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shanastoryteller · 24 hours ago

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Happy love day Shana! Could I ask you for either WWX and Jiang Yanli run away or for the AU where John never goes missing and Sam stays at Stanford and he and Jess get married and then Jess calls Dean and John when Sam goes missing (from this post: https://www.tumblr.com/shanastoryteller/766664341635448832/au-where-john-doesnt-go-missing-dean-never-gets) ? It's too hard to pick between those, they're both so good!!

a continuation of 1

Dean's just getting off from a salt and burn when he gets a call from an unknown number and almost doesn’t answer it. He needs bed and a shower and not in that order, but you can never know in this profession, so he rubs a hand over his face and says, “Hey.”

There’s a girl and she’s crying and that’s already waking him up when she says, “Dean?”

“That’s me, sweetheart,” he says, not recognizing her voice. He’ll figure out how she got his number later. “You okay?”

She takes a steadying breath. “Sam’s in trouble and I need your help.”

His blood goes cold. Sam. His little brother who he hasn’t spoken to in five years.

She won’t get into specifics, only gives him an address in San Francisco and tells him to get there as fast as he can. He curses down the line and she just hangs up on him. He almost calls her back, but he figures the fastest way to get some answers is to get his ass over there like she told him too.

But first, he has to call Dad.

John not the most reliable form of backup, Dean’s been hunting mostly on his own for years, and at least half the time Dean says that he could use a hand, he gets brushed off, but Dad will come this time.

He’ll come for Sam.

The smoking hot blonde who answers the door is tall and steel eyed and has an engagement ring and wedding band on her left hand which Dean doesn’t think much about until she’s looking them head on and says, “Dean, John. I’m Jessica Winchester. We need to find Sam.”

Even Dad – grim and closed mouth with an edge of fury to him that Dean hasn’t seen since Flagstaff – goes blank, staring at her in shock. Dean doesn’t know what his own face is doing.

“Come on,” she says, nudging the door open further. “Anything could be happening to him right now.”

“Wait,” he says. “You’re-”

“Sam and I got married last year,” she says. “We don’t have time for this. Azazel has Sam.”

“Who’s Azazel?” he asks, following her inside. It’s a nice apartment, decent, full of shit like throw pillows and matching dishes and all the things Sam used to crave so badly. The kitchen table is piled with books and papers, thick tomes the likes of which he’s used to seeing at Bobby’s and nowhere else. How did she pull this all together so quickly? She only called him seven hours ago and most of that was the middle of the night.

Unless they already had it. But that doesn’t make sense. Sammy left them, left hunting, why would he –

Jessica rolls her eyes. They’re red, but it seems she’s moved on from the tears to militant determination, but Dean’s still reeling. “The yellow eyed demon.”

Dad goes completely still.

“The what?” he asks.

“The thing that killed your mom,” she says impatiently.

He’s barely processed that when Dad says, “You found it.”

“We found the other kids it targeted,” she says, eyes and voice going colder than when she’d just been speaking to him. “Sam started getting visions a couple years ago and we found a couple of the other psychic kids and then some more. A few months ago they started going missing and we haven’t found any of them. It’s always sulphur and anyone in the same room left for dead. It’s Azazel. He was taking them and now he’s taken Sam and I can’t do this on my own so I called you.” She glares at both of them. “Don’t make me regret it.”

Sam wakes up alone in an abandoned town with a splitting headache. Jess is nowhere that he can see, which is good, he thinks. His phone is dead and he’s thinking it’s some sort of ghost or something until he literally walks into Andy.

“Sam!” he says in relief, gripping onto his sleeve. “Oh man, am I happy to see you!”

Ansem, who Sam still thinks isn’t quite sane most days, snorts and crosses his arms. “Yeah, are you? Because if we’re here and Sam’s here that means we’ve probably been taken like all the others. That we haven’t been able to find and have never heard from again.”

Andy wilts. “Oh, right.”

“Come on,” Sam says. “How’s your–”

“Not as good as yours,” Andy says. Ansem frowns. “It’s not and you know it. We all have our specialties for a reason.”

That’s fine. They’re going to figure this out. Jess must have noticed him missing by now and she’ll be looking for him. He doesn’t think about how they’ve been looking for the others for months with no luck.

They hear a scream and they’re running towards it. There’s someone trapped in what looks like an old outhouse, pounding on the door so hard it rattles. Sam doesn’t even think about it, he makes a yanking motion with his hand so the door flies off the hinges and out tumbles Ava.

Who’s been missing for months.

She stumbles out, breathing in air greedily, but she’s already backing away from them, shaking her head, her hands held out. “Don’t make me – I’ll do it, I’ve done it before, but I won’t, not if you don’t make me – please don’t make me–”

“AVA!” he shouts, reaching out for her. She shoves him back, or tries to, but his telekinesis is a lot stronger than hers and there’s nothing she can do to stop him from striding forward and grabbing her shoulders.

She’s struggling against him, nails digging into his arms. “I’ll do it, don’t make me do it, I don’t want to, but I will, I will I will I will!”

He shakes her. “AVA! Stop, calm down. It’s Sam. You’re okay. It’s okay.”

She stops, finally raising her head enough to look at him. There’s something crazed and desperate about her that wasn’t there when he saw her last. She was scared like they were all scared, but she wasn’t like this. “They always say that in the beginning and then they make me do it.”

“Do what, Ava?” he asks, trying to keep his grip form being bruising now that she’s not fighting against him.

Her eyes fill with tears and she whispers, “Kill them.”

He hears Andy go, “Woah, holy shit,” behind him and then the sound of Ansem hitting him.

“No one is killing anyone,” he says firmly. “I’m not killing you and you’re not killing me. Okay?”

“I don’t like it,” she says intensely. “I don’t want to do it anymore.”

“Ava,” he says, ducking down so she has no choice but to look him in the eye. “You don’t have to, okay? If something, who is not one of us, needs killing, then I’ll do it.”

“I can help too,” Ansem says. Then, “Ow!” as Andy steps on his foot.

Her face softens into something that’s finally familiar and her lips twitch up. She leans around Sam and says, “Hi guys.”

“Hi Ava,” they say in unison.

Sam’s starting to get why Dad was always creeped out by him and Dean doing that. “What’s going on? Are you okay? We’ve been looking for you.”

“We thought you were dead,” Ansem says.

Andy adds, “But we’re really glad you’re not!”

Jesus.

Ava swallows. “They show up in groups. Some we knew, some we didn’t. Sometimes everyone gets along and agrees to work together. Sometimes the backstabbing starts quickly. Azazel is here and if people aren’t killing each other quickly enough, he whispers to them, manipulates them, turns us against each other.”

“Been there, done that,” Ansem says.

Ava doesn’t so much as twitch. “Until it’s just me and them and no one will listen to me, Sam, they keep not listening, until it’s me or them and I don’t want to do it, but I don’t want to die, I really don’t want to die. So I kill them and then it’s just me and then I wake up trapped again until someone gets me out.” Her voice drops. “No matter what I do, I can never get myself out.”

“It’s okay,” he says, even though he feels sick. Of all the possibilities they’d considered, this wasn’t one of them. “We’re going to stick together and figure this out. We’ll get out of here.” He pauses. “Where is here?”

“If you try and walk out, the demons stop you. Some die that way,” she says. “I don’t know. It’s been weeks and it’s already getting warmer, so I’d say somewhere in the middle of America? But everything here is old and no one's phones ever have any service.”

Okay, that’s all bad news, but, “Weeks? Ava, it’s May. You’ve been missing since February.”

She stares, yanking on the edge of her shirt anxiously. “What? No. That can’t – that can’t be right. The days sort blur, but it can’t be – that’s not possible. It hasn’t been that long.”

“When you’re the last one, you just wake up to it starting all over again, right?” Ansem asks. “People haven’t been disappearing all at once. Not the ones we know about, anyway.”

“What? You think Azazel is putting me in some sort of – that he’s just keeping me on ice or something in between,” she cuts herself off, fine tremors in her hands.

Sam hugs her, folding her against him and digging his chin into the top of her head, just like he hugged her the first time she had a panic attack in her kitchen. As if Azazel bleeding in all their mouths as babies wasn’t bad enough, he’s now put Ava through actual hell, turning her into something she never wanted to be and doing who knows what with her body in between. The comforting platitudes are starting to sound false, even though he means them, so he just holds her and lets her cry herself out.

Eventually she gently pushes away from him and rubs her sleeve over her eyes. “Sorry. I – sorry.”

“Don’t be,” he says gently. “You’re my friend. We’re going to get out of this together. I’m sorry I wasn’t there before, but I’m here now, okay?”

Her eyes are red and her face is swollen and this time when she smiles, he almost recognizes her. “Okay.”

“Uh,” Andy says nervously, stepping behind Sam and dragging Ansem with him. “We’ve got company.”

He turns and sees someone’s just turned a corner at the other end of the street with his back to them and he’s halfway to pushing Ava towards Andy when he gets close enough for Sam to recognize. His shoulders slump and he shouts, “JAKE! Hey!”

Jake pauses, turning towards them and a grin breaking out across his face as he jogs in their direction. “What the hell? I was in Afghanistan, man.”

“Have fun explaining this to your CO,” he says. If they make it out of here alive.

Jess doesn’t know if she’s done the right thing by calling Dean.

It wouldn’t be so bad if John wasn’t here, she doesn’t think, but she’d known better than wasting her breath trying to convince him not to call him. But Sam’s said over and over again that his father’s a good hunter, a good tracker, and they need that right now.

They’ve been losing people, one after another, and it felt like a noose tightening around their necks. And now Sam’s missing and what they’d been doing hadn’t been working so she’d done something else.

He’s still alive. He has to be.

Please let him still be alive. She can’t do this on her own.

“We have to leave for the airport in an hour to pick some people up,” she says. “Lily and Scott’s planes are landing about forty minutes apart.”

“Who’re are they?” John asks.

She swallows down something biting. “Lily can stop hearts and Scott electrocutes things. They’re friends and they’re going to help.”

John’s lips press together but he doesn’t say anything. Dean looks like he’s waiting for a punchline, but it’s no joke.

They’d kept everyone apart before, thinking it would just cause Azazel to take them all together, but that hadn’t done shit and now Sam is gone.

Neither Lily nor Scott had even hesitated. They’d been scared and desperate and confused when she and Sam had met them, like so many of the others, and Sam had been comforting and kind and told them that they weren’t alone, he’d been the one to help them figure out their powers and the one they called when they had nightmares and now he’s gone.

Jess doesn’t know what she’s going to do if they do find Azazel, but she knows she’ll feel a lot better about it with two powerful psychics on their side.

John is stone faced as he looks over their research, but he hadn’t been all that surprised, just like Sam had expected. Dean is still in shock and she’s not even sure which part is throwing him the most – Azazel, Sam being psychic, or that he has a sister-in-law that he’s never met.

They hadn’t had groomsmen or bridesmaids at their wedding. Even after four years of silence, Sam hadn’t felt right about anything else and Jess hadn’t pushed. It kept costs down, at any rate.

He’d been convinced that John and Dean would care more about Sam having Azazel’s blood than theirs. She doesn’t tell them that part, doesn’t tell them anything she doesn’t have to, but she wonders at it, that Sam could both be that convinced they’d hate him for something he couldn’t help and love them that deeply.

Based on the stories, she’d believed it more easily of John than Dean, but she doesn’t know either of them. Not really.

She just knows that she needs Sam and she needs help and as long as they find him, they can figure out the rest later.

#hi!! haha you know i'm still trapped in supernatural tomfoolery #supernatural #prompts are closed #prompt answers #flamingwell #asks

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khorneschosen · 2 days ago

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I think you lack the critical skills to actually understand what you've made my point for me.

Because you haven't read one so far and every point you have been dismissive of what I write.

But perhaps you should.

At least understand something about this because quite frankly I've thrown tired of it. You don't know what ideology you serve You don't know exactly what ideology you belong to my guy and it's one where wealth is produced by labor only. No intelligence is required for it.

That is your philosophy, You may not realize it right now but you are parroting every single belief they have and I am smart enough and I've studied 10 years to understand the fact that behind the idea is that your parroting without any knowledge of what's behind them.

You are espousing theories that only can be maintained by the philosophical theories I am pointing to.

Actually because there was a man with a similar name I was trying to name but again this is text to speech. I could have named any number of people.

Braum is we have an entire world of people who are capable of doing unskilled labor in those exact terms most of them lacking even the skill of speaking the native language. And yet they are able to perform their tasks excellently. I should know I did most of those jobs myself. I've worked on a ranch I've worked in a factory I've worked retail I've worked every kind of job that you would consider beneath you.

