#Chain of Command in the Workplace | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

five-bi-five-mind · 1 year ago

Note

Can i request toxic ex!wanda trying to get reader back no matter what it takes after doing her wrong and not knowing her worth? And reader just being extremely mad and done with wanda. I'd love to be manipulated by her 🥰🤝

Me & the Devil

Fandom: Marvel

Pairings: Wanda Maximoff x fem!reader

Genre: Dark fic (seriously dark!!) + Smut & Angst

Words: 11.5k+

Summary: It took everything ounce of strength you had to leave Wanda behind. When you did you tried your best to rebuild a life for yourself without her. You had a new career in a city far away and you were trying to restart your love life too. Only it was going horribly for you so far. Until Kate Bishop happened. Was she going to be the person to finally get you over Wanda? You thought so, until Wanda showed up at your door. And when she did, nothing prepared you for the measures she took to get you to let your guard down...

Warnings: toxic!Wanda; strap-on use (r receiving); face-fucking/riding (Wanda receiving); unhealthy relationships; oral (Wanda receiving); fingering (r receiving); choking; dub-con; kidnapping; non-con voyeurism kinda; alcohol mention; stalking; top!Wanda; bottom!r; dom/sub dynamics; tiniest bit of mommy kink...

A/N: lol this is the darkest thing I have ever written... you said toxic ex!Wanda and I really gave you toxic. Maybe it's not quite the request you asked for but... oops. But seriously folks take the warnings serious!! And tell me if I need to add more.

It happens almost every single time. You were starting to think there might be something seriously wrong with you to be ghosted so often. This was a pattern at this point: You’d connect with someone and meet up for a date. The date, in your mind, would go amazingly. Both of you would laugh and chat and they’d usually be the one to say something like “let’s do this again” and you’d happily agree. But then after you both part ways and a few days pass there’s no text, no call, no signs of following up on that hopeful promise to meet again. You’d text them once, maybe twice if you really felt strongly about meeting, but still you’d be met with nothing. You got ghosted. In the past six months, this has happened way more times than you’d like to admit. The first two times, you could convince yourself that they just weren’t that into you. It wasn’t you, it was probably them. But then it kept happening and happening and happening. How long could you say it wasn’t you? What were you doing to repel so many people?

After the last date you went on and then were subsequently ghosted, you were really considering giving up hope. But then somehow you got convinced to try again. This time it was a little different though. It wasn’t someone you met on a random dating app or a girl who happened to randomly pass her number to you at a coffee shop or a bar. No, this time it was someone you actually kind of already knew. It was someone you worked with, someone you already had a sort of established friendship with.

Usually, you’d be hesitant to agree to dating someone who had a professional relationship with you. Not to mention, she was kind of above you in the chain of command at your work. But when Kate Bishop waltzed right up to you and asked you out she was so charming and kind. She reassured you she would understand if you said no and that nothing would be weird if it didn’t work out. She smiled at you in the most endearing way and never failed to make you laugh even from your very first day working with her. Why wouldn’t you say yes? Honestly, you were just shocked she saw you as anything more than a work friend. So yeah, you decided to agree to a date. After all, it would be incredibly hard to ghost someone you have to see regularly at work. If things didn’t work out, she promised you’d still be friends and it wouldn’t affect the workplace. And while, yeah, a lot of people probably say that, you really believed that she meant it.

Prepping for the date had you honestly giddy this time. You asked some friends to accompany you to the mall so you could buy a nice outfit. When you asked what the date would be, Kate gave you the name of an entirely too expensive restaurant. She promised it would all be on her dime, no matter how much you protested. Her exact words were that she wanted to “sweep you off your feet” and you couldn’t help the blush that reached your cheeks when she said that. So, if you weren’t paying then the least you could do was invest in something nice to match the place she was taking you to.

Honestly, you were actually really excited about all of this. You had never thought of Kate as more than just a coworker, but you were really ready to see where this night could go. It felt like a turning point for you after all you had been through. Six months of getting ghosted was one thing, but all of that really added salt to the wound that was your horrible breakup that happened prior to all of those failed dates. This would be different though, at least you hoped. While you didn’t get to know all the other people who ghosted you well enough to know their character, you did know Kate. She was almost the exact opposite of your ex. She was kind and patient. She wasn’t so damn serious all the time either. Wanda was… well, you didn’t even know where to start. She was cold, she was controlling, and more than anything she had a darkness in her that put you on edge. She didn’t seem to listen to you and only wanted to pay attention to what you had to say when you said that you were leaving her. It was like all you were was a toy to her and it made you miserable. The fights you two had towards the end still shook you. When you and Wanda got together it all happened so fast. One day she saw you and then suddenly she was everywhere. In a blink you found yourself in a relationship with her and you didn’t even know how it all happened.

Not that you didn’t want to be with her. You had loved Wanda. You had loved her so profoundly, so deeply, so painfully that it was all you knew when you were with her. But then she grew different. More controlling, less caring. After a while you realized it wasn’t the healthiest situation to be in and you begged her for a change. Maybe you would’ve stayed and even dealt with her temperamental nature if she at least opened up to you, but it just didn’t feel like an equal relationship. She expected too much from you with nothing in return. It didn’t feel like love anymore, it felt like ownership. That change you pleaded for never came, so finally you pried yourself away from her.

The thing is, you knew once you left Wanda, you really had to leave. It wasn’t just that you packed your stuff and found an apartment. It was that you picked up your whole life and moved it to another town across the country. You found yourself an apartment and a job before you even left to make sure you had stability and wouldn’t chicken out. That was ten months ago. It took you four to feel like even trying to get back out there. Even though it went rather horribly up until now, with Kate, you thought maybe you could be ready for something real again.

Except, when the night you’d found yourself eagerly waiting for came and went with no sign of Kate, all those thoughts of restarting your romantic life plummeted. You had gotten to the restaurant, donning the beautiful dress you had bought for this very night. Bragging wasn’t really your thing, but as you got ready and gave yourself a once over in your apartment, you thought to yourself that you had this in the bag. If she was going to sweep you off your feet with a nice night out, you were gonna make her jaw drop with the way you’d make your entrance.

Admittedly, you were early to the restaurant than Kate requested you meet her at. She had a reservation for the both of you so when you walked in you immediately asked to be seated. You couldn’t help the way you fiddled with the silverware in front of you as you anxiously waited for her to slide into the chair across from you. Only when the agreed upon time came and went, you felt that pit in your stomach that said your hopes were about to be shattered. At first you told yourself it was Kate, she was often a little bit late to just about anything. But then ten minutes passed and then twenty and suddenly you were feeling embarrassed and sick to your stomach and furious all at the same time. You paid for the glass of wine you had ordered and nervously sipped on before walking out of that gorgeous restaurant that promised a fabulous meal with nothing but an empty stomach.

You weren’t sure if it was the wine that you had mixed with a lack of food or the fact that your eyes were already tearing up in anger just the tiniest bit when you told the waiter you wouldn’t be eating, but you weren’t pleased. As you stormed your way out of that restaurant and waited for an uber to take you home, you didn’t hesitate to shoot Kate what was probably the tenth text in a row. Each one was a little more angry than the last. Of course, it didn’t start out angry. Your first few were concerned but a little joke-y, but then when it became apparent she wasn’t anywhere to be seen, well, then you didn’t hold back too much.

What was work going to be like when you finally saw her on Monday? You had this naive little idea in your head that you and Kate would hit it off so well that she’d want to spend the whole weekend with you. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but you really thought you could predict that you and Kate would fall into this crazy, cliche romantic relationship after what was supposed to be a dazzling first date. Honestly, you had kind of expected to not be going home alone, or maybe not going home at all. Kate even joked as much when talking about what to expect for this date. You had rolled your eyes at her bluntness, but if you were being honest with yourself it had given you a little thrill.

All of that is gone now. The uber picked you up and dropped you off and all the while you somehow managed to keep it together. The tears that threatened to slip through back at the restaurant had been restrained as you sat alone in the back of the car and blankly stared at the thread of messages you had sent to Kate. They all sent, but the last message to be read by her was the one you sent saying you were on your way. Fucking typical, she chickened out at the last second and couldn’t even tell you to turn around.

The more you thought about it as you climbed the stairs of your apartment complex, the angrier you got until you could tell the emotions you were holding back were starting to overflow. Damn, you had been actually excited for this night. Yeah, when you matched with people and agreed to a coffee date with the others you had a little excitement for them too, but not like this. Not like Kate. She felt like this beacon in the darkness that was the last ten months. She felt like she was the one to pick up the pieces from what your last relationship did to you. How could you have been so wrong?

Now, instead of having a crazy romantic night like you had hoped, you were going to change out of your gorgeous outfit and fall apart alone in your bed in your coziest pair of pajamas. It was a pathetic way to spend the evening, you thought to yourself as you got closer to your unit. How could it possibly get any worse?

“(Y/N),” A familiar voice said from right behind you as you approached your door. You hadn’t realized anyone was even behind you as you made your way to your apartment, so the presence of anyone was going to make you jump out of your skin. But when you heard your name being called your blood ran cold and alarm bells went off. Surely it couldn’t be who you think it is…

You whipped around so fast it made you lose your balance on your heels. A hand shot out quickly though, wrapping slender fingers around your elbow and steadying you. “Hey,” the voice said and you swallowed hard.

Now that you were face to face, the source of the voice was exactly who you thought it was. Wanda stood there entirely too close to you, with her hand still wrapped around your arm. All you did was gawk at her, in utter disbelief of the turn the night just took. If there was anyone you were expecting to show up, it was certainly not her. You had hoped, as you made your way back home in disappointment, that Kate would be waiting right outside for you. Of course, knowing your luck these past few months, it was the last person you’d ever want to see showing up after such an awful night.

The circumstances alone made you want to double over in fits of laughter. It was all so just on point with how your life has gone since you left her. Of course Wanda would show up after yet another failed attempt to move on from her. It only feels even more like a cruel joke from the universe that she shows up before you can get home and wipe your face of the frustration tears that you shed as you stomped up the stairs to your apartment.

It took you a moment to realize that Wanda still had her hand on you and you ripped yourself away from her as if her touch suddenly burned. She didn’t seem phased by your actions, but instead was wearing a surprisingly soft expression. It seemed to add to your embarrassment and frustration.

There was a moment where you thought maybe you should say something. Right now, the only one to speak was Wanda and all she had to offer after showing up out of nowhere was a measly “hey” so there was a lot that needed to be said right now. For starters, maybe you should ask how the fuck she found you. It wasn’t like when you two broke up you readily gave her your address. In fact, you didn’t tell her much of anything when you left. You knew she had a business trip scheduled for the same time every quarter. So, you took her absence as a means to pack your stuff in a flash and leave. It was that trip that allowed you to prepare, you had given yourself a deadline to find a job and an apartment and leave and that’s exactly what you did. The only thing Wanda knew when she left for that trip was that you were incredibly unhappy with her, to which she just rolled her eyes as she walked out the door. That was the last time you saw her.

As you settled into your new place the same day Wanda was returning for her trip, you had left her a note and that was it. When that first night alone without Wanda came, you knew she saw the letter. There was one call from her that lit up your phone that night. You ignored it and that was that. She didn’t leave a message and to your surprise, she didn’t try again.

You thought the book was closed on that relationship after that. Apparently, tonight as she stood right in front of you for the first time in almost a year, you were very wrong about that fact.

“What do you want, Wanda?” You cleared your throat as you spoke. It was rough, you were trying to sound strong and demanding. But after fighting back the urge to sob the whole car ride home, your voice wasn’t coming out the way you wanted.

“It’s been awhile,” She gave you a small smile, but you didn’t miss the way she absolutely dodged that question.

“Why are you here?” You pressed again. Although, you honestly weren’t sure if you wanted to hear the answer. There were two reasons for that. The first being, you were in a vulnerable state and just wanted to crawl into your bed and lick your wounds. The second being, again, you were in a vulnerable state and if she said the right things she could take advantage of that. She always knew to say the right things. Being near her right now was dangerous. Not only because you were so unprepared to see her again, but because you were feeling so utterly hopeless and your pride was, at this point, completely shattered.

“I wanted to see you.” Wanda still had that hesitant smile on her face. She looked down at you as if she was actually nervous. Like she was trying to approach you with the utmost caution in fear that you would flee at any second. She wasn’t entirely wrong to think that either, because you were ready to run. Except, she was standing right at your doorstep, so where exactly would you run? You could close the door in her face and lock her out, but you knew Wanda. She was nothing if not persistent.

There was no response to that statement that would make you feel any stronger or even saner. You wanted to keep your dignity, even if you already looked pretty distraught. So instead you just exhaled, long and slow, before turning to your door.

What was your game plan right now? You couldn’t really tell. It was going to be a horrible decision if you let Wanda take one step inside your apartment, but you had a feeling that was her ultimate goal. Right now, you were running through different things to say. All you could really land on was pleading with her to meet you another day, when you’re less upset and tired. Maybe if you promised her you’d meet with her she would agree. Of course, knowing Wanda, if you said you’d grab coffee and catch up (which is a much friendlier way of putting what would inevitably be a very awkward conversation) she would hold you to that. But anything would be better than letting her slink right on in through your front door.

“Let me help you with that.” Wanda was directly behind you now, her hand reaching out to touch yours. You didn’t realize your hands were shaking so hard until you were trying and failing to get your house key into the lock. The way her hand wrapped around yours as she steadied it and guided the key in, surprisingly helped ground you. It was the familiar touch, even if it was brief and innocent, of her hand on yours that suddenly felt like you were able to catch your breath.

It was like a shock to your system and now all your nerve endings were finally waking up from a long sleep. It was a weird rush, no matter how brief, to feel with the warmth of her palm pressed to the top of your hand. Accompanied with that was the buzz that you always felt when she was in your personal space as she leaned closer to you from behind. And just like that, once the door was open, her hand slipped from yours and it was all gone.

You squeezed your eyes shut for a minute and took a deep breath. The rush of feelings with just that small of a touch from Wanda was not a good sign for you and definitely not a good sign for your will power either.

Wanda waited patiently behind you as you began to take the first step into your own apartment. To your surprise, when you turned back around to face her, she hadn’t crossed the threshold. Knowing Wanda, you had expected her to push her way in, to already have one foot in the door as she convinced you to let her stay. But no. Not this time. Instead, Wanda stood there patiently, her eyes boring into yours as she studied your face.

She still had the posture and facial expression of someone who was trying to be incredibly delicate. It was as if she was totally aware that she was walking on eggshells and, for the first time since you’ve known Wanda, she actually cared not to misstep. You were surprised to see her at your doorstep tonight of all nights, but even more so you were in complete disbelief at how patient she was being. If you were to have bet your money on anything, it would have been that the next time you saw Wanda she’d tear you a new one. Maybe she’s changed. Maybe this is why she didn’t contact you after that first night when you left. Was there hope that she could’ve taken a step back and looked at the way she treated you? Why did your brain automatically go to this idea that she actually took the last ten months to work on herself and now she was back to apologize and show you she’d grown?

Your last thought shot anxiety straight through your veins. That was a slippery slope your thoughts were going down. A slope that might lead into you crashing painfully into the emotionally unavailable wall that was Wanda Maximoff. Except, she was still waiting there, with bright shining eyes that told you she was just relieved to finally see you again. And you, well, you were just standing there in the gorgeous dress you spent way too much money on for a girl you’d known for ten months who didn’t even have the decency to text a rejection to you after promising you the night of your dreams. So why not let the woman who did actually show up and was trying to be kind to you in for the evening? And what’s one more glass of wine? At least this time you’d have company so you wouldn’t just be drowning in your pain and humiliation.

“Do you…” You paused for a moment watching Wanda’s face for any signs of insincerity or some kind of nefarious plan. She looked back at you with nothing but a soft smile and hope in her eyes. “Do you maybe want to come in for a bit? We can- I dunno… talk?”

“I’d love that.” And just like that you watched as she entered your apartment. When you got this place you had made one promise to yourself and that was to never let Wanda in if she ever found you. You had thought that the minute you’d let her back in she’d consume your life all over again. But here she was, at your doorstep, acting like a completely different person and suddenly that promise to yourself went out the window. You were so taken aback by her patience and gentleness with you in the brief time you’ve been reunited that you didn’t think to ask one important question. How the fuck did she find out you lived here?

—-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“So, she just never showed?!” Wanda leaned back in shock as you nodded vehemently. You two were currently sitting on either side of your couch, with half a bottle of wine already gone through. It had started out as small talk once she entered your apartment. Yes, it was awkward at first, but at least the wine had loosened up some of your nerves. Wanda seemed more relaxed than you had ever seen her. You never thought you’d be describing her this way, but she almost seemed bubbly. It was like a whole new Wanda was sitting right next to you and you were loving everything you were seeing.

The conversation stayed on you the whole time, which also was a bit surprising. Wanda wanted to know how you were doing and even praised you for how independent you had become. It was shocking, but with every proud smile she gave you, you felt your heart swell with pride for yourself as well.

Somehow, eventually, Wanda asked you why you were so dressed up. That’s when you were surprised by the wave of guilt that hit you in the gut. You shouldn’t feel guilty. It’s been almost a year, so there was nothing to feel remotely bad about. Except, when she asked you that question, you looked down at your lap and fiddled with an invisible string while you mulled over possible ways to respond in a way that made you feel less ashamed.

To your utter surprise, Wanda didn’t even flinch when you decided to tell the truth and confess that you had a date with your coworker who didn’t show. Instead, the part that made her so emotional was the fact that Kate stood you up in the first place, not that you would have a potential new romantic partner that wasn’t Wanda. Where was all the possessiveness she usually showed? You haven’t had the chance to ask Wanda what she had done in these past ten months apart, but you had a feeling you were in for a long, inspiring story about how she’s ready to be a better woman. Even if you didn’t know the full story, you could see in the way she was upset for your pain and only your pain that she had really grown. It was this change that had you so mesmerized by her. It was this display of compassion for your bad night that had you scooting closer to her until your knees were touching. And when Wanda’s hand, after waving in shock as you admitted that you still haven’t gotten a single text from Kate, had innocently landed on your bare knee just below where your dress ended, you didn’t move it.

“Well, she’s made a huge mistake,” Wanda shook her head. “I mean look at you…” The hand that wasn’t on your knee motioned to your whole body.

“I know! I paid a lot for this dress, you know.” You giggled, shocked that the sting of tonight’s rejection wasn’t quite as strong as it was a few hours ago.

“And it was worth every penny.” Wanda’s eyes darkened slightly as they raked up your body. “You look… fucking incredible.” Her voice was slightly lower as she said those last two words and suddenly you felt something shift. It was like something heavy filled the air, an electricity that was almost too much to bear.

Wanda looked back up and locked eyes with you. That gentleness that you had seen all evening was replaced with something else and suddenly you realized you were currently standing on a metaphorical cliff, one more step and you were about to fall right back into Wanda.

But then she leaned forward and you found yourself leaning too. She was right there next to you, with barely any space separating you two. The smell of her familiar perfume suddenly felt stronger and had your head swimming. The warmth that radiated from her presence was blanketing your entire body, and all you wanted to do was close the gap. Why not jump off that cliff? Obviously, nothing else you’ve been doing has worked so far. This was a sign, the girl you were excited for didn’t even have the respect for you to show up, but who did show up? Wanda. And the whole time she’s been sitting and listening and not pushing anything. She’s changed, that’s what you wanted. You had told her as much when you had all those arguments up until the end. Sometimes it takes a major leap for someone to right their wrongs finally and that seems like what was going on here. That’s what you hoped was happening. So why not indulge? You closed the gap.

The way Wanda let you come to her was surprising. Old Wanda was usually too guarded to let you take the lead, but she was letting you now. Your lips met hers in a hesitant kiss at first, but soon it grew into more. It was familiar and new all at the same time. You surged forward and tangled your hands in her hair and all the while Wanda let you. When you leaned back, pulling her with you, your lips still connected, she happily followed until she was hovering over you. Not once did either of you break the kiss. It was soft, but still had a hint of desperation on your part. Wanda let you take the lead, with your tongue tentatively running against hers when her lips parted for you.

While Wanda’s willingness to let you take the lead shocked you, she still showed that she was enjoying the kiss just as much as you were. When your head met the arm of the couch and Wanda’s body came with you as you leaned back, you felt the way she rolled her body into yours. It was a subtle movement, but you could tell it was her way to get as much contact between the two of you as possible. Meanwhile, the more Wanda pressed her body down against yours, the more your dress rode up. You were so lost in the way Wanda’s lips felt on yours that you jumped when you felt her knee press between your legs. That act felt like someone pouring ice cold water straight on your body.

“Wait!” Your voice was muffled by the way Wanda was still trying to kiss you, but when you pulled back she stopped. Your hands moved down to push at your dress, trying to cover more of you as Wanda shifted her weight so she could still hover over you but get some distance from your face.

For a moment, as you looked up at her, both of you breathing hard from the intensitive of it all, you thought you saw a flash of anger appear in her face. It was brief. A blink and you’ll miss it kind of moment, but you swore you saw it. It was like a crack in the perfect Wanda that sat with you all night. You had stopped the kiss because you thought it was going too far for one night, but when you did you were hesitant if it was the right call. Now, even though admittedly you could be wrong, you were glad you stopped.

If there was one thing you recognized on Wanda, it was the look she’d get when things didn’t go exactly the way she wanted them to. When you pulled back, it was such a brief moment, but you could’ve sworn you saw that familiar look. But then she was looking back down at you again with that gentleness you had seen all night, except this time things felt different. It was like all the warning bells were going off in your brain now. Something inside your mind told you that you had fallen into a trap and now you were too far into it to get yourself out.

But then another part of your brain wanted so desperately to shake that off. She had been so gentle with you, so kind and caring. It was a whole new side of Wanda and it was one that you had dreamt of for so long, especially in the early months after your break up. It wasn’t even like she was the one who started the kiss. You kissed her. Not only that, but you were the one to pull her on top of you. It wasn’t like it wasn’t enjoyable. It was everything you missed. It was fucking fantastic. Still, something told you to watch your back.

You were trying so hard to shake that paranoia off. It was probably just a new form of trust issues you’ve developed after being rejected constantly for the last six months. Yeah, that’s what it had to be. Right?

A moment passed and neither of you had moved after you had tried to push Wanda back. She remained hovering over you and suddenly you felt so small lying there beneath her. Finally, you pressed a hand to her chest, trying to indicate to her to move off you. She didn’t budge.

Instead, she stayed there, staring down at you. The look of anger never came back, but that gentleness wasn’t there either. It was all replaced with an emotion you couldn’t quite place as she cocked her head and flicked her eyes to where your hand pressed against her before looking back at your face.

It seemed like she was calculating something. Like Wanda was trying her hardest to plan her next move with you and was weighing her options. It was in that very moment that you realized the gentleness, the patience, the lack of anger when you told her you had tried to start dating again, all of that was an act. She really was a wolf in sheep’s clothing and she had you pinned right now.

A shiver ran down your spine as that realization sunk and it did not go unnoticed by Wanda. It was like a spark that lit a fire in her, when she saw you react like that. You were helpless underneath her and that was all it took for her innocent facade to melt completely away. She leaned back down, attacking your lips with her own in an instant.

Your hands braced against her chest as she leaned back down, putting more of her weight onto you as she kissed you. Every alarm was going off in your mind as she kissed you with an intensity that had you spinning. Your mind told you to push back, to make her stop, but then it was always this shift in Wanda that got to you. She was kissing you with that same passion that had you weak at the knees. You always hated how possessive she was with you in public, but in private it always had you reacting in a way that you really should’ve felt more shame for. And she was kissing you with that same, desperate, possessive energy you wished you didn’t miss.

The hands that were bracing Wanda’s chest were now grabbing at the fabric of her shirt as her tongue licked into your mouth. Her knee went right back to where it was, pressing in between your legs. You groaned against her mouth when she pressed it a little harder and you could practically feel how smug she was when she felt your hips roll onto her leg to gain more contact.

Wanda pulled back on her own this time. You were breathing hard and you could tell your face was flushed from how worked up you were just from a little bit of contact and her kiss. “This is going better than I thought it would,” Wanda let out a low chuckle as she knelt above you. You gave her a skeptical look as you tried to catch your breath. “I thought you’d put up more of a fight, but I guess I didn’t need to try too hard to remind you.”

“Wh- What are you talking about? Remind me?” You stammered, your head swimming.

“That you’re still mine,” she hissed.

