#*me scrambling to pull the scraps together and then throwing my hands in the air in a 'fuck this' way*

[pokemedia-text-dump]

[Video ID: A massive horde of mochified Pokemon shambling towards Mossui Town at night.

"...Holy crap, it's even worse than I thought..." Florian mutters through a face mask. "...This is probably our last chance to stop this. Is everyone ready?" he asks towards the camera. Various sounds of agreement can be heard.

"Teko, you got that diversion ready?" he asks, looking towards Teko. He pulls his mask down, grins and gives him a thumbs up, holding up his Rotom Phone.

"Alright, everybody...This is gonna be really dangerous, but I'm confident we can pull it off." Florian says, looking back out at the swarm.

A mochified Bombirdier screeches from up above, dropping several large boulders on the group.

"Okay, we gotta start playing defense NOW!! GO GO GO!" Florian yells, causing everyone to scatter.

Teko runs down to the entrance of Mossui Town, sending out a Tinkaton wielding a strange bazooka-like implement, a shiny Archaludon, and several Minior. "Bait and Click - Splatoon 3" starts playing from his Rotom Phone.

The horde changes course towards him instead upon hearing the song. Teko tosses a Minior towards the Tinkaton, and it loads it into the bazooka. It pulls back a plunger, takes aim at the horde, and lets go, scoring a direct hit on a mochified Magcargo, knocking it out and drenching the surrounding mochified Pokemon with scorching magma.

"Fall and fry, live and die! Forever life goes ever on! Our flesh smoking, searing, choking! Feast until the meat is gone!" Teko sings along with the song.

"You know, you're not helping singing like that." Cera yells from offscreen.

He rolls a Minior into a swarm of approaching mochified Yanma like a bowling ball. The Minior rolls to a stop in the middle of the swarm and explodes, knocking out all of them as Teko hollers happily.

Meanwhile, the Archaludon hops into the Tinkaton's shoulders like a bazooka. It charges up electricity in its terminals for about 20 seconds, then fires a massive laser beam, with the Tinkaton aiming it in a way that carves a path through the horde, cackling wildly.

Suddenly, a mochified Noivern swoops down upon Teko and his Pokemon. "WHOA!" he yelps, scrambling to get away from the Noivern.

"Don't worry, lesser son! Gimme a hand, B-33!" Eliza yells from further up in the town itself.

She sends out a strange bipedal insectoid Pokemon, covered in an armor hastily cobbled together from scrap metal. Basically, Lokix if it were imagined by a Tinkaton.

"Hit that thing with Flash Cannon! Go for the...auricle thingies?" Eliza says, pointing at the Noivern.

"B-33" charges up an orb of silvery light in its mouth, then fires it at the Noivern, knocking it back with a headshot long enough for Teko's Archaludon to charge up an orb of orange energy, blasting it point blank and knocking it out with a big explosion. The initial Flash Cannon goes ricocheting off into the horde, knocking out several mochified Pokemon one by one like a pinball.

"Whoa...Man, you gotta teach me how to do that!" Teko says in awe.

Meanwhile, Cauler can be seen charging into the fields below, lugging a Tinkaton's hammer with a bit of effort. "GAHAHAHA!! Come at me, you freaks! My team can handle ANYTHING!" Cauler yells, sending out a Slither Wing. "Punch Buggy, you try and follow my lead with Lunge!" she says.

She slams several mochified Pokemon up into the air with the hammer like golf balls: the Slither Wing jumps up, coated in a faint green aura, then slams into all of them with its tail, causing them to crash into more members of the horde. They're then blasted back further by a bluish-purple shockwave accompanied by an extremely loud clattering noise from offscreen.

Further up above, Florian throws a Master Ball, releasing Terapagos, which builds up crystals around itself until it turns into its Terastal form. Florian holds up a Tera Orb as it wells with power, then tosses it over Terapagos, causing it to transform further into its Stellar form, sending out a surge of energy. "Alright, Teraphim...Try and hit like...that general area over there with Tera Starstorm!" Florian says, pointing at the horde.

A beam of rainbow light erupts upwards from the middle of Terapagos' Tera Jewel: eventually, it condenses into several four-pointed crystal stars. They hurtle towards the horde and explode on impact, along with a large pink energy orb and several blasts of boiling matcha from offscreen, forcing them to scatter.

"....Hmm. I got an idea about how to end this quickly...but you might not like it." Juliana says after some thought, sitting atop a Miraidon wearing a pair of Choice Specs.

"Uhh...What's the plan, then?" Florian asks.

"Valstrax, Draco Meteor!" Juliana yells. The Miraidon charges up an orb of orange energy in its mouth, which fires out several projectiles that condense into a larger orb above the horde. Teko notices the giant sun-like orb, and his eyes light up with an idea. "Metalhead, hit the giant death ball thing with Draco Meteor, too!" he says, pointing up at it. The Archaludon, its terminals crackling with power, charges up another orange orb of energy in its mouth, then shoots it towards the first orb, causing it to grow bigger.

"EVERYONE OUTTA THE WAY!!" Juliana yells to the fields below, causing Cauler and Nemona to book a hasty retreat back to the rest of the group.

Eventually, the energy ball drops, detonating violently after subsuming the majority of the horde. When the smoke clears, all the mochified Pokemon have been knocked out.

"W...we did it..." Carmine says, looking out over the horde.

"It's not over yet..." Florian says from offscreen. He rides up on a Koraidon wearing a Covert Cloak. "All aboard!" he yells. Everyone, including the person behind the camera hastily clambers atop the Koraidon, eventually causing it to buckle a bit from the weight of everyone all at once. "Time to end this crap once and for all!" he yells, causing everyone else to cheer as the Koraidon starts making its way towards Loyalty Plaza.

The video then cuts out.]

[Video ID: The Lousy Four arguing panickedly in the Loyalty Plaza, in front of the shrine.

"WHADDAYA MEAN 'DEM KIDS TOOK OUT OUR AWESOME EVIL ARMY?!" Pecharunt yells in disbelief.

"B-Boss, it ain't da end, yeah...We can still pull somethin' outta 'dis!"

"...Huh. Yeah, you're right! Pechahaha! We'll just make MORE reinforcements, an' 'den nothin'll be able to stop us, see?!" Pecharunt says.

"Heh heh...Who are you calling nothing?" Teko says, hopping off the Koraidon.

"...I don't get it." Pecharunt says.

"Boss, you said 'dat nothin' will stop us, and 'dese guys is tryin' to shove their nose where it don't belong again..." Munkidori explains.

"Oooh, so it's like Boss was callin' 'dem nothin'." Okidogi says.

"Shut up! We're not gonna put up with you idiots any longer! Anjanath, Iron Head!" Florian says. A Koraidon charges from behind the camera, the feathers on its head glowing white, and rams into Fezandipiti, knocking it out.

Okidogi grabs a Max Revive out of a giant pile of assorted items and shoves it down Fezandipiti's throat, healing it instantly.

"Dang...Teko WAS right about their strategy. Uhhh...Cyno, try Psychic!" Cera says, sending out a Lucario with a Life Orb tied around its wrist.

The Lucario's eyes glow blue and it conjures a bluish bubble around Okidogi. It claps it hands and the bubble collapses, knocking it out after tossing it backwards.

Munkidori telekinetically lifts a Max Revive out of the pile into Okidogi's mouth, then conjures a blob of glowing purple sludge out of the end of its chain. It fires it towards Florian and scores a direct hit, managing to knock a Friend Ball out of his Bag.

"N-no..." Florian mutters weakly, reaching towards the ball.

The Friend Ball opens, releasing Ogerpon. She looks at the Lousy Three and Pecharunt in front of her, then roars in rage, hopping around angrily as it prepares to attack.

"...Hey, ain't 'dat 'da ogre 'dat beat us up before?" Fezandipiti asks.

"Duh huh...But 'dis punk ain't gonna be able to do anythin' to us 'DIS time! We's stronger than BOTH of 'da times it fought us!" Okidogi says confidently.

It charges towards Ogerpon, slamming its chain down like a flail, but Ogerpon dodges nimbly, runs up the chain, and uses Okidogi's head like a springboard. It then slams its cudgel down in midair on Munkidori's head, knocking him out in one hit.

Fezandipiti tosses a Max Revive down Munkidori's throat after airlifting him away from the rampaging Ogerpon, reviving him.

"Eh, I'm bored of youse. Munkidori?" Pecharunt asks.

"Heh heh...On it, Boss!" Munkidori says. He raises his arms skyward, and everyone save for Florian is telekinetically lifted up, coated with a blue aura.

The process of lifting everyone up makes Teko grapple for his Rotom Phone in midair, causing "Unexpectancy ~ Part 3 - Pizza Tower" to start playing. Okidogi grabs Florian by the back of his shirt instead, causing him to struggle feebly.

"Pechahaha...Aww, ain't 'dis sad..." Pecharunt giggles mockingly. "Thanks for bringin' all of youse to one place, hat guy...You made it even easier for us to stop youse from messin' with our awesome evil plans ever again, see?"

Upon seeing the laughter of Pecharunt and its goons holding his friends and Ogerpon captive, Florian looks down as if remembering something.

He lets out a primal, animalistic scream, then uppercuts Okidogi in the face, staggering him to the point he can wrest himself from his grip. He then uses his face like a springboard, headbutting Munkidori, in turn toppling him and freeing everyone from his psychic hold.

Ogerpon lands on the ground next to Florian, shuddering with barely contained rage, as he glowers at Pecharunt with a look of pure hatred in his eyes.

". . . Y O U ." he snarls.

"...ah fudge-" Pecharunt whimpers.

Florian lunges towards Pecharunt at the same time as Ogerpon, roaring. But Okidogi manages to come to his senses just in the nick of time, and jumps in front of Pecharunt, swatting away the two of them and causing them to land next to Teko.

"D-don't worry, Boss! 'Dis kid ain't nuthin we ain't able to handl-"

Florian yanks a large metal pipe out of Teko's bag and charges at Okidogi again, this time catching him off guard while Pecharunt backs up. He begins brutally bashing Okidogi all over his body with the pipe. Though Okidogi thrashes about in an attempt to shake him off, his efforts are rendered useless by the fact that Florian's moving around too fast to grab.

"...why did you have that, anyway?" Penny asks. Teko shrugs in response.

"WE'VE HAD TO DEAL WITH YOUR SHIT FOR AN ENTIRE YEAR! I'M NOT GONNA LET YOU SO MUCH AS LAY A FINGER ON MY FRIENDS AGAIN! WHEN I'M DONE WITH YOU IDIOTS, YOU'RE GONNA WISH YOU HAD JUST STAYED IN THE DISTORTION WORLD, WHERE YOU FUCKING BELONG!!" Florian roars, smashing Okidogi over the head repeatedly. Ogerpon deals the finishing blow, winding up a mighty attack with its cudgel, which is glowing green, before smashing it in the belly hard enough to toss it into the shrine, knocking it out.

"Get behind me, Boss! 'Da kid ain't gonna be able to break through 'dis!" Fezandipiti yells, getting in front of Pecharunt. It spreads its wings wide and a purple barrier surrounds it.

Florian lets out another guttural screech of rage before somehow picking up and hurling Arven at Fezandipiti, and the impact causes the barrier to shatter. As Arven shakily gets up and runs away, within a fraction of a second, Ogerpon and Florian descend upon Fezandipiti, pummeling him as one and forcing it to bash into trees and walls as it tries to get them off.

"Whoa...He's going completely Primeapeshit out there!" Nemona says in awe.

"'Dis ain't goin' good...We gotta call in 'da rest of our new friends, see?!" Pecharunt says.

"But Boss, we ain't got many of 'dem left after 'dese guys-" Munkidori stammers.

"Yeah, and if 'dese two keep 'dis up, we's gonna be COOKED! You three palookas ain't enough to keep 'DAT off my tail!" Pecharunt says frantically, pointing at Florian and Ogerpon, who are currently in the process of smashing Fezandipiti against a wall over and over again, eventually knocking it out.

Munkidori sticks the end of its Toxic Chain in its mouth and makes an eerie whistling noise. A much smaller horde of mochified Pokemon swarm up to Loyalty Plaza, making a beeline for Florian and Ogerpon.

"Alright, everyone prioritize keeping Florian safe!" Juliana says, sending out a Meowscarada, which readies a pollen bomb. "That way, we can all-"

But no sooner than she says this does another enraged roar erupt from the swarm. Not from any of Pecharunt's thralls, but from Florian himself, who slams a mochified Golem so hard that it rolls backwards, bowling over a large portion of the horde. Ogerpon and Florian move in unison fast enough that they're practically a blur, the combined forces of Ogerpon's cudgel and Florian's metal pipe instantly knocking out any mochified Pokemon they so much as touch.

"...Alright then." Juliana says, impressed.

"Hey, we're kinda forgetting something...Wouldn't it be a better idea to take out the testicle first?!" Teko yells over the sound of Florian's enraged screeching.

"NONE OF YOU ARE LEAVING HERE ALIVE!!" Florian roars in the background.

"Hey, he has a point for once...We gotta take this idiot out before it can get away!" Cera says.

Kieran and Cera both send out a Hydrapple and order them to use Fickle Beam. All of their combined syrpents funnel their energy into one massive blast in unison, scoring a direct hit on Pecharunt.

Teko sends out a Revavroom and a Tinkaton, then motions for Eliza to join him. "Hop aboard, Lesser Mom!" he says. Eliza sends out several Core Forme Minior, holding them up in a large stack before getting on the Revavroom with the Tinkaton. The two of them drive around the horde Florian's fighting off, with Eliza tossing the Minior towards the Tinkaton, who hits them into the horde, exploding on contact. The last one is aimed at Pecharunt instead, coinciding with the earth erupting underneath it courtesy of Arven's Toedscruel.

Meanwhile, Florian charges out of a vast swathe of unconscious Pokemon towards Munkidori. He yelps and tries to flee, conjuring several globs of glowing purple gunk out of the end of his chain before firing them at Florian. He manages to nimbly dodge most of them, but muscles through the ones that actually hit him, somehow getting angrier in the process. Munkidori eventually tries to hold him in the air with Psychic, but Ogerpon rams into him, staggering him again and releasing Florian. He dives towards Munkidori, grabbing him by the throat before slamming him repeatedly against the ground, then tossing him against a rock. Ogerpon then pins him against the rock with her foot, bludgeoning him with her cudgel until he stops moving.

Florian's neck snaps towards Pecharunt, battered from everyone else's attacks. He charges again, leaping towards it in the air in an attempt to bring it back down to earth.

"W-wait! I-if you kill me, 'den, uh...you'll be WORSE 'den me!" Pecharunt says frantically, tears welling up in its eyes as it tries to avoid Florian's onslaught.

"FUCK YOUUUUU!!!" Florian roars. He lunges into the air to attack Pecharunt, smacking it down before sending it flying high like a baseball. He and Ogerpon use Arven's Toedscruel like a trampoline, jumping up to catch up to Pecharunt, before piledriving it into the ground from up high using their weapons, kicking up a great plume of dust upon impact.

As the cloud of dust clears, the image of the Lousy Three's unconscious bodies can be seen, along with a large pile of unconscious, previously mochified Pokemon.

...and on top, crushing Pecharunt under his heel, is Florian, his breathing shallow from rage, his skin pink from blood and adrenaline flowing through it, a wild, feral look plastered on his face.

He throws three Ultra Balls at the Lousy Three's unconscious bodies: all three of them click to indicate a successful capture. Juliana grabs them and brings them back to the rest of the group.

Teko makes a dive for the very beaten up looking Pecharunt. "Gotcha!" he cackles, holding it aloft triumphantly. "...Now what do we do with this thing?"

"P-please...I'll give you whatever you want, see?! Money! Power! Fame! I can make it yours! Just lemme go..." Pecharunt whimpers, feebly trying to wrest itself free from Teko's grasp.

"You know...what I want?" Florian pants. He lunges forward and grabs Pecharunt intensely, its body bulging out of his hands like one of those squeezy toys where the eyes pop out. "I. Want. You. To GO TO THE DISTORTION WORLD." he spits. He stuffs Pecharunt and the Ultra Balls into the loading chamber of the Tinkaton's bazooka, then pulls back the plunger, while Ogerpon pushes it down further using its cudgel. A visibly struggling Kieran and and the Tinkaton hand the bazooka to Cauler, who aims it far off into the plains surrounding Kitakami. "Outgoing!" Teko yells.

"WAIT!!" Pecharunt yells frantically, its plea muffled by the bazooka's barrel. Everyone pulls back the plunger and releases it with a triumphant "Heeee-YAAAH!!"

"PECHAAAAGHILLbebaaaaaaackkkk..." Pecharunt screams as it and the Ultra Balls careen off into the night sky. It disappears from view as a purple sparkle, and suddenly, Mossui Town's assailant is no more.

Florian clambers on top of the Lousy Three's shrine, and flips a triumphant middle finger to the direction they went sailing off in.

The video then cuts out.]

[casspurrjoybell-31]

The Consort's Fate - Chapter 13 - Part 1

*Warning Adult Content*

Kelly

There are moments in life when your body reacts before your conscious mind 'fight or flight' they call it.

Your body becomes a machine, going through the motions of self-preservation.

Before you know it, the moment is long gone and your mind scrambles to piece together the semblance of a memory, all the while askin, 'what the hell just happened?'

I tighten my hold of Tegan's bloodied body against my chest as Douglas and I get her to the kitchen table.

I don't remember pulling her through the threshold of this abandoned shithole.

I don't remember closing the door or pulling her into my arms.

I don't remember tersely giving the command to Brayden and Finn that they needed to stick together as they secured the perimeter.

All I remember is Tegan, one of the damned strongest females and Secondaries I've ever known, reaching up with bloodied hands and whispering a plea of help.

My mind is a chasm full of torn scraps of memory.

"Get the medical kit," I say to Douglas.

"I picked up more supplies today. Everything should be stocked."

Finn's guard nods.

He clears off the table before assembling the medical supplies.

"She'll heal," he says and I don't miss the comforting tone he uses.

"I know she'll heal," I snap defensively.

"But she's our only eyes on the inside. If Reyo found out she's aiding us..."

"She'd be dead," Douglas interrupts.

My eyes travel across Tegan's features.

Long eyelashes.

A pointed nose.

Harsh features.

I've never seen her this close before.

It's always been at a distance, usually with one of us throwing a sharp barb to the other.

It's no secret Tegan isn't a fan of humans.

Isn't a fan of me.

I can't count the number of times I argued with Brayden about her loyalty.

Each time he assured me that despite her distaste for humans that our common goal was the same.

To save Finn.

Tegan lets out a pained moan in my arms.

I grimace and selfishly squeeze my eyes shut for a moment, suppressing the flood of memories bubbling to the surface.

Seeing her like this takes me back there, to those final days at the Fortress.

All the death.

The blood.

The pain.

The loss...

"Shh," I say, all the while forcing breath in through my mouth and out through my nose.

"I've got you, Tegan."

Douglas moves around the table and assists in peeling her from my arms.

The squelching noise that follows makes bile rise in my throat.

There's so much blood... too much blood.

An ember of fury burns in the deepest pit of my stomach.

"Who did this to her?" I ask.

Accusation burns my tongue and I know it's unfair.

Douglas doesn't bother with a response.

His brow pinches in concentration as he gathers various items.

Gauze.

Alcohol.

Antibacterial solution.

He grabs a pair of scissors and gently murmurs to Tegan that he's going to cut away the soiled clothes to find where the injuries are located and begin cleaning them.

Every word is gentle but clinical, showcasing that he's every bit the guard the Secondaries trained him to be.

That Mr. Primary trained him to be.

"I'll do it," I snap, holding my hand out for the scissors.

Douglas barely spares me a glance before moving back into place, slowly cutting up the hem of Tegan's ruined shirt.

"You can help me when your hands stop shaking."

Douglas cuts away the last scraps of Tegan's shirt and something ugly unfurls inside me as I watch his eyes dance across every inch of her body.

Something dark, protective and foreign.

My hands clench into fists at my side and I glance away.

"There's too much blood and not enough injuries," Douglas mutters under his breath.

"This is someone else's blood."

Gentle footsteps come as a welcome distraction and I turn just as Brayden and Finn enter the kitchen.

Brayden catches my gaze from across the room and nods.

"Perimeter is clear," he confirms.

"But there is blood in the air. Whatever happened, she fought to near-death to make it here."

'Always a warrior.'

[lady-of-the-spirit]

i wanna know about Kris cus she seems interesting so 🖋

Yay! So, Kris came into being at some point between September 2015 and May 2016, because that’s when I was like “You know what, fine, I’ll watch the Avengers,” and ended up watching the other movies afterwards because it became my new obsession. Of course I ended up stumbling upon some “Tony Stark’s daughter” fics, mostly on wattpad, and that’s how I got the idea for her.

I meant for Kris to be the antithesis of the other “Tony’s Daughters” OCs I was seeing (again, mostly on wattpad). Those OCs were nice? Kris was a snarky bitch (for the most part - she could be kind to people she loved, but for the most part she was a snarky bitch). OCs were friendless? Kris was popular and had a best friend who was her sister in all but blood. OCs were “not like other girls”? Kris was girly and into fashion, and she was tough and respected women. OCs were straight and ended up with Steve Rogers (which happened too often for my liking, especially when OCs were 18 or 19)? Kris was a lesbian and ended up with the one female character close to her age, Wanda (my version of the twins were born 1992, making them only a year younger). OCs had their own version of the Iron Man suit? Kris did not, and actually had weapons that were inspired by equalist gloves and weapons from Legend of Korra (Kris was inspired a lot by Asami, a tough girl who was smart and feminine). 

Kris also became a character who, while involved with the main plot of the movies, was also more likely to be off doing her own thing than following the other characters around. Like, in the first movie, I imagined her just trying to deal with her PTSD from Afghanistan, hanging out with her friend, and having more normal dad-daughter moments with Tony than superhero moments. Second movie she’s having her gay awakening on top of finding out her dad’s dying. She has her own life outside of all the superhero nonsense she doesn’t really want to be involved in. 

Send me a “🖊+an OC“ and I will talk about that OC! It can be a headcanon, a fun fact, a small paragraph of backstory- anything!

[ellsbclls]

White Winged Dove

warnings ➛ COUNTRY!TOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MY BELOVED!!!!!!!! smut, baby! (PLEASE do not interact if you are a minor), hurt/comfort, minor angst, happy ending: guaranteed!, a handful of swear words, and y/n has no choice but to have a country accent, i don’t make the rules here. extended warnings will be under the cut!

word count ➛ 9.5K

authors note ➛ i saw that gifset of tom taking a shower in cherry and my brain short circuited, so here! have a cupcake!

synopsis ➛ Tom feels like his world is falling apart, so he turns to you, the only person that reminds him of home.

extended warnings ➛ nsfw, fingering (f receiving), dirty talk, praise kink, multiple orgasms, unprotected f/m intercourse (please practice safe sex, kiddos! wrap it before you whack it!), a tiny tiny tiny sliver of blood!play if you squint with one eye closed.

You remember the night in waves, docile, fleeting waves that tease the rim of your consciousness before reeling back. Golden whiskey licks at the seam of your lips with each pass of the bottle, and the pond is glittering beneath the blinking trails of all the lightning bugs — tens of hundreds of fireflies, dancing in the night’s misty skyglow, rivaling the pale moonlight.

You remember the night in waves, but he is a mighty current.

You can’t scrub the memory of him from your mind, that bleak, hopeless expression that hollowed out his features. You remember how your heart split into a million little shards the second it appeared, and just when you thought there was nothing left to break, his fragile voice pleaded for you to take him somewhere, anywhere, as long as it was far.

By the time the sun spilled past your window pane, you were nothing but a drowsy amalgamation of lithe limbs, coated in morning glow as it spilled through the glass.

But behind your eyelids lives an imprint of the night before — a shimmering reflection of the night sky, and the moments that unraveled beneath its sweeping gaze.

9:17PM — You’re belting into your hairbrush, not a care in the world, and pouring your heart and soul out to a crowd of none. Somewhere between all of your clumsy twirls and impromptu choreography, you stumble over the shoebox that was poking out from under your bed, and a flurry of damp tresses and musical giggles fan across your comforter.

The walls in your house have always been notoriously thin, but what could you possibly expect from the weathered planks of wood paneling that lined your bedroom? You could hear your father’s creaky footsteps whenever he ransacked the fridge for leftovers in the dead of night, and the heavy thump of laundry that your mother would throw down to the basement, but once your radio crackles to life, and Stevie’s enchanting croon permeates the air, all those subtle nuances fades to a dull, lifeless roar.

With each passing note, the white winged dove becomes you, and you soar above endless miles of  Mississippi wood. There’s not a soul that can drag you back to the outskirts of town, force you to confront what may become of you when you land, there’s no room for trepidation where you go. There, in your own little corner of the woods, it’s just you, Stevie Nicks, and the moon.

And, technically, Thomas.

Minutes have gone by, you still can’t find the strength, nor the energy, to lift yourself up, and as your downy blankets hug your tired frame, you remain blissfully ignorant of your peeping tom.

Thomas, affectionately penned Tommy, has been your best friend, your confidante, since the very first day of kindergarten. You had pulled a pack of scented markers from your tiny, pink barbie backpack during free time, and he had pulled out the empty seat beside you, plucking, sniffing, and ultimately discarding each and every pen until the box was empty. When you asked him which one was his favorite, he asked you the very same in response, just so you’d “coincidentally” have a shared affinity for coconuts. He was oddly endearing, which is a trait that’s always stuck with him. So, even at a young age, you never wondered if he was just using you for your nice possessions, or trying to take advantage of your courtesy — he always offered himself to you at face value, and you never stopped taking as much of him as you could get.

Had you been aware that your childhood friend was waiting expectantly at your window, you may have handled your alone time with a tad more discretion — but you weren’t, and each act of your private concert forces him into an even harder position. To what extent does he let you embarrass yourself before he makes his presence known, and for how long will you bury your head in the sand before the embarrassment mulls over? He sees your stage dive as a golden opportunity, and seizes it before you begin to stir.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Three short, mild raps, uttered in quick succession, jostle you from your lavish daydreams like a bucket of ice water, and you have to squint just to make out his fair features amidst all the darkness shrouding them.

“Tommy?” A flash of his soft, earthy hues tame the wild drum of your heart, confirming your suspicions, and you fight the urge to chuckle when he innocently waves at you.

“Well don’t get all shy on me now. Come in.” You open the window just enough for him to slip through its frame, allowing your eyes to graze the sculpted plains of his back, and admire, albeit shamelessly, how his muscles ripple beneath his fitted t-shirt.

Yet, there’s something about him being in your room, towering over fixtures that once towered over him, that makes you feel uneasy. A part of you adores the way he instantly makes himself at home, but the remainder is doused in fear, fretting over his wandering hands and what they may discover, surveying little trinkets and souvenirs that decorate your desk.

“Hasn’t changed much since the last time I was in here, has it?” He notes, absentmindedly shaking the contents of a snowglobe your grandma brought you from New York, a miniature skyline of Manhattan continuously buried in a flurry of snow. Most of your playdates took place in his house, so as your friendship flourished past elementary school, and the time that spanned between your meetings grew shorter and shorter, you’d found yourselves frequenting his home for all of your endeavors. It was just easier that way.

That’s the sole reason you rarely visited your room. It surely wasn’t the suffocating atmosphere that plagued your home, or your hormonal, angst ridden brain convincing you that you’d scare him to the high heavens if he caught a glimpse of your relationship with your family — how dismal it is. How you build entire worlds, cycle through dozens of bountiful lives, in the luxury of your mind in hopes of retreating.

You’d be lying if you said the poster of Zac Efron, now lurking precariously behind his shoulder, wasn’t a glaring reason as well.

“Yeah, couple things here and there, but it’s pretty much the same.” You try to be discreet as you wander around your own room, Destination: Tiger Beat. Once you reach it, you rise up on your tiptoes to cover as much of the poster as humanly possible, but scramble for an excuse once you notice him turning. “You actually left something the last time you were here. It’s on the top shelf.”

RIP! The poster is crumpled in your grasp no sooner than his back turns to you. You’d have to give a formal apology to your wildcat once you were left to your own devices, but until then, he was banished to the most unsuspecting corner of your room.

“Jesus Christ Y/N,” His thumb fondly strokes a small, yellowed testament to your friendship, a weathered page of loose leaf etched in awry plumes of ink that perfectly encapsulate his very essence — egregiously passionate, regardless of the outcome. He had written it when he was about seven, intending to give it to the “girl of his dreams” once he met her. You can still hear his sweet, little voice echo between your ears, endearingly mistaking his r’s for w’s. “You kept this?”

