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luci-in-trenchcoats · 3 years

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By My Side (Part 4)

Summary: The reader goes to dinner with her step brothers, Michael and Nick, as well as Jensen. When Jensen starts to see how her brothers treat her though, Jensen and the reader have a heart to heart and start to try a different tactic with their relationship...

Masterlist

Pairing: Bodyguard!Jensen x reader

Word Count: 3,700ish

Warnings: language, sibling angst, minor violence, mentioned prior deaths

A/N: Enjoy!

_________

Monday Evening

“Hey pipsqueak,” said Nick, your arms crossed from where you sat on the couch trying to watch TV. “Since dad and your mom are at dinner at that fancy place, maybe you could take us out?”

“Yeah,” said Michael, still texting away on his phone at the other end of the couch. “There’s that steak place dad said was good. Y/N, you want to have dinner with your big brothers?”

“Not particularly,” you said.

“She still hate us?” said Nick as he came up to the back of the couch, ruffling your hair and placing his hands on your shoulders. “You gotta let that shit go. We were kids.”

“I was a kid. You were both twenty years old and you two harassed me until I moved out, well past when you knew better. Now that I have money, you two-”

“What was that?” asked Nick and you swallowed. “Come on. Let’s get dinner.”

“Whatever. Jensen! We’re going to dinner wherever you are,” you called out. “Jensen!”

He came down the far hallway near where your office was, his hand behind his back on his holster but you shook your head.

“We’re going out,” you said as he dropped his hand down. “To eat. We’ll be back in a couple hours.”

“I’m going with you,” he said. You thought that was odd of him but he made his jaw hard and clenched it. “It’s part of my contract. I go where you go.”

“He’s perky isn’t he,” said Michael as he stood up. You rolled your eyes and went towards the front door to get your purse.

Half an hour later the three of you were seated with Jensen sat at the bar close by and keeping an eye on you.

“Surprised he didn’t ask to sit with us,” mumbled Nick. “Why do you have a bodyguard again?”

“After my old manager tried to have me kidnapped for publicity,” you said.

“You know how to pick ‘em,” said Michael. You gripped the menu tight and reviewed it, already knowing your step brothers wouldn’t even pretend to offer to pay for their meals. You never quite understood them. Chuck was always good to your mom and nice to you. You weren’t particularly close but you didn’t dislike each other either. You got along, he asked about you, you spent time together whenever you visited them. Chuck had always been okay in your book. His children though you could have sworn were adopted with how horrible they could be to you.

“How much you want to bet me I could get that douchey little bodyguard over here in less then five seconds?” asked Nick, a smirk on his face you didn’t like.

“He’s just doing his job. Let him do it in peace.”

“I still don’t get why you have one,” said Michael as he looked over the wine list. “Compared to the other girl on the show, you’re like, not good looking.”

“Dude, I’m your sister. You’re not supposed to find me good looking.”

“I know that, dipshit. I mean, you’re just, plain,” he said. “You’re not the main lead. That’s probably why.”

“I’m co-lead. We have no main lead.”

“But you’re second on the call sheet credits thing,” said Nick.

“Cause Gen got hired before me.”

“She’s still hotter than you,” mumbled Nick.

“She’s married and they’re both my best friends.”

“I didn’t say I want to fuck her. Relax. You’re always so uptight,” said Nick. You bit your tongue and weren’t surprised when Michael ordered a few hundred dollar bottle of wine. You got the twenty dollar one you normally did that tasted just as good and Nick went for an expensive Scotch you’d never heard of.

“Oh,” you said to the waiter before he could leave. “The man on the end of the bar there, his drinks and meal are on me.”

“No problem,” he said as he took off.

“She’s got no problem paying for his food,” muttered Michael.

“It’s part of his job. For him, this is a business expense,” you said. You gnawed the inside of your cheek and forced a smile. “The garlic bread is very good here if you guys want to get some.”

“Good with me,” said Michael. He gave you a smile, a genuine one before he was checking his phone again. You’d always liked Michael far more than Nick. On his own, Michael was a pretty decent guy. When he got with Nick though, and that was more often than not, even into adulthood, he was normally pretty unbearable.

“Working any big new clients?” you asked, your voice a tad too high but he ignored it while Nick went to the restroom.

“Potentially. I actually got a job offer in LA. Senior partner,” he said.

“That’s great,” you said, Michael smiling.

“You’re actually happy about that, for real,” he said.

“You’re incredibly smart. You always have been. I’m really happy you’re getting out of our little hometown and going to work at a bigger firm,” you said. “That’s a really big deal. You should be proud.”

“Here I thought you’d tell me not to move to your city,” he said.

“Why do you think I’d say that?” you asked.

“You don’t like us,” he said, nodding to the empty spot beside him. “You never have.”

“You guys are dicks most of the time. You skipped over the getting to know each other thing and went right into horrible dick older brothers.”

“We weren’t horrible. We still aren’t. I have worked cases that would make your skin crawl. We’re the Brady bunch compared to most people.”

“My dad died and I was so excited to have big brothers, you know? That year was so horrible and Chuck made mom stop crying and laugh again and I love him for that. But you guys...it doesn’t matter. I’m happy you’re getting a promotion, Michael.”

“Our mom died too that year,” he said, lowering his head.

“I know she did,” you said. “Forget I said anything.”

“So when do you go back to work?” asked Michael as Nick returned.

“A few months from now,” you said.

“What are you gonna do after that?” he asked.

“Honestly I’m not sure right now. I like TV but I might do movies. My options are pretty open,” you said. “How’s teaching going?”

“Always a joy,” said Nick, taking a long sip of his water. “I got tenure finally. Not sure if I’m gonna stay though. If Mikey moves out here I might take a position at UCLA.”

“Oh. So you’re thinking of moving out here too?” you asked. Nick narrowed his eyes and you you looked away. “Maybe mom and Chuck will come out if you guys do.”

“Maybe,” said Nick. Thankfully you spotted your waiter come back with your drinks and you were able to order your appetizer and dinner, already expecting a nearly thousand dollar bill thanks to their alcohol choices.

“I’ll be right back,” you said. You excused yourself and walked over to the bar, Jensen sipping on a glass of beer while he half-watched a TV behind the bar.

“Require saving from your brothers?” he smirked to himself, turning before you could tap him on the shoulder.

“Why do you say that?” you asked, leaning against the padded bartop.

“Just a vibe I get, you and Nick especially,” he said. “Nobody gets a pass from me.”

“He’s not a great older brother but he’s harmless,” you said.

“He intimidates you.”

“Like I said, he’s not great but the worst thing he’s ever done was leave me with a group of strange guys. Michael did the same thing. Otherwise they’re just like, crappy older brothers.”

“Crappy or something else? Like I said, nobody gets a pass from me.”

“Jensen. They would never hurt me. I swear on my life.”

“Michael wouldn’t. Nick...I’ll be keeping an eye on him, both of them, whether you want me to or not. I’m the asshole bodyguard after all,” he smirked again.

“Well, it sounds like they’re both gonna move out here soon so we’ll be seeing them more.”

“Lovely,” said Jensen. “So why’d you come over? Need a break from them?”

“Yes. Also, I already told the waiter but your drinks and food are all on me. Feel free to order whatever you want,” you said.

“I’ll stick to the one beer. I’m at work still,” he said.

“They have really good steak. The filet is amazing along with the green beans,” you said. Jensen smiled and played with his glass, swishing the ice cubes around. “The lobster macaroni is also a great side.”

“That’s a hundred dollar steak.”

“Jensen, you know I can afford it.”

“I also know how much you’re paying me. I can afford it.”

“Jensen. I’m your boss. I’m paying for it. Next time I want Taco Bell, you can pay at the drive through if it makes you feel better,” you said. He smiled, a soft gentle little smile you’d never seen on his face before. You returned it, Jensen staring at you before he shook his head and it fell away.

“I’m going to lose this argument, aren’t I.”

“Yeah, you are. I’d much rather pay for your meal than those two bimbos. I like you better,” you said.

“Must have a pretty low bar for them then,” he said.

“Why’d you stop talking to me? After the paparazzi guy?” you asked. He shrugged and wiped off a stray drop of condensation on his glass. “Please?”

“There’s a line I have to keep with you. We can be friendly but if something happens, I am in charge. There can be no doubts about that. I felt that I needed to step back and reaffirm that boundary.”

“We can keep the boundary. But we can be friends too. If you say hide, I’ll hide. If you say run, I’ll run. I know you think I’m a dumb actress but-”

“You’re not dumb. You’re one of the smartest people I’ve ever met,” he said. You blinked and he offered a half smile. “You have an ability to push through panic and be logical. I know guys with all the training in the world that can’t do that. You’re not a dumb actress. It’s obvious that you were raised to be intelligent.”

“My point is, I will do what you tell me to when it’s those hard moments. But I have confidence that you were wrong before. You can like someone, maybe even care about them like a friend, and still be able to protect them. I actually think it’ll make you better at your job.”

“Give me one example of where that works. Just one.”

“Maybe you want to try talking to your bestie, Jared,” you said. “Or literally most anyone in a relationship anywhere.”

“Touche,” he said. He smiled and nodded. “No more cold shoulder.”

“Thanks.”

“So I should try the macaroni with my steak?” he asked.

“And the green beans. You get two sides. You can get however many you want actually. The dessert selection here is even better than the steak if you can believe it.”

“I’ll have to check it out,” he said. “But no green beans. Traumatic childhood incident with them.”

“I better not be attacked by the cabbage patch kids. They might just take you down,” you said, Jensen giggling to himself. “Oh, he does laugh. Good to know. The roasted truffle garlic fries are really good too.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I think I’ll check them out.”

“Do you want to sit with us?” you asked, nodding back towards the table.

“I better not. I don’t think your brothers like me very much,” he said. “I got a better vantage point over here anyways.”

“Vantage point?” you asked.

“Got a weird feeling is all. I want to stay sharp tonight,” he said. You nodded and turned to go, Jensen catching your bicep. “If something happens, what do you do?”

“Duck and cover and wait for you to get me,” you said.

“Good girl. You did read my instructions.”

“Yup. Even read the part about how to get out of your hands being tied behind your back. Unfortunately, I’m not flexible enough and my ass is too big for that,” you said. He chuckled and you smirked. “Oh you know it is.”

“I’m not opposed to that fact,” he said. You went wide eyed and he laughed. “My boss is hot, what can I say.”

“You better stick to the one drink after all, Ackles,” you said, laughing as you lightly whacked his arm. “Try the triple brownie sundae for dessert. You won’t regret it.”

“Thanks, Y/N.”

“I think I gained five pounds,” said Michael, stretching out in his seat nearly two hours later, the waiter bringing over the check. You frowned at the bill but it was what you were expecting. You stuck your card in the pocket and caught the waiter pretty quickly. It was getting late and you were tired. Even your step-brothers were getting quiet so you hoped to get home quickly.

The waiter returned and you wrote out a tip, sticking your card back in your wallet and purse. You stretched as you stood up, your step brothers taking their time to get to their feet. You headed over towards Jensen when the sound of glass shattering caught your attention. You turned your head and heard tires screeching outside, spotting that the window at the front of the restaurant was gone now. You barely saw the cop car driving by before you heard sharp little noises in the air and felt like you got hit by a truck.

Suddenly you were on the ground, Jensen on top of you. Nick and Michael were ducked down under the table along with most everyone in the restaurant, some people at the bar hopping over the counter and diving behind the back. The whole place was silent and you all heard the front door to the place open abruptly. Jensen stood up in one smooth motion, his gun out and aimed, a shot ringing out a second later as someone yelled. A few seconds later there was a loud echo of feet, Jensen setting his gun on the ground and holding up his hands. Police filled in the place, two very angry looking officers rushing over to him and barking orders.

“It’s okay,” said Jensen to you as he knelt down.

Less than five minutes later he was released and some hostess was thanking him over and over still for stopping the guy that had come in looking for trouble. Jensen shrugged it off, only grazing the guy and the police pretty impressed with him for doing so.

“Are we free to go?” asked Jensen, an officer nodding. He waved for you and your step-brothers to follow, Jensen driving the four of you back to your place quickly. Nick and Michael took their rental car back to their hotel, neither one much in the mood to talk after what had happened.

Jensen checked that the house was secure before he went to his room and shut the door. You weren’t sure if he was okay or not. He seemed pretty calm but he had shot a guy, if only barely. Instead of heading to your bedroom, you wandered down the hall to his area of the house. There was a guest suite there he used for his bed and bathroom but he rarely used it unless he was going to bed and he always, always told you when he was turning in for the night.

As you were about to knock on the door you heard the faint sound of a shower and nodded. He was simply cleaning up. It didn’t sound like a bad idea to yourself honestly. You went down the hall to your room, flipping on the light. It was a soft white in there, the wall behind the bed a shiplap that led up to wood beams going across the vaulted ceiling. Another light was flipped on in the bathroom and you stepped under the shower for a few minutes, washing off your face and skin. After five minutes you went out to the bedroom and over to the closet, finding a pajama shirt and shorts to slip into. Your hair was thrown up in a messy bun and you found your oversized fleece hoodie you occasionally slept in. Tucking it under your arm, you headed out of the room and back down the hall, Jensen’s door still shut.

“Jensen?” you said, knocking on the door lightly. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah,” he said. Carefully you pushed the door open, Jensen walking out of his bathroom in just his boxer briefs, wiping a towel over his head. He tugged it down and stared at you, your eyes going to his chest, legs and everywhere in between.

“I uh, wanted to make sure you were alright,” you said, ripping your eyes away and meeting his gaze. He nodded and tossed his towel back into the laundry basket by the closet.

“I’m fine. You?”

“Yeah. I uh-”

“No need to be nervous around me,” he said.

“Right,” you said, Jensen walking right in front of you before stopping. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay and to say thanks.”

“It’s my job,” he said.

“Still,” you said. “I...here. I thought you might like this.”

“A hoodie?” he asked as you handed him the fleece. “What’s this for?”

“S’my bad day hoodie. I wear it to bed sometimes. Makes me feel better,” you said with a shrug.

“Old boyfriend’s?” he asked as he pulled it on, a soft smile spreading across his cheeks. “It’s so soft. Thanks, Y/N.”

“You’re welcome,” you said.

“So was it the boyfriends? Or you get it for yourself?” he asked.

“It was a birthday present for my dad. He died the week before. I never got to give it to him.”

“I shouldn’t be wearing this,” he said, moving to take it off when you caught his wrists. He was so much stronger than you but he let you manhandle him and move his hands back to his sides.

“It fits you better than it ever did me. Besides, I think you’re a little on edge and not telling me which is fine. It’s good for that,” you said. “I want you to keep it.”

“Y/N, I can’t keep something like this,” he said. You stared at him, Jensen swallowing. “It’s important to you.”

“Yes. But you gave me your blanket and wouldn’t let me return it. Fair is fair,” you said.

“Y/N-”

“S’an order, Jensen. Keep it.”

“Yes mam,” he said quietly.

“I hate when you call me that,” you said, moving your hands away from him.

“I know you do,” he said, a quick smirk crossing his face. “Why aren’t you using this yourself tonight?”

“I got my blanket. I’m good,” you said.

“It doesn’t explain why you’re giving me this though.”

“Lately, something else has been making me feel better and safe. My dad would have liked you.”

“Your father was a good person. A brave person,” said Jensen.

“You know how he died,” you said, Jensen returning a nod. “I used to be really angry at him. Why’d he have to go help that woman? He could have walked past and been alive. But since I got older, if I was that woman being attacked, I would pray for a man like that to come help me. I know he was good.”

“I will do my very best to be that man for you,” he said.

“I know you will. If you need something, come get me,” you said.

“Y/N,” he said just as you spun around. “May I have the morning off? You will be with family and my sister is in town for the day for work. I’d like to get lunch with her if I could.”

“Take the day,” you said with a smile, looking back over your shoulder. “She can come to dinner if you like.”

“She’s got a flight back at five thirty,” he said. “Thanks though.”

“It’s no problem,” you said. “Goodnight, Jensen.”

“Goodnight,” he said. You pulled his door shut after yourself and went down to your own bedroom to get under the covers. You stared up at the ceiling, hearing a light pitter patter on the rooftop. Rain was so rare in LA that you normally welcomed it when it came around. It reminded you of back home in a way.

A text popped up on your phone just as you were closing your eyes. It was from Gen and was a link to some news article about the restaurant, a picture of you and Jensen front and center.

You wrote back you were fine and turned off your phone, knowing you’d have to deal with questions in the morning.

________

A/N: Read Part 5 here!

#spn #supernatural #jensen ackles #jensen ackles au #jensen ackles x reader #jensen ackles x you #au #bodyguard!AU #bodyguard!jensen #bodyguard!jensen x reader #spn fanfic #supernatural fanfiction

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justanotherlifeff · 3 years

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Isn't there this one person in your life that you absolutely hate no matter how much you have tried not to? Well, for you, that person was Bakugou Katsuki, your employer. Honestly, why the hell did you even start working at stupid Dynamight Hero agency as a financial analyst? Oh right, cause it's the number 2 hero's agency and you have a pretty useless quirk. Right.

Yes, you were dumb enough to think that you were going to start an amazing life with this super high paying job on your first day at work. That was till Dynamight himself introduced himself into your life and fucking exploded it to pieces. It will be fun, they said. Plus, Pro hero Dynamight is super-hot, they said (well, you didn't disagree with that part). Yes, you got stuck with paperwork that HE was supposed to complete on day one, ending up having to do overtime while he went out to party with his random overly attractive fangirls.

Anyone might think that Dynamight was a hero work obsessed workaholic and they’d be right, however, only partially. Yes, he was a hero work obsessed workaholic but only when it came to on site missions where he could blast villains into oblivion and show off his quirk to boost his already overinflated ego. Yep, there were times he took over missions that made him work 24/7. HOWEVER, this man absolutely hated the paperwork involved with it. And guess who got stuck with his huge load of paperwork? Yep, you.

You were not exactly a workaholic and you liked having a social life (not saying you actually had one though). Yes, you were the type to work hard while you were supposed to work and rest when you had free time, which was EXACTLY the opposite of Bakugou Katsuki. You tried to understand how his brain works, you really did. However, you figured that normal and plain people like yourself couldn’t possibly do that. Like, who the fuck even trains on their free time? Why is he always at the office gym or out partying with his fangirls (Red Riot came to pick him up once though). Like, does this man never just sit at home with some cheap snacks and just watch movies all night? Apparently not and his horrible mountain of paperwork stopped you from doing that either.

Now that you had to practically live at your office, surviving on solely energy bars, you decided that yes, despite him having absolutely God-like looks, you hated his guts. The fact that his fangirls were so pretty and got his attention like that by boosting his ego made you feel inferior as well. You were just the plain girl at one corner of his agency, someone he never even looked at. Yet, you were getting all his paperwork done on time, pretty much saving his career, unlike those girls who only are there near him because of their obsession with a pro hero and their status symbols. Yeah, it stung that you were invisible. That was till, one fateful day.

You almost forgot when you went back home the last time. Was it last week? Thanks to your shitty boss taking up a rather large mission last month, you were presented with a pile of paperwork that was taller than you. Yes, it was probably as tall as Bakugou, who was a whooping 6ft. You were feeling as if you were about to faint when you decided to get another energy bar and freshen up a bit in the washroom. After all, you were smelling like death due to not taking a shower for an entire week.

Were your eyebags always that bad? As you washed your face, you felt sick. Was it the lack of sleep? Another energy bar should solve it, right? Just as these thoughts were running into your head as you got out of the washroom to the vending machine, you bumped into none other than Bakugou Katsuki himself, with his three hot fangirls.

You really wanted to punch him. This day couldn’t get any worse and this little bitch had the audacity to yell “Watch it, extra!” to you. You really wanted to punch him. However, you only managed a meek “Sorry” as you excused yourself and walked away. You heard one of his fangirls say something about how ugly you look with the eyebags and all but you couldn’t care less. At least you were the reason she could cling to the certain pro hero. He’d have lost his job if you didn’t do the paperwork for him. Yes, you were important…. right?

You absolutely hated Bakugou Katsuki and that was the last thought on your mind when you fainted in front of the vending machine. When you opened your eyes, you found yourself in a hospital bed, in a rather luxurious hospital cabin. As you looked around, a nurse entered the room. “Oh, you gained consciousness. Let me check your vitals and I’ll call the doctor then” she told you, smiling. “What happened?” you asked, your voice scratchy and dry. “Well, you didn’t get any proper sleep for a week and you had really low blood pressure which caused you to pass out. Thankfully, you don’t have a concussion and Dynamight brought you here on time cause you were really low on certain nutrients. You really should eat healthier food.” The nurse explained.

Bakugou wasn’t a pro hero for nothing. When you bumped into him, he was pissed as usual. However, when he saw your face, he had a bad feeling that you were probably going to pass out very soon. The feeling kept bugging him even when he reached the party, even when he was going to get laid for the night. Which is why, he found himself back at his agency, leaving the two women who were eager to open their legs for him, only to find you lying in front of the vending machine. You clearly looked overworked, which made him wonder who the hell were you, since as far as he knew, the workload of his agency was evenly distributed.

He ended up firing his personal assistant when he found out that the paperwork that he delegated to her, were being done by the financial analyst of the agency, someone who already had enough paperwork to deal with. Of course, you were completely overworked. How the hell did you even keep up with all that work for so long? Why did you never even complain?

Bakugou Katsuki hated feeling guilty, which is why he decided to give you a promotion, a raise and of course, apologize to you for the trouble his previous assistant caused you (the latter being suggested by his PR team since they did not want a new headline where Dynamight Agency’s financial analyst is overworked). Which is why, as soon as you got out of the hospital, you found a mail on your phone from Bakugou’s personal email address to meet up with him since he wanted to talk about “the incident”.

And then you found yourself at an overly posh restaurant with your boss, who seemed almost as awkward as you were. As you talked to him, you found out that he was not as egoistic and assholeish as he seems. He is actually a decent guy, only you rarely ever agree with his lifestyle. He let you know that all the work you did were actually supposed to be done by his assistant, someone who actually was hired by him to do his paperwork. Apparently that woman did absolutely nothing and took his money for all these months. When he offered you the job as his assistant and mentioned the salary (which was double you’re your initial salary), you audibly gasped, pretty much embarrassing yourself as everyone near you gave you a disapproving look and making Bakugou chuckle at your stupidity.

And this is how you became Bakugou’s assistant, probably the most nightmarish job in all of Japan.

#katsukibakugou #bakugou katsuki #bakugo katsuki #bnha bakugou #Katsuki Bakugō #bakugo x reader #bakugo × reader #bakugou x reader #bakugou × reader #bakugou fanfiction #bakugou

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legionofpotatoes · 3 years

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I love your art, it is very detailed in a neat way. Was wondering how you got started making it as a source of income? How did you get your first paid work, I'd love some advice on how to get started, if that's ok

Thank you. Of course it's okay, although I doubt I have enough work experience in art to really delve into this. I only went full freelance this year, and had been juggling art as a side hobby until then. If you're still interested in my somewhat narrow perspective, and are okay with my long-winded rambles, I'll give it a shot:

So to answer your question fully, I'll describe how I started and move into personal advice and learnings later on. As a disclaimer, I am a white cishet dude in my late twenties with a moderate cocktail of mental illnesses, but overall I can pass for a functioning adult so a lot I have to say may come laced with privilege I cannot fully identify.

So uhh I began drawing in around 2012? I think? Maybe halfway through 2011? And I mostly made fanart for things I enjoyed and tried to branch out in communities that felt nourishing to my style and interests (I caught a bug for alt posters and enjoyed mainstream movies so I spent a long time on posterspy early on). There were a handful of opportunities that came from there but I could only accept a couple because of primary workplace commitments. Still, it showed that networking in a focused community was definitely a good place to start; I myself have huge trouble committing to social networks and really staying socially active, but I knew it was an essential ingredient in succeeding so I tried to make myself be involved in challenges and art support trains etc. as much as I could.

In parallel to all that I also ran a few third party online stores (redbubble, teepublic) for disposable income and would sometimes, if rarely, hit around $100-150 a month from those sources combined. It is a sort of thing that requires helper accounts on other social media sites to promote it on, because the stores themselves have a huge volume of content that translates into low organic discoverability. Obviously it was never gonna be the way towards financial independence through art, and with community projects being few and far between, I opened private commissions in around uhhh 2017 I think, focusing on offering a few styles I knew I could do well, and sometimes operating in individual fandoms (it was mostly a bioware thing to be frank). But I had to close them back down after a year or so, again because of work-life conflict and how badly it was burning me out. The reason I kept trying to monetize this hobby is because I honestly hated what I did for my main job and wanted to see a way out in some shape or form in the future.

And then in 2020 I had to quit my main job altogether because of *gestures at pandemic* and deal with a mental breakdown from all the wonderful things it did to us and me specifically. I took a short break and decided to give art a shot full-time, and that was around May this year. I was planning on opening up commissions again (and I still am), but a few sudden opportunities that fell in my lap moved that timetable down and now I'm grateful to even be doing something I am getting adequately paid for.

So, with that somewhat limited perspective, here's what I've learned that I'd tell myself if I was just starting out:

1. Being a fan of something can be a shortcut towards effective networking kickoffs. Which are important evidently. If you love something and enjoy making content for it, join communities, settle into a combination of social media websites that feel right for those interests + your body of work + your inner rhythm, and try to play to content discovery as much as your mental health allows you to. Like I said, I know that I myself am incredibly bad at self-motivating to talk to people, so I found that synergizing common interests into fanart - which I enjoyed making anyway - could be a way to give myself a gentle nudge forward and build those bridges leading to community activities, which then net experience and coverage. Sometimes even freelance projects from official avenues. Again; picking the right spaces for what you're after is key. Companies roam twitter, concept art recruiters scour artstation or linkedin etc, instagram can land you private commissions and collab opportunities, so on and so forth. Find your niche and try to kick up dust. However...

2. I do not believe that any social profile can replace a good portfolio. The thing that made an immediate difference to me this year was building a coherent, simple website with my best work front and center and a contact form on top. Every single opportunity I got came from that form (maybe via twitter or instagram initially, but always sealing the decision after going through the website), so I firmly believe that showcasing your skills and portfolio in a visually arresting and user-friendly way is a big priority. I had some reservations about tackling that task but fortunately I had help from a savvy life partner and we slapped it together via wordpress in less than a day. Twitter/whatever social media is prevalent in your target groups is definitely important to get the right eyes on your shit, yes, but those eyes will then look for a second stop where your work and rates are more clear and concise. Simplicity is key imo, I cannot overstate this. So make a cute, simple portfolio!

3. Your skills and rates will grow and change as you do. Let them. Over the years I built several lasting professional relationships from my obsession over mass effect and kept getting opportunities both from bioware and their partner companies, some small and some a bit bigger. A one-off job earlier this year opened an unexpected door to another much larger commitment, and then the work I did there brought some attention from small businesses looking for commercial commissions. These were all incredibly different projects in terms of scope and budget, and I've been tackling them all on a case-by-case basis and slowly coming into my own irt my needs, rates, and SOW thresholds. It is still a work in progress (and a LOT of literal work as well), and very much a thing I struggle with in publicly marketing, which is why I felt a tad underqualified to answer your question in the first place (obviously I did not let that stop me). But what it means for me now is that I am rapidly developing into whatever my "version" of a functioning freelance artist is, and when the conditions for that guy are met, I need to be able to confidently plant myself and operate from that space despite past precedents. Do not let anyone bully you into downpricing what you yourself perceive as legitimate products of personal growth and development. Speaking of which...

