#and people went to fucking war against her

[chrissv4mp]

MISS ME? ᝰ.ᐟ

warnings. smut, angst, fluff, fingering, g!p (girl penis), p in v, unprotected sex, semi-public sex, car sex, switch!billie × switch!reader, added characters, porn with some sort of plot, language.

synopsis. billie eilish. everybody knows her: the girl who always left both men and women in the dust during her races. you've been the starter to each one of them, and recently, you've noticed she hasn't been showing up. it's been two years, and when a big new name comes into town, billie's quick to pull up to reclaim her special title. and her girl.

au. g!p street racer!billie × starter!reader

words. 6.7k

letters. let's excuse my horrific description of street racing—and just cars in general.... also, i'm re-reading this and just now realizing i only made one reference to 'just keep watching...' the song i was originally taking inspiration from—alongside '2 hands' and 'sports car'..... anyway, enjoyyy!!! i had so much fun writing this 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️

there's a stretch of road just outside of the city no one uses anymore—too bumpy for traffic, too dark for cameras, and too far out for any law official to care. potholes like craters. traffic lights flickering yellow every now and then. most maps don't even list the name of the street anymore.

but the second the clock ticks past 11pm, the place lights up like vegas. and everyone who matters knows where to go.

you're always there before the first wave of engines start to pull in, headphones slung around your neck, pistol on your waist, boots up on the concrete barrier like you own the damn place—because you basically do. since you were just sixteen. an older girlfriend of yours had brought you to one of the races, offered to let you shoot the starting pistol, and you fell in love with it instantly. the adrenaline. the rush. and now, five years later you're not even the slightest bit bored.

your clipboard's tucked under your arm, pen behind your ear, eyes focused on the roster of names and heats for the night.

behind you, the old lot's filling fast—old imports, mustangs, beat-up chevys with rebuilt engines and matte paint jobs that already have scratches. headlights making the dust particles visible, exhaust rolling low and thick through the air. cars park in crooked rows beside yours, grills gleaming under the floodlight hung on the power pole. some racers lean against their hoods with their arms crossed, scoping out the competition. others are all talk, loud and gassed up, trying to seem special before they even touch the start line.

you don't flinch when engines rev. don't move a muscle when someone pulls up too close. you've been the starter long enough to know who's real and who's noise.

and you? you're something in between. not a racer. not a spectator. but the one who calls the shots, drops the flag—the signal that turns waiting into war.

people watch you more than they should. and, yeah, you notice, you just don't care.

the boys flirt. some ask if you've got a favorite just to see if you'll flatter them. you never do.

you do have a favorite, though.

but you never say her name. not anymore. not after she kissed you without informing you it was her last race and just up and left without another word—without a proper goodbye, without a proper way of letting you know how she felt towards you.

though, you do still say things like: "no one ever drove that curve like she did," or "that start? it was okay. my girl used to redline smoother."

or the one that always riles them up—"mariah's fast, sure. but she wouldn't beat my girl. not if they went head to head."

and that's when they start arguing.

"you're crazy."

"who the fuck even is 'your girl'?"

"mariah would kill her."

you let them talk, let it go in one ear and out the other. you don't bother answering them when they ask who she is. don't mention that you still check the list every week in hopes of her being on it. you don't tell them she's the only racer on the track who ever had your heart stuttering when she looked at you from behind her tinted windshield and smiled like she already knew how the night was gonna end.

it's nearing midnight when a particularly loud engine rolls into the lot, and you look up quickly—a cherry red charger, engine purring low and smug. some whistle. some cheer. others hold up their phones like they're filming something that can only be seen once in a lifetime. mariah moore.

she kills the engine and steps out slow, calm. mariah's a whole show: gold hoops, leather jacket, acrylic nails brushing her tan cheek as she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. she doesn't look at you, not at first. but you can feel the way the air shifts.

someone murmurs, "she's takin' it all."

you shake your head mindlessly. your mind drifts. like always.

because even with mariah here—the biggest name in street racing, fastest in the city—she doesn't make the street rumble like billie did, she doesn't even compare to the way billie had your palms sweating and your breath hitching.

you don't say it out loud. but she's already here.

lingering in the sound of a loud bass in someone's car. ghosting through the exhaust haze. trapped in the back of your throat each time someone asks, "who's your favorite?"

they all think mariah would crush her just because you keep her nameless. but you know better.

you know what it felt like when billie pulled up the line, slow and sure, making everybody forget who they really came to watch. you'd recognize the sound of her engine from a mile away, the melody of the song that was always playing when she rolled in.

you're leaning back in one of the old metal chairs under the check-in tent, clipboard in hand now, pen in the other, trying to make sense of the barely legible names scribbled in sharpie and faded pencil. the lot feels more alive than any other night before—laughter echoing off the crumbling brick of the nearby warehouse, engines revving in an effort to intimidate others, bass rocking a few cars subtly.

someone slides up next to you. aiden, one of the other starters. tall, kinda weird, always smells faintly of gasoline and peppermint gum.

"you got heat one lined up yet?" he asks, leaning in to scan the paper over your shoulder.

"workin' on it," you mutter, squinting at the mess of names, pen caught between your teeth. "who the hell wrote 'slim jim with the jaguar'? i swear, these guys are getting out of control."

aiden laughs, full and loud. "hey, that's jaxson. he's been coming out since last spring. you'll probably remember him once his muffler explodes again."

you shake your head with a soft laugh, but your attention stays sharp. you've done this a million times—balancing chaos, keeping things moving, occasionally breaking up a fight or two. you're not just the starter, you run this area of the streets.

"alright," you say, tapping the paper. "heat one is jaxson, reneé, and..."

before you can finish, a silhouette of black and red steps into your peripheral.

mariah.

black leather jacket, tight red crop top, sweatpants low on her hips like she owns the pavement. she walks like a girl who knows she's untouchable—chin up, hair falling over her shoulders effortlessly, eyes locked on you.

"got my name on there?" she asks, voice smooth.

you glance up, meet her gaze. unreadable, but steady. it doesn't faze you at all.

"heat three," you say, clicking your pen and tapping the paper again. "against miles and taylor."

she hums, eyes scanning the list and sighing like she's disappointed. "figured i'd get someone tougher. guess not."

"miles' been doing pretty well," aiden chimes in. "heard taylor's been doing overtime off the track to prepare."

mariah shrugs, uninterested. "i'll dust 'em anyway."

"real humble, moore," is what you want to say, but you keep it in your mind. you don't doubt her words, you just don't feel like she has the right to brag that much just yet.

so you just nod instead, standing up and setting the clipboard on the table beside the flags.

"check-in's by the cones," you say simply, nodding toward the start. "just tell 'em your name and they'll put you in the lineup."

mariah doesn't move right away. she lingers. eyes still on you, tilting her head just a bit to meet your gaze.

"...you seem quiet tonight," she says. "nothin' like before."

you raise an eyebrow, eyes flicking to hers, "and what was i like before?"

she grins. "flirty. sharp. mouthy as hell."

you scoff, turning toward the cars. "maybe your conversations just aren't as flirt-worthy as the other girls' are."

aiden laughs a little, then starts to walk away when mariah glares at him.

mariah laughs, low and real. "okay, starter girl. i'll catch you after i win, sound good?"

you don't respond, instead offering a single nod that doesn't really come off as one. but the second she walks away, that flicker starts again. and not from her. definitely not from her.

from the back of your mind.

the itch of a ghost. again. billie, who always made you stumble over your words like no other—nearly making you forget to shoot the gun when she sent a wink your way from inside her car.

you don't even realizing you're scanning the lot again until aiden comes up and nudges your side.

"expecting someone else tonight?"

you blink. "nah."

but the lie tastes bitter. because billie's name isn't on your list. and you're still looking for her anyway.

praying silently that you'll hear the low hum of a bass line later in the night, that you'll feel the familiar vibration of her engine beneath your feet, through your body.

you look over at the start line just as matthew waves you over. heat one is lined up a few feet behind the line, engines revving, the racers exchanging glances.

the crowd goes quiet as you walk over, starting pistol in one hand, the other resting casually on your hip.

you raise your arm, breathing in deeply, eyes locked on the cars—then you shoot the gun.

they're off before you can even process it, a silver camaro speeding past the line quicker than the others. everyone bursts into loud cheers for their separate bids, others only screaming just to scream.

it was always comforting hearing the cheers and laughter coming from the crowd—even if they weren't for you, it felt like you were still getting your flowers each time you shot the gun and everyone erupted into a loud choir of excitement and happiness. you thrived on it, but never would you dare get behind the wheel and actually drive in one of the races.

billie always terrified you with the way she drove—sometimes with only her knees, other times with one hand while she went 100 on the last curve before she really stepped on the gas and flew down the finish line in first place.

you recall the times she asked you to ride with her. "everything's always better with you. like... like a good luck charm," she'd said to you, fingers twirling a strand of your hair between her fingers before one of the biggest races of her life—and the last race you'd seen her at.

the sound of an engine quickly approaching broke you out of your trance. jaxson's purple jaguar skidding across the finish. reneé comes in second, her black audi following a few feet behind.

then the crowd erupts in mixed reactions, some angry and sad, others screaming and jumping around happily like they've just been rewarded with a million dollars in cash—which, in reality, no bid today was even a quarter of that amount.

the next heat passes by slower than the first, a few rookies taking the wheels of cars that they definitely spent their entire life savings on and didn't research at all.

it's all heat and noise around you—couples kissing over the hoods of cars and girls arguing about something that sounds like a cheating boyfriend? you can't really hear over the loud, obnoxious rev of mariah's charger at the start line, the hood just a few inches away from your legs where you stood between her and her opponent.

you felt the atmosphere change as soon as her name was called to the line. the crowd went quieter, murmurs filling the night instead of loud hollers and disapproving boo's for opposing racers. you couldn't blame them, she was the biggest name in street racing right now—but she was no billie eilish. nowhere near that territory. she didn't even compare to your girl. not now, not ever.

but still, you can feel her eyes on you before she even rolls down her window, smirk calm and cocky. "promise me a date if i win?" it makes your lips curl into a small, amused smile.

"what's the point?" you say, tilting your head to see her better. "i already know taylor's gonna beat you by a mile."

mariah laughs once, hollow. "yeah, funny joke."

you cock a brow. "never said i was joking, moore."

aiden snaps at you off to the side. you don't bother giving him a mere glance. instead, you just walk over to mariah's window and lean over, lips so close she feels your breath on her skin.

"fine," you whisper. "but if you pull some shit like you did last time, except to be blacklisted from any future race you're lookin' forward to."

her expression change is so subtle you're sure nobody would think she's fazed even in the slightest, but you see the way her brows furrow just that little bit, the way her lips twitch in that cocky grin that's wavering on nervous now.

"good luck," the tone of your voice is sweeter than before, eyes softening as you walk back to the middle and pull the gun from it's holster in your belt.

mariah rolls her window back up slowly, eyes locking onto the road in front of her as silence envelopes the crowd.

pop.

and they're off.

everyone lets the quiet continue for a second longer before going insane. grown men are screeching like little girls as they scream mariah's name, bouncing on their toes as they watch her clear the curve. smooth. calculated.

everything she does almost looks staged.

taylor trails behind her in a white bmw m3, drifting around the curve and momentarily grabbing first place. you can feel the tension from all the way across the track, your own heart pounding wildly in your chest—the deal with mariah sounds stupid now that you're watching her keep up with taylor.

"shit," you sigh, stepping back from the track quickly and running a hand through your hair, eyes never once leaving the cars.

aiden walks up just as you say it. you hate how he always has the worst timing. "finally see why mariah was named the best?"

you shake your head, and it slips from between your lips before you can stop it. "no, just finally realizing how stupid i was for promising her a date if she won."

he smirks. "same thing."

the final stretch of the race has you clutching onto your pistol, breath caught in your throat—it's mariah and taylor. miles isn't even in the question anymore, having spun out near the first curve.

it's a blur of white and red as they pass the finish line, engines roaring over the crowds applause and screams. not even you can tell who won—and it seems that neither can the girls as they come to a stop and jump out of their cars, their breaths still controlled as if they didn't have everyone on the edge of their seats.

matthew runs to watch the playback, and you swear you see his hands shaking as he brushes past you.

it's quiet as everyone watches him rewind the tape from the camera at the line.

one beat.

two.

then, "mariah moore. first place by a millisecond."

it's even louder than you expect it to be—people honking their horns while hanging out of them in the parking lot, groups of friends crowding each other and jumping up and down, someone even pulling out a megaphone and starting a chant of mariah's name. that makes you let out a quiet giggle.

but as you watch mariah jump back in her car and park it off to the side, nothing's funny anymore—because her next stop was definitely your house, picking you up late in the afternoon tomorrow for the date.

mariah hops out of her car again, strutting over with even more confidence and cockiness than before. her eyes are locked on you, smile growing, hair flowing perfectly in the cool night air.

she stops in front of you, already pulling her phone out of her back pocket. "think you owe me—"

the sound of an unexpected rev catches everyone's attention. including yours—in fact, you're the first one to turn your head in the direction of the noise.

your heart nearly jumps out of your chest.

that familiar vibration of a bass through blown-out speakers, the thick exhaust smoke trailing behind the car—the car.

billie's black dodge challenger.

mariah is the last thing on your mind now, your eyes locked on the windshield, hoping you'd see her sexy grin even through the dark tint that was definitely illegal. she doesn't even park in a space, just stops in front of the check-in tent and gets out, jordan's hitting the ground lightly, shorts hanging low on her hips despite the temperature, brown strands falling over her shoulders.

the crowd has the same reaction as they did before mariah's race, but the murmurs are louder—more curious.

"is that really her?"

"holy shit, i thought she was gone for real."

"time for mariah to retire."

"didn't she quit?"

billie doesn't spare them a glance. her focus is set on the check-in table, steps long and filled with confidence that even had mariah crumbling a little. you watch as she walks toward aiden, who stood behind the table with a clipboard in hand. he looks up, and you swear you see his jaw drop.

"i want a race," she says—no, demands. firm. unrelenting. "the best you've got. can you do that for me?"

aiden stutters, struggling to find his voice as he steps forward. though he was starstruck, he was also very strict on the rules. "i—i'm sorry, we've already got everyone in their assigned heats. there's no—"

"nah, i don't think you heard me," billie brushes him off, shaking her head with a smirk that you always saw when she was getting pissed off. "i want a race."

"yeah, and i said—"

"she's right here, eilish," you cut in, motioning toward mariah, and billie's head turns instantly. the smirk on her face grows into one of excitement, eyes glinting with something you can't quite name.

the brunette scoffs, his eyes widening. "y/n, you can't—"

you eye him. "she's billie fuckin' eilish. go read an article before denying her again."

billie laughs quietly, pushing off the table and walking over to you, stepping between you and mariah, who she doesn't pay any mind. her eyes flick to your lips, biting down on her own before finally looking you in the eyes.

"miss me?" she whispers.

you shrug. "did you win yet?"

her smirk grows. then she gives a shrug of her own and raises her brows. "we'll see."

mariah steps forward just as billie steps back, the two of them now side by side in front of you. their eyes gravitate toward each other, both of them giving the other an obvious once-over before billie speaks.

"mariah moore," she murmurs. "i've heard about you. best racer in town as of now, yeah?"

"yeah," mariah answers quietly. "you must be billie. haven't shown up to a race since 2022, correct?"

the question has no obvious bite, but the tone in which she says it has billie poking the inside of her cheek in frustration, nodding her head instead of saying something stupid.

"hurry up, girls," you interrupt, nodding toward the line as they both look up at you.

"yes, ma'am." they answer.

billie jogs back to her car quickly, jumping in and pulling around to the line, the crowd pulling back and forming a path for her. it's nearly silent now as mariah reverses just behind the line again, the low hum of both engines setting the mood.

tension is high as you step onto the track again, planting your feet firmly onto the small sliver of pavement between both cars.

you look over at billie, who flashes a smirk before turning back to the road, lips lowering into a thin, tight line. once she was focused nobody was able to break her out—not until after she won the race.

then you glance at mariah, who's already staring at the road, gripping her steering wheel tighter than she did when put up against taylor and miles. the last race scared her, you could tell in the way she was so quiet after jumping out of her car earlier—so there was no doubt she was terrified right now.

your eyes flick to the pavement behind them, pulling out your gun and raising your arm, elbow straight. you inhale, exhale.

the gun goes off.

and so do billie and mariah.

billie's challenger jumps forward first in your peripheral, and you turn quickly to see who gets the starting advantage. it's billie, per usual. the adrenaline running through your veins is 20x more strong than it was when you were watching mariah's race. because after not seeing billie race in so long, you're unsure if she still has it.

but you don't lean into the doubt just yet.

mariah's red charger weaves around billie's challenger, taking the curve perfectly and bursting out of it. she doesn't get far. billie kicks her gear lower and speeds past mariah with practiced ease, accelerating quick and drifting on the last curve.

you hold your breath as mariah creeps up on billie, engine revving loud as she tries keeping up with her—but billie's already got the length of a car hood between her. the crowd screams in anticipation, watching as billie bolts through the finish line and slowly comes to a stop.

mariah follows behind her, tires not moving nearly as fast as billie's were. the crowd is speechless, not even hollering coherent words anymore, just babbles of nonsense and excited cheers and squeals.

billie reverses with her head sticking out of her window, a proud grin on her face as she parks just off of the track. she steps out, and you can already feel the smugness radiating off her even from a few feet away.

she walks over to mariah, tapping her shoulder and holding out a hand. "good race," she compliments. "'m'not bad, considering i've been gone since 2022, right?"

you see mariah's expression flip quickly, brows furrowing in frustration as she pushes away from billie and mutters something under her breath.

billie's in front of you before you can even announce the winner—even though it's clear.

"let's try this again," she breathes, taking your hand and bringing it up to her lips, pressing a soft kiss to your knuckles. "miss me?"

your hand finds the collar of her shirt, pulling her close, lips mere inches away from hers. "you know i did."

you don't let her get another word out before kissing her. hard. passionate. like you've been waiting for this since the last moment you saw her. because you have. you've been waiting for it so desperately and now you finally get to do it.

her hands find your waist, pulling your hips forward, pressing your body flush against hers as she kisses you back just as passionately, eyes fluttering shut, heart thumping against her chest so loud she's sure you've already heard it.

you pull away abruptly, breathing hard. "let me show you."

billie doesn't miss a beat—and you don't even care about the small, sharp pain in your wrist as she twists it, dragging you toward her car and practically shoving you into the passenger seat.

you swear you hear aiden call after you, but billie's already pressing on the gas and speeding out of the lot without a second thought.

she doesn't drive far from the noise, pulling off to the side directly under a blue streetlight, a ray shining in through the tinted windshield. billie shifts into park, then glances over at you, still breathless.

neither of you say another word. you just climb over the center console and straddle her lap, legs pressed against either of her thighs, hands snaking up her chest and around her neck, squeezing lightly just to hear her gasp.

then you lean forward, lips finding hers, rougher than before—dirtier because you weren't accompanied by a large, judgemental crowd. billie's tongue presses against your lips, asking politely for entrance. you grant it without another thought in your hazy mind, moaning softly against her mouth when you feel her tongue clashing against yours.

her hands slide down your body, squeezing your waist gently. then they move down to your ass, pulling you down against her lap, pulling you closer to her like she wants to morph your bodies into one.

"don't ever fuckin' leave like that again," you growl against her lips, kissing down her jaw, then scattering open-mouthed kisses along the expanse of her neck.

she huffs a laugh, head falling back against the headrest, eyelids fluttering shut as she lets out a small, relaxed breath.

your teeth nip softly at her pulse point, eliciting a pained hiss from between her pretty lips—you soothe the bite with your tongue, sucking gently, the sensation a contrast from the sharp pain just moments ago.

billie brings a hand up to your hair, fingers tangling in the messy strands of your hair. "thought you'd have forgiven me by now."

a scoff escapes your throat at her words, but it dies down into a surprised gasp when she bucks her hips up, something hard pressing against your clothed core. a shiver runs up your spine.

"don't get an attitude with me now, sweetheart."

you roll your eyes, lips pressing back onto her skin, one of your hands snaking down her chest and slipping under the hem of her shirt, fingertips teasing the smooth skin of her stomach. her breath catches noticeably, pulse jumping under your tongue.

"i have every right to have an attitude with you," you grumble, palm finding the cup of her bra and squeezing through the fabric. "i should fucking hate you. i mean, you kissed me and then up and left without another word. a text would've been enough, billie."

billie bucks her hips again, groaning at the pleasure.

"let me make it up to you then," she pants, slapping your ass.

her hand untangles from your hair, sliding down your neck, your chest, your stomach, before eventually snaking down into your little shorts. the damp spot on your panties is enough to make her moan, eyelids fluttering open to meet your eyes as you gasp.

she stares directly into your eyes while stroking your clit through your panties, biting her lip and smiling as she watches your brows furrow in pleasure, hands finding her shoulders, nails digging into her skin even through the fabric of her shirt.

then she slips her fingers past the cotton waistband, fingertips sliding through your soaked folds, running along your dripping slit and slowly pushing in two of them. the moan that escapes your throat is long. loud. like you've been holding it in for her since before you can remember.

your eyes roll back when she scissors her index and middle fingers inside of your cunt, thighs trembling around her lap, nails unrelenting on her shoulders.

"yeah," she coos. "there you go, baby girl. just needed me to fill this greedy pussy of yours for you to shut up, hm?"

billie lets out a moan of her own when you roll your hips forward, pressing down just enough for her to feel it through both the fabric of your pants and her own. she bites her lip, hips bucking up involuntarily as she watches you get off on her fingers.

she inhales sharply. "so tight, too. fuck," she breathes. "been waitin' for me, haven't you?"

you nod mindlessly, jaw falling agape when billie pushes her fingers deeper, thumb finding your clit and pressing down hard. if that wasn't making you see stars, the added pleasure of her lips on your neck definitely was.

"billie, oh my fucking—" you cut yourself off with a guttural moan, hips stuttering against her palm. "god—i—fuck you."

you feel her grin grow against your neck, lips so soft and plump and mind-consuming as she continues kissing you, fucking you. deep. hard. passionate.

"in a minute, doll," she teases. "can't even be patient and wait for my cock. so fuckin' greedy." she murmurs, kissing her teeth.

a low whine of frustration emits from your throat at her teasing, walls clenching around her fingers as you feel your orgasm start to approach quickly. your breathing goes shallow, quick, short breaths falling from between your kiss-swollen lips.

"shit—gonna, oh my god, m'gonna cum!" you whine.

billie huffs. "c'mon, mama. make a mess f'me."

and you do.

with a loud, broken moan, your walls flutter around her fingers and you finally feel the knot snap in your tummy. she slowly works you down from your high, muttering sweet nothings into your neck as she leaves a litter of kisses all over your skin.

her free hand creeps up your chest, fingers wrapping loosely around your neck—casually. like she owns you.

and after this, maybe she will.

"this make up for my absence?" she hums, thumb running along your pulse point, feeling it jump under the pad of her fingers. she presses down, eliciting a gasp from you.

you laugh quietly, but it cuts off into a disappointed moan when billie slips her fingers out of your cunt slowly.

she brings them up to her lips just as you open your eyes, pushing them in, plump lips wrapping around lengthy digits, tongue moving between the crevices and licking off every last remnant of your sweetness.

cold blue eyes never leave yours, eyelids hooded and dark with lust and desperation—and love, above everything.

you bite your lip, already pulling off your shorts and ruined panties, throwing them into the backseat. "m'still mad at you. but i know what'll make it better..."

billie releases her fingers with a 'pop,' a smirk growing on her lips once again. she cocks an eyebrow, tilting her head, eyes finally leaving yours to trail down your half-naked body. her eyes land on your dripping pussy, clit swollen and puffy, arousal leaking down your smooth thighs. she groans.

"yeah, and what's that?" she inquires, hips already moving.

silence. instead, you answer with your hands—fingers undoing the button of her jeans, then pulling down her zipper. you lift yourself slightly, tugging her jeans down until they fall to her ankles.

there's a small damp spot on her boxers, a large bulge prominent in the dark fabric, straining against it. billie whimpers when you cup your hand over the print, hips lifting instinctively at the touch.

she hisses when you squeeze gently, your eyes finally snapping up to hers.

"this—" you squeeze her again. then adding, "—inside of me."

billie nods eagerly, hands leaving your body, moving quickly to pull down the last layer of fabric that was currently denying her access to your core. she could feel the warmth stronger now that her lower half was clad in only her boxers.

you lift your hips again, helping billie tug the fabric down to ankles, joining her jeans. her cock springs up, slapping against her lower stomach softly before standing at attention.

her tip is a light red, leaking profusely with pre-cum that spills down her 9 inch shaft until it reaches the base. she's already such a sticky mess and you've hardly touched her.

it made you giggle.

"looks like you missed me more," you tease, looking at her through your lashes.

billie sighs, nodding again, hands scrambling to find your hips again. she tries pulling you closer, tries to even run the tip of her cock through your slick folds—but your nails dig into her forearms, and she yelps quietly.

"hypocritical much, don't you think?" you giggle again, and billie pouts deeply, hands relaxing on your hips. "patience, baby—remember that?"

you lift yourself higher, positioning your dripping slit directly over billie's tip, and you hear her breath hitch before you even sink down in the slightest. and when you lower yourself, billie lets out a noise you weren't sure she was even capable of.

she whimpers brokenly—high-pitched and already hoarse—as her cock splits you open, stretching you out slowly as you continue to lower yourself until you reach the base.

billie's nails dig crescent-shaped indents into your skin, the pleasure already too overwhelming.

"fuuck," she groans, dragging it out. her head falls back against the headrest, eyes squeezed shut. "you—fuck—have you, mmh, always been this t-tight?"

you moan softly when you feel billie buck her hips up again, her tip kissing your cervix. she gasps at the feeling, cock twitching between your gummy, warm walls.

her mind goes blank.

you stay in the position for a moment longer, trying to adjust to her size. your hands wrap around her neck, nails scratching along her skin and sending a shiver down her spine. the feeling of your breath so hot on her lips has her in a trance she's not sure she'll be able to break out of.

billie leans forward to capture your lips in a needy, sloppy kiss just as you start to move, hips lifting until all that was left inside of you was her tip—then slamming back down. hard. desperate.

both of your moans are muffled against each other's mouths, lips parting. you sneak your tongue into her mouth, tasting her—and she falls apart even further underneath you, fingers twitching at your sides.

your hands slide across her neck, hips grinding fast, hard, just right for the both of you—billie squeals into your mouth when she feels you clench around her.

"baby, fuck," she grunts, grabbing onto your hips tighter and thrusting her hips up, pushing her cock deeper. "missed you, missed you so—god, i missed you so much. c-couldn't stop thinkin' about you."

a moan passes by your lips when you pull away. "yeah? touched yourself to—shit—to me?"

billie nods frantically, brows knitting together and jaw falling lower. her hips stutter—a clear sign of her impending orgasm. but you don't stop. don't even pull away or slow down in the slightest.

you needed it. needed to feel her cum inside of you.

the windows fog around you, and now the blue shine from the streetlight is hazy, different shades of blues spilling in through the windshield and onto your bodies and faces. you can feel the car shaking beneath you two.

but it only urges you to keep going.

harder.

faster.

billie mewls quietly, struggling to hold herself together. "holy shit—baby. baby, baby, m'gonna cum! can't hold—fuck, i can't hold it, i—"

"cum, bil," you moan. loud. breathy. "want it—need it so bad. please, please cum inside me."

the second that jumbled sentence left your mouth, billie let herself go—body trembling, mind short-circuiting. your jaw falls open in a silent moan at the combined pleasure of your own orgasm and the feeling of thick, warm ropes of her cum painting your insides.

billie whimpers beneath your body, nuzzling her head into the crook of your neck like she needs your scent to stay alive.

it's all heat and heavy breathing after that—the windows still fogged, skin still layered with a thin sheen of sweat, loose hairs sticking to your neck and forehead. billie stays with her face in your neck, arms wrapping around your back, your own hands still around her neck.

billie pulls out slowly as not to overstimulate you any further, helping you lift yourself off her lap. you lean over the center console and grab your shorts from the backseat, pulling them on once you're seated in the passenger side.

you watch billie pull up her own boxers and jeans, buttoning and zipping them with trembling fingers, still facing a few of the aftershocks of her orgasm.

and, though she's still spent, billie's the first to talk.

"...do you forgive me now?"

you can't help but giggle—you wonder how she still even remembered the situation you two were in. it slipped your mind the second you sunk down on her cock.

"i think you know the answer to that," you exhale, stroking her damp hair gently.

billie hums, then pulls away from your neck, eyes softer than you'd ever seen—sincere, a little worried. "...yeah, but i wanna hear you say it."

your face changes, features softening once you hear the quiet, shaky tone of her voice. fear swirled in the pools of her ocean blue irises, and it's only then that you realize she really was worried about this the entire time.

taking her face in your hands, you pull her close, eyes flicking back and forth between the two of hers. she bites her lip, an unreadable expression flashing over her features—fear again, maybe. or maybe it's hope. you can't tell.

"i never hated you for leaving, billie," you explain. firm. "it just... scared me. i thought you wouldn't come back, and i almost lost hope—until tonight."

a ghost of a grin curls on billie's lips.

