#Static screams into the void

[ruby-static]

Dude caught me taking a screenshot, I'm cooked-

[cephalog0d]

I LOVE THIS SERIES A LOT THAT IS ALL.

[ruby-static]

Ayyy- Thanks so much for the tag!! r - “Rhinestone Eyes” by Gorillaz

u - “Uma Thurman” by Fall Out Boy 

b - “Basket Case” by Green Day

y - “Your Stupid Face” by Kaden MacKay

-

s - “Still Alive” from the Portal soundtrack

t - “The Mind Electric” by Tally Hall/Miracle Musical

a - “Angels in the Wind” by Burn the Ballroom

t - “The Main Character” by Will Wood

i - “I’m Not Okay (I Promise)” by My Chemical Romance

c - “Could Have Been Me” by The Struts

Never sure who to tag, so pretty much anyone is welcome!

thank you so much @happinessforevermore for the tag! always a pleasure 💜

rules: make a new post and spell out your url with song titles, then tag as many people as there are letters in your url.

p - paris, taylor swift

o - only angel, harry styles

p - peace of mind, imagine dragons

p - phantom, of monsters and men

y - your love (déjà vu), glass animals

-

i - i miss those days, bleachers

n - norman fucking rockwell, lana del rey

m - migraine, twenty one pilots

y - you should be sad, halsey

h - happier, olivia rodrigo

a - admit defeat, bastille

i - iris, the goo goo dolls

r - ribs, lorde

i dont know that many people so i will tag: @meetmeatthemidnight, @poptart-cat-78, @stoplookingupforheaven, @selcouthangel, @tardis--dreams. (if you want to)

[soulfire-of-void]

day 27 of mARTch, eyes closed

honestly amazed i managed to tap the color wheel successfully every time. probably would've been easier to just stick with one color but then i gotta try to outline shit

[sunwarmed-ash]

Updates gonna have to be Monday

I'm so fucking overstimulated.

[twistedstaircase]

Pulling apart your sheets in the middle of the night and actually being able to see the static electricity?

That’s the shit. That right there? That’s the shit

[savanir]

A sister's love

The justice league hurriedly responds to a call for backup at a little in the middle of nowhere place by the name of Amity Park. 

The situation had seemed so simple. 

A Star Sapphire had suddenly shown up on Earth which isn’t immediately cause for concern but she was unidentified, so a lantern was definitely going to have to look into it if only just to make sure that nothing bad was going on. There are two planet side green lanterns, Simon and Jessica. So they responded to handle the potential situation. 

Things rapidly spun out of control when they realized it wasn't just a Star Sapphire. 

"I hate to say this but we're gonna need backup" Simon tells Cyborg, "the Star Sapphire has brought something with her. My first guess was a white martian but..." The other one can do some manner of density shifting, and he can go invisible, but they know ways around that. Whatever this one is doing isn’t that though.

"Why isn't this working!?!" Comes Jessica's slightly panicked voice in the distance, "he keeps just going through my creations! dammit, think think Jess" She tried to contain him with a flamethrower construct but he just ignored it, like he’s seemingly ignoring everything else she’s throwing at him.

"Our constructs have zero effect on the other one, the alien, meta? man I don’t know he’s human shaped" 

"What is the situation other than the two hostiles?"

"Uh we got some government agents who are retreating because of the Star Sapphire wrecking their stuff. And the civilian people here seem to be falling under her influence, so she must be human. She's from here, she needs emotional connection to pull that stuff off."

The people are furious, the violet glow around them clearly indicates that the girl is using her ring to amp them up but if Simon didn’t know any better he’d say this was red lantern stuff.

Well there are more ways to whip people up into a frenzy, by hurting their loved ones for example.

There is a brief moment where it can be heard that Simon and Jessica try to get into a more advantageous position. 

Simon grunts, "dammit, those agents seemed to have weapons that actually worked on the other guy but the Star Sapphire used her violet constructs to shield him and destroy their guns and we've been struggling since" this whole situation stinks, he has a weird feeling about all of it.

"Simon this is really really bad, i can't keep restraining all these civilians, we're running out of energy fast!"

Cyborg tries to get a visual on the situation from his position in the Watchtower while he’s notifying any league affiliated heroes who are nearby and available. 

But all of a sudden he realizes there is just nothing, just a big lap of void where the two lanterns are supposed to be, there is no cctv footage, no cell towers, no internet connection. Just what the hell is going on here.

Then the audio transmission starts to violently crackle.

A new voice laced with static can suddenly be heard, "There you two are"

"Shit"

"Is the justice league coming yet? Are they finally going to do something?" the staticy voice continues.

"Stay back you-"

"Or maybe they still need more of a reason to act" 

The audio cuts out. 

"Jessica! Simon! Come in!" ... "Shit!" 

Cyborg finally gets a clear picture with the satellite cameras and now sees the entirety of Amity Park has been covered with a crystalized violet dome. It’s then that he remembers the story Hal told quite some time ago now about a Star Sapphire who managed to put a whole planet into love stasis.

They are gonna need more help with this one he thinks.

Meanwhile Jazz is still shakily trying to figure out how her new pink powers work, now that all the fighting is over (for now), the GIW forcefully expelled from Amity, and the two Justice league people captured and restrained.

Everything happened so fast, one moment the GIW had knocked out her brother and were forcefully taking him away and while she saw them drive off (she was pretty sure she was screaming) a pink thing just froze her in place, She was pretty sure someone said something about “great love in her heart” and then she was… well she was flying and- and there wasn’t really any time to question things then so she may have kinda gone and ripped into the van that had Danny.

She’s pretty sure she healed him, and then things just completely spiraled out of control from that point on. and now she’s here.

She’s pretty sure this is crazy villain behavior, she’s going to get put on some sort of watchlist and then she’ll never get to be a psychologist but it’s fine.

Her little brother is safe, that’s all that matters. And she will keep it that way.

[quietblissxx]

.

[missusruin]

[pucksandpower]

Let the World Burn

Charles Leclerc x Ferrari driver!Reader

Summary: a brake failure sends Charles’ world spinning out of control

Warnings: crash, partial paralysis, brain injury, and plenty of angst (with a happy ending because I’m still me)

Based on this request

The paddock thrums with energy as you make your way to your car, adrenaline already coursing through your veins. Charles falls into step beside you, his presence as familiar and comforting as the roar of engines.

“Ready to show them how it’s done, mon amour?” His voice is a low rumble, eyes alight with competitive fire.

You grin, leaning in to press a swift kiss to his lips. “Always. You’ll be the one watching my rear wing this time.”

Charles laughs, the sound rich and warm. “We’ll see about that.” He squeezes your hand, calloused fingers intertwining with yours. “I love you.”

“I love you too.” The words carry the weight of a thousand unspoken promises, a vow as binding as the wedding bands you can’t yet wear.

All too soon, you’re parting ways, disappearing into the organized chaos of the garage. You slide into the snug confines of the cockpit, the car’s familiar lines an extension of your own body. A flurry of final checks, the high-pitched whine of the engine firing up, and then you’re rolling onto the grid, the tension crackling like static electricity.

The lights go out, and the world narrows to the scream of tires on tarmac, the high-pitched howl of the engine, and the razor-sharp focus that has carried you this far. You and Charles trade positions with every corner, locked in an exhilarating duel that has the crowd on its feet.

And then, without warning, your world fractures.

The pedal goes soft underfoot, your instincts screaming even before the telltale high-pitched whine cuts through the roar of the engine. You slam on the brakes, but the response is sickening— a bare fraction of the deceleration you need.

“Ricky?” Your voice is tight, the adrenaline surging as the implications crash over you in waves. “I’ve got a brake issue here. A big one.”

“Copy that.” Ricky’s tone is clipped, professional, even as your heart rabbits in your chest. “Okay, let’s try cycling the systems-”

You follow his instructions with mechanical precision, but the results are the same: negligible braking force, the car still hurtling forward at murderous speeds. A hairpin looms ahead, the barriers terrifyingly close, and you fight the wheel with everything you have, desperate to keep the bucking machine on track.

“Ricky, is this being broadcast?” The words tumble out in a breathless rush as the Turn looms closer, closer.

“Affirmative.” There’s a pause, the faintest tremor in Ricky’s voice. “It’s going out live.”

You exhale, a shuddering breath that shakes your entire frame. There’s only one person you need to reach now.

“Charles.” His name catches in your throat, thick with emotion. “If you’re listening to this-”

The tears come then, hot and blinding as you wrestle with the uncontrollable car. This can’t be how it ends, not like this, not when you’d imagined decades more by his side.

“In some other life, maybe we would have grown old together.” The words are torn from the depths of your soul, raw and wrenched free by the stark reality bearing down on you. “I wish I could have given you babies and watched our children grow up and lived a long life by your side like we always dreamed.”

Your vision blurs, the turn now a void of unforgiving concrete rushing up to meet you. You fight the wheel with everything you have, but there’s no stopping the inevitable now.

“You deserve every happiness, my love. If … if I don’t make it, please … please find someone else to love and cherish. Don't grieve forever. Be happy.” The brake pedal is useless under your foot, the barriers skimming past in a blur of terror. “Because you deserve all the love in this world and so much more.”

“I hope you’ll hear this,” you force out in a cracked whisper. "And I need you to know, my heart, that even if things end here … even if I don’t get to grow old with you … you have been the brightest light in my life these past five years. You made me happier than I ever dreamed. And I will never, ever stop loving you, Charles. Not in this life or the next. You are everything-”

The impact is a cosmic force, obliterating breath and thought and everything else in a blinding flare of darkness. But still, you cling to awareness, to the phantom thread of love that binds you to the one person who matters most.

“I’ll always-” The anguished vow catches, cut brutally short as oblivion rises to claim you. In those final heartbeats, a fleeting kaleidoscope of memories sparks behind your eyes: unmistakable laughter, stolen kisses, quiet moments wrapped in each other’s arms.

Five years of loving Charles, of being loved by him in a way you’d never dared dream possible.

It wasn’t enough. It could never be enough.

But it was everything.

“I love-”

Then, nothing.

***

The world fragments around Charles as his gaze locks onto the shattered remains of the familiar red car. One heartbeat — an endless, merciless instant suspended in time — and then his instincts take over with the force of a tidal wave.

“No … no, no, no!” The anguished words rip from his throat as he wrenches the steering wheel, the shriek of tires on tarmac drowned out by the roar of his own pulse thundering in his ears.

The race, the championship, every ambition and dream that has driven him to this point — it all fades into insignificance as he tears down the pitlane, desperation clawing at his throat. “Y/N! Hold on!”

Flames lick hungrily at the twisted wreckage as he sprints towards the mangled chassis, heedless of the searing heat or the choking smoke that burns his lungs. There’s only one thought, one driving need that propels him forward: reach you, get you out, pull you back from the precipice that has opened up beneath his feet.

“Y/N!”

Your name rips from his lips, a hoarse plea swallowed up by the crackle of fire. He skids to a halt beside the wreckage, fingers scrabbling uselessly at the warped metal that has become your cage, your tomb. “Talk to me, mon cœur! I’m here!”

Coherent thought fractures, replaced by blind panic and the soul-deep terror of losing the one light that guides him through this life.

Your eyes are closed, features lax and far too still against the vivid crimson that stains your skin. Charles’ breath catches in his throat, a raw, animal sound clawing its way free as his trembling hands reach for you, desperate to find a flutter of life, a spark of the brilliant fire he knows blazes within you.

“No, no, no … please, stay with me!” He cups your cheek, fingers smearing crimson as they search in vain for a pulse. “I can’t … I can’t lose you!”

Hands grasp at him then, voices raised in shouts he can’t comprehend. He wrestles against the restraints, a feral need to reach you overriding all reason. “Get off me! She needs help!”

But the marshals are insistent, pushing him back with grim determination until he can only watch, helpless, as they douse the ravenous flames.

It feels like an eternity, each gasping breath torn from a soul being flayed apart piece by torturous piece. And then, finally, they move in, the screech of metal and the hiss of hydraulics barely registering over the roar in Charles’ ears.

You’re so still as they work, pale and frighteningly fragile amidst the tangle of debris. A thin rivulet of red trails from the corner of your lips, each sluggish drip a struck match against the powder keg of Charles’ sanity. He takes a shuddering step forward, then another, his world narrowing to the trembling rise and fall of your chest.

“Please … please, stay with me,” he rasps, fingers closing around the rigid lines of the barrier as if it’s the only tether holding him to reality.

A marshal’s hand on his chest, forceful but lacking the strength to halt the unstoppable forward momentum of a man staring into the abyss. “Back off! Let them work!”

But how can he stand back? How can he simply watch as your life’s flame gutters and fades before his eyes? The words climb his throat, tangling into desperate pleas and vows that he’ll burn the world to keep you here, to keep you safe.

Except, no words come. There’s only the taste of ashes on his tongue and the sight of you, broken and bloodied on the unforgiving grass.

The medics arrive in a whirlwind of crisp efficiency, barking terse orders and assessments that slice into Charles with each clipped syllable. He’s dimly aware of the confirmation that you still live, that there’s a chance — but it’s a flicker, fleeting in the face of the reality unfolding before him.

“What are her chances?” The question rasps out, little more than a graveled whisper as he strains against the restraining hands.

You need an airlift, treatment beyond what can be rendered here on this blood-stained stage. Charles knows it, can see the franticness in the medics’ eyes as they work, but the knowledge brings no comfort.

