#And even then I'm probably not getting asks past 2am.... | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

trippinsorrows · 4 months ago

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looking through your eyes + four

authors note: hi! thank you so much for everyone who has left such kind words for this story! i'm so appreciative for the support and interest!

this one, i think, depicts a lot of contradicting thoughts and feelings for our two favorite characters. that's intentional.

i also take some creative liberties with medical and wrestling shit. let's just go with it, friends, por favor.

if any cw/tw’s are missed, please let me know, and i will add them!

cw/tw: language, violence, sexual harassment, hints at past self-harm, allusions to past suicide attempt, references to traumatic pasts

song inspo: ‘looking through your eyes’ by leann rimes

words: 10k

Roman has spent years coming home to a dark, empty house. It’s been his preference for just as long, enjoying the isolation following day after day of shit that needs to be handled. Because that’s usually how shit plays out for him. Roman’s always calling the shots, always figuring out how to navigate difficult, sticky situations.

It's just what he does.

It’s why he’s been able to advance the Bloodline as much as he has. Because Roman is a man playing professional chess among a group of elementary checker players.

And he’d never voice or admit it to anyone, but the weight does sometimes get to him in one way or another. So, he’s learned to appreciate solitude.

But he’s not met with solitude upon entering his home, which is both surprising and irritating considering it’s pushing 2 o’clock in the morning.

The only sound he should hear is the sound of his heavy footsteps from the front door to the bedroom. Instead, his feet carry him into the source of said sounds that are more pots banging and dishes being washed.

That’s how he immediately knows who it is without needing to check. But, Roman is more curious as to why she’s in the damn kitchen at this time of night instead of sleeping than the noise itself.

And he goes to ask as such when he gets even closer and realizes there’s more to the sound than clanging pots and running water. A soft, melodic, almost soothing voice singing in a language he doesn’t understand but recognizes as Spanish.

Solana is singing, and she’s singing well, beautiful even. So much so that he finds himself leaning against the wall closest to the kitchen, watching as she moves about, earbuds pressed in her ears making her oblivious to his presence.

There’s a sense of relaxation to her, an almost smile as she sings. She doesn’t seem nervous nor skittish….just at peace.

That is she turns around and realizes he's standing there, watching her.

She snatches her earbuds out and immediately jumps on the train of unnecessary apologies. “I’m sorry! I didn’t—-you said you’d be back late.”

He chuckles, calmly pointing out, “it’s almost 2am.”

Her face is flushed red with unnecessary embarrassment. “I thought—I guess I figured that meant you’d come back in the morning.”

“I sleep in my own bed, if I can help it.” It’s a comfort thing, a nod to his preference for solitude. He’s never even stayed the night with Samantha, mostly because he knows her ass would see that as a damn marriage proposal.

Well, maybe not anymore.

“Why are you still up?”

“I—I couldn’t sleep.” It’s a simple answer he’s certain also includes a very real, dark backstory as to why she can’t sleep. He’s been there.

He gets it.

“I’ll be done soon—"

“You can stay up as long as you want. I don’t care.” And it’s true. The house is big enough for her to be making as much noise as she needs, and he probably wouldn’t hear anything from where his room is. He also recognizes the misery that comes with wanting but not being able to sleep, so if being in the kitchen is her distraction, then he’s good with that.

Of course, she continues with the apologies. “I’m sorry about the music—I just—the house was too quiet. I—I don’t like the quiet.”

“Solana.” He has to interrupt her. Roman’s not in the mood for her apology tour. Granted, he does hone in on the part of not liking the quietness of the house. Of course she would be the opposite of him. “I don’t care. Do what you want. Shit doesn’t impact me.”

Roman can see she’s unsure of how to take his words, most likely wondering if there’s some catch, if it’s followed up with a stipulation. But, there is none. As long as it doesn’t impact him, she can do what she wants.

“You have a nice voice,” he compliments, because again, it’s the truth. He’d never taken her as the singing type, but gradually, Roman is starting to see there may be more to Solana than meets the eye.

Her unsure expression remains unchanged with the exception of her blush deepening as she mumbles a quiet, “thank you.”

Compliments of any sort seem to bother her, or maybe it’s less they bother her and more she’s unsure of how to respond because she’s not used to them.

He’d lean more on the side of that being the case.

Nevertheless, Roman decides to leave her be. “I’m going to bed.”

“Okay,” she says almost sheepishly, adding a quiet, “goodnight.”

Roman takes her in, the quietness and passiveness no longer as irritating as he once thought and believed it to be. It might still irk him, but the level of irritation isn’t as high as it used to be.

Whatever that means.

“Goodnight, Solana….”

————

From day one of moving into Roman's mansion, Solana has noticed the watch dogs that occasionally patrol the premises along with the armed guards. And while she’s always been tempted to ask to pet one, she’s also always decided against it. These dogs, like their handlers, are trained killers, not emotional support animals.

They’re not there for her to treat like objects.

But it’s when she walks outside, ready to head off to work, that she notices one guard with a dog Solana hasn’t seen before, a puppy, that she finds it in her to approach. With a couple minutes to spare before she has to leave for work, interacting with a dog seems like a nice way to start off the day.

Hand on her purse strap, she shoves back her anxiety about approaching this strange man, asking in a soft voice, “i–is he new?”

The guard sizes her up and down, answering with a gruff, “yeah.”

Solana looks down at the dog who’s also staring up at her with just as much curiosity. Smiling gently, she carefully crouches down and waits for him to move closer. There's a generous leeway of his leash that would allow him to do so.

Sure enough, the dog walks over to her, ears down. Giggling, she cautiously moves to pet him. “You’re so sweet….” And he is. Solana wonders if he’ll retain that sweetness once he undergoes his training. Unlikely. “Good boy…”

“He’s not a fucking pet.” The guard harshly scolds, giving a tug on the leash that makes the dog start to growl. Solana frowns, recognizing he’s annoyed with her interruption.

“I’m sor—”

But before she can finish her sentence, there’s a flash before her that seems almost too quick for her vision to process. But, when she does, she realizes Roman is now present, directly in front of the guard, hand wrapped around his throat.

“Speak to her like that again, and I’ll cut your fucking tongue out your mouth.” His voice is as menacing and terrifying as the fire in his eyes. Roman shoves the man forward and demands. “Apologize. Now.”

The man is coughing, struggling to regulate his breathing but still manages to cough up a muttered, “I’m sorry.”

Solana feels and probably looks stumped at hearing such a thing. She can’t recall the last time someone has ever uttered those words to her. Understandably, she doesn’t know how to respond or react.

“Leave,” Roman demands. And Solana isn’t sure she’s seen a man haul off as quickly as he does, guiding the dog along with him.

Roman takes in her appearance as she stands up, nervously brushing any invisible lint off her pants. “You good?”

She nods, still not quite knowing how to take this. How to take Roman seemingly defending her. Or maybe he’s just defending what belongs to him. It has to be the latter of the two, because why would he care about defending her?

Red-faced, she tries to explain her actions. “It—it was my fault. I just—I saw the dog, and I just—I wanted to pet it.”

“Why are you apologizing for someone being rude to you? Does that shit make sense to you?” When he says it like that, no, it doesn’t. But it’s clearly meant to be rhetorical, as he then asks, “you like dogs?”

Nodding, she clarifies. “Small dogs, mostly. Big ones, umm, they kinda scare me.” As do most things. This, she’s sure, he’s noticed by now. “Uhh—what time do you want dinner ready?”

He shakes his head. “Don’t worry about that. I’ll be back late tonight.”

“Oh.” Solana is unsure why there’s a strange sense of disappointment in her belly at this. Late….

In her experience with her dad and brother, that usually means they won’t be back until the next day, most likely in the morning.

This should make her feel a bit relieved, not having to be on edge, feeling worried about upsetting him.

Even if the only thing regarding her that she’s seen upset him is when he perceives she’s being disrespected.

She’s not quite sure what to make of that either.

“Ayo, Lil’ Soso.” A new voice enters the conversation, one she’s gradually growing comfortable and used to. Jey walks out with a rubbermaid container in his hand, chewing obnoxiously as he approaches Solana and Roman. “What are these things? They’re pretty good.”

There’s a couple of things to process in that one interaction, starting with the nickname Jey has used to refer to her in the times she’s run into him in the house. The twins, along with Paul, seem to be at the mansion often. The interactions though, have allowed her to feel less tense around him. Around Jimmy too.

She hasn’t had enough interaction with Paul to feel that way about him, and she’s certain that won’t change. He seems only concerned with Roman and no one else, which is valid and fair considering his role as Roman’s chief advisor.

Going back to his question, she answers, “conchas.”

“Con what?”

His expression and delivery make her smile. “Conchas. It’s a Mexican pan dulce. Sweet bread.”

“I don’t know half of what you said, but this shit good as hell. You got any more?”

“Don’t you have fucking food at your house?” Solana would never show or admit to it, but it’s sometimes funny to her how Roman seems almost always annoyed with his eccentric cousins. There’s no doubt in her mind though that he wouldn’t hesitate to kill for them, that he’s probably done so. And vice versa.

But they also seem to get on his nerves just as much.

“Man, Nicki on that shit again, talking about she ain’t cooking until I start treating her right. Me and the kids been eating out.”

Kids? That surprises her. She didn’t know Jey was a father.

“Solana! When you train with Naomi, can you exchange some recipes with her or something?” Jimmy also joins in the conversation, walking over while rubbing his stomach. “Cause I don’t know what that meal was in the blue container, but shit slapped.”

It takes a minute for her to remember which one that was. She’s always been a bit meticulous about separating her meals accordingly. “Carnitas Huevos Rancheros.”

Jimmy hesitates. “Yeah sure, that.”

“Am I running a fucking food pantry?” It’s hard to tell if Roman is genuinely annoyed. Something tells her it’s that type of irritation he naturally gets with the twins but won’t actually do anything about. “It’s not her job to feed you idiots.”

“I don’t mind,” she offers, adding. “I–I like to cook.” And it’s the truth. It reminds Solana of her mom, of all the times she’d spend in the kitchen learning from and spending time with the one and only person on this planet who ever loved her.

“See, Uce, she likes to cook,” Jey points out, wiping the crumbs off his fingers on his pants and tucking the now empty container under his arm. “I’ll just take this off your hands.”

Solana’s watch vibrating, reminding her that her shift starts in half an hour, is the perfect reminder that while this conversation is comical, it’s also interfering with her schedule. She’s also certain Solo is waiting patiently, or impatiently, by the SUV for her to jump in so they can get a move on. “I—I’ve gotta get to work, but I can have the food ready by tomorrow. I’ll just come home and cook after training.”

“If you feel like it,” Roman adds, and she knows better than to push back and tell him cooking is one of the few escapes she has. It’s become even more of an escape without the anxiety and pressure of her dad and brother demanding the food always be ready in sometimes unrealistic time frames and lashing out when that doesn’t happen.

To Roman’s credit, if he’s ever been annoyed with waiting a few extra minutes for meals, he’s done a perfect job not showing as such.

She simply nods, acknowledging his stipulation, offering a quiet ‘bye’ as she jogs off to the SUV with Solo ready to escort her to work.

It’s when she’s gone that Jimmy walks up beside Roman. “Man, she can cook, she don’t got a smartass mouth, and she got a body? Shit, Uce, ain’t you glad I told you to go with her?” Roman doesn’t offer a reply, but he definitely gives Jimmy that look that lets his cousin know to get away from him. Roman’s always been big on personal space.

“Does she cook every night?” Jey comes up, asking with an almost level of excitement. “Shit, me and the kids finna start coming over here.”

“Shut up.” The hell they will. Roman is still adjusting to living with someone. The last thing he needs is his cousin and his spawns running around his place, making noise, breaking and touching shit. Not going to happen. “Is Paul already at the office?”

“Yeah. He’s got the updated figures for you to go over. And the RKO proposal was sent over as well for you to review.”

Nodding, Roman starts to create a mental agenda for tasks he needs to complete for the day. And it goes without saying that he’s forever impressed how his cousins are easily able to slide back and forth between professional bag and bumbling morons.

It’s one of the reasons he keeps them around and as high up in command as they are.

“Good,” Roman acknowledges, sliding his sunglasses over his eyes. “Let’s go.”

————

“Hey!”

Naomi’s smile is just as bright and genuine as the first time Solana met her, and that’s something she doesn’t know how to take. A part of her figured Naomi was just being nice to her because Roman was around, because she was given an order, and no one defies the Tribal Chief’s orders.

And maybe she could even chalk this up to being an order as well, Roman tasking her with training Solana on how to fight, hence the continued kindness.

Regardless of the motivating factor, this woman is clearly a capable and trained fighter. A killer.

Solana would do well to stay on her good side.

“It’s good to see you. We didn’t really get a chance to talk much, but obviously, I’m Naomi. Jimmy’s wife.” For some reason, Solana can see it. Can see these two together, even if she’s only been around both less than a handful of times. “I train a lot of the new recruits, mostly women, some men.”

“Men?”

Naomi chuckles. “That’s typically their reaction too. Right before I remind them who I am and what I can do.”

Solana isn’t sure she wants to know the answer to either of those.

“Just out of curiosity, do you have any kind of combat training? Fighting knowledge in general?” It’s a valid question that only has one embarrassing answer. Solana guesses that Naomi picks up on this embarrassment, adding gently, “it’s okay if you don’t. It just gives me a baseline on where we should start.”

“No—I—I’ve never done anything like this before.” And she’s still not sure if she wants to, not sure what Roman thinks she will get from this. Him, along with everyone else around her, learned how to shoot a gun at the same time they learned how to walk. She doesn’t think she’s ever even held a gun. There’s no way humanly possible she could ever be even a fraction as good at this.

And Roman has to know this.

So, why is he making me do it?

Again, either Naomi is insanely perceptive or Solana is much worse at hiding her emotions than she initially believed.

She’d bet on the latter of the two.

“He doesn’t want you to be like us. He just—”

“He wants you to stop being so damn weak,” a new voice interjects. Solana recognizes the tall, intimidating woman from before when Roman had taken her to the Warehouse. She hadn’t had any direct interaction, but just the mere fact alone that she’d simply looked at Solana with disgust told her all she needed to know. “Wants you to grow a backbone.”

“Nia.” Naomi’s smile is dropped, traded for an intense stare. “Lay off her, okay? You heard what Roman said.”

“Oh yeah, we have to be nice to her.” Nia’s smile is mocking, her unimpressed gaze taking in Solana from head to toe. But Solana focuses on what Nia just said versus her judgmental countenance. Did Roman really tell them to be nice to her? Why? Why would he do that?

Nia walks over, crossing her arms over her body. “Well, here’s some kind advice, I can tell from one look at you that life hasn’t been very nice to you. But that doesn’t make you special.”

Naomi steps in. “Nia!”

“Bad shit happens to people all the time. At some point, you have to stop allowing yourself to be a victim.” If not for the fact that Solana knows Nia can’t stand her, she’d almost think Nia is offering what she believes to be genuine advice vs judging her. “You’re here. You survived it. Make that survival worth something.”

Naomi pushes Nia away from Solana, saying something to her that appears to be in defense of Solana, which she’d appreciate if not for the fact that she’s now in her head.

Nothing Nia said is inherently wrong. The world is undoubtedly both good and bad, perfect yet imperfect, wholly and incompletely balanced. These are all facts she’s well aware of, but what Nia doesn’t know or understand yet is that a person still being here doesn’t mean they survived.

Solana is already broken.

There is no survival.

There’s just existence.

“Don’t listen to Nia,” Naomi advises. Looking around, Solana sees that at some point in her dissociation, Nia departed. Naomi continues with that same warm smile. “She can be a bitch sometimes, but she does mean well…..occasionally.” Hands on her hip, Naomi brings the attention back to the whole reason Solana is even at the Warehouse. “How about we just start with flexibility and mobility? Most of us are smaller than the men, and you definitely are, girl.”

Small……

That’s a word Solana has never thought to use to describe herself.

“Being smaller means we can move around faster, can navigate around an attacker in a bit of a quicker way. But, you also have to be able to move in a way that’s lithe. Don’t worry. I gotchu, girl.”

They are reassuring words, words that Solana is grateful for, especially as they begin and she feels completely out of her element. Because she is. Solana isn’t the least bit lithe, and she’s certain her hand eye coordination is straight up shit.

But regardless of all that, Naomi remains kind, patient, and even makes conversation with her.

It doesn’t feel like she’s being made to do this, but more like something she gets to do. And Solana is grateful for that interaction, for the space to not feel like she’s burdening someone. That feels nice. So, so nice.

But equilibrium is a hard thing to achieve and even harder to maintain, so while one safe space is being created, another unsafe space is gradually forming in the midst of her oblivion.

Austin Theory and Grayson Waller, two upcoming, arrogant, fighters and wannabe heads have used the Warehouse for their training space for the past few months after finally proving and gaining access to the elite training grounds.