Suddenly, a wave of nausea hit you. None of tonight with her had been real. She hadn’t changed, you had just felt sorry for yourself and were vulnerable so you let yourself dream and pretend. Now, you were facing the consequences of your actions. You had fallen back into Wanda and backpedaled on every little bit of healing you had done after leaving her. The worst part was, as she looked down on you with such self-satisfied triumph, you weren’t sure if you could claw your way back out again.

You sat up then, trying to squirm your way out from under Wanda. She didn’t move, but she did let you. When you tried to stand from the couch, it felt like your legs were going to give out from under you. She had you so disoriented from her whole act that you could barely stand on your own two feet.

“I think…” You kept your eyes glued to the floor as you spoke. “Wanda, I think you should leave.”

“Oh?” Wanda cocked her head to the side as she stood up too. You had taken a few steps away from the couch, but Wanda was quick to rid you both of the distance you had so desperately tried to create. “I don’t think that’s what you really want.”

“Yes, it is.” You weren’t convincing. Anyone would be able to tell you were two seconds away from buckling again and begging for forgiveness. This whole scenario felt disturbingly familiar.

“I don’t think so,” Wanda taunted. She took another step towards you and you stood there frozen. “I think you’re dying to beg me to stay.” The once exciting charge in the air changed even more until all you felt was the painful buzzing in your ears as your body shook with an excitement you were trying so desperately not to acknowledge. It was impossible to ignore though, especially when Wanda was stepping up into your space again, brushing her whole body against you as she slipped behind you.

“No…” you whimpered your response to Wanda, but even you knew you sounded pathetic.

“Shhh,” Wanda cooed. Her hands moved to brush hair from your neck before you felt the tips of her fingers dance on the exposed skin. You still stood there, locked in place, trying to hold back a shiver as Wanda’s lips pressed to your neck from behind. Your eyes screwed shut when you felt her brush them up to your ear. Her breath against the shell of your ear made you shiver and your hands balled into fists. “Do you really want to be alone tonight?”

She was turning your vulnerability against you. Of course you didn’t want to be alone tonight. But did you really want to spend the night with your apparently still toxic ex-girlfriend? As much as you wanted to say fuck no, you did. God you wanted her. Maybe you had never really even stopped wanting her.

You didn’t have to answer for Wanda to know exactly what you were thinking. She had her hooks into you and you were hers again. Or maybe you were always hers and even when you were free from her you never really were. With how easily you fell back into her after almost a year, you were starting to think you were really overestimating how much progress you made.

Wanda’s lips brushed your ear before you felt her hands on you now. They were making their way up your body, starting at your waist and moving to your chest in a way that almost made you feel manhandled. “You’re going to have to convince me,” Wanda’s voice was sickeningly sweet in comparison to the way she groped and squeezed at your breasts through your dress.

“Get on your fucking knees,” Wanda growled, the false sweetness leaving her voice and being replaced with a demand that had you jump. To your surprise it was like your body was compelled to do exactly as she said. You dropped to your knees and she stopped in front of you. The grin that spread across her face was menacing enough to make you gulp. She had a glint in her eye that told you any sort of soft, caring charade she had when she appeared at your door was long gone. No, that was all an act to get you to invite her in and invite her in you did. Now you were at her mercy and the thrill of that was clearly getting to the both of you.

As ashamed as you should be to have fallen back into Wanda Maximoff like you said you never would, you couldn’t help but feel anything but nervous anticipation. She licked her lips as she looked down at you. You squirmed under her gaze as you knelt there. Wanda took another step up until she was towering directly above you. Her hand shot out and immediately tangled in your hair, yanking your neck not-so-gently to look directly up at her. She smiled at you, all her teeth showing as she smirked. “Good girl.” She purred.

Wanda’s hand moved from your hair to stroke down your cheek until she reached your lips. You stared up at her, utterly frozen, as she traced your lips with her fingers before uttering one word. “Open,” she demanded and you did exactly that without hesitation. Two fingers slid into your mouth, the whole time she never broke eye contact. Your body was trembling slightly from where you knelt in front of her and as her fingers pressed down on your tongue you instinctively began to suck.

A sadistic chuckle left Wanda’s lips as she looked down at you. “Looks like you haven’t forgotten your place.” Her voice was low, threatening almost. Your face flushed, but it was like your brain wasn't in control of your body anymore. Suddenly, you were on some kind of autopilot, fulfilling the role Wanda always wanted you to take. The worst part was, you were okay with it. You didn’t realize you even missed it, but then again you caved so easily to her. Of course you missed it. No, actually you craved it. Your whole being ached for it.

Wanda’s fingers pushed into your mouth a little deeper and you continued to let her. Not once did you break eye contact, even as Wanda’s twisted smile grew. Finally, after a moment, Wanda pulled her fingers from your mouth, only to grab your chin and keep your head tilted upward in a painful position. “It’s too fucking easy,” Wanda sneered. She let go of your chin then and you took a moment to look down and give your neck a break.

You didn’t notice then that Wanda was backing up from you for just a second. When you ran your eyes up Wanda’s legs to meet where her hands were you realized she was tugging at the buckle to her jeans. You watched with wide eyes as she undressed in front of you before stepping right back up to you. All the while, your mind was screaming at you to put a stop to this. All you had to do was kick her out, right? So why did you just stay on your knees and stare?

“Wanda, maybe we should-” You were cut off by the hand that shot out and tangled in your hair again, giving it a hard tug.

“Shhh, baby,” Wanda cooed. “Let me use your mouth for something else.”

You flushed and those alarm bells in your mind sounded louder, but still you reluctantly nodded. There was something deeper inside you that said you needed this. You needed to please Wanda. It felt so horribly wrong to give into this feeling that you thought you had buried deeper inside yourself. But then Wanda was tugging you closer until suddenly you were between her legs, being practically smothered by her already wet pussy and all of those alarm bells silenced all at once. That feeling you thought you had buried got stronger with the way Wanda was rolling her hips against your face and your hands went out to brace yourself on her thighs. As she began to ride your face the moans she was letting out were just spurring that feeling on until nothing felt wrong anymore and everything about tonight felt just so fucking right.

You were surrounded by Wanda. Her hands held your head still as she fucked herself on your mouth and all you could do was take in every moment of Wanda as she used you. And it was fucking glorious. You didn’t think you could miss something so much and be totally unaware of it. Or, it wasn’t that you were unaware… It was that you got so good at ignoring it that when you finally acknowledged your need to indulge in your Wanda problem it woke back up with a roar.

Wanda’s hands were tugging hard at your hair as she kept riding your face. She was moaning your name as she moved and you did your best to encourage more of the sounds she was making above you. Your tongue lapped hungrily at her clit as best as you could with each time she would grind down onto you. You didn’t even care that you were being slightly suffocated by her. Wanda was overloading all your senses right now and all you could do was greedily accept it. It was like a fucked up rush of twisted joy was coursing through your veins as she practically fucked your face. She was using you like an object, no ounce of gentleness left in her as she got herself off, and meanwhile you were just happy to be useful.

The part of your brain that should feel shame for all of this was finally, utterly switched off as Wanda repeated how good you were being for her and how much she missed your mouth when she came all over your lips. Her hips stopped after a moment and she released your hair. You took in large gulps of air you didn’t realize you needed until you felt the burning in your lungs. Wanda also seemed a little frazzled, like the intensity of her own orgasm had taken even her by surprise. But after a moment of catching her own breath, she slipped back into the collected, controlled Wanda you knew.

“Get up,” Wanda ordered and you did what she said. Your legs felt a bit weak as you struggled to stand, but Wanda was on you in a second, steadying you by the elbow so that you didn’t topple over on yourself. It was the smallest action that didn’t even really mean kindness, but you were so far gone into Wanda again that even that made your heart swell.

“Take your clothes off and meet me in your bedroom.” Wanda’s hands were back on you, already tugging at your dress and pulling it off for herself without waiting for you to fulfill her request. You did the rest before looking back up at Wanda. She looked at you with an excitement that had you curious. Seeing the curiosity in your eyes she answered before you could even ask. “I have a surprise for you.”

Your eyes scanned the room you two were in. How did she have a surprise when she came here empty handed?

Wanda’s grin grew wider until you started to feel the drunkenness that came with being with her start to get replaced with something else. “It’s waiting for you in your bedroom,” She winked.

“Waiting in my…” You were trying to connect some dots.

“Bedroom,” Wanda finished. “Now, come on.” You felt like your whole body had stalled as you tried to think through things. How was there a surprise there left by Wanda? She hadn’t left your sight since she showed up at your door.

Wanda tugged on your hand and you realized she was pulling you in the exact direction toward your bedroom. Your apartment had multiple rooms: one your office, one your bathroom, and one your bedroom. So how could she possibly know to go to the right one? Your stomach dropped as she tugged you closer.

You started to drag your feet and Wanda paused for a second, looking back at you with thinly veiled frustration.

“How do you know where my bedroom is?”

“Lucky guess,” She shrugged and you could hear the irritation in her voice.

“Wanda, what’s waiting for me in there?” Your blood ran cold as you asked that question, realizing you were suddenly terrified of the answer.

“A surprise.” Wanda’s voice was devoid of excitement as she said it this time. You realized she was getting angry and this was your warning to stop pressing. But there were two things wrong with this moment right now: What was behind your bedroom door and how had Wanda been in there without you noticing?

“Wanda, have you…” You didn’t want to ask it, but you had to. “Have you been here before?”

Wanda snorted at that and gave a hard tug on your hand, pulling you with surprising force right up into her personal space. Her hands then moved to grab hard at your hips so that she could press her own bare body into yours without you being able to escape. “Stop acting stupid,” Wanda leaned forward to whisper into your ear, her voice eerily sweet. “I’ve been here the whole time.”

“W-What?” It felt like the air was knocked out of you. Wanda’s nails dug into your sides as she held you there.

“Did you think I would just let you leave?” Wanda chuckled. “I’ve been here, waiting the whole time. I know you could feel me… Especially at night.” Wanda’s nails dragged up your bare skin. “When you were alone. I know it was me you were thinking of.”

A flush grew on your cheeks and you wondered, with horror, how much of what Wanda was saying was a guess and how much of it was her watching you when you never even knew.

“Why now then? Why reveal this to me now?” That’s what was really bothering you. Somehow, the rest of this wasn’t surprising. It was on brand with how she was before you left her. Controlling and secretive. She hadn’t changed a bit. Right now, you were shocked and furious, but still you couldn’t silence the fucked up voice deep inside you that said you wer relieved she was back. Wanda was a piece of you that you desperately wished you didn’t need, but as much as you tried to tell yourself you didn’t belong to her, tonight proved that you might always feel that way.

“Because,” Wanda seemed to be blatantly annoyed with you now. “That girl was getting too close this time.”

Kate. You had honestly forgotten all about Kate. Letting Wanda touch and use you had wiped any thoughts of any other woman out of your mind. In fact, until this moment, you forgot that you should feel angry and embarrassed for being rejected and stood up. You had just been so lost in Wanda’s return that everything else melted away. But now… Now you weren’t feeling anger towards Kate. No, with the way Wanda spat out the word “girl” as she spoke, you realized she was probably well aware of who Kate was. You were concerned.

“What?” You ripped yourself from Wanda’s grasp and took a few steps back. “Wanda, what did you do?”

“Only what I had to.” She followed each of your steps with a long stride of her own. “She wanted what’s not hers. I couldn’t have that, now could I?” The way she was looking at you as she cocked her head to the side sent a chill down your spine. Maybe this wasn’t actually the Wanda you knew. Maybe she had changed. When you were together you had seen a lot of sides of her, but not this one. This one made your palms sweat and your stomach turn. You’d never seen Wanda hurt another person, but just because you didn’t see it didn’t mean she wasn’t capable of it. What did she do to Kate?

“Oh, don’t look at me like that,” Wanda scoffed. “She’s not dead.”

Thank fucking god, you thought. Maybe Wanda was just exaggerating. Hopefully, Kate was just fine. Although, your gut was telling you everything wasn’t quite that simple.

“You’ll see,” Wanda reached out her hand and cupped your chin. Your eyes met hers and you saw the sadistic twinkle in her eye as she grinned down at you. “It’s part of your surprise.”

You gulped at that, not liking the sound of it one bit. At this point in the night you made a lot of choices with Wanda already that you promised you wouldn’t do and the way she was acting now was making you sick to your stomach. She needed to leave, tonight needed to be over. Tomorrow you’d go to work and hopefully see Kate there in one piece. And if she was then you’d apologize profusely for whatever Wanda did to scare her off from your date.

“Wanda, you need to leave.” As much as you tried to sound commanding, your voice was weak and shaky. Wanda’s smirk just grew and you realized now she was looking at you like you were her prey and she was about to pounce.

“Now, now,” She tsked as her thumb went up to press against your lips. “It’s really hard to take you seriously when you still have my cum glistening on your lips, pet.”

You tore your head away from her and wiped at your mouth, as if that would make any difference in erasing what had just transpired between you two. You let her claim you, you let her mark you. You almost let her take you to your bedroom and fuck you senseless until the pain and humiliation of tonight were washed away. Of course, now that humiliation was back tenfold and mixed with it was a gut wrenching fear for Wanda you had never felt before.

“If I had let that girl show up for your… date,” Wanda practically spit the word out. “Then, you wouldn’t have gotten a taste of mommy’s cum now would you?”

You were speechless. The way she was talking, the way she was acting. Was this how Wanda was all along? It made you scared, so scared that you quaked where you stood. But also… the way she had been handling you all night, claiming you, mixed with the glint in her eyes as she realized she had you right where she wanted you and the demanding tone she was taking… As sickening as it was, it excited you.

Like a light switch the frustration left Wanda’s face and was again replaced with the excitement she had before. Wanda’s hands were back on you, turning you around and leading you back towards the dreaded surprise that awaited you in your bedroom. Despite what it all meant, you let her guide you without any more protest. “Close your eyes,” Wanda whispered in your ear. “And don’t open them until I tell you to.”

For whatever reason, you did exactly what she said. It was like you were wired to obey her. Like someone else stepped inside your body and now you were doing all the opposite things you should do. Except, you couldn’t blame anyone else but yourself. You knew, this was all you. This was why you ran, because you were Wanda’s little play toy and you wanted to be more than that. At least, you thought you wanted to be more than that.

The creak of the door swinging open brought you out of your thoughts and you knew your way around your apartment well enough to know Wanda was leading you to your bed. With both her hands on your shoulders, she pushed you down until you were forced to sit on the edge of your bed. Still, you kept your eyes closed. No matter how anxious you were, you were going to be good for her. You needed to be good for her.

You could hear Wanda take a few steps back from you, but you still had no idea what this surprise was. Something told you, in your gut, that it wasn’t going to be a good one. Yet, still you were so ready to accept whatever Wanda had to give you that, with a wave of shame, you didn’t think you cared whatever it might be.

“Open them,” Wanda ordered. You opened your eyes slowly, just as you were told. First, you just stared at Wanda. She was beaming as she stood in front of you. Then, you turned your eyes to the side and practically leapt out of your own skin. “Do you like it?”

All you could do was sit and stare. There she was, Kate Bishop, bound and gagged. She was helplessly facing where you sat, restrained on your own office chair. You should’ve felt embarrassed or ashamed that she was seeing you in such a state of undress, but you were still in way too much shock to process much of anything.

Wanda, in the meantime, was circling the bed. You didn’t really pay much attention to her at this point, still just fixated on the way Kate pulled at her bindings, trying to lean towards you. Kate’s eyes, at first, weren’t even looking at you. They were glaring at Wanda, as if she was trying to break free and protect you. But you knew. You weren’t the one in need of protection. Even in Wanda’s grasp, you knew that in her twisted possessive mind, it wasn’t you she felt threatened by. It was Kate. The woman who, as Wanda saw it, tried to take what was hers.

You felt a dip in the mattress as Wanda crawled to you from the other side of the bed. Once she reached you, she stopped, kneeling directly behind you. Wanda’s hands came to circle around your waist and you let her. Your mind hadn’t told you to do anything to stop her, to take any kind of action at all. The logical part of your mind told you to untie Kate, but then a larger part of you, the part that told you that you were way too far gone, demanded you don’t displease Wanda anymore.

Hands moved all over your body, running up and down your sides, groping your breasts, nails leaving marks in their wake. It was causing Kate to practically growl through the cloth muffling her mouth.

“Oh, look at her,” Wanda pretended to pout as she cupped your chin and turned your head to meet Kate’s desperate eyes. “The poor girl is in love with you. She thought tonight would be the start of some big love story. She was stupid enough to brag about it with anyone who would listen. Too bad she doesn’t know you’re really just a pathetic little thing already ruined by me. Isn’t that right?”

Wanda’s hold on your chin grew tighter and you held back a wince. You knew she was waiting for an answer, but as Kate’s panicked gaze searched your face you felt too ashamed to utter a single word.

“I almost feel bad for her,” Wanda continued when you didn’t speak. “I mean, I can relate. Much like her, I wanted you the moment I saw you too. But she and I have one big difference…” Wanda dropped your chin again and her hands made their way down your body. You let out a gasp when you felt a hand move straight down between your legs and cup your pussy.

“I already fucking took what I wanted,” Wanda snarled as you felt two fingers enter you. Your hand flew to Wanda’s wrist at the surprise intrusion, but you couldn’t help that your previous gasp had turned into a pathetic moan. “And I’m never letting you have her.” She punctuated each word with a pump of her fingers and you bit down hard on your lip to stop the sounds that were threatening to fall from you. Kate was thrashing in the chair in front of you and your eyes dropped to the floor. Your fingers flexed around Wanda’s wrist, but you still didn’t pull her away. At this point the only thing on your mind was to make her happy, regardless of the horrifying circumstances. Wanda has scared you tonight, she has made you take a giant backstep to which you won’t ever return from and she’s gone to lengths you’d never expect. Except, you were just too far gone now.

Feeling Wanda inside you again was earth shattering. You’d spent so many nights alone and in those frustrating nights you had told yourself you just wanted somebody, anybody to hold you. That was a fucking lie. You wanted- No, needed Wanda. You were hers and no amount of time or distance changed a damn thing about that. It took one night, less than three hours even for you to fall back into place with her and realize just how deeply you needed to be hers. Wanda’s goal this whole time was to remind you and teach you and Kate a lesson and unfortunately for the both of you, the lesson was learned. You didn’t think you’d ever have the strength, courage, or even sense to leave Wanda ever again after this.

With Wanda’s fingers pumping inside you and her bare body pressed to your back, your head was swimming. Never mind the poor girl who was forced to watch helplessly. Your eyes squeezed shut at the magnitude of shame you had for enjoying this as much as you were while Kate looked at you with what was possibly the most heartbreaking expression you’d ever seen.

Before Wanda could make you cum she withdrew her fingers. You couldn’t help the whimper that left your lips at that, but quickly bit your lip again to keep from making too much noise. With the circumstances, it felt wrong to be enjoying all of this as much as you did. but this was Wanda. The one person who knew your body better than anyone else. Even after almost a year apart, she hadn’t forgotten the way you liked it when she curled her fingers inside you or the way you’d get so wet from her treating you in such a rough manner.

At one point, when you were with her, you wondered what you had become. Never did you think you’d be someone who let another person utterly own your entire being, body and all. When you left you thought you could free yourself of that. But if you learned anything tonight, it was that you still belonged to Wanda. With the measures she had gone to and the way you kept letting her do whatever she wanted to you, that fact was pretty clear.

You twisted your head around to see what Wanda was doing, only to watch her reach under your own pillow. What she revealed was very familiar to you; a dark red strap on that Wanda used to love to use on you. She kept it. Your eyes widened as you realized she wasn’t going to let you off the hook any time soon tonight. Or Kate for that matter.

Your head turned back to Kate who had stopped struggling to stare in shock at Wanda too. For a moment you thought to get up and actually help Kate, if only so she didn’t have to watch what was to come next. Only, it seemed like Wanda knew exactly what you were considering, because she was on you before you could move a muscle.

With a surprised yelp, Wanda had your body turned and your back hitting the bed in mere seconds. She swung her leg over your body at that and you just stared up at her as her predatory smile slowly turned to Kate. “Look at you,” Wanda was directly talking to Kate now. “This is killing you isn’t it?” Wanda’s hands were slipping under your knees now, bending them so that they could hook around your waist. The toy was lined up and your chest was heaving in anticipation. Anxiety was coursing through your veins, but so was this hard to ignore, appalling feeling of anticipation and excitement for what was to come. For what you missed so desperately.

You held your breath as Wanda entered you with the toy that you never quite got used to back when you two were together. Now, since you were out of practice, the familiar burn of it stretching your pussy out reminded you of the very first time she used it on you. You squeezed your eyes shut again and couldn’t stop the pitiful groan that left your lips.

Wanda chuckled from above you before she finally bottomed out inside you. “Was this how you planned to fuck her?” Wanda was still talking to Kate as she began to rock her hips. “Or were you going to be gentle? See the thing with her is… She likes to be ruined.” Your fingers tangled in the sheets as you tried your best to get used to how big her cock was inside you. Your desire for Wanda was completely in control at this point, letting Wanda start a steady pace with no intentions of stopping her. The way you could hear Kate struggling made you feel sick, but the way you never wanted Wanda to stop, despite her presence, made that feeling worse.

Wanda’s pace kept increasing. Her body bent over you until she was pressed against you. The way she pumped into you was making the whole bed rock and the burn of her practically abusing your pussy had finally turned into extreme pleasure in a way that had your body arching into hers. You had totally given into this feeling now, all thoughts of Kate gone and replaced with how much you wanted Wanda to just keep claiming you in the way that she was.

“Tell me,” Wanda growled into your ear this time as her hips slowed for a moment. “Do you really think she could fuck you like this?”

“N-no,” you were trying to catch your breath as you spoke.

Wanda snapped her hips hard and you immediately cried out again. “What was that? I don’t think she heard you.”

“No!” You cried. “Fuck! No, only you can. Only you. Only-”

“Shhh, that’s my girl.” Wanda’s hand stroked down your cheek as she picked up the pace yet again. Her hand moved down your jaw until it stopped right on your throat. Her fingers wrapped around your neck and she squeezed. It wasn’t hard enough to hurt you, but still enough to make you struggle to take the much needed deep breathes as she fucked you as hard as she did.

All sounds of Kate’s struggles were lost on your ears. Your body was trembling and you were two seconds from falling apart all over Wanda’s cock. Wanda was loving every second of it. She was moaning in your ear as she kept fucking you harder, just the sight of you turned her on beyond belief. The way her hand flexed and squeezed slightly more on your neck mixed with the way she was pumping herself into you with such a force had strangled moans coming from you with abandon. It took more strong snaps of her hips before you were falling apart on top of her with a miserable cry.

Wanda’s hips slowed when you came down from your orgasm and her hand left your neck. You took loud, gasping breaths for air. Your body was spent and splayed out on the mattress. Wanda was looking down at you with such a satisfied grin on her face and for a moment all you could think of was wanting Wanda to make you cum again. Except then you remembered.

Your head slowly turned to see Kate still there, bound with tears running down her face. What now? That was the only thing running through your mind.

Wanda’s hand came back to your chin, turning your head so you were facing her again. The shame that was coursing through your veins again felt louder, more painful. Except she was stroking your cheek, looking down at you with more pride in her eyes than you’d ever seen before.

“Shhh,” she soothed. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of everything. Then you and I are going to go somewhere far away.”

You couldn’t help the shiver of fear that ran through your body as Wanda kept stroking your cheek in a gentle way that you hadn’t seen since she first arrived. Something told you that you didn’t really have a choice, but to go.

A thousand scenarios ran through your mind about what Wanda was going to do with Kate. You felt pity for her and embarrassment at what she had witnessed.

“I’ll go.” You heard yourself before you could even think about what you were saying. “But let Kate go.”

Wanda frowned for a moment, her hand pausing on your cheek. She looked over at Kate and then back down at you, the frown quickly leaving and being replaced with a conniving. “If I promise to let her go, you must promise to never try to leave again.”

You nodded furiously, taking this one chance to get Wanda to do your bidding. Kate would be free, even if it meant that you sealed your fate. Only, little did Wanda know, after tonight you didn’t think you’d ever have the strength to leave her again. She was the one thing you wanted that you wished you didn’t. She was in your veins, she was your entire being. You were hers completely and nothing, no amount of time or space, would ever set you free.