"so, yes, i do forgive you. even if i still think kissing me before leaving without another word was really low of you," you murmur.

billie inhales, exhales. "i know, that—that was stupid of me."

her lips find your cheek, then your forehead. and, finally, your lips. and then she looks at you again. "nationals were just... they were all over the place, and i finally realized that i had some sort of feelings toward you. but i didn't know what they were—"

"—and when you were the first one to come up and hug me after i won, i just—i felt so full of love and adoration and it all just spilled over and—" she pauses. finds her words. "and i kissed you because i felt like it was too early to tell you..."

she trails off, voice going quiet near the end. she looks away for a moment. and when she feels your thumb brush across her cheek, her eyes snap back.

"...to tell you that i loved—that i love you."

your breath catches.

it's not what you expected her to say—far from anything that popped into your mind. but everything you were thinking quickly faded as soon as she said those three little words:

i love you.

words that you'd only hear in teasing tones from drunk guys who came up to you during races, from racers that were still riding high on the adrenaline they got from winning.

but now, hearing it from billie, it felt like your whole world shifted on it's axis.

billie's cheeks flush pink when you don't reply, shifting uncomfortably in her seat and nearly pulling away from your touch—but you pull her back. into a kiss. one that's far more passionate than the ones before. it's filled with something you can't describe with words. something far stronger than love and adoration and admiration.

when you pull away, you're both out of breath.

"i love you, too," you murmur after a beat, eyes never leaving billie's. you wanted her to know that you meant it.

and, by the look on her face, you were almost 100% sure it got through to her. a cheesy smile curled up on her lips, her teeth shining bright even in the dark space of the car. you return the same smile, and billie practically throws her arms around you.

she pulls you as close as she can over the center console, nose nuzzled into your neck, inhaling your scent—and it felt like she was smelling an entire different person. because now there was a weight lifted off her chest and a something new blooming in her heart.

you hold her just as tight, unable to get rid of the stupidly big smile on your face—especially when you feel billie's fingers twitching nervously on your back.

you both just hold each other like that for a few minutes. in silence. but it's not an uncomfortable silence, far from it. it's warm. gentle. filled with shared understanding.

and, suddenly, you forget that she even left in the first place.

tags. @mseilishmwah @sophloveswomen @love4madii @livvydunneness @partyf4vor @chxhir0 @loving1dsworld @tan1shere @fallingforfalll2 @cierraonline @dandelions4us @scarlittt @ifwdominicfike @slxtarchive @bilsdillldough @47lake @hopingforgoodblogs @mybluebossanova @strwberrybils @justtr @greenbttrflyy @billsbaby @bilsova @lottiepierce @northlndnisred @asterisk-eyes @dragoneyelashart @xxangelfarrlzxx @ilomiloblohshh @kittymarrow @meliciousmel13 @jul3esz @rightarion @svelish @eilishssiennaa @eeuni @dragoneyelashart @thinkshespretty @cnnibalize @canthelpit0 @hailwiggly @karaaeilish @bilswifee @drunkinyourbenz @aka-persephone @bitchesbrokenpromises @jayjaywetforbils @slvt4subchratt @cantlandonmyfeet @tezzzzzzzz

[galaxy-stardust]

Task Force 141 x you

"What in the unholy hell is dark romance?!"

The safehouse was, for once, quiet.

Rain tapped steadily at the windows. Thunder rolled in the distance like a lazy growl.

Price sat in the armchair with his feet up, sipping tea and reading a newspaper like a war-hardened grandfather.

Gaz was on the couch, headphones half in, scrolling.

You were curled in a blanket on the opposite side, legs tucked under, cup of tea warming your hands.

Ghost stood leaning against the far wall. Silent. Watching. Present in that way only he could be - still as a shadow with a pulse.

Soap, unfortunately, was bored.

Dangerously bored.

“Oi,” he called across the room to Gaz, breaking the peace. “I need that video again - the one with the goat screaming like a man. You know the one.”

Gaz looked up, confused. “...What?”

“The goat! It screams, and someone edited it into a metal song. You showed me last week.”

Gaz blinked. “You mean the one with the caption ‘me escaping my toxic romance’?”

“Aye! That one!”

He went back to scrolling.

Two minutes of blessed silence passed.

Then -

“…Wait... the fuck is this?”

Soap froze, thumb hovering over his screen.

Then blinked.

Then scrolled again.

“…Uh. What in the unholy hell is dark romance?”

You froze mid-sip.

Oh no.

Ghost didn’t move, but you felt him tune in.

Gaz looked up again. “Sounds like a perfume. Like... a really expensive, pretentious one.”

Price grunted from behind his paper. “Thought it was one of your metal bands.”

Soap ignored them, brows furrowed as he kept scrolling. “Why are there book covers now? With… masked men and half-naked women?” He flipped the phone around. “Why is this one called ‘Chained to the Reaper’? This is NOT about goats!”

Even Price looked up now, brows raised.

Ghost’s arms crossed, his gaze sharpening.

“I searched for a meme,” Soap said slowly, “and now I’m knee-deep on some site with star ratings and lists like -” he squinted, “- ‘Top 10 Dark Romance Alpha Bastards That Will Ruin Your Life.’ What does that even mean?!”

You looked over your mug, playing innocent. “Oh. Yeah. That’s a thing.”

Soap stared at you. “You knew?!”

You shrugged. “I’m a woman, Johnny. Of course I know this exists.”

He looked betrayed.

“This one - ” He turned the phone again, showing a half-naked man gripping a woman’s chin. The man wore a skull mask. “The title is ‘Ruined by the Reaper: A Possessive Obsession.’ Who’s reading this filth?!”

Gaz lost it. “I guess, you’ve fallen into the masked alpha rabbit hole, mate.”

Price groaned. “Can’t have one night of peace.”

Soap scrolled again, reading aloud. “‘She ran. He hunted. Now she belongs to him - even if it breaks her.’ BLOODY HELL. This is romance?!”

You sipped your tea. “Not my thing.”

Gaz raised a brow. “Sure about that? You’re looking a little too calm.”

You gave a sly smile. “Some people like intensity.”

Soap looked horrified. “Intensity?! This reads like Stockholm Syndrome with a subscription plan!”

Ghost’s shoulder twitched. It might have been a laugh.

Soap scrolled more, muttering. “NO BLOODY WAY. This one’s about a billionaire with a soundproof basement. ‘She signed the contract. Now she obeys.’ Someone get me holy water. GAZ! Get me holy water and a bloody priest.”

Gaz was doubled over now, laughing so hard he couldn’t breathe.

“Read one,” you said sweetly.

“I will not - ”

“Do it,” Ghost said. Low. Amused.

Soap blinked. “Did you just - ? You’re encouraging this?!”

Ghost said nothing.

Which made it worse.

Soap groaned, then read dramatically:

“‘His breath was a brand, searing my neck. You’re mine, he growled, the mask hiding all but the feral gleam in his eyes. You don’t run from me. I tried to move, but the cuffs bit into my wrists. My heart beat traitorously as heat pooled low - ’”

“OH MY GOD.” Soap flung the phone away. “I am traumatised. PRICE, SAY SOMETHING.”

Price, not even hiding his exhaustion, muttered, “I need a bloody transfer.”

“There’s fan art. There’s audiobooks. GHOST, BACK ME UP HERE - this is insane, yeah?”

Ghost’s voice was calm. “Sounds like solid tactics to me.”

Soap froze. “...What?”

“Shock. Control. Psychological pressure.” Ghost shrugged. “Useful tools.”

“YOU’RE the reason these exist! This is YOUR FAULT!”

You tried and failed to hold back a laugh. “He does tick a lot of boxes.”

“Don’t start.” Soap groaned.

Gaz wheezed. “You’re living in a fanfic and didn’t know it.”

“I’m gonna be sick.”

You looked back at Ghost.

He was close now. Closer than you expected.

Voice low, just for you:

“…You sure you don’t like that sort of thing?”

You hesitated. “I don’t need it.”

“But?” His eyes didn’t leave yours.

“…It’s fun. Sometimes.”

A pause.

“…Noted.”

Soap shouted, “There’s one called ‘Marked by the Mask.’ IT’S A GENRE. There’s reader-insert?! I am in hell.”

Price stood up. “I need liquor.”

Soap was scrolling again, reading another in a voice filled with pure panic:

“‘He was sitting on the edge of the bed, cleaning his knife - slowly, deliberately. She teased him again, just to watch that vein in his neck pulse. He didn’t speak. Just smiled behind the mask and whispered, Keep going, sweetheart. Let’s see how brave you really are.’”

Silence.

Soap stared at the screen, stunned. “Okay. No. NOPE. That’s it. I’m out.”

Gaz was gasping for air from laughing.

Price pinched the bridge of his nose. “Why am I here?”

You weren’t laughing.

Because when you turned your head, Ghost was watching you again - still as stone. Shoulders faintly tense. Blade in hand, thumb slowly tracing the spine in that idle way he always did when his thoughts ran too deep.

He caught your gaze.

Tilted his head - just a little.

“That one,” he murmured, voice like dark silk, “had potential.”

You rolled your eyes. “Don’t get any ideas.”

“I already did.”

[monards]

i fear that i don’t acknowledge enough the fact that i KNOW rhinedottir's evil !!! and she's horrible !!! and that she's wholly ireedamable !!! i know and love and respect that fact !!! i'd shoot myself in the frontal lobe if hoyo made her out to NOT be wholly evil !!!! but the reason i always go on and on and on about her humanity and complexity is because. SHE IS ALWAYS DUMBED DOWN !!!! TO JUST THAT !!!! it's literally the greatest and most moving theme (IN MY OPINION!!!) in genshin, that human beings are COMPLEX !!!! and they're MORE than just evil or bad or wtv. we see this through every character to almost ever be introduced to us -> literally just take arlecchino as an example. if anyone was at all paying attention to the discourse around her when the fontaine teaser dropped (and. 4.0 in general) it was the BIGGEST thing to watch people argue between "she's a harbinger, so she's clearly the most evil and the big antagonist of fontaine because of these accounts we have right now !!" versus the argument of "we've only seen ONE perspective of her so far, and it's no duh that all this stuff sucks -- but there's no way she's JUST gonna be all these horrible things,, because literally nobody to exist is just horrible and cruel with zero to no good in them. and also that'd make a shit narrative by hoyo in a story driven game" AND LOOK WHAT HAPPENED !!!! we saw !!! in REAL time !!! that while arlecchino was rightfully cruel and horrible and, yes the things she did were fucked up beyond belief and she should absolutely not be excused for any of it - she is NOT just evil ! she's shown to care, albeit in a fucked up way that only shows she's even more deranged ; but what's so incredibly important about her is the way that her being "evil" doesn't mean she's incapable of anything else. She is evil, yes— but so many of those evil actions have *motives* and *reasons* that explain them (but not excuse or condone!) and, although they don’t save her grace or anything of the sort, they DO show her true character. AND YHATS SO IMPORTANT!!!! She’s capable of being an antagonist while still being justified in some form, and given nuance and backstory and redeemable traits

I am !!! NEVER !!! going to say rhinedottir is a good person. she isn't! no shit sherlock ! how the fuck do you think im gonna go on and ignore the fact she sent both her kids to their deaths, and also fed one to another. dare i say, that is NOT anything good !!! suprise of the century !! woah !!! -- but what i AM gonna say is that she's much beyond that? hello !! not only has the point of her having not a zero good trait or will in her body been. proven false over and over and over again. but it's such ! Sad and not compelling is character choice for her *not* to be nuanced and complex and justified in a fucked up !! — like do you REALLY think hoyoverse (who is clearly capable of, and likes to make) complex characters, who are horrible, while not being *only* those horrible things, would pass up a golden (haha) opportunity to make a characters whose entire existence is JUST that??!,!2????

believe what you want! Do what you want! This is a silly video game that will be eroded along with time in a hundred in so years ! But god so help me, please don’t be willfully ignorant to the complexity and nuance of characters, just because you want a villain. No villain , real or not, is entirely evil. People are complex and multi faceted and people really, really need to hop off this cart of going “okay but stop saying she’s multifaceted because it takes away from her being evil” because it DOESNT! If anything, it makes her so much more compelling . Which is something some people can apparently. Not handle.

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

Hey. Hi. Hello. Today I learned about the existence of 15th century Welsh poet Gwerful Mechain and that she apparently has a surviving work of erotic poems.

Please. For Christmas. For Yule. Please tell me more because I can't read Welsh.

Heh heh. Oh, Gwerful Mechain is the absolute best.

(Quick housekeeping to keep the post manageable - I previously wrote about things like cynghanedd and cywydds and englyns and such here, so check that if you need an explanation.)

What's fun is that we don't know a ton about her, because not a lot got written down about people in her time. Her surviving work covers a 40ish year span at the end of the 1400s to just into the 1500s, but we don't know when she was born or died or anything like that. We know her parents' names? And that she was from Mechain, hence the bardic name. And that she married a guy and had a daughter, something which actually does mark out her body of work as different from her contemporaries; being a wife and mother, she couldn't do the usual bardic role of travelling the country to spread news and play at courts. This means she doesn't have any of the praise poetry that a lot of male bards produced about the lords that hosted them.

But, there's stuff we can piece together about her. For one thing, she was not just literate (not a universal skill for anyone at that point, but especially for women), but she was astonishingly well-read and had what appears to be a classical education, given her poetic references and traditional Welsh meters. For another, her work often had recurring themes of religion, sex, and women's rights, sometimes all at the same time.

At the point Gwerful was active, Welsh bardic culture heavily featured ymrysonau. An ymryson is like... well, I hesitate to say "sort of like a rap battle" after the way everyone and their dog now thinks that's what the Mari Lwyd does, but they were like a cross between a rap battle and the publication war between two rival academics. A bard would write an englyn and publish it in the local parish newsletter. Another bard would see this, and write their own englyn about how stupid the first bard's englyn was, and publish it in the same newsletter. The first bard would see this and retaliate. The second bard would retaliate to that. And on and on it would go, like a printed tennis match for all the parishioners to enjoy, until someone wrote a conclusive verse OR until someone went "Lol, you got me good there" and bowed out with dignity. Sometimes, these things were fucking vicious; but other times, they were just banter between two bards who knew each other and were enjoying the chance to keep their poetic skills in tip top condition.

Now, Gwerful was an active and enthusiastic participant in ymrysonau. We have many examples of her work from these. There are two of particular note that I'll list here, each against a different bard:

Dafydd Llwyd o Fathafarn. Mathafarn and Mechain are not so distant from one another, so no real surprise that these two locked horns a lot, but the impression I always got from their ymrysonau is that they were good mates, actually. These fell into the 'banter' category more often than not. Dafydd was a Welsh Nationalist who was hoping for a Welshman to rise up and throw off the yoke of English oppression, and most of his work is about that, but he turned up the filthy erotic shit for any ymryson with Gwerful because BOY HOWDY was that her specialty. IIRC she did occasionally poke fun at his Welsh Nash leanings, especially his obsession with Mab Darogan (OLD Welsh idea that translates to the Son of Prophesy - the Arthur-style figure that will one day drive out the English overlords), but mostly their ymrysonau were incredibly beautifully-written odes that could be summed up as "Dafydd, my man, my good friend, I mean this sincerely: suck my entire clit".

She often won.

Ieuan Dyfi. God, what a fucking asshole. This one was not banter. Gwerful played for blood with this prick.

We actually would know nothing about Ieuan Dyfi if not for Gwerful Mechain, because it was her poetic response to him that meant his only surviving poems made it to the modern day; that, and the record of him being brought before a church court where he admitted adultery with Anni Goch, a married woman. Oh, and the record of him being brought before the law courts at Liverpool, accused of domestic abuse and gambling? If I remember right?

Two things to know that set the scene for what came next:

One of Gwerful Mechain's surviving poems is an englyn considered to be possibly the oldest extant poem about domestic violence written by a woman: I’w gŵr am ei churo (To the husband who beats her)

Dager drwy goler dy galon - ar osgo I asgwrn dy ddwyfron; Dy lin a dyr, dy law’n don, A’th gleddau i’th goluddion.

There are a lot of translations for this one to try to keep its poeticness, but this one is pretty good:

Through your heart’s lining let there be pressed, slanting down, A dagger to the bone in your chest. Your knee smashed, your hand crushed, may the rest Be gutted by the sword you possessed.

She has others, too, that deal with sexual assault, and something scholars often note about Gwerful is her remarkable knowledge of the law as it pertained to women's issues. So she was not, you see, a woman with a high view of a man accused of domestic violence anyway.

But then Ieuan Dyfi wrote five poems about Anni Goch, the married woman he'd fucked, each more "Wow dude, she said no" than the last, culminating in I Anni Goch; a full cywydd of misogynistic Medieval-incel bullshit about how false and evil women are, which listed all the false and evil women of history including classical and mythological figures.

And. Well. Gwerful had some views.

Her responding cywydd - I ateb Ieuan Dyfi am gywydd Anni Goch - basically blasted the guy back into his own impact crater and disintegrated him. What she did with it, essentially, was to mirror his cywydd. Where he'd gone "Isn't it so true how great men throughout history have always been brought low by women, amirite lads? Here's examples", Gwerful went "Isn't it so true how 'great men' throughout history have behaved appallingly and fucked up through their own actions and then somehow managed to blame women, amirite lads? Here's examples." Where his examples had been historical figures, so were hers. Where his had been classical, so were hers. Where he went Biblical, so did she.

And what's so interesting about that last one is how pointed she was with it - for some reason, in his big list of evil women, Ieuan Dyfi did not go for the most obvious and low-hanging of fruit (no pun intended) - he doesn't cite Eve. In response, Gwerful also sidesteps the most obvious and low hanging of fruit - she doesn't cite Mary. In so doing, she makes it clear that she doesn't even need to.

There is no record of him responding to her. IIRC, there is a record of him doing three years in prison.

But! Outside of all of that, the big thing Gwerful was known for was her erotic poetry. You'll be unsurprised to hear that it wasn't written for shits and giggles - much like today, women of the time were told that most of their value was in their looks, and they had plentiful insecurities about their bodies. Gwerful wrote her erotic stuff to confront those insecurities and shine a light on the issue. There are so many examples of this, but far and away the most famous is definitely Cywydd y Cedor - roughly translated, 'Ode to the Vulva'. Though I have also seen it titled Cywydd y Gont - Ode to the Cunt. It's such a shame that the English language is literally, physically not capable of cynghanedd, because it means unless you learn Welsh you will never understand the beauty and the lyricism of the piece, and how it elevates and undercuts the content at the same time; but it's a joyful, masterful, irreverent work that uses the fancy language male poets were forever dedicating to the rest of a woman's body and applies it squarely to the vulva. In fact it basically opens with "Men are cowards, describe more cunts or gtfo" before launching into its main subject matter. The last line is pro-pubic hair, too, like I really must stress how much Gwerful Mechain would have to offer Tumblr if you could speak Welsh. This is probably her most widely translated piece, though, you can definitely find English versions. Although you can tell how blushing and reticent the translator is - and therefore how sanitised their translation is - by whether they've called it Ode to the Vulva/Cunt, or Ode to the Pubic Hair.

Needless to say, the original is not sanitised.

(Actually, I should also say - this one is also a response piece, probably, but in this case to a bard who lived a century earlier - Dafydd ap Gwilym, the absolutely legendary and uncontested king of Welsh romance poetry. He wrote a poem called Cywydd y Gal - Ode to the Penis. I have only just put two and two together on that.)

As a final note, I should say that my personal favourite Gwerful Mechain poem on this subject, mind, is actually I'w morwyn wrth gachu - to the maiden who is shitting. It's an englyn written in Gwerful's customary high poetic form, but it is what it says - it describes a woman taking a shit, and farting as she does. Beautiful and magical and disgusting and banal, all in one go:

Crwciodd lle dihangodd ei dŵr - ’n grychiast O grochan ei llawdwr; Ei deudwll oedd yn dadwr’, Baw a ddaeth, a bwa o ddŵr

Funnily enough, it's hard to find a good translation for this one lol.

My attempt:

She crouched where her water escaped - creased From the cauldron of her heat; Her two holes were arguing, Shit came, and a bow of water

Eh. It's so bland in English. Honestly, if you could read Welsh...

Anyway, if anyone reading this can read Welsh and wants to read some of Gwerful Mechain's stuff - including some of the pieces she was responding to in the ymrysonau - you can find a load here. Otherwise, I hope you enjoyed!

[iydiamartinx]

THIS MEANS WAR VI

Dick Grayson x Reader x Jason Todd

divider by: @cafekitsune & @thecutestgrotto word count: 2.7k synopsis: Gotham’s youngest neuroscience lecturer never planned to get tangled up with two of its most eligible bachelors. Both are determined to win her over—without revealing they know each other… or that they’re vigilantes. But when the Joker takes an interest in her, things get a whole lot more complicated. a/n: I'm finally home!! For some reason tumblr was blocked on my laptop there, which was why I wasn't that active but I hope you all enjoyed the other scheduled posts. I wanted to get this one out to y'all as soon as I could, so I hope my jet lagged brain managed to proof read it fine...if not oops. Also, I think the last chapter of this was scheduled so people were missed on the taglist, i should've fixed that for this chapter but let me know if you were missed! I'm sorry about that! Also did anyone catch that supernatural reference?

MILO'S APARTMENT

You were fucking panicking.

The second you saw that text on your phone, you were out the door and en route to Milo and Anthony’s apartment like it was a goddamn emergency—and to you, it was. You didn’t even say hello. Just beelined straight for their wine rack and uncorked a bottle like your life depended on it.

Halfway through chugging it, Milo snatched it from your grip.

“Talk or no more wine,” he said flatly. “What the fuck is going on with you?”

You groaned, dragging both hands down your face before collapsing onto the couch. “I fucked up.”

“Okay, well, you better start talking, because I swear to God—was it the match? You never told me how it went. Was he an asshole?”

“No,” you said, sitting up. “No. Dick was great.”

“Okay…” Milo said slowly.

“And so is Jason.”

He blinked. “Who the fuck is Jason?”

You explained. Everything. From the amazing date with Dick to the equally amazing time with Jason—each moment fresh in your mind and impossible to ignore—to the absolute mess you’d found yourself tangled in now.

“And now they both want to go out with me again,” you finished, looking like you might actually pass out from sheer stress. “And I don’t know what to do.”

Milo stared at you.

“I fail to see the problem here.”

You gawked at him. “I can’t date two guys at the same time!”

“Why the fuck not?” he demanded. “You’re hot. You’re single. And you’re exploring your romantic portfolio.”

You hesitated, then exhaled. “I feel bad.”

Milo narrowed his eyes at you like you’d just confessed to murdering someone’s puppy. “You feel bad?”

“Yes!” you groaned, collapsing against the couch cushions like the weight of your sins had finally taken you down. “I went out with Jason. After my date with Dick. Who, by the way, I also really like. And now I’m just… spiralling.”

Anthony, who’d been eavesdropping, finally emerged from the kitchen, casually sipping from his own glass of wine like this was better than anything Netflix could offer. He leaned against the doorway, perfectly at ease. 

“So let me get this straight,” he said, one brow raised. “You went on a date with one hot guy, then met another hot guy who you also went on a date with, and now both of them want more?”

You glared at him, deadpan. “Yes.”

He took another sip. “Girl, if that’s not the universe begging you to experiment, I don’t know what is.”

Milo jabbed a finger in your direction. “Exactly! You’re not cheating. You’re single. You’re exploring. Gathering data.”

“I’m not running a clinical trial,” you snapped, though a laugh escaped despite yourself.

“Could’ve fooled me,” Anthony muttered into his wine. “You’re treating this like a double-blind study with ethical guidelines.”

You covered your face with both hands. “This is a nightmare.”

“No,” Milo corrected, setting down his glass. “A nightmare is getting ghosted by someone who still watches all your stories and likes your dog pics. This? This is a champagne problem.”

You peeked at Milo through your fingers. “So… what do I do?”

“Date both,” he said without missing a beat.

“No.”

“Date. Both,” he repeated, completely undeterred. “No commitment. No promises. Just casual. See who actually fits into your life. Who listens. Who remembers your coffee order. Who quotes Austen and doesn’t flinch when you spiral into a lecture about neurotoxins.”

“Dick could keep up when I went full brainiac mode,” you murmured. “And Jason… Jason quoted Austen. Unprompted.”

Milo clutched his chest like you’d personally wounded him. “Be still my heart.”

“And they’re both so… different and amazing in their own ways,” you added, softer now, more to yourself than to them. “Dick is light. Safe. He makes me feel seen. And Jason is—”

“A walking red flag with a Shakespeare soul and hidden depth,” Anthony chimed in, deadpan.

You laughed despite yourself. “Yeah. Pretty much.”

Milo gave you a pointed look. “Babe. You’re not choosing between a villain and a hero. You’re choosing between two men who see you. Who want to know you. If they’re both worth your time… then take the damn time to find out who you want and get to know them.”

You hesitated. “And if it blows up in my face?”

Milo didn’t blink. Just reached for the wine and refilled your glass. “Then we’ll be right here. With a playlist, ice cream, and a very detailed hit list.”

“Color-coded,” Anthony added with a sage nod. “Naturally.”

You exhaled, dragging a hand through your hair. “I hate how much sense you two make.”

“We’re gay. It’s our burden to carry,” Milo said solemnly, raising his glass. “To emotional clarity and romantic chaos.”

Anthony nodded, raising his own. “And may the best man win.”

You stared at them both like they’d sprouted wings or grown extra heads. “This is still ridiculous.”

“This,” Milo countered, pouring more wine into your glass, “is the golden age of options. You’re allowed to figure it out without pledging your undying love to the first man who makes you laugh.”

“I kissed Jason,” you muttered into your glass.

“And?” Anthony sipped. “Did you enjoy it?”

You hesitated. Then nodded. “Too much.”

“Exactly.” Milo held his glass up. “Right now, you just don’t know what you’re allowed to feel.”

You looked at them—these two chaotic bastards who somehow made emotional turmoil sound like a well-curated spa retreat—and let out a long breath.

“…I know I still feel bad.”

Milo rolled his eyes. “That’s because you’re a good person. You can feel bad and also let two hot guys take you out. Both things can be true.”

Anthony raised his glass. “To moral ambiguity and excellent taste in men.”

You clinked yours against theirs, muttering, “I’m going to hell.”

Milo grinned. “Then take both of them with you, babe.”

BATCAVE

Meanwhile, Jason was still riding the high from earlier. The night air was cool against his skin, the streets quiet beneath the hum of his bike. He was halfway to his apartment when the notification came through.

A case update.

He didn’t hesitate. One hard turn of the throttle, and he was veering off course, heading straight for the manor.

Inside the Batcave, the mood was noticeably different. Dick and Bruce were already suited up, arms crossed in near-identical stances, while Tim was anchored to the console, eyes scanning a rapid stream of data across multiple monitors.

“Took your time,” Dick said lightly, though the usual ease in his voice was dulled.

“I was busy,” Jason shot back, tugging off his gloves. “What’ve we got?”

Bruce turned toward the central screen, the glow casting shadows across his jaw. “We found a breakthrough.”

Jason’s easy mood evaporated.

Tim tapped a key, bringing up a profile. “To cut to the chase—we know who our ghost is.”

“Well, that’s great. Let’s track the son of a bitch down,” Jason said, his voice clipped with impatience as he stepped closer to the screen.

“It’s not that simple,” Tim replied, already typing something in. “There’s been no physical sightings in over four years. No residence, no digital footprint, no bank activity. Nothing directly traceable. We only got a name because of a flagged experiment—an old one that matches his signature. It was buried in an ethics report filed by his only known connection.”

Tim tapped another key.

“B/N L/N,” he said. “And the only person who might be able to help us find him—his younger sister.”

With a soft beep, the next slide loaded on screen.

A profile image appeared.

Jason froze. So did Dick.

“Dr. Y/N L/N,” Tim continued, unfazed. “Lecturer. Neuroscientist. Gotham University. She’s the one who blew the whistle on his unethical research, which caused the rift between them. Records show he’s made multiple attempts to contact her over the years. If he’s on the run from Joker… she might be the only person he trusts enough to go to. Or the only one who knows how he thinks.”

“She’s one of the youngest in her field,” he added, “with two PHDs—”

“Three,” Jason and Dick said at the same time before pausing.

Both men turned slowly, brows raised, staring at each other across the space between.

“How did you know that?” Dick asked, eyes narrowing slightly.

Jason’s gaze snapped to him. “How did you know that?”

Tim looked between them, a flicker of confusion crossing his face. “Okay… do I even want to know what’s happening here?”

Bruce didn’t so much as blink. “Where can we find her?”

Tim cleared his throat, grateful for the shift back to business. “She’s scheduled to appear at the Gotham Futures Gala this weekend. It’s a high-profile event at the Fairmont. She’s a guest speaker. The event’s raising funds for youth science education and mentorship programs—STEM access, early outreach, that kind of thing.”

Bruce nodded, calculating. “Alright. I can go and see if I can—”

“No!” The word rang out in unison. Both Jason and Dick spoke at once, their voices overlapping in sudden urgency.

Bruce’s gaze flicked between them, unimpressed. “No?”

“I’ll go,” Dick said, his voice smooth and easy—too easy. The kind of voice he usually used to charm the high society. “You’re stretched thin with the Joker situation. Let me take this one.”

“Or I can go.” Jason stated. 

“You don’t even like gala’s.” Dick scoffed. 

“And you do?” Jason raised a brow. “You spend half the night dodging donors and sneaking champagne behind the curtains.”

“At least I clean up well.”

Jason crossed his arms. “You need to get back to Blüdhaven.”

“I’m on leave.” Dick snipped back. 

Bruce pinched the bridge of his nose like he was already nursing a headache.