4. The shitty challenge of turning envy into inspiration, and paddling outside your comfort zones in full riot gear. it is hard, but realizing that being a miserable, self-hating artist in my early days got me nothing but more misery back was the first real step I took and what truly blew the hinges off. I was just not pleasant to be around, I would badmouth my work all the time, and it all somehow made sense in my broken mind because the validation I sought was purely external and the way I sought it was through eliciting sympathy via self-victimization (even when I made something objectively nice). It all led fucking nowhere. Except perhaps to my own narcissism that I one day managed to identify and start managing. So I started looking at things that made me seethe with envy and calmly deconstruct and figure out their inner workings instead, do studies, and find nuggets of inspiration or discover new ways to approach rendering or building up specific elements. It was an application of analytical diligence to what I wanted to be a purely emotional, esoteric workflow, but that I deep down knew wasn't. Art is a discipline and a skill, and maybe it isn't a straight line, but you gotta find some line to thread nevertheless. Being self-hating was almost an identity I had to break out of, and despite it still being like, 4-5% there? I realize its cause and effect on me, my work, and those around me, so it is with a conscious choice that I gently set it aside when I work and especially when I learn. It won't always stay quiet, but the effort is the difference. Your doors towards accepting true growth and venturing into uncharted territories, art styles, and networking will really open from there. But there's a huge caveat...

5. Toolsets, accessibility, privilege, and all the good things that enable artistic expression and profitability are not given equal to all. you might do all the mental work I mentioned to be ready to rock and roll and learn and draw your way out of anything, but digital art is a fucking money pit that asks almost too much at times. I don't got a good case study here but identifying and ensuring accessibility to the tools you need to do your best work is, like, super important. The ergonomics can improve as you make money and settle into the job, but the basics have to be made available to you. And some of that might not even be under your direct control. That can be anything from pen tablets to software subscriptions to opportunities in hiring sullied by sexism or what have you. You gotta navigate all that through careful networking and money/time management. I don't do a good job of devoting specific slices of time to work/study, and my primary clutch is iPad software which went from a good deal to a nightmare scenario over the years. So all I can say here is do what I didn't; network, invest in a PC/tablet, and pick a software you'll learn that won't burn a hole in your pocket.

6. Be nice to work with? This one is hard to articulate and has landed my own ass in hot water in my early years because of how socially inept I am, but nothing is more worthwhile than being.. like. a good person to work with. That can be anything like meeting deadlines, or sometimes missing them but eloquently articulating why, being generous in early stages, being communicable and not too wordy in your emails, having a good grasp on abstract artistic concepts and how to describe them in simple terms, having a clear, laid out framework of your working rates in commercial and non-commercial projects and sticking to those guns with grace, understanding when you need to say no and saying it well, the works. Just being nice. Sometimes that might mean going headstrong with something you believe in, or simmering down and sucking up to the big man, all relative and adaptive. Part and parcel of the service provision dance that we all have to do in order to make bank. Know your lines here, obviously, and don't like. work for nazis. or uh.. *shudders* exposure. but be nice and empathetic and communicable and word will travel eventually. Skill may be in abundance these days, but good people are most certainly not, and capitalism has a way of bubbling up scarcity. Grim, but uh, them's the breaks.

I know I'm ultimately telling you to like. Have a body of work, make a portfolio, grow, and network. But that's really how I see it for now. And being nice can be a cherry on top that sets you apart, along with the inherent irreplaceable voice of your artwork. I think I rambled on enough, but if there is something specific you need my help with, even if you want to come off anon and talk in private, please feel free.

#anon #asks #long post #sorry I cant actually condense ideas better :(

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captainkjones · 4 years

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The Murder of the General

Summary: Anita Williams, aka Bangalore, is found guilty for the murder of General Clarke, but before she goes to the prison, someone bails her out to hire her for a job she’s got a perfect skillset for. So now that she’s got the job, what does she do now that the person she has to take out is her ex she hasn’t seen since that night with the general. Assassin Au

Warnings: Murder, angst

Words: 5095

Ships: Bangalore (Anita Williams) x Gn!reader

A/N: This is my first fic over a thousand words, let alone 5000, pls dont let it flop. Have fun reading

It’s not like Anita planned on ever being one of those people, who kill who the big guys in the underground wanted dead. She didn’t plan on using her skill set on that type of stuff, stuff like sniping Generals in the military from a building across their big fancy suites. But that’s what she does now. It’s not like she can complain, right? It’s giving her big money, and after being kicked from the military, she needs that money. So now she’s there, staring at the file that was just passed over the table to her.

“This is your new assignment, I want it done by the end of the week.” The man in the seat said gruffly, grabbing his cigar and taking a smooth pull off it, waiting for her response. She looked over the front page of information, her eyes scanning over the info on the assignment's description.

‘Assignments. Really? When did I stop thinking of them as other people?’ She thought to herself after catching herself on her thoughts. She sighed and looked up after closing the file. “Why the end of the week?”

“They have vital information that I can’t afford for them to tell. They have a meeting with the higher ups in the military over the weekend. You can handle this job, right?” He questioned her, staring her down with such force that she didn’t hesitate to answer.

“Of course, I can. No one else out there is better suited for the job.” She stood from her seat, thanking him for his time before being led out by one of his men. She was quick to get in her car and drive off to the motel she was staying at. With the boss being so far, everytime she had to get an assignment, she’d have to stay at some run down motel, to also keep anyone off her tracks. She didn’t want anyone suspecting her for the deaths of her assignments.

She tapped the wheel while stopped at a red light, taking a glance at the file in her passenger seat. “How did I end up like this?” She asked herself, before seeing the green light and continuing her drive. Spending the rest of the drive in her thoughts, she started thinking about how she ended up being hired as The Boss’ personal assassin.

“The defendant, Anita Williams, is found guilty for the murder of General Charleston Clarke. This court is adjourned.” Anita looks up from the table, standing up as a police officer starts to lead her out of the courtroom. Right as she’s about to leave, her eyes find the eyes of a man with two men sitting next to him in the back row, watching her closely. Her brows furrowed before she walked out and was led to a holding cell.

“You’ll be transferred to a federal prison tomorrow morning, for now, you better get comfortable in here.” The officer said as he took her cuffs off and left the cell, closing and locking it behind him. Another officer stood by the cell as the other one walked away. She sighed as she laid down on the uncomfortable and hard bed, thinking she might as well sleep until she’s transferred. She doses off soon enough.

About an hour later, she’s woken up by an officer. She groaned as she sat up, wiping her eyes in an attempt to wake herself up better. Standing up, she yawned as she put her hands out so the officer could put the cuffs on her. She’s silently led to a room where two of her former higher ups and her lawyer were waiting.

“Sit there.” The officer instructed before she sat down at the table, keeping her expression neutral. She didn’t want to cause unnecessary issues with them right after being charged with murder. They started talking about her discharge, telling her she needed to sign papers for it and that it was a dishonorable discharge.

She went along with it, sighing as she signed all the papers they told her to sign. When they were done, she was led back to the holding cell. When back in the cell, she laid in the bed, thinking to herself on everything that happened. It wasn’t too long before she had ended up dosing back off to sleep.

The next morning, she was awakened by a police officer, telling her to get up and that she was being released. Barely knowing what's going on and still being half asleep, she followed him outside where she saw one of the men she saw in the courtroom. “Anita Williams. Come with me.” She looked behind her at the building then at the man, thinking about her choices. She sighed and walked down the steps to the car. He opened the door for her, waiting for her to slide into the back seat before closing the door. He walked to the drivers door and got in.

“Who are you?” She questioned, looking at him with her brows etched together, waiting for a response from him.

“You’ll find out soon enough.” He answered simply, not elaborating further. She sighed, knowing that was probably all she was going to be getting out of him, leaning back in her seat, looking out the car window. When they started getting farther downtown, she sat straight up, getting worried now. Up until now, she had avoided this part of town due to recent news of gun fights. “Where exactly are we going?”

“You’ll find out when we get there, now just sit back and wait.” She looked at him, waiting a moment before leaning back again and crossing her arms.

Not long after, they pulled into the garage of a building. She sat back up, her heart starting to race just a bit. ‘Great, I was bailed out by someone I don’t know, just so they could kill me. This is wonderful.’

When the car was parked, the man got out and pulled her door open. She stepped out of the vehicle slowly, the door being closed behind her. “Follow me.” The man said, walking towards an elevator. She looked around the garage for a moment before following him and stepping onto the elevator after him.

Anita sighed as she was pulled out of her thoughts at the sight of the motel. She parked quickly, grabbing her things from the passenger seat and opening her door. She got out of the car, sighing as she stretched her legs before walking into the motel, nodding to the person at the front desk. Walking to her room, she unlocked the door and locked it again behind her. She placed her bag on the desk and put the file on the bed.

She looked towards the bathroom then the file and decided to take a shower before reading the whole file. She went ahead and grabbed one of the towels and put it on the counter in the bathroom before getting undressed. She got into the shower, turning the water on and letting it run hot before stepping under it. The tension in her shoulders slowly dissipated as she started thinking more about how she ended up doing the dirty work for one of the biggest mob bosses in the country.

The man led her into a big lounge type of room, where music was playing and had small circular stages where both men and women were dancing. He led her over to a table where the same man from the courtroom was sitting. “Anita Williams! You're finally here, please sit.” He motioned to the seat next to him. She was skeptical while she sat down, looking around the room, noticing a small bar where a tall, broad man was making drinks. Her eyes moved back to the man next to her.

“Who are you and are you the one who bailed me out?” She asked quickly, watching his face for a reaction. He laughed as he straightened in his seat.

“Straight to the point aren’t you. Well, I suppose I should tell you who I am. I’m Ronaldo Navvaro, and yes, I was the one who bailed you out of that pretty big charge.” He explained as she sat there, visibly on edge. She didn’t know what to expect now that she knew who he was. She knew his name, of course she did when she was that high up in the military previously. The man caused a lot of issues within the ranks. A lot of people ended up missing or dead because of him.

“By your reaction, I have to assume you know who I am, which saves us time. I’m sure you’re wondering why I bailed you out. I’ll get to that in a moment. First, let's talk about you.” Ronaldo lifted his cup, signaling to the man at the bar that he wanted another round. She tensed up, making sure she was entirely aware of her surroundings. She nodded to him slowly, waiting for him to continue.

“So, you were a Sergeant in the Army, almost about to be promoted to Staff Sergeant when you, what, killed General Clarke is cold blood. Explain to me why you murdered him.” The man behind the bar brought over more drinks, placing them on the table. Ronaldo grabbed one and slid the other to Anita.

She slowly grabbed it, taking a sip from it before placing it down and thinking. “I killed him because he did something to a friend of mine. She was discharged for reporting him. They denied all of her appeals because he said for them to. He made my blood boil. People like him should not be in places of power like that.” She answered honestly, looking at him to watch his reaction. He nodded as he obviously thought something through.

“I see. Now that we’ve discussed that, let’s talk about why I bailed you out. As you must know, I am a high power in the underground so I can’t go around doing my own dirty business. I bailed you out to offer you a position where all you have to do is take out the people threatening me and my business. You’ve got the skill set, being trained in the military of course, and you are obviously capable of murder.”

“What are my choices?” She asked, knowing that there must be some sort of consequence with saying no to the position. She grabbed her drink and took another sip as she started to relax in her seat.

“You can take the position, or one of my men can take care of you.” Out of the corner of her eye she saw a man casually holding a pistol, looking over it carefully as he glanced up at her. It was obviously a threat and not some sort of offer with some second meaning. She sighed as she placed her cup down and looked at Ronaldo again.

“Okay. Will I be getting paid or is that not part of the job description?” She asked, straightening up more. Ronaldo let out another laugh as he took a drink from his cup.

The water started running cold, pulling her out of her thoughts. She turned it off, stepping out of the shower as she grabbed the towel, wrapping it around herself as she walked out of the bathroom. She stopped to stare at the file, groaning as she realised she was going to have to read it before going to bed. She was quick to get dressed and sit down on the bed. Grabbing the file, she opened it and started pulling out the different papers. She first started reading the description again, humming to herself as she placed it down and picked up the stack of pictures, pausing in shock as she saw the face of the assignment.

“Y/N?” She started flipping through them, seeing pictures of you doing day to day things, like getting coffee and taking your dog on a walk. She wondered what kind of information you had on him that could have put a target on your back. When she was done with the pictures, she put them down and picked up a stack of papers that explained in extreme detail what your normal routine was, what your schedule for the next week was and when you were having that meeting with the higher ups.

She picked up the last papers that contained all your personal info, including your address, your phone number, where you were located in the last 6 months, family names, etc.. Sighing she put all the papers and pictures back in the file, thinking about how she was going to go about doing this. How she was going to bring herself to ending the life of the one person she was closest to for the last 10 years, give or take.

She laid down, picking up her phone and looking up one of the cafes the papers talked about, finding out where it was. It was a few towns over. ‘Guess I’ll be checking out of here in the morning’. She thought about going to check around the buildings to see if there were any roofs she could use for sniping, or maybe if she could try to just see you, and reconnect to get you alone somehow. Then she started thinking about how long it’s been since she’s seen you. Last time you saw each other was right before she had murdered the General. That was about a year ago, she was still unsure if it was safe to be seen in public during the day the more she thought about it.

After being released and the media found out, she wasn’t able to do anything during the day. And when she did, she had to make sure her face was covered and her appearance was different to the last time the media had seen her, the trial. The Media was raging about it, most people were angry at her release, others not as caring about it. Her release was all over the news. Headlines like ‘MURDERER ANITA WILLIAMS RELEASED FROM PRISON’ were everywhere for months after.

After people stopped talking about it so much, she was able to go out at night safer at least. Most of her jobs were given to her after the media quieted down about it. She spent most of that time that she couldn’t go out just training more, using the supplies Mr. Navvaro gave her.

She huffed as she thought out her choices before deciding sleep was a better choice until morning. She moved the file over to the bedside table and got comfortable. Or as comfortable as someone could be as a criminal who has put many targets on her back could be.

She only slept for about four hours, rising early to get her bags fixed up and dressed in time to be checked out of the motel by 5 in the morning. She put her duffle in her backseat before tossing the file into the passenger seat, and getting into the car. Starting the car up, she pulled out of the parking lot swiftly, setting off towards the town three towns over. She wanted to leave early cause the roads were almost empty and it was quicker to drive when there was no one on the road to get in her way.

The drive was only an hour, as she successfully beat traffic. She pulled up to a hotel, parking and being quick to pull her bag and file out of her car, walking into the lobby. After paying for a room, she put her bag on the available desk and placed the file down next to it. She didn’t unpack, she never does. Not unpacking makes it easier to leave if someone is onto her.

She pulled her laptop out of her bag and started looking up directions to the cafe, wondering if that would be the best approach. She bit at her lip as she decided she was going to go with that plan. She tried convincing herself this was an easier plan and not a self-fulfilling decision. Looking back at the file, she scanned over your routine of going to the cafe and spending about an hour sitting at the same booth reading. You usually did that around 9 ish in the morning. She looked at the time, seeing it was exactly 8:45.

She sighed and got up. “No time for a shower I guess. I’m glad I took one last night.” She mumbled to herself as she changed into more appropriate attire. She put on a facemask, and grabbed her room key, the file, and her phone before heading out of the room. She walked straight out to her car. She wanted to be there on time so she could catch you while you’re reading.

Driving off as fast as legally possible, she got to the cafe within 10 minutes. She hadn’t seen your car yet, so she sat there in her car, keeping her eye out for you. When she saw you pull up, she grabbed her phone and slid it in her jacket pocket, putting her facemask backup so it wasn’t immediately obvious who she was. She got out of her car right as you were walking into the cafe, speed walking to the door before casually walking in. She didn’t want to bring any attention to herself while she was in there.

She walked up to the counter as you walked to the booth she saw in the pictures. She ordered a black coffee and just waited by the counter for it. When she got it, she walked over to the booth and sat down across from you, immediately bringing your attention to her. “Uhm.. Hello?”

She sighed and slid the facemask down so you could see her face. “Williams? What the hell are you doing here?” You were quick to question, getting nervous at the fact your ex, who happened to be a murderer who mysteriously disappeared after being released, was right in front of you.

“I was in town for work, and saw the cafe. Wanted some coffee. I wasn’t expecting to see you here though. It’s been awhile, y/n” She spoke clearly before taking a drink from her cup, watching your expression.

“It has been a while. I definitely wasn’t expecting to see you again, after,” you paused, thinking about your choice of words, “you know.” She nodded at your words in understanding. “So, you’re working? I’m surprised to hear anyone hired you after all that happened. No offense though, it’s great to hear you’ve got a job though.”

“Yeah, I understand, no offense taken. I was surprised too. But I guess it’s working out as it’s supposed to.” She said before taking another drink, looking out the window at the building across the street. If this had been a year ago, she wouldn’t have been able to do this type of plan cause she’d be under watch from Navvaro’s men. But, now she had gained his trust enough to use any plan to get the job done.

“What about you, you still a staff sergeant?” Anita asked, looking back at you, smiling warmly. It felt weird for her to smile like that again. Working as an assassin has kind of given her life void of reasons to smile too much. But she didn’t mind, it’s what kept her fed.

“No, actually, I was promoted and moved up in ranks a couple months ago.” You said, still concerned if you should be talking with her, but still smiled back. She didn’t like the fact you smiled back, didn’t like the fact that it meant you were starting to trust her, even a little bit. She would rather you tell her you don’t want to talk so that she can just fall back to plan b and snipe you while you were in your apartment.

But you didn’t. You smiled, and continued the conversation, actively catching up with her, or what you thought was catching up. She watched your face and body language throughout the conversation over the next half hour, seeing you slowly relax into your seat and become more expressive while talking. She knew she had you where she needed you. She was certain she had you where you needed her when you checked the time and said you had to go.

“Damn, I’ve got to get going, I have some errands to run today, but I want to keep catching up. Would you like to meet me for dinner, maybe at my place, tomorrow night?” You asked, looking almost hopeful. Her heart broke when she realized that if she said yes, what you’d be thinking was happening would be entirely different than what she knew would be happening. She knew she’d be leading you on, only to hurt you once again.

“Of course, I’d love that.” She answered, her smile almost faltering as she said it. When you slid a paper to her, her heart broke just a little more. She looked at it, seeing your number and address on it.

“Here you go, you can come over around 8ish, if that's a good time for you?” You smiled, putting your bag together. She for a moment started thinking about before, when you first met 10 years ago. When you were both in your late teens.

“ Is this seat taken?” You had asked, pointing to the seat next to her. Anita shook her head no, motioning for you to sit. It was senior year, and you had just moved to town. During the whole class, you had tried making conversation. It worked at some point, as she had been talking more than paying attention to the teacher. When the bell had rung, she sighed and looked at you.

“I have a different class but do you want to hang out after school?” You asked with hope in your eyes. She nodded with a small smile, grabbing a paper you slid over to her. It was your number and your address. “Come over anytime, my parents won’t mind.”

“It’s a perfect time, I will see you then. I hope you have a good day.” She agreed, thinking to herself how ironic her hoping you have a good day is. She didn��t know what she was going to do now, especially as she watched you walk away and out of the cafe. She watched you walk all the way to your car before she pulled her mask up and got up, leaving to go to her own car. She drove back to the hotel, deciding she was going to start planning what she was going to do.

She got in her room and looked over at her duffel, and decided what she was going to do. She started planning everything out while also going through her own hesitations and feelings beforehand, not wanting to get herself caught during this because of a misstep in the process.

Before she knew it, the new day had come and she spent the day getting ready completely. She woke up early and took a shower, spending more time than she’d like to admit in there. When she was out, she got dressed and went and got breakfast. When she was back in the room, she sat on her bed, letting her thoughts take over for a bit.

“Anita!” You called out to her, running to catch up to her. She was headed home, mostly just wanting to eat something better than cafeteria food. You went with her, her mom already used to you coming in with her. She grabbed some food from the fridge before both of you went up to her room. You sat on her bed, reaching and grabbing some of the food off the plate and plopping it in your mouth. She smacked your hand before dropping her bad onto her floor and getting on the bed. You laughed and you both just relaxed and hung out until it was time for you to head home.

She ran a hand over her face, checking the time. It was about noon. She didn’t know what to do until 8. So she laid down and kept thinking.

“L/n, something funny?” The sergeant standing in front of the group of recruits asked after you started laughing at something Anita had whispered to you.

“No, Sir. Nothing is funny.” You said, getting serious enough for the sergeant to move on, before you and Anita looked at each other and quietly chuckled. This was a normal occurrence for you two. Even as you moved up in ranks together, you both were seen as the ones who seemed to never stop laughing around each other. If one of you was with the other, jokes could be heard. But without you, Anita was serious, a seemingly different person when you weren’t around. She’d barely make jokes, or even laugh at someone else’s jokes. They figured it was the bond you two shared.

No one had blinked an eye when you two had gotten together and started dating. Everyone was waiting for it to actually happen, hell, half of them believed you two were already dating. For years, everything went well, minimal problems between the two of you. Everything was great until the incident. You had looked so worried at how angry she was about your friend being discharged. She had disappeared in the middle of night only for you to find out where she’d gone was General Clarke’s room, having strangled him. Someone had found her right after, calling for help. She was quickly arrested for his murder and had been tried immediately.

It broke you the next morning when they’d told you what she’d done. How she didn’t resist when they took her, she just looked emotionless. Like she didn’t care about what she’d done. She didn’t though. The man deserved what he had coming in her eyes. He had hurt one of her friends then had her discharged for wanting someone to know what he’d done. He didn’t deserve his position as General.

After that night, you had never seen each other. You’d refused to face her, not wanting to see her. She understood. She was a murderer, and she understood why you didn’t want to see her after she had become a murderer.

Anita woke up suddenly, not knowing when she had fallen asleep. She checked the time, seeing it was about 7:30 now. She cursed at herself before getting up and getting dressed. She slipped on her best looking outfit that she had with her and pulled out her knife roll from her duffel. She looked through it, choosing a simple dagger that’d be easy to hide in the inner pocket of her jacket. She looked at the time and saw she had about 10 minutes to get to your place and felt her heart start to race. For the first time in forever, she felt herself get nervous about a kill.

She put everything including the file into her duffle and made sure she had all her things, before leaving the room and checking out of the hotel. She got to her car and tossed her bag into her trunk before getting in and driving to your place. She made sure to text you that she was on her way at a red light.

When she got there, she reached into her center console for her leather gloves. She looked at her reflection in her side mirror before getting out, and walking up to the building. Once she was buzzed in, she took the elevator up to your floor and walked over to your door, knocking a couple times.

You opened the door with a smile, welcoming her in quickly. When she walked in, she was hit with the smell of food. “Smells delicious.” She mentioned as she looked around the apartment before looking back at you.

“It should be done soon, until then, wanna watch T.v?” Everytime you asked a question, she swore her heart stopped because you always had a hopeful look in your eye. It made it really hard to say no to you. She nodded and took her jacket off, putting it on the back of the couch as you both sat down. It felt awkward until the show came on and she made a comment about how she hasn’t watched it in so long.

Soon you both were laughing like you used to. Soon, you both were right next to each other on the couch, laughing so hard at each other jokes, everything felt okay. Then you were looking at each other, tears going down both of your faces from laughing too hard. It was sudden, she wasn’t expecting it and she didn’t know who initiated it. But somehow, you both were holding onto each other with smiles on your faces as you kissed for the first time in almost two years.

The only thing that stopped you was the beeping from the oven. You sighed as you got up, Anita quick to follow. You pulled the food out of the oven and pulled out the plates as Anita looked for the cups and got you both cups of water. With the food ready, you both sat at the counter across from each other. You kept conversation as you ate. It was like any other date you two had been on before everything happened. It was like nothing had happened, like you both so easily fell back into the same habits with each other.

Time flew by so quickly, neither of you paying attention. Soon enough, it was midnight, and Anita felt her heart leap at the fact she had to finish this soon rather than later. You both were on the couch by the end of night, Anita pushing you to lay down as you were kissing. She reached over to her jacket smoothly, digging into the pocket. When she got the dagger out and realized what she's about to do, the emotions hit her. She started crying. But you assumed maybe she was emotional after all this time apart. So you just pulled her closer, smiling into the kiss. She slid her hand up your stomach, letting herself cry just a bit harder as she pulled the dagger up to your skin. She broke from you just enough to whisper, “Y/n, I am so sorry.”

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troutfishinginmusic · 3 years

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The story of Grass Records: From Brainiac to Wind-Up and Creed

Images via Grass of ’96 compilation

Everything isn’t available in the streaming era. There are notable gaps in the seemingly bottomless amount of music currently available. Some of the most noticeable exclusions are albums released on Grass Records.

If you’re a fan of ’90s indie music, this short-lived New York label mattered. Though sometimes dismissed as a sibling label to Homestead Records, Grass released over 60 full-length albums ranging from pop to punk to noise to experimental music. It raised the profile of influential bands like Brainiac, Toadies and the Wrens.

The amazing thing about the label is how consistent it is. Every time I thought I was done with this article, I would listen to a band like Baboon and be completely blown away. These are all fascinating, idiosyncratic bands. This is more incredible considering the label was only around for about four years.

Much of this music is hard to find. The odd song might be lingering on YouTube, but you’re almost better off looking at your local record store or ordering from Discogs.

Why are the albums in this weird limbo? Mostly because the monied interest who bought the label in 1996 thought it wasn’t yielding a big enough return on the investment. Grass was gutted and rebranded into post-grunge/nu metal giant Wind-Up. Money poured in and these wonderfully weird records were swept to the side.

The following interviews were conducted via email, Facebook messenger and phone over the last few months. Quotes from the interviews have been edited for style/clarity. I’m eternally grateful to everyone who got back to me. I am also willing to expand this story if more former Grass artists want to reach out. If you’re one of these artists, my email is at the bottom of this story.

Seedlings

“I started in the music business purely by chance,” said Camille Sciara, who founded Grass Records.

Sciara got her start working at Record World in New York as a second job and became friendly with the store’s buyer. After attending a manager training program, she moved on to become a manager of the store. Her second job became her first.

“Then, after two years there, I became bored managing a record store and my friend Mike, the buyer, told me about Dutch East India,” Sciara said. “I started there as a salesperson and, after a year of sales, became the buyer when that position opened up. I never envisioned starting a label.”

While working as a buyer at Dutch East India Trading a friend sent her a Toadies cassette. She “loved it” and started Grass in 1993 to release it.

Grass released the Toadies EP Pleather soon after, which contained an early version of the band’s inescapable alternative hit “Possum Kingdom.” After Pleather, the band scored a major label deal with Interscope. The platinum-selling Rubberneck arrived in 1994.

“They did really well on their first major release,” Sciara said in an email interview. “But then it appeared that Interscope just dropped the ball or lost interest. They were such a great band live, I never understood how they weren't huge stars. And super cool people.”

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Tall grass

Sciara would go on to sign unique and influential bands like Brainiac and The Wrens.

“Since I had never run a label before, I was going purely on how much I liked what they submitted,” Sciara said. “Obviously not the best business model for running a label, but for the money we offered it worked to some respect. The longer I ran the label, the more I understood what was needed from them [the bands] regarding can they tour etc.”

There were few bands of the 90s that radiated weirdo energy as brightly and brilliantly as Brainiac. The documentary Transmissions from Zero chronicles the significant impact the band had on the music scene at the time. It also shows a band on the brink of mainstream success. Brainiac released two albums on Grass, Smack Bunny Baby and Bonsai Superstar, before departing for Touch & Go. The band’s forward motion was sadly cut short by Tim Taylor’s death in 1997. Prior to this, Interscope was expressing interest in the band.

“If Tim hadn't passed I'm pretty sure they'd have been the biggest [band on the label],” Sciara said.

Original Brainiac guitarist Michelle Bodine said Grass’ association with Dutch East India made the label initially attractive.