Want to hear something that's even harder to understand than the fact that differentiation between skilled and unskilled labor is that labor can beyond skilled They can have 10 plus years of experience and it still will amount to nothing because they do not have the virtue required to expand that skill even further.

You know Starbucks is closing locations You know that right because it lost its competitive edge It's laying off workers because it is no longer a successful company something you don't seem to understand because you've always viewed it as an absolute. It is laying off its workers and then hiring CEOs at a much higher price because they are bringing in what they view as skilled talent to unfuck their situation This is what they do This is what a lot of the CEOs do rather than owning stock in the company they will take a huge paycheck so that they can unfuck their management situation.

You would know this if you would be able to place most historical or even current events in their own proper context.

But you don't because you don't put it in these contexts because you put it in a Marxist framework rather than a capitalistic framework. Because it is not a lack of skilled versus unskilled labor it is the incredibly and high-end skilled labor that is now missing from our society. And the shit does roll downhill.

Starbucks lost all of its competitive edge because it understaffed workers, has a menu that is far too complicated and gets more complicated by the day, has lost most of the atmosphere within its own restaurants, and doesn't even make the best coffee anymore every competitive advantage it once had besides brand recognition is now gone. Because it lost it to the local coffee house. So yeah and the long view of them as a company they very much said we will not be able to sling coffee for very much longer unless we get some new talent in.

And again if you're not able to put things in their current context to understand what is going on with them and merely just rely on this Marxist framework which has been proven to be not only academically but in reality wrong every time, then new will not be saved by your ignorance. Like the ignorance of when I am pointing out that you are using a Marx's framework to turn around and go So anyway I don't like to use this term the skilled labor versus unskilled labor I like to go with undervalued labor and properly valued labor. Which is again using the Marxist labor theory of value. Like I wouldn't recognize it. Fucking absurd. If you can't understand economics can you do me a favor and least understand good philosophy.

I said take someone off the street and see if they can do it is a point about skilled and unskilled labor because what we describe as skilled and unskilled labor is the scale of that skill. But it doesn't matter because you've already made my argument for me so I'm not going to argue with you further.

Look at you trying to make it more argument like you understand right from wrong.

You call it wealth warden because you don't understand what wealth is doing. You are ignorant of economics and you're even ignorant about the people you're talking about.

Oh yeah no that he shouldn't have left anything for his children They should have to struggle and work hard to survive as well because you see that's what we consider charity that your parents work hard and they leave you with nothing.

Again place that work in its proper historical context and you'll see that yeah it wasn't much different for those who were doing other dangerous jobs at the time. Because I I'll put this in your terms materialistically these were the jobs available to them.

Darling I'll ask you a question, what is there to be admired about people to you. I have a great deal of answers I'm wondering if you can come up with one you'll actually practice

Answer: Roughly $400 per month.

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barblaz-arts · 2 days ago

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Hey, I was reading one of you're post and you said that you love Charlie as a protagonist. Can you elaborate why that is?

I've just always loved sweet-hearted protagonists. Steven Universe, Aang, Luz Noceda, you name it. It might be a cliche, but I'll always be a sucker for the optimistic protag who kills with kindness. They may not be realistic in some ways, because it's so much easier to remember all the shitty people out there, but truly kind people do exist and they are so strong for choosing to be kind and I love to see protagonists who have the strength to stay kind and extend that kindness to others despite all the shit the plot throws at them.

I already mentioned in that previous ask the reason why I like Charlie in particular a lot:

"... I think Emily is too sweet for Vaggie in a way that even Charlie isn't. Like, obviously Charlie's got a kind heart, but her demonic nature and her general hard-headedness and explosive temper are all things that separate her from Emily and other typical non-Exorcist angels that I can see is what really pulls Vaggie to her"

Ok so let me just elaborate on this a bit.

There's a lot of surface level reasons why I love Charlie. Her design is adorbs. Her archetype (ray of sunshine with a sad family background) is one of my favorites. Her VA is someone I've liked in a previous project(Mean Girls The Musical) and her performance as Charlie whether she's speaking or singing is just impressive and incredibly charming.

If we wanna dig deeper, I like her for the same reason I like characters like Enid Sinclair from Netflix's Wednesday; she's an amalgamation of contradictions that somehow works.

So just a quick disclaimer: I still don't think the writing for this show is "smart" nor do I think I will ever feel this way. But I do have to say that what I do like about this show is that characters were written with a lot of love, and despite the majority of the fans' claims that the creator and writers somehow dont give a shit about their main character(*cough*PROJECTION*cough) I think a lot of care and thought was put into Charlie as a character. Not a lot of WISE decisions necessarily, but the thought was there.

So if you were to ask people to describe Charlie with a few words, words that would probably come up are stuff like Happy or Energetic or Determined or Righteous or Gay or whatever. I would think those too. But other words I'd use to describe her are Stubborn and Temperamental and Prideful and REBELLIOUS, that last one being the most I think about when it comes to her.

It comes back to me seeing her as a walking contradiction. Charlie's always one thing that defies what you'd think she's supposed to be. She's a demon but she's kind. She's patient but she's irritable. She's a pushover but she's stubborn. She's no good in a fight but she has a lot of raw power. There's more to her than meets the eye and one of my favorite things about her that a lot of people may overlook is that despite the fact that she's a sweetheart is that she's rebellious and isn't afraid of standing up against authority.

Nurture-wise, being royalty very likely helped cultivate her hard-headed rebellious phase. She had a snarky emo phase for goodness sake. That spoiled rich girl definitely gave the king and queen of hell a hard time during puberty. Fortunately, she grew up to use that hard-headedness for a good cause. She's not afraid to stare down a goddamn Seraphim and tell her off on her hypocrisy because she's probably done the same to Lucifer when she was still prepubescent.

Nature-wise, the rebel in her comes from her parents, of course. Lucifer was a troublemaker who constantly tried to break away from Heaven's rigid system, while Lilith was a Strong Independent Woman who would rather leave Paradise than be objectified by the husband she didn't even choose. Freewill is a huge thing for Lucifer and Lilith, and because of this Charlie is also strong-willed, determined to do what she wants to do, even if it means getting ridiculed and disrespected for it.

Also. Don't you just love when the sweet character has another side to them that awakens when people they care about is hurt or when injustice happens? Righteous anger paired with a super power just never fails to be super cool. If you wanna know more about my thoughts regarding Charlie's temper, you can read it here

So yeah. I love Charlie a whole lot. She's cute, she's hot, she's kind, and she's cool. The whole shebang. There's a lot about her to dissect and I'm sad that people dont see that and constantly write her off as JUST the naive optimist because she's so much more than that.

#asks #tldr: i love her bcuz she's one of those sweet people that you'll later find out is an activis #who stares cops down during a protest

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breakindishesinaelevator · 22 hours ago

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Invincible & Blue Diamond!Reader

(yes these will be put in parts)

these bbls killin yall 🥀🥀

i never really watched steven universe so ive been doing super duper research and hope i got the idea of her character right

and this might just be platonic rather than romantic idk

if theres any romance in this it might be cecil and/or nolan

1.5k words tho i might be a beast (/j 🥀)

fic under the cut :P

“Mark, there’s some kind of giant that’s causing tsunamis, hurricanes, and some real fucked up storms up on the west coast. It’s also abducting people at random! I need you to go and settle this immediately! Before more lives are lost and more people go missing!”

Cecil’s voice cuts out from the comm in Mark’s ear. Mark sighed, he was enjoying his time chatting and having a nice barbecue with his friends. Rolling his shoulders and stretching out his limbs, Mark stands, preparing himself for what could be a possible fight.

“Well! See you guys later, I guess.”

Mark makes a move to walk away from the group before Eve speaks up.

“Another mission from Cecil? God, he can’t give you a break, can he? I mean, you just got back from those two bank robbers who do the same shit every week. What is it now?”

Putting her hand on her hip, Eve is very unhappy with how Cecil is overworking Mark. She stepped away from the team to do her things to help the world and stop being badgered around by the old fart. Why couldn’t Mark do the same? Sure, he needs to get his mind off of things after what happened with his dad, but he needs to know his limits…

“Some… giant on the west coast… Nothing big! Nothing I can’t handle. It’ll be quick! I’ll- I’ll be back for some more wings though!”

Mark’s expression goes from confident to a bit nervous. Yeah, he’s been in this hero business for about a year and a half, but giants were still a bit troublesome to him. Preparing to take off soaring into the sky, he stops after Rex speaks up.

“Hey, man! Why don’t we come and help!”

“Oh- no that’s not- you don’t have to…”

Rex gets up, a big stupid grin on his face. Placing his hands on his civilian clothes, he explodes them into his hero suit.

“If the giant is nothing big then we could come with and wrap things up quickly and have a long time needed beach vacation! We could beat that giant and tan in the sand afterward! And if Cecil needs the Guardians, then fuck him! He can have Samson and Immortal help him out!”

Monster Girl giggles, getting up along with Rudy. Rae smiles, standing up as well, and placing her hands on her hips.

“That’s not a bad idea. I’m so down for a beach day!”

“Then it’s settled! Robot! Fire up your little doohickey and let’s go take down a giant!”

The others exclaim in agreement and preparing for the trip over to California, Mark smiles warmly. He is so happy to have some hero friends like them. Even if they’ve had their arguments and scuffles from time to time (mostly from Rex), he’s still grateful to have allies and friends with them.

————————————————————————

Sighing, you look down at the tiny humans running rampant. Scanning everyone as much as you could, one caught your eye. Is that who you’re looking for? Reaching your hand out, you grab the human’s arm, dragging him up towards you.

The human screams out in pain as his shoulder dislocates from your handling. Dangling him in front of your hooded face, he looked close to who you were looking for. Mustache and seemingly young. It has to be him. It has to be Nolan. He’s probably the closest one you’ve found so far, along with the other 34 humans you’ve caught.

Humming, you move to put him in the bubble you have trailing behind you. A bubble that contains the aforementioned other 34 humans you’ve taken. The bubble wasn’t super uncomfortable for them— it contained little rock formations you found, along with fruits and fountains that could prove useful to them ever if they needed it.

Before you could place him in the bubble, you hear a whizzing sound, then boom! The human is gone!

“Wh-what?”

Flipping around, you search for him, before locking eyes on some pink figure floating a couple of yards in front of you. The same pink figure is holding your human.

You reach out to take him back from the random figure before the pink figure begins to fly towards the shore. Panicking a bit, you move through the ocean and follow her.

“Give him back!”

Now being closer to shore, you’re also closer to the flying pink thing. Reaching out once more, you flinch back as some sort of projectile hits your hand, blowing up on impact.

Whipping over to see what that was, you see a bunch of humans on, what looks to be a flying rubbish contraption, another projectile is thrown at you. The human throwing them laughing maniacally, obviously getting a kick out of hitting you with the explosives.

Grunting and getting annoyed very quickly, you watch the contraption fly around you. A robot on the contraption begins shooting beams at you, not like it was doing anything to you, just irritating you more. And as if those things weren’t annoying enough, some green ogre thing jumped off and gave you a mean left hook to the face before landing back on the contraption.

“Grrngh- enough!”

Swatting the contraption out of the air, the humans (and robot) rush off of it in order not to get injured. You reach out to grab them but then, the pink thing comes back, wrapping some kind of pink rope around you. Struggling to move, you get ready to break out of it before another flying being, this time a male, comes at you with a right hook. The force of it knocks you down completely. You gasp, knowing only one being who had that kind of strength.

Now down on the ground, bound by the pink bonds from the pink figure, you look up at what brought you down.

“Nolan?”

Gasping heavily, a blue aura comes from your body in waves, causing the ocean to stir and also causing the heroes in front of you to weep profusely. Tears coming down your face as well.

With Eve now feeling immense sadness, her powers begin to weaken. She looks to the others as they’re now groveling in the sand sobbing. Even Rex! She looks out to the coastline and sees the waves crashing into each other and coming to the shore in big waves. Gasping and looking back to Mark, she sees him staggering in the air, feeling the effects of the giant woman’s power as well. Not as much as them though, due to his Viltrumite genes.

Before the waves could sweep up her and the team and possibly drown them, she used the last of her strength to gather the team and fly them out of the giant’s range so they could recuperate.

“Mark! W-we’ll come back-! Urgh-!”

Mark nods to her in acknowledgment and understanding and Eve takes off with the team. Seeing that they’re gone, Mark flings himself at you, hoping that another few punches would make you stop inflicting this feeling on him and any possible person within a 30-mile radius.

Getting closer and closer to you, he reels his hand back mustering whatever strength he could into his fist. He is stopped though, your hands immediately clasping around him, bringing him closer to your face. Your hood coming down, Mark could see your face in full clarity and the giant tears that were treading from your eyes. You were… ethereal…

“Nolan! I finally have you back!”

