#only for it to shed the organ and disappear

[growingstories]

Office politics

Fresh out of college, Nathan had put on the dreaded "freshman 15". Despite this, he was in decent shape, with a nice chest although his six-pack had disappeared. He began working at a finance company where the CEO, a fit 40-year-old, stood out among the rest of the management team, who were 30 something men with big bellies. The only woman in the office was Linda, the assistant to the CEO. Nathan met Henry, a handsome guy with a strong chest and a belly, who had started working at the company three months prior, they were both 23 years old.

Henry warned Nathan about Linda's influence in the company. He advised him to do whatever Linda asked in order to secure nice clients and tasks that would lead to bonuses. Nathan took this advice to heart and decided to play by Linda's rules.

One day, Linda brought a big cake to the office, announcing that the winner would be rewarded with a new client. The junior co-workers enthusiastically dug in, with one big guy eating four slices and emerging victorious. Nathan was on a diet to lose the freshman 15 so skipped the cake and watched how all the men devoured the cake in a matter of seconds. Little did Nathan know, the CEO noticed that he had skipped the cake entirely and mentioned it to Linda.

The following day, Linda gave Nathan the tedious task of filing old reports, a long and lonely assignment. To alleviate the boredom, Linda brought him six donuts. Nathan, unable to resist, ate one. Linda soon found out he only ate one and punished him by assigning him even more archive tasks.

Linda continued her pattern of bringing in large amounts of food every day, including pizzas, cakes, and other tempting snacks. The employees who ate the most received better tasks and clients along with bonuses. Nathan often tried to resist the fattening snacks, feeling determined to stay in shape. However, Linda would bring in other snacks as punishment for him. In an effort to burn off the excess calories, Nathan started running every morning.

As weeks went on, Nathan found himself 10 pounds heavier, while Henry had gained double that amount. Linda began handing out late-night tasks and arranging dinners for the employees who stayed late as a punishment for not joining her food challenges. Surprisingly, these employees were the fittest in the office. On the third night, Linda surprised them by bringing in bowls of ice cream, warning them not to let it melt. Fearing longer nights with work, they quickly consumed the ice cream-filled bowls. Linda then walked in and told them to go home, praising their good work.

After weeks of late nights and indulging in rich food, even the typically fit employees began to gain weight. Nathan and Henry found themselves in a constant struggle, their clothes becoming too tight and their workouts becoming a thing of the past. They had no choice but to complain to the CEO, who gave them budget for new clothes instead of stopping the overflow of overfeeding. Feeling defeated, they both decided to go all in for the bonuses and began participating in the various food challenges Linda organized. As they became more successful, the bigger guys in the office grew jealous and started to eat even more. Linda brought in more challenges and new tasks with bonuses, leading them to gain even more weight.

The big bonuses were accompanied by even bigger food challenges. Nathan and Henry found themselves struggling with their weight, experiencing heavy breathing with every movement. Instead walking or biking to the office they frequently took the subway or a taxi. Especially in Summer to avoid sweating. Their focus on work and food left little time or energy for dating, resulting in pent-up desires and frustration. They also found how ruthless the gayscene was, both experienced fatfobic remarks from their dates.

One morning the agreed that it was too much. In an attempt to shed some pounds, Nathan tried to start a diet and wanted to put on his running shoes. He could hardly bend over as his belly was in the way, he had to catch his breath after the first shoe and struggled with his second. He did make it outside in his tight clothes. After 10 minutes the intense exercise began to take a toll on his knees, and he found himself taking an uber home. The same afternoon he went to the Nike store to get new workout clothes. Surprised that he almost was 3 sizes up. Back in the office he started complaining about his new size and his failed running attempt, he told Henry that he would go the the gym the next morning and built on some muscle mass. Linda, always attentive, heard his complaints and brought him protein shakes to support him in his workouts, instructing him to have three a day. After a few days of going to the gym and skipping food challenges he was only getting bigger and found his new gym shirts also getting tighter. He was convinced that it was the laundry and that his muscles were growing. He started to feel more confident again.

Nathan continued with his dieting and his gym visits. Linda showed up with shakes and bars. Nathan found food wrappers from weight gain bars hidden away. While Nathan had become stronger, he realized he had also grown fatter. Meanwhile, Henry had taken up flirting at the office with growing Nathan seeking companionship beyond the office walls. He complemented Nathan on his new bulk. Nathan liked this and continued this pattern of gym and fattening bars.

Henry and Nathan found solace in each other and started dating. The had amazing sex and found a shared passion for nice restaurant and good food. The fact that both lost their once athletic looks didn’t bother them. They decided to abandon their diets altogether and began indulging in more food challenges, resulting in increased weight gain but also big bonuses they were sharing. Surprisingly, this made them Linda's favorites as they eagerly participated in these challenges, earning big bonuses. With their weight gain, they encountered more difficulties in their sexual encounters, struggling with positions and heavy breathing. Despite this, they continued to grow closer, engaging in intimate encounters both in and out of the office and agreed to stop seeing others.

Unbeknownst to the couple, the CEO started flirting with them individually. Confused, yet intrigued, Nathan and Henry decided to see where this newfound attention would lead. During a dinner invitation from the CEO, they were individually treated to a massive feast, where they ate to their heart's content and indulged in drinks until they could no longer move. By the end of the night, they agreed to explore a more intimate relationship together. The day following, they were rewarded with a big new and client a huge bonus. This pattern continued for the next few weeks, with their weight steadily increasing alongside their. earnings They continued their sexual encounters with the CEO both in and out of the office. They both were open about it to eachother and promised to share their money.

One fateful encounter, the CEO accidentally stumbled upon Nathan and Henry in the middle of their intimate moment. Rather than being angry or disappointed, the CEO invited them both to his home for another extravagant dinner. With each bite, they were stuffed beyond their limits, but their arousal only grew. That night, the three of them engaged in an intimate encounter, deepening their connection.

The following day, the CEO informed Nathan and Henry of their big promotion to the management team. They were given their own proteges to mentor and were assigned their own projects. The CEO revealed his secret to success: the bigger their employees became, the more bonuses they would receive. Inspired, Nathan and Henry continued to encourage their staff to indulge in the excessive food challenges, while they themselves continued their encounters with the CEO at his home. Their weight continued to skyrocket as they partook in more and more stuffing sessions.

#fictionalweightgain #maleweightgain #maleweightgainstories #weightgain #weightgainstories #fictionalstories #wg fantasy #wg fiction #exjock #aiweightgain

[kyber-kisses]

It’s You

Captain Rex x Jedi!reader

Summary: you run into Rex in what could only be the most awkward moment of your life.

Warnings: none just severe fluff

A/N: I came up with this while I was in the shower so please enjoy!

Nothing could ever go easy for you could it? You swore every day it was just one thing after another of unfortunate events.

Like today for instance. You woke up twenty minutes late for a mission debrief, then afterwords all the caf in the mess hall was cold , the the mission on Sereno went sideways and you and Ahsoka had to go pull Anakins ass out of the fire, and then your beloved Delta-7 interceptor got damaged and was now currently in the hangar with its insides all over the place as the mechanics tried to fix it.

And now for some lovely reason the refreshers on the level of the Resolute where the Jedi quarters were were malfunctioning.

All you had wanted was a hot shower.

You smelled bad and your muscles ached and you were tired beyond all get out.

And so that’s how you found yourself here. in a bold spur of the moment decision you had thrown your usual hygiene items into a small pack, snuck yourself down several floors and into the empty barracks of 501sts Torrent Company. The refreshers beyond their bunks were vacant and would be for another hour.

More than enough time to wash the filth of the day of your body and be gone before anyone came back. The lingering smell of cleaning chemicals clung to your nose as you entered, the motion sensor lights flickering on as you did.

At least it was clean.

Then again why wouldn’t it be? Rex kept his brothers more organized than most. The captain of the 501st wouldn’t dare let their living spaces fall into disarray. Plus tack on the fact that Fives pulled some idiotic move about once a week that landed him with cleaning duty and bam! They were sure to have a clean area for a majority of the time.

You just had to make sure you were quick. And it wasn’t that you were afraid to be seen naked in their barracks. . . More like- how would they react if they saw their naked general in their barracks, you know?

In other words you weren’t up for the awkwardness that could come from this all.

You just had to get clean and get out before they all got back from the mess hall.

Easiest mission ever.

Choosing a random stall, you started the water before shedding the many layers of your robes, folding them neatly on the bench that ran the length of the room as you did. Steam slowly crawled up the mirrors, turning the atmosphere humid as you finally ventured under the warm spray of water.

The water came hot and ample, running in rivulets down your bare skin before disappearing down the drain. The pressure of it wrapped around your body, massaging it just right as you allows yourself to relax.

Yes. This was what you had needed. Peace and quiet and—

You were halfway through scrubbing shampoo into your scalp when the silence in the large room was broken by the sound of quickly approaching footsteps accompanied by a rather foul string of curses.

Quickly smoothing your hands over your head to press any remaining soap out of the way, you wiped the water from your eyes before peeking your head out of the curtain for your stall.

Even in your motionless stance you nearly slipped at the sight of Rex entering the room, the captain busy trying to scrub something off the collar of his blacks with a rag as he did.

You had been hoping no one would enter while you were here. . . But if it had to be someone at least it was Rex.

“I didn’t know you knew such a wide array of curse words.”

At that you had never seen the captain move so fast. He tripped slightly, hanging reaching out to catch himself on a sink as his other went to his chest.

And then it only grew more amusing when he found your eyes. Almost insanely you watched as a deep red crawled up his face.

“G-general!”

“Sorry, wasn’t my intention to scare you.”

Seeming to notice how his own cheeks had turned red, Rex spun quickly, hand going to the side of his face to act as a divider to give you privacy. “Just wasn’t expecting to see you here General. Though if it’s not too much to ask; why are you here exactly?”

“Some idiot broke a water pipe on my level, and seeing as I smell like garbage I thought I could sneak down here before I went insane.” You explained, Tilting your head slightly as you spoke. “Sorry for intruding on your space.”

“Understood. And no apology needed.” Rex shuffled awkwardly. “I’ll give you some privacy.”

But before he could venture more than a step toy stopped him. “And what happened to you?”

Turning his body slightly in your direction, Rex looked at you before looking down at his armor and blacks. “Oh ah, Fives got a little too enthusiastic with one of his stories tonight, spilled spotchka all over me.”

“Whered he get that?”

At that Rex let out light huff of amusement. “I don’t even wanna know.”

You were silent for a moment a toy watched him. Despite having seen what he was capable on the battlefield— he was adorable. One minute he could be barking commands and planning battle strategies and the next he would be the most endearing, socially awkward person you had ever met.

He made your heart melt.

“Well if you need to rinse off you’re welcome to join the party .”

At your words you watched Rexs eyes widen slightly, the pink returning to his cheeks and with that you realized how that might of sounded.

“I, I meant that in the most non-creepy way possible!” You quickly added, “and I did not mean that to sound like an invite to join me in here- i was just trying to say don’t let my presence stop you from showering yourself—“The sudden rambling made you wince and before you could say anything else stupid you pulled your head back behind the curtain.

Ok. Well that was definitely not part of your plan.

And that was a whole other level of embarrassing. Kriff you almost preferred the option of a bunch of clone troopers seeing you buck ass nude.

Cursing under your breath you turned to face the water, resisting the urge to hit your head repeatedly against the tile wall.

What the hell was that you idiot?

In that moment you wanted nothing more than to melt into the drain and disappear. Things like that didn’t normally happen. You weren’t known for stuttering or feeling embarrassed. You approached every situation head strong and with a smile.

. . But when it came to Rex? Oh boy when it came to Rex there were moments when that blonde captain turned you into a gooey puddle. He was so kind and brave and caring and a thousand other things you could only hope to be.

A few stalls down the sound of another fresher turning on made you turn your head, though the second you saw Rexs bare shoulders you turned back towards the wall.

Just focus on getting clean.

And that what you did, occupying yourself with scrubbing down every inch of your body in an attempt to keep your mind off the captain several feet away from you.

It was only when you were done that you came across your first problem; your towel was still folded on the bench. . . In the middle of the room.

Letting out a string of curses as you peaked your head out of shower you attempted to calculate the distance, because like hell were you going to scamper your naked butt out there with Rex in the room.

Maybe if you just—

Wrapping the shower curtains lightly around you and praying to the force that Rex wasn’t watching you, you leaned out of your stall, stretching out your arm as much as you could.

Kriff, still not close enough.

Letting out a huff of annoyance you leaned further out, balancing on one leg as you stretched even farther.

So close, if you could just move a little more—

The sound of Rexs shower turning off pulled you out of focus, and in a sudden rushed movement you slipped. One moment you were fine and the next your bare foot was sliding across the wet floor and you went hurtling towards the tiled floor. With fingers still gripping the curtain a series of rapid pops echoed through the room as you pulled it down with you, getting tangled in the fabric as you fell with a shout. As your body hit the floor your head made contact with the bench before you finally came to rest on the wet tile.

“General! Are you alright?” A sudden figure moved into over you, kneeling next to you with nothing but a towel around their waist.

Oh kriff. Let the force take you now.

“Rex?”

“Got a little tangled up did you?” He mused, a whisper of a grin on his face as he helped you sit up slowly.

“Not my proudest moment.” Clutching the shower curtain to your chest your free hand wandered to your temple, wincing upon the contact.

“I’ll go grab a bacta patch for that.” Rex breathed, pausing to reach behind you and the grab the towel you had tried so hard to get yourself. “This might do a little better than the shower curtain.” As he spoke a pink hue returned to his cheeks before he rose to his feet. “I’ll- I’ll be right back.”

And with that he departed the room, leaving you in a stunned silence on the still wet floor. Once his figure had disappeared you shed the curtain, moving swiftly to wrap the towel around you instead before moving yourself to the bench.

Damp hair clung to the side of your face as your fingers once more moved to the welt on your temple.

Force, that did not feel good.

“How you feeling?”

As Rex returned, you watched as he crossed the room, now in nothing but his blacks. Goodness was he pretty.

“Like I wiped out on the floor of the freshers.”

A light smile tugged on the captain lips as he knelt down in front of you, peeling the wrapper off the bacta patch. “Don’t worry I won’t tell anyone.”

At that a small laugh left you, your body staying eerily still as he applied the patch to your temple. There was a moment of silence that followed before you spoke.

“Sorry for intruding on your barracks captain. I thought I could be in and out before anyone got back from the mess.”

“Eh I don’t mind.just be glad it was me and not Fives or Jesse that walked in here-“

At that you couldn’t help but raise a playful eyebrow, watching as Rex realized how his words had sounded. “Oh?”

“I- I mean just be glad it wasn’t them because they never would have let you live it down. You know how they like to tease.” He rambled, sitting back on his heels as he rubbed the back of his neck.

Force he was gonna be the death of you.

Curling your fingers around the edge of the bench , you looked at the captain in front of you. “If I’m being honest I’m glad it was you. You make me feel safe, you respect me.”

“We all respect you General-“

“Oh I know, I know. It’s just. . . I guess I trust you the most out of everyone on this ship. I know you won’t tell anyone about this. . . Rather awkward meeting.” You admitted slowly, watching as Rexs face softened.

Another band of silence settled between you and after a moment you looked down at your feet.

“I should. . . I should probably get dressed.”

It was almost as if Rex had forgotten you were in nothing but a towel because suddenly his face went rosey and he quickly shot to his feet. “Right! Right, forgive me. I’ll Uh— I’ll go make sure no one else walks in.” Giving a rather awkward salute he turned and walked away, but not before you heard him cursing himself and his awkwardness as he punched the bridge of his nose.

With that you got dressed quickly, trading out your wet towel for a pair of sleep clothes and then draping your Jedi cloak over your shoulders.

With the rest of your belongings tucked safely in your pack, you threw it over your shoulders and head for the door, finding Rex standing guard just beyond the threshold just like he said he would.

“Thank you again, Captain.” Sending him a smile you watched as he jumped slightly, startled by how you had snuck up on him.

“Anytime General.”

“You know you don’t always have to call me that right? We are friends. You can call me by my name. I call you by yours all the time.”

Rex smiled at your words as he nodded. “I can do that.”

Somewhere beyond the barracks the two of you could hear the loud sounds of Torrent Company returning from dinner in the mess, Fives boisterous laugh echoing as they approached.

“I should get going before we are swarmed by your teasing brothers.”

“Might be for the best.”

With his arms folded neatly behind his back, Rex watched you walk away, only for you to stop and rush back to him before placing a kiss to his cheek.

“And just so you know, you’re my favorite of the bunch.” You whispered, placing another kiss to his flushed face as you did, this time lingering a moment longer. “Goodnight Rex.”

And with that you were gone, leaving the Captain do the 501st in a stunned silence as his face continued to heat up.

Force, you were going to be the death of him.

#the bad batch #star wars #captain rex #captain rex x reader #captain rex imagine #kyber writes #star wars x reader #star wars the clone wars #star wars tcw

[peachesofteal]

Vanilla Latte

Same pairing as Double Espresso and Farmer's Market and yeah, I guess this is becoming a fic. thing. something. It's becoming something.

Simon Riley/reader 1.8k words Warnings-tags: 18+ Minors DNI, no smut but this fic has mature themes. There is a man staring at you in the cafe.

There is a monster in your life.

It is a shapeshifter, a horrible creature that no one else seems to be able to see. During the day, it is fairly unsuspecting and blends in with its surroundings, but at night, it sheds its skin and rears its ugly head, exposing it’s true nature when it drags itself up the stairs of your apartment complex to bang on your door, its rage filled voice calling your name over and over, forcing you into your bedroom closet, where you sit in the dark with your hands clamped over your ears. Sometimes, it hurls its entire body against your door to break it down, and you hide in your locked bathroom, knees to your chest in your tub, little pocketknife handle digging into the skin of your palm.

No one seems to know your monster exists.

No one cares that the monster followed you across an entire ocean when you tried to run away from it.

Your neighbors have turned a blind eye. Those who do see, have fallen to the bystander effect. 

