#*before* he learned henry murdered kids. obviously.

[metamatronic]

can we get confirmed sexualities and pronouns pleaseee? 🥺🥺🥺

tbh i genuinely believe most of this cast has not given it much thought.

Michael (he/him) somewhere on the demi/ace spectrum, he never quite figured it out.

William (he/him) gay (that may have been the cause of those marital issues, womp womp)

Elizabeth (she/her) ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ i dunno probably bi???

David/C.C. (he/they) aro/ace

Charlie (she/her) also probably bi

Ennard (they/them) fiercely aro/ace

Henry (he/him) bisexual (evil edition)

Mark/Phone Guy (he/him) straight

Cassidy (she/her) i truly do not think she’s thought about it

Nick/Phone Dude (he/him) pan

Amy/Tape Girl (she/her) lesbian

Jeremy VR (he/him) straight probably

Vanessa (she/her) pan

[account-name]

Five headcannons you have about Phone Guy ?

[EDIT: all of this was written months before the week before came out. some of my hcs have been adjusted slightly since then although most of this still applies]

yayyyyy thank you so much for the ask this is the first time i've been asked about him !!! this ended up a bit long because i wanted to fit in all my important phone guy lore because i've never gotten the opportunity to talk about him

i apologize if this is a bit all over the place and hard to read i'm not good at putting my thoughts into words

also i might reblog with more if i think of anything big i missed

he drinks way too much coffee. he needs to stay awake and alert all the time so he can continue to be productive despite his inconsistent sleep schedule (he gets nightmares which get more and more frequent over time) (and he is also being overworked which is not a good combo) (he doesn't remember the last time he's had a day off) so he uses the caffeine as a way to make up for that. plus he also just genuinely likes how coffee tastes. he also used to smoke but he stopped when his ex wife (marilyn) was pregnant with fritz, so he at least got over that one (if i didn't mention it yet he is fritz's dad btw). caffeine is the only addiction that he still actively struggles with by the time he dies.

he has a confusing relationship with his gender. i think in the normal fnaf timeline he unfortunately dies an egg and never gets the chance to think about it fully but in any au where he lives past that and learns that being trans is a thing he would proceed to have a gender crisis. (fun fact in the au i made specifically for selfshipping daydream lore he is working that out in real time) (i am supporting him every step of the way :) ) he is questioning and he has no idea how he identifies at the moment but that guy is not a man. he does still have a trans pin in the normal fnaf timeline but he doesn't actually know what it means. he found it while cleaning the ballpit one day and decided to keep it because it was kinda neat. he IS trans but he doesn't know it yet. i generally still refer to him with he/him since those are the only pronouns he ever used but depending on the au i think eventually he might experiment with other pronouns in the future. change is scary though so it would definitely take him awhile to get to that point. especially since he's been repressing his emotions for so long. (EDIT: she is now using he/she pronouns :3)

i've touched on this one before but he was working the day his son was murdered. he brought fritz to work with him thinking he could multitask but phone got caught up with work and wasn't paying enough attention to notice fritz getting lured to the back room. he didn't notice his son was missing until it was too late. he absolutely blames himself for it and it eats him up inside. he goes through a messy divorce shortly after since marilyn blames him too. poor phone guy has no one left except his bosses. at least they always cared about him right? they saw his potential when no one else did and he was their best employee. except no they didn't. william was actively manipulating him to do his bidding and henry just didn't care about him at all. poor phone guy. but he still puts on a happy face and pretends everything is fine until he can't anymore. he also blames himself for the other missing children because he was too far in denial and desperately wanted to believe that it wasn't what it looked like so he didn't do anything to stop it when other kids started disappearing. he knew what was happening he just couldn't bring himself to accept it. and then it was too late. he hates himself for that.

he's helped william hide bodies. not the missing children obviously, but whenever other employees happen to know a little too much and they turn up dead in the morning, someone's gotta clean it up. he's had to sweep so much under the rug. it's horrible but phone guy can't say anything or else it will all get pinned on him. phone guy getting framed for murder wouldn't help the situation much either. maybe it was the cowards way out to give in to the blackmail but he was put in a horrible situation and made the choice he had to to get out of it. he helped dispose bodies of his coworkers. it doesn't help that he trusted william and looked up to him for so long. he was one of the only people to ever say he was proud of him. and look where he ended up.

i can't decide on another singular hc to write an entire paragraph on so here's a bunch of small ones instead:

he dabbled in theatre in highschool. he wasn't a dedicated theatre kid or anything and definitely didn't continue after graduating but he did good

he has a beautiful singing voice. he'll get embarrassed if you overhear him though

he witnessed both bites, and sees 87 as his own fault since jeremy was following the instructions phone gave him

he's a breakfast enjoyer :)

he was born in 1957 and died at the age of 36 . fritz was conceived when he was 21

similar to his gender, his sexuality is also a mystery. he's probably ace but as for romantic orientation who knows

he likes to read. it's one of the only hobbies he has time for

he likes sci-fi and is a fan of star trek

he idly hums while he works

when he was a kid his parents had very high expectations for him and expected him to do something big with his life. they weren't bad parents but they weren't the best either. they were very strict with him especially when it came to school. (gifted kid burnout weeeoo)

he has a little sister (phone dude's mom) however he doesn't really have any contact with her or anyone else in his family at the time of fnaf as they moved away from utah and he did not follow them.

i love all the phone biology hcs mentioned in @ask-the-phone (sorry if you didn't want to be tagged lmk i can remove it) so those apply to my phone guy as well. (he molts periodically, his mouth is on the receiver, esophagus cord, ect.)

gives the best hugs

touch starved and very easily flattered

//⚠️cw attempted suicide for the next couple //

this is a dark one but he went into fnaf one knowing full well he was going die, and to an extent hoping for it. this is when he was at his absolute lowest. he was never going to get through that week. i think if for whatever reason the animatronics didn't kill him he would've finished the job himself. he's scared of death but he couldn't imagine a future for himself and didn't think he even deserved one. fnaf 1 was an act of suicide. despite this he still tries to leave helpful reassuring messages for mike to help him survive the week, even up until his last moments.

he tried to take his own life after the bite of 87. maybe also after the divorce too. it didn't work and he just had to go back to work afterward and pretend he was okay. he was not.

[ok back to the other hcs]

fritz always used to put stickers on phone's face. he continues to wear the stickers to remember him

while his head is phone shaped it's entirely biological. it's essentially like a bug exoskeleton. he was born like that and it's not questioned because that's a completely normal way for people to look. sometimes people are just phones

his head is also functional as a phone though. don't ask me how

he purrs when he's comfy.

in the movie universe he is alive and well and living a life outside of freddy's. he worked there briefly and recorded some tapes and then left before it all went wrong. i guess in this au his bosses never really saw him as anything special this time. his son still dies and he probably still gets divorced but phone is able to move on and heal and live his own life. good for him.

i think if phone guy didn't work at freddy's he would've made a good teacher

he is so full of autism

very much a perfectionist unfortunately

not easily angered, but he can get frustrated at times. he bottles it up though so he seems fine until he finally snaps

and that's the list i came up with so far :) i might add more if i think of anything important i forgot but thank you so much for giving me an opportunity to finally talk about my phone guy !!! :)

edit:

-in honor of the news, his middle name is ralph, making his full legal name phone ralph guy (because that is just so funny to me)

[yourassimcomingforit]

A ramble about the amazing fic his empire of dirt because I love it so much

Where do I even start with this fic I guess with the name itself empire of dirt. They use dirt and worms and of course empire of dirt throughout this fic but especially when pee paw and William meet to show the differences between them pee paw is this pathetic little worm drowning in his empire of dirt and William will never be him. Pee paw is this pathetic old man who never learned how to get help and continues to drown in an empire of his own making.

Onto drowning and learning how to swim baby Willy and pee paw new learned how to swim they’re always drowning both literally and metaphorically. They can never get their head above the water whether it’s their mother shoving their head under water or loosing themselves to the thoughts in their head and downing. We don’t see it as much in baby Willy as he’s still a kid and hasn’t succumbed but we especially see it in pee paw he’s drowning in his thoughts and he can’t get over them it seeps into his everything and of course leads to his obsession with Henry and his control over Clara and all the murders he commits. Will while he does struggle with the same thoughts and keeping his head above water he does know how to swim mike taught him and he’s able to keep going he’s not drowning. He has his ups and downs whenever he has an episode but Mike is there to remind him that he does know how to swim and that he can keep going. I just love the use of the Williams literal knowledge of swimming representing their state of mind and whether or not each one is drowning in their thoughts.

Bunny’s and the color purple are obviously incredibly important to the whole story I mean pee paw is the purple guy who killed in a rabbit suit. From the beginning with baby will having the nickname of bunny to the character of Bonnie being made to William having nicknames for his kids based around bunnies you can find it everywhere in the fic. Bunnies are a comfort to William it was his first friend after all and are with him throughout his life yet the original meaning and feeling gets twisted and corrupted over time. It was originally something sweet and sad, bunnies always get away and it’s been turned into something used to murder children it’s no longer something innocent. The color purple is a comfort to all the William’s but also a crutch. Will loves the color purple but it holds him back and makes him think of pee paw will he become that man will be Mr. Smith. The color is so important to them all but it at times holds Will back.

The Williams relationships with Clara and henry. We learn that Will and Pee paw had an obsessive relationship with Henry he was the first person to make them feel human he’s there and only theirs no one else can have him. Henry is meant to *need* them, they are his everything they are his *god*. Now with Clara they control her she is just some obedient little pet that follows their every whim and gets put back together whenever the Williams think something needs to be fixed. But then Mike steps in before will truly gets to that point he helps will get better he shows him that they are their own people not something to control or fix at his own whim and we watch will get better he treats them both better he breaks up with Henry cause it wasn’t healthy for either of them and will is on the path to recovery.

Death. One of the biggest things in this whole fic. The Williams relationship with death, they’re all so terribly scared of death it’s their biggest fear and yet they have such different yet similar reactions to it. Baby Willy is so curious about it it scared him but he has to know more he has to learn more, will is utterly terrified of it and thinks of everyone as just soon to be corpses stopping him from having proper connections, and pee paw was so scared of death that he started killing others so that he and the only ones that mattered could live forever damn everyone else. And he became a God. What I really want to go deeper into is the differences between pee paw and will because pee paw is so determined to make will like him someone who will become immortal and evade death and also love snuffing the life out of others while will is utterly petrified by death he’s so scared of those he loves dying and cannot bear the thought of being the one to kill someone.

Lookie here another paragraph all about death and pee paws relationships. He is so cold and distant from his family he hates Micheal oh so very much he’s just a pest a parasite trying to ruin his life that he has to *erradicate* and yet the ones he’s killed the missing kids oh how he loves them so much. He snuffed the life out of each and every single one and loved it and loved them for being killed by him and bringing him such happiness. They died so perfectly for him and even help evade death what more could he ask. So while he is so distant from his living breathing family is so enamored with these children that he sucked like from himself.

A new paragraph about bombs <33 “everyone has bombs” I love that I love how wills very first traumatic event to really show him that other people matter he thinks that others dont really matter and they’ve never suffered cause he has his “bombs” (trauma) and they don’t and Mike saying everyone had bombs is just telling him that no he isn’t the only one and that they to have their own problems and I just love it.

That’s all for now may come back to add some more rambles

[simmi23]

I wanna see William afton headcanons of ur AU

WILLIAM AFTON HEADCANONS OF SIMMIVERSE AU!!

(Btw, this is *NOT* a copy of Mobox87, this is sorta inspired but not intended to affiliate with them cause of the controversy. )

• William Afton in this AU is not like most versions of him, (obviously) because William wasn't a psycho to begin with. In fact, he was just a normal guy. Although, he had a terrible childhood in many ways.

• When he was just a child, his father wasn't around him much nor did he care for William, who was also an only child. Will lived with his mother who was loving, but not good as a mother, she only cared about other things which drifted her away from Will, she cared for him, but she just didn't know how.

• Being independent from childhood, at elementary school..William was self indulgent and very observant of what he learned, he was very intelligent and creative. But he only had 1 friend, Gron. Will was lonely, and nonchalant sometimes, though he tried to be more positive. During school, Will would avoid people due to being afraid of people, though one girl caught his mind, a girl he crushed on. Will never felt this way for anyone, but for her, he did.

• Will spent his teenage years focusing more on his ability to create something technical and mechanical. With that, Will was way too smart to the fact that he graduated high school early (according to US college system), at 16 he entered college. This gave him the opportunity to create more things and build on his future.

• This led to William meeting his business partner, Henry Emily. They were both very opposite but they still figured ways they could create a great business that would benefit all ages. Something fun and entertaining. They were building the process of 'Fredbear's Family Diner' a place where children and adults come alike.

• (*Still deciding this*) For William's ethnicity, he is European with a slight Hispanic decent, (he is Italian/Spain) but he moved to Hurricane, Utah for studying and applying his works.

• William soon met this girl he crushed on years before, again. They started talking and soon they became friends..well, more came to that and they started dating. Renata Rennings was her name and that's how he met his wife. Their relationship described as a song would be "Mine". He loves her very much and wouldn't want to lose her, and when he did, that's the beginning to how he went nuts. She was the only person in his life that ever showed him 'love' and made him feel 'loved.'

• William loves his family and children a lot, he even made things for them with his efforts, and he also tried to be the best father ever. This sorta changed when his wife died, because he began to be mentally abusive to his kids with anger and drinking too much but he only did this out of depression, he never meant to hurt them. William also got a scars from doing self harm. Sadly, William would also try to kill himself. ����

• Will became a psycho and a murderer after being so depressed and broken to losing his wife and kids from his creations, (but the C.B situation was because he wanted to kill a child and blame henry.) William and Henry had many disagreements to the business, but Henry got more credit than Will, which made him resentful. Henry also pressured William with too much work and occupations.

• William made remnant because he was tormented about the idea of death, even though his life wasn't "fair" after everything that happened to him, he wouldn't want to have death to sum it all up. Meaning, he just wanted to be normal and happy. He never got that. Will was miserable with being misjudged, misinterpreted, and unlucky. Remnant was also made to "revive" his family, though it didn't work. (not until reunion AU) Remnant was also for youth. When William was springtrap; he started to regret things but slowly due to the ignorance of believing his life was 'unfair'' and ''everyone should suffer if I did''.

• Will mainly hated Henry, not the kids he murdered (bc he was out of his mind.) or Michael. But truly, William hated himself. The 'Old man consequences' (Red Crocidile UCN) taught William everything he did wrong, and how he should change it. Turns out, William and Glitchtrap/Burntrap, AREN'T the same. (this is terribly hard to explain) Glitch/Burntrap are just (AI Virus demon and Mimic) and/or mockery of William as his punishment for what he did. Because the real William is in hell still, (or in reunion au as a dead person w his family).

Sooo yeah! That's pretty much it and this took me soo long.

[pwurrz]

uh. to put the games in chronological order it would be

fnaf 4: we play as the crying child as he lay in the hospital after the bite of 83. the minigames show the days leading up to the day he died, his birthday. the animatronics we see as the nightmares the crying child is having before he passes away at the end of the game.

fnaf 5: michael is told by his father to investigate an underground bunker connected to their house. there he finds a massive facility that houses the funtime animatronics, animatronics that never made it into the public eye because of an incident that occured opening day. this incident was of course elizabeth afton's death at the hands of circus baby. william had already killed children at this point because the reason he made the funtime animatronics was to lure and kill children in order to study remnant, a substance that allowed children murdered by animatronics or near them to have their souls bonded to the very endoskeletons of the animatronics. anyways this is when circus baby and the rest of the funtimes meld together to form an animatronic named ennard and use michael's hallowed out body as a way to escape.

fnaf 2: takes place in 1987, one of the rare occasions we get an actual year the events occured. besides fnaf 4 which ofc takes place in 1983. william has been shut out from any freddy's locations at this point. probably bc of all this missing and dead children he leaves behind everywhere he goes. this is their third? location. so the first missing kids incident takes place and when the bite of 87 takes place. after all that went down obviously they had to close and re-opened using remodeled versions of the old animatronics from the previous restaurant (the second one in the chain of many, many locations).

fnaf 1: takes place after the bite of 87 and is a direct sequel to the second game. we've known this since the second game came out. probably michael afton takes up the job of nightguard to do investigations into his father's crimes and is eventually fired for tampering with the animatronics. since it's the first game in the series we don't actually learn a lot at this point except for a) the bite of 87 happened and b) some kids went missing

fnaf 3: takes place in 2023. some dickwads open up a horror attraction to capitalize on the kind of urban legend that the freddy's restaurants had turned into. michael starts working here as a nightguard because of course he does and is rewarded in the form of his father's corpse, now melded to the spring bonnie animatronic (it's a long story). yay! a family reunion! too bad every family member michael meets is trying to kill him. turns out the people running this horror attraction managed to find a real aimatronic that had been left over from the fnaf 1 location and that was, of course, william. long story short michael tries to burn down the attraction and kill his child murdering father but is unsuccessful.

then finally fnaf 6: don't know how far into the future this is but it's after ennard has been forcibly removed by michael's body (you know. bc he was dying. and what's a dead body to a bunch of robots trying to blend in?) and was forced to live in the sewers and after the fnaf 3 attraction was burned down. henry emily, father of charlie and previous business partner of william is actually responsible for building a new freddy's location with the sole purpose of luring all the animatronics into one place so he can finally kill them all. michael once again takes this job because of course he does (shouldn't he be dead? don't worry about it). so boom it works and all the animatronics with souls attached to them including the original five murdered kids, elizabeth, william and charlie are lured to the location and burned, finally setting them free. henry and michael choose to stay behind and burn as well.

fnaf custom night: william's eternal purgatory/hell, basically. idek if it's canon to the timeline but if it is this is where it fits in.

idc about security breach or help wanted as they relate to the lore. i'm just gonna say the story wrapped up in 6 because that's the best possible timeline that makes the most sense!

also this isn't like. a description of the lore it's just a timeline for me to decide where to start when talking about the lore. also if i got anything wrong let me know (anything canon that is, most of the stuff we have is just heavily implied or speculation anyways lmao)

[that-darn-clown]

came here to ramble about my boy bl!Sammy. both in regards to him being (Mostly) nonverbal and about how he reacted to Charlie's murder.

so. to start:

Sammy is, for the most part, nonverbal. he Can speak, but only with single-word answers or short phrases. anything more than that, and he starts stumbling over his words until he's eventually just mumbling or unable to speak anymore. it's not like Cassidy, where it depends from situation to situation. for Sammy, that's...just how it's always worked for him. he's basically Charlie's exact opposite; she's hyperverbal (and he sure puts the 'hyper' in hyperverbal, i'll say that).

i looked it up to see what forms of AAC would've existed around the late 70s-early 80s, but. there weren't many that i could see Henry being able to Realistically get both during the time period and that i could see a child at that time using.

but!! AAC is not limited to just devices!! it can literally be as simple as just drawing and writing! so here's what i think Sammy would do depending on the situation:

One-Word Answers/Short Phrases: pretty much just for answers in class, especially math. it's why math, and subjects like it, are his favorites. they don't require any long complicated answers, not usually.

