#John expected to loose his sole again

[tanglepelt]

Dp x dc idea 36

John summons the ghost king Danny. Needs helps makes a deal offering his soul. Danny being the troll he is accepts. He would of helped regardless of the deal. Instead of johns soul. He steals johns shoe. Just rips the sole out of the shoe and vanishes.

[yiiyiiwrites]

Friend or Foe (2)

Summary: Kiara's older sister (kaya Carrera) still trying to figure why Rafe hasn't slipped up yet. First Chapter: (1)

Kaya Carrera liked to think she knew the ones closest to her, a good judge of character but after her younger sisters warning a week ago she tried everything to push Rafe and get a reaction out of him. None of her shoves successful though.

Refilling her cup with vodka, Kaya elbowed her way through the crowded house. In the far corner Rafe and his friends stood chatting with beer bottles lining the coffee table. The latest summer party, some Kook she'd never heard of and still had not seen at the event. She stepped out onto the deck, lanterns lining the wide steps down to the pool. The house was in between the cut and figure eight so it wasn't strange to see a mixture of pogues too. The grey area where the semi rich lived.

One in particular catching Kaya's eye, the tall blonde her sister was friends with and a curly haired brunette. She was ashamed to say that she couldn't remember their names, their faces only recognisable from the pictures in Kie's room.

The summer evening breeze sent a shiver down her bare arms, fingers grasping the plastic cup and crushing it. Alcohol spilling over the side, Kaya shook the excess from her hand and glanced back to the boys, her younger sister bouncing beside them in excitement. She met her gaze, smile creeping onto her face and then vanishing as quick as it came.

Rafe's hand traced the small of her back and found a place on her hip. Kaya leant into his side and wrinkled her nose as he kissed the top of her head. "Everything ok?" He asked, he swigged the last remnants of his beer, eyes not leaving hers.

"Bored," she said, but she didn't need to tell him what he already knew. Kaya found herself searching for her sister again, bottom lip pulled between her teeth.

Nodding his head, Rafe bumped his elbow to her arm. He'd half expected her to bring a book, something she found herself doing a lot in his presence whilst he did the odd work for his dad. "You'll get used to it," he said kissing her cheek before he disappeared for more beer.

Kaya followed the trailing stairs to the lower garden, climbing the small fence to walk the short dock. She watched the party in distance, the music a dull hum from where she stood. The water rippled below the wooden slats, boat swaying in the wind.

“Hey.”

The sudden deep voice echoing behind her made her jump, the sole of her sandal getting caught between the gaps of the dock. The searing hot pain on her knees and palms came before she’d realised she’d fallen down.

A warm hand wrapped around kaya’s upper arm and pulled her up. “Oh shit, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to scare you.” The person releasing her as soon as she caught her balance.

Tingles ran up her elbow, the cool night air nipping at the grazed skin. She swiped the hair out of her face, mouth hanging open at the curly brown haired Pogue she’d been watching earlier. She winced, not in pain, but at her memory for not knowing his name.

“Oh, why don’t you have a seat,” he said guiding her by her elbow to a nearby bench. “John B,” he said kneeling down and squinting up at her. “Eh, Kie’s friend.”

Kaya nodded her head, too embarrassed from the fall and to admit she still didn’t know her sister’s friends names. She pouted, turning her palms to look at the blood and one large splinter sticking out of her skin between her finger and thumb.

“I can get Kie, if you want?” John B said glancing over his shoulder, his hand ever so close to her thigh as it leant against the bench.

Picking the splinter out, she shook her head. “It’s fine, it just a few scratches.” She looked everywhere but John B, her gaze fixed on the bent edge of favourite sandals. “She probably wouldn’t come anyways, not exactly in her good books lately.”

John B shook the curls out of his face, “she’s just worried, that’s all. You know how she can be.” He fiddled with the bandana on his wrist, teeth loosening the knot to remove it. “Here,” he said cupping her calf and wrapping the cloth around the bloody gash on her knee.

Smiling down to him, Kaya stood up and placed her hands on his shoulder to push herself up. “Thank you, but it’s just gonna ruin your bandana.”

“I’ve got loads of them, you can keep it.” He shrugged, dusting the dirt from his knees and falling into step beside her as she walked back up to the garden.

Glancing to John B as they made it up the sloping grass, she couldn’t help but smile back at him. “I can see why Kie likes you.” All she could think back on was her little sister giggling at her about the boy who kissed her, of course it was John B.

They climbed the low fence, John B helping her over. Kaya stopped abruptly when she turned to see Rafe waiting on the other side. Beer can crushed in his grip, jaw tense and fingers twitching.

In the blink of an eye, Rafe shoved John B against the fence, elbow pinning him down. “What the hell you doing.” Rafe spat, his focus on the Pogue but Kaya knew the question was directed at her.

Slowly and gently, Kaya touched Rafe’s arm trying to get his attention. “I fell..” she began, stopping as he shrugged her off and sent her back a few steps. “John B just helped me. Just let him go, please.” She didn’t know why she was pleading, but in the moment she could see the anger rolling of Rafe and shifting his shoulder blades with each deep breath he took.

The two boys were locked in a piercing glare, both murmuring insults to each other.

“Come on, Rafe,” Kaya said pulling at his arm and hanging off it as he stayed in his place. “Need to clean the dirt of my grazes. Don’t want it getting to infected.” The reasoning behind leaving was one she knew he couldn’t refuse. He always did take care of her, just like she did him.

Rafe allowed himself to be pulled away, eyes not leaving John B’s till he left. Kaya nodded, telling the Pogue everything was all right and that she’s sorry for the commotion. "You okay," Rafe said inspecting her palms, fingers trailing down to the scraped elbow. He clicked his tongue, "can't even blame it on having ya nose stuck in a book."

The glimpse of anger is gone like a flicker, his lips stretching into a smile as he scoops her hand in his. Kaya watched his face, waiting for the switch, but it never came. He brought the back of her hand up to his lip and kissed it.

Unable to make sense of the evening, Kaya followed Rafe through the house and many hallways to the front door. "Got a first aid kit in my truck," he said over his shoulder, the bodies of people made a path for him as you finally made it outside and onto the pebbled driveway.

Cars lined the area, but just ahead Kaya caught the truck in the distance. As usual Rafe had arrived later to ensure he could leave at anytime without getting blocked in. He unlocked the truck and opened the passenger door, lifting her up to take a seat in front of him.

He leant over unlatching the glove compartment and sliding out the green first aid box. Without another word he took Kaya's wrist gently and dabbed her palm, cutting a large plaster to stick to the broken skin and curve of her hand without excess layers puckering.

The silent moments like that, was when she studied him the most. She didn't know how someone so caring and particular could hurt another person, but she wasn't naive enough to think he wouldn't. She'd seen the way he reacted and how sometimes he let it get the better of him, that split second of blinding rage. She'd savour the silence, the light touch and the in-between, the time that he could just be himself with her. Even if it was brief.

Rafe stilled his movements, his focus on the blood seeping through the bandana on her knee.

Kaya lifted his head and held his face, "he was just helping, please don't give him trouble." She regretted the words as soon as she said them, a sigh leaving his lips and retreated from her touch.

“Your sister’s always getting in your head," he muttered, tearing the bandana from her knee and flinging it behind him. "Making me out to be the bad guy.” Rafe smoothed the plaster on her knee, gentle as ever. He busied himself with collecting the packaging and rubbish, stuffing it all back in the box to sort out later.

"I just don't understand why you needed to go for him, nothing happened. Do you think so little of me? Don't you trust me?" Kaya grabbed his hand stopping him, box falling to the footwell of the car and littering the floor. She doesn't know why she's pushing him so much, still wondering if the flicker of anger will relight.

Silence. Rafe's hands on his hips and gaze on his boots. He's nodding, hand rubbing his jaw as he paced the gap between the parked car and his. Stopping he leant against the truck, shadow falling over her as she stared up at him. "I see you, I get you." Leaning into her, he released a deep breath, eyes flitting to hers.

"I know what you want," Rafe whispered, his lips a hair width away from hers. "You want a reaction, been pushing me all week." His hands rested at the nape of her neck, thumbs tilting her head to meet her gaze.

Kaya nodded, lips parting to release a breath. The wave of alcohol suddenly hitting her as he stared down at her.

"You ain't getting one, could never treat you like that," he said, gentle peck at the corner of her mouth almost teasing. Kaya leant into his touch, eyes closing as she took in his musky scent.

And just like that she melted into his embrace, fingers tugging at his shirt to drag him closer. She'd let him win that night, the game of push and pull she needed to know in order to see how far to go with him. The niggling thought scratching away at her, the promise of maybe one day it'd be fight or flight.

[yourwakingnightmares]

Subversion versus Shock Value

So there’s a massive difference between subverting a reader/watcher’s expectations, and doing something solely for the sake of shock value.

Subverting an expectation is a nuanced process; it’s either the result of several plots coming together, or it sets the plot off in a new direction. It might end a character’s arc, or a tragedy that sets them in a new direction.

For example, to use something well known: at the end of Season 1 of Supernatural, Sam, Dean, and John are left injured due to a truck coming out of nowhere and crashing into them. It’s shocking, yes, because moments before they’re just all riding in the Impala. But it sets us up for Season 2, with John’s death, the reveal of Sam’s abilities, and Dean starting to become his own person rather than a clone of his father. This is subversion. We didn’t expect a thing to happen, but when it did, it had meaning, and it set the stage for future plots, and character plots.

Compare that to Star Wars, where Ray, out of nowhere, lets loose with Force Lightning. It added nothing to the plot, it added nothing to her character; she could just do a powerful Force ability now, one that we never saw again. This is just shock value. It does nothing for the story, it does nothing for the characters, it just is. 

These are just two examples. But at the core of it, it boils down to...

Subversion is something that the reader/watcher doesn’t expect, but has an affect on the character, or plot. Shock value is something done just for the sake of making the reader/watcher shocked.

[oddlykilledghosts]

I Want You To Like Me - Rafe Cameron x reader (Part Two)

Summary: You're a pogue by choice, kook from birth. The friendship that you have with the other pogues is undeniable, no one questions their loyalty for you or your loyalty to them. So when a certain King of the Kooks takes interest in you, it's only right to turn him down. Right?

Such a long part and so little Rafe…in the next parts I swear I will write more for just him, but it’s been so fun to be a part of the pogue friend group for now (but seriously next part will focus heavily on solely Rafe don’t worry) Very ‘domestic’ (loose way to use the word) view of the pogues this chapter, you get to see the ins and outs of their friendship a little more with reader

Word Count: 6.5k

Pairings: Rafe Cameron x reader, John B x Sarah Cameron, platonic!Pogues x reader

The Chateau was quiet when you walked in. You hadn’t expected the other Pogues to be there, but a part of you hoped Kiara had left the party at Tannyhill and would be waiting for you on the couch on the screened-in porch with that look on her face that said she knew what you had been up to. You kind of wanted her to scold you for taking that ride home. For kissing the eldest Cameron. You wanted Kiara to kick your logic back into its rightful place where it had abandoned it’s station back at the party (and in Rafe’s car) and agree with her that even the thought of fraternizing with him was wrong. Even if it meant she would be angry with you. 

The thought of your best friend lingered in your mind as you stood aimlessly in the front door of the Chateau. Frozen, you could picture her different reactions. Mostly the angry ones. And then the nicer ones. Your eyes flickered to the chairs in front of you as dreamy images of Kiara floated into your view. Her face changed as you imagined the various scenarios, none of them ending up well whether nice or angry. Desperately you wanted to confide in the girl, to have someone to talk this through with. But you knew that the anger that came with it would not help you work through what were beginning to be some very confusing feelings. For some reason you bargained with yourself, saying that the anger would be better. That it would give you a better sense of reality than this idea of Rafe could.

But then you looked around the screened-in porch and sighed, picking up a bandana that had been left on the chair nearest to the door. Of course you wouldn’t tell her. And you hated yourself for it. You wanted to hate yourself for liking Rafe as well. For liking the conversation you had with him in his car and for kissing him because you wanted to. But somehow you only hated how you didn’t hate yourself. You twirled the bandana between your fingers, thinking about how Rafe probably didn’t mean any of what he said. You figured he was bored and made it all up (although you doubted he would lie about Wheezie). You also doubted he was going to brag about a measly drunken kiss to any of his friends. It would be more likely he would never want to talk about fraternizing with a pogue ever again. If he did talk, he would say offhandedly that it was a mistake and that you were wrong about the whole situation. There was no worry this was going to escape Rafe’s lips and spread to the likes of the other Kooks of the Outer Banks. So really, the harm in telling Kie would have no benefit. It’s not like you were actually “in love” with Rafe Cameron now. It was a kiss. A crush from over a year ago. And it didn’t mean anything. Yes, you nodded to yourself as you held the bandana, wringing it in your hands. You were right, Rafe is an asshole, and pretending he’s not just for a night isn’t going to change his behavior. He’s going to keep being Rafe Cameron and wishing that he’d miraculously evolve into a better person won’t change that. There aren’t enough shooting stars in the world.

“Okay,” You breathed in, talking to yourself even though no one was around to hear (especially because no one was around to hear). “No Kie. Got it.” You looked down at the bandana in your hands and started smoothing it out against your thigh, and then folded and tied it into a headband. You figured it was JB’s and knew he wouldn’t mind if you borrowed it. Maybe you just needed to borrow John B’s assuredness for a day or so. Just as you did with JJ’s hat. JJ was right, maybe the feelings can transfer. You reached up to your head ready to retrieve your friend’s accessory and patted the top of your head. Shit. 

JJ’s hat was gone. Of course it was gone. By JJ’s logic, the hat held all the power. And all of his dumbassery. And you had been wearing it at the party. Then in the car. Where you kissed Rafe. Maybe the wrong trait was transferred? Is that possible? This is JJ logic that is being discussed here. 

You needed to get that hat back. 

Slipping the bandana over your head - because if there was anything to do when you need guidance was to follow JJ logic (please do not ever do this) - you pushed yourself into the kitchen hoping the bandana was leeching John B of all of his good qualities and in turn giving them to you. Sorry JB. 

__________________

The search for your phone was the first thing on your agenda. You liked to think that your friend, JJ, would remember to tell the other pogues that you had left the party. However, in his state, you doubted that he would be able to relay the message to your other friends. This would cause a problem if you weren’t able to reassure the worried pogues (once you found your phone) that you had not in fact been murdered on your way home and that you were as fine as you had ever been (leaving out the parts that weren’t convenient to your case). The hope was to find the phone before they even realized you were gone. The second, more inconvenient hope, was that you would be able to contact Rafe before anyone else found a certain Pogue’s infamous red and gray hat on the floor of his passenger seat.

You tried your hand between cushions and between spaces on the bookshelves. Then you even dared to look through some places in the messy kitchen, which no one had thought to clean up since the last misadventure in cooking. While you looked, you tried to clean up as best you could - being a good house guest and all - but it was mostly a lost cause (and technically some kind of torture). 

You usually tended to leave your phone in odd and awkward places, especially when hanging out with the Pogues…but this was crossing a line. You truly wanted to believe that it was somewhere obvious and you were just being stupid. For all you knew, it had fallen into the marsh from earlier in the day. 

Walking across the kitchen, you were finally ready to call it quits and sink yourself back onto the pull out couch in the next room when you heard it. You were hoping it had been your phone. But then more noise. Shuffling feet. What seemed like some very loud attempts at whispers. Sinking into the wall, blending in with the old wood as best you could, as if you were an intruder in the house, your hand instinctively went out to the table where misplaced cutlery were scattered and dirty (from what you assumed had been an attempt to make mac and cheese that had gone wrong). Pulling your hand back to your chest after successfully snatching one of the items, you felt a little calmer with a makeshift weapon. To fend off an intruder or drunk teenagers? Maybe both? You were easily on edge anyways.

So maybe you were drunker than you thought. You kept checking back in your head, how many drinks did you have? You couldn’t have thought it was that many, could you? Partier or not, drinking with JJ always loosened you up a bit. There was that game you two always played. What was it? Something about keeping track of drinks while betting to do more…you shook your head in defiance, he had made that up ages ago, it wasn’t an actual game set with actual rules. No way to be sure. But this did mean, if you were drunk, that you could blame the Rafe of it all on the alcohol.

“What are you doing?”

“AHHHHHHHhhhhh!” A scream jolted through your veins and through your mouth as you were disrupted from your scheme of blaming your “affliction” on your inability to hold your alcohol. Your weapon, now jutted out from your body towards the direction of the voice, suddenly looked weak as you realized it was a spatula. You looked up at where the sound came from and your eyes fell upon a familiar face. “Oh.” You said, suddenly disappointed you weren’t going to save The Chateau from uncertain death. “Hi, John B.”

Another face rounded the corner and entered the room, wiping at her hands with one of those souvenir towels JJ had stolen from the country club (don’t tell anyone). “Who was screaming?” Her face first found John B and then just as easily landed on you, with your spatula and her boyfriend’s bandana in your hair. You just hoped you didn’t look as suspicious as you felt you looked. 

The girl, who you hadn’t seen at Tannyhill, had her signature gold necklaces on and they gleamed softly even in the overhead lights of the kitchen. Her presence shook you a bit, as unexpected as it was to see an old friend you barely talk to arrive in the house of your new friend. It also surprised you to find she was wearing a shirt the two of you had picked out a couple years before. Yellow always looked so good on her, and you could tell she had barely been drinking as her skin faintly glowed with that morning’s tan.

It was a clear contrast to John B, who was in his signature pogue attire. His gray bandana hung loosely around his next and a button up hung on his shoulders with most of the top buttons undone. He looked so familiar and so comforting and so different than how the girl now felt to you. Which was foreign.

“And Sarah. Hey.” You looked between them wondering whether to be angry or glad they skipped the rest of the party and ended up at The Chateau with you. It crept into your mind that Kie would want you to be mad. Inviting Sarah into the pogues’ space, whether it be John B’s house or not, was almost sacrilege. It was making it real. But then, like a pang in your lower rib cage, Rafe entered your mind. That kiss. You weren’t allowed to be angry. You were doing the same, if not worse, to the pogues by getting in that car with Rafe. This was the time to be understanding. Maybe Kie wouldn’t understand at first, but you had to. You put down your spatula and leaned against the table where it had first been. “I was looking for my phone.” When the couple looked confused, you continued, “To answer your question, JB.” 

John B held back a little laugh, slowly realizing that you weren’t going to pummel him for having Sarah Cameron with him, “With a spatula?”

“I thought you were an intruder!”

“Yeah you were really gonna get me.” He let out a light laugh. He had been drinking too, but not enough to get shit-faced. He was in his happy little buzzed bubble and it definitely had something to do with the other girl in the room.

You could tell Sarah eased at her boyfriend’s laughter and the tension in the air shifted into something more comfortable as she spoke, “Why are none of the lights on? We thought no one was home.”

“I was conserving electricity! The kitchen light is on. Don’t act like your electricity bill it’s a worry of yours, Routledge.” You paused and then added, “I’m drunk, don’t expect me to have clear logic.”

John B stepped forward and made a show of feeling your forehead with the back of his hand, as if this would show definite proof, and said after he made a big shrug, “Results inconclusive. Drunk? Maybe. Stupid? Definitely.” You eyed him suspiciously, you knew John B well enough to know when his words were laced with something more. He was smart enough to keep whatever it was to himself with Sarah in the room, pogue business and all. That was a line you wouldn’t be able to let him cross. At least seeing as you didn’t cross it first. 

Absentmindedly, you pulled at your crop top as an anxious tick and then you poked an eye at Sarah quickly and changed the subject back to your phone, “Can you guys help me look while you’re here? I need to find it.”

John B muttered under his breath a short laugh that sounded like, “I’m sure you do.” While Sarah spoke up again, pulling out your phone from her back pocket, “We already did. Although, it is dead. I would think to be suspicious of you and John B, seeing we found this in his backpack but-” 

You cut the girl off, practically leaping into her arms, but you stopped yourself a few feet short and accepted the phone back like a normal person. You don’t usually leap into the arms of ex-friends unprompted. “Thanks, Sarah. Seriously.”

