#[ blood tax au ]

[sarcophagid]

xxv in the tower of babel essence

he looks a bit too much like yuanji with a braid... im sorry

lore:

xxv's name here is jinwu for now. this was originally a time loop thing where jinwu was an oracle with a severed head that nebu reattached every loop. regardless of that detail they used to know each other when they were young prior to nebu's conquest. they separated because nebu wanted power and jinwu got bored of him

jinwu reads nebu's fate and tells him that he'll succeed. however, the new kingdom will also eventually fall to a new insurrection, following a cyclical pattern like the rising and setting of the sun.

nebu calls bullshit and they part ways. years later, he orders to have jinwu executed by beheading, who points at the setting sun before he dies. it ends here!

(or we can keep the deathless looping thing and nebu hangs onto the head so it can't get reattached. also some stuff about haunting and descent into madness but anyways thats just for fun though.)

notes:

elements of the makeup and clothing were inspired by tang dynasty fashion. idk when the story takes place so im not actually sure if thats super accurate 😭

the moon symbolism goes nowhere, the oracle doesn't have an active role in the rebellion, i just wanted to have it match the crescent shaped face markings. main idea is the crow symbol, which goes with the sun bc everyone in the essence has some sort of sun-related symbol in their outfit

[an0n-1o1]

Remember when I had an insane crush on the Tax Fraud AU version of bob bell

Tax Fraud AU belongs to @loonypendulum @stinkysdiner and @puppit-geek

Tax Fraud AU C.O.P.S. designs belong to @loonypendulum

[ceilidho]

take me home, country road

[ao3]

You have nothing on your person apart from a hastily packed suitcase and the dress you came into town wearing, on the run from trouble back home. Too bad John's missing a bride that matches your description. Or: the 1800s (mistaken) mail order bride au (part 7)

part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6

-

You watch him like a hawk after that. 

Not because anything’s changed. In fact, nothing’s changed. Seeing him drag a man by the collar of his shirt, the look in his eyes punishing and severe, has only confirmed the essential imbalance in your relationship. You don’t suffer the same fate as that man being dragged from the bar not because of mercy or leniency or forgiveness, but because the truth hasn’t yet come out. You’re safe because the truth is still hidden, a fact that could change at the drop of a hat. 

The thought makes you wary. You watch John in the days after with a scrutiny that borders on the paranoid. Does he already know? Has he left you stewing in ignorance all this time while waiting for the proper authorities to arrive? When he looks at you, does he see the blood on your hands? Does he know that he’s looking at a murderer? Does he know that your sins weigh on you like heavy stones dragging you down into the earth?

Every time the porch steps creak, your heart turns to stone and betrayal rushes up your throat like acid, and it burns. 

Then the door opens and John walks in. His face lights up when his eyes fall on you. “Hi darlin’.”

All you can do is let out a shuddering breath and slump into his embrace. 

You’re waiting for it to happen. Even when he pulls you into his chest at night, a big arm settled around your waist and his palm spread wide over your belly, you tense and wait for the truth to come out. But all he does is sigh and fall asleep, tucking you closer into his chest. You stare at the wall until the grooves between the wooden boards start to expand, the darkness encompassing every inch of the wall before bleeding down to the floorboards and up to the ceiling. Then you wake up and it’s the next day. 

The truth is imminent. It shines its light on the darkened path before it and stalks forward. You cower in the shadows waiting for it to find you, hopeful that it won’t. Sure that it will. 

There’s never a good moment to pack your bags and leave, and the longer you stay—as the days turn into a week since you first disembarked from the train and wandered into a town soaked in russet and red—the harder it seems to get a moment of peace. Though John wasn’t exaggerating when he said that a sheriff’s job never stops, you hadn’t thought that it would involve so much. 

Between chores and John and the townsfolk, you can’t get a moment to yourself. The closest you come to it is when Kate leaves you to your thoughts while she helps the customers. Even then, she still comes by every now and again to offer you a tea or brandy ball to suck on. 

You resent the idea that you need to be babysat, but he isn’t exactly wrong either. You’re not too stubborn to admit that. Under Kate’s watchful eye, you aren’t scurrying off anywhere. Instead, you help out around the shop where you can, offering to stock the shelves and sweep the floors. On occasion, you even get on your hands and knees in front of the shop to pull up the weeds, but that draws more attention than you’re comfortable with. They simply aren’t as concerned with weeds out here.

Most of your time is spent loitering around town waiting for John to take you home. Sometimes you join him for the day, trailing along after him when he goes out to collect the taxes or you accompany him when he has to attend trials and hearings in the court house, where you sit quietly in the public gallery and watch in rapt attention as the magistrate conducts the court proceedings, but there are days where that’s simply not possible.

“You’re gonna spend the day with Laswell, alright?” John tells you, pinching your chin to tilt your head up. 

He loves that little gesture, you’ve realized. Loves to touch you and guide you with a hand on your back or chin or arm, a hand brushing down the side of your waist to pull you in, gripping you by the nape of your neck just to hold. Even now, in broad daylight and in front of the window to the general store where anyone could look out and see the two of you, he keeps his thumb there, reluctant to let you go. The thought makes your neck go hot.

“When will you be back?” you ask.

“Later this afternoon—before dusk, so don’t go worrying about heading home without me. I have to see to something a few towns over.”

“Oh…what do they need you for?”

John frowns. “You’ve got an awful lot of questions today.”

“Never mind. Have a safe trip.” You don’t know why his reluctance to tell you anything frustrates you so, especially when he has good reason to, but even you can hear the way your voice grows petulant. 

His thumb squeezes against your chin, holding your head in place when you try to turn away. “I’m overseeing a hanging. Couple of men were found guilty of murder.” He studies you so intensely that he can practically see in your eyes the way your stomach turns at that. “See, I thought that might upset you. This is why I didn’t wanna tell you, darlin’.”

“It’s fine,” you say, swallowing. “I’m a big girl.”

“Yeah,” John agrees, brushing his thumb up your chin until it tugs at your bottom lip, watching the way it snaps back into place when he releases it. 

He makes every moment feel like a last goodbye and a homecoming. You almost can’t meet his eyes under the intensity of his stare, but you also can’t look away. Not with how he looks at you like some precious thing. 

You expect it before it happens, but when he dips his head to plant a soft kiss on your lips, you go breathless for a moment. His beard is bristly against your skin, just south of coarse. The kiss turns into another, even more tender than the first. You resent the way you lean forward when he pulls away, chasing after him. 

“You be good for Miss Kate, okay?” he says, waiting for your reassurance. 

“I will,” you rasp, mortified at how easily he unravels you and how plainly you let it show. John grins when he hears the tremble in your voice. 

Then he leaves, riding off towards where the horizon dips below the visible and you watch until he disappears completely, falling away with it. Kate beckons you inside after that, and it’s just hot enough out that you gather up the skirt of your dress and follow after her, climbing up the steps to the general store.

Kate is a tough nut to crack. She’s kind and never rebuffs your questions when you make conversation, but she also isn’t exactly forthcoming with personal information. She seems more than happy to let the conversation lapse into silence. When there isn’t a customer to serve, she’ll take out a leather-bound notebook and write, going so deep into her own thoughts that you sometimes need to call her name a couple times before she’ll respond. 

“Kate,” you say again, waiting for her to finally blink and look up, which she does with only the faintest glimmer of impatience in her eyes. “Care to join me on a walk? I need to stretch my legs and…well, I don’t know my way around just yet.”

She snaps her book shut, winding a bit of string around it before placing it back beneath the counter. “There’s a restaurant on the other side of town if you care for a bite as well. I could do with something to eat.”

It’s not as much of a walk as you might have expected. You learn along the way that Kate has lived in town for several years, taking the shop over from her predecessor, a former employer prone to drinking and prone to expiring from that very same vice. She speaks of him with familiarity and affection for the dead, but none of the longing and misery that you’ve come to expect from someone grieving a loss.

“You came far just to find a husband,” she remarks when the two of you are seated at a windowside booth in the restaurant. She spreads a cloth over her lap and you follow her lead. 

You bite your lip. “I’ve heard good things about the frontier.”

Kate looks amused by that. “Now who’s been lying to you?”

You laugh, half genuine and half to keep the atmosphere light. You don’t tell her that no one lied to you about going out west because no one had said those words to you in the first place. There hadn’t been enough time for a conversation after the event, only enough time to unlock the study door and wash your hands of the blood in the sink downstairs before fleeing the manor with only your purse and cardigan, the feather duster still lying on the floor upstairs. You hadn’t even bothered going home.

There’s no telling what your aunt and uncle must have thought. You try not to think about that because there’s no going back now. You had the luxury of a single cry on the train as it chugged away from the station and the day slipped into night, but nothing more than that and nothing since. 

You tuck into your food when the waitress comes back with your meal.

“John said you were a schoolteacher before this?” Kate says, pulling you back into the conversation. 

It makes you nervous to lie too much about a subject you hardly know, so you smile and nod instead of responding. 

“You must be quite the polymath,” she continues, eyes downcast, not allowing you a good read on her. “Arithmetic, writing, history—goodness knows the skills one needs nowadays with the leaps and bounds in education. Thank goodness for the Common School reformers, giving women the opportunity to develop young minds.”

“Yes,” you croak, then clear your throat. “I certainly did my best to…educate the children.” 

Comical, given that you’d dropped out of school at the age of fourteen to work in a factory sewing buttons onto shirts. 

“And was the profession enjoyable? I know John mentioned you were keener on starting a family than continuing on as an instructor, but was it an informative experience?”

“Oh yes, it was. I enjoyed it. Immensely.”

“It must have been nice to work in a profession with such little turmoil.”

“I couldn’t have asked for better,” you agree, your smile tight now, wavering only a bit at the corners. 

Kate stares at you for a beat too long. It makes your stomach hurt and you fight against the urge to wilt under her stare. You can’t imagine you’ve said something wrong with how little you’ve said, but her stare makes your skin crawl. 

Finally, she smiles, the skin around her eyes creasing. “Well, that’s just lovely to hear.”

You put the conversation out of your mind on the walk back, sure that you must have imagined the flicker in her eyes. 

John comes back earlier than you expected. You swear your heart jolts in your chest when you hear the sound of a horse whinnying outside the shop out of nowhere and a man’s low, rough voice responding back, soothing it. You hear the sound of dismount, boots hitting the ground hard, and then come up the steps, each step making the spurs on the back of his boots rattle. 

When he opens the door, his eyebrows jump up at the sight of you already there waiting. Your eagerness should embarrass you, and it does, but there’s not much you can do about it, and there’s even less you can do about the way you melt when he says, “There you are, darlin’. Time to go home.”

Precious is the world where home has come to mean something tender and soft, even as much as you’ve pushed against it. You still hold fast against the notion, steeling yourself when John helps you up onto Buttercup and follows suit, riding home at almost a gallop. You hear his laughter on the wind when you yelp and nearly slide off, his arm around you the only thing holding you in place. 

“It’d be easier to ride if I had pants,” you complain when you dismount, hands pressed to his shoulders when he helps you down. “How do women even ride sidesaddle on their own?”

“Plenty of women do, darlin’. It’s nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Well, I don’t like it.”

“We can get you pants if you need them so badly,” John says, looking up to the sky like Lord help me suffer this woman. “But that means I’ll be teaching you how to ride Buttercup on your own. Think you can handle that?”

You balk at the thought. “…Let me think about it.”

He snorts. “You do that.”

He leaves you to your thoughts when he takes the horses out to the paddock for a bit. 

You sit out on the porch and watch the sunset while the horses run around the pen, soaking in the last hour of daylight. Overhead, clouds as big as mountains pass, heavy like an oil painting. Off in the distance, you can see thick clouds blotting out the sky entirely, the belly of them split open and letting out a downpour of biblical proportions. You only grow a bit nervous when you notice the wall of rain moving closer to your house with the wind, inching forward more every minute.

It’s not long before John notices it too. He whistles for the horses and waits until they trot back over to the gate, fixing the lead to their mantles again and leading them one by one back into the stable. A light drizzle begins to pour. It churns up the dust and dirt when it hits the ground, scenting the air with the fragrant smell of earth.

You head over to the stable as John brings in the last horse, hovering by the door while you watch him run his hand down Buttercup’s muzzle, whispering softly to her. If he notices your presence, he doesn’t acknowledge it, his attention focused solely on her. 

It gives you a chance to admire him from the back. Thick thighs in indigo jeans that seem almost painted on. Shirt tucked into his jeans, stretched taut at the shoulders; dark droplets of rain drying already. The dusting of hair on the back of his neck. You can see the fine lines on his forehead and in the corner of his eye from the side angle and it reminds you again that he’s older and more weathered than you, settled into his age rather than floundering in it. 

“It’s raining,” you say, just to have something to say. You shrink under his gaze when he turns towards you, faint amusement in his eyes.

“I noticed.”

You cringe at that, aware that he knows. He’s the one that brought the horses in after all. There’s just something in you that feels compelled to open your mouth when he’s around. An impulse that makes you cheep like a bird. 

“Looks like a bad one,” you mutter instead of shutting your mouth, instead of hightailing it back to the house and shutting all the windows to keep the rain from coming in. Useless girl. 

“Probably rain all night,” John says, squinting out at the sky through the open door. It’s darker now, a storm brewing. 

“Is there…is there anything we have to do? To get ready?” You don’t know why you say we like this is a partnership, but it comes unbidden and you know if he told you to hurry back and take in the porch chairs, you would. 

“Nothing to worry about. I’ll close up the stables and seal the windows—storm probably won’t hit for another hour or two. After dinner, we’ll turn in early.”

With a final stroke down Buttercup’s jaw, he steps away and moves towards you. You feel rooted in place again at his approach; the thought of taking a step back never even occurs to you. When he finally reaches you, he doesn’t hesitate to reel you in by your hips, drawing you into a deep, wet kiss that he breaks only when you whimper into his mouth. 

“You feelin’ better about being out here?” he asks, low and intimately. “Looked like you had a good time with Laswell.”

“She’s nice,” you say, deflecting from the other question. 

John hums his agreement, readjusting his hold on your waist until every inch of him is pressed against you. Your breasts are flattened to his chest, belly pressed to his; every hard inch of him, solid as an oak.

“C’mon, honey, talk to me,” he murmurs. “Have I been treating you right? You still have any reservations about marrying me?”

“Bit late for reservations, isn’t it?”

He clucks his tongue. “‘Course it ain’t. Won’t change anything, but I still wanna know.”

It’s hard not to consider the possibility of being honest with him for a change when his gaze borders on the devout. No one in the history of time has ever looked at you like this, like you hung up the moon and stars. The thought chokes you up. In all the years of your life, has one other person looked at you and asked if everything was to your liking? John’s love borders on reverence, straddles the narrow divide between the telluric and the celestial, the earthly and the divine. 

It’s dizzying. And you’re not built for subterfuge. Not built to lie to the one man that, despite everything, despite taking you from your former life by force, has offered you a new one on a silver platter. 

You wet your lips, conscious of how dry your mouth suddenly is. John’s eyes follow the glide of your tongue over your lip.

And then you lie. “None whatsoever. I’m happy here.”

Maybe it’s a half-lie. After he shuts the stable doors and barricades them to keep the doors from swinging open in the midst of the storm, you wind up back on the porch watching the dark clouds up in the sky slowly approach, John at your back this time. 

John tilts your head up into another kiss. You don’t know when you made the conscious decision to let him think you amenable to this relationship, but you cling to that thought desperately when his tongue licks into your mouth velvety smooth. 

The roof extends out over the porch, keeping the two of you dry, but you can hear the sound of raindrops pelting the slate shingles. 

“You’ll see, honey,” he says against your lips, the words rumbling through you, buzzing under your skin and making it tingle. “‘M gonna make you so happy. Never gonna even think of leaving me.”

The words dissolve on your tongue. Swallowed down dry. With his arm hooked around your waist and hand tilting your head up, there’s no way you could think of anything else except wanting more. 

It’s hard to talk when he has you up against the railing, your dress pulled up and his fingers spreading apart your lower lips. It’s not the first time he’s touched you there, but it’s the longest he has, at least without the barrier of your underwear. His fingers spread your labia delicately, middle finger running up the wet seam. He hums into the back of your head while he does and presses a kiss into your hair. 

“Always so soft and wet here, darlin’,” John murmurs, stroking his fingers up your inner lips and petting the sensitive nub at the apex of your sex. “Why didn’t you tell me you’ve been aching for it? Been waiting for you to give me the word.”

Waiting, he says, while tucking a finger into your sex, curling it up into you and chuckling under his breath when your hands clamp tighter on the railing and your back arches. Just a single finger feels like more than you can handle. John has thick fingers; thick fingers with calluses that you can feel on the delicate flesh between your legs. It plugs you up tight, more so when your core clenches involuntarily around his finger. His chuckle descends into a groan, then a sigh. 

He pulls his finger out against the squeeze of your internal muscles, ignoring the way you whisper, “No, please” under your breath. 

You only stop pleading for more when he swirls his finger around your pearl again, lavishing it with attention. “Aching? I’m not—”

“You are, darlin’,” he breathes, and now you feel him pull you from the railing, stepping back to take a seat on the porch swing. He pulls you into his lap, sitting you across it instead of with your back to his chest like he did in the bath the other day. 

“Anyone could come by—” you hiss, fluffing the skirt of your dress out around your thighs when he tries to push it back up to get his hands back on your nethers. 

“You tense up when you’re nervous, honey,” John cuts you off, forcing his hand back up your dress until he pushes his finger back into your quim, delighted to find it hotter and wetter, practically dripping onto his lap. “See, there you go. Just relax. I’ll make you feel good, darlin’. We’ll take care of that nasty ache.”

You pant through each pulse of his finger. You don’t even think about looking up to meet his eyes, not when he stares down at you with obvious adoration and devotion, the emotion splayed across his face. He looks entranced at the sight of you coming apart on his fingers, a flush high on his cheeks. 

“No one’s gonna come by. Not this far out. ‘Sides, they know to keep their distance. Newlyweds need their space, right, darlin’?”

Supposing he’s right and no one comes out this way. Isn’t it still unseemly to do this out in the open? So far from your marriage bed? John seems incapable of relegating his affections to that space, unconcerned with propriety or modesty. You wonder with a spark of fear if he’d even budge if someone were to come trotting up the walkway on horseback or if he’d just wave them off and send them on their way. You don’t think he’s the kind of man to want an audience, thank the Lord, but he seems entirely unphased by even the idea of being intruded upon. 

You melt when he shushes your worries, feeling you tense against him, and sinks his fingers in deeper, now another. Don’t fret, he murmurs against your temple, sighing softly. I’ve got you, honey. Ain’t going nowhere.

You aren’t, are you, you think wildly. The land around here goes on forever and the train whistles by only twice a week if you’re lucky. Then townsfolk know you by face and a false name, but that would be enough for them to grow concerned if they were to spot you heading for the train with your suitcases packed, and with John or one of his deputies always in town, there’s little chance you’d be able to board without one of them interfering. 

Still though, it’s better than the alternative. For over a week now you’ve been on high alert, waiting for an arrest warrant to be slipped onto John’s desk with your likeness drawn on it, and for him to come collect you stone-faced and furious. It could still come. 

He keeps you tucked into his arms and nestled close, shushing you when you hiccup and pinch your lips together to keep quiet. He lets you have that, unphased by the way you try to hide it, only tutting when you try to fight it, curling his fingers up inside you and rubbing a spot inside of you that makes it hard to breathe. 

“I could just take it, but you’re gonna give it to me, darlin’,” John says.

And you do. Messily, noisily. Burying your face in his neck and sobbing it out, humiliation wrung out of you, squeezing out every drop. He smells like musk and old sweat, amber warm. Liquid gold. You press your nose into the skin of his neck and draw in a breath so deep that you go lightheaded. 

John keeps his fingers tucked in you until you stop shaking, talking you through it even though you hardly hear a word. How could you over the rush in your head, the blood in your ears? When you open your eyes and look around, the sky is swollen and dark, the wall of rain 

“C’mon, honey,” he says, pulling his fingers out and placing his hand low on your belly. “Let’s go inside.”

You sit across from him at dinner, eating under candlelight. The weight of his gaze for once isn’t stifling. 

The rain only starts in earnest when he’s pulled the quilt over the two of you and pulled you into his arms. The rain pelting the windowpane dulls to a low roar when you turn over and snuggle deeper into John’s chest, pulling the blanket over your head. Tomorrow, the grass will be greener than the day before. You can feel it in your bones.

[ditzybat]

nothing in my head except for thoughts of bruce and constantine co-parenting billy.

like it could very well be platonic co parents bruce and john, but i think it could be a very tense pining situation - but doesn’t matter, however you interpret it just imagine how funny the dynamics would be

john: well i saw him first

bruce drafting up adoption papers: too bad

—

john: and if you trace this rune here you can summon trigon, although raven will get her knickers in a twist over it

bruce: no summoning powerful demon lords in the manor

billy: but bruceeeeee

—

billy: dad

bruce and john: yes? [glaring at eachother appalled that the other thinks they have the right to think of themselves of billy’s father]

billy totally doing this on purpose with a shit eating grin: dad?

—

teacher: so are you little billy’s father?

bruce and john simultaneously: yes

teacher: oh! just know we are a very accepting community and find your relationship heartwarming! now if you would head this way i believe billy drew a wonderful portrait of your massive families mr. wayne’s

bruce snaking a hand around john’s waist, grinding his teeth: of course, shall we dear?

john pinching bruce so hard he’s sure it draws blood: yes anything you say love

billy: aw man there goes my two christmases… :(

—

billy: this is why i like dad’s better, at least he lets me summon supernatural kings from other dimensions

bruce in tears: you don’t mean that

—

bruce: i’m not letting you keep a tiger at the manor

john: don’t be ass, let the boy have his talking tiger

bruce: oh well i don’t think you have a say in this mr. ‘soul tax evader’

john: oh fuck off you furry bat

billy: god, if you’re there, i really don’t wanna see them make out in front of me

—

damian and billy playing a board game while gossiping:

billy: my dad and your dad wanna smash, don’t they?

damian sighing: unfortunately constantine’s… rugged look has enamored my father

billy:…

damian: …

billy: ten bucks says they ‘consummate’ their marriage by the end of the month

damian: hm, twenty dollars that by the end of this week they’ve had preformed coitus

—

billy: i miss when you guys were at each others throats, no one wants to see you guys grope each other at breakfast

dick: i think it’s sweet

jason: they defiled the library, definitely not sweet dickhead, it’s practically child abuse to watch them basically on top of each other

—

idk i think it’s a neat au, even if there’s no canon whatsoever to make this even sort of plausible in the slightest.

[phoenixyfriend]

Heiress of the Count AU

Early in the Imperial Era, Vader is sent along as The Muscle for someone's trade negotiations with what's left of the CIS. There's not much, all told, and they've already capitulated to The Big Ask of submitting to the Empire, but bureaucratic minutiae still need to be pinned down, and they're still cohesive enough that it'll be easier to discuss things like tax rates by meeting with a few representatives than hashing things out planet by planet. Vader doesn't want to come along, but Sidious said he had to (and then laughed).

Once he arrives, he finds out why! The head of the loose coalition of CIS planets is the Countess of Serenno, Asajj Ventress.

Asajj is listed as Count Dooku's primary heir in the will, despite him trying to kill her and her fucking off to be a bounty hunter instead. He still cared? Was fond? He still regarded her well enough to name her as basically his adopted daughter. The line of succession will revert to Dooku's nephew if Ventress doesn't have any heirs of her own, and a good portion of the larger estate did go to him (and some pockets went to Obi-Wan), but the title, castle, fortune, and throne went to Asajj.

She doesn't know what the hell to do with it. But then comes the situation of negotiating with the Empire, and her... cousin? Grand-nephew? Whatever the fuck Dooku's actual blood nephew is. The guy said she had to go because she was the only person around that could claim to be at least somewhat resistant/unintimidated by Imperial lackeys, being a notably powerful Force User with a history of Jedi Kills.

So Asajj is now the new face of what's left of the CIS.

And she's honestly pretty likely to recognize Vader as Anakin, if they're in the same room for a few hours and she's calm enough to try and figure out which idiot is in the massive armor.

IDK where this goes but I think maybe Asajj could pspspsps Vader out of the Empire by mentioning that the nightsisters had a better grasp of necromancy than the Sith, and if Vader really wanted to follow through on whatever it was about immortality that got him on Sidious's side (she's heard Amidala is dead, and the two weren't subtle, though she doesn't mention it), then she's basically the only one left alive that could help him access the right Dathomiri texts to fuck around with dead souls.

Anyway. Countess Asajj. I want to put her in fancy outfits and have an actual noble (Dooku's nephew) as her long-suffering chief advisor.

(The man is not planning to usurp or betray her because she's letting him have a fair amount of power and will probably let the line go back to him anyway, possibly even abdicating after the situation is stable enough that they don't need her Former Sithliness anymore, so like... what even would be the point? Waste of resources.)

[brucewaynehater101]

I have a really soft and cute au for Lesbian Janet that could work in any universe but I think works best in the Young Justice TV Show Universe.

See, everyone gets really confused when Tim talks about his Mom, sometimes referring to her as Mama. Tim thinks that using two different titles like that should make it Obvious that he has Two Moms but well. The Bats may be Super Geniuses but they are still Idiots. Tim is also an absolute Mama's Boy with Both his Moms. He loves them both So Much.

Oh, where is Jack you ask? He doesn't actually exist. He's the fake name and personality that Tim's Mama came up with and used Magic to disguise as so they could get Legally Married For Tax Benifits. Also to get his Mama a legal identity. Why would she need one of those? Well... as was mentioned, Tim's Mama has Magic with a Captial M. This by extension means Tim is Magic With A Capital M as well. Totally has nothing to do with Janet and his Mama sculpting him from clay and breathing life into him. Woes of pregnancy who? Not Janet that's for sure.

Also Tim does Not tell anyone that he has Magic and he doesn't show it off. The only reason the Bats found out about it is because Tim came to a meeting with Bruce and Diana went "you. Your Magic is Familure but I don't know from where." And Tim was sweating while saying, "Magic? What magic??" And after getting questioned by Diana and Bruce he Caves and tells them a half truth, "fine. I was made from Clay, like you. My Mom didn't want to go through the struggles of Childbirth but still wanted a child. Instead of adopting like any sane and rational person, she made a deal with a God or Godess. I don't know all the details but she owed them something in exchange for Me. I do know the debt has been paid already though."

The debt was simply a tea spoon of blood for the ritual and A Kiss. Janet over paid the second part by a lot.

As for how Janet met and wooed A Goddess? Well, she was on a dig in Greece when her boat she was using to get to another island was caught in a storm and washed up on a different island. The Goddess was expecting violence or anger at being stranded, perhaps even Sorrow. But no, Janet took one look at the Temple in the distance and was pushing past her saying she needed to get to the Temple because it's clearly in *amazing* condition and could bring So Many insights into Ancient Greek culture and building practice. For the first time in decades, as this Random Woman ran her hand along a pillar and started rambling about the design and what the type of collums were called, Circe felt herself blushing.

CIRCE?!?!?

FUCK YEAH.

Anyways, this is absolutely adorable. Fuck. I would love an entire fic of Janet. Here's a general plot line:

Janet hasn't ever really been interested in romance. She's tried dating a few guys in high school for appearance sake, but she usually broke the relationship off when they became too affectionate.

This is when others started referring to her as "cold." She wasn't, but few people got close enough to her to listen to her rambles about ancient civilizations, archeology, and sociality impacts of culture. She enjoyed other stuff, but nothing quite lit her up like those topics did.

In college, she did find and make a few friends with similar interests. This is where she figured out she was into women and not men. The relationships lasted longer, but she was single by the time she graduated with her bachelor's.

Her master's ends up as some sort of work study where she travels the world. She's more invested in her studies and work than relationships at this point. She enjoys learning about people's lives and cultures but doesn't seek out more than friendship.

I'm not sure if Janet has already or is working on her doctorate by the time she ends up lost on an island (or really how archeology even pays bills).

