#Reliving the Past AU

[thedreamworldlibrary]

Dusk till Dawn

Here’s an angsty Drabble for you all! I wrote this as a gift for my friend Undynlicia’s Welcome to Dreamworld fanfic, Reliving the Past! I highly recommend reading the fanfic as it’s really good, and filled with angst!

Also this idea had been on my mind for a month and I had to write it before continuing my other series. It also gives me a break since I have some stories on a backlog at the moment.

For those who have read RTP this little drabble takes place between after Starlight and Allison.

BIG thanks to my beta reader @gigilefache

Enjoy!

The sounds of children laughing and seeing hem run around the facility brought a smile to Lewis and his two best friend’s faces. Their dream has finally become a reality with no problems whatsoever.

“I can’t believe we did it,” Lewis said. Oliver and Sara chuckled as the three continued to watch the kids play.

Lewis heard a knock and turned to see his boyfriend, Wiatt outside with a bouquet of fresh flowers. The founder smiled as he went to the door to greet and kiss his boyfriend.

At least, that’s what Lewis thought was going to happen…

Upon opening the door Lewis was teleported to the hallways that were located near the cave system, hidden down below the facility. He looked around and realized that the door he came through was gone.

“W-Wiatt!” Lewis called out. He received no answer other than the echo of his voice. “Oliver! Sara!” Seeing there was no one other than himself, Lewis started to walk the hallways calling out the names of everyone he knew and loved, hoping they would answer.

“Eric! Carly! Ben! Liz! Anyone!” Lewis yelled, listing down the names.

A loud clang was heard that echoed deep into the hallways. Lewis was breathing heavily as he just wanted to get out of there. However, a scream snapped the founder out of his thoughts. He recognized that scream.

“Wiatt!” Lewis yelled.

He sprinted as fast as his legs could take him. He tried to find where the scream came from until he heard Wiatt cry out again. “Let go of me!”

“Darling! I’m coming! Hold on!” Lewis yelled again.

After what felt like forever, Lewis found Wiatt and his eyes widened.

Wiatt was pinned down by the Pegasus animatronic, Winnie. The young boy struggled to free himself from the animatronic, but the second Wiatt was to free himself, Winnie would grab him by his shirt and slam his head on the ground.

“Let him go!” Lewis yelled.

Winnie and Wiatt looked up to see Lewis, glaring at the animatronic with anger. Wiatt’s eyes widened as he gave a small smile seeing his boyfriend. “Lewis.” He whispered. 

Winnie growled. “So the prince is here to save his little boyfriend.”

Lewis glared as he glowed, starting his transformation, “I said let him go.” He repeated.

Winnie laughed as he raised his claw, and stabbed Wiatt in his shoulder. The young boy let out a scream, causing Lewis’s eyes to widen and quickly had to transform and save his boyfriend.

However, instead of transforming the glow faded leaving the founder confused, “w-what?!” He asked himself.

Winnie laughed again, “Looks like Litho’s plan worked!” He beamed. Lewis looked at the Pegasus animatronic confused and frightened, “While you weren't looking, Litho made sure to disable your powers to make sure you wouldn’t stop us.”

Lewis was breathing heavily, he tried to transform again, but no luck. Winnie chuckled, feeling his grandson trying to remove his claw from his arm. Winnie turned towards him before shoving his claw in further, causing Wiatt to scream. His screams in pain got louder as the Pegasus animatronic tore his arm out of the socket and tossed it aside.

“STOP IT! PLEASE!” Lewis cried, begging the animatronic to stop hurting his boyfriend any further.

“Stop?” Winnie asked, before letting out a chuckle. The chuckle evolved into laughter, a laughter that scared the boyfriends. “Oh I’m not going to stop Mr. Bright.” He then gave a smirk that made Wiatt’s blood run cold.

Lewis’s blood went cold too as he shook his head, “No…” Lewis whimpered. Winnie chuckled as his smaller claws became sharper. “NO! STOP PLEASE! NO!”

Winnie ignored Lewis’s screams begging him to not hurt Wiatt, as the pegasus raised his claw and slashed Wiatt on the neck. 

“NO WIATT!” Lewis screamed, jolting from the bed. He breathed heavily as he looked around and saw he wasn’t back in the hallways of the facility, but the mansion belonging to his boyfriend.

It was a nightmare. A horrible, sadistic, twisted nightmare.

Lewis slowly reached for his glasses, which he almost dropped before grabbing them and slowly opened the door from his room out into the hallway. 

He slowly opened the door to his left and sighed seeing Eric was asleep. From the looks of it, Ribbondancer took over and couldn’t sleep either, as shown from the blanket and a few pillows on the floor.

Lewis closed the door and opened the door to his right where Rex and Alyssa were sleeping. The founder was relieved no one woke up from the sound of screaming. He closed their door, went back to his room, and eventually, back to bed.

However, Lewis wasn’t going to fall back asleep. The second he closed his eyes, images of the day Wiatt was killed played in his head. His eyes snapped open and all Lewis could do was stare at the ceiling, deciding not to sleep at all. 

By morning, Eric decided to make breakfast for everyone while the group chatted and planned what to do next. Lewis on the other hand was tired, and had bags under his eyes. His eyes would slowly close, but then he would always swiftly open them again. He smiled and nodded so no one would notice him sleep deprived and that he was focusing on the situation at hand.

Oliver noticed his best friend looking tired. “L-Lewis?” Oliver asked. Lewis wasn’t responding as his eyes slowly closed. Oliver then shook his best friend, and shouted his friend’s name, “Lewis!”

Lewis screamed and fell out of his seat breathing heavily. Oliver jumped, nervous that he may have scared his best friend.

“Sorry. I’m sorry.” Oliver apologized.

“L-Lewis are you okay?” Rex asked.

“Mr. Lewis, are you okay?” John asked.

Everyone was asking the founder if he was alright, but all Lewis could hear was Wiatt’s voice echoing in his head. He didn’t hear Eric telling everyone to step back and give the founder some space.

“Lewis!” Eric yelled.

Lewis, still breathing heavily, glanced at his former teacher. He saw the worry in everyone’s faces as his breathing slowed.

“Lewis.” Eric said again, calmer this time. “Are you okay?”

Lewis slowly nodded. Eric helped his former student up and saw he had bags under his eyes, and he looked tired.

“Lewis, did you sleep at all last night? You look exhausted.” Eric exclaimed.

“You're more tired than Oliver!” Ben exclaimed. Oliver glanced at his younger brother with a small glare. The younger brother gave a sheepish smile, “no offense.”

Lewis went quiet thinking of what to tell his friends. If he told them about the nightmare he had of Wiatt, they’ll just give him comfort and tell him “it wasn’t his fault.” 

“I-yes I didn’t sleep at all.” Lewis spoke up. “I got up early to look through notes on how to stop Litho and Winnie,” Lewis lied.

Out of everyone in the room, Eric, Oliver, Rex, Alyssa, and Carly knew the founder was lying. They knew it was about Wiatt, and how his soul is possessing Starlight in this new timeline. They didn’t want to bring it up as they knew it was a hard wound on Lewis.

Eric sighed and put his hand on Lewis’s shoulder, “Lewis you need to rest more.” He said.

Lewis shook his head, “n-no. I’ll be fine.” He replied. “I promise.”

“Lewis.” Eric said in a stern voice.

The founder knew he couldn’t argue with his former teacher. He sighed, “fine.” He whispered before slowly walking back to his room.

As he walked back Ribbondancer took over Eric’s body, looking concerned over the founder. “Is this because of…” he asked.

Carly nodded and put her hand on her dad, or possibly Ribbon’s shoulder.

If this was any situation, Ribbondancer would find ways to cheer Lewis up, but he knew the situation and painting or jumping on the bed wasn’t going to make Lewis feel better.

When Lewis made it back to his room he collapsed on his bed and turned facing the ceiling again. He didn’t want to sleep, he just wanted to lay there forever. He was so tired though that his eyes closed on their own despite him struggling to keep them open.

The second Lewis opened his eyes he was outside underneath a tree. He turned and smiled seeing Wiatt next to him. The younger boy scooted closer to his boyfriend before kissing him on the lips. Lewis melted and giggled over the affection his boyfriend was giving him.

“I love you, Lewis.” Wiatt said.

Lewis chuckled, “I love you too, darling.” He replied. He then realized that he wasn’t outside but back at the cave system of the facility. “W-Wiatt?” He looked around.

The founder walked through the cave system and called out for Wiatt. Suddenly a loud scream was heard that caused Lewis to run and search for his boyfriend faster.

He ran as fast as he could till he saw Wiatt pinned down by Winnie, as the latter was ready to remove the young boy’s arm.

“WIATT!” Lewis screamed, tears appearing in his eyes.

“LEWIS!” Wiatt screamed back using his free arm in hopes Lewis would reach for him.

Winnie growled and stabbed Wiatt’s shoulder deeper, until the Pegasus felt his claws touch the floor before going ahead and tearing the young boy’s arm off, and tossing it to the side.

Wiatt let out a loud scream, which made Lewis’s eyes widened in horror. “Stop please!” Lewis cried out.

The pegasus animatronic chuckled ignoring the founder’s cries, and in a twist of events, Winnie went to Wiatt’s left leg, and used his claws to stab it and just like with the young boy’s arm, the pegasus tore Wiatt’s leg off, tossing it to the side.

Wiatt let out a scream and started to cry.

“STOP! STOP HURTING HIM!”  Lewis screamed.

Winnie laughed, “oh I’m just getting started.” He sneered, having his claw up and striking Wiatt down.

“NO” Lewis yelled, waking up. He breathed heavily and looked around seeing he was in his room, and he was only out for an hour. Lewis groaned and collapsed on his bed realizing he was never going to sleep at all.

Days passed and Lewis’s nightmares didn’t stop. Seeing Winnie kill Wiatt over and over again, sometimes worse than what he saw before, and Lewis couldn’t do anything to stop the murderous pegasus. Lewis couldn’t focus on the situation at hand, he was drained and wanted to sleep peacefully.

One day Wiatt finally left the facility and was able to reunite with the others. Upon him arriving, he saw how exhausted and tired his boyfriend was. When Wiatt asked, Lewis responded the same thing; he’s was trying to find ways to stop Litho as well as seeing if there was a way to bring Wiatt back to his old body. However, Wiatt knew it was something deeper. By night time, Eric told Wiatt a bit of what’s going on with Lewis.

“So, he hasn’t been sleeping?” Wiatt asked.

Eric shook his head, “I think since everything that happened during that confrontation with Winnie, Lewis seems bothered by it.” He explained.

Wiatt frowned and went over to Lewis’s room and saw his partner in bed, on his phone watching videos. The animatronic saw Lewis’s eyes closing before he snapped them back open to stay awake. He saw Wiatt and gave him a small wave, and smile, even though he was tired.

Wiatt frowned and gave Eric a nod that said he'd stay with Lewis for the night. Eric nodded back and walked off leaving the animatronic and his partner alone.

The animatronic slowly walked over to Lewis, who finally passed out and fell asleep. Wiatt went and laid down next to him, hoping not to wake his partner, and sighed. The star animatronic tried to get to sleep, but the second he closed his eyes he felt Lewis shifting back and forth, crying out his name.

“Wiatt…No…Wiatt…” Lewis cried.

“L-Lewis?” Wiatt asked.

“Wiatt no!” Lewis yelled, tossing and turning.

“Lewis!” Wiatt yelled. The star animatronic was horrified seeing Lewis toss and turn, screaming and crying out for him in his sleep. He tried to shake Lewis, but nothing woke up the founder.

“No! No!” Lewis cried.

Wiatt couldn’t stand seeing his boyfriend in so much pain. He shook him one more time and yelled, “Lewis wake up!” once more.

“GAH!” Lewis’s eyes snapped open as he breathed heavily. He looked around, seeing he was in his room, and that Wiatt was in front of him. “W-Wiatt?” 

Wiatt nodded in reply. “Are you al-” He was cut off when Lewis tackled him into a hug and sobbed into his mechanical chest. Wiatt’s eyes widened as he looked down at his partner and slowly put his arms around him.

“I’m sorry!” Lewis cried.

“Huh?” Wiatt asked, confused.

“I’m sorry for letting you die and becoming Starlight! I’m sorry for leaving you after high school for Dreamworld! I’m sorry for pretending to lose my memories of you just to keep everyone safe! I’m sorry for every stupid thing I’ve done to hurt you darling!” Lewis wailed listing every bad thing he’s done in the previous timeline.

If Wiatt could he would have cried too, as he felt the Scarlet mask go on his face. He didn’t realize Lewis was holding this all in for a while, probably since the previous timeline. He then wrapped his arms around his crying boyfriend, and started to rub circles on his back.

“Lewis.” Wiatt started. “I told you before it wasn’t your fault that I died and became Starlight.”

Lewis sniffled, not looking up at his boyfriend. “It is. If only…” Lewis choked out a sob.

“If only what? You died again to protect me?” Wiatt asked.

“Mhm.” Lewis replied.

Wiatt sighed. “Lewis, don’t think like that. If anything it could’ve been anyone. Not just me.” He said. 

Lewis let out a sob, and looked up at his boyfriend, his eyes were red at that point, and filled with tears. Wiatt used his hand to cup Lewis’s cheek and used his thumb to wipe the tears from his eyes.

“However, with what you said. I forgive you. I forgive you for everything Lewis Bright. So don’t feel guilty. It wasn’t your fault. I forgive you.” Wiatt said as he stared into Lewis’s glossy eyes as the blue mask went on him.

Lewis sniffled and wiped the tears from his eyes, “I-I am glad, darling.” He replied. He felt like he didn’t deserve it, but Wiatt pulled him into a kiss and with that Lewis melted into the kiss.

The two let go, and smiled at each other before lying down together. Lewis was still scared of falling asleep and falling into the same nightmare again. Wiatt took notice and pulled Lewis closer to him.

“Sleep. You need it.” Wiatt whispered. “Don’t worry about the nightmares. I’m right here and I’ll make sure you’ll never have them again.”

Lewis gave a weak smile before slowly closing his eyes. Wiatt placed a kiss on Lewis’s forehead before closing his eyes and falling asleep alongside him.

A smile appeared on Lewis’s face as he slept showing that his nightmares were truly over.

By morning, the couple was still in bed in each other's arms. Eric smiled seeing the two have finally gotten some rest after a few days of pain.

“Should we wake them?” Ribbon Dancer asked, taking control of his host body.

Eric took back control and shook his head. “Nah, let them rest. They need it.” He said, before closing the door letting Wiatt and Lewis sleep a little longer.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

oh hey! i was reading a fic the other day where Wangji was once misspelled as Wangu. which leads me to: MDZS Pingu-style??? noot noot!

Do you think love can bloom on the sea ice?

[delicatebeauties]

Small personal hc that kant jumped to his "death" because

1 he thinks he deserves it for hurting the ones he cares about (and blinded by pain forgets about style or babe) and the pain of bison disbelief in his love when it's the only truth in his lying body, the immense love he has.

Story wise by the hospital scene he had officially switched sides looking to rescue bison

2 he has been a dead man walking for so long , the cards dealt by life exhausts him and when given that choice to prove his love by death like a romantic hero he does

He doesn't beg fight or struggle for mercy. He could have crawled at bison feet

3 in his love for bison he doesn't want to make him carry the burden of shooting him. If he jumps and kills himself then bison can still save him

[sjsmith56]

The Visitor

Summary: A visitor to the Avengers compound causes concern for Bucky as she wishes to talk to him about his time as the Winter Soldier. Tony thinks she has something to hide.

Length: 4.3 K

Characters: Bucky Barnes, Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, name OFC.

Warnings: Emotional trauma, bringing up the past.

Author notes: In this canon based AU, the Avengers defeated Thanos in Wakanda. Bucky returned to the United States but was confined to the Avengers compound while his legal status was determined. Although Tony accepted his presence there is still awkwardness between the two men.

After the battle of Wakanda the world was in turmoil regarding the close call with the genocidal Thanos, that could have resulted in the death of billions of people.  The Avengers rallied together to fight the Titan, in a battle that saw the arrival of Tony Stark along with several non-human beings via a portal provided by Dr. Strange.  They met up with the force already in Wakanda that included the fugitives Steve Rogers, Sam Wilson, Natasha Romanoff, Wanda Maximoff, and the man most people knew as the Winter Soldier, Bucky Barnes.  The moment when Tony Stark found himself alongside the man who had killed his parents was captured by drone cameras that broadcast the battle to the world.  There was no denying that Stark wished he were beside someone else, but when Barnes took out an alien beast that knocked over Stark from behind then offered the iron-suited man a hand up, a hand that was taken, it was hoped the healing could begin.

After the defeat of Thanos, it was Stark who asked Bucky Barnes to return to the United States, offering him a place at the Avengers compound while his legal status was clarified, and providing him with legal counsel as the American political, judiciary and military complex began drawing their own battle lines over the former PoW's return.  When Bucky provided Stark a long list of names of HYDRA supporters in those areas, names that would have marked millions as enemies to be taken out, he went public with the information, turning attention towards the traitors who still hid openly in plain sight.  While Stark was the public face of the Avengers that handled this, Bucky was required to stay on the compound, wearing an ankle monitor to keep him there.  He was free but he was still confined.

The two super soldiers entered the common room, both fresh out of the showers after they ran close to 20 miles that morning.  As they helped themselves to the offerings of the breakfast buffet, then sat down at the large table, several others strolled in, having just awakened.

"We have a request from the legal team representing the families," said Tony Stark, entering the common room, looking like he had been up all night.  "Friday, display the request.  They wish to send another person to interview Bucky Barnes."

"Why?" asked Steve, looking up at the formal letter.  He frowned at the terse request.  "He already submitted everything he remembers.  What purpose would this serve?"

Tony looked briefly at Bucky, who sat quietly, as he often did at the compound, still trying to fit in there.

"Part of it is to question him themselves in a non-legal location so they can get an idea of what kind of man he is," he answered.  "That's what one of the lawyers admitted to me.  Personally, I think the woman they are proposing may be looking to find inconsistencies in his memories.  Our lawyers are insisting that anything he says to her would be inadmissible and unpublished by her in any way, shape or form."

"Is she a relative of one of the dead?" asked Bucky.

"No, she's not related to anyone," said Tony, bringing up a picture of a woman in her late twenties or early thirties, her dark hair cut in a stylish bob.  "Her name is Dr. Aline Clifton, a sociologist, PhD from Columbia University.  She's written several papers on the effects of imprisonment and torture on PoWs and kidnap victims.  Her papers have been ... interesting as she doesn't really come to any conclusions on whether a person can be forced to commit crimes when they are a prisoner, yet she appears to be sympathetic to those who have."

"Do I have to see her?"

"No, you're under no obligation.  It's just a request.  They would like an answer by tomorrow."

He nodded at Tony and got up from the table, leaving the rest of his breakfast untouched, followed by Steve.  Together, the two men went to Steve's quarters, which Bucky was sharing.  His nightmares occasionally needed an intervention from his friend.

"Why are they doing this?" he asked.  "She's the third one.  The first two concurred with my defence that I was in no position to counteract my programming.  I guess they didn't like hearing that.  Why do I have to go through this again?"

"You don't," replied Steve.  "It's just a request that you have already granted twice.  You don't have to see her."

"They'll twist that into saying I have something to hide.  I'll see her."

He left to tell Tony personally that he would agree to the meeting.  It wasn't like he was busy doing much else.

Two days later

It was stressful sitting in the conference room, waiting for the arrival of Dr. Aline Clifton.  Bucky had examined every vibranium plate in his left hand, tracing the seams between each section.  It was the equivalent of chewing his fingernails, which he had already done to his right hand.  He looked at the LED clock on the wall, noting it was only a minute since he last looked at it.  Then, with a sigh, he got up and went to the window, looking out over the nearby reservoir.  The waters looked so calm and peaceful, but he knew below that they were anything but, as currents drew the water towards the downstream dam that originally formed the body of water in the 1880s.  Hearing the door behind him open he was startled to see the woman in question standing in the doorway, alone.  She nodded her head at him, then entered, closing the door behind her.

"I'm Aline Clifton," she said.  "Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Barnes."

"Bucky is fine," he answered, then gestured to a chair.  "After you."

She sat, facing him as he sat across from her.  Quickly, he took in her appearance.  Her dark hair was cut in a modern style that accentuated her dark eyes and fine facial features, giving her an intensity that wasn't common on someone her age.  She had a septum piercing which drew his attention until he realized he was staring and looked away.  She smiled slightly at him, noticing his stare.

"A remnant of my youth," she explained.  "I embraced a goth lifestyle for a time.  There were many such piercings that I discarded over the years as I became more attuned to myself.  I keep this one as a reminder that everyone has issues, both exposed and hidden."

"I'm sorry.  That was rude of me to stare.  I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"You didn't and the sentiment is returned.  You're probably wondering why I'm here."  Bucky didn't answer.  "The truth is that I wished to meet you, and I put in a request to your lawyers, but they refused me outright.  So, I reached out to the lawyers of the families as I heard that two others approached you on a fact-finding basis.  I was hoping a third request would be accepted."

"I didn't hear about you until two days ago but now that you're here, you seem familiar.  We haven't met before." 

She shook her head; her mouth set in a grim line. 

"No, we haven't met but I did manage to be in the courtroom several times during your appearances.  Perhaps you remember me from that."

"Perhaps."  He caught himself staring again, trying to reconcile exactly where he knew her from.  "Why did you want to see me?  Everything that you see or read about me is true."

"I know, but I was hoping to provide you with some comfort, for lack of a better word."  She looked outside the window then, and he saw how she was choosing her words carefully.  "My whole career has been spent in studying individuals who were indoctrinated by others.  Some were subject to it by proximity; their parents were members of a cult, or they were looking for personal enlightenment at the hands of charlatans.  Others, like yourself, were captured, imprisoned, and tortured.  Sometimes, the treatment they received was just for the hell of it, to satisfy the sadistic desires of their captors.  Other times, it was with a purpose in mind, such as manipulating them into becoming agents or supporters of their cause."

"I didn't choose to be the Fist of HYDRA," interrupted Bucky.  "I was a prisoner of war, who was experimented on before my rescue, then I fell into their hands again, in a broken body that couldn't defend itself, and they continued the experiment for decades.  It was only Steve saying my name, and me recognizing him as being someone I once knew, that everything they did to me began to unravel."  He breathed out steadily.  "That's all public knowledge."

She nodded again, then looked out the window.  "Can we go for a walk and just talk?"

"I'm not allowed to be off the grounds."

