled and left the property. Tommy was taken care of; it’d be her turn next.

        “Sam, where’s dad?” (Y/N) asked Sam Nook quietly.

        “I’m not sure. I’m sure he’ll be back soon though!” He tried to encourage her.

        “Yeah.” She muttered. “Keep Jack away ok? I’m going to…go see if anyone knows where he went.”

        “Ok. Be careful Miss (Y/N).”

        She nodded as she went home, taking deep breaths before going on the public channel.

        “Hey, does anyone know what Tommy was doing last?” (Y/N) asked, pacing the room.

        “He was visiting Dream last I heard,” Foolish answered her call.

        She stood frozen in the middle of the base. Tommy had gone and…

        “Did something happen when he came back?” Her voice was more frantic.

        “Not that I know of, yesterday was the last I heard from him.”

        Yesterday?!

        (Y/N) felt her chest tighten as she remembered her fear when she was thirteen. The fear she felt when she read Tommy’s note. All the pain the two of them endured to try and finally now live happily. She needed to see Sam now.

        Just like she had a few months ago she scrambled to put on her gear and ran out the door towards the prison. The effects of the area tired her, made her feel weaker, but she didn’t care as she stood at the entrance.

        “Sam!” She called, knowing the man could hear her. “Sam! Answer me please! Sa—”

        “I figured you come.” Sam said stepping through the portal, hands behind his back. “(Y/N), I need you to leave.”

        “Where’s my dad?” She demanded.

        “There was a security breach when he was in the main cell. I can’t open it until I have it figured out.”

        “He’s…He’s in there with Dream?!” She shouted.

        “Yes, but Tommy’s tough he can…”

        “Daddy!” She screamed, going for the entrance but Sam took her arm to stop her.

        “(Y/N), I need you to leave until I have this figured out.”

        “No, while my dad is in there you stupid bastard! Let him out!”

        “I can’t open the cell—!”

        “I don’t give a flying fuck!” She roughly pushed him away and sprinted in before Sam could stop her. “Dad!”

        “(Y/N)!” Sam shouted as he followed after her.

        She went to run but Sam easily caught her, more used to the effects of the prison.

        “Let me go! I have to save him! Daddy! I’m going to save you this time!” She screamed into the building. “I won’t leave!”

        “You’re only prolonging how long he’s in here!” Sam told her. “I need you to leave so I can work (Y/N).”

        “I can’t leave him. I can’t lose him again. Please, Sam. He—That box and—Dream—and…” The teenager was in tears as she pleaded with the creeper hybrid.

        Sam sighed sadly. “I know. I know. I will fix this as soon as I can. Please, go home. I’ll fix this and get him out, I promise.”

        She couldn’t do anything, but she had to do one thing even in hopes he’d hear.

        “I LOVE YOU, DADDY!” She heard her voice echo. “I’LL MAKE SURE YOU GET OUT OK!”

        She couldn’t do anything more. Sam wouldn’t let her. Instead, she went to the hotel and stayed there as it was even just a few miles closer to where her father was trapped.

        For days, she didn’t leave the room, just staring out the window at the building looming in the distance. Sam Nook tried to get her to eat but she couldn’t. Tubbo had come to try and help her once but that didn’t help at all, only reminding her of before. Her mind couldn’t even think about doing something like that.

        All she could think about was her father.

        Sometimes, as she stared at the building, she sat on their channel on the walkie and just talked like he’d hear her. He had to hear her…

        She was sitting by the window when her door opened, Sam Nook looking at the ground as Sam stood tall behind him.

        “What are you doing? You need to be—” (Y/N) started, her voice strained as she stood up.

        “I’m sorry,” Sam muttered.

        “What? What do you mean? Why aren’t you looking into your security breach?” She asked.

        “I’m so sorry, I was too late,” Sam whispered.

        (Y/N) stood there, taking in his words. “What the hell are you talking about?”

        “I tried (Y/N) and I wish I could have…” He came in but she shook her head.

        “You’re fucking with me. You lying piece of shit, this isn’t funny.” She pointed at him, as she stepped back.

        “I’m not…”

        “You’re lying!” She shouted her throat hurting, but she took off her walkie.

        She needed to prove them wrong! But…

        Tommy Innit was slain by Dream

        “No. No. No. NO! IT’S WRONG!” She screamed to the wind. “IT’S WRONG! HE’S NOT GONE!”

        She collapsed crying, hugging the walkie close to her as Sam came over, hugging her tightly to him. Across the ocean, Tubbo was running for the nearest boat to get to the girl he considered a niece, but nothing would comfort her now.

        “DADDY!” She cried out, her bandana around her neck fluttering lightly as she cried at the true death of her father…

#mcyt x reader #mcyt imagine #mcyt fanfiction #tommyinnit x reader

[mkstrigidae]

Current WIPs and Fic Concepts

I promised I would do this yesterday, and then I forgot!!! (I was very sleep deprived). Anyways, here are a bunch of the WIP premises that I have in my 'unfinished drafts' folder. Most have at least a few pages written for them, but I love them all! ☺️💕

- A Santa Clarita Diet AU (Jonsa) Takes place in sunny southern California, where a shitty dinner at a mediocre restaurant turns into a huge problem for Jon and Sansa when Sansa's heart stops beating. Although she seems fine, Jon is flabbergasted several days later as he watches his wife- who alphabetizes their pantry and refuses to let anyone wear shoes in the house- rip the throat out of one of the sleazy new partners at their law firm, eating half of him before anyone processes what's going on. Hilarity ensues as Sansa's inhibitions and filter disappear, Arya ropes an extremely confused Gendry into helping figure out what the hell is going on just because he moderates the zombie forum on reddit, and Jon tries to deal with the fact that the woman he loves more than anything is now a humanitarian. He really could use a drink. (This one is actually mostly complete, but i need to refine a few things- i really love it. It's as gory and irreverent as the show, so viewer discretion advised, but it's a BLAST to write).

- A Thor/MCU AU (Jonsa, Steve Rogers/Sansa)- Asgardian prince Aegon is banished to Midgard after one too many arrogant decisions, and is promptly hit by a van containing Dr. Sansa Stark, Dr. Barristan Selmy, and Margaery Tyrell- two astrophysicists studying wormholes and Sansa's best friend and pseudo-intern. Marg yells at him, he yells back, Sansa tases him, and Barristan didn't sign up for the kind of heavy lifting that getting a 200+ pound slab of muscle into the back of a van takes. And then Aegon's younger brother, Jon, shows up, in the middle of an identity crisis because, apparently, he's adopted. He wasn't intending to stay, but he's rather drawn to Dr. Stark and her brilliance, and against her better judgement, she starts to trust him, and maybe even like him. This story is in about three parts so far- the first is based on 'Thor' and the second on 'The Avengers' and are fully Jonsa, and the third started as a family bonding story between the Stark kids and Tony (Ned and Tony are second cousins, and Ned was really supportive of Tony in rehab without expecting anything in return), and accidentally turned into a Steve Rogers/Sansa Stark story, which is a pairing i am HERE for. A lot of this one is written, but it needs some fill in before publishing, although it's one of my favorites that i've written to go back and actually read.

- A Star Wars AU (Jonsa) where Sansa and Arya are Alderaanian princesses who are off planet when Alderaan is destroyed- Sansa as a senator and Arya as a pilot, both working for the rebellion, and jon is a smuggler who does not know how all of these people got on his ship and why two princesses are sassing him. His copilot, Tormund (yes he's a wookie), thinks it is hilarious. I started this one just the other day, and it's already thirty pages long, most of them involving Sansa and Arya sassing people. Dany is a leader in the rebellion, Roose Bolton is the emperor, and Barbrey Dustin is a disgruntled former jedi trying to live in peace on a remote planet until another Stark crashes into her life and harangues her into teaching again.

- A witches/magic AU (Jonsa) where the Starks run an apothecary and spellcasting supplies shop. Jon had been completely in the dark about magic before his mother confessed to being born into a family of witches. He finds himself traveling to her hometown, trying to understand her world more clearly, and what it means for him. On the way, he develops something of a crush on the red-headed shop clerk who brews the best headache potions in town. Featuring lots of magical shenanigans, this is one of my favorites in the folder :)

- A 24 hour diner AU (Jonsa) where Jon is a local mob boss, and Sansa works the late shift at Seaworth's diner to buy textbooks for the PhD she's working on in botany. Sansa's running from memories, and Jon has a soft spot for the red-headed waitress who always remembers how he likes his coffee.

- An East of the Sun, West of the Moon AU!!! (Jonsa) This is one of my fav fairy tales, and of course i couldn't resist Jon as a direwolf striking a deal with the starks!

- A Roomates AU (Jonsa)- Arya, Jon, Tormund, and Sam have been renting the same house together off Winterfell's campus for years- but when Sam moves in with his girlfriend, they need one more person on the lease. Sansa, about to relocate to Winterfell for grad school, finds out that her boyfriend has been cheating on her and that her housing plans have fallen through, all on the same day. Needless to say, she's a bit upset when she calls Arya to relay the news. There's a simple solution here, if Arya and Tormund can stop teasing Jon about his crush for five minutes. (any excuse to write tormund and arya roasting jon, tbh).

- A Fae AU (Jonsa)- When Sansa, a baker living in the city, washes her face in an enchanted spring on a camping trip, she gains the sight as a result. Suddenly able to see the fae underworld all around her is disorienting and terrifying. Sansa tries to conceal it- afraid of what might happen if the fae around her know that she can see them- but slips up, and catches the attention of Jon Snow- one of the lords of the unseelie court.

- A nuclear winter wasteland AU (Jonsa)- (?? I don't even know how to describe this premise, haha) where the Starks are living and running the Free Winterfell settlement in Siberia after a worldwide nuclear meltdown. Before the fallout, Sansa was one of the world's preeminent researchers in plant genetics and pathology, and works at the settlement to create newer, disease and radiation resistant crops to distribute for free to other settlements, aiming to break up the monopoly that Lannister Corp has on the market. Jon is a scavenger, searching throughout Siberia for his sister Rhae who disappeared several years previously. When he runs across Arya Starkovna, helping her fight off another band of radiation ravaged scavengers is just instinct- he doesn't think twice about it. In thanks, she brings him to the Winterfell settlement, where her brother Robb offers Jon sanctuary and resources, in exchange for serving as a bodyguard for Sansa when she travels to other settlements. Sansa is not particularly thrilled by this arrangement, but given that multiple parties seem to want her dead, she doesn't have much of a choice but to accept his company.

- A reincarnation AU (Jonsa)- of sorts. Robb is an archaeologist who finds a strange set of runes at a site up north, and immediately calls in Jon Snow- a historian and expert in said ancient language, as well as an old university friend of Robb's. When he arrives though, Robb shows him their most valuable finds- two mysterious ice blocks, with what appear to be perfectly preserved bodies from over a thousand years ago. No one could ever have imagined that either of them were still alive, but when the ice melts, revealing two very alive girls, the entire crew is instantly buried in NDAs, and given an assignment from the Westerosi government to figure out what the hell was going on. Sansa and Arya wake up, extremely confused about the world they live in, trying to adapt and mourning all that they've lost, even as the people around them wear familiar faces.

- Soulmates AU (Jonsa)- (Yes, another one, I love this dumb trope) Trauma surgeon and medical resident Sansa Stark is having a very bad day, and ends up meeting her soulmate during what she thinks is a mugging gone wrong. Fortunately, he’s not the one mugging her, just an intervening bystander, but she ends up slightly shot nonetheless. Sansa’s fretting about bleeding on the upholstery in his car, but Jon is a bit more worried about her injuries than the blood stains. He’s a bit confused when she threatens him if he takes her to a specific hospital, nearly has a nervous breakdown when she insists on doing her own triage, and is very charmed when she insists on ice cream after taking pain meds at the hospital. On Sansa’s part, she’s a little less concerned about being shot, and a bit more concerned about whatever weird first impression she’s making to her soulmate while high as a kite on pain pills. (this one just needs some tweaking to be postable- I'm not sure if it's going to be a oneshot or a series, but i love what I have already)

- A Demon/Archivist AU (Jonsa)- where Sansa works in the university's historical archives in Oldtown, and is learning to restore old texts with her fellow student and friend, Alleras (Trans Sarella is an amazing concept). When Joffrey Baratheon shows up with a pile of old books from his family's library to donate, Sansa is eager to get away from his sleaze, and accidentally takes one of the books home with her in her rush to leave. Unbeknownst to her, it's more than it appears, and when she leaves it open overnight, she accidentally summons forth Jon- an ancient, powerful, and extremely annoyed demon who is under a curse, and now hers to command. As Jon and Sansa try to get used to this new normal, the Lannisters (unaware that Joffrey had donated the tome) try desperately to find the book and it's owner, wanting Jon's power for themselves, and putting Sansa in considerable danger unless she can figure out how to break Jon's curse. Fortunately, she's a pretty good researcher, even if Jon is initially a bit of a grump. (This is based on a total wish-fulfillment mary-sue type premise for something I wrote when I was thirteen, and I revisited it and wanted to see what it would look like if i took it very seriously, and i am really enjoying it so far. It's a love letter to the terrible, heartfelt writing i was doing in middle school that created the foundations for my writing today, and so much fun).

The one that I am MOST excited about though:

- A Pacific Rim AU!!!! (Ned/Cat, Gendrya, Braime, Sansa/Jon Umber)-Twins Sansa and Robb Stark have always been completely in tune with each other, and when your parents are Jaeger pilots and your mother invented the neural handshake, what option is there but the Jaeger academy? Sansa studies to be an engineer, but ends up copiloting the Jaeger 'Winter Wolf' with her twin brother, after they lose Ned Stark to cancer. When Robb is ripped out of the conn-pod and killed by a kaiju while he's still connected to Sansa, she barely manages to kill the creature before stumbling back to shore, traumatized, grieving, and swearing that she'll never pilot again.

Unfortunately, the Kaiju don't stop just because Sansa does, and when the end of the world is imminent, Marshall Catelyn Stark orders both her daughter and former pilot Jaime Lannister (who lost his twin and copilot, Cersei, several years previously) back to Hong Kong for one final stand. Forced to face both her demons and an irate Arya, furious that Sansa had abandoned the rest of them after Robb's death, Sansa and Arya have to figure out how to pilot Winter Wolf together before the apocalypse comes for them all.

Featuring Marshall Catelyn Stark (commander of the Hong Kong Shatterdome, inventor of the neural handshake, former Jaeger pilot, and BAMF), Sansa x Jon Umber (Yes i know it's a rare pair but i've always kind of loved the idea of them, even though we know so little about him), Kaiju parts dealer and smuggler Petyr Baelish, bickering kaiju biologist Dany and theoretical mathematician Jon Snow, LOCCENT officer Theon, lots of snark, lots of angst and heartfelt conversations, and a weird friendship between snarky-grieving-asshole Jaime Lannister and kind-quiet-grieving Sansa Stark, who are the only two people in the world who know what it's like to lose a copilot and a twin in the drift.

Thanks for reading guys!! There are more, but some of them I just don't know how to explain quite yet, haha. I'd love to hear what you guys think about these!

#my writing #fanfics #fanfic wip #jonsa #jonsa fic

[dwellordream]

“...By the 1920s, only the very poorest Danish families had to depend on the economic contributions of adolescent children for survival, but in most households daughters were still expected to help supplement the household income by handing over their pay. Especially in their first years as wage earners, parental control over children's income was considerable. Mothers in charge of the family budget generally kept most of the wages, permitting adolescent wage earners only a limited weekly allowance for personal expenses. Young women's family responsibilities continued in other ways as well. 

While sons were given much more leeway, daughters were generally expected to contribute their labor to the household after they arrived home from work. "In my family, all the children were sent out to work after their [Christian] confirmation [at the age of thirteen or fourteen], and we all had to give mother some of the money we earned for housekeeping," Gerda Eriksen recalled of her working class youth in the early 1920s. "But," she continued, "the girls also had their chores—running errands, peeling potatoes, setting and cleaning the table, doing the dishes, bringing up coal from the basement. My brothers never had to do any of that. That was women's work."

But if contributing wages and labor to the household continued to be the unquestioned norm, young women's sense of their rights and obligations vis-a-vis the family was nevertheless changing in other ways in the early decades of the twentieth century. When earnings were sufficient, some daughters decided to strike out on their own and live independently in rented rooms, small apartments, or boarding houses, but given their low wages this was a possibility for the very few. More frequently, young working women sought to use their earnings as leverage to negotiate a stronger position within the family. Especially after World War I, when most families were able to place themselves safely beyond the poverty line, the necessity of individual sacrifice for household survival began to fade.

This allowed even working-class daughters to assert their right to new privileges in exchange for their economic contributions, and in the 1920s they did so in increasing numbers. Young women's sense of what they could legitimately demand from their families clearly sprang from their status and experiences as wage earners outside the home. In the labor market, and particularly in jobs other than domestic service, young women learned a rhythm of time and labor that divided daily life into paid work and one's "own" time. This was a rhythm already familiar to most men, whose lives had long been split into realms of work and leisure. Therefore, (male) wage earners were the obvious beneficiaries when Danish government regulations in 1919 limited the work day to eight hours, allowing working men more free time than ever before. 

Married women, on the other hand, did not experience a similar shortening of the workday. Whether they worked outside the home or not, housework, child-rearing, cooking, and cleaning were never ending tasks, and unlike their husbands, they had to snatch their few leisured moments in between domestic responsibilities. As working women, daughters were precariously positioned between these different patterns of daily life. Even though they took on wage labor much like their fathers and brothers, young women were simultaneously expected to share the steady burdens of domestic work with their mothers and to devote their nonworking time to household labor. 

It was this discrepancy between expectations fostered by labor market participation in the context of increasing standards of living, and the realities of family life that became increasingly intolerable for many young women in the 1910s and 1920s. In their minds, earning a living and bringing home money positioned them on a par with male members of the family, entitling them to at least some of the same prerogatives. Consequently, while they did not resist having to hand over a substantial part of their earnings, they more and more openly resented that their financial contribution did not always earn them what they considered its reasonable counterpart, namely the right to free time. As a result, families with adolescent daughters were plunged into conflicts about the degree of personal autonomy that labor market participation and wages ought to bestow. 

Intrafamilial conflicts are often difficult for historians to document, but in this case tensions between parents and children are easily discernible. They surface, for instance, in the immensely popular advice columns of the 1910s and 1920s. Convinced of their right as wage earners to at least some free time and exasperated by their parents' unwillingness to grant them this privilege, some young women turned to advice columnists, hoping for replies that would affirm the legitimacy of their demands. 

Among the correspondents was "Betty" who openly questioned her parents' authority. "I work from 8 A.M. to 6 P.M. every day," she explained. "When I come home, I am tired, but I still have to fix dinner and look after my younger sister. In the evenings my parents say I have to do needle-work, but I would rather read or go for a walk. Can they really demand that I stay at home? I am seventeen and a half years old, and I pay my mother Dkr. 8 every week."

Similarly, "a Copenhagen girl" found the relationship between rights and duties in her life unreasonable. "Before I leave in the morning," she complained, "I have to light the fire, make coffee and pack lunches. When I come home, the dishes are still sitting there, and there are errands to be run. Sometimes I want to meet my girlfriend at night, but my parents will almost never let me go. They say there is no reason to 'gad about,' but I don't understand what is wrong with having a little bit of fun at night when you work all day." Other evidence also suggests that many young women openly struggled to obtain the right to leisure and independent activities they thought they deserved. 

Personal narratives often reveal both the intensity of such conflicts and the ingenuity of young women bent on getting their way. Emilie Johansen, who grew up in a middle-class family in a suburb of Aarhus recalled, for example, how she and her sister enlisted the help of an older aunt in their conflicts with an authoritarian father. "He was so strict. He would never allow us to have any fun, never allow us to go anywhere. It was hopeless. But then my aunt—I guess she was feeling sorry for us— we talked to her, and she hired us to do some cleaning and stuff. And we would get there and she would say, 'Why don't you girls run off to see a movie?' I don't remember if we ever actually did any work."

