#(Hasn’t outlined the paper)

[sandycookie]

I want to write, but life throws annoying assignments at meeeeeeee

[selfcarecap]

MUSE [L.H.]

Logan Howlett x reader

summary: Logan would never admit it to anyone, but over the course of his long life he has attempted to draw maybe once or twice. He hasn’t done it in years, maybe even decades, but he’s struck by inspiration when he meets you. Of course, no one can know that Wolverine draws, so he does it in the dead of night, sliding anonymous envelopes with the finished drawings of you under your door. When he sees how much you love them, he wonders if you could also love the person behind them. 

warnings: smut 18+ but with an actual plot for once (brief m masturbation, oral f and m rec, unprotected piv sex, kind of accidental (but consensual obv) facial; pet names: bub, baby, good girl, princess), soft!Logan but he won’t admit it, also soft!reader, fluff (although the summary makes it sounds a bit more dramatic than it is tbh), implication that reader has curly hair, implied mutant/X-men!reader, (obviously the pic doesn’t represent the envelopes Logan uses lol he’s not doing all that)

word count: 7.3k

also i feel the need to say something about the fact that it’s Hugh Jackman’s birthday today lol so uh thanks for being huge jacked man and for giving us our Logan yay <3 | gorgeous divider by @plutism

It’s everything Logan is the opposite of – he would never tell a soul – but over the course of his long life, Logan has attempted to draw maybe once or twice. It’s not really him, but he did have a phase or two.

When he meets you, he hasn’t even thought of picking up a pencil in years. Ever since you’ve been at the mansion though, Logan’s fingertips twitch with the urge to start sketching your features every time he’s with you. It gets hard to ignore after a few days.

He waits until he’s known you a few weeks, there’s no way in hell he’d ask if he could draw you. He’d probably embarrass you by asking, and embarrass himself by admitting he’s into fucking art. That’s not him. 

Except, well, sometimes it is, when he’s inspired. And you’re nothing if not inspiring. 

He gives in to the urge to get out pencil and paper again, waiting until everyone else has gone to sleep. The first few drawings are shit, he feels like they’re almost an insult to you. It’s not that he’s accidentally drawing you ugly, it just doesn’t look like you. So he practises. 

Logan Howlett sits down at night to practise drawing. 

He picks out a few other things to draw then, to ease the pressure that comes with drawing the woman he… is friends with. Yeah, you’re a friend. And he totally knows that you’d never go for someone as rugged as him, that’s for sure. You deserve much more. So much more. 

But after a few nights he feels more confident in his drawing skills again, but still, as much as he can picture you in his mind – he can do that absolutely perfectly – he’s not too sure he could really draw you accurately.

So he gets Rogue to show him how goddamn fucking Instagram works so that he can look at some of your pictures and use them as a model. 

He doesn’t know what you’re doing to him; you’ve got him using social media.

He can’t believe it, but the first time he seriously attempts to draw you, it’s perfect. It’s a small drawing, not even as big as his palm, capturing your gorgeous face. He thinks of adding another few lines to your eyebrows, or to your hair or another small one to the outline of your lips, but he doesn’t want to mess with it. 

Logan hates how drawing makes him overthink, but he loves how it feels to create something other than violence with his hands for once – something that may even be the opposite. 

He hides the drawing in between the pages of a book, and hides the book under a pile of random clutter on his desk that not even he would normally spare a glance at. But when he lies down to go to sleep, he gets all the stuff out again and gets out the drawing. He wants to see it again. And he can’t leave it there anyway, what if the pressure from all the items on top of it smudges it? 

But he doesn’t know what else to do with it. He can’t really have a drawing of you sitting in his room. What if someone sees? Then what is he gonna do with it instead? 

He finally lets himself think the thought that’s politely been waiting to be allowed into his brain from the moment he decided he might take up drawing again. 

He could give it to you. 

Logan knows his drawing isn’t objectively a masterpiece, but if he’s proud of it he has to acknowledge that that probably means it’s at least decent. And you’re definitely the type of person to appreciate something like this. It’s weird admitting to himself that he’s even proud of what he’s drawn; he’s done so much in this world, who cares about a little drawing? 

The only thing is that Logan isn’t sure if he’s ready for anyone to see this side of him. To see the side that has him staying up until 3AM to finely trace the lines of someone’s eyelashes and cheekbones and lips, the side that makes him feel calm inside. 

He knows it’s stupid to hide but he just can’t. He decides he’ll leave the drawing in your room in an envelope, maybe a pink one to show you it’s not a creepy threat but meant as a sign of adoration, from someone who couldn’t resist but try to recreate your beauty. He won’t write his name on it, he just wants you to have it. 

Sappy motherfucker. 

He puts the small drawing back into the book and carefully pushes it between his mattress and the bedframe to protect it during the night. God, who even is he – protecting a tiny piece of paper? He groans at himself as he turns around to go to sleep. 

He dreams of making a thousand drawings of you, with you as his live model. His muse. 

You’re his girlfriend in his dream, he thinks. 

He’s sitting in a chair in your room, drawing you as you tell him about your day. You’re lying on your bed on your tummy, elbows propped up to support your head. You’re gently kicking your feet in the air behind you, wearing nothing but a t-shirt of Logan’s, some silly graphic socks, panties with little cherries on them, and a bright, bashful smile as Logan attempts to capture your glowing features in a sketch block he’s dedicated to drawings of you. 

He wakes up with morning wood. 

Logan is no stranger to jerking off with you on his mind, so he spits in his hand and slips it beneath his boxers, stroking himself as he thinks of you. He imagines you on top of him as he jerks his cock, imagines you under him, or with your legs around his head, or you between his knees on the floor. He cums quickly and hard, leaving his boxers wet and sticky.

He goes for a run after he’s dealt with it and picks up an envelope on his way. He’s doubting himself but he knows he has to just do it. He’d doubt himself even more if he pussied out – a grown man who can’t even slide an envelope under someone’s door. 

So Logan mans up and, like an idiot, kisses the fucking drawing before he puts it into the envelope. He licks the edges of it to close it and writes your name in the most anonymous handwriting he can muster and adds a little heart. 

It’s soo stupid. 

He makes sure no one is anywhere near your bedroom, walks up to your door, and slides the envelope underneath. Except he didn’t check if you were in your room. As soon as the envelope disappears beneath your door, he hears a short creak from your bed and your soft footsteps. 

He hears the small and adorable noise of curiosity you let out – a confused hm? – and then he quickly and quietly makes his way down the hallway. He hears your voice about ten seconds later, an intrigued hello? as you open the door, but you don’t investigate further, closing the door behind you. 

Logan’s heart is beating so fast. He’s never doing this shit again. 

He’s antsy all day, waiting for some type of reaction from you. Except you don’t know that the drawing is from him so he’s probably not even getting one, and he can’t conspicuously come to your room the same day you receive an anonymous drawing of yourself. 

It’s also when the insecurity settles in. Maybe he should have added a few more lines or started the entire drawing anew. Who does he think he is pretending to be an artist? 

He shakes those thoughts off as he starts training with the punching bag in the gym. It’s not something that he necessarily needs to train, but it gets rid of some of that pointless energy. This isn’t him, worried about some lines he drew on a piece of paper – a scrap of a paper, really. Who cares about something like that? Certainly not him. 

He sleeps dreamlessly and wakes up the next day disappointed that he didn’t get to dream about being your boyfriend again. God, what are you doing to him? Making him think about being boyfriend and girlfriend. He’s pathetic. You’re a friend and nothing more, and that’s fine. You probably don’t like him like that and he can deal with that.

-

He’s not even thinking of the drawing anymore, truly, when he walks into the kitchen the next morning. It only comes to mind when he sees you, alone in the kitchen, leaning over the counter to scroll on your phone, your weird green coffee (“it’s Matcha, Logan”) next to you as you stir it mindlessly with a metal straw. 

“Hi,” you look up with one of those sweet smiles of yours, but redirect your attention to your phone. 

At least you don’t immediately say something like hey, you know that drawing you slid under my door? It was so ugly I threw it away. Since when do you even draw? 

Not that he was worried you would or anything. He hasn’t been thinking about it. Obviously. Why would he? And he knows you would never expect that it’s him; that’s the only reason he did it. He never would have given you the drawing if he thought you could have even the slightest inkling that Logan would be someone who draws. But he still wants to know what you think of it. 

“You want some toast too?” You ask, putting your phone down and turning to get some bread. He sits down at the other side of the kitchen counter and as his eyes flicker to your green drink (he still doesn’t get it), he sees it. 

“Is that–” my drawing, he almost said, “What is that?” He pretends to be confused, drawing his eyebrows together, trying his best to look inquisitive, “No toast by the way, thanks.” 

You have one of those clear phone cases, filled with a bunch of tiny pictures and stickers (and is that your credit card?). But wedged in front of all of those is Logan’s drawing. 

“Did you draw it?” He asks. 

You turn around, giggling, “No, I don’t draw. And anyway, I wouldn’t be drawing pictures of myself. I got it in an envelope under my door yesterday, photocopied it because I was scared it would bend in my phone case. I don’t know who drew it.” 

“Secret admirer?” 

Smiling, you say, “I don’t know. I won’t get my hopes up. But the person must definitely be fond of me to draw me like that.” 

“Like what?” He asks, unsure if he’s about to be offended. 

“I don’t know, just, so beautiful. I’m not saying I’m not pretty or anything, but this looks… I don’t look like that. I wish I did. I can’t believe someone actually sees me like that. It’s stupid but I….” You trail off and, conveniently, the toast is done at the same time and you move on to that. 

But Logan won’t let you, “What’s stupid?” 

You turn towards him with a shy smile, “I’m embarrassed.”

Logan stays silent. He can’t seem too pushy and draw attention to himself, but his silence makes you confess.

“I cried when I first saw it yesterday. It’s one of the best gifts I’ve ever gotten. And it’s the nicest compliment I’ve ever received, for someone to perceive me in such an artistic way.” 

Logan makes a noise of satisfaction and smiles, asking you to pass your phone so he can look at it more – pretending it’s his first time seeing it. If you think that way about it, maybe the three more lines he was going to add aren’t that important after all. 

The problem is that it makes him want to draw more, his stupid heart melting at your reaction to something he made– no, created. 

-

After a week, he figures he has to give in. Drawing another picture of you is on his mind twenty-four seven. 

It doesn’t help that he still catches you staring at the copy of it in your phone case lovingly more than once a day and you’ve put the original drawing in a special little frame on your nightstand. He thinks he’s sappy for drawing it but he doesn’t think the same of you for enjoying the drawing. 

This is for you. It’s not about him. He’s not an artist or anything like that, he’s just doing something kind for someone he cares about (which is honestly sappy enough but he tries to ignore that). He’s usually more of a silent carer but maybe that’s why he likes this. He’s not making it a grand gesture, not making it a thing that he’s the one drawing for you. It’s just for you to enjoy. 

He’ll just make this second drawing and silently put it in your room, and he’s the last person you’ll suspect. 

But of course now that he knows it means something to you, he can’t get anything right. He draws your hair too curly, then not curly enough. He draws your nose too big, then too small. Your eyes end up crooked. He can’t erase too much because it’ll look sloppy, so even the drawing he gets almost perfect, he ruins with a few final additions at the end. 

It takes him an entire month for the next drawing, and it feels more like him that it’s been making him so angry that he couldn’t get it right at first. Maybe he had the wrong picture of artists. They’re always talking about pain, aren’t they, and that’s what he experiences too (over a drawing. Who is he?). 

He takes another few days to keep track of your routine, to monitor when you’ll be in your room. He can’t have it be as close as last time. 

He ends up doing it in the evening. There’s a time after dinner when most of the team stays together to watch tv, just talk, or play some games. It’s normal for some of you to wander off, come back or stick around a bit longer. It won’t be suspicious if he leaves for a few minutes and comes back.

Logan wants nothing more than to follow you when you say that you’re going to your room for the night; he wants to see your reaction. But he can’t. All he can do is go up to his own bedroom fifteen minutes later, lingering in the hallway longer than he needs to.

Just as he’s about to give up and go to sleep, you walk down the hallway, coming back from the bathroom.

“Logan!” you call all excitedly when you see him, and his heart skips a beat. Do you know the drawing is from him? 

“Look,” you take his arm and pull him to your room, “I got another drawing!”

He breathes out in relief; you don’t know it’s from him. He smiles when you hold up the drawing, already framed.

“Were you expecting to get another drawing?” he teases.

“Noo, but the frames came in a pack of two. Isn’t it gorgeous?”

Logan looks at how your eyes sparkle, how proudly you’re showing him this drawing. All the work he put into it was definitely worth it. It’s another picture of your face, this time from a new angle, and with your hair styled differently, curls coiled another way from last time.

Logan clears his throat, remembering to keep up his act. “It looks good.”

“Good?” you take the frame from his hands defensively, “It’s beautiful.”

He chuckles, “Sorry, I don’t know much about this type of thing. It is beautiful though.” He’s looking at you instead of his drawing.

“It is. And you don’t have to know much about art or drawing to see how pretty this is. I still can’t believe someone would take the time to make these for me.”

Logan remains silent instead of saying what he wants to tell you. Of course he would take that time for you – and you don’t even know how much time it really took him. If there’s someone who’s worth it, it’s you.

Seeing your pleased smile at something he made for you, he decides he’s never going to stop drawing you.

-

He’s on a roll for some time. He’s better at drawing again now that he’s getting in practice, and he makes five drawings of you within the next weeks. Logan watches the collection of them on your nightstand grow fuller, along with your smile that somehow gets bigger every time you tell him about a new drawing.

It’s a wonder you haven’t caught on yet, but you don’t seem particularly interested in snooping around to find out who it is. You respect the person’s privacy, but you’ve confessed to him that you’d still love to know. 

“I won’t try to find out who it is. I won’t push it if they don’t want me to know… but, I mean, anyone would want to know, wouldn’t they?”

You’ve adopted the nickname of ‘secret admirer’ for this mysterious ‘they’, after Logan used the term about ten times. You were reluctant at first, because the person isn’t calling themself a secret admirer – you’d just be putting words in their mouth. But after seeing how much more beautiful the drawings get each time, you’ve accepted and admitted that, okay, yes, the person must be an admirer.

Your secret admirer Logan is particularly proud of his latest drawing, excited to bring it up to your room tonight. 

But this time he’s sloppy. He’s stayed for a few post-dinner card games with the team, and it’s risky, because you’ve been saying that it’s your last game for the last two rounds. But he also knows that you always say that, and never mean it.

Logan gets up to leave, and he hears Scott convincing you to play just one more round.

It’s stupid, really, risking it like that. Even if he’s gone from your room in time before you come upstairs, you could easily guess that it’s Logan. He’s the first one leaving the round tonight, so your first assumption could be that it was him.

Maybe subconsciously he wants to get caught. He’s seen how you light up at every drawing, and no matter how much you respect your admirer’s anonymity, of course you want to know who’s dedicating so much time and work to drawings of you. Of course it’s crossed your mind that the person isn’t just doing this because they’re a good friend. They’re drawing your face because they think it’s beyond beautiful.

Logan doesn’t really know why he hasn’t told you yet that he likes you. He’s good at flirting, and he’s attractive – he’s not blind. But with you it’s different, there’s a bigger risk, for the both of you. The older he gets, the harder it is to open up to yet another person. You’re friends, and you talk about personal things, but confessing that he’s in love with you is different.

Not to mention this stupid recurring dream he keeps having, in which you find out it’s Logan who’s been drawing you, and suddenly your opinion of the drawings changes. You don’t like him back like that, and suddenly the drawings feel creepy if you think about him staying up late drawing your face.

He rolls his eyes at himself and gets the thought out of his head, taking the small envelope out of the back pocket of his jeans, smoothing his hand over it. He looks around, making sure no one sees him.

Logan bends down to slide the envelope under your door as usual, but one of the corners of the paper catches against the wall, and he quickly opens it to check the drawing isn’t damaged. His heart is beating so fast, he feels stupid. 

He can hear footsteps, still far away, but he can hear them. Logan messily licks the edges of the envelope to close it back up, but it’s not sticking. He can’t decide between shoving it under the door like this or leaving now and bringing it back the next day. He can feel his heart hammering against his ribcage now.

Then he hears it. He miscalculated how far the footsteps were.

“Logan?”

He turns around slowly, and it feels like the world has frozen.

You come closer, looking at him and then at the letter that he must’ve dropped. It hasn’t made it under your door yet.

He says something before you can, “I’m delivering for someone else.”

“Who?” you ask, bending down to pick up the envelope. If he wasn’t petrified, he’d enjoy the view of you bent over in front of him.

He breathes. He can’t have anyone taking credit for his work, for his art (you called it that recently, he would never). But his heart is beating so fast he doesn’t know what the fuck to do or say. 

This is exactly why he never wanted to do any of this. He’s making a fool out of himself and that doesn’t usually happen, especially not over a piece of paper. Logan is confident, cocky even, he can admit that, and has no idea how to deal with things like being nervous; he never has to. This really isn’t him.

You don’t wait for an answer and look at the envelope. You open it so carefully, gently taking the drawing out with your fingertips. You’re treating it with so much care he immediately feels better. Again, this isn’t for him, it’s for you. (Well, it’s for him too but it’ll take him a while to admit that). 

He’s drawn your smile this time. You were happy in most of the drawings before, but he focussed more on the eyes, and your lips only ever tugged up in a slight smile. 

This one is a full-toothed grin, mid-laugh. 

You two were drinking last weekend. He barely felt it but your tipsy, giggly mood was contagious. He couldn’t imagine himself feeling any other way but blissful when you’re happy around him. 

It started when Logan made a casual comment about something silly Scott was wearing that night, and he had you giggling. He wanted to immediately hear that angelic sound again, of course, and so he gave you every joke about your shared friends he could think of – all light-hearted, but he was still glad you two were alone. 

It was the stupidest joke of all that made you really laugh, some dumb comparison between Xavier and Caillou. You probably wouldn’t even giggle at it anymore now, but in the moment it was so funny you almost spat out your drink from the deep belly laugh he drew from you, holding onto his bicep so you wouldn’t fall over as tears formed in your eyes from how hard you were laughing. He wanted to engrave the image on his soul. At least he got your smile on paper.

You look up at him now, eyes filled with tears. 

“You drew this?” you ask.

He nods softly. He can’t say it but he hopes the drawings convey how in love with you he is. 

Suddenly, Logan feels like his heart has stopped beating.

You’re kissing him. 

You’ve leaped up, wrapped your arms around the back of his neck, and now your lips are on his. 

He feels your mouth falter, probably because he’s being a fucking idiot and not kissing you back. Logan places his hands on your waist to pull you further towards him. Then his brain finally catches up and he can do what he’s wanted to for so long. 

He takes your chin with two fingers and angles you so you can kiss him easier. He closes his eyes and revels in the feeling of your soft, warm lips against him. You’re soft and warm all over. Your top has slipped up over his fingertips at your sides, and he slides his hands further around your back to support you against him even better. 

Logan’s tongue pushes at your lower lip, and you let out the sexiest, tiny moan of surprise as you part your lips for him, granting him access. 

His tongue touches the tip of yours and from then on your cravings intensify. You feel your way over his muscular shoulders, his big biceps and over the hard planes of his chest. When you’ve had a good feel there, your hands grip his shirt in desperation and Logan gets even hungrier for you. He gently bites at your lower lip, but then you shriek into his mouth and squirm out of his grasp. He opens his eyes wide. 

You grip Logan’s forearm for support when you bend down in a panic, picking up the drawing you just dropped. You let out a big breath of relief when you see it hasn’t been damaged. 

“You made me drop it!” You slap a hand to his chest; it doesn’t actually hurt and it’s not meant to, but it leaves a pleasant tingle behind instead. 

“I didn’t do anything”, Logan laughs, and you shake your head at him with a smile.

You take him into your room where you make him sit on the bed while you stare at the new drawing in awe. “I didn’t know you draw”, you say without taking your eyes off it.

“No one else knows.”

You pretend to zip your lips, smiling, “It’s our secret.” Logan can tell that you like that. He likes it too. It feels much better to share a secret with you than to be keeping one from you.

“I’ll only draw for you anyway, so there’s no point in telling anyone else.”

“You’re really good. I love the drawings.”

Logan gives a satisfied hum at your words, “You inspired me. Can’t have you walking around all pretty and not expect me to try and recreate it.”

You straddle Logan and hover over his lap to hug him, “They’re the best thing anyone's ever given to me. Do I really look like that?” You say the last question more quietly, and Logan wraps his arms around your sides, careful not to bump your hand that’s still holding the drawing.

“You’re more gorgeous than anything I could ever capture, but I think it comes close. I didn’t change anything about you to make you more beautiful. I couldn’t if I tried. I just tried to draw you as accurately as possible, that’s why it’s so beautiful.”

“I really love it,” you say again, happily staring at the details of the drawing. Hearing you say the word love so much tempts Logan, but he doesn’t want to move too fast. He doesn’t want to overwhelm you. He does, however, want to kiss you again.

Logan carefully takes the framed drawing and puts it on your nightstand. You push your mouth against his before he can initiate the kiss, and he grins against your lips.

You don’t know how to put your feelings into words, so you’re kissing him instead. He pulls you down so that you’re not hovering over but sitting on his lap, and the mood immediately shifts to something different. Logan doesn’t want to overwhelm you, but if you’re ready then he’ll take anything he can get.

Your chest is pressed against Logan’s, and you can feel the rise and fall of his chest when he breathes. You may or may not be pressing your boobs against his body on purpose.

“God, baby, I’ve waited so long for this,” he says, already breathless, as his hands trail down your back, leaving goosebumps behind.

“You’ve waited long?” you raise your eyebrows, grinning, “I’ve wanted to fuck you since the day I met you.”

You see the look in Logan’s eyes changing as he bites his lip, “Who says I didn’t want the same?”

You giggle, “Why did it take us so long?”

Logan chuckles, readjusting you so that you’re even closer to him, “I was too busy to actually talk to you, just been starin’ at you so I could draw you.” His cheeks have the faintest red tint, and you kiss them, hugging him.

You whisper into his ear, “Then it was worth the wait. And anyway, it’s not talking that I’m interested in right now.”

He pulls you back to look into your eyes, then at your lips. “Where do you want me?” he asks. You giggle slightly helplessly; you weren’t entirely prepared to have a man like Logan at your mercy like this tonight.

“You can do whatever you want,” you say softly, kissing him.

Logan’s lips are hungry against yours, strings of spit falling between you two, but he pauses the kiss to lie you on your back. “Wanna eat you out,” he husks, “Been dying to know what you taste like forever, bub. Can I?” He reaches for the hem of your top, and you nod so that he can pull it off you, admiring what’s underneath. 

“Sometimes I make myself cum imagining that I’m going down on you,” you confess somewhat shyly, but you figure he’s been so vulnerable for you that you can share a secret too.

Logan smirks, and pulls off his shirt, “Maybe we can make your dream come true then.”

You move to sit up, but he insists on eating you out first. You both take off all your clothes, staring at each other with huge smiles on your faces for a few moments. You’ve never seen Logan this happy.

“Look at you, baby. So pretty,” he leans down to kiss your lips, then down your neck, all the way to your legs. He spreads them, lying down between them as he all but drools at the sight of your wet pussy.

You get nervous all of a sudden. “It’s been a while,” you tell him. He looks up, taking your hand, enveloping it completely in his much bigger one.

“You sure about this? We can wait,” he gently kisses your knuckles, and a warmth spreads in your chest, slowing your heartbeat down a little.

“I’m sure,” you nod, and Logan comes up again to kiss you. The head of his hard cock catches against the space above your clit, and you both look down between your bodies. When Logan looks back up at you, his eyes are desperately begging you. You place your hand on his head, threading your fingers through his hair as he moves down your body.

“Such a pretty fucking pussy,” he mumbles into your thigh, kissing you there. You giggle, getting comfortable, your hand never leaving his hair.

Logan starts eating you out, his tongue gentle but determined against your clit.

“Taste so good, baby. Even better than I imagined.” You hum at Logan’s words, already feeling yourself come undone with his mouth on your wet pussy.

You sink further into the mattress when he starts sucking on your clit, licking into your pussy like a man starved every few moments, and your thighs squeeze around Logan’s head, and it’s even better than in his fantasies.

“Feels really good,” you tell him, pulling on his hair to stop yourself from moving too much, and Logan moans against your skin. Hearing your words motivates him even more, and he pushes two fingers into your wet pussy. He curls his fingers, rubbing up against that spot that makes you see stars.

Your back arches as you cum, Logan’s lips wrapped around your clit as your legs push harder against his head, and all he does is moan, revelling in the feeling.

Logan doesn’t stop licking your pussy until you’re tugging his head away by his hair, and he comes up for air with a grin on his face. You smile back, pulling him up to kiss him. You give yourself only a few seconds of recovery time before you make him sit down. You know you’d never have enough strength to actually make him get into a different position, but he lets you.

You push him onto his back, getting between his legs. You’re blinking up at him all prettily when you ask, “Can I suck your dick? Please?”

Logan huffs to himself because he can’t believe how hot you are, can’t believe that this is really finally happening. He tells you yes – he has no more words to describe how badly he wants this – and he watches you wrap your pretty lips around his cock.

It’s hard to grasp that it’s really you doing this right now – the woman he’s been into for so long. His cock is in your mouth and you look so gorgeous with spit running down from your lips, and all he can think of is all the dirty drawings he can now make of you, if you’ll let him.

He closes his eyes when you take him deeper, enveloping him with your warm, wet mouth. “Good girl,” he whispers absent-mindedly, too gone to say much more.

You’re not using your hands as you suck his cock, your spit trailing down on him, and you’re so eager. But it’s also late, and he sees you getting tired, eyes blinking slower as you pause to catch your breath every few moments. He also sees the determination in your eyes, and the absolute want, but he doesn’t want you to exhaust yourself. 

You look so sexy all fucked out, strings of spit connecting your mouth to his cock as you pull away another time, giggling up at him shyly when you realise that he’s noticing you getting tired.

“Just need a second,” you wipe your mouth, out of breath, and it’s not that you’re not incredibly hot like this, but he still wants to fuck you tonight and he’s not sure that will happen if you keep going.

“C’mere, baby,” he says, reaching out his hand.

“Huh?” you ask, taking his hand nevertheless.

