#and all the tags that have my fanfictions

[r0tting-rat]

Happy Valentine's Day!

Sooo, is anyone in the mood for a greek feast?

Credits to @hexcii, who helped me greatly with the character designs and keeps supporting me in every little thing I do <3

I can finally present you a new AU that will be released in the following days in occasion of this holiday—Kallisté.

It's a God of War!Eclipse x God of Love!Reader fanfiction obviously inspired by Ares and Aphrodite. (character playlists linked)

(again, all credits go to @/hexcii <3)

God!Reader is gender neutral, pretty tall compared to normal humans (they're a god, duh), and has a generally outgoing and cheerful personality (but there's a lot more than just that to their character). Eclipse is harsh, rough, angry and mean with the other gods, but the very moment he's faced with someone so different from him, so... pure, he falls so hard and fast he doesn't even know what hit him.

The classic gods will make an appearence too! With their original names tho bc renaming them all would be HELL.

I will take inspiration from many different myths and authors; some greek, some roman, like Ovid, Virgil and Catullus. Other inspirations may come from more recent poets like Ariosto.

My inbox is open for any questions you might have, and I truly can't wait to show you all what I have in store <3 This new AU will be Mature at best (due to some... suggestive scenes and a few sex jokes) and very centered around fluff and comfort, I'll go more into details in the tags when I finally post it.

Again, happy valentine's day!

And btw, Hexcii, you're a fucking treasure <3

[syluss-karaoke-teacher]

Love and Deepspace - Nightly Rendezvous - Part IV, Sylus

And finally we complete the series with Sylus' card!! I admit, I kinda dreaded him bc alongside Raf he is my main and his card was so breathtakingly emotional, not to mention pretty much canonically their first time. Hope I was able to do it justice!

Word count: 2539 words

MDNI! Tags and main text under the cut. You have been warned.

NOTE: This fic is only posted on tumblr and on AO3 under the pseud Yuli_Hunter. All other uploads on any other websites are non-authorized. I do not own any part of Love and Deepspace as an IP, but I do own this piece of fanfiction, and you are not allowed to repost it, copy it or otherwise claim it as your own.

That's it, enjoy! ❤️

Tags: reader!MC, fem!reader, PWP, fingering and oral (f!receiving), PIV, mentions of overstimulation, Sylus is king of consent, emotional sex, first time together, yes I make all of them eat MC out what are you going to do about it?

Not beta-read we die like Grandma

*~*~*

You point the gun at his chest with a victorious smirk.

“I won. Now for my prize, Mr. Crow.”

Sylus chuckles, the sound rumbling deep from his chest as he raises his hands in mock surrender. His crimson eyes reflect the crackling fire that illuminates the living room.

“Fair and square kitten. Ask away.”

The tension between you two is so thick you could almost grasp it with your hands. In many ways it is not unlike your first ever meeting. Back then you hated him, hated everything he represented. Then you thought you hated him, and then wished you hated him.

And now… Now you hate that you ever hated him.

You still don’t know why Sylus decided to meet you the way he did, but you aren’t naïve enough anymore to believe it’s solely because he is the boss of Onychinus. The discoveries you have made along your journey have made you painfully aware of just how incomplete your worldview was.

The man before you is a killer and a criminal, yes. But a monster he is not. After all he has shown that he is capable of changing and learning from his mistakes; if not for anything or anyone else, then at least for you.

That is why the famously impatient and easily bored man waits for you, his silver eyebrow arched in a silent question, not pushing or prompting. As he has done from the minute he heard you despised him.

Sylus has no problem embarrassing you: he enjoys seeing you squirm and blush, whether due to walking around in little more than a towel hanging precariously from his sinful hips, or due to the sudden tenderness that he slips into your everyday moments together. He doesn’t hide his gaze raking over your body as you try on a new designer dress he bought for you, and if you ask him directly he will tell you in no uncertain terms just how beautiful you are to him. Yet despite the intensity that oozed from his very being, he always stopped at just the right distance. If you so wanted, this night would end like your nights so far had always ended: in separate bedrooms, with you getting more frustrated each time.

Well, not anymore. If you wanted to play the part of a big, fearless hunter, you should be able to manage this much of an offensive.

“I’m getting tired, Sylus.” To emphasize your words, you fake a yawn and stretch.

Sylus lowers his hands and cocks his head to the side. “That doesn’t sound like a question, sweetie.”

You pointedly ignore his jab, place the gun on the table and lay your hands on his shoulders instead.

“Can you take me to bed?”

There’s a sharp flash in his eyes, and you watch as his whole being refocuses on you. His muscles tense ever so slightly, and you see his Adam’s apple bob before he answers you.

“I thought you wanted to know my destination for tomorrow.”

For an outsider that would be a perfectly normal question. But to you, the only one that Sylus has let this close, the quiet raspiness in his voice tells you everything you need to know; the great leader of Onychinus is in the palm of your hand.

You slide your fingers up the sides of his neck to cradle his face. The crackling of the fireplace isn’t quite enough to drown out the quickening of his breath as you lean in closer.

“I’d rather live in the present, so I won’t dwell on a situation beyond my control. So… will you?”

Sylus’ answer is an unsteady exhale before he tightens one broad arm around your waist. You loop your arms around his shoulders as he lifts you off the couch and starts walking towards the master bedroom. His hand on your thigh almost burns through the flimsy fabric of your loungewear set, and his other hand gently turns your head towards him as he passes through the dimly lit corridors. He doesn’t break your gaze for a second, not even as he settles you on the ground between the loveseat and the bed.

“If you want to go to sleep, you need to release me,” he murmurs, making no move to pull apart. You look up at him coyly and press your body against him. Your head barely comes up to his chin, and you can feel his heart thundering in his chest.

“What if I don’t want to let go of you?”

Sylus smirks, but you see that the corner of his mouth quivering. His hold on you tightens again and he turns you both around before nodding towards the loveseat.

“Then I can keep holding you until dawn,” he says and runs his hand up and down your spine. The heat in his gaze is unmistakable now, and yet he doesn’t act on it. The man who forced you to fire a bullet into his heart the first time you met would now rather rip that same heart out with his own bare hands rather than make you uncomfortable.

The sweet tenderness makes you ache, but right at this moment a feeling far more intense demands to be let loose.

You bring your hands to Sylus’ chest and push him onto the loveseat. He lets out a small, surprised huff as you climb onto his lap and cradle his head once more in your hands.

“Then hold me,” you whisper, only inches away from his lips, “until dawn and beyond.”

The small kiss is all it takes for the dam to break. Sylus moans into your mouth and winds his arm tightly behind your hips and his other hand behind your head, locking you in place as he takes the lead. Sylus’ kisses are all-consuming and feverish, with no room for hesitation. You had been confident that he would return your feelings, but the sheer intensity of his actions leaves you breathless.

When your lips are red and swollen he finally pulls away, only to press a line of kisses along your jaw and neck. His hands run along your hips and ass and pull you flush against him. You whine as you feel the outline of his hard cock against your clothed core. He rocks his hips experimentally against yours.

“Is this okay?” he asks as he kisses your earlobe, “you’ll tell me if you want me to stop, right kitten?”

You answer by kissing him deeply. For a moment he lets you grind against him, but then pulls you back and looks at you with seriousness you didn’t expect.

“I need you to say it: ‘I will tell Sylus to stop whenever I want to.’”

You study his face for a moment, and that tender aching in your chest simmers to life again.

“I will tell you to stop whenever I want to,” you echo back to him. “Now take me to bed.”

You gasp as strong hands grab your ass and lift you up as effortlessly as picking up a kitten by its scruff. Sylus’ lips latch onto your neck and the twinge of pain as he sucks on your skin sends a jolt of electricity down to your core.

Sylus sets you down on the bed. His massive frame blocks the ceiling light almost completely from view. It makes his eyes shine even brighter, and you feel your breath catching in your throat. You lift your fingers to gently trace the corner of the eye wherein his Aether core resides.

“Am I greedy if I say I want you to only look at me?”. Sylus isn’t using his power on you, but you can hear your innermost thoughts raging in your head, nonetheless. They form only one name, one target.

Sylus smiles. It isn’t teasing or arrogant as his usual smirks; your question seems to delight him.

“You have always had the right to demand it, kitten. Which means you can be even greedier now.”

He lifts up your hips and grinds your core against his. You whine as he rocks himself against your silk shorts, the thin fabric doing nothing to hide the wetness that soils your panties underneath. The friction of the fabric against your clit makes your toes curl and you squeeze Sylus’ arm in response.

“Sylus…” you groan between kisses. The world around you grows hazy as your brain struggles to give orders to your body. You want everything from him, all at once, but the words die on your tongue and morph into moans and gasps instead.

Luckily there is an end to Sylus’ self-control after all. Just as you think you can’t take it anymore, he leans his forehead against yours and looks at you so reverently it forces your addled mind into focus once more.

“Do you want this?” he asks. This, meaning him, on you, inside you, tonight or for all eternity?

“Yes. All of it. All of you.”

A twinge of energy skitters along your skin as Sylus’ Evol surges from his fingertips. In seconds both of your clothes fall apart, covering the bed in black tatters. Before you can so much as squeak Sylus flips you over and settles you onto his chest. You gasp at the feeling of your bare pussy pressing against his firm chest. He spreads you wide open and strokes the skin of your thighs with his thumbs.

“I’m afraid I won’t be able to stop once I get to taste you,” he says as his fingers slide closer to your center. “So I’m hoping your answer won’t change.”

You shake your head and let your eyes fall close as Sylus strokes your glistening folds with the calloused pads of his fingers. He stays away from your clit, making you whine from frustration. He chuckles and you slap his chest in retaliation.

“I need to hear what you need, sweetie,” he replies as he catches your hand and brings it his lips to kiss it. “Your pleasure is my pleasure. Whatever you want me to do, I will.”

He pushes your hand backwards past your hips. You blindly reach behind you and shudder as you feel his heavy cock resting against his abdomen. The slight touch makes him sigh and you watch as a beautiful flush rises on his cheeks as you gingerly stroke him.

“See how little it takes? Just the mere opportunity to be able to please you has made me this way. So believe me when I say this, kitten… You are allowed to ask anything of me.”

Your breathing struggles to flow as you take in his words. Your thighs tremble at his sides as you finally swallow your hesitation.

“Your mouth, Sylus… I want you to use your mou—”

The rest of the sentence is drowned in a pitiful wail as Sylus pulls you forward onto his face. You hastily brace yourself on the headboard as he pushes his tongue inside you. You can feel his nose bumping against your clit as he eats you out like a man starved. Instinctively you rock your hips against the divine, soft heat of his mouth. You feel him groan against you, his hands gripping you even tighter to block out any notion of pulling back from your position.

“Sylus, Sylus, oh god…” you whimper as you try to stay upright. You feel so incredibly wet it’s almost humiliating, but the relentless pressure makes you forget any rational thought as you fast approach a high you have never experienced before. You feel Sylus take his other hand from your hip and maneuver it under you, and before you can ask him if he needs a break you feel him slide his middle finger inside your pussy. He changes his position to focus more on your clit as he rubs you from the inside. The change in pace makes you howl.

“Please, please, oh god, feels so good Sylus, please, I’m—” you babble and grip the headboard with white knuckles. Stars swim into your vision as your body tenses to a breaking point. When Sylus pushes another finger in your mouth falls agape in a silent scream and you crash over the peak. The orgasm rolls over you like a tidal wave, and if it wasn’t for the strength of Sylus’ hands you would collapse entirely.

You feel like floating when Sylus lifts you up and flips you over onto your back. He wipes his glistening jaw with the back of his hand as he stares into your eyes with a hunger that hasn’t been satiated in the slightest. You let him manhandle you into spreading your legs for him, hands pressing your things apart and down, his cock dragging itself against your glistening pussy.

“More,” he whispers as he squeezes your thighs almost painfully. “Please, let me hear it. Tell me you want it too.”

You watch as his cockhead catches onto your entrance before sliding forward once more. You feel yourself clenching around nothing as you image him inside you, claiming you, filling you to the brim. You are still quivering from your high as you plead him to take you, all of you.

The moment you give him permission he takes it to heart again. He pushes inside you slowly, lets you adjust to his size, his broad chest heaving with the effort of holding back. His eyes are glazed over with both want and something soft, something you don’t dare yet name. His figure becomes unfocused as tears well up in your eyes from the almost painful fullness.

“Sylus, it’s too much,” you gasp, and he kisses the corner of your mouth.

“Just breathe, almost there.”

By the time he has pressed himself in to the hilt of his cock your head is trashing against the pillows and your pussy is leaking around him in a desperate effort to ease the intrusion. Your mind grows hazy once more as he starts to rock into you, and you could swear you feel his cock nudging your goddamn throat at this point. Just as you think you can’t take much more you feel Sylus’ fingers rub tight circles on your clit.

“Let go sweetie. You can cum as many times as you want. We have the whole night after all.”

And with that he pulls out almost completely before slamming back in, his cock pushing straight against the sweet spot inside you. Your world goes white as you shatter around him.

This time he doesn’t stop. He fucks you like a man possessed, pulling orgasm after orgasm from you as you fight to stay coherent. Only your fourth one proves too much for him and he finally spills inside you with a long, shaking groan. Even then it’s merely a moment’s distraction. His cock doesn’t even soften inside you: instead, he fucks his seed deeper into you while shaking from overstimulation. You tell him with a failing voice that he too can stop if he wants to, but your only answer are blunt nails pressing crescent moon shapes into your hips as he carries you both deep into the night.

Tell me you want it.

I do, Sylus. I want it all.

[iscdisc]

You and your gorgeous TMNT art make me ship everything you ship. You could tell me to ship the most outrageous thing, draw it, and I would ship it. Like the most grotesque thing. I would love it. You are brilliant. May I ask for the fics you are reading and/or you have read?

Well I hope I wouldn't ship anything grotesque or that you feel would be grotesque- 💀😭 Lmao

But I get what you mean and that's incredibly flattering ! I hope everybody that engages with my content knows that I'm not trying to necessarily convince anybody to enjoy the pairings that I enjoy, but if you happen to click with my perspective whether it's from my art or from me talking about them, that's really cool to me !! ☺️✨

And sure ! I'll list some that I'm currently reading or have read recently that I really enjoyed ! I'll even include some that I plan to or started but haven't gotten very far yet- :

• "And It All Starts Again" (by Non_Parsimonious | Currently reading-)

I'm starting with this one because it is absolutely peak- Are you serious?? I'm telling you right now, this should have been Season 5 instead OR if the 2012 series had ever gotten the opportunity to have a film adaptation and it actually be well done narratively, this should have been that movie- I'm TELLING YOU, this story is absolutely phenomenal and I'm already in the process of making art for it to promote it ! 🫶 || I'm not going to spoil too much because I really want people to read it for themselves, but there's so much stress and angst that kind of pushes the narrative for that I'm just eating up because I enjoy those kinds of stories ! But if that's not your cup of tea, then feel free to skip this one-! 👍✨

• "Thoughts About A Boy" (by @jaywritezshitz | Currently reading-)

Maybe I talked about this one enough already, but I'd love to talk about it some more because it's a really great 2012 Jonatello story and I think it's incredibly well written !! I love the premise, I love the character interactions (Especially with April and Donnie, which says a lot in regards to myself because that's usually something I don't particularly enjoy because of canon / not fanon- /,, 😭), I love the build up and the constant anticipation that I feel waiting for confessions or for Donnie's letters to be weaved back into the narrative in the least expected way possible (Not to give too much away, because I really encourage you guys to read it for yourselves-), like !! There's just so much to enjoy with this one, and I really encourage people to read it cause I personally think it's really phenomenal !

• "Oh, Where'd All The Time Go?" (by Tae_rhymeswithslay | I plan on reading this one-)

My memory is kind of foggy with this one, because I swear I started reading the first couple of chapters but when I went back to confirm that I have read the story before it didn't feel familiar-?? So maybe I meant to read it and I thought I'd started it but I hadn't yet? 😭

But you're going to see a couple of Tae_rhymeswithslay entries on here, because I do enjoy their stories ! I also know that they're on here (Tumblr) but I couldn't @ them, so if you're reading this Tae, I'm sorry !!I did not tag you on purpose or anything like that-! 👍✨

• "Purple Hokey" (by Ani_Wagner_7w7 | Have already read-)

The setup for this particular 2012 Jonatello fanfiction feels very authentic to the show, in the sense that this is a situation I can absolutely see the writers putting them in (Not that they were the biggest Jonatello enthusiast, but you get my point-), you know? LMAO / It sort of felt like a cliche trope but done well ! It does ramp up a little maturity wise towards the end, just to give a heads up for that-! But otherwise it's just a cute story in my opinion ! ✨

• "Of the Same Cloth, the Same Coin" by Kazegami | Currently reading-)

Another incredibly peak story- Are you kidding?? I genuinely get so happy every time the story gets updated because it's one of my favorites ! The premise is that Casey asked Donnie for help with his school tutoring since April's going on a trip with her father for a few weeks, so of course they build a better relationship through constantly being around each other due to this tutoring situation ! Another kind of trope-like premise, but how the author tackles it is my favorite thing ever- I also really enjoy how April is written in the story as well and the sort of subplot that's going on with her ! I swear these writers do such an incredible job with her character and it makes me both happy and upset at the same time because why couldn't she have been like this in the show? I don't know- 💀 Lmao / But another story that I highly recommend !!