You surrendered to Wanda the moment you saw her again. Even if you tried to leave once, you knew Wanda was going to spend a lot of time reminding you that you would never be able to leave again.

taglist: @geekyandgay98 @desperate-gay @high--power @storiesofsvu

Join the taglist here

#wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff x you #wanda maximoff x female reader #wanda maximoff #wanda x reader #scarlet witch x reader #scarlet witch #scarlet witch x you #wanda x you #dark fic #wanda maximoff smut #five-bi-five-mind

812 notes · View notes

bitchfitch · 3 months ago

Text

Fewer women than men enlisted, then only a handful of those women made it through the gauntlet of machismo that stood between them and real valor. Of those that did, next to none of them got promoted up the ranks or into the jobs so specialized and classified that they didn't get official titles.

Zephyr had been aware of this aspect of his workplace, but had never really thought much of it because it simply did not concern him.

It meant he got the odd jobs that had him flying out to exotic places and talking pretty while draped in a moderate income's worth of jewelry and high end fashion, even though women were always the most effective in this sub-field of subtle swaying.

He liked the term "influencer" to describe their line of work, and that was what he told people his job was, but the official term was technically, less-sexily, "psyop."

The lack of women in his immediate circle of coworkers never really stuck out as a failure of the system, it benefited him just fine, until he was stood outside a modest suburban home in the exurbs of Iowa.

The first wave of super soldiers were begining to be retired, and someone miles further up the command chain than Zephyr seemed to have finally had to face the consequences of making a weapon no one could destroy. That, or, this had always been the plan.

Once the things were obsolete, put them behind a white picket fence in ass-nowhere and stick an operative with the job of teaching the murder machines how to live that apple pie life.

It was a stupid enough idea for it to have always been the plan.

The only evidence that it wasn't always the plan was that when the day finally came for the first Andromeda Class Soldier to go home, there was not a Single woman with the right clearances, temperament, availability, lack of a family or friends that would notice her disappearance, and who had a willingness to be spayed, to take up the mantle of Faux-Bride of Frankenstein

Instead there was just Zephyr, who, in the words of his handler, "Was close enough."

He was supposed to be in Bali, but instead He's In Fucking Iowa, because the actual U.S. government didn't think to neuter their science experiment before making it bomb proof.

"Seething" was the only word to describe his mood as he walked down the stepping stone path to a porch that looked like something out of a stock photo.

Perfectly painted with two rocking chairs and a potted ivy, it would be cute were Zephyr's handler were not staining it with his presence.

Elton stood from one of the rockers and demonstrated his one impressive talent as he greeted Zephyr: His ability to look down his nose at someone nearly a full head taller than him.

"Zephyr."

"Elton," he responded coolly. They had ranks, technically, but neither of them typically cared to cast that kind of respect on the other. Especially not when they weren't even using their real names. "I'm looking for someone. Big guy, fugly. Seen it?"

"Your beautiful bride is just inside," Elton held out a cartoonish looking journal to him. "Here's everything you need to know for its care and keeping."

Zephyr took the book in hand, he didn't bother to ask who decided it should be pink and furry with ugly sequins and glitter that was already making Zephyr itch. He knew Elton had probably taken great pride in designing this "diary" himself.

"Hm hm, Give me the TLDR," he dropped it into the small backpack of personal belongings he was being allowed to bring into this mess.

"It's got super soldier dementia. Sad really. It's still in prime physical condition but something went wrong with a reprogramming and now it's bunk. According to the file, it gets confused. Old programs come back online or it's current one breaks so badly it has to revert to those shreds to stop itself going catatonic.

"There's no helping it and no putting it down, so it's your problem. The lab guys stripped out every memory and scrap of programming they could, so it should be a sponge of a blank slate for you to do your manipulations on."

"Everything?" Zephyr quirked a brow. He didn't know if he should be made eager by the limitless potential in making a man from nothing, or intimidated by the vast number of ways he could fuck this up.

"Everything. The higher powers want to see if you can make it into anything useful, and if you can't, then if it's able to adapt to being it's own person."

"Understood," he slung his backpack over his shoulder, "Last question - What are my off hours?"

"It's a temporary and highly sensitive post. You don't get any."

"Elton."

"Don't whine. You'll survive at least a year."

"No I won't. If I'm still 24/7 in three months time I'm killing us both," Zephyr shoulders pass him, not because Elton was in the way, but because Zephyr was hoping it'd knock him down the steps.

"It's a fucking super soldier- You're not killing it," he watches down his nose as Zephyr grabs the keys that are in the lock and opens the door to his new prison.

"Oh," he sneers as he backs through the door "I was Not talking about We as in it and I."

Closing the door in Elton's face was almost satisfying enough to make this situation worth it.

#zephyr #tbh i cut this in half bc im fussy and am indecisive about how to introduce Renard #anyways i had to bend over backwards to find a way to justify the us military setting up a fake gay marriage.#why cant zephyr be woman? dont worry about that. thats a special surprise for later.

69 notes · View notes

tb3ih · 1 year ago

Text

KISSES LIKE SATIN, childe/reader.

SYNOPSIS... pearls unlaced and strewn about the floor, fabrics newly discarded on the furniture, oh how you love the burn when TARTAGLIA sinks his inscisors into your skin, breaking it open and letting constellations spill in (He is the Sun, but you were born of the Moon).

⋆ warnings, model!tartaglia & fashion designer!reader, enemies to lovers, hardcore workplace & BANDAGING WOUNDS tension, fluff and a bit a LOT of spice, influenced heavily by the Goddess Herself, lana del rey (this is entirely self-indulgent), also mentions of previous relationship trauma, but it's non-specific!

⋆ notes, exploration of romance in-between luxury brands and lavish living, also coping with the fact that i've been enamored by yet ANOTHER boy who might just be the death of me. accompanied by bad for business by sabrina carpenter.

⋆ tags! @yakshahs @xngelholix @rinoomi @rainsoughtflowers @14shroud

"YOU'RE absolutely ridiculous!" there is no budge in your expression, pure frustration and borderline hostility apparent in your eyes as you examine the ginger before you. grin just teasing lazy and eyebrows raised in non-chalance, TARTAGLIA was lucky he was the face of this brand, otherwise you're absolutely sure you would've given him a nasty right hook about now.

the time on your watch read 10:34 am, approximately and entire hour and twenty-four minutes past the scheduled time for the photoshoot. hair roussed and button up mussed, the model had sauntered into the backstage room looking like he'd just wandered out of another girl's bed and remembered he had some kind of commitment today.

it was the annual teyvat fashion convention. only one of the biggest in all of the nations.

which, again, was just another agenda item.

"awh, miss l/n, don't be so harsh, i overslept, honest!" you ignore the skip of your heart when the corner of his lips curls into a boysih grin, eyes only narrowing as his eyes seem to peek into your soul.

damn him.

"illya!" a taller blonde appears next to him, black clipboard tucked into her arm, her attention shifting to show disdain at the sight of your brand's top model before settling back to you. "when was mr. tartaglia supposed to arrive?"

she doesn't miss a beat. "8:45 am, miss y/n."

"and when was he to take to the runway?" your eyes narrow at the ginger who's smile doesn't waver.

"9:00 am, sharp, miss y/n," she replies curtly, checking her clipboard.

"ah," you hum, chuckling humorlessly. "how many pieces do we have left?"

"twenty-seven designs in queue, miss y/n."

"how many are his? fifteen?" you turn, stopping a model to adjust the styling of his scarf before dismissing him. "get me an expresso, make it triple, illya. and please, direct mr. tartaglia out of my sight and to his dressing room. he better be on that runway in four minutes or i swear to the archons i will level this entire show."

it's tartaglia who speaks this time, offering a slight bend at the waist to tip you his imaginary hat, "as the princess commands."

you turn curtly to leave before he can see the pink that lightly dusts your complexion at the nickname.

"LOSE the chain." your eyes examine the piece with extra scrutiny, narrowing at the culprit which seems to be disassembling the entire outfit. scowl at how well tartaglia wears it, the long slacks making him appear more intimidating. the low cut v-neck stops just above his abdomen, teasing you with a peek of what you suppose to be his sculpted chest...

tartaglia clears his throat, the shade of blue in his eyes shifting when they catch yours, the curl of his lips telling you he didn't miss a beat of you admiring him. but you reveal nothing, lifting your chin before circling him once. "pearls and black iron chain."

someone hands you both and you approach him, bringing both up to his collar to compare it in the light. you hate to admit that he's one of your most valuable models, the combination of his hair and eyes and his demeanor as a model being the reason you sell out at just hours after ever show.

those damn eyes.

you hold the black chain out drop it into an assistant dresser's hands, focusing on latching the pearls around his neck. one final once-over and you're now positive on the look. "he's good, now get him in line to walk, i want him behind diluc."

you move to adjust his belt, styling it to hang loosely where his shirt tuck breaks. "you know, if you wanted to look at me, you should've just asked." his voice is low enough that it catches no one else's attention.

you scoff, "please, i'm sure you've got supermodels lined up down the block just to get a glimpse of you on the catwalk." when you look up, he's looking down at you, head turned to watch you fix his belt and the back of slacks. your fingers are featherlight so as not to make more contact than necessary. "i have enough model photos and issues to last me a lifetime, but i appreciate the kind offer."

you ignore the small curve of his mouth as he smiles at you amusedly and you dismiss the fluttering feeling in your stomach. "well, i'm not sure any these apparent supermodels bites back as cruelly as you," he replies lowly.

you cough at the comment, eyes narrowing up at his and taking a curt step back from him. you can still smell his cologne from where you stand and you wave a hand at a fashion assistant to signal you're done looking him over. "just do your job."

"sweetheart, i wouldn't dream of anything else." he's caught up to the other models before you can bite back a reply. and you shake an odd feeling from your head.

the caffine's probably the reason your heart's pounding.

YOU'RE pinning a ruby onto a shirt collar when you hear the knock on your hotel door room. the living room of the suite is where you've set up all your upcoming designs, sketches and fabrics strewn about in a collective fashion disaster as you try to piece together next season's collection.

sighing, you set the container with the rest of the precious gems down on a nearby coffee table before dusting the silk of your pajamas lightly and making your way to the door.

you scowl, opening the door to reveal a tall, wavering, ginger, blue eyes softening just a bit when they meet yours. "hi uhm, is now a bad time?"

you're about to say something spiteful when you notice the wrinkles in his collar don't look like they'd been made out of good intent. the knuckles of his hand are red and there's red smeared in splotches on his shirt. you look around the hallway behind him, ushering him in quickly so as not to let anyone see the disheaveled model.

"now before you say anything—"

"ajax, it is 1:43 in the morning, just what the archons are you doing outside of my suite?!" your voice is sharp in tone, but not loud enough to be heard from another room. something in his eyes catches you off-guard and his lips pull into a full smile, boyish and wide. "now is not—what? is something funny?"

his voice comes out a little breathless, as if he'd seen a shooting star. "no you... you said my name..."

oh.

"don't i always?" your voice is a little quieter and the room doesn't seem as big anymore.

"well... it's just..." he flexes his hand and you watch him wince, if only for a second and you remember why he's here.

"i'll meet you in the bathroom," you say, offering no question before moving to the bedroom to look for the healing kit. when you walk back in to the bathroom, he's already taken the liberty of attempting to wash out the blood stains in his shirt.

"you won't get the stains out with water, it has to be professionally cleaned," you comment, watching his broad shoulders turn to face you where you stand in the door way. "zhongli's going to throw a fit when he hears you've ruined something imported from liyue."

tartaglia laughs a little softly to himself, the sound causing your heart to pick up it's pace just a little. "ah well, i suppose i've got a habit for ruining things, huh?"

when you meet his eyes, they hold none of the confident charm you're used to, nothing teasing about the way his lips seem to curl in apology deeper than just the ruined button-up.

you try to wave off the feeling, motioning for him to forget the shirt and relax against the marble countertop. "we need better shirts anyway, it's from two collections ago."

holding out your hand, he rests his hand in yours, allowing you to examine the wounds on his knuckles. "you'd feel better if you saw the other guy," he says quietly. when you look up at him, his eyes are on you.

you clear your throat, "well, i don't feel good at all, you have a jewelry showcase tomorrow and i can't have you looking like this." you take a towel and wet it with warm water, carefully dabbing at his knuckles. "what happened?"

tartaglia swallows, voice quiet when he replies. "i saw kaeya at the bar."

your movements pause, eyes blinking quickly to clear the sudden rush of memories. "ah."

it's quiet other than the sound of a clock ticking quietly in the other room as you continue to clean away his hands.

"i know what he did to you." he sucks in a sharp breath, "and i, truly, am sorry. i wish there was something..." something in those azure hues shifts and you know he truly means what he's saying. there's a faint whiff of dandelion wine on his breath and you have to restrain yourself from saying anything that you'll regret.

your laugh is a little too dry, too soft. "well, it's in the past now, right?" you set down the dirty cloth and pick up the healing ointment. "there's nothing to get so angry about, now is there?"

he's quiet and you know he's focused on you handling his knuckles. you reach for the bandages, but he's already got them in his other hand to give them to you. your "thank you" is barely above a whisper.

"you're so gentle," he starts, making you pause to look up at him. there is a small upturn of his lips and you have to suck in sharply to remember to breathe. the look is so genuine, so raw, and you're not sure what to do with the erruption of butterflies in your stomach. his skin is radiating heat and you need to get away before you get burned.

you push away from him, steadying yourself against nothing. "i can't do this, not with you, not right now."

he's bad for business. but he's close you could just reach out—

his complexion is marred with confusion, eyes falling on the distance now between the two of you. "y/n..."

"why?" you choke out the word, years of memories bubbling up in the back of your throat. fashion deisgn school, late nights spent out in the cities, even the ocean breeze between tangled sheets. "what do you want?"

"it's not... i'm not..." the ginger is searching your eyes, struggling to piece together some reply to your reaction. "i'm sorry—"

"stop saying that," you plead, pain building in the corners of your eyes. "you don't even know what you're apologizing for."

he lets out a frustrated breath of air, running is unscathed hand through his hair. "but that's exactly the thing, i do. i know exactly what i'm apologizing for." his expression is determined, gaze set on you in the middle of the bathroom now. "i never should have left you like that."

you blink hard and fast, memories threatening to spill down your cheeks in hot, salty trails. you remmeber that cold, posessive hand on your waist, the spiked dandelion wine, those azure locks while you were taken to places you'd only read about in the tabloids. "you didn't do anything, ajax, please—"

"that's exactly my point!" something in his voice is breaking, but so is something in your chest. "archons, y/n, i've known you since we were kids, i was there, when you first moved to the neighborhood, when we graduated secondary school, even the first day day you came to advanced design class, i. was. there."

his chest heaves a little as he tries to catch his breath. "i watched that asshole tear you apart and didn't move an inch to try and piece you back together." tartaglia pushes lightly off the counter, only inching just a bit cloaser to you so as not to startle you.

you only have a few feet before you hit the other wall.

"every day for the past near decade of my career, the only thing you have done is stress me out and test my pateince," you reply, this time with something hot bubbling in the back of your throat. nothing is making sense anymore. "why? why do you insist on making my life so hard?"

all the backstage mischief, the tardy appearances to fanshion shows, even the silly misdemeanors at afterparties. there was no end to how much this boy provoked in you, good and bad.

"y/n..." he's closer now, the look in his bright blue eyes never letting you look away from his. you're backing up subconsciously, praying the room might magically expand at your approach. "i'm still that dumb, immature, ten-year-old boy who fell in love with you on the playground. you couldn't even acknowledge me in the room after what kaeya had done to you because we were friends. i thought maybe..."

his voice trails off and you watch his adam's apple bob as he swallows, the next words seeming to crash into you as deeply as his gaze.

"even if it was with contempt, at least you were looking at me."

the reminder of the wall brings you to look up at him. he's closed in on you and you're not sure you even want to escape. you were supposed to hate him.

"why are you telling me this?" you feel as if you're heart's about to burst and he's so dangerously close.

his hands are so gentle when they hold your face, directing your eyes to meet his. "because if i don't tell you now, i'm not sure i ever will." his thumb strokes gently at your cheek. "after today, i thought you might fire me for my behavior so figured now's a better time than ever."

his smile is so full when he speaks, that same boyish charm, only in a different light. "i am so wholy, and genuinely in love with you, y/n."

you're definitely sure he can hear your heart pounding in your chest. the tears you'd been trying so hard to hold have begun to spill down your cheeks, dusting your complexion with a light tint of rose as his confession sinks in. his hands wipe them away gently, the warmth radiating off of him comforting and coaxing you as you cry.

"so please, sweeheart," he whispers, "don't push me away anymore."

the breath of a distance between you two is a question, one that your head and heart seem to both agree on answering. you breathe out an "okay," and it's a split second before planets seem to collide.

his lips are softer than velvet on yours, gentle and patient as he lets the worries weighing your heart spill from your closed eyes. tartaglia does not wipe them from your cheeks this time, his hands having moved to secure a hold around your waist. your hands find his hair, slipping through the soft locks like cashmere.

your name escapes his lips in a low groan when you tug a little and you find yourself smiling a little against him. he is so terribly close to you that you can feel his warmth blooming between your ribs, spreading throughout your limbs and soothing aches you never knew you had.

such a sweet boy to heal something he didn't break.

#xx tb3ih #genshin impact #genshin #genshin impact tartaglia #genshin tartaglia #genshin impact childe #genshin childe #genshin impact x reader #genshin x reader #genshin fluff #genshin impact fluff #genshin smut #enemies to lovers #high fashion #mens fashion #childe fluff #childe smut #tartaglia fluff #tartaglia smut

391 notes · View notes

honeyjars-sims · 3 months ago

Text

3.28 Coming Clean

The next time I arrive at work, I remind myself that I need to be an adult about this whole situation. I figure I should start by admitting to Lexie and the others that I exaggerated my importance at the company. Before I can get settled in, though, I get a text from Lucy asking to see me in her office.

“Hey, how’d it go with your new minions?” I ask. I can tell by the annoyance on her face that my joke didn’t land.

“I wanted to talk to you about that, actually.” Uh oh. I realize I might actually be in trouble.

“Sure, what about?”

“Did you tell the students that you’re their boss?” She folds her arms across her chest.

“Oh yeah, I did say that, but I’m going to tell them I was just joking.”

“Well, joking around is fine, but misrepresenting your role goes a step too far. I needed you to help them get acquainted with their new workplace, not confuse them about the chain of command.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize it would be such a big deal.”

“It’s not just that, though. I didn’t mind finishing up the tour for you, but there were other things I needed you to do yesterday and you were nowhere to be found. When I asked Damien what you were doing for him, he said he hadn’t given you any assignments. This isn’t like you, Johnny. What’s going on?”

I don’t know what to say. I know I dropped the ball, but I also don’t want to have to explain why I dipped out like I did. “I really am sorry,” I tell her. “I know it’s not an excuse, but I was feeling really anxious about something and I needed to step away.”

I can see her face soften a bit. “Look, I’m sorry that you were struggling yesterday,” she responds. “Mental health should always be a priority, but I really need you to communicate these things to me. If you need to take some time to yourself or you need a mental health day, please just let me know.”

For some reason it never occurred to me that I could have just talked to her about it. “Okay, I’ll make sure to come to you next time,” I promise. “I’m sorry I let you down. Whatever you need from me today I’ll do it. Actually, I was going to ask about getting security badges for the students. I, uh, might’ve made it sound like they weren’t important enough to get one.”

Lucy exhales loudly through her nose. “Yes, I’ll put in a request. I’ll let you know when they’re ready.”

“Okay, thanks.”

“And Johnny, I know you can do better than this. Don’t get in your own way.”

Once the badges are ready, I deliver them to the students.

“I thought you said we wouldn’t get one of these?” Izzy asks.

“Yeah, I was just trying to make myself seem important,” I admit. “Just like when I said I’m kind of your boss. I don’t actually have any authority here, but if you ever need something I’ll do what I can to help.”

“Johnny, you don’t have to impress us,” Lexie says gently.

“Yeah,” Donovan adds. “We all think it’s cool that you got a job here.”

“Well, I’m sorry for lying. I know you probably heard about some of the stuff I was getting into over the summer and I didn’t want you to think I was still a fuck up.”

“Hey, man, we never thought you were,” Chase tells me. “We were mostly just worried about you.”

“Yeah, we were all relieved to see you’re doing so well,” Kelsey chimes in.

All I can do is smile and nod. I’m afraid if I say anything, I’ll start crying. Not because I’m sad, though. I feel happy that I have so many people in my life that care about me. Even if things are awkward for a while, I feel like everything might actually be okay.

Previous | Beginning of story | Beginning of chapter | Next

29 notes · View notes

yjhariani · 2 years ago

Text

Things We Do for Love

Simon ‘Ghost’ Riley X GN!Reader (through platonic/professional!Price x Reader) Word count: 1800± Warning: Profanity, kind of angsty. Summary: Price caught you and Simon engaging in an unprofessional relation in a workplace, here came the consequences.

It was hard living like this. Being so close yet so far, reachable yet out of reach, and yearning without getting satisfied.

It was even harder after you and Simon got caught engaging in a certain activity in a barrack many a night ago by Price. You were in his arms, on his lap with your faces practically magnetted on each other’s.

That same night, in that same place, the two of you were punished by what seemed to be the most pushups that you had ever done in your life. However, other than that, Price proceeded no further than giving you both a warning; should he find the two of you engaging in the same way, he would bring it up to your superiors.

If that happened, either one of you or both of you could be dishonourably discharged. At worst. Especially with your rank difference with Simon’s.

In a way, Price was looking after you both. He could not turn a blind eye as your superior officer, but he did not necessarily want to lose the two of you both as a captain and as a friend.

Had someone else caught you and Simon making out, you both would have been in much bigger trouble that might lead you both into, again, getting discharged dishonourably. At worst.

Price could tolerate your flirting even on the field, but he was disappointed that you both did this in a workplace, especially in uniforms that you would likely take off had Price not caught you both.

By the end of that night, which was 2 AM when Price finally dismissed you both, you were only able to exchange a simple handshake before Price moved you to another settlement, far away from where Simon’s was.

From then on, the two of you were never given the same mission any more. It was his order—as much as it pained him to do so—that the two of you should limit contact with one another. In spite of the two of you working in the same task force.

As the captain saw it, both your performances were stable after the incident, but he also noticed that both your enjoyment were lacking. You only spoke when spoken to, Simon was more easily irritated than he used to, hardly the two of you cracked any jokes with other people like how it was when the two of you worked together.

Meeting each other, of course, was unavoidable. Seeing that the two of you stayed in the same base, walking around the same people, working under the same chain of commands.

Most of the time, every time the two of you saw each other, you immediately looked away, brokenhearted. The closest thing you two had that resembled a greeting was a stiff nod without eye contact. It was as if one word exchange could jeopardise your whole career.

For most people, they hardly saw anything wrong with you both other than that the two of you just started being very stiff, but that was not something uncommon in the military. One day some people returned home a different person than when they left.

This affected not only you and Simon. Price felt first hand the disadvantage of separating the two of you; his best soldiers who were invincible working side by side.

Soap was getting pissed and quite frustrated that none of his jokes worked on Ghost any more; he even started fearing Ghost again to an extent. He was so ridiculously frustrated by how the two of you could not even seem to look each other in the eyes.

Though you both still sought each other in crowded places, the two of you never had the chance to be in a private area together. Sometimes all the communication with one another happened through Soap. You would ask how he was and he would ask the same—which was what got Soap frustrated in the first place.

What people did notice was how you and Simon were hardly seen together any more. You never walked side by side any more, you never stared some rookie down the field menacingly together any more, yourself never even smiled any more. They were thinking positively that the two of you fell out due to a professional disagreement on the field.

Some people started theorising that the two of you were pointing guns at each other, almost shooting each other, and even beating the shit out of each other as well as the people who tried to stop you from fighting. Some said the two of you were trying to get your credits up, fighting over who should kill the enemy and such.

After all, you and Simon were amongst two of the most professional soldiers. Who would believe that the two of you would have to be separated due to something as unprofessional as engaging in such a… relationship?

A few months passed with such tension and it only grew by the seconds. When it could no longer be ignored any more, Price decided to take initiative and dealt with the consequences of his choice.

Price came to your quarter, inviting you to take a walk with him. This was not an offer, so you did as he requested.

It was early in the morning. A lot of people were having their morning PT, a lot of officers were also around. Price lit up a cigar as the two of you started walking outdoors.

“How long does your contract last from today?” Price asked.