Through your tears, you smile greatly, your aura intensifying and your waves getting bigger. Mark looks at you in confusion, his head tilting.

“What?”

Bringing him closer to your face, you nuzzle your cheek against him. Your ginormous tears almost drowning him, he sputters trying to find air. You pull him away from your face a little, fully taking in his appearance before gasping.

“You look worse than ever! In what universe could that possibly be fine?!”

Now bellowing loudly, you crunch over on your knees, sobbing.

“I’ve waited thousands of years for you to come back… Now look at you… Weak… Frail… How can you come back to Homeworld looking like this?”

Oh… The giant woman thinks Mark is his father. …Awkward. Mark squirms uncomfortably. You’re a bit calmer now though. Your saddening aura lessening substantially. The tears on Mark’s face slow down but yours still go. Mark’s vision beginning to clear up, and he finally got a good enough look at you. Long hair, long lashes, blue skin, curvy. Damn. He quickly tried to speak about the moment on hand. The unnatural disasters and the abducted people. But, the only thing on his mind right now is how you know his father and what your relations are with him.

“Uh- The- Where’s-? I’m not- Well- I don’t-“

You place a giant finger on his lips, shushing him.

“No, no. Don’t speak. You must save your voice and energy for the trial.”

“Trial? What trial?”

“Why, yours, of course.”

What. What’d his father do this time?!

#invincible #invincible x reader #platonic maybe #mark grayson #idk i tried to make it like the show where blue kept calling steve pink diamond but instead itd be you referring to mark as nolan #but then it felt weird so i was like fuck it this might js be platonic w mark #nolan grayson #omni man #cecil stedman

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cxffecoupx · 13 hours ago

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universe factory

you're live, but all your fans can talk about is 'universe factory'. what in the world is that??

[yourusername is going live right now.]

"hii~ hi you guys, I've missed you!"

"'i see the headphones; will you be gaming today?' yes yes, very keen observation. there's this new game that's launched recently, called 'good coffee, great coffee'. I'll be playing that today."

"for those who don't know, its a game where you basically just have to make coffees for the customers, but they can really be a pain in the butt so you also have to make sure you're doing everything correctly and such. it's really fun though, because it's got an interesting storyline with it where you get to meet other characters too. it's reaaally fun, you should try it out."

you take a moment to read a few of the comments, where fans ask about the game, upcoming works and your life in general.

"okay guys, going to finish a round. i'll read your comments after that."

the next 5 minutes is spent finishing the game, brows furrowed in concentration as you navigate through the level, curses occasionally coming out your lips when the customers give a bad rating, but you're quick to shut them out. after the round ends, you turn to your phone.

"hello again, i've finished day 75 in the game, and i'm fairly pissed at some of the customers who ordered a vanilla latte and then complained when i gave them a... vanilla latte."

you skim through a few more comments before deciding on one.

"'omg is this universe factory?' ...what is a universe factory? i've been seeing a few dozen comments about it, but i really don't know guys."

"'it looks so similar to universe factory aah i can't believe it' guys i genuinely don't know what you're talking about. what is a universe factory? why is everyone talking about it?"

as you watch more comments flood in, you notice most of them are now related to this thing, or whatever, that they're calling 'universe factory', and a look of confusion glazes your face. a while later, clarifications start coming in.

"'it's seventeen woozi's studio. the lights seem very similar to that' ohh well, clearly there's no reason for me to be there heh. these lights were actually a recent upgrade that i did to my room. for the vibes and all... but thank you for the classification! i assure you, this is just my room, not the factory you're mentioning."

"although," you add after taking a few sips of your cola, "i'd love to work with them someday. it's like a bucket list thing, kind of. deep down on the list, though, because it seems pretty unachievable. but they're really talented and amazing, so i'd love to keep hoping."

"anyways, i'm getting back to my game. see you after another round," you conclude and begin the game. the live goes on for about an hour, before you decide that any more could actually become detrimental to your idol image and health.

"well, i guess i should end the live soon before i lose my sanity. thank you so much for watching, guys. thank you for just watching me make coffees for people in a game. i love you, take care, i'll see you next week! bye bye."

once you're sure the live's over, you can only stretch your arms and take in a huge breath before sighing. just as you reach for your cup of cola, two hands pop out of nowhere and pull your cheeks. you turn your head to see jihoon standing beside you, a huge smile plastered to his face.

a rare sight truly.

"hi, my love," he says before pressing a smooch to the top of your head and sitting on the sofa beside your table.

"i'll never understand how you did a live for 6 freaking hours," you speak through sips and he chuckles. "i could barely finish one hour and that's cause i was playing games."

"well, it was just me talking about anime, so i guess i didnt realise time pass by."

"still impressive. oh! and also, the fans almost caught onto us, you know?"

"yeah, i was watching. but you handled it so well."

"aww you softie... but seriously, i thought they might have figured it out. weren't you worried we might get exposed?"

he just waves his hand, shaking his head. "nah. i knew you'd handle it well," he says and takes your hand in his.

"also, even if we do get exposed, i'm not worried. i'd only be glad that the world finally knows we're together," he brings your hand to his lips to press a kiss.

you can't help but smile.

"aah lee jihoon. who knew you'd say such romantic things out of nowhere?"

"it's just what you do to me. by the way, you were saying you wanted to work with me sometime...? you do realise i've got a few tracks of us, right? working hot and heavy with each other?"

a/n: this was waaay better in my head than whatever this turned out to be. this is also a way for me to speak about the game I've been playing recently. anyone here who plays 'good coffee great coffee', hmu i wanna exchange souls w u (⁠◍⁠•⁠ᴗ⁠•⁠◍⁠)⁠❤

#seventeen #svt #svt x reader #seventeen imagines #seventeen × reader #svt scenarios #seventeen woozi #svt woozi #lee jihoon #jihoon #woozi #woozi fluff #woozi x reader #jihoon imagines #jihoon x reader #jihoon fluff #articles.ris

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h0neybane · 2 days ago

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MAGIKEY (TWST AU) BY @quartztwst !!

im going to PASS AWAAAAYYYYY IM SOSO TIRED. BUT ITS DONE. but anyway, more on evelyn...

Evelyn [Magikey User "Luna Luceat"]

“Hurry up, I'm gonna pass out."

Evelyn is an 18 year old girl and has been a magical girl for 4 years, since she was 14. In her magical girl form, she comes off as mysterious and aloof... but she's really just thinking about going home. She has occasionally breached the top 10 of Magical popularity rankings, but she mostly tries to keep to herself, vanishing immediately after her work is done. Oftentimes, she finished things so quick that the public is unaware.

A quiet, sleepy girl who is jaded from her years as a magical girl.

Status:

Mental/Emotional Strength: ★★★★☆ (She's hard to crack since she's used to her job, but her constant exhaustion can become a vulnerability if left untreated for too long.)

Physical Strength: ★★★☆☆ (She's moderately strong as her staff is fairly hefty, and she does swing with it sometimes.)

Stamina: ★★☆☆☆ (This girl is tired as FUCK LMFAO. She uses her little floating platform to move because she doesn't want to actually run.)

Strategy: ★★★★★ (Evelyn is very calculated with her moves as her goal is to get the job done as fast as possible to go home and SLEEP.)

Strengths: Evelyn is very experienced and keeps a close eye on all of her teammates, making sure they can operate effectively. She is especially strong during the nighttime in a full moon.

Weaknesses: Evelyn is constantly exhausted because she only works during the nighttime as that is when her powers are most effective. A daytime attack would leave her extremely vulnerable.

Evelyn lives with her little brother in their childhood home. Their parents are usually overseas on business trips, so they don't see them in person very often. Evelyn's brother is aware that she works during the night time, but doesn't know that she's a magical girl.

Evelyn grew up very sheltered, being homeschooled by tutors hired by her parents. She was very lonely and she didn't really speak to her brother. She accumulated a massive amount of hobbies to pass time, one of those being gazing at the moon on her balcony, wishing for something to change.

Her wish was granted the night of her 14th birthday, with her magikey falling into her hands after gazing at the moon for the nth time. She eagerly and naively accepted, thinking that this was everything she hoped for.

Unfortunately, she soon came to realize that the nature of her abilities forced her to be sleep deprived if she wanted to do anything much outside of being a magical girl. After her second year of being a magical girl, her enthusiasm fully died, and now she just tries to get by until she can go home. (she still really likes her outfit though, LOL)

After a shift as a magical girl, Evelyn will usually rush inside a convience store, grab snacks, pay and bolt home. She hates staying for overtime even by 5 minutes... though, she's willing to grab some stuff for her brother if he asks for it.

Evelyn is technically enrolled in theMagikey Training School, but she rarely shows up to classes. If she does, she's usually sleeping in them, though she doesn't mind a chance to show off once in a while. The instructors tend to leave her alone whenever this happens, as they're aware of how hard she works.

She does try to be nice towards her juniors though. She fetches them treats once in a while.

uncharted lore territory!! i didnt watch madoka magica or anything so idk if this fits in at all so im warning in advance lol. this is adjacent to evelyn's ACTUAL lore within the original canon twst, which is why it's here. i will make a separate post explaining further later on

Evelyn has a secret. One that isn't her being a magical girl. She has not told crowley, nor any of her magical colleagues, and she does not intend to— at least not for now. However, this secret does leave her susceptible to... negative feelings.

tag list!

@taruruchi @honeyedpearcrushh @boopshoops @scint1llat3

@h2llish @viperbunnies @buttholesparkles @oya-oya-okay @cheerleaderman

@qsoap @angelwishess @jadelover69 @skriblee-ksk @lychee-face

#twisted wonderland #twst #twst au #twisted wonderland au #twst ocs #twst oc #twisted wonderland ocs #twisted wonderland oc #twstsona #twst sona #twst prefect oc #magikey #magikey au #・❥・my art #my ocs #twst fanart #evelyn [my yuusona!!!]#magical girl

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r4fe-cam3ron · 2 days ago

Note

Hello again! I have an idea for part two, if you like it.

What if y/n doesn’t take care of the wound (they’ve got a lot going on after all) and they start to get sick from it. Maybe they collapse/get really sick somewhere public. The Pogues don’t know what’s happening but Rafe does so he runs over and tries to help. Then all the Pogues are like ‘what the hell, how does he know?!’

If you like it, if not it’s totally fine! ❤️

an; oh my goodness, lovie (hopefully you see this plus the ones who requested a second part to my maybank!reader oneshot which you can find here!) i’m so so sorry that i had not replied to this sooner than i should’ve. there had been a lot going on along with a major writers block. i’m using this request to be sure i answer you and to thank you for being THIS patient. i will probably kind of change this request up a bit, but ill try to keep some of it in the writing! — just wanna also note im still only on season two of OBX !! so if anything is ooc, that is definitely why and i apologize! w; this honestly is longer than i wanted it to be but hey, what can you do? mentions of an injury, for this im still imagining s1 rafe (ignore s2 gif </333 thats the only one i could vibe with for this at the moment), mentions of drug and drug usage, abuse though i never directly speak of how anything happens, follows the show only slightly but not completely, a little something, something with john b though not quite disclosed (i added a scene just for this — hopefully that’s okay with everyone!)

the boneyard is somewhere nice to come when you need to think and pull away from reality for a bit. you were right — you would apologize to jj and help him with whatever john b and he needed help with.

you’d also told jj about what had happened after he had saw the bloody gauze in the bathroom trash.

you left out the part where rafe cameron had helped clean it up a bit better.

that was only three days ago. somewhere in between those short days, jj had landed himself in jail for sinking toppers boat.

to say luke was angry was a complete understatement.

the hundred dollar bill had floated down to your feet when he had called you out of hiding. you bent down to pick it up.

“you know what i want.”

getting the thing you know he wanted meant seeing rafe cameron storming out of the house and down the rickety old porch that squeaks under any weight.

he’s reaching for his helmet when he finally sees you, pausing when he notices the look on your face. you don’t looked surprised, or happy, to see him.

just disappointment.

pinching his brows together, he slips the helmet over his head without saying a word and giving you another glance. the dirt picks up behind him, leaving you in dust. he doesn’t want to dissect what that look you had given him made him feel.

the exchange is quick, with some banter barry throws your way. something about how good you look today and you know you don’t have to pay.

slipping the hundred dollar bill into your pocket this time, you pat his cheek and grab the baggie from his hand. with a quick ‘thanks, barry’, you’re gone.

apparently you’d taken too long this time for luke’s liking. after the screaming match and, quite frankly, your side bleeding again, you’d found yourself sitting on the course sand.

the back of your hand wipes angrily at your tears that continue to fall. your head is pounding and your side is throbbing from being practically ripped open once again over the already healing wound.

the back of your thighs itch and you feel queasy. the heels of your palms dig into your eye sockets, a strained yell leaving behind clenched teeth.