When she arrives on the island, there's a beautiful woman there as well. Janet notices this, but doesn't give a flying fuck in comparison to the architecture.

And Circe? Finds herself amused and confused by this woman who, although is into women, doesn't care about Circe's looks. Janet just keeps asking questions about Circe's life, the temple, the plants, the culture, etc. It becomes endearing watching her work late into the night with her research.

Janet is so enthralled in all that is going on that she doesn't notice Circe's continuous flirting. It's so fucking frustrating for Circe, but makes her unbearably fond as well. Janet starts to consider this drop dead gorgeous woman a close friend of hers as they "work" late into the chatting about ancient Greece, their past experiences, and their lives. Janet, who has some experience with romance but not much, even flirts back. After all, women call each other beautiful all the time and hold hands and shit. Surely Janet can platonically cuddle with her friend while Circe compares Janet's eyes to the night sky.

It's only when Janet is ready to leave that she realizes that she's willing to give up everything she's worked for, all of her findings and education, to have more time with Circe. Janet is in love with her best friend.

Also, Circe is able to get a fake ID as "Jack" due to magic and Janet's connections

[heartkyeom]

be sweet

prince!hoshi x princess!reader (svthub garden collab)

word count: 18.7k

warnings: arranged marriage, enemies to lovers, modern royalty au, family issues, descriptions of food, unprotected sex

tag list (only svthub members since I’m revamping my tag list): @bitchlessdino @wondernus @idyllic-ghost @strawberryya @junkissed

notes: oh my god I finally have another fic out!! this one was truly a labor of love, thank you to all the svthub members that beta read any part of this story. this fic is for the @svthub garden collab and I am extremely grateful for the network’s help with this story <3 I’m very happy that this aligned with hoshi’s birthday! and a big big thank you to my beloved @wondernus for making this amazing header for me!!! as always, I hope y’all enjoy this and please leave feedback through reblogs !!!! and the title is based off the amazing song be sweet by japanese breakfast, listen along to it if you’d like!

The day’s events shouldn’t have felt so taxing, yet they were. There were only a few meetings you had to sit in on, both not requiring full participation. That sounded easy enough for you to handle, you were used to the rigor of royal meetings for years now.

It was easy enough to brush off any requests with a short comment of approval or neutrality, never expressing a thought of negativity unless the guest was close to your family.

You didn’t pull the princess card very often, especially since your meetings mainly consisted of fellow royals who knew the pressure of the job, but today felt different.

Maybe it was the dull pressure that resided in your head, making it hard to focus on the topics at hand. You curse yourself for not taking some kind of headache relief earlier, but now it has lodged itself in the middle of your brain.

You almost work up the nerve to speak up, but your aide beats you to it.

“Princess,” you feel a hand on your shoulder, “there's an urgent matter. We should leave immediately.” Her hushed tone makes your heart clench.

You could only hope no one in your family was hurt. You silently nod and clear your throat, bringing attention to yourself.

“I’m so sorry, but something urgent came up. I have to go, but please make sure to send me any notes and I’ll be sure to review them before we meet again,” You offer the room a small smile, enough to garner empathetic nods from the room.

You let out a shaky breath and stand from your seat, your aide trailing slightly behind your side as you both exit the room in silence.

“What’s going on?” You ask hesitantly.

“Someone has requested a private meeting with you, they asked to keep their identity a secret. Everyone in the family is okay, don’t worry,” The aide turns her head slightly to make sure she can see your response.

You can’t help but ask about your family first, it’s the only thought you have as the only child.

If someone’s passed on, you’re stepping up to handle the situation, and the emergency plans start to kick into high gear.

Luckily, that nightmare can remain at rest.

“Okay,” you nod slowly, trying to process who could want a private meeting with you.

Is an elder statesman concerned about his country? An estranged family member asking for a favor? It really could be anything or anyone.

You both keep a consistent pace through the cavernous halls of the royal estate, your footsteps echoing loudly with each step. You soon arrive at one of many conference rooms, and you’re surprised to see your aide face her back towards the door, she steps aside to let you walk in.

“I’ll be out here if you need anything, lest it escalates to that point,” She raises her eyebrows at you before looking away. That wasn’t a reassuring sign.

You brace yourself before going inside, but nothing seems to prepare you for who’s waiting.

“Hi, lovely.” Kwon Soonyoung smiles at you in a menacingly sweet kind of way, it makes your blood boil.

He’s dressed much nicer than you’re used to seeing him, he’s the type to wear baggy clothes that swallow him whole. In contrast, today he wears a crisp button-down with black slacks, his suit coat nowhere to be found. His signature designer sneakers are exchanged for loafers instead. There’s no logical reason why he could be here, considering his own busy schedule as a prince.

Soonyoung isn’t flying in for a private conversation just for the hell of it.

“Why are you here?” Your tone is resolute, not allowing for even an inch of resistance.

“That’s what we need to talk about. We’re getting married,” He lifts the corner of his mouth.

You let out a laugh that is nowhere near polite, in fact, you’re nearly cackling at the prospect of this idea. It’s simply so outlandish, so fantastical that every time you look at his face it seems more unfathomable.

Most princesses knew to let each other know that if they were charmed by him, Soonyoung was ultimately not marriage material. If anything, he was determined to make himself the least suitable husband possible.

He was the typical sweet boy turned party animal, spending most nights abroad drinking his days away with a new girl in his bed every night. He does show up to the occasional political obligation, but only when his team forces him to. That’s one reason why he bothers you so much, he has such little duty to his native country of Aranorin and the people in it that everyone else has to make him care about it.

“You’re joking, there’s no fucking way,” Your body vibrates from laughter, but you slowly come to your senses once you see he’s not cracking another joke.

“I’m not joking, I’m here to start our courtship.” His serious tone makes you start to consider the gravity of the situation.

“Hold on, so you think you can just come into Maritria, coming from god knows where,” You make a broad gesture toward him before continuing, “to formally start our relationship. That’s what you’re saying,” You cross your arms, returning to your originally defensive stance.

“Yes, this isn’t just coming out of thin air. This has been in the works for a few months now,” He raises his eyebrows to punctuate the timeline. It just makes you even more confused. Why wouldn’t anyone tell you about this?

“What do you mean?” You question.

He braces himself one last time. “I’ve been speaking to the king and queen about arranging our marriage for two months,” You almost think his face goes slightly sympathetic at his admission, but that’s wishful thinking.

Regardless, it’s a blow to your ego.

How could they not tell you? How could they so easily shift the responsibility onto him without saying a word?

It would be one thing if they were still considering other men, but to know the talks were final, that Kwon Soonyoung was your future husband whether you liked it or not, was a devastating realization.

“This is unbelievable.” You let out a shaky whisper, you’re so rattled that you force yourself to sit down and close your eyes, willing yourself to take a deep breath.

You open your eyes to see him hovering near you, clearly a stifled attempt to try and comfort you. Yet, he’s the least comforting person you’ve ever known.

“I don’t want to do this either. You’re definitely not my first choice for a wife.” He scoffs at the possibility that he could ever choose you without incentive.

“Yeah, clearly. You’d rather want a girl who would kiss your ass every day instead of being honest with you.” You retort.

The gossip that flitted between young royals all but confirmed your suspicion that he dumped any girl that tried to make a long-term connection with him. It was fine if he didn’t want to get married. Not all royals are meant for it, and he didn’t have as much pressure to marry off as the youngest child. He could get away with being a lifetime bachelor, but choosing that lifestyle wasn’t worth hurting other people in the process.

“Aw, is lifetime celibacy boring you that much to the point where you’re worried about the girls I sleep with?” He cracks a smile that you match with a forced laugh.

“No, I just think you dump them as soon as they realize how small your dick is.” You smile through your response, causing him to form his arms together.

“You’re so lucky now that we’re together, you can finally stop waiting for those nice guys who don’t have a personality to sweep you up,” His condescending tone makes you frustrated but not deterred from bantering completely.

“So I can end up dating one of your dickhead friends instead? Absolutely not,” You shake your head knowing how insufferable most of his friends are. Soonyoung just happened to be the worst of them.

“All jokes aside, I know you’re perfectly aware of why we’re getting married. I don’t have to look at the news to know things are bleak,” His straightforward approach forces you to swallow the lump in your throat.

You knew the country’s finances were not great.

You didn’t want or need to see the exact numbers, especially if it makes your day-to-day duties labored with worry. Although many political teams insist that princesses have no business in the logistical affairs of running a country, it meant everything to you to know how your country was faring in the world. Maritria already maintained a longstanding connection with Aranorin that gave your country some freedom to pursue other lucrative opportunities, but it dawned on you that it wasn’t enough.

“I’m doing this for my country, not out of some pathetic excuse you may have to avoid self-reflection. You can just get married to me and stop pretending to be a good person, right?” You ask bitingly.

“We both know I stopped pretending a long time ago. Marrying the nation’s sweetheart is just a bonus,” He smirks unapologetically, you don’t like the way the nickname sits on his tongue as if it’s his own.

“Is there anything else you want? I need to get back to work,” You stand up from your seat, trying not to look back at the door while you plot your escape. It was hard enough not to completely explode at him, and you needed to redirect your energy elsewhere.

“There is, I got you something,” He retrieves a small velvet box from his pocket. “It’s not an engagement ring, but just consider it a courtship gift.”

You open the box and lightly examine the ring. You know it’s far too expensive than most of the jewelry you’ve ever worn. Your family was wealthy, but Soonyoung’s family had the kind of money that you didn’t need to plan so carefully around. However, you don’t want to seem so easily impressed.

“It’s fine. When are you planning on proposing?” You brush him off easily.

“That ruins the surprise.” He smiles at you yet your face remains stoic.

“I’ll get your number from someone else, I don’t want to drag this out anymore.” You stuff the box in your dress pocket and start to make your way toward the exit.

“It’s been horrible to see you again, Your Royal Highness.” His stiffly formal greeting makes you turn around to face him.

You squint your eyes. “Don’t do that.”

“What?”

“The Royal Highness thing,” You point at yourself before continuing, “I’m not gonna say Your Royal Highness every time we’re in private. Don’t start giving a shit now.”

“Fine. Bye, darling.” He quips.

Your face contorts into disgust before you can stop yourself. “You’re not gonna make that my mandated wife nickname.”

“You don’t get to choose the nickname I give you, honey.” He approaches you and pinches your cheek before speaking, “Besides, it’ll be fun to try to figure out how to mask my hate for you in public.”

You cringe at his touches, but you straighten up immediately.

“Likewise,” You offer a tight-lipped smile before finally leaving the room.

You close the door behind you and take the breath you didn’t know you were holding in.

“Can you clear my schedule for the rest of the day? I need time to deal with this,” You finally look at your aide with an expectant glance.

“Yes, of course, princess.” She immediately grabs her phone to send notices to those involved. You can’t even remember who you were meant to see for the rest of the day. Your mind simply wanders to your parents, the next targets of your rage.

“I’m gonna go home. I don’t want to see anyone unless it’s my parents. Or him, not that I want him around anyways,” You roll your eyes at the thought of having to voluntarily communicate with him on a regular basis.

“Sounds good. I have his phone number, if you’d like it.” She offers.

“Ok,” You agree and quickly input his phone number. As you type in a contact name, you’re not sure what to call him.

Soonyoung is far too casual, it doesn’t feel comfortable yet. You’re absolutely not calling him by his title, not by a long shot.

The romantic pet names similar to the ones he used with you were not earned, so it left you stumped.

You settle on “headache,” because the ache in your temple is still there, bothering you immensely and now he’s adding to it.

You’re just lucky that you didn’t end up shouting at each other this time.

—

As if they could read your mind, your parents call you in for an emergency meeting before you can make it home. That pent-up rage is starting to make its way out before you even see them, it shows in the way you stomp to your father’s main office, marching far ahead of your aide.

You open the door without knocking, a major sign that you’re not looking forward to the discussion.

Your father gives you a warning look, but you’re not bothered by it. The staff turns their attention toward your bold entrance, immediately preparing themselves to leave.

Your father is sitting in his velvet study chair, poised as always. Your mother stands behind your father, idly leaning her weight against the back wall.

Her demeanor is not as composed, as if she knows you’re about to raise hell.

“We’d like a private meeting, thank you,” He gives a pained smile to the staff and they all file out silently. You watch them with a fiery gaze, waiting for the last person to close the door behind you.

When the door finally shuts, you whip your gaze to face them again.

“Soonyoung? Are you kidding me?” You exclaim.

“Y/N, please,” Your mother tries to intercept, but you’re faster than that.

“Actually, I’d like to know exactly why I was left out of the conversation about me having an arranged marriage, to begin with,” You cross your arms and lean back in your chair, preparing yourself for a bullshit excuse.

“Well, we were anticipating this kind of reaction,” he gestures at you in disapproval, “you weren’t meant to be involved in these discussions in the first place.” He speaks to you so patronizingly that it almost catches you off guard.

“So you can just decide that I’m getting married on a whim, just like that.” You snap your fingers impatiently.

“You know how the country is currently faring, you knew marriage could possibly be an option for financial security almost a year ago. Please don’t act like this is some affront to you,” Your father slowly raises his voice, fists slowly clenching as he elaborates.

“Yes, but you didn’t tell me things were this bad. You didn’t tell me that you had tried everything else. Hell, you didn’t even tell me that you were starting discussions about marriage!” You were trying your best to keep your voice even, but the defeat was starting to show through.

“We ultimately thought leaving you in the dark was best, but we miscalculated.” Your mother tries to cover for your father’s stern approach. You scoff, turning away for a moment before continuing.

Miscalculated is an understatement. You were devastated.

Your father seems to be annoyed that you were showing this much emotion while your mother seems ashamed that the situation has escalated this far. Their conflicting expressions just made you feel even worse, knowing that they couldn’t act as a united front. You wished that it was either complete anger or support from both of them.

“Soonyoung. You can’t possibly tell me he was the only option,” You turn back to them with glossy eyes.

“Sweetheart, you know Arinorin is one of our most important allies. Soonyoung would have always been an option. Even if there were better options, we couldn’t ignore him.” Her comforting tone does little to comfort you at the moment.

A tear finally falls onto your cheek. Her words hurt because she was right. Even if there was a perfect prince waiting for you out there, he wasn’t the prince of Arinorin.

“He hates me, you don’t see how much he hates me.” You shake your head and cover your face with your hands. You’re fully sobbing into your hands and it leaves your parents speechless. You know they’re looking at you with full judgment, but it didn’t matter.

“You’re giving your only daughter away to a man who despises her.” You seethe through your tears.

“He hasn’t given us any reason not to trust him.” Your father speaks up again and it breaks you down even further. He has that immovable stare on his face that signals his word is final.

You compose yourself before speaking again.

“When we get a divorce, it’ll be your fault.” You lift your hand to your cheeks, wiping away any stray tears left on your face.

“You’re being ridiculous, you’re saying that you won’t even try for your country?” Your father shifts in his seat, it seems like he wants to jump up and fully lecture you but it won’t happen.

You finally snap. “I have tried for this country! Every day, I have shown both of you what I’m capable of as a future queen, not asking you for anything. Now, the one part of my life where I should have control, choosing the person I’m married to, I have none.” By the time you finish speaking, your tears are gone by sheer will. Your eyes burn with the familiar sting of fatigue mixed with anger bubbling over the surface.

“I’m sorry, dear.” You see your mother wipe a tear of her own. You were grateful that she saw through you, at least at this moment. It was a quiet show of support that you needed amongst all these difficult feelings.

You put your head in your hands for a moment before looking up at them. “I’m going home and someone will send me the things I need to wrap my head around this entire situation.” Your tone is far more measured compared to before.

Before you can hurt your own feelings by hearing them out, you decide to make your exit. You’re nearly out of the door before you turn around again, letting go of the doorknob.

“I’ll always remember that he told me first instead of you.” With that, you leave without looking back at their expressions.

Hopefully, it’ll hurt like hell for them to hear it.

You ignore the staff members that were peering near the door, eagerly waiting to see who would break first. You’re sure that it looks dramatic, but you were far too concerned with your own feelings before anyone else’s.

—

Once you made it home, you were attempting to forget the stress of the day and it was going relatively well. You were able to catch up on a TV show you’d been forgetting to watch, and finally remembering to do self-care tasks that were left unattended due to your work.

Now, you’re taking a bubble bath with no intention of opening your eyes anytime soon. You needed to just sit, you didn’t have much time to do that most days.

The water is still fairly hot, enough to where you can sink down and continue to salvage any remaining calmness you might’ve had left.

Thus, your vibrating phone didn’t exactly make you feel at ease. You hope that it wasn’t one of your parents, considering your conversation didn’t have a clean finish. Any of their apologies would be falling on stubborn ears.

You glance at your lock screen and if anything, it’s worse.

It’s him. You pick up the phone with an anxious hand and press the accept button.

“What do you want?” You snap at him.

“You actually picked up!” He notes with a hint of surprise.

“Trust me, I didn’t want to.” You shift uncomfortably in the bathtub, the sloshing water calling you out immediately.

“Is that water? What are you doing?” His curious nature already annoys you, so it’ll be easier to dodge the question.

“None of your business.” Your free hand cups the remaining bubbles in the bath.

“Oh my god, is the princess naked on the phone with me?” He sounds far too pleased with himself. You can practically hear his shit-eating grin in the way he replies.

“You’re a horny little freak who hasn’t told me why he’s called yet.” You force yourself to sit up now that the relaxation in your body is quickly dissipating.

“Right. We’re doing intimacy coordination tomorrow. I figured you didn’t look at that schedule they gave you.”

“Shit.” You sigh just out of earshot.

Intimacy coordination isn’t common at all with arranged royal marriages. If a couple looked like they had never met before in their life, it was typically on them for not being more convincing. Yet, the number of public events you two have to be involved in over the foreseeable future warranted different circumstances. If you couldn’t look head over heels for each other at the wedding, it was going to spell trouble for both countries.

“I’m only in town until tomorrow night, so I don’t have to look at your face for much longer than that,” You sigh at his response, knowing that he’s not one to hold back with you.

“I wish you could leave sooner, maybe I could actually enjoy not seeing you even more than I already do.” You reach to open the drain.

“Just practicing my future husband duties by stressing you out, love,” You can practically hear his smile through the phone.

“That one isn’t bad, actually,” Your thoughts trail off once you hear it, but he brings you back to reality almost immediately.

“So that’s definitely not what I’m gonna call you.”

“I’m hanging up.” Your waning patience with him has officially run out and you’re itching to move on with your night.

“Bye, honey!” He’s laughing uncontrollably through the response and it makes your blood boil. It’s clear that this is already a joke to him.

“Fuck off,” You hang up before you have to listen to his laughter any longer. You put your head in your hands and let out a muffled scream.

He already wanted to make this courtship as excruciating as possible.

You finally stand up from the bath and wrap a warm towel around your body, staring at your reflection in the mirror.

Luckily, your parents did listen to your request and a massive document of schedules and timelines of your relationship with Soonyoung appeared in your email inbox.

You had only skimmed the schedule before Soonyoung called you, you stopped looking at it before it stressed you out beyond repair.

According to the timeline your parents created in accordance with his team, you were supposed to have been dating for 11 months at this point.

You can’t possibly imagine putting up a front for 11 months, but then again, you would have to pretend for the rest of your life.

That thought haunts you through the rest of your night routine.

How do you carve your life around Soonyoung when he’s creeping his way into everything?

How do you find peace when you’re with someone who’s determined to misunderstand you?

These questions have you wiping your tears as you attempt to fall asleep that night.

—

To your dismay, the intimacy training was first thing in the morning.

You were barely conscious, but somehow you arrived early with a slightly cloudy mentality and an overall dread for the next 2 hours.

You were the first of the three, besides your personal staff members, to arrive at the dance studio. You figured the space was far too big for what you were working through today, but you forego criticism to admire the room.

Admittedly, you didn’t go into many of the creative spaces throughout the palace because you weren’t a creative type. The arts were simply something you admired from afar, you didn’t have the talent even as a child to pursue these things seriously.

This apparently needed to be remedied as you notice the sweeping mirrors around the perimeter of the room. The hardwood floors were practically shining underneath your feet. You’re sure that whoever used the room was sure to enjoy themselves.

You’re admiring yourself in the mirror when you catch Soonyoung entering the room. He quietly greets the staff, giving short bows to everyone in sight.

It’s the only time you’ve seen him act with a royal demeanor, even in his casual workout clothes it’s a bit surprising to see him this way.

He makes his way over to you with a smile on his face.

“You’re early.” He eyes you up and down.

“Unfortunately, yes. You look.. comfortable.” You don’t mean to raise your voice up another octave, but you were just barely attempting niceties.

“So do you, you actually don’t look like you're trying too hard for once.” He leans against the mirror and gives you another judgmental look.

“It’s far too early in the morning to play this game, Kwon Soonyoung. Don’t get your feelings hurt.” You close your eyes before you get too angry, a slight change of pace from your typical interactions with him.

“It’s fine. I’m sure you’ll be more awkward considering you’ve only had two boyfriends, one who looked like he was your son.” He stifled a giggle.

“Chan was so sweet.” You pouted at the thought of your teenage boyfriend. He really was kind, probably the perfect first boyfriend that you could ask for. You remember how much he cried when you broke up with him. You just weren’t the same person you were when you started dating him at 16, so you needed the space to grow apart.

Unfortunately, Soonyoung was right about the mom thing.

“It’s not my fault I had a growth spurt and the stylists kept dressing me like a divorce lawyer.” You insisted.

You recalled how harsh the style blogs were on you back then, many claimed that you’d never find your own personal style as long as other people kept dressing you older than you actually were. Unfortunately, they were also right. You live and learn though.

However, you didn’t even want to think about your second boyfriend.

“I’m just saying good chemistry doesn’t come naturally to all of us, it’s okay to ask for help.” His faux concern was especially irritating.

You weren’t that awkward with men, were you?

You didn’t have much time to consider an answer before a young woman walked into the studio.

“Hi, it’s nice to meet you both! My name is Elise and I’ll be leading you both through training today.” She offers her hand out to you for a handshake and you accept with a smile. She does the same to Soonyoung and moves toward the mirror.

“So, how long have you known each other?” She dives right into discussions with the question.

“Around 15 years or so?” The number that came out of your mouth was definitely a rough estimate, but it sounded about right.

You vaguely remember being introduced to Soonyoung and his older siblings at a fancy state dinner as a child. He was far less mischievous then, a bit timid around everyone except his family. Since then, you’ve ran into each other regularly due to the relationship between your parents. They were far closer to each other than you were with him and his siblings, so the situation feels a bit ironic now.

“Okay, but I’m assuming you haven’t been in contact very often?” She clarifies.

“Not at all.” He chimes in.

“Right, so we’ve got our work cut out for us then. Today isn’t gonna be too complicated, you’re just gonna be trying some physical activities to see how natural that looks.” Elise smiles in order to lighten the mood, but you’re certain it won’t work out.

“So, what are we gonna practice, hugging?” He scoffs, and you’re certain that he thinks this is all bullshit. You weren’t happy about it either, but keeping up appearances was the most important part of this.

“Yes, I know that sounds weird, but I promise it’ll pay off,” Elise continues to offer reassuring statements, but he’s not convinced and frankly, neither are you. You exchange a glance with him and decide to take the lead as the awkwardness continues to sit in the air.

“So where should we start?” You ask out of a mix of curiosity and dread.

“Let’s just have you both hold hands.”

Soonyoung extends a hand out to you with a smirk on his face. You’d rather slap him, but you’d think it would leave Elise traumatized.

You take his hand a bit too forcefully and adjust yourself within his hold. By glancing at the two of you in the mirror, you notice two things.

First, his hands are warm, a bit too warm for this moment.

Secondly, his thumb is absentmindedly brushing against the back of your hand. You can’t call attention to it or else it’ll stop, and you decide in the moment that it’s too relaxing. He probably doesn’t even notice that he’s doing something so romantic, that little bastard.

“Okay, so how does that feel?” Elise asks.

“Fine.” The reply forces itself out of your mouth.

“It’s fine.” He agrees with a nod of his head. He also peers at the both of you in the mirror with a slight curiosity, his head tilting slightly.

“We do look good together, though.” He murmurs to himself. You’re not sure if it’s the arrogance peeking through and he only believes you look good while he’s with you, but maybe for a second, you can see what he’s talking about.

“Good, and what’s a small physical gesture you can do to make each other feel at ease?” Elise’s question causes you to look up at him.

This feels unnecessary since Soonyoung is not a nervous person. No matter what, his particularly frustrating charm and gregarious personality never allow any anxiety to show to others.

“I can just do this.” He calls attention to the thumb thing and that puts you on the spot.

He seems incapable of needing comfort. It’s one of the things that keeps a silent distance between the two of you. You believe that he remains emotionally stunted in order to navigate his world a bit easier.

He can let the girls who want something more from him down easy, and they don’t realize how bad it really felt to be pushed away until they never see him again.

You didn’t want to end up in that position.

“I don’t know.” You let your mind wander for a moment.

Yet, he was bold. He was always decisive in what he wanted, never caring about what his actions made him look like if it was for better or worse.

You figured that you should be bold too.

You intertwine your fingers deeper into his grasp and pull his hand to your lips, leaving a small peck on the back of his hand.

His eyes widened immediately. “That’s quite forward, princess.”

“I needed to one-up you,” You answer nonchalantly, but you don’t miss the slight spark in his eyes. It was unexpected, and you were always going by the book.

Elise ignores your conversation and continues her questioning. “So I assume you both will be interested in PDA?”

“To a certain extent, I don't see why not.” You pull back slightly into your reserved nature, but he runs with it.

“Yes, we’re supposed to be a more open and progressive couple to represent a new generation of royals, so it would be nice to be a bit bolder,” He nods decisively along with his response.

You didn’t really think about the relationship like that until he mentioned it. While you were attuned to a certain sense of responsibility as the singular face of your country’s new generation of leadership, it was known that you fought back against regressive norms brought up in your daily work.

Why not lean into something new when the image of your respective countries so desperately needed a refresh?

“That’s good to know. I know you both have different styles, but I think there are ways we can meet in the middle here.” Elise notes.

That statement proves to be true for the rest of your session. Elise leads you both through hugging and slightly provocative gestures that make you want to crawl out of your skin, but you both fumble your way through it.

Soonyoung seems insistent on embarrassing you with more revealing gestures while yours are relatively contained. He’s being a bit too playful for your liking, but it helps you understand his personality a bit more.

You decide that you want a moment to speak with him before he flies back home later that evening, excusing Elise and the remaining staff to leave you both in the studio.

“When do we see each other again?” You ask.

“You’re a bit too eager, aren’t you darling?” He smirks at you, and you lose the slight bit of faith you had instilled in him before.

“Shut up, I’m just trying to remember this stupid schedule.” You grumble. You resort to pulling out your phone instead, quickly finding the most up-to-date iteration of the relationship timeline in your email inbox.

“I’ll be in Arinorin in a few weeks to meet your parents,” Your brain works through the schedule quickly, scanning the information fast enough to say it out loud.

“Oh shit.” He mutters under his breath.

Oh shit was right. You haven’t had a proper conversation with the king and queen since you were a teenager. It was typical family friend fare, asking how your studies were going, if your hobbies were still things you enjoyed and a faint interest in any other topics that you happened to bring up.

Since then, there were only brief interactions in passing that were fairly positive. They must’ve thought quite well of you if they agreed to have their youngest son marry you, but that was something you’d have to inquire about with them.

“And to go on a date with you,” You mumbled.

That’s what really rattled you. It wouldn’t be real until no one else was around to direct and stage your romance, it was up to the both of you to make it happen.

“Right, I’ll get to choose what we get up to.” You can tell that his brain is creating a vision that will be less than satisfactory, and you can’t fight the urge to attempt to gain control.

“We aren’t going on your yacht, are we? I think you’ve broken enough hearts there.” You tease him.

“Very funny, and no, we’re not going on the boat… anymore.” He admits with an eye roll.