The ones who were organized to protect people like you from monsters say they can’t do anything unless you have proof, or it gets worse.

You don’t bother to tell them that if it does get worse, you’ll probably just be dead.

Sometimes, you see it on the street during your walk home from work, standing with its hands in its pockets, dark eyes tracking your every step, waiting for its chance to strike. Sometimes, it follows you onto the train, a car ahead, watching you between the shoulders of the people that separate you from it, their presence the only thing preventing it from making you disappear.

You tell yourself that eventually it will get bored and move on, that it’ll go away, leave you alone for good. But days pass, and it still drags itself up your apartment stairs to torment you, still stands on the sidewalk across from your building.

Sometimes, when it’s really bad, you wonder if you should just open the door and let it kill you. Let it take what it wants, let it make you disappear forever. You think it might not be so bad, not living, if it meant you were free of the monster.

But then, the sun rises. The monster leaves and the day begins. The air is warm, and the birds chirp, and the breeze is just right, and it’s enough. It’s enough to remind you that you can feel something other than despair. It’s enough to keep you going.

And right now, that’s really all you can ask for.

“Oh good. Was starting to worry.” Your boss, Tiana, or just Tee as she constantly reminded you, breathes a sigh of relief when you come through the back door. Your apron comes off the hook easily, and then over your head before the waist ties wrap around your middle. It’s even still got some flour caked on it from yesterday. You shoot her a pointed look.

“You know, if you want to take large orders, just schedule me ahead of time, that way we’re not running around like chickens with our heads cut off.”

“It was last minute, and I couldn’t really say no. But! I am here and will help you with whatever you need.”

“Yeah, yeah.” You pull the laptop that’s sitting on the prep table towards you and scan the typed-out numbers. “Forty-five people?” you raise an eyebrow. You called me in for this? She gives you a helpless look, and you roll your eyes affectionately while she puts a mug of coffee down in front of you, heat pulsing off of it like it’s practically boiling. “Alright, let’s get to it I guess.”

Steam floats in the air from the ceramic mug that’s cradled between your fingers. You’re sitting in the back, leaned against the stainless-steel sink, sipping your fifth cup of coffee, waiting for the dishwasher to finish while Tee rings up and helps load the order that you just cranked out.

You don’t do any of that. You don’t even talk to customers unless you absolutely have to, and even then, it’s less than enticing. You leave it for Alex, who works the counter, and puts up with everyone’s bullshit with charm and grace.

You yawn, trying not to melt into the floor, wrists sore from rolling dough for the last three hours. Outside, traffic on the street hums, busses and cars and bikes all moving in the same direction down the little one-way avenue, horns honking and music occasionally blaring out someone’s window. Usually, this was your favorite time of day. After you’ve finished the afternoon rush, the prep table has been scraped and scrubbed, most of the dishes are washed, and there’s one left over croissant with your name on it. It was in these kinds of small moments, that you still felt like yourself, felt like you could enjoy things. Like you were still just a baker, just the pastry chef, just another person, out there living their life. Not a husk of a human, always looking over your shoulder, hiding from a monster.  

The back door chimes, jolting you from your spiral, and Tee hands you a folded over banknote.

“They tipped. Generously.” You frown. You don’t take tips because you’re a full wage hourly, and she knows this.

“Give it to Alex.”

“They get one too. We all do… By the way, the new scones? Orange vanilla?”

“They’re vegan.”

“I know. They’re amazing. You’ve outdone yourself.”

“Thanks, Tee.” You want to sound enthusiastic about the praise, but you’re too exhausted to get the inflection right. Instead, you just sound like a deflated balloon. Or Eeyore. Sympathy flickers across her face. You turn before she can watch your expression shift into annoyance. It’s not her fault. “Dishes are almost done.” You tell her, pulling yourself free of the apron and shrugging on your knit sweater. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“See you tomorrow.”

Every day after work, you walk the six blocks to the corner café to sit by the window with your book and a decaf latte. Vanilla, usually, or caramel if you’re feeling like it. You settle at the little table that’s almost always open because it’s rickety, balancing on three legs because the fourth one is missing a foot. You have an exchange worked out here since you bake their pastries, they give you all you can drink espresso, and you get to curl up with your book like you’re a cat every day after work. You feel safe here. You’ve never felt exposed, the café is off a side street, and as far as you knew, you’ve never been followed. You’ve never seen your monster outside here, or in this area really at all. Never seen it on Sunday mornings at the farmer’s market, or at the cramped, darkly lit bar that you sometimes stop at to grab a pint when you’re feeling up to it.

You hope that means it doesn’t know too much about your routines, but you can’t be too sure. Even so, your monster isn’t a danger to other people, just to you, never approaching you when there are others around, and that small fact brings you small slivers of relief. At least when it finally gets you, no one else will have to watch. No one else will have to suffer.

You’re reading page three hundred and two of The Name of the Wind and drinking your second decaf vanilla latte of the day, when the incident (which is what you’re calling it, in your mind) happens. The girl behind the counter is calling a name, her voice pitched with irritation, and the change in her tone immediately puts you on red alert. You scan the shop, eyes landing on a massive man with a mask and a hoodie on who’s standing by the counter, oblivious to Clarissa, who's just trying to get him to pick up his order. 

He’s oblivious, because he’s staring at you. His gaze never falters, the intensity of his eyes kicking your nervous system into high gear, and you physically clamp down on yourself, so you don’t sprint out of the coffee shop right then and there.

It’s not the monster. That is a man. This man is not your monster. 

Clarissa gives you a helpless look and gestures to the queue that’s quickly forming in front of her register. You give her a nod in return, and stride over to where the behemoth of a man stands frozen, Patrick Rothfuss still in your hand. You take a closer look at him, and swallow when you see his eyes, their amber reflection gorgeous in the afternoon sun. Something hot stirs in you, prickles across your skin and you take a sharp inhale. It’s been so long since you’ve felt the pull of attraction, felt the presence of butterflies in your stomach, that you almost mistake what you’re feeling for fear. 

Something pulls you closer to him, like you're tethered together on an invisible string. 

“Sir?” the man in the mask doesn’t respond. He just… stares at you. Okay… weird? Is this dude on drugs? “Sir.” You drop the question at the end of your statement adding a little more authority, trying to get his attention, and it seems to work, because his spine straightens, and then he nearly stumbles backwards, away from you like you’ve struck him. You blink in confusion. “I think that’s yours.” You point to the white cup that Clarissa was gesturing to, but he still ignores you. “The uh, double espresso?” Something is off here. You pull the tiny cup from the counter and hold it out to him, imagining he’ll just take it from you and be on his way but when he doesn’t move, worry starts to build in your mind. What if he can’t hear? What if he’s having a stroke? What if something is wrong? “Sir? Are you… is everything okay?” You take a tiny step closer to him.

He steps back quickly, banging into the glass side door, and it swings out behind him. A second passes, and then he’s gone, turning on his heel in the breeze, disappearing down the corner while you stand in the café, a double espresso in your outstretched hand.

#it will come back #peaches writes #simon ghost riley x you #simon ghost riley x reader #simon riley x you #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley #cod mwii #ghost x reader #ghost cod #ghost mw2 #cod mw2

[lovelyunholyc]

happy birthday, satan <3

!! nsfw !! minors, blank, ageless blogs will be blocked !!

afab! reader, use of pet names (darling, my love, good girl). soft, loving sex, fingering, praise, no dynamics (just luv :’)), unprotected sex. (if i missed anything pls let me know)

you whisper it out into the darkness of your room, staring unseeingly at the ceiling above you, wide awake despite your best efforts, hoping for your lover's support.

"satan, are you still awake?"

silence for a moment. you almost feel guilty, wanting him to join you in your misery of being exhausted but somehow unable to rest properly. you'd both worked equally hard, after all, sorting through the piles of books in one corner of his room that had started to prevent the door from opening all the way - you were the one who'd insisted on organizing them and giving away extraneous titles, an arduous task you know he'd only agreed on (though still, rather begrudgingly), because it was you who'd suggested it.

no matter how clever, or tough, or unbothered he tried to appear, satan is always ever soft for you, the only being in existence who could bring him to his knees in no more than a breath.

just before your heart can sink in your chest and you can retreat further into your sheets, reluctant to disturb him any longer, he shifts the slightest bit, signaling his wakefulness (in a capacity as yet unknown to you). his thumb begins to soothe into the skin on your hip, where his hand rests, his body still curled sweetly over yours.

you really should let him rest, but you can't help yourself now that you know he's somewhat still lucid, a smile tugging at the corner of your lips. "darling?"

"my love," he all but hums, barely parting his lips to get the words out. the gruff sound of it makes warmth stir deep in your chest. "why aren't you sleeping?"

he has the audacity to sound slightly irked - but it's too late, your energy's only growing, and any trace of guilt for possibly waking him has disappeared. you turn to face him, displacing your comfortable positions and making him groan deeper (though that sound is not unappreciated). "it's your fault for letting me nap for too long!"

satan doesn't tell you that he couldn't dream of waking you when you'd fallen asleep on the floor in his room, surrounded by stacks upon stacks of books and one even still in your hand, because he'd taken one glance at the scene before him and nearly shed a tear at the emotion that welled up within him, at seeing the things he loved the most in such a serene, contented way. instead, he finally peels his eyes open just so you can watch them roll at you. the green practically glitters even in the darkness, making you grin - you're always taken aback by the beauty of his eyes, breathtaking as they are - the only thing you love more than gazing into them is riling him up, poking and prodding at his patience to get a rise out of him.

as a result, he truly surprises you in only the best ways.

"will you help me fall asleep again?" you ask innocently enough, expecting him to suggest continuing where he'd left off in reading aloud the novel he's in the middle of once more.

instead, satan smirks, you can just make out the lovely curve of it in the low light of the moon streaming in through a crack in your curtain. his eyes glint mischievously in the dark as he surges toward you, touching his lips to your shoulder and trailing them up the line of it, up to your neck, beneath your jaw. it makes you shiver, makes your heart start to race, fingers automatically coming up to grasp at his soft blonde hair.

he finally reaches your lips to find them smiling, and he pecks sweetly at them and nips gently, a silent request for you to part for him. he hums, satisfied, when you comply instantly, licking at your lips before slipping his tongue between them, his movements languid, savoring your taste. his tongue twists around yours before he lets you part for breath, nibbling at your bottom lip once more.

he takes a moment to admire his handiwork, how quickly he'd turned you into putty in his hands, panting after him with stars in your eyes.

he is irrevocably weak for you, that is undeniable, but that didn't mean you were unaffected by him in turn.

"turn around for me, darling," satan says softly, and your breath hitches, the low cadence of his voice going straight to your core.

he props himself up on his elbow as he guides you to flip onto your other side, your back flush with his chest. you can feel his heartbeat against your back, steady and comforting through the fabric of his shirt you wear, stolen to use as pajamas. his arm snakes around your waist, slides up the hem of it, long, lovely fingers tracing delicate shapes into the skin of your stomach. he tucks his chin into the juncture of your neck and shoulder, presses kisses into your jaw before whispering, his breath tickling your ear and making you shudder, "i think this is the most effective way to wind you down, isn’t it?"

those fingers slide down your stomach, slip beneath the band of your underwear smoothly. "satan," you nearly whimper as he rubs at your clit and parts your folds, already wet just from his kiss alone.

"spread your legs a bit more, my love," he instructs gently, sending shivers down your spine. you twist to place your outer knee on the bed, allowing him better access between your legs, to which he takes advantage of instantly - his middle finger slides easily through your slit before venturing further, circling your hole. "good girl."

you call his name again and he chuckles lowly, slips his digit past the ring of muscle, down to the knuckle. your hands clutch desperately, one beneath your pillow and the other behind you to tangle into his hair, when he slides in another finger and scissors them before he starts pumping, the heel of his palm rubbing purposely into your clit. "such a good girl for me, so beautiful."

"ah, fuck, satan," you're whining, squirming in his iron grip, one of his legs tangling with yours to further pin you in place as your hips buck into his hand, his pace unhurried, enjoying you unraveling beneath him far too much.

though soon enough, you can feel his own excitement start to press into your thigh.

in a matter of minutes the pleasure rising deep within you starts to crest, each drag of his fingers pulling whimpers and moans of profound arousal from you. "satan, please-" you cry, and his own growing arousal prompts him to take mercy on you this time. he crooks his fingers in just the way he knows you like, pads of them ruthless against that sweet spot inside you, his palm pressing tightly to your clit even as you start to shudder and shake away from the friction becoming overwhelming.

"cum for me, darling, let me feel you," he nips into your ear, and you nearly sob.

as if on command, the wave of pleasure he'd been building swiftly breaks over you, and you cling to him and the sheets beneath you - anything in reach. you gasp his name like a prayer as you gush into the palm of his hand, hips stuttering in time with his movements, the altogether obscene sound of his skin smacking into your slick ringing around the room as he lets you ride your orgasm out, steady and relentless.

satan noses lovingly at your hair, the side of your face, your jaw, as you tremble gently in his hold. you come down slowly, to his fingers slipping out of you and sweeping between your folds carefully, appreciatively, your cunt pulsing once more when he brushes against your sensitive clit. the muscles in your legs are twitching, and the restless energy you had before is replaced with a dull yet deep sense of satisfaction in your gut, making your eyes and your limbs pleasurably heavy.

you suppose he'd been right.

you flip onto your back with a wide, dazed smile on your face, watching your lover through adoring half-lidded eyes as he licks his fingers clean and smirks. he dips his head to capture your lips and you welcome him eagerly, let him steal your breath just as you recover it.

"i love you," you whisper, breathless with adoration, struggling the words past the kisses he plucks from you, sweet and altogether irresistible. satan cradles your face in one hand, gentle as ever, yet the way he tastes from you is hungry, as if he can't get enough. you tug at his shirt until he slides it up and off, seek out the skin and muscle beneath it, the heat of it under your palms intoxicating. "want you, baby, please," you nip at him, beginning to get impatient at his unhurried movements and the emptiness his fingers had left behind, sliding your hand down between his legs to paw at the prominent bulge beneath his pants.

satan chuckles, eyes like emeralds glittering with equal parts mischief and lust. "my darling's so needy tonight, hm?" he teases, nudges his nose with yours, but you can see even in the low light that he's blushing furiously, hips inadvertently pressing into your hand.

you can only roll your eyes, lean in and tease him right back, graze your teeth along his earlobe until he shivers, your voice low and sultry. "only for you, my love."

something stirs in his chest, deep and desirous, spills out in a groan so heavy it sounds more like a growl, and it spurs you on, makes you nearly giddy with adoration and want.

satan is open with his love for you, abundant even, but it still takes him by surprise when you remind him you love him just as ardently, passionate and fierce in a way he could have only ever dreamed of attaining, especially from someone as wonderful as you.

it's all you need to shove his pants down his thighs, suddenly desperate to see him, feel him, nearly frantic. satan just laughs breathlessly - he can't deny your impatience, he feels just the same, like he'd fall to pieces if he didn't feel you around him anytime soon. he doesn't miss the way you lick your lips when you watch his leaking cock bob against his abdomen, your eyes glowing with a hunger that makes him feel raw and just as desperate. you always look at him anew, as if you haven't seen him naked countless times, as if you haven't memorized the places he likes to be touched, the way he likes to be handled.

you don't even have the tolerance to take your own underwear off, hitching your leg over his waist and curling over his body to press your hips together and forcing him happily on to his back as you straddle him, the tiny scrap of fabric now the only barrier between you and all but soaked with both of your juices. satan slips his hand between your bodies to shove the gusset to the side just as you line him up to your entrance, neither of you paying any mind to the sound of fabric being ripped when he accidentally applies more force than he means to. you nearly whimper when the head of his cock rubs against your clit, glides through your slick folds until finally, he slides home.

you moan in unison at the slow, gratifying stretch, his hands gripping tightly at your thighs around his waist, yours at his shoulder and the pillow beside his head.

"oh, fuck, sweetheart," satan breathes, his voice cracking in disbelief. "you're so... so tight." you gasp out what could be loosely interpreted as laughter, the feel of him inside you making your chest too tight with pleasure to qualify for much more.

despite being a demon, thriving on sin and debauchery, satan hardly curses. he sees it as uncouth, often uncreative and only necessary in certain situations. language was endless, he knew that more than anyone, so there certainly were better alternatives for most of them.

with you, however, every thought and belief he holds seems to fall to the wayside, nothing on his mind except the sweet pressure of your slick walls around his throbbing cock, the warmth of your chest against his own when you lean in because you can hardly hold yourself up - his chest always swells with pride to rival lucifer's at that, how only he can make you feel so good you nearly lose yourself.

strong hands come up to grasp at your hips and guide you into a slow grind, electricity jolting through your body when you sink down gradually and take him to the hilt, and the base of his cock massages into your oversensitive clit. "you're so good to me, beautiful," he manages, grinning drowsily when you shift to cradle his face in your hands, smiling just as dazedly, pressing lazy kisses to his face until he lifts his head and catches your lips in a messy, open-mouthed kiss.

"y-yeah? feels good?" you try to tease, but your voice breaks, as breathy as it already is with arousal, and he chuckles, brushes away hair sticking to your forehead and letting his hand linger so he can slide his thumb along your bottom lip, slick with both of your saliva and swollen from his teeth, he's sure.

"always, gorgeous," he affirms with a lopsided grin, squeezing at your ass playfully with his free hand and feeling you clench around him in response. "always."

you rock against him sweetly, rolling your hips steadily, impatience wearing away now that you have him exactly where you need him, savoring the slow drag of his cock along your walls, splitting you open so nicely.

satan can't stop touching you, elegant fingers caressing along your skin, tickling and pressing and gripping at where you're softest just to hear you hum in satisfaction, feel you twitch and shiver and moan, arching into him to greedily press more of yourself into his touch. his hands slide back and forth beneath your shirt, cup at your breasts and pinch at your nipples, squeeze at the delicious curve of your waist. he holds the hem of the fabric up to your sternum just to watch you move, mesmerized at how equally lewd and yet so beautiful the scene before him is - the deep, purposeful stroke of your hips as your needy cunt swallows down the thickness of his shaft, down to the base and back again, the pretty arc of your spine when the swollen tip nudges at your sweet spot, the way your walls clench and pulse, hugging him so perfectly.

satan thinks this, among other things, is evidence that you were made for him.

he loves how responsive you are to him, how wholly you give yourself to him, how openly you show it. he loves how soft and hot and lovely your lips feel along his skin, how you tease him with gentle grazes of your teeth on his shoulders, his neck, his jaw, just to make him groan, make him squeeze his hands around whatever part of you he's holding.

