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petit-etoile · 1 year ago

Note

Oh oh I have an AU I haven't had the chance to write anything for. It's pre-vampirism magistrate Astarion and criminal tav who is incredibly well-versed in law. They keep committing crimes and getting caught in purpose just to see Astarion who fucking hates their guts because he can't ever convict them of anything bc they find loopholes and somehow manage to evade the law. It's an "at each other's throats" kinda romance and they kiss with teeth between cases

darling, if you love me say it back

pairing . ⊱ astarion x tav wordcount . ⊱ 3,604 content warnings . ⊱ canon compliant temporary character death, tav isn't a human but can be whatever else you like, astarion isn't a vampire yet, tav is gender neutral other tags . ⊱ canon compliant, canon temporary character death, introspection, p.orn without plot, oral s/ex, desk s.ex, inappropriate use of a cravat, c.reampie archiveofourown . ⊱ here.

taglist . ⊱ @azrielshadows1nger, @pandimoostuff, @faevi, @microskies, @foreverthemaraudersera, @queenofthespacesquids, @claryvoyantfray, @6doodlaang14, @anne-isnotokay, @itshimbotime, @yeeteth-the-raven, @sessils,@8-opossums, @worryknotdear, @abirdaboxandachippedcup, @ghosts-and-ink, @b4um3pfl4um3, @gunslingerorchid, @hypopxia, @m0ssytrees, @erysione, @odette-attackattack, @catching-fire-in-the-wind, @ashrio20, @wills-mental-illness, @queenofcarrotflowers-s, @kirahlene be added . ⊱ here .

summary . ⊱ The Magistrate Judge Astarion Ancunin has a soft spot for you. You like to exploit that fact.

‘I need to see you in my office,’ Astarion hisses — and the tips of his ears are so red you think they might catch flame. He grabs you by the elbow roughly and tugs. ‘Now.’

‘Let’s do it, baby,’ you say smugly. ‘I know the law.’

Knowing the law might be an overstatement. You have studied the law for only one purpose, and that purpose you know like the back of your hand. So when Astarion presses you, you don’t argue. You do as the magistrate says and allow yourself to be dragged across the court. He admonishes you like one would get onto a dog who misbehaves. You can’t help but laugh.

It isn’t like Astarion isn’t a super serious magistrate with a focus on criminal prosecution. He wants to nail you for your sins, for your crimes. The only catch is that no matter how amazing Astarion is at his job, you’re simply better. If you’ve stolen something, you’re more than capable of hiding the evidence. If you’ve murdered someone, you know all the best ways to hide a body. It comes naturally.

Astarion is wearing that ever familiar frown as he marches through the elegant halls. It’s a frown that says you’re in trouble and there’s nothing that I can do. But that isn’t necessarily true. Astarion will do anything you ask so long as you ask nicely, and you’ve been getting good at asking nicely lately. He prides himself in training you even if it isn’t that simple. He calls it rehabilitation. You call it sex.

‘You can’t keep doing this, you know,’ Astarion snaps at you. ‘At some point you must give it up!’

He isn’t good at whispering when he’s riled up. He runs his free hand through his curls in anger, pushing them away from his face like his bangs being wild make it hard to think. It makes him more attractive.

‘You don’t mean that,’ you say with a shrug.

‘I do,’ he says, ‘very much mean that.’

You grin. ‘You would miss me,’ you tell him lasciviously, and he groans. ‘I know you would.’

He huffs. ‘The only thing that I would miss is the peace after the headache you’ve given me. It’s as though you aren’t even aware of how vexing you are.’

You laugh, and the fine line of Astarion’s temper snaps. He all but throws you in his office and locks it behind him. He’s annoyed with the way you stagger dramatically to one of the velvet couches before his desk. You lean over the arm and kick your feet up.

‘Does the idea of cuffs around my wrists excite you?’

You look over your shoulder. Astarion clenches his jaw. It must hurt to frown as hard as he is. You pull yourself onto the cushions and sit demurely. You study him. His rigid lines, tense gaze. He comes and sits on the edge of his desk, pressing his forehead into his hands as if that will relieve him of his headache. You’re determined to make it worse.

‘I apologize,’ you say sweetly. ‘I’ll behave from now on.’

‘We both know that you are not capable of behaving,’ Astarion says thinly.

He shouldn’t have said that. You can’t help yourself, but most of the time, Astarion makes it so easy for you to dig into his weaknesses and exploit them. You stare at him with wide, innocent eyes.

‘You should teach me,’ you suggest.

Astarion’s patience snaps. ‘I beg your pardon? Have some decorum, please!’

‘Having decorum is so boring,’ you say, pouting. ‘Life is much more fun when you live freely.’

‘And committing crimes is your definition of living freely?’

‘What is the point of living if not to live?’ you ask. ‘Why confine myself to rules of good or bad when I can choose what makes me happy.’

‘What exactly makes a criminal like you happy?’ Astarion asks bitterly.

You’ve always been possessed by a sense of otherness. You rise from the couch and carefully twist your fingers in his cravat, tangling yourself in him as he has become entangled in you. The Silverymoon lace tickles your skin. You pull Astarion closer and he begrudgingly caves to your strength. Your lips barely brush against his and already you can sense it. The barely contained restraint. The hunger. Astarion longs for you. He’s carefully hidden it beneath the scent of bergamot.

Slowly, you slide him free of what pressures him most. The cravat slides from his neck easily. It excites Astarion. His eyes glitter like you’ve never seen before. Being a magistrate isn’t about caring about the laws he’s vowed to uphold. It’s about power. You give it to him. You hold your wrists together with a wicked grin.

You balance the fabric on your fingers. Astarion swallows. Being proper isn’t really his thing. It’s thrilling to watch as he changes his mind. You annoy him — he detests you, wishes you gone. You are the object of all his improper late night dreams.

But as if he’s moving through water, he takes his cravat from your hands. You almost think it’s going to be a rejection. Astarion bundles your wrists together with an expertise that suggests he’s done it before. The binding becomes tight but not too tight and you relish in the way it twists your wrists. He fastens the knot into a pretty bow.

And then he kisses you. He grabs you so roughly by the back of the neck that your teeth slam together, but Astarion sighs so prettily against your mouth you decide you could withstand anything.

It’s a passionate kiss made up of teeth and spit and tongue. Astarion is both pushing you and pulling you. He can’t make up his mind. Does he want you and the stain you’ll bring to his reputation? A magistrate with a weakness for a criminal is such an interesting dynamic, but Astarion is a proud man. You are almost certain he would throw you into harm’s way if a situation ever occurred that deemed it necessary. You would do the same given the chance. This is simply a tryst.

You like to pretend it is, at least. You hate coming across as a romantic. You chase a freedom so exquisite no one will ever understand it, but when Astarion pushes you towards the couch, you don’t complain. You fall across the cushions with ease and catch him as he falls between your thighs.

‘You,’ Astarion accuses hotly, ‘are an irrevocable annoyance I may never be cured of.’

‘You are so very frank in all the ways you despise me,’ you say, moaning softly as he kisses your neck. ‘I think you’re capable of being freed after all.’

‘I am glad to see you are finally aware that it is hate that drives me,’ Astarion murmurs thickly. ‘It repulses me that you think you could possibly be endearing.’

You laugh and Astarion sucks a bruise into your collarbone. He’ll pretend to be aloof and noncommittal to your very presence, but he’s invested. You can feel the weight of his pleasure against your thighs even as he denies his feelings for you. Astarion doesn’t bother with your shirt or his own. He clings to your waist as he finds the lace of your breeches and tugs you free.

Astarion pushes his hand inside of your smallclothes and touches your flushed skin, spreading his fingers so that he can touch every inch your body has to offer. The fervor of the motion is what causes you to gasp. He’s a man on a mission, and he touches you at your core so adoringly it makes the bite of his words all but disappear. He fondles you like he’s never touched your skin before. Your gasp turns to a sultry whine, and he bites your neck like a punishment. You almost think he’s going to admonish you, that he’ll say your silence is worth more. He doesn’t. If anything, the echo of your voice spurns him to go further.

Astarion presses two fingers inside of you and the laughter dies in your chest. He’s trying to rearrange you through a perverse method. If he fucks you good enough, crime’s appeal will turn to dust within your mind. It makes you wonder what it would be like to dote on a magistrate. Would it be enough? Could it be enough? Sinning feels just as sweet.

He curls his fingers against your core and your back arches prettily off the velvet cushions. You bite your bottom lip and try to quell the pining, but then you catch a glimpse of him from beneath your eyelashes. Astarion is watching your every move. His lips are parted. His pupils are dilated. His cheeks have colored at the sound of your voice. He is torn between watching your face for your reactions and glancing down at his hand underneath your breeches. You meet his gaze bravely, chin lifting, and smile.

He adds another just to watch you struggle. The angle, the curve of his wrist, and the situation are enough to make your thighs squeeze together, but Astarion doesn’t let you. He roughly throws himself between your legs so that you can’t, and it’s hot, too hot that you cry weakly. He grins at the sound like he always does, like he always will. It’s his victory this evening.

But as quickly as Astarion deigned to touch you, he releases you. He stands up and drags you by the wrists, turning his cheek the other way when you try to taste his skin.

‘The prosecutor is ineffectual — ’

You snort without meaning to, and Astarion digs his fingers into the swell of your hip. You allow him to maneuver you, bending at the waist while he presses you forward, chest against the chilled wood of his desk. You have to rise on your toes to stand comfortably.

‘Is that what you’re thinking about?’ you ask breathlessly.

‘I’m thinking about the necessary reform,’ Astarion snaps.

You press your cheek into the wood and stare at his door. The prosecutor, the defense. It doesn’t really matter, does it? Astarion is the only one who cares. You’re somewhat glad he does. It means he’s taken your case to interest, and when he presses himself to your lower back, you’re excited. He shoves your breeches to your ankles.

‘Are you going to take me here?’ you murmur. ‘On your desk. Where is your propriety?’

‘You dare speak to me of decency?’ Astarion snorts.

‘The weight of my sins will be forever embedded on your desk,’ you say. ‘You flatter me, your honor.’

‘Do you ever stop talking?’ Astarion asks. You can hear his patience snapping.

‘Well, you’re just so boring,’ you say, laughing. ‘Why don’t you do something that — ’

Astarion kneels down behind you and shoves his way between your legs. You shiver when he presses his lips against your core. He mouths at you hungrily. He grunts low in the back of his throat and digs his nails into your thighs. It steals your breath away. He’s so determined to change the very essence of your being that his tongue and mouth searching where his fingers first were makes you go weak in the knees. You whine.

You press your fingers into the dark, rich mahogany of his desk and try to keep focus. You want to taunt him. You want to tease him, but that wanton desire is almost forgotten entirely by the way Astarion feasts upon your flesh. He parts you with his thumbs and groans against your skin and you almost forget who you are. This is what he wanted. He wanted to pull your desires from you and replace them with his own.

You let him. He works you up as easily as anyone can be worked up, his fingers and his mouth exploring every inch of your skin that’s exposed. He goes to slide a finger in curiously, but you twist your hips away. Astarion is all work and no play. He will tease you relentlessly as it suits him, and he will do what interests him. You interest him more than he’s willing to confess. That’s why he works so hard for your pleasure.

When he’s done with you, he kisses the base of your spine soothingly. Your legs tremble beneath you. Astarion smooths his hand across your hip. You glance at him.

‘Perhaps I can fuck some sense into you now,’ Astarion mumbles.

He has the audacity to sound inquisitive. It’s not like it’s possible, but he seems determined enough to try it out regardless of his intuition. His hands are warm against your skin, and the excitement only builds in the pit of your stomach as you feel Astarion’s skin touch yours. You hear his clothes rustle and his breath catch in his throat. You hide a smile against your arm.

When Astarion slides into your core, it’s like a possession. The breath steals from your lungs. His touch is a familiar constant — you would recognize him anywhere by scent alone. You cry weakly. Your toes crunch from the angle, but there’s nothing you want more at this moment than to learn to be good.

Astarion hums behind you as well, his fingers digging into your hips as he tries to steady himself. The desk crunches uncomfortably against your belly but it’s a welcome pain. It keeps you focused. You still have the energy to wiggle back against him as his cock slowly pushes in until there is no more room left to explore.

‘Be good,’ he whispers, ‘and I will give you what you deserve.’

What do you deserve exactly?

It’s hard to say. You enjoy your life of crime almost as much as you love the way Astarion bends you over his desk. You’re good at stealing, you’re good at killing, but you’re good at being soft and pliant as well, giving in to that sentimentality that keeps you coming back from more.

At first it was an elaborate game. What could you do to ensure that Magistrate Judge Astarion Ancunin looked your way? He was a noble elf, and your hands were covered in fresh dough from the baker you stole from. There was a curious glint in his eyes when he looked over you, yet somehow the gods had deemed the yeast and honey on your fingers was not honest enough to be proof.

You are smitten. You bounce taller on your toes with every aggressive thrust, arms struggling to support your weight. Astarion fists his fingers into your hair and pulls until your throat is exposed. He wants you to sing for him, so you do. You arch your back and moan loudly. The sounds of it bounce around his little office.

‘You wouldn’t shut up before,’ Astarion says breathlessly, a hoarse laugh.

‘Do something — worth talking about — ’

Astarions laughs incredulously, but he does fuck you harder for it. He releases your hair without much flourish and focuses on dragging your hips back onto his cock, punching forward so hard you see stars. It’s wonderful, it’s powerful. If Astarion’s entire goal was to make you forsake the world, he’s done a good job of turning your life around. The cravat rubs against your wrists as you try to seek purchase on the desk. Your fingers drag across the polished wood, and you shudder as you clench down around his cock.

You sound so breathless and silly, groaning while he fucks you against his desk. He fills you full until you’re certain you can take no more. You press a hot cheek against the wood and try to catch your breath. You hook a foot around his ankle for support, twisting on his desk. You tuck your arms beneath your chest. You feel as though you’re coming undone. All your years of villainy, and it comes undone by the consistency of Astarion’s presence.

Your arms are stiff from constantly being up, but you’re almost grateful when Astarion pauses. He helps you turn on top of his desk so you’re on your back instead, and even though the edge digs into your lower back, you prefer that to anything else.

You meet Astarion’s gaze. He tells you he hates you, that he wishes you were out of his hair, that he despises you, but the gentleness of his eyes tells you otherwise. He slides back into you with a small moan, and you wrap your legs around his hips to guide him in further.

‘It’s good,’ you gasp. ‘It’s good, you’re good — ’

Astarion doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t have to. You can see it clear as day in his eyes. Astarion won’t say he loves you, that in his ardent fervor he seeks you out, but he knows that you know. Why else would fate lead you back together? You reach for his face with your hands, and his eyes flutter closed to avoid the wistfulness. He leans into your touch.

You cry softly as Astarion begins to grind into you again. He helps carry you as he does so. And it feels so good, feels so overwhelming that you briefly consider the fact that he has changed you for the better.

A spirit that slides into your very marrow. Astarion is hauntingly beautiful, and if he is a spider then you are a fly tangled in his web. He calls you a pretty thing and you give into the struggle. You press your wrists against your forehead and strain against his cock, unable to hide from the waves of crashing pleasure.

Astarion finishes inside of you with a low moan. He presses a rough hand against your belly to stabilize himself, and shyly, you touch his wrist with your bound hands just to feel his pulse. As soon as he’s caught his breath, he releases you from your bonds.

You almost miss him when he pulls away from you. He uses one of his hanging cassocks to clean himself with and is kind enough to do the same for you. You’re almost certain that your legs won’t work, so you sit up on his desk to rest and damn his paperwork to the hells. You kick off your breeches from around your ankles and sit, legs crossed, while Astarion tries to fix his reflection in the mirror.

‘You are truly an astute teacher,’ you say casually. ‘The art of lockpicking is all but gone from my mind. Thank you, your honor.’

Astarion snorts and shakes his head, torn between ignoring you and giving into your wiles. He curls his hair back into place and then walks back to you, leaning forward until you’re nose to nose.

You think he won’t kiss you, but then he does. His lips taste like summer oranges and you taste him until it’s the only thing you can think of. He hugs you tenderly. It isn’t the same as when he admonishes you. It makes your chest feel warm. You almost feel weaker for it. Your bite is being taken away.

‘I can’t keep protecting you,’ Astarion says softly against your cheek. ‘You torment me day and night. When I lie down in my sheets, I find myself consumed with worry.’

‘You think about me?’ you tease. ‘In your sprawling manse?’

‘Move in with me,’ he murmurs. ‘Then you can be inferior yet vain inside my sprawling manse.’

Astarion is not there that evening. You try to wait as long as you can without seeming suspicious. There are maids, family members, and their admirers who come inside and out throughout the evening — but not Astarion, never Astarion. You wait until the sun sets and fireflies light up the streets of the Upper City but eventually, the malaise of abandonment guides your feet away. You walk the streets aimlessly until a shiver runs down your spine. A chill so violent turns you away from the courthouse.

But in the morning, there’s a fuss. It draws you back into where you left and you can’t help but to lose yourself. Astarion is dead. His mother sobs. The members of the city watch who bear the bad news look equally as morose. Astarin’s father nearly falls to his knees in despair.

When you break into their manse that evening, you look for one thing. You steal a cravat from his wardrobe and tie it around your neck.

Then, you leave Baldur’s Gate.

You aren’t sure where your feet are going to take you.

Part of your yearns for the Underdark. Baldur’s Gate is a cursed city, you decide. You wander back to it after two hundred years of avoiding it like the plague, and not an hour within the city are you spirited away on an adventure you never longed for.

You have changed. You can’t really remember who you were all those years ago, or the hopefulness you might have felt in your chest once. You’re different now. A folk hero. You used to steal from the rich and give to the poor before the mindflayers fed you their parasite and stole that part of you. But you aren’t alone this time. You wander the beach for hours searching for anything that can be of use and pause over a love letter that makes you sob.

It isn’t all bad. You meet a half-elf who scowls as much as she mumbles to herself.

On the other side of the beach, you meet a ghost.

His eyes are different from what you remember. The warmth he once looked upon you with is gone and replaced by unfamiliar sanguine.

#astarion #astarion ancunin #astarion bg3 #astarion x tav #astarion x reader #astarion x you #astarion x oc #astarion smut #bg3 smut #from ，carcosa .#my fic #hyliandreso #you know i hit the prompt square on & then threw in a plot twist #is it really a carcosa fic if there isn't a plot twist somewhere #* say what you want，even if it's bad

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heizlut · 1 year ago

Text

Jealousy (part 1)

"Can you write about Aether, Gorou, Kazuha and Albedo getting jealous because the reader is not paying attention to them (like is busy that day and didn’t have time to be with them)?" (anon ask/answer)

a/n: so i kind of added a little twist to the prompt... i hope you don't mind, anon! (any extra character mentioned has a purely platonic relationship with reader with no hidden agenda, i promise!!)

cw: none! this drabble is sfw but is suggestive

tags: multiple chars x reader (separate), possessive!aether (he gets his own tag b/c he gets a lil mean with it), gn!reader, no specific pronouns used (just they/them), use of y/n (plz forgive me), not really proofread (r.i.p)

read part 2 here!

check out my masterlist here!

Aether~

You and Aether almost always took commissions together, but today was different. Kaeya had approached you personally with the hope that you would accompany him on his business trip Sumeru that he took on to help relieve Jean of some of her workload. What fully convinced you to accept was that Kaeya had told you to consider it more as a vacation with just a touch of business on the side. You happily accepted, excited to have a break and being able to spend it with someone you considered a close friend. Caught up in the excitement, you failed to let Katheryne know to tell Aether that you would be gone for awhile.

Imagine Aether's surprise when he ends up on a commission in Sumeru a day later and sees you with Kaeya at one of the taverns. Your laughter rings in his ears as though Kaeya had just said the funniest thing in the world. Aether finds himself becoming frustrated... no, jealous. Not only had you failed to let him know you would be travelling to Sumeru for who knows how long, you were also there with Kaeya. He made his way over to where you both sat, taking the seat right next to before even greeting either of you. Your eyes widen as you realize the mistake you had made when you had forgotten to inform him of where you were going and with who.

Before you can even apologize, Aether has a fake smile plastered on his face, but you're quick to notice how his jaw is tensed as he places a hand on your thigh under the table, giving it a harsh squeeze to let you know how he really felt, "Y/n and Kaeya, funny seeing you two here." The tone of his voice was saccharine and you shift a little nervously in your seat, only making Aether dig his fingers into the plushness of your thigh even more. Kaeya is quick to notice but chooses not to say anything about it, "Well hello, traveller. What brings you all the way here to Sumeru?" Aether holds that fake smile on his face as he tells Kaeya about the commission he was on and how it was oh so interesting that he couldn't find his lover who would normally accompany him. You look at Aether, a glint of possessiveness in his eyes as he steals a glance at you before looking back to Kaeya. "Apologies for whisking them away for a day. I simply wanted some familiar company around as I completed some business here", Kaeya offers a small smile. Aether hums in response, "Well then apologies for cutting this trip a bit short. I'm sure any remaining business you have here can be done without y/n" Kaeya nods in understanding, "You're quite right. Well then, I suppose I'll see you two when I return back to Mondstadt. Safe travels!" He stands up, excusing himself as he walks off toward the docks of Port Ormos. You seem to let out a breath you didn't even know you were holding as you turn to look at your jealous lover, "Aether... I'm so sorry." Aether simply tucks a strand of your hair behind your ear, "Don't worry. You can always make it up to me."

Gorou~

Gorou was already not the biggest fan of Heizou, especially now that you were spending the day with him, having stated that you were helping him with a new case that had caught your own personal interest. It was already nearing sundown when you still had yet to return and Gorou excuses himself from the other soldiers chatting with him, now on a mission to find you and bring you back home, away from that sneaky detective. As soon as he makes his way towards the entrance of the camp, Gorou hears the sweet sound of your voice. He almost breathes out a sigh of relief only for it to get caught in his throat when he hears his own name fall from Heizou's lips in a comment that Gorou couldn't quite pick up from this distance. His ears press flat against his head as he makes his way towards both of you, moving as if he's about to enter into a battle. You smile sweetly when you finally spot your lover, beginning to raise your hand up in a wave. But your smile flaters slightly when you see a look of anger and.. was that jealousy in his eyes? Heizou pays no mind to the demeanor of the approaching general, offering his typical sly smile, "Why hello there, General Gorou~"

Gorou fights back the growl that's trying to claw its way from deep in his chest as finally stands in front of you both. He grabs your chin, turning your head at various angles as if he was inspecting you for anything amiss. When he sees that you're perfectly fine, he tilts your head up to look at him, a stern expression on his face, "I think your time spent with that detective is over." Heizou dramatically feins offense, "Oh, so now I'm just 'that detective'? I'm wounded." Gorou shoots him a glare but your sweet voice draws his attention back to you. You reach up to gently caress his cheek, looking at him so sweetly, "Gorou, I'm fine. There's no need to be so hostile. I'm sorry I was away all day. We just got caught up on so many new leads we both lost track of the time." Gorou's expression softens slightly at your words, realizing that he's gotten all worked up over something that really shouldn't bother him as much as it does. He lets go of your chin, letting out a heavy sigh as he wraps on arm around your waist, pulling you away from the detective, "S-sorry... Let's just head back to the tent now, yeah?" You let him pull you alongside him as Heizou watches you both walk away with a shit-eating grin on his face, having been quite entertained by Gorou's antics.

Kazuha~

Kazuha doesn't get jealous easily. He has always been such a laid back lover and felt secure with his relationship with you. However, you had spent almost your entire day with Thoma making sweaters for the cute little strays around Inazuma. He knows it's really such a silly thing to be jealous over, especially when you were simply helping Thoma care for the animals that most definitely deserved the love and care you both showed them. But what truly drove him to jealousy was that you seemed to have forgotten that you two had previously made plans to spend the next couple of days together before he had to board Beidou's ship that was heading for Liyue.

Kazuha did not want to interrupt you two, but the moment that Thoma had offered to knit you both matching sweaters, he felt the need to butt in. Neither you nor Thoma noticed Kazuha approaching, so of course you let out a small gasp when he came up behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist while pressing a kiss to your cheek, "Hello, my dove. Have you been having fun today?" Kazuha was definitely making it well known that you were his and his alone. "Kazuha! I-", you stop yourself, your mouth falling open slightly when you realize that you had forgotten about your previously made plans with him. "Oh archons, Kaz, I am so so sorry. I completely forgot-", Kazuha cuts you off this time as he puts his fingers under your chin, tilting your head back just enough for him to press a deep kiss to your lips. Thoma stands there a bit dumbfounded as he watches the scene before him, a blush creeping onto his cheeks when he quickly clears his throat awkwardly, "I-i'll just get going now. I'll see you around, y/n." Kazuha hides his satisfied smirk by nuzzling into your neck.