“See! I knew you were gonna take me there!” You interject, letting out the laugh that had been sitting in your chest for a minute or so.

“I’m never anybody’s boyfriend, cut me some slack,” He says it as if it’d get him off the hook for being mentally checked out during this process.

That much was obvious from the lack of planning, but you’d have to give him some space to try and impress you.

“Yeah, that’s pretty clear. I know long-term planning isn’t your strength.” You bite back and he brushes it off easily.

“Get all your jokes out now, but I’m gonna impress you. Mark my words,” He points at you while heading towards the door.

“We’ll see about that, loverboy,” You check your phone absentmindedly while he sees himself out.

“Is that my nickname?” He pokes his head back into the door with an excited tone.

“Bye, Soonyoung,” You grit your teeth into a smile and watch him reluctantly leave the room.

You can only hope your future in-laws aren’t as insufferable as him.

—

A few weeks later, the trip to Arinorin has arrived and all of its possible consequences are driving you up a wall. The culmination of meeting with your future in-laws, the date with Soonyoung, and the idea of being perceived as his partner outside of your home country are all slightly nauseating.

At first, it was just fun and games, but now, as the plane lands, the tension settles beneath your skin. Soonyoung was supposed to be picking you up, but you didn’t have much faith in that happening.

You barely remembered to grab the ring he gifted you so you could wear it while you were in town, simply as a reminder that this was all happening.

You exit the plane with your luggage in tow, only for Soonyoung to be waiting on the tarmac. He’s accompanied by a large black SUV that is clearly not his personal car, but his stance is trying to convince you that it is.

“Hi, princess.” He calls out with a wave of his hand.

“When are you gonna actually call me by my name?” You approach him with squinted eyes, your vision steadily adjusting to the early afternoon sun.

“When this feels less awkward, so give or take a few years,” He jokes.

“Not funny,” You gesture to him to take your luggage, and he catches the hint once you look at him again. You don’t want to shoulder smaller tasks onto his staff, you wanted to see how he would handle these things instead.

“How was the flight?” He calls out to you again, you hear the trunk slam shut and he comes into view again to anticipate your answer.

“It was alright, I’m just tired.” You rub at your temples to punctuate the feeling.

“Hopefully your room will be good enough,” He sounds somewhat considerate while opening the door for you. It feels wrong.

You slide into the back row with him following behind you. He shuts the door and his driver promptly begins the drive to the palace.

“Are you nervous about the trip? My parents aren’t exactly as kind as yours,” Soonyoung chuckles.

You let out a deep sigh. You wouldn’t call them kind considering the circumstances, in fact, you’re barely on speaking terms with them outside of public obligations.

Was it petty? Yes.

Was it also justified? Yes.

You figured that icing them out for a while would help them come to their senses. If worst comes to worst, maybe it could help you gain further control over the wedding.

Nevertheless, you were still upset with them.

“They’re really not that great, and I’d say that I’m pretty good with parents,” You avoid his glance to look out the window instead, taking in the sights of the country.

You don’t have many memories of Arinorin. Many of them were informed by meetings that you couldn’t even remember anymore.

“You’re right. The nation’s sweetheart can charm anyone. Plus it’ll give me time to think about what we’re gonna do on the date,” He affirms with a nod of his head.

“God, don’t remind me. If I’m lucky, we’ll be meeting at a strip club.” You roll your eyes.

“You really have no faith in me!” He pouts. You don’t give into him though.

“It's hard enough just being in a car with you.”

—

Soonyoung doesn’t ever have to think about first dates.

In fact, he doesn’t think he’s been on a proper first date since he was a teenager. Even then, it was low stakes. He could just pick something random for him and another girl to do, and it would be completely inconsequential to his life.

Now, impressing his future wife with an incredible first date feels monumental. He barely knew anything about you besides that goody two shoes personality of yours. It seemed like everyone was suddenly obsessed with you and he was the last to know.

He decides that a midday picnic is inoffensive enough for the both of you to enjoy. If either of you were miserable with each other, there would at least be good food to distract from it. The sunny weather was already on his side, now he just had to charm you.

You waved slightly as you approached his picnic blanket, stopping before your feet could cover the edge of the blanket.

“Wow, this is a lot,” Your eyes landed on the assortment of food spread across the blanket. There was a spread of fruit, snacks, and sandwiches for the two of you to eat together. Soonyoung knew he didn’t completely fuck up by the way you nodded, but you weren’t exactly jumping to praise him in general.

“I don’t get a hello?” He attempts a greeting but it falls flat.

You roll your eyes. “Hi, Soonyoung,” You state halfheartedly, crossing your arms in protest.

“Hi. Does the food look alright?” He takes off his sunglasses and fixes his gaze on you.

“Yeah, I figured you’d be inept at setting up a date, so it’s surpassed my expectations already,” You give him a tight-lipped smile before sitting on the blanket. He attempts to ignore the way your dress hikes up slightly to expose your thigh. The sundress that you’re wearing seems to expose every detail of your body that he’s neglected to look at, but he snaps back into focus when he hears you clear your throat.

Once you both start eating, it’s clear how little you have in common with each other. Sure, he figured it’d be a little difficult to get to know you, but the lingering silence doesn’t exactly make him eager to strike up a conversation.

“How do you feel about all this?” You ask suddenly. It catches him so off guard that he chokes on the piece of fruit he was chewing.

He coughs, raising the attention of the nearby guards. You turn to them, giving a signal that he’s okay before turning around. “Damn, I didn’t think the question was that bad,” You laugh sadly.

“No, it’s fine. I just didn’t expect it.” He waves off any suspicion.

He takes a deep breath. “I mean, I’m not thrilled. I know the economic aspect of this is the most important thing, but my parents are practically dying to marry me off,” He reaches for a bottle of wine, grabbing a nearby glass before pouring himself something to drink.

“So I’m not the first?” You ask.

“Absolutely not,” He snickers. This relationship would mark the 5th time his parents have tried to set him up with a fellow royal. He has managed to sabotage all previous attempts on account of pissing his parents off.

The girls they set him up with were nice enough, but he had no chemistry with any of them. He felt like sparing them from a relationship full of misery by ruining it before it even started.

“So your parents figured you wouldn’t want to escape a marriage instead of just dating?” You attempt to clarify.

“Bingo,” He sips his wine before handing you the bottle.

“So, does that mean you’re gonna try to escape this?” You accept it and pour yourself a fuller glass, immediately taking a sip after asking the question.

“I think you’d be pretty fucked if I tried to do that. I’m not that much of an asshole,” He shakes his head and laughs it off. Since being hated by his parents was bad enough, Soonyoung didn’t want to become the center of an emerging geopolitical crisis.

It would fuck everyone over, especially you. He could at least admit to himself that you didn’t deserve that.

“That’s nice, I guess,” You smile halfheartedly at him.

“Don’t say I never did anything for you.” He speaks in an unusually flat tone before turning away to face the view of sprawling hills and seemingly endless mountaintops. The sight of the burgeoning nature surrounding the houses below him brought a sense of peace.

Before you asked, he hadn't given the entire arranged marriage process much thought. Sure, he knew that you’d be getting married relatively soon, but he had no idea how to present himself as a good partner. He didn’t exactly know how to move forward knowing that everyone expected him to fail.

“You really are a dickhead,” You mumble.

“You’re not exactly sweet as pie either. Everyone loves you, but you’re fucking miserable to be around.” He responds in a piercing tone.

“Well, if you get to be a cunt, then so should I. It’s not like I’m getting anything out of this,” You shoot back.

You were definitely worse off as an only child. Sure, he was the black sheep of the family, but he could get away with plenty of things as the youngest. His siblings were off impressing the world by ruling the country, getting PhDs, having a shit ton of kids, and generally being upstanding citizens.

However, it didn’t make sense for him to try that hard.

“Your country’s finances won’t go to shit, isn’t that enough?”

His question seems to bring out another layer of frustration for you. “No, I want a husband who gives two shits about me past my bra size, but apparently that’s wishful thinking,” You angrily bite into a strawberry and turn away from him.

“Look, we don’t have to do anything except pretend that we’re in love. So, let’s not do anything past that. Alright?” He proposes. Your face is unreadable, but the way you chew on the inside of your lip shows that he’d never get to know what’s eating away at you.

“Alright,” Your body language seems to retreat completely.

The mood of the date is different after that, and his request seems to render you both silent as you eat the rest of the food without interacting. The view of the countryside makes him wish that he didn’t have to deal with any of this, just live in a tiny house where no one had to remind him about his impending marriage.

—

The entire day leading up to the Youth Summit Ball left you feeling incredibly rattled.

You know the staff is perfectly capable of executing your vision for the ball as they've done year after year. It was one of your signature events as a royal, and its annual presence in Maritria brought much-needed attention to the country with the presence of young royals and its ever-popular red carpet.

Tonight, however, would be the first time Soonyoung is escorting you as a “longtime” boyfriend in public. You’ve been seen together in public, yes, but this is a public declaration that you are hypothetically in love with him. As a co-chair of the event, nothing could go wrong since many of your peers would be attending with their families.

Nothing could go wrong, thus you needed him to know the extent of your anxiety.

You heard a knock on the door, and you’re accepting them inside without a second thought.

“You wanted to see me?” He asks as he steps inside the dressing room.

You’re thrown by how handsome he looks. You argued with each other over text about what he should wear, he insisted that it didn’t matter. Yet, your color palettes were not to be betrayed. You internally thank yourself for persisting with a navy suit. It contrasted well with his platinum-blonde hair that seemed to attract as many eyes as possible while you were out in public together.

“Yes, I did. You need to behave tonight, I’m not risking anything because you want to get your dick wet,” You scoff.

“Trust me, I already got this little lecture from your mother. I’ll be fine.” He smirks at you, not doing much to quiet the anxiety that was starting to build in your stomach.

“Well, your girlfriend is telling you herself that I’m serious about this,” Your hands automatically move up to his shoulders, smoothing out the nonexistent creases on his jacket. It was still weird to call yourself his girlfriend, the word felt too stiff coming from your mouth.

“And I’m reluctantly listening,” He moves his hand to your bare shoulder, brushing something off with a few light sweeps. You opted to wear a black form fitting gown, the design was relatively simple but it was still eye-catching. You thought you noticed Soonyoung taking glances at you.

“Do you remember everything I told you about tonight?” You remind him.

“Why wouldn’t I remember, Y/N?” He gives you that “are you serious” kind of look and you’re starting to buckle under the pressure.

“I don’t know, maybe you’re nervous or something,” You turn away from him, peering into the mirror to check if there are any flaws with your makeup.

“I don’t get nervous about stuff like this. Are you nervous?” You see him approaching, but you put your focus immediately back on your face.

“What? No, stop, I’m fine,” You purse your lips to check your lipstick. He mimics you, pushing his lips out like a duck and it startles you.

“Those cheeks of yours are telling me otherwise,” He rubs a finger on your cheek and you slap it away almost immediately.

“Stop, Soonyoung, I’m serious. Let’s just get through the night.” You shoot him a warning look and he puts his hands up defensively.

“Okay, no funny business. I promise,” He smiles. It’s not enough to convince you, but your mind is too focused on creating a good outcome for the night that it’s fruitless trying to argue with him any further.

“Ready for a good time?” He offers his hand out to you, and you reluctantly accept it.

“It sounds bad when you say it.”

—

“You know, she said we should kiss just once to see what it’s like,” His voice was slightly slurred as if the alcohol was slowly taking possession of his words.

“You’re just tipsy,” You throw your purse across the living room and fumble to lock the door shut.

“No, you are, I saw you sneak two shots out of the kitchen,” He points with a shocked smile, “plus a few glasses of chardonnay. You’re not fooling me, princess.”

He was probably right, but that didn’t make it any better. “God forbid that I wanna drink at my own event. Why are you at my place right now?” You’re irritated at his presence almost constantly.

“You wanted me to do everything for you, remember? So you could just hop into bed with no worries,” He waves his arm into the air.

The event went well, accounting for your drunkenness and Soonyoung’s unpredictable nature.

“What are you waiting for then? Take my shoes off,” You flail your arms helplessly, your body is slowly slumping forward but Soonyoung catches you before you stumble.

“Okay, let's sit down, miss bossy. You’re ordering me around when I was a perfect boyfriend tonight,” He guides you to your couch, slowly easing you down onto the seat when you let out an audible sigh of relief.

“You were an average boyfriend who didn’t look stupid in front of paparazzi. Don’t feel too proud of yourself.” Your tolerance for his shenanigans was lower than usual now that you were drunk, and you didn’t feel bad about fighting back at him.

“All of this is extra credit,” He tries to reason himself out of the bare minimum.

“Taking care of me is not extra credit, it’s the standard. You’re supposed to be taking care of me for the rest of my life, not just right now. Idiot,” You roll your eyes and close them briefly before his voice forces you awake again.

“You’re so mean to me, your poor boyfriend is still learning what you like,” He finally takes off your heels and you let out a deep sigh of relief.

“Better?” He asks with a smile. You know that he wants to laugh at you so badly, but you’re too far gone to care.

“Much better,” You close your eyes for a moment before snapping again. “Take off my jewelry.”

He removes your earrings quite easily, but you still feel a bit flustered when he leans toward your ear to focus on undoing the clasps of your necklace.

He settles his face near your neck to fully remove your diamond necklace, he cradles it in his hand and you think you might go slightly insane. He places it on the coffee table gently and looks back at you with a smirk.

“What’s going on?” You pick up on his expression.

“Nothing, I’m gonna do your hair.” He turns your body so your back is facing him now. He’s sort of just feeling around for bobby pins, placing them down on the coffee table whenever he pulls another out. Once he takes out the decorative pins near the top of your head, your hair finally feels free.

“Soonyoung?” You ask suddenly.

“Hmm?” He’s organizing all the hairpins but takes a moment to look up at you.

“Do you think I’m pretty?” Your voice is a bit timid, nervous about how he might react. You would’ve contained yourself in any other circumstance, but now you just needed to head that you were worth complimenting.

“Where’s all this coming from, you’re just fishing for compliments now,” He shakes his head with a smile on his face.

“No, I’m not. It’s just-,” Your thoughts trail off, but Soonyoung catches your attention again with a gentle hand on your thigh. You don’t jump to move it away.

“Everybody was looking at us, but some people looked at us like I wasn’t meant to be with you. Is that true? Am I not pretty enough to be with you?” You feel increasingly insecure the more you elaborate. You didn’t think you’d feel this upset about it, but it meant your work was failing. You weren’t a believable couple and it was obvious to you now.

“Y/N, don’t say that. You’re beautiful,” His voice is noticeably softer.

“Not beautiful enough to sleep with. You wouldn’t sleep with me,” You rub your eyes with your hands and Soonyoung removes them from your face, laughing at the traces of makeup on the sides of your fingers. It seems like he still caught what you said though when he stops laughing.

“And that’s not the point. You’re just saying shit now, all of the guys in there would be lucky to even kiss you,” He insists. He stands up suddenly and walks toward your room. You assume he gets up to find makeup wipes, but you sit with his statement in the meantime.

You contemplate if you’d even want to kiss any of the royals who came to the party. You knew your standards were high and wondered if that would chase them off before they even had a chance to kiss you. He comes back and immediately wipes across your face the moment he sits down. His approach is slightly rough, but you couldn’t exactly get mad at him. He was just doing what you asked of him.

He’s analyzing if he got all of the makeup off when you speak up.

“But you’re not lucky?” You remark quietly.

That makes him clear his throat. You can even spot a hint of blush across his cheeks. It appears that you’ve riled him up slightly.

“I am lucky,” He lowers his head to rub the back of his neck with his hand, “You give me a run for my money.”

“Show me how lucky you are.” You continue to tempt him to see how he’ll react.

“I thought you wanted me to behave tonight?” He’s almost willing to act, but he still waits for your approval.

“I do, but she said we should kiss for practice,” You swallow lightly in anticipation. He rests his forehead against yours and you can hear his breath hitch in his throat.

You’ve been good, you’ve been so good all of your life. You don’t think you’ve done anything worth batting an eye at for your entire adolescence and young adulthood, but it was exhausting.

It was exhausting to be good, the voice of reason, the example of a perfect daughter to your country.

You weren’t in love with him, absolutely not.

Yet, the curiosity about what his lips tasted like made you want to be rebellious.

“I didn’t think you heard me.” He chuckled softly.

“I did,” You nodded your head against his. Soonyoung didn’t ask for permission to be bad, he just did it. That’s what runs through your brain when your lips meet his. Neither of you move for a moment and you’re afraid that you messed up.

That is until you feel Soonyoung’s hand cradling the back of your neck. He’s tilting into the kiss and you know he’s comfortable by the way his tongue slips into your mouth.

He tastes like tequila mostly, but there’s a hint of sweetness that you suspect comes from the dessert table at the party.

It feels so much better than you expected, now you know why girls couldn’t get enough of him. Even if it is just practice, he still took it far more seriously than you expected.

You haven’t had many kisses that were worth remembering, but this was something spectacular.

You know he’s kissed people far more times than you have, but there’s still a hesitant energy there that you can’t describe.

Did you make him nervous?

He pulls away first and it surprises you. He takes a deep breath and looks at you with tired eyes.

“Just a practice kiss, right?” He whispers.

“Just practice.” You affirm, pulling your head back. You’re not sure why it felt so disappointing to not have another kiss. You were sobering up which made the realization even worse.

“I’ll leave now before you kick me out.” He stands up from the couch and you don’t follow him. He makes it to the door and turns around.

“Don’t stay up all night reading thinking you can fight a hangover, go to bed.” He points at you with a teasing finger.

“Don’t lecture me, Kwon Soonyoung.” You stand up and walk toward your bedroom, ignoring whatever expression is on his face. You don’t look back until you hear the front door shut.

He didn’t say goodbye and that was probably for the best. You didn’t need any other memory from this part of the night to linger in your brain.

You rush back to the living room to lock the door again and sulk back to your bedroom. You eye the novel on your bedside table, you left it there earlier in the day to pick up whether you ended up drunk from the party or not.

Damn, he was good.

—

There were now multiple days, even weeks, between your shared schedules with him, and the more time that went by after the kiss only made you want to see him again.

Of course, he was friendly to you in public, and you were both able to handle public events with ease, but

the timing left you with many questions, and one stuck out in particular.

Why was he nervous to kiss you?

Today, he requested a private schedule for the two of you before he left Maritria early next week. There was a sneaking suspicion that it was the proposal since there wouldn’t be another reason for you to be alone.

He never wants to be left alone with you, it’s all about putting on an act for others that makes it so thrilling for him.

That’s what you try to tell yourself, at least.

“You’re here,” He eyes you carefully as you approach the entrance of the private garden. He’s surrounded by endless blooms, it’s almost suffocating how romantic it’s supposed to feel.

“I’m here because you want me here,” You offer quietly.

“Right, well I don’t want to waste any time. I’m sure my princess has lots of work to do today.”

On any other day, he’d be right, but the underlying suspicion of his true intentions made you want to linger.

He grabs your hand before you have another second to contemplate your feelings.

“I know that I’m not the person you wanted this to be from, but that’s how things have turned out. We both can’t get what we want, but I want to make this a good memory for us regardless of the situation.”

He gets down on one knee before asking. “So, Y/N, will you marry me?”

His hands held a small black velvet box and he quickly opened it to reveal a stunning oval shaped diamond ring. There are definitely more carats than you've ever seen on an engagement ring, and the gold band it sits upon feels equally regal.

It almost makes you sick from how ornate and gaudy it is, but it’s yours.

“You know this is the part where you say yes,” He clears his throat.

“Give me a second,” You mumble. You can’t see his glance, instead choosing to look at the ring. Everything else felt like a game before, but this was real.

He is proposing to you, offering a ring to you to signify a love that wasn’t actually real. That kind of sappy affectionate love you dreamed of would never come to fruition, possibly for the rest of your life.

It’s a realization that is entirely too bleak for the moment.

You’re meant to be happy, but if your parents were here they’d pick apart how long it took you to respond.

“Yes, I’ll marry you,” You force a smile onto your face to appease him. It doesn’t seem like he notices the pained expression within it, only offering a content sigh.

“Great.” He rises to his feet to place the ring on the appropriate finger. It feels like it’s all over now, you can imagine the rest of your future laid ahead of you on a set path.

The thought of taking constant publicity trips as a couple, having future heirs to the throne, and the idea of bringing him into Maritria’s lineage makes you wonder if you did everything you could to save yourself.

There is no out, just you, him, and the impenetrable distance between you both.

You wonder how a couple might build a life with an unstable foundation.

“Should we kiss?” His question brings you back to your senses.

“What?”

“For the camera, we should kiss.” He points to a photographer making themselves known from a nearby bush.

You swallow the lump in your throat and nod.

This is your duty, right?

You pull him close and kiss him, trying to ignite the small spark you felt when he was at your apartment.

Yet, the feeling doesn’t come and you pull away from him gently after a few moments.

“We just need some photos for social media and then you’re free to go.” The photographer reassures you with a kind tone.

You snap into professional mode in order to speed up the process. Your hand rests on his chest, angling it slightly to show off the ring. You force a smile, trying to indulge in the fantasy of it all. Once he gets a few shots of that pose, you turn back to look into Soonyoung’s eyes.

He was unfortunately quite handsome, it’s a shame that nothing else about him could make you happy.

“What are you thinking about?” His questioning pulls you out of your head once again, but you’re not sure what to tell him.

Being honest with him means making a sweet moment uncomfortable, and lying to him means letting your pain continue to simmer.

You go for the latter, to spare everyone a difficult moment. “Nothing. The ring is beautiful,” You shift the conversation with a quiet tone in order to deflect the topic off of you. He smiles widely, his face tells you that he didn’t expect you to like it one bit.

“I let my team take the reins with it since I don’t know you that well.” He responds so earnestly, and you’re not sure if he understands how hurtful that sounds.

You take it in stride though. “Well, it’s beautiful.”

He only nods and takes a moment to adjust his suit jacket.

You watch him brush over the fabric with his hands, wondering how in the world you ended up here. Even if things were different, fate would probably still bring you into Soonyoung’s orbit in another way.

Regardless, it’s enough to make you even more upset. Once the photographer is satisfied with the variety of shots, you’re about to leave when you feel Soonyoung’s hand touch your shoulder.

“Hey.” He turns your body to face him with his hand. You’re not sure how much longer you can stand in front of him without crying.

“We’re still on for this weekend, right?”

You can’t be bothered to remember what he means, but it’s best just to agree. It’s not like you had much of a choice.

“Yeah. I’ll see you then.” You nod at him before leaving. The moment you turn your back, you can’t hold back the stray tears falling onto your cheeks. You can only hope that he can’t hear your sniffling.

—

Now that the proposal news was officially out, your life had an even bigger microscope on it than usual. You’re used to being judged on a public scale, however, there were millions of people who were obsessed with Soonyoung that now wanted to know every single piece of information about his new fiancée.

Your Instagram posts and tweets had an influx of new activity that you could barely keep up with, and the new attention was starting to work into every corner of your life, even the time you spent with Soonyoung.

“Can you tell your fans to stop making video edits of me?” You stuff your phone into your jacket pocket in slight annoyance. You were genuinely trying to enjoy the private dates you had with Soonyoung, even if they were heavily guarded by staff. It was only right that you treated these outings as the dates they were, opportunities to get to know him better in order to connect with him that would hopefully prevent any issues further down the line.

Today, the location of the date was your choice and the staff had elected to leave you alone in light of the proposal news. Thus, you decide to take Soonyoung to a small beach on the outskirts of Maritria’s capital city. You’ve spent many days throughout your teenage years in your favorite spot, a cove in a hidden part of the beach. You figured that it’d be smart to let him in on a few things that you enjoyed, namely one of your most treasured spots in the country.

“That means they like you, and since when are you afraid of attention?” His interest is now piqued as he places his head in his hand to face you.

“Since always, I’m not exactly a Kwon Soonyoung-level attention whore,” You scoff.

“I think that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me,” He speaks in an exaggerated sad tone, accompanied by his pretending to cry. He turns his head to face you, sunglasses attempting to hide the goofiness peeking through.

“Still, I mean this is all a lot. I’m not exactly important enough to warrant 700,000 new followers.” You attempt to redirect the conversation.

As soon as the remark leaves your mouth, Soonyoung takes his sunglasses off. He looks at you with a confused glance, as if your self-deprecation was a personal attack on him.

“What are you talking about? You’re a princess and a genuinely nice one at that. That’s pretty hard to come by these days,” He compliments you. It pulls at your heartstrings very slightly, enough to absentmindedly check for a blush on your cheeks before snapping out of it.

“You wouldn’t know, you don’t see anything past the title before you sleep with these girls,” You attempt to defuse the response again, but he’s prepared.

“First of all, those days are behind me. I’m a proper engaged man now,” His thumb grazes your engagement ring and it sends a chill down your spine.

“And second, that statement is funny coming from someone who’s marrying me for financial stability,” He pokes your shoulder and you move to cover it.

“Correction, my country’s financial stability. You’ll have to get used to living here once we’re married,” You clarify.

“Who said we’re living in Maritria?” He argues instantly. You let out a sigh and try to understand the perspective he’s going to bring up.

“Soonyoung, wouldn’t it be smart to show how much the country’s condition would improve with you here?”

“Yes, but imagine being in Arinorin. The optics of giving you away to the country that saved yours seem pretty positive to me.” He suggests. While idealistic, the perspective is shortsighted. He didn’t necessarily have a shining future back in his home country considering his reputation and lack of communication with his parents.

“Even though you’ll never be king?” You didn’t mean for the question to sound so mean, but it’s true.

He was not the country’s future king, not unless there were dire circumstances that would force him into the position.

He scoffs. “Way to rub it in.” He looks into the distance, not acknowledging your glance anymore.

“I’m just saying. At least here, you’ll have the chance to have more of the public’s attention. There’s nothing to fight over, it’s just me,” You add sympathetically.

There’s a lingering silence that you don’t want to fill for the moment. You can tell he’s mulling over your words by the way he’s looking down at his hands, playing with his sunglasses idly.

“You know, you don’t have to stay there. Not to be that person, but if the idea of staying makes you feel worse, then what’s the point?” You soften your tone in an attempt to bring him back.

“You don’t know what it’s like,” He shakes his head resolutely. You feel your window of opportunity to try and comfort him closing rapidly.

“Ok, you’re right, but I’ve kept up with the news. I know a bit about how my future in-laws have treated you. You’ll be okay here,” You place a hand on his shoulder.

“I think they’ve wanted me to leave for a while, honestly. I’d go somewhere where they don’t have to think about me anymore.” He scratches the back of his neck before focusing on a small tidepool that sat directly below the both of you.

His statement is enough to now squeeze his shoulder, gently rubbing it to show your support.

“I’m sorry.” You offer quietly.

“It’s not your fault. I don’t think being a problem child fits me very well anymore.”

“You can reinvent yourself here if that sounds alright with you?” You offer and he laughs quietly.

He smirks. “I’ll think about it,” His slightly hopeful tone makes you feel at ease.

Any true affection toward him still feels too foreign, but verbal reassurance is a step you’re willing to take if it means your shared future is relatively peaceful.

—

The trips back and forth to each other’s countries were becoming a blur of wedding planning, being present at each other’s public engagements, and trying to get to know each other. It was becoming such a tedious process that any opportunity to rest was taken without hesitation.

The big plan for the current trip to Arinorin was to have a joint dinner with both of your immediate families.

You waited endlessly, but Soonyoung never showed up for dinner. It was embarrassing trying to subtly figure out where he was by going to the bathroom and frantically texting him. When that didn’t work, calls went unanswered until you were forced to give up and return to the table in defeat. He wasn’t answering and you were left to deal with two confused families on your own, attempting to answer questions that you had no answers to. Dinner eventually proceeded with an unyielding amount of attention on you, but thankfully, the rest of his family seemed to accept you.

Yet, it was ultimately embarrassing to attempt to cover his tracks and defend his actions throughout the night.

Thus, your post-dinner plans were to relax in your room and attempt to forget how wild the night had been. A knock on the door interrupted those plans almost immediately.