"i love you," it spills from his lips and straight into yours when he brings you back up to his face with a gentle hand at the nape of your neck, his chest tight, heart pouring his adoration into his words. you relax into his touch, eyes dazzling, lips turning up at the corners, and he could swear you're the most beautiful thing he's ever seen, even looking as wrecked as he feels. "so dearly," he finishes against your mouth when you tilt your head down to kiss him again, catching your bottom lip between his teeth before his tongue slides in, dances along with yours.

you pull away only to breathe, nipping down along the line of his jaw to reach his ear, to murmur his name against his pretty skin.

every touch from you, every whisper of your breath against him sears his skin, fills him with emotion.

and when he jerks his hips up almost involuntarily, drawn by your own irresistible movements, and you whine so high and melodious, he swears he internally explodes.

in one smooth motion satan shifts you onto your back without detaching from you, caging you in between his arms. a slow smile breaks onto his lips as he takes a moment just to admire you, the way your hair splays out around your head like a halo against the mess of pillows behind you, the way your eyes seem to overflow with desire, with love, leaking out in tiny droplets at the corners, shining in your irises. “so good to me,” he repeats, because he still simply cannot seem to believe it, “so beautiful.” satan kisses your nose in a gesture so innocent compared to what you’d been applying so far that it makes you giggle, only to be cut off abruptly when he undulates his hips.

satan groans, so rich and guttural you feel it vibrate through you from his chest. you clutch and claw at his back as he moves, taking hold of your thigh against his waist and circling his hips, digging deeper, making you cry out in response. “so beautiful,” he continues through gritted teeth, syllables breaking off between gasped breaths, melting into you and molding you to him, finding his pace and that spot inside you that makes you keen, that makes you scratch and pull at him because it overwhelms you.

“satan, satan- !!” where you were slowly building your pleasure from him snowballs soon enough, and you can feel your orgasm creeping in much faster. you plead with him, though you aren’t sure what for, your mind growing hazy and your hands clutching at his back and hugging him close, chest to chest, your hips moving on their own, stuttering up to meet him.

he can feel your walls start to spasm around him and he half-smiles, knows you’re close, presses messy kisses along your face and your open mouth just as he slips one hand between your bodies. his fingers find your clit with practiced ease, and he rubs the bundle of nerves harshly between the pads of them, slowing his hips to carve even deeper into you.

you reach your second peak so rapidly, so forcefully you think you see stars. white spots into your vision and you grasp onto your lover for dear life as he carries you over the edge and holds you there, pinning you in place with strong hands and the unwavering determination to please you as much as he's able.

"satan, fuck, i love you, i love you," you're babbling, not sure what you're saying but knowing your sentiment to be true, overcome with nothing but pleasure and your love for him, nerves singed and heart hammering in your chest.

satan isn't much better off, gasping at the tight squeeze of your perfect, perfect pussy, how your walls pulsate around his cock and make him start to lose control of his careful momentum. "fuck, darling, i-" you hug him close to your chest, and he can feel how fast your heart is racing against his own. "i love you, too," he mumbles it into your skin, and he thinks he sounds a little drunk, the words uncharacteristically slurred together. the thought is distant to him in the moment, however, as he pistons into the tight heat of your cunt, driven by the urgent sweep of his own pleasure catching up to him.

it's dizzying, the frenzied way he's moving, like he can't get enough of you - (and he never can) - but you urge him on with a gentle tug to the roots of his hair that elicits the loveliest moan from him, your walls twitching around him in response, in the aftershocks of your own orgasm.

it only takes a few more careful strokes for him to come undone, gasping your name into your hair as he sheathes himself fully inside you and spills into your needy cunt, shivers wracking through his body. you can't help but gasp at the feel of him coating your inner walls, at the delicious throb of his cock, how he fills you.

satan partly collapses over you, hardly able to support himself as the pleasure jolts through him in waves, and you accept him easily, holding him close and whispering sweet nothings as his thrusts grow sloppy and gradually fall into a slow grind. you gasp and moan along with him when his pelvis nudges insistently into your swollen clit, can't help but squirm and writhe beneath him at the oversensitivity, at the stickiness leaking out between your bodies.

when he eventually rides out his orgasm and falls fully into your arms, you're soothing your fingers into his scalp, tracing random patterns into the smooth skin of his back.

the sudden urge to yawn rises from your chest, and you can't seem to stop it, so you give in easily, starting to feel the aftermath.

satan feels it from where he's laying on your chest and chuckles, shaking you both gently.

"i think i can sleep now," you quip, and he lifts his head to smile at you, looking every bit as charming and handsome as usual even with his hair as messy as you've made it.

"don't you dare let my hard work go to waste," he replies, and pecks at your lips, can't seem to resist and comes back for another, before he parts and pulls out carefully, hissing at the loss of your wet heat, the sensitivity, and pulls his pants back up.

his eyes gloss over and he bites back a groan at the sight of his cum dripping out of your hole, how your skin glistens with how wet he'd left you.

if he didn't know how much you truly needed to rest, he would've pushed it back in, as much as he could, and worshipped you with his tongue.

instead he kisses a line down from your chin, sliding the hem of your shirt up to continue his way between your breasts (taking a detour to press chaste kisses below each swell), over your stomach, until he reaches the crux of your thighs and what's left of your underwear (which is then tossed carelessly across the bed) - and presses an innocent kiss to your clit just to make your breath catch. he grins and sits up to find his discarded shirt to wipe you down before coming back up to your open arms.

you're giggling when he kisses you again, settling into the crook of his neck and wrapping an arm around his waist.

"i'm sorry i woke you up, satan."

"oh, darling," he chuckles into your hair, doesn't say he'd let you keep him awake for as long as you could ever want. "i'm not."

#obey me satan #obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me satan x reader #obey me satan smut #om! satan #om satan #om! satan x reader #om satan x reader #satan smut #satan x reader #obey me smut #om smut #om x reader #om satan smut #om! satan smut #might b ooc but o well this was a small thing tht got out of hand and i got sick of writing it !! wanna b done !! #i wanted to include his bday in it since it was insp by the feels his events were giving me lmao #but i forgot and im tiiiired #ten.writes #satan #nsfw.

[sparklepocalypse]

Hi! I wrote RPF.

If that's your jam, stop scrolling. If it's not your jam, this is your advance notice that you'll want to scroll past this post.

“You’re straight,” Taylor points out. Nick snorts. “90% of the men in the industry are ‘straight.’ You know as well as I do that maybe half of them are honest about it.”

[Nicholas Galitzine/Taylor Zakhar Perez | E | 6.2k words]

A snippet under the jump for the folks who want a little extra preview:

Nick can pinpoint the exact moment the line disappears. They’re filming the lake scene today, both of them stripped down to swim trunks. His trunks, Nick notes, are adorable; they’re light blue with little multicolored turtles that he supposes symbolize Henry coming out of his shell. Taylor’s trunks are, like every pair of trousers the wardrobe department has put on him for this film, just shy of too snug, making his already ridiculous legs look longer and more muscular. But it’s fine. Nick’s fine. He slips in and out of Henry Mode with ease these days, putting Henry on like a second skin, only to shed him again between takes. Robbie’s off set today, but they’ve got this. They’re professionals. They’ve rehearsed this sequence until it’s second nature. As with all of the most pivotal scenes, they shoot over a dozen takes from different angles before Matthew has what he needs for the tight shots: Alex climbing up onto the float and soaking Henry with the spray of lake water from his hair, close-ups of their entwined hands, shots from above and from the left as Alex plans the future and Henry panics, Alex attempting to confess his feelings, Henry flinging himself from the float. But by the final take, it’s Nick who’s annoyed that he’s repeatedly gotten drenched, and not Henry, when Taylor-as-Alex climbs onto the float and shakes the excess lake water off onto him. Nick delivers his lines, but there’s something off about his delivery, and by the end, he’s annoyed with himself. Matthew calls, "Cut!" and Nick sighs and rubs a hand over his face.

Read the rest on Ao3!

#rwrb rpf #taylor zakhar perez #nicholas galitzine #rpf #yep i wrote that #don't make it weird #my fic

[reneeofthestars]

Reunion

Excited to share the short story I wrote for "Star-Crossed: An Anidala Zine" @anidalazine ! A "Padme Lives" AU

Words: 2,585 * Read on AO3

******************************

Padmé Naberrie Amidala, former Queen of Naboo, former Galactic Senator, and current member of the Rebellion, had been in her share of tight spots before. 

But this was the first time the tight spot was an Imperial holding cell.

She’d already examined every inch of the enclosed dimly-lit space, searching for a weakness she could exploit, but found none. There was no access panel, no loose wiring, and no ventilation system large enough for her to squeeze through. So Padmé sat on the bench and watched the door, working on what she would say when an officer inevitably came to interrogate Sola Minnau.

After all, Padmé Amidala was dead.

For a while, Padmé thought she was dead. The galaxy around her swirled in hot reds and blues, then cold blacks and whites. Grief so raw it threatened to tear her apart, pain unlike any she had experienced, then stillness. Such perfect, silent stillness. She was weightless, drifting through some gentle embrace where there was no pain. No suffering.

It was the babies’ cries that called her back.

Once she was well enough to sit upright, she held her children close to her. Leia had Padmé’s eyes; Luke had Anakin’s. She was given privacy to cry. And once she had no more tears to shed, she set to work.

Padmé contacted Sabé, and her dearest friend organized the rest. Gathering Padmé’s former handmaidens, they worked swiftly to organize a body double and a funeral, and before long, the people of Naboo mourned the death of Padmé Amidala.

Heart aching but determined, Padmé had agreed to have her children separated – from her, and from each other. Having lost Anakin, Palpatine would turn his interest to the children if he knew they lived. Obi-Wan disappeared into the Outer Rim with Luke, and Bail falsified Leia’s birth records and took her into his home.

Over the years, Padmé – Sola Minnau, now – worked closely with Bail, Mon Mothma, and other trusted allies, establishing contacts, supply lines, and information networks. They smuggled food and medicine to communities being bled dry by the Empire, and helped those in danger disappear, all while trying to bolster support to resist the ever-growing dominance of the Empire over all worlds.

They all knew the risks. If they were caught, they could be subject to execution, or worse. But Padmé couldn’t stop. She would help, no matter the cost. She had spent her childhood on relief missions with her father, and she hadn’t been able to stand by while her people suffered when she was queen. She wouldn’t hide now.

That’s the thought that kept her focused when the contact on Rodia ended up being an Imperial informant. They had barely greeted each other before Padmé was surrounded by stormtroopers. Padmé had kept quiet, giving only her pseudonym when they initially questioned her. The troopers marched her onto a shuttle, and once they’d boarded the Star Destroyer in orbit, she’d been taken to a holding cell.

She took a deep breath and leaned back against the cold wall. In the twelve years since the fall of the Republic, Padmé had never been taken aboard a capital ship. With no communication or resources, help wasn’t coming. Padmé was on her own.

The door of the holding cell hissed open. She stood as a towering black-clad figure stepped in. Coarse, mechanical breathing filled the room; Padmé forced down a shudder. They had never crossed paths, but she recognized him from endless holos and horror stories, from the expressionless helmeted mask, from the lightsaber hanging from his belt.

Darth Vader.

*

Darth Vader’s breath would have hitched if his respirator hadn’t dragged the air from his lungs and reinflated them automatically. His heart would have stopped if the cardiac regulator hadn’t measured out steady heartbeats. The servos in his legs whirred as the galaxy was swept from under his feet and he nearly fell to his knees, so overcome with the emotions that suddenly raged inside him.

Padmé was alive. Alive, breathing, not five feet away.

No, that couldn’t be. She was dead. Vader had observed her funeral on Naboo, had mourned at her tomb. This was some trick, some deception meant to rattle him; the Emperor himself was likely behind this, testing Vader’s resolve. What was this trickery then? A PROXY droid? A Force Apparition? A Changeling? Perhaps a handmaiden?

But as Vader and his dead wife stared at one another, he shakily reached out with the Force, and felt – Padmé. Her existence thrummed in the Force, whole and strong, with that same vibrance he remembered from so long ago.

But she’d never looked at him like this. Anger burning in her eyes, resolve in the set of her lips, defiance in her stance. He’d seen her look at others like this and he’d admired her dedication and determination. But to have her glaring at him now, with loathing and defiance… he felt unsettled.

Padmé didn’t waste time. “On what grounds was I arrested?” she demanded. “It’s unlawful to take a citizen into custody without disclosing the nature of the supposed criminal activity.”

The current Admiral of The Executor had been so smug when he’d approached Vader to announce that a rebel insurgent had been captured. Vader had strode to the detention block, flanked by two stormtroopers, ready to wring out all the information he could from the rebel scum –

Of course she would be with the Rebellion. The Empire was the very thing that she had been so concerned about creating during the Clone Wars.

He forced himself to speak. “Conspiracy against the Empire.” His synthesized voice rang out in the enclosed space, so warped and pitched that she would never realize who she spoke to.

But did he really want her to know? Did he want Padmé to know what became of Anakin Skywalker? To see this broken, twisted husk of what remained? Would she want to know? Vader had killed Anakin Skywalker, had carved out everything that remained of the naïve Jedi, everything that Padmé had loved, until only Vader remained.

She was speaking, and Vader said nothing. He just… listened to her voice, bringing to mind memories of her practicing her speeches the night before important Senate sessions, as he half-listened, so happy that the Force had their paths cross all those years ago in Watto’s shop –

Fury burned in Vader’s core and he let it fester, let it burn away at the memories of the man he had killed. He turned his head, addressing the two stormtroopers standing in the cramped cell just behind him. “Leave us.”

Hastily, the troopers filed out, the door sliding closed behind them.

His breathing filled the silence; Padmé had stopped talking when Vader spoke. He felt her fear, though it did not show on her face.

“Do you have nothing to say?”

She had come to him on Mustafar, knowing what he’d done. Even as she betrayed me, she loved me.

It was the last thing she said to him; Vader heard it in his nightmares, sometimes. “Stop, stop now, come back. I love you. Anakin…”

Grief welled in him, and he spoke before he could stop himself. “I thought I lost you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. We’ve never met.”

“You were alive, I knew you were, but I felt – I felt our bond break.” His emotions roiled through him. “You were gone, he said –“

Hatred .

“He said I killed you,” Vader rumbled. “He said I killed you in a fit of anger, and when I couldn’t sense you, I believed him. The Emperor lied to me. He’s kept you from me all these years, knowing that I –”

That he what? Would have left Emperor Palpatine’s side? That he would run away with his long-lost wife? That he would kill her?

Padmé’s eyes had gone wide, frightened, incredulous as she stared at him. In a small voice, so quiet he almost didn’t hear: “…Anakin?”

The anguish threatened to consume him.

“Anakin Skywalker is dead.” He paused. “I…am what remains.”

She stared at him for so long, so silently, that Vader wondered if this might be a dream after all. “What…what happened?”

“It is because of Obi-Wan that I am like this,” he hissed.

“No! He would never hurt you! He loved you –”

“Enough! I don’t need to hear empty assurances.”

Fear lingered in her eyes, but that spark had returned. “If you can’t believe he loved you, what about our love?”

“I loved you more than I can ever express. I did everything for you – I would continue to do anything for you – ”

“Except come with me.”

“You brought Obi-Wan to kill me.”

“No! I didn’t know! I didn’t know he’d snuck aboard my ship.” And Vader was startled to hear the truth of her words reverberate in the Force. Taking a hesitant step forward, Padmé’s eyes flickered between the lenses of his mask, as though trying to see through them. “All I wanted was you. For us to be safe, and happy. We didn’t need anything else. Even…even after everything you did…”

“It was necessary. To bring order to the galaxy, to gain powers of the Force that would save –” Vader stopped abruptly. “The child. Does the child live?”

She bristled, and that was all the answer he needed.  

He turned from her, but he didn’t see the cold cell around them. He saw a child splashing in the lakes of Naboo, Padmé laughing as she chased them, and Anakin Skywalker watched them from the grass, smiling and happy, whole and unburnt.

And then his vision clouded with red, and black, and Darth Vader’s fury returned, wiping out the scene of peace that had been stolen from him. Because it had been stolen from him. If he had never pledged himself to the Emperor, never razed the Jedi Temple, never succumbed to the Dark Side, if the Emperor hadn’t lied to him about Padmé’s death… 

“Anakin?”

He jolted out of his seething reverie. Padmé’s expression was carefully controlled, but Vader could sense her unease, her fear, her… hope.

Her steady voice held more gentleness than he deserved. “What happens now?”

Now, the Emperor would die. Now, Vader would have revenge. Now…

He turned on his heel and waved his hand, the cell door opening, harsh white light spilling into the dim space.

“Bring her,” he commanded.

The stormtroopers moved immediately, pulling Padmé from her cell and marching her behind him. He could feel her eyes boring into the back of his helmet, but he didn’t turn around. If he took the time to explain, he might lose his nerve.

And neither Darth Vader nor Anakin Skywalker ever lost their nerve.

*

Padmé wanted to cry. She wanted to curl into the corner of some isolated place and sob her heart out. Instead, she raised her chin and walked as upright as she could as the stormtroopers escorted her behind the towering Sith.

How had the man she loved become the most feared monster in the galaxy?

She had believed, all those years ago, that there was still good in Anakin, even as he turned his back on everything he believed because he thought it would save her. But when Obi-Wan said that Anakin was dead –

Obi-Wan. Did he know that Anakin lived? Did he know what had become of his best friend? Had Obi-Wan lied to her about Anakin’s death, the way the Emperor lied to Anakin? No, she couldn’t believe that. He had been nearly as distraught as her. He couldn’t have known.