Only an agonizing cycle of seconds hand-cranked like a Medieval torture device, each one stripping another layer of sanity as he watches you slip away.

“Just hang on, mon amour. I’m here … I’m right here.” His voice cracks, breaking on a devastated keen as they load you onto the backboard.

The whine of rotor blades cuts through the static in his head, a cold metallic slice that raises the hairs on the back of his neck. He sucks in a breath, lungs burning with the effort as the helicopter circles in a raucous descent.

“Please, let me go with her!” He wrenches against the hands with renewed desperation.

They’re taking you away.

He tries to follow, legs turned to lead weights, only to be held back once more by the wall of marshals. There’s shouting, words and pleas and anguished vows all tangled into an incomprehensible madness. “No! Y/N!”

And then, you’re gone.

Lifted skyward in a cloud of downdraft, growing smaller and more indistinct until the sleek lines of the helicopter grow razor-thin before disappearing completely.

“No … no, no, no!” Charles’ legs buckle, sending him crashing to his knees in the scorched swath of earth where you were just lying. His hands fist in the grass, heedless of the crimson that stains his fingers, his palms, every inch of shredded skin and broken soul.

The world has ended. His universe has imploded.

And all he can do is kneel in the ashes and scream your name into the uncaring void.

***

The deafening roar of engines fades to a dull thrum as Charles staggers away from the wreckage, his world reduced to a kaleidoscope of fractured images and white noise. He doesn’t register the shouts, the hands grasping at his shoulders as he stumbles blindly towards the track’s perimeter.

Racing. Championships. It all feels like a cruel cosmic joke in the face of what he’s just witnessed.

A chain-link fence looms ahead, the flimsy barrier doing nothing to impede his forward momentum. Figures materialize on the other side — fans, their faces twisted in shock and concern—and then hands are reaching through, steadying him as he clambers over the top with a desperation bordering on madness.

He has to get to you. Nothing else matters.

The parking lot stretches out before him, a maze of gleaming supercars and sleek team transporters. His feet move without conscious thought, propelled by a single-minded determination to reach his haven, his sole remaining tether in this swiftly unraveling realm.

Except, when he arrives at his Ferrari, chest heaving with exertion and the first tendrils of panic starting to set in, the awful truth crashes over him like a tsunami.

No keys.

A choking sound tears from his throat, part sob and part anguished growl of frustration. He can’t break down here, not now, not when every fiber of his being screams at him to keep moving, to fight, to-

“Charles!”

The familiar voice cuts through the din, offering a lifeline just as the darkness threatens to swell and consume him utterly. Andrea skids to a halt beside him, chest heaving and face flushed from his own desperate sprint across the paddock.

In his outstretched hand, the keys dangle and glint in the harsh sunlight.

“I had a feeling,” the trainer pants, thrusting the keys towards Charles with a knowing look.

No other words are needed. Charles snatches them with a terse nod, every agonizing second weighing like an eternity as the engine roars to life beneath his expert touch.

His knuckles whiten on the steering wheel as he wrenches the car into gear, jaw clenched to keep the scream of agony caged behind his teeth. Andrea hardly has time to slam the door before they’re peeling out of the lot in a spray of gravel and burnt rubber.

Except, the awful truth rears its head once more as the speedometer climbs past ludicrous speeds, the blur of the Italian countryside offering no reprieve from the maelstrom tearing him apart from the inside.

“Shit!” Charles’ palm cracks against the steering wheel, knuckles screaming in protest. “Where did they take her?”

Of course Andrea knows what he’s asking. The performance coach doesn’t even hesitate, already dialing his phone with the same razor-sharp focus that has guided Charles through so many battles over the years. “Fred? It’s Andrea. Where did they take Y/N?”

The next few seconds stretch into an eternity, each rattling breath searing Charles’ lungs. The line must still be ringing because Charles can’t make out any other voice, just the muffled hum of the connection and Andrea’s terse breathing. He casts a sidelong glance, jaw clenched so tightly he can feel the tendons straining beneath his skin.

Then, a response — clipped and authoritative even through the tinny speakerphone crackle. “They’ve airlifted her to the trauma center in Milan. She’s still en route.”

No other words are needed. The Ferrari leaps forward with a howl, devouring the asphalt as Charles whites out every other thought, every scrap of sense and reason. All that exists is the burning need to reach you before the unthinkable becomes reality.

Highway signs whip by in a blur, red taillights and shrill horns little more than background noise as he tears down the roads, uncaring of speed limits or lane markers or any of the trifling rules governing the everyday world he’s left behind. Just an animalistic need propelling him forward, the destination the only thing that matters.

Get to her. Don’t be too late. Please, god, don’t let me be too late ...

And then, finally, the looming skyline of Milan rears into view.

Tires squeal in protest as Charles wrenches the steering wheel, the Ferrari fishtailing wildly before rocketing down the street towards the distinctive profile of the hospital. He doesn’t even bother looking for a proper spot, swinging the car up over the curb and leaving it stranded halfway on the sidewalk in a blatant obstruction.

But he doesn’t care. Can’t care about anything beyond reaching you.

The chaos of the emergency room hits them in a crashing wave of noise and activity, but Charles forges ahead undeterred. Shouts and rebuffs part around him like a river around a boulder, falling away as staff recognize the wild-eyed visage barreling towards them.

It’s Italy. It’s the Grand Prix. Of course they know his face, the name that every tifoso here would sell their soul to claim as a native son. A path opens before them, whispers and pointing fingers trailing in their wake.

“Leclerc!”

“Did you hear what happened?”

“Code Red from the Autodromo ..”

The words slice at Charles, both too loud and too indistinct to comprehend beyond the implication that you’re here, somewhere through these endless, claustrophobic hallways. A nurse in seafoam scrubs appears at his side, ushering them with brisk efficiency. He follows without a word, legs fueled by pure desperation as they weave deeper into the sprawling facility.

At last, they’re led into a waiting room, the nurse pivoting to face them with a carefully composed expression. “The patient was brought in approximately thirty minutes ago with severe trauma from the crash. She’s currently in surgery, but there are no further updates I can provide right now.”

Surgery.

The weight of that single word hits like a sledgehammer, sending Charles reeling until his back slams against the nearest wall. He sucks in a ragged gasp, fingers tangling in his sweat-damp curls as the magnitude of what’s unfolding threatens to drag him under completely.

There are voices, murmurs of concern as figures materialize from the edges of his frayed vision. Hands grasp at him, trying in vain to offer comfort or reassurance or something, anything to tether him to this reality that has become his waking nightmare.

But there is no solace to be found.

With a shudder that wracks his entire frame, Charles slides down the wall, knees tucking up in a pitiful facsimile of the bright-eyed young man who had stood on that sunbaked grid only hours ago. His head drops into his upraised palms, fingers tightening in his hair until the pain is the only thing anchoring him against the relentless maelstrom of grief and terror threatening to sweep him away.

The rest of the world falls away until all that remains is the hollow ache in his chest and the silent pleas to someone — anyone — tumbling through his mind on an endless refrain.

A hand rests on his shoulder, grounding him, and he registers Andrea’s presence beside him, the other man’s face drawn in anguish. Tears track down the trainer’s cheeks, glittering in the harsh fluorescent light.

For a long moment, there is only the sound of their mingled breaths, of a silent understanding too profound for words.

Neither speaks. There are no more words to be said, no prayers to voice beyond the torrent of desperate pleas echoing through their fractured psyches.

All that remains is to wait, and steel themselves against the soul-shattering eventuality awaiting them no matter which way the scales of existence tip.

So they wait. And Charles breaks.

***

The fluorescent lights hum a discordant drone, casting stark shadows that seem to leach the warmth from every surface. Charles stares unseeing at the scuffed linoleum tiles inches from his boots, the clinical smell of disinfectant burning his nostrils with each shallow breath.

Beside him, Andrea’s presence is a fixed point amidst the whirling currents of nurses, orderlies, and grim-faced family members that swirl through the waiting room. A bottle of water is pressed into Charles’ hand at some point, the plastic slick with condensation against his palm.

He doesn’t drink. Doesn’t move or speak or show any reaction to the flickering passage of time.

The flow of bodies ebbs and swells like the tide, more familiar faces appearing in scuttling clusters. First the Ferrari personnel, then other teams’ crew, and finally the drivers themselves, one by one. Gasps and muffled curses drift past as the scope of the situation sinks in. Whispers, a bitten-off sob from somewhere across the room.

Charles hears none of it.

He’s adrift in a sea of his own spiraling thoughts, each cresting wave dragging him deeper into the all-consuming torment. Memories mingle with fragments of overheard updates, snippets of frantic phone conversations from those trying to unravel the events of the race.

Blood, so much blood staining the grass, her lips, matting her hair in crimson streaks as she lay unmoving, unbreathing.

Internal bleeding, fractures, neural trauma.

Laughter muffled by the sheets, lazy mornings spent tangled in each other as the world continued its inexorable spin beyond their bedroom walls.

Code Red from the Autodromo ...

The last words she’d tried to force out, little more than a whispered breath over the roar of the racetrack: “I love-”

The purgatory crawls on, each sluggish second carved raw against his tattered nerves. Charles is vaguely aware of the others filtering in and out in shifts, some speaking to him in murmurs too soft to understand, others simply sitting in silence as the minutes bled together into hours.

Some indeterminable span of time later, a ripple works its way through the room, crystallizing into a gathered hush as figures in pale green scrubs appear. One steps forward — a man with graying hair and a craggy face lined by decades of triaging human lives.

The hush deepens to an utter stillness as every eye turns towards him, a held breath drawn taut to the breaking point. Charles lifts his head, forces his gaze to focus on the man’s lips as they part, the moment elongating like a length of rubber pulled to the edge of its tensile strength.

“The patient-” A pause as the surgeon’s eyes flick across the sea of apprehension before settling on Charles with deliberate weight. “-has been stabilized after undergoing extensive surgery to address the trauma sustained in the crash.”

A soft exhalation moves through the room, instinctive reactions barely bridled by the undercurrent of anxiety that keeps them taut, waiting.

“She suffered a severe brain bleed which resulted in significant swelling. In order to alleviate the pressure on her brain, we were forced to put her into a medically-induced coma.”

The words lance through Charles like jagged shards of ice, locking the breath in his lungs. Unconscious, unresponsive. Alive, but without any way of reaching out to reassure himself that the spark still flickers in those endlessly warm eyes. He swallows hard, the room swimming in and out of focus as the surgeon continues in a measured cadence.

“We’ve also had to repair multiple internal injuries and fractures, including her spine. The next forty-eight hours will be critical for monitoring her condition and responses.”

And there it is, the crux they’ve all been tensed in agonizing anticipation to receive. In two days, they’ll know if the fight — your fight — is over before it’s truly begun. The flip of a cosmic coin will determine whether Charles’ entire universe continues to spin … or falls into the black void opening up beneath his feet.

Peripherally, he’s aware of the questions starting, the anguished pleas for more details and reassurances as the others process the impassive surgeon’s words through their own lenses of experience. But Charles hears none of it, only the deafening rush of his own pulse echoing in his ears as the grains of sand in fate’s diabolical hourglass begin their insidious trek.

A blink, and the surgeon is gone, the rest of the somber scrub-clad figures dispersing back towards the swinging doors of the surgical ward. Just like that, they’re alone again, adrift in the limbo of both desperation and dread.

Charles sags, his tenuous grip on composure fracturing like a dam rupturing beneath the crushing weight of reality. A broken whimper rasps from deep within his chest, guttural and visceral and utterly devoid of anything resembling hope.

A hand finds his shoulder, grounding him enough to keep him tethered to the earth as the universe he knows compresses into the torturous rhythm of a mechanized ventilator breathing life into your battered form.

He can see you so clearly, even with his eyes screwed shut against the harsh fluorescents bleaching every surface to the same antiseptic pallor. Fragile, fighting, hooked up to the cold indifference of technology while it works to preserve what he knows to be the brightest, most brilliant soul ever breathed into existence.

The thought of those sparkling eyes, your eyes clouded with unresponsive stillness … it rips the last tattered shred of restraint from his unraveling core. A desolate wail tears free, strangled and raw and utterly devoid of resignation or peace.

He’s loved you for years, months, days, lifetimes — and still it will never be enough to prepare him for a world in which you don’t exist. A breath where he is forced to simply survive without the steady radiance of your presence illuminating every step along his path. Without living.

Andrea’s arms encircle him, a brotherly embrace that does little to quell the flood of anguish now pouring from him in heaving torrents. The others retreat with quiet steps, allowing themselves to fade into the shadows, mere ghosts slipping from the devastation of a man confronting the whispered dread that inhabits every driver’s subconscious.

A love and a life, both hanging suspended by whatever cosmic forces govern their fleeting existences.

You are his gravity, his sun, his guiding starlight.

If you burn out, his universe will go forever dark.

***

The antiseptic haze of the ICU feels like a vice around Charles’ chest as he follows the nurse down the sterile hallway. Each shuffling step is leaden, tinged with an unreality that weighs heavier with every closed door they pass.

Part of him doesn’t want to go through with this. Doesn’t want to face the reality that awaits on the other side of that threshold and shatter the tenuous equilibrium he’s managed to cling to since the moment everything disintegrated on the racetrack.

“She’s just through here.”

The nurse’s words are a wrench, jerking Charles from his reverie with a sobering lurch. Ahead, a nondescript door with a window barely cracked — the entrance to a realm he’s not sure his soul can withstand traversing.