You open the door to see one of the guards that have been assigned to you since the arranged marriage proceedings had begun.

“Sorry to bother you, princess. I’ve just received word of a disturbance with the prince downstairs that needs your attention.” His tone was especially solemn, so you didn’t want to leave him waiting for long.

“Alright, I’ll be ready in a minute.” You nod at him and thank your lucky stars that you’ve already changed into more comfortable clothing.

With his assistance, you were soon traveling through the endless halls of the castle to find your fiancé. It wasn’t long before he came into view, sitting on a bench with his legs tucked up to his chest, arms wrapped around the front with his hands clasped tight. He was clearly drunk, sighing to himself before looking up.

“Y/N! Hi!” He exclaims, waving at you wildly.

“Fucking hell,” You exhale under your breath. You’re extremely grateful that he wasn’t out wandering the streets, clearly under careful watch by his guards.

“Can you give us a moment?” You look around at the surrounding guards. They nod curtly and dismiss themselves, retreating to a nearby room where they could still intervene quickly if needed.

You turn your attention back to him once the door closes. “Where were you?”

“I was out with Seungkwannie and, um, Seokmin. It was so much fun,” He laughed brightly, eyes almost disappearing from his smile.

“We were supposed to have dinner with our families. Remember?” You hold onto your curt tone.

He shakes his head immediately. “They didn’t wanna see me, they don’t care about me.”

You were starting to lose your patience. While you understood his hesitation to face his family, it wasn’t an excuse to leave you to navigate so many different dynamics on your own. This was supposed to show your families all of the efforts that had been made thus far, and there were plenty of efforts that were beginning to show naturally.

He had become more affectionate in public, it was less uncomfortable to smile at him and speak with each other kindly. It wasn’t real, obviously not, but unsuspecting eyes wouldn’t have known any better.

You were almost visibly in love.

“How about how I feel, Soonyoung? I had to deal with everyone alone, deal with everything by myself. That was so hard for me, but you just ignored it and got drunk.” Your voice was tight, barely allowing yourself to feel anything besides anger.

“I’m sorry,” He sighs before running through his hair. He’s affected by it, as his posture starts to wilt like a dying plant.

“You should be. That hurt my feelings a lot,” You felt the intended venom of your words dissipate on your tongue until nothing was left.

What was the point in yelling when he wouldn’t remember any of it anyways?

Honestly, you were disappointed in him. You had earnestly tried to connect with him, and it finally felt like he was trying to do the same thing. Yet, he let you down. You didn’t ask for much of him and adjusted your expectations for him at every step of the way, but he couldn’t do it.

He couldn’t be better for you.

“Was being selfish,” His pout seems to get deeper somehow.

“Yeah, you were,” You whisper. You finally take a seat next to him on the bench, taking a deep breath. The silence between the two of you almost felt labored, as if the air held all of the emotions you were both feeling at once.

You shouldn’t be babysitting your fiancé like this, that much was true. If he couldn’t even attend a family dinner, what did that mean for the marriage?

“You don’t have to worry about the wedding. I’ll take care of everything,” You mutter quietly.

“What?” He sits up in surprise.

“I can’t trust you, Soonyoung. You don’t care about this and you clearly don’t care about me, so why would I let you plan any part of this?”

“I can try, just let me try,” He pleads quietly. You can feel the desperation in his tone, but you can’t budge.

“I’ve let you try and this is what happens. I don’t know if this is how you picture our marriage, but if this is it then consider us strangers. I can’t do this, not like this.” You can’t look at him as you stand up.

Your body goes into autopilot as you knock on the door where the guards are stationed, letting them out so you can both separate for the night. You gently request for him to be taken home before starting the journey back to your room, wiping away tears that welled up in your eyes without a second thought.

You hear him calling your name, but what point is there in turning around? You didn’t have the energy for drunk pleas and broken promises anymore.

If you couldn’t stop everything and everyone from falling apart, you could at least try to protect yourself from the wreckage.

—

For the first time, Soonyoung hadn’t been able to stop thinking about you.

It never felt good to be ignored by anyone, but getting ignored by you? It had to be a new kind of pain.

Despite his unbothered facade, he didn’t mind your company at all. He quite enjoyed your little quirks, small things that other people probably wouldn’t notice.

In the chaos of your intertwined schedules, there were moments where he’d just look at you to take in your features for himself, and not anyone else.

He loved seeing how peaceful you looked while you slept during flights or the way your cheeks lifted when you smiled. Since he couldn’t have you to himself often, he could hold solace in the smaller moments.

Admittedly, he had been in love with you for a while now, and he could pinpoint the exact moment when he realized it.

He mentioned to you offhandedly that he’d lost a beloved stuffed tiger toy as a kid, but he’d accepted the loss and attempted to move on. He didn’t think you’d remember the anecdote, much less do anything about it.

Yet, you handed him a silver gift bag while on a flight with him.

When he unwrapped the tissue paper to the sight of the exact make of the tiger he had, his heart momentarily stilled in awe.

“I found the original manufacturer and they still make them. The certain model you had is a collector’s item now, so it took a little while to find but it wasn’t impossible.” You explained everything calmly, your hand propped your head up on the armrest of your seat. You lazily smiled at him as he admired it in his hands.

“This is very kind of you, thank you,” He couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face.

His parents hadn’t thought of trying to replace it for him after all these years, and he surely didn’t expect it from you. The gesture is just so romantic, even if you just wanted to write it off as simply a nice thing to do.

He didn’t cry until he was alone after the day’s activities were finished, realizing just how important it was to him. You were so nice, much nicer than he deserved from his future wife given his standoffish behavior.

There was no reason why he couldn’t confess his true feelings to you at this point. The wedding was fast approaching, sooner than he’d like to admit.

Details about the ceremony were quickly ironed out between your shared staff before he could think twice about asking, and you held to your word that he wasn’t allowed to get involved in wedding planning.

He didn’t remember much from the night you found him drunk, but it was clear that wedding planning was off-limits and you were extremely wary of being alone with him. Thus, he had to make his apology meaningful, and he couldn’t wait until after the wedding. He was determined to mend the relationship before you walked down the aisle.

He started by sending you various bouquets, all carefully chosen by him.

That was a kind gesture, right?

He thought so until he saw you throwing one of the bouquets into a dumpster from afar.

All of his apologetic texts to you were swiftly ignored as well, forcing him to switch gears completely. It was clear that you were subtly hinting at an in-person apology, which was daunting but not impossible for him to do.

He hadn’t been back to your apartment since the night of the Youth Summit Ball, a major oversight on his part. Yet, he figured there was no better time than the present to start taking things more seriously.

He held the bouquet of white and red carnations tightly in his hand, fingers playing gently with the paper wrapping as he sat in his car.

He was optimistic that the rain would hold out until he was hopefully let into your apartment. Yet, he ignored the raindrops periodically hitting his raincoat as he walked up the stairs to your brownstone.

The moment he knocked on the door, it was as if the universe decided to fuck him over. The occasional raindrops turned into a full downpour, and he scrambled to figure out what to do with himself. There wasn’t any awning to hide under, so he attempted to conceal the flowers from the rain, unzipping his jacket enough to sit the damp bouquet on his chest before zipping it up again.

It felt like a lifetime before you opened the door, and the sight of you rendered him speechless.

This was the first time in so long that he was facing his fear of resolving the neverending conflicts in his life.

“Hi.” He smiles despite your unreadable expression.

“Hi,” You were confused, rightfully so. After passive-aggressively sending indirect apologies, he decided to skip everything else and just show up.

“Are you busy?”

“No, but I don’t think I have a choice,” You move to the side so that he can enter your apartment. He takes the cue and makes himself comfortable in the living room.

“These are for you.” He hands the flowers to you, and the hesitancy is clear on your face.

“You aren’t giving up on the flowers, are you?” You ask with a judgmental tone. He doesn’t feel completely deterred when you place them on the dining table instead of throwing them out.

“Well, these are your favorite.”

“This doesn’t bail you out, you know.” You give him a knowing look.

He sighs, steadying his breath before speaking. “I know, and you deserve an apology for everything.” When he notices that you're focusing intently on his words, he feels confident about continuing.

“I know that I’ve made you feel isolated, and I’m truly sorry for that. I don’t want you to feel like you’re alone in this, and I want to make this marriage work. You deserve to marry someone who’s willing to admit their mistakes and grow with you. I’m ready to be that person if you want me.” By the time he finishes, he knows that he was completely honest with you. He’s wanted to be upfront with you for so long, but it wouldn’t have been worth it if he didn’t express himself properly.

You let out a contemplative sigh. He could tell that you didn’t want to reject him, it’s as if your face was processing his statement just as swiftly as your brain.

“As much as I appreciate this, I don’t want to be in a loveless marriage.” You said.

He swallows lightly, but he’s still understanding of your perspective. He knew that he had to lay everything out for you before it was too late.

“Who said it was loveless?” He says.

“What?”

The revelation seems to catch you off guard, but it's not surprising to him. Soonyoung is a happy-go-lucky kind of guy, and this kind of confession feels completely out of his emotional range.

“I love you, and I should've told you sooner. I regret not proving that you could trust me, and you have every right to not have any faith in me.” He walks toward you, internally pleading that the lack of distance will help you change your mind.

“I do have the right,” You mutter under your breath with a chuckle. He lifts your chin slightly with his finger, forcing your eyes to meet his again.

“I will prove to you every day for the rest of my life that I love you.” His eyes are completely sincere, showing that he’s willing to provide the romance that you’ve been grasping for. He can tell that you can’t let him in this easily, he has to earn you completely.

“Every day?” You question him.

“Every single day,” He reiterates. He means it too, his mind was already thinking of dozens of ways that he could start making it up to you.

“That’s pretty tempting, honestly.” You tilt your head in curiosity.

“Anything holding you back?”

“I don’t think so. You just can’t keep coming into my apartment soaking wet anymore,” You scrunch your nose at his appearance and gently tousle his hair, earning a giggle from him.

“That wasn’t planned. It was pretty romantic though, right?” He can’t fight the smile that spreads across his face as he asks.

“A little bit. I forgive you, by the way,” You admit.

He exhales and runs a hand through his hair with shaky confidence. He couldn’t be certain of your decision, so the relief he feels at your words is palpable.

“Does that mean I get to see all the spreadsheets about the wedding now?” He knew he was testing his luck by asking, especially because the process had been under lock and key even before restricting his access to wedding-related documents.

“Yeah, it’ll take some stress off my back. It’s giving me headaches just thinking about everything coming together,” You rub your forehead and close your eyes for a moment before looking back at him.

“You’ve been stressed like this and you haven’t told me?” He frowns.

“I was mad at you, so all my other feelings just kept building up. I’m sorry,” You shake your head, immediately covering your face with your hands. He pries them off just as quickly, pressing a kiss to the palm of your hand.

“It’s okay, love. I am more than willing to help you, I promise,” He nods eagerly with a grin.

“Okay. I like that name, you know,” You finally crack a smile and his own smile widens.

“Figured you would.” He’s leaned closer to your face, but there’s enough space to move away in case you reject him. “Can I kiss you?” He asks gently.

“Please,” You whisper.

It’s all he needs to complete the distance between your lips and the feeling of you is almost overwhelmingly beautiful. He’s so lucky at this moment, feeling your hands push his head deeper into the kiss. He was too cautious last time, but now he’ll never take another kiss of yours for granted, not when it feels this good.

He would do anything to make sure you felt loved and cared for, no matter how long it took to earn your full trust.

—

“I just need a moment alone, if that’s alright?” The question comes out a bit shakier than you imagined, but you can’t seem to quiet your nerves. Your wedding day has already taken you on an emotional rollercoaster despite not going down the aisle yet.

As you view yourself in the gown that you meticulously picked out along with the detailed hair and makeup that took hours to complete, nothing looks out of place.

Yet, your heart feels unanchored.

Your relationship with Soonyoung was getting better every day, but it seems like it was all going a little too well. Even though your relationship was transforming from a state of emergency into a promising romance, it was all catching up to you at the moment. Your mutual efforts to improve your relationship had been fruitful, giving you both the confidence to get married without feeling insecure.

You wouldn’t regret it, right? You needed to be certain that you wouldn’t.

“Of course, Princess.” Your head staff member agrees without question before exiting the room along with a few team members who were assisting you for the past few hours.

Your brain can only think of him. The tradition of spending the night before the wedding apart from each other felt more like torture than anything else, as you’ve come to appreciate his comforting presence next to you. In the last few weeks leading up to the wedding, he’s made such a genuine effort to intertwine your lives together that spending time apart felt futile.

A knock on the door breaks you out of your trance. Before you can ask who’s there, Soonyoung’s voice fills the silence.

“Is it a bad time?” His voice makes your heart flutter before you can even look at him.

“You can’t see me before the wedding, it’s bad luck,” You attempt to fight the smile on your face but you don’t allow yourself to look at him.

“Even if my bride has cold feet?” He presses on, his footsteps quietly approaching you.

You turn to reveal yourself to him and his face lights up.

“They’re not cold, they’re lukewarm,” You smile coyly at him. He grabs your hands and scans your body with wondrous eyes, his gaze seeming to land on every detail of the dress before meeting your eyes again.

“You look so,” His voice trails off. You’re sure that you can read his mind, he’s practically grinning from ear to ear. It makes you feel a bit shy, you can feel your cheeks heat up from his complimentary words.

“You’re really inflating my ego here,” You shake your head gently, but the feeling of his hand grazing your cheek pulls your gaze to him. Despite your best efforts, it’s still hard to fight the inner voice that tells you that he doesn’t mean it, that he’s only saying it because it’s something you want to hear.

Yet, his responses are just unflinchingly earnest that it makes you wonder why you ever felt that way in the first place.

“You just look so stunning,” His voice begins to shake before he clears his throat, “I just can’t believe that you’re mine.”

You were certain that you’d never seen that much sincerity in his eyes up until now, but it started to quiet the lingering fears that still sat in the pit of your stomach. He was absolutely smitten with you, to the point where his smile didn’t go away while you were talking to him.

“You can’t cry yet, you have to save it for the cameras.” You chuckle in an effort to push away his tears, but his eyes were still glossy.

“I can’t help it. You’ve worked really hard on all of this and it’s coming together so well,” He sighs with content. Honestly, you needed to hear that it was all worth it, especially from him. Although he’d been offering reassurance more often than not, the sentiment felt different knowing that you were minutes away from getting married.

“I wanna kiss you so badly, but I can’t fuck up my makeup.” You pout. He instinctively places his hands on your shoulders, moving them up and down to make you feel grounded with his touch.

“We can kiss, you know. There are no rules to any of this.” He attempts to get you out of your tradition-focused mindset with a low tone. You do want to indulge him though, considering that this was the first time you'd been alone with him all morning.

“Just go below the mouth.” You nod and he smirks, immediately placing his lips on your jaw to see how you’d react. It pulls a soft moan from your throat, and your reaction encourages him to go down your neck, leaving kisses wherever his lips can find skin. You started to let go of the responsibilities lingering over your head and focus on your fiance’s tongue leaving open-mouth kisses on your cleavage.

He’s practically doing everything but undressing you and his eagerness makes it harder to pull away, but you have to.

“Babe,” You whisper.

“Hmm?”

“Later,” You have to hold onto your resolve or else you’ll give in, and you can’t let your first time be in a dressing room.

“Later?” His eyes perk up like an excited puppy. The implication of the consummation of your marriage feels daring, it will serve as the reward after dealing with the decadent fanfare of the day.

“Yes, later. I promise.” You nod and he somehow looks even happier than before he walked in. He focuses on your lips but leaves a kiss on your cheek instead.

“I’ll see you out there, okay?” He presses one last kiss to your palm before heading towards the door.

“Okay,” You wave him off and watch him disappear with a smile on your face.

It’s clear that you don’t have anything to worry about.

—

“You’re sure that you don’t wanna come in with me?” Soonyoung calls from the pool.

“Yeah,” You nod with a hand placed above your eyes, acting as a sun visor since you couldn’t find a hat to put on.

You were two days into your honeymoon, tucked away at a small island resort that mostly isolated you from the outside world.

The wedding had thankfully gone far better than you could have imagined. He stopped you multiple times throughout the reception to tell you how beautiful it was, how happy he was to be in the moment with you, and how well you planned it all. It was a day that felt sun-soaked, enveloped in a love that was starting to soften and lose the sharp edges that had restrained it before.

Despite all of the kind attention from family and friends throughout the day, it was evened out with the constant presence of staff and castle officials that made it all a bit overwhelming.

Thankfully, the honeymoon began the next day and you’d have to force all responsibilities out of your head for the next week.

“You’re thinking about something, probably too many things,” He assumes correctly.

You scoff and turn away for a moment before facing him again. “You can’t be this good at analyzing me, we’ve only been married for less than a week.”

He laughs before swimming closer to the edge of the pool to meet you. “That’s my job, angel.”

“But you’re right, I am thinking too much about you moving in and all the press stuff we have to do,” You’re rubbing at your temples just thinking about how much effort it’s all going to take.

“Hey, look at me.” He calls out softly. You reluctantly place your hands at your sides, trying to take in his words.

“You’ll have plenty of time to worry about this, but this is the only time you’ll be on your honeymoon. Hopefully,” He shows his teeth and it succeeds in making you laugh. He smiles back at you before continuing.

“So maybe we can swim together if you’d like?” He tries again, knowing you’ll say yes. You take one last sigh and nod.

“Yeah, just give me a second.” You take your coverup off to reveal a solid black bikini he hadn’t seen yet. You discard the coverup on a nearby chair before turning to face him.

He eyes you for a moment before you clear your throat. “Slow down, loverboy, we’re supposed to be swimming!”

“Just admiring how beautiful my wife is, that’s all,” He bites back a smile but ultimately lets it show. You walk down the pool stairs until you’re swimming next to him. He only stares at you for a second before pulling you in for a kiss.

You’re caught off guard, letting out a small squeak when his tongue slides into your mouth but you give in to the feeling soon enough. You let your fingers card through the back of his hair, pushing yourself further into the kiss. You feel his hands wander across your ass and you let out a moan.

“Just wanted me in here so you could fuck me?” You whisper, finally pulling away from the kiss to catch your breath.

“You caught me,” He whispers back and proceeds to kiss down your neck, not hesitating to leave marks that force moans out of your throat.

“For fuck’s sake,” You sigh. You didn’t need to have control right now, you didn’t want it when he was making you feel this good just by kissing you. You thank your lucky stars that the vacation house is somewhat isolated because you can’t pretend to hold back the noises you’re making.

He picks up on this and presses his erection against your thigh, causing you to hold your breath. “Where do you want me, sweetheart?” He asks quietly. Your train of thought can’t even start because he’s staring right at you, brushing his thumb against your lip.

“Chairs,” You mutter. He bites his lip and turns to look at the unoccupied beach chairs lined up near the sliding glass door that leads back into the house.

“Okay,” He nods. He leads you back to the pool stairs before taking your hand and helping you out of the water. You both don’t think about drying off before he sits you down onto the chair, pulling off your bikini bottom without a second thought. You watch him with spread legs, taking in the sight of his glistening chest and abs. He seemed just as eager as you, taking off his swim trunks in the blink of an eye. The sight of his cock makes your head spin, so you force yourself to make eye contact with him.

“Are you okay, baby?” He asks earnestly. He must not know how hot he is because you’re rendered speechless. His freshly dyed black hair is slightly spiky, and it doesn’t help when he runs his hand through it. It all just goes to your clit, and you’re certain that the pressure will make you explode.

“Yeah, I’m good,” You force your mouth into a smile to replace the incredulous look on your face. He nods and settles into the space between your legs, quickly spreading hands across your thighs.

“Have I told you how pretty you look today?” His eyes are practically dripping with lust, but you want to let him know that the feeling is mutual.

“Yeah, maybe for the 100th time today, but you look even prettier,” Your compliment comes out a bit shy, but it still makes his eyes light up.

“I don’t think that’s possible,” He lets his thumb graze your clit and you whimper. He lingers there for a few more moments before dragging two fingers down your entrance. He ponders for a moment before pushing inside, and the new sensation makes you cry out. The angled position of the chair makes his movements feel even more powerful, and his fingers gliding against your tight walls already have you in shambles.

“It’s not possible because you’re the prettiest person in the world, and I get all your cute noises to myself, right?” His question makes the coil in your stomach harder to ignore.

“Yeah,” You moan. He leans in for a kiss, capturing your lips easily while thrusting his fingers even deeper. How does he know your body like this? Sure, you’ve made out a few times but he's never touched you like this before.

Maybe it’s the anticipation that’s causing him to show out like this, he’s trying to impress you because of how long you’ve had to wait for this. You let your arms drape behind his neck for a moment before clutching onto his back.

You hear him moan from the scratches you leave on the expanse of his back, you savor the noises as they start to blend in with your moans.

“Gonna cum,” You breathe into his ear. He can tell how tense you are around him, and your eyes are becoming frantic from the impending pleasure.

“Just relax baby, take a deep breath, and let go for me. I know you can do it,” His encouragement lets you cum immediately, arching your back off the chair with a soft grunt escaping your lips. Your orgasm washes over you all at once and his fingers only slow down a bit, allowing you to feel every single bit of pleasure that he could pull out of you.

You take a few deep breaths and focus on his eyes once again. You start to register his face again as he strokes your cheek. “Are you ok? Are you up for more?” He asks hesitantly.

“Yeah, I just didn’t think you’d get me like this so early, that’s all.” You cover your eyes with your hands for a moment before looking at him again. He has you so shy that you can barely look at him. It’s hard to admit to yourself that you haven’t cum like that in a very long time, but if he’s making you feel like this so early on into the marriage, you don’t think you’ll ever be disappointed.

“Well, that’s good. I just wanna take care of you,” He reassures you sweetly. His eyes are so full of love that it makes your heart pound, swallowing in anticipation.

He meant it when he said he’d take care of you, he had barely let you do anything for yourself since you arrived at the vacation house. It was so adorable that you didn’t have the heart to stop him. It was nice to let him live up to his promise of showing his love for you instead of constantly feeling distrustful of his actions.

Of course, there would eventually be moments where you’d disagree or argue with each other, but it wouldn’t be out of spite like before. You’re lost in thought until he presses a kiss to your cheek.

“Where’d you go, pretty?” He whispers, his face now a few inches away from yours. It somehow makes you even more flustered than before.

“Just thinking about how much I love you,” You admit with a smile. His eyes widen at the confession and you burst into a fit of giggles.

“You love me?” He asks in surprise.

“I love you.” You state it confidently. You mean it too, and it feels so easy to express it to him. You knew you loved him since the wedding, he cried at the sight of you walking down the aisle and it helped you realize his sincerity. He seems to let the words settle into the air before giving you a response.

“I love you too. It feels good to say that,” He laughs at his own confession. With a mutual confession out in the open, the air somehow feels lighter.

“Can I show you how much I love you by fucking you properly?” He asks. You can only laugh and nod your head at how sweet it is.

“Not out here though. I need you in bed right now!” He exclaims, sweeping you up into a bridal style hold. You let out a scream before bursting into laughter, you can only let yourself get carried back into the house without protest.

----

“Fuck, right there, please,” You whimper, eyes screwed shut. The feeling of his cock stuffed inside you was indescribably good, it was nearly enough to make you cry. Once he got you on the bed, he wasted no time filling you up and easily pulled moans out of your throat.

He pressed your legs up to your chest, making sure that he was completely inside of you. You quickly learned that your husband had incredible stamina, and you were definitely gonna cum again sooner rather than later.

“You’re so good for me, my love. You don’t know how many times I’ve thought of having you like this,” He whispers in your ear. The sound of his balls slapping against your skin brought something primal out of you, you just want to suck him inside of your walls even deeper. You were barely holding on, but he kept pushing you even closer to the edge.

He leaned down to leave marks in the crook of your neck, leaving a hand free to fondle your breast. It was as if he combined every possible move just to drive you insane and it was working.

“Gonna cum for me, sweetheart?” His voice is laced with something even deeper than lust, it almost felt demonic the way he asked you.

“Yes, please let me cum, please,” The words spilled out of your mouth, your voice was shaking along with your body. He was practically rocking you back and forth with the impact of his cock, hitting that particular spot deeper every time.

“Go on, then. Cum for daddy,” He grants you permission. The nickname makes you flood his cock, screaming again as your orgasm takes over you. He pulls out in time for you to squirt on his cock, leaving you even more surprised than before.

“Holy shit,” You whimper. He looks so pleased with himself, but also shocked that he was able to push you that far.

He lets you both recover for a few minutes, but you know he hasn’t cum yet. “I’m kinda close, baby, is it alright if I-?” He asks, but you don’t let him finish.

“Of course. I already miss your cock, to be honest,” You let yourself smile and his eyes are already blown wide by your response.

“You’re insane, you know that?”

“You made me like this,” You hit his arm playfully. He slides his cock into you again slowly and he watches your mouth fall open slightly at the sensation.

“I did,” He smirks at you, relishing the sight of how fucked out you look just from him staying still.

He picks up the pace, trying to focus on getting himself there. It didn’t seem like it’d take much just from how intensely he looked at you.

“Gonna let me cum inside you, baby? Should I get you pregnant like this?” His questions felt sinful in your ears, but you were too gone to care. You felt pressure building just from that, and the thought of him breeding you felt exciting.

“Yes, please, I want it,” You whine. He felt so deep that you could feel it from your head to your toes. Every single part of you felt overwhelmed by his cock and his relentless pace.

“Good girl, daddy wants to fuck you like this all the time,” He moves to kiss you sloppily, but it still feels heavenly to have him in your mouth. It wasn’t much longer before you felt his body tense beneath you.

“Are you close?” You ask breathily.

“Yeah,” He grunts. He grabs your hips and fucks into you even harder than you remember, the pain radiating from your thighs forces a tear out of your eye but you know it’s helping. He doesn’t warn you before he cums, and the sudden warmth inside of you makes you moan louder than you expect. He finally falls beside you and lets you both recover for a few minutes in silence. You could easily fall asleep like this, both of you laying haphazardly under the covers while his breathing steadies your own.

“Y/N?” He calls your name and it startles you. You struggle to keep your eyes open at the sound of his voice.

“Oh no, I scared you,” His voice is much quieter than before, lulling you back into a state of calmness.

“No, I’m okay, I promise,” You turn to face him, rubbing your eyes gently.

“Ok good. We’ve gotta clean up now, alright?” He softens the blow of the question by kissing your forehead. It still feels foreign to let him take care of you, but when you see how gentle he is, you don’t feel the urge to take control.

It’s enough to watch him go through your suitcase, observing how his eyebrows furrow while trying to decide what shirt you might want to wear.

You decided that he didn’t have to prove anything else to you, ultimately, you could see how pure his heart was, and it would be doing both of you a disservice to let assumptions of character control the course of your relationship.

You’re attentive enough to follow his cues while he’s dressing you or helping you up to the bathroom, but your mind is consumed by him.

“Doing okay, love?” His question pulls your head toward him. You adjust your posture in bed as he approaches you, climbing into the bed beside you.

“Better now that you’re back,” You hum lowly, leaning your head onto his shoulder. You take a deep breath, taking in the feeling of his skin against yours.

His body vibrates as he chuckles. “I’m glad you’re alright. I was thinking about something while we were in the bathroom,” He leans into your touch slightly, enough to make your eyes flutter shut.

“What’s up?” You accept his inquiry.

“I think we should take the kids here one day when they’re old enough,” He explains it as if it’s fate, and you can’t help but smile at the thought of him being certain that your shared future is meant to expand in so many different ways. You can’t picture yourself being pregnant for a long while, but the idea of building a family with him feels right to think about.

“We’ve fucked once and you’re thinking about our kids,” You tease him in a lighthearted tone, but you hear his nervous laughter.

“It’s just a thought,” He waves his hand gently.

“It’s a very nice thought, you’re really sweet,” You finally raise your head to look at him. You let your hand caress his cheek before kissing him gently. He accepts you immediately, and you let yourself linger on his lips for a few moments before pulling away to look at him.