With all her heart, Padmé wanted to believe that there was still some sliver of good left in the creature that was Darth Vader; some glimmer of Anakin that she could recognize. But the horrific things that Vader had done… She watched the Imperials scatter from him in fear as Vader led her through the maze of corridors. How many had he killed? Tortured? He continued to hunt down surviving Jedi, relentlessly pursued Rebel insurgents, left ruins in his wake.

Could there really be good left in such a man?

She had to believe there was.

The corridor opened to a hanger bay. TIE fighters, small cargo ships, and shuttles lined the platform; technicians, pilots, deck crew, officers, and troopers moved in tightly organized groups, or else with purpose from one task to another. Darth Vader ignored them all, heading straight for a shuttle.

Technicians tending to the shuttle tripped over themselves as they leapt to attention.

“Lord Vader! We weren’t informed of a scheduled departure –”

“An apt statement, as I don’t often operate on schedules.” The man flinched. “I have need of my shuttle. Is it suitable?”

“Yes, my lord! It has been returned to your specifications.”

As the deck crew hurriedly cleared away their equipment, Padmé couldn’t help a twinge of familiarity; of course Anakin would be particular about his ship. So that, at least, had remained.

Darth Vader stood at the landing ramp and faced her. The troopers shoved her forward. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his hand twitch. But he didn’t strike. Instead, he stepped in front of them. “That will be all.”

“Sir?” one of them asked confusedly.

“I am not accustomed to repeating myself.” The low, warning tone sent a shiver up Padmé’s spine.

“Yessir,” the other said hastily, stepping back. The first trooper went to speak, thought better of it, and followed his fellow soldier.

Darth Vader’s shadow fell over her as she walked into the ship. Despite the size of the shuttle, there wasn’t much room inside; half the interior was taken up by some spherical mechanism, like a ball-shaped chamber.

“What’s happening?” she asked, doing her best to keep her tone calm.

Instead of answering, Vader swept past her, cape billowing behind him as he strode to the cockpit. “Strap in until we enter hyperspace.”

Her stomach flipped. Where was he taking her? Why didn’t he bring any guards along? Tense, she lowered herself into a seat and adjusted the safety harness. Darth Vader – Anakin – no, she couldn’t think of him as Anakin – Vader sat in the pilot's seat, expertly flipping switches and adjusting controls until the ship hummed to life.

The harsh white of the hanger bay ended as they emerged into the blackness of space. She could just spy Rodia through the viewport as Vader turned the ship and input coordinates. Coordinates to where? Within moments, the stars warped and stretched, before slingshotting them into the blue-white of hyperspace.

Gathering herself, Padmé undid the harness and stood. Vader made no movement as she walked into the cockpit. Even when she stood beside him, he didn’t turn to look at her. She gazed out the viewport feeling like she was hurtling towards –

“I will take you anywhere you want to go.”

A breath escaped Padmé. “What?”

Vader said nothing.

“You’re –” she sat heavily in a little-used copilots chair. “You’re helping me escape?”

“You will be interrogated as a Rebel spy. You may be tortured, or killed. And if the Emperor discovered your identity, he may take personal interest.”

After a long moment he added softly, “I cannot lose you again.”

With a trembling hand, she reached over and touched the side of that black mask. Finally, he turned to face her. It may have been a trick of the lenses, but for just a moment, she thought she saw his eyes illuminated in the light of hyperspace. Anakin’s eyes. Luke’s eyes.

“Come with me.”

#anidala #andiala zine #anakin skywalker #darth vader #padme amidala #vaderdala #padme lives au #rebel padme au #star wars #star wars prequels #star wars empire era #star wars original trilogy #star wars fic #star wars fanfic #renee's writing #sw #padme/anakin #padme/vader #padme amidala/anakain skywalker

[lime-bloods]

i've long held that there can be no proper discussion of all trolls as "male" without acknowledgement of the drones, but for the first time i'm also wondering if this was deliberate reasoning for the drones' existence? Alternia's drones arise from a lineage of machine enforcers in fiction (Terminator's terminators and the X-Men's sentinels are both evoked in Homestuck if only in a very indirect fashion on the part of the latter), which in Homestuck is necessarily analogous to a machine patriarchy. so in contrast to this - as well as by analogy to the social structure of colony insects - i would argue trolls are almost necessarily feminine.

last night's Matrix rewatch in particular highlighted to me the sort of compromise Alternia's drones have with their trolls; Alternia's drones are biological insomuch as they require the biological processes of organisms like trolls and mother grubs to breed - in not dissimilar a way to English keeping a facade of matriarchy around his empire so long as this compromise continues to be convenient for him. but by the time the drones arrive on Earth, this pretense has seemingly disappeared entirely. drones no longer enforce reproduction in any meaningful way; they are, essentially, drones for drones' sake.

i guess implicitly the ultimate robotification of the troll empire, as with the shedding of superfluous biological elements like caste and, eventually, trolls themselves, is all English-as-Terminator's design. by forcing reproduction and adherence to the design on pain of death, the drones even act out on a microcosmic scale what English does on a universal level; the culling drone becomes an avatar of the inevitability of death that English represents. i ponder, even, if the idea of a drone as a male insect born from an unfertilised egg is alluded to at all by Caliborn as a male creature born from a failure to absorb his feminine half?

#homestuck #caliborn #drones

[celtic-crossbow]

You Wanna Shut Away the Pieces of a Broken Heart

Pairing: Daryl Dixon x Carol Peletier (Seemingly Unrequited)

Setting: Alexandria (Commonwealth Arc)

Warnings: None

Summary: Carol makes assumptions that could break her in the worst way.

A/N: A follow-up to Two Sinners Can’t Atone from a Lone Prayer. Can stand alone but I recommend reading that one first.

The chaos had been endless. One blow after another, both personally and against the people of the communities. Alexandria was the last one standing, being rebuilt after the brutality with the promises of support from an ally Carol still found suspicious. 

A few people would be moving to the Commonwealth, seeking trustworthiness before committing fully to a partnership in expanding. It would be like the old world, they had claimed, with jobs and currency and recreation and businesses. There was electricity and phones and even computers with basic capabilities of data collection and storage. 

Carol had learned over the years that if something sounded too good to be true, it usually was. 

Regardless of the changes to come, she couldn’t help but linger on one significant change that had nothing to do with Alexandria or the Commonwealth, but with her relationship with Daryl. 

She was up before the sun as usual, making coffee and preparing breakfast for the kids and the archer, covering it and placing it in the oven to keep it warm. Alexandria had limited solar power at that time, so she would usually tend to her tasks by candlelight, conserving as much energy as possible aside from the stove. It was only the mornings when she was late to wake, that everyone enjoyed a hot, fresh meal. 

She stood at the kitchen island, her duties done and bags packed for the move the next day. The sun was up and so were Judith and RJ. She fed them before they went out the door, RJ to play and Jude to see what she could do to help. 

That only left Daryl. He never slept late. She wondered if he’d gone outside the walls again to hunt or scavenge. There was a time when he’d tell her beforehand but with the wedge that had pried open such a gaping void between them, he never offered that courtesy anymore. She deserved it after all she’d put him through; disappearing and keeping her secrets, worrying him to no end. There had been no fairness toward him from her. 

Sighing heavily, she drained the last of her coffee and grabbed the laundry basket. Organization meant more to her those days, a simple sign that not everything was out of her control. She wanted everything to be ready for the move, anything she could do to make the transition easier. 

Judith’s laundry was neatly piled in one corner. The girl had always been considerate toward those who did anything for her. RJ, on the other hand, always sent Carol on a scavenger hunt. He was still young so the most she would do was give him a gentle reminder after finding all the articles he had shed in twenty different places in the house.  Daryl was a combination of both kids. His laundry was scattered about but only in his room, never left anywhere else. 

There was a time when she would enter his space without a second thought. The room no longer felt inviting. It was a tad bit easier when he wasn’t home but she still hesitated.

Finally turning the knob and following the door as it opened, she froze. 

Daryl was still in bed. Shirtless and on his side, snoring softly and utterly oblivious to her presence. The single sheet that covered him lay low over his hips, the elastic band of his boxer-briefs just above it. The archer had been a light sleeper for as long as she had known him, waking and fully alert at the slightest sound. The fact that he was still sound asleep concerned her. 

Her brow furrowed, blue-gray eyes narrowed. With all that had happened, when was the last time she had seen him sleep? The cabin before they had parted ways to walk on separate sides of the canyon that now lay between them. The dark circles beneath his eyes were telling. 

He was exhausted. 

She knew she should walk back out the door and close it behind her, give him privacy to rest, but she couldn’t seem to make herself move. It was the first time in a long time she could feel the slightest touch of the bond they had once shared. The comfort he’d felt in her company alone to be vulnerable. She had felt—still felt the same around him. Though there was anger and sadness and a trepidation surrounding it now, he was still her comfort. 

Her person. 

The man she loved. 

The only man she had ever truly loved. 

She had been ready to tell him once, as she watched him from the tent during the building of the bridge, twisting Ezekiel’s ring on her finger. The jewelry had never belonged there. The thought of it made the skin of that digit burn. After that, Daryl had vanished to chase a ghost and she had run away to chase a fairytale. They had each returned empty handed. 

Then he told her about Leah; everything about Leah. 

Carol knew that he had never been hers, would never be hers. He had never said he loved Leah, but his note had screamed the affirmative. 

I belong with you. 

All the years surviving together, Daryl had never taken a lover. He had never seemed interested. When he told her that Leah had been the first since before the end of the world, she had to fight to keep her schooled mask in place while her heart had shattered. Why had she ever thought she could be that first for him?

Stifling the sob that had worked its way up to push against the back of her teeth, she quickly gathered his clothing and left the room with one last glance at his rarely seen peaceful face. When the door closed, she felt the metaphorical door between them more strongly than ever before. 

Their luck had run out. He was still her closest, dearest friend. She knew he felt that way too. 

I’m never gonna hate you. 

That would never be enough for her, but she was a master at being someone else. And this time, the mask she would wear was one of a woman that hadn’t fallen in love with Daryl Dixon. 

Carol placed her palm flat against his door and closed her eyes, a single stray tear falling to splash silently—yet somehow deafening—onto the floor. 

No, he would never be hers, but

“I belong with you, Daryl.”

#murda writes #daryl dixon #carol peletier #caryl #twd caryl #caryl fanfiction #caryl angst #caryl fandom #daryl dixon x carol peletier

[saltygilmores]

DANCE MARATHON EPISODE-PART 4

Before we begin, I have some fun news. today I learned that my Tumblr nonsense will be discussed on a podcast. My DALA (Dean and Lorelai Affair) theory will be discussed! How rad is that?! Please give my friends at Gilmored! a follow and tune in. It will air next Thursday, March 7th.

Speaking of DALA tomfoolery, of which there is thankfully not too much of in this episode...this is where we left off...

Hey! Why hasn't that T Rex devoured Dean and Lorelai in her mighty jaws yet?

Lorelai does not stop Puppy-Eye'ing him throughout this entire exchange. She breaks eye contact only for a moment to glance at Rory. In fact, I don't think she blinks.

Maybe we'll all get lucky and there will be a catastophic bleacher collapse. Look at the way this tiny boy in a thrift store castoff bin green coat parted that dance floor like Moses parting the red sea. He carved that crowd of people up like a Thanksgiving turkey, which he won't eat because he's a vegetarian or like he will soon be carving out Shane's internal organs. The dancers are trembling in awe and fear. Taylor Doose desperately calls for security, but no one arrives to save them.

Dean Forrester besat his own goofy very much non dancing keester upon the same bleachers above Jess, causing Lorelai to remark seconds earlier that "Spectator Ken" (Dean) was "sweet" for just showing his goofy face at the thing at all and paying them a mediocre compliment. This was also after she heard an explanation from Rory earlier in the week that he had no intentions of dancing, hence Rory and Lorelai becoming dance partners in the first place, and she reserved all judgement for Dean. Rory "Salty" Gilmore concurs that Jess' sitting abilities pale in comparison to Dean's to please her mommy. Also, I had to look up another stuffy old timey reference for "Martha Graham."

Poor Shane. So blissfully unaware.

You think Dean ever just confidently grabs Rory by the back of the neck and pulls her in for a kiss like that? Hell no. At least Shane will die happy with the taste of Jess in her mouth, maybe in more ways than one, the night is still young, hey hey.

Rory throwing J&S this look is the origin of the name SaltyGilmores (Back in my Twitter days).

Just noting the time for any true crime podcasters who might need that information to try and solve a Swan Murder.

The puke jacket has been shed. The night is fully underway. And Shane will be fully underwater. Since it was a one of a kind donation bin find, he wouldn't want to get any blood spatter on it. It would be hard to find a replacement. I understand. The black shirt will also be helpful in hiding the blood stains.

What are you looking at, number 34? You putz. I can't believe I may actually semi-defend you later, you goofy ass. Taylor announces a barbaric ritual in which the remaining dancers must run laps around the gymnasium and the 5 slowest couples will be eliminated, taken out behind the school, and processed into hamburger patties to be served at the diner. Although the Gilmores survive the Running of the Lamewads, Lorelai soon faces the wrath of Jackson for meddling in his and Sookie's marriage (which she didn't really do, for once).

Line up in an orderly fashion behind Shane at the back of the school and you can both be axed to death if that's what you really want. The size of the crowd on the bleachers appears to have ballooned in the last minute, and I was hoping to see Jess and Dean and Shane react to the Running of The Goof Troop, but I could not seem to find them. Well, I can only guess why Shane and Jess disappeared. Boooiiinggg. We'll catch up with them in just a moment.

Just a sea of dead bodies. Nothing to see here, True Crime Podcasters.

Has Luke been standing there for 14 hours?

#im gonna be so famous #gilmore girls #denise rewatches gilmore girls #dance marathon #tsgdt #they shoot gilmores dont they #gilmore girls season 3 #rory gilmore #lorelai gilmore #jess mariano #shane #shane campbell #dead shane #shane is swan food #murder on the dance floor #ha ha ha ha stayin alive not really

[greaterspawnislands]

haiii i wrote a fitpac fic and i wanted to get it done before wilbur's return so here it is :)

Here's the thing. Fit is happy that Wilbur's back. Really, he is! Everyone is happy that Wilbur's back. Tallulah, of course, is overjoyed. Fit doesn't think he's seen the young egg leave Wilbur's side once since he reappeared at spawn. Their reunion was exactly the kind of overdramatic, sickeningly sweet scene that everyone imagined it would be. Tears were shed, there was music, all of that shit. Phil, too, has been visibly relieved by Wilbur's homecoming. It had been a little rocky for the old bird at first, as it took him a while to stop thinking that Wilbur would disappear every time Phil turned his back. But Phil quickly adapted, as he always did, and in time he managed to quell his worries. Everyone is excited that Wilbur is back. Chayanne is excited. Tubbo is excited. Quackity is excited. Even Pac is excited. Here's the thing. It's not like it's a big deal that Pac is excited that Wilbur's back. Pac hadn't gotten to meet Wilbur before he managed to escape the island to go on tour of all things, of course he'd be excited to meet a rockstar upon his return. But there's something odd about the way Pac has been behaving around Wilbur. Something that makes Fit's skin itch and his stomach twist and makes him want to do nothing but work in the elevator shaft with Ramón so long as Wilbur is online. He wants to blame it on some kind of Federation-mind-altering bullshit, but in his heart he knows that's not the case. Wilbur is the same as he's always been, Fit knows the guy well enough for that. Nothing's changed with him, he's only returned to the island with more stories and, frankly, much less trauma than the rest of this people on the island. Fit kind of envies him for that, he'll allow himself that much. But, no, it's Pac. He's the only one who's acting different. The way he looks as Wilbur, it's like the guy may as well have stretched up with all six-and-a-half feet and hung the sun in the sky. Fit remembers when Pac used to look at him like that, like Fit hung the stars for only Pac to see.

READ HERE

reblogs appreciated ^-^

#fitmc #qsmp fitmc #pactw #qsmp pactw #qsmpshipping #fitpac #qsmp fics #my writing

[genuine-wrestleboy]

freeze or fawn (1/2)

words: 6,396

You couldn’t have known it was too good to be true. Your aunt wanted someone to watch her house while she spent the next two weeks on a singles cruise to Alaska, and you’d jumped at the excuse to take the time off from your soul-numbing retail job and get lost in the fantasy of a life where you could afford anything more than your dingy studio apartment. Two weeks of lounging around and picking at the massive cake your aunt left behind as a thank-you, reading by the huge bay windows, occasionally dusting something—you could certainly think of worse ways to spend your time. It’s a lovely little dream, full of rosy anticipation (and also seriously so, so much cake), for about twelve hours.

You're nodding off in front of an old horror movie in the living room when something crashes out in the backyard. It startles you into bleary wakefulness, and you notice that the mass of shambling undead on the screen has been replaced by the brittle neatness of a very-early-morning news broadcast. The grim-faced anchor is saying something about…a fire? The photo inset over their shoulder shows a building consumed by flames, the scrawl beneath it announcing, ‘Fire At Local Haunted House Attraction’. You lean in, blinking, and realize that you recognize the name of the place as it scrolls across the screen—you’d passed it on your drive here, not ten minutes away. The coverage seems to be happening in real time, and you’re struck with a strange, distant thrill at the idea of a place you’d just seen being reduced to ash right now, as you sit here, close enough that you could probably see the smoke from the yard. You hope no one was inside.

As if summoned by the thought, there comes another loud crash, followed by a thunderous banging noise. It sounds like something heavy stumbling around, blunt aimless trauma. You don’t remember where you heard it, but somewhere in your mind is the vague knowledge that animals sometimes wind up in residential areas when fleeing from fires, panic overriding all instincts but survival. Given, you think that's usually forest fires, but it doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibility that a deer has gotten into the backyard and gotten itself stuck amongst your aunt’s carefully manicured shrubbery.

