#I have struggled to find something to suit the prompt and my brain refuses to give me any sort of title for this...oh well! I FINISHED IT!

[musee-de-muse]

DWC November 2024

Day 6: Crack/Positive (This one really gave me trouble!!)

OC: Lilliana Whitedawn, Sin'dorei "Felblood" @daily-writing-challenge

She ducked her head, as she slipped inside the Earthen inn – a crack of thunder making the Elven woman jump, at just how loud... and how close it had sounded, as if the Titans themselves were cracking a great whip, displeased at the disobedience of their long-forgotten “children.” It brought her thoughts back to the Dragon Isles that she had left behind, and how it had all begun – with Raszageth. Lilliana loitered in the Inn's doorway, leaning into the frame, as she watched lightning arc sideways through the dark, swollen clouds that had only just begun to weep – the fury of a storm always a delight to bask in... so long as she wasn't at sea.

Just as the sky broke open in a torrent, upon another peal of onerous thunder, did a familiar hand alight on her shoulder – a different dragon entirely, than the one that circled her thoughts. A smile is spared the redhead's way, and she only feels a bit guilty for telling her daughter that Eryth was too busy; in truth, he was still busy, regularly portaling between Dornogal, and the Dragon Isles.

“Copper for your thoughts?”

She couldn't help but widen her grin – now and then, it struck her just how well he had adapted to... well, posing as a mortal – only for dragons to mingle with mortals so much more intimately than they ever had, that the pair no longer felt the need to hide his true nature so often.

“The storm just... reminded me of Raszageth's fury – which made me think about Iridikron, and... the Titans. It made me think of just how much harm the Titans have done, how much pain – and death - they've left in their wake.” She pauses here, and pushes her tongue against the back of her teeth, before grating out the last bit a touch softer, yet, “It made me think about the things they've done not just to your people, but also the Earthen - and to Azeroth at large.”

The hand on her shoulder squeezed, before falling away, as the dragon joined her – his a visage of a tall Quel'dorei with crimson hair, and molten gold eyes all too similar to those of his draconic form – and it was clear, as he posted up on the opposite side of the doorway, that similar thoughts troubled him.

“They forced their magic on the proto-dragons who disagreed, Eryth... and all I can think of is my own imprisonment... having magic forced on me. Being forced to change – being molded to another's 'design.' The fucking demon wanted to make something 'beautiful' – the Titans want 'order'... and because they are more powerful, we get no say in it? I found myself quick to sympathize with the Incarnates, despite our having been at odds – my own wrath was, and remains, as mighty as their own! What is wrong with their fury? I would help them tear the Titans from the sky, myself if I could!” Though a hushed, harried whisper – the pair both sweep the area with silent, burning looks... it could be touchy to discuss the Titans so, in this city, even now.

“It's... confusing to weigh the gravity of it all. You live for centuries, believing one thing... and it's all a lie - all of it. I feel like I don't even know who the Titans are supposed to be to me, or any other dragon, now.” It looked as though it almost pained him to dwell upon it – but then, the Reds had always been quick to forgive... but this time, there could be no forgiveness. So where did that leave the dragons?

For some time now, Lily's own thoughts had begun to turn against those supposed “all-powerful” beings – but to be told about the origin of all the hurt, and anger between the Incarnates' and the Aspects' flights... there was a part of her that understood Iridikron's implacable rage. She'd gone rather far to secure her own freedom from imprisonment, and experimentation. She, too, had magic forced on her to alter her body and mind against her will. And to have those closest to you abandon, and betray you, on top of all of that? She knew the taste of that, as well. It was only a shame that the Incarnate had chosen to go about his vengeance in a way that threatened everyone.

“'Absolute power corrupts absolutely,' or some such, hm?” She offers to the red dragon's thoughtful moment, a slender shoulder rising and falling on a shrug, as she peels off the door-frame to meander further inside, “Now come on, let's have a drink by the hearth where it's warm – there's enough doom and gloom as it is, we can worry about the bigger picture later.”

And for once, it was the Elf soothing the nerves of the Red – and she was right: one world-ending catastrophe at a time.

[novelconcepts]

Prompt: Jamie is the one who finds Dani locked in the closet. Dani is still having a panic attack and Jamie helps her.

Time slips away when you're out of your head, Dani has found. It moves so much faster--so much slower--so much less correctly with blood pumping at a dizzying rate. With black spots marring her vision. With her breath caught, tangled in a fisherman's net of sharp inhale, hold, hold, bare exhale, she can't think. There are tears dewed on her eyelashes, and fingers folded into shaking fists, and she is little more than the repetition of her own weight meeting the door--again--again--again--

It's open, she realizes, and wonders how long it has been open. Not long, certainly. Not with how forcefully she's been hurling herself against unyielding lumber. Certainly, she would have--

Well. Tumbled out as she is now, a horrible muddling of limbs and purple sweater and mascara scraped down her cheeks. The breath she has been clawing for still won't quite come, not even with the door hanging open and the soft light of Flora's bedroom pouring inside.

Not even with strong hands catching her by the shoulders, a voice speaking low and smooth into the silence left in the wake of her screams.

"Hey. Hey, now. Hey, you're out, you're all good."

She blinks once. Twice. The world as painted by hysteria is neatly bisected, right down the middle. On one side: the mirror, his solemn face, the horror of being locked in with him. On the other: butterflies on the walls, a dollhouse in the corner, cool air rushing against her flushed skin.

Dark curls. Bright eyes. The gardener from lunch, the one with whom Dani still hasn't held a real conversation.

Jamie.

"What," she tries to say--what are you doing here, you left hours ago, you shouldn't be here--and can't get any further. What, echoing between them, strangled on the end of a sharp inhalation that refuses to fill her up. Her throat is closing. There is a boulder lodged against her windpipe, another sinking down against her chest. She is, she realizes, folding her hands together so hard, her knuckles stand stark against the front of Jamie's overalls.

"Kids," Jamie says--a one-word question. The panic swells higher as Dani realizes she does not know. They were there, turning the key. They were shouting through the door. And then...then...

"Don't know," she wheezes. "Don't know--I--"

Jamie grits her teeth. Her eyes dart back toward the door, her body still tilted entirely toward Dani. "You all right if I...?"

Dani nods, a rapid bird-flutter of a gesture that sends her sour stomach heaving. She gropes backward for Flora's bed, sinking onto the edge of the mattress. Jamie watches her with an expression she can't quite read, her jaw lifted, her shoulders set.

"Back in a sec. Promise."

Dani shuts her eyes, scrounging for breath, listening to the steady thud of boots striding out of the room. Her fingers sink into Flora’s bedspread, her elbows pressed to her knees as she struggles to keep from folding completely in half. Who will that help? She's out. She’s out, and there’s plenty of air out here, and she’s--

Hands, gently brushing her arms. She peels her eyes open, hating how swollen they already feel, hating that faint whistle at the back of her throat that says her lungs still aren’t quite doing their job. Jamie is kneeling on the floor, looking at her with absolutely none of the tight unease from lunch. Her expression is surprisingly warm, though creased with concern, and her hands do not fall away from Dani’s arms. 

“Found ‘em,” she says. “They’re fine. What happened?”

Dani draws as deep a breath as she can manage, unseeing eyes rooted to the front of Jamie’s shirt beneath her scuffed overalls. The neat rectangle of navy cotton swells out--in--out with Jamie’s entirely-stable breaths. She finds herself blankly trying to mimic the beats, relieved and embarrassed in equal measure when Jamie seems to realize what’s happening and begins breathing with intent. In. Hold. Out. Hold. Again, again, until Dani’s heart finally catches up with her brain. 

“Better?” Jamie asks. Dani, uncertain how much time has slipped away with this woman holding her by the elbows, setting a pace for slow, even breaths, nods. “Right. Good. Now: what happened?”

A flash of movement tugs at her attention, pulling her eyes to a point over Jamie’s shoulder. Miles and Flora, leaning against the doorframe, their faces ashen. She swallows hard. 

“We’re sorry,” Flora says quickly.

“It got stuck,” Miles adds. There is a furtive look to his eyes that says even he does not expect her to believe this. Dani swallows again.

“Bed.”

There are more words in her--big, angry, panic-throttled words--but she wouldn’t let them fly even if Jamie weren’t here. That isn’t how you deal with kids. That isn't how you deal with traumatized orphans. 

Not even when they pull stunts like this. 

“Honest,” Miles starts to say. She closes her eyes, scrubs her hands over her face. Her palms are hot, her newly-caught breath stuffy. She wants to stay in the cupped enclosure of her own hands forever. 

Flora makes a tiny hiccuping noise, the precursor to tears. Jamie’s hand flexes around her arm. Dani bites her tongue until the throb of pain cuts through the memory of his glasses, his glasses in the mirror, I was in there with him alone.

“We,” she says in as level a voice she can muster, “will talk about this in the morning.”

Jamie is looking at her, she realizes. Jamie, leaning back into a crouch, is watching her with the wary concern of one waiting to see if a rabbit will escape a snare unscathed. Dani gives her a very small nod--I’m okay--and she pushes to her feet, claps her hands, turns on her heel.

“Right. You heard her. Bed.”

Dani removes herself from Flora’s bed, still shaking even as she tucks the tiny girl under the covers. Jamie stands back, almost to the door, watching the proceedings as if half-believing she’ll have to take over at some point. 

No, thinks Dani with hot embarrassment. This is her job, not Jamie’s. Jamie even being here is more than her job description. Even still floundering at the end of a panic attack, Dani can do this much.

“I really am sorry,” Miles mumbles, blankets pulled up to his chin. Dani searches his face. Not a single beat of a lie there now; he looks perfectly miserable, his cheeks bright with shame. She exhales, hoping her voice will hold. 

It does. Barely. “Get some sleep. We’ll discuss it tomorrow.”

He rolls over, face mashed against the pillow. Dani drags in an unsteady breath, holds it as she closes in on the door, the light switch, the hallway. 

“All right?” Jamie asks again when the doors have been closed and the children tucked away. Dani presses her face to her hands, groaning. 

“Yeah. Yes. I’m sorry, that was--”

“Sorry?” Jamie repeats blankly. “What’ve you got to be sorry about? Didn’t lock yourself in there, I’d wager.”

No. No, she hadn’t. And tomorrow, she’ll have to pull herself together better than this--locate the mask of the Polished Au Pair, who is good with even the most difficult of children, who doesn’t scream herself hoarse and bruise up her shoulder trying to get away from memories held behind glass--

“What are you doing here, anyway?” Her voice is brittle, the words edged. Jamie only looks at her steadily, hands in her pockets, not taking so much as a step back. 

“Left my flat key. Ring broke this afternoon--must’ve skidded under something out in the greenhouse. I was going to check when I heard the, ah. The...” She trails off, looking almost embarrassed for the first time--embarrassed not for herself, but for Dani, who had indeed been scraping her throat raw with shrieks. Dani grits her teeth. 

“I have a--”

She’s not sure what she’s going to say next; a condition? A phobia? The absolutely horrific poor fortune to be haunted by her ex-fiance in every reflective surface? Jamie holds up a hand. 

“Doesn’t matter,” she says. “Not unless you want to talk it over. Do you?”

Dani shakes her head. Truth be told, she’s wrung out--her head is pounding, her hands numb from being squeezed into such uncompromising fists. Jamie looks unsurprised. 

“Then it’s your own,” she says easily. “You share it on your time. Christ, Poppins, think it’s the first time kids have reduced a grown woman to tears?”

There’s plenty to unpack here--Jamie’s kindness, in letting it slide; Jamie’s careless phrasing, as though she expects minor doses of aggression from perfectly well-mannered children every day; Jamie’s expression, even, holding firm on Dani as though she’s the only real thing in this house. Dani finds herself landing on something else entirely.

“Is that...mud?”

There are, she sees now, footprints. Wrapping down the hall, leading down the staircase, all the way to the front door. She frowns, following them at a slow clip, her legs still trembling. Jamie follows. 

“Wasn’t me,” she says, as if Dani holds accusations on her tongue. “Hannah says this happens sometimes. Maybe one of the beasts taking the piss?”

“Maybe.” The prints are larger than either child could make on their own, Dani thinks with a plummeting sense of alarm. Large, and staggered, and odd. Still. Kids. Jamie’s probably right--it’s likely just a prank. A silly trick to test the new au pair’s mettle. 

She turns her head, surprised to find Jamie still looking at her. “I’m sorry. Did you need help finding your key?”

Jamie shrugs. “Nah. I know the way. And if it’s not where I figure, I’ll just post up on the couch for the night. Hannah won’t mind.”

Dani smiles faintly. “There are so many bedrooms, I’m sure you could--”

Jamie flaps a hand. “Don’t like sleeping in beds that don’t belong to me. Couch’ll suit me fine. Anyway, maybe I won’t need it. Night might have a little good luck left in it yet.”

“You’re sure you don’t want to...” God, she’s so tired. What is this impulse to play hostess, even with her bones twisted to exhaustion and a thunderstorm ringing in her head? “I mean, you could...stay. I could get you a drink?”

Jamie smiles. It’s the first true smile Dani’s seen on her lips since flicking water on the kids at lunch, and it doesn’t just light up her face--it revolutionizes her entire body. All at once, Dani remembers how she’d felt watching this woman stroll into the kitchen this afternoon: like a song she’s been humming under her breath for a lifetime. 

Heat twists up her neck. She clears her throat. 

“I think,” Jamie says gently, “I should let you get to bed. Tomorrow, maybe. If you’re up to it.”

She leaves the rest of the offer unspoken--tomorrow, maybe you can tell me what really happened--and Dani understands, somehow, that if it never comes up again, Jamie won’t mind. Jamie doesn’t seem the sort of woman who is rocked by much.

“Thank you,” she says, walking to the front door, leaning awkwardly against the enormous slab of wood as Jamie steps outside. “For--anyway. Thank you.”

“Anytime,” Jamie says, and though this woman had frowned at her this afternoon, wariness cutting grooves through her dirt-smudged face, she is nothing but warm now. Warm and more than a little bit beautiful, with moonlight scudding off her hair. 

It’s been too long a night for that, Dani warns herself. Too long a life for that, probably. Certainly nothing she’s prepared to deal with right now. 

“One more thing,” she adds, unable to help herself, even as Jamie crunches over gravel with hands swinging loosely at her sides. Jamie doesn’t quite stop, only turns at the waist with an inquisitive eyebrow raised. Dani smiles weakly.

“Poppins?”

“Yeah,” Jamie says, and Dani is so tired. So tired, she must be imagining the light tinge of pink around the woman’s cheeks. “You know. Julie Andrews.”

“Sure,” says Dani, who can’t think of a single actress she less embodies in this moment. “Right. Of course.”

She can’t help grinning a little, falling into bed a few minutes later--still in sweat-damp clothes, her boots barely kicked to the floor--with the scorching awareness that the surly gardener has just given her a nickname. Possibly because she doesn’t actually know Dani’s real name, sure--but a nickname, all the same. A nickname, and a warm smile, and the impression of long fingers wrapped gently around her arm. 

Tomorrow, she’ll handle the kids. Put her foot down. They need to know, right off the bat, that she won’t stand for this sort of thing. She needs to know it, to prove to herself she can still do this, just as she’d insisted to Henry Wingrave. Tomorrow, she’ll talk to them the right way--steady, calm, no accusation in her tone--and give them a suitable punishment. 

Tomorrow. 

Tonight, Jamie’s shining eyes, slouched shoulders, accent curled around Poppins almost let her forget the horror of being locked in with a ghost.

[robininthelabyrinth]

Prompt: NHS non-fatally qi deviates. How do NMJ and the others take that?

ao3 

Untamed

It had always been something of a behind-closed-doors debate – a chicken-and-the-egg problem, what came first, what was the cause and what was the symptom.

Was the Nie sect’s atypical cultivation method the reason behind the notorious Nie temper? Or were they born with the temper, and the cultivation method merely built upon that? Which one was the reason for their clan’s tendency towards early qi deviations?

Nie Huaisang usually threw his money on the “blame the cultivation style”, almost entirely for the sake of pissing off his brother.

He was starting to think, though, that he’d been wrong.

Aituan wasn’t even anywhere nearby, after all, when he started bleeding out of his qiqiao, his qi disordered and violently raging inside of him and still somehow, somehow not enough to assuage the rage in his heart, in his head –

“Nie-xiong! Nie-xiong! Nie Huaisang!”

Nie Huaisang turned with a snarl, but Wei Wuxian was already holding up his hands in surrender, Jiang Cheng quickly following suit a second later, and in the end he wasn’t really angry at them.

“I’m pretty sure you’re done,” Jiang Cheng said cautiously. “You’re – you are done, right?”

“I dunno,” Wei Wuxian muttered. “I don’t think Wen Zhuliu is entirely paste yet – there’s still a few bones Nie-xiong hasn’t crushed down into dust…”

“Shut up.”

“I will not.”

The familiar bickering was soothing, like slipping into a hot bath at the end of a tough day – like arguing with his brother about silly things, scoring a clever point and getting one of his brother’s rare smiles. Nie Huaisang felt his shoulders relax a little, and he lowered the stick –

“Why am I holding a stick?” he asked blankly, looking down at it. He didn’t remember picking it up at any point. “And why is it…uh…”

“Covered in the blood and guts and possibly brain matter of your enemy?”

Nie Huaisang swayed, suddenly light-headed. “…that,” he agreed, voice weak.

He slowly became aware that there was something squishy and wet under his feet, soaking into his shoes, and he very carefully did not look down.

“What happened?” he asked faintly. “What did I – actually, on second thought, don’t tell me.”

Jiang Cheng’s expression was a strange mix of being impressed with him and pitying him, and honestly Nie Huaisang preferred the pity. No one was impressed with him, not ever, and in retrospect he rather liked it that way, if the alternative was…

“You defeated the Core-Melting Hand in one-on-one combat,” Wei Wuxian said. “Congratulations.”

Nie Huaisang gaped at him.

“Don’t you remember?” Jiang Cheng said, blinking at him. “He said something about your brother, and you suddenly lost it –”

Nie Huaisang remembered, suddenly, and he felt a sickening lurch in his stomach as his vision flickered red around the edges again, and he imagined he could hear Aituan shouting his name from thousands of li away. How dare that man, that stone-face bastard who looked so long-suffering and yet underneath it all was so cruel and unfeeling – how dare he say such a thing about his da-ge –

Nie Huaisang had been angry the entire time he’d been here at the indoctrination camp.

Really angry, not the silly little temper tantrums he usually threw back at home or the occasional shouting matches he had with his brother to vent steam. He hated it here. He hated the fact that he was here in the Nightless City, the one place his brother had always refused to bring him no matter how embarrassingly impolitic it was, the place Sect Leader Wen had murdered his father over a stupid dinner table conversation. He hated the fact that his brother had tried to protect him, and failed only because he’d gotten distracted by Meng Yao of all people.

(He hated the fact that he’d had to learn that fact from one of his retainers, weeks too late and him already gone to the Nightless City, too late to apologize or make it up; hated the fact that the last words he’d said to his da-ge on the subject were cruel ones, blaming him for sending away his friend, when in fact his friend had torn off his face to reveal something dark beneath. He hated that his brother had just taken those cruel words from him, suffered under his accusations, without defending himself from them, because he blamed himself for – for what? For being just, the way he was supposed to be?  For protecting him?)

He hated the Yin metal, the vile corruption he could feel for all that they were in a different part of the palace. He hated Wen Chao making them memorize and recite, which he was terrible at, and he hated him for making them do it outside in the hot sun and the hot earth until he fainted from heatstroke, his weak golden core insufficient to protect him the way the others did them.

He hated Wen Ruohan, he hated Wen Chao, and he hated, hated, hated Wen Zhuliu.

Most of the boys at the indoctrination camp had gotten the idea that he wasn’t that bad, for all that he was terrifying, because he always looked so bored about everything, like he was having to fulfil all of this as a torturous duty instead of a pleasure, but he’d been the one to carry Nie Huaisang back inside after he’d fainted and he’d said some things about his brother then, when Nie Huaisang was too weak to do anything, and today he’d come by, watching Nie Huaisang struggle to set up the small tent he’d been given for their travels, and he’d said them again…

“He wanted to steal my brother’s cultivation,” Nie Huaisang said through numb lips. His hands were clenched, quivering with rage that was impossible to bury down in his heart – was this how his brother felt all the time? No wonder he was so straightforward about most things; forget scheming, it was amazing he could even think. “He wanted – he didn’t even think of him as a person. Just dirt beneath his feet, fruit ripe for the plucking, some animal he could slaughter as a prize to give to his wretched master –”

He’d even said, today, that they could use what was left over as a corpse puppet, and chuckled when he thought of what the great Chifeng-zun would have thought of that.

Nie Huaisang had been angry ever since they’d arrived, full of bile and choler and rage.

His family never did handle their rage well.

“You had a minor qi deviation,” Wei Wuxian said solemnly, looking at him. “You’re still bleeding – your eyes, your nose, your ears…We need to get you to a doctor.”

“We need to hide the body before anyone finds it, that’s what we need to do,” Jiang Cheng said.

“We can do both! Multitasking!”

He was very lucky to have such good friends, Nie Huaisang thought to himself, and toppled over.

He woke up back in the sorry excuse for a camp, with Wen Qing acting as his doctor and Wen Ning as her assistant, taking care of him (it had taken an embarrassingly long while before Nie Huaisang remembered their names, for all that they’d come to lessons at the Cloud Recesses, too, both of them, and even though they’d all gone on a whole mission to the village with the goddess statute together afterwards, but in his defense he was really bad at memorizing - anything), and while Wen Qing kept herself nice and professional, Wen Ning kept shooting him extremely impressed looks that Nie Huaisang didn’t think he deserved.

He hadn’t actually defeated the Core-Melting Hand in one-on-one combat, no matter what Wei Wuxian said. He’d launched a surprise attack at the back of a man who wasn’t expecting it, because no one ever expected anything from Nie Huaisang.

“You have remarkable arm strength,” Wen Qing said (she had looked amused when he asked about her name, blushing with shame), sounding casual but clearly fishing a little. “It’s hidden by your thin frame, and even further minimized by your choice in clothing, but actually you have significant muscle there.”

“Saber practice,” Nie Huaisang explained. “Sabers are heavier than swords, and rely more on brute force. At home, you train a lot with heavy things even before you get your own saber, just to make sure you can wield it properly – you have to have a good arm.”

He’d been barely mediocre by his sect’s standards, and even that level he’d only achieved through years of nagging, threatening, and occasional bribery on his older brother’s part. He shouldn’t have been able to win, but Wen Zhuliu hadn’t even been looking at Nie Huaisang when he’d said what he said, hadn’t seen the moment he’d snapped and attacked, his disordered qi giving him extraordinary strength even as it turned against him to destroy him internally, and if there was one thing that saber style taught you it was not to let someone who’d fallen to your blade get up again.

(Had his brother brought out Baxia against Meng Yao, before deciding to let him go? He couldn’t help but wonder – it was bad luck if he had, a severing of the relationship in an unfixable way, but he wasn’t sure his brother would be strong enough to resist trying to repair it if Meng Yao ever came back. Where was Meng Yao, anyway?)

Attacking a man from behind wasn’t really honorable, he thought glumly, and he thought he understood for the first time why his brother was so strict about such things: it didn’t feel good to have done it this way. It felt like cheating, made every approving gaze feel like a lie, like something he didn’t deserve.

“So what happens now?” he asked, and Wen Qing shrugged a little helplessly. “Does, uh…”

“Wei-gongzi and Jiang-gongzi are hiding the remains,” Wen Ning volunteered. He looked way too cheerfully when he said ‘remains’. Possible budding mass-murderer? Or maybe he’d just been a doctor’s assistant for too long. “Wen-er-gongzi hasn’t noticed yet – he’s still with Wang Lingjiao.”

“But he will notice,” Nie Huaisang said.

“As long as he doesn’t blame any of you, does it matter?” Wen Qing said.

