maximoff-pan

[maximoff-pan]

The Wonder of You : ̗̀➛ Johnny Storm x Reader

Pairing: Johnny Storm x Reader

Summary: Over your four years working for Reed Richards, you'd given yourself one job: you can be his friend, but don't fall for Johnny Storm's charms. Too bad you had already failed that mission before it could even begin.

Warnings: 18+ ONLY MDNI, SMUT (making out, unprotected sex, p in v, nipple play, oral f. receiving, temperature play, creampie, aftercare), porn with a LOT of plot, slight hint of some angst, fluff, friends to lovers, Johnny is a massive flirt, mutual pining, SPOILERS! for The Fantastic Four: First Steps, female reader but no characteristics described, mentions of parental loss, maybe some incorrect stuff regarding the 60s and how it worked but it's a fantasy world, lightly edited so apologies for any mistakes

Word Count: 17,433 words

Requests are open! : ̗̀➛ Find my masterlist here

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ: ✧

“We need to adjust the parameters for this. There’s a few more levels that I want to adjust, to ensure that we’ve scanned the baby for all possible anomalies,”

Years ago, when you had miraculously been offered the position as Dr. Reed Richards assistant, it was a dream come true. The smartest man alive, holding 18 Doctorate degrees himself, choosing you out of the thousands of applicants to be his assistant was a ‘pinch me’ moment. Of course, he didn’t want an assistant, it was thrust upon him by his wife, but you liked to think after all this time you’d wormed your way into his heart.

Working with Reed…was something else entirely. It was a learning curve, understanding just how the man’s brain worked. Even to this day, you weren’t sure you understood it. Even when things went perfectly, when test runs on prototypes worked out better than you could’ve ever imagined, Reed was never satisfied. Something could always be better, be improved, as if his brain was factoring in the hundreds of thousands of possibilities that could occur and alter your data. You made it work, though–with patience and understanding–you managed to find the best way to work around Reed’s faults and work with him, to support him.

What was supposed to be just a job in the Baxter Building became so much more. Through it, you gained a family you never thought quite possible.

Reed’s wife, Susan Storm, was another one of the brightest minds that you had ever encountered. Kind, compassionate, but fiercely loyal and unafraid to step up to the plate when a challenge arrived, when the people she loved were threatened. You admired her and everything she stood for, the way she carried herself day in and day out. And since the day you had arrived at the Baxter Building, she welcomed you with open arms, as if you had always been part of the family.

Ben Grimm was the most talented pilot you’d ever had the pleasure of meeting. The perfect counter to Reed and his panicky mind at times, having known the man long enough to understand his quirks in a way you could only hope to. Ben was always kind, always open, always ready to lend a hand or be a shoulder for anyone that needed to listen.

Johnny Storm…was the bane of your existence, in the best way.

“Wrong address, sweetheart. The modeling agency is two blocks down. I could escort you over there, if you’d like?”

Those were the first words the hot-headed younger brother of Sue Storm had said to you, passing by you in the lobby of the building on your first day, a wink thrown in for good measure when he’d spoken.

Having followed Dr. Richards' work long enough, which meant knowing bits about his personal life, you were well aware of the reputation that Johnny Storm carried. The papers and magazines, talk shows and gossip blogs, all called him a playboy simply because he’d never been in a long-term relationship but was still a ladies man. You never saw him like that, though. All you saw was a brilliant guy, a lover of space, even if that passion of his was sometimes overlooked because of his ‘love for women’.

And, oh, how you wished his empty, blatant flirting with you didn’t bring a blush to your cheeks every time, or make your heart skip a beat, but it did. Every single time, it did. You weren’t blind: Johnny Storm was objectively handsome and much too charming for his own good, and you decided right then and there that you would use every ounce of your willpower to ignore his empty flirts. You didn’t need to become another girl hopelessly in love with the heartthrob of the Fantastic Four, even if your heart ached when you saw him with anyone else.

Those four had become important to you in ways that you would never be able to describe, but Sue always described it best: a family. 

That’s why when four of the closest people to you in life went up into space for Reed’s exploration mission, and came back cosmically changed forever, you never left their sides. They were your family, and family stuck together, no matter what.

“Reed,” your comment was cautious, hands stilling at your work station in the lab of the Baxter Building. Glancing over your shoulder, Reed was hunched over the machine he’d built in just a day, specifically to monitor the health of the baby growing inside of Sue’s stomach, as Herbie rocked back and forth beside him. “You’ve scanned Sue a thousand times at this point-”

“That’s an exaggeration. I’ve scanned her 123 times-”

“That’s not the point,” he glanced over at you then, looking away the second he saw the pointed look you were throwing at him. With a sigh, you abandoned your work, leaning back against the table behind you to watch him fret over the device. “We have run every test possible, scanned for every data point that links back to the fluctuations in your DNA from the cosmic rays we noted years ago, and we’ve gotten nothing. Your baby is okay.”

“There are still more tests to run,”

Another sigh escaped past your lips, and you allowed yourself to hang your head with a shake.

Since the moment Sue had announced her pregnancy, he’d been like this: even more on edge than usual. Baby-proofing the kitchen, smoke detectors in every single room and hallway, baby gates around every corner, it was getting insufferable. A sweet gesture, overall, and a testament to how much he loved and adored Sue, but exhausting to everyone else that had to be in his presence.

“Fine, but I’m not breaking the news to Sue that you want to scan her…again,”

“I already told her to meet me down here before dinner for another scan. We can adjust the parameters tomorrow. I want another data set from today’s scan at the current parameters to compare the changes with,” Reed never looked in your direction, still fiddling with the machine in front of him. “You’re staying for dinner, yes?”

“I’m making it,” was the response you shot back to him, powering down your workstation in the lab and rising from your chair, crossing the room to stand in front of him. “Apparently Sue has been craving spaghetti, and requested my family recipe.”

“You can’t argue with a pregnant woman,” Reed muttered, just loud enough for you to hear, but he still never looked up. “I’ll see you up there for dinner, then. There’s a few more tests that I want to run.”

“You also have a meeting at 5:45 and one at 6:15,” you shot back to him as you turned to leave the lab, checking the desk calendar lying beside your work station. There was a hum from the man, the smallest acknowledgement you were going to get, so you set your sights on Herbie and waved him forward. “Come on, Herb. An extra hand in the kitchen is always nice.”

As much as you thought of the Fantastic Four as your family, you never stayed for dinner often. You always tried your hardest to uphold the lines between your work life and personal life, not wanting to blur them completely (though, you were sure you had already blurred them enough for it to be too late). There had been plenty of times over the years where you’d stayed for dinner, usually once a month at this rate.

Sue always invited you, and you never wanted to disappoint her, and you gave in often. Ben had a way of wrangling you into saying yes before you were ever given the chance to speak at all. Reed had only asked once, asking you to stay back for the dinner months ago in which they announced to you that Sue was pregnant.

Johnny asked every day. You said no, most of the time, but when you did stay for dinner it was usually because those captivating, bright blue eyes were staring into your soul and pleading with you to stay.

Speak of the devil: there he sat at the dining room table. Clad in a white t-shirt with their logo resting over the pocket and the blue pants of his suit, a weird sight given that you had been in the lab with Reed all day and didn’t think any of them had left to attend to any ‘hero’ work.

You didn’t say a word as you strolled past him into the kitchen with Herbie on your heels, simply plucking the box of Lucky Charms from his hands as you swooped past. It was impossible not to smile to yourself at the scoff of indignation he let out at your actions.

“Hey-!”

“You’re going to spoil your appetite,” you shot back at him, throwing him a smirk over your shoulder before slotting the now closed cereal box into the cupboard where it usually sat.

Herbie beeped out a set of beeps that, over the years, you had come to understand. This time, he was agreeing with you, pointing out some facts about how eating out of the box lacked moderation, and would in turn actually spoil his appetite. You gave the little robot a fist bump for that, something that Johnny shot the little helper a glare for.

“Come on, Herbert, you’re supposed to take my side on these things!” There was no real malice in his words as he got up from the dining room table, rounding into the kitchen as you took the pots and pans that Herbie had gathered for you, setting them out along the counter where you needed them. “Baby, you didn’t tell me you were staying for dinner.”

When you told yourself that you weren’t going to fall into the trap that was the charming and charismatic Johnny Storm, you weren’t prepared for two things.

One: when he got comfortable around someone, he could be an even bigger flirt. Pet names were constant. Baby, sweetheart, honey, doll, love…you name it, Johnny called you it. Constantly. So constantly you were sure the blush on your cheeks was a permanent staple. He’d even once called you his little flame–that had been met with the tip of your heel being dug into his foot.

The second thing you weren’t prepared for: touch. Johnny Storm didn’t understand personal space, not when he was comfortable around you. If you were in the room with him, he was standing less than a foot from you, and you always knew because you could feel the warmth that radiated off his unusually hot skin. His hands would always rest on your arm, your elbow, right at the bottom of your lower back.

Moments like this in the kitchen were normal, and yet they still fried your brain. That simply little pet name, and Johnny’s warm hand ghosting over your lower back, before coming to rest on your hip. Clearing your throat, you gently pried his hand from your body, shooting him a look as you moved around to get the ingredients for dinner, hoping your flushed cheeks didn’t give you away.

“When your pregnant sister has cravings for my personal family recipe spaghetti, I’m required to oblige her,”

“I asked you to make this for me two weeks ago and you refused,”

Johnny followed close behind you, like a little puppy following its owner. You tried, and failed, to contain your smile at his actions. The media might paint him as some sex god (you weren’t going to lie…if he wanted to be, he could be) but you saw him for what he was: the epitome of a little golden retriever at times.

“Well you aren’t a hormonal pregnant woman with super powers,” you shot back at him, taking the opened jar of spaghetti sauce from Herbie’s hand and dumping it into the pot on the stove top, turning up the heat on the boiling pot of water for the noodles Herbie had laid out for you.

“No, but Johnny is a hormonal guy with super powers, who adores your cooking,” bumping his hip with yours, Johnny stole the wooden spoon from your hand with ease, dipping it into the simmering sauce to stir. With that same ease, he leaned down just slightly, leaving a kiss to your bare shoulder that felt as if it had left a brand into your skin. “Johnny also happens to just adore you, and loves when you stay for dinner.”

You had given up on the blush by now. He’d surely seen it enough over the years with his incessant flirting, there was no use in hiding it. Bumping your hip back with him, biting into your bottom lip in a failed attempt to conceal the smile spreading across your lips, you stole the wooden spoon back from him.

“Johnny also talks in the third person too much, and is an insufferable flirt half the time,” he dipped his hand into the sauce, coating his fingers in red as you whacked lightly at his hand, forcing him to withdraw as quickly as he’d dipped in. “What have I told you about doing that!”

He’d laughed, one of your favorite sounds, as you glanced over at him with a bright smile, unable to truly stay mad at him…ever.

That was, until he dipped his sauce-covered ring finger and middle finger into his mouth to lick the sauce clean off, eyes never leaving yours and a smirk curling up on his lips. It forced you to swallow the lump that had formed in your throat and look away as quickly as you could, feeling a different kind of heat swelling in your body: yeah, Johnny knew exactly what he was doing.

“Not sure, baby, that look you’re giving me right now doesn’t scream that I’m insufferable-”

“Oh, that’s exactly what it’s screaming,” you shot back, even with the ghost of a smile pulling at your lips as Herbie readied the garlic bread on the counter behind you. “If you’re not going to help, you can leave this kitchen. I don’t care if you live here.”

Johnny rolled his eyes in response, hopping up onto the counter next to the stove where you worked. You caught the box of noodles he knocked over before they could fall to the ground, shooting him a look as he held his hands up innocently, dumping them into the boiling water pot.

“You basically live here, too,”

“I don’t-”

“Yeah, because you keep refusing the room that Sue prepared for you,”

He…wasn’t wrong. Two years ago, Sue had transformed what was previously the guest room into a room that looked like it had been built just for you. Your favorite color on the walls, a matching quilt set on the bed, and she’d offered it to you. A place to stay, to live, given that Reed sometimes had you in the Baxter Building until the oddest hours of the morning.

You declined, still desperate to keep that line between your work life and your personal life separate, as tempting of an offer as it was. Sue wasn’t slighted by your decision at all, instead offering it to you to use whenever you needed to. There had been times in which you had taken up that offer, a few changes of clothes tucked away in the room on the odd chance that you’d need them.

“This place is your home, not mine,” you didn’t look at Johnny as you spoke, simply shaking your head as you stirred both the sauce and the noodles in their respective pots. “I’m Reed’s assistant, I’m not family-”

“Stop it,”

Even with the heat that rolled off Johnny Storm, every time his bare skin touched your own it sent a shiver straight down the length of your spine. His hand curled around your jawline, thumb and index finger pinching at your chin to force you to look up at him, to gaze into those intense blue eyes and the look on his face that had morphed so quickly from playful to serious.

“Johnny-”

“You are family, whether you like it or not,” the statement didn’t surprise you, it wasn’t the first time in your four years of knowing him that Johnny had said something like this to you, or anyone on the team for that matter. It always made you feel warm inside, though, to hear him say it, to see that loyalty and love for the people he cared about shine through in his words, such a stark contrast to the way the media sometimes portrayed him. “There’s not a thing I wouldn’t do for you.”

That was new. He hadn’t made a declaration like that to you before.

It was something about the look in his eyes as he said it–so genuine, so soft–that had you melting into his touch. His hand curled back up to your cheek, thumb just barely caressing the apple of your cheek, leaving a trail of heat with every swipe of his finger against your skin. Your heart betrayed you, fluttering in that moment like it always did.

These moments used to be few and far between. You didn’t know how else to describe them besides just calling them moments. Over the first few years of knowing Johnny Storm, there were small moments where that empty flirts verged on the edge of something different, something raw and real. But in the last year, they happened more often than they didn’t. Johnny wasn’t pictured out with as many women anymore, wasn’t brazenly caught flirting with anyone with legs and a pulse at events. And in moments like this, even in front of his family, he’d touch you, caress you, speak to you in a way that felt so genuine, that felt like it was real. Like the flirting was no longer just empty, meaningless fun.

That line between your work and personal life might have been a muddled mess, but the line between being Johnny Storm’s friend and something entirely more was practically non-existent now.

“You say that to all your women?” you quipped back, trying to hold your own, even as you were melting inside and your voice came out as a whisper. The playful look on Johnny’s face returned in a second, his fingers instead pinching the cheek he’d just been so softly caressing.

“Never, honey. Those words are reserved for my brother-in-law’s pretty little assistant,”

In typical Johnny fashion, he was able to dissolve and ruin whatever the moment was in an instant with his usual ‘charm’. Swatting his hand away, you returned your attention to the food on the stove in front of you, smiling to yourself as Herbie beeped out a popular song you’d heard on the radio behind you.

“You always have a line, don’t you?”

“Hey, you know what you signed up for, being friends with all this,” he jokingly motioned to his body, and you caught sight of the smile lighting up his face again as you laughed incredulously at his actions. “As part of the package deal, being friends with me, you are legally required to attend movie night in the living room with me after dinner.”

You hummed in response, even if you were smiling the entire time just from listening to him talk.

“This sounds like an impromptu movie night-”

“All of our movie nights are impromptu, babe-”

“I saw earlier that channel 2 is playing The Sound of Music tonight,” you shot back at him, finally looking up at him with an expectant look on your face. “That’s what I want to watch.”

Johnny groaned, throwing his head back and knocking it against the cupboards with a wince on his face. You couldn’t help but chuckle at his overdramatic antics, as usual.

“But channel 3 is showing Psycho!”

“And you dipped your hand–which, god knows where that thing might have been–into my sauce for dinner,”

Johnny opened his mouth to speak, before mulling over your words, and effectively shutting it with a nod.

“You know what, if it gets you to have a movie night with me, then I’ll take it,”

God, you adored this man, more than you should. More than you wanted to. In his presence, especially now, you were pretty sure the smile on your face was a constant, that it would never leave, as you laughed at him once more. 

Finishing off the special blend of additions to your sauce, giving it another swirl with the wooden spoon, you brought it up to your lips for a quick taste. Satisfied, you held one hand under the spoon to keep it from dripping, holding it up toward Johnny.

“Alright, give it a taste,”

His eyes stayed locked on yours, that familiar intensity and warmth in them keeping you locked in place, holding your breath, as he took a quick slurp from the spoon. Smacking his lips together, running his tongue out along his lips, he gave a definitive nod.

“As always…perfection. Though, I expect nothing less from you,”

Before you could retort to his cheesy comment, his hand reached out, eyes still locked on yours, as he cupped your chin once more and ran his finger over your lips. With the slightest of glances down, you saw the small spot of red on his finger, the remnants of the sauce he’d so gently just wiped from your lips.

Glancing back up to those blue eyes you loved more than you cared to admit, you caught the way they finally glanced down at your lips, before looking away as if to not get caught.

“...am I interrupting something?”

As if Johnny had burst into flames and burned you, you jumped away from him immediately the second you heard the voice of Sue Storm across the room. You never even looked back up at Johnny, or turned around to look at the woman by the dining room table, just stared down into the sauce pot as you continued to stir it and the noodles.

“Actually, sis, you very much are interrupting something here,” Johnny called out across the room, and you could see him gesturing with his hands between you both from the corners of your vision.

“Johnny,” you rolled your eyes, glancing over at him with flushed red cheeks from what had just transpired. “Sue isn’t interrupting anything.”

“She kind of is. We were kind of having a moment here-”

“Johnny, we were not having a moment,”

You very much were having a moment, but you weren’t admitting that to him. His ego burned hot enough, no need to stroke the fire.

Sue laughed, rounding into the kitchen as she stopped by Herbie, thanking him and taking the garlic bread tray from him to pop into the oven he had preheated.

“Johnny, why don’t you go get cleaned up for dinner and stop bothering the poor girl. Bad enough I’m making her cook for me, she doesn’t need you hovering,”

The man let out a sigh, muttering something mocking toward his sister, as he threw himself off the counter with dramatic flair. He wasn’t done making your heart race, though, his hand curling around the back of your head as he planted a kiss directly to your hairline, before he disappeared from the kitchen with a pat to Herbie’s head.

The pots on the stove were forgotten as you turned around, simply watching him disappear with an incredulous look on your face. Quickly, your eyes shot to Sue, who was watching you with a smirk as she leaned against the island counter.

“There was nothing happening there,”

“I didn’t say there was,”

“But you’re giving me that look,”

“I’m not giving you any kind of look,” the blonde laughed, stepping up beside you to take the wooden spoon from your hand, tasting the sauce herself with a happy little sigh. “Just…enjoying watching the show from the sidelines, waiting for one of you to make a move.”

“Sue, there’s no move to make. He’s just…he’s Johnny,”

“And Johnny is my brother,” she shot back with a grin. “And Johnny has never been like that with someone, just with you.”

You didn’t get to respond, before Herbie cut in with another series of beeps. Your eyes shot wide as you listened to what he was saying, cheeks flaring an even brighter shade of red as Sue choked on air, laughing to herself at your side.

“HERBIE! THAT’S SO INAPPROPRIATE!”

❤︎

It had been two weeks, and Reed had somehow managed to scan Sue a total of 142 times, now. Sometimes, you wondered how she was able to put up with his hovering, the hovering that had gotten exponentially worse since she announced she was pregnant.

“I’m not getting clear imaging,” Reed called out from the other side of the lab, the only sound in the room being the incessant beeping of the machine he’d built to monitor the baby, and the solder iron in your hand as it worked away on the small device in front of you. You shook your head at his comments once more, adjusting the eye protectors resting on the bridge of your nose as little sparks jumped up as the last piece of the triangular device was finally attached. “I’m going to have Herbie recalibrate this, I don’t like the data output I’m getting, I want a clear image on the next scan. Is the second bridge device ready?”