“Enough,” he said, tone edged with steel. “I don’t care which one of you goes. Just make contact with her. Find out what she knows.”

And with that, the ever-exhausted father of far too many turned on his heel and left the cave.

The second Bruce left the cave, the tension snapped like a rubber band. Both Jason and Dick turned in perfect sync, glaring at each other with the intensity of a pending brawl.

“I’m going,” they declared at the same time.

Jason scoffed, folding his arms. “How do you even know her?”

“She was my date!” Dick snapped, voice pitching upward as his patience immediately vanished.

Jason blinked. “Wait—the one from that dating app?”

“You signed up for a dating app?!” Tim choked, spinning around so fast in his chair he nearly tipped over. His eyes were wide, scandalized. “You?!”

Dick didn’t even spare him a glance. “Yes. And we hit it off.”  he said, sharp and pointed. “Now, how do you know her?”

“She’s the civilian I pulled out of that alley last week,” he said coolly, voice dipping into something just shy of smug. He tilted his head, eyes glinting. “Should’ve walked her home, dickhead.”

Dick’s jaw clenched.

Jason smirked. “We grabbed coffee today.”

Dead silence.

And then—because he never knew when to shut up—Jason kept going. “She even kissed me.”

Dick’s expression shifted like someone had just pulled the rug out from under him. His jaw tightened, eyes narrowing with something sharp and disbelieving.

“You’re lying.”

Jason raised a brow. “Am I? You really think I’d lie about something like that?”

“I think you’d do whatever it takes to piss me off.”

Jason shrugged, unbothered. “That too.”

Tim opened his mouth, then closed it. Slowly wheeled himself back in his chair like he was watching a bomb about to go off.

Dick took a step forward. “She wouldn’t—”

“She did,” Jason cut in. “Not that it’s any of your business now.”

“That’s exactly what makes it my business,” Dick snapped.

“Funny. She didn’t seem to think so.”

“Alright,” Tim said quickly, raising both hands. “Before someone gets thrown into a wall—can we maybe, I don’t know, not have a turf war over a girl who clearly doesn’t belong to either of you?”

Neither of them looked at him.

Dick’s eyes narrowed into slits. “That’s it. I’m going to the gala.”

“Like hell you are!”

Tim raised a hand like a kid in class. “How about… rock, paper, scissors?”

Two sets of eyes pinned him to his seat. He shrank back a little. Then, after a beat, both brothers turned to each other.

There was a long pause.

Then, without a word, they stepped forward, hands balling into fists, resting on their open palms.

“On shoot,” Jason muttered.

“Obviously,” Dick snapped.

And they went.

“Rock, paper, scissors—shoot.”

Scissors. Paper.

Jason cursed under his breath.

“Always with the scissors,” Dick said smugly, shaking his head like an older brother who’d won this game a hundred times before. “You never learn.”

Jason’s glare could’ve peeled paint. But Dick was already sauntering off, throwing over his shoulder, “Better luck next time, Little Wing.”

“Best two out of three!” Jason called, stepping after him.

Dick scoffed. “I won fair and square. No one likes a sore loser.”

Jason grumbled something under his breath—low, unintelligible—but Tim was pretty sure it included cheater, rigged, and next time I’m bringing a taser.

“Fine!” Jason snapped, crossing his arms with a tight huff. “But I want ground rules.”

Dick paused and turned around. He arched a curious brow, arms folded across his chest, then gave a slow nod, signalling Jason to continue. “Go on.”

“First—we don’t tell her we know each other.”

Dick nodded without hesitation. “Agreed.”

Jason took a step forward, the tension between them tightening like a wire. “We stay out of each other’s way. And I don’t think either of us should sleep with her—not until she makes her decision. Things’ll get messy.”

Behind them, Tim mock-gagged. “Ugh. Can we not?” he muttered. He didn’t even want to think about his brothers in that context. He didn’t care that they were adopted—they were still his brothers, and thinking about them doing that was just gross on every possible level.

Dick held Jason’s gaze, steady and unflinching. “Fine.”

Jason’s tone shifted, quieter now—less about pride, more about principle. “And if this starts to mess with the case, or with us, we end it. Doesn’t matter where we’re at.”

Dick’s posture shifted slightly, his jaw tightening. But he nodded. “Done.”

They stared at each other for a beat.

“Whoever she chooses,” Dick said, calm and clear, “the other backs off. No hard feelings.”

Jason’s fingers curled at his sides. A long pause.

Then, he nodded. “May the best man win.”

Dick’s gaze didn’t waver. “For her. The best man for her.”

Meanwhile, Tim watched the entire exchange unfold like a tennis match—head swivelling between brothers, eyes wide. He looked personally offended that no one had handed him popcorn.

“I’ve got to tell the others,” he muttered under his breath, already planning the group chat text.

Dick left for patrol not long after, slipping his domino mask into place with the smug confidence of a man who thought he’d just secured a win.

Jason, who didn’t need to suit up for another hour, turned to Tim with a groan and a scowl. “Alright, nerd. How did you even know where to look for that flagged experiment?”

Tim blinked, caught off guard. “Oh. Uh—it was actually Damian.”

Jason’s eye twitched.

“He said the doctor might be a potential lead. Once we ran her name, we found the connection to her brother and his research. Looked solid.”

Jason exhaled slowly through his nose. Of course it was Damian. The demon spawn never let anything go. And this was exactly what he got for digging into her file on Batcave servers of all places. He might as well have slapped a neon sign across the screen that read I’m hiding something, please investigate. The one girl he was actually interested in—and she was tangled up in one of their ugliest cases to date.

Jason turned to Tim, narrowing his eyes like a man about to drag someone else into his personal war.

“You’re gonna help me.”

Tim blinked. “With… what exactly?”

“Reconning Dick.”

Tim frowned. “Didn’t you two literally just agree not to interfere?”

“I’m not interfering,” Jason said, far too quickly. “I’m making sure he sticks to the rules.”

Tim gave him a long, deadpan look. “Uh-huh.”

Jason just stared.

Tim sighed, resigned. “I don’t have a choice, do I?”

“Nope.”

Another sigh. Tim rolled his chair back from the console like it was a death march. “I need a vacation. Or a therapist.”

Jason clapped him on the shoulder. “You’re a real one, Replacement.”

“Don’t call me that.”

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[wholoveseggs]

Phantom Desires

18+ ---- {Masterlist} {Tag-List}

{Daemon Targaryen X Reader} Harrenhal is tormenting Daemon, blurring the lines between what is reality and what is a dream. The damp, cold castle is driving him mad—until he meets you. You smell like summer, feel like a dream, and your lips taste like honey. If only you weren't a ghost.

♡♡ I was super inspired by Daemons bad time at Harrenhal and I decided he needs more trauma ~xoxo ♡♡

5.3k words - Warnings: smuttt, ghost!reader, oral sex {m! & f! receiving}, Harrenhal lore, spooky shit, fiery death, Daemon is losing his mild, ghost sex, Alys Rivers being Alys Rivers {I love her}, horrifying as it is horny ...

♡♡ Tag-List ♡♡

{Daemon Targaryen Tag-List}

@elijahstwink @starshipcookie @absolutemarveltrash @odairtrqsh @darkened-writer @cheneyq @fallout-girl219

My love, please… 

Daemon was woken by a voice calling him softly from across the room. It sounds like the breeze through the curtains, but when he opened his eyes, all was quiet.

He loathed this place, the damp made his bones ache and in every dark corridor he felt as if he was being watched. He could hardly sleep a full night in the cursed castle.

My love, come with me…

This time when Daemon's eyes snapped open, he could see a figure at the end of his bed, silhouetted against the moonlight that shone through the open window. He reached for his dagger, but stopped when the figure stepped into the light and disappeared.

"Fucking hell." Daemon cursed, rubbing his eyes with his palms. Maybe the damp really was making him lose his mind. He couldn't even trust his own eyes anymore.

He laid back down and closed his eyes again, pulling the furs around his body tighter. Sleep. He told himself. Go. To. Fucking. Sleep...

You stood there, watching him sleep from the foot of his bed. He was a handsome man, his blonde hair was tousled against the dark furs of his bed, the moon casting silver across his features.

You crept closer, kneeling down on the edge of the bed, your hands smoothing the sheets. You longed to touch him, to feel his warmth, to feel his hands upon you.

My king…

You whispered, tears stinging your eyes. He would never hear you, no one could hear you. You watched him stir a little, his eyelashes fluttering, his face frowning in his sleep.

Please, I'm begging you. I don't want to burn. Don't let me burn…

Daemon's eyes snapped open. He was sure he had heard something. There it was again. Crying. Someone was crying.

He needed some air, this place was starting to make him paranoid. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed, pulled on his breeches and a jerkin before grabbing a torch and stepping into the hall.

The castle was quiet, his footsteps echoing along the empty halls. He wasn't a fool, believing in tales of ghosts and the like. But this place... he had seen things he couldn't explain.

Maybe it was the stress of the war. Of the guilt he was trying so hard to ignore. All the lives lost because of his actions. The lives of people he loved.

A sob cut through the silence, pulling Daemon back from his dark thoughts.

Don't burn me alive…

A voice, soft and pleading, echoed from the end of the corridor. It had to be a hallucination brought on by lack of sleep and the damp.

Please…

There it was again. Daemon turned on his heel, following the sobs until he found himself outside a small door. A woman's voice came through the wooden frame, crying, sobbing, pleading.

His hand went to the doorknob, he was shaking, terrified. What was happening to him? He had become so unmoored that he had lost his grip on reality? He knew the only way to get it back was to confront it head on.

When he pushed open the door, he saw you, standing in the dark corner of the room, your arms wrapped around yourself as you sobbed.

For a moment he just wanted to turn around and leave. He didn't have the capacity to console a crying woman right now. But then, he couldn't stop staring at you.

You turned, looking straight at him. Daemon felt a jolt in his stomach. Your eyes, they were beautiful. They seemed to glow with their own light.

"Are... Are you alright?" He asked you, cautiously, looking around the room for someone else. There was no one.

You wiped your tears, the reason you had been crying had already slipped your mind. The moment you saw the man before you, his blonde hair shining like the moon and his eyes, they were so piercing, like he could see right through you.

"I'm sorry, I must have gotten lost." You said, taking a step towards him.

He looked you up and down, his face twisted with confusion. You were dressed in finery, soft silks and velvets, the kind of thing a noble would wear. But this room, it was bare, cold and damp, not fit for a mouse let alone a woman of your beauty.

"I'm afraid I must have missed your introduction." He replied, giving you a curious look.

You smiled softly, it was the first time in so many years you had a visitor. He was handsome, strong, everything a man should be. You knew what he was, a Targaryen. A dragonrider. Born with fire in his veins.

You reached your hand out, and his eyes darted to it. He hesitated before taking it, half expecting his hand to pass right through you, but instead your fingers were warm, solid.

"I'm sorry for intruding, my lady. I thought this room was empty."

Your heart was pounding, the blood rushing to your ears. His touch, it felt like fire, power and there was an odd void to it. Like death rode beside him.

"It's alright." You whisper, not wanting him to let go.

"Are you a ghost?" He asked, his hand sliding up your arm, as if testing you, checking to see if you were real.

You laughed, how silly, "A ghost? No."

Daemon let out a shaky breath, "Thank the gods."

"Do you want something warm to drink? It can get so cold here," You asked, you wanted him to feel welcome, to calm the fire in his veins.

He seemed hesitant at first, but then he nodded, a small smile forming on his lips.

He followed you down the dark halls, keeping his torch aloft to light your way. The flames illuminating the damp, cold walls and the dust that floated through the air.

"You know, it wasn't always like this." You said softly, as you walked through the narrow passageways, your fingers running along the cold wet stone. "It was once a beautiful place, warm, welcoming."

He glanced around at the rotting floors and the moss growing along the stonework. He couldn't imagine it.

"My understanding is that it was always a cursed place, even before Aegon's arrival," he stated as the two of you entered the kitchens.

It was just as cold as the rest of the castle, but there was a fire going, and a basin full of fresh water. He lit the torches around the room and you began pulling out ingredients and preparing the tea.

Daemon leaned against the table, watching you work. You didn't look like you belonged in this place, you were too clean, too soft. Yet you behaved like you owned everything you touched.

"They say that before Harrenhal was built, it was a vast forest of heart trees," You said, focusing on putting some herbs and root vegetables into the pot over the fire, "That the trees themselves were Gods, and their roots are still underneath the stones, waiting to reclaim what is theirs."

"Sounds like a lot of nonsense," Daemon replied bitterly, his skepticism evident. 

"Yes," You agreed with a small smile, "But old stories often have a grain of truth to them."

He didn't understand why he was so drawn to you, why he sat and took the warm cup of tea that you handed him, or why he asked you to sit down next to him. He wasn't in the business of trusting people, but you... it felt like he had known you his whole life.

"The witch that resides here, Alys, said something similar," he added, remembering how she spun a tale about how this place was cursed. 

Your eyes darkened and your lips set in a line.

"Do not trust her," You tell him, your voice firm, "She sees things that are not there and hides secrets that are not her own."

He laughed and shook his head. "And what makes you so certain?"

You shrugged, "I see things too," you replied nervously, twiddling your fingers on your mug.

Daemon took a sip of his tea, an amused smile on his face and his eyebrows raised, "Is that so? Well, what do you see about me?"

You looked at him, your eyes studying every inch of his face, his hair, the scars along his neck. "You wish for things you don't really want," You whisper, "You seek violence, but deep down, you only want peace."

Daemon's face darkened, his jaw clenched and his hands tightened around his mug.

"Peace is for the weak," He replied harshly, his voice low, threatening, "Only the strong survive, and take what they want."

He looked so sad, so lonely. You wanted to reach out and comfort him, but you were scared. There was a rage in him, and a desperation that seemed to engulf him.

"I didn't mean to offend." You apologize, lowering your gaze.

You didn't look at him, your fingers running around the rim of your mug, until you felt him move closer to you.

"You didn't." He answered you, his voice softer, "Tell me more, about yourself. If you will."

You looked up at him and you could see his eyes had changed, softened, there was a curiosity there.

"How did you end up here?" He asked you, watching the fire dance in your eyes.

He could see a shadow of sadness in them, pain, worry. But then it disappeared, hidden behind a mask of a beautiful smile. You fascinated him, such a pretty flower growing amongst the cold unforgiving stone.

"My husband put me here." You told him, tracing your finger along the scarred wood of the table. "He's gone now, lost in smoke,”

You could tell he didn't know how to respond. But his expression told you that he had lost someone too. He just quietly nodded, taking another sip of his tea. He was starting to relax a little more, the warmth of the fire and the comforting smell of the drink was starting to put his mind at ease.

"Why did you think I was a ghost?" You asked him softly, your hand coming to rest on his arm, as though to remind him you were real, solid. 

Daemon sighed, rubbing a hand over his face, he didn't know how to answer that question without sounding insane. You could sense that a shadow hung around him like a stormcloud. His secrets coming to the surface.

"This place... It has a restlessness to it," he said, his voice low, cutting through the silence. "Some nights I lay awake listening to the walls groan, as though they are shifting and moving. I can hear... I can hear..." He trailed off, his voice getting hoarse.

You placed a hand on his cheek, his skin was rough and warm, and he leaned into your touch. You liked the way your skin felt against his, you wanted to assure him that you were trustworthy.

Daemon couldn't explain why he was telling you so much, but there was a calmness to you. When you touched him it felt like Dragonstone on a summer's day, like the feeling he got when he was alone in the clouds, flying far away from everything.

"Perhaps you are just lonely, and the castle is lonely too," You suggest to him.

Daemon couldn't deny the loneliness that plagued him. The nights were the worst, he had no one to confide in, no one to love him. He didn't want to think of his wife, his queen, far away and angry with him. Or his brother, dying alone and in agony. He had hurt them in ways that he could not atone for.

"Perhaps you are right," he admitted, taking your hand from his cheek and intertwining it with his own. 

You watched him, the firelight dancing across his handsome features. His blonde hair was like liquid silver and his eyes were beautiful, like a summer sky.

"Stay with me tonight," He told you, his thumb rubbing the back of your hand, his eyes pleading. There was a vulnerability in him, one that drew you in.

Daemon couldn't tell if he was being a fool, or if he was simply desperate to not be alone. The practical part of his brain told him that a good fuck would help him sleep, but this felt like something else. You were beautiful, there was no denying that, but you also felt like a dream, a figment of his imagination.

You didn't say a word, just stood up, still holding his hand, and led him from the kitchen, through the hall, past the courtyard, up the steps to his bed chambers.

The journey there felt like a blur, he couldn't take his eyes off you. The way your dress swayed, the way your hair bounced, the way the moonlight lit up your skin. It was like you were made of mist, or smoke, something that could fade away any moment.

The room was colder than when he left, the air smelled stale, and the curtains were flapping in the wind. It had a haunted quality, like a portrait whose eyes follow you around the room.

He had left the fire burning, but the warmth had been extinguished, and the flames were low. You moved to light the candles, giving the room a soft glow, but the darkness remained.

You turned to face him, he was watching you intently, waiting for you to make a move. You stepped closer, closing the distance between you, your hands sliding up his chest. He was so warm, so solid, full of life and power.

His hands tangled in your hair, pulling your face closer, and your lips met. It was a gentle kiss, hesitant, almost afraid. Like he was doing it for the first time.

His mouth was warm, the taste of the tea still on his lips. You could feel the desire building, the fire growing inside him. You pulled away, looking up at him. His eyes were dark, pupils dilated, a hunger in them.

"Please don't burn me," you whispered, the words sounding strange to his ears.

Daemon didn't understand what you meant by it, and his lust was too powerful to care. He captured your lips again, kissing you deeply.

Your fingers found the hem of his shirt, pulling it up over his head. The light of the candle flickered across his chest, illuminating the texture of his scars.

"You have seen battle," You comment, tracing the mark on his chest, a reminder of the war and the violence he craved.

"Many times," he said, his voice low, heavy with desire, "And I have many more to see."

"So much suffering," You whisper, leaning forward, kissing one that stretched across his chest, "So much blood."

He closed his eyes, letting the heat of your touch wash over him.

You moved down, dropping to your knees, pressing your lips against his stomach, feeling the hardness of his muscles. Your hands reached for laces of his breeches, untying them and freeing his cock from the confines.

He let out a shaky breath as your hand wrapped around him, slowly stroking his length.

"My king," you whispered, kissing the underside of his shaft.

Daemon let out a moan, his head falling back, his hand reaching out to grip the back of your neck. He needed more, needed to feel your lips wrapped around him.

You obliged him, opening your mouth, taking his cock into your hot, wet mouth. He groaned, his hips bucking forward, pushing himself deeper.

"Fuck," he hissed, his fingers tangling in your hair.

He looked down at you, his cock disappearing between your plump lips. The sight made him harder, and he was struggling to control himself. He wanted to fuck you, claim you.

Your hand reached down, cupping his balls, massaging them gently. Daemon moaned, his grip on your hair tightening, pulling your head forward, forcing his cock further down your throat.

He tasted like power, like a dragon made flesh. You could feel his pulse throbbing, the heat of his blood, the energy that pulsed through his body.

Daemon pulled you back by your hair, his cock popping out of your mouth, a string of saliva connecting you. He stared at you for a moment, before bending down and picking you up.

He carried you to the bed, dropping you onto the sheets. You looked up at him, his eyes were wild, and the smile on his face was pure lust.

He untied your dress, pushing the fabric aside, his hands sliding across your breasts. He bent down, his lips wrapping around your nipple, his tongue flicking over the sensitive nub.

Daemon groaned, his hands moving down, tugging on your skirts, pulling them up around your waist, leaving you completely exposed to him.

He continued kissing his way down, his lips trailing across your stomach, his hands lifting your thighs, pushing your legs apart.

He settled between your legs, kissing your inner thigh, gently nipping at the tender skin. You felt his warm breath against your cunt, a soft moan escaping your lips.

He chuckled, pressing his face between your thighs, inhaling your scent. You could feel his tongue licking the length of your pussy, his fingers probing, pressing inside of you.

You gasped, your back arching, your hands clutching the sheets. You had never felt anything like it before, the feeling of his mouth and fingers moving in tandem, making your whole body tingle.

"Don't burn me, don't burn me," you whispered, over and over.

He pulled away, his eyes filled with concern, but he did not speak, did not ask you what you meant.

Instead, he pressed his lips against yours, his tongue sliding into your mouth. You tasted yourself on his lips, and you moaned, wanting more.

His eyes were gentle, trying to convey a tenderness he did not have, and his voice was quiet, as he whispered, "You are not going to burn."

Your hands went to his chest, clutching his shoulders, and you let him spread your legs. He was still fully clothed, but his cock was free, the tip of his erection pressing against your entrance.

You gasped as he slowly pushed himself inside of you. You clung to him, wrapping your arms and legs around him, moaning softly as he began to thrust.

He moved slowly at first, allowing you to adjust to his size, but he quickly increased his pace, pounding into you, the sound of flesh slapping together echoing through the chamber.

"My king, my king, please don't-" you moaned, feeling him hit a good spot inside, sending sparks through your body.

He didn't listen, didn't understand what you meant, just continued to fuck you, his fingers digging into your thighs. He could feel his climax building, his cock throbbing inside of you.

You could feel him getting close, his breathing becoming ragged, his movements becoming erratic. You fell over the edge together, crying out as he released his seed deep inside you.

"My king, oh my king," you moaned, your nails digging into his back, leaving deep red marks.

He collapsed on top of you, panting heavily, his head resting on your chest. He didn't know why you kept calling him king, perhaps you were a bit confused about his status. But he wasn't going to correct you, he enjoyed the way it sounded coming from your lips.

You stroked his hair, his breathing slowly returning to normal. You could feel his heart beating, his warmth, his power.

"Don't leave," he whispered, his voice barely audible.

"I won't," you promised him, the words slipping from your lips before you could stop them.

You felt him slowly fall asleep, his weight comforting on top of you.

There was a strange peace in the room, the darkness and the chill receded, the candlelight dancing across the stonework.

You held him, running your fingers through his hair, humming a tune that was as old as the castle itself.

Daemon woke to the sounds of screaming. His eyes shot open, his hands grabbing for his sword that was always close by. He was alone in his bed, the fire long since extinguished, the only light coming from the full moon.

He didn't have time to worry about where you had gone, the sounds of people shouting and a dragon roaring had him jumping out of bed, quickly dressing.

He ran down the corridor, the stones were ice cold, and the air smelled stale, the shadows dancing menacingly along the walls. He had to push against a door, it was swollen from the damp, but when he burst through, the smell of burnt flesh was thick.

You were in the courtyard, standing in the middle, your white dress glowing in the moonlight. You turned to look at him, your eyes full of tears.

"Please don't burn me," you begged him, your voice breaking.

The roar of the dragon filled his ears, and the sky was lit up with orange flames. He looked to the sky for the source of it, had Aemond arrived with Vhagar?

He was horrified when he saw that the dragon was not Vhagar, but the largest dragon he had ever seen. It looked like Balerion, but it had three heads.

He watched as it descended, its wings so large that with every movement, the sound of the wind would change, becoming deafening, thunderous.

He turned to look back at you, to tell you to run, but you were now right in front of him. Your face was mere inches from his own, burned black, melted, half of it hanging off.

"My king," you cried, your voice a broken, raspy sound. "Why did you burn me,"

Daemon screamed, then woke up in his bed. His body covered in a sheen of sweat, his heart pounding.

The bed next to him was empty, cold, the fire still burning low. He could still hear the screams, the dragon, the pain and suffering, still smell the ash and the charred flesh.

The sun was shining through the window, the sound of birds singing. Everything was peaceful, the castle was still, silent.

He sat up, his breathing slowing, his pulse returning to normal. He looked around the room, there was no sign of you, no sign that the night had ever happened.

He ran his fingers through his hair, trying to calm himself. It had just been a dream, a vision. Nothing more.

But he could still smell you on the sheets, and the image of you was burned into his memory. He got up, dressing quickly, needing to move, to do something.

He spent the day meeting with vassals and lords, discussing matters of the realm. Trying to keep his mind busy. He felt as though he was slowly losing his grip on reality, he swore he could see you around every corner, could hear your voice in every creak and groan of the castle.

The sun had set, and the candles were burning low. The castle was quiet, the servants had gone to bed, the halls empty. He felt like he was completely alone, the only one left in the vast void of this wretched place.

He made his way down to the kitchens, looking for you. It was a foolish thing to do, he knew, but he had to find you, had to see if you were real.

He found Alys, sitting on a stool next to the fireplace, her nose buried in a book.

"Evening," she said without looking up, "Tea is in the pot."

Daemon didn't want tea, he didn't want anything other than to know you were alright.

"Have you seen the new girl?" He asked her, trying to keep his voice even, trying to seem nonchalant.

"Who?" She asked, still not looking up.

"She..." Daemon tried to describe what you looked like, but when he tried to picture you in his mind, the only image he could see was the one from his dream, your burned and melted face.

Alys watched him with a slight smirk, this dragon lord was unraveling so quickly, it was delicious. She went back to focusing on her book. "Doesn't ring a bell,"

He knew there was no point in trying to get more out of her, so he gave up and left the kitchen.

"Perhaps she is where you left her?" Alys suggested, her laughter echoing after him.

He walked back to his chambers, his heart pounding, his palms sweating. He stood outside the door for a moment, before gathering his courage and stepping inside.

The room was dark, the curtains were still closed, the air cold. There was a book lying open on his bed, one he did not remember leaving there.

He picked it up, holding it far away from him, like it could burn him. It was a book of the histories, of the conquest. Of Harren the Black and his sons burning alive.

He wondered who else died in the blaze, the nameless faces who were forgotten by history, the servants and slaves, the wives and daughters.

Daemon was sure he was losing his mind, the castle was haunting him, and it was only a matter of time before he became one of its ghosts.

Don't burn me… My king…

He remembered the fear in your voice, the sadness, the pleading. Anger and confusion bubbled in his chest and he threw the book across the room, the pages fluttering as it landed.

He needed sleep, this was all because he wasn't sleeping. Once he was rested, his mind would be clearer. He put no stock in dreams or visions, ghosts and monsters, that was for children and fools, this was all just because he was tired.

He got ready for bed, blowing out the candles, the moonlight casting shadows across the walls. He settled into bed and closed his eyes, waiting for sleep to take him.

You watched him lay there, his brow furrowed, his face troubled. He tossed and turned, his eyes fluttering open and closed.

You laid down next to him, gently placing your hand on his cheek. He calmed at your touch, his breathing slowing. You pressed a kiss to his forehead, his skin warm, and his hair tickled your lips.

"My king," the words fell from your lips, barely above a whisper.

He opened his eyes, nearly jumping out of bed when he saw you, laying right next to him, your head on the pillow.

"What are you doing?" He demanded, his voice harsh, his hand gripping the dagger under his pillow.

You sat up, your hair falling around you, your dress slipping off your shoulder. "I was just... I just..." You tried to find the words, tried to think of what you were doing, where you were. "...I missed you," you said, the words not feeling quite right, but they were the only ones that came.

He stared at you, his eyes wild, his hand gripping the dagger so tightly, his knuckles were white.

"How did you get in here?" He asked, his voice low, dangerous.

You thought about it, trying to remember, but it was like there was a fog covering your mind.

"I don't know, I've always been here," you said, your voice trembling, tears starting to form. "I just wanted to see you."

He let go of the dagger, and took a deep breath.

"What is your name?" He asked, his eyes studying you.

"I- I don't know," you stammered, the tears falling freely now.

He reached out and touched your face, wiping away the tears with his thumb. His hand lingered, his fingers brushing against your cheek.

"You're not real are you?" He asked, his voice full of sadness.

"Yes I am," you cried, grabbing his hand, pressing it against your cheek. "I'm right here."

He sighed, closing his eyes. "Who do you think I am?"

"You're the dragon king," you said, smiling through the tears, “the great conqueror,”

He stared at you, his eyes filled with sorrow. "What is my name?" He asked, his voice barely a whisper.

"Aegon," you said, the word felt right, like it belonged in your mouth, but the fear in his eyes told you otherwise.

He pulled away from you, moving to the edge of the bed, his back to you. He felt your arms wrap around him from behind, your breasts pressing against his back, your head resting on his shoulder.

"You're not really Aegon," you whispered, "Are you?"

He shook his head, his eyes staring at the floor.

"I'm not real?" You asked, your hands clutching his shoulders.

"No, no you're not," he whispered.

Suddenly you were kneeling in front of him, your hands resting on his thighs, your head tilted to look at him.

"Then why can I touch you?" You asked, running your hands up his thighs.

He didn't answer, just pulled you into his lap and pressed his lips to yours. You melted into him, his hands on your waist, his lips parting.

You tasted sweet, like honey, like a spring day, the flowers blooming. He needed you like a fire needs air, like a man needs water, his hands moving down to your hips, pulling you closer.

He moaned into the kiss, your hips rolling against him. You could feel his hardness beneath the fabric, the heat radiating from him. Your hands untied his shirt, pushing the fabric aside, revealing his bare chest.

You kissed his neck, biting and sucking on the tender skin. He groaned, his hands moving to your hair, tugging, pulling you away from his neck.

You stared at him, your eyes dark, full of lust, your lips swollen. He pulled you back in, his mouth crashing into yours, his hand moving to the back of your neck, holding you in place.

He lifted your skirts, his hand dipping beneath the fabric, easing a finger inside you. You gasped against his lips, his touch sending shivers through your body, your hands gripping his shoulders. He slipped another finger inside you, pumping slowly, then adding another. His eyes never left yours as the intensity increased, moving faster, your breath coming in short gasps.