“Get back here, baby. I’m gonna fuck you now, alright? Don’t want you tiring yourself out.”

You let him lift you and put you on your back, but you pout, “Wanna taste you.”

Logan grins, “I’ll cum in your mouth, princess. Promise.”

You smile at his answer, satisfied, so you lie back down, pulling your legs up to your chest. His cock looks huge as he jerks himself off between your legs, rubbing the tip against your clit, making you squirm.

“Don’t know if I can take you,” you bite your lip. You’re not entirely sure if you mean it or not. You definitely want to try.

“We’ll make it fit, baby, we’ll make it fit,” Logan assures you, leaning down to press a kiss to your mouth, a mix of your wetness and his precum between your mouths. You feel his cock at your pussy, “You ready?”

“I’m ready,” you nod desperately, letting him push his cock into your pussy. He pauses after a few inches, but you wrap your legs around his waist more tightly, and he goes deeper.

“Y’okay, baby? You can take it, right?”

You nod, unable to form words with your pussy stretched like this, a combination of pleasure and pain between your legs – but it’s infinitely more pleasure.

“That’s right. You’re my good girl, hm?” He kisses along your neck as he bottoms out, and you both moan when he’s got his cock fully stuffed inside you for the first time. He pulls out slightly when you whine at the stretch, but you scratch down his back to get his attention.

“I can take it,” you tell him, and you watch the look in his eyes darken.

He begins to fuck you, the pain subsiding more with every thrust into your wet pussy. You can barely take him, but it feels good. With your slight tiredness, you feel like you’re floating on cloud nine. 

You can’t believe that Logan – your super hot friend Logan who you’ve been fantasising about for so long – is fucking you. He not only feels the same way about you, but he’s been your secret admirer this entire time, taking hours and hours out of his day to make you smile. You’re the only one he wants.

And now he’s fucking you, fucking you well, and you feel so warm inside, not just from the sex but you feel warm in your heart, because of Logan’s care.

“You okay?” he asks, stroking a hand down your face when he notices you’re not entirely present. You nod happily, smiling up at him, and you can’t talk because you feel so good.

“Good, that’s good, bub, but let me know if it gets too much,” he says as he starts rubbing your clit, watches you nod while he’s fucking you so well, and he’s so big and so deep inside of you, “Squeezing me so tight, baby, feel so fucking good.”

You cum suddenly, letting the warm pleasure flow through your body as Logan keeps fucking you through it, rubbing your clit in just the right rhythm.

“That’s my girl, taking it so well,” he moans, breaths stuttering. You slump against the pillow after a few moments, with a soft smile on your face, and Logan pulls out.

“Gonna make me cum, baby,” he jerks his cock, and you sit up on your elbows immediately, looking him in the eyes with a smile as you stick out your tongue for him. He promised.

Logan moans when he cums, painting your face in his release, jerking himself off. He holds your head in place with his other hand, aiming for your mouth but you’re making no effort to catch his cum there.

“Such a pretty fucking face, princess, ’m cumming all over it,” he rasps, shooting more ropes of his cum all over your cheeks, jacking off onto your face.

You open your eyes when he’s done and breathing heavily, and you smile up at him. You open your mouth, taking the head of his cock between your lips to suck off the last drops of cum.

“Look at you, baby. Look so fucking pretty with my cum all over your gorgeous face.”

You hum, pulling your mouth off him and licking your lips, tasting his salty release. You brush a finger over your cheek, sucking it into your mouth to taste him more. Logan kisses you then, the flavour of himself mixing between your mouths.

He cleans you up gently, carefully wiping your face with a baby wipe and kissing every inch of your cheeks afterwards. You take his face to kiss him properly, and if you didn’t seem so tired Logan would be ready for round two immediately.

“Next time you could try to actually cum in my mouth,” you tease, making Logan grin.

“Sorry, baby. Got too excited. Couldn’t focus on asking you again if it was okay.” He presses an open-mouthed kiss to your lips.

“It’s okay,” you tell him, “I liked it.”

Logan grins, “Oh I could tell you liked it, baby.” You lightly slap his chest as you giggle, pulling him in for another kiss.

You cuddle for a while, not saying much because you don’t have to. You’ve both waited for this for so long that you’re just enjoying the moment, enjoying that it finally happened.

You slip out of his arms to sit on top of him. You’re in nothing but panties, the blanket bunching around your hips. You lean your hands against his chest as you tell him more about how much the drawings delighted you. And Logan cares, of course he cares to hear that, but he’s also just a man seeing the woman he’s into naked for the first time still. 

You become quiet when you realise that he’s not listening, and you giggle, “Distracted?”

Logan grins, “Just a little fucking bit, baby.” His eyes don’t leave your body, and you laugh as you bend down to kiss him. He grabs your ass, kneading the flesh. When you slightly sit up again, your tits are near his face, and he can’t help himself. He cups your breasts, playing with your nipples, making you hum.

“I should draw these,” he looks up at you, “Should draw every perfect fucking inch of you.”

“You wanna?” You adjust how you’re seated in his lap, and you feel that he’s already half hard under you again.

“Maybe after I’ve fucked you again.”

You smile, feeling yourself growing wetter on top of him.

“Tomorrow,” he continues, and your smile drops.

“But you’ve got to get more familiar with the inspiration, right? If you’re going to draw me.”

“That’s true, baby. But I think you’re too tired.”

You smile bashfully, ignoring how your eyelids were drooping shut just a few seconds ago, “Okay, but then I’ll have more energy for tomorrow.”

“That’s my girl,” he smiles, pulling you off him to cuddle you again. He tucks you in and kisses your head. 

You turn to your side, taking one of the framed drawings and looking at it for a while. 

Logan watches you looking at it, and the sparkle in your eyes never fails to make him feel all warm inside. “Now that you actually know about it, I don’t have to draw you from memory anymore. I can study my muse in peace.”

“Aww, I’m your muse?” you beam.

“Of course you are, princess. You’re the only reason I’m drawing again.”

“I love your drawings so much.”

Logan clears his throat, and looks at you. “Well, I love you. So, I think that went into them.”

You look at him, pouting and then kissing him. “I love you too,” you say into his mouth. He grins against your lips, pulling you closer to kiss you some more. He can barely grasp that you just said that, but he’ll have enough time soon to comprehend how lucky he is. 

For now, he takes your hand, and asks, “The question might be redundant now, but do you wanna be mine? Be my girlfriend?”

“I’m already yours.”

Logan grins, takes you in his arms, and you’re still cuddling when you’re both drifting off to a peaceful sleep.

P.S. reblog with a comment and let me know your favourite moment/what you liked to get a drawing from Logan under your door tonight and a facial <33

gorgeous divider by @pommecita

[symbiomancy]

be aware wolf —werewolf

—summary: you venture into the woods to hunt for werewolves | 1.5k | AO3 | monster masterlist

—warnings: monster x human, monsterfucking, p in v sex, knotting, creampie, stomach bulge, mounting, outdoor sex, implied voyeurism

It’s a simple cycle. Enter the woods. Keep the local werewolf population under control. Retrieve any animal carcasses you come across in the woods. Make pelts out of said carcasses. Keep them or sell them. Receive payment from the town for your hard work. Pack your things and find the next town with a werewolf problem.

There are quite a few steps, but it’s a simple, straightforward cycle.

You sling your shotgun onto your back and place a hand onto the handgun at your hip. Your other hand rests on the belt of silver bullets around your hips. The ground is dry and this place hasn’t seen rain in weeks. There are no tracks to go off so you settle for scouting tufts of fur.

Something catches in the corner of your eye as you step around a grand oak.

You whip your head to the side and meet the pair of yellow eyes from the distance. It’s late August, and the blessing of the summer solstice only lasts so long. The sun is long gone and the full moon has crested. Darkness creeps around you, the tall trees shielding you from the moon’s glow. A cool breeze caresses your bare arms. You can just about make out the creature’s outline in the shadows. It’s large, maybe about 6 feet tall.

Slowly, you slip the shotgun from your shoulder and raise the barrel in the wolf’s direction. You whistle.

“Here boy,” you call. The pair of eyes blink at you languidly. “C’mere. I got treats for ya.” Indeed, you do; an opened pack of beef jerky in your back pocket. “C’mon, I have a whole pack of you to hunt tonight and I like to be efficient with my time.”

The werewolf rises onto its hind legs. Oh, great, you think, there’s different species in the same genus for these fucks. Perhaps 8 feet tall is more accurate.

You adjust your hold and cock the shotgun.

The werewolf is gone in a blink.

Your pulse picks up and you whirl on your heel, shotgun still raised. These things are fast, always are but they’re also big. How hard is it to shoot one?

The sound of a branch breaking has you whirling around, finger on the trigger to take the shot —

A claw strikes out at you and catches on your belt, ripping it like it’s paper. Your belt and the bullets in their holster disappear from your waist, your pants ripped and a superficial gash in your hip. You lose your footing on a protruding root and fall onto your back, barely keeping your head from slamming against a thick root.

The werewolf drops onto all fours legs, standing over you, its front paws planted on either side of your head. Its warm breath fans against your face, your arms. Its teeth are bared. Saliva dribbles from its maw.

You spare a glance away from its face to assess your situation — maybe there’s a way to roll out from underneath it and scramble towards your shotgun, wherever it landed. Instead, you find yourself staring at its bulbous member, fully erect. It’s long and thick, precum glistening on its tip. You look away, heat flooding to your cheeks and cunt. In your defense, it looked at you first.

You slowly draw your foot back and strike out, hit the beast’s hind leg. It howls in pain and you scramble out from underneath it, roll onto your stomach and stumble upright. Your shotgun is just a few steps to the right.

A heavy weight slams into you from behind and sends you onto the ground. Your jaw collides with the ground and your teeth snap together. You groan, rest your weight on one elbow and place your free hand against your jaw, pressing against the sore muscles. Hot breath fans the back of your exposed neck and something heavy and slick presses against the flesh of your hip. U kick again and scramble forward, your gun just about in reach. Claws swipe at ur body, snag on your shirt and tatter ur barely intact pants.

The cool night air hits your throbbing cunt. You try to ignore it, want to ignore it so bad, to finish the job and go take care of yourself — the werewolf shoves its fanged snout against the back of your neck. You still, heart leaping in your chest. Its heavy member rests on the swell of your ass, hips rocking back and forth, shallow thrusts as if it’s looking for a warm hole. Your pussy clenches at the thought.

It finds that warm hole, pressing its cock against your entrance, just barely breaching it, and you groan. It’s not going to fit but damned if the beast won’t try to make it fit. Maybe it will fit. The wolf grabs your waist — fuck, it’s hand is big enough to nearly wrap around your entire torso — and jerks its hips forward. You gasp as it pushes in all at once, filling you so completely, so deliciously that you nearly see stars. It’s so big and thick, you swear you can feel every vein and ridge of it.

The wolf snarls, beads of saliva dripping onto the back of your neck and thrusts forward shallowly. You struggle onto your knees. It pulls out shallowly and thrusts back in until the bulb at the bottom of its shaft nudges against your pussy.

Heat pools in your stomach as the werewolf drags its cock in and out of your hot cunt. The ridges and veins of his cock feel like bliss, have you gasping for air. Its furry hips connect with yours, the sound of your bodies colliding muffled by his coat. But you’re so wet, every thrust into your sopping cunt is nothing but a wet squelch. It thrusts in without resistance, going in all the way and pulling out with ease. It pushes so deep into you, drags against your walls like nobody ever has. Your thighs are wet, almost shaking at the strain of holding yourself up on all fours.

Your hand slips out from underneath you and your shoulder collides with the ground. The werewolf presses forward — it mounts you, places a clawed hand next to your head for balance and drives in with newfound vigor. The tip of its cock hit so deep in you that you nearly see stars, try to blabber something, something incoherent between ‘no’ and ‘yes’ and ‘more’ and ‘please please please please’. The wolf pistons in and out of our shopping cunt. Its tongue lolls out of its mouth, slobbers onto the back of your neck. The bulb at his crotch nudges against our opening with every thrust and dives slightly in each time. It’s wide and big and you gasp a pitiful sound when it slips into you with a painful stretch. It’s too much and too little at the same time. You try to clench around it.

The werewolf pauses and you want to cry out, beg it to keep going, to bully its way into your pussy until you can take its knot. You’re so full, so full, this thing is everywhere, in your pussy, in your guts, in the back of your throat. All you can manage is a pitiful croak before the beast is back on you again, resting its weight on your back. It picks up the pace, ruthlessly pistoning into you, bullying your throbbing, leaking pussy, rutting his bulb against it, almost stuffing it inside. It places one large clawed hand onto your thigh and pulls it to the side like that will give it more room. Perhaps it does but the stretch of your cunt and your thighs is too overwhelming to not focus on.

You press back against him as much as u can from your contorted position, meet his hips with urs in a frantic attempt to get your release. Your chest heaves as you attempt to match his pace, pressure building in the pit of your stomach. You’re babbling now, you absolutely are, begging for it to push you over the edge and stuff you full. It speeds up as if it understands you, pressing its weight on top you. Your cheek scrapes against the ground and in the corner of your eye, you can make out the bulge in your stomach as the werewolf thrusts in. It’s too much, too good, too deep, rubbing against that spot, knocking the breath from your lungs with every thrust.

You come with a wail, pussy throbbing and clenching around its cock, sucking it back in to keep it there. The wolf howls, head thrown back and buries its knot inside you. Its cock spasms and spills into you. Rope after rope of hot cum coasts your insides until you’re full, and then some. You feel it slide down your thighs, dribble from your pussy. You try to adjust yourself to get a look and clench involuntarily around the beast when you spot the shape of his cock protruding from your stomach.

The cool night air feels pleasant against your heated skin.

You look away from the unholy sight buried in your guts and let your eyes unfocus to bask in your post-orgasmic bliss.

One, two, three, four —

There are at least four pairs of yellow eyes observing you from the darkness.

note: I'm open to hearing about dead batteries!! be as graphic or non-graphic as you'd like:)

banner & divider by @/cafekitsune

[wroteclassicaly]

18+

Warnings: Language, smut, and NSFW. Reader uses lipstick on Eddie’s back.

~*~

When you let Eddie use your naked back as a place to outline his campaign plan with his figurines, in exchange, also using your lipstick on his body for a little extra fun…

It’s a story that will be for the history books, it will. Eddie running out of paper and forgetting to add it to his convenience store list - a tale as old as time, really. Having to rely on one sheet you���d scrounged from your small pocket journal — with minimal space for game plan, Eddie was irritated. But you’d been in a playful mood all day, teasing him, taunting him, wearing that oversized t-shirt with a printed bouquet of flowers on it, and having the audacity to change out of your normal underwear for a thong.

“You’re not wearin’ any underwear there, sweetheart,” he says, watching your shirt ride up and the fat of your ass spill out around the thin piece of fabric.

You hum, chewing on your gum, blowing a bubble that touches your cute nose, acting nonchalant — ergo, making Eddie Munson go crazy. “Yes I am, and you know it.”

He pinches the bridge of his nose, continuing to rifle through his things, before giving up. He knees his way into the bed with you, arm tossing around your shoulders, kneading tension with a mannerism, in which, only he can provide for you. You form a plan quickly, reaching for your discarded purse on his nightstand, forgoing your magazine to show him an extremely bright, neon red lipstick. “Here’s a pencil.”

“And just what do you propose, little devil of mine?” He’s amused, mirth glittering in those chocolate eyes when you turn into his cheeky smile.

“You’ve got a pencil - check. Well, I do. But that’s for later.” You place the lipstick aside. “And you need a canvas, right?”

He’s nodding slowly, eyebrow raised. “Well established, yes.”

You perform an erotic act next, one that Eddie can’t describe. You reach back to yank on your hem, tugging your shirt up your back until it’s around your neck, then you lift your head, slide it down your arms, and fling it across room — without even showing him just a glimpse of your beautiful tits. He’s cursing, jaw dropping. And then you’re propping on your tucked arms. “A fleshy expanse, for lack of better word terms.”

“You… I… you’re shittin’ me.”

You shake your head. “Nope. Write down a general idea on your paper, then act it out on my back. But only if I get to have a little fun of my own on yours.”

Eddie thinks he’s passed on again. But as you relax back down, he immediately gets to work outlining on his one sheet of paper. It’s done after what feels like forever, but has been half an hour (he hasn’t finished, needing a halfway break by your distraction.) It’s enough for him to slide off his bed and go grab his little figurines he normally maps out on a bigger sheet of paper. You sigh with their tiny little presses, Eddie muttering out commands to them, lining them, shifting. And your ass wiggles a bit, causing him to lose all focus.

He tosses everything aside and it clatters to the floor, but you’re rushing him before he can even adjust the growing hardness between his legs. You shove him onto his stomach, straddling his backside in surprise, a giggle as you sweep the curls off his naked shoulder blades, his ears perking up as he hears the cap click off your lipstick.

“Babe…” he warns, a whine dipping off his hot mouth.

“Shh, you had your fun, now it’s my turn.” And Eddie awaits your ‘fun’, cock trapped between his stomach and the mattress, throbbing.

It’s a weird sensation to have your makeup marking his way — cool and kinda sticky. He doesn’t resist the smirk at his own joke. But he’s curious, he’s turned on, he’s a hot rod smoking at the wheels. And only does he let out the extreme breath he’s been holding, when he hears the cap return. You blow along his back, causing his nipples to perk, and he is lifting himself up.

He can’t wait anymore. He doesn’t care what you’ve drawn on him (an attempt at a bat with heart eyes), he’ll find out later… You’re already consenting with blown pupils and a matching nod, lipstick landing on the dresser across the room from a careless throw. Eddie’s voice is a low rumble, practically making his chain bounce from its echo. He licks his mouth, the corner of his lip, and he speaks. “Turn back around for me, pull your thong down.”

You comply, soaked and ever-so-willing. It makes him cocky, giddy. His sweats catching on his cock as he lowers them below his ass. He can’t wait. Spreads your cheeks apart to see how you glisten for him, how messy your curls are, and ring clad fingers spread you open and he watches, spare hand jerking himself with his pre to slick up. His hands finds yours over the headboard as he takes you, across your sticky flesh, the lipstick stained bat moving when the muscles beneath his skin do…

[minnie-cai]

I had a dream of sleeping over nerd!Arts dorm room, it was storming outside and he refused to let me go walk out on my own I was on hid bed and he was working on something hes reading a book with his glasses low on his nose and was only in a white shirt and sweats where his junk was almost out. I was so horny I just straddled his lap and started going crazy, he ended up shoving my face against his pillow pounding me from behind fucking me while he kept his glasses on <3

𝑰 𝑴𝑬𝑨𝑵 “𝑪𝑨𝑴𝑨𝑹𝑨𝑫𝑬𝑹𝑰𝑬” !

that’s so crazy i actually had the exact same dream last night so here’s something i wrote about OUR dream

not proofread, bless your eyes, it’s 2 am and my eyes are basically shut.

rating ; mature. smut. it’s smut. leave if you’re a minor. or don’t. i can’t stop you. actually i can. i will find you. and take away your phone.

oh nerdy!art my beloved, where he’s the sweetest guy you’ve ever met and he’s stumbling over his tongue awkwardly as he tries to flirt with you but it turns out his tongue was made for bigger things.

and it’s so weird the first time you fuck because you fall next to him on the mattress, out of breath, sweaty and high on orgasms and suddenly, all you had heard about nerdy guys being good in bed was confirmed.

you start dating, he holds your hand around campus sweetly and all of your friends love him. you’d heard the lore of all of tolkien’s writing at least a hundred times as you played with his hair but you’d hear it thousands if he asked. you give him head under his desk as he does your assignment for you and he cums all over his thighs and panics, rushing trying to find a towel or a dirty t-shirt as he babbles apologies and squirms because he hasn’t even properly finished yet.

after a few months of dating, it’s totally casual and normal for you to stay over at his single dorm after you’ve complained about how annoying your roommate was, under the condition, of course, that you’d let him study when he needs to. you promised.

you were lying in his bed, wearing a hoodie he’d lend you after you’d softly fucked with the rain pattering on the window. you pouted and twisted the fabric of the sweater in boredom. art was sweet, sure. he’d made you finish first like a gentleman, cleaned you up and dressed you but you just found it so annoying that he managed to move on to studying right after sex. you stared at him and stared and stared as he sat in his chair, his foot resting on the desk as he read a book he was assigned with his lips lightly agape and his round glasses low on his nose.

the grey sweats he’d thrown on quickly after he got out of bed being a size down from his normal one, giving you the great view that was the outline of his semi-hard cock.

as you’re thinking and just admiring him, you hear him sniff and he swallows, his adam’s apple bopping with the movement. and suddenly, yet again, your panties are wet. what is this boy doing to you?

“artie….” you mewl gently from the bed, your legs twisting under the sheets as you try not to press your thighs together. “is it gonna take long?”

“i wanted to finish at least two chapters by class tomorrow, why?” he mumbles as he moves on to the next page, licking his fingers so that the paper doesn’t stick together but the only thing you can think of is him licking his fingers and playing with your clit as he mumbles compliments against your collarbone.

“nothing… just a bit bored…” you respond as you start to stand up but he just hums, not looking up from his book. when you reach his chair and lean against the back of it with your elbows, moving your fingers to run through his hair, scratching his scalp gently, his head falls back against your chest and he lets out a breathy grunt.

when you moved to straddle his lap, that was his last straw. “you’re kidding…” he mumbles in a soft but raspy voice with a sweet smile when you roll your hips against him. his glasses threatening to fall off his nose and his curls falling messily on his forehead, times like these is when you really take a look at him and realize how gorgeous he is, like he’s trapped a ray of sun inside his eyes.

“huh?” you giggle, almost breaking this innocent character you’d built up. “i don’t know what you mean.” you shake your head with a gentle smirk and furrowed eyebrows, your eyes narrowing as you try your hardest to look confused and hold back your laugh.

“oh you don’t? oh really?” he says with an amused laugh and raised eyebrows. “i- yeah?- rea- really?” he starts with narrowed eyes but he ends with a scoff and a small smile as he realises he wasn’t sure what he really wanted to say and was just stuttering nonsense. “you don’t know what i mean? you want me to show you what i mean?” he chuckles with a sarcastic attitude, looking up at you through furrowed eyebrows.

“i might need you to show me what you mean.” you laugh but it’s cut short by a shriek when art throws you over his shoulder, laughing. “what are you doing?” you cry out as he stands still in front of his twin bed for a second, contemplating before he decides he doesn’t want to throw you on it and gently sets you to sit on the bed. he pauses and folds his arms, looking down at you, the smile not fading from his face. “what are you looking at me for? c’mon, pretty! down and on your belly.” he says, snorting at his own tone.

“down and on your belly? where did you come from? orderin’ me around!” you say surprised by his newfound confidence before following his instructions. “i’m not sure, i like it though.” he replies laughing before settling on the bed, his knees on each of your sides as he pulls down your panties, pulling your hips up, carefully raising them.

his hands hold their position on your hips when he inserts into you, making you sigh shakily. he grunts as he feels the warmth of your walls enveloping him. his head falling forward, his eyes shut.

moments after, he pulls himself back together, pushing his glasses back to the bridge of his nose and moving his hands to push down your back, your body being smashed against the mattress by his warm palms and when he moves to rut into you, you leave out a moan, muffling it with the pillow.

by the time he is close to cumming, full on whines and whimpers fall out through his lips, his thrusts getting quicker as he chases his release. “so pretty… fuck.. ugh- so good…” he babbles and his upper body connects to your back, folding forwards to try and handle the pleasure as you suddenly feel the cold material of his glasses against the skin of your neck which you felt was burning, the sensation making you shudder.

“please, baby… i’m- i’m close…” he blabbers on your neck, leaving small wet kisses against it as his rhythmic pace gets rougher.

when you both cum, whining and moaning like hormonal teenagers and fall back against the bed, he wraps his arms around your head, pulling you into his chest. “that was really, really hot-“ he pauses, taking a long deep breath “don’t do it again.” he finishes and laughs, pulling away to wipe the fog off his glasses with his your shirt.

[yanderemommabean]

Yandere red room idea

The Red rooms. It’s not something He really thought he’d find himself using but here he is, walking up the corridor with a key card in his pocket. It’s definitely a secret society type of deal, code words, secret hand gestures, one use keys, all the security one could imagine. The first time he even heard of such a place like this, he assumed it was dark internet fetish mumbo jumbo. 

But after he found you, well, the right people found him and led him to the right place. Not a room of pain, but one of pleasure, to show his darling all of his intense love and emotion and then some. 

He hasn’t even booked a room yet, he’s here as a sort of consultation visit. To see if he really has the balls to do this and show that yes, he adores you, and that his love outweighs anyone else’s. 

Sliding the card into the door brought him into an empty room besides a desk, a few chairs, and two large filing cabinets. He takes a look around, quickly surveying the area, before stepping inside fully and sitting in the chair facing the large office chair in front of him. Before he can let his shoulders relax, a man follows in behind him, followed by a woman as well, both dressed professionally and seeming very…happy. 

“Ah! It’s good to see you, Mr-” 

“Lee, you can just call me Lee. And you are?” He asks, gesturing to the woman standing beside the man in the suit as he begins to open a manilla envelope, spreading the papers out on the table. 

“Victoria. We can leave it at that. I can tell that you know secrecy and customer privacy are our top priority with this business” She says with a knowing smile, sliding the papers over to face them towards the doctor.

“Now, Lee, What we have here is a very basic outline of what we can do for you and that love bug you’ve found yourself. We celebrate rather than punish our loved ones here, and want them to understand that to their core! We find that the red room experience helps!” The man exclaims with excitement, but has yet to really introduce himself. 

Lee was told to expect that however. The leader behind this all was kind enough to reach out but he wasn’t to expect anything too personal. “All business” was his very aura, and Lee could respect that. He nods along as Victoria took the reigns, explaining some of their core beliefs before getting to what Lee really wanted to know. 

“We can make the room however you please, lease it for up to four days at a time with personnel who checks in every four hours with their own special keys, for the darlings sake. As much as we wish to fully trust our customers, we will not take the risk of them dying or being seriously injured in any way. As stated, this is a way to show love and we give you the tools to do so! “ Victoria then spreads apart the papers, pointing here and there as she explains a bit more, intriguing Lee with every bit. “We have romantic layouts like at a hotel, we have BDSM specialist rooms, we have very highly rated toys and devices that we inspect and clean before each room is ready, and we have a live stream option if you’re the type who thinks everyone should see the pleasure you’re darling is receiving! I personally recommend the tribbing machines with the black rose theme if you prefer the dom and sub type of vibe, but we can personalize however you like!” 