“Just finished fixing the soldering on the stand, so it should be good to go,” you shot back, tossing your eye protectors down at your workstation, lifting the device carefully and carrying it over to Reed’s station, setting it down with the matching device. “And, once again, you really don’t need to scan the baby again.”

You were met with silence, unsurprisingly. Until, the workstation down the room set off its alarm bell, a familiar tone that had you stand up straighter where you stood.

“New deep space transmission,” there was a hint of elation in Reed’s tone as he said it, quickening his pace across the room with Herbie hot on his trail. “Let’s identify the origin, then record it for further analysis.”

Quickly walking back over to your workstation, your eyes drifted to that desk calendar sitting next to you, and to today’s date: a poorly drawn flame, and the time “2:15” scribbled in a barely legible handwriting that you recognized instantly. Even if you hadn’t, the terribly drawn heart with your initials in it scribbled in the corner would’ve given it away.

“Your analysis is going to have to wait, Reed,” you called out with a sigh, knowing you weren’t the one who put this meeting on the calendar, but you sure knew who had. “You have a 2:15 incoming.”

“2:15? What 2:15?” Reed never even looked in your direction, focused on the new transmission. “You didn’t tell me there was anything on my calendar.”

“Well, I didn’t put this one on the calendar myself, but you must have cleared it at some point…”

Just then, the elevator doors to the lab popped open with a familiar ding sound.

“Ah–Reed!”

Good god, Johnny Storm was trying to kill you. You weren’t even sure if that was an exaggeration at this point, because you wouldn’t put it past him.

Blue looked good on him, it always had, but the navy blue button up he was wearing was doing nothing for your mind that was screaming at you to “keep it professional.” It didn’t help that the first few buttons were already undone, giving a slight peak to his chest. The white chinos–those were the nail in your metaphorical coffin. They had no right to be that tight, and he had no right to look so damn good in them.

“Ah…that 2:15,” you tried your best to conceal your laugh at Reed’s comment across the lab. “Johnny, do we have to today?”

“Johnny, do we have to today? As if I didn’t ask to put it on the schedule,” the blonde man in question mumbled mockingly to himself as he slid up to your side at your workstation as you laughed at his antics. One of his hands grabbed the back of your neck, tugging you closer before you could even think about it, pressing another kiss to your hairline. Suddenly, you felt like you were back in the kitchen weeks ago. “Darling, have I ever told you how breathtaking you look in your lab coat?”

“It’s a white coat, Johnny, it’s nothing special,” you deflected, taking just a short glance up at him before you had to look away, already knowing you were as red as the table beneath your hands.

“But the girl wearing it is-”

“Johnny, do you want to have this meeting or do you want to flirt with my assistant?”

You hung your head with a groan, even as Johnny laughed at the comment from his brother-in-law. His arm slung around your waist, hand settling on your hip as the heat that rolled off his body enveloped you for a moment, letting yourself lean into the side hug he gave you and the squeeze to your hip, before he was gone.

“There’s enough time in the day to do both! No, I had some thoughts about the new suit designs,”

“There are no new space suit designs-”

You glanced over at the pair as they met face-to-face in the middle of the lab, Johnny holding up the sheet he was concealing behind his back.

“You finished them years ago…they have dust on them,” Johnny deadpanned, letting out a sigh as Reed took the design sheet from him. “Look, I get it. You’re going to be a father soon, you’re scared-”

“I’m not-I’m not scared,” Reed cut in immediately, and you could hear the anxious undertone that overtook him immediately at Johnny’s words. Without even having to be summoned, knowing how his brain worked after all this time, you simply shrugged off your lab coat and stalked over to the pair, taking the design sheet from Reed’s hands without a word and placing it on his chalkboard full of equations. “I’m-I’m busy, Johnny. I’m busy. I’m busy, there’s a difference.”

“He means busy on his pace to scan Sue at least 200 times before she gives birth,” you shot back, sending Reed a bright smile that he frowned at, clearly seeing that you were siding with Johnny here. “Not terrified of becoming a father at all, those two things definitely don’t correlate.”

Johnny laughed, smile bright, and it only brightened the one on your face, a tug somewhere deep in your chest pulling on you when he locked eyes with you. Reed snapped your attention back to him in an instant, running a hand down his face as he gestured in Herbie’s direction.

“Just handle the new deep space transmission, please, instead of ganging up on me with Johnny,”

You laughed, heels clicking against the floors of the lab as you joined Herbie’s side as he waited for the transmission to be scratched into the record. There was a woosh of air, the air beside you heating up instantly as a hand found its way to rest on your lower back.

“Have you listened to it yet?”

The smile on your face softened as you glanced over at Johnny, who was staring down at the record in front of you both with pure excitement in his eyes. Beyond the physical moments, his flirtatious moments, these were the moments that had your plan to not fall for Johnny Storm splitting at the seams, if it hadn’t already.

“Seems to be a lot more of the same, just another complex signal,” Johnny left your side, the heat going with him, as he leaned against the blue table behind him. Herbie took the record from its place, rolling over to Johnny to hand it directly to him. “You’re more than welcome to take it with you, give it a listen.”

He twirled the record in his hands with a grin, absentmindedly reaching out to scratch the top of Herbie’s head. That simple little action elicited a giggle, hand coming up to cover your mouth as Johnny glanced up at you with a smirk.

“What’s so funny?”

“Herbie isn’t a dog, and yet you treat him like one,” you explained, stepping up just in front of him and grabbing his hand lightly, stopping the twirling of the record in his hands. “Also, you do know you aren’t supposed to get your fingerprints all over these, right?”

It was Johnny’s turn to laugh as he spun his hand, catching it in his palm and bringing it up to his lips, leaving a scorching hot, but gentle, kiss to your knuckles, sending a shiver straight through your bones. He didn’t even have a retort to your comment, just simply held your hand in his, thumb stroking along your skin, while your entire body flushed with a feeling you wanted to ignore.

“Johnny, what have I told you about flirting in my lab? I need my assistant, we’re trying to run a test,”

The moment was gone in seconds, your hand dropped from Johnny’s as he raced to the other side of the lab, following closely behind Reed and tossing the record onto the closest table.

You could only shake your head with a laugh, walking beside Herbie to join them, knowing Reed would be mumbling to himself the rest of the week about this moment and how much Johnny liked pissing him off.

“Cool! I got time,”

Reed didn’t roll his eyes as you and Herbie joined them back at your workstations, but you could see how much he wanted to. Holding the device you’d just finished off in his hand, you watched in the same awe you had for four years as his arm stretched across the length of the lab, placing it right back beside your own workstation.

“Bridge teleportation test one,” grabbing the notebook lying beside the device that contained your notes on the project, you flipped to a new page, prepared to note down any disparities that occurred during the test, as Reed placed an egg on the newly soldered stand. “Movement of organic matter six meters.”

Johnny grabbed the protective glasses beside the work desk, about to slip them on, before Reed took them with no hesitation and slipped them on himself. The blonde turned to you with an incredulous look that simply drew a laugh from you.

“Those are his pair, you can’t touch his pair,” you teased the man, who simply shot you a wink in return, as you both took the pairs that Herbie was holding out to you both. Johnny gave the little robot a quick fist bump.

Such a simple action that still had you grinning in childlike adoration at the side of his face.

Reed gave you a simple look, confirming you were ready. You gave him a nod, as he took hold of the switch to activate the device.

“Let’s run it,”

The whirring of the machine sounded, three silver beams of energy emitting from the device and encasing the egg within a sphere of energy. There was a shift in the room as that energy grew, as the hum of the machine filled the air, before there was a simple POP–and the egg was gone.

One glance from each of you over your shoulders was enough to confirm that the egg was, in fact, sitting on the opposite platform. Completely untouched and intact.

“It worked!” Johnny exclaimed, gesturing toward the egg.

That’s when the power to the building cut out.

It wasn’t surprising, given the notes you both had taken. The amount of energy that needed to be funneled through the device in order to channel enough energy to actually move organic matter without hurting it was sure to be beyond the energy limits of the Baxter Building. A full power outage…not what you were expecting. Not that you could write that note down in the pitch black of the room.

“Johnny,” Reed’s voice called out in the dark, steady with no hint of any emotion you could decipher in it. The man in question came to life beside you, body engulfed in flames, the flame resistant fabric of his specially tailored clothing working overtime to keep him from being stark naked. He stood with his hands on his hips, and even from the side you could see the smirk curling up on his lips. “Could you reset the breaker?”

You’d known Johnny long enough now, been his friend for enough years, to know him. Know him better than a colleague should. The instant dip in his smirk to a frown was clear, the tension in his broad shoulders, as he tossed his glasses down onto the table. He didn’t spare either of you another look, crossing the room to grab the record.

“Other way-”

“I know,” Johnny snapped, beside his flame engulfed body was on the other side of the lab, flipping the breaker as the electricity of the building roared to life again. The second it did, he was in the elevator, doors shutting without another word.

Neither you nor Reed spoke for a moment, simply looking down at the bridge teleportation device on the table in front of him.

“I’ve upset him,”

Reed didn’t phrase it like a question, he said it like a statement. Both were true, though. Reed always knew when he had upset Johnny, but never how he had really upset him.

You took a deep breath, nodding, as you scribbled a note in your notebook before turning on your heels, stalking back to your own workstation.

“Well, he went out of his way to put time on your calendar just to talk to you about the suits, and you did dismiss him…” you trailed off as you reached your station, eyes flickering back down to that desk calendar beside you. You couldn’t help it, letting your fingers lightly trail over that little heart with your initials, smiling to yourself, wishing it meant more than what it did mean: nothing. “Johnny loves space, he only got to go up once before…this all happened. You can’t blame him for wanting to go back.”

It was quiet for another moment in the lab, before Reed spoke up again.

“You know him well…better than I think I do,”

The flush in your cheeks was inevitable at that, embarrassment flooding you as it was easy for you to read between the lines of what Reed was trying to insinuate.

“I-I just listen to him. I always listen,”

It was quiet again.

“Go check on him,” was all Reed said. “If there’s anyone he’d want to talk to right now, it’s you.”

You wanted to argue, to save the crumbling bits of that wall between work and personal, but even you knew it was too late for that.

Johnny’s bedroom door was just two down from the guest room Sue had offered you years ago, a bathroom being the only thing that separated them. Ben’s room was at the other end of the hallway, along with the nursery where the soon to be baby Richards would sleep.

You may not have stayed in that guest room often, but you’d been in these hallways enough to know it like the back of your hand. To know it like it was your own home. 

There were countless nights, before you’d make the short walk back to your apartment, where Johnny had coerced you into movie nights in his room. He’d never try anything, never push you into something, always leaving the door open to make sure you knew he wasn’t bringing you upstairs for some alternative reason. His room was just quieter, and felt more private. It gave you the chance to see the side of Johnny that the world didn’t get to see.

The space lover, who spent his life dreaming of being an astronaut, of going into space and seeing the stars. He was a thrill-seeker, always wanting to live his life on the edge, to find joy in those rushes of adrenaline. But beyond it all, just a good man. A man who had an entire collection of records lining one wall of his room, organized from his favorite records to his least favorite, even though he claimed there wasn’t really a least favorite. The world got to know the Human Torch, but in  the confines of those four walls, you got to know Johnny Storm. The second you did, you knew your heart was fucked.

You found him in a spot you’d found him in before: leaning against the floor to ceiling windows of his room, staring out at the spaceship he hadn’t stepped foot in for four years. Your heart broke slightly from where you stood in the doorway, able to see the longing that was woven into his frown, that shone through his eyes that never strayed far from the Excelsior.

“You know,” with a few steps into the room, standing beside the record player, you lifted the needle to stop the replay of the foreign language from the deep space transmission that played on a loop. Johnny looked over, a soft smile overtaking his frown at the sight of you, as you kept your own voice soft and light. “I don’t think deep space transmissions are the right background music if you’re going to stare longingly out your window.”

Johnny laughed in a huff, turning on his heel to flick through his record collection.

“And suggestions then for a melancholic moment such as this?”

“Elvis typically has some hits that can set that mood,”

You watched him, the slight shake in his body that hinted he was laughing again, before he plucked a record from the shelves and rose back to his feed. Standing beside the record player with you, he slid it into your hands without another word and plopped into the chair just across from the player.

With care, like you’d done it a hundred times before (you had, right here in this room), you slipped the record onto the player, dropping the needle down as it coasted along the grooves etched into the record.

When no-one else can understand me, when everything I do is wrong…you give me hope and consolation. You give me strength to carry on.

The lyrics settled in you heavily, but it made your body feel lighter. It was impossible not to read into them, to not think too hard about the deliberate music choice that Johnny had made. You couldn’t help that, somewhere deep in your heart where you had buried your feelings for the flaming man years ago, you were hoping these lyrics were a personal message to you.

“Reed send you to check on me?” Johnny asked after a moment, leaning back in his chair, arms folded over his chest as he watched you. Composing yourself for a moment, shoving the flurry of butterflies beating against your chest down, you turned to face him and his blue eyes with a shrug.

“Technically, but I would’ve come on my own,” Johnny hummed, the ghost of a smile on his lips, as his gaze found its way back to the spaceship taunting him just beyond the window. “Come on, matchstick, talk to me.”

He huffed out another laugh, stretching his arms above his head as you tried your best to keep your eyes trained on his face and not drift down his torso. Eventually, his arms settled back across his chest, his gaze still stuck out the window.

“I don’t know…it’s stupid. Last time we went up, we came back with superpowers, trust me, I get that. Now, he’s got a kid on the way. But I know–I know–that he knows how much space means to me. So, when he just dismisses me like that-”

“It makes you feel inadequate? Like you’re a child?” Johnny’s gaze found you again as you shrugged with a light smile. “I’ve worked in an enclosed space with him almost every day for four years, Johnny. He used to make me feel that way all the time, until I realized that Reed’s never trying to make me feel like that.”

“I know he’s not doing it on purpose…doesn’t mean I’m not going to shit talk him in the confines of these walls,” he gestured around the room as you laughed, coming to stand beside his chair, looking down on him as he sighed once more. His hands fell, gripping his knees, as he rubbed them back and forth against the fabric of his pants. “I love space. Simple as that.”

You hummed, bending down beside the chair Johnny sat in so that you were essentially squatting before him, having to look up at him. Hesitation caught you for just a second, your brain actively fighting a war with your heart as you raised your hands, but you ultimately took his hands in yours. 

All it took was a second for your eyes to drift over to the table beside him. One lamp, a stack of books, and the flash of a polaroid photo leaning against those books: a photo of you. Taken at some point in the lab, laughter written across your face, your hand almost blocking a portion of the lens as you tried to stop him from taking the photo. You didn’t even remember it being taken in the first place.

Good god, he was really going to be the death of you.

Eyes quickly back on him, with a little squeeze to his hands, you gave Johnny the most comforting smile you could, even as your heart did somersaults in your chest.

“I know you do. You’ll go back to space, Johnny, I promise,”

His eyes watched your hands, and you could see it on his face: that hint of adoration, that hint of something genuine that suggested it wasn’t all just a game, that you weren’t imaging moments for more than they were.

“What if I don’t?”

“You’re Johnny Storm, I’ve never seen you not get something you wanted before. Especially not something you want this bad,”

His mouth parted just slightly as he hesitated. You watched as his tongue darted out, just barely grazing over the edge of his bottom lip, before you flicked your eyes back to his.

“You’re wrong…I think there’s something I want more. Been trying to get it for awhile, but…she just keeps slipping through my fingers somehow,”

That tug on your heart was back. Your heart was surely beating so fast that it could be heard, hammering against your ribcage, as his thumbs glided back and forth across your skin. You could barely think of a response, too stuck on his words: the closest thing to a confession of any kind you’d heard in four years. Raw, real, genuine.

Johnny stood quickly, barely giving you a chance to potentially think of a response as he tugged you back to your feet. His arm enveloped your waist, your hand falling to his bicep as he still held your other hand in the air beside you both. You weren’t sure now if the flush crawling up your neck into your cheeks was from the moment, or from the heat radiating off of him.

“W-What are you doing?”

“We’re dancing,” he said it as if it was the most casual thing in the world, that usual smirk of his back on his face. Whatever had happened moments before, whatever confession may or may not have been said, was brushed away in an instant, that charming, flirty personality of his back in full force. “Can’t turn on Elvis and not dance, I think that’s a literal crime.”

“I didn’t know you even knew how to dance,”

“Oh, I don’t, Sue’s been telling me for years that I have two left feet,” Johnny shot back, shooting a wink down at you as his hand readjusted its grip along your waist. “Can’t be that hard with the prettiest girl in the building in my arms, right?”

Swaying back and forth, wrapped up in the heat of his body, in the faint smell of the cologne that coated his clothing, you were very certain that Johnny Storm was going to be the death of you.

And when you smile the world is brighter. You touch my hand and I'm a king. Your kiss to me is worth a fortune, your love for me is everything.

Johnny tilted his head back from you by just a hair, and you followed suit. Deep blue eyes, as captivating to you as they were the first time you ever saw them, shone with an emotion you couldn’t quite decipher. If you could, you weren’t sure you would survive knowing. 

Faces just an inch away, the closest and most intimate moment you’d ever shared with the man you knew in your heart was never going to be just your friend, your colleague, you were verging on the edge of making a terrible choice. Of opening the floodgates, of unlocking the feelings you’d buried away so long ago and letting them flow.

“This is an interesting little relationship you and I have, you know,”

Johnny always found a way to ruin these moments, and this was just another example. Lips tugged up into a smirk, mischief swarming his eyes as he teased you, that fleeting moment of raw vulnerability was gone.

Hand slipped from his, body pulled back from his and a roll of your eyes, you turned on your heel within seconds.

“So typical of you, Storm,”

“What-? What did I do!”

You huffed out a laugh, a smile creeping onto your lips even as you tried to keep it at bay, as you threw your comment over your shoulder as you walked toward the door.

“You went and killed the moment, Johnny, as per usual,”

“...so you admit it, we WERE having a moment!”

You barked out a laugh, shaking your head as you crossed through the doorframe. You could never stay mad at him, not when your heart yearned for him in a way you wish it didn’t.

“Come on! At least let me make it up to you. Will you stay for dinner?”

With a final glance cast over your shoulder toward him, you shot him a bright smile.

“If you’re lucky, flame boy!”

❤︎

Yeah, you really couldn’t say no to Johnny Storm.

Not when he’d spoken so sweetly to you, held you so tenderly, and all around just invaded every part of your brain and your heart. To be fair, he barely had to try honestly to do that.

It wasn’t shocking to see Ben in the kitchen, it seemed to be one of his happy places. You weren’t complaining: on the nights you did stay for dinner, and Ben was cooking, you knew you were going home with the best leftovers the city of New York had ever seen.

“Decided to stay for dinner again?” Sue called out toward you with a smile, giving Herbie a pat on the head as he worked away at carving a pumpkin. You shot her a smile in return, pouring yourself a quick glass of water before making your way toward Ben.

“Johnny asked…and I decided to be nice and oblige him,” you didn’t miss the teasing hum that Ben let out, lightly whacking him on his rocky shoulder. Not that it did you any good, hurting your hand more than it would ever hurt him. His laughter was ignored as your eyes lit up, catching sight of the familiar black and white cookies he was dumping onto a plate. “Oh my god, did you go grab these from Maisie’s?”

“Yes,” Ben waved your hand away when you went to reach for the cookies, producing another paper bag and sliding it your way. “These ones are yours.”

