#But when I will try harder difficulty i will need to make multiple saves

[set-wingedwarrior]

Me? Adding a little bit of blue on Shepard's armor in reference to her relationship with Liara in a very rwby fashion? It's more likely than you think

[m3ab]

herbst appliance 101

ive had a Herbst appliance for about three months(I think) and I'm going to give any people who are getting one or thinking of getting one some advice/info I wish I was told. I have a telescoping Herbst, so I will be saying "the smallest pole". I'm referencing the part circled in red. (The picture is not of a telescoping Herbst appliance, but it has the same small pole)

Basically, a Herbst appliance is a device that moves your lower jaw forward to cure an overbite. It consists of two arms, one on each side of mouth.(Google more info about what it is, I'm just here to explain my experience and different side effects I've had)

First and foremost, for the first week chewing will be just about impossible. I'm not kidding. Since your jaw is being moved drastically in that first week you get it on, chewing is extremely difficult. I survived off of a diet of soup, protein shakes, and yogurt. Soft food diets will not work, as you still need to have some chewing ability. I googled "what to eat when you can't chew" and it brought me to blogs from people who've had jaw surgery, and they listed foods that they could eat. You can basically only eat liquid foods, or foods that you can mashup against the roof of your mouth with your tongue. My orthodontist conveniently forgot to mention this, and I panicked when I realized i couldn't chew.

The Herbst also makes rattling sounds. All the time. If you move anything in your mouth at all, it will rattle. You get used to it pretty quickly (as you're focused on not being able to eat) so it isn't that much of an issue.

Just like braces, you need to go in to get it "adjusted". They add these little disks(I believe they're called crimps, but that might just be my orthodontist's nickname for them) to the smallest pole of the Herbst appliance, stopping it from closing all the way. What this does is it pushes the jaw even more forward. When you get that added on, it will be harder to chew once again. It's not nearly as bad as when you first get it on, but expect some difficulties. I eat soft foods for the first day after getting another crimp, just to make it easier for myself.

Food gets stuck EVERYWHERE. With braces, food can get stuck behind the wire, against your teeth. With a Herbst appliance, food will get stuck along your gums in the very back of your mouth, especially right after you get a crimp. This is a place where flossing will get you nowhere. I highly recommend getting a waterpik. You don't have to get a super expensive one. It's well worth the money, both for getting the food out where flossing is futile, and for all the time saved by not having to floss in areas where that is actually effective.

Expect sores along the sides of your mouth. These sores SUCK. They form because the collapsing part of the Herbst is catching on the sides of your mouth(this also is more frequent right after getting a crimp). They hurt a lot, mostly because the Herbst continues to catch on them. Sometimes I have to numb up my mouth because of how bad they hurt. They will go away with time, just try not to irritate them too much.

If part of the Herbst gets bent or wears out, it will lock up, either making it impossible to close you mouth or open it(or both). When I had this happen, I couldn't open my mouth past a certain point(in my case, I could open my mouth wide enough to eat, but not enough to take a bite out of a burger) and if I forced it past that point, it would get stuck in the way down. I could force it closed, but it wasn't ideal. If your experiencing problems like this, it is an issue and it will not simply go away(contrary to what I believed). Go to your orthodontist. What they will do is take off the arm that's causing the problem and replace it. It's quick and easy, and shouldn't hurt at all. Pro tip: if you've had a crimp put on, make sure they put one of the same size on the new arm. Same goes for if you've had multiple. You don't want a lopsided jaw, trust me.

I used to subconsciously stick my tongue inside my molars to get any food that might be stuck there out. Because the herbst stops your jaw from moving backwards, it's really hard to do this. This is the only thing I've noticed so far about the whole not-being-able-to-move-your-jaw-backwards thing that actually effects you.

edit: i forgot a couple things. When you first get a Herbst on(or get a crimp) your jaw will feel kinda loose and all weird, like it's hanging by a thread (it isn't, you'll be fine) because of this, you might accidentally slam your teeth together, resulting in pain. I recommend hot water/tea and distracting yourself by listening to music. It helps more than you'd think.

speaking of hot water, sometimes your Herbst will get stiff. Especially after you eat/drink a milk based product. This isn't a huge issue, and it doesn't cause pain or mess with your day-to-day life. It also goes away on its own after a bit. But anyways, hot water helps loosen the Herbst(as well as tea).

The Herbst appliance does kinda look like a medieval torture device, but it honestly isn't all that bad. I've heard not great things about the alternatives(headgear or rubber bands) and after a while, you get used to it. Sometimes I forget it's there. This list isn't to discourage you from getting Herbst, but to inform you of things I wish I knew. I haven't had it all that long, so I might add things to this list as I learn, for all of you who might want to know.

(p.s: when you look up not being able to chew regarding the Herbst appliance, it tells you that you might have trouble swallowing. While this is somewhat true, it's downplayed severely and it's more about the chewing)

[snuggles-and-struggles]

So that lore.

If I do ever get around to writing more for these boys, what I'm thinking is that monsters had still been underground, but surfaced earlier than usual, around the time Edge and Stretch would've been like, 7-10 ish.

The transition up top took some time, what with there being multiple different ones over the span of a few years, and as the monster sanctioned areas grew, became sort of segmented by universe. This brought its own difficulties with it, as some monsters, mostly those from "Fell" type undergrounds, had harder times adjusting to surface life.

Edge and Stretch met very early on, shortly after surfacing and before the "divisions" got too bad. Edge and Red had already lost their father and were semi accustomed to looking after themselves, but Stretch and Blue's father, while not the most outwardly compassionate, did try to keep an eye on them and help them out in ways Red would let him.

Unfortunately, it wasn't too long after that Swapster got sick and declined pretty quickly. Stretch and Edge were tween/young teenagers when he finally succumbed, but as things had simultaneously been growing more strained between the 'verses, circumstance pushed them apart a bit. They still tried to hang out when they could, and Blue and Red certainly had more than one argument over the two just coming to stay with them (despite barely being able to keep their own heads above water), but distance grew between them over the teen years.

Until Red got sick.

The same illness that claimed Swapster, during one of their rare actual opportunities to spend time together, Edge told Stretch. He'd been doing any work he could get (and Stretch resolutely never asked about the few LV he'd gained over the years), but it just wasn't enough, and Red's condition was only getting worse.

On the brink of graduating or possibly in a gap year, Stretch completely changed his career choice, going into medical science in order to aid in finding treatment for the disease. And with tensions finally eased into a sort of normalcy and Blue having long since secured a decent job, the Fell boys moved in with the Swaps for a little while.

Once Edge had secured himself better work, and using what little savings Red had accumulated before falling ill, they manage to move out after a few years, and make their own way. Red is a trial patient, by Stretch's recommendation, and is currently receiving experimental treatment that hasn't entirely helped in recovery, but slowed its progression significantly, which is really saying something considering how serious the condition is.

Edge and Stretch, of course, have unresolved feelings for each other, Stretch had probably been in love with Edge almost the whole time, but Edge likely only developed more romantic feelings once older, probably during the brief time they lived together. They both care about each other deeply, but tend to dance around heavier subjects and their own personal problems which keeps that little bit of space there even when they'd honestly both be so much better off if they just talked ough

But! They're actually pretty similar to my young code blue boys, but with waaay less angst along the way lol I'd love to write more with them, maybe some of the earlier days like a time Edge snuck in to Stretch's room really late as teens, or maybe them moving in together in the not so distant future (or maybe slightly distant, Edge probably wouldn't until Red didn't need him looking after him anymore).

They're very cute and sweet and I'm kissing them both on their stupid little foreheads. (Also feel the need to clarify that while Edge does have LV, it's not anywhere near as much as standard for when he’s in the guard and everything, like, maybe he’s at abt 4? More than 2 but definitely not more than 6)

[yeahimaloser]

Oooo I also got another good request how about a hawks x reader childhood friends they grow up together she took his punishments for him yk they have each other’s back and then in the future a villian attack and she ALMOST dies but no she gets save then hawks realizes he loves her and it’s all fluff at the end eek

Ok so, I literally love this request so much, I have no idea why it took me so long to write, but it's finally done!

Oh my god it took so long.

they/them pronouns used.

8k words! please enjoy!

16+ a bit suggestive at the end.

. . .

You sniffed, a hand wiping across your face as tears stung your eyes.

You had been training with the commission for a while now, almost a month to be exact. And it was so hard. In fact, it felt more like they were specifically targeting you.

You looked over at one of the other kids in the commissions program, Keigo, he seemed to have no problem with this exercise, in fact, you would have thought he was excelling at it.

But you could only sit and watch as his little wings flew past you.

You were only pulled from your family recently, but you knew that Keigo was here longer than you were. You rarely talked to him since your arrival, maybe it was because part of you didn’t want to become friends with anyone, maybe it was a small way of acting out, you didn’t know why, but you didn’t like him. He was just so much better than you.

Ever since you first came here, you’ve felt weak. You felt inferior to Keigo, you couldn’t help but compare yourself to him, watching exciede everyones expectations.

Compared to him, you were nothing but a dull blade.

You look down at your hands, cursing them as if that would do you any good. Your eyes stung again, the dust prickling against your eyelids.

The exercise was not supposed to be a difficult one, in terms of the gruelling training practices that they made you do, this one was pretty easy. All you had to do was get from one point in the commission's training facility, all the way to the other side of said facility. A simple running exercise. Although the floors were littered with traps, making it harder for you to get there, you knew it was supposed to be easy. And yet, for whatever reason, you had such immense difficulty.

Your quirk was mostly made for combat. It was the power they gave you the ability to control metal through your will. And although others might find it useful, you found it so difficult.

The problem was, your power was flashy, and yet not as easy to use as one might think. The metal had to touch you, which means that you have to get a hold of some metal object. And although technically you would be controlling it through your mind (Making it fly through the air at your own will) the object couldn’t be very heavy. Whatever metal object you wanted to use would weaken you. For example, controlling a knife was no problem, but controlling a 20 pound ball of metal was extremely difficult. which made your quirk almost completely useless here. Doing a running exercise, like you were doing now, there is little to nothing you could do with your quirk. The only times that your quirk would actually be useful, was during rescue missions or during an attack with multiple heroes in a big city with a lot of metal that you could touch. But that wasn't the case, and you hated it.

As you sat in the corner, trying desperately not to show your tears, you felt a gust of air as you looked up, only to be met with red wings.

“Are you…Ok?”

You never noticed how pretty his eyes were, the honey color’s made his features look so much softer.

After a few minutes, you realized he was still waiting for you to answer.

And for whatever reason, you felt your whole face becoming hot.

“I’m fine.” You said all too quickly.

He raises a bushy eyebrow at you, his face quizzical. “If you’re sure, but we are partners.”

You rolled your eyes.

You two were never truly partners. In this compound, there was only yourself to be concerned with.

“Stop pitying me, I can help myself.”

He smirked, “You say as if you’re not on the ground as we speak.”

You felt your face heating up again as you sprang to your feet, your eyes quickly narrowed, trying your best to seem composed.

“Why did you come back for me?”

But Keigo just shrugged, “Saw someone in need of help.”

That was the last straw.

You angrily stomped away. Who was he to judge you? Who was he to act like some hero? You knew he was the commission's golden boy, they loved him, he was their best weapon.

And you knew he was bright enough to know that as well. Although he never got any special treatment, you could tell by the way they trained him, how they paid more attention to his abilities and not so much the other’s.

Including you.

You felt something pull at you, something tugging you back.

You turned to see- a feather?

“Hey wait a sec,” Keigo said, “I wanna ask you something.”

Your face hardened, you two should be getting back to training soon, you knew the instructor would most likely yell at the two of you for falling too much behind.

“Ask your question and let's go,” you said, huffing.

“Do you want to be friends?”

The question caught you so off guard, causing you to stumble over a rock in front of you.

You whiped back to him, your eyes widen as you realized he was completely serious.

“Wha- friends? What the hell are you on about? There are no friends here, that's an idiot's dream.”

But Keigo only shrugged, “Well, then I guess I’m an idiot.”

You stared back at him, a look of pure disbelief written on your face.

Was he insane? Having friends here was almost imposible. The commission made sure of that, pitting you two against eachother, comparing you to one another, they made it so you would fight amongst yourselves.

“Why would you want to be friends with me?” You asked, your voice barely a whisper.

But he just shrugged, “Because I'm curious about you, and that crousity makes me want to befriend you.”

You stilled, thinking and thinking till your brain hurts.

“Look, you don’t have to say anything right now, I know I probably caught you off guard, and if you don’t want to, I understand… I think-I think I’m just lonely.”

You pursed your lips, still thinking it over in your mind before you grabbed his hand.

“Look, I’ll think about it, but first, let's get this race over with.”

Keigo smiled, blushing a bit as you two took off, hoping you two would becoming good friends.

. . .

And as time went on, you two did, in fact, become the best of friends.

By the time you were both teens, you and Keigo (or Hawks as his hero name) became the commissions pride and joy.

Although you were always so surprised that they didn’t want to through you out, Keigo was so much better than you, and you had fallen much behind him.

Keigo was faster, smarter and stronger, you knew that, you knew that all to well.

But, the commission never removed you, you continued to train to become a hero, right besides Keigo. A part of you wondered if maybe you were only kept on because of Keigo, maybe the commission saw how close you two were, watching how much you mattered to him, and maybe they thought they could use you to their advantage.

The thought made you shiver, mostly due to the fact that it wasn’t impossible, and more than likely.

One night, as you and Keigo lay under the stars on the roof of the commission's building, watching the night sky above.

Suddenly, Hawks turned to you, “Hey Y/N,” he said, “can I ask you something?”

You nodded your head, feeling your heart flutter.

“Do you....do you want to become a hero with me?”

You smiled, “Isn't that the whole reason we’re here? To become heroes?”

But Keigo just shook his head, “No I mean...what do you want to do? With your life?”

You took a pause, you’ve never really thought about it all that much. What did you want to do with your life? You’ve always just done what others have told you to do, always choosing to follow others rather than yourself.

You realized you had never thought about it before, never taking into consideration your feelings, you just worked to survive.

“...I don’t know.”

You hated saying it, it felt like such a childish thing to admit, especially with Keigo. Keigo, who’s figured out his life goal already. Keigo, who’s living out his dream. Keigo, who has most of his life planned out.

“I mean- I guess I’m not used to choosing for myself, you know? I’m not sure how to go about… figuring out my life without someone telling me how to live it first.”

But Keigo just nodded, “No, that makes sense, I mean, you’ve lived here most of your life, you’ve worked to become a hero, but that's really only because you were taught to be one. It’s ok to not know what you want out of life, and don’t worry, I’ll be here to support you, Y/N.”

Keigo turned to you, a smile plastered on his face.

That beautiful, amazing, breathtaking smile.

You felt your face become flushed, and you sat up quickly so as to not have Keigo notice.

“Yeah well- thanks,” you said softly.

But Keigo just laughed, “Don’t worry about it dove.”

. . .

Years later, and Hawks had become the number two pro hero. And you hadn’t done too badly yourself, coming in at the number eleventh spot.

You didn’t mind being behind Hawks, in fact, you found yourself becoming a bit proud of yourself because of how far you had made it.

Right now, you were busy on portal, watching citizens go about their day on a rooftop above.

You watched closely, wondering what kind of life you could have been living if you had never chosen to be a hero, wondering if you too, would have been walking on that very same street as some other hero observed you from afar.

Somedays you found yourself wondering if the hero commission hadn’t taken you away, had let you lived your life for yourself, what would you do? Who would you become?

You wondered if you would have met Keigo as well, or if that would only work if you had been with the hero commission.

Maybe in that universe, you two could finally be together.

It happened a while ago, when you figured out your true feelings for Hawks. Although, maybe you always had feelings for him, since you were little kids. But, you had feelings for him had began to bubble over, you found yourself wanting to spend more time with him, wanted to keep him to yourself. But you would never act on these feelings, you knew better.

Keigo Takami would never be yours, not in a million years.

You let out a sigh, just as you heard boots hit the ground behind you.

“Miss me,” a familiar voice asked.

Even though you had known Hawks since you two were kids, you were always caught off guard by those dazzling eyes, the honey gold color swirling around as he stared down at you, pinning you to your spot on the roof.

You smiled, “Hawks, I just saw you.”

He shrugged, “So? I still missed you in that time.”

You rolled your eyes, “Did you come here to bother me or do you actually have a reason to be here?”

His hands flew to his chest, dramatically saying, “Oh angel, how you wound my poor heart.”

You giggled, “Aw Hawks, always the flare for the dramatic.”

He smiled, but then his eyes got serious, “But I do need your help with something, a mission not too far from here.”

Watching Hawks in action was like watching an artist at work, he was careful, skillful, even downright majestic. He took care in his work, he worked quickly and efficiently, like a well-oiled machine.

And, not to sound too cocky, you two made a pretty good team. And considering you two were very close friends, you vehemently enjoyed working with him.

Although, maybe it was cuz you also had a little bit of a crush on him.

Your face felt flushed at the thought, but before you could think your mouth had already said yes.

“Oh? Are you just agreeing so you can spend time with me, little dove,” Hawks smiled teasingly.

He had a habit of doing this, it was a little game he would play on you. teasing was so fun for him, but he didn’t realize how it gave you such butterflies.

Luckily though, although you did have feelings for him, you learned how to push them away for situations like this.

You scoffed, “Hawks, would you just give me the rundown. Or do I have to call the commission myself?”

He put his hands up, “Wow there chicky, no need to get antsy, I’ll explain everything, ok?”

He told you about the mission, nothing to fancy, in fact, it was quite easy.

Some of his sidekicks had noticed some suspicious activity near a specific location near U.A that the commission wanted to be checked out. They had said that they didn’t want another attack to happen yet again to the school.

On the outside, it might have seemed like the commission gave a shit about the kids in U.A, but you knew better. They just wanted to look good, and right now, this was the best way to do that.

“So basically, if we do see any suspicious activity, we’re allowed to bring anyone in there for questioning, and if worst comes to worst, we have orders to use force.”

You nodded, sounded just like a normal mission for the two of you, should be no p.

“Alright,” you said, “Sounds easy enough. Should we head over now? How will I get there?”

But Hawks seemed to be one step ahead of you.

He held out his hand, a smirk plastered on his dazzling face, “Just hold on to me, sweetheart.”

. . .

You’ve flown with Hawks before, considering how close you two were it was understandable that he would have offered a number of times.

But still, it Always made you so giddy.

The way he held you, so secure in his arms, his face inches away from you. And that gleam in his eyes, it always felt like it was only you and him in that moment, only you two in the entire sky. And each time, it made your heart shudder.

“You ok there, dove,” Hawks asked in your ear.

You jumped a little, surprised by his words. You realized you had begun spacing out while looking directly at him.

You composed yourself, “Just keep flyin’ bird brain. I’m just thinking.”

You could almost feel his smirk, “Thinking? Thinking of what, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“Drop it Hawks.”

“Oh,” he said, his tone mischievous, “just like I can drop you?”

Just then, you felt Hawks serve mid-air.

“KEIGO,” you shouted, not even thinking.

But Hawks had regained his hold on you, the prank only lasting for a second.

He laughed, his chest shaking, “You should have seen your face, Chicky! Ha! That was funny!”

But you would disagree, “I swear to God, Hawks, I’ll punch you when we land.”

But you thought for a second, “Sorry I called you your name...so loud.”

Keigo didn’t really like his name, opting to be called ‘Hawks’ instead.

But you knew why he preferred his new name instead. Because of his past.

Keigo was a kid left in the dirt, left and discarded, a remnant of a past that wasn’t so pleasant. You knew that thinking about it only brought pain to him, and saying his name out loud would only remind him of a past he would rather soon forget.

And the name ‘Hawks’ had marked the beginning of a new life for him. It was a way for him to move on past that old life, a way for him to become the best version of himself.

“Sorry,” you whispered.

“It’s ok… I don’t think anyone heard,” Hawks said.

His grip on you seemed to be tighter, more secure.

“And also, you know I would never drop you, right? I could never hurt you, ever.”

You rolled your eyes, “That’s so cheesy. Just don’t drop me and it’s fine.”

. . .

The place wasn’t too bad.

It was an old supply garage, there were about four people from what you could see.

It was definitely near U.A, you could see a clear view to the school, although it was far, it definitely had a vantage point. You could see why this could be a problem, and your brain hurt thinking about what villainous thing they could be planning.

You could hear the guy closest to you, it was a bit hard but you honed your ears.

“So, you all have everything,” a man asked in a scratchy rough voice.

“Yeah,” one of the others said, “everything's here, make sure to give it to Shigaraki with our gratitude.”

You looked over at Hawks, but his eyes were trained on the villains, his black pupils sharpening and watching their every move, before he nodded, signaling to move out.

And then, everything happened in a flash.

Hawks, as always, moved fast and quick, and you come up behind him.

Hawks grabbed one of the men, and held back the other two with his feathers, leaving only you and the two others.

You pulled out your handy metal staff, preparing yourself to bend it to your will.

But you never got the chance.

One of the men smirked a gun in his hand. The other behind him, activating what looked like an ice quirk.

And before you could think, you felt your feet being Frozen down to the hard metal floor of the garage.

“What the hell,” you mutter to yourself.

you tried your best to wiggle your way out of it, but you saw no way to free yourself from your icey binds.

Luckily, with your fast thinking, you grabbed the metal staff, shaping it to hit one of the men square in the jaw, making him drop his weapon.

the other one was taken aback, a perfect opening for your staff to hit him in the face.

But your feet were still frozen to the floor, and a few whacks to the felons was not going to be enough to take them down.

You racked your brain, Hawks was too far away, and there was no way you could get out of the ice on your own.

You brought your metal stuff back, using it to break the ice on your feet. Just as the men were getting back up.

You ran over, preparing to hit one of the men right in the face, a blow big enough to knock them out.

But you never got the chance.

The other man tackled you to the floor, your back hitting the ground.

“Not so tough now, are you, little hero.”

You looked over at Keigo, but there was no use. He was too busy fighting his own battle, and you knew it wasn't fair to rely on him.

So, with all your strength you pushed the man off. Using the metal floor to help you.

Just then, an idea occurred to you. It was risky, but it could work.

You knew that Keigo was far enough for it to work, it wouldn’t hurt him, but the only problem was it wouldn’t trap the two villains he was fighting.

But, considering he was the number two hero, you knew he would be just fine. You trusted him in that.

The ground beneath you is made of metal, you could feel it beneath your feet. You could also feel the two men running towards you.

You dodged their initial attacks, but you knew that they would soon overpower you. You also knew that you couldn't kill them, but you could hurt them.

So your best bet was to trap them, and yourself, before backup came.

You hit your palm against the floor, willing it to your mind. It was a long stretch, and you could feel the strain on your body. The toll that it was taking was immediate, your muscles felt tired, your brain even felt foggy for a few minutes, but you kept going.

You made sure that the ground collapsed, but it wouldn't hurt anybody.

You were not expecting, however, for the ceiling to collapse along with it.

There must have been a support beam on the ground as well that you had taken down with the floor, causing the ceiling to come down.

You looked up, seeing the last moment as the ceiling collapsed on you.

. . .

Hawks hated hospitals.

The smell, the people, the pain. He hated it all, but you were the one in the hospital, so of course, he needed to come.

The days after the accident had been hard, to say the least.

Keigo just remembered watching as the rooftop collapsed, watching your bruised body go along with it.

He remembered screaming your name too, yelling and willing all his feathers to help you, to get you out.

He remembered his heart racing and beating so hard in his chest, he remembered his eyes, tears swelling up as his breath ran ragged.

He didn’t even care about the villains, he had caught the two he had been fighting already, but he didn’t care. He needed to get you out, he needed to make sure you were ok.

After digging for what felt like an eternity, there you were, bruised and bloody. But you were breathing, and he held you close, his tears dripping over your cheeks.

He felt his heartbreak, he couldn't stand the sight of you being hurt, he couldn't stand the thought that he had something to do with it.

He wanted you to wake up, he wanted you to wake up so badly it hurt. For you to look up, and teased him about crying. He wanted nothing more than to apologize over and over, for making his friend suffer, even if it was unintentional.

He knew he could never forgive himself, and he knew he could never make it up to you.

Keigo knew you were in bad shape, so he called the ambulance to take you to the hospital. He was there with you the whole way, watching you, helping in any way he could.

He felt like his heart was being ripped out of his chest, watching as your fragile body was rolled away to the special care unit of the hospital, as the doctors told him he couldn’t come in with you.

“Mr. Hawks,” a voice said in front of him.

He flinched.

Hawks wasn’t someone who was easily startled, seeing as he had years of training, but his mind was so all over the place. Worrying and wondering if you were ok, hoping and praying to god everything would be ok.

He couldn’t lose you, and he realized that only now.

If he lost you, how would he even be able to function? You were everything to him, his friend (if he was being truthful, his only true friend) , his rock, the person he could trust for support and help.

To be honest, if he lived in a world without you, he really wouldn’t know what to do…

“Sir?”

He snapped back to reality, his eyes looking up at the doctors.

“Sorry,” he sighed, “I think I’m just a bit off my game today, you’ll have to excuse my behavior. But what were you saying, sir?”

“Well, L/N Y/N has sustained some pretty severe injuries, such as bruising of the sides and hips, and a broken leg,” Hawks sucked in a breath, “We know how to treat it, of course, but Y/N will need much recovery time. That being said, Y/N seems to not have any family or emergency contacts but you. If it’s ok with you, would you be willing to visit as well as look over Y/N in the recovery period?”

Hawks quickly agreed, “Anything doctor, anything you need or Y/N needs...anything at all.”

The doctor smiled at him, “Thank you, Mr. Hawks, unfortunately though, Y/N needs a bit more time alone, but when we deem it ok, you can come back for a visit.”

Hawks felt his shoulders slump, he knew it was selfish, but he had hoped to see you again, to apologize for putting you in that piston, he felt horrible.

The mission wasn't supposed to go like that at all, it was supposed to be a swift and easy fight. It was really just supposed to be the four guys with easy quirks, and they were all supposed to be an easy fight.

Hawks had learned about the hideout in front of U.A a while ago, when he learned it was also a part of the ledge, he went right to Dabi.

“Are you insane,” he had said, “someone will catch you, and personally, I can’t stand by and let you attack those kids.”

“Oh?” Dabi smirked, “And how will you stop us? You’re a part of the league now, bird boy, and we need this lookout, so just shut up already.”

Keigo huffed, “I can’t let you do that, that’s right by my portal area, my bosses will get suspicious, and I look bad enough as it is. I haven’t brought anyone from the league in, soon someone will put two-in-two together.”

It was a lie of course, his bosses knew exactly why he couldn't bring in anyone from the league, they had assigned the mission after all.

But the problem didn't lie with his bosses, it lay with the other Heroes and the public eye. The other hero’s had started to whisper to each other, wondering why the Hawks hadn’t brought in anyone from the notorious League of villains yet. He heard their whispers, and it made him uneasy. He knew if he didn't act soon, they would just grow more and more suspicious. As for the public eye, he couldn't let his image slide, he had to figure out a solution, and this would be the perfect way to do so.

Dabi pondered the idea, toying with Hawks’ growing anticipation, like a cat pawing at a helpless bird.

“Alright, I suppose we can make that work.”

And so, a plan was formed.

Keigo was to swiftly take the four men in for questioning. Dabi had arranged for it so all vital information was to be learned from the lookouts, and then Hawks could swoop in and go in fighting. The other four men would have no idea what was going on, so it looked like the real deal.

They had set up specific times and dates to make sure they would take the men and the lookout down, that way the league wouldn’t lose any vital information.

“I’ll tell you when, don’t start till I tell you,” Dabi had said, “or else there will be problems.”

And Hawks had done as he was told, he waited for Dabi to give him the all-clear, and went in.

But you getting hurt was never a part of the plan.

Keigo felt guilt clawing at his chest. How did he get like this? He was supposed to be the one to protect you, to make sure that you were always okay.

But it seemed like he was the one who got you hurt.

His guilt was suddenly replaced by anger, it made him ball his fist.

Those men were supposed to be easy to take down, they were supposed to be simple to deal with, but even Keigo had difficulty defeating them all on his own.

This was an error on his part, he knew that, but he also couldn’t help but simultaneously blame Dabi as well.

It was his fault that he hadn’t warned Keigo about the strength of the men.

Keigo was going to make him pay….

. . .

Dabi’s head hit the wall with a loud thud, Keigo’s angry eyes boring into him.

“I should kill you right here, right now.”

Dabi laughed, “Look, it wasn’t my fault your little partner couldn’t handle a few guys, ain't they supposed to be a hero? Shouldn’t they be able to help themselves?”

Dabi’s twisted smile made Keigo see red.

“I swear Dabi-”

“The league will come after you, you know that.”

Keigo felt his hands shake with rage, his fingers wrinkling Dabis' shirt.

“What were they to you? You seem pretty upset there, birdy. Maybe….your lover?”

A feather sharpened at Dabi’s neck, Keigo’s fury never leaving his body.

“Say one more goddamn word and I swear to god I'll kill you.”

“Look,” Dabi said, “I didn't know how strong those guys were, I thought that you'd be able to take ‘em down pretty easily. But I guess we just gave ‘em more training than I thought. That's all. Nothing I could have done about it, and nothing you could have done about it. You should know that stuff like this is inevitable, shit is bound to go wrong.”

Keigo released him, his eyes still boring into Dabi’s.

“If I figure out you had some sort of part in this-”

“Yeah yeah, you’ll kill me. I get it.”