“[Camille] was super excited about us and we had total creative freedom,” Bodine said. “We also liked the 2-record deal with the option of 3 contract.”

After leaving Brainiac, Bodine would go on to play guitar and sing in O-Matic. The band released its lone album Dog Years in 1996. The album is one of the overlooked gems of the ’90s.

The Wrens’ influence reverberated in more subtle ways. The band’s first two albums, Silver (1994) and Secaucus (1996), provided a blueprint for much of the post-Pixies landscape of ’90s indie rock. They could’ve been much bigger, but still made a significant impression.

“The depth of realization in this record is unparalleled: every angle is perfected,” Pitchfork founder Ryan Schreiber said about Secaucus. The band’s third long awaited album, Meadowlands, dropped in 2001 and received a “Best New Music” tag from the same publication.

Rumblings of a follow-up to Meadowlands have been thrown around for the last 10 years, but a record has yet to materialize.

The level of talent the label had was staggering. A few groups Sciara thought would be bigger ranged from the Irish dream-pop band Chimera to Georgia punk band Sunbrain. “There's more, it would be long list,” Sciara said.

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New shoots

Baltimore

Baltimore punk band Liquor Bike had released one album before signing a two-record deal with Grass. The band’s first release on the label was Neon Hoop Ride in 1993. Liquor Bike was excited to be on the label because of the Homestead Records connection.

“We loved being on Grass, we toured like crazy,” singer/guitarist David Koslowski said. “We had great booking with Creature Booking.”

Between the booking agency, which had done work with Nirvana, Helmet, the Lunachicks and Jesus Lizard; and the new label things were looking up for the band. The band would have posters up in whatever towns they were playing in and mentions in the local paper. The label would keep them up to date if they had to do things like impromptu radio interviews. When they got off the road, they entered the studio to record The Beauty of Falling Apart. During this time Alan Meltzer, who bought the label from Sciara in 1996, entered the picture.

“At the onset we were pretty psyched because this guy’s got major label distribution,” Koslowski said.

It also helped that Sciara stayed on after the transition.

“We could still work with Camille, who we love,” Koslowski said. “We slept at Camille’s house when we would play up in New York. She’s an amazingly nice, sweet person and very giving.”

Koslowski said the band was given significantly more to record the follow-up based on buzz the band was getting at the time. J Robbins, of Jawbox and Burning Airlines fame, did the cover art and Drew Mazurek produced the album. The band even hired John Lay, who had previously worked with Squeeze, to manage the band.

“By that point we were having decent guarantees,” Koslowski said. “Those two years when I was on Grass I barely worked a real job. I wasn’t making a rockstar living or anything, but I was certainly able to pay my rent and utilities.”

Liquor Bike went on tour with Gas Huffer to promote the forthcoming record. On the tour Koslowski noticed there weren’t posters out and the band didn’t receive write-ups in the local press. To make matters worse, they never received CDs of The Beauty of Falling Apart to sell at shows. Koslowski said Grass had promised this.

“We were pretty confused," Koslowski said. “I mean our record had been mastered already, everything had been sent to the factory.”

Lay soon informed the band Sciara had been fired and the band had been dropped. Koslowski said the band decided to stay on the tour even after being kicked off the label. The band had old records and T-shirts to sell. They had put a lot of work into the tour and didn’t want to waste it.

Liquor Bike eventually released its third album on Merkin after failed meetings with Amphetamine Reptile, Columbia and Interscope. It was the band’s last before the members went their separate ways.

Seade was another band on on Grass that was unfortunately overlooked. Their lone album (Perf) is an underrated ’90s classic.

Prior to Meltzer, Koslowski said that he didn’t think there was any favoritism toward any one band despite the label being so prolific.

“I just think the woman loved music and wanted to spread that out to people,” Koslowski said of Sciara. “I think she legitimately wanted to help people, you know, help these bands out. She was nothing but giving.”

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Omaha

Mousetrap, an Omaha-based punk band, hoped to initially get a deal with Homestead when it sent in two 7” singles.

“Camille really liked our singles and got in touch with us.” Patrick Buchanan, Mousetrap’s singer/guitarist said in an email interview. “We developed a great relationship with her, and eventually she offered to sign us — we were given the opportunity to sign either with Homestead OR with Grass, which was a brand-new label at the time.”

Buchanan said the band thought it would possibly get overlooked in Homestead’s large stable of well-established bands and decided to sign with Grass. He also said Sciara made a large difference.

“Camille was one of the coolest people we had ever met in ‘the business’ – she just seemed really genuine, straightforward and honest,” he said. “Those are the types of people we wanted to work with. So our relationship with Camille was probably the main thing that made us sign with Grass.”

Mousetrap would go on to release three albums on the label, starting with Cerebral Revolver in 1993. The band was a big influence on Commander Venus, an Omaha band featuring a young Connor Oberst.

“They were definitely a big deal in Omaha and everybody loved them,” Oberst said of Mousetrap in an episode of the Turned Out a Punk podcast earlier this year.

Commander Venus came in contact with Grass through Mousetrap. The band signed to the label when Oberst was only 14. The band also featured Rob Nansel, who would go on to co-found Saddle Creek Records. Oberst said the band recorded its first album, Do You Feel At Home, in 1995.

“That was a good experience and a learning experience,” Oberst said. “I also think it kind of made it more apparent that even if you do get an opportunity like that, you know, you’re a little fish in a big pond. And maybe people aren’t going to work as hard or care about it.”

He said that this was mitigated by having the support system of a local scene in Omaha. The band ended up releasing its 1995 debut on Lumberjack, which later became Saddle Creek. The band released one more album, The Uneventful Vacation, before Oberst formed Bright Eyes.

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Promoting growth

Alan Meltzer came into the picture with a retail background. He had previously owned Titus Oaks Records in Long Island. He went on to found CD One Stop in 1985, which was purchased by Alliance in 1993. Meltzer became Alliance’s president during this time but left the company in 1995. Meltzer acquired Grass in 1995 from Dutch East India Trading (the label’s owner/distributor), finalizing major label distribution through BMG in 1996.

“When I heard the Grass repertoire, I almost fell down,” Meltzer said in a 1996 Billboard Magazine article. “I heard so much good material.”

“Alan was shopping around looking to purchase an established label with an extensive catalog that he could pour endless money into,” Sciara said. “He originally wanted Homestead Records. A great label owned by Dutch East as well. But once he saw the contracts and issues with some of the ‘grey’ areas in them, he then moved on to Grass.”

Meltzer did have some legitimate interest in the label as an artistic venture.

“He absolutely was obsessed with the Wrens once he heard them and Commander Venus,” Sciara said. “He was sure with all his resources, money and big ass staff he could make them huge stars. He failed. Not the bands’ fault.”

Grass would have the name (and credibility) of an indie, but the corporate reach of a major. Meltzer looked at the new situation as the best of both worlds.

“We’re not a major label, but we’re not an undercapitalized, disorganized independent that’s out there on a wing and prayer,” Meltzer said. “We’re somewhere in the middle. We’re staffed, we have the organization, and we’ve got the know-how. I opted for major distribution because the majors are better at it.”

Grass kept Sciara on as a VP of A&R (artists and repertoire) and expanded Grass’ workforce to 20 in-house employees, according to the Billboard article. The label’s future looked bright. Bodine left Brainiac and formed O-Matic (also signed to Grass) when the change happened.

“…It seemed better – they had a nice office in Manhattan with an open stairwell area and glass walls,” Bodine said. “It was very modern and cool. The budget was much bigger. They hired more people and we felt like we had a good support system.”

“When we went there it felt like money,” Koslowski said.

Koslowski only met Meltzer once at a Grass Christmas party.

“He was a typical New York money guy when I met him,” Koslowski said. “I didn’t get a good vibe. He didn’t have that indie spirit that Camille had unfortunately.”

The meeting didn’t go well.

“I remember drinking a bit and messing with him,” Koslowski said. “I said ‘hey Alan I wanted to see if I could run this by you. You know that new Liquor Bike record we’re working on? We got the artwork but we just wanted to run the title by you and make sure it’s cool. We want to call it Eat My Fuck Asshole.’”

Meltzer and his wife were horrified, according to Koslowski.

Yellowing, patchy

In an oral history with Stereogum, Wrens bassist and singer Kevin Whelan said the band was picking up steam.

“So Secaucus came out and it started to do somewhat well and “Surprise Honeycomb” was starting to get recognized and played on different shows, and we thought that international fame was around the corner,” Whelan said.

And then the call came in.

“He [Meltzer] said, ‘Well, boys, I’m not going to give you any more money. If you don’t sign with me today, it’s over.’ So, I remember, we sat in the van, we looked at the empty gas tank and we were like, ‘Well, I guess we’re not signing, let’s get the credit cards out and see how we can get home.’”

According to the Wrens’ website bio, Meltzer wasn’t pleased.

“[Meltzer], infuriated, commences layoffs of involved record company personnel and vows that ‘the next band to walk through that door will be made famous – at any cost,’” the bio states. “The next band through the door is Creed. Grass Records becomes Wind-Up Records. Creed becomes famous at any cost.”

By the time of the Wind-Up transition, Moustrap had already fulfilled its contract when it released its third album The Dead Air Sound System.

“At that time, Mousetrap was not very active,” Buchanan said. “I think we had become rather disheartened by how much time and love we put into the band, while getting very little recognition on any type of national level. At that point we were physically and mentally exhausted by constant touring and recording, with very little in the way of tangible success to show for it. So we didn’t really have any relationship with the label by the time it became Wind-Up.”

When the label wasn’t as successful as Meltzer thought, he brought in Steve Lerner. This was effectively the end of Grass Records.

“I was let go along with 8 to 10 others when Meltzer brought in Steve Lerner to run the company,” Sciara said. “The new staff felt Grass was too much related to me so hence a name change.”

“With Lerner serving as his right-hand man, the duo transformed Wind-up into a $100 million-plus sales operation with multi-platinum acts like Evanescence and Creed,” a 2007 Billboard article said.

Death, new high-yield crops

Grass was rebranded as Wind-Up, a key player in the nu metal and post-grunge universe, in 1997. Many of the Grass bands were dropped to make room for the likes of Finger Eleven, Creed and Evanescence. Meltzer, who ran the label with his wife at the time Diana, finally found his cash machine.

“I was extremely happy because, although Creed was a mega-seller and saved his label, I wanted nothing to do with that and the direction the label was taking,” Sciara said. “Not knocking it. You need artists like that to sustain a label that had an enormous payroll and nice offices. I totally get it, it’s a business. But I was happy running a small label with smaller contacts and cooler bands that didn't have to compromise their sound to write a ‘hit.’ That’s what he was always looking for.”

The transition to Wind-Up in 1997 did have some overlap with former Grass artists. The second Commander Venus album was released by Wind-Up and Thick (with a later release on Saddle Creek). Pollen, a rough-edged pop-punk act that had released two albums on Grass, dropped Peach Tree on Wind-Up. Baboon’s sophomore album Secret Robot Control was also released in 1997 on the new label.

Slowpoke’s Virgin Stripes, the final vestige of Grass Records, was a co-release with DGC in 1998. The album didn’t break the band, but it’s not a stretch to imagine it could have (especially since it boasted a song as infectious as “Belladonna”). The album retains some of band’s outsider noisy energy, but delivers it in a package palatable enough for the post-grunge crowd. Past this point, Wind-Up focused mostly on its new sound.

Koslowski didn’t initially know Wind-Up was the successor to Grass. One day someone mentioned to him that he was labelmates with Creed.

“I was like ‘wow, OK I guess he got his hit,’” Koslowski said.

Meltzer died in 2011 at 67. He made headlines by leaving $1 to his chauffeur and $500,000 to his doorman. Bodine saw this as frustrating because of how he left things with other Grass bands.

“He owed lots of bands money so it’s just really fucked up that he didn’t pay them/us. Liquor Bike did get theirs before he died only because they were persistent,” said Bodine.

In 2013 Wind-Up was purchased by Bicycle Music Company with distribution by Concord Music Group. In 2015 the two companies merged to form Concord Bicycle Music. Craft Recordings manages the label’s reissues.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/wZBpr1tDktI

Rare strain

Aside from Brainiac and The Wrens, many of the bands on the label aren’t on streaming platforms. The physical releases on Grass are mostly out of print. A sea of fantastic experimental indie music remains in this gray area. This doesn’t seem to be changing.

“Unfortunately, I haven’t a clue about if there are plans of Wind-Up re-releasing any back catalog,” Sciara said. “It’s sad really. Holding peoples’ artistic work hostage or just ignoring it seems cruel. Hopefully Wind-Up did the right thing and gave them back their masters, rights etc. Or at least license it to someone else to release.”

The three Mousetrap albums are stuck in this place.

“I wish more people had the chance to hear our music, so yeah I wish it was easily available,” said Buchanan. “Sure, we wanted to be popular — but the most important thing for us was that we made the music we wanted to make. We always did things our way — for ourselves, with no regrets. So even if the albums are harder to get, we’ll always have the memories — and those who were there to witness it will, too.”

Liquor Bike’s lawyer was able to secure the master tapes and artwork for The Beauty of Falling Apart with no questions asked. The band also has the master tapes for Neon Hoop Ride.

“Crazily enough, Grass did not make us buy Beauty of Falling Apart from them,” Koslowski said. “I have heard from some of my fellow Grass artists that they wanted to charge an incredible amount of money.”

Neon Hoop Ride was remastered and briefly available on streaming services. The album was only available digitally and did not get a physical rerelease.

Greener pastures

Following her departure from Grass, Sciara started Ten23 (Oct. 23, 1996 was the day she was fired from Grass). The label released The Wren’s EP 1135 before folding.

“It seemed like a great idea,” she said. “Didn't put out anything else after that release. It was an expensive endeavor starting a label from scratch, so to speak, and at the time I was unemployed.”

From there she went on to work at the Knitting Factory label group and eventually Narnack Records. She uprooted from N.Y. to move to L.A. to work at the latter. She eventually ended up back in N.Y. where she was a manager at Petland Discounts for 12 years until it closed in 2019.

Buchanan has gone on to release music as Vicious Lovers. Mousetrap has plans to release new music for the first time in 20 years according to Buchanan. Some of Mousetrap’s music can be streamed here:

Michelle Bodine went on to play guitar in Shesus, which was signed to Narnack. The band released an album and an EP before splitting up. Bodine has since been participating in Brainiac reunion shows and was featured in the Brainiac documentary Transmissions from Zero.

David Koslowski went on to play in the post-rock band Vivid Low Sky and the power-pop band Gerty. He currently owns a coffee shop/record store in Baltimore called Baby’s on Fire.

“I loved every aspect of being on Grass, except for the very end,” Koslowski said. “I also loved how diverse Camille had the label. A lot of friends from that time from those bands, I’m still friends with them. It was like a really cool little group of people that all got to share in something for as brief of a time period as it was.”

If you have questions, information or concerns I can be reached at [email protected].

CORRECTION: A previous version of this article spelled David’s last name as Kozlowski. It’s actually Koslowski. Also, J. Robbins just did the cover art for the band’s third album. Drew Mazurek actually produced it. Godplow is a great band but they’re from Minneapolis, not Baltimore.

#grassrecords #indie #90s #brainiac #thewrens #mousetrap #liquorbike #baboon #toadies #omatic

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honeydots · 4 years

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200. “He loves you, you know? He’s just afraid of admitting it.” ~~ This has some Vibes and I kinda like them so? I'd like 2 humbly request your take on this w/ shukita or akeshu if it's ok to ask for!! -- dorky-arsene (a sideblog)

“He loves you, you know? He’s just afraid of admitting it”

Hello no I didn’t forget about these I am just slower than a little baby turtle!!!!! Anyway

Summary: Goro’s new job leads him to discover that dealing with both a crush and an idiot while flipping burgers is, unarguably, the worst turn his life could’ve taken.

cw: sexual themes (+p5r spoilers)

(ao3 link)

“Hello! Would you like to try our Big Bang Special Combo Shot-Straight-Through Promotional Meal for ‘Thy Father of Corruption 2: The Daughter of Rejection’ for ¥850?”

Goro wanted to quit.

You need this job. You need this job. He’d repeat to himself each time a customer decided they were feeling peckish. You will have no money if you quit and then you will have no home and then you will drop out of college and then you will die.

He’d left the police department after graduating. With his past plans of an 18-year life expectancy having slipped down the drain, he hardly had a reason to stay. High school had been an uphill battle with cases of murder and robbery breathing down his neck, and he’d hesitated to even make an attempt at trying to juggle his priorities in university. Dropping the detective gig meant dropping the media attention, too, which gave him breathing room he certainly knew he needed, but never really had.

The problem was, after three years of fading out of fame and living off his savings, he realized this wouldn’t stretch as far as he’d predicted. He hadn’t accounted nearly enough for the expenses that came with the unwelcome enforcement of trying to live as a proper human being. His bank account was growing meager. If he wanted to keep living (which was arguable) in the way that he was (which he did) he’d need an income. Almost anything would do, as long as it would bend and break to his schedule.

And, all things considered, he technically had connections here. And ever since… that, the pay had actually increased to a respectable amount. The management had rehired, retrained, and improved. It was fast food, but it was livable. Nothing shameful about being livable.

And god fucking dammit he had already done three interviews with no hires and he needed food other than half-cooked ramen noodles and bread slices.

“Can I get you anything else, sir?”

That didn’t mean he didn’t loathe every minute.

It was bad enough that he had a job at Big Bang Burger. And, bad enough that he’d been desperate to get it. It was bad enough that he had to bring in his homework like some anguished used-to-be honors student now getting barely passing marks. And christ, it was bad enough each time a customer would walk in, a hamburger-shaped icepick would slam itself into his frontal lobe, forever ingraining the memory of his premeditated brain murder of the former CEO of this very restaurant.

All of that, and he couldn’t stress this more, was bad enough. It was entirely shitty all around. Completely awful, and damming, and humbling, though he hated to admit it. He’d like to say it couldn’t get any worse. That this was the end of the line, get off the train before it turns around, don’t get stuck in the never ending cycle of beef patties and sesame seed buns.

But, god, of all the coworkers.

“Ya know,” said Sakamoto, leaning down on the front counter after their customer had left, “I dunno if clenching your teeth like you’ve got peanut butter stuck in there counts as ‘service with a smile.’”

Sakamoto Ryuji. The boy who had the opposite of a filter, and more like a megaphone spewing recordings of every profanity in the Japanese language. He, who had walked in on Goro’s second day and loudly declared, ‘I thought I smelled something, what’s this a-hole doing here?’ Really, who else could he tolerate spending eight-hour shifts with; greasy stoves, piss poor customers, and the ruthless scent of lysol on tile included?

Ah, right. Anyone else.

Goro pressed his lips together. “Hm. Well you know, I was almost certain that elbows on the counter was a fireable offense.”

Sakamoto snatched himself up in a second, elbows up high. He hung there and looked around the empty restaurant.

He pouted. “Not cool, dude. That’s only when there’s customers.”

Goro raised his eyebrows. He was really just going to stand there? He looked like an idiot, or a chicken. A hybrid that, if anyone could pull off, would be him. He was making a great show of it, too.

Sakamoto narrowed his eyes. “Unless you’re a snitch.”

Goro spoke in his most syrupy sweet voice. “Are you implying then, that your job is in my hands? An entertaining thought, Sakamoto.” If it were only that simple to really get him fired. Unfortunately, their manager seemed to love his enthusiasm. Every moment he spent enthusiastically mopping floors and singing into the handle was a moment Goro could’ve been writing soliloquies of his growing and newfound hatred for Carly Rae Jepsen.

Sakamoto folded his arms in a huff. “That’s what I’m talkin’ about, man! Look at that fake-ass smile.” He shook his head. “And I get customer service blows and stuff, but you use it for everything. Lighten up dude! Take a break.”

Sakamoto said things with such confidence, such surety. It made his teeth grind.

“I’d prefer to keep my job,” Goro said, and gave him the sweet smile Sakamoto was arguing against. “Though, if you’d like to pay my rent for me, you’re more than welcome.”

He acted like he hadn’t even heard him.“Maybe it’s ‘cause you’re so gloomy all the time, your face just doesn’t know how to work it. Look it, check me out.” Sakamoto pointed his thumb at himself and flashed a toothy smile. “Just like that! All natural, bro. It’s easy. Come on, you really try it this time.”

Goro very clearly did not. He stared with his most obsolete and ‘stop-trying-to-have-a-conversation-with-me’ look he could muster. He’d communicate it telepathically, if given the chance.

“That doesn’t look like trying to me,” Sakamoto said expectantly.

Couldn’t they just sit in silence and wait for their fabrication of getting-along time when the next inevitable customer came in? “Perhaps, and please let me know if this is too complicated, I simply have no intention of trying, because I don’t believe there’s anything to fix.”

“Nah, that’s not it,” replied Sakamoto, as if he was being thoughtful.

Another reason why he was completely obnoxious was because the longer they knew each other, the less that Goro’s flawless stone faced looks worked. Sakamoto kept spewing hot air. He’d gained some kind of tolerance, and it was tedious to work around.

Sakamoto leaned back down, previous elbow warnings forgotten. “I bet you’re the kinda guy who’s super ticklish, so you act all boring so no one suspects it.”

“I’m not,” Goro snapped.

“Quick reply there, buddy.”

Goro didn’t answer to that. He didn’t owe it to him. This was pointless; why did Sakamoto find such pleasure in talking about pointless things?

He slouched further down. “So it’s silent treatment now. You’re checking all the boxes over here.” He waved his finger through the air. “Check, n’ check, n’, check.”

Goro was getting a headache. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Betcha you’re super ticklish. And like, one of those cry-laughers.”

“Sakamoto, did you hear what I just said.”

He stretched up from his position on the counter. “Like if I poke you in the side, I bet it would make ya jump.”

“Do not.” He could just try it. Goro would bend his finger back so far it’d break. He wondered if that would be a viable option to get him to stop talking sometime.

“Didn’t say I was gonna.” He rested his arms behind his neck. “You’re just proving my point more, though.”

Sakamoto was annoyingly stubborn at times. Once he found a niche with Goro, he’d hack his way in and grab on like a tick. Bother him like it was his last chance he’d ever get, as if they didn’t work shifts together four times a week. He was bound to get lyme disease at this rate.

Goro felt like a very frustrated pair of tweezers.“Can we talk about anything else, please?”

Sakamoto went quiet. He was just looking at him now. Goro tensed up. Was he really going to try and poke him? He meant it, he’d break his hand.

“Ya know, there is something I wanna talk to you about,” he said.

Goro did not like the sound of that. “Oh really.” He tried to sound like he was just told he was about to be given a lecture on the intricacies and details of lentil soup. Which, perhaps could be more interesting than whatever topic Sakamoto was about to pull out of his ass.

Sakamoto sniffed. “Yup. It’s about Akira.”

Oh, he really didn’t like where this was going. “Sakamoto, I—”

“When’re ya gonna like, confess.”

Goro visibly winced. Dammit. He knew he’d bring this up one day. He was absolutely infuriated Sakamoto knew about that, and he hadn’t even told him. He’d been making guesses and Goro had been just tired enough during his shift to let a hint of a sigh out, and Sakamoto had taken that to new heights. Another example of conversations being had that Goro would’ve just about died to get out of.

Sakamoto was still staring at him. Didn’t he have anything better to do? Goro knew they didn’t at this good for nothing job, but what was so hard about just acting like you’re busy. You’re pretending then, at least, and that’s something.

“Well, dude?” asked Sakamoto.

Any conversation is better than that one.

Mother of fuck.

“I…” Goro started, adjusting a piece of his hair, “I suppose I am a little ticklish.”

Sakamoto’s face lit up. “Dude, for real? Called it,” he said triumphantly. Had Goro not known him as well as he did, he’d think the divergence in conversation was a trick to get him to admit he was a bit… touchy. But he did know him, and he wasn’t one for games like that.

“Most people are, it shouldn’t be a surprise. It’s skin sensitivity, nothing more.”

Sakamoto shrugged. “Still funny you admitted to it.”

Sure. Very hilarious. Yet another fact Sakamoto now knows about him that he’d really have rather not shared under any circumstance.

“Satisfied, now?” Goro asked, but it wasn’t really a question. He didn’t plan on expanding, this was embarrassing enough as it was.

“Nope,” he replied, “cause that’s great and all, but I really gotta know the game plan.” He leaned in close to Goro, and he in turn leaned farther away.

“There’s no ‘game plan,’ Sakamoto. Please don’t get so close to me.”

“Yeah, yeah, sorry.” He moved back, obviously not finished. “Come on, though, you gotta have something.” And back down on the counter he slouched.

‘Something,’ he’d said. Yes, and that something was to keep his mouth shut and go about his life keeping each and every one of those mortifying feelings to himself. It was humiliating enough that Sakamoto knew. Telling Akira? He didn’t even want to imagine it. He’d rather face Okumura-san herself and ask her to buy one of their Shot-Straight-Through combo meals.

“There’s nothing. And I don’t plan there to be anything. And, it’s not really much of your business, is it?” Goro could feel himself growing irritated.

Sakamoto melted further into the counter. “I just don’t get why you’re not gonna ask him out if you like him. You might as well, man, it’ll be fine.”

What simple ways of thinking. Do this, get that in return. Black and white, and right and wrong. Spill your fleeting moment of vulnerability and try not to think about the extensive hole of commitment you’re burying yourself in. One turn of phrase, one word, one misplaced breath to Akira would forever rupture the sorry excuse of acquaintanceship they’d been flip flopping through for the past three years. Akira was a blank slate and simultaneously the person he knew best. He knew him, but didn’t really, and he could never tell what he was thinking. Suddenly he was gambling again, and this time it came entirely unwelcome. Risks you face before death and risks that you’ll keep living through no matter the outcome tasted different. One was tangy and sweet and thrilling, the other was bitter shit. Not to mention that Akira was too kind to him for his own good. He couldn’t even tell what was a lie.

But, Sakamoto didn’t need to know all that. “You say that like there’s nothing to consider. As if I’ve never even given this thought. You do not belong in my head, Sakamoto. And I do not need to give you, an obvious outsider on the entire dilemma, any sort of justification for why I’m going to continue to abstain on something as trivial as a confession.”

Sakamoto huffed at him. “What if I said that I gua-ran-tee he’s not gonna say no to you.”

Goro was already sick of this. What, had Sakamoto expected his heart to skip? His pulse to rise? That just the very thought of mutual feelings would send him into some flustered mess? Please. He told the tingling feeling going up through his legs and down his arms and up the back of his neck to shut the fuck up.

He couldn’t stay quiet for long. Sakamoto could and would get ideas. “Then why doesn’t he just tell me that himself? Why are you playing wingman for him?”

“Cause he’s not gonna say anything cause he’s got to be worried that he’s gonna freak you and your crazy attachment issues out!”

Of course, there it was. The blind bet. Sakamoto’s one-way thinking at it again, and Goro would not have it. “I’m not going to start playing some game with him about the complexities of whatever idea of consent he has in his head. I don’t need his sympathy, and I am certainly not looking for it. I don’t have time for something messy and half-assed. I don’t want that, and surely he doesn’t, either. If he feels any way about me, he’d ought to tell me, because then maybe we’d find some kind of leeway. But I will not let him sit there and wait for me to make the first move, like a key element in his plan. This is not some teenage romance, and I am not a caricature of his love life. He can wait patiently all he’d like, but I’m perfectly content as I am now.”

Sakamoto seemed a little stunned.

“Man, he’s just…” He trailed off. They sat in silence.

So ways still existed to get Sakamoto to stop rambling on. He was sure he’d regret saying this later, for a multitude of reasons. He didn’t hate Sakamoto, even saying dislike felt strong, but he always talked about things that Goro had no interest nor inclination to discuss. Maybe silence was for the best between them, for now.