 Levering yourself off the couch, you roll your shoulders to ease some of the tension out of them and type 911 into the keypad on your phone. You’d like to consider yourself the sort of conscientious animal lover who would take the risk to bring out water for a creature in need, but you’re also not entirely stupid. The idea of a burglar has occurred to you. You don’t call, yet, but it brings you a certain assurance to have it ready, just in case.

Silence; the house seems to hold its breath with you, waiting. You inch towards the back door with your phone clutched to your chest. There’s no further sign of movement, which you take as a sign that things are probably okay, if only because you’re pretty desperate for things to be okay. What you’re about to do is an objectively bad idea if they’re not.

Easing open the door, you step out onto the porch. The yard is washed grey in the pre-dawn light, all long, eerie shadows that make it hard to get your bearings. The grass is freezing under your bare feet, wet with dew and then—suddenly—simply not there anymore. You sort of skip-hop to keep your balance, ankle twisting dangerously sideways as you step hard into a shallow divot in the earth. In the poor light it had been easy to miss, but as you crouch now you notice a long, gnarled trail of torn grass, big clods of mud tossed around like someone’s been at it with a spade. In one direction, it disappears around the side of the house, towards the gate of the fenced-in yard. In the other, it drags towards your aunt’s garden shed. 

The door of the shed hangs open, cracked nearly in half and swaying sadly.

Environmental storytelling, you think, a little hysterically.

You should go back inside. You should go back inside, you should lock the door behind you, and you should put that 911 call through. There is a smart, correct way to respond to this situation, and it definitely doesn’t involve any of the several actions you take that lead to you standing at the dark open doorway, shining your phone flashlight down at the mangled remains of the padlock that once held it shut.

You’re not a wildlife expert by any means, but you feel pretty confident concluding that no deer did this. 

Maybe you hear something, then, a creaking, a shuffle, the pinched sound of metal against metal. One second your phone is in your hand, and then it isn’t—one second your feet are on the ground, and then they’re not. The world spins, all of the air leaving your lungs in a single moment of bruising impact as your body hits the interior wall of the shed. 

Pain catches up to you slowly, trickling down to you through several layers of panicky, breathless confusion. Something heavy is pressed against the back of your neck, keeping you pinned in place, and as your eyes begin to adjust you can make out the shape of a huge hand flat along the wall by your face. You suck in a desperate breath and almost gag; there’s a stench in the air so thick you can feel it on your tongue, an old rot smell like the bottom of a disused dumpster, settled and calcified. Over it hangs the heavy scent of smoke so fresh you almost expect the heat of fire with it. You want to cover your nose, but your arm is pinned at an odd angle by your chest, lost to pins and needles.

The shape behind you leans in, the vague suggestion of a person in your peripheral vision.

“Make a sound, and you die.”

Dread drops a cold, leaden weight in your gut. Whoever this is, they speak like a nightmare. It's a broken, metallic approximation of a human voice, filtered through miles of static and rage. 

One of those voice changers maybe? It's a really good one if it is. You don't want to think about what it means if it's not.

"Do you live here?"

You swallow a whimper and try to shake your head.

A growl. "Who does?"

Is this a test? You risk a quick glance back, which doesn’t actually get you much besides a heavy sigh, the sound clicking in and out like a bad radio transmission. 

“You can answer the question.”

Hang on, is that an accent? Is the monster in your aunt’s garden shed British? Your mind catches on the unexpected detail like a hangnail. You must be going into shock.

“My aunt,” you manage hoarsely. “I’m, I’m watching it, while she’s away.”

“You’re alone?”

“Yes,” you say, and he hmms thoughtfully.

A beat of perfect stillness, terror like a knot in your throat. It occurs to you belatedly that you probably should have lied.

You watch the line of daylight cut its way slowly across the floor. Without warning, the weight disappears from your neck, but it’s replaced immediately by a hand so broad the fingers meet at your throat. The grip is tight enough to make you dizzy, and you barely resist the mad urge to lean into it.

"Well, then," he says, dark and low. "Invite me in, won't you?"

You swallow painfully. You still can’t get enough air to scream, and even if you could, the closest neighbors are too far away to hear it. The prospect of privacy had been exciting—the high fence, all that land, a couple weeks without overhearing next-door’s gossip or accidentally making eye contact through a window. You’d been excited!

And now you’re going to die in your pjs, and not even your good pjs, in a grubby anime shirt you’ve owned for a over a decade and athletic shorts you bought during the extremely optimistic month and a half when you’d convinced yourself that you were going to take up jogging. You can’t decide if you want to laugh or cry.

"After you."

Pushing you forward, your captor marches you back across the yard. It's full morning now, warmth creeping up through the leaves, but none of it reaches you. Your limbs feel numb and far away, like you're not really here, like you're just waiting to wake up. This sort of thing isn't supposed to happen in broad daylight. You can't make it feel real. 

Ahead of you, your shadow cuts a long black trail over the grass. Another stalks next to it, twice as broad and strangely long. You stare and stare at the place where they connect.

The going is tricky enough even in the light, and the fact that you can’t look down to watch your step certainly doesn’t help. Every time you trip—and boy do you trip—your captor lets out an irritated snarl and hauls you back upright, sending stars dancing across your vision. By the time you reach the steps to the porch, you half expect him to just drag you up by the neck and be done with it.

Instead, he yanks you to a stop. You stand there a moment, catching your breath as he taps a finger against your throat, considering.

“Can’t be helped, I suppose,” he says finally, and slings you gracelessly over his shoulder.

You exhale, an audible oof, and hear him snicker beneath you. Despite his obvious strength, he’s all bones, wiry and sharp, and his shoulder digs painfully into your stomach. In this position the smell hits you afresh too, stronger than before, and you’re almost grateful for how the smoke overpowers the rest of that putrid moth-ball musk.

Letting out a shallow breath, you brace your palms against his back and notice for the first time that he’s covered in moldering greenish fur. A whole suit of it, waxy and thinning and disconcertingly slick to the touch. You have no idea how to process this new information.

From your vantage point you watch the ground change from grass to wood to the blue-checked tile of your aunt’s kitchen. You stare at the oven as drawers rattle open and slam shut behind you, an increasingly more frustrated search for…something. What? Valuables? Is he robbing you?

Is he going to carry you the whole time while he does?

Eventually you hear something snap, and the hand holding you steady slides lower, pausing at the small of your back then, slower, towards your thigh.

"Bend your legs."

Maybe you should be less amenable, but you obey without thinking. In your haste, you kick back a little, and your foot makes contact with something solid and soft. It earns you a grunt of pain, and your blood ices over.

Fuck. There is a non-zero chance that you just kicked him in the face.

"Sorry!" you blurt desperately. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, oh god. I'm so sorry."

"Keep still," is the hissed response.

So you do, you keep perfectly still, you don't even breathe as something is wound and wound around your ankles.

Then, without fanfare, you're dropped back down to the floor. You wobble dangerously, grabbing at the edge of the countertop for balance. Your feet have been tied together with a length of extension cord, loosely enough to allow you to stand on your own but not much more than that. You doubt you could even walk without assistance.

It doesn’t look like a complicated knot, though. With your hands still free, you could probably get it undone fairly easily.

You’re not going to say that, of course, but you feel like you should say something, so you look up, mouth twisting, and see your captor in full for the first time.

He’s a rabbit. A huge, grinning thing, scabby with decay and ragged with gaping holes. Loose, frayed wires stick out of him at haphazard angles, and here and there exposed metal gleams beneath the faux fur like bone. There is also, horribly, something that looks like actual bone, knitted with stringy, bloodless tendons. It's a gruesome, twisted merging of flesh and steel, an impossible amalgamation of—

"Oh," you say, feeling stupid. It's a costume.

"Oh?" prompts the man in the rabbit suit. You get the feeling that he'd be raising an eyebrow if you could see his face. 

The mask is heavy-lidded, which lends its expression a permanent sleepy smugness, but the eyes that watch you from behind it are silver and sharp as a scalpel blade. Those eyes could undress you in an instant—wait, no, that's not, you didn't—could see right through you, you meant, could peel open your heart and know you, not like.

Jesus, why did your brain jump straight to undressing?

You clear your throat self-consciously. 

“Did—you came from Fazbear Frights, right?” you ask, voice cracking. “Were you in the fire? Were you hurt?”

He tilts his head, one ear flopping to the side. A deep, wheezy laughter grinds out of him in bursts, like he hasn’t laughed in a very long time and hadn’t expected to now.

"Not in the fire," he says cryptically, then before you can recover, "Where's the bathroom?"

You open and close your mouth, feeling thrown. “Uh, there’s one around that far corner there, up the steps from the living room. It’s, like, the couch is here, and you kind of go this way.”

The man in the rabbit suits watches your attempt at miming the layout of the house and then stares at you in unresponding silence.

“Or I could show you,” you offer weakly.

He gestures you ahead.

As it turns out, you can walk on your own, because he certainly doesn't offer to help, but you manage to hobble your way along with a hand braced against the wall. As if it wasn’t already impossible not to be painfully aware of his presence, he follows closely enough that you keep accidentally bumping into him. You fluster and apologize, which he mostly ignores except for a single, flat, “Watch where you’re going, then.”

His footsteps are heavy against the hardwood, a drag-and-scrape like bare metal, like claws.

By the time you reach the bathroom, the anxiety churning in your gut has spread itself out through your whole body. You hover awkwardly by the doorway, clasping your clammy palms together.

“In,” he orders, pointing.

“I—with you?” you ask.

He rolls his eyes, the movement especially conspicuous in his otherwise unmoving face. “I’ll just leave you out here to run, shall I? Do you think I’m stupid?”

You blank. “I don't even know you.”

It’s the truth, but It's the wrong thing to say. He looms over you, craning into your space until the muzzle of the mask brushes against your temple. You inhale shakily and hold it.

“Get. In.”

His breath is fetid and hot and thick with threat, and an electric thrill goes through you. You bite back a little gasp, well aware that it’s not an entirely frightened sound. You're gonna have to unpack that later, if you survive long enough.

The man in the rabbit suit stills—oh god, did he notice?

Then again maybe it's fine if you don't.

“Got it,” you say quickly, and go.

He follows you in and shuts the door, drawing a line in the air between you and the toilet.

“Sit.”

You sit. He pins you with a look, then turns and goes to the mirror above the sink. You watch him hunch over the pedestal, fingers cracking into the porcelain as he turns his face slowly back and forth. Raising a hand, he scrapes his fingertips across the mask and makes a choked sound that might be a laugh, though it wavers terribly at the edges. Without the force of his attention on you, you notice how slowly he lifts his arm, how deliberately. The brown of old blood discolors his suit in big patches, and you wonder now if some of it is real. He moves like he’s in pain.

“Do you,” you begin hesitantly, “I can bring you to a hospital, if you want?”

He huffs. “There’s nothing a hospital could do for me that I couldn’t do myself.”

“Are you a doctor?”

The question seems to please him. He glances at you in his reflection, eyes bright. “As far as my current needs are concerned, I am close enough.”

He brings both hands to the jaw of the suit and begins to feel along the edge of it, occasionally hooking a finger into the frame and yanking at it in a way that makes you wince. You catch yourself clutching your own face in sympathy.

“What happened to you?” The question slips out before you can stop yourself. You don’t actually expect him to answer; you barely understand why you asked it.

He does, though.

“Total springlock failure.” He hits every consonant like it has wronged him. He looks at you again while he does, and though you know that logically the mask can’t have changed, there’s something about the expression now that’s almost playful. “It killed me, unfortunately, but it’s incredible what one can learn from such a setback.”

Killed him? What is he talking about, what does he mean, killed him?

“What?” is all you can manage before whatever he’s doing with the suit succeeds. The mask clicks and cracks apart at the jaw, and he lets out a triumphant sound. In the mirror, his face comes into clear view.

Killed him, is all you can think, the words spinning through your mind like the blades of a blender, killed him, killed him, whirring everything else to so much pulp.

Familiar eyes burn at you from the dark sunken sockets of a skull, yellowed teeth hanging from grey, lipless gums, cheeks desiccated and hollow, a narrow nose that ends abruptly in jagged darkness. The skin clinging to his bones is purple with bruisey settled blood, and the bottom half of his face is bolted into the mask of the suit by a long steel bar that punches clean through his mandible. He registers your attention with a cold, mirthless grin.

“If you’re going to be sick, don’t do it on the floor.”

You laugh, because it feels like you might scream if you don't.

“This is a weird joke,” you tell him.

"Know that I am built up of death from head to foot," he replies, still grinning, and smashes a heavy mitted fist into the mirror.

You scream anyway, the sound startled out of you as a rain of shards clatters into the basin and onto the countertops. Overwhelmed, you cover your face with your hands and try to focus on breathing. You can’t look at him anymore, there’s too much to process, too much you don’t understand. The world feels dangerously thin right now, wet tissue paper in the hateful grip of this grisly stranger. What is springlock failure? How could it—no, because he can’t actually be dead, he’s standing right there, he’s speaking to you, he—

You hear the sounds of the water turning on, the skreak of metal against glass. Is he taking a shower? What the fuck is going on? Adrenaline ebbs out of your system, a wave of exhaustion swelling in its wake. You don't want to think about this, you want to sit here in the white-noise hiss of the spray and wait for it all to go away.

It doesn't, but you hadn't really expected it to. The showerhead gutters and falls silent. Movement, shuffling, on the periphery of your hearing.

“Look at me.”

Words cannot describe how much you do not want to do that. You feel a little stupid, sitting here about as safe and hidden as an ostrich with its head in the sand. You still can’t convince yourself to move.

His voice gets closer. "I don't like to repeat myself."

Water pools by your feet. You look up, one quick movement like tearing off a bandaid. The man in the rabbit suit crosses his arms across his ruined chest. You’re not sure if he’s actually any cleaner, but he’s certainly wetter. The mask is still folded back, trails of grey water falling from the empty sockets like tears. Dark, sludgey residue coats the floor of the shower stall.

With evident strain, he lowers himself to his knees. The suit creaks and groans with the effort, and he makes an irritated noise.

“Give me your hands.”

Concern and curiosity tangle in your chest. “Why?”

The flat slash of his mouth tightens. “Now.”

Barely breathing, you place your hands in his. Wet fur and metal, strangely warmed by their brief time in the water. Sharp where the fingertips bite out, but he touches you with an almost unsettling gentleness. You nearly snatch your hands back when you realize what he’s doing; it’s that gentleness that stops you.

And then your palms are flush against his skin. Cool and leathery, and where the bruising is darkest alarmingly soft, like an overripe fruit. You lean closer, letting your touch travel downwards, half expecting the color to come off on your fingers. He grits his teeth, but he doesn’t stop you. You can see the ligaments working in his jaw.

Your thumb brushes the juncture where metal intersects with bone, and you bite your tongue so hard you taste blood. There’s a crack in the bone where the light comes through, drawn in perfect tandem with a puckered purple scar. Terrible understanding draws its slimy length up your spine. Your fingertips tingle. It’s real. It’s real. 

How?

He watches you in heated silence, and nothing about his expression is even close to readable. His eyes are intense, though, and your heart thrums behind your ribcage. His hands curl around your arms, swallowing your wrists, the prick of metal against the delicate pulse points. Your pulse courses three times its size, pressing out and out until you’re sure that if he broke skin, you’d burst.

Maybe you imagine that he sways towards you; maybe he does. 

Scoffing, he takes your hands and drops them in your lap. “Satisfied? Or am I still a joke to you?”

You can’t quite catch your breath. You shake your head.

He turns away and snaps the mask shut again. 

“You know,” he says, a horrible slow sort of thoughtful that you hate before he even finishes the sentence. “I think I’ve changed my mind.”

The whiplash of the moment hits like a slap. “What does that mean?”

“I think,” he says, reaching for the cord that binds your feet together, “That I want you to run.”

With a single sharp twist, the knot comes apart. Your knees fall open, legs spreading.

He leans forward, hand on your thigh, and speaks it right into your ear: "I'll give you a headstart."

Cold adrenaline roots you to the spot. “I don’t—”

“Ten. Nine. Eight.”

You jump up, shoulder jolting his chin as you trip over the coils of cord and stumble towards the door. You catch yourself on the doorframe, throwing yourself towards the stairs, praying momentum can keep you going past the spreading feeling of your body shutting down around you. You only miss the last couple of steps, but you land badly, and pain lances through your ankle. You pull yourself around the corner and make a dash for the kitchen. There’s a cupboard under the sink that’s big enough for you to fit in, technically, though not nearly enough to be comfortable. You used to hide there all the time when you played hide-and-seek here with your cousins as a kid.

It did mean you always got caught, but that doesn’t have to mean anything right now.

You shove a bucket to one end of the cupboard and climb in. You have to kind of fold yourself up on your side, but the door closes without pinching anything, and you take that as a success. Not long after that you hear the stairs creaking, that strange metallic footfall on the carpet, then on the wood, the squelch of wet fur remnants. 

He paces in the opposite direction, towards the front door, and pauses there. You press a fist against your mouth and will your breathing to even. In and out, you tell yourself, in and out. It takes four long breaths for him to start moving, again, though when he does he's moving fast, headed without doubt in your direction. You squeeze your eyes shut. He walks right past, and you hear him stop suddenly again. He's close enough that you can hear the ragged, panting way he's breathing, anger distorting it to growls in his throat. Something makes heavy impact with the back door, the wood audibly cracking and giving way.

When the footsteps resume, the gait is measured, deliberate, the cautious confidence of a predator in tall grass. From carpet to wood to the unmistakable click of the kitchen tile.

"Ready or not," he sing-songs quietly.

It occurs to you that you chose to hide in the only room in the house that you know he knows how to search.

Three scraping steps in your direction, and then silence. Your heart is pumping so hard and fast that he'll probably find you from the sound alone when you start vibrating against the floor. Your ankle is starting to ache, but you don't risk moving it.