Sarah smiled but said, “Don’t thank me, JB totally saved the day. He grabbed your phone by mistake. It was in something called a ‘Twinkie’?”

You silently cursed JJ for doubting you. Of course you had dropped it in the Twinkie; who goes anywhere without their phone these days? 

“Well…” Sarah and John B started at the same time. And then it hit you. They left the party to come here thinking no one was home. Crap. You couldn’t just leave. Sure, you had your phone now but you also had at least some lecturing to do on Kie’s behalf. But your house on Figure Eight was far away on the other side of the island. You wouldn’t make it without being maimed. 

“Seems like I totally foiled your devious plans. That’s too bad.” You looked around awkwardly, trying to signal to John B that either he find somewhere else to snuggle up with Sarah or she hit the road. “Wait, how did you get here?” If they took the Twinkie, they’d have to circle back for the other pogues anyway. Win-win. 

“I drove.” Sarah answered. You internally groaned.

Sarah looked between you and the pogue leader. When she locked eyes with the boy there seemed to pass over them quickly, a silent understanding only a pogue would be able to pick up from watching the back of John B’s head. “But I have to get back anyway, Ward is going to be home tomorrow and I don’t want Wheezie to be the only one left cleaning up at Tannyhill.” You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding and wished you could give Sarah a hug. She was being too kind to you, but you’re sure John B had already prepped her on all of his friends (and to be kind to all of them - overtly so). She was being a good girlfriend, and a part of you wished you had been a better friend.

She hesitated before kissing John B lightly on the cheek and then she was gone. Her presence in The Chateau, only lingering by the smell of citrus and floral perfume.

Which left you alone with John B. Who didn’t look happy now that your buffer and his girlfriend had left the premises. And yet, you had only found out they were dating hours ago. Very normal, Y/N. Act cool.

________________________

John B spoke first after running his fingers through his hair. Not once. Twice. His voice was stern as he spoke, but it came out more as a whisper than actual words. “Your phone isn’t dead, by the way.” His words sounded heavy, more tired than mad. 

You looked at the glass brick in your hands, turning it over and holding the power button until the light on the screen flashed white and stayed that way. Heart beating in your chest, you chose to stay silent.

“When I found it,” John B started again, “We were already on the way home and it was going off like crazy.” You looked at him quizzically as he put his weight against the wall opposite you, leaning against the frame casually with his arms now crossed. “A lot were from JJ, just trying to make sure you had found your phone and that you had gotten home safe.” He paused and looked past you onto the ground where there was an old beer stain on the floor boards. “But another-”

“Was from Rafe.” You finished for him.

“Yeah.” He said, his lips in a straight line of disapproval. “I turned it off and told Sarah it had died before-”

“She could see.” You let out a little hum of defiance and turned your gaze as well to the beer stain near your feet. It looked like when Plankton from Spongebob got squished, eye and everything, and you wished you could smile at it. But here you were, caught and guilty before your only friend who would probably understand. And yet, the air felt stiff. As if the words that were being said hung in the air and made no room for anything else. You spoke again, feeling even worse at your choice of selfish words, “What did it say?”

John B let out his own huff and took in a deep breath, “What did you want it to say, Y/N?”

When you had looked up both your eyes met. His were lost and confused and yours were so similar. And yet the intention behind the feelings were so much different. You threw your hands up in defeat, “I don’t know John B. I don’t. I think I left JJ’s hat in his car so maybe-”

“You did what?” His eyes bulged, obviously surprised at your confession, then he shook his head slowly, “Let me backup. You were in his car?”

“You were in Sarah’s car.”

“That’s different.”

“Is it?”

“Sarah doesn’t torment pogues.”

You skipped over his statement and asked, “How did you think I got here?”

“By being responsible?” This time he was the one that held up his hands in defeat. “But clearly I was wrong.” He retorted, letting out a small and angry scoff. You didn’t drink and drive. You didn’t walk. You had been responsible. Heat boiled in your cheeks, and your arms shook a bit as you stood there so mad, no, angry, that he could break the rules and you couldn’t. That he could be angry with you, when you had shown understanding just minutes before. When you had agreed they would go to Tannyhill for him.

“I’m not allowed to kiss kooks but you are?!” Your hand went up to your mouth as John B’s eyes glared at you, burning tiny little holes into your own retinas. His scowl spoke more than enough words as you let out a soft, and sad, sentence, “What did the message say, John B?’

Your phone was heavy in your hand, but you wanted to hear the words come from the mouth of the pogue in front of you. You wanted to hear him say whatever made him despise your actions so much. 

Then it rang. High School Lover by Cayucas started bleating from your phone, playing mindlessly as the silence rang out between you and your friend, signaling that someone was calling you.

Despite John B’s heavy protesting look, you picked it up and answered, “Hello?” You sighed and then smiled at the receiver. JJ. He had somewhat recovered from his moldy bread fiasco and was checking up on you. “Yes, J, I’m fine. I’m with JB. I got home safe. No stay as long as you want. Seriously. We’re good. How’s Kie? Okay, good. Bye.” At least, that’s all that John B could hear of the conversation. You hung up the phone and looked at him pointedly, “What? Thought it was going to be Rafe?”

He held back a relieved smile with leftover crumbs of anger and said, “Yeah. A little.” Then as if he was lifting a weight from the room, John B stood up straight and walked over to the fridge, grabbing a case of beers and motioning you to the living room.

The call from JJ had changed the atmosphere. It had changed John B’s mind. Maybe it reminded him of something. Of what, you didn’t know, and clearly weren’t willing to ask and disrupt the soft and fragile balance of things. But something in him switched, and decided to possibly side with you. Did he sense the same shift in you when he arrived with Sarah? When you didn’t mention to JJ that Sarah had been here, as you would’ve if she was any other girl?

JJ had sent an unknowing olive branch between you and John B, and the world screamed at you to take it.

You stood still for a moment, watching him walk away with the peace offering. For a second you wanted to just drift off to sleep and to steep in your feelings as long as possible before having to actually deal with them. But then you thought better of yourself, you knew something deep down was dragging towards making a bad decision. A decision that would lead you towards the ‘King of the Kooks’, Rafe Cameron. And it was better to have an ally if life was going to go down that road. And some part of you already knew (deep deep deeeeep down) what you were going to choose. So you followed him into the living room, ready to sit down and have a ‘peace offering’ beer.

When you plopped yourself next to John B on the worn out couch, you smiled (a bit as your own peace offering) and chided him about the beers, “I don’t think drinking more will help us solve this.” The couch already smelled heavily of weed and had a few beer stains of its own. And yet it felt so much like home you wanted to wrap yourself in it. You were a pogue through and through. You could live on this couch, and you had in the past. It was something you had to get to know to love.

“I didn’t think you wanted to solve this.” He laughed a bit with a hint of sharpness to it, although the tension in his shoulders from earlier dissipating as he took a sip from the bottle.With ease, he relaxed into the couch and knit his eyebrows with his next comment, “What do you even see in him?”

Sighing, you fiddled with John B’s bandana which had remained on your head, “Ugh. Maybe nothing? Who knows. I don’t want to be one of those people that is all gushy over how ‘he’s really nice to me’ even if he’s a dick to everyone else.”

The boy reached over to the top of your head, pushed your fidgeting hands away and put the bandana back in its place. Instead of looking gentle, as the small gesture would have implied, he looked cocky with a small grin eating away at the corners of his mouth. “But that’s true, so…”

You punched John B hard on the arm, hoping it would knock some sensitivity into him for this conversation. “Yeah, okay? He’s attractive, that helps. But he’s also so, I don’t know…protective-”

“You mean possessive-” John B stopped you as you held up your fist again in a silent warning. “Hey, that first one hurt.”

“There’s a lot of things. He’s not easy. But maybe I don’t want ‘easy’. It’s not like we’re getting married. It was one kiss-” You didn’t want to confide too much in the boy. Especially not that you had thought about kissing Rafe many times before. You’d thought about how he needs someone to listen to him. Someone to care. You knew what that felt like.

The brunette across from you was now practically choking on his beverage while laughing, a pathetic excuse for karma. When he regained his wits, he said, “One? Here you had me thinking you guys had been hooking up for awhile-”

You felt your eyebrows furrow. Now that John B didn’t seem so openly vexed it was easier to be clear about your feelings. “What made you think that?”

“His message?” John B looked your clear confusion in the face and then grabbed your phone from your lap as if in a big show of victory. Unfortunately, he knew your password (all the pogues did at one point or another) and let himself into your phone. Then, as he turned the screen to show you there it was. Plain and simple. 

Rafe:

Can we meet tomorrow? Need to see you

Then below it:

I liked talking to you tonight

You snatched the phone from the boy’s hand and closed it in an act of simple humiliation. The first message clearly did sound like a hook up text, and yet you protested aloud, “That could mean anything.” The second message however, seemed foreign coming from its messenger. Too vulnerable. It seemed like something he thought you wanted to hear rather than something he would actually say. But the last few hours had warped your view of him somehow, and it felt more genuine than you would’ve liked to believe. You could feel yourself putting hope into this (whatever it was), and even you (pogue opinions aside) could tell that that wouldn’t be good. Guilt surged over you, for the fact that John B had read it when it was just meant for you. There was one thing you knew for a fact and that was that Rafe wouldn’t have said that if he knew he had an audience. 

“Not when I know for a fact you don’t text Rafe Cameron. Ever.”

“You didn’t even know it was reciprocated.”

John B smiled smugly, “I do now.” 

You hit him again (just for good measure) and grabbed yourself a beer.

______________________

Waking up the next morning was not what you had expected. You didn’t remember much after finally coming to a standstill with John B the night before but you did know you had one hell of a hangover. Your head pounded as if hammers lived excitedly in your brain. The first thing you noticed was that your futile attempts of covering the room with sweet perfumes had already been overtaken by the smell of weed. When you finally got up the energy to look around the room you found Pope was in bed with you, still clothed and probably as hungover as you were, snoring noisily. It looked like he had crashed here without thinking and still had an empty solo cup duct-taped to his left hand. Smiling, you watched as he slept for a moment watching his chest go up and down with his breath. He looked so peaceful sleeping there, totally passed out from drinking. This guy was going to change the academic world. You knew it. 

Then you groaned loudly as you tried to sit up, the bed creaky wildly underneath you (which led you wondering how JJ had gotten away with so many discreet hook-ups in this room), and still made an effort to not wake your sleeping friend. 

When you got to the doorway,  and it too creaked deeply as you opened it, you stole one last glance at the peaceful Pope. “Sleep tight.” You whispered, and closed the door. “Don’t let the admissions office bite.” Ha ha. Scholarship joke.

“What are you doing?” A voice sounded behind you.

Kie.

Turning around swiftly, you flew into the arms of your best friend and hugged her tightly both as a term of endearment and second to keep you from plummeting immediately to the floor after such a quick movement. Muffled into your hair, you heard her mumble, “Someone’s friendly today?” close to your ear.

While still keeping your hands on your friend’s shoulders, you pulled yourself away from the girl and steadied yourself from becoming woozy. The bathroom was too far to make it in time. “Just missed you. A lot happened.” Kie was wearing another one of her signature chokers and looked ready for the day. Her hair was put up into a messy bun and you could tell she had already been up for hours, which made you envious but mostly just because you felt so awful and already wanted to go back to sleep.

Her eyebrows raised, “Did it? I heard you left early. Get lucky? Score some free weed from a kook?”

Almost like a match being lit, you felt your eyes widen at your mistake. “No. I meant not a lot happened. It was very boring. All too much of the same. Little of this. Little of that.”

Kiara chuckled good-naturedly and pushed what was in her hands to your eyeline, ignoring your blubbering words. “Drink, Y/N/N.” She held up a very green mason jar you figured she had whipped up that morning. You liked green smoothies. You liked kale juice. All very good for you, and while it depended on the other ingredients, it usually tasted alright. This was not alright. And it was not a green smoothie or kale juice. When Kie opened the lid, the smell attacked your nostrils as if it were on a mission. Is this what Kie makes the boys drink after a party? Apparently you had never been drunk enough to need to go through with her little concoction. You were always very happy to let them drink their magic juice after downing too many plastic cups the night before and get on with the day’s activities. 

You could tell Kie had noticed your disgusted look because she added, “Seriously, drink up. It’s not as bad as it smells.”

She lied.

However, Kie was kind enough to help you change out of last night’s clothes and get ready for the day before JJ got back from early morning surfing. The sad thing was, she was actually able to make you look cute and presentable. You kept on the choker you had borrowed from her the day before and played with it on your neck as you struggled to keep down breakfast. “I think I’m dying.” You managed to croak out in between bites of cereal. You felt guilty just sitting there, letting her help you. Hopefully to Kie, it was just another day of picking up after the pogues, and she wouldn’t notice your additional Rafe induced moping.

At this moment, John B walked in freshly showered but still somehow smelling of beer, and said, “You look like it.” He still worked for the Cameron’s in the mornings and was already dressed and ready to make his way over there, Kiara hadn’t said anything about this arrangement, though she was probably thinking of something snarky.

You stuck your tongue at him and feigned shock, “And you don’t, surprisingly.” You were about to mention how maybe Sarah Cameron had this effect on him, but kept your mouth shut as Kie closed the fridge.

“Neither of you do, my magic is working.” Kie retorted. 

“And yet, the feeling has yet to go away.” Another groan from you.

This time, Kie and John B answered at the same time, “It will.”

John B made his way over to you while Kie was busy making another magic drink for Pope, when he finally awakened. “So, Y/N, are you going to pick up that important package today?” He coughed at the end as if to hide the words that had escaped his lips. Convincing John B, very convincing. 

At first, you were foggy, with sleep and the hangover you thought John B was being stupid. If you sent a package anywhere, it would be to your house in Figure Eight. The pogues would just rip it apart here, and to go pick it up someplace would just be a lot of work in the long run. “What are you talking about?” You spat back at the boy, still carelessly eating your cereal.

“The hat.” John B spoke through his clenched jaw and teeth.

“Oh.” You said plainly, thinking back and shifting through your hazy memories of the night before. 

“So are you?”

The magic juice suddenly did seem to be working as you shrugged and said, “I didn’t really think about it.” And yet your heart raced under your ribs as you silently panicked. See Rafe? Today? After a hangover like that? You scooped another dollop of cereal into your mouth before you could say more. 

“It’s important to-” He stole a glance at Kie who was still busy, “get it back before he notices. And he’ll notice when he’s done surfing.”

He was right. That was JJ’s lucky hat. It went everywhere. It had been on his head for years. It couldn’t just be claimed to be lost. It was important. JJ wouldn’t just let it be tossed aside. He would be crushed. That hat held JJ logic, JJ confidence, and JJ magic. You had to get it back.

Unfortunately, Rafe probably already torched it as a way to rid his car of anything ‘pogue’ that lingered.

“Clear my dishes, Routledge, I’ve got a call to make.” Just to be sure, you took one last bite of cereal before rushing off to the backyard where you could at least have the wind from the harbor offer you some privacy. 

“This isn’t a movie, Y/N/N, stop with trying to be cool.”

“Shut up.”

You heard Kiara ask where you were going as you exited, but John B backed you up with some bullshit story. It wasn’t good to lie, but it felt good to be a team. Anyway, it wasn’t unusual for the pogues to be bouncing around The Chateau like ping pong balls.

_____________________

John B’s backyard always felt more like home to you than your own home on Figure Eight. The wind always blew just right through your air, bringing with it the smell of the ocean. And now, as you stood outside fumbling with your phone the air sobered you while still throwing your hair a bit wildly around your head. Your favorite spot, in what was probably the whole world, was that old striped hammock. You watched it sway in the wind, left to right, as you dialed up Rafe’s contact.

Ring. Ring. 

Your phone pressed against your ear, you waited for Rafe to pick up the phone. Doubt stirred within you about whether he would actually answer your call (depended on whether last night was a fluke), but you had loose threads of hope. After getting outside, you had checked your phone and been reminded immediately of the texts Rafe had sent you the next before. He wanted to see you today, right? That meant answering his phone would likely be in the cards. 

He picked up on the fifth ring, right before it went to voicemail.

“Yeah?” The voice on the other end sounded preoccupied, and the thought of hanging up and fleeing back to Kiara and John B in The Chateau flit through your mind. Voices could be heard, muffled, in the background and the familiar gust of wind you were experiencing was also hitting his phone. 

“Hey, it’s Y/N.” 

Cautiously you waited for Rafe’s response on his side. You could hear he was saying something to someone on his side while covering the receiver of his phone, but it sounded a lot like, “Give me a minute, okay?” Then after a couple quick seconds he put the phone back up to his ear and did the best at showing emotion as the boy could with a plain, “Hey.”

Holding back an instinct to apologize, you simply asked instead, “Are you busy?” Feelings of vulnerability felt much more real and much more easily felt as the sun beat down on you in the open air. 

“No,” He answered quickly. And then, “I’m at the range with Top and Kelce.” A pause. “You never texted me back.” You could tell he felt it too. The vulnerability in the daylight. Although probably less so than you. But it was there in the way he talked. Gentle, and foreign to him. Last night had changed something between the two of you. Less angry and more…wanting. 

“I wanted to talk about that actually.” This time you paused. An uncertainty surrounded the both of you, connected through a phone on different sides of the island. “Plus, I left something important in your car and I definitely need it back.”

Rafe scoffed, “You mean Maybank’s hat? That’s important?” 

Suddenly, a wave of protective instinct flooded over you and you held your ground, “So you know what I’m talking about. Good. Glad we’re on the same page.”

“And what about the date?” Rafe’s voice was quieter when he said this, hoarse and a little bit of harshness hid his sensitivity. 

“What date?” 

“The one I texted you about.”

A laugh naturally came out of your mouth as he said this, “Is that what that was?”

A stern, “Yes.” He was now holding his ground. 

“I didn’t realize you were so bad at this, Cameron.”

“And I didn’t realize you were so annoying, Y/L/N.”

“No no keep going, this is really giving you points.” You meant to sound at least half as menacing as he did, but it came out with a laugh. A giggle. Anyone else listening could’ve sworn you were twirling your hair on the other end of the phone. 

You heard him shake his head through the phone and held back another smile. “I can’t just ask you out in those plain words, don’t forget who our friends are, Y/N.” Your smile loosened. He was right. John B had already seen the texts. Now imagine Topper. Or Kelce. Or Kie. JB had just assumed the two of you were hooking up, which was one thing altogether. But dating. It’s too intimate, no matter how far it’s gone. 

“Are you ashamed of me?” You made sure to let out a laugh with the question to keep it light-hearted, but you genuinely wanted to know his answer. Although, you doubted he would tell you the truth. This could all be a well thought out ruse for all you knew. You pictured the kooks laughing at you. The fact that you thought Rafe was genuinely interested.

“A little.” Rafe held back a smile at this. “You?”

“Oh, ashamed of you? Definitely.”

“Ha. Ha.”

“Rafe-”

“Yeah.” Not a question. 

“This isn’t a good idea.” There was a part of you that needed to say this. That needed to scream from the rooftops. That needed to get the sense knocked into your head because here you were having a playful conversation with Rafe Cameron. 

He let a laugh out of his nose, careful not to alert his friends. “Yeah, okay. Meet me at Tannyhill at noon.” Then, before you could say anything. “Don’t worry, Sarah won’t be home so she won’t be able to tell anyone.”

Then he hung up.

Shit.

Major shit.

Were you going to go? Of course you were.

☆taglist: @totallynotkaibiased @asimpwriter @kriss-harrington @parkershoco @the-marvellous-vivi @sarahlizzie @craftyalmondghostflap @siriuslysmoking

[tommyspeakycap]

again, your new john stones fic blew me away!!! Amazing. Please feel free to write about him all day every day!! <3

thank you again!! here’s another sweet one inspired by my own 1am experience tonight :) i wish I had a john stones

My hero

Your heart is quite literally thundering in your chest. There’s no feeling like it, this kind of fear that sticks you to the ground beneath your feet. You honestly feel like you can’t catch your breath, tears streaking down over your flushed cheeks as you hold your phone in your right hand with trembling fingers, one thumb finally letting go of the little microphone shaped drawing in your iMessages app. Even the whooshing sound of the message you knew was about to send to your best friend catches you off guard, making your shoulders clench and raise in fright.