“Of course I did.“ Candor coats your tongue before you catch yourself, the tail end of your answer turning to dust as soon as it hits the air. You can’t bring yourself to admit just how many restless nights you’ve allowed yourself to clamber up that oak dresser, just to read that letter over, and over, and over again, praying that if you had stared at it for long enough, his messy scrawl would transform into the words you yearned for most — that it was meant for you, that he’s loved you from the very start. “Wasn’t sure if you were planning to repurpose it for some other lucky gal.”

You lock eyes with him for the first time since he appeared at your window, and stowed beneath his reservation are faint embers of warmth, kindling behind ebony curtains as you indulge in the hearth of his gaze. Lifetimes seemingly pass before his eyes are flickering back down to his hands, and it prompts you to offer him the note. “You can have it back.”

“No, you keep it.” Your brows pinch together, and a thousand questions collect on the tip of your tongue. You wonder if he recalls the same memory you do, if he remembers the significance buried in that little scrap of paper, but ultimately choose not to dwell on it. He knows just how much you love to collect memorabilia — keep cherished memories stowed away for safekeeping — he’s just being thoughtful. “Consider it undeniable proof that I know how to read and write.”

“Ain’t nothin’ in here about knowing how to read.” You tease, catching your tongue between your canines as a smirk conquers your lips.

“Ya got me,�� He chuckles, smile reaching for, but never quite meeting, his faraway stare. You are so accustomed to his teasing quips, his usual flair for the dramatics, that this half-hearted attempt at replicating it fills you with discomfort. He tries to punctuate his words by tossing his arms to the sky, but they don’t reach high enough to convince you that he’s okay. Something is plaguing him, and you won’t settle for anything less than the truth.

“Tommy,” His name is sweet on your tongue, all honeyed vowels and soft, descant consonants that command his attention. “What’s wrong?”

“No, nothin’, I just-“ he’s avoiding your eyes, which is a clever strategy on his part. If eyes are the windows to the soul, then his are a stained glass mosaic, a vibrant display of all his emotions, and you — you are but an avid observer.

“Hey, look at me,” Two slender digits underline the curve of his jaw, and with a firm grasp of his chin, leave him no choice but to meet your gaze, tender and resolute all the same. “ You don’t have to tell me anything if you’re not ready, but I can tell when someone’s been rode hard and put away wet.”

“I just, I need to get out of here, and I thought I’d ask my favorite distraction to accompany me.” He stumbles over his words, faltering over his messy façade, but you’d rather this over nothing at all.

“And where might we be goin’?” You query. You can tell that this is going to be a long night, but luckily for him, you don’t have any plans that can’t be rescheduled. Your adoring fans will just have to wait another night.

“Somewhere… Anywhere,” He murmurs hopefully, and your heart nearly sinks to the floor. You’ve never seen such a chasm of joy, not in those bright, amber orbs you study so adamantly. You’d almost deem it pain, whatever’s tugging at the frame of his optics, whatever’s depriving them of that usual, warm glow. “as long as it’s far from here.”

9:39PM — “Watch your step.”

“Can you help me?” You whine — one hand reaching out for his assistance, the other firmly clasped around a bottle of Jack Daniels. There is an awkward incline just below you, only a few inches off the ground, but tall enough to make you stumble, and he could already see you bumping your knees on the way down, so he offers his elbow as a point of leverage.

“Atta girl, you’ve got it.” He coos, reluctantly abandoning your grip once you’re safely on the ground.

Mystical, and buzzing with life, you introduce him to the farthest corner of the woodlands. Whenever the walls of your room become suffocating, your legs always give out right about here. 

Your secret hideaway. 

Where you let your most worrisome thoughts roam free, and when those thoughts seemingly wander into nothingness, you chalk it up to wishful thinking, and fail to realize that they haven’t disappeared, they just don’t belong to you anymore. They belong to the babbling brook, constantly replenishing itself and its inhabitants with fresh, spring water, belong to the frogs and crickets as they fill the night with their moonlit ballad, they belong to the night, and it’s reflection, as it wades across the face of the creek; dotted with lightning bugs or the cosmos themself, you weren’t sure. All you know is that you always returned, as if a piece of you was tethered to the very spot.

“Where are we?” He wonders aloud, raking his fingers through his downy, chestnut locks as he explores his surroundings.

“I don’t exactly know.” You confess, making yourself comfortable on the ground. Most nights, you slip off your shoes and sink your feet into the brook, but you know Tom like the back of your hand, know what kind of ideas might venture through that rascally mind of his when he spots you near the water. So, you play it safe, pulling your knees up to your chest as you peer up at him from a safe distance. “It’s nice, though. Quiet. Good place to let your thoughts wander.”

“You ever take a dip in here?” Predictable. You stifle the urge to laugh at his query, sinking ivory veneers into your pillowy bottom lip, and shake your head in response.  “Hell, if I were you, with my own nature-made swimmin’ pool, I’d bring all the boys around.”

“You know I don’t waste my time with no silly boys.” You sigh, sending him a wistful glare. 

“You sure about that?” He counters, mimicking your perked brow with eerie precision.

“Oh, I’m sure.” You huff. God doesn’t build boys the same way he built him, he took his time crafting that statuesque frame, implemented hawk-eyed precision for each and every beguiling detail you’ve come to adore. He is a man, tried and true, from his sharp, angular structure to the neverending bounds of his heart, but rather than inflate his ego moreso, you let him assume the worst. “You can take a dip if you want, though. I wouldn’t mind.”

You wonder if he can tell just how little you’d mind as a mischievous glint highlights his amber hues, but before he can even open his mouth, you’ve already pinpointed the source of his glower, already voicing your adamant refusal. “No, absolutely not. Not a chance, Tommy.”

“But why not?” He whines, bellowing over your feeble chant, conjuring the most convincing set of pleading eyes he can muster. “It’s dark, it’s humid, and ain’t no one around to tell us not to.”

“Sounds like all the more reason to not do that.” You scoff, scooting further away from him and the strength of his hopeful gaze.

“I hate to pull out the big guns, but... what if I told you that it’d make me feel so much better if you accompanied me?” You’re left to wonder what the big guns are supposed to be, if they aren’t the way he is encroaching on your personal space, crawling up the length of your legs until there is only a sliver of space between you. 

“I’d remind you that there are much drier ways to make you feel better.” You could feel your warm breath fanning across his lips, distracting you with the scent of minty toothpaste and your vanilla chapstick, ultimately failing to notice his hands, and how they’re positioned just below your waist.

It would only take one swift move to reach the small of your back, two to scoop you up in his arms, and about six more to drag you into the pond — kicking and screaming, but successfully so.

And he doesn’t chance it.

SPLASH! You’re no sooner submerged in the brooks’ murky depths, reaching out for lily pads and cattails that fail to provide you leverage, and your screams bubble into thick, smothered embers of a once irate flame. He better pray you never emerge from usunder, because he’s merely a howl away from being swept up in the tide — the tide being your arms as they force him to the bottom of the crick.

“Y/N,” your name scrambles between the slosh of the water and the pounding in your ears, but you manage to break the surface and blink spare drops of water from your eyes.

“I was drowning!’ You gasp, struggling to keep your head above water as you kick, and splash, and writhe around in the stygian abyss.

“In two feet of water? I beg to differ.” You can barely make out his comeback over his fit of giggles, but a part of you would rather this bright, teasing version of himself that what you’ve been dreading beforehand. Taking his outstretched hand, you stumble to your feet and, much to your dismay, find yourself standing in about two feet of water (which, in your defense, is a far more daunting threat to someone your size as opposed to his). You cool his inflating ego with a cold splash of water, dispersing tiny droplets from your fingers as they wave in front of his face.

You splash around in the water for what feels like forever, transforming stray lily pads into makeshift hats, dressing to the nines in the latest collection of aquatic couture, and as the moon casts a pale spotlight on the babbling brook, you occupy it’s centre, huddled in one another’s embrace, swaying back and forth amidst the shallow pools.

10:02 — You're still wet.

Drenched, really.

You’ve resorted to wringing out your hair with your bare hands, twisting the dampened locks between your fists until water pours from the follicles. You’d never once pondered the benefits of freshwater landings, but you were about to find out. A glare threatened to slice through the air, but immediately wavered at the sight of him — desolate, void, so lost in his thoughts that you’d wondered if he were even there.

God, you’re worried sick. You’ve dealt with bouts of sadness, sprinkles of melancholy, but this was downright depressing. You wouldn’t even know what to do if you tried, and that’s what worried you the most.

Thomas, your best friend, your crush, your light — the best parts of you all wrapped up in a clumsy little package while the best parts of him threaten to snatch up your heart, as if it wasn’t already his.

“Tommy?” You break him out of his reverie, but press on, scooching closer to his form, dangerously standoffish, like an uncaged animal winding up to attack, until you cross the threshold into his personal space. With a sturdy hold on his bicep, he melts into the palm of your hand, practically leaning all of his weight into you, stealing a reprieve you didn’t know he needed. “You can talk to me, y’know. It’s just us.”

“She left, Y/N.” The evening air seems still, in perfect tandem with your breath as you fear what might come out once you finally exhale. You know he’d shove all of his feelings down if he caught you shedding a single tear, and this isn’t about you, it never has been. So you hold your breath, latching onto the heavy silence that follows his confession, and pray that your chest is strong enough to smother the sob bubbling beneath its surface.

Fortunately, he takes your silence as a cue to continue. “The closet was empty, and all her cookbooks were gone. I looked downstairs and there was nothin’ there.” You don’t know if he’s finished, watching as he toys with a loose string on his jeans, but he breaks his own silence with a newfound waver in his voice.  “I had a feelin’ she was ‘bout to leave, but I didn’t think it’d be so soon. I thought I had a lil’ bit more time to say goodbye.”

Edie was a good mother, the best of mothers, and never had she drawn a line when it came to who she nurtured. When you were little kids, you’d race each other to his house once the school bell rang, tiny little bodies weaving through the stalks of corn that prefaced the farm. She would follow the shuffling crops with a heavy eye, leading you to the porch with her raspy, whimsical chime, and crouch down to envelop the both of you in a tight hug when you emerged. She was the best of mothers.

But she wasn’t the best of wives. You were both far too young to notice the signs — the nights where you found her sound asleep on the sofa by her own volition, the packed suitcase that hid underneath the stairwell to the basement, the hesitance that laced her tone when she said I love you to his father — and something tells you she wanted to keep it that way. 

Her son didn’t need to worry about his parents, and how fast they were falling out of love, and whether they really loved each other in the first place. Her son just needed to be a kid, and that is a belief she devoted the best years of her life to.

But he isn’t a kid anymore.

That’s why she fled in the middle of night, leaving nothing but a ruby encrusted ring on his dresser — her class ring. The same one he’d snatch from her jewelry box whenever she wasn’t looking. The same one he used to propose to you at the wee age of four, promising you as much of the world as a toddler could imagine.

Tears prick at the corner of your eyes as he recounts every detail, and every fiber of your being yearns to just schoop him up in your arms, hold all his broken pieces together with the strongest embrace you can muster. He doesn’t deserve that type of pain, shouldn’t have to relive it, and yet he takes it upon himself to tell you everything, to relive it for your own selfish gain.

You grow envious of the way the moon trails kisses down the slope of his nose, across the high rise of his cheeks, and over the swell of his bottom lip. There were times where you’d find traces of his mother in Tom’s features, lining the curve of his warm smile or, when the sun hit them just right, speckling his earthy hues with tiny rods of gold. Tonight, he is shrouded in a celestial spotlight, mesmerized by its waning body, and if you squint just enough, you’ll find her longing stare hidden beneath his own.

“And the worst part is that I ain’t even mad at her. Not even a lil’ bit.” He concludes, talking more to the sky than to you. “Not even at all.” When his gaze falls back to you, you can only try to cover up the betrayal, wipe the back of your arm across your tear-stained cheeks before he notices they’re even misty.

You inevitably fail, expelling a wistful sigh as he pulls you into his side, comfortingly running his hand over your bicep as he murmurs sweet nothings into the night.

“I’m so sorry. I-I didn’t want you to find out like this,” You furrow your brows, and wonder just how he would want to break the news to you. Would he let you find out for yourself, or would he bring you out to the plantation, and let you sink into the soil until the news began to blossom in the fields? Would they be cornstalks? And would they reach for the sky just like her?  “I didn’t wanna make you cry, but... I didn’t know where else to go.”

“It’s okay.” Your voice is a wash of dulcet tones, fingers soothingly raking through his damp tendrils in a silent bid to comfort him. “It’s okay, I’m a big girl. I can take it.” You’re quick to clamber to your knees, wrapping him up in an airtight embrace, keeping him from wallowing into a puddle of tears. “I’m right here, Tommy.”

“I know,” he sputters, with an edge of sorrow to his tone.

“I’m right here, I’m not goin’ anywhere.” You promise.

“Don’t say that” He whispers, and shatters any trace of consolation looming over the encounter. Your brow furrows, your heart pounds against your chest, and for a fleeting second, you feel like you're caught in a lie. What if he knows? What if he can tell just how much you’d surrender to be with him? What if he doesn’t want it?  

“Why not?” You’re near hysterics, praying that the intensity in your eyes makes up for the tremor in your voice. “Why not? I didn’t say anything I didn’t mean.” 

“I just don’t want you to make a promise you can’t keep, Y/N.” That sullen gaze resurfaces, chills the air with it’s haunting presence — that hollow stare which fosters the remnants of a bright, contagious joy, and carves a pit, just as empty, in the well of your stomach, one that aches to be satiated. He tucks a stray piece of hair behind your ear, but his palm lingers against your cheek, trying to smooth out the heavy creases in your expression with the gentle stroke of his thumb.  “Hell, I don’t want you to promise that in the first place. You deserve more than all this, you deserve the best this life has to offer you, and I’m not gonna keep you from all o’ that.”

You’ve lost track of your heart long ago, it’s dizzying tempo rivaling a hummingbird, nearly undetectable as it flitted uncontrollably, knocking against your ribs until its ultimate descent to the pit of your stomach. 

You pray that he can one day see everything that you see in him, that loving himself is as easy for him as it is for you; you hope that there is a life where he never has to feel as small, or inconvenient, as he confessed, and you wish that this would eventually be that life.

You decide that it’s time to put an end to wishful thinking. 

“Let me make something clear to you, Thomas.” You cup his jaw, firmly, and utter each word without a trace of uncertainty. “I’m not sure exactly what I want from life yet. I don’t know if I wanna spend the rest of it in this little ol’ town, or just pack my things and go as far as the wind will take me. I couldn’t tell you if I tried, but… that’s okay.” Slowly but surely, your lips give way to a sheepish grin, feeling lighter, freer, the further into your declaration. “It’s okay, because there’s one thing that’s for certain, and it’s that I’m all yours. It don’t matter how far I go, I’m always gonna come home to you.”

The silence is deafening. 

All your emotions hang in the air, crippling your air supply with insurmountable regret. But his gaze is what terrifies you the most; just as suffocating, but in a way that sweeps the air from your lungs. You knew that there would always come a time where all the unrequited feelings you’ve harbored would finally boil to the surface, fueled by the hope that maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t as one sided as you thought; but under the void of his empty gaze, you wonder if you’d made a huge mistake. 

Or maybe there really is nothing — nothing to reciprocate, nothing to subdue you, nothing to salvage what little remained of your friendship after such a loaded confession — and so you scramble to assemble an apology convincing enough to overshadow your lapse in judgement.

But he doesn’t even spare you the chance, swallowing your half-hearted excuses with the firm press of his lips, pouring a lifetime of ardent desire, of longing, into the hollow of your mouth. It’s crystal clear that you’re his, the realization comes borderline cathartic. There has never been a day where your heart has not beat for him, and only him, forever threatening to spring from your chest and return to its rightful owner. The days, the months, the years of back and forth felt like a cruel jest from the fates, but now you were here, bundled in the warmth of his strong embrace, tongues curling against one another in an endless battle for dominance, and you would endure it all over again if this was where it lead

He searches for some sign of absolution, paws up and down your back in hopes of grounding himself, and you reverently provide, mustering what little strength you have left to crawl into his lap, brushing against the growing bulge in his jeans without a trace of subtlety, offering him the most sacred parts of you in hopes of bringing him home.

“Y/N,” he sighs raggedly, a half hearted attempt to gain your attention, one that proves unsuccessful as his pleas whittle into a frail, insipid shadow of what they could be. You’re too busy acquainting yourself with the plains of his body, embedding a trail of deep red marks into the column of his neck as your hands slip beneath the hem of his t-shirt. He’s built like a greek statue, you don’t even need to discard his shirt to indulge in the taut muscles tensing beneath your fingertips. “Y/N, darlin’, wait.” He interrupts your greedy ministrations by fastening his digits around your wrists. This is the point of no return, you can feel the fragile divide between friends and lovers, splintering beneath the weight of your heart, and yet you fail to concern yourself.

His digits are free to roam the high plains of your cheeks, pioneering the flushed expanse with beacons of soft, arching butterfly kisses until there’s no skin to cover, ultimately pressing his forehead against yours. ”You don’t- I don’t want you to do anything you don’t wanna do.” Seems almost redundant, you muse, to wonder if you want him when you’ve made it abundantly clear that you’d follow him to the ends of the earth. You are a pillar of salt, and as he showers you in a knee buckling torrent of kisses, you melt into the palm of his hands. If the way you’re draped against his form isn’t evidence enough, then the wetness pooling between your thighs most certainly will be, he’ll come across that confirmation once he tends to the spot you need him most.

You trace the cleft of his chin in delicate pursuit, whining as he tears his lips from their languid path, and peer through your inky lashes to meet his gaze once more. “I want this, Tom. I want you.”

“You have me. I’m all yours.” He echoes your words back to you, reverently, delivering a sacred vow from the hearth of your soul, ove you have, and will continue to, dedicate your humble living to, and you seal that promise with a bruising kiss. 

The weight of his palm melts into the small of your back, pulling your chest flush against his own as it sweeps up your spine, and you moan against his lips when your nipples press up against his sturdy chest, aching to be freed as they strain against their gossamer confines. 

You’ve only had the pleasure of making out with Tom for less than five minutes, but you can already tell that it ranks high on your list of favorite pastimes. Soft, pink petals brush against your own like they’re a flourishing canvas, and he’s trying to even out the brushstrokes, but all he leaves is a scorching flush in his wake, and your clothing, despite being bathed in pond water, do little to ease the blistering heat. It’s suffocating you, and you begrudgingly tear yourself away so that you can rid yourself of the article.

Besides, the less fabric separating you from his anchoring, toned embrace, the better.

“I’m all dirty,” Your meek voice collapses into a fit of giggles, and your feeble attempt to wring out your clothes is thwarted by his hands, venturing up, up, up, and under the hem of your skirt at a teasing pace, savoring the feeling of your warm, silky skin beneath his fingertips. You can tell he’s as desperate as you are, confronted with acres of new terrain to explore, and only so little of his patience to spare.

“I know, I’m sorry angel.” His voice is soft, and soothing, and riddled with mischief. Even if there is even an ounce of truth in his apology, you can still make out the devilish grin that toys at the corner of his mouth. “May I, m’lady?” He croons teasingly, flashing those whiskey glazed hues in a way that you could never refuse. 

“Proceed, good sir.” You counter in the most refined timbre you can dictate, a low chuckle escaping his lips as he bunches the hem of your dress in his palms, hoisting it over your head to expose the breathtaking contours and curves of your body. You can’t remember what compelled you to forego your bra, but the thought is soon pushed to the corner of your mind, making room for the warm, fuzzy feeling that conquers your insides when Tom lays his eyes on you, bared to him and only him. His gaze alone makes you feel like you are a spectacle to behold, the most enchanting vision to ever cross his line of sight. If there was even a speck of insecurity buried deep in the back of your mind, the sight of Tom’s eyes, blown wide with adoration as they worship every sinful inch of your skin, instantly quells those fears. 

He struggles to find his words, to occupy this infinite silence with anything, everything, as his calloused palms caress the sides of your waist, but all he can manage is a husky growl. One that prefaces the reappearance of his tongue, and its feverish descent from the column of your neck to the tops of your breasts, bathing your skin with gluttonous, broad strokes, and coaxing pretty, little whines from the back of your throat.

There is something so unhinged in his actions, so carnal, it summons another wave of arousal to pool against your soiled panties, knowing you have such a strong clutch on his resolve. Though, another branch of your mind races at a mile a minute, consumed by the endless possibilities that come equipped with Tom’s skill. 

You try not to dwell on the little flings that came before you, especially now, in the afterglow of your confession. The taunting, pitious gazes you shared with his hookups in the hallowed halls of your alma mater, toting a reminder that they could indulge in everything you yearned for, scorched you more than the thought of the act itself — but the rumors were just plain inescapable. If even a fraction of them hold a candle to the truth, then you are in for one hell of a night.

“You’re just as sweet as I imagined, angel.” Angel. The nickname sends sparks flying in the well of your stomach. “Can’t wait to taste that perfect little pussy. Just know it’s gonna be even sweeter when you cum all over my fingers.”

You whine softly at his words, but clench hard around nothing, aching to be filled by those unbearably long, slender digits. Nothing could have prepared you for the scene unraveling below you — his lips latched around the stiff peak of your nipple, a husky groan reverberating around the pebbled surface, and head slightly moving against the palm of your hand as your fingers tug at his chestnut locks. The long, covetous laps of his tongue mingling with the vibrations of his contented little hums make you desperate for more, arching, writhing, trembling against him in hopes of finding a semblance of relief for the ache between your thighs.

“Tommy, please.” You plead in the most convincing, fucked out tone you can muster, but he doesn’t budge, showering your other bud with a flurry of quick, relentless kitten licks. Even mother nature joins in his relentless teasing, making you squirm as the gentle breeze blows cool, summer air against the glistening bud.

This is torture, a blissful, euphoric form of torture that, despite your irritability, you would surrender to time and time again. But you fail to notice just how hard your canines puncture the swell of your bottom lip, too immersed in the stroke of his tongue, in the ghost of pleasure that stirs in the pit of your stomach each time you rut against his clothed cock. A sharp, metallic tang seeps into your mouth, hitting the tip of your tongue and forcing a trembling whimper to the front of your mouth.

The pitiful sound piques Tom’s interest, and before you can wipe the blood from your lip, your face is already cradled between his palms. “Fuck, Y/N, look at you,” His eye were wide with concern, and your heart sputters over the blistering scorch of need his compassion arises in you. “C’mere.” Dropping his forehead against your own, his tongue tentatively brushes the curve of your lips, lapping up every last drop of blood that is smeared against it. He applies pressure to the wound, cauterizes it with a searing dance of bloodstained brims, as his one hand weaves into your damp locks. You barely know how to respond, but your body compensates with an untapped sense of hunger, scraping your teeth against his lower lip as you desperately claw at the toned valley of his back.

“Please, Tommy, please. I’m dripping.” You mewl, teetering over the perilous edge of delusion, foraging between your stomachs in search of his free hand. Yet another wave of arousal pools between your thighs at the sight of him, with his puffy, saliva stained lips slightly parted, and his eyes blown wide with the insatiable need to indulge himself, to spoil you. Once your fingers circle around his wrist, you guide his hand to the apex of your thighs and urge him to feel for himself, applying the lightest of pressure against his fingers, urging him to caress your tender lips through the sodden barrier of your panties. To feel what he’s done to you. “You feel that? It’s all for you.”

“All for me,” he echoes back, mesmerized, cognac hues fading into obsidian orbs as he rubs deliberately teasing circles over your covered clit. “And you ask oh so pretty. Let me take care of you, my pretty girl.” Before you even get the chance to reply, he’s pushing your panties to the side, dipping the pad of his middle finger between your silky folds — feeling, exploring, acquainting himself with the tight ring of muscle that he plans on stretching open. 

His hesitation is nothing more than a plight at this point, you are more than willing to take anything he has to offer, and he can gather that much from the wild gleam in your eyes, so he slowly works one finger into your snug, velvety walls and curses under his breath at how heavenly you feel. You’re unlike anything he’s had before, far exceeding the lengths of his imagination as you softly clench around his digit, and it only takes a few seconds to adjust to the lithe intrusion, your walls already twitching against his shallow, testing thrusts, before he adds another.

“So fuckin’ perfect, darlin’. Love the way your pretty little cunt takes me.” A thin sheen of sweat coats your forehead as he rocks his digits at a leisurely pace. Tom is obsessed with the tiny frown forming between your brows, almost like you’re confused by the amount of pleasure building between your legs, struggling to keep your eyes open, your juices spilling past your opening to trickle down the palm of his hand. To say your experience is limited is a bit of an understatement — the whopping two men you’ve slept with prior were merely amateurs in comparison to your lover. Even if there was enough air in your lungs to articulate it, you don’t have the heart to tell him that you’ve never been fingerfucked. Period. The embarrassment almost swallows you whole.

But even without anything to compare it to, you’re convinced that you’re receiving the upper echelon of experiences.

As his pace quickens, prodding against your pulsing walls with an onslaught of keen, ravaging thrusts, you’re too busy gasping for air to notice how he’s switched his angle. Now the heel of his hand is rubbing against your bundle of nerves with each stroke, applying just enough pressure to light a spark without ever setting you off, and as the pads of his fingers pound against your sweet spot, you are reduced to a limbless puddle in his hands, doused in an ethereal glow that only he could surface. “God, Y/N, you look like an angel. My pretty little angel— ‘bout to cum all over my fingers.” he panted, voice biting the air with a wolfish gleam, canines peaking past his thin lips.

“Tommy, I’m so close.” You aren’t sure if you can hold on for much longer, dangling on the coattails of insurmountable bliss, finding a new reason to fall apart with each lewd kiss or sharp thrust. Your orgasm is already creeping up, threatening to crash over you each time he plunges into your slick heat, but you know that you want to feel him — all of him — stretching you to unimaginable lengths as he sinks into your tight little hole for the first time. “I wanna feel you. I wanna- I need to cum on your cock.”

Tom’s brows meet in the middle, and you wonder if you’ve strewn too far, surrendered the remainder of your common sense to lust and her shameless palms. “Such a filthy little mouth for such a good girl.” He whispers, wondering aloud, his free hand abandoning the nape of your neck to cup your jaw as his thumb sweeps over your bottom lip, applying just enough pressure to drag it down before letting it spring back to its pouty default. “You will, angel, you will, but I gotta get you ready first.” He reassures you, and you remember just how prominent his length is, straining against the denim cage of his jeans, and attribute his wavering tone to the sheer restraint he’s been exhibiting. But you have to admit — if his fingers are only a fraction of his length, then you are not sure just how much of him you’ll be able to handle. The thought sends you barrelling toward your climax, but not without the help of his thumb, pressing up to rub fervent, clumsy circles against your clit, his husky tenor cooing sweet words of encouragement into the space just below your ear. “I can feel you, angel, let go for me. I’ve got you.”

With one final thrust, he buries his fingers to the hilt, caressing your g-spot with a tentative come hither motion, until you are ridden with overwhelming waves of pleasure. All you can feel are your tender walls tightening around his fingers, and your thighs starting to tremble under the weight of your high. But he is spellbound, mesmerized by the swirling vision of you at your most content, eyelids hanging low over your blown out hues, your hips absentmindedly grinding against his hand, meeting his timid rhythm as he tries to work you through your aftershocks.

Emptiness soon replaces the stretch of his fingers once he slips them out, but a twitch of excitement follows the path of his slick hand, and you can’t stop from outright moaning at his shameless display.

“Just what I thought,” he murmurs. You are too captivated by the sight of his lips — pink, and kiss-weathered, and frankly obscene —  opening wide to welcome his slick fingers, gracing his taste buds with your juices, and humming around them as they coat his tongue in an intoxicating elixir . “Open up, pretty girl,” You‘re torn from your trance by the pressure of his digits, knocking against your bottom lip, begging for entry. “Come taste how sweet you are.”

Hollowing your cheeks, you graciously welcome his fingers, putting on a show as you swirl your tongue between the two digits, moaning softly as the bittersweet taste that hits your tastebuds. You aren’t prepared for the shallow, tentative thrust of his digits, or how he starts up a slow, steady rhythm against the back of your tongue — but god do you welcome it, softly gagging with each steady downstroke, spit already dribbling down your chin as you try to keep up with his quickening pace.

“Atta girl, that’s it.” He offers you a ginger smile, one that makes the tears pooling in your eyes worth gagging for. “Good girl. Good, good girl. I wish you could see how pretty you look.”

