#and a really bad mix of fast pacing + too many idea + none of them being explored properly

[jewlshardz]

aini as a game makes me SOOOO mad because it was SO CLOSE to being perfect

[bookishofalder]

Pretty Girl - Two

Summary: In which Flip struggles with his feelings for the reader, and his emotions hit the breaking point when she is threatened. 

Warnings: Swearing, suggestion of slur (not written), masturbation, violence, angry Flip, sexism. WC- 3,030

A/N- I rewrote this chapter a few times to get it just right, I really wanted to convey the struggle Flip is having. Feedback is appreciated! 

It was late October, the chill in the air crisp as the apple cider (Y/N) had brewed and brought in to the station, using a hot plate to keep it warm. It filled the whole building with the scent, which was a pleasant upgrade from the usual mix of cigarette smoke and body odour and leather. She had even commissioned the local elementary school to draw autumn-themed pictures for decoration. As a way to boost morale and community engagement, she proudly displayed them in the lobby for everyone to admire when they came to and from the station.

Flip had teased her when he found her one morning, standing on a chair to tape the photos up. Now slightly taller than him, she turned with care and playfully glared down at him.

“One more word, detective, and I’ll be assigning you to take over the job,” she threatened, then added, “I should have done that in the first place, actually. You don’t even need the chair.”  

He laughed loudly, “Apologies, I know it’s not your fault you’re so-“

“Seriously, don’t finish that sentence, Flip!” She giggled, her hand reaching out and ruffling his hair. Before Flip could react fully to the sensation of it, she was shooing him away and chastising him for distracting her. She grinned as he retreated, his hands in the air in surrender.

However, he had spent the rest of that day replaying the feel of her hand on his head.

Although neither of them had discussed it, it had become a routine for Flip to give (Y/N) rides to and from work regularly. They both enjoyed each other's company, their friendship solidifying, and it wasn’t like he had to go out of his way. To thank him, (Y/N) insisted on bringing him breakfast. Fried egg sandwiches and a hot dark roast coffee were handed to him every morning. Along with her endearing ability to make him smile, Flip was more than satisfied with the arrangement.  

If their colleagues at the CSPD noticed the closeness developing between Flip and (Y/N), none remarked on it initially to either of them. Secretly, many of the detectives who knew Flip were beyond grateful for the friendship, as it brought out a side of him that they would all agree, if asked, was more tolerable and likeable to his usual angry demeanour.

It wasn’t until a young rookie officer had spotted them arrive one morning a few weeks after Flip had started driving in with (Y/N), that the rest of the station came to learn the relationship was more important to him than he let on. His rare show of emotions the indication that alerted them.    

The rookie had met up with Flip in the bullpen, loudly inquiring as to whether he was banging the hot new secretary, a cocky grin on his face, expecting perhaps a joking reply, or scandalous gossip.

For most of the detectives in the room that knew Flip, a collective intake of their breath and exchange of weary glances took place. They had watched apprehensively as he had turned to Caruthers, a glare that defined to term, ‘if looks could kill’ marring his handsome features. Flip then knocked the coffee out of Caruthers's hands and jabbed him in the chest as he had shouted. The rookie had nearly pissed himself, apologizing profusely before running off. Flip had then glared around the room, daring anyone else to suggest such a thing, but no one was stupid enough, and those who Flip worked closely with were better men than the likes of Caruthers.

As Flip had taken his seat, his blood boiling at the inappropriate question, he considered the reason for his over the top reaction. (Y/N) had brought a lot of happiness into his life, filling a void he hadn’t taken the time to recognize had grown over the last few years. Loneliness, the acceptance of retaining his bachelor status permanently. And the realization, when she would casually touch him, that he was touch starved. He was already comfortable with, and protective of, their friendship. The last thing he wanted at that moment was for her to overhear Caruthers suggestion, should it cause a rift between them.  

And, if he was honest with himself, he recognized that his feelings for her were...complicated. If he were to see a reaction in her at the suggestion they were sleeping together, he was not sure what that could do to them. The idea that Flip could lose (Y/N) terrified him.

So he actively worked to push his feelings down, preferring the safety of friendship. The safety of routine and the expected.

+

Today, Flip and Jimmy returned from a successful arrest on a perp they’d been following for weeks. They had managed to nail him while he was completing a small drug shipment from his mother’s garage. The whole arrest took them only just over an hour, and it was clean-the suspect, upon seeing the two detectives, surrendered.

When they arrived back at the station, Flip lingered outside to finish his smoke, feeling pretty satisfied with how the arrest went down and looking forward to sharing the success with (Y/N). He never told her anything classified, however in her position she was privy to a lot of sensitive information. She knew the details of most of the cases the detectives worked on.

He found it effortless to share the good days straight away, enjoying the way her features lit up at his words. Regardless of what she was working on, she would give him her full attention. The bad days she coaxed out of Flip with care during the drive to her home, always ready to comfort him or offer words of encouragement.

“Did you have a rough day, detective?” She had asked him one afternoon as they walked to his truck. He had been silent when approaching her at the end of the day, giving her a brief nod as she joined his pace and they hurried out of the station.

Flip had glanced down at her, unable to keep the frown off of his face. She merely tilted her head, her eyes soft as she waited patiently for him to speak, to say whatever he needed to. He had taken a deep breath before relenting.

“Just, usual bullshit from the Chief, about a case I worked just before you joined us.” He wasn’t able to elaborate, the entire case classified. Even files had been destroyed to keep it under wraps. Which was part of the reason he was so annoyed-he felt they could have accomplished more if they’d remained undercover longer. The Chief wholly disagreed.

Part of Flip had wondered if she would tease him, or tell him off for whining; a reaction that would have been entirely unsurprising from any of his fellow detectives. “Flip, do me a favour, tough man?” She had asked instead, leaning slightly against the side of his truck and gazing up at him.

“What’s that, darling?”

(Y/N) smiled, “When you walk through those doors at the end of the day,” She gestured at the main entrance, “You leave all the bullshit behind, don’t take it home with you anymore.”

He returned her smile, shrugging, “What if it’s too much to leave behind?” He hadn’t meant for the words to come out so quietly. (Y/N) stepped closer to him, their bodies inches apart, and Flip found himself unable to tear his gaze away from her (y/e/c) eyes.

“Then let me help you carry it, at least.” She had replied, voice equally as soft.

After a pause, she had patted his arm gently before moving to climb into the truck.  

“Flip,” He glanced up, pulled from his thoughts, to see Jimmy standing at the main station doors. His expression was unusually annoyed. Flip tossed his smoke, stomping it out.

“What is it?”

Jimmy shook his head, “You ain’t gonna like this.” And he pulled open the door. The sounds of a man shouting were the first thing to reach Flip’s ears, and he followed Jimmy inside, curious.

The shouting man had his finger angrily pointed at (Y/N), who was standing behind the counter. His yells echoed off the walls, a jarring contrast to the warmth and professionalism the station usually exuded. (Y/N) was positioned somewhat defensively in front of Donna-who Flip only noticed as he was approaching-her jaw set and mouth in a thin line. His eyes assessed her quickly, taking in her crossed arms and narrowed eyes, while he moved toward the scene with fast steps.

“I don’t give a god damn that he’s a police detective, I’m telling you no-” As the man uttered a slur, Flip’s frown morphed into a glare. He made his way down the hall unnoticed by everyone, all attention on the man. He hated when men cursed and uttered slurs in front of ladies. He especially hated that it was being directed at (Y/N). “-is going to be arresting my son, no sir, now you get that damn-“

“Sir, I’m not going to tell you again, your son was arrested, lawfully by a respected Detective of this station. Now lower your voice and I would be happy to take you to see your son and meet the detective.” Flip had never seen her angry-or even annoyed-but at that moment her eyes were narrowed, lips twisted in distaste as if the irritation tasted sour on her tongue. He did not like seeing (Y/N) upset, nor treated so poorly.

Her reasonable words served to merely enrage the large man further, his face reddening as he stepped closer to the counter. Flip, still unnoticed, moved to step in and lead the man away, his intention simply to diffuse the situation. However, there was a pressure building in his chest; the next few moments seemed to slow down in his red hazed vision, his willpower strong enough to remain professional, his hand reaching out to touch the man's shoulder-

Only the fucker pointed, his dirty hand inches from (Y/N)’s face, and rudely snarled, “Shut up bitch, and get me a white detective to talk to before I-“

The pressure hit a breaking point.

Flip instead seized that hand and twisted it behind the asshole’s back. A growl ripped from his chest as he used his free hand to grab the back of the man's neck and force him down, bending him over the counter. A wave of gratification swept through Flip when the man grunted in pain and surprise, his face pressed to the countertop.

“You were looking for a white Detective, I hear?” He snarled, his grip too tight for the man to struggle against. Flip was much too angry, a fact that his rational mind was concerning over-he had been fine moments before. Movement out of the corner of his eye had Flip glancing up, his eyes meeting (Y/N)’s over the desk. “You alright, darling?” His voice considerably softer as he surveyed her, concerned.

She nodded, her eyes holding his gaze steadily. “Just fine, Detective.” (Y/N) quickly assured him. Flip thought he saw something pass through her gaze, but before he could read it, it was gone. Something about that look had the thundering rage inside of him fading, which was for the best. He loosened his grip, slightly, resisting the urge to cause further harm.

Adrenaline coursed through Flip’s body, eyes never breaking away from hers. She seemed to draw him in, the look alone calming him further.

“Alright, sir, you’re coming with me, we’re going to have a little chat on how we conduct ourselves around ladies.” Jimmy stepped up, smirking, and cuffed the man. Flip looked away from (Y/N), and watched his partner and a uniformed officer lead the man away.

Flip momentarily considered following, but thought better of it. He drew a steadying breath of air, his anger dissolving as quickly as it had come on.

“Oh Donna, are you okay?”

Flip turned at the sound of (Y/N)‘s voice. Donna was visibly upset, her gentle nature affected. (Y/N), it seemed, was much less shaken. She wrapped her arms around Donna and gave her a comforting hug.

“I’m being silly, really,” Donna gulped, wiping at her eyes, “I’ve seen it all, at my age, you know. I just really worried he was going to hop the counter!”

(Y/N) patted her back, “I did too, but we’re alright, thanks to Detective Zimmerman. Why don’t you head home early?”

Flip agreed, ignoring the swell of pride at her words, “You don’t need to be worrying about us, Donna, you go ahead home and tell Carl I defended your honour on his behalf.” Flip joked, causing his matronly friend to give a shaky laugh and wipe away her tears. (Y/N) gave him a grateful look.

Flip stuck around while Donna gathered her things and bid them farewell, never taking his eyes off of (Y/N). She had walked over to the benches that lined the wall, taking a seat and letting her head fall back against the brick. Waving happily as Donna walked out, her smile dropped when she was out of sight.

She heaved a big sigh, watching as Flip joined her. His arm pressed against hers, neither of them adjusting their positions to move away. He said nothing, knowing she would speak when she was ready. They sat in silence for a few minutes, staring across at the silly pictures the kids had drawn.

“I’m sorry you had to deal with that, Flip,” (Y/N) finally said, shaking her head sadly. Flip stared down at her a moment, raising his brow.

“There is nothing for you to be apologizing for, darling.”

“I-I know, I suppose I just...” She trailed off, glancing away. When she didn’t look like she would finish her thought, he decided to joke and change the subject, though he filed her reaction away in the part of his mind he reserved for her failings at caring for herself. It ultimately served to provide him with excuses to care for her in his own ways, as a friend would.

A friend, only.

“You want me to go in there and rough him up a bit?” Flip wished he was fully kidding, but part of him would have been happy to go and knock the asshole around if she’d asked him to.

Instead, she laughed at his words, an arguably much better result. He smiled at the melody of her voice “Flip, thanks for shutting him up.” She glanced up at him from beneath her lashes, an almost coy expression appearing.  

Giving no real thought behind the action, simply following his instincts, Flip reached out and gently tucked some loose strands of (y/h/c) hair behind her ear. His hand lingered there a moment, before dropping abruptly, “Of course.” His voice came out in a rumble, “No one will ever speak to you like that around me, darling.”

She had watched him with her wide, beautiful eyes as he’d spoken, barely moving when he’d touched her hair. She was regarding him now with affection; he could see it clearly.

“My best friend, the protector.” She teased, breaking the frisson that had built between them, much to his relief.

Flip smirked down at her, though his heart was beating tirelessly in his chest and his mind was reeling. She patted his leg before standing, thanking him again. He watched her walk back to the reception desk, his expression unreadable. While he was fairly sure he could return to his desk, Flip decided to go outside for another smoke. chastising himself for the direction his thoughts had moved; from the intensity of his anger to the guilt of imagining filthy scenarios with his best friend.

When she had teased him, it was the first time the term had been used. And he found himself torn, feeling both touched at the sentiment, yet disappointed at its platonic connotation.

Flip returned home that evening in an overwhelmed state of mind, after a quiet car ride with (Y/N). She had thanked him again before hurrying inside her home. He wanted to stop her, to ask about the look on her face earlier.

He wanted to ask her why the first word that came to mind to describe it was hungry.  

Bristling, he sought release immediately, not bothering to undress beyond kicking off his boats and lowering his jeans to his thighs. He stood in his bedroom panting, one hand on his dresser to keep him steady, as he fisted his already hard length. He was desperate, sensitive from weeks of pent up sexual frustration he had pointedly ignored.

A guttural moan ripped from his chest as Flip finally allowed the thoughts of (Y/N) to the forefront of his mind; thoughts of her glowing skin, soft to his touch, her body quivering as he explored head to toe, kissing every inch. His hand moved quickly, the tension building within him swiftly. It only took a few more pumps as he imagined his name on her lips in ecstasy, pleading for him not to stop...

With a cry, he came-the wave of pleasure pulsing through his body as his cum spurted, coating his hand and dripping to the floor. "Fuck!" His head tilted back.

His legs trembled, perspiration coating his skin; he crashed from his high and quickly sat on the edge of his bed, gasping for air. After only a few moments of relief, the guilt seeped back into the front of Flip’s mind.

He sighed, “Flip, you’re a piece of garbage.” He muttered to himself, eyes closing in disgust. He fell back, now laying on his bed, chewing his lip as he considered everything that had happened. His mind was now much clearer.

And there was simply no denying, the expression on (Y/N)'s face had not been of fear or concern. It had been of arousal. Flip wasn't sure of how he would react if he ever saw that look cross her face again, and so he fretted at the best way to move forward.

Would telling her how he felt, and risking their friendship, be the right move? Or was Flip too selfish, too cowardly, to admit his feelings?

Flip didn't sleep a wink.

Did you enjoy this chapter? Please consider reblogging or commenting—likes are basically just a bookmark!

Tag list ✨ @tashastrange89 @finn-ray-nal-beads @fizzywoohoo @iamnotthecatladynextdoor

[cucuxumusu]

@gizaart you started this. @the-bitchking-of-angmar thanks for the recs.

"Have you done this before, Kurosaki?" Grimmjow asked, his big body hovering over Ichigo and trapping him against the bed. Ichigo frowned, his face felt burning, his whole-body pulsing with nerves. This was bad. They shouldn't be doing this, after all he was still a shinigami and Grimmjow a hollow. They shouldn't get involved in this kind of way...or in any kind of way. "That's none of your business?" He snapped way too defensive to even his own ears. It made Grimmjow smile. The crazy smile that showed too many teeth. He lowered his face even closer to Ichigo making him even more tense and uncomfortable. He was already straddling Ichigo's body on hands and knees, did he really need to get any closer? "So that's a no." The espada concluded amused. Ichigo wanted to punch him. Hard. Right in his knowing smirking face. Of course he had never touched himself. There had been wars, and rescue missions and then even more wars. He knew it was normal for teenagers to do this kind of thing, but he had never had the time nor the privacy. Dear god, Rukia had been living in his closet until a week ago.

The way Grimmjow was looking at him however was making it seem like a sacrilege, as if he was missing something fundamental. He pushed himself a bit up the bed, trying to get away from the looming Espada and the weird feeling of betrayal he was having. Grimmjow however only followed him right up not letting him escape even an inch from under him. He had found him right as Ichigo was about to go to sleep and the weird conversation had begun. It was ridiculous. He turned to snap at him once more so he would leave him alone, but the other spoke first. "Do it." Grimmjow said, his eyes tracking Ichigo with way too much intensity for just a joke. "Jerk yourself." "What?!" Ichigo said, his face again burning even hotter. "Of course not!" "I will teach you." Grimmjow said as it that explained everything. "I don't need any teaching!" He snarled. This was getting out of control. Grimmjow however didn't let go, he just leaned down even more into his personal space, his body hovering over his as Ichigo laid down even further into the mattress. He was all muscle and heat and raw power. A tingling sensation spread over Ichigo's body, his heart rate increased in his own ears. Fuck. He looked away mortified. Why this happened to him? "Don't you?" Grimmjow again taunted. "And what does a virgin know?" Ichigo bit his lip. This was a bad idea, a very very bad idea. He should punch the asshole unconscious and return to bed. "C'mon, Ichigo. Do it, Ichigo." The other repeated, his voice growing softer, almost a rumble. Ichigo's trembling hands lowered to his own pants. He was wearing nothing fancy, just a pair of pyjama pants and an old shit, but suddenly it seemed as if he was naked under Grimmjow's sharp gaze. Blood pounded on his ears, his face flaming as he slipped a hand into his pants and gripped his cock. He closed his eyes, not daring look at Grimmjow like this. "Good." the other purred against his mouth however still with that soft tone. "Now move it up and down, Ichigo, you know how. Yeah. Not that fast. Savour it." Ichigo trembled under the instructions. He knew in general how this was supposed to be done, but Grimmjow was right, he had never ever attempted it or even wondered about it. His mind had always been elsewhere to indulge in this kind of fantasy. He stroked himself. Slow like Grimmjow had said. His fingers gripping loosely around his hot dick and moving in an even rhythm that tented his pants. Up to the round tip, and down to his navel. Again and again. The tingling increased all over his body, his stomach muscles tensed, and he spread his legs a bit apart under Grimmjow so he could have a bit more space. "L-like this?" He said mortified. "Yeah." Grimmjow hovered over him, his elbows beside Ichigo's head and his knees bracketing his own. His weight moved over the bed for a second, changing position as if he wanted to see this better. But he never touched him.

Ichigo could just feel his breath on his neck -calm compared to Ichigo's own-, or the heat his body pulled off above him. It kept distracting him and making the tingling worse, and his skin clammy.

"How does it feel, Ichigo? Any good?" Grimmjow whispered against his neck.

"I...I don't know." he answered truthfully. The tingling was increasing, but he didn't know if that was what he was supposed to feel. "It just feels weird."

He moved on the bed, pulling his head back on the bed, and showing his neck to Grimmjow in an unconscious move.

Grimmjow snarled harsh and loudly. Ichigo flinched and opened his eyes surprised. His dick twitched and hardened in his hand suddenly. He swallowed. Oh dear.

"Harder." Grimmjow said between clenched teeth. "Grip yourself harder. And move faster."

He doubted. "But you said…"

"I know what I said, now do it!"

Ichigo frowned at the tone but obeyed. He closed his fist more firmly around himself, and then he moved it faster, pumping himself quickly. And as if summoned by magic pleasure surged all over him. He bit his lip again to contain his sudden gasps as his whole body tensed. His hips begun to move on their own, trusting shyly up into his own fist despite his best effort to keep still.

This was weird, it felt different than before, more intense and good, something begun building in his lower back, the tension increasing. He looked at himself, at his own hand touching himself under Grimmjow's gaze, at the obscene moves and his own sound and almost moaned.

"Yeah, that's it Kurosaki, hard and fast, just as I know you will love." Grimmjow sneered against his mouth, making him feel even dirtier. "Keep on, trust your instincts, you are doing so well."

Something wet dripped from the tip of his cock, helping the whole process, making his moves slicker and easier. Maybe this was an orgasm. Following Grimmjow's words he gripped himself harder, almost painfully, as he desperately wanted and kept going. He moaned this time. Closing his eyes and finally pulling his cock out of his restricting pants to make this easier.

Grimmjow again growled.

He opened his eyes and found a vibrant blue staring right at what he was doing. This was so dirty. So wrong. Yet he couldn't even feel embarrassed this time as he kept on pumping himself, he felt...there was too much...something was coming, but he didn't know if it was what he wanted, it kept on building and building in his belly, and he didn't know what to do.

"Grimmjow…" he whispered, panicking.

"Use your other hand too." the other instructed, as if reading his mind.

Ichigo's body moved on its own. He whimpered as his other hand joined the first making the friction increase to perfection, the tightness, the pace, this felt so fucking good. How had he missed this? His body arched against the mattress, almost pleading under Grimmjow, and he sobbed trying to contain it all, trying to understand all that pleasure.