“we’ve been looking everywhere for you!” jj’s voice startles you and has your head quickly whipping around to watch as the small group heads your way. pope is saying something you can’t quite understand, kiara is trying to get him to slow down and speak normally for a second.

john b has a slight look on your face. your not quite sure if it’s a smitten look or a disgusted look. he’s carrying a six pack under his left arm and his backpack is slung over his right shoulder.

jj’s hands come and clamp onto your shoulder, jostling you slightly. you hope none of them notice the far off look on your face and how pale you suddenly feel.

you know, soon, everyone is about to join at the boneyard. it’s inevitable and happens on almost friday, strangely enough. you were hoping to beat the crowd before it actually started.

he sits next to you while pope, kie, and john b starts up a fire. “what’s going on?”

you look over at him. “hm? what do you mean?”

a frown tugs at his mouth and he sits up straighter. “what’s wrong? did something happen at—”

“j. i’m fine,” you nod. it’s a lie and jj knows it’s a lie. but you don’t want him to worry about you. “seriously. i’m okay. it’s nothing we haven’t been through before.”

jj stares at you sadly. you’re right, though, you shouldn’t be right. this shouldn’t be something you both are used to and something that’s come to be the ‘norm’ at home. if you could even call it a home.

he’s protective over you, the way you are of him. he remembers taking up for you and taking the fall for things just so you could catch a break every so often from the lashings of luke.

yet, you’d do the exact same for jj.

‘go hide in our spot, jj! cover your ears and hum a song, okay?’ he remembers watching with wide eyes as luke had dragged you by your arm into the other room. once the door slammed and he heard your crying, he’d crawl out from under the dinning room table and run outside towards the woods.

he would hum ‘piano man’ by billy joel. it was a strange song to hum, but you both would always sing it together when it came on the radio, dancing around on the small blanket that would lay on the grass with three half eaten peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. john b included — of course.

“but i always worry. im supposed to be there for you.” jj shakes his head.

“you take on to much, j,” your hand lands on his back, patting softly. “i could take this one.” the corner of your mouth quirks slightly upwards as you shrug, the tears beginning to well in your eyes again.

jj notices, but says nothing. he only nods slightly before looking out towards the waves. you hear the trucks and rowdy teens begin to pile in, sighing as you pull your arm away from jj and stand to dust your pants off.

—

you’re still feeling queasy, the crowd — separated, but yet still crowded — makes you feel even more uncomfortable and uneasy.

you stand near kiara and pope, listening to him talk about the interview he has for the scholarship, though you don’t truly know what he’s saying.

sweat beads around your hairline, a panicked feeling settling into your chest when you hear someone shout from behind you. you quickly turn your head, only to hear it quickly dissolve into laughter no longer than a second later.

you still search for some type of danger.

kiara’s eyes look at you, a worried expression etched onto her face. pope’s words slowly stall when he notices the look on her face, his own eyes moving to stare at you this time.

“are you okay?” her hand lands on your arm and you jump from the sudden touch.

you look over at her when she drops her hand, the worry on her face only grows. “i…yeah,” you look over to pope this time and nod. “i’m fine…i just…” you motion towards the ocean, your feet moving before you could even finish your sentence.

your mouth fills with saliva suddenly and the thought of vomiting in front of a bunch of people has you dizzy and even more panicked than before.

you can hear someone say something from behind you, but you’re too busy focusing on your breathing. a hand lands on your back and you glance over to the side.

the figure looks familiar. blinking a couple of times, you make out who it is.

“rafe?”

your voice is small, quivering and it looks like you’d been stuck in a hot trailer with the windows boarded down from how much you’re sweating.

“jesus.” he mutters. he watches as you try to stand straight, stumbling over your own feet. he’s quick to grab you before you could hit the ground, cradling your head and gripping your side as he lowers you more slowly.

“hey!” his jaw clenches when he notices who’s yelling at him. john b was the closest to where you two were standing. he knew you could stand your own ground, but he stayed close just in case.

and it looks like now would be a good time to intervene. “what did you do?!” he’s gaining attention from the others. topper being the second one to make his way over.

“nothing,” rafe snaps back. “she just passed out.”

“you expect me to really believe that she passed out as soon as you walked over?” john b kneels next to your other side, tilting your head over, cradling your jaw.

rafe watches the way his thumb drags across your cheek bone, gently shaking your head. his jaw clenches. “you expect me to really believe you care that she passed out when you could’ve came over here as soon as you seen me walking over?” his eyes quickly leave your face and stare at john b who says nothing.

“make yourself useful and go get a water bottle.” rafe grabs the hem of your hoodie, silently thankful that you had a tank top underneath. john b stands and watches quietly before running off towards the cooler.

“what happened?” topper finally speaks up when rafe slips the hoodie off. “rafe?”

“nothing happened, topper! i didn’t do anything!” rafe looks over at him with anger.

“rafe! get away from her!” jj stumbles across the sand as he makes his way over. he’s drunk, but he’s trying to collect himself the best he could. “i mean it!” he yells when he notices rafe sticking in the same spot.

jj yanks the water bottle from john b’s hand, kneeling next to him. he pushes rafe away and topper grabs rafe’s arm’s before he could successfully throw the punch he wanted too.

sarah stands to the side next to john b, and suddenly, he notices the crowd. his chest heaves and lands on you once again.

“is her side bleeding again?”

jj pauses and looks down at your side before slowly turning his head to stare at rafe. “how did you know about her side?”

rafe’s mouth parts, yet no words seem to come to mind. jj’s jaw clenches as he stares at him.

“i swear, cameron, i will—” he’s cut off by a deep inhale of breath, quickly looking over as you sit up the best you could, coughing. john b is quick to kneel down by you, a hand cradling the back of your neck to push you up.

your hands dig into the sand as your eyes look around frantically, chest heaving with heavy breaths, landing on rafe.

his body slowly grows less tense when he notices. jj sticks out the water bottle. “drink this,” he stands when you grab it. “how do you know about the cut on her side, rafe?”

before rafe could even come up with a snarky reply, you answer for him. “he helped.”

jj looks at you. “what?”

“he helped me during midsummers clean it up.”

jj stares at you for a moment longer before looking back at rafe. clenching his jaw, he shakes his head. “don’t come near her again, got it?” his brows lift slightly.

“that’s not up to you.” rafe shakes his head.

john b helps you from the ground. you thank him silently before making your way over. your hand lands on jj’s shoulder.

“let’s go, j.”

jj stays silent, but his threatening stare remains on rafe for a moment longer before he turns and makes his way up to where they had parked.

rafe watches him silently, but quickly glances down when your hand brushes against his. his eyes quickly jump up to your face.

“thank you.” you mouth.

he’s still for a moment but he eventually nods.

you give him a small, weak smile as you turn and walk away from him.

#𝜗𝜚 cherry’s inbox #rafe cameron x maybank!reader #rafe cameron x fem!reader #rafe cameron x reader #rafe cameron x you #rafe cameron x y/n #drew starkey x fem!reader #drew starkey x reader

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serenehells · 13 hours ago

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For most pilots, the barrier between their war machine and themself is one which many are loathed to admit is more malleable than it seems. I’ve handled too many hounds who died during a sortie because even they did not notice how they considered themselves and the mech to be blurring between one and the same. For many, the only symptoms you may see is an uptick in success rates on their missions, missions done a bit quicker, done more effectively, but even then it is usually not enough time to realize what is happening before one of your hounds die of shock cause they felt the feeling of their mech getting torn in two by a monster or other mech. Its a shame really, poor hounds not even realizing how much they have lost themselves into their mech. Its a hazard you are taught to expect though, so there is little use in pitying the poor souls who die this way as for those who do come back this way are too scarred by the experience they are unable to pilot effectively. All it means is you need to find a new hound.

But many handlers eventually get tired of losing a hound, they get tired and decide that if a hound off the street won’t effectively handle these missions cause they lose themself in the role, they can obviously do better.

Heh.

Those poor fools typically die or back out long before they realize how much of a siren’s song it truly is. Those that do survive though, see just how hard it is for one to see themselves outside of their skins of metal they encase themselves in, the feedback from their monitors blurring with their own senses, and feeling one’s heart burn with the reactor as you fire your railgun or tear into an enemy before you. Those handlers begin to be more, discerning in the hounds they take in, finding like minded individuals to deal with an enemy force, dancing around the bullets and clashing with the poor souls who are scared of their connection to their mech.

Its always fun to force them to face their fears.

But the marks don’t lie, these handlers and their packs are some of the fiercest mercs this side of the sea. Their hounds get loaned out to the highest bidder, and rarely do we disappoint.

But you knew that didn’t you?

You wouldn’t be speaking still if you were not interested. You don’t have that fear the other potential hounds do when I tell them about this. You are not afraid to let the abyss of steel and circutry gaze back into you.

Well then hound.

Welcome to the pack.

Mech piloted by neural link and the more you see it as "yourself" the more fluidly you can control it but the more pain you feel when it takes damage

You can be safe in your mech as a vehicle, under heavy layers of armor and ready to eject if things go wrong, seeing the world through grainy cameras as you drag it forward one clunking step at a time and struggle to track a fast-moving target

Or you can dance in your mech as your body, engine revving in time with your heartbeat as you feel the wind across your metal skin, the heat of the gunshots you're just barely dodging a constant reminder that if your mech dies you die with it

#mechaposting #got inspired to write cause of this post

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mandiemegatron · 2 days ago

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ᴛʜᴇ ᴄᴏʟᴏᴜʀꜱ ᴏꜰ ꜱᴜɴꜰʟᴏᴡᴇʀꜱ

ᴍᴀʀᴄᴏ, ɪᴢᴏᴜ, ᴛʜᴀᴛᴄʜ & ᴀᴄᴇ x ᴄɪꜱꜰᴇᴍ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

ʀᴀᴛᴇᴅ ; 18+. ᴛʜᴇ ꜰᴏʟʟᴏᴡɪɴɢ ᴘʀᴏɢʀᴀᴍ ᴅᴇᴀʟꜱ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴘᴏʟʏᴀᴍᴏʀᴏᴜꜱ ʀᴇʟᴀᴛɪᴏɴꜱ, ᴘᴇᴛ ɴᴀᴍᴇꜱ, ᴘ ɪɴ ᴠ, ᴀɴᴀʟ, ʙʟᴏᴡᴊᴏʙꜱ, ᴏᴠᴇʀꜱᴛɪᴍᴜʟᴀᴛɪᴏɴ, ʙʀᴇᴇᴅɪɴɢ ᴋɪɴᴋꜱ ᴀɴᴅ ᴍᴇɴᴛɪᴏɴꜱ ᴏꜰ ᴘᴏꜱꜱɪʙʟᴇ ᴘʀᴇɢɴᴀɴᴄʏ. ɪᴛ ᴍᴀʏ ᴀʟꜱᴏ ᴅᴇᴀʟ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴍᴀᴛᴜʀᴇ ꜱᴜʙᴊᴇᴄᴛ ᴍᴀᴛᴛᴇʀ. ᴠɪᴇᴡᴇʀ ᴅɪꜱᴄʀᴇᴛɪᴏɴ ɪꜱ ᴀᴅᴠɪꜱᴇᴅ.

ᴡᴏʀᴅꜱ ; 2.3ᴋ

a/n ; :') i did it.

i wanted to do this for quite some time and somehow found the spirit to get over my anxiousness and just... did it. i hope you all enjoy as much as i did writing it. if you see any mistakes, no you don't !!

no beta, we die like men 💖💪

[ Huge shout out to @quinloki and @hannahbarberra162 for writing the most banger WBP poly pieces i've ever read. you both gave me the push to try it myself, even if you don't know it. all my love and respect to you both. ]

"Give me a colour, sunflower."

There's nothing but ragged panting from you as a hand tightens in your hair, pulling your head back and your mouth away from the face directly before you. Your fingers desperately locked with someone standing to your left, as if to ground yourself.

Soft whimpers slip through the panting, eyes slowly rolling back forward until they land on a heavy pair staring back, your fuzzy gaze taking in the small smile on the painted lips. Those eyes speak unneeded words, and finally, a slightly pained, "g-green," comes through your breaths, setting off a praising look on the face above you.

"Good girl."

Burning lips press against the back of your shoulder as a matching set of rough hands tug and twist at your already pert and sore nipples, while another pair tightly holds your hips, another set of lips biting and marking your front, wherever they could reach.

"S-so good treasure, you're always so good," comes from behind you as Ace's almost blazing hot cock slams into your ass over and over, finally chasing his own high as yours slowly begins to climb once more.