“He loves you, you know? He’s just afraid of admitting it. That’s all it is, dude,” said Sakamoto.

Goro inhaled. So he wasn’t done, then. “Love… is an entirely different conversation.”

“Okay, fine, you want me to say he ‘like-likes’ you like some fifth grader? Cause he does.”

Goro didn’t reply. He’d made his point.

“He isn’t playing one of your weirdo mind games,” Sakamoto continued. “I think you’re thinking too hard about this. He’s just a guy. He just wants to make sure you’re all comfortable and shit. Cause it’s not like we don’t all know the bullshit that was goin’ on for you.”

“I am not looking for his pity.” A fine thing to say while working at a Big Bang Burger in a bright yellow shirt and starred apron. It didn’t matter. He didn’t wear this with pride, per say, but he wouldn’t ask someone to feel sorry for him.

He didn’t exactly want to be seen, either. Especially not Akira, but of course he’d make habits of visiting. That was just like him, and it was just like his pity, too.

Sakamoto looked frustrated. “He ain’t pitying you, man! He’s tryin’ to respect you! He knows you got things to go through on your own and he’s trying to give you space and everything.”

Goro clicked his tongue. “If you know that’s his tactic, why are you trying to pressure me into this?”

“Cause I don’t care, dude!” Sakamoto said, and then stopped himself, and promptly looked very guilty. “Well, okay. I do care. Like, I do. But sometimes…” He looked like he was trying to pick his words out carefully. He had an idea, just no way to form it.

He settled. “Sometimes, you just gotta get laid, man.”

At this point, Goro found himself shocked that he wasn’t banging his own head against the counter.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re twenty one years old! Dude, I know you haven’t gotten any,” Sakamoto argued. “Your gay ass with emotional problems? Get outta here.”

“This is not—”

Sakamoto put his hands up nonshalontly. “And like, yeah, no judgey stuff, take your time if you gotta. But have you considered it? Tell me. I betcha you haven’t.”

Goro opened his mouth, expecting to reply with an incredibly well thought out ‘fuck off,’ but the automatic doors slid open, and suddenly Goro was all smiles and greetings, so what came out instead was, “Hello! Welcome to Big Bang Burger! Would you—ah.”

Sakamoto snorted loudly, and Goro wanted to kick him so bad.

And actually, what was stopping him? Sakamoto had earned this, and it’s not like this customer would care.

Because, who else could’ve been just about summoned by the trouble than Kurusu Akira himself; strolling in so casually through the doors, like he hadn’t just become the most unpleasant topic of conversation Goro had ever had with Sakamoto. Speak of the devil was an understatement, or perhaps he was the devil himself.

“What the eff, man!”

“Hey you two,” said Akira, hands in his pockets and clearly bagless. He didn’t even register Goro’s kick, like that was just some normal occurrence. Somehow, that made him angrier.

“Yo,” said Sakamoto, recovering annoyingly quickly. Goro wondered if he should’ve considered breaking his finger.

Sakamoto reached out to Akira for a fist bump. “You don’t have the cat with ya?”

Akira bumped him back. “Nope. Just me today.”

“Sweet,” Sakamoto replied, a smile growing wide. Goro hated the look. It was the hungriest and most dastardly shit-eating grin he’d ever seen him dare to make. So, knowing Sakamoto and his terrible poker face, he had thought up some idiotic ploy.

“What’s up with you?” Akira asked, and thank god it wasn’t directed at Goro. Sakamoto’s obviousness did not go unnoticed.

“Oh nothin’, nothin’,” said Sakamoto, entirely conspicuously, “I gotta go, though, grind never stops. Super secret stuff in the back.”

Goro glared at him. So now he would pretend to be busy?

“Burger secrets,” Akira said, and Ryuji gave him a finger gun in reply. He walked off without a word, but apparently felt the inclination to jerk his head back at Goro, as if he didn’t know what he was doing.

He sighed. No amount of alone time would ever compel Goro to confess at a Big Bang Burger, of all places. At least Akira tended to be a little more bearable in conversation. He hoped he’d be an in and out customer. “Can I get you anything?”

Akira looked at him for a moment. “You look flustered.”

Goro felt himself twitch. He wasn’t flustered, like some preteen who can’t hear the word genital without bursting into laughter. If anything, Sakamoto had caught him off guard with his stupidity. He obviously was not one to be so affected by such a topic. He was an adult, and a professional. He would again not think about the fact he was wearing an orange visor right now.

“I’m positive that isn’t a menu item,” he replied, keeping his pleasant smile plastered on, keeping any stray annoyance from showing.

Akira examined him closer. “Do you have a fever or something? You look red.”

Goro drummed his fingers against the counter impatiently. What was he supposed to say? Sorry, Akira, Sakamoto just decided to kindly push the image of you railing me as a form of twisted therapy into the forefront of my consciousness. Would you like any drinks?

“I’m fine. I’m not the type to go to work sick,” he decided on instead.

“Really?” He didn’t seem convinced.

Goro folded his arms. “While living in a society where health is determined by the trust of the majority, I have no plans to spread my germs to an unsuspecting businessman, in that I expect the same from him.”

Akira considered that for a moment. “So you’re embarrassed, then.”

Goro’s expression turned sour. He was not in the mood for a debate. “Everyone seems to be presuming things today, have I missed a memo?”

Akira didn’t miss a beat. “Ryuji said something?”

Goro dragged his fingernails into his palm. He was hardly being that obvious, he wasn’t a bumbling idiot who couldn’t keep a straight face. Akira was just acutely good at reading people, (namely, reading him) and it drove Goro up the wall. It was unfair, for one thing, since Akira continued to maintain blank expressions in the face of clowns and hookers, keeping his inner thoughts kept behind lock and key. And, as of more recently, he was the one person Goro really desperately wanted to hide every wandering emotion from possible. Just his luck, fall for the bastard who analyzes people as a side job for his savior-complex living.

This was making him more frustrated. “Would you just order?”

Akira looked at the menu, but Goro knew it was bullshit. He ordered the same thing every time— a shake and a burger, no tomatoes. He certainly already knew what he wanted, but was just causing trouble in the meantime. What an annoyance. Goro punched it in, and made no moves to go and cook. If Sakamoto was going to have his “business” in the back, then he could stay there and do his job.

“Sit over there, we’ll bring it to you when it’s done,” he said, and Akira silently obliged. He gave a small smile before he turned, leaving Goro completely alone with his thoughts as he sat at his table and scrolled through his phone.

He couldn’t believe the timing of Sakamoto’s distasteful comment to Akira’s unseasonable entrance. Things always seemed to fall into place with Goro, just not the right places. The right place, but a little down, and to the left, the left, he said. He wished Sakamoto would mind his own business, let him quietly pine until his untimely death; which kept getting put off, might he add.

Sakamoto emerged from the back end of the restaurant. He was holding the bag of presumably Akira’s food, and his shake. He waved them enthusiastically.

“Go on, dude,” he smirked.

Goro was blunt. “No.” He’d pissed him off enough today. He wasn’t going to walk over there and serve the food. Sakamoto’s little idea of love, romance and marriage in a burger joint would have to wait. Ideally, it would get itself stuck in wet concrete, and drown way down under where no one could see it and where the light of day would never reach.

Sakamoto seemed to catch his drift. “Jeez, fine. Huffy, huffy.”

He walked over to Akira with a spring in his step, and they started chatting idly. Goro couldn’t hear. In all honesty, he was trying to tune them out. His headache was growing worse. Pounding in his head, every light too bright and repetitive music blurring together his thoughts. And of course there was the elephant in the room, who was whispering to him Sakamoto’s crude suggestions, and the irritating notion that maybe he was right, just a little bit.

He needed to get himself together. He was acting like some horny teenager. Get fucked, you raunchy elephant.

Sakamoto left to let him eat, and made a show of going back to the other end of the restaurant, all while wiggling his eyebrows at Goro. In turn, Goro made a show of rolling his eyes and planting himself facing away from Akira. It made Sakamoto laugh, for whatever reason, and Goro just ignored him.

He watched the door idly and tried to relax. He’d been clenching his teeth, and his jaw ached. He tried to focus to get his headache to fade into obscurity. He couldn’t find much to concentrate on, was his issue. Other than the obvious, which he would ignore without remorse. He wanted to go home. No lights too bright there, no sloppily cleaned windows, and especially no crush (the word left a bad taste in his mouth. Boy who has left him emotionally compromised after giving him no reason to deny he had worth in the world and keeps him up at night thinking about the way he really tried to will him back into existence when he could, god, have anything else in the world, and he wanted him. Was that a better option?) sitting out of view, chewing quietly and doing absolutely nothing to draw so much attention to himself. At home he could drown it all out in a cold bath, and let himself think of nothing but his numbing toes and pruning fingers.

“Hey, catch,” Akira said, suddenly there and startling Goro out of his bathlike daydream. He tossed something onto the counter. Goro did not catch it.

It was a napkin, all folded up in a careful way. It didn’t hold the shape well, but the intention was pretty clear. “Um. A crane?”

“Yup. Present for you.” he started, rubbing his neck, and he had the nerve to look bashful. “I got bored.”

Goro hadn’t noticed him making it. Which, alright, did make sense, he was purposefully keeping his neck away from that entire half of the restaurant. “Sorry we aren’t quite the height of entertainment here.” Goro lightly touched its head. He didn’t know Akira knew how to make these. “Well, thank you, I guess.”

Akira pushed his glasses further up his nose. “You’re welcome to name him.”

“I think that I won’t.”

“That can be pretty trendy, too,” he replied. “I’ve gotta go. Class. Tell Ryuji I say bye.”

“Bye, dude!” Sakamoto shouted from the back. There was that tiresome enthusiasm again.

It made Akira smile.“Nevermind, then. See you.”

Goro just barely lifted his hand by the wrist to wave. “Bye.”

Akira turned, gave him a small trill of his fingers, and left. Sakamoto did not return to his exit, and Goro savored the moment. It was just him and the crane, now.

It was pretty shoddy. Unfolding, and barely standing up on its own. Cheap paper napkins were not the ideal material for origami, it seemed. He watched it slowly fall apart, wings losing shape and the head relaxing into its neck. Akira had hardly stayed long, so that meant he was probably pretty good at this sort of thing. He wouldn’t have guessed.

…He thought about how it might look on proper paper. The creases sharp and crisp, the ends pointed and still. What would Akira’s hands look like while they worked? He could hear the sounds of the folding, and the wedging, clean paper being bent and rippled. Delicate fingers, working through, meticulously checking every last inch. Sometimes a pinch, just where it’s needed. And then finished, folded tight, wrapped together in itself. Very quick work, with the touch of a hand.

“The heck is that?” Sakamoto said, getting an actual jump out of Goro.

“What?” he gasped, and took a second to collect his thoughts. At work. Sakamoto came back. In a Big Bang Burger. Headache present. Good fucking god. “It’s just…” He pressed his fingers into the side of his temple “It’s a paper crane. Akira made it.”

Sakamoto let that sink in.“You tellin me you were just sitting here staring at the thing Akira made you?”

“I wasn’t,” Goro replied, trying desperately to catch his breath as casually as possible.

“Uh, you literally were.” Sakamoto got uncomfortably close to him again. Goro physically moved away, because now was not the time.

It didn’t deter Sakamoto whatsoever. He put his hands on his hips and gave an annoying grin. “Bro, you gotta tell him… You’ve obviously got it preeetty bad.”

Goro was fed up with this. This conversation needed to end, or he thought he might explode. “I don’t ‘have it bad,’ Sakamoto, stop bringing this up.”

Sakamoto smirked at him. “You so do though, is the thing.”

“I don’t. Leave me alone.”

He shrugged his shoulders, and kept his mouth shut. He was acting so haughty, like he’d won the argument. Which, he hadn’t, for the record.

That stupid crane. All it’d done was make things worse. And what was it even doing? Sitting here crumbling away into uselessly folded paper. A cheap napkin made of other recycled cheap napkins. Clean and crisp paper was a long sought after dream, a fantasy and nothing more.

You know, this was just it, really. This is what he meant. Akira would try and fold him up and he’d inevitably fall back down. He didn’t know just what fantastic method he’d try, but it wouldn’t matter— he was made of what he was made of, and nothing would hold him up. Trying was pointless, risking for naught, it would be better for everyone if he stayed just how he was and didn’t overstay his use.

He would not fit into Akira’s plans or his pities. He couldn’t.

“…Bruh. What does that even mean.”

Ah? “What?“ No. He had not said that out loud. Sakamoto did not just hear all that nonsense.

Sakamoto was giving him a funny look. “You’re not a napkin, man.”

God, shit. Shit shit shit. “I— I know that, this is just—“ The unpleasant feeling of blood rushing to his face was just as intolerable as it was unpreventable.

“For real? Cause you sure sounded like you were calling yourself a napkin.”

Absolutely unbelievable. How unruly was he that he’d just spouted all that like it was nothing? He couldn’t believe he had to explain himself now, but letting him get ideas was undeniably worse. “It’s supposed to be… symbolic, Sakamoto.”

He could practically see the gears turning in his head. That wasn’t something difficult to understand, you dunce. Every second of this humiliating scene felt like a knife turning in his back.

“Why does your brain work in such effed up ways. You gotta work on that,” Sakamoto said, not letting up his judgemental look.

He crossed his arms, trying to make his mortification appear like annoyance. “Don’t you start with me. As if you ever have something useful to say. At least I’m— I’m thinking, here.”

That riled him up a bit. “I’m thinkin’! I almost flunked literature so maybe I’m not so good at this analysis stuff, but you know what? Hear me out.” Goro did not want to hear him out. He continued despite that. “I get it, you got your problems. But I really don’t think you callin’ yourself some shitty crane is fair, you know? Like, you’re a whole guy.”

He did not appreciate how genuine Sakamoto was acting. It was odd, and it felt awkward coming from him. He didn’t want to feel guilty for being rude to him earlier, either. Just another topic to bother him to sleep.

Sakamoto went on. “Gahhh, it feels weird sayin’ this but like, you’re not a napkin, okay! And Akira doesn’t think so either. You’re more… complicated. Napkins don’t pay taxes or anything.”

Ah, alright. So it was mostly bullshit. He could ease the guilt away in one fell swoop.

Goro’s disinterest seemed to show itself well to Sakamoto. “Just, okay. Lemme get my thoughts here. You gotta like… be your own first step. I didn’t get my own shit sorted out until I actually tried to. And I’m not sayin it’s easy to do. But Imma tell you right now your first step is gonna be to stop thinking you’re a napkin or a bucket or a plate of green beans or whatever else you come up with. And I mean it, man.”

Goro knew he had things to say to that. He had thought out replies and phrases that Sakamoto would need more headspace to begin to understand. But none of them came to him. So he decided to stay threateningly quiet.

It was well received. “Okay okay, you’re gettin’ mad, I can tell. I’m gonna take my break,” Sakamoto relented, and turned on his heel. “I ain’t really trying to tell ya what to do but give it a thinking about, alright? ‘Least for Akira’s sake,” he said over his shoulder, and left Goro almost more alone than before.

It wasn’t even Akira’s sake Goro was worried about. Not in the way Sakamoto seemed to think. And he didn’t need to be told he wasn’t some inanimate object, he wasn’t that out of mind.

Any sort of sensible argument would have to come to him after the fact, apparently. To tell him this wouldn’t be a “first step,” more like a hundredth. How many paces did crawling out of the hole he’d buried himself in count for? How many miles had he gone by now, barefoot and bleeding all the way.

Such a stupid conversation. Needless, too, since for whatever reason his filter decided to leave him to fend for himself. Just another addition to this embarrassing excuse of a shift today.

The paper crane sat still on the counter, though it hardly resembled one anymore. He almost felt bad. He had his typical pit in his stomach, but nothing exactly to pinpoint it on. Was he wallowing in that much self-loathing?

Perhaps.

Goro adamantly refused to have any more dramatic revelations at his part time job, so any introspections would have to come later.

He put the crumpled crane in his pocket. It was certainly not going to be a crane once he took it out again, but he didn’t really know what else to do with it. Throwing it away felt wrong, to him. Though he wasn’t sure exactly what he was going to do with it when he got home.

Akira hadn’t given this to him in hopes of causing some mental anguish. Or at least, he assumed so. Sakamoto had said he didn’t play mind games, but if not those, what was he doing? It felt better to know it was a game, in that way there was something about Akira’s mystery of a consciousness he could pry through.

Was he reading into things? For sure. Reading too deeply into anything had been a talent of his for as long as he could remember. It had saved his life before, many times and in the most difficult of times.

This crane wasn’t life threatening, but it felt like it was. Not in the thrilling way, but in the shitty way.

His shift was over soon. Which reminded him, Sakamoto had surely already taken his break. He was a dip, but Goro preferred his own thoughts to any conversation they’d had today. And that was saying something, since getting out of his own head was a much needed relief that he’d take almost any chance he got.

He was overthinking, and there was nothing he could do about it. He would continue to overthink until someone stole his brain and dunked it in acid. Where was the enjoyment otherwise? It was all he knew how to do.

And even he didn’t overthink this— if Akira had given this to him in earnest and in playfulness, and if Sakamoto hadn’t been overtly pulling his leg through their shifts today. There wasn’t even anything remarkable about it. If there was a chance that maybe things were just okay, and getting better, and he wasn’t a living metaphor for a tissue. Oh just, say he invited him out for coffee, and Akira surprised him with a new little creation, less spur of the moment and made something almost sweet. He’d never drop his pride so low as to ask for a lesson, but if he did, maybe he could learn to make something, too. And maybe he wouldn’t hate every moment of it, and maybe he’d like getting so close, and maybe he’d appreciate the mistakes as much as the praises.

…Hm.

That was just a fantasy, of course. And surely, nothing was all that great about it. Anything could go wrong in any number of ways, his own interventions just one category.

Maybe it was the headache, or the dragging on shift, or the terrible lights, or the distant humming of his coworker, but Goro must’ve been caught off guard today. Because otherwise, why else would he have thought, not long and not convincingly, but still a thought as present as can be, that maybe, despite everything.

It could be nice. Just for a little bit. Maybe that didn’t sound quite so bad.

Not so bad at all.

#it is shuake btw!#thank u for requesting this sorry i took ages #i hope you’ll enjoy it...... and sorry if youve been avoiding spoilers!!!#i know the games out but i also know not everyone has seen all the Content #but i will leave it at that #also its 6k cause i just dont know how to stop talking #my fics #my p5 fics #ask #dorky-arsene

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jihoonluvclub · 5 years

Text

Nefarious (M)

About: You miraculously get a dream position at Pledis, little do you know someone behind the scenes had been helping you along. Now he wants you all to himself, even if that means destroying the relationship he built. Pairing: Yandere!Hoshi x Reader Genre: Smut Warning: Explicit content, choking, rough sex, implied kidnapping Word Count: 3.9k

When you started your position at Pledis you never would have expected to climb through the ranks as fast as you did. You began as an intern and within one month you had a full time position as an assistant to the multiple managers of Seventeen.

Even you knew that there was something off about the fact that you were hired into a prime position just months after graduating from college. You wanted to work in PR, and you knew that it took years of experience to be hired by entertainment companies. But the last thing you wanted to do was lose your job at the company for asking too many questions. So you continued to work as if nothing was wrong.

You remembered the first day you walked into the large white building. Promotional posters of their music groups were strategically placed on the walls. You had your resume in hand, hoping that the intern position was still available. You were sitting in the lobby when a group of four men, dressed in black with dust masks covering most of features, walked by.

As they walked past you on their way to the elevator you couldn’t help but stare. Your breath caught in your throat as one of them turned and looked at you. His eyes were piercing, making your heart race increase. You had never been so affected by someone with just a passing glance.

But it wasn’t just a glance. When they reached the elevator he turned his entire body and looked at you. You couldn’t tell what he was thinking, maybe he was confused or upset that someone he didn’t know was in the building. You smiled at him before looking down, wanting the anxiety that swelled inside of you to settle.

The ding from the elevator sounded and footsteps echoed as they walked inside. You risked looking up once more just to see him still watching you. You thought to yourself that you chance of getting a position here was ruined. Whoever that guy was didn’t want you here and was going to make it known. Within two days of your interview you had the position. You still were baffled by it.

Little did you know that it was Soonyoung, and he wasn’t mad or upset, he was so entranced that he was determined to keep you where he could always find you. When you glanced up and smiled at him he was frozen to the spot. Just one look and he was struck motionless.

After years of being in the spotlight, having hundreds of thousands of fans, how could someone make him feel like that? Struck by someone who was a stranger. As if he couldn’t gather the nerves to talk to you, his only option was to watch and burn your features into him mind as best as he could.

Why couldn’t he just walk up to you, introduce himself, and ask for your name. It was a missed opportunity but not entirely lost. If you really were applying for a job like he suspected, he was sure he would have plenty of other chances to make himself known to you.

___

The job, even as an assistant, was a lot of work. It was a thankful upgrade from delivering coffee and faxing papers which is all you did as an intern, but still it was an exhausting effort to organize everything from social media posts to what hair color Seventeen would have.

On your most tiresome days, Soonyoung would order you food or coffee. It seemed every time you were at the breaking point, every time you voiced the want to leave the job, he was there to rope you back in.

When Soonyoung found himself constantly doting on you like this, he came to realize he may have liked you as something more than just a casual crush. Whenever your eyes met or the two of you accidentally brushed hands while walking by, it took his breath away. Spending any amount of time with you was like being in heaven.

Strong feelings like these were foreign to him, something he was trained to ignore as dating was dangerous and possibly career ruining for an idol. But that didn’t scare him off. Rather than run away, he wanted to charge headfirst into you.

But he held back on that impulse because he knew you probably wouldn’t respond favorably to feelings so intense. Since you were the one more likely to be scared away, he knew he had to take things slow. One day, he was certain, you would understand.

Every year Seventeen would cycle through two or three new managers, their assistants coming and going even faster. But you remained, and you never realized that it was Soonyoung behind it all.

He loved the small smile that would spread across your face when he would walk into your office, body limp as he finished working on choreography. He would always run it over with you, to see if you liked his ideas, to see if they made sense with the music. You knew that the CEO of the company made all the big decision at the end of the day, but you entertained the idea nonetheless.

Soonyoung had been so spoiled by you and your sweet attention that he suffered a rude awakening in the form of a new face in your office. Another manager was hired on, in order to help with the new comeback they had planned. He was a young guy, nice enough guy, but that also meant that you would no longer be working alone in your office.

Soonyoung planned his visits around times he knew the other man wouldn’t be in. Usually it was just the two of you. Since he’d gotten used to that arrangement, he’d foolishly come to believe that no one else could come see you with the exact same ulterior motives he had.

He hung around just outside the door, listening with a tightened jaw as one of the other staff members made you laugh. That beautiful, cheerful sound that Soonyoung believed only he could pull from your mouth. He imagined all the ways your eyes locked into the other mans, how your hands might be touching and a blush might have formed on your cheeks, creeping down to your chest as it always did when you were nervous.

He couldn’t stand to eavesdrop on the two of you flirting any longer and impulsively barged himself in without a plan. You both stared back at him expectantly and he attempted to keep his cool. He was pleased to see the both of you far enough away from each other, his was in the chair across from your desk and you were in the seat he grew to expect to find you in.

“Dino wanted to show you some new choreos.” Soonyoung said as he stared down his manager.

“Did he now?” he scratched his chin thoughtfully, and for a moment Soonyoung was worried he wouldn’t believe him. Thankfully he backed off, but not before giving you a smile that made him clench his hands into fists. “I’ll see you around.”

You were friendlier with him than Soonyoung would have liked, and he couldn’t help the distaste imarring his expression when you waved goodbye. It wasn’t until the door shut closed that you finally lifted your eyes to him, questioning, “So what’s up? Need something from me?”

He had successfully gotten rid of the other man, but now he had to deal with the fact that he did not have a plan to come see you. At the very least, he was no longer tense with jealousy but rather the pressure to come up with a believable answer in a short amount of time.

The more impulsive part of him urged him to act now and ask you out properly before anyone else on would get the same idea. It was foolish of him to think no one else had eyes for you in the first place. The only way to avoid this situation in the future was to get ahold of you now.

The more reasonable part of him argued that asking you out after having hastily and rather unconvincingly dismissing his competition wasn’t quite the best look either. Of course to anyone else it would look as if you were just having a conversation with your boss, but not to Soonyoung.

You weren’t stupid. It would be painfully obvious that he was into you, and it would be just plain painful for him if it turned out you didn’t feel the same way. Not after all the time he put in. Not when his heart was already aching with the idea that you wouldn’t feel the same way.

Something inside told him that couldn’t be true. There was no way he would be that in love while you weren’t. At the very least, he convinced himself he could love enough for the both of you. So he didn’t go for either option. He took a third one, which involved him trying to be as casual as possible.

“Not particularly,” he said, hoping he was managing to keep his cool, or at least looked as if he was. “I’ve got some downtime. I thought I’d just hang around after recording today.”

When you didn’t respond right away, he started to sweat. He knew it was a long shot that you would believe him, but he didn’t know what he would do if you called him out on everything. However, all of his concerns faded away at the sight of your fond smile. “You’re cute, Hoshi.”

His face lit up at that, leaving him thankful that you decided to turn your attention back to your screen. He loved the way you said his name, be it his stage name or real one. He knew that his feelings were mutual.

You seemed to have a sort of fondness for him that he had to act upon now. If he waited any longer, he would lose the opportunity for good. “Actually, I was wondering what your plans were for tonight.”

You didn’t even bat an eye, you looked him dead in the eye as you answered, “Beyond curling up on my couch with leftovers, not much. You gotta better offer?”

You noted that he swallowed hard. He could hear his heartbeat drumming in his ears as his dry lips tried to form the real question he wanted to ask you. “I might, if you give me the chance. We can get dinner, and maybe a few drinks?”

Your unmoving expression made him think you’d expected his question, and he hoped to god you hadn’t already decided your answer ahead of time. You didn’t answer right away, instead your mind was reeling. All the things that could go wrong if you were seen out with him, how could you say yes?

The strong tension ended when you decide to throw caution to the wind, “Sure! Sounds fun. I should be done around 6 if that works.”

It took his breath away to hear you agree, so much so that he almost couldn’t even reply. “Perfect! Then I’ll come by here around then and we’ll leave together. I know an exit in the back, I’ll show you then.”

You sent him off with a nod and a smile, and that smile was all he would think about for the rest of the day.

___

Soonyoung felt as if his heart was soaring all throughout dinner, but you helped ground him by being as calm and cool as you always were. The fact that you weren’t acting any different than usual put him back in the mindset that he was just spending time with you as he always did, just in a different setting.

You were in the back of a restaurant, a private room that was closed to the outside world. You had only been in a place like this once or twice before. After touring ended last spring the whole group took the staff out for food and drinks. The restaurant was closed but stayed open for you guys.

This was different though, much more intimate and secluded. Soonyoung had ordered drinks and you both opened up to each other more than ever. Not that you were typically withholding in conversation, but getting a few drinks in you seemed to make you a bit more talkative.

You shared funny stories from your past that he never would have heard from anyone else. Each word from you made him fall in love more and more. You were his dream girl and he couldn’t think of a better time to ask you to be his.

Soonyoung was sincerely having a good time until the alcohol loosened your lips to the point that you said something he didn’t want to hear. It started innocently enough. In fact you said something very sweet that added to the glow of his alcohol flushed cheeks. “I’m having a really good time tonight, Soonyoung. Thank you for finally asking me out.”

“‘Finally?” he repeated before taking a big swig of his beer. “Were you expecting it?”

“You aren’t exactly subtle,” you smiled kindly at him. In response to his embarrassed blush, you added, “But you are cute. And that’s why I agreed to come out here with you tonight, even though I was hesitant.”