He searches your eyes, focused on figuring out what you’re meant to tell him. You can’t think of anything profound to tell him, any extravagant sentimentalities you might’ve conjured up don’t make their way out onto your lips.

“I love you,” You whisper. Your feelings are buried too deep to let them all out now, but it’s enough to tell him this. You feel the pressure in your chest lessen the moment he smiles back at you.

“I love you so much,” He mumbles the words against your lips before kissing you, love seemed to radiate from his lips the way he was holding you against him. The day unfolded into the evening, time passing languidly as you were enamored with each other.

As you fell asleep with him holding onto your waist, you realized that sweetness had made its way into your life before your very eyes. The limitless potential between the two of you no longer strikes fear into your heart, but instead sustains you in new ways.

There would be time to flesh out the dynamics of your relationship, determining how you’d show up for each other in loud and unspoken ways, but the present feeling of safety that sat in your chest was enough.

Neither of you was perfect, but the act of showing up and being willing to grow with each other was enough.

You are both trying, and that is more than enough.

[15-lizards]

ASOIAF modern AU class/wealth distinctions bc in the wise words of Mod Sam from the Inn at The Crossroads Discord: “i love modern aus where theyre like oh yeah the lannisters are filthy rich and here's the starks, piling into a minivan to go to public school. they would not fucking do that”

Lannisters: Private jets and COO/CEO/CFO positions at the family company and plain white tshirts that cost $5000. 1% of the 1%. They’re the Roys we already know this no need to elaborate.

Starks: they’re a rugged type of Minnesota/North Dakota/Wyoming wealth. Land rich. Own ranches and mining operations and oil drilling companies. Ppl think they’re normal bc they look like average farmers until they get a tour of their 300,000 acres and private mountain. Seem down to earth but grew up breeding ranch horses, don’t really understand what a car note is, and Nedcat paid for all the starklings college apartments. Also wear normal looking vests and ranching jeans and boots that cost absurd amounts

Tyrells: masters at the “quiet wealth” bullshit. Wayyyy older money compared to the Lannisters, and aren’t aggressive/scrappy like them bc of it. Literal aristocracy like lords or barons or some shit. Multiple residences, family tradition of politics, and loads of passive income. Maybe run a newspaper or two and own some global shipping companies bc of their merchant roots or whatever. Margaery was at one of those international debutante balls for the ubër-wealthy.

Tullys: Not as rich as the Tyrells or Lannisters but still nothing to scoff at. Not upper middle class but more like lower rungs of the upper class. Family tradition of sending all the kids to boarding school (that’s where Lysa got pregnant 🙂‍↕️) and they have some nice yachts and the like. Have one really nice permanent house on the river, a summer house upstate, and an apartment in the city. Normal enough to blend in with most people at their school. Also made their money thru shipping lanes.

Martells: Southern oil barons. Nymeria emigrated over and immediately discovered oil on her apparently shitty piece of land. Thousands of acres dedicated to drilling and cattle ranching. Awful for the environment but greenwash the fuck out of their business. Good at being a man of the ppl despite literally being in the one percent. Very publicly donate to progressive charities and causes to offset the backlash they get from pay the people who work for them slave wages. People stan them on Twitter because they’re hot and not like other billionaires.

Baratheons: slightly newer money but old enough to have no excuse to act the way they do. Loud annoying displays of wealth. Made their fortune mostly because they were good at being overly aggressive when it came to the stock market or sales or smthn idk what they do. Robert buys an egregious house in Florida where him and some other rich repulsive republicans do Labor Day weekend on their yachts with women they paid to be there. Absolutely terrible at saving their money (except Stannis and kinda Renly) and quite literally have to have their accounts frozen by their investment bankers. Actively going bankrupt.

Greyjoys: Not even rich anymore. Had a sizable shipping company at one point before they got poached bought out by the Lannisters. Also they engaged in too much tax fraud and embezzlement so now no one wants to touch them with a ten foot pole. Still live in their dilapidated cliffside house that’s literally ab to crumble into the sea. Theon got to live with the Starks bc once the Greyjoys got audited Ned felt bad.

Targaryens: REAL old money that stretches back like at least 500 years. Have had multiple income sources over the years and almost all of it is blood money of some kind and extracted through violence :) Giant ass portraits of their ancestors in their multiple residences, they all speak Valyrian at home, and they don’t even go to school it’s just private tutors. Obscene wealth that isn’t even fathomable to most people. Famously bred race horses and hunting dogs for a while until there was some familial infighting about ownership of the racetracks and stables and that collapsed. Got audited and investigated twenty years ago and Aerys just killed himself instead of going to jail.

[ennn]

More Agatha x Rio Fic Recs

For my previous fic recs: 1, 2 <- a few canon-compatible fics in Part 2 have completed so check 'em out if you haven't!

Alrighty, I know some of y'all don't enjoy AU fics so I've put those in a separate category. Usual YMMV disclaimer. I make no claims that this list is comprehensive, there are other well-written fics out there.

· · ──── Canon Compatible / Divergent ─── · ·

For You To Be Still – by @momentary-ecstasy

Pre-canon. In a desperate bid to save Rio from the fallout of the Snap, Agatha binds them together. If that wasn't complicated enough, there's the end of days to deal with. Sounds like a job for a coven.

blood, sweat & tears – by clarkestrife

WIP. Pre-canon. Rio encounters Agatha for the first time since Nicky's death. It goes as well as you'd expect.

you'll sanctify me when i'm dead – by @majorlysapphic

WIP. Pre-canon. Stricken with Hanahaki Disease, Rio seeks to retire permanently but she needs to finish a final mission... and she can only do it with Agatha's help.

death comes for us all – by uniqueusernamegenerator

Pre-canon. A beautiful series of scenes through the years where they come together and fall apart. Well, mostly fall apart.

WAR Stories – by simplysapient

Wanda/Agatha/Rio. Technically canon-divergent? A series that's very very cracky and silly but also contains heartfelt character moments. I especially enjoyed Parts 6 and 12.

· · ──────── Entirely AU ──────── · ·

honey come put your lips on mine (and shut me up) – by tinyteamug

WIP. Retired hockey pro-turned-publicist Agatha is tasked with managing the most unmanageable feral hotshot player that is Rio.

 I lay my heart down with the rest at her feet – by xnodustollens

WIP. Detective Agatha meets her new partner Rio as they investigate a serial killer. An intriguing murder mystery with these two engaging in highly unprofessional behaviour.

 The Heirloom Job – by turtlebass

WIP. Leverage/con artist/spy AU. Agatha leads a team of criminals to take on a corrupt CEO. Things quickly get complicated when the CEO's assistant Rio is much more than she seems.

a new terror – by obsetress

WIP. The Mr and Mrs Smith AU fic. Enough said.

someday we will all be lying on our backs (free at last from income tax) – by @paddingtonfan69

Rio is the bad boy of the IRS. Agatha is an infamous tax evader. Perhaps the most crazy hilarious and well-written AU concept that fits with canon?

To Hate Her is to Love Her – by @justasimplelesbiansfanfic

WIP. Agatha gets her estranged wife Rio to pretend they're still together for the holidays. A long, angsty slow burn with an unfolding plot involving crime, the justice system, and the FBI. Not your fun holiday season fic!

 'til storm breaks loose – by Palmarion

WIP. Agatha's a top music producer and Rio's the only assistant who's managed to deal with her. Whoops, they're stuck at a hotel in a room with only one bed.

[pumpkinspice-prouvaire]

pumpkinspice-prouvaire's required les mis fic reading list

enough of u supported me in my half asleep post asking about fic recs the other day so I am providing. If you want a deep look into my inner psyche this is also the list for that hehe. I tried to be strict about only including my absolute MUST READ fics that I adore and have read and reread and reread again multiple times. Also these will be mostly ExR, to no one's surprise. But there might be a few other ships and gen fics in there too. It's under the read more because this bitch is gonna get long

Auto-read authors:

I didn't wanna rec the same authors too many times in my list proper so these are the authors whose works I have read all (or nearly all) of multiple times. The authors whose tax returns I would read if they posted them on ao3. I will be featuring my favourite fics by them in the list

Fiver

dannyPURO

TheLibrarina

quillsand

Petr1chor

defractum

ShameDumpster

vamillepudding

revolutionbarbie

loverism (all of their fics are currently in a privated bookmark but I have faith that they will someday return. loverism if u see this I miss u)

Need_To_Comment_Rising

Multi-Chapter fics/Series/WIPs:

Under My Wings You Will Find Refuge- Fiver: (WIP) This is the most required reading of my required reading list. I can quote passages of this fic by heart. It's my roman empire. PLEASE check this one out if you haven't it is the best ExR fic in existence, it will change ur life I promise

Beneath a Dragon Moon- The Librarina: GOT AU, no GOT knowledge required. Lots of dramatic moments interspaced with some lovely tender ExR

Guided by a Beating Heart -torakowalski: my absolute FAVOURITE Enjolras centric angst fic. Lots of emotion, lots of friendship, will make you ugly sob

you and i walk a fragile line (is this the time it finally breaks)?- UnforgettableJoMarch: (WIP) I am so enjoying following along with this one. Heartbreaking plot with sublime execution and some brilliant lines, so looking forward to seeing this one develop

The Future's Owned By You and Me- quillsand: ENJOLRAS/FEUILLY ENJOLRAS/FEUILLY ENJOLRAS/FEUILLY WHAT MORE CAN I SAY. Absolutely fantastic rarer pair fic with as much (and maybe more) importance devoted to the activism as to the ship

Getting Fucked in Lingerie- downtheroadandupthehill: PWP. ahem. anyways.

(With a Jubilant Shout) They Will Come One and All- zade: PWP. AHEM. ANYWAYS.

True Blood AU-kjack89: Exactly what it sounds like. Vampire Grantaire and Human Enjolras shenanigans

words can be unwritten- defractum: my favourite soulmate au which makes me melt every time <3

Armillaria- RevocablePeril: THE MOST COURFIUS FIC OF ALL TIME. Lots of excellent Les Amis content in general. SUCH a good, massively underrated fic. 121 kudos??????????? You're all insane.

In An Age Without Heroes- ShitpostingfromtheBarricade: Gloryhole soulmates, the prison industrial complex, Oprah.

walls come tumbling down-reptilianraven: They're cute your honor. One of the only high school AUs I will abide by tbqh hehe

Oneshots:

What's a Bed Between Friends?- dannyPURO: if there's one thing you should know about me it's that I ADORE the there was only one bed trope

epiphany- Abidatchery: screaming crying throwing up that this isn't the fandom's most kudos'ed fic. Every word is expertly crafted and absolutely stunning

Vienna Roast- revolutionbarbie: cosy coffee shop au with a version of Enjolras we don't get to see but that I really enjoy

Out of Touch- ShameDumpster: LET ENJOLRAS GET LOVED YOU COWARDS

A Little More Lois Lane- stellatundra: Just a really funny and silly AU in which Grantaire is Superman

Love in a Coffee Shop-tellthemstories: an absolute fandom classic and rightly so. I've read this one so many times and every time there'll still be something that makes me laugh out loud

My anaconda don't want none (at all)-vamillepudding: v funny and sweet ace enj fic with hilarious triumvirate and exr dynamics

The Waiting is the Hardest Part-samyazaz: In this house, we absolutely love a sexy bet

Between Meetings and Midnight- PieceofCait: Enjolras cries after sex send tweet

A Bad Penny- PBJellie: Gay cowboys and sickfics are the ultimate combo for SURE

Leaves in the Void- myrmidryad: lots of emotion lots of friendship this one is so heavy but SO good you guys. It's also a Space AU I know we all love that <3

my heart's been borrowed (yours has been blue)-Petr1chor: P-tri is so good at writing fics where Enjolras is a complete dumbass and he wrote this one especially for me <3 <3 <3

fire in my hands- geode: This is my go to fic if I want a laugh. "Do you like parsnips?" "Yes they're my second favourite vegetable" iconic exchange god bless

I Would Do Anything For Love- Need_to_Comment_Rising: one of my fave ace Enjolras fics with lovely tender ExR. No I'm not biased because I worked on this series, don't be silly

Like Comfort, Like Solace, Like Relief- areyoumiserableyet: The sensation of coming home to the people you love after a long day <3

Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood- sonhoedesrazao: There should be more fics with oblivious to his own emotions Grantaire that's all I'm saying

Trying to Leave the Ground-barricadeur: rly comfy cosy smut fic

YAY ENJOY I'm gonna go lie down now god I hope I haven't forgotten anything lmfao

[maneatrrz]

‧₊˚✩ wishing it was you / j. sully

♡ 𓂃 ꒰ wishing it was you! ꒱˚.༄ ೃ jake sully x fem!reader. 5.2k words. ⌒(≧▽​° )

𓆩♡𓆪 synopsis: ever since you shared a heartfelt moment, jake has been constantly avoiding you. convinced he's in love with neytiri, you find out it's a lot more complicated after confronting him in the woods: your being is everything he burns for, and it terrifies him. you tempt him in a way you shouldn't, and he's doing everything he can to protect your delicate divinity. but with lips and an attitude like yours, it's becoming taxing for him to resist ditching saintly restraint for a dance with the devil.

content: biblically inaccurate and brotherly!tsu'tey, biblically inaccurate timeline (it's ok guys just go with it it's an au haha), dom!jake sully but also whimpering!jake sully, oral fixation, nipple sucking, hickeys, love bites, vaginal penetration, praising and teasing. slight angst because you both have serious abandonment issues, but an ample amount of fluff and physical affection.

ᘛ⁐̤ᕐᐷ additional notes: this is my first published writing, and also the first time i've written smut myself-i am more than willing to receive tips, just please keep that in mind and be gentle! i also am a bit rusty on the writing uptake and formatting update, and this is definitely not my best work and i hate this with a visceral anger, but i hope you like it regardless because i spent way too much time on it. mwah, thank you lovelies!

୨✩୧ ; MINORS DNI! fic under the cut!

jake sully.

stupid, jake sully.

you observed him carefully from your seat in the plush, lush forest illuminated by the glittering night sky above you, along with the golden flames in front of you. the affectionately crowned toruk makto was chasing around neytiri, as he was wont to do-you were convinced he was vehemently enamored with her. neytiri on the other hand, was adeptly avoiding his efforts to yank her tail with a feline-like grace, and an effervescent, opaline smile exposing sharp canines. you found it hard to blame him, however. she possessed both the deft and couth you were certain you lacked. she made everything look perfect, and it didn’t help that she was beautiful, either. one look into her scintillating eyes could enrapture you, especially during this oppressive, sultry summer weather. the sweltering heat had persuaded you into thinking she was an angel one too many times. but you guessed in his world, she was.

it was stupid.

he was stupid.

“fuck,” you brought your hand up to the newfound throbbing pressure on your mouth, painting slender fingers with a rich, sanguine color: blood. you had bitten through the roast you were eating and into your poor, faultless lip. “i was thinking way too hard.”

“ponder less over jake sully, and more about how our great mother has let you live another day,” tsu’tey smacked you upside the head playfully, taking a bite out of his sturmbeast steak. you couldn’t help but smile a little-you found comfort in him as the brother you never had. when you had arrived on pandora, you were met with cynic skepticism from him, but you had proven yourself to him eventually. your friendship allowed him to lighten up and be more lively, too. “i am pleasantly surprised a skxawng like you has lived this long, y/n.”

“you literally suck,” you feigned lamentation by placing one hand on your chest, and using the other to wipe intangible tears from the unwarranted libel. it earned you a hearty laugh from tsu’tey, followed by a small fit of coughs. “you’re coughing like an old man. slow down, grandpa. easy on the chuckle.”

“now you suck,” he pushed your shoulder lightly, before panning his head over to jake and neytiri, who were now much farther away. jake’s face looked amorphous in the distance, but tsu’tey could see strong brows furrowed in the haze. he began to wonder if he needed what humans called “glasses”. neytiri clasped jake’s forearm before tugging at him to go further into the thicket, turning their backs on you. he fixed his gaze on you now, rubbing his temples.

“...shit, well, that’s fucking fantastic. your ‘fiancee’ ran away into the woods with the fucking idiot. whatever,” you waved a hand to the distance with a heavy sigh, raising the roast to your mouth. you added with a somber mumble, “this was not how it was supposed to go.”

this was seriously not how it was supposed to go.

it wasn’t-neytiri was promised to tsu’tey, and you…what were you to jake?

you were supposed to explore this world and your new bodies together, and you did, at first. attached at the hip, confused and frightened (although, jake would only say ‘slightly’ for his pride) of the wondrous expanse around you. you would lay in your shared, flimsy little cot as you watched the sable dusk melt into an ethereal aurora, talking about everything and anything. what your lives were like on earth, what you wanted to do when you came back-your own personal bucket lists, intrusive thoughts, your worst jokes, your favorite fruits-everything. you both confessed things you had never even said.

enter neytiri, stage left.

she tried to kill you both. she almost succeeded after jake pushed you out of the way to take the blow for you, but you throwing a water canteen at her alerted her that you were not a threat-you weren’t armed with anything to attack her with, and you certainly couldn’t kill her if you tried with those reflexes. she told you this later and it offended you, but the offense disappeared as you realized you were just happy that you were alive. you were happy that jake was alive. he didn’t have to try and save you.

‘of course i did. i don’t know what i’d do without you,’ was all he said in response, with a soft, darkly warm tone that made something burn low in your chest. it was a memory etched in your mind that never failed to make your limbs deliquesce, turning you into a shallow pool of ardor and elation. only for a brief moment, as your puddle would turn into hoarfrost and coat the ground of your empty heart. it seemed like after that day, that was when you truly watched him fade away.

he stopped sleeping in the cot with you, so you had no one for consolation on gelid nights. he’d take neytiri and tsu’tey on raids and hunts, getting frustrated when you’d ask to accompany them. and when neytiri had explained their rituals and the inner workings of mating that came with it, he started to ignore your entirety, without a single explanation why. it must’ve been her.

it had to be her, right?

“fuck it,” you jolted up switfly, dragging tsu’tey by his arm. “get your ass up and let’s go find them.”

“you are just going to find something you do not want to see,” he planted his feet on the ground firmly, rigid and unmoving to your touch. you turned to look at him, as he furrowed one of his brows. “are you a lecher, y/n? is that what this is?”

“first of all, ew. absolutely not. second of all, are you dumb? if they successfully get down and dirty, she’s no longer promised to you, right?” his ears flicked at your response, finally relenting to your touch. “now let’s go.”

you followed their scent, navigating the underbrush with tsu’tey, who was regretting his decision to come with you. you were supposed to be moving cautiously and quietly, yet you kept walking into leaves and suppressing meltdowns over previously uncovered bugs. he was busy thinking of ways to cover up your pursuit when you stopped suddenly, murmuring in the distance.

“...and i love…so, i don’t…” you could make out bits and pieces of a husky voice’s speech through the trees. the mention of love made your heart beat to an unspoken cadence.

“...then tell…keep waiting…unfair…” the second voice spoke with a higher pitch, but a louder tone, the words poisoned with blatant vexation. you contorted your face and looked to tsu’tey, his visage equally scrunched and perplexed. you ventured further into the thicket, until you could make a slight outline of two bodies through thick blades of green.

“she already hates me, neytiri. it’s not worth it,” the lower voice, now discernable completely as jake, slapped his hands to sides and fidgeted through the leaves. he was painfully nervous-he wasn’t the type of person who froze when he was scared. he dawdled around aimlessly. like an idiot, you added a note to your mental observations. a lying, stupid idiot.

“she is going to hate you more if you do not get it together,” a seethe, accompanied by the flattening of ears and a slap to jake’s head. “you will lose her completely. tell y/n.”

“i can’t.”

“it appears you have no choice. y/n,” neytiri swiftly moved through the grass to reveal your hiding spot, tsu’tey’s mouth pursed and yours agape. the edges of her lips curled up into a demure smile. “i had faith that you would come after us. i did not expect you, however. come with me.”

her tone was that of a mother scolding her child, leading tsu’tey back to camp by his small, tender ear. her chides in na’vi as she stomped would’ve made you giggle if it were not for the looming dread in your sternum, turning towards jake and his solemn, downturned ears.

his stupid ears.

his stupid nose.

his lying mouth.

“i know,” to your short response his eyes widened, cheeks donning an uncharacteristic tint.

“i’m so sorry. i know it’s fucked up of me, but i didn’t know how to-”

“-it’s okay. you don’t need my blessing to mate with neytiri, right? i just would’ve preferred you told me sooner. i knew you liked her, it just sucked. to be left in the dust. i really liked you, you know,” you crossed your arms and pressed them close to your chest, trying to ignore the saline tears welling in your eyes. and then, he laughed.

how could he laugh at a time like this?

he really didn’t care, did he?

jake sully.

stupid, lying jake sully.

“fuck you,” you bursted out, teardrops scalding your cheeks in their wake as you turned to leave.

“wait, i’m not laughing for the reasons you think i am-okay, wait. wait, let me explain,” his fingers brushed your wrist, reaching a little too late. “y/n! let me explain.”

“i literally cannot think of a way you can explain this without looking like a total cunt-ow! let go of me, jake! what the h-” your scorning monologue was brief, as jake pulled you off balance by your tail. you fell back first into the tall grass, head braced by jake’s hand underneath it. his hips pinned you to the ground by your own, one leg in between your own. broad shoulders loomed over you and cut out of your peripheral. you felt so…small, underneath him. it increased the growing ache in your lower abdomen, fueled by neither hurt, nor fear. you tried to squeeze your legs together to negate the pooling sensation-you shouldn’t have felt like this. this was a bad idea.

“so, uh, as i was saying…” he trailed off as you rolled your head to the side, refusing to look at him. “can you just look at me?”

“no.”

“fine,” he shook his head slightly with a tsk sound, assessing your body and the way it seemed to be engulfed by his own-even as a na’vi, you were so tiny in comparison to him. just as he seemed to be lost enough in his own thoughts for you to make your escape, he shifted your position abruptly. whipping your head towards him, it felt like all of his weight was on you: his nails dug into your thighs as he pulled them apart and past his torso-now, he was directly in between your legs. jake leaned forward onto his forearms, your lips millimeters apart from one another. you had no choice but to look into rich, amber eyes. either that, or focus on the way his hips were pistoned deeper into yours, fabric unwilling to spare you the feeling of his length rubbing against your clothed sex.

“as you were saying,” you cleared your throat, scratching an itch on the top of your head. he smirked, pleased with his ability to make you yield. his smirk quickly faded, replaced by a more stoic expression.

“remember the day we almost died?”

“you mean, one of the last days you pretended that you knew me?” you scoffed, and he narrowed his eyes at you for a split moment. “yeah, i remember.”

“i didn’t care if i died, but,” he began to fidget nervously, involuntarily exacerbating the wanton throb. yet, you were too focused on his words to notice. “i cared if you died, and i cared a lot, a lot more than i was supposed to. and that started fucking with me.”

you tilted your head with a doe-eyed expression that made jake tense up with a potent, unsolicited salacity. his ensnarement tactic was working painfully against him. his loincloth was growing increasingly more soiled in a messy, debauched ring.

“so i, uh…i ran, like an idiot,” jake’s breath hiked to a dry growl, shifting weight between legs. “i didn’t want to get you hurt. because if i did let myself and i let something happen to you, not only would i lose you, i would lose myself. i would lose everything i believe in. so, i tried to stay away from you.”

“well, i mean. you did just regain the ability to walk again. i’d wanna run, too,” you snickered in attempt to lighten the mood, unable to handle the sonorous tone of his words. jake rolled his eyes, holding back a smile. he thought that shouldn’t have been as funny to him as it was. “i’m so funny.”

“yeah, whatever. anyways,” he took a deep breath, knowing damn well you were right. “as we settled into omatikayan land, neytiri told us about customs, and picking a mate. how i would eventually claim a woman. i started avoiding you right around ‘mating’ season, so it was hard.”

“...okay? what does this have to do with me?” there was too much emotional clamor inhabiting your brain to properly absorb what he was saying. “ohhh…so you claimed neytiri right after ignoring my existence, and now you want to rub salt in the wound because you’re a dickhead-i’m so smart.”

“no-you have got to be dumber than me, holy shit,” he bit his lip in discontempt. either you genuinely were painfully oblivious to the situation, or you wanted him to spell it out for you. he had a notion that it was a reasonable mixture of both. “you literally just disregarded the last few things i’ve said. if it’s time for me to claim a woman, why would i claim neytiri? why would it be hard to stop talking to you?”

“chill out bitch, damn. i’m not the one who pretended someone didn’t exist for several months, watch your mouth. i’m listening though,” you weren’t really. “you’d claim her because you fell in love with her, and then maybe, i don’t know-your conscience thought it was a little weird to completely drop person and cling onto the next? surprised you have one. we’re running in circles.”

“but i wouldn’t claim a woman i didn’t want. i don’t want neytiri.”

“cool…? i don’t know what to say to you.”

“you just want me to say it outright for you, don’t you?”

“that would be particularly helpful, yes. i think if we did this from the beginning it would’ve helped.”

“if i was around you, i would’ve gone against my better judgment and claimed you in a heartbeat. to be blunt, i wanted to fuck you really bad.”

“wow! that seriously took a hard turn,” that was not the most appropriate reaction, but it was all you could utter.

was this how it was supposed to go?

your lips parted slightly, and jake immediately fixated on them. while he was noticing how roseate and plush they looked, you were having an internal dilemma at lightspeed. you thought this man hated you, and this whole time it was the stark opposite? were you the stupid one? were you the idiot? no, you couldn’t be. when you came down from your catatonic spell-well, it was more like you hit the ground violently, you minded jake’s position in between your legs. you also minded the soaked, wet state of your loincloth. “you wanted me like that?”

“yes, i did. but seeing you was a reminder that i couldn’t have you, and i wanted you so bad,” you watched jake’s adam’s apple bob as he swallowed and nodded, looking down at you with a darker stare. it was one you had never seen from him. a more predatory gaze. “i shouldn’t have wanted you, and i wanted you so bad. it’s only gotten worse.”

you assessed his gaze. it was as if he was ready to ravage you and everything that you were in that moment, right there. perhaps that gave you the courage to push his limits-how depraved was he, truly? how much restraint did he have, when it came to you?

“and all this time i’ve been sucking on a bottle of pink whitney, wishing it was you,” you ran your hands over the grooves in his arms, separating each mammoth, rigid muscle. you took one of his hands in both of yours, running his calloused finger over your inner thigh slightly-enough to pick up the sticky substance that threatened to gush out of you. “but now, we’re here. you’ve starved me as much as you’ve starved yourself. so, what are you going to do? what you should do, or what you want to?”

he growled just above a dull roar, trying to battle his ache and the dilemma of forbidden pining. god, how he wanted you. he ached for you, with such an illicit thirst-to devour you, one kiss at a time. your fingers skimmed the pressed outline of his aching tip through his loincloth, which elicited a frantic, breathy gasp from jake. “you can be gentle, or you can be rough. you don’t have to think about anything. actually, i’m pretty sure you’ve been thinking way too much.”

“you don’t know what you’re doing to me,” it came out as more of a dark, tenebrous moan that made you giggle. he stared down at your slick, tempting essence. he wanted to indulge in you, the delicacy that you were to him. yet a quick taste would never be just that-he’d want all of you. he looked back up at you, with the same predatory leer. you brought jake’s hand up to his mouth, feeling the ache worsen as he licked them clean with a groan.

“or, maybe i do.”

his hands worked their way up your thighs. your breath shortened as you let your eyes graze his hands-large, azure, and veiny. the position jake’s hands on your legs seemed natural, as if they were right where they belonged. he gripped your thighs, massaging the innermost part with his thumbs. his lips chose to travel to your collarbone and continue their conquest upwards, leaving carmine bruises, love bites, and tender kisses in their wake. he stopped when he was positioned face-to-face. your heart beat out of your chest as you felt lustrous yellow eyes linger on your own, and then your lips. he brushed them against yours.