And while the initiation and acceptance process was brutal and would ward most off from fucking up their membership status, Austin and Grayson have always been hardheaded, too blinded by their own hubris to recognize when they’re about to shoot themselves in the foot.

And shooting themselves is the least of their worries when Grayson is casually surveying the gym to see who’s present, his eyes landing on a woman in particular who catches his interest almost instantaneously.

“Well, who do we have here?” Austin is confused initially, Grayson motioning across the way to where Solana completes her cooldown with Naomi.

Immediately, Austin scoffs. “Since when does this place offer a weight watchers class?”

Chuckling, Grayson still pushes back. “Hers is in the right places though, mate,” Grayson again advises Austin to watch Solana as she happens to be leaning back, palms flat on the ground making her top hug against her chest.

Austin makes a face. “Decent.”

“Who is she?” Grayson asks again as Austin notices a semi-familiar face walking nearby.

“Melo.”

Carmelo shifts his Beats headphones so they’re no longer covering his ears. “Whassup?”

Austin subtly gestures to Solana, asking, “who is that?”

Carmelo follows the line of vision and almost immediately snatches his eyes back to the duo. “Yo. You fuckin’ crazy?”

“What?”

Carmelo repeats himself, a sense of urgency in his voice. “Do you know who that is?”

“Pretty sure that’s what we just fucking asked you, dumbass,” Austin slaps him upside the head. “Now who is she?”

“Solana Miller. Well, Solana Reigns now, I guess.” Carmelo lowers his voice, as if speaking too loudly will attract too much attention. And he’s not entirely wrong. “Roman’s wife.”

Grayson makes a face, looking between Carmelo and Austin for elaboration. “Reigns got married? Bullshit. That bloke is the last man to ever walk down the aisle.”

“You two would do well getting your head from up your asses every once in a while. It’s a recent thing, but still a thing. So unless you want your insides literally ripped from out of you, it’d be best to leave her the fuck alone.”

Austin, the most smug of the two, is the first to protest. “Don’t tell me you’re one of those. Everyone makes Roman out to be this big bad who can’t be touched. He defends, what, once every six months?” Austin scoffs. The fear that the “Head of the Table” seems to have over everyone has never made sense to him. Sure, he’s heard things, even seen some things, but that’s always been because Roman called the shot. He’s not the one actually taking or making them. “Everyone knows he has his heron boys do his dirty work for him.”

“Plus, isn’t the guy pushing 40? What the fuck is he going to do?” Grayson laughs.

“Break his fucking hip trying to chase us.”

Carmelo shakes his head as the two dipshits laugh at their unfunny humor. “I’m telling ya’ll. Messing with her is a death wish. Plus, I heard she’s not even like that. That’s she’s like….shy and shit.”

If intended to ward the two off, it does the complete opposite. Theory smirks. “Those are always the freakiest.”

Carmelo backs away, lifting his hand in a surrender motion. “Can’t say I ain’t warn you. Dig your own graves.” With zero interest in having any part of what these two are clearly planning, Carmelo puts his headphones back over his ears and jogs off to start his training.

And it’s a wise decision as Austin and Grayson, forever the patient predators stalking their prey wait for Naomi to walk off, time it well so that there’s an appropriate enough time for Solana to walk off to the showers, get clean, and walk out at the same time they happen to be lurking in the halls that lead to the locker rooms.

That’s exactly how it plays out too, Solana looking down in her bag to grab her phone and text Solo that she’s done and ready to leave when a voice nearly knocks the wind out of her.

“Hi there.”

Solana gasps as loud as the sound of her back colliding with the brick wall behind her from how startled she is.

Instantly, she’s met with a set of cold blue eyes and wicked smile. “Solana, right?”

Breathing feels like it’s an optional thing, her hands still gripping the brick wall behind her. She can only nod her answer.

“Austin.” He then nods to the other man that Solana realizes is leaning back against the wall opposite her. The anxiety intensifies. “This is my buddy, Grayson. You must be new around here?”

Solana doesn’t want to speak, doesn't want to be near these two who have her practically cornered. But, she also doesn’t want to piss them off either. “Y—yeah.”

Austin’s eyes twinkle with nothing that seems good. “You really are shy, huh?”

“They make the best.” Grayson comments from his propped up position. Solana doesn’t allow herself to think too much about what he’s implying. She just wants to get the hell away from them. One look, and she knows they’re up to no good.

It makes her sick to her stomach.

The idea of walking past these two brings a visceral, physical response that has her mouth watering. She feels like she’s going to throw up, but she also knows she needs to get the hell away from them. “I—I have to go.” From where the next thing to come out her mouth stems from, she doesn’t know, but it’s blurted with all the nerves in her body. “R-Roman is waiting for me.”

He’s not. She actually has no idea where he is, but there’s a part of her that wonders if reminding them of who she is, who her husband is will make them back off.

“Of course,” the one with an accent speaks, motioning with his arm for her to leave. “Don’t want to keep the Chief waiting.”

The mockery in his tone unease her even more. Does he not realize just who Roman is? What he’s capable of.

Regardless, the second Austin backs away a bit, she’s darting through the hall, trying to put as much distance between herself and the two men, but she’s not far enough to miss the ominous departing statement from Austin.

“See you around, Solana.”

Something tells her this won’t be the last time she runs into them, and it leaves a deep, disturbing feeling in the pit of her stomach.

This isn’t good.

It’s not good at all.

————

Dear Mom,

I’m still alive.

That’s a good thing, I guess. Life with Roman has been….a strange experience. The most important thing is that he hasn’t hit me yet, but I’ve been trying really hard not to upset him or get on his bad side. I do my best to make sure all of his meals are ready and on time, which I guess helps.

But to be honest……he kinda confuses me.

He hasn’t been unkind, and I don’t think I’ve ever experienced him really yelling at me. Not like I’ve seen him yell and scream at others. So, that’s also good. It’s a bit of walking on eggshells, just waiting for him to snap and hit me, but not as much as I was thinking.

I don’t know….it hasn’t been as bad here as I thought it would be. For the most part, he just leaves me alone. We don’t even eat dinner together, which is fine, cause I can’t see why he’d want to spend time with me anyway.

But, he confuses me because it feels like sometimes he’s defending me or something, which doesn’t make sense because why would he do that? That would mean he has to care to some extent, right? I keep trying to remind myself that it’s probably not me he’s defending but his pride and standing, because I think being mean or disrespecting me is like disrespecting him? I’m not sure, but it’s definitely a new experience.

I haven't spoken to or heard from Wes and dad. Roman made me get a new phone with a new number that I’m not sure either of them have. I don’t know if I want to think too much about how bad it’s going to be when I finally do see them again…..

Wes made it clear I was supposed to be keeping in contact with them, but that hasn’t happened. Truth be told, I try not to think about that. Think about the fact that I’m somehow supposed be figuring out a way to…..to kill Roman. I could never do that. I could never kill anyone. You know that, mama.

Even more….I feel like Roman is growing on me, like maybe he’s not as bad as I thought, like maybe there’s more to him than meets the eye.

I think….I think that I could learn to like living here.

—------

“WarGames?”

To Solana, it’s a simple question, because it’s definitely not an everyday term. But that’s clearly not the case given the startled expressions on both Bayley and Naomi’s face.

It’s becoming something she is slowly starting to enjoy. Not necessarily the training part, but the socialization. It’s something Solana has been deeply deprived of over the years, so to have someone to talk to, someone who wants to talk to her means a lot.

Even if it’s technically a job she was assigned by Roman, Naomi has never made her feel like their interactions are forced.

Moreover, it was just in last week’s training session, Solana was thoroughly and pleasantly surprised to find out Bayley is also a member of the Warehouse and friends with Naomi, that reunion almost giving Solana a sense of giddiness.

She’s wanted to reach out since the wedding but never followed through based upon her fear that she’d be bothering Bayley.

Clearly, that’s not the case.

Solana is certain she’ll never forget Bayley’s kindness on a day where she really needed to believe in something, believe that there is always at least one reason to keep breathing, to be alive.

But, it’s when Solana asks about this topic Naomi and Bayley were discussing that attracts confounded expressions.

“You’re kidding right?” Bayley is the first to speak, glancing between herself and Naomi. “He didn’t tell you?”

Still confused, Solana presses, “tell me what?”

“I’m not surprised Roman didn’t, but someone definitely should have.” Naomi shakes her head, shifting into an explanation.. “War Games. It’s an annual match. Super big deal. It’s a show of strength and dominance for the Bloodline. Kinda hard to explain. You’ll just have to see for yourself.”

It sounds….intense. “I—I don’t think I’m invited.”

“Your hubby has clearly been a bachelor for way too long for him to realize that he has to tell you these things.” Bayley rolls her eyes but protests Solana’s belief that she would somehow not be invited to one of the Bloodline’s most important yearly events. “You’re definitely invited. As Roman’s wife, you have to be there. It would be seen as a sign of great disrespect to him if you didn’t.””

Disrespecting Roman…..never a good idea.

“When is it?”

Naomi seems to hesitate before answering. “Tomorrow night” And before Solana can panic at such short notice, Naomis is reassuring her that it will all work out. “Don’t worry. Bay and I will help you get ready.”

“Hell yeah.” Bayley already goes into strategizing mode. “I’ll handle your hair and makeup, and Naomi can find you a kickass dress.”

“Red, of course. That’s the only non-negotiable. Bloodline thing, ya know.” Solana figured as such. She also briefly wonders if that’s why Roman has been coming back home late the past few weeks, because he’s been training? “But, I will say we usually dress….well, like we’re going clubbing for these kinds of events, so it’s gonna be short, tight, and a tad bit revealing.”

That is something that gives Solana pause. None of those things scream appealing to her at all. She doesn’t have the body to dress like that. Not with the rolls, stretch marks, and scars that mar hers.

“I—I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” she finds it in herself to voice her opinion. A rarity. “I don’t—I don’t think I’d look good in something like that.”

Both Bayley and Naomi cast her confused expressions, Naomi being the first to speak.

“Why?” Naomi presses, gesturing up and down. “Girl, you have a nice ass shape. You would fill out a bodycon dress nicely.”

Solana has a hard time digesting what Naomi is saying. She would look great in a dress like that. Naomi is both fit and curvy, the perfect amount of curves in the right places without unnecessary fat. Same for Bayley.

For Solana, the less skin she’s showing the better, though she wonders if the kind of attire they’re describing is some type of dress code, meaning there is no room to protest.

The last thing she wants is for it to get back to Roman that she’s being “difficult.”

Defeated, she murmurs an ‘okay’ as the two of them engage in more conversation about this WarGames as well as fashion options. To be fair, they try to include her in, but Solana is too into her head about what this alleged night is as well as what it could include.

—---

Naomi wasn’t lying when she said that Solana would have to see WarGames for herself to understand it. That’s the absolute truth.

It’s a spectacle, to say the least.

For one, it’s a ton of people packed around the ring, the massive room where fights take place. The noise is boisterous, almost deafening, people drunk, swearing, placing bets, most of which are on the Bloodline.

And thankfully, Solana and Co. are seated in the upper area, a VIP box of sorts, away from the unruly crowd. She’s thankful for this for a lot of reasons, one of the biggest being the fact that she feels extremely uncomfortable in her dress. And just in general, but mostly with how much scarred skin is showing.

The dress is exactly as Naomi said it would be: short, red, and a bit revealing. Thankfully Naomi picked out a dress with a halter neckline that prevents any cleavage from showing, but there’s a split high up on the thigh that she finds herself trying to constantly adjust.

“You look great, Solana.” Bayley wears that same friendly, encouraging smile from Solana’s wedding day. “And I get that you’re self-conscious about your body, but I can guarantee these men would line up by the dozen for a chance to go home with you if not for your psycho-killer husband.”

Bayley playfully nudges her shoulder, and while Solana can emit a chuckle, she can’t bring herself to laugh. That line of men would be just as disappointed as she’s sure her psycho-killer husband was on their wedding night.

But, this isn’t the time and place for that.

“You look nice,” Solana compliments, partially a deflection technique but mostly the truth. Bayley, Naomi, and Nicki, who she met earlier that night and learned was Jey’s wife, all look exceptional in their numbers. Bayley is the only one not wearing red, for obvious reasons, but the jade green compliments her complexion well.

“We all look nice,” she says loud enough for the other two to hear.

Nicki opens her mouth to respond when the lights in the arena start to shift. “Ugh. This bitch again.” Nicki’s scowl and expression of irritation draws Solana’s attention to the woman in the ring, who now has the spotlight on her, a woman she immediately recognizes as being there that night Roman woke her up from a nightmare.

The woman is tall, curvy in the right places, beautiful, bouncy curls cascading down her back. If she has a lot of makeup on, Solana can’t tell because it’s painfully obvious she’s been blessed with natural beauty. Everything about her is just so gorgeous.

At the time, she didn’t think anything of it, too caught in the haze of trauma. But now, curious and believing she can receive an answer, Solana asks, “who is she?”

“The most annoying person ever,” Nicki answers, taking a swig of her drink. In only knowing Nicki for less than an hour, Solana both does and doesn’t understand the compatibility between herself and Jey. They seem very much alike yet dissimilar. It makes sense why they fight as much as they do.

“That’s Samantha.” There’s no way to misinterpret the disgust in Nicki’s voice even as she pronounces Samantha’s name with undeniable distaste. ��She does the announcements for events, but her daytime job is being a professional hooker.”

“Nicki!” Naomi shakes her head. “I think she’s a paralegal for a lawyer or something, but she’s mostly known as a pain in everyone’s ass. Always has been. Ever since we were in high school. She thinks because she’s light skinned with ‘good hair’ that she’s better than everybody.”

“Don’t forget about Roman,” Nicki chimes with her nose upturned. “She really thinks she’s hot shit though because she’s number one on his ‘I want my dick sucked’ list.”

This causes Solana to pause for a second. “What?”

She’s not stupid. Why else would this Samantha have been over at the house that late at night? And with Roman? Solana figured early on that if he isn’t getting any from her, then he has to be getting it from somewhere. Truthfully, even if their marriage did involve sex, she’s not sure he still wouldn’t find his way in between the legs of another woman.

But, there’s something about having it confirmed, hearing for herself that he gets around, that he clearly has a high sex drive that adds a whole new layer of insecurity.

She’s known from day one she could never be anyone he wanted or needed, and he expressed as such that day at the library, but this conversation makes it feel more…..real.

And she’s unsure why or just what makes this bring on a sense of sadness.

“Come on, I get you’re quiet and innocent and shit, but everyone knows that man is a hoe. If you’re black or black–ish with a vagina, fat ass, and big titties, he’ll fuck you. Cause none of them fools fuck with white girls.” She glances at Bayley, almost sympathetically. “No offense.”

“I’m Mexican.”

This serves as a brief, nice distraction for Solana. She suspected that Bayley wasn’t entirely white, but hearing that she’s Hispanic, Mexican, makes Solana feel a small slice of excitement. She makes a mental note to ask her if she speaks Spanish.

Solana hasn’t been able to communicate in the language her mother made sure to teach her in secret given Xavier’s protest since her murder. So, the idea of being able to communicate with another person in that language makes her feel a bit excited. Maybe more than a bit.

Nicki is dismissive, though there’s a hint of humor there. Like she knows and is just messing with the other woman. “Sure you are, Bay.”

Bayley rolls her eyes and assures Solana. “Don’t listen to her.”

“Ya’ll, don’t lie to this girl.” Nicki seems dead set on stressing this point, and Solana can’t figure out if it comes from a good place, a drunk place, or somewhere in between the two of them. “If it wasn’t common knowledge he don’t fuck none of these bitches raw and makes most get on birth control, I’d tell you to not let that fool touch you with a ten foot pole.”

Bayley is watching Solana, sees the discomfort growing at this conversation and moves to change the conversation. “Why don’t we talk about you and Jey and why I literally saw him flirting with Sasha the other day?”

At that, Nicki drops her drink, cussing loudly, “man, fuck him! I don’t give a fuck about him or that bony heifer! I’ll beat the shit out both of them.”

“Nicki. Shut the fuck up. You may beat her ass, but you gon be right back to drunk spilling about how good Jey’s dick is when it’s all said and done.” Naomi dismisses, and something tells Solana she’s not wrong. Nicki and Jey seem to have a bit of a…..tumultuous relationship.

“I mean it this time!”

“Uh huh, sure sis.”

“And if you don’t give a fuck about him, why are you here?” Naomi challenges.

All eyes on her, even Solana’s slightly curious gaze, Nicki falls back in her chair and mumbles, “cause that’s my man.”

Naomi and Bayley are a chorus of laughter and whooping and hollering, roasting Nicki for her contradictory statements.

