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atlasalexanderwrites · 2 years

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Malcolm x Queen!Reader Pt. 4

IMAGINE...Being the Oldest child to Robert Queen, the Older sister to Oliver and Thea, having an on going secret affair with Malcolm Merlyn that is only getting more complicated.

(This installment of the series is based roughly two years before Oliver returns)

Word Count: 2, 906

Warning: Small bit of NSFW Possible OCC!Malcolm Merlyn (I’m still a little rusty but I’m getting there!)

Author’s Note: HONESTLY, I enjoyed writing this so much! And I am so grateful to everyone who has continued to message me/anon me regarding this getting an update. It is my hope that will be just as good - if not better - than the three parts that came out in 2017 and my deepest apologies to everyone who has been waiting so patiently for it!

Author’s Note 2: I HOPE THE READER DOESN’T FEEL LIKE A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT CHARACTER FROM THE FIRST THREE PARTS

Pt. 1 2 3 5 6 7

Future Parts: I HAVE AT LEAST THREE OTHER IDEAS THAT WILL BE TYPED UP FOR FUTURE INSTALLMENTS - and I am rewatching season 1 of Arrow so far! So I will definitely NOT be abandoning this series!

(GIF ISN’T MINE! FOUND IT ON GOOGLE, WILL REMOVE IF ASKED TO)

When you made that decision to get close to Malcolm, to let his dangerously handsome and tempting personality draw you in all so you could find out what he knew about your father’s and brother’s tragic deaths, you never could have imagined how screwed you were from the very beginning. And you never could have foreseen the affair going on for years after it had started.

You wanted to get justice for the loss you and your family had felt, but you found comfort in Malcolm Merlyn and over time you selfishly let yourself fall further and further in love with the CEO of Merlyn Global.

Mom was selfish when she fell for Walter.

Thea does selfish things to try and win mom’s attention.

So why couldn’t you choose something, someone, in the world to be selfish about?

“…with this we have been reassured that Queen Consolidated will see a fifteen percent increase in productivity and profits in the first six months followed by a total of eighty five percent increase by a year and a half, tops.” With a click of the little, white remote in your hands, you turned away from the projector screen where a detailed and colorful graph was being displayed to smile (politely, forcefully so) at the table of old men in suits and your step-mother.

“And…” the nasally voice of John Piston came from the left side of the table, near the door, and you barely bit back your sigh and aggressive eye roll. Italian, dark haired, expensive suit like everyone else in the room, with a habit of cheating on his young, super model wife with her friends. “…how exactly, Miss Queen, do you plan on getting the support from Merlyn Global that you’ve been promising will be partnering with us on this project?”

“John,” Moira sighed and gave him a smile of irritation, turning her gaze from you to him “Has my daughter ever failed to hold up her end of promises? Has she ever failed to persuade Malcolm Merlyn or any other company to partner with us when she’s put her mind to things? If she says that Merlyn Global will take part in this venture than we should trust Y/n.”

You smiled around the room and turned back to look at the projector screen, to finish your part of the meeting, while saying, over your shoulder, “I’ll get it in writing during lunch this afternoon, if that is what you wish, Mr. Piston.” Knowing that there was no way he would talk down to you further or respond with any snarky comments while the two of you weren’t alone.

That didn’t prevent Moira from saying something once the meeting was over and the room was empty. Appearing at your side, she murmured, “Another lunch with Malcolm? This has become a habit over the last year or so.” She was fishing for information, attempting to irritate you just enough so you would slip up.

It worked every time when you were a kid, and so your stepmother had continued to use it as you became an adult. Though, it works less often now.

“Mom,” you smiled, turning to look at her as you closed your laptop. Reaching out, you squeezed her hand and reassured her that everything was alright. “Mr. Merlyn and I are business partners, just as you and dad always were. Our lunch dates are strictly professional. It is why we make sure to have them in public with others nearby. I know the lines of propriety, mom, I promise.”

You could tell she didn’t fully believe you, but she didn’t push.

“I have to go. I’ll see you at dinner.” You offered her a gentle smile and kissed her cheek before gathering your things and leaving the conference room, looking toward your assistant, Kayla, as she fell into place beside you, “My car?”

Kayla made a look close to a grimace and apologized, saying “Mr. Merlyn’s limo is waiting outside. He called and changed plans about fifteen minutes ago.” She didn’t like Malcolm. She was always saying there was something about him that didn’t sit well with her. But Kayla especially didn’t like how difficult he made her, and your, life when he suddenly changed plans at the last minute.

You couldn’t disagree completely.

It was beyond frustrating when he changed plans without notice, as if he could make decisions for you, no matter how often you complained to him about it.

“And is Mr. Merlyn waiting in this limo?” You asked through gritted teeth as you stepped into your office, moving to place your laptop and the few file folders you had taken with you to the meeting on your desk.

“He didn’t say,”

Of course, he didn’t. That would have made my life too easy.

Keeping your comment to yourself, you locked away any important and private documents into your desk drawer and then grabbed your clutch purse and the vanilla folder with Malcolm’s copy of the meeting’s notes.

He might make my life hell, but I don’t feel up to playing childish games today.

Besides, you could hardly go to a supposed lunch meeting without discussing some sort of business. Or, giving the impression that you had discussed such.

Grabbing your coat off the hook next to the door, you shrugged it on and called over your shoulder to Kayla, “Please call Mr. Merlyn and inform him I am on my way.” You made sure to shrug off her offer to attend the luncheon before she had a chance to offer. Some part of you knew that she had caught on to the fact that something beyond business was happening between you and Malcolm, but whatever she knew, Kayla was loyal and would never tell anyone unless you were doing something illegal. And even then, there was a chance she would keep it to herself depending on what the illegal act was.

“Miss Queen,” Malcolm’s driver greeted as you neared the limo, the man offered you a pleasant smile and opened the door.

“Jude,” you greeted with a genuine smile as you stepped past him and slid into the street limo, not wasting any time.

Your gaze settled on the man beside you as the door shut with a soft thud. For a moment, you said nothing. You held his gaze and breathed in the familiar smell of him that hung lightly in the air around the both of you.

The only thing you could think to say after a few moments of silence was, “Louis is more than capable of driving me to the restaurant, Mr. Merlyn.” You mentally gave yourself a pat on the back for not leaning into him as you had done so often before.

“Hello to you as well, Miss Queen.” Malcolm laughed, reaching across the seat to place a hand to your knee, his fingers squeezing through your skirt and pantyhose.

You should have shoved his hand away, but it was the last thing on your mind.

Jude had retaken his seat behind the wheel and cautiously pulled away from the curb. Once the limo was apart of the Friday afternoon traffic, the divider cutting off Jude’s view into the backseat was put into place.

Tinted and one way – you and Malcolm could see through it, but not the other way around.

A laugh slipped past your lips at the irony of it; an irony you chose to share with Malcolm as he threw you an amused, curious raised brow.

“I told Moira we were going to be in public, surrounded by people, as this was strictly professional.” You watched Malcolm, finally giving in and reaching out to trace the pattern on his blue and black tie. “She’s concerned that this has become a habit of mine. A habit that is…less than appropriate.”

Chuckling, Malcolm leaned over and placed his lips to yours, “Maybe she’s jealous.”

“Malcolm,” you huffed, pressing your hands to his chest. Your fingers grabbed at the fabric of his shirt instead of pushing him away as you probably should have. “Jealous? Of what?” Surely, if your stepmother had anything for Malcolm that she had had plenty of time to make a move in the three years that your father had been dead. And she and Walter wouldn’t be set to marry in a month. “I think she’s just worried that I’ll do something stupid that could hurt Queen Consolidated.” What else could there be?

There was something in his eyes as Malcolm playfully agreed with your assumption. He obviously had a different opinion, but you were glad he chose to keep it to himself. Still, it was a look that made you uneasy.

Was there something between your stepmother and Malcolm? Or…had there been something? In the past?

Malcolm leaned forward once more, this time pressing his lips to your jaw and trailing his mouth down to your shoulder – peppering kisses across your skin as he pulled your coat and blouse to the side.

“And do you agree with her?” he asked, his voice a little raspy but still airy and near condescending as it always was.

You said his name almost in a whimper, your grip on his shirt tightening as you shifted in the seat, turning so you were facing him and not just half turned in his direction.

“Do you agree that this is inappropriate? That perhaps we should stop doing things as we have been?” Malcolm prompted as he pulled back, his hands grabbing the lapels of your coat.

“Are you breaking up with me, Mr. Merlyn?” you teased softly, knowing that’s exactly what he was doing.

Building the suspense. Postponing the inevitable.

Choosing to play along, you let go of his shirt and shrugged, turning to look outside the best you could with him still having a hold of your coat. “Perhaps, Malcolm, my stepmother is right. I mean, maybe it would be best for us to end things and for me to find someone closer to my age.” Smirking, you looked at him with a fake look of curiosity and innocence, and asked “Is Tommy seeing anyone? Perhaps I chose the wrong Merlyn male to get close to.”

Malcolm’s jaw ticked and all signs of amusement were gone.

As you knew would happen, every bit of him was seething with possessiveness.

Whatever had been going on with you and Malcolm, the CEO of Merlyn Global didn’t like to share his toys when he still had use for them.

His knuckles had to be hurting with how tightly he was still holding onto your coat, but Malcolm didn’t seem to care if he noticed as he pulled you into his lap and smashed his mouth to yours. It was nowhere near the playful, lazy kiss from minutes earlier.

It was entirely aggressive, and Malcolm didn’t hold anything back as he dominated the kiss with expert tongue, lips, and teeth.

His hands didn’t loosen even a fraction until you were moaning his name and were fighting every part of you not to rock your hips in his lap – your navy-blue skirt had ridden up to the top of your thighs allowing for the perfect (and very dangerous) friction between your clothed sex and his left thigh where he had placed set you at the beginning of the kiss.

“Is…is that a no about me dating Tommy th-Malcolm.” You had barely gotten the question out, knowing you were only poking the bear further, when one of his hands was between your bodies and slipping past the waistband of your panties. “Wha-we can’t!” you hissed, throwing a look over your shoulder toward the front of the limo. Even knowing Jude couldn’t see you, that didn’t stop the panic that filled the pit of your stomach.

“Oh, we definitely can.” Malcolm hissed, his hand cupping your soaked heat, “We can do whatever we want.” His free hand grabbed the back of your neck, keeping your eyes locked on the soft blue of his.

I can do whatever I want.

That’s what he was really saying.

He truly felt he was above everyone else.

“Is this why you changed our plans? You wanted an afternoon booty call?” you asked, ignoring your desires for a moment to try and stop things from going any further. This wasn’t the first time you and Malcolm had ended up in this position, and from experience you knew that you would have to stop at your apartment before returning to the office. Unless, that is, you wanted to walk around smelling like Malcolm and disheveled. “Mr. Merlyn, you could have just had Louis bring me to your place if that’s what you wanted.”

Malcolm’s lips twitched in amusement at the same time his thumb flickered over your clit, “Why can’t you ever just trust me? Play along, Y/n.”

Trust him?

Isn’t that what you had been doing for a year and a half?

Laughing, breathlessly, you brought your hands up from where they had fallen to his sides and brushed your fingers through Malcolm’s hair. “Trusting you, Mr. Merlyn, is probably the worst thing I have ever done, and yet I continue to do that same, stupid thing over and over and over.” Your fingers pulled at the hair on the back of his head making him smirk as Malcolm allowed you to gently yank his head back.

“Then why do you?” Malcolm questioned, as you peppered his neck with rough kisses that – had you been new to this – would have left love bites behind.

The seconds ticked by between his question and your answer. Seconds that would have given you the out you knew you should have taken a thousand times over.

If you were smart, you would have pulled away and got out of that stupid limo as soon as you could. And if you were smart, you wouldn’t crave his touch and his attention the way you did. Gods, if you were smart, you would have gone to the police and told them of your theory – or, at the least, to Detective Lance and prayed like hell that he didn’t hate you for Oliver’s (and Sara’s) poor decision of allowing Sara onto that damned yacht, and that he would give you just a moment even if just to humor you.

Instead of doing any of that, you found yourself rocking against his hand and kissing him roughly as you growled out, “Because I can. Because I want to.”

The two of you barely made it through the front door of Malcolm’s mansion and into the living room before your clothes were tossed aside.

You should have scolded him for having planned to bring you back to his place all along, but the moment you were laid out on the couch and his strong, warm body covered yours, all thoughts of what you should have been doing instead were long gone.

There was no question on whether the two of you were compatible. From the first night you had shared together just a week after that dinner, the connection had been instant and effortless. And every time after had seen both of you well sated and exhausted (it’s how you ended up spending many nights at his place).

Just as you were coming down from what had to be a third orgasm, Malcolm leaned over to place a gentle kiss to your lips. He whispered something in a language you didn’t know, and although you were curious, the gentle way he brushed a few strands of hair out of your eyes was enough to tell you that it didn’t matter what he had said.

Malcolm Merlyn wasn’t sweet or gentle. Not sincerely. In all the months the two of you had been sneaking around, he had never looked at you like that.

“Getting soft on me, Mr. Merlyn?” you tried to tease, but it lacked your usual playfulness. Instead, it came off so fond while so obviously acknowledging his sweet gesture.

Malcolm’s light eyes flickered over your face before he shifted, sitting back so you were seated across his lap. “Would that be so wrong?” he pondered out loud as he gave a lazily roll of his hips.

Your breath stopped, your eyelids closing as you dropped your head onto his shoulder. “No. No I…I don’t think that would be so wrong.” And you let him pull a dozen more sounds from your throat as he manipulated your body so deliciously perfect.

Do not fall in love with him.

Was that not the biggest rule I had when all of this started?

The voice in the back of your head was silenced by the comfort you felt there in Malcolm’s arms. That voice of reason that was there to protect you from harm and, on occasion, from broken hearts was shushed by your denial.

I have everything under control.

I am not falling in love with Malcolm Merlyn…

…but then what was the smile you gave to him as he cooked you a late lunch hours later? If not love than why did you stay the night in his bed, not fucking like affair partners do, but whispering back and forth about some book the both of you were familiar with and your concerns about Thea’s increasingly bad behavior?

If you weren’t falling in love with him, than why did you only feel truly happy and content when he was at your side?

AS MENTIOEND ABOVE, I know that I changed the timing some for Moira and Walter’s marriage (at least, from what I understand from researching the wiki and how quickly I can comfortably imagine the two of them getting together). Roughly, part 4 takes place in 2010 about a year before - from what I have been able to find - Moira and Walter married in the show. It’s a small detail, imo, unless I’m unaware of something SOOOO I decided to go with it!

If anyone would like to be added to a tag list and notified when the next pt is posted, please let me know!

#arrowverse #arrow #arrow imagine #arrow imagines #malcolm merlyn #malcolm merlyn imagine #malcolm merlyn imagines #malcolm merlyn one shot #imagine #imagines #reader insert #malcolm merlyn x reader #female!reader #the arrow #the arrow imagine #the arrow imagines #dark archer #dark archer imagine #dark archer imagines

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ageless-aislynn · 6 months

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Aislynn and the Long Rambly Rambles about Video Games and Finishing My Halo WIPs and Potential Future Halo Fic Ideas and I Dunno Maybe I Should Finish My Last Two Flash WIPs 'Cause That Would Be Super Rad, Too, Right?™️

Finished! I had a lot of fun with Portal! I did finally manage to compensate for the weird "look to the side and look all the way up or down" problem I was having, thankfully. The puzzle aspect was awesome!

Now, since I'm here for a good time, not to be an amazing gamer, I'mma be straight with you: I looked up the answer whenever I got stuck. I tried all of the puzzles "cold" first and kept trying even when I had no idea what to do. Then, when I reached that first hint of ~~frustration~~, I just looked up the answer. Most of the time, I still had to work to get through it, so it wasn't a gimme. But I don't even care if it does. Like I said, I'm here for a good time, full stop. After really thinking I was never going to get to play any other games in my Steam library because of all of Georgette's serious computer issues, I'm just super happy to be playing again!

I may play the second Portal next, might just go for something else entirely.

I still want to finish Scott/Peebee and Scott/Jaal in Mass Effect: Andromeda but while I can't make any further GIFs, I'm not in a big hurry to do that next. I can still capture the footage, though, so might just have to do that and then hope Georgette will let me install Vegas. 🤞😣🤞

I also have Half-Life and Half-Life 2 and I believe they're connected to Portal in some way? Also have heard they're good games, so they're definitely on my to-play list.

Also there is, in no particular order:

Mass Effect Legendary Edition (got to finally experience the OT, after all!)

Dragon Age: Inquisition (I'm thinking this might slightly scratch my itch to play Baldur's Gate 3, since I'm waiting on that to go on sale)

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order (been looking forward to this one for a long time!)

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (another one I've been looking forward to for a while)

Tomb Raider (2013) (DEFINITELY been looking forward to this for ages and ages!)

Titanfall2 (have heard a lot of good things about this one; have also heard it's not too terribly long, which I'm looking for right now, I've got things like ME to play if I want something really long and involved but I'm honestly also looking for a few things that are less of a large time commitment to intersperse with the epic-sized games 😉)

Dead Rising 1, 2 and Off the Record (There are a few things about them I hope won't make me feel stressed out, I don't always do good with things that have time limits, but mannnn, I really want to try out all of the funny weapons and such that you can craft! So the plan is to not worry about "winning" just get in there and have fun!)

I've also got the Resident Evil Village demo but am kinda bummed that it's on a 30 minute time limit. So, like, if it takes me forever to get the hang of the controls, I might not get to see 5 minutes of gameplay. That'll suck. 😠It seems like it would've been better for the demo just to be a level or part of a level and if it takes you an hour to play it, what does it matter? You're still just playing that one little chunk they set aside for you to test out. Oh well, I'll give it a try out of these days.

The Resident Evil 4 remake demo isn't time-locked and you can replay it as much as you want, so I'm thinking about giving that a try. I dunno. I've watched a LOT of playthroughs in this franchise and I'd like to try them myself but I also know I can get skeeved out by body horror and sometimes survival horror in general just stresses me out. So, don't plan on picking up the full game of either of these until I get a chance to try out their demos at least. And I want them to be on a great sale in case I try the full game and then find myself going

Anyway, if you play games, what are you into these days?

Halo MCC will always be my comfort place, needless to say! Does anybody here do the weekly challenges? I love doing them! Just need 100 more points and I can buy everything on the final level/season/whatever they call it. I love getting new nameplates, lol!

Anyway, I did also do some writing today towards Camp NaNo and made my ridiculously low daily word par. I'm hoping to actually get all of the rest of "Recreation" and "15 Minutes" done in first draft form this month. That would be rad to just have to do final editing and get them posted in May! I'm going to miss them when they're done but I want to make sure that I get their story told, you know?

If I should achieve that goal, then I have a fluffy Vannak x Reader one-shot I'd like to finish. Then I realized if I do that, I'll have given everybody in Silver Team a Reader character except Riz. Can't have that, now can I? Riz is also MAH BB!

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mask131 · 1 year

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I hadn’t planned to continue my series of explanation posts about the riots going on in France currently... But I am forced to, mostly because I have conspiration theories thrown at me.

So if you are not up to date, check my original post here: https://www.tumblr.com/mask131/721725551671443456/mask131-before-i-see-any-more-nonsense-or?source=share

And now let us consider this reply I got in my notes:

@justwandering-neverlost you are a fool for believing there is some sort of great conspiracy going on behind this. And you have some chance that I got this note in the morning and am writing this post in the evening, because if I had replied just as I saw it, I would have used less kind words due to how angry I was. We honestly got enough shit going down in France already without people throwing conspiracy theories at us.

Not only do we have more and more saddening and baffling information coming out to us that further proves it isn’t a conspiracy of any sort, but on top of that I can refutate your idea very easily due to your main argument. “The government stepping in through fake riots”. But before I do that I want to say... I understand why people want to believe these mad riots are part of a conspiracy. It is a comforting belief to try to imagine there is a form of order, no matter how vile or corrupt, behind all this violence. Our reasonable and logical minds wants this chaos to happen for a reason. But the truth, the very sad truth, is that these riots are an unorganized, blind, headless, movement, an Azathoth-like movement - as in “a blind idiot”. And for those who live in France and have been through all these dark years, it is painfully obvious.

Why the whole argument of the government stepping in doesn’t work? Because precisely, despite people pressing the government to act, the government doesn’t - or doesn’t want to. The government has an obvious reluctance to deal strickly, directly, strongly with all that. A lot of people have been asking for an “état d’urgence” to be installed - and by a lot of people, this goes from the far-right journalists and politicians who want a state of emergency to prevent what they are calling a “civil war” to the angry grandmother in Marseille who is exhausted beyond belief of all the destruction and vandalism and shouts at the journalists in the streets that the President should send the army to stop all these vandals. But the government was clear: No state of emergency will be installed. There is no need for this at all. That’s what the government says, “We are not in a civil war, no need for a state of emergency, we won’t do that.” And why does the government does not install such a state despite everybody saying cities are turning into war zones?

Because France has an image problem. With all the troubles, all the protests, all the violence and unsecurity happening in France for several years now - people distrust France, people flee France, people mock France. Especially countries that are not in good terms with France - no need to tell you Russia is making its news of all the chaos and unrest in France, and then you have other countries such as Poland where (I think it is the prime minister? I am not sure of his exact position) used the current riots to say “Look! In France they chose immigration - they have chaos. We chose no immigration - we have order and peace.”. A lot of people are invoking the fact that France seems so “weak” because it cannot even control its own population, others denounce how bad of a president Macron is to allow so much violence to happen - these series of protests that keep turning into violence, piling up year after year, are not looking good. And things are ESPECIALLY not looking good since France is currently getting ready to welcome the Olympic Games. The eyes of the world are onto France, as everything is getting built and prepared and ready and adapted to welcome people from all around the world and cameras from every continent... And bam! Huge uncontrollable riots destroying everything. This makes France and the French government look very bad, and if they ever put a state of emergency, they are done for, they are toast. It will confirm what everybody is saying “France cannot control its own population, France is in grip of a civil war, nobody should be going to France currently.” The French government is purposefully not putting a state of emergency to prove that they still have the situation under control, that despite the huge violences things will return to normal, that yes of course the Olympic Games should happen in Paris and of course France is still a strong nation, what are you talking about? [Note: Do not take that as me saying “France should put a state of emergency.” No. But the way the French government is going today is “Of course we DO NOT need a state of emergency, stop talking about this, we have the situation FULLY UNDER CONTROL, OF COURSE the Olympic Games must happen, OF COURSE we are still a safe country for tourism, OF COURSE we are doing fine! No need to send the army or anything.”]

So no, the government is not going to step in further into this matter, especially since the riots are slowly dying down (not because the rioters were “satisfied” in any way, but simply because they spent three-four nights running around, destroying everything and burning everything, they are exhausted and out of ammo, so they need some times to rest). Which brings me to the second item on the list of “Why it isn’t some sort of government conspiracy”: France does not benefit at all from these riots, quite the contrary. France is slowly dying, economically speaking. Remember that these riots are the culmination of a series of times of trouble in France. We had the chaos and mass protests of the Yellow Vests, Gilets Jaunes ; and the manifestations tied to other police-caused death before (like the Adama Traore case) ; and then we had the Covid ; and then the “Do not change the age of retirement” protests, and now THIS. Tourism is at an all-time low, and shops on popular and famous areas are closed or destroyed regularly, and there was the huge inflation that augmented the price of everything in France - and now we have an unprecedented wave of shop destructions coupled with massive pillage and theft. France’s economy is dying out, especially when you consider that before all that the country was already heavily in debt and with a record number of unemployment, and lots of “ghost zones” abandoned by all. Now there’s all this - plus the fact that all these destructions and burning and explosions will need lots and lots of rebuilding, which means a ton of money will have to be spent to recreate schools and libraries (because yes, they attacked libraries also!), and clean up the marks of the disaster in the streets...