"Fuck god, Kurosaki, if you are like this just with..." the other cursed above him, his eyes kept roaming over him with something dangerous in them something that made his cock twitch even more.

"Please," he called again, needing a moment, needing to stop, but not daring pull his hands away should this end. "just…"

"Yes?" Grimmjow said again, moving until he hovered over his exposed face. Still not touching him in the least. Why wasn't he touching him? "What does your body want, Kurosaki? How does it feel?" "It...it feels good." he said. "Are you enjoying touching yourself?" "Yes." A smirk. "How much?" "A lot." he confessed shamelessly, thrashing on the bed a little. "I love it. Just, please...something is...I don't..." Grimmjow chuckled mockingly, lowering his face to his neck. His breath hovered so close to his heated skin it was causing him chills. "Reaching an orgasm so fast?" "No, I.." "It's okay, you have done pretty well," Grimmjow grumbled. "Now let go, and come for me, Ichigo." And he bit him.

Hard and deep, drawing blood from his neck. Ichigo saw white. The pleasure and pain mixing into something cataclysmic. The tension that had been mounting snapped, and he felt something wet paint his hands once and then again. His toes curled on the sheets, his breath stopped in his throat.

He felt into the purest pleasure.

When he breathed again his body felt numb and lax. More relaxed than it had been in years. than it had ever been. He turned to look at Grimmjow feeling groggy, still confused.

"You bit me." He accused, and he probably should attend to the wound by its throbbing pain.

Grimmjow smiled. Smug. His eyes falling to that would for a second and seeming satisfied. Asshole. He was still hovering over him. Not having moved an inch since the beginning. As if he enjoyed crowding Ichigo's personal space, and staying there.

But after what had happened Ichigo just couldn't complain about proper social distance. Dear god, he had jerked off in front of Grimmjow. With his help.

"How was your first jerk off?" The Espada said, still smirking, digging deeper on the injury.

Ichigo wanted to punch him again mortified. He wanted to run away and hide from this man for a while. blackmail material, this was just blackmail material and it was all his fault.

Instead he just stared Grimmjow right in the eyes, and with a bored face, he rose his dirty hand and wiped himself clean on Grimmjow's face, over his mask and even on his hair. Served him right.

The other grew dead still above him, then rose a sarcastic eyebrow. "Kinky."

Ichigo turned scarlet. He should have punched him. Of course, he was a pervert. However, before he could do anything Grimmjow just lowered his head and kissed him.

And Ichigo had another mental breakdown just like that.

Grimmjow was kissing him. The sexta espada and one of his stronger enemies was kissing him after he had jerked off in front of him.

Holy shit!

Dumbfounded he tried to kiss back, pressing his lips against Grimmjow firmly, but before he could try much more, Grimmjow rose again with a frown.

"You haven't kissed much either, have you?"

Ichigo just stared at him speechless. And hot, and hella confused. He frowned out of spite. "Shut up."

Grimmjow smirked and lowering his head once more he nuzzled his nose and check with his own in a fond gesture. Ichigo again short circuited. Fond? Grimmjow? What was happening today?

"I wonder what else I could teach you today?" Grimmjow said against his mouth.

[tundrainafrica]

Title: Lovebug (2/10)

Summary:  

“It might be a bug.”

“A bug?”

“Sometimes the developers of this application make mistakes. This is our first time meeting I’m sure so…Isn’t it a bit weird that we just met for the first time and it rings like this? And for two strangers to coincidentally ring each other’s alarms?“

Levi is the developer of the Love Alarm App and Hange is married to Zeke.

Link to cross-postings: AO3

Other Chapters: 1 3 4 5

Notes: I was torn between publishing the next chapter of lovebug or outlier tonight so I opted to just go for lovebug. I'll post the next chapter of outlier mid next week. As always, feedback is very much appreciated.

“We’re gonna delay the release of our next fix…” Levi repeated, just a little slower that time. He didn’t trust himself then to speak in anything faster or with a tone any louder.

It was too early in the morning for a meeting, just a little past eight in the morning. He was called into Erwin’s office right after arriving into company grounds and Erwin, a natural early bird, was talking louder than what could have been considered bearable for Levi.

At eight in the morning though, not a lot of things were bearable, especially if they involved a huge change of plans and a glaring reminder that he had a long work day ahead of him.

More importantly, Erwin’s voice was grating in a way that most bosses’ voices were grating when laced with a little more urgency than necessary. “Yes Levi, we’re delaying our fixes indefinitely, not just for Love Alarm but all of our other apps as well.”

Levi raised his eyebrows. “Really? You know we’ve been announcing this big fix for months.”

“I’ve contacted the marketing team. We are pushing the fixes back a week. You think that will be enough for you to finish everything you need?”

Levi shook his head. “There’s no need to push back the release. I can work on this bug now and I can have the other developers and the support team work on getting the regression testing done and getting the release out.”

Erwin shook his head. “I do not want to give Mr. Jaeger the impression that we aren’t prioritizing his complaints. Levi, you have to understand. He’s an important client.”

“I understand that. And I will be on top of things. I’m testing this issue myself.” Most days, Levi left the testing option to the support team. Given the nature of the bug though and the severe urgency of getting it fixed, it had been an easy decision for Levi to take it upon himself.

Erwin hummed in approval. “Yes and I’m happy to hear that you're going to be investigating this bug. I would rather that we didn’t release anything while investigating this.”

“May I ask why? This bug doesn’t involve any of our other functionalities. I can test this myself.”

Erwin hummed. “Zeke Jaeger is an unpredictable man. I don’t think he would appreciate us improving our product while such a glaring bug still exists. He is a very vocal and he might give us some bad press.”

“Oh?” Levi heard the derision in his own tone then, a smooth yet venomous sound. Zeke Jaeger had been outwardly friendly yet for some reason Levi couldn’t explain just yet. He wasn’t at all drawn by the charisma that accompanied it. In fact, the blonde had just been annoying and the conversation only cemented Levi’s first impression of Zeke Jaeger as bad, maybe even terrible.

What the hell does Hange see in him? He added to himself then. How that had entered his own contemplations then, he didn’t know. He quickly brushed it away and mustered the most seemingly uninvested face he could make then.

Erwin had that special talent of seeming uninvested either. As he settled on the sofa in front of Levi, he mixed the coffee just a little too loudly. He had an aura about him that very much meant business. “Have you done some prior investigation?”

“I did,” Levi said. As he soon found out, that aura was contagious.

“Anything new?”

“I’m entertaining the idea that what if…. The application is working fine?”

“Can you explain why his partner had two hearts while he had none?”

Levi cleared his throat. “Assuming the application is working perfectly, we can draw two conclusions. One, someone in love with Hange Zoe had their application on and Two, Hange Zoe isn’t in love with Zeke Jaeger.” That last conclusion couldn’t have easily been true, but still such words left such a sweet aftertaste in Levi’s mouth that he had to make some considerable effort not to smile.

Erwin raised his eyebrows inquisitively. “Any leads on whose application could have been on?”

It had taken some strength, some self confidence and some self discipline on Levi’s side to pull his phone out then. “My love alarm was on yesterday, I forgot to turn it off after the demo…” He navigated to the ‘history’ tab and opened his history to the exact time to late afternoon yesterday.

One person nearby is in love with you. Levi read silently to himself. In that split second, he was contemplating display issues and front end bugs that maybe just maybe accidentally chalked Hange’s heart as ‘love.’ It was highly unlikely though so even before that idea had ripened into something worth an explanation and a support ticket, Levi brushed it aside.

“So your application was on the whole time.” Erwin murmured, looking intently at the phone in front of him.

Levi nodded. “But it’s a good step in the right direction. That means there’s a bug to investigate after all. I just have to isolate it to either Hange Zoe’s application build or mine,” he explained.

“That seems promising and do you need any help organizing a meeting with her.”

“She’s coming today for a little testing.”

“Just like my best engineer to think a few steps ahead.” Erwin asked, a smile curling up his lips. “And you think you can get it done within a week?”

“If all goes well… Even less than a week.”

***

It had turned out that that small meeting had worked well to organize Levi’s thoughts. He had a quick action plan from there and with an action plan, a new burst of motivation, or at least enough of it to carry him from Erwin’s room to his own small office space in a little less than five minutes.

A week to investigate. Levi thought to himself as he leaned back on his office chair. He looked back up at the ceiling for a good few seconds before writing his deadline down on the white board next to him.

He didn’t need that whiteboard, their workflow trackers and excel sheets worked well to always keep Levi in the right state of mind. Yet there was something organic about white boards, something natural about being able to write the numbers with his own hand, freely changing his fonts with just the slight of the hand, impulsively changing formats at just a quick motion.

So he kept it there next to him, a large annoying waste of space to most people. But Levi had taken great pains to make it look organized in his room, measuring each frame to the millimeter. It was a large clean slate right next to his desk in his very small office. And more importantly, it was something that was very much his to play around with like he wanted to.

Under the deadline, he put the new release date of their fix.

We’re delaying the release of the next fix by a week.

Such wise words from someone who didn’t know how the investigation process actually worked. But with an employee and boss relationship, emphasis on Levi being the employee, he had to make it work. That’s how it had always been in the office. Erwin wasn’t a developer. He was a manager. And Levi was being paid by him.

Levi though never liked the idea of delaying fix releases. Once the date was announced, he liked to make sure all of the quality assurance testing and the regression testing was done two weeks ahead. And with that habit becoming custom for the Love Alarm project, he was sure they would have managed to make the release next week. Staring at the workflow interface, he noted the bar was more than half full already, most bugs were tagged as fix. All test builds were submitted and passed and they could have easily moved on to the final regression testing before release.

And regression testing never actually failed. The Love Alarm app after all was a very functionally simple application.

With the weight of a wasted timely release and the powerlessness of corporate politics bare on his back, Levi let out a long sigh.

He opened up his slack channel and typed out a few words.

We’re delaying the next fix release.

But it wouldn’t just be the Love Alarm which would be affected, all the other applications would be affected as well. His notifications exploded within five seconds, all feedback from each time. Levi started to wonder, maybe he should have put everything in one message.

So he edited his old message.

We’re pushing it back a week.

Under that, he put a new date and time as a reminder to all other employees. There were many why’s, many protests and his application continued to shake with notifications.

He checked the time on his phone. Hange had agreed to meet at nine and she should be texting soon. With little to no brains pace to create a summary of his meeting with Erwin in less than ten minutes, Levi typed out two words.

Erwin’s orders. Without waiting for anymore protests, he closed his laptop, packed up his things and ready to move to the small conference room he had reserved for him and Hange.

It was a few floors below. A small room among others but Levi was familiar enough with the layout of their offices to know it was very much soundproof.

Any unwelcome alarms, unwelcome notifications and unwelcome conversations would stay in that room. Even before Levi had dropped off his things in the conference room, Hange had already texted.

Her car was by the gate already.

Meet in the lobby. Levi texted back as he quickened his pace, quickly turning back towards the elevator, laptop bag still in hand.

He could have been too slow. Or Hange could have just been too fast but by the time he had arrived in the lobby, she was already on one of the seats next to the reception, playing around with her phone.

She was wearing a light sweater, her brown hair was pulled up messily into a half ponytail. Levi though had to note that it still looked very much like it fell into place. For a second, he had given her a good onceover, admiring everything at once.

Only a split second later, he was cruelly reminded that he had made her wait, long enough for her to have to sit down in one of the lobby sofas. “How long were you waiting?” It wouldn’t have been the first greeting Levi would have liked to give then. His heart was racing though and soon he realized, maybe he had taken up the unnecessary challenge of jogging down those five flights of stairs while keeping his laptop safely in tow.

Hange looked up from her phone seeming surprised. “Are you busy? Was this a bad time to visit?” Hange asked. “We could reschedule... “

More and more, the first greeting then was seeming less and less ideal. “No, no. This is great. I don’t know what just came over me. Thank you for taking the time to test this bug with me.”

Hange shook her head. “No, no, I asked my partner to invest in this application for a reason. I see great potential and I’d be happy to tweak some of those bugs with you.” Her lips widened into a smile. “So what’s the game plan?”

Levi gestured towards the elevators. “We do some simple testing. I just need to isolate the cause of this bug.”

“Oh? How does application testing work?”

“We use the application,” Levi answered matter-of-factly. Was there any other way to test it? It didn’t seem like something he should be asking the very important partner of a very important person though so Levi kept that last question to himself, instead keeping his face then as something both subtle and questioning.

“That’s cool,” Hange said. “So how’s your job?”

“It’s fine,” Levi answered. “The investigation will keep me busy.” He stared at the numbers on the elevator, getting lower and lower and Levi could have sworn it couldn’t go any slower. He could have found some consolation if anybody else had joined them in the elevator then, to at least abate that awkward need to carry some conversation between them.

Any other employees though had chosen for themselves to wait in front of other elevators. Levi was almost considering doing the same thing.

After all, Hange was talkative. She was asking questions. When they entered the elevator together, the very slow elevator, there would be more than enough time to send two to three questions back and forth. And Levi was quick to realize, he was an incredibly boring person.

“So do you have any hobbies?”

“Programming.” What about you? Levi had readied himself to ask in that long split second of silence that followed.

Hange though was quick to respond even before he could take control of the conversation. “Well aside from your actual job.”

“I like to clean,” Levi answered. He started to wonder how dorky that hobby sounded like. He needed to rephrase. “I meant--- organize things…” He added a second later. “Like Marie Kondo.”

“Oh yes, I’ve heard about her,” Hange said. She had at least allowed for a split second silence then, long enough for Levi to take the reins of the conversation.

Hange though was a high profile person, her partner was one of the richest men in the country and Levi’s mind was racing with hypotheticals. Was it okay to ask her about her hobbies? Her interests? Or was that supposed to be an exclusively professional meeting?

Soon, with all the questions nagging at him at once, he unearthed a question at the back of his mind that he had been meaning to ask since he had met Hange down at the lobby.

So how’s your husband?

Where’s your husband? Do you hang out with him often? Do you usually do stuff alone? A question that couldn’t so easily be answered by a single google search on an incognito window, only that night, he had tried searching keywords just to be sure.

Hange Zoe Zeke Jaeger Relationship

And soon after searching that just once. He had made sure to clear his browser history just in case he didn’t do it in some incognito window. After all, night mode and incognito mode had almost the same interface.

He soon found out though after jumbling around keywords over a search engine that Google wasn’t omnipotent as it turned out. The only one who could have satisfied his curiosity at that moment was the brunette next to him then.

He couldn’t bring himself to ask it just then though. So he went for another question, a very vanilla one but it seemed like a safe bet. “What about you?”

“What about me? What do you mean about me?”

Levi was starting to doubt the flow of the conversation of a while ago. Did he remember it correctly?

The elevator dinged like it was announcing some coming of a messiah. That had been more than enough to break the awkwardness of that exchange and Levi quickly slammed the open elevator door, just a little more loudly than usual. He gestured for Hange to go ahead.

“Hobbies,” Levi said as he met her outside the elevator.

“I like research,” Hange answered.

“Is that your full time job?” Levi asked. He didn’t need to ask. He had read more than enough articles of Zeke Jaeger’s partner to have seen ‘neuropsychologist’ used as an epithet enough to be convinced that that was her full time job. The last thing he wanted to do though was actually accidentally imply in a conversation that he had googled a few keywords for answers before clearing his browser history.

Hange nodded. “Yes it is.”

“Well… Hobbies aside from your actual job?” Levi asked. He kept his own word usage and his own phrasing similar to what Hange had used with him. If Hange asked it that way, that should have been a socially acceptable way to ask.

“I like plants,” Hange said firmly. She wasn’t looking at him. Although Levi had wanted to see the face she was making then, he started to realize that craning his neck to get a good view of her face might just look a little too weird.

So he settled for her side profile. From his view he could see eyes were everywhere at once from the hallways to the doorways just a little further away from the area that opened up as soon as they exited the elevator. “Where are we going?”

“Over here,” Levi said, he was quick to pull her towards the other side though, before she found out that he had taken a good few steps already in the wrong direction. “The conference room is over here…”

“We have a meeting?” Hange asked, her voice suddenly very tense.

“No, it’s nothing like that. I just thought it would be better that I reserved a room, so we could do some testing where we wouldn’t bother anyone.”

She let out a sigh of relief. “That’s good. I thought I was supposed to be preparing something.”

In those few minutes, he had made her wait, made her navigate some awkward conversation and made her panic. Then and there as he led her to the room, he was guessing what kind of dashing review she’d be giving Zeke about their first meet up.

More importantly, was he giving a great second impression? It was nine in the morning, too early for him to be confident that he was a fully functioning human being. Or so, that was what he repeated to himself then. He could make up for it after lunch.

Hange settled on one of the chairs nearest to the door. “Do we sit together?” She asked. The meeting room was designed for a maximum of ten people and for a good few seconds, he wondered if he should have gotten something much smaller.

Even before he had figured it out for himself, he was looking between sitting right next to her or towards the other side of the room. They weren’t married. Could he sit beside someone who was married?

But if he sat too far, he might not be able to hear her. He went for a very safe in between. He dropped his laptop bag on the seat next to her with some flourish, as if to say, he was married to his job and he was happy with that arrangement before sitting on the seat right next to his bag.

There was a bag between them, they were a safe distance away and Levi pulled his laptop out and booted it up. “I’m suspecting that the issue with your application might be the build. Can you redownload it for me?” He asked. The laptop had been a reminder at least that they were there for business. And business meant that they had a topic of conversation and he had practiced that script enough times to know, he probably didn’t sound like an idiot.

“Are we testing now?” Hange pulled her phone from her bag.

“Yes we are. Just download the app from the app store. I need to confirm that this isn't just your build in particular being faulty,” Levi brought out his own phone, deleted the application from the folder before redownloading it into his phone.

The ‘downloading’ message next to the love alarm application served some form of inspiration for conversation topics at least. “So, how does your husband like the app?” Levi asked. That line was straight from the basic customer service manual and he was very much sure that was acceptable territory for a professional conversation topic.

“Ahh Zeke? He loves the application. He told me himself, he sees potential in it too.”

Did he tell you over dinner? Over car rides? Somehow, Levi was picturing them over a happy dinner in their European style dining room in their very expensive penthouse apartment down town. He knew how it looked. He had seen it in one of the lifestyle articles he had googled just the night before. “That’s good,” Levi said, he felt that comment catch at his throat. He cleared his throat. “The bug... How does he feel about it?”

Hange’s face fell at that. Subtly at least, but with Levi had been staring at her for the past few seconds, it was very much noticeable as a split second movement. “Yeah, about that…”

“Did he say anything about it?”

“We did research on the application last night… And we were theorizing… so the heart could have been from him… and from someone else right? Someone else had their application open then. And he was saying it was you.” Hange’s eyes were wide with disbelief. “But I remember you said, it could be a bug right? And I’m sure you turned off your phone before we tested it…”

“And we’re testing again,” Levi said as he opened the newly downloaded application on his phone. “Log into your account.” He ordered, looking pointedly at Hange’s phone.

The biometrics were already in his account, all he needed was to log his fingerprints again. Levi took a glance at Hange’s phone laid out on the table.

She had gone through the log in process quickly. He turned the love alarm on and rested his chin on his hands and waited. Hange only needed a few seconds. Soon she had turned it on.

And within a second, her phone buzzed then his phone buzzed. It did wonders to shake the whole table then, enough for Levi to have to grit his teeth as the table shook sending a bolt of shivers up to his chin.

He could have sworn he felt blood rush to his face then. He quickly turned off the alarm. “It might be a problem with our phones. I”ll bring down some test devices and we can try this again. He avoided Hange’s gaze only brushing his hands on her shoulders long enough to make his point known. “Just wait here.”

Hange mumbled something with a seemingly obedient tone. Levi didn’t bother to guess. He quickly made his way out of the room, up the stairs--- he was in no mood to run into anyone in the elevator.

It had taken him roughly ten minutes to go back up to the office and come back down with a bag full of gadgets. He dropped the bag on the meeting table, maybe a little too loud and a little too roughly. “These are the most common gadgets used for testing the love alarm. They’ve all been factory reset so just set any one of them up and we try the application again.”

Hange seemed frozen with surprise, at the least she had managed a nod.

Setting up the device was a simple process and Hange didn’t ask too much about it. She had at least kept quiet through the whole ordeal and although it was second nature for Levi to set up a device, he made sure to keep his head down, his eyes intent, feigning deep concentration.

Or maybe he needed to concentrate. His hands were shaking just a little bit, his heart was racing.