“Are you seriously alright??”

She texts back, her confusion and teasing is something you know is laced into those letters across the screen creating a glow in the dim room. You roll your eyes at her, trying to keep your vision up while sending another voice note back; “No, seriously. Why does this only ever happen when I’m alone??”

“Probably because you live alone?” She replies back, and you curse yourself for a choice of friends who clearly have no empathy for what you consider to be a very serious situation. You know you won’t hear the end of this teasing once it’s all over. But the fear to you is all too real.

“(Y/n) I got your text! Came right here, are you alright?”

The sudden voice makes you literally clench your entire body, nearly shooting off the floor in fright and making one of those internalised fear noises that sounds like you just been attacked with a taser. You hear keys dropping down by the door and then a pause of his footsteps as you try to catch your breath. Your heart swells a little at the thought of him being here.

“John!” You yelp, your voice coming out something more like a strangled cry. The tall defender hears that sound and finds himself in panic, those long legs carrying him quickly and easily up the stairs of your small home until he spots you standing now in the doorway of your bedroom. He rushes towards you, seemingly checking you over for potential injuries the best he can in the darkness only broken by the lowest setting of flashlight on your phone. The first thing he notices when checking over your face with his hands is the wetness still making its way over your cheeks.

“Are you alright? what happened? Is there someone in there? Are you okay? Did someone hurt-“

You cut off his rambling with a finger over his lips, creating even more confusion for the fluffy haired brunette who had very clearly rolled himself out of bed to hurry over here. He was wearing shoes without socks, dirty shorts from training that he’d thrown off before going to bed only to pull back in to come to your, and an old sweater that usually sat somewhere downstairs in the closet closest to the door. It was obvious he had come in a wild rush the second he got your erratic message.

“It’s a wasp, John!” You whisper, as if the little creature that sitting on your lightbulb unwilling to move from the place you couldn’t reach and wouldn’t dare to even if you could, was able to hear you.

“A wasp?” John repeats incredulously. “Seriously?”

You nod vigorously, and and as much as the exhausted footballer wants to complain or even sigh at you, he doesn’t. Maybe he can’t. Because he’s got his arms around you and he definitely can feel you quivering against him. He had expected something more along the lines of a one night stand gone wrong or even someone breaking it, but as his consciousness began to catch back up with his previously very sleepy self, it made a lot more sense. In the event of a break in, you would probably have been bloody calmer than you are now to be honest. John had seen you after a pretty dangerous car crash completely still and relatively calm as you gave statements to police officers with blood still trickling down your face. But put an insect in your path and you scaled the closest thing to you for protection.

It just so happened that closest thing was often John Stones, and he was happy to be that person really.

It has become a norm between the two of you in the years you had been friends. Winter was the worst for spiders, but he generally didn’t mind the mildly irritating insects. He just got rid of them one way or another while you hid as far as you could get and then he’d come get you when the coast was clean. But you hated summer for this particular reason.

Wasps.

They fly in, fly into things and somehow never make it back on the window on their own despite it being the most easy thing one could ever imagine. Then, they try and sting you as if they aren’t in your house. They just creep you out, even the sight of them with their nasty little bodies. Bees aren’t a problem, they’re fuzzy looking and don’t intrude in your home nearly half as much. Also, they don’t try to sting you all the damn time.

“Where abouts?” He asks, his voice showing no hint of any destain or irritation he may harbour. “On the light,” you tell him shakily, following close to him back as you both enter the room. “Right up there- careful!”

John sniggers a little to himself, much to your dismay. He kicks off his shoes by your bedside table and climbs up onto the bed with ease on those ridiculously long legs. By luck, chance or both, he has some toilet paper in his hoodie pocket that he’d probably used to wipe his nose or something like that earlier, he can’t remember. He holds it out at arms length, only inches away form the unsuspecting black and yellow insect. “Where?” He asks again, “I can’t see anything.”

“There!” You insist, pointing up with a shaking finger. “I don’t see anything (y/n).” He repeats, making you whimper slightly, more tears suddenly appearing as you try to come to terms with the fact it might’ve moved while you were outside the room. The thought of having to sleep in your house while not knowing where it was would send you absolutely mental. “It was there I swear, look-“

“Ahhh, I got it. Stand back.”

He leans forward with relative ease, careful with the force he used so close to a live electric source and grips the buzzing creature in his tissue. “There we go,” he hums, stepping down from the bed. “All go-“

As if on cue, it flies out of the paper and you let loose a literal shriek as you dive backwards, crashing into the wall and then jumping forward in fright at that. “Woah!” John calls, “it’s alright, it’s right there. Calm, calm. Take a deep breath. Look,” he tries to calm you. That deep accent with his fatigue coating each word seeps into you, carefully calming your firing heart as he grabs it tighter from the floor, making sure he squashed it this time and immediately takes it to flush it down the toilet. John doesn’t know if you’re supposed to kill them or not, but at this moment in time he genuinely does not care. Was he fuck going to chase a wasp out of a window at half past one in the morning. Not a chance.

When he returns from the bathroom now empty handed, you still seem upset.

“That was scary.” You announce.

John smiles, pearly whites all on display. “I noticed.” He teases, making you scowl tiredly at him.

That scowl falters when his smile breaks into a light, soft laugh and he moves to stand in front of you. You absolutely don’t mind the fact that he’s babying you a little, using the sleeves of his sweater to wipe your cheeks before pressing a gentle kiss to your forehead and taking you into his strong arms. In fact, it’s very much welcomed. His arms are the safest place in the world to you and even the residual discomforted shivers from the concept of a wasp in your bedroom couldn’t get through that defender. He looks after a lot more than just the Manchester City goal line. No, he’s the sole defender of something much more precious that he doesn’t even realise.

Your heart.

“You okay now?” He asks softly, his tired voice rumbling through you. You nod against him, “Feeling a bit better. Thank you Stonesy.” You mumble, words muffled by the muscled chest that your face his resting against. “Anything for you, lovely.” He responds easily, pulling back from you in a way that aches his heart. The sudden lack of your warmth and presence against him is utterly brutal. He loves holding you, but hates it in the same breath. He would love to hold you if it was something he got to do freely instead of fleetingly.

His eyes are stuck watching you sit down on the edge of your bed to grab your phone and check the time with an element of shock rolling through your eyes when you realise it’s nearly two.

“You got training tomorrow?” You ask sweetly, a yawn following the tail end of your words adorable in a way that makes John’s heart flutter like a teenage boy. He nods, “Not till after dinner though, around 5.”

It’s your turn to nod, seeming to be chewing over something in thought as you lie down in the middle of your bed.

“Wanna stay then?”

John has to pretend to think about it at least a little bit so he doesn’t look like he’s jumping right up at the opportunity, which is exactly what he wants to do. “Why not,” he shrugs, chucking off his hoodie to the foot of your bed, “Scoot over.”

He clambers in, long limbs moving nowhere near as coordinated as they are on the pitch as he lays down by your right. It’s like a familiar dance, one you both know so well as you shuffle around so you can lay against his chest, one leg hooked over him as his arm wraps around you to pull you even closer. A silence falls between you as he feels your eyelashes fluttering shut, tickling his chest. He can’t find that same relaxation, can’t seem to shut his eyes for the thoughts flying through his mind all at once.

“I should teach you how to catch them.” John states, rumbling voice interrupting the peaceful quiet in which you had nearly found sleep. “You know, for the future.” He adds almost flippantly. Almost.

“Why?” You hum groggily, sleep croaking your voice ever so slightly. “I got you.”

John has to pretend your half asleep admission doesn’t send his heart flying into his throat. You do always have him, right there in the palm of your hand. Always.

“I don’t think other guys would appreciate me barging into their house in the middle of the night.” He suggests, making you quirk an eyebrow in question, but you still don’t look up at him and he isn’t even sure if you’ve got your eyes fully open. “No other guys here,” you state, “Single, living all alone.” You add lazily. The words almost make John wonder if he has fallen asleep, each one spoke playing straight into the dream he’s had for years for you to be his.

“Yeah, I know but…but there will be, at some point.” He suggests. You give no response for a moment and he briefly thinks you’ve fallen asleep at some point in this conversation.

“Bet those other guys wouldn’t come get rid of wasps for me in the middle of the night like you do.”

“Maybe,” John shrugs, “but I think there’s plenty of guys like that, especially for you.”

He feels you shake your head against him, your words decisive as you speak;

“There are no guys like you, John Stones.”

His words and his breath are caught on his throat, his heart erupting in his chest as he replays those words in his mind, trying to figure out if he had actually just heard them or if his tired mind was playing tricks on him because it was so late and he hadn’t had enough sleep.

But then you look up at him with tired eyes and a sweet smile. You know what you’ve just done, know the bomb you’ve just dropped and you’re hoping with everything crossed that he feels the same way.

“You’re my hero, Stonesy.” You say softly, your voice now a little sheepish and he can barely just make out the flush of your cheeks in the dim room lighting. “And I love you with everything I have.”

He doesn’t know what to say, his eyes wide as his heart beats as erratically as he had felt yours beating when he first arrived with fear coursing through his veins thinking you were in some kind of mortal peril.

“John?” You ask timidly, voice sheepish as you sit up in fear.

“Sorry,” he rumbles, pushing himself to a seated position, allowing him to lean forward and slide his hand around the back of your head to pull you into him, your lips crashing down onto his.

It’s just about everything he’s ever wanted.

“God I love you.” He says against your lips, a groan leaving his throat from pure satisfaction, pure relief of finally getting those words off of his chest. You giggle, resting back against his chest. “Can we sleep now, please?”

He nods, both of you shuffling so you can resume the position you had been in before a life changing confession that had spun you and the Barnsley brunette into the kiss that had been years in waiting. This was the happiest either of you had probably ever been.

“Guess we have the wasps to thank for this eh?” John lulls just as sleep is about to encompass you. He feels you shiver against him, the hairs on your arms immediately raising to attention at the mention of that which you hate so much.

“Don’t say that! That’s basically an invitation for them to invade my house!” You hiss, giving his chest a gentle swat as he pulls you closer to his side.

“Let them come,” he says almost triumphantly, “You got me now, always.”

You cosy yourself against him, a soft sigh of complete content and comfort tickling his chest as it dances across him. He feels that gentle smile that settles onto your gestures as your heavy eyes allow sleep to truly begin to take you.

“Always,” you mumble, words diluted by sleep “My hero.”

[blinder-secrets]

Count For Me

tommy x anxious reader, 2164 words

a/n: i’m not gonna say the reader is having a panic attack specifically, more that they’re experiencing a lot of anxiety, so take that with a pinch of salt pls. i’m not suggesting this is how all anxiety feels or that it can be alleviated like this every time, im just basing it on my own experiences so enjoy!

You’re sat in the kitchen, or rather, the stairwell to the kitchens. You had every intention of making it there, of sitting at the large oak table in the fore-room, and having tea. Bread. Of letting Frances relax and serving yourself. But, instead, you’re on the last step down, legs bouncing on the balls of your feet.

It can only be described as fretting, incessant worry; your mind is agonising over things already done, over what’s to come next. It isn’t guns, or business, or family arguments that’s got you. It’s something invisible. Unknown, but biting away regardless. It’s sitting on the step and thinking about everything, and nothing — it’s losing yourself entirely, feeling the hand tighten around your throat, the dread, the weight of it in your chest. You sit and you feel afraid. After all you’ve seen in the world, all you’ve been through with Tommy. It’s your own head that works itself against you now, your own commentary that rots your mind in the quiet moments. Fuck. If you said it aloud they’d laugh you out the room. If you told Pol she’d say you were sick, that you needed air and spirits, and none of this Shelby wreckage to pull you down.

‘In the kitchen, Sir.’

Oh, Christ, Tommy’s home. You hear him, direct and toward where you're hiding. From his footsteps, it seems like he’s coming from the opposite wing, so he’ll make it into the kitchen before you ever did.

He calls your name through the hallway. It bounces off the cool tiles.

‘I’m here, Tommy,’ you say back in a false tone; you dread him finding you more than the rest of it.  

You’ve got maybe a minute to collect yourself, but from the way your feet are sinking through the stone of the floor beneath you, that’s not going to happen. He arrives in the kitchen, says your name again. He can’t see you from where he is.

‘On the stairs,’ you tell him.

Once he’s in front of you, your energy spikes. It’s easier to ignore the feeling when you’re with him. He tucks it away for you, somewhat, just a bit. ‘What is it?’ he asks, shaking his head slightly, his lips parted. A cigarette leaks smoke from between his fingers. He’s taken his coat off, but the jacket’s still there. Still dressed like he could leave again at any moment.

‘Nothing.’ You smile. ‘Are you back now?’

‘For now,’ he answers. He steps forward, places the back of his hand against your forehead. ‘Are you sick?’

‘No. Just wanted to sit somewhere.’

He doesn’t believe you, he knows you too well. You still your knees but they’re bouncing again before you can offer an explanation.

‘Tell me,’ he insists, clueless.

Where do you start? What could you possibly say that would make sense. I was going to make lunch, Tommy, but then I sat down here and I couldn’t get up again. ‘Nothing,’ you repeat, pausing to force a swallow. ‘I don’t know, really.’

He takes a drag. On the exhale, he offers the smoke to you, silent but willing to help. You shake your head; it’s not your habit, it doesn’t calm you like it does with him.

‘Has something happened?’ he asks. He’s patient, waiting for you to give him a way in, prepared to go slow when you need it.

‘No, nothing’s happened.’ Nothing you knew of. You were doing fine, going about the day like normal, and then suddenly you weren’t. It had already swamped you before you realised it was coming. ‘It’s just my head,’ you say, forcing the words over a breath that hadn’t quite made it. ‘I think it’s out to get me, Tom.’

He sighs. His lips pour smoke onto the tiles as he looks down. Another stress for him: you sat on his shoulders like the rest of it did, weighed him down without meaning to. You feel yourself rock forward, your head pulling into your chest, like there’s string attached from your chin to your heart and now it’s constricting. ‘Sorry,’ you pant, though you may have said it in your head. It could’ve been a thought amongst the sea and you wouldn’t have known. Sorry for the stress, Tommy, sorry for it all.

‘Hey,’ he says, repeating it firmly after a pause. ‘Hey. Look at me.’ His hand goes to your face, fingers leading your chin upwards until your gaze is on him. ‘Whatever it is, it’s just noise, alright? Just shit in the trough.’

Your lids drop a fraction. ‘Tommy…’

‘No.’ He shakes his head. ‘You’re here, with me, right, in the kitchen. Don’t let it pull you under.’

You don’t want to. You’re scanning him, looking for something to ground you, the gold of his cufflink, the button of his waistcoat. Nothing sticks. You’re trying to focus but it’s splitting your attention again. Filling your head with the noise, the pull, the drag. ‘I think I’m going mad,’ you say. Your head’s so tight you can’t make sense of it.

His brows draw together. You focus on the crease in the skin between them. ‘What is it?’ he asks. ‘Eh? What’s worrying you so much?’

‘I don’t know,’ you answer honestly. It sounds like a plea but it’s all you can give him.  

You feel like a horse on the track; everything’s past you, behind you, loud in the stands and betting against you. There’s a worry to your left but it’s overtaken by the one on your right. So much at once, too often and too fast to know which is the biggest problem, which is the one causing the damage. If you could pluck something out, you would. If you could tell him, it’d be the first thing you did. There isn’t an answer to his question that doesn’t just make it worse — the more you try to put a name to it, or explain, the harder it gets to breathe. You can feel your heartbeat in your wrists.

Swearing, you drop your head again like it’s a lead weight, letting his fingertips drag up your cheek with the motion. ‘I can’t tell,’ you say weakly. ‘Feels like I’m drowning.’ 

The ring you’re wearing sits loose on your index finger; you spin it around the knuckle nervously, forcing a shallow breath each time the ruby completes a loop. If you look at him again you might cry. He didn’t ask for this, he didn’t know what to do with you anymore than you knew yourself.

Clearing his throat once, Tommy puts the cigarette between his lips and bends to grab you with both hands. He takes you by the elbows, thumbs tight on your arms, and pulls you to your feet before you have room to complain. You try to avoid his gaze, but his head ducks and chases your eyes until you give in.

‘Listen,’ he starts. He takes the cigarette out, blows the smoke away before he talks. ‘I won’t let you, alright? No-one’s drowning here.’ He looks certain, dedicated, his eyes dig through yours and back into the noise. ‘There’s nothing going on in there that we can’t sort. Okay?’

You want to believe him, so you nod. The next breath you take swells your chest into his.

‘Come here,’ he says briskly, pulling you after him as he walks you deeper into the kitchen. ‘When we were in France—stand there.’ You’re put by the table. He goes to the nearest drawer, pilfering through the silverware as he continues, ‘When we were in France, they told us we had to count.’

‘Count?’

‘To still our hands.’ He turns, pushing the drawer shut with his hip, and files through the forks he’s now holding. ‘Bullets, cards. Saw John counting his teeth once.’

You blink like it’ll help you listen. Everything he’s saying is going in, but bouncing back again. It rattles in your ear canal like coins down a well.

‘Here,’ he says, offering them to you. ‘Count them.’

You hesitate. Then he grabs your wrist, sets your palm straight, and pours the cutlery into it.

‘Go on.’

Mumbling an agreement, you turn to the table and put the first fork onto the wood. One. Two. You hope he doesn’t notice the slight shake along your fingers, the clumsiness as you pass forks from one hand to the other.

‘Do it out loud,’ he guides, as he stands beside you. He exhales, dragging it out and pushing the smoke over your shoulder; you’d forgotten he even had one lit.

‘Three,’ you say. ‘Four.’  

All those cigarettes. Lips barely his unless there’s one between them. They’ll get him one day, you think. The cough will get worse and then it’ll be you, on your own in this big house, you looking after Charlie, you with the ache and the grief and the silence.

‘Stop thinking,’ he chides. ‘Count.’

‘Five, six, seven.’ You sigh. The forks clatter on top of one another. ‘Eight, nine. This is stupid, Tommy. Ten.’ You turn to him, expectant of something else, something more helpful.

He just raises his eyebrows, gesturing for you to pick them up again. ‘Now do it over.’

‘Again?’

He nods. The cigarette is extinguished, flicked to the floor and crushed between his sole and the tile. ‘You do it again, and again,’ he lists, ‘until it feels like you can breathe.’

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

It takes four rounds of it before your chest loosens; four tens, over and over, forks placed down and picked up again as you count. He stands in silence the whole time, his hands in his pockets, his eyes on the table. How he doesn’t tire of it, you don’t know. He clears his throat occasionally but doesn’t say anything until you break the rhythm.

‘I think it’s worked,’ you mumble, taking care as you set the last fork down. ‘I feel better.’

It’s not all gone, but you feel calmer. Stiller. Your hands aren’t as jittery and the room feels big again, cold and empty and utilitarian.

He sighs, heavily, thankfully. The noise loud and partnered with a rough tone. ‘Alright,’ he says. He clicks into motion, pulling his hands free and turning to you so that he can bracket them around your face. His fingers are rough, warm, grounding. The rings stamp your cheeks, cold like ice. ‘What did I say, eh? Nothing we couldn’t sort.’

You smile limply and put a hand to his wrist. ‘Thank-you, Tommy.’

You hadn’t expected him to break through it, to make you pause. Breathe. It’s usually the other way around, you calming him. You sifting through the muck. It had never crossed your mind that it would work in reverse.

‘Next time,’ he says quietly, ‘you tell me.’ His chin dips a fraction, blue eyes laced with intent. ‘You tell me as soon as it get’s too much, alright?’

‘Okay,’ you promise, nodding between his palms. ‘Sorry.’

His lip tweaks slightly. ‘What have you got to be sorry for?’ he asks. Then he tilts up to kiss your forehead and, pulling back, utters ‘my silly girl’ under his breath.