“…if you have an example of Wen Zhuliu’s handwriting, I can probably forge it to look like a note saying he was summoned back by Sect Leader Wen.”

Wen Qing and Wen Ning exchanged looks he didn’t quite understand, but they brought him what he needed, and by the time they got trapped in a horrible underground cave with a gigantic man-eating Xuanwu the next day, Wen Chao still hadn’t figured it out, though he’d been in an awful mood the entire time.

“Why are you sitting down?” Jiang Cheng scolded him even as he dashed around fighting Wen sect soldiers, and see, this was why Nie Huaisang didn’t ever fight. It only made people expect him to do it more – Jiang Cheng hadn’t scolded him at all for hiding behind things before…

Before.

“Leave him alone,” Jin Zixuan said. He hadn’t been there, so he still looked disdainful and dismissive; it was amazing how much of a relief that was. “He can’t help anyway.”

“But –”

“My head hurts,” Nie Huaisang said plaintively, and it had the benefit of being both true and working very effectively to get Jiang Cheng to head as far away from him as possible in a sudden rush. After a while, he got up and picked up one of the swords some unfortunate Wen sect retainer had dropped.

“I have no idea what I’m doing with this,” he said, very seriously, to yet another unfortunate Wen sect retainer, before lifting it and bringing it down, saber-style, the way his brother had all but beaten into his head.

That one didn’t seemed like he was expecting it, either, even though Nie Huaisang was right in front of his face and everything.

It felt a bit better, though – Aituan didn’t like the Wen sect one bit, he thought a little muzzily, and wondered why he’d thought that, since after all Aituan was all the way back at home – and he was a little less ashamed to stand with the rest of them as they tried to figure out a way out of the cave.

“You probably shouldn’t do that,” he said to the Lan disciple who picked up a bow and was trying to aim it at the Xuanwu. “You’ll miss.”

The Lan disciple glared at him.

“Not as bad as I would, mind you,” Nie Huaisang said, looking at it. He felt as though he was standing behind a pane of glass and nothing could touch him - not pain or fear or anything, anything but rage. “I’d probably miss the turtle entirely. I’m just saying that it’s angry now, so the shot’s a lot harder to make; maybe five people could make that shot.”

“Lan-er-gongzi could make it.”

“Yes, well, Lan-er-gongzi isn’t human,” Nie Huaisang said, quite seriously, and the Lan disciple’s lips twitched. “Seriously, don’t waste your time – or your arrows. If you’re anywhere good enough at archery to even think that you could make that shot, you need to keep them to protect me.”

“Are you in need of protection?”

“Oh, always,” Nie Huaisang said blithely, the way he always did, then paused and grimaced. “Most of the time, anyway. I got sick, earlier.”

He was pretty sure the Lan disciple didn’t understand what he meant by sick.

“You don’t really want me to protect you,” the disciple said, frowning. “Do you?”

Nie Huaisang wanted everyone to protect him. He never wanted to fight again in his life.

But the Lan disciple looked like he was a little pleased to have been asked, like no one had ever asked him before, and Nie Huaisang suddenly felt a sudden stab of empathy hitting him straight in the heart.

“I do. I’m pretty sure all the other Nie disciples here are short-range fighters –” His brother had sent as few of them as he could manage, and only sent any at all because he wanted someone there to keep an eye on Nie Huaisang. To protect him. “– and they’re mostly hotheaded idiots –” That was definitely true. “– and I really, really don’t want to end up in another situation where I get sick again, because my brother will never forgive me. So I could use an archer.”

“…okay,” the Lan disciple said. “I’m Su She.”

Nie Huaisang nodded. “I promise to apologize to your sect later on for taking up your time.”

He managed not to be sick the entire journey home.

Maybe it was an aberration, he thought, maybe –

When he got home, his brother was holding Aituan in his hand instead of Baxia – she was in her sheath on his back – and he rushed over to him at once, presenting the saber to him before he did anything else; confused, Nie Huaisang accepted his saber, wondering if he was going to need to go practice or something, and the second his hand wrapped around the hilt –

Oh.

Oh.

His head abruptly cleared, the fog he hadn’t even realized was there finally lifting, the rage draining out of him and back into Aituan – not an especially angry saber, as they went, but still a Nie saber with all that entailed. His qi finally, finally straightened out, stabilized, and he felt like he could breathe again, his mind free and clear now that he had a saber in his hand.

Like all the other Nies before him.

Doomed.

And then he was in his brother’s arms, being held tight.

“Oh, Huaisang,” his brother said, and his voice sounded raw and broken, almost as if he’d been weeping. “I never wanted this for you.”

Nie Huaisang hugged him back.

“It’s okay,” he said, and the buzzing in the back of his head that was Aituan agreed with him. He’d been there the whole time, ever since the first incident; it didn’t matter how far away from each other they were. “It was a small one, it passed, it’s fine…”

It wasn’t fine, and they both knew it – Nie Huaisang might not know the details of all their clan secrets, but he knew enough to know what it was he was so carefully not knowing – but what was there to say?

It was still his family. It was still his heritage.

(He wondered what Meng Yao would say, if he knew. He wondered if he would pull his saber back the way his brother had, if Meng Yao ever betrayed him.)

“At least I can help fight now,” he said, joking, and his brother glared at him.

“Not a chance,” he said. “You’re going to go somewhere safe. You can go with –”

“Su She.”

“– with Su She back to the Cloud Recesses; it’ll be more secure there than here.”

It was about what Nie Huaisang had expected.

“Okay,” he said. “But not now.”

His brother’s eyes flickered down to his saber. His lifeline.

“No,” he said. “Not now.”

[waywardfangirl]

For the fantastic @fight-surrender: You are a wonderful person with a brilliant mind and a kind heart, and I am so happy to know you! I really enjoyed the prompts you suggested for the Secret Snowflake exchange this year, so to give you something fluffy and happy for your birthday I combined a few of them into one sweet and silly fic - I hope that you like it! 🖤

A big thank you goes out to @carryonvisinata for her wonderful beta work and for making this fic even better for such an incredible friend 🖤 Purr-fect Strangers

Rated: General Audiences Word Count: 3208 Chapters: 1/1 Simon

"Die Hard? Really?"

I'm struggling to make the Redbox give me my DVD. Video vending machines sounded like a good idea when I couldn't find anywhere to stream my favorite movie, but the obstinate thing in front of me and the condescending voice behind me are now making me reconsider my choices.

"What's wrong with Die Hard?" I demand, momentarily giving up on retrieving my video to take some of my frustration out on the prick watching me.

Unfortunately, when I turn around to scowl at him, I make eye contact with one of the most attractive people I've ever seen. He's tall, with dark hair escaping the bun on top of his head and falling around his face, and a perfectly tailored suit hugging every inch of his body right on down to his shiny Chelsea boots. My brain shorts out, and he sneers at me.

"There’s nothing wrong with it, per se. But you have a near unlimited assortment of cinema to choose from, and you've selected Die Hard?"

(Read the rest on ao3, or keep reading here)

I scoff.

"Look, mate, some of us don't feel the need to watch pretentious films just to feel better than other people. I like Die Hard. I'm going to watch it while eating pizza and relaxing in joggers, and I refuse to feel bad about enjoying that."

He looks a bit startled, and his cheeks take on a slightly pink tinge, but he just arches an eyebrow at me. (And manages to make that look unfairly hot too, the prat.)

"What movie are you renting?" I say it like a challenge, and he pushes past me.

He deftly removes my DVD from the stubborn machine and thrusts it at me, before turning back around to get his own. I loiter behind him, just like he did to me, ready to see what movie he thinks is better than Die Hard.

"Two Weeks Notice?" I exclaim, when I see the poster pop up on the screen. "You're ridiculing Die Hard, but getting a rom-com for yourself? Unbelievable."

He pushes past me and turns up his nose. My blood boils for so many different reasons, and it's work to hold myself still.

"This has Hugh Grant in it. My tastes are superior."

Then he swans off, and I'm left standing on the kerb.

Baz

A year into my time at university, I started treating myself to a monthly visit to Sephora. It was easily excusable then, with parties every weekend to justify each new purchase, but I've kept up the tradition since graduating. (Retail therapy and good skin care never hurt anyone. And a little eyeliner does wonders for one's self esteem.)

This month, I'm browsing for something sparkly. My eyes are grey, but with a dark, glittery liner I think they might stand out a little more. I'm just testing one of the pencils on the back of my hand when I see him.

Blond hair, plain blue eyes, and a constellation of freckles and moles across his skin. The most lovely man I have ever seen, with the worst taste in movies, and (I'm sure) a well-deserved hatred for me.

For all that I try to appear cool and confident, my facade sometimes fails me. When I get flustered, I become cruel. The man renting Die Hard was so pretty that all I could do was insult him and then curse myself for it the entire way home. I couldn't even properly enjoy Hugh Grant, as mired as I was in self-loathing. And now, whatever second chance to impress him I've been granted with has surely been ruined by my actions last time.

I keep my head down and steal glances at him through my eyelashes.

He is entirely out of his element, that much is obvious right away. I watch him ask one of the shop assistants for help, and she points him in the direction of a display. His brow furrows as he picks up different containers, and he’s ridiculously precious and hopeless as he holds a lipstick tube next to a garish eyeshadow palette and closes one eye to look at them. (What is he even doing?)

Finally, his confusion seems to win out, and he turns to look around for help, when he suddenly spots me. I've been caught out; I can't pretend now like I haven't been staring, and he scowls a little as we make eye contact. I arch an eyebrow, watch as his face grows pink in anger, and decide I hate myself enough to try talking to him again.

"That's really not your shade."

"What?" It's a simple word, horribly enunciated, and does nothing to quell the wrinkle between his eyes.

"The purple. I don't think it would flatter you. Furthermore, that lipstick clashes horribly with every color in that palette."

He turns a bright red and starts to splutter. I am hopelessly endeared.

"That's not- I, I don't- it isn't-"

"Oh, calm down, there's nothing wrong with wearing makeup," I say, flashing him the back of my hand with the eyeliner tests on it. "You just need to pick a better shade." I pluck a different palette (for blue eyes) and a lipstick in a true red from the display and hand them over. "Something like this."

He stares at them dumbly for a moment, his mouth hanging open. (Mouth breather.)

"You think I should wear this?"

"I think it would flatter you if you chose to wear makeup. That purple will do you no favors." I sneer at the garish eyeshadow still in his hand.

"It's for my friend!" he finally bursts out.

"Are you mad at her?" It's a reasonable question, that eyeshadow is truly appalling.

"No? It's her birthday next week, and she said that she wanted to have some makeup for date nights and things."

"Are you in love with her?"

"No!" No hesitation at all. "No, no way. Penny is like my sister. She's my best friend. We're not…" he trails off, and I'm strangely reassured. He still probably hates me, but at least there is one woman in the world that he’s not dating, so my odds have improved marginally.

"Don't get your pants in a twist. I just thought you might be, since that eyeshadow would certainly drive away her current boyfriend."

He sticks out his chin and seems to decide something.

"Fine. What should I get for her, then?" The “if you know so much” is left unsaid.

I'm not really an expert, despite my monthly purchases, but I'll take any excuse I can get to linger around this starburst of a boy for a few moments more.

"Does she wear makeup normally?" He shakes his head no. "Then perhaps start with something more subtle for her." I take the offending palette away and hand him a more subdued one, with a faint shimmer. "Do you think this would look nice on her?"

He thinks hard for a moment, then pulls out his phone, swiping at the lock screen and turning it to face me.

"This is her."

His home screen background is a picture of the two of them, cheeks pressed together and grinning like crazy under the summer sun. His curls are being tossed by the wind, and he looks like a bronze Adonis. I think my heart actually skips a beat at the sight.

"That palette will be fine then. This lipstick, too," I add, handing him a plum shade. "Do you need anything else?" I ask, and then cringe when I sound like I'm working instead of flirting.

He shakes his head.

"No, this is brilliant, thanks."

He still looks a bit confused, and he bites his lip as he looks down at the makeup in his hand - the makeup for his friend, and the things I picked out for him.

I don't want to go, but I can't figure out any way to prolong our conversation.

"You should get that one," he says, pointing to one of the lines on my hand. I raise an eyebrow in question. He's right, but what does this mean? Is he flirting? Does he want me to wear eyeliner? Is he just trying to repay me for helping him? "Yeah. Definitely that one."

He raps his knuckles on the counter beside us twice, and then wanders towards the check out.

It's not until I'm trying to fall asleep that I realize - he bought the makeup for himself too.

Simon

One of my foster fathers had a workshop, and I spent a happy summer watching him build a table and matching chairs for the dining room. I didn't get to stay to see it completed, because one of his biological children kept stealing money out of his mom's purse and blaming me, but I still enjoyed the time I had spent watching woodworking. I liked it so much that when Penny and I graduated and got a flat together, I saved up to buy a few tools. I don't make anything major, but I've built small shelves and a side table and a pan organizer for the flat, and I really like it.

Recently, Penny has been complaining about not being able to reach everything in the kitchen, so while she's still at work I stop by the B&Q to pick up some wood for a step stool. I'm heading to the check out when I see him - the mean makeup guy. (Although he was actually quite nice when we were talking about makeup. He was just rude when we were getting our movies.)

He's dressed casually today, in tight dark jeans and a warm grey sweater, with his hair falling in loose waves around his face. He's glaring down at two wrenches, and I hate that he still looks so good when he's glowering.

Before I even register what's happening, my feet have carried me over to him.

"D'ya need help?"

He startles, and turns lovely grey eyes up to look at me. It's work not to gasp. He’s wearing eyeliner. I'm not entirely sure, but I think it may even be the eyeliner I told him to buy.

"The sink in my kitchen is leaking. I watched a tutorial on YouTube, and it should be easy enough to fix, but I don't have the proper tools."

He goes back to glaring at the wrenches, and I lean over to take a look.

“You want that one.”

“Why? How do you know?”

“Well, it’s adjustable. You can change it within reason, so as long as your plumbing isn’t something incredibly out of the ordinary it should fit just fine.”

He looks surprised (and maybe a bit like he wants to attack me, although I try to ignore that).

“How do you know that?”

I laugh.

“Basic home maintenance, mate, I’ve had to fix a leaky sink before too, believe it or not.”

I grin at him until one corner of his mouth tips upward in response.

“Thanks,” he says, his cheeks flushing a little. “I’ll get this one then. Yes. Thank you. Have a nice evening.”

He strides off, once again leaving me feeling a bit dazed.

He looks really good in eyeliner.

Baz

When Fiona discovered I hadn’t left the apartment in a week, she called in the cavalry. Daphne showed up at my door with a casserole and some flowers, and within minutes she had the kitchen feeling like a place that was less utility space and more home.

“Basil, Fiona is worried about you.” I rolled my eyes, despite knowing it wouldn’t get me anywhere. “I’m worried about you, too. You spend so much time by yourself, and you hardly ever go out to see your friends or enjoy the city.”

“I’m fine. Thank you for your concern.”

“Basil,” she had said, and that time it was a warning. “It’s not healthy for anyone to spend this much time alone.”

“What, do you expect me to get a cat?”

Daphne smiled, and I knew that I had said the wrong thing.

“Yes, actually. And,” she said, before I could object, “Fiona thought you should too. In fact, she made it a condition of your continued occupancy of this flat. We both think it might be nice for you to have someone else around to talk to.”

I arched an eyebrow.

“And you want me to talk to a cat?”

Daphne just gave me a Mona Lisa smile, handed me a plate filled with food, and told me when she left later that evening that I had forty-eight hours to send her a picture of a cat. (I asked what I should do if I didn’t like any of the cats I saw. Or if they didn’t like me. She said I had to at least prove that I tried.)

So, this morning, I made my way to the nearest RSPCA and talked to strangers for the first time in over a week. I told them that I was looking to adopt a cat, and they immediately led me to a room filled with individual cages and an assortment of felines. They said I could play with any of the cats that I wanted, and now I’m staring into the eyes of a fluffy orange tabby.

The tabby meows at me, and I swear that she’s telling me to get lost. I guess cats can tell when you’re out of your depth.

I stroll down the aisle and read the names given to each cat. It’s been years since I last had a pet and even then, the husky my family had wasn’t my sole responsibility. I was in charge of feeding him, but there was always someone else making sure that I did. And really, we only adopted him when my pediatrician suggested that an animal might help me after my mother died. Daphne is probably trying to do the same thing again now. (Is this how one becomes a crazy cat lady? Depression, anxiety, OCD, and an unwillingness to tolerate therapy?)

I keep walking slowly until I feel a tug on my sleeve. I look down, and a little orange paw ending in one very sharp claw has latched on to me. I unhook it before my sweater can snag, and then look into the kennel. There are two kittens, each only about ten weeks old according to their cards, and the orange one is peering up at me with big blue eyes. Its littermate is asleep in the corner, curled into a fluffy black puffball, but the tabby is ready to play. His tail twitches, and he pounces immediately when I wiggle a finger between the bars. He catches my fingertip in a far more gentle grasp than I would have imagined, then looks at me with what can only be described as pure adoration.

“Excuse me,” I say, moving my finger some more and feeling small claws dig in. Then again, louder, to get the attention of the woman, “Excuse me. Can I see this one?”

The woman comes over and flips the latch, then reaches in and comes out with a handful of fur and knives. The kitten opens its mouth in a fierce imitation of a vampire, then stretches it further as it lapses into a yawn. We spend the better part of an hour in a bright, cheerful room, just the kitten and I. At first it chases a string that I drag along the ground and runs after balls with bells in them, but then it calms down and curls up in my lap to sleep.

I’m petting it and cooing softly to it, trying to ignore the fact that Daphne and Fiona were both right about this whole thing, when the door to the room opens again.

“Oh. It’s you,” says the most beautiful man I have ever seen. My face flushes when I remember our last encounter and I pray he doesn’t remember my ignorance. (Of course he does. I didn’t know how to select a wrench. I am incapable of basic home repair and he knows it.)

“Do you two know each other?” The woman from before is back, this time holding the other kitten from the same cage, and looking between the two of us. “These kittens aren’t technically a bonded pair, but they are siblings, the only two remaining from their litter, and it would be lovely if they could still see each other.”

“Err…” the man says, shifting his weight.

“We’ve met in passing a few times now,” I say, trying to avoid encouraging this line of questioning.

“Great!” she says, clapping her hands brightly after handing the kitten off. “I’ll leave all of you to get better acquainted then!”

For a moment, there’s just awkward silence. Neither of us are looking at each other, both focusing on our respective kittens. Then, his kitten turns into the feline equivalent of a slinky, oozes out of his grasp, and runs over to tap my leg once before running away again. It hides behind his legs, and all I can see is a black tail winding around his ankles.

We both laugh, and the ice is broken.

“I’m Simon,” he says, and smiles at me. It’s the same radiant smile I remember from his lockscreen. It feels like looking into the sun, and I bask in it.

“Basil. Although my friends call me Baz.”

“Are you going to…” he trails off, but gestures to my cat.

“Yes,” I look down and give it a scratch under the chin. “I’m going to adopt it.”

“Same here,” Simon says, and then he blushes. “I mean, unless it rips my face off in the next few minutes, but I think this is the one.”

“Do you know which one you have?” Their names and genders were on the cage, but it didn’t specify who was who.

“No idea. I’m going to rename mine anyway though, I didn’t like either of those names.”

“I was planning on doing the same thing. If I’m going to have a pet, it needs to have a proper name befitting its personality. Not something mundane like Fluffy.” I scowl, and he laughs.

As his kitten comes over to touch its nose to my kitten, Simon clears his throat.

“So, um, like she said, they’d probably be happy to have playdates or whatever. I mean, since we’re getting them. And since we keep running into each other. It might make sense to, you know, exchange numbers?”

“Yes!” I say, far too eagerly. “I mean, that seems reasonable. It would be more convenient than waiting to happen upon you in the Waitrose choosing inferior crisps to set up a future meeting.”

He smiles. “Well, yeah, there’s that. And this way, it’ll be easier for me to ask you out, ”

Then the absolute nightmare sits down beside me and hands me his phone. He texts me immediately once I enter my contact info.

Unknown Number (11:27 AM) This is Simon Snow

Unknown Number (11:27 AM) Your cat is cute.

Unknown Number (11:27 AM) So are you

Unknown Number (11:28 AM) Wanna get dinner sometime? ;)

I blush, and send him a reply.

Baz (11:29 AM) I thought you’d never ask.