“i’ve waited for this forever, you know,” he caressed your cheeks with his thumbs. “you’re so beautiful. as humans, or big blue people. whatever we are, and wherever we are, you’ve always stunned me. every rational thought i have blurs when i look at you, it’s like you put a spell on me. you’re enchanting, and it’s unreal.”

“you think so?” your ears perked up coyly as you felt your lips curve into a smile. that was probably the nicest thing anyone had said to you in awhile, or the history of ever, even. your honeyed reaction made his tail flick around in back of him, enamored by your visage. it continued to swish, curling prettily.

“oh, honey. i know you are. my pretty, pretty baby,” he kissed your nose, giving you a grin. his tongue ran over your bottom lip with a soft bite, before intertwining his lips with yours.

suddenly the air was thick and hot; infernal. you weren’t the worst kisser, but god, you felt like you paled in comparison to jake fucking sully. his tongue spoke to you a simple, yet tantalizing and tantric mantra that mesmerized you. veiny hands danced a viennese waltz against soft skin, retracing the path that led to your lips. he let his hands trail back down to your thighs, fingers grazing your sodden, clothed clit.

“you wanted me so bad, huh? all wet for me?” you nodded as he played with the string on your loincloth, before pulling it off and to the side.

“well, i fucking needed you, oh,” he let out a husky moan and ran his fingers over your lips, before parting them. “look at you-what a perfect pussy. i’m going to fucking ruin you.”

he thumbed your engorged, tender clit with one hand, while sliding in the middle & ring finger of the other into your warm, messy cunt. it was all so overwhelming-your faint titillated whimpers and whines, paired with the sound of fingers enveloped in slick folds. your voice was muted and low in an attempt to preserve the sanity and sleep of those in the relatively adjacent camp. but in the stillness of the night, the hot cacophony of your saccharine sweet voice and his frenetic movements that produced such wet, obscene noises, were resound upon jake’s ears. he thought it was akin to that of a siren’s beguiling melody.

“i want…w-want…mm,” you babbled, jake looking at you, yet unrelenting in his pace. the way he pumped his fingers was heavenly, but you needed more. “…you. inside me, please.”

“don’t worry. i’ll fuck that pretty pussy soon. but first…” he unclasped your chest piece with one hand, throwing it to the side while he kneaded one of your boobs. he flicked your nipple with his tongue before swirling it around the sensitive nub, latching onto it. he drove his fingers in and out of your squelching cunt with the occasional curl. two fingers alone already made you feel so full, sucking them in as you pulsed around them.

“i fucking love your tits. you’re latching onto my fingers,” it was like he could read your mind. smirking at your rampant, tiny mewls, he switched breasts, continuing the onslaught on your throbbing pussy. “let me focus on this boob, though. she needs love, too.”

“sisters, not twins, yeah? something like that,” he rasped through his teeth, lapping and sucking. your vision began to get hazy overcome by the torturous intoxication his touch brought, “you know what? doesn’t matter. your tits are gorgeous.”

he released his hold with a pop, leaning back to look at your disheveled countenance, exhaling raggedly. he placed his fingers in his mouth to relish in your sapid taste once more, while his eyes traced every inch of your body. your mouth hung in an O shape, lips plump and glossy. your eyes glossed over. your hair was frizzy and unkempt. you were nothing akin to the meticulously crafted countenance you slaved away for every day. he created a breathtaking mess out of you, which made him wretch with such a frenetic, venereal hunger.

he needed to fuck you stupid.

he needed to tear you apart.

“so pretty,” you murmured as he untied his loincloth, unsheathing his length in its entirety. the shaft same color as the rest of his body, a mixture of azure and sapphire stripes. it was unreasonably thick and lengthy, and had two veins leading to his blushing indigo tip. it throbbed as precum dripped down its side, and onto big balls. it was practically begging for solace in the form of your tongue swirling around it and hollowing your cheeks. “i want a taste.”

“you’re so sweet babydoll. but no,” his denial of your request was met with a disappointed whine and pouty lips. “i really should fuck that mouth of yours for all the shit you talk, but it can wait another day. i need to be inside you right now.”

his breath hitched as he watched his length disappear inside of you with a slicked sound.

“holy shit. you’re so fucking tight, jesus fucking christ,” jake seethed between breaths, panting. he dug his nails into your hips, writhing five hot points of pressure with his grip. his thrusts were slow but with intention, stretching your walls and hitting your core. you stared down at the way his thigh muscles tensed while he snapped his hips. you bit back a moan, your vision blurring slightly from the jolting motion, and your legs threatening to buckle. “dear god-fuck. oh, fuck. fuck, baby.”

“you feel so fucking good, and you’re taking my cock so fucking well,” he let one hand go and trailed it slow up your torso and stopped at your shoulders, quickening his strokes and making your eyes roll back. his fingers ghosted your neck with a dark laugh and a groan, “oh, fuck-what a good fucking girl. you like that, sweet thing?”

“jake,” you pleaded as he rutted into you, raking your nails across his back. you wrapped your legs around him, desperate for release. “this feels so good. oh, jake, ’m gonna…”

“oh god, i fucking love the way you say my name. go ahead and come for me, baby,” he buried his head into the crook of your neck, pumping deeper into you at an unadulterated and alacritous pace. jake pressed kisses to your neck while he felt you squirm and twitch on his length, muffling whines and moans. your glistening cunt tightened around him, like it was luring his cock further into you. he didn’t know how much further it could go. “make a mess all over my cock. it’s all yours, sweet thing. always has been. now use it like it is.”

it was hard for you to give any sort of intelligible vocalization (unlike pussydrunk jake, who seemed to be a little too loud, groaning fuck and i wanna cum over and over) while your eyelids fluttered and blood roared in your ears. you were having a sensory overload, and couldn’t help but drown in the pleasure. from the hickeys he pressed lightly over your taut collarbone with wet lips and the way his cock hit your g-spot, to all the husked whimpers jake let out while throwing his head back and the sound of skin hitting skin, you were in bliss. he was able to quell and rouse the insatiable ache that pooled low inside you, all at once. you were arched and unraveling with a splintering rapture, your own juices mixing with the warm, creamy seed that painted even the innermost corners of your walls.

“wow,” he looked down at your angelic, supine image through long eyelashes, panting. you relaxed your spine, coaxing his cock out of you gently. he was so desperate and unprincipled when it came to you that he probably would’ve stayed inside you the whole night. and you were far too exhausted for that.

“you sure as hell can have a taste of me now, holy shit,” his eyes were glued to your puffy cunt, watching his cum veneer it with a milky white. he swiped his finger in a swipe up your lips, holding his findings to your mouth. you licked it with a small mewl before contorting your face, bleating out a blegh.

“salty?” broad shoulders rose to the rhythm of a hearty laugh as you nodded, pushing the hair out of your face. “it’s cum, baby. i eat like a starved dog. don’t expect much next time.”

“that’s so tragic for me.”

“yeah, yeah. are you okay, though? do you need anything, sweet thing?”

“i need a hug,” you pulled him back towards you, and splayed your hands on his back. with a soft laugh, you traced the welts from your scratches before playing with his tousled mess of hair. the smell of sweat and a rich, earthy scent pervaded your senses as you meticulously picked out the stray blades of grass from each strand. “i’m sorry for fucking up your back.”

“what, are you kiddin’ me? don’t apologize. i’m gonna wear this shit like a medal. tell everybody my pretty girl gave ‘em to me.”

“you say that like you’re not gonna go back to your regularly scheduled ignoring y/n routine. i know you’ll leave eventually,” you huffed, slapping a hand on the newly damp grass to search for your chestpiece. he brought your hand back to his hair, kissing your forehead.

“and you say that like everything hasn’t changed. what’s the point of this if we part?”

“an extra notch under your belt, or something? i have not a clue, toruk makto. oh, congratulations on that, by the way,” you turned your head away from him to spare your tears. for some reason, it suddenly hurt to look at him. the last thing you wanted him to see was your hysterical sobs, after you just bore every other part of yourself to him. you’d have nothing else when he’d go.

he wasn’t really going to stay, was he? no one ever stayed for long. and it would be rather bold to think jake sully out of all people would stay for long, too.

you swallowed, clearing your throat. “i don't expect you to stay. i know i made a big deal about it, but...it really would make a lot more sense to marry neytiri.”

“oh, shut the fuck up," a playful eye roll. "i already told you, silly. i don’t want neytiri. i want you.”

“here-we can get up, and pretend that this didn’t happen, okay? we’ll say you got beat the fuck up by an animal, or something-”

“y/n,” he tilted you gently by your jaw, forcing you to face him. “i want you.”

“-and we can say you were brave and fought him because you’re the hero,” you choked out a sob. “you’re the hero, and i was just there as a witness. the nobody to scoff at; the outsider. i’m nothing to those people. i’m nothing compared to you.”

you were scared. truly, you did not want to see him go, but if you trusted him and loved him with your entirety, and one day he would no longer be there, it would break your heart into pieces. and your heart had already been broken quite enough. ah. so this was jake’s reasoning.

maybe you were the stupid one.

maybe you were both stupid.

yeah, definitely the latter.

“hey, hey, hey. enough of that bullshit. take a deep breath,” jake scooped you up slowly, repositioning you to cuddle in his lap. he tipped your head to lay a kiss against your lips, before pressing your head against his chest. you tried to sync your breathing to the cadence of his own chest rising and falling. he placed a caressing hand on the small of your back, rocking slowly. “i’m not scared anymore, and i’m going anywhere. i love you, y/n. you could never be nothing to me.”

you looked up at him, eyes widening. ‘i love you, y/n.’

there was something about the way he said it, paired with his fluttering, onyx eyelashes adorning gorgeously deep amber eyes. it was like a profound nocturne he sang just for you. there was something about the way he complimented you in a warm, sheltered whisper that tasted like a dulcet dream. it was a sonnet he read just for you. like a poet who lived and died for you.

just for you.

yet, foolishly-for moons, and moons, the poet restrained himself from telling you that your visage was his muse, due to his own trepidation. all he needed to do was trust in you, and let go.

maybe you did, too.

“you promise?” a gentle plead was all you could get out as he wiped your tears.

“i promise. and i’ll seal it with a kiss. or maybe a couple,” he brought your hand up to his mouth, kissing it gingerly. “you are my everything. and that is nothing to scoff at.”

home was not a city, or a state. home was not even a planet, like earth or pandora.

home was jake.

home was jake sully.

stupid, jake sully.

all writing works are my own, do not repost or repost on platforms such as archive of our own (ao3), wattpad, fanfiction.net, and the like. — maneatrrz © 2023.

[astrofhobia]

Post-Mortem AU

It would be amazing to have a Tsams AU based on mexican culture, where real moments from the history of that country are interpreted... WAIT

PUM 💥💥 I'm here.

I started designing these guys again a bit, I didn't really like their first designs that much, but I definitely like these ones.

For now, we have three, the most important ones, within this messy story.

The Sun, The Moon and The Eclipse

I want to give a little information about these silly guys, also some fun facts.

Sunrise

Sunrise. Called "Life" in this AU. Life is the third child of the "Creator" and the youngest. His older siblings are Lunar and Earth. He was born when a star appeared in the universe, the brightest and largest star the universe had ever seen, for this reason, he is considered the god of light, the god of the sun.

His purity caught the attention of "Creator" and he proclaimed him as his son.

Life's arrival brought many changes to the universe. And thanks to him, he convinced the other gods to create things that would worship them, based on the perfection of his father. Life called them "humans" tiny humans who lived on a balanced planet, the Earth.

Sun brought mankind. And mankind called him "The god of the creation" "The god of the Sun" "The god of the life".

Sun used to rule the earth. That was for a long time... Until things started to go wrong, very very wrong.

Moondrop. They used to call her "Death" in this universe.

She was born when the first human died. The bones of that human had joined together into a sticky mass which had formed a body and finally, a consciousness. "Creator" didn't consider her a daughter of purity. But "Killcode" did, he proclaimed her his daughter, his little daughter.

She didn't usually communicate much with the other gods, she always, always kept her distance, in her own bubble.

She used to have a kingdom, "Mictlán", where the souls of humans could rest for eternity. The place used to be quite... Depressing. Souls rested... But the place was completely alone, filled with the bones of humans and only Death there...

Something you really should know. She's not here anymore.

Eclipse. Called "Death" in this AU.

War. It was his first name. He was born from Killcode's blood, the drops of red blood fell. They formed a large puddle. And from that puddle, War appeared.

Creator considered him a god... different. He really repudiated his existence. But Killcode didn't, he called him his son. His first son.

Nobody knows that. He just appeared one day with the other gods.

His arrival was controversial. The gods called him "A mad god"...

Actually, Death has forgotten most of his past. He doesn't really know how he existed, or why he is the "god of death".

Fun facts

Death has the same personality as Eclipse (EAPS).

Death (Eclipse) often has constant nightmares. Surrounded by fire as his metallic body slowly burns until he wakes up, locked in a room without light until darkness consumes him completely, bloodcurdling screams of children, etc.

Death's body parts constantly fail, they just stop working for no reason. It's something... really annoying.

Death feels nauseous at the sight of blood, he really can't stand it.

Death is uncomfortable being around a lot of children, he doesn't really know why. He is not bothered by noise, if they are dirty or naughty, he simply cannot be with children for a long time.

Death is the current prince/god of Mictlán.

Death doesn't like the rain.

Death and Life live together on Earth. They live like normal humans, in a lower-middle class house, they pay taxes and are afraid of the SAT.

Life maintains the same personality as Dark Sun (SAMS) but here it is a little calmer and much more depressing.

Life has a place to sleep. He literally has a bed that he shares with Death but the idiot can end up sleeping in a shower if he wants because he's a weirdo.

Life, ironically enough, hates humanity. No one knows why.

Life can't stand loud noise, make some noise when he's upset and you probably have a ticket to Mictlán.

If Life really had to work in the human world he would be a doctor. An emergency doctor, he practically created anatomy, he can work with this.

Life used to run a daycare alongside Death (Moon). It burned down.

Death really likes music with movement, salsa, cumbia, she's really good at that.

Death's clothing is inspired by the catrina and the traditional clothing of Nuevo Leon, Mexico.

Death hates fire.

Death really wants to stab Life.

The skull on Death and Death's chest isn't just decoration. It's practically their exposed cores. Rip that off their chest and they'll probably pass out immediately.

Death and Life are Pro-PRI. Life is ignorant. Death is evil.

Death is Pro-PAN. She really is a evil girl.

If you want to know more about these fools, you can ask, my inbox¿ is open

[manjiroscum]

LILY OF THE VALLEY

Character/s: snow leopard hybrid!Rindou Haitani

Warnings: f!reader, mature language, explicit sexual themes, dark content, canon typical violence, blood, murder, dub-con, marking, mentions of mating, hybrid au, kidnapping, yandere!rindou, dom!rindou, sub!reader, cockdrunk reader, implied multiple rounds, dacryphilia, unprotected sex, breeding, blackmailing/threats, pet play, and use of pet names. Minors do not interact.

Note: commissioned by @httn 💜 thank you love for trusting me with this! i hope you like it 🫶

Synopsis: Only fools come out to play with a feral cat.

WC: 6.1k

Crimson specks marred the freshly fallen snow akin to wine spilled all over a white linen cloth. The bullet wound on his thigh was slowing him down. Nevertheless, Rindou trudged up the small hill to reach the other side of the forest hoping he would escape his pursuers that were looking through his busted car for any signs of life. With his teeth gritted, the lost man was sure he might die today. After getting separated from Ran and the others, a car chase occurred as he fled from the warehouse when a bomb about to blow up the building was shouted out. In all his years of doing the same song and dance, one could say Rindou got used to the chaos that has intertwined into his life since the day he was born with the need to experience thrills.

But, fuck, he could never get used to getting shot or bleeding out. The first time hurt like a bitch and the second time it happened made him want to pass out. It was more irritating to face than shoot those who dare touch his tail. Now, Haitani Rindou was sure he will die. Whatever plan those bastards cooked up that would confirm his demise, he had to give them props because they might succeed. Car dead, his phone without any signal, the temperature dropping fast, and a forest that may span a thousand hectares was just the starter pack he needed to die in these woods.

Rindou can’t die here. It would just be pathetic. So pathetic that they might make jokes out of it. His death would only make people say he deserved it or it is the consequence of having an unpleasant lifestyle. And honestly, fuck them. He has to live. He has to get out of here and seek shelter before the frost bites his fingers, ears, and toes off. What would his enemies think? What would Bonten do? What would Ran do?

What should he do?

A million thoughts raced through his mind as his knees finally gave away. His eyes fluttered close for a moment, inhaling the cold air sharply that he was quite sure it could cut his nostrils like blades made out of ice. A trail of blood followed him from where he started all the way to the top of the hill. In contrast to the icy atmosphere around him, his lungs burned. During these times, delusions would enter his mind to distract him from the impending doom that was looming above his head. Death was now breathing down his neck as if they were old friends. Its voice called out to him through the chilly breeze that brushed past him and the strong trees that appeared like shadows of those whom he wronged and killed to survive. If he had to guess what hell looked like, this was possibly the closest description minus the flames. Why would such a cold environment bother him in such a way? This has never happened before. He could think of countless reasons why a hybrid such as he who was meant to thrive in such an environment was slowing down.

Ah, that’s right… He never had to be out much to do his dirty deeds. It was always his underlings. Pawns who would readily obey him for various goals. He and Ran, without fail, get away from taxing jobs. After all, meaningless fights never appeased their appetite for violence. Something always had to interest the brothers for them to act. Looking back on those memories of merely partying and finding someone to toy with, Rindou couldn’t help but exhale deeply. His lips were chapped due to the lack of moisture in the air.

If my life is flashing before my eyes, perhaps I am indeed dying…

And yet, amidst the snow and harsh winds, a merciful angel came into view. Rindou thought he was already a goner for his eyes to conjure such a beautiful sight. Vivid colors murked into a blur as his vision steadily failed him due to exhaustion finally catching up to him. However, the second that angel spoke, voice soothing despite the panicked tone evident in it, he realized this was reality.

“Sir? Oh my god, w-wait. I need to call an ambulance—”

“N…o.” It took all of his strength to move his lips and tongue. The woman before him met his dazed stare, shifting her attention between Rindou and something behind her. “No am…bulance…”

“W-what? Why? No, you need immediate attention…”

Haitani Rindou, one of the infamous criminals Bonten has in their arsenal and the fearsome younger brother of Ran was still vulnerable to things that exude innocence. Perhaps it was just in his nature to be drawn toward something he can never be and so he tried to push away the person who came out on a snowy night to help him. This earned him a surprised expression and more questions he couldn't answer. Rindou’s efforts were in vain as his eyelids finally shut, and the last of his energy left him unconscious in the hands of a stranger.

I’m sorry, Ran…

There was a sea of trees you had to drive by to reach your parents’ house. The road was slippery due to the snow but you had to go after promising to drive carefully. After a hearty dinner and entertaining their inquiries about whether you will get married or not, you were set on heading back to your apartment. Tomorrow is Monday and you had to wake up early for your nine-to-five job at the cafe your cousin owned. Normally, your schedule ranged from mundane to the occasional unexpected events that usually revolved around your job or your parents. Yet they were never anything spontaneous or something that will make the hairs on the back of your hair stand until you had to rescue this man now sleeping on a makeshift bed in a veterinarian’s clinic.

Ignorance could sometimes save a person’s life. The second you saw the hanafuda tattoo on his neck, you knew the shit you were about to get into could get messy. Never had you ever thought of bringing an infamous person, let alone one of Bonten’s henchmen, into your home. The veterinarian you called for help swore his secrecy after he commended you for doing first aid, but commented that men like him shouldn’t be saved. Yet, your conscience wouldn’t let you sleep soundly at night if you left him there on a cold winter’s night to bleed to death or get feasted on by bears.

“Are you… his girlfriend or somethin’?”

“No, I’m not,” you responded while cleaning up the bloody clothing and gauze after Rindou’s wound was stitched up. “However, as a human being, I couldn’t just leave him there. I’m… not capable of such cruelty.” The man shifted his attention back to the dangerous person fast asleep and then squinted hard as if his patient was just pretending. Grunting, the veterinarian gathered the last of his tools into his bag and made his way to the door, but not before leaving you some sound advice.

“Be careful because this choice you made might just bite you back. I’ll be back as soon as possible when I find a doctor in the area. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure this secret doesn’t reach the authorities.”

Thinking back to what happened earlier, you were sure your blood ran cold at the sight of a broken car by the road. Initially, you thought the vehicle broke down and that the owner must be somewhere nearby since it would take around twenty minutes to get to the nearest town. Unless they had to hitch a ride because it was freezing and decided to leave the car. But the second you saw what seemed to be bullet holes in its body, uneasiness coated your nerves like thick molasses. The dread of finding a dead body doubled upon seeing blood on the snow, leading up to where you found the dying unknown man.

Damn it all. He wouldn’t harm someone who rescued him, right?

No, scratch that, this man wasn’t a stranger to you. You were the stranger—not him. Everybody who worked in Tokyo and heard the news was all aware of Bonten, the most dangerous gang in the country to date, enough to rival the yakuza. Those hanafuda tattoos they branded on their flesh bear the symbol of their loyalty to the man who founded the group, Sano Manjiro. The Haitani brothers were as famous all by themselves. It didn’t have to take you long to know everything they committed under the sun or the veil of night. Rumors of the brothers and Bonten always circulate on the internet. In short, they were individuals you had to avoid to live long.

Eyes glancing at your phone sitting by the couch, you debated whether to call the cops and turn him in. Maybe getting Rindou off your hands will be the first step to having your normal life back… Or will just cement the death sentence he shall bestow upon your unfortunate soul once he recovers.

“What the fuck am I supposed to do now?” you groaned into your hands. Sleep was out of the question. You had to monitor Haitani Rindou for two obvious reasons—one because he might wake up and two because he might silence you the second he does. Gruesome pictures of your death flashed on the television screen ran across your imaginative mind and honestly, you were scaring yourself. Clearly, you didn’t think this through. But, what’s done is done. There was no way you could throw him out now. “Let’s… just make sure he’s fine enough to walk out of here on his own. Y-yeah…”

Exhaling a defeated sigh, you sat down on the floor and stared at Rindou’s unconscious form. For a man as big and bad as him, you bet he would snore loudly. Yet, he looked almost like a corpse—unmoving and quite fragile. The biggest shirt you had at your disposal appeared tiny in his huge frame. The veterinarian even gave up on giving him something to wear on the lower part, muttering how he shouldn’t even be bothered to clothe the criminal. The thought of Rindou being naked down there was slightly distracting, making your eyes wander down from the hanafuda tattoo on his neck to the intricate design on his torso until you slapped your cheeks to make you stop eyeing the muscular hybrid.

What the—don’t do this to yourself. He is a criminal, for fuck’s sake!

Rolling your eyes, you grabbed your phone to check for any messages. There was only one from your mother, checking up on whether you arrived home. A humorless laugh escaped your lips as you lied to her. Besides, she will definitely panic if she knew you were looking after a criminal in a vet’s clinic. You hoped to distract your mind from spiraling into endless regret by watching adorable videos of dogs. A good turn deserves another… You just wished Haitani Rindou was a person who would reward good deeds.

The morning was rough on you. With a stretch or two, you cursed your aching back while you proceeded to order breakfast for three. Your cousin was kind enough to give you a day off after phoning in with a fake cold. The minute you finished offering him apologetic words after lying through your teeth, you then grabbed the takeout and sped off to the clinic Rindou was moved to. Caffeine and sweets were the things keeping you sane save for the veterinarian and a doctor, whom he roped into the situation, present in the room. Dr. Hinohara was silently observing Rindou’s body while giving a blood transfusion to the still-sleeping hybrid. Compared to last night, the younger Haitani looked slightly better. He still appeared like he crawled out of hell and survived, though.

“I guess we don’t have to bring this man to the hospital,” the doctor spoke after some time. “There doesn’t seem to be a bullet stuck to his thigh. He did lose a lot of blood. I’ll just make sure to monitor him in case he needs more blood transfusions and if there could be any infections on the wound. If he does turn for the worst, I will have to bring him to the hospital—”

You were quick to object, leaving your cup of coffee to stand up. “H-he told me he shouldn’t go to a hospital. I’ll pay you, Sir. I’ll make sure to pay you for treating him. J-just don’t bring him there. Please…”

Dr. Hinohara sighed at your statement, sharing a glance with the veterinarian. Just as you were ready to shoot down their suggestions of you putting an end to your good samaritan role, the doctor then nodded solemnly in resignation. Appeased, you backed away before sitting yourself down once again. Seeing that there wasn’t anything left for him to do, the veterinarian excused himself and left the establishment. A few minutes later, Dr. Hinohara did the same to attend to his outpatients. It wasn’t until lunchtime when he came back that you decided to head back home to catch some sleep after a long warm bath. To be in a room alone with Haitani Rindou, awake or not, was making you anxious. Your eyes were often fluttering close, trying to stay conscious and alert in the presence of an infamous gang member. To let your guard down would be serenading death.

“You can come back tomorrow afternoon,” Dr. Hinohara said with a gentle smile upon seeing you out. “I don’t think Mr. Haitani would wake up today anyways. Go home and get some rest. I’ll call you if anything changes about his current condition.”

“Thank you, Dr. Hinohara.”

If you knew that the day you saved Haitani Rindou would be the last time you could ever experience a normal life, perhaps the future wouldn’t turn out like this—with you almost sticking to a corner whereas Rindou glared at your quivering form. Dr. Hinohara was nowhere to be found on the second floor and your mind concocted various scenarios at the sight of the trashed room. How could the man be up and ready to threaten you with his sharp claws when he was just barely conscious days ago? You even recall Dr. Hinohara remarking about Rindou being too weak to open his eyelids. So just how?

Irises sharp as his claws remained on you, hues of ultra violet hoping to unmask your intentions by staring right into your soul. Behind his predatory gaze were promises filled with violence and a whole world of pain if you so much as make a single move that he will deem a crime towards him.

Haitani Rindou was not a man to be trifled with.

“You… Didn’t I tell you not to bring me to a hospital?” he questioned in a demanding tone, taking a step closer to you which prompted your weak legs to fall back. This is the very thing you hoped to avoid. Maybe if you were given the foresight that Haitai Rindou would recuperate enough to stand today, you would have come prepared to negotiate. Negotiate with him not to kill you and to leave you alone because you did what he asked. However, he didn’t seem happy at the idea of recovering in a clinic, afraid his location would be alerted to the police. “What’s the matter? Suddenly can’t use that tongue of yours? From what I remember you weren’t mute—”

“This isn’t a hospital. Y-you’re in a clinic, can’t you see?”

The hand you used to gesture at the area shuddered upon seeing him move. Rindou was obviously confused as he surveyed the room, unsure whether to take your word or not. You couldn't blame him, though. Blood rolling down his thigh akin to raindrops on a glass window captured your attention, taking away the assertive statements off of your lips. Your fear for him was outweighed by your concern for his wound that might have reopened due to his carelessness.

Rindou was quick to create distance between you two. Your eagerness was mistaken as an act to lunge and subdue him which was something you couldn't do. He realized this the moment he winced in pain, hand applying pressure on his bleeding thigh. You clicked your tongue and hurriedly helped him back onto his bed. His hostility towards you disappeared with each pang of pain that erupted around his injury. Of course, he just had to be slowed down by this and for you, this was a blessing in disguise.

“Stay here, okay? I’ll go see if Dr. Hinohara has returned.”

Any deity above must have heard your silent prayer for the doctor announced himself inside Rindou’s room, eyes wide at the condition of his patient and the messy room. Minutes passed, and the hybrid was now waiting for the pain to subside once his wound was attended to. Lips in a tight line, you sat by the side, waiting for the doctor to say something—anything that will get rid of the awkward air that settled in the room. Instead of something positive, Dr. Hinohara approached you with a dejected expression that caused your heart to momentarily stop beating. His next words almost had you wishing you were sitting down due to the implications of it.