Your lips brushed his, your voice a breathy moan. "Please my king.... Don't burn me, don't burn me,"

Daemon froze.

"I can't burn you," he said, his voice hoarse. "You're already dead."

Your face crumpled, the tears flowing freely, sobs wracking your body. The sound of you crying echoed strangely in the chamber, the shadows growing longer, the light from the moon turning crimson.

"I'm dead? You killed me?" You cried, trying to pull away from him, but he wouldn't let you go.

"I didn't kill you," he said, his eyes locked on yours. "That was someone else, in another time,"

You looked at him, your eyes wide, your mouth open in a silent scream. He watched in horror as your skin began to bubble and blister, peeling off in chunks. It was like you turned into sand in his arms, slowly crumbling, falling through his fingers.

You screamed, a blood curdling, terrible sound, like the screams he had heard in his nightmare. You were being consumed by fire, the flames eating away at your flesh, burning, boiling, the smell of burning meat filling the air.

He couldn't look away, couldn't let go. He was frozen in place, trapped, watching as you were destroyed. Then you vanished from his lap, fading into nothing.

Daemon sat in his bed, his skin clammy, his breathing ragged. He clutched his head, his fingers digging into his scalp. He couldn't take this anymore. He was going mad.

"Don't leave me here in this place," he whispered, he did not know why he had said it, but he did. It was a plea, a desperate, hopeless plea.

But you had left. Because you were never real.

And this wretched castle was just as lonely as before.

[queeranarchism]

Archive link because I'm not giving any clicks to the fucking Guardian, but this piece about Sophie Lewis' Enemy Feminism. TERFs, Policewomen, and Girlbosses Against Liberation is pretty good. Some quotes:

Here we have May French Sheldon, a wealthy American feminist who in 1891 traveled “alone and unescorted” – that is, carried by 150 hired African workers but no white people – through Kenya and Tanzania beneath a US flag and a banner reading “noli me tangere” (touch me not), only to report on her return that everywhere she went, Africans had gathered around “entreating her to remain and rule over them”. She would go on to make several trips to Africa and become a staunch denialist of the Belgian genocide in the Congo. Sheldon’s is one of several forms of feminism that can only be expressed through the domination of people of color, an original sin of the movement that still troubles it today. (Lewis draws a direct line from Sheldon to Israel’s promotion of so-called “lionesses of the desert” who fought for the first time on the frontlines in Israel’s war on Gaza, writing: “Genocide is sometimes feminist.”) And here we have Mary Richardson, a British suffragette whose enthusiasm for the movement’s campaign of violence, arson and bombing saw her earn the nickname “Slasher” after she took a meat cleaver to a Diego Velázquez nude in the National Gallery. After the first world war, Richardson joined the British Union of Fascists and quickly assumed leadership of the women’s section, only to be expelled, two years later, for demanding “fair play” for women. [...] Another feminist ancestor in this tradition was Mary Sophia Allen. A British suffragette, Allen jumped at the opportunity the first world war gave her to “larp” (live-action role play) as a kind of volunteer auxiliary police officer, patrolling the private lives of working-class women living near troop installations. Her postwar career saw her traveling the world as a “woman’s police’ consultant”, promoting the dubious but persistent idea that criminalizing women’s sex lives can be feminist if a woman is the one applying the handcuffs. She wore a police uniform and monocle, called herself the “commandant” and spent a considerable amount of time in Spain and Germany, where she developed both a dedication to fascism and personal relationships with Francisco Franco and Adolf Hitler.

[helluvapoison]

Nice To Eat You

[ii]

The Vees x Cannibal!Reader

warnings: drugs, suggestive, rosie slander, dark themes, violence, security shenanigans and, hello, cannibalism

heads up: if you didn’t know, the people of cannibal town are hellborn; born in hell, never lived on earth, never sinned! their life spans are unknown(?) but seem to age as a human would, unlike other demons

Cannibal town has been off limits to The Vees, courtesy of Vox, ever since the incident with you know who. Meeting you was a suspicious surprise for them. You were kicked out of said town by Rosie for giving cannibals a bad name. Can you fucking believe the irony!?

ʕ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʕ•̫͡•ʔ•̫͡•ʔ

˚✧₊⁎ Vox ⁎⁺˳✧༚

• Suspicious might be an understatement

• For the longest time, Vox is unnerved by you for every other reason than your appetite. Anyone associated with Rosie is an adversary by proxy. If you take Alastor out of the picture, Rosie is still an Overlord and all Overlords will inevitably crumble to The Vees– even if they don’t know it yet

• There’s an expression for that though, isn’t there? Keep your enemies close. That’s exactly how Vox went about dealing with you

• Gives you a job as his security guard. Hell knows he needs one, what with the price of fame and all, those dirty fucking sinners that try and touch him wherever he goes

• It’s a slow development because neither of you initiate conversation

• Vox is beyond used to the rotating door of demons in and out of his life. He abandons the names of anyone that isn’t you, Velvette or Valentino (Angel Dust and Alastor he can’t forget against his will)

• Becoming attached to you while simultaneously waiting for the other shoe to drop is fucking awful. It feels it like a bug in his system, annoys him to the point his screen starts glitching one day

“Just what the fuck are you up to!? I know you’re with Rosie–”

You knew, on some level, Vox didn’t trust you all the way but it didn’t bother you because he hardly seems to trust anyone. So you cut him off with a mix of a snort and a scoff,

“Rosie? Rosie’s a cunt. She gave me the boot years ago, haven't seen her since.”

Involuntarily, he begins to smile, “Years, huh?”

• Trust is another slow endeavor. Now that Vox doubts your motives slightly less than before, he can silently appreciate the fact you do a damn good job of keeping demons away from him. Bonus: if you happen to take a chunk out of them for shits and giggles, blood never touches his pristine self

• “I believe I owe you an apology,”

“Am I going to get one?”

• In a way, sure, but you’ll be sorely disappointed if you thought it was with words. He invites you to dinner. From that moment until you arrive at the restaurant, he’s reveling in the constant state of shock you seem to be in

• Your eyebrows jump when the waiter nervously lifts the lid from your plate and reveals ribs. Real, demon ribs

“Surprised?” Vox asks rather smugly

“Somewhat,” You return his sly smirk, “Most can’t stomach my… indulgences.”

“I don’t have a stomach. I think I’ll be just fine.”

˚✧₊⁎ Velvette ⁎⁺˳✧༚

• Vel doesn’t give two steaming shits about Rosie or her backwards, unflattering town so long as it doesn’t interfere with her enterprise. Vox’s grudges are his own. If The Vees got hellbent and demented over each other’s EOTD (Enemy Of The Day) nothing would get done!

• During a pathetic comment war on the her social, a few threats became too detailed for Vox’s liking

• A cannibal wasn’t his first choice– or second, or third– but you’d certainly scare off anyone trying to hurt his business partner!

• Velvette’s far from worried about being lunch when she meets you.

• “You’re my–? No. Absolutely not! I can’t be seen with this.” She gestures to all of you

“You’re not exactly making me drool either,” You mutter under your breath

• Judging by the looks of her partners’ faces, stunning Velvette to silence was impossible. Key word: was

• It didn’t last long and hasn’t stopped since

• She pulled out every trick in the book to get you to quit. She gave you a uniform to wear during your shifts, tossed fabrics at you until you turned into a living clothes rack, forced you to hold her phone during her live streams but criticized and berated the way you did

• For fucks sake, she even screamed at Vox to let her fire you!

• You didn’t need her to like you and that was as obvious as it was infuriating. She was Velvette! Everyone loved her! Having you around was like a black eye; literally bruising her ego and bad for business

• Or so she thought

• She made you stand in the shadows of her studio so you wouldn’t frighten anyone and ruin photoshoots with your “freaky face” she so eloquently put it.

• Velvette was mid fashion crisis, yelling at Joanne for the gazillionth time, when you approached from behind

“I’m taking my lunch.”

“Fucking fantastic! Here, have Joanne since she insists on being fucking useless!”

Playing along, you let a guttural growl rip from your throat, making Joanne jump high in the air.

She squeaked and shook her head vigorously, holding her hands in surrender, “I-I’ll be better, I swear!”

• Her candy cane eyes widened in delighted surprise. How had she been so blind to your potential usefulness!?

• Velvette could get high off the new game she created with you. It was like having a scary guard dog– only better dressed to aesthetics. Paparazzi didn’t dare touch her now, standing at a respectable distance that made her more unattainable and desirable than before

• Her attitude change makes her like-able to you too, she’s heaps more pleasant to be around now. You don’t mind doing the extra stuff that wasn’t in your contract like being a dress up doll, dealing with the pet names or escorting her to events. She knows and takes advantage of this instead of saying how she feels

• “You’re my arm candy now, dollface! You go where I go.”

“I hardly think I qualify as arm candy,” You mumble to her, overtly aware of how she holds you close to her

“If you’re fishing for compliments, fuck off to another pond. I don’t waste my free time with uggos,” She says seriously, abruptly smiling as a camera flashes in her direction, “Now get ready. Fans have been dying to get a picture with me lately and if anyone smudges this dress with their dirty fucking fingers, I want you to bite them off!”

“Anyone that touches you won’t have hands tomorrow,” You promise

• You swear she shivers upon hearing that

˚✧₊⁎ Valentino ⁎⁺˳✧༚

• The easiest by far to get along with. In a mortifying way

• Val is fairly accepting of all Hell’s creatures. It’s typically followed up by something sexual but, hey, you’re not in a position to complain, not when no one else in Hell would willingly sign up to work with a cannibal. Especially one outside the confines of Rosie’s civil town

• Rosie’s loss is his gain

• You would be lying if you said you weren’t expecting him to turn horror-struck but he barely blinks when you explain what you did to get exiled. Your savage methods intrigue him, a plethora of potentials just waiting to be explored. In fact, he goes a step further to praise you for being different

• “Hell would be deathly boring if everyone thought the same way, darling. That’s what makes you so… alluring.” He rolled his tongue with the last word, dragging it out and making it ring in your ears

• You’d been called many things in your afterlife, but never that

• You feel rather useless at the moth’s side. You were supposed to be protecting him but he could take care of himself just fine. Val was about the tallest in every room (if not the tallest) with guns hidden under his coat that he never used

• Later you’d understand he only reached for them as a last resort, when his head was unclouded by blood lust

• If you ever voiced your complaints, he’d be quick to reassure you that you make him look good. What powerful Overlord doesn’t have bodyguards? (Do. Not. Answer.)

• However the day does come when you prove your services have merit. On set of all places! A coked up Hellhound didn’t take kindly to Val’s directions, sending a demon wielding a boom mic flying towards him

• Valentino dodged the demon with ease, whipping around and aiming his pistol to put the dog down. Instead he saw you pushing the mutt’s face into the ground, his arm pinned at an angle. Your sharp teeth were bared at his throat, drool dampening his fur

• But you made no moves without Valentino’s say-so

• There’s a lot he could say about the scenario you provided him and how it made him feel– but he only calls your name, beckoning you back to his side

• Where you belong

• “You’re lucky I don’t like hair in my food,” You growl in the Hellhound’s ear before following after Val

• Valentino may be a mastermind of porn and sex but he knows the real way to a demon’s heart, it’s is the universal love language

• Unbothered by blood, he’ll sit pretty and poised on his loveseat while you tear into the meal he provided you. A thanks for a job well done

• “You’ll never go hungry now that you’re with me, monstruo,” The pet name is dripping with adoration, “I won’t waste you like that bitch did. Look at you, you’re already so special.”

~

╰(*´︶`*)╯♡ i lost the request that went to this but i hope it reaches them. cannibal!reader got that rizz, huh?

[unknown-cold]

I want to talk about the people who are overlook Caitlyn's trauma and the suffering she went through in two seasons, to the point where it's really annoying and suspicious, honestly.

There are people who unironically believe she deserved the worst in season 1 alone. S1 when she did nothing wrong at all. On the contrary - she's trying to do a lot of good, she's being selfless and compassionate. On the other hand, characters who did commit crimes are being excused.

The artist is: @roosdrawsthings on Instagram and @RoosDrawsThings on Twitter/X

Like some people see her as privileged and as someone who suffered enough not like Vi and Jinx (she only lost her mom, she had a funeral when Zaunites don't) so she can't be a victim and feel pain and lost. This is so fucking stupid!

rich people can also be in grief and a target for manipulation. They are human beings too, a shock that has nothing to do with social status or job. And here are the reasons I think people so easily villainize Caitlyn:

Before that there is something important I have to talk about there’s also such a problem with people viewing things as either completely right/good or completely wrong/terrible and with people not able/willing to admit when they’re wrong or when someone has changed their mind.

Opinions are mistaken for facts. Differing viewpoints are attacked with ferocity. Hateful things are said about fictional characters who are supposed to bring us joy/comfort. It’s freaking ridiculous and has become such a massive problem in several of my top fandoms and I’m exhausted.

So back again to Caitlyn their reasoning is she comes from a privileged upbringing, is part of the oppressive higher social order and is a member of the police force that frequently harasses the citizens of Zaun. All of these come together to make her appear as someone that we as a progressive and morally just society are meant to frown upon and judge, cause those types of people are often to blame for many of the issues in our society.

With those pieces in place they see her as this inherently morally wrong person who needs to be dragged through the fire in order to redeem herself. They hold her to an almost impossibly high standard and will tear her apart if she even slightly steps over the lines they have laid out for her. That's why they like to paint her as genocidal war criminal for releasing The Grey and choose to ignore the obvious that she used it strategically rather than flood the whole city like Jinx did(who btw will get endless passes and excuses for her actions cause she is the "true victim" of the story). Jinx is not the only victim on the show.

And there is something else I want to talk about it, and it's modern liberal spaces, especially among young people. Most people have become obsessed with putting people in little boxes and making assumptions based on that alone. They are unwilling or incapable of seeing people as PEOPLE instead of just labels. It's like re-inventing the racism wheel all over again. We put labels on people and decide if they're good or bad, we don't look at what they do or listen to what they say because that's harder. It's easier to just discriminate against someone based on how they were born. And then the irony is people will accuse Caitlyn of discriminating against others when actually they're the ones discriminating against her, based on her background. It's just a maddening endless cycle of hate.

They also don't quite realize that not everything in the show is meant to be an allegory for real life political turmoil. The concept of a privileged society oppressing another through force has been done in many stories and while they may have been inspired by real events that doesn't mean they were intentionally sending a politically driven message to the masses.

Caitlyn's haters also brush over her trauma a lot too, not only of her mother's death and wanting to avenge it. But to also wanting to kill the person who kidnapped her and almost killed her twice. She hasn't had the time to really process it all and all those wounds are fresh in early season 2 so of course she ends up going dark for a time.

Caitlyn went through grieving, angered, depressed, vulnerable, and... alone. Not a single voice of reason or support around

• Father? Also grieving and distant.

• Childhood friend? Disappeared.

• Vi? Pushed away.

And that’s the vacuum Ambessa mentioned when talking to Vi. People still didn’t understand that? Wow, I guess not everyone throughly watches the plot of series, I suppose.

So in the end Caitlyn for me has one of the best arcs, if not the best, while not being a clown, like Jinx (I like Jinx tbh, but least be real guys). Some people just hate it. Some envy it. Bc much of Cait's hate is simply irrational. Just ugly whining babys out there.

They are literally make Caitlyn the only villain in Arcane. There's Jinx who committed acts of terrorism and murderer. There's Silco's right hand ( I mean Sevika) happily enforcing his rule through violence. There's Silco himself, who tried to kill an entire family and forced the children to work in the Shimmer factories and he suppressed his people himself so that they would obey him, and there is Ambessa the character who committed the most evil acts in the show. And Viktor, who wanted to kill and control all the people of the two cities of Piltover and Zaun. But no, it's Cait that is the worst 🤡

Make it make sense.

[written-in-flowers]

The Places Between Us: The Devoted Lover: (OT8 X Fem!Reader)

Pairing: Kim Hongjong x Fem!Reader | Sidepairings: Ateez x Fem!Reader

Genre: Smut, angst, fluff | AU: Fantasy!au

Word Count: 9k

Summary: After a week of waiting, Hongjoong finally makes his appearance in Breakbone Pass. Finally in each other's arms, YN and Hongjoong can take on the entire world together.

MINORS DO NOT INTERACT!

Overall tags: dub-con, mind control, enslavement, kidnapping, forced breeding, monster fucking, sex work, mentions/implications of abuse, mentions/implications of SA, stockholm syndrome, public sex, exhibitionism, humiliation, degradation, breeding kink, bigdick!Seonghwa, bigdick!Yunho, DoubleDick!Yunh, monster fucking, face fucking, throat fucking, undead sex, sex w/ undead, belly bulge, anal sex, anal fingering, vaginal sex, multiple positions, multiple orgasms, squirting/vaginal ejaculation, slight size kink (height wise), overstimulation, facials, cum swallowing, choking, dom!ateez, sub!reader, tit fucking, sex toys, bondage, multiple partners, threesome (m/m/f), orc!jongho, naga!seonghwa, demon!hongjoong, dragon!yunho, undead!mingi, goblin!yeosang, lycan!san, lycan!wooyoung.

Taglist: @binniesbabe @stay-tiny-things @oiminho @babymbbatinygirl @sopematesxx @pirana10 @juicyjaxxy @corgilover20 @kinkymaminicole @londonbridges10 @readerofallthingss @dvbkie099 @cpg2020 @raralxyne

Part 6: The Orc Warchief < |

****

Breakfast consisted of a warm bowl of rabbit stew. You sat in Talia’s cabin, scarfing down the proper meal with a hunk of bread and milk, as Willow and Sunghoon played nearby. You have been staying with the Orcs for a week now, and your curse has not progressed at all. Talia explained your moonstone necklace, embedded with magic now, was warding off its worst effects. The only times it burned now were when Jongho snuck into your cabin late at night. 

“My brother is quite fond of you,” Talia said beside you, eating her own stew over a bed of steaming rice. “I have never seen him take to someone so easily.”

“It’s not me he’s fond of,” you sneered, spooning stew and rice into your mouth. 

The both of you laughed, and she nudged you gently. “I meant it in a platonic way,” she elaborated. “Jongho never takes to outsiders without them having to prove themselves somehow. Him and Kim are only friends because Kim defeated him in a sparring match; that had been after Kim went into a spider’s nest and defeated the broodmother, bringing my brother its legs as proof.”

You shuddered thinking about that. “Like I said, I think I proved myself to your brother in other ways.” Hongjoong came to mind again, and the burning question came out. “I don’t know why he didn’t tell me who he really was. You’d think being a big bad war hero demon person might be something to impress a girl with.”

“Kim isn’t the boasting type,” she replied. “Personally, I think he doesn’t like being praised as a war hero.”

“Why not?”

“Unlike most of our kind, Kim did not defeat the old king for glory or power. He did it out of love for his people. He did it to protect them. When he saw that Argos became possessed by a power hungry warlock, he realized he was the only one who could defeat him. None of us were there, but the stories have been passed down through generations. My uncle, father and grandfather all told my brother and I about Kim’s infamous battle. My grandfather liked to be mystical and say ‘fire and ice met on the battlefield, and ice won’.”

The image of Hongjoong, muddy and dirty in battle armor, facing off against another king came to mind. He’d told you stories of his other adventures. Most of them involved him fighting some monstrous creature or outwitting his enemies, but nothing like this. He never even mentioned a war. 

“I always thought he was a regular guy,” you shrugged, pushing a carrot around in the bowl. “He knew a lot about magic, but I thought he was just interested in the subject. I didn’t know he was magicfolk.”

“Demons can disguise themselves as normal humans,” Talia told you, washing her food down with fresh milk. “My uncle saw his demon form once, and he said it would make the strongest of Orcs run in terror.” She then said, “Perhaps he kept this from you to protect you. All these years later, Kim has made lots of enemies. They might be inclined to attack you if they knew you meant something to him. Considering the war is brewing, those enemies might decide to hit him in his softest spot.” 

Your heart warmed at being considered Hongjoong’s ‘soft spot’. 

“But, now that this is out in the open, he may decide now is the time for honesty,” she said. “His last letter mentioned he was half a day’s ride from here. He’s on Aerion, so he will be here even sooner.” 

Hongjoong’s latest letter was lying on your table back in your cabin. 

‘Dearest love, 

Fate has been a bitch to us, but now I think it’s starting to ease up. I left Tin City after freezing that goblin’s crops, and am on my way to you. I promise to explain everything when I see you. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, love. I only wanted to keep you safe. You are the only good, pure thing in my life, and I wanted to keep it that way. But, I suppose the cat would make it out of the bag eventually. I’ll see you soon. 

Love forever, 

HJ.’ 

You read his letter so many times you memorized it. Even if Jongho worked you into full exhaustion, you still couldn’t sleep without reading it once. He was coming back to you. The days of suffering will finally be over and you’d have him back in your arms. 

Then you’d get the answers to your questions. 

“Auntie YN, come watch me train! I’ve gotten way better since last time!”

Sunghoon charged out of the cabin with his wooden sparring sword. You, Talia and Willow cleaned up the dishes, then went after him to the training yard. Led by an older Orc, the children listened intently to his instructions and demonstrations. As they began practicing on their own, you wondered where Hongjoong came from. He only said “the north” whenever you asked him. Were there other demons? If not, what happened to them? Did he have parents or was he an orphan like you? Why did he keep all these secrets from you? These questions burrowed themselves deep into your mind. You felt as if you didn't know him at all when you thought you did. You used to think you knew him more than anyone, but everyone you meet proved the opposite. Thinking about everything you heard about him, how could you be sure his name was Hongjoong? How could you be sure about anything?

Archery took your mind off things. Focusing on your target, you let loose arrow after arrow. You managed to hit inside the circles now, though not always. The motion and focus kept you from thinking about what else he hid. He said in his letter he didn't mean for this to happen. You vaguely recalled Seonghwa mentioning a gift before. What did that mean? Was Haeyoung meant to curse someone else, yet used it on you instead? If that was true, why did he let you stay with Seonghwa, whom he knew would take you again? You shot an arrow straight into the center of the target, thinking of the lies. 

“You're improving day by day,” Jongho patted your shoulder. “With a bit more practice, we might recruit you into the army.”

“With a lot of practice,” you said, starting to take the arrows from the target. “I don't think I’m army material.”

“I think you’ll end up surprising yourself.” 

“Trust me, it’ll definitely be a surprise if-”

Darkness cut off your words. The sun had been blotted out, and everything turned into night for the briefest moment. You looked up to see a wide, dark body gliding across the sky low to the village. It covered everything in total darkness. Attached to the underbelly were three small figures you couldn’t fully make out.

“Uncle Kim!” Sunghoon and Willow cheered.

“Hongjoong.”

A smile broke across your face, and happiness washed out the pain you’d been holding inside. Dropping the arrows, you ran out of the archery range with the two children behind you. The urge to be in the safety of his arms propelled you forward. Fate had kept you apart, and you’d make sure you came back together. You kept glancing up at the sky, trying to stay in Aerion’s shadow, as she flew to the mountains beyond. Several more Orc children cheered and rushed behind you, all pointing and jumping towards the wyvern. Your legs aching from sparring and your chest starting to burn from your panting, you still persisted. You and the children ran up a path leading up to a tall mountain peak. Even as the wind grew colder, you kept going. Hongjoong became your only goal. If you’d known about his true identity, you would not have kept running. You would have turned back. You would’ve stayed in place. You might not have a sword, but you would've fought tooth and nail to get back to him just like he’d done for you.

“Uncle Kim!”

“It’s Uncle Kim!”

“Aerion!”

“She has babies with her!”

The Orcs rushed ahead of you to the large beast settling in the clearing. Aerion was enormous, spanning several hundred feet with teeth as long as swords. Her dark blue scales reflected off the sun breaking through the grey skies, white spikes going from the top of her triangular head to her pointed tail. You froze in place, taking in the intimidating size of her from afar. Hongjoong managed to tame this creature? How? It was a story he never shared before.

Aerion lowered her head to the children, amber eyes blinking slowly when they approached. Clearly, she recognized them as children and not snacks. It was then you noticed the three figures from before clinging to her. Half-dragon, half-human, the Dragonite babies were as large as cats: one stood out in a shining silver, another a matte bronze and the last and smallest being a glittery emerald. They stayed close to Aerion’s body, snapping their jaws at those who tried getting close to them. From a leather saddle, someone climbed down to meet the crowd of small Orcs. 

“Hongjoong.”

You might be in a dream again. Right now, you’re sleeping in a cage where some overlord is waiting to take advantage of your curse. There is no way you’re standing on the same ground as Hongjoong. Your mind took in every feature of him before he could fade away from reality: messy black hair brushed back to his shoulders; the weariness in his eyes from travel being concealed with cheerfulness; the long black coat he wore over a black shirt and pants; the leather gloves he always took off right when before he touched you, wanting your skin on his at all times. He looked thinner than the last time you saw him. His upturned nose, his wide gummy smile, his pointed chin and jawline all came into view when he finally looked up. After days of mourning the loss of that face, you choked back a sob seeing it in the flesh.

“Is it really you?” The words came out in a small whisper, faint stinging coming to your nose.

“YN…”

His clear, high voice punctured your heart. Shaky legs took tentative steps towards him, the fear of him being an allusion keeping them behind. If you touched him, he’d break away with the wind. The closer you came to him, the easier the glaze in his eyes became. Lip trembling, you gripped the cuffs of your coat.

“Hongjoong…”

“YN…”

The both of you broke into a run. Your bodies collided, arms enveloping one another and he didn’t vanish. The crisp winter air clung to his skin, a slight frost on his coat, but he couldn’t have felt any warmer. He yanked off your hat to bury his face in your hair, and you heard him inhale the flowery oil Willow used to braid it.

“I’m so sorry,” he buried his head in your hair, arms tight around you. “I’m so sorry, love.”

‘Love’. Nobody called you that but him. To hear it from another man repulsed you, but not Hongjoong.

“Call me that again,” you breathed through your tears, chest tightening from the lump it created.

“Love,” he obliged, kissing your crown. He lifted your head, and you sobbed. It really was him. “My sweetest love,” he said, forehead pressing to yours, “My only love.”

“You’re here,” you wept, tears falling to your cold cheeks. “I thought I’d never see you again,” you touched his jawline, feeling up to his cheek to memorize his face. “I thought I’d be lost forever, and I’d lose every single memory of you that I have.”

“I wouldn’t let that happen,” he said, tears sticking to his lashes. “I wouldn’t have let that happen,” he shook his head, kissing your forehead and holding you there.

“I was so-”

“-I know. I know, love.”

The word ‘love’ broke you in two. You let out the first hard sob, you buried your face in his shoulder.

“It’s my fault,” he wept, stroking your hair. “I should have gone right to you. I shouldn’t have let you stay there. Seonghwa’s palace is one of the safest places for you to be. He might be a bit of a dick, but…It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. Not at all. Please, believe me.” He held you tightly, both of you shaking with tears. 

Your tight throat kept you from responding. Everything about him drowned it all out. You escaped deep into him as he held you.

“I’m never letting you out of my sight again,” he promised, gently pulling you from his shoulder to meet your eyes. “Not for a single second. Ever. It’s me and you forever. No matter where we go or what we do, it’s us. I swear, it’ll be us together.”

“I don’t want to be away from you ever again.”

“You won’t be.” Two thumbs wiping your tears, Hongjoong scanned over your face. “My love,” he said, voice cracking. “My YN…My beautiful YN…”

You stood there in his arms, not noticing the group of people coming up the path. Jongho and Talia had the good sense not to approach either of you, but instead started herding the children away from Aerion and her babies. Your fingers dug into his coat, balling up the fabric as you wept. Nce the worst of your tears passed, Hongjoong led you away from the point back down the mountain pass. 

“What took you so long?” you asked him, wiping your cold, wet cheeks. “I've been here a week already.”

“Byungho suggested that Aerion and I rest in the Choi camp for a while,” he sniffled, doing the same. “He is the healer there. I imagine you didn't meet him, but I wish you had. He would've protected you for me.”

“Protect me from Wooyoung?”

“And others who'd try hurting you. He may be old, but he's tougher than dragon skin,” he said.

“What did you do to him? Wooyoung, I mean.” 

The young beta wolf’s face floating to the front of your mind. Yes, you’d goaded him into throwing you out of the tent, but it’d been your idea to escape their camp. If you’d stayed put like the voice-Hongjoong’s voice-told you, he might have gotten to you sooner. 

“San handled him in their way. But, I might have frozen his arm,” he said.  “I had sent Garnet with a note to San, explaining who you were to me and that I’d forgive whatever he’d done to you, but when I saw…When that mongrel tossed you into the mud like trash, I wanted to flay him alive. I would have taken on that whole pack if they’d tried me. I thought of turning each and every one of them into living ice sculptures whenever I thought about it. Wooyoung is lucky that Byungho likes him so much, and that his brother is a forgiving person.”

“I bet he was embarrassed by that.”

“Very. The worst thing you can do to a lycan is make them look weak in front of their pack.”

“Like how stealing Dragonite babies is getting back at a Dragonite prince with a breeding kink?”

He laughed, a sound you melted at, “Yeah. Aerion hasn’t hatched her own in a long time, so I thought she’d like them.” 

“And you said you froze Yeosang’s crops?”

“His flower meadow, technically. He used them to line the whiskey barrels while they aged. Without a good crop, it’ll be hard to do and disrupt his whiskey profits.” 

“That would hurt, huh?”