Equally resourceful, Copenhagen native Anna Eriksen depended on the backing of an older brother, who, in exchange for small favors, would promise to act as her chaperon outside the home only to vanish as soon as the siblings were out of their parents' sight. In addition to such evidence, numerous magazine articles and newspaper columns from the 1910s and 1920s chronicle the anger and bewilderment of parents who found themselves in constant conflict with their daughters. For mothers, this seemed particularly difficult. Not only did their daughters' desire for a "modern" life seem a rejection of their own norms and values, which in itself was hard to bear, but on top of that, some girls directly flaunted their disrespect of maternal authority, especially if fathers were absent, indulgent, or merely lackadaisical.

"When my daughter is not at the office, she thinks life has to be lived in a cafe, or in other places where people are judged according to their dress and style," "Ninka's mother" wrote to a women's magazine in 1921. "If I tell her to stay home even a few nights a week, she acts as if I've just imposed a life sentence on her." "She doesn't listen to me," another mother complained of her seventeen-year-old daughter. "When I tell her to stay home, she just laughs and says that you are only young once, that this is the twentieth century and not the Middle Ages, and that she is already wasting too much of her youth in a dirty factory. Besides that, she has her own money."

Even more desperate, the mother of one of the much maligned Langelinie girls told a newspaper journalist that she had "begged and pleaded with [her daughter] not to go there, but it doesn't help. I have to go to work, and my neighbor tells me that as soon as I am out the door, she takes off." Using whatever means it took, many young working women who came of age in the late 1910s and 1920s thus pushed for new personal freedoms and especially the right to free time. While some parents never gave in to their pressure, most young women seemed gradually to succeed in carving out of daily life at least some uninterrupted time devoted to relaxation and their own enjoyment. 

From the mid-1920s, the frequency of daughters' publicly voiced complaints declined dramatically, and coming-of-age stories no longer featured such conflicts. Apparently, Ernestine P. Poulsen, born in 1902, described a phenomenon that extended beyond her family when she explained that "I fought a lot of battles with my parents [over the right to leisure]. Perhaps I cleared the way because when my [younger] sisters came along, they did not have to do the same. My parents had kind of accepted that girls also needed time of their own."

This did not mean, however, that conflicts between parents and daughters faded. Rather, the grounds of conflict merely shifted. Much resistance to giving young women free time derived from the material conditions of daily life—the practical assistance of grown daughters was still important for the well-being of many working-class households—and from a more general reluctance to give up control over children. But parents' reluctance also stemmed from their misgivings about young women's actual use of their leisure time. 

Had daughters simply demanded more time to pursue leisure activities within the home, had they insisted on participating in cooking classes and sewing circles, or had they wanted to attend lectures on hygiene and housewifery, they would probably have been met with more understanding. But these were not the kinds of activities young women longed to engage in, and therefore the question of female leisure remained a contentious issue throughout the postwar decade.

Working-class and middle-class daughters had of course not been entirely without time of their own prior to the 1920s. Nor had they been completely confined to the home. Girls from the countryside had always been allowed to participate in regional fairs, celebrations, and local get-togethers of young people. Urban working-class daughters had long socialized outside the home on staircase landings and front steps, in backyards, and on city streets or in neighborhood parks, and many middle-class daughters belonged to women's clubs and organizations. 

What constituted the major departure from convention in the 1910s and 1920s was young women's insistence on their right to "go out," an activity significantly different from the kind of casual socializing that took place outside their parents' windows or in clubs and organizations under adult supervision. "Going out," Regitze Nielsen recalled, "that was when we got dressed up and went somewhere." More specifically, "going out" meant pursuing pleasures that took young women away from home and family, into the public, and, in particular, toward new forms of commercial recreation, including movie theaters, cafes, dance places, and amusement parks. As a social practice, this form of "going out" challenged older norms for female behavior in several ways. 

First, it obviously entailed their deliberate desertion from the domestic world, if only momentarily. Second, "going out" meant young women venturing outside familiar neighborhoods and beyond the realm of adult control and surveillance, claiming for themselves the right to an independent, unsupervised social life distinct from familial traditions. Third, as opposed to more traditional forms of leisure for women, "going out" was a strictly peer-oriented activity in which kinship ties had much less significance than freely chosen and carefully cultivated friendships among girls and young women who usually met in school, at work, in clubs and organizations, or in the neighborhood where they lived. 

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, "going out" meant women's entrance into public spaces traditionally defined as male territory and often imagined as sites of immoral activity where men and women freely mingled, potentially transgressing social and sexual boundaries. Because each of these four aspects seemed to pose a fundamental threat to the social and sexual status quo, intense controversies between parents and children over young women's new leisure activities reverberated throughout the postwar decade. Years after families had conceded to daughters' demands for more time of their own, parents struggled to control or at least influence their use of that time. 

By dictating curfews, prohibiting particular activities and specific locations, insisting on being introduced to friends and companions, and demanding the chaperonage of brothers, parents sought not only to protect their daughters against potential dangers but also to maintain at least some authority. Consequently, when young women ventured out into the public sphere, they generally did so under the intense scrutiny of parents who continued to hold some power to revoke their newly won privileges. Thus, even as "going out" gradually became a regular part of young women's lives, treading carefully remained an often perplexing prerequisite.”

- Birgitte Soland, “Good Girls and Bad Girls.” in Becoming Modern: Young Women and the Reconstruction of Womanhood in the 1920s

#1920s #history #danish #birgitte soland #becoming modern

[dramaticsnakes]

The Revived - Chapter 9: Reconnecting

This is chapter 9 of the Dream SMP multichapter fic @rainbowbutterfrosting​ and I wrote together! I hope you’ll enjoy!

AO3

Read in order (on Tumblr)

Characters in this chapter: Wilbur, Nihachu, Ghostbur

Word count: 2784

Cw: sleep problems, needle imagery, implied desire to get hurt, mentions of guilt, brief mentions of food/eating, discussions of violence, implied trust issues

Fic summary: Wilbur was alive, and it was such a magnificent feeling, that made his mind spark with anticipation. It didn’t take long, however, for Wilbur to realize that this new breath of life, was not just his own. An echo-y voice hides in the back of his mind, and before he knows it, the transparent version of him he saw at the endless train station, is a lot more ingrained than he’d expected him to be.

And Wilbur really shouldn’t care. Because he’d be damned, if he spent the life he’d awaited for so long, babysitting a lost cause of a ghost, stuck in the very same limbo Wilbur spent so long in. It was an even exchange, and one Wilbur wasn’t going to mess with. Why exactly he ends up setting out to get the ghost out of his mind, in order to save the both of them, however, is beyond him. And perhaps Wilbur’s past isn’t as easy to leave behind, as he’d hoped it would be.

The minutes that followed were awkward to say the least. Niki had held onto Wilbur for a while, as if he would slip out of her grasp and dissolve into nothingness at any moment. She’d let Wilbur go free shortly after, and then she started staying at a distance, her eyes never quite leaving him. In a matter of minutes, she’d gone from yelling at him and punching him, to treating him like a fragile porcelain vase that would break the second she got too close. In a way, Wilbur wasn’t sure which he preferred.

“I’m sorry.” she’d repeated several times, quietly and broken, almost as if to mimic Ghostbur’s words that had echoed in Wilbur’s mind earlier, “Wilbur, I’m so so sorry.”

Wilbur had said it was okay, because really, Wilbur had expected punches far earlier, and perhaps it was about time.

He had the chance to look at his surroundings properly, now that he was no longer blindfolded. What had previously been stairs leading to an unknown place, and a lonely room he couldn’t see, now resembled something much grander. An underground area with high ceilings, and god knows how many different rooms. It was like an entire city, right underneath the ground, and Niki was walking through it so casually, looking at Wilbur instead of the impressive sights. “What is this place?” Wilbur asked quietly.

It took Niki a few moments to realize she’d even been asked a question. “Oh! It’s my secret city.”

Wilbur hummed. “Not so secret anymore. You led me right to it.” he said, trying to lighten the quiet mood. Niki just laughed awkwardly. “Did you build this?”

“Yeah. I did.” Niki said with a nod, “I originally made it to house refugees from the war, but… Well, now I just kind of live here on my own.”

“Really?” Wilbur said, looking at what looked like the beginning to a farm, “That’s… That’s a lot of space.” he tried to dig through his memories, “Didn’t you have a bakery?”

At that, Niki’s face turned pale again. She shook her head. “L’Manberg’s gone.”

“Oh.” Wilbur said, “Oh, right. Sorry, that was stupid.” he facepalmed, accidentally touching a bruise, and he heard Ghostbur wince. 

He must’ve winced too, because Niki gave him a concerned look. “You… I’m so sorry, but we should find a way to treat the bruises. I didn’t mean to- or well, I did mean to, but not to you, I…” she trailed off, and closed her eyes, as if her own words made her cringe.

“It’s okay.” Wilbur said, walking ahead.

“It’s not okay. I should’ve…” She shook her head, and took a deep breath. After a few moments of nothing but silence and the sound of their steps, she stopped walking. Wilbur looked back, confusedly. “Wilbur… How exactly are you back?”

Ah. Wilbur should’ve expected the question eventually. “Dream.” he said, “Dream revived me.”

A range of subtle emotions seemed to flow down Niki’s face in ripples. She swallowed something in her throat. “Oh.” she said, “That’s what they said happened with Tommy, I thought… I didn’t even think he was…” she looked at the ground for a moment, her eyes closed tightly. “But why would Dream- Are you… You were dead right?”

Wilbur scoffed. “What do you mean? Yeah I seemed pretty fucking dead to me.”

Niki started whispering to herself. “Wilbur died. He was killed by Phil. Dream revived him.” She repeated the words again, and looked up again, with a smile that looked performative at best. “Okay, I suppose that makes sense.”

“Yeah…” Wilbur attempted to shift the conversation, “Why did you stop threatening me? Like are you just gonna punch me again? I’ll understand if I look punchable, I’ve gotten that quite a lot.” Wilbur chuckled. He desperately hoped Niki wasn’t going to hurt him again, yet part of him still said it was going to happen. Part of him said Niki wasn’t going to let him leave alive.

Yet, Niki managed to prove him wrong when she spoke, “No, no I’m not-” She took a shaky breath. “I’m not going to do it- any of that again. I… I realized that you were actually you when… When you called me ‘Nix.’ You were the only person that called me that.” The words were fragile in a way that made it look like Niki’s eyes were watering. He might have been the one to wipe away Niki’s tears moments ago, but he couldn’t attempt to rub away the unshed ones.

“Niki are you oka-”

“You look tired.” Niki interrupted, the words sounding sharp, “Have you had some rest recently?”

Wilbur looked at Niki disbelievingly, “I mean, I was just passed out and tied up for some hours wasn’t I?”

Niki looked apologetic for a moment again, and Wilbur almost wished he hadn’t said that. “That’s not rest.” she proceeded to say, “You should… You can borrow a bed, and lie here for a while. It’s the least I can do.”

Wilbur caught a good look at Niki’s face again. He looked at the bags underneath her eyes, and the way she looked as if years had passed. For a moment, he pondered if perhaps Ranboo and Tubbo had lied to him, about how long Wilbur had been gone. He found himself doubting this was the same Niki, Wilbur last saw thirteen and a half years ago. “How long has it been since you last slept.” Wilbur asked, and it wasn’t meant to be spiteful. In fact, he was uncharacteristically concerned.

Niki’s expression hardly changed, as she simply blinked once. “Last night.” she said, and Wilbur had enough experience with her to know that it was a lie, but he wasn’t going to say anything. He didn’t feel as if he had the right.

Soon enough, Wilbur found himself sitting on a bed. She left the room with a promise that she’d return, and Wilbur suddenly felt exposed and off, as if he had been miscast in the role of someone who needed help, rather than whichever role he previously had. Not that he was confused about his previous role, because Wilbur had gone way too far by now, to qualify as a hero.

“Ghostbur?” Wilbur whispered.

“Yeah, I’m here! Are you alone?” Ghostbur asked.

“Yes. You went quiet for a while.” Wilbur said.

“Oh, did I? Sorry. I love talking, but you usually don’t like it when I talk while you talk to others.”

In a sense, Ghostbur wasn’t wrong. Wilbur had expressed little but distaste towards it, or he’d ignored it completely, because really he had to. It wasn’t as if this was something he could explain, when people were baffled at the revival alone. Furthermore, he wasn’t sure what would happen if he tried to explain. While people held tension and disdain whenever it came to Wilbur, people held everything from fondness to mild annoyance with Ghostbur. Wilbur wasn’t an idiot. Ghostbur was so inextricably good and happy, and those were two things Wilbur had little to nothing of. There was a little part of Wilbur, however small, that felt as if people would rush to get Ghostbur back from the place in limbo he had done nothing to deserve, even at the cost of Wilbur. 

Of course he shouldn’t want Ghostbur to talk all the time. Ghostbur was annoying. Wilbur knew that. For so long, he’d had to face that fact. And yet, Wilbur still found himself saddened at Ghostbur’s words, because a ridiculous part of Wilbur insisted that the silence was worse. That the light echo-y tone, was keeping Wilbur just above the surface of the ocean, that otherwise wouldn’t hesitate to suffocate him.

Wilbur’s time in limbo must’ve done quite a number on him, for him to think such things.

“You can talk if you have something to say.” Wilbur said quietly, “I won’t always be able to respond, but you can talk.”

“Oh.” Ghostbur said, sounding a little uncertain, “Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me for that. You can do what you want, you know. Not like anyone can stop you in there.” Wilbur said, but he regretted the words as soon as he said them, because they were met with the sound of a harsh inhale. Wilbur took a deep breath, closed his eyes, trying to collect his words. “I’m sorry it’s… How are you feeling there? I left you alone for a… For a while.”

“I’m fine, I think.” Ghostbur said, his cheerful tone apparent, but the words ambivalent. “I-I don’t think I like this place very much though.”

Wilbur nodded to himself, feeling his heart drop slightly. “Yeah, I get that. It’s very quiet and enclosed.” he bit his lip, almost hard enough to taste the blood within.

“It’s okay!” Ghostbur said, “I’ll probably forget it soon anyway. You’re here now.”

“Ah. Yes, of course.” Wilbur said, and perhaps the idea that Ghostbur would possibly forget soon enough should’ve been a relief, yet there was something strangely dishonest about the way the memories worked. In a sense, Wilbur related to the way memories seemed out of reach. To the way, certain parts of one's life were muddled. He carried just a bit of sympathy for the ghost, and the way he, despite everything, held on, through the vague fog of remembrance. 

“And you have to sleep sometimes! The living do that when they get tired.” Ghostbur said affirmingly.

“That’s true.” Wilbur said, a small smile on his face as he chuckled. After a moment of silence he added, “Hang in there.” because perhaps he was still cruel enough, to let the ghost fall into the illusion that it was temporary. It wasn’t. It couldn’t be. 

But Wilbur had gone way too far, to qualify as a hero anyway.

Just then, Niki entered the room. She was smiling, though it seemed practiced. She was holding a plate with a pastry that was probably homemade. In her other hand, she held a glass of water. Wilbur realized that his throat was a little dry, as he laid his eyes upon it. “I had this. Are you hungry?”

Once again, Wilbur felt miscast as a victim. “Yes.” he said begrudgingly, and Niki approached, placing the plate on a table next to Wilbur. “Still baking without the bakery?” he asked.

Niki looked a little surprised at the question. “Oh, yeah! I uh- I am now.”

Wilbur nodded, feeling that the response was a bit strained and off, though he didn’t find it in himself to comment on it. “How long have you been staying here?” he asked.

“A while.” Niki said, “A couple of months, I think.”

Wilbur hesitated. “Alone?” he asked.

Niki turned visibly uncomfortable at the question. “Yeah.” she said, “Or well, I’ve had visitors sometimes.”

Wilbur wasn’t sure what he’d imagined the world to be like, after he died. Perhaps a part of him had expected a bustling community, with Niki standing tall as ever. With her smiling while trying out a new recipe. Maybe with Tommy front and center, with Tubbo by his side. Everything continuing on, as if death led to blooming rather than decay.

And perhaps another, much more selfish part of him, had expected the world to die along with him. For everything to fall to the ground along with L’Manberg, until there was nothing but a crater in the ground.

Neither of those seemed to be the case. Though sometimes, expectations had to be set aside, in order to keep a goal clear.

He took a bite of the pastry, familiar flavours filling his mouth. “Oh. This is delicious!” he said, “Prime I haven’t tasted cake at all in forever.”

Niki giggled, and for a moment everything felt normal. Wilbur wasn’t sure what normal meant at all, but it was as if no time had passed. The sound of the giggle seemed like a gateway through the past, and their voices seemed to blend comfortably, as they went on to make some more awkward conversation. 

Apparently Techno had gone as far as to make an anarchist group, though Niki didn’t go into much details of its members, or whether they’d even done anything noteworthy. She mentioned a couple of new faces, and briefly went into how Dream was in prison. Pandora’s box. Wilbur knew of it. He vaguely remembered the huge building, and he remembered vague dread that didn’t come from his own memories. Ghostbur’s breathing turned shakier at the mention, though they quickly moved on from the subject.

Wilbur noticed however, that whenever the subject of L’Manberg was brought up, Niki’s tone had a sharper edge to it. Her words became quicker and harsher, as if the topic itself stuck needles into her chest, that made her hiss, as if she was catching breath. “Did you miss me?” Wilbur asked at one point.

“Of course I did.” Niki said, her voice turning a little softer.

“Are you mad at me?” he asked.

“Of course I am.” Niki said, and she grasped her mouth once she realized she’d said it. She shook her head. “No! It’s not that bad, it’s just… You’re back now, it’s fine.” 

“I destroyed it all, didn’t I?” Wilbur asked, though it wasn’t a real question. He chuckled, “I destroyed your home. I destroyed everyone’s home.”

“Stop.” Niki said, “It’s over now. The memories are gone and-”

“And I did that!” Wilbur said, with a slight smile.

“Stop.” Ghostbur suddenly said.

“And I’m sorry.” Wilbur added, “I’m sorry I did that, but you should be mad at me anyhow.”

“I don’t… I don’t want to be mad at you Wilbur!” Niki said, a little desperation in her voice. She suddenly took his hand, and looked him in the eyes. “You left. You were gone, and now you’re back. I lost you Wilbur. We all did. And you betrayed everything you used to stand for.” She said harshly, “But I don’t want to be mad at you. Everyone here has done bad things, and you’re not the only one who has left in one way or another. Betrayals happen all the time, and now you’re here. I’m here, and I’m not a part of any of it up there, so it doesn’t matter anymore. None of it matters.”

Wilbur sat in silence for a moment, feeling the heat of Niki’s hand on his, that felt all at once comforting and overwhelming. It shouldn’t be there. At most, it should’ve been punching Wilbur again, because the more he thought about everything, the more he hoped someone would take this all out on him. At least it would make him feel alive rather than confused. He wondered exactly when Niki’s outlook became so somber, and he couldn’t help but feel that he perhaps had played a part. The words hadn’t even seemed planned out, and while Wilbur didn’t doubt that they were truthful, he couldn’t help but feel as if there was more truth to be uncovered. “Okay.” he just said, because what the hell was he supposed to say, with Niki looking at him, as if this was the last second he’d spend within her sight?

“It does matter.” Ghostbur said, “There’s a lot going on, but everyone deserves to be happy. That’s important.”

Wilbur wasn’t sure if the sentiment broke his heart or poorly repaired it with some blue duct tape. “I’m sorry, Niki. For what I did.”

“Thank you, Wilbur.” Niki just said, she smiled slightly, though Wilbur wasn’t sure if his apology had gotten through. “Get some rest, alright? You still look exhausted.”

“I can talk a lil’ bit longer,” Wilbur yawned after saying the words. He caused so much pain to Niki that he wanted to at least talk for a few minutes more. Perhaps make those minutes count more than the ones in his past lives. Cherish the moment in a way.

But Niki only looked sympathetically at him. The pity, saying more than she ever could, “Can and should are two different things, Wil.”

“Aww,” Wilbur rolled his eyes. “Fine, I’ll rephrase that. I should stay up a bit longer.”

Niki sighed in a way that could have been considered a melancholic laugh, “You really shouldn’t.” The words were quiet, genuine concern showing through them.

With the waves of exhaustion washing over Wilbur, he laid back in the bed. Although the pillow wasn’t very soft, he leaned into it gratefully, his eyes closing along the way.