• "Technicolor" (by SecurityTape | Have read already-)

This is one that I genuinely was not expecting to read, since I'm not the biggest fan of crossover pairings (Not that they're necessarily bad, they just don't always interest me in the way I feel the interest of the people-!), but this one was really charming !! I really enjoyed the writing of both Rise! Donnie and 2012 Casey in the work of fiction ! It really reminded me of how much I missed the energy of Rise! and that I need to rewatch that version more because it genuinely is very funny- 😭✨

• "A Kiss As A Prize" (by Mili_8a | Have read already-)

This is one of the few 2012 Raphril fanfictions I've read / found on AO3 that I really enjoyed ! It's pretty short, but the premise was really cute and there's such a shortage of Raphril content in my eyes, so anything that I find I'm pretty much going to eat it up immediately- LMAO ❤️💛

• "Northampton Echoes" (by Gladrial | Currently reading-)

I barely started a chapter of this last night, and I already love the writing so far ! It takes place at The O'Neil Farmhouse (So far at least-), which I find particularly enjoyable because a lot of my Raphril centric thoughts in regards to building their dynamic / better establishing a connection between them starts in The Farmhouse in my head (I actually have this whole comic that I was trying to make talking about how I felt certain things during The Farmhouse Arc should have played out differently in my opinion and it mostly focuses around April and Raph- Maybe I'll bring that up at some point on here !), so I'm already pretty enthralled in this story set up so far ! I don't have much to say about it besides that though, because like I said I haven't gotten too far into the store yet-! But there's 19 chapters so far, and I already know that that's probably not going to be enough for me- LMAO

• "The Day The World Broke" (by @saladmix | Started reading this one-)

I feel like an asshole, because I started reading this one like months ago and I just never picked it up again and I don't know why- I think I might have gotten distracted with other things going on? I genuinely don't remember- But seeing people talk about it on here (Tumblr) reminded me that I need to go back and read that because the story is incredible ! I genuinely loved the first couple of chapters that I read ! I love the dynamic that they were setting up between the Mutant Mayhem Brothers in the beginning of the story, especially since I feel like (at the time anyway-) the MM / TOTTMNT brothers weren't getting a lot of love or attention from people?? I didn't get into the more plot focused chapters yet, but I believe I was close ! So hopefully I'll go back and read that soon I'll have more to talk about ! 👍✨ (Sorry for the abrupt tag by the way, Saladmix ! I hope that was okay-!)

• "My Best Enemy Is You" (by Aethernight | Have already read-)

I didn't think I was going to like this story as much as I did, because I'm not super into vampire stories, but this story was really good !! I never knew how much I needed Vampiric 2012 Jonatello (But in the context of the story, Donnie's the vampire, where Casey's a vampire hunter-) set in like the 1800s (??) before now, it's wild- 🦇💜🖤

• "Something Dumb To Do" (by Aleaf737 | Have read already-)

This is another really short and sweet one for 2012 Jonatello ! It's about a marriage proposal and it honestly was really wholesome ! ✨

• "One Nice Moment" (by Tae_rhymeswithslay | Have read already-)

Another kind of short one but it was really cute ! 💜🖤

• "Make Me A Promise Here Tonight (Love Like A Tidal Wave" (by Imthebest_ever | Have read already-)

This one spoke to me immediately because it involves a sort of aftermath to the episode, "The Power Inside Her" ! I really liked the narrative here ! ✨

• "Ink On Paper" (by Tae_rhymeswithslay | Have read already-)

This is another short story, but it felt so in character for Donnie towards the end it's so upsetting- LMAO

• "Arnold Bernid "Casey" Jones" (by Tae_rhymeswithslay | Have read already-)

I feel bad for saying the same things about a lot of Tae's works, but they really are just short and sweet most of the time and I enjoy reading them a lot !! This one in particular had a lot of humorous moments as well- 😭👍✨

Hopefully those are enough ! There are probably some that I'm forgetting at this point, but oh well,, 😭 Lmao

[theevilcactus]

What's the origin of your blog title?

I was an angsty teenager who liked cacti and I needed a blog title. There was really no deeper meaning behind it, but I'm attached now.

OTP(s) Shipname:

I don't really have one specific OTP right now, but a couple of my top ships historically have been Whouffle (when I was in high school) and Hannigram (in the first couple years of college). I'm currently very much enjoying James/Alyssa (the end of the fucking world) and Polypalooza (from PIBE), but I wouldn't call either of those my OTP.

Favourite colour:

Green! I like all shades, but I'm especially fond of overly bright lime green. Eyesore levels of green.

Favourite game:

If we're talking video games, it's easily The Sims 4. If we're talking physical games, like board or card games, probably Fluxx. (Star Fluxx if you want to be specific.)

Song stuck in your head:

Dead Girl Walking (Reprise)

Weirdest habit/trait?

I can't stand having the volume on an odd number. It needs to be even. No matter what. Even is 10 is too quiet and 12 is too loud, I will not put the sound on 11. I will put up with any level of inconvenience from the even numbers if it means avoiding having to put it on an odd one.

I don't know if that's actually that weird, but my mom seems to think i is.

Hobbies:

Reading & writing fanfiction, making a bunch of characters in the sims that I'm never actually gonna play, occasionally hiking.

If you work, what's your profession?

Unemployed, unfortunately. In the process of looking for a new job.

If you could have any job you wish, what would it be?

Writing novels. It's a damn hard field to break into, though, if you want to actually make enough money to live on. Even harder if you're like me and seemingly unable to actually finish writing a novel.

Something you're good at:

Writing. I'd better be good at it, I've been writing fics since I was 8 and I literally majored in creative writing in school.

Something you're bad at:

Being social, responding to texts within a timely manner

Something you love:

My silly little shows. Also, my cat.

Something you could talk about for hours off the cuff:

Pretty much any of the shows/books/movies I've ever been super into (I tend to get very obsessive about them and rewatch the same episodes constantly). Or Greek mythology.

Something you hate:

The texture of the inside of a tomato.

Something you collect:

I guess you could say I collect books, but that's less of a deliberate collection and more of an accident. Earrings maybe?

Something you forget:

Pretty much everything, I'm very forgetful.

What's your love language?

Does parallel play count? Just existing in the same space as each other but each doing our own thing

Favourite movie/show:

My #1 favorite movie is Fear Street: 1978, closely followed by the Harley Quinn Birds of Prey movie. My favorite show is probably either Gotham or Survivor.

Favorite food:

Bread. I could eat a good loaf of bread all damn day, especially if there's herbed oil or butter or something to dip it in. Also, the specific combination of brie & blackberries & honeycrisp apple slices.

Favorite Animal:

Cats, maybe? I'm also currently very fond of toucans and orchid bees.

What were you like as a child?

Shy and anxious and very annoying about Warriors cats. And smart.

Favourite subject at school?

English/literature.

Least favourite subject:

Chemistry specifically, but other science classes were ok. Math if we want to be more general.

What's your best character trait?

My creativity

What's your worst character trait?

I'm a bit of a coward

If you could change any detail of your life right now, what would it be?

I'd have enough moneyyyyyyy to never need to work again

If you could travel in time, who would you like to meet?

I'd be more interested in various places/eras than specific famous historical people. I'd want to see ancient Greece or maybe some dinosaurs.

tagging @alpacasandravens @poolboyvmprmansion @cherrych4 @panic-wizard-sex-walrus @empir2 @cosmicoceanfic and @ anybody else who wants to do it

Get to know your mutuals!!!

cheers @stevie-marigold for tagging me!

What's the origin of your blog title?

doccy who! plus me mum always used to say i have telescopic arms. personally i think they're a normal length

OTP(s) Shipname:

johnlock, i will forever be a johnlocker no matter which version of those freaks we're talking about

Favourite colour:

orange <3

Favourite game:

factorio! i greatly enjoy the spagetti of it

Song stuck in your head:

antmusic by adam and the ants

Weirdest habit/trait?

darling everything i do is deeply weird, couldn't do something normal if i tried

Hobbies:

writing, reading, nuisance making, music enjoying, getting in the way, and various wool-related crafts

If you work, what's your profession?

im the imp who sits in your camera and paints the pictures for you (im out of blue btw)

If you could have any job you wish, what would it be?

id invent hexopostcards, which are hexagonal postcards and only have pictures of six sided things on. if a thing has more than six sides than you've got to have the seventh+ side(s) off the edge of the postcard. if it has less than six you have to draw where the rest of the sides could feasibly be. then id retire

Something you're good at:

answering questions truthfully

Something you're bad at:

eating dog food

Something you love:

doing jigsaws

Something you could talk about for hours off the cuff:

doccy who. i just do that anyway

Something you hate:

jigsaws that have too much sky so its all just blue (doesn't include my starry night puzzle)

Something you collect:

vinyls, posters, things ill use someday, names, ideas of things to write

Something you forget:

my best friends birthday. i have it written down and i still forget consistently

What's your love language?

circular gallifreyan

Favourite movie/show:

oh theres so many. doccy who and torchwood, sherlock, merlin (im really from a specific time going by those answers) loads of films too but, to say an obscure one to make me sound cool, mcfarland usa

Favourite food:

the souls of the damned. failing that pasta

Favourite animal:

@zelda-wheelz

What were you like as a child?

weird nervous about everything and a nerd

Favourite subject at school?

maths! don't ask me to remember a single thing from my alevels though

Least favourite subject:

drama. hated acting in front of all those eyes

What's your best character trait?

i like to think im quite nice

What's your worst character trait?

asking @zelda-wheelz the answers for half these questions

If you could change any detail of your life right now, what would it be?

id move

If you could travel in time, who would you like to meet?

george michael, so long as i can bring my mum

tagging: @captainfairygodmother @b1uetrees @by-gray

[earenwen-leafwhisper]

This will be for the followers and the few that have read my fanfictions

Its not a easy decision for me... but...

I will not post fanfiction until i found a beta reader, because sometime writing fanfictions is a lonely activity.

And I feel really alone

Its good to know that you have read and put a like... I will never go against it.

Its just that I feel that... I write bad fanfictions, and even if i write on my side. I'm just "why posting?" As i will be alone not having a conversation or even a word to be better

So yes...

I'm sorry for the ask of fanfictions, but they will not be post before long time

Avec affection,

Earenwen

(If you want to read what i have posted before, here the link of my masterlist)

It's not because I'm out that I will not see if i have messages (even if i doubt, that I will have a message)

[themeraldee]

Sweet As Honey

[Masterlist] [AO3]

18+ Only | 7.6k | Homelander x fem!Reader | Set in Season 4. Lactation kink. Breastfeeding. Self-induced lactation (there might be inaccuracies). Established relationship. Shower sex. (And more importantly) Awkward shower sex. Some dirty talk. Cockwarming.

Written for cozy corner kinktober prompt #21: Breastfeeding

Huge kudos to @witchyclipse for beta-reading and keeping me sane 💚

Ever since Homelander has taken up the role as the head of Vought, things have changed. He’s always had to carry the burden of being the company’s poster boy, but it’s a whole different league to be involved with the business side of things.

This change has put a mild strain on your relationship. With the increasingly irritable moods he comes home with, you have tried coming up with more and more ways to make him feel better and release the increasing tension. You’ve even tried your hand at massages. And even though Homelander sighs happily anytime your oiled hands glide down his back, you know it’s more of a soft caress than a massage. And while there’s nothing wrong with a soft touch, the tickle of your hands doesn’t ease any of the deep ache lingering in the fibers of his steel woven muscles.

The closest you ever got him to release even a sliver of tension has been with sex. No matter what the situation outside your little bubble of content and intimacy ends up being, he’s never taken away from either of your pleasures. He’s entirely in the moment. He can be an incredibly attentive lover, thinking of you and only you. Whether it’s about your pleasure or his own, his mind doesn’t wander to outer conflicts. It’s why you push for long sessions whenever you can. The longer you can keep him in the subspace the better.

So it’s not that any of the things you do don’t help. They do. Very well in fact. Daily you have Homelander purring in your lap while you stroke his hair or moaning in your ear while you stroke his cock. He happily guzzles up all the love, care, and attention you pour down his throat. 

However, his highs don’t last long. As soon as he’s forced to break out of the dreamlike state that only you and him inhabit, his mind is quickly plagued with the overwhelming thoughts of plans going wrong and positive public perception dropping in waves.

This is most prevalent after nightfall. The dark of the night brings out his inner demons. The tension snaps back into his spine like a spring that you’ve been doing your best to keep bent the entire evening.

Falling asleep is a tough ordeal. Once that hurdle is over, sleeping soundly is an even harder challenge. His nightmares frequent his sleep more often these days. 

So you do your best to soothe him through this transition. Some nights you talk his worries away. Filling his mind with an enticing vision of escaping the media and the corporate driven life he’s surrounded himself with. You place him in the imaginary scenario of a warm family home. There he comes home to soft music, warmth and comfort. In his mind you’re preparing a home-cooked meal for him and Ryan, calling everyone down to the dinner table when you’re ready. Family pictures on the walls, Ryan’s achievements tacked to the fridge with magnets; nothing about this image screams control or misery. His perfect imaginary family. 

The wistful smile he gives the vision you describe always tugs at your heartstrings. You both know it’s a fantasy and in a way is no better than the Vought-curated story of his upbringing. While the idea is fun to roleplay, at the end the vision always falls apart like a house of cards. 

The hurt he carries pains you to see. So you relish in knowing that you’re the reason behind his relieved sigh anytime he comes home. Just like the soft hum that resembles a purr anytime you’ve got him soft and malleable in your lap. It warms your heart on a daily basis that you still affect him so.

But you know you can do more. 

While other people would be upset at their partner having less time for them, for you it couldn’t have come at a better time. Before this whole Vought takeover really happened you couldn’t free yourself from Homelander’s presence for even a good ten minutes. Whether it’d be him making sure he’s always by your side, because you never know what might happen, or him keeping an eye on you through the walls of the Vought tower; you knew he was constantly there.

Planning any sort of surprise was impossible. He’d always come home, greeting you with a smile and a not at all subtle, what did you get up to today, planning anything? Like a child, too impatient to wait till Christmas morning, he’s scanning every room looking for whatever present or surprise you have prepared for him. And while it’s been annoying to not be able to surprise him, you can’t really fault him too much. He’s never had any of this. After he divulged the details of his upbringing, you started seeing how with you around, he was chasing the moments he missed out. So if looking for secret presents or having you read your book out loud as he dozes off next to you heals any part of his inner child, you can’t really complain.

During these tense days you see how much he craves the simplicity of what should have been. A childhood, and normal upbringing that would have never gotten him into this mess. Something that would ground him and soothe his soul. 

This is where your plan comes into play. It didn’t take long into your relationship for you to figure out just how much Homelander was fixated on your breasts. It’s where his hands immediately slip down to when your kissing got hot and heavy. It’s where he presses his lips anytime he’s inside you and in reach. And it’s most definitely where you most frequently catch him staring when you’re not looking.

The most recent development started off with Homelander falling asleep on your chest. Something about your heartbeat loud in his ears soothing him and putting him to sleep. This gradually turned into Homelander absentmindedly, or so he says, playing with your breasts. Which very quickly turned into him suckling on your nipples as he fell asleep. You never found it bothersome, quite the opposite.  

And seeing him nuzzle into your chest so peacefully, suckling on your breast with such a content face just gave you an idea. Another thing that he’s never had. Something you’re more than happy to provide.

You prove yourself to be resourceful. While Homelander is out of the penthouse juggling crime fighting, press conferences, public appearances and meetings, you’re at home researching home remedies, housewife tales and experiences of wet nurses.

Upon finding out that it’s possible for you to induce lactation without being pregnant or undergoing hormonal treatments, you cheer. While keeping this little secret to yourself would be easy enough with how occupied Homelander was these days, keeping up with a hormonal regiment would be a lot harder to explain.

So started your journey. It took a few months of constant massages. You introduced herbal medicine in the form of teas into your diet. Easily dismissed to Homelander as your new routine towards better health. From fenugreek to fennel seeds, you’ve tried everything to beat the odds. Your determination and hordes of free time left you able to fully commit. 

Knowing you were doing this for him was enough motivation to keep going. Anytime he’d come home upset, irritable and grumpy you made yourself another cup of tea and gave your breasts an extended massage in the shower.

Even in all your secrecy, Homelander still noticed something being off. Across the time together he’s gotten to know your body to a tee, identifying your cycles is as easy as knowing the day of the week. So it’s not surprising that he comments on changes to your body that are out of the typical window.

He nearly caught wind of your secret few months into your little experiment, when he kissed his way down your neck and your chest. Too eager to get his lips around your hardened nipples to take his time cherishing each inch of your skin like he normally would. 

He gives your nipple a kiss, parting his lips to suckle on it like usual but he stops himself right before, making an intrigued hum. 

“Your nipples are more swollen than usual.” He gives it a little lick, as if to check if everything is okay with you. 

“Oh it’s just this new bra I got. It’s a little irritating.” You easily lie. You’ve prepared yourself for this confrontation many times in your mind, coming up with plausible scenarios. And while you’re aware of Homelander’s disdain for liars, you know he’ll forgive this once your plan comes to fruition. 

“Well, fuck, buy some new ones. Have a shopping spree. Or whatever.” He sighs in between your breasts as he presses wet kisses into the soft skin. 

You chuckle at the suggestion. Of course, he’s always there to meet your every wish and demand. Should you voice it or not. “There’s no need, I’ve got plenty. Really.”

“Oop, nope, you’re not getting out of this one. Haven’t had you give me a show in a little while now.” He gives you a cheeky look but really his attention is equally split in between your conversation and your breasts and you know he’s soon going to forget this little detail.

“Sure. If it’ll make you happy. Though I’m not sure a new bra will help. Starting to think you’re the culprit.” Your tone is tinted with your smile as you run your hands through his hair making him hum around your nipple.

“Guilty.” He popped his lips off wetly for a second before turning back to lick and kiss his way around your breasts to continue his nighttime ritual.

And for all of Homelander’s pride in his enhanced senses, he’s not noticed anything different since then. Except for commenting on the obvious enlargement of your breasts, which you end up blaming on your cycle or—when that excuse falls through—weight gain. A fact he very happily hummed at before continuing his playtime.

Lucky for you, you got to conduct your little experiment at your pace. For once really getting to surprise him.

Except all you end up doing is surprising yourself. 

Although your breasts feel more swollen and tender these days you blame it on the constant massaging and Homelander’s very own take on stimulation of the tissue. And yet, you’ve still not gotten any tangible results. The defeatist part of you was ready to wave your plans goodbye as a result. Until now. 

You’re indulging in your nighttime routine before Homelander comes back home. The tenderness you feel as you massage your breasts with the help of a vanilla and almond milk body wash is nothing new. What’s new is the milky droplet you notice when you wash off the soapy residue off your breasts. 

What happens next is a rollercoaster only you’re privy to.

Your heart races, the joy nearly making you scream in celebration as a months-long process is finally bearing fruits. The overwhelming glee you feel at finally being able to gift Homelander this homemade treat is quickly soured when you just about hear the door slam.

No. no. no! Not like this.

You had a setup in mind. Following your nighttime ritual, you’d be easing his mind with the sweet rivulets coating his tongue. You imagined the palpable relief you’d feel coming off him with each suckle of his lips. You don’t want him to find out like this. 