“A lot. A hit to their banks is worse than a hit to their face.” His fingers tightened on your hip, “I don’t care that you were under my curse. They still….They still did that to you. Seonghwa was spared."

 "Why?"

"He was going to keep you on his island, as a guest," he added, "Until I had finished with my business around the north.”

"But then Yunho kidnapped me."

"But then Yunho kidnapped you," he nodded. He kissed your cheek and gave you another squeeze. "That's never happening again. I promise."

You pecked his lips, hugging him close to you as you headed down to the village. It wasn’t until you reached the bottom that you noticed the others. Orcs big and small put their right fist to their chest as Hongjoong passed, bowing their heads. Hongjoong only awkwardly nodded back, the ease from before turning stiff in their presence. 

“Why are they all doing that?” you asked him, noticing their solemn faces. 

“It's a respect thing.”

“Because you're a big badass demon guy?”

“Because I killed Argos.”

“Talia mentioned that to me,” you told him. “Why didn't you tell me about it? Why did you keep all this a secret? I thought you trusted me, Hongjoong.”

“I'll explain it later,” he said right as Jongho came around you both. 

“Kim,” he clasped hands with Hongjoong, “I'm glad to see you again, friend.”

“And you, Warchief.” Jongho smiled at the title, nodding. He stared around the camp, seeing the barricades at the entrances. “Already preparing?”

“You never know when your enemy is going to strike. One of our scouts saw an encampment of three-thousand men two days' ride from here. They can be on us any time.” 

Hongjoong’s face hardened, “The boy is bold, I'll give him that. Has Her Highness sent word?”

“Her last letter said she had just arrived at our outpost down the mountain,” he said. “I can show you-”

“-Brother,” Talia appeared at his side, “Let Kim rest and settle into his cabin first. He only just arrived.”

And had a lot of explaining to do. 

“We'll speak later,” Hongjoong assured him, patting his shoulder as he guided you away. 

Hongjoong seemed to already know where your cabin was in the camp. The moment you went through the door, you turned to him. He stood by the fireplace, pouring himself coffee from a kettle near the fire. You took him in once more and everything suddenly made sense. His unnatural beauty, his charm, his strength all made him stand out from ordinary men. Yet, you never considered him being anything other than human. 

“You're a demon.”

“I am,” he said, sipping the black, rich drink. 

“Why didn't you tell me?”

“I didn't want to tell you.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn't want you to be afraid of me,” he said. “I already stay in this human form to gain people's trust. I didn't want to reveal it to the most beautiful woman I'd ever met and have her run in terror. Demons don't have a good reputation, you know.”

“I wouldn't have been scared,” you assured him, playing with the stone around your neck. “If anything, I would have dug it.”

“My true form would have changed your mind. Trust me, the less you knew of me, the better it would have been for you.”

“Let me guess, your ‘enemies’?” 

“Yeah, them. Not everyone sees me as this big war hero,” he took another sip, letting it warm his insides. “There are lords and ladies I defeated who aren't the forgiving type. I worried they might find out about you and use you to hurt me. YN,” he put the drink down, “I wanted you as far away from all this as possible. You are the most important thing in my life and I didn't want anyone destroying it. But,” his eyes saddened, “It seems fate had other plans.”

“It didn't occur to you that maybe the true safest place is with you?”

“It crossed my mind, but every time it did, I'd remember every single person I lost and push it back down.” 

“Lost?”

“Friends, family, allies,” he replied. He hesitated for a moment, then said, “My parents died during a raid on our village by demon hunters. The local priest said we had set a famine on their crops, and the only way to replenish them was with our blood.” His face hardened, and he did not meet your eyes. “My mother went down first. She was an archer. I remember seeing her on top of a nearby roof, shooting them down with perfect accuracy before someone shot her first. I was ten. She was the first person I ever saw die. My father was killed in the middle of battle. He was fighting the commander of the group, who wielded a sword embedded with holy magic. It was a close fight, but the commander killed him. That was the second person I saw die. They would have killed me too if I hadn't gotten away. I…” he gripped the edge of the table, “I watched those monsters burn down my home and anybody who ever loved me. I’m the last of my kind, YN. I was a little kid out on his own, and it stayed that way for years. I didn’t tell anyone what I was for a long time because I was scared they’d kill me. Then, I learned how to disguise myself, practiced my magic, and promised myself I'd find the men who killed my parents.”

“Did you?”

“After a few years of searching,” he nodded. “The first two people I ever killed.”

“And you’ve killed since then?”

“More than I can count on my hands.”

“Were they innocent people?”

“Far from it, in my opinion, but we're all a villain in someone's story.” He went over to you, taking your hand to bring you closer.  “YN, you were the first person I met who didn't know who I was; you didn't see me and immediately got on your knees to thank me for saving you and your people. With you, I feel normal,” he put his arms around you, “I'm nobody special when I’m with you. I'm a guy who likes whiskey, gambling and having sex with the most gorgeous woman in the world.” You giggled as he kissed your lips. “When we met, you talked to me like any other patron in that place. I could be myself with you.”

“But you weren't….not completely.”

“I know,” he frowned, cupping your face, “But I promise that's going to change right now. I will answer any question you have-”

“-What did Seonghwa mean when he said I wasn't the gift he was expecting?”

Hongjoong paused, “Haeyoung…She wasn't supposed to use the curse I gave her on anyone else. She had strict orders to use it on Father Moon-”

“-Father Moon? Why?”

“He might paint himself as a holy man, but he was anything but that. He had been robbing his congregation blind with fake charities. He told parents his seed is considered a blessing, so they should let him fuck their kids for one. He hurt people. I planned on using the curse to show him what happens to people who abuse others.”

“Make him so horny he goes insane?”

“Yes. I planned on her putting it on him, capturing him, and then I'd give him to Seonghwa to keep as a pet. It was no different than what he would have done if he had the chance. However, Haeyoung betrayed me and used the magic on someone else. I don’t think she knew your connection to me, but that doesn’t matter anymore.” He wiped your tear stained cheeks, pecking your lips. “We’re together again, and that is what I care about.”

“That and this mark on my back,” you said. “It'll be just the best gift ever if you did something about it.”

“I will,” he then smirked, lightly kissing your lips, “But first…” He slipped his hands through your coat until it started sliding off your shoulders, “I want to give you my gift.”

Your hands stayed on his shoulders as he unbuttoned the first long layer. Like an orange, Hongjoong slowly shed each piece of clothing. Even when you became exposed to the chill, your cheeks still burned. His lips started on yours, slow and deep as he poured every ounce of himself into you. Your hand instinctively tugged at his hair, fingers sliding through the silky locks to scratch his scalp. A deep yearning for closeness brought his body right to yours. Every man before him might have started gently, trying to stir that mark branded on your back, but they did not have Hongjoong's touch. They did not elicit the same passion that he did. With him, you wanted nothing more than his hands on your body. Whether sexual or not, you needed him close to you. He then moved to your neck, laying down soft kisses and tender suckles. Each bit of pressure drew out a moan. He let out a soft groan when you began working on his clothes, expertly unbuttoning them as you went. You returned the neck kisses once his naked torso was exposed. The frost that melted from his hair dripped from the ends, and you licked up the trails that cascaded from his shoulders. 

The both of you now nude, he walked you backwards to the bed where you sat on the edge. The Hand kindled like coals on a fire, generating a comforting warmth all over your body. When you reached out for the semi-hardness in front of you, Hongjoong gently swatted your hand away. His eyes stared directly into yours as he cupped your chin. 

 "Lay back for me."

Once you did, Hongjoong put your feet apart so the rush of cold air brushed your hot center. His eyes turned dreamy and he sighed deeply when your thighs parted. He did not dive into you straight away. Hands caressing your legs, he pressed his lips to the inner side of your knee before making a trail downwards. Every kiss awakened that longing inside your chest. It sailed to where his mouth tenderly kissed, creating sparks to excite you. There was no rush to finish; no desperation for his cum or moans. You relaxed on the bed and enjoyed his hands and mouth. The anticipation throbbed in your clit, your walls clenching whenever he pecked close to your swelling lips. The moment he finally touched on the top of your mound, your hips began writhing on the bed. His lips made a line to the hood of your clit, which pulsed when he tenderly flicked over it. He continued licking the small area from top to bottom, always grazing lightly across the sensitive spot. You reached down to bring him closer, and he did not pull away. A wind of bliss came over you once his mouth latched to your cunt. Holding it in place, his tongue continued swirling it, which was only broken when he sucked up the excess juices leaking from you. He never increased the pace or deepened his tongue. He knew the constant lightness would drive you crazy, and it did. You kept grinding into the tongue that so effortlessly pleasured you, wanton moans sounding his name each time. 

By the time he slipped his tongue to your entrance, your muscles stiffened. The orgasm that escaped you left you seeing stars behind your eyes, restricting your chest and focusing on that exact point of contact. You could feel it radiating from there and spilling out into your lover's mouth. His delighted groans added another layer that caused you to grip the furs tightly. When it faded away, Hongjoong kissed up your body, a trail of stickiness being left behind. A small glean of your juices still remained on his chin when he reached you, and you easily licked it before bringing him in for a kiss. 

A slight yelp was muffled at the fingers replacing his tongue. Hongjoong rolled your clit between two fingers, the pair teasing your fluttering entrance every other stroke. The mark made you even more sensitive than usual, and you were soon moving to meet his hand. He didn't warn you of the slender digits slipping inside you, smirking at your arching back and closed eyes. Short pumps massaged the walls of your sex, a thumb focused on your clit in the meantime. His lips captured every moan in a kiss, your essence filling your own mouth. You held onto his shoulders, needing to hold a part of him as the desire burned. You whined once his fingers plunged deeper, curling upwards and wriggling to the spot he knew so well. 

 "Hongjoong…" you exhaled between kisses. 

"I've waited so long for this," he admitted, keeping the same gradual speed. "Having to watch you be used that way was torture to me. If you should have been submitting to anyone, it should be me."

 "Would you have put me in chains too?" You sneered, freely pushing into his hand. "Chained me to a post, naked and ready to be fucked by you whenever you wished?"

 "If that's what you would have wanted," he replied, returning your smirk. "I prefer leashes personally. It's much easier to move you around; gives you a bit more mobility," he suddenly started fingering you faster, and you wriggled underneath. The slick sounds of your wetness  brought you towards another orgasm. "They're a good way to keep you still when I use your pretty mouth."

"You and anyone else you would want."

He chuckled through gritted teeth, then changed the angle of his fingers. You finally went over the edge a second time, nails digging crescent shapes into his skin as it hit you. They dragged down his back in broken lines, your arms shaking from the strength before you finished. 

Hongjoong then pushed you further up the bed and lifted your ankles to his shoulders. His thick length spread across your slit easily, his precum mixing with the dripping juices as he did so. He did this a few times, tapping and rubbing you just to see you react to the slight tingle. 

"Joongie...please…" You whimpered, needing more of him. 

"Is my love getting impatient?"

"Yes," you quivered when he started tracing your sex with his tip. "I need you right now. I've been wanting this so badly. Please, give it to me."

"Hm, I  don't know. After you've been with the others, I don't think I measure up anymore."

"Oh shut up," you giggled, locking your legs to his sides and rolling him onto his back. Straddling him, you rocked your hips back and forth. "How could you even say that? After every night we spent in my bed?" You took hold of his erection, and pressed it to you. "Every night I spent back home wishing each client was you? I don't want any other man but you. I never have wanted someone as much as I want you. Now, " you sunk the first inch inside, earning a low groan from him, "Shut up and fuck me like it's our last night on earth."

 "As you wish."

It took a single thrust to bury him inside you. Another shot of desperation came over you and you couldn't stop yourself. Hongjoong pulled you down on top of him, hands roaming your body as he kept you close. You let yourself drown in everything about him. After days of being mistreated and abused, having the one person who made you feel safe was exhilarating. Neither of you could let go of one another. Your lips rarely left his as you bounced on his hips. When he sat up with you both still connected, you naturally wrapped yourself around him as you rocked into one another. You didn't crave his cum. You only craved his touch and closeness again. 

Dusk had begun to fall by the time you finished. Every orgasm he gave you surpassed anything another could have done. Laying limp beside him, body gleamed with sweat and lips swollen from kissing, you never felt more relaxed. The sweet afterglow of your love making felt too surreal. On his chest, you worried he might disappear. You pictured yourself waking up in a cage, naked and chained to the corner with someone standing over you, ready to devour you again. You then snuggled to his side, trying to erase the image from your mind. Everyone you’d met took advantage of your situation, and you had nobody to protect you from them. They all used you for one reason or another. You were their toy to play with and then discard. Hongjoong wouldn’t have done that. Never. 

 "Lay on your front for me,” he said after a while. “Let's get this taken care of, otherwise you won't sleep well."

 You lazily rolled onto your back, cuddling a soft pillow to cushion you. 

“Are you sure you want to get rid of it?” he asked, laying kisses on your shoulder. “I think it could be quite beneficial for both of us.”

“Yes,” you laughed, “It’s caused enough trouble. From what I’m hearing, we’re going to get into some more soon.”

“Very true.” He moved further down your spine, then said, “This is going to hurt, but you’ll feel loads better afterwards.” 

You braced yourself when he laid both his hands on the lower end of your back. He straddled your thighs, and took a deep breath. Then, you heard him speak the same low, rough language as Mingi. Your eyes squeezed tight, and you hissed when the first tingle came. Someone might have started tracing it with a block of ice. The heat coming off your mark joined in with the cold, creating a sharp burning that paralyzed you. A scream went past your clenched jaw, teeth grinding together to endure the pain. The muscles seized up, and you involuntarily kicked as another wave of pain came. You swore his hands sapped all the heat from your body again, and you shivered. Right when you thought the torture wouldn’t end, it stopped all together at once. Your skin cold to the touch, fingers nearly frozen and toes numbing, you shivered harshly. 

“No-Nobo-b-y sa-said…” you said through chattering teeth. 

“Don’t talk,” Hongjoong hushed, kissing your shoulder. 

He got off you and you immediately curled into a ball. Right away, Hongjoong grabbed more blankets from nearby. You stared off into the distance; the freezing cold filled your bones and constricted your muscles. All desire from before disappeared, and only the cold remained. The  mountain air from outside barely affected you due to the tundra forming within. You hardly noticed Hongjoong pulling furs and blankets over you before sliding into the bed. 

“Here,” he wrapped you in his arms, rubbing your back and arms. “Yeah, this happens afterwards. Arousal creates heat, so naturally my curse raises the body temperature. Once it’s lifted, all that heat it created goes away. It’s like being crazy horny and then taking a cold shower.”

“Some-som-something wa-warm?”

“Not yet,” he said, rubbing your back now. “If I give you anything hot now, you’ll go into shock from the hot liquid going into your freezing insides. Just try soaking up my warmth, love.” He pressed his lips to your forehead. “You’ll be okay soon.” 

Weariness of a whole new kind started consuming you. Not the kind you got from constant sex and orgasms. The type one felt after days of traveling, and going through various tests of your strength and endurance. When the cold started gradually subsiding, you snuggled into Hongjoong’s embrace. For the first time in a long time, you felt safe. Knowing he was watching over you, caring for you as you came down, made falling asleep much easier. Delicate fingers stroked your braids, twirling them around lazily and running between them to your scalp. The thought of waking up alone came back to you, and you buried yourself into his embrace. You’d die if you woke up to an empty bed, and this moment had been a dream. 

“I’m not going anywhere,” he promised you in a whisper. “Go to sleep. You’ll feel better when you wake up.” 

“Please, don’t…”

“I won’t,” he reassured you. 

Your eyes slowly started closing once the cold melted from your fingers and toes. Deep breaths led to his scent filling your lungs, causing you to grow still in his arms. You fell asleep faster than you ever intended to with him. 

****

The counter-curse made you cold as ice, and he knew plenty about that. Hongjoong kept the blankets tightly around you, cuddling you to his chest and carefully stroking you in places. He knew the skin-on-skin contact would warm you up at a reasonable pace, therefore neither shocking nor worsening the condition. As you laid in his arms, soundlessly sleeping at last, he recalled everything he told you. Revealing the more important parts alone lifted a significant weight off his shoulders. He had much more to tell you, though he’d keep it to himself for now. You had plenty going on without him pulling out more information. 

“I brought tea,” Jongho appeared through the door holding a kettle and a large mug. “It’ll warm her right away, and Talia is making soup for her to drink. She’ll need as much heat as she can get when she wakes up.”

“The tea will be good for her.”

He watched Jongho begin pouring water into the kettle, then set it over a grate in the hearth. “I came to tell you that Princess Ophelia has sent word to us just now,” he continued, rekindling the flames inside the fireplace. “She says she will be here tomorrow morning.”

“The same timeframe we have for Jeffery’s armies.”

Hongjoong scowled whenever he remembered the snide, sneering pointed face of the boy king. A young man of only twenty-two, Prince Jeffery did not have the tact or sensibility of his predecessors. The Northern and Southern kingdoms always maintained a healthy, balanced relationship. It was very much a ‘don’t-mess-with-us-and-we-don’t-mess-with-you’ sort of alliance. Hongjoong and his council of lords had no reason to attack the south, and King Rupert had no reason to invade the north. When Rupert died, everyone assumed Ophelia, his eldest daughter, would be crowned Queen of the South. However, from what Hongjoong heard, with the help of his privy council, Jeffery usurped his sister. Ophelia told him that she’d been put under house arrest, and only narrowly escaped the gallows. 

She came to Hongjoong when she had nobody else. With only a few loyalists at her back, Ophelia could not engage in war on her own. Hongjoong planned to keep the north out of the family squabble. It was none of their concern what happened south of the border. However, when Jeffery’s men started raiding magicfolk villages near the border, declaring them in his name, Hongjoong had to do something. He had been on his way to start recruiting the rest of the Northern Council before this whole curse business happened. Now, he’d have to do it with you at his side, which he’d have no other way now. 

“My scouts have seen a squad of his bannermen coming in from the west,” Jongho told him, watching the flames. “We think they mean to go through the mountain pass to try setting up a lookout point over the village.”

“Stupid decision,” Hongjoong replied, hand idly playing with your hair. “The passages are too narrow, and they’d be fish in a barrel if they tried crossing through. Will you send men ahead of them?”

“Already have,” he said. “My brother is leading a team in their direction. Whatever information they plan to retrieve about us is going to die with them.” His eyes landed on you nestled under the covers, “She’s got talent, your girl.”

“Does she now?” Hongjoong asked with a smirk. “I’m well aware of her special talents.” 

“Not only that kind,” Jongho explained. “She isn’t great with a sword, but she’s gotten pretty good at archery. She’s been practicing while waiting for you.”

“A bow and arrow is better suited for her, I suppose.”

Hongjoong never pictured you with a weapon. This was mostly because he always imagined himself protecting you. He’ll admit it is a bit wrong of him to assume you couldn’t handle it on your own. Perhaps if he’d offered you proper training or taught you magic, you would’ve been able to protect yourself. With everything that is coming his way, it’d be good for you to know basic defensive skills. A bit of survival training would not hurt either, considering you’ll both be on the road for a while. He looked down to see you on his chest, and he imagined you in Jeffery’s clutches. He’d do far worse than what any of the others had done and laugh about it afterwards. He pictured your bloody, broken body swinging from the capital’s gates, and he held you a bit more tightly. 

“We’re going to need all hands for this,” Jongho told him, breaking him from the painful images. “Ophelia only has two or three lords on her side. She is going to need your help to convince the others to join in the fight.” 

“You’re joining.”

“Yes, because the omens favor war and an Orc never passes up a chance to seize glory,” he replied. “The other lords will not feel the same, particularly after the damage you dealt them. Stealing Yunho’s eggs, Kim? Are you insane?”

“He forced himself on my YN.”

“And freezing Yeosang’s crops? Embarrassing Wooyoung and San? Those are things that will be hard to forgive. Kim-”

“-They will forgive me once they see what we’re up against,” he assured him. “I’ve known all of them since they were infants in their mothers’ arms. Yunho may throw his tantrum, but once a wife gives him a new egg, he’ll forget about the pit eggs I took. Yeosang has multiple strings of profit coming in, so a halt in his whiskey productions won’t slow him down. The lycan pack might be a bit disgruntled after what I did to Wooyoung, but they cannot say it was undeserved.” 

“An insult is an insult.”

“I will not apologize for dealing justice,” he said firmly. “They all knew what was happening to her, and they took advantage of it. Do you defend them? I didn’t think Orcs approved of that kind of thing.”

“I speak as an advisor, not a defender,” he replied more firmly. “If it were my sister they shamed, I would have taken their heads and put them on stakes outside my gate.”

“I would have done the same if it weren’t for who they were.”

They all tried defending it by saying they didn’t know how important you were to him. Their excuses had fallen on deaf ears. Hongjoong already disapproved of their practice of taking slaves, but every protest went unheard. The northern kingdoms all have their own laws and traditions; Hongjoong had no place to change them. He wasn’t a king, and he didn’t wish to be one. Having people praise him wherever he went already bothered him. If he’d been crowned King of the North, it’d be worse. Yet, when he saw those monsters do those things to you, he considered turning the entire north into a big block of ice, with all of them frozen with it. 

“Still, war is coming, and insulting potential allies is not the way to win support,” Jongho’s voice broke into his thoughts. “My grandfather always said you could be impulsive."

"Where is he, anyways? I thought he would be where the action is."

"There's plenty of action in the Jade Valley nearby," he said, "But do not change the subject. Alliance agreements will be much harder this go around. You're going to need some muscle and better gifts to pacify them."

 "I'll cross that bridge when I get to it."

Only you mattered now. Looking back down at you on his chest, Hongjoong didn’t feel an ounce of regret. Your presence alone pushed away all the pain. Your smile became a light in his shadowy darkness. The ice in his soul melted whenever he saw you. That little brothel in the middle of nowhere became his refuge from the world he knew. A good pint of beer, music playing from the stage and you in his lap was better than any throne or castle. 

"She means the world to me, Jongho,” he said softly, admiring the shape of your nose before kissing it. “I travelled across the whole northern kingdom to have her back. I’m not losing her again.” 

A world without you isn't one he'd stay in. 

****

The touch of his hands on you coaxed you into reality. Your lips immediately found him in the haze of sleep, and you kissed them right away. Senses alone told you it was Hongjoong who laid beside you. His lips immediately opened for your tongue, which snaked through and over to swat his own. 

“Hello, sleepyhead,” he muttered in a kiss, rolling onto his side to cup your cheek, “Feel better, love?”

“Yes.”

Your body didn't yearn like it'd done the past week. It ached for him in a different way. The craving, akin to near starvation, took over every part of you. You didn't want to be anywhere else but in his arms. Even if it felt as if someone disassembled you and then put you back together the wrong way, you needed his comforting touch. Hongjoong said nothing as he brought your leg over his, bringing the two of you closer together. You then hissed from the light brush to your sex. 

“Shit,” you winced, a sharp pain stirring there right away. “It hurts.”

“Yeah, that’s going to be there for a while,” he nodded, guilt in his eyes. “I don’t think I need to tell you that it’s from all the fucking you’ve been doing. You’ve been asleep for a whole day, since your body needed recuperation. Mingi’s spell broke when I lifted the curse, so now…yeah…I think it’s best if we don’t touch this for a while. Any sort of stimulation will make it worse and you won’t heal as quickly.”

“You’re a demon,” you said, eyes tight as you kept your legs open to relieve the stinging. “Can’t you magic it away?”

“All I can do is soothe it with some creams,” he said, “And a pain reliever. It won’t take long. Maybe a day or two more.” He slid out of the bed, pulled on a pair of underwear and walked over to a bag in the corner. You guessed he made himself at home while you slept. “I’m so sorry about all this, love. It’s my fault you’re in all this pain right now.”

“No, it’s Haeyoung’s fault,” you pointed out, watching him gather bottles and jars from his bag to put on a table. “Then every guy I met after that.”

“I’m the person who taught her the curse.”

“And you had no idea what her real intentions with it were,” you added. “I’m alive. Isn’t that enough?”

“It’s more than anything I could ask for.” He began pouring various ingredients into a small bowl, occasionally stirring as he did so. “I kept picturing you completely taken over by The Hand. I started worrying more when I couldn’t get into your head. It meant I was losing you.” He stopped pouring a thin powder into the mixture, losing focus for a moment, “I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t get to you in time. There’d be a point where you’d be beyond saving, and I’d lose you forever. I knew I’d die if that happened. I tried getting a hold of Sels in Tin City, but knowing Yeosang, he wouldn’t have listened to her anyways. I knew the only other people who’d treat you well were Jongho and Talia. They were my only hope of saving what was left of you.” 

Standing up, you ignored the radiating pain and walked over to him. The immediate chill made you shudder, so you grabbed a cloak hanging over the back of the chair. 

“Well, I’m okay now,” you told him, wrapping yourself in the fleece. “My head isn’t fuzzy anymore. I’m not insanely horny. I’m YN again.”

His lips curled into a grin, and he put the back of your hand to his lips. “Yeah, yeah you are.” Arms wrapping around your middle, Hongjoong pulled you in for a deep kiss. “Let me get this finished, then we can get it on you. You really should be resting, love.” 

“As long as you rest with me?”

“Of course.” He nodded over to a small food spread near the fireplace, “You go ahead and eat while I fix this up. You must be starving.”

“You have no idea.” 

You didn’t mind your manners as you started tearing at the cold chicken leg. The tender meat immediately filled that gaping hole in your stomach. You watched him begin creating a cream in the small bowl. He added water droplets to the grinded herbs and powders in the bowl, then slowly mixed them. After everything you went through, you thought you’d never see Hongjoong again. You couldn’t believe he was there, tending to you like he always did. As you bit down on a chicken wing, ripping the skin and meat from the bone, you kept your eyes on him. 

“Here,” he turned to you as he folded a thick white paste around, “Use this.”

You recognized it as the same salve Yunho and Seonghwa used on you. Hongjoong placed the bowl down beside you, and gave you a lopsided smile. You saw his cheeks tinge a soft pink. 

“Maybe you should apply it when you’re done eating,” he said, turning from you shyly. 

“Why won’t you put it on for me?” 

“If I do, I’m afraid your pain will only get worse,” he scratched the back of his head and started putting things back in his bag. “I have a hard time controlling myself around you, you know that.”

“One more time won’t kill anyone,” you smirked, only to then wince when a quick move agitated your center. 

“You’re in no condition to be having sex,” he left the bag on the table and came to your side, “Your body and mind need to recover.” He grinned, pecking your cheek and putting his hand on your thigh, “Otherwise, I’d be having my own dinner while you had yours.” 

The both of you laughed, and shared a kiss. The words might have stirred something in you another time, but now you ached too much for that. “We have all the time in the world,” you said, kissing him again, “Now that we’re together.” 

“Exactly,” he confirmed, biting into the other drumstick, “And I’m not letting you go again.”

“Even with everything that’s going to happen? You can keep it from me all you like. I know something big is coming,” you said when he looked away from you uncomfortably. “Jongho keeps talking about it. The other lords mentioned it in front of me. It sounds like we’re about to get some unwanted company.”

“A lot of unwanted company.”

“Who is it? Another king?”

“King Jeffery. He’s a vicious little bastard,” he said, swallowing his piece. “He thinks everything north and south belongs to him, just like his great-grandfather did. I hate to toot my own horn, but the kid should back down if he knows what’s good for him.”

“Go ahead and toot,” you insisted. “I’d be doing it too if I was flying around on a big scary wyvern dragon thing. Jeffery has no chance.”

You knew very little about the monarch who ruled your side of the land. It never mattered that much to you being a little brothel worker. Yet, men from the capital said he was a spoiled brat, prone to tantrums that often ended in violence.

“Trust me,” he said, “Men like Jeffery are too proud to admit defeat when they see it. His council are a bunch of cowardly lords looking for a bit more power, so they likely will push him to it more. They’ll ride out this war until one of us dies.”

“One of us?” you gulped more wine. 

“Me or Jeffery.”

“Why does it have to be you?”

“I’m the one most likely to put an end to him for good.”

“There’s a bunch of other people who can do it too, I’m sure. I mean, Seonghwa is seven feet tall and Yunho is half-dragon. You’re telling me this kid can defeat them so easily that it has to be you who fights him?”

Hongjoong didn’t miss the concern in your voice. “Jeffery will like gun for me anyway. He has it in his head that killing me will prove how worthy he is of being king of both the north and south. He says it’s to avenge his great-grandfather, but that’s bullshit. He just wants more to brag about.” He forked a piece of roasted potato and chewed it. “I told him to stand down before it was too late, but men like him don’t listen to reason. He thinks everything is his by right, and we’re thieves for keeping it from him.” 

You didn’t like the sound of this at all. You didn’t care how battle-hardened your lover might be; he’d be going into war and might not come back. 

“What will I do while you’re off fighting?” you asked him. 

“What do you want to do? I won’t force you to fight with me. You’re not nearly skilled enough for tha-”

“-I can get better,” you insisted. “Jongho says I’m getting pretty good with my bow, and my knife skills are okay.”

“Knife skills?”

“Talia said smaller weapons seem to do better for me than the big ones,” you said, “And I’ve shredded a dummy or two.”

“You don’t know anything about being in a battle.”

“So? You can teach me.” You put down a chicken thigh to hold his hand in yours. “Hongjoong, I can’t sit here while you’re off fighting and not knowing what’s happening to you. I don’t want to sit around waiting to hear that you died or got injured or something. You said we wouldn’t be apart from now on, and we won’t be, no matter where we end up.” 