"That's okay," she smiled.  "I just want to get out of here.  It feels confining."

He agreed, leaving the room with her, stopping to tell Steve and Tony they were going for a walk.  As they left, Tony looked at the pair and shook his head.

"There is something off about her.  I don't know what it is."

He whirled around, retreating to his lab while Steve stepped to the window and watched as Bucky and Dr. Clifton moved further away from the building.  Frowning, he went outside but hung back until he could barely see them, then he followed.

For some time, the couple didn't speak as they walked.  It was calming to Bucky then as they approached the path beside the reservoir, he put himself between Aline and the water, an action she noticed. 

"That's something that men of your time did, place yourselves between a woman and something that was a potential danger." 

"I guess the old habits came back quickly," he said.  "I can move to the other side if you want to be closer to the water."

"It's fine."  They walked a few more steps.  "Do you ever think of leaving?"

He stopped, frowning slightly at the question.

"No, I promised I would stay on the grounds until my case is decided.  I gave them my word."  He looked down at his ankle.  "They made me wear an ankle monitor but I wouldn't go back on my word.  I'm not that type of man."

"But if you could leave here, would you?"

"Not until my case is decided." 

"Did you try to leave HYDRA?" 

Ah, there was the question that was always asked.  It always came down to that.  So many of the politicians on the various committees that Bucky had appeared before had asked him the same question.  Why didn't he try harder to get away?  With a sigh, he answered.

"Many times.  They always found me, partly because they made me so dependent on them that I couldn't function in society anymore but also because I consistently tried to go home.  Even if I didn't consciously know that home was Brooklyn, a part of me knew and repeatedly headed there so they always knew where to find me.  The punishment for leaving was without exception worse than the time before.  You've read their files on me.  Do you really want me to say out loud what they did to me?"

Bucky stopped and looked at her, seeing the regret on her face.  Aline shook her head.

"No.  It was an obligation from the families' lawyers that I ask.  They are of the opinion that you could have left at any time, but you didn't because you were a believer.  They're surprised you don't try to leave now and go into hiding.  But you're done running, aren't you?"

He nodded, then looked out over the reservoir at the deceptively calm placid waters.  Even though he felt the anxiety and fear churning inside of him, he was still conditioned to display nothing on his face.  One of the psychiatrists he saw said it was a coping mechanism borne from years of abuse, a way not to give his captors a reason to hurt him any further.  Not that it ever really worked as HYDRA never saw him as human and most of his guards and handlers had strong sadistic tendencies that they expressed fully on him.

"Bucky, did any of your captors have families that you were aware of?"  Her voice was so quiet that it drew his attention to her face.  She was also looking out over the reservoir, her face an emotionless mask but he detected a note of anxiety in her voice.  "Were you allowed to interact with anyone outside of their duties?"

"No, although I did see children at times.  Most were told to avoid me, and I was ordered not to engage with them.  I wasn't seen as a person.  Just like most parents wouldn't let their kids play with weapons, I wasn't seen as being child friendly.  That's all I remember about that.  There are still a lot of missing memories."

Now she seemed distressed and wrung her hands a little.  Then she breathed out heavily and turned away from Bucky.

"I want to go back now, please," she said.  "I shouldn't have come."

"Okay," he replied, gesturing to her.  "Are you alright?"

"Yes ... no," she breathed out shakily. 

As they walked, he could see she was almost crying, and he reached out to touch her arm.  She pulled it away as if his touch was fire.  Then she shook her head and began walking quickly away from him.  He watched, concerned, then started following her.

Steve, who was close enough to see the expression on Dr. Clifton's face, frowned.  What happened that she looked like she was about to have a breakdown?  The sound of footsteps behind him made him look back to see Tony approaching.

"What's going on?" asked Tony. 

"I'm not sure.  She's walking fast and looks upset."

"Somehow I'm not surprised."  Steve's expression was curious to which Tony shrugged.  "I do know she wasn't completely truthful with us.  Bring her inside.  She has some questions to answer."

She came closer and made to walk right past them, but Steve reached out and grabbed her arm.  She pulled away briefly then stopped, breathing heavily.

"Please, let me go," she begged.  "I shouldn't have come."

"No," said Tony.  He nodded at Bucky who had just caught up.  "You owe Barnes some answers."

"I can't."  She shook her head, trying to pull away again, then began to hyperventilate.  "I can't do this."

"Do what?" asked Tony, staring intently at her face.  "Barnes is not the enemy, Dr. Clifton, but you already know that."

Agony was written on Aline's face as she looked everywhere until finally settling on Bucky again.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, her eyes brimming with tears.  "I'm sorry for what they did to you.  I could have told someone, but I was so afraid they would come for me ... please forgive me, please."

Burying her face in her hands, she slumped to the ground and bent over.  Bucky looked at Tony, questioningly, but he shook his head. 

"Give her a few moments then we'll go inside.  She can unburden herself in there."  He shook his head angrily.  "You and I weren't the only victims of HYDRA.  They hurt their own just as much."

It was several minutes before Aline was composed enough to go with them.  As they settled in the conference room, Tony poured a glass of water, placing it in front of the woman.  She smiled slightly at him then sipped it. 

"Where do you want me to start?" she asked.

"Allow me," said Tony.  He waved his hand, bringing up a holographic display.  "Alice Meyer, born April 10, 1985, the daughter of Dr. Ludwig Meyer and his wife Eloise.  Although you were born in Austria, your father worked in Siberia, in a HYDRA lab.  After a shipment of stolen serum was wasted on several individuals that became too violent to control, your father was transferred to a HYDRA lab outside of Washington, D.C.  You and your mother joined him.  You grew up in the small town that was built for the employees.  How am I doing so far?"

She swallowed nervously then nodded her head.  "I was seven years old when Mama and I arrived.  We lived a quiet life in Austria, seeing Papa every few months.  All I knew was that it was government work.  I wasn't allowed to ask about it and he never spoke of it when he was home.  But when we moved to the United States, it was like being dropped into the middle of a cult.  Everyone was HYDRA.  We woke up to the call of Hail HYDRA, on speakers throughout the town.  The only visitors that were welcome were other HYDRA followers.  Outsiders were made to feel very unwelcome and basically run out of town.  It was stifling and frightening all the time."

"You were HYDRA?" asked Bucky, a sense of anger in his voice.

"Not by choice," she answered.  "I soon learned that if I didn't display the proper attitude, I could expect punishment, both corporal and psychological.  It became easier to pretend that I belonged than to fight it.  My parents told me to go along with it, as my behaviour would reflect on them.  They used the Winter Soldier as an example of someone who didn't comply and look what they did to him."  She looked sadly at Bucky.  "You were the boogeyman, what we children were threatened with if we didn't behave and follow HYDRA's way.  Although my parents sometimes let slip that you were a prisoner, they never said you were being tortured or forced to do what you did.  Even when I heard the rumours of what was done to you, it was always explained that you deserved it for your crimes.  At that time, I thought my parents were good people caught up in an unpleasant situation, trying to get through the day without being punished in a similar way."

"What changed your mind?" asked Steve, sympathetically.

"September 11, 2001.  I was 16, in high school, a normal school, and all the TVs were tuned to the news, showing what was happening in New York.  It was frightening.  Who would do such a thing?"  She sipped some more water.  "The school bus took us home and it was like a party there.  Everyone was happy, hugging and laughing, celebrating this great moment for HYDRA.  I walked into the house and my parents both had a drink in hand.  No one else was there, so there was no need for them to pretend that this was anything other than a tragedy.  My father said it was a great day for HYDRA.  Now the world would know that they needed a firm hand on them to guide them properly."  She slumped a little and closed her eyes then opened them.  "I was staggered by their behaviour and for the first time in my life, realized that monsters had raised me.  It made me look at you, Bucky, with new eyes.  I noticed the bruises on your face, the way your hair wasn't tended to, of how they made you wear that mask and that heavy black clothing even on the hottest days of summer.  There was always a threat of violence around you, in the circle of people who surrounded you."

"You tried to run away," said Tony, bringing up a picture of her in her high school yearbook.  She looked like she was on the edge.  "You were screaming for help, but the police always returned you to your parents."

Aline nodded, transfixed by her high school photo. 

"HYDRA always tried to recruit from within," she said.  "Career day was a tour behind the scenes.  I saw Bucky in his cryogenic capsule, then we were shown the whole support team that went into reinforcing his missions.  It was like being in a nightmare and I wanted no part of it, but I couldn't say that as it would mean my own imprisonment and probable torture.  I was a coward."

"No, you weren't," said Bucky, quickly.  "Don't say that.  You were afraid with good reason.  How did you get out?"

"I took on a job as a driver," she said.  "We would be sent to safe houses to restock groceries, clothing, medical supplies, cash, false IDs, etc.  One day, they trusted me enough to go on my own.  I kept the money and staged an accident with the vehicle, made it seem that I drove it off a bridge to avoid an animal.  Then I went full goth makeup, clothing, and piercings.  I mentioned that to you, remember?"

He smiled at her and nodded his head.

"They found the car but never found my body.  I went to Canada, with a false passport for Aline Clifton, born in Montreal, May 12, 1986.  I registered in the sociology program at McGill University and got my bachelor's degree, then master's there and my PhD at Columbia, in New York, specializing in the indoctrination of prisoners of war, cult members and abductees.  Then I was offered a position at the university, where I was when you fought against Thanos.  They announced that Bucky was part of the force that fought against him, and that he was coming back.  I wanted to know for sure if what I always suspected was true."

"That he was coerced into it," said Tony.  "I had my doubts too, but the files and the videos were damning testimony against HYDRA.  They were monsters.  As much as I wanted to hate him for killing my parents I couldn't in good conscience do it.  I killed more people with Stark weapons than he ever did.  Yet, I'm supposed to be one of the good guys."  He smiled apologetically at Bucky.  "I'm sorry I tried to kill you.  You had no choice but to obey your orders when you killed my parents."

"I'm sorry I killed them, your mom, especially.  I'd give anything to see my mother again."

"You could always try binarily augmented retro-framing."

"Did it work for you?"

"Not really as it never really fixed my issues that I had with my dad before he died.  It was nice to see Mom again."  Tony huffed a little.  "Sorry, getting a little off topic.  Dr. Clifton, is there anything more that you want to say?"

"Yes, most of the legal team behind the families are connected to HYDRA," she said.  "I'm sure of it.  They want Bucky in prison and likely want him in a specific location where he can receive very special treatment."

"The words don't work anymore," said Bucky.  "Wakanda took their power away."

"They don't care," she answered.  "They'll try and keep trying to bring the Winter Soldier back.  They spent billions on you and you're the only one they had success with.  You're too valuable to give up on now."

"How do you know?"

"I'm a sociologist, trained to observe human behaviour.  I know how to question both perpetrators and victims of torture to get to the truth.  I know liars when I see them and all the tells of someone who is under stress.  I never told anyone about you before because I was afraid of them finding me and forcing me back but I'm not afraid anymore.  I'm not a monster but I know one when I see one.  You're not one, Bucky.  You never were."

A rush of emotion went through him, and he couldn't speak for a moment.  Then he whispered out a thank you and left with Steve, wanting to cry in the privacy of their shared quarters.  Aline looked at Tony.

"You're not a monster, either Mr. Stark," she said.  "I'll write down the names of the lawyers who are true believers.  Make sure they don't get away with this."

"I'll make sure," said Tony, sliding a virtual keyboard over to her.  "Just enter their names and Friday will investigate their backgrounds before I notify the proper authorities."  He watched her as she used the virtual device as if it were no big deal.  "Dr. Clifton, have you ever thought of working for an organization like the Avengers?  Your training would be a great asset to us."

"No, I like being a teacher," she replied.  "But I could visit on a regular basis, if you wish.  Say, once a month?  Maybe more, if circumstances permit?"

"That could work," said Tony, smiling at her as she stood up.  "Will you be alright?  I'm guessing this was the first time you disclosed your real past to anyone."

"Yeah, I think I will be," she said.  "It was freeing."  She looked towards the door.  "He really is a good man inside.  It was obvious to me very quickly that he still feels tremendous guilt for what they forced him to do.  A monster would feel nothing."

Tony walked her out of the building, then waved as she drove away.  He headed for his lab, but instead found himself in the residential part of the building.  Knocking on Steve Roger's door he looked past him when the door was opened.  Steve led him in to where Bucky sat at the couch, the thousand-mile stare on his face.  The man still carried so much on himself, and Tony knew that words alone weren't enough.  Standing in front of Bucky, he offered him his hand.  When Bucky took it, Tony pulled him up, then hugged him until he felt the other return it.  The tears followed and both men wept until they had nothing left.  Their visitor, Dr. Aline Clifton, was right.  Bucky really was a good man inside and so was he.

One Shots Masterlist

Please support the author by reblogging.

[jakes3resin]

Modern Reincarnation AU Part 4 ✨️

Part 3

"John?"

Bucky storms past Jack into the townhouse. It's rude, but he'll apologize later. He doesn't know why he came here instead of his apartment. Old habits dying a hard drawn out death, maybe? He hadn't been thinking clearly. Hadn't been thinking at all really until he found himself waved through by his father's security detail.

"Oh, is that John?" He hears his father call out, dress shoes clicking against hardwood as he walks closer, but Bucky stomps up the stairs towards his room before he sees the man. His breaths come out in rushes as tears keep burning his eyes.

Shit, he thought he'd gotten those under control on the train.

Slamming his door, he slides down until he rests against the floor. He tosses his bag to the side wincing at the sound it makes. Hopefully his laptop survives. At some point he does actually have to do the work he went to the library to finish.

The library.

Buck and Curt.

They wouldn't, Bucky tells himself. They wouldn't. Curt was one of his best friends, and Buck loved him. They...

Fuck they were roommates! Why the hell were they talking about that shit in public? In the place Bucky considered his? Why even pretend? Why drag Bucky into this? Why?!

Bucky buries his face into his hands. His chest hitches as he tries not to sob. He doesn't want his father or Jack to worry about him. He doesn't want to talk this through.

He wants...

He wants Buck. He wants the other to pull him into his arms. To kiss him again as if today had never happened. There was something else about being with Buck, something he'd never felt with anyone else be they friend or lover. He made Bucky feel safe and wanted. Wanted not because of his family and connections but because he was himself.

Buck would know how to make him feel better.

He laughs quietly through his tears. Distantly, he can hear Jack briefing his father downstairs, the words faint but he hears his name and tears used together. His laughter is more sob than anything else. Of course, the one good thing he'd found would end up belonging to someone else. Story of his life.

✨️

There's too much work to do. At least that's the excuse Bucky gave himself for not confronting Buck and Curt immediately. There wasn't time for a confrontation and subsequent blowup of his life.

At least that's the lie he tells himself.

Bucky chews on the straw of his iced coffee as he skims yet another chapter. There's a pumpkin muffin in front of him that he swore would be his reward for getting through this fourty page reading. Midterms have come and gone, but Bucky still has deadlines to meet and research to complete. He can't sit in his room forever, as much as his father and Jack would sometimes prefer that. Better protection from whatever sent Bucky crying to his room as his father would argue. Better protection for his father's political career Jack would quip.

Speaking of protection, Bucky glanced to the side of the cafe towards his security detail. At least these guys attempted to blend in. His father must have briefed them on his track record with previous details. Bucky smirked around his straw. They'd be easy to lose come rush hour. A bit of fun even.

Bucky turned back to his reading, squinting down at the words.

"American airmen during World War II had a dismal life expectancy. It was not a matter of if an airman was going to be shot down but when. Once downed, airmen faced an uncertain 'reception committee,' as Second Lieutenant Kenneth C. Reimer noted in a drawing he made as a POW in Stalag Luft I in Barth, Germany... 'for every [ground combat] soldier killed in action, three or four others would be wounded; air combat was completely the opposite. For every man wounded, three were killed.'"

"Bucky?" A hand settles on his shoulder jolting him out of his reading.

Bucky kept his shoulders loose as he turns around. Buck stares down at him, a bright smile on his face that Bucky can't help but match despite his grief. It wasn't even something he could control. Buck smiled at him, so he smiled back. Bucky felt pitiful.

Buck's sky blue eyes are clear and happy as they dart across Bucky's face. There's no sign that he realizes Bucky overheard him yesterday.

Bucky lifts a hand to calm his detail, all alert now after Buck's friendly greeting. He sees the nearest agent settle back into their chair but knows none of them are relaxed. He darts a look up at Buck, peering at the other through his glasses to see if he'd noticed the disturbance.

Buck's gaze, as it always does, doesn't leave Bucky's face. Even when he rounds the table to sit down, his eyes are pinned on Bucky and nothing else.

"Sorry I couldn't meet up yesterday," Buck dumps his bag onto the chair next to him. Bucky's smile twitches. Buck sits down across from him. His legs tangle with Buck's own under the table, Buck's foot gently bumping his ankle.

"It's fine," Bucky chomps down on his straw. "How was your advisor meeting anyway?"

"It was good," Buck smiles at him, not even a hint of guilt on his face. "Real good."

Buck had told Bucky he was called to fill in a shift yesterday and that was why he supposedly hadn't been able to meet up. A lie Buck hadn't even bothered to remember. His advisor meetings were also always in the morning on Thursdays. Today was Tuesday.

Buck was still lying to him, and he wasn't even guilty about it.

✨️

"I went by your place yesterday. You weren't home." Buck swings their clasped hands through the air.

"Hmm?" Bucky glanced away from the traffic around them. His detail were staying a conspicuous ten feet back, but they were annoyingly keen when Buck offered to walk him back to his apartment.

Bucky would lose them another day.

Buck laughed, deep and airy. Bucky struggled not to lose himself in it. That was what made this so hard. Bucky still loved Buck, and Buck still acted like Bucky was his whole world and then some.

"Oh," Bucky finally processed what Buck had said. "No, I went to my dad's for the night."

"Really?" Buck squeezes his hand. Bucky hates how much comfort Buck's touch gives him.

Does Curt receive the same...? No Bucky doesn't let himself finish the thought.

"How was it?" Concern bleeds into Buck's voice. Bucky hates how genuine it sounds. He's starting to use that word more than any other. The longer he looks at Buck, the more he has to hate to save his heart.

"Fine," Bucky shrugged stepping further away as they came to a stoplight. "The usual."

"The Bucky I know wouldn't give such a short answer," Buck stepped closer eating up the space Bucky had put between them. "Not unless something happened yesterday. Come on, you okay?"

Bucky felt the words bubbling up his throat.

I saw you. I saw him. Why are you here staring at me like I'm the most important thing in the world when you have him? Why are you doing this to me? I love you. I love you so much it feels like my soul hurts. I hate you.

"Spent most of the night avoiding his staffers." Bucky lied. "Barely saw him, Jack either, yet he still asked me to move home at breakfast."

Buck nods, accepting his lies. Was that what they were now? Not a relationship, simply a lie? Bucky wasn't sure anymore. His heart thumped against his rib cage, anger and love in every other beat, but he wasn't sure which would win.

Buck had become his whole world in such a short amount of time. He thought the feeling was mutual, but yesterday showed just how stupid Bucky really was.

"How about this," Buck nudged his hip. "Why don't I stay over tonight? We'll binge a few movies, order something, and have night in. Then,"

Buck paused with a stupid grin that, despite himself, Bucky still found charming. Fuck, he was truly pathetic for this.

"I'll sweep you off your feet and take you to bed. How does that sound?"

"Won't Curt be expecting you?" The question pops out of him without meaning to. Gale furrows his brow, confusion growing in his eyes.

"Curt won't miss me tonight."

Sure, he won't, Bucky thinks bitterly.

✨️

"John," Jack's voice was a surprise. Especially considering it was his father's number calling him.

"You've gotten much better at your Jack impression," Bucky answers just to be annoying. "Does he know you impersonate him on official numbers?"

"You're not as funny as you believe."

"Ooh, you even have his disapproving tone down. I feel like he's in the room with us!" Bucky laughs. He peers around the corner. Buck's still where he left him, buried in his phone texting someone.

Bucky doesn't let himself think about who that person is.

"Your father wants to invite you to a dinner tomorrow. You can even bring that boy that walked you home. The one that hasn't left." Pages flip in the background as Jack talks. Probably governmental reports his father was supposed to read.

"You know you're not his chief of staff anymore?" Bucky leaned his hip against the counter. "You don't have to read reports or wrangle his kid to government dinners to help his image as a family man. You're his husband now, you're the family."

"You're my kid too by that logic, so wrangling you gets to stay on my resume." Bucky snorts out a laugh. "Besides, it's not a state dinner or anything. He just wants to see you."

Guilt gnaws at his heart. Buck pokes his head into the kitchen, phone no longer holding all of his attention.

"Fine," Bucky groans. "But if he brings up the apartment again, I'm walking out with my food on my plate even if it's the good plates."

"See you tomorrow at 7 then. Bring your boy." Jack hangs up without a goodbye.

✨️

It'll be me, and it'll be you, Buck.

Don't count on it.

Bucky jerks awake. His dream flashes through his head too fast for him to remember anything. Scenes superimpose over each other, words jumble together. At least this one wasn't a nightmare. Those always left him shakey and off balance all day.

His dreams have always been vivid, ever since he was a kid. The child psychologists he'd gone to had said it was normal and simply a sign of a well developed imagination.

Bucky runs a hand through his hair groaning when he glances towards his bedside clock. It's nearly an hour until he has to get up, but he knows that he won't be getting back to sleep before then.

Buck lays curled up next to him on the bed. Bucky reaches out to brush a hand through the other's hair. Buck twitches leaning into the feeling for half a second but doesn't stir beyond that.

Bucky sighs. Extricating himself from Buck's long limbs takes time. Somehow in the night, Buck had nearly fused them together as if even asleep the man refused to let him go. Arms layered over arms. Legs tangled together. It's an excellent distraction from his dreams but not from the problems of the waking world. If only he could forget those once he woke up like he did his dreams.

It's only when he's pouring water for his coffee that he realizes he recognizes the voice from his dream. A first for him.

It'd been Buck's.

✨️

(Not a confrontation I know, but it builds my AU lol)

[raddestrose]

Heyo, I’m a bit spooked

And potentially saw a spoiler for Link Click (let’s hope not)

Something about Cheng Xiaoshi, like something bad.

I’ve got like six episodes left I can’t believe that just happened.

[brucewaynehater101]

Red Hood Time Travel AU: Angst Edition

(TW: blood, gore, death, Jason's Ethiopia scene, Joker [y'all, it's rough])

Through the power of magic fuckery, Jason gets transported back a few weeks before his fifteen year old self goes to Ethiopia. Figuring that he has a little time before the explosion, he decides to fix a few issues early.