You try to reply over his digits, but your words are muffled and faint as they thud against the wall of your lips. Luckily, he’s coherent enough to notice that you’d like to speak — and who is he to stifle that sweet little voice of yours? “Thank you,” you pant, fluttering your tear-stained lashes up at him as you clamber to fill your lungs, disputing your feverish pleas as you wriggle away from the outline of his cock. The sensation of his waterlogged jeans rubbing against your sensitive bundle of nerves has you keening over him, pushing you further from his crotch, and closer to his embrace, back arched with a near-feline agility.

“Can I?” you ask, kneading your palms over his thighs, feigning innocence as you inch closer and closer to his zipper with each upstroke, and he nods, granting you permission to free him from his denim confines. In one fluid motion, your one hand unzips his fly as the other helps him kick off the remainder of his offending items, and you have to resist the urge to drool at the sight of his cock springing from his boxers, let alone his sinfully perfect, exposed form.

He’s a little bit larger than you expected — what he lacks in length, he makes up in girth, but there isn’t much to make up for in the first place. His shaft is decorated with pretty, ivory veins, ones that would no doubt twitch beneath the hot, heavy weight of your tongue, and the crown of his cock is flushed, glistening with a thin sheen of precum that makes your mouth feel conveniently dry. Your walls twitch at the disheartening reminder of your emptiness, but all out spasm as his fingers eclipse the circumference of his cock, using your juices to leisurely pump himself.

“You’re so pretty.” You sigh, a flurry of giggles floating beneath your words as you reach out to touch him, hovering just above the tip in order to send him a cautionary glance — one he hurriedly accepts, nodding his head fervently as he stutters into his grasp. A rosy hue blooms across the valley of your cheekbones as you encircle him, covering whatever he can’t as he all but bucks into your palm. His heart strains against his chest upon the realization that his hand easily dwarfs your own, watches your smaller fingers barely curl around his engorged shaft and fights the urge to cum right then and there.

No, he needs to feel you.

“Are you sure?” He asks once more, granting you a final chance to salvage what little scraps remain of your childhood friendship, but you are already committed, determined to devour every last, glorious piece of him, to prove that he is the rightful owner of you, all of you, every shimmering shade of you.The sentiment would be almost derisive if not so loving, so noble, and yet you dismiss it with three, chaste kisses upon the outline of his profile — against his forehead, the notch on the bridge of his nose, and finally his lips, warm and inviting.

“I’m certain.” You promise, merely a breaths width away from his lips.

You have never been more certain of a decision in your life, desperate to feel him nestled deep inside you, to blur the line where he begins and you end. Your fingers curl around the base of his cock, their pressure neither here nor there as they coax a hiss out of him, and you line him up with your entrance, tossing your head back as you waste no time breaching your needy hole with the bulbous head of his cock.

It’s blindingly clear that you have been given the reins, what with Tom’s finger’s seeking refuge in the soil beneath him, a low groan rumbling beneath his chest, his eyes rapt with an unspoken urgency as they survey the spot where you connect, and you relish in your paramount. Your knees dig deeper into the ground as you lower yourself onto him, and with little resistance, your walls steadily welcome inch after inch with a searing embrace, etching every delicious ridge and vein of his length to memory until he bottoms out, and you’re left with an overwhelming sense of fullness. There is a dull pain laced in the stretch of your opening, intermingling with the remnants of your last orgasm, and as you twitch and pulse around his girth, he appears like an dream before you, sifting through a thick haze of desire, wispy curls clinging to the thin sheen of sweat coating his forehead, and eyes blown wide with ripples of pleasure, of lust, that long to be indulged.

Once you’ve adjusted to him, you test a few shallow, tentative rolls of your hips, lifting yourself off the tiniest bit before filling yourself up again. He just feels so perfect, like god spent a little extra time molding him just for you, rubbing against parts of you that have never known such ecstasy until now, and you struggle to find a rhythm amidst all these new, dizzying sensations. “Poor little thing, you’re so worked up, you barely know how to take my cock.” It’s funny, how he can make such degrading words sound so sympathetic, and regardless, your body responds long before your brain can register, wildly spasming around his cock. It doesn’t take long for his fingers to return, digging into the curve of your hips to assist you, working you over his length in long, plundering strokes that steal the air from your lungs. “That feel better, angel?”

“Mhmm,” you shakily nod your head, fingers finding purchase in the broad expanse of his shoulders as you dig your nails into the freckled expanse, flooding his senses with the weak little uh, uh, uh’s tumbling from your lips each time you’re impaled on his cock. If he could lap up every hitch of your breath, every wayward sigh, he’d be drunk off the height of your unbridled joy. Hell, he can barely sustain himself as is, ravenously lapping up the beads of sweat clinging to your temple, swirling his tongue around your earlobe in its descent. Yes, yes, he’s swept up in sultry waves of you, and as your pelvis kisses his, as the air is filled with the sounds of your hips snapping against his own, he’s less and less concerned about emerging from your enchanting depths. “You got another one for me, angel? I can feel you squeezing my cock, baby, I know you got another one.” He’s delirious, clawing at the altar of your hips, and nowhere near as close to finishing as you are, but god is he eager to tear another orgasm out of you.

You, on the other hand, are a furnace, taunting flames of embarrassment licking up your insides, pooling in the small of your back, racing up your cheeks, at such arduous lengths as to mix with the coil of pleasure tightening in your core. Tom seizes the opportunity to find some leverage, pulling his knees up to rest on either side of you, planting his feet on the ground so that he can thrust up into your sopping cunt at a punishing pace, and you both can already feel the tell-tale signs of your building pleasure. “It’s okay, Y/N, you can let go.” Nothing more than a faint whisper, you indulge in the way his cock massages your inner walls, how your name sounds so filthy, yet beguiling, as it slips from his slightly ajar lips, how it blends so well with the weak little moans of his own name rolling off your tongue. “Let go for me. I wanna feel that perfect little pussy cum all over me.” His hand dips between your sweat slick forms, firmly swiping his fingers over your hypersensitive bundle of nerves, turning circles into your favorite shape, and his change in position makes the crown of his cock curve into your g-spot each time he pounds into you — so your helpless to the crescendo of pleasure that washes over you. 

A broken, startled shriek tears through your lungs, and you topple over his thighs, digging crescent shaped indents into his knees as you surrender to your climax, walls fluttering and contracting over his length as he works you over the edge.

“Oh, what a good girl.” He coos encouragingly, reaching his hand out to cup the weight of your breast, swiping his thumb over your peaked bud as his pace eases up, and it isn’t until now that you realize he’s leaning back, holding himself up by his forearms while he drinks in your pleasure-ridden form. “My sweet, sweet girl.” You can tell he’s holding back by the way his hips still stutter up into your overstimulated heat, how his cheeks, his forehead, all of his features are set with a heavy flush, how you aren’t filled to the brim with his cum — and you simply won’t allow that. 

“It’s okay, Tommy.” You whisper, carefully lowering yourself until your chest is aligned with his own, sharply exhaling as you feel him push up against your tender core. Your eyes are soft, and dazed, and oh so pretty, glittering beneath a thin layer of unshed tears, but this is about him, it’s always been about him, and as his cock twitches amidst your spasming walls, you firmly believe that you can handle another orgasm if he can coax it from you.  “Keep goin’, it’s okay. I want you to fill me up. I wanna feel all of you.”

“Y/N—” His voice is stern, but your lips are fierce, stealing whatever argument may have been building in the cavern of his mouth as you weakly tilt your hips downward, offering yourself to him once more. When he muscles up enough strength to tear himself away, he only finds a bounty of understanding, of devotion, of love, teeming at the brim of your eyes, and he needs no words to indulge himself, to yield to a mesmerising whirlpool of you, you, shimmering you.

Tom wraps one arm around your back, holding you close to his chest while you scatter soft, lingering kisses to his shoulder, smoothing his palm over your damp tresses as he hoists one leg over his hip, prying your legs even further apart so he can fuck up into you — impossibly tighter, and tormentingly more responsive as he slams into your overstimulated cunt. You can feel every square inch of him now, every long sweeping vein, the tiny sliver of skin hidden beneath his tip, it’s all crystal clear as he plunges into your weepy core, and you’re so cockdrunk, so fucked out of your mind, that you don’t even notice your hips slanting down to meet his thrusts. You’re just that greedy for another orgasm, hellbent on tumbling over yet again as he fills you to the brim.

It doesn’t take long for him to work himself to that precipice once again, the coil in his stomach pulled taut with your whimpered chant of his name, with each strong pulse of your cunt tightening over him. He buries himself to the hilt one last time, stuttering into your hips with a loud, frenzied groan, and finally teeters off the edge, dragging you down with him as you sink your teeth into his shoulder blade, pumping his hot seed into you, coating your walls with hot spurts of cum as you milk him for every last drop, the crude sound of your arousal mixing with his own making you shudder.

You both lay there for a second, safe in each other’s warm embrace, basking in the aftermath of your fortuned affair, and you cowered beneath the sky and it’s constellation clad ceiling, feeling infinitesimal, but oh so contented, beneath its glorious gaze. There, wrapped up in one another, two splintered halves mending, healing, into the whole they were destined to become — the sky was but a star in comparison to your light, your bright, everlasting light.

How did we get here? You wonder. How, oh, how is he finally mine?

You follow the steady rise and fall of his chest, the way the moon lounges across his curly lashes in a silver chaise — you survey him at his most vulnerable — and determine that you have more than enough time to find the answer. As long as he’s here, by your side, you don’t plan to wander too far.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING! PLEASE LIKE, OR LEAVE A COMMENT, IF YOU ENJOYED!

TAGLIST: @devotion @reawritesthings​

[mellowswriting]

ambrosia

pairing || Steve Rogers x fem!Reader

summary || You’ve been having a hard week. There’s nothing Steve loves more than taking care of his girl. 

word count || 2,318

warnings || oral sex (f receiving), vaginal fingering, soft!dom Stevie, slight degradation but like... sweetly? idk, unprotected sex, slightest breeding kink if ya squint, slight cockwarming

a/n || Hello yes it is I, the local harlot here to bless you with some smut and feel goods in a totally not self indulgent fic bc I was having a hard week.

Main Masterlist  |  Join the taglist!

It had been nearly an entire week since you had seen Steve.

Normally, that wouldn’t have been a problem. Hell, there had been times where you didn’t see him for months when things got tricky on his missions. It was more the fact that in the time he had been gone, you had barely slept more than a handful of hours a night if you were lucky and the one thing that was like magic for your insomniac brain was Steve’s embrace. It all started when you accidentally stayed awake into the hours of the early morning. The muse had struck and given you the blessing of inspiration that quickly became a curse of not being unable to set aside your work until it felt just right. That wasn’t until three in the morning, of course. Then you napped the next day from the lingering sleepiness, effectively throwing your sleep schedule entirely out of whack.

Little things that usually would be a minor annoyance at best left you viscerally frustrated, each inconvenience building one upon another until you were left too overwhelmed to complete even the simplest of tasks. You managed to trudge your way through your other responsibilities, leaving you with only laundry and tidying the kitchen to concern yourself with but the pile of clean laundry that sat in front of you waiting to be folded felt impossible. Instead of feeling proud of how much you had already accomplished, you were angry with yourself for not getting more done. Tears of frustration pricked your eyes, which only made you feel even more ridiculous.

The sound of the front door opening and closing broke you out of your annoyed trance of glaring at the laundry basket and you quickly wiped the tears away when you heard a familiar voice calling from the entryway, “I’m home!”

“Hey,” You said, your voice cracking slightly as you greeted Steve as he paused to lean over the couch and kiss the top of your head.

“Are you okay?” Concern tinged his voice, his eyebrows furrowed on that pretty face of his as he studied your current state. Your mouth opened and closed, trying to find a way to say it without sounding pathetic but you couldn’t. Shoulders slumped, you leaned back into the cushions with a long sigh. “Oh, honey. Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I haven’t slept right in days.” You looked up at him with a pitiful look. “I haven’t slept right in days and I’m exhausted and I spent the entire day cleaning and the only thing I have left to do is this damn laundry, but I’m so tired, and -”

“Whoa, whoa,” Steve sat next to you to bring you into a firm hug, rubbing your back soothingly. If there was one thing you knew for sure, it was that your lover gave the best hugs. He made you feel like the only person in the entire world. “Let me help, okay?”

“What? No,” You grumbled stubbornly. “You just got back from a mission, Steve, you need to sit and relax.”

“It was just reconnaissance.” Steve assured you. “I sat in a car with Bucky for a few days and then sat in debriefings for a few more - the last thing I need is to be sitting around on my ass.”

“Language,” You teased gently, chuckling when he gave you a glare that held no real heat.

“Go on, get your book. Relax for a little bit and let me take care of things.” Steve’s voice had an air of finality about it. You knew that he took a special kind of pride in taking care of those he loved, so you listened.

There was no denying the relief that washed over you. The warmth of his presence next to you as he methodically began folding clothes and recounting some of the antics he had to deal with thanks to Sam and Bucky’s constant bickering helped some of the tension ease from your exhausted body. Not to mention just how good he looked - so good that you could barely focus on the novel in your lap. Sure, seeing him in his uniform was its own special kind of sexy, but there was something about those soft long-sleeves and comfortable jeans that felt… domestic. The sight of him with his sleeves rolled up as he took care of your mixed laundry made something stir in your belly.

“What else needs to get done?” He asked after he took the basket upstairs and put it all away.

“Just tidying up the kitchen,” You tossed the book onto the coffee table and reached up to him with grabby hands that you knew he couldn’t resist. “Plus giving me kisses.”

Steve leaned down with a little grin, balancing himself on one knee against the couch cushions, and kissed you deeply. The little moan he gave against your lips when you eagerly accepted the teasing of his tongue made you shiver.

“You taste sweet.” He whispered as he crowded you closer into the couch, both hands cupping your face in a firm but gentle grip.

“Had strawberries before you came home.” You held him close by the collar of his shirt, probably stretching it out but you couldn’t really give a damn when he felt so good against you. “Forget cleaning, it can wait.”

“Yeah?” Steve teased, his face mere inches from yours as he gave you those hooded, hungry eyes that made your stomach flip. “Whatcha wanna do instead?”

“You.”

The cheekiness of your reply made him snatch you up, putting that super soldier strength to good use with a desperate grip on the soft flesh of your thighs. It was far from the first time he showed off his strength like that, but each time made your stomach flip in excitement just thinking about all of the things he could do to you. You hooked your ankles around his waist, your arms keeping you steady where they wrapped around his shoulders as he marched you upstairs and into your bedroom to drop you onto the mattress. Your thighs rubbed together at the sight of him standing over you, the rise and fall of his chest growing faster along with the hunger in his eyes.

“You work so hard, baby. Let me reward you.” He purred, tracing your ankle where the hem of your leggings ended, and his face lit up at your desperate nodding. You whined at the familiar need tightening in your belly over the strength behind his hands as he pushed your thighs open wide, his fingertips ghosting along your covered pussy. “Such a good girl for me…”

“Steve, please…” You whimpered, desperately pulling off your leggings. This little game of his, the teasing and soft touches ramping up into hot needy fucking, was something you had no issue playing any other time, but right now you couldn’t handle the wait. Steve caught on quickly and helped pull the clothes away from your legs before he ripped his shirt over his head.

“So needy for me, huh?” Steve slowly unzipped his jeans and pushed them down his legs. “Shirt off and lay your head on the pillows. I’ll take care of ya, sweetheart.”

You scrambled to follow his command, not missing the smirk your obedience garnered. The softness of his domination was addicting, left you yearning to hear the filthy praise that dripped from his lips like the sweetest ambrosia that could cure your every ache. Steve followed you up the bed, his briefs the only scrap of clothing left on his body, but before you could admire how gorgeous he looked, his hand hooked around your ankle to yank you closer. A sharp, surprised laugh melted into a moan when he finally got his mouth on you. His tongue rolled against your clit without preamble, completely abandoning the teasing to give you exactly what you were begging for.

“Oh fffuck!” You bit out, your head falling back into the pillows as your hips jolt up, and Steve chuckled darkly as he set his forearm over your hips to hold you in place, his other hand gripping your thigh hard enough to bruise. You grabbed a handful of his short hair in retaliation, a delighted smile lighting up your face at the groan you got in return.

Fuck, he felt too good, knew your body too fucking well. You grew more and more wet with each pass of his tongue against your clit, your hips rolling in time with his ministrations as the two of you found a familiar rhythm.

“There you go, baby.” Steve encouraged as he eased a finger into your dripping pussy with a downright sinful groan, quickly adding another. “So fuckin’ wet for me.”

The dual pleasure of his fingers and tongue made you see stars, made your back arch and your thighs squeeze his head until your orgasm washed over you in a devastating wave. It wasn’t until you shoved him back by his head that he finally stopped his tortuous pleasure. The sight of him wiping the wetness from his mouth with the back of his hand still had your belly tightening with need.

“You did so good.” Steve murmured, pressing a kiss to your thigh, then your navel, kissing a trail between your breasts and up your neck until he met your lips. You moaned at the filthy act of tasting yourself on his tongue. “Look so pretty when you come.”

The combination of his praise and the not-so-subtle press of his cock against your thigh had you keening beneath him, your leg hooking over his waist to drag him close enough to grind against the bulge in his briefs.

“Feel that?” He practically growled as he rutted down against you shamelessly. “That’s all for you baby. Gonna stuff your pretty pussy full’a my cum and you’re gonna say thank you for it too, you hear me?”

“I will, I promise… I promise, Stevie.” You babbled, losing any comprehensible thought other than the absolute dismay that he wasn’t absolutely wrecking you already. “Please fuck me?”

“Since you asked so sweetly,” Steve rid himself of his last scrap of clothes like they were burning him and entered you in one fluid thrust that had the both of you moaning in unison. His forehead fell to your shoulder as he let you adjust, hips swirling in tiny circles of their own accord because you felt so fucking good. “Ssso fuckin’ tight,”

The light desperation in your whimper made him smirk, his teeth sinking into your shoulder before soothing the mark with a lick of his tongue. “This is what you needed, huh baby? Just needed to relax on my cock...”

“S-Steve…” Was all you could manage, your eyes unfocused as he gave that first tentative thrust, followed quickly by a sharp, deep rhythm that made you see stars.

“Cockdrunk already?” He cooed but his cocky tone broke as you clung to him, your fingers digging into the muscle of his biceps as you used those thighs he adored against him, dragging him closer, deeper. “Fuckin’ needy little thing, aren’tcha? That’s okay, sweet baby, I got whatcha need.”

Steve pulled away and for a moment you clutched tighter, trying to keep him against you, but he pushed your legs back to your chest with a strength to be reckoned with, the new position making you feel infinitely more full and he growled at the feeling of you tightening around him. There were already fingertip bruises forming on your thighs where he held you right where he wanted you as his thrusts became faster, more desperate with his impending release, with the damn near feral need to see his cum leaking from your fucked out pussy.

It was the pressure of his thumb against your clit that forced you to find your words, your sweet cries of ‘please, please, please’ egging him on to roll his thumb until your hips jerked under the stimulation. You were so sensitive, so responsive to every little touch, it drove him fucking crazy.

“Come on my cock like a good girl,” Steve gritted out, angling his hips to grind his cock against that sweet spot that made you arch against him so prettily. “Thaaaat’s it…”

You broke underneath him, your second orgasm ripping through you in an intense burst that stole the breath from your lungs, leaving you to gasp as you shuddered. It was his favorite sight, watching you fall apart beneath him, and Steve let your leg settle around his waist once more to chase the high he balanced upon in faltered thrusts until he couldn’t hold back any longer. His pelvis pressed flush against your sweat-slick skin, some basic instinct demanding he shove himself as deep into your sensitive pussy as he could to fill you up.

He let himself melt against you, his full weight keeping you pressed against the mattress as he softened inside you, the both of you trying to catch your breath in the aftermath. You carded your fingers through his hair lazily, eyes closed as you let the satisfied exhaustion soak into you, grinning when your still fluttering walls made Steve hiss slightly. He still kept himself buried inside of you - so typical of him.

Sighing happily, Steve nuzzled his face further into your neck to trail sloppy kisses along your neck, pausing every now and then to lean back into your hand. Playing with his hair was the number one way to get him all warm and snuggly, especially if he was exhausted from giving you a thorough fucking. He gingerly eased himself off of you only to pull you close so you could lay your head on his chest, the rhythm of his heartbeat lulling you even closer to sleep.

“Go to sleep, honey.” Steve rumbled, his voice full of his own exhaustion. “I’ll be right here when you wake.”

[cdroloisms]

Hello, idk if you’ll see this, nor do you have to take this request. But I’ve been thinking, and thought up: Dream joined the egg, but not because it offered him world domination or a happy family or any of that; no it offered to treat him kindly, to be affectionate, to be a friend, basically offering him human decency. (With an add on of everyone believing it was for some big reason, but the actual reason gets revealed somehow) if that made any sense. (Idk if this counts as an au or not)

[ask: if dream showed up to the red banquet, that would be very sexy of the writers to make him join the eggpire instead of the pro-omlette]

hehe egg!dream has so much potential ,, this is a ficlet i’ve been working on for a while (writer’s block my detested) but i finally finished it up !! it’s a bit unpolished but oh well - they cant all be winners lmao 

tw: body horror, blood, injuries, implied torture/abuse, starvation, possession, dark/disturbing imagery, dark content, pandora’s vault/prison arc 

Dream gets corrupted by the Egg, because of course he does.

Sapnap trudges through the vine-filled hallway, his face bundled firmly with a holy-water soaked bandana to keep out the worst of the spores. It’s a shoddy defense, but he doesn’t plan to stay long; he’s only been sent on reconnaissance, to see what public enemy number one is planning and get out as quickly as he can. As much as the entire server wants Dream dead, trying to defeat the man the first time was enough of a feat, never mind with the power of a giant demon egg on his side - to try and fight him now would be practically impossible.

The floor squishes underneath his boots, and his lips curl in disgust; the vines are thick and moist and feel ugly and rotten to the core. He can’t imagine anyone being anything but repulsed by the things, but he guesses it makes sense for Dream to be drawn here - corruption attracts corruption, it seems. It only figures that Dream would be desperate enough for power to let himself get possessed by the living - if you could really call it living - embodiment of decay and deterioration itself. The feeling of the floor giving way underneath his footsteps has another wave of revulsion crawling up his throat, though he’s not sure if it’s directed towards the Egg or his former friend or both.

He reaches the end of the hallway, an itching, pulsing feeling of wrong filling the air in the room just beyond the haphazard archway carved into the stone. With careful hands, Sapnap draws the bandana further up his face, making sure that it is tied securely behind his head - just beyond this wall lies the belly of the beast, the heart of the rot slowly but surely spreading its influence over the entire server. Something hums in the air; whispering, otherworldly sounds pierce through his armor and settle beneath his skin; he pushes on. He knows better than to listen, to try and make sense of the words within the noise - from what he’s heard, by the time you understand what it is saying, it’s too late.

He steps inside; the room feels, for the lack of a better word, red. He’s better suited for the place than most, being a Netherborn and therefore more used to the oppressive heat and heaviness of the air, but there’s something undeniably wrong about how this place feels, something entirely Other having made its home in the room. Every inch of the place feels hostile, angry, hungry, recognizing him as someone foreign and wanting nothing more than his destruction. Unlike the Red Forests, which teemed with life - piglins and hoglins and giant fungus - this room is little more than a twisted mimicry, sucking the air dry, leaving little more than husks behind.

His hand immediately goes to his sword, drawing it with a dull, metallic scrape. The room is eerily silent save for the Egg’s hissing whispers, and he frowns; he’d expected an attack, but the room is still, quiet; a mockery of peace that only makes the uneasy feeling in his gut grow further. He trudges forward, watching against the puddles of lava and smoking magma scattered over the floor, but nothing stirs.

There’s a growing pressure against his skull with each step into the room, and his hand tightens on his communicator; they’d set up a stasis chamber, just in case things went south, his way out of this place only a few button presses away. Still, nothing moves; no Bad or Ant popping out of nowhere, weapons in hand, no Dream driving an axe between his shoulder blades as he’s done so many times before in their spars. There’s only the sound of his footsteps against the rotting growths on the floor and his own heartbeat thudding in his ears and the Egg’s warbling voice, beneath it all - beckoning, almost kind.

He swallows, throat dry, and moves forward.

His feet carry him to the back corner of the room, to the rotting, pulsing core of the wrongness plaguing the entire server. Even through his bandana, the air feels foreign, nearly choking him, and he strains his eyes against the glare of the lava to look up at the vines’ rancid heart, the Egg. Up close, it’s almost underwhelming, only about three times his height, hardly coming halfway up to the ceiling of the room. What it doesn’t have in size, however, it makes up in sheer presence; the hissing whispers in his head grow louder, crawling under his skin and between his bones, and he curses under his breath as he prepares to call for his way back. Dream isn’t here; the mission is a bust.

“Sapnap?”

He freezes.

It takes a moment to realize that the voice wasn’t in his head, as raspy and unsettling as it was, and his eyes traced the edges of the Egg to a dull colored shape at its side, completely overlooked in his initial sweep of the room. He watches, a dull horror rising in his chest, as the shape moves, twists around on itself in an entirely unnatural way like a marionette pulled by its strings. A pale dot rises from where it had been hidden against the bright red of the Egg; it’s a face, Dream’s face, covered in clawing vines, stark against the bone-white of his sun-starved skin, vomit racing up his throat at the sight of the vines having made their homes in jagged wounds all over his face and neck and disappearing into the torn scraps of his prison uniform, each one spilling crimson in the form of writhing vines and thorns instead of blood.

“Sapnap,” Dream says again, his mouth moving with the words but something entirely other having made its home in the air of his lungs, a shivering rasp to his voice that lifts and falls with the same desperate hunger that saturates every tainted inch of the room. His neck tips to the side, shifted over by a twisting vine tangled within his hair and wrapping a crown of blood-red thorns over his forehead, tendrils drooping over his face and framing the gaunt edges. “You came.”

“Dream-” the anger comes back, familiar, at the other’s words - the same red-hot rage that had boiled within him in that first and only prison visit (you took so long) but it dissipates as fast as it comes. Dream - if this remnant, this shade, this corrupted, mangled half that seems more corruption than human can even be called the name of one he had once considered his best friend, his brother - stumbles closer, held up by the vines that twist over his shaking legs, one having the pale, ragged edge of a bone clearly having ripped through skin - and Sapnap does throw up, this time, dragging the bandana from his face and heaving bile all over the floor.

“What happened-” he cries, flames licking up his arms in defense when his friend-turned-monster-turned-this steps closer on a wreck of a leg that should not be able to bear weight, stumbles back to a roaring in his ears-

He is mine he came broken came shattered and I gave him everything I gave him his heart’s desire I am his savior his grace he asked for warmth and he asked for comfort and he asked for nothing but for someone to take his pain and he is mine he is mine he is mine

He freezes, hand tightening over his communicator; Dream stares at him with the one dull-green eye not covered by the vines splayed over his too-pale face, mouth moving but no sound coming out. The roaring, angry sound in Sapnap’s ears grows louder, follows the shape of Dream’s lips come join your friend come with me I will give him to you you have failed him once but not again not again he is mine but you can be mine also and you will be together together together

“-pnap! Sapnap!” Puffy’s words crackle over the communicator, harsh and loud and snapping him out of his thoughts, “Pull the switch, Sam! No, he’s not responding- pull the switch-”

The world dips, and he heaves in a shattered breath, lungs finally full as he breathes in clear air for the first time in what feels like an eternity, hacking coughs pulled from his throat as he tears the bandana off in one sputtering gasp for breath.

“Sap- Sapnap,” Sam pitches his voice low, comforting, a hand rubbing up and down his back, but all Sapnap can see is the skeleton of a man held together by red thread, the life leached from his skin and leaving nothing left, he asked for nothing but for someone to take the pain and he is mine he is mine he is mine-

“Sapnap,” Puffy’s voice is tinny with concern, “What happened? You stopped responding and the time passed so we pulled the switch on the stasis chamber- are you alright? Did he attack you?”

“I-” -you have failed him once but not again not again you will be together- “I need a moment.”

He scrambles away, feet carrying him away from Church Prime, away from the Holy Land, away away away until he’s standing on the Community House roof, staring at his hands at this home, destroyed, this home, rebuilt, this home, empty and wrong and a shadow of house for a shadow of a man, a shadow of a friend found, a friend lost- and sobs.

What had he done?

[debiteful]

Are you still doin' writing requests? If so, could you write about a giant finding a borrower, with some unintentional fearplay on the giants part?