Huh. Wow. They’re very thorough aren’t they? 

The business man nods, sitting back in his seat as he adjusts his tie. “I started many companies in my life, all based on bringing smiles and joy, and it’s my personal belief that there needs to be a company looking out for your lover! Love, adventurous or more mellow, is a beautiful thing that our darlings need to be showered in as much as possible. If you’d like, this can also be set up in a way to just calmly express your love to your darling, but I will clarify that it isn’t guaranteed to go well…I advise getting our crews to pick them up and deliver them for you, with every person being given a  background check of course! Safety and security is what comes first for your darling” 

Lee was a bit flabbergasted to say the least. They talk so professionally, have such a strange ethic to them, and they act as if he’s about to buy a company or large house rather than finally get ahold of the love of his life. It’s…Odd but charming. He can’t say he’s turned away from this, in fact he has a few ideas for his own red room. 

“Are they CPR trained and do they have basic first aid knowledge?” Lee asks as he looks over some more of the photos, liking the array of toys they had up for use to add to the room, each one costing extra of course but for what he had planned…it wouldn’t be too bad. 

Victoria smirks, laughing lightly in amusement “I can see we’ve caught even more of your attention. We can make sure these personnel are trained for the pick up, but our permanent staff are already trained in first aid help and some, even small surgical emergencies. You know, always needing to be prepared and all”. 

They talk  a few more things out, Lee deciding that if these people were serious, then he could trust them. If they crossed him in any way, he’d easily rid at least a handful of them. He didn’t get that gut feeling he usually does when people are lying to him however. This felt thorough and legit and well…Professional. 

“It’s a pleasure doing business with you Mr Lee. We’ll be getting in touch with you shortly! You wont regret setting this up-” the business man says with a firm handshake, smiling in an almost uncanny way. “And remember, when you’re in a bind, one of our smiles will ease your mind"

-Mommabean (This was so silly but I hope you enjoyed nonetheless!)

[wynnyfryd]

Trailer park Steve AU pt 67

part 1 | part 66 | ao3

cw: recreational drug use

Waiting around to die or get arrested or whatever fucking sucks. Partly because there’s no running water (Steve’s never wanted to take a stress shower so badly in his life) and partly because Eddie won’t let him stay sober. Has it in his head that altering Steve’s mental state will keep Vecna away, like hanging a mosquito net over the opening of a tent.

It’s not not working, he guesses.

He hasn’t fallen in to any more hallucinated open graves, at least.

He comes down the stairs a little before noon, towel-drying his hair after a bottled water sink bath, and finds Eddie in the kitchen: Reeboks on, hair a cotton candy mess, head-to-toe teddy bear tie-dye under his leather jacket — a matching shirt and sweats that he fished out of Rick’s dresser. He’s stirring Spaghettios in a small pot at the stove, and when he sees Steve come in he turns to offer some, the wooden spoon held out with a sort of desperate perkiness. “Morning! I found food that isn’t expired. You want some?”

Steve shakes his head.

Eddie shovels the whole spoonful into his mouth; wipes sauce off his chin, speaks before he’s finished chewing. “I also found blotters in the freezer and shrooms in the bedroom closet, so uh. Pick your poison.”

Steve picks the shrooms. They wait a few hours to take them because Eddie swears the sunset while you’re tripping is unparalleled, man, although Steve kind of suspects that he’s just giving him time to work up the nerve to eat them. He still gets nervous about chemicals — probably always will, after the shit the Russians did.

In the meantime, Eddie rummages through Rick’s cassette collection, and Steve talks to Robin on the walkie; gets all the new details in staticky half-sentences — something about mind flayers and mental hospitals, what else is new? He tells her to be safe; tells her that he loves her; keeps his eyes trained on the clock.

—

Shrooms smell and taste like ass. Steve can’t stomach them; spits into the grass while Eddie laughs sympathetically and hands him a little square of paper to put on his tongue instead, and they spread out side by side on a few old beach towels by the water and wait for it to kick in.

Nothing, at first, not that Steve expected different. Twenty minutes; forty-five.

“Still nothing?”

“Nothing.”

And then.

Eddie holds up a glossy aquamarine pebble, squinting at its glow in the late afternoon sun. “I should give this rock to Skye. Bet she’d love it.”

“That’s a shard of glass.”

Eddie blinks at it. “Oh, shit.”

Steve snorts, and when he looks at Eddie sideways there’s a glimmer of that same cerulean shade outlining his whole body, a low-frequency feather of energy rolling off of him in waves. Eddie moves his arm and the color chases it, a long-exposure photo of high beams on rain-slick roads.

“Oh,” Steve says, mouth slack. His voices echo in his head; all six of them. “I think I’m…”

“Yeah?” Eddie asks, eyes alight, pupils blown.

“Yeah.”

All at once something slots into place, attunes itself inside of Steve, and it’s like… he can see Eddie’s mind; touch it, cradle it, reach out to it with its own. It feels crazy. Psychedelics are fucking crazy. He reaches out a hand, slicing through ribbons of shimmering light, tasting the colors as they fade, and Eddie’s emotions spread out in high-definition before him — like the image has always been there but now it’s crystal clear; someone’s shifted his focal point, filled a kiddie pool with Epsom salt and left him there to float.

“I see you,” he says nonsensically.

Eddie frowns. “I’m sorry.”

“…That I can see you?”

“I usually am.”

That’s not right. Eddie’s thoughts shouldn’t sour on his account, shouldn’t sag in the middle like a moldy tangerine. “I can close my eyes?”

“Fuck,” Eddie laughs, thin and strained. “Don’t say shit like that when I’m not allowed to kiss you.”

“You’re not?”

He hesitates. “Am I?” Antsy fingers drum the grass, overgrown with vibrant clover and dandelion stalks. “Just feel like we should talk first, if uh, if it’s safe.”

Steve probes his own mind, tests it for outside threats, but there’s nothing. The acid forms a fractal fortress. Penrose steps, paradoxical and strange. “It’s safe.”

He moves to lie on his side, invites Eddie to do the same. “Talk into the kiss,” he suggests when Eddie joins him — face to face, chest to chest, Steve can see the thrum of Eddie’s heartbeat in the hollow of his throat; wants to press his thumb to it, so he does, the sense memory of ripe cherries bursting on his tongue.

Eddie’s lips against his own; hovering. Static electricity like the scent of summer rain. “I think my pride makes me a coward.”

Steve rubs his dry lips across Eddie’s, chapped skin and shared heat.

“It’s like… I kept trying to tell myself that I was being… I don’t know, valiant, or some shit? Like, ‘oh, he’s so much better without me. I’m the town pariah; I’m keeping him safe by running away.’” He thumps his fist against his heart as if beating a shield to shining armor, and Steve can’t see his eyebrows with their foreheads pressed together, but he can feel Eddie scrunching them into a picture-perfect hero frown. Almost has to laugh — so fucking theatrical even when he’s serious.

“But if I’m honest,” Eddie murmurs, “it wasn’t like that at all. Nothing fucking brave about vanishing on you. Like, what?” His voice shifts again, lilting but critical, a comedian doing crowd work. “I get a liiiittle fucked up by townies two too many times, and I sabotage my whole life over it? Ruin the best thing I’ve ever had over it? As if this goddamn horseshit hasn’t been happening to me since— forever! Shit.” He blows his bangs out of his face; calms himself. Goes a little cross-eyed trying to look Steve in the eye. “I got scared, Steve. There it is. That’s the ugly truth of it.”

He swallows harshly in the dense silence that follows.

Robins chirp; cars pass.

The lake laps at the shore and casts prisms like fishing line, spiderwebs of rainbow light flashing behind Steve’s eyelids. He brings his hands up to Eddie’s face.

“Christ.” Eddie shudders; lets himself become dead weight, rubbing his cheek into the touch, warm stubble scratching over the pads of Steve’s fingers. “Am I making any sense? I feel like I’m not making any sense.”

Yes. No. “You’re making sense. I mean. As much as anything is right now.” The sandy brown freckles on the bridge of Eddie’s nose are swirling like snow flurries. Steve traces them with curious hands. His knuckles blur and swivel, too. “You left because… you wanted to protect me from… yourself?” He sums up, not sure if he’s getting the math right.

“I left because I’m a scared little shit who couldn’t handle getting bullied in a parking lot, but uh. Yeah. I guess I, like, didn’t want to…” His eyes go big and startled, cheeks flooding bright pink. “Oh, shit, I was about to say I didn’t want to curse you, Jesus Christ.”

Steve honks with laughter. Loud and deep and punched out without warning, because the irony of that — that there’s a literal big bad running around cursing people, and the person who was actually doing some real good in his life decided that he was the problem — it’s fucking— hilarious! Hysterical! Steve giggles himself sick, lungs burning as it tapers to a silent wheeze, and Eddie joins him, confusion giving way to compulsion; contagion in the manic giddiness spewing out of Steve.

“You thought—” Steve struggles through hiccups, tears beading in his lash line, “you thought you were the bad luck charm in this relationship?”

“Don’t mock me!” Eddie whines, still laughing. “I already said it was dumb.”

“It’s so dumb.” Eddie may be the cutest, dumbest thing he’s ever seen. He rubs his thumbs over his cheekbones, smile fading. “If anyone’s a curse, it’s me.” Four for four here on getting dragged into supernatural shit. Does Eddie really think homophobes are more dangerous than hell dimensions?

Eddie’s already shaking his head. “You’re a fucking blessing.”

Warmth radiates through Steve, drips from the crown of his head like a downpour of holy water. He feels anointed. Ascended. He feels— “Please tell me we’re allowed to kiss now.”

Their mouths crush together, impossible to tell who moves first, whose tongue is in whose mouth, whose desperate breath Steve swallows as Eddie rolls him onto his back. Hands roam and pull and clutch, molding the shape of him into the earth. Maybe someday, Steve thinks, if aliens invade, they’ll study these imprints like crop circles, trampled declarations of how much Steve loves this boy. “God,” he gasps into the kiss. “Missed you so much.”

“So much.”

“Don’t do that to me again. Don’t go.”

“Never,” Eddie swears. His grip tightens on Steve’s waist. “Never again, baby, I fucking promise. I think I—”

On the far side of the house, leaves crunch and branches snap as a car pulls up the drive. Boots on pavement, rowdy voices; unfamiliar; red alert.

“Spread out, boys!” the voice of Jason Carver bellows. “If that Freak’s in here, we’ll find him.”

—

part 68

tag list in separate reblogs under '#trailer park steve au taglist' if you'd like to filter that content. if you want to be added please comment and let me know (must be over 21; please either verify in the comment or have your age visible on your blog)

[boxofbonesfic]

Title: Return to Sender [5 of 7]

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Dark! Andy Barber x Reader, Ari Levinson x Reader

Summary: Andy Barber promised he would never let you go, and come hell or high water, he's going to keep that promise.

Warnings: Dubcon/Noncon, Kidnapping, Minor Violence, Gaslighting, Basement Wife Trope, Manipulation, Stalking, Obsessive behavior, Possessive behavior, Smut, MORE TAGS TO BE ADDED

A/N: 👀 is… is anyone still there? i promised i’d update this this weekend, and i delivered. an hour before midnight, but i delivered. 😅 i know it’s been a while for this fic, but it hasn’t been forgotten about. i really hope you all enjoy this latest installment, and please don’t hesitate to let me know what you think! as always, comments are great, reblogs are golden. thank you for reading, and mind the warnings. ❤️ divider by @firefly-graphics

 Where am I?

You stare blearily at the distant ceiling, dull and rusting metal beams criss-crossing over exposed brick. You reach out for Dove, and when your fingers meet empty air, your throat tightens as you remember. 

Pronge walking away with your baby, and Ari—

You sit up, your fingers knotted in the thin blanket. The repurposed garage office is still and silent, the springs creaking quietly underneath you. The air smells like old motor oil, singed rubber and citrus-scented antiseptic, and it burns your nostrils. You’re almost afraid to shatter the fragile silence with the sound of your movement, but it can’t be helped as you shove your feet back into your sneakers. The office is long abandoned, the desks all pushed up against the sides of the room to make space for the bed.

The hallway is slightly better, boxes of papers and car parts lining both sides, lit by old yellow florescent bulbs that give off less light than they should. There’s a dusty, unlit neon sign that reads Gary’s Auto-body, leaning against the wall. Down the hall, you can see that the light is on in the garage proper, this one bright and brilliant white. You squint as you pass through the doorway, spots dancing in front of your eyes as they slowly adjust to the light. 

In its previous life, this place had been a car mechanic’s garage, but now it serves as something like a speak-easy operating room. The car lifts have been mostly dismantled, and sitting on the concrete in the rusted outline of where they used to be are two operating tables. Ari is on one of them, speaking quietly to the man winding a length of beige bandaging around his right shoulder. 

Zemo. Ari called him Zemo.

“Mouse, you’re up.” You cover your mouth with both hands to stop the surprised squeak from reaching him. Guiltily, you peer around the door frame, waiting for a reprimand that doesn’t come. The “doctor” regards you with cold, calculating eyes. 

“So this is the young woman Mr. Barber is tearing the city apart to find,” he says. “How nice to finally meet you.” Andy’s name sends a cold shiver down your spine, and you clutch yourself. Zemo’s welcome feels less like kindness and more like tolerance. It makes you wonder how long you’ll be staying here. 

“You know Andy?” You ask, careful to keep your face as neutral as you can manage. 

Zemo scowls. “Well enough to know we do not get along.” He shakes his head, before regarding you with a cold smile. “Your husband has just as many enemies as he does friends.” Beside him, Ari sits up on the table with a pained grunt, swinging his legs over the side. 

“We can trust him, Mouse.” Ari offers you a watery smile. Nervously, you step closer, skirting around the now defunct counter as you attempt to give Zemo as wide a berth as you can manage. He either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care, cleaning his tools with a cloth before dropping them with a loud, metallic pap into the metal tray next to the table. 

“Are you okay?” You ask him in a quiet voice as you approach, fingers dancing nervously around the gauze. You shake your head, closing your eyes as you blow out an exasperated breath. “I mean, I know you’re not okay, but—” Ari places a warm hand over your own, a quiet laugh rumbling in his chest. 

“I’m okay.” 

“Lucky for you Pronge is a terrible shot.” Zemo quips. “He missed bone.”

“See?” Ari says, squeezing your hand tight before letting go. “I’m just fine.” 

“You’re not fine. You have a six millimeter hole in you.”  

“Semantics.” 

“Keep activity to a minimum. I shouldn’t have to tell you this,” Zemo replies dryly. “And keep it clean, I’m not going to do it for you. This isn’t a hospital.” You watch him pack up his tools, ferrying them over to the deep sink on the other side of the room. Ari slides off of the table with a grunt, and you watch him press his lips together as he stands upright, gritting his teeth against the pain. 

“Yeah, yeah, I got it.” Ari mutters, cutting his eyes at Zemo over his shoulder. “Six millimeters.” The doctor tosses him a worn looking cloth sling. Ari tries to fit it over his shoulder, and you rush to help him. “Thanks, Mouse.” Your cheeks warm with an uncomfortable heat. “I could have done it myself.” 

“This is all my fault,” you mumble angrily, shaking your head. “I have to do something.” You step back from him, tucking your chin. He rests a warm, comforting hand on your shoulder. 

“No it’s not.” 

“If I—If I hadn’t—” Guilt is an achingly heavy cowl about your sagging shoulders. 

“Mouse, what good is this going to do you?” The gentleness in his touch makes you flinch.

“As much as I am enjoying this conversation,” Zemo clears his throat. “I have my own wife and son to be getting back to.” You watch as he places his cleaned tools back into his bag. “Do remember what I said about your… hole.” He gestures to Ari’s injured arm with a grimace. “I’m rather keen on not amputating.” 

“You and me both.” Ari says. The two of you watch as he makes his way over to the front of the shop, pulling the metal garage door up enough to slip underneath it. “What time tomorrow?”

“Noon.” 

The garage door slams down hard onto the concrete, and then there is silence. You stand there awkwardly, twisting your t-shirt in your restless hands. They’re so used to holding the baby, without her sure weight in them they feel… useless. 

You feel useless. Adrift. 

And it isn’t just Dove—it’s everything. Despite what Ari says, you know this is your fault. He’d never have been hurt if you hadn’t been so fucking helpless. And it’s your own fault, you’d let your guard down, let Andy back inside, let him make a home inside your head, and it was your fault. 

“What are you thinkin’ there, Mouse?” Ari’s voice interrupts the self-depreciating internal monologue running rampant in your head. “I hope it’s about getting some sleep, you need it.” Again, his earnestness puts you on edge. You don’t know what to do with it—it feels alien to you now, almost like you’d prefer Andy’s smug cruelty—at least then you know what to expect. 

You don’t want to admit that you’re blaming yourself, thinking about all the ways you could have prevented this exact course of events just by being better. 

“Yeah,” you lie. “I’m exhausted.” If anything, you’re too awake, recalling last night’s events with perfect clarity. You can’t even look at Ari as the two of you silently make your way back to the repurposed offices, shuffling along beside him as your insides squirm. You feel too much to go to sleep, so many warring desires it feels like you’re being torn apart from the inside out.

You suppose that’s one thing you sort of miss about Andy—you didn’t have to think, didn’t have to feel. He did it all for you. You arrive back at your “room”, fidgeting nervously before you cross the threshold. You don’t think you can sleep in here now, now that the adrenaline has worn off. Now that the terror has been waylaid by your other earthly concerns. 

 Ari notes your hesitation. 

“I can stay with you util you fall asleep, if you don’t think you can.” 

You duck your head, shaking it emphatically. “I should be looking after you,” you reply, shooting him a look over your shoulder. “You should, um, rest.” Ari looks around, raising an eyebrow. Oh. There’s only one other bed—and it’s current occupant is currently snoring so loud you can hear it in here. 

“You sleep here, and I’ll—” You look around. “I’ll sleep in one of the rolly-chairs or something.” He laughs softly at your sudden determination. 

“You know I’m not letting you sleep on chairs, Mouse.” Ari rests a hand on your shoulder. “You take the bed.” 

“You got shot, Ari!” You hiss. “I-I-I can’t—”

He holds up his hands placatingly, like he can see you working yourself up. Hell, he probably can. 

“Okay.” He threads the fingers of his good hand through his blond hair. “I’ll sleep on one side, you on the other. Fair?” 

“Y-yes. Fair.” Your words shock the both of you, and you feel your face heat as he regards you with a look of pleasant surprise before you look down at your feet. 

“You don’t have to agree if you aren’t comfortable, Mouse. You know that. I wouldn’t—”

“I know.” You grip your own forearms tightly as you speak, like you’re afraid saying the words out loud will make them untrue—like speaking the name of your demon will bring him down upon you. “You’re not Andy.” 

Ari takes the left side of the bed, and the springs creak under his weight. You crawl in beside him, holding yourself as stiff as you possibly can to avoid even brushing him by accident. The truth is, you are scared—but not of Ari. 

And that frightens you, too. 

He’s a man, a stranger, wearing a face too similar to the one you’re running from. Now, though, when you’re brave enough to peek at him, you see Ari—not Andy. And the longer you’re here, the clearer you see him.

You lie there in the dark, your arms held painfully stiff over your chest as you search the dark with wide, glassy eyes. The ceiling is far enough above you that your brain begins to construct patterns and shapes on it’s popcorn-textured surface. Grinning faces, tall, shadowy figures—

“Mouse, are you sleeping?” 

You hesitate. “…No.” 

“Go to sleep.” You swallow against the thick lump in your throat, blinking back hot tears. 

“It’s… It’s hard without Dove.” It’s so silent without the baby, the darkness uncomfortably quiet without the sound of her sleepy burble. She’s probably awake right now, wailing for you. You press the heels of your palms against your eyes like you’re trying to hold the tears in. 

“I know.” The mattress creaks, and you feel Ari’s weight shift. The weight of your loss settles in on you, then, the crushing vacuum of your daughter’s absence sucking the air out of your lungs as you gasp for it. You can’t keep quiet anymore, your hiccoughing breaths rising in pitch until you’re sobbing, hot tears streaming down your cheeks to soak your hair and the thin pillow beneath. 

“Hey, hey, come here.” Ari’s touch is hesitant. He lets his fingers linger on your shoulders before he hugs you, like he’s waiting for you to rebuke him. You don’t. Instead, you curl into his chest, your wails muffled by his body as you tangle your fingers in his over-shirt. You cry so hard it hurts, your throat raw and aching. 

Ari’s hands don’t stray. He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t murmur false platitudes or make promises he knows he won’t be able to keep. He just…holds you, his breath steady and heartbeat slow and even under your ear. 

And then, finally, you fall asleep.

—

In the light of day, Irene looks terrible. Her left eye is swollen black and purple, a patchwork of burst blood-vessels and yellow bruises spread out over  cheek. The other side of her face is not much better, the other eye open but blood red, and her nose swollen. It’s obvious she took a beating, a bad one. Still, she seems to be in higher spirits than last night as she shovels the last of her cereal into her mouth. You’re doing the same thing, hungrily crunching down the contents of your own bowl. 

“We need to talk about next steps.” Irene draws the back of her hand across her mouth, her one good eye focused on you. “We need to move.” 

“I’m not going anywhere without Dove.” 

“That isn’t an option anymore.” 

You clench your hands into fists on the table. “I’m. Not. Leaving.” 

“We will figure out a way to get her back, but right now? You cannot go back to Boston, he is never going to let you go, do you understand that?” It’s like you’re speaking two different languages, talking around one another in dizzying circles. You shove yourself away from the foldout table, knocking over your plastic chair. 

“I’m not fucking leaving without my daughter!” You haven’t felt like this in months, and something about it feels freeing as the hot rage pools in your chest.  No, it isn’t that you haven’t felt it, you haven’t let yourself feel it. Anger was hopeless with Andy, firm and stone faced in the hurricane of your rage until you exhausted yourself, your freedom, your life still frustratingly far out of your reach. 

You storm away from the table, kicking aside one of Zemo’s silver trays, and his tools skitter across the concrete. Behind you is the sound of Ari’s voice. 

“I’ll talk to her.” 

You don’t know where you’re going, but you know you need to be away from them. Alone. The bathroom is on the far side of the garage bay, and you slam the door behind you, your chest heaving. You can’t leave without Dove, you won’t. 

You won’t abandon her. 

You grip the porcelain edges of the sink hard as you blink back fresh tears. You turn on the water with a fierce jerk of the knob, and begin to rinse last night’s tears from your face. This is the cleanest room in the building, fresh towels stacked on on the shelves, and medical supplies arranged neatly in the glass cases across from the standing shower. 

It’s probably the only room Zemo actually uses. 

As you’re drying your face, a knock sounds at the door, and you glare at it as you huff. 

“What?”

“It’s me. Can I come in?” You chew your lip. 

“Fine.” 

You unlatch the lock, and fold your arms across your chest as it opens. Ari peers around the door. 

“Hey.” 

“Hey.” You repeat, and he chuckles, stepping fully inside as the door swings shut behind him. “I’m not leaving without Dove.” You say it firmly, watching his shoulders sag with his deep sigh. “It’s not happening.” 

“Mouse. Look at me.” Reluctantly, you drag your gaze from the air over his shoulder. “Your husband—”

“We’re not married.” You spit, and Ari rolls his eyes at the technicality. 

“He’s dangerous, Mouse. You know that.” Ari places gentle hands on your shoulders. “You know that as soon as you step foot back in that house that he will never, ever let you go again.” Your stomach twists at his words.

“I can get out again.” 

“Will you want to?” His bluntness feels like a slap across the face, and though Ari hadn’t struck you—would never—your cheeks smart anyway. You know what he’s implying—Andy scrambled your head all up inside, and half the time now you don’t know up from fucking down.

But it still hurts to know he knows. Knows how changed you are, even though he never got to see the before, just the after.  

“Fuck you!” You snarl. “I am not leaving her! And if you won’t help me get her back, then I’ll—I’ll go back my fucking self!” For the first time since you’d met him, Ari actually looks angry at this, his eyes darkening beneath his furrowed brows. “If you don’t care about her—”

“I let Leah go back.” It takes you a moment to realize who he’s talking about, what he means. “I let Leah go back, and then I had to bury them both.” Ari’s hand is a pale, trembling fist on the bathroom sink. His next words are hoarse. “I didn’t know they made coffins so small.” 

“Ari…”

“I care about Dove.” The words are heavy, and you hate that you know he means them. “We are going to get her back.” His eyes are shiny, but he doesn’t cry. “I fucking swear we will get her back, but you are not going to do that. Okay? You’re not.” 

“You promise?” Your mouth trembles. 

“I promise.” Ari wraps his pinky around yours, holding your entwined fingers up at eye level. “And you aren’t going back.”  

“I-I won’t.”

“Promise.” His dark eyes burn so fiercely you want to look away. “Promise.” He repeats it firmly. 

“I promise.” 

And then he’s kissing you, cupping your chin with his good hand as he presses his lips desperately against your own. Your heart pounds in your ears as you go stiff in his arms. Ari breaks away, releasing you with a soft curse. 

“Fuck. I’m sorry, Mouse, I—I didn’t mean to do that, I just—” For once, he’s flustered, his cheeks ruddy beneath the shadow of his beard. Ari cards his fingers through his hair. “I’m sorry.” 

The moment hangs between you in the air, held like a breath. 

Your body stays tensed, like you’re ready to fight, or run, like it remembers Andy’s strict instructions. Except… Andy isn’t here to deliver them himself. 

“It’s…” You don’t know what to say, hell, you don’t even know what you’re feeling. Everything is all mixed up, the emotions all biting the tails of the ones they’re chasing—you’re terrified, you’re exhilarated, you’re nauseous and scared and happy and—

“I’ll go. I should go.” Ari mutters the words more to himself than to you. You’re moving before you really mean to, leaning up on the tips of your toes to press a clumsy kiss on the corner of his mouth.

“I—I don’t want you to go.”  With a sigh, Ari melts against you, resting his forehead against yours.  You know you have done this before—many times, even just with Andy—but somehow there is a marked uncertainty as you lift your own hand to Ari’s face, stroking your thumb along his stubbled jawline. He hums, turning his face into your palm, and you feel the press of his lips. 