Simon and you talked about this one time. The only reason the two of you cared about this was because the day one of your military contracts ended would be the day the two of you could be together without breaking any rules and without any worries.

“You know that,” you answered. “A good few years. Hopefully.”

Price exhaled deeply.

“I’m taking my hat off as a symbolic gesture that I’m not speaking to you as your captain,” Price took his hat off, folding and shoving it into his back pocket. “There. Now, I will speak plainly.”

You were the one now who exhaled deeply.

“It fucking burdens me to see you both like this, but I did it because it’s for the best. I can’t exactly turn a blind eye to what happened, but I can’t get rid of either of you,” Price started.

“You already said that many times,” you stated. “Are you finally going to say you regret it?”

“I won’t say that I regret it, but it’s becoming an inconvenience,” Price said. “So, I will propose a solution. I can maybe pull some strings into getting you a promotion, making you a lieutenant.”

“That isn’t really a solution,” you pointed out.

“Well, that’s not the only thing. I might have to… transfer one of you away, drop one of you off the task force,” Price added.

That would likely be you. Everybody valued Simon more than you. Except for Simon himself.

“At least by then you would be able to get together,” Price said.

“What you’re saying is that you’re willing to get dirty for the sake of our happiness?” you teased.

“You both deserve to be happy. You need each other,” Price sighed.

“What’d he say about this plan of yours?” you asked.

Price said nothing.

“You didn’t tell him?” you concluded.

“He stopped talking to me regarding anything outside of work,” Price said.

“You did that to yourself,” you scoffed.

“I’m not denying that,” Price said. “So, what do you say?”

Getting together actually with Simon was so important to you. You would do anything to do so. You almost threw a few punches across a few superior officers’ faces in hope to get yourself discharged out of the force—even though not honourably—so you both could be together.

You were in too deep in this task force that even if Price’s plan worked, you would still get restricted in your work. Clearly, this past few months was proof enough that you did not need any more restrictions.

A few long months of not talking to each other, hardly hearing his voice, and not feeling his touch. You had started thinking about getting discharged the couple of weeks into Price’s order to separate yourself and Simon.

Looking around at the moment, you were surrounded by soldiers who wanted the same thing as you did; a retirement. Honestly, it was a rare thing that anyone in the military did not desire a retirement just one week into their enlistment. You were no different, until you met Simon.

“How long would that take?” you continued.

“A few months,” Price answered.

Yeah, you could not wait that long, but that was way shorter than a few years. However, there were flaws.

“Abuse of power could get you DD-ed, Price, I can’t do that to you,” you reasoned.

“It won’t get me dishonourably discharged if you do earn it,” Price said. “So, I’m offering you to lead some of our men on a big mission with a certain organisation, but not without your agreement. This is not something most of us have dealt with before, but it should give you enough to get that promotion.”

“There’s a lot I haven’t dealt with before,” you said. “What is it?”

“Bioterrorism,” Price named.

“So, I'm working with WHO?” you concluded.

“No. BSAA,” Price corrected.

That made all the difference. The chances of you coming back alive whilst working with the WHO was way, way, way higher than if you were working with the BSAA.

“I’ll take it,” you decided.

“Are you sure?” Price asked.

“Yes, sir,” you nodded.

“You have to promise me that you will come back alive,” Price insisted. “I’m not sending you out there to die.”

“I know you won’t bring this up if you don’t think I can handle it,” you replied.

“To be honest, this one is more on the risky side,” Price said. “So, I will ask again… are you absolutely sure? This means I will remove your name from 141.”

“I am,” you nodded. “Things we do for love, may it be stupid or dangerous, could still be used to an advantage. Let this be one of them.”

“You’re probably the only soldier who would say something like that,” Price sighed.

“Don’t tell him I said that,” you tried smiling.

"Well, see me in my office after breakfast. I'll proceed this... decision as soon as possible," Price nodded.

Price did the best he could to make this situation as quiet yet as quickly as possible. Laswell helped with this and she agreed that he was doing the right thing.

On the day you were about to leave, you saw Simon. He was on his way out of a helicopter with Soap while you were on your way to get into one. From across the hangar, the two of you stopped amidst your walk, looking at each other.

There was something in the way you both looked at each other that felt different. There was worry, more than the usual. There was something odd that could not exactly be described with words.

Simon just knew that something was wrong. Even more so when you saluted him from afar before going about your business. It was as if you were saying goodbye.

#simon riley #simon ghost riley #simon ghost riley x reader #simon riley x reader #ghost #ghost x reader #captain price x reader #price x reader #captain price #mind dump #cod x re

813 notes · View notes

josephquinnswhore · 2 years ago

Text

At Her Mercy

Pairing: Simon “ghost” Riley x Fem! Reader

Summary: you’re needed to help guide the task force 141 group, when you meet ghost, it would tear open your wounds.

Word Count: 6.7k

Content Warning: mentions of murder, childhood abuse, physical violence, ghosting, heartless reader, typical cod violence, child death, bit of physicality between ghost and reader. Ptsd. No happy ending.

Note: I have a lot of requests and I’m sorry I just have so much Simon brain rot I need to get this out of my system. Sorry this is angsty. May be open for p2 idk lol.

You try not to linger around the grave too long after having sat here for 23 minutes, the longer you sat the longer it usually was harder for you to walk away. You couldn’t afford that attachment today; you had a plane to catch. Time didn’t stop for you, the world didn’t stop spinning and you knew you’d have to trudge through the metaphorical mud you often got stuck in again once you’d left; leaving was always the hardest part.

The clock on your wrist didn’t slow for you, the hands tick with each passing second you spent knelt into the unkempt overgrown grass at the cemetery. The headstone was old, in desperate need of a pressure wash to restore it’s original state. The arch shaped stone seemed to stand strong in the structure itself, your fingers had swiped the cobwebs off the top and base of the stone, clearing any critters that tried to make this memorial their home.

You knew you shouldn’t have purchased a whole bouquet of flowers, the bunch of red and orange flowers sat at the base where you’d carefully placed them upon your arrival, a mix of his favourite colours. You’d even purchased him a small gift, a hot wheels car, a red mustang with white stripes across the bonnet. He had always loved cars, playing with them and working on them; he mentioned a dozen times he’d wanted to be a mechanic, now along side him in his coffin; lie his dreams. A life unfulfilled and cut short at no fault of his own. It had been 10 years and 7 days; December 18th was the day your semi-normal but functioning life was stripped away; the day he was taken from you.

“Sorry I couldn’t come see you last week kid, I know I always make sure but things got-complicated. Hope you’ll forgive me.”

Things were definitely complicated. You were contacted by General Shepherd, you knew of him; being he was in charge of several units across the United States Military, including your section. He had a lot of contacts and if you worked for him; there was nothing about you he didn’t know. He directly had asked you to come and command the task force 141 team, alongside a man named Captain John Price.

“John Price is a good man and a damn good Captain.” Shephard stated, hanging off his last word on the laptop he’d called you on, his face could barely look at the camera.

“But?” You question impatiently.

“We fear he may’ve gone soft on the men here. We could use your..” he trails off, looking for the right word to use. “Resourcefulness and ruthlessness.”

“Do you think I’m ruthless, General?” You deadpan. His face pixilated as the wifi on your end fails to keep up.

“I’ve heard many a stories about you, Captain. Plane leaves in two days. John Price will meet you upon your arrival.”

“Copy that. I’ll be in touch General.” You shut your laptop screen, the call automatically ending as it meets the keypad.

You check your watch once more, the action becoming more frequent as the minutes passed, knowing you were cutting it close to missing the plan which left in half an hour to your new workplace.

“Sorry kid I better get going. I miss you everyday, still keep you near to my heart.” Your fingers trace the small ‘m’ letter necklace, the simple silver letter was attached to a small-link chain. Something that spent more time by your bedside table than around your neck these days-something you were ashamed to admit. The small trinket was one of the few items you owned of his, you tried to keep his memory alive as your brain often forgot what he looked like, the sound of his voice and laugh. The day you received this gift was one you’d remember until you died. You pull your mask up to cover the bottom half of your face, reaching underneath your eyes, closing yourself off and your vulnerability.

Christmas Day was always hectic in the household; spending time with your husbands family, his brother and wife, your nephew who was practically your own son.

“Hey, hey! I give up, put me down!” The boy giggled through his fit of laughter, short brown hair brushing the floor as you held him upside down.

“Gotta say the word otherwise you don’t tap out!” You manage through your own burst of laughter, his parents watching on with their own smiles, your husband watches you with a fondness and hope for your own children someday.

“Mercy! Mercy!” The boy squeals, finally. You set him down on the carpet gently, once he stands his cheeks are red and freckles are visible now more than normal.

He walks to the heavily decorated Christmas tree, bends down and precisely plucks a small, messily wrapped gift and hands it to you with a shy smile. The yellow Christmas lights shine in his blue eyes as he watches you expectantly, waiting for you to accept the gift. The first thing you notice is the outrageous amount of tape that secured the wrapping paper, the second was his messy hand writing that had scribbled your name, with a love heart next to his, you tear off the note and secure it in your pant pocket, too valuable not to keep.

“Do you think you can help me open it? I might need your big muscles to help unravel all this tape. Whaddya say?” He grins, nodding, helping you claw at the tape he had fervently taped last night after his parents had finally lent him some money he’d been begging for weeks.

Once the paper is gone, it’s exposed. The small white cardboard top that covered a black velvet box; the brand of a well known jeweller splayed in a cursive font on the box in silver. “This is so sweet!” You hum, completely delighted before you get the chance to even open the gift.

“Just wait till you open it! I think it’s neat.” He boasts proudly. You open the box, a small silver letter ‘m’ shines back at you, casting your reflection in the cursive letter. Before you can question him, he’s already starting to explain.

“It’s for Mercy, it’s something that reminds me of you when you’re not here. We always have so much fun playing together and I hope you like it.”

The tears in your eyes are fluent, your mouth is wet as you fill to the metaphorical brim of the cup with emotion, about to overflow. “Like it? Are you kidding, I love it. I promise we’ll come see you more often okay?”

“Yeah, that would be so neat!”

The memory replays as you’re sitting in the taxi to the Military airport, a junction that’s privately owned and used by few occupants that require urgent travel. The plane is being boarded with flight crew when you arrive; the army plane was one of many you’ve seen before; the dark grey would be a blip in the perfectly blue sky, like the little boy on your mind; his absence was your loss; your dark grey blip.

“Captain, please, let us take care of your luggage. Board the plane swiftly as we are on time and due to depart in 10 minutes.” You offload your giant luggage bag to a low ranking worker, his uniform clear indication he was what the higher ups call a shitkicker, or rookie. They were generally to stupid-or immature to be anything more than a servant, someone to fetch and do basic physical training until they were filtered out; booted or into the military as a low ranking soldier.

“Thanks kid.” You offer the younger man, kindness wouldn’t hurt with the rookies, you’ve been there and were there for two years-they were a necessity in the industry, without them there would be no new soldiers, no people to do the dirty work, like cleaning the toilets and washing the bedsheets.

The inside of the plane was nothing fancy, while it’s seats were mildly stiff and there was a lingering smell of cigarette smoke you didn’t complain, it was better than being seated where the low ranking soldiers were strapped, in the back of the aircraft with the luggage and whatever cargo they were shipping to the next location.

“Anything to drink, madam?” You look up to meet the eyes of a tired stuartess.

“Got any whiskey?” She nods politely and you pull the plastic tray down that’s attached to the seat in front.

“How would you like that made madam?” She’s pouring from a glass bottle, by the look of the honey coloured liquid, it was expensive.

“On the rocks, prepare me a second. Better make it a double.” You grab the drink, throwing it back and swallowing it in one go, the bitterness burned going down your throat, followed by tones of malt and honey.

You hand the glass back to the middle aged woman, she prepares you a double as you ask and you set the cup in front of you.

“If you need our assistance please don’t hesitate to ask, enjoy your flight.”

“Yeah, thanks.” Your voice is rough, the whiskey was harsh on your throat, despite the sweet after taste, it was harsher than you were used to, the ice adding a coolness that made your teeth sensitive with every sip of the liquid.

You pull out a small baggie from your top right pocket of your dark uniform, two small white rounded pills sit at the bottom of the small ziplock plastic bag. You fish out the pills, your fingers a decent size too big for it to be an effortless task. Getting disgruntled and sick of waiting another minute, you tip the baggie upward and crane your neck back into the seat, the two pills falling from the bag onto your tongue. The powdery residue on your tongue is bitter and unpleasant, you don’t take another second to pick up your glass and swallow the pills.

After a few years of using the sleeping pills, you’ve gained a small tolerance, it takes close to 15 before your eyelids start fluttering, the loudness of the aircraft starts to drown out, all the emotion from the gravesite seems to fade away as you fall out of consciousness, you would enjoy the peace as it came; no nightmares, no pain, just blissful ignorance.

You wake just as the plane lands on the runway, the loud screeching of the rubber tyres hitting the tar at great speed. To speed up the process of waking up, you gulp down the last of your whiskey, the beverage barely relieving the dry mouth the pills had caused you on a daily basis. You clear your throat and lick your lips, looking around at the view outside of the moving scenery as the plane circles around to its final stop, where two military grade unimogs full of soldiers await your arrival.

You adjust your black mask, the material clings tight to your chin as it drapes down your neck. A man approaches you as you walk down the giant ramp of the aircraft, the noise ceasing as the engines come to a halt, the blades rotating slowly as they realise their journey has ended. The man stands a few inches taller than you, his brown mutton chops frame his face, blue eyes piercing you with a friendly look that makes you uneasy, the crows feet around his eyes are a knowing sign of his stress. You don’t even want to get started on that stupid hat.

“John Price, Captain John Price. Nice to finally meet your acquaintance.” You shake his extended hand firmly. Believing all you need to know in a person is all in the handshake; take Price for example, he’s firm, friendly, a business man, his hand doesn’t linger for longer than it needs to.

“You can call me Mercy. Glad to finally meet you Captain Price. Shepherd hasn’t informed me much of your men, I hope they’re up to standard.” You begin to walk to the truck, Price has his men load your luggage into the back.

“I firmly believe they are, Captain.” He holds the door open for you to sit in the backseat, an unusually kind gesture for someone you just met.

“Guess we’ll see about that.” You deadpan bluntly. You had seen your fair share of failures in your time, leaders who weren’t harsh enough on their men, who didn’t correct their mistakes or claimed to be a family unit. You hated that dynamic, you weren’t here to build a family or make friends. You were placed here to help the men of this task force with their dedicated mission and get the fuck back to your own unit, you had your own men that relied on you.

“Hope you don’t mind the introductions will be made off base this evening.” You raise an eyebrow, turning to the man beside you.

“Is that so? Where exactly will this off base location be? Is the area secure, will you have men patrolling the area?” These are all necessary questions and this man had looked at you as if you had two heads, which answered your questions for you.

“We can have it arranged Ma’am.” You hum in distaste.

“It would want to be arranged, I don’t leave base unless I know myself and my men are safe. I’m sure you understand Captain.” You already showed no fondness to the man who was supposed to be leading a task force, how incompetent were the men he were in charge of if the Captain himself didn’t pre-organise this off base meeting.

The base was small, a dozen buildings, one awfully large one in which you would assume was medical. One in which you would hope is medical. The trucks come to a stop, you’re grateful for your mask that filters the dust in which stops you from inhaling the swirling storm of dust as you open the door. Your boots leave an indented footprint on the beige dust, the grass growing in patches and the buildings invaded with overgrown weeds that haven’t been touched in what you’d assume were years.

“If you’ll follow me ma’am, I’ll show you around base.” You pull out the small notepad and pen, scribbling down how someone needs to hire a damn maintenance man to clean the weeds and mow the grass.

You come to the largest building which is attached to the other smaller ones in a large D shape. As you walk in, the room is outdated and the stench makes your nose scrunch in disgust under your mask.

“Captain what the fuck is that obnoxious smell?” Price turns to you, slowing his pace to match your own as you look into the windows of the old, outdated rooms, trying to figure out where the smell is coming from.

“This is the mess hall, we used to have people cook for us but they were all fired when the government stopped extra curricula funding.” You frown, speeding your pace through the dirty halls of the building.

“Why hasn’t it been cleaned, or demolished?” You finally exit that part of the building. Price doesn’t have an answer for you. You write some notes in your notepad about the foul stench and lack of use for that building, writing demolish with question marks and drawing a big circle around it.

“This is where we sleep, we have a dozen men on base at the moment, myself and 3 others are the task force 141 team you’ll be working closely with, your room is this one right here.”

You come to a stop, room 5F. He hands you the key, putting a spare in his pocket. Your luggage is sitting outside the door already.

“Keeping the spare key for any particular reason?”

“For emergencies only, we’ve had an incident where someone had a heart attack and locked themselves in. He passed away before we could get to him. Just a precaution, that’s all.”

The room is stuffy when he opens the door, the single bed is topped with a 4 inch mattress and one old flimsy blanket and a flat pillow, you’re grateful you brought your own bedding.

“If you need anything give me a buzz, I’ll text you the address of the bar tonight.” He gestures to a small piece of paper on the wall, sticky taped on all four sides. Written Prices name and mobile number.

“Right. Thanks.” You drag your luggage in from outside the door, the wheels are loud on the floor as it squeaks. You begin to unpack your things, deciding to put up the image of your nephew on the bedside table, having cropped out your ex-husband from the image to show the two of you, an image from your last birthday you spent with him.

“I want a corner piece please, please!” The boy pleas, his love for the crispy par burnt edges of your birthday cake were his favourite. You slice him up a large piece, swiping your finger in the delicious yellow frosting that topped his oversized piece. You lean into him and wipe it on his face, earning a groan of protest from him as he retreats from you.

“I’m trying to eat it, not wear it!” You laugh, cutting your family each a slice of the cake your brother-in-laws wife had made. The sunflowers were handcrafted with such delicacy you were saddened to cut into them-let alone eat them.

“Alright, alright, I guess I can leave you unbothered. But just for the moment.” You push his arm with your own gently in a playful manner.

To your surprise, he pulls out a sunflower from beside the seat he sits on, you set the cake down and grasp the flourishing flower, inspecting the beauty and vibrancy of the perfectly bright yellow petals, it had been picked perfectly. Tears pricked your eyes as you held the flower.

“God kid, you know how to make me cry dontcha?” He grins, his mouth full of chocolate mud cake, “good tears, right?” You smiled at your nephew and he smiled back, “right.” Unbeknownst to you in that moment-your brother in law had snapped an image.

A picture you held dear to your heart, and now bedside. You manage to pull yourself away from the image-a painful memory in which all of him had become, yet you had to preserve as there was no one left that would do so. You refused to let his memory die.

You pull your mask down as you near the sink, a crusty mirror hangs above it, barely clear enough for you to see yourself as much more than a blur. You reapply the black paint to your face as some unwelcome tears had fallen and dropped down your cheeks, ruining the pigment of the paint. You brush your teeth, turning the tap on to see a musty brown coloured water before it turns clear, note to self, don’t drink the water unless it’s bottled.

You apply some deodorant before pulling your mask back upward, your hot breath is once again trapped in the confines of the mask as you close yourself off. Your phone vibrates on the bed and you check it’s a text from Price confirming the location of the ‘meeting’. More like a typical military piss up, these men will find any excuse to drink.

Price: “Bar at 112 West Highland Road. Neon green sign out front, be blind to miss it.”

You: “Got it. Be there soon.”

The bar was quieter than you expected, sure it had a few typical rowdy drinks, but nothing like any of the chaos you’d experienced in America. It doesn’t take long for you to spot Price, your eyes scanning every face in the room as if you’ve got facial recognition in your brain, just in case you need to remember. Price stands from his seat, 3 other men sit with him, one is significantly larger than the rest, he’s wearing a black hoodie and jeans, the rest you don’t see as he’s turned towards the bar.

You stand tall as you approach them, people moving out of your way as you barge into their shoulders roughly.

“Glad you could join us tonight. This is the rest of the team, Gaz, Soap and Ghost.” He points to his men and you shake the hand of Gaz first, “nice meeting you Gaz.” He’s got a bright smile that you find hard not to reciprocate.

“I’m John McTavish but you can call me Soap, ma’am.” You raise an eyebrow, two johns? Seriously? You shake his hand, “I’ll keep that in mind, Soap.”

The last man you approach is large, he’s tall and a black baklava with a skull print covers his face. His hoodie is pulled up and a black substance covers his eyes, his blonde lashes untouched as they poke through, his blue eyes are piercing as they stare through you. “Ghost eh, interesting. I like the look.” He looks you up and down before nodding. “Appreciated Captain.” He sets his drink down on the bar and you take a seat in between him and Soap, there feels something familiar about his accent, those beaming blue eyes and blonde eyelashes, but you chalk it up to him being British. “Call me Mercy.”

“How’d ya come up that callsign?” Soap inquires. You exhale deeply, this was going to be a long night.

“Before I answer any damn questions, I need a drink.” The bartender took your order, within the minute you had the drink sitting in front of you, pleading for you to drink it so it could take your pain away for you, deal with the guilt and memories you found to traumatic to continue to think about.

You take a sip and smack your lips. “It was an inside thing between my nephew and I, the name kinda just stuck.”

You finished off your drink and slid it back to the bartender who gave you a refill as you asked. “You got family back home then?” Gaz questions.

Thank god for the refill. “Negative. All deceased.” The men went quiet and you sip on the liquid, it warms you from the inside out, taking away the guilt and stripping you down to where you had no emotion on the topic. They murmur apologies and you feel ghosts gaze on you, his eyes felt dark and sinister, like he was distant from his physical body, he didn’t really feel there.

“You ever marry?” You grit your teeth, your jaw is clenching so hard you can almost feel your teeth grinding. The mention of your husband boils your blood, but also breaks your heart into a million shards.

“Still married, technically. Piece of shit ghosted me when things got hard, haven’t seen him since. First thing I’ll do if I ever see that sorry bastard is serve him the divorce papers I’ve been carrying for half a decade. Cant change my last name without the divorce being finalised.”

You throw your neck back as you finish off your second glass of whiskey. Your bladder feeling full from the beverage, your mind hazy and spinning already, the talk of your husband is making your head ache. You pull of your ID and card, throwing it onto the bench for the bartender, “excuse me a moment while I use the restroom, prepare another drink for when I get back would you?”

The bartender watches you hesitantly and mutters, “sure.”

The bartender tossed your cards back to the bench in front of you, attempting to sit them where you left them, seemingly throwing it too far as your ID rolls off the bar onto the floor beside your stool legs. Soap mutters, “fuckin idiot.” As he picks up your card, setting it back upright in front of your drink, noticing the last name, he does a double take. He thinks his eyes are deceiving him when he sees your last name- Riley. This surely is just a coincidence, right?

“Eh Lt, you seen this lass’ last name, might be a relation to you.” Ghost turns to soap, irritated by his shenanigans, but glances towards the card anyway and can’t take his eyes away from it. He sees you- her. His wife. It’s her face and her name, how did you get this? His wife hated the military, war and fighting, she would never join it, let alone become a Captain of her own army.

He felt his blood boiling, the alcohol in his blood seemed to fuel the fire swirling in his stomach. How wife was killed that night along with the rest of his family- it made him sick to his stomach having to think you could try and come into this talk force and betray him.

“You alright Simon?” Prices voice is unheard, the noise of the bar and the photo of his wife’s face brings back too many painful memories for him to focus on the reality. Memories that plagued his nightmares- of you and him.

“What do you think Si?” She twirls in the blue sundress for him as her hair falls over her shoulders, he can only smile at the sight of her, her beauty was immeasurable to him-incomparable. He had never felt this way before about anyone. In that moment, he remembers how perfect he thinks she would’ve looked swollen with his child.

His hands snaked their away around her waist, pulling her into his body. “You know I think you look fuckin’ perfect baby, always perfect.” She rolls her eyes at his compliment.

“This is a serious matter you know! It’s a wedding, people will be taking pictures that last many lifetimes, you look so handsome and I have to match it.” He remembers cradling her face, forcing her to look him in his eyes, “you look better than I ever could, baby.”

She smiled but shook her head, “no one could ever be more handsome than my husband.” She rubbed her hands up and down his white long sleeve button up shirt, smoothing out the collar which barely had a wrinkle in it post ironing.

“What’d I ever do to deserve you hm?” His voice was a quiet whisper, she’d worked through previous hardships, his struggles and scars she had kissed better and even attempted to stitch up when he’d come home because he blatantly refused to let anyone else touch his body. She had been there through the worst of it, helped him through his family troubles, stayed after he applied for the military and stayed up during the nights he had nightmares, his ptsd was severe for months on end when he first signed up.