Keigo stormed off, walking away from Dabi.

Keigo wanted nothing more than to beat the crap out of someone, anyone, he just wanted someone to blame, someone to feel the way he felt.

The fact that you were in pain only made it worse.

What was he to do now? He couldn’t go home, he would only be able to think about you, only be able to think about your laugh, your eyes, your lips….

He shook his head. Why was he thinking of something like that? And at a time like this? You were...his friend.

But that thought made his heart sink. Like that thought had filled him with dread.

He sighed, shaking his head, this wasn’t about him, it was about you, it was about helping you. Not thinking about his feelings. Or lack thereof.

He felt his phone ring in his back pocket, just before he was leaving.

Looking at the number, he realized it was the doctor's office that was calling.

Without even thinking he picked up, “Hello?”

“Hello Mr. Hawks, we just wanted to ask if you would want to come in and see the patient L/N Y/N, they have woken up. So if you would like to see them-”

“Yes!” Keigo said, a bit too excitedly, “Sorry- about the interruption- but yes I would like to see them.”

“Alright Mr. Hawks, please come whenever you can, they’ve been asking for you.”

. . .

Hawks had never flown so fast, rushing so fast in order to see you, needed to see you.

When he finally got there, he rushed in, finding the receptionist to find your room.

“They’re in room 236 sir-”

But he cut her off, adrenaline pumping through his body.

“Ok, thank you so much.”

Finding your room was easy, and yet, he found himself outside your room, dreading to go in.

How could he face you? How could he apologize? How could he look you in the eye, see what happened to you, and be able to talk to you.

He ran a hand down his face, why was this so hard? He’s taken down many many villains before, and he had never felt as anxious as he did now?

“...Hawks?”

He jumped, he actually jumped.

There you were, standing, only a few inches away from his face, his eyes widened and he could feel his whole body becoming hot.

Why did he suddenly become like this around you? His heart felt like it was on fire, his whole body felt strange.

But your face, it looked so stunning, that for a moment he couldn’t feel his lungs.

“Are you...ok?” He was surprised that his voice finally managed to work.

You blinked, “Yeah, I’m ok. What about you, though? Your face is all red. Do have a fever or something? I can call a doctor.”

“No no,” he sighed, “just...feeling weird I suppose.”

He felt the redness travel from his cheeks all the way up to his ears, “I-I’m fine, really, don't worry about me, I'm actually here to see you.”

You smiled, gazing up at him, “Aww, you can see lil’ old me? How thoughtful.”

You both walked into your room, and Hawks watched as you lay down on the bed.

The hospital room was nothing special, a state-of-the-art hospital room, similar to one's that Hawks had been in many times. Being a hero always came with getting hurt, but seeing you in this condition, made his heart squeeze.

if he could, he would go back in time and figure out a way so that he could be in this situation, not you. You didn't deserve it, you have done nothing but help him, and this is how he repaid you? He felt sick with guilt.

“Hawks?” You said.

He snapped up, like coming back from a bad dream.

But you just laughed your sweet, kind laugh.

Hawks wanted to hear it again, one more time he wanted to hear you laugh like that, it made him feel like everything was drifting away from him like it was just you and him in this entire world.

“You’re totally out of it! What’s gotten into you,” You said, a smile still plastered on your face.

“Sorry, just thinkin’.”

“Yeah well you must be thinking a little too hard there, are you okay? Do you want to sit down? Something's obviously bothering you, you can tell me.”

but hawks just side, “I don’t know, I don’t want you to be upset with me.”

But you just smiled up at him, “Hawks, nothing in this world could make me upset with you.”

And so he told you, about the league, about the secrets he's been hiding from you. It felt good, it felt good to finally confide in someone, it felt like a weight being lifted off his shoulders. he felt at ease, talking to you like you were the only person who would ever understand. And you probably were.

You listened to him, you listened as he told you about what happened, about how sorry he felt, you didn't blame him for what happened, You just listened. You listened and listened and listened.

So when he finally finished, he was scared of what you would say.

“...I’m sorry,” he said.

“Why are you sorry, Hawks you didn’t do anything wrong.”

He looked up at you, “B-but I got you hurt-”

“That’s not your fault though, you had a mission to follow.”

“But I should have never involved you.”

“I'm glad you did, it could have been you that would have gotten hurt,” you said, smiling.

But he just tsked, “It would have been better if it was me, I can’t stand to see you like this, you know.”

Your hands went to his cheeks, bringing his face closer, “And I wouldn’t be able to see you like this either, I would have blamed myself. I’m glad I came with you, even if it meant I got hurt in the process. I care about you, Hawks.”

Keigo couldn’t breathe, you were so close, your lips an inch away.

“Keigo.”

Your eyes widened, “What?”

“I want you to call me Keigo when we’re alone from now on, I...I like when you say it.”

You paused for a moment, and then burst out laughing, “Where did this come from?”

His face went red, “I-I don’t know, just kinda been thinking about it I guess.”

You giggled a bit before saying, “Ok, I mean, if that’s what you want. Y’know, you’ve been acting strange Haw-Keigo,” you corrected, “are you sure everything's ok?”

There it was again, the pitter-batter in his heart, the nervousness in his stomach.

Something was wrong, but he didn’t know how to say it.

He didn’t know how he would even categorize the way he was feeling, he couldn't explain it to himself, much less to you.

“I’m fine, just...overwhelmed I guess.”

He shook his head, “But I should be asking how you are, you're the one in the hospital, not me. Stop worrying, how are you, how are you feeling? What do you need me to do? I'll be here to help you, no matter what.”

You rolled your eyes, “Eventually you’ll have to go home, and I’m totally fine, Keigo.”

By the mention of his name, he couldn’t help but feel his heart squeeze.

“R-right, well, can I just..stay here. With you? Till you get better?”

You smiled, “Of course.”

. . .

While you were in the hospital, Keigo stayed by your side. He never left you, he cared for you, watched over for you, and was so understanding.

It only made your feelings for him deeper, and you were loath to admit that you enjoyed it.

You enjoyed watching him fawn over you, knowing that he was close to you. You two would talk for hours, about anything, and you loved it. You loved feeling him near you, watching his eyes soften and the stupid silly quirk of his smile. You felt warm inside, you felt so at peace with him at your side.

You knew it was selfish, but you couldn't help loving how long you were spending with him.

But, it all came to an end, and you had to go home.

To your surprise, Keigo offered you to stay with him for a little bit.

Just till you get back on your feet,” he said.

Your heart leaped at the opportunity, sharing a house with the guy you had a crush on for years? It felt like you were a lovesick teenager again. Although, you would always be lovesick when it came to Keigo.

At Keigo’s house, he was nothing but polite to you. Although, a bit too polite.

For all his flirting, for all his suave charm, he was never really like that with you. He was just normal, keeping to himself in the house, but always being able to hang out with you or do anything with you if you wanted.

And yet, you could feel the nervousness oozing off of him, like he wanted to say something, but was holding himself back.

Like something was on the tip of his tongue, but he couldn’t get it out.

It, intern, made you just as nervous.

Were you being a nuisance? Did you say something to upset him? A million thoughts running through your head, and you are worried about all of them.

The last thing that you would ever want to do would be to upset Keigo, but you couldn’t figure out what was wrong.

Maybe he felt bad about the accident?

You sucked in a breath, that had to be it. He felt bad, and therefore, was nervous around you.

You have to confront him, you thought, you had to clear the air so you would both feel better.

You decided to wait till tomorrow morning, not wanting to scare or embarrass him well you could tell he was so nervous.

. . .

“Keigo,” you said, a waver in your voice showing how nervous you were.

“Hm?” Keigo looked up from his phone, his honey-colored irises landing on you, only serving to make you more anxious.

You took a deep breath, “I wanna talk to you about something. and it's pretty important, so I'd appreciate it if you could listen till the end.”

Keigo sat up, “What, am I in trouble or something?” He said in a teasing, yet nervous way.

“No,” you sighed, “But I just really need to talk to you about something.”

You took one moment more to collect yourself before speaking, “We've known each other for a long time, we've known each other since we were little kids when we were both put into the commission's program and since we were both made heroes. So you should know, that I know when you're upset.”

You saw Keigo twitch in his chair, but you continued.

“You've been nervous ever since the hospital, maybe even nervous in the hospital. And I don't know what's going on with you. I... I don't know if it was something that I did, or if it was something that happened, but I'm here for you. And I don't like it that you keep this a secret from me. I consider you to be one of my best friends, and I want you to know that you can trust me. No matter what happens, I'll still always love you. Nothing will ever change that,” a smile pulled at your lips as you said your last sentence.

It was silent for a few moments, the air between you too felt heavy and suffocating.

Finally, Keigo spoke, “Y/N, I want to tell you something, but... I'm not sure how you’ll react.”

You tried to speak up again, but Keigo cut you off.

“I know that you're going to say that nothing can ever come between us, and I do believe you. But... something came up and I just don't know how to deal with it. You mean so much to me, and losing your friendship is my worst nightmare. And I guess…. I just got so scared of losing you that I just didn't think about anything else. I'm sorry.”

Your face contorted into one of confusion, “Keigo, I’m not sure what you mean? What are you talking about? What came up?”

But Keigo just sighed, “Y/n I...I think I’m in love with you.”

You felt your heart stop, your eyes widened as your brain was racing.

What did you say? No... that couldn't be right.

Keigo Takami could not be in love with you, he just wouldn't. You had accepted that a long time ago, you knew that he would never have the same feelings that you had for him. You knew that, so what was going on?

“I...I’m sorry?”

Keigo’s face turned a bright shade of pink, “I-I think I’m in love with you. I’m sorry to spring this on you so suddenly, I know it must be a lot to take in, if you’re uncomfortable being here with me feel free to leave. I completely understand-”

But your lips stopped his words, your body pressed firmly to his.

He was started by the kiss at first, but soon, his body and mind became muddled, hands wrapped around your waist as he tasted your lips. It felt intoxicating.

Before you knew it, your hips were straddling him, keeping him locked in his chair. But Keigo wasn’t complaining.

Your lips tangled with one another as moans escaped both of you, your hands unable to leave each other's bodies.

Your hands traveled down his chest, even ripping open the button-down he was wearing, showing his abs and rippling muscles.

“Y/N..” Keigo said, his voice hoarse.

When you looked back up at him, his eyes were narrowed, slanted, and staring you down. But they had a softness to them, one that made your heart flutter.

“Keigo… god you have no idea how much I love you,” you said.

If this was a dream, you never wanted to wake up.

Keigo smirked, “‘s that so babe? Well, I plan to show you just how much I love you tonight.”

His lips attached to the column of your throat, kissing and nipping lightly at the skin. His hands roaming up and down your body made you feel as though you were on fire. His calloused hands stroked your back, making you arch into him.

“K-Keigo,” you moaned.

But he just hummed into your skin, his brain turning to mush, only able to think about how much pleasure he could give you, how much love he wanted to show you.

“Keigo, I love you,” you whispered into the shell of his ear.

Keigo groaned, still occupied with your neck, but pulled his lips away in order to say; “I’m glad,” and smiled at you.

You returned his smile before your lips found his again.

It would be a very long night.

[cruelfeline]

So, I was admittedly distracted by something a little more... distressing, back in season four. Y’know: that bit where Hordak gets... Well; y’all know. Yes. But now that I’m re-watching various bits and pieces, I’ve realized exactly how much Bow’s friendship speech on Beast Island bothers me.

Though I may be misinterpreting it? Am I misinterpreting it? I don’t know.

I kind of hope I’m misinterpreting it

But to me, it feels as if, upon learning that Entrapta is giving up on friendship because she’s had such difficulty with it, Bow kind of... implies that she needs to work harder?

Is that what’s happening? Because that’s what it feels like.

Again: I may be misinterpreting. But I don’t know that I am? I mean, even his claim that the Alliance never gave up on Entrapta kind of... implies that she’s the one who gave up on them? Is that... is that right?

not even considering the fact that they’ve kind of not really cared about her for a season and a half... until she becomes potentially useful via a mass of magic needing defusing

Because if it is, then I’m not a fan. I’m not a fan at all.

I feel like Entrapta works so hard, throughout the series, to be a good friend. She just does it in a way that makes sense to her.

Back in season one, she tries to provide the Princess Alliance with weapons and technology in order to cement their friendship. She participates in their attempt to rescue Glimmer and Bow after the Princess Prom. She does her best to work with the group during their foray into the Fright Zone, despite their less-than-respectful way of dealing with her. She does her best. She tries. She endures their lack of clear communication in an effort to be useful and belong. 

And, for her troubles, she is left behind. Yes, it’s an accident. No, they don’t mean it. But, at the same time, they don’t go back to look. They don’t make sure. And Entrapta, whether intentionally or not, is left to her own devices in the Fright Zone.

Once there, she repeats her attempt at friendship-building. She again provides weapons and technological know-how, trying to use them as the foundation of a relationship because, well, that’s what she understands. That’s what she’s comfortable with, and that’s what she has to offer. So she does.

And it honestly works! She becomes friends with Scorpia. They seem to genuinely enjoy one another’s company: they talk about their (different) interests, engage in friendly physical contact, enjoy the anticipation of hot cocoa on one of their missions. Entrapta seems to make a legitimate connection with her, one that Scorpia canonically admits to missing.

Entrapta likewise befriends Hordak and develops a sweet, loving relationship with him. She connects with him in a way no one else ever has, owing both to her lack of fear and to her willingness to see humanity in a person everyone else writes off as a tyrannical monster. I don’t know that I need to say much more about this: we all acknowledge the wholesome, wonderful nature of Entrapdak.

She tries to befriend Catra, too, both by providing her with tech and by going so far as to petition Hordak to spare her after the Shadow Weaver incident.

My point regarding all of this is that Entrapta does try. She does work at it, attempting to be the best friend she can be. She enjoys an easy companionship with Scorpia (apparently being the only real friend the latter has had, by Scorpia’s own admission!). She falls in love with Hordak, entering into a mutual relationship that eventually gives him the strength to break from his abusive slavemaster of a god-brother. She tries to provide Catra with honest help, succeeding in helping her fulfill her Horde duties and actually saving her life.

And yet, with all of this effort, what happens?

Catra sentences her to death. There’s no way around this: it’s the only honest way to put it.

Scorpia ends up caring more about Catra than anyone else and subsequently allows Entrapta to be shipped off to Beast Island

Hordak... oh, by the gods, Hordak tries, but he ends up a victim of Catra’s manipulation and his own emotional pain. To his credit, he promptly loses his mind when he realizes what has happened. 

In the end? In the end, all of Entrapta’s work has led to multiple functionally failed friendships (well, Scorpia squeaks out a save... eventually) and one romantic relationship put on hold because of a tragic misunderstanding. And it’s not her fault. It’s not that she doesn’t work hard enough. It’s not that she thinks friendship is easy. It’s not that she gives up on people. Entrapta does try. She works hard with the tools and the understanding that she possesses. And despite all of that effort, she ends up on Beast Island anyway because Catra doesn’t value her, Scorpia doesn’t value her enough, and Hordak is too wounded to realize what’s happening

So this moment when Bow gives her this talk, when it sounds like he’s telling her that she needs to try harder and really work on friendship in order for it to happen for her... I just... is that really what this scene means? Because, if so, then it just falls so incredibly flat for me.

It falls so very flat, right alongside that uncomfortable moment in S5E2 when all of the princesses are furious with her, and she just doesn’t understand why, because in her mind, she’s been trying to help in the only way she knows how. And no one has clearly told her any other way, so how is she supposed to know?

Agh. I just really don’t like this implication that Entrapta has failed at friendship because she didn’t work hard enough. I don’t like this implication that she is the one that needs to buck up and try harder, when she has been putting forth an honest effort to understand people and give them useful things and interact pleasantly, even when said people refuse to communicate clearly with her.

And for pity’s sake, she’s a wonderful enough friend that she helps Hordak find the strength to take back his memories and his life and his name so that he can free himself and kill his god for her. That’s pretty damned successful, isn’t it?

needless to say Hordak is exempt from this entire pseudo-rant because he actually respects and reciprocates her efforts

So why does the Alliance continuously put forth this demand that she “work harder?” Why do the princesses constantly imply that she’s the one not trying, when they never actually try to understand her even one iota? Why does it always have to be Entrapta picking up the social pace and adapting to everyone’s demands?

And why doesn’t the narrative call out this gross discrepancy?

I can understand the characters engaging in this nonsense, but why doesn’t the narrative point it out for what it is? Why doesn’t the narrative mark it as unfair and wrong?

It’s a major aspect of Entrapta’s “friendship arc” that just doesn’t sit well with me. I feel like there’s this constant theme of “Entrapta needs to work harder to understand people” when she’s already working hard. She’s already giving it her all, but she’s the only one who is. It’s all so uncomfortably one-sided. The actual problem, to my eyes, is that no one save for one (1) grumpy clone is meeting her halfway, and the story just completely fails to recognize that.

[rigelmejo]

Comprehensive Reading Guide from Beginner to Native Novels - from Heavenly Path’s Site

Notes:

The article linked above has a reading list in order of difficulty listed in it, so reference that as a beginner.

I personally did not use SRS Flashcard apps (anki, memrise etc) after learning 2000 common chinese words from Ben Whatley’s memrise decks. So while this article mentions ‘adding words to flashcards’ to study, and that does help and speed up vocabulary learning, it is by no means needed. All I ever did was look up words in Pleco/Google translate/Readibu/etc reading tool as I read, and then after looking words up enough times I learned the words. Reading novels which repeat vocabulary, and rereading or reading multiple novels in similar genres/settings increase repetition of new words so they’re easier to pick up from just reading exposure. I often read case stories, and reread stories I like, to run into new words enough times to pick them up. For a while, all common words will be what you’re learning and will be in everything, so you’ll get constant exposure when trying to learn those words no matter what. But my point is: you don’t need to study with SRS flashcards to pick up words. Word lookup as you read will be sufficient, if you’re reading somewhat regularly. SRS flashcards speed up the process a bit but are not necessary, and for people like me who can’t focus on SRS flashcard apps that’s good news.

I recommend that if you don’t use an SRS app like anki to review new words, then regularly read (so you’re forced to ‘review’ every time you see the new word again until you learn it). And/or still save your ‘new words’ somewhere to read over every once in a while to review (graded readers will have a vocabulary list in the back, Readibu and Pleco let you favorite words to reference later, just underlining words or making your own word list when reading would work etc). After my first 2000 words, I only read and looked up unknown words over and over until I learned them, so I didn’t study vocabulary in additional ways but the additional ways may speed up your progress.

Depending on how quickly you adapt to hanzi, you can read ‘harder’ stuff before you’ve fully learned to recognize ~3000 characters. At about 1400 hanzi i recognized in reading (but not necessarily all pronunciations) I could start reading some simpler webnovels for main plot without a dictionary (if I wanted to extensively read). At about ~2000 hanzi recognized in reading (but not necessarily all pronunciations) I could start reading stuff like dmbj and zhenhun for overall main plot without a dictionary if i wanted. Depending on the novel, many unknown hanzi will be in descriptive portions and those can to a degree be guessed (for example 潮湿 moist has 2 wet radicals and in the context of ‘wet grass’ you could guess it has to do with moistness without knowing the hanzi yet,漆黑 and 乌黑 you may not know the first characters yet but recognize ‘black’ and in a color description context figure it means black or some dark color, 咕嘟咕嘟  has 2 mouth radicals and is a 4 hanzi phrase so near someone speaking/moving you can make a decent guess its just a noise).

Heavenly Path’s site has a ton of good resources linked in it’s resources section, check it out! In the Our Favorite Resources page and Other Resources page. I have used a ton of these resources myself.

[olivinesea]

Oooh fun! Okay, do you have any headcannons or thoughts on a dyslexic Hotch? I feel like I never see dyslexia with any characters really, and I like the idea of him with it. And if you do and you want to write something about it, a dyslexic Hotch with the team (and them being the supportive and protective family they are?) Thank you! ❤️

I hope you have fun, wherever/whatever you’re doing!!

I love this so much!! Thank you :) okay I don’t have much personal experience with dyslexia so hopefully I get this decently accurate. The biggest thing that surprised me when I was doing a quick search is that it isn’t actually a matter of reading words or letters backwards? It’s more an inability to connect letters to the appropriate sounds or to break words up into component parts; a general phonological awareness struggle.

So, as with many things, it seems to me to be a matter of slowing down, learning at your own pace. This ties in nicely with so many of my other Hotch thoughts, I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of it before. Idk what this is, it’s neither headcanon nor proper story but hopefully it’s something like what you were looking for:

When he’s a kid he gets called a slow learner due to his undiagnosed dyslexia. It was much less common to get that kind of diagnosis back then in general and I am sure his dad would have hated the idea of his son needing any kind of extra help. So he’s slow to speak, slow to learn how to read, has difficulty with numbers, absolutely hates being called on to read out loud because it’s actual torture and the other kids have no hesitation about laughing at him. So he becomes withdrawn, labeled a “bad kid,” stops trying because, fuck it, he never gets any kind of support, who cares right? It’s always a fight at home, he starts hiding his work, lying about his grades. This works for awhile bc his parents are distracted by other things. His problems are much bigger than grades by the time they do notice.

However, while he hates school and the way people talk about him and his struggles, like he isn’t even there, he discovers that he doesn’t hate learning. There’s a small library in town where he found he could hide out, no one bothering him for hours if he just sat still for with a book open. He was good at sitting still, at being invisible. But eventually a librarian notices that he’s always got the same book open, some sort of technical manual, that he is rarely turning the pages. She asks him if he likes what he’s reading. He’s just alarmed to be spoken to, afraid that being noticed means he will soon no longer have this sanctuary. He nods and tries to bluff his way through but it’s obvious he hasn’t read it, despite having looked at it for weeks straight. The librarian doesn’t say anything outright, just lets him be for now.

Next time she sees him she brings him a different book, a collection of Grimms fairy tales. He wants to complain that it’s for little kids but is too nervous to refuse it. She asks if she can read him her favorite story from it. It’s dark and twisted and fantastical and he can’t help but be drawn in by it. He’s sad when she’s done reading, wants to hear it again, to capture all the details to replay to himself later. She shows him where it starts, encourages him to read it himself. He doesn’t look at her bc he doesn’t want her to see how upset he is by that, already frustrated by the anticipation that he won’t be able to get through it. But she stays with him, helping him where he gets stuck, asking him questions about the story, making sure it’s making sense to him.

They slowly work their way through the whole collection over the course of months. They spend days on each story, repeating it until he’s confident, she never makes him feel like he’s taking too long or wasting her time. Sometimes has to reread a section multiple times, gets hung up on the language rather than the story but it’s okay, she gives him a notebook to copy down parts that spin too loudly in his mind, saving them and also releasing him from their hold so he can move forward. She lets him keep the book, tells him it was too old to stay in circulation anyway, they had a new copy on order already. She’s the first person who was patient with him, that showed him he could do it, he just needed a little more time, a little more practice than other kids.

In college this is part of why he spends so much time at the library. Part of it is his natural inclination to overwork himself, push until he’s given more than he can in hopes that it might be almost enough. He knows he’s never been enough, why would that change just because he’s in a new place? But the other part is he simply needs more time to get through the coursework, to make it through the excessive amounts of reading he’s assigned. Some other students don’t even bother to read but he would never do that, he makes sure that he not only reads every chapter assigned but he reads it again, takes notes, highlights, annotates, does everything in his power to be prepared. Sure he might work himself to the point of exhaustion, to the point where he makes himself sick (though he’ll try to deny that too) but he’s never caught trying to read something while others wait for his answer, the letters and sounds meaningless, slipping away from him faster the more eyes he feels turn towards him, wondering what could be taking so long. No one ever gets the chance to laugh at him for being slow in college, he never allows them to see that side of him.

As an adult, the leader of the BAU, he’s too well respected for anyone to dare laugh at him but he still hates feeling unprepared. This ends up looking like long nights in the office, reviewing case files to the point of memorization, so that he won’t have to read any of it in front of his team. He can if he has to, he’s developed skills over the years, ways to calm the panic that only makes it harder, can fake it well enough that no one would really notice. Until one day, distracted by a migraine and the fallout of some fight with Haley, he gets stuck. He can’t remember something and he tries to read the sentence that has the information but the stupid word just won’t resolve into sounds that make sense and he just stops talking. He’s glaring at the form like it might catch fire. No one says anything for a moment while he tries to refocus, tries to work around echoes of laughter, decades long past but always ready to jump out at him if he lets his guard down, allows a mistake, a tired moment to derail the image of perfect competence that he’s built around himself. Penelope jumps in, finishing the thought, completing the list of traits shared by the victims. He forces himself to smile at her because he really is grateful, it wasn’t her fault. She scrunches her nose at him, dismissing his silent thanks with a toss of her head. It was nothing, everyone needs a little assist now and then.

No one brings it up and he doubles his efforts not to let anyone see. But he’s so tired on the plane coming back from a case, he’s been staring the same forms for an hour at least. He can feel his ears turning red with frustration. There’s really no reason he has to do this now but the fact that his mind is refusing, almost seems to be teasing him, makes him dig in harder. Emily sits down opposite him, pulling the folder away without asking. He’s about to say something sharp, something he’ll regret saying to her when he really means it for himself, but the expression on her face is so odd, smiling with a frown between her eyebrows. It isn’t pity, she respects him far too much, but there is curiosity and something else, something soft.

“Drink with me.” She slides him a glass and they don’t talk, just look out the window, look at the light playing off the ice in their glasses. He doesn’t see the file again until it appears on his desk, every form neatly filled out, the places needing his signature flagged. All but the last spot, where she’s signed his name eerily perfectly, difficult for even him to see that it’s not his own. Just so he knows she can if she wants to. Equal parts offer and threat.

Penelope and Reid start a book club. Derek joins right away. Emily rolls her eyes when she’s invited, muttering something about spending her free time on more work but they know she will join. Rossi flat out refuses to read the books but offers his house for meetings. Hotch hesitates, wanting to say yes but nervous to commit to an activity like that. He loves books, loves to talk about books. He doesn’t love a time limit on books.

The next time they have to drive to a case, Derek puts on a copy of the audiobook. It’s the first time they make it to a destination without any bickering from the backseat. They don’t get through the whole thing but later he finds a copy of the audiobook on his desk, complete with a disc player and headphones.

A different month, Reid tells him about how his mother always used to read him books and somehow finesses an offer to read to Hotch without him even realizing he’s accepted it. So Spencer comes in to Hotch’s office on lunch breaks occasionally and reads to him whatever the book of the month is. He loves it, remembering the first person who read to him, how shocked he’d been to be treated with patience, with understanding and wondering how he got so lucky to be surrounded by people like her, so ready to support him, wanting him there with them rather than off alone, uselessly fighting with himself to prove his self sufficiency over some uncooperative letters.

Okay, that was so much more than I was planning on but here we are. I hope you liked it and thank you SO much for the idea. If you ever have any others you want to share I am totally here for it. :)

Send me requests!

[translations-by-aiimee]

Mistakenly Saving the Villain - Chapter 3

Original Title: 论救错反派的下场

Genres: Drama, Romance, Xianxia, Yaoi

TW for this chapter: Mentions of slave trafficking

This translation is based on multiple MTLs and my own limited knowledge of Chinese characters. If I have made any egregious mistakes, please let me know.

Chapter 3 - Born Without Tears

The red-dressed beauty lightly opened his vermilion lips and blew into the jade flute. The flute sound was full of lingering affection, softly touching his heart, as if he was inviting all listeners to join the red curtain and share the scenery together.

Song Qingshi's mother was an internationally renowned pianist. Because of her influence, music had become Song Qingshi's only hobby outside of school. In the last days of Song Qingshi's life, he had lost all body functions, but his consciousness was extremely clear.

His mother invested heavily in installing top-notch audio equipment in his room to play music everyday. She also asked top musicians in various fields to give him a small concert every day.

Music rescued him from the brink of despair and soothed his heart. During this special time, Song Qingshi was particularly sensitive to the emotions in music. He could hear the player's tenderness in the passionate piano music, and he could also find hidden encouragement in the sad and solemn guzheng music. . .

Now, he heard the familiar struggle and despair in the lingering and affectionate sound of the flute.

Song Qingshi finally raised his head, staring at the brilliant phoenix in a daze. He could no longer look away.

Jin FeiRen found out that Song Qing finally became interested in one of the beauties, and he was overjoyed: "Song Xianzun is interested in this slave? His name is Yue Wuhuan, naturally charming, a rare wood single-spirit root. That means he's much more resistant when tossing him around in bed. The more you rough him up, the more unhinged he comes. Those who have tried it have never failed to boast about it. Do you want to taste him first?"

Song Qingshi's ears were reddened by his explicit recommendation. He quickly turned his eyes away, and said dumbly: "No need."

"Medicine Master Xianzun is clean and does not engage in those activities. If you don't love these things, don't force him, friend." LingBao Xianzun came over, pointing to Yue Wuhuan and exclaimed, "If I remember, was this the best product sold by Xie Que? This immortal world is still the best place for him to raise beautiful people; one is more tasteful than the last. Alas, I have a friend who is his good friend, and all kinds of better goods will be sold to you first."

Jin FeiRen waved his hand and said, "You flatter me. What he really has a good relationship with are thirty hu of mermaid pearls."

LingBao Xianzun laughed: "If all friendships in the world could be created with money, my friend would be surrounded by the most affectionate people in the world. Come, come, let me have three cups with my friend and celebrate the wind and moon together.

Jin FeiRen also laughed, and ordered the young man in his arms to fill a glass of wine and drink with LingBao Xianzun.