 Ari wraps his good arm around your waist, his fingers pressing into the meat of your hip through your pajama pants. His right arm flexes, his fist clenching and unclenches in the sling like he wants to move it, but he knows better. Instead, he buries his nose in your hair, the tips of his fingers creeping up beneath your t-shirt to stroke at your belly. You tense at his touch and then relax again, shivering. 

“You tell me to go, I go.” Ari repeats softly, nosing down the side of your jaw. “I won’t be angry.” You look for the pool of cold dread that usually sits in your belly whenever Andy touches you, the reluctant fear that you stamp down to please him but find it entirely absent. 

“You don’t have to make me happy, you don’t have to do what I want because I want it.” You have to stand on the tips of your toes to wrap your arms around Ari’s broad shoulders. There is undeniable excitement uncurling in your belly, warmth skipping under your skin at his touch. You want Ari to touch you.

“What if… it would make me happy?”

Ari huffs out a breathy laugh, his lips curving against your own. “That’s all I seem to want to do.” He takes your mouth again with a fervor that leaves you pleasantly breathless. Ari tangles his fingers in the curls at the nape of your neck, holding you still. His teeth tug at the weight of your lower lip and you gasp, opening for him. Ari tastes faintly of cinnamon sugar and something distinctly him that makes you shiver. 

“Been wanting to do that for a goddamn week.” He sighs the words against your mouth. He smooths his hand down the back of your neck, tracing a gentle finger along the length of your spine. You don’t know you’re holding your breath until you release is as his palm skirts over the curve of your ass. He chuckles. “Is this okay?”

“Y-yes.” Ari palms your ass in response and you gasp, tangling your fingers in his over-shirt. It feels strange to be asked what you want, to even consider your own feelings as worth listening to. Andy tells you what to want, what to think, how to feel—Ari simply…allows you to be. Just as you are. 

“I wanna touch you, Mouse,” he breathes. The admission sends a sharp bolt of electricity straight down your spine. “Can I?” You can’t avoid his eyes anymore, reluctantly meeting his gaze with your own. The words stick in your throat.

“You have to tell me, Mouse.” He strokes your trembling chin with the pad of his thumb. “I’m not him.”Andy always played at giving you choice, but you know Ari isn’t. That if you tell him to, he’ll walk away, and he won’t punish you for it. 

You close your eyes hard, pressing the lids shut till they hurt. You don’t want to think about Andy right now, don’t want to think about Dove without you—you just want this. It feels like you have to reach down your own throat to find it, pulling your own voice up and out through your mouth with force.

“Please?” 

Ari groans, plunging his hand into your loose sleep-pants to wrap around your thighs. He’s strong enough to lift you one-armed as you adjust. You wrap your legs around his waist as a reflex and he hums approvingly, his fingers sinking into the meat of your hips. 

The hard planes of his body press against yours, and your face heats as you think of the new weight that has settled around your hips and belly, but Ari does not seem to notice its presence, his fingers skimming appreciatively along your skin. You can feel the bulge of his cock pressing against your core, and the breathy, surprised noise you make in the back of your throat at the feel of it prompts a chuckle. 

Ari grips your hip hard as he takes a few long strides backwards until you feel cool tile beneath your back. He holds you there, pinned comfortably between his body and the wall as he grinds into you. He ruts against you with a groan. The thin, stretchy fabric between you offers little protection, considering, you can practically feel him throbbing through his zipper. 

“See, Mouse?” He says lowly. “All for you.” Ari releases you, and your feet have barely touched down on the tile before he’s pulling at the hem of your t-shirt. 

“Let’s take this off.” You nod, tugging it up over your head breathlessly, unaware of where it lands after Ari tugs it from your fingers. He drops to his knees, hooking a finger under the elastic band holding up your pajamas. You tense, remembering the last person who had been between your legs, but Ari grounds you, his lips brushing over the curve of your hip. 

“Don’t.” His mouth moves softly against your skin. “Stay here. With me, right now. Don’t go anywhere else.” Ari peels the layers of clothing back from your skin, his hands roaming hungrily over each newly revealed inch. You step out of them and then quickly scoot off your socks. Ari looks up at you from between your thighs, making hard, heavy eye contact as he places a hand beneath your knee. 

“Can I do this for you, Sweetheart? Can I make you feel good?” God, you want to let him. Everything’s out of you control—Andy, Dove, your whole life, but this? This is yours. This, you get to choose.

“Yes.” Even the act of consent feels unfamiliar. “I—I want to.” You don’t know how to describe the way you see the relief leave his body, his broad shoulders relaxing as he widens your stance, pushing your thighs apart till he can kneel between them properly. He squeezes the back of your thigh reassuringly before slowly lifting it to rest on his good shoulder. Ari holds your gaze as he leans forward to place a kiss on the chubby curve of your vulva through your cotton panties. 

His mouth is warm and soft—reverent as he mouths at your swelling lips through the fabric. Ari strokes your hip as he catches the fabric with his teeth, before pulling it aside to marvel at your bare pussy. You want to look away but you don’t, your mouth dropping open as he delivers a sloppy kiss against your slick folds. 

“O-oh,” the sound falls from your lips unbidden, and you feel his mouth curve against you. He pauses briefly to shrug out of his flannel, and dimly you are aware of the sound of his zipper before he’s back, his face thrust hard into the soaking place between your thighs. You mumble his name. 

“Ari, Ari, Ari—” 

He rolls the pearl of your clit against the roof of his mouth, circling your entrance with one finger. You press your head back against the tile, staring unseeingly at the ceiling. You do not remember threading your fingers through his hair, but as you tighten them, tugging, he moans, throaty and low. When you chance a look down, Ari is staring at you with lidded eyes. He flicks your clit sharply with the tip of his tongue, humming appreciatively as you jackknife. 

“Go ahead and cum, Mouse,” he murmurs the words against your slick, twitching skin. “It’s okay, Sweetheart, I know you need it.” One hand remains buried in Ari’s hair, tugging on it helplessly as the other scrabbles for purchase against the tile, looking for something—anything—to hold onto. You push against the hot water knob, and the pipes rattle as water rockets through them. You are tangentially aware of the spray of warm water from the shower head—but only barely. You whine helplessly, hips rolling against Ari’s face as you cum. 

He presses the tip of his finger into your cunt, groaning at the feel of you, wet and swollen and sucking at him. He gently lowers your leg, and your trembling knees nearly buckle. You watch as Ari wraps his fist around his cock, pumping it slowly as he stares at the sticky, messy spot at the apex of your thighs. It’s thick, veiny like his forearms. He sweeps his thumb across the tip,  spreading the dewy drop of precum gathered there. 

Ari stands, fishing his wallet out of his back pocket. From inside, he produces a wrinkled—but sealed—condom. He tears into the packet with his teeth before discarding it. He fumbles with one hand, nearly dropping it, but you help, gingerly pulling the condom from his fingers. Ari stands stock still as you roll it slowly down to the base before he grasps your chin, his mouth crashing against yours. You can taste yourself on his tongue. 

This time when he lifts you, he uses the wall to leverage your weight, sinking you down slow as you lock your ankles behind his waist. Ari’s head lolls, his lips parting in a silent “o” as he draws his hips back, and then fully sheathes himself inside. The air in your lungs escapes in a sharp, needy whine. 

“F-full.” You don’t even realize you’ve said it until Ari hums in agreement. 

“Feels good, doesn’t it Mouse?” He breathes. “Shit, you’re squeezing me so nice,” he breathes, drawing back until your cunt is sicking at the tip of him before driving all the way back inside. You manage a nod, your hips rolling greedily into his.

“I-I—fuck—again—” The words don’t want to leave your tongue in any sort of sensible manner, but Ari understands them, grinning hungrily as he picks up the pace. He skims your clit with his thumb, and you can feel the sparks skittering up your spine and you gasp as he does it again and again—

“Come on, Sweetheart, you’ve got one more in there for me, don’t you?” He mutters, angling his hips up into yours as you writhe against him. “Wanna feel it on my cock—mmm, fuck—” You do, leaning forward to bury your face against his chest as you wail, your cunt clamping down around him like a fist. Ari curls his massive body over yours as he empties into you, his hips pressing softly against yours. He holds you there, his cock jerking and throbbing inside of you as he mumbles soft ‘mm’’s and ‘yeah, fuck yeah’’s into your hair until he’s done. 

You stay like that, your body buzzing as the warm water streaming down over you. Eventually, when you can no longer feel the hammer of his heart against your cheek, he pulls out, and you press your lips together in embarrassed amusement at the crinkle of latex. He knots it off before tossing it into the trash bin. Your cheeks burn as Ari cleans between your legs, cupping your swollen cunt with an appreciative hum. He slides his fingers through the folds of your sticky sex, and your breath hitches. 

“I’m just cleaning you up, Mouse, I promise.” He’s true to his word, there’s   hungry, lustful intensity in his touches, only care. You str heady yourself against his shoulder, and your heart drops at the  sight of his bandages. The center is tinged with a pink circle, and as you stare at it, it darkens a little. 

“You’re bleeding.” Ari looks down at his shoulder and grimaces.

“Occupational hazard, Mouse. I’ll be fine.” He attempts to reassure you with a smile, but it doesn’t completely do away with the cold feeling in your belly.

“We’re going to need to change these, at least,” you say, fingering the edge of his wet bandage. “I think Zemo will be mad if we don’t.”

“He’s always mad.” Ari replies, and you laugh. “But yes. We’ll change them” 

It somehow feels more intimate to stand there in the shower with Ari, slowly washing off the events of the last day and a half. He shampoos your hair, rubbing it in gently at the roots with the tips of his fingers. When you’re finally done, he helps you towel off, before producing a generic grey sweatshirt and pants from one of the cupboards after a bit of rummaging. 

When the two of you return to the garage, dewy cheeked and differently clothed, Irene snorts. 

“Had a good time, did you?” 

—

Dove won’t stop crying. 

Andy isn’t a bad father, he knows he’s not, but for some reason, he can’t get her calmed down. Her little fists are clenched tight, beating the air above her head with a frustration Andy as her father, cannot seem to quell. He bounces his daughter tiredly as he paces around the nursery, mumbling soothing baby speak as he rubs circles on her back. 

She’s been wailing practically nonstop since Pronge had delivered her, his expression grim as he’d handed her over. 

I couldn’t get your wife.

Andy had wanted to rage, then, and he almost had, itching to slam the whiskey glass in his hand into Robert’s face for the trouble—but Dove’s fussing had provided a sufficient reminder that it might not be appropriate to do so. She cries herself to sleep, hiccoughing in his arms until her breathing evens. Andy carefully lays her down in the crib, stroking his hand over the curve of her cheek. He closes the door to the nursery, and to his disgust, Robert Pronge stands in the hallway, the decanter of whiskey from his office held in his hand. He takes a swig from it. 

“Who else was with her?” 

Pronge grimaces. “Irene. And her new assistant. Fucker’s as big as a goddamn house. Name’s Ari Levinson, he owns some shithole bar.” Andy’s eyes narrow.

“Get out.” He shoulders past the killer in his hallway, not bothering to take back the bottle.

“And do what, exactly?” He sneers. 

“Finish your goddamn job, and find my wife.” Andy waits to hear the sound of the front door before returning to his office. He’d had you—and you’d slipped right through his fingers again. You wouldn’t want to be apart from Dove, at least, that much he could be sure of. You’re a good mother, regardless of the doubts he knows he’ll have to plant in your beautiful head to get you to stay. 

Ari Levinson. 

The name is unfamiliar, and a search through both Massachusetts and New York state databases return no results. He does, however, get pings on basic search engines.

Ari Levinson. Dishonorable discharge, tried for murder, dismissed as self defense.

Now that is interesting.

It’s after midnight when he finally decides to turn in for the night, and as he closes his office door, he feels his phone vibrate in his pocket. He reaches for it, frowning at the unfamiliar number—but then his eyes widen at the caller I.D. 

Albany.

“Hello?” At first, there’s only grainy silence on the other end, until finally, you speak. 

“I’m ready to talk, Andy.” 

He smiles. “Oh, Honey. I knew you would be.” 

to be continued…

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Thank you for reading! Please check out my masterlist for other, similar works, and follow my library blog, @box-of-bones-library for updates. ❤️

[hollyhomburg]

Before I Leave You (Pt.62)

(Omegaverse au, Mafia au, Bts x Reader)

Summary: love becomes guilt, predator becomes prey, and Jin becomes...

Tags: Hospitals, medical talk, sicfic, seizures, angst, hurt/comfort, assassin! Jimin, implied autistic! jimin, meltdowns, settling, non-sexual biting, Mafia shit, murder, Dead bodies, Guns, violence, blood. everyone lives nobody dies, morality conversations, revenge, secrets

W/c: 10.9k

A/n: thank you to everyone who helped me make my birthday this year super special <3 im sorry if i was bad at thanking people publicly for their specific gifts <3 i figured that the next best way i could say thank you was to give you another chapter...be warned, this one ends on QUITE the cliffhanger....be warned

Previous part ~ Masterlist

The hospital is cold, maybe that’s just because of the first snow.

It gathers on the trees outside like a faint white outline where someone forgot to fill the image in. Cresting the shoulders of everyone who walks into the hospital and turning the streetlight into halos and the sky into one big white blanket. The whole world is a nest when the weather is like this. Maybe if the whole world was a nest, it would be enough to keep you all safe.

It’s useless to hope, as you wait with Jimin outside of Jungkook’s hospital room.

The hospital is a mess of glowing exit signs and endless beeping. A dull roar in your ears from coming down adrenaline and a telephone nearby blares. The scratchy intercom system overhead pages a doctor for a code red. Whatever that is. You sit and wait, worrying and picking at your nails, full of useless energy. There is nothing to do but wait until someone tells you if Jungkook’s alright.

You're not sure if he will be, this seizure was a bad one.

You and Jimin sit side by side, and you don’t talk. You don’t even touch. You don’t know what you prefer, the instant terror of the car bomb, or this slow terror. Slow terror feels like nails dragging down the back of your skull, like clothes that are two sizes too tight. A bad taste in your mouth, not blood and not soot either.

The relief of finding out that Jungkook wasn’t calling you because Moonbyul had done something to him was only temporary. instead of your packmate there was a stranger on the other end of the line.

He’d still been seizing when you’d got back to the coffee shop. Foreghein scents on him and a crowd of patrons and paramedics surround him. His eyes rolled back into his skull, on his side, blue lips and froth on the edge of his mouth. Luckily, someone in that coffee shop was a doctor, was able to keep him semi-comfortable but-

This seizure had lasted a long time. Too long. Jungkook has been a patient at most of the local hospitals before on account of how unpredictable his seizures are. He has directives as per Namjoon's guidance, in place since before they were even packmates. Anything more than 6 minutes needs an overnight stay and copious testing. This seizure had lasted almost 10. The longest he's had in years.

You'd watched horrified and all too familiar with it as they’d loaded your still twitching packmate into the red box. Unsympathetic paramedics unwilling to hear your pleas to just let Jimin ride with them to the hospital (he'd tailgated them the whole way) but even at the hospital you and Jimin still couldn’t see him. They whisked him right up for an MRI.

Maybe you’d be less unnerved if Jungkook had woken up, but he hasn’t yet.

They’re still running tests and keeping him under just to be sure. Not a medical coma, but the step below that. Something about Jungkook’s malfunctioned ocular nerve and not wanting to trigger more seizures with more stimuli until the lorazepam and half a dozen other medications have time to take effect.

Jimin is the one who okayed those. He signed those papers for medications as easily as if he were swiping his card or maybe firing a gun. You feel out of your depth here, even if Jimin is very used to this. It’s been a while. It’s not your fault the luck ran out. Maybe that’s why he’s angry, maybe that’s why he’s not touching you. You are at once, somewhere between a four-leaf clover and a bad luck charm. Intangible and unsure of your odds.

Maybe Jimin's not touching you because he hates you, maybe he hates you because you forced him to let you come with him. you'd have been by Jungkook's side while this happened if you hadn't. But Jimin might have died from the explosion then-

Jungkook might still die, you realize with a lurch. Jungkook might die because of the seizures and could die at any time really. It's so easy to forget. Maybe that's why Jimin's not touching you. Your thoughts rush over you, wave after wave.

But Jimin thinks you don’t deserve to be touched when he’s this angry. You’ve had a lifetime’s worth of an angry alpha touching you and he won’t be one of them. Won’t make you worse when you’re sitting small and fragile. Barely there, barely alive. No, he'll keep his shaking hands tightened to fists on his knees and his angry tongue locked behind pursed lips. touching you would be more for him than it is for you he's convinced.

Too close, they were too close today. Jimin promised you that he wouldn’t let them hurt you. He promised and he'd failed. you still have the gash on your chin.

His worry for Jungkook is another monster entirely, one that can't be made better with actions, that can't be fixed with his own two hands.

Yoongi and Tae are the first to arrive. Your mate’s hair is wet and tousled, in a pair of pajama pants on like he’d just been showering for the evening before he’d come. Tae is close behind, a pair of pink sweatpants poking out from below her long thick coat and her long nightdress tucked into the waistband. The same dress you cuddled up beneath this morning. It feels like a lifetime ago.

Yoongi holds your cheeks, searching your face. The words tumble from your lips, the first you and Jimin have said in what feels like hours.

“He was just- we were just getting the car and we thought he’d be fine for a second but then-” you feel like you’re going to be sick all over his shoes. In his hurry, Yoongi put on a pair of Tae’s Uggs, the platform ones. You don't know why your brain fixates on that.

“It’s not your fault,” is the first thing he says, although even he sounds unsure. You shouldn’t have left him alone are the words that he must be thinking, the words that no one’s saying.

(This is a lie. This is your brain making up the worst-case scenario and clinging to it. There is nothing anyone can do, no precautions that they can take that they already haven’t when it comes to Jungkook’s seizures. Yoongi just gets small and quiet whenever Jungkook is sick. Jungkook will always be sick, and this quiet devastation will always find your mate because he loves Jungkook so).

There is nothing to do but wait, even though waiting with them is better than waiting alone.

The people at the coffee shop said they saw jungkook lie down before he started seizing. That's the only way they were able to call you, because he'd had your contact open on his phone. He'd known he was about to have one and he'd tried to call you. He'd been afraid and alone and then he'd been nothing.

The movements of the hospital slosh the four of you like an unmoored boat while you wait. Every doctor coming closer prompts a turn of your head and pleading eyes. Hoping that they’re the ones that will relieve you of your misery. Your leg jumps up and down, jittery. Jimin by comparison is deathly still.

Yoongi goes up to the desk and Tae sits between you and Jimin, one hand a piece on either of your thighs. You lean into her and Jimin rests his cheek on her shoulder slowly. She holds around your shoulders, looking back and forth between the two of you. She doesn’t any anything.

Her fingers rub up and down your shoulder, feeling the crumbliness there. She picks her hand up, and you watch as she takes in the darkness. It's soot.

“It’s from the ambulance,” Jimin says before you can force your words to cooperate and lie.

Jin comes through with a flurry of his long felted coat, snow gathering on his wide shoulder. Holding his keys in his hand and almost dropping them when you stand to collide with him. He has just a choked-out "pup" for you but then there's the nurse, the one you've been waiting for. Telling you that Jungkook's fine- he's not awake yet- but that you can wait in his room with him until he does.

Jungkook doesn't have too many wires connected to him, nothing more than an electrode at his temple, one at his heart, and an IV in his wrist. His hospital gown is pulled down to his collarbones so that the electrodes don't pull, but his skin is absent of his usual healthy flush.

You wait, watching until you notice the rise and fall of his chest. Even and beautiful breath. Jungkook is alive, Jungkook is breathing of his own accord. You let out a single broken sob, but you're not the only one.

You watch Yoongi brush his hair back from his face, eyes glassy. Seokjin sits by his right side and tae takes the other. Jimin and you stand at the foot of his bed, just watching him. No one says anything. Every beep of the heart monitor is anticipated, every second more precious.

"There's nothing on his MRI that indicates any lasting brain damage from the seizure," the nurse states, fussing with Jungkook's IV. "but it will be hard to know until he wakes up. You might notice him unable to recognize you or speak for a few minutes- the location of the seizure may have affected his language and motor capabilities so-"

She continues to list his prognosis, but it's nothing you didn't know before. Every seizure has a risk of taking out part of Jungkook's faculties, his fine motor skills, and his speech. But a seizure has never damaged him beyond repair before. Tae takes one of Jungkook's hands from the bed and brings it to her face, trying to hide her tears but it's no use.

It’s startling, how much your body relaxes upon Namjoon’s presence, you feel the shift in the air before he enters the room. Nauseous one moment and then fine the next. He enters the room, hand skimming the top of your head and Yoongi's side as he be-lines it to Jungkook's chart.

His scent is so thick- comforting coffee even if it is a a little stale. You sway, and when he looks up, his eyes flicker from you and then the nurse.

Today is not the end of the world, even though it feels like it. It feels like it's ending every time Jungkook finds his way into a hospital bed, a good 3 or 4 times in a year. Honestly, they’ve been so quiet recently, so unnoticeable that they should have known a bigger one was building.

“Dr. Kim,” Jungkook’s nurse says, this is not Namjoon’s hospital, but he is on Jungkook’s file. This nurse looks at him and waits for his call. Namjoon flicks past one page on his chart and then another, pursing his lips.

“Why didn't Avery order a Ct? it’s not here.”

“The ct has already been run Dr. Kim, He put the order in 4 minutes ago” Namjoon hums, and you watch the clench of his jaw, the extra tight way he bites his cheek. And it’s then you realize oh, Namjoon is about to cry.

Yoongi gets to him before you do, Jungkook’s fingers twitch of their own accord against Namjoon’s wrist and Yoongi grips his shoulder. Namjoon looks back at him and at the same time, Jungkook opens his eyes blinking against the dim lights.

His words are all garbled for the first few seconds after a seizure, the Jumbled groan startling enough that you flinch. Yoongi backs up so that Jin and Namjoon can hold him down as he reaches blindly, startled and moving before his brain has a second to catch up.

"It's okay Jungkook, you had a seizure. You were out for a few hours, You're okay,"

"Come up slowly, don't try to sit up there you go."

Jungkook tries to get up and out of the bed but has to be held down by namjoon until his brain comes back online, he continues to speak garbled nonsense for a moment. Too loud, voice loud after so much quiet. It startles you; you take a step back.

And almost step right on Hobi’s shoes.

Hoseok is there, hand on the small of your back. Snowflakes that still haven’t melted in his hair. He doesn’t say hi to you, but his hand stays there. Pressed flat. He only has eyes for Jungkook. Jungkook relaxes, falling back on the bed, and gets one coherent syllable out and then another. It's their names-.

"Alpha- Joon- hughr-"

Jungkook pants, breathing heavily, and then his hand reaches up steadily, to touch the electrode on his head. Yoongi's hand closes around his just in case, but he doesn't rip it off.

Everyone waits with bated breath.

“You alright kookie?” Hoseok asks careful, with that same level of humor in his voice that you’ve come to need. His smile is as genuine as ever as he looks down a Jungkook in the hospital bed. Jungkook’s hand is tight around Namjoon’s as he stretches, muscles aching. He’s always so sore after a seizure. It's always so disorienting coming out of them like this.

Jungkook waits, testing out his words. “I feel like Like it got hit by a trucking fuck.”

He blinks, and the lights are turned low, but a breath passes and Tae laughs and so does Yoongi, and then everyone's laughing and sort of crying. Your knees go a little weak and you turn into hobi's chest hiding your tears.

Jungkook just blinks at the ceiling. “That wasn’t right.” But then everyone's smiling. Happy because he's talking, happy because it looks like the seizure didn't do any lasting damage. Jin rests his head on the coverlet and sighs a happy sound. All too relieved to hear Jungkook act something like himself. Wordlessly Jin brings Jungkook's wrist to his face, pressing his nose to his scent gland.

The hospital room isn’t big enough for all of you let alone when more staff enter the room along with someone who Namjoon must know, because she instantly starts listing off different medical jargon. Asking Jungkook how many fingers she's holding up, Namjoon's name, then testing his reflexes on his hands and toes. Stress tests and memory tests.

One moment you’re standing in the doorway and then the next you’re pressed to the wall between Tae, Jimin, and Hobi.

The hospital room isn’t big enough for all of you let alone when more staff enters the room along with someone whom Namjoon must know, because she instantly starts listing off different medical jargon and refers to him by name.

One moment you’re standing in the doorway and then the next you’re pressed to the wall between Tae, Jimin, and Hobi. Tae opens the door and gestures. You step out because it’s surely more important that Namjoon Jin and Yoongi get at Jungkook right now even if your heart clenches painfully at leaving Jungkook.

Jimin is still vibrating out of his skin, has been since Jungkook opened his eyes. But Tae tugs him in for a hug in the hallway. You don’t realize you’ve been holding your breath until you watch him hug her back. But Jungkook was Tae and Jimin’s packmate first. It’s no wonder that this has shocked them both closer, their fight forgotten.

Or mostly forgotten, you watch as Jimin wraps his arms around her slowly, like he's not sure he's allowed.

Hobi jogs you out of your starting, turning your face towards his and, looking at you intently. Eyes flickering down to your chin and then to your eyes. You forget what he’s looking at until his fingers skim below your lips and you feel pain.

You drag your arm across it and it leaves a small rusty trail in its wake on the sleeve of Tae's jacket, just another stain on it. Oh, you fell during the blast and banged your face, you'd almost forgotten.

“Tripped, banged my face on the sidewalk.” it's close enough to the truth that the lie goes unnoticed. Hobi makes a sound, holding your elbow. Squeezing it reassuringly.

“I’m gonna get some snacks from the vending machine, can I get you something?”

“Didn’t eat dinner” you say, staring down at Hobi’s red Converse. There are scuffs on the linoleum and a drop of blood someone must have missed. You wonder who it’s from, another person from the emergency room probably. “You sure Jin and Joon won’t be angry if my dinner is just sweets?”

Tae is close enough to overhear, and she rubs her cheek across the top of Jimin’s head, scenting him sweet (or trying to.) “Yeah- junk food isn’t exactly the most nutritious.”

You stumble, stepping close, swaying suddenly on your feet. Hobi catches you around the shoulders and for a second, you must look like the mirror image of Tae and Jimin.