He was sure he only needed to try it one different device, one commonly used model for both of their phones to rule out any problems with build or model. It was a decisive move.

And the climax of such a process came once again when Hange had motioned to click the love alarm again before looking up at him. Before they even met eyes, Levi clicked the on button on his end.

It was at the moment when the alarms rang in unison again did Hange avert her gaze. Levi bit his lip as he stared back at his phone.

One person nearby is in love with you.

He glanced up, at Hange’s phone. Although he couldn’t make out the words on it, the characteristic heart near the center was enough. She was getting the same heart.

He grabbed the phone from her. “It might be related to the model,” Levi said, Years of experience working with applications and phones were telling him, it wasn’t related. One working phone was more than enough proof. Looking at the watch at the end of the meeting room, he saw it was far from lunch time, he had at least ten devices in the bag. “Let’s try it on other phones… Just to be sure.”

***

“Levi, what if…”

“What if…” Levi nodding his head at Hange slowly, a subtle gesture for her to continue speaking.

For lunch, they had settled for one of the diner just along the wide shopping streets only a few minutes walk from the building.

An eventful few minutes walk. Levi had turned on his love alarm, put an earbud to one ear and listened to the alarm ring on repeat as he followed Hange through the streets. There were a few other notifications that popped up and left as he listened. But the ringing coming from that one heart which he had already surmised long ago, was from Hange’s heart had settled into even the cadence of his steps. It became an ubiquitous part of the short walk to the shopping street.

When they had settled in the diner though, Hange was quick to drop her phone in front of him and show him the history of her application. On her phone, there was one heart that remained steadfast through the whole ten minute walk as well.

At that moment, Hange pointed at it, then glanced quickly at Levi’s own phone. “What if… You are attracted to me. And I’m attracted to you? Because this love alarm, it doesn’t just check love right? It checks attractiveness. So if a passer by thinks you’re attractive, your alarm rings,” Hange said.

Levi leaned back on the diner behind him, picking at his fries with a fork. He couldn’t bring himself to eat one, just the results of their testing that morning had him losing his appetite. Consequently, he had ordered the burger meal at the front of the menu, something he was in no mood to eat.

“So maybe…” Hange said.

“Hange, we just met. During all the tests. I have never made anyone’s love alarm ring. Besides, I don’t think I’d be the type of guy to get attracted to someone at first glance. I don’t believe in love at first sight.” And someone who’s married at that. If Levi had something in his mouth then as that thought ran through his mind, he was sure he would have choked. He was more grateful than ever that he hadn’t started eating.

“But, we saw it already… The application was giving the same reading and when we were walking too… It never stopped ringing…” Hange explained. Still she looked like she was still finding the right words.

Levi understood her clearly though. “Hange, are you in love with me?”

Hange turned a bright red. “What? No, I'm married. Also, we just met and I don’t believe in love at first sight either”

“So do you believe there’s a bug?”

Hange nodded. “Maybe? Or maybe the data you put into the application was flawed. Maybe there are things that need to be improved.”

“That is a good point. So what do you suggest then Hange?”

“I’ll help you research. I pitched this application to Zeke because I wanted to try rolling something out similar to hospitals, psychiatric units. And if he invests maybe we could improve the application, work to make it more accurate?”

“That’s the plan. But he said so himself, he’s not going to invest in the application until the bug is fixed.”

“But what if it is working as expected… What if it’s just a matter of fixing the data?” Hange looked out the window, seeming deep in thought. Levi wondered if that last question had been for him or for herself.

“I can do further testing on this. Just to make sure,” Levi said. “The problem is… How are you gonna convince Zeke to invest in this?”

Hange sighed. “I guess it's going to be a question of timing. I'll catch him when he's in a good mood and--”

“Hange, are you willing to admit to your husband that you might just be attracted to some stranger?”

That shouldn't have been such a difficult thing. He had heard before of married couples who window shopped so Levi amended that question in his mind.

Are you willing to admit to your seemingly unhinged husband that you might just be attracted to some stranger?

***

Sometimes, the only way to find the bug is to break the application.

Levi and Hange got caught in the lunch time rush. But Hange wasn’t a typical worker, Levi wasn’t a typical eight to five employee either.

So Levi saw opportunity for a little test. “Open your love alarm,” he whispered. He put one earbud to his ear, motioning for Hange to do the same. He turned on the application once again, letting the shill ring grace his ears one again.

It was annoying at first, but over time, he had started to see it as an old friend. He was far from the denial stage already and he was already threading the lines of acceptance.

He was a developer. He had fucked up the coding and a bug had appeared. And that issue, it was a bug for sure, a bug he needed to investigate.

And any opportunity for data and evidence, was an opportunity he couldn’t waste.

“We walk through the lunch crowd,” Levi said. “Usually when I walk through, I get two to three rings. Sometimes more. There have been issues before that getting too many at once, sometimes the application would conceal all the hearts and the only way to get it to work again is to reset the application.”

“So what do we do?” Hange asked.

“Turn on your application and we walk through the crowds,” Levi repeated matter-of-factly.

The crowds around him though were disconcerting and he could understand how Hange would have needed some guidance then.

What did she know about testing? When Levi asked himself that question, he started to pick out another question too. What did he know about testing?

He was an engineer and he had been working with applications for years. He had experienced a lot about testing. But he had never experienced testing with a customer married to one of the biggest opportunities of a company and being accused of being in love with her by his own brain child.

He was treading unfamiliar grounds.

The ringing of the alarm was always unsettling at first. By the fifth ring, it always found a rhythm. Or maybe it was his own brain that found rhythm in it.

And he walked to that rhythm, he pushed past the crowds to that rhythm and every two to three rings, he would take a glance to see Hange beside him, her face had settled to some rhythm too. Sometimes, she would look back at him, other times she would look behind her, as if she suspected someone had set her alarm off.

But he had become part of her rhythm too. From his peripherals, he could see she snuck glances at him. Very quick glances that Levi had been perceptible, invested enough to notice.

They could have been walking for five minutes, or maybe even ten. Soon, Levi realized, the love alarm had embedded itself into the background noise, an annoying ring amid faint voices, conversations, public announcements.

It had only seemed loud once again when the street had opened up to an open space at the center.

In front of them was an empty park, and it usually was empty when the lunch crowds had made their way back to their offices. Levi had worked there long enough to know.

The chaos of the alarm had subsided into one noise. He turned to Hange to see that she was looking up at the sky then, one hand over her forehead, shading the view from the bright afternoon sun.

The light from the sun had done wonders to make her cheeks look a bright pink and for a second or so, Levi just stared, long enough for Hange to have noticed. Or maybe it was her plan to look to him eventually.

“Did it stop?” Levi asked as soon as he became aware of those hazel eyes on him. He averted his gaze and looked around the empty park. Nobody should be ringing his alarm. Nobody should be ringing her alarm. But them.

It should have been a win-win situation. If that had worked to break the application, Levi could have clocked that as the bug and investigated that instead. If it worked as expected, if the two applications continued to ring, then maybe it was working.

His alarm was still ringing. He did a thorough 360 of the park. No one was near enough to even meet the ten meter radius. Just to be sure though he turned to Hange. “Anyone around our ten meter radius?”

The park was empty save for one old man on a bench a good distance away, definitely more than ten meters. He hoped it had sounded like a redundant question.

Hange shook her head. “Nobody. But the application is still ringing.”

“Did it stop at all? During the walk?”

Once again, Hange shook her head.

Levi took a deep breath and dropped his shoulders back. “Erwin gave me a week to figure this out. I’ll do some of my own personal investigation after this.”

“Hey, I’ll do what I can too. I really want you to get those funds.” Hange took her hands in his and Levi had half the mind to pull away. If her hands weren’t so soft and maybe a little too warm even for a cool spring day.

Levi had been almost disappointed when Hange dropped his hand and turned back to her phone. Just ‘almost’ though. They just met, he couldn’t be too invested in hands.

So he thought back once again to backend work to the numbers that made up the love alarm. And he thought of Hange’s little suggestion. “You said something about flawed data right?”

***

“My plan is I’m gonna see if I can convince Zeke to take up that love alarm,” Hange said.

“No need to hurry. I have a week to get it working,” Levi muttered. He wasn’t looking at Hange then. His laptop was propped on his lap and he was looking through open support tickets.

They had a support team and being a developer, answering customer queries wasn’t his job. At that rate though, he was looking for anything to keep him busy. Zeke would be coming to pick up Hange and the last thing he wanted to be was free enough to stare at them.

“I have some books on love, I could send them over,” Hange suggested

Levi looked up from his laptop. The support ticket on ‘how to download the app’ was not very interesting after all and he found reason once again to stare at Hange’s bright hazel eyes. “Why would I need books about love?”

“You seem… inexperienced with love?” Hange started. She seemed unsure with that answer.

“Inexperienced with love?” Levi narrowed his eyes at her.

“Allergic to love,” Hange repeated. “so I thought it might help if you read on them.”

“Why would you care if I read them?”

“If we’re gonna work together to improve the accuracy of your alarm, I think you should learn. I’ll do my part too. I’ll learn a bit of coding.”

Levi shrugged. “Send them over then. I’ll look through them if I have time. First things first, I need to get a little more testing done.”

“They might be useful for testing. Or maybe they’ll be able to help you pick out which sensations in particular point to love.”

“I loaded the data. I would know,” Levi said.

Hange raised one eyebrow at him in playful suspicion. It had done some magic in helping Levi recall that all he remembered were the numbers and some hints about sweating, palpitations and some quickening paces. But machines had a tendency of learning more about the users over time.

“Maybe I’ll read one or two before bed," he added a second later.

“Great. Then I’ll do my homework too. I’ll see what I can get from Zeke. Hopefully I can convince him to invest, even with the bug.”

“You have my number---” Just update me. Before Levi could let those words out, he had fallen back into that support ticket about that one person not knowing how to download the application.

It was still a boring and stupid support ticket. But when Zeke had padded into the lobby like he owned the place with a butler in tow, Levi decided that the idiot of a ticket was still a better view than Zeke at that moment.

“Thank you for picking me up,” Hange said in an almost melodic tone, a tone that made Levi’s ears bleed.

“My meeting ended early and I don’t think we had a good dinner since last week. What did you have for lunch?”

“Burgers and fries.”

“Burgers and fries? Hange, I gave you more than enough money for a good meal." Zeke sounded mortified.

Levi froze. He had suggested the diner for its strategic location. He found himself running his right hand slowly over his wallet in his front pocket. He was sure he had the money for anything more expensive.

“It was good.”

“Well, I’ll make sure we get something better tonight. There’s a new restaurant, just outside town, they sell the pink fatty tuna and Kobe beef imported straight from Japan, same day shipping apparently so it’s definitely the freshest we can get here. What do you think?”

“That sounds great,” Hange said.

She had said it in such a tone, a tone she had never used with Levi before. Like she was tasting the food as she spoke of it. Of course she wouldn’t use it on you. You just met her. Levi thought to himself. As he willed himself to get back to his senses, he realized the ticket was still untouched. Although he had been staring at it since a while ago, he hadn’t made any progress at all.

He looked up at Hange then at Zeke. “Apologies for only taking her to a diner. Next time, I’ll make sure to take her somewhere a little…” Rich, expensive, snazzy, exclusive, snobby?  Too many adjectives were running through his head then but Levi settled for something seemingly more professional, or as professional as he could go. “More your tastes.”

“That would be very much appreciated,” Zeke said. He took one of Levi’s hands in his, too suddenly and too forcefully that Levi had to smack his laptop to keep it balanced on his lap. “Thank you again for taking very good care of my Hange here.” He had slipped a hundred dollar bill in between Levi’s hands and maybe he had expected Levi to smile and say ‘thank you.’

And most days, Levi was polite enough to have mustered one but his ears were still ringing, not from hearing the love alarm non stop that day but from those last words Zeke had said.

My Hange.

Hange waved, motioning with her hands to ‘text soon,’ then she turned her back on him.

Levi couldn't’ even get a good view of Hange as she walked away. Soon enough, Zeke had wrapped one arm around her shoulders. From Levi's angle, he couldn’t tell whether Hange had pushed closer to him or Zeke was the one who pulled her closer.

For a second longer, he pondered it. Of course Zeke would pull her closer, that’s his Hange. Of course Hange would move closer to him, she’s his.

Levi looked back at the support ticket, he had opened again.

How to download application. Please help.

He closed his eyes and leaned back on the sofa. He closed all his open tabs before laying his eyes again on the empty draft.

Within seconds, he had closed that tab as well. There were larger issues then than a customer not being able to download an application.

***

Hange had sent books about love in a drive folder and she had emailed it to him. When Levi opened it, he was quick to figure out, they were all self help books

Scott Peck? He could have sworn he had heard that name somewhere and when he opened it, he found the book was hundreds of pages long. He didn’t have the attention span for that.

Maybe I’ll read one or two before bed. He had promised Hange that evening. But he didn’t actually have to read it right?

So instead, Levi googled the summary.

Genuine love is volitional rather than emotional. The person who truly loves does so because of a decision to love. This person has made a commitment to be loving whether or not the loving feeling is present. ...Conversely, it is not only possible but necessary for a loving person to avoid acting on feelings of love.

Levi was quick to close it after that. If that concept of love was real, that would defeat the whole purpose of the love alarm. The last thing he had wanted to do so late at night was invalidate his own brain child.

“Book one for the night. Done,” Levi whispered to himself as he opened the next book on file.

Before you love others, you must learn to love yourself.

“Cliche,” Levi said. But soon after reading it, he turned back to the application on his phone. He turned it on to see an empty blue screen void of hearts. There wouldn’t be hearts, he was alone in his apartment.

He thought back to Hange’s mention of flawed data. He thought back to the alarm that wouldn’t stop ringing. They had been testing it that whole day, there was nothing wrong with the application and the developer in Levi knew there weren't any glaring bugs.

But the testing would continue. He hadn’t completely tested all the scenarios after all. The alarm ringed with Hange but would it have alarmed with anybody else? His five years worth of experience testing the application told him 'no.'

Or maybe he just hadn’t been actively looking for the right people.

Even at night, the gears in his mind managed to turn and soon, he had a plan albeit a vague one. But the first few steps were clear at least. Levi navigated to his play store and typed a few words on the screen. A few minutes later, he was downloading an application with a familiar flame icon on the screen.

He took a deep breath. "This is part of the testing process," he muttered to himself. He was gonna be spending the whole night swiping.

[shadowturtlesstuff]

No secrets...

here is my how you get the girl cressworth. its kinda sad, i wanted to do happy but i cant apparently. the end is happy and i really want to do a part 2 in cresswells pov

The cold buries itself inside me, finding its way past my bones and gathering through me till all my thoughts are of the cold. Distracting me from what I am about to do, and I cannot figure out whether that is a good thing or not. I haven't spoken to the insufferable Mr. Thomas Cresswell for over six months, yet I am walking a familiar route to his door. I still haven't pieced together why I feel the need to see him tonight, instead of the morning but even if he shuts the door on me and leaves me to fend for myself against the rain it might calm my racing mind. He would be right to do so, after I walked away first. We were close, getting closer every day. Thomas had told  me his feelings plenty of times and I had brushed them off till I started to feel them too. I panicked and then made a mess of everything. We are both poor at expressing our feelings yet I had run from the thought of even trying, and now that I have been away I realized how important he is to me, not only as someone I love but as a friend. I miss his quick wit, his charm and dry humour that uncle doesn't think is appropriate half the time. I miss knowing I will see him and see his own smile at me. Knowing I could melt the cold heart of his with just a small comment is something I was proud of, yet began to fear slightly as it was too easy to see that smile. I had learnt that nothing in life is that easy.

I was wrong. Desperately wrong.

Now I haven't seen that smile in so long and I miss it. I miss the person who shares my humour and lets me face any challenge. I just hope he has missed me half as much as I missed him.  

My heels click against the cobblestone, my pace speeding up to match my racing heart. Thomas’s house comes into view as I round a corner and I suck in a sharp breath. Can I really face Thomas again? Tell him that I miss him?      

This is a worthless idea, a ridiculous notion that Thomas would want to talk to me now. I should leave now and get out of the rain before I become seriously ill and bed ridden by my father. The rain has drowned my skirts, my hair clings to my face. This was a fool's errand. I turn trying to swallow my embarrassment and resentment towards myself when I hear a door open. Shit. I refuse to turn and see if it’s Thomas’s and hope that it-

“Audrey Rose?”

Shit. of course luck would abandon me to this. I don't know what I expected to find when I turned back but it was not this. Thomas, my devilishly handsome friend, stands in his doorway eyes completely transfixed on me. We stand staring, the only sound surrounding us is the pouring rain and my own heartbeat which has amplified its sound so all of London can hear my fear. My anticipation, love and heartbreak and guilt. Words flood my mind but none surfice what I need to tell him and I open and close my mouth like a gaping fish. I’m sure the rain is helping reinforce me looking like such a fool. My mind repeats what an idiot I am and I begin to turn to save myself from further embarrassment.

“Come inside?” Thomas's voice fills the whole street, it sounds slightly panicked, as though he doesn't know what to say. I don't blame him. I showed up uninvited at his flat and haven't managed to look like a functioning human yet I debate leaving, even if I want to stay, but just as I make a step to leave I hear a broken please.

Once again we stare at each other, there are so many words between us that I consider that there isn't a right one to start with. Perhaps his ‘please’ is an effective start. It certainly captured my attention. The rawness of the plea makes me nod and walk towards him. I want to believe Thomas has missed me, that I meant something, but if that is the case, he should be more mad at me. So why invite me in? Why bother?    

“I saw you out the window and,” Thomas begins as I stop in front of him and wait in case he changes his mind, “I thought I was crazy at first but when I realized it truly was you I thought I'd save you, just like old times.”  

His tone is bittersweet, I wince because I am the reason it has a bitter-ish undertone laced with a hint of grief.

“Save me?” I look around slightly confused, there is no assailant chasing me, no murderer on my tail as far as I knew so what is he saving me from? My own mind, because in a way he has, or at least might.

“The rain. I know you hate the cold and no one wants to stand in the rain so,” he moves from the door and gestures inside. I look down at my dress, completely full of water and wince again.

“As you might guess, the rain has now used my dress as a sponge so if I enter your flat I will ruin it.” I take a step back, it is coward-ish but I can't ruin anything else for him, even if it is only water damage. It won't be the worst thing I've done to him.

“Wadsworth, just get inside.”

His flat is warm and makes me notice how cold I truly was. Immediately I begin shivering as Thomas gets towels, blankets and anything to warm me up.

We sit across from each other, I'm wrapped in blankets and holding onto a mug of coco for dear life as Thomas sits with one hand on his and the other tapping on his armchair. The silence is not as bad as I expected but it was never awkward silence that Thomas and I shared. Which reminds me of Thomas's previous words.

Just like old times.

Except not like old times at all. I have to say something soon and again there is no right way to start this. Sorry will not suffice or fix it, but it is still necessary. Hopefully it will mean something at least.

“I know this is unexpected and probably unwanted and it has been awhile since we spoke but,” I chance a glance at him and he is staring at his mug with an unreadable expression, I've no idea where I'm going with this speech but if I can get him to at least look at me it will be worth it, “but I've missed you and I've had time to reflect on my mistakes.”

“Wadsworth, I've missed you more than I want to admit. I spent everyday waiting to see if you would come back but now you’re here…”

He trails off, leaving me to guess what he is thinking, which is always difficult, but add my paranoia I can only expect he wants me gone. However, I wait in dreaded silence for him to collect himself and speak his mind.

“You’re here and I've no idea what I want.”

We both consider his words, it seems we are still both atrocious at understanding our feelings.

“I've figured out that I want you in my life in some way, any way, and that I was tired of running, of pretending and hiding. I was afraid, before, of what we were and even if we can never go back to that I- I guess I am not going to conform to my fear anymore.”

“I lost my mind when you were gone. I thought I had somehow pushed too far or interpreted things wrong, perhaps I had, but coming here and saying you missed me doesn't fix everything.”

“I understand the fear, Wadsworth but we were partners, no secrets, remember?”

He finally looks at me and I wish he hadn’t. His dark brown eyes pierce my already fragile heart. “I know.” I whisper, looking at my cup.

Once again I whisper I know. I knew this would only be the start of fixing things and I was grateful he was even letting me try.

“I know, no secrets,” I look at him and brace myself to confess my thoughts, “I am a fool for running, I know that now, but at the time I felt trapped, not because of you but what you represent, in a fashion, change does not come easy, but you made it feel so easy I hadn't realized the change and I had convinced myself long before you nothing was easy or fair. I was the difficult, unfair one, and I will forever be sorry, Cresswell, I would like to make it up to you but I understand if-” I let out a breath and attempt to say, if you don't want me to but I can't. It is selfish but I desperately want to make things right.