“I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t do this since I am a practitioner of medicine and should have empathy for my patients no matter who they are… But I can’t have Mr. Haitani stay here any longer. You must understand. My other patients have caught a whiff of his presence here and are too scared to come over. I-it’s bad for me.” Dr. Hinohara then added to soften the blow, “If he stays over at your place, I-I promise to visit and check on him from time to time. Although, I doubt I could do much since he’s close to full recovery.”

Bullshit.

It was utter bullshit. There was no way his other patients knew about Rindou being treated in the clinic. Based on the days you visited the hybrid when he was still unconscious, everyone who visited the doctor didn’t display any signs of uneasiness. Yet, you couldn’t do anything to appeal for Rindou anymore since the doctor was more than eager to kick him out. For all you know, the hybrid trashing the room was his last straw.

Exhaling a heavy sigh, you turned the stove off and poured the hot soup into two bowls. The Bonten executive sat on the living room couch, watching a daytime show. He was unbothered by the small space of your apartment, thankfully. Rindou barely fussed upon arriving, probably because he did not have any other choice. Even with his infamous reputation, throwing him out was inhumane.

You wanted to help him, but it has been years since you took care of someone sick or injured. Plus, your mother’s temperament was far different from Rindou's.

“You okay with miso soup?”

Rindou merely grunted in response, avoiding your gaze while he took his bowl from you. Fighting the urge to roll your eyes at his moodiness, you took the seat across from him prior to drinking the soup you made. For the hybrid to keep sulking like this, you figured it was because his wound hasn't fully healed, and limped every time he walked. Men like Rindou hated weakness. To display his vulnerability to you like this must be torture to the mighty snow leopard hybrid—someone who isn't used to being on the other side of the spectrum.

Yet, he never dismissed your acts of assistance. No matter how much you teased him in an attempt to lighten the mood or receive his narrowed gaze, Haitani Rindou never made a move to hurt you during his stay here. Or at least that is what he's trying to do—to lure you into a sense of comfort before he strikes like an apex predator. Nevertheless, you continued to meet his needs.

“You okay?” you asked him when his spoon fell to the floor. Your legs were up and running to get a towel once you saw what happened. He dropped his spoonful of miso soup on his bandages because his limpid eyes couldn’t be torn from the show he claimed was too boring. “Mr. Haitani, you shouldn't pay attention elsewhere while eating.”

“Can’t help it,” he answered with a scoff. A ghost of a laugh slipped past your mouth at the thought of him acting almost like he was a big cat distracted by the pretty colors that led to this situation. Shaking your head, you wiped off the droplets of miso soup from his thigh. After you tossed the towel to the side, you stood up straight and placed your hands on your thighs. Rindou’s tail went stiff at your stare which was accompanied by a smile. “What?”

“Are you… enjoying the show? I thought you found it boring?” The giggle that followed your inquiry did not go unnoticed by the hybrid. The tips of his ears turning red were proof of that. Hearing no reply, you continued to tease him. Your hands are busy fixing up the couch before taking your bowl once more. “I mean, it’s alright to admit you like these soap operas. My mom enjoys them too, you know. Well, not enough to be—”

“I wasn't distracted,” he huffed and averted his gaze at your silly smile. “I was just… surprised.” Rindou never elaborated further on whatever stunned him. You merely shrugged and slurped your soup, content with sitting next to him on a Thursday morning. This has been your life lately—taking care of breakfast and Rindou in the morning, going to work afterward, and then coming back during lunchtime. Despite the reasons you came up with, your cousin never questioned you as to why you requested to come in later than your usual hour. He did, however, tasked you to stay until closing time. A small price to pay. After all, this isn't going to be the norm forever. Rindou will have to go back home and disappear from your life as soon as his wound heal.

Somehow, the reality had sorrow creeping up your heart. Rindou staying in the apartment and seeing him every day made you think he has always been there. His sulky expression softens up whenever his guard is down. He wasn't even aware the corner of his lips was curling up once. The way he dismisses you the second he realized he was showing happiness was cute in its own way. You were used to stifling your laughter at his displeased face that did not match well with his tail swishing side to side. His silhouette blended into your little space, making himself at home. And unbeknownst to you, Rindou felt the same way.

“Don’t act like such a big baby. It’s good for you!” You pushed the plate of rice with natto on top. His irked expression eased down while he took his chopsticks. The smell of the fermented soybeans did not sit well with his nose as he ate to appease you. Yet, he willingly ate, especially with you grinning in front of him. “There you go. That wasn't so hard, was it? Can’t believe a gangster like you dislikes natto.”

Innocent things like you were bad for his health. You were poison to his system—having him think of stuff he never gave a second thought on. Rindou lost count of how many ideas of him whisking you away where no one else can see you crossed his mind. Everything about you exuded a normal and peaceful life—a luxury for him who couldn’t afford it anymore. He should’ve turned you away and let himself die that night because now he didn’t want to leave. His wound was almost closed up and he didn’t have to limp around or ask for your help whenever he bathed. Rindou has grown far too fond of you to merely go back and forget about your kindness. For your sake, he held himself back and enjoyed you doting on him despite the numerous teasing you’ve thrown his way. Pretty but lethal flowers were only meant to be admired from a safe distance. Preferring to keep his claws hidden and the space between you wide, Haitani Rindou liked it this way.

Until he didn’t—until he got greedy.

Dr. Hinohara just had to burst the bubble Rindou protectively held with a single statement that the hybrid was free to go. You couldn’t describe the emotion that swirled within you, ignorant to the deathly stare Rindou gave the doctor. Dr. Hinohara swallowed thickly at the heat of his gaze, slowly taking a step back in case the hybrid decided to kill him on the spot. The younger Haitani wished he could turn back time and stop the old bastard from revealing his secret. Despite sabotaging the stitches for so long to keep it from healing too fast, Rindou’s game was up. And yet, not all of his cards were played.

His trump card has yet to fall onto the table.

Ran came over to your apartment the second Rindou rang him up after a month of no contact. The reunion happened under the stillness of the night where not a soul could be found on the streets. The chloroform his older brother brought was put to use to make sure you wouldn't scream or do any trouble as he placed you in Ran’s car. Rindou then discarded the baton hidden at the back of the trunk, already cleaned off of Dr. Hinohara’s blood, into the nearest waste bin before letting Ran drive down the road heading south.

The moment you woke up from what you thought was a terrible nightmare, you were chained to a bedpost in an unfamiliar room in someone else’s bed. The collar on your neck was a bit tight and the chain attached to it wasn't long enough for you to reach the door. A little bell was hanging on the collar and it jingled with every movement you made. You thanked your lucky stars that you were still fully clothed but that feeling of relief waned away too fast. Your head pounded while your eyes frantically searched for signs of where you are. Rindou entered the room with a tray of food. His eyes slightly went wide at the discovery of you greeting the conscious world then his lips broke out into a grin.

“I see you’re awake.”

“R-Rindou? W-what… Where am I? What’s going on?”

Your inquiries fell from your mouth like the teardrops on your cheeks at the realization. Rindou hushed you multiple times while he set your meal down on the nightstand but you never took heed, fearing for your life. It wasn't until he took out his phone to show you a picture of your parent’s house that your tongue felt like it was made out of metal. Your hands balled up into fists at the image.

“Don’t hurt them. P-please…”

“Looks like you're smart enough to guess what I’m implying here, huh?” Rindou chuckles at your horrified tear stricken face. “I guess calling you a big baby right now won’t be satisfying.” Hand underneath his chin, the hybrid let out a contented sigh. “I knew I was right. Other girls I’ve met before weren't as intelligent as you. Saves me from explaining what will happen to your family if you try to escape.”

“What do you want from me?” you demanded, nerves and voice shaky. His irises shone brighter than amethysts as he observed you on his bed. After a month of nursing him back to health, Rindou was intent on returning the favor—just without outside interference, of course. There was no way your parents would allow him to date you and to see you with a faceless nobody would be the icing on top of his cake meant to insult him. He can't have that. “Rindou, what do you want? I-I’ll do anything! Just please leave me and my parents alone. If you want an apology for all those days I’ve teased you or said something wrong, I’m w-will to do so!”

“Nothin’ much, angel. I’ve passed the need for anything.” He then pulled you up by the collar of your shirt. Leaning down to whisper into your ear, Rindou’s lips curled up. “I’ve already got you.” The second he spoke those words, a shiver ran down your spine. Not giving you any time to collect your thoughts or to wipe the tears from your cheeks, the Bonten executive took a step back and gestured at your clothes. “Strip.”

Hands trembling, you did as he said. More tears exited from your glossy eyes which Rindou couldn't wait to lick away. As soon as you got rid of your pajamas, you covered your exposed stomach and breasts until he clicked his tongue. You winced at the sound of it.

“All of it, angel.”

You heaved a deep breath. Your panties slid down your legs agonizingly slow. The rest of your body burned in shame under his piercing gaze. It was as if Rindou would be struck by lightning if he dared to look away from your gorgeous form. You steeled yourself once he took away your clothes.

“Go and eat your meal. I’ll be back.”

Rindou shut the door behind him. You couldn't stop crying even while you ate the meal he prepared. It was hard to know where you were as the window was bolted shut and barely let natural light in. Your heart beats wildly inside your chest whereas you stiffened at the sight of him returning. His violet irises landed on the empty plate before nodding approvingly.

“Good. I’m going to give you a drink now.” He took off the chain from the bedpost and pulled it for you to follow him. But not before commanding you to do it on all fours. His sharp canines peeked out when he smiled at your obedience. The fear strumming its chaotic cords to have you obeying the hybrid. “That’s it, angel. Make sure not to bump into anything on the way to the kitchen.”

Even with Rindou as your sole audience, your soul was close to dying out of shame. Your pussy folds were out in the open, clit throbbing uncontrollably for the wrong reasons as you followed him from behind. It didn't take you long to figure out this was Rindou’s house—or his temporary home. You were too busy making sure you were keeping up with his huge steps and not falling behind to scan your surroundings. The hybrid then paused and turned to you. His hand gestured to a bowl made for a pet sitting on the floor. It was filled up with what seemed to be milk.

“Go on. Drink it all up, angel.”

Cheeks burning, you hesitated for a second. It was when he walked behind you that the panic kicked in again and you unwillingly bent down. Your tongue was stuck out, ready to lick up the milk to appease Rindou, deaf to the sound of unzipping. The palm of his hand was cold against your cunt, causing you to yelp. His free hand was quick to keep your head from turning around to see him.

What the fuck is happening?

“You’re not the only one who’s thirsty… Shit, you’re wet?” He was more amused than disgusted at his findings. This was fucked up. There was no way you were turned on despite what occurred. Maybe you were sick in the head all this time and Rindou’s actions just brought this to light? You would never know as your mind started to grow hazy due to the pleasure of him rubbing his palm across your slit. You were no virgin but it has been a long time since you’ve done it. Perhaps that was the reason why?

Why does it feel like that’s a lie?

Retracting his claws, he plunged two of his fingers into your warm pussy that parted easily for him. Front teeth digging into your lower lip, you kept back the moan bubbling up your throat while Rindou rubbed his fingers against your tight walls. Slick coated his hand which made it easier for him to feel around your gummy walls. His pleased groans were too much for your ears, his hard length brushing on your ass. His tail swished around before curling around your leg. Your hands keeping you upright were trembling as the onslaught of bliss was increasing, gaze glossy.

“Fuck, this pussy is so tight… Are you going to let me fuck you, angel? Huh? Does my pet deserve this dick?” he questioned with mirth in his tone. Another finger was added, widening your hole. You couldn’t help the whine leaving your lips, eyes shut as you fought back more from coming out. Rindou held you by the waist when your legs gave out, cooing into your ear. The hybrid brought up his hand coated with your juices, inhaling it then tasted your slick. “It’s that good? I’ve waited so long. Held back and let you have your way. You’ll let me have you, mhm? Been good, angel. The least you can do is return the favor…” A silent gasp was what Rindou earned when he tapped the head of his cock against your pussy folds, rubbing his length on the damp flesh. Slowly, he entered you.

“A-are you gonna—ah!” You were sure he was going to tear you apart. It stung as the girth of his cock stroked your tight muscles, molding its shape there. Rindou took a few seconds to get accustomed to the way your pussy enveloped his dick, hissing under his breath at how heavenly you felt. And now that he has finally held you, Haitani Rindou was damn sure he has found his mate. Now, he will make sure to keep you by his side whether you want to or now. He’ll just have to give you something that will make you reluctant to leave… Or fuck you so hard you wouldn’t be able to walk out of this place without him. Maybe getting you pregnant will be the solution to this problem. “Ah, fuck… S’ big. R-rindou!”

“Angel, wanna give you cubs. You’d want that, huh? You want to be mine?”

His thrusts were hard and rough, causing you to moan and squirm. Lust rendered you blind as you took and took what Rindou gave. Time was no longer relevant at this point. All you could remember as he continued to fuck you like a savage beast during the mating season was the way his claws dug into your skin, marking you as his. The place’s layout slowly etched itself into your mind as he made it his mission to fuck you in every area with the endeavor of filling up your womb until all you could feel was his cum running down your thighs. Your breasts and nipples hurt after going through the abuse done by his mouth. Hickeys littered your torso and the skin of your neck. Clit and folds puffy, you couldn’t tell how many times you have squirted. Rindou always patted your head each time before tugging your nipples in a teasing way. The collar still wrapped around your neck jingled along with your breasts, soaked with your sweat and tears.

“R-Rindou! I-I can’t—”

“Yes, you can, angel. You can take more.”

He never gave you a break or a minute to rest and catch your breath. The moment he finished inside you, his balls emptied another load, replacing the cum he spurted into your cunt that dribbled out. Mind all in a mush, you sobbed at the overstimulation. Finally, the hybrid set you down on the couch, panting above you. A puddle of your essence and Rindou’s cum sat around your ass. The furniture wasn’t the only unfortunate victim of its owner’s quest to impregnate you and claim you. Mouth wide open, your eyes were fluttering shut due to exhaustion. Yet even as you stared at Rindou with those tired eyes, he held his cock glazed with both of your fluids right in front of your face in expectancy. The tip was red and super sensitive after hitting your cervix countless times while he fucked your brains out.

“Don’t tap out on me, angel,” he mumbled. Mustering up all your leftover strength, you sat up and licked on the reddish tip, earning a pleased groan. His hand reached forward to brush away the strands of hair from your face then carded his fingers through them. “Good girl. Always remember this, okay? Good kittens should clean up after playing. Good kittens shouldn’t make a mess.”

[missisjoker]

@randomingoftherandomness I had another brain blurb.

This one sprouted from an unanswered question of how the hell did wood!LL know ZYZ and ZYC were getting their asses whooped before he chose to show up?

What if he gave ZYZ a hickey, a part of his primordial soul, or some other supernatural "tag" that created a rudimentary telepathic system between the two? Li Lun is a tree, and all trees can communicate with other trees/ plants/ mushrooms via chemical signals. So, what if this is a similar system? But, because ZYZ is a monkey, the system is not fully functioning, in a sense that Li Lun can track ZYZ and get a sense of the other's mood, but he can't have full-blown conversations?

So, when they fight and LL is locked away, he is furious and hurt. Then, as the days go by, he settles down and tries to "ping" ZYZ through their bond to see if the other demon wants to reconcile like they did thousands of times before. But instead of a usual irritated "hi", he gets a tsunami of shame, hate, monster, and die? Tragically, those feelings are not directed at him, it is ZYZ spiraling into a suicidal manic episode and hating himself after the events of Blood Moon, he doesn't even hear Li Lun reaching out to him, doesn't realize he just sent a wave of "I hate yo ass, and I hope you die a horrible death" to his friend who is already dying, but Li Lun doesn't know that, he thinks it is directed at him. This just fuels the negative feedback loop because it hurts Li Lun even more, this suicidal / self-confining mood goes absolutely against his own will to survive and to be free and he, too, spirals into anger and lashes out. Maybe, he tries to "ping" ZYZ later, but gets the same response- and in desperation and anger cuts off the bond completely (which would explain why ZYZ says "you chose to break up").

*** AU idea below

Now, enter ZYC (no pun intended). He is, in essence, a water/air element- and water circulates freely through trees. Water also is a great conductor of chemical elements. This makes me think- what if LL somehow supernaturally hickeyed ZYC, would he be able to talk and exchange mental images with him? Maybe, to a point where Li Lun can see and feel whatever ZYC is seeing, and visa versa?

Who said symbiotic relationship? Oh, right, I did.

Of course, in the beginning, it would be very taxing on ZYC because Li Lun is still in his angry bitchy toddler mode- but if ZYC managed to shake Li Lun's world with just one alley conversation, imagine how much he can do with 3-4 conversations? Plus, LL will get a way to connect to other people's emotions- something he desperately needs to do to understand and deal with his own. And when Li Lun is out of his bitchy mode, he would be invaluable to the team.

(A hilarious plot point would also be Li Lun using the link just to mess with ZYC. Imagine others looking at ZYC's very concentrated face and thinking oh, he is having a mental fight with Li Lun again, such a brave and strong commander- while in reality he and Li Lun are sexting? Because Li Lun would absolutely pick the worst possible time to send the most lewd images in ZYC's mind just for funsies, and then laugh about it)

And the other part of the symbiotic relationship would be ZYC as water element being fully conductive of Li Lun's energy and power. Almost like Li Lun possessing ZYC with ZYC's full permission, but without actual body snatching?

Just imagine a "we are Venom" type of situation where ZYC has to fight ZYZ who's controlled by outside forces or in his Blood Moon mode, and ZYC's sword isn't there or doesn't work, and the Big Evil laughs because what could a mere human possibly do against a Great Demon? But ZYC catches ZYZ's claw as Li Lun's power surges through him... ZYC without his sword is no match for Zhu Yan, but ZYC merged with the other Great Demon? He might just have a chance.

Just food for thought.

[missinghan]

falling asleep in a time machine ⤖ bang chan

❖ genre : mafia au; fluffy angst; hurt/comfort; female reader insert

❖ word count : 6,9k.

❖ warning : swearing, implied major character death, mention of arson, depictions of vomiting, killing, blood, death, can be brutal (!!!), delusional happy ending. 

❖ summary : four times you try to go back in time and save chan; or alternatively, you keep dreaming about chan to see if there is a way to undo his death when in reality there isn’t — from the world of illicit & priceless.

❖ author’s note : just finished my first term of uni (like actually the first term ever) and I’m so dead inside so here’s a silly little something. I can’t use pts anymore so pls bear with the banner *cries and dusts off this old blog* also I try to explain here why Chan was so attached and pissed off when mc stole his mother’s ring even though it’s accidental.

first attempt —

There are three missions that have altered the course of your and Chan’s relationship.

The first mission goes back to when you were still going on heists and Ryujin had foolishly put a piece of Chan’s mother’s sentiments into your pocket. Neither you nor Chan have come to know or like each other much before it.

The second one is the mansion with a bomb planted in the basement and Chan got locked inside a conference room with a three-layered door, one of them made from the same metal as the fucking Titanic. The third mission involves a casino where the Germans and Italians came together to push Chan toward a dead-end they had cultivated for the Devil himself, to his ultimate demise. They are all too arrogant to admit that Chan will take over the entirety of the East Asian market before any of them can start rolling in their graves.

Three missions of importance and not long after that, you and Chan have agreed to never go on a mission without each other. An unwritten contract. An unspoken promise. Nothing that the mafia engages in is legal so everything runs on trust, on how much faith you are willing to give those who you keep close.

However, there is a fourth mission that the Underworld records will fail to keep because even only a minuscule part of the Bang family is informed about this—how their precious heir has been summoned to bring home the girl he loves.

“Would you do laundry and taxes with me?”

“That’s an odd way to propose to someone, Y/N. And please, you’re asking an obvious question.” Chan looks up at you from his book. His smile is gentle, soft at the corners with his dimples sinking in—it’s how you know that he means it—the way it usually is these days. The way it has been for the past year. It is almost obscure, you think, how you both would have wanted each other’s head on a stick a year ago before one of you managed to make the other person cry out of gratitude.

You lift the book away from his face, glimpsing at the cover. Because Chan is an absolute heathen, he has been reading No Longer Human and you’re being annoying about it because he hasn’t come out to train with you for two days already. “Are you telling me you’ll say ‘no’?”

“We’re already doing laundry and taxes together. We will just have matching rings and a signed piece of paper,” Chan gives you a pointed look; he always looks so serious whenever he wants to correct you as if your sarcasm is that dry. “So it naturally implies as a ‘yes’, idiot,” he nags, even though he doesn’t mean the last part.

“Oh how you wound me, love,” you bite back, even though you don’t mean it either. “Chan, come on. You’re locking yourself up in a prison.”

Chan lets out a long, heavy sigh as if he’s insulted that you have just called his room a prison—which you never verbally hinted at, he simply interpreted it that way. He reaches over to grab the book from your hand, seemingly giving up his reading time for you, and places it on his bedside. 

“What are you–” You watch as Chan walks over to one of his mahogany drawers. “-doing?”

“I need caffeine to talk to you.”

Despite your bristling, he stays true to his words and finds himself a mug, a tea bag, along with a boiler. By the time Chan finishes filling up the boiler with water and turns on the heating switch, your legs are dangling over the edge of his bed as you puff up like a cat, baffled and offended. 

“So,” Chan inquires, a steaming mug of tea in his hand. “What’s up?”

“I find your current state distressing to look at,” you elaborate with glee, a glint coming into your eyes that Chan knows you’re up to no good. “Take a week off with me. We can go anywhere you want, it’ll be a short getaway, just the two of us.”

Chan’s back is turned toward you because he’s too busy searching for a spoon but you can boldly assume that he’s smiling. It’s hinted in his tone when he asks, “You mean a vacation?”

“Brilliant interpretation, Chan,” you smile wryly. “Of course, I meant a vacation!”

“No, you can go have fun by yourself. You have my permission,” he shakes his head. “I have things to attend to. Meetings, banquets, important business transactions. You know how boring the mafia lifestyle is.”

You still, voice low and suppressed in something Chan can’t seem to grasp at. “You’re going back to your family.” It’s barely a movement, a small enough action. Any passerby would think that you have only faltered a little but Chan has observed you for a good while now to notice you’re holding your shoulders back from trembling. 

“I am going back to my family,” he repeats calmly. “Only for a week, though. It’s nothing for you to worry about.”

“Chan, I know they want to see me.”

Chan tries not to let anything show on his face. “And they may very well kill you because that is what they are. Godawful, egoistic, and incapable of compassion.”

“Let me go with you, I—” you begin, though you cut yourself off almost instantly. The room is suddenly steeped in silence, unwieldy at the absence of your words. Every noise seems amplified in the quiet: the boys’ chatters echoing dully from the living room, the ticking hands of the clock, and every breath you take to calm the anxiety in your rib cage.

I do not fear death, sickness, or anyone’s hatred. What I fear most is losing you, Chan. It’s all so beyond you because a year ago, you were a thief, taking things as you please and sending them away when they’re no longer of use for your benefit. Now there is someone who you will live for and his kiss you will kill for, his laugh you will die for.

“Chan, do you have any idea what I would turn into if you left me?” You have always worried loudly, from the volume of your attentiveness and the anxiety beneath your skin all lie in the tender manner of how you love Chan—the same goes for him, that you can be certain of.

“I will never leave you, Y/N. We will be okay,” he assures you, unbearably calm.

Chan is a liar. 

second attempt —

Chan is supposed to go back to the Bang family’s estate with Yuriko for the New Year. Yuriko is the housekeeper whom he has retired for about a year ever since you came into the picture. The boys, especially Jisung, have been forced into keeping their surroundings clean because, for some wicked reason, they think you are absolutely terrifying when you’re upset about their muddy shoes dirtying the floor after a mission. Yuriko always giggles at that, her Young Master surely knows how to pick a partner. 

“I’ve got word that your father wants you to back to the estate, Young Master,” Yuriko tells Chan when she finds you and Chan in the archive because you have insisted on reading about something you won’t say a word to him. Surely, Chan recognizes what you’re searching for but he doesn’t mention it. 

“He said he wanted to make sure you are ready to take over his position. And there is a dinner he wants your attendance for,” Yuriko continues, hands clasped behind her back. You didn’t even realize when she stepped in and approached Chan—for a mere housekeeper to be so swift and quiet with her movements, you have long guessed that she’s not just any old woman to be hired by the Bang family.

The way Chan stiffens in his seat is telling all on its own. You are suddenly struck with the recurring memory of how Minho used to babble about how much of an ass Chan’s family is when he has had one too many drinks. “You don’t know how bigshot mafia families treat their children, do you? They kept the world from knowing for a reason. I’m surprised Chan didn’t turn out to be a monster like them.”

“Forgive me, Yuriko, but you can tell the old man to suck it up,” Chan says softly but his voice is dark, tense, riddled with a sharpness you haven’t heard from him in a long time—you were threatened just the same way when you had stolen his mother’s ring. Now you realize Chan only ever speaks so heartlessly if something precious to him is hanging on the verge of being taken away. 

“Young Master,” Yuriko frowns for two reasons; firstly, Chan has never been able to decline his blood family of anything and secondly, there isn’t much that she can do to solve the problem at hand. She’s a mere servant for the Bang family; she doesn’t have much power to begin with and therefore, she can’t exactly tell them ‘no’. 

“No, you can’t make me,” Chan grits because he knows, he understands it all too well. Unsaid words of all the things money can buy hang in the air like bile. 

“Young Master Christopher, you must know what happens if you defy your father.” And there goes Yuriko’s final warning along with Chan dashing out of the archive, straight through the hallway and the front door of the mansion, completely vanishing in the white curtain of December snow.

Yuriko murmurs something under her breath, unintended for you to hear her. You continue staring forward, the file in your hands completely forgotten. “He can come home with me,” you say without actually thinking about it until she turns to stare at you, expressionless before breaking into a fit of giggles.

“I think Young Master would like that.”

With that, you set off to find Chan.

“No one will love you unconditionally like we do.” “You belong to us, so do as we say.” “Work to kill, kill or you’ll die. You were born to kill, it’s a gift that not everyone receives.” “The world will bow before you and sway the way you want it but you’ll have to-”

“I don’t want any of that,” Chan hisses but the voices keep coming back louder, harsher, with more bite than he has ever heard from them. “None of you ever gave me anything that matters! You just can’t admit that you made me a murderer!!” 

The snow around him sinks with each step he takes, their words still echoing in his mind and sending shivers down his spine, driven so deeply inside his skull that he wishes he could have nothing of this reality. “Be mindful of yourself. Control it.” “Your fangs and claws are too sharp for you to be swinging just at anyone,” he hears them again

His nose burns in the cold but Chan doesn’t notice something warm and wet trickle down his cheekbones. “You never cared about restraint. You said I must kill or I would die. You all just want to possess me, you want me not as an heir but as a commodity!!”

“It’s how we’ve been running this family. It’s how we keep things in order. You’re one of us, Christopher, you are this family.”

With a huff, Chan eventually gives in and listens because he has no other choice but to; he slides down against concrete with a white-out vision, a quivering figure with nothing on but his cardigan. “Then you’re just as godawful as any of them,” he tells himself, knees curling against his chest, almost justified in his own lie that he wants to burst out laughing.

Chan knows they have made him more of a weapon than a child, more of a monster than a man and he is stuck with it for good. He has been holding onto life just because he can, not so much that he wants to. Because he never truly wanted anything before or was wanted in any way.

“Oh my god, you’re a fucking man-child!”

He hears someone’s nagging from afar and ignores it, hugging himself impossibly tighter because asking for comfort is unacceptable, they taught him so. “Chan!!” He hopes it goes away with all of the other voices. 

It doesn’t. Instead, it comes closer in a humane form, boots crunching against the snow and warm breaths sounding rhythmically. “It’s been an hour. Do you have any idea how worried we all were- how worried I was?! What the actual hell,” you snap. “Now I’m going to hear all this shit from Seungmin again because I let you run off and he’s too terrified of you to properly lecture you. God-”

Your rambles cut off when you kneel down next to him, rummaging for a scarf, a pair of gloves, yet another pair of gloves, his puffer jacket, and a hat from your bag. Chan quietly watches as he tries to blink away the oncoming tears but he can’t—they keep coming. He doesn’t reply when your scolding goes on because even though your voice is sharp, Chan can catch the worry hidden along the edges. Being cared for and cherished like this has made him realize how much he doesn’t want to come back to his family and he wants to cry like he’s the fourteen-year-old boy who used to refuse to pick up a gun all over again.