LingBao Xianzun had already drunk a lot. He was slightly drunk. He leaned against the table and listened to the flute. He exclaimed: "I remember that when this beauty first entered this place, he was reluctant to accompany guests, even under the control of Acacia Seal. It was very interesting to see, but now he has become so promiscuous, and his flavour has changed. You have great methods, my friend."

Jin FeiRen shook his head: "It's a pity that this beauty doesn't cry no matter how rough you toss him around. He was born without tears, and because of that, some of his appeal has been lost."

Song Qingshi heard the professional question and couldn't help answering: "Being born without tears may be a problem with the lacrimal secretion system."

Jin Fei was dumbfounded for a moment. He appreciated his friendship with Song Qingshi, but he couldn't keep up with his medical obsession. He had to laugh awkwardly and switch off the topic: "Don't look at this beauty's promiscuity deceive you. In the mortal world, he was also a noble and respectable prince. When he was eight years old, Xie Que found that he had excellent aptitude when he was looking for beauties in the mortal world, so he showed his supernatural powers and presented the emperor with a pill for prolonging life. The old emperor was so happy that he happily gave his son to the immortal leader. Xie Que is also an ingenious person. He will seriously accept mortals with spiritual roots as disciples, and coax them to trust him. Then he uses that trust to trick them to sign the spiritual contract of voluntary slavery. He then teaches them superficial techniques, and, when they appear to be at their peak, brands them with the Acacia Seal. He always gets them when the colour is at the best time for picking, and then sells them to the brothels to serve in their rooms.

Although everyone knew he was taking advantage of those loopholes, they all turned a blind eye and eventually accepted this method of slave trafficking."

The Yanshou Pill can only be taken once to extend someone's life to reach 100 years old.

Cultivators can live at least three hundred years so long as they build a good foundation base. They don't need this tasteless kind of thing at all. Most of them are bought for their mortal servants. The price is very cheap, only worth two low-grade spirit stones. Such huge profits have continued to promote the slave trade.

There is an endless stream of cultivators in the trade, but none of them are well-versed as Xie Que.

Song Qingshi was surprised to find in his memory that the original body had seen Xie Que before.

That spring, the original body was studying a new way to create pills behind closed doors. Xie Que came to seek medical treatment with a comatose child. The child was a mortal, about eleven or twelve years old, with a rare pure yang physique and a wood spiritual root. Moreover, when he reached the third rank, his talents were different, and he was even better than some of the wasted descendants of various immortal families. Xie Que said that it was his new apprentice who had recruited more than three years ago. When he went to the mountains to practice, he was bitten by a Devil Mask Snake. Devil Mask Snakes are not extremely poisonous, but they will turn the faces of the poisoned person different colours, just like they were wearing a mask.

The original body typically didn't treat mortals, but Xie cried out in tears, saying that this was his most important apprentice, and he was willing to pay a high price to save him. The original body was in a good mood at the time, and was annoyed by his repeated crying. The Devil Mask Snake poison was also easy to detoxify. He finally relented and ordered a servant to give him two detoxification pills and ordered Xie Que not to cry again.

Xie Que stayed beside the apprentice’s bed and took care of him for three days. The apprentice woke up from a coma, his body no longer in a serious condition, but it took time for the ghost marks on his face to disappear. They stayed in the valley for half a month, and waited until his apprentice's face fully recovered.

During that time, the peach blossoms in the medicine garden bloomed just right, like red brocade all over the sky. When the original body encounters a problem with his alchemy, he often sits in a high place and looks at the peach blossoms and thinks. Every time, the original body would see a small figure under the peach blossom practicing swordsmanship. He practiced in the morning, at noon, and at night, as if it had become a landscape of symbiosis with the peach blossoms.

Mortals trying to cultivate immortality are like a fish leaping over a dragon's gate. The path comes with many difficulties and dangers, and there are few successful ones.

Xie Que was always by his side, with a worried expression on his face. He was either afraid that he would drop his sword or that he would become exhausted. The two quarreled several times. On a whim, the original's body and mind let out a spiritual thought to investigate. He heard the child say to Xie Que: "Master, although mortals are not as good as immortals, my father taught me to reward my diligence, and diligence can make up for my weaknesses. So I have to work harder and never waste time."

"What you said makes sense," Xie Que tried to persuade him with a bitter face. "Your injury has not healed. I'm afraid you might hurt your body. And. . . why do you have to practice sword? Entertaining cultivation, wouldn’t it be better for you to learn some flute, piano or something?"

"Master taught me to use music to cultivate Taoism is very good," the child scratched his head embarrassedly. "But I like swords, I want to be like Mo Yuan Jianzun. Master, rest assured, I know all the songs you taught me. I practiced better than my senior brothers and sisters, and I definitely don't put off practice."

Xie Que had no choice but to say: "I will find you the right ice silk gloves later. You must wear them when you practice swords. You must soak your hands with lotion at night to make your hands soft. This will prevent calluses, so you won't miss the subsequent practice."

The child cheered, excitedly: "Master, you are so kind."

"Don't get hurt," Xie Que lightly knocked on his forehead and complained. "You naughty devil. Your master is terrified. From now on, stay in the sects when you practice, and you are not allowed to go to the back mountains. Take breaks as well to avoid ruining your eyes."

The child accepted all these conditions.

Xie Que leaned over, rubbed his head gently, and sighed: "You don't know how much Master values you. . ."

"I know." The child raised his head and said in a serious voice: "I know that the immortal world looks down on mortals that cultivate immortality, and even looks down on the master who only accepts mortals as disciples. I don't want to shame my master, so I must cultivate a Golden Core to prove to everyone that Master’s vision is right!"

Xie Que looked at his face silently, his eyes distant and difficult to distinguish.

The child pulled Xie Que's sleeves, turned his eyes, and said embarrassedly: "Wuhuan likes Master the most!"

Xie Que stretched out his fingertips, stroked the child's colorful face, looked carefully, and finally stopped reluctantly on the small red mole under his left eye, which was dazzlingly beautiful. He was silent for a long time, showing a very kind smile: "Master also likes you the most."

. . .

[august-anon]

Tickletober Day 13 - Wake up!

Fun fact: this is the very first fic I wrote when prepping for tickletober and that's why it's so plot-heavy lol. It's also one of my favorite fics I've written for tickletober, so I hope you guys enjoy it! Also, sorry for the bit of angst lol

Fandom: Gravity Falls

Ship(s): platonic Pines fam

Characters (lee/ler): Lee!Dipper, Lee!Mabel, Ler!Stan (also Ford is here briefly)

Word Count: 1691 words

Summary: Stan may have difficulty recalling anything now, but at least he knows the kids will be a constant.

[ao3 link]

-----------------------------------

Stan sat at the kitchen table, staring down at Mabel’s scrapbook and flipping through pages. He hadn’t been able to stop since she’d given it to him a few days ago, after they all realized how much it had started helping his memory.

The thing was, Stan couldn’t remember much beyond this past summer, and even that was fractured at best. Ford told him stories, of course. Their mom, their dad, their brother. He’d told Stan about the Stan ‘O War, about how they’d always been there for each other, about shenanigans the two of them had gotten into. Stories from Ford’s perspective could only do so much, though. And Stan wasn’t as clueless as Ford thought he was, he could clearly see that Ford was holding a lot back.

Something had happened between the two of them. Possibly multiple somethings. And not good somethings, seeing as Ford wouldn’t crack.

It was disorienting and uncomfortable, to have so much of his life blank. He forgot names, faces, places. He had lapses, even with memories they thought he’d recovered permanently. Sometimes, on bad nights, Stan forgot who he was entirely again, and where he was, and why this strange man that looked like him was trying to tell him to calm down.

He didn’t know why he gave it all up. Stan’s family said, repeatedly, that what he did saved them, all of them. Even people he didn’t know or couldn’t remember. Stan wished that it brought him peace, knowing that, but it never did. He did know, though, that if it came down to it, he would probably make the same choice again in a heartbeat.

No one was hurting those kids, or his brother, ever again. Not if he could help it.

“Stanley?” Someone called from nearby. Stan got the notion that it wasn’t the first time they’d tried to get his attention.

He glanced up, seeing Ford in the doorway to the kitchen. He chuckled, slipping into a nonchalant persona that felt comfortably familiar, even if he hardly remembered it.

“Sorry, lost in thought, I guess,” he said, knocking a fist against his forehead. “Didja need something?”

Ford’s smile was tight around his eyes, like he knew exactly what Stan had been lost in thought about. “No, not at all.”

An awkward silence spread through the room again and an anxious feeling rose up in Stan’s chest. Was he supposed to be remembering something? Was this another routine he forgot, and now he was messing up the steps?

“Why don’t you go wake the kids?” Ford offered, cutting through the silence. “I can make us all breakfast. It’s starting to get late, anyway.”

Stan snorted. “Eight thirty is hardly late, Poindexter,” he said, but he was already rising from the table even as he said it, closing the scrapbook as he went.

Sure, the kids would probably be a bit grumpy. He would too, being woken up so early during a day off, especially in summer, but it gave Stan a task. Something to do that would (hopefully) be hard to mess up, memory or not. 

So Stan dragged himself up the stairs to the attic and quietly pushed open the door to the kids’ room. He sighed when he saw the two of them curled up together in Dipper’s bed. He wasn’t surprised that they were having nightmares. He couldn’t fall asleep either, most nights, but instead of a face or voice haunting him, he had no name to put to his tormentor. Stan didn’t know if that made it easier or harder.

He heard them shuffling around at night when he couldn’t sleep, whispers carrying down through the old wooden house. Never enough for the words to travel, though, just the tone: angry, scared, tired, resigned. These kids acted far too old for their age.

Stan was rather tempted to just leave them and let them sleep. They clearly weren’t sleeping any better than him or Ford, the dark bruises under their eyes only accentuated by the shadows from the window. Really, Stan doubted anyone had been sleeping well, ever since what the town had dubbed “Weirdmaggedon.”

Maybe the kids would benefit from some time outside their realms of nightmares. He could already see Mabel’s face scrunching up in fear.

But how did he wake them? How did one wake an almost-teenager? Shake them? Poke them until they got annoyed enough to open their eyes? Talk really loud until it drew them out of dreamland? None of that seemed like it would lead to very happy children.

Stan sighed again and quietly entered the room, moving to stand next to the bed. Mabel made a distressed sound in her sleep and Stan couldn’t help but let out a sympathetic hum, tucking some of her tangled hair behind her ear. Mabel scrunched up her shoulder weird and a smile briefly tugged at her lips.

Now there was an idea.

Stan may not have had much memory left, but he knew a ticklish kid when he saw them. It felt a little rude to just tickle them right awake, though. Stan figured that would be pretty startling, while coming out of a nightmare. Instead he gently grabbed each of their shoulders and carefully shook them.

“Kids,” Stan said, voice low but not quite a whisper. “Kids, it’s time to wake up.”

Mabel’s face scrunched up, this time in annoyance and not fear. “Grunkle Stan, no,” she moaned, slurring her words in her half-asleep state and rolling over to bury her face in a pillow.

“Too early,” Dipper grumbled, and pulled the blanket over both of their heads.

Stan couldn’t help but chuckle. “Alright, maybe it is a bit early for grumpy pre-teens. But you know who it’s not too early for?”

Twins gasps sounded from under the blanket, and Stan got the distinct feeling that they’d gone through this song and dance before. Well, at least it was reassuring that his personality didn’t seem to have changed much, despite the gaps in memory.

“Grunkle Stan, wait!” Mabel cried, and it already sounded like she was laughing.

“No, no!” Dipper yelled, but his voice was giddy and excited.

“There’s no Grunkle Stan, here,” Stan growled, ripping the blanket off the two of them. “There’s only… the Tickle Monster!”

Dipper and Mabel shrieked as Stan lunged.

Even if Stan himself didn’t remember, it seemed like his fingers did. One hand clawed into Dipper’s stomach, making him squawk and cackle, while the other quickly buried itself up under Mabel’s arm, making her shriek and squeal. Stan couldn’t help but laugh along with the two of them, their laughter being painfully contagious.

“Hey,” Stan said, a goofy grin spreading across his lips. “Did you know, my ex-wife still misses me--”

Dipper and Mabel both groaned through their laughter.

“But her aim is getting better!”

Stan laughed, and he was certain that if the kids weren’t laughing too hard to talk, they would be making the usual assortment of annoyed comments. 

“Wow, kids, I know I’m funny, but I didn’t know my jokes were that good.”

Mabel’s legs had started kicking, trying to propel her away from the tickling fingers, while Dipper seemed to curl in on himself as he snorted and cackled. It was an interesting dichotomy, with them being twins, and reminded Stan a lot of him and Ford when they were younger--

Well well, looks like goofing off did some good for Stan, after all.

But Stan decided that he had plenty of time to focus on that, later. For now, he needed to finish these kids off and get them down to breakfast. Preferably soon, because the realization that Ford could not cook and would likely burn the Shack down had also just hit him.

Stan leaned down, deciding to do his big finish on Dipper first. He pushed Dipper’s legs back down and pulled up his sleep shirt just enough to see his belly. Then, he took a deep breath and blew the biggest raspberry he could in the center of Dipper’s stomach, making sure to shake his head and rub his stubble in on it, and almost breaking to laugh at the near-scream that left Dipper’s lips. He blew a handful of smaller raspberries in a few random places before pulling back and letting Dipper breathe.

Turning toward Mabel, she had already tilted her head back like she knew what to expect. And now that he thought about it, Stan did seem to be getting a weird sense of deja-vu, so maybe this had been routine, before. Stan darted forward to blow a big raspberry against the side of her neck, hoping he didn’t go deaf from her shrill laughter right next to his ear, and blew a handful of smaller raspberries as he moved to the other side of it. There, he blew one last big raspberry before pulling back.

Stan sat on the edge of the bed as the kids caught their breath. They recovered faster than he expected, and Stan suddenly found himself tackled backwards to the bed, the kids laughing as they piled on top of him. Stan laughed, too.

“Good morning, Grunkle Stan!” Mabel yelled, far too loudly for having been asleep just moments before.

“Good morning!” Dipper echoed at a much lower volume.

“Come on,” he said. “We’d better get down to the kitchen before Ford blows the whole place up. I’m sure you two could convince him to step away from the stove long enough for me to make something.”

Dipper and Mabel both gave him incredibly mischievous looks before rushing out of the room without another word. Stan huffed out a breath, watching them go. Then, he quickly rose to follow them. Either his brother was about to get absolutely wrecked by two 12-year-olds, or those kids were about to have quite the round two (six fingers did wonders for tickling skills, based on what was coming back to Stan) and he didn’t want to miss a moment of either scenario.

After all, he knew more than anyone, now, that the memories he made with his family were beyond precious.

[fang-wolfsbane]

Transformers Generation One: A Seeker's Triangle: Chapter 02: Missing Memories

“Cover it!”

“Stabilise the thrusters!”

“Somebot come and help me with this!”

“Blade!”

“Star!”

Skywarp lurched upright. His servo resting on his chassis. Frag, he’d lost count of how many times he watched the asteroids slice into the side of the Autobot ship, tearing it open faster than a fine-tuned laser.

He remembered falling against the starboard side of the Ark, watching as both Autobots and Decepticons were yanked from the hole in the port side like dolls from a sparkling’s playhouse. One of them had been a recruit placed under his care. A femme.

No matter who he had asked after helping bring his fellows back online with th Autobots’ computerised assistant, Teletraan One, none had claimed to see her. After reporting his lack of information regarding the femme’s whereabouts to his father, Megatron, he had ended up with a visit to the medical bay and a mockery from his eldest brother, Starscream. He had made certain to repay his brother’s ‘kind advice’ with a fist to the faceplate. It had only been because of their younger brother, Thundercracker, interfering that they had broken up their fight.

All he remembered from the rest of that night was downing the little energon they had managed to steal from what the inhabitants of their prisoner planet, Earth, had called an oil rig. The inhabitants themselves had been disgusting little squiggly creatures that ran into the Autobots’ embrace the moment they showed up. He hadn’t bothered to stick around to hear what they were called, and frankly, he didn’t care.

Sighing, Skywarp sat up on his temporary berth. A pile of crates abandoned in a mineshaft that he had to fight his brothers and fellow comrades for. Megatron and Starscream had taken the deeper, cosier, corners of the mine for themselves.

It was times like this that he wished for a fellow companion beside him, if only to warm his protoform as it was freezing from the cold wind blowing in through the surprisingly large entrance. At this point he didn’t care if it was mech or femme. He hadn’t tried it voice his offer to any of his comrades. On his way to his ‘room’ the previous night, he had overheard Blitzwing mentioning to Astrotrain that he would have tried his luck with their only femme if she had still been around, even if he had to do so by force. He hadn’t known whether to reprimand or pity the mech. Blitzwing was certainly handsome, by Cybertronian standards, but the shapeshifting femme wasn’t one to toss away her armour at the mention of a pretty faceplate either.

Come to think of it, he’d never heard of the femme showing interest towards any of them, at least, not in the more private, intimate way. She had joined in on their mocking of each other about berthroom habits or situations but had never so much as mentioned taking a mech or even femme into hers. Each time one of the mechs tried their luck, she would simply shut them down, and if things got too intense after a cube or two of high grade, the femme, always sober, would put them in their place with a couple of manoeuvres he had personally taught her, along with a couple of others she claimed her frame simply remembered on its own despite not having any memory of it.

That part had always bothered him. One day he and his trine, Starscream and Thundercracker, had been going over a new strategy to try and raid an Autobot stockpile, when Megatron came in out of nowhere, a black and green coloured femme at his side, no older than somebot barely out of her teenage frame.

Starscream, ever his charming self, had resorted to taunting their father for taking an interest in the younger generation. A glare from the grey mech had shut him up with a push against the femme’s backplating, sending her stumbling into his brother’s blue arms with the order to train her to be one of them.

His brother had made a comment about having no interest in femmes that fell at his peds and shoved her over into Skywarp’s purple coloured arms instead. The femme had still wanted to make a retort when Starscream swaggered off with Thundercracker at his side, flashing a sympathetic smile towards the two of them.

Needless to say, neither had much to say to each other, which had made getting to know her strengths and weaknesses far harder than it needed to be, especially with her claim that she could remember nothing about how Megatron found her in the first place. She had claimed to already have been seen to by their resident – well, more like ex-resident at this point – head scientist, Shockwave, who had claimed that even he didn’t know how to fix her memory chips. Personally, he found it hard to believe but hadn’t pressed the matter. If Megatron didn’t need her memory chips intact, then neither did he.

He’d contemplated simply leaving her to her own devices and claiming ignorance when she messed up on her own, but the way she fidgeted had annoyed him enough to the point where he took her outside their old base and asked to see what she was capable of. And Primus, was she capable.

She asked for a couple of forms to scan, which, with some difficulty, he had provided for her. she had scanned them all one after another and changed into each and every one. Normally one bott could scan up to one form, with the rare exception of triplechangers, and be forced to stick with it for at least a decacycle, but there she had been, changing like it was nothing to her, even different types of alternate modes, sky, land and liquid-based. When he asked for her to switch in between, she hadn’t even needed to re-scan them. She claimed to be a shapeshifter, the first of her kind. How that had come to be, she claimed to not know either.

That night when he had asked Megatron for a smidge more information, his father had shrugged and claimed to not know either, only that Skywarp was to take her to Shockwave for further study whenever the scientist requested he do so. She hadn’t been too thrilled about the prospect of being poked and prodded like some lab experiment, but if there was one thing the cyclops bot did, it was staying professional. He had asked her to remove her armour multiple times, but it had always been in Skywarp’s presence, and not once did he go near her chassis or undercover plating. He even let her attach the diodes to measure certain function waves herself, only telling her where to place them and how to lock them in so that they didn’t slip during their sessions.

He had to hand it to the scientist. If it had been him, he’d have insisted on doing it himself with the claim that she would be too ignorant to handle the process. Each time she caught him staring for a little too long, one of Shockwave’s more blunt tools would find a target on the side of his helm. Whenever Skywarp scowled and demanded Shockwave restrain the femme, the scientist had simply ignored him with a comment about her being in the right to defend her dignity from his pervasive optics. Those sessions had usually ended with her demanding that Skywarp wait outside until they were done. Shockwave was inclined to agree each time.

He hadn’t realised that he’d been smirking to himself over the memories until Thundercracker came up behind him and placed a servo on his shoulder plating, yanking him from the thought of that feisty femme’s glare.

“Good recharge?” his younger brother asked, sliding into step beside him.

Skywarp huffed. “If only. It’s so fragging cold down here, I swear I’ve lost all feeling below my cod piece.”

Thundercracker merely chuckled, regaining his brother’s smile. Out of his multitude of brothers, Thundercracker was the only one that Skywarp ever felt he could really confide in. The others had their moments, but most of the time it seemed like too much of a chore to even attempt a form of conversation with them.

Their father hadn’t made it any easier either, always pitting them up against one another to see who would have the honour of taking over his throne one day. So far, whether he was deserving of it or not, Starscream had his greedy little servos flexing for the opportunity. They all knew it was only because Starscream was the first Decepticon prince that he wasn’t tossed out into the cold permanently.

The two of them reached their miniature energon storage, each taking a cube to try and quell the hunger grumbling in their abdomens. The bitter aftertaste didn’t help either. If it weren’t for their short supply or the difficulty in attaining it, he would have tossed it aside and led a raid on the inhabitant of this planet until they found something a bit more to their liking.

Megatron had forbidden any attacks on their own, especially after Starscream’s usual blunder that had ensured the Autobots knew they were still online, but he had also given them the mission to find their fellows wherever they could and to return them back to their mine base so that they could replenish their forces, if nothing else. It meant a tighter restraint on their supply, but with more bots on their side, the higher their chances were of increasing their supply. And if they just so happened to run into a potential energon supply along the way… well, there was no way they’d get into bigger trouble than Starscream would.

Tossing the rest of the pink-coloured fuel down his throat, Skywarp slung his arm around his brother’s neck, nearly causing him to spill his portion. Frankly, he’d be saving him the disgust.

“What do you say we go out and stretch our wings a little?” Skywarp asked, his lips pulling into a cunning smirk he’d had eons to perfect. Thundercracker only eyed his older brother, holding onto his cube a little tighter.

He nodded.

[fireblogger]

Tips to Reduce Spending

I’ve never had a problem with my monthly budget, mainly because it doesn’t exist. I naturally spend less than I make, therefore there’s always some money for the bills and rarely some time spent managing my money. It’s not a good situation to be in, it’s not the worse by any means, but if you want to build your savings and retire earlier you need to be deliberate with your spending and savings choices.

This is traditionally done with a budget. Now I’m not going to lie, I’m terrible at budgets. I can create them no problem, but remembering to actually follow them? Good luck.

1.     The first step to create a budget is to document your expenses. If you don’t know how much you tend to spend then it will be very difficult to create an effective budget. If most of your transactions are on debit and credit cards, then you can go back through previous months to track your spending. Or you can start tracking today so you have a better idea in the future.

2.     Once you have a good idea of how much money you tend to spend on various categories you can start building the budget itself. (Don’t forget about annual or semi-annual expenses like car insurance). Make sure you are aware of the differences between needs and wants when you are budgeting.

3.     Once you have a budget you aren’t done, you should continue to track your expenses and adjust the budget as needed.

So, now you have a budget. How does that translate to actually spending less money?  Here are some behavioral tips to help spend less money:

·       Now that you know about how much you spend on things start paying for them in cash. When you go to a grocery store with a $100 bill (or a $100 gift card) you are forced to spend less than that $100. You can’t go over, but if you had a debit card a $112 bill would approve even though it was $12 over your budget.

·       Change your daily habits to avoid temptation. Does your route to or from home pass by a fast-food restaurant that you just love? Did you just notice that you actually spend $50 a month there on coffee and French fries? Try taking a side street so you never see the sign. Do you habitually order delivery through your handy-dandy phone? Try deleting the apps, not seeing them on the phone can reduce temptation and the extra step of needing to redownload every time can slow you down when you’re thinking about ordering. Even if you don’t want to delete the app you can hide in somewhere in the back folders of your phone so you don’t see the icon and thing huh, think imma get myself some pizza.

·       If there’s a consistent ‘treat’ you like to get, think about low-cost alternatives. For example, I love pizza. Like, it’s not healthy, neither is my solution but we’re talking about money not fitness. I will often keep some tortilla shells, a cheese blend, and a bag of pepperonis on site. Then if I’m craving pizza, I can make myself a 400 calories pizza roll that costs less than 50 cents instead of spending the minimum of $10 (to deliver) which usually ends up being a $12 order which also has a delivery charge, tax, and tip and becomes something closer to $20 for a single craving?

·       Consider how your spending habits change when you’re emotional, are you more likely to buy yourself a treat and how much does that treat cost a month? Make the decision before-hand to redirect emotional buying to other positive behaviors instead. Things like working out, calling a friend, drawing a doodle of whoever pissed you off then burning it in the sink, or meditating. Whatever you do, don’t open up Amazon.

·       Ask yourself if you need something or want something before you buy it. Do you need those new shoes? Or do you want them? Taking the time to add one more mental step before actually spending the money can help reduce impulse purchases. My No Spend Year | Michelle McGagh | TEDxManchester is a great TED Talk on this topic.

·       Forget trends. Don’t even bother trying to keep up with all the newest fads. And if a fad looks really cool? Take a step back and ask yourself if you really think that this new item is actually useful and will add joy to your life, or if you just think it is because of herd mentality.

·       Don’t go into debt to buy things. This mainly applies to credit-card debt and doesn’t really apply to houses (especially if you plan on getting a duplex and renting out of it). If there’s something that’s really cool, it will still be really cool when you have the money saved up to buy it in cash. It might even be really cool and cheaper if a new model comes out in the meantime.

Pay down your debts. This is less advice to reduce immediate spending and more advice to avoid future spending on interest payments. There are two main schools of thought when it comes to paying down debt:

1.     Start with the high interest debt. This makes the most logical sense as high-interest debt will end up costing you more in the long run.

2.     Start with the lowest balance, regardless of debt: This makes the most emotional sense. People are human, and they like to see progress on their goals. The feeling of success when you pay off a debt completely can help spur you on to tackle the next debt.

Starting with the high interest debt is my preference. I want to save every penny possible, and that’s the way to do it. But if you know that you may have difficulty sticking to a plan, or if you want the satisfaction of paying off your debt then the second option is a fine one to take.

Changing your behavior and paying down debt are some of the harder steps to take when trying to spend less money overall. Here are some simpler, practical, pieces of advice:

·       Buy in bulk. When you go grocery shopping do some meal planning first and buy in bulk. If you have a larger family then stores like Costco or Sam’s Club can be very useful to get some discounted prices. However, if you’re like me and live in a very small household then buying some items in bulk at a local cheap grocery store can be just as effective without cluttering up limited storage space.

·       Explore secondhand shops for new appliances, clothes, furniture, etc. Online marketplaces like Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace can be great places to get good deals. There’s no need to spend $50 on a waffle iron when the Youth Ranch down the street or Bob around the corner is selling one for $5.

·       Price-shop. Amazon won’t always have the cheapest prices, and while convenience is nice they aren’t the only home delivery store. Shop around to see where you can get the best price for your purchases.

·       Don’t buy as much stuff, borrow it if you can. If anyone knows me then know how much I love books. I used to have multiple bookcase that I would move about once a year when I switched apartments. Over time I forced myself to give away or sell most of them, and now check the local library for my next read. And by now I mean pre-COVID-19. But post Covid I’m sure I’ll be back at it!

·       Look for long lasting, high-quality versions of products. A nice pair of shoes can last you five years or more in my experience. If you can, save up for the longer lasting versions so you don’t have to replace them as often.

·       Reduce any monthly bills that you can. If you consistently have rollover data that may mean that you should pay less for less data. If you’re going to the gym just to use the treadmill, consider walking around the block a few times instead. Decide if you really need all those streaming services that you pay for.

·       Adjust the thermostat, especially if your home isn’t especially energy efficient. Keep the apartment a little colder in the winter and a little warmer in the summer for power savings.

Finally, this is all well and good. But how do you actually follow through? The best person to answer this is yourself, but here are a few options:

1.     Get an accountability partner. You can go through each other’s finances to make sure you are hitting your goals. Having an extra set of eyes can be incredibly useful to not only spot places where expenses can be curbed, but to make sure that what’s on paper matches what you wanted there to be.

2.     Pay for everything in cash. This is reminiscent of Dave Ramsey’s cash budget. But if you have an envelope of cash labeled food, and that’s all the fast food and grocery money you have for the month it will be difficult to go over the limit. There’s also something more visceral in giving up cash as opposed to sliding a card that may make you think twice about going through with your purchase.

3.     Feel broke to be rich. Try opening a second bank account for your paycheck and bills, then set up a recurring transfer to your main checking account. If you never see the bulk of your money, and if your bank balance looks low every time you open the app to check it may be easier to avoid spending money. This isn’t a mindset that everyone wants to be in, but I’ve found that constantly feeling broke means I am far less likely to spend money on frivolities.

If you have more ideas on how to save money on a daily basis leave a comment below!

[striffyisme]

Right so I was thinking, a rarely (or rarely from where I am) discussed aspect of ADHD is reading comprehension. Most people associate ADHD and reading as generally non-compatable, as it tends to require sitting still and focusing for long periods of time. What doesn't tend to be mentioned is that ADHD actually makes the act of reading hard, on occassion.