Sign Language: not very often. he only has a couple of teachers during his life that know sign language, and most people around him outside of his family, The Aftons, and a few of his friends, don't know sign language. now, Charlie does. it's why they're usually put together in classes, outside of them being twins; that way, if Sammy does know an answer to a question, he'll sign it to Charlie, and he'll answer for him.

Writing: what he usually does. if any question in math class includes "how did you get that answer?" he's generally allowed to go up to the board and write it out. he's got Several journals/notebooks that just contain his answers/responses to people.

Drawing: not as often anymore. this used to be how he communicated before he learned how to write, but he would still do it nowadays if either A) it's convenient, or B) he's in a state where talking, writing, or sign language would be too complicated due to being in distress or having shaky hands (so during something like a panic attack or meltdown).

important to mention: Sammy also has really bad anxiety (and issues with paranoia).

now!! onto Sammy post-Charlie's murder!

fucking devastated. obviously.

he sort of always Knew it was William. he doesn't know How he knew, but he Knew (some days he thinks maybe it was Charlie herself somehow. maybe he tried telling Sammy from beyond the grave)

...which makes the fact that Henry still let William watch over Sammy after the murder that much more sad.

William started to catch onto the fact that Sammy Knew very quickly...and Boy did he take advantage of that. he scared that poor boy half to death.

so uh....Entirely Unrelated (lying), but Sammy's anxiety got REALLY bad between 1981-1985. like the kid was having very frequent and pretty common panic attacks.

Henry, for the first couple of years, didn't understand what was going on and chalked it up to Sammy struggling in the aftermath of Charlie's death. uh. He Did Figure It Out Around 1983, Though.

by the time Fnaf 2 happens, Sammy is less scared and more Angry at William. and it's only gonna get worse.

anyway, Little Dark Age by MGMT fits bl!Sammy rather well.

(also, i drew the MCI kiddos and Charlie!! just thought i'd let you know bestie :])

The cutieeeee the beloveddddddd

[fyrefrostanimus]

Evan's not having a good time in this next segment of Fyre's FNaF X Some Random Book of Goosebumps But With Foxes Crossover AU

Recap because it's been a while: all the human characters have notable fox features. Michael bleeds out in an accident while he was trying to prank Evan as usual, and since the little guy got to watch his older brother die he's scared shitless by the animatronics now even though it as just a little bit of anxiety before. A few months later, Elizabeth gets rabies and Evan runs off to Henry's house to wait it out because William isn't doing shit about it (and also isn't giving him any real support while he's grieving Michael's death). This eventually leads to Charlie's murder because Evan wasn't around to "support" Elizabeth (even though she wouldn't have been able to comprehend that and it would have been actively dangerous for him) and Henry allowed that. William forces Evan to learn how to work with the animatronics so he can "get over" Michael's death. William decides to experiment and make a rabies cure, luring kids into the Employees Only room, infecting them with rabies, and keeping them in his little basement workshop until they go completely feral and he kills them to try and study their brains. That cycle continues until he successfully tests a prototype cure on Cassidy, but since he can't just let her go he still kills her. Most of the MCI don't remember much of this because the rabies blacks out that part of their memories, but Cassidy does remember and helps them fill in the gaps. There's a plan for Michael to return at some point, but I currently have no ideas for Charlie or Elizabeth. If anyone has a suggestion it is very welcome.

Now onto new stuff!

It's 1993 and Evan's 18 by this point in time. William's heavily frustrated that nothing is helping his son to just forget out his brother and be happy around the animatronics. So what's the best course of action?

Show him how to wear one of the springlock suits! Because if he's literally inside an animatronic and comes out unharmed, that's sure to work! Henry also hasn't been around much since Charlie was found dead behind the Diner, so the Fredbear suit is available! (I forgot to mention that Fredbear's closes much later in the timeline, so this would be viable)

Evan is very obviously terrified by this idea. Not only was he explicitly told the suits were dangerous to wear as a child, but he's also scared that he could meet a similar fate to his brother. But the punishment at home for not complying was always worse than just doing it, so he might as well get it over with.

But who knew panicking while wearing a springlock suit could be dangerous? Well, William did, but he knew what he was doing so it wouldn't be a problem. For him. Evan wasn't so lucky, because he was trembling enough to set off the springlocks in his left arm. It started in his forearm, and spread to his upper arm and hand before William finally pried the springlocks open and helped him take off the suit. It hurt a lot, and fractured most of the bones in his arm and hand, so it had the opposite effect his father was hoping for.

Evan had to spend a few nights in the hospital due to just how many bones were broken in his arm, and William was obviously forbidden from letting him do anything that could hurt his arm again one he was sent home with a splint for both his arm and hand (I basically just googled the two separately for the drawing as I couldn't find one that combined the two). Of course Evan's tail chewing nervous habit got worse after this, the tip of his tail being much less full and him sometimes even drawing blood.

He wasn't about to tell his father about the little girl that appeared around him after the incident, since it seemed only he could see her. She looked somewhat familiar, although he didn't know exactly from where. Floppy ears and curly tails weren't exactly common around Hurricane.

William wanted to continue his form of exposure therapy even while Evan was healing, so he would bring some of the animatronics home to get him up close and personal with them. And on top of that, he'd get them working to show his son that there really is nothing to fear with them.

Most of them did normal repetitive actions, but sometimes William would bring home members of the main band, and Evan swears they would look right at the invisible girl then at him. Sometimes they'd try to pat him on the head or offer him a hand after that. It was only ever Freddy, Bonnie, and Chica who did that. Foxy even seemed to respond to Evan starting to cry, almost like he was trying to comfort him. Foxy couldn't possibly know why he started crying, because the animatronic wouldn't know about Michael, right?

When that wasn't happening and William wasn't around, Evan would try talking to this little girl since he had nothing else he really could do. He figured out her name was Cassidy and that she hated his father, but she wasn't telling him much past that. The name still seemed familiar, like he had seen her before somewhere. Talking to Cassidy became one of the few comforting things he could do around the house, since William made him get rid of his plushies because he was "too old for them".

Evan walked around Hurricane sometimes. He stayed away from Fredbear's/Freddy's, but other than that it was nice to get out and move every once in a while. Even just sitting on a park bench was nice, because at least he's not at home.

What he didn't expect from one of those trips outside was pulling a missing person poster with Cassidy's name and picture on it out of his pocket.

------

If you somehow didn't think I'd put GoldenDuo in this AU because Evan is alive, then you are very sorely mistaken

[anika-ann]

Just a Human (S.R.)

Type: mini-series turned one-shot, SHIELD recruit!reader

Pairing: Steve Rogers x reader     Word count: 8750

Summary: Being a SHIELD recruit was a dream come true, especially with people like Sergeant Barnes or Captain Rogers offering an input to your class’ training.

It was also hard work for many different reasons. One of them being all those guys around; not all of them were exactly fit to become heroes, simply because they were not good people.

Maybe you shouldn’t have pointed it out so openly though. Then again, what would the world turn into if you kept your mouth shut when feeling like speaking up?

WARNINGS: so-so graphic description of assault almost turned sexual, violence and a bit of blood, boys being boys in a real bad way, language

A/N: Steve Rogers vs assholes, round 2. Also, ‘you’ vs. assholes. And Bucky in the mix.

A/N: This was originally posted as a miniseries on AO3, but now edited, I decided to thrown it in as a long, sort-of three part one-shot. Enjoy and mind the warnings.

(gif source dailymcugifs, divider by firefly-graphics)

A Handful of Spite

“Can you believe the fucking nerve on him?!” Henry hissed, punching the bag harder and catching your attention. The statement was followed by his companion nodding grimly.

You tried to ignore the walking testosterone jerks; you never liked either Henry or Jim. The reason was simple – they were, as you loved to remind people, an advertisement on toxic masculinity. Bullies on top of that. The kind of people you wanted to avoid at all costs.

You weren’t that lucky to have that chance though.

So instead, you scoffed under your breath and continued your sit-ups series. You had more important things to do than wonder about what they were talking about this time.

It was your regular training session with the other SHIELD recruits led by Sergeant Barnes – which--- oh my. When joining the academy, you had no clue that the director’s ‘you’ll be learning from the best’ meant that of all things; trained by the more-than-once-believed-late James Buchanan Barnes. Everyone here knew his story – or at least some of it. The brainwashing. The murders. His heroics to make up for them as much as he could. His everlasting friendship and a nickname that was tied to it. Bucky; the very best friend of the oh-so-praised Captain America.

Oh, speaking of which, he joined the sessions too. You were being trained by not one, but two supersoldiers slash war heroes. You couldn’t believe this was your life sometimes, but you were not one to dwell on it. You just accepted it as a fact. An abso-fucking-lutely incredible fact.

“He’s just a fucker, man. Forget about Barnes, you have Cassie in your pocket. Just ‘cause he’s all sticky sweet on her doesn’t mean she’ll suck his-“

You made a disgusting face, pushing harder to tune out the conversation. You wanted to gag and at the same time, your blood was boiling.

Could there be a jerk who was objectifying women more than Jim? A guy who was using his lower brain more frequently than him? Doubtful. You really wanted to throw up at rubbish that was leaving his mouth.

Not to mention that he was throwing dirt on Sergeant Barnes who absolutely didn’t deserve it.

“-he’s like that to all of them. The chicks. And they fucking dig him, it’s disgusting. He makes the poor brainwashed kicked puppy face, reminding the sob story of his and they’re all dropping to their knees I swear…” Jim continued, practically spitting the venomous words.

You squeezed your eyes shut, half furious and half guilty; the sergeant did have a heart-breaking backstory and many girls were making eyes on him, their hearts softened by the tragedy and his bravery, yes. And you couldn’t say it wasn’t moving you as well, filling you with compassion – but compassion only. Obviously, Sergeant Barnes was objectively a very attractive man too, but what they were saying… ugh.

He didn’t deserve these insults; he was not trying anything on anyone, he wasn’t offering his ‘sob story’, actually being rather secretive about it for obvious and no doubt painful reasons. He couldn’t really couldn’t be blamed for the girls fawning over him a bit more because of it, could he? What was he supposed to do? Stop breathing? Stop doing what he chose to be his job?

It wasn’t his problem – and thank god for that – that these two assholes had egos the size of Texas and couldn’t handle a little competition.

Seriously. Walking testosterone-filled jerks. You seriously considered moving from the station you had been given, eyeing Captain Rogers, checking if he would notice.

“Well, he’s not. Getting. Any. From. My. Chick. Asshole!”

The bag swung wildly under Henry’s blows despite Jim holding it. You laid off, taking your fifteen second break.

“I bet he’s fucking them all on side. Always so… so soft on them. I bet he’s leaving all the hard shit for bed,” Jim snorted, somewhere between angry at him competition and amused at his own crude joke.

You were gonna puke. You were sure of it.

“And he’s too hard on us. Showing off for them. I would fucking want to see him holding up against us without that metal arm-“

You had enough. You sat up sharply, panting, your face flushed, unsure whether it was from the exercise or the exchange you were listening to.

“Are you serious?!” you hissed their way, earning their shocked glances.

And then, Jim’s face twisted in annoyance and disgust.

“Oh geez, you’re one of them, aren’t you?” he snarked, rolling his eyes. “The fangirls.”

More heat burned in your cheeks. You weren’t kidding anyone; both the sergeant and the captain had showed up in your not so innocent dreams, but you were only human, alright. There was only so much time you could spend with two very fine men like them in one room, a bit sweaty and rough (or just slightly gentler with the ladies) until your brain reacted. Mostly to the captain. Not the point.

But actually crossing the line? Being a part of the thing they were describing if it ever existed? Waiting in the line until one of them picked you for the evening with a promise to do it again after they… Jesus what, tried all the others? No, thank you. You had some dignity left.

Also, you simply couldn’t imagine them doing such thing. Raised in a different era, tried by war and pain and lost, yet remaining the great men they were? Just nope.

“No! Jesus, are you even listening to yourself?” you hissed, minding your volume. You hoped that the low hum of voice in the room, of others working out, giving each other pointers and the noise of the machines would offer you a cover from the rest of your companion.

“What, you wanna tell me they’re not going easy on you? On any chick, really?”

“Yeah, well, maybe because they don’t actually want to break our bones during training. Supersoldiers. Superstrength. Does that ring a bell?” you pointed out, reaching for your water bottle, hoping either of your trainers would forgive you when seeing you only took a sec to have a sip.

Henry scoffed, leaning onto the bag. “Sounds like someone has a crush…”

You couldn’t help the motion of your hands, inconspicuously throwing them in the air in frustration.

Why were you even speaking to them? You should have kept your mouth shut!

“Oh go to hell, Ulrich! You’re just jealous and scared that your girl whom you treat like a piece of shit will run off,” you murmured, wiping your forehead off sweat.

“Yeah, because they’re sure pulling their punches with guys too,” Jim complained again, rolling his eyes as Henry now watched you, eyes narrowed in anger – oh you hit a nail on the head, alright.

You couldn’t but mirror Jim’s action, deciding to stick to Devil’s advocate, because…. yeah, because it wasn’t fair to either Rogers or Barnes. They were good people and didn’t deserve this.

“So they’re not beating the shit out of us like they do with you, get over it.”

“They’re humiliating us! Showing off their big muscles, trying to impress all the chicks-“

You chuckled incredulously as they actually admitted the real reason behind their bitching so openly; as if you hadn’t known the whole time. Ego. Ohhh, the ego was bruised. Call 911, CPR is gonna be needed! God, how did they even live with ego this big? Compensating for something?

“They’re doing their job. Training. Yes, they go a bit harder on you, because your physiology can take it. Did it ever occur to you that they have bigger problems than entering a pissing contest with you just so they could steal the girls? Jeez… just… maybe try to be less of assholes and the girls will be into you too… ”

You missed the hard look Henry gave you, laying down again, this time on your belly to work on your back.

You wheezed when a knee suddenly dug into your back, violently and painfully knocking the air out of your lungs. Before you could react, one of your arms was twisted behind your back, Henry’s voice raspy right into your ear, low and dangerous.

“Listen, you little bitch, you don’t get to talk to me like that. Understand? Huh?”

He was so proving your point, but you didn’t have the time You tried to breathe in properly, and free your arm while pushing up on the free one, your muscles burning with the effort. Shit, he was heavy. You wheezed again instead of the answer.

“Can’t hear you, sweetie. What was that?”

Peripherally, you could see heavy boots approaching rapidly, making a quick guess of who that could be. You gritted your teeth, tears of humiliation pricking your eyes. You were not about to give Henry the satisfaction of proving his point of your trainers being sweet on all the girls even if this so wasn’t that.

“Screw. You,” you let out with the last oxygen left, grabbing his left calf and sharply tugging to the very same side. A half-second later when his weight of you eased just a fraction, you threw your body to the left as well, adding a jerk of your legs.

Both of you rolled over, him ending up under you and you quickly spun away, gasping, desperately fighting for air. As it burned your windpipe, it was as painful as welcomed. Little spots danced inf ornt of your eyes, but you quickly blinked them away – luckily for you, Henry didn’t dare to attack you again.

You shook your head before pushing to sit up, only to meet with Captain Rogers’s strict gaze.

“What the hell is going on in here?” he demanded, sharp blue eyes flickering between the three of you.

Maybe you were hallucinating, but he seemed to be murdering Henry with his eyes. Uh-uh. You would have been glad he was, hadn’t Henry been talking about favouritism only few moments ago. You pushed up simultaneously with him and you both stood straight, facing the captain.

“Apologies, sir,” you stated mechanically, his gaze immediately shifting to you. Your heart stopped. Oh wow, you would swear the blue of his irises was on fire. You gulped. “We had a slight disagreement with Mr. Ulrich. I’m aware I shouldn’t have been talking to him in the first place. I’ll take whatever punishment is given to me.”

“Yeah, I bet you’d liked taking a punishment from him, wouldn’t you…” Jim muttered under his breath, making your gut twist in disgust.

Was he ever not thinking about sex? You prayed the captain didn’t hear him and you had to stop yourself from shooting Jim a murderous glare.  

“I don’t think that’s necessary. Consider it a warning. Mr. Ulrich? You have something to add before you take a few laps?”

You could literally hear Henry’s blood boiling. You opened your mouth to ask for the same punishment, not wanting to have his point proved. You never got the chance to speak.

“No, sir. I only don’t understand why I’m the only one being punished,” Henry questioned innocently and you gritted your teeth.

Maybe because you attacked me, you dickhead?

Captain glared at him for a moment before his gaze shifted to Jim. “You’re not. Mr. Larkin is following your example.”

You pressed your lips together, this time to stop a smile threatening to spread on your lips. God, who knew America’s Golden Boy could get that sassy? You cleared your throat.

“If I might speak, sir, I deserve to run the laps as well,” you noted carefully, earning a curious expression from your superior. You could tell he wavered, a strange spark appearing in his eyes.

You desperately wanted him to let you run too even if you breathing was still a bit difficult; because otherwise Henry would be proved right. Yeah, nope.