Albedo~

Albedo hadn't seen you all day and after one of his most prized theories ended up falling apart, all he wanted to do was hold you and let his frustrations melt away. When he got back to his lab up in Dragonspine after being at the Knights of Favonius HQ all day, he expected you to be curled up reading a book with a thick blanket wrapped around your shoulders as you usually would. His soft smile faltered when he realizes that you are not there. He pauses for a moment when he sees a note left on one of his alchemy tables. Picking it up, he recognizes your handwriting instantly, 'Albedo, I am out helping Aether and Diluc over at Angel's Share. I am unsure of when I'll return, but I will do my best to be back before it gets to be too late in the evening♡'

Albedo has never quite understood human emotions, so when this strange feeling emerged and made his chest tighten, he wasn't exactly sure what it meant. Why did you have to spend the day with those two, especially the traveller? While he considered Aether to be a friend, Aether was still a traveller from another world with a mysterious aura about him, leading Albedo to wonder if he could be completely trusted. He found himself making his way back down Dragonspine and into Angel's Share. There he found you happily chatting away with the two men as you helped them organize the various crates of wine in the back. Diluc was the first to notice Albedo's presence, "Albedo, I never expected to see you here in Angel's Share. What brings you here this evening?" Albedo forces a slight polite smile onto his face, "Y/n, here left a note to tell me they were here with you and the traveller" His eyes meet yours, but there is a darker glint to them that you had never seen in your lover's eyes before especially when Aether's hand brushed against yours as he helped you set down a particularly heavy crate of wine.

Aether can't help the blush on his face as he mutters an apology to which you smile sweetly in return, letting him know it was okay. No, it most certainly wasn't okay, Albedo thinks to himself as the feeling in his chest begins to nag at him even more. He swiftly moves to your side, wrapping an arm around your waist and holding your hand in his free one, moving it up to his lips as he presses a kiss to the top of it, "Love, I think it is time for us both to head back. It is quite late after all." His tone sounded sincere but had a hint of bitterness to it. You simply nod your head, letting your lover lead you out, but you don't fail to notice the cheeky smile he flashes back at the other two men as he raises his hand in a wave, "Have a nice evening."

a/n: i went a little feral writing these… clearly

#genshin smut #aether smut #gorou smut #kazuha smut #albedo smut #aether x reader #gorou x reader #kazuha x reader #albedo x reader

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holylulusworld · 3 months ago

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Caught Cold - Alternative Version (2)

Summary: Something goes wrong on your latest mission.

Ship/Main Pairing: Alpha!Bucky Barnes x Omega!Reader

Read the alternative version here: Caught Cold.

Major Tags/Triggers/Warnings: a/b/o, a/b/o dynamics, mentions of sex pollen, fluff, awkwardness

Catch up here: Caught Cold - Alternative version

The flight back to the tower is excruciatingly awkward. No one looks your way, and no one dares to say a word. Usually, you’d celebrate a successful mission, or crack not-funny jokes.

It’s bad enough that Bucky lost control and mated you like a wild animal. Tony and Steve walking in on you was the worst-case scenario.

How can you forget that two of the men you admire the most watched you and their friend mate?

“So—” Steve clears his throat. He tries to find the right words to apologize for not stopping his friend from mating you. “I’m sorry about the problems with the earpieces, Agent. I didn’t hear you called for backup.”

You snort. A broken earpiece is the least of your problems. You just had unprotected sex with your supervisor, and he claimed you. All the while he was under the influence of a strange toxin.

“Sex pollen, a hell of a ride, huh?” Tony cackles watching you and Bucky stare on the ground. Heat creeps into your cheeks remembering the way you were writhing on Bucky’s cock. “So…are we having a Buckethead baby soon?”

“First and final warning, Stark,” Bucky lifts his head to glare at Tony. He’s ashamed of his doings and hates himself for being unable to fight the sex pollen. “She went through enough.”

“You mean she ended up impaled on your—” Tony ends up on the ground, his cheek swollen and bruised. “What the fuck!”

“I told you,” Bucky raises his fist again, a not-so-silent threat, “stop making things worse for Y/N. It’s all my fault. If you want to make fun of someone, look for a better target. Leave my omega alone!”

You whimper when Bucky roughly takes off his jacket to wrap it around your shoulders. He looks you all over, clumsily patting your hair before he sits next to you.

His scent and the warmth of his jacket calm you. You close your eyes and inhale his scent deeply. If only you didn’t drop the vial with the pollen. Everything has changed, and you don’t know what will happen now.

Can you still be an agent? Will Bucky force you into submission? What if he rejects you now? He claimed you while being high on sex pollen. There is nothing you can do if he decides to break the bond.

“Everything is going to be alright,” Bucky suddenly takes your hand to hold it in his hands. “We will talk about everything after we land.”

“Young love,” Tony snickers. His cheek is swollen, but he didn’t lose his sense of humor. “Huh, Capsicle. Why don’t you grab a dose of sex pollen yourself?”

“Tony, that’s not funny,” Steve grunts. “Why would I want to use this devious toxin to force myself on an omega?”

Bucky flinches at Steve’s words. He feels guilt gnawing at his soul. Today, he added another sin to his long list.

“He didn’t force himself on me,” you murmur and lean your head against Bucky’s shoulder. "The sex pollen would’ve killed him. We had sex to help him survive. Live with it.” You glare at Tony. He opens his mouth but snaps it shut.

“We are about to land in fifteen,” Bruce calls from the pilot seat. He didn’t dare to ask what happened in the abandoned building. The sharp man didn’t have to ask. “Please fasten your seatbelt.”

You laugh at Bruce's seriousness. This whole situation feels surreal.

Who would have thought you’d end up with Bucky’s claiming mark?

“Uh—this is the bedroom, and there is the bathroom,” Bucky explains while guiding you around his apartment at the tower. You don’t tell him that his place is similar to yours. “There’s a kitchenette and you already saw the living room.”

“Don’t get me wrong, but why are you showing me your place?” You wrinkle your forehead.

“You’re my omega, and we will move in together.” He nods to himself before placing his on the small of your back to lead you back into the living room. “If we decide to have pups, we can have a bigger home. A house maybe.”

“Whoa, slow down,” you twirl around to place your hands on his chest. For a moment you allow yourself to feel Bucky up. Hands running over his chest you look at Bucky, really look at him. “We—we…”

“We mated,” he ends your line. “You’re my omega, and I will be a good alpha and take care of you. I claimed you.”

“The drugs…the sex pollen,” you sigh when he places his index finger on your lips to silence you.

“It doesn’t matter, Y/N,” Bucky murmurs. “You know that you’re meant to be mine.” He dips his head to steal a kiss. He whispers your name and wraps his arms around you. “Steve will help me get your things. You can get comfortable while we bring everything here.”

“You’re working fast.”

He grins. “I do.” Bucky wiggles his eyebrows. “This way I tamed a cocky omega and made her mine.”

“Dream on,” you giggle, relieved Bucky doesn’t regret his claim.

“Oh, daydreaming is over,” he purrs low in his throat. “I got the real thing now…”

“I’m still unsure this was the right thing to do.” Bruce shakes his head at Steve. “What if he regrets his claim one day?”

“Bucky was pining over her for months. I had to force him to make a move before that new agent got the chance to ask her out,” Steve casually says while deleting the footage of your latest mission. “He wanted to claim her, and Y/N wanted Bucky to become her alpha. We did nothing wrong…”

“You only made her believe she dropped a vial with sex pollen when in truth you rubbed it into Bucky’s tactical suit.”

“The end justifies the means,” Steve says before walking away.

Tags in reblog.

#bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x you #alpha!bucky barnes #a/b/o #bucky barnes fanfiction #a/b/o dynamics

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artists-ally · 1 year ago

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{Flatline} OFC x Harvey Specter {Pt. 1}

I got the title from this song called Flatline by Jared Benjamin. I added it to this playlist of very Harvey Specter vibes if you'd like to listen. There will be multiple parts, around three so be sure to stick around for those. As always comment and tell me what you think, or pop by in my asks. Anyhoo enjoy my loves!

Word count ~ 10,619 (it is a very fast paced read I promise)

Warnings ~ Age gap, smut (18+), handjob, no real BDSM but Dom/Sub concepts, language, alcohol, anxiety/anxious thoughts, probably really inaccurate lawyer terms idk man.

Summary: Harvey has taken notice of the hardest working first year associate, Claudia Martin. Despite being petrified of the infamous closer, she tried her hardest to not let it get the best of her. Harvey has a few ideas on how to increase her confidence.