[theoriginalladya]

Kiss prompts: Under the stars/power for rydenko ;)

from this list

on AO3 here

Well, it took me almost four months, but I finally got this one sorted out! :D  Hope you enjoy it, m’dear!  They sort of surprised me with the way it worked out! lol

Setting:  Sulphur Springs, Kadara in Andromeda, Scott Ryder, Kaidan Alenko, Rydenko

~~~

Scott secures the flap on his pack and tosses it into the back of the Nomad just as Kaidan exits their rooms at Ditaeon.  Nice thing being a part of the Pathfinder team; they’ve got a private suite they can use whenever the Tempest is docked.  It’s definitely better than having Drack’s snoring shake the bed frame all night-cycle long.

“Ready to go?”

Scott steps to the side and gestures for Kaidan to enter the vehicle.  Voice dropping slightly and with a teasing wink, he nods.  “After you, Pathfinder.”  

Kaidan hesitates already half inside the vehicle and tosses a look of suspicion in Scott’s direction.  Scott struggles to bite back a laugh and a grin, and somehow manages to maintain an innocent look before climbing inside after him.  

Once secured and while mentally going over Vetra’s directions, Scott turns the Nomad out in the direction of Sulphur Springs.  Their destination isn’t far, and once they arrive it’s just a matter of maneuvering the vehicle up the right ridge until they reach the top.  He isn’t used to approaching from this direction, thus the necessity of Vetra’s directions, but Kaidan, thankfully, remains silent throughout the trip allowing him to focus.  Scott is nervous enough.  Handling a bunch of questions on top of that would be too much.

Finally, he pulls to a stop and takes a moment to stare out the virtual windows.  It’s difficult to see much with the darkness out there, but really, he’s only buying himself a minute or two to settle.  

Nothing’s gonna happen if you don’t move, he reminds himself and reaches for his safety harness, tossing it aside as he announces, “Well, we’re here!”  

Kaidan gives him a raised eyebrow, but is still silent.  No comment, no question.  Scott isn’t sure what to make of that, and cannot help it when his nerves kick into even higher gear.  Somehow, even though he stumbles his way to the hatch, he maintains his balance. After opening the door, he grabs the pack from behind the seat and slips outside to wait.  With the sun fully set and the skies overhead well on their way to full darkness, he finds unexpected reassurance in the sight.  

A sound behind him pulls him back, and he turns to find Kaidan standing behind him.  “Right,” he huffs softly, forcing a smile that he hopes looks genuine.  “Over this way.”

The spot he wants is less than a hundred feet away, still part of the relatively level mesa-like outcropping.  Scott pulls a blanket out of the pack and lays it out on the ground, then takes a seat and pats the space next to him.  Kaidan doesn’t hesitate, but it’s impossible to miss the skepticism in his expression.  “Just… thought it might be nice to get away and relax for a little while,” Scott explains. “You okay with that?”

Settling next to him, Kaidan replies, “If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t have let you drag me all the way out here.”

Scott chuckles.  “Fair enough.”

“So, what are we here for?”  

A soft snicker escapes before Scott can stop it.  “You make it sound like Kandros is locking us up or something,” he jokes.  “Don’t like the out of doors?”

“I’m not saying that.”  There is a hint of darkness in his cheeks, and for just a second, Scott wonders if he’s embarrassed him.  “It’s just… Guess it’s been a while since I took a moment to just sit and relax.”  He rubs his hand over the back of his neck.  “And I do like the out of doors,” he adds, glancing over at Scott.  “My Dad and I used to go camping up in the mountains near our home when I was a kid.”

“Sounds like fun,” Scott muses.  Reclining back until his arms rest on the ground, he stares up at the starry sky.  “I never got the chance to do stuff like that.  Sara and I grew up on the Citadel.  By the time Mom and Dad moved back to Earth, we were on our own and enlisting with the Alliance.”  He sighs. “They look so different than back home.”

Kaidan nods as he leans back to mimic Scott’s stance.  “Andromeda is definitely… different, I’ll give it that much.”

“You think?” Scott can’t help but tease.  “What gave it away?  The bone-armored alien race bent on our destruction?  Or, the dark energy cloud that wants to kill us and every single planet we wanted to colonize?  My bet’s on the alien race, in case you’re wondering.”

Kaidan huffs and bumps his shoulder into Scott’s, but a laugh quickly follows.  “You are so irreverent.”

Scott’s reply is just as quick and, at least he thinks, witty.  “I think you mean irrelevant.”

There is a long moment of silence in which Kaidan shifts just enough to face him.  Scott stares up at the sky, unwilling to face him just yet.  What he expects is a dressing-down for his self-deprecating sense of humor.  What he receives, however, is nothing less than perfection as Kaidan leans over, slides his hand behind Scott’s head until his fingers thread through his hair, and pulls him in for a very thorough, very intense meeting of their lips.  A kiss of which Scott hasn’t experienced in over six hundred years.  Heat and fire burn through him leaving him numb, and he cannot stop a soft whimper of delight as it escapes his lips.

When Kaidan breaks the contact sometime later – Scott’s brain is so scrambled he can’t even make a guess at how much time has passed, in all honesty – he pulls back only enough so they can get a clear look at one another.  As usual, Kaidan’s face is neutral, not quite expressionless but difficult to fathom.  Scott, well…  He is well aware of his downfalls, and has no doubt the man can read him perfectly in the moment.  Greedily sucking in air, he prepares for the chastisement…

… and instead, finds himself absolutely stunned.  “Never irrelevant,” Kaidan insists, his voice at least an octave lower than his usual rumbly, gravely, incredibly sexy tone.

Scott blinks and has to swallow twice before he rasps out, “O-okay…”

Kaidan lies back on the blanket, tugging Scott to him.  It never crosses Scott’s mind to refuse as he ends up lying next to him, Kaidan’s arm wrapped around him.  It’s strange, yet not at the same time.  The only other time they’ve ever laid this close to one another on purpose was back in the Milky Way.  Scott thought it a fluke then, a one-time thing that never stood an ice cube’s chance in hell of surviving.  But after arriving in Andromeda and discovering Kaidan made the journey as well, Scott hoped they might be able to rekindle what they once had.

It seems like they have.  It’s a dream come true, to be sure, but also sobering at the same time. So, of course, Scott falls back to his usual snarky side to find his way through the moment.  “Soooo, irreverent, is it?”

Kaidan laughs, his chest moving up and down and Scott’s head following the motion as he lies there.  “Why do I get the feeling that’s going to haunt me from now on?”

Reaching over with his hand, Scott laces his fingers through Kaidan’s other hand and pulls it up to lie on his chest.  Kaidan doesn’t pull away.  “Oh, I don’t know…  Maybe because you know me?”  He tilts his head up, smirk in place, and meets his gaze with a twinkle of delight in his.  

“That I do,” Kaidan replies, tightening his hold on Scott’s hand.  “That I most certainly do.”

[set-phasers-to-whump]

dust & glass

prompt: explosion

whumpee: nick burkhardt

fandom: grimm

hi! this fic is for @do-androids-dream-ao3acc​ who requested a fic with an explosion and a character of my choice. i hope you enjoy, and sorry it took a hot second lol :)

“Hey, wait for me!” Hank calls, as Nick pulls open the door into one of the abandoned offices. Nick steps back a second, looking to where his partner is hurrying around a corner, and waves him along.

“Come on, Hank,” he shouts. “Let’s get moving!”

“Hey, come on, man!” Hank yells back, indignant. Nick grins at him and pulls the door open wider. 

Click. 

What was that? Nick wonders, looking around. It hadn’t sounded like a gun, but…

Suddenly he’s being thrown backwards, or pushed, really, by the force of an explosion from just behind the door. He feels himself get tossed through the air, feels shrapnel dig into his skin, feels the intense heat of the blast, tastes smoke and dust, smells something burning and underneath that, something that smells like gunpowder. 

For a second afterwards, he simply lies on the ground, stunned, unable to do anything beyond breathe raggedly. Alarms are going off in his head, screaming danger, but his body hurts too much to do anything in reaction. 

He tries to think, and comes up empty. Then he hears someone call his name, and his brain finally starts working again. It’s Hank.

Nick struggles to his feet, ears ringing and eyes blurring from the dust. He’s insanely dizzy and barely strong enough to stand on his own, let alone move. Nonetheless, he tries to take a step, looking around at his blurry surroundings for any sign of his partner.

Hank grabs onto him before he can fall over as he attempts to start walking. His grip is strong but gentle against the cuts and bruises that litter Nick’s arms, and Nick thinks for a second about simply relaxing into Hank’s embrace, giving his battered body a rest, but he can’t let himself do that. 

He pulls away instead, stubbornly refusing the help. “‘M fine,” he says, and even to his own ears it sounds like the least convincing thing in the world. 

“You sure about that?”

He nods very slightly, making his head spin anyway. 

“So if I just walk on out of here, you’ll follow behind me? No problem?”

“Yeah,” Nick says this time, not feeling like making himself dizzy again by nodding. 

“Okay,” Hank agrees, and he turns to walk away. He gets all of ten steps before he’s turning back around. 

“Okay, Nick, clearly you’re not okay. I was giving you the chance to tell me that, but if you’re gonna be stubborn about it then I’m gonna be stubborn about making sure you’re actually fine.”

As he says this, Hank walks closer to Nick, until he’s standing directly in front of him. Nick wonders what he’s seeing as Hank looks him up and down. Nothing good, surely. He’s bleeding from somewhere, he’s pretty sure. From multiple places, really, courtesy of all the shrapnel, but he can feel a spot on his torso that’s wetter than anywhere else. 

The more he thinks about that particular injury, the more he can feel it, stabbing and sharp and uncomfortably warm. He thinks the blood loss might be getting to him a bit, as he feels his legs momentarily give out beneath him. He makes a quickly aborted attempt to sit down, and is about to collapse when he feels Hank’s arms wrap around his shoulders and guide him to the floor. 

“What was that about being fine?” he asks, and Nick feels him gently touching the area around the wound in his torso, closing his own eyes so he doesn’t have to see it. 

Nick shrugs halfheartedly, regretting the action when it causes an uncomfortable pull throughout his entire upper body. “‘S not that bad,” he mutters. They both know full well he’s had worse. 

“You were caught in a damn explosion, Nick. Of course it’s that bad.” Hank’s familiar tone sounds equal parts concerned and exasperated. “I’m calling 911.”

“Hank…”

“Don’t you try and stop me. I know you’re not looking at it, and that’s probably a good idea, but you’ve got a big piece of glass sticking out of you, and I know you can feel it. You’re going to the hospital.”

A big piece of glass...Nick assumes that’s the thing causing the bulk of his bleeding. He kind of wants to look to make sure, but at the moment his closed eyes are holding back some of the dizziness and he really doesn’t want it coming back, so he decides to believe what Hank and his own other senses are telling him. There’s a large piece of glass in him. Probably some smaller ones too, he figures, given the general nature of explosions. Maybe there’s some metal mixed in there as well. He doesn’t need to see it. Doesn’t really want to, either.

“Don’t go falling asleep on me,” Hank warns, and he taps Nick’s cheek. 

“Not falling asleep,” Nick assures him. “Just not lookin’.”

“Yeah, that’s...probably a good idea,” Hank agrees, which definitely doesn’t make Nick feel any better. “Ambulance is ten minutes out,” he adds, and Nick finds himself momentarily surprised - when had Hank called 911? Had he been too out of it to notice? That thought scares him more than he’d like to admit. If he can’t count on his own senses, his own powers of detection, when he’s been mildly hurt, what kind of grimm is he? What kind of cop?

“Hey, hey, breathe, man. You’re gonna be okay,” Hank says, drawing Nick’s attention away from his momentary panic.

Is he going to be okay, though? A part of Nick wants to ask this of Hank, but a larger part of him tells him to stop. If Hank says he’s going to be okay, he has absolutely no reason to think otherwise. He tries to remind himself of that fact and attempts to take a deep breath to calm down, which catches in his throat and makes him cough in the dusty air. The sensation burns its way through his entire upper body, and when it finally dies down he’s left feeling fairly exhausted, tears dripping down his face from the exertion (and definitely just from the exertion. Not from pain or fear or anything else of that nature). 

“How much longer?” he asks, or rather wheezes, to Hank. He coughs again, tasting the dust in the back of his throat. 

“Seven minutes,” Hank says. “Do you wanna try and get out of here? Breathing in this dust isn’t doing either of us any favors.”

“You...good?” Nick asks, at the mention of the two of them, mentally kicking himself for not asking sooner. If something had happened to Hank...if he was ignoring it in favor of helping Nick…

“No, I’m fine,” Hank assures him. “A little dusty and sore, is all. You’re the one who needs worrying about.”

As much as he hates to agree, Hank has a point. While this isn’t the most severe bleed Nick has ever experienced, it’s definitely up there, and he can feel himself starting to go a bit lightheaded with the blood loss. Besides that, his lungs feel like they’re on fire and the hundreds of tiny cuts all over his body sting in the dusty air. He’d like very much to get out of here. 

As though he’s read his mind, Hank says, “let’s go, yeah? I can see a path outside, and then at least you can breathe a little easier while we wait.”

Rather than reply, Nick simply acts, pushing his palms into the ground and trying to stand. Bits of glass and rock and metal and who knows what else dig into the already-cut skin and make his hands ache, and he barely gets to his knees before the dizziness returns and nearly sends him face-planting into the ground. 

Hank catches him before that happens, again, and hauls Nick to his feet, not saying a word as Nick wraps a shaking arm around him to keep his balance. He waits a moment for Nick to get situated, then says, “might be a good idea to open your eyes.”

Nick forces his eyes open, blinking rapidly in the dust, squinting to see around the spots caused by dizziness. He looks at Hank and follows his eyes to what, sure enough, appears to be a relatively easy path out of the wreckage.

“Think you can walk?” Hank asks, and Nick imagines he doesn’t have much of a choice, so he takes a step. 

Hank follows suit, his arm never leaving Nick’s shoulders. They stumble several times, and twice Nick nearly collapses, and by the time they get outside of the ruined building they’re both sweaty and exhausted and sore. They sink down side-by-side onto a patch of unharmed grass, breathing hard. 

“Three minutes,” Hank says, and Nick thinks he’s never been so glad to hear an estimate of time in his whole life. He lets himself sink into Hank again, feeling Hank’s arm return to its position around his shoulders. Nick rests his head against the front of Hank’s shoulder and tries his best to breathe and stay awake as they wait for help to arrive.

thanks for reading this!!! nick is ok dont worry lol i just didnt wanna do Another hospital scene i am tired of those atm...anyway i hope you enjoyed! and relating to all this like i said in a previous post i just got back from the pnw mostly portland and i have a bit of grimm related stuff i can share if anyone wants! but yeah lmk :) 

[starlightbuck]

20 for the meet cute prompts 👀👀👀

20. You walk out of a dressing room asking if the outfit suits you, but it’s not your friend waiting outside the room like you thought. 

the way you look tonight || read on AO3

“Why are you walking so fast?”

Chim darts an unimpressed glance over his shoulder. “Because I’m a man on a mission. Now hurry up, Buckley.”

Buck picks up speed, trying to understand how it is that he’s struggling to keep up. His legs are longer than Chim’s, so shouldn’t he be the one setting the pace for the two of them? Not vice versa?

“If I walk quicker, will you finally tell me where we’re going?”

Chim had showed up at Buck’s apartment less than an hour ago and all but dragged Buck out the door without any explanation. Buck had gone willingly, mostly because he was bored and didn’t have any other plans for the day. That hadn’t stopped him from wondering what destination Chim had in mind for them.

He had asked where they were going once they got into the car. His question was met with silence so Buck decided to ask a second time. That time, Chim just raised the volume all the way up on the radio. Buck caught the hint and didn’t ask again.

“If you walk quicker, you’ll find out on your own.” Buck, having not yet caught up to Chim, sticks his tongue out at the back of his head. “Very mature, Buck.”

That stops Buck in his tracks. “How did you see that?”

“I didn’t. I just know how immature you are.”

They continue walking at an almost grueling pace until finally, Chim slows down. It’s such a relief to Buck that he doesn’t even acknowledge their surroundings until Chim is pulling a glass door open and gesturing for Buck to walk in. He does so immediately, drawn in by the cool air conditioning that directly contrasts the overbearing Los Angeles heat.

It’s once Buck steps foot inside the store that he realizes where he is and promptly does an about face.

“Uh uh.” Chim blocks Buck’s escape route, standing in front of the door with his hands on his hips. “You’re not going anywhere until you find yourself a new suit.”

It’s the same thing Maddie has been telling Buck for months now, apparently unhappy with the perfectly good suit he has hanging up in his closet. He doesn’t understand why she’s so adamant about him not wearing it. It cost him a fair amount of money and he knows he looks good in it. Why would he waste his time and money buying a new one?

He’s about to say as much to Chim, but is cut off by a wave of Chim’s hand.

“And don’t tell me you already have a suit. Maddie has deemed it unsuitable and what she says goes.”

“Doing my sister’s dirty work now, huh?”

Chim’s expression doesn’t waver, lips set in a straight line as he takes a couple of steps towards Buck. “Yes I am because she’s carrying our unborn child and I love her.”

Buck can’t say he was expecting that response and it works to disarm him long enough for Chim to grab his forearm and march the two of them to the front of the store.

“Didn’t take you for a romantic, Chim.”

Chim doesn’t rise to the bait like Buck’s hoping he will. Instead, his future brother-in-law sets his sights on one of the store’s employees and lets her know that they’re on a quest for a new suit for Buck. She is very efficient, taking Buck’s measurements and then leading him over to the first rack of suits to get a feel for what styles he prefers. Once that has been accomplished, she guides Buck to a fitting room and lets him know that she’ll be back with a few options for him to try.

“I can’t believe you betrayed me like this,” Buck whines through the curtain as he buttons up a burgundy long-sleeve top and slides on the black suit jacket.

“This isn’t so bad.”

Buck pushes the curtain aside so he can show Chim the fourth suit combination he’s changed into. “That’s easy for you to say,” he grumbles. While Buck’s been forced to change in and out of suits like some kind of Ken doll, Chim has been lounging in a comfortable armchair with a cold water bottle one of the employees brought out for him.

“I don’t think that’s the one either.”

“Why not?”

Chim shrugs, not even bothering to hide his smirk. “Just doesn’t seem right. Let’s see the next one.”

Buck clenches his fist and stomps right back into the fitting room before he can say something that might be used against him in the future. This is exactly why Buck refused to go suit shopping when Maddie brought it up, but at least she would’ve been a better shopping companion. She would’ve actually offered constructive criticism whereas Chim is just turning down everything Buck has tried on. Buck can’t tell if Chim is doing it out of spite or if he genuinely hasn’t liked anything Buck has tried on so far.

The final suit left to try on is olive green and definitely not something Buck would’ve chosen for himself. It’s why he left the option for last, hoping that any of the other suits he tried on would’ve been a winner. He changes slowly, knowing that once this suit is rejected, he’ll have to wait all over again for the same employee as before to pick another round of things for him to try on.

“Alright, here’s the last one,” Buck announces, not bothering to look in the mirror before stepping back out to face Chim. He fiddles with the cuff link, waiting for Chim’s opinion. “What do you think?”

“I think you look very handsome.”

Buck startles at the sound of a voice that definitely doesn’t belong to Chim. His suspicions are confirmed when he looks up and finds a young boy with sandy hair and glasses in the chair that Chim was sitting on only moments earlier. “You’re not Chim.”

“No, I’m Chris,” he answers with a toothy grin. The kid, Chris, is far cuter than he has any right to be. Buck finds himself smiling for the first time since stepping foot inside of the store. “That’s a nice color.”

“You think so?”

Chris nods emphatically, glasses tipping precariously on the tip of his nose when he does. He pushes them back into place and gives Buck a once-over. “It’s different, but I like it. Can you spin?”

“Spin?”

“Yeah, you know. Spin.” Chris twirls his finger around in the air to show Buck what he means. “Abuela says you have to look at an outfit from every angle to make sure it looks good.”

Well if that’s what Abuela says, who is Buck to argue?

“Make sure to do it slowly so I can see you,” Chris instructs and Buck does just that, taking his time as he walks in a small circle. He does it twice, moving his arms around during his second spin to see how the suit feels when movements are involved.

He’s just about to face Chris again to receive the child’s final verdict on the suit when Buck sees his reflection in the mirror.

I don’t hate it is the first thought that comes to mind. This might be the one is his second thought.

“Does it look good from every angle, Chris?”

Buck turns back around and almost chokes on his saliva.

Chris is still sitting in the armchair but he’s not alone anymore. There’s a man, an extremely attractive one, standing beside Chris with a collection of suits slung over his arm and amusement shining in his brown eyes.

They’re really nice eyes.

Attached to an even nicer face.

“It looks very good,” Chris answers solemnly, completely unaware of the tailspin Buck’s mind has just been launched into. What does it say about Buck that this kid is able to concentrate on the task at hand while Buck has been sidetracked by someone’s presence? “Daddy, what do you think?”

And oh. If Buck thought having this man stare at him was a distraction before, it’s nothing in comparison to how he feels when the man brings his free hand up to stroke the scruff that covers his chin. It’s a contemplative look that has Buck’s heart doing a backflip or cannonball or something else ridiculous and unbecoming of someone of his age.

So not only has Buck’s brain short-circuited, but his heart has as well.

Traitors.

“It’s a good look,” the brunette finally decides. The words shouldn’t hold anywhere near as much weight as they do. “Definitely a top contender in my opinion.”

Buck is not blushing, he’s not.

Maybe if he tells himself that enough times, it’ll eradicate the tinge of pink that he knows has stained his cheeks.

“Does that mean you’re gonna buy it?” Chris’s question breaks Buck out of his stupor. “Because I think you should.”

Chris’s dad raises his hand. “I second that statement.”

“And I third that statement,” Chim says, appearing out of nowhere wearing a smile that always spells trouble for Buck. Of course he’d choose now to show up again. “Who are your friends, Buck?”

“I’m Chris!” He holds his hand out for Chim to shake. “And this is my dad.”

“Eddie,” his father supplies, also taking a second to shake Chim’s hand.

“Buck was looking for you before.” Chris explains and Buck is glad that the kid is explaining the situation because Buck doesn’t think he would’ve been able to. “But don’t worry. I helped him and told him how handsome he looks.”

Buck doesn’t have to look at Chim to know that he’s withholding his laughter. “Oh you did, did you?”

Is it wrong of Buck to wish that a black hole will appear and swallow him whole? It’s probably dramatic, but he can live with that. At least then he would be able to retain some of his reputation. He already knows that Chim, and by extension Hen, will never let him live this down.

Buck decides it’s best to cut his losses and heads into the dressing room to get changed. The curtain muffles the voices outside, but he can still hear Chim’s laughter. Buck can’t tell if this is a blessing or a curse.

By the time he exits the dressing room again, the laughter outside has subsided and Eddie is nowhere to be found. Buck swallows back his disappointment, a fact made easier by the bright smile Chris directs at him. “Buck! Are you ready to help daddy find a suit too?”

“I-uh what?”

“Help Eddie find a suit,” Chim repeats, as if the problem Buck had with that statement was that he didn’t hear it. “I told Chris that he could keep you for the afternoon so you could pay him back for helping you.”

Buck’s jaw falls open as he stares at Chim in disbelief. Buck was only gone for a few minutes, how did Chim manage to set this whole thing up that quickly?

“I’ll take these off of your hands,” Chim says, taking the suits from Buck. “You can pay me back for the suit later.”

Chim’s final sentence is accompanied by a wink that lets Buck know he’s going to be expected to pay Chim back for more than just the suit. He’s gone before Buck can so much as put up a fight and then Buck is left alone with Chris.

“I’m ready, Chris!” The low voice comes from the dressing room right beside Buck’s and he does not think about the fact that Eddie was getting changed at the same time he was. “You ready for me?”

“I am! Buck?”

Buck glances around the room, curious as to where that employee who helped him earlier is. She’s the one who supplied Chim with a water bottle earlier and something tells Buck he’s about to be very thirsty. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

[radbutsafe]

ALL FUCKIN 35 OF THEM SKLNWESDJFPXO

I SHOULDVE EXPECTED THIS FROM YOU

1. From one to five stars, how would you rate your writing? (No downplaying yourself!)

A three! I think I’m mid range cause I ain’t terrible but there is still shit I gotta improve and grow in my writing

2. Why do you write fanfiction?

to manifest what canon won’t give me and to write more! (though yes it is mainly about the smooching and the— I’ll stop there LOL)

3. What do you think makes your writing stand out from other works?

Hm! My weird research details? I’m that “fun fact, did you know...” in my fics sometimes LOL! I plan on giving a penthouse for erina in a fic and I went through penthouse listings in Japan for floor layouts and locations💀 my research gives me inspo and depth to stuff I think I lack in comparison to others sometimes.

4. Are there any writers that inspire you?

In terms of fellow fic writers, one of them I can’t name here but she’s an inspiration with her exceptional gift for prose period and her lovely skill at comedy! I want to be as funny as her when I write, I love her ironic situational humor. Other fic writers are @takoyakitenchou, @royaldragonsevgisi15 who I always love sharing ideas with and motivate me to create more! For non-fic writers it would be V.E. Schwab, Leigh Bardugo, Oda, and Horikoshi! The last two may be mangaka, however they are writers as well to create their stories! The depth these creators have given their worlds and interesting characters theyve given life to are all what I aspire to be like!

5. What’s the fic you’re most proud of?

so far uh?? hm everything I’m currently writing are wips lol!! im proud of my wip that has been nicknamed ‘soma panics’ that is a multi-chapter fic that spans like probs 20 plus chapters maybe

6. What element of writing do you find comes easily?

dialogue! it’s so much fun! and character thoughts. I’ve said to people I may be better suited for script writing

7. What element of writing do you struggle with most?

I think it’s description, of like setting and showing action. also an expansion of my vocabulary LOL

8. Which character(s) do you find easiest to write?

erina! I think it’s because canon has shown us many of her different faces and range of emotion.

9. Which character(s) do you find most difficult to write?

SOMA!! chill ass mofo whos more carefree compared to the common shonen protagonist! for other shokugeki characters I’m not sure just yet because I haven’t flexed my fingers enough for the rest of them.

10. What’s your favorite genre to write for?

I guess I should say romance cause that’s what I mostly write LOL!

11. Who or what do you find yourself writing about most?

sorina and I try to get them to smooch eventually KEK and yeah it’s..usually romantic fluff lmao

12. Tell us about a WIP you’re excited about.

HONESTLY ALL OF THEM but “soma panics” is my brain child

13. First fandom you ever wrote for?

pretty sure it’s digimon....

14. What’s your favorite fandom to write for?

currently shokugeki no soma!!!!

15. What’s the weirdest fandom you’ve ever written for?

uhhhh I guess SNS? LMAO fandoms...all have their quirks to them.

16. Any guilty pleasure trope(s)?

characters cuddling!!!! or getting the urge to smooch!!!!

17. A trope you’ll never, ever write for.

unrequited love GOOD FUCKIN BYEEEEEE

18. Wildest fic you’ve ever written?

I have plot ideas thst can be wild potentially but so far nothing fits this criteria so far that I actually have written.

19. Do you prefer canon-compliant, AUs, or something in-between?

depends on the fandom, but if written well, all of it!

20. Gen fic or shippy stuff?

shippy 100% like I said I like smoochin

21. Favorite pairing to write for? (platonic or romantic!)

romantic is...*drumroll* SORINA! platonic, soutaku and erina and alice!

22. Do you listen to anything while you write?

Sometimes! There are times songs will be on loop and times I just shuffle a playlist. and if I’m writing in random bursts it’ll be with no music but it really does depend lmao I think music is when I’m forcing myself to write?

23. Do you prefer prompts and challenges, or completely independent ideas?

completely independent ideas, I’ve realized in the past prompts shoot me in the foot often unless I luckily figure something out. but I’m often driven by my own sporadic self interest with shitty ping ponging attention

24. One-shots or multi-chaptered works?

multi-chap I guess cause I can post without being finished LOLLL but tbh can I really answer? I haven’t finished anything.....