You can’t smile. The question almost loses you again. You have plenty to be sorry for, you think, handfuls of apologies shoved into each corner of your brain. ‘Let’s do something,’ you say quickly, chasing the scatter away. ‘Distract me, please.’

He kisses you, lips firm and sure against yours in an agreement, a promise. ‘I have something to show you,’ he says afterwards. His grip on your face drops and he takes a hand instead, fingers curling around your palm. ‘The new horse is here.’

‘It is?’ You cling to him, put your free hand around his bicep and pull tight to his side like the closeness will help. He looks at you like he understands. ‘Well, show me then,’ you push, almost able to smile into it. ‘She was pretty from what I remember.’

‘Very pretty,’ he agrees. ‘Come on.’

You follow him through the house and across the drive. He doesn’t stop talking the whole way, which is unlike him, but he knows any silence will just cause you to slip again, to overthink until you’re tumbling. You answer his questions, dumb as they are, like he doesn’t already know the answers. You tell him what you had for breakfast, what you read in the paper. He asks, and he drawls, and he comments on the bloom of the roses as you pass them. He keeps going and going, until you’re so wrapped up in him, and the house, and the world outside, that everything else falls quiet. Peaceful. He fills your head with his own voice and you thank him for it. You thank him, and you hold on like it’s the only thing keeping you above the water.

‘You alright?’ he asks, checking once you’ve reached the stables.

‘Yes, Tom.’ You smile, meaning it. ‘I’m with you, remember?’

[maxwell-grant]

What’s the difference between a pulp hero and a super hero?

There is a common sentiment when discussing pulp heroes, when compared to superheroes, that positions the two as if they were separate by entire eras, with pulp heroes being as distinct from the superheroes as the dinosaurs are to mankind. But then again, the dinosaurs never really went away, did they? 

Oh sure, they endured a great extinction, they downsized and ceded their thrones to the tiny little rats that scurried in their shadow, who then grew to become just as big, and then even bigger, but they never went away. They simply adapted into new forms and formed new ecosystems. We call them birds now.

The gap between Superman and The Shadow is merely 6 years, hardly much of a generation. There are those that argue that the Marvel and DC universes still have pulp heroes, that Batman is (or was) one, that characters like The Question and Moon Knight carry on the tradition. We have characters like Hellboy, Grendel, Tom Strong and Zack Overkill as original, modern examples of pulp characters, strongly identified as such. Venture Bros had in 2016 the best modern take on the Green Hornet. Lavender Jack is still going strong. So the idea that pulp heroes are defined solely by being old and outdated isn’t exactly true, when clearly there’s still enough gas in the tank centuries later for stories with them to be told.

Is there any meaningful distinction between pulp heroes and superheroes? If not, can we identify one?

Costume is definitely a big part of it, as Grant Morrison famously argued in his own summation. Of what he considers the big difference between the two: 

“What makes the superhero more current is the performance aspect. That's what The Shadow and those other guys don't really have. Their costumes are not bright, and they don't have their initials on their chest, and everything isn't out front and popping like the superheroes. I think we can relate to that about them because in the world we live in, everyone has a constant need to be a star. I think superheroes are keyed into that parallelism. They're performers. They're rock stars, and they always have been.

And he’s right, to an extent. It’s definitely tied into the central differences between The Shadow and Batman, as I’ve elaborated. While The Shadow was far, far from the only type of pulp hero, the superhero’s costume has long been defined as THE thing that sets it apart from every other type of fictional character. At least, when it comes to American superheroes. 

Because the “criteria” for superheroes is nowhere near as set in stone as some would like to believe. Our basic definition of superheroes is based around comparisons and contrasts to Superman and Batman, and how they fit into what we call “the superhero genre”. The existence of a superhero genre is, in and of itself, debatable, and any working definition for superheroes is inevitably going to have too many exceptions. 

Superheroes are not defined by settings, like cowboys or spacemen, or their profession, like detectives. They can’t be defined by superpowers (Batman), a mission statement, having secret identities (Fantastic Four, Tony Stark), being good people, or good at their jobs. The costume, the closest there is to a true, defining convention, still has a considerable share of exceptions like Jack Knight’s Starman, a great deal of the X-Men who do not wear uniforms, or most superheroes created outside the US. The most basic definition of superhero is of comic book characters with iconic costumes and enhanced abilities who fight villains in shared superhero universes, but even that falls short of exceptions by including characters who are not superheroes (John Constantine and other Vertigo characters, Jonah Hex, the Punisher). Some people would call Goku or Harry Potter or Lucky Luke or Monica’s Gang superheroes, Donald Duck has literally been one. “Character with a distinctive design and unusual talents who fights evil” includes virtually every fictional hero that’s ever achieved a modicum of popularity in a visual medium.

Even telling stories with super characters doesn’t mean you’re going to be writing a superhero story (Joker). Superheroes are not defined by settings and genres, but they can inhabit just about any of them you can imagine. Horror, westerns, gritty crime drama, historical reconstruction, romance, space adventure, war stories, surrealism stories. As Morrison put it, they aren’t so much a genre as they are “a special chilli pepper-like ingredient designed to energize other genres”, part of the reason why they colonized the entire blockbuster landscape.

Aviation became a thing in the war years, so they started producing en masse aviation pulps as a subgenre. Zeppelins became popular, so they had a short-lived zeppelin subgenre. Celebrities starred in their own magazines. The American pulps were different from the German pulps, or the Italian pulps, or the Canadian pulps. In China, wuxia arose at a similar time period and with similar themes and distribution. In Brazil, we have “folhetos”, short, poetic, extremely cheap prose often written about romantic heroes and “cangaçeiros”, the closest local equivalent to the American cowboys. In Japan, “light novels” began life as pulp fiction, distributed in exactly the same format and literally sold as such. Pulp fiction has long outlived any and all attempts to define it as 30s literary fiction only.

Likewise, “pulp” and “pulp heroes” are terms employed very, very loosely. Characters like The Shadow and Doc Savage arrived quite late in the history of pulp fiction. You had characters like Jimmie Dale, Bulldog Drummond, Tarzan, Conan, a billion non-descript trenchcoat guys, and before those the likes of Nick Carter and Sexton Blake, dime novel detectives who made the jump to pulp. You had your hero pulps, villain pulps, adventure pulps, romance pulps, horror pulps, weird menace pulps. Science fiction, planetary romance, roman-era adventures, lost race adventures, anything that publishers could sell was turned into pulp stories starring, what else, pulp heroes. 

How do you make sense of it all?

The main difference to consider is the mediums they were made for. 

Pulp heroes were made for literature, superheroes were made for comic books.

Superheroes NEED to pop out visually, to have bold and flashy and striking designs, because comic books are visual stories first and foremost, who live and die on having attractive, catching character designs and the promise of an entertaining story with them. Pulp heroes, in turn, can often just be ordinary dudes and dudettes and anything in between in trenchcoats or evening wear or furry underwear, or masters of disguise rarely identifiable, because the only thing that needs to visually striking at first glance in a pulp magazine is the cover, so your imagination can get ready to do the rest. Smoking guns, bloody daggers, a romantic embrace, monsters hunched over ladies in peril, incendiary escapes. The characters can look like and be literally anything.

Comic books are a sequential art form where art and writing come together to tell a story, and every illustration must serve the story and vice-versa. It needs to give you an incentive to keep being visually invested in whatever’s going on. Pulp literature stays dead on the page unless animated by your expectations; you may have the illusion of submitting to an experience, but really it’s you expending your imagination to otherwise inert signals. You have to provide the colors and flashy sequences and great meaning yourself, and as a trade, you get much more text to work with in novels than you do in comic books, where the dialogue and narration are fundamentally secondary to the visual, whether it’s a superhero punching stars or a monster covered in blood.

Each art form has its strengths and weaknesses, of course, which are only accentuated when each tries to be of a different kind. There's been pulp heroes that tried making the jump to comics, and comic heroes that made the jump to literature. There’s good, even great examples, of both, but even at their best, there's always some incongruity, because that's not the medium these characters were made for. 

Superheroes are characters defined by being extraordinary. The pulp heroes are too, in many cases, distinguished from their literary antecessors because they were too uncanny and weird, a middleground between the folklore/fairy tale heroes and the grounded detective and adventure characters such as Sherlock, and the later far out superheroes. But they don’t necessarily have to be extraordinary. Sometimes they can very well just be completely ordinary characters, caught in bizarre circumstances and managing them as best they can, or simply using skills available to anyone who puts in effort to do good. Often enough the extraordinary comes in the form of a bizarre villain, or a tangled conspiracy, a monster from outside the world, a unique time period. The extraordinary is there, but it doesn’t have to be in the hero. 

That is, I’d argue, the other big fundamental difference between the two. "Superhero” is a name we use to define a type of character who fits an extraordinary mold, a Super Hero. It’s a genre, it can be every genre, it’s a shared universe and a stand-alone epic. There are guidelines, structures at work here. Grids, page count, illustrators. The Big Two and their domain over the concept. Academic usage of the term, standards that rule the “genre”, when it is defined as a genre. Malleable and overpowering and adaptable and timeless as the superhero may be, it’s still bound by a certain set of rules and trends.

The term “pulp hero” is a term that we use to label just about any character that happens to star in something we recognize as “pulp fiction”, even if it isn’t literally written in pulp, even if it’s decades later. It’s a “metaphor with no brakes in it”. Superheroes can be pulp heroes. The most powerless, unlucky, homeless bum can be a pulp hero, there were entire subgenres of pulp stories based on homeless protagonists or talltale stories told in bars. The cruelest villain can be a pulp hero. Boris Karloff about to stab you with a knife named Ike IS a pulp hero, and so is a space slug on a warpath (look up what happened when Lovecraft and R.E Howard collaborated).

As much as I may dislike the idea of pulp heroes largely only existing in the shadow of superheroes nowadays...that is kinda appropriate, isn’t it? Of course they are going to live and make their homes in the place where the sun doesn’t shine. Where Superman and co would never go to. 

Of course the 90s reboots of these characters failed. Because they tried turning these characters into superheroes, and they are not superheroes. They can visit those world, but they don’t belong in them, or anywhere else. They live in places where the light doesn’t touch, worlds much bigger and darker and more vast than you’d ever think at first glance, worlds that we still haven’t fully discovered (over 38% of American pulps no longer exist, 14% survive in less than five scattered copies, to say nothing of all pulps and pulp heroes outside of America). Not lesser, not gone, despite having every reason to. Just different, reborn time and time again. The shadow opposites.

In short: One is represented by Superman. The other is represented by The Shadow. There are worlds far beyond those two, but when you think of the concepts, those are the ones that things always seem to come back to.

[butgilinsky]

babysitting // ph

warning; alcohol ig

summary; where you and pope meet at a party, completely sober and looking for your drunk friends.

word count; 2.1k+

this is for @popeheywards​ pope appreciation week! i gotta give my bby all the love he deserves, so here’s day one (fluff) of pope week(: 

prompt from this list: A and B met at a party, completely sober, and they hit it off super quickly, but everyone else is drunk, so after getting everyone home safely, they exchange numbers, promising to meet up next time they’re both invited to a party

thank you to @mdlyncline​ for convincing me to post this  (:

you had just finished pouring yourself another cup of cranberry juice, opting out of the alcohol for the nth time tonight with a heavy sigh. you didn’t mind not drinking, but being at a party full of drunks while you were practically the only sober person was anything other than fun. 

you don’t know how many cups of juice you’d had, but you were sure that it was a considerable amount less than the number of vodka sodas your friend had thrown back throughout the night. you just hoped that she was in the same place you left her five minutes ago. 

it took you all of ten seconds after leaving the kitchen to realize that you had no idea where she was. you checked the living room, both of the downstairs bathrooms, and even made it all the way out into the backyard before you’d even gotten a whiff of where she had run off to. 

“you look stressed.” a voice rang through your ears, catching your attention quickly. 

your eyes followed the voice and landed on a boy that looked to be around your age, cup grasped firmly in his hand despite his sober demeanor. you could tell he wasn’t drunk, which surprised you but also brought you a sense of relief. he didn’t have any fraternity memorabilia, not a single greek letter anywhere on him, which was slightly confusing but definitely not disappointing. 

you’d never seen him before, you were sure. you would’ve given him a second glance on any day, using the faded print on his hat as an excuse as to why you were looking a little longer than what was deemed appropriate in a glance. 

“i’m on mom duty for the night and i lost my child.” the boy laughed softly, raising his cup to his lips as he closed the distance between the two of you, only to face the same direction you were facing. 

“which one’s yours?” you laughed gently, feeling like two single parents on the bench of a playground while the looked for their toddlers. though it didn’t feel much different, looking for your drunk friends. 

“her name’s morgan. she-”

“freeman?” the boy gasped playfully, only to earn an eye roll and a soft shove from you. “sorry, sorry, i couldn’t help myself. morgan, though? she’s pretty tall, probably 6′ but refuses to say anything about 5′11?” your eyebrows pulled together in confusion, something that the boy picked up on easily. 

“she was in my intro to forensics class last semester. we study together sometimes.” you let out a noise of realization as you nodded slowly, deciding maybe this guy wasn’t some stalker that happened to know everything about your friend for no real reason. 

“well, she’s my roommate and my best friend, unfortunately.” the boy’s eyes lit up, a smile stretching across his lips at the newfound information. 

“you’re y/n then?” 

you’d never loved the sound of your name more than you did when it fell off of his tongue. the lilt in his voice gave you a head rush and goosebumps all at the same time. you felt yourself nodding, letting him know that that was your name and you hadn’t forgotten, though you were sure you would have had he not told you seconds prior. 

“i’m pope.” he held out a hand, the one that wasn’t gripping a cup filled with whatever he chose to get him through a party sober. his skin was soft, though you tried to not focus on that. 

his eyes were soft, holding a sense of comfortability in them. you didn’t know who this person was, despite the few facts you’d picked up on in the short conversation you’d had with him, but you wanted to know more, that much you knew. 

“well, pope. since we can’t find my child at the moment, which one’s yours?” he hummed softly, shifting his weight from the balls of his feet to his heels, and back again. 

“jj maybank.” you hissed softly, watching pope’s lips turn up in a wide smile at your reaction. 

you let out a soft laugh, smiling brightly when pope’s followed soon after. he was beautiful, truly. his laugh filled your senses, somehow taking over every thought that previously inhabited your mind. everything was replaced with the boy in front of you, smiling, laughing and talking with you. 

“you’ve got a long night ahead of you then.” pope nodded, clicking his tongue softly in anticipation to see what the night offered him. 

he’d babysat jj more times than he could count, which is something he told you shortly after. he’d grown up with the mischievous boy, both of them taking their turns of pulling the other out of trouble. he told you about their third, john b, who didn’t go to school here. 

jj was here on a soccer scholarship, pope an academic, though that didn’t surprise you. the way he spoke alluded to his intelligence, and you remembered hearing morgan mention the name ‘pope’ a few times while she spoke about study group. you faintly remember the term ‘genius’ being attached to his name in most of morgan’s stories about the boy, though you weren’t sure if that was because of his intellect or morgan’s ability to expertly exaggerate one’s self. 

they were in the same major, you learned quickly. and because you had never seen pope before, you were surprised to hear that he’d been to your apartment a few times for morgan to grab her things. you had been out every time, and now pope found himself upset about it. you’d just missed each other multiple times before tonight, and pope would be damned if he let it happen again. 

“y/n! there you are!” you and pope both turned at the sound of morgan’s voice, facing the girl who could barely stand straight. 

pope offered to take your drink while you reached for morgan’s frame, holding her up to the best of your abilities. she sighed in content, folding into you more than you would’ve wished for, but you held her up nonetheless. 

“pope!” morgan smiled widely when she realized her friend from class was standing just a few feet away from her. they’d kept in touch loosely, studying for a class they were both taking when need be. 

“hi morgan.” pope smiled politely, now gripping onto one cup in each of his hands while he watched the two of you, making sure he didn’t need to swoop in and hold morgan up in your place. 

“pope! my main man!” and just like that, both of the sober parents had found their drunk toddlers without moving a single muscle. 

jj came stumbling towards the two of you, clapping a hand onto pope’s shoulder before smiling at you and morgan. his eyes lingered on morgan for a moment longer than they had with you, which earned a nudge to the ribs, courtesy of pope’s elbow. 

“this is morgan and y/n.” pope introduced you quickly, to which you two finger saluted jj, keeping morgan tight against you so her friendly drunk persona wouldn’t step towards the blond. 

“nice to meet you, morgan and y/n.” you looked at pope quickly, rolling your eyes at the tone in jj’s voice. pope snickered, looking back at your two friends that were clearly ogling at each other. 

“do you guys need a ride home?” you sighed but shook your head, not wanting to be a bother to the beautiful boy and his already drunk friend. 

“no, that’s okay. it’s not a far walk-”

“y/n/n, i don’t want to walk.” morgan whined loudly, earning a soft snicker from pope while you rolled your eyes exaggeratedly. 

“you promised you were fine walking tonight, morg. you swore you wouldn’t make me call an uber.” morgan smiled at you, doing her best puppy eyes while batting her eyelashes in your direction. 

“it’s really no bother. i’ve gotta drop jj off anyways, and he’s right around the corner from y’all.” you bit on the inside of your cheek, a voice ticking in the back of your head telling you that you’d bother the boy by accepting. 

“c’mon, y/n/n. popie’s nice.” you scoffed at the dumb nickname that morgan gave the boy, not missing the way he cringed at the sound of it.

“okay, okay. thank you, pope.” 

he waved you off gently, telling you again that it wasn’t a big deal. he made sure to rope jj in to leaving, discarding both of your cups in a nearby trashcan, ignoring jj’s comment about ‘kie would be furious with you’. you raised an eyebrow at pope, silently questioning what that meant, earning a ‘old friend. big environmentalist’ in response. 

you clung to morgan the entire way back to pope’s car, thanking him when he opened the back door for you to be able to shove her into the backseat. you sat in the back with her and felt her slump against you within seconds of leaving the house party. 

you complimented pope’s music taste after a few songs, sparking a quick conversation about the few songs you’d heard on the ride. you knew all of them, having a few of them on your own playlists. 

you were ignoring jj’s sly looks between you and his best friend, opting to focus solely on pope and on neither of your drunk friends. though, that proved to be harder than expected when morgan started to deadweight you after pope had pulled up to your apartment complex. 

“morgan, i can’t carry you up ten flights.” morgan groaned loudly, pushing you off of her. 

it didn’t take long for pope to offer up his help, claiming that he could lock jj in his car without much thought towards him being alright. jj would survive, according to pope, for the time being. of course, you denied him the first few times he offered, but when he asked once more, after morgan had gotten dangerously close to falling asleep, he unbuckled his seat belt. 

it took pope all of twenty seconds to swing morgan’s door open and lift her out of the car. she would be mortified the next time she saw pope, but you had exhausted every option in your mind. pope didn’t mind, finding excitement in being able to spend a few extra minutes with you, even if it was because he was carrying your drunk roommate up to your apartment. 

the walk was mainly silent, apart from the few times morgan would thank pope for carrying her, with a quick thanks thrown in your direction for holding her shoes. you and pope would laugh, and you’d smile at pope’s sweet ‘it’s no problem, morg’. 

you’d share side glances and bright smiles, but neither of you dared to break the silence. every giggle that threatened to bubble out was suppressed, either by self restraint or the back of your hand pressing against your lips. you’d lift your elbow gently into his side, filling the void of not being able to brush your hand gently against his due to his holding up your best friend. 

it wasn’t until the two of you put morgan to bed that you made time for the two of you, walking the short distance from her bed to the front door in a comfortable silence. 

“thank you, again.” he stood in front of your door, hands folded into each other while he smiled and nodded towards you. 

“it was nothing, really. if she ever needs an escort, i’m a call away.” you flashed him a bright smile and a simple nod while you shifted your weight from your heels to the balls of your feet. 

“i guess i should grab your number then. you know, in case morgan ever needs a lift upstairs.” you shrugged gently, not missing the wide smile that stretched across pope’s lips before he held his hand out, palm facing upwards. 