He had sensed earlier that you weren’t quite as eager as he had been, and since you opened the door to that conversation he decided to pry deeper. “What caused that?”

You took a long sip of your drink before pushing your glass away, a contemplative expression spreading across your face. After a brief silence, you replied, “I don’t even know how I got this job. I’m horribly under-qualified and I barely have a degree to stand on. And I don’t want to jeopardize this. Dating is tricky as it is, but you’re an idol and I know that means it will be twice as hard. You shouldn’t ruin all the work you up into this group over someone like me.”

With that last sentence you abruptly killed the high Soonyoung had been riding all evening. His smile fell and his jaw locked in place tightly, his lack of a response prompted you to continue speaking.

“I’ll probably be leaving soon anyway. Jobs don’t seem to last here do they? I have a few years of experience so I can get hired on somewhere else. Maybe I’ll go overseas. Paris would be amazing. I don’t want to get attached to anyone that I might have to leave behind.” You said, idly tracing your fingertips over the rim of your drink.

“Even though I can’t say what the future will hold, I wanted to take a chance with one date. I guess I thought that it was worth a shot… As long as it was with you.”

That was when you stopped talking, feeling as if you just rambled on too long and ruined the night. There was so much to process that Soonyoung didn’t even speak. You fiddled with the hem of your dress, desperately wanting the stiffening quiet of the restaurant to ease up.

Wordlessly, he stretched his hand over yours in your lap and rubbed small circles with his thumb. You looked up at him, the brightness in your eyes meeting his lust-darkened gaze. His voice came out low and measured. “Let’s go back to my place.”

___

“I thought that the dorm was in south Gangnam?” You questioned as he drove you through the city, into an upscale district you had never really explored before.

“Yeah, that’s the dorm though. I wanted to show you the apartment I bought. The investors at the company said to put my money in real estate. They said the stock market was too risky.” He said smoothly while turning into a gated and secluded building.

The place looked massive, there must have been thirty or forty floors to the giant building. You walked with him to the entrance, riding the elevator up to his floor. For a moment you thought that it was odd he had never mentioned this to you before, but all those thoughts were lost as he pushed you against the elevator wall.

His lips traced over your pulse point, breathing in the mix of your perfume and natural scent. It was driving him wild, you even smelled the way he knew you would. Your head was spinning as his hands roamed your body. You let your held breath as the elevator opened, taking you to a floor with only one door.

“Is this the place?” You asked as he walked behind you, hands grabbing your waist as you moved towards the door.

“Yep. Floors twenty through thirty five have their own floors. So we don’t have to worry about neighbors hearing us.” He said while pressing his thumb against the touchpad of the door. It scanned his print and unlocked the room.

“Wow. This thing must have been expensive.” Your eyes widened as you walked in. The place was huge. How on earth did something this large exist in a city like Seoul?

As soon as the door had shut behind you both, you couldn’t keep your hands off each other. He lifted you up and guided your legs around his waist. He captured your lips in a heated kiss as his hands gripped your backside roughly.

You were lost in his kiss as he walked you to the bedroom. There, he lowered you onto the mattress and crawled on top of you, moving as if you were his prey. His roaming hands reached the hem of your dress and moved under the fabric, slinking until his palms slid past your torso to settle on your breasts. Idly, he traced his fingertips over your hardening nipples through the thin fabric of your bra.

When his lips slipped off of yours in favor of peppering your jaw and neck with kisses, you breathed, “Soon… Soonyoung…. please…”

He looked down and noticed how eagerly you were jerking up against him, trying to get his thigh to rub up against your clothed sex. You were so cute that he couldn’t stand to keep you waiting any longer and quickly slipped his hand down your hips, briefly pressing against your panties to feel just how much you’d soaked through them.

Then, pushing the thin cloth aside, he felt for your hard clit and began rubbing it vigorously. The motion made you jump, and your hips followed his movements until you seemed to want more.

“Wait. I want to come with you inside of me. Will you?” You pleaded while looking up at him.

Without even batting an eye, he leaned down over you to catch your pouty lips with his own. “I will do anything you want me to.”

His shameless declaration brought new heat to your cheeks, one that didn’t go unnoticed by him. You slipped the dress off your body, underwear following closely behind as you watched him strip himself.

You laid bare before him, legs spread as one hand reached down to rub slowly between your folds. Soonyoung mindlessly rolled a condom down his length, watching you pleasure yourself as if you were Venus come to life.

He trusted two fingers inside of your core, stretching open your walls before adding a third. You were thankful your sex was as wet as it was because he wasted no time in making sure you adjusted to his digits.

He pushed the tip of his cock inside of you soon after, enjoying every moan that fell from your swollen lips as he stretched and filled you. His thumb idly rubbed circles over your clit, keeping his eyes on every movement in your face. He derived pleasure just from getting to see you enjoy yourself.

Your walls were tight around his thick girth, but you took him with minimal difficulty. He was pleased that you were wet enough for him to start thrusting immediately. He fought back the urge to move faster, he would have all the in the world for that later. Right now he just wanted to watch your face as it contorted in pleasure as he took you for the first time.

“Faster, please, Soonyoung.” You moaned for him, the prettiest sound he had ever heard.

At first, he was too caught up in enjoying your reactions to realize this wasn’t the first time you had been with someone. His eyes darkened as he wondered how many other people had fucked you like this, and how often. Then his thoughts regrettably went back to you possibly leaving him. Leaving him to be just another half forgotten memory in your life.

But now, it didn’t matter. You were his and you were going to be his forever. He began to move faster, his hips driving into yours faster than the beating of your racing heart. His hands dug into your hips, pulling your lower half off the mattress as he fucked you deeper and harder.

You cried out his name, clenching around his cock as your orgasm built up. Already so overwhelmed by pleasure, you thought nothing of his large hand wrapping around your throat. In fact you seemed to welcome it, throwing your head back to give him better access. You moaned when he squeezed harder.

Your hand moved down to your sex, fingers rubbing at your clit desperatly wanting to come. Soonyoung thought it was incredible how such a delicate little thing like you would like it so rough. His hand tightened a bit more, allowing a just a fraction of oxygen into your body.

With that you came, crying out his name as your walls clamped down on his length. It didn’t take much more for him to finish, his hand still tight against your throat. You never even realized there was something off about how Soonyoung was handling you. Maybe you had noticed that his grip didn’t let up, but you were already out of consciousness by the time he finished.

He worried that maybe had gone too far. He only wanted you to pass out. Slowly he pulled out of you. Your chest rose frailly, your breath shallow but steady. He felt bad for treating you like that but it was for the best. He had you, all to himself and that was all that mattered.

You were so innocent, so naive. You didn’t notice that the windows were bolted shut, too thick to even break open. The closet of the bedroom was open and you didn’t even notice that it was full of womens clothes. Well, he thought to himself as he got dressed, she will notice they are all there for her when she wakes up.

The fridge was stocked full of food, and the tv was on for when you got up. He took your phone from you, turning it off before shoving it in his pocket. His hands ran over your naked form before he pulled the blanket on top of you. With a kiss to your lips he left the room, turning the lights off as he went.

Soonyoung left the apartment, the deadbolt on the door locked in place as he walked back to the car. He didn’t have a plan just yet, but amazingly, he wasn’t nervous. As long as he could keep you with him forever, he knew everything would work out just fine.

#hoshi smut #hoshi imagine #seventeen smut #seventeen imagines #hoshi #writing tag #halloween 2019 #this turned out much longer than I expected

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adarlingwrites · 3 years

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Absolution

Summary:

noun: formal release from guilt, obligation, or punishment

The Capital Wasteland lauded the Lone Wanderer as a hero, a Messiah, a savior who’s willing to give her life for the Good Fight. Beyond the legends, the propaganda, and the mythification that surrounded her legacy, there is only one person who knew her bare soul. She gave him his absolution, and now he will fight for hers.

Author’s notes: Finally, after months, I finally got to updating the fic! Schedule will be still irregular, but if things go according to plan the next chapter might come at around April 7. Thank you for staying tuned, please enjoy the chapter!

XXIX

January 14, 2278.

The green glow of Percy’s Pip-Boy illuminates the dark corridors of the Vault. I squinted, vaguely reading the time as two in the afternoon. She stands closer next to me. My partner does that whenever we explore vaults, and I can’t blame her.

Even I get creeped out by these damn things.

I didn’t know which was worse; the ones filled with insane clones who screamed “Gary”, or the one that filled my lungs with some kind of drug that made me and Percy trip out of our minds and almost hurt each other.

I don’t even wanna remember either. I must shift my focus on helping Percy find the GECK.

The ventilation is dead, and so is the thermostat, with the vault being in a state of decay for fuck knows how long. Some of these underground bunkers were built when I still had skin. Percy was extra cautious, and she was right to be. We faced several super mutants; Percy took care of them from a distance, while I offered additional firepower, ensuring none of those big green muties came within ten feet of her.

Reloading my shotgun, I hid behind a fallen desk as Percy fired another round from her Gauss rifle, nicking one mutant coming from my blind spot. The corner of my mouth tugs upward when I remember the first time we faced super mutants together, in the DC ruins.

I look at her now, and how she’d grown as a fighter.

Once all the muties in the area are dead, Percy sneaks over to a terminal, the glow of the monitor washing her helmet with a sickly green hue. My partner retracts her helmet, and begins typing away.

Shotgun still warm on my peeling hands, I’m alert to my surroundings as usual, though I can’t help but glance at her baffled expression, her frown frown deepening the more she reads the text on the screen.

“Shit. This isn’t science, this is sick! Charon, oh my god,” she whispers, eyes fixed on the terminal. “Some twisted scientist experimented on the vault residents to make the mutants. Vault 87 is where all the muties are coming from. They kidnap wastelanders and take them here and infect them with the FEV strain that doctor concocted.”

Expression grim, I turn to Percy. “Are you hinting that we blow this place up too, like Paradise?”

Sighing, Percy shuts the terminal off. “It’s too dangerous due to all the radiation in the area, and we don’t have the means to do it now. Maybe we can inform the Brotherhood.”

Knowing those tin cans, I roll my eyes at her. “If they decide to do something about it. They can’t even send their own men to fetch the damn GECK and they sent you.”

“My opinion of them is slowly getting worse as the days pass, that’s for sure,” Percy quips, powering down the terminal. “Fuckers have the most advanced weaponry in all of the Capital Wasteland next to the Enclave and they’re hiring a teenager and her ghoul partner as errand runners.”

At Percy’s remark, I chuckle.

“You mean the Wasteland Avenger and the Ghoul Reaper.”

“I thought you hated those nicknames,” she chuckles, the helmet of her suit protracting to cover her face once again.

“I still do, and Three Dog has no fucking problem using them, and us, to promote the Brotherhood. But those assholes don’t even respect you.”

Percy pauses, then her helmeted face turns to me. “Do you think he’s a little bit biased towards the Brotherhood?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, for starters, he preaches about how ghouls are people too, and he’s absolutely right about that, but he says nothing about the Brotherhood's bigotry against ghouls. Worse, a ghoul had been directly and indirectly helping them, and he’s still quiet.”

I rubbed my chin at her observation. “Huh. I’ve never thought of it- Percy, your six!”

She turns around, and sees the centaur approaching us, those god-awful tentacles writhing as it advanced. A few things unsettle me, seeing how I have to deal with my ugly mug whenever I look in the mirror, but those things? It makes the hairs on what little skin I have left stand.

It took two rounds to take it down, its head splitting like a rotten fruit the second time Percy shoots it. Disgusting.

Percy seems to be thinking of the same thing, recoiling and shivering. “Thanks.”

I grunt in response. “Let’s get a move on. I don’t wanna spend another minute in this damn place,” I muttered, and my partner nods.

We advance, taking care of any mutants we bump into along the way. Percy sweeps every area we go into for supplies, and terminals she can tinker with. I have a feeling that her accessing the files in this vault isn’t born out of her natural curiosity now. She’s seeking something.

A truth of some sorts.

On one particular terminal she accessed, she recoiled in horror, stumbling into me. I steady her, my large hands cupping her shoulders as she takes a sharp inhale.

“That bad?”

“Yeah,” she gasps. “Look.”

Barely making out the words, I lean over to read the text with difficulty. Thankfully, Percy spells it out for me. “These are death codes. They represent what the vault residents succumbed to. See that?”

She points at a string of text on the screen. “UD000.”

“Unexplained deaths. If I had to guess, they came up with this to cover up the fact that these people actually died due to the experiments their bastard scientists did to them. Now look at this,” Percy continues, typing away and accessing a list of the deceased. Eighty goddamn seven of those were unexplained.

A twisted feeling crawls up my spine, reminding me of the government program I was forced into.

??? ??, 2074.

Lined up, waiting for what’s about to come next, I stood beside Mag. My lanky limbs were tense, and the skin of my neck felt sickeningly tender, the collar around it making it bulge. From the corner of my eye, I look at my fellow trainees, all six of them.

Out of the hundreds of people they brought in, only the seven of us survived.

Sergeant Williams steps in the room, and all of us move in unison to salute, starched black uniforms barely creasing as we raised our arm for the gesture.

“Listen up, maggots! Out of the four hundred seventy three recruits we had for rehabilitation, only the seven of you didn’t wash out, drop dead, or ate a gun. Consider this the greatest honor, for you are now considered rehabilitated from commie propaganda,” he barks, barely concealing his Texan drawl, spittle flying everywhere.

“Consider this the greatest honor, for you are now ready to dedicate your worthless goddamn lives to the USA! You are to follow every damn command issued to you by whoever holds your contracts! You were trained for this singular purpose, are we clear?”

Our voices filled the room as we shouted “Yes sir!” in unison.

That was the day I was given my name.

The sergeant christened me as Charon, burning away whatever was left of Artyom Volkov, or so he thought.

Out of the hundreds of souls that got wasted from the Enclave’s bullshit, I somehow managed to survive, and I still intend to continue surviving. I have my partner Percy, that jackass DeLoria, and the dog now.

I pull myself back to the present as my partner shuts down the terminal, turning to the medical safe and taking whatever supplies we can get.

“C’mon. I don’t wanna linger here any more,” she whispers, a small tremble in her voice.

Following her to a corridor, the red lights glower over us almost ominously as we pass by several holding cells. The goosebumps on whatever’s left of my skin intensify. It was cold, desolate.

Until some crazy fuck lunged at us from behind a reinforced glass window and scared the living daylights out of Percy, who screams in surprise and bumps into me. Out of instinct, I catch her, and use my body to shield her.

The man continued to bang on the window as we both recovered from the damn surprise, a frown on my face as I took a closer look. The poor guy’s been driven mad from being held there. I doubt we can save him.

Of course, what happened made us look inside the rest of the holding cells.

I regret doing so immediately.

Centaurs, blobs of vaguely fucking human abominations and other unsightly shit occupied the holding cells. Percy is visibly disturbed, gagging, her helmet retracting just in case she vomits from the sights.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” she curses, sweat dripping from her brow despite the cold. “We should put them out of their misery.”

“Do you really want to deal with them right now?” I ask her as her eyes watered from the scene. “Let’s just come back for them once we retrieve the GECK,” I continue, gently placing my hand on her upper back.

Percy nods, and wordlessly forges on.

As we rounded a corner, we heard a brash voice ringing through an intercom.

“It can’t be!”

Both of us turn towards the sound. Slowly, cautiously, we creeped at the source, and we saw the unthinkable.

A super mutant is locked behind a holding cell. He’s standing next to the window, looking at my partner and I in surprise. Then, he continued talking. Not the broken speech you’d expect from a mutie, but full, actual sentences.

“Either you are quite real, or I’m going quite mad. Could you actually be a pure human?” the super mutant asks, gawking at Percy. Just to be safe, I remain at her side, still gauging if he can be trusted. “And this… is he another of the experiments, like me?” he continues, addressing my presence.

“Yes, I’m human. He is a ghoul. He’s like that because of the radiation and not an experiment, I’m afraid,” Percy replies, stepping closer to the glass to stare at him back, craning her neck to get a better view of him. What’s left of his jumpsuit are in tatters, and he loomed over the window, as big as the uglies who were dumber than him, if not even bigger. Even I had to crane my own neck upwards. This guy dwarfed me.

Damn, is this what Percy feels like when she’s with me?

“But what are you?” Percy asks.

“Me? You care who I am?” he asks, and I can almost hear Percy’s heart break at the question. He seemed like an outcast, locked away like this. I get the feeling he’s exactly on good terms with the mutants that roam the vault.

“I’m not used to pleasantries, forgive me. I’m more used to being struck around by the others,” he responds, pressing a meaty hand against the glass. Just as I thought. Guy’s an outcast.

“My name is Fawkes. I’ve lived in this cage… all my life.”

I looked at Percy and expected the sympathetic expression on her face. One look at that face and I already damn know she’s thinking of how to help him out.

“I’m Percy Zhou,” my partner introduces herself. “This is Charon.”

“A friendly mutie. Now I’ve seen everything,” I comment, and I hear Fawkes groan.

“Must you use that vulgar term?” he laments, face twisting in disdain, or disappointment, or an approximation of either seeing how the movements of his face muscles are limited. “Indeed I was born in the F.E.V. Chambers, but super mutant I am not. I prefer the term Meta Human. Suits me better, don’t you think?”

I was taken aback. I mean, damn, this guy sounds smarter than DeLoria. Hell, he sounds smarter than me. And that’s what makes him dangerous; if the dumb ones are a menace, imagine the damage a smart one can do.

“Percy, I think we should go. He might be dangerous,” I mumble, and Fawkes moves even closer to us, a shift in his tone.

“No, please! I haven’t had a single civil conversation all my life! Don’t go,” he begs, and though his voice is grating and booming like the rest of the super mutants, you can almost hear pain behind it.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Percy reassures him, pressing a small hand against the dirty window as a gesture of camaraderie. Then, she whips her head towards me, and whispers. “Charon, he’s lonely. Don’t you think he deserves even just a polite conversation?”

Grumbling, I fold my arms and nod. Percy smiles softly, and turns to Fawkes again. “Is your name really Fawkes? Like Guy Fawkes, the man who was involved in a plot to end his people’s persecution by assassinating a king?”

Fawkes seems delighted that Percy knew that tidbit of information. “Ah! You know your history as well! Yes, the name comes from a man who was willing to fight and die for what he believed in. I found it fitting, given my current circumstances. I’ve taken it from a historical entry in the computer,” he replies, gesturing to the terminal in his cell.

As they continued their conversation, I scanned for any threats that might befall us. What’s left of my ears picked up something from their chat, and my head whips towards Percy.

“I’ll get you out,” she said.

I frowned and folded my arms. “Percy, what the hell are you doing?”

“Charon, Fawkes said that the chamber holding the GECK is highly irradiated, and he can get it for us. Don’t you think it’s a good trade? He can have his freedom, and we can get what we came here for.”

“And I’m immune to radiation too. I’ll take the GECK,” I tell her, straightening my back subconsciously out of bravado. “We don’t know if he can be trusted. For all we know, the moment he gets out of his cell, he’ll attack us!”

“You’re not an errand boy, you’re my partner. That’s perfectly reasonable, but we’ve handled mutants before, Charon. If he gives any indication that he’s going to betray us, you’re free to empty your clip on him.”

This is starting to turn into an argument. I massaged my temples, frowning. “I’m not going to take that risk. I need to protect you.”

“What if he’s actually decent, and we just leave him here to rot and be tormented by the other mutants? You have your freedom now, Charon. Don’t you think he deserves his too?” Percy almost shouts, voice raised, and on her tiptoes.

Her words made me pause. Percy just had to go there, didn’t she? And it was effective too. I look at the big, green super mutant, or Meta Human, whatever he wanted to call himself, and a pang of guilt tugs at my gut.

Grumbling, I relent and nod.

This woman’s heart might be the death of her one day. Setting Fawkes free better be worth it.

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notaburgler · 4 years

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Morning meetings are such a drag... Endeavor x assistant Fem!reader SFW

His shadow passed your desk, each thump of his massive boots echoing along the hardwood floor, “Good morning, Satan,” he grumbled. Oh that cute little nickname he had for you… Such a sweet boss.

“Good morning Mr. Endeavor,” you greeted him with a smile and a small wave for the three interns trailing behind him like ducklings. “I’ll be in your office shortly to go over your schedule for the week.” You were sure your chipper tone was almost as annoying to him as you were, both facts he made obvious by immediately storming away.

It wasn’t that your boss hated you. On the contrary, he absolutely needed you — and he hated it. He’d forget his head at home if it wasn’t attached to his neck, and he despised knowing that someone as tiny and weak as yourself would always remember it. You didn’t even have a useful quirk. You were just some college graduate who managed to snake their way into a job as a receptionist at his front desk. He clearly didn’t think you would stick around as long as you had, especially with how difficult he was to deal with at times. But five years later, you had unintentionally taken control of his entire schedule.

You grabbed a green smoothie and pulled out his schedule book for the day. Picking up your tablet, you made your way to his office, ready to fight. You originally had his schedule downloaded to his phone, but the man is so technologically inept that he had no idea what was going on when he looked at it in the morning. Paper copies only for the top hero Endeavor.

You wrinkled your nose as you passed the thermostat, giving it a menacing glare. No matter. A quick adjustment and you were off to ‘ruin his day.’

“Damn it,” he growled. You could only guess that he had hoped you wouldn’t make good on your threat.

You held out his schedule book, already open to the proper page, knowing that otherwise he wouldn’t even glance at it. “We will start the morning with a staffing meeting, and you need to stop touching the thermostat.”

“I get too hot!” he snarled, slamming his hand to the desk.

You gave him a beatific smile, as if you hadn’t had this conversation before. “Turn off your flames when you’re in the office.”

He huffed in response. You went on. As you glossed over his day, you reached for the can of Red Bull on his desk. Lifting it by the rim with a smile and direct eye contact, you dropped it in the garbage. “You know these give you kidney stones.”

He snarled as you replaced the energy drink with the green smoothie. “This is much better. And it prevents this from happening again.” You held up your phone, showing an image of Endeavor curled up on the floor in the fetal position.

You didn't bother playing the video, he knew what it was and the last thing he would want was his young interns to hear him crying in pain. It would be thoroughly humiliating. And you, some demon woman spawned from the depths of hell, had a video of just that to use as blackmail.

“Who is that? And why did Endeavor call her Satan when we showed up?” The green-haired intern called Midoriya asked quietly.

Endeavor’s intern and son Shoto sighed, shaking his head before dropping it into his hands, “Endeavor is stubborn, and his assistant, Miss (Y/N), makes sure he follows his schedule.”

You kept going about his day. “You have a meeting with other heroes, a lunch meeting with a tabloid paper to get them off your back, more meetings, and finally patrol. He sunk lower into his seat with each meeting you mentioned. God did he hate meetings. Even worse, meetings with the media.

“I don't like talking to the tabloids — cancel it.”

“No.”

“Just who is the boss around here?”

You stopped reading and glanced up. He hated that look. You were so calm and so sweet on the outside. It actually played to his advantage. Most of the time you were at his hip with his schedule book, coordinating his day and making sure that he wasn't going too far off schedule. Not many knew how much control you had, and if they did, he would be in for quite a headline in the news the next day.

Side by side, you stood at about his lower chest. He’d smirk with crossed arms when you'd try to get sassy. He even bought you a step stool to keep in his office as a joke. When you got mad and wanted to glare him down, you could stand on it and nearly be at his eye level. He still eclipsed you, even on the stool, but it made him chuckle and reminded him that he could crush you at any second if he so desired.

You let your glare fall and went back to your list of things he needed to do that day.

“Endeavor is afraid of some twerp like her?” The third intern, Bakugou, clearly thought Endeavor should be ashamed. But, there was a calmness about the pro hero. Like he had dealt with her for so long, he didn't even get upset. He just pretended to listen then did as he pleased.

With a sharp tap of your nails on his desk, you caught Endeavor’s attention once more. “Did you hear that last part?” you inquired sweetly.

He tilted his head and rolled his eyes in response. You knew he hated how you had taken over. All he wanted was to go fight crime and leave the boring shit to the staff he hired. He often grumbled to the effect of “why do I have staff if no one is doing all of this shit?”

“You have patrol from one to three. I need you back by four for an interview— and you will be there.” As his flames sparked and burned higher, you pulled your face into a stern grimace. “Don't you flash your flames at me!”

He rolled his eyes again. You relaxed your face at that, knowing he was internally cursing your very existence.

“Miss (Y/N) plans and executes Endeavor’s entire day and week to the second. If it wasn't for her, he'd probably starve.” Shoto mentioned under his breath, earning himself a glare from his father and a tiny flicker of flames.

You smiled, catching Endeavor’s attention again. “I've preordered your meal for lunch today and no, you won't be able to bribe the staff into getting you a big steak. You promised you would watch your red meat intake after your doctor's appointment, so I got you that chicken dish you like.” He grunted, seemingly mollified you got him some form of meat and not the dreaded salad.

“Oh, and don't bother looking for the candy stash in your top left drawer. I already confiscated it and won't be giving it back until you get down to your normal weight and BMI.”

Shoto let out a small chuckle at his father’s thunderous expression.

“This girl is scary.” Midoriya noted, taking out a notebook to scribble down all the information he could on Endeavor.

“I'm also not taking the lock off the training facility until you can prove to me that you are getting a good night's sleep and eating well. You overwork yourself and end up dehydrated and malnourished. People depend on you to be in top shape and we can't have you passing out, again, because you haven't eaten all day. Eat a protein bar, drink a bottle of water, sleep for eight hours, and I'll unlock it for you.”

Shoto’s eyes glinted. You guessed he was enjoying this more than his friends knew. If only you’d been around when he was growing up, he might not have quite the daddy issues he does. You keep his father grounded and maintaining a healthy lifestyle, practically forcing him to take care of himself. You could only hope your interference would help Shoto realize he wasn't the only one Endeavor was hard on. He was just as strict with himself as he was his son. If only the boy’s mother had shown the same ability to keep Endeavor in line, his childhood might have been vastly different.

With a pointed sip of his green smoothie, Endeavor tapped the touchpad on his laptop a little harder than necessary. He frowned, clicking faster. Just as you were about to call him on his electronics abuse, he gritted his teeth and puffed out his chest. “Unlock the Wifi.”

You turned away, ignoring his request in favor of double checking his schedule for the day. It was going to be long and those kids would be trailing him. “I'm not invoicing the city for this morning’s villain attack and subsequent defeat. You are behind on your pro bono hours and now that you are the number one hero, you have more to do than normal.” You glanced back and flipped through a few pages in his schedule, “I have added more times where I expect you to do pro bono work to keep up appearances.”

The three students exchanged glances. You imagined they hadn’t realized how busy a real top hero was. Meetings and events to promote. A personal assistant to keep them on track. Countless sidekicks to take on the little work that the hero was above doing or couldn't get to. It was all amazing. A hero’s day wasn’t just comprised of fighting villains and catching the bad guys. It was bound to be a rude awakening to the real world that they hadn’t seen the last time they were out with heroes.

As Mr. Aizawa had made clear, this time around, the work would be more rigorous. It would be closer to the real thing than any of them had experienced. They anticipated fighting villains and late night patrols. They anticipated getting beaten up and tossed around only to have the hero they worked under rush in to save the day. What they didn’t anticipate was sitting in a boardroom for three hours going over profits and losses and how to make up revenue. No, being a hero was more like owning your own business. They had to track expenses and factor in labor costs. A lot of work goes into being the top hero, and most of that work was behind a computer. It was no wonder why Endeavor was so annoyed. None of them would be thrilled about meetings and public appearances.