25. Have you ever daydreamed about side adventures/spin-offs from your fic? Tell us about them!

I can’t answer this question imo because I haven’t finished a fic yet so technically stuff could all fit in the one fic?

26. Is there anything you’ve wanted to write, but you’ve been too scared to try?

MYSTERY AND CRIME! I love the genre and I have plot ideas once a blue moon but I can’t dive in because I want to make details that work and reduce plot holes where suspension of disbelief isn’t as needed. I need to study it more (I need to study all the details for any of my fics imo to be confident sometimes LOL)

27. What’s the nicest comment you’ve ever received?

I don’t think I can say one comment was the nicest because I’ve gotten comments that have given me quite the smiles to my face many times! I know this is a cop out but it’s true!

IS WHAT I WAS GONNA SAY UNTIL REINA SENT ME THE FOLLOWING ON DISCORD LIKE TWENTY MINS AGO:

and also rad. i am never this vocal about my emotions like EVER but this needs to be said your fics are obviously far from perfect, as are mine and everyone else's. but the thing about your works is that they're so well-sanded that it's impossible to find any rough edges or faults in them in terms of cohesion to a plot. your cast is never OOC and the amount of effort you devote to developing your takes on the characters as accurately as possible is unimaginably awe-inspiring.

BITCH I WANNA CRY 😭

28. How well do you handle criticism when it comes to your writing?

I’d like to believe I take it often well to try and improve because that’s always my goal. if someone is rude lol that’s not constructive snd is unhelpful. If I disagree with criticism I’ll explain why !

29. Have you ever gone outside of your comfort zone for a fic? How did it turn out?

Not yet, but I have some plot ideas I think will let me test this.

30. Tooth-rotting fluff or merciless angst?

F L U F F.

31. Do you have any OCs? Tell us about them!

elliott fuji, a japanese-american award winning photographer who is erina’s boyfriend in ‘soma panics’ which..causes soma’s panic LOL he’s 30 with slightly wavy black hair. I still haven’t pinpointed his personality just yet...he kind of humble brags for sure an artsy fucker and flirts maybe I’ll make him a lil shy though. he teaches sometimes, and becomes an adjunct photography professor in Tokyo so he can be with erina.

32. Summarize a random fic of yours in 10 words or less.

a cook is unfashionably late in realizing his feelings.

33. Is there anything you wish your audience knew about your writing or writing process?

I am a slow. so slow. motivation who is she? I also write out of order, unfortunately a bit too often.

34. Copy and paste an excerpt you’re particularly fond of.

this should be for the fic ‘soma panics’ it’s either megumi or satoshi talkin to him rn, I’m leaning towards satoshi

“You thought she would always wait for you, didn’t you Soma-kun? To always welcome you home.”

Soma drags his palms down his face and groans. He doesn’t like this at all. He doesn’t shy from confrontation but this is a whole different ballgame. Soma doesn’t play any ball.

“I guess..?” Is his reply, because he thinks he isn’t sure how to answer that.

“You guess?”

Just being questioned again is enough to crack Soma’s pathetic facade as if it was dropped chinaware and he lets out the longest sigh.

“No.”

Coming home means coming home to Nakiri Erina too.

Nakiri Erina is his forever.

this is @takoyakitenchou’s excerpt she’s most proud of that I’ve written, which is also from you guessed it, the long fic soma panics

SOMA: I am, I mean I will be, I swear I will always come home to you, not spend as much time abroad, once I’m done with work I’ll come right back. I’ll make sure to message you. Nakiri, I’m in love you with you. Maybe for a really long time. You know how I say I dedicate my food to you? My dad—my dad said that the key to become a good chef is to find someone to dedicate your cooking to. A special someone. For my dad it was my mom, you know? For me it’s...

(this is a good piece of dialogue tbh so I am also proud of this)

35. Ramble about any fic-related thing you want!

I’ve mentioned it throughout this but the WIP I’ve nicknamed ‘soma panics’ is something I’m super excited to write, but it’s going on slowly...and almost completely out of order. out of all of my writing it showed off that particular habit of mine, along with “what is this, a shoujo manga?!” though the latter is currently being written chronologically now that I’ve posted chapter one and is pretty solid in direction. it was originally supposed to be a one shot but I got impatient and wanted to post at least something for the sorina / soueri fandom.

however, because ‘soma panics’ (I won’t call it that LOL) is my baby I want to keep true to my rule of refusing to post it until I have a draft of the entire fic finished and I’m satisfied with the main points pretty much. due to my writing out of order, I’m worried I’ll change my mind about scenes or want to reflect things in earlier chapters for later ones etc etc

I joined the SnS fandom extremely late, as season five was airing. I was a fan of the manga five years ago and dropped it because I forgot to check for updates when I caught up 😔 I really want to bang out the different fics and aus for sorina that I have before the fandom fizzles out entirely but tbh I’m writing for myself, I’m manifesting what I want to see and I’ll just share it with all my friends to read if no one else will. cause I’m slow broski I dunno what writing fast even is like LMAO I do really want to write faster though, so I can contribute more and let the words free from the discord dms....

[roguesandsaviors]

What Are We?

Fandom: Marvel

Characters: Tony Stark, Reader

Pairing: Tony Stark x Female Reader

Summary: You never expected to see a one night stand at the front of the lecture hall, ready to teach a class you needed for your degree. What followed was even less expected. 

Word Count: 5,026

Rating: SFW

Warning: Alcohol mentions, one night stands

Author’s Note: This is for Meg’s 11K Follower challenge. Thanks to @thranduilsperkybutt for hosting it. The prompts were Au and trope based, which was an absolute blast. This is the second of a few fics I signed up for. I am always a sucker for the idea of Tony as something other than Iron-Man. College Professor would suit him. He has it in him to teach and he definitely enjoys nurturing young souls. Anyone who doesn’t think that can fight me. The secret relationship trope felt natural to go with the college professor AU and while it isn’t full fledged, the beginnings of it are explored here. I haven’t done a lot of reader insert fics because I find I often struggle with them. So I hope this came out okay.  I am terribly sorry that it is late after you were so generous in giving us a load of time. Not Beta-ed so all mistakes are my own.

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

You never expected to see his face again. It had been the chance of a lifetime when you were presented with tickets to the convention. It meant mingling and networking but most important, it meant being able to talk shop with others that were on your level. If you were lucky, maybe even with some of the most brilliant minds in the country. What you hadn’t anticipated but never regretted was the one night stand that came with it. Of course you had recognized the name as soon as you got there. He was giving several talks throughout the convention and they were the most highly anticipated events of the entire get together. People were lining up hours in advance to make sure that they got seats and when they were gone, a certain amount of people were allowed standing room.

You were lucky enough to get into one of them. It was only happenstance that you ran into the man afterwards and were granted permission to pick his brain. Which of course you did, soaking in every bit of knowledge that he was willing to part with. What you really hadn’t anticipated was him inviting you to drinks. Not looking a gifted horse in the mouth and not being a complete idiot, you agreed to go. One thing led to another and well, the next thing you knew, you were sneaking out of his hotel room before he had woken up. It was better that way. A little more dignified than being kicked out. Only a little.

The memories were fond and ones that you would hold onto for some time.

Back in school, the thoughts faded further and further from your mind. You were entering the final year of your degree and your nose was to the grindstone. You didn’t sit at the top of your class for nothing after all and wanted to ensure that you remained as competitive as possible for a job after graduation. When you stepped into the classroom, the second of your final fall semester, Anthony Stark was the last person that you ever expected to see.

Sure, you had known that he was lecturing. Everyone and their mother knew that. He had enough with his company and had decided that nurturing the so-called future was his real calling. You remembered him being passionate about it over the first few drinks that were shared between the two of you. There was a genuine drive to ensure that the legacy he had created was left in good hands and would continue to evolve. It had been a part of the attraction, beyond the looks and what you were told he was.

He was supposed to be across the country, lecturing at colleges on the east coast. Not out west, at your college of all places, teaching a class that you needed to be able to graduate. The only section offered. Your heart was in your throat.

Normally, you would have chosen a spot towards the front of the class. Easier to engage in discussion and all of that. This was the one instance though that had you slinking to the last row, ducking your head down, hoping desperately not to be noticed. It had meant nothing to him so why were you so bothered? You could act like nothing happened. He surely would. A one night stand at a convention and nothing more. Hell, maybe you would get lucky and he wouldn’t remember you. The thought stung but you refused to give it the time of day or examine why it bothered you. The path that would lead you down was much too dangerous.

You could let out a sigh of relief as others began to file in and fill up the seats. The hall wasn’t big but the size of the class would be even smaller. There would be nowhere to truly hide once he began the lecture and everyone got involved. You were just hoping to save a little bit of face before having to deal with that. If he did remember, it would be horribly embarrassing for him to say something about it in front of the class. He didn’t seem like that sort of man but then again, you didn’t know him. You knew about him yes but knowing him was an entirely different ballgame.

He advised you all to read the syllabus and know when the assignments were due as it wasn’t his responsibility to keep track of it for you. He didn’t give anyone the chance to really settle in or get bored as he immediately launched into his lecture. There was a difference between his lecture and the way that he had talked at the conference. He had been talking to a crowd of some peers and some students but there was an easiness about the conference talk. It was informal and almost impersonal. This? He was fully engaged and he wasn’t going easy. It was a make it or break it pace and there was no doubt that a few students wouldn’t be able to keep up with him. Even so, he made sure the material was accessible and understandable. He knew that he was talking to students but was going to demand the very best from them.

This was the sort of class that you normally thrived in. Being challenged and stimulated was the whole reason that you had gone into the field in the first place. Nanotech in biomechanics was a step above and beyond what you normally dealt with and you fully intended for it to be your capstone project the following semester. It would be tough finding some willing partners but you were determined to make it happen.

You may have wanted to go unnoticed by the professor but you couldn’t help yourself. You had to engage when questions were asked, contributing to the conversation and even throwing back some questions at him. The back and forth, even with the other students, was invigorating.

Class came to an end all too soon.

“Ms. Y/L/N, please stay behind for a minute.” You almost groaned but managed to stuff your notebook into your bag without shaking too badly. You had almost escaped. The rest of the students filtered out, a few giving you looks that you couldn't entirely read as sympathetic or jealousy. Ambling down the stairs towards the front of the hall, you fiddled with the strap of your bag. This would have been easier to handle with some liquid courage. Since there was none of that around, you were going to have to deal with it sober.

“Is there something wrong professor?”  A smirk sat on his face and that same air of confidence that he had at the convention surrounded him now. This was a man that was used to getting what he wanted.

“Hardly. Today at least. Sneaking out before some morning fun on the other hand…” You felt your face heat up. Perfect. This was not the place or the time for this but he didn’t seem the least bit bothered by it.  You were thankful that no one had lingered behind for any additional questions. Or to make passes at the man. Those would come.

His chuckle brought you back to the current situation and caused you to shift on your feet.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable or mean anything by it. A mind like yours is rather hard to forget. Couple it with a great night and well, you know how it goes.” You didn’t but you weren’t going to say that to him right now. “I just thought that it would be easier for you and I to move past it, for the sake of the class.” Move passed it, right. Like you had thought, just another one night stand. Even if he had remembered you and had just complimented you in a sort of round about way. And the way that he was looking at you.

Before you could say anything foolish, you found yourself nodding.

“Yeah, of course. I uh, this class is important for me. Not just because I need it for the degree. I wanna base my capstone project in the area.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” he hummed. “You were easily the most engaged in class. Asking the right questions. Do you think you are going to be able to get anyone else close to your level to manage that?” Apparently you thought much more alike than could have been anticipated.

“I don’t know. But I am going to do my best to get it figured out.”

“Let me know if you need any help with it. I’m sure I could weed out someone for you to work with. And if not, we will see if there is anything else we can do about that.”

“You would do that?” You couldn’t hide the surprise in your voice.

“I’m intrigued to see what you could come up with, just how far you could go with all of it. Sharpen that mind and hone in some of those skills and you could be almost as good as me. We need that in this world.” Some of the cockiness had toned down and there was a genuine note to his voice that caught you more off guard than his offer just had. If you weren't feeling shy before, you certainly were now. That was some of, if not the loftiest praise that you had ever received in your life. The man before you was an engineering genius and he just said you could be on the same level as he was. You had hoped to be half as good as him and that would have been a hell of an accomplishment.

“Thank you.” There was really nothing else to say to that. You had been stunned into silence beyond the basic courtesy that your manners dictated you give. He nodded, appearing satisfied with the response for now.

“Well, don’t let me keep you. I’m sure you have another class to run along to.” You did, of course. Your brain took a few moments to kick start properly. You nodded and mumbled an incoherent reply before quickly turning tail and getting out of there.

****************************************************** Things had felt awkward for the first few weeks of that semester. Eventually, it faded and you were able to really focus on the important tasks at hand. That meant preparing for your capstone project, even if it was not going to be started until the following semester. You wanted to have as much thought out as possible.

True to his word, Professor Stark was a wealth of knowledge and guidance as the idea was shaped into being. Nothing occurred between the two of you beyond the normal professor student relationship. There was a part of you that was disappointed with that. It was that part that you kept shoved down, hidden and locked away. You knew that there was no point in trying to entertain those sort of flights of fancy. He had made it clear what he was expecting, which was absolutely nothing to happen. You had big things that needed you undivided attention. Giving over to a fantasy, however ridiculous yet seemingly tangible it was, was not going to help you. You had worked much too hard to get to where you were and had too much riding on this. If Stark thought that you were capable of doing great things, you needed to be able to make that happen.

Almost a month into the semester, you were settled into Professor Stark’s lab. Refusing to call him Anthony or Tony made it easier for you to keep your distance. At least emotionally. Physically, it seemed that you spent the majority of all your free time either discussing potential projects in his office or with your head down in his lab.

The small grouping of friends that you had seemed to notice this and loved to point it out whenever you were able to come up for some air and the occasional drink. You couldn’t be all work and no play or you would burn yourself out before you got to your graduation.

A disgusted sound came from over in the corner, where the man in question sat grading papers.

“I don’t think there is any hope for this undergrad class coming through. They are failing to grasp the most basic concepts routinely. Why are any of them even bothering when they are all going to fail out.” He pushed forward the papers. Rarely did you hear him speak like that. It must have been bad. Or he was in a foul mood. You hesitated for a moment.

“They can’t be that bad,” you mumbled before setting aside the text that you were reading. You had been pouring over the latest papers for the past few days, gathering ideas of where the current research was to help focus your own idea. Not that you planned on doing what everyone else was doing but it would help narrow down the categories and choices.

“Here. Read it for yourself.” He motioned for you to come take one of the papers. He didn’t have any TA’s so he did all of his own grading. Having to see for yourself, you made your way over and grabbed the top paper. It didn’t take you long to figure out that he was right. The paper was horrid. Nothing about the concepts discussed were correct and the application was so far wrong that it was painful. This was someone majoring in the field but the paper made it seem like they were some arts major that just copy and pasted a shit ton of things from a textbook.

“Wow.”

“I wasn’t being over the top in the comment.”

“No, you weren’t. This, it’s,” you shook your head. “This is awful. It feels like things were just randomly copy and pasted in without any sort of thought.”

“The rest of the stack is just as bad. I don’t know if the class all signed up as a joke or if they all decided to get shit faced and do the same damn paper. Either way, what am I supposed to do with this? And with them?” He stood up and grabbed for his jacket. “I don’t know about you, but I need a drink.” Was it the smartest idea? No it wasn’t. But you had been holed up for four days working through papers towards the idea that was so close to taking a proper shape. You hadn’t wanted to let it go. A drink was probably just what you needed to reset and give yourself some time to recharge.

“You know what? That actually sounds like a good idea.” In reality, it was a terrible one. That was how the two of you had ended up in bed the first time around. It was a risk that you understood in that moment and didn’t care about.

“Good. You’ve been in here almost more than me. Don’t need to turn you into a recluse just yet. Said you could be like me. Not that you had to be me,” he teased. You rolled your eyes at the comment.

“Great minds and all that jazz right?” you shot back with a grin as you slid passed, though mentally cursing yourself for falling into the banter. There was a level of comfort that had to be achieved, that was there just for the sake of being able to work together. Sharing ideas and having him challenge you mentally meant that it couldn’t be all business and strict. It didn’t go with his personality at all. It would make it too stiff and too difficult to manage.

The bar wasn’t too far from campus, though not frequently by too many students. It meant that you two weren’t bombarded by familiar faces when you entered. The atmosphere was quiet and welcomed. The place was filled with what were likely regulars, those that wanted to escape the crowded bars of a college town. He motioned towards a booth in the back of the bar and you nodded, understanding what he was saying without him having to say it.

He brought two beers over just as you settled into the seat. Generic enough. It wouldn’t be unheard of for a graduate student and professor to head out and share a drink or two. No one would question or think it odd. Not that there was anything odd going on. The thought pushed to the forefront of your mind and you were thankful for it. It reminded you that nothing was going to happen and nothing could happen. This was just a drink between, well friends and colleagues would be the best fitting terms.

There was a silence that stretched between the two of you. It wasn’t awkward and there wasn’t a need to fill it for the time being as you both just sipped your beers and relaxed. He was away from grading those awful papers and you were getting a reprieve from the hole that you were seemingly digging yourself into.

“I’m thinking that you are going to have to work on the capstone by yourself at this point. You are already putting in more hours into it than I am sure others will for the entire project. At this point, I don’t think that anyone is going to be able to follow what you are onto. That being said, I am willing to offer myself as an advisor for it and push back against the board if they take any issue with it.” The offer had not been fully fleshed out the last time it was brought up. It had merely been a suggestion at best. Now it was being laid out in front of you.

You set your beer down out of fear of spilling it and somehow making a fool of yourself.

“You’re serious?”

“Wouldn’t joke about something like that. But I think you know that by now.” He was right about that. He could brush off a lot of things and make them seem trivial but not something like this. He understood what it meant. He leveled you with a look that meant he wanted a proper answer. Right then and there, you had to make your decision.

“Okay,” you agreed. “I know it’s what I want to do and the only way that it is going to happen.” You watched a smile appear across his face, different from the smirk that he usually wore. It was genuine and caught you a bit off guard but you hid that behind a quick drink.

“Good. I know it’s going to take the rest of the semester for you to refine the idea of yours so I won’t bother asking about it just yet. Or tell you to stop working on it now that you know you aren’t going to have to convince others that it’s a good idea. You won’t anyway.” He wasn’t wrong and a sheepish smile came to your face.

“You’re right.”

“I know.” That brought a laugh out of you. You shook your head and took another healthy sip from your glass. “Guess that settles the elephant in the room then. You can at least stop worrying about it.” He relaxed back in his seat, his shoulders dropping a bit. It wasn’t often you saw him actually relax like that, where he didn’t have something to focus on or the next thing to jump immediately to. You imagined that you had been the same way though since the semester had started.

“Any plans for the weekend?” An innocent enough question.

“More work. There was a concert this weekend that my friends were all heading to but I wasn’t fond of the artist so I really don’t have much else to focus on.” His head cocked to the side ever so slightly.

“You might actually rival me Y/N,” he laughed behind his glass. “You are going to work yourself into the ground. I am going to lock the lab. You need a weekend off.”

“Coming from the man that doesn’t know the meaning of the words day off?” you challenged right back.

“Maybe when I was younger. I have gotten better about it in recent years,” he hummed softly. “And that’s a lesson you are going to learn early on if I can do anything about it. There’s a difference between working through a break through and burning yourself out. You have other classes that I know you need to focus on. Which isn’t the point of taking the weekend off mind you. Take a trip out of the city or something. That’s something that’s still done right?”

It was your turn to laugh. You could understand the sentiment behind it though. Your friends had been urging the same thing. It was just hard to pull yourself away when you were close to finally getting the idea to where it needed to be. It was in your grasp and you didn’t want it slipping away.

“You realize that I could still go to the library or just work in my dorm.”

“I did plan for that.” Your brow furrowed when that was the response. Planned for that? You had no idea what that meant. “You are taking the weekend off or the lab is off limits to you completely next week. I’ll have it locked up and maybe even take a week off myself. I can get someone else to proctor the testing that I have for all the classes.” For a moment, you thought that it could be a bluff. A whole week away? It didn’t seem like something that he would do but that damned smirk of his was taunting. He seemed serious as he cocked a brow in challenge. You weren’t sure that you were willing to call him on such a thing. A week outside of the lab and wouldn’t him to bounce ideas off of could really put a monkey wrench into your plans. It was a good damn threat and he knew it. Your shoulders fell and you had to admit your defeat. There was no way that you were going to risk that happening.

“All right. I’ll take the weekend off.” Though you had no idea what you were going to do for it. With all of your friends away, you were really on your own. You had just promised not to work so you were going to have to figure out what you were going to do. The man across from you looked like the cat that caught the canary and you rolled up a napkin and threw it at him. “You don’t have to look so damn smug about it.”

“Course I do. I got what I wanted and now we can move on. I’m going to get us some more beer. Unless you wanted something different?” He was on his feet but had paused at the side of the booth. There was a moment that you really debated what was a good idea and what wasn’t. If you couldn’t work then it meant that you didn’t have to be up early. If you didn’t have to be up early, then  you could afford to drink a little more than usual. You had already taken the risk in coming out with him to the bar so what was a little more?

“Yeah, some vodka.”

“Coming right up.” It wasn’t like you planned on getting drunk with the man. That had happened once already and while you wouldn’t ever mind a repeat of that night, it couldn’t happen.

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

The weekend off had been exactly what you needed to recharge and reset. The drinks and the relaxed company had helped. You had made it back to campus before parting that night. No funny business happened, even if your subconscious tortured you about it later that evening. The drinks had become a part of your regular routine. Every other weekend, on Friday, the two of you would leave the lab and head to the bar. A couple drinks, some jokes and banter exchanged, and a walk back before separating. You would take the weekend off, or at least put some focus on your other classes. They were all a breeze for you at this point so it wasn’t like you had to dedicate too much brain power to them. Just enough to get good marks and move on.

Another Friday night had rolled around and the routine was maintained. You hadn’t been in the lab for once, choosing to settle into the library and work on one of the whiteboards there. The alarm on your phone went off though and you knew that you had to wrap it up. It wasn’t like the two of you had talked about where you would meet up. It had just been happening since you had been spending so much time in the lab with him. So you assumed that it would be the same as it was every other weekend.  

After you lifted your bag to your shoulder, you slowly made your way to the edge of campus, staying mindful of your surroundings. If he didn’t join you by the time you had made your way to the bar, you decided that you would turn around and head back to the library. There were still a few things that needed to be worked out on your paper for another class before you turned it in in four days.

You made it to the bar just in time to hear your name called.

“Y/N!” He sounded happy. You pushed off the feeling that came with it. “I thought you might have flaked out on me since you weren’t at the lab.” You gave him a smile.

“I know better than to call your bluff. I know that your threat still stands.”

“At least someone understands the value of a good threat still.” The bar was filled with faces that were now somewhat familiar. You didn’t know names, not talking to anyone beside Tony here. That barrier had fallen after the second visit to the bar. It just didn’t fit to keep calling him by his formal title while the two of you were drinking together.

“Well, it holds enough weight and consequence that it holds value. You just have to know how to properly threaten someone these days.” You moved to the booth that you always occupied while he grabbed the beers that you started the evening off with.

********* The pounding in your head was the first thing you noticed. The sunlight creeping in through the blinds didn’t help the situation at all. You reached up to grab the pillow and pull it over your face only to realize that your arm was a bit pinned to your side. In fact, you weren’t able to move at all. You opened your eyes, groaning at the action as light assaulted you, to realize that you weren’t in your room at all. It looked unfamiliar. Then, it registered that there was a warm body beside yours and an arm around your waist was keeping your own arm pinned down to your side. Things weren’t adding up  to equal out to anything good at the moment. You tried not to let any panic make the headache worse but you had to get up.

“Stop wriggling so much.” The voice was muffled but unmistakable. That was definitely Tony. You should have never agreed to go out for drinks with him. You had no clue what you were going to do now. It changed things once again. It wasn’t like you could both just go and forget about it. He was supposed to be your advisor next month. You were going to have to spend a lot more time with him than you already were. This whole mess complicated that beyond belief.

“Tony, I have to get up.”