The smell that wafted from the bag was enough to have you almost moaning in the middle of the kitchen, eagerly digging one of the cookies out. Maisie’s famous snickerdoodle cookies, the perfect blend of cinnamon and sugar that you had adored since you were a little girl. One bite of the cookie had you in absolute heaven.

“Oh my god, I haven’t had these in ages!” Ben and Sue both laughed at your excitement as you took another bite of the warm cookie in your hand. “How did you know these were my favorites?”

Ben’s smirk wasn’t hard to miss at all.

“Oh, I didn’t. Johnny asked me to pick those up for you,”

It was probably time to accept that blushing around this family was the only thing you were capable of.

Sue’s laughter rang loudest as she rounded the island counter, high fiving Ben as she shot you a pointed look.

“You really have my brother wrapped around your finger without even trying, huh? You know, before I went to get scanned–again–in the lab, I stopped by the nursery to check out the crib progress. Heard a little The Wonder of You from down the hall, thought I’d peek in…”

The groan you emitted could probably be heard from the other side of the country, leaning down to barely bang your head against the countertop. Ben and Sue’s laughter rang through the air again as you looked up, desperately waving your hands.

“I swear, it wasn’t what it looked like-”

“What wasn’t what it looked like?”

Of course, Johnny chose to make his grand entrance at that moment. Thankfully for you, he’d changed out of that ridiculously hot button up. Unfortunately for you, he was still wearing those god forsaken white chinos.

“Your little dance Sue was telling me about earlier,” Ben teased, easily catching your hand as it came up to whack him again in his rough, oversized one. “What’s with the long face?”

“Oh that dance was exactly what it looked like. Thanks for coming to dinner though, sweetheart, glad you like the cookies,” Johnny tacked on a wink in your direction, one you affectionately rolled your eyes over, before his smile was back to a frown. “And what of it, Ben?”

“Sounds like your 2:15 with Reed didn’t go well. I’m sorry, pal,”

From across the room, you could see Johnny’s shoulders move in a huff of laughter as he clapped, bringing down the cabinet shelf that held the same box of cereal you had taken from him two weeks ago. You moved around the island counter, filming your cup with more water before standing opposite of Ben while Johnny made his way back over.

“Hey, I’m fine,” he spoke, though the edge in his words was clear as he did, coming to stand directly at your side. “I don’t mind or anything, it’s just, uh-”

“I hear you, pal. We’ll go to space again,”

“That’s what I was trying to tell him earlier,” you tacked on, bumping your hip with Johnny’s, who quickly did the same back to you.

That smile you adored was back in moments, though, as he dug his hand into the box and produced the action figure waiting inside: a miniature Johnny Storm. His bright grin was turned in your direction as he waved the toy toward you, his signature catchphrase from the cartoon–flame on–ringing through the air as Reed entered the room, greeting his wife by the dining room table.

“They captured my likeness so perfectly, don’t you think?” he quipped, activating the catchphrase once again as you rolled your eyes. “Do you still have the one I gave you a few months ago?”

“Yeah, buried in the junk drawer of my kitchen,”

Johnny feigned shock, pinching your side quickly as you squirmed away with a laugh.

“At least upgrade me to your bedside table so I can be with you while you sleep,” that stupid line was accented with another wink before Johnny thrust the toy in Ben’s face. “Come on, admit it’s cool.”

That catchphrase just kept repeating.

I’m Johnny Storm! Flame On!

Flame On!

Flame On!

Ben grabbed the toy from Johnny’s hand in seconds, crushing it to nothing but dust and blowing it back in Johnny’s face with a smirk. You tried everything to conceal your laughter, but it was inevitable.

“Flame off!”

Sirens rang outside the balcony of the building’s living room. The flying cars of the police force raced past, bathing the room in red and blue lights. The second they disappeared, another squadron flew past in the other direction, the sirens all intermixing in the air.

These were the moments you never got to see often, when the team sprung into action. It was clear in Johnny and Ben alone, how their silly little moment was forgotten as they thrust into action, prepared to go running out of the building into danger. Reed simply held up a hand, shaking his head at the group.

“No, no, it’s alright. This is me,”

Ben and Sue followed Reed out onto the balcony, but Johnny hung back, his gaze stuck on you as you hadn’t moved from the kitchen. He simply tilted his head toward his family, holding his hand out for you. Such a simple move that shouldn’t have kickstarted your heart into what was surely an irregular rhythm, but it did.

The second you were at his side, Johnny’s hand rested at the small of your back, fingers curling into the fabric of your shirt just so to tug you slightly closer to his side. Together, you stepped out onto the balcony of the Baxter Building beside Ben, overlooking New York as it was bathed in every corner in red and blue.

“For the past few months, I’ve been tracking a small number of criminal organizations throughout the city,”

You shot a look down at your boss, eyebrow raised.

“That’s what you’ve been doing in that notebook by your desk?” Reed simply waved your comment off, pointing just down the block, fairly close to the area in which your apartment resided.

“47 of them, to be exact. Including the Puppet Master in the Bowery, the Wizard in Gramercy Park, and Diablo in Washington Heights,”

Everyone on the balcony went quiet for a moment.

“You…baby-proofed the world,” Ben finally spoke. Sue’s sigh could be heard from the other end of the balcony as she tried to defend her husband.

“It’s a sweet gesture,”

“It’s a little insane,” you mumbled to yourself, just loud enough for you and Johnny to hear. The blonde at your side simply shrugged, glancing down at you and catching your gaze.

“It’s not totally crazy. He’s trying to protect the things he loves, what’s most precious to him…” Johnny’s lips quirked up just slightly. “I’d do it too…I’d do it for you.”

He said it so…so earnestly. With so much conviction in his tone, as if this was a certainty to him. That protecting not just his family, but you, was something he needed to do. That if it came down to it, he’d do it without a second thought.

“You…you have to stop saying things like that to me, Johnny,” you hated how breathless your voice came out, how wrecked you sounded as you whispered your response back to him, the conversation still droning on in the background between the other three.

The smile on Johnny’s face only widened, his hand slipping around from your lower back to your waist, as he gave you a light squeeze.

“Stop saying what, the truth?”

No, you need to stop saying things that are making me fall in love with you.

Love. That was a word that had only crossed your mind once when it came to Johnny Storm. 

It was two years ago, a week to the day that you had lost your mother, your biggest supporter in life. You stood at that funeral, surrounded by estranged family members you hadn’t spoken to in years, and family friends who wept for your loss. Reed, Sue, Ben and Johnny had come, offered their condolences, paid their respects.

When the others left, Johnny stayed. He stood by your side through the first viewing, never left it during the second viewing, and stood with you in the pouring rain an hour after they’d put her in the ground. You had cried, he held you, and he’d simply never left you alone that day. The colleague that had quickly become a friend, who flirted with you every chance he got, never uttered a single flirtatious comment that day. He’d simply been there, been the shoulder you needed.

That was the day you realized you may have fallen in love with the one man you told yourself not to fall in love with, and you buried those feelings in your heart for what you thought would be forever.

“Stuck in your head over there? Come on, it’s dinner time,”

Ben’s voice broke you from your stupor. The team had all started to make their way inside while you were left at the balcony railing, hands white knuckled on top of the rail. 

Johnny’s hand was held out toward you, and you ignored every part of your brain that told you not to and slipped your hand into his, letting him pull you back in toward the living room.

That’s what their watches all went off, alerts blaring in sync with one another.

It was like a firework went off, a boom shattering the night air of the city. The clouds, the sky, were painted in gold, streaks of meteors and debris crossing the sky as they fell to the earth. The sound that emitted from the golden cloud that stretched across the sky, bathing the city in its light, felt…otherwordly. Like a scream, like a warning.

A warm hand enveloped your face, turning your wide eyes away from the scene.

There were very few times you saw Johnny as serious as he was now. Jaw locked, eyes narrowed but still soft as they looked at you, the cascades of gold shone over his face, highlighting his features as another boom sounded off in the distance.

“Go inside, don’t come out,”

Words were caught in your throat. All you could manage was a nod, his thumb doing a single swipe over your cheek, before he patted Reed on the shoulder and launched himself over the railing and into the air, igniting himself as he went.

If not for the moment, you would have stopped to admire him as he flew, bathed in the reds and oranges of his fire. You were awestruck every time you got to witness those cosmic powers firsthand.

Reed, Sue, and Ben had followed not long after, as you could hear the familiar whirled of their car through the air, chasing after Johnny through the city, following whatever had just appeared from the sky.

You? You sat on the living room couch, wringing your hands together to keep them from shaking. You’d been there as they had dealt with Red Ghost, or even Moleman, but this? 

This was different. This was otherworldly. This was terrifying. And when Herbie flipped the switch of the television, rolling to your side, you were greeted with the sight of the silver alien woman hovering in Times Square for the first time.

“Your planet is now marked for death. Your world will be consumed by the devourer,” 

Her voice sent a single chill down the column of your spine. Herbie’s robotic hand reached out for yours, ceasing the endless wringing of your hands together. You took it without hesitation, though you wished in your heart it was someone else’s hand holding yours in this moment.

“Hold your loved ones close, and speak the words you’ve been afraid to speak. Use this time to rejoice, and celebrate, for your time is short. I herald his beginning…I herald your end…I herald, Galactus.”

And thus began the longest night of your life since the day your colleagues went into space and came back forever changed.

Sending the team into space was the only option, to confront this mystery at its source. Reed had given you the basics in passing: the threat was real, there was documentation of plants across the universe disappearing entirely, the chrome woman’s signature left on each of them. He’d tasked you to the launch team, to prepare Excelsior for launch in T-16 hours.

Hold your loved ones close, and speak the words you’ve been afraid to speak.

Those words rattled around your brain the entire night, into the wee hours of the morning. Even as you helped Lynn set up the press conference, as you conferred with the launch team to ensure that the Excelsior was prepared in every conceivable way, as you checked and double-checked every data point throughout the entire ship, her words never left you.

Hold your loved ones close, and speak the words you’ve been afraid to speak.

The anxiety was clawing at you, even as you threw yourself into work. The notion of what her words meant, of what could happen, of how close the end could be.

The clock read sometime around 2 a.m. when you had finally stepped foot in that guest room made for you. There was no way you were walking home tonight. Besides, come morning, there would still be too much to do, too many data points that needed to be checked, too many scenarios that would need to be run through to make sure your team came back to you.

You knew sleep wasn’t coming to you, though, not when that metallic voice was rattling around your head. Not when an alien threat was upending your life. Not when, two doors away, there was a man that you did, in fact, want to hold close…in case you never got the chance to again.

You loved him. All it took was the end of the world to admit it.

Clad in nothing but an old t-shirt with the 4 logo on the front, one you were sure was Johnny’s, and a pair of shorts, you didn’t care what you looked like as you tore out of the room and into the hallway. Not now, not when your world was being threatened, not when your entire life could be ripped from you in a matter of seconds.

Johnny was awake, just as you knew he would be. White shirt, plaid blue pants you’d seen him sleep in so many times, he stood in his dark room by the windows once more, watching the crews rush around on the ground as they prepared the ship for launch in just a few hours. That same record from earlier in the day was still playing.

I guess I'll never know the reason why you love me as you do. That's the wonder, the wonder of you.

With a step into the room, shutting the door behind you and flicking on the lamp just beside the door, Johnny finally met your eyes.

“I couldn’t sleep,” was the only thing you could manage to say. Johnny tilted his head, studying you silently, before he held out his hand just as he had done hours before.

“Come here,”

Crossing the room in a matter of moments, you all but fell into his arms. His outstretched hand ignored, he was frozen in place for just a moment as you curled your arms around his neck, throwing yourself into his arms. The faint smell of his cologne lingered, as did his bodywash, and the sigh you let out the second the smell hit you was in comfort.

It didn’t take Johnny long to unfreeze, his arms finding their place around your waist. One hand rested on your upper back, one pressing into your lower back. A faint kiss was placed to the side of your head, heat lingering for a second. Heat lingered in your entire body, radiating off of him in waves.

“You have to talk to me, baby,”

Talk? The truth was, you didn’t know where to start. How were you supposed to explain that, since the moment you had met Johnny Storm, your heart was already his. That in all your moments over the years, you’d fallen for the man you told yourself not to fall for. And as the threat from the metallic woman loomed over the world, as he prepared to try and save life as you knew it, the only thing you wanted was to be held by him. To know he was here, that he was okay, that he was with you.

“I-I’m scared,”

Those were the only words you could settle on. Johnny pulled back, his hands sliding gently around the fabric of the shirt hanging loosely from your body until they reached your face. He cradled you, so softly and gently in his hands, it was almost involuntary the way you closed your eyes and leaned into his touch, his warmth, chasing the feeling of security it brought you.

“It’s okay to be,” the gentle tone in his voice washed over you, covering you like a blanket. It’s exactly how he had spoken to you that day, standing in the rain when you refused to leave your mother’s side, reassuring you he was there. “I don’t care what the herald said, I’m not going to let anything happen to you. You know that, right?”

Of course you knew that. If there was anything you knew for certain in this world, it was that when Johnny Storm said he’d protect you, he meant it. He’d spent long enough proving that to you.

There was no hesitation on your part when you laid your own hands overtop of his. Fingers curling around them, tugging his right hand just barely from your cheek, you turned and pressed the lightest of kisses to the palm of his hand.

Johnny froze. You could feel it. The slight tilt of his head, the questioning look that flickered across his face in the moonlight that shone through the windows. It was all fair. You were never the one to cross the boundary like this, to make a move such as this.

“I can’t stop thinking about what she said,” was how you tried to explain yourself, stopping and starting your sentence over and over as you tried to find the right way to explain yourself, the walls crumbling and the floodgates bursting wide open. “Hold your loved ones close, and speak the words you’ve been afraid to speak…it’s why I came to you.”

A single emotion crossed Johnny’s face in seconds: understanding.

That signature smirk of his was back in moments, even if it was twinged with a softness reserved only for you. The heat left your cheeks, but found your hands as Johnny’s fingers intertwined with yours, hanging your joined hands down between you both. There was a bright light that passed over the window for just a moment, bathing the two of you in bright light, before you were plunged back into the darkness of his room yet again.

“You did come to me…why’s that?”

“You know why-”

“I do,” he said it so matter-of-factly, that smirk growing just a tad as he leaned into your personal bubble by just a hair. “This push and pull, four years of ‘will they’ or ‘won’t they.’ I want to hear you say it, baby.”

“It’s not that easy,” you immediately shook your head, teeth gnawing at your bottom lip as Johnny simply watched you. “Saying it…makes it real.”

He scoffed, the sound mixed with laughter, as his head cocked slightly more to the side.

“You came into my bedroom at 2 in the morning–wearing my shirt, might I add–is that not real enough?”

“When you’ve spent years trying to ignore how you feel and refusing to say it, it’s not that easy to say,” you desperately tried to explain. “If I say it…then everything changes.”

Johnny took barely another step forward, and you almost wanted to step back, to bring back the space between you and preserve the small, crumbling wall that still stood between you both.

“A sexy, naked alien woman came to earth and basically prophesied our demise, darling. If there was ever a time to ‘change everything’ and lay it all on the line, I think it’s now,”

Your heart wanted to hang onto the word darling, but your brain was too stuck on the ‘sexy, naked alien woman’ part of his sentence. The sigh that escaped you was instantaneous, as well as the frown, as you shot the blonde man a pointed look.

“Sexy, naked alien woman, Johnny? Seriously?”

“Come on! She was–objectively–attractive. You can’t deny that!”

It was your turn to scoff, tearing your hands from his in a heartbeat, before spinning on your heel. You felt like an idiot–on the precipice of finally confessing your deepest, darkest secret you’d kept locked away for years, and this is what you got.

“I try to be serious with you, Johnny, and you turn it into a joke once again-”

You didn’t get far from him. A hand enveloped your upper arm mid sentence, tugging and spinning your back around. A gasp fell from your lips as you collided with the chest of the man before you.

Whatever you were going to say never saw the light of day. Not when Johnny Storm gripped at your hips, tugged you as impossibly close as he could, and finally–finally–kissed you.

The kiss you’d dreamed about for four years, finally yours.

Johnny’s lips were soft as they slanted against your own, enveloping you in his warmth. They moved against you in a steady rhythm, passionate but still gentle, still testing the waters of the line you had never crossed before. 

His hands curled into the fabric of the t-shirt clinging to your body, pushing it up just enough so that his hands could dip underneath. Your breath caught, even as his lips continued to move against yours, as his heated skin made contact with yours, and any part of your brain begging you to stop this was silenced as you melted into him.

Hands landed on his broad chest, gripping the fabric as you let him mold your body to his, the scent of his bodywash enveloping you as your body almost became one with him. In the pits of your stomach, as those heated hands trailed up your waist and ghosted over your ribcage, another flurry of butterflies erupted as a moan slipped past your lips, swallowed by his mouth.

A moan left Johnny’s lips at the sound of your own, one hand leaving your waist to curl around the back of your neck. Those slender fingers buried themselves into your hair, gripping just enough to have another groan of pleasure tumbling from your lips, as he guided your mouth against his own.

“You can’t keep making little noises like that,” his mouth barely left yours as he spoke, lips moving against yours, as he dove back in for another kiss the second he was done speaking.

“Your fault,” was all you could manage out, trying to back away just enough to speak, but Johnny never let your lips go far. Your hands glided up his chest, his neck, curling into his short hair as your thumb crested the ridge of his ear. “I’m trying to be mad at you.”

“Be mad at me later,” was his immediate response, his lips leaving yours just to find their place along your jawline and slide down into the hollow of your neck. His tongue danced its way across your skin, leaving tingles of electricity everywhere he touched you, his words murmured into your neck as he buried himself there. “I’m trying to kiss you.”

There was some part of you that wanted to protest him–over what, you weren’t even sure at this point–but you couldn’t. Not when his teeth dug just so into the side of your neck, leaving his mark on your skin as if he was claiming you as his.

You were always his.

“You c-called–oh god–you called the alien sexy while I was trying to confess,” you just barely managed to get the words out through your moans. Johnny was slowly walking you backward, straight in the direction of his bed while his lips never left the side of your neck, leaving his mark on every inch of skin he could see.

Your foot caught on the raised edge of the platform his seating area sat on, your feet stumbling backward. Johnny was there–he was always there–and tugged you back into him. And god, if you loved those blue eyes before, you loved them even more now: pupils blown wide, Johnny Storm looked about as wrecked as you felt.

“Your confession was four years late, and I’m impatient,” he stole another kiss from you, his teeth sinking just barely into your bottom lip, tugging gently. He let go, pressing a messy kiss to your lips to soothe the pain of his bite, words fanning out over your lips. “I’ve been trying to tell you I’m in love with you for four years now, so please just shut up and let me show you instead. Now–jump.”

At this point, you’d do just about anything he asked of you.

Johnny caught you with ease, both of his hands splayed out across the bare skin of your thighs, locking your legs around his hips. A choked moan fell from your lips the second your core was dragged against the painfully hard length bulging against his own pants, hands curling into his hair as you, this time, desperately pulled him into a kiss.

I’m in love with you. Those words repeated like a mantra in your head. Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, the world’s fire boy and hero that they painted like a sex symbol. The ‘playboy’ with a new girl all the time, never able to hold down a girl…was in love with you.

Your back hit the bed, body bouncing just slightly before settling. His eyes never left you as you crawled back just slightly, propping yourself up on your elbows to look up at him in the dark of the room, lit only by sky and the lamp by the door. The music played faintly in the background, but at this moment, it meant nothing to you.

Johnny’s hands gently touched your knees from where they dangled off the edge of the bed, parting them just so in order to step between them. You watched, entranced by every move he made, body flushed from the heat that coursed through your bare skin at the slightest of touches from him. With a practiced ease, his hand took hold of the back of his shirt, yanking it over his head without hesitation. It found a place to lay somewhere across the room, discarded until the following morning.