They had spent a little time working on interviewing skills, but they didn’t think they would be so important. Midnight tried to press the issue, but each student, the present three in that room included, didn’t care much about the political part of hero work; an important, albeit annoying aspect of the job. Not even the number one hero was immune to the force of the media. You made that painstakingly obvious to the trio as you went over the approved questions you would give the reporter at the lunch meeting.

“Unlock the wifi.” He demanded again, this time his voice showing his irritation.

Again, you continue on with your rant, not paying any mind to his demand. He did this every morning. He would sit on his phone, not paying any attention to your debrief. You masterfully solved the problem by changing the password every day before he arrived and only giving it to him when you were done.

You turned and placed your hand on the growing stack of papers on the corner of his desk, “Procrastinating will get you nowhere. All of these papers need your signature and to be filled out completely by the end of the day; No exceptions.”

You finished your briefing and looked to him for questions. He stayed silent not wanting to drag this on any longer than it already had.

“Oh and Mr. Endeavor, Sir.” Your usual bubbly and happy go lucky demeanor got a bit more serious, “The doctors called… about your wife.”

Shotos attention was undivided. Once he heard doctors and wife in relation to his father, he stopped relaying information to Bakugo and Midorya about the unusual relationship between his father and his assistant, and focused solely on you.

You saw his face go white, “Don't worry Shoto, it's nothing serious.” You hoped your smile would calm him down, “It's just been a minute since someone made an appearance.” Your glare burned holes through the flame hero.

He hated that glare. And he hated this topic, especially in front of Shoto. He felt a bit embarrassed about visiting his wife more often now. He’d leave her flowers, of course, you would go pick them up for him.

“I'll go see her later. I've more pressing matters-”

You cut him off. “You know, I think you have time tomorrow. I'll schedule a visit for you.” You smiled.

He grumbled at your reaction. This was not the time or place for this subject. But thank the holy heavens this briefing was over.

****

Your day went by quick. Endeavor had been showing his son around the small changes made and his classmates followed. You couldn't help but notice that the other two boys had been getting neglected in his training. You called over Shoto to have him help you, much to Endeavors dismay. This forced him to spend some time training the other two and not focus solely on his own prodigy.

The end of the day arrived and as your boss left, you stopped him, “Those papers?” You asked with a tilted head and a cute smile.

“I'll have them done later.” In public, he puffed his chest and showed a more dominating side not shown in private.

“This is when it gets… interesting.” Shoto whispered knowing that the assistant respected her employer a bit too much to cause a scene in front of the people that thought of him as the sole ruler of castle Endeavor.

“I need them done today.” You repeated your earlier demands.

You really didn't ask for much. All you needed was for him to complete the tiniest of tasks you needed from him and to be where he needed to be at the time he needed to be there. It wasn't hard. As a matter of fact, all of his speeches- if he even does them- were all written by you. All of his interviews were arranged and practically directed by you. You write the questions they would ask, you write the answers he would give- or at least a readers digest version. He wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed, so you’d have to make sure that they were questions he could answer on the fly.

He was clearly irritated that day. He started his day in a foul mood, and it was no shock to anyone he would end it that way or worse.

“I said I'll get it done later.” He yelled having raised his voice at you for the first time in years, “I know you think I can't live without you, but I'll have you know, I'm perfectly capable of doing all of this myself. I use you to make life easier on me. Don't go thinking that you aren't replaceable.”

You looked at him like a deer in headlights. To think that he would say such a thing after all you had done. You had got him coffee and scheduled appointments that were not even work related. You spent countless hours calling tailors that could cater to his massive physique and wouldn't take forever. You picked up dry cleaning and went grocery shopping. You found the restaurants that served a healthier version of his favorite meals since he requested that you make sure he stopped gorging on junk food and garbage like instant ramen.You woke up in the middle of the night to do nothing about his kidney stones and just watch him writhe in pain on the floor until they passed. All he wanted was moral support while he squirmed and cried for hours. He trusted you. Maybe even loved you, to a certain extent. So these words, they hurt.

“You can do it alone, huh?” You gripped the papers in your hands tight, turning your knuckles a ghostly white.

“Fine!” You tossed them in the air, letting them rain down on him like a baptism of clerical duties, “Do it yourself!” You huffed, grabbing your purse and jacket to storm out. “I don't get paid enough to deal with this shit.”

Every single eye in the building was on you as you stomped to the elevator. Endeavors flaming shoulders were like ice cubes compared to the heat your rage was putting off. People parted like the Red Sea as you made way through the many desks and cubicles. If you had any strength, the force at which you pushed the elevator button would have crushed the whole pad and destroyed it entirely.

You waited, tapping your finger to your forearm. The stares from everyone were noticeable, how could they all not stare? This was a big commotion in the office. Everyone thought you and Endeavor had such a good relationship. You bickered, of course, but mostly it seemed the two of you had an understanding.

The door opened and without hesitation, you stepped on- or tried to. You were tugged back gently by a large hand, your body staying in the elevator door, stopping it from closing. His tough face donned a pout. His flames had been extinguished. He tried to stay tough, not wanting to show weakness in front of his staff, but he knew he’d have to eat crow.

“Can I help you?” You asked with sass.

“Please,” He looked to the floor, “Don't le….”

You heard him. He tried to hide it, but you heard him. The question was: Was it enough?

“I'm sorry Mr. Endeavor, I can't quite hear you.” You cupped your ear with your free hand.

“Please don't leave.” He said louder, standing tall and gaining his composure.

He was so damn stubborn. This was your chance to finally get him to stop acting like a goddamn child and realize that he needs to take some accountability for his own Hero agency. That means not having someone holding his hand all day to get him to do his work, even if it wasn't hero work.

You tilted your head implying what it was you wanted to hear. “I'll take your morning debriefs more seriously.” He said with a sullen tone.

“And?”

“And we can discuss a significant raise if you keep helping me the way you do.”

“And?”

He’d catch on in a second.

“I'll go get those papers done.” He sighed, having been defeated by a midget in a dress, “Right now.” He let go of your arm.

You looked up at him with a cocky grin on your face and walked back to your desk.

You sat down and organized the papers you had thrown and glanced to the three boys standing shocked at what had just happened, “Like a fiddle.” You smirked, going back to your duties and watching his defeated form pass your desk and back into his office.

#enji todoroki #endeavor #Female reader #reader #bnha fanfiction #bnha #my hero academia #assistant reader #you have him by the balls #I love this man #even if he is an asshole #flame daddy Endeavor

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prorevenge · 5 years

Text

My wannabe fashionista coworker always threw shade at me for being frumpy. She looked frumpier, unemployed!

TL;DR at the bottom

*******

I worked at a popular, high end clothing store while I was in graduate school (I'm an engineer). I won't name the brand, but it's the sort that charged $50 for a pair of male boxer briefs, $200 for a lady's fancy bra, or $400 or more for a pair of jeans, $1,000 or more for those skinny suits that hip guys wear to their job, where the hems of their pants reveal that they're wearing loafers without socks.

The clothes there weren't really my style but the starting pay was two dollars higher than minimum wage, and higher than most of the other, surrounding stores. This was at a rich people shopping center, where lots of people who shop there are wannabe celebrities and constant selfie-takers.

I was surprised to get hired there, but was relieved that I wouldn't have to really do customer service, as I worked only in the stock room. I'd put out clothes on the shelves and racks before and after closing, and also arrange everything in the back to make it organized. I was also trained so that in emergency situations I could cover register if we were short handed, so that the regular associates could go on break.

I was hardly seen by customers, but I still had to wear the clothes the store sold, to promote the image of the company. I didn't, thankfully, have to wear the dainty little suits, but I did sport the jeans and other casual things we sold.

It was a job. I didn't love it and I didn't hate it. I just worked, took my pay, went to school, and went home.

At least that's the way it was for two months.

After those two months, "Jessica" began to work during the same hours as me. She was about my age (I was 22), maybe twenty five, tops. She didn't work in the stock room (it was just me back there, with one or two other college guys), but worked the front. She wasn't the manager, or even a supervisor, but she SWORE she was in charge of me.

She made it known to everyone, even customers, that she graduated with an associates degree in fashion marketing from FIDM. I suppose it's a big deal but I was thinking girl if you're a college graduate why are you bragging about it as if it has something to do with you folding jeans and ringing people up at the register? She talked like she was fashion expert and in the "fashion industry," and would talk about the New York or Paris fashion weeks in a familiar way that implied that she just got of the plane after attending these events personally. You know the type, the kind that talks about famous fashion designers by their first name, as if they knew them.

Well she always criticized the way I wore the jeans because I didn't tuck in my T-shirt like the mannequin, or that I work Chuck Taylors on my feet instead of the little leather Sperry Topsiders knockoffs we sold for $300.

We were given a clothing allowance as employees. As a stockperson, I was allowed three complete outfits for free, everything from tops, to underear, to socks, and pants (but not shoes). If I wanted more and it was specifically for wearing at the store, I could mark it as a "uniform purchase" and have the price deducted from my check a little at a time. This was advantageous because they wouldn't charge you tax for them, and charge you only a third of the retail price.

Uniform Purchase was distinctly separate from "Store Discount," for which we also received a percentage off, but it wasn't the incredible 66% discount we got for uniform purchases.

Jessica would snicker at me when I took over register for someone, shake her head or roll her eyes at me as if I looked really ugly. I'm always thinking, whatever girl, you wannabe model you aren't even hot and you're not the boss, who are you? But I held my tongue.

She'd also complain if I was supposedly not fast enough in grabbing a size medium from the back because a customer is requesting the dress and all we have on the floor are smalls and larges. She'd trash me to the customer and when I showed up would sarcastically say "finally!" and turn to the customer with a "see what I have to put up with?" expression.

She was especially mean if any customers got chatty with me and treated me with respect. And if those customers were female and were getting flirty with me, Jessica would be a total cockblock.

The real manager, Paula, had their own issues to deal with beyond petty bickering between a stockboy and an entry level sales associate with delusions of "Project Runway" grandeur. The assistant manager, another fashion industry wannabe named "Heather," was just like Jessica, but thankfully I hardly interacted with her. According to my coworkers, Heather was just as bad as Jessica.

Even though I didn't plan on making this store my career, and even though Jessica didn't bother me THAT much, I thought it won't hurt to get this bitch fired.

To her face, I'd just smile and act like I was following her orders happily, or didn't mind when she would point at me rudely, or snap her fingers at me like she was calling a dog.

Jessica would always hear a directive from one of the managers, and then go around telling the other employees what to do, as if they didn't have ears. She'd try to act as if it was HER directive. LOL.

Her coworkers who were the same "rank" as her would sometimes vent to me about how Jessica acted like she was in charge, when in some cases she had even less time in the company than other employees on the floor.

I noticed that when I arranged clothes in back, especially big ticket, desirable clothes that were seen in magazines in our company's advertisement campaigns, she'd "order" me to set aside things in her size.

I'd do it, because it's my job to set aside things if employees want to buy them outright at a discount or put it as a uniform purchase.

Whenever an employee was on register (really, a big Ipad with a cash drawer beneath), you could tap in a code and the register would show a rundown of every non-customer transaction that employees performed that day, and with a few more keystrokes, their transactions over MANY days. The managers knew this code, of course, and I'll assume Jessica knew the code too because Heather shared the code with her.

I WASN'T supposed to know the code, but I did, because there's a mirror in the wall behind the register, and I was re-stocking paper handbags behind Heather when I saw her tap in her four digit code. She assumed I was stupid and didn't understand the incredibly complex wizardry that is a two year old, low-end spec Ipad.

I knew Jessica was getting rung up for "uniform purchases" when she should have been getting rung up for regular employee discount.

She assumed that when I set aside all those expensive items for her, that I was too dumb to know what she was doing, just because I might have something of a mouth breather countenance.

Even if I look on the surface like a fugitive from the trailer park, something told me Jessica wasn't going to be using $800 heels, a $500 dress, and $1200 motorcycle jacket while working at the store.

And anyway, I asked around. No one saw Jessica wearing any of the truly fancy clothes she bought at our store at what the other employees assumed was simply a regular employee discount.

I thought maybe she was being honest, too. It WAS possible, after all, because I didn't always work with her. Maybe she wore evening dresses to work on her other shifts? Whatever, I decided to make sure.

One time when everyone was busy doing other stuff and the store had to resort to putting me on the register, I typed in Heather's code and pulled up Jessica's purchases. As I suspected, she had bought thousands of dollars worth of our store's best items, but put them all as "uniform purchases" and not at her regular discount.

So I swiped "print" and the register switches from the regular tape to the 8.5"x11" printer beneath the counter, and a complete rundown of all of Jessica's purchases come out.

I highlight all the most expensive items that she was charged for "uniform purchase" (such as, her $1200 jacket would only be $300, and even that was tax free and she got to pay it little by little).

I knew that my manager, Paula, wasn't exactly a nuclear physicist and she was more interested in moving up the chain of command to be working at a job higher than store manager in the company, so as long as her store's sales numbers looked good she didn't care what her assistant Heather did.

Except, if it was a violation of company policy that might reflect badly on her.

I knew Heather was in on Jessica's scam because you're not allowed to ring yourself up at the store, you have to have someone else do it, and none of the other associates would want to conspire with her for fear of getting fired or worse.

To make sure, I printed HEATHER's purchase history too. I didn't see Heather as often as I saw Jessica, but I could also see really glaring red flags on her purchase report. Like, she bought a $900 nightclub dress as a uniform purchase, which I'm quite sure she never wore to work. I did the same highlighting on suspicious items as I did with Jessica's.

Then, because none of this was REALLY my business, I was just a part time asshole who worked in the stockroom, I waited for the most fun opportunity to lower the boom.

Jessica got on her little bluetooth earpiece that she wears on he sales floor that she thinks makes her look like a VIP, and says, "OP, I'm going to need XXX in a size small, customer waiting, get the lead out." So I bring the item, and Jessica says I'm "not passing muster." I thought wow Jessica you sounded really 1940s there, you wannabe pinup girl LOL.

After the customer leaves, Jessica says, "I'm going to need you to go on a trash run and sweep out the receiving bay. And I need you to cover Annie's lunch."

I laugh and tell her, "who died and made you supervisor, you fucking headass burnout?"

She looks like she was the fucking Crypt Keeper for a second and that she wanted to punch me, before she remembered that I'm 6'2" and outweigh her by a hundred pounds.

She hisses, "You are SO fired, you fucking geek. Heather's going to hear about this."

I tell her, "Fuck you, I'm going to lunch."

And I clock out and leave.

When I come back, I see Jessica immediately get on her little earpiece.

Before I even reach the stock room, Heather is there, and the manager Paula intercept me.

"Annie, can you cover register? We have an urgent matter to deal with."

I know I'm supposed to be fired.

Which is why, during my lunch, I went to the copy place and made PDF scans of the printouts I made for Jessica and Heather. I had all the corporate bigshots' emails. They were in the new hire handbook all of us get when we start working. I saved a draft to each but didn't hit SEND yet. I had the printouts as attachements. In the BODY of my email, I described exactly what had been going on. I did send ONE email. And that was to Paula the manager, herself.

But I didn't press SEND until we were on our way to the employee break room.

Paula tells me, "OP, Heather sent me a text that says you were verbally abusive to Jessica. Heather herself says that Jessica has complained to her on numerous occasions that you are a substandard employee, and only her own, personal kindness has presented her from firing you. I came in myself to see if you have anything to say in order to save your job."

It's been a couple of years so of course that can't be exactly what she said, but it was something typical and rehearsed and faux-professional that any low-level boss would say when trying to sound important.

I said I didn't have anything to say in my defense, and that in fact I quit.

Jessica and Heather looked surprised, but then Jessica started smiling.

Paula looked disappointed, and said, "I'm very sorry to hear you say that. You may collect your last..."

"Oh, but before I go, I think you should look at these printouts. I know you don't spend a lot of time studying this stuff, but I thought you might find it interesting. It's the last three months of Jessica's and Heather's employee purchases. Notice how they always ring each other up, and notice all that stuff they're claiming to use as uniforms. If you're having trouble understanding it, I explained it in an email I sent to your cellphone. You should have it already, if you check.

I have the same email ready to go to Dan and Pam and Kimberly and Victor and Kevin but I haven't sent it in yet. I was hoping you could look it over and email me back when you're ready, I mean if you want me to edit anything."

Then I got up and left.

Later that afternoon, my phone was ringing.

It was Paula.

She was practically crying, telling me, please don't send those emails, "I've fired Heather and Jessica. They're GONE. And please don't quit. Please don't tell anyone about--"

I tell her to relax.

I already quit. And I'm keeping my mouth shut.

A few days later, I showed up for my final check. I learned from one of the sales associates that corporate Loss Prevention was called in (our corporate office is only a few miles from the retail location) to interview both Heather and Jessica about their fraud.

In lieu of arrest and heavy fines for what amounted to outright theft and fraud, they were simply fired and unable to use the company as a reference, and due to being fired for cause, could not file for unemployment.

Paula was actually in the store that day, and practically ran to me to thank me for "keeping this scandal at a store level. It's been handled."

I told her no problem. What I didn't tell her was that I never did delete those drafts.

She offered me a reward of free merchandise.

No thanks.

I'm going to look awfully silly in those dainty little suits at my super cool new job of working at Sizzler.

It all ended okay.

A year later I finished my degree, and now I'm doing what I really want to do. Except now at my job, guess what we have to wear. Yeah. Dainty little suits.

I wear socks, though.

I would have never torpedoed Heather and Jessica if they just left me alone to do my job in peace, and didn't try to feel big and important at my expense.

I would have left them to live in their self-medicating lies, live and let live.

Other than some difficult customers, people like Heather and Jessica are what make working retail such a nightmare for so many.

And that's why I feel no guilt about destroying them.

I'm sure Jessica had lots to talk about at that year's Milan Fashion Week.

Hold this L, bitch.

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

TL;DR: I was stockboy at a fancy clothes store. A low level associate would always boss me around and call me stupid even though she wasn't in charge. I found out she was stealing from the store. I was mean to her on purpose so that I'd be called in to a manager meeting to be fired. I quit, and presented proof to the manager that the associate and the assistant manager were both thieves. They both got fired. I began work at Sizzler.

(source) story by (/u/SaggingSkinnyJeans)

#prorevenge #by /u/SaggingSkinnyJeans #pro revenge #revenge stories #pro revenge stories #pro #revenge #last10

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the-blind-assassin-12 · 5 years

Text

I’ll Think About It

A/N: *LET IT BE KNOWN: on this, the third day of September in the year 2019, I have decided to place Billy Russo in an alternate universe where he just gets to run Anvil and be happy. Like that’s it.* Okay, that’s not completely it, but like, no bullshit shady ass secretive back door deals, no playing a part in murdering his best friend’s family, no revenge. Just his own stubborn self getting in his way. This makes smooch #17…

Word Count: 3,162

Prompt from: @thesumofmychoices who wanted “On the street, life or death for Billy”

You leaned against the door frame, glaring at him as he stalked through the bedroom. Shirt unbuttoned and hair falling loosely over his brow, he gathered his things quickly, lining everything up on the bed. Gun, knife, headset, tie, keys, second gun, second knife... The argument had chewed up some time, so he was rushing now, cursing to himself under his breath, something about his phone. He passed right in front of you but you kept your arms crossed tightly over your chest, kept shooting daggers with your eyes. His long fingers deftly started working to slip the buttons of his shirt into their corresponding holes as he scanned every surface in the room for his phone, shoelaces dragging on the hardwood.

You’d watched Billy get dressed for work plenty of times, usually from the bed before the sun had finished rising, and after being thoroughly reminded of how you made him feel. You’d roll onto your side as he pulled his arms through the sleeves of his vest, and he’d lean over you, gripping your hip and seeking out your lips with his own, his grip wandering over the side of your body to squeeze your ass and pull a moan into his mouth. With a nip at your bottom lip, he’d stand back up and finish getting ready, securing buttons, dragging his hands through his hair to slick it into place, fastening his watch band, and doing the laces on his shoes. He’d turn once more to the bed and your spent form slumped into the pillows, telling you not to move, that he wants to come back to you in the same position, that you better not put any clothes on...something along those lines. But he’d throw you a wink as you slipped back to sleep, and a few hours later you’d get a text asking if you were awake yet.

Billy hadn’t said that he loved you, and you knew better than to say it first, but you also knew that things were changing between the two of you, regardless of what words you used to describe it. He hadn’t asked you to move in with him, but he’d flicked a key across the breakfast table at you while you sat cross legged in the chair eating blueberries from a bowl, wearing his shirt from the previous night. You hadn’t made a big deal of it then, continuing to munch your fruit as your hand closed around the pair of keys, Billy observing your non-reaction with a barely there smile from behind his coffee mug. You’d gone back to your place that afternoon and couldn’t keep your smile in your pocket any longer, pulling it and the keys out and falling into your bed before packing a bag with as much as you could fit. You moved in with Billy slowly over the course of the final few months of your lease, spending 3 or 4 consecutive days with him before going back to the address that still bore your name, staying there for a few days with your increasingly emptying shelves and closets before taking a few more things to Billy’s. Even after your lease had expired and you had forwarded your mail, you were slow to call Billy’s place home. But after he’d called once to tell you that a meeting ran late, that he’d miss your dinner reservation, you’d smiled at his next words. “Just head home, I’ll pick somethin’ up on the way back. I’m sorry to ruin the night, it’s just, these are important clients and-”

You’d cut him off then, still smiling. “It’s fine, Billy.” You turned and started walking in the opposite direction you were travelling in. You were only about a block and a half from the restaurant by the time he called you. “You can make it up to me when you get home.”

And he had, too. He’d brought dinner home from your favorite diner, even picked up a bouquet of roses from a corner vendor. Depositing both in your hands, your fingers closing quickly around the squeaky plastic wrapping the flowers and the rolled top of the plain brown bag, he grabbed your hips and pulled them to his. “Dinner,” he leaned in, tracing his tongue up your neck. “Flowers,” his teeth took the moistened skin over your pulse point between them. “Did I make it up to you?” The low growl in his voice and the way his fingertips were digging into your flesh told you how to answer.

“Not even close, Billy.”

He grinned, taking both items back from your grasp and setting them on the countertop along with his keys. “I was hopin’ you’d say that.” His hands and lips were on you again, walking you into the bedroom, dinner entirely forgotten.

You knew that night that you loved Billy Russo. And when he emerged from the shower to join you in the kitchen, towel tied low on his hips and water clinging to his hair, you were fairly certain that he loved you, too. He reached over your shoulder to grab half of the turkey club in the open take out container, shredded lettuce falling on the table as he turned to quickly kiss your cheek before hastily stuffing the sandwich in his mouth. His cool, black eyes warmed as you brushed a crumb out of his beard with your thumb, and you didn’t have to say it out loud to know what you felt. You loved him, and it filled your entire being with excitement, with happiness and possibility.

But it was also terrifying to love a man like Billy. Danger was never more than a few paces behind him, and while he assured you that he’d always outrun it, that confident smirk on his perfect face, you couldn’t help the anxious way your stomach would flip when you thought about his job. You couldn’t have been more proud of Billy for building the company that he dreamed of, for getting it off the ground and turning Anvil into one of the premier names in private security. You loved the way he beamed when he filled you in on new developments, and were more than happy to massage the tension from his shoulders after a long day.

In the beginning, there were endless meetings and conference calls with investors and potential clients, which meant missed dinner dates, interrupted plans, and nights where Billy came back long after you’d already been asleep. But you understood. There were recruiting events and training drills that lasted several weeks at a time, Billy calling you from a hotel in D.C. or Philadelphia or some other metropolis, making promises that sounded more like threats about what he wanted to do to you when he got home. He’d usually yawn mid way through, and your heart would ache with how much you loved him, with how much you wished he was in bed with you, his weight dipping the mattress beside you, his sleepy mumbles into his pillow. But you understood. You understood that for the first year or so, he’d have to go on all the jobs, running the missions himself to ensure that things went smoothly and safely. While you hated knowing that he was essentially contracting himself out as a human shield for some politician, celebrity or businessman, you understood that this was how it had to be until he was confident enough in the higher ranked members of his team to let them take the reins. A few nicks and bruises, a black eye here and there, all of that you understood. This is what it meant to love Billy Russo.

What you failed to understand, almost three years later, was why Billy still insisted to lead as many jobs as he did. He’d promoted four of his guys to operations leaders, hired enough employees- all of them former military- to run all four teams at once. The occasional job, a high powered client, a conditional term in the contract stating that William Russo himself lead the security detail… those instances you understood. But he’d told you at the beginning of all of this, when you’d spent more time apart than together, when he’d come home bleeding once or twice, or else splattered with blood belonging to someone else, that it wouldn’t be this way for long. He’d told you that eventually he’d cut back and focus more of his time on running the business and not the missions. But when you’d asked him a few times about when that might be, all he’d answered with was a kiss on your nose, a wink and an “I’ll think about it,” on the way out the door.

Which is precisely what he’d told you when you’d brought it up again last week. You’d had a dream, a nightmare, that ended with Billy, blood soaked and fading in your arms. It wasn’t the first of its kind, and you were sure it wouldn’t be the last, but it was strong, gripping you by the lungs and shooting your veins with ice. You knew he had a big job coming up, and you knew it was a high risk client- one with several death threats over his head- and you knew that it was likely to blame for influencing your sleeping brain. But you had to ask, had to try, even though you could already hear his answer.

“Billy, it’s just… you’re the CEO. You have other responsibilities, you don’t need to go on all these jobs anymore… don’t need to risk-”

“I’m not riskin’ anything,” he reached behind you to grab a banana from the fruit basket, kissing the corner of your eye as you rolled it.

Not riskin’ anything, no one’s gettin’ the better of me. It was almost as practiced a response as “I’ll think about it” at this point, and while you knew he meant it, knew that confidence, that bravado were real and that he wasn’t trying to deflect or lie or shut you up, you also knew he wasn’t seeing things from your perspective. You sighed, pushing yourself away from the counter to follow him as he finished getting ready to leave. “You are risking something though, Billy, you’re risking your life… you’re risking all of this,” you gestured broadly around the apartment, indicating your shared home, your shared love. “I try not to let it bother me, I really do. But, Billy?” you placed your hand on his bicep and he stilled his motion to turn to face you, hands settling at your waist as he looked down at you with his full attention. “You roll the dice too many times, your luck’s gonna run out. That’s just a fact.” You tried to keep the lump in your throat from changing your voice, and you knew he noticed your effort.

He narrowed his eyes and flexed his fingers around your hip bones before tilting his head. “Well, I don’t wanna risk all that.” Fingers slipping under your shirt to slide over your skin, he dropped his lips to your cheek and you sighed. “I don’t wanna risk you.”

“So… you’ll stay home? On Thursday night for the Anderson job? You’ll let Donovan or Zeke or one of the other guys lead it?”

“I’ll think about it. Promise.” With that, he grabbed his briefcase, stuck the banana in his pocket, and coffee in hand, strode for the door leaving you just as exasperated, nervous and unsure as you were before you brought it up.

Now that it was Thursday night, it was clear that if he’d thought about it, he hadn’t thought enough of your concerns to agree with you. You’d lost your patience and your temper, asking if he’d even cared about your opinions, if he even considered what you’d said. He’d groaned, telling you that now wasn’t the time, that of course he’d thought about it, that he had to get ready and that you’d talk about it when he got home.

“If!” you’d shouted, setting the wine bottle down with a little bit more force than necessary. “If you get home, Billy. Because, you know, you’re gonna go put yourself in danger for no reason, so if you get home, we can talk about it.”

You heard his annoyed laugh, the one he let out when you’d pressed his buttons and he knew screaming at you wasn’t an option. “If I get home. Okay.” He was already in the bedroom, already getting dressed by the time you took a swig of the drink you’d just poured. You huffed, setting your glass next to the bottle on the counter and crossing the apartment to take up residence in the doorway. “So I’m definitiely dyin now? That it? Every time I go out on a job,” he looked at you, one eyebrow raised sarcastically. “I’m not comin’ home?”