“Very well, then. Ten laps around the gym, recruits. Then you move to the station free at the moment. Go. Don’t let it happen again.”

The three of you nodded dutifully and picked up a pace. For some reason, you could feel the captain’s eyes on you while he walked back to assisting his friend with hand-to-hand training. You glimpsed the sergeant leaning to him, probably asking what was that about, but the blond just shook his head.

Towards the eighth lap, you were being overpassed by Henry and Jim, who ran together; faster than you, whether you liked it or not.

“This isn’t over, bitch,” his hateful hiss reached your ears and you picked up speed stubbornly, not showing them that they might intimidate you even for a second.

They wished.

Even when leaving the room after the session was finished, you would swear there was a pair of blue eyes burning a hole to the back of your head. You hoped that you’d soon be free of the captain’s attention.

You sure didn’t want him to watch too closely. You didn’t need him behind your back to see mistakes you sometimes made just like anybody else. Also, it would be harder to admire and ogle him; you did that occasionally, okay. You were just a human, after all.

A Handful of Mistakes

Shauna, your roommate and bestie from science division of SHIELD, was very patient listening to your lament about guys being dicks; she was awesome like that.

So you vigorously vented your frustration with male population, rolled your eyes when mimicking the silent threat of ‘this not being over’, had a very unhealthy piece of cake at the cafeteria that afternoon and moved on.  

You should have known better.

Henry’s words came haunting you few days later; which was too bad, because you had already forgotten about them, until the very moment they had punched you to the face.

…or rather to your shoulder and it wasn’t even a punch, more like one of those bumps people did, especially when they were being jerks, shoving you too hard for you to believe it was an accident.

“Sorry, didn’t see you there,” you threw over your shoulder sarcastically, continuing your way to the women’s locker room.

In hindsight, that was probably mistake number one; ignoring Henry and not starting a fight right there, not to mention being mouthy.

To be fair, you had no interest in further interaction; you were exhausted from the training, you were sticky and sweaty and all you craved was a shower. You would have just gone to have one at your dorm, but Shauna was having a hot date and you didn’t want to step on her toes. So you had taken your toiletries with you, using the showers near the gym.

Using the gym shower; mistake number two. It meant all of the students being gone by the time you emerged in fresh homey clothes, hair dripping water, because you hated hair-dryers and avoided them unless they were completely necessary.

You had spent much longer in the shower than needed, allowing your muscles to completely relax under the spray of water. That was mistake number three.

The fourth mistake was your pride. When you saw Henry, Jim, George (at least you thought, you weren’t sure, not having many classes with him) and Frank in the corridor, clearly waiting for you, since they bounced off the wall they had been resting against when you appeared, you should have probably been smarter and scream for help right away.

But no, you were being Miss Future Agent and you weren’t intimidated by four equivalents of high school jocks. Yep, this one was definitely the biggest mistake of yours.

“Fellas,” you beckoned to them, passing them gracefully, your bag over your shoulder along with the wet towel.

You barely made a few steps before a hand gripped your arm, harshly tugging you back. Your heart jumped into your throat, but you tried your best not to let it show. You turned to Henry, looking at his face, head tilted back just slightly due to his height.

“Is there a problem, Ulrich?” you asked calmly, earning a lift of his eyebrows at your tone.

“You know there is. I told you it was not over.”

You tried to ignore your pulse skyrocketing and the panic rising in your gut. You were not that stupid – you understood the implications. You knew that with four guys slowly circling you, you would have to fight bites and nails if it came to it and probably still lose. Sometimes it was just better to walk away and swallow your pride; a concept Henry and Jim clearly didn’t understand.

You jerked from Ulrich’s grip, still hoping you could walk away and call it day.

“It is over for me. Now if you’ll excuse me…“

Yes, you were being naïve thinking it would work.

The bag was torn away from your shoulder, your fingers automatically letting go to stay attached to your hand. You gritted your teeth, blood slowly reaching the boiling point.

Also, maybe you were more than just a bit afraid. Not that you would ever admit it to them.

Henry’s hand reached for your chin and your snatched it away in disgust before he could even make contact with your skin. Amusement dances in his eyes along with a flash of anger.

“Oh, kitty has claws?”

You felt another hand on your backside, sending a shudder up your spine, so you grabbed it, shoving it away as well.

Jim. Why weren’t you surprised? Pigs. What the fuck was their problem?

“I’ll let you know when I meet any. Now get out of my way,” you spat, your gut twisting as a sly grin spread on Henry’s face and he made a step right into your route.

“Or what? You’ll scratch, kitty? Or you’ll scream? Like a little girl?” he mocked you in high-pitched voice, his face lowering to yours so you were only inches apart.

“Bet you’d like that,” you murmured, narrowing your eyes when his breath with an unmistakable hint of alcohol fanned over your face. “No, I’ll offer you a breath-mint, because honestly you should do something about your breath.”

Yep, that was the mistake no.5 and definitely an enormous one.

You heard one of the guys chuckle, but you never got to enjoy the thrill of victory.

Out of blue, there was something around your neck, the weight of the towel shifting (add that to the mistake list) and your body flew backwards, colliding with a male one. George was it?

Your hands went to instinctively grab after the towel crushing your throat, but suddenly they were wrested down and pinned to your sides by strong arms. Jim had caught one, Henry another. Fucking cowards.

With your breath coming out short with both lack of oxygen and rising fear, your pulse thundering in your ears, you tried to jerk from their grip, but they wouldn’t budge, having an undeniable advantage.

Oh fuck, fuck, you were so fucked.

“Sassy little mouth, aren’t we?” Henry hummed, wry expression on his ugly face. “So dirty, feels like we should wash it with something. Who wants to go first, fellas?”

Loud alarm bells rang in your head, icy shiver running down your spine, stomach turning over.

Oh no, you don’t.

Your knee snapped up on instinct to gain the momentum, followed by a swift low kick to Jim’s knee.

He yelped and let go of your arm, allowing you to send an elbow straight to George’s face; and finally, your airways were free as the assault as the towel trap loosened.

You coughed, fighting for oxygen and mindlessly threw the item away to have at least one arm free.

“Bitch!” one of the men yelled; you weren’t sure which one, but you didn’t waste time thinking too much. Survival instinct took over.

Tears prickled in the corners of your eyes and you barely silenced the scream when Henry took advantage of your hesitation, twisting your arm behind your back. Fuck he really had a thing for that, didn’t he?

You tried to kick him, but someone else’s leg somehow managed to swept their leg under yours and you fell on your knees. Sharp tug on your hair caused you to cry out and obediently tilt your head back. Few tears escaped you, but you pushed up in attempt to get up again.

A kick coming from behind threw your body forwards and you nearly fell on your face when Henry finally let go of you. You tasted blood as you bit your cheek, but you managed to at least land on your shoulder instead of face-planting.

It still hurt like a bitch, but at least you still had all your teeth… or you thought so, not having time to check. Catching a movement from the corner of your eye, you managed to roll over before a kick to your side could hit you with full force. Frank’s foot only brushed you, but you were sure you’d have a bruise as a souvenir anyway.

A punch landed next to your face when you dodged it in the last moment, someone grabbing your legs and holding them together. Between your efforts to free them, you didn’t have time to chase away the body suddenly holding your arms as well.

“Fuck--- she’s a handful.”

A ragged battle cry erupted from your throat as you tried to jerk your body from their grip on pure instinct, every self-defence move you had ever learned flying of the window.

“More fun to break her, don’t you think?” Henry purred, his hand sneaking around your waist under the hem of your t-shirt.

Your head spun like crazy at the skin-to-skin contact and nausea hitting you hard. You wanted to puke and scream and punch and you couldn’t make yourself to do either, tears rolling down your cheeks as your body convulsed in a desperate attempt to break free.

There was ringing in your ears, disorienting you, but aware of the hand suddenly covering your mouth you tried to bite it on instinct holding you down.

“Oh-ho, biting!“ you heard, strangely muffled as if you were under water.

“I like them feisty-“

“Playing hard to get!”

“Shit, SHIT-“

The pressure on your legs eased all of sudden and you immediately kicked with all you had, catching the rising figure in the calf, knocking them off balance.

“Fuck!”

You would swear the floor vibrated, but in must have only been your mind playing tricks on you. George disappeared from your field of blurry vision; you only saw a fist sending him flying sideways.

Yep, your mind was fucking making up things, because there was no way he could have been thrown away like this by a single punch. You weren’t complaining; the relief the illusion provided was almost blissful.

Henry’s body weight vanished as well in nearly supersonic speed as if he wanted to escape the illusion. So you did the first thing that came to your mind; with your hands free, you grabbed his ankle, stopping him from running away. Which, thinking about it, was stupid, because only a moment before, you would have given anything to get him the fuck away from you.

He kicked back blindly, but his sole never met with your body – he was dragged away and… and lifted to the air as if he weighted nothing.

Blinking your tears away, your fuzzy mind cleared.

Only to reveal a very muscled and very much pissed off blond slamming Henry against a wall and then letting his suddenly unconscious body slide down.

You gasped, your eyes catching a glimpse of the fourth figure – Frank – several feet away, running for his life.

“Buck?!” came a shout and before you could question it, a metal arm emerged from behind the corner, stopping Frank dead as he rushed straight into it.

“Yep?!” the dark-haired supersoldier yelled back, sounding almost amused.

What the hell was happening? What the hell just happened?!

You blood sizzled in your veins, loud and rapid thump-thump-thump banging in your ears, face damp with several shed tears, body aching and your mind fucking racing.

You heard a whimper on your left, automatically turning to the sound. It left Jim’s lips, his form crumbled on the floor, struggling to stand up.

The captain’s knee seemed to come out of nowhere, digging into Jim’s back and pinning him down again before you even registered a movement.

“Is it fucking over now?”

“Steve, let him be. Not worth it,” Barnes’ voice tried to reason, sounding rather growly, but not nearly as loud as before. He approached your group in rapid pace and Rogers scoffed and let go.

You gulped at sergeant’s angry grimace, crazily convinced he was angry with you for all the mistakes you made that lead to this; but his expression softened when his gaze fell on you.

“Hey there,” he greeted you almost casually, holding out a hand to help you up. “Can you stand?”

You blinked several times at the suddenly dispassionate tone, even if you still sensed something bubbling under it. You shook off the thought and accepted the offered hand – the flesh one. The detail didn’t escape you, your bran in overdrive. Of course he hadn’t offered you the metal arm. He didn’t want to scare you. He was thoughtful like that-

-or not. The strength he dragged you up with was way too much for you, more so when combined with the speed and your state. You stumbled over your feet, a wave of dizziness messing with your balance.

You awaited the upcoming reunion with the floor, unable to stop the fall, but it never happened. Before you could as much as reel, gentle hands supported you in a firm grip, pleasantly warm against your bare arms.

“Whoa, take it easy,” Rogers’ voice warned you, soothing. For some reason, it felt more like ‘I got you,’ instead of ‘take it easy.’

You took a deep breath, Barnes’ hand letting go of yours as he semi-voluntarily handed you over to his friend.  

“You’re bleeding from your mouth.”

Thanks for the reminder, I noticed.

You swallowed the snarky remark, well-aware of the sergeant’s care. You fought against the urge to spit the blood out.

“Is fine…” you muttered, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “Bit my cheek. I’m pretty sure I—“ you quickly ran your tongue over your teeth just to confirm your theory, “-still have all of my teeth.”

Sergeant Barnes gave you a tiny smile, the worried crinkle that had found its way between his brows disappearing.

“Whatever you say.”

His gaze flickered to something behind your head, probably in order of exchanging a wordless conversation with your still present crutch. Not that you were complaining. The weight of what had happened was slowly settling on your shoulders and you were grateful for any support – and who were you kidding, Captain America made for a pretty reliable support.

“Why don’t we leave you in pu- Cap’s capable hands while I-“ Barnes’ jaw clenched, pale eyes scanning the four bodies on the floor, calculating. “-take out the trash?”

You nearly choked at the choice of his words, wincing. Captain Rogers’ hands squeezed your shoulders reassuringly and you nodded, not sure what else to do.

You didn’t want to look at Henry. Or Jim. Or their loyal companions.

So when the captain carefully spun you on your heels, you didn’t protest and your feet started moving on autopilot in the direction he had set.

“You okay to walk without support?” he asked softly, a stark contrast to the voice you remembered from earlier or from the training sessions.

You knew that if you said yes, he would let go of you. Honestly, his touch felt damn nice, firm and yet somewhat gentle, a pleasant contrast to harsh fingers of the men who had the nerve to attack you – you had to swallow bile rising to your mouth at the awfully fresh memory. Fuck, it had been so close, just a minute later and--- you shook your head mentally and tried your best to erase this memory from existence.

You decided not to abuse the kindness the captain was offering. After several indulging steps, you quietly confirmed he could release you. You found out that sensing his large frame by your side as if he was your bodyguard was nearly as comforting. Nearly.

You didn’t have the strength admonish yourself for basking the light of his protective persona. Future agent of not, you still had the right to want to feel secure at times.

After all, you were only human.

A Handful of Truths

You didn’t realize you were shaking until a blanket was tossed over your shoulders.

You were sitting on a short couch in what looked like a cosy office, hair still damp, body finally registering the ache caused by previous events, just like your brain was slowly taking in what had happened.

Captain Rogers, whose courtesy was to escort you from the hellhole you had been attacked in, had clearly took it as a personal mission to take care of your injuries; it hadn’t dawned to you until you were seated and your mind helpfully supplied you with ‘This isn’t the infirmary’.

He pulled a swivel chair to sit face to face with you, a box of medical supplies left open on the coffee table at your side. You didn’t realize he had moved the chair or dug the box from god-knew-where until the items were simply there.

“How do you feel?” he inquired, attentive eyes scanning your hunched form. You instinctively curled onto yourself, snuggling further into the blanket. You knew you should come up with an answer, but your brain started to hurt with the effort to do so. “I guess that’s fair. Can you tell me what hurts the most?”

You quickly glanced at his openly kind face, his baby blues still watching for any reaction that would clue him. Your throat went dry at the compassion of display and you had to swallow before speaking – and think. What hurt the most…?

You didn’t know what possessed you to tell him what you did, but it came out before you could stop yourself.

“My pride,” you croaked, causing his eyebrows jump just like the corner of his lips.

“That’s probably fair too. Then again, I’d rather know about something I can fix.”

You felt your body relax a little at his informal tone – you might even say a jovial one, but you could still sense too much worry behind it to call it that. You attempted a tiny smile at least to show him that you were more or less fine – you weren’t – and brilliantly failed.

“Landed on my shoulder. Probably gonna have a bruise on my side from when… when they kicked me. Ribs and arms might be a bit tender for few days, ‘cause they were heavy as they--- they’re heavy,” you voice wavered as you saw the muscles on the captain’s forearms clench and his hands curled up in fists. You sheepishly looked up to his face. “I got lucky.”

His eyebrows rose again in a ‘figures’ manner as he leaned back to the chair.

“Nothing else apart from that, your cheek and your pride?”

“I’m a little cold, but you took care of that,” you admitted, taking a deep breath in as you tugged on the blanket pointedly.

Despite what you were saying, you didn’t feel okay, the tremble never quite leaving your body. It wasn’t hard to figure out why. You stared at your knight in shining armour, gathering courage to do what was needed. You tried your best to meet his gaze, feeling so small and embarrassingly weak in front of him.

“Could have been much worse if you haven’t showed up. Thank you.”

He pressed his lips together, shaking his head. He leaned in, his elbows on his knees.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t faster... I should have kept closer eye on Ulrich,” he muttered under his breath, making you wonder if you only imagined it. “Your pride shouldn’t be hurt. You held yourself against them just fine.”

Your heart skipped a beat at the honestly his voice held – and you were honestly grateful for the slight shift of attention. Oh. Had he forgotten how things had been when he had arrived?

You weren’t sure whether you should remind him. You definitely didn’t want to remind yourself, but before you could solve your little dilemma, he clarified.

“You haven’t started training the combat against multiple opponents yet. Let alone four opponents, all of them having both height and weight advantage. You couldn’t exactly go all Black Widow on them if no one showed you how.”

He accented his words with a reassuring smile and you almost believed him. The shivers finally eased, most likely thanks to the warm treatment you were being given in all senses of the word. The inner cold gradually melted and you were left in nothing but pleasant warmth.

Mentally, you patted your pride gently on its head; you couldn’t quite disagree with him. No matter how helpless you had felt earlier and how ashamed for it you were, the truth was you were still learning. You weren’t a finished agent yet.

You breathed in and out, avoiding the gaze that was still on you. It felt like a freaking brand with how intense it was. You couldn’t say you hated it necessarily, you only wished you at least didn’t look so pathetic. No make-up, probably red with a smudge on blood somewhere, perhaps with some bruising already forming, hair wet and messy. You absently ran your fingers through it in attempt to fix it a bit as if it could help.

What had you been talking about? Right… those assholes being cowards and coming at your four against one.

“I… I just fucking hate bullies,” you grumbled darkly, your hand immediately covering your mouth when you realized what you had said. Oh. Language. Still your superior you’re talking to, no matter how nice. “Sorry. Please, pretend you didn’t hear the f-word. I just hate bullies, period.”

“I might have sworn earlier too, so let’s call it even,” the captain offered, one corner of his lips raised. Oh. He had, hadn’t he? ‘Is it fucking over now?’ What did that even mean? “And so I heard.”

“What?” you yelped, your mind racing again in search for the meaning behind his words.

“I mean… I heard you. When you were defending Bucky, in the gym. I’m pretty sure your exact words were about a ‘pissing contest’.”

“Oh god,” you breathed out, your face no doubt set aflame. He had heard you; that was why he had said he should have kept a closer eye on Henry. Oh. Ohhhh.

Also, did he just say ‘pissing’?

“You weren’t wrong by the way. But… neither were them.”

You blinked in surprise. What? “About?”

You knew he didn’t mean the sleeping around with recruits, your gut was screaming that at you, because they wouldn’t, but still, you rather asked for clarification. If he didn’t mean that part, which one then?