"Mm, I think you can give us one more, yoi," purrs from in front of you, teeth nipping at your throat in a possessive manner as his cock slides through your still twitching and gushing folds, thrusting into you just a bit slower than the fire user panting behind you. "Can't you? Our sweet girl, such a good songbird..."

While lithe fingers tighten their hold on your hair, another face moves in and peppers kisses and murmurs warm praise to your own, holding tight to your hand as you hear Thatch promise you, "Give us one more, just one more and I'll run you a bath, make you all the snacks you want… you'd like that, wouldn't you, our sweet little love?" A soft whimper of agreement falls from behind your lips as your eyes flicker shut, your form slowly turning limp in the multiple holds on your body.

There's a pleased grunt from behind you as Ace shoves his face into the side of your neck, licking and nibbling at your skin while drinking up your scent, inhaling deeply and groaning almost possessively at your scent. "Mm treasure, gonna cum, gonna cum, gonna cuu-um-"

Your other hand grips his on your breast, clinging to him as you beg out in a quick pant, "please cum, please Ace, please, please," until you swear you see stars as his cock finally twitches and throbs inside you, filling your small, puckered hole to the brim with his thick seed. His breathing falls staggered and short as he clings to you, breathing you in, to the point that he couldn't pinpoint where you started and where he began. As blissed out as he was, he could tell with slight disappointment that you hadn't cum along with him.

"Tsk, Ace... you'll be punished for that later, yoi," remarked from a slightly disappointed Marco who continued to rock his hips into yours in front of you. He looked to Izou for a moment, and the two seemed to share a thought before Izou turns your head so it was facing Marco. Your blurred eyes tried to focus as his cock hit that spongy place inside your cunt that sent your head spinning.

You'd squirted on him twice already, and you could tell by the look in his half-lidded eyes that he wanted you to do it one last time. "What colour, songbird?"

You give him a breathless chuckle and a shaky grin, moving your shaky hand from Ace's to graze over Marco's jawline before settling your palm at the base of his neck. The gaze in his eyes matched yours - adoring, endless, and near obsessive.

"S-still gree-green.”

An almost wicked grin washes over Marco's face as your words meet his ears, a low purr grumbling in his chest as one of his hands gently gathers yours from his neck and whisps a few, pointedly placed kisses to your wrist before letting his teeth nip at the fat of your palm. "Good."

Izou brings your head back slowly as Ace eases out of you, flopping backward onto the bed with a pleased huff and a goofy, loving grin. Thatch snickers down at the tuckered out fire user before helping the younger man slide away from you, but not far enough that his hands couldn't graze over your skin adoringly.

"Are you lying, sunflower?" Izou quips down at you, his own teeth nipping at the side of your throat before licking a long stripe from your collarbone to just under your ear. You shudder at the feeling, your eyes rolling back slightly as Marco gives a particularly rough thrust, the tip of his cock kissing your cervix unkindly. "N-no, Sir, I'm not lying," you manage to confirm though your entire body aches with twinges of pain that flutters through the immense pleasure.

Izou watches your face for a moment before humming with a slight nod, accepting your answer before he teases quietly over your ear, "Then give us another, sweet sunflower.”

At those words, Marco's grip releases your wrist and moves to cradle the back of your head, moving to lay you on your back. When he's between your legs again, he raises them to your chest with your knees squishing your breasts together, letting his cock slot back into your slippery cunt with ease.

"You're going to give us a big one, songbird." Marco insists, looking down at you with clearly pleased eyes as he takes in your ragged form. As he slides his cock out right to the tip, he flashes you a that same wicked grin as he demands, "Sing for us."

Your voice cracks out a moan at the onslaught from his cock, his strong thighs twitching as he already nears his release from the endless edging from earlier. "Ma-arco," you sob out, your hand moving to scratch over his back desperately as you feel the simmering warmth inside you begin to boil again. One of his hands forcefully turns your head so your eyes meet Izou and Thatch, who sit on the edge of the bed close enough for you to reach your other hand out.

Thatch immediately snatches your hand as Izou leans over to place his own hand over the space where Marco's rests on your face. Finely manicured nails dig into your jaw and cheeks just enough to bite. You're able to watch Ace pleasure Izou from this angle, tingles rushing over your skin from the sight. "What a bright sunflower you are," Izou praises, cooing down at you as tears fill your eyes, his other hand gently running through Ace's messy hair. You give another weepy moan as you beg, "P-please, I need it, I need it, please, please -"

Izou's fingers move from holding your face to curling around your throat, just tight enough to hinder your breathing, not yet cutting it off entirely. Your eyes roll back at the pressure and Marco swears thickly as he accidentally cums at that sight, his cock throbbing with every spurt that fills you. "D-don't waste it," he rasps, keeping your hips up as he lazily thrusts into you a last few times. When the sensitivity is too much for him, he tags Thatch in with a nod, continuing to hold your legs in the same position.

Taatch slides up behind Marco and takes over, his thicker cock immediately spearing through your puffy folds to keep you full, accidentally pushing some of Marco's cum out of you.

Thatch gives a soft "Tsk," as his large hands lovingly rub your thighs before letting them rest under your knees and gripping tight. “Didn't you just hear Marco? Wasting the potential to give Pops a grandkid…” Thatch grins at the disapproving look Marco gives him at blaming you for the gooey loss.

A visible shiver runs over your entire body at his words, and the three watching you give a knowing look to each other as Izou interrogates seriously, “Would you like that, sunflower? To be filled so many times by us that there would be a near one hundred percent chance that you'd end up with our child?”

His own words set him over the edge as he gives a shuddered gasp, spilling down Ace's throat, Izou's grip accidentally tightening in Ace's dark hair and around your throat. You give a choked gasp as Thatch's hips snap into yours, your cunt singing for them, the sloppy and wet sounds echoing in the small room.

“You gonna take it all, little love? Think about it, us giving you hours and hours of ecstasy, taking our time to bring you to the edge until you're so full of us that everyone will know just who you belong to?” You whimper and sob under him as Izou's hand relents, nodding as best you can while nearly crushed under Thatch in the mating position. He leans down just enough to emphasize his words as he practically moans out,

“Don't you want to give us a son?”

Your vision goes black as his cock finally hits your g-spot hard enough that you're twitching and squirting all over him, your eyes rolled back and your mouth parted slightly as you can do nothing but pant and take the brutal pleasure. Thatch gives a victorious chuckle, his lips pulled into a large grin as his thrusts become erratic, now chasing down his own end and he purposefully spills inside your weeping cunt, keeping his cock nestled in your walls until it softens a few minutes later and slips out. His thumb presses between your puffy and slippery lips to keep your cunt plugged as his other hand pats against your raw ass-cheeks with a pleased hum.

“I love when we find out things about each other together,” Thatch teases as Izou and Ace slowly make their way onto the bed on either side of you. Eventually, Thatch lets your legs down, though he holds your thighs together, giving you a slight warning look as he gently demands, “Keep them tight, little love. Can't let any go to waste, can we?” You're too far gone to register his words, your legs shaking slightly from the ache and the furious tingles that still wrecked your entire body.

“Give her a few moments, yoi.” Comes from behind Thatch, who glances over his shoulder to Marco, who had sneakily left and returned with four warm washcloths. Each of the men take a cloth and gently caress over your heated and tender flesh, one of them cooing down at you every once in a while when you hissed from pain. Soon enough, you were cleaned and dressed in one of their shirts, oversized and old, but still well loved by you. Once you were dressed, the men took turns cleaning each other. Izou and Ace remained naked, sitting back against the headboard and pulling your body to them as Thatch and Marco began redressing.

“I'm going to make you a snack, do you need anything else?” Thatch asked once you were more lucid, curled against Ace and Izou at the head of the bed. Both their hands wandered lovingly over your form, pulling you into a warm lull. You gave a slow shake of your head before giving a large yawn, your hold on both men tightening slightly as you croaked, “Snack… sounds good.” You flashed Thatch a small but genuine grin with a soft, “Thank you. Love you.”

Thatch leaned over with a hum, pressing his lips to yours before standing back up with a hand running over his pompadour. “You look fine,” snarks Izou jokingly before he presses a kiss to the top of your head. Thatch simply rolls his eyes with a slight smirk before heading out the door. “I'll be back soon,” he promises, letting the door shut behind him.

“I've got to get back to the infirmary,” Marco laments, frowning slightly as he copies Thatch's movements and leans over while tilting your chin up, your lips meeting his in a tender kiss. “Send someone to come find me if you need me,” he murmurs the second he pulls away, giving you a pointed stare which you nod under. “I will,” you swear, pressing your lips to his once more to solidify the promise.

When Marco turns to leave, you give a content hum, letting your body sink into the two men behind you, officially turning to jello. Marco throws one last glance at you over his shoulder, smiling mildly to himself before he lets the door shut behind him, hiding you three from the outside world.

“You did so well.” Murmurs Izou as his lithe fingers run over your tired thighs and your hair. Ace nuzzles his face into your neck a little more, his lips grazing over your now damp and chilled flesh, giving a soft sound of agreement against your throat. “You're always so good for us,” Ace adds softly, attempting to fight back the call of sleep.

“Mm… love you…” you barely reply, your eyes heavy as you snuggle into the warm bodies a little more. Both men reply in kind, their voices soft and echo-y as you finally succumb to the darkness. When your breathing evens out, Ace and Izou look at each other for a moment until a flicker of curiosity lights up between them.

“Let her rest for a few hours and then wake her up with my face in between her legs?” Ace offers, grinning with a chuckle as Izou leans over slightly to peck the fire user on the lips. “Good plan. Five hours should be sufficient, I think.”

Izou winks at Ace before the messy haired man curls back around you both, his devil fruit unconsciously warming your skin as he finally yawns and lets his eyes shut as Izou muses lightly,

“Just don't tell Marco. He wouldn't like us waking his little bird too early.”

#mandies mumbles ; fanfics #ok to rb #poly fic #whitebeard pirates #marco x reader #thatch x reader #ace x reader #izou x reader #whitebeard pirate commanders x reader #please show support if you enjoyed !!!#this was a good one lmao !! sitting there rereading it like :D #i love when theyre a little mean and doting at the same time 🥺🥺🥺🥰🥰🥰

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loudest-subtext-in-tv · 9 hours ago

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The Blind Banker and Iain M. Banks's Transition

Years ago I ordered the edition of the London A-Z I thought was most likely used in The Blind Banker just to see if the graffiti cypher actually matched. Well, it didn't. Not especially surprising, I suppose.

But two things nagged at me for a decade now:

One of the numbers in the cypher is "221." You know, like 221b. Did they only throw that in there for fun?

One of the books the murder victims had in common was Iain M. Banks's Transition, which made it a candidate for the cypher. When Sherlock pulls the book out of the box, he turns it to page 15, and the first word is "cigarette."

Out of all the other candidate books, that word has the most relevance to the show and Sherlock himself. But every time I got the urge to buy the first edition of Transition I would remind myself I wasted money on the London A-Z, and I'd manage to get on with life.

Well, the last time I rewatched The Blind Banker, I finally snapped. Sherlock said that stupid word and it lingered on the stupid screen, and I took a strong, stupid stand: I would not get on with life. I paid $36 to have a first edition shipped from the U.K... to my old address, where the London A-Z had been sent the last time. Stupid. I watched the tracking like an idiot, and on the delivery day, I put a letter on the door of my old address explaining my stupidity. The new tenant called me to let me know my stupidity was not terminal. I picked it up, safe and sound, and hoped it would be worth the trouble.

Baby, was it EVER!

Warning: This book, on a page referenced, has explicit sex. Like, fanfic-level explicit sex.

I turned to page 15, and the first word was indeed "cigarette." Correct edition, then, and they really did bother to use an accurate page and word for The Blind Banker:

I should explain the premise of this book. It doesn't matter a ton, but you're naturally going to wonder why these pages are so unusual.

It's science fiction, and agents called "Transitionaries" can move between infinite parallel realities to embody pre-existing people in order to change events. So when they land in a body they have that person's same neuroses, sexual preferences, etc.

Here's a few shots of the cypher for reference:

The first thing you're wondering is if the cypher spells out anything using Transition. The answer is no, not anything coherent. It says, "Edward like killed here speaking been sit of [BLANK]."

What's insane is the things on the referenced pages -- and especially what's on page 127, the one that's paired with the number 221.

This is what the script for The Blind Banker said about the book comparison scene:

So they wanted to throw in something saucy. Well, things are about to get saucy for those of us who are obsessive enough.

Let's start in on the cypher.

Page 112 is about a stock trader named Edward, talking about how some things are insanely overvalued. Oh, what a coincidence: The Blind Banker revolves around a stock trader named Edward (van Coon) stealing a jade hairpin worth £9 million.