So yeah, France is gaining nothing in there. One needs to have a very warped mind to convince themselves that the French government is somehow pulling the strings of these riots. In fact, if you want a conspiracy theory that do work - take the one that another country hostile to France, like Russia for example, or some extremist Islamic state, is organizing all this. Because these riots are destroying France, and it is very easy to imagine some foreign power is sending agents to rile up these riots in hope of making France bleed from the inside. But I can’t even bring up this theory because of two things.

1) This theory could veer very easily into pure racism or xenophobia, and we already have enough to deal with currently. It won’t surprise you to learn that the extreme-right is currently using these riots as a way to say “Look at all those foreigners and immigrants that came to France and are now destroying it! All those rioters are Arabians and Africans, and so they must all be banned away from France.” In fact, it isn’t just the French extreme-right - I said before that some far-right or hostile countries are also invoking racist arguments to try to explain those riots... And the USA too! What a surprise to learn today that the American journals are currently making these riots all about... Racial conflict? If you follow the USA media, apparently it is all about racism.

As a French guy living those riots let me tell you - IT ISN’T ABOUT RACISM! I do not deny there might be some racism in France and a part of the hatred that is now exploding was fueled by some form of existing or perceived racism towards “non-white”. But the death of Nahel, and those riots now, are not about racism. They are about badly trained and badly prepared policemen, they are about the panic-causing fear prevalent among policemen, and the hasty attempts at covering a massive mistake leading to a teenager’s death - and further than that they are about class-divide and class-conflict, and the hatred of police and of the government, and about the disappearance of authority, and about the “abandonment” of the banlieues and the perceived discrimination against them... But this is all, at its heart, NOT about skin color or ethnic origins. Despite what the extreme-right or the extreme-left tries to make you think (oh yes, because the far-left is also at it in France, they are trying to convince people that these violence are justified because they are anti-racist violence, and that the rioters are so angry because they are filled with the just wrath of the oppressed masses, and that the entirety of police should be destroyed to stop the institutional racism in France), it isn’t about racism. How is throwing a car into the house of a mayor and trying to burn his family alive a way to make him “pay” for racism? How it stealing from the Restos du Coeur tied to racism? How is the rioters burning down elementary schools something tied to “racism”? This is the kind of shit that the Traore family tried to pull when it came to the death of Adama - remember, they did a protest against the French government because of Floyd’s death, as if France had a relationship to this murder in the USA, and I even recall a group that came on TV during these troubled times, in France, a group of activists that had shaped themselves after the Black Panthers, imitating their outfit and copying their goals and speeches down to the very last detail. This is all an attempt at projecting the problems and society of the USA onto France, but FRANCE ISN’T THE USA! We have two different histories, two different societies, two different “race dynamics”. Yes France has problems, BIG problems, but they aren’t the problems of the USA!

2) My second big argument as to why this is all just a blind idiocy and violent chaos - which also ties back to “Why this isn’t about racism”. The rioters themselves confess that they had no goal behind those riots.

Remember how I said before that a good thirty percent of the rioters were underage, and the other still young adults and teenagers? Well now that we have better estimation, the average age of the rioters was calculated: 17! The average age of the rioters is seventeen years old! And we have seen kids as young as twelve participating in the burning of town halls. These are teenagers, these are kids, this shows a form of immaturity in all of this. Remember the interview with one of the rioters I talked about before? Well, in contrast to this, we now have the explanations and confessions of the other rioters - because there were hundreds of arrests all throughout France. And now that these teenagers and those young adults are confronted by courts, trials, judges, journalists, they are asked to explain their situation... And their answer? “We had no real reason to do what we did.” I am not kidding. Almost none of the rioters asked talked about Nahel in any form or shape - and those that did it, did it indirectly without even saying his name, just evoking “the kid that died”. Why did they do it? Because for them “it was fun”. Because “everybody else was doing it”. Because they just “wanted to”. They didn’t even claim any kind of revenge or punishment the same way the interviewed rioter did. They literaly said “We did what we did, and there’s nothing more behind that. We didn’t had any reason to do that. We just did.”

It isn’t about racism. It isn’t about religion. It isn’t about justice. It isn’t about Nahel. It just because these kids and those idiots wanted to break things and burn things and steal and kill people - and others saw an opportunity to do the same things, and yet others just followed like sheep and imitated the rest.

And if you are baffled by this, sadly it is actually understable when you see how France has slowly degraded. On one side, as I said, in the poorest and most criminal “banlieues”, the defiance of authority and law, and the hatred of anyone wearing a uniform, became a widespread custom, a local tradition, even a game. It is a game to call policemen only to throw rocks at them. It is a game to burn police cars with a policeman still inside. On social media, they compete to see who can destroy the most car-police wheels. Even firemen, and nurses, and ambulance are getting attacked or harassed in the street just for doing their job - because there is a strange and bizarre hatred in some areas of France for anything that represents a country, a system, a society. On the other side, France - which was THE country of protests and strikes and manifestations - lost its own art and ability to protest as year after year, each protest systematically ended up in violence, more and more violence. The minute there’s a problem, there’s a protest, and these protest end up in violence - because they aren’t even protests anymore, but temper tantrums. The conspiracy theorist above used “populace”, which in French is a pejorative word for the people as a whole - and this is a word I shall use for the behavior of French people nowadays. I still remember when Mélanchon, the far-left (not to say extreme-left) candidate to the presidential election, wasn’t elected - there were riots and protests. Protests BECAUSE A CANDIDATE WASN’T ELECTED IN AN ELECTION? I distinctly remember that because students had entered the Sorbonne university, organized a siege by blocking everybody outside, and had destroyed everything inside - old paintings and university papers and computers. They wanted to destroy a university, because their candidate wasn’t elected as a president? As I said before, one shouldn’t confuse the USA and France, but the Trump riots can be brought to mind. There’s a true “bratty child” behavior in people (and especially younger generations) nowadays “If we don’t have what we want, if you displease us in any way, we will destroy everything in reliation”.

Anyway, I have exhausted myself just writing about the misery and disaster going on in France... So yes, there is no great governmental conspiracy going on here. There is no greater goal and no great evil plan and no mustache-twirling villains. There’s just a wave of pure and undiluted hatred and violence coming from teenagers and young adults of poor, dangerous and criminal areas, an explosion of a desire to destroy everything and anything, a wish to blindly kill and burn whatever cross their path. Town halls and libraries, schools and supermarkets, prisons and book shops, police stations and clothing shops, bus stations and tramways, even houses and habitation buildings - it is all targetted. If there is the slightest “conspiracy” going on there - it is minor, local conspiracies pulled by the local drug dealers and drug markets, mostly to make sure the violence doesn’t touch their domain and their “lair”. Take Marseille: many people have pointed out that the violences in the town happened everywhere... except for the areas where the drug commerce and drug dealers are notoriously installed and ruling their criminal system. This is the furthest I can accept the idea of a conspiracy behind all that - or if you can bring me solid proof there is a foreign power like Russia organizing all that, I will take it, because Russia has been doing insidious operations before (such as the Döppelganger operation, discovered a month ago or so, which was about duplicated and imitating the French information websites to spread false informations about Ukraine and the Ukrainian war).

But honestly, so far, it just seems to be the work of a hateful, blind and idiot mass, with no head, no goal, no mind and no purpose.

#france #french riots #french news #conspiracy theory #this is no conspiracy #this is just pure chaos

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the-fiction-witch · 2 years

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The Cesar Brat P1

Media The Last legion

Character Romulus Augustus

Couple None

Rating Dark af

Concept ‘ you are a kin... to a god.’

Long ago in a time only to be recalled through stories and written accounts. The time and events are known to us through tales and artworks. But as the story goes, when the old world fell its king went with it buried under the rubble of the world his family had built and a new system was installed into this world rebuilt. A system with senators, advisors and other wise men to surround an emperor of the empire in hopes to avoid future… unpleasantness. Many emperors rose and fell the empire shifted and changed until a certain family took hold. The Caesars. The first didn't last long and many barely thought him of note but when the second Cesar took up the mantle Rome and her empire were joyous, prosperous, and healthy. The Caesars ruled for a good while each with their own way about them but of course with any family the further down history you go the weaker the blue blood and many deem that the reason for newer emperors not living up to such expectations. Not at all that the need for an emperor was diminishing with each passing year. Twelve ruled however as the twelfth passed many held their breath.

He had no sons to mention.

No bastard's to attempt legitimacy.

His wife was long dead.

He had only a sister.

And even their blood had been watered down to merely a blue hue.

For a time Rome and her empire were only ruled by the senate and advisors while she took her husband and soon enough it was announced the birth of a son.

A Cesar.

People rejoiced at the idea of this new generation that this boy would be the change so many desired.

I was only a small child when it was announced he was born and even I knew better.

That boy would be hidden away, in villas and palaces, he would view the real world we lived in as a painting, there but impossible for him to be part of, his life would be meticulous and planned out, this boy wouldn't bring change. Only the same as all before him.

They announced they had named him Romulus Augustus Cesar. Harking back to those emperors loved before.

Honestly, I worried.

Life was not easy for the poor in Rome and I had yet to see a single sign of improvement.

I had been gathering herbs and flowers to sell at the market all day returning back to the little house we shared with other families and there I found my mother on the floor on her back her throat slashed with a sharp blade I knew what had happened.

She must have come in from her own work and found one of the Roman soldiers waiting, she had been raped and beaten by them with a slit throat and left for dead so know one knew of their perverted crimes.

It wasn't unknown or really too uncommon.

Knowone about the city would even help me bury her. But I did my best burying her out on the hill.

I had to get a job and there were very few options but luckily the villa and palace were looking for handmaidens and maids for the new soon-to-be Emporer boy and I quickly got the job as they went through staff so quickly they couldn’t afford to be picky but… when the young emperor was crowned I and many others in the job quickly found out… why.

"is it true mother? that I am the king of all the known world?"

"It is my darling, my sweet little boy. all that you want shall be yours, all shall bow to your will, you are a kin... to a god."

"Then why can I not stay out the night I am crowned? what am I to be... a god. or the Senets pet"

"You are a Cesar. and my Cesar will not fall as others have."

"But the people rejoice for me"

"They do. but they are sheep and they are afraid of what your rule could mean for them. give it time my darling. in the meantime, my Cesar will be protected."

"But... anything else"

"anything else in the world my darling" she smiled "Anything you want at all"

"I- I... I want... I want him dead" the boy snapped pointing to one of the soldiers guarding the room

"then it will be done" she smiled "hung. drawn and quartered. or-"

"Drown him."

"of course my Emporer" she smiled

and immediately the other guards took the man away even if he screamed and begged

"No Please my Emporer! I have children! Please!" He begged as he was dragged away

"You're the Emporer. you are a god"

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heygerald · 8 months

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Love Mummified (The Mummy, 1999)

OFC x OMC

just watched zodiac and couldn't stop thinking about jakey jake, then found myself circling back to these two. i happen to think they're quite adorable.

Running.

They were running. Again.

And just like the time on the boat, and the time they raced across the sand, it seemed that there was no plan. Perhaps that was another thing that Rick and Louis had in common; foresight was not their strong suit.

"Rick, what is the plan here?" Catherine cried as the group barreled further down a dark hallway that was coated with spiderwebs. Their only source of light was the torch being carried by Rick, and each movement he made cast exaggerated shadows all around them.

"Plan?" he echoed, a familiarly stupid look on his face. They reached a circular room that opened into three different hallways; none of which were marked. The group spun through it at random. "Uh, how about, don't die? That seem like a good enough plan for you, Catherine?"

Despite the time crunch, she glanced away from one of the halls to scowl at him. "The sarcasm is entirely unhelpful, O'Connell," she snarked.

"Oh, really? Because I found it pretty damn helpful, actually!"

Catherine popped a hip at him bitingly, glare sharpening, and the shadows cast daggers across her face. Evelyn stepped up between them before any other words could be shared, however. "Neither of you are being quite that helpful at the moment if you ask me. Now, there are three options. Which are we going to take?"

Catherine and Rick immediately pointed in opposite directions.

"We're going this way."

"No," he argued. "We're going that way."

"I thought you said there was no plan."

"Sure there is. The plan is to get the hell out of here, and to do that, we're going that way," he said as if that was the only thing that made sense. And—oh, did she want to hit him. Moreso even than she wanted to hit Beni. Rick must have seen that because his eyes narrowed at her challengingly, flames flickering from his torch. "Happy?"

"If the plan is to get out of here, then we shouldn't go deeper inside, we should go back the way we came," Catherine argued. However, when she went to do just that, she came to the awful realization that all the tunnels looked quite similar, and that, well, she wasn't really sure which way they had just come was as they all had been mindlessly spinning around the cavern during the argument. "Oh. Well... does anyone remember which way we just came?"

The others groaned when they came to the same realization.

Rick spun sharply in a circle, torch flaring. "Er, well, you know, one of these has to be the way out, right?"

"Good math, Ricky," Louis joked as he peeked his head down one of the ways at random. "Anyone feeling particularly lucky?"

"We can't—gentlemen, honestly!" Evelyn huffed at them, throwing her hands up as she spun in a circle herself. Despite her irritation it seemed that she had no more idea which route to take than the rest of them. "The locusts are still outside. Is out really the direction we want to take?"

"As opposed to, what, staying in here for eternity?" Jonathan asked glibly. "You may fancy becoming the next museum installation, dear sister, but I for one would like to live a long and happy life under the sun."

Their bickering continued in the typical sense of a brother and sister as Rick tried to pick a path. Catherine watched him spin in a circle three times over before pointing down one at random.

"That one," he said.

"You don't have any idea where that leads," Catherine jibed with her hands settled firmly on her waist. She was out of breath from all the running, already, and didn't fancy darting off into the unknown on one of Rick's whims. "Give me the torch and help look for footprints. At least we'll be able to see which way we came in."

"Jolly good help that'll be," he mocked.

"To the only way we know for sure leads back outside," she corrected him sharply. No one else seemed to know what to say—or perhaps no one else wanted to be the person that had to make a decision—and Catherine threw her hands up with a huff. "Gracious! If you don't want to pick a way then I will."

She picked the tunnel closest to her with a nod and started off down the shadowy hallway.

She only got a few feet into it, however, when there was a loud cracking noise—as if stone splitting from stone—and she squinted at the dark hole that seemed to have appeared out of nowhere in the floor. A hole that wiggled and moved and—chittered?

"Scarabs!" Evelyn cried at the same time that Louis tugged Catherine backwards by the elbow. "They're flesh eating, don't let them touch you!"

Nausea swelled hot in the back of her throat when the large black mass started to move in her direction. Suddenly, a hallway at random didn't seem like the worst idea.

"Rick?!"

"This way!" he shouted, leading them down the hallway to the right.

Catherine tripped over her own two feet in her haste to follow, but Louis held a grip on her hand tightly. He kept her from falling as they rounded a sharp corner, and then pushed her in front of him when the sound of chittering got louder.

"Keep moving!" Rick shouted over his shoulder—as if anyone had forgotten about the ancient flesh eating insects racing behind them, getting louder with every second.

Her skin was crawling by the time their hallway opened to a large, rock cavern, a bridge trailing up across the room. She glanced over her shoulder to find the mass of insects getting closer, and bigger if that were possible, and when she looked back she watched Rick and Jonathan leap to a small rock on their left, Evelyn to the right.

Catherine didn't have a moment to consider where to go when Louis was tugging her further up the platform, and then throwing her to a small rock ledge of their own. He leapt a moment later, chest crashing into her own, forehead knocking into one another, and when he tried to overcorrect she watched in terror as he began to teeter backwards as his boot slipped on the worn down edge of the stone.

"Louis!" she yelped, before grabbing him by the lapels and hauling him against her. Their bodies flattened against one another as his hands gripped at her hips. "Don't—stop moving!"

"I ain't trying to," he said, and when she took too deep of a breath that pushed him back again, his grip turned almost bruising. "Don't do that!"

"What—breathe?"

"Just—here—let me..." he muttered while moving this way and that, and if they weren't in such a life or death situation, Catherine may have blushed when she realized how close they were to one another. His breath was warm on her face, lashes kissing her cheek, soft tendrils of hair tickling her forehead. Catherine took a steadying breath as she glanced over his shoulder to the endless stream of scarabs that were moving along the pathway. "They still there?"

"Yeah," she breathed.

His eyes locked with hers in the next moment; this time she did flush. Flushed at the way his breathing stuttered, at the way his eyes darted to her mouth, at the way that his fingers tightened ever so slightly on her waist.

She thought about what he said before—about loving a woman who had left him—and then she thought about what it would be like to kiss a man like him.

All those thoughts went out the door when Rick started yelling.

"Evelyn?"

"Evie?" Jonathan echoed, and she glanced over her shoulder to watch as the two men moved to the platform the historian had been standing on. Had being the key word. "Where'd she go? She didn't just bloody disappear!"

"I don't know!"

Louis twisted to get a better look at what was happening, and as he moved his boots kicked rocks into the abyss they were standing above. Together, the pair froze, and when they made eye contact again whatever had been there before was now replaced by a tense stress.

"Maybe you should—" she started as he said, "you should try to..."

They both paused, coming to a unanimous conclusion, and she tried to move as little as possible as Louis awkwardly shuffled along the thin ledge they were standing on. He got nearly to the platform the others were on when his boot once again slipped on stone.

A perfectly square stone that sank, rather than broke, beneath his weight. A perfectly square stone that reminded Catherine of a trap door button she would see in the newspapers as a kid.

Her eyes widened in horror. "Louis, don't—!"

But it was too late. He had already put all of his weight onto the stone, and as it sank, the wall that she was pressed flat against moved with her. It gave way beneath her back, and with it Catherine felt all the air rush out of her lungs.

Somehow she still found enough breath to shriek.

All three men snapped their attention towards the sound, Louis' gaze going the widest as he watched her teeter backwards.

"Catherine!"

Her shriek turned something very unladylike when her feet fell off the stone. Hair flew up around her face as she fell—something that was fine by her. Catherine didn't fancy watching herself plummet to death. Going out blind was far better than seeing something horrific.

She was just preparing her last sentiments in mind when something snagged her by the hand, and Catherine's body jerked from the fall. She swung forward until her shoulder collided harshly with the stone wall.

A painful grunt slipped past her lips.

"Catherine?"

She wrenched her eyes open to find the top half of Louis' body dangling over the ledge. He had caught her by the wrist—she wasn't even sure how that was possible—and stone and dirt clattered down past her with each minute shift he made. Clearly, this was as trepidatious as it could get.

"Y'alright?"

"I don't know," she breathed. Hanging all her weight by a single arm didn't feel all that good. Then again—she glanced down to find a dark pit with sharp, pointy spikes at the bottom of it. "Could be worse," she noted half-heartedly.

He grunted when he shifted above her, and she turned her eyes back upwards. "Yeah, I can see that. Can you give me your other hand?"

Catherine didn't really think she had the upper body strength for that, but she wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth, and so when Louis stretched down towards her, she did her best to meet him in the middle.

It worked just about as expected, and when he slid forward another inch in her direction, she let out another yelp. "Stop moving!"

"I'm tryin' to help ya."

"You're going to get yourself killed, you idiot!"

"Better than lettin' you go," he grunted. Catherine couldn't help but blink up at him, stunned. Louis had proven to be foolhardy more times than she could count—all action and no forethought—yet he never failed to surprise her with how effortlessly of a hero he could be. "Just hold tight, okay?"

"As opposed to letting go?"

He took a moment just to frown in annoyance at her before he was hefting her upwards with a series of grunts. When she was close enough to reach the ledge, Catherine dug her elbow in and started to pull herself up as well. Her boots knocked loose a whole lot of stone towards the pit of spikes. Louis let go when she was mostly up, standing dangerously still on the thin ledge as she wiggled.

Thankfully, he had learned his lesson, and this time, he waited until he had both of his feet solidly on ground before he leaned down to lift her up.

"Careful, now," he tutted.

His hand was cinched around her waist when she finally got onto two feet, and the feeling of vertigo from seeing an abyss in front of her and behind her was so strong that she wavered into his chest.

"Woah, now," Lous held her tightly against him. He didn't seem to mind when she dug her hands into the front of his jacket for the second time that hour. "I got ya, yeah?"

Catherine met his eyes sheepishly.

She was shocked to find that she didn't doubt him.

"Now," he grinned, holding her hand just as tightly as he helped her hop back towards the bridge. He followed with a thud. Only when they were on solid footing did he take a moment to brush some hair out of her face. "Does savin' your life get me a kiss?"

The entire temple shook around them; in the distance, they could hear yelling, and the still reverberating sound of the scarabs chittering away.

Catherine huffed. "Get me out of here first and I'll consider it."

His smile was blinding. "Yes ma'am."

#love mummified #the mummy 1999 #the mummy fanfic #original female character #original male character #the mummy imagine #plot bunny #drabble

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childofaura · 3 years

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I know I’m late making a Trollhunters movie post but (SPOILERS)

I wanna talk about the elephant in the room with the movie’s ending. And how much it left a wrong taste in my mouth (like the ending of the Trollhunters show did).

So in my overall post about the movie, I mentioned how the ending where Jim rewrites the past events so that Toby is the Trollhunter REALLY bugged me. Because that meant that every relationship that Jim built up has now collapsed, but also diminishes his relationships with other characters while... you guessed it, pretending like his relationship with Claire is the MOSTEST IMPORTANTEST RELATIONSHIP YOU GAIZ so he takes great care to make sure he sets all that garbage properly in motion while disregarding his other important friends and family. I need to say that when you have a series that spends so long developing dynamics, story points, and relationships that are apparently as fragile as a gossamer thread, then you introduce time travel at the last minute to rewrite history, it feels like you’re devaluing all the work that previous writers had to do to create these stories and relationships. Like yes, you can do time-travel rewrites the RIGHT way, but this just made me mad.

So here’s all of the things that I felt were wrong about Jim rewriting the past like that, and all of his relationships with other characters that will now not happen or not be the same:

1. Blinky.

Despite Blinky’s heartfelt emotions about seeing Jim as his son, despite the fact that the moment Blinky heard that Jim’s father left him he decided, “Is nobody going to raise this boy properly? Well I think I will!”, despite how much time and effort and love Blinky put into properly training Jim and spending time with him... Now that Toby’s going to be the Trollhunter, that’s all not gonna happen. Blinky will have no reason to invest any time into a mentor/father relationship with Jim because he’s not the one who needs to be trained. Someone might argue, “Well I’m sure Blinky would still feel the same and fall into the father figure role if Jim’s the sidekick!” Let me ask you: Did Blinky ever establish the same type of relationship with Toby when he was a sidekick, the literal orphan Toby with no parents and no father figure in his life either?

No. The most they have is a friendly relationship.

And the same thing will happen to Jim, because there will be nothing special to see in him when he’s not the Trollhunter.

And the thing that pisses me off about this is that Jim still makes the effort to get back into a relationship with Claire over becoming the Trollhunter again so that Blinky will not lose him as a son.

2. Strickler

You can argue that Strickler did not have as much of an influence like Blinky did, but Strickler still became an important figure in Jim’s life as a guiding figure. Them showing Jim inviting Strickler to have dinner with his mom doesn’t feel plausible because the whole point of Strickler’s conflict with his feelings for Barbara was that he develops feelings for her, and feels guilty that he lies about who he is and putting her in danger; this isn’t gonna happen with Jim not being the Trollhunter because Strickler will have no reason to spend so much time around Barbara and Jim. Plus, that scene of him and Barbara having dinner feels... insincere, I guess? Because at that point there’s no feelings for her established and he’s still at the point of plotting the Killahead Bridge project. The part in the first season of Trollhunters where he tells Jim to pass his number to Jim’s mom didn’t have any romantic connotations, he was just playing the part of the teacher concerned with his student’s wellbeing and checking in on his home situation. Then Barbara hints at being interested in him after he bails Jim and Toby out of the museum situation where she flirts with him; at that point he uses that to his advantage to be invited to dinner. It’s GRADUAL BUILDUP THROUGH CONSTANT INTERACTION. One dinner date isn’t gonna re-establish all that.

Oh, and also Strickler will have no reason to care for Jim’s safety as much because Jim won’t be the one in constant danger like he was in the show.

3. Draal

THIS ONE BOTHERS ME THE MOST. OR AT LEAST IS ONE OF THE ONES THAT BOTHERS ME THE MOST. BESIDES BLINKY AT LEAST.