Flashing blue lights illuminate the arena as everyone immediately moves to their feet followed by opening music that almost instantly brings chills up Solana’s arms. The lights then transition to a combination of red and blue, the sound of cheering intensifying as she redirects her focus back to where the first group entered.

Solana’s eyes instantly, maybe even naturally, land on Roman. He stands first among the men, shirtless, ula fala around his neck, championship belt around his waist, a look of fierce determination and stoicism painted across his handsome face.

And that body…..rippling muscles glistening under the heat of the lights.

It’s a strange and miserable experience. Feeling all of the sensations and attractions a human typically has to another human being but having an almost inability to act on them. It’s not that Solana isn’t attracted to Roman. She finds him to be sinfully attractive. The issue is that whenever she thinks about what physical acts take place when two people find each other attractive is when her head is swarmed with vivid memories and flashbacks of being violated in the worst way possible.

And the attraction is stumped by fear and trauma. Fear of being touched. Fear of being with anyone in that way.

It’s like Roman said. He can get that from anyone, so why would he bother with her?

When he has someone like Samantha, prettier, smaller, easier, at his disposal?

It brings a wave of sadness over her that she’s grateful isn’t noticed by the other ladies who are focused on the start of the match.

And to her credit, Solana tries to pay attention, grateful and thankful for Naomi and Bayley occasionally pointing out certain aspects of how it works, why the two groups are separated, individual members from each side periodically being sent into the line of fire.

“Roman always goes last,” Naomi explains at one point.

“Save the best for last type shit,” Bayley adds, finishing off her beer and asking for another.

“More like once he gets his ass in there, it’s a wrap. Everyone left getting smashed.” Solana believes this wholeheartedly. She’s just not sure if she wants to see that, see that side of him up close.

It exists, obviously, but it’s hard to compare the killer she knows he is to the man he’s been to in the short duration of their marriage.

Almost….almost kind.

The fighting, brutal and bloody, all occurs in the ring, but Solana constantly finds her gaze falling back to Roman. He remains seated, patiently or maybe impatiently waiting for his turn, never once ripping his gaze from the match. She sees Paul outside the cage, occasionally speaking to Roman, advising as he always does.

Solana can tell he’s completely immersed, focusing solely on the match before him.

And it’s when there’s some type of in-ring argument between the twins and the other member-in-training of sorts, Sami, she thinks Naomi called him, that she turns to the ladies. “What are they doing?”

“Sealing a death wish,” Nicki answers with a shake of her head. “Roman gon’ have all they asses for this.”

Naomi sighs loudly, advising Solana after the bickering results in one of the men from the other group getting the upper hand, landing a particularly brutal looking kick to Jey. “There’s been some….contention between Sami and the twins, mostly Jey, but Nicki isn’t entirely wrong. They should know better than to let that shit interfere with a match. Roman will most likely make them stay after and……yeah.”

Solana doesn’t need a detailed explanation. She has a good idea of what Roman making them pay will look like. It’s also not something she wants to see.

The match, in and of itself, despite the excitement and pure interest of everyone around her, isn’t necessarily something she wants to see. Solana has seen, been exposed, and experienced enough fighting violence to last her a lifetime.

This is entertainment to them, but for her, it’s been her lived experience.

So, she doesn’t feel any sort of adrenaline rush watching grown men beat the crap out of each other, blood, sweat, and bruised, battered bodies putting themselves through hell. It gives her some relief to see that the Bloodline, for the most part, remains with the upperhand. Even with their in-house argument earlier in the fight.

But, it’s when the timer that ends with another man joining the brawl moves to a ten second countdown that her interest grows a bit more. It grows a bit because Roman is finally about to enter the ring.

She watches him, has mostly just watched him this entire time. He’s just as unbothered as he was the minute he walked in. Adjusting his gloves while Paul clearly tries to bestow some last minute wisdom before he makes his entrance.

It feels a bit redundant. She’s certain this man doesn’t need anyone helping him with anything.

And as soon as the timer winds down to zero, Roman gradually making his way to the ring, Solana knows she was right. Knows he doesn’t need help, because he’s been studying and planning for the past almost 45 minutes. Strategizing.

It shows the minute the men, all 10 of them go at it. It’s hard to keep track of all of the mayhem, fists flying, kicks landing in areas that are sure to require a couple days to recover. But, it’s Roman who still manages to catch and hold Solana’s attention. He moves with such precision and accuracy, blows every bit as barbarous and violent as his reputation warrants.

There’s a small part of her that experiences something she can’t quite label or understand when he takes a hit, especially when a member of the other team manages to catch Roman off guard, sending him into the table, the weight of him snapping it in half.

At that, she nervously starts to move her fingers up and down the side of her dress. But, Roman, while clearly impacted from the blow by the blood starting to stream down the back of his arm only seems further enraged. Like being attacked has somehow refueled him, recharged his already pre-existing rage.

“They are in trouble now….” Naomi murmurs, shaking her head, as if she knows what’s about to come. “Roman hates getting hit, and they made him bleed too?”

It’s the blood part, maybe, that bothers Solana. It’s silly given who he is and the fact that he’s clearly holding his own just fine, but Solana wonders why he doesn’t or can’t have that tended to. It has to hurt.

But, then again, it all hurts, so maybe the pain just numbs itself out.

And maybe Roman is clearly caught up and consumed in adrenaline, in the mad rush of the battle, because it seems from the table slam on out, no one is touching him. He’s all over the place, strong blows resulting in grown men crying out in pain. She’s certain those closer to the actual ring can hear the sound of bones crunching, an inevitable thing given the abnormal distortion of limbs she sees on the other team.

He yells and taunts his opponents, one by one, laying them out with the somewhat assistance of the rest of the men. Truth be told, Roman could have probably tagged out the other four men and handled the other team all on his own.

He’s just that effective.

And when there’s only one man standing, barely, Roman moves to the other side of the ring, face turned up in rage, watching and waiting for the perfect moment for him to dart across, laughing into a spear so forceful that it knocks the man unconscious instantly, guaranteeing an instant, easy pin.

The crowd erupts in cheers, Roman’s music sounding as Samantha formally announces the Bloodline as the winners.

There’s a strange sense of relief that Solana has at that, at the fact that this is all over, that the fighting is done. That Roman is done, because her mind keeps going toward the fact that he probably needs some level of medical attention and when said attention is going to happen.

But while she expects the Bloodline to start their exit, she’s instead met with security dragging the unconscious bodies of the losing team outside of the ring.

“What’s happening?” Solana asks Bayley, realizing that the women are starting to pack up to head out. “Isn’t—isn’t it over?”

“For us, yes.” Her eyes set on the twins, Solo, and Sami. “For them, it’s just beginning.” Solana reflects back on their in-ring argument and Naomi’s foreshadowing about this happening, about this punishment.

And one glance at Roman, his hulking shoulders lifting and lowering with his heavy panting. His eyes are flaming with a fury he clearly intends to take out on his team.

“Come on.” Naomi draws Solana’s attention. “I’ll ride home with you, cause Solo ain’t gon be free no time soon.”

None of them will.

Solana recognizes this and agrees, but it’s not without a sense of disappointment at not leaving with Roman.

And that confuses her. It confuses her a lot.

She didn’t arrive with him, so why would she leave with him?

More importantly, why does she care that she’s not leaving with him?

—----------

“I–I can do that for you.”

There are some things meant to be thought and some things meant to be said. This is one of those things that should have stayed in Solana’s head instead of rolling off her tongue the way it does.

She was only supposed to ask him if he wanted her to make anything in particular for breakfast tomorrow, not offer to freaking suture stitches for him.

Well, that’s not entirely true, because as it’s almost damn midnight, she could and should at least be in bed trying to sleep. She’s been home for almost two hours, showered, changed into her oversized shirt and sweats.

She shouldn’t even be standing before him, but there was some type of unease she had at trying to fall asleep without making sure he made it home, without seeing to it that he tended to any injuries he sustained tonight.

Solana almost feels like that’s what she should do, like she should make sure she’s available to assist him with anything he may need. Like it’s just another thing that could keep him from directing his anger from earlier towards her.

And it’s slightly less stressful for her in knowing that he’s more likely to harshly dismiss her, maybe even chastise her for unintentionally implying he’s somehow incapable. However, instead of a rebuff, he simply looks at her, asking, “you know how?”

Solana doesn’t know why, but she takes this as a sign that he’s accepting her offer. Walking over to where he sits at the kitchen island, she sees he already has the supplies laid out. “I—I’ve had a lot of experience.”

Some of it from patching up her dad and brother but most of it from patching up herself over the years, from watching and learning from her mother tend to her wounds after sustaining beatings from Xavier. “My mom was also a nurse. She—she taught me a lot.” Like the proper way to suture. “Did—did you already disinfect?”

Solana is slightly nervous when he says no. That means she’s the one that’s going to have to inflict that brief but potent burning pain.

Lovely.

Nonetheless, she readies the cloth, holding it over the cut before warning, “this—this might sting.”

“I don’t care.” And she believes it. Seeing him in the ring tonight, his prowess, his brutality, she’s not sure if anything could hurt him.

Solana proceeds to clean and disinfect the area before grabbing the sutures to start stitching him back up.

Roman suddenly asks her. “Did you want to go into the medical field?” Roman recalls from the file he read on her that she never pursued any higher education beyond high school, something else he marked against her at the time. Education and knowledge have always been important to him.

But meeting her and slowly learning more about her backstory, he wonders if that was of her own choosing, hence his asking.

Solana, meanwhile, can’t figure out why he’s even talking to her in the first place. He seemed, justifiably, annoyed with and not wanting to be bothered with any and everyone post match. Now he’s asking her questions about things she hasn’t thought about in years.

Still, she answers with the truth. “I—I wanted to be a nurse. Like my mom.”

This doesn’t surprise Roman as he follows up with, “why didn’t you?”

A lot of reasons. Many of which she has very little desire to share, not that she could or would even want to ever voice as such to the man sitting in front of her.

That’d be an instant death wish.

“My—my father. He, umm, didn’t want me to leave home.” It’s a version of the truth, the unabridged version being he didn’t want her to leave home because he wouldn’t be able to control her if she did so.

And Solana has a feeling that she doesn’t need to share all that, that Roman already knows this.

“Why didn’t you just leave?” Roman’s delivery, like most of the time, is insensitive. But, he genuinely wants to know. For what reason did she stay there all those years, in a house of horrors instead of just leaving and never looking back?

It’s a fair, simple question with a complex, layered answer that she greatly simplifies.

“I tried. It—it never worked out.” And it’s when Roman hears the sudden sadness in her voice, sees the way her eyes temporarily shift to her inner forearms, horizontal faded scars that he’s just now able to see from how close she is to him that he gets it.

He realizes that she tried in more ways than one, none of them being successful.

And in a truly coincidental way, Solana notices he’s also cut on the back of his bicep. It’s also in her being so close to him that she realizes underneath the intricacies of the tribal tattoos on his forearm, there are scars. Burn scars, nothing severe, but visible enough for her to notice.

It makes her wonder about where he got them, how he got them, not that she’d ever have enough bravery to ask.

She instead clears her throat and gestures to the cut. “Do–do you want me to do that one too?”

It takes a second for Roman to think about what she’s asking. “Is it deep enough?”

Without thinking about it, she brings her hand to finger to lightly feel the cut that was clearly poorly and in a rush patched up post fight. Nodding, she explains, “it’s deeper than about 1/4th an inch, so yeah, I—you should let me.” And in realizing she’s touching him, like she isn’t doing the same thing while suturing, she snatches her hand back, apologizing quietly.

He doesn’t think he’s ever had a woman apologize for touching him.

“Okay.”

And that’s it, he doesn’t protest, doesn’t chastise her for making it seem like he doesn’t know or understand injuries. He just allows her to work on him, Solana doing her best to ignore the fact that he’s so close to her, his big, strong body, even while seated, overwhelming her.

But while this would typically cause Solana to go into panic mode, being so close to a half dressed man, she doesn’t feel that with Roman. She doesn’t feel anything at all. No anxiety, no fear, just some nameless emotion that doesn’t evoke her typical nervous responses.

“Okay.” Finishing up, Solana moves to clean up the supplies, discarding what is no longer usable. “Just….don’t get it wet for next few hours, and apply the ointment as needed, but—I’m sure you know all this already.” She feels silly for speaking to him as if he hasn’t patched himself up or been stitched up countless time before. “I’m gonna—I’m gonna go to bed now.”

Not wanting to risk embarrassing herself further, she turns on the heel of her foot and starts walking off, only to stop when he calls for her.

“Solana.”

She turns around, and Roman is briefly caught up in how she presses her lips together, trying to suppress a frown. She thinks she’s done something wrong.

One more sweep of her frame from bottom to top, remembering the stunning complement and contrast of the red dress against her complexion. He compliments, “you looked beautiful tonight.”

She looks absolutely taken back by what is an obvious statement. Taken back and confused. “M—me?” She’s pointing to herself, brows arching together. And for a second, there’s a small hint of a growing smile as she asks, as if he could have made a mistake. “Really?”

He didn’t.

Roman doesn’t make mistakes

Solana has a lot of things fucked up about her, but one thing not a damn person can deny is that she’s absolutely gorgeous with a body to match. That’s just a fact, why he felt the need to express said fact is a bit beyond him, but Roman doesn’t allow himself to think too much about it. It’s not a sentimental thing at all, just a plain fact being stated, if anything.

“Thank you,” she finally says as he notices the reddening of her cheeks. “Umm, good night.” Solana’s hand is on the banister, her finger squeezing tighter than the coils in her stomach. “Roman?”

It would be a hell of a lot easier if he would have just ignored her, but he doesn’t. His gaze snaps up to her from the phone now in his hand.

The same hand she witnessed just tonight pummel grown men, just as muscular and intimidating as he is to a bloody pulp. The same hand that could easily take her life, could have her clinging onto life with just one beating. And that’s all she can see at the thought of telling him about Grayson and Theory messing with her, that it’s now happened twice, they’ve caught her off guard and alone, sexually harassing her.

Nia’s words from the other day return to the front of her mind.

“He wants you to stop being so weak.”

He’ll blame her. He’ll blame her the same way her father blamed her for what they did to her. He’ll blame her for being so weak. That’s what Solana knows will happen. Knows he’ll say she was leading them on, that she must have done something to garner their interest in her. And he’ll be angry.

He’ll be angry at her.

And nothing good ever comes out of Roman Reigns being angry.

She’s seen it for herself firsthand tonight.

Determine to find a way to deal with this on her own, she shakes her head, “nothing. S–sorry.” She’s turned back to the steps when he says her name this time. His tone clear and authoritative.

She jumps, immediately turning back around to face him. He’s now standing near the steps where she stands, halfway between rescue and ridicule.

Something flashes in his gaze at her obvious nervousness, but he quickly refocuses on the topic at hand. “You have something to say, so say it.”

A deep layer of regret and anxiety settles in at the realization that there is no lying to Roman. He’s adroitly skilled in reading between the lines and seeing through bullshit. Or maybe she’s just that bad at lying.

Hopefully not the latter because another lie is about to roll right out.

“I was just—I was gonna sleep in tomorrow, but I have to make your breakfast, so I’ll just—”

“You don’t have to do anything, Solana.”

Roman knows she’s lying. Knows she just pulled that out of her ass instead of sharing whatever it is she initially wanted to say. It’s probably something stupid too, something he won’t give two shits about, but something she thinks he gives two shits about. And he’d push her if not for the fact he can tell she’s getting all nervous and shit on him again. The last thing he needs is her having another panic attack.

“Sleep in,” he directs. This is a conversation, much to his chagrin, that will have to take part in sections. And it’s too late in the evening to hash out one of those sections. And to be fair, there is a part of him that recognizes she probably does feel like she needs to be up at the ass crack of dawn like him to have his first meal of the day ready to go. And his lunch. And his dinner.

Granted, Roman can’t and won’t complain about all of it, because the girl can cook her ass off.

But, it’s not necessary.

He’s more than capable of taking care of himself.

He’s done so since he was 10 years old.

“Thank you.” She does that thing again where she smiles like he’s just told her she’s won the lottery or been given the cure to world hunger. It’s the simplest things that seem to make her happy. Considering the bar has already been set so low, it makes a bit of sense.

It makes a lot of sense.

“Goodnight.”

Roman is certain she’s intentional in the way she turns on the heel of her foot to move up the stairs, putting as much distance between the two of them to avoid a follow up question. Her avoidance behavior is a bit impressive, irksome, but still impressive, nonetheless.

And it would be remiss of Roman to not sneak a peak of her retreating form moving up the steps, his eyes glued to the sway of her ass, again remembering that short, red dress that momentarily distracted him when he laid eyes on her at the match.

Roman would never deny his physical attraction to her. That’s just a fact. She’s shaped in a way that makes his dick hard at the thought of having that body underneath his, writhing, begging for him to not stop fucking her in all the ways he would if he could.