“I’ll give you a few minutes.” Her voice has taken on that too-gentle lilt, the one that says she’s borne witness to too many lives fractured.

Charles nods automatically, not meeting her gaze as she retreats on soft-soled steps. Then it’s just him, alone in the dimly lit hallway with only the muffled noise of machines and murmured voices beyond the door to keep him tethered.

With a fortifying breath that does little to settle the jackhammer pounding in his chest, he grasps the handle and pushes through into your room.

And then … there you are.

Pale and hauntingly still against the sterile sheets, a sickly garden of tubes and wires cocooning your form. There’s barely a rise and fall of your chest, just the robotic ebb and flow of life being pumped through the mask clamped across your face. Dark crescents of bruising mar the fragile skin beneath your eyes, blossoming in vivid shades of yellow and violet across your cheekbones.

You’re so devastatingly still. As if all your vibrant essence has retreated inward, abandoning your corporeal shell in favor of waging an unseen war to simply continue existing.

Charles sucks in a shuddering breath, fingers spasming against his thigh as the first hairline fractures split through the dam he’s erected around his emotions. Part of him wants to flee, to escape back into the blissful naivete of the world before this became his reality. Another part is rooted to the spot with magnetic inevitability, drawn in helpless orbit around your pale, unmoving form.

Slowly, one foot drags in front of the other, carrying him across the room to hover beside your bedside. The blanket of tubes and wires prevents him from seeing much beyond your face and the barest suggestion of a shoulder through the loose neckline of the hospital gown. He reaches out, fingertips trembling as he ghosts them over the exposed skin just above the jutting notch of your collarbone.

You’re so still. And so, so cold.

That’s what breaks him.

His knees hit the tile with a dull thud, unheeded tears already streaking down his cheeks by the time he presses his forehead to the mattress edge. One hand finds yours, enveloping it in a desperate grasp as his entire being crumbles inward like a spent force of nature.

“No, no, no ...” The words are a mantra intermingled with broken gasps as the dam ruptures completely and the anguish pours free in ragged waves. “This can’t … you can’t ...”

Coherent thought deserts him, spiraling into the endless dark of a life without you at his side. These last few days have been a mere fleeting taste of that desolate actuality, uncomprehending glimpses into a reality too obliterating to fully process.

A universe without your light? Your radiance and warmth suffusing his world with color and texture and meaning? It feels like a black hole has opened its maw inside of his chest, hungry to devour everything until nothing remains.

“Please ...”

The plea rasps out in a guttural whisper, little more than carbon scoring the back of his throat. Head bowed, he crushes his brow to your knuckles, each etchings of bone an anchor weight lashing him to this merciless reality.

“Come back to me ...”

The words splinter apart, shredded into woeful gasps as the dam of his fragile composure ruptures. Great, racking sobs claw their way free, tearing through him from the center of his hollow core.

“Take everything else.” The words fracture anew, dissolving into heaving sobs as another piece of his soul splinters away. “Take every trophy, every podium, every championship I will ever win ...”

His voice cracks, seizing in his throat as he drags in a ragged breath, leaning his brow harder against the bedside to ground himself in some last anchor of solidity. Anything to keep from shattering into a million irretrievable pieces as he pours out the final offering, the ultimate sacrifice any driver or athlete can make against the cruel cosmic joke of mortality.

“Take my career, my records ... everything racing has ever meant to me ...” His fingers spasm around yours, clinging on with everything he has left as the darkness closes in. “Just ... please, let her wake up. Let me have more than just these memories of her smile and her laugh and the way she makes everything brighter just by existing.”

The sobs come harder now, racking his frame with deep shudders as his voice dissolves into jagged keening. Tears scald rivulets down his cheeks and drip from his chin to patter against the utilitarian sheets in glimmering droplets. He cries for the unfairness of it all, for the loss that is so brutally imminent it’s already written into his very bones, for the gaping hole that is soon to hollow out his very existence.

Eventually, the racking sobs subside into muted whimpers, the storm ebbing into a quieter desolation as he clings to the thin lifeline of your hand still cradled in his own. A bitter laugh claws its way up his throat, raw and devoid of any trace of humor.

“You’d probably kick my ass if you could see me making deals with the devil like this.”

The silence is deafening, broken only by the measured hiss-pause-exhale of the machines mercilessly keeping that precious flicker of life from extinguishing completely. Another laugh escapes, rough and graveled with the weight of a million shattered pieces of himself littering the floor around him.

“You’ve always been the stronger one between us, haven’t you?”

He angles his head, pressing his lips to your knuckles in a lingering kiss as a fresh deluge of tears gather in his eyes. “So wake up, mon cœur. Wake up and show me how to keep going ...”

The whisper hangs in the air, suspended in the limbo of waiting and dread as the machines continue their indifferent monotony. Charles lingers there, forehead pressed to your palm as the minutes drag onward and the final flickers of day fade from the window.

He’s here. He’ll always be right here.

No matter how many nights and days and eternities that ceaseless tide must crash over him until your eyes open once more.

The quiet is shattered by a stifled gasp at the threshold, a swell of fresh emotion that causes Charles to lift his head, scrubbing futilely at his eyes with the back of his free hand. Two figures have appeared in the doorway, silhouetted by the dimmer light of the hallway beyond.

Footsteps, two sets. Familiar yet not, like ghosts drifting through the periphery of a dream. He knows instinctively who has stepped into the claustrophobic bubble of vigil, but cannot summon the energy to turn, to confront them.

There’s only you. Only you, and this carcass of shattered promises and devastation that he’s been reduced to by the simple fact of your absence.

Until …

Motions in the corner of his vision, the slide of fabric and muted footfalls amidst the monotonous cadence of technology. Then, a pair of weathered hands — hands he recognizes like the veins pulsing with life beneath his own skin — come into view, cupping his bowed head in a cradle of reassurance and shared infinitudes of anguish.

Your parents’ voices carry in the wake of their touch, whispers ragged with the same bone-deep desolation bleeding from Charles’ shattered core. Indistinct murmurs of comfort, of empathy, of that level of understanding that only those poised on the precipice can ever understand.

He doesn’t resist as they draw him into the circle of their arms, enveloping him until their shared warmth banishes some of the chill snaking through his soul. Hot tears streak down his cheeks again, but these aren’t solitary, bitter shed of a man abandoned in the void of loss.

Their mingled anguish binds them together on this fevered plane of suffering, a communion of the damned begging with whatever beneficent forces might hear their pleas.

Please.

Please give them back the spark of light they all crave with every fiber of their beings.

Please, because this ...

This is no life. Not without you.

***

The fluorescent lights seem to dim with every passing hour, the edges of reality blurring together into an indistinct smear. Time has lost all meaning amidst the monotonous cycle of machines and muffled hospital ambiance swirling through your room.

Charles is adrift in a wakeful dream state, his world compressed into the miniscule shifts across your features. The steady beep of the heart monitor, the almost imperceptible rise and fall of your chest, the flutter of your eyelids as your mind navigates whatever ethereal paths separate you from him.

He hasn’t left your bedside. Not for food or rest or even the most basic of human needs. It’s all he can do to simply exist in this liminal space with you, unwilling to surrender a single breath or blink to the cruelty of a reality in which your presence doesn’t illuminate every crevice.

His thumb traces idle circles over your knuckles, the motion as robotic as the whoosh of the ventilator forcing air in and out of your lungs. Voices drift through from the hallway, clinical and detached. More tests and updates being murmured without context or depth of feeling.

None of it matters. The only metric capable of penetrating the fog enshrouding Charles is the ghost of sensation where his calloused fingers brush your skin.

He’s acutely attuned to the details of your condition at any given moment, no matter how inconsequential it may seem to the professionals at their stations monitoring labs and scans. A slight spike in temperature or blood pressure, the faintest twitching muscle or brow-furrow. All of it feels magnified a thousandfold as he clings to every indication, every little shift that might signal a turn for the better.

Or … for the worse

The thought skitters away the instant it surfaces, instinctively repressed by the force of Charles’ sheer desperation. He’s been here, motionless and steadfast, as the forty-eight hour milestone stretched into seventy-two, ninety-six, a hundred and twenty. With each passing day, the doctors grew more optimistic, more positive in their assessments as the swelling in your brain gradually abated.

Until this morning. The preliminary preparations to rouse you from the protective shroud of the medically induced coma began. Rounds of testing, consults from specialists, hushed asides between the scrub-clad personnel that Charles couldn’t parse beyond the undercurrent of anticipation that rippled through the ward.

Now they wait. He and the contingent of nurses and doctors hovering at stations like sentries guarding the gateway to the only world that matters. Watching, observing, as your eyelids begin to stir and the heart monitor’s pattern shifts just slightly from its metronomic rhythm.

Charles holds his breath, fingers tightening around yours as his gaze fixes on your face, the first pinpricks of awareness flickering there. Your eyelids flutter, brow furrowing as if straining against unseen barriers holding you back. Flashes of animation, of unvoiced struggle, play out in rapid succession and his world constricts into that singular point of reality unwinding.

Your fingers twitch, a spasmodic shudder, before settling into a steady movement in his grasp. The change in pressure is minute, featherweight, but it’s enough to electrify every nerve in Charles’ body. His head whips toward the observation window, breath sawing from his lungs.

“She’s waking up!”

It’s little more than a raw exhalation, the spark that ignites the room into urgent, yet controlled, flurries of activity. A nurse slips inside, tapping briskly at monitors and checking lines with an instinctive flow of motion. Charles barely registers her presence, his world distilled down to that singular point of lifeline linking him to you as the fog of unconsciousness finally begins to lift.

Your first inhale tugs at something primal within him, hauls the breath from his lungs even as unfettered joy spills through his chest. There’s movement beneath the fluttering of your eyelids, the rustle of lashes and tiny furrows creasing the delicate skin around your eyes. The seconds stretch out like an eternity until finally ...

They open.

Slitted and hazy, but undeniably open and aware. For an endless heartbeat, Charles is frozen, hands still wrapped around your fingers as afraid to move as a cave explorer plunged into impermeable black.

Then the world rushes in with all the chaos and color he’s been robbed of for far too long. A desperate sound tears itself free of his throat, as his body releases the suspended tension flooding from every pore. He sways forward, bracing his other hand on the mattress edge to keep from utterly crumpling at your very first flutter of life.

“Oh god ...” The fractured keen catches with a gasping sob. “Dieu merci, I thought I-”

But the words fracture, tumble away into lost coherence as you shift, throat bobbing with visible effort before the slurred shape of words escapes past chapped lips.

“C-can’t … f-feel ...”

Charles freezes, the world contracting back into stark lines and hyper-focused clarity. You’re struggling, the effort of speech clear across features still slack with the vestiges of your ordeal.

Panic claws its way up his throat, instinct sounding the call to seek help, to rally every force of medicine at their disposal toward solving this new, horrifying complication. He turns, mouth already open in a shout toward the observation window-

Only to find the room already flooding with personnel, summoned by some unseen alert the moment you stirred. Voices begin filtering through the dissonance clogging his senses — clipped, professional directives lancing through the feedback loop skipping inside his skull.

“Keep her calm-”

“... signs of paralysis ...”

“... damage to the motor cortex ...”

The final phrase lands like a weighted punch, sending Charles reeling back a half-step as the implications unspool into his consciousness. Your face twists in distress, breath sawing as the tube mask fogs with each panicked exhalation.

“I … n-no ...” You try to move, to shift position, but whatever spinal injury incurred in the wreck limits you to feeble twitches and whimpers.

Charles is at your side in an instant, features etched in silent agony as he brushes back the hair feathering across your forehead. His other hand finds yours, solid and grounding as he wills every iota of strength into the contact.

“Shhh, it’s alright. It’ll be alright, just stay calm.”

A cursory glance over his shoulder confirms a flurry of activity unfolding behind the glass as neurologists and specialists filter in. Tests will be run, evaluations and diagnostics to chart out whatever neural trauma has wrought such devastating effects upon your mobility.

In this moment, none of it matters beyond the trembling whimpers parting your lips and the glimmer of tears streaking your cheeks to dampen the pillow beneath your head. Charles wants nothing more than to gather you into his arms, to shield you from this fresh cruelty that has robbed you of yet another piece of your spirit.

Instead, he leans in close, cradling your face in his palm as you struggle to latch onto his presence amidst the waves of fear and distress no doubt crashing through your psyche.

“F-feel my … can’t ....” The disjointed words catch in racking sobs, your eyes squeezing shut against a torrent of emotion he recognizes all too well.

“I know, I know ...” The platitudes feel hollow, meaningless verbal gestures against the enormity of the situation closing its grip around them. But Charles speaks them regardless, murmuring soft reassurances against your anguish.

“Just focus on me, mon cœur. Only me.” His thumb swipes the moisture from your cheekbones, smearing tear tracks through the pallor there as his voice drops to a soft rasp. “You’re still here, still fighting ...”

Your eyes open at that, lashes spiked and heavy with more saline that slips free to streak down your temples. Those depths are oceans of heartache, roiling with a tempest of emotion that momentarily banishes every scrap of reason or logic from Charles’ mind.

All that matters is easing your suffering. Doing anything to lift the veil of anguish smothering the radiant light that marked your essence, that wondrous spark responsible for thawing every one of his defenses and opening a pathway to the heart he’d resigned himself to never sharing.

“I’m here and I’m not leaving. Not ever.” The words scorch themselves into his very soul as he presses his brow to yours. The antiseptic smells of your surroundings fade, the two of you cocooned in the intimate embrace of making your entire world his, if only for these fleeting seconds.