“Ladies do fall over for Bucky,” he hummed with a lopsided smile, a playful twinkle in his eyes. It did something to your belly, a strange familiar shift that was very inappropriate, but hell, people needed to cut you some slack. He was impossible not to ogle and you didn’t have the energy to control your reaction after today’s events. “And I don’t really pull my punches when I’m training those two in particular.”

“Why?” you blurted out before you could stop yourself and think better of it.

His gaze bored into yours, burning with intensity and with a glint of something you couldn’t quite put your finger on.

“I don’t like bullies either.”

Did he lean in even more or were you so focused on his face it only seemed closer?

You weren’t able to look away. His blue eyes simply locked you in, not allowing you to escape. The strangest thing was that it wasn’t scary. It should be, he was— he was a freaking captain, your superior, a superior to a lot of people, which you were constantly forgetting ever since he had saved you from falling on your ass in the hallway and you had to remember that.

Before you could though, your racing mind packed up and let your body, your mouth to be precise, act without supervision.

“Not trying to impress the ladies then, huh?”

His tiny sheepish smile cut off the uprising panic in your chest when you realized how bold of you was to say that. He lowered his gaze, giving a subtle shrug. “Guess I wouldn’t want one falling for guy’s muscles and a show-off of dominance.”

“What for then? Honesty? Sincerity? Kind eyes? Strong moral compass?” you heard yourself prying, internally horrified how far you had come when saying that. Your face was drained of colour when it clicked. You were literally naming things you liked about him, absolutely shamelessly putting them in the open. Oh shit. Fix it, fix it, fix it! “…the sass?”

His eyes went wide and he burst out laughing so loud it startled you for a second, especially as he threw his head back with the outburst. Then you reluctantly joined him, covering your face with your hands in embarrassment.

“The sass!” he howled, unable to hold back another fit of laughter and when you peeked at him through between your fingers, you saw his palm resting against his chest as if it could help him stop laughing.

Just like that, blood rushed back into your cheeks.

“Oh god, I made it worse!” you cried out, wishing for the earth to swallow you, frantically looking around for the fastest escape route. “Oh my god, I have to switch schools now… excuse me-“

You hastily got up from your seat, but a quick hand snatched yours, pulling you back.

You stumbled, landing ungracefully right back in your place, this time without the blanket. Captain Rogers was watching you with the corners of his lips high, his eyes sparkling with amusement.

“Sorry for grabbing you like that. But no, please. Stay.”

Your throat closed off when you heard his soft plea, only traces of humour in it. Yeah, you bet he hadn’t met anyone with such big mouth for a while, so he thought it was better to keep the comic around.

“Captain Rogers, I-I- what I said, it was completely out of line-“ you stuttered, only to be interrupted.

“Were you making it up?” he questioned.

You gulped, your mind screaming at you to say yes to save you the humiliation. And yet, with the cerulean irises staring into your eyes, your mouth did the exact opposite.

“No.”

Dammit.

“Then why would you go?” he questioned softly. His hand still didn’t leave yours, only easing the grip into a kinder one. You felt like a brand was being burned into your skin. A pleasant one, so you didn’t retreat. Oh, you’d never. But what on Earth was he getting at? “We need someone honest like you. People who stand up for others, even if only to defend their honour. That is the kind of people who should be in this line of work. The good ones.”

You opened your mouth, no sound coming out as his speech shook you to your core, tickling your stomach pleasantly along with your pride. His words seemed to be coming from heart, genuine, which was not helping your blood pressure and suddenly wobbling limbs.

“Even when they have potty mouth and put their foot in it? ‘Cause I seem to excel in that.”

“Especially then,” he chuckled and you could tell there was no pinch of a lie in it.

Something was in the air, crackling deliciously, and you liked it. You wouldn’t be able to describe it properly, the feeling simply too unique, but it was tickling your fancy so weren’t about to complain.

“O-okay. Thank you, Captain,” you whispered, revelling in the sight of the gentle curve of his lips.

“You started with the compliments, Agent.”

And just like that, you wanted to run for your life again, drowning in embarrassment.

What were you even still doing here? Complimenting him? Enjoying his touch? Flirting with him?

Were you nuts?!

Him, a captain— no, the captain. And you, an agent--- hell, you were not even an agent yet!

The captain whose eyes flickered to not-an-agent’s lips for the shortest of moments, widening a fraction before returning to her eyes.

Oh, now you were definitely going nuts. You were hallucinating. You must have hit your head too. He wasn’t into you and you being into him was very stupid.

You should go.

…any moment now.

…just get off your ass for god’s sake-

“Can I ask you something?”

You blinked yourself back to reality, shushing the voice in your head, curious smile appearing on your lips involuntarily. The softness of his voice felt better than the blanket before and you wanted to cocoon yourself in it, postponing the leaving plans to never.

“Sure,” you replied, the smile remaining on your face despite your better judgement.

He lowered his eyes to your joined hands, his thumb running over the back of your hand in a feather-light touch. You heart positively stopped at the moment, your breath hitching. Holy shit, what was he doing?

“This, does it… do you hate it?” he whispered the question, not meeting your eyes as if he was too shy, which was… ridiculous. He had no reason to be shy.

It still felt like a shot through your heart – a nice one, though, it that was possible. The words combined with the way they were spoken, it stirred something in your belly, warming it up and you couldn’t deny it anymore.

You really wanted this man; whatever this was, it was getting beyond a silly crush. Also, for some reason, it seemed as if he was trying to tell you he was interested too, which you thought was pretty freaking crazy.

“Stay honest, please,” he pleaded when you didn’t answer right away.

Did you hate it? The chastest display of affection if you dared to call it that? Your mind raced, trying to figure out why on earth he would ask that. Because the only reason you had come up with so far was completely impossible.

“No,” you said simply, earning a brief glance up before he looked down again. His Adam’s apple bobbed.

“Good. That’s good… and would you… I’m aware this is out of line and I—I want you to answer truthfully without fearing the consequences-…“

It was your turn to swallow loudly, because what? What did he want to ask that he considered it out of line? He was your superior – you could think of thousand ways of how you could get out of line, but him? And why should you fear the consequences?! Did he want you to help him to hide a body?

That’s not it and you know it. You know what he wants to ask, you rational side admonished you.

Oh please, shut up. Since when you switched sides?

“O-okay. What— what is it-- Steve?” you stuttered out, freezing when his name left your lips and his head snapped up, his hand giving yours a squeeze. Oh boy.

“Would you possibly say you like it?” he blurted out and your brain went to overdrive at the hope behind his expression.

Huh. He really just asked that. Oh shit. Oh wow. Your jaw fell into your lap – only figuratively, you hoped –, your ears buzzing, your blood bursting in excitement.

Oh yeah, you understood why he mentioned the consequences. Either you could say no and you’d fear he might treat you differently or you could say yes and you’d ‘fear’ he might treat you differently.

The fire in your insides burned hotter at the idea of the latter.

His hand slowly left yours, giving you a simple choice you still couldn’t believe you were given.

Holy shit. What do you even say to something like that? Coming from someone like him? Your brain froze as you only managed to stare.

Did his— did the corners of his lips turn down? Was that sadness pooling in the sea of blue of his eyes?

Oh no, you don’t.

“Y-yes,” you admitted sheepishly, closing your eyes at the heaviness of your confession.

You could feel the weight on your shoulders as silence fell, only interrupted by your soft breathing that sounded ominously loud.

Your fingers twitched when his warm palm covered them again, your lips parting in surprise. You kept your eyes closed, indulging the strange moment. His free hand caressed your other as well, the gentlest of touches, tender, contrasting with rough callouses on his fingers.

“I like it too.”

At that, you gathered enough courage to look at him, only to see him inspecting your face closely, observing your reactions. It shocked you that it wasn’t uncomfortable as you would expect; must have been the kindness and wonder in his gaze. You forced your lips to curl up in a tiniest smile. Steve smiled back with same hesitance, his face lighting up.

He looked like a boy next door (making it to a modelling agency), shining eyes and happy grin forming on his lips. He was more gorgeous than ever.

Still keeping your hands, he raised his right one, his knuckles brushing your unharmed cheek. The gesture was so tender it brought tears into your eyes, causing him quickly retreat.

“Sorry-“

You shook your head with a self-deprecating chuckle, squeezing his fingers before he could let go of you completely.

“It’s not you—I mean… it is you,” you babbled nonsensically, taking a breath to gather your thoughts. “It’s just— that was really sweet. No, that’s not-“ Not the right word. “It was beautiful. I swear I never felt so…” loved “-cared for in my life.”

He frowned, a shadow of pain running over his face. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I know that today was… unpleasant.”

Seeing his reluctance and discomfort, you went for the first thing that came up to your mind. You straightened up and pressed a light kiss on his cheek, withdrawing much slowly because once you were in his orbit, it was hard to leave.

His breath hitched, his eyes glued to you intently, flickering to your lips again.

“You didn’t upset me, Steve. That’s the last thing you could do with that,” you assured him, face still inches from his. His name rolled off your tongue easily this time, even though it still left your heart fluttering.

“And if I asked you to have dinner with me?”

Your stomach twisted in a pleasant knot at that suggestion, your lizard brain already thinking about having a dessert for a second; and you weren’t thinking cake or ice-cream.

Yeah, barely. This was a guy ready to treat you right, you were sure of it. He certainly wasn’t about to kiss you now, not afar what happened today, he might go for it after the dinner and that was only if you got lucky enough. You swallowed the disappointment at the idea, quickly shaking it off.

Make up your goddamn mind, woman. You should be glad that men who weren’t thinking with their lower brain still existed and one of those was clearly interested in you, which… yeah, what the hell, that might take a while getting used to. Add the fact that he was being incredibly considerate of how you might feel after being assaulted and you had a winner of your heart. You realized you were actually happy he wouldn’t try anything even nearly ‘funny’.

You were fine with hand-holding and brushes of his fingers on your face, which honestly, the tenderness behind that gesture made you toes curl. You didn’t care much if that made you a freaking sap.

“Still not upset,” you gave an answer at last, deciding he probably liked when you were a bit cheeky.

He offered a closed lipped smile in response, confirming your theory.

“Does that count like a yes?”

You shrugged, the corners of your lips twitching. You had no idea when the change had happened, but all you wanted now was to giggle. And maybe snuggle, but you weren’t about to say that out loud.

“You tell me.”

He licked his lips and shook his head as he retreated. Before you could protest – or have a heart attack, because the motion of his tongue attracted your gaze like a magnet, setting your core on fire –, he sat beside you, leaving enough space in case you didn’t like it.

You liked it, subtly moving an inch closer to his side. Damn, he radiated warmth. Maybe just a bit closer…?

“Cheeky dame, aren’t you?” Steve more stated than asked, reaching for the blanket pooled around you to cover you again.

You didn’t realize you had goosebumps before his hands gently tugged you in, careful not to touch you where you could consider it inappropriate.

Yeah, forget about any funny business any time soon.

You huffed. “Clearly. It did get me into trouble before.”

His eyes darkened a bit, his face noticeably falling.

No, nope, bad move, miss not-an-agent.

“I should walk you back to your dorm,” he remarked, already rising to his feet.

You first reaction was to say no, because you weren’t ready to say goodbye yet. Your second was to say no also, because Shauna probably still had her hot date.

Instead, your hand shot up to catch his, effectively stopping him. He froze before returning to his seat, tiny question mark in a place of his face right next to his soft smile.

You cleared your throat, deciding to give him the latter reason.

“Uhm… my roommate has a date. If I go there, I’ll probably find a sock on the doorknob,” you admitted, biting your lip when he raised an eyebrow and relaxed to the cushions.

“People still do that?”

You chuckled, the fact that not only he was a captain, but also Captain America, which meant he was about hundred years old, hitting you like a train.

“Yeah, people still do that,” you assured him, amused.

He pouted, which you found unfairly adorable and… kissable. Nope, later.

“Sure, make fun of the old man…” he uttered, but a spark of laughter lighted up in his irises, so you assessed he wasn’t too offended. He was most likely used to the teasing.

As an idea of interpreting his words differently popped in your mind, you grinned.

“Is that a permission to make fun of Sergeant Barnes?” you pried playfully, sending Steve into another surprised fit of laughter, not unlike when you had complimented his sass. Your heart swelled at the joyful picture of him and the prospect of seeing more of it in future.

Due to his laughter, you didn’t hear he knock on the door if there was any n the first place. The door simply swung open, revealing the other supersoldier. Speak of the Devil…

Seeing his friend, Steve burst out laughing once more. Sergeant Barnes closed the door with a puzzled look.

You just shrugged in response, opening your mouth without a sound coming out and he took in the scene in front of him again, a smirk appearing on his lips. Under that gaze, you felt your face heat up. You could only imagine how that looked like, Steve cosily close to you, laughing, your hand right next to his thigh as his outburst had sent it sliding from his hand.

The smirk on the supersoldier’s face only deepened when he noticed how flustered he had made you.

“Punk?” he questioned and Steve wheezed once more, raising a palm in the sergeant’s direction, turning to you first.

He offered you a hand to shake. Confused, you accepted as his eyes twinkling in mischief bored into yours.

“Deal,” he mouthed, sending your lips twitching, and only then he shifted his attention to his friend. “Buck?”

The supersoldier had his eyes narrowed, watching you suspiciously.

“I’m gonna regret sending you with her instead of doing it the other way around, aren’t I?” he stated, not actually asking as his gaze flickered between the two of you.

His expression pushed you over the edge and the giggle building up in your chest for the last few minutes finally broke free. You simply couldn’t contain it anymore despite having two superiors in the room. Steve gave you a warm smile as the sound left your lips, clearly not bothered by it.

You hoped you’d be forgiven by Sergeant Barnes as well. After all, you were just human.

“Yeah, Buck, I think you are.”

S.R. masterlist

Sorry for the cavities at the end. Or should I say ‘you’re welcome’? Whatever works for you :))

Thank you for reading! 

[procrastinatorimagines]

Here For You Part 6

Fandom: Chicago PD / One Chicago

Series: Here For You

Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3 // Part 4 // Part 5 // Part 6 // Part 7 // Part 8 (Final)

Pairing: Jay Halstead x Reader

Warning/s: none

Word Count: 1,534

Summary: Y/N’s world spun out of control after she got pregnant, uprooting her life and moving to Chicago only for her brother to get involved in a murder trial. Now, her baby is finally here, and with Jay by her side her life feels like it’s finally coming together again, until someone from her past comes back into the picture and threatens to tear down everything she’s tried so hard to build.

The trial process was nervewracking, multiple interviews, assessing characters, income, stability... You were glad you had Jay to lean on when it got overwhelming, but you knew you were the best thing for Lucas, and you held onto that throughout the ordeal. 

Between juggling raising your son and fighting to keep him, you made yourself think about your own future, not just in terms of Jay, but in terms of a career too. So when Lucas was big enough, you were going to start training to be a nurse. It was a time of near constant fear, but also hope; you could see your life beyond this, all you had to go was get past this colosal hurdle. 

Tommy on the other hand, as you learned in court, didn’t have a job or apartment, and had bailed on two separate court-ordered rehabs, leading to hefty fines he couldn’t afford to pay. Needless to say, the trail was going in your favour.

Eventually, the judge ruled that you were to receive full custody, but adviced you let Tommy have visitation at your own discretion, and at a time when he was in a fitter state and child support was being paid regularly and in full, the issue of custody could be revisited. Tommy wasn’t happy, but it was everything you could have asked for. 

You left the courtroom with your head held high that day, Henry passing you back Lucas as he and Jay led you out towards the elevators. Tommy chose that moment to approach, your smile wiped from your face in an instant. 

“Y/N,” he said with force, making you stop in your tracks and turn to face him. He was angry, and while you couldn’t exactly blame him... wait, yes you could. Tommy was the one who wanted to take this to court, actually having the audacity to put you and Lucas through all that thinking he had a chance. 

Jay put a protective hand on your back, positioning himself so that he was slightly shielding you and your son. “You brought this on yourself,” you told him, watching his eyes flare with rage as you continued, “if you’d have just reached out properly, we might have been able to sort something out without needing it to get this far.” 

It wasn’t a lie, you would have considered it, maybe not when you were lying in a hospital bed with your new born baby obviously, and he never should have expected that, but you could have come to an arangement. 

Tommy rolled his eyes and grumbled something you didn’t care to repeat, Jay tensing beside you. “Who the hell is this guy anyway, seriously?” He asked, gesturing to Jay with indignation, “this guy isn’t Lucas’ dad, I am, and what? He gets to be around my kid whenever he wants while I have to beg you for scraps?” 

Lucas was starting to fuss in your arms as you took a step away from Jay towards Tommy, wanting to show him that you were fighting your own battles. Jay cast you a worried glance but he didn’t stop you. You took a breath, leveling yourself as you felt your blood boil. 

“Yes,” you answered his question, much to his shock and anger, “Jay’s been there for me, for us, this whole time since we met, since you left. He’s a good man, kind and dedicated, and Lucas would be lucky to have Jay for a dad.” 

You heard Jay suck in a small sharp breath, not expecting you to say that; Tommy gasped in surprise, almost looking hurt. Honestly, you were surprised you said that outloud too, but there it was. Henry was smiling in a knowing way, glad his sister was finally standing up for herself.  

“You little...” Tommy hissed, taking a step forward and pointing his finger in an acusatory manner. Instinctively, you took a step back, a protective arm around Lucas as he started to cry. That was all the cue Jay needed to intervene, blocking Tommy’s path.

Security took a step forward, ready to de-escalate the situation if they needed to, but Jay had it under control, sensing the shift in Tommy’s stance and the way he clenched his fist. It was an obvious swing, one that Jay dodged with ease, a slight glint clear in his eyes, gaining all the justification he’d been waiting for as he aimed a well placed punch at Tommy’s nose, knocking him to the ground in one hit. 

Tommy looked daised, steam practically coming out of his eyes as he tried to stand, clearly going for round two before he froze, staring at the badge Jay had just revealed under his shirt. Jay signaled to the guard to pick him up off the floor.