Page 103 is next, but doesn't strike me as anything special so I'm only putting it here for posterity.

Bear in mind they had to create enough words for the Tong's instructions; they're obviously not going to find a book with nine different pages of coincidental overlaps with The Blind Banker and Sherlock as a show, especially not when they only had one series of material at the time to correlate to anything. The ones that match up are worth the wait, so bear with me.

Page 36 is also not super relevant, although The Blind Banker does feature kidnapping, attempted murder, etc. Let's keep going, because the next page is a doozy.

Page 70 is our first jackpot: The narrator lands in the body of a gay man in London, with dark curly hair and pale hands who speaks multiple languages -- including German, which Sherlock speaks in The Blind Banker.

🔥 Oh, and a handsome male assistant is attracted to him. 🔥

And that's all the warning we get to prepare us for page 127, the one that's linked with the number 221:

🔥 A couple going over the evidence to untangle some mystery, one of them fingering the other while they get a handjob. If you only read page 127 it comes across like anal fingering, so I'm including page 126 first which... well, it still makes explicit mention of her anus, what can you do. 🔥

Here's the preamble page, page 126:

And here's page 127 itself, just after:

This has, uh... incredible Sherlock energy to say the least. Particularly the one getting fingered.

Let's keep this rolling.

Page 19 is about someone who was into drugs using their knowledge of the criminal class and their facility with observation and manipulation to trade secrets and turn their life around:

The next page in the cypher is page 15, which is same page referenced in the death threats, i.e. the first page I covered.

Then we've got page 7, which is about how eclipses are insane coincidences where two things line up exactly. The Blind Banker is about matching pairs.

Finally, page 178 is simply a blank page between chapters.

And there you have it. Thank God I can quit wondering about this book every time I watch TBB.

#tjlc #my meta #The Blind Banker

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slutoru1207 · 1 day ago

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Wildflowers

Warning: This story will involve emotional conflict, heartache, and bittersweet moments that may be heavy and triggering. It explores themes of loss, fear, and the fragility of love in the face of impossible responsibilities. Proceed with caution, 2,902k wc.

The first time Mark kissed you, the world felt like it could finally be still. He was Invincible, a hero to the world—yet when his lips touched yours, for a brief, impossible moment, he was just Mark. Just a boy who loved you.

You remember that moment like a dream. It felt like the calm after a storm, the kind of serenity you could almost touch. He had always been your wildflower, free, untamed, growing in places no one could imagine, but to you, it was simple. You loved him. He loved you. And in those quiet moments, in the spaces where he wasn’t Invincible, he was yours.

But now?

Now, everything is different.

You stare at him as he stands in the doorway of your apartment, his back turned to you as if he can’t bear to face you. The bruises on his skin, the blood on his suit—he wears them like a badge, but you know, deep down, they’re eating away at him. The weight of it all. The responsibility. The guilt.

He doesn’t speak. You’ve tried talking to him, tried reaching through the distance that’s been growing between you, but the words never seem enough. Every time you try, he pulls away, even if just a little. Even if just enough to break your heart.

“I’m fine,” he says, as he always does. “I’m just... tired.”

But you can hear the lie in his voice. You can see it in the way his shoulders slump, in the way his eyes no longer shine with the same light that used to make you feel like you were the only thing in the world.

It’s been like this for weeks. Months, maybe. Since he left for the battle against the Viltrumites. Since the war became personal.

You thought you knew what it meant to love him—to love someone who had to fight, to protect, to save. But this... this is different.

Every day, he slips further away from you. Every day, he becomes more of a symbol and less of a man. Less of the Mark who once held your hand in the dark and whispered promises of a future you both wanted.

And it tears you apart.

“Mark, please.” You step forward, your voice barely a whisper, but you feel the weight of the words. “Don’t push me away.”

His head turns slightly, just enough to show you the exhaustion in his eyes. But there’s something else, too—something colder. Something that scares you more than any villain ever could.

“I’m not pushing you away.” His voice is steady, but the words feel like glass, fragile and ready to shatter. “You deserve better than this. I can’t keep doing this to you.”

You blink, confused and hurt. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m not good for you,” he admits quietly. His words hang in the air, sharp and painful. “You’re... You’re a wildflower, and I’m just—” He shakes his head, cutting himself off before he can say more.

Your heart tightens in your chest, and you don’t know how to respond. The metaphor stings because it’s so true. You arethe wildflower, the one who’s supposed to be free—unbothered by the storm around you, unburdened by the weight of a world that’s always demanding more. But Mark? Mark has always carried the world on his shoulders. He’s always been the one to take on everything, even at the cost of himself.

“You’re not a burden to me, Mark,” you whisper, stepping closer. “I don’t care about the world. I care about you. I’ve always cared about you. I’m not asking you to be perfect. I’m asking you to stay with me.”

But he turns away from you again, his body language closed off. The space between you seems to grow, as if some invisible force is pulling him farther away, no matter how much you reach.

“You don’t understand,” he says, his voice breaking for the first time. “I can’t keep you in this world. I can’t protect you from it.”

And then it hits you. You’ve always known it, deep down. That Mark wasn’t just fighting the Viltrumites, or aliens, or other threats—he was fighting the part of him that wanted to be your Mark again. The boy who wasn’t Invincible, the boy who could laugh and hold you close without worrying about the next fight.

But Invincible has always been the one who wins. And in that battle, you lose him.

“Mark,” you choke out, your voice trembling, “please, don’t leave me.”

But the truth is—he already has.

He’s already gone, slipping between your fingers like sand.

And no matter how much you love him, no matter how many times you say his name, you can’t hold onto him.

You can’t keep him.

He’s too far gone.

The tears fall before you even realize it, and you hate yourself for it—hate that you’re crying in front of him. Hate that he has this power over you, even when he’s slipping further away.

And just when you think you’ve lost him for good, you hear it—the sound of his footsteps, tentative, careful. You feel his hand, warm and steady, against your cheek.

“Don’t cry,” he says softly. “Please. Don’t cry.”

But it’s too late. The tears have already fallen, and they’re carrying with them every fear, every hope, every promise you’ve ever made to each other. You hold his hand against your face, silently begging for the comfort you know you can’t have.

“Mark, please,” you whisper again. “Please don’t leave me.”

But the words are useless. They always have been.

The silence between you and Mark is suffocating. He doesn’t say anything as he kneels down in front of you, his hand still gently cupping your face. The warmth of his touch is almost enough to make you believe everything is going to be okay—almost enough to convince yourself that he hasn’t already decided to let go. But the doubt lingers, thick and heavy.

"I don’t want to hurt you," he says quietly, his voice cracking on the last word. He wipes a tear from your cheek with the back of his hand, and the gesture feels like a small, fragile attempt to hold onto something that’s already slipping away. “But I am.”

You shake your head, refusing to let him continue down that path. “No, Mark. You’re not hurting me. You’re shutting me out. You’re pushing me away, and it’s killing me.”

He closes his eyes, pressing his forehead gently against yours. You can feel the weight of everything he’s carrying in that touch, the burden of the world that he feels he has to bear alone. You want so desperately to take it from him, to make it easier, but you can’t. You’ve never been able to.

“I’m not enough for you, Y/N,” he admits in a whisper, his words like a knife to your chest. “I’m not good enough to be the man you need. Not when I’m constantly risking my life… not when I’m constantly torn between what I want and what I have to do.” He pulls away slightly, his hand dropping to his side. “And I don’t want to lose you. I can’t. But if I stay, I know I will.”

You look at him, tears streaming down your face, and you realize just how much pain he’s in. The weight of his choices, the sacrifices he’s made… it’s too much for one person to bear, and yet here he is, trying to do it all alone.

“Mark,” you choke out, voice trembling, “You’re killing me by leaving. I’m not afraid of the fight, or the pain. I’m afraid of losing you to the weight of everything you’re carrying. I can’t live in a world where you push me away to protect me from yourself. I love you too much for that. I want to stand beside you. Whatever comes, I’ll be here.”

His face crumples at your words, and for a moment, it feels like you’re speaking to a stranger. Someone who’s too broken to understand. You see it in the flicker of doubt in his eyes—he loves you, but it’s as if the love itself is a curse, a ticking time bomb. And he’s too scared to let it explode.

“I want to be the man you deserve,” he says, his voice barely a whisper. “But I don’t know if I can be him.”

“You already are,” you reply, your voice soft but firm. “You are the man I love. You don’t have to be perfect. You don’t have to carry the weight of the world on your own. You don’t have to be invincible for me.” You pause, swallowing the lump in your throat. “I just want you. I just want us.”

Mark’s face contorts in pain as he tries to hold back his emotions, but it’s clear he’s losing the battle. His body shakes with the weight of it all, and he collapses to his knees in front of you, his hands trembling as he reaches for you.

“I’m scared, Y/N,” he confesses, his voice raw, barely audible. “I’m scared I’ll never be enough. I’m scared I’ll hurt you. I’m scared I’ll lose you. And I don’t know how to stop it.”

The vulnerability in his words shatters you. It hits harder than any battle he’s ever faced, harder than any villain he’s ever fought. This is the truth—this is what he’s been holding inside, locked away because he’s afraid of hurting you. But the irony is, by trying to protect you, he’s already lost you.

“You don’t have to be perfect,” you repeat, your voice thick with emotion. “You just have to be you. You’re enough, Mark. You always have been. And I don’t care about the world… I care about you. I care about the person I fell in love with.”

And as the tears fall freely from both of your eyes, Mark’s hands tremble as they reach for you, pulling you into his arms. You hold onto him like you’ve never held on to anything before, as if this moment will slip away the second you let go.

You feel him tremble in your arms, feel the way he breathes shakily as if he’s been holding onto his emotions for too long. He buries his face in your neck, his tears wetting your skin as he tries to muffle his sobs. You can feel the weight of his guilt, the crushing burden of his love for you that he’s too scared to let flourish.

“I don’t want to let you go,” he murmurs, the words broken, almost desperate. “I can’t lose you.”

“You won’t,” you promise him, your hands running through his hair as you hold him tightly. “You won’t lose me. I’m not going anywhere. I’m here, Mark. I’m always going to be here.”

But even as you say those words, you know that this moment can’t last forever. The world outside is still waiting for him to be Invincible, and no matter how much you wish it could be different, he can’t escape that. Neither of you can.

You don’t know what comes next. You don’t know if this will be enough to heal the rift between you, or if it’s just another chapter in a long, painful story. But in this moment, as Mark holds you and cries in your arms, you know one thing for certain: he’s still yours, and you’re still his.

And maybe, just maybe, that’s enough.

For now.

Mark's arms tighten around you, as if he’s trying to hold you together, to keep you from falling apart. His breath is shaky against your skin, and you can feel the steady beat of his heart, but it’s broken. It’s fragile, trembling under the weight of everything he’s been through. And you know, deep down, that this moment—this rawness, this closeness—might not last long.

He pulls back slightly, his hands gently cupping your face, his thumbs brushing away the remnants of your tears. His eyes search yours, desperate for something, but you’re not sure what. Hope? Reassurance? Or maybe he’s looking for a sign that he hasn’t already destroyed everything you’ve built together.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispers, his voice hoarse. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I never wanted to hurt you.”

You place your hand over his heart, feeling the frantic pace of it, the intensity of his emotions. You can feel how much he’s holding inside, and it breaks you. He’s not just battling the Viltrumites, the threats to the world—he’s battling himself. And he’s losing.

“Mark,” you whisper, your voice soft but firm, “you’re not hurting me by loving me. You’re hurting me by thinking you’re not enough.”

He shakes his head, his eyes glazed with pain. “But I’m not, Y/N. I’m not what you need. I’m not even sure I know who I am anymore. I’ve been so focused on saving the world, on keeping you safe, that I don’t even know how to be the man you deserve.” He takes a deep breath, and the pain in his expression is so raw, so real, it’s like a physical blow to your chest. “I don’t even know if I can be the man you want me to be.”

The words hit you harder than you expected. The truth is, Mark has always been the one who carried the weight of the world on his shoulders, and now he’s carrying the burden of your love, of his doubts. And it’s crushing him.

You take his hands in yours, grounding him, willing him to hear you. “Mark, you don’t have to be anyone else. You don’t have to be anyone other than the person you are. I love you. I love you, even in your brokenness. Even when you’re scared. Even when you feel like you’re failing.” Your voice shakes, but you push through the fear. “I don’t need you to be perfect. I need you to be real with me. I need you to be here. With me. As yourself.”

He looks at you, his eyes wide with uncertainty, and for a moment, you wonder if he can even believe you. He’s so used to fighting, so used to winning, but this is different. This fight isn’t against an enemy; it’s against himself. And no matter how hard he tries to deny it, you can see it in his eyes. He’s afraid of losing you, and he doesn’t know how to handle that fear.