But, that’s a fantasy. It’s a fantasy because the reality is that he can’t even touch this girl without her freaking out on him, something that would annoy him greatly if he didn’t realize there’s a reason behind her jumpiness.

Something that’s beyond just her shitty father and brother.

Roman doesn’t allow himself to travel down that path, to see what it might lead to because just the thought of what might be the reason she doesn’t like being touched has his fist forming at his side, nostrils flared, and anger brewing at an accelerated pace that doesn’t make sense.

It also doesn’t make sense when he grabs his phone, navigating to the desired thread, sending a text he doesn’t think much about.

Roman: Get me a list of dog breeders. Small dogs. Preferably local. We can travel if necessary.

Paul: Sir?

Roman: Just do it.

Paul: I’ll have it to you by tomorrow morning.

#roman reigns x black!oc #roman reigns fic #roman reigns #roman reigns x black!reader #arisnotebook

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fandoms--fluff · 24 days ago

Text

Baby Bradshaw

Flufftober, October 19th

Sister reader x Bradley Bradshaw

Summary: You’re Bradley’s little sister whose 14 and he doesn’t exactly know about the mischief you (cause) get into until he gets called back to Top Gun as one of the candidates. Maverick hasn't seen you since you were six because of the whole pulling Bradley's papers thing. (You've been living with Ice). So, a lot has defiantly changed. Your callsign is Marvel.

A/N: I know the time lining doesn’t exactly add up, but I came up with this idea at 2am. Deal with it I think it’s cute (and hectic). Please, I know it's shitty but just bear with me for it.

Warnings: Swearing, Underage drinking (only a little), (underage) flying combat - it’s just a fanfic and I can create the rules so.....deal with it!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Can I leave now?” You complained.

“For the last time, NO” Warlock answered while going through a stack of papers.

You walk over to the front of his desk, where he’s standing. “Oh, come on, you’re the one who always says that I should be in the farthest room from where you are. Just between you and me, I’m pretty sure that this is because there’s something going on downstairs that you don’t want me to know about.”

“MARVEL!” He yells, fed up with you.

“WARLOCK!” You imitate him and his stance.

“You know what? Yeah, your right I don’t think I can actually handle any more of well......you today. You can leave” He exasperated while doing a hand gesture when he said ‘you’.

Immediately you grab your phone from the tiny square table in there and sped out the door, deciding to go check out what’s happening downstairs since your brother was saying something about having to go there again today. He’s been complaining about someone - his callsign is bagman you're pretty sure - to you for the past week but won’t tell you why, so you’re deciding to investigate what's going on because, well you’ve got nothing better to do. Well, you should probably get all the science homework you have done but that's a later problem with bullying one of the navy research persons into "helping" you.

You've also asked Ice multiple times but he's found ways to distract you so you'd forget about it until the next day. (Yes, he has written a whole handbook of how to deal with your shit - you don't know of course)

While you're walking down the hall you've come into eyesight of Cyclone who was about to go into a room.

'Shit' you thought to yourself.

"What are you doing down here Marvel?" Cyclone, paused right before turning the doorknob.

"Well, my plan worked with annoying Warlock into letting me leave his office and now I'm going to figure out what you guys are failing at hiding from me just down the hall" you said pointing to a wide door into one of the hanger/classroom things as if it's a normal occurrence.

Which it kinda is...

"That's funny cause I don't remember allowing you to go anywhere near there" He crossed his arms.

"Well unlike everyone else I don't give a crap what you want or think I should do or just orders in general" You smirked and resumed your walking.

“Marvel! Stop!” He yelled.

Right as he yelled you started to sprint as fast as you could (which is FAST).

“MARVEL! GET BACK HERE. NO! DON’T YOU DARE GO IN THERE!” He started to chase after you.

The dagger squad and Maverick turned their heads to the noise coming from the hallway until the door burst open. You ran over to the other side of the room, quickly before Cyclone could get to you.

By the time Cyclone ran in you already ducked underneath an old wooden desk nobody has probably used in years considering the amount of dust it held.

Everyone looked from where you hid, over to Cyclone who’s clearly pissed.

“Marvel!” Cyclone called out, ignoring everyone’s confused faces.

You kept quiet, not making even a small amount of sound. Your legs are tucked up against your chest, tightly while you lean your chin on your left knee.

“Okay if no one else is going to say it, I am. Who the hell is Marvel? Is the little girl who ran in Marvel?” Hangman spoke out loud, earning an elbow to the ribs from Phoenix.

Cyclone looked over to everyone and sighed before yelling out, “Y/N BRADSHAW!”

At that you rolled your eyes and crawled out from under the desk, walking over.

“You know I really hate it when you call me by my full name” You glared at him, paying no mind to everyone who’s watching with shocked faces. Bradley's face though was filled with more so disappointment.

“You know what I give up, I don’t have the energy to fight with you today” Cyclone said, walking towards the doors.

“Well, that’s disappointing, I’ve got nothing better to do and it’s entertainment for me” He walked out giving you the bird.

“Wow! How real nice of you!” you said sarcastically before turning over to everyone.

You walked a bit closer to Hangman, giving him a death glare.

“Oh yeah, call me ‘little girl’ again, I’ll kick your shins until they’re raw and bleeding” You threatened him.

His reaction is a mixture of shock and against his wishes, fright. Before you could laugh at him, Rooster started walking towards you with an eyebrow raised.

“Okay, in my defense what do you expect me to do? Stay in my room and happily do fucking homework all day?!” You stated to him.

You looked over at Maverick who was walking towards you and enveloped you into a tight hug.

"I missed you kiddo."

#top gun #top gun maverick #top gun maverick fic #bradley bradshaw #bradley bradshaw x little sister reader #bradley bradshaw x sister reader #bradley bradshaw x reader #pete mitchell #maverick #pete mitchell x daughter figure reader #pete mitchell x reader #phoenix #natasha trace #jake seresin #hangman

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vioartemis · 2 years ago

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I love her so much...

(Jenna Ortega x fem! reader)

Summary: After she comes home late in the night, Jenna and you have a fight Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 2 [au] Request is here :)) Warnings: angst (English isn't my first language, I'm sorry if there are mistakes or if something doesn't make sense TvT)

You had been Jenna's girlfriend for almost two years, but lately, your relationship wasn't at its best. Rather at its worse actually. She had been ignoring you lately, and it was starting to be difficult to deal with.

You were alone at your shared appartement, in tears, when the doorbell rang. You got up shakily and made your way to the door, opening it for the girl behind it.

"Hey..." she said

"Hey..." you replied

You stepped to the side so she could enter, but quickly broke down in her arms.

"I don't know what to do Emma... I can't... I can't do this anymore..."

The girl held you close and rubbed your back, before leading you to the couch where you could both sit.

"I know, I understand... Maybe..." she bit her lip

"What...?"

"If you wait for her to come home you could talk, get things straight..."

"I don't even know if she will come home tonight..."

"It's okay, I'm sure she will... I'll stay with you until then if you want..."

"Yes please..."

Time passed by, and quickly it was 2am.

As you were still crying in Emma's arms, you heard the door of your appartement open, followed by footsteps. Jenna was home. Finally.

She entered the room, putting her keys back in her bag, and froze and she saw you.

"Where the fuck where you?" you asked

"Are you cheating on me?"

You couldn't believe your ears. Did she really asked that?

"I should probably go..." Emma said, getting up

"No, stay" you tell her, before turning to your girlfriend "You're seriously asking me if I am cheating on you?"

To everyone's surprise, you let out a laugh.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me. You've been ignoring me for weeks, and I am the one who's cheating? You get up so early and come back so late I don't even see you anymore! And when you don't you spend all your time with Percy! "

"I'm sick of your jealousy Y/n! I told you there's nothing between Percy and I-"

"I know!" you cut her off "But you spend all your time with him! It's like I don't exist anymore! Do you even care about me? About us?"

"Of course I do!"

"Okay then. What day is it?"

"What? I don't know the... the 4th of July?"

"And?"

"And what?"

"What. Day. Is. It?" you repeated, throat tight

She stayed silent. You could tell she was thinking hard. Which hurt you even more.

"I- I don't know, Y/n."

You chuckled, whipping the tears in your eyes with shaky hands. You wanted to believe she would remember. You wanted to believe you were important to her. She just crushed all your hopes.

"It's our anniversary, Jenna. Was our anniversary, considering that it's 2am now. You really do care a lot, huh?"

You watched as realization hit her. Maybe she did care a little after all.

"So you spent our anniversary with Emma?"

Or not.

"Don't try to turn the situation around. I spent all day waiting for you. I had everything planned. I thought we would finally be able to be together and talk about us." you felt your anger rising "I called you 27 times. 27 fucking times Jenna. You never picked up, not once. I texted you too. Still no answer. So yes, I called Emma. It was already past midnight. I called her once, and guess what? She answered and came, even at that time."

You had to take a deep breath to prevent tears from rolling down your cheeks.

"Y/n I'm sorry I was-"

"With Percy? Figured that out."

"No it's not-"

"Jesus, Jenna! Stop trying to find excuses! Stop pretending that you care about us! You didn't even remember it was our anniversary!"

"Of course I care I- there's just... a lot going on right now... But I love you Y/n..."

You couldn't help another chuckle to escape your throat.

"No, you don't love me! You ignore my calls, my texts, you don't kiss me anymore, you don't talk to me anymore, you don't even look at me anymore! How can you say you love me when you do all that...?"

"I do! I- I love you I-"

"If you really loved me you would've picked up. Read my texts. Answered me in any way. But you didn't, Jenna. You left me alone on the day of our anniversary, crying all the tears in my body when I understood you wouldn't come."

"But I didn't know! If I knew you were crying I would've-"

"Of course you didn't know. How would you know, considering you barely say hello to me these days? And what would you have done? Taking me in your arms, telling me everything would be okay, even though we both know it's not true?"

"N-no I- I would've... I would've..."

She too had tears in her eyes now. She was hurt, and it only made things worst for you. But you had to. You couldn't continue living like this.

"It's too late, Jenna. I- I can't..."

"What...?"

"I can't keep up doing this." you took another deep breath, fist clenched hard "It's over, Jenna."

It hurt you to do this, but she didn't leave you any other choice. This relationship had become toxic, and for your own good, you had to end it.

"What...?" she repeated "N-no Y/n wait..."

You took a little box out of your pocket and threw it at her. She caught it, confused.

"Here, your anniversary gift."

You then walked past her, to the door.

"What are you doing...?" the brunette asked, her voice trembling

"I'm leaving." you had to make an insane effort not to cry "I'll be back tomorrow to pack my things."

You didn't wait for an answer and got out of the appartement, Emma following you.

Deep down, you hoped she would burst out of the flat and follow you, try to hold you back, do anything that could prove she still loved you. But she didn't.

You arrived on the sidewalk without anyone to stop you. That did it for you.

You broke down again, in the middle of the street, letting all the tears flood down your cheeks, all the sadness, the pain, out. Your heart was in million pieces.

And again, Emma took you in her arms, patting your back gently.

Jenna didn't move from her previous position, in the middle of your living room. She was devastated, tears rolling down her cheeks. She never meant to push you away. She felt like she had ruined everything. And it was the truth. She did.

She wanted to run after you, tell you she was sorry, tell you she would try to be better, to be more here, anything that could make you come back. But her legs weren't working. No matter how hard she tried to move, she couldn't.

Her own incapacity to do anything only made her cry more. With a cry, she finally managed to move and stumbled to the window.

And what she saw really broke her.

You, in Emma's arms, again. You were crying, again, because of her.

She loved you, she really did. But all she did was hurting you lately. She didn't deserve you. You didn't deserve to be with someone like her.

Maybe it was better if she didn't try to hold you back...

You wanted to run back to her, hold her tight, kiss her, tell her you didn't mean it, tell her you loved her... But you couldn't. It was simply not good for you.

Your cries only intensified at the thought.

"Y/n..."

"I love her so much..." you cried out, voice hoarse from crying

"I know... I know..."

[Next part] || [Next part [au]]

#jenna ortega #jenna ortega x reader #jenna ortega x fem reader

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cryingisnecessaryfanfics · 11 months ago

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PART TWO

Its 2am have more scar headcannons/imagines

Characters: Razor(platonic), Kaeya, Xiao, Tighnari

Sorry these are probs subpar cuz my writing style varies depending on the bpd mood lmao. Bear with the redundancy of these, there are only so many ways to write the same action.

If youre the anon who sent me an ask im replying to your ask with the inverse you talked about. Stay tuned <3 (its probably gonna take another 6 months but welp)

Not spell checked or proof read sorry lol

Razor (platonic)

Wolf boy has a lot of scars as we can all tell. I feel like he probably doesnt get the point of lotion. Probably says it smells bad, like chemicals. His scars are all really improperly healed. Probably has keloid scars (overproduction of scar tissue). The sheer size of the ones on his arms lead me to believe he never got stitches or bandages of any sort, which makes sense considering his story. Regardless, that shit looks painful lmao. (Lighthearted imagine to start us off)

“Razor!” You yell, damn that kid was way faster than you. You nearly trip over a log as you run after him.

“Razor, stop running dammit.” You continue to shout after him, hoping anything you say might just make him slow down. Lord knows you could never catch up to him.

“It's just lotion. It'll make you feel better!” Your lungs start to sting from the chase and your legs drag behind you. You stop to catch your breath and Razor slows down in front of you.

He approaches you slowly like he's afraid you’ll catch him if he gets too close. “Smells bad,” he says and you all but roll your eyes.

“Sometimes things that are good for us smell bad.” You explain. Razor waits for your breathing to even out before he gets within arms reach of you.

“Like soap?” He says and you laugh at the memory of trying to get him to wash himself with soap instead of the occasional dip in the river.

“Yes, like soap.” You sigh and he frowns. Tentatively he holds out his arm, he looks at you expectantly.

“Finally.” You say under your breath and open the bottle of lotion. You can practically feel Razor's eyes watch your hands cautiously. He doesn't move as you spread some against the skin of his arm.

“Cold.” He comments and you huff a little laugh.

“See.” You say when you finish. “Feels better right?”

Razor finally relaxes and smiles at you. “Yes.”

You're just glad he stopped running.

Kaeya

Not gonna go the obvious way and say his eyepatch because I'm different lmao. I think his knuckles are scarred. I think kaeya seems like the type to cope with his feelings through violence. I think kaeya probably hates himself. When everything gets to be too much he just starts coming out swinging. The kind of person who punches a wall without really thinking about it. But yeah I think he used his fists too much when he was younger and now he wears the fingerless gloves to protect/cover the scars. (Sorry if this is weird or seems ooc, it just makes sense to me idk why)

You first see them when he gets the new outfit in sumeru. Everyone around you seems to disregard them, or maybe just not notice. But you can sense the way he subtly hides the scars, the way he walks with a hand behind his back, one covering the other. Its easy to not notice if you arent always watching closely. Maybe the only reason you noticed was because you seemed to always be staring at him. Kaeya catches you looking more than once and in typical kaeya fashion he deflects with flirting or jokes.

Later, when youve returned home to mondstat you ask him about it and he explains after some persistence.

“Its nothing to be shameful of.” You murmur, a hand holding his, looking at the dry scar tissue.

“Its one thing to have scars from braving a battle, a complete other thing to have them from your own stupidity.” He looks away from you and the eye you can see seems far away. Like he’s recalling something from his past.

“But it wasnt stupid, it was a way to cope. How can anyone think of something like that as not brave?” He doesnt answer you, only frowns slightly, a face youve never seen him make. “Do you atleast take care of them?”

He still doesnt respond. You sigh, exasperated, and pull out your endless bag of goods to find a lotion to help with the dryness.

“What are you doing?” He asks, and you all but cringe at the thought of him not knowing you have to moisturize scars.

“I’m helping you.” You half expect him to make a witty comment but the situation proves to be too heavy and he goes back to staying silent. The whole act goes without words, you spread the lotion over his knuckles, rub it in gently. He doesnt say anything until you slide his gloves back on.

“Thank you.” He says and before you can say anything back he adds, “For your actions and your words.”

You press a kiss to one of his gloved hands. “Your welcome.” You thnk you see his cheeks tint the slightest shade of red before hes back to normal again.

“And here I thought I was the romantic.”

Xiao

I always liked the images of the karmic binds/shackles so I like to imagine his wrists are scarred from straining(?) those too much. I mean considering Xiao is an Adeptus physical wounds wouldn't leave a scar so maybe these more mental-type wounds would. Like the more karmic debt he has the worse the scars get in condition, the less debt the more they fade. Maybe the lotion helps soothe the debt more than anything. Maybe the act of something so comforting and intimate with you lessens the pain. Food for thought I guess.

Every morning, at dawn, Xiao enters a room in Wangshu Inn so his lover can put lotion on his scars. This morning is no different.