Tagging : @maxdamax @ashcosmo @rosedpetal (This is basically just dedicated to you three so I hope you enjoy it the most!)

~~~~~

“Alright, everybody stop,” Harvey announced. I put down my file and sat ramrod straight in my seat, eyes darting at the other associates as they put theirs away too. “We have been working on this case now for four hours and no one has brought me a single thing that I can use as evidence. Now, if someone doesn’t put a file in my hand in the next ten minutes, we’re going to lose. And those of you who don’t want to get stuck doing whatever bullshit Louis is going to punish you with, you better come up with something fast.”

I looked at the blue file in my hands, heart hammering in my chest as I saw Harvey leave out of the corner of my eye. With a deep breath, I pushed up out of my chair and followed after him.

Circling around the office a few times, I made up reasons and excuses not to go see him. It was stupid, I knew that, but I didn’t want to bring him something and then immediately be called an idiot for bringing him shit he already knew.

I saw how he treated Mike. And Louis. Even Donna from time to time.

There were two things you did in this world: die, and respect Harvey Specter. As a first year associate in this god awful firm, you didn’t dare break his trust or waste his time.

“Is Mr. Specter available for a moment?” I asked Donna. I hadn’t talked to her much, but I’ve heard her speak to Harvey a few times around the office. She was someone I wished I knew better, someone I wished I could ask for help, but I didn’t want to bother her either.

“Yeah, he’s in his office going over the statements from the mock trial,” Donna smiled, pointing over her shoulder. I nodded, willing my feet to move in the direction of his office. I knocked before pushing the glass door opening, keeping my head down.

“Claudia, now is really not a good-” “I have something for you,” we spoke at the same time. “I’m sorry to interrupt, I can come back and-” “Is that for the mock trial?” He asked, and I nodded. “Hand it over.”

I placed the file in his outstretched hand as he came around to sit on the corner of the desk. My hands were trembling with dread as his eyes raked over the words on the page. The lines in his forehead creased, eyes narrowing.

“Claudia, this is brilliant,” he had a very confused expression when his eyes met mine. “Where did you find this?”

“Well, I figured if Mrs. Thompson said that she didn’t pay her rent that month, because there wasn't money in her account, then there had to be some kind of a trail. Some clue. There was, but it was only an amount, and it didn’t say which account it came from. When I did some digging, I found out that she uses Capital One banking and when I looked at her bank statement-

“There was a draw for the exact amount that Mr. Saros used to bet on that game,” Harvey finished before I could get the words out of my mouth. “Claudia, this is genius. Come on, we’ve got a case to win.”

____

“...Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this compelling evidence reveals that Mr. Saros was in fact fraudulent and used his ex- wife’s funds to continue gambling. Thank you.” Harvey closed the argument, taking a seat besides Donna, who represented the client. Jessica looked to the opposing counsel as if to say ‘do you have anything?’. Louis had nothing. Not a sliver of hope.

“Then it is decided, Mr. Saros will be charged with a misdemeanor and face a prison sentence of one year in county jail.”

With a crack of the gavel, the case was over, and applause rang through the office for Harvey and his team. I had a tiny smile on my face as I left the conference room to go back to the bullpen. There was an endless stack of reports to run, motions to file… it never ended when it came to Louis. And now that I was on the winning team I’m sure that-

“Claudia, where are you going?” Harvey called out.

“Oh, I was just going back to my desk. Why, is there something that you need?” God I hope he didn’t need anything. I was sweating bullets by just standing next to him.

“I just wanted to congratulate you on your first win,” he gave a small smirk. His brown eyes were sharp, but not as intense as they usually were.

I flushed, “Well, it’s not really a real case.”

“No, it’s not. But seeing what you did today, how would you like one of your own?” He extended a blue file back to me, a stack of papers covered inside. I could feel the gaze of the other associates on me as I hesitantly took the file.

“Mr. Spector, I’m honored, but I’m not-”

“Yes you are,” he cut me off. I bit my tongue. “You are a lawyer, Claudia. And you clearly have an outside the box approach to your tactics which we don’t see very often. I haven’t seen someone able to compile and order evidence like you since Mike came to work for me a decade ago. I’ll be supervising your case, you report to me with any questions you might have, but otherwise this is all you.”

My first case… given to me by Harvey Specter himself.

“I don’t know what to say,” I whispered. I flipped through the file, seeing that this wasn’t just some pro-bono case. This was against a big time client and the SEC. The SEC meant Sean Cayhill, who, from my understanding, was already on the rocks with this firm and has been for a very long time.

“You can thank me when you win it,” he extended his hand, and I shook it, hoping that they weren’t sweaty. “Look over the file tonight and come ready to swing tomorrow morning.”

Harvey’s hand was warm, and significantly larger than mine. Everything about him was bigger than I was, especially his ego. And his personality. Lord help me…

My nod was the only confirmation that I would meet him there. As he walked out, I met some of the eyes of the associates and they scowled at me. At the file in my hand. At the fact that I hadn’t said a word the whole meeting today and then came up with the winning piece of evidence. And now I was working alongside Harvey.

The infamous closer at Pearson-Specter-Litt.

____

“Claudia, what’s wrong?” Donna startled me so bad I dropped my coffee on the floor with a shout. “Something’s really wrong.”

“Oh, it’s just you Donna,” I sighed in relief. I could feel the coffee seeping into my shirt and chilling against my skin. “Great.”

“What has you so skittish?” She asked, worry gracing her features.

I didn’t want to admit that it was because of Harvey and the fact that I had to work alongside him on this case. I hadn’t been able to sleep much last night because I was up thinking about him, wondering how he’d handle this case himself. What he would do, how he would do it. Sure, I admired the guy, how could I not? He was a perfectionist and always found a way. I wish I had half the confidence he did.

“It’s Harvey, isn’t it?”

“How did you know that? Nevermind, you’re Donna. But… Yes it’s because of Harvey.”

“Did he say something to you yesterday after you guys won the mock trial? I saw he handed you a case file, what was it all about?” “That's precisely what’s wrong,” I groaned, bending over and picking up the dropped paper cup. “He gave me a case of my own as a 'thank you' for finding the evidence that won the trial yesterday. I’m terrified of him, Donna. I-I don’t know how to act around someone with that kind of personality. He is so abrasive and forward and harsh and-”

“A total jackass?” She finished for me.

I chuckled nervously, “I’m afraid to even think of that word in association with his name. I mean, how am I supposed to work alongside someone that intense? Plus, I’m a first year associate, how am I supposed to compete with what he as to offer and-”

“Hey, it’s okay. No need to get yourself all worked up, Claudia. Harvey is a lot of bark, and only some bite.” “That doesn’t make me feel better.”

“What I’m trying to say is that there is some heart inside that cold dead chest of his,” she smiled, a genuine, friendly smile. “For what it’s worth, I’ve never seen him give someone a case after a mock trial. Not even Mike. Up until yesterday I’m not even sure he knew you existed.” “Wish it was still that way,” I rolled my eyes, folding my arms against my chest.

“Claudia, listen to me. Yes, Harvey can be rude and obnoxious, but he is the best damn attorney in the state of New York. He didn’t get to the top by being nice and sweet. He was impressed with your willingness to bring him the evidence yourself. Now he knows he can count on you to get things done in a pinch when he needs them.” “I had that evidence for an hour,” I emphasized. “I was trying to build up the courage to give it to him long before he came and ripped us to shreds for not having anything. I just didn’t want him to think that it was a stupid idea or to be in a bad mood and turn me away because I definitely wouldn’t have done it at all after that. I don’t know how to deal with someone like him, Donna. What am I supposed to do? I should just give the case to Griffin or Thomas-”

“No no no. You are definitely not going to do that. That will only show Harvey that you aren’t serious about becoming a lawyer.”

“I am serious about becoming a lawyer.” I was mildly offended that she’d even say that to me. “Of course I want to be a lawyer, it's all I’ve ever wanted.”

“And Harvey will only know that if you work on this case with him.”

I inhaled and exhaled, leaning my head back and looking at the ceiling. “Fine.” “That’s my girl,” she grinned. “Now, come on. I have an extra dress you can borrow because I am sure as hell not letting you walk around covered in coffee stains.”

“I appreciate it, but I don’t think what you have will fit me.” Donna jerked her head over her shoulder and I followed to a closet in the back of the file room. When she opened it, it was like a full blown wardrobe. There were dresses and shoes and purses and hair supplies lining the walls. “Woah…” “Don’t ever underestimate the power of Donna,” she winked before rummaging through the office closet.

After searching for a few moments, she pulled out a lovely royal blue dress that was, as she hinted at, a perfect size for me. How she knew that it would fit, I’ll never know. But I did know that I wouldn’t ever underestimate the power of Donna ever again. She’s magical.

“Now, what do you say?”

“Thanks, Donna,” I smiled sweetly.

“Actually I was looking for ‘you are an ethereal goddess who makes all my dreams and wishes come true’ but that works too,” I knew she was teasing, and I gave her a small shove of her shoulder. “Go get dressed, come back here and let me do your hair.”

“What’s wrong with the way it is?” I turned to look in the mirror on the back of the door and grimaced. “Oh…” My messy curls from yesterday looked more like a rat wrapped around a bunch of fishing line.

“Hurry up, Harvey will be back soon and I want you in that office, file in hand, ready to go when he gets here.”

I quickly shuffled to the bathroom and changed into the form fitting, very Donna-style dress. It didn’t look half bad, and I actually somewhat tolerated the dress. Normally I’d find a pants suit far more flattering and business appropriate than a dress, strictly because of the over sexualized nature of women's business clothing.

I hate the corporate world.

I did one more glance in the mirror before heading back to the break room to grab the file. I must’ve set it on the counter while I was pouring my coffee. Hopefully it wasn’t ruined.

There was no blue file on the counter. Or the table. Or on top of the microwave or the fridge. I even checked inside the microwave. Nothing. It was nowhere. Oh shit.

“Do you want curls or for me to straighten-” “It’s gone,” there was a clear panic in my voice. “The file, it’s not in the break room, Donna. It’s gone.”

“How can it be gone?”

“I-I don’t- I don’t know I thought I set it on the counter while I was getting coffee and it’s not there.” I felt a cold sweat break out onto my skin. My forehead was damp to the touch.

“Okay, take a deep breath. Let’s go look again and then check your desk. Maybe someone found it and put it there, or maybe left it with me or Gretchen. It didn’t grow a pair of legs and walk away, we’ll find it.”

“I’m gonna get fired,” my voice was almost a silent whisper, tears building behind my eyes, prickling my nose. “Donna, Harvey is going to kill me.”

“Worst comes to worst we get a new file, Harvey will never know.”

“No no no he will because he had notes of his own on the papers in there.” “Shit,” she swore. “Let’s just go look.”

We speed walked through the bullpen, earning some odd looks as we practically sprinted through the office. She checked the break room for me again, and I went to my cubicle. Nothing, not a blue folder anywhere to be seen.

Donna came up empty handed in the break room, checking with Gretchen on her way by Louis’s office. We met at her desk. Nothing.

“Fuck fuck fuck this is bad.” My hands were shaking, heart thundering against my ribs. I felt faint, like I could’ve fallen to the floor at any moment. “Donna, what am I gonna do?”

“Maybe somebody mistook it as their own file,” Donna blurted out after a moment of silence. She took off towards the bullpen and I followed after her, right on her heels. She marched through there, unapologetic as she invaded the other associates' work spaces.

Still nothing. No blue file labeled ‘Devlyn Inc. Vs. Fulton Dynamics’.

“Where the hell could it be?” She murmured to herself.

“What are you guys looking for?” An associate, Benson, asked.

“Oh, you know, a leprechaun pissing pieces of gold,” Donna’s voice was full of sarcasm. “Claudia set down a file in the break room for three minutes and forty-two seconds and now it’s mysteriously disappeared. Know anything about it?”

“No,” he pressed his lips together. “Not really.” “Not really?”

“There are a million case files floating around this office, you really expect me to pay attention to every single one and where it’s going?” “As an associate of this firm, yes, actually. I do. Now I want to know if you know who took her file and I want to know right now. You have one chance to tell the truth, otherwise the bottom of my stiletto and your ass are gonna be great friends.”

Benson swallowed, “I truly don’t know. I’m sorry, I can keep an eye out for it. Is it the one Harvey gave Claudia yesterday?”

“Yes, and he needs it in twenty minutes,” Donna said, an undeniable urgency in her voice. “If you find it, do the right thing and give it back or so help me god you will find yourself jobless faster than you can get down on your knees and beg me to let you keep it.”

Donna beckoned me for her to follow and I did, my heart sinking and sinking into my stomach. It had to be around here somewhere. It had to be.

I did another lap around, rummaging through all the drawers in the desk and thensome. Still nowhere. How could I be so stupid? So irresponsible? This is exactly why I didn’t want to take this case in the first place.

Despite all Harvey and Donna said the other day, I’m not ready to be a lawyer. Not really, anyway. I know I have my license and I’ve passed the Bar. I’ve done all the hard work, but this was… this was hell. A living nightmare. Not only was this firm constantly on the verge of collapsing, but it seemed like I made new enemies every other week by simply doing my job quickly, quietly, and efficiently.

I don’t know how or why I piss everyone off all the time. I just do my work, I quite literally don’t bother another soul in this building unless I have to. Occasionally I’d ask Donna a question that she could ask Harvey or Mike to see what they thought about it. I’d never speak to them directly, just through her which didn’t make me feel good, either.

I’d eat by myself, working through my meal. It took me two months of being here to finally use the break room because I was too nervous about taking the last tea bag or power bar from the cabinet. I just took a disposable coffee cup and filled it with tap water. And then kept that cup because I didn’t want to take the others because I figured other people needed them for coffee and I didn’t want them to be all gone-

“Claudia,” Donna interrupted my mild panic. “Harvey wants to see you.”

Oh no… no no no not yet god please not yet. I swallowed, or tried to at least; there was no moisture in my mouth whatsoever. I stood, knees trembling as I smoothed out the skirt of my dress.

Before I went on, she ran a brush through my hair, taking out the knots. It lay sleek and flat against my shoulders, a major difference from the low bun I always kept it in. My hair always made me so hot; I never understood how anyone could get anything done with it swaying in their face all day.

I could see him in his office, eyes staring us down as we rounded the corner. His gaze was locked on me and I felt my body tighten and constrict around a breath. Harvey was sitting on the corner of his desk, fingers toying with the cufflink on his left wrist..

“Hey, look at me,” Donna spoke softly, hands coming to my shoulders. “Give Harvey the truth, and nothing but. He will understand, if not, I will make him.”

I nodded.

When I pushed open his glass door, tension was thick in the air. My palms were clammy, still shaking. My mind was going a million miles a second.

“What can I do for you, Mr. Specter?” I asked, trying to keep my cool despite almost throwing up.

“Please tell me you have some good news about the case that I gave you,” he sighed, pushing off the desk and standing in front of me.

Welp… here goes my career.

“Actually, Mr. Specter there is something I need to-”

“You were looking for me, Harvey?” I whipped my head over my shoulder, seeing Griffin knocking on the door.

“Yes, Griffin come on please, shut the door as well.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, sir. I can come back and we can discuss the details of-”

“No, Claudia. Stay for a moment,” Harvey gave a firm nod, full attention slipping from me to my fellow associate. “Griffin, I see you have something for me.”

“Yes,” Griffin threw a wicked grin at me before handing over a blue file. I could feel the sick rise in my throat. That was my blue file. “I would just like to go over the details of my case with you to get your input.”

“Your case?” Harvey questioned, sharing a glance between me and Griffin. “Where did you get this? Who the hell gave you a case?”

“That’s not important. I was hoping we could actually-”

“No,” Harvey cut him off. “It’s very important, actually. Because I can recall that just last night this exact file, with my handwriting, was in Claudia’s hands. So whatever act you’re putting on, I suggest you cut the bullshit right now.” “Okay I found it in the breakroom,” Griffin rolled his eyes. “Maybe if she were a little more responsible, which she clearly isn’t because she left her documents in a public space, then she’d be more equipped to handle a real case. Like a real lawyer should.”

I could see the muscle in Harvey’s jaw clench and contract several times.

“Claudia, care to explain how our case got in this thief’s hands?” “Thief?” “I had spilled coffee,” I started, taking a deep breath when Griffin cut me a gaze so threatening I almost crumbled to my knees. “I spilled coffee and Donna offered a change of clothes for me. I didn’t even notice I left it. When I came back it was gone.”

“Well, I think that about settles it. How about you get out of here before you cause yourself a real problem. And If I ever catch wind of you stealing another one of Claudia’s files, or anyones for that matter, I will personally make your life a living hell. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” he ground his teeth, refusing to look at either of us.

“Now get your ass back to your desk and pray to whoever you believe in that I don’t have you fired and disbarred for the shit you pulled today. Get the hell out of my sight.”

Griffin was out of there far faster than he walked in, head down, hands shoved in his pockets. I let out a shaky breath.

“Are you okay?” Harvey asked me. “I’m so sorry,” I completely ignored his question. “Griffin was right, I was extremely irresponsible and shouldn’t have let that file out of my sight. If you want to give it to another associate I completely understand. Again, I am so sorry and understand that there are consequences to my actions for letting such important information go missing-”

“Claudia, slow down,” he eased. “It’s okay, you are not the one I am pissed at.”

“You’re not?” I didn’t understand why. “But- but I completely misplaced a case.”

“No,” Harvey shook his head. “No Griffin is the only one to blame. You spilled coffee, went to go get cleaned up, and he stole it. He should know better. And seeing that he clearly doesn’t, I know I’m right in my decision on who to bring onto this case with me.”

I could feel my blush creep up my neck. “I appreciate that, Mr. Specter.”

“Of course, Claudia. And please, call me Harvey.”

I just gave a subtle nod, taking the file from his hand. I followed his gaze from my face to my hair where he took a strand between his fingers, letting the end curl around his digit.

“I’ve never seen your hair so long,” He added, dropping it from his grip. My breath was caught in my throat. Words were vacant shadows in my mind as he surveyed the dress I was wearing. “I bet that’s Donna’s, isn’t it.”

I had to clear my throat before I could speak. “She wouldn’t let me walk around with coffee stains all day.”

“It looks good on you,” He complimented. Harvey’s eyes, again, went from my head to my toes. There was nothing I could do but fall victim to his… I didn’t know what to think of how he looked at me. Couldn’t decide if it was good or bad.

“Time for the case then?” I needed to get his attention off of me. Now. I was flushed and losing my mind. Harvey didn’t really seem to acknowledge my words at all.

“Sure.” Was all he gave me.

____

I barely escaped with the skin on my teeth after our consultation. No, he didn’t rip me to shreds, but he would not take his eyes off of me for even one second. It was so… so potent I couldn’t focus. It was almost lunch when Donna came in and saved my ass.

I couldn’t have gotten out of there fast enough.

“So, how did it go?” Donna asked as I sat in my cubicle. When she came around, or maybe she just followed me, I didn’t know.

I put my face in my hands. “It was a disaster, Donna. I was a stuttering mess and I kept forgetting everything I was going to say because he would not stop staring at me. Like, he would not stop.” “Well, you aren’t exactly ugly, Claudia,” she snickered.

“Donna, this isn’t funny,” I groaned. “I’m being completely frank with you.”

“How can I be expected to work alongside him when I can’t stand being in an enclosed space with him for more than four minutes without turning into a bumbling idiot? It’s like he enjoys watching me get flustered.”

“Claudia, I think you are making this a bigger deal in your head than it actually is.” Donna came around and sat on my desk, crossing a knee over the other. “And besides, Harvey understands what it’s like to be a new associate. It can be nerve wracking, especially when you have Louis breathing down your neck.”

I chuckled gravely, “I just don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

“You’ll figure it out.” “Why can’t you just tell me?” I whined as she stood up.

“Because I am the Yoda to your Luke Skywalker. Wise you are, patience you must have, my young Padawan.”

“I am not a Jedi who is going on a self discovery journey to start using the Force,” I countered. “I am a nervous wreck who can’t handle being alone with Harvey Specter.”

“Then you need to get over it because Harvey is not going to berate you on your first case!” She argued.

“Did you not hear what he said to Griffin? Or-or to Thomas when he suggested that we consider taking the deal that Mr. Saros had offered during the mock trial? He cracked them wide open and left them to bleed. What about with Mike? How many times has he almost sent him to the curb for not being able to find what Harvey needs?”

“Mike is different and you know it,” Donna lowered her voice. “Plus he always says shit like that to light a fire under his ass. Harvey can see that you are nervous to work with him. He isn’t going to hang you out to dry, I promise. He stood up for you, Claudia, in a way I’ve only seen him do with me and Mike. You know how much he cares about us.”

“Well, yeah of course. But you’ve worked for him for fifteen years and Mike almost seven now. You have a relationship with him and established trust. How am I supposed to have that with him when I can’t even look him in the eye?” “It comes with time, Claudia,” she rubbed my shoulder. “But if there is anything I can say to get you to trust the process, Harvey is loyal, almost to a fault sometimes. He will stop at nothing to make sure the people he cares about are taken care of. I can see that he wants that for you because if he didn’t, he wouldn’t have given a shit if Griffin stole the file or not.”

Donna walked away after smoothing down some of the hair on my head, disappearing behind the corner. I let out a huff. She was right, I was being a little over dramatic.

Harvey had a reputation, though. How was I supposed to know if- no. This is unrelated to anything going on. Sort of. I just need to focus on the case.

I pulled out the files and looked over them again, compiling all the notes into one space for easy recall. As I was looking through it, I found a loophole in one of the contracts that unbound our client from having to give up half of her company.

____

I paced up and down Harvey’s office, tapping my file in my hand as I went through all my key points in my head for today’s trial. I needed to lure, or bait rather, the witnesses into my questions to get them to admit to trespassing on our clients property. We had everything we needed; security footage, witnesses to testify on our behalf… Everything was all lined up. I just needed to blow it.

I could do this, right? I had only spent all night doing a fake run of how today would go in my mirror, but then again anything could happen when I got into that courtroom today. Maybe they had another leg on us, maybe there was another witness they had to testify against us.

God dammit, if I screwed up today I wouldn’t get another case. Probably not ever again unless I packed up all my shit and moved to Iowa.

Having Harvey there didn’t make me feel better. I thought it would, but as we worked together I realized he only made me more nervous. I couldn’t help it, he just looked at me this way I couldn't describe. It was incredibly annoying, I don’t know how Mike does it. Or Donna. Or Jessica or Louis or-

Jesus focus, Claudia. I rubbed my eyes with my thumbs. Just focus focus focus. I’ve been over it a million times. I could do this. I didn’t have a choice, court was in less than half an hour.

“Claudia,” Harvey ripped me from my concentration, making me jump. “Sorry to startle you. Are you ready for today?” “Not really,” I admitted. “I am kind of freaking out, to be honest.”

“It’s okay,” he eased me to sit next to him. “What are you so nervous for?”

I chuckled, “Everything.” “Okay,” he gave a half-hearted laugh. “What specifically? Just name one thing that you are worried about.”

“I don’t know- forgetting cross examination questions? Screwing up the order so it doesn’t lead him into our trap? A billion things could go wrong and I’m not sure what to do if I freeze or stutter. What if the jury or the opposing counsel laughs at me?”

“That is not gonna happen, Claudia,” Harvey reassured. “You have prepared some amazing questions, you’ve got this in the bag.” “You know, I much prefer to stay in the background and do research. I don’t think I’m cut out to handle court stuff this is-”

“Hey,” he said so softly I almost didn’t hear him. He grabbed my trembling hand and held it between his own. My body went completely rigid, chest puffing in and out with heavy breaths. “You are going to do great today, I know it, Claudia. You are prepared, capable, and even more prepared. This is always what you’ve wanted to do, isn’t it?” I just nodded. Over the past week and a half of working together, I had told him what made me want to be a lawyer in the first place. About how I saw my best friends’ parents' business completely ruined by a group of robbers and their insurance did nothing to help them.

It made me so sad for them, made me feel so sick that I knew I had to do something to help them. I did my research and then brought it to them. They brought it to their lawyer and ended up getting a settlement for far more than they were ever gonna get. All because of me and my discovery that I made on my computer when I was thirteen.

“Okay. Think back to teenage Claudia for a moment. I bet she dreamed of being in this exact position. Where she can help people and give the sorry bastards who put them there a taste of their own medicine. Well, Claudia, here you are. Your very first case. Your very first helping hand. Your very first entrance into the world of the law. And you are going to absolutely shake up those witnesses, blindside them so hard they won’t have a choice but to tell the truth. This is your moment, Claudia’s moment. Don’t let fear take it from you, okay?” Again, all I could do was nod. And think about how warm his hand was in mine. We stood and he let go, leading me out of the office and down to his car waiting for him in front of the building. Ray, his driver, greeted me sweetly as I settled into the back seat with Harvey.

I flipped through my cards over and over and over on our way to the court house. Harvey snatched them from me. “Hey!” “You know the material,” he gave me a pointed look, sliding them in the breast pocket of his jacket.

“I know but-” “There is no but,” he shrugged. “Have just one ounce of confidence, Claudia. Trust yourself.”

All of whatever I had been reading was swept from my mind as he placed his palm on my knee. I hadn’t realized it was bouncing up and down until he pressed against it to stop its movements. I tried to sit still, but I just started picking at my nails instead.

“Claudia,” he said in a stern, commanding voice. I stopped my fidgeting, laying my hands flat in my lap. “Good, just relax. Everything will be alright.”

Highly doubtful. He was playing a dangerous game, and we both knew it. But neither of us said anything as he left his hand there the entire car ride.

____

“After the conclusion of today’s trial, the jury here finds Fulton Dynamic guilty of trespassing and breaking and entering with intent to steal inside information.”

I felt the tension deflate from my body, eyes fluttering shut as the judges whacked the wooden disk on his stand. He said something, but I couldn’t even hear over the roar in my ear. Holy shit we won…

“Claudia,” Harvey shook my shoulder. I snapped my eyes to him. “Come on, let's get out of here.”

He didn’t have to tell me twice.

I rested my head back against the seat, eyes focused on the window outside so I wouldn’t throw up. Man did I hate getting car sick every time I looked at my phone when in a car. The city lights were bright and fierce, unrelenting all hours of the day. Why on god's green earth did I decide to move to New York? Out of all the places I could’ve gone to work as an associate in this state, why did I choose the city? I hate the city. I’ve always hated the-

“Yoo-hoo,” I heard from my side. I lifted my exhausted head and gave Harvey a look. “Did you hear anything I said?”

‘Oh… n-no I’m sorry,” I stiffened, giving him my full attention. “What were you talking about?”

“I was just saying that you did a great job today, Claudia. You kicked ass in there,” he smiled.

“Thanks, Mr. Specter.” I just let out a sigh.

“You don’t think so?”

“Not really.” Anxiety swirled in my chest. Tears pricked my eyes and nose.

“Why not? Claudia, you gave one of the best cross examinations I think I’ve ever seen. And the way you handled Cayhill? Defended Devlyn from those accusations? It was masterful.”

“It doesn’t feel like it.”

Silence hung between us. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. “You did great today.”

“I was a complete idiot when I was defending Devlyn. I was way too animated and let my emotions get the best of me. For Christ's sake Judge Peterson gave me a warning.”

“I want you to take a guess at how many warnings judges give me when I’m the one in there leading the case.”

“You’re Harvey Specter, of course you… get a lot.”

“You right, I do get a lot. But that isn’t a bad thing. And I’ve been doing this a hell of a lot longer than you-” “That’s the problem,” I snapped. “You have been doing this for seventeen years and I’ve been doing it for ten days. I’ve barely got my toe in the water and I’ve already shown other lawyers and firms that I can’t keep my cool.”