With Toby as the Trollhunter, Draal is now going to direct all his anger at HIM. Who is Toby going to face in the arena (granted provided that he does the same thing as Jim in standing up against Steve which... I would highly doubt that he would given that he was the first to say, “Ignore Steve and let him bully Eli so we don’t get targeted)? Draal. Who is going to be living in his house after losing the fight (Which we can agree that, as much as I love Toby and think he needs his moments to shine, he doesn’t have any pre-existing skills like Jim to be able to fight)? Draal. Who will be constantly spending time training him and talking to him about his human problems? DRAAL.

Draal has basically ignored Toby in the show because all his time lies in training the boy who inherited his father’s mantle. Can you honestly tell me that Jim will still have his brothers-in-arms relationship with Draal if he’s the sidekick?

4. Steve and Eli

Did you guys notice that in the scene where Toby and Jim are walking by Steve and Eli, neither one of them stopped Steve from shoving Eli in a locker? That “One hit and you will be changed forever” moment isn’t gonna happen now! That was supposed to be the pivotal character moment where Jim finds the strength to fight instead of passively laying down! And neither one of them stopped it!

Again, Jim has essentially forsaken all of these (and more!) relationships with other characters, but at the same time decides to treat his relationship with Claire like it’s top priority. It’s an insult to the previous work done in the show.

#Trollhunters #trollhunters spoilers #Tales of Arcadia #The writers REALLY didn't think this through did they #And honestly I have no idea if they have any plans for a further installment or if the series is supposed to end on that cliffhanger #But if it IS supposed to end with the movie then they made a bad choice erasing the past like that #Especially because that is NOT a happy ending #Nomura dead? Strickler dead? Toby dead? I don't care that Jim goes back in time because that doesn't change what we've seen!

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this-has-returned · 2 years

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Spoilers for Blindsight and Echopraxia by Peter Watts...

Okay, so I've been trying to process the Scrambler perspective in these books. (Maybe it should be called the "Rorschach perspective", if Scramblers are more like white blood cells...?)

During Firefall, enough data was gathered on Humans and Human technology to create a plan to stop us from emitting signals into space.

The problem, though, is Theseus used hidden technology and was launched with a breakneck schedule, which completely took Rorschach by surprise, because it shouldn't have been possible for Humans to build this so fast, much less find Rorschach at Big Ben.

This would have been Rorschach's first clue that things like Vampires, Transhumans, and Bicamerals live among the Humans.

This means that Rorschach is not working with enough data. So it injected two spies into Theseus to try and get a better idea of what pilots such a bleeding-edge spacecraft. Inside, it finds a team of Transhumans, someone with half a brain swapped out with a machine, a Vampire, and a high-level general intelligence in the computer systems.

The Vampire and general intelligence refuse to enter Rorschach for inspection, so it has to gather what it can from the invaders, at first. After abducting Susan James, and adjusting her to be a surprise agent later, they discover that we have the ability to coordinate several intelligences as a single system. This creates more questions than answers, so Rorschach must search harder.

The two spies probably discover the general intelligence running the ship. This probably fills in a few blanks, because there's no way the flesh-and-bone team members could have planned and executed any of this.

At the end of Blindsight and parts of Echopraxia, it's implied that the Scramblers somehow collected a large amount of data on Theseus. If Theseus self-destructed, it was probably all gathered by the two spies sniffing the camera and computer feeds, as they leisurely explored the operating system, and participated in the tests inflicted upon them. Honestly, I can't imagine that these tests would have slowed a Scrambler's ability to snoop around.

So the Scramblers store the data in their bodies, and leap back to Rorschach, so it can assimilate what was gathered.

In Echopraxia, the telematter stream is shown to be hijacked. This either means that the spies were covertly emitting from it while on Theseus (which I assume the general intelligence would have noticed), or Rorschach survived the antimatter detonation from Theseus, and replicated the telematter broadcast itself. I feel like there's an argument to be made that general intelligence might have genuinely not noticed, and the Bicamerals (who detected the hijack) are a magnitude smarter than the Theseus computer.

Either way, why does Rorschach send an agent (Portia) to the Icarus station?

Because there's still one more blank to fill.

The Humans could not have implemented the strategies seen from Theseus, but it's discovered that they're being orchestrated by a general intelligence in the computer.

But the general intelligence is not what created the ship and spotted Big Ben. There's still something even smarter lurking in the solar system, and it's not coming out to meet Rorschach. Rorschach needs bait.

Because Rorschach is hunting for Bicams.

So it uses the telematter stream in a way that only something like the Bicams would notice. It installs Portia at Icarus to fill in the missing blank when something so smart comes to look.

And when it DOES find the missing piece, it's clear that Humans are simply obsolete, and that Rorschach's species will not need to worry about open broadcasts in the future. That problem is solving itself, and requires no further intervention, and those that will usurp the Human species will still not be a threat to Rorschach's people. Indeed, it only took Rorschach's arrival, and nobody else needs to follow up in the solar system.

Also, if we are to take some passing details from Echopraxia into account, the Singularity has likely been born already, and has far-surpassed even the Bicams. This Singularity might be something that Rorschach's people identify as an ally, if not a simple non-issue cohabitant of the galaxy. Rorschach may have been attempting to diagnose and cure the Singularity of a rampant disease, because if the broadcasts are bothering Rorschach from WAY out in deep space, it must be absolutely insufferable to live ON THE PLANET that the broadcasts originate from!

#peter watts #blindsight #echopraxia #imagine you're a scrambler #spoilers

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bleachhaven · 4 years

Text

Soutaicho’s Secret Admirer (Shunsui x Reader) — Part 5/6

Author’s Note:

It should be noted that this story is almost coming to a close...I’m sad to stop writing about Shunsui but it’s time to wrap this one up. So there’s maybe 1 or 2 more parts left.

Warning: A bit of smut ahead. One can only be seduced endlessly for so long without something happening about it.

–

Read Part 1, Part 2 , Part 3 and Part 4 first!

Uncharacteristically, Shunsui was late to arrive at the office. It was almost ten in the morning when he finally strolled in. Nanao would have admonished him without a thought but the dark circles beneath his eyes revealed he had already had a terrible night. She didn’t want to make it a terrible morning as well.

Shunsui didn’t have the excuse of drunken debauchery at some late night party for his tardiness. The last party he’d been to had been Lisa-chan’s Valentine’s Day celebration and that was over two weeks ago.

It was more or less about how his loneliness and melancholy had kept him up late into the night. Something he definitely didn’t want to burden sweet Nanao-chan about.

He had found himself strolling randomly in seireitei at around three in the goddamn morning because simply staying in his bed staring at his ceiling felt impossible. He didn’t have these kind of difficult nights too often but when he did have them, they were quite terrible.

Sure, he missed Juu. But his loneliness was a bit more than that this time.

It has been over two weeks since he had received anything from his beloved Secret Admirer. Fourteen whole days of complete silence from her was quite unusual, and he felt it acutely. Where was she?

The darkest of thoughts had plagued him at night. What if she was sent on a dangerous mission? What if she had been injured? He hated to think it...but what if she was never coming back? Hadn’t he honestly lost enough?

The thoughts spiraled as the evening progressed into the wee hours of the morning, growing darker and more melancholy.

He knew he was not the greatest catch in the Soul Society. That title fell to Byakuya, uncontested. Shunsui was older than everyone in seireitei - a thousand years too old, he’d say. He was nobility too but he wasn’t one to truly fit into that mould, which deterred most noblewomen from considering him.

He wasn’t what one would call conventionally handsome either. He knew he wasn’t ugly...but he wasn’t exactly...whole. Not anymore. Maybe once he would have held some appeal and he had many lovers who thought him handsome enough to have a tumble with him... but the eyepatch never failed to remind him that he was never going to be good looking, by anyone’s standards, with a goddamn hole in his face.

Most days, none of this would honestly bother him. But last night it did.

His beloved Secret Admirer probably came to the conclusion that he wasn’t worth all the trouble after all. Surely, there had to be a reason why he had never been able to have a long term relationship. He blamed it on his job but...was that all it was? Maybe he was just not meant to have a happily ever after with someone.

As romantic as he was, he didn’t really believe in the concept of happily ever after. He knew relationships were work. It was a commitment between two people who cared about each other to work on staying together through whatever. With time, he had put any thoughts of a relationship on the back burner. With his duty to the Gotei 13, and his responsibilities as well as the added burden of maintaining his reputation as the Soutaicho...it was a practical choice.

But his Secret Admirer had made him want. Had made him yearn for a happily ever after for himself in a way he never had before.

He wanted to be loved and cherished as much as he wanted to love and cherish that one special person in his life. But did he really deserve it?

He knew it was her silence that had his latent insecurities rising to the surface keeping him up at night.

So as sleep deprived as he was, he came to the office with a plan. He couldn’t bear her silence anymore so he was not going to. With everything that had come up in the office, he hadn’t been able to finish up the letter he had started to write to her. At that time, it had felt futile considering there was no way to send it to her.

But he had a brilliant idea. He would have it published in the next installment of the Seireitei Communication including just enough information so that she would know it’s him while withholding enough details to still keep it anonymous. He could trust Hisagi-kun to be discreet.

He had a plan, and it could actually work!

If only he could actually find that bit of lavender paper he had left on his desk.

“Nanao-chan, did you remove anything from my desk by any chance?” he asked, opening up drawers and bending down to check under the desk.

Nanao looked up from the training schedule she was working on. “Nothing more than the usual paperwork. Why what have you lost now?” she asked with an overexaggerated sigh.

“My, my, Nanao-chan. You make it sound like I lose things on a daily basis.”

“The only thing lost on a daily basis around here is my sanity,” she said, rolling her eyes. Still she relented. A distressed Taicho always meant a distressed Nanao. “Fine. Describe it to me and I will tell you if I saw it anywhere.”

“It was nothing official. Just a bit of lavender paper I had been writing on…” he trailed off seeing the look on her face. “What? Did you see it?”

“You lost the letter you were writing to you Secret Admirer?” she asked.

“Nanao-chan! How did you…?”

“You forget, Taicho,” she said quite matter of factly. “There’s nothing that goes on here I don’t know about. But I haven’t seen it. Maybe it got mixed up in some paperwork and got sent to another division. I don’t think anyone would recognize your flowery handwriting which you reserve for your personal correspondence anyway. So nothing to worry about.”

Shunsui simply stared at her. He has known his little fuktaicho for too long to not notice that something was off. All this time, he thought she was just laughing at his expense because he was mooning over someone he didn’t even know. But now...that look...the way she said it without even having to think about it...it all felt fishy somehow. Nanao-chan was up to something.

“Why are you staring at me like that?” she huffed, correcting the papers on her desk that didn’t need correcting. A nervous habit that always gave her away. “If you don’t have any serious work, I have a pile of forms…”

“You know perfectly well who it is, don’t you, Nanao-chan?” he interrupted her attempts to distract him.

“I don’t know what you’re…”

“Please, Nanao-chan. It’s perfectly obvious you know exactly what I am talking about. Just...tell me…” he said.

He was so serious and intent. Nanao had only ever seen him like that in the heat of the worst kind of battle. She dropped her pretenses as well.

“She and I have both left enough breadcrumbs for you as it is. So if you’re so desperate to know who she is, why don’t you do the work to actually find out?” she asked him. “Clearly the girl cares about you but is terrified to approach you. Who wouldn’t be considering who you are and the position you hold. She is a nice girl, Taicho. But as things stand, she wouldn’t be the one to approach you so maybe you should find out for yourself who she is and do the approaching.”

So Nanao did indeed know who his Secret Admirer was. He understood her reasons why she couldn’t tell him. It wasn’t really her secret to divulge. Shunsui had to respect that despite his desperation.

“Is my sweet Nanao-chan giving her taicho dating advice?” he teased instead.

“Yes, I am,” she declared with a raised brow. “For even I can see how far you’ve fallen that you need advice from me to get yourself a date!”

Shunsui gasped, buying into the friendly teasing. “Nanao-chan is so mean to her taicho!”

Finally, they both got back to work, but Shunsui’s mind was still thinking about what Nanao had said. Apparently breadcrumbs were laid out and he hadn’t even noticed! He clearly had to pay more attention.

He tried to outline the facts in his mind.

The letters were always lemon scented. It could be a shampoo or some kind of scented cream...but it smelled fresh, almost as if unintentional. Something to further ponder upon.

The gifts were always elaborate but simple and he hadn’t been able to trace it through any vendor. The chocolates were handmade so his little Secret Admirer was probably very good with cooking and baking.

The handwriting was very distinctive as well. Especially the way she looped all her Ls and Bs with a distinctive flowy curve.

So far, the facts didn’t fit well into place to identify her as anyone he knew...but somehow, it felt like it was just barely within reach now. As if it’s only missing one final puzzle piece for the whole thing to come together.

That night, sleep evaded him once more. He couldn’t deny it. He missed her! He couldn’t help but wishing that she was right next to him, romancing him with more than just her words. He wished he could cherish her in all the ways he desperately yearned to.

He took the letters he kept at hand in the drawer of his bedside table. He found that he liked to read them sometimes, and no matter how many times he read her words, they still managed to make him feel things. The shape of her words, the texture of the paper...it comforted him.

However, the sensual seductive ones were his downfall.

With all the time he has been alive, and all the experience he’s had, one would think he would be able to resist the temptation. But he often couldn’t.

Reading those letters, describing how she wanted to make love under the moonlight or how she yearned to taste him...it had him imagining soft feminine hands touching him. His hand would unconsciously reach into his hakama of its own volition and grasp his manhood, wondering what it would feel like to be touched by someone who ardently wanted to please him.

It wouldn’t take him too long at all. He would cum, gasping into the empty bedroom, wishing he had a name he could moan. Wishing she was here for him to hold.

Sated, he’d finally fall asleep. Yet though his body was satisfied, his mind wasn’t. He couldn’t help but feel alone on this big empty bed.

That coveted final piece of the puzzle arrived as, of all things, more paperwork. He was mindlessly flipping through some reports after lunch the next day when it popped out at him like well-lit beacon.

It wasn’t anything special. Just a request for more funds to be allocated for a better training ground for the 13th division. Except it was filled out by his beloved Secret Admirer. The handwriting screamed her identity at him, looping Ls and Bs and all.

“_____-san,” he whispered to himself, wondering how he could have missed it.

Suddenly, everything was perfectly crystal clear.

Everyone knew that while Kuchiki Rukia settled in enough to pick her own fuktaicho, the 3rd seat of the 13th was acting in that role in an unofficial capacity, putting her in-charge of all the paperwork coming and going from that division. A reason why she was always showing up at the 1st...giving her ample opportunities to learn his habits well enough to leave behind those delightful missives without ever getting caught.

The lemon scent was from all the lemonade he knew she made for her division and for some special occasions in the seireitei. It was her specialty, a way of creating comfort and homeliness for her subordinates. He had tasted her chocolates twice - once at the Valentine’s Day party itself and then when she gifted them to him specifically. Both facts which had been pointed out by Nanao-chan while _____-san stood right next to him. No wonder she had flushed red then. It hadn’t been out of embarrassment but possibly from thinking she might get caught. The little minx.

He couldn’t help but remember every encounter he had with her in the recent past. Her cute blushes...the way she gasped out “Soutaicho!” Come to think of it, every time he saw her, he felt like she almost called him Shunsui out of habit only to change it to his official title at the last minute. He even recalled the twinkle in her eyes every time she looked up at him.

He couldn’t believe it. He finally knew who his Secret Admirer was and she’d been right before his eyes, had he only known where to look. He couldn’t help smiling, thinking about all the ways he would get back at her for running him around in circles. He would torture her so, so deliciously…

“You have that dopey smile on your face. Should I be worried?” Nanao asked, breaking him out of his thoughts.

“Hmm…? Of course not, Nanao-chan,” he said, not really reassuring her at all. “I am heading out. Be back soon!”

“Taicho!” she called out but he was already gone.

...to be continued.

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cobaincreates · 4 years

Text

touch

warnings: freshly served smut :), oral (male receiving), 18+

count: 4k+

this is part one & wow i really did that. taglist is totally open by the way! let me know what you think!

— — —

what the hell was it about veins sticking out of an arm that had you nearly drooling? they shouldn’t be so attractive, yet here you were in a deep trance thinking about licking the prominent flexing of them in a specific forearm. you supposed it was your brain sending a slew of chemicals through your body, making your heartbeat spread from your chest to your fingertips. the longer you stared at the tiny mounds, the quicker the thrum of your heart spread to your center. science wasn’t really your strong suit, so you didn’t dare try to knit pick the core reason you were feeling a little (very) hot (and bothered).

if you could push down with the pad of your thumb at the peak of the vein, you’d most likely be grossed out, but it’d be intriguing to see it bloom back to its original place. you’d feel the warmth underneath the buttery skin, maybe even feel the pulse of a heartbeat. god, what you’d give to just—

“y/n?”

you jerked, eyelids fluttering as you processed where you were and why sarah was holding a large bowl out to you. the contents were leafy greens with pops of orange and yellow peppers. a few cherry tomatoes poked from under the blanket of lettuce. right, you thought, dinner. on the cameron’s boat. where you’d been for the past seven hours.

“you okay?” she asked slowly as your hands moved to life to take the bowl from her.

“mhm,” you hummed and picked out a good amount of salad to have. you then placed the tongs back in the bowl and held it across the table. catching sight of those veins from earlier, you swallowed thickly and flicked your eyes to a very interesting pepper.

“thanks.” sarah’s brother said as he lifted the weight from your hands. you swallowed again and sat up straight as the sounds of silverware scooping from dishes continued. once everyone had what they wanted and a conversation had started, you dove into your salad like it was your last meal on earth.

you stole a few glances directly across from you, your eyes skimming over rafe’s skin under his light blue t-shirt. it wasn’t helping that he was moving, making the veins pop more whenever he used his muscles in his forearm. you busied yourself with your food and nearly choked when rafe caught your glance. you thought you were being sly and not obvious in your stare, but you caught a glimpse of that tiny little curve at the corner of his mouth as he chewed.

you’d known the camerons for some time now, thanks to your parents mingling once you moved to the island. you had sparked an instant joy to having sarah cameron as one of your best friends and you loved her so much that it hurt even worse when you finally met her older, very infamous brother. it was like you’d been struck by lightning. you were left with a sensation you couldn’t quite put your finger on. sometimes it felt like the jolts of electricity whenever you caught his eye.

you weren’t in love. you knew that much. you were just very, very attracted to rafe. a perfect example would be your ridiculous obsession with the veins in his arms. god, why were they so addicting?

“what are you girls up to tonight?” rose, sarah’s stepmother, questioned from beside you. you chewed the food in your mouth, not quite tasting it as you waited for sarah to answer. you honestly had no idea what you planned to do during your sleepover.

“probably junk food and rom-coms.” sarah answered easily.

you were fine with the suggestion; it was usually what you two did during sleepovers. sometimes you’d sneak out to meet your friends at the boneyard, but it had been months since the last kegger and you weren’t exactly fond of the memory. maybe sarah would ditch you for a secret rendezvous with john b again, which would leave you in her room all by yourself. you could imagine yourself spread out on her floor, listening for soft shuffles in the hallway, and looking for rafe to come through the door. you shifted in your seat, coming back to reality on the cameron boat.

“when are we heading back?” wheezie asked, looking at ward at the head of the table.

“are we boring you?” rafe asked, causing your attention to shift from the youngest cameron to the oldest. and sexiest.

“i have plans tonight and to be honest, i'd much rather be anywhere but here.”

“you weren’t dragged on the boat. you had a choice to come just like any of us.” sarah said.

you looked at her then gauged wheezie’s reaction. she just sighed and sank into her seat. you pushed around a few noodles from the pasta salad rose had made earlier this morning.

“we’ll head out as soon as everyone is done.” ward said, reaching over to pat wheezie on the back of the hand.

sarah, wheezie, rafe, and you were on cleanup duty while ward prepped the boat to head back to tannyhill. you stacked all the dishes and brought them over to sarah at the sink in the makeshift kitchen. wheezie was on drying duty, leaving rafe to take care of the leftovers and cover all of the dishes back up. you watched for a moment as he picked up one of the dishes that was nearly empty and threw the rest out in the trash. you held your hands out for it to bring to sarah and he smiled at you.

“rafe!” you looked up at the sound of ward’s voice floating from above then over at rafe. “come up here please!”

rafe brushed his hands off on his thighs and moved around the table. “can you cover the rest?”

“sure.” you nodded and reached across the table for the pasta salad. a hot warmth appeared on your waist as rafe brushed past you, his hand touching your skin. you swallowed as the contact sent a whole heatwave through you and watched his back as he walked out onto the lower deck, his shirt brightening under the sun. going back to covering the food up, you turned around to bring them to rose who brought over the cooler. just as you did, you realized that rafe touching you had no correlation between needing to get by. he had perfectly enough space to do so in the dining area and kitchen. nothing was blocking his way.

—

“i'm really upset that i didn’t get to witness rob lowe in the 80s in person. like, really upset.” sarah whined with her hands over her eyes.

“he had no right with that hair and that stupid earring.” you said, arms crossed with a pout on your face.

“and that jumpsuit!” you both cried in unison then laughed loudly. st. elmo’s fire had been a whirlwind of emotions, strictly from rob lowe’s appearance. it just wasn’t fair to be born so late.

“okay,” sarah said as she snuggled further under her covers. “i'm exhausted.”

“no follow up with the outsiders?”

“say hi to rob lowe for me. night.” she said and turned onto her side with her back to you. the tv was still rolling the credits before you stopped it and got out of her bed to change the discs. you weren’t ready to sleep just yet. maybe seeing dally would coax you to dream of greased up characters played by actors who were now twice your age.

given that it was only eleven, it was too early for sarah to be going to sleep. usually she was all for staying up until three and munching on popcorn or playing a board game with dice. you knew she was only falling asleep early because john b had texted her about an early morning date he wanted to take her on. it was so disgustingly cute how quickly she wanted to sleep after reading his words. so while she fell asleep, you tried to focus on ponyboy and his dyed blonde locks instead of the veiny-armed off-limits cameron across the hall.

obviously, you failed. by the time it was nearing two and you already turned the tv off, you still weren’t tired. the ceiling wasn’t moving closer to you or providing any interesting details as you continued to stare up at it. your heart beat rhythmically throughout your body as you thought about the instance of rafe touching you today. you closed your eyes and felt his warm hand on your waist again, but then you felt it moving all over you. sarah made a small noise in her sleep as rafe’s hand was gliding over your stomach.

your eyes opened, his hand disappearing, and a huff leaving your lips. you looked toward sarah’s door, shut tight and separating you from her family, from her brother. you covered your eyes and rolled away from your sleeping best friend. you peeked through your fingers, looking where you last placed your phone and debating on sending an innocent text. maybe you could pretend you meant to send it to someone else. but maybe rafe would find it weird since you didn’t have a texting history with him. no, it would be too obvious.

rubbing your face, you sighed again and sat up. you needed a drink of water. the glass that sat beside you was empty from earlier and you and sarah had exhausted all the stashed drinks from your earlier preparations.

closing her door quietly behind you so you wouldn’t wake her, or anyone for that matter, you breathed a little easier and found your way to the stairs. about three steps down, you noticed a faint light from the ground floor, but you guessed it was a nightlight just in case anyone like you came down, looking for a snack or drink.

the tiled floor was crisply cold under your feet, sending a shiver up your bare legs and eliciting goosebumps on all exposed skin. you wound your arms across your chest for some semblance of warmth.

the chill you felt two seconds ago reappeared as you entered the large kitchen and found the source of the light coming from the fridge. it wasn’t a nightlight like you thought.

rafe stood there illuminated by the light, very shirtless and sweatpants hanging very low on his hips. you swallowed as you watched him munching on something.

“hey,” you whispered quietly so you wouldn’t scare him.

he looked over, stopping mid-bite. “hey. you okay?”