He skips his way past Talia's assassin defenses, scoops up a growling and stabby child, and then sashays his way to Gotham.

Not wanting to be interrogated, he leaves the kid on Wayne Manor's doorstep wrapped up in a green bow. The words "Congrats! It's a boy!" are taped to his forehead.

While Bruce is dealing with the new kid, Red Hood forgot to account for the tension between Batman and Robin. Instead of trying to fix their relationship, the appearance of a new kid pushes young Jason out even faster. Red Hood only finds this out after dropping off kid Tim.

Cursing, Jason desperately chases Robin all the way to Ethiopia. He chases him to that damned warehouse.

Seeing the younger version of himself get slammed with a crowbar, watching the scene from a third person's point of view (but still an older Jason's POV), causes the man to freeze. He's watching the worst time of his life being replayed and he can't move. He can't announce his presence to Joker.

After all his training, after the showdown with Batman and the clown, Red Hood can't even step into the light. What if the monster sees him? What if it turns that bloody, dripping metal on the older version of himself?

Who is Jason anymore? Is he still the kid wrapped in chains begging for his dad to save him? Is he the man available to save himself but incapable?

Each grunt of pain, the choked cries, and the slap of flesh breaking they all numbly hit Red Hood's ears. At the same time that he tensely watches Joker's every move, another part of him is barely aware of where he is.

He must make some noise, perhaps a cut off whimper or a scuff of his boot, because manic green eyes flicker away from their prize. Glee lights up lime colored eyes as the Joker's hand twirls the crowbar. Blood droplets fly from the metal as the clown steps towards a trembling man in red armor.

After the first hit, the first drawn-out laugh, Jason loses time. He comes back to himself on the floor next to the child version of himself. The teen hasn't noticed that Red Hood is responsive again. This allows the man the ability to watch realization and then resignation settle on the kid's shoulder. They both know that the timer and their injuries will not allow them to escape. They're going to die thousands of miles from home, from their dad.

Through the twinge in his arm, Red Hood reaches his hands to the young bird. He frees him from the chains so that his finally moments aren't as trapped. Two broken hands hold each other as they both stare up at steel beams. Twin breaths sluggishly cough out, and the timer beeps ever closer to zero.

Any second now, Jason will die. At least this time he isn't alone.

[teamfortresstwo]

In a life swap AU rather than just a role swap I think it would be sooo fucked up if Patroclus swapped with Theseus and Achilles with Asterius

[acuityfeed]

Kasaen would play DND in a modern au

[hederasgarden]

Eternal Devotion (1/3)

Summary: Months after your husband's untimely death, his presence lingers, haunting you in ways you never expected. Pairing: Vampire!Friedrich Harding x Wife!Reader  Word Count: 3.9K Rating: Mature, 18+ only. Heavy angst and grief, period typical sexism, creepy things, mildly dubious consent, sexual content, vampirism and all the warnings that come with that (I’m diverging from canon a bit in regards to feeding). This is my attempt at Gothic Romance. A/N:  The reader has always been Friedrich's wife, Anna does not exist in this AU. Big thanks to @ryebecca, @otaku-girl-ao3, @whatblogisthis216 , @eremeldanin and @caught-reading for their help with this fic.  Please comment or reblog if you enjoyed this and want to see more. Or scream at me in my inbox. That always makes my day.

Aaron Taylor Johnson Character Masterlist ♡ Masterlist

No grave can hold my body down, I'll crawl home to her. -Hozier

The room is dim with the curtains drawn tight, allowing only a sliver of daylight to creep through the gap. In the distance, the soft hum of morning activity rises from the rest of the house, the gentle chatter of your two daughters layered over the quiet rustling of the servants preparing for the day ahead. You should rise and follow the rhythm of the world outside this room, but you cannot. 

Friedrich has been gone nearly six months. It feels like a lifetime. The days stretch endlessly, and each one feels like an affront, a reminder that the world refuses to stop turning. How are you supposed to go on living? You know if you had died, Friedrich would have climbed into the casket beside you and his grief would have blotted out the sun.

But there was no casket for him. No body left to bury. He was swallowed by the sea, lost while fulfilling a promise you made, helping Ellen return to Thomas.

Your daughters do not yet grasp the finality of it. No matter how many times you tell them, they speak of their father like he is simply away at work, perhaps, or out on some important errand. And each morning they act as if he’s come to tuck them into bed, kiss their cheeks, and say their prayers like he did before. They look up at you with soft eyes, the very same as his and you must relive the pain of it again and again when you remind them their father is gone.

Sometimes, you wish you could believe your own dreams, the ones where Friedrich slips back into bed beside you. Yet even in those fleeting moments of illusion, something is wrong. The warmth you long for is absent. His touch is colder, harder, his presence not the way it used to be. When his lips meet your skin, it stings, sharp and unfamiliar, and the truth rises within you, pushing against the comfort of the dream. 

It’s not him. And it never will be. Now and forevermore, each morning you will wake to find the sheets beside you cold. Empty.

Everyone told you the grief would abate with time but these past few weeks have drained you more thoroughly than any that came before. Each morning, it feels as though your very blood has turned to sand, your bones to lead. Even the simple act of turning onto your back, to stare up at the wooden beams of the ceiling, takes more effort than you can summon. 

You remain in bed until the door creaks open, and the light sound of footsteps follows. Kerstin’s voice is no more than a whisper as she brushes your shoulder.

“Frau Harding. Your parents have arrived for breakfast. Your father wishes for you to join them.”

The sight of your maid’s pale, worried face is enough to rouse you. You let her dress and prepare you for the day. Although she’s done this a thousand times, there’s something about the way her hands hover over the buttons of your gown, the hesitation before each movement, that makes you feel like a stranger in your own skin. You see how she and the other servants watch you now. Even when they pretend to be absorbed in their tasks, their glances are sharp, laden with worry. They fear you’ll descend into the same madness as Ellen, but it is only your grief, so vast and deep, that’s reshaping you in ways you can’t even recognize. 

When you enter the dining room, your daughters rush to you. You hold them close, inhaling the familiar scent of their hair. Your mother greets you next, reaching out to cup your face in her hands, her fingers trembling slightly as they linger there. There is a deep sadness in her eyes and she glances over at your father with a look halfway between pleading and resignation.

“Come, you must eat,” she encourages, guiding you to sit beside her.

Your father, sitting at the head of the table, offers no such tenderness. His presence is a commanding weight in the room and the deep set of his brow lets you know this is not merely a social visit. You glance at your mother who stares at the hands in her lap and your fingers curl around the richly upholstered arm of the dining room chair. Whatever he has come to say will not be good, you realize. 

“The children are finished with their breakfast,” he announces sharply, his voice cutting through the air like a command. With a quick flick of his fingers, he gestures to the governess. “Take them to the parlor. Their mother and I have matters to discuss.”

Once they are gone, your father doesn’t wait long to speak again. “It has been six months,” he begins, his gaze unwavering. “Long enough. You must remarry, and soon.” 

You blink, momentarily stunned. Six months? Six months since Friedrich was swallowed by the sea, leaving nothing but an empty, aching space behind. Six months in which you have not even been able to make sense of the grief that clings to you like a second skin. How could he even think of you remarrying so soon?

“But… Father, I…” you begin, the words faltering in your throat.

He doesn’t let you finish, his voice growing sterner. “You must think of the future, not just of your own sorrow. The children need stability, and you need a husband. You cannot manage alone, not with the wealth you inherited from your late husband.”

You shake your head, even as you know there is a kernel of truth to his words. The vast estate, the shipyard, and the assets Friedrich once managed all fall on you now. It is a burden you are not prepared to shoulder and one you have steadily ignored these past months. But even beyond all that, the thought of remarrying, of taking another man into your life is something you can’t even entertain.

"I cannot… not yet," you whisper, barely above a breath. And in the pit of your chest, a deeper thought rises unbidden: Not ever.

“I understand your reluctance,” he says firmly. “But even now, men circle you like vultures. They want your husband’s wealth and his business. We must act swiftly and secure the right match — for you, for the children, for our family’s future.”

You swallow hard, the lump in your throat refusing to pass. Your hands move to straighten the cutlery in front of you, anything to occupy them, anything to hold off the flood of emotion threatening to spill over.

And then, almost without thinking, you speak. “You never say his name.”

Your father’s brow furrows. “What?”

“Friedrich,” you whisper. “It is always my husband or your son-in-law. You do not… you do not say his name.”

There is a long pause before your father clears his throat, dismissing the uncomfortable silence. “We cannot afford to linger on sentiment,” he says. “Sentiment will not feed the children or keep the business afloat. We need to think practically.”

You stare at him, hearing nothing more than the absence of your husband's name in his voice, the not-so-subtle command that you too must move on, move past this grief, and return to the world of the living. 

“You cannot make me do this.”

"Perhaps not," your father concedes, exhaling sharply. "But your husband has many cousins who would think nothing of reclaiming control over the business." He pauses, taking a deliberate sip of his water, his eyes never leaving yours. "Men who would see no value in a widow and her daughters when they have families of their own.”

His words have their desired effect, leaving you feeling small and powerless. Your shoulders slump, the strength in you draining away as your head hangs, heavy with the crushing knowledge of what awaits.

“Now, your mother has already arranged for you and the girls to have new clothes made for your return to society," he continues, his tone cool and businesslike. "We will host a small, intimate gathering. I will invite a few prospective suitors—men I consider promising options. You may, of course, choose which one you wish to pursue."

“How kind you are to offer me a say,” you murmur, the words bitter in your mouth.  

A muscle in his jaw twitches. “I know grief has stolen your good sense but you will watch your tongue when you speak to me,” your father warns. 

A surge of emotion rises within you, sharp and unwelcome, forcing its way up your throat. The words spill out before you can stop them, raw and unrestrained. “You would not speak to me this way if Friedrich were here.”

Your father shakes his head, rising from his seat to tower over you. “He is not here, my girl. He will never be here again. You are alone in a world that is unkind to women such as yourself.”

The pity in his eyes is more than you can bear. The dam breaks, and the first wave of tears crashes down, unbidden and unstoppable. A  flood that drags you under. You sink back into the chair, helpless as wracking sobs tear through you, a deep, raw ache flooding every part of your being.

Distantly, you hear your mother’s voice chastising your father. Her arms slip around you, pulling you close. She whispers gentle reassurances, her shushing echoing the soothing words you’ve said a hundred times to your own girls, but it feels empty now, a hollow repetition that cannot shield you from the brutal reality.

Friedrich is gone. And with him, any hope you once held of finding happiness.

–

When you step into your father’s parlor, the weight of every gaze in the room settles on you like a tangible thing. The faces that turn toward you are mostly unfamiliar, offering you that sad, understanding smile you’ve grown so weary of. It is a smile that means nothing at all in light of their presence here. Each one of them is complicit in your father’s schemes.

“You look lovely,” your father says. He presses his lips to your cheek in an exaggerated gesture of affection, more a farce than any real expression of love. “The blue truly suits you,” he adds, his eyes dropping to take in your fine silk dress. 

It’s the latest fashion from Paris, or so you’re told. Once, a dress like this would have delighted you—Friedrich always took such joy in bringing you the finest, most exquisite silks and fabrics from his travels. But now, the dress feels all wrong, too tight and too revealing, exposing more of your shoulder and décolletage than you’re comfortable with. 

You smile at your father. Even though it barely touches your lips it doesn’t seem to bother him. He simply sweeps you further into the room, his hand on your arm guiding you forward as he begins the task of making introductions. It’s a performance, and you are trapped at the center of it. But you do as your father and society demand, falling into the practiced motions of politeness. 

You engage in small talk, offering the kind of perfunctory responses that are expected of you, feigning interest in whatever these men have to say. Some ask after your children, while others offer their condolences for your loss. But behind their kindness lies a predatory sort of interest. It is all you can do to nod, offering your own strained smile as you stand there wondering how much longer you can keep up this charade.

When your father finally leaves you for a moment you close your eyes, exhaling. 

“Oh, dearest girl.” 

The unexpected voice makes you flinch. You turn, meeting a familiar pair of brown eyes of Herr Gothrim. Of all your father’s friends, he is the one you think might understand your plight the best. He lost his wife to the plague that swept the city nearly a year ago.

“It is shameful what your father is doing. Forcing you from your mourning period so soon.” He shakes his head. “Though, I confess, had I daughter like you I might be convinced to do the same.” He steps closer, his voice quieting. “You are the talk of the city and beyond.”

“They desire Friedrich’s wealth,” you reply. “Nothing more.”

Herr Gothrim stares at you for a moment before he speaks again, his words laden with something that makes your skin crawl.

“Do not sell yourself short. You are young. Beautiful. You might still bear your future husband a son or two.”

Friedrich had wanted a son. You knew that long before you ever married him. He had spoken of it often, longing to see his name carried on but he never once made you feel like an instrument to secure his legacy. More than that he loved your daughter fiercely, completely. And though it might have been a sin, he loved you even more.  

“I fear you will not have the luxury of time, my dear,” Herr Gothrim warns. “Your father will push forward with his plans, and if you do not make a choice, one will be made for you. Perhaps a familiar one would be best.”

His eyes briefly flick over his shoulder, and you follow his gaze. It rests on his son, Pieter. The sight of him makes a sharp, uncomfortable feeling bubbling up from within. Once, he had petitioned your father for your hand and before Friedrich had made his offer, Pieter had been the one your father had entertained as a potential suitor. 

To your dismay, Pieter seems to take your attention as an invitation, crossing the room to join the two of you. He greets you with an overly familiar kiss to your cheek that lingers, brushing against the corner of your lips. When he pulls away his hand remains on your elbow, tethering you to him. 

“Frau Harding, you look well,” he says brightly. “Or should it be Fräulein now?”

His boldness stuns you but before you can gather your thoughts, he continues, oblivious to the discomfort in your silence. “I must confess, I was both surprised and pleased to receive your father’s invitation. And to see you again after so long. I am eager for a second chance to win your hand.”

It is only the thought of your daughters and the need to ensure their future is safe that keeps grief from sharpening your tongue. You force your eyes downward, focusing on a speck of dust on his lapels to avoid looking at his face. “My father was pleased you accepted his invitation. He has always been fond of you,” you reply hollowly.

Pieter smiles, seemingly unaware of how your voice thins and your words fall flat and meaningless. 

“You look cold,” he observes. “Come, you should warm yourself by the fire as we reacquaint ourselves. My import business has grown greatly since we last spoke.”

His touch feels possessive, demanding even yet you are helpless to do anything more than follow him. You catch your father’s eyes when you pass him. He looks pleased and it turns your stomach. 

Pieter keeps you by his side for the rest of the evening, his words a constant hum around you. Whether he’s wholly unaware of your discomfort or willfully blind to it, you can’t decide. His conversation is a relentless stream of boasts about his business, his wealth, and his success, as though he expects you to be impressed, to be eager for his attention. Each time you try to excuse yourself, your attempts are dismissed with a smile and an insistent push to stay.

It isn’t until your mother comes to collect you at the end of the night that you are finally freed from his hold. You follow her away from the gathering and into the waiting carriage, Pieter’s gaze lingering on you. 

You’re so exhausted on the ride home that the muffled sound of the horses’ hooves on the cobblestone streets and the rocking of the carriage nearly lulls you into sleep. You find your daughters are already in bed when you arrive at the house. Though you loathe to disturb their peaceful slumber, you find yourself drawn to them, compelled to check on them before you can rest. You make your way down the dark hallway, the soft creak of the floorboards beneath your feet the only sound betraying your presence.

When you crack open the door to their room, a cool rush of air greets you, sending a shiver through you. You find their window unlatched, the curtains fluttering in the autumn breeze that has slipped in. Startled, you step further into the room, a wave of panic rising in your chest. You move quickly to reach the window and quietly shut it again. 

Once it is secured, you turn to your girls. The sight of them, peaceful and safe in their beds, eases some of the tension in your chest. Your youngest clutches a slip of fabric in her hands, her tiny face relaxed in sleep. There is something about the cloth she holds that gives you pause. You kneel beside her, gently prying it from her grasp. At the sight of the familiar handkerchief and your own needlework, worn and fraying with time, your breath stutters in your throat. 

It was one of the first gifts you ever gave Friedrich, back when he was still courting you. You had made him dozens more over the years, but still, he carried it with him, even as it began to unravel at the edges. You always assumed it was lost with him and to find it here, tucked in your daughter’s hands, feels like both a balm and a wound.

Fingers trembling, you press the fabric to your face and close your eyes. For a brief moment, you swear you can still smell Friedrich’s cologne, faint but unmistakable. You linger in that moment until your daughter shifts in her sleep and you're brought back to reality. Carefully, you tuck the handkerchief into her tiny hands and kiss her forehead before retreating from the room.

–

Your dreams are restless, an amalgam of fractured images and disjointed sensations. Pieter’s dark, unblinking eyes merge with the black fabric of your mourning gown, and then, without warning, the scene shifts, plunging you into the vast, endless depths of the sea that claimed Friedrich. 

The cold water envelops you, and you gasp for air, but the water rushes in, drowning your cries. In your panic, you thrash wildly, desperate for escape. Just as you feel yourself slipping into the abyss, strong hands seize you, pulling you upward. Your eyes snap open, your breath coming in sharp, desperate gasps. The water recedes, and in its place, Friedrich’s face fills your vision.

“I am here, I am here, my love,” he murmurs softly, pressing his forehead to yours. His hand rests lightly on your chest, guiding your breath to match his steady rhythm, coaxing the frantic pace of your heart to slow.  

You stare at him as the world crystallizes around you. Then, you surge forward, your lips crashing into his with a desperation that consumes you. Your hands find their way to his shoulders, clutching him tightly like he might vanish if you let go. The kiss is a lifeline and you cling to it with a need so raw it aches.

“Friedrich,” you gasp, reveling in the familiar tickle of his mustache and his strong hands on your body.  

For a fleeting moment, you wonder if this is real, if he’s truly here, or if your grief has finally unraveled, conjuring him from the depths of the ocean to haunt you. But then, as his lips press urgently against yours and the solid weight of him fills your arms, you decide you don’t care. It doesn’t matter if he is a ghost, risen from the sea’s cold embrace. Nor does it matter that death has leached the color from his cheeks and the warmth from his hands. All that matters is that he’s here.

“My love,” you cry. 

“I am here,” he promises, trailing his lips down the side of your throat until his mouth seals over the juncture where your neck meets your shoulder. 

He lingers there, the sting of his kiss euphoric. You bury your fingers in his thick curls, tugging gently and he all but growls against your skin. With his mouth still on you, his fingers tug at your nightgown, baring your body to his eager hands. They slip between your parted thighs, finding your wet heat, and stealing it away as they work you to the peak of pleasure. Friedrich groans and the pain in your neck flares, sharp and sudden.

When he pulls away, a wave of exhaustion crashes over you, leaving you breathless and spent. You stare up at him as your vision shifts, the world taking on a hazy hue. In the dim light, his blue eyes are dark, almost silvery, and something deep within you recoils, an instinctive fear that you can’t quite name. But then, he blinks, and just as quickly the shadow fades. The warmth of his gaze returns, and those same familiar blue eyes, the ones you’ve loved for so long, look down at you with tenderness.

Your fingers hover over his face, longing to touch him again. But a painful realization stops you. 

"You are not real.” The words leave you in a rush. 

“Does it matter if I am?" he asks. "Does this not bring you peace, my love?"

You shake your head, the pain of his absence still raw in your chest. You can’t resist the pull of him, the need to feel close again, even if only in this fleeting moment. Without thinking, you draw him down to kiss you, and the taste of him is sharp, unexpectedly coppery.

"It is a horrible thought," you murmur, breaking the kiss, "but I wish I would not wake when morning comes. I want to stay here with you. In this dream."

A deep frown forms between his brows, and his hand finds your cheek, his touch colder than it should be. His mouth parts slightly, and his teeth, white and sharp, glimmer faintly against his pale lips. 

“You do not wish to find a new husband? To live?” he questions. 

"I wish only for you," you say, voice trembling but sure. "And for our girls."

“My dearest wife,” he whispers, kissing you sweetly. “I will never leave you. I cannot.”

A soft moan slips from you, unbidden, the sound encouraging him to kiss you deeper. His lips move with a possessive tenderness that fills the hollow spaces inside you. “Nor would I ever let you go," he promises. “We are bound even in death.”

Part 2

[wonusite]

Cat and Mouse

❝ Wonwoo doesn’t understand why you’re so adamant in avoiding him after the amazing night you two spent together, but he’s not going to let you get away from him so easily. ❞

PAIRING: jeon wonwoo x female reader

GENRE: bad boy au, smut

WORD COUNT: 5.6k

WARNINGS: bad boy!wonwoo, allusions of illicit activities, descriptions of minor injuries, wonwoo is down HORRENDOUS, reader is in denial about her feelings, our bad boi is soft for one (1) person, mutual pining, fingering, oral sex (f receiving), unprotected sex, riding, multiple creampies, overstimulation, mating press, aftercare

ㅤ→ continuation of this timestamp

A/N: here’s a little something to celebrate one year with this blog. very grateful to all my followers and mutuals who’ve made this past year amazing! MINORS DO NOT INTERACT!!!

Wonwoo glares at his phone, tongue poking at the inside of his cheek in annoyance.

It’s been a week. An entire fucking week without hearing from you. He knew he should’ve ignored Jihoon’s calls and stayed in bed with you that night, but when he sent a message saying the entire crew needed to be there, he couldn’t ignore it. Now, he really wishes he would have.

The night he spent with you was the most incredible of his life, and now he might never relive it because he left in a haste, only leaving you with a brief kiss and a promise to come back.

“You still torn up over that sweet lil’ thing from that flower shop?” Seungcheol's voice has never sounded more irritating than it does now.

“That’s Shua’s girl, dumbass.”

Being on the receiving end of that mean tone and angry glare doesn’t faze Seungcheol in the slightest. In fact, it only causes his infamous smirk to get wider. To see the stoic Jeon Wonwoo acting up over a girl is not only a rarity, but it’s also really fucking funny. That’s why he can’t resist pushing Wonwoo’s buttons further.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” Seungcheol cackles. “Guess you better hurry up and help us finish this shit. Her shift ends soon.”

Wonwoo can feel his irritation near that boiling point he could usually avoid. Of course Seungcheol knows about your schedule. That asshole has the annoying habit of knowing everything about anyone who is even the tiniest bit associated with the crew. Sure, it’s for precautionary reasons, but that didn’t make it any less annoying. Nonetheless, Wonwoo focuses on the task at hand so he can catch you before you leave work.