You can only hope that he’s annoyed and distracted enough that blaming the scented soap would be enough of an explanation to the underlying sweet scent of your milk. Your own milk. The thought alone was enough to make you giddy again. The man has been entertaining your every wish and whim throughout your entire relationship. Not only has he been terribly difficult to surprise, the appropriate gift has been just as hard to find. Who knew that you’d find the perfect one within yourself. The thought of finally revealing your secret to Homelander leaves a visceral throb of warmth in between your thighs..

Your body goes through sharp turns each second. From joy to dread to arousal, you feel the anticipation of what’s to come when the bathroom door opens and in walks an already naked Homelander.

“Fuck, you're a sight for sore eyes. Missed you.” Homelander quickly makes his way into the glass walled shower sliding right behind you, his arms automatically wrapping around your waist.

“I missed you too. I'm glad you're home.” You mumbled weakly, tilting your head to the side to allow him to press a kiss to your cheek first, neck second. Even amidst the spray of hot water his lips are hot against your skin, leaving warm tingles along their path.

“You have no clue how happy I am to see you.” He talks into the juncture of your neck, barely audible to you. But you catch the fatigued tone nonetheless. Maybe today really is a perfect day for the reveal.

“What happened?” 

“You don't have to worry your pretty head about that right now. I can tell you later.” One of Homelander's arms dips lower. He exhales in a way that feels like releasing the entire day's worth of weight off his shoulders.

“Now… I want you. Because fuck, I don't know what you've used today but you smell really fucking good.” He inhales sharply letting the soft vanilla and almond sweet smell of you take over his senses. Whether or not his senses picked up on the lingering milky undertone is something you don't want to press on. Instead you distract him.

You spread your legs a little allowing his hand to slither in between your legs. While water is not a lubricant your pooled arousal is. Already you’re slick enough to let his fingers glide along the velvety softness of your cunt. 

“Look at you... You know—hah—I could hear your heart rate go a teeny tiny bit insane when I arrived. Getting up to no good, were you?” You clearly see the mischievous grin in your mind without having to turn around.

“I wanted to be ready for you.” You exhale softly. You slump in his hold. It's nice to be able to relax and feel his deft fingers softly rolling your clit in a way that leaves your nerves buzzing and craving more. “I was hoping you'd get home soon.” You trail off, your voice turning a little high pitched as he massages you precisely enough to get your thighs quivering. He's learned how to rub your clit in a way that feels like bursts of fire sparking underneath the surface while not overstimulating you. It feels like heaven. Your eyes roll back and you grip hold onto the arm that he still has wrapped around your middle.

And while your arousal came from the excitement regarding the progress of your long-winded journey it’s not difficult to lose sight of that when Homelander is coaxing sweet moans out of you with well placed strokes around your clit. The victory is all forgotten by the time you feel his hard cock grinding against your ass, just begging to be taken care of.

Homelander has always been a needy lover. Even when his day to day is filled with bullshit he seems to be losing more and more of his sanity over, he still takes care of you as thoroughly as you deserve. Of course, knowing he’s getting just as thorough of a treatment from you. 

“Feel that?” He grunts in your ear. Taking the opportunity to nip your ear with a playful chuckle.

“So fuckin’ slutty of you, barely touched you and you’re already dripping.” Your legs feel like jelly with the way he treats you. He holds you tight, unyielding against his frame. Manipulating you to his heart's content. You’re almost off the ground. You can still reach with your tip toes but it’s far enough that it forces you to sag all your weight onto his frame. The sense of weightlessness and the confusing physicality at play gets you lightheaded. With how effortlessly he supports your weight, his fingers find it easier to glide with precision.

Normally you’d love to return the dialogue. Praise his efforts, his body, his mind. Just him. You know that’s what he wants. But the euphoria from the excitement and the constant burning pressure on your clit is enough to have your mind spinning. Barely focused on what he’s saying, let alone capable of coming up with your own sexy one-liners. 

“I love that about you, you know that? You’re so responsive. You never disappoint. Needy. Eager. All for me.” His voice gets frazzled towards the end. The quiver in the way his voice breaks could make anyone think he’s the one close to the finish line. And really, if you weren’t still getting sprayed by hot water you’d be able to feel the precum his cock has leaked all over you, grinding into your body with the slip it provided. Even though you’ve given him no extra attention, you simply craving him is more than enough to get him riled up.

It’s okay, he’ll get his turn. He’ll get his reward.

"Nobody can make you feel this good, baby. Nobody." He trails off with a hiss; the smell of you intoxicating enough amongst the soft sweet scents of almond and vanilla.

What makes Homelander a truly great lover is his unfaltering pace. He’s not pausing because he has to readjust his grip on you, neither is his hand tired from the endless and torturously consistent strokes around your clit that make your nerves light up all the way to your toes. 

“Gonna be a good girl and cum for me? I know you’re close. I can almost fucking taste it.” Homelander sounds wrecked. 

As if he could feel every single sensation your body is going through. Maybe part of him can. He’s so attuned to your body’s reactions. The smell, the sound of your heartbeat, the feel of your straining muscle, the tremble of your limbs. It’s no wonder he’s just as affected. 

He’s proud of being able to make you feel this way. Being the only one to make you feel this way. He has said so many times before and he continues to do so. He revels in being able to bring you the heavens themself with each spectacular orgasm. “M’gonna need you to hurry up sweetheart. I still want to fuck you.” He says this with a chuckle as if you were simply a little late to a meeting and not on the brink of a mind-altering orgasm. “And with how good you smell, hah well, I’m not gonna fucking last long.” 

With a few more finishing strokes you’re locking up in his hold. This orgasm had a long build up. The consistency of his strokes slowly stoked the fire to a bright flame until you felt the sensation spread to every nerve ending across your body. From your toes to your scalp, your body endlessly tingling. You slump in his arms, the pleasure pulsating through you like waves crashing across the beachfront one after another. 

“Mhmm that’s it, spread your legs a little more.” Homelander grunts out. He isn’t patient enough to give you a second to collect yourself. So you lean forward a little, bracing against the wall while you part your legs. A shiver runs through you when he grinds his cock in between your legs. The head of it catching on your abused clit.

While you’re excited to feel him in you, the need for each other isn’t enough to overcome the awkwardness that tends to come with shower sex. It’s slippery, wet and the verticality ups the difficulty. 

Homelander struggles pushing inside you from the odd angle your bodies are at. You’d be giggling at the clumsy slide of it all if it wasn’t for your own frustrated impatience. You whimper and whine, almost in protest at not yet getting what he promised. Homelander, in equal fashion, grunts in annoyance. Each effort to stuff you full gets derailed by slipperiness of your folds. And while the thickness of him rubbing between your slit feels grand, it’s not enough to quench his hunger for your tight squeezing warmth.

“Please… I need—” You whimper when the tip of him hits your clit again. Your clit feels so overstimulated that at this point it resembles the fuzzy shocked feeling of hitting your funny bone. 

“—I'm fucking trying alright, stop moving so much.” Homelander interrupts you, even more frustrated than you.

“Your cunt is just too fucking slippery. God fuck—” It’s when the tip of him finally makes it in, yet manages to slip out right as he’s eager to push in all the way is when he’s really had enough. 

Homelander effortlessly lifts you up, forcing your knees to bend, pressing against your chest as his hands grasp the flesh of the back of your thighs. 

You yelp at the sudden feeling of weightlessness. It’s the one thing that never ceases to amaze you. With your previous partners the sex positions didn’t move past the classics. All perfectly fine positions that you still thoroughly enjoy with Homelander on a daily basis. But nothing thrills you as much as being able to feel his wholly inhuman strength. Easily tossing you around and molding you to his body. You become less of an active participant and more of a warm and perfectly wet toy for him to fuck into.

Now is no different. Homelander finally manages to sink his cock into your throbbing and just as eager pussy. Your little content sigh of relief at finally being filled doesn’t last long. Instead he steals your breath away with the hurried press of his hips into yours. Your weight in his arms does nothing to deter his pace, effortlessly ruining you both with the slide of his cock. You brace yourself against his arms, looking for a shred of stability but that never comes.

The stretch of his cock from this position makes your clit ache. Already desperate for more direct attention. Opposite to the long drawl of your orgasm, Homelander is rutting into you as if he’s competing with himself on how many more thrusts he can fit in before he’s unloading into you.

It’s not many. He was clearly as worked up as he sounded. Losing himself in your pliant and warm body was already mind-blowing any given day. Being able to manhandle you fully, not giving you any leverage was an entirely different beast. While still minding his strength he lets himself unravel into the welcoming squeeze of your walls, pumping spurt after spurt of hot cum deep inside you.

While the quick fuck managed to reignite your flame, you don’t find it in you to beg for another finish. You feel rattled, legs resembling jelly and you haven’t even been put down. You’re all too aware of the way the thickness of his cock slowly slides out, and with it your pussy squeezes out a dribble of cum, sliding down in between your ass cheeks. 

You whimper at loss almost instinctively at this point. Some would find it surprising to see just how carefully Homelander sets you down but to him it’s a no-brainer. You’re precious cargo. And even then, standing on your own legs doesn’t feel right after what you’ve been through.

You hang onto his frame. Your quivering limbs make you hazy. Your pussy trembles with the remnants of your previous orgasm and the one that could have been. “Thank you.” Mindlessly you lul your head against his chest, breathing out the words.

Homelander laughs. Rarely do you thank him for sex but it’s a good indicator of how thoroughly he melted your brain. He always enjoys the extra stroke of his ego. Even if things are precarious or falling apart you will always be here, ready to sing his praises in all the genres.

“Mhm, you’re very welcome.” He pinches your chin and brings you closer for a big kiss. He indulges in the lazy press of your lips to his and he keeps you there for long enough to really imprint the feel and taste of your lips into his own.

You gain some clarity back when you pull away.

“Come on, let’s get to bed.” He greedily squeezes your ass with a wicked look. How he still holds the same excitement for more amazes you. In comparison you feel like you’ve run a marathon. 

Plus there’s the whole thing with your breast milk coming in that you’ve yet to mention.

“I’ll meet you there in a minute. Just want to clean myself up.” You say offhandedly. Really you wanna wash the scent of sex off your body so nothing detracts from the sweetness of your milk. You want your surprise to be perfect.

“Don’t take too long.” You can just about hear him over the shower as he leaves the bathroom after drying himself off. 

As the time for your big reveal nears you feel the anxiety brew in your gut. You’ve been working on this for months. The last thing you need right now is for your body to fail you. Just the idea of this plan failing or worse—him hating it—leaves you your gut in knots.

No. No, you can’t stress yourself out. Your body needs peace, quiet and excitement. Positive thoughts and feelings. You will yourself instead to think of the reward, the payoff of seeing Homelander grateful, happy and relieved.

You massage your body and breasts with some unscented soap you keep around for times when Homelander is feeling particularly overstimulated with senses. You do your best to wash off both Homelander’s cum and your arousal. You want a clean slate.

Resetting your mind back to your nighttime ritual, your body untangles the knots of anxiety. You leave the shower calm and at peace. You take your time drying yourself off, blow-drying your hair to not make the sheets wet and finishing off with brushing your teeth. You’re taking an awful long time but there’s not been a moment when he’s not waited for the warmth of your body lulling him to sleep.

He can wait a little longer. 

You hang up both yours and Homelander’s towel—one he left on the counter—and you wrap yourself up in your favourite combo of particularly fluffy robe and slippers. Both are of great quality, courtesy of Homelander. The robe feels soft and warm against your bare skin and part of you dreads the short moment when you’re gonna need to take it off before sliding into bed. It’s one of the few things you’ve cared to enjoy the luxury of. The comfort is unmatched.

Same goes for bedsheets. You’ve told him before that albeit the satin sheets look fancy and expensive, they don’t provide the soft comfort of a loving home you’ve been trying to introduce him to. It’s a constant battle trying to warm up the cold museum-like quality of his living quarters. But alas, one swap at a time.

The path from the main bathroom to bedroom isn’t long but you’re still grateful for your fuzzy slippers. No need to get your feet cold if you can help it.

You finally make it to the bedroom, well, if you could even call it a room. It took a little while to get used to the sprawling open space of his penthouse. Nothing really felt enclosed and the idea of some Vought employees having full access to not just his penthouse but the very exposed sleeping quarters made you queasy.

“Took you long enough.” He’s already in bed, covered with a blanket from the waist down. He props himself up on his elbows, unashamedly looking you up and down. He raises his eyebrows, expectantly nodding at you to proceed. 

You untie your fluffy robe, sliding it off your shoulders. Immediately shivering as the cool air hits your skin. Vought could really heat this place better. You catch the thick fabric of your robe before it falls to the ground, draping it over the ottoman in front of the bed.

Homelander whistles and his lips stretch into a wide grin.

“You’re ridiculous.” You shake your head, smile tugging at your lips. 

“And you’re gorgeous.”

He’s different today. Something about the way he looks at you that brings back the boyish charm he had when he swept you off your feet for the first time. These days you see worry lines and furrowed brows adorning his features more often than not. Rarely does he come home happy. 

But now? He’s looking at you, bare to the world, with that twinkle in his eye, finding comfort and excitement in your presence.

“You’re gonna tease me any longer? Come on, come here already.” His tone makes you feel giddy, it’s exciting—especially knowing you’ve a little surprise of your own. It’s lucky he caught you in the shower today.

Usually he comes home late when you’re already in bed reading a book, waiting for him to seek out some much needed comfort. You cherish those moments too, but today’s excitement feels particularly rare. It gives you a preview into what life could be like if things were different. 

But just like the fantasy of peaceful family life you often feed him, this also feels like a temporary illusion, just waiting to give way for the gruesome reality you find yourself to be a bystander to. 

Still, you take it for what it is and throw yourself into bed, straight under the covers he lifts for you. You’re used to sleeping naked because of him. Homelander says the sound of mismatched fabrics rubbing up against one another is downright infuriating. But really, you see it for what is. Though you can’t deny that the occasional midnight romp or a morning quickie heats up a lot faster with no clothes in between. 

Homelander quickly pulls you in, already greedy for a kiss. Barely apart for a moment and he’s already ravenous. It makes you wonder how he manages without you the entire day. 

Your hands glide from his stomach, over his hairy chest and up and behind his neck. He kisses you in his signature possessive way. 

There’s barely any build up. He goes from a decent, soft press of his lips to eagerly licking yours open. His moans are needy, impressing themselves into your lips as he takes over your lips with deep, open-mouthed kisses. Chasing after you each time you move any other direction that’s not towards him.

The sudden change from a gentle kiss to a downright sloppy makeout session shocks you enough to lose your bearings. Not that you had many to begin with. Effortlessly, Homelander pushes your back flat to the mattress. The power you feel from such a simple push shocks a giggle out of you, sending a tingle down your spine in excitement.

He leans over you, propped up by his elbows and knees. While you thought he had plenty of excitement in the shower he seems to be just as riled up by this charged up energy surrounding you both tonight. You feel his cock, already half hard, pressed in between your bellies.

He kisses you with raw hunger, his deep kisses pulling sighs and moans out of you. Apart from his inexperience when it comes to innocent affection and love, he’s mastered the art of making you feel like he’s pulling you apart bit by bit with every kiss. 

He kisses the rest of your body with his hand. Sliding from your shoulder to your arm then to your hip and thigh, pulling on your leg to wrap it around his waist. Without a break in the kiss he swaps hands and treats your other leg in the same way. He settles himself firmly in between your legs, still too focused on your lips to move things further along. Though you’re very aware of the weight of his hefty cock.

Just when he’s letting your lips off the hook, finding his next victim in the soft skin of your neck, you glide your hand up the back of his head, pulling on his hair. You pull hard enough to earn both a moan and an inquisitive look in his eyes. This is not the energy he was expecting from you today.

“Slow down baby… I just… I need you to take it a little easy on me.” You mumble. The showertime shenanigans left you feeling a little sore and tender. Albeit good in the moment, your soft pussy easily aches and needs some gentle treatment from time to time.

He looks at you with this innocent puppy look and you feel a little bad for breaking his flow and making him feel like he did something wrong. He just hums and gives you a little nod. His ravenous kisses turn soft and sweet when your fingers scratch through his hair, giving him a glorious scalp massage.

“Could you keep me warm? Please?” He asks softly, an uncharacteristic trait that very few have gotten to see over the years. Without waiting for an answer he’s squeezing his cock at the base, little more than half hard now and steadily filling out as he gently guides the soft tip through your slit gathering the wetness on his cock.

“Mhm, of course. Be gentle, okay?” He almost whimpers at the approval as he presses the soft head of his cock into your pussy, guiding inch by inch into you. He’s not fully hard and that makes it easier on your tender tissue. The heft of him sits comfortably inside you, right in the space he has long carved out for himself. 

Your pussy softly pulses around him, not out of your own doing but just the pure instinct of having him inside you. It’s comforting. Intimate. Something you didn’t expect to become a favourite part of your nighttime routine.

Homelander keens as he settles into you, every instinct screaming at him to fuck you again. But the hand at the back of his head scratching at his hair makes him melt. The soft and warm touch almost matches the equally soothing warmth of your pussy and he happily lets you guide his head to your chest.

Homelander descends kisses upon the soft skin in between your breasts. It's instinctual at this point. His palm softly cups your left breast from the outer side. His lips ghost over the delicate skin of your breast, hot breath mapping his way across.

You feel your heart rate spike as his lips inch closer and closer to your nipple. The excitement coiling in your gut and partially souring into anxiety. The thoughts coming back to you again. What if he doesn't like it? 

He's desperate for the familiar comfort, his parted lips releasing a soft stuttered moan as he moves up to the peak. His cock twitches inside you as soon as his lips brush upon your nipple.

You watch with bated breath as Homelander finally wraps his lips around the hard bud. Your heartbeat is picking up speed as you watch him intently, hoping—no, praying—that your body won't disappoint you.

It happens quickly. He pulls away in shock, uttering a panicked, what the fuck, as he flattens both palms on either side of your body, pushing himself upright. 

“Ah! Oh fuck…a-ah…” You yelp out in shock followed by a pained stuttered moan as his hips push forward in shock. His cock goes fully hard in the moment, burying itself as deep as your pussy allows in a sharp and uncontrolled thrust.