“You deserve me Si, more than anything you deserve me.”

“Ghost?” Soaps hand was on his shoulder, shaking him out of his hazy memories of his old wife.

“Need a minute outside.”

As he pushes through the large crowd, he finds you already outside, smoking a cigarette that blows large clouds through the cool night air. You pull down the bottom of your mask, not wanting to be exposed to the larger man. He towers over you, something about his size and silence is both terrifying and has you feeling safe.

“Don’t like people seein’ your face?” You’re surprised when he asks, having not said much to you this evening.

“No one but myself has in a long time.” He leans up against the brick wall, standing too close for your liking beside you.

“You ever get sick of it?” You turn to him, squashing your cigarette underneath your boot, the red light fizzling out on the damp cement.

“Sick of what exactly?” You turn to him, an arm on your hip.

“Bein’ a snake, pretendin’ to be someone you’re not.” This makes you frown, your impatience coming in at an all time high, blood pressure rising as this man insults you.

“If you’ve got something to say, Ghost, I suggest you spit it out.” You snap accusingly, pointing at his chest as you stand tall, keeping eye contact and not intimidated by what he’s doing. You take a step closer and he comes off of the brick wall, standing a foot in front of you.

“You’re the enemy, have to be smarter than to use an ID of someone who is dead!” He snarls, his voice is booming as he swings at you, his fist connects with your stomach and it sends you sliding backwards on the wet cement. You exhale, steadying your breathing after the hit. You lunge towards him, ducking at the last second to avoid is hands trying to grab you, you kick as his knees and one falters, nearly bringing him to the ground, you had quickly figured out his weakness.

He levels himself on his leg, watching you with a look so furious in his eyes you want nothing more than to erase the look from your mind, if you had to accomplish that with violence-so be it.

He pulls out his knife from his boot, you scowl as he does so, “fucking coward, fight like a man!” You yell at him, he ignores you and charges like a raging bull, heavy footsteps slow in comparison to your nimble movements which allows you to narrowly avoid the knife he aimed to plunge into your ribs.

You pulled out your own knife, “wanna fucking okay dirty hm? Come on then you fucking prick! I’m not scared of you, I eat shitheads like you for fucking dinner.” You’re eyeing each other off, circling like predator and prey, although no one knows who is which yet. The rain makes it difficult to see, the drops falling onto your mask make it more difficult to breath through. Through the scuffle part of your hair had fallen out of its plait, the strand of hair irritating and blinding you as it sits in front of your eyes.

“Fuck it.” You growl lowly, tearing off your mask as you cut it with your knife, all while avoiding a blow from Ghosts forward attack, you pull your hair backwards and tuck it behind your ear.

The man freezes in place, his movements stop entirely, the knife falling from his hands, clattering onto the wet sidewalk. As he sees her-you, his wife. Your face is more matured, it’s grown into its features and you have a sternness he doesn’t recognise, eyes as cold as stone as you watch him fall apart before you. He notices a giant scar along your nose that has never been seen before.

“It can’t be, you’re dead, you died-“ he trails off, eyes wide as he watches you like a Hawk.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” You growl, confused and still pent up from the fight.

He doesn’t say anything, he doesn’t mutter a single word, he barely finds the strength to lift his hands to the bottom of his baklava and pulls it off his face, revealing himself for the first time in over a decade. He felt himself crumbling, so vulnerable and exposed to the world, his world-you. His wife and the woman he loved so much-loves.

You stutter for a moment before your face hardens again, you storm forward and shove him, your fists hit his chest so many times you can’t count, he doesn’t react, he just stands like a punching bag for you to let out your Pent up anger. You pull away from him, the thought of touching him and him touching you, made you nauseous.

“You piece of shit! You left me! For better or worse my fucking ass!” You pace the sidewalk, kicking the trash can as a decades worth of emotions come crashing down on you. “You weren’t even there for the funeral Simon! Have you even visited them? Since they’ve died, have you? I see Joseph whenever I get the chance.”

Tears are falling down your face at the thought of him, your nephew Joseph.

“Don’t talk about him.” Simon growls, obviously still a soft spot for him. You roll your eyes, “I thought you were fucking dead with them! When I ran through that house and didn’t find you I thought they’d taken you to fucking get back at me! I chased every piece of intel for years on end trying to find you.” He steps towards you, his big chest heaving. The street lamp above you shines above him, his face looking more scarred and handsome as ever.

“I killed every damn one of those motherfuckers and you were still nowhere to be found. I dedicated the past decade of my life trying to find you and you’re in the fucking military, alive and fine.”

You slap him across the face at his accusation.

“If you think this is me fine Simon Riley, you’re stupidly fucking mistaken. Now get the fuck out of my face! I’m your Captain, you’re dismissed! Get the fuck out of my sight.”

You storm away from him, sheathing your knife into your leg harness. Once you were far away enough and sure he couldn’t see you, you slipped on your mask and sobbed, uncontrollably against the wall of a building in the street, forgetting about the bar, the team and the ID you’d left behind. Screw all that, in the morning you were going home. The rain poured on you, your uniform heavy on your skin as it sticks.

You mindlessly walk until you reach base, not realising how far you’d walked until you ended up standing out the front of your room door with the key in hand ready to unlock the door. You exhale and close the door, removing your mask and grabbing a fist full of wipes to clean the smudged black face paint that had dropped down your neck from the rain and probably your tears. Fuck Simon, you couldn’t stay here, not when he was a constant reminder of the pain, your past was too much to have to relive everyday. The death, blood, the screams, the way he abandoned you.

You sit on the chair beside your desk, grabbing the photograph of you and Joseph before your emotionally exhausted body begins to slump over the desk, eyes fluttering shut before you can remember to take your pills.

You’re preparing Joseph’s things for a bath, his clothes laid down on his bed, his green towel and toothbrush on the bed. You’re about to call him up when you hear the front door bust open.

“Kill every last one of them, I want no survivors. Riley has to pay.” It’s a foreign voice you don’t recognise, the fear of something happening to your family and realising this is the end as they fire the first gunshot. The screams of your brother in law shake the foundation of the house as gunfire rings through the walls, his wife begging through her sobs for these men to stop, “we’ll do anything, please!”

Her pleas are ignored and she too is gunned down, silence fills the house, you sneakily hide in the bedroom closet in Joseph’s room, the door thankfully making no noise as you close the door shut, the old hinges working a charm for the first time ever. You can barely see anything through the tiny cracks of the closet door, the moonlight coming through the window is the only thing you see.

You hear footsteps running down the hall to your direction and you try to even your ragged breathing, you hear more footsteps running up the stairs, the thundering noise beats in your ears. You hear him crying, sobbing as he calls for help, for you to help him. You’re frozen, trembling in place as the kid stands there alone with a gun pointed to him in his own bedroom.

“He’s just a kid, can’t we leave him?” One man says, the other sneers at him, “boss said all of them, especially the kid.”

“No please!” Joseph begs before he’s gunned down, his blood splatters into the closet cracks and onto your face, you flinch and your eyes are wide as your nephew is ruthlessly murdered in front of you. You were too much of a coward to help him, you are compliant in his death.

The man walks closer to the closet, hand rattling on the closet door knob like he’s going to open it, then the sound of police sirens can be heard coming down the street, they’re coming fast and the red and blue lights are seen through the window, illuminating the room and the dead body but feet away from you.

“Hurry up and let’s get out of here. I ain’t goin to prison!” The hand releases the doorknob and trips over Joseph’s body, running downstairs as they escape the consequences.

Your body is trembling, stuck in a back and forth rock of trying to self sooth but to no avail. Your brain replays the scene over and over, him begging for your help and being shot by a couple thugs in a targeted attack.

“M sorry joey.” Is your mantra, you’re repeating it over and over, what starts as a soft whisper becomes a chant that attracts the police.

“Hey, we got a survivor over here!” The officer calls to his colleagues, trying to pry you from the closet. “What’s your name?” His voice is drowned out by your ears ringing, your dissociated state accompanied by the incoherence nonsense that leaves your lips, “mercy.” You mumble, mercy. That’s what you wanted, hoping the muttered word would stop the pain, stop the cruelty and stop the joke.

But it didn’t. Of course it didn’t.

Your eyes shoot open as you’re gasping for air, the scream that leaves your lips is one of genuine terror, your arms are thrashing and shoving the weight you feel on your arm as someone’s hand.

“It’s me, it’s just me.” You recognise his voice, Simon. Your heart is thumping and you sit up from your spot on the chair, pacing the small area in the room that Simon didn’t occupy.

“You have em too?” Your neck snaps around to Simon, glaring at him through your tears and wet face. “Of course I have them, I hear their screams and see Joseph killed in my head over and over on reply, as if it happened yesterday.”

Simon stumbles backward, shocked by your confession. “You- you saw him..” you rubbed your hands over your eyes. “Yes.” Confirming what Simon would never want to hear from you. You watched your nephew die.

“I don’t want you or need you in here Simon, I need you to leave.” He shuffles on his feet, his eyes torn between you and the photograph of you and his nephew on the table you’d just been cradling.

“If you ever want to talk-“ you cut him off with a scoff, irritated by his presence.

“I don’t. Now get out, I’m fine. I’m not here to make amends with you and sure as hell not trying to be your wife again, Simon. You were a shit husband, now please, get out.” You sigh, sitting on your bed, completely exhausted.

Simons heart shatters at your words, every wall he’s built comes crumbling down at his feet, he’s now left truly alone. The hope of you had kept him going- now what does he have? He simply nods, wanting to respect your needs, when he reaches the door you call his name, he’s hopeful when he turns around to see you barely a foot away when you hand him an envelope.

“Sign the divorce papers Simon. Please.”

It feels like his heart has been stomped on the for third time tonight, you were trying to sever the last connection he had to you, his last name. The only proof he had that you were ever his, that his family existed at all; he holds the papers tight in his hand and walks out of your room, leaving you to take out your pills and swallow them dry, having a sleep that’s uninterrupted by those plaguing nightmares, those pills, your poison, you were at her mercy and Simon was at yours.

#Simon Riley #ghost #Simon ghost Riley #call of duty fic #Simon Riley angst #cod #simon riley imagine #Simon x you #simon riley x reader #simon riley x oc #Simon Riley x mercy

304 notes · View notes

dailyanarchistposts · 5 months ago

Text

J.5.10 Why do anarchists support co-operatives?

Support for co-operatives is a common feature in anarchist writings. In fact, support for democratic workplaces is as old as use of the term anarchist to describe our ideas. So why do anarchists support co-operatives? It is because they are the only way to guarantee freedom in production and so “the co-operative system … carries within it the germ of the future economic order.” [Bakunin, The Philosophy of Bakunin, p. 385]

Anarchists support all kinds of co-operatives: housing, food, consumer, credit and workplace ones. All forms of co-operation are useful as they accustom their members to work together for their common benefit as well as ensuring extensive experience in managing their own affairs. As such, all forms of co-operatives are (to some degree) useful examples of self-management and anarchy in action. Here we will concentrate on producer co-operatives as only these can replace the capitalist mode of production. They are examples of a new mode of production, one based upon associated, not wage, labour. As long as wage-labour exists within industry and agriculture then capitalism remains and no amount of other kinds of co-operatives will end it. If wage slavery exists, then so will exploitation and oppression and anarchy will remain but a hope.

Co-operatives are the “germ of the future” for two reasons. Firstly, co-operatives are based on one worker, one vote. In other words those who do the work manage the workplace within which they do it (i.e. they are based on workers’ self-management). Thus co-operatives are an example of the “horizontal” directly democratic organisation that anarchists support and so are an example of “anarchy in action” (even if in an imperfect way) within capitalism. Secondly, they are an example of working class self-help and self-activity. Instead of relying on others to provide work, co-operatives show that production can be carried on without the existence of a class of masters employing a class of order takers.

Workplace co-operatives also present evidence of the viability of an anarchist economy. It is well established that co-operatives are usually more productive and efficient than their capitalist equivalents. This indicates that hierarchical workplaces are not required in order to produce useful goods and indeed can be harmful. It also indicates that the capitalist market does not actually allocate resources efficiently nor has any tendency to do so.

So why should co-operatives be more efficient? Firstly, there are the positive effects of increased liberty. Co-operatives, by abolishing wage slavery, obviously increase the liberty of those who work in them. Members take an active part in the management of their working lives and so authoritarian social relations are replaced by libertarian ones. Unsurprisingly, this liberty also leads to an increase in productivity — just as wage labour is more productive than slavery, so associated labour is more productive than wage slavery. As Kropotkin argued: “the only guarantee not to be robbed of the fruits of your labour is to possess the instruments of labour … man really produces most when he works in freedom, when he has a certain choice in his occupations, when he has no overseer to impede him, and lastly, when he sees his work bringing profit to him and to others who work like him, but bringing in little to idlers.” [The Conquest of Bread, p. 145]

There are also the positive advantages associated with participation (i.e. self-management, liberty in other words). Within a self-managed, co-operative workplace, workers are directly involved in decision making and so these decisions are enriched by the skills, experiences and ideas of all members of the workplace. In the words of Colin Ward:

“You can be in authority, or you can be an authority, or you can have authority. The first derives from your rank in some chain of command, the second derives special knowledge, and the third from special wisdom. But knowledge and wisdom are not distributed in order of rank, and they are no one person’s monopoly in any undertaking. The fantastic inefficiency of any hierarchical organisation — any factory, office, university, warehouse or hospital — is the outcome of two almost invariable characteristics. One is that the knowledge and wisdom of the people at the bottom of the pyramid finds no place in the decision-making leadership hierarchy of the institution. Frequently it is devoted to making the institution work in spite of the formal leadership structure, or alternatively to sabotaging the ostensible function of the institution, because it is none of their choosing. The other is that they would rather not be there anyway: they are there through economic necessity rather than through identification with a common task which throws up its own shifting and functional leadership. “Perhaps the greatest crime of the industrial system is the way it systematically thwarts the investing genius of the majority of its workers.” [Anarchy in Action, p. 41]

Also, as workers also own their place of work, they have an interest in developing the skills and abilities of their members and, obviously, this also means that there are few conflicts within the workplace. Unlike capitalist firms, there is no conflict between bosses and wage slaves over work loads, conditions or the division of value created between them. All these factors will increase the quality, quantity and efficiency of work, increase efficient utilisation of available resources and aids the introduction of new techniques and technologies.

Secondly, the increased efficiency of co-operatives results from the benefits associated with co-operation itself. Not only does co-operation increase the pool of knowledge and abilities available within the workplace and enriches that source by communication and interaction, it also ensures that the workforce are working together instead of competing and so wasting time and energy. As Alfie Kohn notes (in relation to investigations of in-firm co-operation):

“Dean Tjosvold … conducted [studies] at utility companies, manufacturing plants, engineering firms, and many other kinds of organisations. Over and over again, Tjosvold has found that ‘co-operation makes a work force motivated’ whereas ‘serious competition undermines co-ordination’ … Meanwhile, the management guru … T. Edwards Demming, has declared that the practice of having employees compete against each other is ‘unfair [and] destructive. We cannot afford this nonsense any longer … [We need to] work together on company problems [but] annual rating of performance, incentive pay, [or] bonuses cannot live with team work … What takes the joy out of learning … [or out of] anything? Trying to be number one.’” [No Contest, p. 240]

Thirdly, there are the benefits associated with increased equality. Studies prove that business performance deteriorates when pay differentials become excessive. In a study of over 100 businesses (producing everything from kitchen appliances to truck axles), researchers found that the greater the wage gap between managers and workers, the lower their product’s quality. [Douglas Cowherd and David Levine, “Product Quality and Pay Equity,” Administrative Science Quarterly, No. 37, pp. 302–30] Businesses with the greatest inequality were plagued with a high employee turnover rate. Study author David Levine said: “These organisations weren’t able to sustain a workplace of people with shared goals.” [quoted by John Byrne, “How high can CEO pay go?” Business Week, April 22, 1996] The negative effects of income inequality can also be seen on a national level as well. Economists Torsten Persson and Guido Tabellini conducted a thorough statistical analysis of historical inequality and growth, and found that nations with more equal incomes generally experience faster productive growth. [“Is Inequality Harmful for Growth?”, American Economic Review no. 84, pp. 600–21] Numerous other studies have also confirmed their findings (the negative impacts on inequality on all aspects of life are summarised by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett in The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better). Real life yet again disproves the assumptions of capitalism: inequality harms us all, even the capitalist economy which produces it.

This is to be expected. Workers, seeing an increasing amount of the value they create being monopolised by top managers and a wealthy elite and not re-invested into the company to secure their employment prospects, will hardly be inclined to put in that extra effort or care about the quality of their work. Bosses who use the threat of unemployment to extract more effort from their workforce are creating a false economy. While they will postpone decreasing profits in the short term due to this adaptive strategy (and enrich themselves in the process) the pressures placed upon the system will bring harsh long term effects — both in terms of economic crisis (as income becomes so skewed as to create realisation problems and the limits of adaptation are reached in the face of international competition) and social breakdown.

As would be imagined, co-operative workplaces tend to be more egalitarian than capitalist ones. This is because in capitalist firms, the incomes of top management must be justified (in practice) to a small number of individuals (namely, those shareholders with sizeable stock in the firm), who are usually quite wealthy and so not only have little to lose in granting huge salaries but are also predisposed to see top managers as being very much like themselves and so are entitled to comparable incomes (and let us not forget that “corporate boards, largely selected by the CEO, hire compensation experts, almost always chosen by the CEO, to determine how much the CEO is worth.” [Paul Krugman, The Conscience of a Liberal, p. 144]). In contrast, the incomes of management in worker controlled firms have to be justified to a workforce whose members experience the relationship between management incomes and their own directly and who, no doubt, are predisposed to see their elected managers as being workers like themselves and accountable to them. Such an egalitarian atmosphere will have a positive impact on production and efficiency as workers will see that the value they create is not being accumulated by others but distributed according to work actually done (and not control over power). In the Mondragon co-operatives, for example, the maximum pay differential is 9 to 1 (increased from 3 to 1 after much debate in a response to outside pressures from capitalist firms hiring away workers) while (in the USA) the average CEO is paid well over 100 times the average worker (up from 41 times in 1960).

Therefore, we see that co-operatives prove the advantages of (and the inter-relationship between) key anarchist principles such as liberty, equality, solidarity and self-management. Their application, whether all together or in part, has a positive impact on efficiency and work — and, as we will discuss in section J.5.12, the capitalist market actively blocks the spread of these more egalitarian and efficient productive techniques instead of encouraging them. Even by its own standards, capitalism stands condemned — it does not encourage the efficient use of resources and actively places barriers in their development.

From all this it is clear to see why co-operatives are supported by anarchists. We are “convinced that the co-operative could, potentially, replace capitalism and carries within it the seeds of economic emancipation … The workers learn from this precious experience how to organise and themselves conduct the economy without guardian angels, the state or their former employers.” [Bakunin, Bakunin on Anarchism, p. 399] Co-operatives give us a useful insight into the possibilities of a free, socialist, economy. Even within the hierarchical capitalist economy, co-operatives show us that a better future is possible and that production can be organised in a co-operative fashion and that by so doing we can reap the individual and social benefits of working together as equals.

However, this does not mean that all aspects of the co-operative movement find favour with anarchists. As Bakunin pointed out, “there are two kinds of co-operative: bourgeois co-operation, which tends to create a privileged class, a sort of new collective bourgeoisie organised into a stockholding society: and truly Socialist co-operation, the co-operation of the future which for this very reason is virtually impossible of realisation at present.” [Op. Cit., p. 385] In other words, while co-operatives are the germ of the future, in the present they are often limited by the capitalist environment they find themselves, narrow their vision to just surviving within the current system and so adapt to it.

For most anarchists, the experience of co-operatives has proven without doubt that, however excellent in principle and useful in practice, if they are kept within capitalism they cannot become the dominant mode of production and free the masses (see section J.5.11). In order to fully develop, co-operatives must be part of a wider social movement which includes community and industrial unionism and the creation of a anarchistic social framework which can encourage “truly Socialist co-operation” and discourage “bourgeois co-operation.” As Murray Bookchin correctly argued: “Removed from a libertarian municipalist [or other anarchist] context and movement focused on achieving revolutionary municipalist goals as a dual power against corporations and the state, food [and other forms of] co-ops are little more than benign enterprises that capitalism and the state can easily tolerate with no fear of challenge.” [Democracy and Nature, no. 9, p. 175]

So while co-operatives are an important aspect of anarchist ideas and practice, they are not the be all or end all of our activity. Without a wider social movement which creates all (or at least most) of the future society in the shell of the old, co-operatives will never arrest the growth of capitalism or transcend the narrow horizons of the capitalist economy.

16 notes · View notes

getitoutofmymindwrites · 1 year ago

Text

Pairing: Dave York x f!reader

Summary: A private conversation goes wrong when your boss overhears you commenting on him and decides to teach you a lesson. Will he have his way or does he meet his equal?

Word count: 2.4k

Warnings: not in my books, let me know if you feel otherwise! 😅 (well, if you really squint you might see a hint of smut, blink and you’ll miss it!)

A/N: There’s definitely another part coming because I wanna see these two collide in more than one ways 😏

Antagonists.

“Oh my GOD, did you see him today?”

“Saw who?”

“He’s driving me crazy with these belts; the way they hug his waist, like, Oh. My. God.”

“I still don’t know who you are referring to.”

“And the unbuttoned buttons on his shirt? Do you think he does it on purpose?” And that’s Carrie. Your best friend in and out of workplace. Spontaneous, funny, brutally honest and your bigger supporter. Your rock.

“Woman, if you keep rumbling like that, I swear to God..”

“The boss! I’m talking about the boss, Jeezzz!”

“Oh, what about him?” you respond, stirring your coffee absentmindedly, standing in the lunch room, at the quarters of the Company.

“I just told you! Oh, I bet his wife can’t have enough of him. Do you think he has a huge-”

“Carrie! I told you before, not this kind of talk at work. It’s not proper. Especially about a superior officer, we could get in trouble.”, you stop her anxiously. You hated even the possibility of anyone overhearing something that they could later hold against you.

“Oh, relax you virgin, you’re driving me crazy with all your rules. So, as I was saying before you rudely interrupted me-”. She always called you that, a virgin, when she thought you were too uptight. It bothered you at first, because you were not uptight. Right? Now you don’t even register the sound of it.

“Carrie..” A sign of warning in your voice as you squinted at her.

“Ok, ok, but in my defense -if you really think about it- I’m praising him! What, I can’t put in a good word for him?” The woman is insufferable.

“Well.. No, if it has anything to do with his genital area. I’m pretty sure it’s a strange way to compliment your boss! Of course, knowing you, you could always find a way to make any filthy praise work!”. You both laugh at your comment.

“I don’t know about strange, but it would definitely be original!” Carrie responds.

“Jesus..” you pinch the bridge of your nose with your fingers, almost exasperated.

“But you can’t deny he’s sweet!”, she persists. Unbelievable. You side-eye her and roll your eyes.

“What?! He has a good reputation around here, he’s always fair, polite and his smile is kind. He is sweet! We can give him that! Or I could give him the ride of his l-” she gives you a lopsided smirk, but she doesn’t get to finish her answer. Is she serious right now? Are you even talking about the same person? Could your gut be so wrong?

“Ooh, ooh, ooh,” you almost laugh nervously, “I definitely wouldn’t call him sweet.”

***

“What a man has to do to get a cup of coffee around here?”, he mumbled to himself running his hand down his face. He felt exhausted. His secretary had called in sick, so the routine of having his coffee served and waiting for him on his office table was disrupted.

Be polite Dave, he thought to himself, you can get your own coffee.

He wore his best smile and made his way to the lunch room. He felt so tired, the intel he had to go through before passing it up the chain of command, was overwhelming. Even with all hands on deck, sorting out the useful data from the noise, still, the load of work was massive. It was going to be a long, boring day. He wished he could be on the actual mission sooner rather than later.

Turning the corner and arriving almost outside the entrance of the lunch room he heard low-voiced chatter.

“…not this kind of talk at work. It’s not proper. Especially about a superior officer, we could get in trouble. ” He recognized your voice but he wasn’t sure who were you talking to. What are you talking about? He stumbled, trying to decide if he wanted to know or not.