Hobi's scent smarts with worry and he pushes you back, making you sit down. “They can live with it, she deserves a special treat. I’m getting you a Band-Aid.” Tae looks like she wants to argue with Hobi, then doesn’t.

Hobi gets Skittles and Peanut Eminem’s and two bags of funyuns that you pick apart while you wait for the doctors to be done. The colorful packages are scattered across your lap as he tilts your head to put the Band-Aid on your chin (gotten from a helpful nurse). Fingers that tenderly curve under the wide part of your jaw, drumming there.

Tae nibbles on a peach ring. Inside Jungkook's hospital room, it isn't quiet, but the four of you are silent with exhaustion listening in. Jin sounds relieved, and the low grumble from your mate sounds just as happy.

Jimin still isn’t speaking much, just pacing back and forth in front of Jungkook’s door. When you say you feel nauseous, Hobi gets up and gets you ginger ale too. You know there just isn’t much for him to do, alpha instincts and no omega to cool them but you. Hobi holds your hand, he doesn’t say that Jungkook’s going to be okay. He doesn’t say anything but.

“Which are your favorite?”

The back of Skittles jingles and he picks out all the green ones, lining up his pants in an orderly little row for you to grab when the ones you suck on go small enough.

You don't realize you're crying until he gets you a tissue, dabbing at your cheek. "There you go, Kookies gonna be fine. He's always fine." His voice goes slower, honeyed.

You rest your cheek on his shoulder, and he lets you. “You got a pair of headphones?” Your breath is shaky, and you think you might be shaking apart right now if it wasn’t for Hobi.

Namjoon stares at the packages for a second too long when he exits the door. His hair is pushed up like he’s run his fingers through it, but he doesn’t smell quite as worried as he did before. He looks at the package and you shrink underneath his disapproving stare.

He all but snaps his fingers, “Tae, would you please go get some real food.” Hobi does not flinch at Namjoon’s cross-tone, even as Tae shoots to her feet and chirps "Yes alpha!"

Hobi doesn’t do anything but stare Namjoon down, put a pink starburst on his tongue, slowly.

Jimin keeps pacing.

“We’re sleeping here tonight.” It’s not an order or a request- your pack alpha has decided that this is too great a danger to separate you so you won’t separate. Neither of you pipes up anything to the contrary, now is not the time for contrary voices.

Jimin is still pacing. Black leather shoes smoothed and silent, barely acknowledging the pack alpha.

He’s making you anxious, your scent sour even to your own nose as your eyes track him back and forth. Namjoon pulls you to your feet, hand lingering on the back of your neck. “Will you be okay in those clothes pup? Or should someone go home and get your things?”

You hear the request for what it is; Namjoon is asking you if you think the alphas need a nest to settle if you think they need a change of clothes and things that smell like pack tonight for sleep and safety. he's leaving this up to you.

Your hands stay buried in the pockets of Tae’s white floral jacket. Hoping he doesn’t notice the soot smudge on your shoulder. “It'll be fine just-” your eyes are half glassy, “are you sure Koo will be okay?”

The pack alpha pulls you to his front, and one of the nurses passing by gives you both a look, you have to get on your tippy toes to kiss him. "of course he's going to be, we're making sure of it" Namjoon promises.

"I meant like, without a nest."

Namjoon laughs, and you watch the stress melt off his shoulders. he turns, guiding you inside with a peculiar look over his shoulder at Hobi. “I’m sure he’d love it if you’d help him make one. he already wants to start"

Jungkook looks a little bit better, with less of a pale-yellow flush to his face and more of a healthy glow. pouting down at the blankets and complaining that they're too rough.

For someone who looks so physically well/muscles defined even when they’re not flexed, it’s always a bit startling to see him lying prone and exhausted, lights dim to avoid the risk of another seizure.

Tae comes back with some food, and you all eat in silence, white Styrofoam containers balanced across your knees. The faint crinkle and drag of plastic spoons scraping plastic bowls. Jungkook eats hospital food. Nibbles it, and doesn't throw it up. One of the side effects of the medication is nausea.

The only one not at ease is Jimin, who doesn’t eat, sitting tacitly in the corner watching each of you, getting up occasionally to pace. The pack let him work off his restless energy until it’s clear it’s making Jungkook restless too. Shifting and watching him. His request of, “Minnie will you come and sit by me?” goes unanswered as Jimin flexes his hands from open palm to open fist again and again.

Jungkook watches the jello in his plastic tray jiggle with the force of Jimin's pacing, back and forth. Back and forth. Tae sighs, and Yoongi stiffens.

He goes like that, pacing one two three steps just in front of Tae before turning. He falls apart like this until Jin steps up to intercept him, and Jimin rocks to a stop rather than crash into him. He’s put his hands on Jimin’s shoulders, fingers digging into the tense ball there. Moving quicker than any of you thought possible.

“Breathe.” Comes his terse request. A little broken, a little begging. But Jimin’s alpha will never willingly disobey an order from his pack omega, that’s what’s happening, isn’t it? Jimin’s alpha has taken over, took over the second he saw Jungkook lying between those two tables in the coffee shop. All instinct and no Jimin, all fear and pulse and get them safe get them home get them out.

But it’s like Jimin’s lungs are pried open from it. He gasps, and Jin pulls him in for a thorough scent mark, systematically dragging his teeth from ear to ear, hard enough to leave dull red lines in his wake. You watch Jimin’s eyes dilate and constrict, plush lips parting in a gasp. Looking at you.

Jin licks his teeth after, “There you go.” You don’t know if you’ve ever seen Jin settle Jimin or if you’ve ever seen him settle any of the alphas like this. Jimin asks for bites again and Jin obliges. Bending over him to drive his teeth, to nip Jimin's skin pink between his teeth. Bite after bite Jimin’s body relaxes inch by inch.

And so does the rest of the pack, underneath the covers, Jungkook shifts his hips, splaying them a little wider. Relaxing as Jimin goes boneless.

Jin’s voice is a dark croon, the tone he reserves only for Jimin and maybe Namjoon sometimes. He's a little firmer when the more dominant alphas need his touch. Jimin feels it as delicately as Yoongi's soothing thumb on the side of your thumb when Jin pinches his cheeks and shakes him a little bit.

“Now, do you want to tell Omega why you’re upset?”

“S’my fault” Jimin sways on his feet, closer to Jin’s touch than back again. a planet in orbit. the rest of the pack watched transfixed. You see Hoseok perk up slightly. “Wasn’t there.”

“Minnie, I know you,” Jin cups his cheek a little gentler. Fingers skimming stubble. “I know you,” Jin repeats, such an air of finality about it that you can’t doubt it to be true.

Jin could command the moon to shift its orbit and it would. “I know you’ll do whatever’s possible to protect the pack" Jimin's eyelashes flutter. "To your dying breath.”

“You don’t have to be so intense about it” Namjoon half snaps, any of them dying isn't what he wants to think about right now. But he's forgiven the second he realizes he's being too harsh, everyone’s a bit stressed right now.

Jin’s dark tone falls away as quick as it came, “But still- what happened with JK wasn’t your fault, isn’t that right kookie?”

Jungkook nods, eyes closed, licking his lips like he's tasting the settling in the air. “Not Jimin’s fault my brains fucked up, just how it is” Jin pecks Jimin’s head, pinning his blond hair flat. “See pup? Listen to the omega’s, You’re fine. Everyone's going to be fine."

Jin speaks the words so surely you almost believe it.

The hospital is a bit generous with the extra sleeping cots (Namjoon might have called his boss and asked him to pull privileges), and you get 3 that they roll up one on one side of Jungkook's hospital bed, and two more on the other side.

But you and Jin pile in just around him. Cuddled up close and scenting along his shoulders, sniffling and fluffing a few extra threadbare blankets around him in a makeshift nest, full of your jackets too.

You steal Tae's pants for the nest making, letting her untuck her nightdress and let it flutter around her. But when one of the nurses comes to the door Namjoon (panicked) throws himself across the exposed line of her honeyed thighs to conceal her nakedness. but she just giggles, she’s not some Victorian maiden full of virtue, but it makes Jungkook smile and scrunch his nose. and it feels like a win even if Namjoon's cheeks go bright red.

You cuddle up, trying fitfully to banish the medicinal scent by scenting him. It's sour and not all like him, but the medicine they give him for his seizures always makes him smell a little off for a few days. It’s no less distressing to you, but Jungkook just grins and tells the others to let you do what you need when you rest your body weight on top of him and stubbornly bury your face in his chest. His hand with the attached IV strewn across your back to cradle your ribs.

Before no time Jungkook is laughing and leaning into Yoongi’s stomach where he lies across the top of the bed. In no time he's taking a few bites of veggies and a few sips of water, eyes heavy. He is tried from the seizure and medication even if he puts on a brave face.

They’ll drag him into one more MRI in the morning just to be sure that nothing concerning has developed over time but until then, the beeping of Jungkook’s heart monitor is your lullaby. Every heartbeat is a new chance. You don't even mind the lumpy hospital pillow. The pack goes quiet when Jungkook's eyes flutter, when they shut and his breathing goes deep. yoongi puts his finger to his lips and jin shifts slowly, Jungkook's head resting on his thigh. your lovely packmate resting between jin's parted legs.

The rest of the pack falls like Domino’s once Jungkook's asleep. Hobi shucks off his jeans to be more comfortable and so does Yoongi. The room is full of heavy breaths and dreams waiting to swoop in. You struggle to settle until Hobi gives you one of his headphones, and you lie close to share them, one in each of your ears. he still has his sleepy time playlist, and it blocks out the sounds of the hospital. When Sleep takes you it's thankfully dreamless.

Somehow Hobi's hand finds your waist under the covers, bunching up and tangling in his sweatshirt. Clinging to you and holding on for dear life. His bare thighs between your thin leggings tangled up in the makeshift nest. Jin only glances at your particular closeness a few times.

Sleep evades jin until he gives up on it entirely. Nothing feels quite as good to Jin’s instincts as having all of his packmates sleeping in one room. Even if it's not quite good enough to get him to fall asleep himself. But still- Jin would rather they not be here; would rather they be in the nest at home.

That will have to wait until tomorrow.

The distant hum of the hospital and the sound of his dull typing fill the room. His work computer screen is the only light in the whole room besides the monitors. Jin's computer balanced on his back because Jin had to leave during a briefing on a low-level gang member and Koo said he didn’t mind being used as a computer rest so long as Jin kept running his hands through his hair. Jimin is curled up on the next nearest cot, within petting (and settling) distance if he should need it.

7 a.m.

A look at the clock says that the pack has 5 more hours until Jungkook is allowed to be discharged. Until then, Jin will get some work done and keep an eye on the rest. Namjoon sleeps by the door, he declined a cot on account of there not being enough room for the rest of them to sleep comfortably. Namjoon turns fitfully with every new person who walks by the door. He’s gone in and out of sleep a few times. If he flinches awake again, Jin will get him a cup of coffee.

Until then, there's paperwork and an endless array of evidence for Jin to examine.

There are documents he can look over again, the same ones, back and forth. There are about 300 crime scene photos for each murder that the family has committed in the last 6 months, it doesn’t hurt to skim them again and refresh his notes.

That boy from the coffee shop burned beyond recognition. A pair of 30 caliber bullets in his chest. One under his ribs the other in his head, evidence of deep lacerations and torture on his body, bitten tongue, and evidence of red paint under his fingernails. The only other bit of evidence.

The origin of these paint flecks have been a source of annoyance and frustration for jin and the rest of his coworkers. Maybe they're evidence from a third location between abduction and dumpsite? A bit of the killer's car scraped maybe? The paint was metallic, old-fashioned. After a few minutes, Jin moves on to other murders, other people who have lives and packs and dreams that the family extinguished.

Jin no longer spends hours looking at his picture. The one of Choi Beomgyu alive and grinning. He still gets weekly calls from his pack alpha, begging Jin for any updates and leads. Jin has stopped feeling guilty over being empty-handed.

Jin’s boss's crime scene photos are a little harder to look at if only because of the nausea that those photos bring. Although Jin has become so desensitized to them that his bloated face no longer makes his stomach swirl with revulsion. His missing hand, the torn stump of it induced post-mortem.

One burned and one drowned.

These two kills are by far the family's messiest and hastiest. Usually, they don't even find this much of the bodies. Just a few fragments of bone or a tooth in a pire. Most of the time people just disappear.

What did you know, he thinks, looking at the photograph of the boy and then his charred corpse, what did you know that you shouldn’t have? Why didn't they have time to properly make you disappear? Why couldn't they risk you talking?

It’s funny, out of all the evidence, he tries to look at your cookbook and the late Don and data’s autopsy reports the least. Their tox screen and that one page that might as well be your confession and Ahn Hyejin's (Jin compared the second handwriting to a sample they had on file and matched hers to it in about an hour). Their murder was a neat and tidy little thing, but it is the murder that got his boss killed so maybe Jin should treat it with more scrutiny.

But that’s so simple, it’s almost a wonder why such a slight thread of spider silk needed snipping. Or is Jin wrong and this is a thread that could send the whole thing crumbling down?

Jin’s not sure yet, but maybe after a few more hours of pouring over this, he will be.

It’s nearing 3 in the morning and Jin is still sifting through every little bit of information when a ding punctuates the quiet in the room. Jin panic smashes the mute button before any of his packmates stir.

A warm body away, Hobi lets out a particularly deep and easy breath, and Jin relaxes.

Jin’s first thought looking at the email, is that no one not directly connected to the bureau should be able to get ahold of his email address, let alone be able to send him anything.

The email doesn’t have a heading, and the email doesn’t even have a subject or a cc. Unlike half of Jin’s other correspondents to other people giving them guidelines and delegating tasks. It's only secure for him to look at these here because everyone’s eyes are closed.

On closer look, the sender is just a random email generated with an obscure amount of Xs. He hovers over it. Cursor blinking until he clicks it, he knows better than to click on the link without launching it on his firewall server but the contents of the email aren’t anything but a video and a short line of text.

Skip to 17:19:07 for the fun parts :)

The video isn’t infested with bugs planning on robbing his data and pilfering him for information. No, the data and danger is just right there when Jin skips ahead, Jin holds his breath as he watches the grainy imagery.

The security camera is an IPC-110 if the shitty quality is anything to judge by. Trust a parking garage to install the shittiest CCTV cameras on the market but still the blurry figures of two of Jin’s packmates is unmistakable as he watches. Jimin’s face terse and afraid, backing up against the wall and exchanging words.

The flash of light is so sudden it makes Jin flinch hard and Jungkook groans, before settling and smacking his lips. Jin hardly notices as he watches you and Jimin get thrown by the blast, tight nuckled watching Jimin tuck his body around you and shouting your name. Pauses the video just to look at Jimin's panic-stricken face. To see him yank you to your feet and put you in the car.

Jungkook makes another soft whine when Jin shifts him, jostling him “One second baby” Jin murmurs, putting his computer to the side. Your jacket is on the side of the nest, delicately folded into the border. Jin detangles it and brings it to his nose.

Fire, burning things, soot. The smell is unmistakable. If the timestamp is to be believed, this is the reason why you and Jimin weren’t at the coffee shop with Jungkook. Jin feels the last little bit of his frustration fade at this.

Oh, Minnie.

It’s no wonder why Jimin was too spooked to speak, why he’s been so laconic tonight. First you and then Jungkook so quick. The stress would have anyone shutting down, this is why Jin's smallest but strongest alpha was so quiet and afraid. Why he’d needed a bit of settling when usually he’s someone Jin can depend on during Jungkook’s seizures. One surprise is hard enough to handle.

Jin shifts his petting from Jungkook’s hair to Jimin’s, combing through his blond strands lovingly.

He rewinds the tape back to the beginning, as far back as it will go, and sets it to 3x speed. The first hour goes by in 5 minutes, The person on camera is in all black, but even in black and white Jin would know the kind of mask they wear. It's red at the top and a stunning grimace at the bottom.

He watches as someone slight and billowy, probably 5’7 in height- no 5’9- figure cuts through the cars, heading for Jimin’s like they know which one to go for. The CCTV footage doesn’t cut out at all. Usually, the family is better in concealing their crimes. Usually, they don’t even leave a hint of evidence.

Usually, they don't send the evidence to Jin.

Jin freezes the frame when the figure turns, with the mask fully facing the camera. It’s a traditional Korean mask, the same one Jin has seen photographed on the rest of the family. He drags up Google, doing a cursory search. The footage is in black and white but the images on file are all red and black.

He goes back to the first murder, those hands, the red paint chipped underneath fingernails and his breathing goes heavy.

He needs to go back to Beomgyu’s dumping site and see if there’s anything red, any other possible reason why he’d have that under his fingernails. Either that or this is all connected, and the same person who killed him is trying to kill you.

Jin's breath goes heavy when he thinks about what could have happened if Jimin hadn't been there.

Jin does not wake you and demand to know what happened, Jin keeps his breathing measured and shallow. Does not let his scent get sour enough to wake the others. Jin fully detangles himself from Jungkook and pauses to lean over you, thumb skimming the Band-Aid on your chin.

No one hurts his pack and gets away with it. No one.

He’ll think about what you know and why Jimin didn't tell him later. Poor thing was probably just too shocked to say anything. You might have convinced him that saying anything would have put Jungkook in distress. Jin's anger is a cool sort, it's not you that he's angry at.

It’s only 5 a.m. but Jin goes and gets a coffee anyways. When he gets back, he shoves it into Namjoon’s hands startling him awake. But one glance at the pack omega says that he means business. Shadowed face unreadable silhouetted against the bright and open hospital door.

“Get the doctor, we’re going home.”

~-~

You wake in the hospital bed, roused by Yoongi's gentle hand on your shoulder, feeling listless and sorer than ever with Hobi’s nose pressed to the nape of your neck and Jungkook at your front. You wonder when that started to feel normal. When Hobi cuddled you stopped feeling so forbidden.

you know that when you take off your clothes you'll find your front bruised from falling, that you'll find your body dinnged. you don't know what you'll say, how you'll excuse the marks away from them but in the meantime, you watch jungkook. get a washcloth from the bathroom and whipe his face for him, standing between his legs.

"do you want water? coffee? can i get you something before your MRI"

namjoon sighs heavy, "pup- he can't-"

jungkook leans into your hands, letting you drag the cloth over his face, it's as much grooming as you ever have, but jungkook just smiles up at you and shakes his head. "when we get home yeah?"

The golden light streams through the horizontal blinds and Jungkook shifts as he gets out of the hospital bed and into a wheelchair for his MRI, and you wait for him with the rest of the pack. Yoongi returns with bagels and coffee for everyone. The caffeine makes you all jittery.

After he's given a clean bill of health, Jungkook leaves the hospital under his own power, on his own two feet because he always needs that certainty. Declining the wheelchair that the staff offers because honestly, he’s fine, he'd run out of here if he didn't think namjoon would drag him right back inside.

You’re guided into Jimin’s car, Yoongi drives. Hobi is in the front, turning to look at you more than he should, asking you questions about what song you want to play. Really, it can go as loud as you want cuz Jungkook's in the other car. He asks too many for your brain to answer accurately. You're too tired too worn out too everything to answer.

But when you get home, there is even more movement too quick for your sleepy brain to comprehend. Jin has to go to work and so does Namjoon; something about a revision surgery that won’t take too much time and can't be rescheduled. He's barely changed and cleaned himself before he's heading out the door again. Definitely a bit too tired, but oh well.

But now at home, the rest of the pack has Jungkook well in hand and ready for a bit more babying. Jungkook will be fine by this evening. Is honestly fine now. Just a little tired of being poked and prodded and just needs to nest and rest.

Jin too seems distracted by something, checking his phone and kissing each of you on the forehead before he goes. You're tempted to whine and ask them to stay, if not for Jungkook then for you but before you can, Hobi grips both of your shoulders and tells Namjoon and Jin that he’s got it, and the moment gets stolen away from you.

“I’ll get your pajamas,” he says after the door thuds closed, while Jungkook says something to Yoongi. Noodle meows and darts around Tae's heels and Jimin carries Jungkook to the couch and gently, gently- sets him down. Your mate is distracted right now (as he should be) but that doesn’t mean Hobi can’t fill the gaps.

He thuds up the stairs, bare feet probably cold. The house is still cold from a night left empty even though Yoongi’s just turned the heat on.

Jimin gets a ding on his phone, standing up the second he’s seen it.

Unknown (9:18): I want to talk to you about a murder.

Unknown (9:18): One you might have a vested interest in.

The picture is grainy, but Jimin knows the faces of the two women like the back of his hand although Hyejin takes a few seconds of racking his brain to place. Jimin feels his blood cool to a simmer and the shaking in his hands stops. His phone dings a few more times, whoever's sending it through must be a fast texter, from a burner phone no doubt.

Unknown (9:19): Especially because of the sensitive nature of this, you understand why I’d want to meet in person.

Unknown (9:19): (See attached address)

Jimin's suspicions are immediately peaked, warning bells going off loud. But before he can do more than read over the messages again more come through.

Unknown (9:20): I’m willing to offer you 10x your normal rate for each kill. Two Mil upfront. And Three more when the hit is carried out. I understand how risky it is for you to even view these texts so here

Jimin watches the next notification from his bank account ding through and holds his breath.

Fuck, that's a lot of Zeros.

Unknown (9:20): As a show of my good faith in you. I'll see you in three hours. If not, enjoy the money.

Jimin holds onto the phone like it’s a lifeline, the black plastic case digging into his fingers. He knows it's stupid, he knows that it's dangerous, and a million other things but-

Jin's words ring in his ears. "I know you'll do whatever you have to do to protect the pack, until your dying breath."

The money means nothing to Jimin, he'd do this killing for free. Out of all the lives he's ever taken, this is the first one that maybe he's ever felt vindicated in. the first murder that he's ever truly wanted to commit.

He's gripping his phone so hard he doesn't move until you make a noise. And when he looks up at you, you have a glass of water in your hands, waiting there, watching him. There is still that fucking scrape on your chin. Jimin looks at it and his mind is made up. All of this karma has come due.

If Jimin's being honest with himself, it's not Moonbyul’s confrontation or her comments about you that had Jimin so bothered.

All that "you belong to me" kind of talk that bullshit alphas with something to prove say, like something out of a manhwa. If he's being honest, the thing that bothered him the most, that made him so very angry was how clearly you didn't want them, and how willing she was to ignore that.

He grins at you, tipping his head back and you think Jimin might look like more of a demon than a man.

“I have to go to work.”

“What?” Jungkook’s eyes go wide, and he reaches for Mini and tries to cling but Jimin steps away, sliding back on his still-warm shoes. “I thought you called out already?”

Jimin tugs on his coat, The one with the reinforcement in it, hard panels that flap just a little bit too stiffly. The shoulders that seem just a little too crisp.

"Sorry Koo it's an emergency."

You know just by looking at him that this isn’t for his other job. (You don’t think of bodyguarding as Jimin's real job, not when this one is so much more prescient and dangerous.) You follow him outside, the door closing with that same rusty jingle of the old doorknob.

“It’s not from her.” The words are quiet, stolen. The empty birdfeeder clangs in a sudden wind and you shiver, warm only for a few seconds without a jacket. Jimin’s hand skims your shoulder and he pushes at it, urging you to go back inside.

“It’s not just her who hires me, this isn’t related to her.” He lies effortlessly. Turning and making to walk away, you wrap your arms around him and almost make him fall down the stairs but he catches both of you, swaying at the bottom.

“Pup, you need to let me go,”

“No!” you cling to him stubbornly, “if I let you go something bad is going to happen!”

Jimin is so quiet you think you might not hear him. He stops struggling and trying to twist out of your arms for a second. “You’ve got to, I have to do this, please.” his tone is so calm, so gentle. Jimin is smiling down at you when you pull back to look up at him. He gently but forcefully separates you from him, hands holding yours and prying them apart.

“I’ve got too much to make up for. You have to let me do this.”

You have a bad feeling about this, your instincts that you should listen to. Walking into this so soon after Jungkook’s seizure. Is this punishment for leaving him? Jimin slips from between your hands. Walking to his car, and you feel a lurching in your gut like something terrible is about to happen.

You say nothing, watching him, heart beating quick. but you are powerless to stop him, powerless to keep him from leaving.

You wonder if this is how Yoongi felt, leaving them. Powerless.

“You'll come back? you've got to- you can't-" you can't leave us is what you want to say. Standing on the steps of the house, Jimin by his car.

"I'd never dream of leaving you." Jimin says, swearing it. And all the fight goes out of your sails.

"Be careful Minnie.”

He looks back at you, hair ruffled by the wind. All the snow from the night before has melted but the cold will stay.

“Always am.”

You nod, giving him permission and Jimin gets in his car. You return inside where it’s warmer. And Jimin turns it on, but before he has a chance to pull away from the curb, his phone lights up with another notification.

Unknown (9:27): Make sure to wear your mask.

~-~

The location on his phone is a lot more desolate in person, the scrub brush that’s that's grown in is thick enough to hide his car. Green by the river and poisoned into sticks here. Jimin parks far away among the maze of what must be four-wheeler tracks and walks in. mask on and gun at the ready.

The rusted metal of the industrial park rises out of the soil and the fog. It has to have been abandoned for years given how poor of a condition it's in. There are a few half-fallen-down buildings and one big complicated warehouse flanked on one side by a wide and slow-moving river. The soil smells strongly of gasoline and rust. The soil here is probably soaked through with it. Jimin wonders if would burn and catch fire if a spark was lit.

The traditional mask fits snugly on Jimin’s face, the hole at the mouth just large enough for him to not feel like he’s suffocating. Eye holes are wide enough to see and not block his peripheries.

The doors are cracked and nearly rusted shut with age but Jimin slides through a crack easily. He’s a whole hour early on purpose. This is all by design, every moment of this. Every second is orchestrated like a symphony;

Jimin is the violin, with high and pointed movements, drawing his weapon like a cymbal. The crunch of his boots on the floor the drums, every breath a crooning saxophone. His thoughts flute spiraling up like high delights. All of this builds to one big crescendo.

He doesn’t take out his phone to check the time. The upstairs is mostly unlit but Jimin doesn't use a light, just lets his eyes adjust. He waits, stalking quietly, completely silent in his movements.

Jimin is not nervous about this handoff, mostly, he’s just wondering who it is in the family that's finally betraying her. He’d be lying if he said he didn’t suspect that the conditions of this were a little too perfect. Money and all.