As a kid, I was constantly stuck with my head in a book. I read all the time, sometimes multiple books a day, because of the escapism it offered. I also have really bad ADHD, that I struggle to manage as an adult. Because of that, I struggle to read now, something I'm sure a lot of other ADHDers can relate to.

So, I've made a handy image to try and show what reading with ADHD is like, for people who don't have it. Fair warning, it's not meant to be easy to see/read, so if you already have problems with that then skip to the image ID below.

[Image ID: A text note, made to be difficult to read. Large portions of the text are blurry, and warped, while some are clear, and highlighted in different colours. Text with warping reads: "Hi there! This is an... ADHD... overstimulated. Sometimes... external overstimulation... process... process... overwhelming... paragraph breaks... This... Hope this helps!" End Image ID]

Here is a transcript of what the note says, without distortion: "Hi there! This is an extremely long message. This is what it feels like to have ADHD, and have to read a long passge of words, all closely together, when your brain is overstimulated. Sometimes this can happen due to external overstimulation, like bright lights, loud noises, or even just a combination of many things, that when put together we struggle to process. Sometimes it is because our brain is struggling to process new information, which can be caused by many things, including new or overwhelming emotions, exhaustion, and burnout. Often, without paragraph breaks or something to break up a wall of text, we find it difficult to read. This is often hard to explain if you don't experience it yourself. Hope this helps!"

If you skipped the big walls of text, that's fair. It's a fairly common part of ADHD, as a lack of clear visual differentiation often makes it hard to keep track of your place whilst reading. This is one of the many factors that affect our ability to read text.

For the image itself, the distortion follows some very simple patterns of ADHD reading. First of all, we do manage to get at least the first word or two. After that, our eyes tend to dart down, desperate to find patterns in the large wall of text. This can be formatting patterns, or word patterns. This is often why we tend to skip ahead over descriptions, straight to dialogue, and then have to work backwards, as written speech almost always breaks up large walls of text into small, manageable, pieces.

This is why some of the words are highlighted. They are either repeating, or similar to words previously seen. They also tend to be longer words, as these are easier to see at a glance, or capitalised words and acronyms, as these stand out from standard lowercase text. Our eyes jump to these, as they are easy to find quickly in lines of text, and we often use these as 'anchors'.

Anchors are places in text where we work outwards from. They tend to be words, or short phrases, that we can easily see at a glance, so that if we lose our place whilst reading, we can jump back to these metaphorical save points, knowing we have processed all the words before that.

Processing itself is another problem. An inherent part of ADHD is a difficulty, or inability, to prioritize tasks. This includes reading, which often means that when confronted with a wall of text, our brains try to process the whole thing in one go. This often leads to a difficulty in telling the difference between individual lines of text, combining words, or missing things, i.e the warping. This can vary in extremity dependent on the person, and obviously gets worse when combined with other things such as dyslexia, and other learning disorders.

Combined, all of this makes reading very difficult. As mentioned in the note itself, this varies depending on how stimulated our brains are. Something not mentioned in the note, however, is that this can also occur in understimulated brains. Due to a lack of engaging material, our brains will try to process new information a lot faster, in an sort of "finally we're doing something!" excitement. This tends to backfire, as processing issues tend to make people with ADHD put off doing the task, or get frustrated, making everything harder.

This doesn't just apply to books, though that is the most common example. It can also apply to text messages, group chats particularly, menus, posters, anything that can fit more than a few sentences of text on it, really.

So, if you have any friends with ADHD, suspected ADHD, or a processing disorder, and they seem to be struggling, then it might be worth asking if they need help reading the material they're having a hard time with. Changing the form of processing (from visual to audio) can help, e.g reading it aloud. You can also help by: pointing out the most important pieces of information; reading it over and giving them a basic summary, or; whatever they think will help them most.

I know it might be frustrating to deal with, but I promise we are likely even more frustrated then you are. We are the ones living with ADHD, and so have to deal with our brains all the time. Just give us some kindness and patience, and we'll get there eventually.

Thanks for reading, if you made it all the way through this. If you have a processing disorder feel free to add onto this! Any questions shoot me an ask/message. Neurotypicals do not clown on this post.

[itshardcandy]

Strawberry Flavor - Part 1

Pairing: Kim Seokjin x Reader, Min Yoongi x Reader, Park Jimin x Reader

8789 Words

Genre: Fluff, Idiots Friends to lovers, crack

Warnings: None except some super light swearing, an unhealthy obsession for Jimin’s cakes ( I think i might have a problem idk ) and some light flirting ( I tried to create some mild tension at the end... not sure I did it right ) 

Summary: What’s a girl to do when her handsome colleague, her sweet business partner and her mysterious, piano playing friend compete for 1st place on the list of her favourite people?  

Heavily inspired by the “Another Story” individual stories in the BTS World game but with a twist. The final pairing isn’t fully decided, yet, so if you have some input or some suggestions or just a burning desire for me to twist the story into a certain direction please let me know and maybe we can work something out ;) 

IPlease don’t hesitate to give feedback and like & reblog if you enjoyed <3

______

“Strawberry Flavor! Strawberry Flavor, where are you?”

Hotel-service intern Kim Seokjin rushed into the kitchen of the hotel restaurant to find you, his colleague and only friend in this hell of an establishment,

“Yah, Strawberry Flavor! This is important, where are you?”

He knew the kitchen area would be empty at this time, save for you. Most of your colleagues had already clocked out for the night but you usually stayed longer to wait for Seokjin to finish his shift as well. Which is why he busted through the doors of the locker room, guns blazing, to find you already waiting for him and packing your things,  

“Ah, there you are! Didn’t you hear me?”

Accusingly, he thrust his hands in your direction, which were full of laundry items. You turned around, wide-eyed and flabbergasted at Seokjin’s dramatic entrance in the break room,

“Kim Seokjin, I swear on all that’s holy in this world, one of these days I will bash your head in with a frying pan, if you yell at me like that again!”

You pointed at his smug face and tried to look like you actually meant it,

“I could have been changing in here, you punk! Don’t you have any manners? Jeez, you give a guy leftover chicken and suddenly he thinks he owns the place…”,

Jin took a moment to process your words before he smiled at you and rolled his eyes,

“Ah, Strawberry Flavor, I’m sorry, I’m just so excited! You said there’s more leftover chicken again today, what am I supposed to do? Stay calm?”

You didn’t actually mean anything you said, of course, you adored your tall, handsome and broad-shouldered colleague and were glad that you had become friends. Or so he liked to think, at least,

“Yes! That is absolutely what you are supposed to do!”

You tried to answer without a smile creeping on your face but seeing Jin just did that to people. He was handsome, sure, but his face, when he got a little worked up over something, was one the funniest things known to mankind,

“You know I can’t be held responsible for my actions when chicken is involved…”

He dropped his gaze and kicked at imaginary dirt on the ground. You took a deep breath and remembered that Seokjin was essentially an overgrown child with an even more overgrown appetite,

“I saved it for you, no one’s going to steal it”

You said and Jin huffed, pouting at you,

“Ok…”

You noticed the laundry in his hands just now,

“Did Areum give you more laundry, again?”

You asked as you pointed at the various blankets and stuffed animals he was carrying,

“She said she wants them dry cleaned by tomorrow morning. How am I supposed to do that? Everyone already left…”

He explained and you sighed. That girl knew how to keep him on his toes,

“Well, you just have to come in early tomorrow and beg the guys from laundry to run an express load”

You checked the contents of your purse, before turning back to Seokjin again,

“Hm, you’re right. I should drop this in the laundry bins, right? Be right back!”

He mumbled and turned on his heels to leave,

“Can you heat the chicken up for me, please? Thank you”

You heard him say as the doors closed behind him. You shook your head and let out a long breath,

“This guy really has no shame”

You said to yourself as you grabbed your things and went to work on the chicken for Jin, so you both could finally leave, as soon as he got back.

------

As you walked along the beach promenade, a Tupperware in hand containing Jin’s chicken, you listened to him munch on a piece of it while he tried to recount all events of the day to you. Apparently, the lady, who had been staying in 306 for the last week, wasn’t as sweet as you thought. Jin told you about this morning, when he went to bring her breakfast to her room and she pinched his butt while he was on the way out. His eyes almost bulged out of his head, he was so invested in his own story,

“And then she said the bacon looks good this morning! The bacon, Strawberry Flavor! As in MY bacon! Can you believe?!”

Were he not so busy to stuff his mouth full of the wings you had saved for him, he would have ranted on about it for hours,

“No, Jin, I can’t, in fact, believe”,

“I know it looks good, I have eyes, after all, but just pinching my bacon like it was a cheap side dish…”

“Absolutely outrageous”

You commented while typing away on your phone. You knew by now that you just needed to pay attention at the right moment to appease Jin’s ego,

“Exactly!”

He flung his hand around and looked like he tried to fight someone with the chicken leg, that he was currently holding,

“Did you say anything to her? Or did you just do that creepy customer-service fake smile”

You asked, already knowing that, even if Jin talked a big game now, he probably just squeaked like a squirrel when the thirsty grandma felt him up and looked like a deer caught in the headlights when she shut the door in his face. Deep down, he probably enjoyed the attention, though,

“No, I didn’t. can’t risk an additional complaint from any of the guests with all the negative points I keep scoring with Areum…”  

He mumbled and his puffed chest deflated a bit at that,

“Ah Seokjin, don’t worry! I’m sure Areum will see soon how much effort you put into everything she makes you do!”

You patted his shoulder reassuringly and handed him a tissue to wipe the spicy chicken sauce off his face,

“Thanks, Strawberry Flavor, you always know what to say…”

Unbeknownst to you, Jin was thankful for more than just your kind words and company today. He was thankful for a lot more when it came to you and the chicken was only the cherry on top of the biggest, most delicious scoop of heart-shaped ice cream, he had ever imagined in his life.

When you two met on the day you were examined as a potential addition to the kitchen staff at the hotel, he didn’t think you’d become such an integral part of his life but he’s certainly thankful things played out the way they did. Even though he wishes he was brave enough to ask you for more, he is content to just be the best friend to you, that he could be. You deserved it. If not for you, he would have been kicked out of the hotel multiple times already because he just kept messing up so much. Most of the kitchen staff still avoided him because of the wedding cake incident a few months back. He cringed inwardly; it had not been pretty,

“And even if she doesn’t and tells Manager about all your shortcomings and he kicks you out, you can count on me to save you chicken from time to time!”

He almost chokes on said chicken when he has to laugh at your poor attempt to lighten the mood,

“Jin, you need to swallow!”

He could only laugh harder and it made you smile,

“Yah! Stop laughing! You’re gonna choke! I don’t know any first aid…”

You clapped him on the back and he slowly calmed down, still cackling like a little kid. You wanted to see him laugh like this more often, lately, because interning at the hotel wasn’t working out so well for him. He had a lot of difficulties with the service and it didn’t help that he was assigned as Areum’s caretaker during the time she would be staying at the hotel. That little girl… you knew she was only 7 but she drove you up the wall sometimes. Especially when she scolded Jin for all the things he did wrong, which was a regular occurrence,

“I’m fine, I’m fine, do you have any more tissues, though?”

Jin asked and you dug around your purse until you found one. He coughed roughly and then took a deep breath,

“Phew… Let’s just hope Manager keeps me around a little longer, yeah?”

He smiled at you and you nodded,

“He has to, or I’m going on strike. See how he handles the rioting guests when there are no more Special Strawberry Flavor Pancakes around!”

Jin puts his arm around your shoulder and hugs you to his side a little awkwardly,

“Ahh, don’t do that, you’ll be fired, too! And then who will be my chicken hero?”

You cough out an awkward laugh at the physical contact and quickly try to get your bearings back,

“Ok, ok… I won’t go on strike”

“And I’ll figure something out with Areum… she’s just a kid, how hard could it be to find something she likes to do? Do you think maybe I should try bribing her with candy?”

You opened your mouth to answer when a familiar voice interrupted you,

“Hey Rice Cake, I’m over here!”

It was your roommate Park Jimin; passionate dancer and number 1 rice cake enthusiast. He was waiting for you at the bus stop like he usually did to pick you up after work. He insisted on doing so, even if he had to take a few extra buses after dance practice to get here.

You happily waved at him and turned to Jin to say goodbye for tonight,

“There’s my ride. Well, my companion for the bus ride, anyway… You should probably come up with something more creative than bribing a little girl with candy, though, ok? I’ll see you tomorrow! Good night!”,

“Yeah, ok… Good night, Strawberry Flavor”

He smiled and waved half-heartedly after you already turned around and walked towards your friend. Park Jimin seemed like a good guy, as far as he could tell; he obviously cared about you enough to go out of his way to get you home safe and in Jin’s books that was the least you deserved. Still, he would rather he was the one to accompany you on your way home.

 _________

As Jimin watched you say goodbye to your colleague he briefly wondered why you still let him be the one to take you home when there was this tall, good-looking man in your life, who, clearly, was head over heels for you. He had known the minute he met Kim Seokjin for the first time a few months ago, that the handsome hotelier had the hots on for you. He couldn’t fault the guy, though; he knew first-hand the power your pretty smile and beautiful personality held. If Jimin didn’t feel so insecure and small in the presence of the other man, maybe they could have become friends but all Jimin could see, was a really tall, handsome and impressively built obstacle in the way of his plan to get you to be his girl when he looked at Kim Seokjin.

Jimin loses his self-deprecating train of thought pretty quickly though, when you enter his personal space and hug his arm to your chest,

“Jiminahh, I had such a good day! I can’t wait to tell you all about it”

You smiled at him and for a few precious moments he just felt lucky to have you in his life at all. Kim Seokjin and his good looks be damned. He reached for your hand and took your bag to carry it for you. He knows you would never admit it, because you’re a strong, independent woman, who don’t need no man but you secretly loved that he did all these little things to make your life a little easier. Even if it was just carrying a bag, that, quote unquote: wasn’t even really that heavy,

“Yeah? Tell me about it”

He smiled down at you, as you both went to sit down on the bench and waited for the bus to arrive and take you home,

“It was my turn to decorate all the little pastries and cakes today! Well… after I fried a shit ton of chicken for the buffet in the conference room”

You answered and Jimin smiled to himself. Decorating cakes was one of your favourite things to do, even when you helped him out in your spare time in the little rice-cake shop he inherited from his late grandmother. He was quite good at it himself, too, having watched his grandma make and decorate rice cakes with a burning passion for years, but he let you do it whenever possible, just so he could watch your face scrunch up cutely in concentration when you bent over the sweet little treats and painted fantastic floral works of art on them,

“Sounds like you had a lot of fun today”

He commented and you nodded,

“I did. And Manager even said I did good today, so that was worth all the hours I spent covered in chicken grease afterwards”

You stifled a yawn after you said that and Jimin laughed quietly. You did actually smell faintly of fried chicken but honestly? That was just a bonus because you looked like a snack already.

Just as he was about to comment on your fried chicken smell, the bus rolled into the station and you took your seats and fell into a comfortable silence for the duration of the ride. It wasn’t too long of a way home but it was enough for you take a quick nap on your friend’s shoulder, before he gently shook you awake again, to signal the imminent arrival of the bus at your station. You followed Jimin outside and as the bus rode on peacefully, you walked the rest of the way towards the rice cake shop and the apartment you shared upstairs.

You felt thankful for it every time you set foot in your shared home because it had been the first good thing to happen to you in a long while. Starting off as Granny Park’s apprentice in the rice cake business, you first met Jimin as he was about to head out and handle some deliveries for the day. He was shy at first but quickly warmed up to you when he noticed how seriously you took your work and how respectful and hard-working you were with his grandmother. Granny Park taught you and her grandson how to make the most delicious little cakes and she had even let you live in the spare room in the apartment she shared with Jimin. She had given you so much and you were determined to prove worthy of her trust. Sadly, not long after she had taken you in and you and Jimin became close friends, she passed away and left you and her grandson to continue to run the shop. You and Jimin had made some significant changes to the way the shop operated and now, it ran more profitable than ever before.  You hoped Jimin could see how happy and grateful you still were now, months later.

Jimin dropped your bag in your room and you took a few minutes for yourself to change into more comfortable clothing and wash up. Even though you got to do something fun at work today, doesn’t mean you weren’t exhausted and ready to drop dead on the bed. You took your phone out of your bag and swan dived onto the sheets. A few notifications were waiting for you, including a few texts from Jin and Yoongi, another friend of yours. Apparently Jin had finished all the chicken before he arrived home, which was a new record for him and he had sent you a selfie of him and the empty Tupperware to prove it. You snickered and replied with a few thumbs up.

[You 20:34]: Glad u liked it! U know I never met anyone with such an unhealthy love for chicken, right?

[SeokJerk 20:35]: Ha… then stop feeding my addiction! Shaming me while enabling me… smh

[You 20:36]: Ugh why am I friends with u…

Jin sent an angel emoji and you decided that was enough Jin for today and then switched to Yoongi’s chat. It was just a series of pictures of a few different outfits and a question mark at the end. He was a man of few words. You knew Yoongi had an important gig coming up and he desperately needed your input, so it didn’t surprise you that he didn’t send an entire paragraph voicing his concerns about the wrong choice of attire. You answered with number 3 and a few flame emojis and heart eyes. Going for the fancy choice while also maintaining his casual style seemed like the best way to go. He replied a few seconds later with a thumbs up. Just as you were about to put down the phone, it dinged with another text from your roommate. Why he didn’t just knock and ask whatever it was he wanted, you didn’t know. He was probably being lazy like you right now.

[Mochi 20:46]: u still up? Netflix? Or u too tired?

You debated that for a second; it was only 9 pm, you could probably remain conscious for another 2 hours or so. Even though you had to pass by the hotel to meet Jin for lunch, you could sleep in.

[You 20:48]: Sure, u gotta come here tho bc I’m not moving

2 minutes later your door creaked as Jimin opened it and walked in the room with his laptop balanced on his arm,

“I picked something good this time, I swear”

He did, in fact, not pick something good.

________

 When you woke up the next morning, Jimin was already out and about, busy bee that he is. You didn’t have to worry about getting ready just yet, since you didn’t have to meet Jin for another few hours, so you enjoyed the feeling of your soft and warm sheets for a few more minutes and played around on your phone until there was nothing left to do but get up.

Should you have breakfast? A question you asked yourself every day, regardless of the fact that the answer was always no. So, you skipped the trip to the kitchen for now and jumped in the shower straight away.

You should take care of some boring chores and house work today, as well, preferably before you met Jin.

The rice cake shop was closed for today so you didn’t have to worry about the mess downstairs for now. Maybe Jimin had left out some treats for you to take with you. You would go through the shop and check when you left.

___________  

“Yah, Seokjin! Stop hoarding the sauce!”

You snatched the little bowl from under his nose while he was distracted and finally, you could dip your food into the spicy goodness,

“Leave some in there for other people”

You added and Jin tried to act like he didn’t know you were chastising him, of all people. It was no use anyway, so you changed the topic,

“Did you get Areum’s laundry done on time?”

Seokjin nodded his head, while chewing on a spoonful of rice,

“Luckily, yes. I owe the guys from laundry big time”

He swallowed the rice and took a deep, sobering breath,

“Don’t know what she would have done, if I didn’t show up with her favourite blanket, this morning…”

He visibly shuddered at the thought and you also felt an unpleasant tingle slide down the length of your spine,

“Let’s just be thankful you’re still in one piece, hm?”

You smiled sweetly at him and Jin briefly forgot what had him so shook just seconds ago. He watched you eat some grilled vegetables for a few moments until he snapped out of his reverie,

“Thank you for meeting me for lunch, Strawberry Flavor, it would have been so boring alone…”,

“You mean there would have been less food for you to devour”

You snickered to yourself and Jin huffed,

“Don’t make me look so bad, you brat! I’m still older than you, show some respect!”

He couldn’t help but smile at how, even he, couldn’t take himself seriously. You started laughing and had to put down the food you were about to put in your mouth,

“Alright, alright, I’m so sorry, Seokjin-Oppa… I promise I’ll be a good girl from now on, ok?”

You dragged out his name and your lips formed the most adorable little pout. Although he knew you were teasing him just now, Jin felt warmth flood his cheeks and he cleared his throat,

“Ah… yes… don’t worry about it, Strawberry Flavor”

He tried to sound casual but his voice betrayed him. Alas, he was but a man, sat in front of the prettiest woman he knew, trying not to look like the complete simp he was for you. A few moments of food-related silence ensured until you put down your bowl,

“I almost forgot, I brought these for you”

You suddenly started digging around in your purse and produced a little package wrapped in simple brown paper,

“These are from a batch Jimin and I made last night. They didn’t come out shaped as nicely as usual but I thought you wouldn’t mind having them, since we can’t sell them like this”

You held the package out to him and he put down his chopsticks to receive it,

“Seriously? You didn’t have to!”

He stumbled over his own words because he felt a little touched. You thought to bring him some of your lovely rice cakes? He unwrapped the package and found a colourful assortment of sweet rice treats in the paper,

He slapped a hand over his face in a theatrical way,

“Ahh, I can’t look at them for too long, they are so pretty! Strawberry Flavor, what are you doing to me…?”

You giggled happily like a little kid when you saw his reaction to the cakes and he had to smile,

“You have to look, though, if you want to eat them!”

You tried to gently lift his hand from his eyes,

“It’s too dangerous, I’ll go blind…”

He loved making you laugh, so he would ride this wave as long as you would let him,

“So, you’re never gonna look at my cakes again?”

Well. Not that he would mind looking at your cakes once in a while, he just felt really inappropriate doing so. Or were you talking about the rice cakes? Probably the more likely option…

“Don’t sound so disappointed”

He lifted his hand and put the cakes down on the table in front of him,

“What if I feed you one? You won’t have to look then”

“Ah, Strawberry Flavor, you’re so smart! I never would have thought of that”

You rolled your eyes at him but still you smiled. You picked up your chopsticks, lifted a rice cake from the package and held it to Jin’s lips. He slowly opened up and let you place the small treat inside his mouth.

You stared at him expectantly, eyes wide,

“Good?”

You asked and, even if the cakes didn’t taste as amazing and sweet as they did, Jin would have told you they were the most delicious thing he’s ever tasted. He closed his eyes and savoured the taste before he answered:

“They are amazing”

Your lips spread into a shy smile,

“Really?”

“Really”

“Maybe you can share them with the laundry staff as a thank you?”

You suggested and Jin’s eyes went wide in disbelief,

“Are you kidding? I may owe them but I don’t owe them enough for that”,

“You are impossible”,

“Impossible to please, yes, but these are pretty close to perfection”

He grinned and you tried to hide your smile,

“Now give me one more”

He opened his mouth and waited for you to feed him another rice cake. It really was the simple things in life, huh?

_________  

Over the course of the next week you and Jimin perfected the new recipe for the revolutionised rice cakes you were going to permanently keep in your assortment of treats in the shop and they turned out to be just the right amount of chewy and sweet. You might have used Jin as your personal lab rat and fed him an obscene amount of cakes until his eyes got glassy and his shoulders sagged in satisfaction. ‘This is heavenly’ he had mumbled while chewing and you knew it wouldn’t get any better than that. Jimin trusted your opinion but he had, of course, also tasted a fair amount of cakes before he agreed with Jin’s judgement. Both of you were lucky you got a few extra days off, since you had collected some overtime in the last month, which gave you enough time to work on the cake recipe. Jimin was grateful for the extra time he got to spend with you, even if Jin had intruded on some of it. At least he got to feed you some of the extra cakes while Jin watched and tried to hide the, very much obvious, jealousy on his face.

That evening, when Jin left, he had touched your upper arm for just long enough for Jimin to consider it inappropriate. Of course, you were oblivious to their childish behaviour.

Today was your last day off before a new week of work started and there were no more cakes to prepare for the shop. Last night, Yoongi had texted you to ask if you wanted to join him for coffee and keep him company while he practised a piece for another upcoming show. You had said yes, since you hadn’t seen your friend in a while and you were happy, he wanted to spend time with you. He was the elusive kind of friend that surfaced out of the blue after periods of being completely dead to the world.

On your way to the university he studied at, you picked up coffee for both of you and a snack for Yoongi, since he usually forgot to eat when he was working on something. You found him in the usual place, already sitting at the piano on the far side of the room, playing away and not noticing your arrival until you plopped down on the bench next to him,

“Hey, Piano Man, take a coffee break”

He stopped playing and turned to you, clearly not having expected you yet,

“I didn’t think you’d be here so soon”

He said, a surprised pout on his lips. You smiled and handed him the coffee and the snack you brought him,

“Left early so I could get you some sustenance”

“How do you know me so well, hm?”

He squinted his eyes at you suspiciously before opening the paper bag and taking an experimental sniff, then nodding approvingly,

“Well, I don’t have that many redeeming qualities but I like to think keeping the people I care about fed, so they stay healthy, is one of my better ones”

You smiled shyly and took a sip of your own coffee. You were wrong though, Yoongi thought. You had a ton of good qualities; far more than he ever thought could be found in a single person. You were the reason he was still in school, after all, and to hell if you didn’t think that counted for something,

“I don’t like it when you do that”

He mumbled under his breath and took a sip of that sweet, sweet bean juice that would bring warmth back into his heart and soul,

“Do what?”

You asked, creasing your brows in confusion,

“That thing where you talk badly about yourself and cover it up with humour”

You huffed and ran a hand through your hair,

“You act like you don’t do that, too”

You accused him and he gave you a look that just said ‘really?’

“I don’t, not like that, anyway. I know I’ve got some good qualities, I’m just super insecure, anxious and nervous at all times, there’s a difference”

Well. He got you there,

“So, stop talking like that, yeah? You know you’re a good person, Serenity, no need to doubt yourself”

He knew he didn’t have a way with words as much as he had a way with the keys on the piano. He just hoped that the essence of what he meant bled through the words and reached your core. He really did mean it like that: you were a good person. In fact, you were the best person in his life, even if he couldn’t show it in a way that he felt would be meaningful enough for you. Through all the problems and hardships thrown at him by his professors and the university and all the obstacles placed in his path by all the policies, regulations and deadlines, you had been there to support him and provide him with advice. You grounded him when his nerves threatened to reach a breaking point and you helped him find the calm and peaceful place in himself that he could retreat to when the world became too much.  

He had told you so in his own way; calling you his Serenity, when he felt you needed a push to take his words seriously,

“Alright… I’ll work on it, ok?”

You picked at your nails when you agreed and he was satisfied with the conclusion,

“Ok”

He said calmly and sipped his coffee,

“So, how’s practice going?”

You asked, changing the topic,  

“You tell me. You heard me playing when you snuck in like a damn ninja”

Yoongi answered and grinned,

“Everything you play sounds good to me but I’m also not a professional musician, so my opinion isn’t really gonna help you much…”

You would always tell him when you liked a piece, he introduced you to but beyond that? You had close to zero knowledge about music and all the terms and whatnot used to describe it, so Yoongi would have to be satisfied with you either saying ‘it’s great’ or ‘I love it’ repeatedly,

“Hm, fair enough”

He grumbled and turned back to the keyboard. To anyone else, he probably sounded condescending but you two were close enough for you to know, that was far from his intention. He just gave off particularly grumpy and unapproachable vibes at all times.

He sighed loudly and rolled his head around to loosen up some tension in his neck and shoulders,

“Alright… well, will you listen to it anyway?”

He asked and placed his hands on the keys according to the notes on the music sheet,

“Take it away, Maestro”

You said and the smallest smile crept its way onto his face before it scrunched up in concentration and he started playing.

_________  

Work was really slow today for some reason. Well, as slow as work in the kitchen of a hotel with hundreds of guests can be. But it felt slower than usual and you had yet to feel like ripping your uniform off and quitting dramatically in the heat of the moment, like you usually did. The majority of the guests currently occupying the rooms were tourists, who only visited the small fishermen town for the yearly celebration of exactly that: the fishermen who had inspired the people of the town to celebrate their work over the hundreds of years since the town had been established. By now fishing wasn’t the main source of the town’s income anymore but regardless, the tradition of celebrating was still going strong. The main source of income was now tourism.

It also meant dinner shift didn’t make you want to repeatedly punch the wall. Who would’ve thought that less guests equals less work?

As you enjoyed a few minutes of relative peace and quiet in the kitchen, you thought about your own relationship with the festival. A while ago, you and your friends, and also some of their friends, had decided you’d all visit the festival together this year and you were looking forward to it. You and Jimin would have to man your little rice cake booth for a while but since you were the business owners you could decide when you would close up and enjoy the rest of the festivities. You would probably only have the booth up during the day and leave it closed in the evening so you would have time to join your friends and get the party going. The festival was approaching fast and you had a feeling it would be a series of nights to remember.

Your thoughts were interrupted by a few new room-service orders, delivered by none other than your favourite colleague and intern, Seokjin. He entered the kitchen through the big double doors and invaded your workspace like it was nothing. Classic Jin,

“Strawberry Flavor, do you have time to make all this? It’s for Areum and another guest”

He handed you a note with a couple of orders scribbled onto it in terrible handwriting. Luckily you were accustomed to Jin’s writing by now and deciphering it was no problem for you anymore,

“Hm, sure, although… it’s already pretty late, Areum shouldn’t have any sugar before bedtime, don’t you think?”