It was impossible not to stare. His broad chest, those biceps that always threatened to bulge out of every shirt he wore. His toned abdomen and the trail of hair that led straight to the waistband of his pants, the outline of him still prevalent and straining against the fabric.

“I need to know that you’re sure…about this,” you weren’t used to it, the vulnerability in Johnny’s tone. He leaned over you now, hands splayed across the bed on either side of you, barely a few inches from your face. Those blue eyes flickered down to your lips time and time again. “Because if I kiss you again, I’m not stopping until you’re mine.”

There was no hesitation on your part. Just a single movement of your arms, tossing the old shirt hanging from your upper body across the room to join his. As simple as that, you sat bare before him, chest heaving with every deep breath you took in.

“I was already yours. I always have been,” there was only certainty in your tone as you held his gaze. “Speak the words you’ve been afraid to speak…that’s why I came to you. Because if this is the end of the world, I needed you to know that I love-”

He didn’t let you finish your words. His next kiss was anything but gentle.

Messy, spit coating your lips as Johnny’s tongue seemed to invade your mouth and every one of your senses, his lips devoured yours as if you were his first meal in decades. He kissed with the hunger of a starved man, his hands grasping at every part of your skin they could–your waist, your hip, before finally your ass. The squeeze he gave to your skin, the uptick in heat you felt as if he was burning himself just slightly hotter on purpose, had another moan tumbling from your lips and into his mouth.

The hand still gripping your ass tugged you upward on the bed until your head fell against the silk pillows at the headboard. Your hands never left Johnny’s hair, carding through the strands as you frantically kissed him back, addicted to the feeling, as his hips ground into yours. That bulge in his pants pressed heavenly into your core, the friction rolling your eyes into the back of your head as you let your head fall to the pillows with a moan.

Johnny’s lips were everywhere. From your jawline, to your neck, until they finally reached your collarbone. He lavished you with his lips, tongue running over your skin as his hands trailed up the sides of your lower abdomen, stopping just as they reached the swell of your breasts.

“Since the day you walked in, I’ve thought about this,” his voice was raspy, the words barely understood as they were spoken against your skin. “Since the moment Reed introduced you to us.”

“I-I was wearing a lab coat,” you choked on your words as Johnny’s lips reached your sternum, trailing kissing down your chest, but never where you wanted him. “Hardly sexy, I’d argue.”

“It is when I’m picturing you in that coat and your heels, and nothing else,” he tacked on, before his lips wrapped around your nipple without warning.

You mewled at the sudden contact, one hand returning to his hair on instinct as your back arched off the bed and into him. Johnny’s hand on your abdomen was quick to push you back down, holding you down against the bedding beneath you.

God, with the fire that felt like it was burning through your body, you could’ve sworn that Johnny had caught you on fire. His teeth just barely grazed the sensitive bud in his mouth, a sharp intake of breath leaving your lips on instinct. He was quick to soothe you, tongue swirling around the erect and sensitive bud with rapt attention. A moan slipped through him, felt through your entire body, as your other hand tore into the bedding. Desperate for something to hold onto. Something to ground you in your pleasure.

“I’ve dreamed about you under me. Kissing you, tasting you, loving you,” his practically purred out every single word, tongue flicking back and forth over your sensitive nipple. He moved to the other one easily, delivering the same rapt attention to it.

“I’ve thought about you, too,” you relented, divulging every secret you held dear to the man who lavished every inch of you in love and adoration. “In the kitchen, the lab, in that stupid button up from earlier-”

“I knew you liked that shirt. Wore it just for you,” his husky tone sent another shot of pleasure through you, heat curling through every inch of your body.

The tips of his fingers trailed lightly down your stomach. When Johnny’s head lifted for just a moment to lock his eyes with yours, that familiar smirk on his face, you weren’t given a second to react before heat poured through his touch.

Gasps mixed with moans of pleasure fell from your lips on instinct, that unnatural heat of his pouring through his touch and into your skin. Every movement of his fingers over your ribcage and down your abdomen felt as if it was leaving your skin on fire, branding his touch into your skin so that you would never forget the feeling. Burning him into your memory so that you would always feel the phantom sensations of his touch on your skin.

“You’re absolute perfection, you always have been,” Johnny moaned into your skin, lips trailing over the mounds of your breasts with another series of a thousand kisses. Those heated fingers dipped past the waistband of your shorts, pressing directly against your clothed clit without a warning. The moan you let escape mixed in the air with the moan that tumbled from Johnny’s lips against your skin. “Jesus Christ, baby, you’re so soaked.”

The heat was still there in his fingers, setting off every little nerve ending in you even through the soaked fabric of your panties that you desperately wanted gone. Your hips ground up into his hand, whimpers falling from your lips as you chased after the feeling of him, desperate for friction.

“All for you,” even this hint of pleasure had you stumbling toward the edge, babbling almost incoherently. With a tug to his hair, you were quick to bring Johnny’s lips back to yours, arms wound around his neck. He gave into your needs immediately, devouring you in a kiss as heated as his touch was, fingers rubbing slow circles over where you needed him so desperately. “Please–Johnny, please! Please, I need you. Need you–need you so bad.”

“I got you, baby. I got you. Keep moaning my name like that, and I’ll give you the world”

Those whispered words stayed on your lips, lingering, as Johnny left you. His touch wasn’t gone long. Fingers curling into your shorts, they were discarded across the room in a flash, panties gone with them as well.

For the first time, you laid completely bare in front of the man you loved–the man you denied loving for so long. And Johnny Storm was a mess. His hair stuck up in multiple directions, skin flushed, but he was still beautiful. The most beautiful man you’d ever met, inside and out.

Johnny didn’t give you a second to truly breathe once he was done admiring you. He sprawled out along the end of the bed, head dipping between your thighs, as he licked a single stripe with his flattened tongue directly up your center.

“Fucking beautiful, and all mine,” his words were growled into your core, two fingers lazily moving between your folds and spreading every ounce of wetness around, holding you open so he could see every inch of you. “Sweeter than I ever dreamed you could be.”

He dove into you like you were the only thing that mattered. Fingers spreading you open, giving him access to every square inch, his mouth devoured you. A cool drink of water for a starving man in the middle of the desert. Johnny moved his tongue with precise expertise, as if he knew exactly what your body craved.

Delving into you, flicking back and forth as he drank in every secretion of arousal that dripped from you. That same tongue dragged its way up to your clit, swirling around in figure eights, flicking back and forth.

Cries fell from your lips wantonly, hands digging into his hair. Eyes fluttered shut, head tilted back to the ceiling, there was only one word you could repeat over and over again: Johnny, Johnny, Johnny. 

His name was all you knew anymore, too lost in your own bliss and pleasure.

In one fell swoop, your thighs were settled over his shoulders, before his head was back where you wanted it more than anything. His lips and tongue focused on your clit, still swirling back and forth, as his fingers dipped slightly lower, dancing right across your opening.

It started with one long, slender finger sliding into you. One of your hands was forced to leave Johnny’s hair, falling over your own mouth to try and conceal the cry that threatened to burst from you, afraid that the others would hear you.

“Let me hear you, baby,” he laughed against your core, his finger curling just perfectly against your walls as they clenched around him every time he dragged his finger back and forth. “Want to hear you.”

“Don’t want to–fucking hell, Johnny–let the others hear,” 

“Let them. Let them hear me love you,”

Fuck Johnny Storm and his stupid lines. His stupid dirty talk that had your walls clenching around him again and again.

Another finger joined the first, followed by another, before you were stretched as wide as you could be around Johnny. The squelch of your juices rung through the air with every move of his fingers–dragging so deliciously into you, curling up, before dragging out just to the edge of your opening. His mouth–god, his mouth–never let up, lapping away at your core like it was his job, what he was meant to do.

That coil of pleasure deep within your lower body came out of nowhere, sneaking up on you just like your love for this man had.

“Johnny–baby–I can’t. I can’t–I’m gonna-”

“Let go, darling,” came that growl in his voice again, the speed of his fingers increasing. “I got you baby, let go.”

That coil snapped in seconds after he spoke. The precipice of your orgasm was earth-shattering, like you’d never felt before. Like trails of fire through your veins, the pleasure coursing through you had your head buried into the pillow behind your head, desperately trying to conceal the wails of pleasure that tumbled from your lips. Your thighs snapped shut around Johnny’s head, but his ministrations never let up as he eagerly drank up every bit of your arousal that leaked from you.

The come down was slow, like waking up. Your breath was uneven, heart beating erratically when you finally pulled your head from the pillow. Eyes bleary, it took a moment to blink them back to life.

Johnny stood at the edge of the bed, discarding his pants and boxers to the pile of clothing littering the other side of the room. And even in your fucked-out, blissful state, one look at him for the first time had that burning desire coursing back through your veins.

He was big. There was no way around it, no denying it, no other way to put it. Flushed, hanging with that beautiful reddened tip, one large and prominent vein throbbing along the edge of it. Beads of precum collected at the tip, his hand smearing it down along his length as he gave himself one single pump before he was crawling back onto the bed.

Johnny knelt between your legs again. Even with limbs that felt like Jell-O, you met him halfway, dragging yourself into a seated position. It was the smile on his face right now, the one erupting those butterflies once more, that you decided was your favorite: soft, adoring, loving.

It was your hands that cupped his cheeks, bringing him into a soft kiss. The taste of you lingered on his lips, sweet just like he said. You poured every ounce of emotion into your kiss, trying to convey to him the years you’d spent loving him so quietly that you couldn’t admit it.

“I might be addicted to you, Johnny Storm,” your words were mumbled into his lips. He laughed so gently, stealing another peck.

“Glad you finally caught up with me, princess, I’ve been addicted since day one,”

Pressed to him, his lips stealing a thousand pecks from yours, the lust in your bones was back in full force. All you could do was hum in response, one of your hands trailing down his chest, nails dragging slowly over his abdomen, before you finally took his throbbing cock in your hand.

He felt even bigger than he looked, which didn’t even make sense in your mind. But he was hot, the skin searing into your hand in the best way. You gave him one squeeze, one tug, and you smiled at the hitch in his breath. The twitch of his cock in your hold.

Johnny’s hand quickly grabbed yours, though, unlatching it from him. All you could do was shake your head, practically whining as you tried to take your hand back.

“Johnny-”

“God, it’s so hot how eager you are to touch me,” he laughed again, tilting his head to leave a single kiss to the column of your throat. “This is about you, doll. Save that for next time. It can be a ‘welcome home from space’ gift for me. A ‘thanks for saving the world’ gift, if you will.”

Space. 

That word was enough to have your next words caught in your throat as the weight of everything came crashing back down on you. The threat, the herald, the space launch commencing in a matter of hours now, the events that brought you here in the first place.

You weren’t sure when you started crying, when a single tear slipped down your cheek, but Johnny caught it. Eyes full of concern, but understanding, he simply wiped the tears from your cheek, laying a kiss to the wet splotch of your skin.

“No crying, none of that. Just lay back, baby,”

You listened, letting his hands guide you gently to rest back against the pillows once more. Parting your legs, Johnny placed himself between them, holding himself up over your body on his forearms. Right where he belonged.

Your hands rested on his chest, sliding up so gently to his neck. His eyes never left yours, his length sitting right against your soaked and sensitive core, gliding back and forth with each gentle twitch of his hips.

“You didn’t let me say it earlier. So let me say it, for the first time outloud,” you gave him a watery smile, lips quivering as you looked up at him. “I love you, Johnny Storm. I’ve loved you for so long. I’m sorry it took the world maybe ending for this, that I didn’t let myself be yours sooner.

He smiled, that same charming smile he always did, as he rolled his hips once more. His cock caught just along the edge of your opening as Johnny dipped down, breath fanning over your lips.

“Like you said: you’ve always been mine,”

The first press of his length into your core stung. As wet as you were, as prepared as you were for him, it had been so long. He stretched your walls little by little, taking his time as your body adjusted to him. Then, inch by inch, he sunk within your walls that clung to him tightly.

His cock bottomed out, sunk fully within you, bare hips pressed to bare hips as you both let out shaky breaths. Your nails dug into the hair at the nape of his neck while his hands trailed up your ribcage, squeezing every moment or so as choked out moans fell from his lips.

“God–so tight for me, baby–you feel like heaven,”

His name was the only thing you could manage to choke out between your moans as he dragged himself back to the tip, before burying himself again to the hilt. Your moans, your cries and the way your hands threaded into his hair only spurred him on more, Johnny’s hips snapping into yours again and again and again.

His lips found yours amidst every snap of his hips, every drag of his cock against your walls. Every moan that slipped through your lips was drowned out by him, by the feverish movements of his lips against yours. They trailed away, back to your neck, leaving a trail of saliva connecting you together as he bit another love bite into the side of your neck. It didn’t matter to you how this would look to others, how scandalous you might look in the light of day to others.

All that mattered was Johnny Storm.

“Oh god, Johnny!” your head fell to his shoulder, teeth sinking into his skin as his hips snapped against yours over and over, driving him deeper with every thrust into you. “Holy fuck, w-why weren’t we doing this for years?”

“Because you’ve been a stubborn–fuck–little tease all these years,” his tongue dragged up the column of your throat, peppering kissing up and down your skin as his cock dragged against your walls. “Bent over your workstation in the lab–oh god–you don’t know how many times I’ve thought about it. Thought about walking in and taking you right there, making a mess right at your desk.”

“R-Reed would walk in and you’d scar him for life,”

“Sounds like a win-win to me,” there was shared laughter, punctuated with a shared moan as his cock dragged right against that spot nestled within you. “And try not to talk about my brother-in-law when I’m fucking you.”

There was no time to reply as Johnny scooped up your wrists in his hand in a single motion, pinning them down above your head. He adjusted your waist, suddenly driving into you at a new angle that had you mewling his name all over again.

Johnny whispered your name into your skin with every kiss, timed just so with every snap of his hips against yours. That coil of heat was burning, wounding itself tighter and tighter for the second time that night. All you could feel was him, was Johnny.

His warmth, the heat that burned off of him. It warmed your skin, it had beads of sweat dripping down your forehead. It was uncomfortable in the best way. His one hand still trailed up and down your ribcage, every so often tweaking your sensitive nipple between his thumb and index finger and coaxing another moan of pleasure from you.

He worshiped you, every inch of you, like you were the greatest thing to ever grace the earth. To him, you might have been

“Fucking perfect, baby. Fucking made for me,” his lips found yours again, slick with spit as his tongue dipped into your mouth to taste every inch of you possible.

His stroke faltered, the rhythm uneven, and you knew he was close. That coil of heat in your stomach was threatening to snap any second every time his cock pulsed and throbbed within your walls. His grip on your wrists was tight, even as you struggled against him, desperate to just hold him.

“Johnny–baby–please I-I’m so close-”

You choked on your words once more, the hand still trailing across your stomach heating up again, leaving a burning trail of heat in your skin. Those heated fingers found your clit like it was second nature, a cry of pure pleasure leaving your lips as they circle that bundle of a thousand nerves over and over again, hips still snapping into you as quickly and desperately as they can.

“Let go,” his voice was husky, eyes blown wide as he looked down at you. Your wrists were finally let go, your hands immediately finding their place in the strands of his hair again as his free hand cups the back of your neck, smashing your lips into his in a flurry of moans. “Let go, baby, let go.”

Your second climax burned hotter than the first.

The pleasure burned so hot, so bright, you were practically sobbing, every cry and moan of pure bliss muffled by his kiss. Your legs locked around Johnny’s waist–tightly–so tight he could barely move away from you. It was overwhelming, the shockwaves of bliss that ran through your veins, the shaking of your thighs as you held onto his hair like it’s a lifeline.

He ground himself into you over and over, rhythm so far gone he was struggling. But all it took was your lips lazily finding his neck, teeth sinking in to leave your matching mark to his, for his hips to still as he spilt into you.

Johnny breathed out every moan into the side of your head, your name tumbling from his lips along with a flurry of swears. The grip he had on your hip was bruising, so tight you think he could snap the damn bone if he held any tighter. And his cock? Seated so deeply inside of you it’s as if you are one, heat pooled within your lower abdomen with every wave of cum that filled you to the brim.

On the other side of the room, the record was still playing softly. Bright lights still flashed by the windows every so often, crews still at work on the spaceship set for launch by mid-morning.

None of it mattered in the silence of the bed.

You aren’t sure how long either of you laid there. Your heartbeat, eventually, returned to normal, even as your chest still heaved to take in every breath that it could. Johnny still laid half on top of you, pressing repeated kisses to the side of your head, but said nothing. Your hand stayed in his hair, carding through it, as your core pulsed. It would ache come morning–hell, it already did–but it was worth it. It was so worth it.

Neither of you were quite sure when he pulled out of you, or how long you simply laid there and basked in the afterglow of a moment that should’ve happened years ago.

Eventually, Johnny shifted down. His lips trailed down your body in worship, like they’d done already that night. From your cheek, to your neck, your collarbone, the swell of your breasts, and down your lower abdomen.

“Careful…not sure I’d survive a round three,” your voice was hoarse, mouth dry. Johnny laughed against your skin, still kissing every inch he could see.

“I don’t think I would, either,”

His hands were heated once more, but not for the same purpose as moments before. Now, his touch was gentle, massaging every piece of you that he could get his hands on. His thumbs rubbed into your wrists, your waist, and your hips, digging into the muscles. A sigh escaped you at the comforting feeling, taut muscles loosening at the feeling of the heat and the movement of his hands.

With every kiss pressed to your skin, you could feel it: Johnny was humming. It didn’t take long to know which song he was humming, which lyrics: that same song once again.

I guess I'll never know the reason why, you love me as you do. That's the wonder, the wonder of you.

“Is that our song now?” you laughed, even if your heart was clenching at the mere thought. The mere idea of that song belonging to the two of you–the idea that Johnny Storm belonged to you.

You could feel his smile against your abdomen as he spoke. “It should be. It’s accurate. Because I don’t ever think I’ll get over the miracle that is you…loving me.”

It’s not a miracle. What you really want to tell him is that falling in love with him was so easy, you barely realized you had done it. It might be the easiest thing you’ve ever done.

Johnny crawled back up your body, slotting himself onto the bed beside you, before tugging you in. There’s no hesitation on your part, simply curling into his side with your head over his chest and arm slung around his waist. Words aren’t needed in the silence, not when you’ve both clearly laid everything out on the table now. Instead, you just listened to the beat of his heart, the natural rhythm that lulls you into a state of peacefulness.

He’s yours. Johnny Storm is yours. He’s always been yours, you just didn’t know it.

He pressed a kiss to your forehead, hand cradling the back of your head as he said his next words confidently.

“We’re going to go up there tomorrow, and we’re going to stop this guy. We’re going to protect this Earth, like we’ve sworn to do. But me? I’m going to do it so I can come home to you, and love you for the rest of my life. I promise,”

He can’t promise that, you knew he couldn’t. There was no telling what might happen when that ship took off tomorrow, what they might encounter, or who this Galactus really was.

But Johnny Storm loved you. For now, in the quiet of the night, just between the two of you, that’s enough.

[maximoff-pan]

weapons don't dream | john walker

summary: You and John Walker have a past — you're a mind-reading ex-Hydra assassin and he's a disgraced soldier — similar in one too many ways. When forced to work together, old ghosts resurface, sparks ignite, and the line between enemy and something more begins to blur.

pairing: john walker x fem!reader

word count: 2.6k

warning(s): enemies to whatever the hell this is, angst, mentions of violence, slightly dark, comfort fic — possibly a very screwed up timeline that makes absolutely no sense (sue me, marvel is too complicated for me)

a/n: hello there! Long time no see haha...This is my first attempt at diving into the thunderbolts universe (which I have totally fallen in love with)... I hope you all enjoy this quick little fic! Feedback is always appreciated <3

New Avengers Tower, 2027.