“Congratuations Tommy, you’ve just assaulted a police detective in a court house full of witnesses,” he told him, nodding towards the crowd of people who had stopped what they were doing to witness the commotion. 

Any sympathy you might have had was gone as you looked him square in the eyes. “Goodbye Tommy,” you told him, turning on your heals as you soothed your crying son. You already had an actual baby to take care of, you didn’t need to pile a grown man onto that list. Somewhere down the line, you might consider letting him visit Lucas, but that wasn’t going to be anytime soon. Besides, after this there wouldn’t be a judge around who wouldn’t take your side on that matter.

As the doors shut to the elevator and Tommy was taken into custody, you let out a breath you hadn’t realised you’d been holding, grateful when you felt Jay’s fingers slip into your own. You glanced down at his bruised knuckles and ran your thumb over them lightly, squeezing his hand in thanks as Lucas began to calm down. 

It had been satisfying to watch, if you were being honest, you knew Henry agreed by the smirk that had become permanently plastered on his face. Jay definitely enjoyed it a little too much, but you didn’t blame him.

You looked around at the people in the elevator. They were your family, Lucas’ family. You didn’t need Tommy, hadn’t for a long time, maybe now he’d realise that.

-

“What’s going to happen to Tommy?” You inquired once you were back in the comfort of your own apartment, Lucas finally calmed down and asleep after the ordeal at court. 

“I don’t know, but after that outburst he won’t be allowed near you or Lucas for a long time,” Jay informed you, temporarily putting on his serious detective voice, “I’ll make some calls tomorrow.” You knew he would, he took yours and Lucas’ safety very seriously, Tommy was probably at the 21st right now nursing his nose.

“I didn’t want this, Lucas deserves stability, a good father...” You sighed with frustration, all the emotion you’d bottled up during the day and the trail threatening to boil over. Jay grabbed your hand and you met his eyes, “I meant what I said in there, about you. I want you in his life.”

“I want to be in his life, I love him...” Jay told you honestly, taking a deep readying breath, as if preparing himself for what he was about to say, “I’m kind of in love with you too.”

“Jay-,” You breathed, shocked by his declaration.

“I know you’ve been through a lot and this is sudden, but I love you Y/N, and I want to be a part of your life, both of your lives,” he continued, taking your other hand too. 

His touch was strong, warm, comforting, everything you wanted for yourself and Lucas. Jay had proven time and time again the kind of man he was, without fail, he’d been kind, patient, supportive... everything Tommy had never been, everything you didn’t think you deserved, but here he was, ready to give it all to you without hesitation. 

So you told him the truth, the truth you hadn’t even realised it until this moment, buried deep down as you’d tried to navigate your new life. “I love you too,” you told him, and it was like something cracked open in your chest, and you could breath again. You’d never said those words to anyone, not romantically, but you knew it your heart that you did.

“Yeah?” He asked hopefully, not quite believing that you’d said it back so quickly, or with so much confidence. You took him in as you thought of what to say, every detail.

“Yeah I really do, I guess I’ve been trying to fight it, thinking that it might be selfish to think about a relationship right now, but the truth is you are what’s best for him, and me,” you tried your best to explain, “I love you, and although I don’t know what’s going to happen with Tommy, I know Lucas could never ask for a better father than you.”

“You mean that?” 

"With my whole heart.” 

And then you kissed, and it felt like a promise, a promise of ‘i love you’, a promise of a future, a promise to always been there for each other, whatever came next. 

[annavoncleves]

the saga of henry the young king

ok so, henry the young king, eldest (living) son of henry ii (he did have an older brother, william, but william died as a baby so in practice henry's oldest) dad's the king of england, lord of wales and ireland, count of anjou and maine and aquitaine, and eventually brittany

lots of titles, lots of sons as well, and rather than the oldest son getting everything like comes in later (unless he's an only child/only has sisters) at this point he has to share with his brothers, though he does get the Best Cut, which in this case is the kingship of england

BUT

kingdoms are a lil different to other realms, in that, whilst counties and duchys can be split whilst dad's still alive, bc those are vassals of the kingdom, the throne can't be split up, obviously

so even though henry is named 'henry the young king' (an attempt at securing the throne, after the absolute clusterfuck that happened to henry ii's mother, empress matilda, whose throne was stolen by her cousin stephen after her father's death, bc she was a) a woman, gasp and b) the lords of england didn't think SWEARING AN OATH TO RECOGNISE HER AS QUEEN BEFORE THEIR KING AND PEERS was BINDING ENOUGH, so that henry's chosen heir would. actually get the throne when he died) he has no actual power

which tbh, looking at his record, is probably a good thing, bc although he thought a lot of himself, he wasn't actually that great a leader of men

he was a very good jouster tho, but that's neither here nor there 

SO. henry ii is king. henry the young king is basically the king-in-waiting, whilst all his legitimate* younger brothers get THEIR inheritances (well, richard and geoffrey do, getting aquitaine and brittany. john - later known as bad king john, yes the bad guy in robin hood, he's based off THIS john - is the youngest and doesn't get shit, gaining him the nickname 'lackland') 

*henry ii was a bit of a slut, but all kings were, and was actually pretty good to his bastard sons, by the standards of the day, anyway. he made one of them an important bishop and gave the other a position at court. fun fact, when henry ii does eventually die, it's one of his illegitimate sons at his bedside, and none of his legitimate sons

[in the words of the astounding @searchingforserendipity25: “to be the only illegitimate son at that bedside, crowded by all those absences” damn queen, go off]

BUT. henry the young king, king in name, but JUNIOR king, and only titular. younger brothers get their lands. he's pissed.

daaaaad, he whines, i want a go at ruling now

i'm ruling now, wait your turn, henry ii says

no, fuck you, henry the young king says and starts a rebellion

despite being... well, a bit useless, henry the young king is VERY popular (idk, bc he was moderately handsome and good at jousting?? it makes no sense to me why the people liked him as much as they did, he didn't exactly do anything to earn their love or allegiance as far as i can see) and quite a few lords get behind him

also wanting a bigger portion than they've been given, richard and geoffrey join the rebellion, bc they want more of that sweet, sweet land, as does their mother eleanor of aquitaine who fell out with her husband at some point

henry ii, against all expectations, successfully puts down the rebellion and henry the young king et al are in troubleeee, but henry ii can't afford to really punish his ungrateful offspring as much as he'd probably like, so he goes the other way and gives henry the young king a nice big allowance to keep him happy, which works for a little bit

then henry the young king, beautiful imbecile that he is, decides he's gonna rebel again. it ends the same way. he's just not very good at war, is the only conclusion i can come to

SO the second rebellion is in progress (henry the young king is allied with his brother geoffrey again, but not richard, who appears to have learned his lesson... for now. richard does rebel again later, but he waits for the right moment, proving he had some degree of intelligence that the other two... lacked) when henry the young king gets sick

i'm gonna have to copy and paste from wikipedia for this bit to explain what he was sick WITH bc there is no way i can beat this: "[Henry] had just finished pillaging local monasteries to raise money to pay his mercenaries [when] he contracted dysentery at the beginning of June."

you heard that right

he got dysentry whilst PILLAGING CHURCHES

it was a real Bruh moment for karma

anyway, he starts getting sicker and sicker until it becomes clear He Ain't Surviving This, at which point he does what a lot of people do when faced with the reality of their own mortality: say 'oh shit, i fucked up' and try and apologise

he's also pretty out of it so at some point in a presumably feverish stupor 'as a token of his penitence for his war against his father, he prostrated himself naked on the floor before a crucifix'. just stripped off, got on his belly, presumably in one of the few moments he was not shitting himself, and says 'lol my bad'

unfortunately for henry the young king, he's got form for being a tricksy, underhanded bitch. (seriously, why was he so popular?? enquiring minds - mine - would like to know) and when the messenger gets to his dad saying 'welp, i'm dying, i'm real sorry about the wars, come see me on my deathbed?

henry ii takes one look at that and goes: 'he's not really dying, is he?’

the messenger: uh. yeah. really dying.

henry ii: sounds fake

the messenger: no, he's really really sorry and really really dying

henry ii: this is Definitely A Trap

so henry ii isn't gonna be taken to a secondary location to get imprisoned or murdered by his rebellious son, which u can't entirely blame him for, considering henry the young king is currently In The Process Of Attempting To Depose Him when this all goes down, BUT henry ii also figures that if his son really is dying, and he doesn't grant him forgiveness, then he's gonna be haunted by that shit/his son won't find peace/bad things will happen. so he takes one of his rings and gives it to the messenger and says, take this to my son as a token of my forgiveness. the ring couldn't come from anyone else, so henry the young king will know it really comes from his father, and henry ii doesn't get possibly murdered, so everybody wins!

messenger goes back to henry the young king, who we presume has now got some clothes on, or at least a strategically placed sheet, and gives him the ring. as expected, henry the young king dies soon after, get this, holding the ring that his father sent him.

like. i don't think he was a good king. i don't think he would've been a good king. but. he dies holding onto this ring. and he's got a lot of people around him, but his dad isn't there, just this ring. 

when henry ii gets the news that henry the young king is really, really dead now, he is meant to have said the absolute soul-crusher of a quote that made me want to tell you this whole saga in the first place: "He cost me much, but I wish he had lived to cost me more."

like??? this kid tried to overthrow his dad. TWICE. he spent all the money his dad gave him and then some, which led to the aforementioned pillaging monasteries, he signed up to go on crusade that his dad specifically told him not to fucking go on (which he died before he could fulfil)... he did EVERYTHING wrong. like. so much.

and his dad just wants his pillaging, disobedient and wasteful son back.

and that is the story of henry the young king, the only junior king england ever had.

[bansheeoftheforest]

More Jacob x Henry, this is a threat 🔫 /lh

Ahem <3

Henry is an incredibly good singer and also incredibly good at playing piano and violin, Jacob can do neither for the life of him, but he loves to hang on the piano as Henry plays and sings for him. Henry is quite shy about his singing (it feels quite personal, as much of the songs he knows the lyrics and notes to he learned in Scotland) but he feels really comfortable doing that with Jacob.

Evie is quite sure Jacob developed some sort of Stockholm Syndrome because he really does not try to hide how hot he thinks Henry is in his templar outfit, regardless of the original or dyed one.

It doesn't take long for Jacob to move into Henry's house after they get together, mostly because it starts getting cramped in the train and Evie and Greenie makes him annoyed. Henry's servants are not even batting any eyes (absolutely not because Poole is threatening to hit them with the hilt of his cane if they dare to comment on their master and his... Friend) and Jacob finds it incredibly amusing to freak them out with his weapons, but he is still v kind to them and the servants like him.

The first time Henry saw Jacob without his shirt (most likely while seeing him in the fight clubs) he lost function of his brain for at least five minutes and almost passed out. Jacob loves to take advantage of that.

(Honestly, yeah, sure, Henry had an affair with a man and also a woman but that was at least 15 years ago so he very much would faint at the sight of an ankle)

They are the same height but Jacob has much more stock, which means that he, obviously, is a very good personal pillow for Henry during the few times he actually goes to sleep. Also Henry actually sleeps regularly when he dates Jacob because... Well... Jacob forces him and cuddles too good <3

Henry loves to steal Jacob's clothes. Most of them are quite too big on him but they are comfy and they smell like Jacob and makes him feel safe, Jacob once searched for his favorite shirt for two whole days before he caught Henry curled up with it in his office when going on a surprise visit.

Jacob has a distinct musky whiskey smell, Henry smells like honey and lavender, when they miss each other they steal each other's colognes and sprays it on themselves or their clothes.

Letters. So many letters. Henry loves writing letters to Jacob because he can just pour his feelings out and tell him how much he loves him, all he want to do with him, and Jacob is no poet but he tries and succeeds in absolutely managing to get Henry swept off of his feet with mere words. Sure, Henry is easily swept, but Jacob still loves the affect he has on Henry and Henry loves the feeling of just being high on love.

Jacob loves picking Henry up by the waist and twirl him around, both because it gets Henry to giggle the most adorable giggle and also because he can just stare at him and admire him <3

Dances. A lot of dances. Henry loves to dance and while Jacob is not a perfect dance partner, he still does his best because it makes Henry happy <3

Jacob gifted Henry his first gun-- a beautifully handcrafted one that was both as beautiful and mesmerising as it was efficient, and Henry bought the sleekest and largest canesword for Jacob that money could buy. They both want their lover to stay safe <3

Sometimes Henry will have nightmares about his brothers or him murdering them. Most often he will wake up crying and hyperventilating in the middle of the night and try to leave the room to not wake up Jacob. Jacob wakes up within moments and immediately comforts him. It doesn't matter how often it happens or how much they both need the sleep, Jacob will stay up until sunrise brushing his hand through Henry's hair as he lets him sob the trauma out.

Evie's and Jacob's favorite inside joke is that they both have a soft spot for Henrys. Both dating Fryes, Jekyll and Green become good friends and go out for brunch on saturdays when the twins are out spending some time together or murdering people.

Jacob was the first ever person to find out about Hyde. He accepted it immediately, even if he was... Hesitant, so to speak, scared for his lover's wellbeing but after a thumbs up from Henry, he suddenly found great joy in cornering the blond man and flirt with him until he is a quivering mess.

Brokenshire and Abberline are probably the biggest Jekyll x Jacob shippers. They both did their best to match them together but almost to their disappointment, the two got together before they could try to set them up fully 😔

Have I said this one before? Anyways Jacob gifts Henry a teensy tiny puppy he found because he knows that Henry loves dogs, strays, and puppies. Correctly, Henry was as excited as a kid on a sugar rush.

Henry has to patch Jacob up a lot. He loves to kiss his hands and wrists and knuckles and arms and every single muscle of Jacob's body, not even counting the actual wounds and scars, while he bandages him. Jacob feels like it's the best painkiller there is <3

Jacob loves to kiss Henry and he does so every moment they get. Sometimes he acts like he is french just so he has an excuse to kiss Henry on his cheeks in greeting in public, complete with a fake accent and everything.

They never really argue, if they argue it's because the other were reckless and could have (or did) get hurt or worse, but they love each other too much to let the arguments go further.

Henry rarely sleeps but he falls asleep on Jacob all the time. Cuddling? He sleeps. Doing paperwork together? He sleeps. On a date? He sleeps. In a carriage together? Sleeps. Jacob doesn't mind bc A) Henry trusts him enough to sleep on him, B) holy shit he is actually sleeping, and C) he loves to carry Henry around and tuck him into bed <3

The Lodgers found out about the relationship (or about Jacob at all) when they found Henry pressed against a wall by said assassin. At first they thought Henry was in trouble, then they heard Henry giggling and saw Jacob kiss his nose <3<3<3

Jacob is a surprisingly good cook but rarely has patience for it. Henry has patience but often finds cooking boring or a waste of time because he often feels like he never has enough time as is. To combat that, they often cook together once they have retired and have to learn to take care of themselves.

Jacob is incredibly clingy, Henry craves affection and validation, both of them often refuse to let go of each other.

Jacob almost debated beating Lanyon up when he heard about what he did to Henry during the affair they had together, however, changed that plan to just absolutely spoil Henry rotten with love and affection <3

[mermaidsirennikita]

Hello, I hope I'm not bothering you, but do you have any good "enemies to lovers" recs, may they be books or movies?

I neeeever am bothered by people asking for recommendations.  Those are my favorite asks because I am nothing if not in love with my own opinions, lol

Books

Obviously, The Viscount Who Loved Me by Julia Quinn, the best Bridgerton book, because I’ve been blogging about it lol.  If you haven’t read it, it’s basically “rake tries to seduce the beauty of the ton, beauty’s older sister cockblocks him, he realizes that He Is Into It” 

The Hating Game by Sally Thorne is a classic.  Very light and fluffy contemporary, two people who’ve always hated each other begin competing for the same job and fall in love.

Kate Quinn’s Mistress of Rome series is a saga and the initial big ship of the first book (which you do have to read lol) is not enemies to lovers.  However, the NEXT ship which dominates the last two books of the series (which is four books long, and tbh... I recommend the second book but it’s a prequel and can be skipped technically) is SOOOOOOO GOOD.  It’s really “childhood friends to young lovers to SEVERE ENEMIES still secretly in love” and it’s literally epic lol.  Essentially, the series is set in Ancient Rome and Sabina (very bitchy Roman noblewoman) and Vix (child of a former gladiator, soldier) are friends who I think lose their virginities to each other?  And are in love as kids.  But then she fucks him over and marries the emperor.  Who he actually begins to loyally serve!  But he haaaates Sabina because she.... constantly backstabs him lol.  But he also looooves Sabina and gets off on everything she does.  And she wants him so badly.  And it is delicious.  And I live for it.

Both of the Evie Dunmore books I’ve read, Bringing Down the Duke and especially A Rogue of One’s Own are very enemies to lovers.  In Bringing Down the Duke it’s a bluestocking versus a duke who for political reasons is her enemy.  In A Rogue of One’s Own it’s another bluestocking versus a rake who has known her basically all their lives.  They have to begin working together and fall in looove.

Sarah MacLean LIVES for this trope lol.  Her first true enemies to lovers was Twelve Scandals to Start to Win An Earl’s Heart, in which the heroine is a scandalous young woman and the hero is a duke determined to avoid scandal--and he rebuffed her before the book began, so they hate each other.  But he also has a massive boner around her, of course. 

My favorite MacLean book, A Rogue By Another Name is another “childhood friends turn enemies to lovers”.  The leads, Penelope and Bourne (last name lol) were best friends as kid and he basically fell off after life set in.  Her family now has hold of his ancestral lands, and Bourne essentially blackmails Penelope into marrying him so that he can get those lands, after which she DESPISES him even though they had..... extremely great sex lol.  It’s SUPER GOOD, and it involves borderline voyeurism, which is great.

Then No Good Duke Goes Unpunished is very enemies to lovers.  The heroine was set to become the hero’s stepmother--then he woke up covered in blood with her missing. He then finds out, after years of being despised by society as a presumed murderer, that she is very much alive with a fake identity lol.  It’s WILD.