You answered and Jin nodded, looking thoughtful,

“I guess you’re right… what else can you make for her? I don’t wanna show up empty handed”

You mulled it over for a second, tapping you bottom lip with your pointer finger,

“How about something light like a yogurt with a little bit of fruit in it? Nothing special but I can make it look really nice for her”

You suggested and taped the note to your workstation, so you could get started on the other orders, as well,

“Sounds good”

Jin simply said and leaned against the counter to watch you prepare the food. Like yours, his day had been a little less eventful than usual and he was thankful for the extra time he got to relax in between chores. He chose to use a few minutes to talk to you and watch you work. He liked seeing you whirl around the kitchen and grabbing ingredients here and there to put together a perfect meal. He loved food and he loved it even more when you were the one to prepare it. He was sure all the guests that were lucky enough to have their food made by you could taste all the love and effort you put into it,

“Jin, can you come help me? I can’t reach the damn pan on the shelf!”

Jin listened up and pushed himself away from the counter to walk over to where you were standing on your tiptoes, trying to reach the highest shelf,

“Sure”

He said and before you could step aside to make room for him, he stood behind you and placed a hand right next to you to support his weight while he slightly pushed his body forward to reach the shelf. You felt his chest pressed to your back and suddenly your hands felt a little clammy,

“I can reach it but I can’t move it, there’s too much other stuff around on the shelf”

Jin said and you cursed the person who reorganized the shelves the other day,

“Wait a second, I’ll get you something to step on”

You mumbled and tried to move away from Jin but he had a different idea,

“Don’t bother, I’ll just pick you up and you can get it. It’ll be easier, just do it like this”

He maneuvered you around until he was leaning with his back against the shelf and you stood in front of him. Usually you would have protested against this. So much physical contact was not only strange for you and Jin but it was also inappropriate in your place of work,

“Jin, what are you doing?”

You mumbled to yourself while Jin was already bending his knees and wrapping his arms around your middle. You took a deep breath and let out a surprised squeak when Jin lifted you off the ground. The position was more than inappropriate but Jin didn’t seem to mind,

“Is this ok? Am I holding you too tight?”

He asked, seeming concerned with your uncomfortable expression,

“No, no”

You cleared your throat and started to support yourself with your hands on his shoulders,

“It’s fine, just… don’t drop me, ok?”

you looked down at his handsome face and he smiled gently up to you,

“Don’t worry, I won’t”

You held onto his shoulders a little tighter. They felt nice, strong. Did he work out?

“Can you get it?”

He asked and you remembered the pan, so you let go of his shoulders,

“Ah… yes, just a second”

No rush, thought Jin. You started rummaging around the shelf and moving things around to make room for the pan. While you moved around a little more you felt Jin squeeze you a little tighter and it didn’t feel as uncomfortable anymore.

Jin knew he had taken a risk with this but he also just wanted an opportunity to get closer to you. He didn’t do anything too inappropriate; he would never touch you in a way that would make you feel uncomfortable or unsafe. He knew you trusted him and he knew you knew that he valued that trust. Thus, he also knew, you wouldn’t mind it if he held you like this. Granted, he didn’t think his face would be this close to your boobs but it wasn’t like he would ever complain about that. He wouldn’t mind being even closer.

You had finally managed to procure the pan without pushing anything else off the shelf and Jin had let you slowly slide out of his secure grip until you were the one looking up at him, again. You brushed your shirt off and cleared your throat once more before awkwardly thanking him,

“I’ll get back to work…”

You mumbled and walked back to your station. You couldn’t exactly explain why you felt a little nervous all of a sudden. Or why your mouth had run dry. Or why you felt a tingle in the places where Jin’s big and gentle hands had touched you. You also couldn’t exactly explain why your innocent friendship suddenly didn’t feel so innocent anymore.

_________

Jimin couldn’t pick you up from work tonight and when you got home, you peeked through his open door and found him already fast asleep in his bed. You had hoped he would still be up when you came home but you guessed practice must have been especially exhausting today. You quietly closed the door and retreated to your own room to unwind and then go to sleep, too. Tomorrow would be an eventful day for both of you, since you needed to transport your little booth to its spot on the festival area and decorate it; make it look pretty and approachable for all the visitors and potential customers.

Together, you had developed a nice decoration scheme and decided to go with minimal but effective. Small but cute decorative figures and little Stickers for the children to take with them. Working with Jimin was always so easy. You couldn’t remember even a single time when you and him had to argue about something because you both preferred to stay rational and talk it out like adults.  

You had recruited Jin and one of Jimin’s closer friends, Namjoon, to help you transport and set up your booth. You weren’t thrilled at Joon’s involvement in the delicate process because the independent writer had a reputation for being one of the clumsiest people alive. And even if you were thankful for the help, you were going to need to be prepared to deal with any major damage Joon would most likely cause.

For now, all you wanted to do was sleep and recharge for the events of the next day, yet you felt restless.

Nervousness started to creep in on you and you only tossed and turned in your sheets, unable to fall asleep. Were your rice cakes really going to sell tomorrow? Would the visitors of the festival actually consider your booth and try the cakes? Maybe the recipe wasn’t perfect, yet, after all… Suddenly you sat up and sighed deeply,

“Ah.,. let’s just check the recipe one last time, I won’t be able to sleep, anyway”

You mumbled to yourself and pulled a thin nightgown over your body before you made your way back through the dark apartment. Stumbling over a box you or Jimin left in the hallway, you made your way down into the shop and started putting together the ingredients for the dough. You tried to rustle around the kitchen as quietly as possible, not wanting to risk waking up Jimin, who clearly needed the rest more than you,

“Ok… let’s do this”

Cracking your knuckles, you looked at the prepared work space.

The bowls of ingredients stared back at you, taunting you and your skills as a baker,

“Ugh, this is ridiculous”

You rolled your eyes and took a deep breath. It couldn’t be so hard, could it? Why was this making you so nervous?

“Rice cake? What are you doing in the shop so late?

Jimin’s soft voice pulled you out of your thoughts and you turned around to see him standing on the last step the stairs and leaning against the wall. He was looking at you, squinting his eyes sleepily and trying to adjust to the light,

“Jimin, why are you up? Did I wake you? I’m sorry, I tried to be quiet”

You said and moved around a little to try and cover up the bowls behind you,

“Are you ok? You look stressed”

Jimin walked over to you and put his hand against your forehead, trying to feel your temperature,

“I’m fine, I just couldn’t sleep”

You pulled his hand away from your forehead,

“Do you need something to help you sleep? Tea, maybe? I can make you some soup or porridge- “

“Jimin, I’m fine, really”

You smiled at his suggestions, loving how he wanted to care of you,

“Thank you, though. I think I just need a minute or so, to calm down”

He nodded and pursed his lips, then he noticed all the stuff behind you on the counter,

“What’s all this?”

He craned his neck to get a better look and you gently pushed against his chest to avoid having to explain yourself,

“You want to prepare cakes, right now? It’s the middle of the night”

His creased brows and confused expression made you feel a little bit guilty,

“What’s really going on? Are you nervous about tomorrow?”

He asked and you felt yourself at a loss for words,

“I- “

You were surprised time and time again, how well Jimin knew you and could how easily he could tell what really went on inside your head,

“Well… if you really wanna know, then, yes. I’m a little worried”

You confessed and turned your eyes to the floor, then continued your explanation:

“I’m worried people won’t like our booth and the cakes. We’ve put so much work into this shop… what if it was all just a waste of time? I know the locals like what we do but that won’t be enough to sustain a growing business for long, you know? I was hoping we’d branch out eventually, maybe open up another shop in the next big city, or something. If we can’t convince a few lousy tourists to buy from us, then how are we going to establish ourselves anywhere else?”

“That’s what you’re worried about? That people won’t like the cakes?”

He asked and you pouted. When he said it like that, your worries seemed so small and unreasonable,

“Yeah…”

You kicked at some imaginary dirt, wanting to avoid Jimin’s kind eyes at every cost but he wouldn’t have it, trying to wiggle into your line of sight even if you turned your head away from him,

“Hey, Rice Cake, look at me…”

“No, I feel stupid for worrying”

“It’s not stupid to care about what you do. This shop and the cakes, they’re your babies. They’re also my babies but without you, I wouldn’t even have made it to this point. So, don’t feel stupid for wanting to succeed”

Maybe he had a point, you thought. You let out a quiet breath and lifted your gaze to find Jimin smiling reassuringly at you,

“Ok”

“Ok? You sure?”

He asked and gently nudged your arm with his elbow,

“Yes, I’m sure”

You said, finally smiling again,

“Good. Now tell me… is it only me, or are you suddenly craving something sweet?”

Jimin raised his brows expectantly,

“I don’t know, I guess I could eat something”

You answered and Jimin chuckled,

“Then it’s a good thing we’re both so good at baking, right?”

Jimi whipped past you and started to mix up all the stuff you had laid out and you just watched in astonishment, unable to believe the nerve of this guy,

“What are you waiting for? Get to it, the flour won’t sift itself”

You just shook your head, smiling to yourself and thanking every higher power out there, that Park Jimin existed in your life.

The two of you worked in comfortable silence for a while. You worked well together in the kitchen. All the time spent down here, working on recipes, manoeuvring around the limited space without bumping into each other had really helped your coordination as a team. Jimin had whipped up some creamy dough and you were about to prepare the steamer. You watched Jimin whisk the mixture a little more until he was satisfied with the consistency. You watched him curiously, prepared to take the batter off his hands and form little balls to put in the steamer but you found yourself not only watching the whisk but also the arm whisking it. A very nice arm, one might say. Smooth skin, visible veins and strong muscle, all working together to create a picture you found yourself admiring a little, if you were being honest. Objectively speaking, Jimin was handsome; no one, not even you, could deny it. Years of passionate dancing had shaped his body in a way, that you could definitely appreciate. Even though you lived together, you had never seen Jimin wearing less than jeans and a t-shirt. An unspoken rule about decency had always kept you two from crossing each other when you were wearing anything other than a full outfit. The fact that he was standing before you in a tank top and sleeping shorts, was what made this situation feel even more out of the ordinary, than it already did.

You pulled your nightgown tighter around yourself, more aware of your own state of (un)-dress. Your shorts were even shorter than Jimin’s and you wondered, if he also felt a little weird about the situation. If he did, he didn’t let it show,

“You ready for me, Rice Cake?”

He asked you without looking up from the bowl,

“Yes, I’m ready”

“Wanna taste it first? Make sure it’s good?”

Jimin’s voice suddenly didn’t sound so soft and gentle anymore. You stuttered and then cleared your throat,

“Um, I trust you”

You replied, sounding a little insecure,  

“You sure?”

Jimin looked up at you now, focused on your unsure expression. He put away the whisk and slowly dipped a finger into the batter and then placed it in his mouth, without breaking eye contact.

A quiet moan left him and he smiled,

“Come try it, have a little taste”

He beckoned you forward with a curled finger and your feet moved on their own accord until they were planted firmly on the ground, next to Jimin’s

“Ok”

You mumbled and looked up at him,

“Close your eyes”

He said and you sighed and let your eyes fall closed,

“I’m sure it’s good, we’ve worked on the recipe for- “

You were caught off guard and simply obeyed without a second thought, opening your mouth. A second later you felt Jimin place his finger on your tongue, covered in batter. You closed your lips around it and opened your eyes, finding Jimin’s gaze fixed on your lips, with his own slightly parted. You tasted the sweetness of the batter and let the taste overrun your senses. With your tongue slowly starting to move around Jimin’s finger and gently sucking on it, you were able to taste all of it; the sweet, the tangy and the slightly salty taste of Jimin’s skin.

“Good?”

He asked, voice sounding a little strained. You nodded,

“Yeah? You like it?”

He asked again and you looked up at him with wide eyes, slowly letting his finger slide out from between your lips,

“I like it”

You said and Jimin ran his other hand through his hair. He had to look away; you were too sexy for your own good.

And you didn’t even notice it! The worst of it all was, that he had never seen you wear anything like this before: just a camisole with thin straps and sleeping shorts. Not to mention that scrap of a night gown. He’d never seen so much of your skin and he had to admit, it was becoming harder and harder no to reach out and touch the smooth-looking skin of your upper arm, where your shoulders started, or accidentally brush his fingers against the soft skin of your thighs in passing.

He was about to pop the most uncomfortable boner while you licked your lips and didn’t even pretend to acknowledge the sexual tension in the small room,

“Ok, good…”

Jimin mumbled and wiped his finger on his shorts before he grabbed the bowl and stepped around you to the steamer. He quickly needed to focus on something else because he didn’t want to risk accidentally bumping his problem into you and making things awkward. He thought maybe you didn’t notice how his shorts slightly tented and he did his best to turn his body away from you, while he filled small portions of the batter into the steamer. Maybe he could get you to leave and have some time to cool down again,

“Ah… Rice Cake, why don’t you go ahead and wait upstairs, hm? This won’t take long. I’ll bring them up when they’re finished”

He smiled at you reassuringly,

“What are you talking about, this was my idea. I can’t let you slave away over this alone…”

You pouted slightly and took a step towards him,

“No, no, don’t worry! I’ll take care of it, get some rest, ok?”

You considered it for a second and then sighed. He may have sounded slightly more panicked than necessary but hey, if it did the trick,

“Ok, if you’re sure… I guess I’m a little more tired than before”

You said and promptly yawned,

“Go to sleep, you need the rest”

Jimin ushered you out with a wave of his hands and a last cute smile and then he could finally let out a deep breath,

“Well, that was close”

He said to himself, after he heard the door to the upper floor close, then wiped the metaphorical sweat off of his brow,

“Ah, seriously Jimin-ah, what are you, 12?”

he looked down at himself and pointed a finger at the, still very much visible, tent in his pants as a warning,

“You could have gotten us in trouble…”

Then he shook his head and sighed, remembering the little cakes in the steamer. He hoped you would already be asleep by the time he brought the last batch upstairs because he wouldn’t be able to handle the visual of him, feeding you a few of them, after what had just happened.

Later, when he was finally back in bed, he still wasn’t quite sure what had possessed him. You, however, slept like a blissfully ignorant baby that night.

_________

Thank you so much for reading! Part two is now here !

[terramythos]

I beat Prey yesterday! here are the general thoughts i scribbled down. 

i thought the opening was super strong. When you break the glass on the apartment window? *chef's kiss*

i’ve never played system shock 2 but understand this is heavily influenced by it. I've played Bioshock though so I did pick up on some of the similarities by proxy.

generally I liked combat. In the first half it's pretty tense and survival horror-y and there's certainly a difficulty curve. I liked using limited resources and thinking up creative solutions to problems. 

However, most stuff became trivial halfway through. The shotgun is just busted after a couple upgrades. Once you know a surefire way to deal with each enemy type, the game gets pretty easy. from what I understand the difficulty settings do not affect this much (I played on normal). You can make the game more tedious, but not necessarily harder.

i wish there were more horror elements in the mid to late game. There are some genuinely great jump scares early on but they're basically gone past a certain point.

main quest in general was a treadmill of “go to point a, do x thing, oh no something stopped you from doing x thing, you need to go to point y and do b thing so you can go back and do x thing”. kind of disappointing; it mostly served as a way to get around and find more interesting stuff (with a few exceptions). i liked the side quests more. 

the voice acting was great. In particular, Benedict Wong's performance as Alex stuck out to me.

the visual and world design was fantastic, too. I think its impressive that Talos I had a unifying design but each area still felt distinct.

visually the Looking Glass stuff was super cool. I think that Arkane developed this with the time travel Dishonored 2 mission and it was cool there too.

there's an impressive amount of extra flavor. All of the art, audio logs, emails, books, and even the ability to explore a bit in space. Just cool details that helped make it all feel real and believable. It adds a lot.

i wanted neuromods to be more like the plasmids in bioshock. While they are the same thing story-wise, in game they function as a talent tree. And some just don’t make sense. Like... how would jamming 4 neuromods in my eye make me physically better at lifting stuff? Why is it an incremental skill I have to invest in 3 times? This makes a little more sense with the Typhon powers since those are basically magic, but not the Human ones.

the ending and some of the mid story is clearly rushed, although I'm glad there's more stuff after the credits.

despite the underwhelming endings (pre credits) I do think the developers put an impressive amount of thought into the circumstances various playthroughs would have surrounding them. I looked it up and there's a boggling number of variations on what's basically two endings.

startlingly few bugs! Just some clipping stuff for me, mostly.

there were some cool small details. I like that if you go someplace before the main story officially tells you to, January will act surprised that you knew ahead of time to go there for the next step. This only happened to me once (on accident), but I imagine it's fun for replays.  

SPOILER THOUGHTS BELOW THE CUT 

LOVE the meta commentary on identity and autonomy in video games. Morgan is a little different between each reset in the early simulation, even though theoretically that shouldn't be possible. Characters constantly compare you to the Morgan they knew, whatever that means to them. Morgan the player character is a silent protagonist. Morgan the narrative character has several audio and video logs from their past and multiple robots with their voice. More broadly, each player will play a video game differently, even if they make similar choices. So is any playable character the same person between playthroughs? Is the player character narratively that person, or are they simply a vehicle that reflects what the player wants? It's no "would you kindly" but it's still interesting. 

in theory i like the Nightmare. kind of a pyramid head type thing but more random. however there’s little incentive to defeat it and it’s easy to avoid, so it turned into a “wait for a 3 min timer to count down” simulator. also, if you accidentally spawn it in certain areas it can WRECK your ending (though it’s easy to reload). 

so the Big Twist hints were pretty heavy handed. I figured it out early. It occurred to me after the first level that if the tutorial was a simulation, anything could be, and that was basically the big twisterino. Stuff like January saying "well good thing you're not an alien" in a super ironic tone of voice made me laugh out loud. Also, I did the Obvious Bad Ending for shits and giggles and it spoiled the whole thing. Really wish it had just cut to black since you can access it early. This potentially ruins any shock value for a lot of people.

on some level I like that the ending explains away certain "plot holes". Probably the most obvious is Morgan not remembering any of their past, which is... not how the neuromod memory loss works. But of course they wouldn't remember it, because the player is a Typhon going through a simulation, not the real Morgan.

you can also view the ending from the perspective of humans desperately trying to convince an alien they're worth saving, despite some "bad actors" (read: war crimes in space). Hence the sometimes on-the-nose moral choices and optional side quests. Even the fact that Morgan and Alex are characterized as total assholes in the past-- yet Alex in game and post credits is gentle and compassionate. Perhaps Alex in real life is trying to atone for his mistakes?

i kept expecting mirrors to be relevant? The Phantoms whisper about "what you see in the mirror", promo material shows Morgan looking at themself in the mirror, the Looking Glass tech, and the fact that mirrors are all over the place and DO NOT actually reflect Morgan. Which isn't a technical limitation since the Looking Glass is a whole thing. There's the whole mirror neuron thing but that's such a tiny line of dialogue I'm not sure it matters. Have to wonder if this was a story concept that got cut. 

in a similar vein to "crap Phantoms say", there's a minor human character who just... says a bunch of Phantom lines in a row once you complete a quest. He’s seemingly unaware that he's echoing them. What was the purpose of this? Was this an abandoned plot thread? 

why wasn't Dahl a bigger part of the story? or Alex and Morgan's parents? I assume it's due to a time crunch, but it just feels like a missed opportunity.

small detail: I love that one of the main story quests has you fake someone's voice using audio logs, and someone MUCH later uses the same trick against you.

another small detail which I missed: flying out to the space billboard to get an early horror twist about the fucking escape pods. there are lots of little things like that all over the place. 

[lifebeginsbyleaving]

Mama Mia Scotts A Peace Pimp

Hey ya!!! So this is my last entry for @sterek-bingo I've had such a great time and I'm so glad I did this!!! So all the love to the admins over yonder 💜💜💜 I hope to see you all well when sterek week rolls around. Also the biggest of thank yous and the mostest loves to @halevetica Girl you know how important you are to me. I wouldn’t have even dreamed of attempting this if it wasn’t for you. So, *strums guitar* I love you bitch. Thank you for your endless support in my shenanigans (Like shlongshire, naming this mama mia scotts a peace pimp, and my endless unnecessary backstory that stresses both of us out.) and for brainstorming with me well past two in the morning multiple times. Oh and also for your help wrangling Brian, god that asshole. She also made this amazing mood board for me ahhhhh!!!! She is so amazing an talented I love her. You should check her out!!! She writes 1000x better than me, so you will not regret it if you like sterek. Anyway, this is around 10,000 words. 

----------------------------------------------

Derek could feel himself losing his patience. He got it already. Fairies were tricky. Don't offend them. Don't accept gifts from them. He got it, they all got it, hell they had it ten minutes into his half hour rant. But Stiles went on and on.

"Don't accept anything. Anything at all. Pay attention to wording. And, for the love of God, don't-"

Derek's patience snapped. "Eat anything, we know."

Scott went to move in front of Stiles, but Stiles put an arm across him. Derek puffed out his chest unconsciously.

They had been so territorial and snippy with each other lately both packs were sick of it. Especially Stiles, though. These last few months had been filled with uncooperative alpha instinct bullshit. It was the last thing they needed right now while dealing with fairies, beings that were known for being cutthroat at exploiting weaknesses to kill entire packs if they so wished it. Stiles hated being in the middle of it, but as Scott's emissary he needed to keep the peace between packs.

"Would you quit it you two. You're both pretty. And petty."

Scott protested, "You're just trying to explain everything. Why does he have to be like that? You don't even have to help their pack, but you are. He should be thankful."

Derek tried to ignore how that grated on him. Scott, unconsciously, had been referring more and more to Stiles as being his and separating them from Derek and his pack. He supposed he had been doing it as well, but he couldn't help it. Still, it didn't escape his notice that he had been pushing everyone from Scott's pack to be separate except Stiles. Deaton had warned them two alphas sharing a territory would be hard, but they could do it if they were determined. He also said some things about compromise and not challenging each other, but that wasn't as memorable. "Stiles is your emissary, not your beta. And he certainly isn't anyone's bitch. He can help whoever he wants without you."

Stiles gave him the murder face and once again, with greater difficulty, stopped Scott from going forward. "Both of you need to chill the fuck out or I'm leaving both of your furry asses and taking your packs with me."

They quickly snapped their mouths shut because they knew he could and would. Their posture slumped.

Stiles looked pleased. "Good. Now shut the fuck up if you don't want to die. These fairies aren't like the tooth fairy, and they sure as hell ain't Tinkerbell. They can and will kill you given the chance. Do not give them the chance. Watch your words and mind your manners. It is easy to offend a fairy, so don't. I don't care if you're non verbal through it."

Liam spoke up from the couch, "I don't see why we have to sit here for this. Only the pack alphas, Derek's first beta, and you, cuz you're Scott's emissary, are allowed to go."

"So you know for the future."

Issac spoke from where he was at Derek's side, "But why would they be so hostile towards us? We have that treaty thing with them. They couldn't hurt us without breaking that."

Stiles groaned and looked at Derek. "You see, this." He shoved a hand out towards Issac. "This is why I repeat myself. We don't have shit with them. Derek's mom saved the fairy queen. Her and her pack had the treaty. It's Derek pack now, hence the moot point you just made. Some things like a life debt or a blood oath can be passed through the generations, but not a treaty. Not when the terms or people involved change. Believe me, I do not want to be doing this any more than you do, but it's important. I found their fairy ring and Deaton said they would know I found it. He also said it would be akin to an open declaration of war if we ignored it. Apparently they're touchy about being snubbed and want to be introduced. Which shouldn't be a shock, they're touchy about everything. Now, the options are say hello to the fairies on our land, don't offend them, and hopefully sign a new treaty, or get the fuck out of Beacon Hills and hope they don't hunt us down. Should we put it to a vote?" He asked sarcastically.

Lydia looked analytical. "So is there something we can do to please them?"

Stiles gave her a flat look. "Other than not doing and doing all the things I've told you about for the last half hour? No, not really. Die, maybe."

Derek crossed his arms. "What do we actually need to know?"

Stiles gave him an annoyed look. "I'll start at the beginning."

There was a loud chorus of groans.

---

Stiles was glad the pack was out of his hair. He had stayed behind to help Derek clean up and was relieved to have finally shooed out Scott after both alphas had apologized. For all their bickering, at the end of the day they were friends. Even if their wolves wanted to tear the other to shreds. Stiles folded another blanket as Derek walked back out from the kitchen.

"That could've gone better. Can you help me wi-" Stiles' words were cut off as Derek hadn't stopped in front of him, but had continued right into his space. Derek wrapped an arm around his waist and quickly pulled him closer. He pulled him into a forceful kiss and Stiles was caught off guard.

Once Stiles recovered from the shock he tried to slow him down. He finally was able to pull back and ask, "Okay, what was that for?"

Derek only tried to kiss him again, but Stiles pulled back to look into his eyes. Derek huffed. "Mine." It sounded like it was barely able to be growled out.

Stiles smirked. "What's got you all gruff, sourwolf?"

Derek only reacted by sniffing deeply to smell Stiles' satisfaction. It was one of his favorites, despite how he hated seeing it on his face when they were arguing. Stiles smiled and tilted his head to the side slightly. Derek rumbled out his approval and dove into the offered space. He kissed and licked at his neck till he felt Stiles' light laugh bubble up. He pulled back and looked inquisitive.

"I bet you don't even know you're half shifted right now."

Derek immediately shifted back as if to prove his point. Stiles leaned forward with a smile and kissed him. "It's okay. You know I think it's kinda hot."

Derek kissed him again and the harshness was gone, but it was still insistent. Right before he spoke, Stiles wiggled his eyebrows at him. "I bet you were listening to Scott. I bet you only waited one second after he was out of earshot to come in here and kiss me. I bet yo-"

Derek cut him off again, but this time he added a nip to his lip to curb his snark. "Kiss me. Shut up."

Well, who was he to refuse such a polite request. Stiles wrapped his arms around his neck. Derek harshly grabbed his hips and leaned into him.

"Okay, are you going to tell me what's got you like this?"

"He said you don't have to help their pack. He said it like you're separate from us."

Stiles sighed and looked down. "I am separate Derek. I am, and always will be, in Scott's pack. I wish I could choose both of you, but if I can't, I choose him. Scott's my brother. I can't turn my back on him, not when he's always had mine. So until we figure out a way to work it out, I'm in his pack." Stiles looked up guiltily even though he'd done nothing wrong.

Derek rested their foreheads together. "He's your family. I get it. I do, anyway. The wild in me just wants you to myself though. It wants to take care of you myself. To keep you safe myself. To have you in my pack. To love you. It wants you to be mine." Derek's eyes flashed red. "Mine. I want you. I want you to share a pack with me. I want you with my pack. I want you with me."

Stiles gripped the back of his neck harder. "I am with you. I'm here. We are together."

It pained Derek how much that wasn't true. They had been dating for over six months and both packs were in the dark. He hated having to lie, but Stiles said it was for the best and in the end he agreed. He didn't want to start a pack war over Stiles with Scott. Mostly because he knew it would kill Stiles for him to have caused it. So they both agreed they'd get the alpha instinct pissing contest over with first and then tell everyone. Derek smiled at him. "You're right. You being here is enough."

Looking at Derek's insincere face rolled Stiles' stomach. "Don't be like that. Don't smile at me if you don't mean it. Don't say shit you don't believe. Me just being here isn't fucking enough." Stiles looked as sad as Derek felt. "I want to be able to stay with you. I don't want to sneak around with you. I don't want to have to make up stupid emissary shit that Scott believes because I'm a bridge between packs so he doesn't get all territorial with me sharing info with you. Or any other bullshit Deaton says. I want to belong in Scott's pack, but I also want to belong with you and yours." Stiles scratched at the hair on the back of Derek's neck.

"Fine. I hate this. I hate that we can't tell anybody. I hate that I don't get to scream it from the rooftops that you're my boyfriend. I hate that we can only go on dates in the preserve, so no one recognizes us. I hate that Scott gets more of your time. I hate that you see Scott at all, even though I know that's not really me talking and that I don't. I hate that you don't smell like me. I hate that once you walk out that door you aren't mine anymore. I hate that more than anything. God, I hate that."

Stiles kissed him softly and after kept his eyes closed with their foreheads together. "So show me tonight. Make me yours. Make me forget I have to walk out that door. Right here, right now I am yours. Make me want to wake up everyday yours. Make me crave you Derek. Make me need you. Make me yours sourwolf."

Derek's hands moved from his hips to his ass and he yanked him up and he immediately wrapped his legs around him with a smile.

"Are you going to carry me to your bed?"

Derek growled out around fangs, "I'm going to fuck you into my bed."

A thrill raced through Stiles and he leaned forward to kiss him as Derek walked him to his room. "Atta boy."

---

Derek woke up knowing the bed was empty, but a soft smile curled on to his face hearing the movement in the room around him. He squinted against the light coming through the curtains and turned over. He faced Stiles who was moving around the room to get changed. "Good morning sunshine."

Stiles looked at him and his face mirrored Derek's smile. "Mornin yourself hot stuff."

Derek grinned and patted the bed. "Come here."

Stiles obliged and leaned hand down on the bed to give him a good morning kiss. "Your breath is terrible."

"Yours is minty fresh."

Stiles flashed his gleaming teeth and picked his shirt off the ground. Derek always appreciated the lithe beauty of his mole dotted skin, but Stiles covered in the marks he left the night before would always be his favorite. Derek looked up and Stiles had caught his staring in the mirror. "I think you missed a spot."

Derek tossed the sheet aside and got up despite the slight chill. He slid behind Stiles and put a hand around his waist. "Oh sorry, did I? Can't have that."

Stiles' head lulled to the side unconsciously. "We really can't. That's the only spot people look at really. That one tiny uncovered part of my neck."

Derek smiled and started kissing his shoulder then worked his way up. Stiles carded his hand into Derek's hair.

Derek seemed satisfied. "Did I make you forget?"