“Good night, Wilbur.” Niki sat up from the bed, pulling the blanket slightly more over Wilbur. A small smile came across Wilbur’s face. He thought about returning the good night back to her, but he already fell into a dreamless sleep.

#dream smp #dsmp #wilbur soot #c!wilbur #nihachu #c!nihachu #c!niki #ghostbur #revivedbur #fic #The Revived

[sourbat]

is hammertooth 39 (secret admirer) ok? It might be for any other ship instead if it's already asked !

*throws arms* have an entire fic. 

Heads up: i cheated and wrote an AU

Rehearsal was every Tuesday and Thursday, from 5pm onward, though it was unusual for practice to extend beyond nine. Even in the rare instances it did break past the dreaded four-hour barrier, Toki wasn’t too worried. The cold still of the night never bothered him so long as he had space to move and breathe in, along with the lamplight to remind him he was above ground, and enjoyed the ten-minute walk from the rehearsal studio to the small building that served as both a used bookstore and café. Tonight wasn’t any different. It was just past nine when Toki entered the café, plaintive expression replaced with a hit of musical nostalgia and the hot, tasty aroma of roasting coffee. 

Toki took to visiting the café two weeks into joining the band, after a session ended with a nasty downpour. Toki had somehow missed the industrial, brick building that hosted both shops until late at night while shivering and waiting for his bus that only arrived by the hour past eight. Though he barely read anything past age twelve, and had hardly any money to spare, Toki took residence in the store filled to the brim with dry-smelling books, posters, tie-dye shirts, puzzles and board games, and Toki eventually found himself cozily situated at a table located in the furthermost corner of the café, where the boundary between books and nitro cold-brewed drinks met. It was past nine, and hardly a soul was ordering anything caffeinated at this hour, but no one told Toki to leave, so he stayed. No one told him off the second time he stumbled in, this time entering through the café side of the parlor, and once Toki grew familiar with the table nearest the glass pane with a view of street, decided he’d make the warm-smelling shop a permanent fixture of his rituals until politely asked to leave. 

Winter had officially arrived, and though the weather paled in comparison to Norway’s frosty, white winters, Toki donned his fair share of layers as he stepped inside the café. He was hit with a warm, flavorful scent, and inhaled deeply as he glanced at the counter, spotting the backside of the tall barista busy draining old decaffeinated coffee into the sink, and walked to his usual spot. He passed old music posters of punk-rock bands, indie groups and displays stapled to the brim with “wanted” ads or requests for roomies, and located his seat tucked by the window.

 There was a cup of coffee waiting for him when he arrived.

 Once he set his guitar aside, Toki eyed the cup, picked it up, and wasn’t surprised that it was still warm. He also wasn’t surprised when he removed the foam protector and saw the same sloppy heart hurriedly etched by the barista when he took the order, and wasn’t too shocked when he brought the lip to his nostrils and inhaled that delectable scent of sweet white and bitter chocolate intermingling with one another. Toki glanced around the area, spotting an older gentleman reading the paper, two students engaged in vigorous studying, the barista sorting through the remaining biscuits and treats in the display rack, and another employee pushing a tray of books just outside the café’s perimeter.

 This was the fourth time Toki was greeted with a cup of coffee, and the fourth time he missed out on figuring out who had ordered it for him. The first time was understandable: rehearsal ended earlier than normal after a string snapped and cut Skwisgaar’s hand, and when Toki snuck inside, had a long line of people asking for smoothies and precooked take away meals. With all the hulabaloo, Toki barely noticed when the barista slipped by his table, dropped off the cup, and told him “it’s on the house” before parting, giving Toki no time to respond. By the time Toki finished being so giddy over the surprise gift, had considered that he’d need to give himself a shot before drinking, so much time had passed and when he looked around the café. He couldn’t begin to sort through the crowds and determine who bought him the surprised drink. The second time was stupidity on his part, having forgotten the promise of checking the café because it had been so cold, and upon being granted the cup, was so thankful he only had the forethought to thank the barista before greedily using the hot cup to warm his tired, chilled spirits. The third was a bust because, like today, when Toki arrived the drink was already waiting for him. Toki thought about asking the barista since he was the one filling the orders, but because Toki knew the barista was friendly with the girl customers and coworkers, he was hesitant to ask for a name.

 He rubbed the tip of his nose, enjoying the heated friction caused by plastic and chocolatey steam, then settled into his seat and took the first warm sip. The beverage was warm, but not as hot as it normally was when he arrived half-past eight. Whoever was buying him drinks either probably had to leave before or around nine.

 Toki took another sip, smiling to himself and whomever his secret admirer might be.

 What if it’s a dude, Toki pondered midway through a gulp that, despite the beverage’s lukewarm temperature, still managed to fill his chest with a comforting warmth. Whoever was buying him drinks, Toki wished they weren’t so shy. Bad enough Toki had a miserable time figuring out when a person was flirting with him. He finally had someone signaling their direct interest, and they were too afraid to approach little ol’ him for a small chat. Toki didn’t see why. He’d love for someone to sit down with him and let him in how they figured the combination of white and dark chocolate would be his favorite, or give their opinion on the ancient, but tasteful punk that played muted in the background of the café side of the shop. Of course, Toki would also love to know when they noticed him, developed a crush, and decided to help bring an end to his long, cold nights with something so sweet and thoughtful, but for now would settle for a simple “hello.”

 He finished his drink quickly, enjoying the warmth while it lasted, and settled into his corner, eyeing the intersection and bus top near the corner. A few minutes passed, and something knocked gently against his table. Toki jolted, turned and saw the tall barista retract his hand to then point a finger at the neglected cup.

 “Hey, man,” he greeted coolly, offering a short nod to Toki. “You good?”

 Toki couldn’t help but notice the clock on the wall, saw it was thirteen minutes to closing, and the barista’s serene politeness was likely a passive means of trying to kick him out. He gave him a nervous nod in return, then reached for his guitar case’s strap as the barista picked up the cup.

 “You headed out already?” the barista commented once Toki slung the case over his shoulder.

 Toki made one glance at the barista. It only then dawned on him that his admirer might be one of the workers in the store. The urge to ask the barista filled his gut with butterflies, and when the older man asked if there was something on his mind, Toki shook his head, stood so quickly his case almost got trapped with the chair, and stumbled off.

 Perhaps another night, Toki thought, then exited the café.

 …

 After a particularly good, but exhausting rehearsal, Toki arrived at the café just shy of 8:42 p.m. The last of the early Christmas shoppers were making their rounds on the book half of the store, and there were a few shoppers, mostly families, huddled around the dessert and snack display.

 When he exited the bathroom, Toki was greeted to the surprising snap of peppermint mixed with his mocha, along with a decent helping of cracked peppermint and chocolate sprinkles coating the whipped top. There were quite the number of cute, friendly faces in the area, though Toki was helplessly lost at determining whether the occasional glance in his direction was a possible sign of interest. He does pick up on the heat of his cup, and when he slides the foam covering down, sees the same sloppy heart had smeared when he pressed and dragged the cardboard against it.

 Maybe it is a worker, he thought, eyes wandering around, darting between hanging lightbulbs, tables covered with neglected magazines and leftover gift wrapping. Given the size of the bookstore, chances were it was one of the late-night shift workers. Toki’s eyes settled on a family leaving the café, holding some wrapped books, and felt his stomach tickle as he took another sip of his delicious drink. They could be seasonal, he worried, after dwelling on the thought a bit longer.

 A sharp voice called out a name, and when Toki trend, saw the barista leaving the pick-up counter to start chatting with the young woman working alongside him. The thought to ask the barista arose once more, and this time Toki counted on the unspoken bond between men to hopefully work up the courage to ask the older gentleman. Sure, the guy was always so friendly with the girls, but that didn’t change the laws of nature, right? Guys looked out for each other, Toki concluded, and convinced himself to leave the seat and approach the line once it had shrunk to an acceptable wait.

 Toki stared at a few delectable treats, unaware that he was up next until the barista called for him.

 “Hey there,” he greeted, voice cheery and befitting for the season.

 Toki nervously fidgeted once the man caught his attention. A sharp, brown eye settled on Toki. “Uhm, hellos,” he said, both amazed and discouraged that his confidence would vanish so quickly with a simple look.

 The barista glanced at his coworker, sent her silent nod, then returned to the register. He rested both hands on the counter, and with a friendly countenance, asked, “Anything I can get ya, man?”

 The question was friendly enough, and the man, despite his rough features, had a nice smile that drew Toki forward.

 “Uhm, askually…” The barista gave a nod. Toki thought about how he overstayed his welcome the last time, and wondered if the barista remembered, or cared. Probably not, Toki thought, or hoped. Prayed. “I justs wanted…”

 “We got an issue in the back.” The female coworker popped her head from a room, her thick hair bouncing as she learned against the opened doorway. “I don’t know if you noticed, but we’re missing a shipment of soy and coconut milk.”

 The barista’s smile faded as he turned and met with the girl. “Are you kiddin’ me?” he asked, then promptly returned to Toki and, with a slightly strained smile, said, “Sorry, man. One second.”

 Toki nervously fiddled with his hands as he accidentally listened in on the conversation, catching on the older man’s growing frustration, and the woman’s insistences that it wasn’t her fault, that he should have a word with the blond with the glasses, that this always happens when she takes a day off from work. Suddenly, the question seemed stupid. Suddenly, Toki realized he was about to ask a stranger something rather personal. An agreement that the barista ultimately partook in, but a sacred act that was still rather private. And what if the barista refused to share the name, or the female worker thought he was weird for asking? Was it weird to be asking in the first place?

 The barista abruptly returned. “I’m sorry. Do you mind wait–”

 Caught in the moment, and terrified of having nothing to say, Toki’s eyes settled on the older man’s rolled-up sleeves, and he frantically blurted, “I just wants to tells you I likes your tattoos. Really ams a cool sleeves. Well, goodnights.”

 He about-faced before either worker could react to his rushed fray of words and slipped back into his seat, burying his face with a beanie as he inwardly swore at how terrible that went. There was a good chance he'd have to avoid visiting the café side of the store come next week, and quite possibly after that. Maybe for the rest of his life. 

 Toki slumped,  rested his head on top of the table, and stared dejectedly at the cup. After a few minutes, he lifted his stare, catching the bright shimmer of the Christmas decorations slowly encroaching on the industrialized setting of the café.

 It would be so nice to know who his admirer was before Christmas, he thought.

 …

 The following week Toki spent all day at work, doing his and picking up Murderface’s shift (the man complained of an upset stomach, though Toki had his doubts), and after a long day, dragged his heavy instrument down the nearly hour-long route of bus rides, only to have Pickles greet him at the front doors of their rented space to let him know that rehearsal was cancelled. Nathan’s dad suffered some minor injury, but the event left their singer so shaken that he departed early to visit his family. Skwisgaar called the house earlier, but Pickles had an inkling Murderface would be too lazy to call and update Toki on the news, and as such, waited here to drop him back off at his place.

 After pulling two shifts, Toki welcomed the ride, stowed his guitar in the back, and reclined his seat as far back as he could, then rested on his side. Pickles jokingly warned him to sit his ass up while they passed through the gentrified part of the neighborhood, lest a cop pull them over. Once he did, Toki spotted the café and secondhand bookstore.

 The light at the intersection turned red, and as Toki stared inside the shop, became painfully aware of how close the holidays were, and how badly he wanted to know who it was who was buying him drinks. Toki glanced at the red light. If he drove off with Pickles now, that unknown admirer would leave behind a gift that no one would drink. The thought left Toki uneasy, filling with a funny guilt that made little sense. It wasn’t as though he could prove his secret admirer was even around when he arrived…though, the longer he thought about it, the less that made sense as well.

 The light turned green, and right as Pickles hit the gas, Toki fumbled in his seat, and requested that Pickles drop him off here and please take his guitar home for him.

 “Ya sure about this?” Pickles asked a final time before reaching across his seat to shut the passenger door. “S’ gonna be real cold tonight.”

 “Ams sure,” Toki said, smiling through chattering teeth at the already rapidly declining temperature. He rubbed his cold palms together, feeling the wrinkled twenty that Pickles so graciously provided him once Toki explained his story, and forced a still grin upon his taut, shivering face. “Thanks for helpins, Pickle.”

 “No prob, dood,” the older man replied. “Do me a favor? They don’t show up by half-past eight, give me a call. I’ll take ya to a bar n’ we can drink through this.”

 “Okays.”

 Pickles revved the engine. “Don’t wait too long, Toki.”

 “I won'ts,” Toki replied through shudders, but knew it would be at least three hours before he could fully determine who was buying him the drinks.

 Toki managed the first hour well enough, visiting various nearby stores and distracting himself as best he could, but found himself leaving after only a few short minutes, constantly drawn to the used bookstore and café. By the second hour, it was getting uncomfortably snappish, and Toki could see each miserable exhale, and felt the sting of every other inhale. Knowing the risks, he huddled near the bookstore, waited for a group to enter, and joined them and entered through the bookstore half of the shop.

 He hid amongst the puzzles and board games, which proved to do a better job at keeping his mind off the inevitable as he read through summaries, rules and guidebooks.  Once it neared eight, and Toki knew his drink would be placed around that time, he edged closer, covering a portion of his face with a scarf, and his forehead with his beanie, hoping that it would be enough to obscure his identity as he peeked around a display of recycled bookmarks, gift cards and keychains and stared into the café portion of the store.

 By now, the familiar rock music that lulled in the background was gone and replaced with slightly muted holiday melodies filled with the jingle of bells. Though he’d sequestered himself in the store for an hour, the sight of his empty table made him shiver. He checked the time with his phone, saw he had about fifteen minutes left before the estimated time of ordering, and backed himself into a row of classical science fiction.

 He maneuvered through some rows, shifting his position and checking the table from another vantage point. He caught the female barista on her phone, checking a text while the line was empty. Toki waited a bit longer, picking up this year’s best sellers and pretending to show interest, when he overheard the male barista call for his partner to man the register.

 Toki lifted his stare, saw the clock on the wall, and realized this was just about the right time for the order to be made. About this time, Nathan would normally tell everyone he was done for the night, and Toki would take his ten-minute walk over here and enjoy his surprise drink.

“Still just a heart, Hammersmith?”

“Whatever. Just ring it up for me.”

Toki lowered the magazine further as he watched the male barista mark up a cup and attend to his work. The girl snickered, leaned across the countertop and tapped her fingernails against the register to charge the man for his drink.

 “Y’know, this would be a lot easier if you wrote your number,” she said, paying no mind as the older man cast her a roll of the eye before returning to the drink. “Or, better yet: you can just hand him the drink and tell him you’re interested.”

 “Customers,” the man stiffly replied, and the younger of the two shook her head, faced the front, and greeted the two older women making their way towards the front counter.

Toki’s heart suddenly jumped into his throat as he caught the older man turning, reaching beneath the counter and grabbing a container of whipped cream for his newly finished drink. His interest grew as he focused in on the man, watching thin lips form an even finer line as he covered the top of the drink with a nice, bounteous amount of whipped cream. As he grabbed a small shaker filled with sprinkles, Toki fumbled. His heart trembled, remembering how gently the man had knocked on his table last week. Toki had assumed his smile and polite manner were nothing more than a nice way of trying to coax a customer out of a closing store. He didn’t consider how confused the older man had been when Toki suddenly left, and how apologetic he’d been last Thursday when his coworker called him aside. 

Toki gave one final, distanced glance at the older man as he covered the lid to his drink, walked around the counter and carried it all the way to Toki’s specified table. As the man hovered over it, readjusted its placement so it was more aligned on the center, Toki fixated on the older man’s hair, lush and tied in a bun, and the right of his arm that lacked the same amount of ink as the left, but possessed a few decorative rings that took to Toki’s fancy. He saw the man’s weary, but fretful smile as he backed from the table, returned to the counter where his coworker signaled one final “really?” before replacing her sarcastic gleam with amore controlled appearance.

 The drink rested upon the table. Toki swallowed, then shoved his hand deep into his jacket’s pocket. The wrinkled twenty crinkled in his shaking, sweating hands.

 Without a care of how it might look, Toki left the aisle and walked straight into the café. The older man didn’t notice, but the woman sure did, and once her forest-green eyes set upon and read the determination in Toki’s eyes, stepped aside and vanished into the back of the store.

 Toki knocked on the counter. “Hellos?”

 “Abby, customer–” The man glanced over his lanky shoulder, spotted Toki at the counter, and stopped himself from saying more. He quickly removed himself from the sink, then greeted Toki with a charming, albeit less prepared, grin.

 “Heys,” Toki said, smiling warmly at the man. His eyes dropped to the nametag situated on the man’s apron. “Magnus?”

 The man lifted his head at the sound of his name. “What can I do for you, man?”

 “Wants to order something nice,” Toki answered, English slipping and turning messy near the end as he yanked the twenty from his pocket. “Whats do you recommends?”

 Magnus turned slightly, eyes shifting passed Toki to the drink he’d just made him.

 “Oh, donts worry about that,” Toki replied before Magnus could say a word. “Ams not gonna wastes a free drinks!” If he could say a word. Toki figured the man, despite his rough contours and cool appearance, was as shy as he figured his secret admirer to be. If his position didn’t force him to remain quiet, the fear of public rejection most certainly would.

 “Well…” the man cupped his large hands together, “We have a hot cider that’s pretty popular. A gingerbread flavored latte.”

 “Which ones you likes the best?”

 “The cider is nice,” Magnus answered calmly. “Especially on a cold night like this one. It’s not as sweet, though.”

 “Sounds good. Gets me a mediums, please.” Toki watched as the man ringed up the price of the drink. He glanced at the dessert display and chewed in inner cheek. “What’s about snacks? Anythinks you likes?”

 Magnus shrugged. “Cider goes well with the gingerbread stuff.”

 “Ams the bread good?”

 “It’s nice, yeah.”

 Toki went ahead and ordered both the bread and gingerbread man and, upon Magnus’ suggestion, asked for the bread to be warmed before paying for his additional drink and snacks.

 “Can I have a name for this order?” Magnus asked. His expression gave nothing away. Toki couldn’t  tell if he was eager to learn his name, or dreading to hear it.

 “Toki,” he answered back, and when Magnus joked and asked if Toki was going to share those treats or hoard them for himself for the night, Toki ignored him, just smiled and told him to please keep the change before heading off to the restroom to supply himself some insulin.

 He hurried out a few minutes later, head still spinning from the interaction, but found his table as it normally was, empty and bearing the single cup. Toki rushed to it, took his seat and grabbed the warm cup into his anxious hands. He brought it close to him, but refrained from taking a sip, and instead patiently waited for his name to be called so he could pick up his new order. He fished through his pockets, pulled out a pen, and snatched up a nearby napkin from another table and hurriedly began scribbling his number across the slightly stained paper. He drew back, observed it, and frowned.

 “Hey.”

 Toki carefully folded the napkin and stowed it into his pocket. He looked up at Magnus holding two bags in one hand, the drink in his other.

 “Oh, you didn’ts have to carries all of thats for me,” Toki said with a mild gasp.

“It’s no problem, man,” Magnus replied. He offered the morsels to Toki. After a short thanks from Toki, Magnus stepped back, but didn’t leave. Instead, he lingered near the table, eyes resting on the drink he had made some several minutes ago. “You sure you don’t want me to toss that?”

“Nopes, that ams for me to drinks,” Toki answered. He glanced down at his recently purchased meal and, without looking up, added, “this ams for somebody else. Someones specials.”

“Oh?” Magnus broke into a sly chuckle. “Lucky you.”

“Yeah,” Toki said aloud, feeling relieved right when he had said it. He glanced up at Magnus, catching the slight hurt in the older man’s good eye, and after a quick inhale, said with a slight stutter, “it ams for you.”

 “What?”

 Magnus’ voice was terribly soft. His expression yielded to whatever whims he had held within him for so long, and Toki saw the comment had caught him so off guard that he almost looked like he might run away at any moment. Though equally as nervous, Toki  swallowed away any fear he had in him, and grinned at Magnus.

 “I saws you makins this drinks for me,” he explained through slightly chattering teeth. God, he was nervous. He was probably just as terrified as Magnus was, but unlike the older man standing before him, hands fumbling and tugging his apron ins desperate please to keep busy an in control, Toki knew exactly what he was going to say now. “Thanks you for getting me drinks after rehearsals.”