“I can’t promise I’ll be perfect,” he says quietly, his voice trembling. “But I’ll try. I’ll try to be the man you need. I’ll try to be with you, Y/N. I just—” He cuts himself off, his breath shallow. “I just don’t want to hurt you anymore. I don’t want to drag you into this chaos. You deserve so much more.”

You pull him closer, your forehead resting against his as you close your eyes, letting the rawness of the moment settle between you. “Mark… I’m already in this chaos. I’ve always been in it, from the moment I fell in love with you. But I’m not leaving. Not now, not ever.”

Mark’s hand trembles as it moves to your hair, pushing a strand away from your face as he looks at you with a tenderness you almost thought he’d forgotten. “I’m so scared, Y/N. I’m scared of losing you. I’m scared of everything.”

You reach up and place your hand on his cheek, feeling the warmth of his skin under your palm. “Then we’ll be scared together,” you whisper. “We’ll be scared together, but we’ll face it. We’ll face whatever comes, side by side.”

The weight of the world feels lighter in that moment, and for a brief, impossible second, it feels like you’ve found the balance between the man he is and the man he wants to be. But you know the truth—it’s never that simple. The world doesn’t stop turning because you wish it would. The fight will always be there, waiting for him. And you’ll always be waiting for him, too.

But for now, in the quiet of this moment, there’s peace. There’s a promise. A fragile, beautiful promise.

Mark leans down, pressing his forehead against yours, and for a second, you close your eyes, savoring the warmth of his touch. You feel the love he’s too afraid to give, the love you’ve always known was there. It’s enough. Just enough.

And then, as if the weight of the world finally catches up with him, he whispers, “I love you, Y/N. I always will. Even when I’m not enough… I’ll always love you.”

And you know that even if the world crashes down around you, even if the battles never end, that love will be enough to carry you both through. Because sometimes, all you need is the truth—that no matter how broken, no matter how lost, love is always worth fighting for.

i was listening to Wildflowers by Billie while writing this <333

#invincible comic #invincible season 3 #invincible fanfic #mark grayson invincible #mark x reader #mark grayson x reader #invincible #invincible x reader #invincible show #invincible smut #mohawk invincible

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hongjoongspoetry · 2 days ago

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Thank you so much Esther!! 😭🩷🤧 *Hands you some tissues* I'm so happy you liked bad boy!jongho (especially knowing that he's your bias), he has easily become one of my favorite characters to write now and I'll definitely do more of him in the future!

God the idea of knowing your soulmate and who they are and knowing that in the eyes of the public, and perhaps yours as well, that they’re a bad person, someone others don’t like or have a negative viewpoint of must be hard. Especially if you still cannot help the feelings you have for them when you’re around them even when they behave badly or something. Sounds like such a hard situation to be in and our precious MC is going through just that😭😭

Definitely! Imagine you are fated to someone who is more or less a "bad" person, like what does one do in that situation? Ngl, I wished to dive deeper into that but considering it would go past our word limit for the event I wouldn't do it justice 😭 But I'm still happy you caught onto the indication of what our MC was dealing with!

Although can I say I’m living for bad boy!Jongho, it just does something for me like yes boy be a menace to society🤩 also I totally did not giggle at his introduction where he’s sitting behind his desk as MC questions him on accepting the invitation in her name🙈

This scene was actually inspired from his screen time in Crazy Form (where he's sitting in an office (?) with a gun and shit), all dressed up and looking expensive. I just had to include it, and also his charm! Despite being a menace, he still has girls swooning for him *cough* secretary Eunji *cough*.

JgsuvhccvugcdsuhadbcjadhvfaeibhfbkjaeC he’s so in love with her and she hasn’t noticed it yet😭😩 like he keeps dropping hints throughout the one shot with very subtle ways he’s acting and unfortunately our dear MC only thinks he’s acting that way because of the contract🥲

THE FUNNIEST THING IS WHEN YOU REALIZE HE KNOWS THEY ARE SOULMATE THIS ENTIRE TIME AND ISN'T EVEN ACTING- Like the man wants you, contract or no contract 😭🤭 Ugh, I love writing men who are simps and idk about you, but I feel like Jongho is the type of guy who would treat his partner to everything. I'm talking about spoiling them to the maaaaax.

I enjoyed so much the way you wrote her Mina, it was so nice to see a bit more of a firecracker of a character, like she doesn’t fully take most of his bullshit while also having moments where we see her worry or the conflicting feelings of you know being with your soulmate but also being in a contract where you’re fake dating each other. I can’t really blame her for accepting the contact because I’d probably done the same if I saw the payment whilst also hoping that perhaps this would bring us even closer as soulmates for it to click naturally.

THANK YOU SO MUCH!! I think, at least for me, the biggest challenge is to write interesting MCs that aren't these typical I-take-no-crap characters. Becuase, in my opinion, those are the easiest to write. So, there's a moment where I always stop and wonder if my MCs are different or if they are just the same character in different universes lmao. It's' also something I want to get better at as I'm writing. To make my MCs different Shy, reserved, scared, introverts or extroverts, talkative, rude, mean, etc. I feel like in my series Puzzle Pieces, I'm way better at making the MCs diverse (obviously no one knows as only Mingi's story is out, but you will see when the time comes😭) And as for this MC, she was 100% right in signing that contract because it was a looooot of money they offered. It's even better when you realize that the two agents (who came with the contract) knew she was Jongho's soulmate and went to her on purpose with that sum of money 😭

I think some of my favorite moments are when you allow us to read how it all affects the, like the idea that thinking/speaking bad about your soulmate causes the bond to burn/hurt you is actually so cool! Don’t think I’ve ever seen that before in a soulmate au and I liked it so much because the idea that Jongho who seems to enjoy “tormenting” her also gets hurt and it quiet possibly being moments where he feels the need to leave to get some time alone, perhaps to even reflect if he went to far or not, just makes me feel things😩

OH!!! I love this! I'm a complete addict when it comes to soulmate aus. They are my favorite fanfic genre to read so best believe ive consumed a good amount of them 😭 And it is as you're saying, not many writers incorporate the soul in soulmate, at least not up to my standard. Yes, the characters are destined to be together, but what else is there to the soulmate connection? What makes them connected and in what way? That's why I decided, for Jongho and this MC, to have that type of bond, where they can kind of feel each other's emotions. Ugh, Esther I love the way your mind works because you literally catch onto everything I'm trying to convey with my writing! Yes, Jongho definitely went out for a smoke (in the middle of the charity event) to calm down after his childish behaviour and yes, him going from teasing to distant in seconds is also his way of trying to collect his thoughts and not feel too much of MC emotions. (It makes me wanna smash my head in knowing that they feel each other's emotions when they are being lovey-dovey, like in the ending scene)

I just adore all the small details you added in which Jongho comforts her, like the hand gently caressing hers, his hand on her hip as he guides her through the overwhelming crowd, even when he tries to stop Ms.Kang and her quiet rude questions🥺 [...] My reaction to Jongho giving her his jacket once she found him outside smoking. Like hello? I love it so much. Just the idea of Jongho covering you with his jacket so you won’t freeze your ass off! When’s it my turn?🧐

Jongho tries to be a bad boy so hard but at the end of the day, he's just a huge softie beneath that hard exterior especially when it comes to the MC. I will never let the "give-them-your-jacket-trope" die! It's the epitome of gentleman behaviour and I need it added in every piece of literature I write lmao 😭 It also further strengthens the image of Jongho not being a "bad" person.

Nah I would never get on a motorcycle ever like you are so right for calling them a death trap, I do not trust them at all!! And that’s coming from someone who’s grown up with both her parents driving said death traps😭 not Jongho laughing at her for being scared and holding on tight to him😭😭 also please I love their bantering so much, the way you wrote Jongho teasing her so often is so good I enjoyed it so much💓

That's criminal. I love motorcycles and I'm even planning on getting a license + bike when I have the money for it (plus I have to wait until I'm 24 but that's another thing lmao). Okay, but your parents are so cool, first your dad plays electric (I believe they were electric) guitars and now I find out both of your parents RIDE MOTORCYCLES??!!?!? So cool😭🌟I feel like its such a Jongho thing to-do, he definitely made the motorcycle go a lil too fast for her to cling onto him AHAHAHH I can just see his menacing smile, like look at these:

menace one menace two menace three

God this whole part after they got of the motorcycle is so beautifully written, the description and the way you wrote the dialogue just did it for me. Truly wonderful and such a delight to read.

THANK YOU AGAIN, omg you are spoiling me 🥹🥹 It's so nice to hear this though, because I really put a lot of effort into that whole last scene. I wanted the readers to really feel their emotions and vulnerability through the screen, especially Jongho's. For a guy who’d always been seen as tough and unapproachable, changing wasn’t going to be easy. But with the MC — his soulmate — there, I feel like he understood that she wouldn't judge him and he just decided to bet on it, be vulnerable and get his feelings hurt or be vulnerable and go home with the love of his life, you know?

You should have heard the noise I made when I read that part and everything that followed🫣 BUT YES HES CONFESSING FIRST🥰❤️ also my poor girlie getting to hear that while she thinks she’s been good at hiding it all Jongho has known since forever that they’re soulmates😩😭

HAHAHAHAHAHAH, I wish we got a live reaction to it (istg that mountain cat meme never makes me not laugh) AND YES HES CONFESSING FIRST, as I said previously, it's Jongho giving their relationship his all or nothing.

Those two lines and everything that followed after that was the like cherry on top as an ending for this story. Ughhhh the way they melt into each other, the kisses, just everything😚🤌💓 in fact I think I re-read the last part from them arriving at the beach like five times because I enjoyed it so much before I reblogged this amazing piece of work.

YOU READ IT FIVE TIMES?!??! 🫨😧🥹 THATS THE BEST THING IVE HEARD ALL DAY THANK YOU!! 🩷😭 I really don't know how to convey my gratitude beside saying thank you! Your words, this whole reblog, has really brightened my day (the meme reactions have aslo been highly appreciated, 10/10 laughs)

The tension, both realizing they want more than what they currently got because of the contract, both deciding to break the contract and start dating fully instead, the way you’ve written it all is so full of life and feels so pure in a way. Like I can’t help but feel that both in a way felt like this contract was the only way to be close with their soulmate while also both hating the contract wanting it to be real and then finally it reaches to the point where they confess💕😩

YES! BUT NEITHER WANTS TO GO AGAINST THE RULES (ESPECIALLY NOT THE MC) AND ARE JUST HOPING FOR SOMETHING TO CHANGE SO THEY CAN DATE-DATE!

Mina, truly thank you for writing and sharing this beautiful piece of work you’ve created. I could go on and on about all the little details you’ve added which gives so much life and depth but I’ve been rambling for a while now.

Oh, Esther, I should be thanking you for taking the time out of your day to read and reblog this fic with all of your thoughts! It really means a lot and it's been so fun to read your thought-process, especially when we share the same opinions and "theories" about the characters 🩷😭

Words can’t really describe how much I’ve enjoyed reading this story and I just think your passion and creativity is such a blessing to be allowed to read!

Yeah, no, you are going to make me cry. I'm going to write this down and keep it in my wallet to remember whenever im feeling sad or not finding the motivation to write 🥹🤧 Thank you once again Esther, you are a diamond and the sweetest atiny I know, and I'm so happy I can be your friend

Pretend You Love Me | Choi Jongho

🥂 Summary: Jongho, heir to Choi Clothes, and you are soulmates marked by each other’s names on your wrists since birth. Instead of a fairy-tale romance, you’re stuck in a fake dating contract to restore Jongho’s tarnished image created by scandals. As you navigate public events and play the part of a cute couple, the lines between fake and real blur together. Despite your undeniable chemistry, you refuse to take him seriously due to his reckless past. As the arrangement nears its end, you must confront the truth about your feelings and whether you can move beyond the contract.