His eyes turn from wild, panicked and confused to worried. “Fuck, sorry, sorry,” he whimpers, his body buzzing, vibrating with unspent energy. You watch as his tongue darts out, collecting a droplet from his lips as well as licking the entire surface area just in case he missed any.

As the immediate reminder hits his tongue his eyes flicker in between the droplet of milk beading on your nipple, and you. 

“W-what? How?” He scrunches his eyebrows before dipping his sight lower. For a second you think he’s looking at how deep his cock was in you.

“You're not pregnant. H-h-how?” He stutters, shaking his head in short bursts, squinting at you in confusion.

“Did you just look in my uterus?!”

“Stop avoiding the question.” 

His expectant gaze and the way it flickers in between your leaking nipple and your eyes has your gut twisting with anxiety. Was it too much after all? Did he not want this? 

“I…I just. Um, I just read up on some stuff. You don’t need to be pregnant for…well, for this to happen.” Your ears burn with embarrassment at being examined at such a deep level. You don’t want to upset him. The whole point of this was to make him feel good. Make him happy. Did you overthink this? Looked too much into it? “Stimulation, massages, all the stuff we do. It helps it happen.”

“Babe, I’ve been sucking on your tits for a while now. It hasn’t happened before.”

“I’ve been massaging them a lot throughout the days. It took a few months.”

“I didn’t notice you doing that.”

“You’ve been busy. Look if this is weird—” You can’t stand the awkwardness brewing in you like a storm, a feeling similar to sour burning bile making its way up your throat.

“—I should’ve noticed this…” Homelander interrupts you, his gaze now firmly with your leaking nipple. Absent-mindedly he licks his lips again, as if looking for any milky residue. ”You—umh, hah, you did this? You really did this just for… just for me?” His voice goes from level to wrecked in the span of a sentence.

His expression looks tortured, brows furrowed, lips parted. A little strangled gasp leaves him as he watches you tap your finger against your wet nipple. You bring the tip of your finger to his parted lips. With an anguished whine he purses his lips around the digit. Eyes fluttering shut as he wraps his lips around the tip properly and runs his tongue around it. 

His eyes snap open and meet yours when he pulls the finger out.

With another rushed movement his cock sharply thrusts into you again, forcing a pained little whimper out of you just as Homelander captures your lips. Your aching walls flutter around him with the rush his needy kiss brings. The heat of it blooms in your core. The anxiety dissipating and your gut untangling. 

“Sorry.” He mumbles into the kiss half-heartedly but he’s too preoccupied with pouring his love for you into the press of his lips against yours.

“I fucking love you.” He spat out in between kisses. Harsh and desperate. Rushing through the motion of the kiss and the words. Worried about the moment escaping him. He imprints the words ‘I love you’ in each kiss. The syllables are barely distinguishable with how closely he’s pressed your mouths together but you feel it. You feel it with each breath, sigh and whimper. 

You pull him away with a simple tug on his hair. He looks high and drunk on the feeling of it all. It’s been a while since you’ve seen him give into you this much. These days he was all about keeping a semblance of control and appearances. Some of that ended up translating into the bedroom and your relationship. While he still had his vulnerable moments with you it was easier to feel bulletproof when he kept up the same act all day and all night.

You nudge his head down, nodding down towards the breast he abandoned earlier. He’s careful with his movements this time. As he moves lower and settles himself on your sternum his cock moves inside you, but the gentle wet glide just pulls a sigh of content out of you this time around.

“It’s okay. Go on, you can have more. It’s for you.” You’re breathless, the anticipation is unreal. After the long prep, being able to see and feel Homelander nursing on your breasts feels like a dream come true.

He brings your breast in a little closer to his lips, already parted and gasping. He leads with his tongue, licking up the little rivulet that dripped out earlier. Carefully he flattens his tongue, dragging it up the tender skin. When he gets to your swollen and leaking bud his tongue gently slides back behind his lips and he wraps them around your nipple.

The feeling of your milk flowing into his mouth is surprisingly more intense than you expected to. You throw your head back on the pillow, exhaling with relief. His tongue presses against your nipple with each suck, lapping up the milk you produce for him and guiding it down his parched throat.

Homelander isn’t doing much better, his brows are furrowed and he’s almost whimpering with each suck. With each glorious, delicious drop he loses more and more composure. His thick eyelashes flutter and you can see the way his tenderness seeps out. Tears bead at his waterline, clumping his eyelashes together into a few thick strands.

Your pussy quivers around him with every press of his tongue and instinctively he softly grinds into you, following each throb of you, matching the rhythm of his sucks as his left hand clutches the side of your ribs while the other still supports your breast.

He’s breathing rapidly through his nose and you feel when with one, two, three strokes he unloads inside you. It happens in the matter of seconds. You knew just how intrinsically emotions played a role in his arousal and it was no surprise that he came with such little stimulation.

As if riding out the pulses and twitches of his cock he sucks harder. 

“Gentler honey…” You guided him, your nails gently scratching down his scalp. He hums affirmatively and he does soften the suction of his lips around your nipple.

You feel his cock soften inside you and you settle yourself a little more comfortably. Relaxing into the mattress, you continuously glide your hands through his hair even when you move him to the other breast.

It’s moments like these that get you appreciating the usually gaudy mirrors surrounding the bed from all angles. You tilt your head to the side and watch the side profile of Homelander indulging with little whimpers and mewls. 

You coo soft words, still comforting him with your fingers in his hair. And really, he’s as relaxed as he’s been in a while. And that makes it all worth it. You smile as you turn your head back and look up this time. The birds-eye view of the two of you feels like a painting. The blanket has been pushed down and bunched up around your bodies while Homelander keeps himself as close to you as possible. You watch the bob of his head as he suckles on your other nipple. You don’t even mind that he’s laying all of his weight on you.

You smile at yourself in the mirror, seeing your goal accomplished. You reach down to pull up the covers a little, keeping both of you cosy and warm. Leaning to the side to pluck the discarded blanket from the side of the bed you move your breast and Homelander’s head with you as if you were supporting a newborn baby’s head. 

Even though the blanket covers him halfway up his back, the mirror gives you a good view of the way he softly grinds his hips into you. It’s less to seek friction and more to just actively feel you around him. The wet glide of your pussy is heavenly and even if he’s not fucking into you with the intention of making either one of you finish, the feeling is still worthy of being indulged in. Like a good dessert.

You turn to humming. Nothing in particular. Songs that are stuck in your head. Or just a random melody of repeating tones. You enjoy the sight of Homelander looking peaceful. Choosing to live in the moment and be grateful for what you were able to achieve today.

You did that.

Homelander takes you out of your dreamy and happy, heart-soaring thoughts with a displeased whimper. He pulls away from your nipple with a kicked-puppy look that nearly has you chuckling. Just like a kitten his lips are covered with the milk residue, beading a droplet in the corner of his lips from when he was getting messy, mouthing at the nipple and your breast rather than just sucking peacefully.

“Sorry. I guess there’s not that much yet.”

“Don’t you fucking dare be sorry. You… you’re perfect.” He places a kiss in between your breasts and nuzzles his head in between the softness of them. “Thank you.” He sighs out quietly. He settles his head comfortably on your chest, his eyes falling shut with heaviness that comes after an exhausting day. 

You readjust your position a little so that he’s only partially lying on your chest, no longer suffocating you with his full weight. You hold his head close to you, enveloping him in a warm embrace as he swiftly dozes off.

You realize he never actually said what angered him today but at the end of the day it doesn’t matter. As long as you can keep him sated and happy, nothing else will ever matter. 

Taglist (you can add(or remove) yourself to be tagged when I publish a new fic):

@infinetlyforgotten | @rafecamsgirlll | @nervoussystemss | @hom3landr

@mrsdesade | @nommingonfood | @littlegaaby | @jokesonyoupup

@natliecole | @misatxox

[sunofpandora]

OFFICIAL AVATAR 3 ANNOUNCEMENTS

This just in guys, last night on D23, avatar 3 has an official title “fire and ash”

We are so back guys 🤭💙🩵

[periwinkle-the-11th]

ngl as a chronic-pain-haver who regularly sorrows over the lack of chronic-pain-comfort-fics, getting into jayvik is doing great things for me.

[incorrect-green-lantern-quotes]

Hey! Just wanna say im really glad i found this account ive been getting into green lantern comics recently and your page is a godsend.Aside from that its one of the few that isnt overrun with batman/batfam content propinng him or his orphan child soliders by putting down other dc characters..so i was curious if you knew any dc fanfics that portray the lanterns as competent and or calling bruce out on his bullshit ( sorry if my text is a bit jumbled english isnt my first language)

I'm glad you like my content!

Tbh the fanfiction situation for Green Lanterns is just as bad as it is on Tumblr, if not worse. So a few of these fics are going to be bat-centric, but I've specifically selected those that I feel actually respect and understand the GLs instead of flanderizing them to be stupid assholes.

I've tagged the authors whose Tumblr usernames I could find in the fic or their AO3 profiles. If you're one of the authors I haven't tagged, just let me know and I'll edit the post to add you.

But without further ado, the GL contents of my bookmarks in no particular order:

Fics where the Bats are uninvolved or only play a minor role

In the end, we all bleed Green. by @catboyollie (series) - a collection of GL shortfics

Kink Meme #5 by Perpetual Motion (perpetfic) - Most people forget Guy Gardner was a teacher...

Friendship, Ice Cream, and Green Lanterns by MildlyRebelliousMint - GLs hanging out after a battle

Family is What You Make Of It by @exasperatedfey - in which Hal has to bail his fellow GLs out of jail

In Case of Emergency by @susanphoenix - Kilowog’s been adopted by the Earth heroes as the GL to go to if they can’t find the earth lanterns. No one told him that.

i ate up all the light by @effietrinket1619 - Six times Hal was there for a fellow GL (and one time they're there for him). TW for roofie

Good Cop/Bad Cop by @meduseld - shortfic of Hal being a scary mf

Adrift by @rose-cake - Simon and Jessica are partners. That word has multiple meanings. Minor Simon/Jessica

These Mountains by pastelplastic - Superman meets Tomar-Re, the Green Lantern who failed to save Krypton

Justice League's most wanted fugitive: Hal Jordan by Panamic - The Justice League are trying to find Green Lantern. Hal does not want to be found by the JL. Shenanigans ensue

No Rest for a Superhero by Crimson_Crystal - Kyle sacrifices sleep to finish an art commission and crashes

A Mind Of His Own by @wolfsbanesparks - The Justice League finds out Captain Marvel is actually a kid, and Hal is the only one who still treats him like a fellow hero

The Goddess of Petty Annoyances by @galahadwilder - Jessica invades Apokolips specifically to annoy Darkseid. Crack

Shooting for the Stars by @green-lanterns-c0ck - Guy in his yellow ring era bumbles into saving a galaxy far far away. Crack crossover with Star Wars

canary in a coal mine by BrandyFromTheBottle - Guy is an asshole to Dinah, but he's trying to be better about it

Hal & Kyle fics (there's enough of these that they warrant their own category)

Luminance by @lanternwisp - Hal slowly realizing he thinks of Kyle as a son

trajectory from me to you by @softpunks - deaged!Kyle thinks Hal is his dad

the moldy cup is not a metaphor by MildlyRebelliousMint - Kyle calls Hal "dad" and Hal goes to visit Barry, totally not freaking out

friendly fields and open roads by @ufonaut - Hal returned to life and feels like shit. Kyle comes seeking a mentor.

ship in a bottle by @hopeworth - Two former hosts of Parallax meet up for brunch

Fics involving Bats that respect Green Lanterns

we're in the mellow mayhem together (series) by lunaratlasky - Jason seeks out Hal whenever he wants to piss off Bruce

Emergency Line (series) by @crucifixinhell - jason looked at hal once and went "you seem like good dad material"

For Whom We'd Give Blood (series) by Boogalee99 - How Hal Jordan becomes the favorite uncle of the batfam

There's Always Another One by lapsedpacifist - Dick gets fired and decides to crash at Hal's place

To Overcome Fear (ongoing) by @dc-sideblog - Stephanie gets fired and Kyle decides that if the Bats don't want a perfectly good superhero, the Green Lanterns definitely do

Disclosure by @aj-artjunkyard - Maybe Hal isn't as at peace with a certain android's death as he thought he was... and maybe he's not alone in his grief either.

Stars in a Paint-Filled Sky by @thenaphorism - Kyle has to explain to the Justice League why he has a Red Hood/Troia tramp stamp

because you know better by @matchahater - Ion and Red Hood contemplate the ethics of resurrection

catch the asteroids that come your way by @thepackwantsthed - the only JayKyle fic that I've ever liked

Justice League International - Spoiled! by @secretlystephaniebrown - Guy Gardner, Crystal Brown's childhood neighbor and best friend, ends up taking in her daughter Stephanie after an unexpected turn of events.

the superhero game (ongoing) by Nyame - Jason Todd Peggy Sue longfic ft. a near-omnipotent White Lantern

I'm gonna pin this post and update it as I encounter more fics I like, so drop some recommendations in the comments for me and everyone else!

[demaparbat-hp]

“Zuko?” Ming searched for the Prince in his silence. He was staring intently out of the window, mouth blown wide open, eyes distant and awed and sincere. Oh. His whisper was a fragile, breathless thing.

“We're here.”

Ming’s doubts and concerns are hers alone, but that doesn't mean the rest of the Crew doesn't share them. This sudden mission, Zuko's change in attitude, his obsession with the Water Tribes...

Ming tries to discover the root of it all in For the Spirits Chapter VIII: Make You Stay, but will Zuko let her in?

[inkyrainstorms]

The Martian Stan AU - The Beginning

“Is that it?” Stan asked, his voice burning and rising like the coming tide, vicious and overwhelming and inevitable. Ford’s shoulders tightened involuntarily, and he threw his brother as scathing of a glare as he could manage. Couldn’t Stan see that this, Ford’s problems, were important? “You call me all the way here after ten years, just to tell me to get as far away from you as possible?!”

If Ford was any less exhausted, if the hole in his left hand and the hole in his heart  were any less gaping, and the fresh scrapes and cracked fingernails ached any less, he might’ve taken a step back to apologize. To explain that it wasn’t about what Ford wanted, or what Stan wanted. It was about stopping Bill, and saving the world.

If Ford were a different man, he’d reconsider his approach and find a way to fix the chasm that seemed to yawn wider with every word that came out of each of their mouths. But as it was, Ford was not a different man. He couldn’t even fix himself.

So Ford instead felt indignation sting like hot coals in his gut and urge him to step forward, closer to Stanley. His brother took an involuntary half-step back. “Stanley, you don’t understand what I’ve been through!”

“What you’ve been through!” Stan kept talking even as Ford pushed past him, fury etched onto every word like a brand. “No, no, you don’t understand what I’ve been through! I’ve been to prison in three countries, and I once had to chew my way out of the trunk of a car!”

He got up in Fords face when Ford turned back, his brows drawn low and finger jabbing into Ford’s abdomen. He didn’t realize it, because of course he didn’t, but he’d pressed right into one of the bruises on Fords ribcage from his trip down the stairs earlier that day. Ford grit his teeth and glared back.

“You think you’ve got problems? I’ve got a mullet Stanford!”

Why couldn’t Stan take Fords problems seriously? Was he really cracking jokes at a time like this? 

Ford couldn’t take it anymore. 

Oblivious to the dangerous precipice Fords stability had drawn close to,  Stan got bitterly sarcastic. “Meanwhile where have you been? Holed up in your fancy house in the woods and living it up, selfishly hoarding all—“

Ford went still. If he’d been a slightly different man, a slightly more composed man, perhaps, he’d have fired back another jab at his twin, because how could the man that ruined Fords life and betrayed his complete and total trust call him selfish?

There was a different voice, at a different time altogether too recent and a lifetime ago. His monstrous Muse, his most trusted friend, taking his body on a fucking joyride and then having the gall to look him in the eyes and say “YOU’RE PRETTY SELFISH IQ”. 

Ford had just kept on weeping blood. 

As it was, Stan didn’t get a chance to finish his rant. He was much too busy receiving a solid punch to the face and staggering back against the force of it. For a moment, all was quiet. Ford was shaking, he realized distantly, staring blankly at his brother. His knuckles stung from the impact.

Stan took more time to recover than Ford would’ve thought, but when he finally did, it was with a new layer of dark fury that Ford hadn’t ever seen from him before. Stan lowered the book from where he’d clenched it to his chest, and pulled out a lighter. “Fine.” He whispered roughly, though it echoed in the cavernous room anyway. Louder, then, “Fine! You want me to get rid of it so bad? I’ll get rid of it right now!”

A challenging fire burned in Stan’s eyes, and with a flick, it burned in his right hand too. Ford’s journal dangled above the hungry, all consuming light. 

Ford couldn’t breathe. Every piece of himself he’d had to let go of, that he’d lost to Bill and all that he was giving up to rectify his own mistakes, all to see Stan get rid of part of his life’s work right before his eyes. 

How dare he.

Ford let out a guttural shout and lunged for the book. Stanley, evidently not expecting this, stumbled back and tried to move the lighter before Ford and him could get burned from it in the tussle.

He only partly succeeded. Ford hissed at the momentary new pain shooting up the underside of his hand as he tried to grab for the book and Stan flat out dropped the lighter in response. His brother faltered for a split second, his brow creasing. 

“Sixer, I—“

Ford didn’t let him finish. The second he heard the nickname, some part of him blanked out entirely, and the buzzing in his ears sounded like an angry hornet in his skull. “Don’t,” he grit out, and he’s sure his voice was much too thick and angry and he wasn’t being rational but he couldn’t bring himself to care. “Call me that!” 

When Ford lunged for the journal anew, he tackled Stan to the ground as his brother instinctively tightened his own grip on the book. Ford’s book.

“Why not?!” Stan cried out, trying to pry Ford off of him and only succeeding in rolling the two on the ground away from the portal. Ford couldn’t figure out if he sounded more hurt or concerned. The hurricane in his chest kept him from thinking on it too much.

Ford let out a wordless grunt in response, as the two of them, having grappled up to stand, slammed straight through the door and Stan tried to pin him down onto one of the control panels, before Ford managed to gain enough momentum to roll Stan off of him. They were throwing punches and shouting insults they probably didn’t mean, and after a minute long struggle where they surely broke every damn thing in that control room —and good riddance, Ford tried to think but he was too tired to think much at all— Stan had shouted with all the ferocious desperation of a drowning man, “why can’t you listen to me, damnit! You ruined my life!”