 Magnus played with his ponytail. “Ah, well…it’s no biggie.”

 Blushing, Toki added. “Was hopin’ I could surprise you with a drinks, too?”

 That soothed the nerves. Magnus dropped his arm, face darkening as his head sunk with the shaking appendage, but lifted after a quick exhale and exposed the flattery hidden underneath. “I appreciate that…Toki.”

 Now cupping his drink, Toki asked. “When does you get offs work?”

 “Not till half-past ten,” Magnus confessed with a low, but pleasing voice that Toki was sure he wouldn’t mind hearing more often. He watched Magnus check the clock, frowning. “You, uh, sure–”

 “I can waits!” Toki announced with a hearty beam.

 He grinned wide, watching and holding in a chuckle when Magnus took another step back, hands pressing against the back of his head as he fought to control the rising excitement building in him. Toki caught a glimpse of some additional tats he overlooked before, noticed the red gemstone glimmering as Magnus brought his hands down, and wondered more about the man who’d taken a liking to him since he had started visiting the store.

 “Beens waitinks for a whiles to haves a friendly chats with yous,” Toki said, resting his blushing face into his palms. “What ams few minutes more?”

 Magnus smiled back at him. “Sounds like a plan.”

#magtok #hammertooth #magnus hammersmith #toki wartooth #coffee shop #AU #ficlet ask thing #thank you #totally not betaed #or edited #but I'll fix it and publish later

[kimnjss]

the hardest part | requested

⇢ pairing: jungkook x reader ⇢ fic type: one shot ⇢ genre: angst ⇢ word count: 2.5K ⇢ theme: bestfriend!jungkook + friend zone ⇢ warnings: i don’t think there are any?? its kinda sad lol. ⇢ synopsis: for years, you have been in love with your best friend. you regretted not saying anything about it... and it only gets worse when his wedding is just around the corner. ⇢ A/N: hope you like this! wrote the entire thing listening to the the hardest part by roy kim, listen to it while reading it... it’s even sadder that way :(

It was so hard to see him with her. Happy with her. Jungkook and you have been best friends basically your whole lives. You met in first grade and ever since then your parents made sure that you had the same teacher, same classes, same lunches. They didn't want to separate you.

Even back than Jungkook was a bit of a hothead, snapping at any one who dared to cross him. You were way more calm and thoughtful, managing to put the fire out every time. You balanced each other out.

The closeness between you only grew as the years went on. You never spent more than a few days apart. When family trips came around it was always: 'Can Jungkook come too?' or 'Y/n's coming, right?'. You two were the definition of inseparable.

You fell in love with Jungkook your freshmen year of high school. He had taken you to winter formal after Yoongi Min dumped you with no explanation. Of course, you were surprised when Jungkook  broke his date with Seulgi Kang to take you.

You danced the entire night and then he walked you home. You still remembered how often you thought about him in that suit that night. He looked so good all dressed up and matching you. When you got to my door, he smiled his brace-face smile at you, giving you a kiss on the cheek before telling you goodnight and walking off.

That's when he had you. You started to notice things about Jungkook that you're not supposed to notice about your best friend. The subtle dimples on his cheeks that appeared only when he smiled real wide. How he snorted quietly if he laughed too hard. That tiny vein that stuck out on his forehead whenever he was pissed. How he treated his baby sister like a little princess.

Each time noticing something new, you fell deeper in love with him – until it was too late. You were in too deep and you had no idea what to do.

It had been years since that first realization. Nine to be exact. You had kept your feelings a secret for nine whole years. Now he was engaged. To his soulmate as he liked to call her. You liked to stick to just referring to her as the 'stupid bitch that stole my best friend'.

Her name was Eunae. Eunae Choi. She looked like a freaking Victoria Secret model. Long pin straight jet black hair, porcelain smooth skin, high cheek bones and an amazing body. On top of that she was a genius. She was working on her Master's in Psychology.

It was no wonder he fell for her.

“Hand me the banana peppers,” Jungkook nodded his head towards the jar and you slowly reached for it. It had been a long while since we had a pizza-building-movie-bingeing-sleepover.

You figured it had been just as long as him and Eunae had been together. What was it? Two years, five months and thirteen days? Yeah, but who's counting?

“Can you believe I'm getting married in a week?” Jungkook spoke as he scattered the peppers around the pie.

“Hardly.” He only mentioned it every half hour.

“You got your best ladies' speech ready?” Having Jungkook ask you to be his best man but call it a best lady was the epitome of friend zone. You nearly cried yourself to sleep after that. Nodding your head, you plucked a pepper from the jar and shoving it into your mouth.

“Eunae sent you the dresses, right? She wanted you to wear a bridesmaid's dress even though you're not one of the bridesmaids, it would just make more sense.” Eunae had sent the picture to you and that entire sentence. You nodded once again.

You loved the dress. It was a dusty rose long halter neck dress. “I still can't fucking believe it,” Jungkook mumbled to himself as he pushed the pizza into the oven. He tapped a few things on the screen before coming to sit next to you.

“Have you found a plus one yet?” The two of them were threatening you with the single's table if you didn't find someone to bring to this wedding. The thing was, you didn't want a date. It would just be a waste of time to find one. It wasn't like you would even be interested.

You honestly hated yourself for not speaking up when you had the chance. You should've just sucked it up and admitted your feelings to him. Maybe he would've rejected you but you wouldn't be in this situation that you were in right now. Watching him get married to someone you knew he loves while you're sitting there in love with him. It was pathetic.

“No, I'm gonna go stag and I'm completely okay with it,” You put extra emphasis on the last bit hoping he'd get the hint.

“Alright, alright. Go pick the first movie, I'm going to give Eunae a quick call.” You almost rolled your eyes. Of course he'd find a way to bring her into your night. Plastering a smile on your face you headed into the living room, scrolling through the movies on Netflix before deciding on a comedy.

You waited for him with the bowl of popcorn in your lap. Jungkook didn't find his way back into the living room until twenty minutes had passed. He sat down beside you, stealing the popcorn off of your lap before shoveling a handful into his mouth.

“What did you pick?” He spoke through his mouthful.

“Sausage Party.” You laughed as Jungkook's eyes widened. “That movie is so bad!” He chuckled, leaning back against the cushions and turning his attention to the screen.

As the movie progressed, Jungkook had managed to pull you against him. Your pizza laid half eaten on the coffee table and the popcorn bowl empty. His arms were wrapped around your shoulders, the tips of his fingers tickling the skin on your bare arm.

Him doing things like this is what fucked you up in the first place. Shifting away from him, you tried to calm the racing of your heart. He gave you a weird look, confusion written all over his face.

“What's the matter?”

“Nothing,”

He looked as if he wanted to say something else but refrained from doing so. You watched the rest of the movie in silence.

All these thoughts were bubbling in your head. You wanted to tell him, you wanted him to know how you felt about him before he went and got married. You couldn't form a sentence for the life of you, though.

Would it be wrong? To tell him this ten days before his wedding? What if he changed his mind? What if he called the entire thing off? What if he changed his mind? What if he called the entire thing off? 

You sighed, watching as he turned the couch into a makeshift bed, dusting the popcorn bits off and onto the floor. “You heading into your room?” When you were younger he use to sleep up in your room with you. Then puberty hit and morning wood became a thing. It was safer for everyone if you slept in separate areas.

“In a little bit,” You paused, eyeing him as he laid back on the cushions. “Why? Are you tried?” You questioned and he shook his head.

“Nope.” A smirk grew on his face. “Remember when I dared you to streak around the dorm?” Of course you remembered that shit. You tripped and fell into a pile of mud. Had dirt in your cooch for days.

“Yes, why?” You laid my body down beside his, staring up at the ceiling as he spoke.

“Jimin Park saw that. He thought you were hot and asked if you were single. You weren't at the time but now you are. Would you like me to give him a call? Maybe he could be your plus one?” He suggested and you scoffed.

“No thank you.” Jimin was the king of the douche bags. Fraternity president and ignorant as fuck. You wouldn't waste a second on him.

“I don't want you to have to go alone,”

“I am choosing to go alone, Koo. If I wanted a date, I would've gotten one.” It was lost on you why he was making out of you bringing a date. Him and his bride wouldn't leave you alone about it.

“Okay, fine.” He made it seem like he was letting it go, but he was far from letting anything go.

“You're gorgeous, you know that right, Y/N? Any guy would be lucky to have you if you just gave one a chance...” You glared at him, warning him to shut up about it. You were in no mood to hear this speech for the thousandth time.

“In all the years that I've known you, you've only ever had one real boyfriend and that was a few years ago.” He pointed out. “Guys approach you too, I've seen it. Why don't you give any of them a chance?”

You sighed, running my hands over your face. “I'm just not interested.” This had become a mantra of yours.

“Yeah, but why not?”

“They're not my type.”

“You have a type?” He sounded surprised, a chuckle dying on his lips.

“Yes, I have a type.” You were quickly growing annoyed with this conversation.

“No you don't.”

You scoffed. “Yes, I do.”

“What's your type then?”

“You.” The word left your mouth before you could pull it back. Jungkook was sitting up, staring down at you with wide eyes.

“What did you just say?” He sat there staring at you. Your heart was beating in your ears. Slowly, you were sitting yourself up. Preparing yourself for what was to come next, there was no backing out now. You needed to finish what you started.

“You. You're my type, Jungkook. I'm in love with you, I have always been,” You could feel your throat closing up. But you weren't able to stop the word vomit from tumbling from between your lips.

He sat there silent for a minute. You just dropped something huge and the impact was written all over his face. He opened his mouth as if he finally came up with an answer, did that twice before his face furrowed in confusion.

“You're in love with me?” He repeated, just to clarify. You nodded.

Jungkook just continued to stare at you. Forcing your eyes shut, you cleared your throat. You couldn't look at him. There it was right on his face, how much he didn't love you. Had you expected him to admit the same, call off the wedding so you could ride off into the sunset? Yeah, right.

Maybe.

You started to head towards the stairs, quickly coming to my senses. He was getting married! “Holy shit, forget I said anything... I-I...I don't know what I was thinking. I'm going to head up,” Avoiding his gaze you rushed towards the stairs and into your room, slamming the door shut.

Overwhelmed with humiliation and the sting of rejection, tears began to stream down your face which only intensified when you heard the front door slam.

Ten days had went by and you hadn't heard anything from Jungkook. A brief message from Eunae this morning was what confirmed that you were still invited to this stupid party. You got dressed in the bridesmaid's dress, did your own hair and makeup and showed up at the church minutes before the start.

Not wanting to leave any time to mingle.

It was unbelievably hard to stand there with a smile on your face as you watched them recite their vows, staring all lovingly in each others' eyes with these dopey smiles on their faces. 'I do's' were said and they were kissing.

Not the sloppy wolfish kiss that they often displayed in front of their friends, this one was elegant one that dragged an 'awe' from the lips of the crowd. You inwardly rolled your eyes.

Your speech was quick and extremely general. You avoided getting into too much detail and you didn't tell any stories. It was the type of speech you could copy and paste and recite at any wedding. You weren't up for anything else.

Nursing your third glass of Chardonnay, Jungkook approached you. “How you holding up?” You felt yourself swaying, but you were certain you were standing still.

“I'm fine,” Another mantra.

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“I liked your speech,” He tried.

You laughed. “Okay,” Gulping down the rest of your drink, you set the empty glass down on the table. “I'm going to grab a cab. Great party,” You commented, shooting him a thumbs up before exiting the hall.

It was raining very hard. You were soaked the second you stepped outside. Not letting that slow you down, you made your way to the sidewalk, calling for a taxi. A hand on your shoulder stopped you from entering the first one that pulled up.

“Why are you pissed at me?” Jungkook stood, tux soaked and hair sticking to his face.

“I'm not,”

“Yes you are, Y/N. I know when you're pissed.” He spat. “Did you expect me to call off the wedding?”

“No,” Yes.

“I'm sorry. I hate that this hurts you but you got to understand how I feel about Eunae. She's it for me, you know? I wish that it didn't hurt you so bad,” He looked sincere, it honestly hurt him that he was hurting you.

Now you felt bad. “You deserve to be happy, Koo. You shouldn't have to apologize. It's just hard to see you with her... I'm just going to stay away for a little bit,” You actually planned to stay away for more than a little bit.

Yesterday morning you were getting a call about a job in Boston. It paid a lot more than the job that you had now and it was actually related to what I=you got a degree for in the first place.

“Okay,” He was so understanding. How can someone break your heart and make it swell all at the same time? “I love you, Y/N.” You nodded, knowing the exact way that he meant. You called for another cab, slipping in without him stopping you.

Telling the driver your address, I sat back against the seats. You forced yourself not to look back. He wasn't going to be standing there waving you off. This wasn't like a movie. He wasn't going to realize that he had been in love with you all along and you'd live happily ever after. Nope.

Jungkook was to go back inside, dry off and live his life with his perfect wife. You were to go to Boston, study the behavior of the animals and their environment and that was it. Maybe you'd cross paths in the future, but for now – that was it.

#bts one shot #bts fic #bts imagine #bts smut #bts angst #jungkook imagine #jungkook smut #jungkook fic #jungkook one shot #jungkook angst #kim namjoon #kim seokjin #min yoongi #jung hoseok #park jimin #kim taehyung #jeon jungkook #jungkook #taehyung #jimin #hoseok #yoongi #seokjin #namjoon

[nothingeverlost]

The Most Brilliant Idea, or how Sirius Black Accidentally became a Romance Novelist (HP, Wolfstar)

In which Sirius has a Brilliant Idea, Remus is gainfully employed, James is clueless and Lily is always right.

Unmitigated fluff with minor references to the first war, AU because James and Lily didn’t die.

II

It started with the classified, the first bit of proof that everything that happened was really Moony’s fault.  There was always a classified ad in the kitchen, even when Moony was working, part of his optimistic opinion that any job could and would end.  The classified ads were always marked in pen, and one could tell just how Remus thought his prospects fared based on how he’d marked a job.  Some were viciously scratched out (potions expert and anything with ‘night shift’ in the description) some were circled multiple times (he usually came away dejected from those interviews, things he actually wanted but rarely got) some had question marks and some had a single bold circle.  It was the single circle ones that were the best prospects.

On this particular Tuesday morning while Sirius drank his tea and dripped jelly on a story about Minister Fudge’s election, the only ad that was circled was one looking for a book editor.  It was commission work, the sort of things Moony did from home sometimes.  It suited him, both because he was such a stickler for commas and spelling and because the flexibility meant that moons didn’t present a problem. The only downside was that it was sporadic work, a book at a time, and didn’t bring in enough income to make Moony feel like he was Contributing to Household Things.  Sirius always rolled his eyes.  Moony was the most stubborn person he knew.

It was then that he had his Most Brilliant Idea.  What Remus needed was a constant stream of editing.  Someone who would keep him employed on a regular basis with things a lot more interesting than editing a technical manual on the care and keeping of flobberworms.

“Lily I need to borrow some books.”  When someone had a Brilliant Idea they had to start right away, so his first action was to floo to the Potter home.  He was distracted for half an hour by Harry who insisted on a hippogriff ride and a sword fight, and he wouldn’t be a proper godfather if he said no to either, but after that it was strictly business.

“The only books we have here that you don’t have are meant for a three year old.  You and Remus had quite the library between you,” Lily replied after telling both him and Harry they could only have two biscuits.  Sirius took a third, but split it in half so it didn’t count.  After all, two and a half was practically the same as two.

“Not true.  Moony and I don’t have any of those girly books,” he said with his half a biscuit in his mouth.

“You want to borrow my romance novels?” Lily asked, puzzled.  “I don’t know who you’re trying to date, Sirius Black, but romance novels aren’t actually meant to be used that way.”

“Like I need help,” Sirius said with an eye roll.  Sure, it had been a while since he dated but that was totally his choice.  He had a lot on his plate right now with a godson that needed his attention and Moony needing looking after and his three days a week working for Quality Quidditch Supplies.  “They’re for Moony.”

“Somehow I doubt he knows that.”  Lily rolled her eyes right back at him.  “Take as many as you like, and don’t worry about when you get them back.  It’s not like I have much time for reading when I have three boys to look after.”

“Something you want to tell me, Lils?”  He looked at her stomach pointedly and wondered if they were really ready for another Prongslet.

“Yeah.  You and James are more work than Harry and he has the excuse of being three.”  But she gave him a bag for the books and sent him home with a plate of biscuits, warning him that she would tell Remus that she’d sent them so not to eat them all in one go.  It was like she didn’t trust him or something.

Once he had the books stage one of The Plan could begin.  He’d read a few of the romance novels when he was bored and they seemed like the easiest book to write.  Certainly they weren’t anything Moony read so he could borrow a bit from others and no one important would be any the wiser.  Over the next few days he spent most of the time Moony wasn’t around reading, stashing the books in the closet so they wouldn’t be seen in case Remus came in his room for late night chats or early morning bed sharing.  It was a habit that they’d never quite left behind in school, especially when either of them had a nightmare.  With the war almost two years gone the nightmares weren’t as frequent but they were always a good excuse if he needed company.

Stage Two of The Plan had a few false starts, as writing a book proved to be a little trickier than he figured, considering how many books he’d read.  Finally though after twenty-six days he had a story written.  The pining of Sigmund G Toadsnatch for Anastasia Flower ended in a passionate snog and a happily ever after.  It was time for Stage Three.

“I need your help.”  The moment Moony was gone for the day he popped around to the Potter home again, this time with manuscript in hand.

“Harry managed to get jam in his hair at breakfast and I have to give him a bath.  Can it wait?”  Her arms were full of a squirming toddler, anxious to greet his ‘Padfoo.’

“I’ll give him a bath,” he offered.

“The last time that happened you flooded the bathroom and transfigured the soap into a boat.”  She carried Harry up the stairs.  Sirius followed.

“He came out clean, though.  Mostly.”  He might have missed a few spots, but no one was perfect and there had been an important battle with a giant squid that looked a lot like Harry’s toes to wage.  “I need to know if you have any friends that have girly writing and want to earn a few quid.”  He plopped himself on the edge of the tub after stowing his manuscript on higher ground.  

“You need what?”  it was really quite impressive how she managed to run the bath, undress Harry, and listen to him.

“Alright, so this is the part where I have to swear you to absolute secrecy.  Unbreakable vow kind of stuff.  You can’t tell anyone what I am about to tell you, not even James.”

“You know James and I don’t keep secrets.”

“It’s not a big secret, just a little baby one.  The more people who know the more likely it is that Remus will know that people are keeping something from him and then the whole thing will be ruined.”  Besides Prongs would never let him hear the end of it if he knew what Sirius was doing.

“I will consider not telling him, once I know.  That’s the best I can promise.”

“I guess that will have to do.”  He was certain she’d see reason, or more importantly his side of things.  “Now about your friends.”

“Do I even want to know what girly writing means?”

“You know what I mean.  When you pick up something and you know a girl wrote it because there’s little hearts above the I’s and the ink changes color.”  Not that Lily had ever done things like that.  Her writing was perfectly sensible, not that it mattered.  Moony would recognize her handwriting.

“Your handwriting is pretty fancy, with all those loops and the illustrations in the margins.”  Lily made a few loops of her own, sending bubbled cascading into the tub to entertain Harry.

“One of the many skills a pureblood snob is required to learn, according to my dear old mum.  Trust me I’ve tried mimicking James but it’s useless.”  James wrote in a barely legible scrawl that only those with practice could read.  Sirius envied him, though it had led to an accident or two over the years especially in potions and what time they were supposed to meet.  “But it doesn’t matter, Moony knows my handwriting and that’s the whole point.  I need someone to copy over my writing so he doesn’t know it’s me.”

“I think I need more focus and perhaps something to drink.  Hold on a minute, will you?”  Lily finished up Harry’s bath, keeping him long enough to dry his hair but giving up when he decided to squirm out of her hold and run away without his togs on.  She shrugged.  “Won’t hurt him to air dry.”

“James said the same thing once.  It works better in a warm house and when you’re three, rather than when you’re thirteen and it’s snowing out.”  He’d won the dare, though, and claimed it was worth it.