“yeah. just came to get some water.” you held the glass up as proof and stepped carefully to the sink installed in the island. rafe had a slew of condiments spread out on the countertop and you glanced over them curiously as you filled the glass. he had made himself a sandwich, the other half not in his hand sitting on a plate beside you. just as you turned the water off, his hand appeared and slid the plate over.

“you hungry?”

turning slightly and placing your hip against the island, you knew you needed something to lean on from the way he looked right now. as if you hadn’t just been thinking about him upstairs, it all came rushing back.

“don’t you want it?” you asked, taking a shaky sip from the glass.

rafe shook his head and swallowed his next bite. “i'd rather you eat it if you’re hungry.”

you looked away from him and picked up the sandwich, taking a small bite. rafe reached into the fridge and pulled out the pasta salad. fishing for a fork from the silverware drawer beside you, he leaned his elbows on the island and pierced a few noodles. you looked away from the muscles in his shoulders and took another bite in silence.

“it was nice having you on the boat today.” rafe said without prompt. you stopped chewing as you gauged his expression. “did you have fun?”

it was difficult to answer when he was looking at you as if you looked stunning in a tank top and sleep shorts. it was two in the morning. you should’ve been sleeping. but your heart leapt at his question.

“i did.” you nodded once you swallowed the next bite. you then thought about his hand on your waist and felt those shivers all over again like someone had opened a door behind you, letting the wintriest winter air in.

you decided on one more bite even though you weren’t hungry at all and now you were feeling rather nauseous with the way your stomach was rolling and leaping and doing all kinds of things. all the while, your heart started to beat louder in your chest. your fingers pulsed. rafe pushed off the counter, trapping the fork in between his lips to hold as he closed the container and put it back in the fridge. it was darker once he closed it, taking away any light so you couldn’t watch him as closely.

but once your eyes adjusted, you watched rafe come closer. you pressed yourself up against the counter, knowing that he needed to get to the sink when he took the fork from his mouth. you picked up your glass, taking a generous gulp. the water failed to distract you as rafe’s hand appeared on your hip, his chest brushing against you as he put the fork in the sink. your skin was totally exposed to his since your tank top had ridden up. you let out a shaky breath into the glass, your eyes closing momentarily until his hand disappeared and he stood next to you.

“why do you keep doing that?” you asked, your voice shaking a bit but you hoped he didn’t notice.

“doing what?” he busied himself with cleaning up the countertop. you stared at his back as he opened the fridge again.

“touching me.” you said. he turned to grab the packaged cheese, opening the drawer to drop it into. it annoyed you that he wasn’t paying attention or giving you all of his attention. “you’re either doing it just because or you’re trying to tell me something.”

rafe closed the fridge and gave you a questioning look. “you don’t touch people, rafe,” you clarified.

“how are you so sure?”

you wanted to groan about him playing dumb with you. why couldn’t he just tell you?

“because i've known you for a while now, at least i think i do, and i've never once seen you touch someone else.” rafe picked up the dish with your half the sandwich on it and tossed it into the trash. you stepped back so he could reach into the sink to leave the plate there. “so, what is it?”

“isn’t it obvious?” he questioned, frustrating you even further. you were getting confused, getting off track of trying to figure him out. you wanted to pull at your hair. why did he have to be mysterious all of the sudden?

“what do you want from me?” you questioned, hoping you’d get to the bottom of it. sure, you had ideas of what his answer would be, but you weren’t going to do anything until he told you himself.

your mouth nearly dropped open when he took your glass and downed a long sip. becoming angry, you reached up and took the glass from him, splashing a bit of water on his face from the sudden movement. he held in a laugh, water still in his mouth.

the grin fell from his face as you wedged yourself between him and the countertop. you knew you’d only done it out of frustration from his lack of answer. he was driving you crazy. rafe stared down at you, moving his hips away from yours very noticeably while his hands found your waist for extra measure. you looked at him almost daringly, trying to egg him on.

when he stayed put on his decision not to say much, you found your hands appearing over top of his. they were warm on your waist and under your palms. the hammer of your pulse started to feel like a cartoon character was taking a mallet and whacking as fast as they could to your insides.

you couldn’t describe how it felt touching rafe’s forearms finally after stressing over them hours earlier. if you had stayed a little while longer, you might have felt his own pulse through the vein. instead, you wanted to learn the contours of his biceps all the way up to his shoulders.

“this would be a lot easier if you just told me what you wanted.” you whispered like you’d done when you first walked into the kitchen.

rafe’s fingers dug a little deeper into your skin and his hips hovered over yours like they weren’t even there. you swallowed thickly and watched your fingers run down his chest, his torso that flexed faintly you thought you missed it like missing a sunset change color. rafe stayed still even as you traced his jutting hipbone down into his sweats. you lifted your eyes to his, finding his lips parted and slick. you licked at your own, watching his eyes never leave your face as you felt him through the fabric of his pants. he let out a shaky breath. his hips moved ever so slightly.

you stroked him once, painstakingly slow from the soft lift of his eyebrows. his eyes nearly slipped closed when his forehead sank to yours. it was as if he was so weak, he couldn’t stand to be touched. it made the mallet in your chest hammer harder.

the second time you stroked over him, tightening your grip a little, rafe let out a noise and shook his head softly against yours.

“what?” you prompted.

rafe removed a hand from your waist to catch your wrist. “not here.” he squeezed out and pulled away reluctantly before tugging you along.

you watched his back, taking in a few shaky breaths. you focused on controlling your breathing as he opened one of the french doors that led out onto the wrap-around porch. the air was cooler than the one you just shared with rafe. it was refreshing as it helped you relax. you heard a few chirps of the insects and the bloats from a few frogs somewhere closer to the marsh.

rafe led you over to the patio furniture. he sat down in one of rose’s white wicker chairs, creaking under his weight. he tried to pull you with him but wasn’t expecting you to sink down to your knees in front of him. he sat up in confusion, his hands resting on your shoulders as he watched you reach for his sweatpants. you needed them to come off, or at least be pulled down. you needed to taste him.

rafe’s hands slipped from your shoulders as he leaned back so you could tug his pants down. you bit your lip rather harshly as the sight of him. the whacking continued and sounded louder in your ears. you wanted to cry out of joy and laugh ridiculously at the vein running up the underside of him. you had to swallow to control the salivating, like a kid anticipating chocolate cake for breakfast.

the moon wasn’t even out, but you could see rafe’s arousal on his tip. you reached for it, wrapping your hand around him like a blanket. rafe heaved a breath.

“is this what you wanted?” you asked him, running your thumb over him and collecting the warm liquid.

rafe groaned. “oh, fuck. yes.”

you rubbed his thigh as your other hand moved over him slowly. the hairs tickled under your palm as you brought it all the way up and settled over his hip. you rubbed your thumb over him again, eyeing that vein that seemed to be taunting you now. rising higher on your knees, you looked up at rafe’s expectant and waiting gaze.

“tell me, rafe.”

you drew your lips between your teeth, waiting patiently for him to speak. he looked down at you between his legs and held back a moan as your hand moved over him. “i want you to suck my dick. fuck,” he panted in anticipation. “i want those pretty lips wrapped around me. please.”

you breathed in deeply with excitement, careful not to show it so you didn’t blow your cover of how badly you’d been wanting to do this. would he think it was ridiculous?

lowering your face closer, you dragged your hand to the base of him and pressed a kiss to his tip. you coated your lips with his arousal and wondered if he was coming undone at the seams. what did you look like, between his knees, on your own? you saw his hands reaching to grip the armrests at the precise moment you stuck your tongue out, finally tasting him. it was an innocent lick, probably showcasing just how anxious you were to have him in your mouth. but once you had that initial first taste, you were gone.

“oh, fuck.” he repeated, his chest heaving. you licked him again then traveled down the length of him in open-mouthed kisses. feeling that vein against your lips sent a large wave of shivers to your core. you hummed in delight to yourself without realizing until rafe’s hand appeared over yours on his hip. catching his eye at the right moment, you tilted your head upright, flattened your tongue on the underside of him, and licked all the way up that delicious vein. rafe’s face screwed up in agony, but you weren’t even done yet.

taking his tip between your lips, you applied the slightest bit of pressure. you swirled your tongue, moving your hand around him at the same time. “shit,” he said as his hips flinched off the chair in return, rutting into your mouth further. his fingers appeared at the side of your head, pushing into your hair. “fuck, baby, keep going.”

you did as he said, closing your eyes and willing yourself not to choke. you were unsuccessful as you gagged and recoiled off of him.

“go slow,” he coaxed and loosened his hold on your hair. your cheeks began to burn from the embarrassment. rafe rubbed soothingly into your scalp. you tried to relax; you didn’t want to stop now just because you couldn’t take all of him. you breathed through your nose and concentrated on taking him slowly. you took a little past his tip, sucking your lips around him. the second time, you took a little more and licked back up that vein.

“good girl,” he praised, reminding you that he was there and that you were doing okay. the phrase alone sent ripples down your spine.

minutes later with rafe’s grip on your hair not hurting anymore, he rutted his hips and pushed himself into your mouth. you took him, quite surprised at your ability to do so, but it felt good.

“y/n, i'm gonna come.” he gasped. the new opportunity had you rolling with determination as you moved your mouth over him. he groaned louder and for the first time, you thought about his sleeping family inside. god, what if you were caught? what if someone had already heard everything?

the possibility edged you on to go faster, to make rafe explode into your mouth. you then thought about tasting him, all of him, about how you’d have him in your system. it seemed weird almost, but you didn’t care as you listened to him coming undone beneath you and felt his fingers in your hair. he swore left and right just before you made your own noise, surprised, when he finally did come undone. he spilled into your mouth, coating your tongue. you slowed your movements over him, helping him through his high as his chest heaved.

you sank back onto your legs once you parted from him. you licked your lips, swallowing, and wiped the corner of your mouth. it was almost criminal the way you had the dark to hide your grin, like it was an accomplice. you looked up at rafe still lounged in the chair and felt another heatwave at the sight of him glistening in his lap. what you wouldn’t give to have another go.

“fuck.” he sighed to himself once he caught his breath. “where are you going?”

you looked down at him when you stood, adjusting your shorts. when you saw how he was looking up at you, you wanted to do everything you could to just crawl into his lap and stay there, to have the sun never come up. instead, you knew tomorrow had to come. “to bed. i'm tired.”

for a second, you pleaded with the universe to have him ask you to sleep with him. you wanted to walk upstairs hand-in-hand and close yourselves in his bedroom. you wanted to lay down under his covers, to have him touch you until the sun came up. but you knew you couldn’t risk that all in one night. you could wait, only if he wanted to.

⭐️taglist of beauties & babes!⭐️

@tovvaa @fttayla @dontjinx-it @moniamaybank @drewstarkeygf @cheshirecat107 @jjmaybankzz @obxcunt @honeyyhemmings @dvakat @macey730 @twinklelilstarkey @disrecpectful @prettylilwolf-blog @jjcanloveme

#rafe cameron #rafe cameron x reader #outer banks #rafe cameron imagine #rafe cameron smut #rafe cameron oneshot #rafe cameron obx #rafe cameron x fem!reader

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dimorphodon-x · 2 years

Note

So I got some birdformers questions that came up while doodling totally wasn’t in class when this happened:

1) How would Sol react to Elbent being clingy to him after he rescued her? Just her having anxiety from being away from him and crying? She didn’t get any nurturing from her time with Sunder and parental cuddles I imagine are the cutest thing, but something Elbent cherished.

2) How would Sol react to Verglaust wanting to choose Elbent as his mate? I’m sure Verglaust, even though based on a Harpy eagle, is still shorter than Sol. Just the idea of a conversation going to something like “How far would you go for her?” Intimidating father tactic to see if Ver is worthy???

3) What was Starstrike’s opinion on Elbent?

Ooh fun stuff fun stuff :>

1. He’d completely understand and would also want to make up for some of that lost time with cuddles :> however he still need to go out and get food, which he often times needs to do alone. He’s anxious about leaving her and the other younglings behind, but Starstrike and a few of the other older fledglings ease some of his worries by keeping an eye on them and keeping a newly installed door to the hollow locked. (Planning on sketching concepts of what the hollow looks like soon)

2. Sol would be wary of Verglaust. He doesn’t know him and therefore doesn’t trust him, but he does trust Elbent. Doesn’t mean he won’t test him tho. When Vergloust fist visits, Sol stands taller, narrows his eyes further and scowls deeper to subtly intimidate him to test his bravery. After all, Elbent deserves to be with someone who will defend her just as fiercely (or even more so, which would please him greatly) as he would.

3. Starstrike, though he never showed it normally and is emotionally distant, was worried for her. Not only is she a bird whose species is extinct in the wild (making her valuable), she’s forever grounded thanks to her four wings. Starstrike often told frightening tales of humans to the younger hatchlings to warn them, but he took it a step further with Elbent by being incredibly descriptive. Sometimes he’d speak to her in private to whisper horrible things the humans will do to her if they ever find her. How they’ll slice her wings off, rip her feathers out, cut off her feet and hands and gut her while she’s still alive, then let their dogs eat what they don’t want from her corpse. It honestly sounded more like threats than warnings tho.

It’s mean, and he’s mean, but it was never intentional or out of malice. He’s genuinely worried and wants her and the others to avoid the same fate his parents met.

#tigracespace #birdformers au #Solclave #Starstrike

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storiesbymads · 4 years

Text

TOUCH TOO MUCH ( jj maybank . )

gif by @phoebejays

It was one of those nights.

warnings: smut, pwp, female receiving oral, protected sex

wc: 1.7k

You could see JJ sprawled out across your bed in the bathroom mirror as you finished up your night routine. He was clad in black boxers and, oddly enough, a pair of white crew socks as he absentmindedly scrolled through instagram. Every once in a while, he’d glance up from his phone to see you still doing whatever it is you did in the bathroom for forty-five minutes before bed and would sigh before adjusting himself and continuing down his feed.

It wasn’t the first time JJ had convinced you to let him stay the night after spending more than a month on John B’s pull out and you knew it wasn’t the last. He liked to tell you that he was staying with you to give his friend a well earned break from him but you knew the real reason. It was one of those nights.

“Y/N, baby, are you almost done?” he asked for the third time since you stepped into the connected room.

You let out a soft laugh in response, “Why? Got something big planned at 10:30?”

“Maybe. If you don’t hurry up in there you’ll never find out,” he said, tossing his phone somewhere onto the bed and trudging over to where you stood. He looped his arms around your waist, intertwining his fingers with yours and resting his chin onto your shoulder.

“Lucky for you, I just finished,” you whispered as he began placing open mouthed kisses along the base of your jaw. Subconsciously, you tilted your neck to give him better access to the skin as one of his hands moved to trace the hemline of your— his —shirt.

“Perfect,” he breathed into the tender skin just below your ear, biting down on the lobe ever so softly. The hand on your thigh trailed up higher, hiking the shirt up in its path, to fiddle with the flimsy fabric of your panties. He snapped the waistband against your skin.

“J,” you moaned. You made eye contact with him through the mirror before he abruptly pulled away. A whine slipped past your lips at the loss of contact. He grabbed your hand to pull you towards him as he backed himself up to the bed. His knees hit the back of the comforter forcing him to sit and pull you down to straddle him.

He was taking his time peeling the flimsy t-shirt off of you, his fingers leaving goosebumps in their wake as he slowly pushed the fabric up your torso. You were losing your mind.

“J, if you don’t hurry up I am going to scream,” you sighed, lifting your arms above your head so that he could fully remove the shirt. He complied, thankfully, slipping it over your head in one swift motion.

“This damn woman’s going to drive me insane,” he said, jokingly looking up at the ceiling with the shirt still in his grasp. You quickly grabbed it and tossed it behind his head before slapping his shoulder softly.

“Shut up.” You grabbed both of his cheeks with your hands as you pulled him in to smash your lips against his. The joking atmosphere vanished as soon as it started as JJ’s hands moved to rest on the backs of your thighs.

You hadn’t even realized you had started to grind down on JJ until you felt the wet patch that had started to grow.

“See what you do to me,” he pulled away to growl into your ear, his hard-on extremely evident to you now.

“Why don’t you do something about it, then,” you said. He groaned at your response, digging his fingers into your thighs so hard you were sure there’d be bruises when you looked in the morning.

It wasn’t long before JJ moved the pair of you to the center of the bed, flipping you over so that he was now hovering over you. His breath felt hot against your skin as he trailed kisses down the valley of your breasts and past your navel. One of his hands was resting beside your hip, supporting his weight, while the other was roughly groping at your left breast.

“Fuck, JJ,” It was too much for your body, too much for your brain to focus on him.

“Baby, I’ve barely even started,” he chuckled when he noticed the very obvious wet spot on your underwear that only seemed to grow as he continued his actions. You were practically losing your mind and he hadn’t even touched you where you needed him most.

“J, please,” you whined. His face was centimeters away from your clothed heat at this point. He placed a soft kiss on your clit over the fabric before he hooked his fingers into the waistband and slipped them off.

He was slow moving back up your legs. It felt as if he were literally pressing kisses to every inch of your skin, starting at your ankles and ending at your thighs. The anticipation for him to just touch you grew each time you felt his lips press against your skin and your mind was spinning with the thought, I just need your touch.

“Baby, please,” you begged. He let out a dry laugh in response.

“Tell me where you need me, princess.” He placed an open-mouthed kiss just above your folds and you swore you were seconds away from screaming.

“You know what I need, J,” you said, running your fingers through his hair in an attempt to push him closer to your heat. You felt him hum, his nose now dangerously close to pressing against your clit. “I really need your touch. Your fingers, your tongue, something.”

“As you wish,” he mumbled against you, placing a final kiss against your thigh before licking a full stripe through your folds.

“Oh my fucking God,” you groaned as he inserted his tongue into you. He had to place one of his hands on your stomach to keep you from bucking your hips any further into his mouth, the other securely wrapped around one of your thighs to keep you spread open for him.

His nose rubbed up against your clit anytime he so much as moved his face. You didn’t even know if he was doing it on purpose but God, if it didn’t feel amazing. You knew your orgasm would be hitting you in a matter of seconds.

“I’m so fucking close, J,” you said. He nodded as he sped up the rate at which he pumped his tongue in and out of you. A loud moan fell from your lips as you felt your high wash over you, your fingers desperately tugging at JJ’s blonde locks. His movements slowed as he helped you ride it out before he pulled away from you completely to hover over you once more.

You took a brief moment to admire him in the dim light. He had the face of an angel smiling with sin. His chest was heaving slightly and his body had a slight sheen to it that glistened as the moonlight hit it.

“You’re so gorgeous, angel. Taste even better,” he said as he connected his lips with yours. You could taste yourself on his tongue. If you weren’t so desperate to have him inside of you, you would’ve returned the favor. But, seeing as you were that desperate, you dipped your fingers into the waistband of his boxers and wrapped your hand around his throbbing length.

“Patience,” he tutted, pulling away enough so that your hand slipped out of his underwear. One of his hands moved to rest on your jaw, his thumb resting on your bottom lip, “Open.”

The second you complied to his instructions, his thumb was resting on your tongue and your head was being tilted back. You thought JJ was moving closer to kiss you again but he surprised you when he spit directly into your mouth, spreading the saliva with the pad of his finger.

“Good girl,” he said before finally taking off his boxers and tossing them across the room with your t-shirt. He reached towards the bedside table to grab a condom before he quickly tore the packaging open with his teeth and rolled it onto his cock.

“Are you going to fuck me or what, Maybank?” you asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Don’t get bratty on me now, princess. You were doing so good for me.” He lined himself up with your entrance causing the both of you to groan simultaneously. The tip of his cock pushed into you ever so slowly, his pace agonizingly slow as he bottomed out.

“Oh, fuck me.”

“I’m trying,” he said. You giggled softly at the comment, pulling your bottom lip between your teeth seconds afterwards as JJ pulled almost all the way out of you before slamming back in.

The only sound in the room was a mix of your pornographically lewd moans and JJ’s hips snapping against yours at an ungodly pace. He placed one of your calves over his shoulder which allowed him to go even deeper, his tip grazing your g-spot.

“I’m gonna cum again,” you whimpered as JJ slowed his pace slightly in exchange for harder thrusts. You felt your stomach starting to burn as your second orgasm approached.

“Hold it for me, baby. I’m not that far behind,” he said, placing a delicate kiss onto the ankle that was over his shoulder. You grasped onto the comforter in an attempt to ground yourself. You honestly had no idea if you’d be able to hold it for any extended period of time at the rate JJ was pounding into you.

“JJ, I-“

“I’ll count it down for you, princess. Okay?” You nodded, clenching around him when you felt his movements stutter slightly.

“Five.” He removed your leg from his shoulder so that he could bend down and nip at the skin on your collarbones.

“Four.” His grip on your hips tightened and his movements started to get sloppier.

“Three.” His left hand slipped between your legs to rub circles against your clit.

“Two.” Your fingers moved to rest on his shoulders, your fingernails digging crescent shapes into the skin there.

“One.” His hips stilled as he came in thick ropes into the condom, you having come undone at the same time. After one or two more thrusts, he pulled out of you and left for a second to discard the condom in the bathroom.

You were left panting on the bed when he returned with a damp washcloth. It took a few minutes for him to clean you up, making sure to rub lightly on the sensitive nub.

“I am never gonna get enough of that,” he sighed as he pulled the covers back so you could both slip under them.

This is the third installment of my favorite song series. you can find the rest of this series as well as any of my other works on my masterlist!

tagging: @ptersparkers bc she gave me the encouragement i needed to finish this. go check her out if you haven’t already!!

#jj maybank #jj maybank imagine #jj maybank x reader #jj maybank smut #rudy pankow #rudy pankow imagine #pudy pankow x reader #rudy pankow smut #outer banks #outer banks imagine #outer banks x reader #outer banks smut #obx

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eclecticstarlightconnoisseur · 3 years

Text

EDINBURGH TO BOSTON - CHAPTER 21 - SECRETS AND TRUTHS

Hello all, Finally the new chapter of Edinburgh to Boston is ready.

As I said in my update this has not been betaed. Therefore, any mistakes. lack of continuity or general mess-ups are all mine. I hope you will forgive me and overlook them. It took some re-writing when I read it over several times and I hope I caught all the mistakes.

This has been my baby for a long time and honestly, I think that was another reason that took so long to finish it as this is the last chapter. There will be an epilogue to clean up some things that are hanging around.

Just because this is the last chapter, does not mean this is the end. I can't really let go of these two people. They are so dear to my heart. Besides that, as I wrote this I realized that I did not totally address the opening premise that I made. If you recall I said that Fate and Destiny had their hands in seeing these two come together. There are other stories to tell about how such forces brought them together. I do plan a Part II but how I will do it has yet to be planned out.

I can't thank you all enough for being patient with me during times of difficulty when it took so long to get a chapter posted. I am so honored that so many of you liked this story which I honestly thought was going to fall flat on its face. I never dreamed I would get the response to it that I did. I thank you all for reading, commenting, giving the story some love. I am truly overwhelmed by your kindness.

As always I need to thank my betas who helped me along the way and gave me the encouragement to continue when I didn't think I could do it. @scubalass you're the best.

Without further ado and a tear in my eye, I give you Chapter 21 Edinburgh to Boston.

Edinburgh to Boston

Chapter 21

Secrets and Truths

“Come On! Come On! COME ON!” Claire groused at the tardy lift. It really wouldn’t do to be late for surgery on her first day back to work. She wanted to give the damn thing a good kick but thought better of it since she would be standing for most of the day. The idea of standing on a sore foot did not appeal to her.

“Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ, what is taking this thing so long? For a new building, you would think they would have installed a better lift system.” Finally, the doors slid open on the fifth floor where the cardiothoracic surgery department offices were located.

She ran down the corridor trying to free herself from her coat while hanging onto the bag containing her morning fix.

Claire ran through the building’s front door shouting a greeting to Eddie, the security guard on duty. She made a beeline for the Cafe to get her morning coffee before going up to her office. It would be a long and trying day and the caffeine jolt would serve as her means of survival.

Niall stood behind the counter and grinned at her. “Late Dr. B?”

“Whatever made you think so?” she replied rather dryly. Her face was flushed and her hair exploded out from her wooly cap.

“Just a wild guess,” he smirked.