Content: apparent threat of harm, size difference (Giant/tiny), fearplay, hand held, crying, trapped under a bowl, ends on a positive note

Taking on a renovation by yourself was a monumental task. Thankfully the boundless strength of a giant made it much easier. Will spent weeks planning everything before he was finally ready to begin.

He started with the floors, tearing them up bit by bit. Beneath the boards there were scraps of fabric, bits of metal that seemed to have once been staples, and even an old cereal box. At first Will assumed whoever had built the place had been careless. As he progressed and found more trash, he began to see patterns. Strategic cuts in the cardboard here, nails running in a diagonal line without securing anything, and other such seemingly intelligent designs. 

Though it was odd, it helped click some puzzle pieces together. Rustling in the panty, socks disappearing, and soft yet shrill noises in the night. Something tiny was living in his home. By the looks of it they were taking things for their own purposes too! Nothing important of course, or he might've noticed sooner.

Now he had more planning to do. After all, he was tearing apart their home too!

Skip berated herself for the hundredth time for sticking around after that bean began tearing the place apart. Safe hiding places were growing fewer by the hour it seemed. It was impossible to predict where it would go to next, meaning she had to move all the borrowed things hastily. Already she had left a lot behind, and, to make matters worse, it had been found. Thankfully the bean hadn't seemed to catch on.

On the bright side, the renovation left lots of building scraps. Most helpful was the chunks of insulating foam. They were easy to cut and carry, and they could be used to build all sorts of things.

Presently Skip was trying to move them into the shed across the back lawn. She'd never lived out there because the temperature fluctuated too much. With insulation it might be bearable, and it would certainly be safer than in that madbean's house!

Unfortunately, the main house was still the best place to get food. Skip would wait somewhere secure in the evening until she heard the bean go to bed, then sneak out to get what crumbs she could. 

Tonight, a fallen cracker tempted her, but it was the crushed cereal on the counter that would be doable to bring home. She darted out from behind the toaster towards it, but she didn't get far.

Something caught her leg. As she fell, there was a grating sound. Then darkness. Something had landed atop her! A bowl? Probably.

Skip walked slowly with her arms out as feelers. Upon reaching the edge she tried to get her fingers under it and lift. That failed, of course.

She tried to fight back panic. Her shim and pry bar lay securely at home- this was supposed to be a quick in and out job! Essentially equipmentless, there were very few options. 

She took in a deep breath, releasing it slowly. Mind a little clearer, she searched her memory for what direction she must be facing. Slowly she walked around the edge of the bowl to the side closest to the edge of the counter. At least, she hoped it was. 

Pushing with all her might got her nowhere. Getting a running start for the shove did about the same. Soon, Skip was throwing herself at the bowl in desperation. 

Battered and exhausted, she sunk to her knees. Body and tears fell to the countertop.

The rest of the night was spent filled with tension. Every sound was certainly the giant coming. Paranoid thoughts spiraled, centered around what the giant would do to her.

When at last Will did come, the sound was unmistakable to the trembling borrower. She had heard those thunderous steps a thousand times.

Skip envied the ease with which the giant lifted the bowl which confined her. Tilted up on one edge, it could now shove its gigantic hand beneath. She couldn't help but utter a little shriek as fingers as large as her groped around blindly. She didn't dare try to dart through the gap lest the bowl snap back down on a limb.

Dodging the fingers was difficult with no sleep or breakfast. The tip of one brushed her leg. The whole hand rushed her. A massive thumb pinned her to the pointer finger.

The bowl lifted slowly, so she had ample time to imagine the look on its face while she struggled. Her heart was racing wildly. Tears threatened to well up, but she had spent most of them through the night. Stinging eyes locked on to the enormous face.

The giant had quite the satisfied grin splitting its features. Its eyes flicked side to side as the giant took in its captive.

Likewise, Skip's eyes darted frantically. No sign of a weapon. Then again, with teeth and hands like these, it wouldn't need a weapon. Gracious it was absolutely gigantic up close, larger than she had ever thought.

The thunderous voice she had heard dozens of times was deafening at such a close range.

"Hello there," Will said in awe. The borrower was silent and flinched. He frowned and spoke more softly, "Who are you?" 

Even at a dull roar the sound was too much. Skip growled like an animal and bit at his knuckles. He inhaled sharply and adjusted the hold to pin her head. It wouldn't take much for those fingers to crush it.

Will put her in the jar he had for this purpose. Being moved through the air was a disorienting and unpleasant experience. If she was lucky, she would be too dizzy to see whatever killed her coming. Skip was genuinely surprised when she landed on something soft in the bottom of the glass.

Left on the counter, she didn't dare take her eyes off of her captor. He bustled around the kitchen humming softly. She was familiar with this habit of his- the sound echoed through the walls in the evening. For the first time she heard the lyrics of his little ditty, "Gonna cook you up, gotta cook you right up! First I gotta chop you up, then plop you in the pot to cook you up!"

Hearing the giant narrate his process sent a dreadful chill through her. He was going to cook and eat her!! 

More vigilant than ever, her gaze never left him. Eyes locked onto the shining blade of a knife pulled from the block. Watching the vegetables get chopped up brought to mind terrible images. The ease with which the bean could toss a heap of food into the pot brought to mind just how small she was.

Finally, the tears spilled out. Where they had been held in reserve, she had no idea. Frantic little hands rubbed one eye at a time. Delicate fingers brushed away tears without obstructing her view too much.

By the time the food was filling the air with its aroma, she still hadn't stopped crying. She watched through bleary eyes as he filled a ladle with the sauteed vegetables and brought it over. So she wasn't to be cooked: he was going to heap scalding food onto her! 

Skip scrambled to one side of the jar and slid her back up the wall. That one scoop wouldn't be enough to bury her here. 

Her warped upturned face looked back down at her as the ladle lowered. The giant stuck it right into the jar, then let go. What was its angle? 

Tearing her gaze from his intent face, she eyed the handle of the ladle. Yes, it should be doable. Three bounding steps took her to the ladle. Using her momentum she vaulted over the bowl of it and grasped the flat handle. Like she had done hundreds of times before, she shot up the metal beam.

Just as she reached level with the lip of the jar, the giant reacted. He shouted, a deafening thunderclap. Those enormous fingers engulfed her momentarily, then they knocked her back into the jar. Now one hand lay over the mouth of her prison, effectively sealing it.

Will crouched, bringing the jar to eye level. He spoke gently, "Hey, aren't you hungry? I don't know how long exactly you were stuck on the counter." When she didn't respond he pressed on, "I promise it's good. I didn't know if you ate meat, but I figured veggies would be a safe choice. Hope it's okay that it's cooked- do you cook? Oh nevermind, it doesn't matter. Hey- can you understand me?" As his eyes scanned for any response, he finally noticed the red eyes and wet cheeks, "Oh no, have you been crying? Why? I didn't hurt you did I? Oh- I might've scared you… I'm really sorry little one."

Skip listened to his continuous ramble. It almost sounded good natured… Could she have been mistaken? A small bubble of rage rose up and erupted, "Wouldn't you be terrified if some gigantic brute trapped you and started singing about cooking?!"

Will frowned in dismay, "I didn't think about it like that."

"Beans never think," she screeched, "They just kill."

The frown deepened then flashed to a smirk, "Bean? Is that what you call us? Why?"

Skip rolled her eyes. What a dumb question! ….why did they call them beans? That didn't matter right now. 

She walked over to the ladle and picked up a spear of carrot. One eye still on the giant, she took a bite of the tender veggie. 

He gave a big grin, "Is it good?"

She nodded, honestly a little surprised. "So, why did you catch me? Why feed me too?"

"Well, as you've probably noticed, I'm doing a little work on the house. I found some of your stuff and I worried I might accidentally hurt you. Considering you've never introduced yourself, I figured just asking you to come out wouldn't work. I wanna help you move somewhere safer- whether it's temporary or not is up to you."

"My name's Skip," she piped up.

"Oh, mine is Will," he said with another big smile. His teeth were hardly threatening now.

She smiled back. "Oh! Actually I was already in the process of moving most of my stuff."

"Really? Where?"

There was a moment of hesitation; her distrust of beans ran deep. "Your shed, outside."

"All the way out there?" His eyes widened. 

With a barked laugh, she nodded, "Yeah its pretty far. Not ideal, but I haven't a clue where you're going to strike next."

The harsh choice of words made Will frown a little. He recovered quickly though, "Well now you have the inside scoop! The entire upstairs is going to be left alone. There's also the kitchen. I- well, I still don't know what sort of places you like to live, but I'm sure there's some somewhere around here.

Skip considered her options. The upstairs was rather far away, but it was a big area so safer. The kitchen was prime territory for food and other bits n bobs, but the giant would frequent it. He seemed nice enough, but one encounter couldn't undo a lifetime of learning.

"Up the stairs should do nicely," she trailed off, already scheming on how to move all her stuff.

"Alright! Sounds good. So, is there anything I could help you move?"

The response was an absent nod before she realized what he asked. What was his angle? "Oh! Um, I guess."

They discussed what exactly needed to be moved and where. Though she was on her guard, Skip didn't notice anything untoward. The move went just as smoothly. Soon she was settled into a secluded gap beneath the floor, where she had moved all her stuff herself after he brought it to a nearby location.

By the end of it, Will was very pleased with himself. He had begun to make a new friend. What's more, she was his neighbour! He felt more at ease knowing she would be safely out of the way of the renovation.

[spinchip]

It’s Not That Bad

Wordcount: 2400 Ship: Mountaingshipping, Cole/Zane/Kai Warnings: Broken bones, blood, violence, injury

Summary: Zane hides an injury.

The fight can’t even be classified as a real fight, in Coles opinion. It’s a street brawl, raw knuckles and split lips- the remaining members of the SOG are brutal when they catch the scent of blood. Without leadership the gang has devolved into troublemakers and men itching for violence, and they’ve gotten bolder- the fight taking place in broad daylight near the center of town. Two weeks ago they’d taken Jay down in the middle of a scrap, a bat to the side of his temple when the group had been separated (he’d been laid up in bed in the dark for days afterwards with a concussion) and since then they’d gotten cocky about the Ninja's weakness.

Lloyd had been adamant about showing a united front- the Ninja team had to be unflappable, rigid and strong to show the growing gang that they were not so easily beaten. They couldn’t afford to give them another inch, which is why it’s so frustrating when they get separated once more. There’s a new player on the gangs side this time, a big man hefting a hammer that could hold its own against Coles. He’s not particularly fast, but the others in the group keep them occupied while the man swings his weapon with bone breaking force. His presence was not something they could ignore, splitting their attention dangerously, making their formation too easy to break.

And it’s not Jay this time, but Zane, who is pushed into a throng of enemies all looking for blood.

Cole doesn’t see what happens to get them to this point, he misses the moment Zane is surrounded, but Lloyd urges the others to make their way to him over the clash of fists. Zane’s always been capable, and today is no exception- but just like before when it had been Jay, there are too many, and it’s not long before a lucky shot sends Zane to the pavement. A sloppy leg sweep Zane wasn’t expecting, going sprawling onto his stomach. It’s simple enough to recover from just fine.

Except the big man swings his hammer before Zane can get his hands underneath him. Down down down in a deadly arc-

There’s no warning Cole can give, no speed or strength to stop it, random men pushing him away from his friend but not crowded enough where he can’t watch it happen. The head of the hammer hits the base of Zane back and the sound it makes- Cole can feel the impact in his bones, his stomach churning and nearly making him gag. The crack of the anvil on metal makes him feel ill.

Zane doesn’t yell or scream, his fingers dig into concrete so hard they leave gouges, and then he goes completely limp. He looks dead, lying facedown on the pavement. The gang members hoot and holler, their fight rejuvenated, and they jump into the fray with more vigor than before.

Slowly, the man brings his hammer up and Coles realizes he means to hit him again.  He pushes frantically through the fight, blows glancing off his shoulders as he barrels through. Nya appears at his side, hair askew, and throws waves of water that sweep several people off their feet, dumping them clear of the path. Cole slams into the big man's side before he can deliver another blow, knocking him back from Zanes still form. Before either of them can get to the downed nindroid, new adversaries file in to try and beat them back, the fight resuming- but the ninja now scrambled and panicked at the loss of one of their own, and the gang member reveling in it.

The man with the hammer, he’s got thin blonde hair and dark eyes, manages to keep up with Cole. Despite Coles obvious skill and experience, he’s making stupid rookie mistakes. Internally cursing, Cole urges himself to focus- rushing into the fray to protect Zane would mean nothing if he fell to the man's hammer too, but it’s looking increasingly grim. The man is pushing himself faster, sweat beading on his brow, and he’s strong.

A smaller man darts past the two of them in a planned maneuver. The big man steps back and Cole is thrown off kilter as his hammer swings wide, and realizes too late that the smaller man has a knife- he can’t avoid it now. He twists, steps back, tries to minimize the damage- and then the man’s legs slide out beneath him and he hits the ground hard, head bouncing off the ice-slick pavement. Zane appears at Coles side and throws ice hard, frost and big chunks of ice invigorated by the wet pavement from Nyas last attack freeze the big man's legs to the road. Cole falls into place at his side, the two fighting off a few more before the gang realizes Zanes back on his feet.

Their bravado and cockiness vanishes. One man turns and runs, and at that the gang scatters- the one who are able to, of course, and are not frozen to the sidewalk or knocked unconscious.

Cole spins around to face Zane, who’s surveying the scene silently, “Are you alright?” He asks, hovering his hands over Zane as if to feel out the injury by aura alone.

Zane’s eyes are trained on the alleyways the gang members disappeared into, mouth a thin and calculated line, “I am alright. The Sons of Garmadons strength is dwindling.”

Cole blinks, frowning. It was almost like Zane wasn’t speaking to him, but the backs of the men hiding away in the dark corners of the streets. As if he was making a point.

The cops show up and begin to load the remaining men into Police Cruisers or ambulances, depending on their state. The ninja did not always pull their punches, especially after Zane hit the ground.

Zane watches as the man with the hammer is loaded onto a police cruiser.

Lloyd motions the two of them over, the others are gathered near a throng of policemen milling about, and Cole reaches out and sets a hand of the small of Zane's back to lead him- Zanes shirt is soaked through and ice cold. The moment his fingers make contact, Zane jolts forward with the barest intake of breath between his teeth. Cole jerks his hand back, the pain flashing across Zanes face almost impossible to catch, but Cole knows his boyfriend better than anyone. A blank mask slips over Zanes face as he stubbornly refuses to acknowledge the act, striding across the pavement before Cole can comment.

Cole trails after him, and now that he’s really looking he can see a dark outline of what looks like water straining the back of Zanes gi. In the heat of battle, if Zane got a particularly bad scape, he’d do some emergency first aid and patch himself up with ice like a scab. The hammer hit him hard, it must have jostled something loose- Cole tries not to worry too hard, Zane is still standing and had even fought with him. They just needed to wrap this up quick and get him home. He has half a mind to scoop the nindroid up gently and carry him back right now- but Zanes' words from earlier hang around his ears. Treating Zane like a delicate injured flower in front of any of the new SOG was bound to encourage their violence, just like in the aftermath of Jay. Like Lloyd wanted, a united and unbreakable front is what they needed to project.

Zane is hiding an injury, and for the sake of reputation, Cole has to allow it.

The police chief is standing with the others, and by the time Cole catches up Zane’s already reassuring everyone, “I am fine.” he says gently, Kais worry coming off of him in waves, “Is there anything we can help with?” He directs his next question to the police chief, clasping his hands in front of him.

Cole, along with the rest of his little family, zeroes in on the way Zanes hands are trembling.

His face is completely serene, his gi is soaked through as his ice patch job struggles to stay frozen, and he’s shaking badly enough for even Nya to notice, shooting him a concerned glance as the Police Chief thanks them. He drones on about safety measures and clean up and other things Cole wants him to shut up about so he can bundle Zane up in his arms and kiss and make it better.

Finally, once the conversation draws to a close and they can excuse themselves from the scene, they unconsciously box Zane in as they walk back to where the bounty is parked. The ramp is down and they surround him protectively as they trek up it. Zane still doesn’t hint that anything is wrong, the silence stretching over them tense as they wait for something to happen.

Nya lifts the bounty into the air, and still Zane doesn’t say anything as he pensively stares over the edge of the railing. Cole can’t stand it anymore, he turns around as the city disappears beneath the clouds, “Zane-” he starts.

“Cole.” Zane gasps, grabbing at Coles shoulders as his knees buckle, the calm mask cracking down the middle as he collapses. Like on the pavement before, Zane clenches his hands and bunches Coles gi in his fingers. Cole, startled, grabs Zanes waist- he gasps and whimpers, and cold fear snaps across Cole's mind. He’s never heard Zane make that noise before.

“Not there,” he shakes his head, Cole moves his hands up to cup under Zanes armpits, and while he doesn’t seem to be happy he doesn’t make that awful whimper again.

Jay and Kai are at his side, fluttering their hands in a panic. They want to help but Zanes reaction makes them reluctant to put their hands on him.

“How can we help? What’s hurt?” Jay asks as Cole pulls Zane closer, pressing them together to help stabilize him.

Zane doesn’t attempt to stand on his own, “Shut me down,” He pants, “It’s- the hammer. He broke my spine.”

Jay pales dramatically, weaseling between the two of them to gain access to Zanes chest compartment. He pried it open quickly, reaching it with practiced ease and resting his finger on the switch off button.

He hesitates, under normal circumstances Jay was to never use this button, “Are you sure?”

“Jay.” Zane stresses each letter, and tears spill over his eyes.

He goes limp- again- as Jay pushes the button, his forced shutdown stealing the iron grip from his hands and the tension from his body. He ragdolls in coles arms, slumping bonelessly into his chest. With no ice to keep him stable, Coles can feel the way his body- it’s… it’s not quite right, the break in his spine sending intense warning siglas to coles head where he’s laid against him. The same bone deep wrongness he’s felt once, in dance class when he was 12, and a girl landed wrong doing a complex dance move and her hand had twisted the wrong way- it’d made him sick, seeing the new bend in her wrist where there wasn’t supposed to be one. It makes him feel sick to carry Zane down to the garage when the dock at the monastery, legs trailing behind him and waist a little too loose where the rigid metal casing was snapped.

Jay's prognosis is, “It’s better than It could have been.” Which is not reassuring to Cole, but Nya seems to lose a bit of tension at.

Zane's artificial spine worked much like Cole or Kais, a bundle of ‘nerves’ and wires and other tubes strung through it to keep it safe. The blow had broken through the outer protective metal but the main cord and delicate wiring was largely unharmed. A few pinched and torn wires, mostly- Zane's ice brace kept the wound from deteriorating drastically. Jay wouldn’t comment on how much pain an injury like this would heap onto their friend, but Cole remembers the way the blood had drained from his face at Zanes confession.

“The fact that he could even move…” He mutters to Nya in awe, delicately and oh so gently maneuvering wires. Nya nodded, mute.

Once their repairs reach completion it’s nearly dark out, Jay flips the on switch back up, and they wait for Zane to turn on.

He wakes up with wet eyes, a few stray tears slipping down his face as the leftover pain signals work their way out of his system. He twists over the edge of the table, looking for relief from the hazy pain, nearly taking himself to the floor if not for Coles gentle hands steadying him.

He clutches at Cole again with a low sound of pain, and slowly his eyes clear.

Cole holds him as Zane buries his face in the soft of his gi top, hiding his eyes against Cole's collarbone. Kai moves in and starts to pet his hair soothingly, warmth spreading through his hands.

“You should have said something.” Cole murmurs, “This wasn’t a loose tube or a scrape, this isn’t something you should have powered through. You should have stayed down.” Cole doesn’t dwell on how much it must have hurt for Zane to get back on his feet, and how if he hadn’t the grunts knife would have struck home.

“I could not.” Zane breathes, pulling a way to readjust so he’s resting his cheek against Cole and his face is bare, “If the SOG knew they had hurt me-”

“We would have dealt with it just fine.” Kai says firmly, “Zane, this- you can’t hide an injury that bad. Watching you collapse, knowing how badly you were in pain…” He can’t finish his sentence, huddling closer and clutching at both his boys.

“I apologize,” Zane mutters, his eyelids flutter.

“We can discuss this tomorrow.” Cole says gently, “But I think we’re all exhausted. Let’s go to bed.”

Kai looks like he wants to say something else, but Zanes dazed and sleepy expression makes the words die on his tongue. He runs a hand through his hair, and Cole watches the weight of the day fully settle on his boyfriend's shoulders, “...Yeah, that sounds good to me.”

Cole carries Zane up to bed, Kai immediately taking up a spot at their boys' side. Zane curls into the warmth of Kais embrace as Cole turns out the light and crawls in behind him. Cole cuddles into Zane, who’s already asleep again, and idly traces the near imperceptible scar on his back where the hammer had split metal.

He stares into the patch of darkness where Zanes head is, and thinks about Zane lying prone on the pavement. He pulls him closer, wraps him up in his arms and holds on tight.

He closes his eyes, and sleep doesn’t hesitate to come.

[makoblue]

Sparks fly from screeching metal against metal, Roche's new blade already chipping away at the dark patina to Cloud's Buster sword. It's been ground down to a wicked edge with steady but firm strokes against the grit of a whetstone and the easy glide of filtered water, factory edges were always leaving him rather wanting.

"Like it? Not really my style, but-" he admits, putting on more pressure and forcing them to spin in place, Roche's height advantage leading the blonde by the nose during their fight.

"-made me think about you, Spitfire."

A manic grin that all teeth and impulse at the wheel, but he employs the barest modicum of self-control. Wouldn't want to put an end to their little tryst so quickly.

Cocking his head to the side, his eyes sear a slow and heavy trail down the length of Strife's body, his figure's svelte and tightly compacted muscle, snake-like in that steel was deceptively masked by a smooth and supple layer of healthy skin. He was built for speed along with power, which is exactly Roche's type.

When Cloud jumps back he knows what's coming, just narrowly evading that massive slab of alloy chopping a limb clean off. The concrete shatters where he had been standing, Roche having spun out of the way and was currently using his momentum come in hot and slide an arm around his partner's waist.

He throws his head back and laughs, peals of it echoing off of scrap steel and rumbling through his broad chest. Leaning back and stabilizing himself against his left leg as it pivots, he forces Cloud into a kind of reverse dip, his smaller frame having nowhere to go but against Gallo's larger torso.

"You love it when I punch your dance card, don't you? Do I make your engine roar, baby?" he purrs, smirking as the blonde struggles to regain his footing. Cloud looks like he's ready to drop the sword and just strangle him to death.

Good.

"Keep those baby-blues on me, Gorgeous. Only me," he murmurs into blonde's neck, lips pulling back into another rakish smile before giving the lobe of Cloud's ear a gentle tug with his teeth.

Cloud wants to believe that Roche’s incessant flirting is part of a grand strategy to disarm him in some way. As far as strategies go, it’s not a terrible one. Use pure shock value to catch your opponent off guard, then cut him down when he’s distracted. Or most likely, Roche must have an insatiable urge to run his mouth. Just like Cloud has an insatiable urge to gouge out the other man’s eyes when he realizes that Roche is not in fact assessing him, but undressing him with his eyes.

“Don’t. Normal people use magazines or some shit,” Cloud growls. He leans his weight back on his heels into a spin that comes up too slow: the battered edge of the Buster Sword catches only concrete. Worse still, the wide arc that his sword cuts into the air leaves him wide open. Not enough time to recover or stop the momentum of his own swing–

No, no no—!

Contact.

Winded, a lovely epithet cursing Roche’s ancestors dies on his lips. In fact, the ability to string together a coherent sentence becomes an altogether impossible task when he feels the SOLDIER’s breath gust hotly against his neck.

Motor oil and musk, the exact shade of blue of his eyes, the prickle of goatee against his skin; all in the span of a few seconds. Too many details. Way too many.

Cloud can barely feel the muscles in his own face other than the heated mask of a blush that stretches from his cheeks all the way down past his neck. The Buster Sword slips from his hands and drops to the asphalt like a two-ton weight in favor of allowing Cloud to scramble upright and make a straight lunge for Roche’s throat. 

“Shut up shut upshutup!”

[lookforanewangle]

hold on a little longer || spn || 2k || ao3

tags: blood, injury, broken bones, hurt/comfort, and forehead touches! also protective dean and protective cas

Between the spells, and the warding, and the combination of grace and Rowena's power, they thought they had been prepared.

Chuck, however, always seemed to be one step ahead of them.

or, Cas's grace is dwindling, Dean is dying, and both of them are too protective of the other for their own good.

a/n: inspired by this post by @letsboldlygomotherfuckers and @rainbowscas

also, I’m also playing in my hci verse here a little bit; all you need to know is that chuck turns to this universe after the show's canon (and yes, I believe in the chuck won theory, it's the only thing that makes sense), and tries to mix things up a bit. cas is introduced when dean is 13 instead of 28? 29? there are a lot of other changes, but those don't play into this scene, so I'm not gonna spoil anything else ;) this bit wouldn't come in until fic four or five anyway. idk if I'll ever write that far, but here's hoping!! (fic one is like.....a little over halfway done. I think. we have a long way to go lmao)

Between the spells, and the warding, and the combination of grace and Rowena's power, they thought they had been prepared.

Chuck, however, always seemed to be one step ahead of them.

"How?" Cas bites between waves of pain, arms bound tight behind him. There's blood dripping down his face, a shoulder dislocated, maybe a rib cracked, but his pain is nothing close to what Dean must be feeling.

Dean, who is just a mess of broken bones and skin on the floor.

“Because, see, I already know what’s going to happen,” Chuck says, pacing leisurely around them, tilting down towards Dean's unconscious form as he speaks. His footsteps are quiet in the vast emptiness of the warehouse, but each step seems to pound in time with Cas’s own injuries, pain driving higher at each step. For all Cas knows, Chuck could be doing that on purpose.

“Your brother will come racing in to save you,” Chuck continues, gesturing as he speaks, “and Jack will be there, too. They’ll make some valiant effort to save the two of you, try to beat me at my own game, but it’s not going to work. I’ve written every possibility, every scenario that could ever happen. Each one, I win. It's literally impossible for me to lose!” he says with a giddy grin, arms spreading out to his sides in victory.

Cas strains against his bonds, wrists tied much too tightly against the small of his back, eyes never leaving Dean’s too-still form on the floor.

“Dean,” Cas calls, but Dean doesn’t stir. His limbs are bent at awkward angles, the whole of him a heap atop blood splattered across the ground. Too much blood. Cas would almost think he was dead if not for the wheezing emanating from Dean’s chest at every shallow breath, every minuscule rise and fall. If he could just get close enough—

Chuck’s fist hits his face, and Cas crashes to the ground with a grunt.

“I never did get you figured out,” Chuck says, crouching in front of him. He tilts his head as he observes Cas struggle back into a sitting position. “Whatever changed, whatever you did in the last universe bled over into this one, and now we’re at the same end here as we were there. Well, almost. Close enough, anyway. You, grace failing and doing everything you can to save Dean, nearing death at every second. Dean will follow soon after, no matter what you do,” Chuck says with a helpless shrug. “It’s just how it’s supposed to go. Then again, if you hadn’t broken script…”

He trails off suggestively, and Cas’s blood runs cold. No. No. Dean’s coming death couldn’t— wouldn’t— be his fault.

“Dean’s not dying today,” Cas says, determined, voice gravelly.

“That’s not up to you,” Chuck counters. He reaches his hand out towards Cas and squeezes. Cas’s chest constricts in pain. He gasps, doubling over, feeling his grace ebbing further and further from his reach.

“Dean was always meant to die,” Chuck says, slowly twisting his wrist. Cas cries out in pain, tucking his head towards his chest, trying and failing to pull away from the pain radiating through every cell. “Even if you hadn’t saved him all those times, he still would have gone out in that stupid blaze of glory he was always glorifying.”

Chuck releases his grip on Cas’s grace. Cas goes limp with a gasp, limbs weak and trembling. Chuck hums.

“Wish I could just kill you now,” he says glumly. “But of all the drafts, killing you and Dean slowly in front of Sam and Jack is just...so much juicier. The pain is so much more intense when you make them watch. Especially if you're first. Dean watching you die just never gets old,” he says, fond smile on his face.

Cas wants to throw up.

“Well, then!” Chuck says with a sigh, eyebrows raised. He slaps his thighs and pushes to his feet, turning towards the entrance. “I’ll be back in, oh, however long it takes for Sam and Jack to show up. Depends on how they decided to travel here. There’s six different drafts just for their transportation. So, you know, don’t go anywhere,” Chuck calls over his shoulder with a wink. He snaps his fingers. Cas screams as his shin shatters. The door slams behind him and the sound reverberates through the warehouse, thunderous in Cas’s ears.