“Yeah, I remember that.  Thought he was mental then.  Now I know he is.”  Lily headed for the kitchen and started a pot of tea brewing.  “Now please tell me you’re not trying to get me to help you prank Remus.  You know my rules.”

“It’s not a prank.  It’s a Brilliant Idea to help Moony.  You’re going to love it.”  He couldn't hold it in anymore.  “I’vewrittenabook.”

“Excuse me?”

“A book.  I’ve written one and I’m going to send it to Moony to edit it, and then I’m going to pay him.  But he’s not going to know it’s me so he’s going to accept the money without being his stubborn prideful self.  When he’s done I’ll have another story ready and then he’ll be gainfully employed and happy and he won’t have to worry about what happens to his job when there’s a moon.  Brilliant, right?”

“I’m still on the bit where you wrote a book.”  Lily poured the tea and set a slice of quiche on a plate for Sirius.  The spinach was in small enough bits that it didn’t actually look like a vegetable and he might not notice that under all the cheese he’d actually eaten something green.

“It’s not hard.  I read the books you had and I wrote something like it.  Boy meets girl.  One of them annoys the other.  There’s secret longing and someone trying to keep them apart and then they snog and everyone’s happy except the evil bloke who ends up in a cellar or something.”  He shrugged and ate the food Lily had given him without much thought.  He’d been so excited about the next stage that he hadn’t bothered with breakfast.  “The book’s not really the important part, though, and there have to be bits to fix or else Moony won’t have anything to do.  What’s important is that Moony doesn’t know it’s me.  I have to rent an owl once it’s ready and send him a letter about a job.  I have a name picked out already.  Marmaduke Gaylord from Gaylord’s Romantic Press.”

“I don’t know why anything you come up with should surprise me anymore, Sirius Black.  It’s completely bonkers and there’s probably fifteen different ways it could go wrong.”  Lily reached across the table and covered one of his hands with her own.  “It’s also unfailingly kind and possibly crazy enough to work.”

“Of course it will work.”  Any doubts he’d had he’d buried down deep enough that he wouldn’t have to worry about them for a while at least.  Probably not until the whole thing exploded in a very Sirius-like fashion.  

As it turned out Lily did have a friend that could use a little spending money and had hand writing that, while not containing any hearts, was feminine enough to satisfy Sirius and more importantly wouldn’t be recognized by Remus.  She rewrote the manuscript in her own handwriting.  Sirius borrowed a typewriter from Arthur Weasley to make an official looking offer from the Gaylord Romance Publishers.

Stage Four was well timed, as Moony’s job in a muggle bookstore ended that week after the third time he’d had to miss work the morning after a full moon with no explanation.  Sirius had made sure he was tucked into bed with a water bottle and a cup of tea with a warming charm that would last at least an hour, then nipped over to Diagon Alley to rent an owl for a single trip.  The offer letter and manuscript were bound together. For an added bit of cleverness he’d asked the clerk to delay the delivery until afternoon so that Sirius could be home when the owl arrived.

“What could be so important about a romance novel that they’d be willing to pay this much?”  By afternoon Moony was feeling well enough to be on the sofa instead of in bed.  Sirius glanced at the letter Remus handed him and shrugged. 

“Dunno, mate.  Guess there’s enough people reading them to make it worth their while.  The girls at school all read them.  Tripped over them all the time in the common room.”

“They’d be better off reading Austen,” Remus groused but he was also quick enough to send off an acceptance letter with the owl.  Sirius had a plan for that as well, and a newly rented owl post box.

“I’ll give you some quiet to work.”  Sirius locked himself in his room, using the time to start his second novel, the story of five sisters all sorted into the same house  and the rich pureblood transfer student who seemed rude but was secretly shy.  The prat’s best friend was cheerful and had a crush on the main character’s sister.

“Comma,” was the comment he heard the most from the other room.  ‘Why’ and ‘bloody hell’ and ‘you can’t do that to the English language’ were also common exclamations.

“Sounds like it’s going well,” Sirius said when his stomach was too loud to ignore.  

“It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever read and the romance is dreadful but there are some bits that are hilarious, actually.  Don’t know their goal but as a satire it’s not bad.”  The stack of papers in front of him was all marked up in red ink worse than the first essay he’d ever written for McGonagall.

“I thought romances were supposed to be all sappy.”  His main character had declared his love seventeen times.  That was what girls wanted, wasn’t it?

“Fortunately I’m only supposed to edit the grammar and not the sap.  I’m over my head on that sort of thing.  Imelda Carson seventh year said I was the most unromantic boy she’d even snogged.”

“Imelda Carson is an idiot who is now breeding pink pygmy puffs and is completely single because no bloke was romantic enough for her.  Besides you don’t like girls, remember?”

“I like girls just fine.  I just don’t want to snog any of them or…”

“Smash your bits together?”  Sirius offered.

“Yeah, exactly what I was going to say,” Remus said dryly.  “I’m starved and close to going cross eyed from this editing.  Whose turn for dinner?”

“I’ll start some steaks.”  Sirius danced towards the kitchen.  The Plan was going perfectly.

II

It seemed silly, really, to have a wonderfully written and perfectly edited novel and not do anything with it.  The original plan didn’t take into account anything outside of making sure that Remus was employed, but when Sirius collected the edited manuscript from the owl post it seemed a waste to just throw it away or lock it up somewhere.

“I need a name.”  It was just before lunch when he flooed to Godric Hollow, finding Harry just up from his nap and more than excited to use uncle Padfoot as a climbing toy.  

“You know some people do give a little notice instead of barging in all the time.  There’s a lovely front door on this house I don’t think you’ve seen in two years.”  Lily winced when Harry’s foot found a foothold on Sirius’s crotch, but really the man deserved it.

“Other people aren’t nearly as entertaining as me.”  Sirius winced as well and moved Harry’s foot a little higher, regretting it when the lad’s next handhold was his ear.  “Now about that nom de plume.”

“I thought you were only writing so Remus could have an editing job?”

“Yes, but that’s no reason not to share my genius with the world.”  He waved his manuscript over his head.  

“How many times did Remus threaten to throw up while reading this drivel?”

“Only once but he edited that bit out.  Not even I can be perfect my first time out.”  Lily, of course, rolled her eyes for approximately the 42,596th time since she’d first met Sirius.

“If you’re serious about this we should do it properly.  No more ridiculous names.”

“I’m always Sirius.”  He couldn’t resist.  After all the joke never got old, no matter how many times Lily groaned.  “Too bad I can’t use my name.  Imagine how dear old mum would roll over in her grave if she knew the sacred Black name was attached to a romance novel.”

“Sirius.”

“You’re right, Lils.  If she got too excited she might reanimate and the world is not ready for zombie Walburga.”  He shuddered dramatically at the thought, making Harry, now perched on his shoulders, laugh and say ‘again.’  Of course he obliged.

“Leave it with me and I’ll sort it out.  I’ll have Molly redo a clean copy and send it off to Mary who’s a junior editor and a publisher.  We’ll see what happens, alright?”

“This is why I love you, Red.”  Sirius gave her a kiss on the cheek and handed her the manuscript so he could get down to what was really important; teaching his godson how to make bubbles in his milk.

II

Three months later Phaedra White was a published author.  Sure, there wasn’t an enormous amount of money in a single book, but it was more than what he’d spent to pay Molly and Remus so it seemed profitable enough, and he was more excited than he’d expected to see it on the shelves of the bookstore..

In the next year ‘Phaedra’ wrote nine more books.  More importantly with actual connections in the publishing world he was able to recommend Moony’s services to other authors, to the point that he began to worry that if Remus had too much work he might turn down the requests from Marmaduke Gaylord to edit Phaedra’s books.

“Get the bucket, Pads, I’m going to be ill.  This is the worst thing I've ever read.  Not only do I want to vomit but I think my eyes are bleeding.”

“It can’t be that bad.”  His own book had arrived that morning but Sirius hadn’t known that Remus had started on it already.

“I don’t know how Gilderoy Lockheart got my name but I’m never editing a book for him again.  Not only is it nonsense that clearly didn’t actually happen, but it’s badly written as well.”  It was hard to tell from Moony’s tone what offended him more, but it was probably the bad writing.

“Wasn’t there a Lockheart a few years behind us in school?  A gormless little thing that spent more time on his hair than anything else?”  They didn’t usually pay much attention to Ravenclaws, but if he remembered correctly the boy had annoyed them enough that they’d pranked his hair blue once.

“That’s the one.  What he knows about defense against the Dark Arts would fit in my little finger.”  Remus pushed the manuscript away.  “I can’t even look at this again until I have some chocolate.”

“I picked up a new stock from Honeydukes when I was at Diagon.”  Rule number one for the care and keeping of your Moony was to always have a supply of chocolate on hand.  “Why don’t you grab a bar and we’ll go out for a walk.  It’s beautiful outside.”

“What would I do without you, Pads?  Why don’t we pick up some curry while we’re out, my treat?”  It was a plan, and they left the house shoulder to shoulder.  Later that evening after he’d eaten Remus returned to his work.  Sirius found him laughing, his shoulders relaxed, and not a single bucket around.

“Back at the Lockheart?”  he asked.

“No, I’ve given myself a respite and picked up the latest White novel.  You know this bloke is improving.  It’s really kind of nice to see the balance of romance and friendship in here.  Less sap and more affectionate teasing.”

“I thought that romance writer you edit for was a woman?”  Sirius held his breath for a moment.  Did Moony Know?  He couldn’t possibly.  

“I’m sure that’s what they want people to think, probably because most romance novels are written by women and I’d imagine they sell better.  But I’m practically certain this is a bloke writing this.  If the book centered around a flying motorcycle didn’t tip me off, the fact that the details about female anatomy are more vague than the male anatomy seems quite a clue.”  Remus shrugged.  “I don’t suppose it really matters, though.”

“No, I don’t suppose it does,” Sirius agreed.

II

“I need help.”  The next morning Sirius showed up at the Potter house in the middle of breakfast, not knowing what time it was.  James was still home, which was not the most favorable thing that could have happened.

“Help with what?” Prongs asked as he broke a banana into pieces for Harry.

“Nothing at all,” Sirius lied.  “Just a question for Lils about a girl thing.”

“Dating someone you haven’t mentioned to us yet?”  James cocked his head to the side.  “It’s been a while since you’ve mentioned anyone.”

“Yeah, well it gets to be all the same after a while, doesn’t it?”  Truth was he hadn’t had a date in ages.  His free time was taken up with writing, and the rest of the time he was with Remus, or Prongs and his family or both.  Lily had them over to dinner once a week at least, somehow thinking they couldn't take care of themselves properly.  His social life worked out pretty well, except for the lack of shagging.  He did miss that sometimes, but not enough to bother with finding a date.

“Not when you marry the love of your life and the most perfect person in the world.”  James, of course, couldn’t help looking at his wife.  Sirius was torn between wanting to gag and feeling a tight ball in the pit of his stomach that he’d never felt before.

“It’s been six years since you married her, Prongs.  You are going to be a little less sappy at some point, aren’t you?”  Of course considering how close they’d come to losing each other it was understandable.  And Sirius was happy for them, but as a sibling it was his job to raz James as much as possible.

“If you don’t like it you do know where the fireplace is, Sirius.”  Lily was careful when she stood up, her belly now heavily swollen.  Potter number four was due in less than a month.  “Come on, you can wash up dishes for me while you tell me what you need.”

Dutifully he followed her, ignoring Prongs’ questioning look.  When the water was running he looked around to make sure they weren’t followed.  “I need to know more about girls.”

“Excuse me?”

“Moony’s figured out that Phaedra White is a bloke.  Says there’s not much detail about women’s bits and things in there and that it sounds more like a bloke or something.  I don’t know.  My first thought was that I could use some polyjuice and spend an hour as a woman but that’s a month of work just to make the potion plus it tastes disgusting.”

“I’m not going to ask why you know what polyjuice tastes like.  I don’t want to know who you were or when or if my husband was involved.”  Lily rubbed her stomach absently.  “Your books are selling surprisingly well, I wouldn’t change things now.  Besides you should know at least the basics about women.”

“I know that their breasts are nice and soft, most of them like to snog, and redheads have very good aim.”  Or maybe it was just one specific redhead, who proved his point by throwing a spoon at the back of his head.

“Obviously rumors at school had to be taken with quite a few grains of salt and I know some girls exaggerated because it was good for their reputations for it to be known that they snogged the ‘great’ Sirius Black”  Lily’s voice was dripping with sarcasm and she stuck out her tongue for good measure.  “But you did date a fair bit, and I myself witnessed at least some snogging.  Are you saying you never…”

“Did the no pants dance?  Nah, girls are nice for kissing and easier for dating but for the whole naked tango I prefer a blokes ‘bits.’”  

“Huh.  I was dead certain about you and that Hufflepuff in sixth year.”  Lily shook her head, bemused.  It wasn’t like Sirius had ever hidden the fact that he liked boys as well as girls.  “But if you’re here to ask me about my ‘bits’ that’s where I draw the line.  We’re close, Sirius, but not that close.”

“You are the best sister a bloke could ever hope for, Lil my love, and as such that is a completely disgusting idea that I would never suggest.  I was thinking you might have a friend.”

“I am not pimping out my friends to you, brother dear.”

“You try to set up Remus sometimes.”  And somehow each time Remus came down sick and couldn’t come to dinner.  

“I worry about Remus being alone.  Do you know when he last went on a date?”

“Sometimes in the seventies, probably, and he’s not alone, he has me.  What could be less lonely then having me as a roommate?”  Other than a bit of time during the war he and Remus had lived together since leaving Hogwarts.  It worked well for them both, and honestly the idea of Remus dating made his left shoulder blade go all tense.  They took turns making dinner and washing up, cleaned the flat together on Mondays and read out bits of their books to each other as they shared a sofa in the evening.  If Remus was spending his time with someone else there would be less of the enigmatic little half smile that made his day better.  And at some point Moony would have to share his furry little secret and what if they took it badly and hurt him?  Or worse, spread it about?  Sirius would have to kill them and then he’d go to Azkaban and then Remus really would be alone.  It would be a disaster.

“Sirius have you ever considered…”  Lily stopped, wincing a little and struggling to pull herself up.  “This little one has great aim and likes to kick mummy’s bladder.  You’ll have to excuse us, Sirius.  And find your own dates.”

II

He did find his own dates.  Three of them, in the next month, and twice with the girl from the local coffee shop.  And though the snogging was nice he just couldn’t get interested enough in taking it farther, not even in the name of research.  Sighing he decided he was just going to have to keep doing what he was doing.  Besides, having Moony suspect that a romance novelist was a man was a far sight from having him suspect that it was the man he lived with so he was still safe enough.  After all who in their right mind would think that Sirius Black was writing romance novels?

When he got home from his last date he found a note stuck to his door in Moony’s careful hand.  The word ‘St Mungo’s’ might have worried him if not for the ‘Baby Potter on the way’ underneath.  He took a minute to change into something more comfortable, remembering that Harry had taken hours to arrive, and apparated to the maternity ward.

“You brought work with you?”  Remus was already there, sitting in the waiting room with a quill in one hand and a stack of pages on his lap.

“You know how long Harry took to make an appearance.  Might as well pass the time in a useful manner.”  Remus looked up at him, head cocked to the side.  “How was the date?”

“Bit boring, to be honest.  I think I’m out of practice.”  Dating used to be more interesting, but halfway through he’d found himself wishing that he was on the sofa throwing popcorn at Remus and asking about his latest book.  The editing of the Lockhart book and its ridiculous lies was keeping him well entertained.  “Speaking of the sprog, where is my favorite godson?”

“Lily’s friend Molly has him.  The one will all the redhead kids, you remember?”

“Yeah.”  Molly happened to be the friend that rewrote everything he wrote.  No reason for that to make him nervous, though.  “She was Gid and Fab’s big sister.”

“Yeah, she was.”  It was never easy to think of the casualties of the war so Sirius tried not to think of them, not even the ones with hair and hearts like fire who he’d shagged once.  Gideon had been one of his first crushes in school, and a compatriot in war.

“What are we working on tonight?”  Sirius tried to take a look at his papers.  “Anything good?”

“Something very frustrating, at the moment.  The latest Phaedra White.”

“I thought you said her books were getting better.  Seemed to me you quite enjoyed the last one.”  He took great pride in the fact that he’d made Moony laugh more than once, and that it came back with hardly any notes other than the usual missing commas and split infinitives.  The ending, Moony had declared, was only as sappy as was  necessary for that sort of story and not bad at all.

“It’s stupid.  I’m just the editor, there’s no reason for the direction of the plot to bother me so much.”  Sighing, Remus put the quill down.  

“I’m sure the author is grateful for your notes.  You said she’s listened to them before, hasn’t she?”  Of course he knew the answer.   He’d written three thank you notes for changes the Remus had suggested, and every time Remus had been right.  Merlin’s pants, Phaedra White was actually making best seller lists and had been mentioned in Witches Weekly twice, and Sirius wasn’t too full of himself to know how big a part Moony played in that.  His publisher was trying to make him do a book signing at Flourish and Blotts, and didn’t understand why he kept saying no to the publicity.  

“This isn’t the same situation.  It’s not a small change to a scene, it’s the whole romance that feels wrong.”

“You read me a bit the other night, between the bloke and his best mate that made you laugh.”  He’d found the byplay between his main character and his friend to be the most fun part of the book to write.

“That’s the whole problem.  Byron and George have this great relationship.  The scene where George is trying to convince Byron to go on the date feels almost like…”

“Like what?”  There were times that Sirius totally wished he could talk through scenes with Remus while he was writing.  He’d had to bite his tongue more than once when he remembered that he hadn’t sent a story to Moony to edit yet.

“Like he was trying to cover his own feelings for his friend.  The chemistry between the two blokes is more natural and interesting then the bits with Byron and Melody.”  Remus picked up his quill again.  “Now you see why I can’t write that suggestion. I’m not about to tell someone to trash half their story and turn it into a gay romance.”

“Moony, w-”

“She’s here.”  The door to the waiting room crashed open and Prongs came running out, tripping over his feet in his hurry.  “I’m a dad.”

“You’ve been a dad for almost five years, Prongs,” Sirius couldn’t help but tease him.  

“But never to a girl.”  It was funny how big Prongs’ eyes could get.  “Merlin’s elbow, I have a daughter.”

“Most of the bits are the same, mate.  You’ll be alright.”  Remus shoved his papers and quill into a bag and took out a flask.  “I think this calls for a drink.  Not too much, or Lily will kill us all, but just to celebrate.”

“You think of everything, Moons.”  Sirius shouldn’t have been surprised, it was very like Remus, but there was something about drinking out of the flask immediately after Moony’s lips had touched it that felt different.

“You’re brilliant, both of you.  In a minute we can all go in and you can meet my daughter.”

“Poor Lils, she’s got three kids on her hands now.”  Sirius pointed to the dopey looking expression on Prongs’ face.

“I think you mean four kid, Pads.  After all she has to deal with you as well.”

II

“Her name is Olivia Marlene.”  Lily had that exhausted but happy glow of a new mother when they were let in to see her.  The baby she held looked pretty much the same as Harry the first time they’d seen him, the dark hair on the top of her head and the splotchy looking face.  

“It’s a good name.  Strong.”  Moony nodded solemnly.  “Marlene would have been proud.”

“Marlene would have rolled her eyes and called me daff,” Lily said with only a hint of moisture in her own eyes.  “But if my daughter is half as fierce she’ll be able to do anything.”

“Moony, ready to say hello?”  James took his daughter from Lily and held her close to his chest.

“Let Sirius go first, I’ll hold her in a minute.”  Sirius had been the first five years ago, when Harry had been born.

“Sirius will have his turn but it should be her godfather first, Remus.”  When Lily spoke Sirius had the good fortune to be looking at Remus.  The look on his face and the way his knees buckled were priceless.

“Alright there mate?”  Sirius caught him around the waist and helped him to stand up again.  “Welcome to the club, by the way.”

“So will you, Moony?” James looked at him expectantly.

“I think you’re mental to ask me.”  But Remus carefully took the baby and held her, touching her cheek with a single finger.  Sirius felt for a moment like he’s turned into liquid marshmallow, watching the two of them.

“Welcome to the world, Olivia Potter,” Remus said softly.

It was in that moment that Sirius Black, author of almost seventeen romance novels, realized that he was in love with his best friend.