The Thunderbolts compound smells like gunpowder, sweat and recycled air. A place you once called home reduced to a mere mimicry of its former glory – now devoid of all the people that once made it so. Its body…its bones still look the same…but its organs are missing. 

Bile rises up your throat. You can’t help but hate it already.

The walls are sterile, everything’s matte black and seemingly made of soulless steel. There's a chill in the air that doesn’t come from the AC but from the place itself—like the ghosts of bad decisions still linger. There’s no traces of Tony’s greatness or the visions he had for this tower. Nothing but the stench of business business business – lifeless and cold. It’s like everything you once knew is gone. All that’s left behind are the shadows of your past, one only you can remember.

You wonder how Bucky can stomach it. How he can work with this team knowing what it once was – knowing that even the greatest of heroes couldn’t make it out alive – let alone a group of morally grey individuals whose abilities to work as a team, you seriously question. 

Undoubtedly, they’re a ticking time bomb. One that Sam has warned you against joining, and yet, you can’t let your curiosities die. Always yearning for a little danger. 

You’ve only just arrived when the briefing room door swings open. And of course he’s the first one you see.

John Walker—U.S. Agent. Patriot. Killer. Whatever they’re calling him these days…whatever branding Valentina is using to polish the blood off. 

He stops cold when your eyes meet. Not in shock, not even in regret. There’s something more dangerous floating across his cerulean orbs. Like familiarity wrapped in friction. Just that tight expression of someone biting down on something too bitter to say aloud.

“Well, shit.” He mutters. “They let you in?”

You don’t answer. You don't even bother dignifying it with a smile. You already know what he’s thinking.

His thoughts come in low and sharp.

‘Still cold. Still reading minds. Still dangerous.’

You let him feel your presence scrape along his mind’s edges. Not enough to intrude, just enough to remind him: you're still here. And you're still listening.

He flinches when he realizes you heard him. Good. Let him flinch.

“Nice to see you too, Walker.” You say completely unenthused, dropping your go-bag beside a chair. “Didn’t think you’d be the Thunderbolts’ official welcoming committee.”

“I’m not.” He grunts. “But I guess someone’s gotta make sure you don’t stab anyone before you meet the rest of the team.”

You arch an eyebrow. “Tempting.”

Silence oozes with tension as you take a seat at the table in front of you, gaze trained solely on him. John’s doing a good job keeping his thoughts shielded from you – something he’d always struggled to maintain. 

His stare breaks from yours, and a sigh passes from his lips. Apprehensive. Curious.

“So what, does Barnes just dig you up every time the assignment smells like Hydra?” He asks, dropping into a chair across from you.

You shrug off your jacket, revealing the shoulder holster beneath. “Better than digging up another American PR disaster.”

He huffs a bitter laugh. You don’t look at him again, but you can feel the weight of him—his thoughts, his regrets, the bruised, barely patched ego that still aches from everything he lost in that goddamn suit. Because of the shield.

You were there when he wore it. When he fell apart in it.

Madripoor. 2023. The rooftop.

He was bleeding from the mouth, hands shaking, and you watched him pace like a caged animal, the blood of that man still drying on his knuckles.

John was spiralling. You knew the signs—you'd lived them. Years ago, in another life, in what felt like another body.

“You don’t know what it’s like.” He snapped.

You didn’t flinch, staring at him calmly, even as his presence loomed. “Don’t I?”

You let your walls drop just enough for him to feel it—your past, your training, the blood on your hands. The screams. The pain you didn’t ask for. For just a second, you let your mind touch his—like the graze of a knife across skin. Not deep enough to bleed. Just enough to show him the flash of what you once were.

The reprogramming. The red room. The memories that weren’t yours but lived inside you anyway. The manipulation. The misuse of your powers—used to hurt the people you cared for most. 

He went still.

He stared at you for a long time after that. Said nothing. Didn’t need to.

‘It’s going to be okay.’ You spoke into his mind, repeating it like a prayer he needed to hear. 

For one second, he saw you. And you saw him. This was the first time he looked at you like a person. And the last time you’d see him for nearly four years. 

Then everything went to hell, and the government gave him a new shield and a black suit and told him to behave. John Walker—a trained soldier—didn’t want to follow those orders. But what choice did he have?

And you? You went underground. For four years.

Until Bucky called. The New Avengers – a chance at a new home. A chance at redemption.

Dahlonega, Georgia. 2027.

Valentina helps make the mission assignments, much to your (and Bucky’s) dismay. She seems to have an obsession pairing you with Walker. Maybe it’s because she can sense the history between you—the glaring dislike you have for one another is a crumbling facade.  

You don’t hate him because of who he is. You hate him because he’s too much like you. Your own self-hatred has left John Walker at a disadvantage. 

They've send you both to extract a rogue HYDRA biochemist hiding in Georgia. Rural, backwoods, half-flooded farmland. A decaying plantation house tucked behind a screen of swamp trees and slow-draining rivers.

You hate the symmetry. You hate the assignment.

You hate that it’s just the two of you. That leaves you vulnerable.

“I’ll take point,” John says as the quinjet descends.

“No.” You snap, already checking your gear. “You’re too loud. I'll go first.”

He rolls his eyes. “Jesus. Are you still pulling the lone wolf crap?”

You glance at him. “I don’t like being shot because you can’t shut up.”

The pilot makes a show of not hearing.

You drop from the jet into wet grass, your boots sinking into the mud like the land itself is trying to swallow you. The air smells like mildew and rot. You ghost through the tree line, eyes sharp, mind open just wide enough to catch stray thoughts drifting in the mist.

The compound is buried behind a cornfield, stalks yellowed and rotting from stagnant water. Vines curl over rusted fencing. Drones buzz faintly overhead, but you dispatch one with a silenced shot before it can alert the perimeter.

You signal Walker to move. Valentina had put you in charge – a fact John refuses to admit to himself. He hates that it makes sense.

He approaches from the southern fence line—less subtle than you, but fast. Efficient. You both converge at the target's front steps.

“Basement lab.” You murmur. “Underground. Reinforced. One heat signature. Two upstairs.”

“Copy that.” He says gruffly. He doesn’t question how you know. He’s learned not to. Even in the short time you’ve been back in his life, he feels like he’s known you forever.

He supposes he has. Outside of Bucky, he’s known you longer than anyone on the team.

You breach from the roof—silent, practiced, a shard of darkness slipping through rotted rafters. You land light on your feet and sweep the hall.

Glass from the skylight cuts your forearm, but adrenaline surges. Below, Walker busts in through the ground-level entrance, clearing the stairwell like a battering ram. That had been exactly the plan. 

You move in tandem. Like a dance choreographed by grudging familiarity. You clear the top floor while he moves to extract the target.

You round a corner—And then: static. Your radio hisses. Your head pulses.

Something’s off.

An unnatural hum surges in your skull, vibrating at the edge of your telepathy like barbed wire.

“Walker.” You hiss into the comm, but there’s no answer.

You take the stairs two at a time. The basement door is ajar. You step into a white, sterile hallway—

—then everything explodes.

You don’t hear it. You feel it. The floor bucks, the air implodes. Fire licks up the stairwell. Heat and pressure slam into your body like a truck.

You hit the ground with a sickening thud, shoulder screaming, ribs cracking against concrete. There’s glass in your thigh and the taste of blood in your mouth.

Your vision sways. Your ears ring. And then, barely, just as the world goes dark—

“Hey—HEY! Stay with me—don’t you dare—”

John screams your name. Not your code name. Not a title.

Your name.

His voice.

John.

Back at the compound, you sit on a gurney in the infirmary, arm stitched, pride shattered. Head absolutely pouding. You’ve just woken up, unaware of how long you’ve been out. It has to have been hours. 

John leans against the wall, arms crossed, bruised and breathing heavy. He looks like he hasn’t moved since dragging you from the basement in Georgia.

You haven’t said a word since awakening.

“You could say thank you, ya know?”” He murmurs as a joke.

You surprise him when you respond with a quiet and genuine thank you John. He wasn’t expecting you to listen—wasn’t expecting you to be so nice after almost dying. 

You sit up, wincing at the movement. “How bad is it?” You don’t know if you’re asking about his injuries or yours.

“I’m fine, just a couple scrapes and superficial bruises.” His arms are crossed as he takes a step toward you, gesturing to your physique. “The Doctor says you’ve got a dislocated shoulder and a minor concussion. I helped take care of it—popped that baby right back in place.”

You blink at him. “You took care of me?”

He shrugs. “Don’t look so surprised.”

Silence. Then: “Why?” You ask. Quiet. “Why did you pull me out?”

His jaw clenches. “Because I’ve seen enough people die on me. Especially ones who know what it’s like to be used up and tossed away.”

That silences you. Because under the anger and ego, you remember what lives in him.

Shame. Guilt. Loss. The same things you carry in your chest like weapons.

You look away.

His voice is softer now. “I didn’t forget what happened in Madripoor. You didn’t look at me like everyone else did.”

“I saw what you were capable of.”

“Yeah, and you didn’t run.”

“No,” you say, voice breaking just slightly, “because I’m capable of it too.”

Silence.

And just like that, his mind opens up for half a second, unguarded. You feel the way he’s always looked at you—with resentment, sure, but also curiosity. Attraction. Fear.

He doesn’t hate you. He hates how much you remind him of himself.

“I should go.” He whispers.

But he doesn't move.

Neither do you.

You spar in the gym three days later. It's supposed to be rehab. It's not.

Punch. Block. Kick. Grab. Repeat.

You sweep his leg. He slams you into the mat.

You flip him over. He rolls, pins you.

Your chest rises and falls beneath him, fast and hot and ragged. You’re nose to nose, panting.

He doesn’t move.

You blink. His hands are on either side of your face like he forgot how to touch softly. John’s mind flares—desire, restraint, something raw and frantic trying not to surface. But you can feel it. You can hear it in his thoughts. 

You try to resist it. Try to let him keep that part of himself a secret. But it’s like your own desire is mixing with his, not allowing you the chance to preserve his privacy. 

“I should hit you.” You whisper.

His voice is low. “I’d let you.”

Silence. One beat, then two, then three. 

Your hands grip his shirt. His thumb brushes your jaw.

“I don’t know what this is.” You murmur. “And I know you’re trying, but I’m not someone you can fix John.”

His name feels foreign on your tongue. 

“I don’t want to fix you.” He responds. “I just want to stop pretending like you’re not under my skin.”

Then, he leans in. Stops. Breath brushes your lips. You could kiss him. You could kill him.

Instead, you shove him off and walk out. It’s too much, too real, too raw. He doesn’t follow. But he doesn’t leave either.

Seven days of avoidance and aching tension. Of him watching you from across the compound, always with that haunted, heated look.

Until one night, you find him on the roof, staring at the midnight inky black void like it might offer him redemption. It feels eerily similar to that night in Madripoor. Different skyline, same ghosts. 

You step beside him.

He doesn’t look at you. Just says, “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Me neither.”

You hesitate. Then: “I used to dream in Russian. Still do, sometimes.” You’ve never told anyone that. It’s such a trivial piece of information to withhold but telling him feels good. 

He exhales. “I still hear his screams. The guy I…” He can’t bring himself to say it.

You nod. Understanding flashes in your eyes. “We don’t get to undo what we were made into Walker. Only decide what we do with what’s left.”

His voice cracks. “I don’t think I know how.”

You look at him, really look. See the broken soldier, the boy who wanted to be Captain America, the man who lost everything and kept going anyway.

“You start by letting someone in.” You whisper.

He turns to you. “You offering?”

Your heart stutters.

Then you say it—soft, brave, real: “Yeah. I think I am.”

You find yourself leaning, and so does he, until you meet each other, your breath whispering across his face. There’s a faint hint of a smile on his features – he wants this more than anything. And without much thought, he kisses you.

And his mind goes silent. You can’t hear anything but the sound of breaths colliding. 

It’s not gentle and it’s certainty not sweet.

It’s desperate. Hungry. Two broken people clawing toward something they don’t fully understand.

John’s hands cradle your face like you’re fragile. Yours grip his shirt like you’ll fall apart otherwise. They move up his back achingly; blonde tufts of hair find your fingertips like you’re spinning gold strings. 

When you break apart, you rest your forehead against his.

You whisper, “We may never feel like true heroes John, but maybe it means we’re not just weapons anymore.”

“Hmm,” he hums with a smile, “That’s something.”

And for now, something is enough. For the first time in a long time, you’ll go to sleep without ghosts clawing at your door. 

So will John.

tags: @bmyva1entine @kjmonster111

thank you to anyone who took the time to read this fic. I'd love to write more for walker and the other thunderbolts in the future.

[maximoff-pan]

weapons don't dream | john walker

summary: You and John Walker have a past — you're a mind-reading ex-Hydra assassin and he's a disgraced soldier — similar in one too many ways. When forced to work together, old ghosts resurface, sparks ignite, and the line between enemy and something more begins to blur.

pairing: john walker x fem!reader

word count: 2.6k

warning(s): enemies to whatever the hell this is, angst, mentions of violence, slightly dark, comfort fic — possibly a very screwed up timeline that makes absolutely no sense (sue me, marvel is too complicated for me)

a/n: hello there! Long time no see haha...This is my first attempt at diving into the thunderbolts universe (which I have totally fallen in love with)... I hope you all enjoy this quick little fic! Feedback is always appreciated <3

New Avengers Tower, 2027.

The Thunderbolts compound smells like gunpowder, sweat and recycled air. A place you once called home reduced to a mere mimicry of its former glory – now devoid of all the people that once made it so. Its body…its bones still look the same…but its organs are missing. 

Bile rises up your throat. You can’t help but hate it already.

The walls are sterile, everything’s matte black and seemingly made of soulless steel. There's a chill in the air that doesn’t come from the AC but from the place itself—like the ghosts of bad decisions still linger. There’s no traces of Tony’s greatness or the visions he had for this tower. Nothing but the stench of business business business – lifeless and cold. It’s like everything you once knew is gone. All that’s left behind are the shadows of your past, one only you can remember.

You wonder how Bucky can stomach it. How he can work with this team knowing what it once was – knowing that even the greatest of heroes couldn’t make it out alive – let alone a group of morally grey individuals whose abilities to work as a team, you seriously question. 

Undoubtedly, they’re a ticking time bomb. One that Sam has warned you against joining, and yet, you can’t let your curiosities die. Always yearning for a little danger. 

You’ve only just arrived when the briefing room door swings open. And of course he’s the first one you see.

John Walker—U.S. Agent. Patriot. Killer. Whatever they’re calling him these days…whatever branding Valentina is using to polish the blood off. 

He stops cold when your eyes meet. Not in shock, not even in regret. There’s something more dangerous floating across his cerulean orbs. Like familiarity wrapped in friction. Just that tight expression of someone biting down on something too bitter to say aloud.

“Well, shit.” He mutters. “They let you in?”

You don’t answer. You don't even bother dignifying it with a smile. You already know what he’s thinking.

His thoughts come in low and sharp.

‘Still cold. Still reading minds. Still dangerous.’

You let him feel your presence scrape along his mind’s edges. Not enough to intrude, just enough to remind him: you're still here. And you're still listening.

He flinches when he realizes you heard him. Good. Let him flinch.

“Nice to see you too, Walker.” You say completely unenthused, dropping your go-bag beside a chair. “Didn’t think you’d be the Thunderbolts’ official welcoming committee.”

“I’m not.” He grunts. “But I guess someone’s gotta make sure you don’t stab anyone before you meet the rest of the team.”

You arch an eyebrow. “Tempting.”

Silence oozes with tension as you take a seat at the table in front of you, gaze trained solely on him. John’s doing a good job keeping his thoughts shielded from you – something he’d always struggled to maintain. 

His stare breaks from yours, and a sigh passes from his lips. Apprehensive. Curious.

“So what, does Barnes just dig you up every time the assignment smells like Hydra?” He asks, dropping into a chair across from you.

You shrug off your jacket, revealing the shoulder holster beneath. “Better than digging up another American PR disaster.”

He huffs a bitter laugh. You don’t look at him again, but you can feel the weight of him—his thoughts, his regrets, the bruised, barely patched ego that still aches from everything he lost in that goddamn suit. Because of the shield.

You were there when he wore it. When he fell apart in it.

Madripoor. 2023. The rooftop.

He was bleeding from the mouth, hands shaking, and you watched him pace like a caged animal, the blood of that man still drying on his knuckles.

John was spiralling. You knew the signs—you'd lived them. Years ago, in another life, in what felt like another body.

“You don’t know what it’s like.” He snapped.

You didn’t flinch, staring at him calmly, even as his presence loomed. “Don’t I?”

You let your walls drop just enough for him to feel it—your past, your training, the blood on your hands. The screams. The pain you didn’t ask for. For just a second, you let your mind touch his—like the graze of a knife across skin. Not deep enough to bleed. Just enough to show him the flash of what you once were.

The reprogramming. The red room. The memories that weren’t yours but lived inside you anyway. The manipulation. The misuse of your powers—used to hurt the people you cared for most. 

He went still.

He stared at you for a long time after that. Said nothing. Didn’t need to.

‘It’s going to be okay.’ You spoke into his mind, repeating it like a prayer he needed to hear. 

For one second, he saw you. And you saw him. This was the first time he looked at you like a person. And the last time you’d see him for nearly four years. 

Then everything went to hell, and the government gave him a new shield and a black suit and told him to behave. John Walker—a trained soldier—didn’t want to follow those orders. But what choice did he have?

And you? You went underground. For four years.

Until Bucky called. The New Avengers – a chance at a new home. A chance at redemption.

Dahlonega, Georgia. 2027.

Valentina helps make the mission assignments, much to your (and Bucky’s) dismay. She seems to have an obsession pairing you with Walker. Maybe it’s because she can sense the history between you—the glaring dislike you have for one another is a crumbling facade.  

You don’t hate him because of who he is. You hate him because he’s too much like you. Your own self-hatred has left John Walker at a disadvantage. 

They've send you both to extract a rogue HYDRA biochemist hiding in Georgia. Rural, backwoods, half-flooded farmland. A decaying plantation house tucked behind a screen of swamp trees and slow-draining rivers.

You hate the symmetry. You hate the assignment.

You hate that it’s just the two of you. That leaves you vulnerable.

“I’ll take point,” John says as the quinjet descends.

“No.” You snap, already checking your gear. “You’re too loud. I'll go first.”

He rolls his eyes. “Jesus. Are you still pulling the lone wolf crap?”

You glance at him. “I don’t like being shot because you can’t shut up.”

The pilot makes a show of not hearing.

You drop from the jet into wet grass, your boots sinking into the mud like the land itself is trying to swallow you. The air smells like mildew and rot. You ghost through the tree line, eyes sharp, mind open just wide enough to catch stray thoughts drifting in the mist.

The compound is buried behind a cornfield, stalks yellowed and rotting from stagnant water. Vines curl over rusted fencing. Drones buzz faintly overhead, but you dispatch one with a silenced shot before it can alert the perimeter.

You signal Walker to move. Valentina had put you in charge – a fact John refuses to admit to himself. He hates that it makes sense.

He approaches from the southern fence line—less subtle than you, but fast. Efficient. You both converge at the target's front steps.

“Basement lab.” You murmur. “Underground. Reinforced. One heat signature. Two upstairs.”

“Copy that.” He says gruffly. He doesn’t question how you know. He’s learned not to. Even in the short time you’ve been back in his life, he feels like he’s known you forever.