Cas takes a moment to get his ragged breathing under control, fighting down the little amount of grace he has left. He can’t let himself heal. He has to get to Dean first.

Dean is not dying tonight.

Cas grits his teeth against the pain, rolling over onto his stomach. He clenches his fingers in their binds and squeezes tight as he uses his good leg to push himself across the concrete towards Dean, biting back a cry as his leg is jostled. His brow furrows and he pushes on, refusing to let the pain get in his way.

“Dean,” he calls out as he draws near, desperate to hear his voice.

Dean doesn’t answer.

Cas pushes the final few feet and rolls to his side, heaving for air. He tugs at his bonds again, but until he’s able to heal his leg there’s no way he’s breaking out of the enchanted chains tying him back. He lets his eyes slip closed and leans forward, pressing his forehead gingerly against Dean’s bloody brow. He channels any scrap of grace he has left through that connection, hoping with everything he’s got that he reached him in time. Broken bones will heal on their own; he focuses his energy towards anything vital—damaged organs, severe trauma around his skull, and whatever else he can heal, remaining grace and breath leaving him in a rush. Dean’s wheezing has gone away at least, his breath steady and sure, and Cas sags, exhausted.

“Dean,” he whispers, voice weak. He pushes his brow against Dean’s forehead just enough to feel the pressure. He doesn’t have the strength for much else. “Dean. Please.”

Dean stirs slowly, and Cas fights with everything in him to stay awake. He has to make sure—

“Cas?” Dean breathes. Dean is still coming to, but Cas can feel darkness seeping in at the edges of his own consciousness, startling him back into awareness. Not yet, he begs desperately, blinking hard. Please not yet.

“Dean,” Cas answers, his voice so weak he’s not even sure that Dean heard it. Dean shifts against him. Cas concentrates on breathing through the pain, waiting for Dean to realize—

Dean inhales sharply and curses under his breath.

Cas is beginning to drift again, but he can hear Dean scramble into a sitting position, grunting against some pain Cas’s dwindling grace couldn’t reach. But he’s alive, Cas reassures himself in relief as the darkness grips him tighter. He’s still alive.

For how much longer, he can’t guarantee, but just for now is good enough.

Dean grabs his face between his palms then, fingers holding him steady, squeezing gently. Cas's eyelids flutter, exhaustion dragging at his limbs.

“No no no, hey,” Dean says in a rush, words quiet. Cas can hear the desperation in every syllable. “Come on, Cas, stay with me, man.”

Cas grunts softly in response.

“‘M here,” he rasps. Dean sighs, tipping forward to press their foreheads together.

“Okay,” Dean says under his breath, thumb swiping across Cas’s cheek. Cas is almost certain that was more for Dean than himself, reassuring himself that Cas was alive. Cas wants to reach up and grab him, intertwine their fingers, and assure Dean that he’ll be all right. But everything hurts, it’s difficult to breathe, and he’s not going to be awake for much longer; draining his grace like that wiped him out. Survivable, but dreadfully exhausting.

“Okay,” Dean says again, firm, shifting to move Cas, “let’s get you up.”

White hot pain explodes as Dean brushes against his leg, ricocheting into every other pain across his vessel. His back arches as he shouts, eyes clenching tight, teeth clenching.

“Ngh! Don’t—”

“Okay, okay,” Dean says, voice pained as he changes direction, lifting Cas's head into his lap. He settles and slides a hand into Cas's hair, brushing through slow and careful as he scans him for injuries. Cas is sure his leg is a mess, but the other injuries aren’t as obvious. Cas gasps, breaths shuddering in and out of his chest as he sags, the pain dulling back from the sharp flares at being moved.

“Are...are you all right?” Cas says as the pain fades to the background, eyes slipping closed as he rolls his head against Dean’s thigh towards his stomach. Dean barks a laugh, disbelieving, and shifts the hand in his hair to cup his face.

“Am I all right? Cas, you’re a mess.”

“Are you all right,” Cas repeats, straining through the tightness of his chest. He opens his eyes to look Dean over, searching for any sign that he's lying.

"Yeah," Dean says quietly, sobering as he meets his gaze. He swipes a thumb across Cas's cheek, eyes flicking back and forth across Cas's features. "Yeah I'll live, no thanks to you."

Cas exhales, breath rushing out in relief.

"Good," he whispers. "Good."

They sit like that for a moment and just breathe, pipes clanging in the distance. Cas shifts uncomfortably, arms pinned beneath him.

"Gotta get you up, Cas," Dean murmurs, apologetic, and slowly tugs Cas up and into his arms. Cas fights back a cry as he's shifted, Dean apologizing softly as he goes. Once up, Cas's head lolls against Dean's shoulder. He exhales slowly through his teeth, pushing the pain down and away as best he can. Dean presses a gentle kiss to his hair and turns his attention to Cas's wrists. He tugs at the bindings single-handed, his other arm holding Cas to him. He grunts in frustration as the chains only tighten at his efforts, Cas tensing in his arms. He shifts his hand to Cas's back, rubbing his hand up and down Cas's spine soothingly.

"We're gonna get you out of here, okay? We're gonna make it, Cas," Dean promises. "You hearing me?"

"Yes, Dean," Cas breathes. Everything hurts.

"Just, don't—" Dean takes an unsteady breath, fingers tightening on Cas's shoulder. He buries his face in Cas’s hair, eyes squeezed shut in agony. His voice is hoarse. "Don't you leave me again, Cas. Please. I can't...I can't go through that again. One more time and I'm done. I'm just done."

"Dean—"

"You don't have any idea, man," Dean whispers. "You have no idea what you do to me every time you leave. If I have to go through that again, I—"

He cuts off with a shuddering exhale. Cas's chest aches.

"Dean," he whispers, breathless. He presses his crown to Dean's throat. Dean tips his cheek against Cas's hair and sighs deep. Sam had told Cas in not so many words how hard Dean took each of his deaths and disappearances, but to hear it from Dean himself hurts Cas worse than any physical injury.

"I'm not leaving," Cas promises, voice weak from pain. He's fading again, clinging to consciousness with a death grip. He has to make sure Dean understands. "If we can...can defeat Chuck, I'm not leaving, Dean."

Dean's arm tightens around his back.

"I'm not leaving," Cas whispers again. "I-I want…I want nothing more than to stay by your side."

Dean shudders.

"Cas," he breathes. "I—"

A door bangs open somewhere in the warehouse. The two of them tense, breaths frozen. Dean scans the room for his gun, reaching out with his foot to pull it towards them. Once in his grasp, he pulls it to his lips, murmuring something against the metal, and aims it towards the sound, cocked and ready.

"Dean," Cas starts, but Dean shushes him, pulling him closer.

"We're gonna be fine," he says, reassuring. His eyes are steely as he waits, hand steady on the gun. "I'm not letting him take you away from me.

"Never again."

----

tagging some mutuals who may be interested!! @hashtagbravo @demenior @redriotted @leviathancas @starrynightdeancas

[farrah-fowler]

read to me? {j.m. x reader}

summary: jess and y/n spend a perfect day together

warnings: none

pairings: jess mariano x fem!reader

word count: 0.8k

{lowercase is intended}

A/N: this is my first jess fic! honestly i think this is my best writing so enjoy! (taglist for all writing is open)

{MASTERLIST}

soft golden light filtered into luke's apartment from the large window in the living room. yellow and orange leaves rustled on the trees outside as the wind shook them gently. cars and people went by without a care in the world, enjoying the beautiful and blustery autumn day. y/n sat in the window, watching people go about their day. she felt the chill of the wind through the window and the setting sun dusted a diluted warmth over her nose. she looked over at her boyfriend, missing the warmth on her face. he was laying on the sofa, reading a book he had read maybe a dozen times before. the autumn sun highlighted his features in such a way that it made him look like a statue in a museum made of glass at sunset. she could’ve sworn that her breath was knocked out of her lungs (no doubt carried down the street with stray leaves and scraps of papers) when she saw him.

“i heard taking a picture lasts longer,” jess mumbled while his eyes lazily scanned the page of his book. “what are you doing?”

“just watching,” y/n replied, resting her head against the cool glass window. “it’s such a pretty day today.”

jess turned his head to look at her. his heart skipped a beat at the sight. her figure was draped with one of his sweaters that was much too large for her body. the golden hue put a spotlight on her, making her look more angelic than jess had ever seen her. dust particles floated through the air and swirled around her like snowflakes on a winters day. he could hear a hint of longing in her voice as she looked out of the window. “we can go out there if you want to.”

y/n’s face lit up with joy, her smile shining brighter than the sun. “really?”

jess nodded. a smile matching hers fell on his face. “yeah, come on.”

she quickly scrambled off of the seat and got her shoes. she grabbed a blanket, well attempted to anyway, from the top shelf of the closet before jess came up behind her. he rested a hand on y/n’s hip as he reached up and got the blanket off of the shelf for her. handing her the blanket, he pressed a kiss to the tip of her nose. y/n blushed, hiding her face in the picnic blanket. she reached her hand out for him to take, smiling brightly when he placed his hand in hers. “let’s go.”

jess led her out of the apartment and through the diner. they both said hello to luke before jess pulled y/n out of the door and to the town square. y/n smiled as the cold wind brushed her nose and the weak warmth of the sun ghosted over her forehead. jess took the blanket from her and laid it on top of the almost dead grass next to a large oak tree. he sat down and leaned against the trunk of the old tree.

“come here,” he said, motioning for y/n to come sit next to him. she plopped down next to him, giggling slightly as the wind pushed her hair around.

“it’s so nice out,” y/n mumbled. she rested her head on his shoulder and sighed contently. “read to me?”

jess nodded and opened the small book. he flipped to the page he left off. the page had small notes and was worn from several reads. she watched as he traced the lines of the page. his voice was soft and gentle as he told the tale of the fictional characters. y/n shifted her attention to around the town.

she felt peace wash over her while listening to jess’s voice and watching her beloved neighbors go about their days. kids down the way were trying to build a leaf pile, their giggles echoing through the square. y/n laughed quietly when a little boy did a cannon ball into the leaf pile earning squeals of frustration from the other kids.

“what’s so funny?” jess asked. he pressed a kiss to the top of her head before looking in the same direction as her. he was met with the little kids throwing leaves at the young boy who jumped in the pile. orange and yellow leaves fell from the sky, showering the kids like a midnight thunderstorm.

“those kids,” y/n replied. she reached for his hand and played with his fingers softly. she relished in the contact between the two, her head on his shoulder, his hand in hers. the autumn sun and the soft wind was the cherry on top of the ideal afternoon. it was perfect. “thank you, jess.”

“for what?” jess asked. he grinned at the way she fiddled with his fingers.

“for this,” y/n motioned to the autumnal scenery around her. “i love just being here with you and spending time with you.”

“oh,” jess said quietly. he had never had someone express that they like spending time with him the way y/n had. it had thrown him off his rhythm for a split second before he regained his composure. “no need to say thank you, y/n. i’ll do this anytime, any weather.”

“really?”

“really."

✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

taglist for all works: (open)

[janeofcakes]

Soulmates: How John Met Sherlock...Again Chapter 6

Sorry I'm late this time, my friends. I had a busy weekend and have now fallen victim to the blasted cold that's been making its way through my family. I don't seem to have it as badly as my husband did, thank goodness. I'm going to post and answer some comments, so if you get one from me that sounds a little bizarre, it's the cold medicine. Lol.

---

Monday morning is a busy one at 221B. Greg calls with a case in the middle of breakfast that has Sherlock scrambling to conscript Mrs. Hudson into taking Olive to school. He places his daughter’s lunch on the kitchen table next to her backpack and throws on his coat. Tipping down to kiss Olive on the cheek, he whispers I love you and have a good day. With that, Sherlock grabs a piece of toast and rushes from the room.

Olive sits at attention, the adrenaline of watching her father hurry around the room still in her veins, but it wanes as soon as she hears the click of the flat door. She lets out a long sigh and slouches a little into her chair. After the bits and pieces she had observed at Mycroft’s birthday party, she was even more curious about Gracie’s dad than when they left the park on Saturday. Something was off. John had absolutely no problem with her or her father until he met him, but had he only just met Sherlock two days ago? Olive isn’t so sure, especially after the way her uncles acted yesterday when she brought up the playdate refusal.

Olive raises her fork and chews on the eggs thoughtfully. Her father had been extremely irritated yesterday, in spite of trying to hide it, and Uncle Myc was definitely the cause. She has seen them argue before, of course. Perhaps heard is the better word. They avoid it when she is in the room and Uncle Greg usually distracts her somehow. Every so often, curiosity gets the better of her and she sneaks away from Greg to listen. Her father doesn’t seem to have ever gotten on well with his brother. Olive used to wonder if that is why she has no brothers or sisters, but dismissed the idea when she was five. She likes that it’s just her and her dad. The two of them against the world. Olive smiles to herself. Now she has Gracie too.

With that thought, Olive’s mind turns back to John. She had planned on cleverly asking Sherlock questions about him over breakfast and had even started working their conversation in that direction, but then Uncle Greg had phoned. To make matters worse, Mrs. Hudson will get her to school later than usual, effectively robbing her of all the time she has to talk to Gracie before classes start.

Olive grumbles around another bite, cursing the fact that she has to wait until lunch and that’s when inspiration strikes. Their class has library time at 10:30. She and Gracie can go to the computers, but search up John instead of books. Maybe if they know more about his past they can figure out how their fathers know each other because Olive is convinced they do.

Olive is just beginning to determine how best to communicate this to Gracie before library time when the door to the flat opens.

“Yoohoo,” calls Mrs. Hudson pleasantly, “Are you ready, dear? We really must be on our way.”

Olive glances at the clock to see how much time got away from her. Too much. She hops up and places her empty dishes in the sink. Pulling on her coat, she grabs her bag and lunch. Mrs. Hudson is smiling brightly as Olive runs down the hall.

“Good morning, Mrs. H,” Olive breathes as they hug one another tightly.

“Good morning, my darling,” Mrs. Hudson laughs warmly. “I take it Uncle Mycroft’s birthday was a success?”

“Yep,” Olive pops the P as she pulls away to look at her with twinkling eyes. “The cake was delicious. Thanks for the recipe.”

“My pleasure, dear,” Mrs. Hudson waves a hand as they pass through the door. She pulls it closed as Olive starts down the stairs. “And his presents?”

“He loved them,” Olive grins back at the older woman. “We pinned the donkey eight times and I won the most times.”

“Did you? That’s wonderful,” Mrs. Hudson chuckles to herself as she catches up with Olive in the foyer. “I’d give my good hip to see your uncle playing a party game. Must be Gregory’s influence.”

The mention of her other uncle jogs Olive’s memory and she turns, her face filling with glee, as she swings open the door to the building. Mrs. Hudson pauses in front of her, excitement already growing at just the look on Olive’s face.

“Uncle Greg asked Uncle Myc to marry him!” the girl all but shouts, throwing her arms in the air.

“Oh my goodness, that’s wonderful,” Mrs. Hudson clasps her hands together at her chin. “I always knew we’d find one for your uncle. Now we just need to find someone for your father.”

“Yeah!” Olive exclaims before she really considers Mrs. Hudson’s words. She frowns as they walk outside and down the steps to the pavement. They cross to the sleek black car waiting for them. The driver greets them as he opens the back door and they are soon on their way. All the while, one question rattles around in Olive’s mind.

“Do we?” she asks after the car has started moving. She slides her eyes to Mrs. Hudson, who looks at her inquisitively. “Do we want to find someone for Dad?”

Olive swallows loudly in the silence that follows. Mrs. Hudson’s face does not change, she merely tilts her head to the right as she considers. It doesn’t make Olive feel like she has asked something bad, but it was definitely unexpected.

“I mean, it’s always been the two of us,” Olive ventures with some uncertainty, “and things are good. Why add someone else?”

“Don’t you want your father to be happy?” Mrs. Hudson asks and Olive frowns mightily, clutching her bag to her chest tightly.

“He is happy,” the girl mutters defiantly.

 “Oh, of course he is. That’s not what I meant, sweetie,” Mrs. Hudson reaches for her arm and touches it gently. Still glowering, Olive raises her grey eyes to meet the older woman’s soft brown gaze. “Your father loves you dearly and he is certainly very happy. It’s just that his heart has so much love to give and it’s a different kind of love. Like the kind Mycroft shares with Greg. I call it romantic love.”

“Romantic love?” Olive raises a skeptical brow, tiny wrinkles forming on the bridge of her nose.

“Yes,” Mrs. Hudson continues in a solemn tone. “You will feel it too one day when you meet a boy or girl you want to spend your whole life with, to kiss and hug.”

“Like on the mouth?” Olive asks, straightening her spine a bit and pulling her head back. Mrs. Hudson nods with a little smile. “Like Anna and Kristoff?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Hudson laughs. “Just like that. Like Mycroft and Greg.”

Olive’s expression becomes very serious. She shakes her head and releases the vice grip hold on her bag.

“Uncle Myc and Uncle Greg are nothing like Anna and Kristoff,” she says flatly. “They’re more like that older one. Beauty and the Beast.”

“Ha!” Mrs. Hudson crows, throwing up her hands. “I won’t even ask which one’s the beast.”

Olive grins mischievously and ducks her head, laughing with the older woman. The car stops outside the school as their merriment dies down. Mrs. Hudson puts her hand on Olive’s before she moves to leave the car.

“Know that having someone in your father’s life will never make him love you less,” she tells the girl tenderly. “There’s nothing on earth that could ever do that.”

“I know,” Olive says with a grin. She dives for her godmother and gives her a big hug as the first bell rings. 

“Oh no. Hurry, dear, get to class,” Mrs. Hudson shoos her toward the door. “Sherlock will never forgive me if you’re late.”

“Thanks, Mrs. H,” Olive says, popping open the door. She runs for the three-story school building and is inside in minutes.

***

“So we are up to the number five in our multiplication table,” Mrs. Jennings finishes writing a large five next to a line of smaller numbers running from one to nine. She turns to face the class as she explains. Gracie is watching intently like most of the other kids, but Olive’s head is down while she scribbles on a scrap of paper. “As you know, these numbers are basically how many times five is added to itself, but there’s a secret to the number five that makes it one of the easiest to multiply. Start moving along the number line, writing your answers on paper and raise your hand when you know what the secret is.”

Heads go down as everyone begins working through the equations. Just as Gracie jots down twenty-five, she notices a folded scrap of paper on the desk between she and Olive, who is watching out of the corner of her eye. Gracie glances to the side and up to the whiteboard where Mrs. Jennings is slowly walking from side to side to make sure everyone is on task. Gracie licks her lips, leaving just the tip of her tongue poking out as she casually covers the scrap with her palm and slides it close. With the paper on her notebook where it can blend in with her work, she unfolds it and peers at Olive’s writing.

Your dad doesn’t like my dad.

Gracie blinks and furrows one brow while simultaneously cocking the other one. She nearly turns to look at Olive to ask an incredulous ‘What’ with her face, but resists the urge and scratches out a quick response instead. Folding the paper in half and sliding it back to the middle of the desk, Gracie raises her eyes to the front of the room again.

“All right. Who knows the secret?” Mrs. Jennings breaks the silence. “Teri?”

“You start with five and basically count by fives all the way up the line,” the girl answers from her seat in the second row. The pencil in her right hand is poised to write while the index finger of her left hand winds her long red hair around itself. Gracie watches knowingly at the nervous tell. It is just one of the many keys to observation Olive has taught her.

“Perfect. So why don’t we do that together, and remember to write it down as we go,” Mrs. Jennings moves to the whiteboard to write as well.

“Five, ten,” Teri begins and the rest of the class starts in with her until they reach forty-five. 

“And there is our multiplication table for the number five,” Mrs. Jennings remarks and turns back to the class. “Does everyone see how we got that?”

Heads are bobbing up and down when Gracie notices the scrap of paper again. She slips her hand over it and moves it close.

“Good,” Mrs. Jennings is saying. “Let’s move on to number six. Write out the number line with six as your common denominator.”

Gracie quickly does this, if a little messily, and opens the note. Olive’s words are clearly printed under Gracie’s own message.

(Gracie) He just met him.

(Olive) But he doesn’t like him.

Gracie frowns and glances at Olive, who is staring straight ahead at Mrs. Jennings so as not to give them away. Gracie underlines her previous statement and slides the paper back toward Olive. It is back on her side of the desk in no time.

There’s something going on though. He kept looking at Dad like he’d seen him before and he freaked out about a playdate at mine.

Gracie glances in Olive’s direction, wondering how she wrote all of that so quickly. Getting a little irritated by the accusation, she writes hastily in a jerky script.

He didn’t freak out.

She passes it back.

“Good job, Michael,” Mrs. Jennings interrupts Gracie’s train of thought. “Now, what is six times four?”

Gracie quickly scrawls twenty-four in her notebook and looks up to see the note again. She huffs quietly at Olive’s words.

I don’t think he wants to come to my flat. 

Gracie is about to pen a disgruntled response when Mrs. Jennings calls on her. Apparently, her frustration is more evident than she realized.

“Doing okay, Grace?” the teacher asks. “Are you having any trouble?”

“No, Mrs. Jennings,” Gracie answers respectfully. Mrs. Jennings nods and then asks Gracie for the answer, which she gives succinctly. 

“Yes, Grace. Excellent work,” Mrs. Jennings commends her. “Six times four is the same as adding six to itself four times.Does that make sense to everyone?”

Gracie scribbles ‘That’s ridiculous,’ beneath all the other messages. The scrap is getting full now, but her two-word response fits in the space perfectly. She pushes the paper away and starts writing the table for seven. Olive’s reply awaits her when she is finished.

No, it’s not. They obviously have a history.

Gracie grumbles deep in her throat and pointedly underlines ‘He just met him.’ again as Olive watches. The little blonde adds an exclamation point and looks at her friend smugly. Olive purses her lips, turns the scrap over and begins writing feverishly. ‘They KNOW each other.’

Gracie rolls her eyes and tears her own corner from her notebook. She writes quickly and shoves it at Olive, who reads it immediately.

Wait til library time.

Olive looks to her friend and gives a shallow nod right as Mrs. Jennings calls on her.

“Do you have an answer, Olivia?”

“Thirty-two,” Olive says smoothly, directing her eyes to their teacher.

Gracie’s eyes go wide and she looks at her friend’s notebook as their teacher compliments her work. Olive has already written the number line for eight. Gracie is a line behind, in spite of being sure that she was paying attention while reading and writing the last few notes. Thank god Mrs. Jennings had not called on her.

Gracie looks at Olive’s now smug face and blows out a breath that ruffles her bangs. How does Olive do it? It’s like she has two separate brains sometimes. The girls exchange a smile and return their attention to the white board, each one anxiously anticipating the day’s special.

***

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Gracie whispers from her seat across the table, leaning forward for emphasis. After what seemed like days, but was only an hour, their class had lined up and walked to the library. Gracie and Olive immediately went to their usual table where Olive presented all of her evidence, as she called it, that proved their fathers had known each other before meeting in the park. She pointed out everything from eyes widening slightly to changes in tone and bloody shuffling of feet. She noticed Gracie’s dad curling his left hand into a fist, which Gracie has never once seen him do. How did that mean he actually knew Sherlock already and how on earth did Olive notice all these things?

“It makes perfect sense,” Olive insists, her neck craned toward Gracie. She had hunched over, pressing her chest and arms to the table side as soon as she began laying out her analysis. It is her position of choice for intense conversation and plotting. “Just look at all the clues. There’s no other explanation.”

“There are plenty of explanations,” Gracie counters. “Maybe your dad reminds mine of someone.”

“And yours reminds mine too?” Olive barely contains a bark. “Nonsense. No such thing as coincidence.”

“If they know each other, why wouldn’t they just say so?” Gracie throws her hands up as far as she dares in this setting.

“Adults have secrets, Gracie,” Olive mutters in a low voice. “Just like we do. There’s something they don’t want us to know.”

“Like what? They robbed a bank together?” Gracie snorts quietly. “No. I’m sorry, Olive. I can’t believe it. My dad never met Sherlock Holmes before we met you in the park.”

Gracie’s words slow as she reaches the end of the sentence. Olive starts in on trying to convince her, but her voice fades into the background. Things click inside Gracie’s head and for the first time since the conversation began, it all makes sense. Or doesn’t, as the case may be. If her father knew Sherlock, why wouldn’t he just tell her? Why keep it to himself? Gracie presses her lips together in thought. ‘You can have a playdate eventually. Just give me some time,’ he had said. Sherlock is obviously someone he had not expected to run into, but he must have been special to John at some point. Why else would he…

“Are you even listening?” Olive’s irritated tone suddenly breaks through Gracie’s thoughts. She blinks and looks at her friend with wide eyes. Olive huffs. “I’m not going to tell you all over again.”

Olive sits back in her chair, arms across her chest and a petulant look on her face. It only takes a second though before she reads Gracie’s expression and leans in again. Her grey-blue eyes shift rapidly between Gracie’s and she cocks her head slightly in consideration.

“What is it?” her voice is low and brimming with excitement.

“They do know each other,” Gracie breathes, “and they must have liked each other a lot.”

“Why? Why?” Olive can barely stay in her seat and she struggles to keep her voice down. “What is it?!”

Gracie wets her lips, her eyes darting to the right and left, as she leans close.

“My middle name is Holmes,” she tells her friend quietly. 

“What?” Olive gasps in a hushed voice. Then her face swiftly morphs into irritation. “And you’re only just NOW mentioning this?”

The librarian shushes her from across the room instantly and Olive looks at her apologetically. When her focus is back on Gracie again, her expression is less disgruntled and more eager. Still, Gracie starts in right away, wanting to beat her to the punch. 

“It was that first day with Jones and everything in the lunchroom,” she says in a rush. “She kept calling you Holmes and I thought she meant me at first. It was so weird, but I got distracted with hitting her and just sort of forgot about it.”

Gracie stops and watches Olive for a moment. The pieces are clearly falling into place for her too as she stares back with wide, luminous eyes. Her lips are shaped into a perfect O, but she hasn’t made a sound yet. Gracie hops a little in her chair, skooching forward to its edge and placing her hands flat on the table.

“Why would Dad name me Grace Holmes Watson if your dad wasn’t important to him?” Gracie takes in a quick breath when Olive gasps loudly, her hands flying to cover her mouth.

The librarian shushes them again and Gracie smiles a timid apology this time. She nods at the librarian’s silent warning, promising they will do better and then turns back to Olive. Her friend’s face is absolutely astonished, her eyes filled with shock and wonder. Olive knows something. Gracie’s words have pulled some key observation to the front of Olive’s mind and Gracie must know what it is. Now.

Gracie opens her mouth to speak, but Olive’s lips part first. Her voice comes out shaky with emotion.

“Olivia Watson Holmes,” is all she says.

Gracie’s eyes double in size and her face goes slack. They sit for a moment in utter silence, unmoving while the world slows to a stop around them. Gracie’s body is tingling and feels like it’s floating. It is almost too much to believe, like it can’t be real. Surely their fathers must have been best friends for them to name their daughters after each other. But then what happened? How did Gracie’s dad end up in Bath and why did he never mention Sherlock?

“Gracie?” Olive’s eyes are on Gracie when her own come back into focus. Their gazes meet and both brows crease with determination. They are of one mind. There is only one way to find the answers they want.

“Google,” they say together and rise from their chairs decisively, hands planted on the table to push them up.

Minutes later they are each seated in front of a desktop computer in the library lab. As luck would have it, they even got two next to each other and in a corner where their whispers are unlikely to bother anyone. Olive is scrolling through links to article after article from ten to twelve years earlier, all of them solved by Sherlock Holmes and John Watson. Meanwhile, Gracie does much the same, though she has just stumbled across a goldmine.

“I can’t believe this,” Olive murmurs in a breathy tone. “Look at all these cases. Your dad is the partner in his stories. Dad’s man, Friday. His conductor of light.”

“Oh my god,” Gracie mumbles in disbelief.

“What?” Olive crowds in next to her and reads the title of the blog on Gracie’s screen. “The Personal Blog of Dr. John H. Watson.”

“They’re all here,” Gracie’s voice sounds far away. She just can’t believe this is all real. “All of Dad’s bedtime stories. The Mayfly Man, The Hounds of Baskerville, The Deadly Tealights, A Study in Pink. Every last one, and more.”

“What do you mean?” Olive asks in a confused tone. “These are all Dad’s cases.”