II

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to leave the country.”  Somehow Sirius made it through the next week.  He wasn’t sure how but it seemed only fair to give Lily a bit of recovery time before bothering her.  A week was as long as he could wait, though, and on the eighth day he flooed over.  

“That’s a bit of a dramatic reaction to not being chosen as godfather for our Olivia.”  

“What?  No, of course you should have gone with Moony.  Brilliant choice.  Probably should have picked him for Harry, bit of an unfair advantage Olivia has.”  Sirius flopped down on the armchair across from Lily.  “Where are the sprogs, by the way?”

“Baby’s sleeping.  Harry and James are at the park so Harry can run off some energy.”

“Prongs is probably the one that needs to run off the energy.  He’s walking on clouds, that one.  Reminds me of the week after you finally said yes to a date.”  Sirius was pretty sure James hadn’t slept for two days straight.  For a week he also hadn’t shut up, even when he did finally sleep.  He’d been well stuck on Lily long before they’d dated.  Sirius finally had an idea of what that was like.

“Probably.  Now tell me what you’re running from.”  Lily put on her best getting-ready-to-mock-you expression.

“Nothing really, only the most stupid thing I’ve probably ever done.”

“I’ve seen some of the stupidest things you’ve done, Sirius.  Many of them.  Unless you’re going to tell me you have to flee the country because aurors are after you I very much doubt it’s as bad as you think.”

“I’vefalleninlovewithMoony.”

“I’m going to need you to actually take a breath at some point, sweetie.  You’re going to turn purple if you don’t and then I’m going to have to explain to James and Harry why you’ve passed out on the floor.”  Lily patted the empty seat on the sofa next to her.  “Now come over here, take a breath, and tell me again what you said.”

Sirius, erring on the side of caution, took three breaths, decided that wasn’t enough, and took three more.  “I’ve fallen in love with Moony.”

“Now there, wasn’t that easier to say the second time?”

“You knew perfectly well what I said.”  Sirius narrowed his eyes.  “You tricked me.”

“Only for your own good.”  She leaned in and wrapped her arms around him.  “I know this bit is scary but you’re going to get through it and you’re going to do it without fleeing the country.”

“Didn’t you hear what I said?”  Maybe having a baby did something odd to your ears.  

“You’ve finally figured out that you’re in love with Remus.”

“Finally?”  Sirius stared at her.  

“Finally,” she confirmed.  “Other than this month because of your crazy idea about your books, when was the last time you dated?”

“Dunno.  That carpenter maybe?”  Sirius had wanted to find out just what else he could do with his hands.  The answer was quite a bit.  Unfortunately not so much in the brain department and even less in the sense of humor department.

“That was three years ago.  What is Remus’s favorite dinner?”

“Steak with mashed potatoes and lots of gravy, popovers, peas.”  It was a meal he liked to make a day or two before a full moon when Moony was feeling a bit low.

“And for dessert?”

“Chocolate, of course.  I found a chocolate fondant recipe the other day I thought I might try.”  Moony was happy to have a chocolate bar but Sirius liked to find new desserts to try.  Moony was always pleased when there was a new dessert.

“Who is the first person you see on Christmas morning and whose present do you spend the most time picking out?”

“Moony, of course.  We live together.”  Last year Moony had put a ridiculous ten galleon restriction on gifts, insisting he didn’t need anything extravagant.  His silly Moony hadn’t thought to specify that it was only a single gift, though.  Sirius had brought thirteen, but they were all under ten galleons each.

“And when you’ve had a really shitty day who is the first person you seek out?”

“Moony.”

“And when something wonderful happens who is the first person you want to tell?”

“Moony.”

“Are we seeing a pattern yet?  And before you tell me it’s just being friends let me remind you that you have created a whole career for yourself solely because you wanted to make sure that Remus had work that he could take pride in.  The entire existence of Phaedra White is basically one really long love letter, which is a bit over the top even for you.”

“I’ve been in love with Moony this whole time?”  It didn’t feel wrong when he said it.  Maybe later he’d be able to look back and figure out when exactly it all started, but for now it seemed to be enough that it was true.  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“You were always going to figure it out in your own time.  I couldn’t make you go any faster and risk it not happening at all.”  Lily kissed his cheek.  “If I’d said yes to James in third or fourth year maybe we would still be where we are.  Or maybe I would have written him off as a ponce and I wouldn’t have him or my babies.  Things happen when they’re right, and you can’t rush them.  Or run away from them.”

“What if he doesn’t feel the same?”  Remus rarely dated and never said anything about marriage.  “What if I ruin everything?”

“What if he does?  I don’t have the answer.  I think you have to trust Remus and yourself enough to give him a chance to hear how you feel.”

“And if I fuck it all up?”

“Your friendship has survived war and betrayals and pranks gone horribly wrong, as well as seven years of sharing a dorm and about as long sharing a flat.  I don’t think it’s going to fall under the weight of loving him.”

“You better be right, Lily Potter.  If you’re not I’m going to be crashing on this sofa after I flee the flat in embarrassment, and I shed.”

II

Talking to Moony, of course, was a far too direct and logical choice.  It took an hour for Sirius to decide that no, that just wouldn’t do.

“You alright, Pads?” Remus asked when he spent the second hour after he returned home pacing.

“Just thinking about Christmas,” he answered distractedly.

“It’s May, I think you have some time before you need to worry.”  Remus caught his hand as he walked past.  “You look like you have one of your headaches.  Why don’t you sit down and I’ll give you a massage?  Or I could read something to you?”

“No books.”  Books are what had gotten him into the whole mess in the first part.  How could he tell Moony how he felt without also confessing the whole story of Phaedra White?  Why had he never considered that at some point Moony would have to know about The Brilliant Idea?  “I think I might just go to bed.”

“I’ll bring you some tea, it will help you sleep better.”  True to his word Remus showed up ten minutes later with a cup of tea, cream in first and half a spoon of sugar, just the way he liked.  He’d valiantly tried to fall asleep in those ten minutes, but had failed completely and sat up to accept the tea.  

“Thank you.”

“You know you can tell me if something is bothering you, right?”

“There’s no one in the world I trust more than you,” Sirius said honestly.  The tea was too hot still but he sipped it anyway, knowing he’d either burn the tip of his tongue or the roof of his mouth but not caring.  

“It’s a bit odd, isn’t it, Prongs and Lily having two kids now?  They’re well and truly settled, like proper adults.  Might make someone think about it a bit, wonder if they’re wanting something different.”  Remus settled on the edge of the bed, looking up at the ceiling as if he could see the stars overhead.

“Do you think about something different?  Finding your someone and settling down with a couple of sprogs?”  

“Merlin no.  That sort of life’s never been for me, even if I could find someone who wasn’t put off by my special little problem.  Besides I like things the way they are.  You know how much I loved marking up papers with red ink in school and I get to add commas and edit dangling participles to my heart’s content now, with the added bonus of actually making a proper amount of money.  And I couldn’t possibly ever be lonely or bored with you around.  If I want to play with a kid I just have to pop over to see Prongs and Lily.  Seems to me being a godfather is like the best bits of being a parent without all the rest.”  Remus shrugged and looked sideways at Sirius.  “I always figured you’d follow James’ example at some point.”

“I would have had to start developing a crush more than a decade ago, wouldn’t I, to really emulate Prongs?”  It made him stop and wonder for a moment, tea slopping over his chin as he stopped halfway to his mouth.  Just when had he started falling in love with Moony?  Maybe he was more like Prongs then he thought, with less of the whinging.  He couldn’t remember a time when making Moony smile hadn't been a priority, or when Moony touching him hadn’t been a comfort.

“Not like that, of course.  I mean the whole home hearth and family sort of thing, and making me a godfather.”

“I like my family just the way it is.”  It was a little too close to the truth, and Sirius faked a yawn.  “Night Moony.”

“Night Padfoot.  Sleep well.”  Despite being the first to say goodnight, Sirius was a little dismayed that Moony actually left his room.

II

The next day Sirius stopped by to pick up his post, finding a rather sizable cheque, yet another request for a book signing, and the edited return of his most recent book.  Remus must have mailed it when he’d been with Lily.  Flipping through the pages he found the usual red marks adding commas and rearranging the occasional unclear sentence structure, but nothing about the plot of the novel.  He hadn’t made any of the suggestions that he’d mentioned at the hospital.

Sirius took the book home and read through the story again.  Remus was right.  The supposed romance of the story felt flat and predictable when compared to the banter between the best friends, and George was clearly nurturing a crush on his friend.  He only wanted Byron to be with Melody because he thought it was what his friend wanted.  It was a mess.  Sirius was a mess too, but at the moment it was a lot easier to fix things for Byron and George.  All he had to do was cut half the book and rework the rest to make sure two best friends realized that they were actually in love.

When he was done he sent it off to Molly with a bonus payment and a warning that he might not be needing her help anymore.  She sent it back three days later with a cheerful little note letting him know that her twins kept her quite busy and while it had been fun to read his stories first she was fine with the change in things.  Also it was her favorite story yet.

“I need to borrow my godson.”  The day after he sent the manuscript back to Remus for editing he left the house early in the morning.  He couldn’t bear to be around when Moony saw it for the first time.  Better to let him read it and get it all over and done with at once, no matter what way it came out.

“You’re not back on the fleeing the country plan, are you?  Because you can’t take Harry to Spain.”  Lily raised one eyebrow.

“Why would Sirius flee the country?”  James held his daughter but stared at Sirius in confusion.  “You didn’t actually break into your cousin’s vault at Gringotts, did you?”

“I decided anything Narcissa owned would probably have cooties.  Not worth the risk.”  Sirius shrugged.  “I won’t even take him out of the county, Lils.  I promise.”

“Pads?  Lily?” James pushed, not having a clue what was happening but suspecting that his wife knew a fair bit more.

“Not now, Prongs.  I’ll tell you tomorrow if the world doesn’t crash around my ears today.”  

Lily, fortunately, said yes and Sirius was able to mostly distract himself with a trip to the zoo and far more ice cream than an almost five year old and a twenty-five year old should eat.  He returned Harry in time for tea but warned Lily that he probably wasn’t very hungry.

“I’m proud of you,” Lily said before he left, kissing his cheek.

“I’d probably be proud of you too if I knew what the bloody hell was going on,” Prongs added, kissing his other cheek.  Sirius said thank you to them both, decided against the floo, and apparated home.  He sat on the front stoop for half an hour before daring to open the door.  The flat was completely silent.  

“Moony?”  Maybe he wasn’t at home.  Maybe he hadn’t gotten the package or had been too busy to read it today.  Maybe he had read it and had run for the hills.  Maybe he hated it and hated Sirius and was in his room packing for a trip to Zanzibar.  For a minute he worried that Moony really was gone because the flat, even Moony’s room, were empty.  The last place to check was what they grandly called the balcony, which was really just a fire escape with a upside down rusty cauldron as a seat and a single pot with a dittany plant they barely kept alive.  Moony sat with his back to the wall, looking out at the view.  They were lucky enough to be on the side of the building that looked out over a park rather than another building.

“Hey.”  He settled on the sill of the open window, which was the only other place to sit but also meant that Remus couldn’t go anywhere without stepping over him, which could come in handy.  “How was your day?”

“I read a book.”  Moony didn’t look at him.  Sirius couldn’t tell what he was thinking at all, other than that he looked like he should be smoking.  They’d both given it up when Harry was born, though, and that went double now that Oliva had come along.

“Yeah?”  He took a deep breath and waited.

“Yeah.  I thought it was weird, at first.  It’s the same Phaedra White book I just edited, and I thought it was a mistake until I got through the first couple of chapters and it’s been completely rewritten.  I didn’t say anything about the story to anyone, other than you, but it was like they looked inside my head and saw how I wished the story had been written.  George was so certain that Byron was going to propose to his girl but instead there’s this scene, this magical scene where Byron says that he couldn’t fall for Melody because he was already in love.  That it had been George all along.  Sometimes your best mate is also the love of your life.”  Remus was still staring down at the park and Sirius wanted to shake him, or beg him to turn his head, or just kiss him and take his chances that Moony wouldn’t throw him over the side of the balcony.  

“Do you think that’s true?” he asked.  “Even when the best mate is a complete disaster who might be keeping a secret or two, but only because they want their best friend to be happy and not have to worry about anything?”

“Do I think that Byron and George are in love?”  When he finally turned, Moony had a perfectly inscrutable expression on his face, the one he used in school that let him tell McGonagall that he didn’t know anything about a prank that had in fact been his brainchild.  When he used it on anyone else it made Sirius smile.  Facing it himself was agonizing.

“Do you believe that sometimes your best mate can also be the love of your life?”  He’d channeled everything he felt and thought into Byron.  Remus set a great store in books and the written word, and Sirius hoped that maybe works written in black and white would make his argument for him.

“I think the hardest thing to believe is that I could possibly be that extraordinarily lucky.”  With the blink of his eye Sirius could see all the vulnerability Moony had been hiding.  The hope and the fear, the trust and the love.  The love he saw there knocked the breath out of him.

“Merlin, I think you just scared five years off my life, you were that hard to read.”  He pulled himself through the window and squatted in front of Remus.  “Do you really think you could love me?”

“You deserve to be scared, you bloody git.  You had me secretly editing books you wrote and somehow you became an author for the lark of it.”  Remus rubbed his forehead, like he did when something was puzzling him or the writing of something was particularly confusing.  “I’ve been in love with you for ages, Pads, and I find there’s generally very little thinking involved.  It’s a simple fact.”

“I don’t think there’s anything simple about it.”  Sirius Black was the author of seventeen and a half books, and it seemed to him there was only one possible option for what came next.  He kissed Moony, of course.  Kissed him like Byron had kissed George, like Psych had once kissed Cupid and Darcy had kissed Elizabeth.  The kiss had been brewing up inside him for some time and he did not stop until the air was gone from his lungs.  And then he said the words that he planned on repeating every day for the rest of his life.  “I love you Moony.”

“I love you too, Phaedra White.”

Sirius groaned, and laughed, and kissed his Moony all over again.  It was Absolutely Brilliant.

#wolfstar #wolfstar fic #sirius black #sirius x lupin #remus x sirius #harry potter fic #my fic #remus lupin #lily potter #remus lupin x sirius black #maurader fic #everyone lives #or at least the important people

[luci-in-trenchcoats]

Won’t You Stay (Part 9)

Summary: The reader and Ethan talk about their pasts where they learn they have more than a few things in common...

Masterlist

Pairing: Jensen x Director!reader

Word Count: 3,600ish

Warnings: language, depression, self-doubt, past domestic abuse, mention of death

A/N: Please enjoy!

_____

“Hey,” said your dad half an hour later, handing you some tissues as you sniffled and sucked down your milkshake at a park nearby.

“Thanks,” you hiccuped, getting an arm around your shoulders on the bench. 

“How bad was it?” he asked.

“What?” you said, wiping off your face.

“Y/N. There are things you don’t know about your mom, your birth mom, things I never wanted to tell you but you deserve the truth, not the story I made up,” he said. “I used to make up stories and lies too.”

“What are you saying?” you asked. He leaned back and stared out at the dim park, a few lights turning on.

“I didn’t love your mother. I feared her,” he said. You stared at him and he shifted around, pulling up his shirt and showing you his side. “You know that scar I got from skateboarding as a kid? She threw a glass at me.”

“She hurt you?” you asked.

“I moved to LA to run away from her,” he said, staring at the ground. “She was...awful. We were only teenagers and she was awful. I couldn’t imagine what it would have been like as adults.”

“Dad. Did she hurt you?” you asked. He sighed and closed his eyes. “You said she threw a glass. What else did she do?”

“What did Logan do?” he asked.

You sighed and sipped on your milkshake, your dad rubbing your back.

“Alright, I’ll go first. Your birth mother was controlling. She was mean. She got physical at times. And I was a kid that didn’t know what the hell to do,” he said. “Then she did something without me knowing and after I left, I found out what that was and then I heard nothing and then I got a call she was in an accident. That’s when I found out about you. Sweetie, I was never depressed because I loved her and lost her. It’s something that’s been a part of me since I was thirteen years old. I’ve always been a bit like this. The thought of you growing up with her though, alone, mortified me. I am happy that she is gone and that’s the honest truth.”

“What did she do to you?”

“...You were planned, by her,” he said. “She poked a hole in a condom.”

“Dad,” you said. “Dad...she-“

“I didn’t know. Not until it was too late,” he said. “I thought it tore. A few weeks later I was told by her that it was on purpose, right after I left. She said she got her period though and I believed her. I believed her. I never should have. Who knows what I was leaving you with? She knew exactly what she was doing though because by the time she would have had you and she came back to me, she knew I would do it, for you, and then she’d have the both of us.”

“Did you ever tell anyone?” 

“Mom knows. No one else,” he said. “I’m not proud of that time in my life.”

“You were eighteen and you left. You should be proud,” you said. He smiled and gave you a hug, releasing a shaky breath. 

“You left whatever was going on too. We must have done something right,” he said. You nodded and blew your nose, tossing your garbage in the nearby trash can. “Whatever happened with Logan, kiddo?”

“At home he got controlling,” you said with a swallow. “I didn’t even notice it at first. Then he started to pick out my clothes and what I could eat and he put me down and then he got rough in bed one night and I knew I had to leave before it got worse. So I broke up with him and two days later he was dating someone new already.”

“How rough?” he asked softly.

“It hurt. I kicked him and then punched him and then left,” you said. “I got a hotel room that night.”

“How do you feel now? You ever tell anyone?” 

“No. The book and movie made me happy for a while,” you said. “It didn’t work all the way but I am feeling a little better lately.”

“You really like Jensen, huh,” he said, giving you a smile.

“I had a mini freak session this morning and he was so nice about it. Logan would have put me down and belittled me. Jensen made me feel safe though.”

“He’s a good kid. He didn’t have to drive me home the other night and hang out and help keep mom and you calm. But he did. Be with a boy that does stuff like that, sweetie,” he said.

“He’s kinda like a big fan of the book,” you said. “Like big fan.”

“Does that bother you?” he asked.

“No. I just...I hope he likes me because of me, not because I wrote his favorite book,” you said.

“Didn’t he ask you out before he knew who you were though?” he chuckled. “I think you got him on the hook all on your own.”

“You’re not gonna like, go murder Logan, are you?” you asked.

“Do you want me to?” he asked. 

“No. I just want to forget about him,” you said.

“Then forget about him. Stop giving him control and move on with your life,” he said. “You were really good for me in that regard. Really good.”

“I’m sorry about what I said back at the house,” you said. “It wasn’t true. I wanted to be mean because I knew it’d get you to back off.”

“You were scared and trying to push. I knew that,” he said, fixing a piece of hair behind your ear.

“You didn’t see your face.”

“You didn’t see yours,” he said. You nodded and took a deep breath. “Can we talk again? Be thick as thieves like the old days?”

“Yeah. Yeah,” you said with a small smile, wiping off your face with the back of your hand.

“You want to come stay back home?”

“No,” you said with a smile. “I’m a big girl. I do like having my own space. But can we do a family dinner every week or something?”

“I think that’s a good idea for all of us,” he said. “Offer is always open though.”

“I know,” you said. “I’m still sorry about earlier.”

“Apology accepted. You want to get some sundaes to bring home?” he asked.

“Yeah. I feel like the other guys are gonna be pissed at me,” you said.

“You’re a good secret keeper. They should let you slide without an explanation,” he said. “I mean, no offense but does Anthony think we’re idiots? I knew years ago he liked guys.”

“Really? I was a little surprised when he told me,” you said. 

“Well, you can catch your son checking out men’s asses only so many times before you start to wonder,” he teased. You felt yourself giggle and got a boop on the nose. “That’s the sound I like to hear out of her.”

“What’d you think about Ella?”

“I think her big sister did a good job of making sure she gets treated right,” he said.

“Jensen kinda helped out during that talk,” you said.

“He’s just racking up all the brownie points, isn’t he?” he said. 

“You think he’s a good actor?” you asked.

“Yeah. He’s got the potential to go big. This movie will change his life,” he said. “He certainly knows Lyle inside and out.”

“What’s a good date idea?” you asked. “I kinda ditched on one with him tonight.”