"Forget what?" He seemed distracted.

"That you have to walk out that door."

Derek saw his grin in the mirror they both faced. "Baby, you made me forget I could walk at all last night."

Derek tried to smile back at him, but he couldn't muster it. Not when he hadn't gotten the answer he had wanted.

Stiles moved away to continue getting ready. Derek leaned against the dresser.

"Alright, I better head out. I'll see you in a couple hours for the meeting with the fairies." Stiles kissed him. He was almost out the door when he turned around. "Oh, I almost forgot!" He went to Derek's night stand and grabbed his bracelet. He put it on and instantly the scent of them together was everywhere in the room except on Stiles. He waved his hands a few times and let a few sparks go. The marks on his neck and undoubtedly everywhere else started to fade.

Derek's wolf howled like it had been burned. He looked away from the vanishing marks. Tears threatened to gather in his eyes. His voice was thick as he softly said, "I don't think you know how much that hurts."

Stiles turned around concerned. "How much what hurts?"

Derek gestured to his neck. "It's like you rejecting everything we did last night. It's like you regret it. My wolf thinks that you are deciding to leave me for good every time."

Derek could see the disheartened look in his eyes, but he still tried for humor. "Well, what about you? Leaning against that dresser all sleep ruffled and naked. It's practically a crime. Nay, a sin. You shouldn't be able to look that hot. How could I reject you when you stand there practically begging for someone to make sure you don't get cold or lonely. I don't know if I can leave you like that. All naked and hot."

Derek let out a huff. He muttered, "Is that all it would take?" He looked up. "I'll never put in pants again if you stay."

Hurt flashed briefly on Stiles' face and Derek instantly felt guilty. He walked over to him. "Hey, no I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say that like it's your fault. It's not up to you, and it sure as hell isn't up to me. I get that we can't do anything about it right now, it just frustrates me. I didn't mean to guilt you. I'm sorry."

Stiles folded into his arms. "I know. I hate it too."

Derek kissed him. "You should go."

Stiles nodded. "I'll see you in a bit."

Derek nodded bittersweetly.

---

"This is it? This is just twigs."

"Issac, what did I say? Watch your mouth. Besides, you can't see how amazing it looks."

Derek looked over to his wonder filled eyes. "But you can, can't you?"

They all turned to Stiles. "Yes. Ground fairy wings sprinkled into my eyes allows me to see through their illusions. I didn't want to be fooled by pretty faces as well as mellifluous words."

"Damn, that's hella metal." Issac tilted his head in consideration while Scott looked disgusted. Derek looked impressed.

"Whatever, just listen. Their spring moon festival will be going on so hopefully we can blend in with all the other royalty and dignitaries they met. And also they should be in high spirits. Ground rules. No eating, I do most of the talking, but don't ignore words directed at you, no insulting, no dancing, stay close, no gifts or favors, and-" Stiles pointed a finger in between Scott and Derek. "Absolutely no alpha macho fighting."

They looked offended but agreeable.

Stiles turned to the gate. "Now, follow me."

---

The tall intimidating ethereal being that towered over them steepled their hands. "I have given you much to discuss. We will leave you to make your decision. This room is warded against all prying eyes, no one will listen to you here." The king's impressive guard and extensive council readied themselves to leave.

All four of them let out a breath of relief at having a moment to themselves after nearly three hours of talks.

As they filed out a female voice spoke, "Father?"

Stiles caught the easy smile that took over their face. "Yes, my petal?"

She locked eyes with Issac even as he desperately tried to send help signals out to Stiles and Derek. "I want to dance with that one."

Issac locked pleading puppy eyes with Stiles.

Stiles stepped forward slightly. "I think we are all too tired, your grace. He would probably step on her toes more than anything." Stiles tried for the easy humor and high spirits they had been sharing all night.

They clearly missed the king. Their eyes went sharp and demeanor cold. "You wouldn't allow my daughter to dance the night with your beta?"

Issac and Derek both went to speak, but Stiles cut them off. "He may dance with her for one dance. Any more would be too high an honor." Stiles turned to Issac with a look.

Issac opened his mouth, but seemed to think better if it. He simply bowed his head to the king and princess.

"Very well. Come petal. Come boy."

Issac left with one final traumatized look over his shoulder. Stiles nodded calmly and confidently to him and Isaac looked slightly calmer.

As soon as they shut the door Derek exploded. "What the fuck Stiles! What happened to no dancing and stay close?! Issac is bad with this kind of thing and you just let him go? Do you just not give a shit about him, huh!?"

Stiles was about to placate him when Scott jumped in. "He's doing the best he can. Besides, he has no obligation to watch out for you. You're not h-"

Derek interrupted through clenched teeth, "His pack. Believe me, I know."

"Can we focus children? Issac will be fine as long as he listened to me. Besides, a refusal of the fairy king's prized daughter would've ended in death for all of us. They could come back any moment and demand an answer. And I don't know about you, but I don't trust our odds about getting back to the portal through that literal army of ancient ruthless beings. So stow your crap and let's get this figured out."

They grumbled but complied.

"Good. Okay, so we know their claim on the eastern woods is complete bull, and we can get out of it easily. But what are we doing about the claim hierarchy? If both of you die or are unable to lead they want to take control of the territory. Which is something that shouldn't happen, but we don't have a way out of it, not really."

"Is that what they were saying? I thought they were talking about pack kids. With all that legacy shit. Also where's the queen? What happened there?" Scott looked thoughtful. "So, what do we do?"

"We can't agree to that. It would paint a target on your backs if they ever wanted to take over and that's all they would have to do. Also, I swear to god Scott, if you bring up the queen I'll cut your balls off. If he wanted us to know he would've told us, he could kill us if she died and it's a sore spot. Now, back to business. We can leverage their spot where they are right now, I think. It takes a lot of time and energy to built a fairy circle as powerful as that one, they won't want to just pack up and leave it. Even if the land they're on is now back to your ownership. So, I say we leverage their current part of the woods for the claim hierarchy they want. Sure, what we offer them is what they have, but they don't have to put in the effort and sacrifices again to build another circle."

Derek furrowed his brows. "You said time does not concern fae and that they are willing to put in the effort. Don't you think they would just forcefully take more land and make a new circle?"

Stiles looked considering. "No. I think most of this is just to size us up. I don't think they want more than what they have right now or they would've taken it by now. The king looked more playful than aggressive, which isn't to say that couldn't change."

They went back and forth debating possible terms and conditions for several minutes.

"Yes, but the northern preserve is Hale territory indisputably. Given that, I think we're in agreement. What about th-"

The doors slammed open with a loud bang and their heads snapped up.

Issac had his hands still outstretched and his chest was heaving. They took in his appearance. He was absolutely covered head to toe in at least an inch of glitter, his hair was wild and there were twigs woven into the strands. He was wearing a long robe also covered in glitter and falling off one side. Most disturbing there was what looked almost like a dead rat that fell off his shoulder, but Stiles knew it wasn't quite a rat. There was a desperation and terror in his eyes as he spoke, "Guys! I think I just got engaged!?"

The doors slammed back closed. Scott's face looked confused. Derek's eyebrows were high in shock. Stiles just closed his eyes and tilted his head down to let out a deep sigh while pinching the bridge of his nose.

Stiles didn't even look up before he began to speak, "Issac. I thought I was pretty clear, don't accept anything from them. I'm pretty sure a freakin marriage proposal qualifies as anything!" He looked at Issac disappointed, but not surprised.

The distressed beta walked closer to his alpha for comfort. "I didn't! I promise!"

Scott still looked confused. "I thought you were going to dance?"

"We did! But then they started shoving me into this robe and covered me with glitter and put branches in my hair. I thought it was just a party thing, but no one else got a dead rat so I got concerned. I asked what's going on and they told me I'm engaged to marry princess Annalise! I can't get married! I don't even have a credit card yet!"

Derek put a hand on his beta's neck to soothe him. "Calm down. We'll figure this out." He looked to Stiles.

"Oh, don't look at me. Your dumbass beta did this. You get him out of it, big guy."

Derek gave him a flat look.

Issac looked over at him desperately. "Stiles I know we don't always get along, but please. I am literally begging you, I cannot marry her." He looked white as a sheet when he leaned forward to murmur, "When she smiles you can see bug legs in her teeth."

Scott's face scrunched up. "Gross."

Stiles grinned. "And you can't even see her true form. That'll give you nightmares come wedding night." Issac whimpered.

"Stiles." Derek raised an eyebrow. Stiles huffed and crossed his arms. Derek simply raised it higher. Stiles rolled his eyes. Derek raised the other one and looked expectant. Stiles squinted at him. Derek kept both brows up as he tilted his head towards Issac.

Stiles huffed and threw out his arms. "Oh, my, god, fine! I'll think of something."

Scott piped up. "Wait, would you have to stay here if you married her?"

Derek sighed. "Well, she certainly isn't going to become a PTA mom."

Stiles huffed. "Issac, explain. Everything. From the beginning. Don't leave anything out."

"We were just dancing and not talking like you said, then they grabbed me and started doing all this weird stuff to me." He shook some of the glitter off and a twig fell from his hair.

Stiles looked confused. "You didn't talk at all?"

"No. Nothing. Other than when she asked to dance."

Stiles closed his eyes breathed through his nose heavily. "Yeah, and what exactly did she ask you?" He squinted at him and pursed his lips while nodding waiting for the answer.

He seemed insistent for the first part. "She just asked..." His eyes widened. "For my hand."

Stiles turned away from him to face Derek and Scott. He threw an arm behind him to the general area of Issac. "This! Is why you listen to Stiles! This! Is why you appreciate Stiles and listen to him! This! Is why Stiles is always right and you listen to him. This! Is why when there's a clan of fairies about to declare war on you if you don't meet them you show up to the fucking pack meeting ready to mother fuckin-"

Scott and Derek chorused with Stiles. "Listen to Stiles." "Listen to Stiles." "Listen to Stiles."

"Exactly!"

"If it helps, I'm sorry for not listening."

"If it helps, I'm only moderately considering wishing her well on training you to listen to her and hoping she likes scarves."

The door opened, this time much more calmly and less violently. "The king would request to see at least one of their mortal guests. If not the groom, then the emissary."

Issac made a choked off noise and looked wildly at Stiles before opening his mouth just to be interrupted.

"I think our discussion has concluded. We will all join the king to finalize their treaty terms."

The two guards filed out into the hall. Scott followed them and Derek motioned for Issac to do so as he fell into step with Stiles at the back. They had a bit of space between them.

"Have you thought of something yet?" Derek whispered.

They both kept their eyes forward. "I'm working on it."

"Well, work faster. You know what I'll do to you if you don't get my beta out of this." It was said with harshness in case someone was listening, but after he finished he looked over with a raised brow and smirk. Stiles resolutely looked forward and shut everything else out to focus.

The no sex treatment was brutal.

Stiles' mind raced with ideas on how to get them out of this. He thought about all he knew about fairies and couldn't think of anything about how to get out of a marriage proposal. There were so many stories, but none that didn't end in death. There had been one thing about a fairy and a human truly falling in love, but the groom made his bride dance until she died. Definitely not the solution, no matter how much he didn't get along with Issac some of the times, he was still a good friend. Stiles and him had grown closer even despite the occasional ribbing or friction.

They came up on the dance hall and were guided through the bustling floor to the king's harvest table. Annalise immediately went to Isaac's side with a sharp toothed smile.

Stiles thought about all the different fae he'd read about and their rules. Somehow he didn't think spilling some salt would help here. He tried to remember everything he'd read, but there was so much and somehow he couldn't think of anything. Stiles began to feel frustrated as he had to tune out the three of them talking with the king trying to buy him some time. Deaton had showed and told him so much, why was it so hard to get them out of this! He had a story or book about everything. About lore, about fae folk, about how Talia dealt with them and got her peace treaty. He made it sound like a movie. Talia sounded like a great hero to him. Stiles was next to tears as he thought about how much better at this she would be.

Wait...

Stiles remembered a lore book about how, if a person saved a fairy child, that person could dictate what that fairy child did. Most used them for an I'll advised marriage, or slave. Both never ended well. They would just have to be careful to make it seem like they aren't wronging them. Talia had gotten her peace treaty because she had saved the life of the fairy queen. The fae hated owing or being in someone's debt so they penned the treaty. If Stiles gently mentioned that the king's daughters would never have been born if not for Derek's mother. They would owe Derek for them. In that same book he learned that blood oaths and life debts were passed down, even if treaties weren't.  Stiles smiled as a plan took root. He would mention the life debt and that that Derek could claim to dictate Annalise's life as well as her sisters'. They would say very carefully that they wished her nothing but happiness in a marriage to a fae to continue the line of great rulers. Perfect!

The king was speaking, seemingly agitated. "You speak in circles more like fae than humans. Enough. Why can't you marry my beautiful daughter Annalise?" They demanded and let just a little of their glamour fade to reveal their horrific face. The once glittering beautiful wings turned to a pitch black with twisted roots digging into and fixing them to their back.

Stiles was ready to jump in and save the day. "I would lik-"

Issac blurted and full volume, "Because I'm already married!"

Stiles craned his neck to look at him with an incredulous look. Scott looked bewildered and Derek just swore under his breath.

The king looked disbelieving. "Really?"

All four of them looked at each other as hopelessly lost and fucked as they felt.

They were in an unfamiliar place with a literal supernatural army between the four of them and the door. There was no way they could fight their way out, and his last plan was shot now, when they had to get him out of this lie first. Stiles figured he might as well roll with it.

"To me." His words came out just as Derek's did. "To me."

Stiles and Derek caught each others eye.

Stiles cleared his throat and gathered himself. Derek knew from the set of Stiles' shoulders he wasn't going to like what came next. He walked up between Derek and Issac and grabbed each of their hands. "To us." Stiles gripped their hands as harshly as he could for getting them into this before letting up.

A ripple of chatter erupted from the king's table, but the dance hall around them continued the festivities.

The king narrowed their eyes before motioning for a servant to come forward. They whispered into his ear and the servant left. "We will see."

Stiles swallowed harshly and Derek squeezed his hand.

The servant hurried back in with what seemed to be a crystal vial of a shimmering light blue liquid. The king tilted their head back and the servant put a few drops in each eye. The king blinked before focusing intently on the three of them.

Stiles had his eyes narrowed in confusion before they widened. "You're using fairy wings."

The king focused on Stiles. "Don't sound so appalled boy. Did you think we didn't know you used some as well to see our true forms?" They smiled. "Fairy wings have many magical properties, but most notably their use for sight magic. Mix the right ingredients in and you can see just about anything. For example: myrrh, basil, and valerian root."

"And what are you using those ingredients for?" Scott inquired.

"If one knows how to look, you can see a sort of line, a link one might say, between people. You can see what ties bind people. I believe wolves think a pack bond is something intangible by everything except instinct, but they are wrong. There is nothing magic cannot see or touch with the right entity wielding it. No matter how one tries to his or conceal it, it is always set free with patience. Ah ha, there you are."

They all took in a breath and held it as they looked in-between them. They looked puzzled for several moments. They tilted their head and made an inquisitive noise. Their council began to murmur and that seemed to distract them.

"Oh. Most interesting." They turned to their daughter. "My poor sweet Lise, the wedding is unfortunately off."

They let out a relieved, if not confused, breath.

Scott spoke, "Wait, what?!"

The king turned to Scott with a predatory grin. "You. You are quite the enigma. True, we had wondered how two alphas were possibly keeping the peace sharing a territory, but this? This was unexpected. A true alpha arranging a marriage between his emissary and greatest friend to his rival alpha and also his rival alpha's first beta? Unexpected, but well played." The king looked like they were appraising a clever chess game. "I am curious how you knew that an emissary building a relationship with a different alpha can quell instinct and unite packs?"

Scott gaped at him.

Stiles let go of Derek and Isaac's hands to wave his around. "Wait. What?"

The king turned to him with furrowed brows. "You did not know? Hm, I would have thought you would have been the one to figure it out. Clever human must not be as clever as I thought. Yes, he used you. But with how strong those bonds are I would say it did not work out entirely disadvantageous for you, did it?"

Stiles didn't know how to respond as Scott gave him a, 'What the fuck?!' face. Stiles sent back a, 'Just go with it!' face. "I would say not."

"Well, now that the nuptials are halted, should we continue our negotiation?" The king settled back against their chair.

Stiles quickly gathered himself yet again. "As the emissary representative of both packs I put forth the same treaty you and Talia Hale had. She gave you favorable terms and we are willing to do the same. You stay here and live on our territory peacefully in exchange for protection against things. You can draw from the nemeton without dealing with the things it draws. You stay on your side of the circle and we will keep our side there. We find it agreeable that instead of involving you in the care of our territory through a claim hierarchy, you keep your portal here. It would take a great deal of effort and sacrifice to move your circle closer in order to defend and manage Beacon and the nemeton, if it were ever to come down to a claim. It is better for all parties if we manage our territory and you manage yours. Agreeable?"

The king held his chin up by resting it on three of his fingers. "And if we want more?"

"If you wanted more then you'd try to take it. Are you?"

The king spoke aloof. "And if we did try to take your land?"

Stiles' eyes went hard and cold. "We'd protect it."

Scott looked to Stiles nervously after his risky answer.

The king grinned. "Good. No sense in having a treaty with packs that won't protect their land or us." He turned to Derek. "Your mother would approve of this one. He reminds me of her. His voice never wavered, exactly like hers. But do not be concerned with your strength little human." They looked at Stiles with an almost paternal interest. "Her hands shook just like your as well."

Stiles gaped, awed at how the king had seen right through him. He wondered what ingredients he had used for that one, or if it just came with a long life. Derek looked down at Stiles' shaking fist and reached out to hold it. Isaac saw it and after momentary hesitation mirrored it.

They laughed and then inclined their head toward their hands. "You know, it is intriguing to watch you mortals run in circles. You have such short lives so you dare not waste time looking to the past to learn from it, but we fae live long enough to see you as what you really are. Rats. Forever spinning on a wheel. Fun to play with and good pets, but ultimately you end where you started."

Everyone looked confused and they all looked to Stiles then, but he was just as confused.

"True, everyone in her pack looked to her just as you all look to the emissary, but that-" They once again motioned to Derek and Stiles' hands. "That was what your father did when he noticed her trembling. He didn't take over, he didn't talk over her. He supported her and trusted that she could handle it. Round and round you go, living the same lives in different bodies. He may have an edge to his voice like she had, but I see the same steadfast faith your father had for your mother in your eyes. You carry it for the emissary. The same relationships in different people. You bore me. Give me one good reason I should let you leave here alive. Especially when the fae could do so much more with the land."

Derek knew the fae could sense the fear coming off each of them.

Stiles spoke with conviction, "Does the juniberry flower get less beautiful with each passing season that they bloom? Is every peaceful ruler boring because there have been so many before it? Is a trick any less fun because you've already pulled it? You cannot deem us less worthy of life because we live it with the same burning love of those before us, the same beauty, the same compassion, the same embrace of frivolity. Repetition, while in our nature, isn't its entirety. Humans are known for their growth. Fae are born with magic and always have been. Humans learned to harness and use it. We grew with it, we invent and change it. There will always be humans fighting to love, to discover, to live, to be happy, to destroy, to hate, to do so many things good and bad. You call that fight not as important while you sit on a throne built by fae who did all the same things. The fact that you are immortal does not exclude you from the truth that you are also a part of the circle. Here you are again making another treaty. We are not two forces, we are one. But if you would like to divide us in two, pit us against each other in a way that would cost both sides lives, you are not breaking the circle. You are completing it. There has always been war, there has always been peace."

The king smiled. "And what would you have me do?"

"Do not attempt to break the circle. Appreciate it. Slow down and realize there have been before me, there will be after me, and I am being now. Make peace when possible, and war when it is not. Create when you can, but also destroy when it is necessary. Love your family, hate your enemies. But most prudent, know the difference between friend and foe, and have the wisdom to act accordingly. That his my advice, take it or leave it." Stiles bowed his head slightly while all three boys looked at him awed.

The king looked impressed. "You have moved my opinion and taught me, that is no small feat. Consider the treaty done according to your stated terms. Will you accept this favor from us?"

Scott and Derek went to jump in, but Stiles held up a hand. "We will accept no favors, but we accept the treaty."

The king nodded approvingly. "You are the clever human. Well done. Not many survive a fairy court. Much less on that was intent on killing them eventually from the moment they walked in. Consider the treaty in effect. This will probably be the last time you hear from us. That is, unless you need a favor."

"We'll see about that one."

The king motioned to the guard.

Stiles bowed and the other three followed suit. "It has been an honor."

The king bowed back. "Likewise emissary." The king nodded to the other three. "You as well." He looked to a guard who then began to lead them out. As they left fae talked and pointed at Stiles as they walked out.

They made their way back through the halls and to the circle.

"Well, we're not ones to over stay our welcome." Stiles nervously laughed. Upon seeing the fairy's unchanging face he nervously shoved Issac through the circle. "Best be going." Derek stepped through and they both followed.

---

As soon as they stepped back into the, now dark, woods they spoke hysterically, "Stiles, what the fuck!?" "What the ever loving hell Issac!" "Oh my god guys we made it! Hallelujah." Derek remained quiet.

Stiles turned to Issac. "Hallelujah. Hallelujah?! Like I want the one that got your ass out of there?"

Scott looked absolutely shell shocked. "Stiles? What the fuck?!"

Stiles looked back through the circle and saw the impassive guard still there. He gave a tiny wave. "Not here guys. Let's get back home."

"But yo-"

Stiles grabbed his arm. "Not. Here."

They walked in silence back to their cars.

"Let's talk at the loft. If my phone is right it's been over eight hours. Our packs will be worried."

Derek nodded. Scott jumped into the Jeep. Stiles followed him and started it. Issac watched them turn around then drive away before whirling on Derek. "What the hell? Why did the fairies think we had a bond?"

"Get in. It's going to take a little bit."

Derek started from the beginning and explained how Stiles and him had been in a relationship for over six months, how Stiles didn't want to betray Scott and his pack, and how the packs absolutely could not know, under any circumstances.

Issac understood quickly and they were on the road to the loft.

---

"Wait, you guys got the treaty signed, but somehow Issac almost got married off and then he did. But to Derek and Stiles? Now I'm kinda sad I didn't get to go. His little sad puppy face would've been hilarious." Jackson snorted.

Erica crossed her arms. "If you would have gone they would've taken one look at your cold conniving heart and made you stay because they thought you were one of them."

Lydia high-fived her and Jackson flipped both of them off.

Malia looked confused. "Did you actually all get married?"

Stiles sighed. "No matter how many times a different person asks, no. No, we did not get married."

Thankfully he got Scott to the loft without answering anything, but now it was him against both packs, who had been waiting for them together.

"Why isn't my brother here yet? Check your spouse bond. You can telepathically speak to your spouse if you're a werewolf. Ask him."

Stiles was so sick of them. "Cora, you absolutely cannot telepathically speak to your spouse if you are a werewolf. For Christ sake, you are the only born wolf here! You know that, stop being a dick."

She snickered.

Erica decided to join in. "Go on Stiles, check your spouse bond." Boyd cracked a small smile beside her.

"There is no such thing as a spouse bond!" He sounded manic.

"So you are married?" Allison played dumb.

"I swear to fucking Christ I will murder you all!"

As he screamed that Derek and Issac walked in with hesitant and fearful faces. "Bad time?"

"Perfect. Get in here and tell them we didn't all just get married."

"We didn't?" Issac looked relieved. "Oh thank fuck. I mean, you guys are better than Annalise, but no thanks. I thought with that bond shit he did he married us."

Jackson and Cora snorted.

Derek's pack walked up to him and checked to see if they were alright. "And just where the hell have you been? Stilinski drives recklessly, but he's not that much of a speed demon." Cora crossed her arms.

"Had to make a stop." Derek gruffly replied.

No one believed it.

Lydia finally piped up after having an analytical look on her face for awhile. "Wait, but how did the king see the bonds? He would've had to have seen something in order to believe you guys. Fairies hate lying. He must've believed you. What did he see?"

Issac looked at Stiles and Derek's panicked faces and thought about how much Derek had stressed their relationship remain a secret. His wolf howled for him to quickly defend and protect his alpha. He anxiously tried to think, but there were to many people staring expectantly. "I'm fucking Stiles!" He blurted.

Everyone's faces went wide with open shock, especially Stiles'.

Both packs instantaneously hurled questions. They overlapped and drown each other out with their volume.

"Everybody stop!" Stiles commanded.

There was silence.

"And here I was thinking Isaac was a bottom." Jackson snarked.

At least eight, "So did I."s were heard.

Isaac's cheeks flamed.

Stiles rolled his eyes. "He is a bottom. But thats no-"

The questions came from everyone except Issac who looked embarrassed and Derek who looked reserved.

"Everybody shut up! I'm not fucking Isaac!"

There was confused silence.

"Yes you are!" Isaac replied petulantly.

The shouting began once again.

Derek burst and finally roared at them while showing his eyes and teeth. They stopped. He grabbed Stiles' wrist and began yanking him behind himself. "We need to talk."

Scott instantly moved closer. "Whoa, whoa. Just because he's dating your beta doesn't mean you can shove him around! I get that you don't like it, but you don't see me pushing Isaac somewhere to give him the shovel talk."

Derek just growled threateningly.

Scott was about to respond when Stiles got in-between them. "Hey, hey, stop. No. Bad dogs. No fighting over the Stiles. Scott, just let me talk to him. I can handle this."

Scott opened his mouth.

"Remember what we just learned about trusting Stiles?" Stiles raised his eyebrows.

Scott closed his mouth and backed off.

Derek continued dragging Stiles up to his room. As the door shut behind them, Stiles was grateful for the soundproofing. "Thank God. I hav-"

Derek harshly clawed off Stiles' bracket without tearing his skin.

"Dude! What the hell!"

Derek didn't respond he just slammed Stiles against the wall and shoved his head into his neck.

"I repeat, dude, what the hell!?"

Derek licked a wide stripe up his neck. "Mine." He licked another stripe up the other side. "Mine."

"Okay, do you mind explaining? Because I'm starting to feel like a milkbone."

Derek teased the sensitive skin of his neck between his fangs. "He said we all had bonds."

"Yeah?"

Derek pulled back and looked calmer, but sad. "He saw bonds between all three of us, not just me and you. And then Isaac said that, so I thought-"

"You thought Isaac and I?"

Derek nodded to confirm. "I thought you were fucking him too. I needed to know, to smell that you were just mine."

Stiles shoved him back and off of him. Derek's eyes flashed hurt, but Stiles' held anger. "Fuck off!" He shoved his chest again. "Fuck off if you think I would ever do that to you. And especially fuck you for implying all we do is fuck. Derek, I love you. Fuck you for thinking that." Stiles' voice broke as he said the last sentence. Tears started to fall from his eyes. "God, fuck you so much."

Stiles went closer to the door and Derek quickly followed. He grabbed Stiles' arm. "Hey, hey. No. No baby, please. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. It's just, shit, we can't tell anybody, you never smell like me, you use spells so I don't smell like you, we can't even go on dates. I'm going out of my mind here. We are so much more than fuck buddies, that isn't what I meant. I just want you to be mine. Hell, that's all I've wanted for the longest time. I just want you." Stiles turned back to him and Derek leaned their foreheads together. "I just want you. I love you."

Stiles closed his eyes and another tear raced down his cheek. They stood there together for a moment.

"Don't lose me thinking you already lost me. Because I swear to god Derek if you ever accuse me of cheating again, I'll shove wolfsbane so far up your ass you'll have to pick it out of your teeth. I love you so much it hurts my heart knowing you thought that about me. I could, and would, never cheat on you. You hear me Derek Hale? Never." Stiles looked deep into his eyes with glossy ones. "You're it for me. God, you are. You're the person I want to wake up beside and not have to leave covering up your marks. Hell, I don't want to leave our bed at all. I don't want to ever have to leave you. It tears me up inside."

Derek kissed him and Stiles kissed back ferociously, like he had to leave the second their lips parted. Stiles pulled back for air, but clung onto his neck desperately.

"What are we going to do?"

Stiles wiped his eyes and then  smirked. "I've got a plan."

"I'm going to hate this."

"You're going to love this."

"I have hated literally every single one of your plans since day one."

Stiles drew circles in the hair on the back of Derek's head with his finger tips. He smiled. "You didn't hate the one with the picnic and the strawberries with chocolate sauce and the-"

"Okay, I liked that one."

"You didn't absolutely hate your birthday with the-"

"Yes, I did like that one."

"What about two weeks ago with the woods and th-"

"Alright fine, your sex plans are perfect. Is this a sex plan? I would like to stress that this is the only time I'll say this, please say no."

"No, it is not a sex plan."

"Oh good. Then I probably will hate it."

Stiles grabbed his hand and laced their fingers together to pull him along. "Let's find out."

"Wait, wait! You're not wearing your bracelet."

"I don't need it."

Derek's eyebrows furrowed. "Have you finally learned how to block your scent?"

"No. Thanks for rubbing it in. I just don't need it." Stiles once again turned to the door and he stopped him.

"If you walk out there, they'll know. Scott, your pack. I can't do that to you. No matter how much this hurts, I can't do that because I know how much it would hurt you."

Stiles smiled softly and kissed him. "I love you for that. But it's okay."

Derek started to shake his head, but Stiles put a hand on his cheek. Stiles grinned. "It's okay. Trust Stiles." He pecked his lips and looked at him expectantly.

Derek nodded his head and Stiles' stroked his cheek with his thumb. "Perfect. Now, follow my lead, and when the moment is right you better sweep me off my feet, Hale."

