#I’m assuming the art I saw on your profile is yours I only took a glance hehe

[mostlyhumantmblr]

I like your art keep it up

GEHEHEHE THANKS YOUR ART IS FIRE ALSO

[maxwell-grant]

Jumping off from my previous question/suggestion, might I please ask if there are any superheroes you think would make fine Pulp Villains and any Supervillains you think would make convincing Pulp Heroes?

I'm gonna go ahead and remark that I'd personally suggest to anyone who's trying to create pulp characters inspired by superheroes (which would be probably about 90% of you who may want to do that sort of thing) to flip the script around a little. As in, don't try to create pulp analogues to the Justice League/Avengers upfront, but play around with some of the lesser-known icons and filter those through your idea of what “pulp” means (which is gonna be quite different than my own or anyone else’s). 

I’m not gonna really mention characters I’ve already talked about before like Vandal Savage or Namor, instead I’ll pick new ones and see what can be highlighted about them.

Regarding “Superheroes who could make fine/convincing Pulp Villains”, even though he’s a character I've read basically nothing on, Martian Manhunter definitely leaped out to me as an obvious option. He’s a Sci-Fi Superman who takes the first half of the name to an extreme that borders on comical, except he’s not a square-jawed white man, he’s a 1.000 year old green alien from Mars with shapeshifting powers who can look as monstrous as the artist desires. He’s the product of an advanced civilization and genetic modification, and on top of the Flying Brick powerset and shapeshifting, he also has incredibly powerful and extensive telepathic abilities, he can become invisible, phaze through matter, use telekinesis and other weird abilities. A lot of pulp stories closer to sci-fi were based around the idea of taking one of these abilities and extrapolating horrific consequences for them, and J’onn has those by the dozens. He also has an extremely mundane weakness that would allow him to be beaten by Macready with a blowtorch if that’s where the story ended.

He was also a law enforcement officer from Mars who became a police detective and it’s even right there in his name, and again, I have never read anything he’s in (I should probably pick the Orlando mini), I know he’s for all intents and purposes a generally nice man who tends to job a lot in crossovers and cartoons, but the idea of taking all those great vast and horrifying alien powers, combining all of them into a single character who also happens to be the last survivor of a doomed planet (and one who actually lived through it’s collapse), and then making that character a former cop trying to resume his work on Earth? 

That is a Pulp Supervillain begging to happen, and a particularly horrifying one at that. And hey, speaking of The Thing-

Now, Plastic Man’s potential for horror has already been explored quite a bit in some of the darker DC continuities like Injustice and DCeased, and it’s quite funny seeing a lot of these turn Plastic Man into The Thing because there were quite a handful of Wold Newton pages that ran with the idea that Macready from the original story was Doc Savage, and that the secret chemicals that Eel O’Brian was hit by that gave him his powers were actually samples of The Thing contained in one of Savage’s labs. Regardless, the idea of a former street crook suddenly gaining bizarre shapeshifting abilities that allow him to reign terror on his gangster associates could make for a great premise as a pulp crime story that veers into horror as the gangsters gradually figure out what is Eel O’Brian’s deal, and then the story can take a more tragic turn.

The thing about Jack Cole’s Plastic Man that modern takes on the character neglect is that, while Plas was a lively roguish anti-hero (arguably the first of it’s kind in comics), he’s still for intents and purposes “the straight man” (HA, right, Plastic Man being “straight”). He’s the relatively sane hero who plays off Woozy’s wackier misadventures and the imaginative madness that Jack Cole paints his adventures with, and it makes for an interesting contrast considering Plastic Man is already a weird character, having to ramp up the strangeness of the world around him so that he still remains the sane man. There are ways to twist this into something quite horrifying, even tragic for Plastic Man as he either struggles to maintain coherency, or embraces the shifting chaos the world’s spiraling into for better or worse (and definitely for the worse towards those on the receiving end of his vengeance, or even his humor).

Now, onto the flipside, regarding Supervillains that could become Pulp Heroes -

Normally I’d not mention the Batman villains here, because I already have a lot to talk about in regards to them as is, they comprise some of my favorite comic characters, but I pretty much have to make an exception for Two-Face in this topic, as not only a pretty obvious option but one with even case studies to prove it, as not only do we have The Black Bat, a 1930s costumed pulp hero with an identical origin story and several other conceptual overlaps with Batman, as well as The Whisperer, a young hotshot police commissioner who dresses up as a disfigured vigilante to kill criminals without consequence (and who’s somehow less of a maniacal asshole in his secret identity than in his regular one), but it turns out that there actually was a 1910s pulp hero called The Two-Faced Man:

Crewe was created by “Varick Vanardy,” the pseudonym of Frederic van Rensselaer Dey (Nick Carter, Doctor Quartz), and appeared in three short stories and two novels and short story collections from 1914 to 1919, beginning with “That Man Crew” (The Cavalier, Jan. 24, 1914). 

Crewe is “The Two-Faced Man.” 

He is in his forties and has gray hair and a “sharply cut and handsome profile—until one caught a view of the other side of his face and saw the almost hideous blemish that nearly covered it, and which graduated in corrugated irregularity from a delicate pink to repulsive purple.” 

Crewe is two-faced in another way. Crewe is a saloon owner in below Washington Square. But he has another identity: Birge Moreau, portraitist and socialite hanger-on. Crewe uses both his identities to solve crimes as an amateur detective.

The only person to know about both of Crewe’s identities is a police inspector who is also Crewe’s friend and who Crewe helps in pressing cases - The Encyclopedia of Pulp Heores by Jess Nevins

And speaking of obvious picks for Supervillains turned Pulp Heroes,

Assuming I even need to make a case for Kraven the Hunter other than just presenting this cropped panel from Squirrel Girl and in particular the art painted on the Kra-Van, or even just telling you to read Squirrel Girl and it’s take on “The Unhuntable Sergei” (I had no idea most of the people saying “Kraven’s arc in Squirrel Girl is as good if not better than Kraven’s Last Hunt” weren’t actually joking in the slightest and I speak as someone who has Kraven among their absolute favorite Marvel characters, it had no right being that good), I’m going to quote the brilliant Rogue’s Review from The Mindless Ones that lays down in painstaking detail why Kraven could make a killer protagonist in that horrifically over-the-top pulp fashion

One thing that strikes me writing this, is how well Kraven could hold his own comic. There’s always room for a book spotlighting a ruthless, hardcore, gentleman bastard, and Kraven’s raison d’etre makes him supremely versatile, so well suited to any genre, any environment. It’s odd that more writers haven’t jumped on the fact that in a universe where off-world travel is possible – indeed, common – a hunter like Kraven would have a field day. 

I can just imagine the opening scene – herds of weird cthuloid bat creatures grazing in the gloomy green nitrogen fields, bathed in lethal, bone splintering fog, when, suddenly, LIGHT! from above and an unholy bellowing: “CTHGRGN fthgrgnARAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHGN!”

They look up in fear and then they start to run – ploughing into and over each other, tentacles flailing, as from the space-ship’s docking bay Kraven silently plummets, barely dressed for the cold, a glowing knife smothered in elder signs jammed between his teeth. 

You should have seen him one night previous, sipping alien tokay around the Captain’s table with the other guests, discussing the morning’s hunt; and the way he insulted the Skrull dignitary by forgetting himself and accidentally sporting his favourite piece of formal wear: his boiling unstable dinner-jacket of many colours, fashioned from the hide of one of the Ambassador’s super kinsmen.

Whoops!

Midway through Kraven explaining how the best way to irreparably damage a symbiote is to wait until its bonded with you and then seriously maim yourself, the Skrull decided it might be a good idea to simmer down, while his beautiful Inhuman lover hung on every word.

The deeper I get into this the more convinced I am that the MU’s hunter-killer extraordinaire wouldn’t limit himself to bloody planet Earth. And neither would he limit himself to this dimension, or universe or timeline. The guy’d be just as at home leaping, sword raised, onto the back of a T-Rex in the Savage Land, as he would be ploughing through werewolves in the graveyards of Arkham or tracking a howling Demon across Mephistopheles’ realm. 

He’d work perfectly in all these environments because he has a damn good reason to be casting a bloody swathe through them: wherever there’s big game, you’ll find Kraven.

The next choice I guess is an oddball, but not that much of an oddball if you know already what is my main frame of reference towards Marvel

I don’t think people appreciate enough that the main reason Shuma-Gorath has anything resembling a fanbase has nothing whatsoever to do with the comics he was in, but entirely because, when Capcom designers had a list of Marvel characters to pick from to work on Marvel Super Heroes, they took a look at the diet Cthulhu and went “gimme THAT one”, and then went all-in in giving the alien squid monster a funky personality along with a great stage and music and animations and all that great fighting game character stuff, and now he’s maybe the most popular Dr Strange villain along with Dormammu and Mordo, despite having ZERO film appearences or major showings in comic sagas.

Capcom's designers redefined Shuma-Gorath from a nebulous cosmic evil into a comically smug cartoon bastard who can rant about devouring all dimensions and souls horrifically while also cracking poses and zingers like “How do you expect to win a fight with only two arms?” and having dinners with Dhalsim or hosting Japanese game shows in his endings, and it kills me that none of this ever made it’s way into any depictions of the character outside of MvC. 

So that’s kinda what I’d go with. I’d take Capcom’s Shuma-Gorath, depower him a bit obviously from his canonical power, and run with the premise of his MvC3 ending where he decides that, well, if he's the unlikely savior of this pathetic planet and these wretched human dogs like him so much, and he’s clearly having a much better time here among them than he ever had drifting among the stars cealessly consuming life, then maybe he can take a break from all that eldritch business and keep up hosting the Super Monster Awesome Hour and maybe fight whatever PITIFUL villains think can take HIS planet. I mean, he’ll probably still end up destroying the planet by the end, but why not give this hero business a try?

Just until he gets his full powers back of course. 

I mean you can’t deny he DOES look pretty good in that bowtie, surely The Great Shuma-Gorath wouldn’t be so unmerciful as to deny these vile wastes of flesh something good to look at in their brief and miserable lives.

[travellingarmy]

║Venti║ Frappuccino

Requested from Wattpad.

Gender-neutral.

Modern AU. Fluff.

Word count: 2.3k

---

With the sound of the bell the hang just above the entrance, you would be greeted by the smell of a freshly brewed cup of coffee mixed with a sweet aroma from the many pastries that you would see before you.

Working at the cafe was no easy feat with the many people coming in and out in random times but as a university student that still had to pay for their tuition and dormitory whilst still having extra money left over for food, you couldn't complain. Well, not that you would complain. You found joy in being a barista.

"(Y/N), you're zoning out. Come on, we still have customers to serve to." Barbara taps your shoulder, gaining your attention. "Ah, sorry," you muttered, turning to your station. "Hehe, there's no need to apologies. I assume that you have an exam coming up?" she asks, eyeing you from the corner of her eyes as a customer waltz inside. You hummed and nod slightly. "It's a good thing that I met Master Diluc. Otherwise, I don't think I would be cut out to major in business."

After getting the order from the random customer, she returns to have a chat with you. "Stop with the 'Master Diluc'." She laughs. "It's a bit old-fashioned, don't you think?" And indeed it was, but he comes from a wealthy family so you saw it best to address him formally. "And don't be so hard on yourself and say negative things about your own capabilities! You entered this university by your own smarts! Diluc is smart as well, yes, but he got in due to connections along with his brother. That says something a lot about you."

Barbara was always good at cheering people up and supporting them. One can tell that she was quite popular in high school. She wasn't in the same major as you so you ended up being friends through working in the same cafe. She majored in music-- not that it should surprise anyone. With one look at her, you could definitely tell without even knowing her personally. You saw it best that she would become an idol and her personality will help her with that.

You smile at the blonde. "Thanks." She waves her hand in front of her in small motions in dismissal. "I'm just stating facts." You both returned your focus on your job afterwards, listening in on the chatter of others instead. Most were students so they mainly talked about their studies.

The bell rang once again, getting your attention. Coming in, was a usual customer that you learned comes around at 2 in the afternoon; during your shifts. Yes, there were other customers that you would recognize-- making them usual customers as well but this one was quite distinctive, you'd say. He had dark hair that was always braided on both sides of his head that had a natural teal at the tips of it. He would always come alone, only carrying his backpack- that had his laptop- and a notebook.

You don't know who he was but you figured that what made you so intrigued with him was his fluorescent green eyes that would seemingly glow even in the day. It was truly unique.

You look at Barbara who was busy making another customer's order and decided that you would be the one taking his order. Coming up to the counter, you put on a smile as usual. "Hello, what can I get you?" you repeat the words that you grew to familiarize yourself with as if you were a robot being programmed to say it to people you take orders from. In fact, you already know what he will get but it was something you had to say every time.

"Hi, can I get a venti-sized Matcha Green Tea Frappuccino and two double-chocolate chunk brownie?" he says, not needing to look at the menu. You nod, punching in the code of the ordered drink and snacks. "Please wait at the side." You see him walk away from the counter and take his phone out, seemingly texting somebody.

You made the drink in no time and brought it over to the pick-up counter along with his brownies. "Thank you," he said and take his order, then walking to a table and place his things. He sat down and took out his laptop and started jotting things down in his notebook, looking up at the screen from time to time.

You noticed that he brings in new notebooks every week. A waste of paper, you thought. You wonder what major he was in to go through so many notebooks each week but it was rather hard. You guessed business, but you have never seen him around the area so that flopped. He looked like a porcelain doll with his small, pale face and skinny body- that looked as if it would be easy to break- that you guessed he was probably majoring in one of the arts-- visual arts, drama, music. Something that someone with his size could take. You asked Barbara if he was majoring in music but she answered that she has never seen him around.

Well, no matter. The thought alone doesn't bother you as it doesn't hold any importance.

-

The following week, you didn't go to work and so did Barbara. Well, it wasn't as if you chose not to go to work, rather, it was because the cafe was getting renovated so it had to temporarily close.

Since you had no work to go to, you focused all your energy in your studies. When you aren't studying, you enjoy what little time you had to relax before suddenly getting the urge to study even more so that you don't fail-- sometimes even studying with Diluc outside in the campus grounds.

During those times, you looked out for the guy who usually came to the cafe in the afternoon but to no avail. At this point, you are wondering if he truly goes to the university. That was soon to be answered, however, when you went shopping for more school supplies. The area was located closer to the entrance of the campus so it was quite far away since your department was across the place. The department that was closest to the stores was the arts. It was always lively there with the students showing off their talent and skills. You loved going near there because it looked fun.

After purchasing the needed supplies, you walked back whilst looking at the students and whatever they were up to. Once near the exit that would say that you were no longer in the arts, you hear the strumming of a guitar not too far to your left. It was a rather familiar music but you didn't know what the song was or where you heard it.

You would have just acknowledged that it as a good piece of music and walk away if it wasn't for the fact that when the music stopped, a sigh was heard and the person shifted, allowing you to see their side profile that hid behind a small tree.

Your eyes widened at the sight of the person that dawned familiarity. You finally found him! With that said, your question as to what he was majoring was answered. Music. Looking at him, you see that he looked somewhat annoyed, looking at a piece of paper beside him, brows furrowing. All those papers that you have seen him scribble onto and later crumble it because it dissatisfied him were most likely his other works.

He was so focused on fixing the notes in his paper that he has not felt you watching him. His state made you pity the male. It was most likely a stressful thing to make music with the right notes that satisfied oneself. He was most likely here because the cafe was closed.

An idea came to but you don't know if you should go through with it, not wanting to appear like a creep to him by making a homemade Matcha Green Tea Frappuccino and giving it to him. That thought was quickly changed and decided that you will do just that tomorrow when you looked at him a bit longer.

-

You waited until it was 2 in the afternoon to make him his frappuccino and bring it over. You were glad to see him at the same spot at the same time. Otherwise, you wouldn't know what to do if he didn't show up. Now thinking about it, you always see him at 2 in the afternoon and wondered if he knew of his routine.

Walking closer, you see that he had more papers and notebooks than what he usually brings to the cafe. "Um, excuse me.." At that, you felt awkward that you walked up to a stranger and began a conversation just to give him a drink.

He looks up, his eyes seeming to glow brighter when they landed on you. "Oh, aren't you the one working at that cafe?" he asks, not needing to specify which cafe since he remembers you. You hummed and nodded. "Aren't you majoring in business? What brings you here?" Your breathing hitched when you saw him smile that you almost forgot the reason as to why you were there. It was adorable.

"Huh? How did you know I majored in business?" you ask. "When you aren't working, I see you studying with Master Diluc.. And I heard your conversation with Barbara from time to time," he answers. "Eh? You know Diluc and Barbara?" Your eyes widened in surprise.

"Well, I know Master Diluc because my brother has a business relationship with his father. As for Barbara, I see her exit class every time I go in," he says. Ah, so that's why Barbara doesn't know him. They have different times, you thought. "Anyway, care to answer my question?" His smile was still on his face when he asked. He seemed more relaxed than when he was working in his music. "Oh, right, I saw you yesterday and thought that you might need something sweet." You offered him the frappuccino as well as some homebaked brownies. "Ah! Thank you." His closed smile soon reveals his teeth, closing his eyes that crinkled at the corner. He accepts the drink and snacks. "Hey, why don't you sit down? It is a long walk from where you came from, yes? And it would be rude to just shoo you so soon." He pats the empty space beside him. "Ah.. Okay.." You hesitantly agreed, not wanting to make him sad at your early leave.

When you sat down, you suddenly felt more aware and felt the awkward tension-- well, you only felt the awkwardness in the air. He seemed fine, sipping the drink freely. Then, "Wah! This is good," he compliments. "I can tell when you make my drink and when your friend makes them." He leans close, putting a hand near his mouth as if to whisper to you. "Don't tell your friend, but I really like it when you make my drinks." He winks. You chuckled, feeling warm inside. "So, what is your name?" he asks, leaning away to give you space. "(Y/N). What about you?" "Venti!"

You smiled. "So, Venti, do you only play the guitar?" you ask, eyeing the wooden instrument on his lap. He shook his head. "I play instruments from all families-- the strings, woodwind, brass, percussion, keyboard, and guitar," he says. "However, I don't play the bigger instruments that require to be picked up because they are too heavy. I also don't really like drums. I find them too loud." You were amazed to know that he could play so many instruments. You have only tried a hand at the piano that you later gave up in high school.

"Which instrument do you like the most?" you asked, seeing as he already said which instrument he doesn't like playing. "Oh, that's easy! The lyre!" His eyes sparkled at the thought of the instrument. "There aren't many occasions where I can play the instrument so I play other instruments like the guitar."

It could be because your major was not appealing and boring that you found yourself interested in the topic at hand and started asking more questions. "Did you get a teacher to help you play the instruments?" He shook his head. "I have lots of books at home to learn from so I taught myself." If you weren't already surprised at his talent, you would be now. "All those instruments?" you ask. He nods proudly.

"Oh! Since you are here, care to listen to a song I've made?" he asks, eager to show you what he could do. You nod excitedly. He laughs and adjusted himself to be more comfortable when playing the guitar.

The song wasn't finished but it was enough to have you breathless. "I don't know how many times I had to rewrite the same notes but I hope this one sounded better?" he asks, turning to you when he stopped playing. You nod. "It sounded amazing!" The compliment made him bashful, scratching the back of his head as he chuckles. "I'm glad you think so! I hope I can finish this soon." He turns his head to look at the paper before returning his focus on you. "Will you listen to it when I finished?" You did not hesitate and nodded.

It wasn't too long since you two started chatting but it felt as if you guys had been friends for a long time. When the cafe opened the following week, you greeted each other with a smile with you already punching in his order that you have memorised by heart.

"Here is your Matcha Green Tea Frappuccino."

---

[stxrrywildflower]

carolina

pairing - emily prentiss x reader

summary - you meet emily in a bar, she doesn’t realize who you are until she hears a song about her on the radio

warnings - nsfw mentions (nothing graphic), cursing

series masterlist

the second emily layed eyes on you, she was instantly captivated.

you sat at the bar, your back pressed against the counter. a drink was in your hand, your cherry red lips occasionally taking a sip. you were observing the crowd, a slightly smile tugging at the corners of your lips.

and then came your outfit. tight black jeans and heels, a silver sparkly cropped tank as your top. a gold necklace was around your neck and hair in your natural style, or what she assumed was.

while emily could have stayed in her spot sneaking glances ever so often, a gentle shove to her back made her tear away her gaze. “emily come on, i need a drink,” j.j. teased.

the three girls pushed further into the venue, already buzzing about their night out.

penelope had been raving about a bar she had discovered. it wasn’t downtown, further away from everything in location. it was a more formal bar in details such as a taxi service and places to drop of coats and accessories if needed.

with no case being presented, they had all agreed to go out. after heading home and getting changed, they all met up to inevitably get drunk.

while j.j. and penelope quickly got drinks and headed out to socialize on the floor, emily decided to head over to the counter.

you shot a smile at the woman who slid into the seat beside you. she cooly ordered a drink, spinning around to face the same direction as you.

“going with a daiquiri? i can’t blame you, they’re my favorite,” you smiled, figuring you might as well introduce yourself to the woman beside you.

“i’m y/n,” you greeted.

“emily,” she replied.

you never really fell hard for someone, let alone a stranger. but something about emily was different. maybe it was her looks, her raven hair and dark brown eyes were nothing short of beautiful. or the way she spoke, her name flowing easily as she introduced herself.

maybe it was a combination of the two and her personality already begining to make an appearance. all the times you rolled your eyes at people mentioning love at first sight were really contradicting themselves. maybe not love yet but you knew emily was special.

“who are you watching?” emily asked, being the first one to initiate small talk.

you raised your drink in the general sea of people dancing. “alice and mel,” as you spoke, you pointed towards the two girls, each occupied with others. “you?”

“penelope and j.j. can’t believe we’re both the designated sober friends.”

“oh i’m not, i would just much rather be here talking to you,” the flirty remark rolled off your tongue easily. a blush passed across her cheeks, a smile tugging at her lips.

you ordered a second drink, offering to get emily something if she wanted a second. after shaking her head ‘no,’ you shrugged and leaned back against the counter.

“so what brings you to this bar?” emily questioned.

“night off from the public eye. figured i would spend one of last days in the city out with my friends.”

the alcohol clouded emily’s thinking process a bit, not allowing her to process the first part of the question. “last day?”

you nodded, “i live in d.c. most of the time but i have some work which involves traveling. i’ll be back soon, you can definitely find me here at least once.”

another drink was ordered for the both of you, your attention focusing on emily.

“so what do you do for a living?” conversation flowed easily.

“not sure if i want to reveal it so easily. any guesses?” emily replied.

you leaned close to her face. “well,” you started, eyes flickering down to her waist. “i’m going to go with something in law enforcement.”

a brief shocked look passed over emily’s face letting you know you were right.

emily chuckled. “i’m a profiler for the fbi. though with your guess i’m not so sure you aren’t. how’d you know?”

“well you have an imprint of some clip on your side. adding on your pant pocket is stretched out, probably from some badge. i just put the two and two together and guessed,” you answered, taking another sip of your drink.

“alright, how about you? i’ll be honest, i have absolutely no idea what you do and have no clues.”

your heart fluttered at that. “it’s not important. it’s not anything bad, i promise. just would like to enjoy this night without having to think about work,” you answered truthfully.

talk went on, mostly about your mutual interests and introductory questions.

you were only interrupted when some guy took the now empty seat on your right. he opened his mouth to talk, probably some dumb pickup like, but you caught him off. “don’t even try, i don’t play for your team.” both for you were thankfully he left you alone.

emily grinned into her drink. “sorry about that. i really hate men sometimes,” you apologized. “no it’s okay i promise. i’ve had to deal with people like that for so long with my work. you think they would just realize that we just aren’t into them.”

maybe you did internally smile when you realized you may actually have a chance with her.

flirty remarks were tossed around after that, both of you completely forgetting about your friends who came with you.

“come with me to grab my coat?”

emily nodded, leaving her drink at the counter and following you back.

the two of you couldn’t have been away from the center room of the building for more than a few moments before your lips were on hers.

“already undressing me here? thought you’d be more classy than that y/n,” emily groaned as you pushed her jacket back. you hummed against her neck, moving to the pulse point along her jawline.

“come back to mine?” you mumbled in between kisses. emily nodded, “call a cab.”

the entire ride back, the tension was almost unbearable.

you tired to be quiet for the sake of the driver but emily’s occasionally kisses to your neck made it quite difficult. to add on to that, she kept her hand on your thigh, it trailing higher and higher up as you neared your location.

after paying your ride fee (with a pretty hefty tip), you pulled emily out of the cab and towards your apartment bulding. you could tell she was in slight awe just from the outside. but with one quick tug of her hand, she was following you once more.

you fumbled with your key trying to open your door after waving to those at the front and heading up the elevator.

when the door was pushed open, you waisted no time pushing emily in. the two of you moved as quick as possible, kicking off your shoes and slowly moving towards your bedroom.

“you sure you want to do this?”

the question made you grin, “absolutely.”

____

you woke up to the weight on your chest being lifted, the sound of sheets shifting as well. your eyes struggled to open, fighting with tiredness, especially from the night before.

it was easily one of the best experiences ever.

your eyes slid open, head lolling to the side to find the creator of the noise.

emily was sitting up, sheets pooled around her waist. her raven hair fell down her back, covering up the top half of her body.

“what’s up?” you asked, pulling the covers up over your bare chest.

“i need to get going if i want to shower and be at work on time,” emily rushed out, standing up to grab her clothing strewn across the room. “shit,” she mumbled upon seeing her very revealing shirt she wore last night. there was no way to could go home in that.

“just borrow one of mine,” you offered, keeping a pillow over your eyes to block out all of the light.

she mumbled a quiet ‘thank you’ and was out the door without another word.

you later smiled to yourself at the shirt she chose.

____

neither of you could stop thinking about the night at the bar, well more the night after.

the bruises littering your neck served as a lasting reminder. the amount of concealer used in the days following was definitely a new record.

but, as always, life had to go on.

just like you had told emily, you had flown to los angeles the next day for work. well in your case, it meant photoshoots, writing music, and recording new songs.

with your hookup still in your mind, you channeled all your feelings about it into the best way you could.

emily went to work as normal, pounding through paperwork as no new case had been presented to the group.

j.j. and penelope has cornered her in the break room, already gushing out their girls night before bombarding her with questions. “where did you go that night? we looked around and one of the bartenders said you had already left.

“i know,” emily confirmed. “i saw your text.”

she grabbed her freshly made mug of coffee, already turning around to leave. j.j. followed, not quite done with figuring out where her friend went. “you met someone,” she concluded. “maybe i did j.j., i guess it’s a mystery.”

the conversation was done after that.

after work, everyone went their separate ways. the team all bid their goodbyes, each happy that they would be home on time.

emily grabbed her bag before heading out to her car, sitting in the drivers side for a few minutes before she could head out.

a text from penelope made her phone buzz. emily picked the device up before looking down at the screen and focusing on the message.

‘have you heard y/n y/l/n’s new song? oh my god it’s so good. i know you don’t really follow her but it sounds like your vibe. here’s a link with the cover art if you want to listen. i’m sure it’s playing on the radio too :)’ -p.g.

emily sucked in her breath as she read your name, mind already wandering back to the night at the bar. your words slowly pieced together in her mind, “night off, public eye, last day.” all were related to your status as a celebrity.

the first half of the song went by in a blur, emily only partially listening.

“she feels so good. i met her once and wrote a song about her, i wanna scream yeah i wanna shout it out, and i hope she hears me now,” your voice played out of the speakers.

there was absolutely no way those lyrics were about anyone else.

she examined the cover after listening to the entire song. it was fairly simple, having a more vintage vibe. you were seated on the end of a couch, arms resting on your knees and looking directly at the counter.

what initially caught her eye was your shirt. plastered across the white fabric was a band logo, the exact same one sitting in her drawer. even the small tear along the left shoulder stitching. it was the exact same one she had worn out of your apartment.

there were way to many factors for it to be a coincidence.

the lyrics. the shirt. your one night stand. it all just connected.

she was carolina.

☆ ☆ ☆

tags - @sapphicspence @itsmyblogandillreblogifiwantto @kissessforharryyy @garcias-batcave @zoseph @kissessfordraco @ogmilkis @cm-is-kinda-cool @matthewgublerswife @guessthatswhyiliveinhell @babyangellee @agentshortstacc

[sasa-gay-yo]

His Little Teacher (Levi Ackerman x Teacher!Reader)

Request: Here

Summary: You never knew your favorite kindergartener, Isabel Ackerman, had such a good-looking father until Parent-Teacher Conferences. 

Timeline: Modern!AU

Warnings: this bitch is LONG, Some slight mentions of sexual activity, drinkin 

Art Credits: ? help pls

She was the only child who never had a chaperone, or a parent come with cookies or treats on their birthday. If you didn’t look at her profile, you wouldn’t even know what day her birthday was and that it had passed a month prior to today. Even when you would go on field trips, like today, sending home permission slips encouraging parents to come to museum, all that came back was the five dollars for lunch and his elusive signature.

Levi Ackerman

Despite that, you loved the little raven-haired girl. She was smart, she always listened, washed her own face and hands after craft time, and she always talked about her father. Even now, on the bus to the museum with her pink princess backpack on her lap, she was talking about her father to you. From what you gathered, her mother had passed away when she was born, and he was the only one taking care of her. That’s what her preschool teacher had said to you in the teacher’s lounge last week. You felt bad that you judged his parenting when you finally learned that, now knowing he was probably working hard to take care of her and raise her as well as he did. You just wanted parents to be involved with their children, especially with your favorite child. However, from what she’s told you about her father, you didn’t need to worry about that too much.

“And he’s so strong Miss. (Y/L/N)! Yesterday, Daddy and I went to pick out a fish tank and he carried it even full of water to our kitchen table. Daddy got a Dory fish and I got a Nemo fish.” You smiled down at her, nodding at her stories. She grabbed at your hand harder, trying to convince you at how strong her father was. You did wonder what the man looked like, again, having the preschool teachers tell you all about her glorious looking father. Still, halfway through the school year, you’d never met him, and she took the bus back and forth from school every day. You just had his neat signature.

Throughout the whole field trip, she didn’t let go of your hand, dragging you around to all of the stations while you let your other fellow teachers deal with the whole group. They knew that they couldn’t do anything to drag you away from that child. She was like a magnet to you, even on the first day of school. Your fellow teachers said that your first class of students was always special, and so it made sense that you had a relationship with a child like that. Bright-eyed, cute, and very insightful on certain things. The only thing that you would write down on her monthly report cards was how blunt she was to her fellow students.

You would have to hide your laugh with the things she said to them. In her defense, nothing she said was wrong, but you did have to teach her how to give constructive criticism without insulting anyone. When you sat her in the time out corner, she would give an annoying look at the calm-down toys, her arms crossed. It was comical, but oh, so cute. This is why you taught kindergarteners. They were just learning how to live life, and you were there to guide them along on their quite funny mistakes... and you got a front row seat to those hilarious moments.

“Miss. (Y/L/N), did I tell you that Daddy can come to student teacher conferences? He gave me a note to give you!” She dug through her backpack again and pulled out a cleanly folded white piece of paper to give to you.

“That’s great, Isabel! I can tell your father how good you are.” She beamed up at me, and you knew how much she loved when you praised her. It must be what her father does at home. You took time to read the tiny note, taking in neat and orderly handwriting.