“I couldn’t fight properly knowing you’re in danger-”

“-I’ll be in danger anywhere I go in this damn kingdom,” you cut him off. “I’d have my necklace, and if I train hard enough, I’ll be able to protect myself. Joongie, you can’t keep me in a bubble forever. I think what’s happened since my curse kind of proves that. Jongho said the gods put me on this path-”

“-He says things like that all the time. It’s an Orc thing, love. You’ll see it the longer we’re here.”

“He said the gods put me on this path for a reason. I went through all that bullshit for a reason, and I think it was to prepare me for this-”

“-Oh, YN! Come on now-”

“-I mean it. I would never have learned the things I did or gotten here on my own. I know you like being my knight in shining armor," you said when he let out a huff, “But you can’t be my savior every time.” 

“YN, this isn’t a game. It would be war. People will die. People will get hurt; you could get hurt. I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to you because of me.”

“And I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t try to help you. Do you really think I can’t do it?”

“I know you can. I am confident that you can, but this is serious.”

“And so am I. Let me join you out there, and I’ll prove it to you.”

He cupped your cheek, gazing over your face. You already saw the battle going on inside his head. He seemed to come to a conclusion while looking at you. 

“Well, if you have a Warchief giving you personal training lessons, you might be able to protect yourself. You might not even need me.”

“I’ll always need you,” you assured him, turning back to the feast in front of you, “And you’ll need me.”

“Always, love.”

The two of you shared another kiss before digging into your meals. With Hongjoong beside you, you felt you could take on the entire world. You didn’t know what lay ahead, and you wouldn’t say the worst was behind you just yet. But, whatever was coming would have to go through you and Hongjoong. 

Together. Like always.

****

A/N: Yaaay the happy ending!! I want to thank everyone for reading this chaotic tale of a girl getting put THROUGH IT haha I hope you guys enjoyed this ending <3 I really appreciate all the love you guys have been sending my way for this, thank you so much <3

[whoopsyeahokay]

Wreck It Like A Rumor

summary: prompt fill. Wally saves you from a joke gone terribly wrong the night of the Homecoming dance. what unfolds after is a friendship you desperately cling to as you try to survive the rest of term... what you don't know is that Wally Clark is deader than a doornail until you learn it the hard way. (request)

pairing: Wally Clark x fem!reader

warnings: smut lite. AU - canon divergence. CWC (canon what canon). single mention of a mental health slur. attempted assault. protective behavior. angsty themes. hurt/comfort. bullying. HEA.

note: author hasn't watched S2. all knowledge of new content comes exclusively from GIFs on this platform. (i got tired of filtering Wally content. he's my babe. i am weak.)

bon reading, frens

___________________________🐦‍🔥

Wreck It Like A Rumor

They disguised themselves as friends.

You should've known when the one person out of the group you considered a sister—the girl you'd glommed onto in elementary, who'd been by your side through every shitty thing that'd unraveled your life at the time. You know, your real friend—started acting shifty.

Eyes down, nervous laugh, not giving you a straight answer when you asked her if she was okay.

"Help! Anyone, please! Let me out of here!"

You pound your fist against the door, tears streaming down your face. Mascara smudged, nail polish chipped, kicking and banging and screaming until your skin is red and blotchy.

It's Homecoming. You never went to the dances, tend to avoid a lot of high school social events like the plague since everyone in your grade (and others) treats you as if you're contagious.

But it's junior year, and your best friend begged you to join her as her ride or die since she wasn't super comfortable with her new group of friends yet.

You threw caution to the wind and said yes.

For Oli. Olivia Hazelwood. The awkward daughter of Split River's old-money elite couple, Henry and Marion Hazelwood. You and Oli were awkward together. Outsiders who found a home in each other. You shared everything with her and thought she did the same, but now you question how true that was.

Because, along with her new friends—who she insisted were your new friends, too—she'd locked you in the secret fallout shelter in the school basement.

Cruelty packaged as a practical joke.

You heard Travis cackle to the others before calling through the door, "Get comfortable, it'll be a while 'til the janitor comes to get you!"

It's fucking Friday. You don't know Mr. South's schedule—hell, you don't know if he even knows about the fallout shelter—but you assume he won't be back until Monday like the rest of the staff.

Someone will do a walk-through, you tell yourself, gasping for air as you pace around the space. It's dark, the only light coming from the weird dashboard on the clunky equipment lining one wall.

How Travis and the others found out about the fallout shelter isn't a mystery. You told them, stupidly, when you were trying to bond with Elitzia and Marybelle. Split River trivia you'd collected through hyperfixation research. Hours spent diving down rabbit holes after binging Fallout with Oli over a weekend.

Nuclear winter. Chernobyl. Bunkers. The Cold War.

God, why'd you say anything? Should've kept your mouth shut. Should've known that Travis and his friends weren't actually trying to buddy up, because you're still the school pariah.

After all, you gave Jake Tremblay crabs after you rejected him in 9th. You were a homewrecker and forced yourself on Matt Wilson when his girlfriend caught him shoving his unwanted hand up your skirt. You told Claire Zomer last year that you liked to wear diapers and be bottle-fed like a baby as a result of neglectful parents after you refused to do her English homework.

The mill churned out rumor after rumor, and though you tried to fight it at first, it became too much. Like squashing an ant hill. You stopped, people lost interest when you didn't react, but those rumors still circulate.

Sometimes, new ones join the rotation depending on who you piss off just trying to make it to the last bell.

Oli was the only person who stood by you until Elitzia extended her friendship.

Now you're alone. Stuck in the creepy fallout shelter in the dark. Suffocating on shadows as you double back to the door and start banging your palms against it again. Oli knows you're claustrophobic. She was there when you trusted Sarah Thompson in 5th Grade and climbed into her toy chest.

What is so other about you that makes people hate you so much?

You gulp in harsh breaths, sobbing out exhales, losing energy quickly as you smack and bang the door. You can't hear the music, but you know it's still loud, the dance in full swing two floors above.

"Please," You cough, shaking, "Please, let me out..."

‗•‗

Wally sighs. Tonight's been one giant letdown. He doesn't know why he got his hopes up, especially since it's been obvious from the get-go that Maddie isn't ready for the things Wally wants to try with her. Romance. Dates. Hand-holding and affection and inside jokes.

He understands. Of course he does. Maddie's new-dead. She was murdered. She and her best (and very alive) friend are trying to solve the case, to help her remember so she can find closure or whatever.

Why would she want to take a break from that and hang out at a dumb dance with Wally? Who's been trapped in limbo for the last forty years; same four walls, same seven faces to interact with. Same. Same. Same. Same. Fuck.

It's fine. It's totally fine.

As he lies on the grass, staring up at the stars, the quiet outside giving him space to sulk, he hears it. Bang. Help! Bang bang bang. Please!

It's faint, no louder than a breeze, but consistent. Wally gets to his feet and tries to follow the sound. Back into the school, down the steps, along the first-floor hallway to the basement door. It muffles for a moment when he goes the wrong way, toward the janitor's office, so he backtracks and hurries deeper into the bowels of the school.

Despite having the run of the place, no holds barred, he hasn't been this way before. Never saw a reason to go to the boiler room, not even after Maddie took a seat at the Afterlife Support Group.

The sound loudens, banging and muted pleading, someone clearly in distress. Wally slows his steps as he nears a door he's never seen before. It's old, white paint peeling, made of metal. It shakes when whoever's behind it starts slamming their fists again. Renewed vigor, higher-pitched agony, "Please!! Anyone!!?"

Wally scans the outside of the door for a latch or handle and notices the deadbolts attached to the top and bottom of the doorframe. Quickly, he undoes them and yanks the door open, stumbling back when a figure slumps out.

Small. Trembling. A girl whose makeup is stained with tearstreaks and whose eyes are bloodshot, her skin pale from fright. She's breathing heavy, sniffling, rubbing the back of her wrist under her nose as she gradually calms.

"Uh..."

And that's as much as Wally gets out before she's on her feet, arms around her middle, shoulders up. She takes one look at Wally, mumbles a wet thanks, and then charges through the boiler room, down the corridor, and out of the basement.

Wally's stunned. Because he knows for a fact that that girl is alive.

Not only did she look right at Wally, she spoke to him. Like, to his face. Eyeballs met eyeballs. For the first time in a long time, Wally was part of the living world again.

"No freaken way..."

‗•‗

You keep your head down as you walk toward your locker. Headphones on, blaring angry music to quell the crash and surge of emotion inside you. You're embarrassed, humiliated, hateful. Rightfully so, you think, because the last person in the world you trusted betrayed you in the worst way you can imagine.

Oli tried to apologize over the weekend. A novel of a text that repeated several times how sorry she is about what happened. How she didn't know that was the plan. I swear, I thought they were just going to close the door for a minute.

So why didn't you come back?

She never answered. Either ashamed of her non-actions or annoyed that you won't forgive her as easily as you used to, you don't care.

The guy who saved you—tall, handsome, dressed like a silverscreen leading man—looked just like someone that group kept in the middle of their circle-jerk. Which was why you didn't stick around to thank him properly. He was probably just a little less bad; has what amounts to a conscience for those assholes, and decided to cut the joke short out of guilt.

Definitely a senior, you figured, since you didn't recognize him from your class.

Makes things easier. You intend to steer clear of him just like you will the others. You've got enough on your plate, the newest rumor sticky-tacked to your locker when you finally arrive.

Crybaby got herself locked in a room and couldn't get out! Accentuated with photoshopped baby bottles and crying emojis.

It's stupid. Juvenile. But it burns. You tear the paper off your locker, crumple it up, and march to the trash to shove it through the lid. Even through your music, you can hear the chorus of laughter. Some of it nervous, as if going along with it to avoid the same attention Travis and his cronies give you. Some of it hearty and genuine.

You swallow your discomfort and go back to your locker, wrench the lock open, and almost violently swing the door right into someone's face. Thankfully, that someone catches it before it does any damage.

"Whoa there, Helen Sharp, I'm not here to steal your man." The guy chuckles, giving you what you assume is his most charming smile.

It rubs you the wrong way. You glare back, ignoring the comment as you begin to rifle through your things, exchanging last night's homework for the textbook and notes you need for first period. He clears his throat, keeps standing there awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck and watching you.

"So, you can't hear me," He mutters, and, weirdly, it doesn't sound like a snide question. Rather, his voice is heavily laced with disappointment.

You stop and straighten, staring right at him when you cock your head and say, "I can hear you just fine." Then, "You come to make me thank you again?" Just like Mike Bower earlier this semester, who pinned you to the vending machine after the cafeteria emptied, demanding you show him your gratitude for lending you a pencil during the History test.

The guy swallows and shakes his head, eyes wide and mouth agape. As if you speaking to him is the most astonishing thing that's ever happened to him.

Your glare intensifies.

‗•‗

Wally can't believe it. You can see him. You're talking to him.

Kind of.

You're mostly scowling at him, but that doesn't matter. He'll take what he can get. He knows you're likely still upset about Friday, how you got locked in the fallout shelter somehow. Which, the fallout shelter was a whole discovery on its own that helped unlock some of Maddie's memories over the weekend, so if anyone should be grateful, really, it's Wally.

"N-no," He stutters.

His shock swiftly melts into excitement, big grin sweeping his face, and he giddily follows you toward your first class after you slam your locker closed and start walking.

"So...are you okay? You didn't look so good, last time I saw you."

You heave a sigh, "I'm fine." And it sounds an awful lot like something you've been repeating to yourself until you believe it. Clearly, it isn't working.

"Right. Yeah. Of course you are." Wally nods sagely. "...What's your name?"

You come to an abrupt halt in the hallway and turn to face him, brows furrowed, giving him a slow once-over that makes his heart skip a beat. Now that he can see your face better, he swallows thickly. Jesus, you're beautiful. Even scowly and off-put. Pretty as a peace lily.

"Why?" You ask, and, wow, okay, has no one ever asked you for your name before?

Wally hesitates, not quite understanding why you're being so hostile until he hears it. A couple of students behind him, snickering to each other, commenting on how, the fucking weirdo's lost her mind. She's so fucked up.

Spinning on his heel, Wally faces the students, ready to put them in their place before he remembers that they can't see him...can they? No. They can't. They look right through him at you, snorting and shaking their heads in pity like you're some kind of headcase.

When he turns around again, you're gone.

‗•‗

It takes Wally a few days before he finds you again. Outside, sitting in a patch of sun, eating your bagged lunch alone as you lean against the side of the school. Without preamble, he plops down beside you.

He spent his time doing a little research. Between helping Maddie and Simon investigate, obviously, he's a good person who has his priorities straight. Still, you were always on his mind. The gorgeous living girl who can see him.

You ignore him, bite into your PB&J, and stare into the middle distance as if Wally doesn't exist. That's fine. He understands now. And, holy shit, the things he'd do if he had a body to do them in. He'd fuck every last one of your tormentors up. Break egos before breaking bones. Guy, girl, he doesn't discriminate; he hates what he's heard.

Can't be sure none of it is real, but from the way you shrink when he keeps his attention on you, he doesn't think any of it is.

"You okay?" He ventures again, voice low and kind.

You shrug. No snarky comment, no anger. Just...resignation.

"I, uh, heard what they say about you..."

You snort, "Great. You come to give me words of wisdom, oh wise one? It's just high school, it won't matter when you get out of here," You mock, clearly some bullshit you've been spoon fed before.

Wally shakes his head, "Nah. Nothing like that." He gives you a smile. Cheeky, "High school's all there is. It really does shape your whole life."

You choke on your next bite and then give him a look of horror. When you catch his impish smirk, your eyes narrow.

"You're an asshole."

"You're kind of a grump." Wally shoots back good-naturedly.

"I think I've earned it."

Wally's smile falters slightly, but he makes an effort to remain upbeat. Softly, sincerely, he says, "I'm sorry you have to go through all that."

"It is what it is." You respond, equally as soft, gaze on the ground.

You and Wally sit in silence for a moment. It doesn't feel awkward or tense the way Wally expected it to. Instead, it's peaceful. A welcome change from the mounting drama he's experiencing on Split River High's metaphysical side.

Eventually, you seem to relax. You and he exchange names. He doesn't give you his last name, not quite ready for that conversation, though he's sure you'll figure it out sooner rather than later. His letterman is a dead give away (no pun intended).

"Do you...have any friends?" He asks bluntly after talking around the point for a few minutes.

Tensing, you stop chewing the last bite of your sandwich, gaze distant as your face slackens in what Wally can only describe as hurt.

"I did. But then she helped her new friends lock me in a fallout shelter even though she knows I'm claustrophobic."

"Fuck..." Wally exhales sharply, "I'm sorry."

"You say that a lot," You accuse, slanting him another suspicious look. "Why are you sorry? Did you know that was the plan? Are you friends with Travis and Marybell and Elitzia?"

Wally tries to keep up with your questions. You must've been thinking those things based on how rapidly you asked them, and it takes Wally aback.

"No," He replies, "I don't know any of those people."

You relax again once you've stared into Wally's fucking skull to see if he's lying. Apparently, you can do that since you give a small nod and settle back against the wall.

"Thank you," You say after another minute of silence. "Really. For...getting me out of there."

"Yeah, of course," Wally says. "I might look like an asshole, but I'm not actually one."

You peek at him, a tiny smile forming on your lips that makes Wally's heart soar, "I'm starting to get that."

‗•‗

Your unconventional friendship with Wally grows from there.

When Wally isn't busy saving the day with Maddie and Charley and Rhonda, he spends his time haunting you. His own little joke, because it appears you haven't figured out how dead he is, and as more days pass, he's more reluctant to reveal that spooky truth.

In the span of weeks, you blossom like a flower for him. He learns how giggly you are when you aren't shielding yourself from the disgusting things your classmates sling at you. It's not often, but it's often enough that Wally never sees you as anything but reserved and quiet when you're between classes.

At this point, he's heard the slew of rumors about you. Gross and inflated, a game of broken telephone that chips away at you a little more every day.

Except when you're with Wally. It's as if his presence is helping you heal, and he can't keep the warm, fuzzy feelings from growing in his chest. Bigger and bigger with every encounter.

You've taken to studying in the library until the very last second you're allowed to stay. Tucked in the back, muffling laughter when Wally tells you about things that happened to him when he was alive. He omits details that might give away the era, but shares everything he can.

God, he loves the sound of your laughter. How your eyes sparkle when you're happy. How your cheeks flush when he sneaks in something flirtatious. How you bite your lip after you say something suggestive in return.

You're not exactly tactile, probably scarred from things that've happened in your past, things that've been said to you, or things that've been done to you. (Wally wants to punch everyone, teachers included.) It makes it easier to hide his deadness. However, it's getting to a point where Wally has a hard time remembering not to reach out and fail at tucking a strand of your hair behind your ear when you stare up at him with those sweet, joyful eyes.

There's always, at the very least, an inch of space between you and Wally. An inch he so desperately wishes he could eradicate. Either way, he can't break that barrier, the energy emitted from a living body preventing him from touching you, even if you did finally welcome it.

You bring him homemade cookies the day you reveal that your parents are rarely around. Break his heart, then heal it with chocolate chip, his favorite. He has to wait for you to turn away before he picks one up, so you don't see how the cookie never actually leaves the container.

When he bites into it, he moans, filthy, sexual, not even exaggerated because, "God damn girl, these are delicious."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," Wally takes another bite, moans again, eyes closed as he savors the taste, "Best I've ever had."

You blush, duck your head shyly, "Thanks, Wally." And, fuck, he wants to kiss you. All over your face. Cheeks, nose, forehead. Lips. Deep and slow as he cups your jaw, angles your head just right, pulls you into his lap and—

"Earth to Wally," Your voice breaks through the mist, "You still in there?" Then, to yourself, "What the hell did I put in these?"

Wally blinks himself back to the present, "Sorry, what'd you say?"

"I asked you if you wanted to try the oatmeal-peanut butter ones."

Very seriously, "Yes. And everything else you've made ever, if you don't mind."

He wants to offer to make you banana pancakes or a burrito or anything to show off his skills in the kitchen, but he isn't sure how the food he makes would translate in the living world. His stomach clenches, eyes sad, as he begins to think about all the things he can't do with you. All the things you don't know he can't do with you because he doesn't want to lose you when you learn the truth.

Maddie didn't lose Simon, a part of him thinks, but while that's true, Maddie and Simon are best friends. Have been best friends since fuck knows when. Simon was willing to throw himself behind Maddie being a ghost because of how close they are.

Wally isn't certain you'd react the same way.

‗•‗

Things between you and Wally are...amazing? No, that's too simple a word to describe how his friendship has basically turned your whole high school experience on its head.

He's quickly become the best part of your day. He makes you laugh, helps you with homework when he isn't distracting you from it. He's sweet and compassionate and thoughtful. He remembers everything you tell him, even the mundane, silly shit.

You've never experienced that before. Not even with Oli, who had a knack of steering every conversation back to herself. It wasn't in a rude or self-righteous way, honestly, it stemmed more from insecurity and external processing.

But, yeah, it got old sometimes, especially when you just needed someone to hear you. See you. Know you.

Things with Wally are so incredible that you're even able to ignore the newest rumor about you making the rounds. How you're crazy, talking to yourself like schizo, you need meds, why do they let her near us? Dude, she could be dangerous.

None of it matters anymore. Oli's been fully indoctrinated by her new friends, ignores or avoids you, unable to look you in the eye anymore since dying her hair to look like Chloe's and dressing herself like Kirsten.

Wally has your back. Comforts you with humor or listens when you need to vent. Mostly, it's just bliss. And it's alarming because you've never felt so close to someone like this. You've exposed yourself to him in ways you never let yourself before. Not with Oli, not with your parents, not with anyone.

But he draws it out of you, bit by bit, your personality slowly reestablishing itself after years of being smothered behind the walls you had to build to protect yourself.

He's safe.

And he's hot like burning. Like putting your hand over a lit element.

Another new feeling unlocked; you want to feel his hands on you, even for a moment. Want to feel his lips on yours. Want all of him so wholly and greedily it makes your head spin.

Yes. Everything with Wally is perfect.

Until, one day, he simply...disappears.

‗•‗

It's not Wally's fault. He doesn't mean to do it. He wouldn't have, he promises. Especially not to you. But, Wally has his turn getting stuck in the fallout shelter; Mr. Martin unmasks himself as a bad guy; and Maddie's body is alive out there being used by Janet.

Things go from moderately unhinged to fucking hectic overnight.

He stays away only to help Maddie. Finds out, shit, Yuri Vyarheychyk isn't actually a looper. Discovers a lot of things he never wanted to discover. Wally's lost and despondent, and can't seem to get his head above water long enough to seek you out and apologize for abandoning you for two weeks.

He's relieved when he finally catches sight of you again, a smile on his face as he watches you help put the gym together for his high school reunion.

Just as he's about to approach, he notices you go eerily still, staring at something he can't see from this angle. He steps a little closer, cautious, heart in his throat when he finally gets a glimpse.

"Oh, no."

‗•‗

You were roped into helping set up the space for the class of '84 reunion. You'd reacted vehemently when Travis made a joke at your expense during Math and Mr. Davis immediately issued you detention.

This is how you earn back his respect. Carrying stacks of chairs and fussing over an easel that's to support a picture of that guy the stadium is named after. You're feeling bitter, neglected, alone all over again since Wally hasn't surfaced, and the rumors are starting to pick at vulnerable flesh.

Then, Ms. Monroe clucks at you, hands you the blown-up photo to fit onto the easel. You don't notice at first, and then the shock swoops in and leaves you breathless. Gaping wide-eyed at the face staring back at you.

Wally's smile is exactly how it looks when you say something he calls 'cute'. Charming. Cheerful.

The world fades away, time stands still, and you almost buckle under the realization that you made up a whole person to keep you company. You really are fucking crazy, just like everyone said.

"Hey..." You hear Wally's voice, but it can't be real, pulled from some broken part of your brain that shattered after the fallout shelter.

Slowly, you pan to your right, Wally towering over you, as solid as he was the last time you saw him. You glance back at the photo, then to Wally, rinse, repeat until you have whiplash. A tiny, wrecked sound escapes you and your body shivers, the weight of what this means bubbling inside you like acid.

"Hey, no, it's okay," The figment of Wally Clark, class of '84, dead dead dead, tries to reassure you. "You're not crazy, babe, I'm right here. You can see me."

His words do nothing to calm you down. You need help. Professional help, hard meds, a straitjacket, and a padded room.

Another trembling whimper and you wheeze, "They were right... I'm... I'm insane."

"No!" Wally insists, stumbling after you as you force your feet to move and head for the door.

Ms. Monroe calls out, but you ignore her, not bothering to think up an excuse as you leave.

"Leave me alone," You beg the figment of Wally, covering your ears with your hands to block out his voice as he urges you to believe him, that he's real, he's a ghost, he's been here for forty years, babe, please, stop!

You don't stop. You start running. Out the door, into the parking lot, off school grounds. You run until you get home, where you lock yourself in—parents still in Dubai for one of your dad's conferences, the house empty and cold.

Sliding to the ground, back against the door, you tuck your knees to your chest and cry.

Alone. Again. Always.

‗•‗

Wally's heartbroken after you leave. Never had he ever thought you'd become that important to him until you made it abundantly clear you want nothing to do with him. Because you think he's a figment of your imagination. Some trauma response.

He tries twice to convince you he's real, but it doesn't work. You shrink further into yourself, pale and placid, not even challenging the remarks made behind your back like you'd started doing again.

Unfortunately, shit hits the fan and Wally can't make time, plowing through scars, saving Maddie from herself, encouraging her to run back into her body.

All throughout, he longs for you. Wishes he'd been upfront from the beginning. He'd just wanted to be selfish for a while. To keep you. His own little secret, beautiful and bold, his to indulge in and cherish and...love.

Fuck.

Now, he stands in front of a door, a thick, bright light burning on the other side of it as he holds his key. He stares at the door, feels the warmth beckoning him. There's nothing left for him here. He's done his time, languished within the school for too many years.

Wally takes a step forward.

‗•‗

Without Wally's presence to ground you, you start to unravel. Piece by piece, whittled away to nothing but anger and fear. Right now it's predominantly fear, in large extent due to the empty halls and lack of teachers. There's a commotion outside that drew everyone with any authority out there.

It's well past the last bell, and Travis was leaving the locker rooms when you were headed to the theater to grab a notebook you forgot on one of the seats during Drama. Apparently, despite being fucked in the head, you've been a lot more appealing lately.

"You got a great smile when you aren't being a bitch," Travis leers, crowding you against a wall.

He's big. Huge. Built like a brick shithouse even at seventeen. He's got more muscle on him than you could ever hope for, and the strength of the linebacker he is behind him.

"Get away from me," You demand through clenched teeth, hands shoving uselessly at his chest. He doesn't budge an inch.

"Nah, don't think so, freak." He smirks, massive hand around your throat. Not too tight, just enough to hold you there with the promise of pain if you try to struggle.

That's when you start screaming.

‗•‗

Wally's head shoots up, and he drops the football, takes several long strides toward the exit door. The sound gets louder, clearer, as he nears. It's coming from behind the door. And it's familiar. He knows that scream, heard it weeks ago. The night he rescued you from the fallout shelter.

Without a second thought, Wally kicks the exit door open and barrels through, tripping when gravity hits him for the first time in decades. He gulps in a gasp of air, the taste sharp and bleachy, filling his lungs. Chest expanding, bones and blood and flesh heavy in a way he doesn't remember his living body being.

"Help!" You scream again, the tail-end of the word muffled by the hand of who Wally recognizes as one of your antagonizers.

Travis has you on the floor, his knees on either side of your waist as he grapples to control your arms. Wally fights against gravity, skids forward and then, Stop! Stop it! he charges. Tackles Travis' weight off of you and to the ground.

His knuckles burn as he punches Travis' face in, his lungs burn as he sucks in more air than is probably necessary, his body no longer familiar with the function but quickly getting with the program.

Wally falls back when he's sure Travis isn't getting up. Alive. The guy's alive. Just wrecked and bloodied, groaning as he rolls onto his side and clutches his jaw.

"I've wanted to do that for so long," Wally pants, wiping the sweat from his upper lip.

"W-Wally?"

Your voice is so small, so uncertain, and it gets Wally's attention immediately. He's with you in a flash, hands on your face, holy fuck, he can touch you, and you're so warm, so solid, skin so soft, he doesn't know what sensation to focus on first.

"Y-you're real." You murmur, as shocked as Wally is. "You're..." You lift your hand and place it over his, the touch smarting the cuts he opened on Travis' nose.

"I was always real, baby." He says, chest still rising and falling rapidly, God, he can't take his hands off you.

It happens in the blink of an eye. He can't tell who moves first, who initiates, only that it's pure fucking bliss when he feels your lips against his for the first time. Soft and pillowy and yielding. You taste like Sprite and those chewy watermelons you like to snack on during study sessions.

Wally moans into the kiss, can't help himself, pulls you into him as much as he can just to revel in the feeling of your body against his. Your real, living body against his.

A groan behind you and him reminds Wally that Travis is still there, will likely be found soon, and whoever does the finding will have questions Wally can't answer right now. Possibly not ever.

"Come on, baby, we've gotta go," He says, intending to hide you somewhere else in the school so you and he can talk.

You apparently have other ideas, because you drag him behind you all the way to the bus stop. He tries to tell you, tries to get you to stop before—

"I can't leave school property!" He shouts.

You slow, letting go of his hand to walk a few steps backwards, eyebrow lifting as you stare at his feet.

"But...you are off school property."

When Wally looks down, his jaw drops. He scrambles in a half-circle to measure the distance between himself and the curb. Thoughts flood his brain: He has to tell Rhonda, to tell Charley and Yuri and Quinn. He has to find his friends and tell them about his...what? His aliveness? Is he alive?

"Come on," You urge, grabbing him by the hand again and hauling him away from the school. "We can't be here right now."

You're right, he knows that, but, holy shit! He's off school property. He's breathing oxygen. His heart is pumping, his muscles ache from the exertion of beating Travis to a pulp, his tongue feels too big for his mouth, and his eyes sting from lack of blinking.

Whatever Wally is, he's not a ghost anymore.

‗•‗

You take him back to your place. You don't exactly know where else to stash a forty-year-old ghost, which Wally insists he is and is basically proof of that himself. You looked him up after the reunion. When you weren't so overwhelmed, that is.

Number 57, Walter Clark, beloved son and friend. If he is a fake, the likeness is uncanny.

As soon as you and he are through the door, he surges, lifts you into his arms, laughing, unable to believe the changes he's already taken stock of. He twirls you around, holds you like something precious, and gazes at you with sweet, soulful eyes.

"I can touch you," He murmurs, as if that's the most important development. "I can actually feel you. God, baby, I can't stop smiling. And it hurts!" The last part makes you giggle because he says it with so much joy, it tickles the giddiness right out of you.

You sober, soften like butter in his arms as he holds you. "You can...touch me some more, if you want..."

There it is, the bravest thing you've ever done. Hanging in the air between you and Wally as he viscerally registers your offer.

When he finally gets it, his smile turns into a smirk. A cocky thing that makes your belly warm.

"Yeah?" He glances around, sees the couch, then looks back at you.

Wally carries you to the couch like you weigh nothing, easy, muscles bunching and releasing as he sits down and settles you in his lap. His hands roam under your shirt, his hot touch like a brand wherever he holds you, and, slowly, giving you time to reconsider, he leans in and captures your lips in a gentle, sweet kiss.