“No secrets,” Thomas says, almost to himself as he quickly stands then takes the seat right next to me, taking the coco and setting both mugs down. “You are a little insane Wadsworth,” he says with a hint of a smirk and I let the comment slide just because of that smirk, “We cannot change what has happened or fix it as quickly as we would both like but I've missed you too much to be mad. In the future we should be better at this, both of us. I never told you how petrified I felt either. My adoration of you caught me off guard. I thought I had some disease, much to Dacina’s amusement, and I considered running too but you were, are, intoxicating.” Thomas smiles at me, full of promise that I smile back. He is offering a truce of sorts through his own truth and I can't help but imagine Thomas trying to explain his feelings to his sister.

“No secrets, no running.” I offer back and he nods, taking my hand in his and absentmindedly making shapes as we sit in silence. Just like old times.

Except I ruin it with my shivers. I was so focused on Thomas I forgot I was still damp and cold.

“You know, skin to skin contact is the most efficient way of warming up, I wouldn't want you catching hypothermia when there is a simple solution.” he says, smirking fully and I roll my eyes despite my huge smile. There is the Cresswell I fell in love with.

“Scoundrel.” I remove my hand from his and place it under the blankets and nestle further back.

“I am indeed, but also a gentleman. You’re staying here till it's stopped raining. You can have my bed if you want, or the sofa. I can find some fresh clothes and dry your dress as much as possible.”

Thomas leaves the room too fast for me to formulate a sentence so I sit and mull over what has happened. It will not be like before, we have those elements but mixed with something new. I expected to fear that, but found myself excited instead. Thomas returns with a pile of clothes and sets them by me but i make no move to get them. I have only just gained some warmth and even though sitting in wet-ish clothes will be worse, I can't make myself move.

“Can you sit with me please? For a bit, then you can use your bed. I've imposed too much so the sofa is fine, thank you.” I watched him sit back in his chair and smile slightly. I missed all his little mannerisms, how he immediately sets his arm out ready to tap if he needs to. How his hair flicks down. I decide I much prefer his messy hair than neat. There is a softness to his features now that wasn't there when I first saw him tonight. He also looks tired and I consider that I should have picked a better time. Thomas is too kind to comment on that fact.

“You are not imposing Wadsworth. I will happily sit with you all night if you wish and thank you for coming. Albeit the timing is bad, you could have waited for better weather to prevent any illness but- I'm glad you came. I wanted to see you but I thought I was a coward and didn't want to face you if you didn't want to see me.”

His words hit me like a knife in the gut. We were both afraid, both controlled by our own insecurities that we both nearly never got to this stage. It is laughable at how ironic it was. Thomas and I were both convinced the other would not want to see us.

“You are right, we do need to be better,” I say and he looks over at me, “tomorrow, weather permitted, would you like to go to breakfast with me?”

“I'll make breakfast and if weather permits I'd be delighted to go to lunch with you.” Thomas tries to stifle a yawn and I ignore the tug of uneasiness that is screaming. This is too easy. Instead I lean my head back and revel in it, commit Thomas's adorable yawn to memory and agree to tomorrow's plans.

“You should go to bed Cresswell, we seem to have a long day planned tomorrow and i need to get out of my wet clothes.”

“Do I need to reiterate my method of warmth?” He asks.

“Need I reiterate what a scoundrel you are?”

“Yes, I enjoy your slight blush when you say it.”

“Goodnight Thomas.”

He stands and I watch him stretch slightly, walk so that he is facing me. Then he reaches and presses a kiss to my temple. “Goodnight Audrey Rose.”

The kiss lingers, a phantom touch that stays with me all night. Warms me enough to hold onto the hope that Thomas and I will be okay. Our spark will reignite just as, if not more, intensely than before.

@fangirling-again @kittycat2187 @goatahoan @city-of-fae @the-hoofflepooff @ink-insomnia @purplecreatorhorsewagon @boredbookwormgirl @goddess-of-writing-wars @lovecakeandmore @yikesitsmaddie @loveyatopluto @bookscressworth @androgynousdeputylawyershoe @fandomtakeover @throneoftsc

[thetriggeredhappy]

How about the team agreeing to play baseball with Scout for his birthday? Because they always admired how happy and free he looks when he's running. (SniperScout in between if possible would be great)

pushed up in the requests backlog for reasons. team bonding fic is best fic

(warnings for alcohol mention and passing non-graphic cartoonish violence)

-

“The hell is he so excited about?” Demo asked, raising an eyebrow and glancing over his shoulder towards where Scout was laughing his way down the hall.

“No idea,” the Engineer said, shuffling the deck neatly. “Been all high-energy high-spirits the whole damn day.”

“Unfortunately,” Medic agreed, a little bitter. That garnered several more raised eyebrows from around the table.

“Twice in one day Doktor has to fix broken leg in fighting,” Heavy explained, placing a placating hand on Medic’s shoulder. “And Scout takes many bad risks. Overconfident.”

A questioning noise from within Pyro’s suit. “I’d sure like to know why, as well,” Engie nodded. “Tryin’ out some new energy drink, maybe?”

“High spirits and hubris from consistent victory?” Soldier suggested.

“You’re joking,” Sniper suddenly cut in, glancing around the table, who all looked right back, surprised to hear him cutting in on the usual gossip. “...You lot really didn’t remember?”

A snort from Spy, a vague shrug from the rest of the table.

“It’s his birthday tomorrow.”

A pause, then noises of surprise, shock, and from some of the table, alarm. “A repeat of last year, how very unfortunate,” Spy hummed, taking a sip of his drink.

Pyro shouted something with no small amount of conviction that might have been along the lines of “this is terrible!”. Demo seemed to agree, from the shock on his face, the widening of his eye.

“Oh no,” Heavy rumbled, looking legitimately worried. Medic’s eyebrows were furrowed.

“I can’t believe you,” Sniper deadpanned, glaring at all the other mercenaries sitting there. “First year, you don’t bother wishing him a happy birthday. Second year, he plans a whole damn party for himself so you lot wouldn’t forget again and half of you don’t plan ahead and we get scheduled out on a mission and leave the bugger all alone all weekend. And you promise you won’t forget again. And one year later, here we are.”

Pyro appeared to be in a state of panic, pacing at high speed behind their chair, tugging at various points of their suit in high agitation. The Engineer’s face was largely hidden behind the hardhat and goggles and the hand clamped over the bottom part of his face.

“Perhaps he won’t be upset,” Medic suggested. “We all simply wish him a happy birthday and have drinks.”

“We do that every other weekend,” Demo pointed out. Soldier murmured in the affirmative.

“Sniper has remembered,” Heavy noted, looking at the man in question. “Maybe team helps with plans?”

“I already got him a gift,” Sniper mumbled, fidgeting with his hat. “But I don’t think we’ll manage to pass it off as from the whole team.”

“He’s gonna be so disappointed if he finds out that we forgot again,” Engie sighed, head in his hands. “It’ll break his damn heart.”

“So once again, it seems that I’ll need to step in and save you all,” Spy drawled, putting his glass down and reaching into his jacket, pulling out and unfolding a sheet of paper. “With your collective track record regarding this specific event, I assumed you would all forget again, and so took some steps to ensure that there would be a backup plan when the event arises and we wouldn’t need to deal with moodiness and general malaise from the team for the next several weeks.”

The Engineer took the paper, holding it so Medic could read it at the same time as him, Heavy leaning to try and get a look. Eyebrows began to rise. The paper was passed around the remainder of the table.

“You think this’ll work?” Demo asked suspiciously.

“Obviously. Well, and to be fair, you don’t exactly have any other options.”

He had them there.

-

“—Just totally can’t believe you talked Miss P into lettin’ us do this that’s just the coolest shit in the world lemme tell ya, like seriously that’s completely nuts and I can’t even believe it, she’s the best—!“

Scout had only stopped talking long enough to breathe over the course of the entire walk from the base to the makeshift baseball pitch that the Engineer had propped up overnight, absolutely bubbling and more high-energy than any of them had assumed to even be possible—even for him. And most of them had anticipated already hating the idea by the time they got to the pitch, but so far things were actually going rather well. The uniforms that had been shipped in (in their team colors, obviously) all fit them correctly and weren’t nearly as embarrassing as expected, in particular since most of them opted to keep at least one part of their usual wardrobe in the mix, such as masks or helmets or hats. Pyro, for one, just put the baseball uniform on over their entire flamesuit, but nobody was particularly surprised.

They crested the little ridge and got a look at the pitch, and for a moment, Scout went silent, eyes wide and mouth agape. Demo elbowed the Engineer to get his attention and flashed a thumbs up, making him grin and fluster a bit, mumbling about how it was nothin’ special, really.

“Alright,” Scout finally said, turning to them with his hands on his hips, taking on an authoritative tone. “So who here knows how baseball works?”

The Engineer and Soldier raised their hands. After a moment, Sniper and Pyro tentatively did the same. Demo made a so-so motion with one hand.

“And who knows how sandlot baseball works?”

Everyone but the Engineer dropped their hands, and even then, he looked a little doubtful.

“Alright,” Scout said, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “So we don’t exactly got enough people to make a real team—need twelve for a standard six-players-a-team. So we’re gonna be improvising a little bit.”

He looked around, and started addressing each of them with a pointed finger.

“Heavy,” he said, and the giant raised an eyebrow. “You’re catcher, all you gotta do is stay behind first base and catch the ball so it doesn’t roll away. I know you’re not gonna flinch when you see somethin’ speeding at your head, yeah?”

Heavy nodded thoughtfully.

“Cyclops, first base,” Scout said next. “Fucks with your blind spot the least, and you know how to throw shit. Mumbles, you’re on second, Helmet-Head on third.”

Demo flashed a thumbs-up, Pyro clapped their hands together, and Soldier raised an arm in a sturdy salute.

“Doc, right field. Odds are, none of these chuckleheads are gonna hit anything too far to the left or right of normal, but if they do, you’re like practically as fast as I am and can handle it. Spy, you hang out back there in left field. I know you’re probably not gonna catch shit if it comes at you, but hey, it’s worth a shot and you won’t gotta deal with much anyways.”

Medic nodded at the compliment and Spy raised an eyebrow at the insult.

“And Snipes, you’re the pitcher,” Scout concluded, hands returning to his hips.

There was a snort from Demo. Sniper elbowed him.

“Figured you know how to throw shit and won’t straight up brain anyone,” Scout continued, not noticing the squabble. “And I’ll be first up to bat, and we’ll cycle through everyone in that same order, starting as soon as you guys can stop me from running all the bases, then we’ll play normally from there, how’s that sound?”

“You’re sure talkin’ yourself a big game there, son,” the Engineer observed, eyebrows raised.

“Damn right, I’ve been playin’ this shit since I was three,” Scout said, grinning wide. “This is gonna kick ass.”

-

Indeed, the first eight pitches went by in pretty rapid succession. Two because they fumbled and hesitated and miscommunicated in their pitching and couldn’t beat him to the bases, two after that as Scout scored home runs, another general fumble, another home run, one where the ball landed a few feet away from Spy who outright didn’t attempt to catch it, only kicking it closer to Medic as he rushed up to get it, and then one where Scout didn’t notice until he was back at home base that Soldier had unintentionally thrown the ball directly into the side of Pyro’s head (who was distracted by drawing shapes into the dirt at their feet).

They just barely managed to get him out on third, and then it was Demo’s turn.

Overall, by the first circuit through the whole team, they were surprised to find that they were actually having fun, even and especially with the odd shenanigans that ensued during the course of the game. There was one point where Soldier full-body tackled Demo at first base (just slightly confused about a few of the contact rules), and another where Sniper thought it would be funny to throw a hard ball of clay from at his feet, sending the team laughing as it exploded all over Pyro’s suit and they needed to stop to wipe the lenses on their mask clear. Demo surprised all of them with the first bunt of the game, and the Engineer with sending the ball soaring nearly into a homerun, with him sheepishly asking if using the Gunslinger to swing was allowed after he’d already run the bases. Then there was Pyro calmly stealing their way to third after the team thought their turn was over, and Heavy accidentally cracking the bat, and Medic absolutely eating shit as he tried to take off towards first. And nobody for sure knew how to react to the one time that Spy actually caught the ball, all but diving to catch it and send it to second just in time to get Soldier out. And of course, all of them were left just slightly in awe as Scout sent home run after home run sailing towards the stratosphere.

They finally had to stop when it was getting dark and Heavy informed them that they didn’t have any more baseballs left in the bucket for all the ones sent sailing far foul or off into the distance with a homerun. Soldier and Demo promised to go pick them up the following day and they all began their trudge back to base, covered in the bright orange loam of the desert and already slightly sore and feeling like they were in much higher spirits than any of them had expected. Scout, most of all, seemed... contented. Not just cheerful, not just bubbly, but contented, satisfied. Happy. He seemed so very happy.

Several of them, glancing around between themselves, considered telling Scout the truth, that they hadn’t put in nearly as much work as he thought they did. But most of them just settled in for saying happy birthday a few more times over assorted bottles of booze and maybe even a movie.

Sniper, for one, was a little fidgety on the way back to base. Halfway there, he took Scout by the shoulder, pulling him to slow down just a bit.

“Had, er,” Sniper said once they were a good few meters trailed behind the team, eyes averted. “Heavy said we were out, but. Had, er. Had one ball left.”

He pulled the baseball in question out of his pocket, unfolded it from the handkerchief it was in, passed it over, a little sheepish. Scout took it, confused, turning it over in his hands.

He stopped dead in his tracks. The rest of the team slowed and turned as they realized two of their party weren’t with them. Scout’s mouth was agape.

“Ohmygod ohmygod ohmygod ohmyGOD—“ Scout babbled suddenly, eyes widening, practically starting to vibrate in place. “—is this a real actual serious legitimate gen-u-ine real signature? Snipes please tell me you’re not fuckin’ around right now ohmyGOD.”

“Nah, yeah, from the actual bloke,” Sniper agreed, scratching at the back of his neck awkwardly. “Yats-rem-key, something like?”

“Only just jersey number eight, left fielder for the Boston Red Sox, five-time All-Star four-time Gold Glove winner and three-time batting champion, Triple Crown winner and overall MVP in the entire American Major League of baseball, Carl Michael motherfuckin’ Yastrzemski!”

Sniper faltered under the sudden weight of the entirety of Scout as he was all but tackled in a hug, Scout continuing to babble excitedly on about the man whose signature was on the baseball in his hands. There was a general chuckle and rolling of eyes from the team as they watched the scene unfold.

“And we’re sure Sniper’s not the catcher, then?” Demo asked lightly, and with Sniper not there to elbow him, the Engineer took his place, making Demo snicker.

“If you would please cease embarrassing yourselves,” Spy called over after giving them a solid minute, which made Scout look up and apparently notice the entire team looking at them, flushing red and promptly trying to pretend he didn’t just do all that. “I believe that Heavy has prepared some kind of cake and I for one would rather not eat it after Pyro has covered it in candles and torched them all.”

Indeed, Pyro by then had a good head start on the team, who all hurried to catch up. And they all bumbled their way through at least five nationalities’ rendition of a Happy Birthday Song, and each very nearly got through their slice before the first scrap of the night began and the rest of it was lost in the mayhem, and overall, Scout would remark the next day through the haze of his hangover that actually, that was easily one of his favorite birthdays in a long time.

[dukeofonions]

I already sent this ask to youtuberswithalex, but I wanted to see if you had something to say too. Also it just feels like you’d get it. It’s an onion. A painfully big, smelly one.

Seriously, I’m starting to wonder how much of the series is even truly planned out. Thomas says that it’s all-so-carefully meticulously planned throughout season 3, but he just keeps putting off solving the biggest non-surface-level issues and adding more drama each episode. Plot thread on top of plot thread keeps getting thrown onto the mix, and it doesn’t seem like there’ll be any time to properly resolve them all in only one season. It’s almost as if each new one is meant to distract you from the unresolved ones.

And then it comes out that the writers are literally getting huge plot threads and the story written for them by fans rich enough to have the Patreon?! Even though they said it wouldn’t happen that way?!

I just... don’t know how much I can trust them with their story anymore. I want the characters to have fully resolved, satisfying, complete arcs and become a better family, but all I’m seeing is more examples of Thomas and the team creating more drama and brushing unresolved issues under the rug.

Heck, does anyone remember that there seemed to be a plot thread building up where Logan and Roman seemed jealous of Patton in the earlier episodes? Where did that go? It’s like it was just forgotten about once more causes for drama were thrown on top of it.

And are we ever gonna know why Virgil was also mad at Patton during the first Asides episode? Or was it just another pointless piling of drama, and they’re hoping that some fan theory will write the story for them so they can brush it under the rug and move on with the Janus plot?

And what happened to Virgil becoming, honestly, kind of a bully to Roman after his acceptance vids? He was never confronted about his moments of unnecessary cruelty. But suddenly in FWSA none of it ever happened? Did... did Thomas even understand that the way Virgil was treating Roman, with the uncalled-for mocking and attacks in moments of vulnerability, was wrong? Or did he think Virgil was just being a cool emo character? Roman seemed to react with discomfort... but it seems like the team decided to pretend that it was somehow fixed offscreen for FWSA. Like they expect another fan theory to explain the drop in tension between the two. Which is just... lazy.

I just don’t know if I trust them with their story anymore... I want to believe it’ll be okay, because I love the characters, but I’m starting to feel like I need to look to some random Patreon fans to wrap up the story properly.

Alright lets peel this onion open... 

I agree about questioning how much planning they’ve actually done for the series. With every live stream, I attended I always hear about how so many things were just added in at the last second. I’ve also heard that they know where they want the series to go, and while I do believe this it feels like they’re not entirely sure how to get to those points and that’s why everything is so confusing. Not only that but Asides has shown up and completely thrown a wrench into things because now they’re taking priority over the main series. Why do we have to have these Asides before the season finale? They said they had a plan but now they’re throwing in all these extra unnecessary plots when the main issues presented in season two haven’t been resolved yet. Slow down and pace yourselves people! 

As for the writer’s room I’m still iffy about that. I’m in the tier that gets you the writing room and from what I’ve seen so far it really doesn’t seem like a good idea because yes, they are taking ideas for the episodes from the fans. Yet there’s no guarantee that anyone will be properly credited for the ideas they contributed. And of course they’re being paid to help write their scripts but I’m not gonna go into that right now. 

I’m really worried about the characters too. I’m afraid Roman’s arc is just going to revolve around everyone else instead of just dealing with him personally. (I swear if Remus suddenly gets accepted I’m gonna scream) already Janus’ development is being rushed through and I’m worried the pay off just won’t be satisfying. Even Virgil revealing himself as a “dark side” just seems empty when you think about it and I’m starting to wonder why it needed to be a thing in the first place. Thomas is warming up to Janus pretty fast and even Remus isn’t as big of an issue, so why is Virgil suddenly admitting to be something that was actually pretty obvious be so shocking to Thomas? Like, there aren’t actually any dark sides! Roman made the name up! I’m gonna move on before I go into a rant but yeah the current character development is very wonky. 

I don’t remember any plot thread of Logan and Roman being jealous of Patton. Probably because I wasn’t really invested in the earlier episodes but I think they weren’t being jealous as much as they were just dismissing Patton as the “goofy dad character” and had to learn that it wasn’t the case (as we see in Growing Up) I don’t think it was really them being jealous but hey I haven’t watched season one in awhile so what do I know?

As for Virgil being angry at Patton in Asides, I assume it’s just carried over from the whole “Virgil doesn’t like being babied by Patton” plot but that entire plotline is kind of a mess and Virgil is just coming across as unnecessarily mean to Patton but I’m going to get into that in a future post. 

Yes I am waiting desperately for the series to finally call out Virgil’s behavior because literally he’s been insufferable lately. I wouldn’t have a problem with this if the series did literally anything to show him in a negative light but he is always having excuses made for him and he is never blamed for anything. And again this just brings up more issues with Asides because in FWSA it’s like they all just forgot the events of POF happened? Roman is suddenly chill with Thomas and I guess Virgil isn’t ashamed of his “dark past” anymore. I honestly don’t know if Thomas (real Thomas) recognizes Virgil’s behavior as bad seeing as Virgil is beloved by all. But I seriously hope he does and is planning to finally have Virgil be put in check later because my gosh I am sick of seeing this character act like a piece of shit and having it justified because “well he’s a good guy now” or “but we have to be nice or else he could do something worse to us” yeah definitely no red flags there.

I understand all of your concerns, but really all we can do is wait and see. Honestly, I don’t know how much influence the patreon writers (that sounds so weird) will actually have on the main story. All we can do is wait and see. 