“Oh, boy talk? I missed that for sure,” he teased. “I am sure you’ll come up with something good. Why don’t we head on home and maybe mom can help us come up with something.”

“Okay. Dad...I won’t tell anyone about what you said. Ever,” you said.

“I know. I will give you the same courtesy. Come on, sweetie. I’m starving.”

“Hello, Y/N,” said Jensen with a big grin when you let him into your apartment Sunday afternoon. “Your apartment building is very fancy.”

“A doorman and security were a requirement from my parents to living alone. I had to appease them somehow,” you said.

“It smells pretty in here,” he said as you locked up behind him. He pulled out a bundle of flowers from behind his back and handed them over. 

“Thank you,” you said. You set them in a glass of water, Jensen following you into your kitchen. 

“Nice. It’s very cute,” he said, leaning against your counter. “So. I heard someone was going to make me the best grilled cheese and tomato soup I’ve ever had before we watched some football.”

“Not to brag or anything but I am pretty spectacular at grilled cheese,” you said. 

“So humble you are,” he teased, taking a seat at the counter as you pulled out some ingredients. “How’s your dad doing?”

“Better. Everyone kind of aired their crap last night. It was good,” you said. 

“Good. You seem a little more relaxed than normal,” he said.

“Wait until I’m filming again in the morning,” you said as you whipped up a light dressing to put on the bread. “Your ribs feeling better?”

“Oh, I’m fine. They were only bruised. I should be ready to do scene 12 on Friday,” he said. “I hope. I’m kinda nervous about it actually.”

“Afraid of heights?” you asked.

“No. It’s just the big stunt for the first act,” he said. “I know it’s like an ‘oh fuck’ moment in the book. It’s important to get it right.”

“Don’t worry about it, Jensen. No one knows Lyle better beside me,” you said.

“Not to go full nerd on you again-”

“Ask away, fanboy,” you teased, Jensen giving you a smirk back.

“Cute,” he said.

“Does it bother you?”

“No. I like my little nickname,” he chuckled. “I’ll have to come up with something good for you.”

“In the meantime, ask away. I like talking about this stuff with you,” you said. He hummed and watched you work on the sandwiches for a moment before you switched over to the soup.

“So how did you come up with the story? It’s a bit dark sometimes. I like that but I was always curious. Scene 12 for example. Lyle’s going to get caught, interrogated by Hale, he’ll escape and then nearly get killed by Hale when he catches up to him.”

“I think there’s two ways of focusing on that chapter. One is Hale is hellbent on revenge for his son and lets that rage take over and he nearly kills an innocent man for it after terrorizing him. The other is the way I think you see it, the way I think I lot of people see it. A man who lost his son and another young man whose family hurt him. Hale hurts, Lyle hurts. Hale shows Lyle eventual kindness after he realizes his mistake and Lyle finds a father figure, he finds someone that will protect him, not hurt him. Two lost souls and all that,” you said.

“I totally get it. I just wonder how a Hollywood girl who grew up with Ethan Y/L/N as a father comes up with a story like that,” he said.

“I had a single dad for the first ten years of my life, Jensen. I love my mom, I do, but our whole family knows that me and dad, that’s something special. He was my father and my mother back then. He didn’t know what he was doing. We figured it out together,” you said. “Plus I like the flawed hero story. Everyone does.”

“True,” he said. “Those are always more interesting.”

“Is that the kind of role you like to play? If you had your choice I mean,” you said.

“Yeah. I’d play a good or bad guy. I don’t have a preference,” he said. “Happy to have a steady job right now mostly.”

“I know you guys get a pretty good paycheck,” you said, stirring the pot a few times.

“I heard a rumor that I wasn’t supposed to get as good a paycheck as I got. Apparently our director pushed for me,” he said. “I suppose I have you to thank for that.”

“I feel like you should be compensated for your work,” you said, shrugging as you covered the pot. “It’s a lot of pressure and this is going to be a multi movie thing someday.”

“My agent told me this movie will change my career. I’ll get to pick my next project instead of scraping for it,” he said.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” you asked.

“It is. It’s going to be hard to top working on The Dark Woods is all,” he said. 

“Oh yeah because this working experience is so awesome I bet,” you laughed.

“Actually, yeah, it is. I have never met a director like you. Even when shit goes wrong, I’ve never once seen you yell at someone, even when they probably deserve it. You’re kind and prioritize cast and crew over a schedule and money. People notice that, Y/N,” he said.

“It’s how people should act,” you said, shaking your head. “Alright. How do you like your grilled cheese? Barely crispy or extra crunchy?”

“Somewhere in the middle,” he said. “Need help with anything?”

“Nope. Just grab yourself something to drink from the fridge and this will be done in a jiffy,” you said. Jensen hummed and took a bottle of water out for you and himself, carrying them over to where you had set your table. 

Ten minutes later Jensen was moaning around the grilled cheese, giving you a thumbs up.

“Okay. You are allowed to brag about your grilled cheese skills anytime,” he said. “I haven’t had a home cooked meal in forever.”

“You don’t cook?” you asked. “I’m not great but slowly trying to learn. Instant pot is a girl’s best friend.”

“Well I mean, no one’s cooked for me besides my parents or your parents in like a year,” he said. “It’s kinda nice. I will be sure to return the favor soon.”

“Might have to wait until the weekend. It’s going to be crazy busy this week,” you said. 

“Eh, it’ll be fine,” he said, dipping his sandwich in his soup. “Mmm, so good.”

When you were finished eating, Jensen helped you clean up before you sent him into your family room to settle in for the game. He wandered over to your bookcases on either side, scanning the rows while you turned the TV on.

“I didn’t know you had other books,” he said, looking back with a smile. You quickly hopped up and saw him pull out one. “This is not a Lyle Sullivan book.”

“No, it isn’t. I’ve written a lot, since I was a teenager. I uh, only the one is published right now, the other two on the way,” you said. “This other stuff is crap. Only my parents and siblings have read it really. Also Logan but he said they were bad.”

“Logan is an idiot, full offense intended,” he said with a smirk, flipping through one. “I finished The Dark Night yesterday which holy crap by the way. It was amazing and I have so many questions.”

“You liked it?” you said, tucking your hair behind your ear. 

“It was so good. Lyle’s like a full on badass but he still fucks shit up and he and Molly are like living together and they’re so cute and she’s actually like learning from Hale how to be a badass too so she’s safe and Hale’s like his actual dad and Lyle called him dad and I was like fucking finally but-”

“Okay,” you laughed. “I see you liked it.”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “I did. Since I’ve read the Lyle prequel before too would you mind if I read one of these? I get bored in my trailer sometimes.”

“Sure,” you said.

“Any you recommend?” he asked.

“Oh they’re all horrible,” you said, rubbing the back of your neck.

“I see. I guess I’ll just have to read all of them,” he said with a smile. “I’ll start with this one. Oak Street. I wonder what it’s about.”

“Jensen,” you said as he pulled out the first one. “I’m really not a good writer.”

“We have very different opinions on that,” he said. He hummed and he sat down on the couch and set the book on the end table to take home later. You rolled your eyes and sat down next to him, Jensen putting an arm around your shoulders. “This okay?”

“Mhm,” you said, leaning against his shoulder as you turned your attention to the TV. You shut your eyes, the game drowning out in the background.

“Y/N, wake up,” said Jensen. Your eyes flashed open and you shot up, both his hands on your arms. You looked around, still on the couch with the football game going on. “Hey. It’s alright. You were having a nightmare. You were taking a nap on me.”

“Sorry,” you said, rubbing your eyes. 

“S’okay. I’m pretty tired on the weekends. I can’t imagine how exhausted you must be,” he said, sliding a hand up to your cheek. “Bad dream?”

You nodded and looked away, Jensen turning your cheek back towards him.

“I get bad dreams too,” he said. He smiled and returned it, dropping his hand away.

“People aren’t sweet like you, you know.”

“They are. You just haven’t been around too many quality people lately it seems,” he said.

“I can’t really disagree with that,” you said.

“Your friends aren’t sweet?” he asked.

“Are yours?”

“I ditched the bad ones. The ones I got left, some are guy guys, they don’t talk about the serious stuff but they’re good. The other guys...yeah, we talk about feelings and shit. One of my best friends we talk everyday about that stuff,” he said. “We have a tag up. We just check in, make sure the other is okay.”

“Like I said. You’re sweet,” you said. 

“Like I said. You should hang around with some better people,” he said. You nodded and sat back, tucking into his side. “Not a lot of friends?”

“Never had a lot. But then when I broke up with my ex, all my friends stopped talking to me and kept hanging out with him,” you said. “Always was kind of hard, growing up the way I did, knowing if people liked me.”

“Well I know someone that likes you very much,” he said, smirking at you.

“I wonder who that is,” you said. 

“He’s quite adorable,” he said. “Very handsome.”

“Lucky me,” you laughed. “Sounds very humble.”

“For sure,” he said. You glanced up at him, Jensen rubbing your arm. “If you’re up for it, want to go do something fun?”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Your hair is a hot mess,” teased Jensen three hours later. He tried to fix it back in place but you quickly felt his baseball cap on your head, ponytail pulled through the opening. “All better.”

“I cannot believe you took us to Disneyland,” you said, looking back at the rollercoaster you’d just gotten off of. “I haven’t been here in years!”

“Best part is we can totally drink now,” he said. “Want to hit a few more rides first before we get a snack?”

“Yeah, that’d be great,” you said. You got bumped as you walked, Jensen grabbing your hand and pulling you around to his other side. He didn’t let go once you’d made it past a crowd of people and you gave it a squeeze. “Hey, Ackles.”

“Y/L/N,” he said as you headed for another coaster.

“Thanks for saving my ass that night we met,” you said.

“I’m sure you would have handled it on your own,” he said. “I got your back from now on though if that’s cool.”

“I’m okay with that, Ackles,” you said.

“Good. You watch mine and maybe it’ll all work out,” he said. 

“Maybe it will,” you said. He hummed and leaned over to kiss you, smiling when you blushed. “Don’t say a word, fanboy.”

“Mhm,” he said, a smug little look on his face. “Alright, let’s try another one of these coasters out.”

_____

A/N: Read Part 10 here!

#supernatural #spn #jensen x reader #jensen ackles #supernatural series #supernatural reader insert #jensen ackles x reader #spn reader insert #jensen reader insert #jensen x #jensen ackles x you

[e-vasong]

hi!! I just wanted to ask about the daemon AU--do you have a headcanon abt when their daemons would settle? or did they just settle after puberty? Did 5's daemon settle before or after the apocolypse?

AH!! this is such a good question.  I’m gonna put a cut after this first bit, though, because I took a simple question and accidentally...wrote a 2k thing that kinda straddles the line between answering your question and being a freeform fic? whoops.

Okay.  So I think all the kids probably settle a little later than normal for most people.  It’s been a while since I read the books, but I recall that most daemons, though not all, settle towards the start of puberty.  I headcanon that trauma is one of the things that can push that process back, and all the Hargreeves kids have that in abundance.  Not to mention that I don’t think isolating your kids from a normal childhood and forcing them into a vigilante lifestyle is exactly helpful for their development.

Luther settles first, a day after their thirteenth birthday.  It happens without much fanfare, while they’re resting at home after a mission.  There’s not much a golden retriever can do on a mission that another animal can’t do just as well or better, and Reginald really emphasizes the utility of their daemons above all else.  But sometimes Luther likes to let Amalthea turn into big, soft things when their dad isn’t looking.  He likes them, even if Diego mocks him relentlessly for it.  And that afternoon Amalthea plops down on his chest and turns into a golden retriever, licking at his chin to comfort him after the verbal excoriation their father had given them after the mission had gone wrong at every possible turn.  It’s a miracle none of them were hurt.  That scares Luther more than anything else.  How close he’d come to failing and getting someone killed.  And they don’t even realize that she’s settled until like an hour later when they’re headed downstairs and Amalthea tries to shift back into a form that their father will find dignified and just...can’t.

Klaus settles next much to everyone’s surprise.  It happens a few months after Luther.  Their father has them locked in the crypt again, and it’s particularly bad tonight.  Klaus can see them everywhere, tearing at his clothes, clawing at his skin, and he can barely breathe.  They go after Cassandra just as eagerly as they do him, but she’s harder to catch.  Suddenly she’s a falcon, an ermine, a rat scuttling through a new hole in the wall that their father must have missed.  And then she’s outside.  Twelve, thirteen feet away maybe, and it pulls at the connection between them, almost to the point of being painful.  Hurts enough to gear Klaus out of his catatonic haze and get him to push through the throng of ghosts just to get a couple feet closer to her.  And then Cassandra is a cicada, fluttering up to the lock.  And then she’s a raccoon, clawing futilely at it with those deft, clever fingers, but unable to work it open without anything to jimmy the lock open with.  Yet she’s also trapped by their bond, unable to venture and look for something to use.  And so she tries to shift back to rat, to get back inside, and just.  Doesn’t.  Can’t.  So Klaus stills his breathing long enough to stumble over to the door of the crypt, pressing his back flat against it and trying to still his breathing.  Cassandra curls up in a small ball in front of the door.  And they stay like that all night, until their father comes to let them out in the morning.

Allison, Diego, and Vanya all settle pretty close together, towards the end of their thirteenth year and the start of their fourteenth.

Allison settles on a mission.  She’s so busy rumoring a bad guy into killing his friends that she doesn’t notice the one behind her until Diego drops to the ground with a muffled cry of pain.  She makes a noise, a hoarse-sounding scream of shock and surprise.  But she’s well-trained enough to wrestle her gut reaction under control quickly.  She whips around, a rumor already on her lips, but before she can say anything Alexander is there.  A flash of muted gold and black, not hulking but still larger than she expects.  He jumps, first onto a table.  The spring inside a loaded gun.  Fifty pounds of coiled muscle and snarling rage.  Then he leaps again, surprisingly agile.  There’s a flash of canine, long and sharp.  The man dies with a gurgle, and when Alexander pads over to Diego’s injured body, licking at their brother’s face with concern, Allison sees that those white teeth are bloody and red.

Diego settles during one of their sneak-outs.  They’re walking along the pier, eating fish tacos they bought from a vendor nearby.  Ben is reading as they walk, flipping pages idly.  He’s not paying attention to where they’re going, though Luther keeps trying to get him to put the book down.  But then Diego had told Luther to lay the fuck off, and that had turned into a whole thing, and Ben’s still reading his book.  If Five were here, there wouldn’t be any concern about it.  He’d had that sort of quiet, watchful way about him, where you knew that even if he wasn’t actively stopping you from doing something, he was still keeping an eye out to make sure it didn’t kill you.  If Five were here, he’d have made them take Vanya.  If Five were here...

But he isn’t.  He’s probably off somewhere, living happily away from their father and from them.  Asshole.  It’s an uncharitable thought, and Guinevere would bite him for it if he said it out loud, but Diego is so caught up in his anger that he doesn’t see Ben walk into the pole until its too late.  

Ben swears, hands flying to his face automatically.  Klaus bursts into hysterical laughter.  Allison’s gasps, putting a hand to her mouth.  Ben’s book tumbles out of his hands and into the water, and Guinevere--also laughing--follows it, turning small and furry as she does.  She doesn’t catch it before it gets soaked, but she gets the book in her teeth and paddles over to a small ladder that drops down off the dock.  Ben turns to thank her, but Diego is too distracted to catch what he says.  Diego just settled, he’s pretty sure.  He can feel it in his bones.  He’d kind of been hoping for something that would prove once and for all that he’s better than Luther, but frankly their father isn’t going to be any more pleased with otter than golden retriever.  That’s kind of a bummer.  But when he kneels down to let Guinevere scramble up his arm and around his neck, he can’t really bring himself to care.  She’s Gwen, and he’s Diego, and if their father has anything to say about it?  Well then.  He can go fuck himself.

Vanya settles that winter.  She’s playing her violin in the living room.  Ben is sitting nearby.  They aren’t hanging out, not exactly.  None of her siblings really hang out with her, not since Five, but Ben maybe comes the closest.  Calliope usually takes the form of a cat, winding around Vanya’s ankles as she plays.  She used to turn into a capuchin sometimes, to flip the pages of Vanya’s music, but Io has more or less soured Vanya on monkey daemons these days.  But still.  Things are nice, and today they are in a particularly good mood.  Ben’s company is comforting; it’s nice not to be alone; and Vanya hasn’t missed a single note.  So today, Calliope flutters up onto her shoulder and sings along with her.  And she never changes back.  And when Vanya shyly shows her to their family later, Reginald sniffs, disdainful, having barely spared them a flicker of a glance.  Just a songbird, he says dismissively.  And that is that.

(And later, years and years later, Leonard peers into the veil of Vanya’s hair.

“Is that your daemon?” he asks affably.  He looks unbothered by the way Vanya cringes.  His orb weaver is crawling up the sleeve of his shirt, looking almost like a toy or a strange decorative pin.

“Yeah,” Vanya says.  Cal is a bundle of fluffed-up feathers nestled in the crook of Vanya’s neck.  She huddles in closer at the sight of Leonard’s attention.

“What is she?” Leonard asks, then holds his hands up apologetically.  “I mean, if you don’t mind me asking.”

“Just a songbird.”

“Just a songbird?” Leonard echoes.  He leans in closer.  “Hey, she’s a...great tit, right?  I’ve read about those.”

“Oh?” Vanya asks, bracing herself for whatever is going to come next.  Leonard is a nice guy; she’s sure he means well.  It doesn’t mean that what he says next isn’t going to hurt.

“Yeah,” Leonard smiles at her.  “You’re right.  They are songbirds.  But they’re more than that.”

Vanya pauses, lifts a hand to her hair uncertainly.  She hadn’t expected that.  “What do you mean?”

“Well, I’m surprised your family didn’t ever say anything to you, I have to admit.  They are songbirds, Vanya.  But they’re hunters too,” Harold says.  There’s wonder in his eyes, and when Vanya looks up to meet his gaze, he just smiles.)

Ben, like Luther, settles without much fuss.  Once a week, since they turned ten, they’ve had a designated time to try out new forms for their daemon.  Their father brings out books on zoology.  Gives them specimen after specimen to try.  Ben isn’t quite sure that this is how it’s supposed to work.  All accepted science suggests that settling is half a physical affair and half a mental one.  It’s not just about finding the right shape, it's about state of mind as well.  Amalthea is a golden retriever, but if she had tried that form when Luther was eight, Ben doubts that she would have settled.  But their father doesn’t much seem to care, nor does he seem to understand.  Then again, Io and their father have a dynamic that Ben doesn’t quite get either.  They seem less like human and daemon and more like warden and prison guard.  But maybe that’s just Ben projecting.

Melpomene takes to their father’s training with more courage than Ben does.  His stomach hurts; he wishes that he could go back to bed. This is worse now.  All the others have settled, and Ben’s been doing this part of their training alone for almost a year.  But Mel is braver than Ben is, and she takes the lead.  So they go down the list, while their father watches with those piercing eyes.  Io is perched on the desk, lips drawing back from his teeth whenever Ben so much as twitches a muscle in the wrong direction.

Mel turns into a large octopus.  A cassowary.  A vulture, a great Philippine Eagle, a Sumatran rhino, a spectacled caiman.

And then she stops.  Tries to shift again.

“I’m stuck,” Mel declares, sounding just as surprised as Ben feels.  Their father’s back straightens, and it’s the nearest thing he’s ever given Ben to pride.  He peers over his spectacles.  Nods.

“This is acceptable,” their father says, like there’s any other option.  It’s not like Ben can do anything about it, but he holds his tongue and stares at the floor again.  A predator.  A scary one, not like Guinevere or Amalthea.  Even Alexander is cuddly.  Crocodilians, though, people hate.  This isn’t how Ben wanted his settling to go.  He hadn’t wanted their father to be right.

Ben’s stomach twists.  He feels something nudge against the inner lining of his gut, like it’s trying to escape, and ignores it.

“Dismissed, Number Six,” their father says, and when Ben turns to go his eyes feel wet.