“Good morning, Xiao.” You say like always, same pretty smile on your face every day.

“Morning,” Xiao mumbles and frowns as if this isn't his favorite part of the day. He avoids your eyes as he takes off his gloves. As many times as youve seen his wrists, he still gets insecure about them. It's no secret Xiao hates being vulnerable, even around his most trusted companion.

“I saw zhongli yesterday.” You say quietly as he sits down on the bed next to you, lotion in hand. “He was with that harbinger.”

“Tch. Useless scum.” Xiao comments and you laugh.

“He seemed happy, Xiao. Try to be tolerant of his friend.” Xiao just rolls his eyes and rests his arm in your hand. You continue to talk about your day as you open the bottle of lotion and start to spread it out against his wrist.

Xiao stays quiet during this, as he always does. You think he must enjoy your voice because he's always been intent on listening to you speak even if he usually prefers silence. He absorbs your words so soaked in affection and the ache in his body seems to lessen. Pain becomes distant, horrible and intense feelings become easier to push away.

It's over before he realizes it, you've put the lotion away simply holding his hand now, savoring the feeling of his skin against yours. He leans against you and you hum in content.

Maybe this is healing for the both of you. Mutual comfort.

Tighnari

I know a lot of people like the idea of him having scars from getting struck by lightning so i'm just gonna play off of that. Lighting very rarely leaves scars but the scars it does leave are burns. The electricity also causes nerve damage so you'd have to be very gentle and careful when handling tighnari’s scars. They're probably on his neck/back so itd take a lot of trust for him to let you see him so vulnerable. He probably already has lotion he puts on himself but its very hard to reach your own back so eventually he asks you for help.

You've seen him put lotion on his scars many times, watched him wince at the pain of it. You refrain from asking him if he wants your help. Tighnari is independent, he doesn't need anyone's help. But maybe itd be less painful if he didn't have to strain his muscles to reach the scars.

He doesn't say much when he asks the first time. Just tells you to be careful. He starts to list the ingredients of the lotion he's made. How he found it, what the weather was like that day.

No matter how gentle you were he’d still pause in the middle of sentences, and with his back to you, you never saw his winces but you knew they were there.

“Okay,” you say when you've finished and you know he's relieved it's over even if it was a more pleasant experience than him doing it himself.

But he thanks you anyway, and he’ll ask you to do it again the next day.

#genshin #genshin fanfic #genshin impact #gender neutral reader #genshin imagines #genshin fluff #genshin impact x reader #genshin x reader #xiao x reader #kaeya x reader #razor gi #razor genshin impact #tighnari #tighnari x reader #genshin xiao #genshin kaeya #genshin tighnari

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softguarnere · 1 year ago

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2 am

Joe Liebgott x reader

A/N: (this is written for the fictional depictions from the show - no disrespect to the real life veterans!) This fic idea has been banging around in my head for a solid year now, but for some reason I'm only just now writing it. Oops. The title comes from "2am" by Foals. Thanks for reading, and I hope that you enjoy! Warnings: alcohol, mentions of the Holocaust, language (one f-bomb and that's it)

For the middle of summer, the night air is cool against your warm cheeks when you stumble out of the hotel lobby, arms slung around the necks of your friends as the three of you lean into each other for support and guidance as you make your way to the curb. The three of you are still laughing at some joke that Luz made back inside when the cab pulls up.

“Here you go.” Careful not to lose his grip on you, Luz opens the back door of the cab and guides you towards the back seat.

You really should be getting back to your hotel, but you don’t want this night to end. And who would, after all the fun you’ve been having with your old friends? It’s nice to see them again, to catch up with them, like you’re finally getting to know them without the constant threat of German artillery fire looming over your heads.

“I’ll take the next one,” you protest.

This makes Babe laugh. “Nope. Drunkest person needs to get home first. We gotta make sure you get in the cab before you pass out.”

You fix your old friend with the best intimidating look that you can manage in your current condition. “You drank way more than me, Heffron.”

Babe chuckles. “But I can actually hold my liquor.”

Well, touché. You can’t argue with that one.

“Can you make it home okay?” Luz asks.

“I’ll be fine,” you promise. After all, you’re not nearly as drunk as they seem to think that you are . . . At least, you don’t think you are.

As if he can see your thought process, Luz laughs. “I’ll swing by tomorrow morning to make sure that you’re still alive.”

Your friends close the door of the cab then. Babe taps the glass of the window twice to signal to the driver that you’re ready to go. On cue, the car pulls forward, slowly pulling out of the hotel’s drive. Only when it nears the exit of the parking lot does your driver finally ask his question.

“Where to?” A voice with a familiar raspy quality wants to know.

The sound is enough to make you freeze, your breath stuck in your throat. Maybe you are drunk. Yes, that must be it – the alcohol making you hear what you want to hear, using some wild manifestation of your subconscious desires. Because you haven’t heard that voice in years. You haven’t seen its owner in just as many. And you certainly didn’t expect to run into him here, of all places.

Your eyes jump to the rear-view mirror. A lump the size of a golf ball appears in your throat. Because even in the faded light of the late summer night, there can be no mistake as to who is staring back at you, waiting expectantly for your answer. Even after all these years, even though you can only see his eyes, you would recognize him anywhere.

“Joe?” Somehow, the words manage to push past the lump in your throat, echoing through the car in the silence that has fallen.

Click-click, click-click. The turn signal methodically keeps time, a metronome as your fellow paratrooper waits for a reply. Though you still haven’t said anything, he takes a right out of the parking lot and eases onto the road.

“Guy behind us was looking impatient,” he says by way of explanation.

It’s Joe Liebgott, you can tell. From the voice, the eyes, the way he tensed when you said his name. Would he have reacted that way if anyone else had said it? Or is it only because of you and the things that happened between the two of you so long ago?

The car is moving and you probably shouldn’t, but you can’t stop yourself from leaning forward, trying to get a better look at him. He’s so close – closer than you ever thought he would be – but he seems unreal and worlds away, like a dream that you can almost, but not quite, reach.

“Is it really you?” You whisper.

Joe sighs, a familiar sound. “Yeah, (Y/N). It’s me.”

“San Fransisco,” you remember aloud, some far away memory of some offhand comment that he once made to someone filtering into your memory. “You always said that you would come back here.”

He only nods. Your heart thuds in your chest. There’s so much to say, to ask, yet it feels like you’re running out of time for it all.

“And now you’re here,” Joe finally says. “With . . . them.”

It takes your brain a second to work out that he means Luz and Babe. Two of the many members of Easy Company who came to the reunion this year. Unlike some people.

“You didn’t come to the reunion.”

“No.” He makes a noise that might be a laugh. “Kind of defeats the purpose when you’re trying to leave the war behind you.”

Leave the war behind you. A slap in the face would have hurt less. Is that why he stopped calling you? Stopped answering your letters? You met during the war, during boot camp, and made it through the whole thing together – from Georgia to the Eagle’s Nest. You had been under the impression that you could make it back to the States . . . Well, at least now you know that Joe had different ideas.

“Then why are you here?” You ask. It’s a fair enough question; Easy Company reunions always generate a lot of attention. Joe happening to be outside of the hotel that was hosting this year’s reunion can’t be a coincidence, can it?

His silence is all the answer that you need.

“You showed up, but you didn’t come inside. Why?” Before he can answer, you add, “And don’t say the thing about leaving it all behind you again. I got that part, okay?”

You can hear Joe’s mouth shut with a click. You hadn’t meant to snap the last part at him. But seeing him here . . . All the anger, the sadness, anything you ever felt about or towards Joe Liebgott that you’ve spent years repressing is now rising to the surface.

“I think you know why,” Joe mutters.

No! You want to snap. No, I don’t understand how you could have left me hanging like that, after all that we went through together, all that we meant to each other.

“I – “ He clears his throat, shakes his head. “I was only hoping to see you. Just . . . I don’t know. I thought that would be enough, if I saw you. I never expected you to get into my cab.”

“And now I’m here.”

“Now you’re here.”

Thankfully the darkness of the night hides your faces from each other. In the solitude it provides, you can feel warmth bubbling and spilling over your eyelids, leaving glossy trails down your cheeks that shimmer gold in the passing streetlights. When it was clear that Joe was done with you, you had decided to leave him and your affections towards him behind. Clearly a part of you never quite let go. That much is clear to you now, as tears escape you without your permission.

Still driving, Joe glances up at the rear-view mirror, catching your eye. Your teary eyes. You can hear the frown in his voice.

“(Y/N)?”

“You left me behind,” you whisper.

For a moment, more silence. Then, “I know. And you know what? It was the stupidest decision that I ever made.”

Yes, it was. For a while, having loved him, having trusted him, felt like the stupidest decision that you ever made. It seems so terribly silly and childish to be sitting behind the man you once loved wholeheartedly – the man who broke your heart – and to wish for nothing more than for the two of you to go back to the way that you once were.

Second times the charm? Or should you follow a policy of “fool me once”?

“I want to go home,” you say. “Can you take me home? Please?”

Joe nods. “Where to?”

You give him the name of the hotel that you’re staying in. The cab fills with the rhythmic click-click, click-click of the blinker as Joe changes lanes, easing the car onto the exit and then navigating onto the quickest route like a master. There are several times when you hear him draw a breath as if to speak, but he never says anything. You keep quiet, allowing him the silence to concentrate on his driving.

Say something! Part of your brain – or is it your heart? – demands. You never expected to see him again, and now the chance is here. The destination is fast approaching, and then what will you do? If only you don’t squander it, this could be your chance to say all the things that have plagued you for years.

The cab slows as Joe sidles up to the hotel. Warm light from the lobby spills out the door and into the back of the cab, beckoning you into its safety. However, something stronger in the front of the cab keeps you firmly in place.

“I can’t sleep alone. Not again.” The words tumble out of your mouth before you’ve even had the chance to register them in your mind.

For the first time since you got into the cab, Joe turns to face you so that you can look at each other head-on. He frowns.

You rush on. “Do you remember Austria? After we liberated that camp, I never thought that I would sleep again. I only got rest because you were willing to flaunt the fraternization policy to come hold me, keep me safe.”

“I remember.”

“I think about that, sometimes,” you admit. You probably shouldn’t have told him that, given him that power over you. But who doesn’t regret the things they say at 2 a.m.?

Joe pushes a sigh, long and hard, through his nose. “Fuck.” He adjusts his position so that he’s leaning further back into the cab, closer to you. Through the darkness, you can see the conflict so clearly on his face, with his wrinkled brow, his frown. It’s so familiar.

“I’m sorry,” Joe says. “I really . . . I was stupid. You deserved better than that. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I thought that I was sparing you.”

“From what?”

“All my pain. My anger.”

“You don’t think I have that, too?”

Joe blinks, like the thought hadn’t occurred to him. When your boyfriend should have been helping you through those things, you had to rely on your old friends from the company instead. You would have helped him through his struggle, if he had only let you.

Then again, Joe Liebgott always had trouble asking for and admitting when he needed help.

“Park the car, Joe,” you say. “No, not here. In one of the parking spots.”

“Why?” Joe asks, even though he’s already pulling into a parking spot – he gets it perfect on the first try, effortlessly.

“Because,” you say. “You’re done driving for the night. You’re coming up to my hotel room and we’re finally going to talk.”

Joe kills the engine, but he doesn’t move from his seat. For a moment he stares at you, like he isn’t sure if this is real, or if he should. He must make up his mind because he nods, gets out of the car, and comes around to open your door for you. In the old days, he would have smirked at you, given you some pick-up line to hear you laugh. Now, he watches you with reserve.

Maybe this is a mistake. But if either of you really feels that what happened was a mistake, then there’s the possibility that it can be fixed, even after all these years. Not in one night, but it will be a start. Tonight, you can do something for Joe that people so often forget that he needs – show him some understanding, some compassion. And maybe, just maybe, you’ll be able to reignite the light that once existed between you again.

#band of brothers #band of brothers fanfic #band of brothers imagine #joe liebgott #joe liebgott x reader #joseph liebgott #joseph liebgott x reader #my writing #hbo war fanfic #hbo war

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shou-jpeg · 1 year ago

Text

-Back on the Beat-

Part 3. 05

November 3rd, 7:15am

Porchay's phone wakes him up far earlier than he wanted to be awake this morning. He was up late playing video games and didn't get to bed until nearly 2am.

Strangely enough, Kim didn't reply to the song he'd sent last night. Kim was typically late to bed, late to rise and had been for as long as Porchay had known him.

Looking at his phone, Porchay realises Kim probably went to bed early in order to be awake at this hour.

Porchay blinks, suddenly feeling a lot more awake.

He… he thinks that he's figured out what Kim has been doing with these songs.

He can’t believe he was so slow to catch on, but it's so obvious now, looking back at their messages and the songs Kim has been sending him.

He feels so embarrassed about the song from last night. He only wanted to recommend Kim something more uplifting. Kim has probably been thinking that Porchay has been sending him messages via music too.

He opens up his web browser.

Oh God.

He can't believe he sent Kim this this song.

At least it's sort of accurate, Porchay thinks desperately. Even if he hadn't wanted Kim to know just yet.

He doesn't know what to do.

He could be wrong. It is possible that it’s a total coincidence, and Kim just listens to sad, longing love songs on the regular. Except Kim is so analytical and detailed… there's no way it's a coincidence, he wouldn’t miss something like this even if it did start that way. It all makes sense and Porchay is going to jump out the window.

Okay. He takes a deep breath.

This is an opportunity.

He did tell himself that he would let Kim make the next move. It's ridiculous and backhanded and not at all what Porchay had been expecting, but if Kim is asking for his forgiveness via song lyrics, then it totally counts as a move. Which means that the ball is now in Porchay’s court.

He looks down at his phone.

What does he really need from Kim? He's still hung up on what happened, but he also wants to move past it. He wants to forgive Kim, he wants to date him again. So what does he need from Kim to do that?

Porchay feels eagerness beginning to stir in him. He takes a breath and forces himself to calm down. He won't get his hopes up. He won't.

He already knows a song that would work well enough, so he sends it to Kim and locks his phone.

It's up to Kim now how he responds, though if Porchay receives an apology song back, he might just throw his phone into Tankhun's fish pond.

He deserves more than that, surely.

He yawns.

Porchay doesn't need to be anywhere today. He may as well get some more sleep, and then he'll find some way to fill his day.

He puts his phone back on his night stand and snuggles up into his blankets.

Sleep comes quickly.

It's 6:50pm and Porchay is grabbing his things to head to Tankhun’s rooms for movie night when he hears a knock on his door.

"Yes?" He calls out.

"Khun Porchay," his guard, Nok, calls through the door "Khun Kim is here to see you. Are you available?"

Porchay stills.

What? Kim came to see him?

…

"Khun?" Nok calls again

Porchay jolts and quickly grabs his dirty clothes to throw into the laundry hamper and begins grabbing food wrappers for the bin.

"Yes! Sorry!" He tosses the couch pillows back onto the couch haphazardly and kicks an old soft drink bottle under the bed "Yes I'm available. Send him in!" Oh! His dinner plates are still on the coffee table... he moves to stand in front of them.

Porchay quickly straightens his hair, and then his clothes. Damn, he's still in the pyjamas he changed into for movie night.

Wait, movie night!

The door opens.

< Prev - Next >

First

Playlist

#kimchay #kinnporsche #kim theerapanyakul #porchay kittisawasd #porchay pachara #i want you bach au #FYI the song kim sent in the mast update has been CHANGED to the song Chay is looking at at the beginning of this one #this one works better lol #I want you bach au part 3

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angelsanarchy · 1 year ago

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One Long Weekend: - Clyde/YN One-Shot Series CH 02

"Fuck does this mean you get to taser me?" "100 Percent."

FRIDAY 10:30PM

Y/n stood at the foot of the stage taking photos of the metal band currently occupying the stage. Luckily they brought a crowd of headbangers rather than full violent moshing or else the photo quality would suffer. Baby had promised a few hundred bucks for some promotional photos for the local venues and after the rent hike, she could use the extra cash.

Tonight had been different than most. Usually she was strictly business, bouncing from one venue to the next getting the photos taken and crawling into bed at 2AM just to have Baby blowing up her phone for the images before she's even had a chance to get real sleep. Tonight she finally got a chance to meet the shaggy haired, stoner who seemed to travel with one of the local bands. She had thought maybe he was blind at one point with how he stared blankly at her but one of the bartenders assured her that he was pretty harmless, if not a pain in the ass.

"Hey Y/N, you staying for the next couple of bands? We've got some new guys coming in." The bartender knew Baby and had kind of taken me under their wing while I was working these jobs. Bartenders and bouncers seemed to really enjoy her company.

"I might stay for a few. I don't have anymore pressing items on my agenda so I might as well." Y/n packed up her camera and sat on a stool for at least two more performers before bidding farewell to the bartender and heading towards whatever commotion that was trapped at the front door. The owner of the venue had been arguing with someone, cussing loudly at him and telling him that he was banned.