[angelz-dust]

masters of none - part 3 (jason todd x reader)

summary: i wanted to give you guys a more jason focused chapter. i plan on doing more of these where the reader isn’t as heavily included or not even included at all. hopefully the jason chapter i do will be better because i feel like the quality of my writing dipped a little on this one fhjghdk the next part will be back in reader’s head i promise. anyway i hope you guys still enjoy. this chapter is a little more dangerous, so prepare yourself.

word count: 6k

warnings: illegal activities (street racing, running from the cops, gunfire). food and drink (non alcoholic). smoking.

part 1 /// part 2 /// part 4

rascal (superstar)

money, cash, clothes, fast cars

...

jason felt the cool nighttime air beating back against him, the rumble of his engine being the only thing he could hear as he rode his motorcycle down the quiet road in robbinsville. he felt naked being out and about at night in his civilian clothing but it was necessary for the task at hand. 

"exactly what does bruce want me to do?" jason asked barbara through their comm link.

"he wants you to report back with any intel you can get," barbara explained, the sound of her furious typing picking up in his ear. "my father thinks southside may be up to something. after that blow up between them and the penguin's guys, they've both been quiet. bruce just wants to make sure nothing's brewing under our noses."

"this is such a cop mission," jason complained as made a turn. "below my caliber, if i'm being honest."

"well, you'll have the races to keep you entertained," she reminded him. "i'll be on the line if you need me."

the races were the only reason jason had agreed to take on the little spy mission in the first place. sure, street racing was very illegal but it was also very entertaining. barbara was correct on that end. he just hoped it wouldn't be a complete waste of his time and he'd actually get some information out of the whole thing. he had to admit that it was a tolerable change of pace from the monotony that was patrolling crime alley. jason had passed the baton to cass for the night. she was the only person he trusted to do a good job. he refused to let just anyone take over his patrol route. things were different in crime alley. it required a... gentler touch that only he could provide and that he felt cass had an understanding of. one of the things he promised himself he'd do with his undeserved second chance at life was to protect the people who needed it most. it didn't matter how monotonous patrol became, or how tired he felt, or how how hard things got. he'd protect them all until his body didn't let him anymore.

jason could see his destination, the abandoned industrial park, in the distance. there were several cars parked all throughout it with people congregating around them. from what he could see, everything seemed calm. the closer he got, the better he could hear the loud music playing from the cars. he slowly pulled up, getting some looks from the people he passed by on his way to park it. coming here alone may have been a bad idea. he should've dragged dick along with him. it would've made blending in easier. he dismounted his bike, propping it up on the kickstand and pulling his helmet off his head. as he casually fixed his hair, he did a quick scan of the area. there were several groups of people scattered around while the road was being prepared for the race. 

he saw a group of rowdy socialites a bit overdressed for a street race. he could use them as cover but the last thing he wanted to do was willingly be around the likes of them. there was one small group tucked away, standing around an electric blue sports car. their eyes were shifty and he could see they were trying to keep their voices down, even when they were far away from everyone else. he'd have to keep an eye on them. jason's eyes fell on the group of people counting money, presumably the betting pot. placing one would be a good way of blending in organically. he had made sure to grab some money from the emergency stash when he left the manor for this very reason. he stuffed his hands into the pockets of his black leather jacket, making his way over to the crowded area.

"we're short by a thousand," a woman, the bookkeeper, announced.

"pitch in," a man said, elbowing another guy.

quinton kelly, jason thought to himself, recognizing the rapper that stephanie and duke liked so much. 

"i don't have a fucking band on me," quinton laughed in response, pulling out his wallet. "i can put down three."

"i'll match that," another man spoke up, a cigarette in his mouth. if memory served, which jason liked to think it did, that was tyler ronan. 

"who else has money burning a hole in their pocket?" the bookkeeper shouted out, making the group laugh. 

"come on, superstar. donate to the cause," the man from earlier spoke up, bothering someone else now.

"hell no," an oddly familiar female voice said. jason's eyes searched for the source. "are you insane?"

surprise flashed across his face when he realized who the voice belonged to. it was you. y/n l/n. the girl from the gala. his bard. he felt an odd sensation building in his stomach. he had convinced himself he was never going to see you again yet here you were. your presence made sense. quinton and tyler were members of cloud 9, just like you were. he wasn’t sure if he was happy to see you or if he was glad he could use you as cover. he could just follow you around and no one would question it. this was him banking on the assumption that you'd actually want to speak to him. he was hoping that he made a good impression on you at the gala. your interaction was short, but memorable. at least it was to him. staring at you like a deer in headlights wasn't going to get him anywhere, so he spoke up.

"i can put down four," he said, emerging from the back of the group. he felt all the eyes on him and he could hear the whispers. he ignored them all, his attention fully on the bookkeeper. the surprised look on her face led him to believe that she recognized him, too.

"well, i'm not going to turn down old money," she joked, getting some laughs. "what's your name? there's so many of you wayne kids, i can't keep track."

jason chuckled, nodding in understanding. even he lost track sometimes. "jason."

"okay, mr. jason wayne," she said, taking his name down. 

"it's todd," you said, catching him off guard. his eyes met yours, a small smile appearing on his lips. 

"oh, excuse me," she laughed, correcting herself. "mr. jason todd."

"i'm racking up the celebrity bets tonight," the man, who jason now deducted was the driver, grinned. 

"yeah, so don't embarrass us by losing," the bookkeeper said seriously, counting up the money. 

"alright! let's get this shit started!" someone yelled, everyone cheering loudly and moving in towards the finish line.

you, tyler, and quinton were walking over as a group, but jason noticed you were trailing behind. he couldn't help but think in the back of his mind that you had slowed your stride for him. he made his way over to you, being greeted by your sweet smile.

“hi jason,” you said softly, keeping your voice low. “i didn’t think i’d see you here tonight.”

“i could say the same about you,” jason couldn’t help but wonder what it was you were doing a street race. yes, there were other celebrities there but he didn’t peg you as the type to hang out with gang members. but then again, this was gotham. “can’t say i’m disappointed to see you, though.”

your smile grew, your eyes crinkling a little. “well, the feeling is mutual. it’s nice to see you, too.”

what he said was the truth. it wasn't something he said to try and butter you up, although that may have influenced his decision to tell you how he felt. he really did enjoy your company, both as red hood and as jason. he wasn’t particularly looking forward to his mission but now he was glad he accepted. 

"hey," you called out, sticking your foot out and kicking quinton in the butt with the tip of your shoe. quinton turned around and gave jason a look. after a moment, he held his hand out to him. 

"what's up, man?" he greeted jason, dapping him up, tyler doing the same. "you hanging with us tonight?"

"yes, he is," you answered for him, making jason grin. 

he was glad you were eager to keep him around. now he didn't have to try and convince you or insert himself awkwardly. "can you spot me?" jason asked, gesturing towards tyler's cigarette.

"sure thing," tyler nodded, holding the carton out for him. jason plucked one out of the box, quickly lighting it and taking a long drag. 

while the three of you talked, jason took the opportunity to try and listen in on the other conversations happening around him. it was like he was playing with a radio, tuning in and out of conversations as he saw fit. none of them were interesting or helpful, though. they were pretty boring and mostly topical, pertaining to the race, the cars, and just other mindless bullshit.

"yeah, we're gonna drop the stuff off at the docks after the race. mix it in with the bite bottles," he heard someone say. 

bingo. he didn't know what the stuff was but he assumed it was nothing good, especially if it was being hidden with something as harmless as track bite. he'd have to look into that later. it was safe to assume they were referring to were the docks off of cape carmine, not too far from the current location. jason lightly pressed on his comm link, glancing around before speaking quietly. 

"i think something might go down at the docks later tonight," he said, hearing barbara's shuffling.

"cape carmine?" 

"i would assume so. they were talking about hiding some shit with track bite bottles."

"knowing them it could be something as simple as drugs or complex as new tech. just keep me posted."

jason was pulled out of his thoughts when he heard the low rumble of car engines. the first car was candy apple red 240sx, souped up beyond comprehension. the other was as glossy black gtr, more subtle in presentation. as he admired the cars rolling by, he realized something. he turned his head towards you, clearing his throat.

"which car did i bet on?" he asked you quietly, getting a confused smile from you. 

"the red one," you said through a little laugh. "did you seriously bet without knowing?"

"perhaps," jason shrugged, feigning nonchalance. 

"idiot," you shook your head, making him laugh now. 

"well, your friends knew. i trust their judgement."

"as you should," quinton said, catching the tail end of the conversation between you both. "our boy spider knows what he's doing."

you and jason looked out at the road again, watching as it was prepped with track bite and then lit on fire with propane. jason glanced over at you, noticing you were struggling to see behind your very tall friends and the other people in the way. he gently tapped your arm, non verbally offering you a spot in front of him. you accepted with a smile, working your way in front of him.

"don't get any ashes in my hair," you playfully told him. he went to do just that, pretending to tap off the excess from his cigarette on your head, purposefully missing so you could see the ashes fall down in front of you. you gasped, moving back, his firm abdomen pressed against you. with your head against his chest, you looked up at him and glared.

"okay, okay, i'm sorry," jason laughed, sticking the cigarette back in his mouth. "you made it too easy."

"you're such an ass," you rolled your eyes, turning back around and moving out of his personal space bubble. jason's shit eating grin never left his face as he took another drag, making sure to keep the smoke and ashes as far from you as he could. the flagger for the race walked out as the cars pulled up to the starting line. with the street prepped and the cameras set up, the main race was finally going to begin. 

"gigante wants us to head out early, so we need to leave after this." 

these idiots just loved talking about sensitive information out loud, didn't they? it made jason’s job a whole lot easier so he couldn't complain. it was too bad that he'd have to leave early for the lead, though. he was just starting to get comfortable around you again. it seemed to be a running theme with the two of you.

the cars flashed their high beams, the flagger waiting a moment before giving the signal. as soon as he did, the drivers pressed down on the gas, their tires screeching against the concrete. spider's car popped a wheelie before speeding down the street, the black gtr not far behind. the 240sx was swerving, which would normally be alarming with an inexperienced driver behind the wheel. thankfully, the gtr stayed straight. despite spider’s sloppy swerving, the two cars were still neck and neck. it wasn't long before they zoomed past the crowd, eventually slowing down at the end of the road. it happened so quickly but it looked like spider had just barely passed the finish line before the gtr. 

"review the fucking footage!" someone from the other side shouted. 

there was a lot of money riding on the race, so naturally tensions were high. jason could hear arguments as two people went to go grab the cameras so they could look over the recordings. aside from the arguing, it was very quiet while everyone waited for the results.

"it's the 240!" they announced, looking at the footage on a tablet. there was a mix of cheers and objections. people were demanding to see the footage themselves but it was clear that the ruling was accurate and final. just as the two bookkeepers made the money exchange, accepting the results of the race.

"see, y/n? your boy was right to trust us," quinton grinned, patting jason's back, who grinned back. “easy money. not that you needed it.”

"i'll go grab our cuts?" tyler questioned, looking between quinton and jason, who agreed. "alright, i'll be back."

jason's eyes were glued on the two men he was eavesdropping on earlier. they were headed over to the same area tyler was going, presumably to get their cut of the money. there was a huge crowd of people, so it would probably take awhile. during jason’s observation, quinton had walked off to talk to someone else, leaving you with him. he probably had a few more minutes before he’d have to go back to being red hood, so he wanted to make the most of it. 

“so, you come to these things often?” jason asked, his curiosity getting the better of him. he wasn’t sure if you’d give him the answer he was looking for but it was worth a shot.

“not really. i got dragged here,” you shrugged, getting a nod from him. he was slightly relieved, hoping that meant you weren’t heavily involved with the people there. it would be convenient to get information from you but he didn’t want to spend the little time he had left interrogating you. “what about you?”

“i’ve been to a few,” he admitted, looking back at his two targets. they were still waiting around with tyler. his attention quickly went back to you. “how’s your wife?”

your brows furrowed briefly before your eyes widened. “oh, misha. she’s my ex-wife now, technically.”

“my deepest condolences,” jason joked. “does that make me a home wrecker after all?”

you hummed, looking up at the night sky as you thought it over. “no, i don’t think so. you’re more than welcome to be my back up plan, though.”

a hearty laugh came from jason, making his chest tingle. that was probably the douchiest thing he had ever said to someone. he was lucky you hadn’t slapped him or threw your drink in his face for being so bold that night. jason looked over at the group again, noticing that tyler was in the middle of getting the money, his two targets right behind him. he frowned a little, realizing that he’d have to excuse himself. just as he was about to, he heard some yelling in the distance. you both looked around, trying to figure out where it was coming from. 

before jason could even find the source of the commotion, he heard the sound of police sirens and the red and blue lights that naturally accompanied it. the crowd quickly reacted, stampeding away and back towards the parking area. people were yelling and cursing but loud screams replaced it all when gunshots rung out. jason immediately reached out to you, pulling you into his body while he searched for a way out. 

"come on!" jason shouted, grabbing your arm and starting to drag you away. he needed to get you both out of there as soon as possible.

"wait!" you gasped, looking around for your friends. jason could tell you were panicking as you tried to find them, but there was no time. not while the gunshots got louder and more frequent. "tyler! quinton!"

"we have to go, y/n! come on!" he firmly grabbed your hand and pulled, you reluctantly running off with him. he looked around for his bike, pushing through people as he worked his way over.

"god, you're parked in fucking guam!" you complained about the distance, trying to keep up with him. 

"less talking, more running!"

you both made it to the bike, him put on his helmet and passing you yours. as you both mounted the bike, he felt your arms wrap tightly around his midsection and your cheek press into his back. "hold on tight, alright?" he said before speeding off, slipping expertly through the parked cars and people in his way.

as he rode his bike through the park, there were several cars with the same idea, all evacuating the area by going out the same way. too impatient to wait, he began weaving through the cars. it didn't take long for the huge group to get to the main streets where more cops were waiting for them. many of the cars began making wild turns off road and going in the opposite direction but jason had other plans. he picked up speed, heading straight for the forming blockade.

"you're heading straight for the cops!" you yelled, tightening your grip around him. 

"keen observation!" 

"maybe you should turn around?"

"nah, i'm good!" jason told you, cockiness lacing his words. he knew what he was doing. "you trust me, right?"

"i don’t even know you!" you said back, peeking over his shoulder before hiding your face in his back as he continued approaching the cars at a violent speed. jason easily slipped through the cop cars, making it through before the road was blocked off. 

jason smirked, making a sharp turn down the curving street. he was about to say something smug when he heard the sirens getting closer. he glanced at his mirror, seeing one of the cars trailing him. shit.

"shit."

"jason!"

"i know!" 

his grip on the handle bars tightened as he sped up, trying to find a way to lose the cop without putting you in danger. if it was just him, he'd do some more risky maneuvers but he really didn't want you flying off the back of his bike. he'd have to lose them in a safer way. 

"pull over your vehicle! this is your only warning!" the officer said through the speaker of the car.

jason really didn't want to take you through crime alley or the bowery, so his best bet was driving towards blüdhaven. it was better than finding a way to turn around in order to stay in gotham and blüdhaven was much closer, anyway. hopefully he'd lose the cop after crossing city lines. he really didn't want to circumnavigate the planet to get away from one cop.

he had an idea. a stupid idea, but an idea nonetheless. he was getting dangerously close to traffic and as long as you stayed tightly wrapped around him, he could slip through and cross the bridge to blüdhaven, losing the cop in the process. would you like it? probably not, but he was running out of options. 

"jason, what are you doing?" you asked frantically, the bright city lights getting closer and closer.

"something stupid," he sped up, trying to put more distance between him and the cop. "do not move a muscle."

"stop the vehicle! now!" the cop yelled through the speaker again. 

jason could smell the burning rubber of his tires as he turned down the street, the sound of horns honking as he slipped through traffic, the cop still hot on his tail. he slowed down a little in order to make accurate and much safer movements as traffic got denser, giving him more cars to avoid. he glanced at the mirror again, seeing he had made a some good distance. if he could keep it up, he'd lose the cop in no time. the bridge to blüdhaven wasn't much farther. 

"jason, look out!" you yelled, pointing to the oncoming sixteen wheeler about to cut both of you off. there was a reason you weren't supposed to run red lights. 

he had two options: come to a screeching halt, turning the both of you into projectiles or keep pushing and pray to god that you both didn't get t-boned by the s.t.a.r labs semi. jason furrowed his brows and set his jaw speeding up as much as he could. he could hear the loud horn ringing in his ears but he kept laser focus on his intended destination. he zipped past the truck, just barely going fast enough to not get hit. in the driver's attempt to not hit you two, he stopped in the middle of the street, preventing the cop from being able to follow anymore. jason's heart was hammering in his chest as he rode down the bridge down to blüdhaven, the warm yellow streetlights illuminating the way. once he crossed over, he headed to a nearby diner. he parked in the back lot, not wanting to draw too much attention.

"hey, are you alright?" he asked, taking off his helmet and getting off the bike. he hung it from the handlebar, helping you dismount. he hesitantly moved his hands towards your face, unclipping your helmet and pulling it off your head. "y/n? talk to me. are you hurt?"

"n-no, i'm fine," you told him shakily. seeing you all shaken up made him feel terrible. he wasn't sure how to comfort you without overstepping boundaries, so he kept his distance, giving you time to recover. after you collected yourself, jason flinched at your sudden physical attacks.

"i can't believe you!" you yelled, abusing his chest with smacks and punches. "you almost got us killed!"

"i-i'm sorry!" he sputtered, grabbing your wrists to stop you from hitting him. "i didn't know what else to do!"

you looked at him, a hard expression on your face. god, you probably hated him and he couldn’t blame you. leave it to him to fuck some shit up. his self deprecating thoughts began to subside when he saw the smile of disbelief forming on your face. "jason todd, you are a fucking maniac."

he loosened his grip on your wrists, a smile slowly making its way to his face, mirroring yours. "i've been called worse."

"just another fucking day in gotham," you groaned, dragging your hands down your face. "or blüdhaven, i guess."

"yeah, sorry about that," he apologized with a frown. "that bastard was persistent."

"don't worry about it," you reassured him, letting out a deep sigh. "i need to call my friends and make sure they're alright."

jason nodded, grabbing his own phone. "yeah, i gotta make a call, too."

the two of you separated, jason only pretending to be on the phone so he could talk to barbara. "you there?"

"yeah. i see you went on a little drive," she said, her almost sounding like scolding.

"what the hell was i supposed to do? we had to get out of there," jason frowned. 

"we?" barbara echoed and jason could practically hear the quirk in her brow. 

"not important. what's important is acknowledging the fact that i didn't hear the sweet sound of your voice earlier," jason started off sarcastically, it being his turn to scold now. "where the hell were you at, almighty oracle? you didn't wanna tell me the cops were gonna show up?"

"i didn't know they were out there," she admitted honestly, sounding confused. "they must have been keeping it on the down low. the question now is why."

"probably so people like us wouldn't find out," jason sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. 

"maybe," she sounded unsure. being unsure wasn't really barbara’s thing, so that was alarming.

"well, i doubt anything will go down at the docks now. the area's too hot."

"you're probably right. there's nothing else we can do tonight," barbara sighed. "glad you're not dead."

"yeah, thanks," jason gave her a quick goodbye, putting his phone away and walking back to his bike. you had just finished your conversation, looking relieved. "good news?"

"tyler and quinton got out fine. i think they took a different exit out because i didn't see them with that big group we were in," you explained, shivering a little. 

"we should go inside. it'll be better than loitering out here," jason offered and you nodded in agreement. you entered the diner, noticing there weren't many people inside.

"let's sit in that booth over there," you pointed over to the near the window, jason's bike being visible on the outside. 

you both made your way over, sliding into your seats. the atmosphere was a bit awkward initially, the both of you still coming down from your adrenaline rush. jason hooked his finger under the little acrylic standee holding the dessert menu, pulling it towards himself. a nice cup of coffee with something sweet sounded good right about now. it would definitely calm his nerves. he wasn’t sure if you’d get anything, though. maybe you were too frazzled to eat, which made him feel bad again. before his negative thoughts could return, he looked up, noticing you eyeballing the menu leaning against the window sill. you had your head tilted to the side, as the menu was stored horizontally, making it difficult to read the text. he couldn't help but smile to himself as you squinted at it. why would didn't just grab the menu to look at it properly, he didn't know. he wasn't going to question it, though, simply putting his menu back where he found it. 

"what can i get you kids tonight?" the approaching waitress asked, pulling out her notepad. 

"a black coffee and a slice of pie for me," jason said as the waitress quickly wrote his order down. 

"is apple alright?" she asked and jason nodded. "what about you, hon?"