“Our dads are Sam and Dean,” Gracie stares at the screen, selecting one of the links and scanning the page rapidly.

“Sam and Dean?” Olive furrows her brow. “What are you on about?”

“Remember I told you my dad has these mystery stories that he tells me at bedtime?” Gracie turns to look at her friend urgently. “Two guys named Sam and Dean solve them all. I always thought Dean sounded kind of like Dad, but…” Her voice fades away and she looks back at the screen. “He actually is.”

“Go back to the home page,” Olive says. Gracie complies and Olive points. “Look at this one. ‘My new flatmate.’.”

They both read quickly and then eyes meet, wide with shock.

“They were flatmates,” Gracie breathes, astonished.

“No way,” Olive mutters. “No wonder your dad doesn’t want to come to my flat.”

“Wait, wait,” Gracie clicks back and scrolls, not finding what she wants. “But what happened? Why did he move away?”

She clicks on different links and they both read as their library time ticks away. With only minutes to spare, both girls sit back in their chairs, completely overwhelmed with the knowledge they now possess.

“Dad faked his own death?” Olive is dumbfounded, her face slack with shock. “He never told me that story.”

“Dad got married and just stopped,” Gracie shakes her head in disappointment. “Your dad even wrote the blog about the wedding. I just… I don’t understand. Dad obviously loved what he was doing and with his best friend too. Why would he stop?”

“All right, everyone,” Mrs. Jennings calls from the stacks. “Line up and back to class.”

The girls close their searches after clearing the histories. Olive is always on about covering their tracks. They walk to the end of the line in defeat. Their investigation turned up more questions and confusion than answers. Standing in silent thought as they wait for the line to move, Gracie makes a decision. She has to have answers.

“I can’t not know,” she says sternly, determination bright in her blue eyes. “I’m going to ask Dad about it tonight.”

“What? No!” Olive grabs her arm and Gracie turns to glare. “We can’t just ask them about it. They won’t tell us anything.”

“Then how are we supposed to find out what happened?” Gracie growls with frustration. The line begins to move and she has to turn her back on Olive to walk.

“We’ll carry out our own investigation,” Olive says in her ear. “This is our case. Our first case.”

“I don’t know how to do that,” Gracie grumbles without so much as a glance backwards.

“I do,” Olive’s voice has some of its usual tenacity again. “I’ll teach you at lunch and we can talk to them tonight.”

“I don’t know,” Gracie replies hesitantly. “I’ve never done anything like this before. What if I’m no good at it?”

“Ha,” Olive huffs. “You’ll be a natural. Trust me.”

***

Gracie raises her eyes from the book propped on her chest where she lies on the couch. Lifting her chin just a bit gives her the perfect view of her father sitting in his chair with the day’s newspaper in his hands. At this point in the evening, he has it folded in half so she can easily see his face. Olive said that was of the utmost importance because Gracie will see what John doesn’t say.

Still not sure if she is ready for this, Gracie runs through the list of features to watch for. There are obvious ones like eyes and eyebrows, knee-jerk expressions that are schooled away, mouth movements. Olive went on for some time about how different ways of wetting one’s lips mean different things. Gracie had never realized there were distinctions. Then Olive went on about twitches and other such things that were lost on Gracie. Given the time, she is sure she could learn and understand quite a bit about it all, but certainly not from what little she gleaned at lunch.

Gracie looks at her father again where he sits completely unawares, his eyes moving from left to right across the words on the page before him. With a fortifying breath, she clears her throat and starts with a question she hopes to build on without giving anything away.

“Dad, how long did you have a best friend?” Gracie asks as casually as she can manage, but it comes out sounding more like she placed air quotes around the words best friend. She closes her eyes immediately, supremely disappointed with herself and then pops them open quickly to check on her father. Allowing a tiny sigh of relief upon seeing that John has not even lifted his gaze from the paper, Gracie’s confidence level bounces back up.

John is frowning in thought at the page, so he has definitely heard her. His mouth opens and he looks about to give some cursory answer, but cocks a brow and shifts his gaze to hers instead.

“What?” John replies with a tone of confusion.

“Your best friend,” Gracie continues, lowering her book to lay flat on her chest. “I know you had one.”

“Oh. Right,” John pauses, glancing back at the paper and then looking at her over the top of his reading glasses. “I feel like we talked about this already.”

“We did,” Gracie answers somewhat abruptly, not wanting to give him much time to think on that, “but you didn’t say anything. Just that you solved cases together.”

“Medical cases,” John corrects and Gracie wants to smirk as she thinks ‘Medical cases, my foot’.

“What was he like? What did he do? What’s his name?” Gracie rattles off, even as she hears Olive’s voice in her head reminding her that they can’t just walk in and demand names. Gracie nearly shudders, but hides it with the movement of pulling herself up to sit.

“Whoa, whoa,” John lowers his newspaper to let it rest in his lap. “Where is all this coming from?”

“Well,” Gracie pauses a moment to try and get her thoughts together. She has to salvage this. “Now that I have a best friend, I want to know more about yours. Did you really like him? The way I like Olive?”

“I loved him,” John answers without hesitation and he looks like the candid response surprises even himself. Gracie’s eyes widen tenfold as John clears his throat and shifts the newspaper pages noisily. “We were quite close.”

“Wow,” Gracie breathes. Now she is getting somewhere. She wonders if Olive is having this much luck with her dad. “You must’ve done everything together.”

“We spent a lot of time together, yes,” John says somewhat absently. Gracie tilts her head in amazement. He is trying to affect indifference, like the whole friendship was perfectly normal and not at all a special part of his life, and Gracie can tell. Empowered, she continues.

“Solving cases,” she nudges in a light tone.

“Working on cases,” John corrects for the umpteenth time. “Medical cases.”

“Hmm,” Gracie hums in thought. When John cocks a brow as if wondering what she is up to, Gracie moves for distraction with another question. “Did you have lots of sleepovers?”

Unabashed laughter bursts from John’s lips and the clever girl smiles to herself. Distraction successful.

“No, sweet pea,” John chuckles and then back tracks. “Well, maybe in a manner of speaking. We shared a flat, so I suppose you could say every night was a sleepover.”

“Wow. That would be so awesome,” Gracie repeats, truly in awe for a moment as she thinks of it. Living in the same flat as Olive so they could play all the time and do schoolwork together and she could help with Olive and her dad’s experiments. The thought of Sherlock brings her back around to the task at hand. She aims for idle curiosity when asking the next question. “So what happened to him?”

“Erm,” John’s body visibly gives a slight shudder and a feeling of concern begins to rise up in Gracie’s throat. She bites her lip and considers brushing the inquiry aside when John straightens in his chair. “Sometimes…things happen. Sometimes friends can hurt you. And then Mary wanted to move and we just...left.”

“So Mary wanted to go to Bath,” Gracie has never once called Mary Morstan her mother. John has always just called her Mary, so Gracie does too. It is hard for her to think of Mary as anything since she has no part in Gracie’s life. She found an old wedding photo once, but has never met the woman. “And you just went with her?”

“She was my wife, sweet pea,” John answers simply.

“Well, why didn’t you call him?” Gracie frowns. “Or text?”

“It’s hard to explain,” John sighs. “Sometimes the things adults do are hard to understand.”

“Dad,” Gracie says in a dull voice and blinks her eyes into a roll like she is already a teenager, “I’m eight and a half years old. I can totally understand complicated things and I want to know. I don’t want that to happen with me and Olive.”

“It won’t. Of that I have no doubt,” John assures her with a quiet huff of a chuckle.

Gracie shifts on the couch to face him fully and sets her book aside. Fixing him with a serious expression, she goes in for the kill, a move Olive had explained very carefully.

“You said friends can hurt you sometimes,” she begins, already seeing that her words have the desired effect. “I’m sure they don’t mean to. Can you honestly say that will never happen to me and Olive?”

John lets out a weary sigh, sets aside his newspaper and rises to join her on the couch. He looks at her with soft eyes for a long moment and smoothes back her hair. Gracie licks her lips, looking at him expectantly.

“He hurt me very badly,” John’s voice is little more than a whisper. Gracie can hear the pain and regret in it. “I tried to pretend it wasn’t there, but...it was hard. Very hard. Mary saw it. SHe didn’t like him much in the end, so she did a little looking and found us a place in Bath. We broke off everything, all communication with all of our friends in London. We started over.”

“Damn,” Gracie murmurs before she can think better of it.

“Language, Gracie,” John scolds with a fond frown.

“Sorry,” she says quickly and then pauses a moment before asking tentatively: “Mary’s gone now. She has been for a long time. Would you ever want to be friends with him again?”

John takes a deep breath and stares over her shoulder for a moment. His eyes are far away and almost wistful. She can already see his answer in his expression, but waits to see if he will put it into words.

“Yeah,” he says finally. “I think I would.”

Victory.

John blinks and returns his gaze to his daughter, who is trying not to look too satisfied with her success. He smiles and pulls her into a hug, kissing the top of her head.

“It’s getting late, my Gracie girl,” John says affectionately. “We need to get you to bed.”

“Okay,” they both stand and head for the loo. “Are you going to call your best friend while I’m sleeping?”

“Ah, no,” John answers as if the proposal is absurd.

“What?” Gracie stops cold and stares up at him, looking for clues. She was sure she had solved it. Why wouldn’t he want to call Sherlock? “Why not? You said you want to.”

“It’s been too long, sweet pea,” John says almost sadly. “It’s all in the past and can’t be salvaged. It just happens that way sometimes.”

“But Dad,” Gracie starts, determined to make him see why that is stupid. John’s hands are on her shoulders now and he is gently guiding her to the loo.

“That’s enough for tonight,” he says good-naturedly. “You’ll be grumpy tomorrow if you don’t get enough sleep.”

“Dad!” Gracie lets out a loud declaration, looking back at him as she walks. “I will not be grumpy.”

“Still bedtime,” John reminds with an amused smirk. Gracie turns to face him and crosses her arms over her chest. She narrows her eyes and gives him a stern look, the bridge of her nose wrinkling.

“Fine,” Gracie mutters and quietly stomps to the sink to show her displeasure without enough defiance to get in trouble. John walks away with a half chuckle.

Gracie considers their conversation as she readies her toothbrush and brushes. Her dad would clearly like to be friends with Sherlock again. Gracie thinks he still likes him very much and Sherlock didn’t seem mean or anything when they were at the park. Plus, she has Olive’s word for it too. Why couldn’t they be best friends again? 

Olive will have a plan, Gracie resolves as she spits in the sink. Once she tells her friend all about this at lunch, Olive will have a plan and they can put it into action. Satisfied, Gracie rinses her toothbrush, puts it away and heads to her room for a bedtime story.

---

No mortal danger in this story, but still so many compelling questions! What will happen?? Only The Shadow (ME) knows. Mwahahahaha! Maniacal laughter. Next couple weeks are going to be busy, but I intend to keep on my posting schedule. See you all soon! Love, Jane

@johnlock-rocks

[whatifyoulivelikethat]

wrath. | sss | kth

seven sins series. Kinky smut themed around a deadly sin.

pairing(s): taehyung x reader | kink: dominance

warnings: idol!BTS; PWP; dom/sub; consent (?); Taehyung’s POV

--

“What the fuck is wrong with you, Kim Taehyung?”

She shoved him with such force that he stumbled into his apartment, rolling his eyes. Her voice was a little slurred from the alcohol and she barreled at him with her fists as he calmly closed his door and locked it. He wasn’t that drunk and, compared to his hands, she had tiny fists that did absolutely no damage.

“I almost had a chance, almost! Why did you butt in?” she wailed, still smacking him as he calmly kicked off his loafers and tossed his keys on the console table.

“It’s not my fault that Jimin was giving me the signs to save him,” Taehyung drawled, trying to shove his childhood friend away from him.

“Signs? What signs?”

“I could see it in his eyes.”

It was the wrong answer. She roared and punched him over and over, missing more often than not, stumbling as he shuffled away. It was starting to piss him off. She went on and on about how she almost had a chance with Jimin this time. Taehyung could remember the way Jimin admired her tight high-waisted black jeans, the way Jimin’s eyes lingered on the low-cut neckline of her nude satin crop top, so tight that it made her breasts bulge. He had made up some excuse about her being too drunk and that he needed to save her dignity.

He hated the way she threw herself at Jimin and how Jimin never seemed to get the fucking hint. Either both of them were idiots or Jimin was just trying to be polite by not fucking his childhood friend. And he better not, because Taehyung would rip his head off for even thinking about it.

“Are you even listening to me?”

He hated the way she never seemed to understand that she was his friend first; that she was his best friend even now that he was popular and traveling the world doing what he loved; that she was what he wanted; and, even just for one second, she could just pull her head out of Jimin’s ass and look somewhere else, anywhere else, maybe she would realize it.

He grabbed her wrist suddenly, glaring at her. She tried jerking her hand away, cheeks flushed from cocktails, pout puffed as she glared back.

“Stop it.”

She huffed and clicked her tongue. “I hate you, Taehyung.”

His grip on her wrist tightened. “You hate me? I saved you from making a fool of yourself!” It came out harsher than he intended, but at this point he didn’t care.

“Who cares? If I’m a fool and Jimin likes me, then I’ll take it,” she snapped back.

“Who cares?” he echoed, his voice dropping several octaves over. He voice was already deep, but it was becoming feral in his rage. Before she knew it, he was backing her up against the wall, pinning her wrists against it. He leaned down, breathing hard. It was only then that her eyes went wide, lips parting slightly as she looked up at him.

“Tae–Taehyung?” Her voice was unsteady, but in a different way now.

“Park Jimin this and Park Jimin that,” he grunted, slamming her wrists up against the wall, making her whimper at the force. “How beautiful and handsome you think he is. How you would like Jimin to fuck you, force you on your knees and spank you, call you dirty names – and I listened to all of this!” Maybe it was his annoyance or the alcohol but the words started tumbling out of his mouth, sharp and lashing, making her cower with every word. “You tortured me every time I told you we were meeting up with the guys, asking if Jimin would be there, putting on your sexiest clothes, asking me if it was good enough. And I told you and I watched you pine over him like a dog in heat, but guess what?” He brought his face close to hers, her lips quivering, pupils blown wide.

“I’ll never let him have you. Not even if I have to drag you away from him each time. Not even if you say you hate me,” he snarled. “You’re mine.”

He didn’t miss her breath hitching at his words. It didn’t matter that she was sputtering at him, saying, “W-what are you saying, Tae?”

“I’m saying I’m going to give you what you want and maybe then you’ll forget about Park Jimin for once,” he growled, letting go of her wrists suddenly and tearing the stupid thin straps off the useless top that barely covered her. Her breasts spilled out – of course, she wasn’t wearing a bra. Just two nude flower-shaped pasties to cover her nipples.

“Tae!”

“What?” he snapped. He looked up, expecting to see rage, annoyance, distaste. Any of those things would have made him stop. What he didn’t expect was her eyes glazed over with lust, hands planted against the wall to make her breasts jut out even more.

“You… you ripped it…”

He smirked. He leaned in close, breathing in her scent, lips against her ear.

“I’ll buy you a new one.”

Without warning, he reached up and ripped the pasties off, throwing them across the living room. She moaned, knees almost buckling. He pinched her nipples hard, voice low and dangerous.

“You’re a bad, bad girl, so now it’s time for your punishment.”

She whined, crying out as he twisted her nipples with his fingers before letting them go. He grabbed her by her hair and dragged her to the sofa.

“Take off your clothes. Now.”

She scrambled to wiggle out of her pants, kicking off her heels as she slipped her jeans over her ankles. He wasted no time, grabbing her by the hair again and pressing her face into the pillows, ass up in the air, the tiny strip of her thong barely covered her pink, swollen pussy lips. The scent of her sex hit him like a truck, intoxicating him and making him heady with excitement. He could see her pussy was slick and glistening with her juices.

“Such a dirty slut,” he drawled, running his large hands over her ass and squeezing it. She mewled in response, clutching the pillows as he kneaded her flesh. He reached for the thin strip of fabric and tugged up on it, watching it sink into the swollen lips, earning a wanton moan. “Ready to be a fucktoy for Taehyung? Or are you still thinking about Jimin, whore?”

She shook her head quickly, desperately. “N-no, Tae, only you…”

He clicked his tongue. “Really?” He tugged harder, making her squeal at the harshness of his actions. He began to slap her ass with his free hand. She whined and bucked with each slap, hips shuddering with need. He didn’t bother to take off his rings and faint bruises began to appear, along with her pussy leaking down her thighs.

“T-Tae… p-please…” She was sobbing now. He stopped, grinding the tiny strap of lace between her ass cheeks.

“I think I better make sure you remember you’re my little cockslut.”

He used two hands and ripped the thong apart, scraps falling onto the sofa. It took him seconds to drag her body along the sofa so her ass was facing him. Maybe he would let Jimin see her now, marked and bruised by his rings, sobbing and pleading for his cock, shoving her ass up and wiggling it in attempt to entice him. He barely registered her words, reaching into his pocket for the condom before unbuckling his pants and slapping his belt against her ass, tearing a guttural moan from her lips. How many times had he rehearsed this in his head? Maybe not quite like this, but it still felt like heaven.

“Let’s see if you can take me well,” he drawled.

Condom on and he entered her with force, grimacing at how tight she was, forcing himself in. She was doing it on purpose – he could feel her clench and tighten around him, squeezing her legs together to heighten the sensation. Hot, tight, pulsating. Fuck, it felt so fucking good, seeing her crawling at his cushions and moaning his name.

“I won’t stop unless I cum, so prepare your slutty pussy.”

Whether he meant it or not didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was that she believed him and she wanted it, shoving her hips back into him so that his balls smacked against her thighs. He could tell how deep he was, stretching her out and almost hitting her cervix. He grabbed her hips and slammed back into her. The sounds coming from her mouth were obscene, her moans reverberating off his walls mixing with the wet squelch of his repeated drilling into her pussy, her abused ass stinging every time his pelvis smacked against it.

And it felt good, so fucking good that he never wanted to stop. So good to make her shut up and moan his name, so good to hear her pleading for more, to fuck her harder. So good to hear her sobbing about how big and thick his cock was. So good to hear her whining about how full he made her feel. So good to fuck her pussy as hard as he wanted, fueled by his rage and frustration.

He dragged his nails down her skin and watched her back arch as she wailed, gushing cum down his thighs, squeezing him so hard that he came right then and there. A wicked grunt and he spilled himself into the condom, cock twitching inside her. His chest was heaving with effort, sweating because he was still mostly dressed. He stayed inside her for a good ten seconds before he pulled out.

“On your back.”

She flipped around weakly; legs splayed open. He tugged the condom off, breathing hard. He watched her face as he held it up to her and turned it around, spilling sticky, white, viscous liquid all over her chest and stomach.

“Now you know who you belong to.”

--

masterpost

[roman-writing]

no great revelation (6/8)

Fandom(s): The Haunting of Bly Manor / Star Wars

Pairing: Dani Clayton/Jamie Taylor

Rating: M

Wordcount: 6,797

Summary: Jamie  just wants to enjoy a drink after a hard day’s work on the Telosian  Restoration Project. The last thing she needs is to get herself  caught  up in a mysterious woman with a lightsabre at the local bar.

Aurthor’s notes: Please note the rating change

read it below or read it here on AO3

VI.

—

It was somewhat gratifying to know that Jamie wasn’t the only one who was absolute shit at meditation. 

“This is pointless,” said Dani with her eyes closed. 

“You’re telling me,” Jamie muttered, her eyes also shut.

They were both seated on the massive bed, cross-legged and facing one another. Jamie had ordered the ship’s computer to dim the lights, so that the room was dusky, the ship’s computer even going so far as to project pinpricks of light onto the high ceiling like a map of stars. Back when Jamie had been a padawan, the Jedi Masters used to do something similar back on Tython to encourage that e’er-elusive quest for inner peace. Jamie used to take the opportunity to take a quick nap while she pretended to meditate, but she couldn’t do that now because she was trying to set a good example or whatever. 

“Have you tried slowing down your breathing?” Jamie asked, keeping her eyes closed and straightening her shoulders a bit.

“This is just how I breathe.”

“Yeah, but have you tried slowing it down?”

“When I do that it just feels like I’m slowly drowning.”

“Okay, then what about relaxing your body one part at a time?”

“One -? What?”

“You know. Think about relaxing just the muscles of your face, and then move on to your shoulders, and so on.”

Dani huffed, and Jamie heard her shifting her weight on the bed before going still. All was silent but for the pattern of their breathing and Jamie’s heartbeat accompanying it like a percussion instrument. Sitting still. Being still. Thinking and doing nothing. In short, the most difficult activity for Jamie to attempt ever in her life. She would rather be back on Peter Quint’s flagship, dodging blaster fire. 

Okay, maybe not that far. But honestly sitting still for long periods of time really was her own personal hell.

The air whispered with a hint of cold, like standing in a room with a window open, the tendril of an icy draught threading its way inside. Jamie shrugged against it, but kept her eyes closed. It was only when the whisper of cold lifted to a prickle, when the sound of Dani’s breathing grew too shallow, that Jamie’s eyes flew open. 

Dani was still seated on the bed, eyes squeezed shut, brows furrowed, every exhalation through her nose a plume of white steam, shivering as if she were on the surface of an ice planet instead of in the warm safety of the luxury cruiser. 

Immediately Jamie grabbed her hand and squeezed. “Woah. Woah woah woah. Not that way.” 

Dani jerked as though she had just been shaken away from a deep sleep. Her eyes were on the edge of wild as she looked around the room, her breathing heavy and sharp and slowing when she remembered where exactly she was. 

“Oh,” she said with a guilty glance towards Jamie. “Did I - Did I do it again?” 

With a stroke of her thumb across the back of Dani’s cold hand, Jamie nodded. “Yeah.”

“Sorry. I didn’t mean -” 

“I know,” Jamie murmured. “I know. Don’t worry. This time tomorrow, we’ll be on Tython, and we can get you a much better teacher than me.” 

Dani swallowed and nodded, but her expression was unsure, reluctant even. 

“You’ll like Hannah and Owen,” Jamie insisted. “If anyone can teach you, they can.”

“It’s not that. It’s just -” Dani turned her face away and exhaled. She chewed at her lower lip. “What if I’m caught? What if The Order doesn’t care that I was - that I’m not -”

Frowning, Jamie asked, “Not what?” 

“Good,” said Dani.

“What like -?” Jamie grinned. “Not good at the Force? ‘Cause they’d throw me out on my ass with nary a care if that were the case.” 

“No, that’s not what I -” Dani’s teeth were clenched, the muscles bunched up between the line of her neck and her jawline. “I killed people. I killed a Jedi. There’s already an investigation into his murder. And I can’t even channel the Force on my own without slipping into the Dark.”

Jamie shook her head while she listened. “You weren’t yourself. And once we find a cure for whatever is going on with you, then you can be trained properly.”

“What if we can’t?” Dani whispered. “What if there’s nothing to be done? What if I’ll always have this - this angry, empty, lonely thing haunting me?”

Jamie rocked Dani’s hand beneath her own gently. “We’ll find a way. We just need to take it one day at a time.”

Every muscle in Dani’s body seemed to be held taut. The tightness of her jaw. The flex of her hands. The bunching of her shoulders and the muscles all along her spine. Her hand was still cold under Jamie’s grasp, though the wintry edge had been blunted from the air around her. Jamie offered her an encouraging smile, but did not receive one in return. 

“We should get some sleep,” Jamie sighed, pulling away. “We have a big day ahead of us tomorrow -”

But Dani was scrambling to her knees and she was gripping Jamie’s hand tightly in her own before Jamie could fully let go. Her fingers trembled and her eyes were overbright, fixed and unblinking upon Jamie’s, holding her fast. “Not yet,” she said quickly. “Not - I want to feel it again. Please. I want to feel good. I want - I want to feel you.”

Jamie could already feel the thrum beneath her skin, the Force like a tether between them, on the brink, but there. As if Dani were reaching out then waiting for permission to drag her in. 

For the last four years, Jamie had been telling herself to keep her head down. Don't get involved. Mind her own bloody business. Don't do what she did back in ExplorCorps and paint a great big fuckoff target on her own back. And for four years, she had done exactly that. Telos IV and the AgriCorps were a fresh start, a good life, a simple, boring life. All it had taken to completely upend that life was a week of Dani Clayton.

Jamie nodded. Because it made relief sweep over Dani's face. Because it made Dani smile at her with that big smile that crinkled her eyes and creased her cheeks. Because it meant that connection snapped taut like a wire, drew them together into something more than the sum of their parts, more than this crude matter. Because it did indeed feel good. 

Each brief contact of the Force between them had remained discrete in the past. Stolen moments in which Jamie tried to coax Dani towards the Light on her own. Now, Dani gripped her hand to keep the connection alive, a current like static, like the movement between the inchoate and the flourishing, and it extended to the horizon. Dani's eyes dropped to her mouth and Jamie should've known this was coming, shouldn't have been as surprised as she was when Dani leaned forward to kiss her.

Bad idea, Jamie’s pesky little inner voice kept saying over and over like a mantra. Bad idea. This is a bad idea. A very very bad -

She should have pulled away, called this off, cut the line. Except Dani was warm and solid and groaning low into Jamie’s mouth, a sound that coiled heat in the pit of Jamie’s stomach. She cupped Dani’s cheek with one hand, allowed herself to welter for a lingering moment in the softness of Dani's mouth, in the texture of her jaw, before she pulled them apart just enough to breathe, their foreheads still pressed together.

"I want -" Dani murmured urgently, so close Jamie could taste the words on her lips. Her free hand had grasped Jamie's collar, rumpling the starched white fabric in her fist. "Can I -?"

"Yeah," Jamie breathed, throwing any vestigial scrap of self-preservation out the airlock.

Dani kissed her again with a grateful sigh. Jamie couldn’t remember ever being kissed quite like this. With singular focus. As if there was nothing else in the world for Dani to do but kiss her and pour everything of herself into it. 

"Kept thinking about this," Dani mumbled against her lips.

"Explains why you're so shit at meditation."

Dani huffed out a laugh and pressed her smile to Jamie's. She pulled at Jamie's collar shifting forward on her knees so she could lean over Jamie and turn the kiss from giddy glee to hungry in an instant. Jamie took off Dani's headband and threw it onto the bedside table beside the lightsabre so she could rake her hands through Dani's hair. With a tilt of her head, Dani opened her mouth and Jamie would've been appalled at her own weak whimper if she'd been in any state to care. She couldn’t. Not when Dani was kissing her like this. Not when Dani was pushing Jamie onto the bed and straddling her hips. Not when Dani was tugging the buttons of Jamie’s shirt free with trembling fingers. 

They didn’t break contact even when Dani paused to gasp at Jamie’s thigh pressing up between her legs. Always some section of skin was touching, so that the link remained, buzzing around in the back of Jamie’s head like an amplifier. Every movement, every sound an echo caught on a feedback loop, building to something impossible to miss. Jamie could feel the way Dani’s blood stirred in her veins, the way Dani was grinding down against her thigh, the way Dani was tugging the shirt down her shoulders and casting it aside, as though the sensations were her own, but muted — a phantom feeling. 

When she had imagined this  — and over the last few days on the luxury cruiser, Jamie had in great detail imagined this — it had always been a slow, coltish thing. All start and stop, lazy hesitance and careful exploration. In her mind, Dani was keen but skittish, wanting but indecisive. Something to do perhaps with the long glances sent in Jamie’s direction, or the distrustful ventures into the Force. When it came to this however, Dani was uncertain about nothing. 

Dani made excited little sounds against Jamie’s exposed neck when Jamie began to fumble with the button that fastened her pants. Jamie tugged at the zipper and Dani lifted herself up just enough so that Jamie could slip her hand down. Tugging lightly at Dani’s hair to get her to tilt her head back, Jamie sought out Dani’s pulsepoint with her mouth just as her fingers sought out slick heat. 

There were too many clothes between them, far too many, but neither of them could bring themselves to pause for long enough to fix that. The pants shoved partway down Dani’s thighs gave Jamie little room to manoeuvre, but she had two fingers inside of Dani, and Dani was sitting upright to rock her hips at a better angle, eyes lidded, lips parted on a stuttered sigh.

“That’s -” Dani’s breath hitched. “Yes - Right there - Please -”

Jamie had to bite back a groan of her own when Dani bucked against her hand and made a high desperate sound, clenched and shivering, and the moment going on as it echoed back and forth, mirrored and caught between them. Feeling this good, this alive, this conjoined, then chasing after it with a fervor as Dani leaned down at the same time Jamie pushed herself up to kiss her hard.