“Oh, relax, you virgin, you’re driving me crazy with all your rules. So, as I was saying before you rudely interrupted me-” A virgin, huh? He wondered if that was a literal description.

“Carrie..” Ok, good to know the other side of the secret conversation, he thought to himself, smiling. Something got him hooked, the back and forth of your chatting, this kind of communication between two people who know each other well and the way you responded to each other, intrigued him.

“Ok, ok, but in my defense -if you really think about it- I’m praising him! What, I can’t put in a good word for him?” To whom they’re referring to?

Shit.

Are they talking about me? Last time I checked, I was the only boss around here. And why would they -or more accurately, Carrie- be talking about my cock?

“I don’t know about strange, but it would definitely be original!”

“Jesus..”

“But you can’t deny he’s sweet! What?! He has a good reputation around here, he’s always fair, polite and his smile is kind. He IS sweet! We can give him that! Or I could give him the ride of his l-” Holy sh-

“Ooh, ooh, ooh, I definitely wouldn’t call him sweet.” Oh, wouldn’t you, now? he thought with a smirk.

Suddenly, another agent is making his way to the lunch room so he has no other option but to abandon his little surveillance and pretend that he had just arrived outside of the room.

***

“Good morning, sir.” Carrie says suddenly, looking behind your back and then back to you with an uneasy look on her face, while you are still laughing in the aftermath of your observation.

Shit. Shit.

“It sure sounds like it.” Dave says smiling like he knows something both of you don’t.

“Good morning, sir”, you also say sheepishly, looking down and then to Carrie. Is there any chance he heard what we were talking about? And what does he even do here. He never comes here. And then it hits you. The fucking secretary. Absent when you need her the most. What a mere secretary can save you from. Ok, stop thinking about the secretary, Jesus! You should just focus on getting out of here, going back to your office. Back to where you would have been if Carrie -fucking Carrie- hadn’t distracted you with her nonsense.

“How’s the presentation coming along? The director is breathing down my neck about it, he wants to be briefed as soon as possible.” Dave asks, looking at you. Why on earth is he looking at me? I’m not the only person in the room. Carrie is here, too, even Gregor just came in with him. Ok, get a grip, you are the head analyst. That’s why. Don’t overthink this.

Of course, that was part of your job. To overthink, analyze, choose and put together the right pieces of information. See behind unorganized, seemingly irrelevant scraps of intel and connect the dots. See behind the veil, as Carrie always teases you. Then hand your results to the next of command and pray you didn’t just kill a fellow agent with your trail of thinking.

A deep voice calling your name pulls you out of the depths of your thoughts. Three sets of eyes are looking at you expectantly.

“Ah, no, yes, we ‘re very close sir, we will have it on your desk by the end of the day. The presentation is set up for tomorrow afternoon, so you’ll be able to go over it until then.” you answer. He’s looking at you for a second as if he’s deciding something.

“Good; you have ‘till midday.” he says in a casual tone. Your eyes widen and your jaw drops open.

And then he’s gone.

***

“That doesn’t mean he heard us, don’t be absurd! He knows these things take time, he wouldn’t have rushed us if it wasn’t important! And he wouldn’t put the safety of an agent on the field -or his, in this case- in line just to get back to you! AND you didn’t say anything wrong! AND there is no way he heard us!”, Carrie insists.

“And you are so sure of that, because..?” You want to believe her so badly, but your goddamn gut always knows better and the knot in your stomach is there to remind you of that.

“Because!”

If looks could kill, she would have been seriously injured right now.

“Ok, think about it. He walked into the room with Gregor. What do you think, they grabbed their popcorn and eavesdropped together like the great friends they are? I ‘m telling you, there is no way he heard us.” She almost makes.. sense?

“Fine! But there is also no way this presentation is ready till midday.”

***

Midday.

Three knocks on the door separate you from disaster. Embarrassment. You never were late on a deadline. Ever. Always on time. Or ahead even. How did this happen? Why did he rush you all of a sudden? Something wasn’t right. On the other hand, he was always precise, fair, careful. He was never careless about those things. He knew the importance of them. What the stakes were. You had to give him at least that much. If your life was hanging by a thread it was him that you would count on. He was oozing authority.

Well, there goes nothing.

“Come in,” his voice firm, invites you in, his head not moving from the board he's staring at, full of photos and notes. He seems preoccupied. His left hand is crossed in his chest, his palm enveloping his side under his armpit. His right elbow rests on the top of his other hand, while his palm rests in front of his mouth, pinching his lips absentmindedly. His shirt is stretching on his back due to his posture, exaggerating the broadness of it. Why are you analyzing him like this? Jesus.

You're about to step into the office and before you close the door behind you, Carrie pops in and sneaks in with you, staying a step back. Good for her, because you want to hit her right now. You are so dead, you think, rolling your eyes to the ceiling. Thank God, his back is still turned on you. You try to shoo her away with gestures but suddenly he turns and looks at you. Both of you. Great. Now he thinks I need backup.

“Do you have something for me, agent?” It was so fast you almost missed it, but you swear you saw a mocking smile for a second.

Deep breath. Steady. “No, sir.”

He looks at you, emotionless at first. “What do you mean, no?” he asks, flatly. Then, his brows furrow and his head tilts in question, his hands move to his hips and you swear he’s not even trying to compose himself. Like he’s enjoying this turn of events. Like he’s preparing for more. Almost challenging you.

“Like I said earlier, sir, we can have the presentation ready by the end of the day, like the schedule was.” Carrie is taking a sharp breath, stunned by your directness.

“Maybe I should apologize then, for the inconvenience I have caused you?” If you couldn’t see his expression you would think he was really apologizing. He was clearly not.

“That wouldn’t be necessary. Sir.” Carrie is hyperventilating at this point. He’s looking at you clearly annoyed and secretly amused.

“I’m sure you understand the importance of the task in hand, agent, don’t you?” His eyes darkening and sparkling at the same time.

“I do, as I’m sure you do, too, sir. After all, I’m only looking out for your well-being. Sir.” Carrie is mentally seeking a convenient place to faint.

You’re staring at each other, none of you breaking the silence. His gaze is so intense, you’re starting to feel.. something. Not uncomfortable, not exactly vulnerable, but something; almost arousing. Well, you always loved a good challenge.

You would never defy a superior officer, especially about something so serious. But you stand your ground, because deep in your gut you know there is an ulterior motive behind this. And the excuse of maybe hearing you in the lunch room is not convincing you. Something else is on his mind and you want to see how this unravels. What’s the worst that could happen?

He could fire your ass, the wheels on your mind turning as you process the situation, trying to read him at the same time. No, he wouldn’t do that, he knew your value, your worth. You have rent to pay. Your work was solid, reliable, that’s why you were the head of your department. You have bills running. He wouldn’t jeopardize that over a game. Right? Oh, fuck it, too late now, you’re calling his bluff.

The balls on this woman. I could have her fired by the end of her shift and yet, look at her all steady and unwavering. Does she know what’s going on? Does she suspect I’m messing with her? Is she fucking enjoying it? Is she wet under all those clothes? What I wouldn’t give right now to slip my fingers inside her and see for myself. Maybe she needs someone to put her in her place. You little brat. He haven’t felt that excited in a long time. Apart from the thrill of the action on the field, that is. It was refreshing.

You don’t know how long you would have stared at each other, if his office phone line hadn’t rung. A whispered “Thank God!” escapes Carrie’s lips.

He touches the telephone handset, his fingers freeze on it, but doesn’t pick up. Still staring at you, he commands “You have by the end of your shift.”

“Oh, thank you, sir! We will be more than ready for you by then!” Carrie almost yelled in relief. You mentally roll your eyes. And then she has to take it a step further. Of course she does. “You ‘re so, sooo..-”

You just wanna laugh and cry simultaneously. This isn’t happening. An awkward silence fills the room; you stare at him, he stares at Carrie, while she’s trying to find the right word and the fucking phone is still ringing.

“Well, as much as I ‘m curious to hear what you think I am, I have a phone call to answer to but to help you limit your options, I definitely wouldn’t call me sweet.” His eyes slowly turn to you as he says the last words, his mouth curling upwards with a smirk.

Shit, shit, shit.

***

#pedro pascal #fanfic #pedro pascal imagine #dave york #dave york fanfiction #dave york x female reader #dave york x you #dave york fic #pedro pascal fandom #dave york x reader #dave york imagine

115 notes · View notes

dadsbongos · 5 months ago

Note

MINIMUM WAGE LAIOS LETS gooooooo no bc the fic was so cute😭😭 obsessed w everyone’s characteristations now I wanna know more about minimumwage!dunmeshi verse lmaooo. Also I screamed when I read hawk tuwa

ngl i meant to erase hawk twah (and the ultra violet lesbian line) from the record but i was so tired i just left it in. glad i did though cuz i've gotten a couple people now saying it made them giggle

and omg!!! minimum wage dunmeshi... i assume about the grocery store i made up in my mind sorry if not

so.

laios is a courtesy clerk. very polite and kind, honestly, just not outgoing towards the customers (even downright avoiding them sometimes lol)

kabru is the tired assistant front end manager. has to stay wayyy later than the store managers and do all the actual important shit for a quarter of the pay. always on the employee's side, but is such a workplace drama instigator.

mithrun and toshiro exclusively work self-checkout and only interact with each other. toshiro because everyone else is jarring in their customer-service voices and mithrun cuz he's been there basically since the store opened and doesn't give a FUCK.

i can see falin being a pharm tech that got her brother the job. she's not really a customer favorite because she under-explains things and comes off spacey.

marcille opens at the customer service desk. she WANTED to be in the pharmacy too but couldn't remember which medications conflicted with each other and was politely "asked" to step down.

chilchuck closes the service desk. he's been there almost as long as mithrun and similarly has no desire to move up in the chain of command. doesn't want more responsibility and likes how isolated the desk is. he can sit back there and get paid for it. it's great.

izutsumi is another courtesy clerk. she started like three weeks ago and already hates it. does not mind letting laios do most of her work. has already been written up and receives many poor performance reviews from secret shoppers.

senshi wanted to be in the meat department but they had "no available positions" so he got stuck as a cashier. says he really doesn't mind (LIAR). very approachable though! gives honest item recommendations and nutrition advice based on what customers are checking out. always thanks people for stopping by. women want him, men also want him.

namari doesn't know how it happened, but she's also assistant supervisor. she started as a courtesy clerk, then skipped cashiering to go behind the customer service desk and one day was asked what she thought of becoming afem. acts more like a regular coworker than a supervisor though and doesn't care for customers. constantly wondering if she's able to step back down because the additional little jobs are extremely tedious and annoying to her lol

rin quit forever ago but came back as a cashier because kabru BEGGED her to because they needed more help.

inutade is another courtesy clerk, actually likes her job???

yaad and thistle are assistant store managers, rarely do you see them actually out on the floor. yaad is excused as an airhead and thistle's reputation flips from sweet summer child to ruthless twat constantly.

delgal is the big bad head store manager everyone has a secret power-crush on. very kind to employees on the RARE times he interacts with them. kabru sees him a lot because delgal asks for opinions on how the store could improve -- kabru adores delgal as a boss.

#laios could also work at a bookmans or zia #ive seen people say that and i totally agree #dunmeshi.🍈#bongos.answers.🥝

12 notes · View notes

uyuartik · 4 months ago

Text

othello finale| anakin skywalker x reader

tags: othello au mini series, no major character death (just want to make that clear), borderline dark fic, this just looks like my last attempt to add one more smut, but i swear it's not that, this is for dynamic purposes

summary: The aftermath.

a/n: the end! i hope you all enjoyed this as much as i did. i can't thank you all enough for all the ways you've shown your support to me.

also crossposted on ao3!

word count: 2303

prologue | ch.1 | ch.2 | ch.3 | ch.4 | ch.5 | finale

finale

The next couple of hours were a little hazy, but you knew you were adamant about witnessing his arrest, and what came afterward; the interrogation, his imprisonment and hopefully sometime soon, his trial. You only remembered two officers putting him in handcuffs, and you, tagging along with Anakin, and now you were in his office in the fort. Him just on the other side of that open door, sitting in a chair like the rest of you felt comical, the one difference being the chains around his wrists, and perhaps the dirt on his clothes. But the latter could be compensated by the fact that you weren’t in your best looks either, face still red, dress wrinkly. Anakin was the most presentable, although the shine of fury on his face provided a different sense of disarray.

You’ve never seen his workplace, you realized, as you came to your senses.

None knew why the prosecutor took so long. Of course, it was the middle of the night, but he was the commander of the navy, sent by the Venetian Senate. He was their right hand man, their eyes in the east of the Mediterranian Sea and not for the first time, you mourned on the ignorant attitude he received.

Before the end of an hour, he started pacing around the room, and you couldn’t sit either, so you leaned against his desk. Every time he walked past you, your dress brushed against his clothes and the sound filled the room, like the ticking of a clock.

“Ani.” You couldn't bear the stress anymore.

“Yes, my love?” Despite the fury, haste and tension, his voice was soft as he stood in front of you, his eyes pleading for you to name your concern for him to fix it. That intense gaze was very distracting, and quite honestly you have started to forgot how it felt like, burning under his attention.

“Just…” Words came to you simply. “Stop for a moment.”

“I’m sorry.” He sighed, realizing the contagious nature of his actions. “I wish I had something to offer- but there’s not much to choose from, especially in this hour-“

You shot a weary smile. The image of the two of you sipping tea in this very chamber was absurd. You weren’t even sure that they had tea in this entire facility, anyway. As if the aspect of time struck you in that second, you couldn’t help but feel exhausted.

What a day.

What a month.

While this was definitely the end of suffering, it was by no means a remedy. Your chest still ached with the pang of yesterday, and the weeks before, the neglect and the uncertainty of it all. The explanation was the most simple thing, you did not dwell on it. Everyone would have thought the same, with those clear shreds of evidence and weeks of seeded doubts. But your spirit was not so rational, not that it had to be, and wouldn’t be content with the revelations. You were broken, and the prospect of healing was not on the horizon for you, at least, not in the heat of the moment.

“Did you know that growing up, they nicknamed me Desdemona?”

“No, you never told me.”

“I don’t even remember how it came about, but the whole house preferred it over my real name for a while. I don’t mind such thing, but it was the meaning that got me confused. Ill fated. Why would anyone tag a child with that name? And the fact that everyone got used to it so quickly, now I see, that it was indeed my fate.”

“You can’t believe this sort of superstition. You’re the best thing that has happened to me, and you assume yourself to be a bad omen? You’re my love, my luck, my Angel.” He caressed your cheek, tentatively. The warmth of his hand blossomed across your skin, yet you couldn’t react. “I apologize.” He retracted his hand, “I am being forward. I am yet to beg for your forgiveness.”

“No.” You certainly were not refusing the attempt, but his choice of words. Reaching before he could move, you trapped his hand between your face and your fingers, and even leaned towards the touch. “This- this is fine.”

You could see the twinkle of love and reliefin his eyes when you reveal the boundary. His thumb stroked over your skin, relishing its softness like it was the first time. You closed your eyes, completely giving yourself to his hold. This was one of those rare moments where you had a glimpse of peace in a while, so it was no wonder that your body clung to the feeling.

And it was no wonder that for he too devoured the serenity that radiated off of you, drowning in all the reasons he fell in love with you once again, his hand slipped further down and back, to your chin and then to your hair, guiding a small tilt of your head to allow your lips to meet for a split second, like a promise. Yes, this was a little forward, but it was exactly what the two of you needed, to experience the gentle contact of your plump lips, to seal each other with your sweet tastes. It was quick, yet meaningful, and chaste. There would be no shame if someone saw all of it from the very open door, especially given the nature of your famous relationship.

Except the part where a sound of lust escaped your throat, filling the room.

Caught off guard, your eyelids snapped open, yet you couldn’t yank yourself out of his touch. Thus, with the pride of being helpful to you, he did it again, catering to your needs. To see your muscles relax under his touch, to notice the frown of your brows disappear, he had no reason or logic to stop himself. He massaged your lips with his, brushing away your strands, drinking in your whimpers that managed to get free, delighted in the way your hands traveled everywhere on his body constantly.

It was a mystery how much later and exactly how you found yourself properly sitting on his desk, and him pressed against you, with a very prominent addition.

“My love, I- I didn’t mean to.” A pant. His face was in agony, but his hold never changed, treating you like a bird, tame and tender. “Perhaps it would be wise to…” His voice was strained as well.

“You’re right.” You shove your forehead against his shoulder, clenching your fists hardest. He’s so warm and smells like home. “Fuck, but I don’t want to.”

He didn’t know how to react to you swearing, but it was enough of a signal. He suppressed his chuckle, placing his hand on the small of your back. There was no space to close between the two of you, but the pressure of it helped- and it set fire to your nerves too. “Your wish is my command.”

He started slow as if a reminder of how sacred you were to him, exploring every inch of your neck. You squirmed with anticipation as he hit every sensitive spot, feeling the beat of your veins underneath. You threw your head back, but grasped his lapels tighter, rooting him near.

Yes, it was too early; yes, it looked like the two of you were acting by pure instinct like animals; but it wasn’t such a bad thing. He was keen on keeping his promise, undoubtedly, and you would give no compromises about it. But why deny yourselves the pleasure of reunion, a first step for a better path, a reminder of how he adored you, and you cherished/desired him?

When you got lost in the clouds so much that small moans started to escape once more, he found you staring at the open door, for a split second, thus he paused with great regret. “Are you still sure about it?” His rhythmic kneading of your scalp proved his answer to that question, but it was obvious that he would follow your wishes.

You took another look, and turned your gaze to his blown pupils, anchoring yourself to it. With a gulp, you whispered, your thoughts being new even to you. “If it was up to me to decide his punishment, I would have his last vision to be of us, his last hearing to be the sound of us together - be it laughter or moans. He is an insanely jealous person, he can’t help it- and this time he will truly have something to be jealous of.”

How fierce you could be.

Anakin smiled, proudly. How much strength you had to know what viciousness was, and decide not to act on it every single day… It was madness of a plot that brought you up to the mere threshold of it, yet still not stepping any further. A single blow of your sentence- it was simple and more effective than whatever the judge would rule.

“You’re right.” He agreed. Nevertheless, he thought himself unworthy of you before he properly earned your forgiveness, so it was only his fingers that traveled across your sweet core, finding their way through layers of fabric without teasing. While he always properly admired every inch of your skin, this time he knew the time was of the essence, and he couldn’t deny the small pang of jealousy at the possibility of someone seeing your bare thigh, so he spared himself the holy image of your legs, gleaming in the moonlight.

“Oh, Ani.” You whimpered and sang his name at his touch at your wetness, catching on his fingertips as he dragged them upwards where you needed him the most. Your arms hastened around his neck, and you reached for his mouth, wanting him to drown you in every sense of the word. When you tugged at his roots, he was the one to pant, and even though the sound had nowhere to go but through you, it was quite audible still.

He circled your clit lightly, building up a pace, just the way you liked it. You could feel yourself getting wetter- it probably leaked all the way to his desk- and dizzier, the bliss too much for your depraved nerves. You thrust your hips, and that’s how you were reminded that- he had the same problem too. One of your hands roamed across his body, between his legs. He only understood their destination when you reached it, and he outright hissed at the crude pressure, too much and too little at the same time thanks to his clothes.

“This is about you, angel.” The only attempt of getting you to stop was stopping his own administrations, instead choosing to rub against your entrance, pushing every so slightly, causing your juices to drip down.

You whined, not removing your hand, and moving your hips again, making his finger probe inside you. Standing your ground, you wrapped your palm around his bulge, and he surrendered, dragging two fingers through your tight walls, giving you what you wanted. His thumb found your clit, and the combined motion of his hand rendered you useless, a blubbering mess. Chuckling, he returned to spoiling your neck, not wanting to dampen your cries. After all, he earned those, giving everything to deserve them. It was a joy to hear it again, and he wasn’t going to waste another chance, not when he got so lucky. Pressing his nose closer, he basked in your natural perfume, licking it out of your skin, and thrust into your hand instinctively, his body unable to stand still. You weren’t doing much but rubbing him slowly, probably the only motion you could muster, and it was fucking enough for him.

It was.

It didn’t take you very long to reach your climax, the game being over the minute he found the spot that made you see the stars. You didn’t know how he could hit it so perfectly with your body writhing, but he did, also while keeping your mouth somewhat occupied and his ears on the door for any intruders. And likewise, your warm grip was all he ever needed, and he was more than content to come in his pants like a teenager- it was only natural considering his greatest pleasure was seeing you lost in it.

You winced as he torturously removed his thick, long fingers, his hand wet beyond imagination. The eye contact as he slipped them inside his mouth, tasting you, the intention of licking them clean only on the second priority, your cheeks grew red, yes, it was a very inconsistent reaction considering the previous minutes, and the thought of them in your mouth was sure to haunt you for days. It was quite evident in the way you eyed the motion, and Anakin snuck them out, holding them between your faces for a second, and moved to your lips even though they were already free of your essence.

You accepted them, eagerly, your tongue moving along with precision that came from previous experiences, and your husband was concerned that he would get hard again impossibly early if you kept that going.

Though, it was about time that the judge decided to show up.

The simultaneous clanking of armors came as a warning, and the two of you separated. With each step, conversations grew louder, and it was getting evident that this was it, the moment you’d been waiting for all night, you fixed your appearances, as much as possible.

It was seconds before the official stepped into the room, him looking very annoyed probably because of the ungodly hour, and Iago the same, for a different reason, that Anakin smiled at you- a little bashful, a little reassuring, a little like hope itself.

You smiled back.

#anakin skwalker fanfiction #anakin skywalker x reader #anakin skywalker smut #star wars fanfiction #star wars imagine #anakin skywalker imagine #anakin x reader

13 notes · View notes

unironicallytes · 7 months ago

Text

It's not Wednesday, but I emerge from the fog to hand you a WIP of my slow rewrite of Dear Brother anyways. There are some additional Dark Brotherhood headcanon lore bits explored here.

“Ocheeva wrote that the Breton woman, Antoinetta Marie, shows promise. She’s to be baptized the evening of the 25th, which I believe is tomorrow.”

“Oh, cheers, that's quick. Been naught but a month or so.” Typically, it took anywhere from one to three months, so she must have caught on with the scripture quick.

“What did you think of her?” Speaker continued.

“Ain't had much to do with her yet,” I shrugged. “Thought she was a bit ditzy. Mousey. Seems fine enough, though. Vicente didn't seem put off by her.”

“Alright.” Input received, he drummed his fingers against the table. Then: “Give her the Odiil Sacrament for her first blood, it's a charcoal. As for the reds in that stack, there should be one for an Orc, ah, Fighter's Guild, Chorrol, forgot the name. Gurz or something …”

I flipped through the pages until I found what he meant. “Kurz gro-Baroth?”

“That's the one. You take that one. Yes, it works out perfectly that they're both in Chorrol. ” Hands sorting it out in the air again. I realized what he was about to say and scowled preemptively. “You will escort her and see to it that her first blood goes to plan. The Odiil Sacrament is child’s play - the man’s brother gave me his schedule, it's all written there. You'll have time to teach her some techniques on the way.”

“Oi, oi, hold yer horses there,” I began to protest, leaning forward in the chair. “Lucien, you know I don't do babysittin’, yer just havin’ a lark, right?”

“Oh, no larks to be had, I'm quite serious.” He ceased his gesturing and turned to actually look at me. I met his eyes, frowning. Maybe pouting is a better word. I thought maybe a well-placed whine could do the trick.

“ … eghh, c’mooonnn, Lu.”

“Don't you give me that pathetic wet-eyed look, Zath, I've developed an immunity to it,” he said, invoking a nickname in return. At least there was a casual air to this fight. Our workplace dynamic was constantly in flux, even four years into his tenure as Speaker and mine as Silencer. More often than not, banter from our days as equal ranks would resurface like this. “Go ahead, list who in the Sanctuary can supervise her blooding right now, I'll wait.”

“Brother Mathieu,” I shot back.

“Nope. Wrong. He's about to get transferred, try again.” Caught and shot in return like a Jaqspur with an enemy’s arrow, the nerve.

“What! What d’ye mean, ‘bout to get transferred? Ugh!” I groaned, knowing my escape route had just been blocked. Save for Mathieu, there were no upper ranks in Cheydinhal at the moment. In a stroke of bad luck, the two others had just recently lost their lives on mission. Meanwhile, M’raj Daar, Telaendril, and Teinaava were still Murderers and Slayers - in other words, not yet authorized to blood an Initiate. And the Sanctifiers always stayed put, as they were the highest, direct link on the chain of command before hitting a claw of the Hand. But guess which part of that claw was deployable for nearly every situation? One last attempt to reason with him, though I knew it was in vain now. “Teinaava’s barely a hair away from advancement, and he’s a Shadowscale, no less. Can ye not assign him?”