Ford had retorted, because of course he did, with “You ruined your own life!” as he finally got a good grip on the book and kicked Stan away with enough force to shove him against the side of one of the control panels. 

Stan’s scream was abrupt and guttural and horrifying. It cut through the haze in Fords mind with all the precision of a scalpel, dropping a rock of dread into his gut. Ford backed away as quickly as he could, and didn’t even register his journal slipping through his slack fingers to land facedown on the ground. He felt sick.

“Stanley! Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry!” 

For a few, horrible, horrible seconds, Stan laid there, slumped and unmoving from where he’d hunched onto the floor. The burn— the brand on his shoulder looked angry and hot against his skin. It had burned clean through his coat and shirt.

Ford took a few hurried steps closer, shaking so hard he could barely walk, when Stan groaned. “Stanley…” he started, but trailed off as Stan pulled himself to his feet. His eyes were darker than Ford had ever seen them before. Stan was shaking too.

“You really want your dumb mysteries that bad?”

And Ford wanted to say, no, no he didn’t, because Stan still held his shoulder stiff as he could and his grip was knuckle-white where he’d used it to brace his arm against his side, because Ford had branded his own twin.

But the words stuck in his throat, because he realized with a start that Stan and him weren’t the ones shaking. The room was. His eyes shot to the portal.

His magnum opus and his curse, his Dadaleus’s Labyrinth, was activating. 

A sudden movement from Stan snapped Fords attention back to his injured, angry brother. Ford took a few cautious steps out of the control room and held up his hands placatingly as Stan advanced. His brother was blocking the doorway, but Ford needed to get in there, he needed to activate the shutdown procedure. “Stan, please,” he said weakly, not sure what exactly he meant. Let me through? Wait? Let me help you?

He didn’t get the chance to find out, though, because Stan continued talking, hefting up the journal he’d evidently picked up from the floor while Ford was distracted. “Well you can have ‘em” Stan said viciously, and Ford could hear the pain in it clear as day as he moved to shove the book into Ford’s hands.

Ford dodged Stan attempt, careful to not touch Stan’s injured shoulder, and weaved around him. “Stan, please, wait.”

Stan laughed, turning around. His grin looked painful. “I’m tired of waiting, Si— Stanford. I really am.”

Ford didn’t have time for this. His heart ached in ways Ford didn’t have the time to decipher as the humming in the room got louder, and he turned to move back to the control room. “Just a moment, Stanley, I just need—“

When Stan latched onto his arm and tried to whirl Ford back around, Ford reacted on pure instinct and deep seated paranoia, that kind that can only be born from aftermath of pure devastation. He followed the momentum and shoved Stan back as hard as he could, turning and sprinting to the control room before Stan could recover and try to stop him again.

“Stanford?”

He never got there. Stan’s voice, suddenly small and scared, ground Ford’s pace to a halt. The humming was louder now, reverberating through his chest. 

“Ford, what’s happening?”

For a terrible moment, Ford didn’t turn around. He just stared at the door of the control room as if he could stop time if he tried hard enough. He didn’t want to see. Seeing made it real. It meant his worst fears had become true, it justified the cold sinking in his chest. 

“Ford!”

Ford whirled around and let out a hoarse cry. There Stanley was, greasy hair floating in a halo around his face, one hand outstretched and the other holding Ford’s journal tight to his chest. Ford had pushed him over the danger line.

The look on his twins face was worse than Ford could’ve ever imagined. 

The anger had drained out of him, the closer he floated to the all consuming blue light of the portal. The was naked terror in his eyes, and he cried out for Ford again.

“Stanley! Hold on, please!” Ford said, before making another break for the control room.

He needed to shut it off right this instant.

“Hold onto what, brainiac!?”

“I don’t know, Stanley! Anything within reach, just don’t let yourself go through the portal.”

Ford input the shut down code. He input it again. He then realized that they’d knocked the cords out of alignment and frantically began adjusting them from where they were wired into the top of the control panel. Shit, they really broke everything in this room, didn’t they?

The third time he input the code, the light flashed green, and the keys made themselves known on a panel adjacent to Ford’s position by the window.

Three keys. Of course. Why did he have to make it three keys, all turned simultaneously?

Metal screeched in the portal room, and when Ford dared to glance up between trying to maneuver himself to turn all three keys, a jolt of horror swept through him and nearly knocked him off his feet. 

Stan has nearly entirely consumed by the light now, clawing at the edge of the portal he’d managed to reach. Ford cursed himself when he realized that the metal plate Stan was holding, as well as  over a dozen others, were loosening to the point of nearly falling off entirely from the main frame. The other objects he’d scattered across the floor of his lab, everything from basic tools like screwdrivers to bigger machine parts floated through the portal at increasingly high speeds.

Ford wouldn’t need to do anything, he realized, and it wasn’t the comfort he wished it was. The portal was destabilizing. Judging by the erratic pulsing the portal light was doing, it’d be closing soon.

Ford ran out of the control room and stopped short just as Stan locked eyes with him again. 

“Stanley!” he called, another desperate idea beginning to form in his panic addled mind as he scanned the room for spare rope and found none. The spare rope from the first portal test must’ve gotten caught in the portals expanding gravitational pull. His brother was barely a shadow in the light now, but Ford knew Stanley had heard him. “If you toss me the journal, I can—“

“The journal?” Stan gasped out, frenzied. “Is that still all you care about!?”

“No, no, if I just had the instructions, I could fix—“ this, fix everything. 

The screeching of metal and thundering of the portal reached a deafening crescendo, and Ford could see Stan open his mouth to interrupt, to say something, assent or argument or—

But Ford didn’t get to find out what Stan would’ve said. A particularly violent jolt shook the metal frame of the portal, and Stan, with a wide-eyed final look that Ford didn’t know how to decipher, slipped.

His brother disappeared into the light just as the portal collapsed in on itself with enough concussive force to send Ford crashing to the ground. He slammed onto his back hard enough to knock the air from his lungs.

Silence fell over the room. It was dark.

Ford stared at the ceiling above him, then dragged his eyes, slowly, painfully, to the portal. 

The deactivated, half missing and half obliterated portal.

For a long, long time, Ford sat in the dark under the full weight of every bruise and scratch and burn he’d sustained, and it was like he was underwater, head swimming with nausea and pain and bewilderment. He was numb. 

A faint plip-plop sound echoed suddenly through the deathly silent basement, and Ford squinted at the sound through his crooked glasses, trying to identify the source. 

A dark substance stained the edge of the portal, right where Stan had been holding on. Ford watched blankly as the liquid slowly rolled along the curve of the portal entrance, before reached a jagged gap in the perfect circle and slipping through. It slid down the jagged and crumpled panels, weaving until it gathered at the tip of a particularly jutting sheet of metal. 

Another drip.

Another.

Ford shifted closer, simply trying to breathe. He pointedly didn’t think about how the other side of the portal had driven Fiddleford to seemingly the brink of madness in moments, he didn’t think about the glimpse into the Nightmare Realm Bill had given him when he first revealed his true hand, and he certainly didn���t think about the final look Stanley had given him, grief and rage and betrayal all rolled into one.

He finally got close enough to see the liquid for what it was. It wasn’t oil, like he’d figured, like he’d hoped and prayed with every inhale and exhale to the gods he didn’t believe in. It was too thick, congealing with familiar splatters on the floor. It was a deep crimson.

Stan must have cut his hand on the metal with how hard he’d been holding it, Ford realized, and the thoughts were the first crack in the dam Ford had buried himself beneath. This was Stan’s blood.

Stan was in the Nightmare Realm, bleeding from one hand and burned on the other shoulder and begging for Ford to do something, asking Ford what was happening because he didn’t know, because Ford didn’t tell him, and—  

It was all Fords fault.

All of it.

Oh Moses.

The dam creaked with warning, a death rattle and a laugh rolled into one, before Ford was swept into the undertow.

Ford had killed his own brother.

All alone in the dark basement with the machine he’d turned into his brother’s grave, Ford buried his burnt, bloody hands in his hair and bowed his head until it hit his knees. All alone, Stanford Pines cried for the first time in years.

Alternate Titles: The Worst Conversation Ever

Or: Ford started disassembling the portal early and everything went to shit accordingly.

Tags! @aroace-get-out-of-my-face @pleasantartisanhottea @empressofsamoyeds @littlelilliana15 @pinefamilycatsau @thejaxindianrizzler (I saw your comment in the og post and it made me laugh cause I was in the middle of working on this when I noticed it) (I hope you don’t mind the tag :))

if I missed anyone I’m sorry about that! The tag is always a fair option to follow too (#martian Stan au)

[haza1ll]

TNV Fanart

so i think i said i was gonna make fanart for this (again).. probably uhhhhh early september late august?? i don’t remember. but. erm. It took FOREVER. school kicked my butt and i had no free time. (buddies this took me 6hr 30min total) BUT i think it came out good. so yippie! also, side bar, im trying to get used to digital art again so the lighting looks mega weird. pls help. OTHERWISE YAYAYAY ITS DONE @sugarpasteltmnt SORRY IT TOOK A COUPLE MONTHS. this could possible be classified as a remake (spot the old one: impossible mode). ill put both down~ (TUMBLR ATE THE QUALITY LITERALLY WHERE DID IT GO.)

[bratbarzal]

On Your Side (NH13) / Prologue

Pairing: Nico Hischier x Fem!OC Poppy Jensen

WC: 13k

Chapter Warnings: angst, miscommunication, ghosting? maybe, some cursing, mentions of OC having nephews (gross), being broken up with over a text, allusions to anxiety, my oc being argumentative and avoidant (she's me), and nico also being avoidant and a poor communicator (he's a man) (he's also a capricorn) (sorry capricorns)

Summary: Poppy Jensen’s job with the New Jersey Devils was supposed to be her first big step into adulthood - a way to prove to herself and her overbearing parents that she could make her own way in life. She was never supposed to become involved with any of the players. Becoming best friends with their captain was stupid. Getting her heart broken by him was tragic. Getting knocked up with his child was just plain messy.

Series Masterlist

A/N: is a 13k prologue excessive? probably. is the mixture of tenses in this part going to grind your gears? most definitely. am I going to do anything about it? no.

I've never actually published any writing before so go easy on the girl. if I need to tag any warnings just let me know. if you like the fic let me know. if you don't like the fic I beg you I'm having a bad month spare meeeeee.

TW for british english spellings because shock horror I am unfortunately british, get used to u's and s's where you least expect them, I will change my spell check settings for no one!! nico's facebook aunt shenanigans have lit a fire within me today and I was writing a later chapter for this fic and thinking if I don't actually put this out into the world I never will so here we are hi my name is maggie I hope you enjoy

Poppy

New Years has always been Poppy Jensen’s favourite holiday. The dwindling aftermath of Christmas - lights and decorations still hung throughout the city, everyone decked in the hats, scarves and ugly sweaters gifted by distant relatives over the Christmas period, and the six days of limbo usually spent drinking and eating copious amounts of leftovers before the new year, new me resolutions kick in - and experiencing it all in her hometown surrounded by the people she loves the most, there is no other time like it.

This year, she feels like the festive period has been one, long, strung-out horror show. 

Self-inflicted, of course, like all the other tragedies of her life, she does know she only has herself to blame for how pathetic it has turned out.

She had prepared herself for Christmas to be a dud. The one time of the year that she and her family put aside their differences, and this year she had opted out - or, so her mother had dramatically concluded; she actually just had work commitments. But, this would be her first spent alone due to the fact her parents had decided to go and visit her older brother, Oliver, and his family in San Francisco.

They didn’t have to fly across the country - Oliver has more than enough money to book his clan on a flight back to his home state, but obviously as the golden child, the Jensen’s must bend to his every whim. Of course, Poppy had been invited. Her relationship with her brother wasn’t mutually acrimonious, but the aforementioned work commitments got her out of that bore-fest. 

She does love her brother. Sometimes. Christmas, especially - he’s a great and expensive gift-giver. And she loves his wife, Kimberley, and their two sons - her nephews, James and Lucas - but spending the holidays with them would have been a lot. Her family is hard work on the best of days, and the only reason Christmas is ever bearable is because her mother hires help, and it’s impossible for the stress train to leave the station if Priscilla Jensen is given enough wine early enough in the day to dull her usual wicked demeanour. 

Kimberley, God bless her soul, maintains a sober house, and Poppy, as much as she respects this, would not go anywhere near that train wreck if you paid her a million dollars.

There’s also the fact that the holidays were invented to unwind, and Poppy somehow always gets lumped on nephew duty. She had long grown out of her boys are gross phase, but lord, do those two try everything in their power to bring it back. She has lost count of the amount of their bodily fluids she has had wiped all over her best clothes over the years. If she had agreed to fly out, she no doubt would have ended up being the one to watch the kids while everyone else had their version of a good time, and so she’d successfully managed to avoid all that with a half-assed promise of visiting at Easter, instead.

Her brother hadn’t been too upset - one less place setting at the table for him to worry about - but her mother had been livid, and there was no chance Poppy would live it down without owing her.

God forbid she, as an adult, actually got to choose how to spend her time.

She hadn’t actually been completely alone on Christmas, not all day, at least. Her best friend Nia had invited her to eat with her and her dad, but they were hardly putting her in the festive spirit with their constant snipes at each other, and so she’d given herself stomach ache stuffing herself full of corn bread and roasted carrots and dipped out to make it home for the Giants game - because there’s no better tradition than watching your team lose on Christmas Day. At least she wasn’t there to watch her dad and brother yell at the TV and get all grumpy for hours after the fact. 

She’d watched Love Actually with mulled wine in hand and fallen asleep on the couch - waking up in the middle of the night to the muffled sound of her neighbours screaming at each other through the walls. 

Poppy had the 26th off, and spent the day preparing her apartment for New Years, knowing she wouldn’t have any other opportunity to get her big clean done. She’d cleared out half her wardrobe - done several loads of laundry so that she could donate clean clothes to the women’s shelter a few blocks over - rid her kitchen of all the outdated tinned foods in the backs of her cupboards, dusted every surface, vacuumed every floor, colour-coded her bookshelf to look more aesthetically pleasing and then within an hour put it back in alphabetical order - all in a day’s work. 

By the time the 27th rolled around, and she had to return to work, she had tired herself out completely. She had been drained, and the worst part of it all, she didn’t even actually need to be there.

Sure, December was a crazy time to work in the NHL, their schedule unrelenting when the season got into full-swing, and the holiday events that Poppy’s team had to organise seemed never ending, but she had technically been given limbo-week off. Not that her mother had to know.

The Youth Foundation team had all wrapped up work for the year on the 23rd, and if Poppy was a truly good daughter/sibling/aunt, she would have booked herself on a red-eye after the home win that evening, but the second the opportunity to accept an actual real excuse not to change her plans arose, she took it with open arms. Her guilt of lying to her family diminished, along with her will to live at the fact she had - self-inflicted, as always - put herself down to work her favourite time of the year.

Her career with the New Jersey Devils had started with an internship in her final year of college. She had worked with the digital content department for her first year, quickly being sniped by the Foundation in the middle of her second year and working her way past content creation to helping co-ordinate and run some of the community events.

When her friend Jessica had approached Poppy and begged for her to cover her spot in the department they had started out together in for limbo-week, spending it with the team at their games, she had jumped at the bit. She knew no one else would agree to work last minute after having their time off approved, and was pleased to relay to her mom that she had to prove herself as a team player if she wanted more responsibility at work. It was all in the name of bumping up her performance and getting her name out there, and definitely not avoiding her family and that whole shit-show.

Poppy loves her job, and is more than happy with her career, but she could sing about it until the cows come home and her parents could not care less. They rarely ever acknowledged her successes because her life didn’t fit the mould they had set out for her - another reason she hadn’t wanted to spend this Christmas hounded with questions of why don’t you come work for your dad? Or why didn’t you accept the interview Ollie so kindly got for you? She doesn’t want a non-sensical, nothing job made up to keep her under her family’s influence. She has forged her own path, one that many dream of in one of the biggest industries in the country, and no matter how much she disappointed her parents in comparison to her lackey brother, she is content with where she is.

She had completely forgotten, however, that the devils played away on the 29th and 30th, and if she was going to be tagging along with the bare-bones limbo week media crew, there was no way in hell she was getting out of joining the team’s New Years celebrations. 

She had done her fair share of dodging team events already this year, and despite the fact she could appease most of her friends within the organisation, there was one person who would not let her off so easy.

This year is Jack Hughes’ first year hosting the big Devils New Years party - he’d, in her opinion, stupidly volunteered pretty much last minute after the venue the team had booked flooded in November and cancelled their reservation - and he would not let Poppy get out of coming, even if that meant scuppering her own annual tradition of getting shit-faced with her girls in their perfectly planned New Jersey bar crawl.

She’d done her best work to convince him - had almost sold him on the dream - she and her best friend, Nia, always start at the bar below Nia’s apartment in Hoboken, and then dot to the bars closest to their other friends apartments until they end up by Poppy’s, which has the perfect little rooftop set up where they get to watch all the fireworks across the Hudson. It’s how she’s spent the holiday every year since she and all her girls turned 21, and it was her favourite day, her favourite way to ring in a new year with her best friends in her favourite place in the world. 

Jack’s argument was that he also had a great view across the Hudson from his Jersey City apartment, and that she was less likely to catch hypothermia this year because his view came through floor to ceiling windows and the luxury of central heating.

She’d tried to argue that she had all intentions of meeting her future husband on her adventures through New Jersey, and he gave the quick rebuttal that he had plenty of single friends she was yet to meet. 

There was no excuse she could give that he couldn’t counteract, and so she’d eventually given up with the resolution that when he is 3 drinks deep, Jack Hughes can barely remember his own name, let alone keep tabs on where Poppy is, or if she ever showed up in the first place. She can always just say she’s running late until he stops asking.

And then she’d somehow gotten roped into helping him set up. 

Jack had cornered her on their flight home from Boston, where they had just lost to the Bruins and, all of a sudden, no one was in any kind of mood to party.

“I swear,” he had said, throwing himself down into the vacant seat beside her as she attempted to clear her inbox on the short journey, swiping away messages and storing others to review when work started back up in the next week, “If I mess up this party, and my name goes down in Devils history tied to the biggest depression session this team have ever seen, I’m holding you personally responsible.”