And Five...Ugh.  I’m debating how much of this I want to share, because I actually have this scene written elsewhere?  But Five settles last.  Five settles last by no small margin, not just chronologically, but by age as well.  Five settles late even among other late bloomers.  He settles when he’s eighteen.  Approximately.  It’s hard to keep track of days in the Apocalypse; Five is good with numbers and has a great memory, but it’s been five years by this point and the days are starting to blur, even for him.  The lateness of his settling comes from a combination of trauma, a lack of socialization, and the fact that he is desperately trying to avoid it.  He and Dolores keep a list of forms that they know are safe, forms that she’s taken again and again and hasn’t settled in yet.  

Because in the Apocalypse, an unsettled daemon is an incredible asset.  She can be a hawk, fluttering up to a roof to scout for places to salvage.  A wolf, sniffing out supplies.  An elephant, moving rubble and bricks so they can turn what remains of the library’s atrium into a makeshift shelter.  And a bear, warm and hardy.  That form’s kept Five from freezing to death for the past several winters.  But the thing about nature is that it always finds a way.  They can only fight it for so long.  And one night Five wakes up, and Dolores is a snake, and she can’t shift out.  She’s cold, too.  The night temperatures are too much for her now.  

I’m sorry, I’m sorry, she says to Five, almost frantic with it.

It’s fine, he tells her as she curls up under his jacket, soaking up the warmth radiating from his chest.  You’re beautiful.  It sounds like a lie.  It kind of feels like one too, even though he means it. 

This should be a wonderful thing.  It would have been, under almost any other circumstances. 

They do make it, of course.  We know that.  Five is clever and he is determined and he has no choice but to survive.  He will accept no other outcome, and he’s right in that.  They suffer, but they live.  They win and they get back to their family.  

In the moment, though, they are just a seventeen-year-old boy and his daemon, entirely alone in a world that doesn’t care whether they live or die, and it mainly feels like a death sentence.

(BUT THEN ALSO THEY ALL REUNITE WHEN FIVE TIME TRAVELS BACK AND BEN COMES BACK TO LIFE SOMEHOW AND LEARNS SELF LOVE AND THEY ALL RECOVER FROM THEIR TRAUMA TOGETHER YEE HAW)

#tua #the umbrella academy #my writing #daemon au #this is actually sadder than my normal fare i promise it all works out but by virtue of being a settling fic this involves their childhoods #which were. awful. #sorry for any crappy writing its literally 2am for me i just got fixated on this

[rhosyn-du]

Never make a mess when a total catastrophe will do - Chapter Three

Pairings: Jimon, past Clace, background Clizzy, a bunch of other minor background pairings Rating: Explicit Art: @cor321​ Beta: @all-thestories-aretrue​ Tags:  Alternate Universe - College/University, fake dating, oh my god they were roommates, friends with benefits, idiots to lovers, pining, miscommunication, holidays, drinking games, mistletoe, symbolically significant Oreos, domestic fluff, brief mention of past character death, Jace’s self-worth issues deserve their own tag Summary: What do you do when you find out your sister is not only dating your ex and love-of-your-high-school-life but is also bringing her home for Christmas? Bring your annoying, hot, annoyingly-hot roommate as your fake boyfriend to show them you're totally fine with it, obviously! There's no possible way this could backfire. Link: AO3 , Tumblr Master Post

Chapter Three

Jace woke with the sun just barely beginning to filter through his bedroom window. He’d been half-afraid, half-hopeful that he’d wake to find he and Simon had gravitated toward each other in the night, but they each remained firmly on their sides of the bed, a scant few inches between them.

They had, however, shifted slightly. Simon had kicked the covers off in the night, or maybe Jace had stolen them, and Simon was curled toward the center of the bed, facing Jace, one hand tucked beneath his cheek. His curls stuck out at odd angles, and there was a faint damp patch of drool on the pillow beneath him. Jace thought it was oddly endearing. Either that, or he was completely losing his mind. Probably both. Either way, he needed to get the hell out of bed before he did something really stupid, like reaching out to straighten those curls, or just continuing to lie here staring like some love-struck supermarket romance novel heroine.

Making as little noise as possible, Jace made his way out of bed and pulled on some actual clothes, including the very silly, but very soft reindeer-adorned sweater Izzy had given him for Christmas last year.

“How is it morning already?” Simon’s voice was muffled, and Jace refused to look over and see him looking, no doubt, adorable and far too right in that bed.

“The inexorable march of time,” Jace told him. “I was just going to head down and see about starting some coffee if Iz hasn’t already.”

“Gimme just a second and I’ll come with you,” Simon said, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “Clary swears your sister’s coffee is amazing and almost makes it worth getting up as early as she does.”

“Nothing is worth getting up when Izzy does,” Jace told him, folding his arms and looking pointedly away while Simon changed. “But she does make some damned good coffee. I’m not sure how she manages to do that when she’s such a disaster with everything else in the kitchen.”

“That’s like the opposite of my sister. Becky is a great cook, but she can never brew a pot of coffee without getting grounds in it. Which is kind of messed up considering how much of it she drinks.”

“Is that where you get your caffeine addiction from?” Jace asked, risking a glance over at Simon for the sake of treating him to a mocking raised eyebrow. He was just in time to catch the last sliver of toned abs disappearing beneath the hem of a Yoda sweatshirt.

“Pretty sure we both get it from Mom.” Simon grinned at him, offering his hand. “Ready when you are, sweetheart.”

“Then let’s get a move on, sugar bear.”

They were greeted with Izzy’s singsong “Good morning!” as they descended the stairs. Clary, feet tucked up beneath her on the couch and leaning heavily into her girlfriend as she sipped her coffee, offered them a sleepy wave.

“About time,” Max muttered from where he sat, engrossed in his phone at the end of the opposite couch.

Jace should have known something was up from the way Izzy watched them as they made their way downstairs, should have felt the telltale dread he always felt at her slowly growing Cheshire Cat grin. But he hadn’t had his first cup of coffee, and he hadn’t gotten nearly enough sleep, and he was still maybe just a little distracted by that tempting glimpse he’d gotten of Simon’s abs.

So, he was taken entirely surprised at Izzy’s half-shouted, “Stop!”

It was only after he’d obeyed on instinct that he saw the danger, saw a hint of Izzy’s manic smile reflected in the smirk Clary gave Simon.

“Look up,” Clary instructed.

Jace did, and then turned a flat stare on his sister. “Iz. Did you really get up before everyone else just so you could catch us under the mistletoe?”

“It’s not supposed to be for you,” Izzy said dismissively. “And Max was up before me, anyway.” Her grin grew. “But as long as you’re there.”

Jace glanced at Simon. They hadn’t actually talked about kissing since that brief, interrupted discussion in the cafe back in Boston, when Jace had promised to follow Simon’s lead. He hadn’t thought they’d end up under this kind of pressure, though, and the last thing he wanted was for Simon to feel like he didn’t have any other option than kissing Jace.

He turned back toward his sister. “Iz—”

His protest was interrupted by a pair of guitar-calloused hands cupping his face and drawing him into a gentle kiss. It barely lasted a second, not even long enough for Jace to really register it until it was already over, but Jace still missed the feel of Simon’s lips on his own as soon as it ended.

“All right,” Simon said. “We’ve satisfied your prurient interests, now tell me where to find coffee.”

“Big, brushed steel pot on the counter in the far right corner of the kitchen,” Izzy told him. “I’m glad at least you’re fun in the morning, even if Jace isn’t.”

“There’s still time for me to return your present, you know,” Jace told her.

“Nuh-uh. It’s Christmas, stores are all closed.”

“Are they always like this?” Simon asked Clary.

“Always,” she confirmed.

“No, they’re usually much worse,” Alec said as he and Magnus descended the stairs. “This is Iz and Jace on their best behavior.”

“Stick around long enough that they start thinking of you as family and the gloves will come off,” Magnus added with an exaggerated shudder.

Izzy didn’t even have a chance to point out the mistletoe before Alec was leaning in to give his fiancé a soft kiss. “You are family.”

Jace wasn’t sure they’d even noticed the mistletoe.

“Technically, not for another five months,” Magnus said. “Which reminds me, I need to call the florist back this week.”

“Already taken care of,” Alec assured him. “Even if I’m still not entirely clear on what a gladiolus is.”

“I only know that Scott Joplin wrote a rag named after them,” Simon said. “Which, I am realizing is completely beside the point. I’m going to go get that coffee.”

He turned to Jace. “You grab us some good seats, and I’ll bring you a cup.”

A few minutes later, everyone had a cup of coffee (even Max, although the cup Alec made for him was mostly milk and sugar), and Izzy had started a new pot brewing. Jace sipped his coffee contentedly as Simon gave an excited play-by-play of the winter concert to Clary, who apparently hadn’t heard the full story of the Great Harpsichord Mishap yet.

Jace, who had heard the story three times already, found his mind wandering back to that kiss. Which was stupid, because it wasn’t even that remarkable a kiss. Just a quick press of lips, really. Objectively speaking, he’d had better kisses. Many of them. It made no sense that he would be so hung up on this one, especially since it had clearly been no big deal to Simon. And yet, he couldn’t stop thinking about it, about the soft warmth of Simon’s lips, the way the callouses on Simon’s fingertips caught just slightly on the stubble along his jawline.

Luke joined them not long after the fresh pot of coffee finished brewing, bypassing the mistletoe trap by virtue of having stayed in the guest room on the first floor.

“Mom is taking too long,” Max announced as Luke returned to the living room with his own mug of coffee. “We should wake her up.”

“Max,” Alec chastised.

“What happened to being twelve now, buddy?” Jace teased.

“I want to open presents before I turn thirteen,” Max answered flatly.

“Your mother was up late getting things ready for today,” Luke said. “You should let her sleep.”

Max gave him a long look, then rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to his phone.

“And how exactly would you know Maryse was up late?” Clary asked with an obviously feigned innocent curiosity.

“Because I stayed up to help her,” Luke said, leveling his stepdaughter with a look that said that was the end of the conversation. Clary’s feigned innocence turned to a more obvious smirk, but she let it drop.

By the time Maryse made her way down the stairs almost an hour later, Max was practically vibrating with impatience, although he was clearly trying not to show it.

And so was Izzy, although she was far less obvious about it. At least until she gasped in faux shock, “Oh no, Mom! Looks like you’re standing right underneath some mistletoe. Guess you’re going to have to kiss someone.”

She and Clary turned expectant smiles toward Luke, who returned a flat look and an equally flat, “Really?”

“Isabelle,” Maryse said in the tone of voice that usually preceded a lecture, “it’s impolite to make assumptions about people’s personal lives, or to try to trick them into revealing personal details they might not be ready to share.”

Izzy had the grace to look chagrined. “Sorry, Mama.”

“You’re forgiven,” Maryse said. “See that it doesn’t happen again.” She turned to Luke. “Lucian, are you just going to sit there or are you going to get over here and kiss me good morning.”

Izzy clapped a hand over her mouth to muffle her excited shriek as a laughing Luke walked over and let Maryse drag him into the sort of kiss Jace would never have expected her to give anyone in front of her children.

“Gross,” Max muttered. He had the sense not to say it loud enough for Maryse or Izzy to hear, but Jace kicked his foot and gave him a disapproving shake of his head.

“As you’ve probably gathered, and some of you clearly already guessed,” Maryse said, giving Izzy a pointed look, “Lucian and I have been seeing each other.” “

“We were planning to tell you after the holidays,” Luke added, “but I guess there’s no point in waiting now, is there?”

“We all kind of guessed,” Alec admitted. “And we couldn’t be happier for you.”

“You guys were pretty obvious,” Clary said.

“Super obvious,” Izzy agreed.

“Now can we open presents?” Max asked.

~~~

“Congratulations,” Jace said the next morning, as Simon was packing the last of his things back into his suitcase. “You survived an entire Lightwood Christmas celebration.”

“It was surprisingly less dramatic than I’d been led to believe it would be,” Simon said. “Except maybe the mistletoe thing. For a second there, I thought Luke was ready to strangle Clary.”

“Izzy’s the one he should be annoyed at,” Jace said. “I’m sure she talked Clary into helping her set that up.”

“Uh-uh, no way,” Simon insisted. “I know a Clary Fray plan when I see one, and that had her metaphorical fingerprints all over it.”

“Izzy’s too. I guess the rest of us will have to watch our backs with the two of them together.” He paused. “About the mistletoe thing. We’re okay, right?”

“Huh?” Simon threw him a confused glance. “Of course we are.” He frowned. “Unless... I didn’t overstep, did I? Oh my god, I’m so sorry. I know we never finished our discussion, and I didn’t even ask before I kissed you, I just thought—”

“Simon,” Jace interrupted. “It’s fine. I told you, I’m happy to follow your lead. I just wanted to make sure Iz and Clary didn’t pressure you into it. But as far as I’m concerned, you can kiss me whenever you want.”

For just an instant, Simon’s frown seemed to morph into something that was almost speculative, and Jace wondered if he’d given too much away. But it was gone so quickly he thought he might have imagined it, replaced by an easy smile.

“Cool. I’ll keep that in mind in case we get ambushed with any more mistletoe.”

It took Simon almost twenty minutes to get out the door once he made it downstairs. Clary wanted to nail down plans for getting together later in the week, and Max kept trying to convince Simon to stay a little longer and play the new video game they’d spent half the previous afternoon playing together.

“Max,” Jace said finally, “Simon needs to go spend time with his own family. If you want, I can play with you.”

Max considered him, then shook his head. “You haven’t got the combos down yet. You’re too easy to beat. But I guess I could teach you. If you want.”

“Sure,” Jace told him. “Why don’t you go get it set up while I help Simon take his stuff to the car.”

Max ran off without even bothering to say goodbye, and Jace shook his head. “I don’t know where that kid got his lack of manners.”

“I think I’ve got a pretty good idea,” Simon said, giving him a pointed look. “But I can be magnanimous about it, since he recognizes my clear video game superiority.”

“One day on a new game does not a champion make,” Jace told him. “We’ll see who’s got video game superiority when we get back home.”

“I’ve got an even better idea,” Clary interjected. “What about a game of Land Mines at Magnus’s New Year’s Eve party? Me and Simon against you and Izzy.”

“Oh,” Simon said, throwing an uncertain look at Jace. “Magnus’s party?”

They hadn’t talked about the New Year’s Eve party. Jace had thought about inviting Simon, had thought about inviting him even before they’d agreed to play each other’s boyfriends, but he figured Simon already had plans with his own friends and family. And now, it seemed too much to ask if it meant Simon spending New Year’s Eve having to pretend to be his boyfriend.

“You are coming, right?” Clary asked, looking between Simon and Jace with clear concern. “We always spend New Year’s Eve together. Unless you guys made other plans?”

“No!” Simon said quickly, avoiding looking at Jace. “No, of course I’ll be there. Obviously. I’m just, you know, not sure kicking Jace’s ass at Land Mines is worth the hangover.”

“The part where you’re worried about your hangover means we’ve already won,” Jace said, hating the way that Simon wouldn’t look at him. He’d have to find a way to make this up to him. “Not that you’ve ever beat me at a drinking game.”

“That’s only because I don’t play them,” Simon said, finally meeting his eyes with a forced smile. “I’ve watched Maia and Lily both drink you under the table, though, so I think I’ve got a pretty good shot, especially with Fray on my team.”

“You only say that because you’ve never seen Iz drink,” Jace told him. “I’ve definitely got the advantage when it comes to partners.”

“Yeah, we’ll see about that.” Simon’s smile was less forced now, falling back into their usual banter.

“Uh huh,” Jace said, unimpressed. “I’ll believe it when I see it. Now get going before your mom decides she hates me for making you late before I even get the chance to meet her.”

“You’re cute and occasionally charming. She’ll love you,” Simon told him, but he picked up his bag anyway and started to head toward his van. Then he stopped and threw a quick glance at Clary, who still stood beside Jace in the doorway, before dropping his bag and strode the three steps back up to Jace to pull him into a kiss.

This kiss wasn’t fleeting like their kiss under the mistletoe had been. Jace had plenty of time to register what was happening as Simon’s mouth moved against his, enough time to relax into it. Enough time to get just a little lost and pull Simon closer.

When Simon pulled back from the kiss, he left behind the warmth of a sharp exhale against Jace’s lips. Jace opened his eyes to find Simon watching him with an unreadable expression.

“I’ll text you later,” Simon said.

“Yeah,” Jace agreed, hoping Simon couldn’t hear the faint unsteadiness in his voice.

“And I’ll see you,” Simon pointed at Clary, who Jace had momentarily forgotten was even there, “day after tomorrow.”

Right. Clary. That’s why Simon had kissed him. Because it would have been weird for him to leave without kissing his boyfriend goodbye. Jace stepped back, putting some much-needed space between the two of them.

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Clary said.

Simon flashed Jace a quick smile before turning and taking his bag out to his van.

“Come on,” Clary said, linking her arm with Jace’s and tugging him back inside. “I need to go tell my girlfriend that I volunteered her to get trounced at Land Mines.”

“Please,” Jace said, doing his best to push everything that had just happened out of his mind. “You know you’re going to lose. Just admit it now and save yourself the embarrassment.”

#shadowhunters #shmb2021 #jimon #jimon fic #jace wayland #simon lewis

[smashing-teacups]

Atonement, Chapter 23

A/N: And we’ve arrived at one of the most critical chapters in this fic! No moodboard will accompany this particular post, as it’s full of spoilers; I’ll post it on my twitter in a few days, if you’re interested!

Previously: Ch 1, Ch 2, Ch 3, Ch 4, Ch 5, Ch 6, Ch 7, Ch 8, Ch 9, Ch 10, Ch 11, Ch 12, Ch 13, Ch 14, Ch 15, Ch 16, Ch 17, Ch 18 , Ch 19, Ch 20, Ch 21, Ch 22

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: One Last Cut

Her time was up.

There was no more later, no more tomorrow.  

No more delaying the inevitable.

Claire had done her duty by James Fraser. He’d bear the scars of her mistake for the rest of his life, but he’d recovered as well as could possibly be expected. After two weeks of IV antibiotics, the tunneling infection in his back had finally cleared up, and that last troublesome gash was closing nicely; another week or two and it would be completely healed over. As long as he kept up his protein intake, stayed hydrated, slept enough, and took all of his medications exactly as prescribed, Jamie would be fine.

So that was the last thing. The very last thing Claire had to do for him.

She stayed up all night making him a folder of hand-written instructions and schedules, highlighting the most important things in bright yellow and underlining them twice for good measure. She wrote until her hand cramped, trying to think of everything worth mentioning, every last scrap of information that could possibly help him or his physicians back home. When she’d exhausted her encyclopedic memory bank of his chart (and everything that wasn’t in his chart but should have been), she sat back and reread her notes with the tip of a pen pinched between her teeth, nibbling bite marks into the black plastic.

What am I forgetting? What else, damn it? What else?

There wouldn’t be another chance after this. It wasn’t as if she could just text him with an “oh, by the way, I forgot to tell you…”

The stomach-gnawing panic that she would forget something vital — something that could make a difference — compelled her to her feet, pacing the length of her living room restlessly until the next stray thought occurred to her and she dashed back over to the folder to jot it down.

The previous thirteen days had dragged by at an agonizing crawl; every hour spent in silence at Jamie’s bedside had felt like weeks. But somehow, cruelly, that last night before she had to say goodbye to him seemed to speed by in a dizzying whirl, as if time had suddenly realized its error and lurched forward to correct itself.

With less than half an hour before the start of her shift, Claire finally, reluctantly, set her pen down on the stack of papers with a shaking hand.

That was it. That was everything. Everything she could remember.

All she could do now was pray that something written in those pages would help Jamie when she no longer could.

Claire felt strangely numb as she walked into the bathroom — hollow, cold; a living echo of her nightmare. She cranked up the hot water until it scalded her skin and scrubbed herself raw.

It didn’t make any difference.

Staring vacantly at a fixed point ahead of her, she went through the motions of getting ready for work on autopilot.

She didn’t bother with mascara this time.

Gathering up the folder from the coffee table and holding it to her heart, Claire stood for a long moment in the middle of her living room, eyes squeezed shut, just wishing...

But then it was 06:55. And the time for wishing was gone.

She drew in a deep breath and held it for as long as she could.

One last cut, and Jamie would be free of her. He could have his life back.

One last cut, Beauchamp.

She opened her eyes as she exhaled in a burning gust, and strode resolutely out of her flat toward Massachusetts General for the last time. Keep reading...

#Atonement #smashing-teacups #outlander fanfic #jamie x claire