“Humph!” she snarled. “I would love to stand and chat with you but I have surgery in an hour. I’ll have a…”

“Here it is Dr. B. Large black coffee with one sugar and a raisin scone.” Niall smiled showing her the takeaway bag with her name on it.

She looked flustered, “How did you…”

“Dr. Fraser came by earlier. He ordered for you thinking you might be...um, in a hurry.”

“You say Dr. Fraser’s here already?” Claire grimaced ashamed of her lateness. It seemed, however, that curiosity got the better of her. Doing her best to look nonchalant, she casually asked, “Um, how did he look? Tired was he?” Dark smudges rimmed her eyes from lack of sleep. Claire would have liked nothing more than to curl up in bed and pull the covers over her head.

“Nay, no’ at all. Dr. Fraser said he worked out in the gym first then ran here. He looked quite hale and hearty actually. A wee bit pink from the cold, but truly well.”

“Of course, he did,” mumbling with annoyance to herself, “the man is made out of steel.”

Opening her overstuffed slouchy bag, she began the ritual of hunting for her wallet.

Cocking his head to the side, Niall pushed the bag toward Claire, “Oh, and he paid for this too.”

“Thank you, Niall and I’ll thank Fraser when I see him.”

Grabbing the bag, she made a mad dash toward her arch-enemy, the lift.

As usual, the ride to her floor became an act of slow torture and unmitigated agony. Once the lift doors opened, she sprinted down the corridor shaking one arm out of her coat while juggling her purse and the bag with its precious contents in the other hand. As she arrived outside her office door, her other arm managed to jiggle out of its sleeve. Finding the key to her office would require a balancing act considering the disordered state of her handbag. Placing her coat between her teeth and the bag containing her coffee and scone between her knees, not the soundest of ideas mind, she rummaged inside her handbag. Of course, the key could not be found being buried in the deep recesses of the purse. Needing a little extra stability, Claire leaned against the doorway. The door swung open making her lose balance and stumble into the room. Her mouth opened, squawking in surprise causing the coat to drop to the floor. Flailing hands pinwheeled around trying to maintain equilibrium rather than land ignominiously on her arse. She managed to keep her footing but lost the grip on her purse and watched as the contents tumbled out spilling haphazardly around the room. By some miracle, the sack with the coffee and scone remained intact. Not a drop of the rejuvenating liquid spilled. Which, of course, was the most important thing.

Surveying the mess she had inadvertently created, Claire concluded it was going to be one of those days. No doubt about it. And to make matters worse, she would have to operate without Fraser. Not to have his strong capable hands there moving in concert with hers, well the thought just soured her stomach. Of course, Pound would be there to help, but he was still in training even if he was Chief Fellow and she would still have to monitor him.

Mumbling words that a lady should not use, Claire picked up her coat and tossed it on a chair. On her hands and knees, she crawled around picking up the scattered bits and bobs shoving them back in the purse.

Standing, she walked toward her desk and saw it. In the middle of the desk stood a small beautifully cut crystal vase filled with forget-me-nots, white heather, and baby’s breath. A handwritten card placed in front of the flowers was written in a distinctive script declaring, Tha gaol agam ort, J. Claire could not read Gàidhlig but she instinctively knew what it meant. Her eyes misted over as she touched the delicate blooms.

How do you do it, Jamie Fraser? You take a terrible day and turn it into something magical.

Claire put on her lab coat, grabbed the bag with her coffee and scone, and walked out closing the door behind her. She strolled toward her nemesis, the lift, smiling and humming happily.

****************

“Aye, that’s right. See how Dr. Beauchamp keeps her field clear. It gives ye an unobstructed view and prevents postoperative infection.” Jamie turned to look at his students and they all dutifully nodded in appreciation.

“Watch how Dr. Beauchamp creates the anastomosis. Then she’ll tie it off. See how she makes her knots! ‘Tis a thing of beauty, is it no’? Perfect technique!” Jamie praised. Peering at his beloved, he saw her eyes crinkle with pleasure and her cheeks blazed red above her mask.

He came alive while he watched her work. As a surgeon, she was smart, talented, and highly sought after. Not only because of her skill but because she deeply cared about her patients. Some colleagues thought her “too involved” or believed her gender would make her“too soft” to become a competent cardiothoracic surgeon. Other critics thought her involvement with her patients would undermine her professionalism.

They had made love. Legs twined together; her head rested on his shoulder while his arm curled around her protectively. Jamie turned on to his side just enough to allow him to see her nakedness gilded by the moonlight. She curled into him clinging to him like a limpet anchored to a rock. Her muscles tense where normally she lay in his arms boneless after their intimacy. Finding a particularly tight knot he massaged it and felt it go slack.

“Is something wrong, my own? Did I no’ please you?” he asked anxiously.

“No, you were wonderful, really, Jamie. It’s just me. I started thinking. I don’t know why. But it’s nothing at all truly. I’m fine, just fine.”

“Sassenach, I ken well enough what ‘I’m fine means. Why dinna ye tell me what’s upsetting ye.” Jamie pulled her closer, tucking Claire’s head under his chin.

“We need to go back soon,” she said in a voice so low as to be almost inaudible. “And I’m so happy here with you,” she looked up into those startling blue eyes. “Then I started thinking about what it took for me to get this far in my career. My residency. My Fellowship. And suddenly I wondered if it was all worth it. I wondered if they were right in the end.”

“Who was right, Sassenach?”

Heaving a heavy sigh, Claire shared her trials as a cardiothoracic fellow. The competition for the position had been fierce. Only the top five candidates were called back to interview for the one open position. Even though she was highly ranked among the candidates for the fellowship, her prospective mentors suggested that perhaps she would be more suited to pediatrics, dermatology, or aesthetics as one of those specialties might suit her female sensibilities better. They had suggested cardiothoracic surgery might be too rigorous for a woman. The hours too demanding for a married woman. What would her husband say? Wouldn’t she like to have a family someday?

“The only qualification I didn’t have was I didn’t have a prick,” she said with some bitterness. She never expected an easy time. A distinct amount of sexism existed in medicine and women were not welcomed with open arms. She worked the worst schedule and given the most complex cases. Evaluations were harsh and judgmental. All done in the hopes that she would quit. Instead, it just made her work harder. And she turned a blind eye and a deaf ear to the mockery heaped on her. Claire succeeded where many others failed. She became their first female Chief Fellow; won several prestigious awards for her research. More importantly to Claire, her patients thrived.

“I am beginning to think they were right about some things. There is so much more to life. Much, much more,” she said drowsily. “And I want to have it. All.” Yawning, her eyes fluttered closed, and fell into a contented sleep.

“Aye, mo nighean donn, ye will. I’ll see tae it,” and leaned over kissing her brow.

Truly Claire is a woman of rare spirit, he thought. A woman who overcame many challenges and obstacles from an early age and was better for it. After all, she survived a plane crash that claimed the lives of her parents, lived like a vagabond with her archeologist uncle, and prevailed over a nightmare marriage. Many people would have been crushed under such hardships. But not his Sassenach; she endured. She managed to overcome them and emerge victoriously. A woman of rare spirit indeed. And one who deserved to be loved and loved well.

Jamie’s narrative kept pace with Claire’s every movement. Occasionally, he fired off questions at various intervals to his followers which they answered to his satisfaction. They remained throughout the entire procedure until skin closure finished and the patient made ready for transfer to the CSICU.

“Dr. Pound will accompany the patient to their room and start to write the postoperative orders. Please go with him. I will meet you over there.”

“Dr. Beauchamp, a word if ye please about yer next case,” called Jamie.

“Of course, Dr. Fraser. I would be delighted.”

The doctors exited the operating room on the pretext of being nothing more than two colleagues engaged in a discussion about a patient scheduled for surgery that afternoon. They approached an out-of-the-way corridor between the OR and the CSICU stealing down the passageway like two thieves in the night. Jamie’s head spun around looking for anyone who might have observed them. Deciding that they had not been seen, he seized her hand and pulled her into a little-used utility room. He locked the door behind them and drew her close, kissing her thoroughly.

“I missed ye.”

Claire cuddled into him resting her head on his chest. “I missed you too.”

Lifting her arms, she wrapped them around his neck. “Come here,” she whispered as she tugged his head down toward her.

Claire kissed him once, then twice.

“No’ that I’m complaining but what’s that for?”

“One was for the coffee, the other was for the scone. This one,” her voice turned provocative, “is for the flowers.” Her mouth latched onto his giving him a proper thank you kiss. The kiss, a searing flame, igniting them like a match to dry kindling. It left them both breathless and wanting for more.

She pressed firmly against him. He could feel her nipples rigid and taut through the thin scrub top. He knew she felt him; his hardness pressed against her body. If only I were home with her I’d carry her off to bed. This thought, naturally, made things much worse for him.

“How did you manage it?” she asked, her voice a sultry husky tone.

“Ewan gets the credit.”

“Be sure to thank him for me.” Claire crushed her body closer to his taking in his warmth. She buried he nose against him absorbing his smell. His scent was masculine, with the tang of antiseptic and just a dash of laundry starch hovering around him. Some things completely stirred her soul.

Clearing his throat, Jamie asked in a shaky voice, “Will ye, ah, will ye… Christ Claire, I canna think with ye so close tae me. Will ye take yer lunch with me?”

“Yes,” she said breathily.

“Why don’t ye go dictate yer op notes while on check on Pound? I’ll meet ye in about thirty minutes.”

“That’s a fine idea,” she leaned forward giving him a quick kiss. “Don’t be late.”

Jamie opened the door enough to peek out and found the corridor remained empty.

“Ye go first, I’ll follow after ye shortly.”

Claire slipped through the door while Jamie watched as she left. He noticed a little extra sway to her hips as she walked away. Damn little vixen. She did it on purpose. Sighing, he closed the door and leaned his head against it. He would have a wait a minute or two until his “problem” disappeared. It was becoming truly uncomfortable as he sought to adjust himself. “She’ll be the death of me yet.”

***********************

Walking into the CSICU after completing a successful surgery always filled Jamie with a certain satisfaction. He felt overjoyed that he and Claire helped patients return to their life, their work, their family, and without pain. He would tell patients, when he first met them, that this surgery was “enabling”. It would enable them to return to the life they wanted and not become a bystander.

With that thought in mind and a large grin on his face, Jamie swiped his badge across the electronic keypad granting him entrance into the Unit. The sounds of controlled chaos greeted him, voices raised, ventilators whooshing delivering needed oxygen, the soft beeping of heart monitors keeping time with healing hearts, IV pumps clicking as they delivered medication critical to the patient’s recovery.

He walked briskly toward the nurses’ station with gladness in his heart for he was back where he belonged.

“Fiona, ‘tis good tae see ye. How have ye been?” he inquired of the Unit’s charge nurse.

With the sound of his voice all conversation, all activity ceased, and every eye fastened onto him. The silence in the room would have been deafening if not for the continued mechanical sounds. Jamie became keenly aware of the absence of sound and the staff rooted in position. And just as quickly as it started it ended with activity resuming at its normal pace.

Fiona MacGowen kept her eyes glued to her computer screen, deliberately not making direct eye contact with the doctor. “Oh just braw, Dr. Fraser, just braw. Dr. Beauchamp’s patient is in Room 10 with Dr. Pound, Elspeth, and Iona getting him settled,” she said with her lips slightly turning up in a smile. “They’ll be waiting on ye.”

“Thank ye, Fiona. I’ll go and see how they are getting along.”

Jamie walked away, stopped, and turned back to look at Fiona once more. He thought her behavior a bit strange. Generally, one would say Fiona was a gregarious person with the reputation of being a chatterbox. Today, however, she acted more like a nun under a vow of silence. But to be honest, as he gazed around the Unit once more, everyone’s behavior seemed strange. And he had yet figured out what to make of it.

As Jamie approached the room the sounds of busyness gave the impression of a beehive humming with activity. As he stepped into the entryway, activity ceased. Again, all that remained was the soft mechanical sounds made by the life-sustaining equipment.

Elspeth stood quite still and uttered a little gasp. Meanwhile, Iona took a step back bumping into the ventilator; her eyes round with surprise. Dr. Pound cleared his throat glaring at the two nurses. They resumed their usual pleasant expressions with lips curling up into crooked smiles.

Jamie looked at the three of them thinking his team had gone daft.

“‘Tis good to have ye back Dr. Fraser,” declared the Fellow. “The ladies and I were just finishing getting Mr. MacNichol set up.”

Pound grabbed one of the portable workstations and began reviewing the patient’s current vitals as well as the orders he had written with the surgeon. They discussed the ventilator’s and pacemaker’s current settings, and when to call Dr. Beauchamp with any changes to her patient.

“Well-done, well-done. Mr. MacNichol is in very capable hands,” he smiled at his team. “I am off to lunch. Ye ken how to reach Dr. Beauchamp or me.”

Jamie walked out of the room and on impulse turned back to see the three heads buried in whispered conversation. He shook his head and left thinking about having lunch with Claire wanting to discuss the staff’s strange behavior with her.

Preoccupied with his thoughts, Jamie walked smack into his cousin Rupert almost knocking him down. Extending his arm quickly he caught his cousin by the shoulder steadying him.

“Sorry about that Rup. Doing a bit of wool-gathering I suppose.”

“Oy must be something awfully important to have ye so distracted.”

“I promised Claire I would have lunch with her and I dinna want tae be late.”

“Tae tell ye the truth, I am on my way tae find Geillis. We’re supposed to have a bite together too. Suppose ye two join us, aye?” He grinned broadly, “Twill be interesting to see if the plan

succeeded.”

“Sounds like a good idea cuz,” Jamie clapped an arm around Rupert’s shoulder as they strode off in search of the lasses.

************************************

Seated at one of the dictation corrals, Claire began her op notes. Her cardiac anesthesiologist, Geillis Duncan took the hutch next to her.

Dr. Duncan was a beautiful woman, with a trim figure, flaming red hair, and eyes as green as spring grass.

“Claire, ‘tis good tae have ye back. I’m sorry I dinna have much of a chance tae speak with ye this morning before the case. Did ye enjoy the conference?” Dr. Duncan gave Claire a sly side-long look.

“Wouldn’t you know it, Boston had a blizzard and the speakers weren’t able to make it.”

“No. What a shame. Ye flew all that way for nothing,” she sympathized.

“Too bad, right? Dr. Fraser and I were looking forward to hearing about those peripherally inserted heart valves.”

“Aye, but ye had the fox cub with ye. Perhaps it wasna so bad after all,” she leaned over jabbing Claire in the side. “Did ye maybe get tae share a room and have a go at him between the sheets, um?” She gave Claire a wicked smile. “I ken if I was snowed in with him, I would.

“Geillis!” Claire swore. She blushed from her hair roots to her toes.

Geillis gave her a sly smug smile. “After all, Georges X is an exclusive luxury hotel. Verra private, and verra, verra discrete. Or so I’ve heard,” she said shrugging her shoulders. “They have those flowers, all over the place. What are they? Orchids? she asked while tapping her nail against her white teeth feigning an attempt at recalling. I understand the lobby is decorated with a fortune in artwork. The rooms are quite grand, are they no’, with a fireplace, champagne, chocolate-dipped strawberries, fine whiskey. And I hear the bed is big enough to sleep an entire family. How could ye no’ entice him into yer bed, is what I want tae know?”

Claire glared at her friend, “What I want to know is how you know I stayed at Georges X. I know I never told you.”

Geillis chuckled nervously, “Why of course ye did. How else would I ken that?” Geillis became uncomfortable under Claire’s scrutiny.

“Spill it, Duncan. You know more than you’re telling.”

Geillis affected a look of innocence, “I swear tae ye Claire, I dinna ken anything.” She nervously scanned the area looking for any means of escape from further questioning. Her eyes latched on to Dr. Rupert MacKenzie ambling directly toward her, along with Jamie. “I need tae go. I promised tae meet Rupert for lunch. See ye later, Claire.”

Reaching out, Claire grasped Geillis by the forearm, “That’s a load of rubbish and you know it. I suspected there was something dodgy about that trip right from the beginning. I need answers and you have them, Duncan. You’re coming with me.”

************************************

The two male surgeons walked amicably through the corridor talking and laughing as Rupert entertained Jamie with tales of hospital gossip. As they approached the physician workstation, they noticed a loud commotion that seemed to be attracting a crowd. Jamie wondered what caused the kerfuffle this time. Most such squabbles centered around obtaining a certain OR room or available time for surgery. This behavior bordered on the ridiculous in his opinion.

As the men came closer to the center of the fray, they saw two female doctors engaged in a struggle. One of them had wild brown curls bouncing around her head. Claire? The second doctor had hair the color of flame. That head of hair belonged to the fiery Geillis Duncan. He quickened his pace needing to reach Claire.

“Claire! Claire,” he called, “What’s amiss?”

“‘Claire’ he calls her now. No’ Dr. Beauchamp,” Geillis snorted.

Claire’s posture had all the hallmarks of frustration and anger as she tried to drag her colleague toward the doctor’s lounge.

Claire’s eyes locked on Jamie, “It seems that Dr. Duncan knows a great deal about our trip. Particularly where we stayed and I want to know how.”

Rupert took Geillis firmly by the elbow and leaned over to hotly whisper in her ear, “Wha’ have ye done woman!?”

Cold green eyes glared fixedly up at him disliking his insinuation. “I may have spilled a bit of tea is all,” she said, wrenching her arm free of his grip.

“Sounds more like ye spilled the whole damn pot,” he growled at her. “Ye ken they were never supposed to find out, at least no’ this way. We were supposed to tell them gentle like. Now what?”

Dr. Duncan gave her shoulders the tiniest of shrugs. “Dinna fash. We’ll think of something,” and walked toward the lounge.

He squeezed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth, “Aye, that’s what I’m afraid of.”

Rupert held the lounge door open for his co-conspirator trying to usher her quietly into the room. Geillis, however, turned to observe Jamie and Claire huddled deep in discussion.

“Are ye both going to stand there all day blethering, or are ye coming? I’m hungry and I want my lunch.” she snapped.

The crowd lingered about waiting for the fuse to be lit and the fireworks to begin. Dr. Duncan had a very volatile reputation easily flying into pieces like an unstable explosive device. Whereas, Dr. Beauchamp was a genial person, kind and caring. But, the one thing she was not was a meek individual. When pushed beyond her tolerance limits, she could be as ruthless as a she-wolf defending her pups.

Jamie placed his hand firmly on the small of Claire’s back giving her a little nudge forward. The crowd began to murmur heads close in a whispered discussion, Some rudely pointed a finger at his hand on her back, while others outright stared. Jamie flushed. He should have known such an intimate placement of his hand would draw attention. They saw he claimed her. Not knowing how Claire would feel about this public display, he thought he needed to break up this crowd before someone accidentally said something.

“Show’s over everyone. Just a private meeting among friends. Nothing tae see here. I’m sure ye all have some work tae do. Patients are waiting for ye. Go on with ye.” Jamie said dismissing the loitering group.

Following behind Claire, Jamie entered the room and shut the door.

Claire wanted to get to the bottom of things quickly and stormed up to her colleague in a blazing fury. “Alright Duncan, spill what you know.”

“I already told ye. I dinna ken anything about ye trip. As I said either you or Jamie must have mentioned where ye were staying. Beyond that, I dinna ken anything.”

Jamie looked at Claire and shook his head signifying that he had never mentioned the hotel to anyone.

“Um-hm. Since when does this institution send a chauffeured car to pick up two staff surgeons? For the Chief certainly but not for ordinary staff personnel. And we’re supposed to believe that the hospital made five-star accommodations with all expenses paid for us? Hmm? I think not. Did I not say so, Jamie?”

“Aye, ye did. Several times.”

“Claire began to pace while considering the other strange occurrences surrounding their trip.

“And what about my clothes? I most certainly did not pack away that nightgown. It was a mere scrap of silk and lace. And that lingerie! Those panties and bras were not something I would have packed for a conference trip.”

“I’ll bet he enjoyed it,” Geillis muttered under her breath a sly grin curling up on her lips lighting up her face.

Jamie leaned forward, his eyes narrowing, staring intensely at the female doctor, “I am inclined tae agree with Dr. Beauchamp that the circumstances surrounding our trip tae Boston were, tae say the least, most unusual. I also had clothes in my suitcase that I ken I dinna pack and I’m wondering how they got there. Can ye shed any light on this mystery?”

As Jamie questioned Geillis, an acrid odor caught Claire’s attention. Being a very astute doctor, she was used to the various malodors emitted by humans and knew what they meant. She raised her nose into the air and sniffed delicately. The pungent smell seemed to be coming from the direction of Rupert. A light sheen of sweat glossed over his forehead and there was a distinctive musky odor about him. Fear. Anxiety. Her intense scrutiny seemed to worsen whatever internal conflict plaguing him. Unable to withstand the intensity of her stare, Rupert turned away not wanting to meet her eyes.

Claire jabbed Jamie in his side with her elbow gaining his attention.

“I think Rupert has something to add to this conversation.”

Jamie walked over to his cousin and stared at him intently. Rupert took a few steps back, feeling the unconscious need to put some distance between them.

“Aye, I think yer right. Rupert, ye look like ye have something ye’d like tae get off yer chest. Out with it man.”

Deciding that the best defense is a good offense, Rupert widened his stance and crossed his arms over his chest.

“I dinna ken what yer talking about Jamie lad. As the lady said, I dinna ken anything about yer trip either. And dinna ask if I ken anything about how yer jeans, duck boots, and down jacket got into yer suitcase,” he replied, a self-satisfied look plastered across his face.

“Ye great dunderheid! Do ye ken what ye said?! Ye just gave it away,” Geillis shouted giving him a slap upside his head. “And ye were worried about what I said.”

“Wha’ are ye talking ab…” He had that startled look that one has when they realize they stuck their foot in their mouth. “Oh! Oh, shite.”

“Ye just admitted that ye changed Jamie’s clothes in his suitcase.”

“Dinna blame me for everything. You changed Claire’s clothes,” Rupert countered.

The two combatants escalated the argument going at each other nose to nose, eyeball to eyeball, tooth, fang, and claw.

“And whose ideas was this? Mine. Who made the hotel arrangements and spoke tae Joe Silverberg in Texas to get him on board with the plan should one of them call to discuss the meeting?” Geillis boasted as she swung her hair over her shoulder. A dreamy look took over her as she recalled the conversation with Dr. Silverberg. “I invited him to come to Scotland, ye ken. Told him I would show him the sights and a good time. Said he may take me up on that too.”

“Mmphm, so ye did,” Rupert grumbled with annoyance. He did not like the suggestion of Geillis showing the American surgeon a good time. “Ye forget I made the plane arrangements and got Kenny to print up the fake conference brochure. And who enlisted their secretary’s help to slip the vacation request under the Chief’s nose and have him sign it? Cost me a night out as payment for that,” Rupert griped.

The two doctors continued in their game of one-up-manship, oblivious to Jamie and Claire standing in the room.

Unable to take the bickering anymore, Jamie bellowed, “Haud yer weesht!!!”

Geillis and Rupert looked up in bewilderment having forgotten where they were and that Jamie and Claire stood listening.

“Do ye two realize that what ye did invaded our privacy? That ye had no right to interfere in our lives?” Jamie growled.

“So, that’s it then? The whole thing was a setup, some sort of game? None of this was real? ” Claire said as she looked at Jamie.

“I beg tae differ, hen,” Gellis walked over her expression softening and gently took hold of Claire’s hand, “it’s as real as it can get. We all saw the lovesick eyes, the secret peeks ye two gave each other, and the way ye fuss over each other. If two people were meant to be together it’s ye two. We just nudged things along is all, ” said Geillis.

“Aye, yer right,” Rupert chimed in. “‘Tis the truth that NO one could take watching ye two anymore. The whole hospital wanted tae see ye together.” Rupert smiled at Claire. He quickly turned his vexation on his cousin. “And if Fraser here was no’ going tae be a man about it and make the first move, well by God someone had tae,” he snarled at Jamie. “What are ye then, cuz, a man or a moose?”

Jamie ran his hand through his hair and rolled his shoulders as if trying to loosen his shirt that had suddenly become too tight. A shy crooked smile flashed over his face; his lip curling up on one side.