Miss. (Y/L/N),

Next week’s Parent-Teacher conference openings are at weird times in my work schedule, but I do really wish to attend to talk about Isabel’s first school year. Is there anyway we can have a meeting later in the night? I’m sorry if it’s too much of you to ask to stay in the building that long, but either 8 or 9pm would work best for me. I am able to get Isabel a babysitter then.

My email is: lackerman23@gmail.com

Thank you in advance,

Levi Ackerman, Isabel Ackerman’s father

There it was, that signature. You had seen it almost every week on a random piece of paper or Isabel’s planner. You would make sure that you would stay late for him. You wanted to meet the man that raised your favorite student on his own. Even if it was Friday and you were planning to go out for drinks, you were sure your friends would understand your lateness.

When you had waved all the children goodbye, including Isabel who was always last on the bus wanting to keep talking to you, you went right away to email Mr. Ackerman back.

Hello Mr. Ackerman,

This is Isabel’s kindergarten teacher, Miss. (Y/F/N) (Y/L/N). I received your note today, and am totally willing to meet with you at 8:30 or 9 pm. The last scheduled meeting for Friday is at 8:00 pm, so you won’t be holding me back in the building at all. I am excited to meet you and talk about Isabel’s progress!

Best,

(Y/F/N) (Y/L/N)

You sent the email and sat back in your chair, thinking about the man before you got to grading the color tests. From what the other teachers had told you, he was short, but very good looking. He also seemed a bit young to be a father, or at least that’s what their judgement was. You probably wouldn’t be very focused on his looks, but his personality. If it was anything like Isabel’s, it was to be enjoyable. You wouldn’t be upset to stay back for that.

In the teacher’s lounge, you took out the early dinner you packed, turning to the others who had done the same. The town had to be small enough that even if they didn’t have Isabel in their class, they would know about the Ackermans. You didn’t grow up in this town, and you only did your student teaching here, so you knew absolutely nothing besides what the PTA moms gossiped loudly about in your classroom.

“Do any of you know about Levi Ackerman? All I’ve heard is that he’s young and good looking. I have a conference with him this week.” You sat down with the younger teachers whom you formed a bond with your first day here. They also looked eager to answer your question in hushed tones.

“The only thing I know is that the woman he got pregnant was like a one-night stand or something. They didn’t like each other, were in the same friend group, and then it was like a drunken fantasy or something.  Then, she shows up a few months later after he got hired at this big company in town, pregnant. Rumors say that she was going to terminate her pregnancy, but he vogued to keep it. The day after Isabel Ackerman’s birth, she took off, never to be heard or seen from again.” You mouth widened as you shoveled in your rice.

“I thought she died? Isabel said something like that.” The all shook their heads no.

“It’s probably what he tells her since she’s too young to understand.” You nodded in agreement and turned to Mella who was student-teaching for the preschool when Isabel was there. She was the one who told you how he looked, and she apparently went to school around him.

“Is he as handsome as they say?” She shrugged and took a drink.

“He is, short, but like, he’s a dark handsome if that makes sense. It’s the personality that people didn’t like. He’s really antisocial and mean to other parents, like he’ll insult you for anything. He was the best at everything during high school, and people always thought he was cocky, hence the attitude..”

“So that’s where Isabel gets her little problem from. I hope he isn’t like the other parents then, thinking their kid is the best. If he is, I guess he’ll just be nice to look at.”

Friday 8:39 PM

“Yes, well, sometimes when we see this behavior in a student, we first tell the parents to see if it is something at home affecting them. Perhaps other older siblings? Someone who may show negative emotion to him?” She scoffed in your face and grabbed the behavior evaluation sheet out of your hands.

“There is nothing wrong at our house! How dare you to assume that about us!” The husband just sat back in the chair almost glaring at his wife. Right, right, nothing going on at your house. You felt bad for Ryan too. The boy was smart and incredibly creative, but he couldn’t play well with anyone else. He felt the need to yell at any child who tried to get him to share, probably emulating behavior of an older sibling or parent. No doubt, the mother… but you had to be professional about the headache she was giving me.

“I’m so sorry if my words offended you! I didn’t mean anything like that,” you held your hands up in defense, “Maybe it could be TV shows he watches that models this type of behavior? Something to spur anger?” That made her calm down and think about it. You didn’t think a six-year-old was watching violent TV shows on PBS, but who knows what goes on in that house.

“Maybe we can monitor his TV intake, yes.” You sighed and looked up at the clock. This had gone over thirty minutes because they had to pick apart everything you said about Ryan. You sneaked a look out the door but saw an empty hallway. When was he going to come?

“Thank you both for coming. It means so much to me that you are involved in your child’s education at such an early age. It shows them the importance of an education and makes my job that much easier!” You gave them your spiel, standing by the door, and she refused to leave for some reason. She probably wanted to stay and brag loudly to the next parent who was coming. That was a common thing, for the parents waiting to talk about their kids, but how much genius could you find in your kids scissor practice paper?

“Do you know what parent is next? We’re friends with most of them, you know, PTA president things! It’s getting late however, are we the last ones?” She was looking left and right down the dimly lit hallway to stalk her prey.

“Next is Mr. Ackerman. He’s the last parent to go.” Her smile dropped.

“Oh, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him around. He doesn’t donate for the fairs; he hasn’t come to any of the Daddy-daughter dances we’ve had… I wonder what he even does, all alone like that.” You heard the tone of judgment ricochet through her words and your headache got bigger. She had no room to judge other parents.

“Well, I think it’s very commendable how he’s raised such a wonderful child in the circumstances he’s been given. Being a single parent is never easy. My mother raised me and my siblings by herself.” She looked you up and down, now judging you for your upbringing. She should be judging how her attitude affects her son’s interpersonal skills.

“Ah, yes, how commendable of your mother! Honey, we should get back to the kids.” She gave me a sickening smile before hauling her husband down the hallway, no doubt to insult you. You made sure she turned the corner, and the hallway was clean before you collapsed back on the door frame, holding your head.

“I swear I never had such bad parents when I was student teaching. Ugh, my head. How much can you analyze a five-year-old’s sight word recognition?”

“And they want judge me for not going to any PTA meetings when they act like this.” You jumped, covering your mouth as a silent scream ran through your body. How had you not seen him? He was leaning on the wall right next to the door, suit coat in hand. You were sure you checked both sides of the hallway before you said that. Damn it. Strike one to you acting professional.

“M-Mr. Ackerman. Nice to meet you finally!” You re-tucked your shirt back in before extending a hand. He looked down at it, smirking, before shaking your hand back.

“Nice to meet you too, Miss. (Y/L/N). My daughter seems to only talk about you these days.” You almost blushed at his words and from the fact you finally got to see him. He was incredibly handsome. You didn’t know why you didn’t listen enough your fellow teachers, and you wish you prepared yourself more than the sweater and the midi-skirt you were wearing. You did have a change of clothes for the bar you’d be going to with your friends after this, but that was highly, highly school inappropriate. What was also inappropriate was how long you were staring at his suit clad form. It was the way he had his sleeves rolled up and two buttons undone that made you stare.

“Let’s go in,” you smiled at him, gesturing to the circular table you set up in the center of the classroom. You had Isabel’s file right on the desk waiting for him. It was funny to see him sit in the small chair that was meant for a child who tagged along, but you didn’t have the heart to tell him. It fit his height a bit, and was very cute.

“That chair is for the children unless you would like to sit in it. I have no judgement though; they are surprisingly comfortable.” He looked up at me before seeing the regular sized chairs at the other end of the table. He then just shrugged and set his suit coat to hand on the side of the purple chair.

“We have these at home, so I’m used to it.” You nodded and opted to sit down on an equal sized chair to be eye level with him. He noticed your gesture and smiled at you. Now that, you would literally pay to see him smile again. You thought back to what Mella said. Cocky, insulting; you didn’t see any of that now. Maybe he’d matured the few years after they went to school or just was trying to act nice in front of his daughter’s teacher.

Isabel had talked so much about her father, but he never said how incredibly hot he was. I mean, that made sense, but still. He couldn’t have been older than you, there was no way. How was this man hiding in the midst of all the middle-aged parents? You were excited to share the news with your friends after this. A hot parent was always nice, and you hadn’t had one yet. He would be your first.

“Well, Mr. Ackerman, this is going to be a short meeting. Isabel is my model student really. Here’s some work of hers to look at. She’s smart, attentive, clean, and very, very sweet.” He smiled down at a drawing Isabel had made of him and that made your heart sing even more. This smile was very different from the short one he gave you. It was like his soul was singing through his eyes. How could he be so hot and so loving of his child at the same time? You could see it. The genuine love he had for that drawing and the little girl who made it. The little girl who looked exactly like her father, minus the eye color.

“But she does have a mouth, I know that for a fact. The fat mom called me a few weeks ago complaining about what Isabel said to… what’s his name? Rock? Rufus?” You couldn’t hold in your laugh this time, even if it was unprofessional to agree with him. The whole meeting was unprofessional at this point. You were sitting in foot tall chairs and thinking about how good of a figure he had. It was actually refreshing how laid back he seemed to be, unlike the other parents, especially this late at night.

“Yes, she is sometimes very… critical of her peers. Ryan is a student who doesn’t get along with others. She had to let him know that. To be honest, it is very funny, but still, we have to teach her to be constructive with it.” He nodded, now listening to your words with the same attention he gave to Isabel’s drawing. It made you melt even more. He cared so much about his child. Oh god, why was he perfect?

“I’ll work on her with that. She gets that from me. During quarantine, when she was doing preschool at home, I was also working. She probably heard me talking to some of my workers in that tone.” That made me perk up, knowing absolutely nothing about him. You usually do parent introductions at the first all-class meeting, but he, obviously, wasn’t there. Now that he exceeded all your expectations, you want to know more.

“If you mind me asking, where do you work?” He leaned back as much as he could in the chair, trying to spread his legs under the table. The way his ankle brushed against yours didn’t go unnoticed.

“I’m a Lead Captain in the Survey company in town. I’m fifty-fifty office work and on the job work, lifting and things.” That would explain how good his arms were looking under his sleeves. He did manual labor half of the time. 

You nodded and handed him Isabel’s behavior sheet out of the folder. You got your pen to explain him the scales, and when you turned back, he had leaned in pretty far to hover over the paper. Trying to hide your blush in your hair, you tried not to react to his closeness. He didn’t seem to pull back, so you continued to explain to him how her score was perfect except for group behavior. Again, he listened so intently to your suggestions and what you had to say about Isabel it made your heart glow with warmth.

“I guess when she was younger, the only interaction she would get was at morning preschool. She only has a babysitter since I can’t afford daycare. That’s my fault, one hundred percent. I-I heard that you know how single parenting is.” He pointed to the door with his thumb, referring to the interaction you had with Ryan’s parents. It was refreshing for a parent to take the blame too. He was getting more and more perfect by the minute. A perfect child and a perfect father. It made so much sense.

“Yes, growing up I was an attention hog. I only had older brothers, so when I went to school I expect to be treated like a princess. I had my first great awakening when a boy threw mud at my face during recess because I refused to share my swing.” He leaned his head back and let out a deep laugh and you matched him, taking in the view he was giving you. This seemed to be a one night only type thing, so you’d take your liberties where you could. I mean, if you didn’t study his face, how were you going to describe him well enough to everyone at the bar?

No. You shouldn’t be thinking this much about how good looking and perfect a student’s parent was. You shouldn’t be thinking about what’s under his clothes either.

“With the way Isabel talks about you, you might as well be a princess. It’s ‘Miss. (Y/L/N) does it this way, Daddy’ or ‘Daddy, today Miss. (Y/L/N) and I did this!’ You seem to be taking my child away from me, Miss. (Y/L/N).”  You smiled, and almost blushed at what he was telling you about Isabel and put a hand over your heart. The teachers were right about your first class.

“You can call me (Y/F/N), Mr. Ackerman. We seem to be similar in age.” He sat up again, nodding and taking the behavior sheet you gave him.

“Then it’s Levi to you, (Y/F/N). I’m thirty-two. May I ask how old you are?” Your mouth dropped and you couldn’t help it. You didn’t think he would be in his thirties and now your numbers were thrown off.

“You don’t look at all like you’re over thirty. I’m twenty-seven.” He smirked again and seemed to be comfortable enough to lean back again, arms coming together behind his head. The pose made your heart beat faster again. Oh yeah, you were telling your friends all about this.

“Well, thank you, (Y/F/N). I’m glad you think I’m so young. Isabel calls me an old man already.” You laughed and looked up at the clock. 8:52. You had time to talk more, pushing a few minutes, but you didn’t know if he had somewhere to go. This meeting itself was set up because of scheduling conflicts. You wanted to talk to him more about Isabel and his experience raising her, but you didn’t know if that would be too personal for him.

“Now, that might be my fault. She asked me sometime during our lesson about family how old did someone have to be to be considered an Uncle and I told her above 30. Then she asked if I was old, and I told her that compared to her I was. So, she now thinks that people about twenty-seven are now old.” He shook his head and let out one huff in laughter.

“Now because of you I have no game. Imagine, first, I already have a child, and now when I bring a date home, she tells her that I was an old man. I never get a third date because of that. Are you trying to keep me forever single, (Y/F/N)?” Was he… was he flirting with you? No, it couldn’t be. He was just talking, just bantering like every parent does. The problem was is that he was a very single, very good-looking parent. This was a dangerous situation and it happened during your first-year teaching. This was bad.

“I’ll talk to her on Monday to tell her to stop calling her father an old man. Does that atone for my sins?” He quirked an eyebrow up, smirking again, but this time you could tell that he was definitely flirting with you.

“Maybe, I’ll have to come to these meetings more often. To check up on your progress with getting my daughter to go against me. The only reason I don’t come around the school often is because of the other parents.” You leaned your head in your hand, finally just deciding to go along with it. Even if he said that, this was probably the only time you two were going to meet and Isabel was going to progress on to a new teacher in a few months. You both were young too, nothing was going to get to HR.

“Next week, I’ll try to get her to call you a silly, old man, how about it? We can have a progress check next Friday.” You felt your Apple Watch buzz, looking down to see who was calling. Armin. He was probably wondering where you were, but you thought you told them you’d be late.

“I’m sorry about that, it’s just my friends.” You went to hang up, knowing that in a few minutes Eren would call. Then Jean. Then Connie. Then Sasha. Then Historia. Mikasa wouldn’t care, but at this point, the train of calls would be never ending. You were going to yell at them for cutting into your time with Levi.

“Ah, don’t worry about it. I also have something to do tonight, but it was great talking to you.” You almost pouted when he went to stand up, grabbing Isabel’s folder. You were dumb to think he was flirting with you, and now you got your hopes up.

“If you have anything you need or any questions about Isabel, I’m here to answer them. Also, I’m supposed to extend out an invitation for our Spring Festival celebration next week. If you would like to come, it will be on Friday at 2 pm.” You stood, matching his height. You really wanted him to come this time, as he never came to anything, but you knew he probably wouldn’t.

He smiled at you, “You know, maybe I will come. You’ll just have to protect me from the PTA moms.” You both started walking to the door and you took the chance, putting a hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, Levi, I stay as far away from them as possible. It’s an all-school thing, so it will be easy to avoid them.” You saw the little glance down to your hand before he just nodded once and continued to walk out of your classroom. He put on his suit coat and looked back at me, smiling a bit to say goodbye.

“Have fun with your friends tonight, (Y/F/N). A great teacher like you deserves to relax.” You smiled back at him, leaning on the doorframe.

“You, too, Levi. With whatever you’re doing tonight. A single father like you deserves to relax.”

Club Rio 

“Eren, if I have to tell you to stop touching me one more time, I will break your arm off!” He winced, taking his arm off of your shoulders and drinking his beer. The bar was packed tonight, so there was almost seven of you crowded around a single circle tabletop. You already felt smooshed, so you didn’t want Eren to make it worse.

“How were your conferences today, (Y/F/N)?” Armin asked you from across the table and you held a thumb up while taking a drink. It may be squished, but it was worth it to get this buzz. You took Levi’s advice and relaxed hard. The amount of bullshit you spewed in the last three days to make the parents happy to it out of you.

“Most of them are the same old, your child is great, I love having them in my class, here’s something to work on though, and then they blame my teaching. It’s really annoying having to agree with their criticism of me, but I want to keep my job. However,” you held a finger up, “the last meeting was with a single father in my class. He was amazingly hot. A bit over thirty. He also is the father of my favorite student, so it just added to it. Like a treat at the end of a hard week.” You could hear Jean and Eren scoff, but Historia leaned in, her blue eyes wide and sparkly from the drinks. 

“What did he look like?”

“He’s short, like my height, but he has black hair. An undercut. Then he’s definitely muscular. You could even see it through his button up. Thirty-Two. His eyes are really narrow, but like a type of grey that shines. One of the teachers described him to be a dark handsome, and I completely agree. She also said he was kinda of cocky and insulted people a lot. Too bad he doesn’t show up around the school because he’s busy at working at some company in town.” You saw Jean and Armin exchange looks and you pointed at both of them.

“Hey, hey, hey. What was that?” Jean spoke up first.

“Um, well, is this person - is his name Levi Ackerman by chance?” Your eyes widened and you stood straight up, your body colliding with Eren’s. Jean now had your full attention.

“How do you know him? You two didn’t live here before!” Jean leaned to rest his arms on the table, looking at Eren to explain since he wouldn’t have to yell over the crowd.

“No, but he’s our team captain at work. Short, black hair, mean, grey eyes: I think you described him to a T. But, you said he was a treat? That doesn’t sound at all like the Levi that chewed me out today because I didn’t put a signature at the end of my email.” Eren answered and you gave him a confused look. Levi seemed really nice and he joked with you. Maybe it was just his work personality.

“He was though. He even called me a great teacher and we went by first name basis.” This time Mikasa spoke up next to Eren.

“Levi’s nice to women, Eren. Not to people who probably mess up all the time at work.” Eren groaned and you arched your body around his so you could look at her. She did look a little like him, but she was half Asian, so there was some doubt in your mind. From what you could connect though, they may act alike in certain situations. Maybe it was on her dad’s side.

“Ackerman! Are you related?! How did I not think about that before?” She nodded as Eren nudged her for the comment she made about his work ethic. 

“On my father’ side. We’re cousins, but distant. I don’t talk to him unless we’re forced to at family functions. But he does act how they’re saying. He’s cold and calm, you can’t tell what he’s thinking usually. Most of the time he has a scowl on his face and doesn’t talk a lot unless it’s an insult or something. Then again, you’re a pretty woman, so that could have changed his attitude.” You blushed a bit, trying to hide it in your hair, but Connie caught you.

“You have a little crush on the DILF, don’t you?! I can see it!” He poked your cheek, him and Sasha roaring in laughter.

“No, he was just nice to look at! He also really cares about his daughter, which is just… girls like guys who are good with kids. Teacher’s also like parents who care about their kids, it makes my job easier.” They still couldn’t stop laughing and you couldn’t stop blushing.

“A teacher-parent relationship, how scandalous,” Jean added in on making fun of me, “What will the PTA moms say about that (Y/F/N)?” You glared at all of them as they laughed.

“I told you he was just hot!”

Paradis Elementary Spring Festival     

“Do you need any help reorganizing this whole table so the PTA mom’s stop roping me into work I don’t want to do?” You jumped at the body that came close behind you. You also jumped because you didn’t expect him to show up. The little raven-haired girl ran to the playground and you turned around quickly, eyes wide.

“Levi! I mean, Mr. Ackerman. I’m glad you showed up!” He nodded and used both hands to lean down on the table seeing the cupcakes that I rearranged four times, so I didn’t have to talk to the mothers about their kids.

“You said you’d protect me from them, but there I was carrying all the boxes from their damn cars.” You looked over at the mothers, now huddled around staring at you talking to Levi and gossiping. Figures. Last year, one of the third-grade teachers breathed in the wrong direction and there were rumors about her having an affair with a married man. You hoped you weren’t next on the PTA list.

“Well, its not common for a father to come to these types of events. Notice how there aren’t any on the PTA.” He switched positions so he could lean on the table and watch Isabel play on the swings with her friends and the older children. You picked up the Capri Suns from the ground, deciding to organize them by flavor.

“You know what Isabel asked me the other night? After our conference?” You perked up at his words, signaling that you were interested in what she said.

“Hm?” He scratched the back of his neck, now debating whether he should tell you this. It was a bit personal and maybe would make you, as a teacher, uncomfortable with Isabel. Either way, he did it.

“Well, I actually had a date that night,” your heart dropped a little bit, and you scowled down at your chest, “and my date needed an umbrella, so I went in to get her one. When I came out Isabel was there outside our apartment, glaring up at this woman, arms crossed and everything.” You giggled at that, imagining it in your head. You could see her signature glare now looking up at someone three times taller and five times older. You looked over to Isabel, matching Levi’s stance against the table. Right now, it looked like she was lecturing a boy on how to play the floor is lava.

“She asked me why I didn’t bring you home,” he said through a laugh and you followed his cue laughing. You weren’t doing any laughing on the inside. Your mind was swirling now after he said that, but he couldn’t have meant that. It was just Isabel thinking like a six-year-old. If Levi told her he had a date, she might have just thought that the two meetings were connected. Yeah, he couldn’t mean anything other than that.

Still.

“Ah, she’s funny, isn’t she?” You almost winced at how dismissive your tone was. It sounded like you wanted to move on from the conversation and you were afraid he took it the wrong way. You didn’t want to dismiss the opportunity of it being him flirting with you, but you also didn’t believe that was his intention. Now he thought must have thought that it was your intention to ignore it anyways. He stayed silent after that. Goddamn it. You had to fill the space somehow.

“Are you related to a Mikasa?” He seemed to perk up after that, turning his head to look right at you in recognition.

“She’s my cousin, yes. How do you know her? Are you friends with those brats?” You huffed in laughter at his tone. Brats wasn’t a word you would use for your friend group, but you guessed since he was a bit older and, from what you heard, was annoyed all the time by them at work.

“We know each other from college, yeah. Since they had secured a job at Survey, I decided to follow by teaching here so we’d all live by each other. I met Eren first.” He lifted up an eyebrow and you could see a little trace of annoyance gloss over his face. It was very much an Isabel look, or rather, she’d gotten it from her father. Pretty much copy and paste.

“You met him first and wanted to meet the rest of them?” You rolled your eyes at that. You can see how Connie and Sasha got a bit wild, Eren and Jean a bit intense, but overall, they were great people to be friends with. Armin had helped you through a required science class, Historia and Mikasa stayed with you and bought you ice cream when your boyfriend had broken up with you, Connie and Sasha were the life of the party any hour of the day, and Jean and Eren, respectively, would provide you some stress relief and good times when you were down. No, they were the greatest people you’d met.

“They’re my best friends, Levi. I love all of them.” The annoyed look still didn’t leave his face and he crossed his arms. Was he really going to argue with you about your friend group? If he did, you would definitely text the group chat to make his next work week a living hell for revenge.

“You don’t seem to be like them. Maybe Historia, but still, I wouldn’t peg you to be with that group.” You turned back around, seeing the children starting to walk over to the snack tables. Soon, once they were done with their lunch, they would descend on the cupcakes you were guarding and destroy the orderly table. You had to tape down the cheap plastic tablecloth, so it stood a chance.

“What do I seem like then? They’ve told me about you, you know. I couldn’t believe what they were telling me.” You grabbed the tape, ducking under the table do you couldn’t see his expression. However, his legs moved as he turned to face where you once were.

“Much more professional and put together than them. Maybe Armin is okay, but the others, I had to teach them how to write a formal email.”

“Well, you’ve never seen me outside of a school setting. Arguably, you know all of them more than you know me. If I had to compare myself to any of them it would be a mix between Armin and Jean. When we all go out, it seems to be like that. I can see, though, how they’d be a bit tough to handle at work.”

“Well, then why don’t we meet outside of school?” Your breath had to have stopped, but his face was completely serious. Did he just ask you on a date? Right in front of the kindergarten cupcake table?

“Miss. (Y/L/N)! Can we have a cupcake now?” Two or three of your students gathered at your leg, and you looked down at them, probably with your eyes still wide. You then looked back to Levi who was giving the children a very annoyed stare, before stepping back from the table so they had full access.

“U-Um, what did you – Cupcakes! Yes, El, you can have one cupcake each. What color do you want?” You went to hand them the specific colors you wanted, and you thought that your business would make Levi go somewhere else, but he was there staring at you while you handed them out. His gaze was unwavering as he leaned up against the basketball net’s pole. Even when Isabel came to stand next to his legs, he didn’t look down at her. You knew he was waiting for an answer and you were having an internal crisis.

You didn’t think you’d get this far, actually, no you never thought this would happen. It was going to be the one parent-teacher meeting, then you’d never see him again and only complain to Mikasa and Historia about how you let him get away. Now, he literally just came out with it. Was this his whole intention of coming today? Your stomach did flipflops because of that. But now, you were thinking of how unprofessional it would look if you two did start something. You would be offender number one for the PTA moms and it was only your first year teaching. Then, on the other hand, the school year was almost over, and you would soon not be Isabel’s teacher and you and he were both single. And he was very good looking. And he was good with kids. And you did like him a bit, only having talked to him for thirty minutes. Still, what could fully develop if you took up his offer?

“Can I please have all the parents and their children gather?” You turned your neck to look at the principal who had yelled that through a blowhorn. He was standing on the makeshift stage in front of the school, probably going to give the day ending speech before dismissing the children with their participation medals for the games we played. You would have time to ask your crisis hotline and you were thankful that Isabel so eagerly pulled her father towards the front of the school. You still couldn’t shake his gaze, him looking over his shoulder at you while you tried to hide your blush.

Once you were alone on the basketball field, you used your watch to send a text to you, Historia, Mikasa, and Sasha’s group chat.. You knew whatever they were doing, they would take the chance to slack off. It also had to be important if you were texting during the school day. 

From Mi: What are you texting us for?

From Mrs. Potato Head: Yes, aren’t you at school?

From (Y/F/N): Okay, well a situation has occurred, and I need quick guidance. I only have like two minutes

From My Queen: We can help!

From (Y/F/N): Thank you, Historia. I know I can count on you.

From Mrs. Potato Head: Just get on with it! I didn’t eat lunch today and I’m starving!

From (Y/F/N): Ok, ok, ok! 

You glanced over at the parents and there he was, staring at you while holding Isabel’s hand. 

From (Y/F/N): Oh god, I can’t believe I’m even saying this to you guys. I think Levi asked me on a date!

From Mrs. Potato Head: OUR BOSS LEVI ACKERMAN?!

From My Queen: You sound like a sixteen-year-old, (Y/F/N)! Of course, he would ask you out, who wouldn’t?

From Mi: So, what are you asking us? It’s a yes isn’t it?

From Mrs. Potato Head: Yeah, by the way you were talking about him at the bar last week, it has to be a yes

From Mi: If you two get married, we’ll be cousins

From (Y/F/N): Stop that! I don’t know if I should! I’m his daughter’s teacher and I barely know him 

The principal was on his ending notes, and you could tell that Isabel was going to race up to you before saying goodbye. She always did. At the end of the day, you would take he to the bus with the other kids, and she would have to run her homework by you, tell you one or two random things, and then get yelled at before she would go on the bus.

From My Queen: Isn’t that why you go on dates with people or am I mistaken? Mikasa, is your cousin a serial killer?

From Mi: No, Historia, I don’t think he is. I think you should do it, (Y/F/N). Even if it’s kinda weird I’m setting you up with my cousin

You rolled her eyes at her remarks and the clapping notified you that in about thirty seconds a little raven-haired girl was going to be at your feet.

From (Y/F/N): Don’t tell the guys about this please. Not unless the date goes well, okay?

From Mrs. Potato: Oh, so you’re accepting! That’s mad crazy. My best friend and my boss. I’m going to tell Connie

From Mrs. Potato Head: Oh, wait, shit sorry. Nevermind

You groaned and knew that your request would fall on deaf ears. Soon you’d have Jean and Eren at your heels telling you that you shouldn’t go out with anyone but either one of them.

“Miss. (Y/L/N)!” Isabel started her bounding run towards you, and you could see Levi starting to walk in that same direction, his eyes never having left your figure. Jesus, this man’s gaze was so intense.

From (Y/F/N): We’re talking more later 

You put your phone away, turning around to face Isabel with a big smile hiding how nervous you were in her father’s presence. Everything wrong was going through your mind. What if he didn’t mean a date? What if he thinks you’re too young for him? What happens when the date goes terribly that you end up hating him?

“Miss. (Y/L/N), I got a medal from the principal, look!” She held up the participation medal that all the children got. Something about everyone deserving to win something. You were falling asleep during that meeting.

“That’s great, Isabel! You can hang it on the fridge, yeah?” You could see his eyes spark when you said that. He smirked, too, finding it funny that you knew about their fridge, completely covered with Isabel’s drawings, report cards, and various other trinkets. Perhaps it was even a bit heartwarming to him.

“Is, can you go get your backpack from the classroom? Daddy needs to talk about you to Miss. (Y/L/N.” The little girl just lifted her head up, almost falling over to look back at Levi.

“But Daddy, I’m not done talking to Miss. (Y/L/N)!” One second of annoyance reappeared on his face before urging her to go do it again. This time, with a pout, she walked inside with the rest of her classmates to go get ready to leave.

“So, how does Saturday sound?” He was really direct, and you’d guess it was his age or the fact that you haven’t dated anyone other than college frat boys in their early twenties. You looked back at him, remembering what the girls said. They wanted you to go on it and you, yeah, you definitely wanted to go on it too.

“At seven?” You suggested and you swear you saw a smile break across his face before he dropped it to nod. That made the butterflies come back again.

“Seven, yeah. I’ll get your address from Mikasa.”

Saturday, 3:57 AM

“I couldn’t believe he posted that either! When Mikasa showed me that, I thought he was for sure getting fired,” my hands moved with my words as I explained to Levi about Eren’s awful thirst trapping social media posts. While I was doing this, he gripped my shoulder with the hand shrugged around me, trying to steer me in the right direction. Granted, I was also probably a little tipsy from the alcohol we consumed at the second bar. It was cheaper and fruitier, so I obliged, and Levi seemed to find it amusing.

“Oh, he definitely got reprimanded. It took everything in me not to kick him. Erwin is usually away, so I’m the one who has to deal with everything. One time they started, oh what are those things called, the pictures that are supposed to be funny?” He was gesturing with the hand next to my ear, trying to get me to fill in the blank.

“Memes? I knew you were old, but not this old, Lev.” He rolled his eyes at you, ignoring your insult and continuing with his story.

“They started a Meme fight in the company group chat even though I clearly laid out the rules to them. Apparently, their explanation was that if they got everyone to do it, I couldn’t punish everyone in the office.” I smiled up at him and grabbed loosely at his fingers, trying to hold his hand, but not really. I ended up just playing with them as we walked up to my apartment building.

“So, you punished everyone twice, yeah?” He smirked as we stopped outside the doorway of my building.

“Three times.” This made you both giggle like children, and you were sure the alcohol, the third round of drinks, was starting to have an affect on you both again. You’d make sure he’d call a cab to get back.

“I can walk you up to your door?” He suggested and your eyes widened, shaking your hands in front of you. He couldn’t know that Historia, Mikasa, and Sasha were on a stake-out at your apartment. It was something you all did when the other would go on a date with a new person. It was to make sure that they got home right and that they had someone to immediately rant, cry, or laugh with depending on how the date went. Last time, you, Mikasa, and Sasha almost went to egg a guy’s house that made Historia cry. However, this stake-out was going to be very different.