From directly outside the cupboard comes a series of creaks and groans. One leg of your shorts pulls taut against your hip, then relaxes. It happens again, twice in quick succession. You twist around to see what you’re caught on, banging your elbow painfully against a pipe. You don’t manage to stifle your hiss of pain, but it quickly becomes clear that you could make all the noise that you want and it wouldn't change a thing.

Your shorts are closed in the cupboard door, a corner of them hanging out into the kitchen like a flag, waving surrender. As you watch, a shadow grows in the line of light below the door, and you feel what you recognize now as someone tugging on them. Once, twice, then a third time.

Someone, like it could be anybody else. 

“Here I come," croons the corpse in the rabbit suit.

It's all the warning you get before the door rips from its hinges, and a huge paw wraps around your ankle. You find yourself dragged out onto the kitchen floor, pain shooting up your leg.

Charged, achey stillness, the moment between a lightning strike and its thunder. You stare up into the leering mask, the eyes that burn at you from behind it. He stares at you like he's trying to take you apart. You're about ninety percent sure that you're about to die, and there's something seriously wrong with you because you're also possibly the most turned on you've ever been in your life.

“Why didn’t you try to leave?”

The question doesn't parse right away, but when it does your face flushes with embarrassed heat. The thought hadn’t even occurred to you. You gape at him wordlessly.

He tuts, all sympathy.

“Something of a dim bulb, are we?” He cups your jaw in his hand, fingers caging it from end to end. His eyes flicker over your face, and you can only imagine what he must be seeing. You can feel how flushed you are, can hear the shallow gasping of your breath. He turns your face into the light and you blink rapidly at how it stings; your pupils must be huge.

He tilts his head to one side and stays that way, impossibly still.

"Or could it be," he muses idly, "that you wanted me to find you?”

It's like a physical blow, the wave of lust that hits you. You squirm underneath him, every inch of you prickling with gooseflesh, fingers flexing ineffectually against the floor.

"Tell me, do you have a deathwish? No, I don't think you do. "

His thumb slides along your bottom lip, the texture catching your skin in a way that makes you shudder. He watches you with a fierce kind of curiosity, hungry and keen. You let out a little gasp and open your mouth to him, and he slides the digit fully onto your tongue.

“Well,” he chuckles, “this is an unexpected development.”

You pant around his thumb, your tongue lolling further out as he eases back towards your throat. Against your better judgment, you close your mouth and suck, pulling him in, swallowing hard as your mouth fills with the taste of rust and sour rot. A deep, snarling sound rolls through his chest, and he pushes inexorably forward, forward until you’re choking on him. Tears well up and fall, a heady, hazy heaviness spreading into your limbs as your conscious sensation softens into vague awareness, the hulk of him hunched over you, the pleasant ache in your throat. Your body, reshaping itself to fit him.

With a sudden, harsh motion, he levers your jaws apart, wrenching his hand away to leave a slick trail of your own saliva down your chin, your throat.

“Stay with me, now,” he coos.

"Who are you?" you ask deliriously. Your voice comes out in a breathless rasp.

He laughs. "A fair enough question, I suppose." Sharp fingertips prick at the skin of your neck. "They called me The Springtrap, at that tacky little mockery they’ve made of my legacy.”

"I can—do you want me to call you that?"

He sits back, settling himself between your legs. "What makes you think you'll be calling me anything at all?"

“I want to,” you blurt, because you do. Hunger unfurls in you like a beckoning hand and you ache for the taste of it, a name to keep between your back teeth. “Please, please, I want to.”

Humming thoughtfully, he drags a hand up under your shirt, leaving four long, raised welts on your stomach, angry and red. Your heartbeat is a sloppy, swollen mess, bleeding out waves of warmth that pool low in your hips. His touch travels higher, and it takes everything you have in you not to grind against him when he palms your breast, fur rough against the delicate skin.

"It does have a sort of ring to it, doesn’t it?"

Whatever response you might have had for that is lost in a jolt of pleasure as he pinches your nipple roughly.  The other hand draws another scratch along your hipbone, towards the soft dip where it joins your thigh. You whimper softly as that teasing touch hovers closer to the front of your shorts, closer to where you can feel yourself soaking through the liner. The barest hint of pressure, and your hips buck helplessly upwards.

Springtrap oohs appreciatively. "What an eager thing you are."

Oh, it’s wretched what that does to you. You burn, tossing an arm across your eyes like it can protect you from the moan you can’t quite bite back.

"Ah-ah-ah. No more hiding.”

He takes your wrist and guides you downwards, pulling your shorts aside to expose you to the air, fevered and needy. His fingers over yours, your breath hitches high in your throat as you’re knuckled through your own wetness, trembling with arousal.

“Hold this,” he says, closing your hand around the fabric, and you can hear the grin in it.

You watch him fiddle with the jaw of his mask, watch it shudder and release just an inch. Watch the gooey length of tongue that falls out, writhing and thick. 

"Jesus Christ," you breathe.

"A bit late for praying, I'm afraid."

He doesn’t bend down so much as fold you in half, fingers digging into the undersides of your thighs as he pins them to your shoulders. Your whole body hums with your heartbeat, something melting, sinking, needing. That long tongue slithers up the inside of your thigh, stopping just short of the insistent ache between your legs. His breath is hot against your skin, deep, rapid puffs of air, like he’s sniffing you. Part of you wonders briefly, madly, if he can smell how badly you want him.

He makes a soft, please sound, fingers tightening. One of them breaks skin, and you feel a thin trickle of blood slide down your thigh. Leaning in, he follows it with his tongue, and it's so gentle, so unhurried, that you could sob from it.

"Do you taste this good everywhere?" he wonders, and you honestly, genuinely think you might die if he doesn't touch you right here and now.

His eyes rise to yours, white-hot and merciless.

“Look at you, so desperate. I bet you would do anything I asked of you, wouldn’t you?”

A gasp punches its way out of you, and you nod frantically. “Yes, yes, please, anything.”

“Good,” he says, and licks a hot, slick stripe across your clit.

All the breath leaves your body at once, your head falling back against the floor. His tongue lathes up over the full length of your cunt, a long line of squirming pressure that makes jello out of your bones. You moan raggedly as he repeats the motion, languid and steady, circling your clit lazily with every pass. The tip of his tongue presses at your entrance, curling in like a finger, and your free hand shoots forward to clutch at the base of his unbroken ear.

He stills, ever so slightly, just for a moment, and then doubles down on his efforts, breath going rough as he thrusts into you. You shudder at the strange intrusion, the wriggling fullness that stretches you open. He urges your legs further apart as he closes the distance between you, and by the time his muzzle meets your skin you feel like you’re melting into the floor. In your current position you have no way to chase the friction you need, and the slow, inconsistent bumping against your clit as his tongue moves inside you is just barely short of enough. The fingers still holding your shorts aside flex involuntarily.

Springtrap pulls back, and you nearly cry out in disappointment. Your breath shatters into desperate, thready pleas as he retracts his tongue, drops into something arching and guttural when it swipes back up towards your throbbing clit. He growls hungrily, a sound that reverberates along your nerve endings like electricity.

"The things I would do to you."

He doesn’t finish the conditional and your head swims with it. What would he do? What’s stopping him?

"Please," you beg, "please, whatever you want.” Whatever it is you'll take it, you want it, you want it so fucking badly.

"Such a pretty promise," he simpers, licking over the knuckles of your captive hand. "Whatever I want?"

He tilts his head, and you catch the flash of a devilish grin behind his teeth. "Be careful, I'll remember you said that."

With that he licks back into you, filling you again with that incredible, roiling pleasure. The sound of it is wetly obscene, your arousal and his saliva dripping together. You cling to his ear like an anchor, a solid point of contact as the rest of your senses dissolve into gluey static. High, mewling moans spill out of you one after another, and his responding grunts grow more and more animalistic, less and less controlled.

He drops your legs and reels you in by the hips, forcing your cunt flush against his face, and you nearly howl with pleasure as you finally, finally get enough leeway to roll your hips forward, to chase that delicious friction. His muzzle is rough against your clit, just close enough to hurting that it makes everything else all the more intense. You pick up speed, rocking up desperately into his mouth as he devours you from the inside out.

Maybe you scream his name when you come; the sheer, blissful force of the orgasm that catches you nearly whites out your senses completely, sucks you under like riptide, abandoning you to the mercy of a rushing, euphoric current. It spins you out and unspools you like thread, leaving you trembling and picked apart, utterly undone.

You shiver and gasp as Springtrap untangles himself from your body, tongue flicking once more at your oversensitive clit. He chuckles when you jump, laying you unceremoniously on the floor as he turns to readjust his mask. The fur around his mouth is glistening with moisture, and while not all of it is from you, some of it definitely is, and it’s sort of thrilling and sort of mortifying and also sort of hot. Your throat feels sore, and every joint in your body is in various stages of cramping, but the fuzzy comedown pads out the sharpest edges of any discomfort.

“Can you stand?”

“Um.” You seriously consider the question for a moment. Several parts of you that usually feel much more solid definitely still have a noticeably rubberlike quality to them. “I think so.”

“In your own time.” He opens and shuts a drawer, a distinct undercurrent of impatience in it.

You feel a touch of annoyance at that—you certainly didn’t get this way all on your own—but you do your best to hoist yourself to your feet, adjusting your clothes self-consciously. Cooling wetness paints you from knee to navel, making the fabric cling uncomfortably. You’d like to clean yourself up a little, but somehow despite everything that just happened the idea of letting Springtrap see you wiping your own come out of your shorts feels like a little too much.

He taps a finger against the countertop, clicking like a claw. “I am an extremely self-sufficient person,” he tells you carefully, “but I find myself now in a very strange position where I may require rather a great deal of help.”

You don’t even think about it.

“Can I do anything?” you ask eagerly.

His posture softens immediately, like a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. He looks at you, and his eyes are almost warm.

#springtrap #springtrap fnaf #springtrap x reader #william afton x reader #expanding the purview of this blog a little as i become obsessed with another nasty man #my fic

[dumdumsun]

Wild World | Eddie Munson x Reader

A/N: This may be a bit later than I said I’d post this. But this is a treat for helping me reach a milestone of 500 followers. I said I’d give you an Eddie x Reader oneshot, so I made you one ❤️ This may not be my best work since it’s my first time ever writing for Eddie, so I hope I did good. Lmk if you want a part 2. I kinda already have something in mind. Enjoy ❤️❤️

Warnings: implied self-harm, mentions of death, blood, marijuana and corpses. S4 SPOLIERS!!!

Word Count: 3735

—————————————

She had never truly smiled until she met him.

(Y/N)’s journey through life had always been more of a trek, a trudging through the cruel and unapologetic wild. She couldn’t exactly call herself a gazelle, for even a gazelle destroys for its own benefit. (Y/N) was more of the grass that sprouted and grew from the dirt. A natural, living organism that is constantly taken advantage of. Trampled over, cut, burned, eaten alive. The gazelle uses her for its nutrients, only to be hunted and preyed on by the lion, the most superior, who no one in the wild is safe from.

On her rainy days, even when it feels she may drown, she is strengthening. So that on those bright, sunny days, she may flourish and prosper with the brawn of the lion, but with the vulnerability of the gazelle. And the knowledge that this will not last. When the cold falls over, she will wither and dry, she will break easily under the pressure of the winter snow. She will shiver and weep and she will freeze nearly to death until the spring takes her stand to rain and shine upon her again, continuing the cycle.

(Y/N) found herself existing in a cycle she desperately wanted out of, but lacked the knowledge on how and the desire to even get out of bed to do so. She couldn’t remember the last time she smiled, truly smiled. She had her friends; Steve and Robin were a hilarious duo that always kept her guessing. Nancy wasn’t as humorous as them, but (Y/N) didn’t need humor to break out into a small smile. The kids, ever since starting their freshman year, were around her more than they had ever been. Everyone she was close to was around her, save for El, Will and Jonathan. She had fought alongside this group. She shed sweat, blood and tears with this group. She fought off the Demogorgon in Joyce Byers’s home with the teens in the fall of ‘83. She helped Steve with the kids in their journey through the Upside Down in ‘84.

They held her as she sobbed her eyes out after defeating her flayed mother who had attacked her in the summer of ‘85.

Everyone had noticed her shift in emotion since then. The girl had never shown much emotion before then, but now she was hollow, a shell of the girl they had befriended and loved. She hardly reacted to humor besides a huff of a laugh and a hint of a smile she felt she had to give. Conversation with her was mostly one-sided. She claimed she never had time to hang out, always disappearing after school. Sometimes, she would resurface at the supermarket where she worked. Sometimes she would simply be at home. They knew someone had to take care of the house while her father was at work. They also knew that he had told her she didn’t have to, but (Y/N) felt herself partially responsible for her mother. She was home alone when she was flayed. She was alone because her father was working and (Y/N) was late coming home.

(Y/N) knew it was unwise to blame herself for her mother’s death, but who else would she be able to blame? The Mind Flayer? It was dead, it wouldn’t be able to feel her wrath on a daily basis, it wouldn’t know that it ruined her life, that it ruined Hawkins and sent it into the deepest pit of despair it had been in yet. She couldn’t blame her father, he did nothing wrong. He was completely unaware of interdimensional creatures intending on wiping out the human race. She couldn’t blame her friends. Not after everything they had done for her. She was the only one left to hurt.

She suffered under her own hands, under her own words. She started during her mother’s funeral. Her father held her in his arms and she felt the sob he was holding shudder his entire body. Afterwards, she told him that she didn’t want him to hold in his sadness, she wanted him to freely grieve under their roof. He didn’t need to be strong for her. He needed to let himself feel. Meanwhile, she was the one holding in everything. She couldn’t tell her father how his wife had actually died. That she had been possessed, that she had attacked their daughter against her own will, that it was between the two of them. That (Y/N) had come close to dying that night and had to bash her mother’s head with a frying pan continuously until she watched her melt into a pile of meat right before her very eyes. (Y/N) held the truth, the anger, the sadness, the guilt, all within her sternum. And one day, she would die with it. It would die with her.

(Y/N) tried everything in her power to push Eddie Munson away. He wanted to get close, he wanted to peek behind the walls she put up. He wanted to break them down to see the real her, the one not everyone gets to see. But (Y/N) was terrified. Everyone knew her mother had died in the “fire” that engulfed the Starcourt Mall, but he made her want to tell him everything. He could have intimidated her at first glance, but she had been through enough. She had him in a class or two and was surprised the past two years when seeing him in classes, swearing to herself that he should have graduated in ‘84. She didn’t mind, he was intriguing. His tresses of brown curls and crazy hot tattoos pulled her right in. His charm and his alluring voice held her down. But once he let go, once he allowed her to decide, his caring nature and ability to see right through her was what made her want to leave, but ultimately was what made her stay.

She didn’t want him to see why she was hurting and she definitely didn’t need him to read her aloud like a storytime book when they were alone for the first time. It made her feel transparent, like anyone would be able to see her, but she soon realized that his ability to see through walls was what made him different.

“You could be a tree.” He had shrugged, bringing the joint up to his lips. (Y/N) frowned and turned to him, her mind hazy from how much she had been inhaling from that same joint. Eddie saw the confusion on her face. “Your little analogy on who you are in this world. The grass, the gazelle, all that. Doesn’t have to be like that. You could just be a tree.”

She hadn’t even realized she was speaking that much. Fuck marijuana, honestly. “A tree?”

“Yeah,” He pulled the joint from his lips and blew the smoke up to the ceiling of his bedroom. The two were sprawled out on his bed, a safe distance, but close enough to pass the smoke to each other. “You know, you could be like a tree. You’re already this grand, beautiful creature, if I may be so praiseful, if not flirtatious.”

“You may.” She accepted the offered joint, a small and bashful smile on her face.

“Well, alright then,” He grinned. “So, yeah, you’re beautiful and amazing and you know you are. You’ve always known. You don’t need me to tell you, you don’t need anyone to tell you. Deep down, past all that guilt, you know who you are. You stand firmly in place where you know you belong and you exist for yourself. You change through the seasons and you’re still you, even when your leaves turn brown and fall away from you.”

“Eddie-”

“And you wanna know what the best part of it is?”

She released the smoke from her lungs with the shake of her head. “What?”

“There would be no gazelles or lions to eat you and use you. No feet to trample you.”

“But I’d still be cut down at some point when I’m in the way of what someone wants to do.”

Eddie sat up and waved his hands about as he spoke. “I hate to break it to you, honey, but aren’t we all gonna be fucked over at some point? That damn lion that eats the gazelle that ate you, the grass, is gonna end up some rich asshole’s mat in their bedroom. And then that asshole that uses that lion? The one who ordered for you, a possible tree, to be cut down? His life would soon end and everyone would say ‘oh, man, he’s dead! Who gets his money now?’, like they actually gave a shit about him. But you? You will be avenged, you beautiful creature. Because… we need the trees, (Y/N).”

She looked up to find him staring tenderly at her. She couldn’t help the wide grin that spread across her features.

“We need them.”

Her heart never got used to seeing Eddie or hearing his voice. It still sped every time his eyes locked on hers and it burst whenever her name left his lips. God, those lips… She never got used to him, not even when they felt that they knew each other more than anyone had ever known them. They didn’t care for labels, didn’t care what people thought of the two of them spending so much time together. (Y/N) was certain they weren’t dating. That would require too much trust, too many obligations. She didn’t want either of them to get hurt, especially not Eddie. He didn’t deserve any of that.

“(Y/N)!” She heard him call out to her in the crowded hallway. She continued on without looking back to acknowledge him. A few seconds later, she felt his hand on her arm. “Hey, you never showed up yesterday. I had to get high all by myself. And let me tell you, it is not the same anymore without you.”

She wanted to smile so bad, but she forced it down.

“You okay? Surprisingly, you’re a lot more talkative than this.”

“I’m fine.” She whispered.

“Right. So… do you wanna try again today?”

“I have work.”

“So, after?”

“I don’t wanna miss dinner with my dad.”