He supposes he has. Outside of Bucky, he’s known you longer than anyone on the team.

You breach from the roof—silent, practiced, a shard of darkness slipping through rotted rafters. You land light on your feet and sweep the hall.

Glass from the skylight cuts your forearm, but adrenaline surges. Below, Walker busts in through the ground-level entrance, clearing the stairwell like a battering ram. That had been exactly the plan. 

You move in tandem. Like a dance choreographed by grudging familiarity. You clear the top floor while he moves to extract the target.

You round a corner—And then: static. Your radio hisses. Your head pulses.

Something’s off.

An unnatural hum surges in your skull, vibrating at the edge of your telepathy like barbed wire.

“Walker.” You hiss into the comm, but there’s no answer.

You take the stairs two at a time. The basement door is ajar. You step into a white, sterile hallway—

—then everything explodes.

You don’t hear it. You feel it. The floor bucks, the air implodes. Fire licks up the stairwell. Heat and pressure slam into your body like a truck.

You hit the ground with a sickening thud, shoulder screaming, ribs cracking against concrete. There’s glass in your thigh and the taste of blood in your mouth.

Your vision sways. Your ears ring. And then, barely, just as the world goes dark—

“Hey—HEY! Stay with me—don’t you dare—”

John screams your name. Not your code name. Not a title.

Your name.

His voice.

John.

Back at the compound, you sit on a gurney in the infirmary, arm stitched, pride shattered. Head absolutely pouding. You’ve just woken up, unaware of how long you’ve been out. It has to have been hours. 

John leans against the wall, arms crossed, bruised and breathing heavy. He looks like he hasn’t moved since dragging you from the basement in Georgia.

You haven’t said a word since awakening.

“You could say thank you, ya know?”” He murmurs as a joke.

You surprise him when you respond with a quiet and genuine thank you John. He wasn’t expecting you to listen—wasn’t expecting you to be so nice after almost dying. 

You sit up, wincing at the movement. “How bad is it?” You don’t know if you’re asking about his injuries or yours.

“I’m fine, just a couple scrapes and superficial bruises.” His arms are crossed as he takes a step toward you, gesturing to your physique. “The Doctor says you’ve got a dislocated shoulder and a minor concussion. I helped take care of it—popped that baby right back in place.”

You blink at him. “You took care of me?”

He shrugs. “Don’t look so surprised.”

Silence. Then: “Why?” You ask. Quiet. “Why did you pull me out?”

His jaw clenches. “Because I’ve seen enough people die on me. Especially ones who know what it’s like to be used up and tossed away.”

That silences you. Because under the anger and ego, you remember what lives in him.

Shame. Guilt. Loss. The same things you carry in your chest like weapons.

You look away.

His voice is softer now. “I didn’t forget what happened in Madripoor. You didn’t look at me like everyone else did.”

“I saw what you were capable of.”

“Yeah, and you didn’t run.”

“No,” you say, voice breaking just slightly, “because I’m capable of it too.”

Silence.

And just like that, his mind opens up for half a second, unguarded. You feel the way he’s always looked at you—with resentment, sure, but also curiosity. Attraction. Fear.

He doesn’t hate you. He hates how much you remind him of himself.

“I should go.” He whispers.

But he doesn't move.

Neither do you.

You spar in the gym three days later. It's supposed to be rehab. It's not.

Punch. Block. Kick. Grab. Repeat.

You sweep his leg. He slams you into the mat.

You flip him over. He rolls, pins you.

Your chest rises and falls beneath him, fast and hot and ragged. You’re nose to nose, panting.

He doesn’t move.

You blink. His hands are on either side of your face like he forgot how to touch softly. John’s mind flares—desire, restraint, something raw and frantic trying not to surface. But you can feel it. You can hear it in his thoughts. 

You try to resist it. Try to let him keep that part of himself a secret. But it’s like your own desire is mixing with his, not allowing you the chance to preserve his privacy. 

“I should hit you.” You whisper.

His voice is low. “I’d let you.”

Silence. One beat, then two, then three. 

Your hands grip his shirt. His thumb brushes your jaw.

“I don’t know what this is.” You murmur. “And I know you’re trying, but I’m not someone you can fix John.”

His name feels foreign on your tongue. 

“I don’t want to fix you.” He responds. “I just want to stop pretending like you’re not under my skin.”

Then, he leans in. Stops. Breath brushes your lips. You could kiss him. You could kill him.

Instead, you shove him off and walk out. It’s too much, too real, too raw. He doesn’t follow. But he doesn’t leave either.

Seven days of avoidance and aching tension. Of him watching you from across the compound, always with that haunted, heated look.

Until one night, you find him on the roof, staring at the midnight inky black void like it might offer him redemption. It feels eerily similar to that night in Madripoor. Different skyline, same ghosts. 

You step beside him.

He doesn’t look at you. Just says, “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Me neither.”

You hesitate. Then: “I used to dream in Russian. Still do, sometimes.” You’ve never told anyone that. It’s such a trivial piece of information to withhold but telling him feels good. 

He exhales. “I still hear his screams. The guy I…” He can’t bring himself to say it.

You nod. Understanding flashes in your eyes. “We don’t get to undo what we were made into Walker. Only decide what we do with what’s left.”

His voice cracks. “I don’t think I know how.”

You look at him, really look. See the broken soldier, the boy who wanted to be Captain America, the man who lost everything and kept going anyway.

“You start by letting someone in.” You whisper.

He turns to you. “You offering?”

Your heart stutters.

Then you say it—soft, brave, real: “Yeah. I think I am.”

You find yourself leaning, and so does he, until you meet each other, your breath whispering across his face. There’s a faint hint of a smile on his features – he wants this more than anything. And without much thought, he kisses you.

And his mind goes silent. You can’t hear anything but the sound of breaths colliding. 

It’s not gentle and it’s certainty not sweet.

It’s desperate. Hungry. Two broken people clawing toward something they don’t fully understand.

John’s hands cradle your face like you’re fragile. Yours grip his shirt like you’ll fall apart otherwise. They move up his back achingly; blonde tufts of hair find your fingertips like you’re spinning gold strings. 

When you break apart, you rest your forehead against his.

You whisper, “We may never feel like true heroes John, but maybe it means we’re not just weapons anymore.”

“Hmm,” he hums with a smile, “That’s something.”

And for now, something is enough. For the first time in a long time, you’ll go to sleep without ghosts clawing at your door. 

So will John.

tags: @bmyva1entine @kjmonster111

thank you to anyone who took the time to read this fic. I'd love to write more for walker and the other thunderbolts in the future.

[maximoff-pan]

this is so so sweet, thank you!! And that makes me so happy to hear! I would absolutely love to write more for John — and I’m so glad you enjoyed the reader — I was kind of worried about her portrayal 🥰🥰🥰

weapons don't dream | john walker

summary: You and John Walker have a past — you're a mind-reading ex-Hydra assassin and he's a disgraced soldier — similar in one too many ways. When forced to work together, old ghosts resurface, sparks ignite, and the line between enemy and something more begins to blur.

pairing: john walker x fem!reader

word count: 2.6k

warning(s): enemies to whatever the hell this is, angst, mentions of violence, slightly dark, comfort fic — possibly a very screwed up timeline that makes absolutely no sense (sue me, marvel is too complicated for me)

a/n: hello there! Long time no see haha...This is my first attempt at diving into the thunderbolts universe (which I have totally fallen in love with)... I hope you all enjoy this quick little fic! Feedback is always appreciated <3

New Avengers Tower, 2027.

The Thunderbolts compound smells like gunpowder, sweat and recycled air. A place you once called home reduced to a mere mimicry of its former glory – now devoid of all the people that once made it so. Its body…its bones still look the same…but its organs are missing. 

Bile rises up your throat. You can’t help but hate it already.

The walls are sterile, everything’s matte black and seemingly made of soulless steel. There's a chill in the air that doesn’t come from the AC but from the place itself—like the ghosts of bad decisions still linger. There’s no traces of Tony’s greatness or the visions he had for this tower. Nothing but the stench of business business business – lifeless and cold. It’s like everything you once knew is gone. All that’s left behind are the shadows of your past, one only you can remember.

You wonder how Bucky can stomach it. How he can work with this team knowing what it once was – knowing that even the greatest of heroes couldn’t make it out alive – let alone a group of morally grey individuals whose abilities to work as a team, you seriously question. 

Undoubtedly, they’re a ticking time bomb. One that Sam has warned you against joining, and yet, you can’t let your curiosities die. Always yearning for a little danger. 

You’ve only just arrived when the briefing room door swings open. And of course he’s the first one you see.

John Walker—U.S. Agent. Patriot. Killer. Whatever they’re calling him these days…whatever branding Valentina is using to polish the blood off. 

He stops cold when your eyes meet. Not in shock, not even in regret. There’s something more dangerous floating across his cerulean orbs. Like familiarity wrapped in friction. Just that tight expression of someone biting down on something too bitter to say aloud.

“Well, shit.” He mutters. “They let you in?”

You don’t answer. You don't even bother dignifying it with a smile. You already know what he’s thinking.

His thoughts come in low and sharp.

‘Still cold. Still reading minds. Still dangerous.’

You let him feel your presence scrape along his mind’s edges. Not enough to intrude, just enough to remind him: you're still here. And you're still listening.

He flinches when he realizes you heard him. Good. Let him flinch.

“Nice to see you too, Walker.” You say completely unenthused, dropping your go-bag beside a chair. “Didn’t think you’d be the Thunderbolts’ official welcoming committee.”

“I’m not.” He grunts. “But I guess someone’s gotta make sure you don’t stab anyone before you meet the rest of the team.”

You arch an eyebrow. “Tempting.”

Silence oozes with tension as you take a seat at the table in front of you, gaze trained solely on him. John’s doing a good job keeping his thoughts shielded from you – something he’d always struggled to maintain. 

His stare breaks from yours, and a sigh passes from his lips. Apprehensive. Curious.

“So what, does Barnes just dig you up every time the assignment smells like Hydra?” He asks, dropping into a chair across from you.

You shrug off your jacket, revealing the shoulder holster beneath. “Better than digging up another American PR disaster.”

He huffs a bitter laugh. You don’t look at him again, but you can feel the weight of him—his thoughts, his regrets, the bruised, barely patched ego that still aches from everything he lost in that goddamn suit. Because of the shield.

You were there when he wore it. When he fell apart in it.

Madripoor. 2023. The rooftop.

He was bleeding from the mouth, hands shaking, and you watched him pace like a caged animal, the blood of that man still drying on his knuckles.

John was spiralling. You knew the signs—you'd lived them. Years ago, in another life, in what felt like another body.

“You don’t know what it’s like.” He snapped.

You didn’t flinch, staring at him calmly, even as his presence loomed. “Don’t I?”

You let your walls drop just enough for him to feel it—your past, your training, the blood on your hands. The screams. The pain you didn’t ask for. For just a second, you let your mind touch his—like the graze of a knife across skin. Not deep enough to bleed. Just enough to show him the flash of what you once were.

The reprogramming. The red room. The memories that weren’t yours but lived inside you anyway. The manipulation. The misuse of your powers—used to hurt the people you cared for most. 

He went still.

He stared at you for a long time after that. Said nothing. Didn’t need to.

‘It’s going to be okay.’ You spoke into his mind, repeating it like a prayer he needed to hear. 

For one second, he saw you. And you saw him. This was the first time he looked at you like a person. And the last time you’d see him for nearly four years. 

Then everything went to hell, and the government gave him a new shield and a black suit and told him to behave. John Walker—a trained soldier—didn’t want to follow those orders. But what choice did he have?

And you? You went underground. For four years.

Until Bucky called. The New Avengers – a chance at a new home. A chance at redemption.

Dahlonega, Georgia. 2027.

Valentina helps make the mission assignments, much to your (and Bucky’s) dismay. She seems to have an obsession pairing you with Walker. Maybe it’s because she can sense the history between you—the glaring dislike you have for one another is a crumbling facade.  

You don’t hate him because of who he is. You hate him because he’s too much like you. Your own self-hatred has left John Walker at a disadvantage. 

They've send you both to extract a rogue HYDRA biochemist hiding in Georgia. Rural, backwoods, half-flooded farmland. A decaying plantation house tucked behind a screen of swamp trees and slow-draining rivers.

You hate the symmetry. You hate the assignment.

You hate that it’s just the two of you. That leaves you vulnerable.

“I’ll take point,” John says as the quinjet descends.

“No.” You snap, already checking your gear. “You’re too loud. I'll go first.”

He rolls his eyes. “Jesus. Are you still pulling the lone wolf crap?”

You glance at him. “I don’t like being shot because you can’t shut up.”

The pilot makes a show of not hearing.

You drop from the jet into wet grass, your boots sinking into the mud like the land itself is trying to swallow you. The air smells like mildew and rot. You ghost through the tree line, eyes sharp, mind open just wide enough to catch stray thoughts drifting in the mist.

The compound is buried behind a cornfield, stalks yellowed and rotting from stagnant water. Vines curl over rusted fencing. Drones buzz faintly overhead, but you dispatch one with a silenced shot before it can alert the perimeter.

You signal Walker to move. Valentina had put you in charge – a fact John refuses to admit to himself. He hates that it makes sense.

He approaches from the southern fence line—less subtle than you, but fast. Efficient. You both converge at the target's front steps.

“Basement lab.” You murmur. “Underground. Reinforced. One heat signature. Two upstairs.”

“Copy that.” He says gruffly. He doesn’t question how you know. He’s learned not to. Even in the short time you’ve been back in his life, he feels like he’s known you forever.

He supposes he has. Outside of Bucky, he’s known you longer than anyone on the team.

You breach from the roof—silent, practiced, a shard of darkness slipping through rotted rafters. You land light on your feet and sweep the hall.

Glass from the skylight cuts your forearm, but adrenaline surges. Below, Walker busts in through the ground-level entrance, clearing the stairwell like a battering ram. That had been exactly the plan. 

You move in tandem. Like a dance choreographed by grudging familiarity. You clear the top floor while he moves to extract the target.

You round a corner—And then: static. Your radio hisses. Your head pulses.

Something’s off.

An unnatural hum surges in your skull, vibrating at the edge of your telepathy like barbed wire.

“Walker.” You hiss into the comm, but there’s no answer.

You take the stairs two at a time. The basement door is ajar. You step into a white, sterile hallway—

—then everything explodes.

You don’t hear it. You feel it. The floor bucks, the air implodes. Fire licks up the stairwell. Heat and pressure slam into your body like a truck.

You hit the ground with a sickening thud, shoulder screaming, ribs cracking against concrete. There’s glass in your thigh and the taste of blood in your mouth.

Your vision sways. Your ears ring. And then, barely, just as the world goes dark—

“Hey—HEY! Stay with me—don’t you dare—”

John screams your name. Not your code name. Not a title.

Your name.

His voice.

John.

Back at the compound, you sit on a gurney in the infirmary, arm stitched, pride shattered. Head absolutely pouding. You’ve just woken up, unaware of how long you’ve been out. It has to have been hours. 

John leans against the wall, arms crossed, bruised and breathing heavy. He looks like he hasn’t moved since dragging you from the basement in Georgia.

You haven’t said a word since awakening.

“You could say thank you, ya know?”” He murmurs as a joke.

You surprise him when you respond with a quiet and genuine thank you John. He wasn’t expecting you to listen—wasn’t expecting you to be so nice after almost dying. 

You sit up, wincing at the movement. “How bad is it?” You don’t know if you’re asking about his injuries or yours.

“I’m fine, just a couple scrapes and superficial bruises.” His arms are crossed as he takes a step toward you, gesturing to your physique. “The Doctor says you’ve got a dislocated shoulder and a minor concussion. I helped take care of it—popped that baby right back in place.”

You blink at him. “You took care of me?”

He shrugs. “Don’t look so surprised.”

Silence. Then: “Why?” You ask. Quiet. “Why did you pull me out?”

His jaw clenches. “Because I’ve seen enough people die on me. Especially ones who know what it’s like to be used up and tossed away.”

That silences you. Because under the anger and ego, you remember what lives in him.

Shame. Guilt. Loss. The same things you carry in your chest like weapons.

You look away.

His voice is softer now. “I didn’t forget what happened in Madripoor. You didn’t look at me like everyone else did.”

“I saw what you were capable of.”

“Yeah, and you didn’t run.”

“No,” you say, voice breaking just slightly, “because I’m capable of it too.”

Silence.

And just like that, his mind opens up for half a second, unguarded. You feel the way he’s always looked at you—with resentment, sure, but also curiosity. Attraction. Fear.

He doesn’t hate you. He hates how much you remind him of himself.

“I should go.” He whispers.

But he doesn't move.

Neither do you.

You spar in the gym three days later. It's supposed to be rehab. It's not.

Punch. Block. Kick. Grab. Repeat.

You sweep his leg. He slams you into the mat.

You flip him over. He rolls, pins you.

Your chest rises and falls beneath him, fast and hot and ragged. You’re nose to nose, panting.

He doesn’t move.

You blink. His hands are on either side of your face like he forgot how to touch softly. John’s mind flares—desire, restraint, something raw and frantic trying not to surface. But you can feel it. You can hear it in his thoughts. 

You try to resist it. Try to let him keep that part of himself a secret. But it’s like your own desire is mixing with his, not allowing you the chance to preserve his privacy. 

“I should hit you.” You whisper.

His voice is low. “I’d let you.”

Silence. One beat, then two, then three. 

Your hands grip his shirt. His thumb brushes your jaw.

“I don’t know what this is.” You murmur. “And I know you’re trying, but I’m not someone you can fix John.”

His name feels foreign on your tongue. 

“I don’t want to fix you.” He responds. “I just want to stop pretending like you’re not under my skin.”

Then, he leans in. Stops. Breath brushes your lips. You could kiss him. You could kill him.

Instead, you shove him off and walk out. It’s too much, too real, too raw. He doesn’t follow. But he doesn’t leave either.

Seven days of avoidance and aching tension. Of him watching you from across the compound, always with that haunted, heated look.

Until one night, you find him on the roof, staring at the midnight inky black void like it might offer him redemption. It feels eerily similar to that night in Madripoor. Different skyline, same ghosts. 

You step beside him.

He doesn’t look at you. Just says, “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Me neither.”

You hesitate. Then: “I used to dream in Russian. Still do, sometimes.” You’ve never told anyone that. It’s such a trivial piece of information to withhold but telling him feels good. 

He exhales. “I still hear his screams. The guy I…” He can’t bring himself to say it.

You nod. Understanding flashes in your eyes. “We don’t get to undo what we were made into Walker. Only decide what we do with what’s left.”

His voice cracks. “I don’t think I know how.”

You look at him, really look. See the broken soldier, the boy who wanted to be Captain America, the man who lost everything and kept going anyway.

“You start by letting someone in.” You whisper.

He turns to you. “You offering?”

Your heart stutters.

Then you say it—soft, brave, real: “Yeah. I think I am.”

You find yourself leaning, and so does he, until you meet each other, your breath whispering across his face. There’s a faint hint of a smile on his features – he wants this more than anything. And without much thought, he kisses you.

And his mind goes silent. You can’t hear anything but the sound of breaths colliding. 

It’s not gentle and it’s certainty not sweet.

It’s desperate. Hungry. Two broken people clawing toward something they don’t fully understand.

John’s hands cradle your face like you’re fragile. Yours grip his shirt like you’ll fall apart otherwise. They move up his back achingly; blonde tufts of hair find your fingertips like you’re spinning gold strings. 

When you break apart, you rest your forehead against his.

You whisper, “We may never feel like true heroes John, but maybe it means we’re not just weapons anymore.”

“Hmm,” he hums with a smile, “That’s something.”