“Aye, yer right. I, ah, I… Well, tae tell the truth, I am a bit of a coward. Ye ken, I dinna think um, I dinna know if Claire felt the same about me.” Jamie turned and looked deeply in Claire’s eyes, “I was afraid tae lose ye. If being yer friend would be the best of it, then that would have been enough.”

“I was afraid of losing you too, Jamie. I’ve had feelings for you right from the start. Only now do I dare to admit them,” Claire turned toward Rupert and Geillis giving them a look of gratitude. Moving closer, placing her hands on his chest. “I love you and I always will.” Her arms went up around his neck, standing on tiptoe, she leaned in, and kissed him soundly.

The kiss finally ended, each blushing from making a display of themselves.

Geillis stood there making gagging noises as she watched their affection. Rupert looked at Geillis with a smirk on his face.

“What’s the matter, lass, jealous?” Rupert said with a grin on his face.

“Certainly not,” Geillis waved off that idea with a flip of her hand and turned away.

“Well then, ye won't be minding this. I've wanted tae do this for a long time.” Rupert turned her around, took her in his arms, and kissed her.

“And I dinna want tae hear about ye showing any other men a good time, either.” He gave her a look that told her he would not brook no for an answer.

Geillis, looking dazed readily agreed.

Jamie coughed loudly, reminding the other couple they were not alone.

Wrapping his arm around Claire and pulling her into his side, Jamie smiled at their friends, “We want to thank ye, both, for bringing us together. We are truly grateful.”

Claire nodded in agreement, forgetting about her anger with the unorthodox methods they used to bring her the love of her life.

“Since we are all telling the truth,” Rupert reluctantly admitted, “there’s a wee bit more to it.” “We were not the only ones involved in this. When other staff members heard what we about they wanted tae be part of it. And so...”

“And so everyone began to contribute money tae help pay for the trip. So that’s how ye had such fine accommodations and such.” Geillis huffed, “We told ye that people could no longer stand tae look at ye. They wanted ye two as a couple, no’ apart. Now can we stop havering about and get some lunch? My wame is empty. Besides, everyone is waiting in the canteen tae see ye both.”

“Oh, God,” Claire groaned as she grew red and buried her face in Jamie’s chest.

Jamie chuckled and rubbed her back in long soothing strokes.

“Are ye ready then, Sassenach? Let’s go give these good people their money’s worth,” he grinned.

“Yes. We should thank them all, don’t you think?” Claire replied, running her fingers through her hair trying to tame her wayward curls.

“Ye look fine, lass,” he bent to kiss her gently on the cheek and took hold of her hand.

Rupert and Geillis led the way, laughing and talking. Claire and Jamie walked behind them holding hands. Nerves were getting the best of her and her hands became sweaty. She surreptitiously wiped her free hand on the scrub pant leg.

“Dinna fash. Ye’ve faced worse and ye’ll no’ be doing this alone. We’ll face them as one.”

One.

ONE, he said. But. What did that exactly mean?

“What do you mean by that? Being one?” She held her breath waiting for an answer.

Jamie frowned, crease lines set upon his forehead.

“It’s like I’ve kent ye my whole life, even before that, if that’s possible. I mean yer part of me. I ken that sounds crazy, but I…”

“I know what you mean, Jamie. I feel the same way too. It’s hard to explain, but it’s there.”

“Aye, lass, it’s most definitely there.”

Approaching the canteen seemed a surreal experience. Normally, one would call the dining hall a lively place, with the sounds of laughter, chatter, mixed with the scrape of dinnerware against plates. Today seemed different. A thrum of excitement and perhaps expectation filled the air as if waiting for something to happen. As Jamie and Claire approached the door a steady vibration emanated from its core.

Geillis waved them back signaling she and Rupert would enter first. Rupert lifted his hand spreading his fingers indicating they should wait five minutes before entering. Jamie nodded and Rupert and Geillis entered the dining room.

Jamie and Claire waited in companionable silence. Who would think that five minutes could feel like an eternity? But it did.

Jamie looked at his watch; it was time.

“Are ye ready, Sassenach?”

“Je suis prest,” she acknowledged.

Their fingers reached out seeking their mate bonded the two hearts and souls into one. Turning they gave each other a nod and walked through the door only to meet with absolute silence.

All eyes turned upon them and it became unnerving. Claire inched closer to Jamie, if that was even possible, drawing on his strength.

Then the cheers began along with the whistles and applause. Someone from the back of the room called out, “It’s about time, Fraser.”

“Och why don’t ye just give us a bit of peace, aye?” came his laughing response.

They were rushed by a mob of well-wishers. Men clapped Jamie on the back wishing him well. Others made jokes, at his expense, about his manliness for taking so long.

The women embraced Claire telling her how happy they were for her. Some gave her sly looks while others made off-color jokes causing her to blush.

Eventually, people began to amble back to their tables and lunch, and the couple discovered themselves alone. Finding a table in an out-of-the-way corner, they sat to eat.

“I guess we are out as a couple officially. It’s no’ how I would have wished it tae become common knowledge, but…” Jamie shrugged. “They are good people and they meant well.”

Claire nodded in agreement as she moved her salad around on the plate not eating.

“It’s a strange feeling. Knowing that someone orchestrated this relationship. I know how this will sound, but I feel like this happened to me, to us before.”

Claire looked up at Jamie, eyes pleading for understanding.

“Forget what I said, it’s silly.” She stabbed a particularly tender piece of lettuce and ate it.

“Nay Sassenach, it’s no’ silly at all. I feel it too. It’s as if I am drawn to ye as if I kent ye from another lifetime. Like we were meant to be together, bonded if ye like.”

“That’s it, exactly.” Claire looked at him with a sense of relief. Looking up, she noticed the clock on the wall, reading 12:55 PM.

“Damn, we have to go. We’ll barely make it in time for Dr. de Gascogne’s appointment for your hand.”

Jamie muttered something in Gàidhlig which Claire really didn’t want a translation of.

“I dinna ken why everyone is making such a fuss over my hand. It doesna hurt and it will heal in a few more weeks.”

Claire blew out a breath of exasperation, “You know very well why Dr. Fraser. Your one of the best cardiac surgeons in all of Scotland. Well, next to me you are,” she said teasingly. Besides, the hospital needs you, your patients need you but most of all I need you. So that’s why.”

“I ken, but I dinna like being fussed over.”

“Yes, I know; you’re a doctor and doctors make terrible patients. You think you’re supposed to do the healing and don’t like when you need help,” Claire said with a raised eyebrow. “Now, let’s get your hand attended to, shall we?”

They hurried through the corridors, making it to the appointment with seconds to spare. Jamie was whisked off for X-Rays then he and Claire were escorted to an exam room. He sat on the examination bed while Claire took the chair next to him awaiting Dr. de Gascogne’s appearance.

Jamie studiously inspected an anatomical chart of the hand and wrist hanging on the wall in the room.

“Ye said ye need me,” he said almost inaudibly. “Do ye mean as yer surgical partner or as something more?

Claire noticed him drumming his fingers on his thigh anxiously.

“I need you, Jamie, in every sense of the word. As my partner, my friend, my lover, my everything. I. Need. You.” Claire stood and walked over to him. She wrapped her arms around his neck pressing her forehead to his.

“Aye, weel I wanted to make sure, is all. Yer the prettiest lass in the hospital. Any man would want tae be with ye,” and gave her a shy smile.

“Jamie Fraser, you say the most…” There was a knock on the door, the knob turned and Dr. de Gascogne entered the room finding the lovers locked in an embrace.

She looked at the two, raised an eyebrow at Jamie’s hands on Claire’s hips, “Un jour, quelqu'un entrera dans votre vie et vous fera comprendre pourquoi cela n'a jamais fonctionné avec quelqu'un d'autre, mes chers. Et il semble que vous ayez. I believe congratulations are in order. My secretary tells me you have announced that you are a couple. You two made quite a stir in the dining hall?”

Claire jumped away returning to her seat cheeks and nose bright red. While Jamie’s ears went pink.

“Well, um, ah, yes. Thank you. I believe that we made quite a spectacle of ourselves and continue to do so, it seems,” Claire replied mortified having been caught.

“Ah, mon chéri never be ashamed to show that you are in love. We are born of love and seek out love. Many have sacrificed greatly for love even died for it. It truly is a treasure to enjoy. No?” Dr. de Gascogne said with a smile. “Now to business.”

Dr. de Gascogne opened the electronic medical record and began her inquiry. Jamie explained how he injured his hand - twice - causing Dr. de Gascogne to raise her eyebrows in total disbelief.

She reviewed the X-Rays; then removed the splints. She moved and wiggled the fingers finding them healing well and moving to her satisfaction. The splints were replaced and Jamie was dismissed with a caution not to hit any more people or trees. She instructed him to see her again in one month for a further follow-up.

The two surgeons graciously thanked Dr. de Gascogne for her time and casually left the examination room. As soon as they could not be seen, they bolted toward the operating suites as quickly as they could eager to leave behind another awkward situation.

The remainder of the afternoon went on as planned. Claire completed her second surgical procedure without incident. Jamie’s students doggedly followed him from place to place. Finally, the day came to an end. The surgeons tiredly returned to their offices, checked in for urgent messages and for their schedule for the next day. Each too exhausted to do much of anything else, except want the comfort of a bed, chose to go home. It was a short walk to Claire’s flat from the hospital and Jamie escorted her home. He wrapped his arm around her waist and she leaned into him. They spoke of this and that sharing different events of their day. Arriving at Claire’s flat, they walked up the stairs toward the front door. Jamie stood one step lower than Claire allowing them to be of an equal height.

A wave of fatigue washed over her, but Claire did not want Jamie to leave despite her tiredness.

“Would you like to come up? I have some soup in the fridge. Mrs. Bug made it. She’s quite the cook. Won’t take more than a moment to heat up. Or maybe a glass of wine or a dram? To help unwind?” she said looking at him hopefully.

He unzipped both their jackets and pulled her into the depth of his wrapping the jacket around her. He wanted her close to him and to share his warmth with her.

“Mo chridhe, yer completely knackered and ye need yer rest. If I come up with ye, ye ken neither of us will get any sleep,” he said pressing himself against her his desire completely apparent. “It’s no’ that I dinna want tae, but it wouldna do tae have ye fall asleep tomorrow during yer procedures.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve worked with little sleep, just like you have, during residency and fellowship,” she pouted.

“Aye, but ye need to set an example for the students and fellows. And what about yer patients? They need Dr. Beauchamp at her best. They’re counting on ye.”

Claire luxuriated in the radiant heat of his body and the knowledge that he wanted her as much as she wanted him. But, she still did not want him to leave. For to be alone with Jamie was bliss but to be alone was, well, to be alone. She racked her fatigued brain for anything that would keep Jamie with her. She blurted out the first thing that came to mind, “I love you.”

“I ken ye do, mo nighean donn. I feel it every time ye touch me,” Jamie took her hand tenderly placing a kiss on her palm. Gently, he folded her fingers over to seal his kiss against her skin. “And when ye kiss me,” he brushed his lips over hers. “Most of all, when ye lie with me. I ken the truth of it in our lovemaking,” he pulled her even closer to him until no space existed between their bodies. “Woman, ye’re like a live wire. Yer body fairly pulses with yer love and it flows out from you into me. It’s no’ just lust between us. ‘Tis love that brought us together and binds our souls. ‘Tis a thing that I never knew I wanted or needed until I found ye,” his hand moved to cup her face.

“It’s the same for me. I never knew it could be like this. Especially, after Frank. I thought all relationships would end up like that one. I see how foolish I had been to keep myself closed. To close my heart from love. If not for this trip, this may have never happened. We may have never happened.”

“Mo leannan, I would have found ye somehow. Whether I found ye now or even if I had to wait two hundred years to find ye, I’d find ye. We are meant to be together. I ken it.” His forehead pressed to hers each inhaling the other’s breath.

It began to rain lightly; a mizzle he had once called it. Tiny droplets of water clung to his hair. In the light of the streetlamp, his hair looked like a ruby adorned with sparkling diamonds.

They stood locked in an embrace for several moments; neither truly wanting to part from the other.

“Sassenach,” he whispered into her ear, “go on up. Ye need yer rest. Yer poor wee eyes are closing and there are dark smudges around them. Go on then. I’ll see ye tomorrow.”

He kissed her on the forehead and she nodded her head in agreement. Claire walked up the last two steps and slid the key into the lock of the front door. She turned to watch Jamie as he disappeared into the night walking toward his home and it occurred to her that this was just the beginning of their life and of their story.

The End - Part I

Tha gaol agam ort: I love you. (As if you didn’t know already.)

Anastomosis: An anastomosis is a surgical connection between two structures. It usually means a connection that is created between tubular structures, such as blood vessels or loops of the intestine.

CSICU/Unit: Cardiac Surgical ICU.

Blatherer: Chatterbox.

Dunderheid: An idiot, a stupid person.

Haud yer weesht: Be quiet.

Moose: mouse

Un jour, quelqu'un entrera dans votre vie et vous fera comprendre pourquoi cela n'a jamais fonctionné avec quelqu'un d'autre, mes chers. Et il semble que vous ayez.: One day someone will walk into your life and make you see why it never worked out with anyone else, my dears. And it seems that you have. (Google translation. If it’s wrong I apologise.) The quote is attributed to anonymous.

Mo nighean donn: My brown-haired lass

Mo leannan: Darling

Mizzle: A light rain

I hope you enjoyed this chapter. This Jamie and Claire will return. When I don't know. I also have several other stories in various stages of completion sitting in my files. I would like to give them a little attention too. And I still need to get through all the other stuff going on in my life.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you for reading. 🧡🧡🧡🧡

#edinburgh to boston #chapter 21 #Secrets and truths #here goes nothing #ol fic #my writing #jamie and claire #I can't believe I finished it

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dialovers-translations · 4 years

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DIABOLIK LOVERS MORE, BLOOD OFFICIAL VISUAL FANBOOK ー Interview Vol. 2 feat. Nao Nakamura

Source: DIABOLIK LOVERS MORE, BLOOD Official Visual Fanbook

Release date: 2013

Huge thank you to @keithvalentinex for providing the raw scans!

SECTION 1: Q&A

Q1. When was the series’ sequel decided on?

A: Around the time the first game ‘DIABOLIK LOVERS’ was released in stores. We were fortunate enough to have already received news of an anime adaption at the time, so at some point we played with the idea of creating a fan disc to go along with it. However, if possible we wanted to hype up the series even more in anticipation of the anime’s release, which is how the production of a ‘DIABOLIK LOVERS MORE, BLOOD’ series came to realisation.

Q2. Did you plan on introducing a set of 4 new characters during the early phases of development?

A: The initial draft we received from Rejet-sama mentioned four characters. We figured that with that amount, we could pack it into one game and create an equal amount of content as we did for the Sakamaki’s, so we proceeded with said idea. At one of the first brainstorm sessions, we casually dropped the idea of creating a game with 6 Do-M characters... (lol) However, that would stray too far away from the core concept behind ‘DIABOLIK LOVERS’, so it obviously got rejected. (lol)

Q3. How did you go about writing the characters’ dialogue and actions?

A: I believe that the previous installment can be regarded rather groundbreaking within the genre of otome games. However, the boys coming across as too strong to the point where it would prevent someone from delving deeper into their character is something we reflected upon. We wanted to make up for that this time and created this game with the intend of exploring them even further.

Q4. What did you struggle the most with while writing the script?

A: This doesn’t apply solely to the script, but the fact there are so many romanceable characters in this game is what made it so difficult. However, we did not want there to be a difference in quality between the different characters’ routes. Despite our strong wish to please the playerbase, it made the distribution of time very difficult. The writers would first pen down the script, then Rejet-san would do the proofreading and make adjustments and then pass it on to us. However, reading a script while playing a game or simply reading it on paper is still different, so we were making minute changes down to the very last minute of development. We ran through the same process for the last game, but this time around, the total amount of content was just very large. We once again felt the struggle of putting in so many characters to choose from. However, we did this to create an even better game, so it was worth the struggle.

Q5. Which character caused you the most problems while writing the script?

A: All of the Sakamaki’s. The four Mukami brothers who make their appearance in this installment may be Vampires, but they were once human just like the heroine, so in terms of emotions, they tend to sympathize with her more. As a result, it only makes the Sakamaki’s seem even more like they are the villains of the story. While this may seem obvious given their original setting of being both ‘Vampires’ and ‘extreme sadists’, it makes it very easy for the otome game element as well as the feelings they end up developing for the heroine to be lost, in which case they would no longer be the six brothers we wanted to deliver. Therefore, it was very difficult to convey to the player that the love they harbor for the heroine eventually makes them change, while still preserving the sadistic tendencies which stem from their nature as Vampires at the same time. The player base has spent quite a bit of time interacting with these brothers, and I am sure it was not always easy, but I hope said message was delivered to those who played our game.

Q6. Is there a character who underwent drastic changes compared to the last game?

A: All of them are still the same at the core, so my impression of them did not change depending on the scenario. I believe minor changes were done to the way some of the characters are drawn, but personally I perceive each character as a mix of both their previous and current representation.

Q7. In this game, each section is divided into a ‘Situation Part’ and ‘Story Part’. Could you explain your intentions behind this?

A: When collecting feedback on the previous game, we received many complaints about the different chapters feeling inconsistent and all over the place. However, we always intended ‘DIABOLIK LOVERS’ to be a game in which the player gets to enjoy these different kind of ‘situations’, so without losing this part of the enjoyment, we figured we had to make the plot progression easier to grasp, which is how the current structure was implementend. To make it even more clear to the player, we divided it into two sections and gave each of them a title, changing the names as well.

Q8. What are parts which have greatly improved or parts you want us to focus on in comparison to the first game?

A: To ensure the player gets to enjoy the development in the heroine and characters’ thoughts and feelings, we applied small adjustments till the very last second. We hope that the people playing the game will take notice of this as well.

Q9. Why do you think the series has received such a great amount of support?

A: I believe the impact of the ‘Do-S Vampire’ concept, Satoi-san’s eye-catching illustrations and the charm of the cast who voices the characters all play a big part in this. Furthermore, I also believe that the simultaenous announcement of both drama CDs and a game which took place during the early stages of development had a large influence as well. We were able to make a smooth transition from the release of the CDs to the release of the games, which made it easier for the fans to follow along with the franchise. We truly are grateful for that!

Q10. Were there any ideas you wanted to incorporate in this game, but were unable to do in the end?

A: This game features the same selection segment as the previous one in which scenario’s 1 ~ 6 raise your love meter, while scenarios 7 ~ 10 raise the SM meter. However, we implemented the distinction between the ‘situation part’ and ‘story part’ this time, so it might have actually been even more enjoyable if the situation part raises the SM meter instead...I think. Those kind of features may vary depending on the vision of the director and staff members, so I would like to use this experience to think of various possible routes for future installments, as well as to settle on an end product which is fitting for the franchise. Furthermore, this may seem like a task without an end but I believe that the voicing plays a big factor in delivering the story. It is a vital element of conveying the message you want to tell, in a way that whether or not the player understands the plot is often highly dependent on the voice work. Every time I find myself wanting to perfect this, but it is difficult to supervise all of it just by myself...However, there’s always next time, so I’d love to squeeze in the time to thoroughly check this!

Q11. Do you have any more games planned for the series at present? Would you personally like to create more sequels?

A: We do not as of now, but if there is a strong demand for it, we might just be able to develop another game. Personally I would like to make a stereotypical ‘fandisc’ but the very first thing that comes to mind with those is a 'sweet, romantic story’ so I do struggle a little envisioning how that would play out with a cast made out of nothing but intense characters.

Q12. Please leave a message for the fans.

A: Thanks to the support we have received from all of you, we were able to create so much content for this franchise. I put my heart and soul into this game, so I sincerely hope that many people will enjoy it. Your impressions and encouraging messages are a great motivator as well, so I am eagerly awaiting those! The series may deliver new installments in the future, and to ensure that you all can continue to enjoy ‘DIABOLIK LOVERS’, we will continue to try our hardest together with Rejet-san, so we’d be happy if you could send us your heartfelt support.

SECTION 2: THEIR FAVORITE EPISODES

Sakamaki brothers: The final few chapters of Ayato’s route left a strong impression on me. I couldn’t help but wonder if somebody could truly be that stubborn and in denial about their own feelings, insistent on calling the girl they love ‘a prey’ till the very end. I felt so frustrated when the heroine’s feelings just wouldn’t get through to him, tears welled up in my eyes.

Mukami brothers: The part which gave me the most goosebumps during the development stages has to be Ruki’s Manservant Ending. Takagi Sakurai-san did a magnificant job portraying his silent madness, it was truly wonderful. Second place would be Azusa’s brute ending, even though I knew how the story would go, I still ended up feeling a little depressed by it, so please be careful when you play this scenario...

SECTION 3: NAO NAKAMURA CHOOSES ー SITUATION-DEPENDENT CHARACTER SELECT

Who would you choose in these situations? What’s the developer’s opinion?

S1. To sleep together with?

Best: Subaru, I feel like he has a good sleeping posture.

Worst: Subaru, he might not move around much in his sleep, but it’d still be uncomfortable and narrow in that coffin, huh?

S2. To go on a trip together with?

Best: Shuu, I’m sure he’d just loaf around the lodge all day, so I get to enjoy the trip in whichever way I want!

Worst: Laito, I’d rather keep my distance from him.

S3. To eat together with?

Best: Kou because I’m sure he’d happily gobble it up.

Worst: Kanato, I feel like the food would be lacking in nutrients.

S4. To study with?

Best: Ruki, I think he’d do a good job explaining everything accurately.

Worst: ???, honestly all of them...

S5. To go on a date with?

Best: Yuma, I actually think he would make for a great boyfriend.

Worst: Shuu, because everything would be a chore to him...

S6. To play a video game with?

Best: Ayato, he just seems like the type of guy you can always have fun and make some ruckus with.

Worst: Reiji, he seems super fussy.

S7. To play sports with?

Best: Shuu, I don’t really like exercising so...I’ll go with the person who seems unlikely to exercise in the first place.

Worst: Ayato, I don’t like exercise after all...

S8. To go on a drive with?

Best: Ruki, I’m positive he would look handsome behind the wheel.

Worst: Azusa, it’d be bad if his bandages were to get stuck around the steering wheel or the gear stick...

#diabolik lovers #dialovers #diabolik lovers more blood official visual fanbook #diabolik lovers translation #diabolik lovers fanbook #diabolik lovers interview #nao nakamura

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wordynerdygurl · 4 years

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Skin Deep - Part 6

Author’s Note: Honestly, this story is nearing it’s ending. Hard to believe that a little idea I couldn’t shake has now grown into this mini-series! For all my die-hard homies, waiting for the next installment, I hope this is worth your while! If you’re new here, take a look around, see if you like anything and please, let the management know if you have any questions!! As always, writing like this requires the emotional support of people and pets. My dogs, Murphy and Winston, get me through a lot of plot bunnies just by being stalwart companions. My husband, graciously, lets me take these flights of fancy when I probably should be paying better attention to him and his day... and some of my besties here on Tumblr make it possible for me to do this for you guys. @sammy-jo1977 , my sister from another mister! Couldn’t/ Wouldn’t do it without you! To all the folks who follow me... My Minxes! Love you all! Stay well, be kind, and remember that Love, really does conquer all! If you want to be a Minx, send me a note, I’ll happily add you to my tag list! Lastly, be sure to like and share anything that you see on Tumblr that catches your eye. Creative types, we need the constant validation, you see? Without it, like an unwatered plant, we wither on the vine and perish! Be kind to those who help you through the day and reblog! Skin Deep Part 5 - click here for the previous chapter! Pairing: Loki x Reader, Steve, Valkyrie & Thor all make appearances Summary: Continued from Part 5, You and Loki put your plan into action, returning to Farmhouse. When you encounter Steve again, you learn there’s more than two sides to this story. Warnings: Loki’s POV and perspective, including mentions of his time under Thanos. I’m re-writing MCU history here, but some of the main beats are the same, so look out for SPOILERS for Dark World, Ragnarok, and a touch of Infinity War. The SNAP never happened because, reasons.