Jeon Wonwoo is the bane of your existence.

From the moment he first came around with that stupidly attractive smirk of his, your life was never the same. And now that you fucked him, it never will be again.

Giving into your carnal desires isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but getting mixed up with the likes of Jeon Wonwoo definitely is. Despite not knowing all of the grimy details, you know he’s bad news. You can see all the red flags clearly—the people he hangs around, all the fights he gets in, and the tattoos littering his body. And yet, none of those warning signs mattered now or when Wonwoo was ravishing you in a way that still made your toes curl just by thinking about it.

Maybe the worst part of it all is that you can’t get the resident bad boy out of your head, or the way he held you after you two had sex. It’s like you can still feel how he nuzzled into your neck, strong arms tightening around you like he never wanted to let you go. Part of you hopes that he wouldn’t have if he hadn’t had some urgent business to take care of. It’s a dangerous thought, but even so you can’t help but crave that uncharacteristically sweet side of him that he presumably only showed you.

A displeased sigh comes out of you as you gather your things to go home. It’s bad enough that you can’t stop thinking about Wonwoo, but to think that you’re actually pining over him even though he literally disappeared after your night together is—

“Y/N left already.”

It’s Mingyu’s voice you hear at first, and it makes you stop in your tracks. You wonder who could be asking for you until you hear someone answer him. It feels like your heart is going to jump out of your chest when you hear a familiar deep voice that has your stupid pussy clenching in anticipation.

“Alright. Thanks.”

You peek out from the back when you hear the door chime. It’s annoying that your chest tightens when you see a set of wide shoulders draped in a leather jacket walking toward the large motorcycle parked outside. The way your mind goes blank yet is also clogged with nothing but thought of Wonwoo is infuriating. You don’t realize you’re pouting at the exit until Mingyu jumps back in shock at seeing your sulking figure.

“Y/N what– I thought you left!” He says, vaguely gesturing behind him. “You just missed your boyfriend! I think he wanted to take you home—”

“Boyfriend?” You interrupt him, not entirely angry or disgusted that your coworker had referred to Wonwoo as such.

Mingyu furrows his eyebrows. “Yeah? The scary dude with the leather jacket that comes in here all the time just to see you. He’s your boyfriend, right?”

It’s almost mortifying that your sweet but oblivious coworker can tell that there was something going on between you and the resident bad boy. And yet, there’s also a part of you that likes the fact that Wonwoo is so obvious about his feelings. You don’t know what to make of these conflicting emotions that you can’t seem to shake, and seeing Wonwoo (even just the back of him) didn’t help you find the clarity you so desperately need.

“Well, even if he’s not, he definitely wants to fuck you.” Mingyu says with a wink as he brushes past you to check on the pastries he had put in the oven ten minutes ago.

You wonder how he would react if you told him that Wonwoo already has.

Wonwoo thinks you’re the cutest person ever. And the part of you he finds the most cute? The fact that you actually think he’s going to let you avoid him forever. You’re good at it, he’ll give you that (even if he can see right through your every method).

It’s funny that you actually change your off days and regular working hours just to avoid seeing him and throw him off, which it does—at first. He knows you haven’t quit because Josh mentioned seeing you at the bakery when he went to buy the love of his life a cake for her birthday. This is confirmed when he goes to see for himself the next day.

Maybe you don’t realize Wonwoo can see you run to the back through the large glass windows when you hear his motorcycle, but either way he thinks it’s funny. Actually, it’s hilarious because soon enough you were going to give into him like before.

Meanwhile, you feel like a mouse being preyed on by a sly cat—one that’s toying with you before he finally catches you. Avoiding Wonwoo had been easy at first, but now you’re starting to wonder if he had let it seem easy.

“Babydoll.”

You almost drop a tray of croissants when you hear a familiar deep voice calling for you. The way you whip around with a gaping mouth must be hilarious because Wonwoo just smirks at you in that infuriating way that drives you crazy. Your hands tighten around the tray as you snap your mouth closed, trying to contemplate on how to navigate the situation.

With a bit of a mental pep talk, you finally manage to put up that happy to help attitude you usually had with every other customer. The smile you give him feels exaggerated and fake, but it’s the only way you can mask all the emotions you’re feeling.

“What can I get for you?”

That devilish smirk widens as Wonwoo pretends to skim all the delicious pastries in the case before he sets his smoldering eyes back on you. “This all looks good,” he muses quietly, but you can hear him perfectly since it’s only you two. “But I think you’re the only thing that can satisfy my hunger.”

It kills you that his words make you heat up from the inside out. You ignore him and start to put the croissants into the case. The clench of your jaw is tight and bordering on painful, but it’s the only way you can keep your emotions from spilling over for him to see.

Unfortunately, your lack of response doesn’t really faze him. One thing you’ve come to learn about Wonwoo is that he’s never uncomfortable in the silence. You wish you could say the same. You’re nearly squirming by the time you’re done placing the croissants in their designated space because he hasn’t taken his eyes off of you once.

Finally, you look up to meet Wonwoo’s gaze. It’s so intense that you almost want to look away. However, there’s a part of you that loves being under the heat of his stare since you can clearly see the desire he has for you.

“You’ve been ignoring me.”

“You’ve been gone.” You counter, vaguely aware that you sound like a sulking girlfriend.

Wonwoo realizes this too because he gently coos at you. “Missed me, babydoll?”

Yes. “You wish.”

It’s obvious Wonwoo doesn’t believe you. That stupid smirk of his only seems to get bigger with every passing moment, and you don’t know if you want to kiss it or smack it off his face.

“I missed you.” He tells you honestly, loving how you’re visibly growing flustered with his words.

Resisting him would be a lot easier if he wasn’t so tempting to you and if the feelings he always evoked from you weren’t so strong. Before you can say anything to betray your easily crumbling facade, Mingyu comes out from the back with a tray of small cakes. Wonwoo gives you a once over before stepping away from the case.

“I’ll be back after your shift. Wait for me.”

You don’t wait for him—technically. It’s not waiting since Wonwoo is already outside of the bakery when your shift ends. He’s clad in his leather jacket, dark jeans, and signature combat boots. It’s not fair that he can lean against his bike so casually while looking as good as ever.

Ignoring him would’ve been all too easy, but you can’t when you notice the bruises and cuts on his pretty face. A familiar irritation bubbles in your chest, but annoyingly enough, it’s overpowered by the concern you feel. You react before you can fully think your actions through.

“What the hell!”

Wonwoo’s eyes widen the tiniest bit when you stomp over to him with angry tears in your eyes. You can’t even enjoy his cute shocked face because of the overwhelming concern and anger you feel. All you can do is hit his brawny chest in frustration.

“You—You asshole!” Your voice cracks with raw emotion as you continue to weakly hit his chest. “You said– you promised that you weren’t going to fight anymore—!”

Wonwoo lets you hit him. His chest aches, but not because of your soft blows. The last thing he meant to do was make you cry, and it’s something he wishes to never see again. His large hands come up to cup your face, fingers delicately wiping your tears. “I know I should’ve kept my promise, and I’m sorry. Just please don’t cry anymore.”

You let out a quiet whimper at his tenderness. His eyes are full of so much remorse and concern that it makes any remaining willpower you have left disappear. It feels right to bury yourself in his chest and let yourself be held by him. He caresses your back, and you can’t hate that it actually makes you feel better.

Once you’ve calmed down, you pull back and smack Wonwoo’s beefy chest again. “Asshole.”

“Your asshole.” His haze is tender as he cradles your tearstained cheek in his hand.

You scowl at him, but it’s quickly wiped off your face when he places a gentle kiss on the corner of your mouth. A sudden desire consumes you when you see Wonwoo’s affectionate gaze. This time you let yourself be driven by your desire and press your lips against his.

It’s easy for him to melt into the kiss. Wonwoo sighs into your mouth as one of his hands comes up to cup your face. His rings feel cool against your warm skin, and you let out a quiet moan when his other hand slips into the back pocket of your jeans and squeezes your ass while pulling you closer to him.

The kiss is slow at first until your hands smooth over Wonwoo’s chest and fist his shirt to pull him closer. You part your lips to allow his tongue to slip into your mouth. It feels like you got struck by a bolt of electricity the longer his lips are on yours. His desire and hunger are evident in his needy movement, and you absolutely love it.

When you two finally pull away, you’re left breathless. Wonwoo’s thumb gently caresses your cheek as his heart pounds harshly in his chest. “Stay the night with me, babydoll.”

“M’kay.” You breathe out, mind still swimming.

The smile he gives you is so pretty that it makes something inside you burn with ardent desire. You feel like you’re floating on air when Wonwoo hands you a spare helmet that happens to be your favorite color. He looks bashful as he waits for you to accept it, and you wish you could take a picture of his pretty blush.

In spite of all the reasons you have not to take the helmet from him, you still do. And you don’t regret it.

You’ve never allowed yourself to regret the things that you’ve done because life is too short for regrets. But you definitely regret avoiding Wonwoo as long as you have, especially with the way he’s trailing his lips along your legs. Every wet kiss he leaves behind has your heart hammering and your cunt clenching in want.

Finally, Wonwoo gets to your inner thighs. His large hands spread you open with ease, eyes dark when he sees your wet pussy.

“Fuck.” His gaze fixed between your legs as if he's in a trance. “You’re already so wet.”

Your toes curl when his breath ghosts over your cunt. It sends delicious shivers throughout your body, and you have to stop yourself from bucking your hips into his face. But as you’re starting to learn, it seems like Wonwoo knows what you want before you even ask for it.

“You want my mouth, babydoll?”

Wonwoo nearly blows his load when you nod cutely, a needy mewl escaping your lips. “Please.”

He hooks your legs over his wide shoulders, thumbs spreading your folds open for his viewing pleasure. Wonwoo resists his ravenous desire for you long enough to toy with your pretty pussy before he actually tastes it—a luxury he hadn’t gotten to do last time. His rough hands are soon occupied with you, one hand pinching and flicking your sensitive clit while the other gently rubs your slippery folds.

“Fuck, baby.” You whine, biting down on your lower lip. “Feels so good.”

Your cunt is dripping with so much of your arousal that Wonwoo’s fingers are drenched as he slowly rubs circles against your aching bud. It’s throbbing and pulsing in need as his pace grows the tiniest bit quicker. You can’t even try to contain your moans as you stare down at your boyfriend.

Wonwoo has a huge smirk on his pink lips. You’re making such a mess on his fingers, and he just loves it. “You look so fucking cute when your squirm like this, babydoll.”

A needy whimper tumbles past your lips when he presses a gentle kiss to your throbbing clit. It pulses under the attention like it wants his mouth again. Wonwoo’s pupils are blown wide as he licks the remnants of your arousal off his lips. The addicting taste makes his control snap, and in the next second he smashes his face into your cunt like a starved man.

Your hips start move on their own as Wonwoo groans deeply into your drooling pussy. His mouth latches onto your clit, massaging the nub with his tongue. The movements are skilled and toe-curling, and you already feel like you’re fucked out.

“Wonwoo!” You cry out in absolute pleasure when he slips two fingers inside you.

His long fingers work your cunt open, curling up to rub the sensitive spot inside you that made you arch your back in ecstasy. Your mouth is dropped open in a silent min the longer Wonwoo fucks you with his tongue. He captures your juices with his tongue only to slobber them all over you again. Your hands grab ahold of his hair as he keeps moaning into your wet pussy, the vibrations shooting up your spine with every one of his movements.

All it takes his his nose bumping against your clit as he licks around his pumping digits for you to come all over his face. Wonwoo groans into your creamy cunt, licking up every drop of your release.

“So fucking messy.” He grunts as his hand spreads your folds and exposes your heat to the cool air. His fingers trail down your cunt, tenderly rubbing along your sensitive lips. “Fuck, just look at that cream."

You can’t contain your needy moan when Wonwoo brings his fingers to his mouth and licks them clean. He’s so fucking hot that you just want him to fuck you until you can’t think. Before you can get him to do exactly that, a heavy weight settles on your soppy cunt. His cock is hot and wet as it slides between your folds.

“You feel so good, angel.” Wonwoo groans as he thrusts forward, coating the underside of his dick with your arousal. “So fucking wet, just for me.”

The mouthwatering sight of your folds splitting open as he slides his cock between them makes him feel like he’s drunk. Maybe he is. Drunk on your pussy, that is. He only gets to enjoy the feeling for a second before you eagerly buck your hips against his.

“Let me ride you.”

It’s a miracle that Wonwoo doesn’t come all over your stomach at the words you moaned so desperately. He’s quick to get into position, leaning against his headboard as you hover above him. You look so eager as you straddle his lap, the love bites he littered all over your thighs giving him a sense of pride as he brushes his thumbs over them.

Wonwoo’s free hand reaches for your ass. He roughly kneads the skin before slapping it. You moan out in pleasure. Everything is almost too much for you to handle. The sight of him bellow you waiting patiently for you to fuck him like the first time is making your core throb with insatiable desire. His cock rests on his stomach, leaking with precum and waiting for you to sit on it.

The hottest part of it all is how Wonwoo’s looking at you with unadulterated desire and affection—like you’re a living goddess on top of him. Your hands are splayed over his muscular chest, and he just loves the feeling of them smoothing over his hot skin.

His hands move on their own, caressing your hips and mapping out every inch of your body with his rough hands. Wonwoo kisses any part of you he can reach, lips trailing from your neck down to your collarbones. His large hands slip back to your ass to deliver a sharp spank which makes you fall forward. Wonwoo skillfully captures one of your tits in his mouth, tongue immediately gliding over your hardened nipple.

“Nonu!” You cry out as your arms hook over his shoulders to keep him close, softly moaning as he switches between your tits, warm tongue swirling around each erect nub.

The cute little nickname makes his cock twitch. Fuck. You were going to drive him completely insane.

He gently nips at your sensitive bud before pulling away to look up at you. “You look so fucking pretty on top of me, babydoll.” He murmurs, forcing himself to stay still as you shift against his leaking tip.

His sweet praise is enough to make your pussy flutter. You mewl as he teasingly circles his cock against your pussy. The insistent nudges from his leaking head are making your head swim with pleasure. You’re so soaked at this point that he can feel your arousal start to stick to his skin.

Finally, you can’t resist any longer and slowly sink down on his cock. Your tight walls stretch wide, welcoming the bulbous head with just a bit of resistance. It’s been almost two weeks, and you’d already forgotten it felt to have such big and thick dick inside you. His cock isn’t even halfway inside yet, and you can nearly feel him in your stomach.

You sit back and slowly circle your hips, throwing your head back with a moan when his twitching tip nudges your walls repeatedly. Wonwoo feels like he’s gone and died to heaven with the filthy show you’re giving him of your soppy cunt. He curses quietly at the sight of your tight cunt clinging to his fat tip, nearly blowing his load at the erotic sight.

“Show me what you can do, pretty girl.”

He doesn’t have to tell you twice. With a wanton moan and your hands braced behind you, you slide all the way down. You whimper at the stretch, loving the feeling of his thick cock splitting you open. Mewls flutter from your lips, and it feels like the oxygen is slowly being forced out of your lungs.

Once he’s fully inside you, Wonwoo is sure that he’s never going to feel as good as he does now. His head is thrown back and his eyes roll to the back of his head. The feeling of your hot cunt wrapped around him is absolute heaven. You share in his feeling as you moan loudly, completely full and stretched out as he grips your ass to steady you on his dick.

Wonwoo can’t stop looking at the fucked out look on your face while you’re busy staring down at where your pussy and his cock meet. You don’t notice how his pupils are blown out with lust at the sight of you impaled on his cock. His heart fluttering in his chest because fuck, you’re like a literal goddess on top of him.

“Shit, babydoll. You gotta move.” He sounds out of breath, almost needy with his plea.

Wonwoo looks so fucked out and pretty that your pussy tightens around him at the hot sight. That's all it takes for you to give him what he wants. You lift your hips before slamming your ass back down. His cock reaches so deep inside you that you throw you head back with a loud cry. It makes you ravenous, and you eagerly repeat your movements until your practically bouncing on his cock.

You lean towards him and wrap your arms around his neck, your pace faltering a bit when your lips meet his neck. As you litter his skin with wet kisses and gentle bites, you feel his cock throb and twitch inside you. It makes you think that you might actually get him to come first this time.

At least, until Wonwoo commits the tender act of pressing a sweet kiss to your shoulder, removing a hand from your ass to gently thumb at your clit.

“Fuck, Nonu.” You whimper at the stimulation. “You’re so deep.”

“Missed having you on my cock, babydoll. You look so fucking pretty being split open like this.” His fingers trace your stretched hole before they slap your clit.

You moan wantonly when Wonwoo suddenly thrusts up, going impossibly deeper. That’s when you know he's about to ruin you in the way you’ve been craving. You shove your face into his neck, sucking and biting his skin so he can move you on his cock in the way he wants. Apparently, this isn’t enough for him, though.

Wonwoo grips your face, pressing his fingers into your cheeks. “Need to see your pretty face while I fuck you stupid.”

He doesn’t give you time to respond before he’s gripping your ass and grinding you on his cock. His fingertips press into your soft flesh as he lifts you and brings you down his length. You start bouncing to meeting his pumps. Broken mewls contrast with Wonwoo’s groans and mix in the the sound of lewd squelching and skin slapping. His abs tighten every time you come back down, thighs flexing beneath your ass.

Your swollen clit rubs against his pelvis with every thrust, and the feeling is quickly driving you insane. The knot in your stomach is coming undone fast, much faster than you want, but you feel too good to stop. Wonwoo isn’t doing much better. His mind is only full of you and the way your hot cunt is gripping his cock. The carnal look in his eye is locked to where you’re connected. He’s mesmerized with strings of arousal connecting his skin to your dripping folds.

“You look so fucking pretty when you’re bouncing on my cock—just like last time. Gonna let me pump your pretty pussy full again, babydoll?”

“Yes, yes, yes!” You cry out mindlessly, a delicious ache blooming in your core. “Whatever you want!”

You can’t believe Wonwoo has the audacity to blush like you two aren’t literally fucking like animals. It makes you gush around him, orgasm so close that you can feel it in every inch of your body.

“God, baby. Keep fucking yourself stupid on my dick.” He growls as he fucks up into you harder, needing to see you come undone on his cock.

The leaking tip of his cock brushes against your sweet spot over and over again until your eyes gloss over like you’re on the brink of tears. Wonwoo will never get enough of that fucked out face of yours, and it drives that insatiable desire in him to fuck you impossibly harder.

It takes only a few more deep thrusts for you to come on his cock with a loud moan. Your body shudders and shakes against him in absolute pleasure. Wonwoo’s movements don't stop. He fucks you through your orgasm and straight into overstimulation. But you can’t really care because it feels so fucking good. All you can do is cry out his name until he’s emptying his balls inside you.

“Y/N!” He groans into your ear as he pumps you full of his hot cum, thick ropes filling you to the brim until it’s leaking out and coating his heavy sack.

You’re gently grinding into each other as your mouths meet for a messy kiss. Wonwoo’s still-hard cock keeps twitching inside you, and you can’t help but groan into his mouth at the feeling.

“More.” You plead against his lips. “Want you to keep stuffing me full of your cum.”

“Fuck, angel.” Wonwoo pants out. “You’ll be the death of me.”

But if this was death, he’d gladly embrace it every time.

Wonwoo moves down the bed until his back meets the messy sheets. With his hands secured on your waist and the back of your neck, he pulls you down to his chest and forces you to take every inch of his throbbing cock. At this angle, he feels even thicker. Your mind goes blank as his fat dick spears into your tight hole relentlessly.

Wet noises fill the room, dancing in the air with your wanton cries. A white ring forms at the base of his cock, smearing down to his loaded sack. Wonwoo moans along with you, large hands sliding down your body to grip fistfuls of your ass. You let out a broken gasp when he grinds up and pulls you down, stuffing you to the brim only to do it again and again.

You’re panting and whimpering as his cock sinks in deep, plugging your dripping cunt. Tingles of ecstasy course through your quivering body with ever snap of his hips. You aren’t even moving anymore, it’s all Wonwoo. He’s fucking you on his cock like you're his personal fucktoy. The more you think about it like that, the more turned on you’re getting.

Your hot cunt tightens around his veiny cock. The drag of his veiny length stretching you out makes more of your juices coat his dick and spill down to his heavy balls. Wonwoo shudders when he feels how tight you keep getting. He can feel his own high quickly approaching.

“You gonna come for me again, babydoll? Soak my cock with your cream and make a mess all over me?” Wonwoo changes the angle of his hips as he speaks his lewd words. The tip of his cock slams into the soft spot inside you that makes you scream in pleasure. He keeps pounding into you from below without stopping, and you love every second of it.

“Fucking love your cock.” You babble mindlessly, any and every thought that’s not about the fat cock splitting you open being fucked out of you.

“Sweet little cunt is all mine now.” Wonwoo growls possessively. “Gonna be mine forever, right, baby?”

It’s all too much. His filthy yet sweet words combined with his fierce thrusts make you fall over that edge and into your orgasm, this one more powerful than the last. Your body erupts in flames as you squirt all over Wonwoo’s aching cock. He keeps you locked on his dick, balls slapping against your ass as he continues to pound into your gushing cunt.

“So fucking good.” Wonwoo groans gutturally before his hot cum floods your ruined cunt, painting your stretched out walls and claiming you in every sense of the word.

So much of his cum spills out and trickles down his pulsing cock, and you whimper when Wonwoo fucks it deeper into your pussy. You’re both sweaty and sticky, yet there’s still a burning ache in your core that seems like it can only be soothes by Wonwoo and his big cock.

“Want it again.” You moan into his ear, clenching down on his twitching dick. “Please.”

This is where you learn that the resident bad boy can never tell you no.

You barely process him flipping you over and manhandling you into the position he wants. Wonwoo presses your legs against your chest and start to pound into you with rough thrusts. He’s slow but brutish, slamming against your cervix every time he pushes in. Your cream soaks his thick cock and your inner thighs. It slowly drips down to your ass where his heavy balls slap against the tender skin.

“Fuck, babydoll. I’ll never get enough of this tight little pussy.” He sounds so gone, punctuating each word with a sharp thrust.

You cry out each time, the pleasure blooming into that delicious feeling in your stomach. Wonwoo’s words have you clenching around his dick, and he lets out a deep groan. He keeps moaning out praises about how good you are for him, but it’s hard to focus on his words when his thick cock is pummeling into you relentlessly.