“Claudia, you are passionate. I don’t see that as a huge problem in the courtroom. There needs to be a level of pushback from attorneys because if you, of all people on someone’s legal team, aren’t going to fight back, then you might as well be fired. Because you are the only person some people have hope for. You have to be aggressive and assertive sometimes to get the job done.”

“I don’t know how to do that.”

“I am going to teach you,” Harvey’s words completely short circuited my brain.

“What do you mean?”

“Claudia, I think you’re going to be a great lawyer, even without my help. I know you struggle with confidence and that is all I want to help you with. To get some leverage over these other associates so you can climb that ladder.”

“I can’t just magically pull a wagon load of confidence out of my ass overnight,” I shook my head, folding my hands tightly together. “I don’t see how you can help me.”

The car pulled up outside the building and Harvey let out a sigh. Great. Now I’ve pissed him off, too. That’s exactly what I needed to do was piss off Harvey Specter after a great win. In all honesty, it had been a good day. I didn’t fumble the ball like I was going to, but this was completely taking away from them.

My door opened. Harvey looked down at me from outside and extended his hand. When did he get out of the car? I hesitantly took it, getting out and shutting the door behind me.

“Claudia,” Harvey started. “You need to learn to let go. To put the bad moments behind you.” “I can’t.” “Which is why you and I are going to go back up there and have a drink. Get to know each other a little bit so we can start building that trust. I know I intimidate you, and I try like hell to be as calm as I can around you, but one day Louis or Jessica or Donna is going to come into my office and give me some bad news. You might be there and see how I handle it. You might not, but I don’t want you to be afraid of that happening to you.”

“And how can I be sure that if I come up with a plan one day, and it falls through and goes to shit, you won’t flip out on me or fire me or-or-”

“Because I won’t. I give you my word. But I need yours as well.”

“Need my word, why?” “I need to know that you won’t think I’m a monster if you’re in the room and I lose my cool.”

I’ve never thought Harvey was a monster to begin with. I’ve always admired his ability to shut off his feelings and get the dirty work done. Of course I’ve seen that side of him a time or two, but never catastrophic like some of the stories I’ve heard from the third and fourth years.

“You have my word.”

The elevator chime brought me out of my spiraling momentarily to walk to Harvey’s office. The firm was empty, not even Jessica was here. He led me to his office and got to work on the drinks. My eyes wandered from him to the view through the window. This was the only part of the city I might’ve let myself enjoy from time to time.

“Donna was right, you do have a lot of music,” I noted, taking in the wall filled with vinyl records. She mentioned it when I was caught with my head buried in a book in the library, some random Beatles song blasting so loud she could hear it down the hall.

“You’re just now noticing that?” “Well, I haven’t exactly been in your office for anything other than to work on this case so… no I guess I never really noticed.”

“You can pick something to listen to, if you’d like.” He was gonna let me touch his records? This place was like a museum; autographed basketballs and baseballs, art hanging on the wall. “Or you can just stare at it.”

I flushed, picking up a record at random and handing it to him. In exchange, he handed me a glass a third full of whisky. I smelled it, it kind of made me scrunch my nose. I didn’t drink often; most of the time I was too tired to even feed myself let alone consume alcohol.

When I took a sip, I actually didn’t mind the taste. It was smooth, simple in flavor and didn’t burn too bad. Quite nice, for all it’s worth.

There was a couch along the wall of records that I fixed myself on, Harvey taking the time to remove his tie and lay it across his desk before sitting across from me on one of the chairs. I toed off my pumps and set them on the floor beside the table. God damn did my feet hurt.

“Do you do this with all the new associates?”

“What do you mean?” He asked, taking a seat in one of the chairs while I took up the couch.

“I mean, when you think they’re ready, do you give them a case and help them get their foot in the door?”

“No, no I don’t,” Harvey admitted. “Louis is in charge of the associates. You know that.”

“Yes,” I nodded. “But I just thought that there was some deal between you guys: you have a mock trial with the new associates, whichever team wins gets to give a case to the best performing associate.”

Harvey laughed. I didn’t even know he knew how to do that. “Oh, Claudia, you really are that innocent, aren’t you?” My throat collapsed on itself. What did I say?

“Relax,” he set his glass down, swallowing his sip. “Yes, we do a fake trial every year for the first years, but we don’t just give them cases when they win. No one in their right mind would give a first year associate, fresh out of law school, the time of day. Normally they have to prove themself down the line, after years and years of loyalty to this firm to get their first case. And it’s usually pretty easy pro-bono shit.” I had to stop and think for a moment before I could speak. “You keep saying normally, usually… What are you saying?”

“What I’m saying, Claudia, is that in my decade plus of working here, I’ve never seen an associate who busts their ass quite like you. Who takes every ounce of bullshit from Louis and turns it into the Mona Lisa.”

“I think that everyone does tha-”

“No,” he cut me off. A stern look in his eyes, lips in that crooked line. “No they don’t. Not like you. You put your head down, get into it, and don't come up until you’ve found what you were looking for and thensome. You go above and beyond every time. You don’t go to Louis begging for more work, he brings it to you, and only you, because he knows he can count on you. Which means I know I can count on you, too.”

I honestly didn’t know what to say. I kind of just wanted the ground to swallow me whole. To make me evaporate and never see the light of day again.

“Thank you, Mr. Specter. But I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not but I am not very good in the spotlight. I don’t do well with… all of this.”

“I know, but I’m glad that you are trying anyway,” his smile was very charming. In a way that made his eyes crinkle. “So, besides giving a hell of a cross examination, what else do you like to do for ‘fun’?”

“Well, for starters, your definition of fun, and mine, are going to be very different. I am a very solitary person, I don’t need to be around people to have a good time. Most of the time I prefer to go do things by myself because I find when I ask, people already have plans, or they’re faking having plans so they don’t have to hang out with me. I can’t tell what is the truth and what isn’t so I stopped asking… that was totally not what you asked. Sorry, I didn’t mean to ramble.”

“Go ahead, talk about whatever you want. I won’t judge you.”

A small part of me believed that he wouldn’t. A tiny, microscopic part.

“There is nothing like the feeling of getting lost in a good book. I’m a complete sucker for a cliche rom-com where the bad guy gets the good girl.”

Harvey let out a dramatic puff of air, laughing into the space around us.

“You said you wouldn’t judge!” I chuckled.

“I’m not, it’s just lame. Come on, what do you really like to do for fun?”

“That is what I really like to do for fun,” I let my hand fall to the cushion beside me. “I told you, I am not a very interesting person. I don’t have time for a whole lot of anything other than working here so… Most of my hobbies have been put on the back burner through grad school and working nonstop.”

“If you could be any type of sea creature, what would you be?”

“What does that literally have anything to do with anything we were just talking about?”

“It doesn’t,” Harvey smiled. “I’m just curious.”

“I don’t know, a jellyfish?”

“Really?” He questioned, one brow rising higher than the other. “I’d be a great white shark.”

“Of course you would,” I snickered. “Harvey Specter, the Great White of New York. If you wanted to be a real predator that no one fucks with, you should be an Orca.” “A whale?” “The killer whale,” I corrected. “They put sharks in the obituary for fun, you know. They sink yachts for fun, too. If you really want to be on top, be an Orca. No one in their right minds fucks with an Orca. They’re intelligent and not afraid of anything.”

“Aww, you think I’m intelligent and not afraid of anything?” Harvey mewled.

“Well, duh you’re Harvey Specter.” Everyone knew it. Harvey was the baddest cat in the sky, you didn’t approach him without giving him your respect. Cause if you didn’t, a whole boat load of shit will be coming your way.

Harvey rolled his eyes. “Well, I hate to break it to you, but there is more to Harvey Specter than the title my name comes with.”

“Of course,” I agreed. “Harvey Specter, badass attorney and the best closer New York has ever seen, killer whale of the corporate world.” Harvey couldn’t keep his laugh inside, sending the rumbling noise into the office. I made Harvey laugh, and I have for the past however many minutes.

“You left out the part where I’m devastatingly attractive and charming,” his smirk was nothing short of either of those things. Devastating and charming. It cut through me like a hot knife. I knew I blushed because his eyes went to my cheeks and that spot at the base of my throat that always gives it away.

My fingers tapped away anxiously at the glass in my hands, fingernails rattling against its crystal surface.

“It’s late I should… I should go.” Great, now I’m flustered and stuttering. As quickly as I could, I threw my heels back on and reached for my coat.

“Claudia-”

“Thank you for the drink, and for all your help on the case,” I hurried out, trying to not let my voice break and give away all the things I wanted to say. “Have a good night, Mr. Specter.”

“Claudia.” His voice commanded, stopping my movements. I held still on the couch, drinking in his stare. “Stay.”

“Mr. Specter I really should-”

“Harvey,” he bit out a little harshly. “Stop calling me Mr. Specter.”

“I’m sorry. Harvey, it’s late.” He just nodded, taking a sip from his glass. “And?”

“It’s been a long day and I think we should both go and get some much deserved rest,” I spoke quietly, resuming my nail picking from earlier.

“Do you really want to leave?”

It was such a loaded question. Yes, absolutely I wanted to fucking leave. But there was something deep in his eyes, deep in his voice that made me want to stay and explore. My heart was hammering in my chest. I couldn’t keep my eyes off him, no matter how much I wanted to look away. It was impossible.

“I don’t think you do,” he answered for me. “I told you I was going to help build your confidence.”

You never told me how, jackass, I thought. I swallowed, nothing going down, but I did it anyway. Harvey threw back what was left of his whisky and sat back, knees far apart, fingers drawing patterns on the arm rests of the chair.

“Come here, Claudia.” What? “You heard me.”

Shit, I must’ve said it out loud. If I thought my heart was racing before, it sure as hell was halfway around the world now. Legs trembling, I rose. Why the fuck did I stand up? It wasn’t too late to make a beeline for the door and pray he didn’t catch up. Then again, it wasn’t like I could escape him, we worked in the same fucking building. On the same floor.

When I came to a halt, a few feet in front of him, he held out his hand, palm up. As I put my fingers in his grasp, there was nothing I could do. Harvey yanked me to him, other hand catching my hip as I collapsed into him with a yelp.

“Straddle my thigh,” he ordered. Something about the way his voice went down my spine made me obey. With extreme hesitance, I moved one leg on each side of his, lowering myself. I didn’t dare put all of my weight down. And he knew it because his hands came up to my hips and forced me all the way.

“Sir, what are you-”

“Do not call me Sir unless you are ready to deal with those consequences.” His fingers dug into the exposed skin on my thigh, eyes full of his pupils.

“Harvey, what are you doing? We shouldn’t be doing… whatever this is,” I tried to defuse the situation as best I could, but there was such a seriousness written in his features I wasn’t sure I could sway him. Maybe I didn’t want to, either.

“How does it feel?” He asked.

I blinked, “H-How does what feel, Harvey?”

He smiled at the use of his name on my tongue. I hadn’t really ever called him by his first name.

“To have one of the most powerful men in the city underneath you, bent to your will?”

When I did look away from his face, to where I was seated on his lap, I felt my stomach start to twist and mold into something new. I did have Harvey Specter underneath me. Granted, at his own command, but still…

“And before you even think about it, no. I don’t do this with all the other associates.”

“Then why me?” My voice was a barely there whisper, gaze averted from his until his thumb caught my chin and made me look into his eyes.

“Because I see something else in you that I don’t think anyone realizes. And I know the world will never see it unless you start believing in yourself and take control of the cards you’ve been dealt.”

I took a moment to steady my breath, and my uncontrollable thoughts. “And you think that whatever this is… you think this is going to help with that?”

Harvey shrugged, “I am in no way forcing you to be here, am I?”

My blush came creeping back. Of course he wasn’t forcing me to be here. I shook my head, my face just inches from his. I felt oddly relaxed under his touch.

“And I am not stopping you from getting up and leaving right now. It’s your choice, Claudia, but I think you want to be here, on my lap. Because if you didn’t, you would’ve already left.”

God dammit I hated this cocky son of a bitch. Was he right? Yes. Of fucking course he was. But the way his mouth curled up was dangerous. This was dangerous, and utterly a horrible idea. Was I really about to sit here, on one of my bosses thighs? He did look pretty good under me, shirt unbuttoned the top three, cologne wafting into the air every time he moved his head.

Harvey’s hands came back to my hips as he leaned up.

“So, are you going to get up and leave? Or, are you going to ride my thigh while I tell you how pretty you look?” His breath tickled my ear, his lips trailing the space just below. I couldn’t help the shudder that went through my whole body, and I knew Harvey felt it because he cooed.

As I adjusted myself, I couldn’t help the movement, his breath on my skin was making me flutter, Harvey moved my hips back and forth. I felt the air take from my throat. The material of his pants against my core wracked through me. So unexpectedly I found myself pressing closer to him so I wouldn’t fall off.

“That’s it, Claudia…” His voice was sickly sweet with praise. Harvey moved to fiddle with the front of his pants, and when I went to look, he caught my chin. “Eyes up here, sweetheart.”

“Harvey this… this isn’t the best idea,” I kept trying to reason. Not necessarily with him, but with myself. Obviously he wanted it, so why was I trying to convince myself to go?

“So?”

“This could have some serious implications if we don’t-”

He laughed against my neck, placing a few kisses right over where I always blushed. “Claudia, Claudia, Claudia. This is exactly what I have been talking about. You are wound far too tightly with concern. You need to let go, need to be out of control with something in your life.”

“Let me guess, that something is going to be you?”

“Only if you want it to be,” he said. “Look Claudia, I know we don’t exactly always see eye to eye on things, and we sure as hell haven’t really worked together, but that doesn’t make me less sure about this. About you. If you are having doubts, and this isn’t what you want, then walk away and we never have to talk about it ever again. But I think there is a part of you that really likes seeing me under you. That likes knowing you can make me this way.”

“And what if I do?” Harvey was right. God dammit he was right and he knew it. I looked and saw just what I had been doing to him.

“Then just let yourself enjoy it because I know I want to.”

Man, he was quite the smooth talker. My resolve crumbled and I gave in. No, I didn’t give in, I made the choice to let this happen. Harvey wanted this too, for some reason known only to the great mother and beyond. This was not going to end well, I don’t know why I thought so, but I just know this is going to cause a problem down the road. Maybe it’ll be a good one, maybe it won’t– Jesus I need to get out of my head before I start thinking into oblivion.

Harvey rolled his eyes, hand cupping the side of my face before his lips met mine. The gasp I let out… I could feel his smile. He guided my hand into the front of his pants, but did nothing else. Just left it there.

When I tried to pull away, he bit my lip and pulled me right back in. Finger pressing into the front of my throat. In a commanding, possessive way that made my stomach burn with desire.

I slowly traced around the outline of him. My fingers were trembling so fiercely that I wasn’t sure they were moving at all. As best I could control them, I made my way up to the waistband of his briefs, just… testing the waters.

“You’re so close to where I need you,” Harvey purred, eyes looking at my surly swollen lips. “Go on, sweetheart, don’t be shy.”

I guess there really was no turning back. As my hand ventured further, I ducked down and swept my tongue into his mouth. He approved very enthusiastically. Harvey continued to guide my hips back and forth and back and forth across his thigh. All too gently, all too slowly. One of his hands kept working my hip, the other camp up around my throat.

How could he know that was one of my weakest sides? It didn’t prevent any air, but it was a firm reminder.

His breath broke our searing lips when I moved my thumb over the tip of his cock. Harvey’s grip tightened on my throat and a noise slipped through my mouth. There was little I could do to keep my eyes from lulling back, head going with it. He made an effort to weave his fingers between my locks and pulled. A lot harder than I think he actually meant to.

“Sorry, sweetheart,” he murmured against my ear, sending goosebumps down my neck and arms. “I can’t help myself when you make such pretty noises. I’ll be gentle.”

I huffed out a laugh, as best I could with the straight against my neck. “I don’t mind.”

“Those are dangerous words, Claudia,” he warned, bringing my head back up. His eyes were dark in a way I couldn’t process in that moment. His lips were red and his hair was a mess from my fingers.

I tugged at him as emphasis for my earlier words. “I don’t mind you being rough with me.”

His eyes closed, and his jaw clenched. I continued my motions, slow and long, drawing divine noises from him. Even with his hands away from my hips, I still moved them, picking up pace with my hand. I took the liberty to occupy his mouth with my own, hopefully filling him with euphoria. It was fast, and quite messy. My hair was sticking to the back of my neck with sweat, and I could taste it on his skin when I couldn’t help but trail my tongue up his throat.

Harvey murmured my name, but I didn’t stop. I couldn’t now, not with the constant moans and praise from his tongue. ‘Just like that sweetheart’, ‘I know that pretty mouth of yours will feel so much better wrapped around my cock’, ‘Can’t wait to take you apart’.

With his release, warm and wet over the back of my hand, he stilled my hips. Fingers digging in. At some point my skirt rode up, or he tugged it over my ass, and his nails left long lines of scratches. I hissed, and Harvey was breathing deep.

Harvey’s grin was nothing short of animalistic as he looked at where my hand still connected us. “Look at that, sweetheart. Look how well you’ve done.”

I could do nothing to keep my blood from rushing to my face. When I moved my hand– not entirely sure if I should get up and clean it off– Harvey snatched my wrist.

“Open.”

I was going to question him, but I watched his eyes flick over my surely swollen lips. I flushed deeper. And deeper again as he moved them into my mouth. Bitter, but not in a bad way. And If I had been thoroughly fucked, I’d undoubtably find it irresistible.

“Good girl, Claudia.”

There would be no way to recover from hearing that. I shuddered, so hard I clamped his thigh between my own, and whimpered. Like I had never before. And his stare… the way his eyes watched my tongue circle over my fingers. As they watched me swallow him down.

“I bet you didn’t even realize,” he tilted his head, tucking hair behind my ear, flopping it behind my shoulder.

“Realize…what?”

“How you took control. How confident you were with your hand… with that wicked tongue of yours. It was like it was second nature for you, wasn’t it? I didn’t even have to tell you to keep moving your hips. You just did it.”

I didn’t even know I was doing most of it… It all just happened. At some point or another.

“I wouldn’t say that I was confi-”

“Yes,” he interrupted. “You were. And that feeling, of being in control, is what you need to feel when you are in the courtroom. You were able to do it here, with me, to me. It was the most powerful and direct I’ve ever seen you.”

“Sex and being a lawyer aren’t exactly the same thing.”

“No, but you were able to feel safe and let yourself go. To release all that potential and work miracles.”

“You’d consider me giving you an orgasm a miracle?”

He chuckled, leaning so his lips brushed against mine. “Your hands do miraculous things to me, Claudia. I don’t normally give myself to someone the way I did with you. I didn’t have any second thoughts about it because I knew how willing you’d be to please me. And god damn do I love watching you pleasure yourself for me.”

In the minutes that followed, Harvey stood me up and straightened out my skirt. He did give me some hand sanitizer until I could go to the bathroom. I watched as he tucked in his shirt, buttoning his pants and rolling the sleeves back up his arms.

“Harvey?”

“Yes, Claudia?” His voice was much more mellow.

“How often is this… you know. Gonna happen?”

He smirked, “Why, already picturing yourself on your knees for me?”

I wasn’t, but I sure as hell was now. One thing that I needed to learn to do was control my facial reactions because judging by the way his stepped closer, he could see that I was, in fact, picturing his hand in my hair while he forced me to take it down my-

“Oh sweet sweet Claudia,” he chuckled, tilting up my chin. “You really are that eager to please me.”

“I was just wondering when you were going to return the favor.”

Harvey seized my throat, tighter than he had before. “Don’t you worry, sweetheart. I will have my name dripping from your tongue for so long you will forget it completely and beg for mercy. And when you beg for it, just know that you won’t get it until I say you do.”

#harvey specter #harvey specter suits #harvey specter x ofc #harvey specter smut #suits smut #suits #suits tv #mike ross #jessica pearson #louis litt #rachel zane #suits fanfic #suits fanfiction

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motherofagony · 1 year ago

Text

A HEART FOR EATING // vol. 2

joel miller x f!reader

pairing: post outbreak!joel x f!reader setting: jackson, wy (think tlou pt. 2 minus the golfing) rating: mature, 18+, minors dni word count: 8.7k series summary: a vicious raider attack robs you of human connection and lights a fire of destruction in your life in jackson. joel's fixated on you, and your lives tangle. revenge becomes a needful thing. chapter summary: you take care of joel after a patrol injury, but you suspect there's more to it than he's telling you. the atmosphere shifts as you and joel grow (begrudgingly) closer. content warnings + tags: age gap (we'll say 15-20 years), protective!joel, brief masturbation (f!reader), praise kink for two seconds, blood, bodily injuries, needles (reader gives joel stitches), dissociation/triggers, alcohol, angst, sexual tension intensifies, The First Kiss™, soft!joel vol. 1 // vol. 2 series playlist a/n: we're picking up speed, folks. world-building is my weakness, so i hope you enjoy this nonetheless. honorable mention goes to the readers in the trenches, waiting patiently for joel to [redacted] reader senseless until she [redacted] all over his [redacted]. thank you for the love on the series so far. taglist: @ghostwritesthings, @widowssbite, @p3rkerr, @eternallyvenus, @punkshort if anyone would like to be added/removed to the taglist (or if i missed anyone), please send me a DM!

You’ve always hated flying.

In the great before, the stone ages of family vacations and things to look forward to, fears were singular and planes were yours.

Your family never had a lot of money, not really, but on the special occasion of a death in the family, you’d find yourself trapped to a seat in a metal tube. Going nowhere but up. Sitting through safety instructions that came from smiling, lipsticked mouths that were only hypotheticals until they weren’t.

It’s like a rollercoaster, your dad would say, amused in the way only a dad can be and sleeping through damn near anything in the same fashion. It did nothing to calm the knocking of your knees, to quell the flip of your stomach as you climbed higher and higher until you couldn’t see anything but cotton ball clouds.

It was always unnatural to you that something so heavy could float, that you were supposed to go on doing human things and drinking your ginger ale and munching your pre-packaged snack option. As if you weren’t being hurled into the sky with no one walking you through it.

As if the plummet onto tarmac meant no harm, just completely normal erratic braking that felt a lot like the moments before a crash.

There was no control — it was in someone else’s hands that you never saw. And as you fell, you were supposed to say thank you, that’s exactly what I paid for.

This is your version of the oxygen mask. This is you putting yours on before you help Joel.

You’re on your knees digging through your med bag, thumbing through bandages, checking for a quick count of gloves, antibiotics, wash cloths. You fumble with the zipper, fighting with the tremor that starts in your forearms and liquifies into your wrists. There isn’t much in the way of supplies unless you ransack what’s kept in storage, but there’s no time, and you’re not sure of what you’re about to walk into.

Waiting any moment for a scream, or the blast of a gun when they realize Joel’s not Joel anymore.

And it isn’t really a big possibility in the grand scheme of things, if you consider that he would’ve likely turned on the route home. But it’s still there, tickling the back of your head, nudging your navel uncomfortably. Nothing’s impossible.

You of all people know that.

You linger in your living room, giving a final sweep. Worst case, you can run back for what’s forgotten, but something about the idea of abandoning a vulnerable Joel – if only for a minute – doesn’t settle right in your stomach.

Before you can stop yourself, you’re shoving a bottle of whiskey into the bag, the only anesthetic on hand. And if you’re being honest with yourself, you need to score back some points.

The steps leading up to Joel’s house are sturdy, and you imagine it’s because of the pride he takes in what’s his. Before this, his house was just another skeleton of roof, foundation, windows, and siding.

The kind of houses you pass by every day that are rife with familiarity but you don’t know what it’s like to see the people inside eat dinner, brush their teeth. Fight. Fuck.

Fresh paint from only two seasons ago, reinforced porch posts. A swing. It’s weird to see permanence in this day and age, but his intention to anchor himself and grow roots here flutters meaningfully inside you.

It’s always been a sacred thing to you, you don’t know why. A place you’d never dreamed of entering, but dreamed about what it would smell like. A pair of boots haphazard by the front door, small piles of organized chaos, of collected tangibles. A you never know if you’ll need this in one corner, a saving that for a rainy day shelved in another.

So when you raise your hand to knock, you feel like an intruder, an unwelcome invasion of privacy. And you don’t know why you knock at all, you nearly think better of it given the circumstances, but you’re testing the atmosphere, hoping for voices inside instead of a struggle.

Ellie’s swinging the door open, relief smoothing out the lines in her forehead when she sees you. Her presence seems to answer any unspoken questions you had about Joel being infected, and you don’t voice them to her when you can see unrest in her antsy legs.

“Hey. Sorry for the wait. He alright?”

Her teeth are worrying her lip, probably more traumatized by the sight of him than anything. A few strands of hair have freed themselves from her lazy half-bun at the base of her neck, caught in the crossfire when she ran her hands through it, you think.

“Yeah,” Ellie breathes, committing to it. “Yeah, he’s okay. Bleeding stopped, nothing seems broken. Just needs stitches, I think.”

It sounds more to convince herself than anything else. There’s a foreign fragility to her, and you hate it.

“He tell you what happened?”

The question strikes a nerve. Ellie’s shaking her bowed head, scoffing in a half-laugh that doesn’t touch her eyes. Her hand wraps around her knuckles, cracking slowly in an effort to alleviate the tension that’s reached a fever pitch inside her.

“He won’t tell me, says it doesn’t matter. He shouldn’t have gone alone anyway, he was bein’ a dick. ‘I wanna think, kiddo - need t’clear my head,’” she mocks in a gruff, rolling pitch, the perfect dosage of Texas.

It levels you, potent. Are you the thing Joel needed to clear his head of?

You’re weirdly longing for it, but being flicked away like a bug, peeled away layer by layer from him isn’t something you want.

There’s hope that you’re contagious. That you’re haunting him and lurking in the darkest corners of his mind like an apparition like he has yours. And maybe there’s hope after all, something left to salvage.

But you play dumb, furrow your brow a little too expertly.

Ellie’s measuring you, and there’s a glimpse of worry but she hides it in a way that you wouldn’t know what you were looking for if you hadn’t already found it.

“Anything you wanna tell me about the other night? He was pissed when he left,” she tacks on quietly.

You go a little slack-jawed. You don’t even know how to put it into words, and you couldn’t tell her what it meant even if you tried.

What’s there to even say?

“You know what, none of my business,” she says, her hands lifting in tired surrender when you don’t answer, ignoring your near-sputter. “But you’re not off the hook, just make sure the old man doesn’t croak. And tell him he scared the shit outta me.”

You exhale and hope it doesn’t read too much as relief. You’ll have to answer to her later, but at least you might have an answer to give.

“Handful of salt in the wound, rub in circular motions – got it. Tell Tommy I’ll catch up later.”

Your shoulders scrape affectionately as you nudge past each other, and you cast a wide look at the periphery of Joel Miller’s house. The feeling of unwelcome disappears, and if anything, you’re being tugged further inside. Imagining what it’s like to be a fixture, an adornment in his weird little life.

Nooks that you assumed would be messy are neat, coiffed even. There’s that unavoidable smudge of secondhand all over the furniture – mottled ever so slightly, aged uneven in places that only an apocalypse can do. But it’s an otherwise tidy existence. Another surprise from Joel that you’d never pick up on if you only witnessed him nursing a drink at the bar.

An oak bookshelf props itself at the bottom of the stairs and it rivals your own, dust gathering in thin lines where he’s repeatedly shelved this, reread that. There are paintings hung decisively on most of the walls, breathtaking rural landscapes of wherever.

You’re lugging the bag upstairs, counting your breaths with each step. The whiskey rattles mutely against the first aid tin, and it’s a toss-up now of who you really brought it for.

The landing mirrors the ground level, a purposeful littering of tchotchkes. Doors line the second floor, some closed, some ajar but not inviting, and you realize you have no idea which one you’re looking for. You sway uninvited by the bannister until you hear the unmistakable hiss of breath between clenched teeth, then a soft moan as his weight shifts.