The Rogue Not Taken is an enemies to lovers roadtrip romance.  The heroine thinks the hero is a horrid rake who purposefully ruins marriages.  He thinks she’s a stuck up brat.  They end up journeying together and he eats her out in a moving carriage.

Theeen there’s Daring and the Duke.  The hero literally thought the heroine was dead (MacLean loves this) and is OBSESSED with her, but she hates him because the man who raised them both basically pitted them against each other after their days of being childhood sweethearts.  It’s very dark and delicious, and there are blow jobs!  Blow jobs don’t happen enough in romances, especially historical romances.  More BJs!  They are fun!

If you’re interested in a dark and BONKERS romance, Desperate Measures by Katee Robert is a retelling of Disney’s Aladdin about a modern Jafar and Jasmine getting together after he takes over her father’s criminal empire.  It’s definitely extremely explicit and a bit fucked up.  The book comes with content warnings; the first sex scene is dubcon.  (Like you’re reading from her perspective and she WANTS IT but she says no.)

Beach Read by Emily Henry is a cute contemporary in which the hero is a literary author and the heroine is a romance novelist.  They find themselves in neighboring beach houses and basically challenge each other to write in the other person’s genre.  Very light enemies to lovers.

A Heart of Blood and Ashes is a fantasy romance by Milla Vane!  Essentially, the hero’s parents were killed by the heroine’s father and he’s out to kill her father and overtake his throne.  Luckily, she’s on board.  But he needs to marry her in order to accomplish his goals.�� They do not trust each other whatsoever and torment one another a lot.  For context, within the first fifty pages she gives him a handjob while her hand is covered in her own brother’s blood (and yes, he did kill her brother).  It’s great.

The Worst Best Man is about a wedding planner who suddenly finds herself needing to work with her ex-fiance’s brother... who she holds responsible for her fiance leaving her at the altar.  Very fun and sexy contemporary.

The entire Four Horsemen series by Laura Thalassa.  In each book, the heroine falls in love with a literal embodiment of one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, who is here to bring the end of the world.  VERY heavy enemies to lovers.  Kinda dark at times?  Kinda fucked up at times?  I love it a lot?  It begins with Pestilence; War and Famine have already been released, but Death has not.

From Lukov with Love by Marina Zapata.  It’s a figure skating romance; a down on her luck skater pairs up with a male skater who is extremely successful, and who she’s known for years and hated.  Verrrrry slow burn, but fun.

Movies

The Proposal, of course, starring Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds.  You’ve probably seen this, but the setup is that she’s his evil boss, he’s her assistant, and she’s about to lose her visa so she bribes him into marrying her so that she can get citizenship.  But ruh-roh, they have to go to Alaska for his family reunion and he’s also got a great body and is like, an Alaskan Rockefeller?  

Obviously, Clueless which is enemies to lovers by way of former stepsiblings, and also by way of the only valid retelling of Emma.  Emma itself is not enemies to lovers, really, but Clueless amps that aspect up a bit.

If you want a super tragic version, warning lol--House of Flying Daggers.  It’s a wuxia movie, so melodramatic to the max.  She’s a blind daughter of the leader of a vigilante group, he’s a soldier who’s gone undercover to follow her to their stronghold.  Many reveals and one of my favorite dramatic love stories ensues.

Princess Diaries 2, duh.  Baby Chris Pine?  Anne Hathaway?  PLEASE BITCH.

365 DNI.  If you haven’t watched yet, watch it and thank me later.  The greatest cinematic contribution of the last decade.

Down with Love.  It’s a delightful take on like, 50s/60s sex comedies in which the heroine writes a book that convinces women to ignore love and men, which makes the hero look bad and makes it difficult for him to get laid.  So he sets out to basically.....  wear a different persona?  And seduce her?  It is one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen, and I adore it.  Renee Zellweger and Ewan Macgregor have great chemistry in it too.

The Thomas Crown Affair, starring extremely hot Pierce Brosnan and Renee Russo.  She’s an insurance investigator, he’s a billionaire who basically is suspected of stealing priceless works of art because he’s bored.  She investigates him and immediately begins fucking him.  Has a scene where she dances with him while wearing a completely transparent dress.  Then they fuck everywhere in his house.  I have never wanted to be between two people more.

The Painted Veil.  A socialite marries a dorky scientist for convenience, then cheats on him.  He finds out and basically forces her to go to China with him, where he is fighting the cholera epidemic, as an extremely long and petty murder suicide attempt.  But they get to know each other!  And the ice begins to melt!  Warning: tragic but lovely.

Casino Royale YES I SAID THAT.  The James Bond reboot movie that explains why he’s such a whore!!!  HE WAS BROKEN!!!  Basically James Bond is not like... a learned man... in this movie.  So he’s a cocky bastard and the Bond girl is impossibly sexy Eva Green as Vesper, who’s the “money man” on his mission.  They begin as bickering assholes and then fall in love.  But also!  Tragedy!

The animated Anastasia movie is one of the finest enemies to lovers movies of any time, I will defend this forever

Anyway....  Hope this gives you some ideas!  Lol

[tjlikesprettythings]

Ooo I've got one! Prompt: write about what one of the characters (your choice who!) thinks about when THEY drink alone (lol).

Hey Anony, not sure which fandom you’re from but I decided to write for both Prodigal Son and Macgyver cause I loved this prompt, but I will post the Macgyver with a prompt paste. Thank you. <3

Prodigal Son: Malcolm

It was a long day, throwing his keys down and hanging his coat, Malcolm walked towards his wet bar cart. Pouring himself two fingers of the Macallan he usually reserved for something to celebrate or when he’s had the worst day. It was usually saved for the latter, but since his return to New York and joining the team, he found himself having more of the victory drinks. Though tonight it was for an altogether different reason. He pressed play on the sound system and let the soft melodies float through his apartment.

He sat down on the chesterfield and threw his head back letting it rest on the back of the sofa, staring at his ceiling as he thought about the day. While the case was an easy open and shut case, the players in the said case were what had him feeling uneasy. 

Dani was unusually friendly with Detective Henri Fontenot of the 32nd precinct who joined in their investigation for the murder of a young couple. As he would later find out from JT who happened to be in a bit of a gossipy mood that Fontenot had asked Dani out just weeks before Malcolm joined their team, and as far he knew that date went well cause Dani hadn’t seemed annoyed after the said date. JT shrugged and then simply deduced that since Malcolm has joined the team they have been kept on their toes and maybe Fontenot had fallen through the cracks of Dani’s schedule. 

Malcolm’s mind flashed to the way Dani had smiled at the other detective outside of the building, tucking some hair behind her ear. Malcolm found himself faltering in his steps as he walked towards them to join the crime scene, in the time he’s known her she never reacted quite so...charmed? Her usual reserved but amiable demeanour kicked up a notch as she chatted away, smiles and shy glances at the man standing across from her.  

He couldn’t place a finger on why it made him feel a bit uncomfortable to see her like this, but he pushed it aside as he walked up to them deliberately going to join her rather than where Gil and JT stood speaking with the officer on scene. He bounced up to her, his normal excitement for a case returning. Only she straightened herself and smiled a tight smile, he could see she looked startled by his presence as if she had been caught?

Malcolm remembers his own smile faltering very quickly at her reaction. He interrupted something. He turned to look at the man who very obviously had Dani engrossed in conversation, introducing himself and learning his name and figuring that he had a creole background from his name and a slight accent to his speech. Detective Henri Fontenot was definitely a charming man with appealing features. He turned to look at Dani who still looked like a kid caught with her hand in the cookie jar and smiled, she was obviously attracted to Fontenot and that revelation brought an easy knot to Malcolm’s stomach. 

He sighed, taking a large sip of his drink, squeezing his eyes tight, he shook his head. But all he saw behind his lids were Dani, smiling, nodding at him with knowing eyes. Teasing him about something. His mind dissecting each expression to match with the ones she had for Fontenot. He wasn’t someone who felt possessive about people in his life, to be fair he didn’t have many people to feel that way about. But Dani...she was special.

Malcolm sat up and looked at the glass of amber liquid, it was surreal that Dani wasn’t part of their team, his team. In this particular situation, she was paired with Fontenot and that knot in his stomach grew with each smile they shared or even the banter that flowed between them. The visible flirtations made Malcolm internally roll his eyes. Fontenot could work on his pick-up lines. 

It definitely didn’t help when they finally arrested the supposed best friend of the woman who was their murder victim, apparently, he lost it when she told him that she was in love with her current partner and they would be getting married and she was expecting his baby. Malcolm did not miss the sympathy that crept in the back of his mind, as if he understood their killer on a whole other level. 

After the wrap-up, when he was packing his bag for the night, he watched from afar as she laughed again at something Fontenot said, head thrown back full-blown laughter, not even he was able to get that kind of reaction from her. He was so deep in his observation of his friend and the object of her affection that, only noticed Gil when he heard him slurp rather loudly from his mug standing behind him.

“Looks like Dani’s gonna be busy on her day off,” JT wiggled his brows playfully as he joined next to Gil. 

“Nah, he’s not all in yet. He’s definitely close though.” Gil stated. “If he were, then she wouldn’t have dropped him after the first date.”

“I think Fontenot is already in, have you ever seen our girl laugh like that?” JT said pointing the file in his hand in the direction of the couple in question.

Gil shook his head, “I dunno,” still not convinced. 

JT turned to Malcolm, “what do you think?” 

Malcolm shifted uncomfortably, “I think this is not any of my business, Dani wouldn’t like the speculations.” 

“Really? Now you have boundaries?” JT shook his head teasingly as he walked away. 

Malcolm caught the sly smile on Gil’s lips as he turned to go back into his office. He looked on for a second longer and nodded to himself. It’s none of his business. 

Macallan deserved to be sipped and appreciated but he took another long gulp of the drink. He was annoyed with himself and with Dani irrationally. Why did she have to be so perfectly friendly, and caring, and...beautiful? Why did she embrace him and bring him into her fold?

He knew he had to address the uneasiness in the pit of his stomach but for now, all he wanted to do was drink his very expensive scotch and overthink about whether Dani was out with Fontenot.

[realm-sweet-realm]

Angel of the Ink Machine, chapter 2: Compromise

The premise of this AU is simple: Sammy leaves the studio instead of Henry, and as a result, Joey needs a new partner in crime. He finds one in Allison. Power struggles, sacrifices, passion, ecstasy and tragedy ensues.

---

Allison’s first few weeks at Joey Drew Studios had been interesting, to say the least. Joey had introduced her to the music room on her first day, and all had seemed to go well. The next day, however, just as she was setting things up in her recording booth, a small, blonde woman who hadn’t been around the day before had come in to interrupt her. Apparently, the last voice actress for the part of Alice Angel- Susie Campbell- had been away the previous day and hadn’t been told that she’d been replaced. The poor woman was heartbroken, and Allison had felt bad for taking a role that was essentially meaningless to her from someone who clearly cared much more about it.

That pity only lasted until Allison realized that half of the music department had taken a disliking to her, seemingly overnight. It was hard to tell how much of that was their loyalty to Susie and how much of that was just their regular standoffish-ness. Either way, Allison didn’t much care for the whole high school-level cattiness of it. Any friends she’d make in this studio would be outside the music department.

Voice acting was fine. Dating Joey was wonderful. She hadn’t gotten to play with the ink machine yet, but they’d done other magic together. She didn’t care for his secretiveness about his plans for the machine worked, though, and after a while she decided to seek out answers on her own.

Her first thought was to ask the man who was building the machine, Thomas Connor. He said that he didn’t know how this thing was supposed to work and didn’t want to, and sure as hell wouldn’t tell some random music department kid if he did. She asked his assistant, Wally Franks, who told her a round-a-bout tale about how he’d drawn up the first blueprint. This was not information Allison could use.

There was one other person she could ask, but it was a long shot. Despite her best efforts, Allison hadn’t fully avoided the high school nonsense of the music room, and she knew the reputation that their projectionist, Norman Polk had as a keeper of unknowable secrets. Allison thought that they were being ridiculous, but it was worth a shot, and he was open enough about meeting with her over lunch one day.

“So, you’re working with Joey Drew on the magical stuff,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

“Uh, yes. Does everyone know?”

Norman laughed a little. “Most people here don’t even know that magic is real. Anyhow, I assume that you came to me because you’re interested in knowing some kind of secret?” If he was annoyed about the new girl knowing his reputation, he didn’t show it. If anything, he seemed amused.

“Yes. Honestly, I just want to know as much about Joey as I can. Especially anything that has to do with magic, and the ink machine.”

“Well, I guess telling you can’t be any more dangerous than him keeping it from you. Follow me.”

“You want to know a secret about Joey?” Norman asked as they walked, “he hires people he thinks are vulnerable and down on their luck. So Joey Drew Studios has some teenagers working here, some people with disabilities from the war, and a lot more non-whites and queer people than you’d expect. Not a secret, just a pattern I’ve noticed. But I know that what you want is real secrets.”

Norman took her to a room labelled, “The Archives.” Within it was hundreds of audio logs in locked glass containers. “Joey audio-records us,” Norman explained. “I don’t know his purposes for it, but he clearly does it a whole lot. The glass bins are locked, obviously, but I stole one off his desk a couple days ago. Wanna hear it?” The man’s face had gone from proud and amused to dead-serious.

“Sure...”

Norman pressed the button, and the audio log played. It was Joey Drew speaking to Thomas Connor. They were talking about how to change Bendy from a soulless abomination into a lovable cartoon, and it ended with Joey promising that if these things are soulless, he would get them a soul. After all, I own thousands of them.

“You wanna know what I think? I think that Joey is great at preying upon the desperate. And quite recently, he made a person desperate to be a cartoon character again. So, Allison. I don’t know what your role in this magical business is, but if you can help it, don’t let Joey hurt Susie Campbell- she’s my fiancé. I’ve already told her to be careful around Mr. Joey Drew, but...”

Allison was struggling to take this in. Joey wanted to kill people for this project? That was insane! And yet, some of those pentagrams in the basement had looked awfully large. “I’m sure he doesn’t mean that he wants to murder people. But I’ll talk to him, Norman. I promise. And I do have power over him, so you can count on me!”

---

Allison kept her promise, and brought it up the next time she was at Joey’s house.

“Joey. I need you to tell me right now if this ink machine project involves killing people.”

Joey immediately tensed. He’d been thinking for weeks of a way to break that to Allison that wouldn’t make her run for the hills. “Not... killing. I mean, they’ll still be alive. It’s more like putting them in another body. Yes, the process does involve causing their old body to bleed out, but their consciousness will still be there- probably.”

“Probably?” her face was remarkably calm, given the circumstances.

“I’ve tested the machine on rodents. None of them came out physically resembling a cartoon- only your potion lets me do that. But some of them came out acting like rodents, some of them came out acting like cartoon characters, and some of them went berserk. I’m trying to figure out how to make more of them come out as either rodents or cartoons. If the person retains their personality, they could basically be actors. And if they come out with the cartoon personality, well...”

The more Joey spoke, the more withering Allison’s glare became. “Okay. None of that. I’m not going to destroy people for this. Going forwards, only retaining the consciousness is considered a good outcome. Capisce?”

“Okay,” Joey said, starting to regret letting Allison into the project.

“And I assume that you were going to tell the sacrifices exactly what’s going to happen to them beforehand?”

“Well... Allison, how many people do you think would do this if we were to tell them everything? I was going to tell them that they’d go to sleep and then wake up as the cartoon character they want to be.”

Allison shook her head and appeared to think things over a moment. “You know what, Joey? I’ll do this. But we can’t do it without my potion, so we’re going to do it on my terms. You understand? So, here are my terms: one, we test that machine. We test it on rodents until we have at least 70% of them coming out acting like rodents. Alright? Two, don’t sacrifice anyone without my permission. Ever. And three: I want to be the one who talks people into becoming sacrifices. I have a silver tongue, too, and I don’t trust you to be honest with people. Those are the terms. Take them or leave them.”

“I’ll... I’ll take them. But Allison, if you’re going to have this much power over the project, I need you to show that you’re loyal to it.”

Allison smiled. “Of course. I’m sure that we could work something out!”

---

“What do you think- can you break the lock, Wally? I can’t believe I locked myself out like this.”

“Hmm... Well, Shawn has been tryin' to teach me how to pick a lock. I could try.” Wally got to work on the door and had busted it open within two minutes.

“Alright! Thanks, Wally.” Joey handed Wally the 20$ he’d promised him. They parted ways, and then Joey got to work scouring Allison’s house for that potion recipe.

It was nine weeks and four days after Joey had agreed to Allison’s terms. Six weeks, and only now were they making their first human sacrifice. Worse, they’d wasted hundreds of dollars worth of pet store rodents and a few dozen hours spent altering their ritual. They’d gotten those rodents to turn into toons- mostly perfect toons- that acted like animals at a high enough rate to satisfy Allison, and now Allison was headed to Susie’s apartment to talk her into becoming their sacrifice. Joey wished he could be there, making sure that Allison was doing it right and not scaring Susie away from the idea in the name of honesty. But the one benefit to this situation was knowing that Allison wouldn’t be here, and that after this she would be headed straight to the studio- he wasn’t leaving this place without that potion recipe, and thus full power over the project.

Joey checked all the obvious places like cupboards and drawers, paged through binders full of recipes for various potions and food items, and then checked the obvious “hiding place” places, such as under her bed, under rugs, and so on. It didn’t help that Allison’s house was rather cluttered. For all Joey knew, he could have missed the recipe while sorting through the various papers on the kitchen table. He checked his watch and learned that he’d spent too long here and had supposed to be at the studio an hour ago. Well, he had to give up and leave sometime. Before he left though, he went back to one of Allison’s recipe binders, where Joey had bookmarked a page labelled, “Memory spell? Failed.” He tore out the page. Allison clearly wasn’t the best at creating spells, but seeing it had given Joey an idea of something he could add to the ink machine rituals. It would take at best a few weeks to perfect, but what if he could control what the sacrifices remembered and forgot? There were so many potential uses...

---

Norman had been right about Susie being desperate to be Alice again. Susie had been furious when Allison had showed up at her apartment, but once Allison had said the words, “Joey and I want to make you Alice again. We agreed that you’re the best person for the job,” she’d broken down in tears.