“No you don’t. You have to go back to sleep.” You thought that maybe he had just done that when there was a pause. “You have one hell of a hangover and so do I. It’s early on a Saturday, the sort of early that no one should be awake unless they stayed up all night to see it. So go back to sleep, stop worrying.” That was easy for him to say. Stop worrying? How the hell were you supposed to do something like that when you had just slept with your professor and soon to be advisor? You may not have remembered much of what happened after deciding to leave the bar but it was more than obvious given the warmth of his skin against your abdomen that you were lacking more clothes than what would be proper.

“I’m not going back to sleep. I have to get up.” The unspoken leave was there.

“Not letting you go this time.” You didn’t understand that. He was the one who recommended keeping things a strict professor student relationship. He was the one who brought up putting the one night stand beyond you and acting like it never happened. Now he wanted to flip the script? That was not fair and a shot that he couldn’t just call like that.

“Let go.” It was a demand, clear and simple as you shifted and grabbed his arm to pull it off of you. “I’m leaving Tony. And that’s that.”

“Y/N.” His voice was softer and much more awake than it had been before. “Sweetheart, turn over and look at me.” You didn’t want to. There had been enough risks taken and it landed you here in his bed. Again. Only this time, you couldn’t escape. He huffed behind you before shifting himself, pulling you onto your back so you didn’t have a choice. You were forced to look up at him as he hovered over you. Nothing was said as he looked down, almost to the point that it became uncomfortable. That was when he leaned in and kissed you.

[hecohansen31]

Hello love, I’d love to request a part two to the escort lady!reader Alfred imagine with the prompts 39, 109 and 5. Thank you so much and have fun writing!! 💕

WARNINGS: Mention of Oral Sex (Female Receiving), Slight Slut-Shaming, Exposing, General Angst.

“You taste like fucking candy” Alfred commented softly, as he kept on licking between your legs, and you gripped tight on his short hair.

That awful moustache of his making your thighs redden as it brushed against your tender skin when he continued on going down on you.

And you were close to reaching the stars, thanks to his gentle demonstration of affection.

Alfred was quite the generous lover, you had discovered.

And not only in the bedroom.

But you didn’t truly care about the money he’d dote on you.

You cared about the way he wouldn’t hesitate to listen to your rants, after your boiling nights together.

How he’d just adoringly look at you.

How annoyed he’d be by the fact that you had been belittled by somebody in your newest work.

He had tried to get you to let him handle the entire work prospect.

He had his own sources and might set you up somewhere that’d be truly fitting for you, instead of being a ‘coffee-bringer’ intern for ten hours a day.

But you had refused his help.

You already felt too guilty at the sole thought of accepting his money, for your time, although you insisted he didn’t need to do it anymore, since you didn’t work anymore for the agency and your appointment were all set up by you.

It had turned to being into something more than a simple agreement.

You honestly had wanted to get to know Alfred after the disastrous family event.

But at the same time you also knew better than to hope that a client like Alfred, with everything in his pockets, would fall in love with you, an ex-escort with too many problems and a reputation that was in pieces, almost as if you were a disgraced courtesan.

You should have broken the relationship, after your first encounter with Alfred had ended.

He had been staring at you from his comfortable bed, hazed by the amazing sex you had had, as you got in your change of clothes, having to go back home before it was too late, and he had persuaded softly with those rosy lips that had been on yours..

‘Stay please’.

And you had stayed with him, dangerously tiptoeing the line of professional and not.

You had thought at first that what you felt for Alfred was simple interest and a good sexual chemistry, but with time you had felt yourself slowly falling for him.

Which wasn’t a good thing.

Because he probably didn’t feel the same.

You were simply somebody who might get him and was nice for a night sex.

Whenever you focused on it, it just brought you down, ruining the few moments you stole from Alfred.

So, you always said yourself, you’d quit it, after one last night.

But you never did.

“… Gosh, I am so close” you murmured, throwing your head back on the pillow, as you comfortably adjusted, meanwhile you felt pleasure becoming stronger and stronger till it reached the faithful…

… and then Alfred’s phone rang.

You grimaced at the awful sound, and Alfred did the same and you felt it on your core, but he ignored the annoying sound, focusing as a true gentleman on working you in the earnest, pushing you over the edge.

But again, just as you were breeching heaven, again… that damned hellish sound interrupted you.

And Alfred had to relent his various attempts, laying a soft kiss on your left thigh, before he moved to collect the phone from his bed table as you crossed your arms over your naked chest, annoyed and tried to lure him back in bed.

“Alfie… I need your attention!” you screeched lightly, as he just laughed at your antics, but moved to grab the phone, immediately his expression moving in an annoyed one, meaning it was either Judith or Aethelred.

“Just give a minute, lovely” he mumbled softly, kissing your forehead, and propping himself to sit beside you, as he accepted the incoming call “… hello there, bro… what? You need to calm down I can’t understand what you are screaming”.

You expected Aethelred to either be pissed as usual with Alfred or needing a hand, but you were surprised by the fact that as soon as Aethelred’s voice slowed down, Alfred’s face became completely shadowed by worry.

“… ok I got it” he muttered, and although his brother didn’t seem in the slightest finished, Alfred closed the phone right on his face.

A few minutes before you hadn’t been able to think about anything other than having him back in your legs, but now you couldn’t help but be extremely nervous about what Aethelred had told him, as you gently moved an hand up to his cheek, surprising him with your sudden appearance by his side.

“What happened?” you breathed out, moving a hand between his hair, a gesture that always seemed to calm him down a bit.

“They found out about you and me”.

You raised an eyebrow lightly at his cryptic expression.

Of course, his parents knew about you two, so it wasn’t anything that should have come as a surprise.

“They know also about the… true nature of us two”.

And you understood his worry, but…

“… and it leaked out. It’s on tabloids already”.

Now you understood completely his bad mood.

You had ruined his reputation.

Fucking shit.

“… fucking hell” you uttered, moving away from the bed, as you moved to get your own iPhone and a robe to hide your nudity, sex being the last thing on your mind, as you moved to click around a few tabloids.

And indeed, you found photos of you two at an elegant dinner, but what was the worst was that the source that had leaked them had told them that you were nothing more than a paid escort.

You were confused about it all and your mind rushed to the person that might have said it.

Your family didn’t know shit of your job, as many of your friends and even if they knew some part of it, you kept the secrecy of your clients.

This left only the agency.

You could guess that somebody had spoken up because you had finally chosen to leave.

But again, your brain was too rushed to properly know who the hell they could be.

And you were panicking hard, when you felt Alfred’s hand, gently pushing itself on yours.

“Hey…”.

“It’s a disaster” you moved away unable to calm yourself or feel yourself able to stay near him, as you moved away from the bed, jumping up “… fuck, Alfred you should go, before the paps swam over here”.

“Hey no!” he tried to protest, as he moved to reach you, but you pushed yourself away “… we are, we can’t just ignore this…”.

“Alfie, this is the kind of stuff that ruins careers” you tried to explain at it, your voice thoroughly panicked “… you have been caught with what people think is a hooker…”.

“You aren’t a hooker!” replied Alfred, and although you were thoroughly moved by the fact that through this entire mess, he still tried to thoroughly defend your honor, you had to keep yourself rational.

And assume the worst.

“I know, but they won’t understand it” they would never have understood it.

They’d just take what some journalist had written about you.

‘Alfred York’s latest conquest isn’t what you’ll think’.

‘Hooking up with Alfred York’.

‘Scandalously at dinner’

“…yes but… “he kept on trying to speak, but you knew better.

It had been fun till it lasted.

“You have to go”.

And if he couldn’t see how much damage you had done…

… you’d do the right choice for him.

“You can’t be serious” he protested roughly, as he tried to bring you on his laps, but you pushed a strenuous resistance “… we’ll just stay here huddled together, and wait that it’ll all calm down”.

“Alfred be realistic!” you retorted to him annoyed.

Why did he have to make it all so difficult?

Why couldn’t he just see this for what you truly were: a rotten relationship.

“I am!” he moved to mimicking your tone, perfectly “… I am trying my best to stay calm, although this shit is scaring me like fucking hell”.

“… and this is why you should go” you insisted “This was a mistake that lasted much more than it was supposed to”.

You didn’t mean to be so thoroughly harsh with him, and almost went to console him as you saw the hurt in his eyes, but then stopped yourself, catching your hand just as it was lurching forward to him.

And he seemed to finally get the message.

He moved to get his clothes as a fury and put them on as you set yourself on the bed, almost wanting to stop him, to hug him tight and to ease his worry.

But you just couldn’t.

And when he was done, he just shot you one last look, before he rummaged through his pockets getting a few dollars out, as you tried to reject them, but he just threw them out onto the floor, again that brilliant rage shining in his eyes.

“I honestly have to say that I should have foreseen that this would have never lasted, honestly but to me… to me…you’re more than just a one-night stand”.

And the painful sound of the door closing behind him, was followed by the one of your screaming cries.

The following months had been thoroughly tough.

Although your name hadn’t been leaked, your newest boss had soon noticed the similarities between you and the girl on all the tabloids, not to talk about your friends and family.

Most of them had been low key supporting, you could feel their heavy judgement onto you.

Finding a new work hadn’t been easy and eventually you had had to move back home, in order to get something nice that’d suit your degree, but you were still underpaid and struggling every day.

But the fatigue wasn’t bad, even more when it helped with feeling less the breaking of your heart, as you went through the realization of having broken not solely your heart but Alfred’s, also.

Still you thought he was better off.

He would have found some pretty cute high society lady that would have given him cheek kisses and smiled at his sweet embarrassment.

But would he have been able to let out his darkest side, with her?

Would she make him feel as understood as you did?

Would he be able to have the same deep conversation you did?

… you shouldn’t have certainly over thought about it.

The most contact you had with him was checking his results, on the news.

Thankfully ‘the escort scandal’ hadn’t stained his reputation and many people had been ready to swear on Alfred’s good heart, a few online memes even pointing out that he was probably helping ‘the nice escort lady’.

And you, yourself, had laughed at it once, because it was just how he was made.

And you missed him.

With every breath you took.

So, when you had received a call from an unknown number, hearing his voice had left your breath frozen in your lungs, and you had just been unable to think that your name sounded better than said by his voice.

“(Y/N)…”.

“Hey, Alfie” you uttered back, unable to deny him your usual sweetness.

“I miss you” he breathed in, his voice so frail and shy that you almost wanted to reach out and hug him tight “… why aren’t we together?”.

“Because… because it is better off like that…”.

“Were you seriously with me only for the money?” the reply seemed almost an attack and you weren’t able to deny him the truth.

Because you owed it to me, at last.

“No, I mean… only the first time, but… then… I did it because I liked spending time with you, truly”.

“Then why did you…” you felt him sobbing on the phone and to know that you had caused him so so much pain, it broke all the stitches you had on your badly-mended heart “… why did you tell me that it was better over?”.

“Because I am a mess, Alfred” you tried to keep your tone normal, but it lightly became choked as you uttered the truth that you had kept hidden from him and also you.

Because you were truly nothing he deserved.

“… I… was in an escort agency and I barely make it through my day, each month” all the worries of lately came crashing down onto you, like a flood “… and you are the prince charming, the sweet heir to a fortune…”:

“I am also very much in love with you”.

The affirmation broke any barrier you had put in your heart.

“… and I don’t care if you are that” his voice was so sincere and broken that you thought that maybe, you hadn’t done the best thing ever in breaking up with him “… you were never that to me, and I thought you knew”.

“I just…” you bit your lips, to try to stop yourself from crying “… I thought I was doing the right thing”.

“… but is it what you want?” now his tone had grown aggressive, passion blooming under it “… because what I want right now is to fucking hold you tight, because I know that you are crying and it breaks my heart to know it”.

“I…” you were indeed breaking down.

Any barrier of prejudice and insecurity you had put up for him now falling down.

“Can I come to you, princess?” he breathed, his tone being more a demand than a question and although your brain told you to just stop the conversation, your heart wasn’t able to shut itself completely off.

“Please, come to me” you shivered as you uttered it “… come home”.

---

Smut Prompts List

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[s-trawberryv-eins]

We’ll Keep You Safe

NOT MY GIF

We’ll Keep You Safe

Vals 400 writing challenge – prompt: “If you pass out I’m not going to catch you.”

Summary: Sibling bonding in the workshop takes a turn when Caroline gets sick.

Please read here before reading!

Stark!OC x Peter Parker x Morgan Stark

Warnings: Illness, super minor angst, FLUFF

Word count: 1755

A/N: This is my questionable entry for @valkyriesryde​s writing challengeE!!! Thanks for letting me enter about two minutes ago, I love stress. Huge thanks to @crushedbyhyperbole​ for fixing my mistakes ;) I was tempted to write this as a reader insert but I decided to keep it within the Caroline Stark Series. Hope that’s okay with all my 3 fans! Enjoy :)

 AVENGERS COMPOUND

THE STARK WORKSHOP

Caroline remembers the day she met Peter as if it was yesterday. The day she really met him; as Tony's daughter, not as a S.H.I.E.L.D. employee. It’d surprised her how upset Parker had been upon discovering Caroline was Tony’s. Pepper had explained their relationship after in incident in Berlin, but she couldn't really understand it then. At 18, she thought it unfair that whilst she lived under a fake name, hiding in the shadows, her father was all but publicly claiming the boy he'd known for two minutes.

An uncharacteristic bitterness ran through her veins, and she'd refused to meet him. Tony confessed that he would’ve told Peter of her true parentage, had she been willing, but the doctor took her frustrations out on the boy despite it being obvious her upset was really with her father.

It’d had taken some time for Caroline and Tony to actually talk about the problem. Pepper had forced the two to sit down and talk it through.

“I know what I sound like Dad, okay? I know that I'm kept a secret for a reason, I get it. But it hurts! To see you out there, like father and son, with a kid you've known for 2 minutes! I can’t even post a picture of us on my Instagram, yet you two are the headline of every newspaper in New York."

He'd been speechless at first, kicking himself for not understanding what his daughter struggled to say. Taking his hands in hers, he promised to fix the problem. 

If only he’d had the time.

-

“We could add an override? Like, in case she's in real trouble?”

“I toyed around with the idea, but if it fell into the wrong hands? I don’t think she needs it. I’ll control the suit, she’ll have basic autonomy, but it'll be myself and FRIDAY doing the work.” 

Peter and Caroline were playing with the idea of an in-case-of-emergencies suit for Morgan. It was armour more than anything, a way to keep her safe if she ever found herself in danger.

“I wanna shoot bad guys.” Peter ruffled the young girl’s hair with a laugh, crouching down to her height.

 “What’s your superhero name gonna be? You’ll need to think of one.” Upon realising that she had an important task, Morgan raced over to her desk - the one Caroline had created for her one day after a fall from a stool resulted in a trip to the med bay for stitches. Morgan had slept in her little workshop that very first night, sat on her chair with her head resting on her desk amongst her stationary and Morgan-friendly tools. Even now, it was difficult to pull her away.

“What's your superhero name Caroline?” Morgan appeared distracted as she asked, but Peter seemed interested by her answer.

“I don’t really know, actually. The Doctor seems to have stuck with the media; the team call me Doc, I guess they got it from that? I’m not…” Pausing mid-sentence, Caroline pressed her fingers to her temples, wincing as she did. Having woken with a small headache, she’d taken some paracetamol and forgotten about it. It seemed to be worsening, an ever-present thumping pain at the forefront of her head.

“You good, Care?” Parker’s voice pulled her from her thoughts and she nodded quickly.

“FRIDAY, do you have Mo’s measurements?” The holographic screen the AI produced displayed a digital scan of the smallest Stark and allowed them to run the first mark of her suit.

“Baby come here a minute please?" Caroline summoned Morgan with a wince, the pain in her head almost unbearable.

Peter began to attach the nano-sensors to the girls skin. One on each temple, one on her back, and one on each hand. Sticky and cold, Morgan squealed playfully at the sensation. Once the sensors were attached, the doctor would be able to have the nanotech suit form around Morgan's frame, allowing her and Peter to adapt it and configure it as they saw fit. 

“It tickles!” The little girl giggled as the suit formed around her, but Caroline didn't hear her sister. Turned away from the younger Stark and Spider-Man with her head in her hands, she struggled to concentrate on her surroundings. Peter watched over Morgan, as did the AI who continued to monitor her vitals and the nanotech itself.

“Care?” Peter’s voice was soft as he spoke, excitement lacing his tone due to the progression of their project. When he didn't receive an answer, he turned to face her. "Caroline? Hey!” Still nothing.

Bouncing round to face her, he placed his hands on her shoulders, trying to gain a response.

“HEY! You need to lie down or something?” Snapping her head up at the sudden closeness of his voice, she forced a laugh and shook her head.

“No! Just a little headache.” The lie came easily; the 'little headache’ she was experiencing felt more like what one would expect to feel if they’d been hit in the head with Mjolnir. 

“If you pass out I’m not catching you." Though Peter’s words were playful, the look in his eyes was one of concern. After the two had cleared the air regarding her identity, they'd quickly formed a sibling-like relationship. In truth, he'd found a sister in both Stark girls. There was a sadness that lurked sometimes, knowing that they didn't come together as the family they were until after Tony died. Peter and Caroline visited him sometimes, together. They’d sit, leave flowers, and tell stories of their recent adventures. The team knew of their visits and would always know what they needed when they returned home. Caroline liked tea and quiet company, usually in the form of Bucky or Wanda. Peter tended to seek Morgan out straight away, needing the distraction minding a child would bring.

“Whatever, Parker.” Smiling at him despite the pain, she couldn’t help but bite at his words.

“Mo? How ya feeling?” The metal that covered the girls body was grey; they'd style it later, they'd been provided with very specific instructions in that department.

“I like it! Do I get lasers? And blasters? Or webs?!" The older Stark sister had thought of keeping the whole project a secret but figured it'd be something fun to do with Morgan. How she wished she’d kept it under wraps.

“I can do lasers. That's it.” Peter’s eyes grew wide at her words, the wink he received not doing a great deal for his nerves.

"Peter, can you help her out of the suit and upload the mark?” Caroline headed to the other side of the room where she’d been assembling a bracelet to store the sensors in. Morgan would wear it at all times, and whenever FRIDAY was alerted, she'd activate the bracelet, thus rendering Morgan a little safer.

Maximoff had designed the bracelet. With an eye for pretty things, she was far better suited for the task. All Caroline had to do was weave the sensors into the piece of jewellery and have Morgan promise not to take it off. Peter removed the sensor pads from Morgan's’s skin and handed them to Caroline to extract them. 

“What colours do you want?” Peter sat down with Morgan and let the girl play around with the colour features, allowing the doctor to concentrate.

Grabbing a pair of tweezers, Caroline squinted as she tried to remove the tiny pieces of tech. The pounding in her head seemed to worsen, her vision suddenly blurring. Reaching out to the desk in front of her, she grabbed on to try and steady herself, the room spinning around her.

“FRI?”

“Mr Parker, Miss Stark is in need of assistance.” It barely took him a second to leap to his feet.

“Contact Dr Cho, tell her to meet me in the med bay now.”

The colour had drained from Caroline’s face and her eyes were screwed shut by the time Peter reached her. 

“I’ve got you, you’re okay.”

She turned to Peter weakly and was about to respond when her vision blurred further, and her knees gave way. Unable to even brace herself for impact, she whimpered as fear shot through her. 

Peter never let her hit the ground, of course. Scooping the doctor into his arms, he scolded her softly for her refusal to take care of herself.

“C’mon, Care. Why’d you lie? Is it your head?” Peter fussed, but her only reply was a mumbled apology and a grimace.

“FRIDAY? Get Barnes there too? He’ll wanna see her. Come on Morgan, Caroline’s kinda sick so we need to take her to the med bay.” Morgan ran alongside the Avenger, giving her sister a once over before running off to find Helen.

“Doctor Cho! Caroline fell over!” Her voice echoed quietly through the halls as she ran off, Peter laughing at her childlike view of the situation. 

"You can't do this. I know it’s just a migraine or something, but we need you, ya know? An- and-“ sighing as he tripped over his words, the Parker boy grew frustrated "-and you can’t do this! Me and Morgan need you!” 

Cho was waiting, the med bay doors open for their arrival. Peter followed Helen's directions, laying her down where he was told to. Bucky was there, requesting a grown-up explanation of the situation; Morgan’s version not quite cutting it (although he'd never tell her that). The boy was visibly shaken but calmed significantly when Barnes sat with him a while, talking him down from his anxiety-ridden state.

Caroline whimpered in pain as Helen inserted a needle into the crook of her arm, but she quietened as the pain meds entered her bloodstream. Consciousness gave way to sleep as her brain grew heavier, and she didn’t fight it.

-

Eyes fluttered open but shut tightly when greeted with a bright light. A squeeze to her hand brought her attention to her right, where Bucky sat with a gentle smile on his face. No words were spoken, he simply kept his grip on her hand and returned to the book that lay in his lap.

“Caroline?” Parker's voice came from the left, her attention drifting there instead. “I’m glad you’re okay. I‘m sorry for snapping at you.” His words seemed to be filled with guilt, a guilt she didn't deem at all necessary.

With bright eyes - a little hazy from the medication - and a lazy smile, she reached out for his hand.

“I passed out and you caught me.”

[rose-demica]

Princeling’s Home, Chapter One

For: @fanficocean‘s Starting out with a Challenge.

Prompts: 16. “Why is the coffee always gone?” and 23. “Hang on. Where’s the baby?” 

Tags: @mariekoukie6661

Pairing: Clint X Reader (eventually)

Fun Fact: Symkaria is an actual kingdom in the Marvel Universe! 

Head’s up: As per normal with me, I started the idea, realized it needed more background, and now it’s longer, so the two prompts are not in this, chapter one, but will be coming soon!

Marvel Masterlist:

Normally, you loved missions with Clint Barton. The Master Archer had an interesting way of looking at problems, and you loved watching him in action. Spending half of your time trying to figure out how his brain came up with such wonderfully stupid plans, and then how they seemed to work every time. He even managed to make stakeouts fun, sitting in one spot for hours on end was tedious, but there was something different about when it was just the pair of you. 

This mission, however, was not one that you were looking forward to. It had to be serious, they’d pulled Clint out of a deep-cover mission, and you’d been doing recon out in the field for Natasha Romanoff’s next big mission. You had nowhere near the level of information you had wanted to return with.

You were not prepared to be hauled up to the director’s office the second you landed at headquarters. There had been a sliver of hope that you would get to Shower and change into your SHIELD uniform first, maybe grab something to eat. You’d been on the streets since dawn, with the plan to grab breakfast while monitoring the building across from the cafe. The recall order came before you could order more than a glass of water.

Fury and Clint were already there, waiting for you. Fury pacing back and forth in front of his huge glass windows, deep in thought.

Clint was wearing a light blue suit, the jacket was missing and the tie loose around his neck, the top few buttons were undone as well. He was slouched in a chair in front of Fury’s desk, feet up on the wood, it had earned him a hard glare from Fury, but Clint ignored it in favour of the steaming mug grasped in his hands. 

“Barton sit up before you crinkle that suit.” Barton sighed at your order, but obeyed, sitting in the seat properly so that the shirt couldn’t crinkle. He didn’t lift his feet from the desk though, and you hadn’t quite expected him too. He was clearly ‘punishing’ Fury for pulling him out early, and wasn’t going to stop until he felt like it. 

“Agent Y/L/N, thanks for joining us.” Fury turned, motioning for you to take the seat beside Clint. You did so quickly, unlike Clint you weren’t that comfortable with upsetting the man who ran SHIELD. “Barton get your shoes off of my desk!” Clint only raised an eyebrow, taking a sip of his drink. “Barton!” He relented with a roll of his eyes as Fury growled at him. 

“Hello Y/N, how was your jaunt out to Cairo?” Clint turned to look at you, a hint of laughter sparkling in his blue eyes. 

“How’d you know where I was?” He laughed as you turned the question back around on him, no one was supposed to know where you’d been sent. Anyone but your handler was supposed to think that you were in Morocco. 

“A little birdie told me.” He was still laughing as he reached out to boop your nose, watching as you crinkled up your face and moved back.

“Barton!” Clint sighed, rolling back into the seat and away from you, looking at Fury.  “Are you drunk?” 

“Sir I was deep cover, and you pulled me out of a gambling den full of mafia-” You’d never seen Barton drunk before, he normally refused to drink more than one on social occasions, and maybe if he was forced to at a party.

“Y/L/N.” Fury cut Clint off before he could reveal anything about his mission to you. “You best remember this in case he can’t.” Fury passed you a file, and you reached out, but Clint intercepted it before you could take it. His coffee placed where his feet had been before.

“I’m fine,” Clint grumbled, holding the file so you could lean closer and read it over his shoulder. You rested a hand on his shoulder as you did so, and noticed that he leant even closer towards you. 

The file was pretty empty, normal for you, you were often tasked with finding the information out before sending someone else in to do the job. It wasn’t as normal for missions you usually took with Clint though. 

There were only 3 pages in there, and one was the official portrait of the King and Queen of Symkaria and their 2 daughters. The next page was a birth certificate, for a Theodore Amadocus Phillip, Prince of the Kingdom of Symkaria. The last page, a job offer, 25 million to anyone who could provide the head of the new Symkaria heir. 

“Their royal majesties have requested that we protect the heir until they have found and vanquished the threat.  We have decided that you and Barton will take the newborn, and live undercover as if he was your own.”

“What?!” You and Barton spoke as one, looking up from the file to see the dead serious face of Director Fury. You didn’t do undercover missions, nor protection details, this was both! Clint didn’t seem much happier than you were.

“It is not up for discussion. You leave for a small town in the midwest in an hour, only the three of us will know which town and where you are. I have organised it all myself. There will be a pilot waiting for you both in half an hour, they will fly you to an airport where I have brought you a vehicle. The Prince will meet you there, he is flying with a royal nursery maid who will provide you with everything you need to know to care for the child.” Fury moved closer to hand us another file, this one was much thicker.

“You’ve recently relocated from San Antonio with hopes to raise your son in a quiet, safe little town. Barton, you will have decided to take a break from your career as a builder to be a stay at home dad.  Y/L/N you will be working, we have set up a job in an office as a marketing consultant, you will mostly work from home, but you do have to attend some meetings at the office.” Clint took the folder once more, flicking through all the paperwork they had made so Barton and I could become completely different people. 

“You have been married for two years, Theodore is your firstborn, we’ve left most of the other details up to you two. Figure out what fits.” Fury stopped speaking, waiting for Clint to finish flicking through the file, he paused on the deed to a house, slowly flicking through the next few pages, photos of the house we had supposedly brought. “You should both go pack, and pack well, we have no idea how long this will take.” Clint closed the folder, handing it over to you, and picking up his mug. 

“After you, my darling wife.” Clint frowned as you plucked the coffee from his hand and took a sip of your own. 