“that was smooth, i’ll admit it.” you laughed gently, watching him punch in his phone number before texting himself. “now you have to use it.” he winked at you while slipping your phone back into your own hand. 

“i’ll be sure to do that.” he nodded again, waving off your hundredth thanks of the night and reached for the doorknob. 

“have a good night, y/n.” he leaned forward, closing the small gap between the two of you by placing a kiss on your forehead before walking into the hallway.

he walked backwards, smiling just in time for you to stick your head out of the doorway and wave at him, fingers wiggling in a wave that had him swooning. you yelled out a gentle ‘goodnight’ just before he opened the door to the stairwell and disappeared. 

you laid in bed ten minutes later, grinning up at the ceiling above you with thoughts of pope swimming through your mind when your phone buzzed on your nightstand. 

pope♥ : i’m starting to think that babysitting jj isn’t so bad 

obx taglist: @rafej-cambanks​ @sportygal55​ 

[jacquiesims]

Viper Canyon - Chapter Eight

“’In light of how much Viper Canyon has grown in just the past year or two, I think it’s best if we elect a new sheriff as soon as possible. Are we all in agreement?’”

November 1852

Slowly but surely, the schoolhouse was being filled by the citizens of Viper Canyon arriving from their homes. Along with them, the heavy presence of unease and disquiet filled the air, and there was little small talk amongst the people as they sat down at the students’ desks in wait of the first ever town meeting.

Winnie wouldn’t have come to the meeting at all if it weren’t for the fact that she was the only person with a key to the school. As its sole caretaker, she stood in the back, wishing she were at home with Mamma and Bea. 

The meeting had been called to discuss the bank robbery – even the mere thought of outlaws anywhere in the area made her stomach turn. Most of the women, it would seem, shared the same sentiment as Winnie – or there were still things to be looked after at home, like children and housework.

Timothy Putnam, proprietor of the Sidewinder Saloon, was chosen to lead the meeting. He’d always been regarded as one of two de facto leaders of the town alongside Mr. Monroe. 

He stood at the front of the room where Winnie usually taught her lessons and cleared his throat. The room immediately turned and watched him carefully with baited breath. 

“As I’m sure you’re all aware, we’ve had to call a town meeting of sorts to discuss the events that took place at the bank this past Saturday.”

“Usually this sort of thing would be taken care of by a lawman. But seeing as our previous sheriff, Mr. Daniels, passed during the bout of flu a few years back, we have no man of the law left. Unfortunately he had no successor and at the time there was no one available to take his place, so the jail has been empty ever since. ” 

Winnie had seen the empty jail on Main Street and wondered why there was no sheriff or deputy to look after it. Naively, she figured it was because there was no need for one in such a peaceful town. Her stomach twisted.

Winnie turned over her shoulder at the sound of the door opening. 

Quickly, with only the sound of his heavy boots against the floor boards giving him away, Elijah slid into the back of the room. He stood there in the corner and waited for Putnam to continue.

“In light of how much Viper Canyon has grown in just the past year or two, I think it’s best if we elect a new sheriff as soon as possible. Are we all in agreement?” 

There were several quiet responses, all positive, and a great nodding of heads as the people all looked between each other and then back to Putnam. 

“And what do you think, Mr. Yates? It was your bank that those outlaws robbed, after all…”

Mr. Yates was a man of advanced age, with a nearly bald head and shaking white hands dotted with brown spots. He was gentle and sweet and generally regarded as a saint, and his voice passed through his lips like a whisper of wind. 

“A new sheriff would be for the best,” he nodded decisively. “Those men should be hanged for what they did to our poor John. May his soul rest in peace.” 

The crowd murmured words of condolence and Mr. Yates settled back into his seat without another word. At his side, his son, Percival, gave him a tender look.

“I agree wholeheartedly that we should elect a new lawman,” Mr. Monroe spoke up. “Seeing as we have all of these children and families in town now. But one does have to wonder how he would be paid.” 

Winnie pondered quietly in her corner. She was lucky enough to be paid her wages directly from the parents, seeing as there was no formal government in Viper Canyon to collect taxes to then divvy up between public servants – or nearby schoolboard to see to her salary. If there was a sheriff to be elected, that meant everyone would be responsible for ensuring he got his pay, and it was unrealistic to have each citizen in town come by to the jail to drop off his paycheck bit by bit. The next step would obviously be taxing the people, but…the idea of creating an entire local government seemed daunting. 

“Excellent point, Mr. Monroe,” Putnam agreed. “We’ve covered Miss Hawkins’s salary quite easily by having the parents pay for their children's schooling directly, but…there have been a few flaws in that method.”

“Flaws?” Robert Campbell, the tailor, asked from his chair. “How do you mean, Mr. Putnam?”

“Consider if a child wanted to go to school but their parents couldn’t afford Miss Hawkins’s wages outright. If we were to set up a fair tax system, where everyone pays a small bit towards the school, then every child could afford to attend. Isn’t that right, Miss Hawkins?” 

Putnam looked towards the back of the room where Winnie stood. She squirmed as every pair of eyes turned to look at her. 

“Yes.” She cleared her throat, not having expected to speak. “Exactly, Mr. Putnam. Every child should be able to go to school and learn, regardless of how much or how little their parents may make.”

“Very civilized, very good,” Mr. Monroe nodded. “It’s about time we started doing things the right way around here!” 

Like a flock of birds stopped on the street, everyone’s heads bobbed up and down, making small, short sounds of approval.

“Well then, I believe we’ve come to the consensus that we should move forward with establishing some form of government for the town. But there’s still an incredibly urgent matter at hand – what are we going to do about a sheriff?”

“I say we nominate one as soon as possible, straight away.” Mr. Monroe was deathly serious. “Preferably right now at this very meeting.” 

“Well, that might be a bit soon, don’t you think?” 

Robert Campbell was already a meek man, and he shrank at the thought of possibly being nominated for sheriff. 

“There are vicious killers on the loose!” Mr. Monroe cried. “Those wicked criminals murdered poor John in cold blood. We have no time to spare!”

“Yes, I do have to agree with Mr. Monroe,” Putnam said. “Who knows when the outlaws will strike again? Not only was poor John Williams viciously killed, but they nearly robbed our entire town blind.”

Mr. Yates shakily came to his feet. “Don’t worry, your money was insured. I shall see to it this is all sorted out as quickly as possible.” 

Percival helped his father sit back down with a sheepish look at the crowd over his shoulder. 

“Thank you, Mr. Yates. My point is, who knows what they’ll do next? Their first crime here was so heinous…perhaps without a lawman, they’ll think they can get away with much more. It’s imperative we move this process along as quickly as possible.”

Elijah shifted uncomfortably in the corner. Winnie cast a look at him, having not seen him since he abruptly left town nearly a year ago. He was the same as ever – maybe a bit older looking, more tired. He caught her staring and Winnie backed down from his green eyes, pretending to stare at some of her students’ assignments pinned to the wall.

“So, are we going to nominate anyone to vote on? All of the men in town are here. It should be a fair vote.” 

“Yes, let’s begin nominations. But keep in mind the men that can’t make the commitment – men with families and large businesses to run.” 

That excluded more than half of the room. Even Joseph Ebey couldn’t be nominated, seeing as his large farm needed looking after and his wife was due to have their first child any day now. 

Clarence Monroe was a bachelor and the successor of his father – but Winnie figured no one in their right mind would elect such a soft and awkward man into an important position like that of the sheriff.

“The obvious choice here is our Elijah McLain,” Mr. Monroe called loudly. 

He looked up from beneath the brim of his hat. “Sir?” 

“You’re strong, reliable, you have a good head on your shoulders…and all that time hunting and trapping for the Hudson Bay Company made you an incredible shot – I’ve seen it with my own eyes!” 

More positive sounds came from the crowd.

“What do you say, Elijah? Do you accept your nomination for Viper Canyon Sheriff?” 

He thought about it for only a few moments before taking a deep breath. “Yes, sir. Sounds all right to me.”

“Well, then. Our first nomination goes to Elijah McLain. Does anyone else have anyone in mind?” 

Winnie thought she could hear the crickets chirping outside. 

“Anyone?” 

“Elijah’s perfect for the job,” Mr. Monroe reiterated. “I’d trust him with my life.”

“Is there anyone who disagrees? Who thinks Elijah wouldn’t be a good fit for Sheriff?” 

Silence. 

“Well, then. By order of acclimation, Elijah McLain is now the newest sheriff of Viper Canyon. Congratulations!”

To Be Continued

Previous Chapter | Viper Canyon Index | Chapter Nine Coming Soon

(These group scenes take me so long...such a short chapter that took me forever! I hope you guys like the story, things are finally falling into place for the main plot to begin :) let me know what you thought and thank you for reading as always <3) 

[pedros-mustache-main]

my victoria park

“the reader’s gift of the victoria park painting?” for @joemazzmatazz​. the painting below is “hyde park—london” by count girolamo pieri nerli. (last one for tonight, btw! i’ll work on the rest in the coming days. xoxo!)

“okay, now are your eyes closed?” you adjust the swath of golden fabric over the frame, glancing over your shoulder to ensure that, yes, john’s eyes are closed as you’ve repeatedly requested.

he has one hand over his eyes, the other pushed into the pocket of his jeans. “[y/n], for the ten-thousandth time, my eyes are closed.” 

“i’m just checking, john,” you counter. “i can’t trust you with these things.”

he hums in amusement at himself. “’s cause i think you’re bloody talented and the waiting is agony.”

“only a moment longer.” stepping back from the frame, you pull the hand from his jean’s pocket and intwine your fingers with his. your heart is beating so fast, you’re sure he can feel the blood pumping in the veins of your palm. you squeeze his hand. “okay, open.”

he removes the hand from his face, eyes expectant, but his anticipation quickly morphs to confusion. “it’s a piece of fabric,” he says.

“what?” 

frowning, your neck cracks in your haste to figure out the issue. what you see makes you roll your eyes: you’ve dreamt so many times of watching his face as the painting comes into view that you forgot the remove the covering itself. that painting is still obscured. you lean forward, grab the corner of the cloth, and pull it to the side. 

the golden fabric falls to the wayside, revealing a rectangular painting housed in an ornate gold frame. the painting resembles a photograph, what with the position of the horizon line and the way movement seems to continue off the canvas, out of eyesight. a tapestry of greens in all different shades gives the illusion of a cool spring afternoon. of the people milling about the promenade, few wear bright colors, and those that do stick out amongst the rest like a beacon of good cheer. a woman sits on a park bench, her face turned toward the viewer, a serene sort of smile on her face. she holds a bright red parasol, and her gaze follows no matter which way you turn.

john’s jaw hangs loose.

“do you remember last month when we went to the frame store?” you ask. he nods, but he can’t pull his eyes away from the painting.”and do you remember when you asked me whatever happened to that victoria park painting and i told you it didn’t work out, that i’d scrapped it?” he nods again, this time swallowing hard. “well, i lied. that frame—the one you picked out for the painting i was working on then—there it is, complete with your victoria park.”

john clears his throat and rolls his lips together in a tight line. he shakes his head. “[y/n], i—”

“wait!” you drop his hand and take a step forward to point to the woman with the red parasol. “i like to pretend like this woman is me, and you are the sole viewer. it’s like you started walking down the lane, and she thought you were so handsome she couldn’t stop staring.” blush warms you cheeks as you confess the intimate daydreams, but you continue on, moving to stand by his side, your arms curled around his as you press into his side. “maybe you even tipped your hat at her, and now she’ll think of nothing for the rest of the day.”

john untangles his arm from your grasp to wrap you in a tight embrace. he lays his cheek on the top of your head, one hand firm on your back, the other against your head. 

“i love you so much,” he whispers, and you think he must be crying because his voice is thick with emotion. 

you return his embrace, just as tight. he smells clean, and the print on his awful t-shirt scratches your cheek as you lay against his chest. “i love you more, silly man.”

he’s quiet a moment before he releases you to move closer to the painting. “can i—” his fingers hover over the raised bumps and edges of the paint.

“yes, you can touch it. just be gentle.”

he brushes his pinky finger over the woman with the red parasol’s face, and your heart flutters—truly flutters like the wings of a butterfly—at the sight. still entranced by the painting, john doesn’t look at you as he holds his opposite hand out, but you know what he wants. you slide your fingers over his palm, content to watch him marvel at the painting—his painting, his victoria park—until the end of time.

[eternalstrigoii]

Flowery Language

Borra (Maleficent: Mistress of Evil) x Desert Warrior Dark Fey Reader

                   After a point, peace talks became little more than a formality.

John and Philip fussed with the treaty’s wording while Aurora listened, as it was not her first declaration of peace between the kingdoms and its peoples. While you recognized the importance of brevity, clarity (and wit), you were bored out of your skull. (It was different when they spent hours fussing to ensure no one could break peace because of loose language – when they genuinely entered talks about phrasing based solely upon the conjunction, you stared at the walls and wondered if living in exile had not been such a terrible fate.)

The dread former queen’s cat, Arabella, circled lazily between your legs, rubbing on you and Borra because you were the only fools left over when talks descended into this. Had you not loved him, he would’ve been entirely on his own.

Had he not loved you, he wouldn’t have allowed his attention to lapse.

You were trying to set the tasteless tapestries on fire with your eyes when the first little tendril of unnaturally-behaving peony stem brushed your ankle. You thought it was the cat and lightly toed at it, discouraging her from bothering you while you glowered. Was iron as painful as listening to this conversation? You almost wished they’d left a handful of bullets lying around for you to play with.

A flicker of mischief passed over Borra’s lips. Aurora frowned as she mentally backtracked through Philip and John’s discussion – what had they said that warranted so knowing a look?

The advancing flowers lashed around your ankle, the quick snap of their woody stem nearly enough to make you startle. Your eyes flickered to him, and you raised your brows as though wholly unamused.

Leaves bloomed against your skin. Vines that should not have been vines continued to climb up your leg like a trellis. Right now? you asked with your eyes.

His glinted. He knew you – boredom made you impulsive. You were a restless creature by nature; you favored action over talk as much as he did, if not more. You did not have to be reminded that your shared place at their table ensured the safety of your people both fey and moor-folk, and you did not expect him to apologize for the benign stupidity of ornamental leadership.

Though he made it quite clear he intended to repay you for your patience.

It was an exercise in self-restraint not to shift when those woody stems crept over your hip and brushed over your inner thigh. They were no replacement for his fingers, but their light caress was enough to soften your glare at the walls. They should redo those murals, at least.

A blooming leaf caressed your bundled nerves, fluttered lightly as if caught by the wind. Your eyelids half-lowered, and you made a show of rubbing them as though you were well and thoroughly frustrated already.

Thank skies your human companions did not have senses anywhere near as keen as his.

He did it again. Lighter and sweeter than he would’ve with his fingers, but it was a caress all the same. The lingering hostility in your thoughts went temporarily forgotten.

You spread your legs on the chair-seat. Hooked your bare feet around the legs and pressed into the caress of a slowly advancing tendril. Agonizingly slow; he had to give you something else to focus on, though the sight of your darkening eyes and the instinctive weight-shift of your hips did little but offer him plenty in return.

You made a beautiful sight, spread just for him. If you could keep your wings from giving you away, he might even move closer to converse with you when you were ready to finish.

Your eyes lifted. The molten heat in them made him set his teeth to bite back a low purr. Such a good girl, keeping your pleasure to yourself.

He let you watch the motion of his fingers. The leaf and the tendril did what he asked them to: curled around your bundled nerves, stroking, flicking, before parting you along your seam and making you strangle a half-animal whine as it rose to your lips. You could not even squirm against him and that was wildly unfair.

The little sound you did make tensed his stomach like you’d been caressing him with your talons and let them fall away. He thought, faintly, about how lovely you would look when you could squirm for him – panting, keening, your pretty legs still spread and his fingers tracing the air instead of you while he let those plants tease you. You should do this again in the privacy of the forest; he had the urge to press kisses to your bud until your voice was rough and pleading.

Since when did you get off on tormenting each other? Since you had the time, perhaps. Peace was to be maintained long-term, which gave him the opportunity to slow down all those sweet things he’d learned from bedding you. Kiss where you enjoyed being kissed; leave bruise-darkened love bites on the soft flesh of your inner thighs. Maybe you could enjoy the lash of those little branches under different circumstances.

You gripped handfuls of your trousers in place of handfuls of him. A budding flower bloomed against you, velvet-soft petals nestled against your skin. Oh, Great Skies Above. He shouldn’t have thought about how it would feel to trace it back and forth, trail those petals over your flesh like feathers. You wanted, desperately, to squirm, press forward, beg for more.

You grit your teeth and stared at the wall again. No one had better ask you what you were looking at, the whole of your attention was focused on not grinding that flower into oblivion.

Which amused him to no end, even as he shifted his wandering hand to make sure the low-hanging waistband of his hide trousers kept all but the scent of his desire from you.

Your silent exchanges had not gone unnoticed, though their context most assuredly was. No one on the other side of the table knew that the plant at the nearest corner of the balcony had grown across the floor from a singular point so that the small handful of palace staff flitting in and out of the room would remain unaware that it had. Philip frowned at your shared tension, dropped his eyes back to the document, and re-read the sentence quietly to himself in a handful of different tones.

“Oh skies,” you whispered, taking a moment to deliberately run your hands through your hair. Yes, right there. The press of pliant stem was nowhere near as satisfying as his fingers, but it was nearly enough to make you arch.

“I’m sorry,” Philip repeated. “We need to make sure no one can deliberately misinterpret the text.”

The light stroking slowed. Began to retreat. The horrible tease. Oh, you are going to claw new cracks in his back when this is over.

“We know,” Borra replied.

Your fingers curled in your hair. Another shoot emerged, grew into a whip-thin tendril and crept up the leg of his chair. You kept your mischief entirely to yourself until it was long enough to caress over his thigh and wrap around him through his trousers at the same time.

It was his turn to strangle a hiss, and he failed miserably at it.

“Bella,” Philip whispered rather sharply. The cat was lounging under the table’s middle, well out of range. She wasn’t stupid enough to get wrapped up in your shenanigans.

“Let her be,” Borra’s voice was audibly rougher. “She’s just playing.”

Aurora did not understand quite how she knew what you were up to, or how you were accomplishing it, but you weren’t making any snide quips and Borra no longer watched the three of them like a hawk, so she knew you must’ve been up to something. Make love not war, I suppose.

“If she’s bothering you—”

“It’s just a kitten, Philip,” you replied with much too much satisfaction in your tone; Borra flicked the retreating stem against your bundled nerves and the suddenness of it killed whatever reassurance you meant to tack on at the end. The unfinished sentence hung over the table like a pendulum.

Strange as it was, Aurora was your greatest ally. Her time spent handling affairs alone in Perceforest was adequate motivation to learn how to operate as a team in Ulstead – and to not blame you for indulging yourselves during extended periods of mundane ho-hum. She called them back to an issue she really had taken with phrasing of the line that came before, and you cast a sidelong glance to the man you loved. She knows.

His eyes were melted honey. That little lash’s slow undulating was not enough – he wanted your hands, your mouth, your welcoming, wet heat. If you could just slip away to the balcony together for a moment…

You teased him with a soft little squeeze. Even if he didn’t slip that tendril back inside of you, it lingered along your parted seam so you might take some pleasant friction from rubbing against it – you just had to be careful to keep your wings from giving you away.

You intentionally deprived him of the same. You, too, were consumed with thoughts of lowering his trousers to caress him while you kissed against the sun-warmed stone outside. How hungrily he would run his hands over you, how easily your bodies would join after you were both so well-teased. He would rut you hard, right there where anyone could see. Would he quiet you with his mouth, or would he watch you struggle not to cry out? You could imagine the hunger in his eyes. Nearly feel the collision of your hips. He would growl quietly, just for you, let it dissolve into a quiet, breathless moan…

You dropped your foot from around the chair-leg and pinned the woody stems to the floor, abruptly pulling them away. The sound of it did not go unnoticed, though your companions’ attention only fixated when you stood as calmly as you could while maneuvering the rest of the withering vine out of your pant leg.