And you’re stepping inside a room – his bedroom – warmed in the soft beginnings of sunset. Joel’s sprawled asymmetrically on his bed, eyes pinched shut, delirious with blood loss but already looking substantially less like a corpse. A damp rag settles just above his brow, and the handiwork of Ellie.

There’s an unrecognizable hurt in him, wounded in ways that he shouldn’t be capable of.

He doesn’t give any indication that he knows you’re here until he’s rasping out something weak disguised as stern.

“I ain’t bit. Shut the door behind you.”

Your mouth goes dry.

“How did you –?”

Joel just huffs in response, as indignant as his body lets him be.

“You see anyone else here? They might as well’ve jumped out the window, as fast as they dumped me ‘n left. I ain’t stupid.”

You accept that and drop the pretense, pursing your lips with a nod. He doesn’t seem that offended, knows it’s just the nature of the beast.

You move over to his bedside, unpacking the bag quickly on a side table, looping your metaphorical stethoscope around your neck and switching gears into a mode that’s strictly doctoral.

Yet, there’s still that hum beneath your skin, the fizzle of unfinished business. It’s thick in the space between you, in the way he flicks his gaze at you lazily. You’ll let him foster the anger, giving it a home. You can be the martyr he says you are.

This new lens feels calmer, almost professional. Your nerves are still firing rapidly, and your composure is forced, but it’s better than nothing.

You drag a chair from the corner up to Joel’s bed, not letting your eyes wander too far into the depths of the space. You don’t have time to dissect the idiosyncrasies of his life. Not yet.

He still hasn’t opened his eyes, but you get the sense that he’s tracking your every move. His limbs are concrete, the tendons in his forearms so tense and coiled like any and every movement is forbidden.

“Joel.”

He grunts, a pained translation. Still no effort to move.

“I need to take a look at you,” you say patiently, bargaining like you would with a kid. “Wanna tell me what hurts?”

Another grunt, softer this time. He motions vaguely, weakly to his head, then the left flank of his abdomen.

You already know what you’ll find under the rag on his head, and it bodes well that the bleeding looks to have stopped. His stomach wound, on the other hand, was enough to bleed through two layers.

“Alright. Lemme see.”

A muted whimper echoes in his throat, so uncharacteristically that it tugs on your heart. Still statuesque, unmoving.

Your fingers are deft, careful as they unbutton the first, second, third buttons of his flannel. Joel’s stock-still, and his breath comes in sharp, slow waves through his nose. Your own breath kind of sits in the back of your throat, and you pretend with a hurried exhale that you weren’t just holding it.

Your fingers reach his navel on the last button, and you’re gently tucking each panel of his shirt under him on either side, focusing too hard on not touching him. It feels like something is somersaulting low in your stomach.

You can’t even dare yourself to look at his chest, his stomach. The patch of hair leading down to the band of his pants.

Get it together. That’s not what this is.

An angry gash looks up at you, thankfully clotted with dried patches of blood. It’s about two delicate fingers long, a nasty slice. It looks clean, abrupt in shape but suspiciously manmade. Not too deep, but not superficial enough to heal without some assistance.

And thank god, not nearly as bad as you thought it would be.

Joel’s looking at you now through heavy lids, wary of you, but something like fear touches the corners of his eyes. You fight to stay medical, methodical in your diagnosis. No emotion slips out, nothing allowed in.

You sit back calmly, letting loose a sigh. Not letting yourself bathe in the intimacy of the moment, in the way he’s staring.

“You need stitches,” you announce simply.

“Like hell.”

“Joel.”

He’s scowling, a hurt animal pissed at its own vulnerability. Silence passes like a ship between you, and for a moment, you think he’ll really fight you on this. He can’t hide anything when he’s like this, the weighing of his options evident in the tick of his jaw, the pathetic pinch just in the center of his brows.

“Fine,” he grits out. “Make it quick.”

This fucker.

You’re rolling your eyes, unceremoniously tugging the rag from his forehead. The cloth is red but not soaked, just twinged pink around the edges. Joel curses, just an octave above unintelligible.

His hand is shooting to the cut near his hairline and you’re smacking it away before he can pollute it.

“Lay still, fuck’s sake,” you chastise. “An infection’ll put you out longer than a few days. Unless you have a puzzle you been meaning to get around to?”

The faux-threat calms him immediately, and the shift in restraint doesn’t go unchecked. He doesn’t say another word, but you catch a glare and a twitch of his mouth.

You make quick work of cleaning him up, squeezing rubbing alcohol on a clean towel and scrubbing patient circles through the mess of dried blood. Joel releases sharp noises you can only describe as growls when you get too close to the border of his cuts.

It’s primal, a dog asserting dominance with his leg caught in a trap.

You try to lose the attitude, and it’s difficult when your patient hates you, doesn’t hate you, won’t clarify either way.

There’s a hint of purple that’s developing like fresh film on the mountains of his knuckles that doesn’t go unnoticed. Places on the most taut peaks of flesh where his skin has split, marred with scrapes that look like indents of teeth. And in the right light, there’s a discoloration of something in the same family splayed on his ribs.

And that… you know that when you see it. Even if everything else can be explained away.

“You wanna talk about it?” you say quietly.

There’s an intermission where he doesn’t respond. Too long to be the truth, too short to come up with a lie. And you know he’s been waiting for this question, might’ve already thought of a story.

“Got clumsy,” Joel recites. “Tripped on some stairs that were caving in, hit my head.”

“Bullshit.” And it’s a statement, not an insult. It doesn’t cover why he has a certified stab wound in his side.

Another stretch of silence, lack of defensiveness, makes it clear that he knows you know. But he doesn’t elaborate, and for whatever reason, you don’t push it.

And maybe it’s enough to acknowledge this sort of thing for now. You can stow it away, let it keep you up at night. Draw parallels where there possibly aren’t any. If he’d run into a human thing, he’d be much worse off, right?

Just like you were.

You take care in lining up the supplies to stitch in neat order beside you, mulling over each step in your mind. Stalling, maybe.

You pull the whiskey bottle out of your bag by the neck and nudge Joel with the cap.

“Something to take the edge off.”

He kind of hesitates, but there’s a tenderness. Recognizing it as an act of mercy, a peace offering.

There’s nothing said, but he takes the bait, spinning off the top and swallowing a messy mouthful. A drip escapes through the corner of his mouth and slips into his beard.

You can feel the taste of it blossoming on your tongue.

He grunts his thanks and keeps a steady grip on the neck of the bottle, and the network of veins in his forearm unwind.

You clamp the needle, laced through with something thicker than thread but not quite medical grade. Joel exhales a shaky whine when you pierce the skin, and his fist grips the sheets when you twist clockwise to push the needle through to the other side.

“You’re doing great,” you murmur.

The needle weaves over the cut, greeting the other side. You pull it through and up, and his lower lip trembles, sweat beading his forehead.

“First one done,” you say, praising him but also yourself.

Joel’s still clenching the linens on the bed, ignoring you and hiding out in his own mind somewhere.

You don’t tell him that you’ve only ever practiced on fruit, that your suture knowledge comes exclusively from the one medical text you have and endless hours of TV you grew up on.

Silence envelopes you again, heavier than before if possible. The pressure waxes and wanes like nighttime waves, licking the shore between you. And it’s not angry, just something… else.

“Some house you got,” you note casually as a distraction, like you’re commenting on the weather. It comes off relaxed enough, though any conversation between you feels like flossing a crowded mouth.

His eyes sharpen, and you think it’s in excruciation, but there’s a twinge of apprehension. You straighten for a moment, hands fixed mid-stitch, and roll your eyes.

“Okay, cool it, Home Alone, I’m not casing the place.”

Joel takes a turn rolling his eyes. You swear that you see his mouth twitch again, but you hang your head, dabbing a cloth where pinpricks of blood form.

You try again.

“I like your paintings.”

You dare to look up, and his mouth is in a tight line.

“You like my paintings.” he repeats dully, not a question. Joel’s as cynical as you, and he thinks it’s a jab, not sincere.

“You’re not gonna make this easy on me, are you?��

“Wasn’t plannin’ on it.”

Now’s as good a time as any. You sigh at that.

“Look, the other night wasn’t my finest moment. It didn’t need to go that way,” you mutter, leaning on the concentration of sewing up Joel’s skin. Otherwise, you might feel too strongly, dissect your word choice with an uncomfortable linger. “Sorry. I know you were trying to help.”

He goes rigid as your second stitch meets a third. The bottle tips to his lips again, and you wonder if it’s an act of liquid courage. You boldly hope so.

“Nah, I shoulda kept my mouth shut. Been thinkin’ I needed to apologize anyway,” he admits, and you know he’s happy you made the first move. You can already feel him loosen, but maybe it’s the alcohol. “You ain’t a martyr, y’know.”

Oh.

The needle hooks into the final sliver of skin, your handiwork tightening into a neat line. You sit back, wiping your brow with the ungloved section of your wrist. It’s a treaty, a handshake at the very least.

“Actually, I think you hit the nail on the head with that one,” you smirk, olive branch fully hanging between your teeth now. “Keeping up the charade is so exhausting.”

Joel presses out a pained half-laugh, and you feel something crumbling between you.

You tie off the last stitch, trimming the excess thread off the knot. The clamp clatters into the tray, and you give it a final once-over before peeling a large rectangle of bandage from your kit and pressing it gently over the wound.

“All done,” you quip, peeling your gloves off. “Didn’t even have to amputate.”

“Not too bad,” he grunts.

“I’ll add it to your tab.”

While you’re riding the high of approval, you stand and move to the foot of the bed. Joel’s boots are still on, laced messily.

And for some reason, you don’t even ask permission, you just start untying, tipping them off and lining them next to one another on the hardwood.

He doesn’t say a word. Out of confusion, maybe.

You scoot your chair and makeshift flatlay along with you, positioning yourself at Joel’s head. That look is back, a side-stare that steals your breath.

That look that knows you could absolutely ruin him, and he’d either thank you or kill you.

The pads of your fingers brush back the hair from his forehead, still slightly matted with blood. It’s a surface cut, but crescent-shaped and easily hidden by a curl of brown, peppered with grey. Butterfly closure it is.

No signs of a concussion show themselves. At least there’s that.

“You might have a scar,” you murmur. Being this close to Joel makes you feel like you’re wearing two layers too many.

And he hasn’t broken the stare, not even minutely.

“Add it to the collection,” he says lowly, not an ounce of self-pity.

Your eyes flash to the scar near his temple. You’re exercising full-on restraint not to ask him about it. But it’s not the time, something you could try to pry out of him later. And knowing there’ll be a later makes you relax your shoulders, unclench your jaw.

He’s nice enough to pretend not to notice, or he’s in too much pain to mention it.

You dab the damp rag around the border of his cut again, mopping up any excess. You reach for the isopropyl.

“You might wanna take another swig,” you warn. And he obeys, down the hatch and white-knuckling through it.

“Good boy,” you’re murmuring automatically, and it just slips out.

Your mouth falls open just so, and Joel’s coughing, clearing his throat against the burn of whiskey. You’re pleading with the universe that his cough was close enough, loud enough to cover the words, but his face has turned a shade of red that’s probably rivaling the heat that reaches your ears.

Good boy? Jesus Christ.

If there was ever a heightened moment of being fucking touch-starved, it’s this.

You make haste with the disinfectant and place the closures over the cut. The bloodied towels and scraps from the DIY surgery are cleaned up, tied neatly into a plastic bag. And now, this is the part where you run and never face him again.

You’re already making plans to board up your windows, maybe have Ellie deliver your meals solely through a slot in the door.

But Joel’s pain is overriding everything, and he’s sunken even further back into the pillow, his head lolling to prop on his shoulder. He’s whispering a weak thanks that’s incoherent at best. You tug the blanket up and over him.

You grab a glass from downstairs, fill it to the brim with water and bring it to him. He groans at the sight, petulant.

“I’m not leaving until you finish this.”

His lifts his arm for it, scowling. “Gimme the damn thing.”

Satisfied, you hand it over and watch him drink it down, his throat bobbing in a hearty gulp. Your gaze can’t help but snag on it.

You have got to get the fuck out of here.

You come back with a refilled glass and sit it on his bedside table, close enough within reach. The medical bag is packed up and ready, sagging slightly in areas where you’ve emptied it. It knocks against your already-knocking knees, and you’re grateful to use its weight as an excuse for how blurred you feel.

“I need to talk to Tommy. You gonna be alright for a bit?”

His eyes are closed again, on the outskirts of rest, but his mouth pulls up in the ghost of smile.

“Ain’t goin’ nowhere, sweetheart.”

And you hope he means it.

—

You track down an unsettled Tommy, finding him pacing in the back of the general store. He’s restocking some shelves but not quite – there’s an gross pairing of tinned fish and fresh eggs sitting on a display that’s unappetizing at best.

“He’s okay. No bite,” you add lowly, acutely aware of how many pairs of ears are in the store. “But he needs to be monitored.”

Tommy slackens, rubbing his eyes that are full of exhaustion and bruised with worry. Index finger and thumb stroking the respective tails of his mustache one, two, three times as the gravity of that strikes him.

He loops you into an embrace, and it’s kind, full of ease. The smell of firewood and smoke tickles your nose. His worry evaporates then, and honestly, so does yours.

“He doin’ alright?”

You chew on that for a moment and nod. There are complications, but nothing to do with Joel’s health.

“He was pissed about the stitches, but I didn’t have a choice. Cut was pretty deep.”

“So… he tell you what happened, then?”

There’s that question again. You feel like you should have an answer, but if he wouldn’t clue in Ellie, you sure as hell wouldn’t be.

Like squeezing blood from a stone, your dad used to say.

“No,” you lie instinctively. You don’t know why.

But it isn’t really. Not if you don’t know the full truth yourself. There’s just something about Joel’s omission that makes you feel entitled to find out first.

“He said he fell down some stairs,” you amend, “just didn’t say where or how.”

Tommy offers you the same look that Ellie gave you – a raised brow coupled with a touch of disbelief.

“If you say so.”

You shrug, playing it as cool as’ll come natural to you. “You know Joel. Doesn’t want to make a fuss.”

He chuckles, shaking his head and rolling out his shoulders that you know have been holding tension. He believes that, at least.

“Sounds like you know him, too.”

—

A few days come and go.

Ellie takes on a lot of the recovery, but she doesn’t like messing with stitches — creeps me the fuck out that you did that without puking all over him, she claims — and she’s eager to substitute for the patrol routes while Joel’s down and out. You offer to step in, with a totally normal and selfless motive.

If she thinks anything else of it, you’d be the last to know.

Your new itinerary consists of changing Joel’s bandages, cleaning up through his hissed breaths and every goddamn it. Twice a day, morning and night and sometimes in closer intervals, but never approaching the cusp of any boundary.

Joel’s fiercely independent, swatting your hands when you try to help. Donning a clean flannel in the space between your lunchtime visit and your nightcap, despite you telling him that he shouldn’t be pushing his mobility.

That said, he’s marginally better about following doctor’s orders, drinking the water you leave on his nightstand but neglecting the pills that would stop him from coiling in on himself like a ready spring. And he doesn’t say it but you know it’s because he thinks it’d be a waste.

You trade regular formalities at first, each of you standing behind your respective walls, daring the other to toe a bit closer.

Joel doesn’t ask, but you bring him some short stories to pass the time and he devours them. You didn’t think much of it other than just straying past the point of being nice, but your heart sings a bit at how he leaves his shell at your coaxing.

You learn Bradbury is his favorite, but when he finishes The Most Dangerous Game, it’s the most he’s ever spoken to you in one sitting, astounded at the perfectly tied bow of an ending, asking you questions that only the author could answer. But it’s a marvel to witness, something you think about when you’re cleaning stables or washing dishes.

He’s unraveling for you, a loose thread tugged too hard on your favorite sweater. He talks of the places in the paintings, sometimes abruptly, like he isn’t sure what his cue is or if he has one.

Mentions of pre-Jackson when there was so much uncertainty and isolation, but it was coupled with those types of watercolor skies that you couldn’t paint if you tried.

These little pieces of him that make him whole – it’s like you’re both in on the same secret. And Joel isn’t doing it to lighten the tension, to be nice; that isn’t his brand of politeness. He just revels in the holy act of confession with you as his witness.

You come to learn that his room is modest, different from the rest of his house. Clues of hobbies sprawled on his desk – leatherworking tools and hand drawn blueprints that you can’t get a good look at with just a sidelong glance.

There’s a dusty stereo tucked at the back towards the wall, and you picture a content Joel, sketching new plans for a porch swing or some small addition while old bluesy country croons from the speakers.

You like this daydream, placing him in something lighthearted where his only worry is that he’s losing daylight on yardwork.

The two of you talk about little bits of everything and nothing. Reminiscing about sending snail mail, discussing what you think places like Italy look like now. How close you came to crossing an ocean in another life.

Tonight, you have a night terror that clings to you like wet denim. Stop-motion, nonsensical. Your head ricocheting into concrete, hitting your temple just so. Flashes of the people that used to be your parents, your friends.

And just as the life drains from you, blood seeping onto the floor and into spidering cracks, you wake up a flailing mess.

You practice your routine, twisting on knobs of lamps and plugging in the twinkling lights hanging around the perimeter of the living room. You press your cheek to the floor, checking under your bed for monsters for good measure.

Bleary-eyed, you’re climbing back under the covers, pulling them snug up to your chin.

There’s a neediness crawling its way through your organs with a one-way ticket south. The juxtaposition of fear mingles with an otherness, and it anchors itself to Joel.

You never cared for a protector, still don’t, but the eagerness that sprouts from him to defend your honor — and for nothing in return — magnetizes you on a cellular level.

Your fingers are dipping into the band of your already-damp underwear, taking inventory of what the thought of him does to you. Body on auto-pilot. A pool of dripping neediness, so slick that you’re coating your clit in excess and rubbing in tight circles.

He doesn’t even have to touch you, and it’s pathetic.

Images of Joel’s beard scratching your thighs swirls behind your eyelids, your hand gliding between the glistening of your folds. Fingers crook inside you, dipping into the last knuckle, and you’re choking on a gasp, already on the edge.

You wish they were more calloused, thicker, with length that can hit the spot that’s desperately out of reach.

You wish they were Joel’s.

It takes only a minute, some curling and pumping of your wrist to make it quick in case it’ll only ever be a fantasy. The wet noises of your arousal are nothing short of obscene, and you’re coming loudly, sharply on a string of moans.

In some ways, you think, you have already died.

And fuck. It’s so poetic it makes you sick.

—

On the fourth day, Maria sends you to Joel’s with some stew — two hearty containers that're meant for the both of you.

She’s been taking her shift at his place, carrying over containers of this and that to keep him fed. You wonder how often she takes on that role anyway, sans injury. You don’t peg Joel as the type to eat three square meals a day of his own accord.

Tell Joel I can’t make it tonight. Gotta do inventory.

She makes no room for elaboration, so you don’t ask. But you thank her with a hug, and you could swear that she’s giving you a conspiratorial smirk.

When you knock on Joel’s bedroom, he gives a new, warm invitation, coated in subtle hospitality. It’s a far stretch from the unaffected what? you might’ve received a week ago.

You place the stew down on the bedside table, along with some bowls and spoons you plucked from his kitchen. He just looks up at you from his bed, uncertainty reaching the lines of his forehead.

“It’s all Maria,” you explain and he hums, catching up.

“Explains a lot,” he mutters.

You eat quietly for a little over ten minutes. Joel’s flannel today boasts a rich navy, buttoned up to the top but not far enough to hide the sprinkling of hair that peeks through.

He catches you staring and pins you with a dark glance.

“You afraid of the dark or somethin’?”

Joel’s ask cuts through the air, and your spoon stops mid-route to your open mouth. It’s so out of the blue that it stuns you momentarily.

“Sorry?”

“You turn the lights on at night.”

What you thought to be private moments of fear were actually on display for all to see.

For Joel to see.

And the memory of your thighs trapping your hand as you came over and over again on your fingers… you’re grateful to at least have had some decorum to draw your bedroom curtains.

“Um.” You dig for a way to say nope, I’m actually just a pussy and I see things that aren’t there. Also, I was touching myself thinking about you last night. “No, just nightmares.”

Every inch of your skin feels like it’s searing. A bead of sweat makes a slow descent down your spine to your tailbone. You laugh lightly to deflect.

Joel’s mouth thins into a tight line.

“It’s nothing,” you promise.

“Ain’t nothin’,” he snaps. His brows are knitted in fury, misdirected. But you get it.

Your stomach is rumbling, but you’ve effectively lost whatever appetite you had. The bowl finds a space on the side table, and you’re pulling your knees to your chest protectively, thumbing at the fray on the cuff of your jeans.

You don’t mean to scowl, but you can’t help it. You can’t even meet his eyes.

Joel’s sighing, his own bowl discarded on the nightstand, grazing the lip of yours.

“Look, it’s not my business,” he starts, choosing his words carefully, “but that kinda shit worries me.”

When you do look up, he’s rubbing his beard with rigid fingers. You should feel nice and fuzzy that he cares enough to point it out, but it’s just embarrassment instead.

That, on top of everything else, you can’t even get through the night without waking up in a cold sweat.

“I know how it looks,” you say in surrender, “but I swear I’m fine.”

You can imagine what it would feel like to really mean it; it’s just on the tip of your tongue. There is a defiance there, it’s just struggling to find a way out.

“You sure about that?”

You let your feet touch the floor, straightening out your legs and busying yourself with smoothing the creases in your pants.

“You worry about everyone else like this?” you muse, hoping to redirect.

Joel’s scratching the back of his neck, eyes fixed anywhere else.

“Always worried about you.”

If you were any farther away, you wouldn’t have heard him.

Outside, kids are yelling, playing tag. You watch in jealousy, can almost hear the crunch of their boots and their tiny, inconsequential conversations. It takes you longer than intended to give a response, and he waits, patiently. Just trickles a look from the crown of your head to your hands to your face. Searching for a reaction.

“You’re about ten months late, Miller.” And you’re smiling briefly. You mean it as playful, but it’s colored with sadness.

His eyes glaze, and the wheels are turning, wondering if that also means too late.

“Didn’t want you to think I was takin’ advantage of the situation. And I thought Max —” Joel bites down on the name.

“Fuck Max,” you spit in disgust. “That was never a thing.”

You don’t have to make eye contact to see that he’s pleased by that. He hums in the back of his throat. Resists a shit-eating grin. From the looks of Joel connecting the dots, you don’t need say much else.

“Yeah, well. We all failed you,” he insists. “I failed you.”

It sets an incredulous spark in some hidden part of you. Nails cut into your palm, your fists balling harshly. Everyone else? Sure, you’d give him that. Jackson spit you out, with the exception of a select few.

But Joel?

“You saved me.”

“Not good enough,” he says under his breath.

—

The next day, you let yourself inside, already learning the language of Joel’s house when you press a little extra weight against the door to seal it shut when it sticks.

It’s quiet, on the cusp of 8, and you wouldn’t be surprised if Joel’s on the brink of sleep.

The sun’s long settled over the mountain, so there’s not much in the way of guidance.

It’s dark, but you expected it to be. You draw the curtains one by one, moving blindly from room to room yet knowing exactly where your feet are. It strikes you as odd, a visitor keeping pace with an unfamiliar house.

But if Joel’s anything, it’s predictable. Unfussy in the way he keeps out of the way, even in his own space. Takes pride in it, sure, but lives in a way that demands nothing but cherishes everything, even the absence of something.

Meaning there’s nothing too unexpected, too risky in its placement. He doesn’t take up too much room in the event that it’s gone tomorrow.

When your hands fumble for the switch of the living room lamp, the bulb springs to life and bathes a wary Joel in light. Sitting on the couch, slouched with residual soreness, but waiting.

For you.

“Jesus, fuck — what the fuck, Joel —”

“You’re late.”

“— sitting in the fucking dark like a lunatic —”

He puts a hand up to stop you, as if to press your mute button.

“I didn’t fall down any stairs.”

Your hands have risen to your chest in the shock of him there, and you’re gripping your shirt in the way he had almost a week ago. You don’t miss that little detail, so much so that you struggle to piece together what he’s saying.

It punches you abnormal; you kept so busy with leaving the subject alone that it slipped your mind that he lied.

“Sit down.”

You’re obedient and you don’t know why. You find a seat across from him, pulling up a stool that’s meant for feet, not your ass. Something crackles beside you, and the embers of a dying fire glow and warm to the left of you.

Your leg crosses over your knee, creating a 45-degree angle that you rest your elbows on. “Yeah, I gathered as much, thanks. You’re a terrible liar.”

Joel’s just eyeing you. And it’s not in a way that sizes you up, more of a calculation of what to say next. What to give away. There’s a beat of this, then another, then another.

“I thought ‘bed rest’ was pretty self-explanatory.”

You’re growing impatient, filling the room just to do it. You both know what happened, and maybe that’s what’s needling at you. That you’re the one person who’d understand the most, but the one person he doesn’t want to know.

It feels wretched and seething, knowing something but not enough.

“I’m gonna need you to cut to the part where you tell me what happened, Joel.”

At that, Joel drags in a breath and leans deeper into the couch. His gaze has moved to somewhere far off, burning into the drawn curtains like he can see outside, can see directly into the window of your kitchen. And with sudden clarity, you realize that he could — it’s a clean diagonal stare.

Are you afraid of the dark?

How many times has he sat in this very spot, taking in the show, watching you make tea, watching you read, watching you stutter and shake with sobs? Witnessing the onslaught of a nightmare?

Touching yourself? Watching you undress?

You aren’t the voyeuristic type, just uncaring to the point of defenseless. But Joel keeping an eye on you in this way is the coup de grâce that does you in. There’s no question now of whether he cares.

“I took Mountain View, headed for the outpost. Not much up that way lately, maybe one or two infected every once ‘n a while,” he says, and it’s unsettling that he’s talking in a way that could be to anyone or no one at all. “Thought I’d stop at the pharmacy on the way up, check that off, too. ‘Cept I wasn’t the only one with that idea.”

He pauses only to crack his knuckles for effect. Fingertips splay on his spread knees, and what seemed so fragile earlier, watercolors of bruises stretching from ligament to tendon, seems threatening now.

“One was lootin’ in the back, didn’t hear me come in. I thought he mighta been alone ‘til his friend followed me in,” he pauses, lost in thought. “Got into it with him.”

As if on cue, the gory split-skin of his hands flexes. Offensive wounds.

You were right, but you wish you weren’t.

“His friend came up from the back, ‘n they took turns for a minute. Long enough for me to get a good look. I ended up takin’ out the shorter one, other one was gone before I could get up.”

Joel doesn’t lift his head, just his eyes. The skin around them crinkles in sinister shapes, lids disappeared, lashes nearly touching brow. You know it’s not anger directed at you, but it’s shrinking you back down into an armchair, your fingers digging and clawing at the fabric without recognizing it.

“Know what’s funny about that?”

You don’t think you can answer with the desert that runs through your mouth. And whatever it is, it’s anything but.

“Not a lot of activity along the outposts this way, unless it’s infected. Everyone else comes straight through to Jackson. The logs say we’ve only run into two groups of raiders in the last five years along the patrol route,” another pause for emphasis. “And one of them was ten months ago.”

Something catches in your chest.

And then there’s a dam that breaks, pure relief. Relief that Joel’s seen the thing you’ve been pointing and screaming at while everyone else shrugs their shoulders and squints.

Then — panic.

Ice sneaks into your veins. The tips of your fingers run numb. It strikes you that you’re standing, that the foot stool is tipped on its side.

He doesn’t move, but there’s a contained rage in his eyes and his voice. A temper bubbling now that you’ve confirmed what he suspected.

“He have any tattoos?” Joel asks roughly.

There’s a flash of stars, hand-poked, bordering on downright sloppy.

“Who?” You say dumbly, but it’s obvious what he’s referring to. He’s seen it, too, and he’s seen it this week.

“You know who.”

You do.

You could draw it from memory if he asked.

Your weight becomes too much for your legs, and you collapse back down, this time into a chair that supports your amoeba-like state as everything in you turns to jelly.

“They’re getting closer. We were in Teton, so if they made it this far —” you jumble out, not sure if it’s just meaningless vomit to his ears. By his solemn nod, it isn’t.