“No, it’s fine. It’s fine. I’m actually against gender norms. If anything, I should walk you home.” He raised an eyebrow, taking his arm off my shoulder. He wore the same suit had had during the parent-teacher conference and you made sure to comment on how hot you thought he looked back then. Rolled up sleeves, buttons undone, and now, tousled hair courtesy of you. It was a very good look.

“You wouldn’t want your kindergartener seeing you drunk.” You hit his chest after that comment, knowing you weren’t completely intoxicated. You could get up to your house, take off your makeup, and have a very productive conversation about how he had treated you to ice cream halfway through your bar hopping session.

“I’m not drunk, just happy. Tonight was really fun.” He smiled at you and nodded in agreement.

“Let’s do it again? And again? You up for it?” You matched his smile and grabbed his hand.

“Of course I am. This was probably the best date I’ve ever had, Levi.” You saw the blush paint his cheeks as he went to scratch the back of his neck.

“Me too, (Y/L/N). Me too.” You sent him off in a taxi, a single kiss on his cheek that left a smirk on his face. You stood there for a while too, letting the cool spring wind blow over your bare legs. Yeah, that was a few hours of heaven. Your heart warmed as you went up in the elevator, replaying the events in your head over and over again. You were sad it had to end, but it was almost four in the morning and you’d exhausted all open sit-down bars.

When you got inside your apartment, you saw them all sleeping on the couch besides Mikasa who locked very annoyed eyes with you. You just smiled and slid down the door, sitting on the floor.

“Oh god,” Mikasa groaned, seeing your lovesick face. She never though she’d meet someone who’d act like this for her cousin, must less one of her best friends. Sasha and Historia woke up, rubbing their eyes to look at the time. You wondered when they fell asleep.

“Why are you back so late?” Sasha mumbled, seeing the clock hit four in front of her eyes. At least you left her a stocked fridge. Historia was the first of the two to be wide awake, seeing your face clearly. She almost jumped up from the couch and ran over to you on the floor. You smile was still plastered over your face, thinking about Levi.

“How was it? How was it!?” Sasha covered her ears at Historia’s yells. She would care in the morning when she was awake. For now, she just looked at you as you stared Historia right in the eyes and said those bone crushing words.

“Historia, I think I’m in love.”

“Love?!” Mikasa popped up, sounding so taken aback by that. No, she’d never, ever bet on someone liking, much less falling in love with her cousin. What had he done to you? She rested her head on the back of the couch, looking over to you. Historia grabbed your hand hard, excited for you.

“No way! Are you sure? How do you know? What did you two do for some long? Huh! You didn’t!” You shook your head, knowing what she was thinking. No, he was a gentleman the whole night with you, even if you did exchange a few buzzed kisses here and there on the fake leather couches of a swanky bar downtown.

“We went for dinner first at a hibachi place. We talked for hours and hours, I couldn’t tell you how long. It was just, I could’ve sit and talked to him in that uncomfortable chair for hours. We just walked about everything. Our lives, Isabel, how I became a teacher, you guys; it was just so refreshing. Then, when the hibachi place closed, he said he didn’t want to end it there, and so he took me to this high-end bar, and I had an overpriced martini and we talked and talked some more. I just couldn’t run out of topics, Historia. Maybe it was because I drank so much, but still, I was buzzing the whole time around him. Then when that bar closed, we went to ours, the one we go to, and I drank more. He did too. I guess the alcohol just opened us up. I don’t think I’ve ever talked to someone for that long about absolutely nothing. Even on the way back, we walked by the river, it was so pretty and there were almost no people. Just a little slice of heaven. I’m sad it had to end, but he asked if I wanted to do it again, and again. He’s just so nice and gentlemanly and funny and handsome and cute and-“ Sasha cut you off with her hand. She couldn’t stand someone talking about her boss like that. If she kept listening to you, she would definitely say something at work and she was too afraid of what Levi would do to her.

“Guys, she’s completely whipped for our boss.” You smiled up at her, acknowledging that fact. Being with Levi just felt so good. Your heart was light and your head was buzzing around. Every time he leaned over to kiss you, you had butterflies in your stomach like some little girl. You even went into the date telling yourself you’d have to act more upright than you really are, but that went out the window when the hibachi chef squirted Levi in the eye with water and you couldn’t handle it. You were just so comfortable around him, it was hard to be professional and upright. He did tell you that you were correct, you were different outside of school, but he loved it.

“He told me that my personality came out tenfold when I was outside of school grounds. He said he liked it a lot and thought I was cute.” You were wringing your hands together, the feeling hitting your toes. God, you never had a man make you feel like this. All of the fairytale books you read the kids now made complete sense. Even Sasha’s gagging sound didn’t take you out of that trance.

“You look so head-over-heals, (Y/F/N),” Historia said, laughing next to you while looking at your eyes. She took, well, they all had never seen you like this around a man you went on a date or one-night stand with. Not Jean, Eren, the one guy you dated in college, or the one right after graduation; none of them made you look like this. It almost made Mikasa sick looking at how lovestruck you were on the floor. All for Levi.

Five Months Later

From Captain <3: I venomed you for the pizza last night. You should use it to bring me a bubble tea from that shop we went to last week

From my little teach: I’m in a meeting, but in like an hour, sure.

From Captain <3: I never understood how you seem busier on summer vacation than you did during the school year

From my little teach: Not my fault you chose to date a teacher, at least I’m always free at night

From Captain <3: Then you have to leave early in the morning and the bed gets cold

From Captain <3: You know I’m anemic ☹

“Miss. (Y/L/N), do you find something funny about the change in our core curriculum?” Your eyes looked up to the fifth-grade teacher presenting and smiled to try and hide your embarrassment.

“No, Mrs. Warnas, I was just thinking about the unique drawings I’m going to get from my kindergarteners once we introduce them to storyboarding.” That seemed to satisfy her enough to turn back around and smile to herself at my compliment. I’m glad that was in my head still, because I didn’t want to get caught in front of all the teachers. They already knew I was in a relationship with a past parent, so them catching me texting like a high schooler in class would be mortifying.

From my little teach: You just got me in trouble

From Captain <3: I’m texting you in a meeting too

From Captain <3: You’re just bad at being sneaky

When you showed up at the office, two bubble teas in hand, you were greeted first by Connie who wanted one.

“Pleaseeeeee, I’ve been working so hard today!” You moved the drinks away from his grabby hands and glared at him. You knew that if Sasha came over too, you’d have to guard these drinks with your life.

“They aren’t for you, Con. I’ll buy you one another time.” He whined again and Jean’s head popped up from over a cubical, one arm resting on the edge.

“Jeez, (Y/F/N). Isn’t this the third time this week you came here? I don’t remember you ever visiting us this much before you started dating our boss.” You stuck your tongue out at him and took a sip of your tea to rub it in his face.

“You’re just jealous you didn’t land me. You had so many chances, yet it slipped through your fingers. You and Eren both.” His eyebrow quirked up, smirk breaking over his face. He was going to say something either sexual or annoying.

“I mean, if you want to talk about my finge-“

“What did you say, Kirstein?” Jean dropped his head, mumbling something, and sitting back in his chair. You turned around, locking eyes with Levi who was in the doorway of his office. His face was one you had gotten used to over the few months of visiting him at work. In this building, he was constantly on edge and it showed all over his face. His gaze was harsh, non-smiling, and always laced with annoyance or sleepiness. His words were the same way. Even the tone he took with Jean was the complete opposite of the one he talked to you or Isabel in.

“If I have to hear about Jean or Eren’s college relations with you one more time, I’ll fire both of them. I swear, I thought it would calm down, but almost everyday they have to say something and giggle to each other like fucking school children. Did you get the brown sugar boba?” You handed him his cup, sitting in the chair opposite his. He looked cute sipping on the boba while in his professional setting. The only time he wore his suit jacket was at work, but as he walked out of that door after clocking out, it was the first thing to come off.

“Bad day? You only ask for extra sugar when you’re feeling bad.” He huffed once in agreement with his bad day, taking another big sip and running a hand through his hair.

“A deal with a Japanese company we thought would be easy is toying with us and since Erwin’s out of town, it falls on Hange and I. I’ll probably have to take stuff home tonight and work.” You frowned, putting down your cup on his desk and leaning forward. He’d been stressed recently about work, which culminated in him needing daily visits to his office for you to calm him down. Pretty soon, he’d lock the door, making sure the blinds are all pulled, and have you sit on his lap to calm him down.

“I can take Isabel to mine if you need to concentrate tonight. We still have a few Barbie movies to watch.” That made him smile, but he shook his head, looking down at the papers sprawled all over his desk. 

Isabel had been very quick to accept the fact that her teacher and father were dating, and she probably happier than either of you. You both told her after school ended so she didn’t start something with the PTA moms, but it was your carelessness that caused all of them to find out over an email thread. Isabel, however, didn’t care that Ryan would make fun of her for having “Miss. (Y/L/N) as a mommy” because there was finally someone in her like that would play princesses with her that would fit the role. You asked Levi if, before you came, he was forced by the seven-year-old to wear a crown and fake earrings, but he refused to answer. It was also very easy to transition your relationship with Isabel from teacher to, basically, co-caretaker since she already saw you as such. When you told her she could call you your first name, she went crazy being able to call an adult by their first name. Now, she’d gotten more and more comfortable with you over the summer and just recently was able to finally see you as Daddy’s girlfriend and not Miss. (Y/L/N). Soon enough, she was falling asleep with you on the couch or your bed when you babysat her, and had just mistakenly called you mommy a day or two ago.

Levi and you had talked about that situation happening before, so you were prepared to sit her down and tell her that you weren’t her mommy yet, so you’d have to make up an easier nickname to call you. Both you and Levi were pretty sure that you were the person for each other, so there was no reason to forbid her from calling you that. Actually, it was during a post-steamy cuddle session that he’d brought it up.

“I can’t see myself being with anyone else. I know it’s early to say that. Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, I feel the same. No one I’ve been with has made me feel like you do, Levi.”

“M-me, too.”

“I was going to ask you to come over tonight anyways. Mikasa offered to babysit Isabel over the weekend.” He trailed off on the last word, trying to suggest that we had three open days without a little girl trying to sleep in between us at night. Of course you’d go over.

“I guess I can come. You’ll just have to help me test out some kindergarten activities for the new core curriculum. School starts again next week.” He groaned, more work, but agreed to do it. How hard could it be? It was just cutting and coloring and he did that with Isabel on a daily.

“Mikasa and I are going to watch the Twelve Dancing Princesses tonight. I know you wanted to watch it with me, (Y/F/N),” she said lowering her head onto your chest as you laid on the couch. You laughed and ruffled her hair that you’d just combed out for Levi. He was still in his home office running over papers and making phone calls. Your job was to get Isabel ready and packed to go to Mikasa’s, but she was running late, so you decided to watch videos on your phone till she got there.

“That’s okay, Bel. I’ve seen it before. That means when you come back over, you can watch the Princess and the Pauper with me.” The little girl smiled, which was followed by a yawn as she watched some toy opening video on YouTube.

“Can we sing like last time?” You laughed a bit, so you didn’t disturb her tired form, slowly slipping into a nap as she laid on you. Apparently, Levi let her stay up last night, forgetting that this little girl won’t tear her eyes away from the television until you force her too. He had gone back to do some work and when he emerged at two in the morning, there she was struggling to keep her eyes open. So much for trying to get her back into a school sleep schedule. You were no better though, going to bed at three last night because you waited last minute to start writing lesson plans. This made you yawn along with her and close your eyes.

“Yes, we can sing like we did with Frozen.” She hummed a bit, snuggling again against your chest as she decided it was time to take a nap. You quickly agreed with that idea.

Knocking on the door broke Levi from looking at the figures for the latest project and he leaned out of his office to see both you and Isabel sleeping on the couch. He smiled to himself, heart singing at the view, and went to open the door for his cousin.

“Where’s she at?” He frowned at Mikasa, moving so she could walk in and see you two sleeping on the couch. Levi didn’t want to move you two, and in actuality he wanted to add another picture to the album on his phone, but it would be way too embarrassing to do in front of Mikasa. Mikasa on the other hand had put a pizza in the oven and was ready to go. Levi grabbed her arm to stop her from shaking you two awake.

“Let them sleep. They both stayed up late.” She rolled her eyes at Levi and he responded with an even more annoyed eye roll. Couldn’t she calm down for a few minutes?

“They get five more minutes of beauty sleep.”

“How gracious.” He stood there, arms crossed, looking over at the two who had no idea Mikasa walked in the door. You had one hand over Isabel’s head and the other hanging of the couch, gripping a phone still playing some YouTube video in the background. Isabel had her small hand touching your cheek, head buried in your chest as she snored soundly on her favorite bed. When Mikasa looked over at her cousin, she thought she was going to be sick. It was the same look you had coming back from you two’s first date and one she’d seen on your face when you bounced into their office. She’s gotten used to you, but this was the first time she saw Levi like that. She snorted at him and he dropped it, morphing back into his normal, harsh glare.

“Never thought you’d be so wrapped around (Y/F/N)’s finger.” Levi scoffed at her, making sure it wasn’t loud enough to wake you two.

“I’m just admiring my girlfriend and kid; can I not do that, brat?” Mikasa laughed a bit at him trying to hide his embarrassment with another insult. He did the same when she walked in on you two making out in his office, having forgotten to lock the door.

“You can, just not with my best friend. Makes me sick.” Levi felt like his eyes were going to roll out of his head. Once you two started dating, that whole friend group had been insufferable to him. Eren and Jean talking about all their college flings with you, Connie and Sasha always bursting out laughing for no reason, and Mikasa made fun of him for showing emotion. The only one he still liked was Armin who inquired about your class activities as school and the other kids besides Isabel. 

“When are you going to marry her?” Levi was taken aback by that question, but Mikasa was completely cool. It sounded so natural coming from her lips that Levi couldn’t help but actually answer back. It wasn’t a surprise to Mikasa when he told her his intentions. From the day you came back from your first date, she knew you’d probably become her cousin in less than a year.

“Haven’t planned out anything, but I have a ring.” She laughed at him again, this time adding a tad bit of happiness into it. Yeah, she was okay with Levi and you, but she didn’t know how the others would take the news. Eren and Jean would be distressed, Historia and Sasha ecstatic, and Connie and Armin probably neutrally happy. She’d probably have to pull Eren “that should’ve been me” Jaeger and Jean “if only she gave me a shot” Kiersten home from some random bar.

“Did you tell Isabel?” Levi nodded, remembering the conversation he had to have with her about keeping very, very important secrets. He even said that if Isabel told you, he would cry, which made it seem very serious to Isabel.

“She helped me pick it. Something about knowing what plastic rings (Y/F/N) liked. She slipped up this week though and called (Y/F/N) mommy. I had to bust my ass to cover that up.” This made Mikasa actually smile. Her best friend would be a great mom, but she didn’t want to think about it. You weren’t the first person she thought was going to get married in their group. Probably Historia, or Armin and his girlfriend, not you, the girl that fell into the Education major who partied all the time stereotype. 

“You’re marrying someone crazy; I hope you know that. By day, she’s a wonderful kindergarten teacher who all her students and parents love, and by night, she’s on top of some table in the club singing to Abba.” Levi grit his teeth, remembering clearly the first time he was forced out with you and the brats. Eren challenged you to a drinking contest and you stupidly accepted, which made it Levi’s job to drag you home and nurse a hangover the next day. It didn’t help that the next day you had another Teacher’s Institute meeting and complained to him that everyone there knew you were hungover. Those were some giant hoops Levi had to jump through to explain to Isabel why you were “sick”.

“Who do you think is the one getting her down and waking her up for school the next day?” Not caring anymore about saving face with Mikasa, he took his phone out, taking a picture of his two girls. Staring down at you holding his daughter, his heart swelled even more. You were going to be a great mom to Isabel, even if you told Levi that you weren’t made for it. Levi thought the same thing when he held Isabel for the first time, alone and abandoned. He reassured you, saying that Isabel has never had a mom in the first place, but you were still worried.

You don’t have to be worried, he thought watching Mikasa kick you awake, you’re perfect. His perfect little teacher.  

“Five minutes is up. Time to come to Aunty Mikasa’s so you won’t end up in therapy later in life for childhood trauma!”

xx Perhaps I got a LITTLE carried away, i hope you like it though! It’s a bit less cute than originally planned

[san-shui]

HAPPY (late) BIRTHDAY MY BELOVED! @djts-arts

i'm sorry this took a while but here's ur gift! it's based off on the MLB AU but doesn't follow ur plot. basically - let parrmour be happy lol! anyway i love you and hope you enjoy it!

i also posted it on ao3

On Monday

On Monday, I met you

It was the first day of school and the first akuma attack when Jane Seymour, a.k.a. Chat Noire, met Ladyblue.

How they met was by accident when Ladyblue flew into Chat Noire, who was walking along her baton like a tightrope, learning her new abilities. Their time to get acquainted was cut due to having to fight an akumatized classmate, Stoneheart.

But the moment Chat Noire met her partner in crime, she was entranced.

I liked you, I liked you

The girl had bronze skin and short, dark curly hair that parted on her left side with blue highlights hanging over her deep brown eyes.

Her skintight was black with light blue on the front in the style of an opened short sleeve jacket that stopped at the waist and on the legs from the knees down her to her feet, and within the light blue were black spots while white pearls lined along her wrists and waist into a “V” on the front. Her mask was opposite of the suit (light blue with black spots), and on her head was a black headband with silver spikes.

Even though she was in her superhero outfit, Ladyblue was gorgeous. Appearance was one thing, but her personality was another, and it's just as beautiful as her. Her bravery, her cleverness, her strength, her positivity, and her confidence.

It’s Monday – bad day

After defeating Stoneheart for the second and official time, the superheroes checked to make sure that the citizens were alive and well. To their surprise and glee, the akumatized classmate ended up dating their crush.

But good day for us

“They’re made for each other,” Ladyblue awed.

“Like us two,” Chat Noire flirted, offering her new partner a hand.

Good for us

Right then, Chat Noire’s ring beeped as the fourth paw flashes green – signaling one minute left before transforming back into civilian form. At that, Ladyblue grabbed her wrist and pulled it forward, showing the ring.

“Uh-oh, you see that?” Ladyblue asked lightly.

Chat Noire glanced at it then at her, and noticed how close their faces were to each other.

Even though they just met today, Chat Noire briefly wondered how those lips felt against her. It must’ve been subconscious because the next thing Chat Noire knew was her eyes drifted close then getting shoved back.

You wouldn’t let me kiss you

“Time to split,” Ladyblue said, releasing her hand.

Too stunned to move or speak, Chat Noire merely stood and watched as Ladyblue walked away.

“See you soon, Chat Noire,” Ladyblue said with a wave, then swung her yoyo out and launched herself into the air and behind some buildings.

Chat Noire smiled and dazely waved.

And that is why

She’s been in a relationship before and truly thought she was in love with him, but he turned out to be douche. She thought she learned to not fall in love so fast, but fighting alongside Ladyblue, Chat Noire was willing to do anything to get closer to her.

“Can’t wait, milady,” she whispered, then turned and vaulted away.

You were my kind of guy

~~~

Then Tuesday, I called you

Chat Noire was playing with her baton while lying lazily on a roof. After defeating another akumatized civilian, the superheroes agreed on doing patrol around London to further prevent harm and more akumas. Chat Noire wanted to talk to Ladyblue, but she left before Chat Noire could get a word in.

Chat Noire wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Wasn’t Ladyblue curious about her partner too? Or was she just too busy today? Chat Noire knew what it was like to be busy. Her civilian form, Jane Seymour, was a famous singer in England, she was bound to be crowded with meetings and rehearsals and classes.

Still, why did Ladyblue leave in a hurry?

Chat Noire supposed she could learn more about her baton’s gadgets. She had the rest of the day anyway. She was boredly pressing buttons when Contacts popped up on the screen. Seeing the only contact on her baton was Ladyblue’s, Chat Noire perked up.

She immediately pressed “call” under Ladyblue’s profile and waited eagerly. To her disappointment, the call went to voicemail. Chat Noire frowned, but it quickly vanished when an idea hit, and she pressed “call” again.

Several hours later, Chat Noire had left about 15 voicemails for Ladyblue of her rambling about her day. Unlike the others, the last voicemail was sincere as she asked if they could meet and talk. Assuming Ladyblue wouldn’t answer, Chat Noire set down her baton, sighed, and gazed at the starry night.

Ignored me, straight voicemail

A minute later, her baton vibrated with a beep, and Chat Noire glanced to see a notification from Ladyblue. She excitedly opened it to a message.

You texted back saying:

Ladyblue: play hard to get. ready. set . . .

You wouldn’t let me see you

Baffled, Chat Noire reread the text over and over. What was that supposed to mean? Was Ladyblue interested? Did she think she (Chat Noire) was messing around? She knew she was a jokester between the two, but she’s real when it comes to feelings.

Whatever it meant, it was clear that Ladyblue was not going to video call with her - at least for today.

Got so depressed by your test

Chat Noire sighed. That’s fine, she didn’t want to pressure her partner to the point of scaring her. Although she probably annoyed her with all of the voicemails. Chat Noire would gladly wait to see her lady, but that didn’t dismiss the depression that she felt at unanswered calls and the game Ladyblue set up.

Still I thought

Yet, a smile crept on her lips at the excitement of the game with Ladyblue, and she typed her response.

You’re the best

Chat Noire: u’re on >:P

‘Cause I’ve been so juvenile

That to take my time is just not my style

~~~

Come Wednesday, black coffee

After purifying the akuma, the victim offered them free coffee. Chat Noire happily agreed, while Ladyblue hesitated but agreed.

“You like black coffee?” Chat Noire asked her partner.

“Yeah, and you don’t?” she countered, raising a brow.

“Just because I look good in black doesn’t mean I like black coffee. I prefer flavor like myself,” Chat Noire teased proudly.

Ladyblue rolled her eyes, and Chat Noire laughed. Once they got their coffee and gave their thanks, the heroes left to drink in peace. They decided to sit on Big Ben, having a perfect view of their city.

Pure talking, clean touching

For hours, they talked and laughed. At some point, they discussed their double lives as being superheroes. While Jane was thrilled to have more freedom as Chat Noire, Ladyblue appeared anxious and concerned.

“I’m glad doing this to save London, but I can’t help but think I’m not the right one for this job,” Ladyblue confessed, staring down at the busy streets.

Chat Noire frowned and leaned back on her hands, gazing up at the sky.

“I get that. I doubt myself too sometimes. This may be bias but–”

Feeling bold, she placed a hand on Ladyblue’s. Startled, Ladyblue stared at their hands then at her with wide eyes.

“–I think you’re perfect for the job. Sure, we have flaws, but that’s what makes us human. I’ve never seen someone as smart, brave, and strong as you. I know we’ve only met and done this for three days, but it feels like a lifetime, and I can’t picture a better Ladyblue than you,” said Chat Noire sincerely.

Chat Noire wasn’t sure if it was the sun’s lighting, but she could’ve sworn she saw color on Ladyblue’s cheeks.

Oh, Wednesday, hump day

Ladyblue averted her eyes and stammered.

“I– um, thank you, Chat. I couldn’t have a better partner than you,” she said, facing Chat Noire again.

From the soft tone and her genuine eyes, Chat Noire knew she meant it and smiled. Then, to her astonishment, Ladyblue turned her hand over, grasped Chat Noire’s, and squeezed it gently. Chat Noire’s heart skipped a beat, and a silent gasp left her lips.

But we just held hands

“And I can’t picture a better Chat Noire,” Ladyblue whispered, giving her a small smile.

Chat Noire beamed and laughed.

“That’s a relief to know,” she teased.

Ladyblue giggled then gazed forward again.

You wouldn’t let me take you away for the day

As much as Chat Noire wanted to do more than hold hands, she was content with this for the day. Facing out, she too stared out at the city. About an hour later, Chat Noire decided to push her luck for the day.

“Are you up for hanging out more? Maybe go see a movie?” she asked.

Ladyblue chuckled and shook her head.

“Sorry, kitty, but I gotta stay. I have some things I need to finish,” she excused apologetically.

Chat Noire tried her best to hide her disappointment.

And I felt so juvenile

“Oh, that’s okay. I’ll see you tomorrow then. Good luck on your stuff,” she said.

Chat Noire then took Ladyblue’s hand, who was close to resisting until Chat Noire simply kissed her knuckles.

“Goodnight, milady,” she said, shooting her a wink.

Suppressing a smile, Ladyblue shook her head.

“Night, Chat Noire,” Ladyblue said.

Chat Noire smirked then jumped away. As she leaped from building to building, a part of her was feeling impatient with her and Ladyblue’s relationship (friends or more). She was clearly pushing it, but she didn’t know what else to do with these feelings – especially towards a girl.

The logical side of her informed Chat Noire that she’s taking this too fast, but the emotional, useless, romantic side of her wanted her to pursue this. Hell, she only knew her partner for three days, and Chat Noire was willing to do anything for her.

You gave an inch of time, and I took a mile

If Ladyblue wanted to just be friends, she would’ve said, right? Maybe she was interested in Chat Noire, but was too afraid to admit it or didn’t know it yet.

Arriving at her mansion, Chat Noire jumped through her bedroom window and landed quietly on her floor. She de-transformed into her normal clothes then walked over and face planted on her bed with a groan.

“You’re such a useless lesbian,” Plagg said bluntly, floating above her head.

“Shut up, Plagg,” Jane mumbled into her pillow, but Plagg ignored her.

“Psh, why love a complicated human when you have camembert!” Plagg said, throwing a piece of cheese up and into his mouth.

Jane flipped over onto her back and stared at the ceiling.

“She may be complicated, but she’s still amazing. I’m still not sure how we ended up getting these miraculous, but we’re meant to be. I can feel it,” she said thoughtfully.

Plagg rolled his eyes. “Yuck. You being all gushie is making me sick. If you need me, I’ll be in the cabinet with my love,” he said, stroking a piece of cheese then disappearing into a desk under the TV.

Jane grinned and shook her head then stared out her window at the moon as thoughts of Ladyblue swarmed her head.

I was so juvenile

‘Cause to take it slow is just not my style

~~~

Then Thursday, like Tuesday

Fed up with her family, Jane used Chat Noire as an excuse to flee her house. She roamed around London for a bit, helping citizens here and there, then ended up relaxing on top of a building.

Similar to Tuesday, Chat Noire called Ladyblue and left voicemails about her day. She probably shouldn't bother her, but Chat Noire found comfort doing this. She’s not sure why, but being able to talk to someone other than Plagg was relieving.

But unlike Tuesday, Ladybug never responded. This baffled Chat Noire. Was it something she did yesterday? Everything seemed fine . . .

Your “day off” from me

A loud crash came from behind, and Chat Noire turned to see a large robot stomping through the streets. It was about to hit another building until a yoyo stopped it, restraining its arm back. Chat Noire followed the line to see Ladyblue tugging on it.

Maybe that’s why Ladyblue hasn't responded. Whatever the reason was, Chat Noire had to put the issue aside as she sprinted to help her partner.

~~~

But Friday busy

Twice, Chat Noire tried to bring up Wednesday’s night event, but Ladyblue kept dodging it, using an akumatization or needing to hide before transforming as reasons to avoid the topic.

And Saturday too

Another victim saved, and Ladyblue and Chat Noire’s partnership appeared alright, but Jane could see through the mask (figuratively and literally) that Ladyblue was evading more moments with her. Jane’s heart broke the less Ladyblue interacted with her when they’re not fighting alongside each other.

Not wanting to deal with this game anymore, Jane made certain Ladyblue would talk to her the next day.