"How am I supposed to know which moment you're talking about?"

"Trust me, you'll know when it's the moment."

Derek's eyes went emotional and his hand gripped Stiles' tighter. "Every moment with you is the moment Stiles."

Stiles rolled his eyes and kissed him, then pulled him to the door. Right as he reached for the doorknob he hesitated.

"What?"

"Next Friday is half off milkshake day at Sassy's. You'll order curly fries too. And I will eat half of them while you pretend not to notice. I want a proper out in public diner date. I'll meet you there at seven. Don't you dare be late, sourwolf."

Derek was over the moon. "Don't you dare be late. We both know I'm going to be there twenty minutes early nervously organizing the sugar packets and wondering if I put on enough cologne. Next Sunday I want to have breakfast with your dad. Don't you dare embarrass me."

"Perfect. And you know I will, but it won't matter because you've already won him over."

Derek held onto his hand like a life line. "Perfect."

Stiles let go and marched down the stairs. Derek followed.

They all quieted, but heard the last thing uttered. "You don't think he'd kill him for fucking Isaac, do you?"

"I'm not fucking Isaac, Alli."

"You ar-" Derek silenced Isaac by lifting a hand up. Isaac looked at him questioningly.

Derek shook his head. "Isaac is not fucking Stiles."

Stiles piped up, "Derek is fucking Stiles."

Everyone was stunned silent.

Derek's face was still not giving anything away. "And sometimes Stiles is fucking Derek."

Isaac let out a relieved breath. "Oh thank God that's over. Erica asked me what your face looks like when you come."

Derek shot her a dirty look and she stuck out her tongue. "Now I'll just ask you."

Everyone's shock faded at once, other than Scott who remained stunned. Loud, 'I told you,'s and, 'You owe me,'s exploded.

"For the love of fuck, shut up!" Stiles screamed.

Everyone looked at him.

"Thank you."

Scott finally caught up. "Wait. What!?"

Stiles turned to his gaping face. "Now Scott, I would like for you to bless the Hale alpha and I. Officially, that is. It's a little too late otherwise. Been there, done him multiple times."

Scott still looked confused. "Wait, like the fae king said? No! I don't want to use you like that! I'm not going to pimp you out for peace!"

Stiles rolled his eyes. "Scotty, keep up. Me and Derek bone like bunnies, we're in a relationship. I want to stare at his stupid face multiple hours of the day for the foreseeable future."

Scott looked like his brain broke.

Stiles huffed. "Oh for the love of God. I love him!"

Scott's face melted into a sappy grin. "Bro really?"

"Yeah, really."

Scott looked over to Derek who had a flat face. He sighed. "I love him too."

Scott turned back to face Stiles. "Broooo!"

Stiles grinned and looked down. "I know."

Scott seemed to get serious. "Okay, I give you to him."

Stiles pinched his brow. "You're not giving me over like I'm the last dinner roll on Thanksgiving dinner. You're giving your agreement and blessing to our relationship."

"Okay. I bless you."

"What are you, the pope?" Jackson snarked.

Scott's shoulders went up in a shrug. "Well, sorry! I don't know how to do this! I'm fine with it okay! You have my blessing."

Erica turned to Stiles. "You're good to go the next time you sneeze."

Derek pinched the bridge of his nose.

Stiles furrowed his brow in concentration. Derek put an arm on his shoulder. "What is is?"

"It should've worked."

"What should've worked?"

Lydia spoke, "You were hoping that if Scott blessed your relationship, you could bridge the two packs like the king said. You were hoping to make them one."

"But it didn't work. Maybe, Scott are you really not okay with it?"

Scott looked defensive and confused. "What? No. I'm so super okay with this! It's not me. I just want you to be happy. I know Derek is a good guy. It has to be something else. Stiles are you okay with it?"

Stiles looked defensive and snippy. "Of course I'm okay with it! I'm the one that wanted this! I am so beyond okay with this! I'm actually out of this universe okay with this! Derek are you okay with this?"

Derek looked like it was obvious and crossed his arms at the stupidity of the question. "Yes." He turned to Isaac sarcastically. "Are you okay with this? Husband ours?"

Isaac answered genuinely, "Yeah, of course."

Stiles crossed his arms back at Derek. He started to pace. "Okay, that should've worked. Why didn't work? The king said I could be the bridge to the packs, but why didn't it work? Do I need to do it with Isaac too? No, that doesn't make sense, it should work with just Derek. Maybe I have to actually marry him. No, in magical matters usually intent matters more than the actual contract. I intend to be with him. I intend to unite the packs..." Stiles looked up and stopped pacing. "Maybe its not about my intent. Or Derek's, or Scott's. You can't force a wolf to accept a pack. They have to choose it. I'm supposed to be the bridge, but you all still have to walk across it. You all have to choose to join each other. If I'm uniting packs, I kinda need packs permission. Are you guys okay with it?"

Four, 'Yeah!'s were heard and one, 'Hell yeah!' sounded. Cora looked at Stiles with squinted eyes. "Don't break him Stilinski."

They all turned to Jackson. He huffed and turned to Derek. "If Stilinski comes over at midnight to watch The Notebook with Lydia and he wakes me up with his blubberin, it's your ass I'm gonna paralyze."

They looked to Erica. "You all know I'm going to say yes. Especially with all the work batman put into trying to get the packs to get along."

Derek and Scott looked confused.

"Oh come on, we all know Scott is clueless, but you didn't know Derek? Lydia and I have standing nail appointments together ever since he took her on a day I just "happened" to be going. Jackson and him help Isaac with his complicated social worker law shit on Thursdays, which I have no idea what kind of magic he uses for that. Somehow, god knows how, he found out Boyd used to go deer hunting with his dad, and now he goes with Malia. That's just some of the shit he's done. Hell, he put together a training session without you guys about how to deescalate alphas challenging each other."

Cora piped up, "Oh come on Derek, you haven't smelled Isaac coming home on Fridays?"

He didn't want to mention that the spell Stiles used to get rid of his scent on Derek also kept him from smelling Stiles sometimes.

She continued, "He reeks of the sheriff and Stilinski. The sheriff all but adopted Isaac after hearing his sob story. He goes over there every week. Stiles is the main reason he's even surviving college. He wanted to get close to your beta, so he put all the fighting behind them. Well, most of the fighting." She shrugged.

Scott and Derek looked at Stiles. "Oh, don't give me that. The packs needed a lot of work, forgive me for wanting a head start. I wanted for them to at least be friends by the time you two got your heads out of your asses. Side note Derek, the bond between Isaac and I the king saw was probably the new friend thing we've got going on and the bond I was trying to forge to bridge everyone. That paired with how close you and Isaac are he probably couldn't tell the difference. Sight magic is hard, especially if there's a block. Like my bracelet or the spells I use on you. It probably muddled our relationships to each other enough." He turned to Erica. "Also, that wasn't a yes."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh for godsake, yes, you can be my new daddy Stiles. Scott too."

Just like the latch clicking behind you when you get home, they all felt the new pack bond slide into place like it was always waiting to.

Scott whispered awed and joyful, "Did we all just become one big awesome pack?"

Derek pulled Stiles' body to himself and dipped Stiles with a passionate kiss.

The pack hollered around them and Derek pulled him back up. "That was the moment, wasn't it?"

Stiles smiled at him. "Every moment is the moment with you, big guy."

[istheresomebodywhocanimagine]

Everybody Knows (SMUT)

tabseus said: Hi :) First of all, I really enjoy reading your fics! Could you maybe write one with ben hardy x reader where they are a couple and have some kind of fight because Ben overheard reader talking with her girls about hers and Ben‘s sex life. Although all the reader is saying is really positive, Ben does not want them to know about it. Could end with smut maybe :)? (a/n: holy SHIT this only took me 5 years. this is the NYM spinoff piece, where it can be read as a separate piece, but I’d really advise you go back and read NYM if you haven’t!!! i’ll link the previous parts below. this baby is almost 11k, so don’t think you’re in for some light reading rn hehe. get ready for angsty ben and eventual makeup smut bc we all love a good makeup smut)

NYM Part 1 | NYM Part 2 | NYM Part 3 | NYM Part 4

"Yeah, breaker one-nine, this here's the Rubber Duck, you got a copy on me? Over."

"The fact that you have the Convoy theme song memorized so clearly is both impressive and troubling," you teased, letting go of the push-to-talk button and waiting for Joe's response as you sat the walkie talkie down on your counter, reaching up above your head to try and retrieve the bag of white cheddar popcorn. You'd stuffed it in the top of the cabinet after grocery shopping this morning, telling yourself you'd save it for a rainy day and not snack on it all the time.  Alas, your attempt to put it out-of-sight, out-of-mind had lasted less than 12 hours before you were scrambling to pull the bag down and devour it all in one go - Joe had just gotten back from an extended filming period and after napping the day away, he convinced you to come over and get fucked up on some shitty liquor while catching him up on the latest NYC happenings. The white cheddar popcorn craving had happened after the fact, as you were coming down from your brief buzz already - the liquor was shitty enough to keep you from drinking much, while Joe was more than happy to pick up your slack. The walkie talkie remained silent, and you furrowed your eyebrows, pausing in your embarrassing struggle for the popcorn to snatch up the small black receiver and press the PTT button again. "Joey? You alive?" More radio silence, then finally a crackling and a slurred response. "You didn't say over. Over."

Staring ahead at the cabinet for a moment, you slowly closed your eyes and started laughing, shaking your head. "You're a fucking dumbass. Over."

"Well, someone's a bitch. Over." "Who is he calling a bitch?" Ben's quiet, gravelly voice suddenly appeared behind you, and you startled a bit as you whirled around to find a very heavy-lidded, scruffy-looking Ben standing there. If you didn't know any better, you'd say he was just sleepy - but he'd also been over at Joe's getting white-girl wasted, and the rosiness of his cheeks betrayed that very fact as he shuffled forward, wrapping his arms around your waist and enveloping you in a warm hug that trapped you between the counter and him. "I thought you were still over there, I was just going to be a second," you murmured, running your hand over the back of his unruly blonde hair and smoothing it down before letting your hand come to rest on the nape of his neck. He shook his head, mumbling something incoherent as he pressed his face into your neck, nuzzling it gently and making you smile. Such a baby. Taking a deep breath, you let out a long exhale before pressing a soft, quick kiss to the side of his head and murmuring, "He was calling me a bitch." Humming in response, he blindly lifted a hand to reach for the walkie talkie, and when he'd clumsily stolen it from your grasp, he lifted his head just enough to speak into the receiver as he held the button down. His chin pressed into your shoulder as he talked, making you smile and turn to press a lingering kiss to his cheek. "Stop bullying my girlfriend or I'll come back over there and wallop you." "You didn't say over either," Joe pointed out snarkily, and you rolled your eyes as Ben chuckled softly and resumed burying his face in your neck, sitting the walkie talkie down. Returning his hand to your back, his thumb ran light circles across your skin just under the hem of your shirt, making a sharp thrill run through your body due to your still-mildly intoxicated state. As much as you wanted to stay there forever and mooch off of Ben's body heat, you remembered the white cheddar popcorn calling your name - so with some difficulty, you managed to start peeling Ben's arms off of you, giggling knowingly when he let out an unhappy groan. "Go back over there. I'll be back in a minute." Pulling away slowly, he didn't look too pleased and grumbled to himself as he shuffled off to Joe's again with his phone charger now in hand. 

“Love you!” you called after him, which he reciprocated only after shooting you a playful glare over his shoulder. Grinning, you watched as he stepped out onto the balcony and blew you a kiss before flipping you off and disappearing around the corner with the smile.

It took climbing on the counter for you to reach the bag of popcorn in the cabinet, but you managed to get it down and not sprain your ankle getting off the counter, so you took a minute to participate in a victory dance that would have surely been mocked if you were over on the other side of that wall separating you and the boys. A pleased smile played at your lips as you pranced back over to Joe's, only tripping once or twice.  Losing your balance? That was another story. You almost biffed it when you rounded Ben's couch, over-calculating the turn and nearly ending up on your ass. Of course, even sober, you were still just getting used to Ben's couch being there instead of yours. His was nice, a grey microfiber sectional - "For the dog," he'd insisted, even though you told him time and time again that it wasn't a pet-friendly apartment and you didn't have a dog. But he'd brought it anyways, and it had replaced your poor, flaky pleather excuses for furniture. In fact, there were a lot of touches of Ben in this apartment now that he'd moved in. It had been a year since you started seeing each other, and around month ten of Ben constantly being over at your or Joe's place (as in, every moment he wasn't filming), his lease was about up and he was apartment hunting again. Then it hit you - why was he going to get another place if he was just staying at yours all the time? You'd felt so blind, you were almost reluctant to bring it up to Ben in fear that his response might be along the lines of 'took you long enough' - but you had conveniently forgotten that Ben was an even more oblivious dumbass than you were.  Instead of a condescending 'oh, you finally put two and two together?', Ben had looked at you, very obviously shocked, then laughed and kissed your head repeatedly between mumblings about you being 'so smart' and 'such a catch.' Humming to yourself, you pulled open the bag of popcorn just as you crossed the threshold into Joe's living room. Ben was sleeping away on the couch while Joe looked one step away from dead, his eyes glossed over as he stared up at an episode of Big Mouth he'd probably seen no less than 5 times already. The dab pen perched neatly on the end table between the two of them said all you needed to know, and you narrowed your eyes a bit as you chomped on the popcorn, Joe slowly turning his bloodshot gaze in your direction and smiling placidly as you spoke. "Wow. You look fucking stoned, dude." "Welcome back.... I see you've decided not to share your snacks with us. Bitch." "I told you to stop calling her a bitch." Ben's voice was muffled - he barely gave the effort to even move his mouth enough to speak clearly, his face squished up against the couch and eyes not even opening an inch as he reached out in your general direction weakly. His fingers did the grabby thing that made your heart do flips as you padded over to the couch, Ben sitting up just long enough for you to get yourself comfortable on the end of the couch, and then his head was plopping down on your lap again. You felt his cheek press a little harder against your thigh as he readjusted so he was comfortable, and then he was back to practically comatose.  Sitting your bag of popcorn to the side, you used one hand to keep feeding yourself while the other ran through Ben's hair repeatedly, his breathing slowing down until he was fast asleep. Joe kept quiet, only snickering at crass Big Mouth jokes occasionally and never letting his eyes leave the screen. It was a serene night, an oddly quiet one shared between the three of you - usually, at least two of you were yelling, so the absence of noise was relaxing. As much as you hated to break it, you had to, because the pen between you and Joe was making you curious. Multiple questions were dancing around your tongue like they were on hot coals, urged out by the slowly-dwindling buzz making your head spin a bit as you reached out for the pen. "Did you suddenly come down with some shit that requires the healing effects of THC?" Picking it up, you rolled it around in your hand for a second before sitting it back down. "Shit looks fancy." "Fancy? And I got it from Tori," Joe answered without looking away from the screen, his jaw still a little slack as he struggled to focus on you and the show. "She went out-of-state for some fancy art curator shit and came back with it. Knocks you on your ass, it does." "Okay, Yoda," you laughed, Joe rolling his eyes back in his head and trying not to smile before scoffing. "Can't you buy them in the city anyway? "Yeah, but can you buy the stuff for it in the city?" he retorted. He had you there, and you gave him a grin and a shrug before he rolled his eyes and continued. "Are you even old enough to be making Star Wars references, kid?" "Oh, shut up," you dismissed, not wanting to get in a fight with cross-faded Joe. Rolling your eyes when he mocked you quietly, you decided to reroute the conversation again. "So when are you just gonna bite the bullet and make it official with your favorite art curator? You were all about preaching just doing it to Ben and I last year, where's that energy now?" "Where's that energy now?" he mimicked, clearly at a loss for comebacks, and you snorted at his childishness, but a lengthy sigh from him made you think it was less of a 'fuck you' and more of an aversion. The question seemed to trouble him, and he was deathly quiet for a minute before speaking. "This may just be high me speaking, but I think I'm in a rut right now and she doesn't even know it. So I don't want to trap her if it's not going to work out... in all aspects." "Uh oh, has erectile dysfunction finally set in? I heard that when you get ancient, things like that happen." Joe's clear annoyance couldn't stifle your laughter as soon as you finished your sentence, but he waited for you quiet down a bit before he spoke over you. "If I didn't feel like I was melted into this chair like the wax dripping off of a fine soy candle right now, I'd come over there with a fifty-five-gallon drum of ass-whooping and pour it all over you." "Jesus, it was a joke!" you laughed, tossing one of his smaller decorative pillows at him playfully and bursting into another round of laughter when he threw it back at you harder, acting like he wasn't in the mood for your games even though the smile plastered on his face said otherwise. "I'm sorry, buddy, I'll be nice now. Why do you think you're in a rut?" "I just... I don't think I'm doing it for her, you know?" he sighed, his fingers curling up on the armrests as he seemed to melt even more into the chair. Then, an amused giggle escaped him, almost like clockwork, and he grinned in spite of his words. "Like she seems into it, but my brain keeps telling me that every time we're having sex that she's wishing she was hooking up with someone a lot... younger. And adventurous. Like a young Steve Irwin. Mister Danger." Though Joe wasn't too shy about his sex life, you were still shocked to hear him being so open about such a vulnerable part of it - usually, your conversations about your respective sex lives were just complaints and laments. So, it warmed your heart to hear that Joe was concerned about his end of the game - as much as your friend's sex life through Steve Irwin metaphors could warm your heart, of course. Looking down at Ben, you smiled a bit and brushed a stray hair back from his face, his nose twitching a bit and lips smacking together lazily. For a moment, you thought he was awake, but his breathing showed no signs of speeding up, so you wrote it off as sleepy twitches and looked back up at Joe, still running your fingers through Ben's hair soothingly. "As much as I hate hearing you use Steve Irwin as a sexual comparison to yourself... why did you start thinking that?" "Well, the other day, she brought up the fact that we're both Virgos. At first, I thought that she called us both virgins, and I laughed, but... not the same thing," he admitted in a small voice, but you didn't even attempt to muffle your amused giggles, much to his chagrin. Sighing and burying his face in his hands for a second, Joe let out a long groan before shaking his head and dropping his hands to his lap again. "And I don't completely know what it has to do with our sex lives at all, but she mentioned our compatibility in passing and I just... I feel bad. She was reading something about how Virgo women like to communicate how they're feeling, and I really don't think we're communicating like we should be. Or maybe I'm just overthinking it. Which she also said-" "Yeah, that's a Virgo thing. She's right," you cut in, already knowing what he was going to say, and he narrowed his eyes a bit before huffing at the fact you were apparently siding with Tori. "Virgos are supposed to be so good at communicating! What's the hold-up, Mister 'Talk to Ben or I'm gonna go nuts"? You were all about talking it out last year." "I don't know, I think my mind's just fucking dumb and manic- wait no, not manicure. Manuscript? Jesus Christ, what's the word? Mani-man.... Manifested! Manifested. My mind manifested this block on its own. Do you ever do that? Like, just worry that you're just not doing enough and they're too scared or too pissed off to say anything about it? But then you're too scared to say anything because talking about... your sex life makes you nervous as shit? Because what if she doesn't actually want to talk about it?" Nodding along as he spoke, you considered your life in the bedroom with Ben. Did you have that concern? It was a valid question, one that made your face screw up in thought for a minute before you finally spoke, your fingers brushing Ben's hair back again. "Not really. Ben's pretty open about what works for him and what doesn't work for him, I think. Maybe we both are? I guess we just communicate more than I'm used to, but it really works in the long run." Joe stared deadpan at you, not seeming as if he understood a single word you said, and you raised an eyebrow in challenge. "What? Are you fucking deaf?" "No, I'm just... not sure I was prepared to hear about your sex life with Big Ben. It's so different when it's... well, him." Rolling your eyes, you prepared to stand up, already done with this conversation, but Joe was quick to raise his hands in surrender and stutter out an apology amidst delirious laughter. "No, no no, sit back down! I'm sorry- shit, I'm sorry, I just had to get that out. Keep going, I'm listening." "You need to talk to Tori," you replied matter-of-factly, and the familiar sentiment echoed in your brain, reminding you of a simpler time - a time when Ben was just Joe's dorky, fit friend who came around sometimes and made you laugh at how awkward he could be. Now, he was your boyfriend waking you up in the morning begging you to make almond flour pancakes with him just so he could cover his hand in flour and smack your ass to leave a handprint. At least you knew the 'talk to them' advice was effective. "I know it sounds hypocritical, but you need to ask her about what she's into and what she isn't into. That way you can know what gets her going and what you need to steer away from." "What, like missionary vs. cowgirl?" Joe asked incredulously, and you had to laugh at the naiveté of assuming that sex positions alone would be enough. Were you shocked that a straight cis man was saying this, though? Not really. (Ben was a surprising exception, and you were eternally grateful for it.) "Good god, she- oh my god, I'm sorry I'm laughing. I don't mean to be an asshole, it just happens," you giggled, moving your hand to Ben's back and rubbing relaxing circles into it when he twitched in his sleep again. "You're going to have to get real comfortable here because the only way I know how to explain this is to talk about blondie here." "Fuck, hold on," Joe grimaced, looking straight forward out of the balcony door for a second. His expressions incredibly exaggerated from how high he was at the moment, you could see every step in his process of compartmentalizing all the inner turmoil hearing about his friend's sex life was going to cause before finally nodding slowly, not losing the grimace. "Okay, go." "I think first you need to see if she likes to be in control. Like, dominate." "Um, I don't think so? No, she isn't the dominant one in bed," Joe observed, his words slow as he thought-extra hard, probably just to make sure he was right and not just so high he was imagining things. "But I guess I don't know for sure. What do you mean?" "So like, when Ben and I have sex, I'm the dom-" "Hold on!" Joe interrupted, pretending to gag as he lurched forward dramatically, hamming it up while you watched in unamused silence. When he'd finished his dramatics, he waved for you to continue. "Alright, got that out of my system. You're the dominant one?" "Yeah?" you drawled out slowly, unsure how that wasn't the most obvious thing in the world right now. Ben's face was smooshed up against your thigh, his lips slightly parted as his shallow breathing continued. He was unnervingly beautiful like this, a sweet little soft boy aura to him that always carried over into the bedroom very smoothly - his suave, strong-armed facade hardly held up behind closed doors. Smiling a bit in awe of how precious he looked undisturbed, you stopped rubbing his back and reached for your phone, pulling up Chrome. In the meantime, Joe had narrowed his eyes, still dubious and harboring doubts over whether you were just bullshitting him right now or not. "What's not clicking? Are you forgetting that I literally had to make the first move?" "Yeah, but I figured it was just because he was being shy... like, how does he not dominate when he could easily sit on you and suffocate you with his muscles?" Joe flexed for emphasis, but it did little to drive his point home as you were already laughing at his blissful ignorance, pausing in clicking on a Google link about Virgos and compatibility. In the midst of your fit of laughter, though, he gasped and let out a strangled shriek as he sat up a bit. "Does that mean you peg him?" "No!" You almost choked on the ensuing laughter, feeling like your face was red hot from the exertion of trying to catch your breath, and Joe let out an audible, very exaggerated sigh of relief as he sunk back into the chair. "Why would you even ask that if you knew you wouldn't like the other answer?" "Just.... if you ever peg him, don't tell me. Please," he begged, and with a laugh, you agreed.  "Promise. Although I can't promise you I won't suffocate him when I sit on his f-" "Stop! It's gone too far!" Joe shrieked, trying to stand up, but he came to the realization that he was rooted in his place. His eyes widened with absolute fear that his limbs were essentially jello from the concentrated THC ravaging his nervous system at the moment, and you almost couldn't contain your delight as you stifled laugh after laugh. "Oh my God. Oh my Godddd. Fuck. This is my worst nightmare. I'm stuck here listening to you talk about pegging my poor friend." "I'm not pegging Ben, dude!" you refuted, giggling incredulously and pressing your hands to your face in mild exasperation. "I've already told you that. I just... I don't get crazy, but you know, take charge! I subtly control the situation. He's totally a bitch when it comes down to it... and I love it so much! It's not a bad thing." Joe groaned as he sunk deeper into the chair, looking like he wished it would swallow him whole before he reluctantly continued. "So I need to figure out what dynamics she likes." "Yeah, that's the word!" you cheered, feeling Ben stir on your lap a little, and you wondered if Joe's mini-heart attack had awoken him. "Start with that, and then work from there. This website says 'The Virgo male-Virgo female compatibility will include a great love life, if and only if, there is no gap in their communication aspect.'" Pursing your lips, you paused before reading down a little bit and continuing to read out loud. "The Virgo couple has to make sure that they, do not overthink about their problems, are more relaxed, and that they communicate their problems by sharing and accepting each other the way they are.' See? It all comes a lot easier- sex comes a lot easier when you can communicate and be honest about what tickles your fancy." "Please stop talking about tickling anything." Joe's pleading tone was worth a laugh, but you held it back for his sake as you shook your head and grinned widely. "I'll talk to her," he finally resigned, and you felt vindication as you brushed a hand back over Ben's hair, hearing him let out a quiet, happy noise at the feeling. "Damn, this must have been what you felt like when he and I finally got over ourselves last year," you noted, and Joe, though he clearly hated every second of it, nodded slowly. Looking down, you caught Ben just in time to see his eyes open blearily, the glaze over them still evident as he turned on his back to look up at you, blinking slowly. "Hello, Sleeping Beauty." "Hi," he croaked, his voice still gravelly as he offered a smile, and you smiled back before patting his cheek gently, lifting your thigh a bit to coax him into getting up. After stretching a bit, he obliged, sitting up and steadying himself on the back of the couch while you stood up and reached out a hand for him. Helping him to his feet, you let him start shuffling back to your apartment while you turned to give Joe a pointed look. "You better talk to her." "I will!" he whined, crossing his arms grumpily and mumbling a snarky goodbye before letting you usher Ben back to bed, where he passed out quickly, curled up against your side with his head resting on your chest and arm draped across your tummy. A blissful, serene smile was plastered onto his features on into the late morning, where you woke up to find neither of you had moved, and apparently, neither had Joe, according to the texts he'd sent you about an hour ago. jmuzzie: I can't fucking get up from this chair jmuzzie: All I can think about is you pegging Ben jmuzzie: I barely slept. Grinning and shaking your head, you decided to ignore the texts and leave them on your home screen to worry about later, carefully detaching yourself from Ben and crawling out of bed. He grabbed your pillow to snuggle instead, wrapping it up in a tight embrace while you tiptoed to the kitchen to make a quick breakfast - bacon, scrambled eggs, and some coffee to wake up what was sure to be a very sore Ben (which he very much was).  You heard a groan from down the hallway just as you were finishing up the scrambled eggs, and after hearing the bathroom sink faucet run for a moment, Ben appeared in the doorway, his hair sticking up in odd places and clothes frumpy from being slept in. Cooing sympathetically, you put together a plate for him as he somehow managed to pour himself a coffee and sluggishly climb onto a stool at the counter. While you made his plate, he stared off into space, not even giving a simple hello as he seemed to try and will himself to wake up, his cheeks still a bit splotchy and feverish from waking up - he always ran hot, especially during the night. "There you go, princess," you teased, Ben only groaning in thanks when the plate clattered down to the counter in front of him. The noise made him wince, so you decided to keep the conversation minimal while you both finished your breakfast, and you could tell he was already getting sleepy again from the methodical, slow pace he was taking to rinse the dishes off in the sink. "I think I'm just going to stand in the shower for a tick and question my life choices," he finally mumbled once he was wiping his hands off on the dishtowel next to the sink, and with a quick kiss to your cheek, he was off to the bathroom. As he trudged back down the hallway, you elected to pour another cup of coffee to take next door. "Joe said he was up, I'll go check on him real quick. You were both blitzed by bedtime, so I'm sure he's hurting too." Ben answered with an almost inaudible grunt, and you rolled your eyes with a small grin before shifting the mug to your opposite hand and shuffling over to your neighbor's apartment, where you found Joe in the kitchen, apparently over his dramatics from an hour ago. The sliding door squeaked a bit as you shut it behind you, and Joe looked up slowly, his red-rimmed eyes narrowing and lip curling up ever-so-slightly when his eyes adjusted enough to recognize you. "Oh, it's the pegger-" "You really are the worst," you immediately laughed, crossing the living room and holding out the mug of coffee, which he accepted with a grateful noise and sipped in silence while you made yourself at home on his bar stools. "Feeling 10 out of 10 this morning?" "Out of 10? I feel like a Mexican 1." Furrowing your eyebrows, you opened your mouth to question whether that was vaguely racist, but he continued before you could confuse the situation even further. "Because a peso is worth less than a dollar, duh?" "The joke isn't funny if you have to explain it, dumbass." You let out a single, pitying laugh at his poor attempt at humor, though, and reached for your phone only to find that you'd left it over at the apartment. "Shit. Must have left my phone back over there." "I'll text Ben," he sighed melodramatically, pulling out his phone and typing away while you propped your head up on your hand. "He said he's on his way because 'the water won't warm up fast enough.'" When he finally locked his phone and set it back on the counter, you looked at it for a moment before giving him a pointed look, deliberately switching your gaze between him and the phone a few times before he scoffed and rolled his eyes. "Do you have something to say, or are you tweaking right now?... Does your eye have a really bad twitch?" "Sooooo," you drawled out, tilting your head a bit more and shimmying your shoulders playfully before wiggling your eyebrows a bit. He didn't seem to get the hint or want to get the hint, and you let out a huff of annoyance as the skin around his childlike hazel eyes crinkled, taunting you. "Have you talked to her yet?" "At 9 in the morning? Yeah, let me just call her." Picking up his phone, he mimed typing in her number sloppily before raising the phone to his ear, putting on a moronic expression as he did so. "Hey, babe. Yeah, I know it's 9 am, but I was wondering if you want to tie me up and spank me because I've been a naughty little-" "Okay, enough, enough!" you laughed, holding out your hands to shield yourself from the invisible antagonism that practically radiated off of him at this point. "I get it. I was just curious, dickwad." Scoffing again, he gave you an irritatingly condescending look before he reached forward and grabbed the water bottle he'd been most likely nursing since last night, which you assumed from the way a foggy sort of condensation had built up on the inside of the bottle. It went away as he swirled the bottle a bit, then he took the cap off and reluctantly took a swig, wincing at the stale, lukewarm water that he forced himself to swallow. "Ew. How can they say that drinking warm water is better for your health? I think these doctors are a bunch of fucking quacks."  "They probably know a lot more than you do, dummy," you answered in a deadpan, looking around for a moment and furrowing your eyebrows. Ben wasn't there yet, and you wondered what was taking him so long. "He said he was on his way, right?" you asked, and Joe nodded, seemingly unbothered as he carefully examined the bottle he'd just taken a drink out of, his left hand toying with the cap of it absentmindedly and flipping it between his fingers. "Do you think that I could make a bottle flip if I got some practice? I've seen those videos of all the kids doing it from a couple years ago, and I kind of want some good throwback Instagram content." "Joe, you could literally just post a picture with Ben standing in your general vicinity and your Instagram base would lose its fucking marbles." Frowning, you climbed off the bar stool as Joe grunted noncommittally in response, apparently already on one track as he picked up the bottle and weighed his options. As you turned, you heard him let out a strangled cry that barely even registered as you tilted your head a bit, wondering where in the hell your boyfriend was. Had he fallen back asleep? Was he choking on his vomit like that scene from Breaking Bad where Walter watched Jesse's girlfriend die because she apparently had to? Wait, why the fuck would he be throwing up from a weed hangover? "I forgot it was open! Oh my god, oh my god, where's the god damn dish towels?" Joe panicked, and you looked back to see the bottle from before laying sideways on the counter, but your mind was too much of a mess to make sense of why there was a medium-sized puddle of water surrounding it and dripping down to the tiled floor. Joe scrambled around like a chicken with its head cut off and in his panic, you didn't even have to ask - he blurted it out anyway. "I fucking try to do a bottle flip once and this is what I get!"