You continuously gush around Wonwoo’s cock on the brink of yet another orgasm as you leave a stain around the base. Your pussy is stretched beyond belief, and it feels so fucking good that’s it’s making you delirious.

“I’m gonna have to stuff this pretty pussy full every day.” Wonwoo moans, loving how your cunt keeps spasming around his throbbing cock. He’s fantasised about this for so long, and now that he’s had you he’s completely addicted to you.

“Fuh-Fuck!” You wail, soaking his cock even more at his promise, leaving it dripping.

Wonwoo’s thrusts grow more powerful and ravenous. The pretty sounds you’re letting out every time he drives in and out of you is driving him insane. It’s not long for the harsh snapping of his hips to finally send you into your climax. This one is more somehow more intense than your previous one. Wonwoo groans loudly, watching as you squirt all over his cock.

Each time Wonwoo strokes your g-spot, another gush of liquid spurts from your core. “You’re so fucking hot, angel. Making a mess all over my cock.”

“Come inside me.” You beg with a loud moan, mind already so far gone to think about anything else but being fucked full of his hot cum.

Your lewd plea only drives his desire for you. Wonwoo feels his orgasm approaching with every rough thrust. His balls are aching to be emptied again, and he doesn’t hesitate to chase that euphoric feeling. Your pussy is practically begging him to fill you up with his seed, and he does exactly that. With one final shove, he bottoms out inside you and stills, cock twitching and throbbing in your hot cunt.

A huge load of cum pours into you, coating your walls and taking up the minimal space his cock hasn’t covered. Wonwoo slowly fucks it into you until you’re both whimpering from the overstimulation.

When he pulls out, his cum and your cream slowly leak out of your messy cunt. The fucked out pants you’re letting out are quickly stifled by Wonwoo's lips. You moan into his mouth as he slowly lets go of your legs and hooks them around his hips.

Pulling away, you barely register as he starts to tenderly kiss all over your body. You’re completely sated and too gone to acknowledge your surroundings even as Wonwoo gets up and brings back a warm towel. He gently cleans you up, whispering sweet praises that make you feel a different type of euphoria.

“Hold me, Nonu.” You finally manage to say when you realize he’s done cleaning the both of you up.

His smile is so pretty and precious as he goes to lay with you. The way he cradles you against his chest is comforting, and you know that you wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.

taglist: @duolingofanaccount @felix-3002 @junhui-recs @asjkdk @dani41 @kageyama-i-want-tobiors @ohwonwoo

[thekidsfromyestergay]

I'm actually loving this reframing of the black parade as a propaganda tool because there's so much potential for insane shows there... Like are they gonna be grotesque zombified versions of their past selves, being forced to relive the same set over and over? Are they secretly delivering messages of resistance? Are they under some kind of strict control? What about the secretary, is she the new leader of the parade? Will the shows be full of pyro and fireworks and satires of propaganda, or will they be bleak and depressing and a sign that something is truly wrong? Will we get more teaser videos before the tour that expand on the universe, or will each show reveal a new plot point like the AUS/JP tour? Who is DRAAG? What is the MOAT? What is the concrete age? Will Gerard wear more tiny skirts???

[wasyago]

Oh god. Now I'm empty headed exept thinking about how trails gone cold au Etho is haunted in every way possible. He looks like a ghost, he acts like a ghost of his past self and he's constantly haunted by memories, nightmares and regrets..

I imagine the urge to return to the cave would've been so irresistible at times that Gem would have to like. Monitor him. Like a child. And sit him down, and talk sence into him, and take his keys

Poor guy :(

YOU GET IT YOU GET IT

i imagine at first it was very difficult to exist in their house, too quiet, too obvious that pearl and tango are gone. no more laughter, no more random noises, no more random singing. and etho just sat there, wallowing in grief, trying to process that they really are not coming back now. because it's a hard thing to grasp, that one day someone was here and now they're just poof, gone. reliving their time in the cave and spiraling endlessly for what he could've done differently until he has a meltdown. because the guilt and loss and panic are all too much...

and gem is there to help him calm down and bring him back to earth, but there's not much she can do to ease his pain. she's in pain too, but she has to be strong for etho. because yes he's like a child. etho probably realizes the state he's in and he hates to be a burden, but he can't help it, not yet at least.

also this made me think, so have a doodle

[crowlyne]

I love a good toxic scumcum/jiuyuan.

Au where SY is SJ's disciple unfortunate enough to be similar to sj and eventually becomes sj's projection target. SJ reliving his past trauma but now with him in the position of power and sy taking his past self's place. SY though instead of grinning and bearing it like binghe retaliates by being a sarcastic shady mf and making sj's life as inconvenient as possible, but instead of being angry, SJ is amused instead. Basically SJ having twisted feelings for SY, pushing and molding him into being like SJ... Eventually making SY into the top disciple, replacing MF. SJ finds satisfaction in SY being more and more like him

[kitty6choi]

𝑬𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒏𝒂𝒍 𝑺𝒖𝒏𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒆

𝑆𝑦𝑛𝑜𝑝𝑠𝑖𝑠: The memory of his betrayal is still present in your mind, but you decide to leave it behind now that you are at peace, but when an old friend asks you for a favor, you cannot refuse without imagining that you will relive some feelings that you thought you had buried.

𝑃𝑎𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔: Song Mingi x fem! reader

𝐺𝑒𝑛𝑟𝑒: smut MDNI + little angust + mafia au + loves from the past

𝑊𝑜𝑟𝑑 𝐶𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑡: 9.2k (damn it)

𝑊𝑎𝑟𝑛𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠: Fights, physical injuries, blood, aggression, violence, hidden identity, sexual warnings: unprotected sex (don't do it), semi-public sex, fingering, mutual masturbation, creampie, (sorry if I forgot anything)

A/N: First of all, sorry for the delay, December was very frustrating for me and it wasn't very pleasant and I needed a little break, but now I'm better so I was finally able to finish this fic and I'm very proud, I hope you like it <3 English is not my first language so sorry if I made a mistake.

⋆｡˚୨𝖬𝖺𝗌𝗍𝖾𝗋𝗅𝗂𝗌𝗍୧˚｡⋆

With hurried steps, you adjusted the cap over your hair and pulled up the collar of your jacket. You were fleeing from the sirens echoing in the distance. It wasn’t anything new for you, and you knew it wouldn’t stop being part of your life because of the bad decisions you’d made in the past. This was your life now, and there was nothing else you could do but survive.

What started as small thefts to eat or find something to keep you warm turned into a desperate search for shelter. That’s how you ended up seeking help from dangerous people. The Black Eye wasn’t just a group of petty criminals; they were an organized, ruthless network—and, for you, the last chance to keep living.

Despite your efforts, you knew you were at a disadvantage because you were a woman. But if you had to hide that fact to survive, you would do it. The hardest part was cutting your hair, but you did it. Then, you wrapped your chest with bandages, wore loose-fitting clothes, and finally, you began calling yourself “Lee.” You tried not to speak too much and always wore a cap to hide your face, hoping no one would ask too many questions. That’s how you managed to catch the attention of one of their members.

They tested you for a couple of months before deciding to present you to their leader. You were nervous, cold sweat trickling down your back, but you kept calm as you waited in a room. Then, the doors opened, and two people walked in. One of them was tall and muscular, with multiple scars on his face. From his imposing presence, you guessed he was the leader, Jack. The other person entered calmly, taking his time to assess the room silently but with sharp alertness.

“Is this the new recruit?” the second person asked in a deep, curious voice.

“Yes, Mingi, this is Lee,” another man replied, shoving you forward. He was the recruiter who had "guaranteed" your entry into the group.

Mingi approached you, observing you for a long moment, watching how you lowered your gaze and hid your hands in your pockets.

“Why do you want to join us?” he finally asked. His voice was low, almost gentle, but heavy with authority.

“I need protection. And you need someone who knows how to navigate the streets,” you replied, your voice firm but calm.

“You better be useful, Lee,” he said, pronouncing your false name with authority. You knew that from now on, you belonged to the gang, and he was making your place clear. “There’s no room for the weak here.”

“You’re in,” the other man said before turning and leaving the room, leaving you with the assurance that you’d live to see another day.

Your days of trying to survive on your own had now turned into trying to hide your true identity to keep living. It was hard, but over time, you learned to manage. You avoided interacting with the members and rarely spoke to anyone unless it was absolutely necessary. Still, there were a few moments when you were almost discovered.

You tried to blend in, and for most people, you succeeded—except for one. Song Mingi. He always seemed to notice everything, and for the past few months, he hadn’t taken his eyes off you. It was starting to get annoying.

One day, after a mission went slightly out of control, you returned to the abandoned warehouse that served as the gang’s base. A voice you knew all too well called your name.

“Lee, come here.” You turned to see Mingi in the distance and dragged your feet toward him “I have to admit, I’m surprised you made it back,” he said.

You rolled your eyes. He always said before every mission that he didn’t expect you to return, but you made it back just to see his irritated expression.

“Get used to it, Song. I’ll be here for a while,” you replied, a bit defiantly, raising your head to meet his gaze despite his towering height.

Mingi stared at you, tilting his head slightly, and let out a low chuckle—but there was no humor in it. With a swift motion, before you could react, he grabbed your face firmly, his nails digging into your cheeks.

“Listen closely,” he said, leaning in, his voice dropping but his grip unrelenting as you struggled to free yourself by clutching his hand. “There’s no place here for someone like you.” You froze at his words, fear flashing in your eyes as you locked gazes with him. Then, without warning, he shoved you hard, making you fall to the ground “Get out,” he said coldly.

The days didn’t get any better, and you began questioning whether you had made the right decision. But the fear of what might happen if you left the gang kept you in place—even if it meant enduring Mingi watching your every move.

One day, the gang organized one of its oldest traditions: an internal fighting tournament. It was a way to measure strength, prove who was worthy and who wasn’t, and keep the members sharp for real confrontations. The atmosphere in the warehouse was charged with excitement and pent-up violence, as shouts and bets filled the space.

You didn’t want to be there, but you thought staying alone in the rooms would make you stand out more. Blending into the crowd seemed safer—or so you thought. The fight was entertaining, but it didn’t excite you as much as it did the people around you. Still, you forced yourself to watch and analyze the movements of both fighters. To no one’s surprise, the expected victor won. He had five consecutive wins under his belt, and now, as his sixth opponent lay defeated, no one wanted to face him.

“Who’s next?” the winner shouted, scanning the crowd for his next victim. Everyone took a step back, and silence began to fill the room. You noticed how some were shoving the newer recruits forward. From afar, you felt a gaze on you. You looked up, only to lock eyes with Mingi, who was staring at you intently, a smile on his face.

“Lee, maybe you should go next,” Mingi said suddenly, breaking the silence. You cursed him in your mind as all eyes turned to you. You began searching for an excuse to decline, but you knew Mingi wouldn’t let this opportunity pass “You should earn your place, rookie,” he said, taunting you. The murmurs of the crowd grew louder “Or do you think you don’t deserve it?” he added, provoking you further.

You felt hands pushing you toward the ring. With your heart pounding, you climbed into the makeshift ring as the crowd gathered around, shouting bets and cheering for the fight.

You glanced at Mingi behind the crowd and sighed, cursing him under your breath before turning to face your opponent. He was a tall, muscular man whose muscles seemed to have muscles. His angry expression only highlighted how eager he was for this fight.

You took a step back, but hands pushed you forward. Then, the bell rang, signaling the start of your defeat.

You didn’t even try. You knew you had no chance. You simply closed your eyes as you saw the man’s fist coming straight for your face, bracing for the impact. His punch knocked the air out of you in one blow. You thought that would be enough to stop him, but you didn’t expect him to climb on top of you and continue his brutal assault.

Everything around you grew blurry. The crowd’s cheers faded into the distance. You didn’t fight back—not even a little. You let the darkness take over.

When you opened your eyes again, you wished you hadn’t. A sharp pain coursed through your entire body, as if a train had run you over. Despite the agony, you tried to move to figure out where you were until something stopped you.

“Don’t move,” a deep voice ordered. You turned your head to see Mingi sitting nearby, arms crossed. He looked worried, though he tried to hide it behind a mask of seriousness.

“What happened?” you asked, staying still.

“You got beaten up,” he said bluntly. “Then you passed out.”

You let out a dry laugh. “Well, thanks to you.”

Mingi sighed deeply, watching as you struggled to sit up. He seemed angry—not at you, but at himself.

“I didn’t think this would happen,” he said, his frustration evident.

“Whatever,” you muttered, attempting to stand, but the pain in your left side was unbearable. “Damn it.”

“Let me help you,” Mingi offered, stepping closer. You flinched, fear sparking within you as he approached. The sudden movement made you wince in pain again.

“I can handle it.”

“No, you can’t,” he snapped, taking another step forward. You tried to back away, but with your injuries and his speed, you couldn’t stop him from grabbing your arm.

“Stop moving,” he commanded. You wanted to fight him off, but there wasn’t a trace of strength left in your body. He pushed you gently back onto the mattress and lifted your hoodie.

His expression darkened instantly. His hand froze mid-motion as he realized the truth.

“You…” His voice came out uneven, words escaping him as the realization sank in. Everything finally clicked in his mind. “Why?”

You didn’t respond. You didn’t have the energy to argue, especially over something like this. You simply waited for the worst to come.

And it did, far sooner than expected. The door to the room opened, and the leader walked in. Mingi snapped out of his daze as Jack approached you, his face a mix of concern and curiosity.

“How are you?” Jack asked, ignoring the tension hanging in the air.

“I…”

“can’t stay,” Mingi’s voice rang out, cutting through the room. Fear surged in you as you silently begged him with your eyes to keep the secret. But the doubt in his gaze told you all hope was lost “It's a woman,” Mingi declared. The words echoed in the room, followed by silence so profound that all you could hear was the pounding of your heart.

Jack’s gaze shifted to you, filled with a mix of astonishment and concern. After a long, heavy sigh, he finally spoke.

“I know.”

“What?!” Both you and Mingi exclaimed at the same time, equally stunned. You thought Jack would throw you out right then and there, not admit he already knew.

“How…?” you asked, still in shock.

“Since when?” Mingi demanded angrily. “And why didn’t you tell me?”Jack leaned against the wall, crossing his arms “Since the beginning. It was kind of obvious, if you ask me,” he said, looking directly at you. “You were shorter than most, and your appearance was different. You stood out. It wasn’t hard to figure out.” Mingi stepped forward, but Jack continued “I let you join because I wanted to see how far you’d go on your own—until this idiot decided to intervene.” Mingi lowered his head like a scolded dog.

“Even so, she can’t stay,” Mingi insisted.

“She absolutely can. And you, you damned fool, will shut your mouth and act like you saw nothing,” Jack ordered.

“But she can’t defend herself!”

“This is your fault,” Jack shouted, his voice rising. “I told you to leave Lee alone, and now she’s hurt. From now on, she’s your responsibility. If anything happens to her, I’ll kill you.”

Mingi clenched his fists, his face red with fury and frustration. Without another word, he stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

You were left in confusion, unable to comprehend what had just happened. Everything felt strange and surreal. Jack approached you, and you looked at him, still processing.

“Why?” you finally asked.

“That doesn’t matter,” Jack replied.You let out a tired sigh, too drained to argue. You just wanted to rest.

“Mingi’s a good person, but sometimes he’s an idiot,” Jack said. “He’ll look after you. You don’t have to worry; no one will find out your secret. You’re safe here.”You decided to believe his words. You didn’t want to fight anymore “Now rest. Everything will be fine.”

******

The first few months were tense. You were still recovering and couldn’t do much more than linger around. Even so, Mingi was always nearby, watching you with a mix of frustration and curiosity in his eyes. He made sure no one got too close to you, even if it meant getting into fights with other gang members. His constant presence annoyed you, but it was also a relief. You knew that, despite everything, he was keeping his word to protect you.

When you felt ready to return to the streets, Mingi stopped you, and Jack agreed. You had no choice but to stay in the warehouse, but you didn’t waste your time. You started training to be prepared—you didn’t want to end up on the ground again.

It was nighttime, and everyone else seemed to be asleep, but the sound of your fists hitting the old punching bag echoed throughout the space. Your punches were clumsy, and you felt exhaustion in your arms with each hit, but you refused to give up. You needed to learn to defend yourself.

“You’re terrible,” his deep voice said behind you, making you freeze. You turned quickly to see Mingi leaning against the wall, arms crossed, watching you with that irritating smile.

“What do you want, Song?”

“Nothing. The noise woke me up, that’s all. Go on,” he said, gesturing toward the bag hanging in front of you.

“If you’re not going to help, then leave,” you replied, rolling your eyes before turning back to the bag and hitting it again, ignoring him.

He walked toward you slowly, letting out an exaggerated sigh. Standing behind you, he took your wrists in his large hands before you could protest, adjusting them into a different position. His touch was firm but surprisingly gentle.

“Like this. Keep your fists tighter, and don’t just use your arms. You need to involve your whole body in the punch.” His closeness made you nervous. You could feel his breath on the back of your neck and the warmth of his body just behind yours. You shivered but tried to focus on his words.

“Now, try again,” he said, releasing you slowly.

You took a deep breath and threw another punch at the bag, following his instructions. This time, your punch felt stronger.

“Better,” he said with a smile, nodding in approval.

“Whatever.” You couldn’t help but glance at him out of the corner of your eye. There was something in his expression, in the way he looked at you, that made your heart beat faster. “Thanks.” You didn’t know where those words came from, but somehow, they made the air in the room feel lighter.

“You’ve done enough for tonight,” he said quickly, his voice rougher than before. “Get some rest. We’ll continue tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“This is just the first step, Lee.” He turned and walked toward the exit, but before leaving, he paused for a moment to look back at you as you struggled to steady the strange rhythm of your heart.

"Again."Your heart was pounding, and every muscle in your body screamed with exhaustion, but all you could hear was Mingi's voice "Harder."Your hands were bruised and swollen, yet you didn’t stop throwing punches "Harder." You focused on everything Mingi had taught you over the past few weeks—firm feet, clenched fists, channeling your strength. But there was something more, something raw. The anger you’d suppressed for years surged within you, blinding and heavy with sadness.

On your final punch, you released everything you’d been holding inside. Your body gave out, and you collapsed to your knees, gasping for air. Mingi rushed to your side, helping you sit down somewhere nearby as he handed you a bottle of water.

“Shit, don’t scare me like that.”You shoved him away and tried to stand, ready to continue, but he grabbed your arm “Take a break.”

“I can’t,” you said breathlessly. “I need to be ready for tomorrow.”

“You’re not fighting.”

“You can’t stop me, Song.” Mingi gripped your shoulders, forcing you to meet his gaze.

“I don’t want anything bad to happen to you.” His words caught you off guard, and before you could respond, he stepped closer. He was so close now that you could barely think.“Not again.” The overwhelming silence was filled with an unfamiliar sensation in your chest.

In recent weeks, the two of you had spent hours training together. At first, it was just a few hours a night, but over time, the darkness of the night wrapped you both in an odd honesty. You talked about things you never planned to share. He told you how he ended up in the gang, and for the first time in years, you told someone the truth about your past.

“I’m ready,” you said firmly. “And neither you nor anyone else is going to stop me.” You pulled away from his grasp and headed toward the exit, but you heard his hurried footsteps behind you.

“What are you trying to prove?” You turned slightly to look at him and sighed.

“It’s not about that. The world is cruel to someone like me.” You knew he understood you meant being a woman, and his expression softened with compassion “And I won’t let them leave me on the ground again.”

Mingi didn’t know how to respond. You gave him one last glance, noticing a vulnerability in him that you had never seen before. And in that moment, you realized your feelings for Mingi were starting to change.

The boy who once seemed like your greatest enemy had become your only source of security in a dangerous world. And though neither of you would admit it, something was growing between you—something neither of you knew how to handle amidst the darkness surrounding you.

The next day, Mingi promised himself not to interfere. But as the fights began, he couldn’t stop scanning the crowd for you. Not seeing you anywhere made him tense. If Jack found out you’d joined the fights again, he’d kill him—but what mattered most to Mingi was knowing where you were.

The matches dragged on, and he began to relax, thinking you wouldn’t show. But when the final winner was announced and the event was wrapping up, he saw a shadow cross the ring and step into the center.

“This isn’t over,” you declared loudly.

“Get off the ring, Lee!” someone shouted. “They’ll beat you up again!”

Mingi watched as a dark shadow crossed your face, and your eyes took on a hardened, almost menacing look.

“Why don’t you try it?” Everyone fell silent, shocked at your boldness. You’d always flown under the radar, but this was new—and it sparked curiosity in some “Or are you scared?”

The crowd erupted, people pushing and shoving to see who would step up to face you. Mingi tried to get to you, but the chaos of the crowd held him back.

Finally, someone stepped into the ring, facing you. You raised your fists, and he laughed before getting into position.

“You’re done for.”

“We’ll see.”

The bell rang, and the man lunged at you with speed. But you easily dodged him and drove your elbow into his side. He stumbled, turning to glare at you, realizing this wasn’t going to be as easy as he thought.

Adrenaline coursed through your body. You were exhausted, your lungs begging for rest, but you couldn’t stop—not now. The man threw punches aimed at your face, and you dodged as best as you could. The crowd’s shouts blurred into the background as you focused entirely on the emotions spilling out with every strike.

Rage consumed you as you drove a punch into his face, your body moving on its own as you continued to rain blows on the unconscious man beneath you.

Hands pulled you away as the crowd erupted into cheers. You looked up and could barely make out your name being chanted amidst the chaos—you had won.

Mingi shoved his way through the throng, crossed the ring, and ran to you. You thought he was coming to congratulate you, but his furious expression said otherwise.

“Enough!” he shouted, his voice silencing the crowd instantly “This is over.” People protested, but Mingi didn’t back down “I said it’s over!”

Reluctantly, the crowd began to disperse. You turned to leave, but he grabbed your hand and dragged you down the hallways until you were alone in a room.

“Let me go,” you demanded, struggling against his grip.

He didn’t release you until he closed the door behind you both, shutting out the rest of the world.

“What were you thinking?” Mingi paced back and forth, running a hand through his hair “They could’ve hurt you or worse…” His voice was thick with anger and desperation, tinged with something that sounded like worry.

“But they didn’t.” He sighed and gave you a once-over, his gaze lingering on your bloodied hands. You quickly hid them behind you.

Mingi stepped closer, taking your hands into his. For a moment, it looked like it pained him to even look at them. Your knuckles were torn, and the pain was unbearable, though you refused to admit it.

“Let me help you.”