“You know the answer to that.”

“But I can work so much better without carryin’ a wee bairn on my hip!”

#writing wip #my writing #dear brother #tes iv: oblivion #tes fanfic #lucien lachance #dark brotherhood #tes oc #zathiril #ive been reworking the framing again to change how the narration works dont mind me

8 notes · View notes

finn-m-corvex · 1 year ago

Text

Lightning in a Cubicle Pt. 1

Did I expect to see my silly little post about Jay being another boring office drone take off? Absolutely not. Hell no I didn't. But here we are and everywhere I look there's office Jay taking over the community person by person and I have no idea what I've done. So, what better way to celebrate my newfound stardom than to do what I do best and write?

Between my drawing today and suffering in pain (I've had twelve ibuprofen today, YIKES) I have put together this little thing. Who am I kidding? Nothing I write is little.

This is Part 1, don't know when Part 2 is coming out, but I hope everyone enjoys nonetheless! P.s. lemme know if anyone wants to be on a taglist for Pt. 2.

"Thank you for reaching out about this issue, Charlie. I will get back to you in two to three business days..." Jay was muttering to himself, carefully clicking each key as he responded to the email. He did not want a repeat of the incident where he typed 'fuck' instead of 'duck' to his supervisor. HR had hounded him for two weeks, forcing him to take classes on workplace etiquette and sensitivity lessons.

Jay hated their HR department.

After he finished the email, he made sure to include his signature and click send, reloading the page and checking to see if it actually sent instead of being banished to his drafts. It had happened to many times already. He smiled at the sight of his finally cleared inbox, happily ignoring the forms that he still needed to fill out and all of the paperwork he had to file.

God, how was it only Monday?

For the first time that day, Jay finally had some downtime (as long as he ignored all of his responsibilities). He grabbed up his cup of pens, intending on linking them all together with paperclips to "ropen" and close his cubicle door. He snickered at his own joke; damn, he cracked himself up sometimes.

Calling it a door was quite generous, honestly. It was really more a spare cubicle wall he had stolen from his coworker Judy after she had gone upstairs for the day. The old hag didn't even realize that it was missing the next morning, only seeing that she now had a view right into her best friend Janet's office. Jay had haggled for some hinges from his buddy in the maintenance department, nailing them to his wall and attaching the stolen one.

He had just found his groove in making the rope when a shrill shriek echoed through the office. "WALKER!"

Jay jumped with a small gasp, panicking when a couple strands of his lightning leaked out. He was quick to get it back under control with his breathing, and he was filled with dread when he realized who had called his name.

Shitty Sharon.

"Yeah, Sharon?" he called back, poking his head out from the top of his cubicle. Just as he thought, Sharon was standing in the doorway to their workroom, face red with anger and hands on her hips. All the other ladies were staring at him as he made the walk of shame to the workroom, and Jay felt humiliated under their questioning gazes.

Could he go one day without being summoned like he was a lapdog? One?!

"I thought you were supposed to fix the printer." Sharon said shortly, and Jay was wondering who the hell he had pissed off in the chain of command to be the only man on the women's side of the floor.

It took everything in him not to scream. "I did fix the printer, Sharon."

"Then why the hell won't it print?! I don't have the time for this," she growled.

Neither did he. He had ropes to make. "Did you make sure it had ink and paper? Like I told you last time?"

"Why should I have to do that? That's why you're here, office boy," she said snidely, and god it was too early for this.

He chose to be the bigger person and check the printer himself, and what do you know? It just needed more paper.

"I'll put the paper in for you," he said, because he was not getting bad karma for being a bitch back to Shitty Sharon. She had hella connections with the company, and she would not hesitate to make his life a living hell. The last time he talked back to her, his water had gotten turned off for a week. He had to haul some in from the communal bathrooms just so he could take a shower.

Grabbing a fresh package of paper, Jay opened it with ease, avoiding giving himself a cut as he placed it in the tray. Closing it, he pressed a couple buttons to make sure everything was working right, and then it took all of his willpower not to scream when he glanced at the tiny screen with all of the functions on it.

"Sharon," he said, in the sweetest tone he could conjure at the moment, "why are you printing a thousand copies of this report?!"

"The damn thing wouldn't work, so I just kept clicking print!"

"You're supposed to call the maintenance department!" Jay yelled, throwing his hands into the air. "Or I.T.! Or me! Not print a thousand copies of the same paper!"

"Whatever," she said flippantly, turning away and walking back to her nice spacious office that should've been Jay's. "Just be a 'dear' and take care of it for me."

He didn't want to take care of it. Muttering to himself, Jay smashed the small buttons on the printer with much more force than necessary, cancelling the excess orders but making sure to leave one still open. While he would've loved to cancel all of them to force Sharon to click print again and come get it herself, Jay knew from experience that she would print out a bunch of the shit anyway and dump it in his office.

Jay started humming, readjusting the tie around his neck to give his hands something to do. He relaxed, fully intent on going back to his cubicle to goof around some more until he caught a glace at the clock.

8:50.

He had a meeting in ten minutes.

"Fuck!" Jay yelled, sprinting out of the room and straight for his workspace. He snatched up his briefcase and jacket, nearly forgetting his keycard before spinning on his heel to grab them. There was something he was forgetting, he knew it, but he didn't have the time to wonder what it was.

Slipping his jacket on, Jay didn't bother to keep the door from slamming shut behind as he escaped the suffocating atmosphere of the accounting department. He ran down the hall, pushing past other disgruntled employees with a quick apology. The elevators on their side of the hall were broken; he was going to have to use the ones by Public Relations.

His ever-wondering mind thought about convincing the decorating department to get them some plants as he hurried past white wall after white wall, only sparsely brightened up by a portrait of the board of directors or some fancy-schmancy paintings that Jay couldn't appreciate. What was wrong with some good ol' greenery? Some flowers here, a little fern there, maybe they would even let him go crazy and get a bonsai tree!

You know, if he ever got an office with a window.

"G'morning Jay!" his favorite security guard said to him, and Jay barely had time to wave to the man before he passed. If he was lucky, he wouldn't have to wait very long for the car to arrive on his floor.

The Administration was a beast of a building; you could see it from practically anywhere in Ninjago. With an impressive two hundred and fifty-four floors, it was the first true skyscraper that Jay could ever remember seeing in his life. Or what he remembered from it, anyway.

One of the reasons it had to be so large was because the Administration also housed all of their employees and necessities. The last fifty floors were dedicated entirely to apartments for the workforce, and Jay's own apartment was on level 275. Thinking about that reminded him that he needed to stop by the supermarket on floor 168 before he went home for the day. He had run out of coffee grounds the day before, and heaven knows he couldn't go on without those.

Jay's bad luck continued to haunt him when he skidded to a stop in front of the elevators, and the closest one to floor 67 was the one on 154. Someone must've been visiting the indoor aquarium. Jay wanted to go to the aquarium.

He slammed his hand on the up button, watching as the numbers along the top slowly counted down. Checking his wrist-watch, Jay saw that he had seven minutes to get to the one hundredth floor; this was going to be tight, but as long as there weren't any delays he should be able to make it.

And of course, because he's him, there were delays.

"How many stops do you have to make"?!" he exclaimed, watching as the damned elevator paused for the seventh time. He didn't have the time for this!

Finally, finally, the elevator stopped on his floor, and Jay pushed past all of the people getting off. He swiped his keycard, ignoring the female voice saying "Welcome, Jay Walker," in favor of urgently typing his floor number into the elevator's keypad, and it shot up into the sky like a rocket.

Most of his coworkers had told him stories about how long it had taken them to adjust to the elevator's speed, but Jay had never had a problem with it. Part of him always wondered what he had done in his past life before he came to work for the Administration; there had to be a reason he didn't get motion sick, or how his reflexes were sharper than the blades in the shredder, or why he felt so uneasy whenever he saw someone swinging an object in his direction (like he was expecting an attack?).

There was also the lightning, of course, but no one knew that Jay had that. And no one could ever know. He didn't want to imagine the training that he would be forced to go through if the Administration ever found out about it.

If they didn't ship him off to Imperium first.

"Can this damn thing not go any faster?" Jay growled, tapping his foot against the floor in an aggressive beat. He was glad no one else was in the elevator with him.

Up and up he went, the numbers growing higher and higher, blinking red. 97, 98, 99...

100! and he still had two minutes to spare!

Maybe Mr. Harding would give him that promotion after all!

The doors started opening and Jay was out before they could finish, making a beeline for the door at the other end of the blindingly white hallway. He could feel the sweat staining his light blue button-up, and Jay just had to hope and pray that his jacket covered it up well enough to get through this meeting without his eagle-eyed boss noticing anything.

He knocked on the door, checking his watch and seeing that he had officially made it at 8:59. One minute left.

Jay slapped his corporate smile on his face when Mr. Harding opened the door, making sure to hold out the correct hand. His left, because Mr. Harding was left-handed and had a stronger grip; Mr. Harding also loved having the upper hand. "So good to see you, sir! I hope you're well."

"Mr. Walker," Mr. Harding said casually, but Jay could already tell that his boss was in a bad mood. Shit. "I believe I told you that I wanted you here at 8."

"Pardon?" that definitely was not what the email had said.

"I sent an email to you around 7:30 that I wanted you in at 8." Mr. Harding said slowly, and Jay quickly pushed down the ire that rose at the childish treatment.

Wait, 7:30? He had staff meetings from 7-8 on Mondays!

"B-but that's when I have my staff meetings," Jay explained, holding back from messing with the cuffs of his sleeves. Mr. Harding hadn't taken too kindly to his fidgeting the last time he had been in here. "I'm not allowed to check my phone during staff meetings."

"I expect you to read all of my emails, Mr. Walker," the man said firmly, his lips curling into a distasteful sneer. "You're lucky that I happen to be free at the moment. Now, would you like to step in, or do you want to wait another hour?"

Jay grit his teeth, swallowing his anger and shoving it down deep inside. "Yes sir, sorry sir."

This damn promotion better be worth every moment of this nonsense, or Jay was tearing the Administration down himself.

#ninjago #ninjago jay #ninjago dragons rising #dragons rising #dragons rising spoilers #ninjago spoilers #finn's ninjago aus #lightning in a cubicle #finn's writing

22 notes · View notes

valiant-portabella-pirkko · 6 months ago

Text

Red Alert; an AU Guild Wars 2 Story

The Tideturners have lived in secrecy for decades, their operations hidden deep within the heart of the Mists. Rarely have they ever dared to reach out to the myriad of worlds that exist beyond their headquarters-- but things are changing. Time ticks away. The horizon draws closer. They cannot afford to hide away forever.

When the Commander was contacted by their head of security and offered a tentative alliance, he wasn't sure what to make of it. Why him? Why now? Who even are these masked strangers that all seem to know him so much better than he knows any of them? It was unsettling even back then, but now he knows exactly why.

Tick tock. Tick tock. It was a daring move, breaking into the Sidewinder's office to search for the answers, but the truth of this place is finally in his hands. If only it didn't leave him with so many more questions than answers. How can he possibly trust them now?

He has no idea how much his old adversaries feel the same.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The Sidewinder had always claimed that ASP’s security features shone crimson as a warning. Few had reason to doubt her claims; it made sense after all, didn’t it? Red was the color of blood. Danger. Risk. Injury. Who wouldn’t take it seriously? That was certainly how the Inquest used it, and the message never went questioned for long. To most, it was as logical an explanation as any– and there was no reason to ask any further after that.

What else, after all, could the color red possibly mean?

The Commander had almost forgotten, after all these years.

Alarms blared, shrieking into the Turnabout’s main office from every direction. Every circuit flared with sharp, biting crimson, flickering along the wires and making the electric lighting overhead sputter and spark as if on the verge of a short. Power surged all around them– all from a source that he now knew all too well. How had he been such a fool?

“Mai.” A single word left the asura’s lips. That was all he needed to say.

The masked figure before him bowed her head. Acknowledgement, yet defiance remained as her shoulders rolled, the dangling chain links of her mechanical pauldrons rattling. He didn’t need to know what expression lay behind that disguise; he could already guess. Or, at least, he was pretty sure he could.

“You know,” hummed a familiar electronic voice from a nearby speaker, “This really is no way to repay our generosity. Breaking into our humble workplace, after we so graciously invited you into our home? Tsk tsk. You really are a shameless little rat. Pity we didn’t set up any mousetraps for you.” Even laced with a heavy layer of static, he knew that voice well.

“Don’t play coy with me. I know who you are, too.” The Commander’s voice was quivering. “The red energy signature, the morbid jokes, that pretentious attitude… Mai’s identity was just the last piece of the puzzle.” His eyes narrowed, jaw set as he glared into the closest camera. “You really had me going for a bit there, too. I almost believed you might be the real deal.” A twisted laugh echoed through the room, tinny as it reverberated from every intercom at once.

He knew that laugh, too. He’d certainly heard it enough times.

Red meant danger. Red meant fire and molten metal.

But most of all, it also meant Scarlet Briar.

“Come now, I would have thought the truth would be even more impressive! It’s not every day you meet a literal ghost in the machine, darling.” The Commander rolled his eyes, unimpressed.

“Oh please. Every Inquest flunkie knows how to merge a living being with a golem, it’s not that impressive. I’ve encountered at least a dozen different biomechanical prototypes over the course of my career.” An annoyed ‘tch’ could be heard crackling through the speakers.

“And how many of them were able to utilize that procedure to anchor a Fractalized echo, hm?” He had to admit, hearing her actually sound a bit irritated was a nice change of pace. “Or, say, give that spirit total control over a supercomputer hub and by extension, the entire facility it operates? None, I imagine. But you silly little asura do so love to think you’re the smartest ones in the room…”

“Hm,” he remarked, unable to resist poking the bear one last time, “I think you just described yourself, actually.” A sharp pneumatic hiss rattled maintenance pipes in the ceiling, and he couldn’t quite tell if the technomancer’s invocation was hissing at him on purpose or had literally blown a gasket. He suspected it to be a bit of both.

But the altercation was swiftly cut off as one boot thumped the floor impatiently. The Sidewinder didn’t look impressed; her tense body posture spoke louder than any words. The gleaming golden claws of one gauntlet were gripping a pistol at her hip, though she hadn’t yet drawn it. He studied her for a long moment, waiting. She made no move to approach.

“Whatever you may think of me,” she growled finally through rattling hardware, “This doesn’t have to end in a fight. Surrender quietly and we can put this behind us.” The Commander fell silent.

There was something in her voice that he hadn’t caught before. It was easy to miss behind the layers of electronic filtering, but… The more he focused on it, the more certain he was. He wasn’t sure how to feel about the revelation, something twisting unpleasantly in his gut. Suddenly he wondered if that mask was worn to disguise more than just her identity.

… She was scared of him. The Sidewinder wasn’t shaking from anger, but fear.

And in spite of all the poking and prodding, ASP still hadn’t made a single attempt to harm him. Neither of the two had, waiting for him to make the first move. They didn’t want to fight.

The Commander wasn’t the type to back down from a scrap, no matter how impossible the odds. He’d taken on entire armies practically alone, slain massive heaps of raging dragon corruption, dismantled legions of mechanical horrors. He wasn’t afraid to use force if he had to– but that was just it, wasn’t it? He could feel his own hands shaking. This doesn’t have to end in a fight. The Mai he’d known rarely showed that kind of restraint. She only ever gave up when pushed into a corner, beaten down and hopeless.

This woman was so broken she’d given up before the battle even began.

There was no honor to be found in defeating someone like that. The mere thought of it just made him feel like a mean-spirited bully.

A long, heavy sigh escaped the asura’s lips and, with no small amount of reluctance… He allowed his weapons to clatter to the floor. The Commander hoped he wasn’t going to regret that. For a long moment all was silent aside from the continuous blare of that alarm.

“... Er..” To his amusement, the Sidewinder actually sounded a bit incredulous. “You’re.. Actually surrendering?” She straightened slowly, as if unsure what exactly she should be doing under these circumstances; this clearly wasn’t an outcome she’d actually expected. Even ASP seemed to be at a loss for words, her various jade tech artillery modules around the room slowly lowering in apparent confusion. Clearly the ‘AI’ wasn’t as much of a loose cannon as she liked to pretend.

It wasn’t something he was used to doing either, but… This time, it felt like the right choice. The Commander nodded. “I am.” His former adversary only seemed to be even more perplexed, shifting her weight back and forth awkwardly before glancing pointedly at his dropped weapons.

“... If I were to pass on what happened here, you'd be imprisoned at best, but most likely banished from the premises.” He could hear the inner conflict in the Sidewinder's tone. She paused for a long moment, head slightly lowered; only after seeing her nod a few times did he realize she was conducting a silent conversation with ASP. After a long, uncomfortable silence, she lifted one gauntlet and snapped her fingers.

ASP’s alarms went silent as all the room's defenses retreated back into their hidden panels. All that remained of ASP's presence now were a few illuminated screens and the Sidewinder herself, her mask's red eyes watching the Commander in silent contemplation. He didn't interrupt, waiting patiently for her final verdict– only for the staring contest to finally break as she made a gruff ‘ahem’ into one gauntlet.

“... Just put those away,” she ordered finally. “Gods know what sort of magical radiation you're packing. I'd rather not risk frying my hardware by handling them, but if anyone catches you armed then you're on your own.” He knows what she really means and won't say; if she confiscated his weapons they’d have to be logged. She's keeping him off the books. He gave her a nod of understanding and finally crouched to retrieve them, returning the weapons to his bag.

“It really isn't an act, is it?” he inquired finally. “When I broke in here I assumed you were trying to pull a fast one on me, but…” Glancing to the cameras, he frowned. “You two really aren't planning anything are you?” The Sidewinder snorted quietly.

“Oh you silly thing,” chuckled ASP with no small amount of amusement, “You really thought that, what, we lured you here as part of some nefarious trap? Come now, we both know I'm a more effective schemer than that.”

“What she means to say,” clarified the Sidewinder with an exasperated shake of her head, “is that if we wanted to hurt you, leading you right into our base would be one hell of a stupid way to start.” One hand raised, resting on the side of her mask. Hesitation. “But… I get it. You don't trust us, and we don't trust you. Sooner or later something was going to have to give, and I know hiding so much didn't do us any favors. It’s time we talked… Face to face.”

Click. The mask popped loose, electronics flickering out as it slid forward from the mechanical latches shifting underneath. When she drew it away, the sharp gaze that met the Commander's eyes told him everything.

The woman staring back at him with weary eyes certainly was Mai Trin… But not as he'd ever seen her.

She looked so tired and worn. Scars marked her jaw and vanished down into the collar of her coat, tracing old chemical burns that must have been excruciatingly painful. The wear of many years was written all over her features; he couldn't tell whether she was really that much older than the Mai he'd known, or if those creases had been carved by stress and pressure alone. This was the face of someone who'd been through the depths of hell and brought it back with her. There was no escape from the nightmares that lived on in her eyes.

When he'd seen Mai drunken and rambling, abandoned by her crew with nothing left of her legacy except the barely coherent spirit of her former boss, he thought that was as damaged as the woman could possibly get. Maybe the Sidewinder was more stable, but he couldn't begin to imagine what could leave her with such a deeply haunted look. The Commander knew that look, though. He knew it very, very well.

It was the same he saw whenever he looked in the mirror, thinking about all the things he could've done differently and all the lives he couldn't save.

The Commander's gaze softened. Mai had wanted so desperately to be more than the horrors of her past. But in the end, no matter how far she ran, the darkness of her history always had a way of catching her up and dragging her down with it. He doubted this was what she'd had in mind, but it proved one thing he'd only ever been able to guess at before.

… All she'd ever really needed was a chance to be someone better.

“I shouldn't have ransacked your files,” he admitted, scratching behind one ear. “That was pretty reckless, even with my suspicions. I thought I knew what I was getting into, but… I apologize for misjudging you.” The Commander thought for a moment, brows furrowing. “Your version of Scarlet isn't exactly the industry standard either, is she?”

“Well you certainly did find the rudest possible way to phrase that, now didn't you?” the invocation huffed. “But no, I suppose I'm not what you would consider a ‘standard’ echo of Scarlet Briar, as far as the Mists are concerned. Though I like to think that's a good thing.”

“She died early,” the Sidewinder elaborated quietly. “Before the war even began. Her Alliance had barely even come together. Because of that she's a lot less… Corrupted. Turns out not having a dragon in her head does wonders for her sanity.”

“See? As I said, it's a good thing.” Despite the revenant's somber tone, he could've sworn ASP sounded more chipper than ever. “I for one quite like being stable and well-adjusted. Isn't it nice when we aren't trying to kill each other?” In spite of himself, the Commander couldn't help a slight wry smile. He was starting to grasp her sense of humor a little bit more. For all her jokes, she was all bark and no bite.

The last thing ASP wanted was to go back to square one.

“Well, it's an improvement.” He maintained that smile. “At least now when you get an itchy trigger finger, you don't actually follow through on it.”

“Exactly!” she cackled, apparently ecstatic that he was playing along. “See Mai, he gets it! These days I just traumatize nuisances with words instead of violence. It’s MUCH more efficient and I don't get confined to a toaster for maiming some incompetent clerk that doesn't know what an arcanomatrix cryotemperate modulator is.” The Sidewinder rubbed one hand over her face with the most drawn out exasperated sigh he'd ever heard. And that was quite a feat considering how many ridiculous questions had been asked of his poor college professors in class…

“Please don't encourage her,” she groaned. “You're going to give me a hangover and I haven't even started drinking yet.” The Commander raised an eyebrow at her thoughtfully.

“... ‘Yet?’ So I take it you haven’t kicked that habit?”

“Try getting through a day with that menace rattling around in your skull and you'll understand.” ASP gasped in feign offense, but the theatrics were sign enough that she wasn't actually upset. He was starting to figure that out pretty quickly.

… The two of them really were just joking around with him now weren't they? It was a surprisingly comforting revelation– not only that they trusted him enough to include him in their banter… But that he also felt good enough about it to join in naturally, too. Maybe, just maybe, this was going to work out okay in the end. Their casual snark actually reminded him of some of his friends from Dragon's Watch.

“Fair enough,” he agreed, that smile still in place– even as ASP let out another offended gasp in turn. It was remarkable how quickly the tension had melted away now that they were actually being transparent with each other. Maybe that was all they’d really needed.

A leap of faith, no matter what consequences it may entail.

“Well, while you two were ganging up on me like the little traitors you are,” ASP bit back, “I’ve gone ahead and finished logging this security breach as a hardware malfunction in the official records. You’re welcome, you ungrateful drones.” He caught a faint ‘snrk’ from the Sidewinder.

“Yes, thank you ASP.” With that, she made a swiping gesture in front of her with one gauntlet to summon a levitating holotablet, and then swiped and tapped a few more times before dismissing the display with a flick. “There, went ahead and cleared out my schedule for the day. I have a feeling this chat might take some time, Commander.” With that, she retrieved a stool from the edge of the room and placed it next to her desk, flopping into her own seat with a surprisingly casual air. He almost expected her to put her boots on the table, but apparently that level of disdain was strictly reserved for business meetings and politics.

Understanding the prompt, he took a seat on the stool with a nod of agreement. “Then we’d better get started. I think we’ve got a lot to catch up on, Mai.”

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

It was a bit haunting, she thought. The look on his face as she concluded her briefing felt so strange to her. Perhaps this Commander was full of surprises. And perhaps he wasn’t. Truthfully, she wasn’t sure whether his reaction was what she expected or not.

Such keen sympathy wasn’t something she was accustomed to seeing on that face.

But, for all his familiarity, the person wearing that face was much different from the one she’d known. And the Sidewinder had known that– of course she did– but had she been prepared for it? Not as well as she’d thought, it seemed. Even knowing the heart that beat within him was kind and warm, she still found herself waiting to find cold, bitter ice waiting in his eyes.

This wasn’t her Commander. And she’d keep reminding herself of that until she believed it.