A child who was unable to stuff down the overwhelming agony and grief forced upon him. A child who was weaponized. A child who was threatened into killing his own mother. “If you can’t kill what you hold near and dear, you’ll never be able to kill anyone to save yourself.”

“Chan?” you call out to him, unbearably soft. There’s a certainty, a sort of gentleness in the way his name is said that only makes his tears come hotter, more and more of it because your love feels big, overwhelming.

Chan hates crying so he never did, not when they had locked him up in his room, not when they had starved him because of his disobedience, not when they had made him pull the trigger with the gun’s mouth pressing against his mother’s chest. Chan hates crying but it seems to be all he’s doing now. 

You’re wrapping him up so gently and trying to warm him up because you know he’s just as human as any mundane individual out there. Humans shiver when the temperature drops, they shed tears when they’re upset, and they bleed and bruise at the right amount of impact. That’s why humans are so clingy toward each other so they can prevent harm from coming the other person’s way. Because no one enjoys getting hurt and there is no good reason to voluntarily get hurt; it sounds like common sense but Chan never grew up with such things. He never came to think he was deserving of such things.

“Chan, come home with me. Forget your family. I don’t need to know about them,” you smile at him, somehow empathetic and so understanding when Chan has barely given you an explanation, when he is desperate to fill the silence but he knows his voice will be weak with tears, stumbling, and pitching all over the place.

Chan sniffles, finding the courage to say something back because he wants to, not because he feels like he has to, “Can I really…come-come home with you?”

“I’m sure the girls wouldn't mind, they might be a little annoying. Yeji, though, can be wary of strangers,” you shrug, something so relaxed about your posture tells him that you have learned to accept something without telling him. 

A breathy chuckle. “Especially when they’re a mafia leader.”

An exhale. Chan shudders when you embrace him wholly—every moment of pride and arrogance, betrayal and hurt that he has been boxing away—as the beautiful mess that he is. You’re the safest person on the face of Earth not because you are on equal terms with him in power but because you never care about those things. You will let him break something, burn something down, cry, and laugh however he pleases but you won’t ever let go of his hand. You never ask him for anything in return while continuing to save him over and over again.

He’s so unbelievably lucky, Chan thinks but doesn’t say it aloud, instead, he tells you, “If you’ll have me.”

The night after you drive Chan back to your mansion, the place goes up in flames. Only you are able to open your eyes to see the next daylight.

“Welcome home,” you want to whisper but can only watch a last smile bloom on the face of a ghost amidst the orange blaze.

third attempt —

You decide to come home with Chan.

For a non-mafia family, it might go like this.

Meeting Chan’s parents will be the hardest thing you have ever done—and that is coming from someone who has broken through the world’s most modern security systems and got your hands on objects worth billions of dollars. 

You will bow when you meet them, use the politest speech you have taught yourself last minute, and desperately try not to remember how Chan was forced to shoot his own mother as a child. They will pinch your cheek and call you lovely, chuckling at how stiff you are and offering you a ‘Come on in! Don’t mind the mess, it’s always how our house is.’

You will smile and you will play along because you want them to like you so badly it hurts. 

Chan will gawk at you without even trying to hide it because you have given him a completely different experience upon your first encounter. Casual, timid, and quick with your tongues when it comes to those witty retorts.

They will then ask you, ‘‘What are your hobbies? Any sports? Instruments?’’ Purely in the Asian parents’ style. 

You will be so nervous that you forget you play the violin and practice meditation occasionally. You will sit at their dinner table in their cozy, lived-in home, and rack your brain for a proper answer that might be deemed reasonable for a mundane girl. “It can be anything you do for fun, honey. No need to be nervous,” they will say again and you will give them a small grimace in return. 

It’s probably deeply fucked up when the first thing that comes to your mind is ‘I retired from heists a year ago because museums are fucking boring so I have moved on to finding new and creative ways to eliminate anything that might be the cause of Chan’s suffering.’

“…You play the violin beautifully,” Chan will suggest quietly beside you, his hand laced with yours beneath the table. “And you interrupt my reading time whenever you need attention.”

“I…I like to be with you,” you will finally find the courage to say with a firm squeeze of his hand, and the strength to smile when his eyes widen faintly, flustered yet not surprised. 

Still, it doesn’t matter whether Chan was born from a mafia family. You don’t hesitate to hold his hand beneath the table when Chan tenses up from the disappointed gaze of his father, lean over ever so slightly, and whisper, “I like to be with you.” He almost gasps but refrains. “Wherever we are. As long as you allow me to stay by your side.”

For once, Chan lets himself think that he won’t fuck up something before he even gets to have it in his arms. 

You did come home with Chan even if the dinner is anything but cozy and mundane. Their smiles are cold porcelain, a familiarity with death so staggering you feel nauseous. They are all here, though. Every single one of them. “I’ll be back,” you say and excuse yourself to use the restroom, he assumes.

Chan finds an uneasy slick in his throat, almost thick like blood when he sees a bright thing in your eyes. He lets you go anyway. Will things happen differently if he holds you back? 

Minutes after your withdrawal from the dinner table, an explosion goes off downstairs. The mansion quivers with a long string of rumble, a horrible feeling looming over everyone in the room like an ugly shadow. Though, no one bats an eye. Maintaining such a high position in the Underworld for so long is more than enough for the bounty on each of their heads to go up to millions of dollars. 

As much as Chan detests his blood family, he doesn’t want to die here, a horrendous place for his corpse to be found. So he stands as the rest of the room begins arming themselves, doing his best not to pay any heed to his father, and bolts downstairs. 

In situations like this, he is taught to close his heart and kill. Hence why there was barely any screaming when the commotion occurred, only the metallic sounds of bullets being clicked into their chamber. Truth be told, there is a weapon vault on the main floor of the mansion. Chan knows the most efficient shortcut there and can run through any hallways even without any lights on. He did grow up in this terrible place, and now he will make use of that to get you out of here before anything else. 

Chan arrives at the main floor and there is nothing but a giant hole and crumbled metal pieces in the weapon vault—or what used to be the weapon vault, blown up by a bomb it seems. Well, shit, he doesn’t even know how to register this. The entrance to his father’s most treasured place in the mansion has a three-layered door with an extremely lethal surveillance system, who and how the fuck-

He stops. He doesn’t so much as twitch. It gives him a moment of pure chill when the main floor has gone completely muted, both audibly and visually, like his life has just tipped off balance and leaned towards the bad part of a zombie movie. Upstairs, there is a cry for help and the sound of bullets continuously firing. 

“My fucking god,” Chan curses and turns on his heels, steeling himself mentally while rushing up the stairs. 

Upon arriving at the scene, it’s difficult to say whether turning up just five minutes earlier would have made much of a difference. Fuck, but if he had held you back, would things have taken a different turn?

There is a lot of blood. Too much blood to be explained away, and too much evidence to be traced back to no one else other than you. Well, to be fair, you’re the only person still standing and kicking aside from Chan anyway. The shotgun in your hand with a silencer attached speaks volumes, a knife between your teeth, and your left hand is fisted tightly. 

“…Y-Y/N,” Chan utters, in disbelief. “You’re Y/N, aren’t you?” 

You release something in your left hand and several fifteen-bullet magazines drop to the ground, the sound scratching his spine in the wrong way. The knife also hits the ground, metal echoing loudly against hard marble. 

“You’re here, Chan,” you reply, like your hands and clothes aren’t painted red. Swiftly, you duck to fumble for something beneath the dining table. Chan’s gaze follows you suit, prompting uneasiness to crawl down his throat when he realizes everything is, quite literally, drenched in blood. When he manages to snap out of it, you are unwrapping something from a white blanket—Berry, his eight-year-old Spaniel. 

You don’t look one bit surprised to see him—you have been expecting him. You simply keep on tucking Berry neatly into the blanket, murmuring something along the lines of ‘it’s over now’ and ‘I’m sorry I scared you’. Berry offers you a small whimper in return, still startled and recovering from the loud ruckus. 

Chan inhales very slowly. Exhales. “What did you do?”

“I killed everyone here,” you say levelly, as if mass murder is no big deal. “You’re a little late. I thought your intuition would be keener than that.”

“This is no time for a fucking joke,” he snaps. Chan has snapped because he’s mad at himself. He has been living purely by his intuition for more than two decades already, without it he would have died a long time ago. Yet when it comes to you, he’s always the most irrational. 

Your lips twitch like you’re about to smile but realize he’s upset. “You’re right, sorry.” 

Chan moves further into the room, his shoes squelching with each blood-drenched step he takes. He takes the scene in once again and keeps calm because that is what he has trained himself to do ever since the first time he got kidnapped. When his gaze brushes over the corpse of his father, he tries not to think about anything just yet. What’s done is done but Chan can piece the scene together from the explosion downstairs—a bait that anyone will be eager to take and a good way to disarm your enemies—to the scattering of hole-filled bodies, their blood blooming against the marble floor like a grotesque bouquet.

The crux of it is you know all too well he will run to find you without question, lending you the space and time to kill whoever remains.

“Why?”

Your eyes sweep over the mass of bodies, dull and distant. “Does it really matter?” You don’t think it’s fair to say you did it because you love him; it will become a curse that haunts him for as long as he lives. Yes, you love Chan with your entire soul but you also simply want to act as you please, allowing yourself to have your selfish ways of declaring your love for him. 

His chest heaves without any stability. “I thought you said you’re used to taking many things but you don’t take lives!!”

You cut right in, all glass. “Will anyone be able to do anything about it? Can anyone possibly arrest me, Chan?” 

Chan shudders, a sour thing gnawing at the back of his throat. It’s a morbid feeling he knows will become recurring at night, on the bad days. Chan wants to be furious, it feels like a moral obligation to be. Then again, everything the world has learned about empathy is already torn up by his family, they smeared it beneath their feet like it’s common trash. In the end, all of his nightmares and source of fear amounts to this, a mass of corpses with no resolution. 

“Do you want to kill me, Chan? If so, do it. You’re your own person, you are free.” 

Your eyes have turned into ice, and suddenly you have become so intangible that Chan slowly grows afraid. He thinks of terrible things, Am I allowed to have you? What makes you want me so badly? Why am I different from any of them?

The sound of retching interrupts his train of thought. It takes him precisely half a second to stare at how you are folded over your knees, dry heaving at the marble floor with Berry fumbling for help right at your side. Chan rushes to you to keep your hair out of your face as you gasp for air, choking on stomach bile and body raking with shudders. Once his hand smooths over the fabric on your back, you eventually cough and hack out the last of whatever is left that your system rejects. 

You breathe as shallowly as you can. Quiet wheezes, hollow breaths that pull in and out of your lungs too quickly. Chan rubs small, gentle circles on your back and doesn’t expect it when you snap up to look at him with wide, pained eyes as though you didn’t just murder his entire family in cold blood minutes ago, like you didn’t just take out the Underworld’s most feared lineage of demons by yourself.

Chan decides not to say anything, lets you lean into him shakily, and tries to figure out what you’re attempting to do with your hands. Dry blood makes your skin itchy every time your fingers twitch but you don’t mind it. 

“I’m here, I’m here,” he finally whispers with you sitting in the circle of his arms; you’re shaking like you’re sobbing even though you make no noise and cry no tears. Chan lets you squirm with a wild mania in your eyes, frantic and lost. He can’t quite pinpoint what you want until he gets it. 

You stop shaking the moment your head leans against the left side of his chest, right where his beating heart is. A pattern in his rib cage and a rhythm in your ears, relief so immense you feel like you can finally breathe. What you want is just to hear the sound of his heartbeat. It makes Chan feel a little exposed, somewhat scrutinized but he really doesn’t mind taking himself apart to hand his heart over to you. 

“I’m sorry,” you mumble, your tone wet and warm with oncoming tears. 

Chan presses his lips into a thin line, feeling like a hypocrite when he keeps you caged in his arms. “What are you sorry for, silly?” From the bottom of his heart, it’s abominable, he thinks—that even amidst such gruesome bloodshed created by your own hands, Chan is relieved that you are not hurt.

“I’m sorry this isn’t real.”

fourth attempt —

Chan is coming home with you. The childhood home you used to grow up in with two extremely loving, a little too oblivious parents who never once questioned their daughter’s occupation in the big city. 

It takes time to adjust but Chan is sliding into your little family without noticing it himself. He manages to impress your mom with his cooking and discusses politics with your dad. You might be going delusional but you swear you saw him chuckling faintly at your parents’ terrible taste of reality TV. 

The house might only amount to one-tenth of his mansion but it smells like fresh laundry all around, tender and soft, smothered in the love of ordinary human beings. So everything just feels that much bigger, a love so warm and overwhelming it stains Chan’s eyes with unfamiliar myriads of emotions. It takes him a few days to finally laugh a little louder, not refraining his speech to specifically formal phrases, and allowing himself to nag you in front of your parents. He even makes a sound of disbelief when you keep telling them he’s only a friend from work.

“Oh my god, why are you so salty about it,” you chide and close your bedroom door. “If I had said you’re my boyfriend, they would have started interrogating you!” 

Chan sits on the duvet you have laid on the floor for him—your childhood bed is too small to share—and mumbles something morbid under his breath, “I am quite good at tolerating any methods of torture thank you very much.” However, he doesn’t miss the look your parents give you whenever you bid them goodnight with Chan hovering over you in a way that’s nowhere near platonic.

You snort, actually, no, it’s too bitter for you to even react. “The worst they will do is leave you out when we watch TV,” you grin to relieve the inevitably building tension, shit-eating and all.

“That’s cruel. You know I love reality TV,” Chan replies, completely monotone. He flings an arm over his eyes like he’s putting in effort to mimic a dying body trying to convey his love in a Shakespeare play. Wrestling with like ten other housewives to buy those eggs on sale for your mom was more of a workout than any gun fights he has engaged in.

“Sleep. Mom said we’re going outside tomorrow,” you huff, tossing him a teddy bear from your bed—the amount of stuffed animals you own is impressive, they easily take up half of your bed so Chan had to accept his fate with the duvet. 

“I thought we’re heading back?”

“We will after going out with her. She said she wanted something from the bakery.”

Chan hums in response, his gaze skimming over the interior of your room again. Light pink wallpapers, white bookshelves and wardrobe lining the corners, and soft hues of blue on your bed and curtains to top it all off. “Truly, you are the designer of a generation.”

“Toddlers usually don’t like black. And I was eight, Chan, shut the fuck up,” you laugh, the sound so hearty it makes him want to bottle it and keep it all to himself like a child hiding his favorite candy. 

“Hurts my eyes a little, but I like it,” he declares and unwinds for the day.

You never realize you don’t really walk around town every time you visit your parents. Maybe it’s because you didn’t have many friends growing up, meaning there’s no one to call up for a hangout, or maybe it’s because all of the memories you want to relive here are with your parents, in the warmth of their home. So you walk down the sleepy streets with laziness on your shoulders, somewhat at peace when Chan can’t seem to keep his eyes in one place, secretly comparing the imageries of bright, colorful Seoul with this hazy rural area.

“What is that place over there?” He asks when you stride past a sketchy-looking building when in reality, it’s a spa run by this really nice old lady upstairs.

“Did you go to school here?” He ponders when you glance at what looks like a middle school; no kids are running and shouting in the playground since it’s the New Year holiday. 

Your mom notices how much curiosity Chan has for an apparent mid-twenties young adult so she giggles, offering to point out something she thinks he might be interested in, “That’s a small park Y/N used to play at. She wouldn’t leave when I came to pick her up after work.”

You can’t decide if you should scowl at your mom or burst out laughing at her implication that Chan, the leader of a notorious mafia group, should go and sit on one of the swings while she heads inside the bakery. “Come on, Chan,” you quickly make your choice. 

Chan sighs, though the sound is fond because he sees a sort of excitement blooming loud and clear in your pretty eyes. You have observed Chan long enough to know when he has given in so you laugh, turning to your mom and saying, “We’ll be back in a minute.” The familiar promise melts Chan inside out but he doesn’t tell you that. 

You accidentally drop your phone while walking down the stone steps so you turn away for half a second. And when you look back, Chan is seated neatly on the swing which is definitely not fitting for his age—his long legs dragging against the soil as his arms are crossed in front of his chest. As serious as he tries to look, you find the whole imagery so ridiculously unserious. He senses your gaze burning holes on the back of his neck so he stands, reaches upward, and lifts himself to sit on the metal bar that the chains rain down from.

“Chan, what the fuck, that’s not how you use a swing,” you chide, nearly rolling on the ground and barking a laugh. “If I take a photo of you right now, how dead am I?”

Chan doesn’t even need to turn his head. “What do you think?”

He looks down when your footsteps squish against the snow and he tries to imagine how a little you would hang around this place for an entire afternoon, up to no good things while waiting for your mom. “Concise as always, boss,” you purse your lips at him, nostalgia a heavy weight on the curve of your shoulders as you peer over places you used to designate as your hiding spots. 

Chan catches something shifting on your face and he ponders; why would you voluntarily involve yourself in outlaw doings when you could have had a perfectly normal life? “When did you start stealing?” 

“Probably when my parents sent me away for university. I hated it. School was hard and the expenses were awful for their bank accounts but they wouldn’t tell me that,” you mutter and decide to join him, legs dangling over the edges, a confession dragged from your lips unwillingly. 

Chan scoots a little closer, a hand reaching over to your left side to keep you from falling. “And you figured you were pretty good at it?”

“Nothing to be proud of, obviously,” you shake your head and can’t help a small grin. “Okay, maybe just a little. I was making money from racing on the side as well.” 

It takes him a moment to register your words when surprise halts the words in his throat. No wonder you’re better at handling car chases than any of his teammates who have been involved in this business for years. You look over at him, seeing that he’s having trouble reacting so you pinch his nose teasingly, “I know, so sexy, ain’t it?” 

Chan rolls his eyes, neglects the warmth spreading on his cheeks, and simply sits with you. The swing creaks and groans beneath the weight of two adults, rust staining his hand when he lifts it to check. 

“It was enough money for me to graduate and I was fine with that. Mind you I was always the top of my class,” you scoff, thinking of long days when you used to get little to no sleep, of when you had mustered the best smiles for your parents through FaceTime, of how you had begun not caring for how much money the jewels you had stolen were worth. 

None of it matters anymore, you think as you lean into Chan, and he lets you. “I’ll guess this, you were homeschooled?”

Chan doesn’t answer immediately as realization tightens his ribs. You don’t talk about home or how you grew up, and Chan doesn’t talk about his parents. Perhaps you both are similar in that way so neither of you mind when the other person never initiated it. “I was. Everything I ever learned was taught in that forsaken mansion. Most of it, actually.”

“Everything?”

“You can’t run away from what you’re surrounded with,” he says, and there’s a chilling edge to it, an icy kind of shiver that makes your fingers more numb than the winter cold ever can. 

“Chan, you’re not them,” you declare out of the blue, eyes crinkling up in adoration. “You are free, okay? No matter how hard they try to ruin you, you can’t become them.”

When you look up again, his eyes have a glassy shine when he says, “I know that now.”

“Don’t cry,” you huff out a breath.

“I’m not crying,” Chan shakes his head slowly, voice suspiciously shaky. “I guess I just thought you had a lot to live for and I was…you know, it was arrogant of me to keep you by my side.”

You laugh, a sharp, crisp bark of a sound that cuts right through his doubts. “Who do you think you’re talking to? If I wanted to run, I would have and no one could catch me, not now, not ever.”

“Well, I did,” Chan retorts, though there is no bite to it.

“Only because I let you,” you play along sedately. It’s the soft hum of your voice that makes breathing for him feel easier, and his shoulders feel lighter. When Chan exhales, it no longer tastes like the unfathomable, untouchable nightmares that he was so used to choke down, swallow, and not allow himself to throw them up as proof to show anyone else. 

Your mom returns perhaps in about an hour, a box tucked in her arms and groceries hanging from her elbow. “Time to go back,” she yells from the top of the stone steps. “We need to cook dinner, kids!”

You don’t dare budge. Chan notices it and nudges your shoulder gently, sensing your discontent. “You heard your mom, come on now.”

“I don’t want to go back,” you disagree. “Let’s stay here. I want to go to the beach with you when it gets warmer. And diving, kayaking, too!”

“You told me to leave my credit cards back home. You’ll have to feed me and pay all of my expenses,” Chan reminds you.

“Guess what, I left mine at home too,” you reply breezily. Maybe you both need to find new jobs. You don’t think Chan should worry about that because there’s nothing that he can’t do if he puts his mind to it, he’s just that great. Chan is the greatest thing there is, the best thing that has ever happened to you.

You watch rosy lips part, brown eyes widening as his grip on your shoulder falters faintly. “I don’t deserve good things, Y/N. I can’t stay here with you,” Chan says like he means it. “Tell me to leave.” He really is stupid until the very end.

“If you’re worried about that, I’ll kindly decline my spot in heaven and go to hell with you,” you assure him, your voice chirping with mirth but even that doesn’t seem to elevate his gloom at all. A groan. “Fine then, as the most wonderful person alive, I now denounce us of all our wrongdoings. And I announce us to be the best of normal friends as normal people!”

His solemn expression crumbles and now he just looks straight up insulted. “It’s supposed to be ‘husband and wife’,” Chan nags while fighting off a grin of his own.

A light feeling burgeons in your chest. “I thought you didn’t care about that kind of thing? We’re already doing laundry and taxes together, right? It’s not like we have enough money to buy the rings either.”

“I suppose I’ll have no say in that,” Chan sighs in defeat, finally smiling brightly as he reminds himself of what he has, and what he wants to become for you. “But I like to be with you as well. If you’ll have me.”

You look back at him, wanting nothing more than to burn those words into the flesh of your heart. “I already have you right here, don’t I?”

Because Chan’s existence is etched deeply somewhere inside your soul. And you love him everyday for that.

❖ note (yet again) : hello there, if you have reached the end, thank you so much for reading! I wish 2024 will bring you and your loved ones nothing but happiness and great health! (no one asked but I really tried to simplify their speech of affection towards each other here compared to illicit & priceless because all they really want is to be normal people living a normal life)

[rozeliyawashereyall]

I fucked around, I found out, and I came out with an AU that wouldn't make the slightest of sense in the actual universe of where the series take place

But do indulge me, cringe AUs are addictively fun to make.

Thanks to @weltthejellyfish , @lightdragon789 , and @astralbulldragon13 for writing like, 98% of everything, would be clueless about my own AU without you 🙏

Anywho chat. Casino AU.

The casino is kind of like?? A haunted house?? Or at least the concept of it. Yeah human owned places are scattered publicly, but halfblood owned ones are in more secluded and secretive places—no human was allowed into said places, only those who are like, an altruist for halfbloods, and even they have very limited access.

Bug getting into the casino would be very difficult, they'd have to first find out where the casino even is, find it and pretend to be an ally and after that slowly work their way up and face some pretty hard challenges

The casino is a family business that was bustling at first but Cercie caught wind of it and started hunting down every family member until it was only bodie left. With only Bodie running the business, he finds a college graduate, Marco, and decides to hire him as a dealer. A few years later and he finds a kid abandoned by his step parents, Timmy, and the rest is history.

•

The descriptions of the three in the drawings:

-​Swamp of Fortune was a family business run by the Willowroots, but after Cercei caught wind of it she started hunting down every family member until it was only Bodie left. Stressed and paranoid about his safety, he closed the casino down and resulted to alcohol for a few years before meeting Marco, a shady college graduate who's determined to help he guy out of his slump. One thing lead to another and now the casino is both getting popular again and is under watch by the government for alleged suspicious practices.

-​Marco Palustris Cydarki dropped out of college after his involvement with dangerous people led to concerns for his safety. While he majored in computer science, his real talent lies in the arts. After dropping out, he found refuge with Bodie, an older man who just happens to own a casino, one that has a history of questionable purchases and suspicious rumors. Marco has been assisting him in various capacities since being taken in. Whether Bodie's influence is protective or manipulative remains to be seen, but Marco has stuck around, likely owing something to his benefactor.

-​Timmy’s life has been a mix of captivity and survival. Born under Cercie Fain’s control, his parents faked his death, cutting off his dragon wings to pass him off as a regular gator half-blood. After being auctioned off, he was raised by Elizabeth Wheat on a half-blood farm until Cercie’s men took him. He later escaped, and found himself stranded and injured in the city, where Bodie found him and became a father figure for the guy. Since then, he's grown into a mini-manager at the casino, following in Bodie’s footsteps as a floor supervisor. Despite being the smallest his presence is larger than life.

•

These little guys personalities are a mix of OG and BM. So more sadistically playful, hence the neutral/hate relationship Marco and Timmy have with bug in this AU. Timmy and Marco probably see Bug as just a new pet, but with them getting more popular around the casino and climbing up— they could turn from a pet to a threat to the two. When it’s revealed that they’re a cop, they probably do some very… thorough interrogation to make sure they are actually on the casino’s side. Then maybe Bug offers to be a Triple Agent. They're lucky Bodie likes them around, I fear they would NOT survive if he didn't enjoy their company, they'd be torn apart if it wasnt for him...he may have used that to his advantage..but Bodie’s just so sweet, they’d never suspect anything..

•

Crimes👍

​Money laundering

​Bootlegging

​Illegal gambling

​Probably murder ngl

​Loan sharking

​Labor racketeering

​stock manipulation

​Tax fraud

•

Stupid stuff:

​They'd only start calling bug, well, bug, because they were caught in their trap, and they have a habit of playing with their food. After they start using Bug as a double agent they start throwing in other nicknames—First it was just bug but then it'd turn into more playful variations of it (IE: Waterbug, Sugarbug, Bedbug, etc) The day Bodie calls them Sugar Bug, they are caught so off guard

​Bodie gifted Bug a pair of butterfly earrings as a welcome gift, only for the earrings to turn out to be a tracking device/listening ddevice.

​Timmy would drink like five cocktails and get black out drunk because they don’t taste like alcohol. Mudslide would be his favorite though. I can picture Marco drinking red wine, he'd would like mulled wine or wassail during winter. Bodie is either whiskey, or bourbon, but during business meetings, they all drink Willowroot family recipe Moonshine

​Bodie still drinks but has cut back. He only drinks half a bottle compared to the two a day he used to drink.

Bug's aim is so fucking bad bro, it's storm trooper level bad

More stupid stuff but timeline version, kinda, idk actually:

-Bug was tasked to locate the casino, gets chased and almost mauled by a halfblood before Bodie intervenes and helps Bug from dying.

- I'd imagine when Bug is recovering and is eager to work to repay Bodie back. He asks Timmy to keep watch of Bug and kind of assesses Bug to see if they could work at the casino and the two talk from there

-Then Bodie and Timmy along with Bug, go out on a walk, talking about taxe evasion, casinos, and mafias, all that fun jazz. But they stumble upon Tony and Sparkie trying to track down any rogue halfbloods. prompt them to relay it to Cercie that Bug found the casino and she sends the hunters to bug, just to tell them to get every secret they can find and report back to them. Which Bug is very hesitant on doing. Not only because they’ve helped them and shown they aren’t the monsters their people painted them as... also because these gator folk could kill them very easily.

Like the end of episode 3 or maybe when Marco comes in with info on Bug (that maybe Bodie asked Marco to do a background check or interrogate Bug idk man) and that’s when they ask Bug to be a double agent

-It’s been a few months (maybe) and Bug is stressing but pulling through being a double agent in relaying info to both sides. But also getting closer to the bois as they treated them slightly better then Cercie and her people did. Which results in Bug confiding in Bodie and being accepted into their lives.

Idk what to do with the rest bro you figure it out.

Last stupid stuff I promise

Okay I'm done now

Yippee @capitalmaudios @magebunkshelf @dayspriteofficial