“We’ll get through this together,” he murmurs against your hairline, drinking in the simple euphoria of your closeness, of being able to impart even an inkling of comfort through his presence alone. “I promise.”

The words hang there for a suspended eternity, no response beyond the quiet hiccup of your breathing evening out the tiniest bit. A sliver of solace in the storm to cling to, no matter how tenuous.

Then the retinue of doctors and nurses sweeps in, their voices raised in directives and instructions. It shatters the moment, the outside world crashing back into their reality with all its cold indifference and clinical calculation.

Charles is ushered back, stumbling on legs turned to rubber as he watches you drag your reddened gaze from his, focusing inward as the onslaught of testing begins. He wants to refuse, to dig in his heels and remain steadfastly at your side through whatever fresh torments this throws your way.

But that defiance dies before it can form, snuffed out by the fragility written in the slump of your shoulders and the dull, haunted glaze muting your formerly vibrant spirit. All of his instincts scream at him to protect you, to rally against any external forces bent on inflicting more cruelty upon your already overburdened existence.

Instead, with a leaden heart and bile burning the back of his throat, Charles can only slip from the room and let the white coats encircle you with their machines and sterile indifference.

It’s a wait that lasts an eternity condensed into seconds, the rubber soles of his sneakers tracing grooves into the linoleum as he paces the hallway with increasing franticness. Snatches of conversation drift out from behind the closed door — clinical assessments devoid of context or feeling.

Then, as abruptly as it began, the door sweeps open and a group of personnel file out, scribbling notations and conversing in terse murmurs. One of them, a woman with cropped silver hair and piercing eyes, breaks off to approach Charles. Her expression is carefully neutral, devoid of any emotional tells.

“Mr. Leclerc.” It’s not a question, but an acknowledgment of who he is … and what is owed to him. “Your … partner has suffered extensive trauma to her spinal cord and central nervous system in the crash. The amount of nerve damage we’re detecting suggests paralysis of both lower extremities.”

The words shatter into coherent syllables and empty static all at once. Charles nods numbly, awaiting the verdict he can feel looming above them all.

“We can’t say with any certainty whether this condition is temporary or … permanent.” There’s a pause, the ghost of empathy flickering across her hawkish features before the professional mask reasserts itself. “Only time will tell if there’s any chance of full recovery once the other injuries have mended and treatment can begin in earnest.”

The finality hangs in the air for a stretched tautness of heartbeats, crystalline and utterly devoid of warmth. Charles forces himself to meet her gaze, to hold her clinical detachment within his own eyes as the world drifts further and further away.

“Okay.” It’s little more than a whisper, but it feels like tearing out his own throat to give voice to the thing that shatters his heart for you. “Can I … see her?”

A dip of the woman’s chin, a wordless assent as she steps aside to allow Charles to pass. He manages only a few weighted strides before halting, hand braced against the doorframe as he ghosts his gaze over your prostrate form.

You’re crying, quiet and bereft as the blankets rise and fall in time with your shuddering breaths. Something animal and feral keens low in Charles’ chest at the sight, every scrap of resolve threatening to unravel in the wake of your desolation.

Before he can think of second-guess the impulse, he crosses the space in two strides and drops to his knees beside the mattress. You startle at the sudden motion, eyelids fluttering in shock before recognition blazes through the emptiness shrouding your features. It’s Charles’ undoing.

“No, no … no tears.” His voice cracks like splintered glass, adrift on waves of his own withheld emotion. “You’re still here. You’re still with me, mon amour.”

He finds your hand with his own, fingers dwarfed in his calloused grip as he brings them to his brow. Outside, the doctors and specialists confer in low murmurs, their indifference too jagged to apply to the wounds here in this sanctuary where only you exist.

“You’ll be okay.” The promise burns itself into the verse he’s scribed on his heart, a vow etched in trails of moisture searing his cheeks. “No matter what it takes.”

His lips find your forehead, brushing against the clammy skin there as you sag towards him, drawn together by the gravity of an understanding too profound for the empty hallways and clinical trappings circling them. For this stolen breath, it’s simply you and him in all your wounded radiance.

“I almost lost you.” The confession rattles free, sent skyward on exhaled plumes that stir the fine baby hairs framing your brow. “And I’ll fight like hell to keep you beside me for as long as this life will allow.”

Your eyes find his, fractured mirrors reflecting all the heartache and dashed hopes ricocheting between you. But there’s something else there too.

Hope. Defiance. That unquenchable spark that first lured Charles toward you like a moth begging for the flame’s obliterating caress.

He’ll cling to that inner fire. Pour every ounce of his being into nurturing the smoldering coals until they flare again, banishing the darkness fate has chosen to drape them in at every turn. They’ll get through this, finding whatever reserves the cruelest pockets of despair have yet to strip away to sustain them.

Paralysis, brain damage, unthinkable trauma ...

None of it matters.

Not as long as you’re still drawing those precious, rasping breaths beside him.

Not as long as that beautifully battered heart beats on, refusing to surrender to the abyss.

“Je t’aime.” The oath clings to his lips, pressed against your temple as he holds you close. “Always and forever. No matter what.”

***

The sleek, modern lines of the therapy center bisect the Monegasque sky, all glass and steel rising toward the blue expanse. Charles pauses a moment as he strides across the courtyard, drawing in a steadying breath of the crisp early-winter air before continuing on toward the entrance.

The motion-triggered doors sweep open with a whisper, ushering him into the pristine lobby adorned with the fixtures of understated elegance. Sunlight streams through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting everything in muted ambers and golds that warm the precision-engineered decor.

Charles crosses the space with economical purpose, gaze sweeping the sitting areas arranged with studied nonchalance until he pinpoints the familiar silhouette awaiting him. You’re positioned with your back angled toward him, the faint shudder of your shoulders visible as you shift position in the high-backed wheelchair.

For a heartbeat, the sight freezes him in place, the old swell of emotions threatening to spiral into rampant chaos until he can taste the acrid tang of panic curdling on his tongue.

Then the moment passes, brought up short by the instinctive reflex to compartmentalize that’s carried him through so many darknesses since the day his entire universe fragmented beyond repair. He shakes it off, squaring his shoulders as he resumes his trajectory, clearing the distance between you in a handful of strides.

You must sense his presence behind you because a tremor shivers across your frame a half-second before you begin to crane your neck towards the source of the approaching footfalls. Charles times his approach to intercept the motion, stepping neatly into your peripheral line of sight with a warm smile ghosting across his features.

“Mon amour.”

The endearment falls from his lips like silk across skin, the richly-textured syllables suffusing the air between you until it feels thick with emotion and the grounding sense of home. Of course, you react to the sound, lips already parting in anticipation of reply that has yet to fully manifest.

The struggle is still so pronounced, hewn into the furrows creasing your brow and the deliberate concentration sharpening the elegant lines of your profile as you wrestle with the disconnect between neural synapses and musculature. Each time Charles bears witness to these trials, it rekindles the enduring fury and heartache enough to steal the air from his lungs.

How cruel could fate be to hurt the brightest soul he’s ever known?

The questions circle endlessly, gnawing their way across his subconscious in a constant cycle of what-ifs and unvoiced anguish. So he clings to patience as your sole solace, willing every ounce of unspoken encouragement into the sliver of contact where his calloused fingers sit atop your knuckles.

“It’s-” The fragmented sound tugs his focus back to your profile in time to catch the flickering hint of frustration tightening the muscles along your jaw as the words elude their trajectory once more. He watches your chest rise and fall with the effort of measured breathing, sees the war being waged behind blown pupils as your nerves strive to reestablish an equilibrium so brutally ruptured by trauma.

And then … a breakthrough.

“I ...” Barely more than an exhale, shaped on the barest puff of air passing your lips. But the simple vowel ignites something beneath Charles’ breastbone, a frisson of hope and pride and a thousand other tangled emotions combining into unadulterated exhilaration.

“L-love ...” Another pause, infinitesimal in the grand cosmic span yet stretched endless as the consonants parse themselves into recognizable sounds. Your eyes find his, glimmering pinpricks of desperate adoration blazing through the sullen cloud of anguish that’s settled in their depths.

The final whisper crystallizes into the air with the reverent weight of an answered prayer, “... you.”

Charles is across the space in an instant, crashing to his knees before you with a breathless sound that parts his lips on a broken rasp. Trembling hands map along the delicate slopes of your cheeks, cradling your face as a single tear spills free to chart a glistening trail down his cheek.

“Oh god ...” The prayer shivers past his lips, half sob and half keening breath as he presses his brow to yours, drowning in your presence and surrounding himself with the singularity of your existence. “You did it. You said it ...”

He trails off, lost to the beautifully battered rhythm of your exhales gusting across his features. This close, you’re all he sees, all he needs to survive this moment of solace among the anguished trials you’ve endured to forge this path back toward him. With painstaking care, he leans in to dust trembling kisses across your brow, your temples, the feathered crescents of your eyelashes as they flutter shut beneath the reverent onslaught.

Until finally, his lips find yours in a searing confession of worship — no urgency or fire, just two souls colliding into the singularity that first kindled their union. Charles slants his mouth across your own, breathing you in deeply until his senses are awash in the familiar scent of your skin and the dizzying tranquility of becoming something so much more than the sum of fragmented parts.

It both is and isn’t a kiss, just the barest brush of sensitive flesh and shared breath. Yet all of Charles’ fortitude strains against the tidal surge of emotion crashing through his bones … devotion and heartache, fervent pride and the nauseating chaser of reality.

Because even as you persevere, rising like a phoenix from each trial along this endless road toward recovery, he knows the path ahead remains strewn with obstacles and shadowed pockets into which the darkness always lurks.

When he finally tears himself away, it’s with another shuddering breath and two crystalline trails of moisture etched into the hollows beneath his eyes. He drinks in your features with the starving desperation of one lost to the merciless desert of life, maps every nuanced shift of line and breath and expression to catalog the miracles unfolding before him.

“You incredible, impossible thing ...” The endearment slips free on a choked laugh, more for his sake than any lack of comprehension on your part. Even after everything, Charles knows you understand the timbre and shape of his words as deeply as if they were your own thoughts.

But before he can bask in the fleeting warmth of this tiny victory, you’re drawing him back in. Delicate fingertips brushing the moisture from his cheekbones as you struggle to translate thought into sound once more.

“This … isn’t ...” A pregnant pause, brow furrowing with the strain before the rest comes in a tumbling rush. “What you wanted. For us.”

The words land like craters against Charles’ ribs, disjointed bombs stripping away the last threads of cheerfulness with each syllable. He stills, mouth parting on a protest that never materializes as you forge onward in the wake of his stunned silence.

“Y-you gave up ...” Another tiny hesitation, your chest rising and falling as you suck in a fortifying breath, “... everything.”

A fresh sheen of moisture wells in your eyes, slick with too many fractured hopes and dreams to ever assemble into coherent utterances. Still, Charles recognizes each shred of meaning, every whispered subtext behind the fragments you offer up as if stilling him for the inevitable strike to come.

Except this time, the blow he expects never arrives. Instead, you lean in, fingertips trailing lightly across the sharp angles of his jaw as the rest of the thought emerges with painstaking care.

“It’s … okay. To find someone ...” Your voice cracks, throat bobbing against the torrent of naked vulnerability suffusing each word. “... new.”

For an endless instant, the world spins on its axis, that single, shattered confession shearing through all of Charles’ deeply-ingrained instincts and defenses. This is the thing he’s dreaded since the first moment fate’s vicious hand tore the very fabric of your radiance into parts — the inevitability of you shouldering the blame for what has unfolded.

Unacceptable.

Unthinkable.

His hands are on you again before he consciously wills them to move, palms cradling your face like he’s the one in constant danger of crumbling into a billion undone pieces. It’s both anchor and lifeline as he pulls you flush against him, mouth trembling for purchase against the rush of sentiment crashing through his veins.

“Never.” The oath has never felt so feather-light yet absolute all at once. He rasps it out like a scrap of prayer, the shape of the sound rippling through the air between them.

“This life? You are everything I want.” The words feel torn from some primal place he had thought cauterized in the aftermath of all that has transpired between them. But still, Charles lays himself bare in their wake, baring every shred of anguish and love and reverence bleeding from his heart.

“Not the career or the glory or any other pursuit I might have thrown myself toward ...” He drags in a ragged inhale, feeling your quivering breaths ghosting across his lips like a light breeze stoked from embers. “Just you, mon cœur. All of you — from your brilliant mind to your determined spirit.”

His thumb traces the supple curve of your cheekbone, rough calluses snagging lightly against satin-smooth skin as his voice skips toward a halting rasp.

“I don’t know what the future holds.” This final mortal truth lingers in the thrall of hushed vulnerability shrouding them. “But I’m not leaving this existence without you by my side through every second of it. Not willingly.”

In the suspended heartbeats that follow, Charles watches the onslaught of emotion crest through the otherworldly depths of your eyes. He swallows hard, aching to fend off whatever final resistance lingers behind those storm-tossed features. Except his throat has grown too thick, too clogged with unshed tears to give voice to the hundreds upon thousands of fractured promises unspooling toward each other.

So he kisses you instead — harder this time, with the desperate exhilaration of a drowning man breaking surface to taste the first gasps of oxygen-rich air. He pours himself into the connection, igniting the spark that first smoldered between you years and lifetimes ago until his entire being resonates with the radiant warmth.