“How the hell would that be my fault?” She had scoffed, kicking at his feet when he had tried to man-spread next to her and they had quite abruptly knocked knees. The staff seats toward the front of the plane weren’t quite as spacious as the player seats further back.

“You brought some serious negative energy with you on this trip,” he shrugged, reaching for the bag of skittles she had stashed in the pocket on the seat in front of her and stealing a handful, “And I can’t blame you for us losing, so I’m gonna blame you for constantly trying to abandon my event and making me feel so insecure about it that it turned into a complete bore-fest because I didn’t have my literal professional event planner friend to help me set it all up.”

Jack Hughes had joined the New Jersey Devils at the same time Poppy had started her internship. There had been some corny ice breaker session for everyone new to the organisation that season, and they’d bonded over their shared love for country music. He’d become dependent on her as a local to the area for recommendations for everything - food, sports bars, coffee, grocery shopping, running routes - and they’d quickly developed a friendship that had lasted them thus far. No fallouts, no drama, no issues. Being friends with Jack is easy. 

Poppy is older by near enough 18 months, and considers him as close to a little brother as she will ever find - annoying, teasing, loud and somewhat of a know-it-all, but he cares deeply, and he’s loyal, honest and open with her, and she loves him for it.

“I’ve done my part even helping you plan the thing,” she had to snatch the bag back from him before he finished the skittles off, needing the sugar to keep her awake for the quick drive home when they landed. Jack had been on her back about this party since he had first put his name in the hat to host, and she had been gracious, helping him arrange food, drinks, decorations and DJ equipment in the hopes it would lessen the blow that she didn’t want to attend. “I didn’t bring negative energy.”

“Do I have to kidnap you when we deplane or are you gonna come around tomorrow morning and help me?”

“Kidnap me?” she couldn’t help but laugh, casting a quick measured glance over his figure. “Real cute, Jack, you’re nothing without your stick.”

“I could take you.” He attempted to throw a skittle up into the air and catch it in his mouth, not accounting for the fact they were on a moving, somewhat turbulent plane, and he barely had enough finesse to pull that off on the ground. The candy landed and bounced off his cheekbone, and he watched it fall to the floor with a child-like pout. 

“It’s fighting talk like that that would lose you another tooth, Hughesy,” she had threatened in jest. 

“I’m a middle child, I don’t start fights I can’t finish, Popcorn.” He also has a track record of giving Poppy the worst nicknames she has ever heard in her entire 24 years on this Earth. “Luke’s already said he’ll help me on the kidnapping front, we have a plan.”

“Your plan is nothing without incentive, Jack. You come at me with weak threats when you could just offer me something in return.”

“Like what?” His eyes narrowed toward her, shuffling in the seat until he was facing her fully. 

“I want to bring Nia.” If she was going to be subjected to this, she was bringing back up - and she had thought this would be a good trade, knowing how protective the boys were of their private events, especially those thrown in their own homes.

Poppy hadn’t liked the way his lips curved up immediately, like she had fallen straight into his trap. “Done.” She should have known better. He stood up, edging back into the aisle and sending her a wink. “I’ll text you details on when and where I need you. Your hot friend is more than welcome to offer a hand, too.”

And that is how Poppy has ended up spending the day of New Years Eve, her favourite day of the year, rushing to set up Jack Hughes’ apartment. 

Her first task had been to go round to Jack’s and accept the deliveries that came while he and Luke were out picking up the decks for the DJ. Drinks arrived by the crateful, the boxes of paper plates, cups and other table wears took her several trips up and down from Jack’s apartment to the building lobby until she broke out in a sweat, and she had done her best to hang all the decorations, her last call being to pick up the bigger decoration delivery from downstairs.  

Poppy, with the help of Lionel, the building’s concierge, loads the elevator full of decor, ranging from golden helium balloons that spell out ‘Happy New Year’ and ‘2024’, a large roll that should hopefully unravel to reveal a backdrop for a makeshift photo-booth, as well as a deconstructed balloon arch that gave her PTSD from the amount of events at the Rock she’d had to put them together.

Lionel offers to come up with her to help unload everything upstairs, but the thought of cramming another person in there with all the stuff makes her feel claustrophobic, so she politely declines - though, when the elevator doors open and she bumps face first into a firm chest, her nose smushing against a khaki t-shirt she wishes she had someone else with her to buffer the tension that stiffens her spine. 

A large, calloused hand wraps around her upper arm to steady her, and another reaches out to keep the doors of the elevator from closing in on where she stands. She looks up into eyes swirled with the colour of warm, melted chocolate, and her throat feels just the slightest bit drier than it had 5 seconds ago.

“Hey,” Nico Hischier’s voice is deep, scratchy like he’s just woken up - he probably has given how late the team got in last night - and trickles down in static currents from her ears to the base of Poppy’s back. 

She takes a short, startled step back, and gulps down the dryness in her throat before she gives a quick, “Hey,” in response. “Sorry, I’ll just take a second to unload all of this then the elevator is yours.”

“I’ll help,” Nico doesn’t phrase it as a question, as if knowing she would immediately decline. Not, let me help, or do you need help? He’ll just do it. “You get everything out and I’ll take it inside?”

She nods, despite the voice in the back of her head telling her that he’s only helping to get the job done quicker, and be able to get downstairs. She makes a conscious mental effort to drown it out while the two of them work in a silent tandem, her lifting the decorations into the hallway and him towing them down and into Jack’s apartment. 

She makes another conscious effort not to watch when he lifts things, the flex of his arms, the rippling muscles of his shoulders.

“Is that the last of it?” He asks, gesturing to the rolled up backdrop leaning on the side of the elevator and propping it open. 

“Yeah, but I got it,” Poppy gives a tight smile, lifting the roll but staying in place so the doors don’t close behind her and she doesn’t get stuck any longer in Nico’s presence on her own. “Thanks for helping.”

There used to be a time she couldn’t get enough of being around Nico, but those days are long gone.There is a permanent frigidity between them now - it’s been there since the summer just gone - and she’s overstimulated enough having spent her morning being Jack’s lackey while he no doubt slacks off with his brother grabbing brunch out. Her patience is beyond wearing thin, and so the last thing she needs is prolonged contact with the Devils captain where she will no doubt end up blowing up and making everything worse.

No one wants to ring in the new year with an almighty fallout.

She can’t help the frown that befalls her features when he makes no effort to occupy the elevator. He makes no effort to do anything, only looking at Poppy with a pensive pout. “Jack said I should come help you out.”

Of course he did, she thinks.

For the past four months, Jack Hughes has been acting like it’s his greater purpose in life to bring Nico and Poppy back together - like the demise of their friendship was the greatest personal inconvenience he has ever faced in his life. 

He has orchestrated one too many ‘accidental’ run-ins just like this one, and Poppy isn’t going to entertain his childish games any longer.

Nico doesn’t want to be her friend - she knows this for a fact - so Jack’s schemes are becoming a waste of everyone’s time.

“I’m alright, Nia’s on her way, you don’t have to hang around.”

Nia was due at Jack’s apartment two hours ago, but is no doubt still asleep after she was out last night for her pre-New Years celebrations. She’ll come over soon enough, though, and so Poppy doesn’t feel entirely deflated to turn down help she actually might currently need.

“I don’t mind waiting until she gets here.” Nico shrugs, again not giving her a natural opportunity to say no. He nods towards the apartment, gesturing for Poppy to start making her way over. “We both know she won’t take the stairs.”

Something about the way he so casually recalls information about her best friend plucks at her nerves, just a little, reflective of the part of their lives they had once shared with each other like it was nothing, but she shrugs it off, beginning to head towards the apartment with the roll tucked under her arm.

“I thought New Years was your favourite holiday?” He asks once they’re both inside, the sound of the door clicking shut behind him and somewhat trapping her in his presence echoing throughout the room. He doesn’t allow for any kind of prolonged silence between the two of them. If Nico Hischier is good at anything, it’s getting people to talk to him.

It’s not entirely that she doesn’t want to talk to him.

She does.

She’s wanted to talk to him every day for the past 4 months that they hadn’t talked - has been craving even mundane, casual conversation about the weather or traffic on the way into work, but now, as he yet again indifferently recollects such personal details about her as if they have remained close, she begins to feel uneasy.

“It is,” she gives a half-hearted, dismissive response. 

“Then why are you all grumpy?”

“I’m not.” She frowns, eyebrows furrowing and arms crossing as she turns to face him, the lie tasting bitter on her tongue.  

She’s not trying to be difficult. Or maybe she is. She is in a particularly bad mood, but she had thought she’d done a good job at masking it. He’d been around her all of 2 minutes and saw right through her. 

“Jack said you’ve been off all morning.”

Like he cares, she thinks, her mood souring further at the fact he doesn’t see through her or even care at all, he’s here at the request of someone else. Following up on his duties as a captain and fulfilling a favour for one of his actual friends.

Embarrassment floods the pit of her stomach, and rears its ugly head in the form of her biting tone when she replies, “Jack’s been out all morning, how would he know?”

“He left you to do all this on your own?” Nico frowns, gesturing around to the half-way set up apartment. All that’s left to do aside from put up the decorations she’s just lugged up is set up the food and drinks, and Poppy figured she could leave that task to Jack so that it all remained fresher for longer. 

“I do this kind of thing for a living, remember?”

She cringes inwardly at the venom in her voice, turning away from him with a huff and missing the way his posture deflates. 

“You run events, Poppy, you’re not an assistant.” She can hear his heavy footsteps follow as she moves to set up the photo-booth area. “If I’d known he had you running after him all morning, I’d have-,”

“Called someone else to come help me so you could carry on avoiding me?”

She really is wound up now. Jack bailing on her to do God-knows what while she sets up his party had been one thing - there was a rational part of her brain that would tell her there would no doubt be hiccups in trying to source a bunch of DJ equipment in New Jersey on New Years Eve and he hadn’t actually bailed - and she could write off Nia’s disappearance due to the fact Poppy had sprung the plans on her last minute when she got home and called her last night, and she was bound to show up at some point. But Nico implying she is letting Jack walk all over her and needs anyone’s help to get through setting up a basic party is downright offensive. At least, in her stressed out state, it is - and so she can’t find it within herself to bite her tongue about their situation any longer.

If it drives him away and brings back her solitude to finish setting up without him occupying any precious mind space, so be it.

She almost forgets a key fact about the man before her. He doesn’t give up so easily.

“I’m not avoiding you.” He bites back, stepping into her space and helping her lift the backdrop roll to fit into the brackets she had set up earlier when the structure for the booth had arrived. “I would have come to help you, myself, Poppy.”

She wishes he would stop saying her name. 

4 months of radio silence and he’s thrown it at her like a dagger twice in the span of 30 seconds, the way his it rolls of his tongue in a low, smooth rasp scratching an itch she didn’t know she had, and now she can’t shake it. 

“I’m fine,” she huffs, reaching as far as she can and pressing until she hears the brackets click into place. At the brief noise, Nico catches on to what he needs to do at his side and manages to click it into place, barely lifting his arms. She moves into the middle of the structure, pulling at the velcro tab holding the roll together until it cascades to the floor and unveils the backdrop in its entirety. 

“What else needs doing?” He asks, his tone gentler this time.

“Nothing,” she mutters, winding the velcro in between her fingers to occupy them, before moving to pass him and make her way to the next task on her list. It’s only small things now. Arranging the balloons, setting up the arch, clearing table space for the equipment when Jack finally arrives home. “You can go, I’ve got it.”

“Mohn,” Nico sighs lowly, warm hand clasping around her forearm as she attempts to pass, holding her in place beside him. 

She really wishes he wouldn’t call her that.

If Jack is the prince of childish monikers that make her insides curl, Nico is the king of making her melt.

The nickname takes her straight back to the days before the waves of the summer break washed their friendship away. The times where he’d give her a ride home from the Prudential Center after work, whispering a, “Goodnight, Mohn,” in her ear as they hugged goodbye over the centre console in the front of his car. The times she’d meet up with the team to celebrate a win at their favourite bar, and he’d throw a never-casual, “Looking good, Mohn,” her way with an appreciative once-over. 

And it takes her even further back to when they had met, and she’d first offered her name.

“I’ll be interning with the content team, my name is Poppy,” she had offered a bright smile, reaching her hand out for him to shake, and making sure to keep a firm grip, just like her father had taught her, when he places his hand in hers. As she had done since she was a child, it was instinctual to follow up with, “Like the flower.”

“Mohnblume,” he had uttered, a smile so deep his cheeks dimpled into deep valleys.

“Huh?” She had been only a little bit caught out by the way his eyes shone, forgetting her manners as her head tilted to the side in confusion.

“Poppy flower, that’s what it is in my language.”

“Oh,” she had exclaimed, furrowed brows raising, a soft flush warming her cheeks, “Pretty!”

“Very.”

She had convinced herself for a long time that it was just his way of remembering - an aid in blurring the lines between the two languages that, especially back then, he often found himself mixed up in. And then, after a while, using it seemed to bring a protected familiarity between them - like an inside joke - and he’d use it less in front of others and more in the times it was just the two of them.

Years down the line from hearing it for the first time, and months down the line from hearing it for the last, her heart still thumps the same erratic beat at the sound.

Nico’s eyes still shine the same way when he looks down at her, and she fights every fibre of her being not to think too much about it. Or not to think about the touch of his hand on her arm, still holding her in place, the two of them closer than they have been in a long time, now.

It’s painfully easy to forget the months of distance after only seconds in his immediate company - to wipe from her memory the reason for her reticence and to push down the stubborn desire to push him away.

Her lips part to speak, and she doesn’t know if she’s about to turn him down or take him in, because another voice fills the apartment before any words get the chance to spill out.

“I come bearing gifts!” A sing-song lull breaks the silence as her best friend makes her presence known, entering the apartment with a drinks carrier in one hand, and a to-go back over the other wrist. 

Poppy steps away, shaking Nico’s grip from her arm, and turns to give Nia her full attention, hoping that she is either too hungover or too focused on herself to see or care about the obvious tension between her and the captain. She manages to bite her tongue from letting a Thank God slip out, and makes her way over to retrieve a much needed drink.

“They were out of chai so I got you an iced tea,” Nia holds out the drink to Poppy, and then the to go bag, “And half a cinnamon roll.”

“Half?”

“What? I was hungry too.” Nia scoffs, turning her attention to the brooding presence on the other side of the room. “Sorry, Nico, I didn’t know you’d be here.”

“Would you have only eaten a third if you did?” He trials a joke, and when Poppy sneaks a peak back toward him, he looks apprehensive - scratching at the nape of his neck as if anticipating a bad reaction to his attempt at lighthearted humour.

“I’m sure Poppy doesn’t mind sharing if you’re starving,” Nia makes her way to the bar set up by the kitchen, placing her own cup down and shrugging off her purse beside it. 

“I wouldn’t dream of depriving her of half a cinnamon roll.” While his words are directed to her best friend, Nico looks at Poppy with a wistful smile, and she can practically see the memory of an old shared routine wash over his eyes. 

A weekly ritual of meeting by the PATH station close to both of their apartments on a free morning for a run, and then catching breakfast to go and grab a juice or a smoothie for the walk home - abandoned just like all the other little traditions they once had together.

Nico and Poppy had been close, before. Closer than she is to Jack, now - closer than she’s been to anyone else on the team, ever. So close that Nico knows her best friend enough to joke around with a familiar ease; so close that they’d even hung out as a three before, back when the girls shared an apartment in Poppy’s first year with the Devils, and he had been the only person that Nia had ever been happy to share her childhood friend with. 

And now, Poppy stands between them in a silence so uncomfortable she feels like the room is shaking.

She hasn’t talked to Nico in months, and hasn’t talked about him in just as long, but she knows Nia can read her like a book. 

The girls had grown up together - been through everything side by side, pinky fingers intertwined with an eternal promise of friendship and understanding. The demise of relationships, friendship group implosions, familial hardships, Nia’s goth phase, the time Poppy wrecked her hair dying it a vibrant cherry-red because her high school crush said Ariana Grande was hot - she still shudders thinking of how her hair glowed red in any direct light for years in the aftermath. Through middle school, high school, college, and all the way up until now, the pair know each other inside out.

So Poppy knows that Nia knows something happened.

Nia knows that Poppy hadn’t been able to go a day without bringing up the Swiss Captain before the summer, and then all of a sudden, she didn’t mention him at all. But she also knows her friend well enough and loves her too much not to have pressed on an open wound.

“It looks insane in here, Pop,” Nia gawks at the set up around her, every corner of the open plan layout of Jack’s large apartment decked out with decor and party amenities. “Do you guys go this hard every year?”

“Depends who’s hosting,” Nico shrugs, knowing when it had been his turn the year before, his event had been much more lowkey. Poppy had seen the pictures, had been sent an abundance of wish you were here snapchats around midnight from the Captain himself. Jack has a thing about his reputation that won’t let him even consider doing anything lowkey. “I forgot this would be your first year coming.”

“Oh, we’re not coming.” Poppy covers her mouth as she speaks around a bite of her food, unable to wait until she’d finished her mouthful due to the immediate urge to shut him down once again.

“You’re not?” He almost sounds disappointed. She doesn’t dare check for the furrow of his thick eyebrows or the pout of his lips. “Jack said he’d convinced you.”

A flash of anxiety shoots across her chest at the thought of him considering her attendance. Had he asked Jack? Had he mentioned her specifically - pushed him to convince her? Or had Jack just brought it up in an offhanded comment?

“I just agreed to get him off my back about it.” Her choice of words is only slightly intended to hurt. She and Nico were no longer friends - she hadn’t been the one to make that decision. Despite that fact, she tries to suppress the guilt clawing at the base of her throat at the wash of understanding that passes over his features. A solemn nod, gaze bouncing to the floor, lips pressed together. “We have plans with our friends.”

“Actually,” Nia’s voice captures both their attention swiftly - Poppy’s head whipping around in subtle alarm and Nico’s in anticipation. “Blake’s flight back from Arizona got cancelled, and Kelsey bailed on me last night because she got Covid of all things over Christmas.”

“What about Emma?” Poppy asks, hoping and praying their hermit friend has all of a sudden grown some stellar social skills and agreed to carry on their tradition for the sake of Poppy’s sanity.