What’s up with you?

~~~

On Sunday, after a well fought battle with an akuma, Chat Noire caught Ladyblue before she left.

You don’t wanna kiss me

“Ladyblue, wait!”

You don’t wanna see me

Ladyblue froze and stared at her with apprehension.

You don’t wanna take me

“You’ve been avoiding me and I want to know why. I get you don’t wanna kiss me, but why don’t you want to see me? Or even be with me?” Chat Noire asked desperately. “Look, if it’s something I said or did on Wednesday, then I’m sorry. I know it seemed like a game and it’s only been a week now, but I really really like you. But if you don’t feel the same, you can tell me. It’s okay.”

So let me go

Chat Noire lowered her head and closed her eyes, waiting for the heartbreaking words. Instead, a gentle hand rested on her shoulder, prompting her to look up into kind eyes.

But you said:

“There’s things I know . . . you are cute, but juvenile,” Ladyblue said, booping her on the nose.

Then she placed her hand on Chat Noire’s cheek, who happily leaned into the touch.

“Don’t you know the greatest love takes the greatest while? So if you’re willing, take my hand and take the trial for just a mile and then another mile. Be patient for that one day.”

Before Chat Noire could blink, Ladyblue kissed her on the other cheek. When she pulled back, both faces were blushing. Ladyblue chuckled and looked at the sunset.

“Look, kitty, it’s Sunday,” she said, then glanced back at her. “Come with me, and I’ll make it worth your while. Maybe it’s not far away or coming down the aisle, but . . . I do wanna kiss you and try this out if you’re okay with going steady,” Ladyblue asked shyly.

But I wanna kiss you now

Chat Noire beamed. “Can I kiss you now?” she asked eagerly.

Oh . . .

Ladyblue giggled and nodded.

And kiss you

Chat Noire grinned and cupped her cheeks then connected their lips.

And kiss you

Ladyblue tasted like sweetener, and Chat Noire couldn’t get enough.

And kiss you

They broke away for air, but they could barely get some as they laughed at one another.

And kiss you

They then rested their foreheads against each other as they calmed down – goofily smiling.

And kiss you

“Is it too soon that I just want to kiss you?” Ladyblue asked in a hushed tone.

And kiss you

Chat Noire giggled. “We can do it as much as you want, milady,” she whispered.

And kiss you

Ladyblue chuckled then closed her eyes and kissed her again, which Chat Noire gleefully returned.

Till Monday

[beautiful-bau-beau]

helloooo!! I have a Spencer request :) Could you write one where Spencer is injured (maybe like when he broke his leg or something like that) and he stays round yours and you look after him, help him shower, comfort him and stuff :)

Anonymous said to beautiful-bau-beau: could u do a soulmate au w spence where you feel the share pain with your soulmate, i think it would be interesting since spencer seems to be shot or nearly killed in almost every episode 

Sticks and Stones

fem!reader/Spencer Reid

masterlist

[Set in season 5 when Spencer gets shot in the leg but makes references to Maeve]

----

To the average eye flowers are soft, simple little things. They spark romance in the hearts of budding couples, they aid the grieving widows, their beauty inspires the masses in forms such as poetry and art. For some, flowers only caused distress.

Few were "fortunate" in the world to have soulmates. Once twelve years of age, a soul bound to another would feel the pain, to a lesser extent, as well as receive a flower at the sight of the intrusion. Small purple blooms grew at bruises, at a cut, the flowers would mimic the length and size. Any other type of pain was indicated by large, red blossoms. As each wound healed, the flowers would wilt and die.

You were among the many to few flowers as flimsy nuisances, only serving as reminders of the pain you had to go through.

Before turning twelve you often wondered if you had a soulmate. You had spent many days vividly imagining who your soulmate was, what he looked like, what he did for a living, choosing to ignore that if you indeed had one, a lifetime of pain was sure to follow.

Lifetime of pain indeed.

Your soulmate must have been a stuntman, a police officer, hell- even a lion tamer with the amount of pain he seemed to put you through. The occasional bruise and scrape seemed to hit you up until your early twenties, that's when the real pain began.

Every other day it seemed that you were doubled over, screaming in agony. You were an ugly vision of purple and red, but hell, it seemed to strike up a conversation with you and your patients.

You served as a private duty nurse, taking care of patients in the safety of their own home. You enjoyed the one-on-one with your patients, and it was decidedly better than working in a crowded hospital with a difficult schedule.

You had just finished a job working with an elderly woman, as her granddaughter had recently decided to move in with her to take care of her. It was a sad departure, but the job had finished and it was now time for you to find another patient in need.

You were employed through a small local medical office and received career requests through their office website.

One particular request caught your eye that morning from a Ms. Penelope Garcia. A friend of hers had recently been shot in the leg and needed to quickly recover before returning to his job.

You eyed your own leg, sighing heavily. It still seemed to throb harshly every once in a while.

A week ago, out of nowhere, an extreme pain radiated through your leg, causing you to drop what you were doing and scream. Thankfully you hadn't been on the job but the look of pity your neighbors gave you the next day felt just as awful. Every time you glanced at the offending appendage you could swear you saw another blossom grow.

"You and me both, buddy." You mumbled, picking up your phone. The job seemed simple enough, and hopefully you would be able to bond with this new patient by shared leg pain.

-

"You ordered a nurse for me?" Spencer hissed into his cell, turning to look over his shoulder. "I can take care of myself!" He eyed your figure, currently unpacking a medical bag. You had entered his apartment mere minutes ago, not understanding his confusion.

"Are you Spencer Reid?" You asked, greeting his wheel-chair bound figure. "I'm Y/n Y/l/n, the nurse your girlfriend Penelope ordered." You were met with a blank stare. "Is she uh.. here?"

"I'm going to have to make a phone call." Spencer blurted, wheeling himself inside. He left the door open so you took it upon yourself to enter.

"Spencer, I love you but are you listening to yourself right now?" Penelope replied, twirling a pen around her fingers. "You were shot a week ago, you're in a wheelchair. How are you going to shower? Replace your bandages? Sweets, this nurse will help you. And before you even have to ask I already checked and your insurance covers this!"

"Garcia-"

"I won't hear anything more about it as I know I'm right! Goodbye, dear!" A heavy sigh came from the man, and he placed his cellphone back in his pocket. He turned to look at you again, wheeling his way over to you.

"I apologize for earlier. I wasn't exactly informed that you would be coming here." He placed his hands on his lap, awkwardly.

"That's alright!" You chirped. " You’re low-risk so I won’t invade your space too much by staying overnight with you. I'm here to help with personal medical care, bathing, trimming nails, and making you comfortable.... as well as urinary and colostomy care." His eyes widened and you simply waved him off. "I get it. It's weird. But from what I read through of your medical reports, the bullet went clear through and you'll need a crutch in two weeks! At least you're not hooked up to a catheter?" You tried to joke. You were met with another simple stare.

"Let's uh, change your bandages, shall we?"

-

It had been a few days since you started working with Spencer. He was a nice man, a little awkward, and seemed to be more of an introvert, so you respected his space. He seemed to take to staying in bed, simply asking for books every once and awhile.

"There's no way you're able to read all these so quickly. You'd have to be superhuman..." You teased, bringing him a stack of his latest requests.

"I have an IQ of 187 and can read 20,000 words per minute." Spencer replied, catching your eye. He flushed under your surprised glance. "...Not to brag."

"Well... that'll do it." You set each book in your arm down, one by one, a particular title catching your eye. "The Narrative of John Smith?"

"Have you read it?" He asked, trying not to sound too eager. He hadn't originally pegged you for an Arthur Conan Doyle fan.

"Uh, no." You scratched behind your ear sheepishly. "But a few friends of mine have, they all highly recommend it. What do you think? Does it live up to all the hype?" Spencer opened his mouth but shut it almost immediately, causing your brows to furrow.

"I can't tell you what to read... it's just a very special book to me."

"Did someone special give you the book? Penelope?" Spencer let out a chuckle, hissing as he adjusted himself on his bed.

"Garcia is just a friend but you're correct, someone special gave me the book."

"A soulmate?" You asked, immediately regretting your choice of words. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have assumed. I'm just the nosy nurse that asks too many questions." You knew it was a sensitive topic for some, with or without the soulmate.

"No, it wasn't from a soulmate... but I wish she was." Spencer's voice grew soft. You felt as if you had stepped too far, intruded upon a fond memory.

"I do have one though." He continued, noticing your unease. "Sometimes I worry I imagined her but every once and awhile, I'll notice some flowers by my legs, the likely result of a cut from shaving or bruises." You let out a laugh, leaning against his door frame.

"I would love a low-risk soulmate like that. He must jump through flaming hula-hoops or something. I could make a decent living as a florist." You murmured.

"That's got to be tough." Spencer observed, noticing no flowers on your arm.

"I guess he's a lot like you." You lifted up your pant leg, crimson petals on display. "His reason can't be nearly as heroic as yours, though." Spencer couldn't suppress the smile that grew from the compliment.

"Well I guess you'll have to find him and ask."

"Well you're in the FBI right? Let's formulate a profile and find him so I can give him a piece of my mind. You in?" You teased.

"Sounds like a worthy use of all my newfound time." He let out a small huff of amusement, eyeing your figure. He appreciated how lighthearted and casual you were. He noticed the space you gave him and your little efforts to make the apartment easier to maneuver around. Although he hadn't seemed motivated at first, something told him he should get to know you more.

-

"Y/n?" Spencer asked, drawing your attention away from one of the books you had borrowed from his shelf. "Is there any way we can wash my hair?" He had procrastinated in asking, too embarrassed for whatever your plan was for showering.

"Of course! I could cut it too if you'd like." You offered, standing to wheel him into the bathroom.

"Are you saying you don't like my hair?" He faked an offended tone which he knew would make you laugh.

"I think your hair is beautiful, right at that perfect length before it gets too weird for any man to wear." You snorted. You moved him to a stool, not too difficult a feat as he was able to support the majority of his weight on his good leg. "Alright, the shirt has got to come off."

"Isn't against a code to try and seduce your patients?" Spencer teased. Since your conversation the other day he had grown to feel more comfortable with you and a friendship ensued. You took care when treating him and told stories of past patients. It was clear you loved what you did and cared for the people even more.

"Oh please. If I was seducing you, which I'm not, you'd know." You rolled your eyes, waiting for him to lift his arms before peeling his shirt off of him. He leaned back, long tresses falling into a pool in the sink.

He was extremely handsome, you couldn't deny it. His sharp cheekbones and jawline, his full and enticing lips, the way his hand flexed as he read.... you didn't notice any of that. You especially didn't notice how wonderfully intelligent he was, or how kind. Not at all.

Besides, it would never work. You both had your respective soulmates and he seemed to still be carrying a torch for the past relationship he was in. Not to mention the most important factor of all, he was your patient.

You carefully stepped around him to grab a large and small towel, snickering as you found a familiar design on one.

"Star Trek fan?" You asked, hanging the fabric on the shower rail and turning the tap on to warm water.

"Typically I'm not one for fiction but surprisingly there aren't that many scientific errors in Star Trek, especially considering how long ago it was made. There are certain improbabilities, but not that many outright errors, which make it so enjoyable to watch."

"Eh, I've only seen the film from 2009, and I was mostly paying attention to the deliciously handsome cast." You knew that would agitate him. "And not just for Chris Pine but Zachary Quinto as Spock? Oh, he is gorgeous, even if he is gay. Not that there's anything wrong with being gay, and not that I had a chance with him anyway." You laughed.

"Y/n, I am not one to comment on the education of another but you are seriously missing out! Star Trek: The Next Generation is one of the most influential series of it's time. the new film doesn't even have Data! Data, y/n, Data!" He grumbled as you washed his hair.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Next you're going to tell me that the 1996 Doctor Who movie is better than the series?" He opened his mouth when you raised your soapy hand. "Disregard that statement, I can't afford another argument, I'm already too emotional from our last one." You faked a sniffle.

"You know, most females I talk to don't watch Star Trek or Doctor Who."

"I'm just that amazing, I know." You sighed, moving to grab the washcloth and dousing it with water, handing it to Spencer so he could wash himself. You grabbed the Star Trek towel and started to dry Spencer's hair.                                           

"You're something alright." He retorted, drawing a gasp from you.

"I could have let you sit with greasy hair, you know!" Just for extra measure you rubbed his head a little harsher than before but miscalculated your aim, accidentally hitting your wrist against the marble sink.

Spencer felt pain radiate through his wrist and time seemed to slow. It suddenly seemed to dawn on him all at once. You experienced constant pain, pain he gave you because he was often injured on the job. Not to mention his gunshot wound on your leg and now the purple blossoms forming on his wrist.

 He wanted to shout, yell, jump up, wrap you in a hug. He had finally found his soulmate! However, he remained silent.

When you spoke about your soulmate the other day you seemed angry and forlorn at the amount of pain you had to endure. There was no doubt in his mind that if you knew he was your soulmate, you would walk right out of his life, but not before giving him a swift kick to the ass.

So he stayed quiet.

-

You weren’t sure what changed between you and Spencer. After the shower he mentioned he didn’t feel too well so you guided him to bed. Since then he stayed in his room, barely calling you to his side.

It was weird. If it was any other patient you would have paid no mind and kept to yourself but you thought you had made a connection with Spencer. You enjoyed the banter between you both and finding out your shared interests. It must have all been in your head. You brought yourself out of your thoughts to prepare Spencer’s tea. 

“Here you are!” You called, stepping into his room to hand him the mug. “I’m about to head out, do you need anything else?”

“No, thank you.” You stayed by the door, waiting to see if he would even spare you a glance. When he made no motion to move, you gave up, spinning on your heel to grab your purse and coat. 

“Ah!” You heard Spencer hiss from the other room before feeling a sharp sting on your tongue. Your hand came up to cover your mouth, brows knitting together in confusion. Was he…? Did he…? 

Spencer was your soulmate, he had to be. There was no possible way that him burning his mouth and your pain that followed were coincidences, right? Spencer was your soulmate! So why did you feel your heart drop into your stomach?

You shut the door, racing down the stairs and out of his apartment building, letting the cold air sweep over you. 

There was nothing special about you. You were just a simple nurse and he was your patient. Besides, how were you deserving of Spencer? You weren’t. 

He couldn’t find out, he just couldn’t.

-

You didn’t know if it was just because you knew that Spencer was your soulmate but the tension between the two of you was… palpable. 

“Hey!” You popped your head into his room, his figure jumping in surprise. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to startle you!” You exclaimed.

“Hi?” He greeted, trying to seem calm. You were leaving tomorrow and he was panicking. The past few hours were spent debating about whether he should tell you that he was your soulmate. Could he really just let this opportunity pass by?

“I just wanted to know if you needed anything? I figured you probably ran out of books by now. Everytime I think you’ve reread all the books in your library I keep finding new ones.” You tried to joke. 

“I… Yes. Yes, please.” He mumbled, hiding his gaze. You sighed, wondering for the millionth time what you had done wrong to make him so distant and reclusive. 

“Alright, I’ll take the stack.” You bit your lip to keep from sighing once more, groaning as you picked up the books littered around the room. “God these are heavy.” You whispered under your breath, trying to waddle into the other room as you quickly realized you were losing your grip. It seemed as if it was too late, the pounds of literature falling on your feet.

Both you and Spencer let out a groan, heads snapping towards each other in surprise. 

“Did you- did you feel that?” You asked, even if you knew the answer.

“I did.” Spencer’s voice seemed small. “Y/n, I am so sorry.” You were taken aback, eyebrows furrowing in confusion.

“You’re sorry?” You questioned, pain forgotten as shame radiated through you. “Am I that bad of a soulmate?” You whispered, clenching your fist to keep tears from pricking your eyes.

“No! No, no, no!” He tried to sit up as straight as he could, internally cursing at how hurt you looked. “I only apologized because… I can’t help but feel like I disappointed you! I am an FBI agent, I’m always going to be in danger therefore putting you in danger. When you first mentioned your soulmate you seemed so… upset. I don’t know if I’ll ever truly be able to make you happy.” He admitted, the tips of his ears turning red as his gaze fell to his lap.

“Disappointed? Past-tense?” You cried. “Did you know about this?” He didn’t move.

“Well… I guess I can’t be angry with that.” You sighed. “I knew too. I just thought that… you wouldn’t want me. You still seemed so in love with whatever woman gave you that book. And out of my league. And my patient.” You let out a wry laugh, sitting on the edge of his bed. 

“Are you kidding me? You are the most gorgeous woman I have ever met. You make me laugh and you are so kind and caring. I am proud to be your soulmate.” He swallowed thickly.

“Spencer you are selfless. You dedicate your life every day to helping others. You are handsome, sweet, and hilarious.” You reached for his hand. “And I am so happy you turned out to be my soulmate.”

Your eyes finally met and before you knew it, your lips smashed against his. 

“I don’t know if you know this… but I happen to get injured on a lot of missions.” He uttered as you pulled apart. “So I have a feeling that I’ll need you around more often.”

“Well Doctor, I think you just might be right.” You giggled, drawing him in for another kiss. 

-----

Feedback is always appreciated!

[abused-virgil-oneshots]

You it be a grown up, but you’re still my baby + you're leaving?

TW: Kidnapping, lying, DNA tests, mentions of college, unsympathetic Patton

Virgil had been younger when it happened. Of course he had been, he was barely 18 now. Now he was going to college, or, at least trying to. It was getting rather hard to get the information he needed from his father, Patton. Every time he tried, he made a big fuss about it, the fact that he was looking more to out of state colleges than in state. Saying things like "You may be grown up, but you're still my baby," just a general big fuss about growing up and shit. Like you'd expect most parents too. Or at least like he assumed you'd expect most parents to act. Though it wasn't his fault there weren't as many fine art colleges in state. He wasn't the one who chose the middle of nowhere to live.

Which it was, the middle of nowhere. Getting to school was so difficult they ended up homeschooling for the most part. The only time he saw people was when they went into town every other week. It wasn't like he needed people though, he had his Dad. And books, music, a phone, who needs anything else? He  had friends online, much easier than having in person ones. real life people freaked him out anyway. So he kept online.

He wasn't quite sure what lead up to it. He sent someone a picture, someone in the chat had joked that he looked nothing like his father. He must be adopted or something. Of course Virgil had obviously denied it. That was impossible, and if it was he would've been told. it wasn't like that was some big thing that had to be kept away. Virgil didn't care if he was adopted. He'd still have liked to know. So when he was doing his routine check for college mail, and the kit had appeared in there, he'd done it. He didn't think much of it, just that when it finally came back he'd be able to prove that he was his father's son, his friends would have to believe him then.

So he'd done it and forgot. Mail always took awhile to go back. So a month or two later when Virgil was really burying himself in college stuff from places he'd been accepted, happy with where he had gotten in, while a little disappointed he'd barely received anything back from most of the out of state places he applied, the test was there. He'd thrown it on his desk, getting called downstairs for dinner at the same time he was seeing it there. He left, and after a game night, movie night, and homework night all wrapped in one, came back to it.

He was tired, but still. He wanted to feel the satisfaction of proving them wrong. So when he opened it to bright red, bold words yelling NEGATIVE at him, his blood ran cold. Instantly he was more awake. Talking himself through all the possibilities. Maybe it was wrong. Maybe they'd mailed the wrong results. Maybe he had been adopted. He ran through all his possibilities, yet his mind still jumped to the worst one it could, one planted months ago by a friends joke.

Maybe he was kidnapped.

No, impossible. His father was like, the biggest teddy bear, ever. He was in no way capable of that. Besides, he was so fatherly. There was no way he'd been kidnapped. Impossible. So when Patton-his father knocked on the door he told him.

Yet, no matter how safe he felt with him, he didn't miss the way his eyes went dark. The way his hands scrunched up and crumpled the paper. The way his normal smiled disappeared, even if it was just for a second.

It was the only time he'd ever actually felt scared.

He didn't like it.  

But, just as quick as it had come, it was gone. His father was back to his happy self. Reassuring him that it had to be a mistake. There was no way Virgil wasn't his son, he'd been there when he was born! He had pictures of when he came home! And Virgil didn't know any different.

...Yet he couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong. Something was... different now. So, instead of running another test, he bought a different kit. One of those ancestry kits. The ones that could connect him to family members if they were on there. Just, purely because he was interested, not because he was freaked out.

Definitely not because he needed to know if what he was saying matched up.

Plus, if it did, it was no harm no foul. He didn't have to say anything to his father. And as long as he didn't match to anyone he was closely related to, unlikely because the only one he knew was Patton, no one had to know. So when a close relative popped up, he didn't know what to expect.

Certainly didn't expect the match to be parental. And the biggest surprise of all being paternal. Of course he wasn't stupid. He didn't accept the match. He wasn't just going to abandon any belief he had in his dad. Maybe it was a surrogate or something. He looked up the name.

A colossal mistake.

Countless links came through, most saying the exact same things.

BABY TAKEN FROM HOME OF SLEEPING PARENTS, was not the expectation. He had expected a social media profile. Expected to click on a link that told him where the match went to college. He hadn't expected this.

Virgil slammed the computer closed close, his head going too fast to process anything else. He didn't know what to expect, what to do.

He just knew he couldn't stay.

He went through his room, stuffing things in his bag. A charger, his wallet. Any cash he had, granted not much, but enough to get him through a few days. Enough for gas. Enough to give him time to think.

He grabbed his phone off the night stand and went down the stairs as quietly as he could. He stopped in the kitchen, wrapping as much food as he though he could take that wouldn't go bad and went out the front door.

He was not expecting to be met with his father sitting on the front porch.

He must've known.

Maybe he didn't.

He had too.

"What are you doing still up?"

"I could ask you the same question," Virgil counted the seconds, waiting for the next response. "You know."

"I do."

"And you're leaving?" It wasn't really a question. "Without saying goodbye? Did I raise you that badly?" That wasn't much of a question either.

"I just... I need to think is all," Virgil stepped back as Patton stood up.

"You can't think here? Where do you plan on going anyway? Did you think this all the way through Vee?" He hadn't. It hadn't really mattered though, he needed out. He couldn't stay. "I'm just worried for your safety. You wouldn't ask long out there. It's not nearly as safe as here."

"I'll be back in a few days. I promise Dad."

"No, you won't. You can't go Virgil. It's not safe."

"Well I am going. You can't stop me."

"Virgil," he reached for Virgil's arm, and Virgil took what he could as an opening as he shoved past him, not expecting to get hit in the back of the head with something hard. Well, that wasn't the plan.

///1239 words Haha! I wrote! I did things! Thank you for the prompt!

Taglist:

@just-violet-flowers

[starr-fall-knight-rise]

Humans are Space Orcs, “The verdict.”

Was writing very quick today, so forgive the typos, and I hope you like it 

The detective woke to a familiar face only a few feet away from his. He was being shaken back and forth and with every shake his head pounded. Despite being able to see it took  him more than a few minutes to finally understand what was even going on.

“Detective, detective! Wake up, there we go, that’s it. You hit your head pretty hard.”

When his vision finally focused down and he took the time to recognize the face in front of him, he yelped in sudden surprise and tried to leap to his feet. However, his legs had other ideas, and he sagged hard towards the ground, his head pounding and nauseous.

Admiral Vir laid a hand on his shoulder, “Woah there hotshot take it easy. Gonna need you to stay still so I can take care of this.”

He groaned and tried to swat the other man away, “You-!

“Didn’t do this.” HE said, grabbing the Detective by the wrist and holding it tight as he used his left hand, and a damp cloth to wipe blood from his head, “Think back a little and maybe you’ll remember.” 

Confused by the man helping him, and his own throbbing head, he did his best to think back.

He remembered being outside the cells watching the cameras. He remembered dozing off in his seat a little.

And then it came to him.

He remembered being violently dragged off his chair and into the dark bak room, a hand over his mouth only to be set upon by the three escaped human prisoners. Things were so silent and so quick that it was hard to rationalize what happened. His eyes, still trying to focus, looked around the room and the wide open floor which constituted some kind of bar or club, with chairs and tables and seats, and a dance floor. However, everything was deserted as of now, and he was sitting back against one of the couches, his legs sticking out straight before him.

Admiral Vir leaned forward a bit, eyes narrowed in concentration as he parted the matted hair on top of the detective’s scalp. The expression the detective had come to know, one of indignant, childish petulance, was gone, and in its place was a serious expression of worry and concern that made the man look nearly twenty years older than he was.

This was the man he had expected when he heard admiral, not the sass mouthing over talkative prisoner he had been trying to interrogate for the past day or two. Admiral Vir sat back on his heels, his expression serious still, but less worried now, “So, you got yourself whacked pretty hard. Luckily for you the bleeding stopped and the cut isn’t too deep. Normally I would suggest finding a doctor to make sure you haven't badly concussed yourself, but considering the circumstances, we don’t really have that option.

We? He thought with some incredulity repeating the phrase before he knew what he was saying, “We…. What do you mean by we. I am the detective and YOU are the suspect.”

A little bit of the sarcastic childishness returned as the Admiral rolled his eyes to the heavens, “You are a pretty shit detective if you haven’t figured out by now that I am on your side.” Admiral Vir sat back on his heels, his one green eye staring the detective in the face, surprisingly devoid of any sort of malice.

“I’m going to be honest with you about exactly what happened, no sarcasm this time, no jokes. I was called into this planet as a consult to a murder.” he held up a hand as the detective went to protest, “Yes, I know, I am no detective, but I was asked by the GA, so I went. When we got there we found a dismembered Tesraki body in the back of his shop, based on the tourist area and and violence of the crime, I determined that humans had done it. WHen I saw the missing limbs I immediately assumed this was some sick plot about trying to find exotic meat or something, but it turns out I was wrong on that front.”

The admiral Stood and went over to toss the damp rag into a trashcan before returning, “I returned to our hotel room later that night with Krill and Sunny and sat down to compile a list of possible names. I found about twenty, but by the time I was done, it was already too late at night to do anything. I tried to sleep, but none came, so I left to go on a walk. Naturally my preoccupied mind let me towards the part of the city where those twenty names were registered.

It was only by luck that I ran into that alley at all. I couldn’t let the Tesraki die, so I stupidly jumped in and nearly got my throat cut once or twice. I did knock two of them out and break the sternum of the other one.” He patted the leg which the detective happened to know was mechanical, “I always forget how strong this piece of hardware is, but anyway, I called the authorities and the men were carted away. The Tesraki was fine when he left. I remember wrapping my jacket around him and carrying him out to wait for emergency vehicles. That was the last time I saw him. WHen we returned to the precinct the day after, was when you showed up and arrested me.”

The detective sat, his head reeling slowly in confusion and suspicion, “But I saw the security tapes. That’s not what happened.”

“Can you guarantee those security tapes werent doctored. Were you the first person to have your hands on them?” 

He paused and then shook his head, “Well, no.”

“And do you admit it is kind of weird for me to be arrested the day after the three men in the alley?” “I mean a little.”

“And based on all the research you have done on me, isn’t this a bit out of character.”

The detective paused unwilling to admit that he had been having some doubts. Sure he had been given a preliminary report of the Admiral’s criminal history, but when he got a better look at it, most of his actions had been justified. In the Drev war, he had been a member of operation Steel eye, a drugged young man being taken advantage of by a system. During the first contact incident, his excitement had led to the discovery of aliens, though the bran had misinterpreted his enthusiasm as hunting. His return to the Drev home planet had involved him spending time to learn their language and about their culture. And his murder of the burg that had inevitably caused the war was an act in self defence, and he couldnt have known that spitting on the creature was going to kill it.

He sighed deeply, “Alright, you have a point…. But I still think your an annoying asshole.”

The man smiled, “I get that a lot.”

“Anyway point of the story is, I woke up to something last night and the cell was open. I think they were trying to frame me for your murder, but the Tesrak idetective came into help at the alst second, and told me to get out as soon as I can.”

He supposed that made sense, and fit into his experience, “And what do you plan to do now? How are you going to get out of this. IF this is really a plot to frame you, and the department is involved, we can assume it comes from high up, with someone powerful enough to at least consider themselves above the law.”

The Admiral paused, tapping his fingers against his knee, “Did you come here in your own ship?”

*** “You must find the admiral and the detective. Leave admiral Vir alive, but make sure the detective dies. In the meantime, I will take this evidence and present it to the GA council, they are unlikely to disbelieve video evidence of the crime.”

The Kree sighed, but nodded, “It will be done.

At that announcement Sunny suddenly grabbed krill by his shoulder and hauled him back into the darkness just in time for the Kree to step out of the office followed by the Tesraki senator.

WIth one hand over Krill’s mouth, Sunny pulled the two of them behind a very large potted plant, watching as the two made their way down the hall. 

They had just disappeared around the corner, when Krill turned to look at Sunny, “Why didn’t we jump them?”

Sunny turned to frown at him, “Because what were we going to do, threaten to eat him? Besides, no one would believe us, at least not here. I have a better idea.” “A better idea?”

“Just trust me”

***

Admiral Vir pulled his jacket up against the rain as they came to the launch field. It wasn’t that far away from the department, so they had to keep a low profile, which was hard as two humans, though the cover of rain helped some. The Detetive checked around the landing strip and then motioned the admiral to follow him quickly. Adam did as told and hurried after him, until they came upon  a little black/silver ship at the back of the lot.

Adam raised an eyebrow, “A rundi short cruiser, how did you manage to score one of these babies.” he ran his hand along her smooth aerodynamic hull.

“A what? Oh this thing.” He shrugged, “It was given to me for this mission.”

Adam frowned, “This thing? You mean this work of art.

The man just stared at it, ‘It’s a spaceship.”

“It is a shuttle that can warp! And you are calling it just a spaceship. It’s one of only ten ships in existence like this. The Detective shrugged unimpressed, and Adam sighed long and loud, “You have no appreciation for the finer things in life. I bet you don’t even know how to drive it.”

“Its autopilot, why would I want to drive it?”

Adam put his head in his hands, “You’re going to make me cry.”

The door to the little ship hissed open, and the two of them climbed inside. The interior was almost as sleek as the outside, and Adam couldn’t help but run his hands over the console and controls as he went to take a seat in the copilot chair as the other man sat down and began slowly flipping up pre programmed controls.

Adam sighed as the detective flipped through the instruction manual.

“Do you want to drive/” The other man snapped 

“I thought you’d never ask.” Adam retired, reaching out a hand for the controls.

Just then the two of them were blinded as a bright spotlight beamed down upon them.

“Admiral Vir, step away from the controls and come out with your hands up.”

“Shit!” 

The detective was just reaching out to power down the shuttle, when Adam reached forward, and flicked up the last few switches with lightning speed, turning over the engine and grabbing the controls.

“What the hell are you doing!” The detective yelled “You can’t fly this thing manual, it's too fas-”

He punched the throttle, and they rocketed into the air, doing a tight barrel roll to the left narrowly avoiding the emergency shuttle and equipped high beams. The detective screamed, and then choked off as the G force slammed him back into his seat.

Adam caught their spin and leveled out, coming face to face with another three cruisers. Pulling back on the joystick with his left hand, they shot up vertically before he took them into a spinning vertical dive that had them cutting past the two shuttles, now spinning in confusion.

The Detective screamed again as they pulled out of the dive and back into a vertical climb. On the rear cameras, he could see the three shuttles meandering around in confusion, and thought they were out of the woods for a moment before another set of beams fell on them, and a sleek black ship, of a make he could not identify, fell in behind them.

He punched it harder, pulling into a tight backward loop. WIthout his flight suit the G forces behaved brutally causing his vision to blacken at the edges, but by tensing his belly and chest, he continued to force blood into his head. Off to the side, the G force had been to much for the Detective who was hit with a sudden bout of G-lock and passed out, flopping against his harness like a fish.

He pulled out of the dive just behind the pursuing shuttle, and then quickly cut up and left, pushing the ship to the extremes of it’s speed. As they rose higher into the atmosphere there was an automatic cachunk as the atmospheric engine moved over to the compressed warp/funsio nengine.

The detective flopped around like a dead fish for a few more seconds before his head slowly rolled back upright. He looked horribly green.

“IF you throw up I swear to the Leviathan, I am going to kill you.”

Behind him the little black ship was maintaining a distant pursuit with some difficulty.

Once out of the atmosphere and heading into high orbit, Adam reached down and engaged the warp. 

The detective reached out a hand, “Wait!”

But it was too late, the universe around them began to spiral, folding over on itself and reflecting back the space like a mirror. The feeling was terrible like being folded in half or pulled apart as everything far away appeared close and everything close appeared far away.

Admiral Vir felt himself getting ready to pass out against the full power of an undampened warp his brain unable to fathom what he was seeing as space around them was compressed.

They came out with a sudden jolt that threw them against their seats jerking them forward and then back with a sudden halt.

The Detective groaned piteously where he was passed out in his seat Ad had barely retained consciousness, but shook it off as he reached out to grab the controls.

A soft dripping noise had him turning his head to the side, upon which time he grinned rather smugly and turned his head back to the front where the rundi planet, Irus, glowed like a blue and orange marble against the sky. The Detective didn’t wake up for a good few minutes, but when he did, he was soon followed by cruising and a face reddened by embarrassment, “Your first undampened  short warp I take it?” Adam said grinning.

HTe man didn’t answer.

Still grinning, adam laughed, “Don’t worry, it happened to the best of us at one point. Most people aren't able to keep their bladder in check during thief first warp.”

“You’re an asshole, you know that.”

“Well aware, but at least this asshole isn’t sitting in a puddle of his own urine.” His merriment was shut up a few second later as their shuttle jerked violently forward, “Shit!” He yelled, forcing the ship back onto it’s trajectory. He took a look at the back camera to see that, somehow, the other ship was still following them.

“Hold on to your hat!” He yelled, punching the throttle and rocketing them towards the blue surface of the planet.

THe Detective screamed again as they roared into the atmosphere at incredible speeds, fire licking up at the sides as atmospheric friction caught up with them. Adam knew what he was doing, he knew just how much power it would take to burnt through the hull or rip off her wings. Knowing his opponent had a less advanced ship, he hoped that they would either, overestimate their abilities or pull back.

And he was right, they did for a while, though not in time as a contingent of Rundi defence ships shot up after them demanding identification over the radio. He was too busy flying to respond, and the Detective could barely function as a human being. The other ship was swarmed, but Adam managed to pull them down into a tight inverted roll backwards and vertical before pulling up and rolling to the side.

The manuver was more than the rundi ships could handle and they lost him as they roared towards the planet.

The city was closer now, close enough that he could see the spires of the GA council chamber. 

He soared over the launch filed.

“What are you doing!” The detective yelled 

“We don’t have time!” Adam snarled pulling back on the joystick and reversing the thrusters to come to a halt right over the open GA courtyard, WIth steady hands he lowered himself into the open plane as delegates divided out of the way. Guards ran from the outer edge and inward surrounding his ship.

He turned and threw open the doors running out into a wall of heat that battered against him without mercy. The guards froze in confusion as they saw him, and he took the moment to push past.

Behind him the detective staggered out onto the marble barely able to walk, moving about like he was drunk.

WIth a steady stride, adam made his way towards the council chamber.

***

“And as the presented evidence shows, Admiral Vir is a murderer.” The Tesraki delegate announced shocked whispers rising up around him as they stared as the video footage, “In light of these events, I move to-”

At the end of the hall, a door onto the floor slammed open, and everyone turned in shock just in time to see a vrul and a Drev step onto the floor. The Drev was just about to open her mouth to speak when another door slammed open.

The entire delegation moved to their feet with shouts of shock and surprise as Admiral Vir stepped onto the floor, “I OBJECT!.” he paused frowning, “Wait, that’s for weddings isn’t it.”

The chairwoman stood, “Admiral Vir, What do you have to say for yourself.”

Before he could say anything Sunny cut in, “He’s being framed!”

The Tesraki counselor rose to his feet, “Lies, do you have proof?”

“Uh, well no.”

“YES!”

Adam turned to sunny, shook himself and turned back to the delegation, “Er YES!” he turned his head to look at Sunny, “We do/”

She stepped forward, “I have evidence that admiral Vir was being framed, framed by.” She turned and jabbed a finger at the Tesraki, “YOU.” He stepped back in shock, and a muttering rose up around them.

“How dare you.”

Sunny marched forward and past the guards, reaching up to hand something to the chairwoman, who took it and passed it to an assistant, who hurried over to insert the chip into their system.

A voice rose over the speakers, “Get out there, FIND HIM and make sure he doesn’t ruin this for me. If this all works out, by the end of the month I will be chairman of the GA, and the humans will simply be an afterthought.” said the Tesraki delegates voice.

Hundreds of eyes turned to look at him in open shock.

He stepped back hand raised, “I have no idea where this came from.

THe second Tesraki delegate stood a look of absolute rage on her face, “How could you!” she snapped, “How could you betray us like this.”

He stammered, “But he, he escaped prison, he killed the detective!”

Just then, the doors at the end of the room opened up and the Detective came waddling into the room looking miserable and nauseous, but very much alive. Following him Came the Tesraki detective, hauling an unconscious Kree in his wake, who he dumped on the floor as soon as he made it to the center.

The Tesraki was looking a little more worse for ware, his ear torn, green blood staining his fur

He raised a hand and pointed a finger at the delegate, “The Admiral is telling the truth, he was framed, and THIS TESRAKI threatened my department to do it. I was scared at first as my family is in grave peril but I couldn't stand by and watch a good man be framed for selfish reasons.” He turned to the delegation, “He is angry that the humans have taken so much Tesraki economic power, despite the fact that.” he turned an accusatory eye on the Tesraki, “The average citizen has never been so well off. Because of human tourism, we are thriving. The only one’s different are the corporations, and now this Tesraki would have it so we go back to the old days when the average citizen was poor and the elite ruled.”

Sunny nodded, “There is more to that recording. We tracked it by following the a spy who was charged with making tampered video footage to incriminate Admiral Vir. You know him, you know him as a human who has always worked for the betterment of the GA. There is no chance that he could have done anything lie what they are saying.

There was a pause in the crowd for a moment, and then Lord Celzex stood, “IT is as I said, Admiral Vir would never do such a crime, and we have no reason to believe he would start now.”

The Tesraki delegate snarled, though was almost immediately cold cocked in the face by the other Tesraki delegate as guards moved in from the sides of the room to detain the Tesraki and the Kree.

In the chaos Admiral Vir and Sunny were pushed to the side, pinned into a small corner.

She looked down at him, and he looked up at her.

“Thanks for having my back.”

She smiled, “no problem, I’ve decided I want to keep your around for a while.”

He grinned, “I hope you do.” He stretched up on the balls of his feet and she leaned down, their foreheads pressed against one another for a quick moment before disengaging and beng swept away on the tide of questions and confusion. 

[songsformonkeys]

A Tiny Piece of the World Called Home - (Ezra x reader) chapter 2

pairing: Ezra x reader

summary: "Just like the first of the Terras, Icarus had precisely one moon. It was a desolate and barren place, gray rocks and dust as far as the eye could see. It was cold and unwelcoming and you felt a certain kinship to it. It wasn't a hostile place but it gave you nothing for free. For as long as you could remember, you had wanted to go there."

Reader and Ezra end up as partners on a mining job and are forced to live together in close proximity on a small moon base.

rating: explicit

warnings: smut

notes: trying to post all my ao3 stories to tumblr as well so this isn’t a new story and some of you might have already read it. Chapter 1 is here

Chapter 2

While Ezra had been watching you from the very start, it was only now that you had started to actually watch him back. And the more you watched, the more details you discovered about your roommate and work partner. For example, he walked around barefoot in the base a disconcerting amount of time, he was ambidextrous, liked to take long showers, that sometimes left you without any hot water but with a strong urge to strangle him, and he snored when he slept on his stomach. That last bit you knew partly because Ezra liked to take a nap after lunch and partly because the small base offered very little in the way of privacy. You shared every living space and the only way to get away from each other was to hide in the bathroom. In the beginning, Ezra must have thought you suffered from terrible gastrointestinal problems considering how much time you'd spent in there.

Ezra had definitely noticed you watching, you had been able to tell by the way his mouth always curved into a smug smile when he caught your eyes lingering, but he hadn't said anything about it and so neither had you. Instead, the two of you danced around each other while Ezra kept up his usual out loud stream of consciousness.

“Do you enjoy art? I went to a museum once. Sculptures, paintings, VRs, soundscapes, and what have you. They had everything! Of course, I'd never been before so I had no idea. Anyway, I had just landed after a job and was looking for a way to spend my well-earned freedom. So I went. And let me tell you, Birdie, I came out of that establishment a changed man. Now, you know I'm a man of emotion, I ain't ashamed to admit that, but I wept like a small child in there. Did you ever get so moved by something that it consumes your whole being? It's part of the reason why I travel. I have the privilege of seeing the most wondrous of places. The majority of them try their very damned hardest to kill me but you have got to admit that there's a certain poetic beauty in that too. Something so beautiful doing their very best to keep people from seeing it...”

You had been tinkering with the temperature-settings on the water-boiler and had only half paid attention to what Ezra was saying. Something about arts and planets and wanting to kill him. You looked up when he went quiet. That was usually your cue to say something or hum or nod before he would continue but this time Ezra was watching you intently with the faintest of smiles on his lips. The scrutiny made you a little nervous and you wished you had listened more closely.

“...yes?” you guessed, hoping that it would be an appropriate response to what he'd just said. Ezra's smile widened and clearly seizing the opportunity of having your attention, he went on.

“Where's your favorite place in the world, Birdie?”

“Here,” you stated simply and returned your focus to the water boiler. Out of the corner of your eyes, you saw Ezra turn and look out through the window of your small base. He wouldn't get it. No one else had.

“It is quite a marvelous place to behold, isn't it? The planes and the ridges over on that horizon. Never the same, no matter where you turn your eye to. And I know you prefer the sunsets and they are grand indeed but for me, it's the sunrises that does it. Those first rays of sunlight make the whole planet look like it's covered in silver. Takes my breath away every morning.”

You had stopped again to just look at Ezra as he described the planet he was watching outside the window. There was a fondness to his face when he spoke and it tugged on your heartstrings like it was part of you that he was complimenting. As the light from outside hit his face you found yourself thinking that Ezra was quite a wondrous sight to behold too. Rough and rugged, sure, but there was a certain beauty to him. In profile, the curve of his nose and the uneven spikes of his hair reminded you of those very same ridges he'd mentioned just a moment ago. Sharp and jagged. And yet other parts of him seemed way too soft, in comparison. His eyes which, once he'd gotten over the initial apprehension of you, held a sort of kindness that you had not often seen. The scars on his back and torso, that almost glowed like white lines when he undressed in the evening, and told a story of a vulnerability that his usual larger-than-life persona did its best to cover up.

Ezra caught you looking at him and you quickly looked away.

If you happened to wake up an hour earlier the next morning, it was pure coincidence. And when Ezra handed you a cup of coffee and opened his mouth to, no doubt, claim otherwise you glared at him so hard that he raised his hands in surrender before closing his mouth again and pouring himself some coffee.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 Mining Ander was hard work. Much harder than what most people assumed. They only saw the finished product and figured that the delicate ore must be mined in an equally delicate manner. What they always failed to take into consideration was the several feet of stone and rock that you had to drill through to even get close to the Ander.

The big mechanic drill helped but it was still a grueling work, and you loved it. You loved feeling the strain in your muscles and the way they ached after a long day of work. The smell of sweat in an air-tight suit was something you definitely could have done without, although it did make the fresh air back at the base seem all the sweeter.

Ezra was a hard worker too, which was something you appreciated about him. He never shied away from the strenuous work, despite his occasional verbal complaints about the working conditions, and a couple of hours into the workday his grunts over the comms became a familiar background noise.

You took turns manning the drill while the other person carried the discarded bits of rock away from the hole in the ground and over to the pile which had been growing steadily larger over the duration of your shift.

Most days you paused for lunch but there were days when neither of you wanted to pause what you were doing and you ended up working way too late. Those were the very few days when Ezra stayed mostly silent before it was time for bed. In the beginning, you had cherished those moments like nobody's business but as time went on you found yourself almost missing his steady stream of words and comments.

This particular day was shaping up to be one of those days. Lunch was supposed to have happened some time ago but just as you had been about to call for a break, Ezra had cheered and declared that he'd discovered something purple and gleaming. So instead of stopping, you doubled your efforts the get the ore out.

The eagerness to get to the Ander as quickly as possible might have been what did it. Ezra pushed the drill a little too hard into the ground and suddenly there was a loud snap and you started.

It felt like someone had cracked a whip against your lower leg and you yelped. The pain was followed almost immediately by a whooshing sound and you met Ezra's widening eyes before both of you looked down at the tear in your suit, where oxygen was rapidly leaking out.

“Fuck!” you cursed loudly and quickly crouched to press your hands against the hole on the fabric. Ezra hurriedly jumped down from the driver's seat of the drill and ran over to you.

“We need to get you inside,” he stated, unnecessarily, and you had half a mind to make a rude remark about him stating the obvious. But you held your tongue. Maybe the quick decrease in oxygen was making you soft.

Keeping both of your hands wrapped around your calf, to keep the pressure on the wound and the integrity of your suit, made it impossible to walk. Ezra realized this too and wasted no time picking you up and carrying you. You felt grateful for the decreased gravity since it allowed him to sprint back to the airlock in no time, despite carrying a fully grown person in his arms. Your helmets bumped together in an uneven rhythm as he ran. You listened to his sharp breaths as he ran. They were faster than usual and you didn't think it was from the effort of carrying you. He was worried, you realized and you felt a bit touched that he cared this much. It was a bit excessive, of course. This wasn't the first injury you'd suffered during your shifts on the moon. There was plenty enough oxygen in the suit to get you back to the base and plenty enough blood in your body so that even if he'd sliced your whole leg of you were pretty sure you would have been fine. And since you very much felt your leg still being attached, there wasn't really any cause for alarm. You told Ezra as much but he didn't slow down and you could tell that he didn't quite trust your abilities to medically assess yourself.

“Let me remind you that it took you almost a full day to confess that you'd cut yourself on the kitchen knife when we first got here,” Ezra reminded you, and fine, that was a somewhat fair point but you hadn't known him back then and in your defense, you probably would have been fine even if he hadn't discovered the cut and forced you to let him redress it. You said nothing more. If he wanted to run himself tired for no reason then he was, by all means, welcome to do so.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 Once inside, he set you down and instructed you to strip. For once in your life, you did what you were told without arguing and as Ezra rummaged around in one of the cupboards for a medkit, you shrugged out of your spacesuit. Your lower leg and foot felt wet and as you pulled it out of the leg of the suit you winced with pain. There was more blood than you had anticipated and you suddenly felt a little light-headed. You weren't afraid of blood but you weren't exposed to bloody injuries all that often either and you preferred your own body parts without them.

You wiggled out of your pants as well and flopped down on a chair. Ezra had struck gold with his search and returned to your side a second later. You gripped his shoulder as he knelt in front of you. A warning for him not to set his knee down in the small puddle of blood that had formed on the floor in front of you. Ezra not only missed the warning but also interpreted your gesture in a completely different manner.

“Don't you worry, Little Bird,” he assured you, as if you were the one who needed comforting, “We'll have you patched up and in tip-top condition again in no time.” He began wiping the skin around the wound clean. You winced a little in anticipation of the pain that never really came. Ezra's hands were surprisingly gentle as he cleaned away the blood. Ezra always surprised you with that. For some reason you always expected him to be rough, but he never was. Whether he was preparing food, reading one your books that he'd stolen or helping you into your suit every morning, he always did everything with a gentleness like he was handling something precious.

His brow was furrowed as he worked, though more from concentration than from worry, you noted and was pleased that he seemed to have reached the same conclusion that you had on the way to the base; that there was no immediate danger to your life. Once he'd cleaned the blood away it turned out that the cut wasn't very deep at all. It was about three inches long but shallow enough that Ezra could simply tape it shut before sealing it with a big anti-bacterial bandaid. He wiped your blood from his hands as best he could and let out a slow breath.

“You gave me quite a fright there, Little Bird,” he confessed and looked up from where he was still sitting at your feet. One of his arms was resting against your bare leg.

“I told you I would be fine,” you reminded him.

“Well, you down-play things and therefore are not to be trusted on matters like this.”

“I do not!” you protested. Ezra cleared his throat and held up his index finger to begin counting.

“It's just a short walk from here, Ezra. Took us three hours. I just nicked my finger. I cleaned that wound too and I'm fairly certain I saw bone. The coffee is a little bit hot. I couldn't taste anything for two days afterwards. I'm not that cold. Your lips matched the Ander... do you wish for me to continue? Because I've got more examples if you need 'em, Birdie”

You were watching Ezra with indignation and coughed out a laugh. You could hardly be held responsible for him taking every comment you made quite so literally.

“Says the man who exaggerates just about everything,” you countered

Ezra raised his eyebrows in confusion, as if this was the most preposterous accusation he'd ever heard. You were pretty sure he was faking it but you still took the bite.

“You beg me to shoot you every afternoon when I wake you up from your nap. You almost cry every time we strike Ander and how many times have you had the finest meal of your life since you got here?”

Ezra shook his head but you could see the small smile he was trying to hide.

“I am an appreciative man, Birdie. What can I say...” he said with a shrug and yes, he was definitely trying to rile you up.

“Well, appreciate this,” you said and jokingly flipped him off.

“I would appreciate every last part of you if you weren't so damn stubborn.”

You opened your mouth to toss another semi-insult back at him before the words fully registered, making you blink and stutter out a “W-what?” instead.

“I believe you heard me perfectly well,” Ezra answered, holding his ground. You felt your cheeks flush from the boldness of his comment. Even if he didn't realize how unprofessional that joke was, you certainly did and you were at a loss for words. Your usually so sharp tongue had, for once and with the worst timing, failed you. Every witty retort you began to come up with were instantly interrupted by mental images of Ezra making good on the comment he'd made. So what if you had entertained the thought previously? You and he were two people stuck in a small space which allowed little or no room for any sort of release in that department. The mind was bound to go a little crazy after a while. It had happened with previous work partners too. And it was understood by everyone that it wasn't anything to act or even comment upon. Understood by everyone except Ezra that was.

“You have been watching me. There are many things about you which are subtle, but that has not been one of them,” he said. There was something curious in his eyes as he watched you. He was searching your face for any indication whether he was reading the situation right or not. You weren't sure at all what expression you face did show but you were quite certain it wasn't disgust or revulsion, partly because those weren't the emotions you were actually feeling right now but more importantly because you were 100% certain that Ezra would have backed off if he'd detected any aversion on your part. And Ezra remained firmly where he was, on his knees in front of you, looking up at your face with a look on his face that you vaguely recognized.

You had gotten quite good at reading Ezra during your time on the base. This look was something you'd only seen in fleeting glances when he thought you weren't looking and when you both undressed for bed in the evenings. It was a look you hadn't quite been able to read. But now he was looking you dead in the eye and it was clear as day; Ezra wanted you. The realization made heat pool low in your stomach and if truth were to be told, you wanted Ezra too. Had for a while, now that you allowed yourself to admit it.

“I have,” you admitted and Ezra let out a breath you hadn't noticed he was holding.

“And did all that watching reward you with any new insights, Little Bird?” he asked, sitting up a little straighter and placing his other hand on your thigh. Your skin felt like it was buzzing where his hand was resting. His thumb began rubbing small circles against the skin of the inside of your thigh, just above the knee. It felt wonderful but was nowhere near enough and if Ezra was gonna give another monologue right now, you were pretty sure you wouldn't be able to handle it.

“For Kevva's sake, Ezra, can we save this conversation for later and just... do something!” You weren't necessarily proud of the shrill note of desperation to your voice but a dangerous smile spread across Ezra's face and his grip on you tightened. In a torturously slow movement, he pushed your legs further apart and you had to grip the edge of your seat hard to keep yourself from yanking him forward. He moved closer, hands running up the outside of your thighs, and he leaned down to place a kiss halfway up your thigh. Then another one, slightly higher. Then, because he was Ezra and of course he just couldn't help himself, he stopped and looked up at you.

“I must confess that thoughts of this have crossed my mind more than once,” he said, voice rough like sandpaper and utterly delicious. But there were so many better things for that mouth to be doing right now, other than talking.

“Ezra, please,” you groaned, more out of frustration than arousal, but from the smile Ezra gave you he definitely interpreted it as the latter. You didn't care because it had the intended effect regardless and a moment later Ezra's mouth was back on your skin, kissing its way higher and higher up on your thigh.

When his lips finally brushed, feather-light, over the fabric of your underwear it almost had you shooting off your chair. Luckily Ezra had anticipated this and his hands were now firmly placed on your hips, holding you in place. Your first instinct had been to close your legs, the jolt of sensation almost being too much, but Ezra's broad shoulders made that impossible and as he pressed his lips against the fabric a second time at was all you could do to hold back the needy whimpers that threatened to spill out with every breath. Ezra glanced up at you and you could feel the bastard smiling against you.

He pulled back and you were ready to make loud complaints about this lousy decision before you realized that he'd only pulled back in order to get you out of your underwear. You let him slide the piece of clothing down your legs then yelped a little in surprise as he promptly lifted both your legs and hooked them over his shoulders. Any comments on the manhandling died in your throat a moment later when his mouth found its way back to the prize and he licked a broad stripe across your folds. It had been quite some time since anyone had touched you in this way. Maybe that was it, or maybe it was just that Ezra really knew what he was doing, but as his mouth continued to explore, alternating between licking and kissing and sucking, your entire body felt like it was shaking. Your knuckles were white from how hard you were gripping the chair and your breaths escaped you in ragged huffs of air, mingled with the occasional whimpers that you had given up on holding back. The vocal feedback only seemed to encourage Ezra and he doubled his efforts.

It was too much and not enough at the same time. You felt like you would slap him if he stopped but, at the same time, you weren't sure you could handle this much longer. All your higher brain functioning had gone out the window and flown off into space. Your whole world had narrowed down to the sensations of your body and, even more specifically, the place between your legs where Ezra's clever tongue had all your nerve-endings going off like fireworks. And Ezra showed no signs of stopping until he'd made you come apart completely. Something which was rapidly approaching.

You tried warning him, managed to grip his forearm and push a little while stuttering out his name, but he only held you tighter and flicked his tongue over your clit in a way that turned the last vowel of his name into a cry of pleasure as you came. Ezra continued his ministrations and his tongue carried you through the pulsating waves of your orgasm.

When he finally pulled back and met your gaze, you were speechless. Ezra, true to form, was the first to comment.

“You truly are a vision like this, Birdie,” he said with awe in his voice and you gave him a weak laugh. Vision, you suspected, was hardly the most fitting description for you right now. Mess, more likely. You could feel how flushed your cheeks were and your lips must be bitten raw by this point. But Ezra was watching you with a mix of lust and wonder and as his gaze wandered lower he looked like he was ready for another round. You suspected that you might actually die this time if he did.

So, on legs that felt like jelly, you slid off the chair and onto his lap. The taped wound on your calf smarted but Ezra caught you before your knees slammed against the floor. His breath hitched in his throat as your weight pressed against the hardness in his pants and his hips bucked slightly, seemingly out of their own accord.

You wrapped your arms around Ezra's neck and pulled him in for a kiss. You could taste yourself on his tongue and lips and you greedily licked into his mouth, wanting to taste more, taste him. Rolling your hips against him earned you another stuttered breath and a moan from Ezra. He mumbled something against your lips and you had every intention of ignoring it in favor of continued kissing but Ezra pulled back and broke the kiss. You made a noise of complaint, which made him laugh.

“Sincerest apologies, Little Bird, but if I am to make good on my promise to appreciate every part of you we are going to have to pace ourselves, just a fraction...”

You were about to protest. To hell with pacing yourselves when you had Ezra's mouth only inches from yours! Perhaps sensing your usual stubbornness and unwillingness to cooperate returning, Ezra played dirty and reached down to press the tip of his finger gently against your opening.

“Fuck...” you shuddered, unsure if the next word was gonna be you, me or just fuck in general.

“That is what I am arguing for here, beautiful. But you and I are both still way too dressed for what I'm hoping comes next and, for the sake of your knees and my back, perhaps we could relocate ourselves to the relative comfort of my bed?”

As much as it pained you to admit, Ezra did have a point and, in a move that required more energy and coordination that it usually did, you climbed off him and stood up. Ezra got to his feet as well. He took your hand and kissed each of your fingers softly in a way that somehow felt more intimate than the place he'd been kissing a minute or two ago.

“Allow me to take you to bed?” he asked, even though you were under the impression that this had already been established as the next destination. You nodded impatiently and pushed him slowly backwards towards the bedroom.

“Take me to the bed or the kitchen table or back to the floor, Ezra. I don't care, I just... I just need you.”

Ezra's eyes darkened with lust and a moment later he was the one dragging you towards the beds. The two of you stopped just before you crashed onto Ezra's bunk, realizing that undressing might be a slightly easier endeavor before you were both tangled up on the small bed.

Ezra was quicker getting to your clothes than you were at getting to his and he pulled your shirt and then your sports bra over your head and tossed it to the side. You were fully naked now, while he was still fully dressed, if a little disheveled-looking. The contrast made you feel all the more undressed. Ezra watched you, with that same appreciation as before.

“I have imagined this. What you would look like... so gorgeous. Even in that spacesuit, you managed to drive me up the walls crazy. Can barely keep my hands off you,” he mumbled.

“So how about you don't,” you suggested. You were more than ready for this, it was just Ezra that needed to get with the program. He didn't need to compliment and woo you. He just needed to touch you.

You reached for his shirt, made quick work of getting rid of it before you made equally quick work of his pants and underwear. Now you were both naked and you took a moment to appreciate the newly revealed areas of skin. Ezra twitched as if it had been your hands and not your eyes which were caressing his body. You took a step closer.

“I want you to fuck me, Ezra,” you stated, perhaps a tad too matter-of-factly but Ezra made a noise that could only be described as a growl and crashed your mouths together again. Without the layers of clothes between you, your hands were free to roam and you tried touching every bit of skin that you could reach, slowly circling lower and lower, towards where you knew he wanted your touch the most. Ezra was giving as good as he was getting and when it was his impatience's turn to take hold, he grabbed your ass and pulled you fully against himself with a moan. You pushed him back and finally onto the bed. He laid down and watched, with almost pitch-black eyes, as you crawled on top of him and straddled his thighs.

He began talking again, nothing coherent this time, and you leaned forward to press a kiss to his lips, effectively silencing him. Ezra seized the opportunity to grab your hips and pull you a little higher. You both moaned into each other's mouths as your folds dragged along his length.

“In me,” you whispered and Ezra reached down to position himself against your opening. In the slowest pace you could bring yourself to, you began lowering yourself onto him. Ezra's eyes looked like they were about to roll back in their sockets and he said your name, followed by a whole string of curses, some of which you had never heard before.

You stilled for a moment once he was fully inside you, letting yourself adjust slightly to the sensation, then you rose up to let him slide almost all the way out before lowering yourself again. The pace was much slower than what either of you wanted but if he was feeling anywhere near as needy for more as you did, then it would be worth it.

It seemed that he was because the very next thing out of Ezra's mouth was a begging plea.

“Please, Birdie,” he said and he sounded wrecked. You took pity on him, both for his sake and for your own. You couldn't handle this slow pace for a second longer either. Speeding up, you heard the relief in Ezra's breathing and he placed his hands on your hips again to help guide you into a quicker pace.

The sensation wasn't quite as overwhelming when you were the one in control but you could still feel your pleasure building every time Ezra slid back into you. His moans were becoming more and more ragged and you weren't sure how much longer he was gonna last. Just as you were about to ask, he wrapped his arms around your torso and pulled you down for a kiss. The move gave him a little more leverage to move his hips and you gasped as he snapped his hips up, making him hit a whole new spot inside you. He did it again. And again. And you had to take back the thought you'd just had about the sensation not being overwhelming. You met his thrusts as best you could, your rhythm becoming more and more sloppy the closer the two of you got to climax.

In the end, you cracked first. Pushed over the edge by the surprise of Ezra latching onto the skin of your neck and sucking, hard enough to leave a mark. As your second orgasm rushed through you, you felt Ezra follow and he moaned loudly as he came, still inside you. He continued thrusting a few more times before he slowed down to a stop.

The stillness that followed, as you had untangled slightly before pulling each other close again, was interrupted only by your panting breaths...and of course...

“If I were to die now, I'd die a happy and content man,” Ezra mumbled, his hand drawing patterns against your back.

“Dying now would be a breach of contract,” you informed him, with a small smile, “We still have a fifth of our rotation left before we're heading back for Icarus.”

“Only a fifth?” Ezra asked and you watched his brow furrow as he did the math.

“'fraid so.”

Ezra turned and gave you a devilish grin

“Then I propose we attempt to make the very most of that fifth, or what do say, Birdie?”

As his hand trailed lower, you couldn't help but nod.