“Keep going,” Dani panted against Jamie’s mouth, then gave a feeble cry when Jamie did exactly that  — curled her fingers and ground her palm up until Dani was shuddering again, until she was spent.

Dani’s forehead dropped to Jamie’s shoulder to catch her breath. Jamie placed her free hand against Dani’s back, holding her close. She twitched the fingers still inside Dani, just an experimental press, and received a sharp inhalation.

“Too much?” Jamie asked softly.

“A little. Do it again.”

There was no building up to anything with it, just an extension of what had come before, flickers of pleasure that sparked at the edges of her vision, until Dani reached down to slide Jamie’s fingers out and lift them to her mouth. 

“Fuck,” Jamie hissed as Dani licked her sticky fingers clean then nipped at her fingertips.

Dani glanced down Jamie’s chest, one hand drifting inquisitively over the high-waisted hem of her black slacks. “Is it all right, if I -?”

Jamie was already nodding before Dani could finish the sentence. “Yeah. Yeah. Whatever you want.” 

When Dani pulled away to quickly shed her own clothes, Jamie felt the loss of that link like a light suddenly going out. She blinked and skimmed her fingertips along the curve of Dani’s elbow just to re-establish that contact until Dani had finished, until Dani was tugging the slacks down Jamie’s legs, smoothing her hands up Jamie’s bare thighs and watching her with hunger in her eyes. 

Jamie settled back on her elbows, biting her lip, gaze fixed upon Dani as she lowered her head and parted Jamie with her tongue. She wanted to watch  — eyes glued to the way Dani’s mouth moved against her, the way Dani urged her knees wider — but Jamie could not help how her eyes rolled back and she sank back onto the mattress with an embarrassingly loud sound despite how she tried to trap it behind her teeth. 

She twined her hands in Dani’s soft hair and guided her head, shivering when Dani moaned against her in return. Maybe it was the sequence of events, being the one to make Dani completely fall apart while feeling the echo of that pleasure, but soon Jamie’s hips were jerking out of rhythm and she was raking her nails down the back of Dani’s neck and shoulders  — anywhere she could reach  — desperate and hurtling over the edge. Even after she had finished, breathlessly staring up at the star-studded ceiling, Dani toyed at Jamie with the tip of her tongue, just softly, just enough to keep her suspended like a bridge held aloft by the tightness of a rope. 

And as Dani crawled back up her body to curl up against her, Jamie could think only that  — of all the bad decisions in her life, this one would surely have the most dire consequences. She just didn’t know what those might be, and she was afraid of ever finding out. 

—

There wasn’t much to pack, if anything. The majority of belongings they had begun with on this trip had been abandoned back on the Czerka flagship. Jamie was still lamenting the loss of her favourite pair of overalls and band shirt combination — wrecked at the courtesy of none other than Peter fucking Quint himself — as she pocketed her handheld mining laser. Behind her, Dani was fussing with her headband, trying to tease her hair into just the right shape all without the aid of a mirror.

“Does this look okay?” she asked, hands still tucking stray strands back.

A little flatter than usual, but all Jamie said was, “You look great. Better than me. Not that that’s hard.”

Dani smiled, lowering her hands only to approach Jamie and fix her starched white collar. “I think you look wonderful.”

Jamie made a face. “These clothes make me feel like I’m a conductor for a galactic circus.” 

“You look very rakish. Like you’re about to strike some shady business deal.”

“Oh, well, if I’m rakish, then that’s all right.” 

Dani’s smile ticked up at one corner and she leaned forward to kiss her. Jamie remembered waking up to a similar scene not long ago. A morning spent in much slower exploration than the previous evening until they were finger-mussed and kiss-bruised and had to go seeking a much-needed shower, during which Dani had ignored the mirrors in favour of pressing Jamie up against a tiled wall and putting her hands between her legs.

Now Dani put a hand to the small of Jamie’s back and pressed lightly, just enough to brush their hips together. Jamie opened her mouth as Dani’s tongue swept against hers.

A low chime from the ceiling. “Excuse me,” said the ship’s computer. “But we have arrived.”

Jamie pulled away. “We should probably go.” 

“Yeah,” Dani nodded, but her gaze was fixed on Jamie’s mouth, as though she wanted nothing more than to lean back in and pick up where they’d left off this morning. 

Jamie patted her arm and reached around to remove Dani’s hand from her waist. “Later.”

“Promise?” 

With a soft huff of laughter, Jamie answered with another lingering kiss. A coil of heat wound tight in her stomach, and she stepped back before it could take root. “C’mon. Let’s go.” 

Only reluctantly did Dani let herself be led from the luxury cruiser by the hand. The ship lowered the gangway for them with a jettison of atmo as it repressurised. The muggy air of Tython bore with it the old familiar smell of dense vegetation, even here on the planet’s major space station. As the station was revealed and all its bustling people and droids, Dani squeezed Jamie’s hand. Jamie looked up to find Dani nervously chewing her lower lip and staring out at the people, many of them wearing robes of various cut and colour, though their occupation was clear. 

Squeezing her hand back before letting it go, Jamie opened her mouth to give an encouraging word, but before she could speak there came a low chime from the speaker ports.

“How would you like me to wait for your return?” the ship’s computer asked.

“Oh, uh -” said Jamie. “How much is it to dock here?”

“One hundred and thirty-five credits per day.”

“A hundred and thirty-five?” Jamie repeated, incredulous. 

“Do you not have enough credits to afford this?” 

Scowling, Jamie fired back, “Are you always this much of a tit?”

“Query irresolvable,” the ship’s computer responded. “I have no anatomy, because I have no body. I do, however, have a stockpile of credits from Czerka Corporation in a private account tied to this vessel and accessible only by this vessel.”

Jamie shot the speaker ports a puzzled glance. “And how long could you remain docked using this private account?”

“Approximately two hundred and three years.”

Jamie’s eyes widened as she did some quick maths in her head. 

“Would you like me to dock here for two hundred and three years?”

“What?” Jamie shook her head. “No! Just - stay here until we get back. And don’t let anyone else aboard.” 

“Affirmative, Bollocks.”

Muttering expletives under her breath, Jamie continued down the gangway. 

“So, you’re rich now?” Dani asked. 

“Only if I survive the next week,” Jamie said. “I’m going to worry about that later. C’mon. I see Owen over there.”

Dani’s head jerked up and she glanced around with wide eyes. Jamie smiled and shook her head, walking along with Dani trailing in her wake. Owen stood near the station entrance, wearing blue robes dusted with flour handprints, and a sheathed lightsabre at his hip. His moustache twitched in a smile when he noticed her approach and he stepped forward to squeeze Jamie in a hug that picked her up a good half meter off the ground. 

“Oooof,” said Jamie as he set her back down, hands remaining on her shoulders.

“Look at you,” Owen said. “What do they feed you on Telos? Raw air and nothing else?”

She swatted his hands from her shoulders. “Fuck off. And why do you look like you’ve just escaped a bakery?”

“I’ve taken an interest in cooking while you’ve been away.” 

“Thought you were supposed to be a healer, mate.”

“Food,” said Owen very seriously, “is healing. And I’ll not have you - oh no. Jamie. You didn’t.”

He was staring over her shoulder at something behind her. Jamie turned, only to find Dani standing there awkwardly toying with her own fingers as she witnessed their reunion, her mismatched eyes wary. Owen’s face went from confused, to aghast, then to hard and guarded.

“I can explain -” Jamie started to say.

Owen pointed — not at Dani but at the sleek luxury cruiser they’d just disembarked. “You told us you were done with smuggling for good.”

"It's not like that!" Jamie insisted.

“You wait ‘till Hannah hears about this, young lady,” he said with faux gravitas, wagging a finger under her nose. 

“Oh, come off it!” 

Grinning, Owen stepped forward to Dani with his hand outstretched. “You must be Miss Clayton. I trust you’ve been making sure Jamie hasn’t been getting into any trouble?”

With a breathy laugh, Dani hesitated to take his hand before finally shaking it as if expecting to be struck by sudden lightning. “To the contrary.” 

He narrowed his eyes towards Jamie. “That doesn’t sound right. Has she been ill?”

“Oi!” Jamie snapped.

Owen chuckled, letting go of Dani’s hand and making shooing motions at the two of them. “Off we hop, then. I have the landspeeder parked outside and dinner in the oven.” 

“Is that a euphemism?” asked Jamie.

Owen made no gesture, but Jamie felt a light repreminanding flick of the Force at the back of her head. “Don’t be naughty, now. We have a guest.” 

Rubbing at the back of her head, Jamie followed him to the landspeeder. She offered Dani a brief encouraging smile, receiving something tremulous in return. 

“He seems nice,” Dani said in a low voice.

“I am,” said Owen without turning around. “Thank you.”

Leaning closer to Dani, Jamie whispered, “And he’s got big ears.”

“I do, yes. Who wants the front seat?” 

Jamie let Dani take it, so she herself could sprawl across the whole back seat and lean her head over the side of the landspeeder, the wind ruffling her unruly curls. In the front seat, Owen did his best to put Dani at ease while he drove, occupying her with polite talk of her home planet, Alderaan, how it compared to Tython, etc. Jamie only piped up when she heard her own name spoken, usually to correct one of Owen’s tall tales about her, which made Dani’s mouth curve in a smile that Jamie wanted to kiss away. 

They had landed on the planet at dusk, and by the time they arrived at Hannah’s apartment in the outer fringes of the Temple complex it was dark. Hannah was sitting on a couch and scrolling through a dry holo feed depicting ancient texts, when Owen ushered them through the front door and into the lounge. In robes of rich burgundy hues against her dark skin, she was a picture of elegance just as Jamie remembered. Immediately she swiped the holo feed away and rose to her feet, crossing the room to pull Jamie into a warm hug and greet Dani with an outstretched hand. 

“Do you want drinks?” Hannah asked. “Only I believe Owen had a specific wine he wanted to pair with tonight’s dinner.”

“Did you turn off the oven at -?” Owen started to ask but Hannah simply patted his darkly stubbled cheek.

“Of course I did, silly man. What do you take me for?” Hannah chided. 

He grinned but made no move to lean into the gesture or otherwise react, and soon Hannah dropped her hand. Owen disappeared into the kitchen while Hannah urged Dani and Jamie to sit. Jamie sat on the couch, and when Dani sat beside her it was so close their thighs pressed together. Hannah’s dark eyes flicked down to note this, but she simply smiled and inquired about their trip. 

With a hand towel tossed over one shoulder, Owen emerged from the kitchen not long later with a platter of savoury pastries, which he set on a table for easy access. Jamie swiped one up with an eager hand. 

“Not bad,” she said to Owen, mid-chew. “I can feel my latest scar healing up already.” 

“Shush you,” Owen said, swatting at her knees with the hand towel. Jamie snickered and reached for another pastry. 

Meanwhile Hannah had sat on a lone armchair and turned her attention to Dani. “Jamie mentioned she had a Force Sensitive friend with a peculiar - ah - predicament, so to speak. She brought you to the right place.” 

“Oh, I’m not,” Dani said with a flighty motion of her hand, “Force Sensitive.”

Hannah tilted her head. “What makes you say that?”

“It’s not me that uses the Force. It’s -” she pointed to her eye, the one that burned a constant gold these days, “- whatever this is.” 

“And what makes you think you have nothing to do with it?” Hannah asked. 

“Well,” Dani fumbled for a response. She was perched at the very edge of the couch, knees tucked together as if expecting a scolding from a teacher. “Peter said -”

“Peter?” Hannah rounded on Jamie with a flinty expression. “Don’t tell me you’re still getting yourself tied up with the likes of Peter bloody Quint.”

“I’m not!” Jamie said, trying to sound indignant but doing a very poor job of it since her mouth was full of pastry. She chewed quickly and swallowed so she could better defend herself. “Besides, he’s dead now!” 

“Oh, that is a shame,” Owen sighed dreamily. “I would’ve liked to have seen it myself.” 

“Who was the lucky bastard who killed him?” Hannah asked. 

From the couch, Dani cleared her throat uncomfortably, then lifted her hand in a miserable little wave. Both Owen and Hannah exchanged surprised glances. 

“It was an accident,” Dani said in a small voice. 

“Well, brava,” said Owen. 

Dani closed her eyes. “Please, don’t. I - uh -” she drew in a trembling breath and forged on, “I don’t know exactly what Jamie told you, but he wasn’t the only one.” 

“Ah,” said Hannah shortly. “Yes, she did mention something about that. The dead Consular out by Vurdon Ka. Edmund, was it?” 

Dani’s only reply was to nod and stare down at her socks; they’d all removed their shoes at the front door and set them into the cloak closet. 

“Can’t imagine the investigation will come poking around here,” Owen added. “They’ll think you’ve run off to the Outer Rim to hide.” 

Hannah hummed. “Yes, well, best we keep Miss Clayton inside for the duration of her visit, anyway.” 

Dani stared at them in utter bewilderment. “But don’t you - Shouldn’t you be reporting me to the authorities?” 

Owen tipped his head towards Jamie. “If this one vouches for you, then I believe you.”

Placing her hand over her heart, Jamie said, “That’s so romantic. You going soft on me?”

He knocked his foot against her ankle. “You wish.” 

“If what you say is true,” said Hannah, ignoring their antics, “and you’re being inhabited by some Sith entity, then I rather think it our duty to help you, not put you down like a rabid dog.” 

Owen cleared his throat. “About the Sith entity thing. Can we go back to that?”

"Quint said something about a -" Jamie trailed off, then turned to Dani. "What did he call it? The glowy box?"

"A holocron," Dani said.

Both Hannah and Owen turned to look at them with such sudden sharpness that Jamie nearly took a step back in surprise.

"A holocron," Hannah repeated. “You’re sure?”

"What colour was it?" Owen asked Dani before she could answer Hannah’s question. "Was it blue? Please say it was blue. I'll even take green."

Dani blinked, taken aback, and glanced nervously between them and Jamie before she answered, "It was red."

Hannah drew in a sharp breath and Owen grimaced as though he'd just been shot in the leg.

“Where is it now?” Hannah asked. 

"Gone," Jamie said with a shake of her head. "In bits and pieces back on Quint's flagship."

"Not all of it."

The three of them — Hannah, Owen, and Jamie — all turned their attention to Dani, who was wringing her hands together in her lap. Then she reached into the sewn up makeshift pocket of her cloak and pulled out a single shard of black gold metal. 

"I kept one of the pieces," Dani explained, holding it out towards them. "In case — I don't know — in case Peter tried to put it back together again." 

“May I?” Hannah held out her hand. 

Dani passed it over to her. Carefully, Hannah inspected it. Thin, triangular and gleaming darkly in the light. Jamie thought she could almost hear a faint whisper when she looked at it for too long, a cold fingertip brushing against the back of her neck, travelling down the length of her spine.

“There is part of an inscription here in the old Sith Tongue,” Hannah said, and she spoke a series of guttural words that seemed to darken the very air around her before translating them. “I sleep. I wake. I walk.” 

“Mmm,” said Owen. “Hate that.” 

“I’m so glad you two know what the hell is going on,” Jamie said dryly. 

Shooting Jamie an exasperated look, Hannah handed the shard back to Dani. “Thank you, dear. What you have there is a piece of a very rare storage device made with the Force. Undoubtedly Sith in origin, and very ancient, too. Jedi use them as well. Holocrons contain information. Secrets. Wisdom. Power.”

Dani turned the metallic triangle over between the fingers as if trying to read the same inscription, or to glean something more. “And what did this one hold?” 

“I haven’t the foggiest,” Hannah said with a soft smile. “Whatever that holocron once held is long gone now.”

Dani clenched the triangle in one fist. “But what if we had all the pieces?”

“Perhaps that would accomplish something. I doubt it.” Then Hannah added wryly, “You might be able to make a very fine lamp.” 

In the other armchair, Owen snorted. Without looking in his direction, Jamie aimed a kick at his leg, which he easily dodged.

“That can’t be everything,” Dani said, knuckles going white, voice going shaky. “You have to know something more. There has to be more.” 

Hannah shrugged. “I’ll look through the archives tonight. Maybe then we will have more answers.” 

“That’s -”

"Tomorrow," said Hannah firmly yet kindly. She stood and urged Dani to her feet as well.

"But -" Dani started to say.

Hannah put a warm hand on Dani shoulder and steered her towards the dining room. "Tomorrow," she repeated. "We cannot solve the galaxy's problems in an evening."

—

After dinner, they retired to the lounge over a glass of wine. Hannah took Dani aside, where they murmured away together in a corner, while Jamie and Owen sat in armchairs across a polished stone firepit that had been dug into the ground. Dani wandered off to bed not long after with a lingering glance in Jamie’s direction, then Hannah left for the comforts of her archives, murmuring that same phrase in the old Sith Tongue as she went. 

I sleep. I wake. I walk.

Jamie shivered in spite of herself. Owen watched her knowingly over the rim of his glass. 

“How are you really?”

“You know me. Bold as brass,” Jamie muttered.

He glanced down the hallway, where Dani had gone and not emerged after the sound of a door shutting. “I shouldn’t have to tell you to be careful, so I won’t.”

Jamie grimaced. “Yeah. I know.”

“I don’t want you getting hurt.”

“I won’t. Besides,” she reached out to nudge his elbow so that it slipped off the armrest of the couch. “I can always count on you to patch me up again.” 

His answering smile was strained. “I can only do so much with lightsabre wounds.” 

“I’ll be fine.” 

Owen took a sip of his wine and hummed, the note echoing slightly around the glass bowl. “I defer to Hannah in matters of balance in the Force,” he said, “but I’m not sure I can do anything for your friend without more information. And even then — I’m saying this might be a lost cause, Jamie.” 

Jamie gripped the stem of her wineglass and rolled her head back to sigh at the ceiling. “If I had two credits for every time someone told me that, I’d have twelve credits.”

“You could buy yourself a decent stimpack with that,” he said with a snap of his fingers.

She let her head loll forward again and leaned her cheek upon her fist. “I know what you’re going to say.”

Owen smiled sadly at her and then he said it anyway, “You need to prepare yourself for the worst.”

“I don’t want to hear it, mate.” 

He leaned forward, setting aside his wineglass on a side table, and said in a soft yet serious tone, “You cannot let your judgement be clouded by personal attachments.” 

She laughed, a short bitter huff of laughter. “That’s rich, coming from you.” With a gesture around the room, she said, “Awfully cosy here in Hannah’s place, innit? Was that your spare cloak and set of boots in the closet I saw?” 

If Owen was put off his stride in any way, he did not show it, nor did he falter. “As a member of The Order, it is your duty to help everyone you can. And in that regard, you have always been the best of us.”

Jaw tight, Jamie glared into the firepit, a flicker of flame sending up sparks. “I’m not a Jedi.” 

“No,” he murmured, his gaze dark and warm and unyielding. “But you act like one. If strength and power were what made a Jedi, then we would all be Sith. You are not defined by how much of the Force you can control. It’s what you do that matters.”

Jamie eyes burned from staring at the fire for too long. She cleared her throat, lifted her wineglass and drained its contents. 

“Thanks for the drink and for the food,” she said, setting the wineglass aside and pushing herself to her feet. “And for the shit pep talk.” 

Owen did not stand or attempt to bring her back when Jamie turned and walked down the same hallway Dani had vanished down about an hour ago. He let her go with a soft, “Good night,” that Jamie caught just on the edges of her hearing, and which made her fists clench.

At the end of the hall, Hannah had given them each their own rooms across from one another. Jamie stopped in front of Dani’s door. There was a soft light shining beneath the gap at the base, indicating that either Dani was still awake, or she was too afraid to sleep alone with the lights off. Jamie lifted her hand to knock, but stopped before she could touch the door. Instead she ran her hand down her face and rubbed at her eyes. Then with a shake of her head, she turned around and went into her own room. 

It was the first night in nearly two weeks that Jamie slept alone. She tossed and turned, looking back towards her own shut door, seeing the echo of that pale sliver of light across the hall. Telling herself she was being ridiculous, she shut her eyes and struggled in search of sleep. 

—

“I did a bit more research last night,” said Hannah as a greeting over breakfast.

“Oh, aye?” Jamie mumbled to the contents of her teacup. 

Late morning sunlight washed through the tall windows of Hannah’s apartment, and Jamie was combating a pervasive grogginess with her third cup of the morning. Sleep last night had been a futile effort. Sitting across the table from her, Dani looked no better off; her eyes were circled with dark rings and her hair lacked its usual polished care. She had already been out in the kitchen for some time when Jamie had finally emerged from her room to find Dani helping Owen prepare breakfast and set the table. Both she and Owen had greeted Jamie with varying degrees of enthusiasm — Dani with a small private grin, Owen with a boisterous call of ‘Good Morning!’ that could’ve woken the dead. 

Now they were all seated at the dining table. Owen had prepared a spread of food that would have given the ship’s computer a run for its millions of credits. He and Dani had tucked in, while Jamie and Hannah nursed their cups of tea in lieu of food. 

“That inscription,” said Hannah. “I sleep. I wake. I walk. IT was specific enough to give me a small lead.” 

Jamie lowered her cup, while across the table from her Dani did the same with her knife and fork, suddenly alert. 

“So, what did the holocron have in it?” Jamie asked. 

“Not what. Who.” Hannah pointed around her cup towards Dani, who had gone stock-still. “The echo of a soul. An ancient Sith Lord, whose sunken tomb is said to lie beneath the waters of a planet lost to time after the Hundred-Year Darkness. I could find nothing more than this, and at first I thought it a mere legend. Here. These images were taken from The Valley of the Dark Lords on Korriban.” 

Hannah tapped at a link on her wrist, bringing up a holographic display which she set to the middle of the table so the rest of them could see. A collage of pictures from various sources. Old texts written on parchment or carved into stone. Weathered statues emerging from bodies of water in dark caves, and vast frescos painted upon plastered walls depicting a woman. All of them somehow defaced. Sections of writing blotted or chiselled away. The heads of every statue, every painting smashed or blighted as though taken to by a hammer.

“Spooky,” Owen muttered. 

“What’s wrong with her face?” asked Jamie. 

“It seems even other Sith feared her. Or envied her. Or hated her. Who knows? But her very name and image have been desecrated beyond repair, condemned to damnatio memoriae,” Hannah highlighted a section of writing that had been left unscarred. “They call her only: The Lady.” 

Jamie stared at one of the statues, and even though it lacked all discernible features she could not shake herself of the horrible feeling that it was watching her back. “A Sith feared by other Sith? Well, that’s not terrifying at all.” 

“All Sith eventually turn on each other in the end,” Owen scoffed. “This was probably just the work of some ambitious apprentice. You know how they are.” 

“That’s very possible,” agreed Hannah. 

“So instead of knowledge,” Jamie said slowly, “the holocron was holding a piece of her soul? Why?” 

“A piece? No.” Hannah shook her head. “More like a shadow. A reflection of what once was whole. And for what purpose, I cannot say. Did she even make it herself? Or was it made of her unwillingly? Perhaps to preserve her own life. Or even to trap her, to interrogate her. All of these are plausible.”

Owen hummed a contemplative note, nodding to himself, then he abruptly said, “More tea?”

Hannah held out her cup. “Please. Thank you, dear.”

Meanwhile, Dani had spoken not a word. Her gaze was glued to one of the holo images, the one of a fresco depicting The Lady, faceless, with her hands on the shoulders of a young child with gold-graven eyes. 

Jamie nudged her foot under the table, and Dani started, blinking at her. 

“Sorry,” Dani breathed. 

“S’alright,” Jamie said. She nodded towards the holo images. “This sound familiar at all?” 

Dani licked her lips and then nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s her.” Hands clenched and trembling around her cutlery, she said, “I’m sorry, but can you please turn that off?”

Without question, Hannah killed the feed, and Dani breathed a sigh of relief. Owen topped up Dani’s teacup as well, and she smiled gratefully at him. He winked and set down the teapot.

“As fascinating as Sith history is,” said Owen dryly. “What does it have to do with Alderaan? Why target children of House Thul?”

Hannah looked to be deep in thought, sipping at her tea with a furrow to her brow, while Dani shrugged. 

Meanwhile, Jamie groaned and rubbed at her eyes. "I don't know," she said, "but I know someone who does. Do you have a transceiver?"

“Oh! Yeah. Give me a tick.” Owen pushed back his chair and went off in search of a transceiver. He returned a moment later holding a blade-thin screen, tapping at it to pull up the right application before he handed it to Jamie and sat back down in his seat. “Here.” 

“Cheers.” Jamie took the screen and typed in the relevant frequency and hit a green button. 

It rang. And rang. And just as Jamie was about to kill the feed, the screen flickered and a familiar face appeared. 

Rebecca smiled. "Well, that was fast. Miss me already?"

[painless-innit-colourful]

‘Two Down, One To Go’ - part 3

Hopefully I didn’t spend eight months burning the festival vods into my memory to end this badly. Tubbo was there for Tommy the night after he lost his second life, and he’d like to return the favour. After his temper gets the better of him, the last of the heroic Pogtopians must deal with the fallout and figure out what to do next. Featuring a little headcanon about how a person knows how many lives they have left.

part one | part two

---

After what felt like a century, it was quickly ended. Tommy was never going to win, that much was clear from the start, and it was clear in his movements and the growing fearful look in his eyes that he wanted it to end. Techno’s eyes met Tubbo’s for a split second as he dealt the final blow, a punch that landed square in the middle of Tommy’s face. There was a horrible crack, and Tommy slammed into the wall of the pit, blood gushing from his nose and down the white part of his shirt like a raging river. He tilted his head back as Techno advanced for the final time, pushing him away with the back of his forearm, pinning him against the wall, and it was unclear if the motion was to keep Tommy from attacking or from pitching forward. Their eyes met: Tommy’s were dilated with fear and pain, while Techno’s beady gaze was steely but triumphant. They seemed to come to some understanding (perhaps of what mortality is), for Tommy then shut his eyes and dropped his head. Techno stepped away, and the boy slumped to the ground.

With the ease and temperament of a cultivated warrior, the Blade straightened up, wiping at his face and smearing some of Tommy’s blood about his eyes. It was like he was wearing a crimson masquerade mask. For a few moments, there was again that uneasy silence: something about the Blade looking over the crowd kept them quiet, subjugated by his aura of intimidation. Then he looked away, and there was a small burst of noise from the crowd - like a firework - as they began to disperse, sensing the end of the dramatics.

The Blade put one hand on the side of the pit and hopped up with the grace of a dancer. Compared to Tommy, bruised and bloodied, you could hardly tell he’d been in a fight. He looked between the lingering scraps of the crowd, Wilbur waiting with a smile and his hands still in his pockets, Niki glowering at him, Tubbo looking at the floor by his feet and Tommy still slumped against the wall of the pit. One clear of the throat had all of them looking vaguely in his direction, but he was looking for Tommy’s attention. “So..?” “F*ck you man,” Tommy said through a mouthful of blood. The pigman just laughed, and it echoed around the cavern like thunder. “It stays in the pit.” And off he went, an arm lazily thrown across Wilbur’s shoulders as he painted pictures of a destroyed Manberg in the air with his hands and words, the crowd stalking them rife with gossip and gawking and money changing hands. Tubbo’s stomach dropped.

“What are we going to do?” Niki’s voice was soft, barely audible in the echoing noise. Tubbo leant his head back against one of the rough stone walls, the burns curling around his eyes stinging. There was a spluttering to his left: Tommy attempting to clear his mouth of the blood still trickling from his nostrils. “I don’t know.” He admitted, lurching forward to go and help Tommy. “No no, I’m coming up, don’t.” It took Tommy a couple tries to scramble out of the hole in the ground, one palm pressed ineffectively against his nose, still leaking down his face. “Bloody thing- hah-”

“C’mere-” Tubbo reached for his face, the edge of a smile creeping into his voice as Tommy tried to duck away, also ineffectually. “Nah I’m fine, trust me-” “Mate-” He’d managed to grab Tommy’s wrist, reeling him in and slinging his other arm about his waist to keep him there. He ignored the flare of pain from the burns on his chest and arms, instead grinning at the grimace Tommy was giving him as he pulled his hand away from his nose. “You’re doing a sh*t job with that nose bleed.” He pinched his nose, “Head back, big man.”

Tommy crossed his arms like a toddler throwing a tantrum and threw his head back. They waited in the growing quiet for an indeterminate amount of time, as the people became more settled, as Niki grew more restless next to them, as the pressure on Tubbo’s injuries ached more and more, until finally he couldn’t take the lancinating pain any longer, and sprang away from Tommy with a wobble, breathing heavily.