When at last he drags himself back, it’s with a swipe of his thumb to brush away the shimmering track of tears he’s unwittingly drawn to your cheek. “I love you,” he rumbles, the sound resonating from the depths of his core to embed in the very foundations of his soul. “Nothing else matters.”

And as if summoned by nothing more than the simmering weight of his epiphanies, you offer up one final exhalation shimmering with promise and budding hope.

“Race.” A broken sound, little more than a whispered caress against the tide of all that has gone unsaid. “Win for … f-for us.”

Charles’ lips part, trembling with too many half-born replies in that stretched moment of realization.

You’re right. Of course you’re right, focused as always upon rekindling the vibrant sparks threatening to gutter beneath his gaze. It’s yet more proof of why he resolved to kneel before you and bind his existence to your own — from now until the last glimmers of twilight.

He curls a hand behind your neck, prizing this beautiful connection above all the momentary triumphs and thrills his boyhood dreams ever convinced him to pursue. Red-painted carbon and shrieking downshifts, roars of acclaim and champagne spilled as if raining down from the heavens … none of it could ever hope to fill the sacred spaces you’ve already occupied with your quiet strength and luminous resilience.

“For you,” he murmurs against the shell of your ear, leaving goosebumps in its wake along the exposed column of your throat. “And only for you, mon ange. I’ll make the world itself hold its breath if that’s what you need.”

He seals the promise with a final brush of his mouth, lingering until every ounce of the sacred vow sears itself into your skin and memory alike.

By the time he draws back to drink in your features one more time, there’s a spark flickering through the storm clouds rimming your gaze. A dazzling flicker in the instant before it flares into something inextinguishable, something potent enough to blind out every shadow threatening to swallow him whole.

It sears through him like a lightning strike, melting every ounce of resolve into something more precious than any trophy or accolade his profession could ever bestow.

A vow you return with a simple promise. “I’ll be your ...” Your voice falters. But your eyes blaze with the words, with that same inevitable fire that forged those first fateful sparks between your souls, “... biggest fan.”

***

The grand hall seems to hum with the collective intake of a thousand bated breaths as Charles turns to face the gathering. Sunlight streams through towering windows in cascading sheets of amber warmth, gilding everything in honeyed refractions that lend an ethereal glow to the floral arrangements and pristine altar dominating the space.

He sucks in a steadying breath of his own, rolling his shoulders beneath the crisp lines of his tailored tuxedo. Anticipation thrums through every fiber of his being, vibrating in synchrony with the symphony of tremulous breaths rippling through their assembled friends and loved ones.

This moment has been too long in manifesting, too brutally tested by the cruelties of fate to be anything but utterly perfect in execution.

Behind him, the faint rustle of his groomsmen shifting into place provides the barest murmur of ambient sound. Joris, Andrea, Pierre, Arthur, and Lorenzo — all united by the gravity of this singular instance reshaping the trajectory of Charles’ existence. He chances the briefest glance over his shoulder, meeting their steadying nods of encouragement with a fleeting ghost of a smile.

It anchors him, draws together those final errant threads of composure in time for the first swell of the processional to filter through the sprawling chamber. The gentle symphony of strings and woven harmonies crashes over Charles in a physical caress, setting his nerves alight with anticipation as every eye tracks toward the grand archway dominating the far end of the hall.

He doesn’t immediately register the diminutive figure emerging in a sweep of ivory chiffon and pale lace. Only after the sharp inhalation of breath fluttering through the assembled does his gaze lock onto your silhouette, resplendent even through the sheer flutter of the veil haloing your shoulders.

He expects the wheelchair, the familiar sleek metallic lines and measured rolls ushering you towards him. Expects the sight that’s become so achingly you, even as it never fails to tighten every muscle in his body with the urge to shelter you in his arms from every cruelty the merciless universe has seen fit to inflict.

Except … there is no chair.

The shuddering breath that leaves his lips might as well have been torn from the depths of his very essence in that suspended heartbeat of dawning realization.

You’re walking.

With slow, tiny strides, flanked on either side by bridesmaids in burnished golds — but not supported or aided in any functional sense of the movements.

No, these halting footfalls are all your own. A monumental effort of sheer force of will and gritty determination honed across months of exhaustive perseverance through some of the darkest shadows ever spanning your shared existences.

Each trembling step, every inch traveled across that endless-seeming expanse of polished marble floor, is both defiant proof of your resilience and a blazing triumph over pain and hardship and loss echoed ten thousandfold.

Charles cannot breathe. Can barely remain upright as his entire world both manifests and dissolves around this singular progression unfolding before him in strangled increments. Others have begun to weep in earnest, muffled sobs billowing through the gathered assembly like ripples across a pond’s placid surface.

He’s vaguely aware of his groomsmen shifting behind him, of shocked gasps ghosting across their stunned features as they grasp the significance of what’s unfolding before their eyes. Andrea’s palm finds the small of Charles’ back, steadying his frame against the sudden influx of vertigo and exhilaration threatening to collapse his consciousness.

Because all that exists in this shuddering span of fractured instants is you. Nothing more, nothing less than the endless radiance of your soul as you stride toward him.

Toward your destiny.

Toward the culmination of all the strength and beauty and determination he’s revered with every ounce of his being since the first time he met you.

He’s crying in earnest now, can feel the streaking trails of moisture searing molten paths down his cheeks to dampen the crisp cotton stretched across his chest. Yet the tears hardly register as anything more than a bodily necessity to expel the rising tsunami of l elation cresting inside his core.

You’re within arm’s reach now, only a handful of quavering paces separating your joined paths. Charles’ hands tremble where they hang at his sides, fingers spasming around the desperation to move, to reach, to hold you against him and pour every ounce of adoration into you.

Willpower alone is what roots him in place, keeps him tethered until every shift and flex of muscle is committed to memory. Until your forward momentum carries you into his gravitational embrace in a sweeping collision of souls reunited.

He feels your hands first, slightly clammy where they land against his shoulders and chest in search of purchase. Then the subtlest hint of perfume, that floral-tinged elixir unique only to the slope of your neck and the crown of your hair when he dips to brush his lips across your brow in reverence.

The dam breaks and Charles crumples inward, folding himself around your form with only the vaguest cognition of the groomsmen forming a sheltering web around you both as he sinks to his knees in a thunderous impact of boneless limbs.

Words either fail him or escape articulation as the only sounds to pass his lips become a stream of fevered, jumbled endearments and throaty praises poured directly against the fevered warmth of your skin. His hands map every trembling plane in frantic sweeps, nails skirting intricate embroidery and dewy satin as each heated exhale shudders harsh against your neck, your cheeks, your brow ...

“Mon cœur ...” The title is prayer and confession, ground out from the friction of his entire belief system being forged anew around you. “You incredible thing ... dieu, look at you ...”

He silences the reflexive protests before they can rise by slanting his mouth across yours. There’s nothing carnal or profane in the gesture, simply the coming together of two souls.

You taste of elation and salt, of budding promise and fond tenacity. Of incandescent joy and the shredded velvet of nights spent paralleling the loneliest infinities as your fingers clutched each other like dual magnets anchored across the universe’s expanse.

“So strong … my warrior … perfect ...” The muted words ghost over your trembling form. Somewhere distant, a chorus of cheers and applause has erupted beyond the bubble forming around you.

But none of it truly registers, not when compared to this shattering merging of everything either of you has struggled and strained and wept to reach.

Nothing else matters in the sweeping catharsis cascading around you both. Not the hoarse prayers still shuddering past his lips, or the moisture from your own lashes streaking down his cheeks in silence.

It’s only when the dizzying euphoria begins to ebb that Charles slowly drags his gaze upwards to find yours — those beautiful depths drowning in reverence and bliss mirroring his own. The spark flickering there banishes all shadows in an instant, forging incandescence enough for a lifetime no matter what fresh trials fate might see fit to test your devotion.

He drinks you in, committing the flawless canvas of your features to permanence before reaching up to brush trembling fingertips across the sheer lace obscuring your radiance. The sweep of fabric pools around your shoulders and Charles finds himself very nearly undone again by the sight of your unveiled beauty.

“So ...” He swallows hard, fingers tracing the delicate curve of your jaw as words fail him for a what feels like an eternity. “... beautiful. Like the first dawn cutting through the blackest oblivion.”

A tremulous smile sweeps across your lips, the ghost of a promise he absorbs with every pore as you lean into the reverent sweep of his touch. He could stay like this forever, knees grinding against the ornate tile. Anything to capture how eternal he feels right here with you.

Charles drags in a rallying breath, forcing his widened gaze from yours just long enough to call his groomsmen to attention with a look. They rally behind him, steadying him as he rises on legs turned bowstring-taut with adrenaline.

And then, with every eye once more centered upon you two, Charles bends at the waist and sweeps you into his embrace, cradling your trembling frame against his chest with the paradoxical delicacy and unyielding reverence that lives so unbridled within his very bones. Your breath catches audibly, a soft hitch of sound that adorns the sacred silence as he turns away from the guests.

The officiant’s features are flushed and lined, rimed with moisture that glistens unabashedly as he gathers himself to proceed.

“Charles Marc Hervé Perceval Leclerc and Y/N Y/M/N Y/L/N,” he begins. “You have been called here as an acknowledgment of the next chapter in your lives together ...”

The ceremony begins, the words spilling forth as you tuck your cheek against Charles’ thundering pulse, fingers curling into the lapel of his tuxedo in a white-knuckled embrace. He lives in the rise and fall of your mingling breaths, in the warmth of your form pressed seamlessly against the shelter of his body as you bear witness to the eternal scripture neither of you could have fathomed even existing upon first crossing paths.

Then, the officiant turns his attention towards Charles, chin dipped in grave deference. “You may recite your vows.”

The command punches through him, sawing the breath from his lungs in a ragged exhalation that shivers across your crown. He swallows hard, blinks back the fresh deluge of tears that threatens to escape his faltering restraint. But when he opens his mouth, the words spill out like they were always meant to.

“I have dreamed of you since before the first moments of my existence.” The syllables echo across the hall, spiraling forth to caress every rapt attendee in their wake. “Of a love conceived in the heart of a collapsing star and given breath in our adjoined forms to shine forth into the darkness.”

His lips brush your hairline, absorbing the scent of your fragrance and feeling the thrumming rhythm of life radiating from your temples. Here, cocooned in the intimate heart of their unity, the world holds its breath along with the gathered witnesses.

“Nothing could have prepared my soul to be scoured by your brilliance, your resilience … let alone knitted together from the fraying remnants when our path shattered across the cruel stones of fate.” A tremulous inhale, steadying as his gaze flicks across the faces assembled before you — a sweep encompassing every expression of empathy and shared joy piercing back at him.

“Yet here we stand, mon amour ...” The endearment spills forth like rich velvet, textured and avowed as his mouth finds the top of your head once more, the taste of reverence sweet on his tongue. “United into something sacred, something woven from those endless nights clinging to each other across the desolate chasm that could so easily have swallowed us whole.”

He savors the simple elation of your response, of knowing his words resonate through every quivering fiber with the promise of finally reaching what you’ve been steadily ascending to all along.

So he breathes you in once more, chasing the familiar scent of your skin until his very lungs burn with the delight of your proximity. The depths of his gaze find yours again, irises rimmed in the faintest remnants dampness as one final promise takes shape.

“I will love you to the final molecule ...” Quieter now, a molten rasp uttered into the hollow between your brows as fingertips sift through the intricate sweeps of your tresses. “I will walk beside you through each breath and season, every triumph and shadow that marks this existence as uniquely ours. With all that I am, all that lingers when the inconsequential has stripped from my shell — I am yours. Until the last spark is extinguished from this universe and beyond.”

The promise hangs in the reverent stillness as he takes his first full breath after, filling his lungs with the ozone and wildflowers commingling from your respective scents until his senses reel. Only then does he draw back enough to drink in the sight before him — the ethereal swaths of your veil now skirting the contours of your features, the downy lashes beaded with moisture, the trembling swell of your lips as the first stuttered shapes of sound begin forming upon them.

Your reciprocation is a hushed, halting stream of sounds that carry all the solemn gravity of prayers finally granted voice. Each syllable pitches forward, low and overflowing with the fevered weight of their reverence until they resonate through Charles’ bei by like physical sensations trailing electricity along his nerves.

“In the beginning, there was nothing,” you breathe, fingers flexing restlessly against the solid plate of his chest as you struggle to channel the turbulent swell of emotion cascading through every aspect of your existence. “An endless and lightless oblivion that should have terrified me ...”

A faint smile blooms across Charles’ features as he watches the story of a lifetime together play out in miniature across your expression.

“Yet it didn’t.” The syllables part on a whisper of revelation, a new wave of tears flickering in the gleam of your eyes as you find his gaze. “Because I knew you even then.”

[ruby-static]

Anyways. Arcade's dork-ass 'heh'.

[s-4pphics]

errr hi cont to this or whatever combating my depression with horny crazy lesbians with parental trauma goodbye again

—

Guilt festers in Ellie like hornets.

She hardly remembers the last time she’s seen you. The turbulence that roared within you for months had finally reached its peak, and it sent you crashing into a static-filled void — an unsettling tranquility. Whenever she’s home, you don’t say a word to her, fully committed to the bind that reinforces your lack of autonomy. But still, the house stays clean, dinner stays served, and Ellie stays guilty.

She can’t pinpoint for what exactly — her aggression towards you throughout your marriage, her ignorance to your suffering, for leaving you alone to wilt while she goes and lives her life like you don’t exist, like the weight of the band on her finger doesn’t snare whenever they dig inside someone else.