Eddie slowly nodded, aware of (Y/N)’s undying need to be around her father as much as she could. She was still hiding something, he could tell. Eddie could tell most things about her. She let her walls down around him and he was able to see everything she had to offer in her personality, but now she was building those walls right back up. Was it something he said? Something he did? Before he could even open his mouth to speak, (Y/N) ducked into the nearest girls’ restroom at the speed of light, leaving him confused.

(Y/N) gingerly massaged her aching temples with her index and middle fingers as she approached one of the sinks. She had tried her best that morning to conceal the exhaustion on her face with her makeup, but she couldn't even convince herself. The nightmare from last night interrupted what she had left of a sleep schedule and it left her groggy. The headaches were relentless and made her irritable. Just that morning, she felt her nose running with blood and had to quickly conceal it from her father. She didn’t know what was going on with her, but she hoped and prayed Eddie didn’t notice. She didn’t want him to worry. However, not opening up to him left her with no one to talk to, which once again forced her to keep emotion trapped within.

Perhaps she should stop dodging the guidance counselor.

The second she saw Eddie’s trailer on the news, her stomach dropped and twisted. She wouldn’t be able to take it if something happened to him. It would be her mother all over again. She wasn’t sure she’d come back from the guilt she would undoubtedly put on herself. 

But when she found out the victim murdered was Chrissy Cunningham, her worry only deepened. Chrissy, the captain of the cheer squad, was found dead in the trailer of Eddie Munson, Hawkin’s freak. Immediately, she knew it wasn’t him. She didn’t want to blame Eddie’s uncle, since he had been nothing but kind to her, so this was an act committed by anyone else. Though, it couldn’t have looked good for Eddie at all, seeing as he wasn’t even at the scene when police showed up.

(Y/N) hadn’t planned on spending her spring break under house arrest. Because of her close friendship with Eddie and the fact that she wasn’t home the night of Chrissy’s death, it targeted her as one of the suspects. Her father knew she would never commit such a crime, but the police weren’t so convinced. The two officers in her home watched her like a hawk every step she took. It was ridiculous. She couldn’t even speak to Steve on the phone because they were so suspicious. So, she locked herself in the bathroom and spoke to Dustin through her walkie.

She wasn’t all too surprised at the notion that a creature from the Upside Down killed Chrissy and Fred Benson, the latter was reported dead the night after Chrissy’s death. With everything they had been through, it made more sense than a crazed murderer running around Hawkins, sadly. But she could do little to nothing to help them in their search for Eddie. All she could do was provide them information about when she last saw him. Unfortunately, that wasn’t helpful either, considering she had been avoiding Eddie. Already, she was letting the guilt take over. But this wasn’t about her, it was about Eddie.

(Y/N) wasn’t released from house arrest until four days after Chrissy’s death (even with evidence that she couldn’t have been responsible for Fred), when another murder had been announced. Patrick McKinney had been found dead in a lake outside of a boathouse, where Eddie had been. Again, it did not look good for him. Immediately upon being granted freedom, she charged out of her home with her walkie and backpack in hand. She had to be prepared for anything.

“Dustin? Dustin, where are you guys?” She called over her walkie. The Henderson boy was quick to respond.

“Do you know where Skull Rock is?”

“Uh… yeah?”

“Meet us there.”

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

“When I got to the shore, I tried calling you guys, but, uh…” Eddie took a swig out of the large canteen provided for him. “...my walkie was busted, man. Drenched. So, uh, I did the thing that I do now, apparently,” A sarcastic smile plastered itself on his face as he wiped his mouth and set the canteen by his feet. “I ran.” He chuckled.

The group before him watched him in pity. The poor guy had been in the wrong place at the wrong time twice now, which led him to become an actual suspect of three murders now. He was forced into even deeper hiding, for he had been found by Patrick’s friends just before the kid had died right in front of them. And worst of all, Eddie had no idea where (Y/N) was. He didn’t know if she was okay or if she was a broken, eyeless corpse on the ground, waiting to be found and blamed on him. That murder would make the least sense, but it would also make perfect sense. (Y/N) (L/N), killed by her best friend, who also happened to be the supposed crazed freak everyone was after.

“Do you know what time this was? The attack?” Nancy asked.

“Yeah, no, I… I know exactly what time it was,” He stripped his wrist of his watch before tossing it to the Wheeler girl. “My walkie wasn’t the only thing that got soaked.

Nancy glanced at the time stuck on the watch with a nod. “9:27.”

“Same time our flashlights went kablooey.” Robin added.

“Which means what, exactly?” Steve shrugged, ever the confused one of the bunch.

“That that surge of energy was Vecna attacking Patrick.”

During the group’s continuing conversation, they all failed to notice the figure not too far away from them. She was frozen in place behind a few trees, eyes trained forward on one spot.

“(Y/N)...” A voice deep and haunting called out to her. “They cannot help you, (Y/N). They do not need you. No one truly needs you. You will only lead them to their demise. Just like your mother… Let your suffering end now. Join me.”

A gasp from within her chest sucked in some much-needed oxygen. (Y/N)’s eyes watered as she tried to catch her breath, leaning against a tree for support. She had been so close to her friends before everything around her had darkened, before she had seen that… that clock. That grandfather clock. Shaking her head, she jogged to the meeting spot, where she could see Steve, Dustin, Nancy, Max, Lucas and Robin standing in front of something. Or someone.

Everyone whipped their bodies around at the sound of a snap. Steve had gotten into an odd-looking fighting stance before realizing it was just her. Everyone relaxed as she stepped into the clearing, her feet letting off the twig she had stepped on.

“Where have you been?” Lucas furrowed his brows.

“House arrest. I’ve been a possible suspect for Chrissy’s murder. They think Eddie and I have been working together.” She answered as she approached them closer.

“No, where have you been? We called you an hour ago.” Steve clarified. At this, (Y/N) frowned in confusion. Everyone watched as she slowly turned back towards the trees. She couldn’t have been gone that long. It took her about fifteen minutes to get here. Perhaps Steve was exaggerating, but…

“(Y/N)?”

At the sound of the very, very familiar voice, she spun around to see Eddie. He had been wearing the same Hellfire Club shirt since the night of the murder, now a bit wrinkled. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days with the heavy bags under his eyes telling all. She couldn’t blame him, though, he was being framed for murder and was on the run for some time now. (Y/N) then remembered that she hadn’t seen him in days and she had been pulling her hair out in worry for him. The sad smile on his lips and in his big, round eyes was enough for her to tear up.

“Eddie?” She choked out, moving between her friends to hurry towards him with a bright smile.

“Oh, god, honey.” As soon as she was close enough, Eddie pulled her by the arm and crushed her against his chest. One of her hands gently rubbed his back while the other flew up to his hair. He smelled of sweat and beer and cigarettes, but she didn’t care. He was here. He was okay. “I-I haven’t heard from you in so long… I thought- Jesus, I thought-”

“I know,” She sniffled, feeling his face bury into her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Eddie…”

The two of them stayed like that for awhile. A long while, actually. So long that it was becoming less wholesome and more awkward to the rest of the group. They were unaware of how close the Munson-(LN) duo had been and they sure didn’t expect them to be this affectionate with each other. Steve tilted his head at them, both curious and annoyed. “So… are you two, like, together?”

They immediately pulled away.

“No-”

“-Yes.”

The group’s wide eyes caused the two to glance at each other.

“Yes-”

“-No.”

An awkward silence filled the area as they nervously shifted on their feet. Steve had been joking, but now he was regretting bringing up the subject at all. Clearing her throat, (Y/N) nodded and took a step forward. “What are we doing now that we’ve got Eddie?”

“Dustin has a theory that there’s a gate to the Upside Down,” Nancy informed. “We were just about to follow his compass there.”

(Y/N) gave a very small smile to her friend. “Well, you can count me in,” She then glanced at each person surrounding her, eyes filled with sorrow. “But before we go, I have to tell you guys something.”

Eddie joined her side so that he could complete the unintentional circle they had all made.

“I saw a grandfather clock by those trees just as I got here.”

The tension that sat between the group was suffocating. Everyone watched her carefully, some in shock, some with heartache. She couldn’t stand to be looked at like that. She had received those looks enough after the Fourth of July the year prior. This felt worse, though, and it made her want to curl into herself and bawl her eyes out.

“Oh, fuck.” Eddie anxiously ran his hands through his hair. (Y/N) could tell he was trying to hold it all in, but this was heartbreaking news to anyone who cared. And Eddie definitely, absolutely cared. “No… Come on, baby. No, you can’t…”

“I wish I could unsee it, Eddie. God, I wish I could, but I can’t,” She gently took his hand into hers, his rings cool against her skin as she intertwined their fingers. “I’m sorry.”

Just when he had gotten her back, Eddie felt like he was losing her all over again. He tried his best to keep his panic at bay because he didn’t want her to feel worse. There were so many things he wanted to say, wanted to do. She deserved it all and more, but it seemed it wasn’t written in the cards for her. Not unless they found some way to keep Vecna’s grip from tightening on her.

“You got a pair of headphones?”

Eddie and (Y/N) quickly looked to Max, who tugged at her own headphones that hung around her neck. (Y/N) frowned and slowly nodded. “Uh… in my bag, yeah.”

“A walkman and cassettes?”

“Yeah, yeah. I keep that stuff in my bag. Why?”

Max raised her brows. “You’re gonna need it.”

(Y/N) met Eddie’s wide-eyed stare, a silent question on what they meant. He only squeezed her hand tighter in response.

—————————————

Lmk if you want the Part 2 I have planned. Thank you for reading and thank you for 500 followers ❤️❤️❤️

#stranger things #stranger things spoilers #stranger things 4 #stranger things fic #stranger things x reader #st #st season 4 #st x reader #st spoilers #st fic #st s4 #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson #wild world

[swanhurrem]

Imprint. Chapter 1:

Embry Call x FemReader (no use of y/n).

Sumary: You were best friends with Embry, Jacob and Quil. And you saw how each one of them walked away from you. What will happen when out of nowhere they try to fix their relationship?

Twilight Masterlist.

Imprint Masterlist (this serie).

Chapter 2>

You had gone through the years through terrible situations of abandonment that had brought you trauma and pain; your three closest friends were the ones who knew about how much these situations had hit you and they all promised you that they would never abandon you, of course that was a terrible lie.

First it was Embry.

It turns out that Embry had not been able to invite any girl to the dance and he and Quil made a bet to see who would invite you. Quil lost the bet so it was Embry who promised to look for you at your house and then take you to the dance they were organizing at their school. The truth is that you had a secret crush on Embry since you were both 13 years old and you were so afraid of ruining the relationship of years that you both had that you simply preferred to keep all your feelings hidden.

You were so incredibly excited to go to the dance with him that you got up earlier than usual and began to get ready. Soon your hair and makeup was done. The best part was the dress; You went to Port Angeles a few days before with some friends and you bought a beautiful burgundy-colored dress that left your left leg exposed along with some beautiful shoes. When you finally got ready, you went downstairs to wait for Embry.

You sat on the couch in the living room and waited, looking on your cell phone as the time was getting closer, but... Embry never came.

Rejected calls and unanswered messages was all you received from him and when you knew he was not coming, you went up to your room and sat on your bed. All your makeup ruined by the tears that did not stop escaping and the wrinkled dress from how much you twisted it.

You went to look for him at his house two days later but you didn't see him, according to Tiffany, his mother, Embry was very sick and it would be best if you stayed away from him at least until he got over it. He went on like this for another week, until suddenly he joined Sam's cult and you never heard from him again.

Next up was Jacob.

He had stayed with you a few afternoons at your house with Quil after Embry left you all, it was really painful for you that your best friend, the person you grew up with, simply abandoned you as if you had never been important in his life. They all shared this new pain but tried to cope with it as best they could, until little by little the relationship became more and more fractured. Jacob was distanced from you because he spent most of the time with Bella, until suddenly he also disappeared. He wouldn't answer your calls or texts and when you went to his house, Billy would just tell you that he was sick. Even Bella had come to see you on one occasion to see if you knew anything about him and you could swear that he saw that he shed a tear when you said that weeks ago he was ignoring you.

Soon, he was also seen at Sam's cult, along with Embry.

Next up was Quil.

Since you were now alone, you tried to lean on each other more. You spent every afternoon together and every once in a while a few nights when he wasn't punished. You shared more messages and calls than before and you lived with the hope that at some point your friends would give you some sign that your friendship was still worth it. Of course it didn't happen, many nights Quil had you crying on his shoulder while he tried to hold back the tears.

But soon, he too became "sick". Just like your first two friends, he didn't answer your calls or messages, he didn't go to school and he wasn't at his house every time you went. His grandfather, like Billy Black, only told you that Quil was sick and that seeing you would be dangerous.

Soon, he too was seen with the cult of Sam, along with Embry and Jacob.

_________

Buy me a coffee.

#embry call x reader #embry call #quil ateara #jacob black #bella swan #twilight #twilight wolf pack

[crumblecakezz]

i think we can all agree that SHOCK!’s music video is 100% related to buddy daddies.

please pay attention to the lyrics that i note during each section 👀

it’s lengthy but i think it would be worth reading. the music video offers a lot of similarities to buddy daddies and more that hasn’t been yet been similar to any part of the show we can see, which opens up many possible theories.

—reblogs appreciated (o><o)

it begins with a lone reaper (rei) meeting an angel (kazuki) by chance from a crane game.

(lyr: “hey, i want to love you, is this true? > i showed you my heart.”)

there is an entire montage dedicated to just showing them interacting, with the reaper in blue and the angel in pink. at the end of it, they hold hands, but now the reaper is also pink.

(lyr: “hey i want to love you, is this true? > im being tossed around again”)

next shot — they chillin, holding hands or whateva, and then badoom a gigantic ufo (the organization) looms over them, and starts to chase them around. hand-in-hand, the two are running away.

(lyr: “i locked it up so it wouldn’t hurt > it won’t change, and i know, but…”)

the ufo knocks down and captures the angel in its huge hands, and the reaper’s eyes water as it reaches out to save the angel, but the angel then disappears. in very brief shots, the reaper sheds a tear and then sprouts wings.

(lyr: “i know that i don’t want to lose anything anymore > gives me a good laugh”)

in a series of beautiful✨ shots, the reaper is trying to escape the ufo with determination and it’s newfound wings.

(lyr: “let’s love and be loved > let me see if this is love”)

there is a shot of the angel, pink, and the reaper, blue again and far away. there is another shot of the reaper letting a tear fall.

(lyr: “from now on, swing me around as you please”)

the reaper, although with wings, is falling through the sky with great speed. its eyes tear up. in the next shot, it reaches out towards the camera as it falls back into the grasp of the ufo.

(lyr: “swing me around as you please, forever”)

the lights on the sign on the crane machine powers off. a small reaper and angel plush are won by and picked up by a girl wearing pink (miri) from a crane machine (the same one).

(no lyr)

———

so many things in this video make so much sense after i really gave it some thought. here is what we know for sure as of episode 8:

rei was a lone killing machine before meeting kazuki (wandering reaper).

kazuki was trapped by his guilt until he taught rei to live, which in turn helped himself (angel trapped in crane machine).

kazuki and rei met by chance (crane machine).

he changed rei for the better, even if he doesn’t realize it (turning the same color as kazuki).

they are dependent and reliant on each other, for work and personal reasons. they lent each other a helping hand (holding hands).

but we saw that when something personal interferes with the professional commitment people have to the organization, the organization will make sure it doesn’t stay that way (huge ufo with big eyes and hands chasing the two).

as for the rest of the music video? shit gets sad…

the angel is torn away from the reaper and trapped in the ufo’s grasp. it then disappears to become a plushie again.

the reaper sprouts wings and does all it can to escape the ufo, but it meets the same fate as the angel. being separated from the angel makes the reaper blue again.

the two, in a helpless and immobile plushie state, are picked up, by chance, and by a little girl this time. however, this might put the girl in danger of meeting the ufo as well.

———

i think i don’t need to explain my theories for that part. it can speak for itself…

but it’s got me seriously worried about the direction of this show. since we know that the beginning can be well-explained by rei and kazuki’s first encounter and a little past that, there is a chance that the rest of it reflects the rest of the series as well.

or who knows, maybe the music video is only extremely resemblant of the show it ops for by coincidence!! 😭 maybe buddy daddies has a happy wholesome ending…!!!

thanks for readin (o^^)9

#buddy daddies #rei suwa #suwa rei #kazuki kurusu #kurusu kazuki #unasaka miri #miri unasaka #yoasobi #yoasobi ayase #ayase yoasobi #shock ayase #ayase shock #shock yoasobi #yoasobi shock #kazurei

[harmonyhealinghub]

The Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women: An Ongoing Tragedy

Shaina Tranquilino

October 4, 2023

The issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women is a devastating tragedy that has plagued Indigenous communities for decades. Despite being deeply rooted in the history of colonization, it remains an ongoing crisis that demands immediate attention. This blog post aims to shed light on this heartbreaking reality and urges society to acknowledge, address, and support initiatives aimed at ending the violence.

A Historical Context:

To truly understand the gravity of the situation, we must recognize the historical context in which this epidemic has unfolded. Since European colonization began in North America, Indigenous women have faced systemic discrimination, marginalization, and violence. These injustices persist today as a direct result of centuries-long oppression and the erosion of Indigenous cultures.

Disturbing Statistics:

The statistics surrounding missing and murdered Indigenous women are both shocking and disheartening. According to a 2016 report by the National Crime Information Center (NCIC), there were over 5,700 cases of missing or murdered Indigenous American women recorded in the United States alone. Alarmingly, many believe these numbers may be underestimated due to underreporting or misclassification by law enforcement agencies.

Root Causes:

Numerous factors contribute to this crisis. Poverty, limited access to education and healthcare services, high rates of domestic violence within communities, institutional racism, inadequate law enforcement response, and human trafficking all play significant roles in perpetuating this cycle of violence against Indigenous women.

The Need for Awareness & Advocacy:

Raising awareness about this issue is crucial towards mobilizing action to end it. It requires educating ourselves and others about the plight faced by Indigenous women who continue to disappear or be victimized every day. Social media campaigns like #MMIWG (Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls) have played a pivotal role in bringing attention to their stories while demanding justice.