His eyes were screwed shut, as were his teeth gritted and fists balled up, nails digging back into raw flesh and bandages. Prime this hurts. He couldn’t seem to get enough air. He sank to his knees, retreating into Tommy’s jacket like a hedgehog or a turtle hiding beneath protective layers. His head throbbed, like someone was bashing on it with a hammer. Somewhere in the back of his mind - the logical part - he knew what was happening. The danger had passed, the fighting ended. His body had pulled down the protective wall it had raised since Schlatt had snatched the mic from him, and now he was feeling the full force of his injuries without the adrenaline rush to dull the pain. But the part of him that knew this, the part that was telling him he was fine wasn’t as loud as the headache trying to split his skull from the inside.

‘Get up,’ He fell back on his Manberg habitats: don’t cry around other people, don’t show weakness or injury. ‘Stop this now, and get up.’ He willed himself to stand, commanding one leg at a time up. He got one foot flat on the floor and almost stood on it, when another wave of nauseating agony swept over him and he pitched sideways, crumpling into a heap on the floor like a discarded suit blazer.

“Tubbo-” Roughly, he pushed himself off the floor, ignoring the stabbing sensation from his palms as he righted himself. ‘Stop this. Get up.’ “Woah- Tubbo, stop a second-” ‘Stop horsing around. For Prime’s sake, get up now.’ “Tubbo, wait- Holy Prime, stop moving, you’re hurting yourself.”

Tommy’s hands hesitantly grazed his sides, feeling through his borrowed jacket where the bandages got thinner as his eyes traced the rest of them covering most of Tubbo’s upper half where burns didn’t. “Aah- Sto- Stop-” Tubbo managed to get out, shaking his head quickly and falling away from Tommy, the movement making him feel lightheaded. The hands quickly retracted. “Knees?” He nodded, a lot slower than before. “Are- Are you okay? What hurts?” Tommy asked as he put his hands palm down on Tubbo’s lap. The older boy fought through a mental fog that threatened to cloud his vision. “E-Everything-” He exhaled quickly in something that might’ve been a laugh in another universe, staring down at Tommy’s hands on his knees and laying his own next to them. “My head- It feels like- like someone keeps hitting me and- m- my heart-” He shook violently, bandaged hands going to clutch his sides as if to hold himself together.

“Hey,” Tommy leaned closer so he was looking up to talk, his expression empathetic, a soft smile in his eyes as he spoke gently. “This happened before, remember? This happens when you lose a life. Remember last time, in the Camarvan? It passes. Just wait with me, alright?” “Everything hurts-” “I know,” He patted a steady rhythm into Tubbo's lap, one-two-three, one-two-three, one-two-three, like a waltz. Slowly, gradually, the agony receded, relinquishing his senses back to him, and he became aware that Niki had knelt by his side. "What can I do..?" Her mascara was running. Tommy gave her a soft smile, “I think… I think we should get out of this f*ckin’ cave. Get some air.”

“I think you need a change of clothes, big man.” Tubbo croaked, and they both looked down at Tommy’s shirt, stained rusty-red with the blood of multiple people. “Speak for yourself.” He said lightly, and Niki gave a breathy sigh. “I think we should burn it.” “His or mine?” “Both.” She said with a slight laugh, glancing behind her. “I could go find some for us now?” Tommy replied with a shake of the head. “Let’s just get out of here. Although-” He glanced at the axe by the side of the pit. “If we’re going up top we could do with a shield or two and some weapons, y’know, standard procedure.” He jumped to his feet and scurried away with a call of: “I’ll be right back!”

“Hey Tubbo,” He glanced up to see Niki smiling warmly, sitting cross-legged beside him. “Are you alright now?” “I’ve certainly been better.” Their half-hearted laughter flickered like candlelight. “So, um… What Tommy said about you being down a life… Is it true?”

His hand went to the tally under his collarbone leisurely, feeling through the bandages to the tiny, earth-shattering ridges beneath. Two. There were definitely two.

“Yep,” He breathed. “I am down to one canon life.” Stating the fact seemed to make it all the more real. He was the third of his friends to slip, and now he too walked the boundary between those that stay and those that have passed. “I’m so sorry.” She patted his leg. “If I’d have done something- if any of us had done anything-” “Don’t.” He caught her hand. “It’s not worth thinking about. Besides, the Blade has already made it clear that- that it wouldn’t have been worth it.” He tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice, but he felt it was warranted. Sure, military strategy dictated they’d done the right thing. Sure, they only lost one set of eyes on the inside, and not two. But it was like Tommy had said: it was getting less about the nations and the wars and the ideals by the day - at least to them. Of the three founding fathers of L’Manberg, they only had three lives between them now. Some resentful part of him wished they’d found the button. A front-row view of Manberg’s destruction would’ve been better than this.

“What would you have wanted, though?” Niki has this remarkable ability to see through people, almost as if she had heard his thoughts drifting to the button. He shut his eyes briefly, trying to think, and he was standing on the stage again, boxed in by yellow concrete and foes all at the same time. His eyes darted up to the rooftop of the NASA building, where he’d been only minutes ago. Wilbur and Tommy, highlighted figures in brown and red against the cheerful blue sky, each had a hand on their communicators, Tommy staring straight at him, mouth wide open in disbelief while Wilbur’s fingers flew furiously across the keyboard.

‘techno is on our side’

‘he wont hurt you’

“Wilbur said he wasn’t gonna hurt me.” He opened his eyes again, back in the ravine, though he didn’t doubt part of him would ever leave the concrete box. He looked Niki in the eyes, “I would’ve liked the truth, I think. I would’ve liked... to know.” She nodded, and the next time he blinked they were walking through the fields of a once-great nation together, anticipating frivolity and celebration to come, no matter how disagreeable the town they would be painting red. Ironic turn of phrase, to say the least. “This was really not how I expected today to go.” Niki’s laughter in response was sharp. “Definitely not.” She smiled sympathetically. “If it’s worth anything, I thought your speech was very good.”

He smiled indulgently, just in time for Tommy to reappear looking like a packhorse, weighed down with two shields and enough weapons to take back Manberg. None of these things were in his hands though: he was juggling three round grease paper packages, and Tubbo knew exactly what was coming when he stopped juggling and presented Niki with one, standing up straight for once and putting some false bravado into his voice.

“By the way Niki, welcome to Pogtopia. Here’s your dinner. A quick note, we’re not exactly equipped for high cuisine, so I’ll run you through how mealtimes work if you’re going to take your meals in the cafeteria-” He gestured at the bashed-up picnic benches they’d had to disassemble to get into the cave, and then reassemble to eat off of in the space next to the ‘kitchen’ in one very funny afternoon swearing at badly-translated instruction manuals. “Here’s the menu: since we were late back, we get yesterday’s leftovers, the emergency potato stockpile. Also, Technoblade does not seem to be in a chefing mood.” There was a round of awkward faces before he continued. “Tomorrow morning for breakfast: potato stew probably, hopefully not reheated. Tomorrow lunchtime: potato, maybe in a salad.” By now Niki was starting to figure out the pattern, the confusion on her face travelling through disgust to disappointment to resignation to acceptance. “Tomorrow for dinner: jacket potatoes- Hey, do you wanna guess what’s for breakfast the day after?” “Oh boy! I wonder…” They giggled, the first human sound to grace the cavern walls in too long. “I swear on Prime, I wouldn’t have asked for the pig’s assistance if I’d known he’d only cook us potatoes.” His eyes flicked momentarily to Tubbo, and his smile dropped. “As well as a couple other things, y’know…”

The air around them shimmered, or maybe that was just Tubbo’s vision. “We need to get out of here.” “Yeah.” Tommy’s response was quiet and laced with a foreign grief. They headed for the stairs together, Niki following attentively behind, and when their shoulders collided, their hands joined automatically in a softer hold than ever before.

“Did- Did you do that alone?” Tubbo asked Tommy as they climbed the stairs, part of a shuffling conga line of heroes and refugees and martyrs. He looked back for a moment, his eyelashes casting strange shadows down his cheeks from the swinging lamps next to them. “Do what?”

“What- What happened to me just now, and what happened in the Camarvan. When everything hurts and you feel like you’re going to die again.” Tommy’s somewhat guarded expression melted, a small smile tugging at his mouth. “Yeah.” He admitted in his softer tone, “At my house, before I came to tell everyone.” “Why?” Tommy turned away as they kept climbing. “We would’ve been there to help you, if- You didn’t even tell the others for ages though, did you?” He remembered a single terrifying moment in the middle of the biggest party they’d ever been to (thoroughly discounting today) when Tommy confided in him. “You didn’t want to worry everyone.” “I didn’t want their pity either.” He said, tone level.

“How did you do it?” “I… Don’t remember. I think I blacked out, at least functionally.”

Not only had his best friend handled, or tried to handle, the pain of losing a life alone, but he’d also attempted to silently carry that burden by himself. Just the thought of it put a weight over Tubbo’s heart. “I would’ve helped you.” He murmured as they took a left and escaped the crowd, heading towards another exit. “You did,” He said lightly. “All those nights you stopped me waking half the nation? That counts.” They crossed the floor of the small chamber at the top of the spiral staircase, and Tubbo suddenly dropped Tommy’s hand and stopped to open the enderchest against the wall. With careful hands he drew out the record with the red label and a smile from Tommy.

“That’s the real one, isn’t it?”  Tubbo looked between his two companions. “Anyone got a jukebox?” They didn’t have their bench, but no matter where in the world you are banished to, you’ll always have the sun.

Injured and weary, yet stubbornly surviving still, the three of them climbed the steps to the sky and caught enough of the last spillage of heaven for the day that they could fit in a full song. And by the last light, they had planned a plot. Of revolt and rebellion. Such familiar words.

And with the first stars rising as their witnesses, they hatched a smaller plan. A little catharsis, if you will.

---

The sky at dusk was gorgeous as the sun gradually sank out of sight. Tubbo wished he could enjoy it, but the ache in his being and his head and his heart was too much. “Are you cold?” He shook his head, but Tommy put his arms around him anyway. He was so careful, draping them where he knew there were no bandages; back, shoulder, standing just behind him and placing his head right next to Tubbo’s. Blocks turned in the jukebox before them, its red label swirling in the low light like a spinning skirt as the melody played for all the men and the beasts and the trees that came to listen.

Out of the blue, Tommy whispered in his ear: “Can I make you a promise I can’t keep?” “I- Yeah, sure.” If he hadn’t been so tired, he might’ve turned his head to see what Tommy was up to. All he knew was that his best friend had leant closer and squeezed his sides warmly. Tubbo ignored the slight painful twinge. “I promise-” He whispered, the words so soft they got lost in the song. “-to keep you safe, Tubso.” “Oh.” “I promise, as long as I live, to be there, to stand between you and Techno, or Eret, or Schlatt or Dream or Wilbur or- or Death him-bloody-self, and I promise to say ‘No you may f*ckin’ not hurt him’ and-” “Okay, I get it-” “-and I’ll f*ckin’ fight them, all of them if I have to.” “I’m fine Tommy, you don’t have to be all sappy for me.”

“It’s true.” And though he hadn’t moved that whole time, nor had his tone changed, Tommy’s arms suddenly felt a lot safer to be in. “No matter what happens, whether Techno is on our side or not, whether we get Wilbur back or get more people on our side or not or whatever, it’s me and you - and Niki - together against- against the world. And I mean that.”

Like a blanket straightened over a bed, a small silence settled over them as the last signs of the sun vanished behind the next hill. “Swear it,” Tubbo’s voice was barely above a breath. “On something important.” He couldn’t explain his sudden change of heart, but maybe the way his limbs shook with leftover adrenaline and fatigue and fear could. “I- I swear it on the discs. Me and you, ‘till the ends of the Earth.” “Always those discs.” He couldn’t keep the slightest hint of mockery out of his voice, but Tommy just hummed in disagreement. “If I swore it on the safety of the most precious thing, it wouldn’t be a promise, it’d be a paradox.”

By the time the meaning of his words dawned on Tubbo, Niki had reappeared, and Tommy let go out of his shoulders, a knowing smile gracing his features as he purposely avoided Tubbo’s scrutiny. “Had trouble finding it?” “No, actually.” She took a few deep breaths before continuing. “You wouldn’t believe how hard it is to find a lighter in there.” Tommy and Tubbo shared a look equal parts bemusement and consternation. “Well come on then, the sun’s about to have gone down and I don’t know about you, but it’s getting a bit f*ckin’ cold out here.” “I think that’s because you’re only wearing a t-shirt, Tommy.” Niki teased, while the boy just shot her back an unimpressed look. “Yeah, well,” He turned to look at Tubbo, ruffling his hair somewhat roughly. “I lost my jacket like an hour ago.”

They tittered in tandem until Niki cleared her throat. “Who’s gonna do the honours?” His companions then immediately answered her question by looking to Tubbo. The edges of his lips curved upwards. “Can someone else hold it for me?” “I’ll get it-” “No, let me.” Tommy squinted at Niki.  “I think least injured should do it, just in case.” She reasoned. “Didn’t you get shot on the way out of Manberg?” “Didn’t you fight an entire crowd in Manberg by yourself?” “That’s a bit stupid,” Tubbo interjected. “I was trying to find you.” Tommy shrugged. “Okay, yeah, you hold it.”

Straightening her posture, Niki pressed the lighter into Tubbo’s hands and then held up the jacket. It was Tubbo’s Manberg Secretary of State uniform, jet black and singed and soaked-through in places. His thumb played with the catch over the hood of the lighter. “Just- What are we gonna do with it when it’s… on fire, y’know?” Both of his fellows stared blankly at each other. “One second.” Tommy took two steps backwards and disappeared over the ledge, and Tubbo skittered forward with half a laugh to see that he’d hopped down to borrow some water from the nearest pond. “Love the forward planning skills we got here.”

Rather comically, it took Tommy about a minute to lug the bucket of water back up the hill. “We will have no forest fires tonight.” And the three of them giggled a bit more. “Okay,” Niki said, wiping at the corner of her eye. “Ready?”

It took more force than usual for Tubbo to get the lighter to work, and once the flame appeared he snatched his fingers away, conscious of the flammability of his bandages. Niki held the blazer before her, arm high in the air, and Tubbo reached out, touching the end of the lighter to the edge of one of the sleeves. At first, nothing happened, and then, the jacket caught. Abruptly, Niki was forced to let go of the flaming piece of clothing as the fire raced up and across it in seconds. “Holy sh*t.” She whispered. “F*cking sh*t indeed.” Tommy tugged Tubbo back towards him as the blazer dropped into the wind, flapping downhill as it dissipated into dark ash. “I was not expecting that.” “Probably the amount of alcohol soaked into the fabric,” Tubbo said with disdain. “Good f*cking riddance, Manberg.” “YEAH!” His friends cheered together, and he watched as the fire consumed the uniform he’d despised so much. The flag on the left lapel seemed to glow as the flames ate away at it, and that made them three out of three for burning a Manberg flag.

“I heard there was a special place,” Tubbo and Niki looked at Tommy with incredulity as he began to sing the anthem, but there was a certain mischievous twinkle in his eyes as he sang, and they joined in, the familiar words and melody both a comfort and a thorn. “Where men could go and emancipate, The brutality, and the tyranny of their rulers,” Tommy held his hands up, silencing the other two as he grinned. “Well this place is real, don’t be afraid, With Tubbo-” He pointed to each of them in turn. “Tommy, Niki, F*CK TECHNOBLADE-!”

The three of them fell about laughing. “You should do it louder Tommy, I don’t think he heard you-” Niki said between the hooting emanating from a small crowd gathered at the Pogtopia tower and the hysterical laughter of her comrades. His shouts echoed throughout the little valley they overlooked, and they soon resumed the tune, joined by members of the rebellion across the land, humming and singing along whether they were allowed or not. To be a traitor is not a respectable thing, but sometimes it is better to follow one’s heart than one’s leader.

“It’s a very big and not blown up L’Manberg!” It was as if the land itself was singing, and Tubbo hoped they could hear this chorus back in Manberg. “For L’Manberg!” For those that were unsure, that needed to hear that paradise had existed and could again. “For L’Manberg!” For those that were still left behind, keeping their heads down and staying out of trouble, especially after tonight. Tubbo tried to inject as much panache into his voice as he could, partially for them, for those that were rightfully too afraid and unable to sing along. But mostly because he wanted JSchlatt to hear him. “For L’Manberg!” He wanted to walk through the nation he’d served for so long, waving the correct flag, singing their song, and he wanted especially to scare the sh*t out of that tyrant. I survived, he wanted to say, standing at the other end of the trigger. I survived, and I’m leading the choir, and we’re going to have our land back thank you very much, no matter how many tallies on our charts. “For L’Maaaaaanberg!”

For L’Manberg, and for everything it stood for. Tubbo, like his friends, is down to his final life, and he’s sick of playing nice.

---

Taglist: @nixavia @zrenia @spaceheatertrash @hitherto-blue (Please let me know if you’d like to be on the taglist in future :)

[anothertimdrakestan]

Tongue Tied - Tim Drake x Reader

Words: 2.4k

Requested? Yes! From a lovely anon!

“Hello lovely author, may I please request a Tim x reader who start as nerd friends, then she finds out about him being Red Robin before he can tell her, and then Red Robin saves her one day and she lets slip that she knows it's Tim. With her smarts, she's able to help him with cases and missions, and the batfam is impressed by how smart she is. You can choose whether it's a romantic ending or not, that's up to you. I just feel like smart Tim needs to be seen more. Thanks😊”

LINK TO PROMPTS & MASTERLIST -> REQUESTS ARE STILL OPEN!

When I tell you I love me a smart reader I LOVE ME A SMART READER! Thank you so much for the wonderful request! Strap in dear anon you set me up for a long one and I really said “get in the car!” I hope you enjoy ; )

In the midst of a mental breakdown you let the flashbacks ensue, that’s the only correct way to lose your mind as everything you thought you knew crumbled around you right?

First you remembered “meeting” Tim Drake-Wayne for the first time. You always put meeting in quotes because you’d been in love with him for months and had sleuthed out his favorite coffee shop just to stumble into him. And because you’re you, nothing can really go as planned can it? Your plan to stumble into Tim was taken more literally when he caught you from tripping as you tried to enter the store, as you pulled yourself from his chest you felt your cheeks redden immediately. 

“Oh my gosh I am such a klutz I’m so sorry” he looked flustered himself, nervously fidgeting with his sweatshirt sleeve. “Oh uh, no problem, are you okay?” he up from his jacket to meet your eyes, and though he’d never tell you his heart melted on the spot, his brother Dick defined it as “love at first sight” but that seemed too cheesy. “I’m fine! You going in here too? This is my favorite spot!” you shook off the nerves, making your way into the cafe. Tim followed you in, and to your surprise paid for your drink. Sitting at a little bar you pulled out some of your college textbooks before you realized Tim and slipped into the seat next to you. 

“You in college?” his voice made you jump, your head jolting up. “Oh - no! I just think this kinda stuff is interesting. Math can predict everything ya know!” you slid your textbook between the two of you, feeling Tim’s shoulder lightly brush yours as he leaned in to read it. “Totally! Like even the golden ratio in nature!” Tim explained excitedly. 

That day turned into texting every single day and hanging out whenever Tim could, and it slowly developed into a best friendship. 

How did you not see the red flags like how Tim could rarely, almost never hangout at night? Or how he’d have strange bruises scattered across his body. Tim always looked dead tired but you knew he didn’t do any activities after school, to be honest the math just didn’t add up, so you took to investigating before making a conclusion - as any good scientist would. And because he’s a messy teenage boy investigation was easy.

While over at the manor Bruce had called Tim to W.E. for some sort of emergency press conference about his younger brother Damian biting a reporter, the interview was only supposed to be a half an hour. So, Tim left you with snacks and Youtube in his room while he threw on a suit and tie, which he looked like an absolute five course meal in - that wasn’t the point. You took the opportunity the riffle through his room, not exactly sure what you were looking for as you pawed through stacks of overdue assignments and dirty clothes. 

With deep breaths you relived the moment that hadn’t stopped playing in your head, finding his Red Robin suit. Throwing open his closet you stifled a laugh at his pajama pants and ratty t-shirts but you choked on air when a deep red and black suit fell from the top of his closet onto your face. Thinking it was some sort of halloween costume you held it up and realized what you were touching. It made sense, the late nights, bruises, frantic cancellations, it all added up except that Tim was the sweetest person you knew, the most loving soul you knew was kicking ass while you struggled through trigonometry. 

Unable to comprehend what was happening you put everything away and went home, shooting Tim some bullshit excuse about your family as your ran up to your room and began making a list - comparing Tim’s absences to Red Robin sightings, googling photos of Red Robin and drawing comparisons to the way he held himself like your best friend. There truly was no denying - Tim Drake was the Red Robin. Then it hit you like a truck - Bruce Wayne was Batman. And you assumed all of Tim’s adoptive family were vigilantes as well. You didn’t sleep that night, trying to make google searches that didn’t give anything away while trying to make a list of everything you discovered. 

Tim was Red Robin. You still couldn’t wrap your mind around it. So you sat in your room at 4am, crying. Because Tim was probably out risking his life for years without you knowing. Everytime you yelled at him for cancelling plans was probably because he was out saving lives and he took all your anger, he let you berate him for scrapping his knees when it was probably the fucking Joker whooping his ass. Is it right to apologize? To tell him what you found out and try to move on with the friendship. Is this like a “now that you know I have to kill you” kinda thing? You weren’t exactly ready to die. 

It seemed like Tim’s secret to keep, it was difficult at first to keep the facade that you didn’t know what he was doing at night, you just tried to always be understanding and appreciative of all the time he made for you. You fell back into the lull of best-friendship, Robin or not, Tim was the best person you knew.

“You’re in love with her Drake” Damian chided, almost annoyed with Tim’s ambivalence on the topic of his life long crush. “Am not, she’s my best friend. It’s not my fault you don’t understand friendships demon” Tim spat back, keeping his head down to hide his blush. “I’m with the demon, you practically worship the ground she walks on” Jason called, drinking straight from.a carton of milk as Dick cried out in disgust before adding his own opinion to the mess that was Tim’s love life. “Sorry kid it’s 3 to 1 which means you have to ask her out for real, remember last time?” Tim glared at the mention of his failed date proposal where you thought he was speaking in strictly hypotheticals. “You can’t out vote me on my own feelings” Tim groaned. “All in favor of allowing us to out vote Tim?” The three raised their hands again as Tim stomped up to his room, he planned on going on a peaceful patrol to plan his dream date for you.

A couple weeks into knowing Tim’s secret you learned that if you climbed to the roof of your apartment building you could see Batman and whomever he took out for patrol flipping around the city late at night. It had become a nightly routine and you’d grown to be able to identify the hero by their style of movement, your notebook filled with notes and sketches about each boy or girl. Then when you hungout with Tim you could match a vigilante’s mannerisms with one of his siblings, it was simple science really. Then you began taking down notes about whoever the Bats were fighting if it was public, discovering little facts and trying to slip Tim subconscious knowledge, it was the least you could do to help your favorite boy on earth. 

But that wasn’t enough, you wanted in on the excitement of crime fighting, to have more knowledge than was on broadcast TV. So you took to the streets of Gotham armed with pepper spray, a pocket knife, and a notepad. You learned tidbits of information that you poured over, working it together until you’d solved a case, then you’d slip hypothetical ideas to Tim throughout the hours of hanging out. You felt like a real life hero, and you were getting better by the day. 

“Jeez Tim it’s like you’ve been working double time! You’re solving cases before they’re even on B’s radar, what’s your secret kid genius?” Dick was stretching on the BatComputer while Tim feverishly typed in his newest solve. “Well I hangout with Y/N! She’s like a good luck charm dude I also get the best ideas when I’m with her! It’s pure magic bro I’m telling you” Tim explained as he frantically finished his report. “Lovers do have that effect! So when are you gonna tell her you’re in loveeeeee” Dick cooed as Tim shook his head. “Shut up Dickwing I’m working” was all he could give Dick without blushing or mixing up his words. He just had to plan something perfect.

But it never was perfect was it? 

Kill Croc was out in the sewer, and you’d taken it upon yourself to help Tim out, you knew people who knew some of the people that helped out Croc and you were determined to find him first at any cost. That’s how you accidentally ended up in a dirty drug deal. 

“Hey Timbers, you’re gonna wanna get to my location asap, I’m pretty sure your girlfriend is in trouble and it would be rude of me not to offer her saving to you” Jason heard a scramble from the other side of the comm as Tim confirmed he was on the way. He watched carefully as you searched for an escape from your capture, normally he would’ve busted the drug dealers for capturing teenagers by now but he was feeling magnanimous, deciding to give Tim the opportunity to save an unsuspecting but terrified Y/N. 

There were definitely no clear exits, you cursed yourself for getting too close. You were not Red Robin, you played the long game you didn’t rush into the arms of armed drug dealers in the name of the law. Your heart was beating out of your chest as they pointed a gun at you, forcing you to walk towards a sketchy delivery truck with the other kids. “Ooh totally not gonna happen!” a familiar voice cheered as glass windows shattered, none other than your best friend stood with a grin. He looked hot as fu- not the time, not the time. 

“Come any closer we’ll blow her brains out!” you felt a loaded pistol connect with the back of your head as you froze, begging to any god to live and promising not to be a field agent ever again. “That’ll be pretty hard without your gun dumbass” Tim called as four batarangs knocked the guns out of all the guy’s hands. Red Hood, who you knew was Jason Todd, burst through the back windows, guns raised. “I thought we had a deal you sorry bitches. Now let these kids go or I’ll show you what blowing brains out really looks like” the men froze, letting everyone escape. 

“Too late for us, but we’re taking the pretty girl with us!” one of the men had picked up their gun, aiming it straight between your eyes and firing. You screeched when a flash of red jumped in front of you. Almost in slomo you watched the bullet connect with Tim’s body. Your scream was deafened by Red Hood’s guns as he knocked all the men completely out. Rushing to Tim’s side you pulling his head into your lap. “Tim! Oh my god Tim are you okay!” you cried as Red Robin pulled off his domino mask to reveal a very confused Tim Drake. “Kevlar, I’m fine, bullets pack a punch but it just knocked the wind out of me, how did you know who I was?” Tim sat up, showing you the bullet sized dent in his suit. 

“We should go somewhere else and I can explain” you smiled sheepishly, letting Tim put his cowl back on as he loops his arm around your waist, pulling you to the top of the nearest building. 

“YOU’VE KNOWN FOR MONTHS” Tim looked shocked as you explained how you figured it out and how you’ve been helping him out for weeks. “Should I have told you? I’m really sorry I just didn’t know I felt like you’d tell me when you were ready” you flinched at Tim’s shout and he calmed down. “To be honest I don’t know, you’re one of few that know who I am, but I’m glad you know, makes this even better” Tim added the last part softly, placing his hand on your cheek to lift your lips to his. Your eyes widened in shock before fluttering closed, kissing him back. The build up of months detangled itself in a night, and kissing Tim was just as perfect as you’d imagined all those years ago. 

“So you’ve really been solving all those cases and you didn’t even tell me! You’re totally amazing at it!” Tim added, almost as if he’d been thinking during the kiss. “Yeah it’s pretty fun, you’re still gonna let me help right? I’m not stopping now!” you poked Tim’s chest while he thought. “I mean I’m pretty sure Babs needs a partner, but no ground work, you saw how well that went tonight, but it’ll be good to have a partner who finally knows everything” Tim exhaled, letting everything off his chest. 

“Partners!” you smiled, leaning in to seal the deal with a kiss. 

“This is totally epic” you stood stunned as the BatCave shined in all it’s glory. “I mean yeah it’s pretty cool, look this is my actual suit, I bet the one you saw was an older model!” Tim let you around the cave, showing off his favorite parts. You squeezed his hand trying to convey how excited you were. “I’m gonna be a better detective than you soon Timmy” you teased as Tim showed you the ropes of the BatComputer. “In your dreams babe” he rolled his eyes. “Babe huh? Didn’t realize you asked me out” you scrunched your nose at Tim while he blushed. “Oh uh, see I meant to, but yeah, I definitely should do that like-” you cut him off “yes Tim I’ll be your girlfriend you idiot” you laughed at how tongue tied the loveable boy was. You weren’t going to pretend like you didn’t get flustered around him either - you practically tripped on your own feet the first time you met him, but look how far you’d came from there. 

From friends to partners to lovers and probably everything in between, you were finally Tim’s in every way, working side by side was the best thing to ever happen to both of you. That’s not quite right. Tim Drake himself was just simply the best thing that’s ever happened to you. And you to him. And that’s truly love at it’s finest.