"um... blueberry waffles," you said, tilting your head some more before looking at her. "and hot chocolate."

the waitress smiled at your order, nodding as she jotted it down. "you want some bacon or sausage on the side? we have pork and turkey."

you hummed, drumming your fingers on the table. "yes. turkey bacon."

"shouldn't take but a minute. if you two find yourselves wanting anything else, you just let me know."

jason yawned, leaning back against his seat with outstretched arms. he did some people watching while he waited for the waitress to return. there was a small group of people, college students most likely, sitting at the middle tables with textbooks and empty plates strewn about. there was a cop sitting at the bar, very obviously flirting with the other, much younger waitress who was refilling his coffee. then there was you and him. he had been with you for quite some time now and he hadn't taken the opportunity to look at you. to really look at you. you absentmindedly played with the hair that directly framed your face while you were on your phone. you looked awfully comfortable in your oversized sweatshirt despite your shivering earlier. you weren't really dressed up, he noticed. it didn't look like you had on any makeup either. then again, tim had told him that people who wore makeup had the ability to make it look like they weren't wearing any at all. the natural look was what it was called. either way, your face looked nice. so did your hair. and your eyes, that were now gazing into his.

"you know, i definitely didn't see myself ending up here tonight."

jason's brow perked up. "what? running from the cops on the back of my motorcycle wasn't on your bingo card?"

"can't say it was," you shook your head with a smile. 

"are you disappointed?"

"with?"

"where you ended up tonight."

"no," you said, not missing a beat. your lack of hesitation surprised him in the best way possible. "sure, you almost killed me but that's a typical tuesday for a gothamite."

jason grinned, biting his lip. "i'm sorry about that. really, i-"

"no, no," you cut him off, dismissing his apology with a wave of the hand. "don't apologize. it's over and done with."

even though you seemed to be okay with everything, he still felt like shit. that feeling wasn’t going away any time soon. the waitress returned with your food and drinks, receiving thanks from you both. jason immediately took a sip of his coffee, the potent flavor coating his tongue and the warmth of the liquid heating his body up. it helped soothe some of his anxiety.

"this is so cute," you muttered, taking a picture of your plate. the chef had arranged the blueberries and bacon to make a smiley face that you couldn't help but smile back at. once you got a good picture, you started digging in. 

there was no conversation to be had. the two of you just ate, occasionally glancing at each other or at your phones. every now and then your eyes would meet and little smiles would be shared. you and jason were people who appreciated the intimacy of silence. not talking was often harder than holding a conversation. being able to sit in complete silence with someone and not feel uncomfortable at any point was a hard task for most but it came naturally to you both. not that you two had much to talk about anyway. you barely knew each other and you definitely weren’t about to bond over your near death experience. jason didn’t want to risk possibly fucking up even more than he already had, so not talking worked for him. it didn’t help keep his intrusive thoughts out, though. he tried not to focus on them, distracting himself with people watching and looking at you.

“where did you learn to ride like that?” you asked him, suspicion lacing your words. you popped a blueberry into your mouth, tilting your head at him.

“uh...” he trailed off, shrugging softly as he hid his face in his mug, drinking the liquid inside. “nowhere. myself. i don’t know. i guess it was just the adrenaline. why?”

you shrugged back at him, reaching over and stealing a small piece of his pie. you looked him in the eye as you ate it, licking the food off your fork as your eyes narrowed. “you know how i’m batman? i’m starting to think you might be catwoman.”

jason snorted, breathing out a laugh as he looked around the diner in disbelief. not only did he find your little joke funny, the fact that you technically weren’t that far off was amusing to him. “you’re ridiculous.”

“you aren’t denying it?” your brow raised, making him laugh again. “ah, i’ve caught you red handed.”

oh, this was just the gift that kept on giving. now you were making puns without even realizing it. 

“i mean, it all makes sense. the unnecessary flirting, calling me out for being a vigilante, and now running from the cops,” you clicked your tongue with a shake of the head, carefully wiping the corners of your mouth. you balled up your napkin, tossing it on your now empty plate. “i don’t know why you thought that i, the greatest detective in gotham, wouldn’t be able to piece this all together. i’m offended, really.”

“can i get you two anything else tonight?” the waitress asked as she walked up, just missing your conversation.

“no, ma’am. i think we’re good,” jason smirked, not taking his eyes off of you. she left the check on the table, walking off. jason pulled out his wallet, leaving a twenty to cover both the food and the tip. 

“wayne money or dirty money? the world will never know,” you quipped as the two of you got up to leave, making him roll his eyes.

“shut up.”

after a quick pit stop at the gas station, jason took you back to your apartment in the diamond district. the ride there was long, but nice, accompanied by music coming from the radio. a cloud 9 song played at one point and jason decided that he might have to give your discography a listen. the way you held yourself against him, nuzzling into his back gave him goosebumps. or maybe it was just the nippy temperature. he hoped that’s all it was. for awhile, he wondered if you were cold. if his jacket was warmer, he would’ve offered it to you a long time ago. and, of course, if it wasn't so cliché. with the way you were attached to him, he liked to think that his body heat was enough. relief washed over him when he pulled up in front of gotham tower. he wasn’t sure how much more he of that could take. he parked, letting you off.

"do you wanna come in?" you pulled him from his thoughts as you took off your helmet. 

"come in?" he parroted, a laugh falling from your lips.

"i'm not asking you to spend the night or anything. it’s just.. you’ve been acting like my chauffeur all night and it isn’t safe to be out this late. i'd feel horrible if something happened to you," you explained, getting a smile from him. 

"don't worry about me. i'll be fine. my place isn't too far from here," he lied with a shrug. his safehouse was nowhere near the diamond district but you didn’t need to know that little detail. the rest of what he said was true. he was going to be fine. “besides, i’m catwoman, remember?”

"at least let me give you my number," you insisted with a giggle, pulling out your phone. "you have to text me when you get home."

jason agreed and the two of you exchanged numbers, bidding each other goodbye. he made sure to stay and watch you go up before leaving. on his way home, he thought about your concern for his wellbeing, finding it cute. misplaced, but cute. it wasn't your fault, though. you didn't know he was more than capable of taking care of himself and the whole damn city, for that matter. you know, as catwoman. still, it was sweet having someone worry about him for a change, even if it wasn’t completely necessary. when he got back to his safe house he texted you, just as promised. you must've been waiting for him because you responded pretty quick. he crawled into bed, smiling down at the heart emojis you sent him. he decided to send you something back before going to sleep, his thumbs slowly typing out the words that popped into his head.

you better not start texting me all the time.

don't flatter yourself. i won’t.

he hoped that you would anyway.

[shenanigans-and-imagines]

Aaah I loved your Maul nsfw alphabet! Can I ask for Savage?

A = Aftercare (what they’re like after sex)

He treats you like glass. He’ll carry you to the shower, and help you clean up before pulling you on top of his chest.  He likes you sleeping on top of him rather than the mattress.

B = Body part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

He loves your tits.  110% boob man, and you can quote me on that.  He loves reaching out and palming them in his massive hands.  He loves how soft they are and how touching them makes you groan.  He loves all your soft parts, but your breasts are his favorite.

For himself, he loves his arms.  He knew, even before his transformation, what power they could hold.  He knows you like them, and admire them while he fights.  And he knows he can keep you safe in them.

C = Cum (anything to do with cum, basically)

Call it instinct, but he wants nothing more than to cum inside you every time.  He loves watching as cum drips out of you pussy, coating his cock.  You’re too full with him that some inevitably overflows.

D = Dirty secret (pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

As careful as he is and has delicately as he treats you, there is a part of him that wants nothing more than to just use you body.   The need to fully let go and tear you apart with his cock is ever present. He just wants to keep you in bed and stuff you full of his cum again and again, until you pass out.  And even then keep fucking you until you only smell of him and sex.

He keeps this entirely to himself, ashamed of this primal drive inside him.

E = Experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?)

None before you. Personally I think the Nightsisters either kill or enslave whoever is chosen for a mate. That’s why Savage was adamant that Feral keep his head down. So between getting none on Dathomire and getting transformed by Mother Talzin, there hasn’t been an opportunity.

Maybe if there’s a weird coming of age ceremony for Nightbrothers, but I’m not sure.

F = Favorite position (this goes without saying)

You riding him.  He’s very aware of his strength as is constantly worried about hurting you.  Having you on top to set the pace eases his anxieties and allows him to actually enjoy the moment.

G = Goofy (are they more serious in the moment? are they humorous? etc.)

Not really.  He’s not exactly the funniest guy out of the sheets, so that’ll be a negative between them too.  He honestly get maybe a little too serious, and it’ll be up to you to break the tension.

H = Hair (how well groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

Absolutely no hair down below.  He doesn’t even need to shave.  Zabraks are just like that.

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

He is 110% focused on you when you’re having sex.  Rough or slow, it doesn’t matter.  He has to know you’re okay.  Sometimes that means he’s too much in his own head, but it comes from a good place.

J = Jack off (masturbation headcanon)

Not as often as you would think.  Even before being transformed, he didn’t do it that often, associating sex in general with the Nightsisters and what that might mean for him.  After you’re together, he doesn’t really see the point.  He has you.

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

As tempting as it is to say size kink (and it is very tempting), I’m actually going to say he’s neutral on the subject. 

Praise kink is truly what gets him going.  Knowing he makes you feel good.  Knowing you love him.  Knowing it’s him making you feel this way will send him more than anything else.

Also, sub 8.5/10.  That’s just my theory.

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

Anywhere.  Seriously, anywhere.  The man is not picky.  The only thing he asks for is privacy, but other than that; against a wall, on a table, in your bed, in your shower, in the training room, where ever you want to have sex, he is down to clown.

M = Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

You asking for it.  Seriously.  You asserting yourself and telling him and you want him right then and there and he’s ready to go.  It’s your choice to be with him.  Your confidence to know what you want and when you want it, gets him going like nothing else.

Also, your smell.  I’m not sure how else to put it.  He loves the way you smell.  If your sweating from exercise or training and he gets a good nose full, he’s taking you to bed right then and there.

N = No (something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

No to BDSM.  He doesn’t like the idea of hurting you for pleasure and he’s been too hurt to like it on himself.  Pain doesn’t mix with pleasure in his mind.  Pain is pain and pleasure is pleasure.  That’s it.

O = Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc.)

God he loves giving.  It’s so easy to get lost in your taste and sounds.  The feeling of your hand clasping his horns sends him every time.  There has been more than one night where he just keeps going, making you cum again and again with his mouth and fingers until either you tear him away or pass out from the pleasure.  He gets a little enthusiastic.

As for him getting, he likes it, but the simple fact is, you can’t even begin to get him fully inside your mouth.  Deep-throating is nearly impossibly with his ridged cock.  Still the fact that you even offer is incredible to him.

P = Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.)

Slow and sensual...at least at the start.  If I haven’t made my point yet; he does not want to hurt you!!!  He doesn’t fully trust himself to give you everything he’s capable of.  But, the more you beg and plead and insist that you can take it, the more his resistance wains. 

It takes a lot of trust to build between you two.  Eventually though, he gives it to you as rough as you like, nothing more or less.

Q = Quickie (their opinions on quickies, how often, etc.)

Sometimes.  It’s not his favorite thing, but sometimes there isn’t time for anything else, and you ask him so sweetly.  Their fast and dirty against the wall before he’s called by Maul on a mission.  They always leave you wrecked and him, a little less stressed.

R = Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks? etc.)

He’s really nervous when it comes to experimenting and doesn’t really have any interest in looking up stuff.  If you find something you’d like to try and talk with him in detail before hand, he’ll do it.  But, it does take a bit of convincing.

S = Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?)

He doesn’t last as long as you’d think, but his recovery time is insane.  He cums between 10 to 15 minutes in, but he can keep going anywhere between 3 to you honestly lost count when you hit the double digits times a night.

You’re not sure exactly what Mother Talzin did, but you thank her every night.

T = Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

That’ll be a no.  He wants sex to be between you and him, no fancy silicon or anything else.  He wants to be the one to make you cum, every single time.

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

Again, that’ll be a no.  He doesn’t even bother to try.  He wants nothing more than to please you.  The minute you beg to cum, he’s at your mercy.

V = Volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make, etc.)

He makes the most animalistic sounds during sex.  No coherent words, just a long string of grunts and growling, getting louder and louder until he all but howls when he cums.

W = Wild card (a random headcanon for the character)

He can smell your arousal.  If you’re standing in a room with him, he knows the second you’re turned on.  He’s not sure if Maul can sense it, but he can and it drives him crazy.

X = X-ray (let’s see what’s going on under those clothes)

Huge.  Porn star huge.  You can’t even get it fully inside you with out serious prep work, you can see it bulging inside you huge.  Add on a three ridged cock like all other Zabaks and you’ve got the right idea. (insert link to Bad Dragon: Nova here because if I link anything outside of tumblr, I’m blocked from the tags)

Y = Yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

Not crazy high.  His libido did not go up with his size.  He can go for a while without sex and be okay. But when he is in the mood...clear your schedule.

Z = Zzz (how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

It take him a good hour after sex to finally doze off.  He just likes you hold you, listening to you talk until your words get slurred and you fall asleep on his chest.  He allows himself to enjoy the heat and weight of your body on his own, to know that you’re real and here with him.

[lunarmessenger]

So we know that mysme is korean.. I was wondering if you could do the RFA+ Saeran reacting to MC being latina🙈

Please and thank you 😊💜

GIRL YES me being Latina too I’ve always wondered....what it would be like...if they had a lil bit of flavor....LMFAO but i gotchu girl - Luna xx (P.S. I may make MC lean towards the hispanic side a little more because I’m hispanic LMAO) 

translations will be down underneath all the headcanons for my non spanish speaking readers!

warnings: none! just some cuteness

RFA, V + Saeran Reacting to Latina!MC

Zen

• He was already so excited to finally meet and see you in person and it doubles when he finds out that you’re not from Korea/Korean

• “MC oh wow...you’re gorgeous I—”

• Is a lot more flustered than he intended to be

• Takes this opportunity to really broaden his knowledge on other cultures!

• He absolutely swoons when he wakes up one morning to see you cooking breakfast, the smell of eggs and jalapeño’s enticing him out of bed

• But then he’s also furrowing his brows because what kind of music is that???

• That’s when he sees you; wearing his shirt and side stepping by the stove, hips moving effortlessly as you hum along to the tune of the song

• He kept quiet, not wanting to disturb you as you continued to sway, swinging the spatula around as you quietly sang

• “No, no es amor, lo que tú sientes se llama obsesión*,” He would’ve passed out right then and there if he knew it wouldn’t freak you out; he’d never heard you speak spanish before, let alone sing it

• He wrapped his arms around you from behind, trying to sway his hips with you as you leaned forward to turn off the heat

• “MC, promise me that you’ll teach me how to move like that.” He whispers in your ear, causing you to giggle

• “And please speak Spanish more often.”

Yoosung

• He’s surprised but not in a bad way obviously

• You didn’t really have an accent when you spoke over the phone, so he never really suspected that you wouldn’t be Korean

• “You’re so pretty MC!”

• Begs you to teach him your favorite dishes from your culture and childhood

• “How about tamales? Winter is coming soon so it’d be something nice for us to bulk make for dinner and breakfast!” 

• He’s already foaming at the mouth at the idea of getting to cook with you, especially a dish that he’s never even had before

• The two of you spend all day making the masa and filling, ranging from refried beans, chicken, and beef

• “Oh Yoosung we’ve made so many; should I ask everyone in the RFA if they’ll want some—”

• “No!” He yelled a little too quickly, making you stop reaching for your phone as you furrowed your brows with a smile

• “Why not?” He was blushing now, not meeting your eyes as he finished folding the last corn husk and placing it into the steamer

• “Because we made them together. I want them just to be ours, MC.” You grinned, placing a soft kiss to his forehead before nodding in agreement

• “Sure, mi amor*. We’ll keep these to ourselves.”

• He definitely blushed a deeper red after hearing you call him that in Spanish

Jaehee

• It didn’t really bother her that you weren’t Korean and she was actually quite excited

• Especially since you’d both be opening the bakery soon; she would love to introduce some non-traditional items to the local area

• “MC; if there are any sweets you would like to showcase in our bakery please feel free.”

• “Oh, actually! There are some that I think you might like!” You spent the entire day hunting for ingredients just so you could bake them for her so Jaehee could try them

• She was already enticed by the smell, her brows raising in curiosity as they finished baking and you poured the two of you some milk

• When you pulled them out of the oven she was excited to see the brown, bright pink, and white toppings on the bread, their patterns similar to a conch shell she’d seen on beaches before

• You excitedly plated them, placing them between you two at the dinner table and then gesturing for her to grab one

• “What are they?”

• “Conchas!* Dig in, honey!”

• She grabbed one, surprised at the soft feeling of the bread.

• At first she didn’t really know what to think? Or how to eat it? They were a little bigger than the pastries she was used to

• She sneakily watched you pull it apart with your fingers, alternating between putting the pieces in your mouth or dipping them straight into the milk

• She copied your movements, and as soon as she’d gotten the first taste her eyes widened in surprise

• “What do you think?” You asked in anticipation, hoping she loved them as much as you

• “We’ll put these on the menu immediately.” 

Jumin

• Like Jaehee, he isn’t really phased that you’re not Korean

• With the many business trips he’s had he’s pretty knowledgable with his Spanish

• But only when it’s spoken at a normal pace and not so...fast

• You were visiting him at his office, patiently waiting for him to finish a meeting with clients who’d happened to be from Mexico City

• He came out of the meeting speaking a bit of Spanish, the clients responding rather quickly

• You could tell he was struggling a bit with their finishing statement, so you decided to try and listen in

• Your brows furrowed as you realized that the last sentence spoken from the clients was directed towards each other, even though they were looking at Jumin

•What they said caused immediate rage; you stood up and speed walked over

• “Este tonto ni siquiera sabe que ya le hemos vendido nuestra empresa a su competidor. ¡Conseguiremos el doble de dinero!”*

• “Perdóneme*.” You immediately interjected, Jumin looking at you in surprise while you saw the client’s faces immediately pale as you hurriedly told Jumin what they were saying

• His eyes darkened as he immediately called security, having the clients escorted out of C&R

• “Thank you for catching that, MC. I will definitely have to bring you in to translate every once in a while, kitten.”

707

• Of course he already knows you’re Latina due to the background check he did

• But that didn’t make meeting you any less exciting, and when he finally gets to see you he’s practically vibrating in excitement

• He knows Spanish much like Jumin, but he’s way more advanced at it so you two sometimes held private conversations when people pissed you off

• This was the second party that the RFA was holding after you’d joined, and a guest had been extremely rude towards you

• Saeyoung was ready to interject but you signaled that you were fine, keeping a polite smile as the client finished their rant towards you before leaving the party early

• He was on his way to check on you as soon as the guest left, your smile immediately gone as you rolled your eyes and crossed your arms.

• “Maldito hijo de puta.”* You cursed, and immediately Saeyoung was doubled over in laughter while the RFA members looked at you two with curiosity

• You were blushing, insanely embarrassed that Saeyoung had heard you as you pouted

• “Stop it, it was not that funny!”

• “Oh it was hilarious, please do that again.”

• “Wait, what did she say?” Yoosung interjected

• “Don’t worry about it!” You snapped, leaving Saeyoung to chase after you as you grumpily walked away from embarrassment

• “MC please I’m so sorry I just omg it was so funny I’m sorry I swear.”

V

• He’s very much intrigued with you and your upbringing

• It was obvious that the longer you two were together, the more likely you were to mix cultural traditions and rituals.

• He got a taste of that for the first time since you two had gotten together

• One day he came home from a job overseas to see soft lighting coming from one of the spare rooms, his brows furrowing as he called for you

• “MC? Is everything alright?”

• “In here, V!”

• He followed the dim light to see that you’d set up a table filled with marigolds, a couple of pictures of your family members accompanying the table

• “What’s all of this?” He was breathless, taken by the absolute beauty of it that it took him a second to notice that you were setting up a third picture; his mother.

• “Well, seeing as tomorrow is the last day of October, I’ll be celebrating Dia de los Muertos* soon. I wanted to make sure that we keep the memory of your mother alive with my other family members. It’s what we do in my family.”

• You were a little embarrassed, that is, until V suddenly brought you into a tight hug, a warm kiss pressed to your lips before he pulled away

• “I think that’s a wonderful thing, MC. Thank you for thinking of my mother. I know she would have loved to meet you.”

• You beamed in response, leaning against him as you pressed a kiss to the photo of your grandparents.

• “I’m sure that my family that’s already passed is enjoying her company too.”