“D-do you mean that?”

“Of course I do! It was the plan from the very beginning. Susie, no one is as well-suited to being Alice Angel than you are. Now, I’ll still be her voice actress, but you’re going to make history- trust me, people will remember you as Alice for decades after this. Joey found an improvised means to bring you closer to Alice than any actress ever has been to a character. The process will seem scary, but Joey will help you, I’ll be there every step of the way. I’m pretty excited myself, honestly! No one’s ever done this before. So, are you with us?”

“Well, that sounds... too good to be true. I mean, even just getting my role back would be nice wonderful, but here you are promising me fame and all of that... But you’re being awfully vague about it. What exactly do you have planned?”

“Come with me to the studio. It has to be seen to be believed.”

[hideawayintheimaginationworld]

Ok so in the story about Matt you said Lefty found Spring Jr is it ok if we get a short story about Lefty finding them and everyone reaction's to the bab

“You're a strange little creature...”

Lefty was trying to prompt a response from the little Bunny he found, the Bunny in a sense reminded him of SpringBonnie, but with more greenish fur and silver eyes, it also was the size of an infant.

It also was covered by blood and it smelt weird.

The smell reminded Lefty of a dead body.

Having a sensitive nose, he easily sniffed the odour and saw the little guy across the road, wandering without purpose, Lefty quickly realised it didn’t just look like a kid sized SpringBonnie.

It acted like one.

Not being aware of road surroundings.

Lefty had a sneaking suspicion it smelt like Fazbear Entertainment's brand of supernatural bullshit, and being a kid too, so he followed the kid, trying to lure it out of the street and into the house, worried a human would see it and immediately call the police, or worse the little one could get run over by a car.

He had to bribe in the end, retrieving a bag of Candy, he was thankful Halloween wasn’t so long ago, so he was able to get out the leftover sweets and used them to draw the kid inside.

Once inside, Lefty locked the door, trapping the kid, but he— well Lefty assumed it was a male, if it had a gender— didn’t seem too worried and actually looked at Lefty like he expected more food, probably haven’t eaten in while, so Lefty was happy to offer food.

He wouldn’t live with the smell however, Lefty didn’t realise how bad it was until later, when he felt queasy and realised he couldn’t focus on washing the dishes.

So he geared himself up, getting rubber gloves, the custom gas mask he wore to block out smells, which covered his nose, mouth and lenses over his eyes, and he approached the child, almost like it was ticking time bomb to defuse.

He didn’t put up a fight to being lifted up and taken upstairs.

He didn’t even fight when he saw Lefty fill the bath.

In fact he looked curious.

Lefty wondered if he had never seen water before.

Regardless, he didn’t know where it came from, but he treated it like a child since it had obviously child behaviours.

Now Lefty was washing him in the bath, the water wasn’t deep, and Lefty was holding one hand to hold him while using the other to scrub around.

Lefty already emptied the water once because it turned red within two minutes.

Now Lefty was washing out the lotion he used to clean the skin of the sticky residue, wondering what it even was, he thought it looked like a bodily fluid but he wasn’t sure and didn’t dwell on it.

The bunny seem to enjoy the bath, trying to splash in the water, even trying to eat the bubbles that formed.

Lefty tried to think of where this thing came from, reasoning this thing didn’t appear to be something that was built.

But rather born.

And that should be impossible, as Lefty knew, they can’t reproduce.

But this thing could be a parasite... and if that's the case... I’m obligated to destroy it.

The bunny didn’t look bad in the slightest.

No one is born good or evil, he knew that, I'll search for whoever made you... but it's best if you live with me... living on the streets is not only dirty but dangerous.

With that decided, Lefty took him out of the bath, he brought out a towel and wrapped him up, debating where he could possibly sleep.

“So what is it?”

Breakfast was quite a spectacle for all, aside from the fact Lefty made French Toast

Lefty had set down Spring Jr, as he named him, on the sofa, he had obtained a spoon that he was using like a pacifier, much to Lefty's annoyance.

Lefty grabbed the handle, trying to pull it out of his mouth, while the kids watched him playing tug of war with a little bunny.

“I don’t know... I found it... I feel like it has Fazbear Entertainment written all over it...” Lefty answered.

“God, I’m sick of bull...” Alec huffed.

He knew they were all sick of the nonsense, considering everything that happened, like curses, killer animatronics, body swapping, possession, and sentient robots.

“I am honestly too... I’ve been debating...”

“Debating what?” Greg asked.

“Technically... I can quit... when we were made, Henry actually got us our own power of attorney in a nutshell.”

“You have a lawyer?” Millie questioned, surprised by the fact.

“All of us do, so Fazbear Entertainment can’t legally make us do anything we don’t want to... and I think it annoys them a lot... the only thing is... where would I get a job somewhere else? I mean it would be a pain but I could work somewhere else, it'd take a lot of effort, I think they pay us so we aren’t tempted to leave...”

“You can open your own restaurant,” Alec said, Lefty couldn’t tell if he was joking, “Seriously, you're a great cook and you are very patient.”

“I don’t know about it... but back to this... I'm going to sneak around the Archives... this is what I'd like you to do... watch this Bunny.”

“Well it seems calm... aside from the fixation on the spoon...” Oscar added.

“I might need to find something better for it to chew on, like a soft toy...”

“A tennis ball,” Greg immediately said, sounding serious.

Lefty laughed for a second, “How about no for now...” He finally pulled the drool covered spoon out of his mouth.

Lefty brought some stuff back and was studying it, he was reading some “confidential” documents, to which he found laughable how easy it was to take without getting caught, seriously he once got inside houses that were more secure than that building, all he needed was to break the keypad out of the wall and connect the fuse to unlock the door.

He was sitting on the sofa, Spring Jr was at his side, he had found something new to chew on— the spatula, which wasn’t bad since Lefty didn’t have to use it for anything at the moment, Lefty had made dinner and everyone went to do their own things at this time. Alec was sitting next to him, using the TV to play a game, Lefty was sort of interested, Alec said the game was called “A Hat in Time”.

Lefty shifted though the forbidden knowledge, stopping when he saw something, he read it a few times before confirming something he didn’t know.

Fazbear Entertainment had made a game in the works.

A game called Springtrap's Revenge.

It sounded like it was based off William Afton, which Lefty thought was tasteless, considering everything that happened.

He knew the history and it could take hours trying to put it into a correct timeline, the basics were that an unknown of kids had been murdered, Lefty knew the most about the original six, but they were more he kept learning about, Ennard, an incomplete prototype was possessed by a child Lefty had no idea existed, as the kid had a bad foster family and he was never confirmed to be dead until recently.

It sicken Lefty, considering now he had kids, true they were older than all of William normal victims, but Lefty considered himself a fiercely protective parent, and he had actually gone against people who threaten his kids, nothing violent, enough to teach them a lesson.

Lefty's phone lit up, as a message came in, Lefty thought it might be Fetch asking for treats but saw Mr Emily instead and immediately looked at it.

“Plan was success, we aren’t associated with Fazbear Entertainment anymore.”

Lefty smiled, he waited for this day, as did everyone.

Now they could hopefully stay to pull away from the tragedies and evil.

The foundation was corrupt.

But the future was bright.

Considering Lefty had a family now too.

He stopped working and watched Alec playing his game, he wasn’t one for video games, but having a teenager who was kind of obsessed with games (Alec did still study and did chores), Lefty got interested in the games, as a result, he had actually made good memories being a second player with Alec, laughing and smiling.

“We still have to find out where you came from...” Lefty muttered looking at Spring JR.

He then watched Alec for a few minutes before saying, “So you collect like little hourglasses in this game?”

“Yes.”

Pause.

“I might get some ice cream, you want some?”

“Yes, please.”

“Daddy?”

“What?”

“Is it calling you Daddy?”

“No... it's looking outside and saying Daddy... like he lost his father or something...”

Pete and Chuck were watching Spring JR along with Lefty.

“I think it's creepy...”

“I have to wonder... who does this thing see as its Daddy?” Lefty muttered, “Regardless... I'll try my best with it... I need to find out what Springtrap's Revenge might be...”

[emachinescat]

The Casket of the Armadillos (by Edgar Allan Nope)

A Psych Fan-Fiction

by @emachinescat

@febuwhump day 9 - buried alive

Summary:  When Shawn confronts a grad student turned murderer, he learns a very important lesson a very hard way: Don’t piss off English nerds - especially the homicidal ones. 

Characters: Shawn, Gus, Juliet, Lassiter, Henry

Words: 5,924

TW: panic attacks, buried alive, claustrophobia

Note: If you liked this classic lit-inspired Psych fic, you can always check out this one I wrote, inspired by To Kill a Mockingbird: The Finch and the Mockingbird 

Keep reading here, or on AO3!

If you enjoy, please consider liking, commenting, or re-blogging, and you can follow me for more content like this! :)

I forced the last stone into its position; I plastered it up.  Against the new masonry I re-erected the old rampart of bones.  For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed them.  In pace requiescat!

- Edgar Allan Poe, “The Cask of Amontillado”

Her name was Olivia Hale, she was a twenty-three-year-old grad student at UCSB, and she was working on her doctorate in American lit.  She was attractive in a cute librarian sort of way - short and petite, with long, curly auburn hair she kept in a bun and oversized glasses with thick lenses, and a smattering of freckles across her slightly upturned nose.  She knew a little bit about everything when it came to literature as a whole, a rather impressive amount about American literature, and absolutely everything there was to know about the life and works of one Edgar Allan Poe.

She was also batshit crazy and currently pointing a .22 pistol directly at Shawn’s head.

“Don’t move,” she growled, disengaging the safety.  

Shawn did a cursory glance around the empty classroom, looking for anything at all he could use to his advantage, to distract her or attack her with or - worst case scenario - to use as a shield.  But Olivia had found him snooping around on the tiny fourth floor study room that she’d been given to use by the department chair as her thesis headquarters.  She’d really made herself at home here, piling books and journals and what seemed like hundreds of loose sheets of paper on every available surface.  

But he was stranded in the middle of the room, with nothing close enough to use as a weapon, and so Shawn used the most powerful tool he had, one that had saved his life and many others, wooed women all over the country, and ordered more chili cheese dogs than he could count.  

He started talking.

“Look, Olivia, I get it,” he said soothingly.  Slowly, in the most non-threatening  manner possible, he lowered his hands.  Olivia gripped the pistol tighter but didn’t shoot.  “I know what happened.  You didn’t mean to kill him.”

Her eyes were wide and fierce, her lips pursed into a thin line.  “No,” she admitted.  “It was an accident.  But he was going to--”

“Yeees,” drawled Shawn, slowly raising his left hand and putting it to his temple, very well aware that he was probably pushing the limit with all of this movement after she had expressly ordered, at gunpoint, for him to stay still.  “I see it.  Dr. Graves was feeling guilty, wasn’t he?  A fifty-five-year-old professor with a fancy PhD and tenure, and a devoted wife and three kids and two grandkids, to boot.  The perfect life.  But oooh, it wasn’t enough for him, was it?”  

Shawn immediately answered his own question, something that he had become exceptionally good at over the years since he was usually the only one who could keep up with himself.  “Of course not!  What’s the perfect job and family when you’ve got a smokin’ hot, super smart student in her mid-twenties who thinks you’re the most impressive man on the planet?”

She sneered, and Shawn noticed with some trepidation that the hand holding the gun trembled just the tiniest bit.  When she spoke, her voice warbled with rage.  “My age and appearance had nothing to do with it - and even if it did, there was nothing wrong with our relationship!  We were perfect for each other, intellectual equals.  We were on each other’s levels - he was my soulmate!  So don’t you dare belittle what we had like that!”  

Ah.  So he had hit a nerve.  This could now go either one of two ways, in Shawn’s extensive experience in being held hostage: Either she would get fed up and send a bullet screaming through his body, Garth Longmore style, or she would let her emotions distract her, and cause her to make a stupid mistake.  Obviously, Shawn hoped for the latter.  

Now Shawn had to make a choice, because he could proceed in one of two ways: Either he could back off and try from another angle, or he could further antagonize her into (hopefully) making a mistake.  Naturally, Shawn went with the latter.

“Sure, sure,” he agreed airily.  “Older men and younger women do it all the time.  But to say there was nothing wrong with your relationship?  The man was married, and you were his student.  I’m not the headmaster here -”

“Dean,” she corrected sharply, and this further proved that Shawn had pegged her correctly as a know-it-all literature wunderkind who had to be right one thousand percent of the time.  “This isn’t Hogwarts.”

Shawn gave a tiny shrug.  “To be honest, all big schools look like Hogwarts to me.”

“Because you have the mind of a child.”  The words were accusatory and patronizing, but Shawn flashed a dazzling smile.

“Thank you,” he said.  Before she could respond, he continued his earlier thoughts, “Even though you were the ‘perfect couple,’ you were furious with him for even suggesting that you stop seeing one another.  The affair was too risky, and he missed his wife.  He wanted to tell her the truth, fix things.”

“It would have ruined everything!” Olivia hissed, and the sound of her voice sent shivers down Shawn’s spine.  There was an unhinged quality to it, something raw and dangerous that he hadn’t sensed before.  He fought the sudden urge to backpedal as far away from her as possible.  “We were perfect together!  And if he told his wife and she let it slip, I would be kicked out!  All my research, all my time and work here, everything would be gone!  He had no right to make that decision for me, to take away my future!”

“Maybe,” said Shawn, and it was like he was watching from outside his body, because he knew that what he was about to say was a big mistake, but he was helpless to stop the words from tumbling from his lips, “you should have thought more about your future before you pursued your married Shakespeare teacher.”

Fury etched itself into every feature of her face, turning her from a beautiful librarian to a feral monster, but her voice was slow and measured as if it was taking every ounce of self-control she possessed not to shoot him where he stood.  “He taught Southern. Gothic. Masterpieces.”

Shawn tried to backtrack, to undo whatever damage had been done by his unpredictably big mouth.  “But,” he pressed.  “Killing him was an accident.  You didn’t mean to push him down four flights of stairs.”

She considered this.  “No, I didn’t mean to kill him,” she reaffirmed, and then an odd calm smoothed out the angry crevices between her eyebrows - the peace, perhaps, of having come to an important decision that she knew was absolutely right.  Shawn recognized the look because he’d seen it on others’ faces before (very rarely, if ever, had he seen it upon his own).  “And I don’t think I will kill you, either.”

Whatever Shawn had been expecting, this wasn’t it.  Everything about this woman screamed insane and vengeful.  If Shawn lived, he would turn her into the police, and she would go to jail for a very long time.  She was incredibly intelligent - surely she knew this!

And then she clarified, and the world started to make sense again - though Shawn would have honestly been perfectly content in this alternate reality where the bad guy suddenly has a miraculous change of heart.  “Well,” she amended, “I won’t kill you directly.  I’ve never shot anyone before - I only have this little guy here because I’m a young, pretty girl on a big college campus, and I have two night classes.  Besides, your death shouldn’t be so easy.”

Shawn swallowed.  “Olivia, you don’t have to do this.  You haven’t intentionally killed anyone yet.  If you turn yourself in now and cooperate, your sentence will be a lot shorter than if you kill me - directly or not.  Because make no mistake, even if you kill me, you will still get caught.  The SBPD has some damn good detectives, and they’ll bring you down even if I don’t.”

She didn’t respond to him directly.  Instead, her expression was flat save for the dark gleam in her eyes, and she intoned words that in and of themselves had no meaning to Shawn, but that still managed to strike a chord of fear deep inside of his soul.  “‘The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as best I could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge.’”  Shawn was utterly unnerved by this point; it was like she had been taken over by something both sinister and incredibly well-spoken.

And indeed, in many ways she had, as Shawn soon found out, she was quoting the beginning of a story by Edgar Allan Poe.

Presently, however, Shawn had no context for her strange words or sudden shift of demeanor.  His skin crawled and his heart pumped with more get-up-and-go than he’d ever been able to muster in his whole body before.  “Uh, Olivia…”

“Move,” she ordered.  

This time, though it was contrary to his nature, Shawn did what she said without arguing.  This side of the student, with stolen words sliding evilly from her mouth, was a million times scarier than the enraged Olivia who had very nearly shot him between the eyes.

She marched him out of the room and down the three flights of stairs to the main lobby of the English building.  It was dark outside, nearing midnight, and Shawn kicked himself for thinking he was clever for coming to investigate this late.  He’d thought she’d be at home sleeping.  He should have realized that as a grad student, sleeping was the one thing she wouldn’t have time for!  And now he was in very deep trouble, alone, and no one knew where he was.  He should have waited until morning, until the building wasn’t deserted, should have at least called Gus and told him what he was doing.  But it was a college campus, and she was a tiny little literature nerd - it should have been safe!

As she forced him down one flight of stairs, then two, then three, and finally, into a stairwell off the beaten path that had to be unlocked with a key card - which she had - she continued to encant, her voice slowly losing its flatness and growing into something twisted and sing-songy with every word.

“‘You, who so well know the nature of my soul, will not suppose, however, that gave utterance to a threat.  At length I would be avenged; this was a point, definitely, settled - but the very definitiveness with which it was resolved precluded the idea of risk.’”

“Olivia--”

It was as if she hadn’t heard him as she shoved him into the basement, and now her voice stilled from a chant to a slow, measured whisper..  “‘I must not only punish but punish with impunity.’”   

Shawn wasn’t sure what impunity was, but it sure as hell didn’t sound good.

Their final destination ended up being a small, partially finished storage room near the back of the basement.  Dusty boxes and rusted cabinets and archaic old computer monitors lined the walls and cluttered most of the walking space.  Shawn was reminded grimly of a school supply graveyard.  

Olivia stopped him when they came to a brick wall that had been busted through to fix some issue with the pipes - Shawn saw the water stains on the concrete floor near the break in the wall, and there was a brand new water pipe joined to an old, yellowed one at about eye-level in the small open space between the bricks and the drywall beyond.  Shawn also noticed that the new bricks had been neatly piled up near a sealed bucket that almost certainly contained mortar, right outside of the hole.  Someone was in the process of walling this section back up.