Empathy used to seem such a human emotion. Loki had no time for that on Asgard, not when Odin denied anything as frivolous as feeling. Hiding in plain sight was the means to survival and if that made the young prince sneaky and sly, so be it. By placing those parts of himself under lock and key; the parts that hurt, the ones that ached, Loki found it was safer to disconnect from others than subject himself to their suffering too.

Operating under the influence of Thanos and his minions when he held the scepter, Loki had purposefully divorced connection of any kind from his mind. It was dangerous. Weak. And moreover, it allowed Loki to do what Thanos commanded without really experiencing the horror, the havoc, of his actions for himself.

Who could hear the screams of women when the voice of Ebony Maw subliminally chanted all the ways that one could be dismembered at Thanos’ hands should Loki fail? What man would shed a tear after the near constant beatings doled out by Black Order members, just for the fun of it? How could someone care about a house, a car, a city, when they no longer cared about themself? Losing the Battle for New York had consequences far beyond the destruction of property. With Thanos’ hold over him vanquished, the walls around his heart, constructed in youth, crashed and burned like the dream of ruling Earth. Suddenly and completely out of reserves, Loki was powerless. And he felt everything. The fresh hurts caused by his manipulated ambitions in the hands of Thanos. The furious feelings of his brother, the inadequacies of his character, the feeble needs that drove his wild ambition washed over him unceasingly. Anger. Loss. Lunacy. Loki learned a hard truth in that moment. He was a monster. A freak. A creature beyond hope and salvation; proving his adoptive father right and his own hopeful heart wrong. Bitterness soured the fallen prince. Endless hours in isolation on Earth, which continued in his father's house, had Loki believing he had no chance of seeing the world outside again, and it hardened his heart further. To feel was so painful, so raw, and so humane. Why bother anyway? All that emoting, those high spirits, all they really did was expose you to derision. What was grief to a goblin? What was horror to a monster? What was love to a villain like him? An evil, conspiring demi-god, with a mind bent toward domination. A damaged, destroyed, deity alone and in pieces. Who would ever give someone like Loki Odinson a chance? Why should they?

Turning to his mother, Loki did everything but ask for forgiveness. In long rambling talks, her projection to his jailed person, the pair talked around ideas of guilt and innocence, of fate and fortune, of destiny versus desire, yet Loki never heard the words he needed in order to truly find peace.

If Frigga was aware of her son’s need for absolution, Loki would never know, as their last exchange was harsh and full of anger. Another stroke of loss, crippling now, because there was nothing Loki could do to change any of it from inside his prison cell. No illusion could conceal the painful ache that consumed him entirely.

Those days were dark, even for a soul as dusky hued as his own, and Loki’s thoughts followed a similar path. If there had been a way for him to shake off this immortal coil, free himself of the burden of living, Loki would have done so and been glad. Death was welcome compared to all this longing and heartache. But life, even a nearly immortal one, was funny.

When Thor provided a chance at redemption, Loki snatched at it, in his own detached way. He played hero, rescuing Jane, aiding his brother. And if he took a bit more in the form of deposing his arrogant, aging father, who would be surprised? He was Loki, God of Mischief, after all. Ruling the Nine Realms without the oppressive oversight of his father allowed Loki to prove himself in ways he never imagined. And Loki wasn’t just good at it. He was great. Of course, it helped that no one knew he was Loki. Living disguised as Odin was often unpleasant, frequently frustrating, but entirely necessary. Being Loki was still too difficult and likely to bring unwanted attention in the form of The God of Thunder, a thing that no one truly wanted, Loki least of all. Return Thor did, along with an unknown sister and the end of Asgard. When confronted with the insanity of Hela’s bloodlust, Loki’s only thought was of his kingdom, now without a ruler. He had worked too hard, too long, to see the land he cared for in the hands of an enemy, even if she called herself sister. Opening the Bi-Frost, panicked, his mind was solely on saving those he had recently held dominion over. They were his people, after all. But he never reached Asgard. Swallowing his fear, Loki focused all his energy on staying alive in a new and distracting environment, initially. What Loki found on Sakaar wasn't a new home base under a flamboyant, ineffective leader that he could control, even if that was his first design. On Sakaar Loki found his loyalty.

The proud, deep resonance of being Asgardian, of being an Odinson, of being capable and cool under pressure. Sure, he had to prove himself to Thor, Valkyrie, Banner and honestly, the rest of the kingdom, but actions speak louder than words. And through his actions on Sakkar, and by extension rescuing the people of Asgard, Loki had shown everybody his true mettle. It was on the deck of a stolen ship headed for Midgard that Loki had made a commitment of sorts. One that was not to the people, so recently saved or for his found family. This time, the promise Loki intended to keep was for himself. Loki was going to change. The problem is, a task like that takes time. Patience. Motivation. It was something that Loki had to work at and it was exhausting. They say that the best things come to those who wait. Loki was learning to wait everyday. Having earned a place at the side of his brother, he worked tirelessly to win over the heroes of his new home planet. Was it easy? Hardly, but Loki wasn’t willing to compromise. Not anymore. A life like Hela’s was not in his runes. Loki was simply going to be better. Not perfect. No one could be as good hearted as Captain America, nor could one be as tech savvy as Stark. So Loki was planning on being the best Loki he could possibly be, and that’s how he found himself going to meetings at The Avengers Tower, a mostly welcome addition to the team. Meetings weren’t all that exciting and boredom was an awful temptation for a deity devoted to mayhem. In fact, Loki spent more time doodling in his notebook than listening to whoever was droning on about whatever part of the world needed the attention of this motley crew. That was, until Pepper Potts hired her new assistant. That you were polite, pretty and pert wasn’t lost on the young god. Sitting outside Mrs. Iron Man’s office, typing away with a phone tucked under your ear, moving faster than anyone he had ever seen was certainly impressive. You were quick witted, clever and most of all, funny. Everyone else seemed to fall under your spell without much effort on your part, something that Loki found frustratingly fascinating. Here he was, struggling to get people to say his name without having a traumatic flashback, while you simply smiled and smarted off prettily, and had everyone singing your praises. But Norns, were you adorable. If he thought about it, and while off planet, Loki definitely had, he could remember the moment he realized that you were the woman he wanted. You were busy, as always, fielding phone calls and flipping through screens yet every moment your flying fingers weren’t hovering over a keyboard or pushing down telephone buttons they curled around a heart shaped charm at your throat. Clearly, it was a habit and one that you weren’t even aware of, still - it transfixed him all the same. Watching you from his side eye, your voice never wavering, your tone always so pleasing, and your nimble digits returning again and again to the small sigil around your neck. “Loki?” “Huh?” Dumbfounded at your call, those deep sea eyes blinked wildly at the sound of his name on your lips. “Hi! Yes, Pepper can see you now. Go ahead, she’s ready!” He rose on stiff legs, adjusting his tie, about to lie to Tony Stark’s woman all for the chance to see you in passing. Who had he become? It started out innocent like that, but soon, Loki was having to invent excuses for being in the office so frequently. Missing files, random visits, even going so far as to buy Tony coffee just for the thrill of seeing you. Something needed to change, and quickly, or Loki was going to blow. On another made up errand, hanging around the executive’s high rise office, Loki was doing a bad job of pretending not to see you. His mind was on your pouty lips as you sipped lemonade through a straw and not on the stately woman seated behind the desk.

“Loki, you’re a man of some… style.” Pepper said it so casually that he almost didn’t hear, his head lost in thoughts that would shame any other person. “I like to think so.”

Shutting her folder with a snap, Pepper smiled, “And you’d love to help your old friend Pepper out, right?” That got his attention, and quickly. Loki, shoving his hands in his pockets, turned to face Pepper with a widening grin, “I feel like I’m being baited.”

“Baited? Never! It’s just, you’re always here and I have a… project that needs the kind of help that you can provide.” At those words you entered the office, ready for action with a notebook and pen, eager and excited. Suddenly, it was all clear to Loki, “Pepper, no.”

The noose closed in on the handsome god as Pepper gathered paperwork without looking his way, “Come on, it’s the Stark Homecoming Gala and the two of you will do great! I have faith in you both. I can’t wait to see what you come up with!” “Really, Miss Potts, I simply can’t-” Stopping short, the strawberry blonde whipped around, almost nose to nose with Loki. Shrewd and straightforward, Pepper interrupted, saying, “You’ve been dancing around my office for weeks now. Clearly you like her and… against all the odds, she likes you too. I’m doing you a favor and when someone does you a favor, you say “Thank You”.” “Thank you.” Nodding curtly, “You’re welcome. Now, make yourselves comfortable, order some dinner, my treat. And do whatever you need to make sure this is one great party!” That’s how Loki found himself sitting at a clear glass table over sweating bottles of iced tea as you discussed color themes and tablecloths. You were shy, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear as you reviewed notes from previous gatherings both large and small. His hands itched with wanting to do that job himself. “So, what do you think?” It was the first time you had addressed him directly since coming through the door and for a moment Loki couldn’t answer. You were too… not beautiful, that wasn’t the right word, although you were. No, you were too open, too easy to read, and the earnestness you offered him was downright frightening. Sitting forward in the uncomfortable, yet fashionable, office furniture, Loki cleared his throat and again tugged his tie, “What I think is that you should let me take you dinner.” Dropping your eyes, your cheeks colored slightly as your fingers found that locket charm once more, “Loki, I… I don’t know-” Grabbing for your hand, suddenly afraid that you would take those shining eyes away, Loki lowered his voice and did something he never thought he would. He begged. “Please? I find that you’re all I can think about.” It rushed out of him in a torrent, the way truth so often does, and he found himself unable to look you in the eye. Loki was afraid to see rejection on your easy to read face, afraid that wanting you had cracked open the lock box holding his heart, afraid that you would see just how weak you made him. Your fingers twined with his own as you replied, “You didn’t let me finish. I don’t know what took you so long.” Sighing with relief, his face melting into a genuine smile, “Me either.” Over the next two months the pair of you worked tirelessly to plan and execute a perfect party. You were inseparable during the day, heads buried together as you discussed linens and table settings, the quality of cocktail glasses, and debating over a band or a dj. But at night, at night Loki talked about the things that haunted him in the dark. And you loved him in spite of the awful things he had seen and done and said. Others took notice. Loki was more lighthearted, more available. He listened when people spoke and wasn’t constantly doodling during meetings. Yes, Loki was learning how to love through your loving him. If empathy had seemed too humane before, then sharing his life, his love with you, was the kind of immortality that earned someone a place in Valhalla. It was the bravest thing Loki Odinson had ever done and he didn’t mind one bit.

The first time Loki tasted you was burned into his brain, as bright as a flash of lightning. A firefly in a memory jar that he kept returning to, time and again. Loki remembered what you were wearing. He recalled exactly how the light shone in your eyes. If he concentrated, he could tap out the rhythm of your racing pulse as he held you in his arms. It was the night of the gala. Inviting everyone under the Stark Industries banner, up to and including the heroes tasked with saving the world, the event was a way to earn money for one of the many charities Tony supported. The place was full of beautiful people wearing gorgeous clothes under perfect lights set to the hand crafted soundtrack you had created together.

But, Norns, he could still remember the way your eyes sparkled under the lowlights of that hall. How your dress, simple but sophisticated, clung to the fullness of your bottom. Low cut but somehow still modest, Loki couldn’t tear his gaze away from the promise of your curves, willing himself to find anything else as interesting as the idea of you.

You were across the room hanging onto Tony’s every word, eyes bright and cheerfully glowing as you sipped champagne. It made Loki want to do something grand, something suave, something that would demand your attention for his own. Moving towards you, his tuxedo perfectly pressed and fitting better than it had any right to, Loki looked long and lean. Each of his steps seemed to echo, even though the room was full of sound, and you turned your head as if you also heard. Breaking away from the cluster of acolytes surrounding Iron Man, you bit into your lip as the crowd parted, moving closer together one step at a time. It was one of the sexiest things Loki had ever witnessed. Lifting your glass in a toast, taking in the room of mingling millionaires, wealthy hangers on and Avengers, “Well, we did it!” “You did it, my dove, I just hung around and judged everyone.” “Oh stop. I couldn’t have done it without you and you know it.” Playfully you pushed against his shoulder and Loki took advantage, using your momentum to pull you to his side, your curvy figure flush against his own. Crooning into the shell of your ear, his lips brushing over that sensitive skin, “Somehow, love, I think you would have managed.” Before you had time to think, Loki had melded his mouth with your own, stealing your breath along with your heart. Loki’s feet moved in time with the music as he pulled into a dance, laughing in his arms, your cheeks hot and your head swimming. You laughing was, without question, Loki’s favorite sound. Nothing in this world or any other came close to matching the joyful, childlike glee of that enchanting noise. Loki memorized its melody, the rise and fall of your giggle. He had craved it, being away for so long, and now he wanted… no, needed to hear it. But you were the furthest thing from happy at the moment.

"Darling, please. We have to go." Loki tapped his watch, shaking himself free from the memories of your previous life together and barely suppressing his irritation.

Tears filled your eyes as you whipped your arms around Thor’s mighty shoulders, his deep voice grumbly with emotion, "Take care of him, would you? He's a jerk, but Loki is the only brother I have."

"Of course… always. And Valkyrie, your highness, I can’t thank you enough for-"

"No need. Loki, and by extension yourself, will always have a safe haven here in my palace."

Looking on, Loki and Thor embraced almost tenderly before crashing their heads together.

"Stay safe, little brother."

"Be good, Thor."

Eyes on the sky, Val ignored the show of masculine emotion, chastising your plan, "You’re going to start a war, Loki."

Straight backed, Loki turned to the king, "Not on the grass of New Asgard. I will take the fight to them, that is my vow to you."

As Loki offered his hand, Valkyrie shook it, with parting words, "Work on staying alive. You have a tendency to worry your brother."

Solemnly nodding, "As the king commands. Shall we?" With that Loki laced his fingers with yours, leading you a few paces away from the people who loved him most, before summoning the magic that had you both transcending space and time.

This time when your feet touched down it was on the familiar turf of the orchard, surrounded by the scent of apple blossoms and the buzzing of happy bees. Morning had broken and the world seemed full of promise, with the exception of that knot in your stomach.

"Are you ready? Darling?"

"Oh… yes. I mean, I still don't love this plan, but-"

"But it's going to work." Only it was no longer the baritone voice of your long, lean Loki speaking. In his place stood Nick Fury, leather duster and eye patch in place.

"If you say so!" And you clutched your own throat as Natasha’s bored tones came out of your mouth. The suit, skin tight but flexible, molded to your modified form. All in all, you were comfortable, "The boots are a bit much."

"Ya think? This jacket weighs a ton." Pulling at his collar, "Why does he wear a turtleneck anyway?"

"Loki, this is so weird. It feels so weird."

"Agreed, but then, why am I so turned on?"

Laughing, you shook your false red hair, hands resting on Natasha’s waist, "God, I've missed you."

"Same, dearest. Now… let's get your necklace and some answers!"

---

Convincing Bucky to head home had taken a lot of work, but sometime around 2 am Steve had finally seen his friend off. The house was empty. Steve felt the same way.

Turning the black velvet box in his pocket, fingers crushed against the fragile fabric, Steve struggled to feel anger. When that didn't materialize he shot for sadness but even tears seemed beyond his ability.

With a sigh, climbing the same stairs he had trudged up a hundred times before, Steve started going through the motions of bedtime. Only tonight you weren’t there to tease him about the wildly inappropriate amount of toothpaste on his brush. He didn’t have your light footsteps to follow to the bedside or your help with stacking all of your extra, yet entirely essential, pillows on the chair.

Someone must have changed the sheets, he thought. There was no evidence of you and Loki’s adventurous afternoon anymore. Steve made a mental note to thank Buck for that little piece of kindness in the morning.

Shucking his shirt, Steve sat on the mattress, a hand to his forehead. He had lost. Captain America had been bested. Beaten. And by Loki, no less.

Moonlight in silver slivers shone through the window panes, squares of light in the deep of night. Steve was alone. Utterly and totally alone.

And there was no one to blame but himself.

Sighing hard, Steve stood, pacing the floor to work off some of the unspendable anxiety he kept creating. The room still had your energy, your vibe, as you liked to call it, and the feeling was a prickling itch Steve couldn’t quite satisfy. Traces of you were everywhere and something about you leaving all of it, and him, behind was just too big to process. “Damn it.” Even whispering sounded like thunder in the silence of your recently vacated room. His hands, so big, so strong, smoothed along the fabric of your hanging clothes. All that power had done nothing to help Steve get the thing he wanted. Sorting through the baubles and trinkets on your dresser, bottles of perfume he had purchased, necklaces and pins, each with a moment of memory it hurt him to recall. Your watch ticked away the minutes as he stood, stoic and still, surrounded by the shadow of you. In the orchard the birds were waking, their song filling the air, as morning broke in low golden rays. Abandoning his plan for sleep, Steve watched as the light chased away the dark, casting rainbows on the floor. The sun was reflecting off of your Grandmother’s necklace. A pretty, ancient, carved cameo, heart shaped locket. He recalled his own mother owning one just like it, pictures of loved ones pressed inside, holding them as tight as history would allow. Fisting the filigree chain, winding it around his fingers as if it would somehow undo what he had done, Steve slipped it into his pocket before settling back onto the bed. ----

At the back door to the home you so recently shared with Steve, Loki hung back, “I think this is where we split up. You go find your treasure and me… I’m going to find some answers.” Nodding, Natasha’s signature red hair swinging, you squeezed the hand holding your own. It no longer looked like Loki’s long fingered paw, but that was only a skin deep change. You felt the undeniable essence of him in the press of his fingers against your own. “Be careful.” “That’s no fun, dove.” “Loki-” You hated the way your voice broke as you said it, but there just seemed to be so much at stake and you had already lost him once. Sensing your unspoken concerns, Loki flashed you Nick Fury’s best smile, “I will. I promise.”

“Ten minutes.” “Ten minutes.” You watched the black coated back of your charmed paramour as he opened the shed door, hoping that he’d find something worth knowing in that place out of sight. Inhaling deeply you twisted the doorknob as quietly as possible, letting yourself into what was once your kitchen, “What a mess.” It was impossible not to notice the unwrapped leftovers and empty bottles littering the table. An overturned trash barrel, crumpled beer cans littering the counter, things that Steve, your Steve, would never have tolerated. All evidence that the grand evening he’d envisioned had been thwarted by Loki’s arrival and your collective escape.

You started up the stairs, praising Natasha's footwear for its stealth, when you heard the toilet flush and the unmistakable shuffle of Steve’s feet on the carpet. There was no place to hide on the wide stairwell. It was time to see if Loki's plan was going to work.

Voice blurry, eyes rubbed red and raw, you couldn't deny that Steve looked like shit, “Bucky? That you? You back?” Steve’s voice bounced around the brightening room as morning sunlight filtered through the soft sheers you had picked out for exactly this reason. Panicked, you backed into the railing with an over loud “Oof!” “Nat? What are you doing here? I thought you and Fury were headed to New Asgard?” Suddenly wide awake and wondering, Steve rushed to your costumed side, eager for information. The man in front of you now bore little resemblance to the angry Avenger you had escaped from hours before. This man had hair sticking up in odd angles from near constant finger raking. This man had a hint of a stuffy nose and red rimmed eyes, all indicators that tears had been shed. Now those blue eyes were scrutinizing you closely, full of concern.

“Uh… We... We got intel. Yea, intelligence, that Loki was headed back this way. Turned around… and uh, here we are.” One of those sandy blonde eyebrows lifted, “Natasha?”

Squaring your shoulders, channeling that cool confidence you’d see Black Widow display over and over, “Steve?” Something about your tone of voice convinced him in a way your words couldn’t. He visibly relaxed, those broad shoulders going slack as he asked, “Didn’t make it to Norway, then?"

Nodding a negative, you felt the unfamiliar brush of her red hair at your cheek and had to fight the urge to tuck it away, “No. Loki’s using some sort of transporting power to move them around. Fury suggested I keep an eye out here, in case they come back this way.” “She won’t be back, Nat. There’s nothing for her here.” To you, Steve sounded so sad, so removed, that you had to will yourself not to comfort the giant before you. “That’s not true!” It came out of you forcefully, thoughtlessly, and you saw the shock register on the Captain’s face. “That is, Fury and I… we… have reason to believe that she will come back. They left with nothing, Steve. She’ll need clothes… maybe some shoes… and-” Swallowing hard, you didn’t want to give anything away, “-a necklace from her grandmother.” Steve, patting his pocket, felt the weighted chain and it’s heart shaped locket, “I don’t think-” Stepping up to his bulky form, suddenly aggressive, you started, “Never mind what you think, Captain. We're here for a necklace... the necklace. Our intel suggests that your former flame might return for it and… And, I want it, with me, as a means to subdue her when she arrives." Sounding forceful and official was enough to back Steve down. Just a touch deflated, you watched him shrug, “If that’s what you want, Nat, here-” From his pants he pulled out the shining bauble, a trinket really, but full of sentiment and memory. Sitting in his palm, the tiny heart that held the picture of your grandmother and mother looked so small, almost unreal. Reaching for it with wet eyes, you smiled at Steve as you lifted the charm and chain, “Thank you, Steve. Thank you.” Nodding deeply, that golden head bobbing, “You’re welcome.” The large grandfather clock could be heard ticking throughout the house. The sun was gaining on the day and you, dressed as Natasha stood in silence in front of a somber Steve. For another long beat nothing was said, then, as if sensing a shift in your conversation, Steve flashed your fake Natasha a weak smile, “I could use some breakfast. How about you?”

“Um… sure. Yea, ok. Breakfast.”

Steve started moving again, downstairs towards the cluttered kitchen when he paused, "So how did you get back so fast? Cause that's like a 7 hour flight, even with you in the cockpit." “Steve…” You could hear it, the whining almost pleading tone that signaled the end of Loki’s well planned charade. That wasn’t enough to stop Steve. He broke hard, one of those strong arms stopping you in your tracks before you could reach the lower level. “It’s clever, I have to give you guys that. Almost perfect, really.” Panic rising, you doubled down on the ruse, struggling to keep your voice even, “I don’t know-” Blocking you in, his body the perfect unmovable buffer, “Loki’s here too, isn’t he?” Pushing against “Steve, I… I don’t…” “Don’t lie. You don’t have to…” “But… how-?” “You’re not mean enough to play Natasha, doll. Not by a long shot.”

--- It was strange to be seated at the table and chairs that you and Steve had picked out together one sunny Saturday when you thought that your future was going to be Loki-less. Your place, the one that you had imagined filling with children that had golden hair and bright blue eyes, felt like a set. Something false and fake. A facade, put together simply for show. Steve must have felt it too because his fingers drummed against the white washed table incessantly. Clearly he had something on his mind. “Steve-” “No. No. Please, let me just get this out, ok?” Raising an eyebrow, you waved at him to continue, nervous but interested in what the super soldier needed to explain. With a shaky inhale, running his constantly moving fingers through his golden locks, Steve caught your eye and didn’t waiver. “When I saw you… No, that’s not right. Let me start at the beginning. “When Loki left Earth, you… you were so sad. It hurt me to see you so… deflated.” “Steve, I-” “You know it’s true. When he returned to Asgard, something in you, it dimmed, and I just couldn’t allow that… Not when I felt the way I did about you. “I don’t think you realize just how incredible you are… how full of life! And since I had already missed one chance to be with you, I knew I needed to prove that I could be the man you needed… If you forgot about Loki along the way, even better. “Only… you never did. I waited years for you, ya know, doll? Years. And just when I thought there was no chance with you, Nat gave me a reason to hope. “She was your friend. An ally. Someone you could trust… someone I could trust. I swear it started out that innocently, at least for me. I just wanted to make you smile again. But she had other plans. Plans that came from higher up the ladder of SHIELD. “Fury, he wanted us to watch you… something about Loki being too powerful. And-”, grabbing your hand tightly, Steve emphasized his point, “-I promise you that I had no idea about his success, or the messages he had sent to you through Nick. Like you, I thought that Loki was gone. Missing. Never coming back.” “I… I believe you Steve. I know that you didn’t do all this on your own… but what was Nick hoping you’d find out? I knew less than nothing about what was going on!” “I think he was worried that Loki would get to you first. That if… when Loki returned, you would be his first stop. Then you would know about Loki’s success and, frankly, Fury’s failures. You would also know… well, everything you know now. That Fury had you tailed, lied to, and led on in an effort to stop Loki from out flanking him.” Frenzied and frantic, you felt anger boiling up inside of you, “But I thought Loki was gone forever. There was no hope for him and I… and Natasha, she told me that he was dead.” “All a part of Fury’s plan to keep you neutralized and Loki away. If Loki thought that you’d ignored his letters, that you no longer loved him, why would he come back here? And, if that didn’t work… when Loki came back and you were with me, what else could keep him on Earth?”