He’s up and out of his seat with a wince that’s not as severe as before, his eyes careful on you, on your hands that you’re gripping together tightly to keep them still.

The isolation of his side is evident in the way he closes the space between you, but he masks the grimace as best he can. There’s a reprimand in you somewhere that he should be resting, lying down at least, but you know it’s pointless.

“Hey.”

He’s kneeling as much as his flank will allow, a pain in his eyes that isn’t for himself. Those fingertips scale the cliff of your jaw, ghosting as if he’s afraid to overstep. They’re prodding you to meet his eyes, and when you do, he drops his hand like he’s been burned.

It connects fiercely to a memory that you try to hold in your hands. A snowy, reminiscent one that slips through like a ribbon of smoke.

“Ain’t gotta worry about him. I’ll take care of it.”

You laugh, a real one that’s stained with sarcasm.

“What does that mean?”

Joel softens now, and the shift startles you. He thinks for a beat before answering.

“Whatever you need it to mean.”

It feels incomprehensible that anyone would willingly put themselves in danger for you, even adjacently, but then who noticed you were missing that day? Who led the pack, found you bleeding out?

The weather was violent, incoherent — a lost cause, a needle in the proverbial haystack. He already toed the line of a dangerous, potentially fruitless rescue mission.

And you never even thanked him.

“Why?” You ask it for the second time in as much as a week. It’s disjointed in conversation, but he knows that you need this answer.

“You remember how you were before?”

And for a split-second, you try.

There are glimpses, a rickety reel of kids tugging on your pant leg as they beg you to join them during recess, a glittering spray of laughter with Ellie as empty beer cans and discarded guitars litter her living room floor.

Of your friends’ faces on too many relaxed, sunny patrols, sometimes forcing them into a detour into the abandoned record store through Alpine so you can see what’s left.

Dinner in warm houses like Tommy and Maria’s, so full to the brim of love and potatoes and mead that you stumble on down to your house with cheeks burning and tuck yourself in with all of the lights off.

Visions of Joel that are fleeting, taped in frames on a film strip, but friendly exchanges.

But it’s a faceless narration. The accident wiped clean of any room for interpretation. Any visitation with these memories. You can place yourself in them, but can’t for the life of you feel tethered to her.

Frustrated, eyes watering, you shake your head.

“That’s why.”

Now he’s holding your jaw like he would some fragile thing, slotting his thumb just under the pulse thrumming in your neck, feeling the echo of it in his hand. There’s a silence, as if he’s straining to hear, to know the sound and syllables of your livelihood. You wish he’d press harder, bring you to the precipice of pleasure and death.

If only to know what it feels to be glass in Joel Miller’s hands, to be given the taste of death after he’d given you the gift of life all those months ago.

Your heart is hammering against your ribs. You know he can feel the adrenaline in your pulse point.

“Joel,” it falls out as a whisper, and you hate how good his name feels in your mouth.

He’s looking at you with empathy, thumbing through the pages of every agony you’ve succumbed to. It’s new and buzzing, knowing that there’s nothing you’d ever have to explain to Joel. No reasoning or fine print for how you are, he just knows. And he stays anyway.

A tear tracks a salty line down your face and it meets the pad of his thumb, an easy swipe.

And there’s a surge low in your throat, seesawing with satisfaction and the tell-tale lump of more tears if you lean in hard enough. Joel never shows his hand, the last to fold, but it feels a lot like you’re the prize he was waiting to throw cards down for.

So, you lean. Concave cheek into his calloused hand, tears without sobs leaking between his fingers down into his sleeve. The weight of only the world — your world, plural and shared — pushing you into him. The cataclysmic release that you’ve been aching for.

Your head is against his chest, cheek pressed against flannel because he’s guided you there. And it’s nice, you think, nice that he’s being a gentleman about the whole thing.

A gentleman just finger-combing through your hair, tucking it behind your ear.

It’s serene, and you’d happily make a home there and fall asleep if it wasn’t for the hammering of your heartbeat. You know he can feel it, and your quickened breath is the cherry on top.

Joel levels your faces, and his fingers are deja vu on the braille of each ridged cheekbone. He’s waiting on a cue, a line to be given to him from offstage, but you see flames licking through each darkened iris.

Something keeps holding him back, keeps holding you back. He’s too careful, afraid of cutting his hands on you. And in exploring every facet of that, it’s because he doesn’t want to bleed on you, not because the sharpest parts of you could hurt him.

You keep telling yourself it’s foreign and you’re strangers to one another.

But is it? Are you?

As if he’s reading your mind, Joel closes the distance in one fell swoop, and he kisses you.

It’s clumsy at first, in the way that clumsy is when you’re learning each other’s mouths. You taste the dregs of whiskey, of something wanton, and every unspoken word that’s ever misted between you. Years of forming smile lines and the prickle of his unkempt beard against your chin, taste the stories of every scar.

You’re tangling with him, lips pressing urgently against Joel. His tongue’s expert but gentle when he dips it inside your mouth, and you’re swapping breathless sighs. You can only imagine what he’s tasting of you, what flavor he’s been dreaming of.

His hands are still at either side of your face, thumbs pressing sweetly into the bony part of your jaw. Joel’s stilling the unrest in you that’s put its bags down and refused to leave. It quiets, tips a hat and walks out, leaving a welcome calm in place.

There’s a chasteness, but you know he’s just as desperate and hungry as you are. Wanting to claim, to devour each other entirely. And it’s not lost on you that he’s on his knees, hands clasping your face in prayer like you’re some communion he’s drinking from.

He engulfs you, and you’re moving together, fitting together like you were poured from the same mold. Joel’s fingers have moved to thread through your hair, one of his hands cradling the back of your head and tugging just barely.

Enough that magma pools in between your hips.

But he slows, letting loose a low groan into the heat of your mouth. It’s helpless, like he’s accepted he can’t swim and has submerged his head underwater.

And when you finally break apart, Joel’s pupils are dilated, on the cusp of black. Your collective breaths are uneven. He looks at you in awe.

“Been wantin’ to do that for a long, long time,” he’s saying, but you can barely hear him. Not when your heart is catching up with the rest of you, roaring above everything else. His thumb skates over your bottom lip, and the instinct to unhinge your jaw for him shouldn’t be there, but it is.

Maybe this sort of suffering is worth it, if it’s Joel you’re suffering for.

If you weren’t in trouble before, you sure as fuck are now.

#my writing #ahfe #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller smut #joel miller x reader #the last of us fanfiction #the last of us #the last of us hbo #jackson!joel #joel miller #joel miller x you #tlou fanfiction #a heart for eating #joel miller x f!reader #the last of us smut #motherofagony

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white-poppie · 1 year ago

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You're an angel, I'm a dog (s.haruchiyo x reader drabble)

Haruchiyo is petrified when you first ask to kiss him.

His breath caught in the ravine of his gullet as you stare at him with those eyes of yours: the ones he would sacrifice the world for if he has to.

“Haru?” You ask softly, you are so patient with him; it reduces him to a soft, pliable mass. He is scared of shattering his mirage of the perfect future (you) if his grip is even slightly harsh.

“Yeah baby,” he says, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he pulls his mask down and stuffs it in his pocket.

It's not like you haven’t seen his face under his mask, diamond scars bedecking the sides of his mouth, in a faint cicatrix, painted by a soft stroke of a pink that should be patented for him.

Your breath is on his neck as you look up. It is a gust that seems to wash away his sins.

He loves you like a dog. Feral in all its gruesome and bloody glory, how in the end he has his head perched on your lap, kneeling as you brush your hands in his hair, loving him despite all his blemish and bestiality.

The diamonds on the corner of his lips tremble as he leans close, his hand grabbing you closer by your waist, he’s scared.

No one has ever been this close or seen him this vulnerable. He’s afraid of disappointing you. He is nervous about losing control. He is anxious about his first kiss.

“Haru, don’t be nervous.” You say as you move your palm to trace those diamonds on his face; more valuable than any hallmark ones you can find.

He has to close his eyes to control himself, his name uttered by your mouth, Ha-ru… He’s Sanzu to the world, but he is your Haru.

The brush of your skin, feeling someone stepped up on the accelerator of his heart. As you bring your finger towards Sanzu's face, a gentle caress over the bridge of his nose elicits a subtle scrunch at the tender sensation. Your finger then glides to the dip of his lips, tracing the contours of his mouth with a delicate touch, before lingering over the ridged skin at the corners with a gentle reverence.

His lips part in a shaky 'o', head tilts slightly, revealing a constellation of blue veins on his neck, his Adam's apple bobbing like a soft landmark on the expanse of his flesh when he gulps.

He leans in, the muscles of his face twitching slightly before he stops halfway through. Your noses touching. His sharp, small naxal muscles, and fuchsia eyes peering into yours like the world is ending.

And then your lips finally meet. It's awkward and stiff, with skin getting caught between teeth, lips hitting cacophonically, but it's special, enchanting perchance. It's gradual, saccharine melting of lips, eyelids fluttering, palms holding each other's faces comfortably..

Breathing heavily and pulling away with flushed faces as silly grins break onto both your faces.

Sanzu loves you like a dog but kisses you like you are his god.

— TOKYO REVENGERS - Fanfictions

TAGS: @akumicchi, @futuristicallykawaiiturtle, @kristaline2dmensimp, @rintaroubby @nanaseishiro, @cleaningfairylevi, @ynjimenez, @webawee

﹒ Taglist (lmk in the comments in case you wanna be added and the link doesn't work!)

psst, hey, over here! Uhm hi :) Do you like reading? If so can you please check out my first novel? I am a 15-year-old author who needs support, I assure you it won't disappoint! It's okay if you don't buy, it would be enough to share the link with someone else who might be interested! I humbly request you support my career as a child author by purchasing my book. This would help me to write more books in future. “Of Vengeance and Ashes” -> BUY NOW!!!!

Also Check out: L'appel du vide (✔️) (Synopsis: Your husband, Hanma Shuji is dead! With no memories of what transpired two days before his death, you team up with Tachibana Naoto, Chifuyu Matsuno, Ryuguji Ken and Mitsuya Takashi, you go on a journey full of betrayals and twists. Can you find out what really happened to your husband? )

#⎯⟡ 𝔗RV #[𝕭𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍'𝐒 NO. 𝟐]#white poppie🌼#sanzu #sanzu haruchiyo #sanzu x reader #tokyo revengers sanzu #tokrev sanzu #sanzu smut #haruchiyo sanzu #tokrev #sanzu x you #sanzu x y/n #sanzu fluff #akashi haruchiyo #haruchiyo sanzu x reader #haruchiyo x reader #tokyo revengers haruchiyo sanzu

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ask-the-pioneer · 1 month ago

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Hello and welcome to @ask-the-pioneer! This is a scripted ask blog dedicated to a slugcat OC of mine called Marbles (she/her), titled the Pioneer. She is a re-interpretation of Artificer’s blue slugpup, set in a AU where the pup survives, grows up, and receives a name. The main story begins some short time after the end of Artificer’s campaign. At that point in time Marbles is already a young adult (early 20s in human years). She parts ways with Hunter - her mentor - and ventures out to seek the knowledge contained within the pearls that she was always captivated by.

This blog is run by @kalivasquez (@kalivasquezart). Keep in mind I’m not a native English speaker. There may be spelling errors or weirdly constructed sentences at times. This is my first ask-blog ever so idk what I’m doing but I’m trying my best 👍

CONTENT WARNING: This blog has content rating of +18 due to potential sensitive themes: mental trauma, depictions of violence, suicidal ideation, blood and gore, or other graphic imagery that may be uncomfortable, scarring or otherwise triggering to witness. Viewer discretion is advised. Posts containing mild themes will be tagged appropriately, while posts showing heavy themes will have "mature" filter applied to them. Please be aware that all the content shared on this blog is intended for an adult audience!

More info below the cut!

Blog Rules 📜

Last update: 10th of October, 2024

By default you address the main character - Marbles, aka the Pioneer - in your asks. If you wish to inquire me directly (as an author of this blog), please include “[OOC]” at the beginning, or otherwise indicate that the message is directed at me and not the character.

Asks are answered in-character. Sometimes the character may react to your ask in a seemingly negative way. Please keep in mind that it is done from their point of view, and it does not imply that I (the author) personally reacted badly to your message.

I appreciate all the asks that I receive. However, I reserve the right to not answer some of them, at my discretion. It is not guaranteed that you receive a response. Still, I’ll try my best to answer as many messages as I can.

Be aware that some asks I receive may be skipped over, especially ones that are short and vague, in favour of more complex asks that help me push the plot of this AU forward. This is also relevant for asks that refer to the same subject (duplicates).

Please be tactful! Asks that are inappropriate or confusing in their intent (like spam, baits, asks containing slurs) will be deleted. Sorry!

Do not send me asks via direct messages (DMs)! I keep my DMs open in case someone needs to contact me for other reasons, like incorrect tagging or important offsite matters. If you send me a DM meant to be answered like an ask, your message will be ignored and deleted.

More rules may be added later. Please check this section again periodically.

General Character Info ℹ️

As of now, this ask-blog has only one acting character - Marbles the slugcat, aka the Pioneer.

Name (given): Mirmyntasseth, Eight Marbles Cast in Stone

Title (given): the Pioneer

Nickname: Blue (for family), Marbles (for friends, after being named by an iterator)

Pronouns: she/her

Age: young adult (very early 20’s in human years)

Personality: energetic, curious, savvy, humorous, short-tempered, resilient, drive, a little naive and too trusting, exhibits mild case of abandoned child syndrome

Specific traits:

good at finding pearls (she loves them, goes about as crazy for them as scavs) and other trinkets,

knows martial arts, can incapacitate enemies by hitting their pressure points,

can craft explosive spears and grenades - they do less damage, but stun for longer; crafted explosives have deep orange color,

already has a mark of communication, granted by NSH,

Tools:

Marbles is often seen wearing a light colored “sling bag” on her back, where she keeps her pearls and other items,

at a muuuuuuch later point in time, she receives a gift from a kind interator - her very own citizen ID drone; the drone can read from pearls and translate slugcat speech into other languages.

Current reference sheet:

For more in-dept info and drawings/references of the character, please visit Marbles' ToyHouse page.

AU Timeline ⏱️

the story of Pioneer takes place some years after the end of Artificer's campaign, and begins at the same time as Hunter's campaign in-game

this AU assumes the following timeline for slugcat campaigns: Spearmaster -> Artificer -> Hunter -> Gourmand -> Survivor -> Monk -> Rivulet -> Saint,

Artificer/Hunter/Gourmand campaigns happen close together, with Hunter/Gourmand overlapping slightly; all three scugs are roughly the same age, with Arti being the oldest (early 40s), and Hunter the youngest (39),

Saint and Monk are still slugpups by the time the story of Pioneer beings,

Spearmaster is unlikely to be present in this AU as it is assumed that over 432 cycles have passed, meaning they are no longer alive,

Rivulet is unlikely to be present in this AU as here their campaign is assumed to have taken place *much *later in the future,

Saint is thought to be stuck in a time loop, and *may *appear in this AU.

AU Setting 📝

Pioneer’s Backstory (before the events described in this ask blog):

Marbles/Blue (the Pioneer) was born in the Garbage Wastes area, raised by a single mother (Artificer); the other parent remains unknown,

she had a sibling (who was also the runt of the litter) - a brother named Bryn, the green slugpup; the two were fraternal twins,

she got separated from the rest of her family in a scav toll incident,

was not killed, but abducted instead by the scavenger toll tribe, brought into their local shelter just before the rain started,

initially assumed to have been taken in as a fodder in case of predator attack,

in the end she has earned her keep when she learned how to make grenades and explosive spears, turning herself into a valuable asset for the tribe,

was treated fairly well, but never truly incorporated into the local scavenger community,

had stayed with the tribe for many cycles, learning how to fight and survive, but also how to look for valuables (mainly pearls) and haggle with other tribes,

could probably have run away, but she held on to hope that mom would come back for her,

whenever she got “lost”, the tribe would look for her to bring her back,

after one of her short solo expeditions, she came back to the camp only to find out the entire scav tribe has been wiped out,

ran away and been wandering aimlessly for a while, eventualy stumbling upon Hunter who adopted her, took back to NSH's superstructure, and underwent training alongside him (under NSH’s supervision),

promised to accompany Hunter during his important mission, but had to suddenly part ways due to unfortunate circumstances (just before the beginning of Hunter’s campaign).

Post Tagging 🏷️

I use the following tags:

#rain world, #rain world oc, #rain world au - default tags added to all answered asks (unless OOC),

#rain world spoilers - is included in posts that may spoil RW lore, for example: when answers hint to the conclusion of Artificer’s campaign,

#rw - rain world-specific characters that are present in a post, such as: “#rw hunter” or “rw five pebbles”; i will try to use the full name(s) intead of abbreviations,

#au lore - posts that contain important worldbuilding information for my AU,

#ooc- out of character posts, or anything else that doesn’t fall under “rain world” umbrella,

(more tags will be added to this section once I actually start posting stuff)

I also tag sensitive content with appropriate tags like #tw [trigger], if shown.

Text Key 💬

Most dialogue takes form of narrated drawings, where Marbles speaks in her own voice. The speeches are a part of the drawings themselves.

However, if a post contains additional text, the following key is used:

[Narration]

[The road was long and arduous, and she was glad to have finally found a shelter]

(Thoughts)

(This place is full of scavengers, I should be able to trade those pearls for some food)

“Speaking”

“How come you have not seen a vulture before? Climb up to Sky Islands, they are everywhere!”

//OOC

// more art coming soon woohoo!

Credits 📑

image in the blog's header belongs to Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash

Yoŋasabi script (slugcat language, original conlang) in the top banner by @opashoo

all the other drawings posted on this blog were made by me, unless stated otherwise

#rain world #no one actually reads the “About” page so i've decided to turn it into a pinned post #can you believe i still haven't come up with the name for this AU lol #pinned

117 notes · View notes

greensun · 1 year ago

Text

THE BIG QSMPSTUCK LOREDUMP AKA: I finally get to do all the lorebabble I wanted to do.

EDIT (11/1/2023): THIS VERSION IS NOW OUT OF DATE AND DOES NOT INCLUDE THE PEOPLE IN THE ICE CUBES. I AM CURRENTLY REWORKING PARTS OF THIS BUT MOST SHOULD STAY THE SAME FOR THE NEW POSTS SANS BAGHERA, KAMETO, AND DANTDM'S CLASSPECTS! LOOK FORWARD TO UPDATED POSTS IN THE FUTURE.

SOME NOTES: 1. I have a very specific version of qsmpstuck going on with my art I make that I made with a group of friends (thanks Slimercord!) 2. There are other people who made other classpects and takes on QSMP characters that are more character based, mine is not that case, it looks at how QSMP as a whole would work as a full sburb session, and balancing how many people would be on each aspect or class to carry that motif of Homestuck's balancing/equal duality theme. This means I am looking at and using Classpects as a narrative & plot device, not necessarily a personality test like how someone would classpect a real person (This is how the Extended Zodiac works, and why I choose to ignore it for character classpecting. It works great for classpecting real life people though, so by all means you can use the EZ for you and your friends!). 3. AND WITH THAT! It means two people per aspect and and class, with the exception of space and time having three people, and knights and heirs having three people. 4. FAIR WARNING: IF YOU HAVE NEVER READ HOMESTUCK, THERE IS LOTS OF DEATH IN IT, WITH LOTS OF RESURRECTIONS. I WILL BE DISCUSSING DEATH IN A VERY JOKING MANNER HERE! 5. For posterity in case things change in the future: This post was made August 2nd 2023, after the French were added, and right before the Election arc finished. I'm sure if I came back to this after QSMP is over my classpecting would be different. (Updated August 20, 2023)

I'll add this again at the bottom but if you want more of my notes and thought processes or just more qsmpstuck in general here's the link to my tag for all qsmpstuck on this blog, and here's the link to all qsmpstuck on my regular mcyt blog. (my regular blog includes other people's qsmpstuck takes & reblogs however! But every classpect analysis I reblogged in there w/ an anonymous ask sent to the OP was me on anon lol)

HERE WE GO! The big ol google doc sheet I had to make for this. Every note on that godtier order list is how we decided the character would godtier, and we still aren't even technically done! I have so much information built up for this AU I am not sure I could include all of it in this post.

CLASSPECTS

Anyway, in terms of classpects, the way we went about deciding was 1. Finding symbolic meanings we felt fit the characters best 2. If the classpect was funny and had a fun double entendre to the character 3. If we really struggled, we went and picked up Dahni Witch of Light's classpect analyses and found which class fit a character best within an aspect we had a vague idea of. I find Dahni's analyses to be the best at classpecting non-homestuck characters with, because they give enough leeway in interpretation and are somewhat broad, while still applying as a fictional character's story arc, rather than solely a personality test. We also basically ignored most classpect's assigned "role" concept thingy, they were too nebulous in meaning to help much, with the only ones we kept being Sylphs are the passive creation class with Maids as the active creation class, and then Bards are passive destruction, Princes are active destruction.

AND NOW BACK TO THE CUBES YOU CARE ABOUT: As stated before, we did lay it out so we (mostly) only had two per aspect and class, to get that true fan session balancing spirit. Space/time and knight/heir are the only ones with three members. Here's how the outfits look!

My favorites here & their reasonings are: - Etoiles: Sylph of Blood - We all agreed him getting a classpect that is at least somewhat silly would be fitting, but all immediately came to the conclusion that he would hands down be a blood player. From his love of fighting, and the way he goes about befriending everyone he meets to help them, he's just so blood player. To balance out our initial silly classpecting idea, we made him a Sylph! It fits, like, really well! He creates friendship, he helps people, like. What more could you want from a classpect for him. - Mariana: Maid of Doom - I sent these two asks to this other person about this and liked their reasonings lol. - Spreen: Prince of Breath - Look I'm a Spreengirl I think he would play a great active destruction class and he takes away other's freedom (in minecraft). He kills people. He's just so Prince to me. It's really funny. - BBH: Knight of Life - Do you know how funny it is to take a guy who's whole thing is that he's like entirely black and red themed and put him in the burlap sack outfit. Also Knight & Space player frog breeding combo. He's working with Foolish on those frogs. - Foolish: Page of Space - This guy is the ultimate builder of all time ever. He was hands down the easiest to look at and go Oh he is THE space player here. - Fit: Prince of Space - Y'know 2b2t and hacked clients and griefing people? Prince of Space. Plus since he's a space player, soooo - Philza: Knight of Rage - Another great Space & Knight combo. This guy is such a hater on QSMP (positive) he doubts easily distrusts whenever necessary. Such a rage player. - Missa: Bard of Time - Missa is really failgirl I know quite a few people haven't like... watched much of his MC stuff. However you should check out when he had to be placed in a box to fish by himself so he wouldn't die a third time in Minecraft Extremo. He's a perfect Bard, and then he does music. Great set up for a Time player. Wouldn't want it any other way. - Antoine: Seer of Void - truly. Truly. A guy I looked at for two minutes and immediately knew what classpect he needed. That scene where he just like lightly questioned Cellbit after he escaped the federation and it made Cellbit so nervous he started just saying things that made him look way more nervous than necessary? Core Antoine moment for me. The fact he has a basement filled with so much writing on every candidate? The fact he hides his true face so much? We don't even know what's going on there? Void Player. Seer. So fitting it's beautiful to me. - Felps: Maid of Breath - Look, breath is THE aspect of freedom and doing what you want at your own pace. I think I would be committing a cardinal sin if I DIDN'T make Felps a breath player. - Tazercraft: Witch of Doom & Page of Time - They get to do a fucked up glitch timeloop. With these two classpects they can literally do whatever they want forever. Witch of Doom is a classpect that you give to a character if you know they can rip everything to shreds, have fun doing it, but wouldn't (usually) use it to actively hurt people out of true malice (for no reason) (a witch can DEFINITELY respond negatively if push comes to shove). Page of Time is so funny as a classpect also. Just like... Look up what the Page godtier outfit looks like. You'll see what I mean... And why Pac is a page. - Rubius: Waste of Breath - This classpect sounds really mean, sorry. I promise I like Rubius. He's supposed to be a stand in for what the Hussie author insert was in Homestuck, opposing Doc Scratch and fighting him. Hussie was a Waste of Space, I wanted to keep the pun with waste here. Breath worked the best. The federation has a Lord of Blood ability to counter him. Neither of these two count for the main classpect total.

One day I might post a copy of the google sheet and link it for more in-depth reasonings for every character, but like... almost everyone had reasonings like this where we spent waaay too long analyzing everyone LMAO. This is getting long as is, so I'll cut off classpecting here.

DREAMING MOONS

I am about to say something that will make people either really mad or really happy. There is no canon true definition of what assigns you a dreaming moon in Homestuck's text. The only thing we can glean from canon about which moon you get is that Prospit humans make their bed in the morning, and Derse humans don't. Needless to say, this doesn't help when you want to individually give each person a dreaming moon, but it IS great news for me: it makes assigning dreaming moons based on dividing the cast in half really, really easy. That is how it worked for the troll session, it was cut in half with teams, and then assigned based on red team vs blue team. So that is what I did here. All of the English speakers were given Prospit, and all of the Hispanic side were given Derse. This has lore relevance. We'll get back to it in a moment.

Also for note, the Federation is Prospit, with Dersite carapacians being a more nebulous identity against the Federation. Hispanic side was given Derse because they just seem more like Derse guys. Plus the whole Time on Derse/Space on Prospit theme going on in original HS canon is something I kinda wanted to go along with.

Quackity was given dual dreamer, with one of his dreamselves being ElQuackity, hence why he isn't listed. To balance this, we had to make another dual dreamer, and figured handing it to Kameto, who basically is permanently lost in the void, would be a good balance.

The French and Brazilian sessions were assigned using the "well this character would make sense here" method.

Server/Client Orders & Session Chains

If anyone needs a brief refresher, a client is the person you get into a sburb session, and a server is the person gets you into the session. Everyone is a client and a server to someone different. (tl;dr John was Rose's client, Rose was John's Server.) THAT BEING SAID! It means the loop for sessions close once you're all connected to both a client and a server. There are three separate sessions here, and one of them is a mobius double reacharound.

For clarity, the arrows mean: Client <- Server

The Original session, the mobius double reacharound, is the Spanish-English session. The order is

Quackity <- Mariana <- Spreen <- Roier <- Missa <- Vegetta <- Maxo <- Luzu (<- BBH)

BBH <- Foolish <- Slimecicle <- Jaiden <- DanTDM <- Fit <- Philza <- Wilbur (<- Quackity)

Because of the nature of a Mobius Double Reacharound, it means BBH and Quackity enter the session first, by technicality. The first person in a session is also the person who does the ectobiology. Unlike the troll session which only had Karkat as the ectobiologist, if Q!Quackity were the sole ectobiologist, no clones would be made and everyone would be stuck in a paradox, so I think it's funnier if BBH and Q had to work together on Ectobiology. I find their dynamic hilarious. Anyway, Luzu and Wilbur had to be the last in their respective chains, because no one else would be able to enter.

The next chain is the Brazilian closed Session, which is

Forever <- Mike <- Pac <- Felps <- Cellbit (<- Forever)

As previously mentioned, Pac e Mike (uou uou) have very good classpects to make up for the fact they have no space player. I'll come back to this.

The final chain is the French closed session. It goes

Baghera <- Antoine <- Etoiles <- AyPierre <- Kameto (<- Baghera)

They have balanced moons! They have a space player! They have a seer even! Both light and void! However, in missing a time player, they are forever doomed to fail the session.

LANDS OF PLANETS AND PARTNERS

Now I can finally explain actual lore. My apologies for making you read about 1000 words before this.

The Hispanic-English session is glitched. There is not a planet for each person. They have to share planets with a person from the opposite dreaming moon, generating lands that are a combination of two different aspects entirely. The planetary pairings for this prime session are the same pairings used for the initial egg pairings.