“Nice wall,” Shawn joked, relieved that Olivia had finally stopped her creepy recitation and desperately trying to lighten the mood and bring things back to some sort of normal - honestly, he’d take being threatened with the gun again to the horror movie stuff he’d just witnessed.  “I bet all the other walls are jealous of it.”

It was a lame joke, but her eerie dramatics had him all kinds of messed up.  He expected her to tell him to shut up, or to threaten to shoot him again, or to actually shoot him, but instead she asked him a question in that same cold, calm voice as before.  “Have you ever read ‘The Cask of Amontillado,’ Shawn?”

Shawn blinked.  “I make it a point not to read anything that’s not a magazine from the 80s or WikiHow articles on ‘How to Escape from Dangerous Forest Animals.’”

The corner of her lips lifted in a mockery of a satisfied smile.  “Good.  Then you’ll get to experience it for yourself, first hand.  Just wait until you get to the ending!  You’re going to love it.”

Somehow, Shawn doubted that very much.

Still holding the gun on him with one hand, she reached her free hand into the cross-body bag she wore and pulled out a pair of handcuffs.  Shawn groaned.

“Come on!  What college student just carries handcuffs in their school bag?”  Then he remembered that this particular student had until recently been having a passionate affair with her teacher.  “Wait - never mind.  It makes perfect sense.”

She laughed, even though what he said wasn’t even remotely funny.  The sound of it was strange and discordant - light and tinkly with a threatening undertone that made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end.  Then she gestured at the hole in the wall and ordered, “In.”

Shawn had known it was coming, but had tried to shove that knowledge into the corner of his mind - something that was quite difficult to do for someone with a photographic and eidetic memory - in an effort to convince himself that even she wasn’t that cruel.  He tried to appeal to her one last time: “Olivia, it’s not too late to stop this.  I mean, are you really going to do this to another human being - seriously, look at this place - it’s dusty and moldy and I’m almost certain there’s no room service!  If you’re going to chain me to a pipe, why not do it in a five star hotel?”  When she nudged him with the gun, eyes gleaming with something dark and triumphant, he reluctantly stepped into the small space and implored, “I’ll even settle for a seedy motel off a poorly lit backroad.  I’m not too picky.”

She didn’t answer him as she stood on her tiptoes and handcuffed Shawn’s wrists around the pipe, cinching them so tight that the metal dug into his skin and he doubted that even his dad’s lessons on escaping handcuffs wouldn’t be much help here.  Already he could feel his fingers going numb, and his shoulders and back had started to ache from the hunched position he was forced to take due to the height of the pipe and the awkward angle of his arms.  

Well, Shawn thought glumly as she smiled at her handiwork and carefully backed out of the small space, maybe all wasn’t lost.  Surely someone would come down here and find him. This place was dusty, but it couldn’t be abandoned - work still needed to be done down here, after all.  And he could always yell for help once he was sure Olivia was gone.  She was booksmart, but maybe she wasn’t criminally minded.  He might be in for an uncomfortable night, but in the morning someone would find him and he could have his vision and the cute little psychopath would go to jail for a very long time.

He waited for her to leave, but instead, she used a crowbar to pry the lid off the bucket of mortar, and the pit in Shawn’s stomach became a whole-ass trench.  He should have seen this coming - his heart pounded madly against his rib cage as if trying to free itself, with or without him.  He couldn’t blame it.  “Olivia, please,” he said, and this time, there was no joke, his voice imploring and terrified.  “You don’t have -”

Again, she cut him off.  “How would you like to hear a story before you die, Shawn?” she asked in a tone so casual that she could have been asking him if he wanted to grab a taco.

“How about you tell me a story and then I don’t die?” Shawn bargained weakly.

“Mmmm… If you stay alive, my whole life will be ruined,” Olivia reasoned.  “And I have worked far too hard to allow that to happen.  So.  You just stand there - quietly - and I’ll tell you the story of Poe’s most beloved tale of revenge.  I won’t tell you word for word, of course - we don’t have time for that - but for posterity, I do have it memorized.”  She sounded grotesquely proud of that fact.  “It’s my favorite of his stories, after all.”

And so, as she slowly began to brick up the hole in the wall, with Shawn trapped, helpless and in a dissociative state of panic, she told him the story of two men with really stupid names that Shawn somehow managed, despite his raging fear, to file away for later as possible nicknames for Gus.

“Our story starts in Italy, during the carnival, and our narrator is a man named Montresor, who has a grudge against his once-friend, now-foe, Fortunato…”

The story was an interesting one, even to Shawn, who preferred watching over reading and especially over listening any day.  And as it turned out, Olivia was a really good storyteller.  If he had been in any other position, Shawn might have actually enjoyed the suspenseful tale of revenge.  

But as he stooped there and was forced to listen, all he could think about was about how terrified this Fortunato guy must have been, and then he started wondering how long it had been before the man hadn’t been able to hold his bladder or… other things… anymore, and then about what had happened when he was too tired and dizzy to stand up, if the manacles on his wrists had pulled so hard against his flesh that they cut into him, and if lack of water or oxygen killed him first, all the while he knew that he wasn’t asking these questions for the sake of the fictional character.  He was asking them for himself.  Olivia had made it exceedingly clear - for a literature scholar, she was surprisingly un-subtle about any underlying meanings or motives - that Fortunato’s story was now to be his story.

It wasn’t until she had begun discussing with rapture the brilliance of Poe’s use of the Italian carnival as the setting of a story about murder (because of its abandonment of social order, whatever that meant) and had built up all but the last two bricks, leaving a hole around Shawn’s eye level, that came to the most horrifying realization yet.   He’d been so focused on his own thoughts and fears with Olivia’s words washing over him like an acid bath that he’d barely registered that the dim light in the hole had been darkening incrementally with each new brick placed.  Now he came to the bone-chilling understanding that once she placed those last two bricks, he would be completely in the dark.

He was going to die, alone, terrified, and in utter darkness with fear as his only friend.  He thought in that moment that he might die of a heart attack before he could even think about dehydrating or suffocating.  Honestly, it sounded like an easier way to go.

“Well,” said Olivia finally.  “I can’t say that it’s been a pleasure to meet you in any way, Shawn, but I suppose I should thank you.  Ever since I found out about this unfinished wall down here, I’ve had this unscratchable itch to recreate the titular scene from my favorite Poe story.  You gave me the means and justification to do it!”

Shawn was so overcome by the surging sea of fear and early-onset claustrophobia that he couldn’t even muster up the gumption to make a joke about the word titular.  Instead, as Olivia knelt down next to her bag, rooting around for something, he jerked madly against the handcuffs, desperately searching for any give in the metal or the pipe he was handcuffed to (or even his wrists, at this point he wasn’t picky).  But the pipe was new, and it was sturdy, and so was the fitting that connected it to the old one, which itself didn’t seem too keen on budging, either.

A sick grin teased at Olivia’s parted lips.  “Oh, Fortunato tried that too.  But then he stopped crying and struggling and chose to die with a shred of dignity.  But I highly doubt dignity is something you’re capable of.”  

And then, with the finality of fitting a lid to a coffin, she slapped a piece of fluorescent pink duct tape over his mouth and a fresh wave of panic ravaged Shawn’s everything.  He didn’t remember this happening in her retelling of the story!  Then again, the Fortunato guy had been sealed into catacombs deep underground.  Shawn was in the basement of a heavily trafficked university building.  Someone would actually hear him if he called for help, so she took his voice away from him too.  He couldn’t even sing “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall” to pass his time or distract him from the inevitable.  As if it wasn’t bad enough that he would die in the dark, he would die in the quiet too - and silence was, as his incessant need for chatter plainly proved, Shawn’s worst enemy.

“Goodbye, Shawn,” Olivia said, and she added one brick, layered on the mortar, and then gave her captive one last satisfied glance before adding the last brick and leaving Shawn in total, impenetrable darkness.  He would never forget that last, terrible look in her eyes before his world went black - she was no longer human; she had elevated herself to the level of the storytelling gods and she relished in the twisted power she held over the life of another human.

As her footsteps clipped away, her voice, obscenely gleeful, called out, “In pace requiescat!”

***

The next ten hours were the worst of Shawn’s life, and they consisted of five main elements all bundled together into a nightmare that would stalk him for the rest of his life.

Cold.  It was the middle of January, and though it couldn’t have been less than forty-five degrees outside, the basement - especially behind the walls - was chilly, and with the musty smell and the dust and the pitch black, Shawn was reminded far too much of a grave and knew that he might as well be in one, because this was going to be his.  It was the kind of cold that bit deeper than the skin and wormed its way into the very core and dug its icy fangs in and refused to let go - the chill of death, an open invitation from the dead to join them in their home beneath the ground.  He shivered a lot, but he couldn’t be sure if it was the cold, or the panic.  It was probably a little of both.

Dark.  The darkness that surrounded him had an unreal nature that could easily trick the eyes into thinking that they were already closed.  It was oppressive and thick, pressing in from all sides, inky black water dredged from the depths of the sea.

Shawn had never been a fan of the dark, but neither did he exactly fear it.  That changed the second that the last brick was put into place and he found himself in a darkness so severe that were in not for the feeling of floor beneath his feet he could have been suspended in the depths of space so remote that not even stars could reach.  The darkness swarmed his senses - it had a physical presence, and it didn’t lessen, never permitted Shawn’s eyes to adjust to it in the slightest.  It just hung there, surrounded him, assaulted his mind with its infinite arsenal of nightmares.

After experiencing true darkness, Shawn would never sleep without a nightlight again (which unfortunately meant he couldn’t judge Gus anymore for using one, either).

Pain.  At first it was just the pull of his shoulders, the ache in his back.  Then, about five minutes after he’d been sealed up, he realized his wrists were screaming with agony - he must have torn them badly when he fought to get away, but the adrenaline staved off the pain until now.  He vaguely wondered how deeply the cuffs had cut - it felt like the skin on his wrists had been flayed - but quickly remembered that it didn’t matter where he was going.  

Then there were the hunger pangs, and they mingled with the cramps from holding his bladder longer than he ever had before, and at some point muscle spasms in his arms and chest and legs joined the choir of suffering.  At one point, he shed a few tears, but they could have just as easily been from anxiety or exhaustion, which itself produced its own kind of pain - he longed to sleep, but his body refused to allow him even that comfort until the very end, right before he was rescued, as if he were being forced on pain of death to endure the pain of death right up until the very moment of his painful death.

At least he didn’t have too much trouble breathing.  There must have been a crack somewhere in the wall in front of or behind him, because fresh air was entering somehow.  He did, several hours into his imprisonment, begin finding it difficult to pull in a full breath, and by the time he was rescued he was giddy with light-headedness, but he didn’t know if it was from the air quality or exhaustion or panic or from being forced to breathe only through his nose for hours, but he really didn’t care.

Quiet.  Even worse than the cold and the dark and the pain was the quiet.  The tape over his mouth prevented him from doing the one thing that could bring him comfort in even the most difficult of situations.  Talking was what Shawn did - he utilized mindless prattle to distract bad guys, to make people underestimate him, to quell fear and panic in himself and those around him, to annoy and wheedle those whose opinions meant the most to him (and who he was most afraid to be real with), and most importantly, to distract himself from all the pain and baggage that his exceptional memory had filed away for him throughout the years.  Talking nonsense meant that he wasn’t thinking about or acknowledging the parts of himself that arguably needed the most attention, those bits that were scared and unsure and hurt and vulnerable.

Shawn had always detested silence, and now it had invaded so intimately that even he could not drive it out.

And all of these culminated in a constant, agonizing state of absolute, unrelenting fear.  

Panic attacks are horrific things that take your natural instincts in potentially dangerous situations and turn them against you in the cruelest of ways.  They suck the air out of your lungs and make your heart pound so fast and so hard that you are convinced it’s going to give out in pure fatigue and never make it to that next beat.  It makes your skin crawl like there are thousands of spiders nesting there, and your chest hurts and your breath is short and stunted and you know you are dying, that the next breath will be your last, but it isn’t, and the fear just continues and sometimes you curl into a ball or rock back and forth or scratch at your skin.

Panic attacks generally last anywhere from five to twenty minutes.  Shawn was stuck in a state of raw, unfiltered panic for ten hours.  When the EMTs at the scene took his heart rate, it was 160, had been the entire time he’d been buried in a collegiate tomb, knowing that he was going to die.

Put simply, Shawn Spencer spent ten hours in his own personal hell.

***

It was nearly three in the afternoon when Detectives Juliet O’Hara and Carlton Lassiter, with the help of a frantic Gus and a worried Henry that tried his damndest not to show how worried he was, made the final connections in the case and tracked down the woman who had slept with and then killed her lover like a hyper-intelligent, book-loving black widow.  Juliet and Gus remained on the college campus to continue investigating while Lassiter and Henry went on to the station to question Olivia.  She had refused to say where the missing psychic detective was, however, and only offered one bitter phrase, spoken in another language that sounded to the questioning party like a curse being placed on their heads: 

“Nemo me impune lacessit.”

It was Gus who figured it out after Lassiter related the cryptic saying over the phone.

“I know that phrase!” he exclaimed to a swell of raised eyebrows.  “It’s Latin! It means no one wounds me with impunity!”

“You speak Latin?”  Juliet seemed impressed.

“Not much.  But I recognize that particular saying, because it’s from a story that gave me nightmares my entire sophomore year of college.”  He shuddered.  “It’s from the second-most terrifying Poe story.”  He didn’t elaborate on what the first-most terrifying one was, largely because he didn’t want to give the others fodder to use “The Tell-Tale Heart” against him like Shawn already did.  Then the full implications of the words sunk in and he gasped, “We have to find Shawn, now.”  The horror in his expression sent a chill down Juliet’s spine. 

“Gus - what the hell are you talking about?”  Henry was no longer trying to hide the panic in his voice.

“It’s from ‘The Cask of Amontillado,’ Gus clarified, his own panic making it difficult to express himself clearly.

“Guster, this is hardly the time for you to have a glass of wine,” Lassiter barked.  “Now stop talking in riddles and just spit it out!”

But Juliet had now made the connection as well and answered for Gus.  “Oh my gosh - isn’t that the one where the guy is sealed into a wall and left to die?”

The dread in Gus’s eyes said it all.

“He’s got to be somewhere on campus,” Henry reasoned, and his voice shook the tiniest bit.  “Lassiter and I are on our way back to you now.  In the meantime, check with the school and see if there are any places that are easily accessed and under construction.”

No one said it aloud, but the possibility that her words hadn’t been a hint at all and that Shawn was somewhere else entirely hung in the air amongst them.  It was funny, Juliet thought - though it wasn’t funny at all - she urgently needed Gus’s theory to be right, because otherwise they would have no leads, but at the same time, she was terrified of the implications if it were true.  

Her heart felt as sick as Montresor’s when he placed the last brick as she and Gus raced to the administration building and prayed they weren’t too late.

***

When they broke through the wall, the sight that greeted them was one that would never leave them - any of them.  Even Lassiter, who made it his sacred duty to remain unfazed by anything his job threw at him was visibly disturbed.

A moment of silence, a beat where time stood still and everyone was afraid to move, and then - 

“Shawn!”  The four rescuers surged forward as one, but Henry got there first, his trembling fingers groping for a pulse - thank God, but it was racing, dangerously fast, and in the background he heard Lassiter radioing for an ambulance.

Shawn woke up as Henry gently peeled the hideous pink duct tape (an affront to all duct tape everywhere) off of his mouth.  It wasn’t a gentle waking, a flutter of eyelashes or the murmuring of a name - it was violent and erratic, fueled by terror.  

Henry had had to deal with panic attacks before - mostly Gus’s when he took the boys camping together, but once or twice when Shawn was really young and he’d had a bad dream.  This one was the worst that he’d ever seen - Shawn woke with a muffled yell, panting through his nose, writhing, tears streaming down his face, eyes squeezed shut against the trauma he’d been subjected to, and he threw himself against the handcuffs so fiercely that Henry feared he’d break his wrists.  

Soon his wrists were freed, though, and Henry, with the help of Lassiter, helped a weakened Shawn out of the wall and into the basement and lowered him to the floor.  Henry sat with him and rubbed his back and spoke quietly to him, Juliet took his hand, and Gus reassured him while Lassiter ran up the stairs to check on the ETA of the ambulance.  

Twenty minutes later, Shawn had been placed onto a stretcher and carried up the stairs and out into the sunlight - sensing the warm rays, he opened his eyes only to pinch them shut again as the brightness after so many hours in the dark nearly blinded him.  He had been given something to calm him down, and he would be going to the hospital to be checked over and observed overnight, and a psychiatrist would be sent in to evaluate him in the morning, and everything was moving so fast that Shawn leaned over the side of the stretcher and deposited the remnants of the last thing he’d eaten, nearly twelve hours before.

“There’s one thing I still don’t get,” he gasped as he was eased back onto the stretcher.  “Where do the armadillos come into her plan?”

The EMTs exchanged a concerned look at the stretcher, probably wondering if there had been some carbon monoxide poisoning after all.  Gus, however, just rolled his eyes.

“Amontillado, Shawn.  It’s a kind of wine.”

“The story is called ‘The Casket of the Armadillos,’” Shawn argued stubbornly, going so far as to cross his arms over his chest, pulling at the IV in his right hand.  

Gus was going to argue, to insist that he’d actually read the story (and why the heck would someone fill a casket with armadillos?), but then Gus saw the plea in Shawn’s hazel eyes, that need for jokes and silliness, and understood that his best friend was clinging onto his last shreds of control.  

“You know what - I forgot,” Gus corrected, shaking his head and giving himself a light smack on the forehead for good measure.  “It is ‘The Casket of Armadillos.’”  He glared out at Henry, at Lassiter and Juliet and the EMTs, defying them to challenge his claim.  No one did, but they all shared a similar baffled expression.

Well, they could deal with their confusion, Gus thought protectively as he watched Shawn and Henry disappear into the ambulance.  Shawn had been through a night of unspeakable horror, so if it was armadillos he wanted, then it was armadillos he was going to get.