The main atrium of the industrial park is rusted up with age. Old metal shipping containers that used to hold smelting equipment or maybe molten metal long since rusted out even though the chains still hang from the ceiling. A suspended catwalk rings the room on all sides.

Jimin spends a few minutes casing the place, noting the exits, and the obvious places to hide. The old rusty fans at the apex of the roof turn and squeak softly from the wind outside. The whole place smells like chemicals and rust. It's all Jimin can do not to have a coughing fit.

It’s a wonder he doesn’t smell the blood sooner

(Trust me, I speak from experience. if you spend enough time around blood that's not your own, you’ll eventually be able to smell it. Even a drop in an empty room. like a hound the the hunt. You'll smell it.)

Jimin is almost done with logging the entrance and exits when he finds the body.

He rushes to their side, Jimin doesn’t recognize their face when he slides whats left of the traditional mask off their face, it's the same as his. Racking his brain to recognize the face but nothing. the masks is broken into pieces. A bullet between the eyes is a good shot.

Before Jimin can do anything, can decide if this is a setup or just a meet-up gone wrong, He hears footsteps behind him.

~-~

In the wake of Jin, Namjoon, and Jimin leaving, the rest of the pack is a bit forlorn. Jungkook is not so mobile, not so willing to make the trek upstairs. Worried about the stairs and any sudden seizures and all. But there is no shortage of cuddle spots on the ground floor, you've made many a nest in the living room before.

And besides, in such proximity to the kitchen, Jungkook can have all his treats this way.

Lately, it’s started to feel like the pack has several nests, the one upstairs, the nesting pod, and the one on the old grey couch when you shove all the pieces together. Yoongi indulges jungkook in half a bar of dark chocolate while you get some nesting materials. Blankets and your wet cheeks catching the dimmed lights.

You’re a little pouty and a lot quiet, and the others take note of it. Skimming comforting hands up and down your shoulders, always touching you like they’re making sure you’re there. They don't ask why you're upset at Jimin leaving. They don't have to wonder. you snap the blanket as you fluff it huffing.

Jungkook finds your angry nestmaking cute. he pulls you down on top of him nipping at your throat when you fuss a little too long. Testing out Jin's method of settling on you.

It’s surprising even to you when the action sparks tears in your eyes, the opposite he was hoping for. You rub at your wet eyes with a clenched fist stubbornly. It’s not even noon yet and you’re already crying. You're so exhausted by everything that’s happened in the last 24 hours, so tired. You can't be blamed for getting a little teary-eyed.

Tae reappears, freshly showered. Her shoulder-length hair already starting to dry. tilting your face up to her's and says "Oh my little dove-

She piles into the nest and upstairs you hear Hobi moving around. tae stradles jungkook's thighs and shifts the two of you, lying you all flat,

"Don’t worry about Minnie, he’s always had something to prove.” You rub at your tears stubbornly, sniffling and nodding. Jungkook threads his fingers through the back of your hair, a little indelicately. But he loves without boundaries, like a butterfly flapping its wings for the first time.

“But why-” your words are quiet but broken, “why does he always feel so-"

“Guilty?” Tae finishes for you, looking out the window in the direction that Jimin disappeared. Humming as she strips you of Hobi's sweatshirt.

Hobi appears at the bottom of the stairs smiling. "Are we talking about Jimin's guilt complex again?"

Your mate groans and finishes putting together a little snack board. "I swear we've probably had this discussion like- fucking 20 times?" Yoongi's not wrong.

You only get more teared-eyed, crying a little bratty, thumping weakly against jungkook's chest, he grabs your thigh and pulls you snug across his lap. "But why! Why does he feel like everything is his fault?"

Tae hides her sad smile behind a hand, and you're less upset looking at it. Calmed in a second, because they have talked about this you realize, everyone in the pack is well aware.

“I guess he feels guilty because," Tae sighs, "because he was so loved.” Tae's fingers dance along Jungkook's thigh, and you're all quiet. everyone is quiet when they hear tae talk about jimin. it's a little like listening to someone describe what it feels like listening to your favorite song for the first time, what it's like to taste your favorite food, the feeling of a first kiss.

Hobi comes close to tae, sets down a shirt and a pair of pants. "would you get them into this while i shower?" the curtains are drawn and hobi goes upstairs and Tae undresses you while she speaks. You're a doll, teary eyed and willing as she and Jungkook strip you and put you in clean clothes. You didn't realize how much you needed to not smell like hospital until it's done.

"The first love you lose always hurts you the most, whether that's romantic love or parental love doesn't really matters. Each person metabolizes it differently. Truthfully, I believe that Jimin lost love the first time and promised himself- never again."

Tae talks, playing with Jungkook’s hair. He pouts “he's never gonna lose us.” Tae hums, agreeing. But you can see in her eyes the sadness there. Wounds that might never heal and wanting that might never fade.

Yoongi sits down beside you and together, the three of you undress and dress Jungkook. He could probably do it himself just like you could, but he's a willing puppet, happy when Tae tickles his tummy and slides his shirt over his head.

A minute later, Hobi's back, wet head that drips onto your cheek when he leans over Jungkook's curled form to grab one of the grapes on the snack board that Yoongi made. And Tae stares off into space, thinking of Jimin, how they met and how they feel in love, everything between then and now.

Tae smiles just thinking of him. "i know that pup, he just- he can't let himself believe it no matter how much he wants too. It was really hard on him, how our parents treated us, Jimin has guilt built into him because they made him that way."

It's too simple of an explanation for what they went through. What does it mean to love a parent that hates you? Or at least to have a parent that does not strive to understand you. How many times did the words linger on Tae’s lips? Standing in the doorway wearing a little boy jersey and little boy clothes, listening to his mother talk about the things on the news.

Wondering, Mom, would you give up God for me?

Tae rests her cheek on her hand. Her nail polish has gotten all chipped, maybe she picked at it nervously while you were at the hospital. She has a habit of picking at it when she needs something for her hands to do.

“If Jimin had a religion- it would be love. And every time he feels even a little bit like he's not loving us the way he should, he beats himself up for it and guilts himself into loving harder, loving better. He considers a lack of love the greatest crime. So yeah, feeling guilty is par for the course."

Jungkook groans, tipping his head back against the sofa, “I’ve told him, I’ve told him a million times-“

“Doesn’t matter” Hobi interrupts, “he still hates it when he’s not there when you have a seizure. He's upset with himself, that's why he left. Giving him more love when he feels like he doesn't deserve it is like his worst nightmare.”

You think of the explosion. Of Jimin pining your body and putting himself between you and the blast. Maybe with Jimin it's so instinctual it's not even a conscious decision. You wonder if it ever gets easy, to make the decision to sacrifice yourself for the people you love. Does that make Mimin feel like he deserves them more? the sacrifice?

You don’t know if it would be as innate with you, You might have to think it through for a few seconds.

You don't like that. You don't like realizing that you'd need to think through it however briefly. You fear a world in which you don’t love him as much as he loves you, in which any of this isn’t reciprocal.

(But then again, most recipes have twice as much sugar as butter.)

You melt against Hobi’s side. “He shouldn’t,” you say, feeling useless, a little quieter, a little bit more upset. “He shouldn’t feel guilty, he loves us enough!” Tae’s hand rests on your ankle, and her laugh strikes high and sad.

Outside a mourning dove coos, a lonely soft sound.

“Trust me, I’ve been trying to love Jimin more than he loves me for my whole life. He wants to win the 'I love you more' debate every time.”

~-~

The Industrial Park is different than Jin remembers.

It rises a little more jagged against the surrounding area of 3-meter-high brush that disguises a network of other dilapidated sheds and half flooded buildings. Jin recites what he knows about this place; the facts.

An iron processing plant, decimated by the flood of a nearby river 2 dozen years ago and bought through a shell corporation. Vacant land with so many entrances and exits. A veritable hotbed and the perfect body dumping site. construction on a housing development delayed on account of how expensive the environmental clean up.

He scans the building for red paint.

He can be forgiven for not seeing Jimin’s car, parked on the fringes. The opposite side from where Jin came in because Jin had to stop at the office first. Jin can be forgiven for having his blinders on, so focused with single-minded intent that he misses some of the signs. The smell of gasoline drowns out Jimin's vanilla scent.

Jin sees the fresh footprints in the dirt and draws his weapon.

That's the whole reason why it took him so long to get here, (why Jimin got here first even though he left second) He couldn't just go into an unknown setting alone unarmed, he'd had to stop back at the office to grab his vest and his FBI-issued firearm, a standard-issue Glock 17. Forghein and unwelcomed in his hands.

Even Jin will admit that he’s not the best marksman, (Jin had barely passed his exam a few years back, and continually has to study and practice for his re-certification every 6 months.) Jin does not prefer to be armed. If he wasn’t alone, if he didn’t go by himself for this, He might not have brought his weapon at all.

Jin enters through the front door; the old hanger doors are already open. Feet crunching on the gravel. Jin can feel his heartbeat in his fingers, how hard he’s holding the gun, he’s never had to discharge it during a field excursion before. How unbecoming of a director, how green of him. He lacks this experience.

The tip of the weapon shakes because he's holding it so hard. Jin feels like he can feel the breath of unseen eyes on the back of his neck. Someone is here, he knows it.

Jin walks into the atrium, gun at the ready, turning the corner when he sees them.

One masked man is bending over another a body, already strewn across the floor and dead. the man's mask litters the floor in red shards. Jin sees the gun in the living man's hands, gloved, Jin snaps his hand up and aims before he can really take in the details of the scene.

“Stop! FBI! Put your hands where I can see them!”

The man at the other end of the room tilts his head and does not speak, red mask flashing in the half-light. There is a single breath where the man does not move, just looks at Jin with that tilted face. silent. But then he takes off, running like his life depends on it. bolting down a corridor and out of range of Jin’s accuracy on the best of days.

Jin fires a shot and misses. It hits the metal wall with a loud clink and a bright spark, ricocheting off into space.

Jin curses and takes off after the killer, skidding in the dust and bashing into the wall, gun banning against the door with a loud metallic clang as he slides through it, running from hall to hall trying to get a good shot.

Every time Jin crests a turn and tries to aim, the man rounds another, darting through the maze of hallways and shipping containers.

Jin has longer legs and is taller and faster than his target. He catches up to them by the stairs, the man turns and hesitates again. If Jin were less adrenaline high he might already realize they've tucked their gun away.

“Stop or I’ll shoot!”

The criminal bolts up the stairs and Jin goes too. Up and up and up onto the catwalk. Feet clangs against the metal, the suspended walkway sways under the force of their steps, The chains clanking.

And then, at the very end, he stops.

Jimin turns, casting one glance back at him. And hesitates, the mask catches the light again. And Jimin reaches up, about to take it off. The words, "Stop baby it's me." Already hovering on the edge of his lips.

He never gets the chance to say them. Jin’s finger finds the trigger, and the gun fires in a gorgeous explosion of gunpowder and force. Fire made small, and love made lethal.

Jimin hits the wall from the force of the bullet, hitting the latch at the back of his head.

The mask falls off.

~-~

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~-~

Notes:

Everybody lives nobody dies.

Let me repeat that again NOBODY DIES, no one, not even Jimin. He’s just gonna be a little bloody from this, that’s all, before you get angry and yell at me.

I could have made this more convoluted, but I decided not too because…I simply did not want to stage a chapter between this one and the next one.

Jimin’s autistic meltdowns look a whole lot like mine do, I know they’re not typically what other people associate with meltdowns. But going nonverbal and stimming with your body (pacing) is very on par with me.

I felt like we needed to see a little bit of the jinmin dynamic before you know…Jin shoots him, just for funsies. And to talk about how Jimin loves.

A lot of people expressed a desire for Jimin to have some sort of concenquence for the way he treated Tae when she came out, just the part where he needed space, and for him not helping the m/c when he could have. I think this is his penance for that, getting shot by Jin, getting betrayed- however unintentionally- by someone he loves is the justice for those moments. I’ve always been stalwart on the fact that the bily charecters act sort of terribly sometimes because real people act terribly too, they’re dynamic in the way that they love and handle their actions.

On the subject of like- who framed what and explaining the events of the chapter, moonbyul and Hyejin are orchestrating everything. They pay Jimin MOSTLY because they know how suspicious it is and are trying to do anything they can to expose Jin to him. The scene in the industrial park goes exactly the way they wanted it too…accept that Jimin will live. They didn’t count on Jin being a poor shot lol

They are trying not only to manipulate the m/c away from the pack, but destabilize them to try and make the m/c come to them. Having one packmate kill another is definitely they way they wanted to do this. They’d 1000% just kill everyone if they thought that would give them the m/c but they’re attempting to manipulate her into coming to them rather than just abducting her point blank.

Funnily enough this is one cannon-cannon event of bily like, Jin was always going to shoot Jimin. If you go back and forth in other chapters you can see that Jin is almost constantly touching Jimin’s shoulder. It’s up to you if you think that Jin’s bullet got close enough to Jimin’s heart to kill him or if by some luck he survived

That’s a lie I can’t lie to you guys he’s 1000% going to live through this I can’t keep secrets from you guys, no one dies in this story even if it seems like they might at times we only have one more almost death to get through.

I feel like this chapter had less flowery language than my usual ones in part because it’s got a bit from Jin’s pov and also because everyone is so scared and frozen through the whole thing.

I cannot even begin to tell you how much less stressful the next chapter of bily is than my life, like i would rather GET SHOT AGAIN then be where i currently am, with the same level of anxiety that i have.

i wish i had time to edit this more but alas! its only 2 hours until i'll post this and i'm just finishing it up.

[loveinhawkins]

Up until recent events, Eddie hasn’t really put much thought into flashlights—save for that time he had to take out the batteries in the T.V remote to get his to work, back when the power went wonky last summer.

But now? Oh, as soon as he’s through with this whole nightmare, Eddie’s gonna find out whichever saint invented the damn things and start a petition to get them a federal holiday. That’s gonna be his whole… raisin something, something—he thinks it’s French, Buckley will know.

Fucking wondrous creations.

… Okay, he might still be a little jittery.

So sue him. It’s either run with his increasingly stupid train of thought or have a thoroughly justified panic about—well, there’s just so much to choose from: the ash in the air, the apparently sentient vines on the ground, how it’s so fucking cold and dark—

Jesus H. Christ, calm down.

It’s not all that dark anyway—or at least, it’s not as dark as it could be. Steve’s lighting the way, flashlight in hand. Honestly, Eddie thinks he should get it preserved, like in one of those glass cabinets in museums, complete with a plaque: This bulb somehow survived a journey from the depths of a lake into an alternate dimension, and all for the low, low price of…

Well, Eddie doesn’t know how much it cost. He’ll workshop the whole plaque thing.

In his reverie, he stumbles carelessly, nearly pitching over right into Hive Mind territory.

“Ah, shit,” he whispers.

Steve’s hand must move because the light drifts over—ends up illuminating much more of Eddie’s path than Steve’s.

“Thanks,” Eddie says—glances sideways to find Steve already looking at him.

“Think I’m the one who should be thanking you,” Steve replies.

His hand flexes, as if he’d gone to twirl the flashlight before catching himself; Eddie has a very faint memory of Steve doing the same with pencils in class and fights a private smile.

“You gave me it,” Steve continues. “I would’ve just… gone right in without thinking.”

It’s said self-deprecatingly, but Eddie would argue that Steve’s impulsivity (his courage) is an admirable character trait, even if it sets his heart pounding.

His own problem is that he thinks too damn much, until the window of opportunity has almost been and gone.

He was the only one to hesitate before diving into the lake: he knows all too well how that could’ve made its way onto the increasingly long list of moments that haunt him.

He could’ve been too late, could’ve not found the Gate at all—and then, would only have been able to pathetically swim back to the kids and tell them that their heroes were gone.

The light skips onwards just a little, encourages Eddie to look up from his feet. He blinks a few times to try and adjust to the darkness looming ahead. There, the indistinct outline of trees, and he’s drawn back to a classroom again, to the soporific noise of chalk on a blackboard, to…

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.

“The hell is that from?” Eddie wonders, and he doesn’t realise he’s also said the quote aloud until Steve speaks.

“S’a poem. Robert Frost.”

Eddie clicks his fingers. “See, that’s why you actually passed English.”

Steve rocks his hand back and forth, so-so.

Eddie raises an eyebrow. “Don’t play coy now, Harrington.”

“I’m not, I passed by the skin of my teeth, dude.” Steve looks into the distance as he walks, like he’s being drawn back to some place, too. “I was meant to, um, submit a portfolio thing, and I just… didn’t.”

“Like stories and shit?”

Steve smiles. “Mm-hmm, and shit. Poems, too.”

“So why didn’t you…?”

Steve just shrugs in reply so Eddie changes tack—rolls his eyes expansively, but only at himself.

“Fucking Frost. Ugh, why can I remember that shit now, but when a paper’s in front of me, it’s just…” Eddie mimes an explosion in the back of his head, gone.

“Well,” Steve says, chuckling, “if the, uh, lovely atmosphere of this place jogs your memory, we’ll make some time, get you to write an essay.” He grins at Eddie, teasing and charming in equal measure. “We’re nothing if not productive.”

“Sure, that’s one word for it.”

Joking aside, Eddie finds that the mention of school calms his heart somewhat: to think of the foreboding sights around him as part of a story. Maybe it’s a control thing, like his campaigns. Dress shit up, put a film on top, then you don’t have to look at it directly.

He suggests as such to Steve in a longwinded ramble, and gets a thoughtful look in response.

“Like the Shire? And Mordor?”

“Yeah,” Eddie says. “Yeah, exactly.”

Steve nods slightly. The movement dislodges some particles in his hair—and yes, it helps, Eddie thinks, to believe it’s just freshly fallen snow.

“Yeah, that sorta never really worked for me?” Steve’s voice goes up at the end, almost apologetically, although for the life of him, Eddie can’t work out what he’s apologising for. “Like, when the kids ran with all the D&D stuff, the uh… analogy? Metaphor?”

Eddie gestures at himself with one hand, I failed English.

Steve laughs. “Yeah, whatever. Dustin and Lucas keep hashing that one out. Anyway, it didn’t exactly… help. Help me, I mean. Just made everything more…”

He sighs heavily.

Eddie thinks he understands. All his bullshit is just a veneer, after all: it doesn’t truly mask the fear.

“Hey, maybe you could give it a shot,” Steve adds. The light dances for a second, like he’s just barely resisted twirling the flashlight again.

“What?”

Steve smirks—juvenile, light-hearted, almost like he’s about to challenge Eddie at the school gym, like, bet you can’t make that shot from center court, Munson.

“You could write a poem. Make sense of…” Steve gestures around them.

“Harrington, as I keep reminding you, I failed English.”

“Yeah, so? I’ve heard Henderson go on about your campaigns, dude, s’not like they come from nothing.” Steve looks Eddie up and down in exaggerated scrutiny. “You look like the kinda guy who loves a theme.”

“Oh, really,” Eddie says flatly. He can’t hide his smile even if he tried.

“That’s what I thought, every time you’d come into class late: oh, here he is. The symbolism.”

“Jesus Christ, Harrington, shut up.” Eddie steps into Steve’s space just to shove him away (just to touch). He thinks that if he were to try his hand at poetry, it’d be horrendously self-indulgent—something about how he might not be the one holding a flashlight right now, but he’s certainly carrying a torch.

“I don’t work for free, Steve. You’ve gotta do one, too.”

“A poem for a poem, huh?” Steve says. “Sure. It’s a deal.”

And yeah, they might just be saying anything to pass the time. But Eddie chooses to believe otherwise; there’s still a pensive flicker in Steve’s eyes that makes him think he might just get lucky, that Steve might even dig up some old stuff from his abandoned portfolio.

It’s a nice thought—something to look forward to, at the end of all this.

He considers Steve, and even though he knows it’s not snow, he can’t help but turn the particles into flakes in his mind again, into something prettier, safe—almost as if Steve’s presence has softened the danger.

He wants to stop here, suddenly. Linger. It doesn’t make sense. But it feels like time is…

A gentle nudge—a warm elbow to his side.

“C’mon, daydreamer,” Steve says. “You can write down whatever you’re thinking later.”

Eddie snaps out of it with a breath of a chuckle, follows Steve’s light again. Keeps moving forward—past the ash, and the vines, and the trees.

The woods won’t be forever.

After all, he’s got promises to keep.

[nanowrimo]

Pro Tips from a NaNo Coach: How to Write a Clean(ish) Fast Draft

NaNoWriMo can seem like a daunting task sometimes, for NaNo newbies and veterans alike. Fortunately, our NaNo Coaches are here to help guide you through November! Today, author Jesse Q. Sutanto is here to share her advice on how to set yourself up for noveling success:

Dear Nano-ers,

My first book took me three years to cobble together. During that time, I joined Absolute Write—a free writers forum which I completely love and recommend to all aspiring writers—and I made a friend who convinced me to try doing NaNoWriMo. I was completely unconvinced, but I am a people-pleaser and I can never say no, so I agreed to try it for my second novel.

My second novel took me less than a month to write. It was a complete mess, but it was also a revelation. Often, I felt myself falling into that writing Holy Grail—the hole which consumes you, makes you forget the rest of the world, and absorbs you completely in the world you are creating on paper. I loved the process deeply, and never looked back since. All of my subsequent books have since been written in a matter of months. 

And you know what? They were all a horrific mess. I did not learn how to do a clean and fast draft until my NINTH book, and I don’t think I would’ve ever learnt without the help of NaNoWriMo. So here are my tips on how to best tackle a sprint-a-thon like NaNo. 

1. Try to come up with a loose outline.

When I first started writing, I was a pure pantser. I had no idea what was going to happen before I sat down to write. This is a completely legit way of writing, but I have since learned that it is massively helpful to have an idea, even a vague one, of what you are trying to say with your book. What was really helpful for me was to sit down for just five minutes before writing each scene and try to envision what I wanted the scene to achieve. Once I had that in mind, the scene became much easier to write. 

2. Break down your writing time.

Ever heard of the Pomodoro technique? In order to hit 50,000 words a month, you need to write around 1,600 words a day. That is a heck of a lot of words to write! Break it down. Set 10 or 15-minute timers and use that to your advantage. Trust me, if you told me to sit down and write 1,600 words, I would be like, “Omg that’s too much!” But if you told me to just write for 15 minutes, that feels a lot more doable. 

3. Give yourself permission to write trash.

Before each writing session, I actually say out loud: “I am going to write trash.” And this gives me permission to write whatever comes to my mind without judgment. You can always edit later, but for now, focus on letting the words out on paper. 

4. Lean on others for support.

I made the mistake of thinking that writing is a lonely vocation. In fact, it is one of the most social things I could do. Social media, while a double-edged sword, has done so much for the writing community. I have found all of my close writer friends through social media, and I chat with them every day and consider them my close, lifelong friends. Don’t be afraid to reach out and make connections within the community. You are not alone. 

Jesse Q. Sutanto is the award-winning, bestselling author of Dial A for Aunties, Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers, Well, That Was Unexpected, The Obsession, and Theo Tan and the Fox Spirit. The film rights to her women’s fiction, Dial A for Aunties, was bought by Netflix in a competitive bidding war, and the TV rights to Vera Wong was bought by Warner Bros, with Oprah and Mindy Kaling attached to produce. She has a master’s degree in creative writing from Oxford University, though she hasn’t found a way of saying that without sounding obnoxious.

[candlewaxandp0lar0ids]

jealousy, jealousy || Seungmin x Reader

Summary: When you planned a study date with your boyfriend, you hadn't thought that he would actually want to study throughout the whole thing — or that he would unexpectedly ditch you halfway through. Fortunately for you, he has a very obliging roommate who's more than happy to give the two of you some alone time...

Word count: 3.7k

Genres: college AU, established relationship, fluffy fluff

Warnings & Tags: jealousy (duh), making out, it gets quite suggestive but no actual smut (rating M), Han makes an appearance

series masterlist

The idea of a ‘study date’ had seemed appealing to you at first. Your boyfriend was one of the top students in pretty much all of his classes and you didn’t want to interfere with that. You also liked working at the library well enough yourself, and you could see the inherent aesthetic of being surrounded by old books, hands brushing against each other every now and again, only quiet whispers filling the silence… Yeah, you thought you could make it work.

Your friends had also hyped you up. There had been lots of grins and winks when you had announced you wouldn’t be available for the afternoon. When you’d rolled your eyes at them and told them you were going to work, thank you very much, you’d been met with a lot of ‘Yeah, sure’ and one unnecessarily detailed description of how you could fuck in the library without getting caught. You hadn’t thought for a second that was an option, but you’d still left your dorm with some butterflies in your stomach.

As it turned out, though, Seungmin’s ideas of study dates were a lot more focused on studying than on the ‘date’ part.

He had kissed you, very briefly, when the two of you had met, which hadn’t fazed you all that much since you knew he wasn’t very comfortable with being affectionate in public. He had, however, taken your hand, traced circles over your skin with his thumb as the two greeted each other, and squeezed it before letting go, which had only renewed the feeling in your stomach.

…maybe you were a little bit down bad.

Things had gone south after that, though. First, he had declined the idea of getting coffee to go, looking at you like you had grown a second head.

“You’re not allowed to have coffee in the library. You could damage the books.”

So you’d given up on that idea, and instead you had headed inside, had found a quiet, isolated place where it was just the two of you.

And so now, an hour later, you’re staring at your books, bored out of your mind, in dead silence, while Seungmin hasn’t looked up from his work once in the past half-hour.

This is on you, you tell yourself somewhat bitterly. Studying is something that he takes very seriously, and you know that. Usually you wouldn’t even mind. You’ve spent a few nights at his dorm, on his bed, reading or watching TV shows on your phone as he worked, and you’ve always found it very attractive, how focused he got in these moments. Even now, the look of absolute concentration on his face, the way his brow furrows sometimes before he flips through the pages of his book to find an explanation for something, how he pushes his glasses higher on his nose whenever they slip—

Yeah, yeah, alright, you’ll stop waxing poetics about your boyfriend now.

You stretch, trying to get your attention back to the essay you’re supposed to be writing. You’ve been trying to find an efficient outline for it, and though you’ve written a few words down and you think you’ve found some key ideas that will do just fine, there’s still a lot of preliminary work to be done. You stare at everything you’ve scribbled on the paper like you’re expecting some genius idea to jump out at you, but all it does is make the words look more jumbled and—

“What are you guys doing here?”