"Oh don't be such a soft dick! I promise not to jump off the tables...much." The voice is what caught her attention.

"Tony! Hey Tony!" Y/n yelled trying to get the attention of the bouncer.

"STAY THE FUCK OUT!" The club owner shoved Clyde out the door and throwing his hands up as he told off the band he traveled with. Johnny tried to plead his case while she squeezed past and saw Clyde on his hands and knees.

"I deserved that." Clyde was trying to peel himself off the pavement. He looked up and met her gaze with a stupid grin.

"That's my girlfriend." Clyde stumbled forward putting his hands on her shoulders.

"In your dreams kid." Tony scoffed.

"Where have you fucking been?" Clyde whispered.

"I didn't get the bat signal that I would need to be peeling you off the sidewalk. That's clearly my fault." Y/n put rested her hand on Clyde's.

"Oh come on Y/n! You aren't really with these guys are you?" Tony whined as the rest of the band shuffled out. They all looked a little dejected.

"Unfortunately Tony, I do. I'm going to need to cash in on that favor. Can you talk to Pete for me? See if you can get them back in to play a set? Even if it's just tomorrow?" Johnny looked at Clyde who's mouth hung open.

"I can give it a try but this is your only favor. No more freebies." Tony shook his head before shaking Johnny's hand.

"Wow um I love Clyde's stalkee. Thank you!" Johnny reached out and pulled y/n into a hug.

"No problem. Crowd is better on Saturday anyway. Just try and keep this one from getting me put on the banned list." Clyde put his hand on his heart.

"Johnny, I told you she wants to have my little deaf babies." Johnny laughed.

"You better make sure she isn't trying to make babies with anyone with both functioning ears first bud." The van pulled up and the band started loaded it up with their gear.

"You gonna be okay to get home?" Y/n asked seeing Clyde stumbling over to her again.

"What answer would get you to come with us?" Clyde tested.

"I mean I know your boyfriend...or girlfriend or they-friend is probably waiting up-" She cut Clyde off.

"I'm not seeing anyone actually but I should probably get home. This is the first night I'll make it to the motor-rail before it closes for the night." Clyde seemed amused.

"What? No! You can't take the train. Come hang out for a bit and then I can drive you home. It's the least I can do for helping the guys out." Clyde tossed his thumb back towards the van as they finished loading it up.

"Honestly I don't know that I trust you to drive me anywhere right now. You're a little loose on your feet." Clyde swayed a bit as he stood in front of her.

"Even more of a reason to come with. I will let you drive. I'm already deaf, do you really want me to be cripple too?" Clyde showed y/n the hearing aid fitted to his ear. She could smell the weed on him when he swayed towards her. She didn't have anywhere to be for the rest of the night and its not like anyone was waiting at home.

"Fuck it. Who am I to let you crash and burn on a perfectly good long weekend." Y/n held her hand out for the keys and Clyde bounced on his feet, handing the keys over.

"Every weekend is a long weekend if you try hard enough." Clyde hopped into the passenger seat.

"Some of us have weekday jobs, sweetheart." Y/n slammed the driver door shut and looked back at the band.

"Guys, this is my new wife Y/n. Y/n these are the guys. They're all stupid fuckers but they play killer music." Clyde introduced her to the band and they threw empty bottles and trash at his introduction.

"It's a pleasure. If one of you can give me a coherent address, I will get you all there in one piece." Y/h promised firing up the van.

"310 W. Utah. It's the really shitty brick apartments on the corner of Tracy Park and Violet Ridge." Clyde said sitting back in the seat. She knew where that was. It was actually about 45 minutes from her apartment if there wasn't any traffic.

Y/n started to pull away from the curb and immediately the horn started blaring.

"Did you fuckers rig my steering wheel again?" Clyde whined returning the trash that was thrown at him.

"Just try not to use the turn signals. These idiots think it's funny when they mess with the only guy who has a van big enough to transport their shit for free." Clyde gave them the finger before reaching across y/n and flipping the signal off.

"No turning signals. Got it. I'm sure the Vegas residence are accustom to it by now." Clyde laughed at the joke as she drove.

"Does your deafness have a great story worth teasing you over or were you born with it?" Y/n asked. Clyde seemed surprised she bothered asking.

"No it's not too recent but I definitely wasn't born with it. You'll have to dig a little deeper for that story though." Clyde smirked. Y/n rolled her eyes with a snort.

"Always a give and take with you." She remarked.

"Hey I can always tell you and waste your payback for saving my ass but then how would you get home?" Clyde teased.

"Oh I won't need a ride home but I already have plans for that payback so by all means, please keep that story in the cards." Y/n kept her eyes on the road and her hands on the wheel as Clyde sighed.

"Fuck, you're gonna taser me aren't you?" Clyde turned his body towards her and she nodded.

"Oh 100%." Y/n's response made Clyde run his hands down his face.

The guys in the back of the van started laughing and ribbing Clyde about being tasered and he swatted at them.

"How are you going to tase a deaf guy? Isn't that like kicking a kid in a wheelchair?" Clyde offered.

"Absolutely not. One is a dick move and the other is for amusement. Besides I wear a night guard when I sleep but you don't see me using it as a crutch." Y/n said confidently.

"Having straight teeth and being down an entire ear are hardly a fair comparison." Clyde was drawn to her sassy nature and quick to joke sense of humor. Even if she had plans to taser him.

"We've all got our baggage. You'll live." She looked over at Clyde and he caught her wink. Fuck was he in trouble.

#electrick children #Clyde x y/n #y/n series #One shot series #Rory Culkin #Honestly did NOT expect the positive reviews of this #Thank you :)#I want to try and post these every other day #if you want me to add you to a tags for these posts let me know #One Long Weekend Series #2/18

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wuahae · 2 years ago

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✶ seventeen, after it all ends.

post-breakup hcs, ft. hip hop unit

-> performance | vocal

the phone rings at 2AM, and seungcheol immediately knows it's you. it's becoming all too familiar, he laments distantly—the neon numbers blinking on his bedside, the three rings he lets pass before inevitably answering on the fourth, the voice that greets him on the other end of the line. ("hi, cheol," you utter quietly, and it's like he's back at the starting line, still gathering up the courage to tear himself away.) he wants to blame his lack of resilience on the hour, the repeatedly promised 'one last time,' but seungcheol knows he ends up here every single time because he would rather you cry with him than alone. he's not anything to you anymore, seungcheol tells himself, but he can taste the lie before it even forms on his tongue, the way it tangles itself between late night calls and quiet words and—("i'm sorry, cheol," the nickname feels like a mottled bruise, a confession tumbling soon after. like defeat in the admittance. "i didn't know who else to call." you always sound so hurt when seungcheol hears you speak; he wonders if it's his fault.) seungcheol knows better than anyone that he can't keep doing this with you, that it's unhealthy and you both need to move on, that he can't keep letting things linger as a pitiful attempt to ease his guilt, but old habits die hard; seungcheol wonders if this is just becoming another.

wonwoo finds an old note you'd written a week after, tucked away into a borrowed book you'd forgotten to take back. it wasn't anything special or profound, just a little bookmark put for a future-him to find, "this made me think of you," scrawled on the sides and in the margins and page numbers for passages you thought he would like. the annotations speak in a language all by themselves, care crafted into each word, each stroke, and somehow, he sees you in it all. (how had you put it again? like it was memories permanently inked into paper, a version of yourself you could always come back to.) they say that to love is to lose, and that grief is just love with no place left to go, but wonwoo can't seem to care about the accuracy of poetry and prose when he is still mourning of someone lost to him forever. ("don't be a stranger," you had reminded him softly, the day you left, but you both knew it was all wishful thinking than an actual promise. in the end it would all be the same— a forced blank slate, a version of himself grappling with a soul still shaped like you.) wonwoo supposes it's a little too late to feign ignorance and give the book back to you, lovenote tucked back in; it would be cruel for him to insist on making you revisit a past scratched and scribbled and thrown away. he runs a hand over the paper, ink under skin, heart in throat, and closes the book. even if he came back it would never, ever be the same.

mingyu can't hear anything over the roaring of his ears. he can't remember much from the night either, something about his lost phone he probably left on the uber here, fumbling favors from a nearby stranger, something else distant and fuzzy that lead him to sitting on the curb outside waiting for—"mingyu." (oh. it's you.) your voice strikes clean through the fog, but mingyu only manages to utter your name; the muffled bass playing from inside the bar still thrums in his bones. you sigh quietly, taking a seat next to him, arms touching. (it burns, the forgotten familiarity. "let's get you home, okay?" you nudge gently, and mingyu has to remember that home doesn't mean the same thing to you anymore.) it isn't until you're parked outside of his apartment that you ask the burning question ("why did you call me?") and he answers truthfully ("your number was the only one i remembered."). your eyes flicker with the confession and he almost wants to take it back, his secrets displayed raw, but hidden truths already start to spill out of mingyu's mouth, things he's been wanting to say for months. (i'm sorry," he ends up saying, eventually. "i really loved you, you know?" he thinks he still does.) some would call it drunken courage but mingyu thinks it's just his sober cowardice instead. maybe if he had said it when it mattered, 'home' would still be you.

it's been two months, and vernon still hasn't figured out how to break the news. he practices it in his head more times than he can count, drafting and erasing and rewriting the right words to tell his family that you and him are over, but it all falls flat the minute he tries to get them past his lips. some days he gets close, the first few words spoken before his mom interrupts asking how you are; other days, the words die before they even have the chance to form, all amounting to a wooden tongue, a puff of empty air. his sister knows, vernon thinks, the way she shoots him a look half-pity half-judgement every time he tries to bring it up. maybe you were the one to tell her, or maybe she had just figured it out all by herself, but it comforts him, in a strange way—like he's not alone in his unintentionally kept secret. ("dad wants to know if you're able to come over for christmas," vernon tells you over the phone, and the line goes silent. vernon winces, already anticipating what comes after. "have you..." you start carefully, "...not told them?") a part of him wants to say that it's all a matter of luck and timing, that he just hasn't found the right time and he'll do it soon, he promises, but the rest of him knows that it's all just excuses. (vernon is scared, he thinks, still trying to stall the sinking feeling that there truly is no coming back after he tells his family. it feels more like admitting it to himself, carving it into stone, cementing it into the ground where his love lies buried.) vernon says that his biggest problem is figuring out how to break the news, but really, it's figuring out how to let you go.

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peaches2217 · 1 year ago

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Fuck it! Expectant Parents Mareach post. Putting this one under a Read More to hide my shame. Y'all were warned.

(But actually thank y'all, I wanted to get this out of my system so bad 😭)

✨ The first person Peach tells isn't Mario, but Toadsworth. She wants to surprise Mario with the news and is willing to wait until later in the evening, but she wants her surrogate father to know right away. Mario spends the rest of the day wondering why Toadsworth can't look at him without suddenly having to excuse himself, only to burst into ugly-crying one room over, but he decides it's probably not good.

✨ And of course he's incorrect! The news doesn't come out of nowhere; they've discussed it in the past, and recently they've decided they're ready. Now, when I say recently, I mean recently. The biggest surprise is that she's already pregnant.

✨ "Can't blame a girl for being eager!" Daisy jokes. "Making the baby's the fun part, after all." Before Peach can smack her hand in retribution, Peasley adds in, all too casually, "If the red one is anything like his brother, then I certainly understand that enthusiasm." Peach threatens to revoke their titles of Uncle and Honorary Aunt if they don't stop talking immediately.

✨ You know the ending of the All Stars version of Lost Levels, where Peach covers every surface inch of Mario's face with kisses? Peach ends up on the receiving end of that, a lot. That's his wife! She's carrying their child! She's beautiful and strong and perfect! And if he doesn't kiss her a thousand times right this instant he is going to spontaneously combust! Peach laughs through the entire process because his mustache tickles, and that makes it even better.

✨ Also, her feet like never touch the ground the whole pregnancy. The second she mentions her feet being sore or touches her back with a small wince or even just makes a face that looks anything other than content, Mario scoops her up and carries her wherever it is she's needing to go. She stops trying to protest a month in.

✨ To that end, keeping her comfortable throughout the process is a role Mario not only falls into flawlessly, but absolutely adores. He runs hot bubble baths for her every other night because royal work is taxing when you're simultaneously growing an entire human, he rubs her feet while she eats tiramisu in bed because it's 2AM and she woke up crying she wanted that particular snack so badly, he uses his Firebrand to soothe all of her aches and pains on command, and it's some of the most fulfilling work he feels he's ever done.

✨ They decide eventually that they want their child to know Italian fluently (Peach is still trying to learn it, and what better way than having both a husband and a child to hold her accountable?). So nearly every night, once Peach is comfy in bed, Mario will lay his head on her stomach and have one-sided conversations or sing a few songs; since she doesn't get to hear him speak in his native tongue at length too often unless she requests it, Peach is enraptured the whole time. She even has him teach her a few of the simpler songs so their baby will recognize the language in her voice as well. Any time Mario catches her singing one of those songs to herself, hand on her belly and gentle smile on her face, he melts into a puddle on the spot. Cue the face kisses.

✨ Mario decides pretty quickly that they're having a girl. He starts addressing her stomach as (la nostra) principessina, his contributions to name ideas are all feminine or neutral, and Luigi and Peasley jump on board too, discussing all the ways they're going to spoil their niece rotten, because a princess deserves no less! "What in the world are you going to do if it's not a girl?" Peach asks Mario one night. "I'll love them all the same!" is Mario's response. "...but I'm pretty sure she's a girl."

✨ When Peach goes into labor, the head nurse argues against Mario's presence at first, because she insists an untrained man taking up space in the room will merely be a hindrance (whether or not that man happens to be King Consort). Mario bluntly tells her she'll have to drag him out herself if she wants him gone. The nurse is a Toad and Mario is over 200lbs, so she relents.

✨ The labor ends up being long and difficult and Mario doesn't leave Peach's side for even a moment of it. It's emotionally draining, seeing her in so much pain for so long and not being able to do much about it, all while staying calm and being as much help as possible, but his perseverance is a big part of what sees her through. All that collectedness goes out the window the second he's holding their new baby in his arms. Peach just gives him a tired giggle and pats his back while he bawls his eyes out.

✨ Mario was right! They have a little girl with her papa's hair and face shape and her mama's eyes and nose. And when he sees his new granddaughter for the first time, Toadsworth may or may not vow to commit war crimes for her should the need ever arise. Peach chooses to believe she's just hearing things in her exhaustion.

#this took me like an hour to type out because I was Embarrassed #and also it's Very Long #sorry orz #I will never not use Toadsworth for heartfelt comic relief I LOVE that man #peaches screams into the void #mareach #toadsworth #peaches has opinions #tw pregnancy #daddy marioposting

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angelst4re · 2 years ago

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Hello dear Ash! Firstly I have to say that you are an amazing writer, like TRULY and you're such an amazing and sweet person,so kind and caring 😭❤️ilysm.

And i have a request if you don't mind. Umm so i was thinking of a maybe a demon/devil Jamie who would practically be the one sneaking up to your room at nights, talking to you, making you fall in love with the devil, doing as he says and maybe JUST MAYBE after a while things would get heated🫣and well...yk what happens. I remember seeing you post that the works you wrote were becoming routine and u wanted to spice things up so yeah😌 I'll leave all the details to you because you know what to do. LY & THANK YOU🖤🖤🥹

hello lovely!! ahh you're so sweet :') thank you so much!! i'm sobbing, that actually means so much to me, bless you <33

Dance With the Devil - Devil/Demon!Jamie x Reader

summary: in the request :)

warnings: NSFW!! contains smut!! if you're uncomfortable then please don't read, my love <3

notes: i saw this request come through last night and because i couldn't sleep i started writing... at 2am??!! so i apologise if it's quite wild...

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

You sat up in your bed, reading a chapter of a book you picked up at the library, watching the time, waiting for the clock to strike 12am. Waiting for him.

For the last 2 months you had noticed something in your life felt… different. You felt like you were being watched, you felt like you were being followed. In situations like this, you should probably feel scared, even worried, but you felt a kind of safety when he was around. He wouldn’t let anything hurt you.

You would wake up in the mornings to find your bedroom windows were slightly opened, sometimes your curtains would also be open, giving him a clear view of you whilst you slept.

You thought for a while about what to do, and by the end of the week you had a plan. You would stay awake and catch him!

You returned home from work and carried out your usual routine, knowing he was about and most likely kept a close eye on you. You ate dinner, took a shower and got ready for bed, but whilst you lied under the covers, you didn’t allow yourself to drift into sleep. You had to stay awake, you had to meet him.

For hours the only sound that filled your room was the ticking of your clock, until you hear a tap on the window. Did he know you were still awake? You didn’t move, you barely even flinched as your window was opened from the outside and he stepped inside.