~~~~~~~~~~~

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[smallerinfinities]

mad woman (nessian)

a/n: In which Nesta copes and Feyre interjects

hello! again, new here ☺️ this kind of just...happened? the idea came upon me late talking with @harryandmolly​ idk anyways hope you enjoy! if you don’t like modern AUs then this probably isn’t for you, but if you’re into that sort of thing and all the warnings that go with it then I would love to hear what you think!

tw: angst, coping with death, sex work, language

original art by the incomparable charlie bowater

Things were great until they weren’t. 

Nesta Archeron had been engaged. She had a father who loved her and a sister she adored. Until the plane crash. Until a faulty navigational system sent her fiancé, her father, and her sister into the side of a mountain on the way to her destination wedding.

She had gone to Hybern early, to get settled and calm her nerves, to plan around the security that Feyre had hired so that Rhys could attend the wedding. Nesta had told her not to bother, Rhys could stay in Velaris for all she cared. She’d gone and set it all up anyway. But it had all exploded when Nesta got the call that her world had ended and all she had left was a sister she resented and a brother-in-law with too high a profile. She was a tragic headline. A fucking media circus. 

High Lord Rhysand’s sister-in-law left at the altar in tragic plane crash. 

The press camped outside her Velaris studio for weeks. They’d only left when she had thrown a maelstrom of empty glass bottles out of her windows at them. Empty because she’d come back to Velaris and crawled inside a whiskey bottle and stayed there. She might be more whiskey than person now. The days were passing at a rate she couldn’t gauge anymore. Had it been hours or days or months since she’d picked up the phone in the middle of placing name cards on tables in the reception hall? She didn’t particularly care. Everyone who mattered was dead and being drunk was better than counting the minutes since her future had evaporated. 

A knock sounded at the door. 

Nesta removed the eye mask she was wearing and squinted at her phone. 7:15 AM. She’d been up all night again, had just laid down to try and sleep. Who the fuck was at her door at this hour?

She knew but she opened the door anyway. 

Feyre Archeron, High Lady of the Night Court, was in the hallway looking worried. Well, Nesta assumed she was looking worried. She could only see Feyre’s furrowed eyebrows between the oversized sunglasses and the wide-brimmed sun hat. She had wrapped her red-gold hair, twin to Nesta’s own color, into a low chignon to hide it away from prying eyes. A disguise. Nesta snorted. Feyre Archeron could be noticed in this city by a blind man a hundred yards down a busy avenue. It was the way she carried herself, the easy confidence. No one could mistake her for anyone but their High Lady. 

“What do you want?” Nesta crossed her arms over her chest, blocking the view into her apartment.

“Well, to start, a little respect for the person who has been footing your liquor bill for the last eight months.” Her red lips were turned down at the corners, tight. She angled her head past Nesta’s shoulder and crinkled her nose, “God, I don’t even need to see in there to know what it must look like. I can smell it from here. And I can see you.” 

Nesta kept her face a mask of annoyance but considered how she must look. Compared to Feyre’s heavy cream sweater and perfectly tailored tan pants, anyone would look slovenly but Nesta knew she'd let herself go.

A while ago, she’d taken to wearing Tomas’ shirts to bed. Then eventually she wasn’t getting out of bed so it was all the time, changing only when she found the strength to shower. Today’s shirt—more like this week’s shirt if she was being honest with herself—was an old striped dress shirt, one Tomas had maybe worn twice with a suit. It now had several stains from whiskey and whatever takeout she had ordered last night. She couldn’t quite remember. Chinese? Greek? 

It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. Her marriage was supposed to be one of convenience. They had been friends, had both gotten older and then tossed in the towel on dating. Tomas needed a cover for a lifestyle his parents forbade and Nesta...well Nesta wanted to be comfortable. Nesta wanted her sister to stop meddling and leave her alone. At least, she thought she did. 

But, no one had known. No one except Elain.

It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter. 

Her hair hadn’t been washed in days, it was matted in some places, stuck to her face in others. She knew her eyes were hollow, sunken in and lacking that fire people saw when they looked at her. She’d been avoiding her own reflection for weeks, had even covered the mirror by the door. Months ago, apparently. Eight months. 

Had it really been that long? Had she really been moving from bottle to bottle, takeout container to takeout container, for eight whole months? She’d barely left the apartment, had lost her job, happy to exploit Feyre’s seemingly unending pity. Pity she guessed had run out. 

Today. 

She didn’t care about that either.

“Come all this way to chide me, dear sister?” Nesta curled her lips as she moved aside to let Feyre through. Might as well let her see. 

“Thank you.” Her sister breezed into the little sitting area and stopped dead.

Her eyes scanned the room, marking the recycling bin first, overflowing with empty glass bottles. All different labels. Whatever Nesta could find quickest. Then the kitchen counters, filled with boxes of crackers and empty ramen noodle packages, cans of tuna and an open jar of peanut butter, anything that could be quickly consumed with minimal effort. She didn’t want to die, but she hadn’t exactly been concerned with living either. 

At last her eyes darted to the corner, over by the window, where a white dress hung from a hunting knife that had been punched through the wall. Straight through the center of the sweetheart neckline. Nesta had lost count of the weeks it had been there. A reminder. A memorial. Little circular burns littered the fishtail skirt, remnants of late nights with too much booze and an ashtray full of half-smoked blunts still on the windowsill. 

“Oh, Nesta.” Feyre’s hand came up to cup her mouth. Nesta raised her chin, refusing to feel reprimanded. “I’m sending Alis this afternoon.” 

“I can look after myself,” Nesta hissed through her teeth. 