Thank God for Han Jisung, seriously.

“What are you doing here,” Seungmin mumbles without looking up. “It’s my spot.”

“Well it is really romantic,” Jisung says, shooting you a wink. “What are you working on?”

“Seungmin is writing on the notion of humanity in Frankenstein,” you say, “and I’m—”

“Fascinating,” Jisung interrupts you, making you snort, “and how’s it going?”

“Really well,” you reply, easily falling into the same tone as him. “Take a look at that.”

He leans over your shoulder at the empty word document on your computer and chuckles. You always find it easy to be around Jisung. You knew of him before you started dating Seungmin, had heard about him as a part of 3racha, the rap group that everyone on campus was crazy about, but you hadn’t really talked to him. Finding out that he was Seungmin’s roommate had taken you by surprise, learning that they actually got along, more so. He’d been really accommodating though, and he left the two of you alone when he could, crashing at the apartment of one of the other two members of his group.

He also usually made you laugh and, generally, was a fun person to be around.

“Wow,” he grins, “that’s super impressive. There’s already a typo in the title.”

You lean forward with a curse to remove it while he laughs at you. Across the table from you, Seungmin glances up and clicks his tongue. His jaw’s tense, a sure sign that he’s starting to get annoyed.

“You guys should leave if you’re going to be making noise.”

Jisung pouts and gives you a pleading look.

“Wanna grab coffee before you get back to that?” he offers.

“My savior,” you sigh, “I feel like my head’s going to explode. I’ll take a break,” you smile at Seungmin. “I need to get some caffeine in my system to stay functioning. I’ll be back in a few.”

The tension in your boyfriend’s jaw doesn’t go away though, and you almost lean in to peck him on the cheek, but you think that even Jisung’s presence would make him uncomfortable, so you settle for giving him a squeeze on the shoulder as you get up.

Jisung’s already halfway to the door by the time you even get up, waving at you to hurry up in fake annoyance. With a giggle, you follow.

“So, how are things going?” Jisung asks with his gossip voice while he leans against the coffee machine.

You shake your head.

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that? You’re his roommate.”

“Seungmin says I ‘have no filter’ and I ‘can’t be trusted with anything’,” he shrugs matter-of-factly. The insults don’t seem to bother him in the slightest.

“Things are good,” you answer against your better judgement, maybe partially because you want to brag about your boyfriend. “Seungmin’s very thoughtful, you know? He always remembers the little things I tell him. He plans all our dates. He gets me flowers. Even if…” You frown, gesture at the building around you. “Well, it was kinda tough this week because we have all these essays to turn in, so I suggested a study date.”

“Aw,” Jisung says, “aren’t you the considerate girlfriend?” Then, after a silence: “Do you want the room for tonight?”

“You’re a godsend, I hope you know that.”

“I do.”

“If you don’t mind, I think it would be nice. Seungmin’s, uh, focused on his work and this doesn’t really feel like a date at all.” The issue’s probably that you had gotten your hopes up, and you’d still like to get some actual quality time at some point with him during the day.

“All good,” Jisung says, a little too easily, and you eye him from over your burning coffee.

“Do you know where you’re going to crash?”

His eyes widen, and suddenly he looks like some cute, small animal with big cheeks caught in headlights.

“…maybe?”

“Han Jisung,” you gasp, “is there someone you haven’t told me about?”

Of course, the two of you aren’t that close, but you’re not one to pass on an opportunity to be dramatic. His reaction — spluttering and blushing — only makes it more worth it.

“I, uh… maybe? We’re not…” He starts picking at an undone thread on his sweater, which he seems to find absolutely riveting. “We’re not quite there yet.”

“You should go get it,” you say with a decided nod. “Anyone you’re with would be lucky to have you.”

At that, Jisung glances at you briefly, eyes lighting up before they go back to his sleeve, even though he can’t quite hide the bashful smile that’s starting to form on his lips. That’s a side of him you’ve never seen before. You think you’d enjoy becoming closer friends with him, if things keep working out well between you and Seungmin.

“You really think so?” he asks quietly.

“A hundred percent,” you say, and you mean it.

You slide a chocolate bar across the table to Seungmin as you sit back down by the table, feeling somewhat refreshed — and with much better prospects than originally planned for the evening.

He glances at you, and you take the opportunity to lean over to press a brief kiss to his lips. Even though there is no one around to see it, his cheeks have turned a light red when you pull away.

“I know you won’t eat it in here,” you whisper, “but it can be a snack if you want to take a break.”

He nods, once.

“Was it nice with Jisung?”

Oh, right!

“It was fun! And guess what, he’s leaving the apartment tonight,” you grin. “It’ll just be the two of us.”

Seungmin hums in response, and though you think your announcement deserved a little more enthusiasm than that, you know how he gets when he’s focused. You now feel energized and refreshed, though, and it turns out to be much easier to get your attention back to your paper.

You wouldn’t say you considered yourself particularly academically inclined, and those things don’t come as easy to you as they do to Seungmin. You don’t feel very strongly about it. Different people, different strengths, and yours are much more geared towards human interactions. Sometimes, you do feel a bit envious of how easy Seungmin makes it look, of how brilliant he sounds when you feel like a bumbling idiot when talking about the same objects.

You don’t doubt the fact that you have other things to bring to the table, though. For one, you’re the one who instigated the relationship, and you know for a fact (Jisung told you so) that Seungmin wouldn’t have taken the first step, no matter how much he wanted to.

And yet, Seungmin had been the one to ask you to make things ‘official’. That had been… kinda new to you. Most of the guys around you — the ones you met at parties, or the ones your friends had entanglements with — considered college to be perfect for a ‘no strings attached’ situation.

But Seungmin had looked straight into your eyes as he stood in your doorway, a bouquet of roses in his hands, because you’d mentioned how much you loved them on at least three occasions in a not so subtle way for hinting that you’d like to get some for Valentine’s Day. The tip of his ears was burning red, and yet his voice hadn’t wavered when he’d asked.

You’ve managed to write a whole paragraph — 250 words, not bad —, only minimally distracted by the corny thoughts that are commonplace when you’re around Seungmin when the loud noise of a book being closed shut jerks you back to reality. It takes you a second to locate the origin, but it certainly becomes clearer when you see your boyfriend’s packing his stuff up.

“What are you doing?” you ask, a little too loud for the library environment.

“I can’t focus,” he says, not meeting your eyes, “I’m going back to my room.”

You stare for a few seconds, trying to figure out if something’s wrong, if it’s something you’ve said, something you’ve done, but nothing comes to mind.

“You can come by later,” he says, instant relief flooding your chest, “if you’re done with your assignment.”

His playful tone makes you chuckle and, as he brushes past you, you wrap your fingers in his jacket, pulling him down towards you.

“Alright, do well today.”

You’d only intended to peck his lips, but he presses his against yours more intently, one of his hands on the table, the other on the back of your chair, and it’s hard not to let your friends’ previous suggestions get the better of you in that moment. You feel flushed when he pulls away, and his shit-eating grin makes you want to throw something at him.

“Kim Seungmin,” you hiss, “what—”

But he’s already on his merry way, giggling to himself at the state he’s got you in as he escapes.

You huff, knowing it’s going to take you a hot minute to get back to the state of focus you were previously in. Your eyes scan your screen, then the books opened in front of you, but your mind goes back to the unusual tension in your boyfriend’s shoulders, to the twitching muscle in his jaw. You are amused — and quite flattered — by the idea that you were the one who made him unable to focus, but you do wonder if anything had upset him.

You make a mental note to ask him about it, right next to ‘no more library dates’ and above ‘buy Jisung flowers’. You’ll think about that more when you have the time. For now, this essay isn’t going to write itself.

It is barely 6.30 pm when you swing open the door to Seungmin’s room, and he shoots you an unamused look that you ignore completely as you put down a cup of his favorite coffee on his desk.

“I’m not done,” he says. “Are you?”

“Yeah,” you reply with a shrug, pecking him on the cheek, “I’ll just need to proofread tomorrow.”

He scrunches his nose, and you don’t need him to say anything to know exactly what he thinks of your work ethic, but you don’t really care. He strives for academic perfection and he won’t rest until his essay is worthy of a Nobel prize; you aim for a passing grade and will never think about it again. You do admire him for his abilities though, just like he not-so-secretly wishes he could be even a tenth as carefree as you are. You think that might be why the two of you work so well together.

“I’ll let you work,” you hum, “and we can order something when you want to take a break.” Then, with a grin: “And if you want me to help you relax, all you have to do is say the word.”

He coughs and waves to get you away from him, which you do with a laugh. You’re more brazen when the two of you aren’t in public. Seungmin never fails to act like he hates it, but you’d bet an arm that he’d be incredibly disappointed if you ever stopped doing it.

Also, he does take you up on it about half of the time.

You let yourself fall on his bed and pull out your phone, connecting your earphones to it. You have some time to kill. On a normal day, it takes Seungmin about thirty minutes to stop working, like his brain has a hard time leaving the state of complete focus behind. Today, you suspect you’ll have to wait about an hour before you can get his attention back to you.

That’s not something you mind, not anymore anyway. If anything, you appreciate the quiet, and you like knowing that he’s in the room with you. You suspect it’s the same thing for him when he accompanies you to some of the university sport events or parties, just because you want to go. It may not be his favorite thing, but it’s worth it if the two of you get to be together.

You have to admit, though, that what you like more than anything is how focused on you he becomes afterwards. The second his brain is off his studies, it’s on you, you, and only you. His hands and tongue explore every inch of your skin, the words he whispers in your ear leave you burning, and his eyes devour you like you are the only person in the world.

But, sadly, you’ll have to wait a little bit to experience that again, and so, with a discreet sigh, you focus on your screen.

So when, after about five minutes, when the opening to your drama has just finished playing, you hear the familiar creaking of his chair as he gets up, you glance up, surprised.

“Everything okay?” you ask, pulling out one of your earphones and pressing pause on your phone. “Seungmin?”

You don’t get a reply from him. What you do get is his lips pressed against yours as he climbs into bed with you. You let out a surprised sound, immediately muffled by his mouth, and your lips part, allowing his tongue to slip in. He pushes one of his legs between yours, and you resist the urge to roll your hips against it. He’s shown before that he’s not above riling you up and then going back to study like nothing’s happened, and you’re not going to fall for this trap if that’s what’s happening here.

At least, not until at least thirty seconds have passed. You have your dignity, after all.

But Seungmin’s showing no sign of stopping so far. One of his hands grabs your shoulder and gently guides you down on the bed. His mouth is insistent, aggressive almost on yours, which you don’t mind, but it’s certainly unusual for him. His teeth graze against your bottom lip and you find yourself whimpering.

He intertwines his fingers with yours, pressing you into the mattress, and you can’t hold yourself back from arching up into him anymore. If he is just trying to rile you up, which you doubt more and more with every second, you’ll make sure that leaving you behind will be hell for him too.

His grip tightens on your hand and you think you hear him groan. His free hand comes down to hold onto your hip, halting your movement, but not before you feel the way he jerks against you, half-hard member rubbing against your thigh as he does.

“Seungmin,” you gasp when his mouth leaves yours.

You search his eyes, but all you find in them is desire — and a bit of that tension you had noticed earlier. You don’t get much time to ponder it, though, because next thing you know one of his hand is sliding under your t-shirt, pushing it up and sending shivers through your body, and his mouth is making its way down your neck, sucking on the skin in a way that you’re sure will leave a hickey. Again, you don’t mind that, but Seungmin had always been careful to avoid leaving any in very visible places. He usually went for your thighs or your collarbones, places that could easily be hidden under your clothes.

“Oh my God,” you moan as he unbuttons your jeans and start pulling them down, “what’s gotten into you?”

You feel a mumble against your neck, but it’s nothing you can decipher. Your fingers thread through his hair, and he pushes himself back up to kiss you. It’s slower, more tender this time, like an interlude before what is to come.

You think you’re the one who’s the most surprised when you hear yourself asking “Don’t you have an essay to finish?”

Seungmin frowns at the question, but you’re probably the most horrified out of the two of you.

“Kim Seungmin,” you say threateningly, “what have you done to me?”

It makes him smile that wide smile of his that you love so much, and a wave of tenderness washes over in your heart.

You love him so much.

“I can get it done later,” he replies, and you stare at him.

“Did you hit your head?” you ask, finally, when you’re not able to figure anything different about him — like maybe a suspicious mole that would indicate that he’s Seungmin’s secret twin brother or something.

Seungmin sighs, looking more sullen now.

“Do you really think I can’t be fun?”

You’re feeling more and more confused.

“I don’t want you to feel like you have to change things about yourself to be with me,” you say slowly. “I mean, if you want to hook up instead of finishing that, I’m happy to, trust me, but— Is something wrong?”

There it is again, the twitching in his jaw.

“You’re not bored with me?”

“What? No! I— Okay, we were both very busy today, but we can make it up later, I don’t— I don’t need to be constantly doing things, is that— Is that the issue?”

He looks unsure, appears to hesitate some more.

“Isn’t Jisung more fun?”

You blink at him.

“Your roommate, who I asked if he could spend the night elsewhere so I could have sex with you?”

Seungmin clears his throat, glances away from you. The tip of his ears are turning red.

“I’m not saying— Isn’t he more— more your type?”

You reach up, fingertips gentle against him as you tilt his head back towards you so you can look into his eyes. You’re not sure what brought this up — you’re certainly convinced you’ve never shown any form of romantic interest towards Jisung, bless his heart — but you’re also aware of the fact that you’re Seungmin’s first relationship. Sometimes, insecurities hit where you least expect them to.

You’re not one to believe in perfection, all too aware of how messy relationships can get among the best of people, but so far, Seungmin’s been pretty close. It breaks your heart that he can’t see that.

“There is no one I would rather be with than you,” you say, and you mean every word of that. “There is nowhere else I would rather be right now, even if you were still working on that essay.” You see him swallow. “And there is no one who means more to me than you do.” In the silence that follows, he averts his eyes again, though this time you think it’s to recompose himself.

Once he’s done, he gives you a small nod, kissing you tenderly once more.

“For the record,” he whispers against your lips, “there’s no one else I would rather be with either.”

“You better,” you giggle against his lips, and he grins.

“Right, well, in that case, I’m gonna get back to that essay—”

“Don’t you dare.”

i hope this was as much fun to read as it was to write, this isn't a type of character i write all that often but it was nice to switch it up a little bit. first time writing Seungmin too, so i hope that worked out but i had fun! if you enjoyed it, it would mean a ton if you could comment, send an ask, or reblog (with or without tags/comments, whatever you're comfortable with), it's really such an important for an author. and thank you for reading!

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s3 episode 21 thoughts

a fantastic episode yesterday, and… a SKINNER episode today?!?! what kind of journey are we in for?!!!

LITTLE DID I KNOW!!! for i simply had no idea that a skinner episode is EXACTLY what i needed!!! it is the thing i did not order but that hit the spot precisely!!! it was a thing i couldn’t predict!!!

but who would have thought it? a glimpse into the life of such a secretive man… and a beautiful one, at that!! wow!! i’m emotional over WALTER SKINNER! how unexpected, but also inevitable….

let us begin this journey, which went in so many directions

let us read this episode description. skinner, a murderer…. hmm. it’s not really adding up to me... in this context, at least. has he killed people? yes, definitely. but a random person? seems sloppy. seems weird. seems that someone is framing him…

we open with our friend walter.

IS SKINNER GETTING A DIVORCE?????

this is not how i expected the episode to start!

oh, he won’t sign the papers. he says he’ll do it tomorrow. skinner is SAD :( he’s putting his coat on and leaving!!!!! he does not want to get divorced it seems.

wait, an emotional skinner like two minutes in……. woah. we’re in for a rollercoaster here, i can tell (author's note: op was correct)

noooo, sad skinner at a bar. someone sits next to him. this woman is pretty and sits next to him to escape a guy who wouldn’t stop talking to her. a gentleman!

she asks if being alone bothers him and OH! cutscene to sex. well. this escalated quickly. 

PAUSE. is this the first sex scene in this show??? and it’s SKINNER??? if you would have told me that fact a few months ago when i started this show, i would have laughed at you…

omg yeah... i think it is the first on-camera sex scene in this show?? in the past there hasn’t been much (thinking of 3, which is an episode i purposely choose to forget except for right now, and i am ONLY thinking of it to remember how the precedent was established) and they just cut to waking up the next morning. but no, not here. here we get the full show. 

well! he seems to be having fun, at least. 

OH??? until an old lady is on top of him and screaming? 

fun has been cancelled.

that seems to have been a terrible nightmare. but what is not a nightmare is that the woman next to him is DEAD!!!

huh???

my guess…. a slow acting poison??

poor skinner…… he literally cannot catch a break.

oh my goodness, how are our agents going to react to this news….? i would be so embarrassed if my employees knew who i was hooking up with……. and also that she died…..

mulder at da scene. he wants to talk to skinner but he isn’t allowed to talk to him!!!

his phone rings and scully is driving in absolute POURING RAIN and idk why it made me laugh. she was like in a damn flood and flooring it to get where she needed to be lmaoooo

skinner says not to get involved. yeah okay. unstoppable force (mulder on a quest for answers) meet immovable object (skinner)

OH! so it was NOT poison that killed her, and actually her neck was broken. so i guess i didn’t see that. which is probably good because i would have gagged.

this detective is being a jerk to mulder. saying that skinner is suspicious for not taking a lie detector test as if a lie detector test can prove a damn thing (hint: it cannot!) but mulder still gives him his card so they can call and chat

LMAOOOO he was on the phone with scully for all of that exchange with the detective, and she is STILL just trying to get through what looks like a hurricane!!! but she is on her way!!!! he says let’s go look at the body 

still at the crime scene, mulder sees the body’s outline and sighs deeply, realizing his colleague is in trouble

scully is narrating the autopsy into her little voice recorder thing, and it always makes me think she’s vlogging, but i digress. she says the victim’s spine was crushed, and only skinner’s prints were on the body.

mulder makes a stupid remark about “at least they were having safe sex” because really, what DO you say when your boss is a murder suspect, and the body is right in front of you? well! many of us will never have to answer this question. funny how he needs to have a Quip to cope, though. don't think i haven't noticed.

her name was carina, and she was a legal secretary who was fired for working as an escort. they truly hate to see a woman get her side hustle on.

scully looks so sad and confused at all of this, but turns the light out and the body’s face is glowing in the dark around the mouth!!! so she pulls out her recorder and makes note of that. it’s like if you split the juice in a glow stick on there. so maybe there WAS poison afoot?!

(author's note: literally no poison at all in this ep idk i was just really convinced there would be... it is important i also include my predictions that flop so you know i have journalistic integrity)

mulder and scully at someone’s door. the person who answers says lorraine is busy, and he says “busy or not, we need to speak with her” and barges in and AGAIN. the way these two just enter a room so forcefully always makes me lose my mind. someone please make a youtube complication of this someday. they are NOT vampires they do not need to be invited in 😭

lorraine, the head of the escort agency, wants to do their questioning later and they break the news carina is dead. she does not want to tell them who hired her, for it goes against their practice. but mulder is ANGRY and gets her to confess that it was, in fact, skinner.

the agents are walking out, asking what was he thinking, and i am wondering the same thing!! she says they can’t ignore the evidence, but mulder is refusing to believe that skinner could be responsible. oh mulder, your faith in those you love really is admirable.

she brings up that they really don’t know much about skinner, but he says that we know he’s risked a lot for us, and that they owe it to him to find the truth. another case of both things being true, which happens often with these two.

oooo this is juicy, i’m INVESTED!!!

conveniently timed cell phone call! skinner has been released. mulder runs to go get him and skinner says it doesn’t concern him, but mulder says of course it does, and damn, i’m just now realizing how attached to skinner mulder must be, how he sounds like a scared little kid hoping against hope he’s innocent, because the people you love can’t do bad things, right? AUGHHHHH how mulder must look for safety in all the places he didn’t get it growing up. i’m gonna be sick. of course it concerns us! <- yeah. making note to analyze this in depth later because it felt like piercing me through the heart.

skinner is gagged by their revelation that carina was a sex worker, which means something is afoot here, because he was supposed to be the one that hired her...

but when he looks behind them, he sees that creepy old woman again!!! omg i had forgotten about her!!!! she’s in a bright red rain jacket. 

and he runs into traffic after her (he does get hit by a car but it's the least of his worries) but when he goes to get her… it’s someone else?? with brown hair and blue eyes and not a creepy old lady at all. it’s his WIFE!!!!! WIFE REVEAL!!!!! 🎊

so the agents and sharon skinner are chatting. scully wants to know if he’s always been so private. “he lives under this misguided notion that silence is strength” is what his wife has to say, which is both poignant and read him for filth, sharon. so that is why they separated, and have been for about 8 months.

oh! mulder was one of the few people skinner ever mentioned from work!!! she knows he respects him, so she asks him if he really killed that woman. mulder says he doesn’t think skinner did it, but they have to go now. 

some guy named special agent bonnecaze is at skinner’s desk. and the agents are wanted at a hearing for skinner’s ability to keep his job!!! this bonnecaze says they’re not allowed to go sleuthing about. mulder is very very angry.

(what separates a special agent from a regular agent? this is probably a simple internet search, but isn't it more fun to post your thoughts? google says pretty much everyone at the federal level involved in crime investigation is a special agent. so if they're ALL special agents it can't be that special)

back to the office, where mulder is chomping on his pen, and skinner won’t answer his phone. scully notes that he is “doing everything he shouldn’t be doing” which is probably on purpose, RIGHT?? RIGHT?!

and scully looks so beautiful…. she’s concerned about skinner's state of mind, and what else he might be capable of. mulder seems frustrated that she would suspect him, but she explains that genuinely she IS giving him the benefit of the doubt, in the sort of tone you use when you are deeply apologizing to someone, hand on her chest. she can clearly see how attached mulder is to this whole situation. an empath...

scully thinks that maybe something else is going on… she’s playing a video of a man who had REM sleep behavior disorder and relived getting hit by a train each night until he broke his wife’s arm. she is in doctor mode talking about sleep related stuff. and the clinic that film came from WAS WHERE SKINNER HAD BEEN RECEIVING TREATMENT FOR THE PAST 3 MONTHS!!! gasp!! for the same condition!

so he sees an old woman attacking him in his sleep, and maybe he had attacked carina thinking it was her. scully is playing with her necklace as this theory is proposed.

mulder is like, yes i have heard of something like this, a succubus. and he puts his pen in his mouth and grabs a big book off the shelf!!! wow i love that he has a book mentioning medieval spirits in his office :,) maybe need to get one of those for mine.

oh! and his book claims there can be residue left behind… like the stuff she found… scully is pulling a "mulder, you're never gonna believe this" mentally

back to the body. but now her mouth isn’t glowing in the dark! but she had taken a sample… and when sent to the lab for analysis, they found nothing!!!

mulder asks if she is SURE she saw something, and she is like yeah i wouldn’t make that up?? so new theory: skinner is running from all of this because he’s afraid.

skinner is sipping something strong and someone knocks at his door. it’s sharon in a big red raincoat! he didn’t get her calls because he unplugged his phone……. says he hasn't been sleeping....

this must be where he lives now since they separated, but he hasn’t unpacked at all. she wants to make sure he’s okay! but he’s pulling the you’re my ex card. and she says, well i only initiated the divorce because YOU were too scared to do it yourself, and he says “fair enough” <- OOOOO again sharon read him for filth. still, i do not enjoy seeing him so sad.

she wants him to let his walls down, but she knows he will never let her comfort him. so she says to take care of himself and leaves :(

he pulls out their wedding day photo and AWW they’re so young :(((((

AND HE FALLS ASLEEP HOLDING IT. STOP, AM I GOING TO CRY OVER A MAN NAMED WALTER?????????

sleepy time interrupted by screaming. it’s the old lady in the red rain coat just absolutely letting it out, and then she leaves. but there is a REAL knock at the door, and it’s the detective!!!

NO! he says sharon was in an accident!! WHAT IS GOING ON??? skinner’s terrified… and they want the keys to his car…. HE WAS SLEEPING ON THE COUCH!!! HE DID NOT DO THAT SHIT!!!

so he is at the police station and mulder is also here, reporting that sharon is in surgery. but he says they’re building a case against him!!!

mulder clarifies he doesn’t think that skinner did it, but scully doesn’t understand why he isn’t trying to defend himself. and mulder’s doing the angry man thing where he puts his hands on his hips and pushes his jacket back and hnhbbbbhmmmmmmppllhghgh

nooooo skinner :( he’s so angry :( he doesn’t know what is going on or what to believe :(

so mulder asks about the old woman- which they know about from reading his files- and yells that if he doesn’t start trusting someone, he doesn’t stand a chance. whew! he has had enough of this silence!!!

(oh my phone is gonna die hold on. break to procure a charger. charger secured. CHARGER ISN’T WORKING?? omg… now it is… crisis averted)

so skinner started seeing her “again” a few months ago… he’s talking about what happened to him in vietnam, how he was a sole survivor of an ambush. he says he got through the experience by numbing himself with whatever he could, and he “inhaled”, so he assumed she was another hallucination. and she watched him watch himself die, but she carried him back away from the light. 

mulder proposes she was trying to protect him them and still is now. but he doesn’t know from what!! he is so sad!!

GASP!!! CUTSCENE TO CANCER MAN WATCHING THIS ALL GO DOWN?????

ANOTHER EVIL CIG MAN PLOT?!?!?

so skinner’s car matches the damage on sharon’s car, and allegedly the hood of his car was still warm when the detectives got to his house and brought him in for questioning. mulder asks for a flashlight and gets in the car despite the hearing being in a half hour. oh! he’s slicing out the air bag?

bringing the air bag to the lab guy, who can turn the air bag into a facial pattern of whoever it crashed into. is this a thing that can happen??? big if true.

scully at the hearing. mulder not there!! so they just begin.

she’s trying to explain the mouth glow situation, and special agent bonnecaze basically accuses her of hiding stuff; she says she’s reluctant to speak for mulder, but he thought it came from a “visitation”. she has no other explanation! 