Government Action & Accountability:

Addressing this crisis necessitates a multi-faceted approach. Governments at all levels must take concrete steps to address the root causes of violence against Indigenous women, including improving collaboration between law enforcement agencies, enhancing victim services, and implementing culturally sensitive policies. Additionally, funding programs that empower Indigenous communities and strengthen support systems are essential for long-term change.

Community Empowerment:

Indigenous communities have been fighting tirelessly to protect their women and girls. Supporting grassroots organizations led by Indigenous people who understand the unique challenges faced by their community is crucial in eradicating this issue. By amplifying voices from within these communities, we can ensure that culturally appropriate solutions are implemented while fostering healing and resilience.

The missing and murdered Indigenous women crisis demands urgent attention from society as a whole. Recognizing the historical context, understanding the systemic issues involved, advocating for awareness, holding governments accountable, and empowering affected communities are all integral components of bringing an end to this deeply entrenched tragedy.

To honour the lives lost and prevent future victimization, it is our collective responsibility to stand in solidarity with Indigenous communities and work towards creating a world where every woman feels safe, valued, and protected. Only through unity can we hope to achieve justice for the missing and murdered Indigenous women who deserve nothing less than our unwavering commitment to ending this heartbreaking reality once and for all.

#MMIW #MMIWG #Indigenous women #missing and murdered indigenous women #justice for our sisters #protect our women #no more stolen sisters #support Indigenous communities #stop the violence #raise awareness #honouring our ancestors #remember their names #break the silence #stand with Indigenous women

[the-present-is-a-gift-au]

Chapter 2: In Which Farewells are Bidden

Kip left to start his apprenticeship and set off on his expedition before Twig could work up the gumption again to even hint at her memories returning. She really was going to have to grin and bear their return on her own, and the thought weighed heavy in her belly. She only barely managed to keep up a smile for Kip in the days leading up to his departure— and the minute after Treasure Town saw him off alongside her, she started bawling. 

Bidoof noticed her silent tears as Kip disappeared from view down the road and everyone began filing off to their homes. “Shucks, are you alright, Twig?”

She sniveled and blubbered her answer. “I’m fine. I’m just going to miss him. Kip is the first friend I remember making. I just...”

“It must be awful rough, huh? I’m sure it’s hard on you, yes sirree. But… with Team Venture dissolved, maybe you could go on an adventure of your own while Kip’s off on his! I’m sure you got a family worried sick about you around here somewhere.” He smiled warmly, all buck teeth and sunshine.  “Bet your ma’s a right scary Charizard! That’s the kinda family you strike me as coming from.”

It occurred to Twig that she’d never told anyone from Treasure Town that she was once human. She wiped her eyes, then shed even more tears than she could hope to sweep away when her hands were already covered in her grief, and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s a good idea. It’d be nice to know more about my past.”

Bidoof sat up on his haunches and patted her back. “I think it’d do you a lot of good, yup yup! But get some rest for now. You need it after today.”

He fell back onto his paws and waddled off after the rest of the townsfolk, humming cheerfully to himself as he went.

Yeah, Twig bleakly thought, recalling the numerous ways she’d been tripped up by her returned memories, Some good it’s done me knowing anything at all about where I come from. It’s not like I’d give anything to be a real amnesiac and have them stay gone.

The worst part of her bitter inward remarks is that they weren’t even true. She desperately wanted to know who she was and how she’d come to be who she is. But the fact that it came with those memories instead of happier ones first… she doubted whether she could handle the return of any more. It just might shatter her.

***

It hurt a lot to learn respect. That was the only thing she could say. She felt like her insides were all done up in knots and stuck with pins whenever she had to go home to her aunt, so she spent most of her time avoiding passing through the door. She would beg to visit friends' houses, she would volunteer to clean up after school, she would take the long walk back— she did everything she could to put off her return to the place she’d learned was a painful schoolhouse and not a home.

That was funny to think about. Especially when the unit used to belong to her parents. 

Oh, that was sad to think about. Why did it surprise her to remember she had parents at one point? Sometimes it seemed like it had always been just her and Auntie. Her family had passed just a year or two ago, but here she was, remembering that she had forgotten the sound of their voices. 

How had they died, again?

She felt the memory of rattling gasps and the sound of bile splashing against porcelain tickle at the back of her skull. Her stomach twisted at that slightest hint of what happened. She would have liked to pursue the memory and grasp its slippery recollection with shaky hands, but she had just arrived home. She needed to be quiet and pleasant. She needed to hide and be silent. She hadn’t done anything disrespectful yet, but she didn’t want to try her luck and garner another lesson on how to behave for her aunt.

A hand seized her wrist as she carefully closed the front door behind her.

It turned out she didn’t have to do anything at all to need another lesson.

Twig woke up clutching her mouth and dry heaving. It wasn’t uncommon for this to be how she awoke nowadays, but the nightmarish dreamstuff clinging to her senses was more potent than usual— she couldn’t quite discern up from down as she rolled onto her hands and knees to retch. When her stomach finally got the memo that it had actually been well and truly empty the whole time, she wiped the spit from her chin and sat up to try and breathe. Her heart fluttered pitifully in her chest, and Twig recalled a word starting with P that described the sensation. What was it… Petulance? Presumption? She recalled a large dictionary that she’d spend time reading as a human and loving all of the words she learned from it, collecting them all like they were made of gold and precious gems. It was fun to gather them all and try to string the fanciest sentences she could come up with in her head as she hid away in her room. Twig remembered the feel of it in her hands despite not being able to recall the color of the cover or the edition. She remembered the way Menagerie and Jubilee felt on her tongue as she whispered them without sound to herself, and she remembered the way Cacophony described her aunt’s voice so well, even down to the way the word felt coming up her throat. 

Words were nice. A silent companion who she could take with her everywhere, and a way to help her make sense of what happened around her. She had forgotten how much she loved words. 

What a pity that there was no one around to speak English with or to help her remember whether it was Palpableness or Palpitations that she was trying to recall. 

What a nightmare that she couldn’t string together any words, whether in English or Pokéspeak or together, to convey the sheer terror she felt in the moment between hazy wakefulness and uneasy sleep as she looked over to Kip’s empty bed and recalled a terror from the near past instead of the distant Dark Future.

(She had slept in one morning after “Cresselia” had visited in her and Kip’s dreams. She was usually an early riser, but she couldn’t bear to face the day with the knowledge that her very existence was inexcusable. She was damaging the world around her and the people she loved within it just by living. Cresselia had made that clear. And she would have believed her wholly, if not for the fact that she said Kip was of the same make. Kip, the most perfect person she had ever met, who refused to fight before he could at least try to talk things out, who believed in the best of everyone— Cresselia thought he was just as bad as Twig? She was trying to mull over how that could possibly be. 

(Even beyond the morals of it all— Twig had apparently been traveling time for ages longer than Kip. She had been brought back from a Future that was meant to have been utterly erased. Kip had traveled to the future and back to the past just twice— maybe four times if you counted the disorienting spatial situation of the Hidden Land. But somehow Kip was on equal standing as her for being a temporal-spatial anomaly? She couldn’t wrap her head around it.

(But Kip had taken it so hard. He’d gone silent as Cresselia once again reiterated to them that if they were to continue living, they would undo the world around them. In the moments immediately after they had both woken up from their shared dream, he had turned to Twig and hesitantly posed the question of whether they should do it— whether they should go through with the unthinkable. Twig reacted with such a sudden anger at the thought of him harming himself that she snapped he was stupid for even considering it. 

(She didn’t mean to make him cry. She was grappling with the thought that she wasn’t just a burden on her loved ones, but she was also warping all of existence with her continued breath— and the idea that she had spread some of her self-loathing to the point of Kip pondering that very same question she had been grappling with for so long in her life was unbearable. She couldn’t stand the thought of her best friend being so poisoned by her presence that he believed for even a moment that he was as unworthy of existence as she was. He was stupid for considering it. He was. He was stupid for considering such a thing just like she was stupid for considering not doing it.

(She apologized. She said they should talk things through in the morning and try to get some sleep for the time being. He agreed and curled up in his bed opposite to her.

(Twig slept in, and she woke up to Kip’s bed empty, the entire house carved into the side of the bluff empty, and the waves and wind outside crashing and howling like a funeral march.

(She scrambled up the steps to search Treasure Town and found him sitting atop the cliff to watch the last of the sunrise. He was fine. He was okay. He was fine.

(When he asked her why she was shaking, she said she had another bad dream, and it was nothing to worry about.)

Seeing Kip’s bed empty while her mind was still halfway within her last nightmare sent her panicking.

The jolt of adrenaline snapped her awake, and with that wakefulness came the knowledge that Kip hadn’t done anything drastic— he was just gone on his expedition, seeking the apprenticeship of his dreams— but she couldn’t put a stopper on all those horrible thoughts that had gripped her when she first thought her friend had left her behind in a way more permanent than she could bear. 

When she came out of the panic attack, she decided she couldn’t bear to stay in the Bluff without Kip to dispel that awful silence his home had been overtaken by in his absence. Grovyle's words about the restored Future being too perfect despite everything that had happened there rang in her head. She went to work finding herself a new place to stay— even briefly considered living with the Future Trio before she determined she couldn’t bear to live with Grovyle’s perceptiveness when she was in so fragile of a state. 

Honestly, sometimes it felt like he knew her better than she knew herself— admittedly, that wasn’t a very difficult hurdle to leap, but she still found herself irritated by it at times. He knew her tells that had apparently carried over from her humanity, he knew things she was interested in before it even occurred to her how intriguing the topic he mentioned her enjoying was— she could tell from his using her name that they had been close before her amnesia, but it was always surprising to relearn the extent of that closeness when he brought up some insight into her personality that she wasn’t aware of beforehand. 

All of that was to say that she would absolutely not be staying with him and the rest of the refugees from the Future. The fact that she would need to be in close quarters with Dusknoir as well to put the final nail in the coffin of the idea. No, she needed to find somewhere else to stay. Treasure Town didn’t exactly have much available real estate, and she wasn’t willing to wait until a new home could be put up, so Twig set her sights on the settlements outside of her current home. The Future Trio lived in Fair Fields, so it would be nice to set up shop nearby… 

A small settlement nearby called Verdant Village had a handful of homes available. Twig stayed the night at the Future Trio’s home so she could scope out the area— it was too long of a journey to Verdant Village to make as a day trip from Treasure Town— and managed to evade Grovyle’s worried glances and quiet questions on how she was holding up by staying out on her house hunt most of the day.

She eventually found a place that would work for her. It was a bit larger of a home than she would have preferred— it looked like it was meant for two or three inhabitants rather than one, really. But it was cheap beyond belief, and she was able to pay the mortgage in full with a single payment. She realized that she might have a bit more money saved up than she thought when the eyes of the pangoro selling the home went wide at Twig’s offer to pay in one fell swoop. She didn’t really ever spend her portion of Team Venture’s income on anything other than a few stray drinks at Spinda’s Cafe here and there. It was gradually occurring to her that she could spend the rest of her life retired in relative comfort. Not that she could ever retire— the very thought sickened her— but it was a shocking realization nonetheless. 

She moved into the home. Her belongings fit well into the main room, but there was nothing left over to fill up the closets and guest rooms— she barely had a pan and a couple of plates to put in the kitchen. It was weird to live in a home that was so bare. Sure, she’d be able to fill it up with decor and furniture as time went on, but she wasn’t exactly rushing to buy a bunch of stuff that she’d just have to sell in order to downsize once she moved back into Sharpedo Bluff. It seemed like a waste of time and money, especially when she had no idea what she’d even want to buy beyond a table to eat at and maybe a chair or two.

Twig soon learned she had neighbors, and she soon learned that having neighbors was probably her least favorite thing in the world. Sharpedo Bluff had been out of the way, on the fringes of Treasure Town, and her home was as well, for the most part— if not for the fact that there was another home built not too far off, and the gallade and gardevoir couple living there didn’t mind taking a brisk walk to invite her over for dinner or drop off a housewarming gift. 

The gardevoir had stopped by soon after Twig moved in. “I live in the house just over the hill to the east— I'm so sorry for my late introduction, my husband and I have been meaning to make a good impression and intended to introduce ourselves sooner, but I’m afraid we’ve been busy helping our daughter with her schoolwork.”

Twig set down the ax she’d been using to chop firewood when her neighbor arrived— it felt odd in her hands. She'd evolved all of a sudden while doing some more intensive home repairs not long ago, and she was still adapting to her new body. “I only moved in a couple days ago, though?”

“Yes, and I’m so sorry to have kept you waiting. It must be worrisome to move somewhere new without someone willing to help you get your bearings. My husband and I would gladly be those people for you.”

“Oh— uh—” She let out a short, nervous chuckle. “I don’t mind. I’m probably just going to keep to myself, anyways. You don’t need to worry about showing me around or anything—”

“No, no, I insist! It’s the proper, friendly thing to do, isn’t it?” She gave Twig a kind smile, then shivered. “Ah— I hope you don’t mind, but is it alright if I step inside? I’ve always been one to get chilled, and the breeze is just a bit too stiff for my tastes.”

Gardevoir looked over Twig’s home with a scrutinizing eye when she invited her in. The barebones kitchen earned the narrowest appraisal. Twig assumed Gardevoir was judging her for her minimal furnishings or something, but it wasn’t even a week later when Twig was gifted a full set of dinnerware and a stock pot. Apparently her reluctance to possess anything more than two sets of silverware would not stand in the woman’s eyes.

Gallade, at the very least, wasn’t so overbearing with his welcoming nature. He made polite conversation with Twig when they crossed paths on the way to the market one morning, and told her that his daughter was a great fan of an exploration team when she told him about her former employment. “She’s always quoting their slogan. What was it… Nothing ventured, nothing gained? I had never heard it before. She had to explain to me that it was a saying from where one of the members came from. It’s got a lovely meaning, but it doesn’t roll off the tongue quite like you’d expect a slogan to, does it?”

It was a bit awkward to explain that she was the one who had come up with the slogan after that, but Gallade clearly meant no harm by it. He posed the possibility that maybe Twig could perhaps speak to his daughter about exploration teams and what she could expect from an apprenticeship at Wigglytuff’s Guild— she apparently had all sorts of romantic ideas of what it was really like, and Gallade couldn’t get her to understand that an apprenticeship would never be all sunshine and roses, especially an exploration team apprenticeship. Twig said she’d need time to get settled in more, but she’d gladly chat with her about the Guild. She figured it would be nice— she was missing Manaphy keenly these days, and chatting with a kid his age might help soften that wistfulness.

“I have all sorts of stories I could share,” she said, “good and bad, but mostly good. Let her know that the Guildmaster sleeps with his eyes open sometimes, and it scares the members silly whenever he walks in for announcements snoring despite looking wide awake.” 

When Twig finally met the young ralts in question just a few days later at the market, the girl was starstruck. She peppered her with questions as her mother surveyed the fruits available at the stall they had crossed paths before— and many of these questions were ones Twig had no idea how she’d come up with. She knew how to answer what the best way to keep your bearings in a mystery dungeon was, but she didn’t know how to describe the sights and sounds of the Guild. This dumbfounded her interviewer.

“How can you not remember the Guild? It’s so cool!” She exclaimed. “It’s built into a cliffside, and it’s got that big forest at the base, and Wigglytuff carved all the rooms himself!”

“I don’t know about that last one, Ralts. I’m pretty sure he asked some ground-types to help him out.”

“Nope, that’s not what happened at all. He blasted the rock until there was all the different rooms, and he did it by himself.” She straightened her bandana— a sweet little imitation of the informal uniforms worn by many of the Guild’s recruits, and one that was clearly homemade— and puffed out her chest. “Oh, and you can call me Lyra, Twig!”

Gardevoir, who had been silently weighing her grocery options until that point, sighed and shook her head. She knelt down to set her hand on the girl’s shoulder and kindly chastise, “Sweetheart, it’s not nice to use someone’s name without permission.”

“But I’m letting her use mine. That makes it even, so I can use her name too, right?”

Gardevoir opened her mouth to explain further, but Twig waved her hands placatingly. “I don’t mind,” she laughed. “Really. I always thought it was a bit weird to call someone Mudkip or Bidoof instead of something more personal, anyhow. We never did that where I grew up.”

“Is that so?” Gardevoir tilted her head curiously. “Fascinating! We must seem so stuffy to you, then. Where did you grow up, if you don’t mind my asking? I know a few grass-type and bug-type villages far into the valleys up North don’t place much weight in personal names, but I’ve never heard of a fire-type living out there.”

Lyra seemed to swell with excitement, eager to share her next words. “Nobody knows where Twig came from! She just poofed outta nowhere and became the best explorer ever!”

“Oh my!” She smiled down at her daughter. “I can hardly believe it! Truly the stuff of Legends, that sounds to be.” She looked back over to Twig. “You seem to have a fair few rumors built up around you, I’m afraid. I think that… Oh! Are you alright, Cha— Ah, Twig?” She looked her up and down, a worried look overtaking her. “Goodness, you look like you need to sit down.”

Twig shook her head to clear out the nervous buzzing that had filled it up. “I’m fine! I’m fine, I just need to get back home. It’s getting kind of nippy— I’m one of those people who get cold way too easily, you know? Heh. Um.” She wrung the woven straps of the bag she’d filled with her groceries. “I should head out, but I’ll see you again sometime. Let’s talk exploration soon, alright, Lyra?”

Lyra beamed. “Okay! I can show you my explorer’s bag!” 

“Let me accompany you. You don’t seem well—” She took a step forward, but Twig stopped her with a noisy refusal.

“Nope, no need! I’m good. Later, guys.”

Gardevoir’s concerned gaze didn’t leave Twig until she ducked behind a stall and out of sight. The scattered scales that she’d grown upon evolution prickled along the back of her neck. She’d moved out to Verdant Village to avoid Grovyle’s worried fretting, but it seemed she’d just gotten herself a new flavor of it in the form of her neighbor. Great. That was just peachy. 

She was going to regret moving here. She could feel it.

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