And for now, something is enough. For the first time in a long time, you’ll go to sleep without ghosts clawing at your door. 

So will John.

tags: @bmyva1entine @kjmonster111

thank you to anyone who took the time to read this fic. I'd love to write more for walker and the other thunderbolts in the future.

[maximoff-pan]

weapons don't dream | john walker

summary: You and John Walker have a past — you're a mind-reading ex-Hydra assassin and he's a disgraced soldier — similar in one too many ways. When forced to work together, old ghosts resurface, sparks ignite, and the line between enemy and something more begins to blur.

pairing: john walker x fem!reader

word count: 2.6k

warning(s): enemies to whatever the hell this is, angst, mentions of violence, slightly dark, comfort fic — possibly a very screwed up timeline that makes absolutely no sense (sue me, marvel is too complicated for me)

a/n: hello there! Long time no see haha...This is my first attempt at diving into the thunderbolts universe (which I have totally fallen in love with)... I hope you all enjoy this quick little fic! Feedback is always appreciated <3

New Avengers Tower, 2027.

The Thunderbolts compound smells like gunpowder, sweat and recycled air. A place you once called home reduced to a mere mimicry of its former glory – now devoid of all the people that once made it so. Its body…its bones still look the same…but its organs are missing. 

Bile rises up your throat. You can’t help but hate it already.

The walls are sterile, everything’s matte black and seemingly made of soulless steel. There's a chill in the air that doesn’t come from the AC but from the place itself—like the ghosts of bad decisions still linger. There’s no traces of Tony’s greatness or the visions he had for this tower. Nothing but the stench of business business business – lifeless and cold. It’s like everything you once knew is gone. All that’s left behind are the shadows of your past, one only you can remember.

You wonder how Bucky can stomach it. How he can work with this team knowing what it once was – knowing that even the greatest of heroes couldn’t make it out alive – let alone a group of morally grey individuals whose abilities to work as a team, you seriously question. 

Undoubtedly, they’re a ticking time bomb. One that Sam has warned you against joining, and yet, you can’t let your curiosities die. Always yearning for a little danger. 

You’ve only just arrived when the briefing room door swings open. And of course he’s the first one you see.

John Walker—U.S. Agent. Patriot. Killer. Whatever they’re calling him these days…whatever branding Valentina is using to polish the blood off. 

He stops cold when your eyes meet. Not in shock, not even in regret. There’s something more dangerous floating across his cerulean orbs. Like familiarity wrapped in friction. Just that tight expression of someone biting down on something too bitter to say aloud.

“Well, shit.” He mutters. “They let you in?”

You don’t answer. You don't even bother dignifying it with a smile. You already know what he’s thinking.

His thoughts come in low and sharp.

‘Still cold. Still reading minds. Still dangerous.’

You let him feel your presence scrape along his mind’s edges. Not enough to intrude, just enough to remind him: you're still here. And you're still listening.

He flinches when he realizes you heard him. Good. Let him flinch.

“Nice to see you too, Walker.” You say completely unenthused, dropping your go-bag beside a chair. “Didn’t think you’d be the Thunderbolts’ official welcoming committee.”

“I’m not.” He grunts. “But I guess someone’s gotta make sure you don’t stab anyone before you meet the rest of the team.”

You arch an eyebrow. “Tempting.”

Silence oozes with tension as you take a seat at the table in front of you, gaze trained solely on him. John’s doing a good job keeping his thoughts shielded from you – something he’d always struggled to maintain. 

His stare breaks from yours, and a sigh passes from his lips. Apprehensive. Curious.

“So what, does Barnes just dig you up every time the assignment smells like Hydra?” He asks, dropping into a chair across from you.

You shrug off your jacket, revealing the shoulder holster beneath. “Better than digging up another American PR disaster.”

He huffs a bitter laugh. You don’t look at him again, but you can feel the weight of him—his thoughts, his regrets, the bruised, barely patched ego that still aches from everything he lost in that goddamn suit. Because of the shield.

You were there when he wore it. When he fell apart in it.

Madripoor. 2023. The rooftop.

He was bleeding from the mouth, hands shaking, and you watched him pace like a caged animal, the blood of that man still drying on his knuckles.

John was spiralling. You knew the signs—you'd lived them. Years ago, in another life, in what felt like another body.

“You don’t know what it’s like.” He snapped.

You didn’t flinch, staring at him calmly, even as his presence loomed. “Don’t I?”

You let your walls drop just enough for him to feel it—your past, your training, the blood on your hands. The screams. The pain you didn’t ask for. For just a second, you let your mind touch his—like the graze of a knife across skin. Not deep enough to bleed. Just enough to show him the flash of what you once were.

The reprogramming. The red room. The memories that weren’t yours but lived inside you anyway. The manipulation. The misuse of your powers—used to hurt the people you cared for most. 

He went still.

He stared at you for a long time after that. Said nothing. Didn’t need to.

‘It’s going to be okay.’ You spoke into his mind, repeating it like a prayer he needed to hear. 

For one second, he saw you. And you saw him. This was the first time he looked at you like a person. And the last time you’d see him for nearly four years. 

Then everything went to hell, and the government gave him a new shield and a black suit and told him to behave. John Walker—a trained soldier—didn’t want to follow those orders. But what choice did he have?

And you? You went underground. For four years.

Until Bucky called. The New Avengers – a chance at a new home. A chance at redemption.

Dahlonega, Georgia. 2027.

Valentina helps make the mission assignments, much to your (and Bucky’s) dismay. She seems to have an obsession pairing you with Walker. Maybe it’s because she can sense the history between you—the glaring dislike you have for one another is a crumbling facade.  

You don’t hate him because of who he is. You hate him because he’s too much like you. Your own self-hatred has left John Walker at a disadvantage. 

They've sent you both to extract a rogue HYDRA biochemist hiding in Georgia. Rural, backwoods, half-flooded farmland. A decaying plantation house tucked behind a screen of swamp trees and slow-draining rivers.

You hate the symmetry. You hate the assignment.

You hate that it’s just the two of you. That leaves you vulnerable.

“I’ll take point,” John says as the quinjet descends.

“No.” You snap, already checking your gear. “You’re too loud. I'll go first.”

He rolls his eyes. “Jesus. Are you still pulling the lone wolf crap?”

You glance at him. “I don’t like being shot because you can’t shut up.”

The pilot makes a show of not hearing.

You drop from the jet into wet grass, your boots sinking into the mud like the land itself is trying to swallow you. The air smells like mildew and rot. You ghost through the tree line, eyes sharp, mind open just wide enough to catch stray thoughts drifting in the mist.

The compound is buried behind a cornfield, stalks yellowed and rotting from stagnant water. Vines curl over rusted fencing. Drones buzz faintly overhead, but you dispatch one with a silenced shot before it can alert the perimeter.

You signal Walker to move. Valentina had put you in charge – a fact John refuses to admit to himself. He hates that it makes sense.

He approaches from the southern fence line—less subtle than you, but fast. Efficient. You both converge at the target's front steps.

“Basement lab.” You murmur. “Underground. Reinforced. One heat signature. Two upstairs.”

“Copy that.” He says gruffly. He doesn’t question how you know. He’s learned not to. Even in the short time you’ve been back in his life, he feels like he’s known you forever.

He supposes he has. Outside of Bucky, he’s known you longer than anyone on the team.

You breach from the roof—silent, practiced, a shard of darkness slipping through rotted rafters. You land light on your feet and sweep the hall.

Glass from the skylight cuts your forearm, but adrenaline surges. Below, Walker busts in through the ground-level entrance, clearing the stairwell like a battering ram. That had been exactly the plan. 

You move in tandem. Like a dance choreographed by grudging familiarity. You clear the top floor while he moves to extract the target.

You round a corner—And then: static. Your radio hisses. Your head pulses.

Something’s off.

An unnatural hum surges in your skull, vibrating at the edge of your telepathy like barbed wire.

“Walker.” You hiss into the comm, but there’s no answer.

You take the stairs two at a time. The basement door is ajar. You step into a white, sterile hallway—

—then everything explodes.

You don’t hear it. You feel it. The floor bucks, the air implodes. Fire licks up the stairwell. Heat and pressure slam into your body like a truck.

You hit the ground with a sickening thud, shoulder screaming, ribs cracking against concrete. There’s glass in your thigh and the taste of blood in your mouth.

Your vision sways. Your ears ring. And then, barely, just as the world goes dark—

“Hey—HEY! Stay with me—don’t you dare—”

John screams your name. Not your code name. Not a title.

Your name.

His voice.

John.

Back at the compound, you sit on a gurney in the infirmary, arm stitched, pride shattered. Head absolutely pouding. You’ve just woken up, unaware of how long you’ve been out. It has to have been hours. 

John leans against the wall, arms crossed, bruised and breathing heavy. He looks like he hasn’t moved since dragging you from the basement in Georgia.

You haven’t said a word since awakening.

“You could say thank you, ya know?”” He murmurs as a joke.

You surprise him when you respond with a quiet and genuine thank you John. He wasn’t expecting you to listen—wasn’t expecting you to be so nice after almost dying. 

You sit up, wincing at the movement. “How bad is it?” You don’t know if you’re asking about his injuries or yours.

“I’m fine, just a couple scrapes and superficial bruises.” His arms are crossed as he takes a step toward you, gesturing to your physique. “The Doctor says you’ve got a dislocated shoulder and a minor concussion. I helped take care of it—popped that baby right back in place.”

You blink at him. “You took care of me?”

He shrugs. “Don’t look so surprised.”

Silence. Then: “Why?” You ask. Quiet. “Why did you pull me out?”

His jaw clenches. “Because I’ve seen enough people die on me. Especially ones who know what it’s like to be used up and tossed away.”

That silences you. Because under the anger and ego, you remember what lives in him.

Shame. Guilt. Loss. The same things you carry in your chest like weapons.

You look away.

His voice is softer now. “I didn’t forget what happened in Madripoor. You didn’t look at me like everyone else did.”

“I saw what you were capable of.”

“Yeah, and you didn’t run.”

“No,” you say, voice breaking just slightly, “because I’m capable of it too.”

Silence.

And just like that, his mind opens up for half a second, unguarded. You feel the way he’s always looked at you—with resentment, sure, but also curiosity. Attraction. Fear.

He doesn’t hate you. He hates how much you remind him of himself.

“I should go.” He whispers.

But he doesn't move.

Neither do you.

You spar in the gym three days later. It's supposed to be rehab. It's not.

Punch. Block. Kick. Grab. Repeat.

You sweep his leg. He slams you into the mat.

You flip him over. He rolls, pins you.

Your chest rises and falls beneath him, fast and hot and ragged. You’re nose to nose, panting.

He doesn’t move.

You blink. His hands are on either side of your face like he forgot how to touch softly. John’s mind flares—desire, restraint, something raw and frantic trying not to surface. But you can feel it. You can hear it in his thoughts. 

You try to resist it. Try to let him keep that part of himself a secret. But it’s like your own desire is mixing with his, not allowing you the chance to preserve his privacy. 

“I should hit you.” You whisper.

His voice is low. “I’d let you.”

Silence. One beat, then two, then three. 

Your hands grip his shirt. His thumb brushes your jaw.

“I don’t know what this is.” You murmur. “And I know you’re trying, but I’m not someone you can fix John.”

His name feels foreign on your tongue. 

“I don’t want to fix you.” He responds. “I just want to stop pretending like you’re not under my skin.”

Then, he leans in. Stops. Breath brushes your lips. You could kiss him. You could kill him.

Instead, you shove him off and walk out. It’s too much, too real, too raw. He doesn’t follow. But he doesn’t leave either.

Seven days of avoidance and aching tension. Of him watching you from across the compound, always with that haunted, heated look.

Until one night, you find him on the roof, staring at the midnight inky black void like it might offer him redemption. It feels eerily similar to that night in Madripoor. Different skyline, same ghosts. 

You step beside him.

He doesn’t look at you. Just says, “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Me neither.”

You hesitate. Then: “I used to dream in Russian. Still do, sometimes.” You’ve never told anyone that. It’s such a trivial piece of information to withhold but telling him feels good. 

He exhales. “I still hear his screams. The guy I…” He can’t bring himself to say it.

You nod. Understanding flashes in your eyes. “We don’t get to undo what we were made into Walker. Only decide what we do with what’s left.”

His voice cracks. “I don’t think I know how.”

You look at him, really look. See the broken soldier, the boy who wanted to be Captain America, the man who lost everything and kept going anyway.

“You start by letting someone in.” You whisper.

He turns to you. “You offering?”

Your heart stutters.

Then you say it—soft, brave, real: “Yeah. I think I am.”

You find yourself leaning, and so does he, until you meet each other, your breath whispering across his face. There’s a faint hint of a smile on his features – he wants this more than anything. And without much thought, he kisses you.

And his mind goes silent. You can’t hear anything but the sound of breaths colliding. 

It’s not gentle and it’s certainty not sweet.

It’s desperate. Hungry. Two broken people clawing toward something they don’t fully understand.

John’s hands cradle your face like you’re fragile. Yours grip his shirt like you’ll fall apart otherwise. They move up his back achingly; blonde tufts of hair find your fingertips like you’re spinning gold strings. 

When you break apart, you rest your forehead against his.

You whisper, “We may never feel like true heroes John, but maybe it means we’re not just weapons anymore.”

“Hmm,” he hums with a smile, “That’s something.”

And for now, something is enough. For the first time in a long time, you’ll go to sleep without ghosts clawing at your door. 

So will John.

tags: @bmyva1entine @kjmonster111

thank you to anyone who took the time to read this fic. I'd love to write more for walker and the other thunderbolts in the future.

[maximoff-pan]

writing a john walker fic rn if anyone would like to be tagged :)

[maximoff-pan]

I know this is random but I was reading your why do fools preview of your steve fic (which I love and can't wait for more of), and I was wondering if you could write a blurb about will byers coming out to the reader? I feel like with her being so close to jonathan and the byers family, it would be such a pivotal moment 💕

oh my goodness this idea warms my heart, of course I can — I also would love more requests in this universe before I post the next part (if anyone has some

pairing: will byers x fem!(platonic)reader

set in the why do fools universe (read here) — eventually steve harrington x fem!reader

word count: 600+

“I think I like Mike.”

The implication is clear; right as the words pass quietly through his lips, you understand what he means. But almost like he thinks there’s no way you could possibly get it, he feels the urge to clarify. Because in his mind, why would you ever understand? “More than–” he struggles with it. This is much harder than he thought it would be.

Except as he glances towards you, your eyes locking steadily, he knows he doesn’t need to say any more. 

“More than a friend.” You finish delicately. And there’s no judgement in your tone, only love.

Will nods. This has to be one of the scariest things he’s ever done: admitting how he really feels. “I’ve never…” he trails, trying to form the right words, “you’re the only one I’ve told.” 

And you can’t quite describe it, the warmth that spreads through your chest. It’s almost surreal, thinking about how much he must trust you…enough to be the first person he feels he can talk about this with. Initially, it catches you by surprise. What could you have possibly done to deserve this kind of trust? But in your heart, you know why.

The love you hold for Will Byers is unconditional; he’s the little brother you never had. The little brother you didn’t ask for, but who fell into your life and changed it for the better. Of course, with that came Dustin, Mike, and Lucas, (and later El and Max), as well as an interesting friendship with the one and only Steve Harrington, but you suppose, everything had worked out for the best. 

“C’mere.” You gesture to him, arms outstretched and a soft smile gracing your features. “You know I love you right? No matter what?”

You can feel him nearly collapse into you, feeling as he releases a breath of relief. He’s crying, his tears a combination of fear and happiness. They wrack through him in intense waves, and yet paradoxically, his demeanor remains as delicate and fragile as you remember it being. Ethereal. 

It brings you peace knowing that he feels safe with you. Because as much as you adore each of the kids equally, (and while you hate to admit it), Will has always been the one you gravitated towards. Something about his timid nature drew you in. From the moment your friend Jonathan introduced you to his little brother, you knew how special he was. With his gentle brown gaze and shaggy bowl cut, he exuded pure innocence. 

The first thing you remember about him was how reserved he seemed. Minimal words were spoken in those early months. Until he started to open up. Regardless, he was always a bit of a scared kid, a kid who didn’t have a fair shot right from the jump.

Maybe you just got that. And unlike others in his life, you refused to give up on him, or Jonathan.

“Oh Will.” He’s clinging on to you now, grip tight as he shakes like a leaf. “I’ll always be here for you. I promise.”

He breathes heavily, beginning to apologize profusely. “I’m sorry.” He murmurs. “I was just so scared.”

“Never be sorry for your emotions.” 

He pulls back from you, calmer now, allowing you to get a good look at him.

"Never apologize for being who you are." You tell him. "Not to me, not to your brother — not to anyone. You hear me?"

Your tone is delicate, but Will knows just how serious you are. He nods, unable to find the words to thank you, unable to describe the feeling of warmth that has spread through his entire body.

You are a safe haven. You always have been. You always will be.

Will knows what it's like to feel accepted by you, to be loved by you. And he never wants that to change.

"Thank you." He clings to you still.

It's silent and left unsaid, but in your mind you think, always.

I will always be here for you.

[maximoff-pan]

John Walker: what are we gonna do….just like—ride Bob into the sky?

um actually that sounds like a fantastic plan…me first please 🙋‍♀️

[maximoff-pan]

I saw thunderbolts* the other day and I feel like I need to write for Robert Reynolds (Bob) — and I was wondering if any of you would want that or if you have any requests?

I’d also totally be down to write something for Bucky 👀

[maximoff-pan]

maybe, okay? | michael robinavitch

summary: after a hard shift, robby comforts you

pairing: dr. michael (robby) robinavitch x resident!reader

word count: 1.2k

warning(s): mentions of death, sad thoughts & roof talks, the usual

a/n: this is my first time writing for the Pitt— I hope you guys like it (and I would love requests if you have any)... Please let me know what you think! ❤️

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷

“Rough night?” Robby’s question lingers. You don’t need to turn around to know he’s smiling – you can hear it in his voice. It’s a genuine query laced with equal parts teasing and concern. 

“You could say that.” You murmur in response, taking a deep inhale. A gust of wind breezes by. It cools your skin, sobers you to your surroundings, reminding you where you are. 

This shift had been something. Trauma after trauma that came rolling in, the hours ticked by, each one more exhausting than the last. You might think after years of med school and residency – with more than three years in the Pitt — the last two under your attending Jack Abbot, it would make it easier. But as you’d learned, the pain from patient deaths never eases, and this night had been no exception. 

It’s hard to forget the frantic nature that had emerged in the ED over the last number of hours. A family had come in around 4am. A mother, a father, and a 5-year-old boy. MVC, T-boned by a drunk driver – both parents were dead on scene, their child was still fighting for his life. You worked on him for an hour before Dr. Abbot called time of death. He let you go longer than he should have, trying to save this boy’s life. Jack, who never lets emotions cloud his judgment, had given you more time — not for the boy, but for you.

He had seen firsthand how much you cared for each one of your patients over the last two years, but this one felt different. You were usually so composed, just like him. This case, for whatever reason, got to you. It broke something. And he knew who you needed right now. 

Robby steps over the railing to stand at your side, the roof giving way to his presence. He’s always known when to find you. Like he’s tuned into your frequency somehow, even when you barely understand it yourself.

“Jack told me I could find you up here. Said something about you stealing his spot – kinda sounded like he was a little worried you might jump, kid.”

You let out a soft laugh. “Nah, it’s shift change.” Your tone is light as you elbow him gently. “If I was gonna jump, I’d do it on Abbot’s watch – never yours.”

“I appreciate that.” He says. “Wouldn’t want to lose my favourite resident.”