Divorce. Divorce…

If it ever occurs, both families will bury you, then Ellie, then each other, only leaving behind wasteful bundles of inheritance and homes with no name. But death… It has to be better than this crushing burden in her stomach. It has to be.

There’s water running. Right above where Ellie sits on the couch with a bouncing knee, fiddling with her wedding ring. Her heart thumps in her chest when the rush stops. You must be in the bath.

The thought should make Ellie flush and stutter; the image of her beloved wife bare and surrounded by bubbles from the neck down, scented with lavender and incense, soft as ever.

But she can only see you drowning. Breathing water into your lungs as you fight against your own will to survive. Your screams are loud beneath suffocation, battered as you…

Call out to her—

“Ellie.”

She flinches at your presence from behind, heart racing at the sight of you in your robe and dripping hair, somehow disheveled despite your cleanliness. Ellie swallows dryly when water drips down your neck and seeps into your gown’s collar. The tie is synched around your waist and your breasts are pushed together from its tightness and Ellie’s lost her mind because she shouldn’t be gawking like this. Her eyes fly back to the vacant windows that bring such torture.

“I ran your bath.”

You turn to leave without another glance, already up three— five steps before Ellie mutters,

“Thank you.”

She sees your shoulders stiffen, and she shifts uncomfortably where she sits. It might be the first time you’ve heard any verbal appreciation from her. From anyone, matter of fact. Ellie’s heart thrashes in her chest at the look you give over your shoulder: confused… and so, so tired. The emptiness within them sends her stomach into knots, churning up that treacherous feeling that makes her ill whenever she really looks at you.

But then you smile, soft lips curled around pearly teeth. Dark. Empty.

“Anything for my wife.”

The term of endearment is poisonous on your tongue. Small hairs on Ellie’s arms are upright and thrum with fear and embarrassment and… shockingly enough, something else. Something dirty and thoughtless. It’s the maroon robe. It has to be.

“Should I prep you for the bath, as well?”

Your tone is hateful. Mockingly so. Why does Ellie’s face burn? Why do her nails dig into the cushion beneath her? Why is her breathing so shaky? Why is her body so hot? Because of you, of all people, and you’ve barely spoken to each other. You hate her and she hates you so why why why.

Disgusted eyes rake over Ellie’s squirming form, and a smirk grows on your face.

“I’ll be upstairs.” Voice soft as a feather, but your feet are weighted with each stomp up the stairs.

Ellie can’t halt her fear for what waits for her in your bedroom. Fear has never made her thighs rub together this much.

—

Ellie’s in a fever dream.

You put something in her wine from earlier. She’s knocked out cold and this is all a fucked up, sadistic nightmare. The lavender scent that floats through the marble bathroom isn’t real, the candles that burn with cinnamon aren’t real, the last sizzles from the bathbomb melting into the water isn’t real, your hands aren’t… She can’t feel them. They’re definitely not real. Not where they gently massage her shoulders.

But they are. How fucked up is Ellie. It’s been all of two minutes and she’s already memorized your fingerprints through her button up. Nothing but guilt, guilt, guilt and fear and arousal that makes her more guilty. What sick game are you playing at. You’re so fucking sick.

“You’re so tense, wife… You really needed this bath, huh?”

Your nails sink into her shoulders and Ellie can almost feel your venom eating away at her bloodstream. Her toenails scrap against the tile through her socks. She won’t stop fiddling with her wedding ring. A sign of guilt. An act of nerves.

Your hands drag from her neck to her collarbones and she shivers whenever your nails rake through her. They reach the top button of her shirt. Each pop of a button sends aggressive rattles to Ellie’s ribcage.

Before your meddling fingers stop.

Her flushed chest rises with rapid breaths. Your eyes sear and they’re electric. Ellie’s heart stops when she realizes where your attention is.

A blotchy, ruby-red bruise sits right in between her breasts. The bite glows blue where it fades. It taunts you. Ellie can see it where your jaw clenches. Guilt guilt guilt guilt—

“Who gave you that?”

You sound so innocent. Her anxiety will peak in an instant.

“No one.”

Ellie gasps sharply when buttons clatter to the floor, angered hands ripping open her shirt, prying the fabric from her shoulders and letting it drop to the floor. She’s stiff as a board, unable to move, forbidding to combat your aggression. Why does she allow you to take?

“Who gave that to you?” You grit before reaching for her Louis Vuitton belt, pulling it from the loops and throwing it behind you. “Huh? A friend of mine? A family member? Someone I know?”

You smile like it excites you to know who wrecked your home. Who your wife abandoned you for, all for a fix — to exist outside of her body and not think about the world she despises. Ellie shakes her head. Why does she wish to appease you all of a sudden? She’s never cared; never hesitated to flaunt her lechery to you in the late hours of the night. Why now?

“How long ago? How gorgeous was she? Did she give you everything you desired—“

“Stop—“

“Maybe you should invite her over,” You suggest painfully, seductively while you treat her slacks with the same violence, “I’m sure our parents wouldn’t mind a third. More money, right? She’s rich, isn’t she?”

Your suggestion sends knives into her throat. Her hands clamp down onto your arms to get you off. To pull you closer. Fuck, fuck —

“Bring all your whores here, matter of fact!” You screech and fight against Ellie’s grip on your wrists. “I’ll let them fuck me with you if you want! I’m sure it’d please you, wife—“

Ellie nearly vomits when slick drips from her at the imagery; you completely engulfed by the pleasure you deserve for being such a good wife, fucked to peak after peak. Hands all over you, bruised to hell, stress-free. She’d give you that. Only she could give you that. No one else, fuck, just her—

She uses all her strength to shove you into the wall near the sink, ripping your hands from her pants and shoving them behind you, holding you still as you thrash and shout obscenities.

Her heart breaks when you release the loudest sobs she’s ever heard from you, and all she can do is apologize. Whisper calming words against your wet cheeks.

“Look at me, look at me, fuck, m’sorry—“

“Why me! What d-did I do to deserve this! Why — why —“

“I know, I’m sorry, I know I know—“

Ellie blows cool air all over your cheeks. Gentle brushes of wind that ice your boiling skin before your hollers turn to devastated whimpers. She watches you self-soothe, blows more air on your face, redirects your attention onto her.

“Look at me.” She says into your skin.

You whimper and shake your head, eyes downcast at her feet.

“Can you do that for me so we can talk?”

“I don’t wanna fucking talk to you.”

Ellie huffs a laugh at your insolence, “Fair, but I need you to calm down. Can we agree on that?”

“I didn’t drown you. That’s as calm as you’re gonna get.”

Ellie smiles sadly, “Also fair.”

“You’re fucking dead to me.”

“… Potty mouth.”

Ellie loosens her grip on your wrists when you shove her off you, head plopping onto the wall as you gaze at her, eyes filled with rage and possessiveness and lust. For once, your eyes mirror hers.

Your robe isn’t as tight after your fighting, a glimpse of a nipple peeking beneath the deep red cloth. She shouldn’t look, not when you're this vulnerable and hurt, but she can’t help it. She can’t explain it, but she wants you to see how hungry she is for you. So much guilt.

She doesn’t know how to love, to be kind, to dote like a wife should. She can’t do that with you. But she stares, gazes at you with territory. What she’d give to be all over you.

Her ogling pauses when you laugh to yourself, cheeks still glistening under the candlelight. Ellie frowns despite the butterflies in her stomach.

“You’re crazy.”

You don’t adjust your scattered dress, pushing yourself off the wall and into Ellie’s chest. You invade her senses like she wants; her body aches and shakes when your breasts touch hers. She can smell you. All you have to do is inch closer. Your noses almost touch. She just needs a bit more from you and you’ll have her. All to yours—

“Enjoy your bath…”

Your lips tickle hers,

“Ellie.”

Her teeth sink into her bottom lip when you vanish into the bedroom. She's never climbed in there with you, but she just might.

-

-

-

Ellie didn’t believe you when you said she was dead in your eyes, but now, she realizes you might’ve actually meant it. She assumed you to be a vessel of patriarchy, of status, of everything she loathes, but you’re unraveling before her eyes, inklings of your true self seeping through the cracks of your parents’ mold.

You might be just as vile as she is. You might even have her beat. You do want her dead.

What else can she think as she sinks lower into her bath to hide her shock, eyes glued to the glass dildo that still drips with your slick at the edge of the tub? Right next to your wedding ring.

How nasty would she be to use your cum as lube while she fucks herself in the shower? How gross would you be if you awoke from your slumber to watch her get off to you?

… Come to think of it, you both never consummated your marriage.

You deserve to wake up to something nice.

[redfoxwritesstuff]

Curiosity (Demon!Alastor x Reader)

CW: Sensory deprivation, established situationship, smut, porn with way too many feelings, love confessions. Rating: Adult Summary: Alastor overhears Angel Dust telling you about Val's latest thing- sensory deprivation. Curiosity wins out over sensibility.

You lay suspended in the air on a bed of magic, seeing nothing. You heard nothing but the faint undercurrent of static. Even the air was just right, still and warm. You waited, breath coming in nervous pants, for something to happen. Anything. 

Alastor had asked if you would indulge him in a curiosity and you, not having the faintest clue what you were in for, agreed. 

What you hadn’t expected was Angel Dust’s latest talks of his work to be what sparked Alastor’s curiosity. Now you were naked, in his pocket dimension and at his mercy. 

Your ears strained, trying to hear anything that would give away where your lover was. Before now, you hadn’t realized it was possible to feel the straining of your eyes, but you could. Desperately, you tried to look through the perfectly black cloth of your blindfold. 

All you could see was black. All you could feel was air. All you could hear was static. 

“Alastor?” Your voice didn’t even echo back to you. The void all around you swallowed it, like it swallowed everything. 

Your mind spun, struggling to cling to something. The moments leading up to your current situation played in front of your eyes, vivid. Too vivid. If you didn’t know better, you’d think you were watching it happen, a ghost of the future you as you and Alastor tangled together, lips and bodies clashing. 

He was eager, so uncharacteristically eager, to rip your clothes from your body. Panting breaths feel from your lips, only to be swallowed up by him as he pushed you deeper into the room. Wooden floors gave way to grass as you stumbled into the artificial bayou, naked as the day you were born. 

Hands ran over your breasts, pulling at your nipples. He caressed your folds, running his thigh between your legs before whispering into your ear the last thing you heard from him, “Do you trust me?”

The moment the confirmation of your trust left your lips, he shoved you back from him. Everything in the bayou changed, shifting in the blink of an eye. Then there was nothing. 

You were alone with no sounds, no sensations. There was nothing but your arousal. He left you like that, floating in a sea of nothing. Your mind raced, voice calling out to him, though you couldn’t even be sure he heard you when you couldn’t even hear it yourself. 

Water trickled down your face, wetting the blindfold. Confusion flooded through you for a moment. You clung to the wet sensation because it was something you could feel. It took forever, or perhaps no time at all, to realize the water was coming from your eyes. 

You were crying. 

Why? You were not sad. You were not scared. Well, a little, but not really. Alastor was there. You were safe. Alastor was there. Wasn’t he?

“Alastor?” 

Something ran up the inside of your thigh. Your body jerked, and you screamed, not that the sound of your voice carried anywhere at all. Something ran up your spread thighs. When had you spread them? 

“What’s that?” you gasped, unable to make sense of the sensation. 

Sharp something bloomed in the pebbled bud of your nipple. What was it? Pain? Pleasure? Teeth? Nails? Your body arched and pulled away, unsure which was the correct response. 

Static grew in your ears as the thing moved up your thighs. Something long and thin ran through your folds as you tried to understand what it was. Pleasure. That was the sensation you were feeling. 

It was so hard to identify. 

Soft somethings landed on your naked ribs, stinging blooming from each touch. Tremors ran through your body as you tried to place the touches. Kisses. Those were Alastor’s version of butterfly kisses. You called out to him again only for static to answer you. 

The thing between your legs worked its way into your opening as Alastor’s lips moved over the soft swell of your breast. If he was next to you, if he was running his wet tongue over your nipple, then the thing between your leg must be him too. 

His fingers, you realized as they moved inside you, stretching your opening wider. The pad of his thumb, it had to be his thumb, rubbed against your clit as his breath washed over you, sending gooseflesh across your skin. 

“Please,” you whispered, hips working into his hand. “Say something, Alastor.” 

You moved through space, or at least you thought you did. Your lover’s touches disappeared, leaving you with nothing but the memory of his touch, the lingering sting of his kisses and the wetness between your legs. 

“Alastor?” you called out, again and again for him, sobbing his name. “Please, Alastor. I need you. Please, please don’t leave me.” 

“I’m here,” he whispered into your ear, voice too loud and too soft somehow at the same time. You shuddered at how close he sounded. “Cher?” 

Your breaths came in shudders, body wanting to reach out to him but unable to be convinced to move. 

“Cher?” he asked again, hand resting on your ribs, grounding you in contact that felt overwhelming and yet you wanted nothing more to curl yourself around his hand. 

“I’m okay,” you whispered. “I’m okay. You’re here. It’s okay. We can keep going.” 

Alastor waited a few moments longer… or was it an eternity? Tears dripped from your face as his hand ran down your side as he made his way around your body. Large hands wrapped around your knees, pulling them up and out. 

You sat like that, feeling like eyes were on you from every direction, folds exposed and cunt spread open. Static. All you could hear was static. It danced off your nerves and filled your ears. Static.