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not,” he said firmly, guiding you to the bathroom and making you sit down. “Stay still.”

Without waiting for your permission, he grabbed a small first aid kit from a nearby shelf. His movements were deliberate but gentle as he cleaned your knuckles with a damp cloth. You shut your eyes, biting your lip to stifle a groan.

“This is going to sting,” he warned, pouring antiseptic over your wounds.

“Could you be gentler?” you hissed, pulling one hand back, but he caught it with ease.

“If you were more careful, I wouldn’t have to do this.”

His eyes locked onto yours, and the air between you felt charged with something that went beyond physical pain.

The silence stretched as he wrapped your hands in bandages. His fingers were surprisingly tender, and for a moment, you forgot the pain and exhaustion. His closeness overwhelmed you, the warmth of his skin sending your senses into overdrive.

“Mingi…” you began, but didn’t know how to finish.

“What?” he asked, his voice softer now, almost a whisper.

“You don’t have to do this.”

“Yes, I do,” he replied, his tone filled with an intensity that took your breath away. “Because if I don’t, who will?”

His gaze held yours, and something in his expression shifted. There was vulnerability, honesty, you’d never seen in him before.

Time seemed to freeze as his hand lingered on yours. His eyes flicked down to your lips for a split second, and a wave of nervous energy swept through you.

“Mingi…”

Before you could say anything else, he leaned in and his lips brushed against yours. The kiss was hesitant at first, almost as if he were unsure. But when you didn’t pull away, it deepened, filled with a desperation that mirrored the chaos around you.

Your heart raced as you closed your eyes, letting the walls between you crumble entirely. His lips moved against yours with a mix of urgency and relief, as if this moment had been inevitable all along.

When he pulled back, you were both breathless. His gaze searched yours, and what you saw wasn’t his usual cocky demeanor but something raw and genuine. You didn’t know what to say, so you simply looked at him, letting the gravity of what had just happened settle between you. The world outside faded away, leaving only this fragile moment the first kiss in a place as dangerous as it was unexpected.

“No…” you said suddenly, breaking the atmosphere. “This…”

“Please, don’t say it.”

“Mingi, I…” you didn’t know what to do. You had never experienced anything like what you were feeling in your body. This was new and strange, and you were scared, unsure of what to do or say.

“Please, don’t push me away,” he pleaded, holding your waist and looking at you with eyes full of desperation.

“I’m scared,” you confessed, letting the tears well up in your eyes. Mingi hugged you, letting you sob into his chest as he gently stroked your back to comfort you.

“It’s okay, I’ll take care of you,” he said softly. You looked up for a moment, and for the first time in your life, you let the walls around you crumble.

“Do you promise?”

“I will never leave you,” he assured you. His words struck you deeply, and you trusted him. You let his arms wrap around you, comforting you for the night, not knowing it wouldn’t be the only time he would do so.

*******

Time only made your feelings for Mingi grow. It became harder and harder to hide it from others, as being near him felt like standing on fire. Every glance, every slight touch from him made your heart race. Whenever you had the chance to be alone, Mingi would pin you against the wall, pressing his lips to yours, his hands wandering over your body. But you always stopped him when he tried to touch you beneath your clothes. He never insisted, and you were grateful for that, though deep inside, you wanted it too. Yet you were scared—it was something you'd never done before, and you feared it wouldn’t go right.

Mingi never let anyone get close to you. On the missions you shared, he was always by your side, never leaving you alone. Sometimes, when someone bothered you, Mingi made sure to put them in their place, even if it ended in a fight.

You knew this life wasn’t easy—it never was—but there were moments when it felt unbearable. Sometimes you wondered what you had done to deserve this. Sometimes you wished for an easier life, for loving parents, for school, to fall in love under different circumstances, to be a normal girl who could dress up in beautiful clothes without needing to hide to protect herself.

With tear-filled eyes and a heavy heart, your feet led you to Mingi’s room. You hesitated before knocking on his door but eventually did. A few seconds later, he stood in front of you, and without waiting for anything, you wrapped your arms around him, seeking the comforting warmth of his body.

“What’s wrong?”

“Can I sleep with you?” you asked, knowing it was risky, knowing it was dangerous, but you had no other safe place to go. “Just for tonight,” you pleaded.

“Alright.”

You had only been in his room once before—the day everything began, that afternoon when he had tended to your wounds and shared that first kiss with you. “Is everything okay?” he asked as he closed the door.

“No.” With him, you had the chance to be honest, and you never held back from telling him the truth. “I’m tired.” Mingi hugged you tightly, trying to ease the weight from your body.

“Come here.”

You both lay down on the small bed, and you curled up against his chest. It was the first time you’d been this close, yet somehow, it felt as if you had done it a thousand times.

“Mingi,” you said, lifting your gaze to meet his eyes. “If there were another life… do you think this would be different?”

His silence made your chest tighten slightly, but then his hand caressed your cheek with tender compassion.

“If there were another life, I wouldn’t care how it was, as long as I could be by your side.”

Without being able to help it, you pushed yourself up and kissed him, unloading all your sorrow into his mouth, all those thoughts you had you left on his lips for a moment, you didn't want to think about anything other than him. His kisses became desperate and hungry, you felt that intense heat on your body and his hands holding you tightly did nothing but want it. You separated from him for a moment and lifted your sweatshirt, but he stopped you.

“No… I don't want you to do this if you're not ready.”

“Mingi… I want to do it” you wanted him to touch you, you wanted his mouth to run over your skin and show yourself to him without any barrier, you wanted him to see you as you were. You took off your sweatshirt and Mingi looked down at the bandage that covered your breasts, you took a breath and began to take it off, a part of you felt relieved to take it off as you showed yourself as you were in front of him and a part of you was afraid.

When you finished your breathing was labored at the sight, Mingi had bitten his lip and seemed to be struggling with something inside of him. You took one of his hands and placed it on one of your breasts as you sat on his lap.

“Please… say something” you begged as you saw how he closed his eyes.

“You are beautiful,” he said before kissing you again.

That night they both gave more than their bodies, they put their hearts in their hands and gave it to the other, letting the moon be the only witness of their love.

*********

In all the times they had had a mission they had never failed, but this time everything seemed different, everyone was divided and the sound of sirens was heard getting closer, they couldn't get out of the place, they were surrounded and the bullets in their weapons had run out a while ago.

“Shit” Mingi growled at your side hiding “we will get out of this” he told you taking your hand without caring if anyone saw them.

The years had passed faster than you thought, but in that time neither of you hesitated to walk away from the other, even when Jack warned them about the rumors that ran through the gang, Mingi didn't care if they assumed things and neither did you, even so, they tried to be discreet and give themselves only in the shadows.

“I’m scared” you said with tears in your eyes

“Everything will be okay” a loud bang was heard and you both looked out just to see the opportunity to leave, someone had broken the glass of the door “okay, let’s go” he said without letting go of your hand heading to the exit, but before you could get there you felt a strong blow to the head that made you let go of his hand.

Mingi noticed immediately and lunged at the person who had hit you, you tried to get up, but everything was spinning and you felt something hot dripping down your forehead. You touched your head and were not surprised to see your hand red, you took a breath and tried to look for Mingi, but everything seemed to go slower and slower and the sound of sirens resonated in your ears at the same time as someone screamed.

“We have to go” “It’s too late” “They’re here” “Leave him”

You couldn’t bear the pain any longer and you closed your eyes for a moment. You wanted Mingi to take you in his arms, you wanted to feel the warmth of his body comforting you again and hear his voice telling you that everything would be okay, but all you could feel was the cold of the floor and the only thing you could feel was the unbearable pain in your head. You looked up for a moment and wanted to believe that what you saw was a bad dream, that it was just a figment of your imagination, but something inside you broke when you saw Mingi running away from you leaving you alone.

********

Five years had to pass before you could get out of prison, but those five years couldn't make you forget the day you opened your eyes and realized that you had lost everything again and you were alone again. The day Mingi decided to abandon you and leave you behind, that day remained engraved like ink on your skin all this time.

No matter how many times you repeated it and tried to make it less painful, it always felt like a million needles were stuck in your heart and crushed at the same time, it was a slow and raw pain that became more unbearable every second.

The day you got out of prison you looked at the sky as if it were the first time, you let the sun's rays penetrate your skin and warm your body. It was a little comforting to leave feeling like you could start from scratch. Life had given you a new opportunity and this time you wouldn't repeat the same mistakes of the past.

You walked through the streets, contemplating the city that once seemed huge to you, but over the years you got to know every alley, every sidewalk, every store in it. Without realizing it, you ended up somewhere you knew too well, maybe it was your subconscious or maybe it was because you had nowhere to go, but you decided to push the old worn door and enter anyway.

You were surprised that the old warehouse was still here, but seeing it empty and full of dust seemed strange to you. The place that was once your home now felt unknown, despite the bad times you spent here there were also many good ones. Every corner you passed brought back memories and you smiled sadly, the old jacket was still hanging and you felt a small knot remembering someone by your side teaching you how to fight, you looked away and walked every inch until you ended up in front of a door you knew well.

A part of you wanted to knock and hoped someone would open it like the first time you did, you wanted to meet someone, but you opened the door yourself only to find an empty room full of memories and dust. It hurt to be here, but you didn't know where to go.

You entered letting the memories flood over you and it was as if you were living them for the first time, that first kiss, that first night together and many others that followed, those endless hugs and the words he whispered to you to help you sleep. But all that had vanished, all that was in the past thanks to him.

You opened the window and looked at the buildings in the distance while the night fell and the city was flooded with dreams and unfulfilled hopes, you looked at the sky and contemplated the moon whispering your wishes knowing that it wouldn't hear you.

You woke up thanks to the sound of something falling and a bottle rolling on the floor followed by firm footsteps that ran through the place. You looked around for something to defend yourself with, but all you saw was the trash from the food you had stolen and the beer cans you had left abandoned in a corner over the days.

You slipped out of the room and walked towards where you had heard the noise, your heart pounding as you tried to hide in the shadows as you knew how. You peeked your head out and noticed the figure of a man curiously admiring the deformed drawing you had made with the dust the night before.

He seemed to sense your gaze as he looked up and let out a laugh.

“I know you’re there” you hid again and pressed your body against the cold wall, you thought of something, but nothing came to mind, you looked at the ground and the only thing you found were your fists, well, if you had to fight to escape you would do it, you had done it before, you should… “Lee”

That name paralyzed you, you felt like your heart stopped for a second and you peeked out again only to see Jack with his arms crossed when he saw your head peek out. You felt relief run through your body and you came out of your hiding place.

“Shit, you almost scared me to death”

“I’m glad to see you” he said showing a smile “you look… different” shame took over you knowing that he saw your long hair and that you showed your figure without hiding behind a sweatshirt

“How did you find me?” You asked suddenly, changing the subject

“I never stopped coming here hoping you would show up” you turned your gaze to the ground, you were glad to know that someone was waiting for you “when I find out what happened that day…”

“No… that doesn't matter” you interrupted him before he could continue “what have you come for?”

“I want to help you, you can join again and…”

“No, I'm not going back there again” Jack sighed, he looked tired

“Everything has changed, you know?” He dropped onto an old bench, kicking up some dust. “Many left since… we had to leave here and everything was much harder.” He ran his hand over his face as he remembered, you could tell he was having trouble speaking. “A new gang appeared and… we had to join them or we were finished. Many left, including Mingi.” His name made you a little uncomfortable, but you stood firm. “Little by little, the new gang grew and got involved in shady business, but we had no choice.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It doesn’t matter, no one knew this would happen.” He stood up and took a step towards you. He looked at you tiredly and placed his hand on your shoulder. “You can stay here as long as you want, but if you need help, just call me.” He gave you a piece of paper with an address on it and left, leaving you in the dust and the weight of his words.

You thought you would never call him, but the weeks were getting harder and harder alone, stealing wasn’t enough anymore and even though this place was huge it wasn’t equipped to keep running.

You looked again at the crumpled paper you once threw away and wondered if (again) this wasn’t one of your bad decisions. When you got to the place you were surprised to see a small house on the outskirts of town, you expected an old warehouse again or maybe someone’s garage. With a little fear and holding your breath in your lungs you dared to knock on the door.

Jack smiled at you and let you in. He gave you new clothes and let you take a bath, he fed you well and you devoured every bite. You had never felt anything like this and now you knew why people lived so happily.

“So?” you asked leaving your fourth empty plate “if I join you what will I have to do?”

“It's easy” Jack said sitting in front of you “you'll just get paid”

“Wow, I didn't think I'd be Lee again”

“No” he interrupted you “this time it won't be Lee, it'll be you”

“But…”

“That doesn't matter”

A part of you knew that this would be more dangerous than before, you knew it sounded like a terrible idea and that it would be even worse, but you had no choice, you never had one, so you had no choice but to accept.

The days passed and Jack warned you that this would be dangerous, the people you would meet were very dangerous, that they belonged to some kind of mafia and that you should be prepared, he gave you a gun and although you had never used it to harm anyone the weight of having one was always comforting.

The day had arrived, Jack and you were inside a luxurious bar, you had never been in one and you were amazed by the bright lights and the music resonating in your ears, a part of you wanted to abandon everything and get lost among the people while having fun dancing, but you weren't here for that, you had a mission and you wouldn't let anything cloud your mind. Jack guided you through the hallways and approached you.

“It's the last door on the right” he told you before disappearing with a tall guy with a kind smile. Nerves ran through your body even though you had gone over the plan a thousand times before, but you never imagined being in this situation. The missions you had carried out had always been as 'Lee' but now you had left it behind, now Lee had been left in a place of the past and now you walked as the real you.

You entered that room with your head held high, with your heels clicking on the floor and with the loaded gun hidden in your leg, but none of that could prepare you for what you were going to find on the other side of the door.

It was a small room, with just a desk and two chairs, but the light was very dim, so much so that you could barely see the other person in front of you because of the thick smoke from the cigarette he was smoking, even so, you approached and sat in the empty chair that was in front of the desk.

The smoke parted like a curtain and left you both stunned when you saw the face of the person in front of you, he thought he would never see you again and you thought that the pain of that betrayal was behind you, but when you saw it all seemed to come back to you like a wave hitting your heart hard, everything you thought you had forgotten, all the feelings and memories came back to you when you recognized those eyes.

“I see you’ve been busy,” you said, trying to control your voice. Mingi stood up suddenly, it was as if he had seen a ghost and had stolen the words from him. “So much so that you seem to have forgotten me.”

“I never forgot you,” he suddenly replied. Just being here made you feel a lump in your throat with the millions of memories you spent together clouding your mind, but you never forgot the last moment.

“But you abandoned me.”

“What… what are you doing here?” he suddenly asked.

“I can ask you the same thing” Mingi stayed silent, the shock of seeing you still had him speechless “let me guess… you’re the one who’s going to give me the payment, aren’t you?”

“You… joined the gang again?”

“Deal with your own problems Song” you placed your hands on the desk a little irritated

“But why?”

“I don’t have time for you” you stood up annoyed, but the truth was that you couldn’t stand being in the same room with the guy who broke your heart “give me the payment and go back to your business”

Mingi shook his head and looked at you again, he noticed that you had long hair and the dress you were wearing highlighted the curves that you once hid, you looked very different, but he still knew that you were still the same.

“Let’s talk”

“No” you answered firmly taking out the gun “save it, your words are of no use to me now”

“Don’t do it” he pleaded when he saw you load the gun “you don’t even know how…”

You pulled the trigger aiming close to him making his words stay in his mouth.

“I won’t repeat it again Song… give me the payment”

Mingi let out a dry laugh knowing he had lost, he took out the money and placed it on the desk, you looked at him for a second and went for the money when he didn’t say anything, but he quickly took your hand, Mingi couldn’t let you go, not again. You tried to get away, but quickly between the fight and the struggle you were face to face.

“Let me go”

“No” you pointed the gun, but when you least expected it Mingi had snatched the gun from your hand, you no longer had anything to fight with, but that didn’t stop you from trying to do it.

“You never change” he said taking your hands in quick movements and imprisoning your body on the desk “you are still as stubborn as before”

“And you are still an idiot” you could not do anything, you could only look at him with resentment hoping that the weight of your gaze would do something to him.

Mingi was not going to hurt you, he only wanted to talk things over, but when he saw your eyes he knew that you were dragging bad memories from the past.

“I never forgot you” he repeated and somehow you felt that his words reached your heart.

You looked at him and realized the closeness that there was between the two of you, as if all the past that had existed between you had vanished and only this moment existed. He was very close and something inside you urged you to get closer to him, your heart was beating strongly and you wanted to feel more than a simple touch of his hands on your wrists, you still loved him, you always knew it.

“It still hurts” you said, holding back your tears and the urge to hug him. Mingi let go of your hands but didn’t move away “I can’t forget it so easily”

“So, let me help you” he came a little closer and you felt his breath on your lips for a second, you could have moved away, you could have pushed him away and left that room, but the truth was that you also wanted to forget the traces of the past.

His lips were just like you remembered, soft and delicate with a warmth you had never felt before. Mingi's hands ran down your arms to your hips and he held you by the back to bring you even closer. You separated for a moment and it was as if all the differences, thoughts and problems had disappeared in that simple kiss, his gaze was filled with a mixture of desire and pure longing.

“Mingi…” his name in your voice was like a spell for his body and he responded immediately waiting for your words, but there was nothing to say, you just wanted this, you wanted him.

You pushed yourself forward and held onto his neck as you brought your lips together again, your kisses were no longer slow, now they were just devouring each other, your tongues met and your teeth clashed because of the desperation and desire that seemed to overflow.

His hands held you tightly, as if he feared that at any moment you might fade away again, but each kiss felt more real than ever. Mingi contoured your figure and lifted the hem of your dress, you couldn't help but moan a little at the feeling of his fingers on your skin and he took the opportunity to grab your legs and climb onto the desk.

Your gazes met for an instant and you both knew what the other wanted. Mingi squeezed your thighs as he watched you take off the straps of your dress, leaving your breasts exposed. You noticed how he bit his lips, but at the same time he contemplated your body.

His mouth went straight to your neck and you let out a muffled moan at the feeling of his kisses, his hands went up your legs and slowly approached your core at the same time as his kisses now went down your collarbone and approached your chest.

When his fingers touched your pussy you arched your back from the sensation you had missed so much, without wasting time he began to move his fingers over the fabric letting your breathing slowly become agitated. You placed your hands behind you to lean on the desk and leave your chest at his mercy, with his other hand he took one of your breasts while his mouth captured your nipple.

You felt your body slowly sink into the whirlwind of sensations that Mingi caused you, you opened your legs to seek a little more pleasure and Mingi noticed it, you felt his smile on your skin and he looked up to see your pleading face.

“Do you want more?” you nodded desperately and he moved the fabric that separated your pussy from his fingers.

You let out a moan when his fingers ran over your wet core and touched your clitoris, he played with it for a moment turning it and pressing gently on it making you start to moan. You never took your eyes off him and you were struggling not to close your legs when a shiver ran through your body announcing your orgasm.

Mingi knew it and sank two of his fingers inside you, you let out a stifled sigh and held onto his shoulders when he began to move them in and out. You pulled him in for a kiss and he gladly accepted without stopping giving you pleasure, your hips began to move on their own looking for the highest point, your legs began to tremble and when you thought you had achieved it Mingi stopped.

“Not yet princess” you sobbed internally, but when he pulled his fingers out of you a strange mix of shame and excitement filled you inside as you watched him take them to his mouth and taste the trace of you left on him.

You placed your hands on his chest and began to unbutton his shirt, Mingi admired the way your hands shook a little, but you were determined to undress him. When you opened the shirt you admired his bare chest and ran your hands over his skin feeling every inch of his torso, you slid your hand down his abdomen and stopped for a second when you noticed the bulge in his pants.

You noticed his anxious and desperate look, you began to unbuckle his belt, but Mingi felt that you were too slow but that it was somehow a kind of torture. He took a slow breath trying to concentrate on not ripping his clothes off himself and let you continue at your pace.

You gently pressed his bulge when you pulled down his pants and heard him curse, you saw how his chest rose and fell faster and faster, but you continued just touching him above.

“Shit… stop playing with me” he begged through gritted teeth.

“It’s your punishment.” Mingi closed his eyes and sighed as he felt your hand touch him beneath his boxers. He felt you wrap around his girth and begin to massage him.

It was getting harder and harder for him to breathe and it was complete torture the way your thumb played with his sensitive tip. He grabbed your legs and brought you a little closer to the edge, he needed you right now, he wanted to have you and fill you, he couldn’t take it anymore and neither could you. You stopped as his cock began to twitch and smiled as you heard a frustrated sigh from him.

“I guess I deserve it” he said with a broken voice and you nodded when his forehead pressed against yours “but I can’t continue like this anymore” he confessed looking into your eyes “let me have you one more time”

“I’ve always been yours Mingi” your words moved his chest and he lowered your panties along with his boxers leaving the path clear between your bodies.

Your breathing mixed and you both moaned when he placed the tip of his cock over your entrance, you held onto his shoulders and dug your nails into his skin when he slowly sank into you.

The room was filled with the sound of your bodies colliding and your moans saying Mingi's name. You were hugging his neck and Mingi's hands were holding your ass while his thrusts took you into a spiral of sensations. His mouth devoured your neck and his teeth left marks on your shoulders.

You didn't want this moment to stop, but when Mingi separated from you for a moment you felt empty. He lowered you from the desk only to turn you around making you show him your ass while he pressed your breasts against the wood. You turned your head to look at him, but you moaned when you felt him sink easily into your pussy.

Mingi grabbed your waist tightly and looked at your figure, he approached your body and your skin crawled when his mouth began to leave a trail of kisses all over your back. One of his hands slid down a little and squeezed your ass hard before giving you a spank that made you moan, his hand went inside your legs and touched your clit making you squirm under his body that pressed against yours.

“Mingi… I’m close” you warned, but he continued to touch you as his cock sank deeper and deeper inside making your body start to shake.

“Cum for me princess” his words in your ear gave you shivers and his thrusts mixed with his fingers on your clit seemed to be enough to make you let yourself go in the fog that was starting to take you to your orgasm.

You scratched the wood beneath you looking for something to hold on to as you let the knot in your belly come loose. Mingi gave a few more thrusts and sank in hard letting his load warm your insides. He kissed your back and then pulled away from you, watching his essence drip down your thighs.

He couldn't resist the urge to pick it up and sink his fingers into your sensitive pussy, you moved at his touch and pressed against his fingers that didn't let you spill anything.

"Stay like that, just a moment" he said admiring your body and seeing how a trace of him was left on your body.