I really love designing lands for Sburb AUs it's my favorite thing in the world. The first one is the Land of Acid and Alcohol, Slimecicle (Heir of Heart) and Mariana's (Maid of Doom) land. Its oceans are acid and gasoline, and then covered in bottles that are a Russian roulette of alcoholic beverages, and then Molotov cocktails! The second is the Land of Steam and Dreams, Roier (Witch of Blood) and Jaiden's (Seer of Hope) land. It's filled with buildings built in an industrial revolution style architecture, playing on how people could believe in social mobility and "making it" in that time period, while also being reliant on heavy metallic machinery! I have a lot of fun conceptualizing lands.

The session's glitches don't stop at the planetary pairings on their own however, and it continues when Luzu attempts to enter the session. The session glitches from him being BBH's client, where it refuses to match pairings if they're connected directly, as the game would be unable to generate the gates above each player's house, it would simply loop back to connecting with the same Land. Luzu ends up being paired onto Quackity's land because of this, because the Game still detects him as having a dreamself on the opposite moon, even if he technically has both.

This causes BBH and Wilbur's land to glitch, and they end up paired together (as a bit of a nod back to how BBH and Wilbur were initially intended to be paired, before admins just made a new egg for Wilbur). We'll get back to this in a bit.

Some other lands from the AH session I enjoy are - The Land of Lush Forests and Iridescent Lakes, also known as LOLFAIL, BBH and Wilbur's land, which is a double Life player land, so the oceans are filled with gemstones and the land is covered in the most dense forest imaginable. It has the most difficult underlings spawn on it compared to any other land in the Anglo-Hispanic session. - The Land of Frogs and Typhoons, Spreen and Fit's land, which every space player is guaranteed frogs as part of their land, combined with Spreen being a breath player, it is a constant hurricane with frogs in it. They do not work on trying to calm the storm. They just start killing the frogs. There are so many frogs. The frogs are constantly flying at anyone who enters the land. Fit's slogan is FTF. Thank you to crow qsmp-yaoi for saying this idea because it truly brings me to tears every time I think about them being hit by those frogs flying at Mach 10. - The Land of Synapses and Static, Maxo and DanTDM's land. It's a darkened land, caused by Maxo's void, and then covered in a blanket of constant fog so thick a lighthouse can barely cut through it. The land also has mimicking noises to make familiar sounds to any player that steps on it, caused by Dan's Mind. It is an overbearingly lonely land. One where you understand what it truly feels like to be alone. One where you can lose someone as soon as you take your eyes off of them. Maxo last saw Dan on this land. No one else has seen him since.

I'm going to stop myself here, but I might come back and draw some more Land illustrations for these, haha.

Denizeggs

With the planetary partners, you might have seen this coming. Each planet in the combined session is missing a Denizen. Instead, what each player finds at the heart of the land is a little egg they need to help raise. They all find eggs at different points, however. Some people find their egg before they godtier, some find them afterward.

All of the eggs correspond to the land of their respective parents, however Luzu joins into the session too late to ever meet Tilin, second to last of the chain, she's already dead by that point.

And then the final major glitch in starting this session, when Wilbur joins as the final member of the chain, and enters, the only land open is BBH's land. Due to the nature of Sburb already knowing how things would end, it was always going to be this way, and there was no other option on who's planet he would join. The game glitches again, and detecting a second Prospit player, spawns in a new Denizen: Tallulah.

The eggs generally follow how they were in QSMP proper. Some of them die early. Some of them don't. Juanaflippa is as tragic as she is in canon. Two dads who are just bad at raising a child and it would have never worked out. Slime still kills Tilin by accident. Spreen doesn't care about Ramon, ditched him etc you know how it goes. The eggs are partially a planet quest too, so it's best if the eggs do live here.

Also in the glitches with this, there's a lack of consorts on any of the combined planets. There are a few, but not really as common as canon proper would have.

BRAZIL! 🇧🇷

The Brazil Session is a closed session between the five Brazilians. One of the requirements to complete Sburb is that you need a Space player (required to have forge in order to complete the final genesis frog & launch it into creating a new universe) and a Time player (required to keep the session in the proper timeline). The Brazilians have a time player (Pac), so they're halfway there!

There's some hiccups along the way. Mostly just Cellbit accidentally killing Felps and having to sprite him so Mike could make him a robot body to live in, but same old same old etc. Pac and Mike also kill each other by accident, but some other stuff happens there.

They still don't have the main aspect to actually continue the session, realize this, and also have a guy with one of the most conceptually powerful classpects to exist in terms of being able to glitch a game and save everyone. They manage to contact the primary session, reaching out to two grieving parents who are desperate to do anything to revive their daughter, one of whom is also a very powerful Doom player.

Brazilian Lands (brief edition)! - Land of Vultures and Culture, Forever's land, is a Hope land based around having Forever work to help save consorts who are hiding beneath intense structures and live in very isolate communities from each other. There's also massive megafauna in the skies that are always trying to kill them. - Land of Electronics and Experiments, Mike's land, is a pretty typical doom land, based around Chume labs, and has a constant lightning storm overhead - Land of Dancefloors and Dollhouses, Pac's land, is a combination of a land quest he has to get through, and a typical time land. All time lands have a clockwork or a music theme, I think him having a hot pink land that's massive amounts of dollhouse rooms attached to each other he has to make it through is just a fun concept. - Land of Cloud and Sky, Felps's world, is just a land with everything high in the sky. His whole quest is about him harnessing his ability to go with the flow to connect his consorts together. This is hard when he's sprited himself after dying upon entering due to Cellbit fucking up and accidentally killing him, and living in a robot body built by Mike. Aradia style. - Land of Searchlight and Bone, Cellbit's world, is a giant panopticon style prison. With so many bones, both decorating the prison, and filling the prison cells. His final moment is when he gets to the office of the panopticon, and it is his quest bed. He has a whole ordeal over it.

RICARLYSON! So these guys have regular consorts and Denizens, Richarlyson spawns in the heart of Skaia, and gives the quest for the other five guys to raise him.

Pac (Page of Time) has the ability to manipulate time as he wants once he realizes his abilities. Mike (Witch of Doom) can rip a hole in the universe so big it saves all of the players and sets them smack in the middle of another session, especially a previously contacted session with the connection being a Maid of Doom. With a time player land as well, they get a scratch construct on the Land of Dancefloors and Dollhouses, setting up their ability to scratch their session and set loose a whole new universe where theirs once stood.

French

The French session has probably the most normal planets of everything going on here, what really starts their journey going awry is that they have no time player.

Antoine, being a Seer of Void, can see something is going wrong. He makes contact with people outside of their session in an attempt to restore things to balance. He goes off into the veil and contacts the horrorterrors, and sets up a connection between two Doom players who seem they both desperately need it.

While he's doing that, the rest of the French proceed to have the most normal Sburb session out of anyone. Etoiles is having a great time on his planet. Aypierre gets a genesis tadpole. Kameto has two backup lives.

French Planets (Brief Edition) - Land of Apples and Airplanes, Baghera's land! It's probably the nicest land of anyone's. There are many jokes about how she doesn't get why everyone keeps complaining about their lands being horrible until she reaches theirs. - Land of Sham and Soil, Antoine's land, it's a dark land with tall dirt towers that make it impossible to see where you step. You'd need to be someone who could find where you're going in the pitch dark to even survive here. - Land of Bonds and Breakouts, Etoiles's land, is a land of a giant maze dungeon labyrinth. It's a nightmare for everyone but him. He loves it. - Land of Bogs and Frogs, AyPierre's land, is a land with frogs in a very thick swamp. I'll be honest i Just need to cook on this one some more. - Land of Hidden Leaves and War, Kameto's land, is a Naruto joke.

POMME! Is like Richas she's in the middle of Skaia. An easter egg if you will.

The French session is brought into the primary session when Antoine manages to contact with everyone else fully, rather than quietly watch from the outside. Etoiles and Baghera lose their original selves, and are their dreamselves when the universes collide in, and were unable to godtier, due to not knowing about the quest slabs.

GODTIERING! & the rest of the chronological story

THIS is the order of the godtiers from the beginning of the Spanish-English session. Anyone in the other sessions who godtier before their universe collide event has a red numeral to keep them distinct. I feel pretty strongly almost everyone would godtier here, they're all characters based on gamers. Sburb au works exceptionally well when you know everyone's gaming style.

Also, yeah I have notes listed on each godtier order for how each person dies. Like it's that detailed atp.

Spreen has the highest kill count out of everyone on purpose. I think he'd be down to cut his friends down knowing they'd be revived immortal afterward. As well as, the federation is Prospit in this scenario, they want everyone to godtier. I think him playing to what they want out of him feels his style. Anyway, he sprites his own dreamself due to ElQuackity messing with timeloops. To make his living player self trust him, Spreensprite convinces him to godtier Roier first. It is himself he's talking to, after all. Roier becomes the first godtier in any universe, and not out of his own volition. After seeing it really did work with Roier, Spreen godtiers himself. He gets li'l bear ears ala Jade getting doggy ears with her dreamself sprited, he threw in a Rubius cubito to his kernelsprite first. I like the bear ears I'm biased .3. q!Spreen being really fun in a Sburb concept is why I got hooked on this au after all.

After the first lore is repeated, BBH godtiers himself by decapitating himself with a sendificator to fuck with Foolish. He's kinda bitter about getting beige clothes. He befriends the midnight crew at least. This is before he has Dapper. He finds out about godtiering from Roier by accident and then is like. Oh I have the BEST idea.

Vegetta is killed by Spreen by request, wanting to be stronger to protect Leo, and then Spreen godtiers Missa in order to use his time powers on Derse to throw his dreamself at the kernelsprite, locking the time loop. Anyway, Missa is essentially locked in a tower on Derse's moon after this, now permanently in his Dreamself's body, who hadn't awoken prior. Fit realizes people are walking around in weird clothes, hears about it vaguely from BBH, sends a text to Spreen who'd been ghosting him, and goes like. Hey man. Wanna kill me? And gets his first reply in months.

Phil is attacked by an overpowered monster and almost dies, and Missa manages to get the message to Fit that this is happening through time shenanigans, and Fit manages to get him to his questbed before he fully dies and loses his dreamself. Phil is not happy about this and could not be angrier. He doesn't blame Fit though it's like a self anger thing.

THE BRAZILIAN CASCADE HAPPENS! PEOPLE DIE. By which I mean Slimecicle and Mariana work together to try to help the Brazilians into the session in a bid at saving Juanaflippa, hoping one of them have the ability to revive her. Slimecicle is murdered in the crypts of Prospit by Quackity in a duel, where he cuts off Quackity's arm in exchange for Quackity cutting down his life. Truly one of those luck moments where Charlie dies on his questslab. Mariana is murdered at the same time by Spreen, who is now fully working under orders from the Federation.

Pre-cascade, Pac and Mike both godtier, because they stumble into a stable timeloop, by Mike accidentally glitching Pac's questslab into throwing it at him and killing him. He godtiers with this. Now, as a fully godtiered page of time, they make it to Mike's questbed, and godtier!Mike nudges Pac's slab at Past!Mike to pick up and throw when fucking around with powers.

Felps godtiers in the cascade along with Mariana and Slimecicle, they leave behind Derse and its moon, and they both get destroyed. Where his body sleeping on the quest slab godtiers. Aradia style. Except... as a Maid of Breath, his robot sprite body doesn't explode. He just sort of... exists in both. When one falls asleep the other wakes up. The rest of the Brazilian session just assumes the Cascade fucked with his robot body's energy sources. He kind of just figures each side is a weird dream he keeps having.

Cellbit is staunchly anti-godtier, while Forever wants someone he trusts to godtier him. Cellbit refuses to godtier Forever, and causes a major fight between them. Then Spreen murders Cellbit into his godtier under orders from the Federation, which is preceded by a long Scooby-doo-esque chase, where BBH sees them both, and decides to follow. BBH is a fully godtiered Knight of Life here, he has resurrection powers for other players, and Spreen is functionally immortal as well. BBH 100% catches up to him after he kills Cellbit, and proceeds to put Spreen in a torment nexus of dying and undeath. Thus ends the Killing Spree(n).

AND THEN THE FRENCH CASCADE HAPPENS! The final session connects, and Baghera sacrifices herself to make it happen. After they make it in, they learn about Quest slabs, and there's a whole thing with Etoiles dramatically getting her to her questslab before she fully dies. Etoiles then proceeds to go kill himself on the questslab immediately after. Felps is also hanging out with the French, they found him hanging out in the void and take him with them. They lose Kameto in the void however, nobody's really sure where he went.

Pre-French Cascade, Antoine is the only French player to godtier, and no one will explain how it happened. It seems like no one really knows, but Etoiles keeps saying more fantastical descriptions every time someone asks. He's never taken his seer hood off of his face.

Back in the order of the godtiers, Forever befriends Baghera, and eventually her and Etoiles and Cellbit help him godtier. It's a whole event. Richas is having a blast.

Bobby dies, and Jaiden decides to godtier in order to get into the Federation's good graces, as well as out of guilt of feeling that if she were stronger and godtiered she could have saved him. Roier godtiers her.

AyPierre is godtiered in a tragic accident with one of his many machines. Etoiles helps pull him to his quest bed. He's a Thief of Space he has fun with it.

Foolish is the second to last person to godtier, and he is godtiered by Pomme by accident. He wanted his godtier to be as cool as possible, and somehow managed to not godtier by this point. It's just very him. He's down with the page pants.

Quackity is the final member to godtier. BBH kills ElQ at one end of the universe with the aid of Maximus. Slimecicle kills the regular QQ in one final duel.

At the end of the universe, the only people left alive and able to contact the rest of the sessions to never godtier are Wilbur and Maxo.

DanTDM disappears on the Land of Synapses and Static, never to be seen again, along with Turnip following soon after.

Luzu finds a glitch and is absorbed by it not long after he enters.

Nobody is really sure if Kameto godtiered or not.

MISCELLANEOUS NOTES

We're currently working on figuring out sprites for everyone, so hey! I might come back and add an update on that, but this post is so long my computer is lagging. I have a gaming laptop. It shouldn't be doing that. Here's some stuff on the sprites we do have + some misc notes.

Cellbit's flashlightkind is like how Kanaya's lipstick works. It's a chainsaw.

Spreen has Spreensprite, BBH has Skeppysprite, Missa has a sprite that is a mysterious skull sprited twice called Skullskullsprite, and Roier has his dog with a spiderman called Dogmansprite, and Jaiden has Arisprite, who's Miku & Ari combined :D (thanks icarus!)

It is 5 am as I finish typing this and queue it. I think I started typing this at 5 pm yesterday. Feel free to comment any thoughts you have or play around in this au! Also feel free to @ me if you do, either on my main mcyt blog (@etoilesbienne), or here!

qsmpstuck tag on my art blog / qsmpstuck tag on my regular mcyt talk blog

#qsmp #qsmpstuck #qsmp au #qsmp homestuck au #mcytstuck

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bluepallilworld · 4 months ago

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Hehe 4th edition of...

DARK CREAM (AND POST DARK CREAM ) SHIPCHILDREN COLLAB! <3

After the summer vacation, the kids are invited to join the dark cream shipkids school! For their first day and class, all ages are mixed in one singular classroom... Will everybody stay quiet while waiting for the teachers or will chaos arise???

What's that?

3 years ago, I hosted a big collab for christmas, 2 years ago it was for the new year then last year we had an halloween celebration and now the fun continues!

This year, I'm hosting a big collab with a theme of "going back to school" to make some kind of a "family picture" with some of the dark cream ship children ! Nor Cross or S!Dream will be in the final picture as there aren't exactly the same depending on the child.

How to participate?

1- You need to have a dark cream/dark xunshine ship child (Cross x Shattered Dream kid). I'm making an exception for post dark cream kids ;). As long as Dream has been Shattered at one point, the kid can participate.

2- Draw your kid wearing a proper school outfit! (They will be indoors so you may choose to have them sitting on a chair, on a table or standing up, you can give them a school bag and anything you can think of! You can draw accessories aside if you want me to put it on their table or something (pens, notebook...) but no obligation here ^^)

3- Send me the drawing or tag me on it so I can get it! The drawing must have a transparent background so I can easily edit it. If you put a watermark, please put it on the inside of your drawing so that I don't have to erase/move it to make place for the other children.

You need to send me the drawing before the 10th of august so I have time to edit it properly before the big day and in case there are some problems. (It can however be discussed if needed, exceptions will be accepted or refused case by case)

I'll post it the 1st of september (probably early in the day) !

If you have any questions, please ask!

If someone without a kid wanna participate (or just want to participate more for funsies), you're welcome in the background+ team ^^

(being in the background+ team means drawing some elements of the background like all the lil' things you can find in a class, desks, posters, books... or some other stuff. It's usually me and music fairy @diofasolia (if you've got some free time to participate of course, solia) on that team)

PS: You can't use a kid belonging to someone else for that event ! You must be the creator of the kid and send me a drawing you did at least mostly by yourself (it doesn't mean you can't have help or collaborate with someone however) ✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧

PPS: Be creative or more classic with the outfits! Have fun! Do as you wish!

If it helps, the kinda perspective I'm going with (same as every year ;3). I'll adjust the size of the room depending on the number of kids. The kids are not obligated to be staring at us, from the side, showing their back... Also the pov will be from the white board ✨

Pose ideas for those who aren't inspired: awkwardly standing in a corner, reading a book criss-cross applesauce, tripping and falling on nothing (or something), chatting with someone, writing stuff on the wall, perfect student sitting pose, already asleep, climbing, fascinated by something (might be a poster, might be the class pet), showing something that really shouldn't have been brought here to someone, I'm late!, what an insteresting window, staring at the clock...

If you need a special accessorie/furniture/thingie to make the pose work, tell me and it'll be added in the background ^^

#dark cream shipkids collab #collab #back to school collab #dark cream ship children collab #post dark cream shipkids collab #post dark cream ship children collab #woooooooooooo #let's do it for the 4th time!#if you want to put your kid in an uniform you can #casual wear is perfectly fine as well #whichever you prefer ;P #I hesitated for a while for this year's theme but I know some of those kids never went to school soooo #time to go!#all ages are mixed for the first day as it's more of a presentation day #I'd imagine they'd go through a test later to make groups based on level #not on age because they don't all have the same education level (hc I guess)#noooo I did not spent time thinking about it what do you mean???#new kids are welcome!!!!#kinda weird to post about school at the beginning of the summer vacation uh #but I guess if the kids work well #next year we're gonna have a beach episode :]#*slowly filling up my dc kids calendar*#wow those kids do be doing stuff

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stevesbestgirl · 1 year ago

Text

Phases of the Moon - Part 1

Steven Grant x f!Reader, eventual Marc Spector x f!Reader

2796 words

Warnings: poor imitations of British speaking habits, not much else in part one, maybe a few curses but I’m not sure

A/N: This was my attempt to write a slow-burn. It’s long, self-indulgent, and obscenely fluffy. Reader is specified as American, but mostly so I can avoid pretending I know anything about living in the UK. Steven and Marc are aware of each other and trying to find balance in their relationship in this fic, but keep in mind that I am not a system and am not an expert. All of my information about their relationship comes from the Moon Knight show and I use that as my reference point.

*Bold type is spoken by Marc when Steven is fronting.*

Masterlist

“Go talk to her.”

“Well I can’t, can I?” Steven sent a furtive glance at you, toying absently with your phone while you examined the glyphs inside a display.

“Why can’t you?”

“She’s got earphones in.”

Marc scoffed in the glass of one of the display cases, “Always an excuse.”

“I can’t just interrupt her, that’d be rude!”

“Not if she’s interested.”

Steven’s reply was cut short as a pair of boys came rushing around the corner, laughing and shoving each other- Steven wouldn’t have placed them at older than twelve. He watched helplessly as one firm push sent the smaller of the two reeling into your backside. Completely oblivious to their noise, you went sprawling, headphones disconnecting as your phone hit the ground and was sent skittering across the polished floor, coming to rest at Steven’s feet.

Inhibitions gone, Steven scooped your phone up and rushed over, offering a hand to help you up, “Are you okay?” You nodded, feeling a little embarrassed. “You lot,” he called out, locating the pair sidling off behind a diorama, “C’mere.”

They looked like they were considering bolting, but the smaller of them located Steven’s badge and took a reluctant step forward. By the time they stood in front of you, they were looking rather cowed, like puppies who’d been caught gnawing a slipper.

“Shape up, you hear? You could’ve really hurt someone.”

“Sorry.”

“Yeah, sorry.”

“Now listen, down that corridor there, there’s a bunch of old weapons; spears, cudgels, daggers, the like. How about you go give it a look?” You watched him speak to the two boys; his enthusiasm seemed very genuine, not the fake kind adults often used with children.

The taller boy hesitated before leaving, “What’s a cudgel?”

Steven smiled a little, “Why don’t you go on and find out?” Then the two rushed in the direction he’d indicated and he called after them, “Slowly, hm?”

Once they were out of sight, you finally spoke, “Are you sure that was a good idea? Sending them in there with a bunch of weapons?” You couldn’t help but smile as he unconsciously smoothed his dark, nearly sleep-tousled curls back from his face.

His intent had been to chuckle, but it came out as more of an empty puff of air, “They’re all under glass- should be alright.” He added, “Maybe I’ll pop in to check on them, just in case.” Nervous now, he looked down at his hands, still holding your phone, “Oh, there you are.” Your expression fell and only then did he notice the spiderweb of cracks in the bottom corner where it had hit the floor, “Oh no.”

You shook your head, accepting the phone and dropping it to your side, like putting it out of sight would make him forget, “It’s alright. Just a screen protector. I’ll get a new one eventually.”

“Sorry about that, love,” he insisted, his earnest gaze finally meeting yours just in time for your face to go warm. You’d thought you’d been ready to hear the term of endearment used so casually when you came to England, but apparently not.

“It’s alright,” you rushed to speak. “Definitely not your fault. Thanks for helping me-” you glanced at his name tag, “-Steven.”

“No problem- it is my job after all,” he cracked a halfhearted smile.

“You were great with those kids too.”

Rosy warmth tinged his cheeks and his gaze shifted away, “Thanks.” A small pause, “Your accent- you’re American?”

You nodded, “Needed a change of scenery, so I’m staying with some family for a while. Just got in yesterday, actually.”

His gaze eagerly lifted to yours again, but flicked away over your shoulder and he went slightly pale. Glancing back, you saw a stocky woman with dirty blonde hair gesturing impatiently at him.

Returning his gaze to you, he looked a bit panicked, “I’m sorry, I’ve gotta go. I- ah-” He tripped over his words and almost tripped almost his feet as well, veering around you and backing away toward the woman beckoning him over.

You raised your hand in an uncertain farewell as he stammered his way backwards, gesturing faintly over his shoulder with his thumb in a faint attempt at an explanation. Once he was within range, the woman seemed to be lighting into him a bit, though his gaze hadn’t yet left you. It wasn’t until she snapped her fingers that he looked at her.

Not wanting to spy, you turned away, checking your phone for the time. When Steven glanced your way again, he only caught your retreating form disappearing out the entrance. For once, Donna’s criticisms didn’t affect him since he was already kicking himself for not asking you out. Or getting your phone number. Or even your name. He’d blown it.

The following day, you had a bit more time to explore the museum, so you returned. And you noted with dismay, when the cabbie called you “love”, you didn’t so much as blink, let alone blush. Maybe it had been a one-off thing. Now you would be immune.

Walking in and spotting the woman from before at the front desk, you plucked up a bit of courage and approached. Her name tag read “Donna” and she prompted with visible disinterest, as though she were reading off a script, “Welcome. Is there something I can direct you to?”

Deciding to push forward, you said, “Actually, I was just in here yesterday. I ran into a bit of trouble with a couple of young boys and one of your tour guides helped me. I wanted to let you know that Steven was very polite and just lovely with those kids-”

“Stevie? He isn’t a tour guide,” Donna interrupted, wrinkling her nose. “In his dreams, maybe.”

“But he does work here?”

“Yeah, he’s the gift shoppist.” She was still being very flippant; it was clear that she’d barely had interest in this conversation to begin with and now that it was about Steven, it had dwindled to none.

“Right. Thank you.” You forced a smile and nodded before heading off in the direction of the gift shop.

The counter was empty when you first walked into the room, sending a tiny shoot of disappointment into your chest. You wanted to thank him, since it didn’t appear that you could score him any points with his boss.

You wondered for a moment if you should come back later, but then a shaggy, brown mop of hair sprung up from behind the counter, triumphantly brandishing what appeared to be a large, amber-colored marble with a bone inside it, “Got ya, you little bugger.”

His gaze fell on you and he tucked the marble behind his back, like it was something to hide, “You- you came back.”

You reached into your bag, pulling out the brochure you’d picked up yesterday, “I was only passing through yesterday.” You unfolded the brochure and showed him the notes you’d taken on the map, detailing where you wanted to go first and which exhibits had caught your eye, “I like to plan a little bit.”

He followed the line you traced with your finger intently, raising his gaze to your face when you pulled away, “That’s a good way to go about it. The tour is pretty good too.” Steven’s heart skipped as your lips pulled into a slight frown; had he said something wrong?

“Speaking of the tour, I tried to put in a good word for you with your boss- as thanks, for yesterday- she doesn’t seem to like you very much.”

“Oh, yes. Donna and I have got a bit of a rocky history.” He added quickly, “Not a history, mind you. More like a boss/employee history. I’ve got a bit of a bad track record with my punctuality, actually,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Well, I think you’d make a lovely tour guide, for what it’s worth.”

There was another one of those long pauses; you were about to offer a meek “Thanks again,” and cut your losses when he spoke up, “If you like, I’m on a break in ten minutes. I could show you around.”

You’d insisted to yourself that this wasn’t why you came back here, but you found yourself nodding, a faint smile on your lips, “I’d like that.”

Steven seemed even more surprised than you were, nodding quickly, “Great- that’s- great.” He nodded again, “I can meet you in the ‘King’s Tomb’ exhibit.” He pointed, “Right over there-” He checked his watch, “-in nine minutes.”

Your smile widened, “See you in nine minutes then.” You moved off in the direction he’d indicated, the temptation to look back gnawing at you.

“Wait!” he called after you. You turned back, “I haven’t got your name.”

“You haven’t needed it, have you?”

Now you were teasing and you knew it. But you could feel his eyes on you as you disappeared around the corner and you smiled to yourself. So much for doing your own thing. The whole reason for coming to London was to get away from men- although you supposed it was more one man than men in general. But something about Steven just caught your eye.

So you waited out the impossibly long eight minutes remaining until Steven walked in, looking in a bit of a rush. You watched him scan the exhibit, almost like he’d expected you to have left by now.

You raised a hand, “Steven.” He positively lit up at the sight of you, relief visible in the heavy exhale he released- like he'd been holding his breath.

You met him in the center of the room, clasping your hands behind your back in anticipation. Steven still had the remnants of a grin on his face, though he mirrored your posture, a bit of enthusiasm escaping as he bounced on the balls of his feet, just once, “What do you want to see?”

“You’re my tour guide, you tell me,” you teased.

Almost instantly, his face flushed, “Well, I wasn’t sure if there were specific displays you wanted to look at or certain subjects you were interested in, you know? Since I've only got fifteen minutes on my break.”