“Clearly,” Feyre threw her arms wide and turned in a circle, “you cannot. You know I came here hoping you were getting better. I gave you space, knew you blamed me for what happened. At least partially. But it’s time, Nesta. I lost them too. But I don’t have the luxury of drinking and smoking my way into oblivion on my sister’s dime.” 

“Is this just about the money?” Nesta asked incredulously, “I’ll fucking pay you back if that’s what you’re worried about.” 

“No, no,” Feyre brushed a lock of hair out of her face, frustrated, “it’s not the money. I don’t care about the money. Neither does Rhys. We just want you to come back to the land of the living.” 

“Ah, yes. The royal We.” Nesta sat abruptly on her sunken couch and leaned forward, not caring that she was just wearing a pair of underwear beneath the oversized shirt, “how is dearest Rhys? High Lording as well as ever I presume. Now with better reasons than ever to hate me.” 

“He doesn’t hate you,” she said too quickly, wringing her fingers for a moment before she whispered, “we...we missed you at the funerals.” 

Nesta’s blood ran cold. Her eyes swam with tears that wouldn’t fall.

“I know why you didn’t show,” Feyre couldn’t look at her, “I almost understand it...but we still missed you. Father was interred with full honors of the Night Court. I’m having a garden planted for Elain up at the estate. You should come see it when you’re ready.” 

Nesta really needed a drink. Feyre needed to leave. She couldn’t do this. Not now. Not today. Not ever. 

“Get out.” 

“Nesta—”

“Get out.” Nesta’s voice was low, lethal. 

“Fine,” the High Lady voice was back in full force, “I only really came to give you this.” She pulled out what looked like a business card from her freshly pressed pant pocket, “this might seem...forward. But, I think it might help you. Rhys and I use the service sometimes when we’re looking for something different. I know you won’t go see someone. This might be a different kind of therapy. Tell her I sent you, she’ll know what to do.”

“Fine, fine,” Nesta took the card from her, hoping it would get her to leave faster, “get out.” 

“Nesta,” Feyre stopped and took a breath, her hand wrapped around the doorknob, “please do be discrete.” 

Nesta furrowed her brow, but nodded. She had been, for the most part. Except on nights she was too blitzed to remember her own name, let alone that her sister was High Lady of this region. 

“I’m still sending Alis,” Feyre wrinkled her nose again as she opened the door and strolled out. And that was that. No goodbye. They hadn’t ever been good at those. 

Nesta blinked at the door, the apartment suddenly feeling small and cramped. She turned over the card in her hand. It had only a name and a number. AMREN. 202-555-0187. She flicked it onto the table. Whatever, she thought as she sauntered over to the kitchen and took a swig from the nearest whiskey bottle. 

↞↠

“Ms. Archeron.”

“Yes?” The tone of the man’s voice made her drop the place card she had been holding. 

“There’s been an accident. A plane crash,” he hesitated. Her eyes stopped seeing. Her body shivered with a bone-rattling chill despite the summer sun streaming into the room through the open windows. They couldn’t be—

“Say it.” Her voice was a breath on the wind. 

“There were no survivors.”

She didn’t hear the rest. Someone was screaming. A crash, glass breaking, warmth sliding down her leg. A sharp, metallic smell in the air. She couldn’t hear them calling her name, couldn’t feel their fingers gripping her skin, feel the pressure of the towel collecting the blood from the gash in her leg. 

A plane crash, he’d said. No survivors. 

Tomas was dead. 

Her father was dead.

Elain…she had just planted flowers for spring. 

A fresh scream ripped from her throat.

↞↠

She woke up with it echoing in her ears, heart pounding. Wrenching the fresh sheets off her clammy skin, she felt for the scar on her thigh, catapulting her back into the present. Nesta hadn’t let them stitch it for days, had wanted to remember. It had almost festered. Feyre had held her down while they numbed and sutured. Most of those days were lost now, either to shock or sleep, she didn’t know. It hadn’t taken long for the drinking to start. 

Her head was pounding. Alis had stormed the apartment hours earlier, tut-tutting about the stale stench, throwing open every window. Nesta actually appreciated the fresh air. She didn’t appreciate the old woman’s silent appraisal of her ruined wedding dress. 

“Don’t touch it,” Nesta had snapped. Alis had tut-tutted some more, cleaning as she went, but she left the dress alone. 

Now, with a clean apartment and nothing to keep her company but her own self-pity, she laid spread-eagle in her bed that felt too big in clothes that felt too clean. Nothing matched her insides anymore. The small, decrepit thing inside of her that shrivelled that day and rejected everything still living. Even herself. She had never been a particularly warm person, but Elain, sweet and beautiful Elain, had made her care about something outside of herself.

She got up to find something to dull her head. A bottle of ibuprofen sat on the coffee table, next to a decanter of scotch. She washed the pills down with the brown liquor and sat on the edge of the sofa, her head in her hands.

The silence pressed her on her eardrums. An oppressive lack of sound, only the barest of sounds audible on the street. Too quiet. For the first time in months it was too quiet. Her head shot up and focused, eyes darting to the card neatly placed in the corner of the table. 

Amren. 

What had Feyre meant, “a different kind of therapy”? Hell would have to freeze over before Nesta crawled onto a couch to talk about her feelings, Feyre had admitted as much. So what was this? 

She picked up the card and flipped it over. Simple, white, just the number in embossed black. The curiosity was going to kill her if she didn’t just call the number. She reached for her phone, hauled out from between the couch cushions by Alis earlier. It had been dead for weeks. She’d given up on ignoring the condolences calls and just let the battery drain. Probably why Feyre had shown up yesterday unannounced. She swiped past all of the missed call and voicemail notifications and pulled up the keypad. 

It only rang once. 

“Yes?” A clipped, cold voice answered the phone. 

“Uhh, is this Amren?” 

“Speaking,” her voice didn’t soften, “can I help you?” 

“My sister gave me your card,” Nesta didn’t like this woman. She wracked her brain to think of how this person could help her, especially when she didn’t particularly want anyone’s help. 

“And who, my dear,” Nesta could hear the snide smile in Amren’s voice, “is your sister?”

“Feyre,” Nesta huffed, “Feyre Archeron.” 

“Oh, Feyre darling! Why didn’t you say so?” Amren warmed immediately. Well, at least to a level above stone cold. “Yes, Feyre told me about you.”

“You must have read—”

“I don't read the news, dear girl,” Amren said, flippant. “I have someone perfect for you. I will send him. Already have your address.” 

God, she really needed to have a conversation with Feyre about boundaries. Who is she sending?

“Who are you sending?” Nesta had not been sober long enough for this. Her brain wasn’t firing quick enough to deal with whoever this person was sending to her apartment. 

“His name is Cassian. He’ll be at your apartment in two hours.” 

Two hours?!

“I can’t have anyone in my apartment in two hours! What is this??” 

“We call it therapy,” just like Feyre had, “you don’t need to do anything to prepare.” 

“But I don’t even—” The line went dead. 

Nesta stared at her phone. How could I prepare if I don’t know what to prepare for?

↞↠

Two hours later, Nesta was pacing. Nervous. She was rarely nervous but she was also rarely unprepared. This felt like a bad omen, like suspense in a horror film. Like this Cassian might jump out of the shadows at any moment from some secret portal. 

She had washed her hair but no makeup. She had put on leggings but no real pants. There were concessions she was willing to make and others she wasn’t. It didn’t matter that they were only concessions to her own pride. Feyre got one opportunity to meddle in Nesta’s life, one opportunity to try and control how she coped with losing everything. Nesta would endure it in her own home, in her bare feet, or she wouldn’t endure it at all. 

An assertive knock at the door made her jump. 

Her heart thundered. She hadn’t talked to a man in months, let alone been in a small space with one. Now there was one at her door. She padded across her expensive rug, smoothing her hair as she went. Her hand gripped the doorknob, giving herself a second to stop shaking. Breathe in, breathe out. She jerked the door open only to be left utterly speechless. 

The most beautiful man she’d ever seen was leaning on the door frame, forearms crossed over his massive chest. 

“Nesta?” one corner of his full mouth curved upward. He inclined his head behind her left shoulder after she nodded. “Gonna let me in?” 

“Why should I?” She challenged, angling her chin up at him. 

“Because,” his shoulder length black hair slid into his face as his towering frame looked down at her. He came closer and held her chin between his rough fingers, “you’re at least a little curious about what I’m doing here.” 

Nesta ripped her face from his hands and took a step away from him. His hazel eyes stripped her bare. How does he do that? He appraised her frankly, taking in her sloppily thrown together appearance. The baby hairs that clung to the side of her face, unable to stay in her top knot. Her soft curves that the oversized t-shirt she wore only hinted at. All the way down to her toes, the cracked polish left over from her wedding manicure, just a couple of splotches of color left. 

His gaze sent a warmth through her. She tried to will it away, send it back to the hell she belonged in. Shaking her head, she stuck him with a glare. 

“Fine,” she stepped aside, “come in and tell me what you’re doing here so I can tell you to get out.” 

He walked in smoothly, his gray slacks gripping his toned thighs with each stride. Too casual, Nesta thought, for a therapist, especially with his white shirt open at the collar and rolled to his elbows. Not that she actually believed whatever this was even approached therapy.

He stopped in the center of Nesta’s living room and turned, giving the place as detailed a once-over as he had given her. His eyes only paused briefly on the wedding dress still hanging in the corner, but he faced her again as if nothing were out of the ordinary. 

“So,” he took up so much space as he spoke, too big, too much life for this apartment that had only contained her hollow soul for so long, “everyone up to this point has referred to this appointment as therapy, correct?” 

“Yes,” Nesta replied, curt. “But you’re no therapist, are you, Cassian?”

He snorted, a challenge to her fire temper. She didn’t like to be mocked and somehow he knew that. “No, I’m no therapist.” 

“I’m what is referred to in the circles you run in as an escort, a friend, of sorts.” He looked her dead in the eye. No shame, no fear. Just a professional. “We call it therapy, first and foremost for discretion, but also because I’m here to make you feel better. Feel alive again. In whatever form that might take.”

Nesta stiffened. Her mouth dropped open. No. “My sister sent me a hooker? You’re telling me that, my sister, the High Lady of the Night Court, sent me a hooker?!” 

She could barely keep up with the 100 mile an hour thoughts racing through her head. It wasn’t long before the pacing started again. Feyre said she uses the service sometimes...with Rhys?! She maybe could have guessed that her sister and her ass of a husband were freaky but prostitutes?! Couldn’t they just ask someone? 

Nesta, please do be discrete, she’d said as she walked out the door. She guessed paying for silence was easier than risking a secret. Money is always the best form of currency. 

Well, I guess I fucking know why. And she set this up for me?! What in hell’s fire did she think she was doing?

Cassian just stood there while her brain worked, while it exploded with all of this new information. So still, a statue compared to her frantic pacing. He must deal with this a lot. But wait, don’t people usually know what they’re asking for?! 

“You’ve never–“ she couldn’t finish the question out loud. Sharing was something foreign to Nesta even when she wasn’t talking about sexual partners. 

“No,” he shook his head, “Amren wouldn’t have sent me here if I had. She just told me the context of the visit.”

“So, you’re here,” Nesta stopped in front of him, “to have sex with me?” The words came out a whisper. They sounded so foreign, so ridiculous. 

“I’m here to help you.” He took a step toward her. The walls came down fast.

“And why do you think you can help me?” The words cut through the space like a knife. Accusatory, incredulous, they almost stung passing over her vocal cords. 

“Because, dear Nesta,” he took another step toward her, and another, “I’m very good at helping people.” 

The warmth in her blood returned and warred with the acid coursing through her veins, the hate. It came raging back from this morning, from the past months, from ten minutes ago when this cocky prick knocked on her door. He was staring again, close enough to have to look down at her, just an inch or two from touching. 

“I don’t need help from a high-dollar whore,” she spat. The only sign that she’d hit her mark was a faint twitch in his eyebrow. 

“I’ve been called worse, sweetheart,” he drawled. “But let’s get one thing straight. I think you need help more than you’d ever admit. I don’t think you’ve taken a breath since then. I read the papers. A beloved dead sister. Absent from the funerals. You blame yourself for not being there, for not dying with them. The guilt warms your bed at night while you lie awake, as much a part of you as the alcohol that twinges your breath. It’s become so familiar you don’t remember what it’s like without it. Who would Nesta Archeron be without that dark stain on her conscience following her like a storm cloud? Will all those liquor bottles I saw outside answer that question for you? Will that tattered wedding dress?”

“How dare–“ she felt the door press against her back, unconsciously moving with him while he lashed at her burning soul, fire for fire. 

“Oh, I dare,” he continued, planting his hands on the door behind her, trapping her with his eyes. “Because take it from someone who knows, when you decide to wake up and live with what you have left instead of existing with everything you’ve lost, there may not be anything left to live with. And trust me, guilt makes a very lonely bedfellow.”

Nesta had barely blinked this whole time, refusing to let him have that victory. Even if everything he’d said had hit home. Even if everything he’d said had flayed her open and raked her insides across the coals. She still burned with that unyielding rage. 

“Is that what you say to all the girls that pay for your time?” she asked, cocking her head to the side. She was close enough to smell him, the warm spice of clove and sandalwood with a distinctly male musk. It was intoxicating. It was infuriating. 

“Some. Some of the men, too. I’m an equal opportunity tough lover.” 

She swallowed hard. He was close enough that if she moved an inch his hair might brush her cheek. “Is that what this is? Tough love? For someone you just met?”

“It’s the truth,” his breath tickled her face, the tension crackling like static electricity around them, “isn’t it?”

He sounded tentative for the first time, like maybe he’d overstepped. Is it really so obvious?

“Did Feyre pay you to say those things?” Or were they just written so plainly on her face?

“Nooo,” he said, lower than before, gentler, raising one of his hands like he might stroke her cheek. She cursed herself silently for hoping. He came closer then, his lips a hair’s breadth away from her ear, “Feyre paid me to fuck you senseless.” 

Goddamn him. Fire shot into her veins. Not the simmering fury of her anger but something deeper, hotter, pooling in her core. Her breath caught in a little gasp and he smiled. A wide, full grin with teeth that made him look more predator than man.

Her body was a traitor, but it made no difference. She was already burning in hell.

Cassian held still, letting her make the next move. Part of her wanted to make him stand there forever, punish him for what he said, what he knew about her, daring to say what no one else would with just one look. A different part of her wanted to rip him apart. 

“Come on, Nesta,” a prince of cats toying with his prey, “show me that fi–“

Her lips crashed against his. God, he was big. She reached around him, fingers tensed to claw at his back, and savored the muscles and sinews that made up the terrain. He pressed her into the door. His hands cupped her face, so gentle for a kiss that was anything but. Flames licked her skin everywhere he touched, at every point their bodies connected through clothing.

He leaned and gripped and suddenly she was taller than him, her legs wrapped around his middle, his fingers pressed into the curve of her ass. She gripped the sides of his face and guided him to the side, forcing herself deeper, her tongue brazenly exploring his mouth. He even tasted wild, like fresh mint and adrenaline. Her heart beat in her ears, deafening over the silence of the apartment. He moaned, so deep it vibrated in her chest.

Nesta broke first, pupils blown and breath ragged.

“Finally shut you up?” she asked, sagging back against the door, her head falling against the wood with a low thud. 

He….well, he growled. There was no other word for the sound that rippled through his whole body and found a home between her legs. Her toes curled and she thanked every god that he couldn’t see. 

“Pretty little acid tongue,” he pushed them off the door and walked her toward the bed, almost tripping twice over the plush rug. Nesta didn’t notice. She was too busy tearing at the buttons down Cassian’s chest. Each one revealed inch after inch of smooth golden skin. Licks of black ink stretched from his shoulders, mostly hidden by more shirt. She huffed, trying to shove it off, but instead caught his nipple by accident with her nails. 

His nostrils flared as he hissed and dropped her unceremoniously on the mattress. She bounced, breathless. Dangerously close to a giggle. Traitor. She schooled her features back to bored disdain. The only hint of lust was the glassy haze in her vision, honed in on Cassian’s bare chest. 

He had removed his shirt while she had been distracted by her traitorous body, discarded it somewhere above her. The black inked lines Nesta had seen stretched around his shoulders and down his arms in dark whorls and spirals. The tattoo was almost feminine in its pure decoration, a stark contrast to his cut biceps. It was beautiful. 

He was beautiful. 

“Careful, Nesta,” he chided, “someone might think you like what you see.” 

She gave him a filthy gesture. A deep, rumbling laugh escaped him as he took a step closer, his fingers grazing the outer seams of her leggings. From her ankle to her knee, where he stopped to make circles. He curved around her knee and gripped her legs, tugging her to the edge of the bed. The palms of his hands burned her skin straight through her leggings. He hadn’t tried to remove her clothes. She couldn’t decide if it was a tease or an insult. Probably both. 

“Are you just going to talk?” she cocked an eyebrow at him, “or are you going to do something productive with that mouth?” 

His eyes narrowed, “are you sure that’s what you want?” 

She wanted him. Damn her, she wanted him so bad she could barely stand to look at him. The guilt roiled in her stomach, that she should take pleasure while everyone she’d loved could no longer. He’d offered her help, but it would be her damnation. No, this was just a distraction. No amount of distraction could bring back Tomas, or her father, or Elain. 

Light from the city outside shifted and spread into the corner drawing her eye. The dress. Her wedding dress. In the night shadows, the blunt burns looked like angry, gaping voids. They whispered to her as she stared. Traitor, traitor, traitor. 

I’m here to help you. His words were poison. Bred from a kind of hope only Feyre, with her perfect life, could ever have again after what they had lost. Her want for Cassian’s body burned her from the inside, stoked the fires of the self-inflicted hell she’d cast herself into. Nothing more than a catalyst. She could take his body and burn for doing so, but she would not accept his help. 

“Cassian,” Nesta’s voice didn’t belong to her. She pulled her t-shirt up to just below her breasts, exposing her flat stomach and drawing his eyes to her waistband. “just do what you came to do.” 

The air chilled as he stiffened. Her heart raced, waiting for him, fingers teasing her bare skin. He didn’t move. She lifted a bare foot and ran it along his pant leg, coaxing him to touch her. He nodded, as if making some decision Nesta wasn’t privy to. His face, lit so beautifully by the moonlight, hardened into a mask. A smooth, smiling mask. Prince of cats no more. 

“Cassian?” 

“Dear Nesta, I do believe our time is up,” he leaned down and reached over her, his chest just grazing her belly, the only skin to skin contact they’d had. She swore she felt him shudder, but it was over in an instant. He quickly retrieved his shirt from behind her and pulled it on. 

She gaped at him, “what do you mean our time is up?” 

“I mean,” his eyes shot right through her with cool confidence, “it’s getting late and I do need my beauty sleep. I must be going.” 

“But–“ she didn’t understand. Isn’t this what he wanted? Isn’t this how he gets paid? How can he leave? 

He buttoned up his shirt, swift and efficient. Little feeling or warmth. Nesta wasn’t sure what to do. Confusion quickly gave way to anger, boiling in her veins, flushing her skin.

“So, you’re not just a whore,” she hissed, “you’re a bastard whore that can’t even finish the job.” 

“So lovely meeting you, dear Nesta,” he turned with a sweet smile and opened the door, sending any tension between them out into the hallway. He breezed through the door, clicking it shut behind him so gently he might have been a phantom. 

Nesta slammed her head against the mattress and let out a frustrated scream so loud she had no doubt the bastard whore heard it.

taglist: @sleeping-and-books @greerlunna @sjmships @cupcakey00 @queenestarcheron

Cassian’s POV is next ❤️

[flightsoffandom]

Co-Conspirators

Pairs: Aaron Hotchner x Reader

Words: 5421

Summary: Getting your career at the BAU started gets interesting when you realize you're attracted to your boss.

Warnings: None

Notes: Left completely gender-neutral. I had been interested in watching Criminal Minds for a long time, but a friend of mine finally got me to start it. Suffice to say my damn ass completely fell for Hotch. Was there other things I was planning on writing… Yes… but I couldn't help myself. Hopefully, now my obsession will chill out enough I can work on other projects for a bit.

I found this writing prompt @witterprompts​ and went with it. The original prompt is below.

"Look, I think it's a fairly simple question. Do you or don't you want me to work with you?"

Continuation of Co-Conspirators –Part 1*–Part 2–Part 3–Part 4–Part 5 –Part 6

You had initially gone to college for something completely different. Or at least you planned on using your degree for something else.  One of your classes had Jason Gideon come in as a guest speaker, which sparked an epiphany. So you picked up some extra classes and buckled down, reading as many books as you could on the subject, David Rossi’s books were among the ones you read. Whatever college social life you may have had was put on the back burner, so you could pour all your energy into learning. It took a lot of hard work, but you managed to do it. You wanted to help people. This seemed like one of the best ways you could do that. When you were ready, you pushed ahead and got an interview with the Behavioral Analysis Unit at Quantico.

    You had been beyond nervous. For the past few years, you had been training for this moment. So you steeled yourself before going into the FBI building. You made sure to wear something very professional, wanting to make an excellent first impression. Walking into the building was easy enough. When you got into the BAU area, you saw some of the other employees there. They were already watching you. It was easy to tell that they knew you were there for the job opening. While you walked up the stairs, you tried to absorb all the information around you. You reached the office and knocked on a door that read 'S.S.A. Aaron Hotchner', the man who would be interviewing you. You heard a voice call you in. You were thrown off when you entered Hotchner's office. He was older than you, but even with that scowl sculpted into his face, you immediately found him attractive. So that caused you to begin your interview precariously. You knew he was a profiler, so you did your best to bury your attraction to him. Agent Hotchner was your boss. You were going to handle this professionally. You closed the door behind you, "Nice to meet you, Agent Hotchner." You introduce yourself as you take a few steps closer before stopping a respectable distance from him. Hotchner motions to the chair on the other side of his desk, "Sit. Despite what the other profilers might say, I don't bite." You chuckle, moving to sit in the chair. Hotchner moved some papers around on his overflowing desk, “Hotch is fine.” He looked over what seemed to be your personal file. You weren't sure what to expect before you came here. There were rumors about the team and gossip sure. Agent Hotchner was supposed to be intimidating and mean. While he gave off those vibes at first glance, that wasn’t the feeling you got from Hotch when you took a second to read him. Hotch looked up at you from your file, “Your look qualified for the job, but you’re young. What makes you better for this job than other applicants with more experience.” You hum, quickly thinking to yourself. You make sure to thoroughly look around the room, trying to get every detail. You look back at your interviewer, “There are no other applicants.” You said with a very matter the fact tone. Hotch leans back in his chair, a ghost of a smirk on his face. “What makes you say that?” You sit up enough to get another look at the files on his desk, “All these files are paperwork for cases, the dates, and how they are labeled. Applications aren’t labeled like that.” Hotch narrows his eyes at you, signaling for you to continue. You smile, “You don’t have any other applications on your desk. Which means either I’m your last applicant or there were no others. ” You glance down at your watch, “Judging by the time of day, the stacks of paperwork on your desk, and the bags under your eyes, you don’t have a lot of time for interviews. This is why you’re doing this on your lunch break, and I don’t think you’ve actually eaten lunch yet. I imagine you would have scheduled all your interviews in one day to get it taken care of quickly. Limited time, limited people you are willing to bring in and try to fit into your already busy schedule. I'm guessing that I am the only applicant.” You pause and shrug, “I suppose I could also be the only application you deemed had enough potential.” Hotch leaned forward again, closing your file, “Can you start tomorrow?”

    You curiously peek at the papers on his desk. Interestingly trying to see if you missed anything as you respond, “I can start right now if you need me too…” You pause for a second, before looking back up at Hotch, “Was I right?” Hotch tucks your file away, “Yes.” You perk up. You had done exercises in classes and during training, but you always found them too easy. So being able to test your skills on something more challenging and being right was exciting, “Which one I am then? Only applicant?” You assumed you were the only one. Figuring if someone with more experience had applied, they would have easily won out over you. Hotch shakes his head, “The only file I saw with enough potential to bring in was yours.” You slowly stand up, making a curious noise. “Thank you, then.” You reach out your hand. Hotch raises his eyebrows and shakes your hand, “Don’t thank me yet, You'll still have to prove yourself in the field.”

    That was how you got your job with the BAU. To start out, Hotch partnered you and him together a lot, you were assuming it was a probationary situation. You did some cases with other people while you were learning. After you had been at the job long enough to handle yourself, you were still partnered with Hotch most of the time. Part of you chalked it up to the fact that you could handle Hotch’s grumpy and bully-like behavior. Quickly the whole team became your family. You spent most of your time at work, which meant you spent all your time with the team. You enjoyed hanging out with everyone on the team.

    Emily would help you learn new languages if there was time. You found it oddly soothing listening to Reid talk about whatever he was excited about at the moment, plus you usually learned something. Rossi shared a love for classic art, the two of you also shared a love of snarky banter. You and Penelope shared anything nerdy with each other, whether it was movies, shows, or comics. Derek would discuss books with you, and he would introduce you to new music. You were always happy to look at pictures of Henry while talking about family life with JJ. You and Hotch were workaholics together. Hotch got onto you about it a few times, but you always turned it back on him. It was hard to explain, you and Hotch kind of just gravitated to each other. There was always a calm mutual understanding between the two of you. Working so closely with Hotch didn't exactly help with your attraction to him. You were a professional. So you ignored it for the most part. You had resigned yourself to the fact that Hotch wasn't interested in you. Even if he was interested, he was such a stickler for rules that it wouldn’t matter.

    You had been good at remaining professional for a few years. However, you slipped up one night when you and the team went out to celebrate. A case had gone really well, and you all knew you deserved a break. Emily and Derek were the first two to get the idea rolling. Soon everyone was ready and willing to go, except Hotch. Since you both worked way too much when the team went out, it was usually down to either you or Hotch to be what Penelope lovingly referred to as the ‘designated buzzkill’. You agreed to go but kept wondering if you should invite Hotch. Reid quickly caught onto how you were glancing up towards Hotch’s office, “Shouldn’t we invite Hotch?” Everyone except you and Reid made a face. It was a collective look of ‘We could try, but he’ll just say no.’ Their skeptical looks sealed it for you. You moved away from your desk and to the stairs, “I’ll ask him.” Penelope let out an excited squeak, practically bouncing as she spoke, “You’re the only one of us who can speak fluent ‘Hotchner’. You can do it, sugar.” You chuckled and rolled your eyes as you walked up the stairs. You knocked on Hotch’s office door but didn’t even wait for a response before going right in. You and the team had only been back for maybe 30 minutes, and Hotch had already buried himself in paperwork. You walk over and sit in the chair in front of his desk. Hotch doesn’t even look up as he addresses you, “Yes?” You shift about in the chair using the sweetest voice you could muster, “We have all been talking…” Hotch looks up, cutting you off “A night out? I have paperwork.” Hotch had his scowl on, but it no longer affected you unless he was mad at you personally. You grin at him, “It will be fun.” Hotch just stared at you, waiting. You sighed and rolled your eyes quickly, dropping being overly nice, “Why do you make me do this?” Hotch leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms. A smirk threatens to slide onto his face, Hotch still just stares at you. You glare at him, “Fine, you asked for it.” Hotch just waits, already knowing he pushed you to the point where you lose your verbal filter. While he had gotten onto you before for your lack of filter on cases, you think he enjoyed it when you spoke candidly in more casual situations. You point to his desk, “When is the last time you went somewhere that wasn't this building, the plane, or a company car?” Hotch goes to protest. This time you cut him off, “This stack of paperwork has been like this since you hired me... What two years ago now? You always do all your work. Go above and beyond. The files have changed, but the stack remains the same size. It can wait twelve more hours. At which point, you’ll realize trying to sleep is pointless. You'll come into work early anyway.” Hotch makes a face, doing what he does best and avoids the main parts of your argument, “It’s been two years and six months.” You open your mouth, ready to argue again, but are temporally confused. “What?” Hotch moves some papers around, “It’s been two years and six months since I hired you.” You gave him another confused look, “You remember how long it has been?” Hotch once again dodges the main issue. “Also, I’d like to point out that you also haven’t been anywhere other than here or on a case in a while, either.” You scoff, “I totally have…” Hotch rolls his eyes, “Sleeping in your car in the company parking lot doesn’t count.” You grumble and lean back in the chair. You decide to do what Hotch does and just avoid that statement, “What if I promised you I would help you with the paperwork after the teams’ little night out?” You could tell you were starting to win when Hotch sat up in his chair. Hotch motioned to the paperwork on his desk, “This is important.” You stand up and put your hands on his desk, raising your voice in a nonaggressive manner, “Mental health is important too.” You glare down at Hotch, “And I swear to god if I have to drag Reid in here and make you listen to the statistics about mental wellbeing and overworking yourself, I will be so pissed.” You get a bit more dramatic with your voice, “Aaron Hotchner, I already got that lecture from him the other day. If I have to listen to it again just to get you to go to the bar with us, I will.” Hotch puts his hands up in defeat before pushing himself away from his desk, “Please don’t subject me to that.” Hotch stands up, and you start grinning, “Thank you for caving.” You walk to the office door, waiting. When you looked through the window, the whole team automatically looked away. Trying to hide the fact they had been watching. You chuckle, shaking your head at how bad they were at ‘acting casual’. You walk down the stairs, “Stop pretending you weren't paying attention. Bossman agreed to join us.” Derek claps you on the back, “The boss whisperer has triumphed for us once more.” You roll your eyes, going over to your desk. “Why do you all act like Hotch speaks a completely different language?” JJ giggles, commenting, “Asks the only person who understands him half the time.” Hotch walks down the stairs from his office, “Let’s keep it that way. If the rest of you catch on, then I’m doomed.” You laugh. Now that you all were ready, it was time to go. The team went back to their excited chattering as you left the building as a group.

    At the bar, the team stayed together for the first few drinks. After that, though, everyone slowly splintered off on their own. You flitted from each small group for a while until like always, you ended up sitting next to Hotch. Hotch was nursing a drink while watching the rest of the team have fun. You ordered another drink. After a few moments of comfortable silence, you spoke up, “We are supposed to be having fun.” Hotch chuckles, “Is sitting over here with your boss your definition of fun?” You smile leaning back against the counter to relax, “Actually yes.” You take a large drink from your glass, turning to look at Hotch, “But you knew that already.” Hotch turns to face you, “I do. It’s the ‘why’ I could never figure out.” You laugh, playing with the small amount of alcohol in your glass, “You’re a profiler, you tell me.” Hotch glared at you before taking another drink. You couldn’t help the cocky look that fell onto your face. Hotch looks back out at the mixture of people floating around the room, “Really want to go down this road?” You scoff, getting another drink, “Hit me with your best shot Hotch.”