After he helped you get dressed the atmosphere became tense again, it was obvious that you didn't want to leave that room and separate again, but Mingi couldn't have you with him, his job was dangerous and he didn't want to put you in danger, while he thought about what to do you finally decided to speak.

"I have to go, they're waiting for me" your voice came out broken and revealed that you didn't want to leave

"Will we see each other again?"

“I don’t know” Mingi took your hand so you wouldn’t leave and hugged you tightly, he didn’t want to let you go, not again.

When you looked at each other again thinking it would be a farewell a loud bang was heard outside. You looked at each other once and without thinking Mingi took your hand before opening the door and discovering what was happening.

There was a lot of smoke and you couldn’t see anything beyond you, but the screams of the people were not long in being heard. People began to run towards the exit, they didn’t know what had happened, but moving a little further they noticed a destroyed wall in a row, people were pushing each other to get out and everything was chaos.

It wasn’t long before you heard the sound of sirens and something inside you brought you back to the past. You were starting to get restless and wanted to get out of here, but Mingi squeezed your hand reminding you that you weren’t alone.

"I won't let you go again" he said before taking out his gun and walking through the crowd without letting go of you. They managed to get out and for the first time you felt relief when you looked at him, he hugged you tightly and knew it was what he had to do "I'm not leaving you, come with me, I'll protect you"

You'd be lying if you said you weren't scared, but you knew Mingi was serious, he wouldn't let anything bad happen to you again so you just nodded as you shed tears and kept a new hope in your heart.

𝐴𝐿𝐿 𝑊𝑂𝑅𝐾𝑆 𝐶𝑅𝐸𝐴𝑇𝐸𝐷 𝐵𝑌 ©𝐾𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑦𝟼𝑐𝘩𝑜𝑖 𝑀𝑈𝑆𝑇 𝑁𝑂𝑇 𝐵𝐸 𝑃𝐿𝐴𝐺𝐼𝐴𝑅𝐼𝑍𝐸𝐷 𝑂𝑅 𝐶𝑂𝑃𝐼𝐸𝐷

tag: @londonbridges01 || @likeathunderoverflow

[shurisneakers]

unsolved (vii)

Summary: Bucky doesn't even believe in the paranormal. So who the hell thought it was a good idea to stick him in a series about everything haunted for the internet's amusement? With his loose-canon of a teammate who has no concept of subtlety or shits left to give, to make things even worse. (Buzzfeed unsolved AU)

Warnings: swearing, frustrated bucky, obnoxious reader, mentions of hauntings and the paranormal.

A/N: hello. i am late again. i almost gave up but we are here. for better or for worse. i will most likely go back ad edit the second half again ok love u guys mwahmwah

Previous part || Series masterlist

Only after hours, nay, a full day of hunching over his desk, eyes red-rimmed and burning, four crushed cans of energy drinks next to him lending to him the nervous energy of a chihuahua, Bucky realises that there’s no beating it.

He absentmindedly takes another sip of the RedBull, flinching when the taste registers. Either he’d reached his threshold or the medicine flavour had begun morphing into something else entirely. The caffeine didn’t even work on him, so really, he was just placebo-ing himself into having energy. 

Every site he’s visited has had a vastly different interpretation; ones that don't match what he thinks has been happening, or the context past his past provides. Others are simply blatantly wrong based on the additional research he, in his infinite wisdom and totally accurate self-assessment tendencies, has been gathering in the last 3 days. 

The Star. Six of Cups. The Hanged Man.

Bucky knows he could ask someone in real life about this, someone who possibly had more experience than a simple website whose code broke every time he tried to scroll to the bottom. However, that would mean that he had to tell them his dead sister was probably haunting him out of her spite and hatred for the very fibres of his being.

Also, Bucky may be haunted by his dead relatives, but he’s not haunted enough to actually leave his room over it. 

Video consultations were also an option, but he’s convinced that if word got out that Bucky Barnes was half-convinced ghosts were following him around, it would make headlines for a mighty long week. 

Therefore, he resorts to shady, online websites that demand he pay up before giving him the results of the readings they’ve done for him. 

The “lady” that he paid to talk to using Steve’s credit card on mistytarot.com types for a very long time before a message comes through.

The thought bubble disappears for another half an hour, and Bucky thinks hat either she is a complete scam, or it’s run by someone who is about as technologically proficient as Steve was. 

But a message does in fact come through, and it’s enough to have him be covninced that the 20 bucks he blew on Steve’s card was worth it. 

Lady Lilia 

Considering that you think you’re being haunted, The Star could represent the absence of hope. Do you feel like you’re being trapped in darkness? As if you are being abandoned by the universe and with no room for healing?

B. Barneswell i forgot about it until now

Lady Lilia If your sister passed away a long time ago, the reason The Six of Cups may have presented itself is because you may be feeling like you're ensnared in the past, constantly reliving moments that hurt or confuse you, rather than finding peace. 

A frown grows on his face. 

Lady Lilia If you’re haunted by a person who used to be in your life and it is reminding you of past mistakes, The Hanged Man could be because feel like you're stuck in a cycle of stagnation, unable to move forward, as if these spirits are keeping you suspended in a state of emotional paralysis. 

However, if the cards were upright–

Bucky slams the laptop shut, inhaling and exhaling sharply through his nose.

From the corner of his eye, his phone lights up with the fifth missed call in the last ten minutes, but considering that he keeps that thing on silent, he never even noticed.

Shoving aside whatever he may be thinking for the moment, he checks the caller ID, only for feelings of confusion and despair to be immediately replaced with annoyance, or disgust even. 

He calls back anyway, preparing for the worst. 

“Did you drink all my RedBull?” Clint booms the second he picks up.

“No,” Bucky lies smoothly.

“Fucker, I know it was you. Pay me back. With interest.”

“No.”

Clint switches to whining. “You know I need that shit to stay awake at night. Some of us don’t have superhero cocaine in our system.”

“I don’t care, go to sleep at a normal hour.”

“Say, did you drink every last one?” Clint instantly switches to a curious tone for a second. “Because one of them’s not like the others.”

Bucky looks at the cans that littered his bedroom floor. “Why?”

“I can’t tell you what it is over the phone.”  

“Why?” 

“Let’s just say it’s not exactly allowed in the country, but–”

Bucky cuts the call and tosses it onto the bed. 

He runs a hand through his hair, softly exhaling while contemplating whether or not to continue the chat. Steve wouldn’t miss another 20 dollars, he had the wealth of a small prince with all that army back pay bullshit. In fact, Steve should ideally be funding more of Bucky’s endeavours. 

There comes a knock at his door.

Bucky immediately leaps off the bed, sprinting to the door, because he fuckin knows that knock, goddamn it–

He throws open the door before you get the chance to full body slam against it.

“Oh.” You blink, relaxing away from your stance. “Hey. How’d you know–”

“You do this every week,” he breaks in. “You do this multiple times a day.” 

“Don’t you dare say I’m predictable,” you warn, raising a finger. “I’ll start crying right here, then you’ll have to deal with that. You wanna see snot running down my–”

Bucky slams the door shut again, waiting to turn around. 

“Can you take me to the doctor?” Your voice is muffled through the solid wood.

It’s enough to make him hesitate, hand on the doorknob.

“What’s wrong with you?” he inquires.. 

“Nothing, I’m perfect,” you reply instinctively, before course correcting, “Wait, no, I’m sick.”  

He lets his head drop against the door. “Go to the fucking infirmary.”

“The infirmary told me to go to the hospital. Can you just take me?” you bug. “They won’t discharge me unless I have someone with me to drive me back.”

“You have a head injury?” Bucky asks, before following it with, “Actually, that tracks.”

“Rude.” 

“Ask Nat.”

“Nat’s in Lagos.”

“Ask Sam.” 

“Yoga.”

“Clint.”

“Really.”

“Glad to know I’m your first choice,” he mumbles, opening up the door. 

You send him a blistering smile. “You’re my favourite choice.” 

______

“You gotta take this turn,” you instruct, too close to the actual crossing. 

“The nearest hospital’s five minutes away, what the hell are you talking about?“ he points out, eyes on the road. 

“We’re going to the one on King’s Road,” you read off of Google maps. “Take that lef-– well, you missed that. Now you gotta make a u-turn.”

“What’s the problem with Chastain Park?” he demands. “King’s Road is half an hour away.”

“This one’s got all my files,” you insist. “Otherwise I gotta start over and it's so much effort.”

“Aren’t you in a database?”

“Yeah, but not a medical one.”

Bucky lets out something akin to a growl and a groan. “What's the time?”

“Like eight thirty?”

“What’s the time,” he emphasises, because he most definitely had another email due from another lady on the internet who he had sent his cards to a few hours ago. 

“Fine, it’s eight twenty two,” you shoot back.  “Did that make a big difference?”

“Yeah, it did actually,” he fires indignantly, “My life is radically different. You have no way of knowing.”

“Liar. You’re a lying liar, who lies.” You scoff. “And details are for losers.”

“Losers can drive all the way back to drop you off at the infirmary and let them deal with you.”

You relent, flashing him a grin. “This won’t take long.”

“You say this every fuckin’ time,” he groans, before complying and taking a u-turn anyway.

“You’re fucking joking,” he states. 

“No, it’s actually called lying,” you correct casually.  

“Is this an abandoned hospital? What the fuck?” Bucky asks, staring up at the huge decaying building.  

The outside looks run-down, with cracked, weathered brick walls and broken windows. The entrance is blocked off with rusted gates, some sections of which have fallen over. As the car rolls up, the air is thick with a musty, damp smell, mixed with a faint odor of decay.

“Yes,” you say simply, opening the trunk of the car and pulling out all the supplies you had from last time. “Video time. Let’s go.”

“You didn’t have to lie,” Bucky mumbles. “I’d have showed up.”

You give him a deadpan look. “You famously never do.”

That’s fair, but also, that was the old Bucky. The new Bucky circa this week is a bit more… invested. He feels the need to gather some more information, and unfortunately, the only opportunity to do that is here.

So for the time being, he decides he will hang on. For purely selfish reasons. 

“Just tell me next time,” he grunts. 

You observe him for a second like you're about to call him out on something, but instead you simply say, “Okay.”

Bucky grabs his usual stuff– the spirit box, a lapel mic, while you levitate the camera. 

“Hello?”

You both look beyond the camera at the same time to someone stalking up to you.

“Who’s there?” demands a middle aged woman with straw blonde hair, wrinkles decorating sunburnt skin, and a navy blue jacket. 

“Uh–”

“Who are you?” she asks, cautiously stopping a few feet away.  

“We’re here on a video shoot,” you inform. “Just wanted to check the place out.”

“Oh, you’re one of them camera folk,” she says, ponting her flashlight at you. “Those ghost hutner types.”

“That’s us,” you agree, flinching from the bright light. “We're from The Graveyard Shift.”

“Who are you?” Bucky cuts in, because why should only the both of you explain. 

“I’ve been working security here for the last thirty years.” She shines her flashlight at the musty place. “Name’s Brenda.”

“Why does an abandoned hospital need a security guard?” Bucky inquires. 

“Management just underwent a shift. White collars are setting up a mall here, so they bought up the whole place, fired everyone and now they’re gonna build an all year ski world or something in there.” There’s a tick in her jaw as she draws it out. “Whole damn place is cursed. They better hope it only burns down.”

“Okay,” you drag out, giving Bucky a sideways glance. “Anyway, we’re gonna go check out the place. See if we can find some ghosts.”

“Oh, you’ll see ‘em, alright. Everyone who was collateral damage in the buyout is still in there.” Her voice is distant, arm coming to rest on her hip.  “You’ll have to hit up specific rooms. Y’all got a floorplan?”

“No, figured we’d just wing it.” You pause. “Hospital wing it.”

“Shut up,” Bucky replies on instinct. 

“You’re gonna be spending a lot of time in there if y’all dont know where youre’ heading. It’s a maze,” she continues, ignoring your brilliant joke. “I can show you the rooms, but I can’t guarantee that it has ghosts in there.”  

“Uhhh—” you begin. 

“It’ll cut down your time in half.”

“Deal,” Bucky says immediately, sticking out his hand for a shake.

Brenda sticks out her hand too, only to wince immediately, following it up with a curse.

“What’s wrong?” you interject.

“Damn back’s killing me,” she mutters. “You’d think death would stop the pain, but it’s not let up yet. Come on then.”

Both of your eyebrows knit together at her statement, but she leaves no room for a reply as she marches inward, one hand on the small of her spine. 

Bucky elects to use his phone flashlight, as if he keeps that shit charged above 40% at any given point of time. If anything is not going to make it out of the night alive, it was that thing. 

The air inside is stale and heavy, filled with the scent of mildew and old, rusted metal. All three of your footsteps echo in the silence, reverberating through empty halls with each cautious step. The moonlight  in conjunction with the flashlight casts long, unsettling shadows. The faint taste of dust lingers in the back of Bucky’s throat that he cannot get rid of. 

“Y’all gonna sleep in here tonight?” Brenda pipes up, swinging her flashlight around.

You look at Bucky with a grin that’s alarming.

His face immediately pulls into one of “What the fuck”

“No, we aren’t,” you announce instead. “But do people do that often?”

“You’d be surprised,” she comments. “You’re not the first folks we’ve had here with those fancy shmancy gadgets.”

“That explains how you have a tour all planned.” 

“We get a bunch of you every couple of months.”

“Who is ‘we’?” Bucky cuts in.

She pays him no need. “Y’all run a podcast?”

Bucky looks personally affronted. “No, we do not.”

“We run a YouTube channel,” you offer instead. “It’s for ghosts and stuff.”

“I see,” she considers, tone thoughtful. “So, this will go up online?” 

“Unfortunately,” Bucky murmurs.

“Have you caught ghosts before?”

“Not even one–”

“Several,” you chirp. “And we have a witch cat. Her name’s Alpine.”

Bucky narrows his eyes at you. “Since when is her name Alpine?”

“I gave her a bunch of options and she told me she liked that best.”

“The cat can’t talk.”

“To you. She and I chat shit everyday,” you dish back. “She hates that stupid fern in your room, she says it smells.”

That fucking fern was not even his idea. But Sam got it for him when he moved in, so there was a zero percent chance it would be leaving any time soon. 

“Tell her to fuck off.”

“Y’all got a large following?” Brenda interrupts.

“Building towards it.” You look at her before looking at Bucky. “Once we hit a sizable amount and Bucky becomes an official internet boyfriend, we’ll stop the series.”

He sends you a withering look. “We’ll be doing this till I die.”

“Nonsense, everyone loves you,” you dismiss. “You’re a pretty boy and extremely irritable. They think you’re hilarious.”

 His nose twitches, and he feels the need to clear his throat. 

“Your camera records ghosts?” Brenda asks again. 

“We’ve got a bunch of devices. We’ll catch it,” you sound confident. 

“Great, because here’s the first stop,” she says, pressing her shoulder onto a double door.

The door groans as she pushes, its hinges protesting with a long, rusty screech, the cold metal heavy under her hand. A stale gust of air hits your face, carrying the faint smell of rot as the door finally gives way.

She steps back with a small huff, stretching her back with a small, “Shit.”

The pale blue walls had turned greenish, wallpaper peeling away. Counters were covered with a thin layer of dust. Old tools laid unused on the surgical table, once stainless steel but now rusted. 

“A lotta deaths happened in this operating theatre,” she imparts after a bout of stretching. “They thought this place was cursed for a while.” 

The sterile, tiled walls are cracked and chipped, and the old surgical lights hang dim, their bulbs long burned out. The air still lingers with antiseptic that’s long since turned sour.

Bucky feels a little too acquainted with this setting. 

He doesn’t even realise his silence is palpable until you nudge his side, drawing his attention sharply back to you. 

“You doin’ okay?” you whisper.  

“Fine,” he says, tearing his eyes away from the tools and towards you.

It only twists his stomach a little. It makes him think of how different his reactions used to be even a few years go. 

“Old, dingy hospitals may not have been the best idea,” you admit to him, using the flashlight to shine a light in the corner. 

It occurs to him a second later once he forces himself to compartmentalise. 

“You okay?” he asks, voice low. 

“Yeah,” you reply, slowly looking around. “Just looks like my nursery.”

A small crease forms between his eyebrows. 

“Not gonna lie, mine was way prettier. Lot more mould on the walls,” you continue, tone light. “You know, timeless decor.”

His nose lets out a small exhale in the form of a laugh. “Leviathan not into blood stain wallpaper?”

“Couldn’t afford it. Fuckin’ place kept referring to itself as Hydra’s sister org but had none of the budget,” you say, swiping a finger across the dust. “You’d think that at least some of the people that left would give alumni donations, but no.”

Bucky snickers at jokes literally no one else would laugh at. It feels good for once, not to feel the need to censor himself to make others less uncomfortable. 

You take a step forward, camera following behind you. 

You shine the flashlight around the room, noting all the surgical trays piled together. 

But something flashes on the ceiling. 

You swing your flashlight toward it immediately, only for the table beside you a few inches away to start rolling, making a loud whining noise as it did, snapping your attention towards it.  

By the time you finally bring the light back up towards the ceiling, it’s gone. 

“What the–” you mumble. 

“What?” Bucky asks, looking up from where he was scrolling through his phone. 

“Could’a sworn I saw–” you frown at the empty space now, only an old defunct looking camera staring back at you. 

“Red eyes?” Brenda inquires, looking at you. “Yeah, that happens.”

Bucky glances up at you, and then the wall. “Probably just the lens glare.”

You scrunch up your face at her. “How’d you know it was red eyes?” 

“That’d be the spirit of ol’ Doctor Damon, chief of neuro,” she says. “You’ll find him here or his cabin, but that’s a few floors away. He never liked climbing the stairs.” 

“Right,” Bucky acknowledges monotonously. 

“When he worked here, he spent so long in surgery that his eyes were always bloodshot. One day he just dropped dead from exhaustion,” Brenda explains. “So his spirit walks around here, red eyes, wheeling surgery tables waiting for the next patient.”

“What’s he doing on the ceiling?” Bucky questions, going back to his phone. “He did his surgeries suspended midair?” 

“Are you trying to gatekeep the ceiling?” you scoff. “Have you never seen Spiderman hanging upside down for fun?” 

Bucky finally lifts his sight from the phone. “The doctor is not an insect superhero, he would have no reason to be hanging upside down–”

“How would you know if he’s a superhero or not? What if he was bitten by a bat?” you challenge. “Like a bat…guy. Batman.”

He jeers. “Then he’s got a stupid codename.”

“Oh, and Captain America is poetic genius.”

“At least Sam has a codename, where’s yours?” 

You narrow your eyes at him. “Maybe you should have paid attention when your mother was screaming it las-”

“Shall we move on?” Brenda asks calmly. 

“Yes,” the both of you reply simultaneously. 

She doesn’t even bother looking at you, almost as if she’d seen it all in her lifetime. 

“Besides, sometimes you can see him sitting on one of the operating tables. He doesn’t just hang out on the ceiling like… bat…man,” she explains, leading the way back out. 

“See?” 

“See what?” you ask. 

“Nothing,” he replies. “There’s nothing to see. That’s the fuckin’ point.”

You shove him lightly. 

Bucky bites back a grin.

_____

The morgue is silent. 

The ceiling is low and chipped, streaked with stains of old water damage, the paint fallen away in patches. 

Against one wall, old, disused morgue drawers stand open and half-broken, the once-sleek stainless steel now speckled with rust. Some of the drawers are bent out of shape, while others are stuck, sealed tight from years of neglect. Inside some of the open drawers, tattered, yellowed tags hang loosely from the handles, swaying gently as the chill air moves through the room.

“This room’s self explanatory,” she says. “Sometimes, you can hear spirits still trying to claw their way out of the drawers but they never open.”

“Skill issue,” Bucky mumbles under his breath.

“Shut up, oh my God,” you whisper-yell, still mouth pulling into a thin line to stop from laughing. 

“What?” Brenda asks, suddenly from near the drawers. 

You had no idea when she even went there. 

“Nothing,” you reply, before thoughtfully asking, “Bucky, truth or dare?”

“No.”

“Dare it is.” You shine a flashlight at one of the closed drawers. “I’ll give you twenty bucks if you get in one of them for a few seconds. Let’s see if the ghosts come at you.”

“You're deranged,” he replies, incredulous. 

“It’s for science,” you insist. “How else will you know for sure?”

“I’m sure it’ll be comfortable,” Brenda quips. “Like a coffin.”

The both of you look at her together in silence.

She shrugs. “It’s what I’ve heard from them.” 

You look at her for a second more, before turning to Bucky. “Anyway, if you want I’ll come lie in there with you.”

“How does that make it better?” he exclaims. “I am not lying in the morgue.”

“Even if I’m in there with you?”

“That’s even worse–”

There’s a loud knock from one of the drawers on Brenda’s side. She looks down at it, almost like she was expecting it. Soon, there are further loud thuds that come from inside the remaining drawers. 

“Hey, Magda,” she calls, before more knocks come from inside. “You’ve got visitors. Say hello.”

You grab the spirit box from behind Bucky’s ear and hold it in the direction of the wall. Nothing registers.

“Animals,” he answers the question hanging in the air calmly. 

“The spirits?” Brenda replies. “They’re not gonna like that.”

Sure enough, a few of the drawers start rattling on their own accord.

You look at Bucky with an eyebrow raised.

“What?” he carps. “I’m not gonna go lie down in there, if that’s what you want.”

“Come on, take one for the team,” you whine. 

“You take one for the team.” 

“I’m literally the one pulling all the weight around here. You do it.”

Bucky doesn’t agree with you on the last part, but the first one is undisputably right. He makes a mental note to start contributing a fuckton more if he plans on continuing on in the series. 

The rattling around comes to a halt eventually. 

“If none of you want to get in there, should we move to the next one?” Brenda points to the door. 

“Yes, please,” you confirm, sending Bucky a glare.

She leads the way up the stairs while you both follow, bickering and shoving lightly.

Once upstairs, Bucky glances down the hall, only to  see a large double door that is noticeably different from the rest you’ve seen so far. There’s a fading rainbow drawn on the front, little footsteps painted onto the floor leading towards it.

Bucky hesitates, steps faltering. “Is that the children’s ward?”

“Yes,” Brenda looks over her shoulder briefly. 

For a second, he wonders. Whether it was worth a shot. He hadn’t heard from her since the incident at the house, and the tarot cards have been suggesting nothing but reasons to believe she may actually be there.  

“Are we going to check that out?” he asks. 

“No, there’s nothing there,” she shrugs it off. “No spirits. I’ve asked the others too.” 