You rolled over in your bed to face the window, to face him, but you kept your eyes shut.

“I know you’re awake, sweetheart.” He spoke.

You expected him to have a deep, gravelly voice, like one that should belong in a horror movie. But his voice was sweet and gentle.

Not only did he voice surprise you, but his appearance also came as a shock. You were met with black boots, the tops of them covered by fitted black trousers. He wore a black suit jacket, covering a half-buttoned-up white shirt, revealing the edges of two chest tattoos. Even in the darkness of your room you could tell his hair was dirty blonde, and the length came just past his jaw. His eyes were a shade of blue you could only describe as heavenly.

“Hello.” You whispered as you made eye contact with him.

“Hello,” he replied with a slight chuckle, “you waited for me?”

“I wanted to know who was leaving my windows open in the middle of winter,” you explained, sitting up in your bed and signalling for him to sit down with you, “who are you?”

He smirked before replying,

“Darling, I’m the Devil.”

For weeks he would visit you, sometimes you would stay up and wait for him, other times you would have fallen asleep before he arrived.

You would speak for hours, until the sun rose and he had to leave. You speak about your day, your work, but you would also talk about power, how the world’s leaders were corrupt, and he would tell you his plans to change the world. And he wanted you by his side.

You became obsessed with him, you would do anything he would ask you. You would sit and wait for him every night, regardless of other plans, whether you were tired or not, you would wait for him.

You had never been in love before, you had never dated, you have never even kissed anyone before. At school you only had two, maybe three, friends who you had lost over the years. You interacted with other people at work, but you wished you didn’t have to. You only wanted him.

You wanted to be with him all the time, but he would only appear after the sun set. You check on your phone to see when the sun would set each day, you would then rush home and wait.

You looked back up at your clock and saw it was finally time. He was on his way.

*tap tap*

*tap tap tap*

You pushed back the blankets on your bed and stumbled over to the window, opening it wide for him.

You needed to see him today, you had a shitty day and you needed someone to talk to about it, and you knew he would sit and listen.

“Hello, angel.” He smiled once he was inside.

“Hello, sir.”

He examined your face, noticing something was different. You were sad?

He placed his finger under your chin and made you look up at him. He furrowed his eyebrows.

“What’s wrong?” He asked

“Oh, Jamie.” You sighed, sitting back down on your bed, “I’ve had a terrible day.”

“What happened?” He asked, following you and sitting beside you.

“I think I’m going to lose my job, my boss wants to talk to me tomorrow and I know business hasn’t been doing too well these last few weeks so-“

“Shhh,” he calmed you as you began to get overwhelmed, “sweetheart, you know that’s irrelevant, you shouldn’t have to worry about something like that. When I get my way, you and I are going to be the king and queen of this pathetic world, we’re going to be Gods to these people, and you won’t have to work another day in your life.”

You nod your head, sniffling as he wiped away the tears beneath your eyes with his thumb. You looked up at him and noticed he was looking at your lips, and you suddenly felt a bit insecure, and he seemed to notice.

“Have you ever kissed anybody, darling?”

You shook your head.

A smirk grew on his pretty lips, he knew you hadn’t kissed anyone before, he knew you were pure. You were untainted. You were perfect.

He leaned in towards you, placing his hand on your cheek as his lips pressed against yours in a perfect, gentle kiss. You felt a white hot heat consume your entire body, filling you with a desire, a want. You wanted him.

As he began to pull away, you crashed your lips back into his, wrapping your arms around his neck to stop him from moving.

You weren’t sure what to do, how to kiss, but as you kissed him you felt him take over. He placed his hands on your waist, pulling you on to his lap without breaking the kiss.

“Would you do anything for me?” He asked against your lips before he began to kiss along your jaw.

“Yes, of course!”

“Then get down on your knees, darling.”

You did exactly as he asked with no hesitation, you shuffled about on his lap so you could stand, before falling to your knees in front of him, between his legs.

You could see a bulge, a hardness in his trousers, which he was working to free. As he unbuttoned his trousers and pulled down his boxers, his cock sprung up, slapping against his clothed stomach.

It was big, you were sure it was much bigger than average. There was a vein on the underside which caused you to lick your lips. The tip was red and leaking, you were sure it must have been painful.

“What do I do?” You asked, looking up at him through your lashes.

“You can use your hand, or your mouth. I want you to show me how much you love me, show me how you would give yourself to me, show me how you worship the devil. Can you do that for me, angel?”

“Yes,” you were basically panting, your mouth watering at the sight of his cock, “I’ll show you, sir.”

“That’s my good girl.” He smiled, running his fingers through your hair as you kissed the vein on the underside of his cock.

You weren’t sure what to do, and you felt a little bit embarrassed as you took him into your hand and began pumping him, your thumb ghosting over the tip with each pump.

An almost growl escaped his throat as you continued this action. You wanted to use your mouth like he said, but you were unsure how. You didn’t want to make a fool of yourself.

“Wrap your lips around it, sweetheart, take it down your pretty little throat.” He groaned, his head thrown back as his hand grabs your hair, creating a makeshift ponytail.

You do as he says, and you just about manage to fit him in your mouth. He lets out another moan as he feels the wet warmth of your mouth.

“That’s it, just like that, sweet girl.”

You try to take as much of him as you can, but as he hit the back of your throat, your gag reflex kicked in.

“Shhh, it’s okay. You can take a little more, cant you, angel? Hm?”

You nod your head and try again, and you manage to take another inch this time. He praises you, he tells you how well you’re doing for him, how he’s proud of you, and then you feel his cock twitch in your throat.

“Mm, fuck. You can stop now, darling. Let’s do something else.”

He takes your hands, which were placed on his thighs, and he helps you up before pushing you down onto your bed, your head against the pillows. You barely had time to register what was going on before his lips crashed against yours again.

You felt as his left hand began to slide down your body, it was placed on your waist with a tight grip before it began to slide down, down to the place where you ached to be touched.

His hand was placed flat on your clothed cunt, he watched you with excited eyes as you bucked your hips up, searching for some friction, anything to bring you pleasure.

Your eyes met his as he slipped his fingers beneath the material of your underwear, you were quite glad you only wore a baggy t-shirt to bed tonight, and you were sure he was also grateful.

“You’re soaked, sweetie,” he whispered, pulling away from the kiss briefly, “you really want to go further? You really want me?

“Yes, sir. I do, please!” You whined, your fingers tangling in his blonde locks as you pulled him back in for a kiss.

His thumb teased your clit gently as his finger slowly dipped into your hole, stretching you out for the first time.

“Stop teasing,” you groaned, “I can take it, I can take you.”

“I don’t want to hurt my pretty darling, though.” His voice was soft, but you could also sense a hint of teasing in the way he spoke.

“Maybe I want you to hurt me.” You whispered.

Suddenly, it was like a switch was flipped. He tore the t-shirt from your body, discarding it on the floor as he tore your underwear next, leaving you completely bare underneath him.

“You’re… beautiful.” He told you, running a hand over your breasts which were now exposed to him as you hadn’t put a bra on after your shower. “I never thought anything could be so perfect.”

His lips were back on yours within seconds and you could feel the soft head of his cock rubbing against you, and it sent shivers down your spine. It felt truly delicious.

As he began to push himself inside of you, you felt an intense stinging, it burnt like hell. You tried not to clench around him, but you couldn’t help it, everything felt so intense.

You bit down on his shoulder as the final inches slid into you, you felt so full. You never thought a feeling like this could exist. It was perfect.

As he began to move, you let out a pained gasp, to which he smirked at and continued to thrust.

He placed one hand on your waist, holding you in place as he fucked into you, and the other was beside you on your mattress, holding himself up. He looked down at the expression on your face, one he could only describe as angelic. Your lips slightly parted, your eyes squeezed shut, he knew you were starting to feel the pleasure by now.

Your pussy clenched around his cock, causing him to twitch inside of you. He wanted this moment to last longer, but he knew you would both come undone soon. You were a virgin, you felt so tight and warm around him, it was impossible to hold on any longer.

“Darling,” he panted, “are you… ready?”

“I am, I’m ready, sir.”

“Good girl, let go for me, cum for me, angel, can you do that? Cum for the devil.”

“Yes.” You whimpered, before your body was overtaken by a stronger force, something so unexplainable, you could only describe it as bliss.

“My sweet girl,” you heard him say as your vision began to blur and black spots filled your sight, “you were always so perfect.”

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

When your senses came back and you finally awoke, you realised you were not in your bedroom. You were not even in your home. You were somewhere else.

You looked down to see you were wearing a cream silk nightgown, and you were lying on a big white bed. Everything looked so expensive, so fancy, like it was fit for a queen.

“Ah, you’re awake!” You heard him say, a smile spreading across his face as he stood by the bottom of the bed.

“Jamie? Where am I?”

“Oh, sweetheart,” he tutted, “you’re home.”

#jamie campbell bower smut #jamie campbell bower #jamie campbell bower x reader #jamie bower smut #jamie bower #jamie bower x reader #jcb #devil!jamie #demon!jamie

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glouchyouchy · 1 year ago

Text

I just uploaded Chapter 2a on archiveofourown.org, after final tweaking over at fanfiction.net; for anybody who takes the time to read it, I would love to receive constructive criticism. Hoping that those who will read it have as much fun as I had writing it!

( As an aside... MAN the... Shipping wars is what it's called now? Is really HEATING UP in recent weeks even up to the present ( at least that's the vibe I'm getting over especially Reddit ). Hopefully cooler heads prevail, but I'd just like to put this out here as my own little way to try to improve the situation, being a literal nobody and a newcomer ( though a long-time Rebels fan ) :

I don't know about you or others, but since I "grew up", so to speak, with Rebels, these characters ( especially Ezra and Sabine ) feel REAL to me ( I know they're not real, before anyone asks hahaha ), akin to what I feel towards family / close friends. I say that because I really, REALLY wish only the best for them, which is probably why I want them to fall in love and settle down with each other. This is because - at least to me - in real life, when people end up together with their best friend, the one they trust the most, the one they meld with the best, the one they're willing to risk everything for, the one they're willing to go the extra mile to understand and simply be there, etc. IS TRULY SOMETHING MAGICAL ( take it from a happily married person ) and is one of if not the best outcome that will make them truly happy... And this is the exact same dynamic I saw develop with Ezra and Sabine over the course of 4 seasons of Rebels, and even more so now seeing how they ( especially Sabine, and even Ezra when he decided to trust that she will tell him at her own pace ) acted later on in their lives in the Ahsoka show.

It's also why my heart has been aching so hard to see Sabine be in the state that she was in at the start of the Ahsoka show ( and then when the exact circumstances of why she ended up the way she was was revealed during Ep4 ( by Baylan, no less ) and Ep7 ( by Huyang ), it only made matters worse for me ), then see Ezra be understanding and caring enough towards her to not push her too much and just trust her, only to finally see them be separated again... To the point where I've had to pour my grief towards creating a freakin' literary work just to give these characters that we all love a chance at truly being happy.

All of this is to say that we ALL like / care / love these characters enough to actually bother to ship them, which says a lot more towards how alike we all are than anything else. Isn't that something to celebrate rather than bicker pointlessly about?

That's just my take. :) )

[ EDIT :

My "take" above seems erratically written, sorry about that. o_o I had a coffee around 1pm yesterday, so the caffeine was still working on me well past 2am, which is when I wrote the above :)) ]

#sabezra #ezrabine #ezra bridger #sabine wren #star wars rebels #star wars ahsoka

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inventors-fair · 3 months ago

Text

Split Precedent Commentary: In the Aftermath

[NB: Any spelling errors or off-the-cuff-isms are the result of a 2AM writathon that I should've finished much earlier. Always take language—not specifically mine, but language as a concept—with a grain of salt. You think I proofread any of this? It's the rambling of a mad person.]

There's something to be said for a week where I lay out the exact precedents I'm looking for, and the rails still end up getting rocked. Would this have been a good week to do examples? Honestly, we used to have those all the time, but as it happened examples just felt more self-indulgent and often had their own caveats. Oh, what am I saying? Some of the awkward wording was my own fault, and in the end none of it matters. Or maybe it does. I'm split! I'm spilt. I'm my own milk and my own cookies, desperately holding together even as betterment tears me apart.

Speaking of betterment, I'm writing this after I've said it a hundred times down below, but we really didn't need flavor text for any card this week. At all. None of the split cards got 'em and I was hoping to give folks a week off. Y'know? Instead, well... I think sometimes renders end up being a little too gospel. But when you're looking at printed precedent to design your cards, it helps to know what you need.

That's what I want this week's takeaway to be, I think: know what's being asked of you, and study what's come before. Everyone here is remarkably clever, I hope you know. Yes, you. You're a Magic player. You're clever by default. Just...don't be too clever for your own good. Nobody here was asked to reinvent anything, and yet, there were off-split, off-rarity'd, off-whatevered cards here and there that make me realize... I probably wasn't clear enough. I mean, that's it, right? Just what happens. And there were a couple good cards that came out of it. None that won, but like, a couple cool cards are indeed cool.

I'm gonna be up at the counter today so I won't have time to check in, but ping on Discord if you have questions and I'll get back to you. And also, check out some Judge Picks for cards that I wanted to highlight in the commentary.

@bergdg — Plug & Chug

(For anyone curious, Berg and I talked about the nature of this card in the contest and precedent and whatever, so we're just gonna go with it as-is because I can't be bothered to be as iron-fisted as I have been in the past) Anyway. I feel that we're edging more into MHX territory here. Not opposed! My main concern with the cards is mostly with flavor. Mechanically, yeah, quite reasonable to have fun with Plug even as some alternate chain-of-nonsense burn spell with cards like Virtue of Courage. Season of the Bold does give precedent to the fact that Plug should be the card dealing damage, though. I could've sworn I've seen that somewhere else but the Season is actually the only one with that specific wording. Who'da thunk.

Really though, what is the flavor of "Plug" as a verb? I think this speaks less to your abilities as a card namer and more to the fairly limited nature of this contest when it comes to folks talking about, like, connected names in general. They used up all the best ones, and as a result WotC had to resort to the cool but odd GRN/RNA names. Maybe it's about plugging things in? And "Chug" is the more mechanical chugging-along kind of flavor? Maybe there are less incongruous names, but whatever. IMO, Chug could've been blue to fit the nature of this contest, or you could've made it an instant and knocked off fuse for the MH2 split, without too much suffering. For what it's worth, though, on its own merits, this card's 90% solid concept and a great insight into mechanical cohesion with this prompt.

@bowtochris — Escape // Escalate

What a nightmare of a card to deal with. Just to be clear—I assume that this was supposed to be uncommon or rare? One of those slippy-through-the-crack things; I'll give you some benefit of the doubt but I've got my eye on you. I think that I'll get one really minor thing out of the way first, and it's less nitpick than it is question—what's up with how the Azorius do their thing, dawg. In "Escalate," I mean—I'd expect that name from the Boros, and at the same time I have to wonder about their aggression. But also, Martial Law is a thing, and they do have soldiers.

Perhaps vigilance could be used instead of the +1/+1, but I dunno if that would've made a difference, because either way it's one hell of a card. Serious blowout territory. That's the way to beat through the opposition when you're in some kind of stalemate. Evade when you can, and then mass-evade when you can't. Yeah, this is a finisher—I'll say that this should be rare. Even Escape is a fine enough card. At rare, I kinda expect that it can target something besides just one of your own creatures, but at uncommon, Escalate would be a wee bit too strong... Tough stance, but it's making me think, and most importantly, it's making me want to play this card. Seriously cool thinker here. And you know what? Maybe it's not just Azorius stuff! Why's it gotta be Ravnica? Besides precedent, but that aside, who's the name the escalation?

@corporalotherbear — Doomed to Repeat

What an awesome card that I totally didn't forget to save when scouring the inbox! Ahem. Do you know the band Los Campesinos!, emo Brit-rock stuff? That's all I can think of when I see "Doomed," and I think I doomed myself here. There's minor precedent stuff that I can whinge about later but this one is my own fault. And it's your opponent's fault that they played a massive creature only for you to control the board and smash it to pieces. As long as they don't have a small one that they can sacrifice instead. But as a post-combat card, this is a fun one, innit? Aggression is also fun here—get your swings in turns 3+ and then find something big to mess around with later.

I think this card's fairly versatile depending on the color you pair it with in limited. If you want to run this as a simple mono-black piece of goodstuff in casual or commander or whatever, then all the more power to you. You could even see this in a decent Standard brew, format-dependent! But anyway: white can use tokens as fodder, blue can mill/surveil and bounce your opponents' cards for best sacrifice strategies, red can sink its teeth in and then swing through a clearer board, and green has the best creatures to get back in the late game. I won't say that this card is breaking new ground, but it's breaking some cool usage of Aftermath enough for me to give it a thumbs-up.