    Hotch motions to all the people mingling in the bar, “You’re as bad of a workaholic like I am. So you don’t have a personal life.” You make a fake offended noise, but let Hotch continue. “You find flaws in anyone who would be considered a potential romantic interest before even speaking to them. Convincing yourself, there is no use in trying.” Hotch glances back over to you, “It's why you like hanging out with me that I don't understand.” You cock your head, “I’ll answer that after I correct you on a few points.” Hotch crosses his arms, leaning back, waiting. You chuckle, “You guys are my personal life, my family. Your right about the romantic interest part, though... Hard to stay interested in someone when you can profile them in one glance...” You pause before knocking back your drink, “I like grouchy, serious people. Lots of nice silence that isn’t awkward gives me time to think. No bullshit, you’ll tell me if I did something wrong or whatever else. Plus, My mouth normally gets me in trouble but not around you. I can be a sarcastic asshole or brutally honest.” Hotch makes a noise, “Your mouth is a huge problem.” You nervously rub the back of your neck and chuckle, “I mean… I’ve at least gotten better when we are on the job.” Hotch smirks, “You have.” He pauses for a second, “What else? You’re leaving something out.” This is the point where you would usually come up with a convincing lie to hide the fact you had feelings for Hotch. You were a few drinks in. You could handle your liquor, so you weren’t drunk per se, but you had drunk enough that you didn’t really think about the need to lie. You smile to yourself as you let out a small hum, “Because… seeing a sullen person smile… and I don't mean smirking… a genuine smile... It’s a special thing to be able to see that.” You realized that was the first time you had said something like that or even admitted it to yourself. You let out a curious hum. Turning back around in your seat, facing the counter. When Hotch turned around, that’s when you notice the two of you were shoulder to shoulder now. You glanced over at Hotch. He had a real smile on his face. It made you happy seeing him like that. You forgot where you were and that there were rules against fraternization at work. Hotch was so close to you, so when your eyes met his, all logic left your body. You closed your eyes before leaning in and kissed Hotch.

    Hotch even kissed you back. It felt so right that you got caught up in it. Both of you kept kissing each other. That was until your brain quickly started to catch up to what you were doing. It only took a split second for your bliss to come crashing down. You had just kissed your very handsome, regulations focused boss. At a party with your coworker’s nonetheless. When you realized that you just put both your and Hotch’s job on the line, you pulled away. Hotch looked confused. You couldn’t tell if it was because you kissed him or because you stopped kissing him. Not sure what else to do, you decided to bolt. Digging cash out of your pocket before putting it on the counter to pay for your drinks. You avoid looking at Hotch, “I… I have to go.” You said it so fast it sounded more like one word then a sentence. You didn’t wait for a response. Booking it out of the bar and straight to a taxi to take you home. You were mad at yourself. You managed to stay professional for over two years. Then it only took one night out for you to ruin that. Though deep down, you knew the real reason you were so upset was that kissing Hotch had felt perfect, but there were multiple rules against things like this. You didn’t want to forget about that moment but thought it might be easier if either you or Hotch just forgot about it by the time morning rolled around. As soon as you went home, you went straight to bed, hoping to sleep it off.

    When you woke up a few hours later, you hadn’t forgotten. It was actually the first thing you thought about. Making you realize that maybe it was more than a crush you had on Hotch. You pushed the thought back in your mind and decided to just go into work. Knowing you couldn’t go back to sleep even if you wanted to. Even though you were walking into work a few hours before anyone else should be there, you weren’t surprised when you saw Hotch’s car already here. You had your fingers crossed that he had forgotten about last night, and you never had to think about this ever again. When you walked into the bullpen, you got your answer. Usually, when you came in early for whatever reason, especially helping him with paperwork, you would sit in Hotch’s office while you both worked quietly. However, today Hotch’s office door was closed. The paperwork you had promised to help him with was sitting on your desk. Last night may have just fucked up your usual routine and, even worse, a friendship. You sighed to yourself and just sat down at your desk and worked.

    Over the next few months, it only got worse. Where you and Hotch typically gravitated to each other, now you were both constantly apart. He no longer paired you two together on cases, never sat next to each other on the plane. The worst part was probably the early and late hours both you and Hotch always worked. You both were the only two in this part of the building at those times, and still, there was no real communication between the two of you. Just basic, stiff sentences. Neither you or Hotch talked outside of team meetings and cases. It was a shock to your system considering how close you two had been before that night at the bar. But you felt you had no one to blame but yourself. You also felt lucky you still had your job considering Hotch could have fired you.

You reached your breaking point one random morning after a few months of this. It just hit you how much you actually needed to know what was going on. You didn’t even care what the answer was, you just wanted to know. So while you and Hotch were still the only two at work, you barged into his office.  Before you could even get the door closed, Hotch spoke up, “Yes?” You closed the door and crossed your arms, “If you’re pissed at me, could you go ahead and just say so?” You shouted that louder than you meant to. Hotch furrowed his brow and looked right up at you. You didn’t give him a chance to say anything just yet, “I was really drunk, okay? So don’t think anything of… of…” You tried to think of what to call it because calling it a kiss reminded you how much you enjoyed it. You subconsciously touched your fingers to your lips. As soon as you noticed, you dropped your hand and continued, “that situation… It meant nothing.” You didn’t even believe yourself and knew that Hotch saw right through it too. As an effort to hide more of your feelings, you let out a loud, annoyed huff before standing there and staring at Hotch. Hotch narrowed his eyes at you, testing you. “Then why are you yelling at me about it?” You scoffed a few times before you started walking around. You stayed mindful enough that it didn’t look too much like pacing. You calmed your voice, “Because I feel like I’m in the dog house because of it. You stopped partnering with me, practically stopped talking to me altogether.” You sigh, “I understand you could have fired me for that drunken mistake. You didn’t, and I appreciate it. But if you really hate working with me that much now, just tell me.” Hotch leaned back in his chair and watched you. There was some emotion in his eyes you couldn’t pinpoint at the moment. It almost looked like he was amused as he spoke, “You weren't that drunk.” Hotch moves some papers around on his desk, “You know, normally anyone else on the team would think being partnered with me constantly would be the punishment. Not the other way around.” You think for a moment watching Hotch, “I don’t feel that way about it.” Hotch nodded, “I know.” He looked a bit too amused for your liking. So you started speaking louder again, "Look, I think it's a fairly simple question. Do you or don't you want me to work with you?" You paused, but your nerves got the better of you. You let out a loud sigh before adding mostly to yourself, “I knew my mouth would get me in trouble one day… this just isn’t the kind of trouble I thought it would be.” Hotch chuckles at your comment, “I’m not mad at you.”  You scrunch up your face, confused. Hotch’s voice turns more serious as he finishes, “I do want to work with you, but I separated us because you’re a distraction.” You glare at Hotch, “What the fuck do you mean a distraction?” At this point, you may not have been thinking too clearly because you automatically took offense. You fully turned to face Hotch, your body language and tone reflecting your irritation, “We have worked with each other for over two years. Suddenly I’m a ‘distraction’?” Hotch stood up, crossing his arms and staring you down. You dug your heels in, “Am I really that bad at my job that I’m affecting your or the team’s work?” Hotch started walking over to you, “Will you stop and listen to me for a second?” Hotch had raised his voice just enough to get your attention. It was stern with no real anger behind it. You let out an exasperated huff but stayed quiet. Hotch stopped a few feet in front of you. Even a few feet away, Hotch seemed to tower over you. The serious look that was normally stamped on his face was softer than normal, “You’re a distraction because I have feelings for you as well.” 

You falter for a second, “What?” Hotch lets a smile slide onto his face, “You heard me.” You take a minute to think it over, “Then why didn’t you say anything before.” Hotch shrugs, “You’re the one who ran, and I wanted to cover all my bases.” You glare at him, wondering if this was a joke. Hotch wasn’t one for jokes, so it was unlikely, but part of your brain wouldn’t accept he was telling the truth. So naturally, you challenge him, “Since when?” Hotch raises his eyebrows at you, “Does it matter?” You give him a firm nod. Hotch looks off to the side, “Longer than I would care to admit…” Hotch knew you wouldn’t be satisfied with that answer, so after a pause, he looked back at you with a smirk on his face, “The first time you yelled at me. I was able to see how passionate you were. It started then.” You start laughing, “Really? You also wrote me up for that.” Hotch nods, “It was still against regulations, so, Yes.” Hotch pauses, “What about you?” This time the laugh that leaves you is a nervous one, “Since my interview.” You rub the back of your neck, “Tall, Dark, and Handsome. What else can I say?” Hotch makes a curious noise, “I just read that as regular nerves, not attraction.” Hotch smirks at you, “If I had known you had such poor taste, I wouldn’t have hired you.” You scoff and roll your eyes, “Shut up.” You look out the window down into the bullpen below, “If ‘poor taste’ is liking a man who is constantly pushing himself to do the right thing and can be an ass at times because of that. Then sure, I have ‘poor taste’.”  Hotch scuffs, “The word I think you meant to use was jaded.” You smile, looking back over at Hotch, “Nope.” You say it very matter of factly, letting the ‘p’ pop as you speak. You tilt your head and give Hotch a cocky grin, “So you like being yelled at?” Hotch rolls his eyes, “Only when you're the one yelling. If I didn’t, I would have fired you by now.” You chuckle but then have a serious thought, “How much trouble are we in?” Hotch sighs, “None… at the moment, but if Strauss catches wind of this…” It was finally time for other people to start showing up for work, just some background workers. Drawing both you and Hotch’s attention to the window watching over the bullpen. You think, “So we don’t let Strauss catch wind of this.” You tap your foot on the ground. “Everyone on the team hates the bitch, but…” Hotch nods, finishing your thought for you, “But… If we keep it a secret from the team, it will at least buy us time.” Hotch glances at you for a second before looking back out the window, “What do you suggest?” You tilt your head from side to side as you think, “We build upon what the team already knows about… We have clearly distanced ourselves from each other. The team has noticed… So we make it seem like we are actually mad at each other.” Hotch nods, agreeing with you so far, “An event about two months ago that would cause this ‘rift’...” Hotch scowls while thinking about it. You laugh, “It is us we are talking about. There are too many things to choose from. The team knows you can be a hard ass, and they know I have a smart-ass mouth.” Hotch chuckles, looking over at you. Your eyes meet for a second, and you can’t help but smirk. “Are you willing to get this elaborate with lying to our friends and colleges?” You were joking at first, but you had a serious thought. Your tone quickly changed, “In all seriousness… I don’t want to put your job on the line… Don’t get me wrong I want this, but not so badly that I’m willing to risk your career without both of us being on the same page.” You look over at Hotch. He furrows his brow, “It’s not just my job. It’s yours too.” You let out a melancholy chuckle, “Im young, I haven't built up my whole career yet. I could find somewhere else to work.” Hotch shakes his head, “You’d be miserable.” You shrug and smile, “ ‘Miserable’ is a relative term.” Hotch’s frown sets in deeper on his face, clearly he was starting to rethink things. So you quickly spoke up, “I just want to make sure we are on the same page. I’m more than willing, but if you want to back out before we break any rules, I want to give you that chance.” Hotch stares at you for a very long moment, “What event are we going to use from two months ago?” You smile softly, relieved that he wanted to proceed with things. You thought, “I cursed out that cop which you got onto me for even though the guy totally deserved it.” Hotch smirks, “He did deserve it but still inappropriate.” You chuckle and nod, “We could use that… act like someone in the department complained about it more and is riding your ass about it. Could combine it with several other things for more drama or leave it at that.” Hotch nods, “We can work with that.” You move away from the interior window, “When everyone gets in, we fake an argument and let the team see it.” Hotch moves back over to his desk, “They will see it and shouldn’t ask too many questions about it.” You sit in the chair in front of his desk, “From partners to partners in crime.” Hotch glares at you and rolls his eyes, “Crime makes it sound much worse than it is.” You chuckle, “Fine. Why don’t we plan something fun then? Maybe it will make you less grumpy.” Hotch sits down, crossing his arms, “Something fun?” You roll your eyes, “A date. I mean, we literally put all this effort into the lie to cover up something that hasn’t even really happened yet.” Hotch smiles, “Tomorrow night, we are supposed to have it off.” You give him a smug grin, “It’s official, then Aaron, we're co-conspirators.” With a sigh, Hotch leans back in his chair. As he rubs his temples, you can see a large smile on his face.

Continuation of Co-Conspirators –Part 1*–Part 2–Part 3–Part 4–Part 5 –Part 6

[realityhelixcreates]

Dance of the Spheres Chapter 5: Martian March

Chapters: 5/?

Fandom:  Marvel Cinematic Universe

Rating: PG 13

Warnings: drugging, kidnapping, forced marriage

Characters: Loki(Marvel),

Additional Tags:  Loki Goes Overboard, But When Doesn’t Loki go Overboard, Mature Reader, Disabled Reader, Political Intrigue

Summary:  

I'm going back to Saturn where the rings all glow

Rainbow, moonbeams, and orange snow

On Saturn, people live to be two hundred and five

Going back to Saturn where the people smile.

                                              Saturn-Stevie Wonder

our rooms glittered. They were faced in massive scale pietra dura stone patterns from floor to ceiling. Gray, black, and white dominated, with a surprising amount of green mixed in, as well as startling pops of orange-red, blue, yellow, purple, and bright pink.

The designs were large and geometric, almost a sister style to the classic Art Deco that you saw on the older buildings downtown, mixed in among the flavorless glass towers and Brutalist boxes that defined the 'modern' era.

This main room housed a delicately carved stone couch and chairs, around a low stone table, and several stone shelves and storage boxes. These were all made of a black stone that held numerous yellowish-green crystals in their matrix, all polished so that the crystals shimmered.

This same stone appeared in the patterns on the walls and floor, as very thin panes on a pale backing, highlighting the colors of their crystals. This, along with a similar black stone with reddish-orange crystals, and a dark gray, large-grained stone that sparkled at any angle, was contrasted against the now familiar creamy white and pale orange. Here and there, inlays of silvery wire brought organic shapes to the mix.

The cloudy crystal made a reappearance in a round, well-lit, domed room Loki described as a 'Solar', even though no sun could reach this place. Instead, the clearest of the crystal had been set into the dome, all of it covering the mysterious lights, creating a bright light source that illuminated the room to something close to midday. The walls were covered in the cloudy crystal, which, in the bright light, shone with veils and flashes of iridescent blue.

On one wall there was a subtle inlay of  translucent gray stone, in the shape of clouds, that shone in splashes of blue and purple. Cleverly inlaid within them were specific pieces of the same type of stone, in the shape of lightning bolts that sparked yellow when viewed at the right angle, but were invisible from others.

He showed you the antechamber that connected your rooms and his, all in black and green. Even the lights were covered in thin panes of green crystals thickly packed in black matrix, casting a dim, viridian light over the whole chamber.

You decided that room was extremely creepy, and you never wanted to be in it.

The bath room was much better, ridiculously large, with a shower just out in the open, a wide counter with a mirror of polished metal, a huge tub carved right into a semi-finished block of stone, and a strange toilet tucked away in a stall in the corner. It was all big enough for you to move around in easily, though you mentioned that you would need a chair for the shower. Loki vowed to have one brought immediately.

But your bedroom was the obvious jewel. Loki puffed up with pride as he showed it off, as if he were the one who designed it. There were jewels in here, bright, bubblegum pink, golden yellow, and apple green in elaborate platinum settings, affixed to the walls. There was more cloudy gray and white crystal in here, with their blue and purple, pink and yellow flashes. The lights were clustered around the ceiling like stars, and the bed was another of the precious rare wooden objects, a four poster canopy bed, draped with a gauzy veil.

Most surprising of all, the bedroom had a window-or rather, a doorway out to a semi-circular balcony that overlooked what must be the main palace courtyard and entrance. When you stepped out onto it, you could see lines of guards-more people than you'd seen in one place since you'd been here. They framed the long, rectangular space every ten feet or so, in bright, brassy armor and sunny yellow capes.

This was clearly a cape kind of place.

It was very strange. You could have sworn you hadn't climbed any ramps, and you certainly hadn't gone up any stairs, but here you were, at least six stories up, and there were more stories above you.

“You must be clever builders.” you said without thinking about it.

“Our engineering capabilities are the envy of the galaxy, it's true.” Loki boasted. You believed him. All around the courtyard more balconies jutted out. Several dozen feet to the side of yours, the balcony you assumed must belong to Loki was connected to another large balcony on the opposite side by an elegant walkway, supported by slender pillars. There was a round platform in the center, and red curtains obscured the balcony on the other side.

“We can address large crowds from there, or call emergency meetings of the guards, or the other high nobles.” Loki said, following your gaze. “That's who lives on this floor. Myself, my brother, all of the most important Asgardians, and now you.”

But not for long, if you had any opportunity. “Uh, I'm honored.”

“How do you like them, though?” he pressed, “Is the décor to your liking? The size? We've been working on it for months, but we can still change things if you need.”

“Months?” you gasped, shocked. “You guys did all this in just months?”

Asgard had come to Earth a little under two years ago, decimated and begging for assistance. Thor led them, but no one knew Loki had come along. Thor himself served as his own liaison to the United Nations, bringing his case before the leaders of Earth, to secure a place for his people.

Obviously, it had worked. Thor's reputation and high-profile friends, as well as his surprisingly diplomatic and optimistic outlook had both charmed and discombobulated most people who spoke to him. People liked and respected him, but no one expected him to be savvy.

It had worked out very well for him and his people. They had secured some secret land that the entire U.N. had remained tight-lipped about. Then, a few months in, Thor had stopped making appearances, leaving Earth-Asgard relations to his advisors; an abrasive, undiplomatic woman whom you loved to watch, and a stoic and imposing man with unsettling eyes. Rumors flew for a while, but you hadn't paid much attention. There had been so much to fight for at home.

Did anyone even know you were gone? You were supposed to attend a march tonight. Or last night? You didn't know how long you had been asleep. Surely someone noticed you were missing.

But if they did, how would you even know?

“-harness the sun's energy over the long rotation period so that we can build even more efficiently.” Loki was saying. “We've done an admirable job for such a reduced population, but there is so much more to do.”

“And you took them away from that to build this for me?”

“I took them away from this to build special chambers for the princess of Asgard.” Loki corrected, “It was not a waste, nor was it superfluous. It was for someone important.”

“I'm not.” you insisted, “I'm just some rando they snatched up and tossed at you. I'm not princess material.”

“I will find out what is behind this.” he said, “But until I can, I want you to feel comfortable here. This is all yours now, and more.”

You couldn't, you couldn't allow yourself. You weren't supposed to be here. It was only a matter of time before this mix up was discovered, and a swap was arranged. You'd go home, and some other woman would take your place.

How horrible.

“But is everything to your liking? Do you need more light? More space? Is the bed all right for your leg? A good height?”

You were more than a little wary about getting into bed with him here, but as you hobbled over to it, he remained at a distance. You sank onto the plush mattress, with it's silky green sheets and thick comforter. It was very nice, soft and smooth, and warm, despite being placed on solid stone. Hopefully the blanket would ward off the slight chill that followed everywhere you had been so far.

“It's a good height,” you said, “especially if I get a new cane.”

“Excellent. Would you like to see my quarters?' he asked, “You may come and go between them as you please.”

Which meant that he could too. You didn't find that reassuring.

“Uh...isn't that, um, inappropriate?” you asked, casting about for any reason to refuse. “We haven't even, um, there hasn't even been a wedding!”

He paused, then his face broke into a beautiful, glowing smile. “Of course. I understand. You want that big celebration, naturally. Well, it is only fair, isn't it?” He sat down on the floor next to your bed, as if forgetting that he was a prince and a god, a powerful figure, abandoning his dignity to sit on the floor like a child.

“Do you want to plan it, or leave it to the advisors? Asgard is very good at grand weddings, but if you've had some specific plan for it, I'm sure we can accommodate it.”

“Uh...” This would be the perfect opportunity to stall. You could buy so much time with this! “I would like to plan it. There's things I've been wanting to do since I was a little girl. It would be a dream come true, to plan my own wedding.”

Not strictly true. Certainly, as a little girl you had contemplated flowers and a dress. There being a groom was far less important.

“Then begin any time you like.” Loki said warmly. “I'll have notebooks brought to you, and you can plan out whatever you want. Whatever it is, we can do it for you.”

You almost felt bad for what you were going to do, but on the other hand, you didn't trust him and his terrifying adoration, and horrible power over your life and safety. You'd make as many impossible demands and take up as much time as you possibly could. If it kept you safe. If it kept you from the nightmare scenario.

“I will have your bathing chair brought. You seem tired; shall I have dinner brought to you? We can dine in your audience room. We can have you measured for a new prosthetic, and for a new cane as well. The artificers will set to work on them immediately.”

“Um, sure. That sounds fine.” Dinner would be welcome, after only one apple and one cup of water. And a new, higher tech leg and cane might help you escape faster. You should take every opportunity available to you.

Loki helped you out to the largest room, with it's bookshelves and seating, and saw that you were comfortable. Then he bid you stay put and wait for a bit, while he got everything set up. You were in no shape to try for an escape right now; you would just bide your time.

You waited patiently, taking in the details of the beautifully precise stonework that made up your new-temporary-living quarters. What incredible workmanship. Shame it had been wasted on you.

Maybe someone else would have been thrilled. To have wealth and power, security and luxury, a handsome prince just handed to them with no effort on their part at all. That wasn't what you wanted though; you didn't want to join the lucky ones. You didn't want to be lifted out of your hardships and set above your peers, you wanted those hardships to be eliminated for everybody. You didn't want to be a social climber, you wanted a more equitable society. This fantasy was worthless to you. It had all been done without your consent.

A quiet knock on the door grabbed your attention. You didn't answer immediately, and the knock was hesitantly repeated.

“Um, come in?” you called.

The two adolescents you had run off before cracked the door open and peeked their heads in.

“Your highness?” the girl asked.

“May we enter?” the boy finished.

“Yeah, come in. I'm in a better mood now.” you said calmly. No need to be rude to them now that she knew what was going on. If Loki hadn't even known about the kidnapping, there was no way these kids were in on it.

“We were sent here to get measurements?” the boy-Andvarri wasn't it-asked shyly. “For a prosthetic leg, and a cane?”

“Yes, I was told you might be coming. I'm sorry about earlier: I was very disoriented and confused.”

“No harm done, your highness. This won't take long.”

The girl-Bjarkehilde-helped you stand as Andvarri took several measurements and asked about your preferences in weight and materials, flexibility and points of articulation, even colors and decorations.

They were going to put in a lot of effort to help you escape. A fine efficient leg, a sturdy lightweight cane, and Bjarkehilde even asked about what kinds of medication you needed, and for what.

Bjarkehild was surprisingly close to your height and build as well. That stayed in the back of your mind for a while after the two of them left.

As the minutes passed, you began to realize that you were going to need some kind of clock. You had no idea what time it was. There was no visible sunlight, the lights in your rooms hadn't changed at all, and no one had mentioned it at all. How did the Asgardians know? Was some kind of internal timekeeping part of their natural abilities?

Maybe it was the nebulous grasp of time, maybe it was the fading adrenaline and setting in of weariness, maybe it was residual drugs working their way out of your systems, but you began to feel strange as you waited for Loki to return. Either you felt hot, or the slight chill that was prevalent in this place was getting worse. Perhaps you had been staring at the artistic walls for too long, because the colors seemed to be vacillating between painfully saturated, and fuzzy at the edges.

It seemed to take forever for Loki to return, carrying a tray of food and drink. This he set on the lovely stone table before you, and then took a seat in a nearby chair.

“You must be ravenous by now.” he said, and you were. You leaned forward to inspect the offerings. The metal tray was filled with small stone bowls and plates, and two small cups of liquid. Was this how meals were traditionally served in Asgard? A great variety of small portions?

One of the cups turned out to be orange drink, from powder. You recognized that taste from your childhood. The dry air had made your tongue rough, and the acidic flavor was a blast on your tastebuds, as bright as the colors on the walls. The second cup was some kind of brown broth, possibly also from powder, as it got thicker at the bottom of the cup. There were dried apricots, soaked in honey, and dates, a barley porridge with a swirl of honey and a dash of cinnamon. There were common Saltine-type crackers that went with a very strange stew that looked like it was made, not just with re-hydrated vegetables, but re-hydrated meat as well. It tasted fine, but the texture left something to be desired.

You barely noticed. You wolfed it all down as Loki just sat and watched, having brought nothing for himself.

“I see you needed the fuel.” he commented, after every bite was gone. “Yes, I think you will need it. Beloved, I must tell you something about that apple you ate earlier. I can see it's effects are starting to take hold. Like I said earlier, I had thought to feed it to you slowly.”

“The apple? What...what's it doing to me?” Beloved? He was taking things a bit far, wasn't he? But you definitely were feeling weird. Uncomfortable. “I had just woken up and I didn't know where I was, or what was going to happen. I didn't know where my next meal was coming from.”

“And I understand that now, as I did not then, or I would have refrained from putting it out at all. But it's too late now. For several things. We will simply have to adapt and endure.”

“Endure?”

“I will not leave your side, you may count on that.” He promised. “But that was a special apple. Its tree came from a cutting, taken from a remnant grove in Vanir territory, as part of their peace treaty with us. A sacred tree whose fruits provided the Vanir with ageless warriors. For us, they heal terrible wounds and sickness. But for you, they are known as the Apples of Immortality, and they confer a great gift indeed. But it is not without price.”

You doubled over in pain.

[writingwithadinosaur]

“Under the Knife” - Part 3

“Under the Knife” - Part 3

My Masterlist - Here

Story Masterlist - Here

My Tag List - Here

Hannibal Lecter x Reader, Will Graham x Sister!Reader

Word Count: 1,700-ish

Key: Chunks of text in italics are (Y/N)’s thoughts. Y/N = Your Name, H/C = Your Hair Color, E/C = Your Eye Color

Warnings: Talk of Murder, Talk of Crime Scenes, Talk of Murder Victims, Cursing

Summary: You are Will Graham’s sister who works with him at the FBI. When you get offered a job promotion, life starts to change. Some changes for the better; Some for the worst.

Tag List: @fruitloopzzz @theeactress @melconnor2007 @ashenfallsof @geeksareunique @all-by-myself98 @sj-thefan​ @fuck-your-bad-vibes-dude​ @ntlmundy

Author’s Note: This is my first Hannibal piece and I am proud of it. There aren’t too many stories for Hannibal, so I figured I would add to the collection. This does take place in some happy medium where they are all alive and work together. Sort of a happier season 1 era.

This is beta-read by @theeactress​, but please let me know if there is something that we missed or that we should look at again! 

If you would like to be tagged in any of my future pieces, check out my tag list above and let me know! And as always, feedback is greatly appreciated!

<3

- DreaSaurusREX

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

“As most of you know, this is (Y/N) Graham, she will be our profiler for this case.”

“Oh good. Another Graham.” Beverly commented over her clipboard, writing down something involving the case probably. Jack gave her a chastising glance and she held her hands up in defense.

“(Y/N) this is Beverly Katz, Brian Zeller, and Jimmy Price.” Jack introduced you very quickly to the science-ier part of the team very quickly before jumping right into work. “So, tell us what you got so far, (Y/N).”

You opened your small notebook and began summarizing your notes from last night’s reading.

“Alright. So far I’ve been able to see three patterns: the ways they were killed, the time frame, and the fact that all of the victims that were dismembered were doctors. The strongest thing I can think of is that this killer was wronged by doctors in some way. I’m not sure if it's a doctor in the general term or if there is some specific way that ties these three doctors, and our killer, together. That was something I was going to work on today. 

The way that the bodies are taken apart is very particular. From what I could tell from the photos in the files, all of the cuts seemed to be straight lines all the way through. Which means that this guy’s gotta have access not only to the tools that can do this sort of stuff, but also whatever drug he got in their system to make them lay still while he... worked. So I’m assuming the murder weapon is nothing with a jagged blade or saw-like teeth until we get to the bone. Do we have any reports on striation patterns or anything that could help us with what was used?”

“It’s like you said, the cuts were almost completely straight lines, even through to the bone. The only things we could think of were surgical tools.” Zeller spoke up. “The skin and muscles were cut similarly to how a surgeon would with a scalpel. But the bone is where it gets tricky. You can’t cut like this through bone with just a scalpel.”

“Unless you have plenty of time and you're very persistent.” Beverly joked; you were the only one that slightly exhaled a laugh through your nose at her quip.

“Alright, so the killer has a medical background.” Jack tossed into the air. You nodded.

“Possibly. But why would a doctor be going after other doctors?”

“Maybe they’re taking all his patients?” Beverly shot out. You just nodded and looked back at your notes to see where you left off.

“The uh.. The most concerning thing is the time frame. They were all killed two weeks part from each other. Dr. Everet was almost 6 weeks ago, Dr. Chaseten almost 4, and Dr. Loriet about 2.” 

“Which means we could have another dead doctor within the week.” Jack solemnly spoke as he realized the gravity of the situation. “Alright, you three keep looking over everything to see if we missed something. (Y/N), start working on possible correlations between the victims and the killer. Let’s get this son of a bitch.”

And that’s how the next two days went. Researching, thinking, and trying to get into a mindset that you weren’t totally sure of yet. 

You had checked in with Will like you promised and said that you were fine but you were going to be very busy for at least the next few days. Hannibal had called you after your first day and could hear the slight exhaustion in your voice. He asked you to have lunch with him tomorrow and you very quickly agreed.

But the next day, you spent more time than you thought flipping through the databases to try to find any correlation between Everet, Chasten, and Loriet. The three of them never worked in the same hospital, clinic, or even the same city. Their wives didn’t know each other. Their neighbors didn’t know each other. They didn’t have any sort of communication with each other. They were all different types of doctors. Everet and Loriet went to the same med school, but they graduated 3 years apart.

So what the fuck am I missing?

You kept looking back over the crime scene photos. You couldn’t understand why the doctors were mutilated and positioned so intricately, but the others were cast aside. The focus has to be on the doctors. They must have done something to ‘wrong’ the killer. So what the hell did all three of you do to make someone want to murder? 

Your train of thought was interrupted by a knock at your office door. You let out a slightly aggravated sigh.

“Jack, I told you I will let you know when I-- Oh! Hannibal! Hi!” You looked up from your computer screen to find Hannibal standing in the doorway with a bag in his hand. 

“Should I come back later?” 

“No! No. Come on in. I probably should take a break. I feel like I’m going in circles anyways.” You looked at your watch and saw it was almost 3:30 PM. The last time you looked at the clock, it was 10:30 AM. “And I missed our lunch meeting.” You put your head in your hands and groaned in annoyance with yourself. “I am so sorry, Hannibal. I--”

“No need for apologies, my dear. I figured Jack had put a lot on your plate, so I thought I would bring lunch to you.” Hannibal made his way into your office and shut the door behind him. 

“You really didn’t have to.”

“When was the last time you ate, (Y/N)?” Hannibal questioned you, looking you dead in the eye after he sat down in one of your office chairs. 

You weren’t entirely sure. You started to speak but then stopped yourself, really trying to remember when you ate last. I know I had ½ of my breakfast at 7:30 this morning. Did I have my granola bar? Does coffee count as a meal?

“The fact that you have to think about when your last meal was, is a bit concerning. But nonetheless, I am more than happy to remedy that. ” He smiled one of his rare but small smiles and began unpacking whatever culinary art he brought. You tried to condense some of your piles of papers and folders so you had enough room to put food down. 

Hannibal had brought a home-cooked meal for the two of you to enjoy. A ginger salad with fresh pan-seared scallops and even some infused water that he had marinating in his fridge overnight. This was so much better than the PB&J you had packed. 

As you began to dig in, Hannibal couldn’t help but look at some of the crime scene photos and your notes. 

“So what are we calling this killer?” 

“‘The Virginia Scalpel.’” You said with slight annoyance. “He has a medical background and is within a reasonable distance from all of the vics. Yet, we have no idea who he is.”

“Does the killer have to be a medical professional? Maybe they just have very steady hands.” 