“... I’m sorry,” he spoke finally. “It does explain a lot, though. And.. Strange as it is, I can relate.” The asura’s brows creased once more, studying her briefly before glancing at the red flickers that danced along a magitech display. “It seems like everyone around this place has a knack for defying expectations.” She caught the hint of a smile tugging at his lips, if for just a moment. But then it was gone– and he fixed his focused golden eyes on her once more, contemplative. “But… There’s one more thing I’d like to ask, if I may.” The Sidewinder felt her jaw clench ever-so-slightly, but she gave him a nod nonetheless.

“Alright, ask away.” She had a bad feeling she already knew what his question would be.

“... You never mentioned the Grand High Sovereign’s name.” She hated when she was right.

“Trust me,” she answered quietly. “You’re better off not knowing.”

But she could already see the answer in his eyes. It didn’t matter that she wasn’t telling him. She didn’t have to. He already knew. There was no hiding this truth from him, no matter how deeply she wished to. The guard rails were already off, and it was far too late to put them back on.

Commander Ruju watched her silently with those tired, tired eyes, and she couldn’t help thinking how much different the two were. His expression was weary in a way that only the living could accomplish; there was a fire still burning deep within, smoldering under a layer of long-blackened ash. He kept it guarded carefully, but if you were to set your hand over the cinders, you would still sear your fingers on its concealed flame. Resolve like that had been tempered by a lifetime of strain, endlessly fighting against the flow of fate.

The Ruju she’d known was empty and cold, forever seeking the darkness that would one day fill in where a living heart was meant to beat. There was nothing in his eyes, not even hate. That asura had felt more like a machine than a living being even before he replaced so much of his body with rigid, unfeeling metal. Now she wasn’t sure if he had a living heart at all.

What had made him that way? The Sidewinder didn’t know, and likely never would.

He lowered his eyes finally, one stubby claw starting to trace circles on the desk in front of him. “That’s why you chose me, isn’t it?” She couldn’t quite identify the emotion in his voice. Regret? Frustration? Resignation? All of the above? “I’m the only option you haven’t tried.” There was no blame in it, though. She almost wished that there was.

“Lots of Commanders have tried,” the Sidewinder admitted. “None of them survived. You–”

“I can do it.” Her heart sank, breath hitching sharply. “I’ve done it before, and I’ll do it again. I might be the only one who can.” The earnest fire that broke out in his voice– the fierce resolve. She knew that expression, and she was never, ever going to let this happen again.

“Don’t.” He seemed almost taken aback by the firmness of her tone. “The last thing we need to do is to feed another corpse into that lunatic’s meat grinder.”

“Your chances of survival are roughly 0.000001 percent, dear,” ASP chimed in coldly. “And that’s assuming you flee at the start of battle. Victory? That’s a hard 0. I’ve run the statistics. And believe you me, a supercomputer powered by an intellect like mine simply doesn’t make errors.”

Commander Ruju paused at that, but she could tell he was thinking. Finally there was a light tap of his nail against the table once more. His resolve was unwavering, but she saw something else this time– a flash of cunning. Maybe he was most used to having immense brute force on his side, but… That wasn’t how he got his start. Before Ruju was a soldier, he was a scientist.

“Then, how do we even the odds?” The Sidewinder could feel her invocation smile.

“... That’s more like it. Now you’re thinking like a strategist, Commander.”

#Guild Wars 2 #gw2 #GW2 fanfiction #fanfiction #Tideturners AU #The Sidewinder #ASP the Automated Security Protocol #AU versions of the following:#Mai Trin #Scarlet Briar #Commander Ruju #I got slammed with inspiration and just desperately needed to make this exist ok. it had to happen i NEEDED to write it #i'd recommend reading my summary of the Sidewinder first tho it's not necessarily required (and might make some twists obvious)#it ends a little abruptly but mostly i just wanted to practice writing all their vibes and stuff. unsure whether this'll be canon or not tb #i've read and reread this like 20 times i don't think i'm gonna make it any better than it is so. throws it into the tags #edit: it will NOT let me indent the summary for some god forsaken reason so i guess it's just gonna look like that. ty tumblr

6 notes · View notes

systlin · 2 years ago

Note

Fake silk anon: Problem is, my workplace has about 12 employees, so there’s no proper HR/chain of command at all. I’d have to tell The Bosses myself, and there’s no guarantee they’d do anything

Oof yeah that's a sticky one. I'd take the advice to see if you can contact someone at the Better Business Bureau

66 notes · View notes

chibivesicle · 2 years ago

Text

The sadness of Steven A. Starphase.

How Kekkai Sensen/Blood Blockade Battlefront is painfully realistic. In the most banal adult ways possible.

With me going back to rewatch Trigun before Stampede began to air, I was itching for more work by Yasuhiro Nightow. However, his follow up manga that started as a one-shot that became Kekkai Sensen/Blood Blockade Battlefront came out while I was in grad school and when the anime was briefly on Crunchyroll later, it didn’t ping me as a suggestion. I’m very much a josei/seinen person with occasional forays into good sports or slice of life series, then shoujo and then shounen series if they have a good sense of humor. Essentially, I need something like FLCL or Gintama to keep me amused.

With Stampede not meeting what I’m realizing were unrealistic expectations, I was curious and decided to follow up on Blood Blockade Battlefront (B3). The title alone would be a turn off for me; I put faith in it that it would have that original Trigun quirky vibe. Honestly, I wish they’d not have translated and told me it was Kekkai Sensen, I would have been easier to convince to watch it. I watched the first episode and was already loving the style, the artwork and the OST. That OST man - so good. And the VA cast - so many actors from Gintama and I was shocked no one was commenting that Femt, the King of Depravity, was voiced by one of my fav VAs, Akira Ishida! What sealed the deal for me, besides the incredible graphic design, story boarding and attention to detail from studio Bones was the entire sequence in S1E3 - A Game Between Worlds when Klaus and K.K. go to the Alterworld following the former Soviet chess grandmaster to the Alterworld Mafia Don’s home.

As the story unfolded in season one, I started to gravitate towards my usual character types; tough independent females and tall, dark, and handsome males. Yeeeaaaaah; I love Chain Sumeragi, K.K. and Steven A. Starphase. I also appreciate Leo with Sonic and Klaus Von Reinhertz is the best male tank character I have ever seen. He’s so adorable! And gentlemanly with his tie and oxford brogues. B3 is a workplace drama/comedy that just happens to take place in a secret organization that handles weird supernatural stuff. Seriously, that is a great summary and it is a great cast even if I’d likely kill Zapp and punch Brody & Hummer for being double ditzes.

I haven’t finished season two yet (I’ve watched through S2E7 - so no spoiler comments for the rest of season two or the manga please!). But the character who ticks all my boxes is Nicholas D. Wolfwood - er - I mean, Steven A. Starphase. Steven is the second in command of Libra, one of the oldest team members (over thirty), has a facial scar, dark hair, sarcastic, stylish and the team member; who gets shit done. That peaking bit of a tattoo and his ruffly black hair . . . Chain may have gotten Wolfwood’s outfit and is a werewolf, but Steven is the evolution of Wolfwood, balancing out Klaus’ unwavering principles, and willing to take on the role of doing the dirty work in the background which is necessary. The body language of Steven is the same as Wolfwood, he’s a mix of straight lines, angles and noodle.

Steven is also paired with Vash - I mean - K.K. on missions. Following the anime format he’s teamed up with her in S1E5 - Bloodline Fever where they have to fight a Blood Breed in a subway station. Unlike, Vash and Wolfwood, K.K. is not keen on him all the time calling him black-hearted and giving him the mocking nickname of Steven-sensei (I guess since he is the logistics expert of Libra always coordinating the teams while K.K. is a lone sniper character).

However, despite their one-sided discord, the two of them work well together where he shows his noodle qualities saving K. K. and the young girl and her mother in S1E8 - Z’s Worst Day - Part 1. Interestingly, Steven takes K.K.’s criticism rather seriously as he’s shaking as she scolds him . . . Steven takes K.K.’s words into account indicating that he does want work well with her.

Before, reverting to his oft “Now, now, now” line to de-escalate things. The two also naturally balance each other out and communicate well with their options when trying to determine which of the two mysterious individuals is the Blood Breed from the India Gate.

They are also characters who are able to info dump quite naturally due to them being the most senior members of Libra in the main cast besides Lucky Abrams. And the storytelling makes their info dumping flow with the story - sometimes they are trying to figure something out, sometimes Steven is pondering a situation. Either way it works well for the second in command to be the man with a bookmarked to hell reference text and even have a color swatch for a Blood Breed’s aura. He also has lots of paper reports which indicates he’s the kind of guy who likes to read through physical items than scan a computer all the time.

By the end of season one, we know that Steven is for the most part, serious about work, a deadpan snarker, leans towards the more pessimistic side despite having hope for the future. e.g. he’d likely describe himself a realist as opposed to Klaus being a dreamer.

It gives us enough information that he’s been beaten down and is no longer an idealistic youth. Take when he asked about why Leo wouldn’t accept higher pay despite struggling financially and comments that Leo is an upstanding young man. He also originally was hesitant for them to even invite Leo to join Libra in the first place, despite knowing the value he brought to them, we know this is alleviated by S1E5 when he takes a literal beating to stall for time. Steven looks chronically burnt out - he is the only character who always has lines under his eyes. His facial expression is rarely one of him smiling or laughing and he maintains a sort of meh or down turned expression when not dealing with serious work situations. Even in the image below when he’s smiling it isn’t a happy smile, he’s thinking about the situation they are about to enter, looking back on the past three years.

His character is frequently shown with a cup of coffee - at the office, he has a blue mug with a red bottom that matches his shirt, frequently when he has papers in the other hand. He will also drink tea with Klaus but it is clear he’s reached that working adult phase of life where coffee is fundamental to your day to day function. Steven is also shown to down energy drinks in times of extreme deadlines as well.

Season two, B3 & Beyond appears to be a season of back filling manga chapters that were skipped in season one to have a tight story. The one aspect that was a bummer in season one for me was how characters besides Leo, Klaus, Black and White got loads of development and growth everyone else was just in the background as support. Season two likely pulled from manga chapters that were published earlier which lead to some confusing/unclear points for viewers aka, like why K.K. calls Steven black-hearted and the Steven-sensei nickname. It is too bad they didn’t have these episodes earlier but I’ll take my character development background whenever, just give it to me.

We first get the explanation from Klaus and Steven at the hospital that reappeared about their personal experience of the Great Collapse to Leo and the introduction of Dr. Lucina Estavez (who should totally date Klaus) as well as defeating the Blood Breed that the two hand been training to fight.

The episode that really hit on my idea that there is a sadness to Steven wasn’t until S2E3 - Day In Day Out. We get a few parallel story lines that show what happens in Leo, Zapp, Steven and Chain’s day where they are independent of each other but still cross paths by the end.

The first thing we learn is that Steven has an amazing loft apartment with a balcony and cool artwork and an Alterworld/Beyondian housekeeper, Mrs. Veded. He emerges from a bedroom with a cup of coffee in one hand and the newspaper as he greets her. With a genuine smile too.

I can look beyond his choice to put milk in his coffee - however, that goes against K.K.’s comment that he’s got a black heart. I’ll excuse his milk in coffee for his stress and soothing his tummy. The phone rings and he goes to pick it up.

We can still see the lines under his eyes so again, he is either always exhausted or we are to read them as actual wrinkles. Maybe both - he’s older and tired due to working hard. A rather playful female on the phone jokes with him about waking up early - at 11AM and it is clear that he hasn’t been up that long either.

There is a conversation about how much alcohol to bring tonight, cluing us into the fact that he’s having a dinner party at his place. Which again, is freakkin’ swanky as all hell. I want Steven’s place.

He’s got a carefree attitude as he talks to two different people on the phone about arrangements for the evening. These are not Steven at the office looks, these are Steven potentially having an outside life facial expressions!

When he gets off the phone, Mrs. Veded comments that he looks happy and Steven seems shocked. She also noted that he seemed very stressed out and tense all the time and she is glad to see him not in such a state.

Since we know that Steven keeps a straight face for the most time at work, he can’t help but reply that he’s shocked at her observation. Which is true, I’m sure Klaus can read him pretty well in work situations, but it is his thing to keep his cards close to his chest. In season one, he is frequently the go between for Libra and the government whether it is the FBI, HLPD, the League of Casters and so forth. Angelica’s comment of Klaus-san and Steven-shi shows that she knows Klaus from previous interactions, but the -shi on Steven implies that she’s never met him, but knows of him and speaks to him respectfully. The English equivalent would be like staying, “Oh, you’re the well-known organizer at Libra, Steven Starphase.” The point is, Steven is well known in certain circles and is respected professionally.

In season one, he was only happy when they were successful at work or his plans went well. For example, his delight at how Leo was able to spot the Ghost Wagon and how he told Klaus that he needed to work on his management skills of others. He additionally has a mix of a dark and offbeat sense of humor, able to laugh while Leo is wrapped up in bandages.

This is not a relevant image other than that it shows time has passed and I still want Steven’s loft.

Mrs. Veded has been helping him all afternoon to prep for his party and we see that he even gets in on the action cooking and wearing an apron of course. He goes with his more casual dress shirt with no tie. There is an almost excited look on his face. I’d guess he hasn’t had people over in sometime.

He goes to let people in and he hands the flowers to Mrs. Veded (who adorably inhales their scent looking happy) and after greeting them, trips over. Of course the friends comment that he’s been working too hard. Steven, adulting hardcore.

The gifted flowers are placed on the table in a vase by Mrs. Veded and he thanks her for all of her help. However, it is clear that he doesn’t need her for the rest of the evening and she takes her leave.

Again, we see another nice subtle smile from him here but something about it lingers, like he’d like to say more but can’t. After she departs, he talks to himself about getting things started, grabbing a bottle of champagne from a bucket of ice and commenting they should get started.

The next time we return to his place, all of the party guests are eating, drinking and chatting up a storm. There is chill music on, everyone looks fashionably dressed, wealthy - and human. All of this gives us the indication that outside of work, Steven has the most ‘normal’ social group. Look at his swanky place, the nice artwork, stainless steel fridge, kitchen island . . . yet while everyone is chatting merrily in groups we get a framing shot of him silently standing alone leaning into a column in his living room. You can tell that every single individual except for him is talking with another person or two based on their body language. This is such an excellent image and it lingers just long enough before it zooms into him looking off in to the distance with a wineglass of course.

Steven has such an interesting expression here, he’s got what appears to be his usual poor posture, leaning against the wall, holding the wine glass and has a soft but almost sad smile. Wistful is the best I can think of.

The fact that his left hand is across his chest and under his right is unusual for him. He rarely displays this type of conservative closed off body language, think of how frequently he’s got at least one if not both hands in his pockets. Steven speaks rather casually and bluntly; I like to call his overall posture, noodle, which is relaxed and confident. Yet, here, he appears much more stiff and is alone at his own party as you look more closely. Something is definitely off.

He goes off to get more beer and leaves the living room when all of his guests raise their arms to reveal biological weapons and tell him to remain in place, Steven Alan Starphase of Libra. Love the use of his middle name for emphasis as well. Of course he denies any knowledge of Libra at first before turning back towards them slightly. Another great part of this scene is how when he walks the few steps up to his kitchen we get a glimpse of his shoes he’s wearing at his house party.

They aren’t some sort of relaxed shoes, the few short steps allow us to see that they are his modified shoes for Esmeralda Blood Freeze techniques. We didn’t get this when he tripped in the foyer, but this is now giving the viewers a hint that he’s prepared for a serious fight.

The first sign that things are about to go south is that when he calls out two guests for only just meeting this evening but appeared to actually know each other.

As they continue to threaten him, he concludes that they need to capture him alive; likely due to his role as the second in command at Libra. This allows him to stall for time as he teases them to give him more information, by stating their bosses are idiots for wanting to capture him alive - as it implied he was expecting them to shoot him.

The framing for this entire sequence is top notch. He never turns to face them directly while continuing the conversation with Ellen. She tries to threaten him to stop being all pretentious and that they’d have no choice but to attack him. Of course he replies mocking them by throwing the question about it back at them. The resignation in his body language that this is what is happening. I don’t think that at this point that he can even look them in the eye. He’s too upset and is keeping it calm and collected.

The shading over his eyes as he looks down, the slack shoulders, this is not how he wanted his evening to go down. Yet, here he is inside his kitchen in a tight spot. Or so it seems.

However, Steven is anal retentive when it comes to organization and details, and he faked tripping at his front door to use his Needles of Absolute Zero move on them. Obviously, he likely did this at the beginning of the party for the rest of the guests being a good host circulating himself. This also explains why he sent Mrs. Veded home, he didn’t want her to witness him doing something this ruthless. Plus, she likely doesn’t know what he does for a living anyways.

The look on his face as he freezes them is so lonely, his eyes are closed and he’s hunched forward. He may not regret his actions honestly; he had no choice but to follow through with this course of actions but that feeling of disappointment, sadness, loss, betrayal. It hurts. Only after he’s frozen them all in place does he even glance back to them as his breath is visible in the air.

Once everyone has been subdued, he gets a moment to gloat over them and their mistakes. He notes that Larry was smart to select weapons that could get into his building undetected implying that he lives in a pretty secure building and that Larry was carrying his weight funny for the past ten days. He also tells Ellen that she tried too hard to cover the scent of the weapons with her usual perfume - by adding more. However, she should have changed the scent and he wouldn’t have noticed. After telling them how he figured out things were off, he steps back and looks at the group, his entire expression tired and blank. More stress lines under those eyes.

His own personal clean-up crew is there to take them all away. And since this isn’t under the guidance of Klaus, he’ll likely let those masked individuals use questionable methods to interrogate everyone for the information he needs to know. Who or what is targeting him? Why? What do they want from him? These are the sorts of things Steven has to know, but the type of things that Klaus wouldn’t be involved with due to his stricter moral code. In this instance, Klaus is Vash, holding an almost impossible level of hope and goals while it is clear that Steven is pragmatic and realizes sometimes you gotta slog through the shit to get things done and protect others like Wolfwood. Though, Steven would have been very upset if Mrs. Veded’s roast were damaged in anyway so he clearly loves her cooking and the love she puts into it.

The likely immediate reaction for a lot of viewers at the end of this scene when he goes out for some air is; Holy shit! Steven is a total badass. He just froze his entire dinner party and turned them over to shady underlings to pump them for information. Badass indeed!

Yet, when I saw the end of that scene, I felt so sad. When it goes to him alone along the road, he’s chastising himself for his own behaviors. He’s leaning on the railing looking out into the night giving himself criticism for letting his guard down and enjoying himself too much. He tried to meet ‘normal’ people who didn’t work for Libra and look what it got him?!?!

He thinks back to how he met various individuals like Ellen and Larry. And that is when it really sinks in and all of its subtlety. You think back to his comments and realize he had to likely know these people for a few years as he met them and slowly thought about having them meet. To realize what type of perfume Ellen wore all the time. To notice that Larry started walking oddly with in the past ten days meant he saw him walk a lot more for a decent amount of time prior to the recent days.

And then it sinks in - all of those people might have went out of their way to befriend him over the period of several years - for the purpose to kidnap him for their boss. The level of deception, of effort. If that was how he met all of them, it sucks so much that it could break someone down. I almost felt like crying the more that I thought about the entire situation. Even if they’d met him first to just be friends, it still shows they were convinced to join this plot to capture him.

Thinking about that hurts; it would make him absolutely paranoid to befriend anyone who isn’t associated with Libra and socialize with them outside of work. But you don’t want to hang out with your work friends outside of work do you?

The entire mood of this image captures his feelings of sadness, isolation and loneliness. He’s the darkest figure in the image as the car headlights, apartment windows and orange construction barrels are more illuminated than he is.

The car turns out to pull over and stop as it is Mrs. Veded and she’s got her two children with her who meet him. Steven smiles at them and they have a pleasant conversation.

The icing on the cake is when he thanks her for everything - she likely thinks it is about her help prepping for the party and cleaning his place. But Steven is speaking from his heart. She’s likely one of the most normal people he knows. Oh, that smile and his smiling eyes. Steven, you’re a good guy even though you have to do some not so great things. You care about normal people, you know how to talk to normal people and you are not biased based on species.

Her daughter shows him the cat they found and he knees down to see them eye to eye and comment on how the cat is so cute. Note, he’s totally channeling Wolfwood, by talking to the children like they are normal and then comes down to their level to continue to chat with them.

The bonus is that he properly pets that cat which shows it is happy. Aaaahhhh my heart is melting. I love it when someone knows how to properly interact with cats.

The episode then ends with Leo, Sonic and Zapp riding by, Zapp having a total meltdown about his eminent loss of his most important body part. Steven laughs how his friends are having a wild night out on the town - revealing that for better or for worse - his closest friends are his colleagues at Libra and Mrs. Veded.

I’m sure that when Leo stops by to chat with Steven, they likely notice the heads of the two goons in the car and figure out that cat is the missing purebred and all’s well that ends well.

The entire episode was a wild ride as the different characters navigate challenges for the current stages of their lives. The one though that stuck with me the most was how realistic Steven’s entire situation is, besides being a key member of a secret organization who can freeze stuff with his blood. I mean more along the lines of what it is like to be a hardworking professional over the age of thirty. Trying to navigate a work-life balance and meet people outside of a school context. It is really difficult and it makes his situation in this episode sadder. He likely put a ton of effort into meeting all those people as adult friendships are bloody hard. Steven’s actions were not out of revenge nor malice; it boiled to either something bad happening to him or to them. He outsmarted them and won the contest but at the loss of likely a bunch of people he socialized with outside of work and clearly never told them who he was - with the whole working for a secret organization.

We can also guess that with his multilingual skills, like Klaus, he’s not a native of NYC originally and moved there to be a part of Libra. Which makes his story even sadder and more lonely.

We don’t have enough information if he’s a native speaker of Spanish or that he knows it for his Blood techniques. Zapp and Zed have to do theirs in Japanese (with very Buddhist undertones as opposed to Christian for Steven and Klaus) and they were taught by a mysterious ‘otherwordly’ man with a dark skin tone and wears a skull sooooo one can’t correlate Blood technique language with ones own racial/ethnic background. All that it has revealed is that between Steven and Klaus, besides English, they can speak a total of nine languages knowing that Spanish and German are two of those nine.

I’ve gone off track, but getting back to my main point. The entire episode fills in a few gaps from season one.

Steven does have a black heart - sort of. K.K. isn’t incorrect, but he isn’t doing this all for fun. He’s the guy who has to choose between two terrible options. He is the character who makes decisions - very deeply thought out decisions for the overall good of the many as opposed to the few. Unlike Wolfwood, he does not charge into situations and instead, does his research, assembles teams and will work himself to utter exhaustion to prevent disaster. He commands others with a strong presence and organizes almost all of their coordinated plans as well as making sure they are executed properly.

Though his interactions with Veded and her kids as well as his concern for protecting normal people or other staff; he cares a lot about others.

Older characters are more reserved. Steven frequently interacts with all sorts of people and is the contact point for Libra. Everyone has his number. He does not show his emotions easily and takes much effort to be convinced. Detective Daniel Law is the one who talks directly to Steven while Klaus listens silently. Though, as obvious as it is that Law is manipulating Klaus, Steven doesn’t say anything aloud and instead sighs and groans at the expected outcome. When Master Raju Jugei Shizuyoshi appears, it is Steven who quickly determines his identity, implying he’s done his research though it was still after the Blood Battle God utterly mocked both K.K. and him, the two most senior members of Libra. Yet, he holds his own and keeps his cool - interestingly, Klaus does not speak until addressed by Shizuyoshi, instead allowing Steven to carefully question him without being intrusive. A character like Steven also hits differently. The antics of say Chain or Zapp aren’t as interesting or realistic as watching Steven lose it over making sure his computers aren’t destroyed.

He’s realistic even in the context of something like B3. The burnt out vibes, the snarky comments, the confidence in regular work situations. Steven is an easy older character to connect with. And he’s got that twinge of adult isolation and loneliness where you wonder how you got to this point professionally successful, yet, somehow are still alone? What did you sacrifice to reach this point? Was it worth it? I still have a few more episodes to go, but I’m curious to see how things pan out. Annoyingly, the print version of the manga is out of print (throws serious shade at Darkhorse) AND they don’t even have it digitally for me to legally support. That’s pretty annoying there Darkhorse . . . Yet so far, hands down, I love Steven’s character and all of his banal realistic flaws. As life gets older, you have to compromise on things and his character is a great example of that along with the grind of working and being successful

#kekkai sensen #blood blockade battlefront #kekkai sensen meta #blood blockade battlefront meta #steven a starphase #character study

54 notes · View notes