“She double booked with her boyfriend, and he’s a huge drip I don’t really wanna hang out with those two all night.” God damn Emma and her tool of a boyfriend, Poppy thinks. “At least if we come here, we’re still close enough to your place we can make it back for fireworks on the roof.”

“We get a great view of them from this building,” Nico makes his presence known again, attempting to offer a solution. “If you didn’t want to walk back home so late.”

“See, Pop,” Nia claps her hands together with a grin, “We get to come to a cool party, don’t have to worry about creeps following us around all night, and still get to hold on to tradition. Win, win, win if you ask me!”

“Right,” Poppy sighs, knowing now that Nia has her heart set on the plan, there’s nothing she can do about it. Any persistence on her part would be too obvious. “Fine.”

“Awesome! What’s left to do?”

Poppy eyes Nico, knowing she’d told him only a few minutes ago that there was nothing left. “Just need to clear a table for the equipment Jack’s getting,”

“Which one?” Nia asks, making her way over with her iced tea in hand once Poppy points toward the table in the corner by the wall-to-wall window. “Are you helping or just standing around looking pretty?” 

Nico’s cheeks flush, a subtle warmth arising to his skin, and he gives a bashful chuckle.

Poppy feels a little nauseous, and it’s not from the sickly sweet half of a pastry she’s just forced down.

Nia’s eyes flicker between the two of them like she’s at a grand slam, and her lips twist to hide a smile.

“I actually need to head out,” he says, gaze darting quickly to Poppy before turning to her best friend, “I have some things I need to do before tonight. It was good to see you, though, Nia.”

Nia hums around the straw of her drink, giving a dismissive wave. “You too, see you later!”

Nico begins towards the door to the apartment, and just before he passes Poppy, he stops. He doesn’t reach for her this time, doesn’t step too close, but she can feel his presence regardless. And every hair on her body stands to attention like she’s been shocked by static when he says, lowly, “I’ll see you tonight, Mohn.”

She can only nod in response, not trusting her voice to speak, not trusting her eyes to look into his and be able to look away. 

After he departs, there are a few minutes of an ear-piercing silence. Poppy can hear every movement Nia makes, from the slurp of her drink, to the manner in which she throws things around with little care for where they end up. And louder than anything, she hears the violent thud of her heartbeat in her own ears.

“So,” Nia drags out when Poppy joins her at the almost empty table. “What the fuck was that?”

“What was what?” Poppy and Nia have known each other fifteen years, she doesn’t know why she hopelessly thought that would work.

“Don’t play dumb,” Nia scoffs, “You and Captain Sexy,”

“There is no me and Nico,”

“But you know who I’m asking about,” she scoffs like she’s caught her best friend out, and then adds, with a suggestive wiggle of her brows, “So you do think he’s sexy?”

“What are you, twelve?” Poppy rolls her eyes, “He’s the only captain we’ve been in a room with, pretty obvious who you were referring to.”

“Admit it, Poppy, I saw the two of you when I came in, you totally wanna jump his bones, you have for as long as you’ve known him.”

“We’re not having this conversation, Ni.”

“The hell we aren’t!” Nia grabs her best friend by the shoulders, “I’ve bitten my tongue for months, Pop, watching you mope around and get all glum whenever work is brought up. I couldn’t get you to shut up about the guy before, what the hell happened between you two?”

“Nothing happened!”

“It totally did!” Nia can spy the aversion Poppy is attempting from miles off. “Don’t tell me you two finally hooked up and you didn’t fill me in,”

“He has a girlfriend, Nia.”

The way Poppy says it is like a period to a sentence. End of conversation. End of speculation. It doesn’t matter what they had been before, or what they are now. It doesn’t matter what she feels. There is no her and Nico because he is someone else’s. That’s the crux of it.

“Since when?” Nia frowns. 

“Since the summer just gone.”

And there it is. Understanding washes over the face of her best friend, and Poppy has to force herself to look away. 

He’d maybe been with her before that, too, but Poppy doesn’t actually know the entire timeline of it.

All she does know is that he’d come back from Switzerland with a drop dead gorgeous model hanging off of his arm, and he no longer had a use for Poppy in his life.

She knows other little bits, that she’d sourced from parts of conversations with others, or potential social media sleuthing that she will never admit to even with a gun to her head.

Talia, a model from somewhere close to home back in Europe, and Nico had hit it off at some festival when he’d gone back to Switzerland for his break. He’d very quickly and very clearly become smitten with her. Poppy had seen as much with her plastered all over his private stories and even posted on his private instagram feed.

By the time he came back to New Jersey for pre-season training camp, she was tagging along to team gatherings, he’d take her on his morning runs, grabbing breakfast together, he’d pick her up every day after work so he could no longer drive Poppy home, not that he’d ever attempted to explain any of that to her. She was at every home game, was his plus one to every event, and Poppy and Nico’s friendship had fizzled out so much that she sometimes feels like the whole thing had been a fantasy, or a figment of her imagination. Something she’d misunderstood, miscalculating every interaction they had ever shared and assuming they meant the same to him as they did to her.

They didn’t.

She doesn’t think any of it would have hurt her so much if he’d have let her down easy. A sorry for bailing on you the first time she’d text him if he wanted to meet up for their weekly run and he’d left her on read would have lessened the blow. He could have been straight up with an I just want to focus on my relationship right now. That would have been the decent thing to do, but he’d just dropped her, instead. Didn’t come around her office for lunch, didn’t text her after training when one of the guys said something stupid and he thought it might make her laugh. He’d cut her off from the intimate parts of his life - ghosted her, even - and all she could find it in herself to do anymore was miss him.

She’d made attempts to bring him around, at first. Tried speaking to him at work, tried texting, but after a few weeks of staring at the delivered sign at the bottom of their message thread, she had given up. It still taunts her every time she opens it up to delete the entire thing and move on like he clearly has - erasing all the inside jokes and times they had confided in one another like they meant ever meant anything in the first place.

She can count on her hand the amount of times they had spoken since the summer. Work related, entirely. A good game here and a have you seen whoever? there. Today is the first indication in months that they had ever been anything more than two people who worked in the same organisation. Friends of friends, co-workers, barely acquaintances.

Not people who know each other’s favourite holidays and are chummy with each other’s friends.

“I’m sorry, Poppy,” Nia frowns, “I didn’t know.”

“Doesn’t matter,” she shrugs, attempting nonchalance despite the stinging in the back of her throat. “Let’s finish here so we can go get ready.”

Nico

Nico Hischier isn’t the biggest fan of New Years Eve. He isn’t really a fan of the festive period, at all. He isn’t a scrooge by any means. He can appreciate the coming together of people and the celebration of the year just gone, and the one starting fresh - but ever since he moved from Switzerland and started his career in the NHL, the holiday period has felt unnecessarily long.

His schedule is jam packed - games up until the 23rd, starting again after Christmas on the 27th, and again after New Years on the 3rd - and there aren’t enough consecutive days together to celebrate in the way others get to do this time of year. 

He knows he has to make do with the fact - a small price to pay for living his dream - and his teammates help, all sharing in their sacrifices and trying to make the best out of a bad deal. But he can’t help but feel a lack. A lack of tradition, a lack of family being around, a lack of normalcy.

He remembers the holidays as a child, spending time at home with his parents and his siblings, having two weeks at home for his winter break and getting to spend his days doing whatever he pleased. As someone who moved overseas at such a young age, he looks back on those times fondly. 

But now, living at least 8 hours away from the rest of his family, this time of year only serves to remind him of the isolation that creeps up on him like a bad cold.

It starts at the beginning of the month, the sniffly nose period of the bug, when chatter starts around who’s doing what for Christmas. Decorations go up, parties are planned, names are passed around in a hat for Secret Santa, and discussions begin around who is managing to go where. 

Next comes the tickle in his throat - the last game before Christmas, where the team all depart and separate with temporary goodbyes as those who have family nearby all get to go home - their parents arranging home cooked extravaganza meals, reuniting with their siblings, exchanging gifts - and Nico, for the 5th year running, feels like a bit part in someone else’s festivities as he and a few of the other European guys all bustle into the dining room of whoever is willing to accommodate them for the day. 

Then comes the rest, the sneezing, the coughing, the lethargy, in the period between Christmas and New Years, when everyone is reeling off the back of their celebrations and looking forward to ringing in the next year with a big party. 

Nico had thought this year might have been better. He had been in a relationship, there were parts of the holidays he could tweak and adopt into his circumstances - exchanging gifts with a loved one, bringing her along to Christmas dinner at Jesper and Nicole’s place, and not having to feel like a third wheel or like he had to shrink to fit at the kiddie’s table. 

He’d even tried to start his own holiday traditions with Talia, his girlfriend. He’d booked an overnight stay at a fancy hotel on the Upper East Side in the middle in the month on one of the rare occasions he’d had two consecutive days with no game or other commitments - despite how hectic his schedule had been. He’d taken her Christmas shopping down Fifth Avenue like she’d talked so much about how she’d wanted to do ever since she came out to New Jersey with him after the summer. He’d taken her ice skating, away from the Rock so that it didn’t feel like work, they had bought and decorated the tree in his apartment together, he’d brought her along to every team holiday event.

And on the day of their home game against Anaheim on the 17th, just a few days after their trip into Manhattan, in the middle of the third period, she had unceremoniously dumped him with an I’m just not feeling this anymore. Over text. As she was already at the airport preparing to fly back to Munich to spend the holidays with her family. He had slumped into his locker after their brutal 5-1 defeat and couldn’t believe what he was reading.

Nico wanted to be angry. As he read the text, he could picture any other person throwing and smashing things. Calling her up and demanding an explanation - because it was clear she hadn’t been feeling it for longer than she let on, considering she was about to board a no doubt fully booked flight across the Atlantic in the eleventh hour. 

But there was too large of a part of him that just felt relieved.

Talia was great.

He had met her properly in the summer when he had gone home to Switzerland, but they’d had mutual friends long before. He’d liked a couple of her instagram pictures here, she had responded to a few of his stories there, and then they had been formally introduced at a friend’s party.

Things with her were easy, at first. Nico wasn’t looking for anything serious, and she had ticked all of the right boxes. She was good company, always down to do whatever he was doing with whoever he wanted to do it with. She recognised that summer was the only time of the year he truly had to himself, and she let him take the reins on how he wanted to spend it.

She would go on hikes with him, would lounge around in the sun if wanted, go to parties, go to festivals, join him on little weekend trips to Ibiza or Mallorca. And she was a great release when his training had picked up. She would work around his schedule. He’d invite her round to his apartment and he had enjoyed spending time doing nothing with her after a long day at the gym or at the rink.

She had slotted so perfectly into that version of his life that he gave very little thought into inviting her into the rest of it. 

She was beautiful, sociable, charismatic - and then she became hard work.

When summer was over, and he invited her to spend some time back in New Jersey, she didn’t quite grasp how much things would need to change. She constantly wanted to have plans. Wanted to go to parties, wanted to go out, be around other people, take little trips - and he had tried to accommodate her the best he could, but he didn’t have the time for himself, let alone for another person, to be doing things all the time. He had tried to tell her as much, and she said she was okay with it, said as long as he was present with her, she could settle for not doing the things they had in the summer, but she expected too much from him. 

She wanted Nico’s attention at all hours of the day, weaving herself into every aspect of his routine. He wanted to run? She would go with him, could really use the fresh air. He wanted to do some solo training at the gym? She had been meaning to work on her lifting. He couldn’t go to the grocery store - could barely even go to work without her wanting to be there. His phone would blow up whenever they were apart, and if he didn’t text her back straight away, she’d become cold - making him feel guilty and grovel for her forgiveness.

Talia was fun, until she wasn’t. Until she was exhausting, and Nico couldn’t keep up with her any longer. 

She didn’t give him the grace to have an off day. He was tired, he was struggling, and when the season kicked into full swing, and the team’s schedule was packed, he became unable to juggle it all.

His work was suffering, his star was dimming, his body ached and his performance dipped - both in his professional and personal life. 

And so, after the detonation of their relationship, a break up text felt a little like a wake up call.

Talia had contributed so much to the deterioration of normalcy in his life, that Nico was still trying to piece back together his routine 2 weeks later. 

His holiday period this year had been spent in a haze - and it wasn’t for the reason everyone thought. He had caught the pitiful glances sent his way over the dinner table at Christmas, had seen the way the couples in the room tried to spare him of their PDA whenever he was around, and he could have told them it was okay. He was okay. But there was a large part of him that was trying to figure that out, still.

He had known he wasn’t heartbroken. He wasn’t shooting off texts to Talia and begging for her to come back. He’d already boxed up what little belongings she had left behind and was going to ship them internationally after the New Year had passed. He had deleted, not archived, all their photos on his private socials, and had even deleted most of them from his phone. He wasn’t in pieces over the fact she had ended things.

But he knew something still wasn’t right.

At first, he had thought it was work related. Their worst week of the season had happened just before Christmas - 3 losses at home in the span of 5 days - and he thought that could be the reason for his slump. Then, they won against Detroit and he still felt off.

Then, he thought he had been anxious about Christmas - about showing up on his own, having to explain his breakup to everyone not quite caught up on the news yet, and he would have to wallow in that same old feeling of watching everyone else enjoy the holidays. But Jesper and Nicole had thrown together a pretty nice day for the guys. The food was great, the company was great, and he’d gone back to his apartment that night with a feeling of relief - like he’d been dreading something for so long only for him to have genuinely enjoyed himself.

And finally, as if being thrust into a freezing cold ice bath, realisation had washed over him on the morning of the team’s final home game of the year against Columbus. 

He had been walking through the back offices of the Prudential Centre when he had stumbled upon a conversation, and had heard Poppy Jensen’s voice for the first time in what felt like forever.

“I’m just kinda beat, to be honest, J,” she had said in response to a question Nico hadn’t caught. He had thought no one would be around, most of the Foundation staff having the week off, and hadn’t expected to come across anyone on his venture to the best vending machine in the building. The Foundation offices were often frequented by kids, and had an assortment of candies throughout their machines instead of the protein bars or rice cakes elsewhere in the staff areas. At the sound of her voice, he had come to an immediate halt, peaking around the corner where he could see into her office. She was moving some things into a box on her desk and Jack Hughes was reclining in the chair in front of it that once had been claimed by Nico as his own. “I’m all social interaction-ed out, the holidays have kinda beat me to a pulp, I don’t think I could keep up with you guys, I’m sorry.”

Nico watches as she swats at his feet when he tries to kick them up onto her desk, and can’t quite see the crease between her brows as she frowns at their mutual friend, but can remember how it used to form all the same. “You’re such a bullshitter,” Jack had scoffed, clearly pre-empting the stapler Poppy would throw at him, managing to catch it with ease. 

“You can’t call me a bullshitter in my own office,” she gawked, “You don’t see me marching out onto the ice and calling you an attention whore.”

Jack had thrown the stapler straight back. She caught it all the same, and dropped it into the box.

“You haven’t hung out with us in forever!”

“We hung out at the Toy Drive like 2 weeks ago!” There had been two toy drive events organised by the Foundation in different parts of town, and, as he had long become accustomed to, Nico had been put on the one separate to the event Poppy was working. It had been fun, but when he’d checked the social posts the next day and seen the pictures posted of the other team - all smiles between them, a slightly blurry Poppy in the near background of all of Jack’s pictures to indicate how close they had been throughout the event - he had felt like he’d missed out on something.

“That was work, it doesn’t count, Popsicle.” Nico could hear the roll of Jack’s eyes.

“Yeah, well some of us don’t consider helping underprivileged children and spreading Christmas spirit ‘work’, Jack.” Poppy had used air quotes to emphasise her sarcasm, and a fond warmth had spread throughout Nico’s chest at hearing her hold her own against someone as brazenly wise as Jack Hughes. “I thought we were hanging out, having fun, improving our community together. You should really check your ego!”

“I sh-,” Jack had managed to cut himself off, no doubt realising how loud he had gotten. “You’re the one who’s been avoiding the whole team all year, ‘cause you’re hung up on-,”

The door to Poppy’s office had slammed closed before Nico had a chance to hear the end of his teammate’s sentence. Their voices had been muffled after that, and shame had started to creep up on Nico at the fact he’d been eavesdropping on a private conversation.

He’d foregone the snacks he originally snuck off in search of, and returned back to the locker room to get ready for his practice skate. 

For the first time in a long time, when Jack arrived and threw himself down on the bench beside him, Nico had wanted him to bring her up.

In the months prior, he would freeze up at the mention of Poppy Jensen, not wanting to face the reality of his dwindling connection to someone who had once been such a huge part of his life. He had other focuses - namely, Talia - and reflecting on what had once been between the two of them did not serve any kind of good purpose. It opened him up to uncomfortable conversations that he wasn’t willing to have, uncomfortable realisations he couldn’t quite come to terms with, and he had been too comfortable avoiding any kind of confrontation around it.

But in the short time between witnessing the conversation between Jack and Poppy, and getting ready for the team’s morning practice, too many questions had been swirling around his mind, and he needed answers.

Why was Poppy packing up her desk?

Why was she avoiding hanging out with the team?

What was she so hung up on? Had something happened?

He’d spent so long avoiding even thinking about her, that he all of a sudden felt like he’d missed everything.

Luckily for him, Jack Hughes needed little to no prompting for his blabbermouth nature to prevail.

“You know, for someone who’s literal job it is to lead us as a Captain, you’ve done terribly at warning me just how stressful this whole New Years thing is,” Jack had huffed as he began changing into his practice gear.

“I did nothing but warn you,” Nico responded, “You called me Mr Grumpy Pants and told me I was just afraid your party was gonna be better than mine.”

“Yeah, well, you should have insisted, it’s stressing me out.”

“You’ll be fine,” Nico scoffed, running a hand through the mess of his hair and leaning back into his locker. He watched Jack’s jittery movements as he shrugged on his pads, and felt the need to reassure his friend. “Everyone’s looking forward to it. As long as there’s plenty to drink and decent music, people will have a good time.”

“Not everyone,” Jack grumbled, “I can’t even get Poppy to come and she loves parties.”

So that’s what they had been talking about. 

Poppy did love parties, but Nico couldn’t remember the last time he had seen her at one. 