“I didn’t say that, Billy, and you know it. All I said was you’re taking too many risks, and you are.” You crossed your arms. “And you said you’d think about it, and you didn’t.”

You watched him pace around, searching for his phone and choosing to ignore your answer. “You seen my goddamn phone anywhere?” He turned back to you, the sarcasm gone, replaced with a genuine request for help.

I shouldn’t tell him, I should just let him keep looking so he’s late and he can’t go on the job. “It’s on the table in the living room.” You stepped aside to let him pass, making sure to put enough space between you so that he couldn’t just distract you with a kiss or change your mind with his hands.

“Thanks,” he mumbled, striding back into the living room to grab his phone, returning to finish putting himself together. “Look,” he released a breath as he watched you in the mirror, seething silently at him while he crafted a knot in the matte black tie around his neck. “We’ll talk about it when I get home, okay?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it, Billy, if you’re not gonna change anything. I love you, Russo, and I know you love me too. But this is getting out of control, and if you’re not gonna actually think about it, then I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I’ll just keep it to myself and wait.”

“Wait.” He turned, tucking his collar over his tie. “Wait for what?”

You shrugged. “Wait for you to get home. Or not. Seems that’s what you want for me, so that’s what I’ll do.”

He groaned, holstering the two guns and sheathing the knives, one on his waist, the other in holder strapped to his ankle. “It’s not what I…” he patted himself down, double checking that he had everything he needed. “Look. I have to go. You gonna kiss me goodbye, or not?”

You shrugged again, trying desperately to hold on to your grudge.

“Okay, fine.” He pressed his lips to your reluctant cheek, his hand on the small of your back. “I’ll be home soon. I love you.”

His shoes slapped the hardwood as he made for the door, dark head dipped to check the time on his watch, a quiet shit under his breath at the lost minutes. I’m not gonna give in. I’m not. He needs to know I’m serious. Needs to know I mean it...needs to know I’m scared… You heard the door open and close, and then you heard silence fill your home. Distantly, you heard the ding of the elevator, telling you he’d stepped in and was on his way down to the parking garage.

Fuck it.

You hurried into your room, found the nearest pair of shoes and jammed your feet into them before running out the door after him. You knew waiting for the elevator would cause you to miss him, so you flew for the door to the staircase, making quick work of the 15 flights. As you burst through the door in the garage, you were met with his tail lights pulling out of the exit and you picked up your speed, sprinting towards the street. “Billy, wait!” you called, waving one hand to try to get his attention.

The brake lights glowed red and you breathed a little easier. He’d pulled out onto the street, putting the hazards on and stepping out of the driver’s side door. “Look, I really gotta-”

You didn’t let him finish, launching yourself at him, hands grabbing greedily for his hair as your lips expertly landed on his. You swallowed his surprised oof, tongue sliding into his mouth as his hands came to your face. You felt that familiar rush of heat flush through your whole body as he kissed you back, taking control and tilting your head to give himself a better angle. You’d never let him leave without a kiss before, knowing better than he seemed to that the dice could come up snake eyes at any moment, and you weren’t going to let both of your stubborn heads get in the way of that. Your fingers dug into his thick locks, his palms kept you in place. You poured everything into that kiss, pressing your chest to his and not breaking away until you felt yourself straining for air.

“Hey,” he whispered, combing a stray piece of hair out of your eyes. “What was that for?”

“That, Billy,” you let your fingers slide down his face, nails scratching in his beard to pull a hum from his throat. “Was incentive to get your ass home to me so we can talk about it.”

He chuckled with a shake of his head. “Already thought about it.” You wrinkled your forehead questioningly. “You know how slow the elevators are,” he raised his hand in the direction of the elevator vestibule in the garage. “Thought long and hard on my way down here.”

You swallowed, almost afraid to ask. “And?”

“And, this is gonna be the last time I go on a job that isn’t an absolute necessity.”

“You promise?” You felt your shoulders relax, felt all the anxiety drain from your bloodstream as he dropped his hands to your arms.

“Promise. You’re right. We got too much for me to take risks like that. Plus I think you’d kill me yourself if I don’t change my tune, yeah?”

You smiled, a small laugh tumbling out with it. “Yeah, probably.”

“Okay. Look, I really gotta go or I’m gonna be late and then-”

“Okay, Billy.” You raised on your toes to kiss him one more time, fixing the hair that you’d disrupted when you grabbed him. “Okay, go take care of business and you make sure you get back here in one piece.”

“What’s in it for me?” he asked, climbing back into the car as a grin climbed his cheeks.

You shook your head and smirked at him, arms crossed again. “I’ll think about it.”

@something-tofightfor @its-my-little-dumpster-fire @suchatinyinfinity @lexxierave @thebbtongue @songforhema @thesumofmychoices @fireeyes-on-teller-dixon-grimes @roses-in-your-country-house @lysawayne @ymariejp @belladonnarey @audreychaz @traeumerinwitzhelden @breanime @songtoyou @stories-you-wont-hear @gollyderek @luminex3

#billy russo #billy russo x you #billy russo x reader #billy russo x anvil?#happy billy au (shut up just let me have this)#billy smooches #kiss prompts #kiss requests #a kiss in the street #life or death

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xfanfics · 4 years

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Destiel Fic Rec List Part 1

Last Updated in October 2014. Posted in May 2020 for posterity. Listed in no particular order - the total rec list will have ~250 fics. Header graphic used with permission.

This part of the list contains: 48 fics.

Other Destiel Rec Lists: [1]. [2]. [3]. [4]. [5]. [6]. [7].

For Science! by pm_lo E | 21k | ABO, Omega!cas, Alpha!Dean,

Selected transcripts and supporting materials from Dr. Castiel Williams and Dean Winchester’s seminal study on physiological and psychological sexual response by gender designation.

Even though this is a dialogue/email text only story, I still very much enjoyed it and found it ridiculously hot. Maybe I'm just easy. (No I'm not. This fic is good, read it.)

Forget-Me-Not Blues by noangelsinthegarrison E | 68k | Firefighter!Dean, Professor!Cas, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining

Sam and Jess are getting married and Dean couldn’t be any happier for them. Honestly, they’re kind of disgustingly perfect for each other and Dean’s pretty damn excited about staying with them the week before the wedding. He’s Sam’s best man, of course, and he doesn’t even mind that Jess has her own best man to share in all the organizational duties. The more the merrier, right? Except Dean must have done something to epically piss off the universe because Jess’s best man just happens to be Castiel friggin’ Novak. He’s got even hotter since High School, but apparently no friendlier and if Cas wants to spend the week pretending like they’ve never met before? Fine. Two can play at that game.

THIS WAS SO GOOD I'M TEARING UP. tropes abound and I love it!

Cops and Robbers by kinkstiel E | 53k [WIP] | Detective!Dean, Criminal!Cas, Top!Cas, Bottom!dean

They locked eyes for a minute and then Cas leaned back as far as the cuffs would let him go, spreading his legs obscenely wide. “I want you to suck my cock, Dean.” Dean balked, mouth going dry in a second, eyes slipping to the now visible bulge in Castiel’s suit pants. “Um,” he said stupidly, face flushing red, eyes unable to pull away. Cas hummed. “Depending on how well you suck me, I might just tell you everything you want to know.” He licked his lips, smirking slightly when he caught Dean’s gaze. “And with sinful little lips like yours,” he made a low whistling sound, “I don’t doubt you’ll get every last name out of me.

So very good. Love the dark and dirtiness of it. It does get lighter and sappier towards the end tho.

Cursed or Not ❤ by Ltleflrt E | 115k | witch!Cas, shapeshifter!Dean, switching

While experimenting with magic when he was a kid, Sam accidentally cursed Dean. Now, Dean is forced to wear a spelled amulet constantly, or he'll turn into a random animal. For a little over a decade, he's learned to live with the curse, and has even found it useful in some cases, but he sure would be happier without it. When he meets a witch named Castiel, he's offered a deal. Instead of assuming all witches are bad, Dean can spend a season getting to know him. If at the end of the season, Dean still thinks he's evil Castiel will send him away with his memory wiped of the whole experience. But if he learns that Castiel is not the monster Dean assumes he is, he'll lift Dean's curse. It's an offer Dean can't bring himself to pass up.

Literally perfect. Enthralling world, magical relationship.

Surprise Package by wannaliveindeansdimples E | 3k | Hot, , Dom Cas, Sub Dean, Light BDSM

When Cas' roommate Meg has to go out of town suddenly, she leaves him an unexpected gift.

So so hot. Non extreme Dom!cas and sub!dean.

Never Have I ever by sweetdean M | 78k | Fluff, High School AU, top!cas, bottom!dean

When Jo drags Dean along to a game of "never have I ever" with her friends, he finds himself getting caught up in a lot more than just a game. “Never have I ever hung out with such an asshole,” Dean countered, positively shocked at his own sass. Cas smirked again. “Oh, are we hanging out now?fricken adorable

Road Signs by gemmiel E | 9k| Canon!verse, true form

Dean is curious about how angels have sex. Castiel shows him.

Damn. True form, soul sex, and regular sex. Yes please.

It's Brilliant, Really by snarkymonkey E | 15k | Fluff, AU, Professor!cas, Stuntman!dean

Castiel Novak is a History adjunct at Stanford University. He's also the most patient younger brother. When his older brother, Gabriel, decides to start *wooing* one of his younger waiters, Castiel reluctantly agrees to double-date with the intended paramour's older brother. What he didn't expect, however, was how much his own life would flip over such a careless decision.

Adorable. Hot, and adorable.

Gabriel's Unfortunate Mistake by JackHawksmoor E | 8k | Hot, AU

an answer to a prompt: Gabriel decides to hire a prostitute for his virgin brother Castiel as a joke, but instead accidentally hires Dean, a professional Dom. The moment Dean first lays a hand on him, Castiel knows he is lost. Dean/Castiel AU.

Um mm.... Damn. That was hot. Newbie sub!cas and pro dom!dean

Well-Beloved Unto Me by Moorishflower E | 3k | Alt!Canon, tentacles

The Winchesters don't get rewarded for all the shit they go through, so Dean is understandably wary when a few recharged and promoted angels offer him and Sam the vacation of a lifetime. Title comes from the Song of Solomon.

True form. And sex. MY FAVE.

How to Date an Angel in 12 Easy Steps by Fourthduckling E | 23k | Fluff, Alt!canon

It's not that hard to date an angel. All Dean has to do is fight off hordes of vampires, research gay porn, get sucked into a crappy Narnia, endure Sam's comments, creep out on Dr. Sexy, get harassed -- oh, and that's right-- figure out he's into Cas. Easy, right?

SQUUEEEE. Perfect and cute and cuddly.

Two Wrongs Don't Make A Right But Three Rights Make A Left by the0voice0from0above E | 45k | High School AU, Dancer!Cas, Welder!Dean,

The beautiful Garrison Ballet School becomes home to a reckless bunch of misfits after the Colt Welding Academy is severely damaged in a fire and has to close for repairs. Needless to say, Castiel and his friends clash with their unwanted guests but there's one boy in particular who infuriates him.

Dancer!au. Love it love it love it!

Rest My Angel by cobalt_wings E | 86k | Fluff, Season 9 AU

Angels are falling from the sky, and Dean is losing it. Sam is dying in his arms, and one of those burning, twisting figures blazing through the night air might be his very own angel, Castiel. What can he do to help those he loves?

Sex and domestic and lots of fucking. My fave.

One Species Too Many by wallmakerrelict E | 21k | Fluff, Alt!canon

While Dean is laid up for a month after breaking his leg on a hunt, Cas decides that it's a perfect time to adopt a litter of kittens. But even though he's gotten better since Purgatory, Cas still isn't quite the same as he was before fixing Sam's head, and being trapped in a cabin with him for weeks on end is making that all the more obvious to Dean. When Sam takes off on a hunt, Dean has to figure out on his own how to navigate his new relationship with Cas while also helping to raise a bunch of fuzzballs that aren't even cute. Not even a little bit. (Well, maybe a little bit.)

Team free will with kittens!! So fluffy and domestic but also a touch of angst.

It's A Bet by vitamindesi E | 34k | College AU, top!cas, bottom!dean

Destiel College!AU in which freshman Dean is dared by his best friends to hit on senior Castiel at a party. He wants to say no but then someone starts a bet and Benny bets a sum that is ridiculously high for a student and Dean can’t disappoint Benny, right? I deviated only, but hopefully it suffices.

So fabulous and smutty I want to cry. Literally perfection.

Your Call Cannot Be Completed As Dialed by eBob, K_K_TiBal T | 66k [WIP] | Fluff, College AU

AU in which Castiel accidentally sends a text message to the wrong number and befriends the person at the other end of the line. However, accidents don’t just happen accidentally, and sometimes two completely different people are exactly what the other needs.

LITERALLY THE BEST. So many feelings. I WANT IT TO BE COMPLETE SO MUCH. Abandoned WIP.

Equinox by luchia E | 12k | Alt!canon, time travel

In which Castiel is the weird time-traveling freak who just might be the love of Dean Winchester's life.

Confusing but perfect time travel fic.

If I run by betty days E | 4k | Hot, AU, sexting, long distance relationship

"Dean Winchester is a red-blooded American male. He lifts all the things. He aims for functional strength. He counts his macros and makes fun of curlbros. He is not a member of the Tarahumara tribe and he will not read Born to Run, no matter how many times Sam tells him to, because Starting Strength is the only book Dean will ever fucking need." Wherein a friendly competition with the mysterious ThursdaysAngel turns into a sexy selfie-trading spree that motivates Dean Winchester to train for his first marathon.

Soo. Hot. Makes me want to actually exercise?

The Little Things by Alreadypainfullygone T | 2k | Angst, Cancer, Major Character Death

Au based on 'the big C' in which Dean gets very sick, and deals with it the denial way. Meeting a homeless man on the way. Dean/Castiel Angst. Warning for trigger - Cancer. sorry if you think I dealt with it badly.

This is only 2.8k words, and yet it managed to make me cry.

Do What Feels Good by Catchclaw, cymbalism E | 12k | Hot, Alt!canon, PWP

Castiel learns to love alone time in the shower. And then he learns to share.

Fuuuuuck that was hot. Castubation and shower sex is just so hnnnggg.

All That Is And Used To Be by MisaChan E | 26k | Alt!Canon, wing!Kink

Dean never even knew anyone was living in the old estate outside of town until its mysterious occupant contracts his shop for a very specific job: a custom piano bench with grooves cut into the back. He finds Castiel and his terms to be eccentric with a capital E but the money is too good to turn down and anyway, Dean can't help indulging his curiosity about the guy and his secretive, isolated life. There are secrets that will not stay hidden and stories that refuse to be forgotten. Especially when they happen to involve Dean Winchester and the angel Castiel.

Ugh, I love this story. Concept, execution, and characterization are all perfect.

Do I Have Something Like That? by MysticMoonhigh E | 2k | Hot, horn!kink, wing!kink

based on the tumblr post I made: Does anybody know any demon!Dean fics where Cas makes Dean climax by basically giving his demon horns a hand job because I want this so badly out of lifE | I'm. I've read this about three times and I think I'm finally coming to terms with my alien biology kink. Hot. Wink!kink and horn!kink. Yes.

The Doctor Will See You Now by PetrichorPerfume E | 7k| Hot, PWP sub!dean, gentle dom!cas, wing!kink

Dean has a medical kink. Castiel is more than happy to oblige. Starring Castiel as the slightly unorthodox Dr. Novak who enjoys prescribing enforced chastity and daily tease and denial sessions, and Dean as his needy, submissive patient who will do anything for a chance to come.

Wowowwowowow. Um. This was super hot. Nnnghhhh.

Into Your Hideaway by thepinupchemist E | 176k |Angst, a/b/o, omega!dean, alpha!cas, mpreg

Driving down a deserted road in the Rocky Mountains, Castiel finds something unexpected: An omega. Not only an omega, but a naked, injured, pregnant omega. Dean doesn't talk much at first, but that doesn't change the brightness of his soul. It also doesn't stop Castiel from falling in love with him.

I just... Wow. This was an amazing story. Beware that it is possibly very triggering, because of rape, assault, violence, and general bigotry. But perhaps because of all of that, you get a story that is almost painful in its reality, and it is all the more loveable for that.

The World Crashing All Around by thepinupchemist E | 36k| Alt!canon, best friends wing!Kink, kid!fic

During a storm in September of 1987, Dean and Sam hear something hit their roof. When they brave the backyard to investigate, they find a fledgling angel. A story about best friendship, spoiled plans, and love, in four parts.

OH MY GOD. This was perfect all the way through. From soul bonds, to slow burn, to growing up together as best friends, it's all my favorite. And it even has wing kink, which is literally the best.

Share Your Burden by aTimeOfMagic E | 3k Hot, PWP, Sub!dean, dom!cas

Set at the end of 'Are You There God? It's Me Dean Winchester.' 4.02. Castiel shows Dean that he deserves respect, and Dean comes to see that Cas is not, in fact, just a 'hammer'. He also learns that his 'people skills' are definitely not entirely 'rusty'.

Damn. Um, really hot. Also, unexpectedly sweet.

Flawless by Vaerin E | 69k | a/b/o, accidental bonding, sub!dean, dom!cas

A contract is out on the Winchesters, a large sum of money the reward for throwing them off their game. A witch in the town they happen to be passing through decides to collect. She sets her sights on Dean, trying to seduce him into leaving his job to stay with her. When she can't even convince him to warm her bed, she decides to turn her job into his punishment. Knowing he fears commitment and can't stand the thought of being with a man, she works a spell between him and Castiel... the one friend he can call a safe haven. When they end up mated the next morning, not only does the Winchester family business suffer... but so does Dean's friendship with Castiel.

Cute long soul bond fic. Contains sabriel.

Chasing Normal by Donovanspen M | 16k | Fluff, First time, Cuddling & Snuggling

Dean reevaluates his definition of an 'apple pie life' and what that means for him, personally.

This is the definition of domestic fluff and smut. There's a wee bit of angst because hey, it's set in the canon verse. But so worth it.

Hold On by somuchforbaggles E | 92k | Fluff, Angst, mental illness

Castiel is sure that nothing in his life will ever change. Everything that happens to him is predictable, from the stability of his job to the unrelenting sporadic anxiety attacks, he can rely on his life to stay the same forever - until he saves Dean Winchester from the path of an oncoming train. From then on, everything changes for both of them, and the only way they can deal with it is together.

Woww. This was an amazing ride. Angsty and fluffy, then angsty again, then back to fluffy. So good.

I said to myself again by avyssoseleison E | 2k | Fluff, Praise!kink, Self-esteem issues

Dean finally lets himself be appreciated and cared for by his angel.

Praise kink is my ultimate weakness

The One Thing You Can't Lose by MajorEnglishEsquire T | 4k | Fluff, Cuddling & Snuggling

You know what I like a lot? The thought that Dean can just tug Cas anywhere at any time and Cas, who can lift tons without effort, who can demolish things with the light of his grace, who has battled and gone to war, has defended and broken, will just let Dean do it.

fluffy love

Spit Slick by VeraBAdler M | 1k | Fluff, , First Time

[no description]

A super cute fluffy little oneshot :3 (tags say 'happy sex' and 'sexy cuddling' if you need more to go on)

Late Bloomer by somuchforbaggles T | 7k | Alt!Canon, Wing!kink, Wingfic, Soulmates

On every child’s seventh birthday, a celebration is held to mark the beginning of their journey as a fledgling - a sprouting ceremony. It doesn’t matter if the child hasn't shown the symptoms of emerging wings yet, for it is scientific fact that every child grows wings in their seventh year, sometimes even earlier. Castiel is not every child.

A coming of age wing fic. With mates. Basically, I'm in love.

Sleight of Hand by aileenrose M | 64k | Angst, Human AU, psychic cas, journalist dean

Dean Winchester has interviewed them all--mob bosses, serial killers, crooked politicians. Next he plans to unveil the con-man who markets himself as Castiel, a reclusive and secretive "healer" who claims to heal the sick in return for thousands of dollars. Dean's expecting a challenge, but he never expected Castiel to be so clueless or sweet...or that he might be telling the truth.

I HAVE SO MANY FEELINGS ABOUT THIS AU. The one where Dean is a skeptical journalist/professional idiot and Cas is a socially inept healer and mind reader. There's lots of angst, but the payoff is so worth it.

Leaning In by Anonymous T | 15k | Hospital AU

Castiel never changed out his scrubs, Dean had a way of getting himself injured and Sam seemed to think it was a good pairing

Even though I have no idea who actually wrote this story, it's worth a read. I'm always up for a good medical AU.

Someone I Forgot to Be by MatildaMavis E | 36k Fluff, Angst, Human AU

Castiel is content - sort of - with his quiet life in Boston...at least, until his new neighbor moves in. It's Dean Winchester, the cliched long lost love of his life. Can these two idiots find their way back to each other after eight years, after fame and loss and heartbreak? After Dean has found love again with Cas' neighbor, Lisa? Fate can be a sadistic bitch, they've both learned that, but maybe they've matured enough to be able to handle it this time. The sparks, the attraction, the tension...or maybe not.

I thought this would be extremely painful, and it sort of was. But it was so worth it.

Didn't Get That Particular Memo by Snarkymonkey E | 5k

Dean has worked with his best friend for years and maybe it's a bit more than that for him but not for Castiel, right? Right. And really, he'd feel so much better if Castiel would just get a companion already. Because it's not like Castiel actually wants him, right? Right.

Damn, that was fucking hot.

Cas, You Had A Baby? by allthebeautifulthings9828 M | 132k | Fluff, Alt!Canon, Kid Fic, Slow Build

At some point in every angel's life, raising a fledgling is required. Castiel's turn comes rather unexpectedly when his superiors hand off a newly created infant angel to him and leave him to raise it with all of Heaven's principles of blind obedience. He's not sure what to do, so he tucks the fledgling in his coat and goes straight to Dean and Sam Winchester. Together, Dean and Castiel hatch a plan to raise the fledgling away from Heaven's control. And soon, the angel Hael arrives with news that, after Castiel disappeared, she and four other angels ran from Heaven's oppression with their fledglings. Castiel finds himself the unwitting ringleader of angels choosing to raise their fledglings with the principles of free will. Is angelic parenthood too much for his deepening relationship with Dean? Who can they really trust? (Disclaimer: This story depicts fledglings consuming honey for the nourishment of their undeveloped graces. Human babies cannot consume honey, so please do not feed it to your infants. This is fiction.)

Oh. My. God. I admit that I was skeptical at the beginning about this story, but let me tell you, it sucked me in. Sometimes, you run across a story that has wonderful OCs that you get attached to. This is one of those. And of course, the baby is adorable.

Healing by Jacqueline Albright-Beckett M | 2k | Fluff, Canon!verse, PWP

Castiel can heal more than just physical wounds.

Sensual and romantic.

Better Late Than Never by whelvenwings G | 23k | Fluff, Alt!canon, friends to lovers,

When Dean first sees Castiel, he's clinging on for dear life - and things never really get any easier. In fact, they get a lot harder; Dean's worst enemy isn't always the monkey bars. Bound together year on year by the ritual pact of being a Guardian Angel, Dean and Cas grow close, showing loyalty and bravery in the face of danger. But will they ever find the courage to admit their true feelings for each other - and will it be too late by the time they do?

i LOVE best friends to lovers fics! and this delivers on that perfectly.

Like A Candle In The Window On A Cold Dark Winter's Night by TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel T | 6k | Fluff, Canon!verse, asexual Cas

In which Castiel saves Dean, Dean saves Castiel, there is beer and TV watching, and if it weren't for the monsters and assassination attempts, life would be almost perfect.

A cute little fic I've read multiple times :)

How many slams in an old screen door? by dandelioness T | 15k | Fluff, Theatre AU, Asexual Cas

In which Castiel is a theatre major terrible at first impressions; Dean is a set designer who likes Cas anyway; and the most chaotic production of Les Miserables in history somehow manages to go off without a hitch. Or, just as you should never give a moose a muffin (because he'll want some jam to go with it), you should never give a blank check to a university theatre department.

This is perfect. I can't speak for the accuracy of the information and feelings given about asexuals/asexuality, but I enjoyed this fic nonetheless.

Breath of Heaven by solacesnake18 E | 9k

When Dean is wounded and dying in Purgatory, Castiel returns from his self-imposed exile to help him.

Wow. True!form cas and metaphysical sex that somehow manages to be poetic, emotional, and erotic all at once. I approve.

The Mirror by CloudyJenn M | 24k | Canon!Verse,

When Dean touches a strange mirror, he's whisked away to one alternate reality after another and it doesn't take him long to realize the universe is trying to tell him something.

One of my favorite fics, and a fandom classic. So beautiful. It's a trip, but you'll love it. The ending makes me really emotional.

Rock 'n' Roll Queer Bar by chasingrabbits E | 121k | Fluff, Human AU

Ellen and Jo Harvelle run Harvelle's Roadhouse, a bar that unintentionally becomes a beacon for wayward queer souls. Her employees: Dean, the smartass runaway with a big heart and bigger mouth; Castiel, the college drop-out turned hippie; his (surprisingly heterosexual) trouble-making brother Gabriel; and Charlie, who has been told several times that the back room is not to be used for after-hours Dungeons & Dragons games. But there's a lot of love in this place, and a new family for anyone who may otherwise be without.

Sweet little (well, not so little really) universe. Link is to the series.

A Million Ways to Go by chasingrabbits E | 91k | High School AU,

Castiel Novak is a preacher's son living in a world of black and white. Pragmatic and dutiful, he doesn't understand why anybody would want to make waves. Then the Winchesters move in down the street. Soon many of the skeletons in the Novak family's closet are exposed, and as the family faces them, Castiel begins to understand that there are many ways to see the world and so many more ways to live than what he's been told.

Wow, this was a ride. Set in an alternate!canon where Cas is a repressed preacher's kid and dean still grows up a hunter. Also, lots of Sam and Gabriel brother!feels. Not sabriel.

Like That Foreigner Song... by DevilMadeMeDoIt E | 5k | Hot, Alt!Canon, Deancest, Time trave

Dean and Cas have been together for a while now, but Dean always regrets that he has been with so many people in the past. He wishes he could go back in time and tell his 15 year old self that there is someone worth waiting for. Cas gives him the chance and the outcome is one that neither of them expected.

Oh god, this was a perfect little story. So much love.

TutorMate by faeryn M | 21k | College AU

Sam leaves Dean's laptop logged in to some app called "TutorMate" and Dean meets his brother's tutor. Cas helps him with his own work and they strike up a friendship. Before long Dean finds himself growing attached to the cute, clever Cas and flirtatiously suggests they go on a date if he applies himself to his college work. Cas agrees, but Dean discovers his online friend is not quite what he expected. (Or, in which Dean thinks he's met a cute girl and finds out he's actually met a cute boy.)

Wowowwowowow adorable. Perfect little college AU.

More recs coming soon.

#destiel #deancas #spn #spn fic rec #destiel fic rec #*#list

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wheremytwinwatches · 4 years

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[Where My Twin Watches]: Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood Episode 7

So Sokka, where’s this episode taking place again?

Excellent! Let’s get started then!