~~~~~~ Few hours later ~~~~~~

“Is this him?” You craned your head as a woman and a child started towards your designated meeting spot, only to pout when they walked right past. 

“Relax Y/N.” Clint chuckled, looking up from where he was sitting on the floor, another steaming cup of coffee in his hands. “Soon you’ll be pleading for a break from our son.” You simply turned and stuck your tongue out at him, before turning back to look for the Prince.

“Mr and Mrs MacManus?” You jumped as a voice to your back spoke your new fake last name. You had been so focused on watching the people coming off of incoming flights that you hadn’t kept an eye on the doors. You hadn’t even considered that could be an option, you were meeting in an airport for a reason, right?

“That would be us.” Clint stood, slipping a hand around your waist, and tugging you closer to his side. A slight chuckle leaving your lips as you squealed in fright. You couldn’t help the joy and excitement that you felt as you laid eyes on a suited woman and the pram she was pushing.

“This is little Theodore MacManus, your new son. The adoption agency has gone over everything with you?” She pulled off the cover to reveal the tiny infant in the pram, sleeping peacefully, a duffle, and baby bag squished underneath it, and another duffle over her shoulder. 

“They have indeed, we’re both very excited for today.” Clint shot the woman a dazzling smile, and you could see her melt a little, the same way you always did when you saw that smile. “May I?” He reached one hand towards the pram, waiting for permission to scoop the little princeling up in his arms, turning to place him securely in yours. 

“Awww.” You melted a little, brushing one finger along his soft babyface. “He’s adorable.” You could feel Clint’s eyes on you, rather than on the child he had given to you. 

“My wife loves children,” Clint explained to the nanny, turning his attention back to her. You paid no attention to them, eyes focused on the child you rocked in your arms. It had been a long while since any of your siblings were this young and small. Since you had been able to hold and care for a baby.

“I can see why the agency picked you two for this little one. I wrote down everything you need to know and put it in this book. Theodore is a very easy going happy baby, no known allergies or issues, he is accustomed to formula, so you won’t have a problem with that. I attached a photo of his brand and type just in case you struggle to find it.” Clint nodded, taking the folder she offered him and flicking through it. “He does have a rough routine already, and you may find it easier to stick to that, but he may decide he wants a change.” 

“I’m sure my wife will handle it all very well, she had to help raise her siblings.” You felt Clint’s eyes on you before his hand reached out to wrap around your waist once more. 

“Well, I shall let you both go. I hear you have a long drive ahead of you. The young- Theodore has just been fed, so he will probably sleep for a while, he loves car rides.” You raised your head in time to see the Nanny look at her former charge fondly before she put down the bag she was carrying and started to leave. You could see tears forming in her eyes, but didn’t call her back, judging by her quick steps, she wanted to be alone before she broke down.

“We have a son.” You whispered, instead, you looked to Clint. Clint moved closer, his chest to your back as he reached around, the young prince yawned, before reaching out and grabbing a hold of Clint’s finger. 

“He’s so little. Y/N-” You knew why he was hesitant, he hadn’t had many dealings with children, and no good male role models in his younger life. You knew Clint was terrified that he would somehow hurt the princeling. 

“You’ll make a great dad Clint, don’t worry.” Clint’s head rested on your shoulder, thumb rubbing back and forth over the tiny fingers that were clasped around his own. 

“I’ll always worry.” He whispered, “and little one, I do need that hand back if you want me to get your bags and take us all home.” You laughed at that, turning your head to look at him, only to notice just how close his face was to yours. You quickly looked away, feeling heat rise to your cheeks.

“Clint look!” Theodore’s eyes were starting to open, revealing very pale green eyes, almost clear. 

“Wow.” Theodore released Clint’s finger as he looked up at his new ‘parents’, meaning Clint could take one hand and brush it under the baby’s eyes. “Please tell me he isn’t blind, because if he’s blind, and I’m deaf, you’re gonna have issues.”

“I don’t think so, he’ll probably have a very light eye colour when he’s older though.” You checked, watching the baby as his eyes followed the finger you waved in front of his face momentarily, before going back to stare at Clint. “I think he likes you.” You turned to see Clint smile softly before he went to get the pram and the bags. 

“Alright, I think it's high time I got my wife and son home.” You laughed, offering the princeling your finger to hold in his, before following Clint towards the huge purple pick up truck you just knew would be his. “Alpha Romeo Charlie, eight, three, nine.” You could hear Clint whispering to himself, comparing the number plate we’d been given with all the cars we passed. His jaw dropped when he realised the truck was his.

“I think grandad is trying to apologize for ditching us here.” You stood beside him, nodding towards the truck, and using Fury’s new code name, just in case someone was hovering nearby. 

“Apology accepted.” Clint replied, pushing a button on the keys and watching with delight as the indicators flashed at him. Quickly moving closer to the car to open the doors and look in. 

“Clint-” You hesitated, not wanting to spoil his mood. It was so very rare to see him so delighted, and you wanted to enjoy every moment of it.  But also you wanted to keep moving, just in case anyone had followed the princeling. 

“I know, I know.” He sighed, packing down the pram, and loading it and all the bags into the tray. 

“We’ll need the baby bag Clint.” You chuckled as his eyes widened, having to climb into the back of the ute to get the bag back. 

“There’s a carseat behind the drivers side for Theodore, did you want a hand?” You shook your head, you were more than capable of tucking the young one in safely. Even so Clint was there, opening up the back door, and keeping a hand on your back as you stepped up onto the foot rung so you could reach the seats. 

“I feel short.” Clint laughed at your complaint, watching as you buckled in the princeling.

“It is a tall truck, I used to use it for my building business.” His hands moved to your waist, lifting you up and putting you down on the ground.

“Before you became a family man.” You teased, turning to face him. 

“Indeed.” His smile was breathtaking, and you watched as he glanced up at Theodore, before looking back to you. That same smile caused your breath to catch, watching as he leaned slightly closer to you.

“Anyway, we should uh- hit the road.” You stepped back out of his hold, running a hand through your hair awkwardly. 

“Yeah, of course.” Clint’s smile faltered, a hint of sadness in his eyes, “get the little man home.” He forced himself to smile, one of his fake ones that you hated seeing, before closing the back door and turning towards the drivers side. 

The first half of the journey home was relatively quiet, Clint had taken a moment to connect his phone to the audio system, playing his favourite country music. You kept glancing back at Prince Theodore, watching as sleep slowly drew the infant back into his embrace. 

Four hours into the journey you had asked Clint to stop at the next resting area. He’d been slightly confused, but did as you asked. His eyes followed every step you took as you got out of the passenger's seat, and then slid into the back bench to wake up Theodore. 

“Y/N, should you be waking him?” Theodore grumbled as you gently woke him, tiny hands bumping into yours as he stretched. 

“Newborns eat every three to four hours Clint, it’s been four hours since we left the airport, so he needs to eat.” You dug through the baby bag as Theodore stretched, grabbing out a bottle of purified water, and a pouch of milk formula. 

“Can you go ask the gas attendant if they can warm this up. Check the temperature against your wrist when it's done, just a couple of drops” You took the lid off the bottle, before reaching out and silently asking for Clint's arm. He laid his hand in yours, allowing you to pull it closer and demonstrate. “You’re aiming for it to be a tiny bit warm, but not too hot. Then mix this in and bring it back.”

“Yes Ma’am.” Clint took the bottle and pouch, hopping out of the car and heading inside the gas station. By the time he got back, you had changed Theodore’s nappy, and were playing with him, enjoying each wide smile you could coax onto his face. “Here you go.” Clint came to the door beside you, passing up the made bottle and placing a bag on the floor by your feet. “I also got snacks.” Theodore was starving, attaching to the bottle and taking huge gulps the second it touched his lips.

“Take your time, you’ll choke.” You spoke softly, pulling the bottle away so he could have a moment to breath. You waited until he was about to start screaming to return the bottle to his lips. 

“And Coffee.” You nearly jumped when Clint reappeared with two large steaming cups of what he considered liquid gold. The princeling did jump, detaching himself from his bottle to look around wildly. “Sorry little man.” Clint looked really guilty as you and the Prince looked at him, before the hungry prince remembered the bottle you were holding for him. 

“We’ll get used to all this, I’m sure.” You smiled at Clint, and he smiled back, climbing in beside you, carefully watching what you were doing with the Princeling. 

~~~~~~

“Y/N.” You were being shaken, but you ignored it, you were tired and comfortable, why was someone trying to wake you up. “Y/N, we’re home.” Clint was chuckling, still trying to coax you awake. “I was going to carry you into bed, but I thought you might want to explore the place with me first.” 

Slowly you forced yourself awake, your eyes opened to see Clint’s face above yours, looking around to the back of the car. You started stretching, lifting your head from Clint’s lap to sit up. The truck was parked right in front of a garage on a sloped driveway. To the left was the house itself. It looked every bit like a normal house, from the outside you could see a perfect lawn, with a few beds of flowers around the path and in front of the house. A white picket fence encased the entire front lawn. It had two floors, you could see that just from the windows, although it looked like the top floor was where an attic should be.  

“Looks cosy.” Clint was watching you, waiting for your reaction. 

“It does. A little small.” He nodded, looking away from you and towards the house.

“There’s only three of us Barton, were you expecting a mansion?” You teased, hoping out of the truck and stretching your whole body, you had thought you were comfy, but now you could feel the effects of falling asleep in the truck. 

“A farm house would have been nice.” The words were quiet, not quite meant for your ears, so you didn’t react, walking around the truck to get Theodore out. 

“How long has it been since the gas station?” You felt Clint’s hands on your waist as you climbed up the side. 

“Three and a half, he slept through it all.” Clint answered, steadying you as you unbuckled the Prince and cradled him. 

“We should feed him then. Did you want to do it?” Clint lifted you up before you could start to step backwards, putting you on the ground safely. 

“I-” You turned to look at Clint, only to see him frozen in surprise. “I dunno if that’s smart Y/N.” He looked scared, unsure of himself. 

“I’ll help you.” You nudged him and smiled, “There is no way I’m getting up every four hours to feed him. You need to help mister.” Clint chuckled as you half-teased him, a brilliant smile pulling at his lips. 

“Shall we go in? I’ll come get the bags later.” He pointed your attention towards the house, waiting for you to take the first step, keys swinging around his finger.

“Alright, I’m ready.” You took a deep breath, before taking a step towards where you would be for the foreseeable future, playing family with Clint Barton and the Prince of Symkaria. You probably weren’t ready, but this was the mission, and you weren’t going to be any more ready if you stayed standing outside the house. 

“I’m scared too Y/N.” Clint whispered, stepping closer to wrap his arm around your waist, “But we can do this.” You nodded, letting him lead you towards the house, holding the young Prince tighter as the door swung open under Clint’s hand. 

Clint was the first to step into the house, turning back from inside the tiny foyer to offer you a hand. You reached out to take it, tangling your fingers through his and taking a step into the house. 

There were three ‘doors’ off of the foyer, one went to the kitchen and dining room, another to the lounge, and the last to a reasonably big office. Clint led you through the right hand door first, into the office, there were two desks either side, one in front of the windows, looking out to the front yard, and the other against the back wall, surrounded by large floor to ceiling bookshelves. There was a couch against the far wall, right where the evening sun would fall on it. There were pictures of landscapes on the walls, you made a mental note to take some ‘family’ pictures to put up before you had too many people around to visit. 

“It needs pictures.” Clint spoke what you were thinking, turning his attention to the young child in your arms as he started to fuss. “And this little man needs a snack, kitchen?” He chuckled, raising his free hand to offer it to the princeling. Theodore grabbed it and quickly stuck it in his mouth. 

“Can you take him? I’ll go-” Clints hand tightened around yours, stopping you as you tried to untangle your hands to pass the baby over to him. 

“I’d rather we stick together.” His voice was soft, and you looked up to see him glancing between you and Theodore, seemingly unwilling to let either of you out of his sight. “Just, please, until we get settled, I need to know you’re both safe.” He whispered, dropping his gaze to Theodore rather than look at you. 

“Okay.” You whispered, stepping closer to press a kiss to his cheek. This was a whole new level of mission for both of you. It would take some time for you both to get comfortable, and if Clint needed to keep both of you close, then that's what you’d do. 

“Let’s go find this little cannibal food.” Clint chuckled, gently taking his finger back, much to the princelings' unhappiness. 

“Can I have the desk in front of the window?” I asked, following Clint as he walked out of the office and back into the foyer. 

“Of course,” Clint responded, taking a moment to stare into the lounge straight ahead of him, before turning to his right and walking into the kitchen and dining room. You breathed a sigh of relief when you saw that the kitchen took up most of the room, counters and bench space going all the way around the back wall and down the left hand wall. On the right hand wall was a staircase leading up to the next level, but what was missing in counter space was made up for by a Kitchen Island. Two bar stools on the side closest to the living room. In the right hand corner facing you was a large refrigerator, just before it a door under the stairs, what you were hoping would be a walk in pantry. 

“Coffee!” You glanced over to Clint at his exclamation, following his eyes to see a fancy near cafe level coffee machine tucked into the left hand corner. Beside it was a two drawer dishwasher, built into the counters.

“I want a man who looks at me the way you look at Coffee.” You teased him, taking your hand out of his and starting to look for a pot to heat up the baby bottle, bouncing Therodore in your arm as he thought about screaming, getting hungrier and hungrier the longer you admired the new kitchen.

“Rude. What are we looking for?” You didn’t need to look over at Clint to see him sticking out his tongue at you. You looked down to Theodore and shook your head with a smile.

“Your dad is trouble.” He smiled at your quiet whisper, “A pot, we need to heat up his bottle.” You spoke louder, directing your words to Clint this time. You heard Clint start searching the kitchen Island, while you made your way around the room. 

“Got it!” You looked over to see Clint right by the coffee maker, the cupboard under it open and filled with pots of all shapes and sizes. “This one?” He pulled out a small pot, that had deep sides, waiting for your nod to fill it with water and put it on the stove. 

“I’ll go change his nappy.” You glanced over to Clint, who shook his head, moving closer to you. 

“I’ll come help, or watch and learn.” His hand was gentle on your back, “We need to wait for the water to heat up a little first anyway, don’t we?” You were starting to think Clint knew a little bit more about caring for young babies than you had originally thought. That or he’d done some research on the flight in, which wasn’t that surprising.

“Yeah, we do. Shall we go upstairs?” You waited for Clint to be ready, before walking upstairs. “We are so going to need a baby gate when he starts moving around on his own.” 

“Hopefully he’ll be back home before that happens.” Clint responded, agreeing with you nevertheless. At the top of the stairs was a small landing, and two doors, one on the right and one on the left. Clint stuck his head in each, before turning back to face you. “Looks like ours is on the right, and his is on the left. It’s much smaller, and filled with baby gear.”

“Cool,” Theodore started screaming that second, his face balling up as he expressed his hunger and unhappiness the only way he knew how. “I know little one.” Clint got out of your way as you walked into the princelings room and set him down on the change table. Clint watched as you changed him as fast as you could, before scooping him up and putting him in Clint's arms, racing back off down the stairs before either of the boys could realise what was going on. 

“Hey grumpy.” You heard Clint greet, as Theodore went quiet for a moment. You put the bottle in the simmering pot, taking the pot off of the heat as you did so, going back up stairs to check on the two boys. They were staring at each other, Theodore’s tiny hand wrapped around one of Clint’s fingers. Clint had the softest, sweetest smile you had ever seen on his face.

“He likes you.” You whispered, not too sure you were willing to intrude on the moment. Clint slowly raised his eyes to yours, the smile never fading. 

“He likes both of us.” Clint walked over to you, offering to give the baby back, but you shook your head. 

“Can I take a photo? For our wall?” You waited for Clint to nod his consent before taking out your phone and taking a couple of quick pictures. “Alright, his bottle should be ready now, shall we?” 

~~~~~

You tried, and failed, to stifle another yawn, much to Clint’s annoyance. Theodore had stayed awake for a few hours after his bottle, and now he had gone down, you and Clint had decided to reorganise everything in the house to where you both wanted it.

“Okay, go nap.” Clint took the stuff out of your hands, and pointed up the stairs. 

“No, I’m okay.” You took the stuff back, turning away as you yawned again. 

“Y/N, you’re clearly exhausted. I can do this, or I can wait for you to rest a bit.”

“I need to adjust back to this timezone Clint, sleeping in the middle of the afternoon won’t help that.” It was well past when you would have returned to the safe house and slept if you were still on your mission. By your estimate, you’d been up around 21 hours at this point, minus the nap you’d had in the truck. 

“You’re also a new mother, to a child that needs feeding every four hours. I doubt either of us will have a normal sleep schedule for a while, so we’ll sleep when we’re tired, and work out the rest later.” Clint put his arms on your waist, turning you to face him and taking the stuff off you to put it on the bench. You took a moment to look at him, and the dark bags under his eyes. 

“You look just as tired.” You raised one hand to his cheek, brushing under his eyes. 

“Mafia aren’t exactly the 9-5 type.” He responded with a shrug, “Come on, we could both use a nap before the little one wakes up again.” He motioned towards the stairs, waiting for you to argue again.

“Okay, a little nap won’t hurt.” You agreed, trying to fight back yet another yawn.

“Good idea sleeping beauty.” Clint teased, moving back so that you could go upstairs first. You paused half way up when you realised he wasn’t following you, turning back to look at him. “There's uh, a minor situation.” He ran a hand through his hair nervously. “Go see for yourself.” You frowned, walking up the stairs and into the bedroom. 

In the middle of the room, pressed back against the middle wall was a king sized bed. The roof sloping down across the room, to where dressing tables were slid into the gap before the wall. There was a baby cot on the left hand side of the bed, even though you had put Theodore in the cot in his room to nap. On the far side of the room was another door that was open, and you could see that it led to the bathroom. 

“What problem?” You asked, jumping when you turned to see Clint leaning on the door frame behind you, you hadn’t heard him come up the stairs. 

“There’s only one bed.” He spoke softly, “I thought I would take the couch and leave you the room. That way you’re closest to Theodore, and I’m closest to the door if someone tries to break in.” He kept speaking, explaining his reasoning. 

“Clint-” you sighed, “I can’t let you sleep on the couch, not when we don’t know how long we’ll be here. I’m okay with sharing the giant bed if you are.” It probably would have been better to have separate beds, but you were also undercover as a married couple. 

“I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable Y/N.” He whispered, 

“You don’t, and you won’t... unless you snore really loudly.” You teased, reaching out to take his hand. “Now come on, hopefully we can get some shut eye before our little princeling wakes up.” Clint chuckled at you, before nodding. 

[anotherisodope]

Prompt fic: the Nightmare

Prompt 33 from here

The nightmares haven’t changed since the night she lived them for real. 

It's always that same terrible twenty-odd minutes that she had to crawl for her life down a Vault walkway with a sucking chest wound. She remembers every painful foot of that journey, sliding on her own blood over the metal. Arms empty of her baby, the pod across from hers empty of her husband.

Had he been kidnapped too? Or had he escaped and...God...left her behind?

In the real world she only found out weeks later, discovering Nate’s vault suit and wedding ring for sale from the back of a Brahmin many miles from the Vault. Yet another casualty among countless, without even a grave marker. Now she carries his ring as a reminder of why she’s on this path.

But in the dream, she somehow already knows that he left, that he didn’t save her, and that he’s gone. The sense of being abandoned, even by innocent mistake or mishap, is almost too much to bear.

Widow doesn't know if it's her brain trying to process trauma, or something she'll just have to live with for years, like a scar on her mind. Whatever the case, she's sure that the docs at the VA would have called it PTSD. 

She tries not to pity herself when the nightmares hit, like she tries not to pity herself when her scarred lung locks up and she can't push past the pain and exhaustion any more. Every single person still surviving on this damaged, irradiated planet is carrying something. Nearly everyone she's met is a PTSD poster child in one way or another. She knows she's not special. And she doesn’t want to annoy people or worse, provoke them.

So she keeps it quiet. 

She’s practiced at it: when she wakes up and wheezes for air in the dark and adrenaline slams through her, she stuffs her face into a pillow or her arms as fast as she can so that her thin, airless scream doesn't carry. It's not safe to scream aloud when she's alone, and not considerate to do it when she isn't.