Saeran

• He had already seen something special in you, and being Latina in his eyes was just an added bonus

• You told him about your hometown and the delicious frozen treats you always looked forward too, and that made his ears perk up in curiosity

• “Do...do you think we could try to find something similar here, MC?”

• You of course obliged, the two of you searching endlessly online until you found a shop that was similar enough

• The two of you had made an entire day of it, holdings hands while walking into the shop

• His eyes were wide with awe, the different fruity flavors catching his attention as you casually spoke to the owner of the store in fluid Spanish

• “What would you like, honey?”

• He was slightly embarrassed that he didn’t know what he wanted, shrugging his shoulders before nervously answering

• “I guess whatever you’re having.”

• “A-Are you sure, Saeran? My taste is a little more traditional than you might like.”

• “Well now I definitely want to have what you’re having.” He smirked, taking it as a challenge while you sighed

• “Alright, but don’t blame me if you don’t like it.”

• Soon enough your treats were ready, Saeran staring at his portion with wide eyes while you happily took a scoop and placed it in your mouth

• It was mango flavored, with drizzles of red decorating the scoops; spicy flavored powder sitting on top.

• “Go on, try it baby.”

• He hesitated, but nonetheless tried it; grinning from the taste and immediately going for a second scoop

• “This is delicious, princess! ...What is it?”

• You laughed before explaining, “It’s mango flavored sorbet with chamoy and tajin on top. It’s my absolute favorite, I’m so glad they have it here!”

• The two of you sat inside the shop together, happily eating your spicy and sweet treats before going home together.

translations:

No, it is not love, what you feel is called obsession*

My love*

Conchas* A sweet bread with sugar toppings shaped like a seashell

This fool doesn't even know that we have already sold our company to his competitor. We will get double the money!* 

Excuse me.*

Fucking son of a bitch.*

Day of the Dead*

[rigelmejo]

Dude I was on the language learning forms as I do sometimes, and someone was lamenting the lack of Chinese content to immerse in (watch, read etc). And how it was hard to find and they didn’t have this problem with Japanese what should they do?

Well. 1. I get their frustration on one level, as I do think Japanese content is so much more mainstream to watch in English speaking countries (at least anime and Japanese video games), that trying to find content in a language where it’s harder to just find content right on Netflix or from a friends recommendation does bring up a new challenge. Whereas with Japanese, probably you could accidentally stumble onto it or have a friend recommend you something, then at least explore deeper with some idea of what you liked/where to start finding it.

However. The person also sort of thought the lack of content was due to Chinese just not having as much content or as interesting content. Again I’m going to assume their key issue was just - it can be a new challenge finding media if you have a harder time just starting.

Because lol?? Chinese has SO much content. Like as far as language content on the internet alone??? Chinese has been eons easier to find than Japanese for me, and in terms of sites I actually use regularly is much closer to my experience of English online (there’s so much Chinese content online... so much... an incredible amount... like in chinese I’ve even found free movie watching sites FOR shows in English - like the way I find sites in English to watch Chinese shows IN chinese lol! Like you can use English to search for Chinese stuff, and literally do the reverse to find English stuff, there is so much Chinese stuff... I found more stuff in Japanese using bilibili in chinese than I could find of Japanese using YouTube In English). And Chinese drama land is HUGE it feels as active as American television, so you have endless genres to dive into and companies and actors and writers etc (there is a distinct lack of sci fi though as far as I’ve seen, but to be fair america isn’t making a Ton of sci fi compared to like Detective shows either - it’s just English speaking sci fi has had some more good ones in recent years). There is no lack of Chinese content out there. There’s audiobooks, dramas, audio dramas, talk shows, radio, fanfiction, novels, fanart, manhua, sites to find other stuff, forums, weibo, search sites, just a lot?? Like, if you think Japanese has enough internet content then there is an adequate amount of Chinese content on the internet too lol. You just may have to do a touch more initial exploration.

I just. Thought the assumption “can’t find media means their media sucks” was funny. Because also? I have not found that to be true. I know very little about Thai media. I just happened upon SOTUS cause of a friend talking about it. So like someone watching anime conveniently - I got into it. It was good, so I dug, and found a lot of amazing Thai shows (and some I didn’t love cause lol genres all have a mix of quality depending on show etc). There IS a ton of amazing Thai shows that exist right now. But if all you ever found was SOTUS? While it was great when I saw it to me, once I found more I realized there was a LOT better stuff. So like if you see one cdrama on Netflix (if that’s how you first easily find the media), that does not mean all shows will be that quality or anything like them! And just cause it’s the first one you found doesn’t mean they’re all like that ones quality.

Like I had a similar experience with jdramas growing up, so I get it. I was into anime, saw some (trainwreck) live action adaptations. And as a teenage just blanket assumed all Japanese live action media was gonna be around that quality. And then in recent years, I checked out some Japanese live action media - to see if new stuff was better. YEAH IT SURE IS (and I would imagine some old stuff was great I just gave up after one not-wonderful one lol). SO MANY AMAZING jdramas exist now! Even the ones I most feared would not be great - live action adaptations of anime’s? They’re so much better now, some of them are genuinely loved in their own right as standalone live actions. So like. One not-great show experience is NOT representative of the entire plethora of shows available and their quality. Now that I’ve realized how MANY good jdramas I missed out on? I have so much catching up to do ToT

2. If you’re in this boat of “content seems hard to find, so I feel like there’s none or no good stuff” what to do?

First ask some friends for recommendations?

Check Netflix, Amazon, YouTube (YouTube has a ton of cdramas), Viki, iQiyi app. Like how some people get into anime, maybe you just need an easy conviennent show in your recommended to get into more content.

Check out rec channels on YouTube like Donghua Reviews and Avenue X to hear about some shows and figure out the kinds of ones you’d even want to check out (I imagine other languages also have review channels like for kdramas).

Go to MyDramaList.com. Search genres you like, read recommendation list posts. if you’ve seen a show at this point already you can look it up and see in the “Recommended” section what other dramas are like it, you can see it’s genre tags to see WHAT genres you even seem to like. Use this to start DIGGING and finding stuff you might really like. Since like with anime, you’re only going to find the most popular stuff at first just based on Netflix or friends (which might not match up to your personal tastes as well as finding stuff that Is more your favorite genres).

Try out new stuff. And if it sucks, you don’t like it? Drop it, learn that about yourself, start another new thing. You’ll figure out what you like and dislike pretty fast (like I personally hate bad pacing or bad writing specifically characterization, and I can notice when the specific things I love are gonna be in a show pretty fast).

Check out genres specific to that language’s media. Because if it’s new to you, you might not know if you even like it or not, and if you like it then which things you personally prefer in it (since even within a genre there will be wildly different content and feels). For Chinese this might be wuxia, xianxia, palace dramas, costume dramas, republican era dramas, tomb raiding dramas etc.

*That’s how it worked for me, SOTUS led me to the bl drama fans, eventually they recommended Guardian so bam I guess I was learning chinese, YouTube recced me more cdramas from there to continue with, and mydramalist.com helped me find other shows with actors I liked from guardian (and other bl related shows which led me to Go Princess Go of all things for the bi lead), and that site helped me find more genres and shows I’d like, as well as friends continuing to rec things. Didn’t take long to figure out what I liked, didn’t, and to start noticing what upcoming stuff I’d probably be excited for. And now there’s so much good stuff found I don’t have enough time lol.

As for non show media: use shows as the jump off point. Just like using “easy to find shows” can be used to break into finding more shows. Once you have a show you liked a lot - look up it it’s based on a book, if it has an audiobook, an audio drama, a manhua, a donghua. Chances are it DOES have some of this stuff, because cdramas do a PRETTY regular amount of the time. Often cdramas have all or nearly all of these other story types. So jump into those, then find more novels or audio drama or manhua etc by branching off from the one you liked to others like it. Novelupdates.com is good for doing this with novels (it has a recommendations section), I imagine manhua sites have rec lists too, ximalaya starts recommending stuff once you’ve listened to a few audio on it, etc. And if you get into fandoms of those x media types, those fans will start recommending more too. And again, even if you just stick to media related to shows you liked - so often shows have so MUCH related media that would definitely keep you busy. (Like I didnt wade into non-show connected novels until I looked up more novels as recommendations afte show-related novels, like MDZS and Guardian leading me to SVSSS and 2ha and Can Ci Pin which at the time had no show adaptations, and then eventually found just-novel rec lists - which is still the main way I find fanfic).

[dessarious]

The Angel of Death Pt8

Inspired by this Story Starter by @someone-ev

AO3   Prologue   Beginning   Previous   Next

Marinette was seated cross legged on the bed with the Peafowl Miraculous in front of her. Her hands were turned up on her knees and Plagg and Tikki sat in either palm. Everything was still a bit too vague for her piece of mind but given their interactions she didn’t think the Kwami wanted to hurt her. She wasn’t certain they could while she was in possession of their Miraculous. Tikki flew up to address her.

“You’ve meditated before I assume?” Marinette just nodded. “Good. What we need you to do is just close your eyes and breath deeply, being relaxed as possible. You’ll likely feel a pull or tugging sensation and may start feeling drained. It’s perfectly normal but if you start fighting it it will get worse.”

“Should I be visualizing or concentrating on anything specific?” She was used to things being out of her control, Talia and the League had made sure of that, so it shouldn’t be difficult to do as Tikki asked.

“It’s probably best if you focus here.” Tikki flew forward and gently tapped the center of her forehead. “It will help us draw the energy we need though it is not necessary. It may also help ease any discomfort that comes up.” Marinette frowned at the Kwami’s tone.

“There’s something you’re not telling me.” Tikki shared a look with Plagg and she knew she was right. Plagg let out a huff and joined the other Kwami hovering in front of her.

“It’s not dangerous kit, I promise, but especially given that Duusu is the Kwami of emotion there may be some pushback. Given the little we know of your past it could open old emotional wounds that you would prefer to stay buried.” They both looked genuinely worried. For her part, Marinette just figured she’d survived it once, she could do it again.

“I’m sure it will be fine.” The Kwami shared a look she couldn’t interpret but she just closed her eyes and began to relegate her breathing. Once it was at a proper pace she did as Tikki had asked and concentrated on the spot they had touched. She swore she could still feel it but put it down to her imagination. She felt the Kwami move back to their positions in her hands but she kept focused on that spot and her breathing.

She didn’t notice any changes at first, but soon found herself becoming too warm. She could tell it wasn’t the room but rather heat coming from her own body. It was a mild discomfort though so she pushed it out of her mind and resumed her focus. That’s when she realized she could actually feel the energy being pulled from her, or rather through her. Yes some of her own energy was mixed it but it felt more like she was a funnel and Tikki and Plagg were directing the energy pouring through her. It was strange certainly but not uncomfortable

The longer it lasted, the more aware she became. Instead of just feeling the energy as it rushed through her she could also feel the way Tikki and Plagg were separating it and directing it into the Miraculous on the bed. She also began to see the different threads of energy flowing through her and unconsciously began separating them herself and feeding them to the Kwami. It was actually really soothing, and it seemed to speed up the process. She was so distracted by it she didn’t notice the sudden burst of energy flowing back from the Miraculous until it was too late.

When it hit her she heard herself yelp and her hands flew to her head as images and the emotions that went with them swirled through her mind. There was no pattern to how or when they showed up. One second she felt the agony of Damian’s string snapping, the next was the fear of her younger self as she was being transported away from Paris. So many conflicting thoughts and emotions she couldn’t do anything but whimper as they tore through her. She tried to force them to come one at a time at least, but when she did manage it she wished she hadn’t.

It was the day after they’d returned to the Leagues base. Talia insisted that she spar with Damian with no training to prove her worth. It was like she was actually reliving it. She knew what would happen but had no control over her own body. Damian seemed less than thrilled with the idea but it was obvious he wouldn’t go against his mother. After he threw her to the ground the first time his mother waited for Marinette to get back up before saying ‘Again’. Damian looked like he wanted to argue but didn’t. It went on like that for what felt like hours. Damian would hit or throw her and Talia would say again every time she got back up. Her entire body felt like it was covered in bruises and scrapes. At one point Damian even told her to just stay down, but some part of her knew that wasn’t an option. It only ended when Damian finally knocked her out.

Marinette came back to the present slowly as the pounding in her head began to lessen. Suddenly, Plagg’s warning about the pushback made a lot more sense. She felt drained, like she hadn’t slept in days and her entire body was tense. She slowly forced each of her muscles to relax before trying to open her eyes. When she did she found four anxious Kwami staring at her.

“Tris, are you okay?” Nooroo’s voice was about an octave higher than before so she had a feeling that none of them were expecting the backlash to be this bad.

“I’m so sorry!” Marinette tried to focus on the blueish blur in front of her. “I couldn’t stop it, the energy was flowing too fast.” She just nodded. So it had been her fault then. If she hadn’t been feeding it out to the other Kwami the way she did things wouldn't have been so bad.

“My fault. Shouldn’t have helped without asking.” Or knowing what she was even doing. The more she came to her senses the more she felt something different. She could still feel the energy all around them. It was incredibly easy to pick out different strands even though she couldn’t tell what they all were. That was interesting.

“What do you mean helped?” Tikki’s voice was confused more than anything.

“I separated the energy before it got to the two of you.” The Kwami shared a look and she realized they hadn’t noticed.

“I just thought it was easier because we were getting used to it. You could actually feel the different types of energy?” Plagg’s question caused all of them to stare at her. That couldn’t be good.

“I still can. It’s everywhere. Is it supposed to be?” None of them answered and that worried her. These were tiny gods who had been around for millennia and they were looking at her like they’d discovered a new species. Finally Tikki broke out of her stupor.

“Yes, it’s normal for it to be everywhere but we’ve never encountered a human that became aware of it without training, let alone what you’re describing.” Just what she needed, one more thing to make her abnormal.

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Ko-Fi

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[sheerbeautyreigns]

DESIRE

Part 43

Paul watched as Joe left the house. He was walking a little slower than usual. “Hey baby.” He greeted him with a smile when he got into the car. “Missed you.” He leaned in to kiss him, noticing the slight swelling and traces of blood on Joe bottom lip. “What happened there?”

“He kissed me and tugged on my lip. He said you’d be OK with it.” Paul pursed his lips and looked at the house. “I’m OK Paul. Can we please just leave?” Paul waited a moment before starting the car and driving off.

They arrived back at the hotel just after seven. “You weren’t very talkative on the way back.” Paul observed, setting the key card down on the dresser. “I’m just tired. It’s been a long day.” Joe said taking his jacket off, setting it behind a chair. “I know baby but you did good. He was impressed. I think he liked you.” Paul wrapped his arms around Joe’s waist, pulling him close to his body.

“Yeah, I got some sorta vibe from him.” Paul looked at him a little puzzled. “Weird or…?”

“I dunno, he was just different to what I expected.”

“Well I’m hoping you’ve learned a thing or two from him?” Paul lead him over to the sofa. Joe grimaced as he sat down. “I did. He did say that I was more obedient that the previous two partners you sent to him.”

“Previous two?” Paul looked at him. “Yeah you said you only had one person sent to him. Maybe he’s mixed up.” Paul brushed it off. “He must be.” Paul placed his hands on Joe jaw and kissed him softly. “Were you…tied up when he kissed you?” Paul asked looking at his bottom lip. “Yes Sir. I did pull away when he first tried.”

“Good boy. You know better now don’t you?” Paul started unbuttoning Joe’s shirt. “I wanna fuck you so bad baby.”

“Yes Sir.” Joe kicked off his shoes and undid his trousers. He left his shirt aside and stood to remove his trousers and briefs. “Inspection.” He stood by the coffee table, legs slightly parted with his hands behind his head. Paul looked him over. Nothing out of the ordinary. “Turn around.”

“What did he use on your backside?” Paul asked, lightly trailing his fingers over the welts. “A belt Sir.”

“Not as effective as the cane but I bet it still hurt right?” Paul asked. “Yes Sir.” Paul could already notice something different in Joe’s behaviour now. “We’ll take care of those in a while but now, I need to fuck you. Kneel on the sofa.” Joe did as told, placing his elbows on the back of the sofa while Paul retrieved the lube. Joe continued looking straight ahead while Paul did what he needed to. Usually Paul would need to tell him what to do but not this time. Paul took his time in fingering him. “I can tell he’s spent a lot of time on you today judging how stretched you feel.”

“Yes Sir.” Joe responded, groaning as Paul massaged his prostate before slipping out. Joe took a sharp intake of breath as Paul’s cock penetrated him. Paul wasted no time in picking up the pace when it came to fucking. He knew that after today, things were going to be different. They would have to be if Joe had learned anything and so far, he was doing well. He laid his hands on Joe's shoulders, putting one foot on the sofa, using him as a support. Joe broadened his arms to support his weight, grimacing as he was fucked hard. “Good boy. Good boy.” Paul said, his lips curving into a smile. “Fuck me,” Joe panted in line with his thrusts. “Oh baby, I’m gonna cum so hard. The thought of you being fucked by another man today. You”ll always be mine though. Always.”

“Yes Sir. Always yours.” His voice piped up as Paul came hard, raking his hands down Joe’s sweaty back, grabbing his pelvis. “Oh fuck!” Paul shuddered, breathing hard. When he withdrew, he spun Joe around, pushing him down on the sofa, lowering onto him. Both his hands cupped his jaw as he kissed him passionately. “So good baby.”

“I love you.” Joe said kissing him back, this time more deeply. Paul smiled breaking the kiss, taking Joe in his arms as he settled back into the corner of the sofa. “I’m so happy right now. If you told me back in December, we’d be here in this amazing hotel room as a couple, I wouldn’t have believed you…”

“Either would I.” Joe said wearily, resting his head on Paul’s chest. Paul stroked his head. It wasn’t long before Joe drifted off to sleep.

Paul lay in silence, listening to the faint hustle and bustle of the city below. His hand rested across Joe’s abdomen. Random thoughts came and went as he listened to the light breaths of his sleeping lover. About how he had to make sure Joe would end up on Smackdown and that Drew and Colby would stay on Raw. He knew Joe wasn’t mad about the idea but it wasn’t really his decision.

He wanted a fresh start now that he had him in a much better place, especially after giving him the ring, putting the offer in on the house in Tampa and his discipline session today. Part of him felt that things were moving too fast but he didn’t care. They had been together for just over a month but there had already been so many ups and downs. Yet they still always found their way back to each other. Paul gently and carefully edged his way out from underneath Joe weight. He stirred a little but didn’t wake. Paul was happy to let him sleep, especially what he’d been through today. He grabbed the throw from the back of the sofa and gently laid it on top of Joe, covering him from his shoulders to his feet.

He took a seat at the desk by the window and opened up his laptop. It was dusk outside and he took a moment to look down at the movement of the city below. Such a contrast from his home in Connecticut. He spent the next while working on a spreadsheet and catching up on some emails. Not exactly how he’d planned on spending his Saturday night in the City that Never Sleeps but it was what it was. Joe shifting on the sofa distracted him from his thoughts. He moved the blankets off a little as he rolled over. He raised his head slightly and rubbed his eyes. The room was slightly darker now. He had that sleepy look in his eyes that Paul found adorable. “I’m sorry,” He apologised catching sight of Paul. “It’s OK baby, you’re tired. You can sleep.” Joe couldn’t, he felt bad. “It’s not fair on you.” He said sitting up.” Paul got up and padded towards him on the sofa. “I’m ordering you to rest. You’ve had a long day.” The older man said placing his hands on Joe shoulders. Joe looked up at him wearily. Paul kissed him on the forehead, easing him back down into the sofa. His eyes were heavy. Being in a big city like New York always took it out of him. He watched Joe drift off to sleep again.

As harsh as Paul could treat him at times, these were the moments he loved the most. The tender moments. Something like watching him sleep could melt Paul’s heart like nothing else. None of his past lovers affected him the way Joe did. He was one of the biggest guys he’d been with but was never as protective over anyone as he was with Joe. He covered his chest with the blanket once more and let him sleep.

[the-ghost-and-the-writer]

NSFW Alphabet-Wade Wilson

The boy! I love him. He’s perfect and he’s slightly messed up but I love him for it

18+ F!Reader

Actually his reaction to this probably

A = Aftercare (What they’re like after sex)

He’ll take a moment to silently (for once) admire you until you say something and then he’ll grin and say some out there comment that turns into a lewd ramble about what you’d just done

At first he was apprehensive to cuddle unless he was dressed in at least a shirt so you wouldn’t have to feel his scorched body, but with your gentle reassurances he’s more open to a near-instant snuggle session

B = Body part (Their favourite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

With you, everywhere. Every part of you is amazing and gorgeous to him and he has to really wonder why someone as beautiful as you would want a guy like him, with a face like spoilt lasagne

Evidently, it took some time to convince him that any part of him was worth a second thought. He’s getting more used to being secure with himself but doesn’t particularly have a favourite just yet

C = Cum (Anything to do with cum basically… I’m a disgusting person)

If you’ll let him, he adores the sight of his cum on your stomach or your face. It’s a special type of dirty for him, especially when you’d run a finger through the mess and lick it off

D = Dirty Secret (Pretty self-explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

Wade has very few secrets, dirty or otherwise, and he will gladly share any thought at all that he has at the slightest provocation

However, since his mutation kicked in and his pain tolerance went up almost as much as his healing factor, he’s been quite tempted to try a bit more kinky stuff. More risky, harsh things

E = Experience (How experienced are they? Do they know what they’re doing?)