Narrator recaps the encounter with Doc Marcoh, who revealed the existence of incomplete Philosopher’s Stones (which is a great writing move, now the Brothers can be going around hunting down Imperfect Stones rather than repeated episodes of “Damnit, another fake.”), and gave the location of his research. Now fixed up, Ed and Al are off to the First Branch of the National Central Library. Whoa, was expecting a title card and got Screaming Edward instead. What’s wrong? Ah. Seems that the library’s a bit… destroyed. When did this happen? Shot of Eastern Command, Lust is commenting that “burning the entire place down was easier.” Damnit, seems they got the location out of Marcoh and removed the lead while our characters were held up at the Rockbell’s. Now Lust and Gluttony are in East City, Lust checking in on Scar. Seems Gluttony has a very keen nose, he can smell the Ishvalan. Lust confirms that Gluttony can get his snack. Still confused about the animosity between the Goths and Scar. Whatever their plans, seems it would be easier for the Goths if there were fewer State Alchemists to get in their way. Or is it more that he’s a disruptive force, a distraction for their own plans? After all, if they do need Ed for some sort of sacrifice, Scar killing him would definitely mess things up. Episode 07: “Hidden Truths” Speaking of the Ishvalan, Scar’s still in the sewers, when he notices a bunch of rats fleeing past him. Looking back, there’s a pair of glowing red eyes in the darkness. Yup, that’s Gluttony with his creepy grin. Goth vs Vigilante fight? Wow, Gluttony’s pretty fast for a hefty guy. Scar prepares his Face Grab, but it’s not an instant kill as Gluttony grabs him. Scar ends that by straight-up slicing off the Goth’s arm. Wait, no blood? Suddenly Lust comes racing up, Scar barely has a moment to be surprised before an explosion sends our view back to the surface, big cloud of smoke pouring out over a river. Seems we’ll have to wait on that fight, we’re back to Riza reporting that Scar hasn’t been seen since his attack on the Elrics. Havoc suggests that he’s not in East City anymore, but Roy hopes that isn’t the case. If it’s gotten to be too much for Central, and he closes it quickly? Then he’ll “be golden.” Huh, didn’t think you were that much of a careerist, especially after you objected to Bradley giving you the credit in the first episode. Wow, Roy doesn’t dream small, does he. Aiming right for the office of Fuhrer. Further talk’s derailed by [Soldier 1] rushing in to report an explosion on the Marl River. Nearby Military Police speculate on what caused all the rubble, as the State Alchemists examine the bloody remains of Scar’s jacket. No body though, so I’m gonna assume he’s still alive. No way he’d be axed off this soon. And may I say how happy I am that it’s “by the book” for the State Alchemists to find hard proof someone’s dead before writing them off? No “Never Found The Body” for these guys! Hey! In the crowd, it’s the Goths! Pretty brazen, sticking around with the bystanders. Lust complains that Scar got away, while Gluttony’s more concerned he didn’t get his snack. Regardless, they assume that Scar will be out of the picture for now. Lust will head back to Central to report to Father. Meanwhile, the Elrics and Armstrong are looking through the destroyed library, when they’re approached by a Second Lieutenant Ross and Sergeant Brosh. Hey, it’s two more people from the intro? Also, Ross and Brosh? Calling it now, they’re either siblings or LI’s. Ross is here to pass on an order: Armstrong is to report back to Command Center, they’ll take over supervision of the Elrics. Nooo, don’t take away The Mighty Armstrong! Ed just complains that he keeps getting saddled with bodyguards. Driving away, Ross comments that there was a woman who was well acquainted with the materials of the ex-library. Although she wasn’t working there anymore. Well, it’s more than you had a minute ago Ed, don’t diss it. Brosh seems nervous, which Al picks up on. Scared of the Giant Fanged Suit of Armor sitting across from you? Or… is it the person sitting next to you, hmmm? Nah, it’s the armor, which he asks about. The Elrics claim it’s a hobby. Really guys? That’s a lame excuse, go back to the “It’s for training” you used in the first episode. Awkwardness all around. They arrive at what looks like an apartment building, and… oh. Oh my. Look at them. Look at all those books! Did this woman make her own library or something? I want them! The Alchemists sidle through the bookshelves, Brosh wondering if there’s actually someone living in the place. Ross calls out for Miss Sheska, Al catches on to a muffled “Please help me” down an aisle to a bunch of collapsed books. Well, at least the lady saved her glasses. A moment of frantic digging later, they uncover a lady who profusely thanks them and apologizes for getting trapped under the books. Yeah, might wanna work on your shelving technique, miss. Confirming that this is the Miss Sheska they came to meet, Ed asks about her working at the library, and she flinches at that? But then she springs into a Glittering Gushing Moment ala Armstrong and Winry, about how beautiful the word “library” is and how she’s loved books her whole entire life, how working in a library was heaven! Buuuuut she kinda forgot about the “work” part, spent all her time reading and got fired. And now she needs another job to move her poor, elderly mother to a better hospital. But all she can do is read! Woe, sadness, despair! ...ok, which one of you guys stuck a gender-bent me into this show? Ed snaps Sheska out of her despair by asking about Tim Marcoh, she recalls the name from some handwritten notes stuck in a bookshelf. Nice memory! And my growing suspicion is confirmed when she just asks if they want to read them. Where do you think all these books came from, Ed? Or rather, Sheska’s got a photographic memory, she remembers the content of any book she’s ever read. So she can write the notes out for them! “Thank you bookworm” indeed! And now, a table full of notes! Lady, why are you apologizing for taking five days? I’m surprised that table’s holding up under those stacks of paper, and all that was written from memory? Alchemists, if you don’t hire this girl for your own paperwork you’re idiots. But here they are, Tim Marcoh’s notes! Or rather… recipes? Oh. Ooooooh. I get it! But our characters don’t, they just complain about coming all that way for a cook book. Come on guys, it’s chemistry! Well, maybe Ed and Al get it, because after confirming the notes are completely accurate he thanks her, gathers the notes to take back to the library, and writes out a check for Sheska from his grant funds. Which going by Ross and Sheska’s reactions (“Did he miss a decimal point somewhere?!”) is not insubstantial. Guess being a skilled State Alchemist pays well. At another building (guess by library they meant one other than the destroyed one) Brosh is asking how the cookbooks can possibly be related to Alchemy. Ed explains that due to the danger of Alchemy being misused, the research is always encrypted. Come on Brosh, aren’t you a State Alchemist too? Shouldn’t you know this? Ed and Al get cracking on the decryption, such as comparing a “green tea” recipe to the “Green Lion” of metallurgic alchemy. Other names get thrown around, like Flamel (I recognize that one!) and Lambspring. Brosh clearly is out of his league. But it seems the Elrics may be as well, collapsed on the table with glazed expressions. Al’s even faceplanted so hard his helmet horn’s gone straight through the papers into the table. The suggestion of asking Marcoh about it comes up (yyyeah, don’t think that’s gonna work out), but Ed refuses to admit defeat. Hey, Sheska! She’s stopped by to thank the Elrics for the money. Although they haven’t had any luck deciphering the notes, and she hasn’t found another job yet, she’s happy to have helped out. And Al gives her an inspiring pep talk, nice to see her smiling. Sudden Hughes bursting in to visit the Elrics, admonishes Ed for not saying “Hey” when he came back to Central. Ross and Brosh mutter in shock about how the Elrics chat with Colonel (hey, did he get a promotion?) Hughes like an old friend. Just how high up are these boys? No, seriously, how high up are they? Do they have an official rank, or what? Asking for clarification. Hughes takes a seat, complaining about their case load, and the library burning down as well. Seems all their case reports were… stored in the stacks… Miss Sheska! You’re hired! The Elrics get back to work, delving through notes (Suddenly noticed that Ed’s writing with his left hand. Hadn’t caught that before). Meanwhile, Brosh keeps up on guard duty (“I’m awake!”) and comments that they’ve been at it for ten days now. Man, Doc was pretty thorough in his coding, wasn’t he? But at least they’re dedicated- “To hell with it!” Aw, no! Don’t give up! Ross and Brosh enter to a wrecked room, books and papers scattered everywhere as the Elrics sit on the floor. Come on, you guys can’t give up now. Wait, you did crack it? You cracked the code? That’s awesome! But why the frustration, then? Why does Al sound like he’s crying? Jeez, now Ed’s going on about how it’s the devil’s research, that it should have been destroyed. What on earth was in those notes? “The main ingredient for a Philosopher’s Stone… is human life.” No. NO. You have GOT to be kidding me! Not again. Not again!

Oh, but it gets worse. Ed’s saying that to make a single Stone takes multiple human sacrifices. Wow. Just, wow. So there we go. Philosopher’s Stones are made with human sacrifice. “For what could equal the value of a human soul” indeed. Stones aren’t about amplifying the power of the Alchemist after all, they’re about drawing on the power of others. Just… using others’ life as a freaking battery! And the Military authorized research into this? They signed off on research into human sacrifice as a power source? First genocide, now this? What the Leto is wrong with these people?! *Sigh* Ok, ok. Calming down, calming down… Ed asks Ross and Brosh to not say anything. Later that night, the two Alchemists appear to meet Armstrong in a hotel, informing him that the Brothers are “holed up” in their room again, and they haven’t been eating either. Well, yeah? I mean, they just discovered that the one hope they had for restoring their bodies could only come at an inhumane cost to others. How do you think you would have reacted in their place? Well, at least Ross and Brosh seem to be keeping their promise to not reveal the secret. Unfortunately, Armstrong catches on and is not pleased with their suspicious behavior. To say the least. Sorry. Trying to be funny, but still reeling from that reveal. Inside a dark room, Al says that Ed really should get something to eat, but Ed just says no. Ed goes on to talk about how they try so hard to grasp the truth, but it always slips away. Or rather, in their search for answers they got the worst possible one. Now Ed’s saying that there’s something he’s wanted to tell Al for a while, but he’s always been too afraid to say it. “I-” *SMASH* “Elric Brothers, I know you’re in there!” Ed decides to ignore him, followed immediately by The Mighty Armstrong completely smashing his way in. Yup, Ross and Brosh couldn’t hold out against the Major, he knows what the notes said. And he’s now Crying Majestically about how the Philosopher’s Stone is built on such a terrible secret. “Imagine the military being behind something like that! Often the truth is more cruel than we bargained for!” But Ed seizes on one word out of that: “Truth.” Is he thinking about the Demon and the Door? No, he seems to be banking on Marcoh’s mention of “truth within the truth”. Ed’s convinced that there has to be more to this. Ed, please. Please don’t take up false hope now. Armstrong’s going over a map, saying there are four Alchemy Labs in Central with ties to the government, and Marcoh worked in the third. So they have a place to look for more information. Wait, hold on. You knew there was a lab in this very city that Marcoh worked at? Why didn’t you go there to look for any of his notes earlier, see if they would help with deciphering the others? Talking about how he’s visited all the laboratories before, Ed points out a crossed-out building. Seems it was designed for a fifth lab, but it currently isn’t in use since the building isn’t structurally sound. Gee, an “empty” lab, classified off-limits? That’s not suspicious at all. As for more evidence towards it, right next door is a prison. Oh, I get it! If Philosopher Stones need multiple human sacrifices to make, you’d need a source of death, which would indicate either a death-sentence prison or… a hospital… Show. Show, listen to me. With all these mentions of Sheska’s mother going to a nicer hospital? Don’t you DARE follow that thread. Ahem. Ed clues them in on the use of “executed” prisoners to make the Stone. Yeesh, “potential to become a political nightmare” is an understatement, Armstrong. He’ll look into it tonight, in the meantime the other officers are to say nothing. And the Elrics are to behave themselves! Armstrong’s in full Scary Superior Mode, knowing full well that they were planning to sneak into the building and look around. The Elrics claim innocence- -before a smash-cut to them doing that exact thing. Yep, a guard posted at an “unused” building? That’s as obvious a sign as any. Since they can’t risk the light from Transmuting a hole in the wall, they have to settle for Ed getting tossed up to the top, and making a barbed-wire rope for Ed. Thank goodness for those metal arms! Door’s blocked, how are they going to get past that. Ed sees… no. Ed, NO. Do NOT go off on your own! Aaaargh! Edward Elric, you listen to me! You suspect that this building is a base for creating Philosopher Stones? Aka that thing that people are KILLED for? You are walking right into a horror movie, DO NOT split up! But of course he does. And he leaves a [DEJECTED] Alphonse behind, crying that he didn’t ask to get too big to fit through the vents. Shame on you, Ed. Shame on you. Inside, among shadows and fog, two voices speak, identified as [66] and [48]. Prisoners? Rather mutated ones, if that’s the case based on their shadowed forms. Ed’s still skulking through the vent, commenting on how small it is… “Oh no! I just called myself a tiny little pipsqueak!” While funny, this is not the time! Be quiet! Breaking out into a hallway, he notes that there are lights on. Yep, definitely “not currently in use”. Outside Al’s worried that Ed’s taking a while. Uh oh, looks like one of the Mutants on the roof, with a big knife. I mean, that won’t hurt Al, right? Right?! Aaaand end credits. Damn it! Ok, well this was one heck of an episode. Learning the secret of Philosopher Stones? The return of “souls as batteries”? That was not a pleasant surprise. If one good thing has come out of this, it’s that I am increasingly convinced this is the prelude to a State Alchemist Revolt. First being used by your government to commit genocide, now learning that the authorities are committing human sacrifice to increase their power? I look forward to Roy, Riza, Armstrong and the others standing up against this injustice. A pity that this is the final nail in the “Fuhrer Bradley is a Bad Guy” coffin, I liked his personality. But I don’t care what kind of excuse he’s gonna use for all of this, this government needs to go down. Should make for an enjoyable fight at least, Bradley’s super-speed against our guys. Post-Credits “There were once two men who knew more of bloody blades than human sympathy. They snuffed out life, laughing as their weapons flew. Now, they guard the darkness, hollow shells of the villains they once were. Next time, on Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood-” Episode 08: “The Fifth Laboratory” “There are those who find pleasure only in battle, who feel alive only during a fight. They are coming soon… with blood on their hands.”

#wmtw #where my twin watches #ranubis #full metal alchemist #full metal alchemist brotherhood #fmab #fmab 7

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dalamjisung · 5 years

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piece of heaven, part two ❃ seo changbin

genre: angst, slight fluff at the end,

word count: 3078

pairing: reader x seo changbing

description: four years is a lot of time for things to happen. Will your relationship handle it all?

(inspired on the song CIGARETTE by OFFONOFF: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AamatUtxev4)

tag: @backtonormalthings

You worked pretty much all of the time you weren’t in school. But this time, you worked with a smile on your face. You had set working hours, so after 6PM you could go out with your boyfriend and get proper sleep. You were in college now, almost done with the process of ‘growing up’ and ‘finding your true self’ in those systematic educational institutes, and already started on the professional world that awaited for you so patiently.

After that one night in the boys studio, it was so clear to you; what you wanted to do with the rest of your free time, and who you wanted right by your side as you ventured this unknown territory. Cigarette ended up not being used as a song in the debut album, as the boys predicted it would, but actually sold to another artist, and that was your first step into adulthood. Once the song hit the charts, Changbin’s company recruited you to be a producer trainee. For two years–your two first years of college– you worked hard, meeting demands and deadlines, producing one song after the other, and although you excelled at that, there was nothing you loved more than sitting down around that one familiar glass table, in a tiny room, with three of your favorite boys; Changbin, Chan, and Felix. Just like you were now.

“Y/N,” Chan whined. “I’m tired.”

“That’s cause you don’t sleep,” You chuckle. “But go ahead to the dorms and I’ll finish up here.”

“I’ll stay with you,” Changbin said smiling.

In four years, a lot happened. Firs you were recruited. Then, after the company president deemed your skills perfect, you were officially hired as a worker. While all of that happened, your relationship with the boys bloomed. Chan and Woojin became older brothers to you; always worried and ready to listen, those two made sure that you were staying healthy and well rested. Minho, Seungmin, and Felix were your best friends; you guys laughed together, and caused trouble together. Hyunjin, Jeongin, and Jisung turned out to be your adored dongsaengs; you’d protect them from any harm, and you were sure they’d return the favor. And finally Changbin… well, Changbin was now your boyfriend of four years.

After that night at the studio, it all happened in a flash, and soon you were both sitting facing his manager, asking permission to date. The condition was that, because the boys signed the dating ban contract, they couldn’t date for one year after their debut, but after that, you two were free to publicly announce your relationship. The boys were so close to the debut at that time that you made sure to work double just so you could speed up the process. The faster they debut, you thought. The faster the one year goes by. And you weren’t wrong. With you training at the company, and him promoting his album, one year went by as if it was one month. Now, it’s three years after that. Three years of happiness, and misunderstandings, and fights, and make up dinners at the balcony of his dorm.

You smiled, remembering all of those good times– the bad ones, too– and reach forward for his hand. He is in the middle of writing a verse when you grab his other hand.

“What?” He mumbles with a hint of smile.

“I love you.” You say and watch as your favorite thing happens: he blushes.

“I love you too,” He says and puts the pen down. “Now where is this coming from?”

You shrug. “Just wanted to let you know.”

“Oh, I know,” He chuckles walking towards you. Leaning down, he gives you a kiss. “I know, love.”

“Good.” You whisper.

“What’s going on in that head of your, Y/N?” Changbin asks crouching down in front of your chair, holding your hands. “You have this one look one your face…”

“We’re growing up, Binnie.” You say. “And that worries me a lot. I’m almost done with college, you’re winning prizes already… what will be of us in a few years?”

This thought had been haunting you for a while now. You saw each other a lot because of work, but you knew that soon he’d have to go on tour again, and that you’d be assigned a new group to work with while they are away. You’d grow to different directions. And there was also the question of your grandparents. Your grandfather hasn’t been well as of lately and you worried about him constantly. You weren’t ready to grow like that; not yet.

“Y/N,” He sighs. “We’ll be fine. Remember? We made a promise; I will be your light. I will shine you bright. We’re here for each other, good or bad, yeah?”

And you nod, hugging your boyfriend, because this is how you wanted to stay.

———————————

The months pass like they mean nothing; and soon you are graduating. Everyone is there, which causes a big ruckus of selfies and autographs, for both your boyfriend and the boys and your grandfather. You guys go out for dinner and drinks and celebrate your initiation into the full-time job life.

Another month passes by and you and Changbin have a huge fight. As you finally had the time to fully dedicate yourself to your job, your name grew quite big in the music industry, resulting on unwanted attention from the media. The fight is about a rumor of you switching companies to work with another boy group. It’s stupid but both of you are hurt and Chan has to intervene; he tells you to go home and sleep it off, and promises to make Changbin call the next day. He doesn’t call for three days and you feel like that was the end. It wasn’t and you both are incredibly proud of the way you overcame that together.

Time goes by just like that; with things happening and things happening over those other things, and you wonder if growing up is just like that; a bunch of things happening all at once and you have to chose which one you will pay attention to.

It’s winter now, and Changbin and the boys are touring. You miss him while you snuggle in the bed, holding his pillow. The boys always asked you to take care of the dorm while they are away, which meant you slept in Changbin’s bed for about three months a year. It was heart shattering to have him gone, but you were so proud and happy for him that the hurt was barely felt.

You are in the middle of a season finally when the FaceTime window pops. You quickly fix your hair, pushes your glasses up your nose bridge, and smile.

“Hey,” You say, hugging the blanket closer to you.

“Hey,” He says back, teary eyes. He is smiling, but as his eyes whine with unshed tears, you can’t help but sigh.

“Changbin…,” You mumble, hand touching his face on the screen. “Are you okay?”

“I miss you.” He laughs. “I miss you so fucking much, Y/N. It’s crazy.”

“I miss you too, my love,” You smile a sad smile. “But it’s just for two more weeks, yeah?”

“It’s still too much,” He whispers. “Too much.”

“It is,” You agree. “But we got this. We got this, Binnie. I’m waiting for you with hugs and kisses, and when you get back we’ll both get off days to just cuddle and sleep, yeah?”

“I can’t wait for that,” He smiles, tears gone and a hopeful glint shines on his eyes. “You’ll wait for me, right?”

“If I didn’t then I’d just be stupid.” You snort, making his laugh. This is all I want, you think, relieved. Him laughing and happy.

You listen to him as he tells you about the concert they just played. The venue, the crowd, the vibe; but your attention is stollen as your phone starts vibrating. You ask your boyfriend for a second and picks it up, thinking that if someone is calling you this late, it must be important.

“Hello?”

“Hello, is this Y/G/N guardian?” The voice asks on the other side and your blood goes cold.

“Yes, who is this?” You ask, feeling as if you could throw up at any moment now.

“I’m a nurse at the Center Hospital, can I ask your relation to the patient?”

“Patient?!” You gasp, eyes widening. “I’m his granddaughter. Is he okay?”

“Ma’am, your grandfather just suffered from a cardiac arrest but we’ve managed to get to him in time and now he is resting. Would it be possible for you to come down here? We have somethings we want to discuss with you.”

Forgetting all about Changbin on the other side of the screen, you shut the laptop and run to the door with only one thought in mind.

Please let him be okay.

He was not okay. You cried as you held your grandfather’s hand. His face was pale and there were tubes everywhere; you’ve never seen his this fragile before, and it broke your heart to know he had been in pain. Your grandmother was in the waiting room, allowing you to have some privacy.

“Grandpa,” You whispered, trying to control yourself. “You can’t leave me yet. I’m not ready to be on my own, and neither is Grandma. It won’t be the same without you…”

“Don’t say that, Y/N,” You hear your grandpa’s hoarse voice. You look at him, raising your head from where it laid next to your joined hands, and saw him frowning. “You’re not alone.”

“I know,” You say feeling guilty. “Grandma is still here.”

“I’m not talking about your grandmother, dear,” He smiles. “Your boy, Seo Changbin. He will take care of you after we’re gone. He promised me he would.”

This was news to you; you never knew they talked about this before.

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve gave him my blessing,” Your grandpa says, smiling. “I gave him my piece of heaven, Y/N. And he promised to take care of it forever.”

At this point, you were crying nonstop. To hear him talking like this was killing you; he talked as if he would be gone at any moment now, and you had to admit, he was old, and time was not a friend, but you weren’t ready. You wanted him to see you get married, and you wanted him to meet your kids. There was so much more that he had to be a part of, that you don’t know what you’d do if he was gone.

“Grandpa, please,” You beg. “Please.”

“You’re my piece of heaven, Y/N.” He repeats, bringing you close and kissing your forehead. “Don’t forget that.”

“You always say that,” You sniff.

“And it’ll alway be true,” He chuckles, and then coughs. “Even when I can’t say it anymore.”

The next week was a blank of mixed days and lost memories; you were always at the hospital so you didn’t really remember anything besides that. Changbin made sure to call you three times– or more– a day, worried about your dark bags and large clothes. You looked like you’d lost so much weight, and honestly, you probably did; your stomach couldn’t hold anything down, except your grandmother’s soup. Work was a mess and it took about three days for your boss to notice what was happening, and then he gave you a couple of weeks of to stay with your family.

My family, you thought, suddenly so angry. It’s not fair. This is not fair at all.

Your phone gets you out of the toxic mindset your were getting trapped, and you sigh in relief. Changbin.

“Hey,” You mumble, looking at his worried face on the the screen.

“Hey, love,” He said softly. Changbin was making sure to be extra soft and careful with you, allowing you to feel safe enough so that you could talk to him easily. “How is it today?”

“He’s not getting better,” You mumble. “The doctors told us to prepare ourselves… they said it could be any day, now.”

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” He sighed. “I’m sorry I’m not there.”

“No, Changbin,” You smile, and this was the first one of the whole week. “You are touring. It’s not your fault. Focus on you, yeah? Grandma and I will get through this.”

He nods and tells you about the concert they had, trying to cheer you up with good news. Some of the boys pop in to say hi and send their support, but you don’t really feel like joking around. You guys say goodbye, and you go back to your grandfather, who is talking to your grandmother. As you watch them from the door, you try to smile, and you take a picture. A last memory together, you think and walk in.

He passes away that night.

———————————

You feel like you are not living anymore, just functioning. You drown yourself in work; writing song after song, but they were all too sad. Your boss, worried about your mental state, gives you another week, so you could stay home with your boyfriend, and grieve without worrying about having to hand in an assignment; but you weren’t really sure about that, because if you didn’t focus on work, you’d focus on him and you weren’t sure that was the best choice. There was no choice, though, and your boss and the CEO all forced you to go home.

I get home tonight, Changbin texted you. Hang on just a little longer.

You were only hanging on because of him; because you knew that he’d soon be with you, and that you could simply give up, and he would still help you get back on your feet. That’s how Changbin and you worked; you weren’t co-dependent, there was no real need for each other, but rather a want. You didn’t need his help, you wanted it. You wanted him in your life because you knew that then you wouldn’t be alone through anything– he’d always be by your side. And you by his. But sometimes, when you were too busy or when he was away, it was hard to keep thinking like that. It was hard to be positive and to keep your chin up, because although he will always be by your side, his physical presence is gone. He can’t hold your hand or caress your hair; there is no hugs and kisses and whispered promises. There is just a cold side of the bed where he’d usually lay, and limited phone calls. You missed him.

You missed him so much, that it was only natural you’s start thinking he didn’t miss you as much as you did, even though he has shown and told you repeatedly that this was a two way street– what you felt would always be reciprocated. As you sat on your couch, holding all tears in, looking through albums and albums of pictures, you started getting angry. Maybe if your parents didn’t leave, you grandfather wouldn’t have died. Maybe if they stayed, they would’ve taken the stress of taking care of you off of his shoulders. You were the type of person that when in doubt of which emotion you were feeling, it would be redirected to anger. Your first reaction was always anger. And then guilt. And only in the end, it would be sadness. You were still in transition from the second to the third when you heard the door opening, the cold winter air rushing in with your boyfriend; his desperate eyes looking for you, examining you, taking you in. You nod– a ‘hello,’ a ‘I’m fine,’ a ‘come here I could really use a hug.’

“Oh Y/N,” He sighs and drops his bag on the ground, walking towards you with arms wide open. You run to him, slotting yourself in this familiar body that felt so strange. “I’m here. It’ll okay. You’ll be okay.”

And you cry. You cry like you haven’t cried in two weeks; words falling out of your mouth, snot running down your nose, and wails of pain echoing in the dorm. You notice that the rest of the boys aren’t there, probably giving you two some privacy, and you are thankful. He holds you tight, not saying a damn thing, allowing you to simply put it all out, let it all go. Your fists were tight against his chest, sometimes hitting him softly, sometimes holding his sweater, sometimes just feeling his heartbeat; a reassurance that he was really there. A couple of hours after, when you have been reduced to a pile of sniffs and apologies, he kisses you, whipping out his phone.

“I’ll tell the boys to come home,” He whispers, kissing your forehead.

“Okay,” Your voice is raspy from the crying and you are embarrassed. You are embarrassed to have been this desperate for Changbin’s presence, embarrassed for being angry at him, embarrassed for thinking he didn’t love you as much as you did him. “I’m sorry…”

“For what?” He asks still typing.

“For everything.” You say and hugs him again.

“Well now you’ve got me even more worried,” He chuckles. “What happened?”

“I had some thoughts,” You say, hiding in his neck. “That you didn’t love me; miss me. I was angry, Binnie, so angry… I hated thinking like that but I just– I just missed you.”

“Hey,” He smiles, grabbing you head and making you look at him. “I missed you too. I get angry too. I feel that way two. It’s so normal, babe, and you don’t have to apologize for feeling. It’s normal to feel needy and angry when your loved one is away, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Don’t you remember?” He asks, smiling a nostalgic smile, and you know exactly what he is talking about.

I wish I be your last

I could be there for you

I could be the one to

I'd be your cigarette

“I do.” You say smiling too. Only him, to make you smile in the midst of your pain.

“I want to hear that again soon, Y/N.” His eyes bore into yours and your heart is racing. “I really, really want to hear that again.”

“I’ll say it how many times you want, love.” You say, arms around him, smell of his perfume on you, warmth of his body on yours. He’s home. I’m home. “We have time.”

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