And so she sits up in the dark, no idea for the moment where she is, and gasps into her palms until the icy cold and terror of the dream goes away. But she still remembers the images, the other sensations: the long crawl, the flickering lights, the rumble of the malfunctioning generators kicking off and on deep beneath her as she searched for help, or some means to help herself.

The pain's still there too, digging into her chest above her right breast, where the knot of scar tissue sits now. In her heart as well: her baby gone, her husband gone, her discarded with a bullet in her, left to make the long crawl alone.

It was then, in those dark moments in the vault, that she found the rage she takes refuge in so much now. Not with her few friends or with the undeserving, but with the world in general, and with those who ruined it. And those who continue to do so. While she's awake, she's too pissed off and determined to feel the fear. But when she sleeps...

Well, that's another story.

She sobs for air, heart pounding hard, damaged lung aching as she struggles to pull in enough oxygen. A curse forms silently on her lips and she mouths it against her palm. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Her husband is dead. Her son is probably dead as well. And the man who shot her would have to be ninety now, maybe more. Her hunger for revenge is as futile as her desire to have her health back.

But she's still on the track, if only to find out what the hell really happened. And to make sure that anyone responsible that is still alive pays dearly.

She focuses on that thought as hard as she can, trying to get her grip on her rage again. It works, heating her blood and slowing her trembling. 

If Kellogg’s alive...she’s going to make him wish he’d shot her in the head.

She's just starting to pull herself together enough to orient herself when she hears the softest footfall in front of her, and the rustle of fabric. A pair of hands grips her shoulders, and her eyes adjust enough for her to see a slim figure in a loose-sleeved shirt standing over her.

“You okay, sister?”

The purring rasp of his voice orients her. She’s in Goodneighbor, crashed on a friend’s couch after helping him root out a local serial killer. He smells like an old bomber jacket under the whiskey and tobacco, and in the dark his black eyes and gash of a nose would probably terrify someone who didn’t know him. Instead, she feels safer seeing the dim features of his face.

“Shit, I’m sorry,” she sighs, seeing him dressed down for bed, shirt open and regalia put up for the night. “Did I wake you?”

“Nah. You wouldn’t have been loud enough for that anyway. I’ve been chewing over this damn Pickman problem all night, so I was awake. Figured I’d better come over and see if you needed help.”

His scarred fingers rest on her gently, thumb settling over the end of her collarbone. She tries to ignore just how much that gets her attention.  Or how much the unexpected sympathy makes her ache. The guy’s only known her a few weeks. Why does he give a damn?

“I’m all right.”

“Nah, you’re not.” He gives her shoulders a squeeze and lets her go, and she sucks air too deeply and coughs. “Didn’t think so. You want a Calmex? I’ve got a few.”

For a moment she almost takes him up on it. Hancock’s a serious proponent of better living through chemistry, and sometimes, she sees his point. This world is a nightmare, and anything that can make it more bearable, even for a few hours, is hard to condemn and easy to embrace. 

But Widow knows her fragile health requires her to be careful. Withdrawal from certain things can kill or incapacitate her. She can’t even get drunk too often for that reason.

This time, though, she considers it seriously before deciding to refuse. “Hold that thought, I...I think I can handle this one without.” Calmex is hard to find. 

“Your choice, but I’m staying here until I know you’re not gonna fall apart on me.” There is that tiny edge of “don’t question me on this” in his voice, and she doesn’t, instead pulling her legs up against her so he can sit on the other end of the couch. 

“Thanks, Hancock,” she sighs instead of protesting. No point arguing; she’ll lose, and she knows it. She knows as well that he’s at least trying to have her best interests in mind...and that she is lucky to have a guy like him around. 

But deep down, she finds herself wondering if he will one day turn his back on her too...or be taken away, by force. 

That’s the nightmare talking, damn it, she reminds herself. What happened to her and her family will always be there...but she survived it. 

“You want to talk about it?” he asks, and she knows he’s not just being polite.

She doesn’t want to talk about the damn dreams, though. “It’s the same story I told you. It’s just like a broken record in my head some nights.”

“Ah. I get it. You’re not the first one to tell me something like that.” She hears the rattle of his mentats box in his hand and knows at once that he has no plans to sleep. “So...what now?”

Make yourself useful, he’s been trying to help you. “I think I need a distraction. Maybe I can do something more to help you sort out this whole Pickman thing? Because I know I won’t be sleeping again for a while.”

Even in the dim light and with a face full of scars, his smile is wide and warm. “Sounds good, doll face.”

[theateared]

You’re an Authority Figure.  Act Like It. ❜

Summary:  Grace has had enough.

    I’m tired of this, Edgar.

    If it took taking things into her own hands for her Alpha to finally acknowledge her again, then that was what she was willing to do.  Her eyes found the clock, closing time approaching all too fast.  Part of her was nervous.  The other couldn’t wait.

    She had the decency to wait until the shift was over properly.  Making herself look busy was easy when there were tables to clean and floors to sweep.  Eventually, the staff began to trickle out, either filing upstairs into their shared living space or exiting through the front door, intent on getting some fresh air before going to bed for the night.  She caught Edgar and Moxie engaging in a brief conversation before the hunter left, though she couldn’t make anything out.

    It’s just us.  We’re alone.  You better be grateful that I waited for that.  I could’ve taken issue with you in front of everybody but I decided to spare you the embarrassment of being called out by a small girl.  Raku knows why.

    As he folded his rag neatly and draped it over the handle of the nearest drawer, she stopped him from leaving by standing in front of him.  As he made eye contact with her, she folded her arms, glowering at him.  If looks could kill, he would have dropped dead in an instant.

    Without prompt:   “What’s your fucking problem?”

    The expletive surprised them both.  She wasn’t the type to use excess profanity;  had expressed several times that she found the habit tasteless.  Though Moxie was her friend, she had a huge issue with the way he spoke because of how rude it was.

    “I don’t know what you mean,”   he replied dismissively, beginning to walk towards her so that he could leave.  When she didn’t move out of his way, he paused briefly.   “I would like to go.”

    “Oh, so you want to talk to me now?”

    He glanced to the side, then back at her.   “Not particularly.  That is why I am leaving.”

    When he began to walk once more, he was stopped by Grace raising a hand and pressing it against his chest.  She already knew that she wasn’t strong enough to stop him from going anywhere, from doing anything he so desired, but she was so desperate for him to talk to her that she was willing to try anything.  He did stop, and she couldn’t tell if it was because he was surprised or if it was because he was fighting back the urge to hurt her.  Touching him in such a provocative way was an incredibly risky thing to do--  especially when she was an inferior.

    “Talk to me.”   When he opened his mouth to refuse, she cut in, tone biting.   “You’re an authority figure.  Act like one.”

    Their eye contact was heated and uncomfortable.  It was the first time he’d really cared to look at her in the past few weeks, and if he was being honest, he could understand her frustration.  He was very aware of the fact that he’d pulled away from her with no explanation;  he’d all but vanished from her life, suddenly ‘too busy’ to hold a conversation with her like before.  There was no fun, no sense of connection to his creed-mates like there had been…  his fight with Neena had cut him deep, even if he didn’t admit it out loud.

                   Does it suck when I’m not clay?  Or is it only cute when it’s Grace?

    Therein laid the problem:  it was only cute when it was Grace, and that was more than enough of a reason for him to pull away.  The last thing he wanted to do was grow genuinely fond of somebody again.  That was how his previous life had gone down the drain.  His affection was only suited for things he wished to destroy in the end-- for beating hearts that he had the desire to squash some time later.  Other peoples’ feelings were leftovers for somebody like him  -  things that he could pick at later when he was feeling empty and bored, like a vulture circling dead meat.

    “Did I do something wrong?”   she asked, raising a hand to start counting things off on her fingers.   “Because I don’t think I did.  I found a new litter squat.  I found a new source of food.  And I handed Arthur’s current whereabouts to you on a silver platter.  Find me the mistake.  Make it make sense in my ‘inferior’ little head.”   He remained quiet for a while, and she took that as her invitation to continue.   “I don’t think you can, can you?  I didn’t make one.  I didn’t do anything wrong.”

    “...”

    “SAY.  SOMETHING.”  

    “NO.  You didn’t do ANYTHING wrong.”   He raised a hand, pointing a finger at her.  He looked serious in that moment, smile barely present as he regarded her with a clinical warning:   “You watch your tone, Grace.  Watch it.”

     “I’m not going to ‘watch it’,”   she retorted, gaze heavy.  It was clear that she was upset.  It wasn’t just anger she was feeling.   “I respect you.  I do!  But you’re wrong.  You’re WRONG and you know it too, so I’m going to speak freely.  And if that upsets you, then we can talk about it, instead of you ignoring me as if we’re in a highschool spat.”   Her stance relaxed somewhat then, arms unfolding until they were limp by her side.  Now that they were actually speaking, it dawned on her how much she’d missed him.  They weren’t close--  they were barely even friends at this point--  but his guidance had always been appreciated, even when he’d tried to do things that she had never asked for.   “I know why you’re acting like this.  And I’m mad at you for it.”

    His hands met his hips slowly, offensive stance morphing into something more composed.  It was clear she wasn’t looking for a fight, only to defend herself.  Had she been wrong, he’d have exercised his right to control her, to put her back in her place beneath him, but she wasn’t.  I have been avoiding you.  I have been ignoring your existence.  I have suddenly disappeared from your life.  All you’re saying is true.  That’s why I can’t be too angry with you:  it stings because it’s correct.

    “Explain,”   he said slowly, inviting her to say her piece.

    “I talked to Neena and she told me what she said.”   She scowled then, her irritation reignited as she considered the foolish details derisively.  How dare you treat me badly because of somebody else’s blunder.  Are you fucking stupid?   “You have no right to treat me like this because of something she said.  You--”

    “Do not discuss my personal affairs,”   he interjected.

    “YOU discussed them!  This is YOUR fault!”

    Her back met the wall then for he’d lunged into her space.  In that moment, she felt terrified. He towered over her with the prominence of a building, and though he was thin, she knew of the strength that lurked beneath the surface.  She’d known from the moment she walked in that there was a chance this would result in a physical confrontation.  However, she’d had it in the back of her mind that Edgar didn’t exert his dominance like that.

    I suppose you had to reveal your true colours as an Alpha at some point.

    However, what came was not a punch or a slash.  It wasn’t the feeling of claws nor the feeling of her clothes being torn away.  Instead, a delicate finger tipped her chin upwards, her eyes meeting his.  They were angry and dark, though his typical streak of control shared space with the frustration.  Her heart fluttered like a bird in a cage, apprehension staining her gaze feeble. As much as she hated to admit it, she was afraid.

    “What do you want, Grace?  Hm?”   His voice was a low whir.  Perhaps in another context, she might have found it attractive.  As it stood, all she wanted to do was run.   “Do you want to keep running your mouth?  Do you want to test whether I’ll allow that or not?”

    He could tell that she was scared.  Not only could he see it in her face, he could smell it.  The intoxicating scent rolled off of her in waves, and it satisfied a primal slice of his brain so much that he felt the need to smile.  The only thing better than the smell of fear is the smell of lust.

    “You invited me to speak,”   she uttered, voice wracked with tremors.   “So let me speak.”

    The silence was tense, so much so that she almost hoped that he’d start shouting.  It was a fragile thing, one that needed so badly to be broken, and as she stared up at him, she prayed that he would.

                  At least I can understand shouting.  I can’t understand this quiet rage.                         I’m used to beatings and blood, not heated power struggles.

    Slowly, he nodded.   “Then speak.  But do not raise your voice.  I’d hate to choke it out of you.”

    She let out an audible sigh of relief as he let her chin go, though his close proximity remained.  Are you trying to taunt me into whispering?  She found that she didn’t care  -  she’d take any means of conversation that she could get if it meant that he would keep acknowledging her.

    “... you shouldn’t be punishing me for something that somebody else said.  Your pride as a leader shouldn’t be so fragile that a single out-of-line comment from an inferior changes your behaviour.  And you shouldn’t be ignoring the existence of your main scout after all of the success she has brought back to you.”   She said it softly, in a ladylike fashion, though the words were still cutting.  She watched his face keenly, eager to see the moment he snapped and decided to discipline her, but it never came.  When she came to the conclusion that she was in the clear, she decided to say more.   “Whatever disagreement you had with her is your business.  I won’t ask.  It isn’t my right to know.  But it’s my right to fair treatment, and it’s my right to be an individual--  one that doesn’t suffer the brunt of other peoples’ foolishness.  She was wrong.  And she’s admitted it now.  To you and to me.  She knows that what she said was unfair--  that she was just digging at you--  and that you don’t treat me any differently to anybody else.  So why are you still so worried about it?  And why are you still letting it affect us? ”

    “Perhaps because she was right,”   he answered.  

    “She wasn’t,”   Grace said with a groan, unable to suppress the need to roll her eyes.  You frustrate me sometimes.  You’re so clever and yet you’re so dumb.   “... and even if she was, what’s more dishonourable?  Having a relationship with a successful inferior, or treating that successful inferior like dirt out of spite for somebody else?”

    She was making him think.  It was clear in the way his eyes were searching hers.  She hoped that, whatever he was looking for, he realised that it was there.  Though she may have had a backbone, and she may have stood up to him when he was wrong, she was still his creed-mate, still his loyal follower in spite of it all, and she’d be damned if she didn’t acknowledge that he was a spectacular leader.  Even the best captains gave sour orders on occasion.  Even the mighty fell sometimes.

   He stared into her face for longer than she was comfortable with before he pulled back.

    “... you’re right,”   he admitted, turning his back on her as a hand raised to rub gently at his forehead.  This whole fiasco had been doing a number of his nerves.  In all honesty, it was difficult to keep himself away from her.  Her feisty attitude was sometimes the only thing he had to look forward to during his hectic schedule.  I’ve missed you more than I thought I would.  It was hard to look away from you for so long.  It was hard to ignore your smart comments.  It makes me unhappy to turn you away like that.  After dragging his hand through his hair slowly, he turned back to look at her.   “... you’re right.”

    The words didn’t land immediately.  She was surprised to be told as such despite the fact that she knew she was.  Large blue eyes stared up at him with a hint of wonder, hesitation plain before she composed herself once more with a clear of her throat.

    “Yes.  I am.”   She shuffled almost awkwardly, peeling herself away from the wall with clear delay, one hand rubbing at her arm gently.   “... so can you stop?  I can’t believe I’m saying this but…  I just want to go back to how it was before.”   A glance was cast at the floor before she found the courage to look up at him again.   “Nobody likes you like this, Edgar. You’re too reminiscent of all the scummy Alphas out there, and we know you’re not like that.  Most of all me.  Our relationship isn’t getting in the way, nor does it mean you’re treating anybody unfairly.  It’s just… harmless fun.  Neena was wrong.  And I think you should trust me over her anyway.  I’ve been here longer.  I know you better.  I know lyes better.”

    “Yes…”   he agreed with a heavy sigh, claws scratching gently before fingers pulled taut in his hair.  I hate apologising, I hate it...  but you deserve it.   “I… am sorry, Grace.  I thought I was doing a good thing.  You have to understand, an Alpha’s concern isn’t to make friends, it is to control their people in a way that makes them prosperous.  I suppose that disagreement…  tapped into some insecurities I have about the differences in my approach in comparison to a lot of other leaders.”   It was a shameful thing for him to admit. Any lingering doubt was not desirable in somebody who was supposed to lead an entire group on their own.  The last thing anybody needed in a superior was the glaring flaw known as second-guessing.   “I should not be concerned with any of that.  I am different, but I am no less efficient.  My priority is my creed, the same as any other Alpha.  I simply favour fun over a lack of personality.”

   A meek smile formed on her face.   “Exactly.  So quit being a dumbass.”

   Knock-knock, Eddie.  It’s me!  HABIT!  Super sweet of you to open the floodgates, letting this girl back into your heart.  Real stellar.  I bet she’d look cute in a wedding dress.

   She is not in my heart, she’s in my best interest.  She is an inferior.

    “Yes, perhaps I will.”

[shambali-sinner]

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Scourge

Red or Black Chapter 5! Thank you for bearing with me. I enjoy writing but find it challenging. It’s also difficult to find the time, energy, and motivation. You’ve waited a while for this chapter, and I hope it delivers!

This chapter is rated T for Teen for a little spice at the end. As always, this story is fem reader/pronouns.

Previous chapter

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“Not that I believe you’d ever do such a thing, given your employment history, but do remember not to speak to Doomfist unless spoken to. Adeyemi is not a patient man.”

Maximilien was guiding you down a long, dark hallway. A month ago you would have thought nothing fazed him. Indeed, even now, the omnic could probably count on one hand the number of people who could notice his nervous tics. The rest of the world only ever saw the calm fluidity of his movements that were so unlike those of an omnic.

But you could hear a faint clicking in his jaw with each step he took. You noticed his pin was slightly askew and he hadn’t fixed it. The twitch of his fingers, hidden under the light caress of your own palm as your arm covered his offered elbow, betrayed the fear few knew he even felt.

Maximilien was terrified of The Scourge of Numbani, and you were the only person in the world who knew it.

“Of course,” you replied, unable to hide the thumping in your own chest from his audio receptors. You walked under a small, quiet vent and the slight chill made you shudder involuntarily. Instantly Max whipped around and took both your hands, rubbing circles into the tops with his thumbs.

“Are you alright, my dear? I will be by your side the whole time. It is important to show strength to him, but in many instances our activities are executed as a team. You’ll have my companionship during the entirety of the meeting.”

He was making an effort to be reassuring and you let out a little breath in appreciation. He was concerned for your welfare. He cared about you, something others might consider weakness. You knew better. Maximilien was anything but weak, and you rejected the thought that you might be in kind. You squared your shoulders and squeezed his hands back before reaching and adjusting his pin yourself.

His eyelids fluttered almost imperceptibly. But you noticed and filed away the reaction for later use. “Max, I—“

“You’re late.” The door at the end of the hall had opened, revealing a tall Nigerian man with red markings painted on his face.

“Akande,” Max seemed to sigh, shoulders falling in irritation. “The present local time is 9:58. I am never late unless I intend to be.”

“A quality my mentor greatly appreciates.” The Nigerian man held the door open wider and you straightened your posture before striding confidently toward the room, Max just ahead of you. In the corner of your eye you saw the man cock a brow and felt his gaze following you as you passed him. Once you crossed the threshold, he slipped out into the hall and the door shut behind you with a full thud.

There was a wide open balcony under a stone archway at the far end of the room. No stars were visible in the navy sky beyond; there was too much light pollution in this city. A small table and three cushioned armchairs were set out next to a lit fireplace on the right side. Max shuffled forward, his footsteps echoing on the chamber’s stone walls, and bowed at the imposing figure sitting. You followed suit with a curtsy.

“Max, my good friend, please do have a seat. You, too, Miss.” The voice was higher-pitched and less booming than Akande’s, more welcoming. You nodded and sat down gently, noticing the steaming pot of tea laid out on the table. Adeyemi’s eyes flickered across your face. “Please, enjoy a refreshment. Be my guest.”

You heard the omnic’s jaw click beside you. A warning. There was something untrustworthy about the tea being offered, and you were in no position to refuse. Your jaw tightened slightly and Adeyemi released a small breath, seemingly amused. “You have every reason to distrust my hospitality, so if it will ease you, I’ll drink from the pot first.” He poured himself a glass and added a single lump of sugar before taking a sip and smiling. “See? It’s safe.”

You breathed in sharply through your nose and lifted your chin, resolving yourself to mimic the pour exactly, down to stirring a single lump of sugar into the cup before sampling it. The flavor was bitter even with the sweetener and you struggled to suppress a cough. The twinkle in Adeyemi’s eye had not dissipated as he turned to Maximilien. “You, too, Max. No one is exempt, you know.”

The omnic’s fingers twitched over a small blinking device behind the teapot you hadn’t noticed before. Hesitantly, he picked it up and unhinged his jaw, screwing the chip into an approximation of where the back of his throat would be.

“So tell me, Max. How do you feel?”

Maximilien reaffixed his jaw before responding, all trace of emotion gone from his voice, his timbre sounding far more synthetic than usual. “Humiliated.”

“Good to know the technology is functioning properly.” Adeyemi turned back to you. “And you, Miss?”

You wanted to respond with some sort of confident reply, but your tongue refused to form the syllables. What was wrong with your mouth? You grew more panicked as you found yourself incapable of saying what you wanted. After several garbled attempts at speech you were finally able to get out the words, “Afraid and confused.”

Adeyemi chuckled. “Then allow me to explain. There was a truth serum in the tea, one that shuts down the brain’s ability to communicate fabrications. We’ve both drunk it. Max has likewise graciously installed a Candor Module into his cortex. There will be no lies at this table tonight.”

“A Candor Module?” You were shocked. Such devices were little more than urban legend: special, secret omnic implants rumored to only be afforded by the world’s wealthiest for use with their servants. The capability to strip an omnic of their personality, their privacy, and their rights, in the palm of a human hand. They were highly illegal, if one even believed they existed at all.

No wonder the characteristically proud omnic beside you felt humiliated.

“I require absolute honesty in all my initial interviews, from both the prospective agent and their recruiter. If you’ll be working for my branch of Talon, I need to know you are not simply working your way in here to kill me. In return, I, too partake of the truth serum, as an expression of mutual trust.”

Your brow furrowed in confusion.

“Speak your mind,” the man exhaled calmly, lacing his fingers together and leaning back in his chair.

You thought for a moment, making sure to choose the right words to not get tongue-tied again. “With all due respect, why am I here being interviewed to work under you when, as I understand it, Maximilien holds equal power on the Council?”

“Have you not told her?” Adeyemi cocked an eyebrow at Max.

“No,” he responded flatly.

“What else do you already know of me, Miss?”

You inhaled slowly, steeling yourself before answering, matter-of-fact, “You are the Scourge of Numbani, the second person to bear the Doomfist mantle. You were often the guest of my former employer, Signore Bartalotti, but we never personally met. I cleaned up after some of your more colorful activities in the meeting hall more than once.”

“And Max snatched you up before any of the rest of us could have you for ourselves?” Adeyemi was smirking at the omnic, a playful flash in his eyes. “Almost as though he anticipated Antonio’s unfortunate demise at the hands of Overwatch’s wet team.”

Max blinked slowly, body language giving away no acknowledgement of the accusation.

Looking back at you, Adeyemi squared his shoulders and inhaled, finally answering your question. “This meeting would have simply been an introduction only if you did not possess a unique set of . . . skills our organization can put to good use. Max wants you to be trained in self defense-style combat. I want to take it a step further.” He leaned forward, pressing his fingers against his lips. “I want you trained as an assassin.”

Maximilien’s jaw clicked faintly again. If your host noticed, he didn’t show it.

Adeyemi went on. “Max has a substantial military guard force, but no one capable of training you in the ways that would be most beneficial. I do. That is why you are being tested today.”

Your mouth hung slightly ajar at this information. The words had washed over you as if they weren’t even real and you found them stewing in your head, not fitting together in any meaningful way. You closed your eyes and took a deep breath, hanging your head and folding your arms. The defensive pose did not go unnoticed, but the others in the room did not prompt you, respectfully giving you the time to process the information.

You swallowed slowly and opened your eyes, looking back up at the man across the table from you, ready to announce your determination. “I don’t know if I have the capacity to kill someone.”

Adeyemi raised an eyebrow. “Well that’s not a response I’ve heard before. I’ve heard outright denial, blind fealty, and hesitancy, but not self-skepticism. Your words suggest that you are willing to accept the moral consequences of doing whatever is necessary to further our cause but don’t know if you could pull a real trigger when the time comes. You are a most definitely promising asset, one we’ll simply have to work on.”

He then turned to Maximilien, giving you time to think. “Tell me, Max, how goes your project in Paris?”