‗•‗

Wally doesn't have the capacity to process anything outside of this moment, outside of you, right now. He should probably take a minute to figure out what happened to him when he fell through the exit door, should strategize a game plan for his friends to follow, should do a lot of things, but he can't find it in him to stop.

Your weight in his lap is so much more intense now that he can feel it in a real, human body. Your little whimpers and soft mewls as his hands wander under your shirt—fuck, the feeling of your skin beneath his fingers, it's like a dream he never thought would come true.

He undresses you slowly, worshipping every piece of skin revealed with his mouth and hands. Little nips and flicks of tongue, tasting your skin, hearing your sounds, absorbing your warmth as you squirm against him.

"You like how I touch you, baby?" He asks, gazing up at you through his lashes as he gently, so gently, trails his fingertips down your side and to your ass where he grabs. "I wanna make you feel good." He grinds his hips up, cock harder than he's ever felt it, groaning when the friction sends shockwaves of pleasure through him. "You feel that, baby? You feel what you do to me?"

"Wally," You gasp, your head tipping back and eyes closing, savoring the sensation.

You help him out of his jacket, his shirt; grip his chain to draw him into another hot, hungry kiss that leaves him reeling and desperate for more. His fingers dig into your flesh as he bucks against you, can feel the heat of your pussy through his sweatpants and shorts.

Gone in seconds because he can't wait anymore. Has waited enough time to feel anything again, but this, with you, no. God help him, he doesn't have that kind of patience or resolve. He's not strong enough. Not with how you tremble in his arms when he smears two fingers through your folds, dips them in to tease you as he watches the expression of euphoria that twists your features into the most beautiful image he's ever seen.

"You're so wet for me, baby," He purrs, nipping that sensitive spot right below your ear. Fuck, you start to ride his fingers, greedy little thing, the slick squelch of your pussy fucking his index and middle finger echoing in his ears and fogging his brain.

"Wally, please," You beg so pretty, and that's it. Control gone.

He lines himself up and guides you down, Jesus, you take him so perfectly. Stuffed full, tight as a vise, gripping him inside you as he leads you up and down, up and down, getting him as deep as he can be inside you.

"That's it, baby, just like that. So good for me," He pants, feet planted, hips meeting yours, his hands tight on your ass as you move on him. A fucking goddess crafted by heaven just for him. "Fuck," He chokes, "Fuck, yeah," and bites your lower lip, soothes the sting with his tongue before delving it into your mouth.

It feels too quick, but he can't avoid it. It's been so long since anything felt like this. You're not any better, quivering under his hands, thighs spasming when he starts to fuck into you faster, harder, making you bounce on his cock to take what you need.

When you come, he cries out, eyes clenched shut, mouth open, stars exploding. His climax ripped from deep within his core. His cock pulses as he spills inside you, arms fastened around your body to pin you to his chest, kissing you with everything he has.

"God, baby, I love you," Maybe it's too soon to say it (definitely), but who the fuck cares? Give a no-longer-dead-guy a break. He doesn't know how long his earthliness will last. He can't afford to take chances.

And he hiccups an awed breath when you say, "I love you, too, Wally Clark."

You gaze at him in the afterglow, so soft and pliant and perfect he could burst. You and he stay on the couch for a while, basking in each other's presence, in the realness of it. Eventually, taking his hand, you lead him to your room, where he writes poems with his tongue in your pussy, where you spread yourself open and invite him in again and again and again until sunrise.

You give him the weekend.

He knows he has a responsibility to visit Maddie in the hospital and make sure she's where she should be. Must inform Rhonda and Charley and Yuri and Quinn and Janet (can he still see them?!) that he's somehow regained a pulse.

But that can wait until tomorrow.

It's Sunday night, and Wally has every intention of proving to you that you're not alone anymore. That you have him as long as you want to keep him. And that he'll stay, even if you don't.

"Not gonna happen, Wally, you're stuck with me," You tell him in no uncertain terms, snuggled into his chest.

Wally smiles so wide, his cheeks ache for days after.

🐦‍🔥___________fin.____________

also on AO3!

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if you liked this, you may also enjoy Best Friends Club.

smut. you've been Wally's best friend since elementary school. and he's had a thing for you the entire time. it would've stayed a secret if, after a shitty date with someone who wasn't him, things changed.

[imhereforthelesbianstuff]

I know we already talked about this a lot (like, a lot) but I just have a little more to say about the jail scene. Mostly because of all the "Vi didn't care about Jinx" and all the "in the middle of a war, they're having sex"

Sort way to say it, using Vi's words: just shut the fuck up.

Using my own words, first of all, Vi didn't know what's Jinx gonna do. As far as she knew, Jinx could have been run away without her, being plotting a new attack against Piltover, or reunited with Sevika. All Vi knew was that she went to rescue her little sister, and that sister punched her (in the same spot Cait did, seriusly, people should stop hitting her there), and left her alone in a cell.

She went behind the back of the woman she loves just to save Jinx of being executed or imprisioned for life. And after that (in her own eyes) betrayal to Cait, Jinx left without her.

And then, Caitlyn is there, and Vi thought she's gonna hate her, for choosing Jinx again, even when Jinx didn't want to be chosen. Vi thought she'd lost, not only her sister, also Caitlyn after all. Just look at her.

But no. Cait is there to say, that she knew, she knew Vi would do this, and that's ok. It's just how Vi is. After all, the Vi who freed Jinx, is the same Vi who became an enforcer for Caitlyn. Vi just can't let the people she loves suffer, if she can do something about it. Cait needed that support and Jinx needed to be free. Both time ended with Vi being punched and let behind. But this time, Caitlyn is there to ease that guilt and pain. She knew Vi was gonna do this, and she helped, because she loves and accept Vi, even when she doesn't understand her.

And no, you can't tell that's was just a Cait's plan to fuck Vi. She did that because she loves her, and didn't expect nothing in return. Just look at her face when she's telling Vi she knew, and a few seconds later, when she stops to tell Vi about her rebound (not so predictable after all, right Cait?), totally different expresions.

And of course Vi kissed her, for the fisrt time in her life, somebody is there just for her, somebody came to support her, not in the other way. So it was pure instinct, visceral, raw feeling. Vi fucking loves her, and Cait just did something no one did for her before. Be there, understand her. How could she not kiss her? Not let herself go in the feeling?

And yes, there's a war, they may die, why wait? They been longing this for so long, and now, both need to feel eacht other, to touch eacht other, to love and hold eacht other. Again, raw emotion.

Maybe she chooses wrong everytime, but this time, she didn't lost everyone. Cait is there, for, and with her.

And I also read some people saying Cait is looking at Vi like a womanizer, Am I the only one seeing just tender in her eyes? Love? Like "this is the woman I love and I would never change her again for nothing" She's looking at Vi with such love.

Sorry for rambling, I don't really have anyone to talk to about Arcane 😬

[bumblesimagines]

War Between Kin

Request: Yes or No

Summary: When Rhaenyra Targaryen takes her throne back, she ensures to take care of the remaining Greens in the Keep. Jacaerys attempts to figure out the whereabouts of the Usurper King Aegon by questioning his younger sister.

Pronouns: She/Her/Hers, F!Reader

CW/TW: Typical GoT/HOTD warnings, AU where what happened in the Gullet does not occur, for plot purposes Jace and Baela are not engaged, potential spoilers for S3/events in the books, mentions of Targcest, brief mention of arranged marriage, bastardphobia,