"Um, Joe, you have fun with that, buddy," you hummed nervously, worry setting in as you decided you'd come back for the mug later - not that he'd give it back anyway, but you'd try. Joe was too busy cleaning up his mistake to pay attention to you already being halfway out the door, hurrying over just to find Ben sitting on the bar stool with his back to you, sipping coffee and appearing to be fine. Letting out a sigh of relief, you padded back into the kitchen where you picked up the now mostly empty kettle of coffee, feeling Ben's eyes on you as you poured yourself another mug. It was quiet, still like last night, but there was an eerie quality to this silence that made a nearly-paralyzing chill trickle down your spine as you poured the last tiny bit of the coffee down the drain, starting to rinse it out. Ben made no attempt to speak even when you peeked over at him to see him very calmly watching you. He wasn't smiling, though, and there was a distant look in his eyes that you recognized immediately. He wasn't daydreaming, no sir. Something had pissed him off royally - you'd seen this look before on rare occasions, and angry Ben was never a treat. He was a true Capricorn if you'd ever seen one, a calculated son of a bitch who could build up a wall within seconds and take days to bring it back down. If you called him out on one single minute flaw in his argument, he'd also obsess over it for hours, either bricking himself in and giving you the silent treatment or snapping immediately and trading in his cool rationale to show you a temper to be reckoned with; a force you'd never seen before. He was never violent - far from it, actually, but if you stirred the sleeping dragon, you were in for one hell of an argument. There was never an argument you hadn't worked through, though, and you weren't about to lose that streak today. So, you turned around and leaned your hip against the counter, crossing your arms as you took a sip of the coffee. "What's up? Joe said you were on your way, what gives?" Ben nodded, sitting down his mug and licking his lips before pressing them together and shrugging. "Changed my mind." "What changed your mind?" you prodded, his body language telling you everything he wasn't saying as he crossed his arms in front of him and leaned over the counter, his shoulders hunching up a bit after he shrugged again. "Ben, come on, don't do this. What's bothering you? I'm not fucking dumb, you know, you're clearly upset about something." "I never said you were dumb," he responded, and the calm, unwavering tone of voice infuriated you so much you lost your taste for the coffee, sitting your mug down on the counter as well and crossing your arms again.  "So are you just going to avoid my question? I really want to know what's upsetting you, bubs, I can't just sit here and guess until you say 'Oh, you got it! Clever girl.' You're acting like I microwaved your tea water, for Christ’s sake!" Ben scoffed, tracing a fingertip around the rim of his mug and shaking his head a bit as you heard the muffled sound of Joe's TV turning on just on the other side of the wall. Your phone vibrated from the counter next to Ben, but you couldn't bring yourself to walk over and go grab it as Ben's annoyingly nonchalant nature perplexed you. "Why do I have to be upset? Can't I just drink coffee in silence with my girlfriend?" "Ben, I live with you, I know your 'looks' like the back of my hand. Can we please just talk about this?" "Talk about what?" Tapping the screen of your phone, which had just locked automatically again, his eyes scanned through the notifications for a second before he smiled sardonically. "Ah, there it is. Yeah, let's talk about it. I get a text from Joe saying you forgot your phone, so I go to grab it and I get to see these beauties. 'I can't fucking get up from this chair, all I can think about is you pegging Ben, I barely slept.'" Leaning forward on his arms again, he gave you a bitter smile and propped his elbow up on the counter, resting his chin in his hand. "Fascinating stuff, really. Apparently, my girlfriend's pegged me and I wasn't even aware of it, and then she's gone and bragged about it to our best friend." Laughing in disbelief, you tilted your head to the side and gave him an incredulous look. "Are you serious right now? You're just going to take that out of context and not even think for a second, 'Hey, maybe there's an explanation to why Joe's-" "Why have you told Joe that you pegged me? You think it's funny? Where do you get off?" "Excuse me?" you choked out incredulously, baffled that he'd even assume that you got a laugh out of this wildly-exaggerated situation as you crossed your arms around yourself, feeling unbearably small underneath his gaze. He was slowly simmering, a single vein in his forehead just barely protruding from the taut reddish skin on his forehead. But there was such a level-headed manner to him it drove you nuts, making you huff softly and press the heels of your hands into your eyes, then shake your head a few more times. "I can't believe this is happening right now, this is ridiculous." "That's fucking rich, considering I'm the one who 'got pegged' and joked about in this situation." Ben's voice was venomous, even, and you shivered again at how easily he spit it back at you, unafraid of whatever he'd say next. "You like telling our friends that I take it in the arse? That really make you laugh, huh? Why are you lying to Joe about our sex life, which is supposed to be private-" "Oh, don't fucking start with me about private sex lives!" you quickly retorted, cutting him off mid-sentence in an impulsive moment of rage. "I've heard you drunk and blabbering on to your fucking 'mates' back in London over the phone about us, don't even start with me!"  Oh. You'd done it now - calling him out on something insignificant was one thing, but accusing him of blatant hypocrisy? You could practically see the steam shooting out of his ears. Something flashed in his eyes, and then he rocketed out of the stool he'd just previously been seated so still on. You followed him as he stormed down the hallway - he yelled over his shoulder as he went. "At least I don't tell my mates that I make you take it in the arse, yeah? Fuck you, Y/N. It's bloody different, especially when it's Joe and you've lied to him about something personal!" "Will you just let me explain?" you called after him, exasperated and ready to pull your hair out as he threw open the door to the bedroom, stalking over to the bed before starting to pace in front of it. He looked caged as he walked back and forth, both of his hands running back through his hair in obvious frustration before he finally let out a loud groan and sat back on the bed, looking at you and trying to mask the anger he clearly felt right now with a forced apathetic expression. "Okay, go on. I'm dying to hear how you'll talk your way out of this one." Recoiling a bit at how unwilling he was to even hear your side of the story, you felt tears welling up in your eyes a bit but you blinked them away, refusing to let him win with such a biting comeback. "Seems like whatever I say, you're not going to care anyways. Is this even worth my time, explaining it to you?" He didn't have a response, and that irritated you even more, making you choke up a bit as you continued. "You're like this every time, Ben, you fucking get this idea of what happened in your head and you refuse to even accept the idea that maybe my side of the story is as valid as yours." "What if I did do that?" He paused and let it sink in, as he was always the actor, and then he was on a roll again. "What if I accepted your side every time, and then you took advantage of that? I'm not a toy and I'm not here to be played with, or used for bragging rights when you're talking to your friends- our friends about our sex life, Y/N, I have feelings too! I'm allowed to feel this way too, and right now, I feel like you're just using me as a- fuck, I don’t know, a talking point or something!" As far as the validity of his feelings, he did have a point (as much as you hated to cede to that), but you still pressed your lips into a thin line and persisted, not letting the subject drop. "I'm not going to take advantage of you, Ben! Stop saying that! Not everyone is out to get you, especially not me, and I hate when you're like this, 'protecting yourself'. You think that by being mean to me, it will get your problems to go away so you can keep this wall between you and the issue, but I'm not going to let you shut me out again. You don't have to shut down every time something goes haywire, damn it!" "I'm not shutting you out or being mean to you!" he yelled back, but you only scoffed and crossed your arms in disbelief. "Then what are you doing?" Your question was warranted, and Ben found himself at a loss for words as he stared at you guardedly. The gears were turning in his head, and you could see from the confusion in his eyes that he was starting to question himself now.  "I- I'm just tryin' to-" "To protect yourself, yeah, I get it!" you interrupted, Ben's jaw tightening as he snapped his mouth shut once again. The tension in his jaw remained unrelieved as you continued. "I get that you want to protect yourself, Ben, but you don't have to be so shitty to me for no reason when you do it! It's fucking mean and it hurts my feelings that you won't even let me explain myself!" That rendered him fully speechless, so you only let up for a moment before pressing one last time. "Can I explain now? Please." Dead silence hung in the air for a moment as the gravity of your words weighed heavy on both of you, Ben's teeth grinding together for a moment as he considered the accusations against him. "Fine," he muttered, yielding to you despite the conflict still going on behind closed doors in his mind.  You could tell it was a raging dumpster fire in there as you approached the bed, tentatively, sitting next to him and wiping away the tears that had failed to escape from your eyes. Between awkward shifts and intermittent sniffles, you explained everything you'd talked to Joe about last night, from Joe's Virgo woes to his mistaken assumption about pegging, Ben, and you. By the end of your story, you'd tucked one leg underneath you and let the other dangle off of the edge of the bed, facing Ben with your hands in your lap despite the fact that they were itching to be running through his hair right now.  You wanted desperately to comfort him, but there wasn't much to be done as you finally quieted to let him process all of this new information, his gaze trained on his legs which were just barely crossed over each other at the ankle, one foot shaking back and forth anxiously. It drove you mad as you hyper-focused on it too, so anxious to know what he was thinking that you nearly didn't register when he uncrossed them. Your head lifted as he stood up off the bed and walked over to the other side of the room quickly, your anxious feelings multiplying when his back stayed turned to you and he came to rest in front of the dresser. However, you vowed not to let it be known how utterly freaked out you were at the moment, so you scooted back on the bed and sat criss-cross as you brought his pillow into your lap, needing something of comfort to latch on to. It seemed like eons before he finally spoke, but it couldn't have been more than a few minutes, and his quiet, gentle words were like music to your ears. "So you didn't tell Joe you pegged me?" "No," you almost laughed in relief, though the situation certainly didn't call for it, and you could see his shoulders relax a bit, though his back stayed turned to you. "I actually told him I never had - multiple times, if I'm not wrong." "He was just joking?" he asked a bit louder, elaborating on his previous question, and you could feel the anxiety crumbling away as he turned to you with a genuinely relieved expression on his face. When you nodded, you could see an incredibly guilty look come over his face, and a little whine escaped your lips as you moved his pillow out of your lap and reached out for him. He gratefully obliged, climbing into bed with you, and you scooted over to make a bit more room as he practically laid on top of you, taking you down with him. "I'm such a dickhead, 'm sorry," was all he had to say, and that's all he had to do to make you start laughing before he began to pepper you with soft kisses anywhere he could. It was hard to breathe as he smothered you in wordless attention, and it took several tries for you to communicate that between breathless laughter and attempts to wriggle out from underneath him before he got the message.  As he turned on his side and let you breathe again, you tried to make sense of what had just happened. So many questions swirled through your head. When had it clicked? Why were you letting this slide? Why was he so defensive about this? But no matter how long you stared at your boyfriend and tried to make sense of it all, it proved fruitless to try and pin down exactly where he had finally got off of his one-track madness. So, you just smiled and saved that deconstruction for later. Right now, you wanted to savor the fact that things had been worked out, and you watched as Ben took your hand so he could kiss your knuckles, offering one more wordless apology with his eyes. His lips sent another thrill down your spine and you marveled at the effect he had on you even when you were both sober and incredibly sleep-worn. Despite him making you incredibly mad at moments, it was so hard not to love this man and everything about him. His green eyes flickered with an apprehensive yet curious look when you smiled widely, squeezing his hand. “Love you, bubs.” A smile spread across his lips, and he kissed your knuckles once more before murmuring his response.

“Love you too. Thanks for calling me out on my shit.” Laughing, you played with his fingers and shook your head, debating your response for a minute. It was your job, after all, but sometimes it was hard, especially when he was a dick about it like today. But Ben seemed to read your mind, and he continued on, relieving you the responsibility of somehow starting another tiff. “I know I suck sometimes, but I’m glad you and Joe can be mean right back to me if I need it. It makes it a lot easier to see when I’m being a knobhead.”

"Speaking of Joe-” Ben groaned before you even got the second part of your sentence out, and you had to laugh at him before you continued. It was like he knew you were about to poke fun at him. “He did say something about being surprised that you haven't smothered me yet," you teased, and Ben reluctantly took the bait, lacing his fingers into yours as he quirked an eyebrow curiously. "Yeah, no, he said something like 'How is he not the dominant one when he could just suffocate you with those muscles?' I think he has a crush on your muscles."  "First off, your Joe imitation is surprisingly poor for having lived next to him all these years," Ben joked right back, albeit in a soft voice. He seemed almost afraid of ticking you off at this point, but he had to roll his eyes when you gasped in mock offense. "Second of all, I'm not surprised that he wishes he could be this fit. And third off, I can be dominant, so I don't know what you were going on about with Joe." "Are you serious?" you laughed, and his attempt at looking dead serious only made you laugh harder as you hid your face behind the hand that was intertwined in his. "Oh, fuck, you're pulling my leg right now! You have to be, right?" The little noise of shock that he let out was genuine, and he moved your hand away from your face as he very obviously tried not to laugh at how hard you were laughing. "Why is it so hilarious? I can be dominant. I've been dominant with you loads of times." "Name one!" you choked out between fits of giggles, and he furrowed his eyebrows as he fell silent at the prompt. 5 seconds, 10 seconds, and then 20 seconds passed with no answer, which made you laugh even harder. "See?" "That doesn't mean that it can't happen!" he offered, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively, but you were still too distracted coming down off of the end of your incredulous laughing fit, so he just whined and gently pressed his lips to your jaw. His kisses were soft and quick as he tried to get your full, undivided attention so he could plead his case, but all that did was make you giggle again, so he laughed with you before rolling on top of you again, one of his legs resting between yours as he continued to trail kisses down to your neck.  His swollen bottom lip dragged over the skin as you snickered one more time, still amused at the thought of Ben genuinely thinking he wasn't the biggest baby when it came down to the wire, and you gave voice to your thoughts. He keened at the impression of your fingers running over his scalp and dragging through his hair, pausing in his kisses for just a moment when he finally heard you speak. "I hate to say it, but I have my doubts. Sue me." You felt a quick puff of air hit your neck as he audibly scoffed, and then he resumed his kisses without any more delay. And really, you had to say that these kisses paired with his roaming hand that had just came to rest on your thigh - it was beginning to do something for you, so you let him continue as you toyed with the hair at the nape of his neck. You could tell from the way his hips rolled against yours subtly that he was getting just as much from this as you were. When he finally pulled away just enough to look at you, for a second you saw Ben in his true form - all smiles and cosmetic charisma, but still just as rosy-cheeked and painfully unsuspecting as the day you'd met.  And he thought he was going to come out the one on top? "As if," you murmured with a shit-eating grin, and then you pulled him into a kiss by the nape of his neck, his lips meeting yours with an eagerness only Ben could fail to contain. For a moment, he'd convinced himself that maybe he could be the one in control, but the way he submitted easily as you rolled on top of him, your thigh brushing up between his legs, said otherwise. You hand snuck up to his jaw, your thumb just casually resting on his chin and brushing over a hint of stubble - it was a subtle move, but nonetheless an effective reminder of who was in charge as it subconsciously prompted him to tilt his head forward eagerly and deepen the kiss. Reaching down with your free hand, you just barely brushed your fingers over the front of his shorts before cupping him through the admittedly-scratchy fabric. His breathing hitched, and then he let out what sounded like the sweetest whimper you'd ever heard as he grinded up against your touch, already desperate for friction and just as predictable as he ever was. Smiling widely against his lips, you broke the kiss and moved your hand away so it was resting just below his navel instead. He groaned unhappily against your lips at the loss, one of his hands finding your hip, and he murmured, "What? What?" as if he didn't want to think about how needy he'd been just moments ago. Letting out a soft laugh, you kissed him deeply once more and roped him right back in, moaning softly in unison with him when you straddled his hips and inadvertently grinded against his growing bulge,  Though it wasn't unwelcome by any means, you bit down on the inside of your cheek as your instincts coaxed you into rolling your hips lazily - suddenly, you were struggling to silence every blazing reminder in your head that you were trying to show him that you loved to love him and wanted to treat him like he deserved, and if that meant dominating the fuck out of him, then so be it! But it was too hard to ignore the desire beginning to course through your veins and cloud your judgment - before you knew it, you weren't only chasing that satisfaction of proving your point. Taking his hand, you wordlessly moved it to the front of your pajama shorts and hummed in appreciation when he took the hint immediately, slipping his hand in between fabric and skin so he could rub circles into your clit. Moaning his name at the feeling, you could sense his pace quicken at bit at the positive reaction, and you rutted against his hand with a serene smile decorating your face.  "Fuck, this never gets old," you murmured, Ben letting out a grunt of agreement, and your eyebrows furrowed in pleasure as he applied more pressure. Managing to pull your shirt off despite barely being able to focus on anything besides his fingers, you hummed in pleasure when you immediately felt Ben's mouth on your chest, kissing and sucking on every inch of skin he could reach. Meanwhile, he slid his fingers through your slick heat, eliciting quiet moans from both of you at how soaked you were. All of your touches and actions became more fervent as things intensified, kisses getting sloppier, hands roaming even further, and clothes coming off in rapid succession until you were completely naked and yanking Ben's shorts to his ankles as you relished in the fact that he'd conveniently forgotten to wear boxers or even compression shorts underneath.  His cheeks were as flushed as ever, and he squirmed a bit impatiently, muscles shifting underneath his skin with each movement and making him look like a marble statue underneath the pale light filtering in from behind the curtains. Proving a point be damned, your boyfriend was hot - and he was very much putty in your hands. Kneeling between his legs, you started to reach out to help him, but he was already there before you could, his hand stroking his cock as he ogled your body and let out short, sharp breaths. When your eyes met his and you raised an eyebrow in question, his hand slowed down almost automatically, his cock twitching in his grasp. The pure lust in his eyes paired with the uneven rise and fall of his chest evoked a visceral reaction, one that made you nearly bite down on your tongue as you fought back the instinctive urge to inhale sharply. Fuck, he was pretty. "I couldn't help it," he admitted weakly, and the appreciation that flickered to life in your eyes only encouraged him as he offered a weak smile, getting himself off as you crawled back up to capture his lips in a quick kiss. Replacing his hand with yours, you continued to pleasure him slowly, each stroke setting off a tremble in his abdomen that betrayed everything you were doing to him despite how hard he was working not to moan into your mouth every other second. "You sound so pretty when you moan like that, baby," you cooed as you straddled his hips, starting to grind down on him again, and he let out a slightly broken noise of delight at your praise while his hands found purchase on your hips. "You like that?" "Yes, yes. Can't wait anymore. Need to fuck you, please," he begged in very obviously fragmented sentences. His head fell back against the pillows in a mixture of frustration and pleasure when you just grinned and traced a finger down the center of his chest, grinding down against him painfully slow.  "Then fuck me." You felt a shiver run up your spine when Ben openly groaned, and you fought the urge to just keep rutting against him until one of you got off - as tempting as it was, you instead let him guide himself until the tip of his cock was pressing against your entrance. "Raw?" he asked incredulously as if he hadn't already done it multiple times before, and you nodded slowly as he began to groan and cover his face with his arm, his head sinking back into the pillow. "I'm going to fucking bust before I even get in," he lamented, muffled by his elbow, and you had to grin knowingly before you finally sank down onto him with a soft gasp, marveling as he filled you up slowly. Fuck, fuck, fuck, that was good. You weren’t sure if you’d said that out loud, but no matter how many times you slept together, it still felt like the first time every time you did it. He bottomed out with a loud groan as you rested your hands on his torso, pausing a moment to adjust. When you finally looked down, his eyes were screwed shut in a desperate attempt to keep himself away from the edge as long as he could. "Baby, look at me," you whispered, and he peeked open an eye only to squeeze it shut as soon as he opened it. Letting out a small huff, he began to curse under his breath until you quieted him with a gentle hum and a quick kiss. "I love you." "I love you so much," he choked out softly, his fingers digging into your hips as you started rolling them tentatively. Humming in euphoria, you finally began to ride him, and he helped as much as he could to guide your hips against his between sweet, yet sinful moans. The two of you moved in unison, pornographic sounds of skin on skin intertwining with mumbled curses and breathless moans.  At some point you couldn't discern in the chaos, Ben had started to meet your efforts in the middle and began thrusting up into you with a wild abandon. If your upstairs or downstairs neighbors hadn't woke yet, they were sure to have by that point - it was no holds barred as you both neared your climaxes, and nothing was off the table at that point. "Oh fuck, fuck, fuck!" Ben gasped when you began to slow down and roll your hips more deliberately, his hips stuttering as he tried to stave off the inevitable. "Keep doing that, please, I'm so fucking close- Shit!" When you circled your hips a certain way, his cock brushed up against your walls at an angle that made your thighs nearly falter from the wave of pleasure it sent rolling through your body. Goosebumps broke out on your skin, and you cursed under your breath as you repeated the motion with a satisfied gasp. "You that close, baby? You want to cum in me?" you asked breathily, the rhetorical question hanging in the air while Ben's fingers dug into your hips as he tried to meet you halfway with sloppy thrusts, his abdomen trembling with the effort. He looked close to tears as you took one of his hands and moved it to your chest, murmuring some breathless command to play with your tits.  Obliging eagerly, he watched with cloudy, lust-filled eyes as you reached down to rub your clit in rapid circles that matched your quickly-deteriorating pace. A fuzziness entered your vision as a combination of touch, sensation, and just the sight of Ben going slack-jawed in his efforts to consciously avoid a surely-close orgasm. "Just let go," you managed to moan out, and holy fuck, did he let out the prettiest sound. His voice cracked as he choked out something between a sob and a groan - it was a noise fit for a porn star, the feeling of him emptying inside of you only that much hotter coupled with the visual of his eyelids fluttering closed. So overwhelmed with sensations, he could barely form a coherent thought as he came. His breaths came out in gasps, hips pressing flush to you as he spilled inside you. It was a mess, a hot one, and the sound that it made as he pulled out with a whimper was downright filthy, but you were too caught up in chasing your own high to think about anything other than the way the last drops of his cum were painting his stomach, his cock twitching as it finally gave way to the last of his orgasm. "God- you're so fucking hot- I'm-" Ben was still struggling for complete sentences when you finally pressed hard on your clit and then you were coming, your head falling back in pure ecstasy as waves of relief crashed over you, cleansing your body of every curse word that came flying out of your mouth following your climax. Ben was there, and then his lips were on yours as you started to come down from the high, a messy kiss silencing any further sins you could have vocalized. His hands slid to your thighs again, and he didn't loosen his grip until you pulled away from the obscenely long kiss, both of you very out of breath and very content with what had just taken place.  After a chorus of ragged breathing from the both of you, you let a sly grin peek at the corner of your lips before you rolled off of him, silently cursing the fact that you'd be washing these sheets ASAP so the cum dripping out of you wouldn't irreversibly stain the fabric. A few tissues you snatched from the nightstand temporarily alleviated the situation, buying you enough time to pad over to the bathroom and grab a towel for the both of you. You could barely catch your breath as you did so, and you wondered if you were getting out of shape recently - the brief thought of going to the gym with Ben more often passed by, and you huffed as you reluctantly considered it. When you returned and tossed the towel to Ben, who was still sprawled out on the bed and pushing a few stray hairs back out of his eyes, you had to smirk. "So what was that about you being dom-" You didn't even get the chance to finish your sentence before Ben was laughing out an answer, catching the towel as he sat up to clean himself off. "Fuck right off, you're just gloating at this point." "You're right," you teased, silently preening at your own sexual prowess as you cleaned yourself up and slipped on some old, oversized t-shirt, ignoring the sweat that gave your skin a light sheen. Looking over, you ogled shamelessly as he threw his legs over the edge of the bed, picking up a haphazard pair of shorts from the dirty laundry nearby. His muscles shifted underneath his skin with the effort, and you noted that he looked just as sweaty as you, causing you to let out an inward sigh of relief. Maybe you weren't as out of shape as you thought you were - the sex was just that good. "Such a show-off," he mumbled, but you could hear the smile in his voice as you looked at yourself in the mirror to fix your hair, and it brought a proud smile to your own face. When you finally crawled back into bed with him, he'd pulled some shorts back on and stripped the dirtied sheets off, leaving just the comforter underneath the two of you. Snuggling up together, he rested his head on your tummy and gave it a gentle kiss as you felt his eyelashes flutter closed, the feather-like sensation against your skin coaxing a quiet giggle out of you. "What's so funny?" he asked curiously, though his voice was barely above a mumble, clearly exhausted from the events of the morning. "Nothing," you answered honestly, running your hand back through his mussy, slightly-sweaty hair before grinning and back-tracking. "Actually, I was thinking about how fucking funny I was in the kitchen earlier. What would you do if I microwaved your tea water?" Ben groaned at the thought, and you dissolved into a fit of giggles as he buried his face into your stomach, shaking his head slightly at your clear amusement with yourself. As you laughed, you could feel a small huff against your skin, and then he grumbled in response. "You're sick, y'know. Truly sick." "I think someone's being a little dramatic," you teased, but Ben only scoffed once more before getting himself comfortable and dozing off into a peaceful mid-morning nap, the soothing warmth and methodical rise and fall of his chest eventually lulling you back to sleep as well. A final thought of 'God, I hope Joe had his TV loud enough' brought a mischievous smile to your face just before you were both out like a light. - taglist - @crosmopolitan @just-ladyme @rogerfxckingtaylor @fourmisfitz @shae-is-not-ok @moreinfinite @fruityfreddie @poachedhazontoast @strawberryfields-forever @imladrs @psychoticobsession @killer-queen-xo @rebelrebelyourefaceisamess @destiel-stucky4ever-loki-queen @brownhardyho @stardvstial @iminlovewith-rogers-car @benyeehawdy @mercurys-bike @mazzelloplots @beaaatle @sunshine112​ @wonderless-screwup @rogers-sweatbands @whowaits4everanyway @sunflower-borhap-boys @bitemerog​ @jennyggggrrr​ @bensrhapsody​ @xiaoqueencava​ @discodeacygotmorerhythm​ @reedusteinrambles​ @extrovertedwallflower @the-next-one​ @nouvveau​ @storiesfrommirkwood​ @spunky-town @brianprobablywill​ @elizabwrites NYM taglist - @aridrowse @radiob-l-a-hblah​ @caborhapch​ @xtrabroll​ @myguardianmailman @ultrunning​ @onceuponadetectivedemigod​ @neckfruit​ @borhapbxtch​ @ixchel-9275​ @mamaskillerqueen​ @queentrashcanfics​ @sam-mercurry-sixx @kimmietea​ @whenthe-smokeisinyoureyes​ @rogmeddows​ @deacyspatronusisacheesetoastie​ @woaholland​ @a-kind-of-magik​ @darling-egg​ @ramibaby​ @orchideax​ @jazzman-19​ @bloomingbetty​ @hannafuckingsucks​ @theprettyfandom @the-run-n-gogh​ @omgitsearly​ @killerqueenunderpressure​ @imnotvibingveryguccimrstark​ @zyanmaik​ @wehavetofearignorance​ @itsryn​ @multisuperbananas​ @stephanie-everlasting @dancingstan @mercurycrowley​ @awkwardangelshezza​ @deadlyaffairs​ @ken-yee-not​ @crazylittlethingcalledobsession @loveandbeloved29​ @devin-marie​ @lieblingsmenzch @standing-onthe-edge @annabananawastakenx2 message me/reply to this to be added to the permanent taglist! 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