For a moment, you genuinely intended to preface your departure. But you had no good excuses, so you drew back to push in your chair (to tug the spindly limbs right off your calf), and you walked out.

Your stem slackened only once you’d already left.

“Was it something I said?” John asked, genuinely bewildered.

“Maybe we should take a break,” Aurora offered, averting her gaze when it landed upon Borra as he stood. She had no intention of finding out just how far you’d gotten with only a table for privacy. “It must be difficult to sit still for so long when you’re not used to it.”

She handed the both of you a gilded excuse, and Borra’s only acknowledgement of it was a low, animal sound that definitely meant what she thought it did.

The balcony wrapped around half of the palace like a second courtyard, leaving plenty of room for the both of you to find an adequate crevice to sneak off to as you used to in the nest’s high peaks. You hadn’t gone far; you perched upon the stone ledge to wait for him the moment you heard the brush of his pinfeathers against the smooth floors.

He’d only meant to tempt you, but like a hunt initiated for its thrill, that urge was not far from the instinct to sate the hunger sharpening your gaze. His wings perked and flared in display, as though your fingers didn’t trace the leather strap across his chest the moment he drew near enough.

He made a low, hot sound of pleasure. Nudged your hips to the very edge. You growled against his mouth in praise.

“Did I please you?” He undid the waistband of your trousers.

You let them drop. Ran your fingers along the folded waist of his. “Take these off and find out.”

He did not hesitate, and, for that, you decided your gentle stroking had teased him enough. Your wings fanned along the white stone; you meant to climb him like a tree, but the support of his arms beat you to it. He joined with you in one swift, smooth advance.

You brought him closer with your legs, ran your talons down his back.

His bit into your hips. Thank skies for practicality; you couldn’t allow it to last any longer than it naturally would, thanks to your human allies, so you pressed him closer, clung to him with your knees. He rocked to the hilt inside of you to wind the tightness in your belly as taut as it could get, kissed you like it would be too long before you could touch one another again – the way you imagined he’d planned to kiss you before the circumstances around your not-conquest changed.

“More,” you whisper-gasped. “I need you. I need you, please.”

He gave you a half-strangled growl in warning, as though you couldn’t feel him twitch. So close. You dragged your talons down the stone; you didn’t care if it rent trenches in the smooth façade, you were so close.

Then you were there, and the sudden throb and quiver of your inner muscles brought him along with you, and every blank space on the climbing branches that ensnared the courtyard-facing half of Ulstead’s palace suddenly contained new flowers. It did not matter what they were – with every shared, summer-hot breath that passed your lips between kisses, more and more of them unfurled.

His love for you, and yours for him, was the strongest power that did not hail from the phoenix herself.

You laughed breathlessly against his lips. Tangled your fingers in his hair. Your afterglow felt warmer than the sun on your spread wings and you tipped your head back to bask in it, knowing all too well that you invited him to kiss along your bared throat.

A moment before the flowers bloomed, Prince Philip put his hand upon his wife’s and excused himself from the still-silent table. His human senses were nowhere near as keen as yours, but his wife was not the fool most believed her to be. Of all the royal perils that could befall her husband, she did not want to add knocked off a balcony because he intruded to the list.

“Philip,” she tried, rising to follow him.

“Just a moment,” he pressed, and was out onto the connected balcony before she could stop him.

Aurora sunk back in her seat and contemplated resting her face in her hands until the secondhand embarrassment passed.

Borra’s wings were a bit more broad than yours, though, and your legs around his waist kept his pants from going far. The flowers bloomed as the young prince followed the outdoor passage, and, at first, he thought the mild flare of your mate’s wings might’ve been for privacy.

Then he saw your legs, and the close proximity of your horns, and the claw marks that punctuated the white stone, and the young prince had the sense to turn around and leave before he saw anything else.

He lingered just beyond the door for a moment, waiting to make eye contact with his wife. His face hid nothing of the range of emotions he’d gone through: awkwardness mingled with amusement, tinged with mild disbelief, all dressed in the finery of poorly-contained embarrassment.

She tried not to laugh, holding his eyes only to deliberately look away as her smile grew. I told you not to.

“Well?” John asked as if the expression on his son’s face did not say plenty.

Philip made a noncommittal sound and a quick retreat to his chair. Perhaps if he stared pointedly at the treaty for a while, he could soothe the pinking of his cheeks. “Where were we?”

John pressed for an answer only once before the both of you returned, a bit more ruffled than you’d left but otherwise unchanged. The flowers along the floor had fully retreated to their place around the balcony’s ledge, and you fluffed your wings before you sat despite the temptation that offered Arabella.

“Come here, kitty-kitty.” You patted your leg.

The awful little thing jumped up into the chair next to Aurora and folded herself up there, her wary little hackles bristled.

You quirked your head, suit yourself, and stretched your legs out in front of you. The whole of your body was pleasantly warm and well relaxed, and you took Borra’s hand on top of the table when he settled beside you. “Go ahead, John. Conjunctions are a riveting conversation starter.”

“I’ll say,” Philip muttered.

Your glinting eyes flickered to your mate. I’ve underestimated either their senses or their observation skills.

He spread his wings comfortably over the arms of his chair and gave the blushing young queen a wild grin. “Only the fun ones.”

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

Tag List: @squishy-jellyfish, @deathonyourtongue, @thetempleofthemasaigoddess, @mor-ranr, @swim-reaper, @blacksirenswolf

Remember, you can always be added!

[melancholydreadfuldream]

shattered and hollow

Fandom: Doctor Who

Summary: You hated the Doctor and so you joined his enemy.

 Warning: ooc, some angst, plot holes, weak plotline, mention of abuse, suicide, death, etc

      You were on your knees on the floor, handcuff around your wrists as you stared blankly at nothing as everyone around you spoke louder at each other trying to decide a fitting punishment for your crime. At one point, they even talked to you but you ignored them.

  You had lose...again. He, you thought with disdain, had won again. The Doctor. The bane of your existence. Just thinking about him already made you want to puke or maybe that because you are currently unwell after being imprisoned and starved for a few days.

  The only saving grace of your current situation was you no longer need to pretend to love the Doctor in his human form, John Smith. You no longer need to endure his touches. 

  You hated yourself though for failing your mission from the Kovarian Chapter. At the beginning, they recruited you for your grudge against the Doctor. You were trained to be soldier and you are quite good at it. 

  You were hoping that the Kovarian Chapter will succeed in killing the Doctor but of course that didn't happen.

  You were tasked to watch over John Smith. You had no idea that he is actually the Doctor in human form. You might be part of Kovarian Chapter but you are only a foot soldier so when they tasked you with important task to watch over John, you accepted. Had you known his real identity, you would have killed him on the spot.

  You were seven years old when you first met the Doctor. You found out he was at his ninth incarnation at the time. He was responsible for the downfall of your parents. He set in motion a rebellion against your parents, causing their death at the hands of the angry mob. He was 'liberating' the people and then just flew away in his Tardis, not caring about what happened afterward or what happened to you, the young daughter of the family most hated by the people.

You were suffering in the mercy of the people who hated your parents. You were starved and abused and was made a slave as a punishment regardless you were just an innocent child. To the people, you got to live happily before while they were miserable so they are returning the favour tenfold.

  You cried a lot and hating everyone around you but you somehow able to survive through the years solely with a thought to someday get revenge on the Doctor.

  It was when you are sixteen years old, you were able to escape your tormenters. You live on the street until the church found you and offered you a better life and a chance of revenge.

  You were blinded by the offer of revenge that you accepted their offer without a thought of the consequence. You can hardly regret it since they gave you a slightly better life than before.

  It was there you met the Kovarian Chapter's little princess, little Melody Pond. You were told to keep watch of her. It was easy enough. Melody is a polite and quiet child. Eventually she started talking to you and found out a common ground that the Doctor ruined both of your life. According to Melody, the Doctor took her parents away from her too.

  You grew fond of Melody. You felt bad for her though because despite being called princess, Melody had to endure a much more harsh training even more than you and she was just a kid. She was seven years old, the same age as you when you lost your parents.

  You grew close with her as her caretaker and guardian but Madam Kovarian frowned upon your friendship which is seen as a hindrance for Melody's training. As a result, you were taken away to do a different duty.

  You were worried for Melody but keep your head down for fear being kicked out of the church and losing the chance to get revenge.

  Years later, you were tasked to watch over and insert yourself on the life of one John Smith. You were told to 'use your feminine wiles and more', whatever it takes to ensure John gets attached with you.

  When you found out that John actually the Doctor, you felt sick. You felt like you are being played. But your handler told you that you were actually being put with the greatest advantage to hurt the Doctor. John is wrapped around your fingers after all. They wanted to ensure John will never be able to get his real identity back nor will he want to when the time come...for your sake.

  Before knowing who John really is, you were actually torn with your developing feeling for him, that you might ended up catching real feeling for him. But after you knew the truth, your hatred for the Doctor resurfaced and how can you love this bastard, the face-changer, anymore? You can't.

  Your handler adviced to endure it and continue to pretend.

  But the Doctor's companion is very persistant in trying to rescue him.

  Your job is to make sure John stay attached with you and you thought you done well. Apparantly not. John noticed the change in you in regard of him. Despite you trying to distract him by marrying him and settle into a fake marriage life with him, he still ended up meeting his companion and somehow got his time lord conciousness returned to him.

  You were hunted by Torchwood under the name of the Doctor. You were rescued by Melody. You didn't recognize her. She was a young teenager with dark skin. She recognized you though and a bit protective of you.

  That was when you found out Melody is half-time lord like the Doctor. Melody looked a bit insecure after the revelation, it was almost like she was afraid of your reaction.

  "Do you hate me now?" Melody asked.

  "I could never hate you, Melody."

  She beamed at you. "Mels. Call me Mels."

  You smiled softly at her.

  Unfortunately you got orders to return to play victim in the hope to still be able to play on the Doctor's, no, John's feeling for you. You were very reluctant.

  Melody adviced you if or when you get caught, you should surrender to their will and plead guilty. She will then figure out a way to rescue you. But you are not stupid or naive. To Melody, you might be important. To the church, you are a loose end. You know it will only a matter of time before they try to get rid of you. Melody must have known too, that's why she told you secretly to run whenever you can.

  You realized now why Melody got the status 'princess' within the church. She is their ultimate secret weapon against the Doctor.

  You hated the Doctor but you have mixed feeling for John. But it is no longer matter, isn't it? John is gone now. There is only that man. And you wished for nothing but the Doctor's destruction.

  You hope Melody will be able to make that man suffer.

  You were caught and imprisoned where you were on trial on the crime you commited in order to ensure John is never found out. Obviously you failed.

  You hated these people who regarded the Doctor as their savior, their protecter and friends to some. You wished you could kill the Doctor so called friends if only to ensure the Doctor suffer from their loss just as you suffered the loss of your parents.

  As you waited for the final judgement, you didn't fight back but you didn't plead guilty either. You didn't feel guilty, you convinced yourself. You did it all in order to ensure the Doctor's destruction.

  You knew that your parents were not good people but they were still your parents and you love them. The Doctor took them away from you and left you to rot. Just as he did now.

  You chuckled harshly.

  You were slapped for what they called insolent. You didn't care about what they said to you and they were furious for not getting the reaction they are expecting.

  You didn't expect the sound of wheezing Tardis or for the blue box to materialized just outside the room. The Doctor dressed as himself now entered the room confidently.

  You were shaking, not in fear, but in rage when you saw him. You wanted to kill him. He might have different face from the man you met when you were a child and he might be wearing the face of John, your almost lover, but he is now the Doctor. You could see it, that arrogance of the same time lord who cursed your childhood.

  From the way he look at you, he has not figured out your true identity yet. He glanced at you with almost dark look with a tad of...fondness?

  He moved to talk with your judges. You glared at his back but you couldn't hear what they were discussing. He has a very serious look, one the church will says the look of the oncoming storm as he threaten them with just a few words.

  Next thing you know, they decided to release you into the Doctor's care.

  Your eyes widened in disbelief. You glanced up at the Doctor who is now standing in front of you, staring at you without words.

  "No." You whispered hoarsely. "No." You repeated louder. "I'm not going anywhere with you."

  The Doctor gave you a flat look. "You don't have a choice, wife." 

  You flinched at that.

  "I know you are acting under orders. I just haven't figure out who yet. You will tell me who made you do this." 

  "No one made me do this. I do this on my own free will, Doctor." You spatted. "You still haven't figure out who I really am, have you?" You glared at him in fury as you named the planet and the years your parents died.

  The Doctor frowned before his eyes widened. His mouth dropped open. "I'm so sorry." He replied solemnly, eyes filled with guilt.

  You sneered. "Sorry? You think everything can be fixed with that stupid word?"

  "Take off her handcuff." The Doctor suddenly said.

  You were taken aback by the order. Everyone in the room also confused by the Doctor's order.

  "Now." The Doctor repeated.

  "We agreed to release her to you in a few days, Doctor."

  "Now." The Doctor kept repeating that words as he glanced at them.

  They finally obeyed him and moved to release your handcuff.

  You glared at him but refused to move from your spot on the floor.

  "Don't make this hard on yourself, (name)." The Doctor said. He raised his hand toward you.

  "No." You firmly said as you glared still at him.

  He sighed as he pinched his nose in exasperation.

  As he moved aside, you saw a silent figure on the corner of the room. When you saw the figure in dark suit staring at you with its fathomless eyes, you suddenly knew what you have to do.

  You slowly stood up, not taking your eyes off the silence.

  The Doctor walked toward the Tardis before turning to you. "Come on, (name)."

  You took your eyes off the silence and obediently moved toward the Doctor but at the last minute, you suddenly attacked one of the officers and grabbed his gun. You hit him with the gun before turning to point the gun at the Doctor.

  "(name), please just drop the gun." The Doctor pleaded. "Just drop it and get inside the Tardis."

  You scoffed at him. "And be your prisoner? Go to hell, Doctor." You cursed him before you suddenly pulled the gun on yourself.

  "No!" The Doctor yelled as he moved to stop you.

  As your fingers moved to pull the trigger, your eyes hovered toward the silence. You swallowed as you thought of silent apologies toward Melody for not fighting to survive. But you also know your death will serve to fuel her anger toward the Doctor.

  That is what the Silence asked of you. If your death will help Melody to destroy the Doctor, then so be it. Distinctly you wondered if this is Kovarian's plan all along, letting you met Melody, be her only friend back then, making you important enough to her to warrant her anger and grief toward your death.

  You pulled the trigger just as the Doctor reached out toward you with a heartbreaking scream. Melody Pond, you better give him hell for this, you thought.

  You fell on his arms as he clutched your body and cried for you. Huh, look at that... I made him suffer a loss after all, you thought weakly before the darkness overwhelm you.

   A/N: Originally I planned to write dark!doctor forcing his fugitive wife inside his tardis for interrogating and stuff but somehow after reading GC I joined, I ended up inserting a bit of Melody Pond and somehow it takes turn into a darker turn with the reader choose that ending.

Maybe someday I will write the version I intended in the first place. So, this piece is short and weak but oh well...

[aion-rsa]

Mortal Kombat: 15 Most Powerful Characters

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At the end of the day, Mortal Kombat is about a bunch of characters beating the crap out of each other for supremacy. Sure, they toss in stories about tournaments to protect Earth and wars against invading realms, but it all boils down to martial artists brutally punching the hell out of each other until one explodes into a pile of viscera and five ribcages.

Being a fighting game, you expect all the fighters to be on the same level. Even forgettable losers like Hsu Hao and Kai should stand a chance against gods and otherworldly overlords. A nigh-invincible megalomaniac villain can lose to one of their bumbling underlings just as easily as they can lose to the game’s main hero. At least, that’s ideally how fighting games should be balanced.

Storywise, it’s different. Certain characters are straight-up in their own leagues compared to others. Does Jarek really stand a chance against Shinnok? Would Li Mei last five seconds against Blaze? Does Kobra have what it takes to take down Raiden? Not on paper, no.

So here’s a list of the top 15 most powerful characters in the Mortal Kombat series. With this list, there are two main rules:

1) I’m going with the characters at their most powerful, not how powerful they are most of the time.

2) I’m going with the canon storyline. Otherwise, the list would just be made up of Mortal Kombat: Armageddon endings. No DC Universe crossover stuff and no guest characters in general. Sorry, Spawn.

Now let’s see who has the most juice in all the realms.

15. GERAS

This guy is so frightening that his power is more of a curse than a blessing. Geras has near endless experience, having lived through countless timelines over and over again, and is skilled enough to fight off Liu Kang and Kung Lao at the same time. He is also be completely unkillable, as his mastery over time reversal will undo whatever wounds befall him. Granted, Shao Kahn beat him into a blob of red pulp and Geras hasn’t been heard from since, but I’m sure he’ll be back to his old self soon enough.

The rough truth regarding Geras is that being unkillable doesn’t mean he’s unstoppable. In the initial Mortal Kombat 11 timeline, Raiden knocked Geras into an endless ocean of blood in which where Geras was doomed to sink for eternity. Yeah, I’ll be fine over here with my mortality.

14. SINDEL

In the early days, Sindel didn’t seem so tough. She was just a plot device in desperate need of pants. Then Mortal Kombat 9 happened and we got that scene where Shao Kahn empowered her with Shang Tsung’s soul and set her loose. Suddenly, Sindel turned into an Edenian John Cena and cut through most of the heroes like a hot knife through butter. Sub-Zero, Jax, Smoke, Kabal, Stryker, Jade, and Kitana all died by her hand in mere moments while Nightwolf had to sacrifice himself to take her off the board.

This is why Shang Tsung aimed to resurrect her in Mortal Kombat 11: Aftermath. Who else was going to help him get past Cetrion? And while Sindel did win one-on-one against Cetrion, the scene itself looked more like she stunned Cetrion enough for Fujin and Shang Tsung to capitalize and put her on the shelf. Had they not been there, I feel like Sindel would have eventually been overwhelmed. At least, that’s my interpretation.

13. CETRION

Cetrion is Mother Nature. That alone tells you what you need to know. Shinnok’s virtuous (yet still kind of evil) sister would be considered his equal if only she had a final form like him. Regardless, Cetrion is such a threat that Jax and Jacqui Briggs can only stand up to her for a limited time by wearing Kronika’s crown at a detriment to their own health. She also wiped out the rest of the Elder Gods, although that happened completely off-screen.

12. SHINNOK

Here we have Mortal Kombat’s version of Satan. Shao Kahn would later talk shit about Shinnok’s fighting skills, but he’s an Elder God and rules this reality’s version of Hell. He’s an absolute heavy hitter.

He also looks like a total dork when he’s in his base form, but thankfully his Corrupted Shinnok form makes up for that. Corrupted Shinnok is no joke, especially in Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero, where you’re better off cheesing it back to Earthrealm than fighting him head-on.

11. RAIDEN

Raiden was the guy so jacked up that they had to make up a reason for why he couldn’t take part in the first couple games’ tournaments. He was just there to give advice and moral support. What else would you expect from a god among men? He also thwarted Shinnok back in the day to save Earthrealm, meaning he was already a major piece of work by the start of the first game.

Raiden’s apex form is triggered whenever he wields Shinnok’s amulet. It doesn’t make him unbeatable, but it does put an extra pep in his step. The drawback is that it turns his eyes red and he becomes a total dick. Still a step up from him constantly tripping over his own feet on his way to consult the Elder Gods.

10. CASSIE CAGE

Cassie’s is one of the most powerful Mortal Kombat characters but there’s an asterisk. Seemingly more competent and driven than her father, Cassie is so skilled at using her green glow to the point that she was able to defeat Corrupted Shinnok. That’s because the Cage bloodline was bred and trained for the sole purpose of creating mortals who could slay gods. Her DNA is like kryptonite to the likes of Shinnok.

She does have some other impressive wins, like taking down revenant versions of Sindel and Liu Kang. Her Mortal Kombat X ending (which isn’t explicitly canon, but I have no reason to think it isn’t) has her kill Shujinko. Many fans consider that to be a bit on the bullshit side, but this Shujinko would have been 20 years older than the one from the previous continuity and wouldn’t have been powered up by the events of Mortal Kombat: Deception, so it’s not a big stretch (or a big enough deal) that Cassie could take out a martial artist Mr. Burns.