Bucky shifts uncomfortably. “Are you sure?”

You shoot him an odd look that he refuses to meet. 

“Yep. Next stop’s the other way.”

Bucky spares the doors another long look, before traversing down the hallway with you. 

“Why do you wanna go to the children’s ward?” you query, voice low. 

“Just thought it was worth checking out,” he replies, voice steady.  

“We can always make a run for it and go check.”

“No,” he says, giving you a curt shake of his head, “it’s alright.”

“We’re right down this way,” Brenda calls, turning a corner and disappearing out of sight.

“Coming!” you call back before spinning to Bucky. “Hey.”

“What?” he responds, moving at his own brisk pace. 

You tug him back with you with force. 

“What are you doing–’ he hisses.

You link your arm with Bucky’s, pulling him along with you as you walk, shutting him up. He eyes your elbow looped with his and the proximity with which you walked beside him and all of a sudden, the back of his neck feels quite warm, extending down to his chest.

“I think Brenda’s a ghost,” you tell him casually.

Bucky stops in his path, drawn very much back to reality. 

“Keep walking,” you grit through a smile. “I’m pretty sure she’s dead. Why else is she totally chill with the ghosts here-”

“Because there aren’t any. It’s animals.”

“Why is she saying coffins are comfortable? Why is she talking to the ghosts and knowing exactly where they are and aren’t?”

“I can make shit up too, look,” Bucky comments enthusiastically. “Oh, down the hall is the isolation room. You’ll hear heavy breathing because that’s where the tuberculosis patients were–”

“That’s one of the isolation rooms,” Brenda’s voice echoes down the hall. “It’s next up.”

You yank your arm away from Bucky when he blinks, a bit surprised himself. 

“Are you dead?” you whisper-yell.

“Only ‘cause the government declared it,” he sighs. “Do you know what a fuckin’ pain it is to get undead.” 

“Come on.” Brenda beckons to the both of you with her flashlight. 

With a slight shove, the door to the room swings open easily, but the smell of old paper and mildew floods your senses. 

The bed is now a rusted, sagging frame, the thin mattress long since torn and discolored with age. The once-clean sheets have yellowed and frayed, with remnants of old stains. Thin, brittle blankets lie in a heap on the floor.

The walls are bare, save for a few faded medical charts and broken instruments that were left behind in haste. The small window that once offered a faint glimpse of the outside is now cracked and filthy. The weak, filtered light that struggles through the dust-covered glass barely illuminates the room. 

“Patients who were highly contagious were quarantined here. Some of them died without family by their side, so you can still hear their cries. Some of them have problems breathing, so sometimes you’ll hear it through the vents,” Brenda explains. 

“I bet,” Bucky drags out, sending you a “I fuckin’ told you so” look.. 

Down the hall, something makes a loud sound, almost like something had crashed into the floor. 

All three of you turn towards it. 

Brenda’s face flickers for a moment before turning back to its regular calm. 

“I think someone’s angry,” she decides. “I’m gonna go check it out.”

“Do you want us to come with you?” you offer.

“I’ll be okay, I’ve known these people all my life. We’re friends,” she comforts. “Oh, sometimes if you look out the door, you’ll see shadows of people in the waiting room down the hall. They’re just old families lingering around, hoping for better results but they always leave upset.”

“Is there no way to get them out of here?” you ask.

She shrugs. “Unless you find a way to fix their disappointment, I doubt they'll leave. They’ll stick around until something improves or changes.” 

Bucky’s eyebrows furrow at the implication. If that were truly the case, and not just something he concocted in the deep, self hating crevices of his mind, then he had to figure out which part of the fucked up mess that he was had pissed his sister off enough to come back to let him know she was disappointed. 

You nod at her and she nods, spinning on her heel to exit the room, but not before she stops for a second, hand on the doorframe as she catches her breath, and one hand on her spine.

“Are you okay?” you sound genuinely concerned.

She flashes you a thumbs up, leaving without so much as another word. 

“She’s gonna come back with some bullshit about the hospital canteen staff dropping their pans or some shit,” Bucky remarks.

“Yeah no, that was me. I just wanted her out of the room so we could discuss something,” you wave it off quickly. 

Bucky stares at you.

“What? I dropped a cart. It’s not a big deal. Anyway, listen–”

“She’s not a ghost,” he states resolutely.  

“But what if she is,” you insist, a wicked grin on your face. “Imagine saying we got a ghost tour. By a ghost.”

“I can imagine saying that, yes. I have a very wide and limitless imagination.” 

“Ugh, what if we’re meant to help her find her way back?” You peer over his shoulder to see if she’s walking back. 

In the distance another crash sounds through the empty hallways. Bucky stares at you.

“I’m just making sure, it’s not like I’m hurting anyone” you insist, dismissing it. 

“You could've just closed the door,” he says, extending one hand behind him to slide it closed.

“Don’t do that,” you blurt out.

He stops, eyebrow raised.  

“I don't like when doors are closed,” you shrug it off. “Anyway, back to the point. We should totally figure out how to help her exit this realm.”

He slides the door back open slowly, narrowing his eyes at you. 

“EVen if she were a ghost, which she’s not– she seems happy here. Maybe,” Bucky comments, taking a seat on the worn out bed. “I can’t really tell.”

“She can’t be. Imagine being forced to roam the same hallways over and over again till the end of time.” you shudder. “Sounds miserable.”

Bucky shrugs, poking at the pillow, watching a cloud of dust fly up from it. “Routine sounds fine to me.”

“I’d hate it,” you counter immediately. “I hate routines. Fucking inescapable once you get stuck in one.”

Bucky watches you curiously as you shift up and down the small room. “How do you get anything done?” 

“I can get things done without a routine.” The camera follows your command, checking outside the window or the door occasionally facing Bucky. “Why?”

“Just asking,” he replies, checking the time on his phone. It’d been a while since Brenda had gone to investigate.

“And having a routine totally makes you an easy target. Haven’t you watched any assassination movies?”

“No. I didn’t like bringing work home.”

You look at him in surprise before your face splits into a smile. 

Something makes a noise from the wall adjacent to the door. 

You both look at each other, and he gets off the bed to go see what the deal is. The door is adjacent to the wall, giving him a clear look into the hallway that was still empty. 

A faint wail sounds through the vent above his head. You take quick steps towards where he was, and the camera follows suit, pointing at the grill on the wall.

You stand underneath it, spirit box raised as close as you could get it, but the damn thing picks up nothing. 

Another noise comes through, almost like someone was wheezing, before the vent rattles, stopping altogether.

You stare at it, before taking a gigantic inhale and exhaling obnoxiously, forcing all the air out of your lungs with a wheeze. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” Bucky stares at you like you're insane. 

“Well, you can’t just back down,” you argue. “I’m gonna breathe louder than that thing.”

“Jesus Christ,” he mumbles.

You give another gigantic inhale and exhale, rattling all the bones in your body, and the faint noise from the vent stops too. 

“We win,” you beam 

 “You’ve completely lost it.”

“Uh, no, I didn’t. I totally won.”

“That’s not what I–” Bucky starts but stops himself when you grin at him devilishly. 

He sighs, asking instead, “Should we go looking for her?” 

“I guess so,” you shrug. “We’re not exactly cut to be her saviours right now. I’m pretty sure she knows the layout of the hospital better than we do if she’s been haunting it for fifteen years.”

“Where did you get that number?” he demands. 

“Does it matter?” you urge. “Didn’t realise you’re a valid ghost only if you have a certain number of years in haunting.”

Bucky ignores you, taking off down the hall. 

“If you had to haunt a hospital or a ship, what would you choose?” you quip, matching his pace. 

“Hospital,” he answers without thinking much.

“Why?”

“I spent a lot of time in them,” he tells you, voice clear. “Steve’s mom was a nurse. We’d meet her there a lot when he got his ribs broken or his nose busted.”

The memory, though faint, is enough to pull a smile from him. 

“He also used to be sick a lot, so I used to come pick up his medicine for him,” he adds. “They used to know us by name because we’d be there nearly every second day.”

You exhale a small laugh. “Every hospital in the state of New York has a chart for Steve even now.”

“Fuckin’ guy just dosn’t learn.” Bucky shakes his head with affection-laced irritation. 

The hallways stretch out endlessly, dim and wide. A few doors line the walls, some ajar, revealing only darkness inside. The silence is unnerving, broken only by the soft sound of you and your footsteps.

Bucky looks over at you. “What about you?”

“What about me?” you hum, small smile still on your face. 

“What would you haunt?

“Ship, I guess,” you reply. “I’ve always wanted to be a pirate.”

“Should be your next job.”

“You gonna come with? We’ll turn it into a vlog.

“Fuck no.”

“Well, thanks for taking the time to really consider it,” you sing, not really offended. “Way to let me down gently, Barnes.”  

“What? It’s got nothin’ to do with you.” Bucky clarifies still, pausing before letting out, “I get seasick. Can’t be on water for more than five minutes before I’m throwing up all over the place. You want that in your vlog?”

It’s enough to elicit a laugh from you, that in turn makes the corner of his lip curl.

“We could always–

Right in front of him, something moves darts across the wall at the end of the hall.

It cuts you off mid-sentence too, the both of you glancing at each other before turning towards it again.

Against the glare of your flashlight, another shadow darts across the wall. 

“That’s what she was talking about,” you whisper, slightly in disbelief that she wasn't wrong. “Shadow people. Do you think they got to her?”

Bucky rolls his eyes, continuing to walk on ahead. 

“Um, hello?” you scramble to catch up with him. “Where is your self preservation?”

“Against what?” he asks stoically. 

“That,” you say pointedly at the wall, when another figure darts across the wall and disappears out of sight. 

Bucky rolls his eyes. “It’s a shadow, the fuck’s it gonna do?”

“Haven’t you heard of shadow demons? Succumbing to darkness?” you chastise. 

Bucky stops walking, standing solidly in the middle of the hallway.

“Okay,” he says, refusing to budge. 

The hall goes silent, no movement other than the steady rise and falls of your chest. 

You stare at him. “Now what.”

“I'm waiting for them to do something,” he says. “I’m waiting to succumb to the darkness.” 

“You’re so annoying,” you bite, dragging him along with you. “And I’m tired, we’ve been walking for like, eight hundred hours. Let’s go.”

“We’ve been here for two hours,” he reminds you, taking a turn into the corner that the shadows disappeared into. “You did this to yourself.”

“Fine, next time I’ll bring an electric scooter with me.” You huff. “And I won’t even let you use it.”

“Where’d Brenda fuckin’ go?” Bucky mumbles, eyes squinting into the darkness to see if there are any clues.

“Where are you guys going?” Someone pipes up from behind you, sending the hairs on his neck up. 

The both of you spin around instantly, arms clenched in a fighting stance. 

“Sorry, it's a habit to take the scenic route back.” She chuckles, unfazed. “Not a lot to do when you’ve been here so long.”

The both of you lower your hands slowly, letting out an exhale.

“Y’all ready to head out?” she inquires, coolly. “I think it’s time we all get some rest.” 

The walk back is relatively quicker, ater she leads you down a path she calls a shortcut. 

The only thing that slowls you down are the occasional stops you had to make for her back ache.

Right by the entrance of the hospital, she holds onto the door frame again in the midst of explaining who was haunting the basements. 

After a particularly hard exhale and a clamour to stand back up, Bucky awkwardly clears his throat to ask, “Have you tried this stretch?”

“What?” Brenda asks, eyes curious. 

“Learnt it in physio. Doesn’t cure it, but it helps,” he explains, craning his neck to the sides, before taking a step ahead towards her.  

You watch him in thinly veiled delight as he shows her exactly what joint to bend and in which angle, and the degree to which she had to pivot.

He even uncomfortably guides her shoulders in the strangest yoga session you’d ever witnessed. 

“Should help,” Bucky mumbles, taking a step away. 

She raises her shoulders and drops it, lips pursuing and bows raising in a look that seems impressed. The small hunch she carried wit her seems to have disappeared too. 

“Let’s go,” Bucky doesn’t wait for a thanks or anything, taking a step away from her and towards the exit. 

“Now that you’ve fixed her back ache, how do we fix her haunting the place?” you ask lowly. 

“She’s not a fuckin’ ghost, she’s fine,” he whispers back. 

“Nothing about what she’s said tonight is normal,” you argue.

The night is clear and cool when you step out, the musty scent of the building dissipating almost immediately.

“Just say bye, we’re fuckin’ leaving,” Bucky shoots. 

You sigh loudly, giving him a glare at his lack of helpfulness before plastering a smile on your face and turning around. 

“Well, thanks for everything, Brenda,” you say, turning around to stick your hand out. “We sure couldn’t have–”

But she’s gone.

“Holy shit,” you say. 

Bucky looks over his shoulder at the disturbance, before turning around fully. “Oh, fuck off.”

“I told you she was a ghost,” you gush. “You fixed her back ache and now she has crossed over to the other side.”

“Shut up,” he replies, looking all over the place for a sign of where she could have disappeared to. 

“You did it, Bucky, you helped a lonely spirit,” you cheer. 

“I did not.”

“Hey!” Someone shouts from afar, commanding your attention to the gate again. 

“Not again,” Bucky mumbles, eyes snapping shut. 

“More ghosts,” you point out excitedly. “Come on, Charon, ferry those spirits–”

“You ferry your own spirits, I’m going to sleep,” he interjects, fully intending on ignoring the person at the gate and simply getting in the car.

“What are you guys doing here?” A man pants, jogging up to the both of you before Bucky had the time to leave. 

“We were just taking a look around,” you say, sticking your hand out, much to Bucky’s displeasure. “We heard the place was haunted.”

“Ah, I see,” he replies, taking in your appearance. “Podcasters?”

“No,” Bucky replies instantly. 

“We were just leaving,” you cut in. “We already got a tour by this ghost, and Bucky totally sent her to the afterlife.”

“I did not,” he seethes. 

“She disappeared after saying ominous shit this entire evening, what do you call that?” you challenge. 

“Going home,” Bucky responds, frustrated that he was clearly not afforded the same privilege.  

“Uh–” the guy holds up his finger. “--not to intrude, but you got a tour by a ghost?”

“Yes,” you bubble over with excitement. 

“And this ghost… did they have a backache?”

Bucky’s interest piques, the irritation giving way to intrigue . 

“You know her?” you puzzle.

“Uh yeah, that’s Brenda,” he admits sheepishly. “She’s very much alive.”

Bucky would have sworn he had never been this elated in his life, but unfortunately he realises very quickly that he simply does not care.  

 “She said she was a security guard here– wait, who are you?”  you tilt your head at him, seemingly not upset at all. It reduces Bucky’s non-existent triumph even more. 

“Travis Dowell, Labyrinth Inc. representative,” he says, shaking your hand. “We’re–”

“--the company that bought the place,” you complete, eyebrow raised.  

“Yeah.” He nods. “Brenda was a security guard here for nearly thirty years. We had to let go of her when we bought the hospital. We’ve been trying to turn it into an apartment for years, but there’s a lot of red tape that we have to get past because of healthcare reasons.”

“Yeah, she told us that it got bought,” you follow along. 

“Hospital was in the worst financial situation possible. There was just no way out.” He shrugs. “But she was super attached to this place. She didn’t take the redevelopment plans well, so she’s taken it upon herself to make sure it never happens, I guess? I don’t know, she spends a lot of time here convincing people that it’s haunted so that people don’t build anything here. She’s got an apartment close by so she knows when someone’s around. You’ll probably find her there, if you want.”

“You guys know about her?” Bucky questions, crease between his eyebrows.

“Uh, yeah, we do,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. “We sorta ignore her. Her schtick’s annoying, but it’s not the reason we haven’t demolished this place yet. Once all the zoning issues get cleared up, the building’s coming down. And besides, all the PR’s just gonna have people pay a shit ton to stay here. You know, novelty of it being haunted, and all that.” 

“How’d you know we were here?” you ask pointedly. 

“We’ve set up motion sensors in the place?” he replies. “You may have seen them. The red lights in the operation rooms. We know she takes people there.”

“Oh, that’s what that was,” you turn to Bucky who simply shakes his head lightly. 

“Yeah, she really goes the extra mile.” Travis shifts from one leg to the other. “There’s raccoons in the morgue that start running around if she hits the door. What else… oh yeah, she’s made a hole in one of the isolation rooms to make noises through the wall.”

Bucky wonders what will happen of all the footage now that none of it was essentially real. It made sense why she kept trying to find out where the video was going to be posted and how many people were going to view it now, as if a large number of views were going to save her beloved building. 

“So you’ll just let her do whatever until the demolition happens?” you question. 

“If it gets her to stop vandalising our office downtown.” He shrugs. “It doesn’t make a difference to us either way.”

“Right. So the real horror…” you say. “...is capitalism.”

Travis stares at you, before raising and dropping his shoulders. “Sure.”

“Alright.” You blow out an exhale. “Well, was anything about tonight real?”

“I mean, she really does have back pain,” he adds helpfully.

You turn to Bucky. “Net positive, then.”

Sure. Why the fuck not.

“Okay, Travis, thanks for this. You’ve been an immense help,” you say aloud, hoisting the camera onto your shoulders. “You can watch us on The Graveyard Shift, if we can figure out what to do with all these videos now.”

“Sorry about that,” he replies, shoving his fists into his pocket. “Good night.”

You watch as he turns and jogs away to his car that was parked a bit closer to the gate than yours was. 

Bucky plucks the camera off your shoulder and places it under his arm, even though he’s well aware you can carry fifteen of them at once.

“That was fun,” you tell him, seemingly over it already. 

“I’m fuckin’ starving,” he replies. 

Bucky should be glad then, that he didn’t bother with the children’s ward, if nothing about tonight was real–

“Travis, wait,” you shout all of a sudden. “What about the shadows?” 

“What shadows?” he calls back, confused. 

“The shadow people moving across the hall from the isolation room?”

He raises his eyebrows. “We haven't heard reports of that.”

“Fuck’s sake,” Bucky mumbles.

“Hell yeah,” you reply, knocking into his shoulder. “Haunted hospital, baby.”

When you walk into the dining room, you don’t really expect anyone to be there that late at night.

But fiery red hair pulled into a ponytail and an oversized t-shirt perched at the kitchen counter catches you off guard, dulling the arguing between you and Bucky as you argue the logistics of Brenda having a hand in the shadow demons. 

“Took you guys long enough,” Nat keeps her mug down on the counter before hopping off the chair. You note that it’s the same one you got her a few weeks ago from the flea market, the blue ceramic one.

“Oh, hi!” you smile wide, when she pulls you into a hug. “I thought you were in Lagos.”

“I was,” she replies, pulling away. “Got done early.”

“Of course you did. Overachiever.”

In the end of the common room, Bucky can hear the faint sounds of late night infomercials play through the TV. Clint’s legs hung off the couch as he lay snoring in front of it, blanket dropped on the floor in a heap. 

“Hot chocolate?” she offers. 

“I’m good, we went to the drive-through before coming back.” You beckon with your shoulder towards Bucky. 

She finally turns to him. “Hey.”

Bucky gives her a curt nod, glad that she’s back safe. 

“Why were you out so late?” She gives him a onceover, before raising an eyebrow. “Together.”

“Hospital date.”

“Video shoot,” he says at the same time, glaring at you. You shrug. 

Nat’s lip trails up into a smirk. “Put on your big boy pants and finally admit your crush?”

Bucky drags a palm down his face. “I do not have a crush.”

“If you say so,” she concedes innocently, eyeing him over the rim of her hot chocolate.  

“Are you all in on this? Do you have a quota to reach?” he groans. “Why’s everyone asking me this?”

“Who is ‘everyone’?” you sound delighted. 

“If you don’t want people to call you out on our shit, maybe don’t walk around with heart eyes,” Nat comments.  

Buck’s look is ice cold, but Nat just gives him a wink when you laugh. 

“Hey, I needed to talk to you about something.” She turns to you. “You free for a second?”

“Always,” you reply in earnest. 

Nat leads you a few steps away, hand on your shoulder.  

Bucky takes his seat at the counter, stealing a sip from Nat’s mug. Of course, it was fantastic. Overachiever.

He tunes out intentionally, focusing on the fact that Clint was splayed out on the couch with the TV on a low volume. He knows for a fact the blonde was asleep, and probably would wake up with the worst neck pain in his life, but this was the life he chose.

After watching Clint nearly fall off the couch twice, he looks away, not intending on prying on your conversation but vaguely watching the interaction out of the corner of his eye.

He frowns at what he sees. Nat’s face has turned solemn while she talks to you in hushed tones. Your eyebrows were pulled together, arms crossed over your chest. 

Bucky feels a shift in the air, but he’s not sure what exactly has gone down. 

Nat finally tells you something surely, and you nod. She cups the side of your face and you force out a smile at her, before her hand drops.

The both of you make your way back to him. He turns his gaze back to the counter. 

“You owe me a hot chocolate,” Nat tells him, before giving him a quick kiss on the temple and stealing her cup right back. 

“I barely drank any,” he retorts, eyes still trained on you.

The TV clicks off and she drags a half asleep Clint back down the hall to his bedroom while the man rubbed at his shoulders, trailing behind her obediently. 

Meanwhile, you grab a glass of water from the tap, drinking it slowly as you head towards the elevator.

“G’night, Buck,” you tell him, passing by him.

“Hold on,” he says, voice less gruff than before as he watches you, face tight, “What’s going on?

You observe him for a few long seconds, but he gets the sense you aren’t exactly looking at him. Your eyes are slightly glazed over, and your mind is… elsewhere. 

“What do you do when people refuse to let go of something you’ve already escaped?” you ask finally.  

“What do you mean?” Bucky’s eyebrows knit together tighter.  

“Do you feel like everyone’s eyes are on you?” you say, voice strange. “Like there’s nowhere to go?”

“Where is this coming from? What’d Nat tell you?”

It seems to snap you out of whatever funk you were in, at least partially. “It’s probably nothing.”

His frown only deepens. “Is someone threatening you?”

“No, nothing like that.” You shake your head. “Don’t worry about it. It’s gonna be fine.” 

Bucky stares after you as you press the button to the elevator. He isn’t really sure what to make of the what you just shared. He isn’t even sure he should ask Nat about it later on considering that she didn’t want him listening in now. 

He watches the light above the elevator light up before a ding sounds through. 

“Just so you know–”  

Bucky’s eyes snap back to you, one step in the elevator. 

“I had a codename, too,” you tell him. “I just never liked it.”

Bucky is only left staring as you disappear into the elevator, leaving him in silence. 

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