“You won’t.” Your response is serious, assuring. “Just—”

“Thinking about that kid?” Robby finishes for you. The first rays of light catch on the edges of his jawline, and you hate how beautiful that looks, here of all places.

“Yeah... I–uh, I don’t know what happened to me.” You admit, your fingers grasping at the sleeve of your shirt. 

“Talk to me (Y/n).” His voice drifts. “Don’t bottle it up.”

You nod, the motion almost imperceptible, like you're afraid acknowledging it out loud will make it hurt more. “I keep seeing his face,” you say. “The way he kept reaching for his mom, even after... even after she was gone.”

Robby doesn’t speak right away. He gives you space, something he’s always been good at. Not filling the silence with platitudes. Just being there, solid and steady. You feel him shift closer, his shoulder brushing yours.

“There was nothing more you could’ve done.”

You sigh, scrubbing your hands over your face. “I know that. Logically, I know. But emotionally... it doesn’t feel like enough. It never does.”

Robby’s voice softens. “That’s because you give a damn. It’s what makes you good, even when it hurts like hell.”

You glance over at him. His hair is a little messy, like he’s run his fingers through it too many times this morning. His scrubs are clean, unstained, showing no signs of the incoming shift that’s likely to be just as brutal as yours. But his eyes — they’re steady. Kind. And watching you with a kind of care that cuts through the fog in your chest.

“Sometimes I wonder if I’m cut out for this.” You whisper.

He turns toward you, fully now. “Don’t,” he says, firm but not harsh. “Don’t say that.”

You open your mouth to argue, but he shakes his head. If you left, he’s not sure he could continue. Jack might kill him if he can't talk you off this ledge.

“You’re one of the strongest people I know.” He stands firm. “I’ve seen you do the impossible on less sleep and more pressure than anyone should be under. You belong here. The fact that you feel this much? That’s not a weakness. That’s what sets you apart.”

You look down at your shoes, throat tight. “Thanks, Robby.”

“I mean it.” He bumps your arm gently. He watches you for a moment, one, two, then three. There’s something unreadable in his expression — not quite a smile, but close.

“What?” You ask.

He pauses, like he’s weighing something. “Just thinking,” he says finally. “You spend so much time holding it together, I don’t think I’ve ever really seen you let go.”

You snort. “What does that even mean?”

He gives a soft chuckle. “It means… I’ve seen you save lives without flinching. Seen you stand toe-to-toe with Jack when he’s in one of his moods. You don’t rattle easily. But tonight—”

“Tonight was different.”

“Yeah.” He doesn’t press. Just confirms it.

You sink down onto the concrete of the ledge, letting your head rest back against the railing. “I’m tired of pretending it doesn’t get to me.” You admit. “Like if I act detached enough, maybe I won’t crack.”

Robby sits beside you, careful not to crowd your space. “There’s nothing weak about cracking.” He says quietly. “What matters is that you keep showing up.”

You turn to look at him. He’s closer now, the warmth of his body radiating across the narrow space. There’s a softness in his gaze that you hadn’t noticed before — not the usual sarcasm or light teasing, but something gentler. Something more careful.

Your voice is barely above a whisper. “Why do you care so much?”

His lips twitch, like he’s debating whether to deflect. But then, he just says, “Because you matter. Because you walk into the fire every day, and I don’t think anyone tells you often enough how much that means.”

You feel your heart stutter, just a little. “You don’t have to fix me, Robby.”

“I’m not trying to.” He tilts his head slightly, earnest. “I just want you to know you’re not alone in it.”

The silence stretches again, but this one feels changed. Less heavy. More charged.

You don’t reach for him. He doesn’t reach for you. But there’s something in the air — not quite spoken, not acted on — just held between you like breath.

You watch silently as the sun spills gold across the skyline, your head now leaning on his shoulder. Your cheek warms where it rests against his scrubs.

“Still thinking about jumping?” He teases, voice low.

“Maybe into your arms,” you murmur, half-joking.

Robby chuckles, warm and quiet. “Careful. You keep saying things like that and I might start getting ideas.”

You smile, more than content. "I think I'm alright with that."

You’re definitely alright with that…

[maximoff-pan]

maybe, okay? | michael robinavitch

summary: after a hard shift, robby comforts you

pairing: dr. michael (robby) robinavitch x resident!reader

word count: 1.2k

warning(s): mentions of death, sad thoughts & roof talks, the usual

a/n: this is my first time writing for the Pitt— I hope you guys like it (and I would love requests if you have any)... Please let me know what you think! ❤️

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷

“Rough night?” Robby’s question lingers. You don’t need to turn around to know he’s smiling – you can hear it in his voice. It’s a genuine query laced with equal parts teasing and concern. 

“You could say that.” You murmur in response, taking a deep inhale. A gust of wind breezes by. It cools your skin, sobers you to your surroundings, reminding you where you are. 

This shift had been something. Trauma after trauma that came rolling in, the hours ticked by, each one more exhausting than the last. You might think after years of med school and residency – with more than three years in the Pitt — the last two under your attending Jack Abbot, it would make it easier. But as you’d learned, the pain from patient deaths never eases, and this night had been no exception. 

It’s hard to forget the frantic nature that had emerged in the ED over the last number of hours. A family had come in around 4am. A mother, a father, and a 5-year-old boy. MVC, T-boned by a drunk driver – both parents were dead on scene, their child was still fighting for his life. You worked on him for an hour before Dr. Abbot called time of death. He let you go longer than he should have, trying to save this boy’s life. Jack, who never lets emotions cloud his judgment, had given you more time — not for the boy, but for you.

He had seen firsthand how much you cared for each one of your patients over the last two years, but this one felt different. You were usually so composed, just like him. This case, for whatever reason, got to you. It broke something. And he knew who you needed right now. 

Robby steps over the railing to stand at your side, the roof giving way to his presence. He’s always known when to find you. Like he’s tuned into your frequency somehow, even when you barely understand it yourself.

“Jack told me I could find you up here. Said something about you stealing his spot – kinda sounded like he was a little worried you might jump, kid.”

You let out a soft laugh. “Nah, it’s shift change.” Your tone is light as you elbow him gently. “If I was gonna jump, I’d do it on Abbot’s watch – never yours.”

“I appreciate that.” He says. “Wouldn’t want to lose my favourite resident.”

“You won’t.” Your response is serious, assuring. “Just—”

“Thinking about that kid?” Robby finishes for you. The first rays of light catch on the edges of his jawline, and you hate how beautiful that looks, here of all places.

“Yeah... I–uh, I don’t know what happened to me.” You admit, your fingers grasping at the sleeve of your shirt. 

“Talk to me (Y/n).” His voice drifts. “Don’t bottle it up.”

You nod, the motion almost imperceptible, like you're afraid acknowledging it out loud will make it hurt more. “I keep seeing his face,” you say. “The way he kept reaching for his mom, even after... even after she was gone.”

Robby doesn’t speak right away. He gives you space, something he’s always been good at. Not filling the silence with platitudes. Just being there, solid and steady. You feel him shift closer, his shoulder brushing yours.

“There was nothing more you could’ve done.”

You sigh, scrubbing your hands over your face. “I know that. Logically, I know. But emotionally... it doesn’t feel like enough. It never does.”

Robby’s voice softens. “That’s because you give a damn. It’s what makes you good, even when it hurts like hell.”

You glance over at him. His hair is a little messy, like he’s run his fingers through it too many times this morning. His scrubs are clean, unstained, showing no signs of the incoming shift that’s likely to be just as brutal as yours. But his eyes — they’re steady. Kind. And watching you with a kind of care that cuts through the fog in your chest.

“Sometimes I wonder if I’m cut out for this.” You whisper.

He turns toward you, fully now. “Don’t,” he says, firm but not harsh. “Don’t say that.”

You open your mouth to argue, but he shakes his head. If you left, he’s not sure he could continue. Jack might kill him if he can't talk you off this ledge.

“You’re one of the strongest people I know.” He stands firm. “I’ve seen you do the impossible on less sleep and more pressure than anyone should be under. You belong here. The fact that you feel this much? That’s not a weakness. That’s what sets you apart.”

You look down at your shoes, throat tight. “Thanks, Robby.”

“I mean it.” He bumps your arm gently. He watches you for a moment, one, two, then three. There’s something unreadable in his expression — not quite a smile, but close.

“What?” You ask.

He pauses, like he’s weighing something. “Just thinking,” he says finally. “You spend so much time holding it together, I don’t think I’ve ever really seen you let go.”

You snort. “What does that even mean?”

He gives a soft chuckle. “It means… I’ve seen you save lives without flinching. Seen you stand toe-to-toe with Jack when he’s in one of his moods. You don’t rattle easily. But tonight—”

“Tonight was different.”

“Yeah.” He doesn’t press. Just confirms it.

You sink down onto the concrete of the ledge, letting your head rest back against the railing. “I’m tired of pretending it doesn’t get to me.” You admit. “Like if I act detached enough, maybe I won’t crack.”

Robby sits beside you, careful not to crowd your space. “There’s nothing weak about cracking.” He says quietly. “What matters is that you keep showing up.”

You turn to look at him. He’s closer now, the warmth of his body radiating across the narrow space. There’s a softness in his gaze that you hadn’t noticed before — not the usual sarcasm or light teasing, but something gentler. Something more careful.

Your voice is barely above a whisper. “Why do you care so much?”

His lips twitch, like he’s debating whether to deflect. But then, he just says, “Because you matter. Because you walk into the fire every day, and I don’t think anyone tells you often enough how much that means.”

You feel your heart stutter, just a little. “You don’t have to fix me, Robby.”

“I’m not trying to.” He tilts his head slightly, earnest. “I just want you to know you’re not alone in it.”

The silence stretches again, but this one feels changed. Less heavy. More charged.

You don’t reach for him. He doesn’t reach for you. But there’s something in the air — not quite spoken, not acted on — just held between you like breath.

You watch silently as the sun spills gold across the skyline, your head now leaning on his shoulder. Your cheek warms where it rests against his scrubs.

“Still thinking about jumping?” He teases, voice low.

“Maybe into your arms,” you murmur, half-joking.

Robby chuckles, warm and quiet. “Careful. You keep saying things like that and I might start getting ideas.”

You smile, more than content. "I think I'm alright with that."

You’re definitely alright with that…

[maximoff-pan]

So real 👀🫡

Band of Brothers is such a comfort show. Not sure what that says about me.

[maximoff-pan]

okay okay I know I shouldn’t be trying to get into more fandoms with my track record — but — how would you guys feel if I started writing for HBOs The Pitt?

because Dr. Robinavitch and Dr. Abbot have literally consumed my heart and soul and would love to write for them.

so please, if you have any ideas or requests, feel free to send ‘em my way

[maximoff-pan]

What if I told you this would be coming out in a couple of weeks after months of writer’s block — and a busy as fuck uni schedule — has been kicking me in the ass?

The ultimate deception part two anyone? Here’s part one for anyone curious: here

And here’s a little snippet of the ongoing draft if you’re curious at all…

[maximoff-pan]

reader holding steve’s hand (but their really only holding one or two of his fingers) and steve’s like “you alright there?”

this is such a cute idea, I love it <3

pairing: steve harrington x fem!reader

word count: 1.7k

warning(s): mentions of the mindflayer and demodogs, unedited writing, set in season 2 (because I’m currently rewatching and that’s where I’m at rn), so if you haven’t seen that, you have been warned… although it has been five years, you’ve had your chance for it not to be spoiled...

quick a/n: this is very much an AU of the season 2 scene where the kids make a plan to go help El (no Billy because I didn’t feel like including him)... hopefully this is okay, and thank you all for sticking with me!

Holding his hand seems like such a small thing, something so easy and so instinctual that it shouldn’t be this hard. But it is. Because for whatever reason, this doesn’t feel real. 

You’d think it would feel grounding, that it would maybe force you back into a clearer head space. But it’s doing the opposite. As the butterflies fly freely through your stomach, you feel yourself falling further and further from reality. 

This is what all the girls at Hawkin’s High meant when they said Steve Harrington was dreamy. But all that gossip could never have prepared you for this feeling right now. Oh lord is his touch ever hypnotizing. Even if it is just a platonic attempt at reassuring each other that everything is going to be okay. Even if it is nothing. 

Despite it all, you want to curse yourself for falling for it. As if you ever should have thought yourself immune to his charms; you were so naive, so adamant that you could never like someone like him. Little did you know how quickly he could crack that superiority complex of yours.

And as the saying goes, oh how the mighty have fallen.

Or is it, the pride comes before the fall? Either way, you’re fucked.

More than anything, it’s such a strange thing to feel yourself fall into something (or someone) that you promised yourself you never would. Never in your wildest dreams did you think you would be sitting in Jonathan Byers’ living room, your hand reaching for Steve Harrington’s as you await answers on what feels like the fate of the universe. 

Holding his hand seems like it should be the least of your problems, and yet it has wormed its way to the forefront of your mind. 

Honestly, for the life of you, you cannot seem to grip his entire hand. You convince yourself that it must be nerves, your fingers merely clinging on to the tips of two of his. It’s more of a grazing touch really… a weak bid at trying to hold on. If your mind was in a more settled state, you might not have missed the blatant metaphor shining in your face. You also might have even laughed.

But this? The impending doom of the mind flayer and its pack of demodog minions? Not a laughing matter…not in the slightest. And all you can do is wait.

You don’t even want to think about it, how much longer you’ll have to stay here, just waiting. Let alone allowing yourself to stew in the immense pressure you’re feeling right now. If you’re being honest, it’s the most soul crushing stress you’ve ever felt; it’s like you can almost feel the grey hairs forming. Because these kids, they’re just, kids, innocent and losing their last ounce of childhood by the very second. Fuck, you’re barely an adult yourself. And as much as you know you’re not their parent, you feel responsible for each of them in your own silly way. You’d die before you’d let anything happen to them, and you know Steve would too.

That’s what makes this all so scary, and yet paradoxically, reassuring all the same. You’ve got something to live for, people who are depending on you to be okay. And that’s oddly comforting to you, as much as it can be.

“You alright there?” Steve’s voice echoes in your ears. You’re not sure how long he’s been trying to gain your attention, but by the knowing smile on his face, you’d have to take a guess that this isn’t the first time he’s asked you how you’re doing.

Breathing even, he lets go of your fingers, the warmth of his touch suddenly gone, and equally as noticeable. To your surprise, it doesn’t last long before he’s nudging you playfully, his arm gently meeting yours with a soft bump.

When you don’t respond like you usually would, with a bubbled up laugh or a reassuring sigh of, perfectly peachy, Steve’s shoulders drop. He follows your gaze to the kids who are gathered at the Byers’ kitchen table, arguing over what to do next. 

They want to fight back and help their friend, an admirable if not risky idea to act on, you must admit. But they’re brave kids, — albeit impulsive ones — much braver than any other kids you’ve ever met. So, you’re not surprised when you overhear their plan to lure the demodogs away from El, allowing her better access to the mind flayer. 

It doesn’t draw the most confidence in you to know that you and Steve are at a disagreement. While you know where Steve’s opinion lies, and you agree with him that keeping the kids safe is one of your top priorities, you can’t help but want to hear them out. Maybe it’s delusion talking, or maybe you’ve taken one too many hits to the head, but the more time you spend here waiting for any news, the more your heart wants to fight back too, even if your brain knows how stupid that would be. 

“I think we should go.”

Steve’s head turns so fast you think he might have whiplash, and when your eyes meet his, they’re wider than saucers. His deep amber orbs blink in confusion as his brow furrows in surprise.

Shock even.

“You, what?”

Standing from your previous spot on the couch next to Steve, you make your way over to the kids, hands placed firmly on your hips. Facing him now, you echo, “I think we should go.”

“Fucking right!” Dustin’s holler causes a chorus of ‘yeah’s’ and vigorous nods to be shared amongst the group. All except for Steve. He’s less than impressed. 

You’re supposed to be on his side, not theirs. 

“No, no, no, no, no, no.” He repeats the word like a mantra, flicking his wrist in objection while simultaneously signalling to the kids to keep quiet from agreeing any further with your declaration. “Absolutely not.”

Clenching your jaw at his immediate dismissal, your voice raises ever so slightly. “We’re supposed to protect them Steve.” 

He almost scoffs at your words, because how could bringing the kids into the most dangerous place they could go, possibly be classified as protecting them? That sounds like pure ludicrous, the exact opposite of what you’re supposed to be doing. But then you say something that somehow makes sense to him. And for a moment, it has him rethinking everything.

“All of them.”

It’s Mike’s added assertion that seals it for him, his voice stern and steady. “That includes El.” He says, lips pulling into a tight line.

Steve doesn’t know this El girl very well, only having just met her a few hours ago, but already, she means a lot to him. Because she clearly means so much to everyone else. By proxy, that makes her important in Steve Harrington’s world.

“We can’t sit here and let her get hurt,” Max’s eyes shine with tears, gaze pleading with him, “especially if we know we can help her.” It’s oddly strange to see her like this. Max doesn’t show emotion at the best of times, let alone the worst, so despite having known her for less time than the rest, Steve is more than aware how much this means to her.

Tilting your head, you lay on the most convincing voice you can, while still maintaining a genuine tone. You don’t want him partaking in something he’s not comfortable doing. But, you suppose, at this point, it’s far past that.

“Steve, I know how risky this is, and I know you’re doing the logical thing, because God knows I’ve been nearly incapable of it” your (e/c) eyes find his brown ones and he can feel himself beginning to give in, “but nothing about this shit is logical.” You can see it in his demeanour that he’s fighting with himself not to give in. “If we have a chance to help her, we have to take it.”

“We have to.” Lucas cuts in.

“C’mon Steve.” Is Dustin’s attempt.

Whether it’s your words that do it, or Mike and Max’s pleadingly puppy dog-like stares, he’s not sure. But in a matter of seconds, his posture is deflating, and a long sigh is released from his lips.

One second passes in anticipation, then two, and lastly three, before:

“Fine.” Steve finally agrees with a huff, realizing he was never going to win this fight. He hears a quiet mumble of victory from Max and notices a quick fist pump she shares with Lucas, but it’s your beaming smile that assures him that he’s made the right decision. You look not only relieved, but genuinely happy, something that Steve wishes he could see more of from you. It’s hard to be happy when it feels like the universe is crumbling at your feet, but it’s nice to see nonetheless.

Grabbing the car keys, he tosses them to you as you lead each of the kids out the door. 

As you usher them out, you lean your head over your shoulder, sending Steve a soft smile, and mouthing a quick thank you to him. You’re grateful, truly.

Wordlessly, he nods. I’d do anything for you, he thinks to himself. He’d give you the world if you asked. Not that you would. You never ask for anything from anyone.

He wishes you’d change your mind on that.

Taking note of the brief moment shared between you two, Dustin hangs back with Steve, eyeing the older teen in amusement. He watches him lock up the Byers’ residence, hands shaking slightly from the adrenaline of it all. Following a few steps behind the rest of the group, Dustin smiles at Steve slyly, his gaze full of mischief.

“Not a word.” Steve warns, the sound of the car engine starting is enough to put a pause to his words. But Dustin doesn’t listen. Since when has he ever?

“You’re so whipped man…” Steve doesn’t deny it as Dustin shakes his head with a smirk. He watches as Steve steps through the passenger side door, a slight grin on his face. 

Muttering to himself as he slides in beside Max, Dustin huffs, “So fucking whipped.”

[maximoff-pan]

It’s so nice to see you active again. How are you doing? -E

Hi my darling E! How I’ve missed you 🩷

I’m going well! How are you?

[maximoff-pan]

The ultimate deception part two anyone? Here’s part one for anyone curious: here

And here’s a little snippet of the ongoing draft if you’re curious at all…