@curiooftheheart — Read 'Em & Weep

Sometimes when the precedent is eschewed, I found it to be understandable both from an interpretation standpoint and from a design standpoint. Here, the lack of monocolor fuse-cards as precedent would've lent itself to possible acceptance, but I'm not sold on either the concept or the execution. The mechanics of Read 'Em are almost always going to put you at a disadvantage unless you're doing some serious looting, but sure, control decks could use that. For 2UUU, the effect to loot and give a temporary Hysterical Blindness-style effect... It feels like a lot of investment for a trick that only seems designed to work when fused.

There's this feeling that both cards have to work together in order to reach their potential, a ham-fisted amalgam determined to fit the world allowed by the name, as opposed to a concept under the name that fits into the best of what fuse-cards want: independently good effects that synergize well if the situation/resources allow. Weep (which should be worded like Roilmage's Trick, IMO) is far too situational unless you're practically mono-blue. I find myself coming back to the whole world, though, and I wish that you'd gone for...anything that wasn't literal, honestly. It doesn't fit into the cheating aspect presented, and being "blindsided" is usually the action that happens when one is reading the cards, right? The creative investment ends up feeling like a "get it?" at the end of a joke, and as such loses its merit in the face of its potential.

@dimestoretajic — Odds & Ends

When you made/submitted this card, did you know that there's already a split card with this name? I mean, I can't really knock it against you, there are only so many options. So I won't! What I'll say instead is that I'm also going to pretend that this is a rare because (in commentary order) it's ignoring the precedent rule as an uncommon. As I'm writing this, I made a post about it; because it's more than one person who's oops'd it, probably my bad.

Mechanics! Mechanics, mechanics, mechanics. "Ends" is an interesting one; I believe that cards like Slight Malfunction or maybe Galvanic Discharge need to be utilized here? Either choosing the target needs to happen first, or it needs to be some kind of trigger—probably the former. It's still a mediocre killspell as it stands, IMO. And almost all the time, Odds would be less of its own card and more of a kicker for Ends. It serves next to no purpose by itself, which would be fine if you're deep in the dice-sauce, but each of the minute family of cards that've done this before has done it either cheaper or better (see Barbarian Class, Pixie Guide, Wyll). It could be just UR for a cost. Is that enough for the intended limited?

What I'm trying to say is that this card really has to struggle to justify itself in a sea of better options, and what that reflects is perhaps less of a niche cohesion than intended. The name would've been pretty perfect, sure. That's just not enough. When considering these effects, it behooves you to look at past precedent and ask not just what the ceiling is, but also the floor. Where would this card land in a draft deck, in casual commander, in a strange homebrew? There's a lot of love for die-rolling fun, that's for sure. Stacked against the cards that run those effects, this one ends up being the odd one out.

@grornt — Bait & Switch (JUDGE PICK)

Anyway, you're mean. You're very mean. I feel the almost Oko-osity of this card here, but not just because of the food token. What's especially clever is the usage of independent names that tell their own story, and then bam, together you've got a recipe for disaster. In limited, you can eke out a little victory even without making the food token and snag a bombastic beater that you let go in pack two. In commander, which was definitely thought of here, you have the element of controlled chaos. This card was definitely worded with a lot of love behind the thought process, and I appreciate that immensely.

I guess I still can't get over how weak Bait is, heh. There's this semi-unspoken knowledge that halves of split cards have to be slightly underpowered versions of equal effects for the cost, but at the same time, a little variety wouldn't go amiss. What's even the archetype for it, y'know? Let's get off of Ravnica and think about other worlds, or even just a [format] Horizons set. I feel that you could've maybe scried, even? It could play into "setting a trap" thematically, and then as a turn-one play it could feel impactful independently. Right now, it's slightly off-kilter in favor of "mediocre without fusing," and that's a little harsh, I know, but with a card this polished and a history of good decisions like yours, I'm gonna encourage you to push the envelope one metaphorical inch further. And a little to the left. Right there, on that totally-innocent giant X painted into the floor. Now, just stand still for a moment...

@horsecrash — Exceed // Expectations

Welcome to Jerktown, population me: the cards from GRN/RNA had the first three letters the same, not just the first two. Unless it was a conscious decision to ignore that, in which case your license to visit Jerktown's embassy has been revoked and... I'm not going to use "jerk" as a verb here. Anyway. This card meets expectations fairly well otherwise, I'd say. Clean, crisp, and a severely disappointing rare. Honestly, I'd say that this a perfectly fine uncommon, and I'd've been rather happy to see it in that slot. Was the rare side because of complexity with countering abilities? I guess I can see that. And also, why was the card draw stapled to the counter and not its own line?

These are small potatoes being thrown at a giant frog, though. Exceed is a pretty awesome combat trick and I like how you can give reach in blue-brid and still have it feel normal. Hexproof as a combat trick is always more powerful than it seems. Countering stuff for four mana doesn't always feel as nice, especially if it's just a tax, but the draw almost makes it feel worthwhile, doesn't it? In my opinion, you could've had a five-mana Voidslime+[effect] and that would've definitely exceeded my expectations. Maybe it could've been a nice slimy "Exc-" name... Excrete lol. Good lord, I'm exhausted.

@hypexion — Protect // Promote

Why flavor text on these cards? Genuine question—because it's never appeared on split cards before, mostly. Have I become that much of a stickler, or is it just a random afterthought, and I'm reading too much into it? It's a decent piece of worldbuilding, if not Hemmingway. I don't think it's necessary in the context, though; saying that it's a Brokers card would've been enough for me. As it stands, it's as Broker as a card in that vein can get, and I'm happy to slap some seal of approval on it. "Protect" as a previous split card does dampen that a little, but I think yours is definitely more notable.

The cantrip is an excellent nod to how aggressive these decks want to be in the early game, and honestly, Promote is really aggressive all things considered, if you know when to use it. Pop it off too early and you won't have anyone to promote. But maybe you do need the extra damage and the shield counter just isn't cutting it, yea? Either way—the counters are there. That's all that the Brokers are about no matter what they're doing, and you've made that crystal clear. This card demonstrates some solid limited thoughts to how these effects tell the player when they're supposed to be used. IMO, it's possible that Promote could've been one more mana and given team vigilance or something, but that's a minor addition to a solid base.

@izzet-always-r-versus-u — Questions & Answers

With a heavy heart, I must inform you that this also just barely misses precedent by having different card types on the halves. While I'm whapping you with a miniature newspaper, I think that I have questions about how to build this deck. There's some really interesting stuff happening here, mostly in the sense that the tempo and control sides of zombies are rearing their heads. Investigating towards a long-term goal is how Questions is telling you to operate in the early game, and if you've got a mana sink then it becomes a really, really, really bad Divination. Which is fine! Answers really is only one answer, but making folks sacrifice nonland permanents is a real pain in the butt, especially if you're out-tempoing the control players.

And yeah, there's this image if someone getting the answers they need, but the thing about split cards is that there's less of a story at hand and more of a dichotomy to be explored, y'know? What are the halves of this coin? I'm not totally opposed to the flavorful direction; what I'm saying is that my mind wants to see them operate in that space of differences as opposed to continuation. And what deck wants to see these cards pop off? I feel that you're mostly going to use Questions, because card draw over turns is still decent even when compared to instant cardification. Answers is a unique effect that's got me asking more questions, honestly—like the integrity of a Zombies deck that can reanimate via SOI/EMN effects, perhaps. This is a card where I wanna see people play with it first because, well, I do have quite a few questions.

@melancholia-ennui — Wither & Bloom

I think that there's a gulf between these cards that I'd like more information on, if you've got it, because it feels like I'm not seeing something. The destruction is totally fine for a modal-ish rare, and Bloom is also a great blowout card. What do they do together? For 2BGGW, you get to destroy a nonland permanent and populate. Is that enough? Pumping a zillion mana into this card could get you some destruction, but there's the argument you have to make of whether or not the effect is worth it. With something like Flesh & Blood, you can make a big creature, or deal damage, OR for more mana make the creature big before dealing damage. Same with Beck & Call, where eight mana gets you four fliers and some card draw on top.

So what could this have been synergistically? I think that Bloom is the real problem here, because as much as X-spells on Fuse cards is an awesome idea, the keyword is a wee bit clunky and honestly, there's more draw for me towards Wither. What I'm thinking is that you can use a card like Morbid Bloom as precedent—e.g. "Exile up to one card from a graveyard. Create X 1/1 green Saproling creature tokens, where X is that card's mana value." Something like that, yeah? But if you wanted to do an X-spell, I think that you could come up with a weird idea to go along with it. Oh! Maybe it's: "Exile up to X cards from graveyards, then create a number of 1/1 green Saproling creature tokens equal to the number of card types from among cards in exile." ... That's a little verbose, but you see what I mean.

@misterstingyjack — Swords to Plowshares (JUDGE PICK)

I bet you think you're sooooo clever, don't you. Well...yeah, you kinda are, I like this card. I also think that you overcosted Plowshares by a lot. It's a cantrip that can, in many circumstances, end up doing nothing unless you have an extra land to play and/or a token to create. It's Explore plus Wake the Reflections—I'd max it out at four and it could even be 2G if you really wanted to push it. It would take up your full turns two and three to use it, and it wouldn't get too much on the board, so I honestly don't think it's that bad. Regardless! Swords is a great Raise the Alarm style of card to go with this, so that's all good.

Flavor is pretty awesome, too. My more hopeful interpretation is that there was some clash between two rivals/enemies that eventually led to peace and prosperity in the land. Maybe they even got married! Or, depending on the setting in which you want to place this card, you've got some defenders triumphing over an invading foe, and later they can turn a defended land into a homeland. This card invites a lot of generally wonderful feelings, and with how Aftermath cards can tell a story, I'll say that you knocked it out of the park. Just gotta tweak a couple numbers. For anyone reading this, I wanna know in the replies: how would you interpret this timeline?

@partytimesdeluxe — Hot & Heavy

I never know how to feel when people get really weird with these cards. Full rules text make this sort of situation not-exactly-possible, but is it really IMpossible? It's weird! It's weird and I wish it was weird in a way that wasn't grokable, because we're in the Valley of Magic Design, and it's something that plagues custom designers more often than not.

Lemme explain. On the one hand, if you were to throw this into the file of a premier set, it wouldn't see the light of day. Split cards and Overload both introduce their own manner of complexity that doesn't lend to reading well on one single card. On the other hand, if you were to show this card to someone who's more familiar with the ins and outs of Magic, someone with a penchant for Horizons-style sets, then they instantly get it and appreciate the build. And if you show this to someone designing for a Horizons-style set...they're gonna ask you where it fits in, and there really isn't a good answer.

It's not just the niche of this particular card as a sideboard-only piece. One has to ask: why make this a split card in the first place? Both of them are perfectly reasonable as single cards, and even printable with a couple random quirks as-is. Overload is a versatile and super-sweet mechanic. But what deck is in need of having both of these pieces there with such complex inner workings? There isn't a reasonable enough answer. Again, in pure design terms, having this in sideboard arsenals is a neat design concept, and is still grokable. It also eschews context, which is ultimately its downfall. It's a difficult vibe to contend with, but an important one to keep in mind.

@reaperfromtheabyss — Accept & Deny

If I'm not mistaken, Deny should be worded like Memory Lapse, right? Or are we okay with doing shorthanded stuff these days? I know that Commit/Memory puts spells in places, so it's probably fine, but at the same time it's worth checking. Maybe it would squish that flavor text somewhere else—like on a different card, perhaps. That's a lotta text on one card, Batman! Really, genuinely and truly—one of my first thoughts this week was that people wouldn't have to come up with flavor text if they didn't want to. Alas, though. The card as it stands is getting a stamp of approval from me, for the most part.

I wonder if the folks back in the Dissention era tried to play supermulticolor decks based on these cards and combinations. Was there a three-color draft meta back then? Was the mana good enough? With this card, you could make Accept-ing a creature into a great combat trick or just an extra bit of assurance if you're at parity, and if you're not, then Deny can throw all that stuff right back at them and stall for the turn. Selesnya players might not appreciate the countermagic as much as Azorius players might appreciate the buff, if I have to split hairs about guild gameplay. But what do I know, I draft nonsense. This card feels like a mid-2000's throwback in a good way. What else is there to say? Besides the above critiques, I mean.

@stupidstupidratcreatures — In It to Win It (JUDGE PICK)

I am deeply sorry for not capitalizing the "I" in "Win It" down there. Hopefully, that means you are equally sorry about not adding a rarity to your card. I've assumed based on my massive intellect and handsome face-thing that this is probably okay as an uncommon. Combat tricks to board presence? Yeah, no, that all makes sense. This card feels like one that can help you win out of nowhere, but the setup for it asks a lot of your deck. If you haven't built up that much power, it's a bit of a bugbear, but there's nothing that a little mummy power can't help fix.

God, this card was real close to being sad in retrospect. Y'know? Facing one of the eternalized jerkwad zombies is no easy feat, but this initiate is really gunning for it. I think that it's really awesome that you've chosen to go for the hopeful future effect, where the aftermath is that this person's survival is allowing them to perhaps lead the charge to whatever victory that they're going for. Having "Win It" be the name of a card might be a little on the nose—but, yadda yadda, restrictions and creativity. This card also shows black's willingness and resolve in a positive manner, which is a definite plus. Gameplay-wise, protecting one for the board charge later is a perfectly reasonable way to go about a tempo plan. I'm down for it!

@tanknspank — Sword & Board

One of the benefits to having split cards in a set is, despite their initial apparent complexity, they're actually quite simple cards to grasp. The text is usually minimal, but the combined effects and/or the contrasting themes are what grips the player when reading. These two cards have a lot of text that are almost certainly better utilized on either two different cards or one simplified card with Entwine or something. Small text boxes are the devil's playthings, and that devil has tiny little hands that make it hard to see what he's doing properly, I tell you what.

If this was, like, Horizons territory? I'm right there with you and yeah, I grok it. My groking has nothing to do with the size of the text; I have relatively youthful eyes and a whole lot of time adjusted to staring at screens, so yay for me. Still, Flesh & Blood is the closest precedent, and even then, there's no fuse card with that many lines of text—for a reason. I feel that that should've told you that this idea was a little wobbly to execute as it was. I have faith that you could make a cool thematically relevant card with it, though, and in the end this set of cards is pretty cool and comes at a good cost. It's just asking a lot from the eyes and brains of its players, and I don't believe it currently holds up with the sheer amount of stuff on it.

@wildcardgamez — Build to Last

Mom? Can you come pick me up? They're putting flavor text on Aftermath cards now. ... Yes, I'll hold. ... While we're waiting, I want to ask about what kind of environment you envisioned where this card would be a viable rare. Amonkhet's artifact theme was... There wasn't a specific archetypal artifact theme in either AKH or HOU, so let's start with that. Was there a reason that the Wall token that you create with Build isn't itself an artifact? What's the purpose of that in conversation with Last? This could've been an interesting uncommon in some ways, but here we are with a situational strangeness.

I'm honestly really confused about what your thoughts and expectations were with this card and its environment. The storytelling about indestructible walls to protect the city isn't unheard of. The disconnect between the Wall being built and the indestructibility aspect is still baffling. How exactly did you expect players to connect the story synergy if there's no mechanical synergy? Last is, on the whole, a situational card in a set where no situation has called for it yet, attached to a card that itself invokes the situation without actually playing a role in what the card ostensibly wants to convey. As a rare, it lacks verve, and as a design, it lacks cohesion. I feel that this one could've used a lot more shaping up before settling on this version.

@xenobladexfan — Fight God or Die Trying

Isn't the usual saying "get rich or die trying?" I haven't used the phrase myself since, uh, ever, but I also haven't seen it since the early 2000s or whatever. What you've got here is a card that certainly has text on it. Heh, I kid—you acknowledged in the submission that Fight God is a card that is asking a lot of leeway. What I can actually say is that 1) your art skills are exactly the kind of thing that helps us see what's supposed to be happening and I appreciate it greatly, and 2) there's actually merit to what this card is asking.

Imagine this: "Target creature you control fights target creature you don't control if the creature you don't control has greater mana value." Eh? See what I'm putting down? Maybe it's not a god, but hey, if my Squire wants to pick a godly fight with a Chittering Rat he's calling God, then all the more power to him. There are ways of going about using Die Trying as a real card, and the wording that you've used is pretty decent as well. I don't think you necessarily need to have "creature" in the Fight God text? Pretty sure that only creatures can legally fight, so. All the same: I'm willing to meet you halfway on this. Respecting the grind.

That's all we've got. Tune in next week for the sound of grinding, gnashing, and whooping. And perhaps more joy to come than we could ever know. Until tomorrow...

@abelzumi

#mtg #magic the gathering #custom magic card #inventor's fair #commentary #split precedent contest

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