(wow, i love that she admits she has no idea here. you can tell who is intelligent by seeing who is willing to admit to not having all of the answers. it's a small thing but it says a lot about her character <3)

they ask her if she believes in paranormal phenomena, and she dodges the question by saying she views everything “through the lens of science”. a measured response. but they’re asking if skinner has become “enchanted by agent mulder’s notions” HUH?? what da hell does that mean? anyway, she says no. 

bonnecaze accuses her of protecting skinner by exaggerating the unexplained elements of the case, which she ENTIRELY refutes. and when she tries to say that she is NOT finished, they say she is. OHHH the bastards. 

scully calls mulder but he’s right behind her lololol. anyway, it’s no laughing matter that skinner is OUT OF A JOB. she says he would have had a better chance against a firing squad. and they used the x files to justify getting rid of him!! he thinks "they’re" doing it to hurt the x files, whoever they may be!!! (presumably cig man and his UN alien club??)

so mulder has a graph that looks like pixel art of whoever stole skinner's car that night and his sharon. "they" couldn’t try to kill him again, so a set up would be less obvious. it makes sense.

i think the lab guy’s name is danny?? well they can’t figure out who thief is, who must have also been the fellow who hired carina. 

oh no! now they’re at the scene of another crime. it’s the lady who runs the escort agency! she jumped off a building :( or it was staged to look like that

but they see the woman who answered the door when they visited her place of work!!! her name is judy. and she says that the pixel art man who hired carina said no one would get hurt!!!! so this dude stole skinner’s card!!! 

(is it krycek. i can’t stand him any longer!)

due to lorraine being dead, she can’t talk with this mystery client, so they ask judy to set up a meeting with him, to pretend she needs money to get out of town. she calls some unnamed men on the phone to arrange this meeting.

and the men on the phone are not krycek, but they ARE watching this all go down from their car!!!!!! WHO ARE THESE FREAKS!!!!

skinner is going to see sharon. and she can’t hear him but he’s telling her he’s not signing the divorce papers :( he says he can’t tell her the terrible things he has seen…. and that she was what got him through each day, knowing he had a reason to wake up :( NOOOOO

and as he smooches her forehead her monitor starts going off!!!!!!! but then he sees her turn into the scary old woman!!!!!! who looks out at him and beckons. so he goes back in and grabs the hand of the old woman but it’s actually his wife again!!!!!!! she says to listen to her. WHAT IS IT!!! what does she KNOW!!!

mulder at the bar where they planned the set up. sipping something and looking good, yeah yeah. the men who set this whole thing up are arriving. 

while scully and judy are upstairs and oh my god scully. she is so beautiful. both of these bastards are so utterly beautiful. 

sighs wistfully…….

well, whoever it is they’re waiting on isn’t showing up. but there’s a movement at the door! and she says mulder, get up here right now!!!

scully with her gun out in the hotel room……. the suspense…….. she finds judy in the bathroom but SOMEONE ELSE IS BEHIND HER!!!

it’s the guy from before, who was on the phone with judy!! and he’s firing his gun!! scully is on the ground but she seems unhurt beyond the head slamming??

WAIT! it isn’t that scary phone guy who fired his gun!! it was SKINNER!!! who shot whoever set this whole operation up!!!

SKINNER TELEPORTATION TO THE SCENE....

judy is crying and scully is on the floor still, but it seems all is well in the world?

back to skinner’s office!!! which is rightfully his office again!!!

they bring him the report on the case, and there are lots of unanswered questions, including who that dude who was shot was. there is no identity whatsoever.

OH! mulder points out that there is no explanation as to why skinner was at the hotel last night, so please fill out that line yourself. which he says he can’t do, because it has no place in a report.

so mulder asks skinner to tell him what happened, off the record, and scully is waiting with bated breath… and he says he has some catching up to do. mulder kind of looks like someone just kicked him but he walks away :(

(oh mulder, funny how you're trying to get him to break these walls down, but you have some pretty damn solid walls of your own. now you know how it must feel... i jest, but it is so sad to see him unable to connect to skinner in the way he wants to. nevertheless, this is a happy ending)

skinner puts his wedding ring back on!!! and gets back to work!!!!!!!!!!!

WHAT!!!!!!! 

omg. so much to unpack here. i kind of assumed we would never get any skinner lore beyond his vietnam story, so this was a deeply welcome surprise. earlier i was very suspicious of him- you may recall some posts where i repeatedly say things along the lines of "i don't trust this guy"- but you can see how the narrative is shifting, how now we are supposed to trust him after he has done so much for scully and mulder. and it is very interesting to see how he operates, how he tries to put on that strong facade, and how it needs to crumble for him to move forward.

so, i think that there are two things at play here: one, someone who was trying to frame skinner for the murder and the attempted killing of his wife, and two, the whole situation with the scary old lady. we know the scary old lady was the one he saw in vietnam, and the one he attributes to saving his life, so it makes sense to think that some sort of guardian angel spirit would show up to him as an attempt to make him realize that he was losing what really mattered to him (sharon) due to his own fear. so even though she is scary looking, she led him to sharon, and appeared when he was with another woman as if to scare sense into him.

now, what is LESS clear is who did the killing! we know his prints were found on her, but did they check everything? how does that even work? maybe he strangled her in his sleep on accident, but given that someone else paid her to be there that evening, it would make more sense that someone else did it, no? except they said there was no sign of any intruders... so perhaps whoever it was who set that whole scenario up knew enough about him to know that was a possibility. in that case, they must have access to his medical records and know about his visions.....

must be the work of the cig man and his cronies.

so, if you accidentally kill someone in your sleep... how do you proceed from there?

well, i guess it doesn't matter, because he got his job back.

interesting to explore the concept of a guardian angel sort of creature as a being of terror, to shock you out of the mistakes you make that ruin your life. and it doesn't explain the glowy mouth or succubus allegations, but hey, there's always some stuff that doesn't entirely add up!

overall, i thought this was a really great episode. it was very different from the last one, but the tone shift didn't feel drastic and uncomfortable. i'm really interested in how mulder handled this whole thing, how he clearly has these projections for what he wants skinner to be and how he wants him to act, as if he's idolizing him. i think that is very fascinating and i will be mentally chewing on that for a while. and scully being willing to admit what she does not know, and observe what she cannot explain... mmm, it's just delicious to me.

so huh! i'm pleased! shoutout to walter, sharon, and the sleep demon that saved their marriage

[jupitermchai]

NNT Pride Day One - Red

Hi folks!! This is my first entry for the NNT Pride event, albeit a little sad. I hope you enjoy, Happy Pride!!

the art of desire (my only desire is you)

It was like any other book. The leather-bound book stood perched on his desk among the many assignments Meliodas had yet to sign. On the outside it looked normal, and for a few weeks, Meliodas assumed it was any other book.

But when he opened the cover, he recognized the colorful pages immediately. It was his art book!

Oh, Meliodas hasn’t drawn in ages. The sight of the tanned leather made his heart leap, and he was perched on his desk seat in an instant. The assignments were discarded on the floor, left forgotten as Meliodas carded through his old drawings and sketches.

Most were of Elizabeth before their marriage but there were a couple landscapes sprinkled in: between his newly-wed wife and the land, Meliodas was more akin to the former.

He plucked a piece of charcoal from the desk drawer and flipped to the last page. It was empty, just as he remembered, and he readied the charcoal in his hands. Then, almost instantly, Meliodas was reminded of why he hadn’t drawn in so long.

Meliodas didn’t know what to draw. There were many things he could sketch: landscapes, his comrades, Elizabeth; nothing seemed to be fitting for the end of this sketchbook. Then, another realization dawned on him: looking through the worn pages was like reading a story. In the beginning, there was a family portrait of Meliodas’ family in the demon realm and closer to the end, there was a group portrait of all the sins. Meliodas tapped his chin in thought. He made up his mind on the matter - “This was a book that documents my life, after all” - and the charcoal finally began to move.

Soft scratches filled the room as the charcoal glided across the paper. Black bled onto the creamy sheets of parchment, outlining the curve of a face. The remaining sunlight cascaded like an orange blanket over the valley of Liones and poured into the room, illuminating the paper as he worked. Soon, the moon burst through the thicket of clouds as darkness washed over the plains. Crickets chirped in the blades of thick blue-grass, yet Meliodas surged forward. Planets collided in his mind. Colors and shapes molded to create perfect harmony filled with adoration.

Meliodas ran out of breath as he finished. Had he held his breath the entire time? The man couldn’t tell. Despite the tightness in his chest and the burning in his face, the blonde man lifted the book from the desk to examine the marked paper.

No words could describe the tingling in his fingertips as he stared at his work. It was Elizabeth, Tristan, and him, but the meaning was so much deeper than a family portrait. Each curve, line, and shadow displayed his unwavering fervor for the woman and child he held so dearly to his heart. Their smiles were real, this family was his new reality.

Choked by his own tears, Meliodas pushed away from his desk. The finality, the pure nature of this life, made Meliodas’ heart stutter. This was everything he had hoped for - she was everything he hoped for. The fleeting moments of pain during those thousands of years were worth it. This family was worth it.

Deep in dusk, the great King of Liones wept tears of joy, for his heart held nothing but pure, unfiltered love. For his country, but also for the time he spent fighting for those he loved.

[ponder-the-orb]

Broken Horizons

(Actually chapter one. Read the prologue here)

Pairing: Fem Tav (named)/Gale

Chapter Tags: Post-Canon, Mystra, Angst, dealing with trauma, hurt/no comfort (yet) , Tara

Word count: 4K words

Read chapter 1 below or on AO3.

***

The pain is instant. 

It rips Gale from sleep like a fish speared in a pool, searing from his chest and burning into every nerve.

The silence of the dark study rings with his cry, then a series of duller thuds as he staggers from his desk. Papers flutter, something shatters and another flash of pain crumples his body to the floor.

He bites his lip until he tastes warm metal, trying to centre himself. He knows this ache, as familiar as an old nightmare.

This isn’t happening. It can’t.

The thought tears apart as he touches his chest. It pulses under his fingers, the dark outlines of the mark suddenly flaring with a nauseatingly bright blue light. A light he hasn’t seen in almost two years.

He squeezes his eyes shut and waits to wake up back in his bed, sweaty, aching but fine.

As if to spite such a thought, the feeling swells again and crashes through him. He swallows and hardens each joint, every piece of self control locked in on keeping it firmly inside him. The wave ebbs away slowly, along with his denial. 

It’s no dream. The orb is awake and it's desperately angry.

Old reflexes snap to life. He pulls a ring from his finger and presses it to the glow. He feels the weave wrap around it like a delicate veil, then instantly rip apart. He grabs another and does it again, then his earring, his pendant, the sending stones in his pocket. One by one their magic disappears into the orb’s waiting maw, just enough to mute the very edge of the pain. 

He sits up, shaking. He has minutes to write a plan lest his tower and the entirety of Waterdeep be levelled around him. The thought sits with cold weight on his shoulders as he heaves himself to his feet. How many people would be lost to his mistake? Babes sleeping in their Mother’s arms, wine-blushed patrons watching the stars through inn windows, sailors reclining on their boats and taking in the city’s wintery skies. A hundred thousand people, gone in a flash. 

Ciri.

The wardrobe door shudders against the wall as he yanks it open. It’s a dark mess inside, the small space piled with clutter from their old adventure they’d yet to find a proper place for. Blindly he searches, grabbing the few magical items he can find and shoving them into his chest. Hungrily it devours each one, gorging itself on the weave until he reaches the very back of the wardrobe. 

He touches the wall and breathes as slowly as he can. His body is sweaty and tight from the effort– but slightly calmer. He sinks to the floor, rubbing his damp forehead as he tries to piece the night together.

Whatever was keeping the orb dormant is gone, that much is clear. Why now or what caused it are questions Gale doesn’t have time to dwell on. The only thing that matters is finding a way to sate it in the precious few moments he’s managed to obtain.

His hands curl into fists as the only solution stares at him from a dark corner of the wardrobe.

The trinkets in here aren’t enough to hold it. Already he can feel his defences taking a battering under his skin, naught but paper strips holding a door closed against a hurricane. He needs its previous fix.

He carefully picks up a large wrapped object and carries it to the empty plinth at the back of the room. A fine layer of dust swirls in the air as he pulls the sheet free, revealing the effigy hidden beneath. 

Mystra.

He lights the candles with a snap of his fingers, then grabs anything gold or silver he hasn’t already torn to shreds and leaves it in front of her. 

Her flat eyes stare at him as he kneels. The statue stands a foot tall, but he feels smaller, sagging under the memory of her dispassionate expression from the last time he’d seen her. He can’t quite remember the exact immodesty in his words when he’d refused to blindly follow her orders; it would be foolish to hope she wouldn’t either.

“Mother of all Magic, I beseech you. As you spin the weave that lights our path, grant me the honour of your ear.” 

The formality feels strange on his tongue. Such summons were usually draped in more lyrical praises, but he’s more than certain she’d know he wouldn’t mean them. She controls his power, not his life and certainly not his love. 

It’s not a comforting thought right now.

His wedding ring bites against his finger as he repeats the words before continuing. 

“I know it has been some time and I am sure you do not wish to hear from me. I know… I know that I failed you, but I swear I can offer something much greater than an apology.” The hidden bitterness to his words curdle at the back of his throat. He takes a breath, then firmly presses forward.

“Let me bring you the crown and I’ll right this wrong. Just grant me a little more time to do so.” 

The silence stretches on. The air feels colder.

He swallows, then prostrates himself until the cool flagstones rub against his forehead. “The people of this city do not deserve to pay for what I did. So many wizards here will never finish their work. It’s an injustice to all magic.”

When no response comes, he sits up against his heels and finally looks her in the eye. He feels something piercing back, taking in all of him.

“You knew me once, better than anyone. That time together meant something.”

He touches the hand of the statue, gently rubbing its smooth surface.

“Mystra. Please.”

The candles snuff out the moment her name leaves his lips, her presence and his last hope dissolving into darkness. 

He tears his hand away, doing nothing to stop the statue as it falls and shatters into pieces against the ground.

There’s no remorse. No fumble to fix her or quiet whisper of apology for his rashness. No. He wants to smash harder, grind each sorry lump into dust until his blasphemy permeates the very air. Let his last act on this plane be one of defiance, finally breaking that old fatuous hope that if he begged harder, worshipped harder, unmade every shred of his dignity for her, then he might finally find that she has a heart to turn.

The breath caught in his throat pushes out in a high, jagged laugh. It happens again as flames engulf his hand, then again as his fist repeatedly meets the flagstones, again and again and again until they morph into sharper, drier sobs.

The hero of Baldur’s Gate becomes the cur of Waterdeep . The thought taunts him as the ache in his chest begins to eclipse the one in his fist.  

Another lightning bolt of pressure topples him to the floor before he can stop it. It tears at the restraints until his surroundings have melted into nothing but burning white pain. He wants to fight, to run, to do something to stop this but his body has long since given up the battle. The ache builds again as he desperately thinks, cresting like a tidal wave in his chest.

He closes his eyes, letting one final thought take him into oblivion.

Ciri. Please forgive me.

“Oh Mr. Dekarios. Look at you.” 

His neck protests as he lifts his head. A familiar blur of charcoal and ginger fur sits in front of him, watching intently.

“Tara?”

The tressym stretches her wings, slinking closer until he can see the concern knit in her broad feline features. She taps his cheek, then his temple before shaking her head.

“Goodness this is quite the mess.”

He reaches out with a trembling hand. “You need to get out of–” 

She shoves something small and shining against his chest before he can finish.

“Eat, Mr. Dekarios.” 

More powerful strands of weave bind themselves around the orb as he takes the object in, strong enough so that each breath feels less like stones being forced up his throat.

A pair of gloves drop by his knee as he sits up. Tara hovers above with expectant eyes.

“Now these.”

Something heavier lands at his side as he finishes absorbing them: a large necromantic tome this time. 

“And this,” she says as he picks it up, frowning when it doesn’t immediately comply. 

He brushes the series of twisting skulls poking out from the worn surface. “There are only three of these on this plane, you know.”

“Then we’ll find the other two afterwards,” she replies, batting the cover with her paw. “ Eat . I won’t ask twice.”

She brings him item after item until the ground is littered with shards of what Gale assumes is every rare artefact he’s ever collected. Little by little the pain ebbs away, a fire quenched by a handful of sand at a time, until the glow finally stops.

He exhales and touches his chest again. It’s bound enough for him to think clearly, at least for now. He flicks the fireplace to life with his finger and props himself up against the nearest wall. Tara follows at his heels, taking her usual spot in his lap.

“How did you know what was happening?” he asks after a moment.

“I may not live here anymore but I am still your familiar. I’ll always know when you need me.” She presses her head to his palm, purring when he starts to pet her properly. “There was an awful lot of shouting between you and Mrs. Dekarios when I first arrived, so I decided to come back later– and it’s a good thing I did.”

He rubs his forehead. “You heard that?”

“The patriars on the other side of the city most likely heard that, but it isn’t the most pressing issue right now. Your condition has returned.”  

“Returned and worse than ever. The artefacts are barely touching the sides anymore.” He traces the grooves of the orb as he speaks, trying to remember what it actually felt like when there wasn’t a permanent weight entrenched around his heart.

Tara stretches and turns away. “With this affliction there are worse places to be than a wizard’s tower. Stay here, I’ll find more.”

“I can’t hold it in anymore.”

“Then I’ll be quick.”

“Tara. Listen to me. I can’t hold it in anymore,” he rests a hand against her back and looks over to the broken statue. “She’s made sure of that.”

He watches the quiet steel of his words settle across her face.

“No. No, I won’t believe it,” she declares, leaping from his lap. “Mystra wouldn’t do this. She could never be this senselessly cruel.”

He fights a cold laugh. “We both know that could not be further from the truth.”

“Well then, we will just keep feeding it until we think of a more permanent solution. There are powerful forces other than the divine out there.”

“I could absorb every strand of the weave in this tower and it would give me days at most. It’s never going to be sated; it’s never going to stop and we don’t have enough time to experiment anymore.” He’s speaking the lines he’d rehearsed for weeks in solitude those years ago, the ones he’d thought that he’d folded away for good the moment he’d got on one knee for someone else.

She hisses and starts pawing through the broken items as if the answer could be found amongst the disarray. “There is always something to be done. You told me you’d been keeping a careful study of it.”

“I was. There has not been so much as a twinge in my chest for two years now and, believe me, I tested a variety of different magics to see if any would aggravate it. I thought, well– assumed that because nothing had changed all was well.” He drops his head against the wall, fingers digging bruising stars into his thighs. “I’m a fool.”

“You’re only a fool if you think that I’m going to sit here and watch you give up.” 

“This is not giving up.”

“That’s exactly what it is, Mr. Dekarios.”

“Then tell me what I’m supposed to do!” 

Tara jumps back at his sudden shout, her wings slamming flat against her body. 

“Mr. Dekarios–”

“Go on, tell me then.” Blood thunders in his ears as he speaks, new tears welling in the corners of his eyes. “There is not a force on this plane that can stop it and the Gods that haven’t left me are not going to pull their fingers out for mortal affairs. They’d rather cower behind Ao then stop something that could potentially kill a city’s worth of people. So tell me. Tell me how I’m supposed to fix this. How I’m to pull the perverted power of a false God out of my chest and actually live the next sixty years like I so naively believed I could.” His voice breaks on the last few words, dropping to a more jagged whisper. “Please. Just tell me what to do.”

His words hang in the silence for a long moment. She sits quietly as his breathing evens out, before padding over and curling back in his lap. 

“I’m sorry,” she says, resting her head against his thigh. “I really am.”

He sighs and lightly strokes the length of her back. “Me too, Tara. Me too.” 

It’s as if all the heat of his anger has dissolved into the air. He should want to shout louder, scream, break everything around him until the whole tower is left in ruins but he can’t .

He’s just tired. So so tired.

Looking down, he remembers the first time she’d rested on him like this. She’d barely been an hour old: smaller, less grey, but just as fiery a presence. How nervous he’d been at scaring her off with a wrong word, but when she’d curled up warm as a fresh pastry in his lap, every silly fear just seemed to float away. What he'd give for it to be so easy now. 

“So, what is to be done then?” she asks, lifting her head from his leg.

“The old plan,” he answers, still gently petting her fur. He doesn’t need to elaborate any further than that, the details have been clear for three years at this point. “And thus ends the tale of Gale Dekarios. At least it will be with a bang and not a whimper.” 

She stiffens under his touch but stays quiet, letting him continue his rhythmic petting until the hearth dims into embers again.

Eventually she jumps from his lap, regarding him with a softer look. “Shall I wake Mrs. Dekarios for you?”

“No. Let me,” he says, his legs clicking with the effort as he finally stands.

He pauses when he reaches the door. “Tara,” he says softly, turning back to the waiting tressym. “You must know that-”

“I know, Mr. Dekarios,” she interrupts, shaking her head. “Unless you want the last memories of me to be a blubbering mess, you really do not have to tell me.” She nudges his calf and gently rubs the spot with her head. “It’s a terrible thing for a tressym to outlive their wizard, even if the one that summons them is as withered as an old boot. The most surprising thing to me when I first arrived here was that you were just a boy. A loud, talented, nervous little boy. And even though they say that only those with pure hearts can summon us, that doesn’t mean we are bound for good lives, so I really had no idea what was in store for me… or you.” She pauses and leaps into the air, hovering so he can feel every word. “Believe me when I say there is nowhere on this or any plane that I would rather have gone and I couldn’t be prouder of the man you’ve become. You may have stumbled sometimes and made some interesting choices when it came to your personal grooming, but you were never really lost.” 

It takes every ounce of his faltering restraint to swallow back a fresh round of tears. It’s the shake in breath that betrays him as he gathers her in his arms one last time. He loses himself in the feeling and, for just a moment, lets himself be that child again: innocent, happy, completely oblivious to how the edges of greatness are far sharper than he could ever have imagined.

“Who’s the blubbering mess now?” he whispers as he deposits her back on the floor.

She taps the wet corner of his eye with her paw. “None of that Mr. Dekarios. It’s hardly becoming of you.”

He brushes his eyes, then his cheeks, completely at a loss for how he’s supposed to even begin to approach the next conversation. He rubs his wedding ring for a few seconds before looking back to Tara.

“Promise me you’ll take care of her.” 

She bows her head, wings spread like a cape as he rises again.

“On my honour, I promise.”

***

Walking into their dark bedroom, he can almost forget the discord that has just unfolded below. There’s the pile of first year papers sitting unmarked on the desk, his slippers by the wardrobe, a copy of A Dark Day for Cormyr unopened on the bedside table– everything as neat as when he’d left them this morning. The only hint of disarray is a pile of Ciri’s clothes by the window from where she’d either dropped or thrown them. 

She doesn’t rouse as he sits on the edge of the bed. She’s bundled herself in the majority of the blanket against the cold, the sliver of visible face a mask of calm. It’s a far cry from the last time he’d seen it, so twisted and scarlet with anger. He can’t quite remember half the things he’d said before she’d stormed up here, just how deliberately he’d chosen the words, refusing to be the one that broke first.

It all seems so stupid now, those problems a thousand miles away.

For the longest time death had always felt like his waiting mistress. Those years ago, he’d accepted it, made it welcome even as he rewrote his will over and over again in this very room with a calm steady hand. Falling into adventure had only strengthened that resolve, made him more ready than ever to jump into its waiting arms if it meant his failures could mean something.

But, something else happened. She happened. Someone who loved him beyond the measure of his usefulness, enough to pull him from that embrace and tell him that he deserved more than being the discarded plaything of one God and the current puppet of another. 

So he did the hardest thing of all; he believed her. He turned away from Mystra’s forgiveness and the power of a God so he could make the choice to live. Really, honestly live.

He stops his hand as it lashes towards the bedside table.

And now all of that means absolutely nothing.

“I’m going to die,” he whispers into the darkness, then again, directly at Ciri’s sleeping form. “I’m actually going to die.”

The words don’t feel quite real as they linger in the air. He shifts closer and rests his hand on the warm curve of her cheek.

“Tell me that we will find another way,” he murmurs, brushing a few orange hairs away from her face. “You never stopped believing we could fix this, even when I thought I had exhausted every other possibility.”

He’d bore witness to the miracles she could perform first hand: commanding a devil to fall on his own sword, pulling an undead dragon from the sky, burning the very God of Death to cinders– why would it be such a foolish thing to hope she could stop this as well?

He leans closer, stopping but a breath from her face.

“I can’t do it. I’m not ready.”

She shifts slightly at the noise, the blanket slipping to reveal the patchwork of burn scars down her back and arms. He brushes each one softly, then her shoulder, the point of her ear, the sleek pattern of coppery scales by her eyes. She groans slightly as he presses her left hand to his lips, rolling towards him. 

“I love you. I love you so much.” He kisses the words against her palm, then again, over and over until his voice is raw and sentiment tattooed into her skin. 

Not even two years they’d been married. He has grey hairs older than that. It’s such a fleeting time for a human, but even more so for an elf. She could live another six centuries, him but a single page in the story of her existence. 

The matter of their lifespans was a conversation they’d had but once and they’d both decided that it did not need revisiting. Enjoy the time we have , that’s what they had said. Back when the assumption was decades, not hours.

He pulls another blanket from the bottom of the bed and drapes it over her, some soft navy thing patterned with the Tears of Selûne. His touch lingers against the silvery threads. Thousands of nights he’d promised her under those very stars. It’s hard now not to count the number they’ve actually had and see just how much of a liar he’d turned out to be.

“I’m sorry, my love. I… I wish– ” He trails off, no idea where he’s supposed to go from there. What words can he possibly spin to soften this or lessen the hole he knows he’s about to rip into both the earth and her heart. 

“Let this dream be a good one,” is what he settles on, pressing his lips to her forehead before quietly walking over to his desk.

Snow falls down in sheets through the crack in the curtains in front of him. He can imagine the children at Blackstaff lying awake and staring through the dormitory windows, grinning ear to ear at the thought of missing lessons. He’d already taken more than one snowball to the back of the head between classes, though he’s yet to work out whether those had been from his students or another faculty member. Now he never will.

He shakes the thought away, grabbing a fresh piece of parchment and quietly casting darkvision on himself.

He’s never liked winter all that much, but right now it’s a small mercy. Night will hang over Waterdeep that little bit longer, giving him a few more hours to plan and for Ciri to rest in blissful abandon.

He takes in the beautiful curve of her body one more time before turning back to his desk and beginning to write.

***

And there we go.

Updates will be posted on my AO3 and promoted here. (Hopefully every 2 weeks)