Whispering with realization, “So, they used you too.” Steve sighed and buried his hands in the pockets of his sweatshirt, “Don’t feel bad for me. I let them use my love for you, let them twist it up and shape it as they needed. Honestly, I wish I could tell you that it was for you, but it wasn’t. It was for me. I wanted you, so, so badly. I didn’t care what strings were attached. And we built a life together, you and me. I thought I could outrun the reality of the constant monitoring and daily reports. Telling Natasha and Nick about every word and each email. Don’t you see, I love you… and I wanted you, however I could get you.” Shaking your head, Natasha’s red wisps flying, “That’s not love, Steve. I don’t know what that is… but love isn’t it.” “No?” With a loud thunk, Steve slammed a small velvet box on the table between you. “Is… Is that what I think it is?”

“Last night. It was going to happen last night. Our friends here, under the lights and the stars, I was going to ask you to marry me. I still would if-” Realization hit you like a ton of bricks, “If Loki hadn’t stepped back into our lives.” “-If Loki hadn’t stepped back into your life.” It made you both laugh in a sad way, how you finished the same thought, and for a fleeting second you could see why you had allowed Captain America to sweep you off your feet. He was a lot of things to you now, but there was a time when he had been almost everything. The evidence of that was in the small black square that said nothing but spoke volumes. “Steve, I don’t know if I would have said yes… even without Loki’s… arrival. I think I have always known that you and I… we are very different people.” Sitting back in his chair, his gaze still locked on your own, “I just want you to know that I’m sorry. I’m sorry about what I’ve done… what I’ve said… How, shit, how I’ve behaved. I could say that it was my duty. I could tell you it was out of love, but the plain truth is that I have always been jealous of what you and Loki share.” “You’ll find it Steve. You really will. There’s a person out there waiting for you. And once you’ve found them, oh Steve, you’ll see that this… what we had, it’s a shadow. An illusion. Because love, real love, doesn’t come with caveats and catches. It is an undeniable force which, in my case, even the boundaries of time and space can not deny.” Something like a sob burst out of Steve, and you were surprised to see tears in his eyes, “I was so wrong. Could you ever forgive me?” “I want to, Steve. I really do... “ What more could you say? Patting his hand you started to rise, “I have to go now. Loki and I need to keep moving and I don’t want to risk running into Nick and Natasha. At least, not yet, anyway.” “Where are you planning to go?” “To the Avenger’s Tower. I believe I know what Mr. Fury has been planning all along.” Loki’s strong voice entered the conversation as smoothly as his arms wrapped possessively around your waist. Steve took in the protective stance of your returned lover with a raised eyebrow, and without further comment asked Loki, “Really? And how are you going to breach the building? They’ll be looking for you, even with disguises… Fury is no fool. Plus, there’s little chance that Tony hasn’t activated a million safety and security protocols by now.” Only interested in you, Loki refused to give Steve any of his attention, “Getting in can’t be that hard! I’ll figure it out when I get there. Ready pet?” With a gentle push under his broad hands your feet started to move towards the door. Loki was eager to be off and away, especially after hearing so much of Roger’s confession. Just knowing what Steve had done, manipulating you while also convinced of his love for you; it was enough for Loki to commit murder. He was having quite a difficult time not tearing the good Captain’s limbs off his body. Softening his tone, Steve practically pleaded, “Loki. Wait. I… I can help.” Turning his attention fully to your former flame, Loki purred venomously, “You can help? I’d love to know what entails, Captain.” “I can get you into the place and take you exactly where you need to go. Fury’s going to hate it, but I’m tired of taking orders that hurt the people that-” His pause was as lingering as the look he gave you, “- That I love.” Before Loki could offer a sincerely sassy reply you grabbed his sleeve, tugging, “Um… Excuse us a minute Steve.” Pulling him down the hall of a home that felt like a familiar faced stranger, you waited until you had a bit of distance from Steve before harshly whispering, “How long were you listening?”

Serving you that small, sexy smile, Loki grinned, “Long enough. How did you know I was there?” “You are sneaky, but even you, God of Mischief, cast a shadow.” Swinging you close enough to catch your mouth with his own, Loki pressed a sweet kiss there before answering, “A mistake I will be careful not to make again!” “The tower, huh? That’s where you want to go?” Grabbing you at the swell of your hips, grinding his frame against your own, “Where I want to go, my darling, is to the nearest bed, preferably naked, with you and you alone.” Your hands traced over the lapels of his borrowed leather duster, pausing only to jerk him closer by the supple fabric, “Hmm… is that so?” “Oh yes…” Loki’s buttery grumble filled your ear as his strong hands dug into the flesh of your bottom. For a moment you thought he’d give in to temptation, his sweet lips teasingly close to your own upturned mouth, “But-” On your toes, leaning into Loki’s sturdy, leather draped frame, you paused, “Ugh. But?” Moving you to a safer, less kissable, arms length away, Loki sighed with the same frustration you felt, “-But, where we need to go, as soon as possible, is the Tower.” Moaning grumpily, you stepped out of the arms you longed to linger in, “I was afraid you were going to say that.” “I know it’s less than… ideal, love, but I did find something useful before the good Captain unburdened his soul this morning.” “And that is?” “Fury’s plan. At first I couldn’t figure out exactly what he was after. What did Fury want? How was I involved?” Loki was dragging this out, loving how it kept you hanging onto his every word, and you rolled your eyes, “Well? What is it? Weapons? War?” “All of that, yes… and… yours truly.” That triumphant smile that filled Loki’s whole face lit up his mischievous eyes. Tilting your head, struggling to make sense of what Loki had just told you, “What do you mean, you. Fury wanted you… to do what, exactly?’ “Loki was going to be the patsy.” You both turned toward the sound of Steve’s baritone at the door, suddenly remembering that the Good Captain was still there and that he was waiting to see what you were going to do next. Leaning his 100 year old bones into the doorframe, Steve crossed his arms, “The fall guy. An example of what happens if you cross SHIELD.” “I think, my dear Mr. Rogers, that you mean, I am to be used as an example of what happens if one crosses Nick Fury.” Loki countered, slinging an arm over your shoulder protectively. The idea was frightening. A man like Fury had too much power, too much at his disposal. Just knowing the lengths he had gone to in order to keep you and Loki apart was scary enough. Making enemies of your friends. Threatening the people you loved. Selling your affection to Steve in an effort to control Loki.

Now, the knowledge that all of it was done in an effort to ensure that Nick Fury was the toughest guy in the galaxy, it made your stomach clench. “What do you mean, an example?” “Unless my intelligence is flawed, I believe that Fury was going to kill me. Is that correct, Captain?” Steve felt the weight of two sets of eyes on him. Yours, full of fearful love and blind hope that this was all just some misunderstanding. Innocent and naive and as lovely as he could ever remember. Loki’s were reflecting a deeper understanding. The kind of knowledge that only time in the trenches teaches. There was no answer from Captain Rogers. None was needed. Honesty, final and resolute, was out in the open. “Look. I know I’m not the guy you want on your side. I’ve… I haven’t been the man I needed to be. Not for you-” Steve locked his bright blues onto you, offering a small smile that spoke of sadness before facing Loki, “-Or you, Loki. But if you let me help you now, I promise that I can get you into the tower and maybe, one day, you won’t think so little of me.”

Around you the morning gained strength. Somewhere nearby birds chirped wildly, blissfully unaware of the drama unfolding in the modest little farmhouse and its implications on intergalactic politics. Without moving a muscle, Loki plainly asked you, “Do you trust him, dearest?” Squaring your shoulders, you crossed your arms, staring down the man called Captain America. Nodding decisively, “I do. I don’t think he’d spill everything like that only to turn on us. He’s not so bad Loki, really.” “We’ll see about that. For now, we trust Steve. Ok, what’s your plan, Rogers?” --- “Hey. I… I have one other thing to show you.” Steve was dressed for action in his branded tactical gear, looking every inch the super soldier that Dr. Erskine envisioned. “Steve, we have to get moving. Loki’s eager and -” “Just open it, ok?” The envelope was thick with folded paper, the flap tucked under and not sealed. Clearly it had spent time in and out of pockets, the edges frayed and tattered. In exasperated curiosity you gingerly pulled the sheets free.

Shaking, your hands trembled holding the once white documents as your voice thickened, “Is this… is this what I think it is?” Cocking his head playfully, that rueful smile pulling at his full mouth, Steve almost seemed cheerful as he teased, “It’s yours. I think something about this place has always been yours and I want you to have it.” “But-” Folding your small hands in his mighty ones, Steve squeezed gently, “It was a wedding present, or it was supposed to be.” “But we’re not getting married.” “I know. Still-” “I can’t, Steve. It’s yours. Your house, your farm, your dream.” Shaking his head, disagreeing, but feeling lighter than he had in decades, Steve insisted, “Too late, I’m afraid. It’s done. Actually, that version of the deed has been signed since our second week here.” As realization sunk in you appraised the man changing right before your eyes, astonished but exhilarated, “Where will you go?” “I dunno. Think I might need to be alone for a bit. Maybe see the world… but first-” “First, we have to stop Nick Fury.”

To Be Continued... My Minxes: @scrumptious-finicky-illusion @iamverity @mizfit2 @sammy-jo1977 @wolfsmom1 @jessiejunebug @iluvsumbucky @unadulteratedwizardlove @procrastinatinglikeabitch @shxdowofdarkness @nonsensicalobsessions @ahintofkiwistrawberry @alexakeyloveloki @rorybutnotgilmore @crystalizedcaramel @lokislittlecorner @capcapcapsicle @jamielea81 @caffiend-queen @otakumultimuse-hiddlewhore @jenjen8675309 @that-one-person @roguewraith @toomanystoriessolittletime @vodka-and-some-sass @just-random-obsessions @brokenthelovely @lots-of-loki @thefallenbibliophilequote

#loki x reader #loki x you #you x loki #loki smut #steve rogers x you #steve rogers x reader #mcu smut #MCU fanfiction #loki fanfic #loki fanfiction

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bedbellyandbeyond · 3 years

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Only Vampires

(Story Post)

Nari wasn't sure why he trusted these two vampires, but he wanted to know what they knew and so he followed them to their home. They didn't live more than a block north of where the library stood. They must've lived there a long time to afford such a big house, but then again, he had no idea what the housing market was like here. Either way, any active and diligent vamp over 100 years old could secure themself considerable wealth if they tried. Nari himself hadn't focused on capital during the majority of his life though, but he still did well for himself. The front doors of the house were very big, with stained glass windows, but Wesley and Everett took him around to the back door which was average sized and let no light in. This wasn't an issue right now as it was an hour to midnight, but he guessed that any daytime travel came through here, so they'd grown accustomed to it.

Inside was a small mudroom with another door at the other end. Nari waited for Everett to take off his shoes before he removed his own because wasn't sure what the traditions were in this country, but he was only further confused when Wesley took his shoes off but Everett kept them on. “Um, shoes on or off?” Nari had to ask. Wesley wacked Everett's leg with his loafer. “Shoes off, please.” Nari was relieved and did as told. “Alright.” “I'm not sure why we adopted that,” Everett said, reluctantly removing his footwear and then promptly putting on a pair of slippers. “My family always wore their shoes inside, his family wore shoes inside… Not to mention, it doesn't matter at all what Wesley wears.” “It's for our housemates,” Wesley said. “We have several housemates from across the world, you'll find Nari. The general consensus has been shoes off. We do our best to be accommodating.” He then proceeded to pull out a set of wheel slippers and socks and maneuvered them onto his chair. Nari thought for a second and then raised a hand. “I hope you don't think I need somewhere to stay. I'm well established.” “No, no,” Wesley said. “We just like to help anyone when it comes to library matters. As you may have noticed, it is not very accessible to all vamps of all shapes, abilities, and colours. We like to help anyone find the knowledge they need.” Nari nodded. “I see. So you steal the books for them.” “I told you, we borrow them,” Everett said as he led them through to the main hall. “Evie does think of himself as a modern-day Robin Hood of Knowledge, though,” Wesley said. The main hall was a lot more modern than Nari expected for a house apparently full of vampires. It was open concept with a lovely kitchen with granite counter tops. Further on was the living room and stairs, both up to the next floor and down to the basement. An elevator had also been installed beside the stairs for easier access to all floors. Nari’s hosts took him down to the basement, which was set up as a games room and study. There was pool, and darts, and even a pinball machine on one side. Some lounge chairs, a sofa, and a set of bookshelves on the other. There, they found another pair of vampires, one with her nose in a book, the other passed out on the couch, an open book on his chest. “Ah, glad some of you are here,” Wesley said going over to the reading nook. “Inaya, please meet Nari. We met him at the library.” The conscious vampire got up and smiled. She wore a hijab and had big round eyes framed with detailed eyeliner. She offered a hand to Nari. “Nice to meet you. Are you looking at a room?” “No, no, I’m just getting a little extra help with my research,” Nari said shaking her hand. “It’s nice to meet you. I’ve never met, well, a vampire like you.” “A hijabi vampire?” Inaya chuckled. “Me neither. That’s why I’m here.” “To find more?” Nari asked. “No, to learn about being a vampire,” Inaya said. “I didn’t know anything about them really until I was turned, and I didn’t have any other vampires around to teach me. Figuring out how to be a vampire and muslim at the same time is difficult. Blood is haram, you see.” “Ah.” Nari nodded. “Have the books been helpful?” “Some, yes. Wesley seems to know how to find me good reads,” Inaya said. “I’ve tried entering the library on my own, but it’s always been a hassle. They always find some excuse not to let us in.” “I understand,” Nari said rollimg his eyes. “It's a different excuse each time.” Everett went over and kicked the end of the couch to wake its occupant. “Rise, Jeremiah! Meet our guest!” Wesley frowned. “Evie, let the boy sleep. He's probably been studying tirelessly, the poor kid.” It was too later however and the sleepy vampire stirred and sat up, rubbing his eyes. The book he had been reading fell off his chest and onto the floor. The bang made him curse and scramble to pick it up. “Shit, it better not be busted… These old ass books…” “Language, Jeremiah. You know the rules,” Everett scolded. “Shit, sorry, Ev,” the vampire huffed. “Not my fault you woke me up.” “I have half the mind to discipline you,” Everett said, crossing his arms. “Yeah, that’ll look good, you pasty old Brit beating my black ass…” the young vampire mocked. He noticed Nari. “Who’s this little mosquito?” Wesley put a hand on Nari's shoulder. “This is Nari. We're helping him in his research.” The other got up and offered a hand to the newcomer. “It's Jez, but these old farts insist on calling me by my whole name like they're my damn mother or something.” Everett huffed. “Seriously, if you don't straighten out your language, I'll—” “The entire concept of vulgar language is inherently racist,” Jez interrupted, his entire diction changing just to prove a point to old Everett. “My use of swearing is not abusive, but instead cathartic, emphatic and idiomatic, forms of swearing that are not meant to offend anyone. For you to tell me what words I can and cannot say is a blatant form of oppression and reduces my abilities to cope with pain or misfortune.” Everett frowned, his lips pursed. “Fine. But could you tone it down just a bit?” “No.” Wesley came up behind Everett and patted his back. “Relax. We're all adults. Anyway, where's Paolo?” “He's in his room,” Inaya said. “Probably working.” “Ah, okay. Nari can meet him later,” Wesley said approaching the coffee table. From out of nowhere, he pulled out a book and offered it to Inaya. “I found an Arabic tome with stories from Turkey in it. I’m hoping it might help you.” “Oh! Maybe!” Inaya took the book gratefully. “I appreciate it, Wes!” “Where did you pull that book from?” Nari asked, a bit dumbfounded. “The library?” Wesley said, a little confused by the question. “No, I mean… I didn't notice it on your person before,” Nari said. “Oh! It's pocket magic,” Wesley said. “Easier than carrying them around.” “Pocket magic is some real basic level shit,” Jez said, eyeing Nari. “If you don't know that, what abilities do you have?” Nari shook his head. “…I never learned vampire magic. Well, except a blood purifying spell I found the other day.” Everett placed his hands on Nari's shoulders. “Oh dear, so you've just been going about your life with all the cons and none of the pros to the whole vampire thing? Sounds miserable!” Nari frowned. “I didn't know I could learn any of it…” “You absolutely can!” Everett said. “We will show you the basics.” “Honestly, it's fine…” Nari said. “I don't plan on sticking around long, and my partner has enough magic for the both of us…” “Your partner knows magic but you didn't know you could learn it?” Inaya asked. “They didn't try to teach you?” “He’s not a vampire,” Nari said. “He doesn't know what I'm capable of doing as one.” “What is he, then?” Jez asked. “A dragon?” “No, he's a wizard,” Nari said. “A wizard?” Wesley inquired, his voice a little concerned. “Like, a human wizard?” “Uh, yes,” Nari said. “The magic isn't the same, though he's convinced he can learn vampire stuff…” Everett started shaking his head. “Do you always engage in romantic relationships with humans?” “Yes.” Nari frowned, reading the negative energy coming from his acquaintances. “You say that like it's bad. Are you going to tell me we're not supposed to do that? It's taboo or something?” “No, it's fine! I mean…” Everett put his hands on Wesley's shoulders. “He was unturned when I fell for him…” “But we weren't trying to reproduce, that’s for sure,” Wesley said. He placed a hand on Nari’s arm. “It’s no wonder you’ve been having trouble… You can't have children with humans. It never works.” Nari clenched his jaw. “That's not…My information came to a 1-in-8 chance that a vampire can complete live birth.” “It's more complicated than that,” Everett said, pulling out one of the books be grabbed. “It's likely the one successful time out of eight, their partner was another vampire. The odds are much better with two vampires. Like, 1-in-3.” He opened to a page that displayed a large family tree on it. “Any time in history that a vampire successfully completed a pregnancy, both parents were vampires. Any pairings with children from one unturned and a vampire were from before the vampiric parent had turned. Or, there has also been the occasional time a vampire sired a child with an unturned person, but it is rarer.” Nari frowned and sat down on the couch. “But…I… Isn’t there any magic that can help?” Wesley shook his head. “Not that we've found. Your best bet is to try with a vampire.” “But I don't want a child from someone else…” Nari said. “I want one with Diederich.” “I'm surprised you even date unturned,” Jez commented. “It's sad stuff watching humans grow old and die all the time…” “Diederich isn't just any human, he's immortal too,” Nari said. “He knows really powerful skills and spells.” Jez rolled his eyes. “So, easy fix. Just turn him.” Nari shook his head. “No, I can't do that.” “I could teach you,” Everett said. “Or I could do it.” Nari glared. “No, I don't want to turn him. I wouldn't do that to someone.” Everett sighed. “Nari, I don't know what to tell you. Your goal is to have a baby with your partner. Both of you need to be vampires for that to happen. That's all there is. We don't have any other advice.” Nari looked down at his hands, his eyes brimming with tears. “So, all those times I tried… Complete waste of time...” Wesley rubbed Nari’s shoulder. “You didn't know…” He looked to Everett. “Would you give us a moment? All of you.” “Of course, love,” Everett said, kissing Wesley on the forehead. “Come along now, children.” “We are not your kids,” Jez groaned as he got up reluctantly and followed Inaya and Everett upstairs. Once they were alone, Wesley sighed and rubbed Nari's arm. “Before you turned, did you have any children?” Nari slowly and sniffled. “Yes… My son, Tae-seok. He was just a baby when I turned…” “Is he alive?” Wesley asked. “No… He passed away around the turn of the millennia…” Wesley sighed. “When did you start trying for another baby?” “We tried for several years when Tae-seok was young… But his father, Eun-young, died in a factory accident when Tae-seok was still a child. I didn't try again until well after my son passed away too.” “With your current partner?” Wesley asked. Nari shook his head. “No, my previous relationship. It was an accident… But I wanted it to work out. I had a little hope.” “I'm really sorry, Nari,” Wesley said. “It must be difficult to hear about the circumstances of your pursuit… And I'm sorry about Evie. He thinks turning people will always fix everything. It doesn't.” “But he's right though… If Diederich were a vampire, we'd have a much better chance,” Nari said spreading his hands. “If he were turned, we could try…” Wesley shook his head. “I can tell, you don't want to do that. It sounds like your experience with being a vampire has been more negative than positive and you don't want to subject someone else to that.” “I don't. Diederich is… He’s so lovely, and he's happy…” Nari said. “I don't want to take that from him.” “I understand. It isn’t easy. I don't always love being a vampire either… And I certainly wouldn't make that decision for someone else,” Wesley said. “You do realise that if you did manage to give birth to a baby, you'd be choosing a life as a vampire for them too?” Nari blinked. “Yes, but… I…” He paused. “…With Diederich, since he's unturned, I thought that they might not be…” “Well, even if you could reproduce with a normal human being, you’re a vampire. Your kids would be vampires.” Nari grit his teeth. “…I guess I just…you know, if I could have a baby again, I didn't care what they were… But now just saying it, that’s sounds so incredibly selfish… To subject my own child to the exact same curse I've suffered for their entire life…” Wesley rubbed Nari's knee. “I think you need to think about your situation and talk to your partner. Really work out what path makes the most sense for both of you, and any possible children in the mix. What's best for everyone is what is important.” Nari nodded slowly. “Yes… I just want to be with Diederich… I should go…” Wesley checked his watch. “Where are you staying? Evie can drive you over.” “It's okay, I can walk…” “No way, this time of night, any drunk vampires tumbling out of a bar will want to pick a fight, and while I'm not saying you can't hold your own, you don't know much magic and vampires around the library know their stuff.” Nari sighed and told Wesley his hotel. “I do appreciate you guys trying to help me… You’re honestly the nicest vampires I've ever met.” “Aw, it's nothing,” Wesley said going to the elevator. “Each of us understands the difficulty of being accepted in the vampire world. But we've been very lucky and those who have should give.” “So, is this sort of a boarding house for vampires using the library?” Nari asked. “Sort of… We keep the rent super cheap though because the house was paid off many, many years ago. Our housemates just split utilities. Evie and I cover the taxes and insurance.” Wesley smiled. “If you ever need somewhere to stay, we'll be here. First month is free for long term. Of course, we won't charge you if you just want to come over and visit.” Nari nodded. “That's more than generous, thank you.” They rode the elevator together and met with Everett at the back of the house. “Good talk?” Everett asked, spinning his car keys. “Yes, I think so,” Wesley said. “Inaya and Jeremiah are back in their rooms, then?” “Yeah.” Everett unlocked the door. “Alright, Nari. We won't keep you any longer than you'd like. Wes said you needed a ride, yes? Come along.” Nari blinked. “When did he tell you?” “Come on, now.” Everett placed his hands on his hips. “You really do need a rundown on basic magic. You could teach toddlers mind connection.” “I really don't know anything, then…” Nari frowned following him out. Wesley waved as they left. “Hope to see you soon!” Nari waved again before going to the garage with Everett. “You should consider coming back tomorrow night,” Everett said, unlocking the car. “Jeremiah will teach you everything you need to know.” “I might take him up on that. At least I'll have gotten something out of this trip.” “Well, there you go. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” “Hm… Yes, I suppose.” “Oh, and you still have to meet Paolo! He’s Asian like you too! Wouldn’t guess from his name though, would you?” “You really don’t think before you speak, do you?” “Hey, respect your elders.” “Sorry, grandpa.”

#lore #Nari #Everett #Wesley #Jez #Inaya #vampire

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