You wanted to hear his voice. 

Something warm and rounded pressed into your folds. There was a moment of resistance, hardly a second, and then it was inside you. Thick fire passed through your walls, spreading you open on the thing until something pressed into your hips. 

“Alastor,” you sighed his name, voice broken with overwhelming desire. “Alastor.” 

Static. That was alright, you could feel him. There wasn’t a way it could not be him. You knew the way his cock felt buried in your body. You knew the way he twitched, the press of his head against your cervix.

Yet, you doubted what you felt, even as hips pressed into you. Something, a body, folded over yours as arms wrapped around your torso, pulling you up. Was it up? Your body went to his as stinging kisses peppered your neck. 

The hips pulled back, his cock pulling from your body in a drag that set nerves afire. You felt every ridge and vein of him in a way you never had before. Pleasure cut through your core with a knife’s edge, ripping through any other sensations. 

It burned in your blood as he thrust into you. Each slap of his body against your clit lit up your nerves like fireworks. No longer were you surrounded by nothing. Now it was him that surrounded you, static and teasing touches of his hands over skin. Breath washed over skin, filling your lungs with him. 

You were drowning in him. He was everything. He was your everything. 

“I love you,” you whispered, saying the words you had felt in your heart for far too long and been too scared to say. It didn’t matter, your voice didn’t go anywhere but into the void. You could say whatever you wanted, feel everything as he pushed his cock into you again and again, pace and pleasure building. 

“I love you,” you whispered again, not for his ears as he thrust into you. His hair brushed against your shoulder as he kissed your neck, more sensations in a sea of him. 

“I love you,” you sobbed the words, fear running through you. You feared the power of those words. They meant so much. They meant handing him something far more valuable than your soul. They meant handing him your heart. 

Did he want it? Would he take it? Were you nothing more than a body to him? Would he let you love him, anyway? Could he love you back? Would he?

“I love you.” Large wet tears ran down your cheeks as your arms found strength, hands finding his shoulders. You clung to him, grounding yourself in the feeling of touching him, not just being touched by him. 

“I love you.” It was a prayer on your lips as he worked himself in and out of your twitching opening. Your walls trembled, gripping him from the inside with the same strength as your arms around his shoulders. You took refuge in the feel of his chest pressed against yours, the feeling of his heart beating in his chest. 

“I love you,” you said, pleasure crashing through you in violent waves. It could have been painful, you didn’t know. All you knew was it stole the breath from your lungs. 

He swelled inside you, twitching as you ran your hands over him. Nails scratched over the short hairs at the back of his head as he sighed. Finally, another sound!

Each twitch of his cock inside you brushed his tip against your cervix. Soft hair, thick and almost fur like, slipped between your fingers. You could feel the shape of his skull, the way his ears, so well masked as hair rose above his head. 

“I love you,” you whispered as he twitched violently inside you. You could feel the way his cock moved, the force of it expanding ever so slightly in waves as he shot rope after rope of seed into you. Every pulse of his member, you felt in your core. 

Shadow dissolved from your face, letting the man, usually dripping in red to come into view. He was naked, pressed to you as he weakly thrust into your body. Two bodies moved through the void together, as one. 

The look on his face was one you had never seen before. You couldn’t read it. Instead of trying, you simply bathed in it along with the feeling of being surrounded by him. 

“I love you, too,” Alastor whispered as the void slowly returned to his bayou. 

Join us at VoxTek for a Vox themed Hazbin Discord where we talk Vox, Hazbin, writing, reading, art and who knows what else. You may even catch some exclusive sneak peeks at upcoming fics from some of your favorite writers including the first page of the next chapter of MisD a day early!!

[darlingdaisyfarm]

Please can you write something with Bill? 🥺 I would really like him in your writing style

✮⋆˙ twinkle twinkle little star (Bill Cipher x reader)

author note: hii, so this is my first time writing Bill Cipher (if we’re not counting smut LOL), so if he feels a little OOC, I’m so sorry in advance :((

“You’ve got no idea how small you are. A little ant, crawling on the rim of a soda can, thinking the universe stops where the metal curves. But you’re lucky, babe. You’ve got me to show you the truth.”

You never should’ve made that deal and you knew it.  

You should've known better than to trust him.

“Love” wasn’t the word for it.

At first, it felt. . .  flattering. Who wouldn’t be seduced by the idea of being special in the eyes of something so vast, so incomprehensible? But Bill wasn’t the type to love, not in the way you understood it. 

He didn’t love you, not the way humans did. Bill Cipher didn’t do love. You were his curiosity, obsession, a bright, burning light in his endless void. 

He called you his little star, but very soon it turned into his pretty, breakable toy. And you hated how the words made your skin prickle, how his attention felt like sunlight filtered through glass, so beautiful and searing, but dangerous if you stayed too long.

He never asked you to love him. That would imply some sort of equality, wouldn’t it? Something mutual, balanced, tender. No, Bill Cipher wasn’t a man or a demon. . . or a whatever he was, who traded in such mortal trivialities. Love? What even was that, anyway? A chemical spill in the brain? A pathetic excuse for self-destruction? Hilarious!

Instead of your love, Bill demanded your existence. Every breath, every thought, every fleeting moment of fear or fury or fascination, it all belonged to him, as surely as the stars belonged to the sky. And wasn’t that the whole point? To take something so ordinary, so inconsequential and remake it in his image?

Bill didn’t love you. He consumed you. 

He didn’t care about your happiness or well-being, but he cared about your essence and your potential. 

The stars were his obsession, and now you were too.

When he first spoke to you about the them, he said, “you humans love to romanticize the heavens, don’t you? Gazing up with your sad little eyes, dreaming of escape, like you’re anything more than dust stuck in a whirlpool. But you, sweetheart, you could be a star if you wanted.” 

And it sounded too tempting.

***

With fear and trepidation, you realised that you would like him to appear more often in your life. You felt lonely and empty without that singular eye which was so damn alive in ways human ones could never be. When Bill Cipher looked at you it felt as if the fabric of the universe peeled back, and for the first time, someone truly saw you.

“You’re different,” he whispered once and his voice sounded like molten gold. “They’re all rats in a maze, but you’ve got potential. You could shine, dear.”  and you believed him.

Maybe that’s why, when he first tore the sky apart and dragged you into a void of glittering stars, you didn’t scream.

Because Bill doesn’t show you space, he shoves you into it. 

It was fucked up, all of it. 

The way he could snap his fingers and peel the world apart like wallpaper, exposing the writhing void beneath it. Bill doesn’t do anything halfway. One moment you’re standing on Earth, listening to him wax poetic about infinity; the next, you’re drowning in the universe itself. 

“Look what I can do. Look what I’ve seen. And now, you get to see it too!” Bill said excitedly meanwhile all you could do was only stare, slack-jawed, as galaxies spun like pinwheels with their light painting you in hues of silver and violet.  

Bill’s laugh cuts through the silence like static on a dying radio. “Beautiful, isn’t it, dear? A front-row seat to the cosmic symphony! And guess what? You’re the lucky guest of honor!”

“Fuck,” you whispered in awe, not even daring to blink.

Bill laughed at you again. “Exactly, baby! Fuck! That’s the kind of reaction I’m talking about! Do you get it now? While all these other ants were busy bumping into walls, I saw this. This!”

His eye spun toward you, unblinking, watching you from head to toe. He watched you both worshipful and utterly unhinged because for him you were part of those infinite constellations he adored, he watched you like you were the only thing that mattered in a universe of infinite distractions.

“You could be one too. A star.” Cipher spoke.

You didn’t ask what he meant back then, only laughed. “Stars burn out, Bill.”  

“Yeah, but they make one hell of a show first.” 

But how sad that stars didn’t just shine, they exploded.

***

It wasn’t all chaos and destruction, not at first. There were soft and tender nights, when the storm of his mind calmed just enough to let the starlight through.

Bill Cipher didn’t have lips to kiss, but he had power and he wielded it for you when he felt like it.

One of the clearest proofs of his power was that night by the lake.

You remember it, the night the moons danced just for you. 

Bill hated water, loathed its constraints, its rules, but he was levitating beside you anyway, watching as you waded deeper. You floated on your back, staring up at the night sky, feeling the silence, enjoying it. His eye gleamed in the darkness, lighting you up, taking you in like a masterpiece he didn’t know how to ruin just yet, but there was unusual softness in his voice when he snapped his fingers. 

And the moons, now two of them, impossibly large, swelled and glowed with light. And then the lake shimmered, the ripples reflected the radiance until it looked as though you were swimming through liquid silver, no. . . melted pearls in their beauty.

And it took your breath away.

“You like it?” he asked in a casual tone. “I can make it brighter, if you want. Or darker. Or gone.” 

And as if reading your mind, Bill snapped his fingers once more and the two moons shone even brighter.

“Better now, right? It’s for you, sweetie,” he said, leaning on his cane. “The moon, the stars. . . hell, the universe.”

You hated how beautiful it was. How much it felt like it was for you. But back then, you felt loved. Or at least, something close enough to it.  

***

Bill was everywhere. In your mind, in your shadow, in the air you breathed.

But love with Bill was never meant to be gentle, it meant to be a trap. A game played in his favor, in which you were destined to lose. It started small, quiet, too quiet to notice and react, his words cutting deeper, his charm was imbued with a poison. He didn’t just want you near; he wanted to own you, to reshape you in his image, to pull you apart until there was nothing left but the star he claimed to see in you.

He didn’t just want your attention, he demanded it, craved it with a desperation that was feral. And when you tried to push back, tried to claim even the smallest piece of yourself, he didn’t take it well.

One night, after you’d dared to argue with him, to tell him no, he burned with a rage that lit up the sky. His form glowed red, large, his voice so loud and low that made the ground tremble beneath your feet.

“You think you can defy me? You think you can just walk away? Newsflash, sweetheart: you’re mine. You’ve always been mine. And you’re not going anywhere.”

He grew restless. Obsession turned to cruelty. When he spoke, it was no longer about the stars you could see, but the ones he wanted you to become. His anger was cosmic, vast and unrelenting, and it terrified you.

“You’re wasting yourself here,” he snarled one day, his triangular form flashing red again as he hovered above you. “These people, this place, they’re nothing. I could make you mor—”  

“W-what are you even talking about, Bill?” you spat, though your voice trembled. “I’m human, Bill. I can’t—”  

“Bullshit! You can. You just won’t. And that’s what makes you pathetic. You think you can leave me? Do you even know what I’ve done for you? What I’ve shown you?”

You stared at him, trembling, but still defiant. “You’ve shown me a prison with a prettier view.”

And Cipher only laughed. “Prison? Sweetheart, I’ve given you the fucking stars! You’d be nothing without me. Nothing.” if he had a mouth, it’d be that disgusting crazy wide grin.

You wanted to run. But how do you run from someone who can rewrite the very ground beneath your feet?

***

You remember the terror of Weirdmageddon because you were at the center of it all. Not by choice, never by choice, but because that’s what he wanted. And what Bill Cipher wanted, he took.

But when it was over, when the Pines family managed the impossible, when Bill was defeated, erased from Stanley’s mind, when they unraveled Bill’s madness, tore him apart, and your world snapped back into place, the silence felt. . . deafening. 

You didn’t see Bill fall, not directly, but you felt it, you knew it was over, the sudden, aching silence where his presence used to be.  

The world felt smaller without him, quieter, duller. And you hated yourself for noticing.

You should’ve been relieved.

But instead, you stood in the ashes of his world, staring up at a sky, at the empty space where his chaos had once burned so brightly.

You didn’t cry. You didn’t laugh. 

And you remembered the stars. But Bill taught you that stars were always meant to burn out.

You remembered the way his voice softened when he talked about them, how excited and happy he sounded, the way he’d show you galaxies as if they were flowers he’d plucked just for you. You remembered the way he watched you, like you were the only thing in all of creation that mattered.

Even now, after his fall, you hope he remembers the galaxies. . . or if he’s just another forgotten star, lost to the void.

And you wondered if, somewhere, in some forgotten corner of the universe, he remembered and saw stars too.

[kettlefire]

DP x DC Death Train edition

Bruce awoke with a start, eyes sweeping his surroundings to reveal a train. A train filled with three other members of the Justice league. All in civilian clothing.

Clark Kent. Barry Allen. Oliver Queen.

His first action was to attempt to wake the three heroes, all attempts failing miserably. Next order was try to figure out where they were and why.

The sight outside the windows was a deep, dark void. No light or shapes among the darkness. An ominious feeling grew stronger the longer he stared into the empty void.

He then worked to check the cargo holds above him. All of which were stuck shut and closed.

He quickly shifted his focus to the two doors on either side of the train cart. He had absolutely nothing on him that could be helpfully. Still dressed in the Pj pants and a shirt he had gone to bed in.

He moved to the one he thought might lead towards the front of the train. Giving a quick glance towards he's sleep comrades before making his choice.

The second cart was completely empty. The cargo hold was just as seal as the others.

He moved swiftly towards the next cart, softly cracking open the door and peering in.

This one wasn't empty.

Instead there stood a terrified man. Pale skin covered head to toe in tattoos and piercings. An impressive handle bar mustache paired with a bald head and leather jacket.

He wasn't the main focus though. Instead it was the shadow being that stood before him. The dark shape was humanoid, however it seemed to wisp and shift around the ends.

The being itself looked more ominous then terrifiying, but there seemed to be a recognition in the man's eyes.