“Poppy has a New Years ritual, she didn’t come to mine, either, I wouldn’t beat yourself up about it.” Nico shrugged, despite the wave of a memory that washed over him of him doing exactly that when she hadn’t showed up last year. He’d had to restrain himself from leaving his own party - spent the night texting her updates on what everyone had been doing, snap-chatting her pictures in the hopes it would entice her the few blocks over from her apartment building. He’d only been consoled by the text he’d received just after the clock had struck midnight, settling for the pride in knowing he had been one of the first to get a Happy New Years message from her - knowing it wasn’t just a mass text she would have copy-and-pasted to everyone else, and had been personalised to him with a bunch of perfectly curated emojis and exclamation marks after his name.

Nico didn’t see Jack’s stiffened posture at the way he had so nonchalantly mentioned her for the first time in forever. Didn’t see the side eye, or the pensive twist of his mouth as he carefully considered his next words like he was about to step through a minefield.

“I’m gonna keep trying,” he had sat back down on the bench beside Nico to put on his skates, “I’m definitely her favourite, she’s been helping me organise the whole thing, I don’t think it will take much to convince her.”

Nico tried not to show any kind of reaction to Jack being Poppy’s favourite, or at the thought of how much time they must be spending together to organise such an event. A part of him knew he was only saying it to rattle him. “Cutting it a little fine, aren’t you? New Years is in a couple days, and the guys from the Foundation aren’t even around this week, are they?”

“She’s covering someone on content until January, I said I’d drive her home after the game and me and Lukey can double down on it. And if we can’t get it done tonight, she’s coming on the road with us at the end of the week. I’ve got plenty of time.”

“Oh,” Nico was thankful for how Jack had leaned over to tie his skates up, because he wasn’t entirely sure he’d been able to mask whatever had flooded over him at the revelation that his teammate would be driving Poppy home.

That was his thing. He was pretty sure his passenger seat was still positioned to her liking despite how long it had been since she’d sat in it. He was still working his way through the stash of smiley face air fresheners she had stashed in his glove compartment. He still felt like he was forgetting something every time he left the parking lot and she wasn’t sat beside him, chatting his ear off about some of the kids she had worked with in the day.

“Maybe you should ask her?”

Nico’s eyes shot over to meet Jack’s in alarm. “Me?”

“Yeah, the more people that ask, the more she might feel like she’s missing out. Flash her those cute dimples, how could she possibly say no?”

“I think I’m the last person that’s gonna convince Poppy to come, Jack.” Nico had tried to be nonchalant about it, but he had come across so painfully uncomfortable that he could feel the hair on his arms stand, not liking the ache that spread through his chest at the statement. 

There was once upon a time that cheering Poppy Jensen up had been a large part of his routine. Even small acts, like bringing her a coffee on a busy day, where he knew she wouldn’t take a break to go get one herself, and knew how much she disliked the stuff from the pot in her office. Sending her texts from across the room when there were big organisation meetings and he could see her chewing at her fingernails at the vast amounts of information being spewed about. Tagging her in cute animal videos he’d come across on TikTok when he was across the country on a roadie and on a different timezone - she’d wake up to them sometimes, and he’d wake up to her response.

“Right, I forgot you two aren’t friends anymore.”

“Is that what she said?” Nico had swallowed down the hurt at the thought of her coming to that conclusion - vocalising it to someone and finalising the decision before he had any chance to do anything about it.

He couldn’t really blame her, though - he’d had plenty of chances.

Nico could feel himself beginning to spiral, words swirling around his head like a tornado of realisation and guilt. 

Aren’t friends anymore.

Avoiding the whole team all year.

Jack is driving her home.

He’s her favourite.

Aren’t friends anymore.

Shit.

He didn’t even take in Jack’s response to his question. As much as he wanted to know the answer, he couldn’t bear to hear it. 

Nico couldn’t face up to what he had truly lost.

It wasn’t his girlfriend of five months, who had dumped him over text during the most wonderful time of the year. It wasn’t a few games, that, sure, it had sucked that they had been beat, but in retrospect, the team had had a pretty decent start to the season, and shouldn’t have had his back up that much. 

Nico had lost someone who had, at one point, been the most important person in his life. 

The person he would usually have gone to to help him through the other stuff - the breakups, the losses, the stress, the anxiety - the crushing weight that had been pressing down on his chest since he had left for Switzerland at the beginning of summer. 

Nico and Poppy used to work around each other like a beautifully choreographed, well-rehearsed dance. She always knew when he was overwhelmed or exhausted, he always knew when she was stressed or upset, and they both knew how to pick the other back up. 

They hadn’t even fallen out of sync when they’d stopped talking to each other, only this time, they were moving around each other. If Nico entered a room, Poppy would leave. If she knew he was going to be at a team party, she’d make up an excuse not to go. If someone mentioned Poppy in casual conversation, Nico would quickly change the subject. All of it had been subconscious, on his part, at least.

It had been so easy after such a prolonged distance between the two of them to move when she pushed, to watch when she ran, like he had grown into his part in their relationship akin to repelling magnets, always moving away from one another.

It had been so easy that he hadn’t even really realised what was happening - lost and handicapped by a thick fog clouding his thoughts and his judgement. He’d let their once blooming friendship wither and die, and for what?

As he had watched Jack waddle out of the locker room for their practice session, muttering a dismissive, “Whatever, I’ll figure it out,” to his Captain, it was like he had been awakened into full consciousness. 

Nico had thought that his turmoil had started with the holiday period. Had thought the ache of homesickness had swirled in with the grief that came with the loss of his relationship, and the shame his poor performances on the ice had thrown upon him. But it had started long before that. He hadn’t been himself since he’d returned from his summer break. Before that, even.

Without realising that he had lost her, Nico had spent the last few months subconsciously mourning his friendship with Poppy - the crushing weight of that grief consuming him to a point that he felt lost with no way out, and had expressed it in a bunch of misguided ways.

He reached into his bag to retrieve where he had stashed his cellphone, scrolling through his Messages app until he stumbled across Poppy’s name. The last text had been sent in September, by her, and he had never responded - had never even opened it, the blue dot to the left of their message thread taunting him with chirps of how awful he had been to ignore it.

Poppy: Hey, can we talk? I miss you.

How late is too late to reply to a text like that? He could only hope she still felt the same way.

Turns out, 4 months might be too late.

Nico has drafted an embarrassing amount of messages to Poppy over the days since that conversation in the locker room.

His notes app has a whole folder dedicated to her. Bullet pointed lists, random memories that made him think of her, structured essays that laid out a timeline of their friendship, and all the mistakes he would need to beg for her forgiveness for. 

He’d tried sending a message when he had got back to his apartment after the game against Columbus, feeling a rush of confidence from the adrenaline of their OT win, his high had soon dwindled when he was alone. He sat staring at all the different iterations of an apology he could offer, and had even chickened out of the final draft of a very simple but hopefully effective, ‘Hey.’

He knew he was overthinking it. A conversation starter would at the very least open the door for the apology, and all he needed to do was talk to her in some way - but that turned out to be easier said than done.

She wasn’t in her office when he’d gone to seek her out at work the next day, and when he realised she was probably in the content and media offices, he felt like he would be cornering her if he sought her out in front of anyone else. When the weight of how far removed they now were from each other’s lives dawned on him, a text felt too informal, and so the paragraphs sat untouched in his notes. The weather hadn’t been too great, so he couldn’t try and intercept her on the running route he knew all too well, and even attempting to orchestrate a seemingly random encounter outside of work seemed too creepy so stopping by the cafe around the corner from her apartment in the hopes she’d be there grabbing a latte was off the cards. 

He’d seen her on the plane to Ottawa, having to pass her seat to get to the team section at the back, but he had a few people boarding behind him, and she had her eyes cast toward her cell, headphones on and typing intently to somebody, he couldn’t even offer her a friendly smile to try and warm her up to the possibility of a conversation.

Between their win against the Senators, and their loss against the Bruins the next day, there wasn’t much time, or energy, really, to seek her out, and so he’d had to press the breaks, but as they flew back to New Jersey from Boston, a panic had started to swirl within his chest.

Nico knew he couldn’t enter a new year without clearing the air, and so time was well and truly running out. He again had seen her on the plane, and when he had plucked up the courage to get up and go sit with her, Jack had beaten him to it. When the plane had landed, and the team bus had driven them all back to the Rock, the Hughes brothers had both walked her to her car to see her off for the evening. 

For someone who had been not-so-subtly trying to initiate a reunion between Nico and Poppy for so long, Jack Hughes sure knew how to get in the way. But, he was easy to forgive - especially when Nico had woken up to his texts late this morning.

Jack: need ur help

Jack: urgently

Jack: wake up dude

Nico: I’m not driving anywhere for you

Jack: not asking u to

Jack: u will like this I promise 😌

Nico: what do you want?

Jack: need u to keep Poppy company

Jack: she’s in my apartment and she seemed off when she got here

Jack: been on her own for a few hours

Jack: so she’s grumpy 👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻 👹👹

Nico: doubt I can change the grumpy part

Nico: especially if you’ve left her alone for hours

Jack: don’t need to

Jack: ur a grump too

Jack: will cancel each other out 👍🏻👍🏻😇😇

Jack: u going down or no?

Nico: fine

Jack: I’ll be back in 1 hr :)

Jack: love u cap 😚

Nico: 🙄

And that was how Nico had found himself trudging down to Jack’s apartment, hopeful at the dream of a bridged gap between him and Poppy, and quickly disappointed by the reality.

She had been cold, rightfully so, and had made it clear as day she didn’t want anything to do with him. She had shrunk into herself, backing away from him any time he got too close,  defecting to a state of avoidance - gaze dropping to the floor, declining his offers to help her, making assumptions she was in his way, as if the thought of him seeking her out had become an entirely alien concept.

He couldn’t blame her for how she was being with him. It had been his fault things had collapsed between them - he’d come to that conclusion with the vast amounts of evidence piled up in his phone storage the past couple of days, but it didn’t make it hurt any less to see her like this - or to feel an actual, tangible resistance when he had tried to insist on being around. She didn’t want him around, that much was obvious, and it was starting to feel like it was to late to fix what he had so royally screwed up between the two of them. 

The once well-oiled machine that was their friendship was now clunky, clattering, dying a slow death with parts that were now obsolete.

But that didn’t change how much he wanted it to work. His parents had once told him when he was growing up that nothing was beyond repair, and if he wanted something fixed enough, he would figure out a way.

They had been talking about a model train he, his father and his brother had made when he was very young. The company that made the sets had gone bust, and they no longer sold the individual parts anymore - so when his sister had stumbled over something in the garage back home, knocked a box, and the once pristine collectable train had tumbled out and ended up cracked and chipped, he had been heartbroken. He and Nina had filled in the chips with wood filler, and touched it up with her nail polish, and it wasn’t the same but in a way it was better - a new sentiment attached with a memory of bonding with his sibling. 

The same thing could apply to his friendship with Poppy. Maybe they couldn’t go back to what they were - maybe they could be better.

And, when Poppy had made one too many attempts to push him away - when he had taken a hold of her after she had tried to move past him, dismissing him and his desire to help her, once again - a fire reignited within him. A spark of hope flickered at the familiarity that had flashed across her face as he referred to her in an endearment he hadn’t let himself use in so long.

In that moment - hand wrapped around her arm, just above her elbow, the skin soft and warm, close enough to smell the all too familiar cloud of vanilla-coconut scent that followed her, and her eyes locked on his - he had seen a crack in her armour.

He had seen an element of want - wanting to reconcile, wanting to fix things, wanting him in her life in the way he had been those months ago - and in a mirror of his own emotions, he had seen trepidation.

They wanted the same things, had the same fears, had the same end goal.

And when the unforeseen interruption of her best friend arriving startled her back into her withdrawn persona, he had realised something else.

Nia’s contrasting attitude toward Nico - open, friendly, familiar - had opened his eyes to the fact that Poppy hadn’t told her best friend about the demise of her friendship with Nico. 

And that, as much as it needed unpacking entirely, was Nico’s backdoor entry into the high security vault of Poppy’s good graces. 

Thankfully for him, Nia’s obliviousness to their tension had worked entirely in his favour. He tried not to look too much into Poppy’s attempted avoidance of spending the evening in his presence, despite her other plans falling apart. Tried to shoulder the blows of her sly digs at them not being friends anymore. Tried to ignore the pang in his heart at Poppy’s best friend being the one to throw flirty jibes his way, and not her. 

A determination had begun to brew within him - swirling, bubbling, steaming - and it was going to push him to finally bridge the gap he had forced between them.

His first success was her agreeing to come to the party, and he could easily build on that momentum.

Nico and Poppy were going to be friends again by midnight, he would figure out a way.

> Chapter One

[seventeenpins]

ok but have we talked about transmasc!joel?

transmasc!joel, who found out he was pregnant with sarah, way too young and scared absolutely shitless

transmasc!joel, whose boyfriend left him when he came out, his baby girl not even a year old

transmasc!joel, whose baby brother may be an idiot, but that kid loves him and always has, and he sure as hell won't hear a bad word about his big bro

transmasc!joel, who had always been a tomboy growing up, navigating being a whole ass adult with a fully developed brain, finding comfort in his gender identity while doing everything he can not to let the scars of his adolescence affect sarah, letting her flourish however she will

transmasc!joel, who gives sarah the BIGGEST hug (and tries not to let her see the tear in his eye) when she casually mentions starting a GSA at her school

transmasc!joel, who's the heartthrob of the cul-de-sac, but surprisingly private when it comes to his dating life. but from the few bored housewives that he's had encounters with all agree, he sure knows how to get the job done (whether it's the one he's hired for or not)

transmasc!joel, who sees a whole lot of himself in his adopted kid, and if ever Ellie decides she wants to try out a different name or pronouns, he'll be right behind his kid in a way no one but tommy was for him

[kit-screams-into-the-future]

another post for @bttfjanaury! this one's @itsthemorph's mermarty au and very predictably i got carried away with it LMAO.

yap session and bonus stuff below the cut:

once again i came up with an entire backstory for this au, and if i were a fanfiction writer i would genuinely consider writing it since it's a lot less visually comedic than the weredoc au (and comedic in general, it's played a little straighter than "man turns into dog and is thoroughly inconvenienced by it") (unfortunate [in reference to visuals] bc i enjoy drawing mermarty a great deal more than weredoc GBJKGJ) bc i really like the premise but i'm pretty bad at fleshing out a narrative in enough detail to last the whole story so bullet points it is:

doc has decided to take a break from his time-travel-related research and go on vacation! the fresh coastal air might jostle a couple ideas into place, and while he is a nuclear physicist and not a marine biologist he wouldn't mind checking out some of the local aquatic life

and by local aquatic life he meant like normal fish and stuff. a nice mollusk or two even. so when he ends up fishing an entire boy out of the water instead he's understandably very shocked

before doc can move past the "where did he come from??" thought to register his more fish-like qualities, the boy makes a run (a swim?) for it. fortunately or unfortunately for doc, he ends up being able to register the fish-like qualities after all since he gets dragged into the water along with him. the moment doesn't last too long, though, and the fish-boy is gone as soon as doc realizes the guy has a fish tail instead of legs

doc gets back on the dock (haha), thinks about the whole ordeal for a bit, and decides that the best course of action is just to assume he hallucinated the whole thing in a fit of heatstroke or something like that. he's here to relax and get his thoughts in order so he can continue working on his time machine! there's no time to investigate fairy-tale creatures or whatever supposedly living off the coast of california!

it's not shown in the comic but i imagine doc has a little portable radio next to him as he was fishing, so some time passes before he catches a glimpse of something shining in the water underneath the dock

he looks through the cracks in the dock and lo and behold, it's the same boy from earlier! doc greets him, and the boy immediately disappears under the water. doc thinks he's scared him off until a few minutes later where he pokes his head out and says hi back

they get to chatting and doc learns a couple things:

1. his name is marty!

2. he was trying to get doc to realize that he forgot to put bait on his hook but got his hand caught on it, and was trying to get his hand unstuck from the hook without ripping it open before doc ever had the chance to see him, which he obviously failed at

3. both the being seen and ripping his hand open, because in his haste to get away after being seen by doc he ended up doing that anyways. so there's like a lot of blood coming out of his hand now? but like don't worry about it. it'll be fine. he thinks.

4. he really likes whatever it is that's playing on the radio

doc insists on patching up his hand and initially marty refuses but lets him do it eventually, and marty tells doc that for a land dweller he's actually surprisingly nice. doc says nah anyone would want to help out someone hurt, especially if they're the one's who caused it. and marty's kind of confused by that because his family's always warned him of how dangerous humans are, which he kind of never thought too hard about until now where his time off this particular coast has really proven them correct, because he's encountered a bunch of humans over the past couple weeks and they've all tried to kill him or catch him. doc's the only one who's actually bothered to say hi!

after learning that particular not-at-all-concerning tidbit, doc asks him to elaborate because there's a lot to unpack over there, but someone else walks onto the dock before marty can get a word in and he takes off

marty does not return, even once the other guy leaves, and when doc packs it up to return to the place he rented out for the vacation he overhears a conversation among a group of men about spotting something weird in the water earlier and that it kind of looked like a mermaid? and that if any of them manage to catch it they'll all be rich as thieves. and another guy in the convo goes no you're thinking of rich as kings, you're mixing it up with a different analogy. and the first guy goes no i'm not i said what i said

so now this vacation is doing anything but clearing doc's mind. he's really worried about that little fish guy

there's a couple more ideas i had but halfway through writing out this bullet list i've realized that if i were to actually write this as a fanfiction, i'd probably want to keep those a surprise. so what i just wrote out is kind of the equivalent of one chapter

edit after thinking about it a bit more: since most humans have been trying to kill him, marty really has no incentive to let a guy know that he's wasting his time fishing with a baitless hook. so a. he's still pretty optimistic that most humans aren't out to get him, even if his experience off this particular coast says otherwise, so he was trying to be nice anyway or b. (which i think is a lot funnier) he has started to pull on people's lines as a way to fuck with them. i think if i wrote this i'd change it to this one

i based mermarty off of a guppy fish! specifically this kind of guppy fish:

i was searching up kinds of fish and he just had the vibe of this thing. although now i think i should've made him a flying fish instead. for the pun

alternate ending to the mini comic:

the other one makes a little more sense since just approaching a guy whose species doesn't know about your existence unprompted is pretty stupid even for marty (and also i thought it was funny that the hook didn't have anything but doc ends up catching something anyways) but i still think this one's funny too