“The pieces are falling into place,” the omnic replied. “Our front reopens next week and I’ve hired a compliant puppet to run it. Her convictions and beliefs will stir the omnic population of Paris to the type of discontent perfect for planting our ideological seeds.”

“Does this puppet of yours know who you truly are?”

“No. She believes she is spreading unity through a message of equality, but we have the resources to twist the meaning of her words for the public.”

“Good, good. Now, I have to ask a personal question of you, Miss.” You swallowed thickly as he turned back to you. This couldn’t be good. “How do you feel about Max? About the nature of your relationship with him?”

You stiffened, coughing slightly in discomfort, knowing you couldn’t lie and you couldn’t run. The Scourge of Numbani would be more than content to sit and wait for hours until the truth serum wore off, only to dose you with it again and wait even longer. You closed your eyes and gave in, letting the words that didn’t even seem like yours burble up from your throat.

“I feel scared and intimidated. I’ve never felt more in danger than when he’s in a room with me. That being said, that fear is fantastically exhilarating. Maximilien makes me feel alive in ways I never knew possible. He ensures I want for nothing, and his touch ignites a fire within my soul. It’s only been a month, and I can’t name this feeling yet, but I do know it’s intoxicating and I don’t want it to end any time soon.”

You opened your eyes again, surprised that so much honesty had poured out of you. Your cheeks burned hot and red with shame and you turned away from the omnic in the chair next to you, pulling nervously at a lock of hair.

Adeyemi responded slowly. “And would you say your loyalty is to him or to Talon as a whole? You’ve worked for Antonio for nearly six years. Would you betray those you’ve worked with for such a large part of your life so far if he asked you to? Hypothetically, of course.”

“Yes.” The word slipped from your mouth before you could even think about how to respond. You gasped a little, and you could see the man prompting you to elaborate. Your lip trembled as you went on. “My loyalty will be first and foremost to Maximilien. I don’t trust him, but I know he doesn’t want me harmed. He will do everything in his power to keep me safe. I put my faith in that. And yes, I would betray any of you if he asked me to.”

Adeyemi closed his eyes, considering. His next words were slow and enunciated very clearly. “Would you die for him?”

“Yes.”

There was a thick silence that enveloped the room, cut only by the crackling of the fire a few feet away. Sweat was beading on the back of your neck and for the first time you noticed the faint scent of sandalwood lingering in the air. After an eternity, the Scourge spoke again.

“And you, Max? Same questions.”

The omnic replied almost immediately in that same emotionless monotone brought on by the Candor Module. “She is only a pet to me, a plaything, a pretty accessory to flaunt my wealth and status. Were she to be lost to me I would experience disappointment in the loss and the circumstances of my security that would lead to such a thing, but I can always find another pet to amuse myself with. There are plenty of people dying to be on the arm of a rich man in exchange for intimate favors. My loyalty is to Talon, and I would not sacrifice myself to save her.”

The words did not faze you. You knew this was Maximilien’s opinion of what you had, and you had prepared for him to respond like this, despite your own confession of feelings just before. Still, you reached for your glass of tea and took another nervous drink to calm yourself, truth serum be damned.

Adeyemi remained quiet, merely observing you stewing in your burning shame for several moments. You both wanted to know what he was thinking and not at the same time. Finally, he cleared his throat and scratched his nose, leaning back in his chair and seeming to relax. “Well, Miss, I think we can proceed with your training. Max and I would like my protege, Akande Ogundimu, to teach you in turn. You met him on the way in.”

“I’ve worked for his family’s company for nearly your whole life,” Maximilien chimed in. “I oversaw the transition of control of the company from his father to him. I’ve requested him personally for your training.”

You nodded. “That makes sense.”

“Well, I think we’re nearly finished here. Do you have any questions for me?” Adeyemi asked.

You only had one. “What kind of assassin does Talon expect me to be?”

———————————

Maximilien slid into the seat behind you in the back of the limousine and wrapped an arm around you. As soon as the door closed, giving you privacy, you turned and straddled his hips, resting your hands on his shoulders. His fingers squeezed your hips encouragingly and he hummed questioningly, his usual singsong cadence restored.

You pressed a kiss to his jaw and pulled back to look in his eyes. “A truth serum, Max? You could have warned me.”

“Would you have had the same first impression on Adeyemi if I had?”

You pouted. “Probably not,” you admitted, “But I think you prepared me well enough.” You ground against him, the heat beginning to spread through you relieving the tension in your muscles.

The omnic purred, stroking your side. “What’s brought this on, darling?”

“You’re so much more than that stupid module is supposed to strip you down to. You’re twice the man anyone who would force you to assimilate it is.”

He closed his eyes and laid his head back against the seat. “Only one other person knows this, but Candor Modules don’t work on me. With the access to them someone of my affluence has, I was able to have a few deconstructed and my software upgraded to be immune to their code.”

“You mean—“

“Everything I said in that meeting was an act.”

“Why tell me you can’t be compelled into honesty? Why trust me with the information that you just lied to the Scourge of Numbani?”

“You’re still under the influence of your own compulsion,” he groaned, beginning to stiffen beneath you. “I know what you’re doing right now is genuine; you truly think I’m worth something more than my money. You’ll keep my secrets for me, probably better than anyone else I know. It’s almost tragic how quickly and completely you’ve attached yourself to me, though I can’t say I’m displeased.”

You paused to consider his words. You thought back to before the meeting, your fleeting impression that he cared about you. But in what way? “Will you ever tell me how you truly feel about me?”

Had he been capable of facial expression beyond his eyelids, you knew he’d be smirking. “Not a chance, my dear.”

Next chapter | All chapters

[mdelpin]

Small Sacrifices - Chapter 3 (Final)

Gratsu Bingo 2019 Prompt: Love

Chapter 3

It had been a week since the incident and Natsu was going stir crazy. The hospital had kept him under observation for several days poking and prodding him incessantly. They’d checked his brain and his heart and everything else they could think of before finally discharging him.

He’d been lucky, aside from the rather severe burns on his hands, the damage hadn’t been too bad. His organs were fine, but he’d suffered some muscle injuries as well as a dislocated shoulder from when he’d smashed into the wall behind him, and he felt generally sore.

Gray had been a nervous wreck throughout, refusing to leave his side. Natsu knew he was terrified that if he left for even a moment, Zeref would swoop in and take him away. It was ludicrous, but Natsu didn’t fight him, he knew Gray had his own issues, and he certainly didn’t mind getting so much attention from his man.

Through it all, there had been no more word from his brother and although he’d like to think Zeref had seen the error of his ways It wasn’t like him to give up so easily. So Natsu waited for him to make his move.

He heard the apartment door open and found himself relaxing, Gray had left that morning for his dissertation defense and had promised to be home for lunch. He looked up, smile at the ready only to see Lyon coming into his bedroom.

“Hey Pikachu, how you feeling?” Lyon greeted, smirking at Natsu’s heated glare. He helped Natsu off the bed and into some clothes.

“You’re not funny,” Natsu complained, he hated needing help, but the burns on his hands were still very tender and even he wasn’t stubborn enough to subject himself to that much pain just for the sake of pride, “What are you doing here anyway?”

“Gray called me, his defense is taking longer than he expected, so he asked me to check on you,” Lyon explained as he walked Natsu over to the bathroom, being careful to give him as much support as he could since Gray had mentioned sometimes Natsu’s muscles would spasm randomly.

Natsu stopped mid-step and glanced at Lyon worriedly, “Wait, is that bad?”

“No, I think it’s good, they just had more questions than what he’d anticipated, he sounded pretty upbeat actually. I think in a few hours we’ll have to start calling him Dr. Fullbuster,” Lyon beamed at the giddy expression on Natsu’s face at hearing those words.

“We should have a party or something,” Natsu clapped his hands, forgetting his injuries in his excitement and almost passing out from the pain.

“You really are an idiot,” Lyon sighed as he grabbed hold of Natsu and held him against his body while the younger boy rode out the wave of pain. “Where are your pain meds?”

When Natsu didn’t immediately answer Lyon sat him down on the toilet and looked in the medicine cabinet. Reading the instructions on the Vicodin bottle, he grabbed the appropriate dosage and poured some tap water into a rinsing cup.

“Open up,” he placed the pill on Natsu’s tongue and held up the cup to his mouth to allow him to drink it down. “Stay here, I’m gonna get you a snack, you shouldn’t have that on an empty stomach.”

Natsu nodded listlessly, he couldn’t wait until he could do things for himself again. He didn’t mind it so much when it was Gray, but anyone else irritated him, especially if it was someone from work. Lyon soon returned with a glass of milk and a cereal bar. He fed him, and after helping him use the restroom, he looked at the bandages nervously.

“Come on, we might as well change your bandages,” Lyon declared bravely. He was rather squeamish, but he’d promised Gray he would take care of Natsu and so he would do it.

He grabbed the instructions and assembled all the pieces. Natsu stared at him with wide eyes, but he took a shaky breath and presented his hands without complaint.

Lyon donned some gloves per the instructions and after twenty of the most torturous minutes of both their lives, they were done, and Lyon walked Natsu over to the living room setting him down on the couch before sitting beside him and grabbing the remote.

“Have the pain meds kicked in yet?” Lyon asked guiltily, wondering if perhaps he should have waited. Natsu’s glare was reply enough. They sat in companionable silence, neither of them really watching the TV.

Soon, he could see Natsu’s body relaxing, and after some deliberation, he finally blurted out, “What’s the deal with your brother?”

Lyon wasn’t sure Natsu would answer him, but after a week of nagging his brother for information and getting nowhere, he figured it was at least worth a try. He needed to know how much of a threat this guy really was so he could take steps to protect them.

“I never told you about that, huh?” Natsu sounded very calm, and it was a bit unnerving to see him this way, even though Lyon knew it was just the effect of the opioid on his brain.

“You know, considering how overprotective you both are you’d probably have gotten along pretty well.” Natsu smiled at Lyon, his eyes closing briefly in thought. “I don’t remember much of it, but when I was five years old, I almost died, well technically I was dead for a few minutes. Zeref could never get over it.”

Lyon peered at Natsu in confusion not understanding what that had to do with anything. He waited for more information, not wanting to push, but none seemed to be forthcoming. His cellphone rang, and he answered it, assuming it was Gray while Natsu sat quietly, lost in his thoughts.

“Hello?” A slew of frantic babbling came over the line, and Lyon looked down at his Caller Id to make sure he was talking to who he thought he was.

“Laxus?” Lyon called out, “You gotta slow down, dude, you’re not making any sense. What about Natsu’s brother?”

He listened for a few minutes and in a voice filled with rage, he announced, “We’re on our way.”

Lyon nudged Natsu to get his attention, “We gotta go to the office, your brother is threatening to sue the business for negligence. The lawyers need you to come in for a deposition.”

O-o

Gray still couldn’t believe it was over, after all the months of research and writing he had finally presented his dissertation, and it had gone much better than he could have ever hoped. The professors had asked so many questions it had gone way over the scheduled time, and now with their approval, he was officially a Doctor! He’d even been offered a few job interviews. After all the years of struggling to make ends meet, everything was starting to look up for them, and he couldn’t be happier.

He couldn’t wait to celebrate with Natsu and Lyon, both of whom had encouraged and made it possible for him to pursue his dream. He’d stopped at Natsu’s favorite pizza place on the way home and ordered two of their favorites pies before stopping at a convenience store to get a twelve-pack of Lyon’s favorite beer since Natsu couldn’t drink while on his pain meds.

Gray knocked on the door, but when no one answered, he figured Lyon was probably helping Natsu. He balanced the pizza boxes and case of beer as best he could by pressing them between his chest and the door as he fumbled in his pants pocket for his apartment key.

Somehow Gray managed to make his way inside without dropping anything, and he pushed the door shut behind him.

“I’m home,” he announced loudly, heading towards the kitchen to put the food down on the counter. He opened the box of beer putting four in the freezer and the rest in the fridge before grabbing a pile of plastic plates from a cabinet. He was a little surprised no one had come out to greet him yet.

He walked out towards the living room, “Where are you guys?”

“They’ve been called away, I didn’t want our conversation to be interrupted,“ a voice replied. It was a voice Gray had only heard once before, but it had managed to imprint itself in his mind.

A sheen of cold sweat covered his body as he turned to see Zeref Dragneel standing in his living room, his expression disgusted as he peered down at a framed picture of Natsu kissing Gray at the beach. It had been taken by their friend Levy a few years ago, and it was one of Gray’s favorites.

“How did you get in here?” Gray snarled, trying to hide the fear that he couldn’t seem to shake after so many years.

“This dump?” Zeref took out his wallet and showed him a credit card. “Does Natsu really enjoy living here?”

“He’s never complained,” Gray bristled at the man’s haughty tone as he stood there looking down on their home. Gray walked over to the door, pulling it open roughly, “Thanks for stopping by, now get the hell out.”

“There’s no need to be hostile,” Zeref smirked, sitting down on their couch, “Gray, is it?”

“You know damn well what my name is, I’m sure by now you’ve had me checked out.”

Zeref chuckled, “I have indeed. I have to admit given your proclivities, I was expecting to find something more...scandalous.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” Gray retorted, and when Zeref made no move, he growled, “Am I going to have to drag you out?”

“Sit down, Gray,” Zeref ordered, his voice infused with authority. “We have a lot to talk about.”

Gray could feel his blood turn to ice as his previous elation turned to dread. What did Natsu’s brother want with him? He thought about Natsu, and it helped bolster his courage, whatever it was didn’t matter, there was nothing this man could do to tear them apart.

“There’s nothing for us to talk about, you’ve made your feelings quite clear,” Gray snapped before closing the apartment door with a frustrated grunt and sitting down in an armchair.

“Where’s Natsu?” Gray demanded.

O-o

Lyon and Natsu had rushed to their workplace to find the office in chaos. There were several men dressed in business suits that Natsu had never seen before along with a white-haired man that seemed vaguely familiar. It bothered him that he couldn’t place him until Lyon reminded him he had been at the hospital with his brother.

Another group of men was talking to Laxus in the office’s conference room. They could hear Laxus muffled shouts before the door was pulled open so hard the room shook around them.

“This is bullshit!” Laxus yelled at the group of lawyers who only nodded politely and entered the room, shaking hands with the men inside, closing the door behind them. Freed hurried in with a pitcher of water and some cups.

Sting was also in the office, and he looked positively terrified. Natsu felt terrible for him, it had been a stupid accident, and now his brother was using it as some sort of excuse to come barging into Natsu’s life.

Freed came back out and informed Sting the lawyers wanted to speak with him first. Sting took a shaky breath before going inside.

It was slowly beginning to dawn on him that there was only one way for this to end. Zeref would threaten to put the company out of business unless Natsu went home with him. It was despicable, but it was just the type of thing he’d expected from his brother.

“I have to quit,” Natsu thought out loud, it was the only way for Zeref’s threat to disappear. He wasn’t willing to go back home, but his friends shouldn’t have to suffer for it. But if he quit, what would they do for money? They didn’t really have a lot saved up, and until Gray found a full-time job, they’d be screwed.

“Like hell, you will! You’re one of my best employees and more than that, you’re family,” Laxus protested, grabbing a stress toy and squeezing it in his hand, “There’s no need for any of that, Pikachu, this will blow over.”

Natsu rolled his eyes at the nickname. Great, it had stuck. Fucking Lyon!

“They just showed up requesting a bunch of documents,” Freed reported, looking a bit flustered by all the activity in the usually quiet office. “Then they asked for you, and when they learned you were still out, they demanded you and Sting come in for depositions. They want to talk to a bunch of the others too.”

“You’re an adult,” Laxus pointed out, hand squeezing the toy ever faster, “He shouldn’t be able to initiate legal matters on your behalf. Come to think of it shouldn’t they be talking to you first, seeing as you’re the injured party? How’re your hands healing, by the way?”

Natsu and Lyon looked at each other at the same time and yelled, “Gray!”

“We gotta go,” Lyon held the door open for Natsu, and they rushed back to his car.

O-o

“Natsu should be fine, I’m sure by now he’s beginning to realize what he’s up against,” Zeref’s smile was almost predatory, “But let’s talk about you. How long have the two of you been together?”

“Ten years, “Gray replied defiantly, wanting Zeref to know how strong their relationship was. They’d been together through some tough times, clinging to each other just to get through it.

“Ten years, huh? I have to hand it to you, that’s a long time,” Zeref whistled, “That’s actually longer than our parents managed to stay together.”

“So tell me, what are those ten years worth to you?”

“They mean everything to me, he means everything to me,” Gray replied simply.

“No, I mean, what do you think would be adequate compensation?” Zeref took out a checkbook from his jacket pocket, “How about one hundred thousand for each year, that’s a million dollars just for shacking up with my brother.”

“A bribe? After all these years, that’s the best you can manage? This is what I was so scared of?” Gray laughed in disbelief.

“Take it and leave. It’s not a bad haul for someone like you.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“We both know you’re nowhere near Natsu’s league. If he hadn’t run away when he did, you would never have even met.”

“Do you believe in fate?” Gray asked, suddenly.

Zeref scoffed, “I believe you make your own way in the world.”

“I believe that Natsu and I were fated to meet, that we are two halves of one whole and there’s nothing that can break us apart. Not your money, not your lawyers and certainly not you,” Gray sneered.

“I know you don’t approve of us, and frankly, I don’t care. For years, I’ve had to watch as Natsu worked his ass off just so we could have a life on our own. He paid for everything, including my school, and he did it all with a smile. But that’s about to change because Natsu deserves the world and now that I achieved my dream, I’m going to give it to him, not you.”

“You can’t seriously believe this is what’s best for him? I’m his brother, I know what’s best for him,” Zeref roared.

“You’re so full of shit, you know that? You know nothing about him. With all your resources, you could’ve found Natsu at any time, but you didn’t even bother looking for him, did you? You were probably expecting him to come running back to you. Tell me something, is your father really back, or was that just bait?”

“That’s enough!” Natsu’s voice was full of rage, and Lyon immediately moved next to Gray, as if he expected Zeref to attack him at any moment.

“What are you doing here, Zeref?” Natsu asked, “I thought I made myself clear at the hospital.”

“Natsu, for God’s sake, look at this dump. How can you live here when you could be back home?”

“I don’t have to explain myself to you,” Natsu snapped, but when he saw a flicker of something real in Zeref’s eyes, he reined himself in. “I wish you’d understand. There’s more to life than money, Zeref. I’ve never been happier anywhere than I am here.”

“There is nothing you can do or say that will make me leave Gray and I think you realize that or you wouldn’t be here. Did you try to bribe him?” Natsu chuckled already knowing the answer.

Zeref looked at the ground, making Natsu laugh harder.

“How much?”

“One million dollars,” Zeref responded grudgingly.

Natsu whistled, “That’s a decent chunk of change, Gray.”

Gray crossed his arms, annoyed at how Natsu didn’t seem to be taking the situation seriously, “Perhaps I should have taken it.”

Natsu laughed, “Nah, don’t be a sucker. I’m worth way more than that.”

He suddenly looked over at the kitchen counter, “Is that pizza I smell? Why don’t we go eat it at the beach? I want to hear everything!”

“Aren’t you forgetting someone?”

“Zeref?” Natsu looked confused, “He can come if he wants to.”

Gray and Lyon were both looking at him as though he’d grown a second head.

“Actually, why don’t you guys go ahead and set it up, we’ll be right behind you.”

Natsu waited until the two brothers had left with the food, smiling at Gray reassuringly when he noticed his worried expression before turning to face Zeref, his smile replaced with determination.

“If you want to give me my life back, with Gray in it, I’ll consider it. But I won’t be your whore. Either make the deal without me or not at all. And back off my boss, he runs a good place and helps a lot of people out.”

“I don’t get you,” Zeref growled with frustration, not used to not getting what he wanted.

“I don’t expect you to,” Natsu shrugged, “Our lives are too different. All you really have to do is accept me, Zeref. Love me for who I am, not who you wanted me to be.”

“I’m going to lose a ton of money on this,” Zeref complained, but he didn’t try to change Natsu’s mind, and he took this as a good sign.

“It’s only money, Zeref, you have plenty of it,” Natsu reminded him, “Loosen up a little, have some fun. Eat pizza at the beach while drinking a cold beer. Get to know my boyfriend, he’s amazing.”

Natsu motioned for him to open the door to his apartment so they could head over to meet the others. Zeref only stared at him in confusion until Natsu waved his bandaged hands in his face. Zeref paused for a moment before complying.

Natsu began ambling towards the beach, and Zeref settled in next to him, matching his pace.

“He does seem to care for you,” Zeref admitted reluctantly, “He didn’t even consider the money.”

“I give amazing blowjobs,” Natsu retorted with an evil grin, enjoying his brother’s obvious discomfort at his words.

“I really don’t want to hear about that,” Zeref groaned uncomfortably, “Oh God, please tell me you never did anything like that for money.”

“I could have if things had been different,” Natsu stopped to look his brother in the eye, his tone serious, “Your words really hurt me back then, and I didn’t ever want to go back. I would have done anything to stay gone. But I found Gray instead, and he saved me. He introduced me to Gramps, who made sure I stayed in school and got me a job with Laxus when I graduated.”

“Natsu, I—,” Zeref began but didn’t expand, only managed to look embarrassed.

“I’ve had to work hard for everything I have, and I’m proud of it. I like my life. I enjoy my job, and my friends even though they’re dicks half the time. I found someone I love, and I do love him Zeref. He makes me want to be the best I can be to be worthy of him. I would do anything for him, “ he stared at his brother, daring him to say anything against his next words, “and I plan to marry him as soon as I can.”

Zeref stopped in his tracks, “Marry?”

“Yes, Zeref, marry,” Natsu deadpanned, “It’s a thing we can do now. And I’d like you to be there and be happy for me, but I can’t make you accept me. That’s up to you.”

Zeref considered his words, remaining quiet for what felt like forever and staring at Natsu the whole time.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry I said those awful words to you,” Zeref sighed in defeat, “I know I’m an asshole, but I really don’t want to lose you again. I’ll try.”

Natsu gave him a hug as best he could with his injured hands, “I forgive you, we’ve both grown up a lot since then. At least I hope so.”

They arrived at the beach and were able to see Gray and Lyon by the picnic tables. Gray was pacing while Lyon tried to calm him down. Natsu smiled.

“You’re right, it’s kind of nice here,” Zeref commented beside him, “The view is beautiful.”

Natsu, who only had eyes for Gray, replied with, ”I couldn’t agree more.”

Zeref snorted marking where Natsu was looking, “You really have it bad, don’t you?”

“Hmhm, and he’s a doctor now, you know,” Natsu grinned proudly, “That’s what we’re celebrating, his dissertation was approved.”

Zeref rolled his eyes at his excitement but smiled before looking suddenly ashamed. “Hey uhm, Natsu? Igneel didn’t really come back.”

“I figured, let’s just go eat, okay?”

They made their way to the table with Zeref getting a slice of pizza and putting it on a plate for Natsu while Gray fussed over him.

“Everything’s gonna be fine, Doctor Princess, we’ve come to an agreement. Zeref’s gonna try not to be an asshole, and I will no longer deny he’s my brother,” Natsu grinned happily at Gray’s disgust at the new nickname and Zeref’s annoyed grunt. “Now tell me all about your dessert presentation.”

Gray glanced at the two brothers, and although he was a little hesitant to take Natsu’s words at face value, he dared to believe they might be true. That they could move forward without having to worry about Natsu’s family ever again.

He wrapped his arms around Natsu, being careful of his injuries and whispered, “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” Natsu replied before kissing him sweetly, “and you don’t have to get me the world. Everything I need is right here.”

“Really? That’s too bad, cause I thought since you were injured, I could do this,” Gray whispered some words into Natsu’s ear that made him blush and peer at him with undisguised desire.

When Natsu tried to coax him into doing whatever it was Gray shoved a pizza in his mouth, and the two of them began laughing hysterically with Natsu almost choking on the food.

They could hear Zeref ask Lyon, “Are they always like this?”

“You don’t know the half of it…”