"Please, please, I'm begging you! I'm sorry, if I had a choice I would never have done the things I did!"

The man's deep voice raised in octaves as the being took a step closer. He took a step back, pressing into the seat behind him.

Bruce barely refrain a flinch as a strange static noise left the being, seeming to echo in the empty air.

"No! No, that wasn't on me. You don't know the full story! Just hear me out, you'll understand, and-"

The man's pleas were cut short as the static sound filled the air again, this time louder. Sounding more hostile.

"No, she was asking for it! Please, look, I know what it looks like but-"

The being seemed to have enough of his pleas, pressing a dark, twisted hand onto the man's shoulder.

Bruce watched with wide eyes and baited breath as the man seemed to melt before his eyes. Screams filled the still area as the man's skin bubbled and dripped.

Starting at his legs and rising up with every second that passed. There was no flame. No reason for his skin to bubble and peel away from him.

In almost a blink an eye, the man was nothing more than a scorched puddle on the ground. Bruce quietly worked to move back into the prior cart, trying to close the small gap he made as quiet as possible.

The shadow being barely moved, but Bruce swore he felt eyes on him. It was looking straight at him. It knew he was there, there was no doubt in his mind.

Throwing caution to the wind, Bruce clicked the door closed and made a fast retreat back where he came.

Glancing over his shoulder to see nothing but the empty space. If that being wanted him dead, there was no doubt in his mind it wouldn't be hard to do.

Not in this state. Not when he had no clue what they were dealing with.

When he flung the door back to his original cart open, he almost ran straight into a sturdy chest.

Clark. He was awake. A quick glance around confirmed that everyone else was as well.

Bruce gave them a quick rundown of what he knew, shifting from Bruce Wayne billionaire to Bruce Wayne Justice League member.

After a brief debate on what to do, the team settled for moving the over way. The further from that thing they could get, the better their chances.

All hope relying on the being not being able to teleport between carts.

They catiously moved their way into the other carts. The others just as empty as the one he was in prior. Every cargo hold sealed shut, not even Superman's strength could pull them open.

Abilities didn't seem to work past the carts walls. Clark could only hear the heart beat of those around him, but nothing further passed the doors. X-ray vision was of no help, either.

It wasn't until their third cart that they ran into someone else. A shocked teenage boy staring back at them from the ground. Wide blue eyes and tossled black hair.

"You aren't supposed to be here." The teen mumbled, taking in the new crowd of four. "How-How did you get here?"

[mimimarvelingmarvel]

time bound part seven

pairing: worst wolverine!logan howlett x f!mutant!reader

Part Seven - Masterlist

summary: Y/n’s life takes a dramatic turn when the Time Variance Authority intervenes, pulling her from a critical moment in her timeline. The TVA sends her to the void where she eventually meets with Deadpool and a very familiar face. With Deadpool's universe in the balance, alongside his reluctant would-be pal, Wolverine, and the enigmatic time-bending mutant known as the Veil, the trio must complete the mission and save Deadpool’s world from an existential threat.

overall warnings: 18+, Fem!Reader, AFAB Reader, Use of Y/N, Her X-Men name is Veil, She/her pronouns, Swearing, Angst, Heavy Violence, Character Death, Deadpool (he’s his own warning), Hurt, Fluff, Angst, Eventual Smut, Slow Burn, TVA

word count: 2k

The road stretches out before us, a seemingly endless ribbon of asphalt cutting through the desolate landscape. The car, a beat-up old muscle car with a purring engine that speaks of too many miles and too many battles, rumbles beneath us. The seats are worn, their once-plush leather now cracked and faded, much like the people riding in them. The air inside is stale, carrying the faint scent of gasoline and sweat, mingled with the metallic tang of blood that seems to cling to everything we touch.

I lean back, my body sinking into the seat as I close my eyes, trying to find a moment of respite. The gentle vibration of the road beneath the tires lulls me into a light, uneasy doze. But it’s not enough—never enough—to ward off the nightmares that wait just beyond the veil of sleep. Images of my world, my friends, everything I’ve ever known, shattered and dying, claw at the edges of my consciousness. The sounds of their screams, the scent of burning flesh, it all lingers, just out of reach, waiting to pounce the moment I let my guard down.

When I open my eyes again, the car is still moving, the road still stretching endlessly ahead. The world outside is a blur, the trees we’ve been driving in continue on for ages, but I can tell we’re close. Inside, the only sound is the soft strains of music playing from the car’s ancient radio, a static-laced tune that feels like a ghost from a time long past. It’s quiet—too quiet—yet I cling to this moment of calm like it’s the only thing keeping me tethered to reality.

“You enjoy your power nap, pumpkin?” Wade’s voice slices through the quiet, shattering the fragile peace I’d managed to find. The nickname, as ridiculous as it is, grates on my nerves. I groan, my eyes fluttering shut again, hoping to block him out.

“It was so peaceful before you opened your mouth,” I mumble, my voice thick with irritation. There’s a part of me that just wants to hold onto the silence, to bask in it a little longer before reality comes crashing back in.

Wade’s gaze meets mine in the rearview mirror, his expression playful, as if he’s completely oblivious to the tension simmering beneath the surface. “I don’t hear Logan complaining.” 

Logan, sitting stoically beside Wade, rolls his eyes. The subtle gesture, the way his knuckles whiten as he grips the steering wheel, tells me more than words ever could. I chuckle softly, a hollow sound that barely covers the unease gnawing at my insides. 

Then, as if he’s compelled to break the fragile truce, Wade blurts out, “Okay, I’m just gonna ask it. What’s with the suit?”

My gaze drifts to Logan, to the yellow X-Men suit he’s wearing. It’s a jarring sight, one that doesn’t fit the image I have of him—rugged, battle-worn, but never in something so bright, so out of place in this bleak world. The realization hits me hard: I’ve never seen him wear it before.

“The first thing I did when I flamed out, I took mine off,” Wade continues, his tone light, almost mocking, but there’s a sharpness beneath it that makes my skin prickle.

Logan’s response is immediate, his voice low and edged with warning. “Drop it.”

But Wade, relentless as ever, presses on. “It’s not that ugly.”

“Stop talking about the suit,” Logan snaps, his irritation growing palpable in the confined space of the car.

Wade, ever oblivious to danger or perhaps simply indifferent to it, persists. “Did you make it yourself? Been there.”

Logan’s tone darkens, a growl rumbling in his chest. “Quit now.”

But Wade doesn’t quit. He never does. “The X-Men make you wear it? Those sons of fucking bitches. They are not your friends, I’ll tell you that. Friends don’t let friends leave the house looking like they fight crime for the Los Angeles Rams.”

The words hang in the air, and I feel the tension coiling tighter, a noose around my throat. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to block out the mention of friends—our friends—who are no longer here, no longer anything but ghosts in a broken world.

“Shut the fuck up about the suit,” Logan’s voice is a razor, slicing through the air. It’s ice-cold, and for a moment, I flinch at the intensity of it.

Wade raises his hands in mock surrender, but there’s a seriousness to his tone that wasn’t there before. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Watch your frown lines, angel baby. I’m just trying to bond a little bit.”

“Yeah, well then talk about something else,” Logan’s patience is fraying, each word a thread pulled taut, ready to snap.

“Fine.” Wade’s voice shifts, losing its edge. “If they can fix your world, what’s the first thing you’re gonna do when you get out of here? Rubbing alcohol shots? Maybe a wiper fluid chaser?”

The word “If” lodges itself in my mind like a splinter, unraveling the fragile grip I have on my emotions. My ears start ringing, and suddenly, I’m not in the car anymore. The world blurs, and I see it—Wade, punching Logan in the face. The vision is jarring, disorienting, and then, just as quickly, I’m yanked back to the present.

“What did you say?” Logan’s voice is sharp, pulling me out of the haze, grounding me in the here and now.

Wade, his confusion plain, repeats himself. “So when you get back, what’s the first thing you’re gonna do?”

“No, no, no, before that,” Logan insists, his eyes narrowing, his suspicion flaring.

Wade hesitates, and I can see the moment he realizes his mistake. “If… they can fix your world?”

Logan’s expression hardens, anger and betrayal flashing in his eyes. Without warning, he slams on the brakes, the car screeching to a halt. The sudden stop jolts me forward, but it’s the look on Logan’s face that makes my heart skip a beat. “What do you mean if?”

“I mean…” Wade falters, his bravado crumbling as he struggles to find the right words.

Logan’s voice is a dangerous growl, the kind that makes your blood run cold. “You lied to me. You don’t have a fucking clue if they can help me fix things, do you?”

“No, I mean… No, fuck! Fuck!” Wade stammers, but it’s too late. The truth is out, and Logan’s claws are already extending, a deadly promise in his eyes. Before Wade can react, Logan stabs him in the leg.

Wade yelps, the pain clear in his voice. “I didn’t lie!”

“You lied,” Logan hisses, his voice as cold as the steel in his hands.

I sit in the back, overwhelmed by a tidal wave of guilt and the crushing realization that there’s no undoing what’s already been done. I could have stopped this. I should have stopped this. But it’s too late now—too late to change anything.

Wade, his tone desperate, tries to explain. “No, I made an educated wish. Because I need you.” He pulls out a photo, his hands shaking slightly as he holds it out for Logan to see. “This, this is why. Right here. Because if we don’t do something, they die. I don’t know anything about saving worlds. Why would I even care? Because my entire world is right here in this picture. It’s only nine people, and I have no idea how to save it alone. I know how to fuck people up for money, but you, you know how to save them. At least the other Wolverine did.”

Wade’s voice cracks, a rare moment of vulnerability slipping through his usual bravado. “Oh, fuck!” Logan twists his wrist. “I guess I’m stuck with the worst one.”

Logan’s eyes narrow, his anger simmering just beneath the surface. “Did you say you made an educated fucking wish?”

“They call me the Merc with the Mouth,” Wade tries to regain his usual humor, but it falls flat. “They don’t call me Truthful Timmy, the blowjob queen of Saskatoon.”

Logan’s hand twitches, his control slipping. “One more,” he demands, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. “Please, give me one.”

Wade, ever the joker, tries to lighten the mood. “Gubernatorial.”

But Logan is beyond reason now. He goes to stab Wade again, but Wade screams, the sound tearing through the car, reverberating off the walls of my mind. I’m sitting in the back, too shocked to move, too numb to process what’s happening. There’s no saving what I’ve done. No changing the hurt I could have stopped.

Logan turns to Wade, his voice dripping with contempt, his words a knife twisting in the wound. “You know what, you’re a fucking joke. No wonder the Avengers didn’t take you. Or the X-Men—they’ll take fucking anyone. I mean, you are a ridiculous, immature, half-wit moron. I have never met a sadder, more attention-starved, jabbering little prick in my entire life. And that says a lot because I’ve been alive for more than 200 fucking years. I’ll tell ya, that bald chick was right. You will never save the world. You couldn’t even save a relationship with a goddamn stripper. Motherfucker, I wish I could say you’d die alone, but it’s one of God’s best jokes that you can’t die, except that’s on all of us!” He slams his fist on the top of the car, the metal groaning under the force, and I flinch, my heart skipping a beat. The tension in the air is so thick it feels like it’s suffocating me, wrapping around my throat and squeezing until I can hardly breathe.

Logan stares at him, his eyes filled with a mix of pity and disgust. “You got nothing to say, Mouth?”

Wade flinches, the words cutting deeper than any blade ever could. His usual bravado crumbles, and for a moment, he looks like a lost child, the weight of everything finally breaking through the armor he’s built around himself. He looks away, his eyes dull, and when he speaks, his voice is barely a whisper. “I’m gonna fight you now.”

Logan chuckles darkly, the sound devoid of humor, and I feel my stomach churn, the dread pooling in the pit of my gut. The vision hits me again—flashes of blood, violence, and something far worse waiting just beyond the edges of my mind. My hands start to tremble, and I know I can’t stay in the car. I push the door open and step out, the cool air hitting my face like a slap. My legs feel like jelly, but I force myself to move, taking a few shaky steps away from the car.

Behind me, the fight erupts with a sudden, violent force. The car jolts as their bodies slam against it, and I hear the sickening sound of flesh hitting flesh, the wet splatter of blood as it sprays across the ground. The smell of iron fills the air, sharp and acrid, mixing with the earthy scent of the forest. My stomach turns, and I barely manage to keep myself upright as I stagger over to a tree and collapse against it, sliding down until I’m sitting on the ground.

I curl up, hugging my knees to my chest, trying to block out the sounds of their fight, the horrible, animalistic grunts and growls that seem to echo in my head. But it’s no use. The vision is getting stronger, more vivid. Bright, flashing lights sear across my mind, and I hear a scream ripping through the vision—a scream that’s mine, raw and terrified.

And then, as if the world itself is breaking apart, there’s a loud crash. Logan is shot through the front window of the car, his body flying through the air before crashing to the ground with a bone-jarring thud. He rolls past me, his body leaving a trail of blood in the dirt. I tuck my legs closer, curling into a tighter ball, trying to protect myself from the onslaught of sensations that are threatening to tear me apart.

The vision crescendos, a blinding storm of light and sound, and then, just as suddenly as it began, everything goes dark. There’s nothing left—no sound, no pain, no fear. Just an endless, consuming void.

Next Part

A/N: I’m so tired, I need sleep updates will probs be slow.

taglist: @oscarissac2099 @somiaw @100percentlazybonez @obsessedwthdilfs @sun7lowxr @corvid007