9. QUAN CHI

This sorcerer doesn’t have the raw power of the other main villains, and he gets completely clowned in Mortal Kombat X, but he is smart and sneaky enough to get what he wants most of the time. While overshadowed by Onaga, you also can’t forget that in the conclusion of Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, Quan Chi and Shang Tsung took down a handful of Earthrealm’s strongest warriors, defeated Raiden, then turned on each other with Quan claiming ultimate victory.

Various endings show that while he is working under Shinnok, he has the means to overthrow him if need be. This is especially apparent in Mortal Kombat 9, where Quan Chi has the rights to use necromancy on all of those slain during Shao Kahn’s invasion. He has a whole army of revenants at his disposal, and there are some serious heavy hitters mixed in there.

8. ONAGA

The Dragon King’s introduction came with so much hype that you could almost hear the other characters soil themselves in unison when he stomped onto the scene. On his own, Onaga was a wrecking machine, but in Mortal Kombat: Deception, he had the Kamidogu pieces, which made him completely unstoppable. Unstoppable enough that he shrugged off attacks from the united forces of Raiden, Shang Tsung, and Quan Chi. Add to that his ability to resurrect the dead and mind-control them and you had the ultimate threat.

EXCEPT…those Kamidogu pieces weren’t exactly unbreakable. I don’t know how hard those things are supposed to be, but in-game they would shatter just by walking into them. Either way, Shujinko was able to shatter them all himself and that depleted Onaga’s power enough to to end him. Being a reptilian juggernaut means only so much when you have such an overt off switch.

7. SHUJINKO

The most gullible hero of the Mortal Kombat franchise spent his entire life questing and fighting for what ended up being Onaga’s resurrection. In return, Onaga blessed him with Taskmaster powers. Shujinko can copy fighting styles from other warriors and has been doing so for decades.

That ended up being Onaga’s undoing, as Shujinko absorbed the abilities and fighting skills of just about every playable character in Mortal Kombat: Deception. After shattering the Kamidogu artifacts and removing Onaga’s invulnerability, Shujinko had no problem thrashing him. While experience was his ultimate weapon, the only thing really weighing him down was his aging and human mortality.

6. BLAZE

Blaze, by design, is a top tier beast. He’s the final boss in Mortal Kombat: Armageddon, a game that brings back every Mortal Kombat character in one massive roster. When guys like Onaga and Goro are playable and they’re working their way up to take on Blaze, it really says something about what this guy’s about. Not to mention he’s the catalyst for ultimate power, turning whoever can slay him into an enhanced, godly version of his or herself.

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While it seemed at first that new hero character Taven would be the one to end Blaze, Taven was instead slayed and the real winner was Shao Kahn. Unfortunately, this is where things get a little hairy because we don’t know if Kahn would have truly been able to defeat Blaze one-on-one or if, say, Taven wounded Blaze and Kahn took advantage. Either way, it looks like Blaze straight-up took the L and wasn’t the be-all/end-all after all.

5. SHAO KAHN

Shao Kahn has always been the go-to villain of Mortal Kombat, and as the recurring villain, he’s taken his lumps. He’s suffered defeats at the hands of Liu Kang, Raiden, and Kitana. When he took over Outworld, he killed Onaga by poisoning him because battle was too risky. So yes, Base Shao Kahn may be tougher than most, but he’s not invincible.

But then you have Mortal Kombat: Armageddon, which was Kahn’s real showcase. After dominating the free-for-all, Kahn was grabbed and taken away by Onaga. As foreboding as that would seem for Kahn, he not only bounded back from that, but he also ended up being the last man standing after slaying Blaze. That enhanced Shao Kahn’s strength even more and turned him into a multiversal threat, thwarted only because of Raiden’s desperate use of time travel.

4. KRONIKA

After years of telling us that Elder Gods were the ultimate beings, NetherRealm decided to reveal another tier of beings called Titans who rank even higher. So far we only know Kronika, the Keeper of Time, who is so overpowered that nearly everyone on the roster should have absolutely zero shot against her. She controls time like it’s nothing. Overcoming that isn’t like dodging a fireball.

Thankfully, Kronika has one major weakness: while she can rewrite history, she can’t omit the gods. She can’t create a world without Raiden. Raiden still can’t beat her one-on-one, but it’s through that loophole that Kronika ultimately meets her downfall.

2. LIU KANG (TIE)

The series’ initial protagonist was always fighting above his weight class. He spent the first four games taking down Goro, Shang Tsung, Shao Kahn, and Shinnok. His canon deaths came in the form of an ambush perpetrated by Shang Tsung and Quan Chi, and later an accidental frying from Raiden’s hand. In fact, he spent multiple continuities clashing with Raiden.

That was nothing compared to what he became at the end of Mortal Kombat 11. Two Liu Kangs from different parts of history merged together into one being, with Raiden handing over his godly power, giving us an incarnation of Liu Kang that was not only a god but had control over both electricity and fire. This was the upgrade needed to destroy Kronika and put Liu Kang in control of time itself.

2. SHANG TSUNG (TIE)

As it turned out, Fire God Liu Kang wasn’t equipped to wield Kronika’s magical hourglass for long without her crown, or else time would eventually collapse. Shang Tsung popped in to explain all this, making it clear that he was reality’s only choice. Liu Kang and Fujin realized that they had to give into Shang’s obvious trickery to save everyone.

By the end of his adventure, Shang Tsung had re-killed Kronika and wore her crown while empowered by the souls of Kronika, Raiden, Fujin, Shao Kahn, and Sindel.

Then Fire God Liu Kang popped in to take over. The two rivals faced off and the player was given the choice of which character they wanted to play as. As it is right now, we don’t know who won the epic battle in official canon, so consider Liu Kang and Shang Tsung to be tied until further notice.

1. THE ONE BEING

The most powerful being in Mortal Kombat is not playable in any of the games, nor has it appeared as a boss. In fact, the One Being is presumably too powerful to be portrayed in humanoid form at all. It’s the Galactus of the Mortal Kombat universe, though honestly even more threatening.

The One Being existed at the beginning of time, along with the Elder Gods, and initially fed off of them. The Elder Gods struck back and were able to break the One Being apart into the various realms. If the realms were to be merged back together, it would awaken the One Being once more and destroy all of existence. Despite their desire to be top dog, guys like Shao Kahn, Onaga, Shinnok, and Shang Tsung are unknowingly being influenced by this ominous force.

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[keanuvibe]

Bodyguard (John Wick x Reader) Pt. 5

A/N: Howdy, here's part 5 my loves. Oh and there's smut ;)

Words: 3.6k

Warnings: swears, smut

Cool evening air began to add a chill to the summer night. The sky glowed light blue in the west, but a dark navy in the east, causing a wonderful gray hue to illuminate your surroundings. A gentle sigh escaped your lips as you brought your knees closer to your chest, eyes looking across the New York skyline. Police sirens and lights could be witnessed a couple blocks away, and you watched as the flashes made their way down the street. You currently sat on the roof, lost in a mindless gaze. The past week has been such a blur, it felt nice to finally not think. Your parents came home the next day after receiving the call from John. Since then, they haven't left you alone. Your father constantly demanded your whereabouts, and your mother treated you as though you were a child. Plus your ill-defined relationship with John caused such a swarm of emotions. Not to forget: Santino wants you dead and could do it so easily.

On a lighter note, your face wounds had healed nicely, though they were still evident and forming into scars. The bruises that littered your body were fading into a yellow hue and your muscles aren't nearly as sore. You and John had resumed training, per your request, though he remained very gentle with your figure. The only reason you even wanted to train again was solely so John had to touch you. When your parents came home, he made sure to avoid the little touches when in front of them, obviously not wanting to cause any alarm.

Since the day the fight happened, and John slept in your bed, there was a different energy around you two. You couldn't explain it, but things felt different. Plus, you hadn't forgotten about the kiss. It still crossed your mind, and you would often find yourself daydreaming about it, fingers toying with your bottom lip. John has only been apart of your life for two months, but it felt like you've known him longer. Especially after he opened up to you about his deceased wife. It developed a level of trust between you pair; a wonderful, fresh blanket from the dryer, feeling. John hasn't ever brought up the subject of your romantic happenings, though he thinks about them often. To be honest, the man is secretly excited that you wanted to train again. He too likes the close quarters, the warmth your body and energy brought. The repetitive close contact and the kiss you shared resulted in such an uproar of emotions to stir within the man; fondness he hasn't felt since Helen. It was almost refreshing-- a good omen-- to him that he could still feel love. Was this even love? Or merely infatuation? He didn't know, but you gave him a feeling he hadn't experienced in a while. Maybe he is falling for you.

John climbed up through the window and up onto the roof, seeing the silhouette of your shape. He carefully made his way over and sat down next to your body, wrapping a throw blanket over your shoulders. You glanced over to him, silently thanking him as well as admiring how the gray light accentuated his features. His eyes caught your own, and you two got caught in a silent gaze. His dark eyes pierced into your own.

“How are you?” He spoke after a few moments, his voice deep. It caused a chill to trickle down your spine.

“M’ alright.” You murmured, looking away and back towards where the sun had settled out of view. John mimicked your stare, turning to face the sky as well. Your hand slowly snaked from under the small blanket, and found John’s resting on his thigh. You quietly intertwined your fingers, giving his calloused hand a gentle squeeze.

“This is a wonderful view, hmm? I used to sneak up here when I was a child and watch the city. Mainly at night when I couldn't sleep.” You began. John turned to admire your profile, enjoying the curve of your nose and the gentle shape and softness of your features. He took in how the lighting accented you beautifully.

“Why couldn't you sleep?” The man asked. Your hands remained together, John’s thumb occasionally rubbing the side of your palm.

“Night terrors.” You hummed, “Nearly every night. This was the only way I’d escape. There's so much of this view to cherish, I'd easily forget the monster that chased me in a dream.” John listened to you speak as he scoot himself close to your body, your right and his left arm touching the other, as well as your thighs. You rest your head onto his shoulder, another quiet sigh escaping your lips. The warmth of your bodyguard’s form immediately caused you to snuggle closer to him. The sun had now completely set, and the sky was nearly black. The city lights illuminated your surroundings as horns, sirens, and general city noises filled the silence. You lifted your head from the man's shoulder and cast your gaze towards him. His stare remained on the city in front of you, however. There was no denying, you’d fallen for your bodyguard. He was handsome, caring, secretly sweet, and a killing machine. What else could you need? He could protect you, provide for you, and probably fuck your brains out when given the chance.

“John, there's something I should tell you.” You broke the silence, feeling emotions rise within your chest. The man reacted, cocking his head and furrowing his brows as he looked at you. You opened your mouth to speak, however his phone dinged, interrupting any words that would've escaped.

“Your father wants to speak with us.” John murmured, checking the device. You felt your stomach drop from the loss of opportunity, and nodded, swallowing thickly.

“I wonder what about.” You spoke quietly and removed yourself from a John's side. The two of you carefully trekked back to the window of your bathroom, climbing in. John entered first, then held out a hand for you to steady yourself on as you climbed through. Your heart pained at the feel of his large hand engulfing your own, but you pushed aside the feeling and nudged past him to exit the bathroom.

——————

“La mia bellezza.” ‘[My beauty.]’ Your father cooed, witnessing you approach him. He held his arms wide open with a gentle look across his face. You accepted his hug, allowing his arms to engulf you. You never understood how people were so scared of your father until you got older and really noticed how intimidating he is. He isn't a small man by any means; He stands just past six feet tall and still toned from his youth. The man has many scars as well. His most noticeable one is a gash across his left eye. You remember the day he came home with it, bleeding and bruised. Your mother had to tend to it-- you were barely eight years old.

The three of you settled into the man’s office; You taking a seat on a small two seater couch and John standing next to your figure, hands folded neatly as he stood. Your father stood behind his desk and grabbed his case that stored cigars.

“What's up?” You asked, observing as Francesco grabbed one and began to light it.

“Your mother, John, and I have been talking. We think we know how to get rid of Santino.” The older man began, taking puffs in between a couple words. You glanced between him and John, curious as to how you'd been excluded from the planning, but pushed aside the frustration.

“What have you been thinking, then?” You asked, sitting up and began pouring yourself a glass of dark liquor from the coffee table in front of you. Your father smiled at you and pulled out a set of blueprints, unrolling the sheets. You furrowed your brows, standing up and walking over to your fathers desk, taking the drink with you. John followed behind, standing next to you as you two placed yourselves in front of your father.

“There is a gala in two weeks. I am expected to be in attendance, you and your mother as well.” Francesco spoke, ashing the cigar. “Santino is expected too.” You glanced up at John, who gave you a gentle reassuring nod in response.

“So,” You began, looking back at your father, “What are you thinking?” You took a hefty gulp of the liquor before pouring yourself another glass.

“La mia bellissima figlia,” ‘[My beautiful daughter.]’ The man began. “I had in mind that we could use you as a decoy.”

“... Me?” You paused mid sip to ask. “Do you forget he almost had me killed last week?”

“You were ill prepared for that, my darling. This is the perfect plan. I have already briefed my team.” Your father countered. You clicked your tongue, taking another sip of the dark alcohol. You could feel John’s stares on the back of your skull but paid no mind to the intrusion. Francesco was basically asking you to be a live deer to a pack of wolves. You don't care how many lackeys will be there, or how many people will be protecting you, it was too risky. After the alleyway, your confidence and feeling of security has plummeted. To be fair, you didn't have any help, but it still scares you.

“Of course John will be by your side all evening, if that makes you feel better.” Your father added, too pouring himself a glass. He offered John a cup, who politely declined. You looked over to your bodyguard, catching his gaze at the same time. You felt your stomach flutter at the sight and took a sip of the liquor to drown out the feeling. You quietly paced over to the window, gazing through the curtains. Could you do this and get away with it? And are they going to kill Santino? You could hear your father and John murmuring and turned your attention back to them.

“Fine. Facciamolo.” ‘[Let’s do it.]’.

——————

The hot sting from a mat burn pulsed throughout your back. You let out a hiss, squeezing your eyes shut to push away the pain. John’s hand gently rest on your shoulder and you opened one eye to see him kneeling above you.

“Are you alright?” He asked softly. His hair had been tied into a bun with a few loose strands hanging in front of his eyes. You nodded, leaning on your elbows to sit up, slowly.

“Can we take a break? We've been training for two hours,” You breathed, leaning over to grab your water. Your bodyguard nodded, stepping away. Since you've agreed to be bait, essentially, John has been training harder with you. It's been a week since then, and you two have been training every morning for three hours. He’s stopped holding back, resulting in you being covered in more bruises, minor cuts, even a few rug burns. Your body is sore, tired, and worn out. 

“I just want you to be prepared.” John spoke after a few moments of silence. When it was quiet in the gym, it was more noticeable. Your breath would echo off the walls, you could hear your stomachs rumbling from hunger, you could even hear the drip of a loose pipe in the wall. However, sometimes the silent gym was nice. You couldn't hear the city life from down here, nor the scramble of your fathers employees. It was solitude.

“I know the gala is in a week, John, I can't show up bruised and covered in cuts.” You murmured, taking a sip from your water bottle. A wince covered your face as a mat burn on your back begin to sear when you moved your shoulder. John draped a towel over your back and shoulders, his figure sitting down next to your own. You glanced over, meeting his gaze.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you.” He spoke softly as his knee folded so it touched the side of your thigh.

“No, you didn't hurt me. My body is just sore.” You looked over to your bodyguard, relishing in his beauty. Even two hours deep into a training session, he still looked flawless. Your crush was growing stronger everyday, you've discovered. Even the simplest things John did made your heart flutter. The other day, he made you a little breakfast before you went down to train. You were turned on the entire time. You're a simple lady: A man making and serving you breakfast is hot.

You two ended up sitting for a couple more minutes before deciding to freshen up. Johns hand remained firm on your lower back as you two trailed up to your bedrooms. He used it to guide you, or push you if need be, towards the space. You two passed by your fathers office, and you peeked in to see your mother sitting on the edge of his desk. Business related, no doubt.

As you reached your respective bedrooms, the two of you paused in front of the doors, turning to look at the other. John’s tall figure towered over your own. You could smell the sweat stink from your sparring and bit your lip, looking down the man in front of you. Johns eyes did the same; he followed the curve of your body, down to your shoes and back. The tension had been getting more and more tight, ever since the night he slept in your bed. Was this meant to be? Your parents basically placed a buffet platter right in front of your hungry yearn for intimacy, how could you not take advantage?

“Do you want to-”

Your question was cut off my John’s lips attaching to your own. Rough hands dug into your hips as the man pushed you against the wall. Your bruised body burned at the sensation, but lust had taken control now and had already began numbing the pain. Your fingers found the man's hair, tangling themselves within the raven locks that donned his head. Johns large hand began to toy with the waistband of your leggings and you paused, pushing his hand away.

“Shower?” Was all that you could manage to leave your throat. The man nodded eagerly and you quickly opened your bedroom door. John closed it behind himself, immediately grabbing you and picking up where you left off. He gently bit your bottom lip, a low growl escaping his lips. Your hands found themselves at the hem of his shirt, fingertips eagerly feeling underneath the cloth. His skin was warm, soft, inviting, and you could feel his happy trail covered with a tuft of hair. John took action, breaking away to peel off his shirt first. You admired his bare top; toned with a soft squish to his belly. Next, you took off your shirt, leaving you in a sports bra. Your bodyguards large hand quickly found its way to your skin. You could feel his calloused fingertips gently caress the softness of your bare skin. His lips once again returned to your own, the hunger evident as he once again bit your bottom lip.

You kept the kiss going, shuffling towards the bathroom and shedding more clothes as you went. By the time John slammed you against the bathroom door, you two only remained in your underwear. His body pressed against yours, his leg parting your thighs slightly. You used the opportunity to grind onto his toned thigh, causing the man to shudder. You opened the bathroom door from behind your back, resulting in you two stuttering into the space. John quickly steadied your bodies, his lips kissing along your jawline, before lifting your person and placing you on the bathroom counter. He then turned around to the shower, starting the hot water before facing you once again. You bit your lip, admiring his hungry stare. You’d ruffled his hair pretty thorough during your make out, as it was obvious sex hair now. His eyes were dark, enticing, filled with want. His nose and cheeks were stained a light pink, and his lips a dusky fuchsia. You bit your lip, concealing a smirk as you lift your pointer finger, signaling him to come here.

In an instant John returns to you, his hands on your thighs. You wrapped your legs around his waist, trapping his crotch against your own, queuing a groan to release from the man's throat. You could feel his growing member rubbing against your own heat, and leaned your figure into his own. You lift your arms above your head, beckoning him to take off your sports bra. John’s eyes hungrily scanned your body, his hands reaching out and grabbing the hem of the bra, nearly ripping it off, as eager as he was. Your now freed breasts caught his attention and he let out a low moan of pleasure; large hands grasping each one. His lips returned to yours, more desiring than before. You reached your hand and began to palm his hard on, feeling it twitch under your touch. Your fingers found the hem of his boxers and you reached underneath, your hand wrapping around his bare cock. John moaned at the sensation of your cold hand.

“Should-We- Shower?” You asked in between kisses. The man nodded, stepping back and shedding off his underwear. You hopped off the countertop, too shedding off your leftover garment. You stepped into the shower first, John following close behind. The hot water eased your sore muscles instantly, however, you turned your back to the faucet, facing John. You wrapped your hand around his still hard cock, slowly pumping. The man shuddered at the movement, a low groan releasing from his throat. You pushed him back so you were away from the hot water stream, and knelt down, your head becoming level with his member. You looked up at him through your lashes, witnessing his hair fall around his eyes. You kissed the tip before licking underneath from base to tip. John's hands found your hair, keeping it from falling into your face as you took him into your mouth and began bobbing your head. Your bodyguard’s moans filled the bathroom. However, not too loud as to not alert someone. He used his hand to guide your rhythm, little praises leaving his mouth.