“Well, I’m interested in everything, but since we only have fifteen minutes; how about you show me the way you’d start your tour if you were a guide?” His cheeks darkened further and you had to bite the inside of your cheek not to smile again. But he surprised you, recovering quickly and placing his hand on your arm. He steered you over to one of the displays and you glanced at him, “The Ennead?”

The Ennead,” he corrected your pronunciation. “The Egyptian Gods.” He wheeled around so his back was to the exhibit, his gaze meeting yours with ease. “Everything about Egypt comes back to the gods one way or another, so to understand Egypt, you have to understand them.”

He walked you through the exhibit, one god or goddess at a time, his hands moving animatedly as he talked. And he was good at it, in a different way than you’d expect. He had such a wealth of knowledge- you felt comfortable asking questions because you expected him to have the answers. And he answered many of your questions before you could even ask them; his explanations were pretty comprehensive.

It was all strangely charming, actually. His enthusiasm was so genuine, it was as though he invited you inside it with him. It was a nice place to be- like sharing a secret. It was also putting you in dangerous territory; a magnetic field that would be hard to pull yourself from.

Once you were about halfway through the eleven, you tentatively raised your hand. Steven faltered slightly, giving you the chance to speak up, “Two things- I just want to check the time, I’d hate for you to be-”

“Late-” he checked his watch faster than you could pull out your phone.

You grabbed his hand, pulling him back toward the gift shop, “Well, come on then, I don’t want you getting into trouble!”

Steven’s long strides quickly outpaced you; you had to hurry to keep up, a laugh at the ridiculousness of it slipping out. Steven glanced back- nearly shouldering a display case. Right before impact, his back straightened a bit, like he sensed it coming, and he just twisted out of the way. It was so smooth you wouldn’t have noticed the deft movement if you hadn’t been anticipating the collision.

By the time you skidded to a halt in front of the gift shop counter, you were full-on giggling; you couldn’t remember the last time you’d laughed so hard over almost nothing. “Sorry about that,” Steven offered meekly.

You took a breath and collected yourself a bit, though you still felt the warmth of the laughter in your cheeks, “Don’t be- it was fun.”

“What was the other thing?” he asked, shuffling back behind the counter.

“Hm?”

“You said there were two things, the time and what else?”

“Oh! Well that exhibit was called the ‘King’s Tomb,’ right? Why are the gods in that one?”

He leaned on the counter, some of his timid demeanor vanishing, “Well, the pharaohs were considered to be gods by their people. So they put them in a room together. And since the mummies are what brings in the crowds, they get the-” he clicked his tongue, framing a little marquee with his fingers, “-title spot.”

“I suppose you know quite a lot about those too?”

He gave a chagrined smile, “Did I go on a bit much then?”

You shook your head, “Not at all- I wasn’t teasing. I wish we’d had time to do the whole exhibit.”

“I’d wager with me giving it, that tour would take all week,” he joked, feeling like he’d done too much talking during your time together.

You shrugged, “I’m on vacation.” Smiling, you added, “Or holiday, you’d probably call it.”

He smiled weakly at the joke, seeming to be working out what you’d meant. He scanned your face, as though nervous he was misreading you, but you just smiled at him. “I’m scheduled again on Thursday, I could- if you like, I mean- I could show you some more. Of the exhibit. Obviously. If you want.”

You were here for freedom. You’d come all the way to another country so you could do what you wanted, when you wanted, no strings attached. But, you reasoned, this wasn’t dating. This was an exclusive tour, on Steven’s break. It wasn’t like he was taking you out to dinner.

You were bargaining; whittling away your rules to nothing because they no longer suited your purposes. You knew that. And you also knew that you only did so because Steven was, very clearly, a large string. A large string with lovely, brown, puppy eyes and enough passion for Egypt to make a pharaoh blush. But you nodded anyway, “I’d love to come back. Same time?”

He seemed stunned by your acceptance, but he nodded rapidly to overcompensate for the moment of hesitation, “Yeah. My break is at three.”

You smirked, “How many minutes from now?”

He stared at you for a moment- you almost wondered if he was trying to do the math, but then he flushed and gave a weak chuckle, “Right, I’ll work on that one.”

You pulled out the brochure you’d picked up yesterday and a pen from your bag, “Since I won’t be needing this anymore-” You scribbled down your name and number and slid the brochure across the table, “Text me when you figure it out.” No strings, you reminded yourself.

He gave another hurried nod, “Okay, I will, I-”

You got a sense of deja vu as Steven glanced over your shoulder and paled in nearly the exact same way he had yesterday. “Is it Donna?” You quickly scanned the counter, grabbing a stuffed hippopotamus, “Because I’d like to purchase this.” You deliberately moved it across the counter where Donna would be able to see and pulled out your wallet.

Now Steven looked back to you, “You don’t have to do that. Most of this stuff if junk-”

“I want to. This one is kind of cute.” You held out the money, “And you’ll tell me all about it next time?”

He nodded, a small smile returning to his face, “Yeah, I will.” He handed back your change and the plush, speaking up so Donna could hear, “Enjoy the rest of your afternoon.”

You smiled, “Same to you.”

You left the other way so Donna wouldn’t see your face, hoping she wasn’t descending on Steven for being late from his break. You held the little hippo plushie to your chest and thought ahead to Thursday.

#moon knight x reader #steven grant x reader #marc spector x reader #moon knight #steven grant #marc spector #moon knight fanfic #moon knight fic #moon knight fluff #steven grant fluff #phases of the moon series

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staticespace · 2 months ago

Note

Hi sorry for burging in . I need your helping Please if you can be able to extend a hand for me,that would be much appreciate. I'm $800,needed pls🙏 . I need to save my blood sugar which costs $300.and also to afford living expenses.food,gas and medication which costs$500. I plead for your little donations. I'll really appreciate your help❤️please help me with your little donation or share🙏

I will not donate. But I will share.

Not to advise others to donate, though. Because I think you're lying.

Your request doesn't really pass the smell test for me.

🚩Red Flags🚩:

You say on your page that your request is "vetted and verified" but do not say by whom.

Your tags start with "free palestine" despite your request having nothing to do with Palestine or Palestinians. This makes me think you're trying to get people who want to donate to Palestinians to think you're one so they can donate and/or spread your post if they don't read any deeper into your account.

Adding to that, looking into your archive, you only recently started your account this month (September 2024) and all of your posts closest to your start were about Palestine. It seems you're putting a mask on.

As of today (September 29th) only 3 of your 29 posts are from a date that is not September 25th, so it's not as though you're particularly active.

Your other tags on your pinned post have nothing to do with the topic of your post, meaning you're clogging other tags to get someone to bite (e.g. "artists on tumblr" and "succession").

The link you provided goes to a PayPal account, which does not have many protections for anyone who donates money on its platform, like reimbursement and such.

In case I was wrong, I reverse-image-searched your icon photo and...

Well, well, well...

Same photo, same script, different account.

This naming trend on your old account is very familiar, too. Three words smushed together, usually starting with an adjective. Hell, you might be related to the other person I found out was scamming using insulin requests.

And when I tried to find that account, it's apparently been closed.

So yeah, nah, you don't pass the smell test.

---

If you want to donate to Palestinians, here's some actual, verified ways to do so. The methods through that link have been backed by various frontrunners in the Palestinian sphere, like @/90-ghost and @/el-shab-hussein.

If you aren't going to look much further than the fact they sent a note to your inbox, please stop.

Look further and do your due diligence or rely on people who will do it for you.

Some scammers are not just trying to get money for food or a TV or something. Giving to a scammer may not be harmless.

Scammers can and have used false aid requests to fund human and drug trafficking.

Double-check. If it doesn't smell right, don't donate and call it out.

Also, feel free to report their PayPal account for fraud if you see their pinned post.

#aid request scam #false aid request #herkidavenue #deepestsandwichtriumph #aid scam #probably scammin #don't get scammed

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thepersonperson · 4 months ago

Text

Sukuna's You Pronouns

Someone pointed out that Sukuna doesn't exclusively use the you pronoun Kisama for Gojo in the tags as a response to this post. Sukuna also uses it for Kashimo.

This prompted me to go back and double-check his you pronoun usage with everyone since I focused on people he openly likes (Gojo, Higurama, Jogo, Megumi, Maki, Uraume).

And that, of course, spiraled out of control. Please enjoy my findings. (Someone made a formal response to this post if you want an alternate perspective.)

-Written as of JJK 262.5.

-Mangareader(.)to for the raws.

-TCBscans for everything else.

(Click images for captions/citations.)

Preface

Here's a shorthand for how Sukuna addresses characters with you pronouns. Not when he's speaking about them to other people, but when talking to them directly.

No You Pronouns: Haruta, Higurama, Kenjaku, Kusakabe, Mahito, Miguel, Ui Ui, Uraume

Omae: Finger Bearer, Gojo, Jogo, Mahoraga, Maki, Mimiko/Nanako, Megumi, Ryu, Yorozu, Yuji, Yuta

Kisama: Gojo, Kashimo, Yorozu

What does 'no you pronouns' mean?

Not using you pronouns or someone's name is the most polite and formal way to go about addressing someone in Japanese. Using you pronouns invites certain assumptions about the relationship between the speaker and the addressee. In most cases it's informal or rude. Sukuna going out of his way not to use pronouns for someone suggests he views them with some amount of respect. (Except for Haruta. To this day, this is the only character Sukuna has called trash.)

What does Omae and Kisama mean?

お前 (Omae), often written as オマエ in JJK, is a masculine, informal, and indicates the speaker's higher status to the addressee. It can also be used as a causal you between peers of equal standing (Gojo, Yuji, and Megumi use Omae for everyone in this way).

There is a third use in the context of love. It's the male equivalent of あなた (Anata aka the wife pronoun you could translate as "You, Dear") when used by a man to their lover. This usage seems to have conflicted usage irl. It might be too intimate or informal depending on the relationship. (Basically it pisses some people off or is a massive turn on.)

貴様 (Kisama) is historically formal and respectful, and modernly an extremely informal and hostile insult that is far more rude than Omae.

Which way does Sukuna mean his Omaes and Kisamas? Well, context is everything. He is 1,000 years old, rude as hell, and a hater. In most instances, he means the rude version. Trying to figure out when he's not being a bastard is the hard part and what I'm interested in.

Why does this matter?

Pronouns in Japanese indicate how the speaker views themself and how they view their relationship to the addressee. In other words, pronoun usage in Japanese carries characterization that gets lost in translation. I'm trying to figure out Sukuna's internal logic and his particular brand of communication so this is a helpful thing to consider.

For example, when Gojo first trash talks Sukuna out of the box, Uraume gets pissed and insults him. And guess what they use as the insult—Kisama.

I put this side by side with an English translation for context. If you noticed, there is no kanji for "Swine" in the raws. That was added in by the localization to carry over the tone of the original. Since English doesn't have a you (derogatory), this is where localizations will vary the greatest. To get across the hostility of Kisama, translators will add extra things with or without the creator's direction for their language's audience.

Uraume is extremely polite to Sukuna and uses high level vocabulary in Japanese. The only time their politeness drops is when they're being hostile (especially with Kenjaku), but their elegant manner of speech doesn't deteriorate with their mood. In my opinion, "Swine" is a great word to pick that carries that insulting, yet dignified pattern of speech. Someone less snobby might use pig.

Gojo replies by referring to Uraume with てめえ (Temee) which is even more rude than Kisama. (Sometimes this you is spelled as てまえ (Temae) instead.)

This stands out because Gojo either uses Omae (friends and enemies), no you pronouns (everyone), or 君 Kimi (students—this one is cute because it's an affectionate way to dote on your juniors). (Gojo also exclusively uses アンタ Anta with Toji but that deserves its own post.) Not just that, but he ends his sentence with だよ (Dayo). This is a combination of the particles だ (Da) and よ (Yo) that emphasizes what ever the speaker is saying without respect.

Both TCBsans and Viz localize this as "Who are you?" That's a direct translation that in my opinion doesn't get across how pissed Gojo is. If it were up to me, I think it would be better as "Who the FUCK are you?"

Anyways I hope this explains why I'm so obsessed with how Sukuna uses you pronouns. There's characterization and tone that translators may or may not pick up on. Figuring out why Sukuna uses certain yous helps with understanding how he views others.

Omae

As you saw in the list, Sukuna uses Omae for just about everyone. It ranges from people he openly hates (Yuji) to characters he massively respects (Mahoraga). The easy way to resolve this is to assume that Sukuna looks down on everyone so that's what he means at all times.

I don't think that's the case. Sukuna is a very complex character with weird motivations that don't fit neatly into black/white boxes. Reading his words a single way at all times seems to be a disservice to him. So I'll be presenting my theories on what determines the meaning of Sukuna's Omae.

Omae (Deragatory)

Itadori Yuji

When Sukuna uses Omae for Yuji, it's coupled by insults. That's not surprising, Sukuna despises Yuji so much that he's devoted a good deal of his time to making his poor little nephew suffer. I can confidently say the Omaes are derogatory. Here is one of many instances.

No matter how angry Sukuna gets at Yuji, he has never deviated from Omae. This is interesting to me because the more hostile and ruder you pronouns Kisama and Temae/Temee exist. In fact, Yuji uses Temee for Sukuna most of the time. And he uses Temee for no one else, not even Mahito, who gets Omae like Yuji’s friends. This special pronoun usage for Sukuna shows how much Yuji hates him compared to any other character.

Anyways, this is a good starting point for determining how he means Omae. When Sukuna means Omae in a rude way, it'll be combined with an insult and/or accompanied by an aggravated facial expression. He also will avoid addressing the character by name and instead use nomers (such as Brat) externally and internally.

Finger Bearer

Despite trying to befriend this curse for the sole purpose of bullying children, Sukuna doesn’t show the Finger Bearer a lot of respect. He tries to kill it, insults it at every turn, and gives it a few nasty faces for attacking him. It’s no surprise he uses Omae for this thing.

He treats this curse like he treats Yuji, which is a pretty good sign that the Omae usage is disrespectful. This is also helps establish a pattern for Sukuna’s behavior when he chooses to engage with other beings. It should be noted that he calls the Finger Bearer an insect and refuses to address it by anything that's dignified.

Hasaba Mimiko & Nanako

Sukuna addresses Mimiko and Nanako as you kids and with Omae for bringing him a finger. He also demands they bow before him to acknowledge just how far beneath him they are.

He doesn’t ask for their names and he kills them the second he finds them too annoying. There’s a clear lack of respect for the twins here that makes the Omae appear to be very deragatory.

Jogo

Jogo starts in the same category as Mimiko wnd Nanako. That much is obvious with Sukuna cutting off the top of his head for mot bowing low enough. Sukuna uses Omae to both address and insult him, so it can be assumed he’s being deragatory.

But what separates Jogo from everyone on this Derogatory Omae list, was his fight changing how Sukuna viewed him and therefore the usage of Omae.

Omae (Complimentary)

Jogo

Jogo is never addressed by name, Sukuna never asks for it and refers to him as Cursed Spirit throughout their interactions. This seems more in line with something Sukuna does to someone he dislikes, however, he bothered with seeing Jogo off into the afterlife to gain a better understanding of him.

When Sukuna learns that Jogo and his friends wanted to become human, he doesn’t mock their dream but their methodology. The criticisms he levies at Jogo are constructive. If Jogo wanted to obtain his goals he should’ve been more like Gojo and burned everything to the ground, etc.

Sukuna goes onto complimenting Jogo using Omae, ending on the iconic, “Stand proud, you’re strong.”

If this is enough to move Jogo to tears, the Omae here unlikely to be meant as something rude. This shows that Sukuna is capable of using Omae in a friendly manner and that the intent behind it can change with the same character over time.

Fushiguro Megumi

Before Sukuna realizes Megumi's potential with Mahoraga he is still quite friendly with him compared to other characters. (As friendly as you can get beating the life out of someone that is.) He compliments his Cursed Technique (CT) and shows interest in his internal logical as he tries to teach him how to be a better sorcerer. Omae is used as he does this.

When he senses Mahoraga, he starts calling Megumi by his full name, which is the most respectful way to directly address someone in Japanese. I'm pretty sure the Omae he uses from the start is well-meaning. It should be noted that he stops using you pronouns for Megumi after this, upping the ante when it comes to showing respect for him. (Outside of murdering his sister and caretaker with his body you know.)

Mahoraga

When Sukuna first fights Mahoraga, he avoids using you pronouns entirely. He has fun and very much values its strength so this is definitely a show of respect. The only time Sukuna uses a you pronoun for Mahoraga is during his fight with Gojo. He uses Omae after addressing Mahoraga by name. "You (Omae) are not Fushiguro Megumi's shadow, you're mine."

I'm pretty confident the Omae is friendly here, albeit very possessive. It almost reads like Sukuna's composure slightly breaking to show his excitement. His manner of speech does seem to get rougher the more into a fight he gets, and so far the wildest we've seen him is with Mahoraga and Maki.

Zenin Maki

Sukuna has yet to address Maki by name. He calls her The Woman when thinks about her or speaks of her to other people. However, since meeting her in Ch 215, he has always been impressed with her. Sukuna has not once insulted her prowess and has exclusively complimented her, just like Mahoraga. He dodges using you pronouns with her, a sign of respect, until he starts flipping out over her in Ch 253.

Similar to Mahoraga, his excitement appears to have made his manner of speech deteriorate. Combined with those expressions, the Omae usage here can’t possibly be coming from a place of hatred. Sukuna seems to like people similar to himself and Maki did “eat” her twin to gain power. She rejected her fate as a twin to survive. I think Sukuna recognizes that and admires it immensely.

Omae (Unknown)

Ishigori Ryu

When Sukuna first tries to kill Ryu, he doesn’t die. This impresses him so much that he apologizes for taking him lightly. The Omae he uses while doing this is probably complimentary.

However, Sukuna is kind of a dick and not above sarcasm. He doesn’t ask for Ryu’s name and doesn’t bother watching him die like he does with most other named characters. And if you noticed, he tried cutting him into 3 pieces like he did with the Finger Bearer to gauge his strength. That cursed spirit is barely above Yuji on Sukuna’s tolerance scale. I’m not sure if he’s being genuine here.

Okkotsu Yuta

Before Yuta takes over Gojo’s body, Sukuna doesn’t seem impressed with him. He doesn’t address him by name and uses the nomer Cursed Brat when thinking of him. Being called a Brat puts him on the same level as Yuji. I think the Omae here is derogatory.

He does seem to enjoy fighting Rika so there’s a little more respect than what he has for Yuji. But prior to Ch 261? I think he means it in a rude way.

Similar to Ryu, Yuta got Sukuna to apologize to him after impressing him. But unlike Ryu, Sukuna makes direct eye contact with Yuta and addresses him by name. The excitement on his face is almost identical to what he had for Maki. If Sukuna continues to use Omae for Yuta, it will be complementary. Especially since his internal dialogue now uses Okkotsu Yuta in the same way he uses Fushiguro Megumi.

For reasons I’ll get into, there’s also a strong chance Sukuna might swap to Kisama for Yuta. And if he does, it’ll be very significant.

Kisama

In a different post, I proposed that because Sukuna is old and hates Yuji the most, who he exclusively uses Omae with, that his usage of Kisama with Gojo is the formal version. But after learning that Sukuna uses Kisama with Yorozu and Kashimo, I want to reevaluate that interpretation.

Uraume using Kisama as an insult towards Gojo means that Sukuna is aware of and therefore capable of using the polite and hostile versions. If this is because of vessel memories or both meanings being present in Heian era I don't know. Regardless, just like Omae, additional context will be needed to determine which way he means it.

Yorozu

That's surprising, Sukuna is using Kisama with Yorozu when he has otherwise demonstrated that his usage of it with Gojo is formal. Does that mean he secretly likes her? Sukuna outwardly despises Yorozu, so it wouldn't be wrong to read his Kisama with her as hostile. Does that mean he hates her more than Yuji? Does that mean he hates Gojo?

Let's start with how he greets her. Sukuna initially uses Omae and addresses Yorozu by her name with a slight smile. All signs that his Omae is further towards friendliness than hostility even though he's here to kill her. (Sukuna communicates with violence this is normal for him.)

But the moment she brings up love? Sukuna swaps to Kisama. He uses it to insult her love too.

Sukuna is not showing respect here, he is actively being hostile with this use of Kisama. Of all characters, Yorozu would be the one who reads into Sukuna's words the most if it would frame things more romantically. The fact she sees this pronoun change as a part of the rejection and pursues him harder further supports this reading.

As she's dying Sukuna switches back to Omae. This can be read as him believing he's effectively told Yorozu to piss off with the love talk and is being a little nicer as she passes. It wouldn't be out of character for him to do this.

Still, he's insulting her CT and lack of battle intellect. She's definitely not amongst the likes of Jogo. Yorozu reads into his parting words as affection anyways and this is how Sukuna feels about that.

I'm comfortable marking down Sukuna's use of Kisama with Yorozu as one of disrespect, and Omae as slightly derogatory.

Kashimo

For Kashimo, Sukuna exclusively uses Kisama when addressing him. Now that would seem a bit sus given the exclusivity, but once again, context is everything. What separates Kashimo from everyone else he uses Kisama with is Sukuna's refusal to know or even speak his name. And if he checked Culling Game player names prior as a participant, this is pretty significant.

When Sukuna really likes someone, he addresses them by their full name, if possible. In fact, he pauses his fight with Higuruma to ensure he got his name correctly.

No such thing occurs for Kashimo. Additionally, he brings up love, which Yorozu has established as something that makes Sukuna more hostile. His entire love speech uses nothing but Kisama and Sukuna goes from cordial to visibly irritated. There's a strong chance he meant it in the piss off way.

As an aside, Kashimo first addresses Sukuna with Omae at the start of their battle and switches to あんた (Anta) when they discuss love and satisfaction 満足 (Manzoku).

Now this fascinates me because Anta is a contraction of Anata. It usually indicates the lack of class in the speaker, but is otherwise used just like Anata. Since Kashimo is talking about love and uses Omae for everyone else, this reads as Kashimo hitting on Sukuna. (In other words: Are you, dear, satisfied?)

And this is Sukuna's response to that.

Rejection.

I'm mostly comfortable marking this down as a hostile use of Kisama. Not sure if this means Sukuna hates Kashimo more than Yuji though. They did have a civilized conversation that wasn't exclusively insults. The worst Sukuna called him was greedy, and he briefly expressed annoyance with the loudness of his CT. It’s not like Yorozu where he mocked every aspect of it and her love to the end. He humored the loved talk even though it seemed to make him miserable. Not really sure what to do with this.

Gojo Satoru

Well, now that I know Sukuna is aware of the hostile meaning, there is a good chance when he promised to kill Gojo he meant it in the piss off way for humiliating him earlier. He didn't bother addressing Gojo by his full name despite knowing it at that point.

If Jogo showed us that Sukuna’s use of Omae can change over time, this means that his use of Kisama is capable of evolving too. That being said, it is still pretty confusing when it comes to Gojo because Sukuna combines his hostile and friendly mannerisms at the same time.

The Gojo fish speech showcases this frankly bizarre contradiction the best. He addresses Gojo by his full name and then insults him for being a nameless fish with the use of Kisama.

Prior to this scene, Sukuna has been thinking of him and speaking to other characters of him as Gojo Satoru. When Sukuna thinks about Yuji? His inner dialogue keeps calling him Brat. Maki, who he likes, is just The Woman (so far). If someone is nameless to Sukuna, they stay just that—nameless. He’s blatantly lying about how he views Gojo here and I have no idea why.

What’s even weirder is that for a single instance, Sukuna swaps to Omae for Gojo during their fight. The usage of Omae appears to be playful in this context as Sukuna uses an English word alongside it.

If you didn't know, it's cool to use English words in Japanese. Randomly sprinkling them in is something youths like to do a lot. Gojo himself is one of the people who does this. Not just in normal speech, but specifically when he’s engaging in “play” with other sorcerers.

What’s weird about Sukuna doing this to Gojo is the fact that English didn’t make it to Japan until the 1600s. Sukuna very much speaks like a weird out of touch old man from the wrong century. To my knowledge, (correct me if I’m wrong) he hasn’t used English like this prior.

Omae is the go-to you pronoun Gojo uses for most people. He also uses English when engaging in sorcery “play”. This almost seems like Sukuna is mimicking Gojo’s style of speech as either a form of flattery or as an insult (most likely flattery given that he is still copying Gojo's moves obsessively). Regardless, Gojo seems to pick up on Sukuna being playful since this is his response.

From his perspective, the guy calling him Kisama (aka you bastard) has started calling him Omae (you, but neutral), which would come across as Sukuna deliberately being more respectful towards him. It seems to put Gojo in such a good mood that loverboy Kashimo looks at this and goes:

Which starts to make me wonder. Did Sukuna mean Omae in the Anata way? After all, the previous chapter ended on this:

It ended on Sukuna thinking of Gojo as Anata. This fight can be framed as a date too, so it’s really sus that Sukuna swapped to Omae for an event that can be read as romantic.

The only reason I'm looking so closely at this usage is because it's sandwiched between Kisamas. It stands out enough for Gojo of all people to notice. To him it signified that Sukuna’s view of him had changed. That probably means this Omae is telling us something about Sukuna’s character.

Surrounding this Omae is the use of Kisama in the kill context a total of 8 times. Either as "I'm going to kill you." or "This is how I killed you." (Fish speech not included in this collage.)

What stands out to me compared to other characters is how happy Sukuna looks while describing how he’ll get past Infinity. It’s so persistent and detailed sometimes... (To be fair he did spend 6 months on this.)

The use of Kisama with "You cleared my skies." is definitely the respectful way. He addresses Gojo by name with a happy expression while showering him in praise.

The rest of the Kisamas? I don’t know. You could read it either way and it's not being used in the same way for Yorozu and Kashimo. The takeaway here is that Sukuna doesn’t usually use this pronoun, which means it’s significant when he does.

What did Sukuna mean by this?

The problem, once again, is Sukuna priming others to read him a certain way. Way back when Sukuna and Gojo first met? Probably hostile. During their rematch? Kisama was coupled with contradictory insults and/or death threats up until the very last second. And that still doesn’t explain the Omae.

He only used Kisama for Kashimo. Why did he briefly swap to Omae for Gojo? He swapped to Omae for Yorozu as she died. Why did he swap in the middle of their fight instead of the end for Gojo?

And this still doesn't address the massive elephant in the room—Sukuna only using Kisama for Yorozu and Kashimo because they had the audacity to bring up love to him. Gojo didn't try to do that. Not once. The only time the word "love" has explicitly come out of his mouth to another character was when he told Yuta love was the most twisted curse of all. What does this mean? Is this implying Sukuna has associated Gojo with love from the start? Am I reading too much into this pronoun usage?

One of the most prominent themes of JJK is love being a curse. Whether its Yuji's love for other people driving him forward after they die or Gojo's love for Geto screwing everything up. Yuta's entire deal is him cursing a loved one into a semi-immortal monster creature. It would not be out of the ballpark to have the main antagonist motivated by a very fudged up obsessive love in the same way Kenjaku's parental love speedruns Mommy and Daddy issues at the same time.

Yuta fighting Sukuna in Gojo’s body is significant for all these reasons. Sukuna is either going to stick to Omae, or he’s going to start using Kisama. With how happy he is at seeing Yugo, it’ll be meant positively.

If he keeps using Omae that’s not too weird. That’s normal Sukuna behavior. If he swaps to Kisama when it has been strongly suggested that in 2/3 instances it’s in relation to love… I’m going to be sus on why he’s using it for The Love is the Most Twisted Curse of All Poster Child, Yuta, who is piloting Gojo’s body.

#cactus yaps #I'm being gaslight by Greg Arbuckle.#This is like the 3rd time that examining Sukuna's relationships has driven me mad.#He's so finicky with how he treats others. But there are patterns.#Straight up the headache I'm getting from this is similar to how Umineko fried my brain until it all collapsed into the answer.#I feel like whatever the hell happens with Sukuna vs Yugo will confirm or deny this all.#I'm thinking Sukuna will eat Yugo for his 20th finger. Or he will forcefeed himself to Yugo for Gojo's body and the 20th finger.#If he does either of those things I'm going to start calling him slurs (affectionate).#Gojo is Sukuna's special something. That I can say for sure.#ryomen sukuna #sukugo #jujutsu kaisen #jjk spoilers

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