He is quite experienced, with many different types of people all across the gender spectrum in all sorts of situations. That doesn’t make him any less excited about being with you any way you’d like it, of course.

F = Favourite Position (This goes without saying. Will probably include a visual)

While of course he’ll never say no to missionary or simply bending you over a table or the couch or a counter (the classics are classics for a reason), he does have a preference for the more challenging positions, more for bragging rights

Any possible way the two of you can bend yourselves without causing injury, he’ll try to somehow turn it to sex...which does sometimes cause some injury.

G = Goofy (Are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc)

He’s never 100% serious, that’s not possible for Wade. There’s bound to be a few one-liners or sarcastic quips or comments to a person who isn’t there, but he won’t go too far with them in certain situations

Light-hearted is his favourite tone for sex anyway, since not only does he love to make you smile and laugh at any chance he can, but he’s slightly worried that having it be too serious will put him in his own head too much and he’ll get self-conscious

H = Hair (How well-groomed are they, does the carpet match the drapes, etc.)

There really is none, since the experimentation

I = Intimacy (How are they during the moment, romantic aspect…) 

Wade has a special idea of romance. A mix of overly cheesy and completely pornographic.

He’ll fuck all levels of coherency and possible movement out of you, in a candlelit room on a bed covered in rose petals and filled with gentle music. Or he’ll take you to a beautiful wood cabin out in the middle of nowhere and rut you into the ground in front of the most picturesque view you could ever ask for.

J = Jack Off (Masturbation headcanon)

Any moment he needs to, he’ll masturbate, regardless of if you’re going to get down to It or not.

He also uses it as a build-up to the main event and keeps him ready for you while he’s waiting for you. Sometimes he’ll try to entice you into sex by showing you just how desperate he is for you by touching himself and whining for your attention

K = Kink (One or more of their kinks)

The Merc with a mouth is also the Merc with a multitude of kinks. Evidently. His more noticeable ones are post-fight sex, mutual masturbation, and having you touch him

Post-Fight; Not make up sex, though damn he loves that as well, but coming back to you from a fight or freshly killing a guy that probably deserved it. If it went good or bad, it doesn’t matter to him because either way he wants you in any room and any position that’s quickest so he can get all adrenaline out while simultaneously celebrating that he has you still

Mutual Masturbation; Watching you do almost anything can rile Wade up, and he’ll never have enough of seeing you naked so watching you touch yourself is enough to fry his brain. And that’s not even taking in the fact that you’d touch yourself at the sight of him. You getting off on him getting off makes it feel so much better than just jerking off

Touch; A majority of the physical contact he gets is either fleeting or violent, so he loves when you take the time to check over him after a fight despite his healing factor or you insist on smothering him in kisses when he’s down. For a minute, it helps him forget his situation and his insecurities and makes him only want you for as long as he can

L = Location (Favourite places to do the do)

Anywhere he can have you, most of the time. The X-mansion, Blind Al’s place, your shared place, the back room or a quiet corner booth of Sister Margret’s. He’s even brought you on a few missions where you end up having a risky fuck in a dangerous back-alley

M = Motivation (What turns them on, gets them going)

Just you. Having you around, and you wanting him, and you being there for him is enough

Of course, the adrenaline of a fight gets him riled up just as much though more noticeably

N = NO (Something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

Hurting you to severely is a definite no-go for him, as it anything too reminiscent of what he went through with Francis

Otherwise, any non-con roleplay and toilet stuff is also off limits

O = Oral (Preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc)

Though he is by no means selfish, he does prefer receiving over giving. Having you so willing to get him off in such a way only enhances how good it feels. He always wants to finish in your mouth and he’ll sometimes ask you to beg him for it

He’ll eagerly return the favour whenever you want him to, or for any little excuse. He’s good at it as well, he can have you on the edge in record time and he always seems to relish that knowledge

P = Pace (Are they fast and rough? Slow and sensual? etc.)

He almost always goes quite slow, to make sure he can fuck you deeper or rougher and really pick you apart. Even when you might get caught, he rarely goes faster than his usual pace

Q = Quickie (Their opinions on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc.)

Quickies are almost as good as proper sex to him. Sometimes better but it depends on the occurrence. Any possible moment, he’s offering to take you aside for a bit of ‘tension relief’ regardless of how many times you’ve already had sex that day

Even if it’s totally the wrong time, or there’s no semi-private place, he’ll still offer

R = Risk (Are they game to experiment, do they take risks, etc.)

He’s down for trying almost everything and he’ll approach every new experience with the same enthusiasm each time

Evidently, he won’t push you to take any risks that you aren’t certain about, but he will try to encourage you in his usual way

S = Stamina (How many rounds can they go for, how long do they last…)

Since the Incident with Francis, his stamina in all ways has improved

He’s borderline insatiable, able to easily go for four rounds before he’s spent, and with that he could keep you up almost all night

T = Toy (Do they own toys? Do they use them? On a partner or themselves?)

He owns a few, a small collection, or a couple vibrators and dildoes as well as one or two masturbation toys. There is a strap-on hidden somewhere, half forgotten

All the toys are tried and tested, he is very willing to use each one on himself or have you use them in any way

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

Wade teases, mostly, by giving you almost enough but not quite to  make you whine and beg

Other times, it’s the typical denial and delay teasing also but only when he’s feeling more playful

V = Volume (How loud they are, what sounds they make)

He is unashamed with his moans and whines, any little noise that wants to get out, and can be loud but he can’t see the issue

However, when there are complaints, he can get obnoxiously louder out of spite.

W = Wild Card (Get a random headcanon for the character of your choice)

Because of his situation, his insecurities, he gets quite easily jealous over any possible sexual interest you could show to anyone else. He trusts you implicitly, he just thinks that he isn’t the most physically appealing person

To take that jealousy out of his system, he makes you cum in the nearest possibly-private place he can, hoping that whoever it is that is causing the jealousy might come by and see that they have no chance

X = X-Ray (Let’s see what’s going on in those pants, picture or words)

As almost everyone who knows him will know, he’s got a pretty big dick. While they know from his bragging and overly descriptive recollections of nights or even hours before, you know from the ache that lasts for hours after sex

Y = Yearning (How high is their sex drive?)

Wade is always down for sex. He’s insatiable, having gotten you both in trouble multiple times for sneaking away to fuck when you should be focusing on something else

Z = ZZZ (… how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

When you’re both settled down in bed, he’ll make a point of staying awake after you’ve fallen asleep so he can be more obviously worriedly-overjoyed that he has you in his life and his bed and his heart

Give me requests or give me death. If you want the notifications for when I rise from the dead again, then the tag list is always open.

[shaydeoffical]

A Plea: Shouto Todoroki X Depressed Reader

Summary: After a being ditched by their friends, (Y/N) goes into a depressive episode for nine days. Will Shouto be able to get inside? Is there nothing a little love and attention can’t fix?

Warnings: Depressive negligence. Abandonment. Hurt and Comfort.  

A Plea

   The water was almost as cold as the kitchen. My attempt to feed me long forgotten with the engorged noodles left in foggy liquid. As if it was a toy that grows when left in water. The electric company had shut off my power the day before, and it's not because I couldn't pay, I just didn't send it in. There were too many other things on my mind, like how I'm going to avoid sleeping for the rest of my life, and why I could eat a sharing size bag of M&M's in one sitting.

   Rolling into my sheets on the kitchen floor, I started to count the cracks in the wood, add caulking the siding to my list of to-dos, and wait for the draft to shift the fuzz back under the fridge. Maybe, if I got wild, I'd roll and face the living room. Rub my fingertips across the grain on the carpet and pluck at the fibers.

   Knocking. There had been so much knocking. It made my headache worse, so I covered my eyes and groaned- twirling to face the living room.

   "(Y/n) open up. I'm not leaving this time." Shouto jiggled the handle. "I'm reasonable enough to give you space when you ask, but I need you to let me in, babe."  

   "Go," my voice crackled, throat rubbing against itself like sandpaper. There was so much more I wanted to say, but the will wasn't there. The washing feeling, like I was in the rinse cycle.  My body urged to motion    "Come and unlock the door." Shouto sighed, but he would just have to keep waiting there. My body pushed itself up and collapsed back down, the shock releasing the hold of his quirk. "(Y/n)?"    "No use." I dry sobbed, no tears left to cry. The door frame rattled again and again. He wouldn't give up, it was a wonder he had left me yesterday. Believing that I just wasn't home.    "(Y/n)," the lock gave, and Shouto was hovering over me. His hands wrapped around either side of me, pulling me into his chest. My head lulled to the side, and he pinched the skin on my hand, the raised part ever so slowly evening back out. "You're dehydrated. Damn it, I knew I should have made you opened up yesterday."    Shouto got me to my feet and laid me on the sofa. Lighting a few candles, after seeing the lamps wouldn't work, he went to the case of water by the fridge and pulled one out. He sat me up and placed my upper body in his lap, in an upright position. Pressing it to my lips, I resisted at first, before a tiny drop made it to my tongue. My body remembering we needed water, I took long greedy gulps and downed the bottle at a sickening pace. "That's it, don't go to fast or you'll get sick Kitten." He massaged my scalp, working around the knots in my hair. "Can you speak now?"    "I don't want to," I hid my face in his neck. "I just want to disappear."    "You've disappeared for over two days." He massaged my shoulder, rocking slightly, switching between hot and cold.    "Nine days." I corrected, "last I checked, it's been nine days." I pulled back to looked at the clock, eyes squinting in the dark.    "What happened on your friend's trip?" Shouto was so good at putting the pieces together, always so sharp, so reliable he had changed so much from his days at UA. I crumpled my hand in his soft t-shirt.    "They told me it was a sauna on Toyama, but they all three went to Koichi. When I texted them, I was at the resort, they left me on reading. Sho, I thought they had been in some sort of accident. There was a period of three hours where I was calling hospitals and police stations, scanning the news for any accidents they could have been in. I rang their phones off the hook, and- God, my voice hurts so bad. It hurts so bad." His hands had wrapped around me and squeezed just tight enough, so I knew he was there. If there was one thing right in this world, it was him. His undying devotion and love.    "Take your time, baby," Shouto cooed, his teeth gritted body slightly tense. "Toyama and Koichi are so far apart, it wasn't an accident."    "No, I wanted to believe it was. But I finally got on Facebook to message one of their partners, and they had posted pic's from the resort. You can't take a selfie without your phone…they had to see it. None of them called or checked in on me. You know I could have saved three hours of my life if they had just told me they were okay. That they didn't' want me there." Shouto rubbed my back softly, my body shuttered as the kinks were being worked out. The floor was not a kind mistress. "I don't know what I did for them to turn so suddenly."    "You didn't do anything to have this happen. The fault is not in you, but them. Where you able to get your money back for the room?" I laid on the couch, and he straddled my back and began to work out the more significant kinks in my neck.    "Noo, I used my card to pay, and since they didn't show, I lost the full amount. There was enough money to pay my eclectic, but then I'd be broke the rest of the month. And that involved moving to get to the phone to pay it, and I just want to lay on the floor and cry." More tears slipped. Shouto kept his pace. "Even I wanted to go to the other place I couldn't have afforded it. I should have thought it was weird they reached out to me after all these years. It was so stupid to believe they really wanted to patch things up."    "You have. A good heart, that's not a bad thing, they just took advantage of that." He sighed, getting up and walking towards the kitchen. "(Y/n)You didn't deserve this. I wish you would have called me the idea of you being like this for nine days." He pushed his hair back, resting against the kitchen counter, eyes on the sheet pile on the floor. "Babe, sit up so you can eat." "I don't deserve you." I curled into myself, the familiar position I had been for days. "I don't deserve you caring for me or anything."    "It's okay to feel that way, but it's not true." Shouto pushed my hair back, not even shuttering from the grease. "There's a lot that we don't deserve, but I am not one of them. As much as I know I don't deserve you, I want you. Do you still want me?"    "Yes." I hiccupped, interlocking our fingers.    "Do you want to be held?" His voice was a low coo, pressing his forehead to mine.    "Please?" He sat the plate of crackers down on the coffee table and got behind me, acting as the big spoon.  His knees rested under my ass, and I was cocooned in his sandalwood scent. Fresh and smoky, mixed in with the woody undertone of his cologne. It didn't much of a leap to know I smelt of death, yet his nose was neck to my ear. Lips pressing small kisses to my throat and decalage. Working his hands up and down my torso, hot and cold ebbing aware the soreness.    "Is that better?" He lifted up and kissed me from behind.    "mmm," I agreed, his lips matching mine at a slow yet burning pace.  We had no reason to rush, and I had no energy to get heated, but his passion left no room for me to want more from this.    With my eyes closed, I lifted my head for another smooch as he pulled away, and was met with a cracker. "Once you eat and get cleaned up, we can do more.  Can you eat just a few of these, babe?"    "I can try." Shouto handed me the water, and we sat up. If I thought the water was excellent, the crackers were heavenly. I had snacked and drunk some over my depressive stent, but it was just so much energy to put out to make food.    "That's all I need from you, baby." He pressed a kiss to the side of my forehead and gave my shoulder an affirming squeeze. "I love you."    "I love you more." I smiled slightly, for the first time in nine days.    "I'm never going to abandon you, remember that. There's no way I'd ever turn my back on you, no matter what state you in. Okay?" He kneeled in front of me, holding my knee. "I'll go heat up a bath for you, then we can work on getting the electric back on."    "Thank you, Sho." Shouto reminded me I had a life here. My old friends were important to me, but this was my future. Shouto and I were going to take on this world together, and it was okay to be weak in front of him. It would take time to get used to him seeing me like this, but he wanted to be here. And who am I to deny him to be a light in my dark mess.

[the--highlanders]

31. Rest

on ao3.

It was oddly warm, in the draughty little room they had hidden themselves away in. He could have sworn that only minutes before it had been freezing – but perhaps then all the heat had been draining out of him to fill the air instead, and now it was soaking back into him. Or perhaps the cluster of candles spread across the desk had finally grown hot enough to warm things up. Or maybe it was just that he was so tired, his eyes drifting closed against the flickering of the candlelight over the pages before him. Surely, he thought, surely it would be alright for him to close his eyes. Just for a moment. Not even to put his head down, but just to get the heaviness in his eyelids out of his system, and then he would feel fresh and awake again.

The Doctor put his hand on his shoulder, making him jerk back just as his head started to tip forwards. “Are you quite alright, Jamie?”

Shaking his head and blinking, Jamie stared down at the quill in his hand. It had scratched against the parchment as he had leant forwards, leaving a long, black streak through his painstaking rows of tally marks. “Och, no -”

“It’s alright.” Easing the offending page out from under Jamie’s arm, the Doctor held it up to the dim light, tracing his finger over the shapes of the tally marks beneath the thick streak of ink. “It, ah, should still be legible.”

Casting a glance over towards the Doctor’s much larger pile of finished documents, Jamie felt guilt twist in his gut. Quite how long it had been he was not sure, but he had watched the light from the tiny window above them rotate across the rough stone of the opposite wall, dimming and growing orange with the sunset before eventually vanishing. Now all that was left was a small patch of moonlight, all but drowned out even by the greasy, tallowy candles, faint as they were. It would be dawn before he was finished, at the rate he was going.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, reaching over to take the page back from the Doctor. “I’ll copy it out again, I’ll -”

The Doctor laid a hand on his arm, quietening him. “It’s quite alright,” he said gently. “It’s not so bad. And you’re almost done.”

Throwing his pile a dirty look, Jamie snorted. “I’m only halfway through.” The cold was creeping back into him now that he was properly awake and alert again, stiffening his hand around the quill, and he shook his wrist gingerly to loosen it. “It’s alright,” he said hastily, blocking the Doctor from taking some of the unfinished documents from him. “I’ll get it done. It’s just – I’m no’ so fast as you, ‘cause of the reading thing, an’ -”

“Some of the handwriting is rather hard to read -”

“I’m tryin’, really -”

“Perhaps we ought to get another candle, it might make things easier -”

“But I’m just no’ so good at this.”

“Jamie.” Startled by the Doctor’s sudden firmness, Jamie looked up at him. The Doctor reached out to take his shoulders, twisting him around fully so they faced each other. “If I hadn’t thought you were up to this, I would have asked Victoria to help me.”

“She would’ve done a much better job,” Jamie mumbled. In truth, he had been wondering exactly why the Doctor had sent Victoria to help the militia, and asked him to sort through the monastery’s records. It was not as if Victoria was not capable – despite her size, he would not like to cross her when she was upset – but he could not help but feel as if the Doctor had gotten their jobs mixed up. At least with the militia, he would have felt like he could try and keep pace with them, and Victoria would have had no problem at all with these scribbled little lists of numbers and books.

“Victoria,” the Doctor said patiently, “is very good at telling people what to do.”

“Well – aye, she is.”

“And what the militia needed was someone to get them into shape. Could you do it better than she could?”

“Well, no, but...” Jamie’s objection crumbled and trailed off. He could imagine it all too well – Victoria as the self-appointed general, marching the town’s inexperienced rabble of a defence force up and down the monastery’s gardens, barring the gates, readying buckets of oil to be dropped onto any invaders outside the walls. She would surely be having much more fun than he was. “Aye, alright, she’d be good at that. But I’m no’ good at this.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” the Doctor said, tapping at the page that held his tally marks. “Look how many you’ve done.”

“But yours -”

The Doctor shifted his own stack of tallied pages away from Jamie’s protesting grasp. “Are purely down to the fact that I can read much faster than any human. Including Victoria,” he added when Jamie opened his mouth. “You, ah, might be at something of a disadvantage compared to her, I’ll admit – though I think you underestimate yourself – but I wouldn’t go measuring your progress against mine.”

It was cold comfort, and Jamie slumped back against the knobbly wood of his chair, sighing. “I should’ve done more.”

“None of that, now. It’s been a long afternoon.” The Doctor broke into a yawn, flailing his arms out so Jamie had to duck to avoid being hit in the head. “I could take yours, if you like. I’m almost done with mine.”

“I can do it!”

“I’m not saying you can’t. Just that you look like you could do with a break.”

Principles aside, Jamie could not deny the fact that the idea of a break sounded almost heavenly. “I’m meant tae be keepin’ ye company,” he said, if a little half-heartedly. “Even if I cannae do anythin’ else.”

“Oh, I’ll be alright. Don’t worry about me.” Jamie hesitated, quill still hovering an inch above the ink pot. “Go on, go back to the dorms. I’ll wake you in the morning.”

“I’m no’ going tae the dorms.” Finally dropping the quill, Jamie crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m stayin’ here. I’ll sleep on the desk.”

“Jamie -” The Doctor’s mouth quirked into a bemused smile. “That won’t be very comfortable, you know.”

“Aye, I know. I’m too tired tae care.” Even as he spoke, Jamie smothered a yawn, his words summoning his tiredness to the forefront of his mind. “An’ this way I’ll still be with ye.”

“Your snoring will be, at least,” the Doctor countered playfully. “Might liven the place up.”

Scowling, Jamie swiped at him. “I don’t snore.”

“I can assure you, you do.”

“Hmph.” Jamie lowered his head, then jerked back up so the Doctor could take his papers and add them to his own pile. “Wake me in a wee while,” he said, as firmly as he could muster with his mouth pressed against his arms. “An’ leave me some. I’ll finish it off for ye.”

“If you insist. Oh!” The Doctor wriggled his way out of his coat, balling it up and holding it out for Jamie to take. “You, ah – might be more comfortable with this underneath you.”

“Thanks.” For all that it tended to jingle around like it was full of coins, the Doctor’s coat made a surprisingly comfortable pillow. Jamie nestled his head into it, breathing in the Doctor’s honey smell that had woven its way into the worn fabric. “Promise you’ll wake me.”

“I’ll wake you.” Dropping his papers, the Doctor shoved his hand against Jamie’s folded arms, prodding around until he had found Jamie’s hand and taken it. “I’ll hold onto you to remind myself.”

“Aye, alright.” Closing his eyes, Jamie smiled. “If ye like.”