I'm about to fill up the fucking tag because of this man. Super short but here you go for my fem readers!

~~~

"Where is Aegon Targaryen?"

"I've already told you, I do not know."

Jace had long grown tired of repeating himself, and he knew for certain his aunt had grown tired of the questioning the first time he asked. A rough near twenty minutes had passed since he'd first entered the bedchambers she'd been confined to when his mother returned to her rightful home, and he'd learned nothing new about the whereabouts of his missing uncle nor who could have had a hand in smuggling the usurper out of King's Landing.

Truthfully, Jace's patience always had a tendency to run out. He certainly felt it reaching the end of its line as he bounced his knee and laced his fingers over his stomach, eyes tracking his aunt as she paced the room back and forth clad in that godsforsaken shade of green Dowager Queen Alicent often wore. His legs ached just watching her continuously move, although he suspected if she stopped and sat across from him as he'd asked her to numerous times, she'd likely strike at him until someone tore her off him.

"He is your eldest brother, is he not?" Jace spoke through near-gritted teeth, the bouncing of his leg intensifying with each passing second.

The longer they went without locating Aegon Targaryen, the longer his mother went without rest. He remained a threat to them all, even in his battered and ruined state. Half his body burnt, they'd said, and hardly able to walk by himself without help. Jace hardly understood why anyone would desire someone in his state on the throne.

"I am not my brother's keeper." (Y/N) seethed lowly, voice laced with irritation and legs continuing to move back and forth across the room. Her hands tightly clutched the skirt of her dress, keeping it barely lifted to avoid tripping over it.

Despite the rather eyesore of a color reminding Jace of her traitorous family, he'd be a fool to deny it wasn't a beautiful dress that suited her well. She looked regal, if not incredibly furious with him and the rest of his family. It'd been expected after all the fighting and bloodshed between their families even before the war began.

"Do not lie to me, Aunt." Jace scoffed, bracing his arms against the table before him. "All my life, you've always been the watcher amongst your siblings. I doubt not a single thing happened in this castle, in this city, without you learning of it. You must tell me where your brother has fled before Daemon's patience with your stubbornness runs thin. He will not be as kind as I have been."

(Y/N) scowled at him and finally ceased her mindless pacing, her back turning to him and hands raising to her face. In all the years Jace had known the beautiful woman before him, he'd only ever seen her lose her icy demeanor once when Aemond's eye was taken and she'd bitten the skin around her nails until they were raw. He disliked it. He much preferred her snarky attitude over her anxious habits unbefitting of a lady such as her.

"What of Helaena?" She questioned abruptly, her dress swishing when she spun around to face him and her eyes squinting with an unspoken accusation. "You have kept your dogs at bay, have you not? She is not of sound mind." 

"Helaena is the most innocent out of the lot of you! Her Grace would never bring harm upon Helaena, of all possible people." Utterly absurd! Jace hardly believed his ears, hardly found it within himself not to snap at her and remind her it'd been her brother who'd killed Luke mercilessly. Still, (Y/N) released a dry laugh, her shoes smacking against the ground as she stormed up to the table.

"Do pray tell, Nephew," She spat the word venomously, as if it were full of filth. "What were Rhaenyra's intentions when she hired those animals who forced Helaena to choose between her sons? What were Rhaenyra's intentions when those animals killed my nephew before his siblings, mother, and grandmother? Helaena has lost her mind. She relives that night every waking moment. A son for a son, they claimed, justice on behalf of Rhaenyra the Cruel."

Jace shot up from his seat, nearly knocking the chair back from sheer force, and slammed his palms against the table with his lips pulled back into a snarl. "Her Grace did not order the death of any of Helaena's sons!" 

"Oh, even better, she cannot keep a leash on her own people, then?" (Y/N) laughed again, dry and bitter. "Let us pray Aemond and Daeron arrive quickly with their army, shall we? At least then we will be spared the reign of a queen who cannot control her own allies. It's pathetic, Jacaerys, utterly pathetic. Even if the Realm allows a queen to sit the throne, they will never accept a bastard."

"Mind your tongue, Princess, before I-" 

"Before you what?" (Y/N) rounded the table swiftly, gliding along the floor until she reached his side. He managed to turn sideways to face before their chests pressed together, their faces mere inches apart and noses threatening to brush against each other. Jace stiffened, his hands rolling into tightly clenched fists and eyes struggling to remain focused on the lilac of her irises. "Before you cut my tongue out as your grandfather once threatened? Do it, then. Cut my tongue out, here and now, and show your subjects you will not be a king of words alone."

Jace remained silent, his nostrils flaring with his deep inhale and jaw clenching. A challenge, a rather blatant one from his aunt of all people. His cheeks warmed against his will, the embarrassment trickling in because he'd never dare to lay a threatening finger on a lady, much less a beloved princess of the Realm. Jace stared into her eyes and swallowed, his mind searching for words he could shoot back at her. 

"A bastard and a coward, then? You will be the end of our dynasty with your tainted blood." She hissed lowly, her breath fanning against his face. "The Gullet did not make you a warrior, did it? Not when you had to be dragged out of the waters full of arrows by another bastard."

"You-" 

The sound of a sword unsheathing filled his ears and made his blood bubble with dread, unable to do anything else when she stepped back and pressed the tip of his sword against his throat. Jace's head instinctively tilted up, his heart beginning to drum against his ribcage when his adams apple dragged along the sharp blade threatening to cut his skin. Her lips curled up cruelly and she shook her head slowly, her earrings swaying with her movements.

"The Realm will never a bastard such as yourself to sit the Iron Throne. It'd be an insult to each of the Great Houses. I could end this pathetic display of a boy pretending to be man right here... but your inheritance would fall on the shoulders of young Joffery, and Gods know what Daemon would do to that boy with the line of succession so close to reaching his own sons. I would rather witness Daemon stew in his desperate desire to see his own blood on the throne than offer him up a child on a platter. Unlike your mother, I am not that cruel."

"Daemon knows his place." Nobody would ever believe those words, not even Jace himself. "He is King Consort. He's achieved what he's always desired."

"Has he?" (Y/N) slowly retracted the sword from his throat and tossed it onto the table with a clatter. "Or is he merely lying in wait as he's done time and time again? When he was refused the throne, he waited for the opportunity to arise to bring humiliation on your mother. When he was exiled, he waited for Ser Laenor to be no more so he could take the heir for himself. You are not his son, Jacaerys. You are an obstacle, and Daemon obviously despises obstacles. It will only be a matter of time before he realizes if something were to occur to your mother, he would rule as regent, and as regent, he'd do whatever he desired."

(Y/N) turned away from him once more, her skirt dragging along the stone floor as she walked toward her open window and stopped by it, staring out into the long expense of ocean. Jace took his sword and slid it into his sheath again, internally scolding himself for having grown distracted before he approached his aunt, his steps slow and cautious. 

"Rhaenyra should have never been named heir." (Y/N) murmured, and Jace's eyes fell down to her hands, watching her scrape her nails along the skin of her fingers. Her eyes danced, never focusing on one thing for longer than a second as her mind continued working with thoughts and ideas Jace surprisingly longed to hear. 

"And yet, she is the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms... and by late morrow she expects you to bend the knee publicly before the court." 

"Or what? She shall behead me as she did my grandsire? I hear the executions have become a daily occurrence. Rhaenyra the Cruel's bloody reign, they shall call it. You will see in due time that we would have all been better for it if she had accepted the terms for peace. Your brother may have yet lived, and you would not have nearly met the Stranger in the Gullet." 

"We are still at war, Princess, and we'd be fools to keep traitors in our midst," Jace spoke, but he could not stop the tremor in his voice. It'd been satisfying at first when they spilled the blood of Otto Hightower and his son, as well as the Small Council members who'd so openly opposed his mother. But then, blood continued to be spilled, and neither Rhaenyra nor Daemon would stop to hear of it. "It is... for the good of the Realm." 

(Y/N) shook her head but otherwise remained silent, the fury she'd contained in her body dissolving. She continued watching the distant waves in the water, her nails only digging harder and harder into her skin until they threatened to break through to her flesh and blood. Unable to help himself, Jace clasped his hand over hers to stop the constant scratching, his lips pressing together and a quiet sigh escaping him.

"I am here to question you about Aegon Targaryen's whereabouts... but I suppose I should also inform you that your mother has made a proposal in an attempt to stop the bloodshed and put an end to the war. She's offered up a betrothal between you and I so that both sides may come together in marriage. Her Grace agreed to some of the terms that came with the proposal, among them a promise to not bring harm upon Helaena, Jaehaera, or Ser Daeron if he bends the knee. She will have the heads of Aegon and Aemond regardless." 

His aunt stared at him for a good long while, her body eventually tilting to face him fully. Her arms dropped down to her sides, forcing Jace to drop his hand as well. She wet her lips and turned her gaze away, the news finally beginning to settle into her body. She opened her mouth, looking back at him: "I would rather fling myself from this window than marry a bastard and further tie myself to a hopeless cause." 

[evilminji]

Had another Si-Oc thought >.>

My standard "you know what Would Be Cool?" Musings...

Getting reborn, as you do, ending up Force Sensitive, as can only be the case. Because really... how ELSE would you soul end up there? CHANCE? Force ghosts are a PROVEN thing! We KNOW that the Force sometimes just... deals in souls.

Ffs, it MADE A BABY.

Yes, there was Sith interference there. But that doesn't chance the fact that it went? "Eh, good enough. I'll take the chance and run with it. Thanks~☆ Mine Now~~☆ Bye~~~☆" And Chosen One'd that baby. Because ultimately? Before the plans of gods and men? The Force Laughs.

So like? Yeah. If there WAS to be a Reincarnator?

Probably the Force.

Congrats on the new, third (or second, depends on your species. Might be another number entirely, honestly. But we are averaging here so MOVE ON), Parent! They are very, very happy to see you! Love you as only a Primordial, Extradimensional, Timeless, Formless, All Pervasive, Orange-Blue Morality havin', Not-A-God Super-God CAN. Their Benevolence? Could be called another God's cruelty.

They don't MEAN too. They are just.... really, really Big. Infinite. Not organic or mortal. It's like trying to comprehend the limitations of an ant, living on a planet, circling a sun, in a GALAXY the size of a DUST MOTE. The fact that the Force can even come CLOSE? Is literally miraculous.

But of course... OC? Not the Chosen One. The favorite, special, "I have Important Things For You" child. Which.... turns out to actually? Be kinda great. The realize that quickly. Which of course, is followed by the logical follow up.

Anikin? Fuckin SCREWED. Because he IS the Favorite Child.

Oh... oh No. Oh Fuck, that is a CHILD.

How easy it is, to cast blame, to judge, when you can't FEEL the Force in your EVERYTHING. All the time. Every moment of every day. Beautiful but cacophonous, like a symphony of screaming. Like staring at the sun and never going blind. It still hurts. But it's so... so bright. So Beautiful.

Connection. To the universe itself. Soul deep and transcendent. You can feel that the universe loves you. That there is good in people. That Life itself is worth protecting. But at the same time? It is... it is so much.

Because you can FEEL the ugly too.

The greed. The hate. The suffering. Lights snuffed out, in dark places of despair. Selfish actions and deep cruelties, like barbed wire against the soul. Thorns that hook and drag. And... and you're supposed to use your words. Just... just ASK them to stop? And, What? Hope that they WILL?

It HURTS!

But pain only begets more pain. Cruelty, more cruelties still. And only the Sith, believe they can use FORCE, in any sense of the word, to change a persons nature. The Jedi build. Grow. They work together, with those who are willing, towards something better. Defend, those who can not protect themselves.

Balance and growth. Not fire and chains.

And Oc is pretty sure Anikin will agree. No one should ever be in chains. Dead maybe. Or in jail. But never, ever, in chains. (And no one ever said they were pacifists. Just not war mongers. Sometimes the only answer IS to kill your opponent. To respect their choice, but honor your commitments. Protect those you swore to protect.)

Of course... OC? Going through Jedi training. It's Pre-Anikin days. Both she and Obi-Wan are fuckin Smol. She's not even in his Creche clan. She's over here in the "wanders off, lost in their own thoughts" Chill AF Creche Clan. Not Mr. "May you Live In Interesting Times And Have Padawans JUST LIKE YOOOOOOOU" and Co., over in the... "Energetic" Creche Clan.

None of HER Creche-mates BIT people, Obi-Wan.

WE keep our fuckin teeth to ourselves, Kenobi!

So, obviously, THEY don't have a lifetime ban on the "look, don't touch" fragile plants meditation garden. Very Rich in the Force. Good for focusing. Peaceful, really. And Oc? Has the time and space? To Consider™ things. Experiment. Ponder Fandom theories. Long "lost" Cannon techniques. Maybe have one-sided chats with the Force.

.....finally get CURIOUS™.

And wonder... if? Since, you know, through the Force, she can encourage and discourage plants to grow? And somewhat control animals. Why not... micro-organisms? Say, Midi-chlorians? Force healing is all ready a thing! So the Force all ready CAN interact with the body. Effect it. Change it. What is this, but more?

Really, all she'd have to do is find them, within herself, right? They're already a part of her! Yet... not. Do they consider themselves a part of her? Or is it symbiosis? Yeah, everyone says it can't be done. Perhaps shouldn't be done. But, frankly? They said the same about a LOT of Force techniques over the years. Big leaps in progress scare the SHIT out of folks. Cause if you miss? A LOT of people can die gorey.

So she sits. Mediates. Looks. Smaller... and smaller.... and smaller....

Until she finds whispers. Humming. Chatter.

As though each and every blood cell in her body had a teeny, tiny, whispery little voice. All chattering together, talking and arguing and discussing. One great hive of progress and industry. Complaining about a lack of potassium... huh. She goes and gets some fruit. Eats it. Then settles back into meditation.

They are JOYOUS! Potassium! Yaaaaay! ᐠ( ᐛ )ᐟᐠ( ᐛ )ᐟᐠ( ᐛ )ᐟᐠ( ᐛ )ᐟᐠ( ᐛ )ᐟ

Well... what'd ya know... huh. Hello there? She tries. Only to get a whispery and very alarmed ( ˶°ㅁ°) !! BODY CAN TALKヽ(°〇°)ﾉ ‽‽‽ Y-Yeah... she can. (How are they doing that?) The conversation? Only gets more surreal from there. Filled with... a surprising number of kaomojis.

But! She DOES figure out? How to increase her Midi-chlorians count. (By asking. Supplying needed resources for the expansion.) And WITH it? He awareness blooms.

The headache is... awful. The little guys(genderless) are WAY to enthusiastic. Working way too fast. If she didn't check the next morning? They might have continued to increase, indefinitely, until her veins were SOLID midi-chlorian. They just want to HELP, you see. And if you want More? Then surely FAR TOO MUCH is better, right?

(She may have fucked up. Oh god. Ow. Fuck. OW.)

Eventually she figure it out. Only gives her healer in training Creche mate a... few near heart attacks. He'll TOTALLY forgive her! (He will not. What the FUCK OC. Experimental medical procedures?! On YOURSELF!? You're not even HEALER TRACK!!!)

So NOW? She can reliably do it to OTHERS.

Need a bit more Midi-chlorians? Nearly Jedi quality but juuuuust under that cut off? She can fix that. Come. Be a jedi. Everyone should be a jedi. In FACT~! Whoops! Oh hey. Looks like all these Midi-chlorian counters are fuckin broken! (They look perfect fi-)(Broken! :] Do Not question me) So when you find that Orohan Child in desperate need of love and care? Just bring um on back!

They're TOTALLY Force sensitive. You can just tell. It's the vibes. Look at their lil face. Vibes, man. Just hand um here. For... reasons. You go get the paperwork. A working tester. And~? Oh would you look at THAT! Perfectly within acceptance range! Neat. Called it again, didn't you, Master Koon? You really do have an eye for these things. Anyway~ off to get this little one settled~~☆ *adoring cooing noises at the baby*

Weird, huh, how there suddenly just... SO MANY random orphan babies that are force sensitive? How 'bout that >.> strangest thing.

Of course, it's a god damned open secret. Everyone KNOWS. How could they not? But? Like with most things? If they don't Officially Know™? They don't have to stop it. And it DOES help both the Force AND those kids. Can be reversed if they don't like it, later. (They asked. All hypothetical of course.) So OC is basically Temple bound, so she can receive any new kiddos. To... you know... Check Their Health, on the way to ACTUAL healers.

But she's ALSO waiting. And as her skill increases? She can FEEL midi-chlorians, easier and easier. Until it gets to the point? Where if she's bored and zoning out? Not even ture meditation anymore? She accidentally tunes into Midi-chlorian Live~☆ the talk show. (What's the latest gossip from bodies nearest to her? Oh? Your second spleen is acting funny? Better remember to tell him to get that chec-)

Palpatine can't hide SHIT. It's literally in his blood.

And MAD at him.

This is NOT what they're FOR. He's taking TERRIBLE care of his body! Fuck you! Fuck you, fuck you, FUCK YOOOOOOU! You want power? Choke on it, you-!!!!!

Holy shit. So THATS what Sith Midi-chlorians feel like. Oh my god. They... they are SO MAD. Like tiny wasps. That have been violently shaken in a jar. She's never used the word "seething" in reference to someone before... but like...? If they COULD stab him? Man would be a thick paste at this point.

She's not sure what facial expression she makes. But it sure is obvious. As is the blatant, horrified staring. And refusal to get near him. HE doesn't notice, being to busy with the powerful. But the Jedi sure as fuck do. Because THEY sent her? Out with a Shadow. You know... just in case.

Cause she literally can not be replaced.

She not High Ranked... she's just priceless. Equal sort of significance, but in a very quiet, Soft Power sort of way. She is, after all, single handedly? Reversing centuries of slow population decline. Her entire Line promises to be the next Yoda's line. Priceless and with far reaching significance. So obviously, they're making sure that shit stays locked down.

No one is to so much as BREATHE about this.

Not until her great-great-GREAT Grand Padawan has passed their Knight Trials so HELP US. We LEARN from our mistakes! Need we bring out the records? Times we got cocky? Sith and political fuckery!? No. Oc stays INVISIBLE. There is no war in Ba Sing Se! Move along!

So like? Why is Miss Midi-chlorian Sensor and Future of the Jedi... making that face? She's literally NEVER made that face. What sort of monster do you have to BE? Huh? Shadow asks, casual as fuck, like he's not a plotting plotter who's planing terrible things, what's up?

She tells him. Palpatine has RANCID vibes. His midi-chlorians fucking DISPISE him. She's literally never seen that before. In anyone. Didn't even know that was an option. They would gleefully kill him if they could.

.....senator Palpatine is Force Sensitive?

Yes.

.......Interesting™(Ominous Intent)

Says local Shadow, who is perhaps putting together some dots. May not be getting the correct picture. But is getting the Vibe. And boy howdy, he does NOT like the vibe. Has got himself some questions. Cause Mr "uwu I'm harmless" lil mask? Only holds up? If you're willing to believe him.

Shadows don't buy that shit. Shadows? Need receipts. Full character statements and an audit on the fucking hospital you were BORN AT. Every credit you picked up off the side walk, why, and where you spent it.

Give them your Secrets. Or they'll keep digging until they find them.

uwu Their ASS. Gonna tear this bitch APART.

......huh. So THIS is why you guys keep accidentally getting married to Mandalorians on missions. (We agreed not to mention that.) (Fucker, I agreed to nothing. Shouldn't have eaten my special Me Day pudding if you didn't want me to gossip.) Man, her friends are... a trip. Uh... have fun? Happy hunting? I guess? *feral Jedi noises*

She? Continues to wait. Palpatine? Begins to have a VERY bad time. (Ha! Get fucked!)

Unfortunately, it's not fast enough to stop his dumbass plans. He just gets desperate. Figures more power is the answer. Because of course he does. So here comes the "oh nooooo~ my planets under attack~ better manipulate a child and make me president of the galaxy!" Plan. Fucker. Bastard.

She can't stop that.

But what she CAN do? Is be there. Waiting. For HIM.

Her little brother. Her son. Her center of the universe. The most important man to ever live... and also? A scared little boy. Far, far from home. The only other person who understands just how BIG the Force is. How much it weighs. How even as it crushs you... you can't bear to put it down. Not even for a moment. Because it loves you. And it hurts, that it does.

And... oh. Oh.

He is so very small.

Dirty, tired, in lovingly mended clothes that are barely beyond scrap. With bright, bright eyes like hope and starlight. He sings inside. Like freedom. Like hope. Daring to ask "why CAN'T you be kinder?", "why CAN'T we be free?". A storm of change. Bright and beautiful.

A child. Great and small, all at once.

Oc can't help but smile. Because, oh. Oh how long, she has waited to meet him, Anikin Skywalker. Welcome. Are you hungry? Cold? Let's get cleaned up. See the healers first. The council can wait.

Chips are removed and food is shared. Warm clothes, soft and new. And she can not help but smile, smile, smile. Even as her face begins to hurt. For years she has gathered. Planned. Studied and trained. As though some part of her knew. As though all for this moment. Taking one of those small hands in hers. Looking right in his eyes.

"It's going to be okay."

Because it IS. Because regardless of what they decide? OC will be with him. Regardless, she's going to go and make sure his mother is free. Not bought, not sold. Free. She has friends who can help. Will learn how to remove the chip herself if she must.

And? He IS going to be a Jedi. Even if he never become a Coruscant Jedi. Even if he decides he doesn't agree with how they do things or they decide the disagree with how HE does things. The Jedi have changed before, they will change again. Living things are meant to grow. Meant to change. And people can be both wrong and right at the same time. It's messy.

But what's important? Is Anikin is not alone anymore. And Oc is gonna help teach him. And someday? HE'S gonna break chains. So many chains. Gonna help people heal. If he wants to. (He does) But for right now? A quick talk with some old people. Maybe a nap. And we either get settled or arrange a trip back to Tatooine. To pick up your mom. In the meantime! You can figure out what classes she might wanna take. Where seems like a good place to settle. *chatting as they walk off, hand in hand*

Just? Sometimes a Padawan-ship is you, your Teacher, your OTHER Teacher, and her body guards that teach you Cool Knife Tricks and how to gamble, behind Obi-Wan's back! :D

@legitimatesatanspawn @mayfay @leftnotright @babbling-babull @hdgnj @spidori @the-witchhunter @lolottes

[burningcheese-merchant]

Merchant! Please, rant to us about the mythological inspirations of the BurningCheese!

The fact that I came home and sat down and wrote out a detailed post for this ask... The fact that I did research into Hindu mythology for BurningCheese inspo in the first place... (sidenote: Hinduism is legitimately interesting, I had genuine fun learning about it even outside of cringe shipping bs)

THE FACT THAT THERE'S ACTUAL SHIT TO WORK WITH...

Buckle up, buckaroos lol (I'll put it under a cut in case it turns out really long)

Do note that I am not a religious scholar nor a follower of Hinduism, and I didn't do a suuuuuuuper deep dive. I spent a few hours reading different articles/sources and looking at some paintings and the like. Whatever I say is what I derived from my own personal understanding (and my old notes), which may well be flawed!

Let's start with the obvious.

Burning Spice is directly inspired by Shiva, Hindu god of destruction. Important note: in the actual religion, Shiva is not malevolent; the destruction he brings is considered a necessary part of life and the foundation of cosmic balance. He can be temperamental and violent, yes, but he is by and large a pretty decent guy and performs his duty in the cycle of life and death without complaint (obviously, this is where Spice deviates lol)

His hair is a fucking pitch black jungle. Matted af. Just like Burning Spice's. I just felt like saying that lmao (they both look like shit, Shiva wears animal skins and dead people's ashes and doesn't brush his damn hair. HE WENT TO HIS OWN WEDDING LOOKING LIKE THAT! (Until Parvati told him to please freshen up and he went "yes dear, anything for you <3" and manifested fancy groom attire))

Now let's poke our heads into the rabbit hole.

Parvati is Shiva's wife, whom he adores and is wholly devoted to (and vice versa).

She is revered as a life-giver. A goddess of creation, love, devotion, and... ABUNDANCE.

Parvati has many forms. Her original form is that of a beautiful woman wearing a red sari, with a GOLDEN HEADDRESS/HEADBAND and LOTS OF GOLD JEWELRY AND PRECIOUS STONES, WHICH SHE LOVES.

She's very beloved by pretty much everyone. She's elegant, vivacious, and revered as a doting wife and mother

I'm not finished.

One of Parvati's forms is that of a fierce warrior woman called Durga. She is powerful, confident, and no less beautiful than her original self

She has many arms, and a sacred weapon in each one. One of which is a GOLDEN SPEAR.

Durga is regarded as a goddess of protection, war and destruction - but not the malevolent sort. She fights and destroys the forces of evil, for the sake of others'; the destruction she brings is in the name of protecting and liberating innocents, and empowering creation

One of her epithets is Mahamoha, which means "great delusion" - and in this context, the delusion/ignorance derives from intense desire and attachment

Now, with all of that said, I'm gonna tell you guys a story.

Shiva's first wife was Sati, daughter of Daksha. Though they were madly in love, Daksha despised him and never approved of their relationship

The blood between them was so bad that Daksha declined to invite either of them to the yajna (VERY important ritual sacrifice) he was hosting. Against both social norms and Shiva's advice, Sati showed up anyway, which led to her father cruelly insulting her, her marriage and basically her whole fucking life in front of everybody

In protest of everyone's derision of her and the life she chose to live, she throws herself on the sacrificial fire and thus kills herself (extreme and unnecessary, I know lol). Shiva finds out and LOSES. HIS. SHIT. Shows up, goes on a rampage, hurts a bunch of people, beheads Daksha (whom he revives and pardons eventually)

In his grief, Shiva basically decides to retire from everything and seclude himself in the mountains, denouncing the world and everything in it and refusing to interact with anyone or anything

Sati ends up reincarnating as Parvati. She remembers exactly who she is/was, and made it her mission to return to Shiva's side and rekindle their relationship

Shiva doesn't buy that that's his beloved and rebuffs her. She doesn't give up. She tries over and over again to convince him and win his affection. She endures harsh weather without appropriate clothes, starvation, the faces of her own fears and doubts, endlessly; all while continuously performing acts of religious penance/piety. So unwavering is she in her strength and devotion that Shiva eventually, finally realizes that that really is the woman he loved and lost

They reunite and remarry quickly (and it was a big blowout event, too! Very important, there are even several sculptures depicting it!) and they live happily ever after

And a short summary of their union:

Shiva and Parvati are considered complementary forces; one without the other does not make sense and simply cannot be. Parvati is the warm, life-affirming, creative force that balances Shiva's cold, world-denying, destructive one. She's portrayed as having lured Shiva away from his lonely, ascetic lifestyle and showed him the value of life, love and marriage. They're almost always depicted together in artworks, as they're admired/adored not only for their loving partnership, but for the way they uphold cosmic order together. They are life and death. Attachment and detachment. ABUNDANCE AND DESTRUCTION.

It's commonly stated that Parvati is the outright source of Shiva's power. His shakti (not super sure how to explain what this is, it's not very simple. It's... ultimate cosmic energy, basically). She encourages and energizes him. Without her, he is incomplete

They have two kids :P two sons, Ganesha and Kartikeya. (I DID NOT KNOW THIS when I first made up the fankids, I just happened to guess the correct number of kids to give them lol. I thus decided to partially base Pepper Jack on Ganesha and Matar Paneer on Kartikeya, enjoy those links where I explain properly haha (and you can look through their tags to see more abt them if you want))

They also jointly represent harmony between sexes. Shiva is the male aspect, Parvati is the female

They also jointly symbolize love, devotion and sexuality and are said to have a lot of sex (and are also often depicted having sex)

Let me walk you guys through it all one more time. A god who, in his endless rage and grief, chose to forsake the world and all within it, for he believed he had nothing left to value from it...

Who is temperamental, violent, and is not above lashing out at others when he feels wronged... who can and will destroy everything in his path... (You don't need screenshot evidence of this but whatever lol)

Who will lash out at others if they dare to lay their hands on his counterpart, or otherwise keep him away from her...

... And his counterpart, a beautiful, vibrant, benevolent goddess who can take many different forms, including that of an elegant queen adorned with gold and gems, and a great, fearless warrior... (You notice how there's some red in her Soul Jam now? There's that bit of Destruction, used to defend others...)

Who's known and loved for the boundless love and warmth and charity she bestows upon one and all...

Who's known as a creator, a life-giver; who so cherishes the world and what she makes that she allows herself to descend into madness in pursuit of preserving it all... Whose desire and attachment led to ignorance and delusion...

Who, in stubborn defiance of the cruelties she faced, chose to remove herself from them and from the world itself for a time, only to eventually return with her identity and life's purpose still intact, and livelier than ever...

Who takes the form of a hero, a protector of the innocent, a warrior who battles against evil and seeks to vanquish oppression and tyranny...

And together, she and he make up the foundation of the world. The threads with which the great tapestry of the universe is woven. Life and death. Attachment and love for the world, and detachment from and contempt for it. A woman dressed in the finest garments and jewelry, and a man who embodies the unforgiving wilderness in which he sequesters himself.

Abundance and Destruction.

In conclusion: Burning Spice and Golden Cheese are literally Shiva and Parvati, they are husband and wife, they NEED each other and are meant to be together, together they create and maintain the balance of life and the universe, we must all band together and demand that Devsisters release the cutscene that shows their wedding, they are the bride and the ugly ass groom fr fr

[artsninspo]

010 | Richmond Inc.

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⇚ 009

♠ summary: Lorence is confronted with the realities of her current predicament, unchartered territory with her Boss. Her past and present collide while Terry is away on business. But, when he returns - old habits die hard. ❤️‍🩹 🌶️

♠ pairing: Terry Richmond (Aaron Pierre - Rebel Ridge) X Lorence Cole (Black Fem OC)

♠ warnings: NSFW, mature themes

♠ word-count: ~5K

⌖ - Multiple Locations

I walk alongside Joel with a smile as he holds Beau’s leash. The past week and a half he’s kept my dog to keep up with Beau’s physical needs, and allow me rest and recovery. My good boy Beau is having the time of his life with Joel’s kids, but now he won’t stop looking back at me. His usual brisk pace is moderate - it’s like he knows I’m hurt and his exuberance is why we’re a part.

“The wife keeps asking when you’re gonna let him sire a litter” Joel asks as we walk to the dog park.

“You know I’ll want to keep every single one of those puppies or make sure they’re close by and I don’t have six people who want a larger dog” I tell him.

“No working lines?” Joel asks to be funny.

“No, none of Beau's babies will be doing any scary shit” I tell him and he laughs.

“You’re not limping as much,” he says.

“I’m feeling better” I tell him honestly.

“And your wrist?” He asks.

“Seems a bit slower to heal” I admit holding up the brace. “Have you heard anything?” I ask and his expression told me he has.

“Rich’s furious” he sighs, talking about the Boss but since that night on the beach I haven’t seen anger from him.

“Really?” I ask.

“Yeah, it’s his own personal project. Everyone’s talking about how he didn’t even wait to get war ready. He just went in there without protection and a handgun after you.” Joel says with eyes trained on me. He’s capable of sensing deception, and I’m no master at it so I swallow hard to give myself time to choose my words wisely.

“It wasn’t the smartest thing to do” I admit. Joel nods and I don’t realize I’m anxious until Beau puts his muzzle against my hand. I smile looking down and pet his head.

“I’m glad he did, sorry I wasn’t there” Joel says again.

“You’re taking care of Beau and I’m glad you were safe. You followed protocol” I remind.

“Emerson said he saw you and Richmond leave the Monaco accommodation together the night before.” Joel trails openly fishing for information..

“After three years of being a tyrant and an asshole he showed me he can be nice. It was surprising, we walked my routes together. He was trying to help me calm down.” I tell Joel and he nods. There’s no happiness in his expression. I swallow bracing for a lecture and he sighs.

“I know you and I know Terry…” He starts.

“Joel-”

“Let me finish” he says in a tone he doesn’t use often. I stop to look at him. “I know you’re type and Richmond isn’t that.” Joel sighs, letting Beau off his leash in the empty dog park. I watch my dog bound away freely. “Are you listening to me?” He asks.

“Yes, you said Richmond isn’t my type” I repeat beginning to shut down.

“He’s not a fling abroad, or a ‘call me whenever you’re in town’ kind of guy. I’m not judging you Lorence.” Joel says knowing me well.

“Sounds like you are,” I mutter.

“I’m not Lorence, I get it. I do. I’m a man. I get wanting freedom. I get that you’re independent and I respect it. But if you think for one minute whatever’s going between the two of you is something you can put away when you’re done I’m letting you know it isn’t that. I had a feeling Terry liked you but fuck did I underestimate how much. The man was willing to take on fire. He’s not the free spirited type you're comfortable with” Joel says stressed.

“Terry and I aren’t sleeping together” I tell him and he puts his head into his hands, sighing. “What?” I ask.

“That’s even worse” he exclaims.

“How?!” I respond.

“We all put ourselves in danger daily. If you meet a soldier who can keep it in his pants, the man is in love. If the display in Monaco isn’t enough - there it is. You need to be straight with him, Lorence. Tell him what you want and what you’re used to. Because Richmond’s not the kind of man I can say I can confidently protect you from” Joel says having had to play the role of crazy ‘older brother’ for me once or twice.

“He wouldn’t hurt me” I say before I can process it. It’s something I know deep down. Joel looks at me like I’m hopeless. It’s new territory for us and somehow this conversation has aged him. My happy go lucky friend is now a concerned father figure. “I’ll talk to him” I concede wanting nothing less than to air out my attachment issues to Terry. Beau comes back from his patrol of the area and Joel tosses his ball for him. I watch beau bound after the ball and retrieve it with a proud prance completely unaware of life's challenges.

“Lorence I’m not trying to beat up on you, okay?” Joel says and I sigh.

“I know, you're a good friend.” I sigh.

“I think you and Terry would be good together if that’s what you wanted. But I also know it takes you longer to settle and trust people.” Joel says knowing the number of men I’ve kept at arm's length, how many girlfriend requests I've declined over the years. I prefer to keep my romantic life as far away as possible from my personal life.

“I don’t even know how to cook well, Terry’s all distinguished company and social commitments. He’s probably like you and wants kids for his family name and I don’t” I start on all the reasons we wouldn’t work long term aloud.

“Stop it Lorence. You learned how to be an agent, you can learn how to cook but you have enough money to hire a live-in chef or order in every day. I’m not telling you to cut it out or end it. I’m telling you to think. You can’t do things the way you normally do. Rich’s your boss and you’re the best at what you do. Figure things out and move forward accordingly. Dont fuck up your work life for some excitement you’ll want to run from in a week. Maybe have Richmond go off on a tirade or two on you so you can figure out what’s going on between you without whispers. Just clean it up” Joel advises reading me for filth and giving me options. I smile appreciating that he doesn't coddle me.

“Okay”  I concede. “Have you ever seen Richmond with women?” I ask, wondering if there was an ex wife or someone else.

“Not seriously, not without a reason” he says.

I raise a brow, “what’s that mean?”

“Why don’t you ask him?” Joel says and I give him an exasperated huff.

“So he’s never asked about me?” I ask.

“Oh he did, but he asks about everyone so I thought nothing of it.” Joel says.

“What’d he ask?”

“If you were single, then if I thought pairing you with some of our colleagues would lead to intimate affairs,” he says. I smile at Terrance’s futile fishing expeditions.

“If you were me, what would you do?” I ask Joel.

“I can’t put myself in the shoes of a woman” he says and I push him playfully with my good hand..

“You know what I mean”

“I know you’re happy and your life is full already but I would like to see you with someone. Someone who loves you and takes care of you. Someone that's always there and you can't avoid. I don't know if that's Terrance Richmond but if it is you deserve it all. Just know that he’s not your usual free spirited guy that’s gonna sit around when you don't call back. He’s a grown man and your boss” Joel says and I sigh with a lot more than I bargained for on my plate. Joel pulls me into a caring hug and I know I’m lucky to have him even if it’s not what I want to hear. He’s right. He’s never steered me wrong before and he’s partly to thank for where I am now in life. So I heed his advice.

…

I’ve been sitting in it all day. From the moment I got home to right now, after midnight I’ve been ruminating on my discussion with Joel. I wish he was wrong about me or Terry but I know deep down he isn’t. Terrance Richmond is a grown ass man with his shit together and isn't chasing his peak. By all means he’s already settled and successful. That’s the kind of resume that would usually keep me away. I’m the girl who likes a summer fling or a vacation romance every now and then. I need the predetermined start and end dates to keep me grounded and sane. That way there’s not too much room for distraction - that way I never end up like my mom. I sigh, wishing Beau was here as I sit alone in my house. Typically it’s my safe space but right now it feels haunted with visions of what was and what could be. Terrance grilling with my father, getting along with my mother - us kissing. 

I close my eyes wishing it wasn’t almost two in the morning and I could call Sin. I make my way to the kitchen for some melatonin when my phone rings. I frown seeing Terrance is calling. 

“Hey” I respond.

“Hey, what are you doing up?” he asks and I frown.

“Can’t sleep” I confess and I hear a car door close.

“What’s wrong, are your injuries keeping you up?” he asks.

“No,” I sigh. “How was your flight?” I ask, hearing a knock at my door. I pull up the security feed.

“It’s me” he says just as I confirm it. It’s like my brain shuts off in a second and I’m heading to let him in. He’s been gone for the past three days. I know now it was to do reconnaissance for what happened in Monaco but we haven’t talked about Monaco since the safehouse. He hugs me gently before putting a kiss on my head.

“Thought I’d drive past your place on my way home” he says, it would be weird if it were anyone else.

“How was your trip?” I ask.

“Could've been better, how are you feeling? If the meds are keeping you awake maybe have them adjusted” he says but I stopped needing my meds two days ago. 

“It’s not the medication - I don’t want to be here alone tonight and I realized it after Sin went to bed” I tell Terry.

“I can drop you off there if that's what you want?” he asks.

“Not it's okay” I sigh looking up at him. Finding peace in his light eyes is the very last thing I thought would ever be possible. I feel my nerves settle and he smirks leaning in to give me a quick kiss. 

“If you want me to stay I can or you can come over to my place” he offers. 

“Let me pack a bag” I smiled, letting go of him. I head up to my room and throw everything I’ll need in an overnight bag. I realize I've been advised against lifting and call him. He emerges moments later looking around at my bedroom. I realize the decor isn’t everyone’s cup of tea but I’m still finding my signature style. 

“Are all these plants real?” he asks.

“Yeah” I nod, getting my slippers and putting them in my bag. When I look at him he’s looking at the plants with a smile again.

“What?” I ask.

“Nothing,” he yawns.

“You don’t like it, do you?” I ask, thinking of my father who still doesn't understand why I have so much ‘dirt’ in my room. 

“I didn’t say that” he says coming over to my vanity as I pack my makeup bag. He dips his head sniffing my neck before placing a kiss on the same spot. 

“Which one is that?” he asks, looking at the perfume bottles in front of me. I hand him the bottle.

“Sin and I did a perfume workshop in Paris. I made this” I say.

“Is Sin your best friend?” he asks.

“Yup, my mom was the babysitter while aunt Kaye was out, so we’re very close” I explain.

“Pack a swimsuit,” he says.

“Why?” I ask heading over to my drawers to find one.

“I have a pool and water therapy is good for recovery,” he says. Of course he has a pool.

“Of course you have a pool, how else would you come up with sick and twisted water endurance tests for us” I tease getting my swimsuit and putting it in the bag. 

“Swimming is perfect low impact active recovery, that’s why I have a pool” he says as I zip my bag. He takes it with ease adding me to his load and descending the stairs. I lock up and I head to his car with him. I schedule send a text to Sin that I’m with Terrance so someone knows by location. My conversation gnaws at my consciousness as I get in with him.

“If you're having flashbacks from Monaco you can tell me, PTSD is better treated sooner than later” he says resting a hand on my thigh. 

“I’m not” I tell him truthfully.

“Lorence, I know what you look like at peace and I know how you look stressed,” he says. 

“The car is in darkness” I state matter of factly.

“Not dark enough” he responds.

“So the pretty cat eyes come with night vision?” I ask turning to his shadowy shadowy silhouette.

“I pay attention,” he says at the stoplight. Red hues are cast into the car and I make out worry in his expression.

“I’m just having a bad day,” I confess.

“Anything I can do?” He asks and it makes my heart swell. I lean on his shoulder.

“This is good” I admit and he gives my leg a squeeze. We drive for another twenty minutes in silence. I watch closely and find us in the most expensive residential part of town. I sit upright looking at the gorgeous homes as we enter the gated community. It’s not full of cookie-cutter houses; but architectural feats that are unique in their own way. We turn off the main road into a driveway lined with trees. We drive for another minute before arriving on a lit driveway and a castle-like house. I look at Terrance and wonder how much he actually makes. It makes my home look like a toy. He opens the garage and we drive in. He gets out with my bag and I follow suit. When we enter his home I step back and look around at his manor. It’s not that I didn't expect him to live in a nice place but I definitely didn't expect this. The room is white with black and grey accents all over. There are high ceilings and top of the line furnishings. Not a single thing is out of place and it’s classic but elevated like the man himself.

“Come on, let's take the elevator” he says. Of course he has an elevator. I follow him to a hidden elevator door that seamlessly integrates into the wall.

“DId you buy or build this?” I ask as we step in.

“I built it” he responds, pressing a console that takes us up. But the door in front of us doesn't open. One does to the side of us. He steps out first and by the scent of his cologne I know we’re in his closet. We enter the main part of his bedroom and his bed is bigger than any I've even seen before. “Let me get a shower, then if you're hungry we can get something to eat or drink.” he says leaving me to my own devices.

I’ve never been so out of step, actually Terrance Richmond keeps me in a state of frenzy. If he was a gentleman, he’d have offered me my own room. But we’re past that now aren't we? Joel's warning comes back to me as I change into pj’s instead of the silk negligee I packed. I sit on the ottoman at the foot of the bed and take it all in. I take off my wrist brace and massage the area as I take stock of his home. Why would he want me when he has all this and my own mother didn't want me? There it is, the thought that’s ruined every single one of my relationships. The pain that’s never really gone and keeps me in safe comfortable solitude. I wipe the silent tears and stand going to his full length mirror to wipe them away. I put on a brave face and sit back on the bed. Terry comes out minutes later smelling heavenly and with black silk pants.

“Your eyes are red,” he says.

“The tiredness hit me” I lie and he nods, pulling back the sheets for me to climb in. I do, facing away from him and he turns off the light. A moment passes before he reaches out and pulls me back against the heat of his bare chest, wrapping his arms around me. It takes a few minutes before our breaths sync and our chests rise and fall in tandem. It’s the most non sexually intimate exchange I've ever had with a man I don't consider family. I place my hand over his and he pulls me even closer.

“Feeling disoriented after a traumatic experience like what you went through in Monaco is normal. You don't have to be strong around me if you feel down” he says. “I know you’re crying - you don't have to tell me why. Just know I’m here” he says before kissing my cheek. He has the patience of a saint putting up with me like this when we should be keeping things light and fun.

“I’m sorry for ruining-”

“Lorence being real with me won't ruin anything” he says.

“Yes it will” I tell him.

“You’ve had a stressful few weeks. From Switzerland to now. In part because of me. You're having a bad day and telling me why won't ruin anything” he says in his usual cadence like he’s commanding time and there's no rush.

“Can we talk about it later? Or never?” I propose and he scoffs letting me go. It’s happening faster than I could have even imagined. He sits on the edge of the bed. It takes me a moment to swallow my fears and try to fix it.

“Tell me a joke, make me laugh” I say to break up the silence and distance but it stretches on. The rejection starts to sting until he clears his throat.

“What do me and elephants have in common?’ he asks, turning to me. It’s a trap, a well laid trap and I can't help but smile.

“You're tall and strong?” I propose not playing into it.

“What else?” he asks with humour in his voice. I shake my head not wanting to give him a complex about his ears anymore than I already have. 

“I don't know” I lie.

“We both never forget” he says, subverting my expectations and I laugh relieved to have not said the wrong thing. “And we have big ears,” he adds. I sit beside him and he taps on the sconces above his bed giving us dim light.

“What do you call a cow with no legs?” I ask.

“No clue” he shrugs.

“Ground beef” I respond and he shakes his head. “Your’s was worse” I snicker.

“It still made you smile,” he shrugs. 

“I hope you know I didn't mean anything by it. I just felt cornered and was popping off at the mouth” I apologize. 

“I know you weren't being malicious. I’ve heard much worse from people I pushed less. It’s pretty wholesome stuff for an agent” he says. 

“Here I was feeling bad” I shrug and he takes my chin kissing me softly.

“I’m not someone you have to handle with kid gloves Lorena.” The look he gives me is both scathing and sympathetic. My shoulders fall and I start to feel bad for my emotions today. Here I have this man that’s asking to be there for me and ran into a life threatening situation to rescue me, and I’m allowing the actions of others who never showed me that same concern decades ago ruin things.

“I’m so-”

“Let’s start tonight over” Terry says, cutting my apology off. I can’t help but smile.

“Okay” I nod and he lifts me off the bed and sits me across his lap.

“I missed you” he says, smothering me in quick kisses.

“I missed you too” I take his chin, bringing his lips to mine.

“When you miss me, call me, as long as I’m not in the middle of something I’ll answer”  he says.

“Okay”

“Got you something” he says and I sit up.

“Really?” I ask and he nods.

“It’s in the car let me go get it” he says standing and setting me down gently.

“Okay” I agree and he leaves. I look at my bag before going into it and grabbing the negligee. The bathroom lights flick on as I enter. It’s as impressive as what I've seen of the rest of the house. I rid myself of the pajama pants set and put on the night dress. I look myself over before walking back into the bedroom. I sit on the couch in the sitting area instead of the bed and he emerges with two bags. He looks up after setting them down. It takes a moment for him to locate me. His eyes focus on the change and he comes over holding a frame and something wrapped.

“The dress is nice,” he comments, drinking me in with his eyes.

“I don't sleep in pants usually - unless it's winter” I tell him as he takes the seat next to me.

“Good to know,” he says, placing the wrapped square on my lap. He turns on another lamp and I tear the brown wrapping paper. A night scene is in front of me and I smile the moment I recognize it. The beach at night, in Monaco where we sat together. I run my hand over the coarse texture of the sand.

“The artist used sand from the beach,” he says, confirming that’s where he spent the last few days.

“It’s gorgeous” I smile and he does too.

“You like it?” He asks and I nod. Getting this made for me only confirms I was on his mind while he was away.

“I do, thank you” I smile giving him a hug. He kisses my cheek before pulling out the frame housing the caricature art of us. In the chaos of my stuff being cleared out I thought for sure that art piece was left behind.

“I can't believe you had this framed” I laugh looking at it.

“The person at the studio said a frame was the best way to preserve it” he says and I kiss him.

“Now I’ve got to find somewhere to put this. I know where I’m gonna put the canvas” I tell him. “Thank you for thinking of me” I tell him and he seems to take a back.

“Lorena, I haven't stopped thinking about you since you walked into my office wearing that striped blue shirt and grey slacks.” he says stopping time. I turn to him and try to go back to that day. My heart races as I come up short on the memory. “Your hair was straight, parted in the middle and you smelled like flowers” he says. I swallow hard, blinking fast to keep the emotions at bay. My favorite perfume then was Miss Dior. Guilt swells as my appreciation grows and my emotions are a seesaw. “What?” he asks.

“I was doubting the logistics of us today. Not because I don't want to see where things go but … Terrance this is new for me. Not just that you're my boss and the CEO of the company I work for - I have to figure out to toe the line there. But even this; the sharing space … I probably don't make any sense. You already know I avoid uncomfortable situations and I like to run but I know I can't run from you … not that I want to but today it’s felt like my head wa in a pressure cooker” I confess struggling to articulate my complicated feelings and fears. Terry looks at me. His usual expression is replaced by an empathetic one. He reaches for me and places a kiss on my forehead instead of responding with words.

“What do you think?” I ask with a racing heart.

“I’m sorry you had a bad day” he says holding me instead of taking issue with my honest emotions. He’s so different from who I thought I knew him to be.

“You're not upset?” I ask.

“No” he says without needing to consider it. I take a moment before pulling back to look him over. He's resolute in his answer, his hand slides down over my dress resting on my hip. “You’re here now - in my arms, in my home, telling me how you felt, smelling good and looking better. What do I have to be upset about?” he asks, surprising me. “I’m not a CEO in this dynamic,” he says, placing a kiss on my shoulder. 

“Your dominance is not something you can turn off” I tell him and he smiles. “I’m not asking you to either but it's there” I tell him and he takes a moment smiling again. 

“What?” I ask.

“It’s not productive” he says, keeping whatever it is to himself. 

“Tell me”

“There are better ways to clear your head,” he advises. After our walk on the beach, I sit forward ready to hear his advice.

“I’m listening?’ I say and he comes in for a kiss, when he pulls away he gets up  and then somehow ends up on his knees in front of me. His eyes tell me where his mind is. I take a breath more familiar with this territory. He kisses each of my inner thighs.

“You have the CEO on his knees” he says, still dominating me in a submissive position. My heart races as passion pools in me. He waits for permission and I nod giving him the green light. His hands slide up my legs and under my thong, grabbing the sides he pulls it off. He scoots me forward gently on the side of my injury, he places kisses on my inner thighs sliding me onto my back comfortably before setting my legs over his shoulders so he’s locked in to my center and I’m locked in his hold. Terry caresses me, upping the tension and kindling sparks I didn't know existed. It leaves searing anticipation igniting all the parts of my body that drive sensory pleasure. He gives me a final look at the same time he takes my hand - our fingers interlock and his head dips out of sight and under the hiked up negligee. His beard tickles my center as he parts my other set of lips with his tongue.

The kiss builds to one of the ones my mouth is used to being treated with. My body’s reaction to him is something new as the tension builds. My hand caresses his waves in a gesture of encouragement and appreciation. There’s nothing to be said as my breaths grow increasingly more shallow. I go to cover my mouth but his fingers don’t release their grip on mine, not allowing the contact to break.

“Be as loud as you want baby” he says, giving me the green light. I swallow my moan and he blows on my clit sending a wave of pleasure through me. My moan is inevitable and when he starts sucking on it I'm finished. I squirm but he has me locked firmly in position giving me more and more. 

“Stay still for me baby” he says, sounding so patient. I moan trying to oblige him but it's so much and so good.

“Let me hear you Lorence” he says pausing, before I can obey he adds one of his long fingers into me sucking and fucking me. Taunting me. My nipples are harder than ever. The nerve endings in my core are stimulated to the point of delirium. 

“It feels so good” I praise his efforts.

“You’re perfect” he whispers finger fucking me as I come. His eyes are on me as I try to handle the sensations from the orgasmic relief. My body is several degrees hotter and I know he can see my nipples fighting to be seen and tended to under the silk dress. He keeps his eyes on me, letting one of my legs down and allowing me to watch him lap up my pleasure with the same attention to detail as he has for everything else. He's a perfectionist and that was nothing less. I sit up needing to kiss him, I pull him up to meet me so we’re face to face. Terry obliges the heat of his bare chest radiating into me, melting the apprehension away. I wrap my legs around his and feel his manhood poking me in my sternum through his pants. I want more, I need him. His eyes tell me we’re just getting started when the kiss is broken.

“Did you like that Lorence?” he smiles, licking what's left of my orgasm from his lips. His eyes spark as my expression changes. We’re so far gone from like, it’s time to practice making love.

authors note: sound off in the comments and let me know how you felt about getting to know Lorence's softer side and insecurities and how Terry's handling everything on his plate. Also, yes theres more 🌶️ 🌶️ 🌶️ in the next chapter - had to break it up because it was getting too long.

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