“Good girl.” He moaned so softly, you almost didn't catch it over the roar of the shower. You felt his member twitch and pulled your mouth off, not wanting him to finish. His hands quickly found their way to your body, grasping onto whatever they could touch as you stood back up. His lips returned to yours in a fever, as one of his hands quickly got to work, having found your clit. Your knees nearly buckled at the overwhelming pleasure, grasping onto your bodyguard a little tighter. John paused, picking you up with ease. His muscular biceps held you in place, your heads level, as he moved to line himself with your entrance. The tip of his cock rubbed against your clit and you moaned, covering it up by kissing the man's neck.

“Please, I want you.” You breathed into his ear. John took that as the signal and slowly insert himself into your heat, both of you voicing your pleasure at the sensation. He allowed you time to adjust to his size before he began thrusting, his arms securely holding you up. The hot water of the shower mixed with the sensation of it all was so intoxicating. John was addicting, and you wanted more. 

“I’ve wanted this for so long, il mio amore.” ‘[My love.]’ You kissed John’s neck in between moans. “Ti senti così bene.” ‘[You feel so good.]’ Your native language slipped through your lips, as your brain was clouded with pleasure. You knew John understood anyways; sometimes you two would have full conversations in Italian before you’d realize it wasn't English.

John slowly pulled out, wanting to change positions. You complied, allowing him to bend you over, grasping to what you could for balance. John’s hard cock rubbed your clit, causing you to shudder. He’d occasionally slip the tip in, teasing the feeling before he’d pull back out. You pouted, wanting to feel his cock again and let out a surprised gasp as John quickly shoved himself into your core and began fucking you fast. His large thumb fingers found their way to your clit and began rubbing, only adding to the pressure building in your lower abdomen.

“Sono vicino!” ‘[I’m close!]’ You moaned over the shower. John began thrusting harder, adding more pressure to your clit. Your legs were beginning to give, however the man was quick to hold you up securely. The warm burn in your lower stomach became overwhelming as an orgasm rocked your system. John felt your pussy tightening around his cock and let you ride out your orgasm before he pulled out, finishing onto your bum.

“Stai bene?” ‘[Are you okay?]’ John asked, gently rubbing your back as you stood up straight. You nodded, standing on your tippy-toes to kiss him. His hands wrapped around your waist, holding your chests so they were squished.

“Sì.” ‘[Yes.]’ A smile spread across your cheeks, and you were sure they were stained a hot pink. John nodded, kissing your forehead before releasing the hug. You two finished out the shower, of course being all lovey on each other. You still didn't know what to call your relationship. It isn't defined, and you certainly didn't want to be the one to define it. John’s contract is almost up, in fact, the whole situation with Santino ending will mean you’ll never see John again. He’ll move onto his next contract, leaving you, only to exist as a memory. It stung to think about John moving on, loving some other woman, fucking some other woman. You need to keep him around for as long as possible. But how're you going to do that?

——————

Master List

[inglourious-imagines]

War Poet (Robert "Peaches" Leckie)

Summary: You're one of the nurses in the hospital where Leckie's staying. You caught his attention from day one and he writes you some poems.

Author's Note: The three poems are NOT written by me but by Lang Leav! All credit goes to that person, check out other poems by this author. They're great!

Taglist: @alienoresimagines @floydtab @kyra3155 @real-fans @meteora-fc @not-john-watsons-blog @band-of-brothers-cz @tealaquinn @ok-roemanov

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"Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood." - G. Orwell, 1984

Robert Leckie was laying on a clean bed with white sheets, his head was resting on the softest pillow and on the little bedside table the clearest water with a bread was waiting only for him.

He opened his eyes slowly and the sharp hospital light immediately hit him. Bob groaned painfully as he turned to the side to ease his tired eyes a bit.

"Is everything okay here, soldier?" a gentle female voice could be heard right above him. His eyes landed on a young nurse with a concered look on her face as well as a big contagious smile. 

"I- I feel just f-fine, Miss." Leckie stuttered and slapped himself in his mind for acting like a teenage boy. "I mean," he cleared his voice, "I'm doing much better. Thank you."

She laughed at his rather cute behaviour and Robert thought it was the most beautiful sound he'd heard in 5 years. 

"I'm very happy to hear that. Let me know if anything happens." she smiled sweetly at the wounded broken man in front of her while writing down something in her papers.

"I'm Bob! Bob Leckie." he introduced himself quickly to make this woman stay a little longer. There was simply something in her that forced him to believe and hope again.

"It was very nice meeting you, Robert. I'm Y/N. See you around."

•••

Since that day, Leckie's mind was full of this mysterious nurse that captured his heart as well after only a few minutes of conversation.

"Can I steal you for a second, Miss Y/N?" Bob's voice called out for her as she was passing his bed. She quicky turned on her heel and approached his bed, her face a little red.

"What is it, Robert? I'm in a hurry so please keep it short. Are you having some pain or troubles?" Y/N blurted out putting a loose strand of her Y/H/C hair behind her ear.

Leckie just handed her a small piece of paper with a "when you have time". She crunched her nose a little and her look glanced on the big clock on the wall. Y/N hid the paper in her pocket and with a smile she disappeared in another room. 

•••

It was already about 10pm and Y/N was still finishing some paperwork she didn't have time to do during the day. Her eyes were slowly closing, her head bowing down and the pen fell out of her hand. It landed on the ground with a quiet crash but loud enough to wake her up. 

Y/N was exhausted. There was nothing she needed more than a proper sleep. At least for a few hours.

She looked out through the window from her office and her eyes wandered to the new soldier she met four days ago. Y/N put out the small paper from her pocket and placed it on the table in front of her. She read the title out loud, "Wounded."

A bruise is tender

but does not last,

it leaves me as 

I always was. 

But a wound I take

much more to heart,

for a scar will always

leave its mark.

And if you should ask me,

which you are,

my answer is -

you are a scar.

Y/N stared at the short poem for some time unable to process it. She'd never read such a thing and it caught her completely off guard. She expected everything but not poetry.

Folding the paper very carefully and hiding it in her pocket, Y/N stood up and finally went to bed with a slight feeling that Robert Leckie was definitely someone who's gonna have a certain impact on her life.

•••

The next day Y/N thought Leckie's about to ask about the piece of art he gave her but he didn't mention anything about it, not even a little hint. She was left confused and this young soldier had started to interest her probably more than her should and when he put another note in her hand, there was no denying it.

Y/N immediately rushed to the bathroom to read it as soon as possible. "Sea of Strangers," escaped her lips as she began to drown in Leckie's words.

In a sea of strangers you've longed to know me, 

your life spent sailing to my shores;

the arms that yearn to somebody hold me,

will ache beneath the heavy oars.

Please take your time and take it slowly,

as all you do will run its course;

and nothing else can take what only,

was always meant as solely yours.

And just like before, Y/N was lost of words. His head must be a horrifying place if he writes so beautifully like this. She again hid the art carefully not wanting to ever lose it. 

When Y/N was coming back to her patients, a sudden idea striked her - she quickly turned around heading to her office. The words were flowing out of her like they had never before. 

Have you ever loved a rose,

and watched her slowly bloom;

and as her petals would unfold, 

you grew drunk on her perfume.

Have you ever seen her dance,

her leaves all wet with dew;

and quivered with a new romance -

the wind, he loved her too.

Have you ever longed for her,

on nights that go on and on;

for now, her face is all a blur,

like a memory kept too long. 

Have you ever loved a rose, 

and bled against her thorns;

and swear each night to let her go,

then love her more by dawn.

Y/N breathed out as she finished her work reading it once again. It's been a long time since she wrote something like that. Before war, she used to publish in her local newspaper some poems or short stories, whatever really, but then Hitler started this whole thing so she immediately gave it up as soon as she enlisted as a nurse in the Pacific.

Y/N folded the paper and smiled to herself - she had a great feeling about it.

"How is it going today, Robert? Are you feeling any better?" she questioned the soldier smirking a bit as Bob looked up from his reading, a cigarette hanging from his lips. Y/N could swear she'd never seen something so attractive before. 

"Doing fine, Miss. Doing fine." Leckie chuckled as he took a drag and blew out a cloud of smoke. Y/N stepped a little closer and placed the piece of paper on his bedside table.

"In that case, I should move on to other patient, Mr Leckie. Have a nice day." she winked at him walking away.

•••

That day, Y/N was still in the hospital working on some paperwork late at night. She was so drown in the writing and thinking, she didn't notice someone coming in.

"You should have some rest, Miss Y/N." Leckie's voice echoed in the small room. She almost fell off of the chair as she was so caught in her work.

"You're gonna give me a heart attack one day, I swear." the nurse laughed nervously as she finally closed the book with patients' cards and turned to Bob.

"You're not really allowed to be here, you know that, Robert." Y/N smirked running her hand through her hair. 

"That's making this thing even more exciting." the soldier replied while coming closer to her with his usual grin on his face. "What if we get caught?"

Y/N was completely aware of the fact how close to her was Leckie now standing. The heat radiating off his body made her feel slightly nervous and when his hand gently touched her arm, she was glad she's leaning against a table for some support. She felt his breath on his skin and the atmosphere in the small room thickened.

"It's gonna cause some serious troubles." Y/N was surprised that her voice didn't tremble at all because the rest of her body was shaking under his tender touch. 

"I'm willing to take that risk." he whispered taking one more stepped closer to her. Their bodies were now pressed againt the other as Bob wrapped his arm around her waist.

"I swear I tried but you signed your fate with that poem of yours. Damn Y/N, you don't even know how much I have to hold myself back not to fuck you right here right now so you can have at least a little idea how I feel about you."

"And why can't you, Robert? Because I'm willing to risk it all for you."

[danddymaro]

With All My Heart | Venom Snake x Reader

ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ I’m back and hopefully for good. Of course, it’s a reader insert. I hope everyone is already well aware of how they work ( ◞･౪･) ?

Word count:

Anyways: 

I like myself some sweetness, so Sweet fluff stuff? YASSS // Somewhat NSFW, but full of sweet love.

Again, as I’ve mentioned before I don't see many metal Gear things, it’s the same backstory but I don’t think it really matters much here.

With All My Heart

Her back lay flat onto the small bed, and not a second after, her head joined, fully rested onto the mattress, infecting the sheets beneath them with her radiating warmth.

- And it didn't stop there, her comforting heat traveled more, spreading out of her like the sun's own rays would, reaching her beloved and enveloping him in the sweet radiance as well.

He also came down, hovering above her, his hands both laid flat on either side of her head, the rest of his body lowering closer to cuddle towards her warmth, affectionately cradling his loving sunshine with his own adoring tenderness, reminding her that her love was well returned and requited.

A small kiss was placed over her left eyebrow, rising a sweet smile from her, and as he came back up to take in all of the preciousness of the cute grin he'd aroused, he stopped, winded by what he had captured instead.

For a silent moment, his eye was aimed to hers, focused like a curious crow's would be at the sight of gleaming silver.

She'd enticed a concentrated connection none one could break.

Havoc could be wreaked right outside their door, and he wouldn't have the will to tear himself from her. In fact, there was a good chance it would all be ignored, not even left as an afterthought.

He kindly moved aside her now messy bangs, moving the stray hairs out of the way to admire her sweet (e/c) eyes.

The two gems had always fascinated him, along with everything else that had to do with her. So, It wasn't to say that he'd never noticed them before, or given them the attentiveness they deserved.

If he were being truthful, he'd admit that everything about her was bewitching. Everything about her was stunning, but there was just something especially wonderous about her (e/c) eyes that tantalized him.

Whether she was saddened or angered, joyous or even dull in mood, they held a captivating charm that bewitched him, drawing him in with an effortless, yet powerful pull.

He could have sworn he knew every detail about the amazing gems he'd stared at for months, but to his surprise, there was something within those shining beauties that had changed.

There was a new glow that he hadn't seen before, and at the discovery of it, his body moved on its own, following what silent orders her (dark/Light) eyes gave him.

With his ungloved fingers, he traced over her facial features, tracing the lines that would exist if he were to draw her. He took in everything he could, to the point of even seeing her as he closed his eyes, his mind not knowing anything but the woman his fingers were softly grazing.

"You look beautiful," he muttered, the words coming out low and breathless.

At his sudden admittance, he watched as her face began to blossom with new color, bashfulness showing as she drew her eyes from him, too embarrassed to look at him straight on.

"John..." she muttered just as softly, having no real response for him but the dumb little mutter of his name.

He'd called her beautiful before and she never came to believe that perhaps there was a hidden meaning behind the instances.

She wasn't doubtful of his words, not when he looked so spellbound, and especially not when he touched her so gently, because she was well aware that a touch so sweet couldn't exist without there being tenderness there.

She wasn't doubtful of his proclamation of love, but she was far too modest to look up at the neediness that was notable in his gaze.

Furthermore, she was beyond flustered due to the thickness of his voice as he had spoken to her just then. There was a want that existed for her, and that was what had her so rattled with both exaltedness and anxiousness.

' - But I want him too,' She reasoned, 'I want him just as much,' She thought to herself with a thick swallow, drawing her eyes back over to him, her face still blazing with the same timidness his loving gaze had arisen.

'And I want this...' She declared with certainty, not willing to back away from him more. 'I don't want you to think otherwise, John...I don't want to back away from this,'

She looked at him with the same sweetness he would always get the pleasure to taste when their lips moved against each other.

- She didn't want to hold back anymore.

Batting her eyes up at him, she began to smile, prompting him to offer her a soft smile of his in return, his face inching closer to hers, nearing close enough that his nose lightly grazed hers.

Their hot breaths and pants mingled, becoming one just as they soon would. Tension...

Anticipation... They both felt it.

Instinctively, her lips twitched, more than ready for him to touch them, a pang of disappointment striking her when it was delayed, seeming to never come. It was a merciless play that she thought was unfair and cruel, leaving her body shivering.

Taking notice, he released a soft chuckle, repeating the action yet again, the tip of his nose barely touching hers with another featherlight brush, watching her expect the loving press the second time as well, "John..." She murmured in the same sweet voice that had the power to make him do just about anything she wanted him to.

"Please stop teasing me," she begged, sounding smaller and smaller as she continued to speak. It was killing her, the deprivation of a single kiss paining her so much, it was nearly unbearable. "Please... kiss me, just kiss me," she said with a hushed voice, still small yet full of demand, screaming of need and desire.

Her plea though soft, yet as powerful as a lion's roar, making his skin riddle with goosebumps.

"Of course," he said sweetly, "But first," he started, licking his lower lip, feeling it suddenly go dry.

There was just one thing he needed to let out and let her know, "I'll be gentle." He said softly, "I'll try," he added, meaning it wholeheartedly. "So, tell me if I'm hurting you," he continued on while his hand gently grazed her cheek. He couldn't bear to hurt her, and wouldn't ever dream of it, even if it was as unintentional as it could come.

"You can tell me anything," he told her, hoping she wouldn't withhold her pain for his own sake.

With a docile nod, she offered him a sweet smile in return, her stomach filled with fluttering butterflies, the little creatures doing all the tricks they knew.

Shaking her head she answered him back, "I trust you," she said in a breathy tone, her eyes batting close as he gently pressed his lips over her forehead.

"I trust you John..." she assured him, "And I love you... I love you so much," She added, her voice quivering, the quake in it making the man give her yet another smile as he moved to press his lips over her eyelids where just beneath them, small tears began to collect.

He didn't know what reason existed behind the misplaced kiss, not understanding what fueled him to lay one over each of her closed beauties, but he reasoned that perhaps there was no other reason aside from his overflowing love taking reign, his body set to pilot mode and controlled by his heavily palpitating heart.

- He wanted to kiss every bit of her, love her all he could to make up for his absences, past, present and future.

She kept complaints to herself, knowing there could be nothing done but wait, and he appreciated that. He appreciated not just her love, but her dedication and patience with him.

With the final detour taken, he moved over to her lips, giving her the smooch she'd begged him for from the start, and that she'd been so desperate for. As he had expected, she eagerly responded back, diving in with desperation.

She replied back, kissing him just as fiercely, pouring in all the love she felt through the heated collision as though it'd be the last one they would ever share, and she had to cram a lifework of affection in one, single press.

Her back arched, her two hands placed at the back of his head as she floated up to a cloud higher than 9.

She nearly forgot to breathe, her sole focus placed on the addicting taste of his invading tongue, the wet muscle eagerly exploring the warm space within her mouth. A deep, drawn-out moan then fell past her, muffled by their wet kiss as she felt his hands grab her sides, each of them placed at her hips and squeezing them as though he had ownership of them already. 'I'm yours... I'm all yours!' She chanted in her head as she became mush in his manly hands.

They parted in what felt like too soon, her lungs immediately filling with air as she gasped loudly, staring at him with a desire for more of those wildly mind-numbing Kisses.

He took half a second to draw back in, aching for another kiss as well, hard presses from his lower half colliding with the rising of her own hips which had instinctively moved.

"God (f/n)..." He mumbled, his teeth scraping her lower lip, tugging lightly, causing her body to let loose of a small shudder of delight.

Her hands slid over his shoulders, working back the black elastic holding his dark hair together. Successfully, she loosened his chocolatey strands, her fingers weaving through the long strands with blissful joy as they continued to make out.

His lips then traveled down, finding a small spot just behind her ear to give attention to, making her upward thrusting cease with a loud gasp as he circled his tongue over her skin. His fleshed hand, ungloved and fully bare slipped beneath the edge of her periwinkle turtleneck, the skin both soft and smooth against his rough palm, a difference he could feel.

Molding her clothed breast through the thin material of her undergarment, he could feel the small peak risen beneath the cotton fabric.

"I love you," He told her, " (f/n)...I love you..." he repeated.

Nodding quickly, she gave a strong heave, "I know..." she breathed out, her (e/c) eyes gazing up at the ceiling, the two twinkling gems tearing with joy. "And I love you too," she huffed.

She loved it when he told her, when he wasn't afraid to admit to her that she meant everything to him.

There was a beautiful feeling that came with his words, and it always made sure to stay for hours, making her feel alive.

His lips left her skin, and he rose up, both legs still on either side of her waist as he stared down at her with haggard breathing, looking arousingly wild as well as manly and overwhelmingly sexy.

His right hand reached down to her, starting from her lips, grazing down to her navel, his eyes connecting with hers through the entire movement. He stepped off from the bed, his hand held out for her, and without question she took it, soon being pulled into his chest.

Again their tongues danced, meanwhile both tasked themselves with going through their lover's clothes, piece by piece falling to the ground, discarded and forgotten. Completely bare, she gazed up at him, seeing the hunger within his gaze grow more.

Swallowing hard, she gave herself fully, each movement of hers being run by the thudding muscle within her chest, letting it guide her.

Again they fell onto the mattress, their naked skin brushing against each other with each movement they made, her mind going hazy as his large hands preoccupied themselves with her most sensitive spots, knowing just where to touch her as though he already had the manual to her own body, having studied it dutifully beforehand. 'This is the best feeling ever...' she thought in bliss, not feeling pain at his first plunge within her, instead, feeling nothing but completion and fullness.

His body hovered over hers, and she felt like she was covered by a soft blanket that protected her from the rest of the world,

'Don't let me go...' she thought to herself, breathing hard.

- And she didn't have to tell him, because he wouldn't ever give her up.

He wouldn't let anything but the feeling of love touch her.

She felt his hands caress her naked body, affectionately petting her sides as he picked up his pace, every stroke striking her at her most vulnerable spot, sure to raise a moan from her, "I love you, John," she murmured, never growing tired of proclaiming her love to him.

Her arms were then tightly wrapped around his neck, her face remaining hidden onto the crook of his neck as his hand slid down her hip, running over the side of her thigh until it landed on the back of her knee, lifting it to hold it within the crook of his arm as he continued to thrust within her.

"- I love you so much," she repeated, her panting breaths fanning over his sweat glossed skin.

"- With all my heart," she added, her body involuntarily shaking as they were both almost at their highest peak.

Together, they enjoyed his night home, withholding nothing from one another, falling deep into the scathing waters of passionate lovemaking.

ʕ ง •ᴥ•ʔง WHOOOP!  ʕ / •ᴥ•ʔ/