“True. But there is almost no way that a regular guy could cut through muscle and bone that cleanly without surgical tools or the knowledge of how to use them. Not to mention the fact that he would have some serious explaining to do on how he got the succinylcholine or whatever paralyzer he plans to use next.” You rub your eyes gently, feeling the strain from the computer screen hitting you. Hannibal could feel the stress radiating off of you. 

“Do you want to talk about this case?”

“Not really. But I’m not sure what else to talk about. This has been my life for the last 3 days, the killer could strike again any day now, and I still don’t know why these three doctors were targeted or who will be next!” 

You started to fidget with your ring unconsciously and a bit aggressively, a sign to Hannibal that your anxiety was starting to catch up. Despite the physical signs that you needed a break, you continued to glance over an open file near you while you took another bite of food. He leaned forward in his seat a bit as he closed the file that you had been rereading for what he assumed to be at least the tenth time.  

“(Y/N), you need to breathe.” You just nodded and closed your eyes to try to help your deep breaths relax you faster. “How about we go for a walk? Get the blood flowing.”

“I would love to. But I feel like I can’t afford that break right now.” You shook your head slightly as you reached down for a stack of papers you had bundled and put on the floor earlier. You didn’t see him get up, but Hannibal was standing, adjusting his jacket before holding a hand out to you.

“What’s the worst that could happen?” You looked from his hand to his face before standing up, shrugging. A small walk around the building wouldn’t hurt, right?

Before your hand could land in his, your phone rang and you felt your heart sink, dreading what could be waiting for you on the other end of the line. Both you and Hannibal looked down at your phone and saw the caller ID: “Jack Crawford.” You took a deep inhale and hit the answer button.

“I really hope you’re calling just to bug me to work faster, Jack…” You tried your best to control your voice. You looked up and Hannibal was watching, trying to listen in and gauge how you were going to react.

“Afraid not. There’s another Scalpel vic. I’m texting you the address. Drop whatever you're doing and get down here.” Jack hung up before you could say anything, leaving you in a bit of shock. 

Dammit! What the hell am I missing?! Someone else is dead--Another doctor is dead because I don’t have any answers yet. How can--

“(Y/N)?” Hannibal’s hand on your arm broke your stream of internal chastising before it could get too bad, but you did unintentionally jump at the contact. He instantly raised his hands up and let you process for a moment. “There’s another one, isn’t there?”

You just nod. A second later, your phone flashed a message from Jack with an address. 

“Guess my ‘walk’ is going to be to a crime scene.” You try to joke despite feeling a tinge of guilt spreading through you. Hannibal tried to walk you to your car but you kindly denied him. You wanted to be alone as you prepared yourself for your first real crime scene. 

[shih-coulda-had-it]

2 and 27 nanakikoooooo

2 (Royal AU) & 27 (Sick/Injured) | Nanahiko

//

Different fantasy AU than the one where Toshinori is the One who Would be King, but definitely still fantasy AU. The Dread God Usurper is just a hoity-toity title for AFO. And for the reader’s information, Sorahiko and Nana are in an arranged marriage, yet had never met before this night.

//

Their flight from the castle was only successful because no one had expected the heiress to co-opt an escape with the visiting mercenary. Of course, it was also likely because the guardsmen were distracted by the undead, surfacing from the earth, under the thrall of the Dread God Usurper.

Somehow, this was not Shimura Nana’s top priority.

“Hey,” she said sharply, jostling the mercenary’s head from where it had dipped onto her shoulder. Nana had commandeered the man’s horse, so she had the reins, but as she couldn’t just leave him, he had sat behind her and (presumably) guarded their backs. Nevertheless, Nana wasn’t about to show gratitude like that.

He murmured something in return, groggy. Nana discerned the words ‘arrow’ and ‘hurts.’

“I’m sorry, you’ve been shot by an arrow?”

“Hn,” he answered, and Nana felt his weight suddenly shift sideways. She hastily reached backwards in an attempt to prop him up; chancing a glance backwards, Nana saw a broken arrow shaft sticking out of his shoulder.

She shrieked.

“Quiet,” said the man. Fortunately for him, the garbled plea was comprehensible enough that Nana managed to put a lid on it and prevent them from being thrown.

“How long has that been there?” Nana demanded, and turned her attention to scouring their surroundings for any safe haven.

The castle was the center of the capital, a sprawling city that boasted zero walls, a rigorously-maintained waterworks and sewage system, and more roads than the city patrol knew how to deal with. The Shimuras’ lax approach to securing the heart of their kingdom was a character flaw, only balanced by the fact that Shimuras were rarely holding court, instead choosing to personally tend to the borders.

One positive consequence of a roaming royal-in-disguise: every innkeeper did their utmost to present their businesses well, and at a bargain price, in the hopes that they would have the repeat honor of hosting royalty.

Another positive consequence: there were many, many inns.

Some of which would not be averse to bloodied men. Or women in bloodied dresses.

“Milady,” the man slurred, and Nana startled at how close the rumble was to her ear. “Wha’s happenin’?”

“Did you forget the past hour?” she asked, incredulous. She spotted several men, still merry (because who, who could have fled from the castle yet and alert the capital that it had fallen besides her and her companion?) and drunk, slipping out of a door spilling warm yellow light.

Nana nudged the horse over to the establishment’s small set of stables, wrinkling her nose at the smell. By the grace of the gods, she thought in relief, seeing several vacancies.

“Okay, down we go,” she said, and she watched the man sluggishly brace himself against her and slide off his horse. Once both of his feet were planted on the ground, Nana followed suit.

“Don’t run off with my horse.”

“I have absolutely no plans to do that,” Nana lied, and coaxed the man to release his grip on the saddle. He made a wounded noise when pushed away, but did nothing to stop Nana from stabling the horse.

Did nothing but stare, Nana corrected herself, freezing in the act of pulling out her coin-purse from between her breasts.

“What,” she said defensively.

“What?”

And then he tipped forward. Nana caught him, grunted at the weight, and resigned herself to lugging him inside. Though the innkeeper was cleaning up the messes of his previous customers, she was swift to pass the chore off to a maid and speak with Nana.

“Do you need a healer, m’lady?” she asked, wiping her hands on a rag.

“A room first,” Nana decided. She readjusted the arm slung over her shoulders and winced at the pitiful whimper. “Hot water and clean rags too, please. Anything you can spare for bandages. I’ll pay for the expenses.”

“Alright.” Blissfully, no questions were asked. After giving additional instructions to the maid, she fetched an oil lamp and said, “Follow me.”

Nana dragged her companion up a flight of stairs, until the innkeeper opened the first door to their left, holding it open and allowing them to step over the threshold. It was a cramped space, minimally furnished. Nana nearly tripped upon seeing the single bed.

“Need two?” asked the innkeeper.

“Ah,” said Nana. She plunged past her hesitation; the Usurper was infamous for his Hunts, and anything Nana could do to cover her tracks would be beneficial. Leaning in conspiratorially, Nana whispered, “The single is fine. It’s just that, he’s a rather large man, isn’t he?”

That earned her a grin. “A large man’s a large target.”

“As we unfortunately learned,” she agreed. The innkeeper waited for Nana to deposit the man onto the bed, face-first, and then exchanged a handful of coin for the key and light. “I’ll take a plate of dinner as well, please.”

“Any for him?”

“If he wants to eat, he’ll have to wake up first.”

Nana saw the woman out, and finally turned her attention to the man. He was tall, sturdily-built, with awfully soft-looking silver hair and a prominently-curved nose. And he was blearily awake, watching her through half-lidded eyes, the pale irises barely catching the yellow light.

“Did you want something to eat?” she asked, approaching the bed and surveying the damage.

“Something to drink,” he said hoarsely. “How bad is it?”

“Pretty bad.”

He laughed into the pillow, and it was humorless and despairing. It eventually petered out into a low curse, then an unsteady statement. “This… was not how I wanted to be meeting you for the first time.”

Nana blinked. “I didn’t realize I was expecting you.”

“Oh. That’s a comfort.”

“You can’t stop there,” she said, poking his uninjured shoulder. “Who are you to me, mercenary?”

“‘Mercenary’?” the man echoed in disbelief. “No, I’m - ” His breath hitched. There was a shadow at the door; Nana leapt up to retrieve the basin of hot water and rags (and an unasked for knife), and ushered the girl away. She didn’t want an audience for this next part.

“You’re…?” Nana encouraged. She set the supplies on the floor.

“Sorahiko. Sorahiko from the Yamanashi Kingdom. I was here because - because - ”

“Prince Sorahiko,” she corrected, reeling just a little bit. Nana recognized the name, even if she couldn’t quite place the degree of importance. Was he a valuable trading partner? An ally? “You’re the Torino scion!”

“Soon to be deceased,” he muttered.

“Aw, don’t be like that.”

“I have an arrow sticking out of my shoulder, and I don’t think even a warrior-queen is trained in the healing arts,” Sorahiko snarked. The burst of sarcasm faltered. “Did you really not recognize me?”

Nana, though feeling guilty about the earlier plan to rob him of his horse and supplies, was not about to be guilt-tripped by a sad small voice. “I hadn’t paired faces to names yet,” she said, defensive. “That’s usually a thing that happens after the coronation.”

“It really isn’t,” he told her.

“Well, I guess we’ll never know, considering what’s happened.” Nana exhaled sharply, then steeled herself. “That was the Usurper back there, did you notice?”

“Hard not to.” Sorahiko stirred, winced, and dug his face into the pillow. His words came out muffled: “He’s supposed to be a folktale boogeyman for bullies. What’s he doing, coming for your throne?”

“I’m glad you asked. Can you keep a secret?”

They breathed in silence for several seconds, the tension thick. Then, Sorahiko snorted and turned his head; Nana saw his profile outlined against the pillow, the wry curve of his smile.

“Dead men tell no tales. That’s how the adage goes.”

“You’re not dead yet,” she said, exasperated, and tapped into the power of One for All for strength (to hold Sorahiko down), for grace (to remove the arrow with as little damage possible), and for mercy (to heal the wound). Sorahiko cried out, one hand clawing at the sheets by his face, the other flailing backwards in an attempt to dissuade her.

Nana held on. The affair took less than a minute, and by the end of it, Sorahiko’s entire frame trembled with the aftershocks, and Nana’s skin felt tingly, charged with static electricity. She tossed the arrow shaft aside and picked up the knife.

Perhaps it had been meant for surgery.

She used it to slice his shirt in half. Mutely, Nana waited for Sorahiko to process what the hell just happened, and wiped away the crusted blood. She pressed hard against healed flesh, distantly registering his warmth.

“Oh,” Sorahiko breathed into the bed.

Nana eased up on the pressure. “I don’t know why the Usurper wants my power,” she admitted. “But he’s not supposed to have it.”

Slowly, he sat up. Trying to look regal, Nana assumed, although that was difficult with his shirt in pieces and that - that awestruck expression.

“So?” she asked nervously.

“Let me help you,” said Sorahiko. “He can’t have known we’ve made contact. Come to Yamanashi with me, and let me help you figure out what you need to do.”

She stared at him. “What if - what if it takes forever?”

“Then it takes forever.” A new kind of determination surfaced on his face, and Nana was taken aback at the fluttery feeling in her stomach. “Even if Yamanashi proves unsafe, and you need to run from kingdom to kingdom, just let me go with you. Whatever your task is, it’ll be easier with two.”

“You’ll have to rough it.”

Sorahiko snorted. “I’m not some spoiled whelp, drowning in ruffles and lace. Queen Shimura - ”

“Call me Nana,” she replied, faint, and extended her hand. He mirrored her; they clasped each other’s forearms instinctively, and Nana’s mouth curved into a slight smile that he returned. “I hope you’re not shy, Prince Torino.”

“Call me Sorahiko,” he shot back.

[amillionsmiles]

get myself together, spend you all of my money (Ellie/Aster)

Title: get myself together, spend you all of my money Summary: “You’d think going to college out of town would have knocked us both down a peg, but instead we ended up pretty pretentious.” / or: Ellie, Aster, and an apartment full of things. A/N: written while listening to Mitski’s cover of “Let’s Get Married” on loop.

[Read and review here] or continue under the cut.

*

Ellie finds Aster Flores again on a Sunday.

So far, the NYC Sublets & Apartments Facebook group has yielded more duds than leads, but she scrolls down and suddenly, there: a corner of Squahamish, waving at her from the screen.

LOOKING FOR: Room to rent, ideally available by August. Recently graduated from art school, so that gives you a sense of my budget, but I’m tidy, respectful, and play well with cats. Any PMs with leads appreciated!  

The profile picture isn’t anything new; Ellie’s pretty sure she scrolled past it and liked it a few weeks ago during the influx of everyone’s graduation photo updates. Aster’s looking over her shoulder at the camera, the quiet joke that always seemed to hide in her eyes in high school now more pronounced. It’s a good picture, from a purely aesthetic standpoint, and that’s the only reason her heartrate picks up when she hovers over Aster’s name to click Message.

She takes a swig from her iced cappuccino and starts to type.

Hey! Long time, less conversation. Haven’t been to church in a minute, but I remember there being a Bible verse saying something about “two are better than one,” and I’m pretty sure that also applies to apartment-hunting. If that seems like something you’d be interested in, let me know.  

Before she can think twice about it, she hits enter.

*

They move in together in July, when the summer heat turns the air liquid and the acrid smell of molten trash bags wafts from the street. For a second, Ellie misses the Pacific Northwest: the greenish tint of light filtered through leaves, the way she could disappear to a nearby watering hole for respite. Even the mudding that Trig and his friends did now seems appealing—on the stairwell, she fantasizes about the cool shock of it against her skin.

“Hey, Ellie?”

Ellie turns from where she’s been sitting on the top step to see that Aster’s finally gotten the door open. Rocking to her feet, she pushes the cardboard box across the floor, stepping inside to get a look at where they’ll be living for the next year.

The first room is spacious, combining a kitchen area with what can become a living room, once they buy a couch. Trailing her fingers along the wall, Ellie wanders into the other bedroom, then tests the lights in the bathroom. She comes back to find Aster eyeing the ceiling, a hammer pulled from her belongings.

“What are you doing?”

“Here.” Aster beckons her closer. “I’m thinking that this space is big enough that if we hang a curtain, part of it can be my room.”

“Oh.” Ellie hadn’t put much thought into it when they’d signed the lease, assuming they’d share the back room, like a college one-room double situation. It seems naïve, now; they’re adults, of course Aster would want her own space. “It doesn’t have to be yours, though. I mean—we can flip a coin or something, to make it fairer.”

Aster shrugs. “I don’t mind. Besides, the back room is more muffled—I’m less likely to hear you clacking your typewriter this way.” She smiles, the two of them both glancing to where Ellie’s Smith Corona peeks out from its bubble wrap packaging, the pale blue paint gleaming in the sunlight.

“It was my mom’s,” Ellie explains, her own memory fond against her lips.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“I always wanted to hear more about her, after that time at the spring.”

“She was fun.” The words take her back to Ping-Pong, Paul’s paddle thwacking the ball against the wall.

“As fun as you are?”

Ellie raises an eyebrow. “Am I fun?”

Aster pushes a sweaty lock of hair behind her ear. Overhead, the air conditioning hums.

“Guess we have plenty of time to find out, heathen.”

*

“Saw is not the greatest horror movie of our generation.”

“It is!” protests Aster, sitting next to her on the couch. Waxy cartons from the Georgian restaurant Aster waitresses at litter the table, and Ellie licks her fingers clean of the buttery residue from the kubdari—mm, delicious—as she leans back, waiting for Aster to continue.

“Ignore the sequels. But on its own, it’s this brilliant little clockwork machine of the lengths people will go to when they think they’ve got no time left. And the reveal at the end? I heard you gasp.”

“Okay, I’ll give you that, but a lot of the rest of it feels like torture porn.”

Aster rolls her eyes. “No one watches a horror movie for the butterflies.”

“Except you, apparently,” Ellie points out, because this is a thing they do as roommates, now: watch movies and then discuss them over takeout. So far, they’ve tended toward foreign cinema, art-house, and horror. The last genre is the one Aster engages with most fervently. However, Ellie has started to suspect that Aster can turn nearly anything into a debate, perhaps a side effect of all the time she spent wrestling with God in her head during sermons.

“Whatever. I just don’t think you’re giving it the credit it deserves for how well it feeds on the psyches of all the characters.”

“Cupid and Psyche,” Ellie thinks aloud. “Now there’s a story we could talk about.”

Crinkling her nose, Aster says, “We get it, you read literature.”

“So do you,” says Ellie, nudging her foot. “You’re just as big a nerd as I am.”

At that, Aster laughs, tilting her head back. It makes the column of her throat into the soft marble of a Canova statue.

“You’d think going to college out of town would have knocked us both down a peg, but instead we ended up pretty pretentious.”

Looking around their apartment, Ellie has to agree. There are too many stacks of books lying around, various papers jutting out of them as placeholders so she can flip to the passages she needs when writing essays. Aster keeps bringing back abstract art prints from the showcases she attends. In the corner, there’s a ficus that Ellie took home from work out of guilt (she’d been the only one in the office watering it) which they’ve named Walter Benjamin.

“I kind of like it, though.”

Aster turns to her, cheek pressing against the fabric of the couch. Her gaze is a paperweight: glassy and clear and heavy with something Ellie can’t quite name. “I’m not complaining, either.”

*

Before college, Ellie had considered herself a morning person, simply because she had no reason to be otherwise. Waking up to signal the trains each morning became part of her biorhythm, as natural and unremarkable as her middle part or her thermal underwear. At Grinnell, though, she’d discovered the guilty joy of sleeping in. The downside has been that her body now relies on coffee to function before 10 AM on the weekends.

“Don’t drink that,” says Aster, whisking the tin away from Ellie’s grasp. “I’ve been using it to wash off my brushes.”

Groggily, Ellie leans against the counter, watching Aster bend over the canvas on the kitchen table. She must have been at it for a while—a good third of it is filled in, streaked with purples and browns. After dabbing at a corner, Aster blows a strand of hair out of her face and straightens, reaching to adjust her messy bun.

Ellie squints. “Have you always had that?”

Pausing, Aster feels along the shaved part of her hair, tracing the chevron indented in it. “The undercut? Yeah. A girlfriend did it for me senior year, before we went our separate ways.”

A spike akin to a dose of caffeine shoots through Ellie. She stands a bit taller. “A girlfriend like a girl…?” she trails off, clearing her throat. “Or. A friend.”

The corner of Aster’s mouth twitches. “The first one.”

“Oh. Um.” Ellie swallows. “That’s nice.”

Aster picks up another paintbrush, twirling it between her fingers before deciding against it and setting it back down. When she meets Ellie’s eyes again, the look behind them is bare, vulnerable.

“I haven’t told my parents, though.”

“Is that why you don’t go back to Squahamish?”

Aster’s lips part slightly. “You noticed?”

“The first summer, yeah,” Ellie admits. “After that, I wasn’t around much either. Internships and stuff, you know.”

“And relationships?”

“Some of those, too.”

“Did you seduce all of them wearing flannel?” Aster asks, nodding to the oversized checkered shirt Ellie favors as pajamas. For a second, Ellie just gapes, taken aback by being so thoroughly called out.

“You’re the one with an undercut. Don’t talk to me about queer signaling.”

Aster laughs. It suddenly becomes very important that Ellie turn around and start the coffee machine, right now.

“I like seeing you with your hair down, though,” comes Aster’s voice, drifting over the sound of water straining into a pot.

*

“—And then I thought, what if it’s a temperature thing?” finishes Paul, his face ruddy and proud through the screen. Sensing an opening, Ellie stops worrying the inside of her mouth.  

“Did you know Aster likes girls? Like, officially?” Almost immediately, she cringes from how juvenile her delivery makes her sound.

Paul doesn’t so much as twitch. “Uh, yeah. It’s come up once or twice.”

“Wait, she’s talked about it with you?” Ellie sits up on her mattress. Since when were Paul and Aster confidantes?

“Yeah. Sorry I didn’t say anything, it’s just I read all this stuff about not outing people before they were ready, and I figured if it was important enough to her she’d let you know eventually. Uh, Ellie, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Blinking rapidly, Ellie fights the surge of affection threatening to overtake her. Stupid Paul, making her stupidly proud to have him as a best friend.

“Do you—er. Do you think you might like her?”

“Oh, god, no. And I mean it for real this time,” she says, meeting Paul’s skeptical look. Part of it is pride—it seems like character regression, to return to the source of her teenage fantasies when she’s learned so much about herself since then. “It’s just nice to have a friend who gets both parts of it, you know? The being queer and being from Squahamish.”

“Yeah, that makes sense. Hey, do you guys want a batch of these sausages when I finish tinkering with the recipe? It takes two days to ship cross-country, I checked.”

Ellie laughs. “Yeah, Munsky, send them our way.”  

*

Ellie wets the edges of the dough tucked in her palm, working from the outside in as she crimps the dumpling and places it on a plate. Across from her, Aster works with similar dexterity, a pink sliver of tongue poking out the side of her mouth in concentration.

“You’re good at this.”

Aster sets aside another dumpling, using two fingers to scoop a mound of dough from the bowl between them. “Yeah, I helped my mom a lot with her empanadas, growing up.”

“Say you had kids,” Ellie starts. “What’s one thing you’d teach them, before they turned thirteen?”

Aster considers. “Long division. Except I’d have to get someone else to teach them, because I’m terrible at math.”

“Really?”

“Really. Do you ever think about how smart people have been, to invent the concept of infinity and the concept of zero?”

“Mm. And where would you put the idea of God on that scale?”

“Like, a solid fifty,” says Aster, flicking water at her face.

*

In November, Ellie publishes a short story in the New Yorker, which Aster crows about for a solid week.

“Aster, oh my god, you’re being embarrassing,” she says upon walking into the kitchen and finding her story printed in full, each sheet pinned to the refrigerator door with a bright red magnet.

“You should be proud,” Aster insists.

Paul calls her to discuss it. “Me and your dad read it. I thought it was really good. Are you working on more stuff?”

“Slow your roll, Munsky.” Ellie laughs. “I’m not as prolific as you are, dreaming up new sausage combinations every day.”

Off-camera, the staticky sound of a TV and a faint Ellie? sounds.

“Here, Mr. Chu.” Paul passes the phone to her dad, who is wrapped in his usual robe. The lines by his eyes relax when he sees her face.

“How are you?” she asks in Mandarin. “Are you keeping warm?”

“You should be worried about yourself—it’s colder where you are,” her dad replies. “Paul’s good about keeping me company. He read your piece to me three times. The scene with the swing set, and the little girl…” He switches to English. “Best part. Your mom would be proud.”

“Thanks, Ba,” says Ellie, voice thick. She goes to bed that night and dreams of being sandwiched between her mom and dad, dancing in the living room.

*

She and Aster host a small get-together in December. They put a Santa hat on Walter Benjamin and get everyone drunk on mulled wine until the party devolves into a caroling session, Aster’s friend James competing with Ellie’s friend Larissa to see who can belt “O Holy Night” louder. Afterwards, she and Aster sprawl on Aster’s mattress, limbs loosened from a successful night. The string lights Aster wound through the curtains as decoration for the party flicker, casting the room a soft gold.

“Would you ever get a tattoo?” Ellie asks. It’s been on her mind ever since she noticed the olive branch inked above Larissa’s collarbone. She’s wary of the pain, though.

Beside her, Aster shifts, arm pressing against hers. “I have one, actually.”

“What, really?”

“Yeah.” She props herself up on an elbow, pulling her shirt up to reveal a cluster of flowers just below her rib.

Tracing the lines with her eyes, Ellie asks, “What kind of flowers are they?”

“Asters.”

“You’re joking.”

Aster looks straight back at her. “I’m 100% serious.”

“Isn’t that a bit too on the nose?” Ellie studies the tattoo again and then snorts, shaking her head. “I can’t believe it.” The wine must still be in her system, because the fuzziness of a laugh flushes through her body.

“What?” Aster seems miffed. “Ellie, what’s so funny?”

“Nothing, I’m just— You were so reserved before, and now you’ve got an undercut and a tattoo and. Do you remember— there was that day when Jenny Newman brought in that pink scarf and you all walked down the hallway like something out of a Clique movie, it was ridiculous. I can’t believe I had a crush on you. Oh my god.”

“Stop.” Aster shoves her shoulder, but she’s laughing, too. “Don’t remind me. God. God! What a terrible color, it didn’t match my outfit at all.”

“But it’s okay, because now you’re Aster Flores, hardcore.”

“Well, what about you, Ellie Chu?”

“What what about me?”

Aster sits up. “You’re walking into a tattoo parlor right now. What do you decide to get, and where?”

“Persimmons,” Ellie says, before even fully conceiving the thought. “On my… right shoulder.”

“All right.” Aster gets up and feels around her desk; the next thing Ellie knows, she’s kneeling before her on the mattress, a fine-tipped pen in hand. “I’ll draw it for you.”

“Okay.” Slowly, Ellie sits up, tugging the collar of her shirt down as far as it’ll go to expose the skin needed for Aster’s canvas. The first touch tickles; she tries to hold herself as still as possible while Aster draws, ink flowing in thin lines. She considers watching the process, but it makes her go cross-eyed and dizzy, so she closes her eyes instead and feels: the smoothness of a persimmon skin, the shine of their texture, the sweet crunch of a fruit just barely ripened.

“Done,” Aster whispers, and Ellie leans closer to catch it. It feels like they’re in a confessional booth. Aster caps the pen and bites her lip, but she doesn’t move away.

“Ellie—” Her breath smells of cinnamon and cloves. Like the sharpest part of the forest, like all things good and lovely and too fragile to want.

“I should go to bed,” Ellie says, and it takes every ounce of strength she has to extract herself, to stumble back to her room and sit against the closed door, shaking.

*

“Ellie? Ellie, pick up the phone. It’s about your dad. It’s not—super critical, or anything, but I still think—uh. Just… call me back as soon as you can.”

*

Her carry-on is by the door and she’s set to leave for the airport in an hour. When Aster finds her, she’s cutting and skinning apples in the kitchen—not even to eat, just to have something to do with her hands.

Silently, Aster pulls out some bread, cream cheese, and salmon. When she’s done with the sandwich, she slips it into a plastic bag and holds it out to Ellie.

“For the plane ride.”

“Thanks.” Ellie sets down the knife and goes to put the sandwich away in her backpack. She zips it up.

“Would you come with me, if I asked?”

By the sink, Aster is quiet. Ellie thinks of that awful moment in the ping pong room, when she’d thought Paul had caught on to her.

“You know what, never mind.”

“If I go with you, I’m going to want to be with you.” Aster looks down at her hands as she says it; it’s the first time she’s seemed uncertain in a while. Ellie soaks in the confession, turning it over in her head. It’s brave. It’s honest.

It’s not enough.

“I just.” Aster shrugs, helpless. “I’m not ready for that conversation, yet. With them. For the fallout of what the worst could be.”

Pick me, her heart throbs, selfishly. Pick me pick me pickme. She is a train leaving the station, hoping for someone to catch her. But no time to wait; her dad needs her.

“Take care, Aster,” she says, shrugging her backpack over her shoulder. Aster’s face crumples like snow. Ellie tries not to look back.

*

The hospital discharges her dad after a week. Ellie stays for another two, making sure his cough is gone and all the mucus has loosened from his chest. When he regains enough energy to start fighting back against her fussing, she recruits Paul to make sure he drinks enough fluids every day.

“Pneumonia,” she scolds at the doorway, shaking her head. “Don’t ever scare me like that again!”

“Ch,” her dad says. “You want to talk about scared? How about that time when you were seven and fell off the monkey bars? Nearly cracked your head open.”

Paul looks between them, bewildered. “Okay, Mr. Chu, I’ve gotta get Ellie to the airport. There’s still ice on the roads so driving will be slower than usual.”

In the car, Ellie holds her hands to the heat, touching the pads of her fingertips to each other.

“Do you like it better out east?”

Ellie tilts her head. “City life is different, that’s for sure. It feels freer and lonelier. Not as many people paying attention to you, so you can be anything you want to be. But also: not as many people paying attention to you.”

“Hm, I get that. Like being at my house versus being at yours.”

“You’re saying that the Munskys are New York City and me and my dad are Squahamish?”

“Never mind. I guess my house has all the people New York has, but they’re all jumping down your throat instead of passing you by.”

Ellie laughs. “You love it, though.”

Across the dash, Paul smiles at her. “Yeah, I do.”

“You wouldn’t consider the Midwest? It’d be a happy medium.”

“I did like Iowa, when I visited you.”

“Chicago, then,” Ellie proposes. “In five years. People there buy lots of hot dogs—it’d be good business.”

“I’ll think about it,” Paul promises, pulling up to the curb. He gets out to help with her suitcase, wrapping her in a warm hug. Ellie buries her nose into the center of his chest and inhales. She wonders if it's possible to absorb his courage through her lungs.

“Paul?” she asks, when he starts to pull away. “Can I ask you something?”

His eyes are bright with concern. “Of course.”

“If you loved someone, and they loved you back in the same way, but they said you couldn’t be together, what would you do?”

“Well, I’d ask myself: when I picture being with that person, what does it really look like? Is it okay if the image doesn’t exactly match up? Because then I’d hold on.”

“Never Let Me Go.”

“What?”

“It’s another Kazuo Ishiguro book,” says Ellie, smiling. “You should read it if you get the time.”

“All right, boss,” says Paul, mock-saluting her. “Now go catch your flight.”

*

It’s past midnight when she gets back to the apartment, careful not to make too much noise as she slips past Aster’s room and into her bed. Her head is about to hit the pillow when her phone screen lights up, casting her as a glaring shadow against the bedroom wall.

Aster: Hey, heard you come in. Is your dad okay?

Yeah. I sentenced him to house arrest for the month, with Paul as guard dog.

Aster: All right, Foucault. Discipline & Punish. Aster: I’m glad he’s better, though.

Thanks. Did you miss me much?

Aster: Well, I realized that the cookies disappear at a much slower rate when you’re not around. :P

It’s strange to be talking like this when they’re separated by only a hallway, when for the past six months they’ve seen each other face-to-face every day. And yet, in some ways it’s easier: the crackle of electricity, the dots appearing, then fading, then appearing again.

Aster: Can you come into the hall? Aster: There’s something I want to say.

Ellie sits up, swinging her legs over the side of the bed. Gently, she cracks open the door to see Aster leaning against the wall opposite the bathroom. Her hair is tangled. She looks beautiful.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

Sliding down to the floor, Aster gestures to the spot opposite her. “Sit.”

Dutifully, Ellie obeys, bringing her knees to her chest and resting her chin atop them. The hallway is so narrow that her toes end up tucked under Aster’s legs, crisscrossed in front of her.

“I’ve been thinking about what I said to you right before you left,” says Aster. “And I did some more thinking while I was here alone. And the thing is, I don’t want to be all or nothing with you. I want us to be—something. And I’m wondering if you could be okay with that. If we could take it little by little, and just figure it out as it comes. If you’re willing to wait.”

“Yeah.” Ellie swallows. “We can do that.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.” Nodding, Ellie starts to rise, but Aster gets a determined look in her eyes and suddenly she’s swooping forward, the scent of her hair—vanilla and violets—swinging around them, her hand cupping Ellie’s cheek and her mouth a bright star against Ellie’s, striking deep as a hymn into her bones. Ellie counts to five before opening her eyes, and when she speaks, her voice is hoarse.

“I thought you wanted me to wait.”

“Guess I’m bad at following my own rules,” Aster says, and grins.