🥂 Pairing(s): Badboy!Jongho x Student!Reader

🥂 Genres/Tropes: Soulmate AU, non-idol AU, fake dating AU, fluff, humour

🥂 Warnings/Tags: female reader, no use of (Y/N), the MC goes by the lastname Jeong, Jongho is a rich kid, the MC not so, Jongho smokes and rides a motorcycle, light alcohol consumption, a lot of teasing, pet names (pretty girl, soulmate, sweetheart & Jjong), probably incorrect portrayal of CEOs and charity events (bare with me, i'm just a girl), some kissing

🥂 Wordcount: 9.0K

🥂 Author's Note: Click the image for a higher resolution (Tumblr, I hate you). This is my first time ever writing for Jongho and also the fastest I’ve finished a fic — just 4 days, to be exact! It was a lot of fun playing around with the soulmate idea and turning Jongho into a bad-boy-ish character. I hope you all enjoy the second fic of the Cherry Blossom March Event and feel brave enough to share your thoughts with me! I'm really curious to hear what you think and have to say :3

AO3 Masterpost Moodboard Event taglist

To go out with people widely. It could mean all sorts of things. A person whose presence spreads widely. Someone who possesses the ability to form broad connections and reach far with their impact, whether it be through influence, relationships or personal qualities. To go out with people widely was the meaning behind the chosen hanja of the name Choi Jongho. The same name that was imprinted on your wrist since birth in black and reminded you daily of your other half. Everyone was born with a name on their wrist that assigned them to a soulmate the moment they entered the world. All you had to go by was the names on your wrists and hope it would be someone sane. Everyone didn’t have to worry about that though as some faced a fate worse than death — their soulmate mark written in white. It symbolized the death of their significant other. One would think the word would change into red, like anger and blood, but no. You liked to think the white represented innocence, cleanliness and new beginnings, almost like an angel.

Your soulmate mark was the same since you were welcomed to the world. Wailing loudly and alerting everyone of your arrival. It hadn’t changed over the course of your twenty-five years long life, for better or for worse. Ever since you could remember, you loved listening to the stories of how people met their soulmates. At family gatherings, you would sit on the knee of your relatives and ask them kindly to retell the moment they met their husbands or wives, but your favorite story was always your parents'.

It was a few days before New Years and both of your parents just recently turned eighteen. The biggest snowfall of the year graced Seoul, like a late Christmas miracle, and the streets were swarmed with people enjoying the freezing weather, young and old alike. Your parents hadn’t known each other by then. They lived in the same neighbourhood, but weren’t aware of just how close they were to their soulmates. Your mother, young and happy, gazed up at the snowflakes being pulled by gravity when something cold and hard struck her, followed by horrified gasps. She crouched down, cradling her head, gently pressing against the side where the snowball had hit. A few seconds later, a young man approached her, apologizing and bowing so deeply that he nearly toppled over. It was your father who had launched the snowball at his friend, misaiming and hitting your mother instead.

Little you hoped to experience a romantic encounter with your soulmate as your parents did. You would stay up way past your bedtime and fantasize of meeting your soulmate, coming up with various scenarios that changed every night, but nothing could prepare you for the surge of emotions when your eyes locked. It was your first day of high school and all of the first year students were gathered in the gymnasium, patiently waiting for the principal to call out their names and their respective classes. You sat in the fifth row on the seventh seat, hands clutching the hem of your blue plaid skirt. It was nerve wracking — starting high school, meeting new people and creating friends. Then there was the possibility of finding the one. The principal cleared his throat, probably getting dried from pronouncing all the names right after each other. You pitied him, but that sentiment flew out the window as he moved onto your class. Out of all the three hundred first years and out of your thirty classmates, one of them was named—

“Choi Jongho!” You burst into his office, letting the door bounce off the wall.

The secretary, frantically chasing after you with desperate pleas not to disturb the designated successor of Choi Clothes, stood in the doorway, her face twisted in a mix of fear and nervousness as she failed at her job. Successor, my ass. That man didn’t know anything beyond smoking a pack of Marlboros a day, dodging his responsibilities, and defying his parents. The man in question was currently sitting behind his desk, one ankle propped on his knee, fully decked out in Valentino — a black suit that was probably bespoke, tailored to his fitting. His hair, a natural shade of dark cocoa, was parted down the middle and showcased his forehead while his hands were decorated with various pieces of jewelry, starting with big fat rings on his fingers, a golden watch and a matching bracelet. Jongho didn’t look the least phased by your appearance nor by the loud entrance. In fact, he looked as monotone as ever, but you saw the brief twitch of his fingers. While he was at the company, he wasn’t allowed to take a smoke until lunch or after work and it sure was getting to him.

“Miss Jeong,” came the annoying voice of his secretary as she began reciting the script drilled into her mind from her first day on the clock. “Mr. Choi’s schedule is fully booked this afternoon and he does not have the time to discuss–”

The rest of her sentence was drowned out as you zeroed in on Jongho and raised a brow, silently challenging him to do something. On cue, the stone cold expression morphed into sunlight seeping through an array of thunderous clouds as he broke out in a charming smile and averted his attention to the woman behind you still going on about rules and policies. Gentle as a breeze and with a faux sweetness to his words, he cut her off.

“It’s alright, Eunij. I called her over to plan our date for the evening. We won’t be long, I promise.”

To really secure the win, Jongho flashed her his significant gummy smile that looked sweeter than sugar itself. Jongho knew he was good looking, you knew he was good looking, everyone knew he was good looking, but what they didn’t know was that he used it to his advantage for years. He would flash them a smile warm enough to melt through ice and cheesing eyes that portrayed the sweetest chocolate in the world, but his mouth wasn’t just good for a handsome distraction. More often than not, Jongho would sweet talk his way out of situations. It worked nine out of ten times. The one time it didn’t work was on you.

As expected, Eunji blushed beneath his attentive gaze and your insides turned on fire. The swirls of his name on your skin burned hotter than a blowtorch and no ice bath would save you from the stinging pain. She threw you one last look before closing the door with a gentle click that could barely be heard in the silent room. Being left alone in the solitude of his office and away from the prying eyes of his father’s employees, Jongho allowed the sugary facade to slip like cotton candy dissolving at a brief contact with water. The round eyes of a teddy didn’t find you, but rather a pair belonging to a hungry bear who’s just had his territory disturbed.

Jongho clasped his fingers together and leaned on the mahogany desk, putting his whole weight on it. “I take it you didn’t come here to give me chocolates for White Day?”

Hadn’t you known Jongho for a decade or so, you’d be confused at the teasing remark coming from a man looking anything but in the mood for playing around. You ignored the butterflies fluttering against your stomach and got straight to the point, hoping it would calm the beautiful creatures pushing you to the brink of puking.

“Why did you agree to attend the charity event on my behalf?”

“Because you’re my girlfriend?”

“Fake-girlfriend,” you corrected him and crossed your arms. “I can’t just change my life to accommodate yours, Jongho, this wasn’t the deal. The contract explicitly said we would be under a fake guise until your name was cleared of rumours and scandals.”

“And how do you think that would happen if we don’t play the part of a happy couple? I can’t go on my own, that tells them I’m more available than ever before, especially when we recently went public with the relationship.”

You yielded under his intense gaze and changed the direction of your attention on the shelf to your left displaying various brands of alcohol ranging from pricey Japanese whiskey to Italian wine. The inside of your cheek was caught between your teeth as you contemplated your answer. He had a point, but you didn’t want to boost his already hugemongous ego. Darting your tongue out to lick at your dry lips, you turned back and found his eyes still staring into the depths of your soul as if searching for the red string that tied you together.

“Just… Just ask me next time before you make a decision on your own, okay? That’s all I want.”

The need to defy everyone and everything danced through his veins, yet the rewarding feeling of succeeding to annoy the other party wasn’t as satisfying when you were on the receiving end this time. He flexed his jaw and the hand that slipped beneath the table to rest on his thigh clenched into a tight fist.

“Fine…”

“Thank you.”

That marked the end of your conversation and you took it as your cue to leave. Jongho’s voice calling out your name brought you to a stop. You didn’t let go of your hold on the doorknob, just turned slightly to show him you were listening.

“We’ll pick you up at six PM on Friday and I’ll have Eunji send you the clothes before then.” As if having the ability to read your mind, he quickly added what felt like the most obvious thing in the world. “And yes, the dress is long sleeved.”

That was probably the sole good thing with the contract, besides the paycheck that sold you in the first place. You weren’t picky with the arrangement and went along with everything stated in the agreement — going on a few dates for publicity, holding hands, kissing, posting each other on social media, attending events and galas. Wearing clothes created by Choi Clothes came with the duty of fake-dating the heir of said agency, however you did make it clear you’d only sign the papers if all the clothes were long sleeved, reaching well over your wrist as not to disclose the soulmate mark. The easy money you once thought you’d earn by fake-dating the successor of Choi Clothes turned into a full-time job with no room for slacking off. Just a few more months, you thought and walked out of Choi Enterprises.

It was still hard to wrap your head around everything. You recalled the day they came knocking on your door. A woman and man dressed in expensive clothes that seemed to cost more than the will your parents set aside for you. They introduced themselves as the managers of Mr. and Mrs. Choi, the owners of Choi Clothes. The ice tea you poured in the prettiest set of china you owned were left untouched as the managers — the names you have long since forgotten — explained their unexpected visit. The Chois selected you as the perfect candidate for their little stunt to ensure their son wouldn’t put the entire family line at shame and burn the whole establishment to the ground before he could even acquire the title as CEO.

Your task was, more or less, to be the candy glued to Jongho’s side and together play the part of a couple head over heels for each other. The pair was patient as you bombarded them with questions, meanwhile they only had three — Do you have a soulmate, have you met your soulmate and how is your criminal record? The quiet voice in the back of your mind pointed out how they probably already had the answers, but didn’t want to seem totally uninterested in you.

At first, you didn’t want to do it. Not only were you going to play pretend for a good few months, but you weren’t even allowed to know who you were going to fake-date as they didn’t want you to decline the offer and run your mouth to a newspaper publisher. The fountain pen with gold swirling engravings on its sides looked scary as it lay abandoned beside the pristine contract. That quickly changed when you saw the never ending zeroes slothed after the word ‘total salary’. Your morning shift at the closest seven-eleven that was about to start in thirty minutes flashed before your eyes and you never signed something as fast as you did that contract.

Perhaps you would’ve said no if you knew the heir was going to be none else than your soulmate. The universe worked in miraculous ways and somehow always made sure to lead you back to him. A magnetic pull that steered you in every direction until you would stand before him again.

The weekend came around and so did the event taking place that Saturday afternoon. It would be marked as your second public outing as a couple feeding into the eager eyes and cameras of South Korea. Mr. Oh, Jongho’s designated driver, pulled up in a squeaky clean limousine that looked more out of place than a kitten raised by a group of squirrel monkeys in the Amazon rainforest. Mr. Oh was a kind older man inching closer and closer to his retirement, always wearing a smile and never speaking without referring to others by their titles. In the few and brief encounters you had with the man, he would always greet you with a ‘Hello, Ms. Jeong’ while opening the rear door for you despite being told to just call you by your name. The backseat was already occupied by Jongho sitting in yet another expensive suit.

The suit jacket was black with white tiger-like stripes erupting from his shoulders and reaching all the way down to his midsection. It had six silver buttons, two for practical use while the rest were there for embellishment. Jongho — never one keen on showing too much — chose to keep the jacket buttoned and you wondered how he could endure it, considering he wore a white turtleneck beneath. The pattern wasn’t what caught the eye of the beholder, rather it was the millions of bedazzles covering the whole piece, making it reflect beneath any form of light, identical to the ones on your dress. His hair was styled in a middle part and unveiled his forehead, a sight you had seen a dozen times before, but were still left breathless. It was already established that Jongho was a handsome man, however the suits created by his parents certainly brought out the best of him — accentuating his confidence, breathtaking features and magnetic presence in a way that left everyone in awe.

Jongho brought you back to reality as he did a rundown of the charity event, what questions to expect and what answers to give, the names of some important people you would definitely speak — or at least greet — with tonight and who would exit the limousine first. You definitely missed the way his eyes ran over your figure, seemingly appreciating you in a beautiful dress from the latest spring collection of his parents. The Chois apparently had a knack for chic attires because your dress wasn’t anything over the top either, but would definitely unscrew some jaws. It was strapless and started from your bosom with a straight neckline allowing your collarbones to be captured by the crazy shuttering cameras. The dress was tight around your torso, giving a perfect picture of your figure beneath, but grew loose from your hips and down. The material didn’t stop until it grazed the ground you walked on, despite wearing a pair of black stiletto heels that were made for your feet and clicked with each step you took, announcing your arrival to everyone in a close vicinity.

Speaking of your lower body — your left leg was exposed as a long slit protruded from your upper thigh. Both of your arms were covered in black detachable sleeves reaching up to your mid bicep and cuffing around the cushion of your hand. You almost threw a fit when you took out the dress from its gigantic box and noticed the lack of sleeves on it. You were one phone call away from canceling the whole agreement hadn’t you seen the remaining parts of the attire. To top it off, the Chois gifted you a set of golden jewelry and a black clutch handbag spacious enough to fit your phone, lipstick and wallet. The matching set of earrings, rings and necklace were nothing too outstanding, but enough to take on the elegance of a model.

“We’ll be there for an hour or two and then Mr. Oh will take you home.”

You ignored the part where it was stated Mr. Oh was taking you home and focused on his subtle slip-in of defying his parents’ rules yet again. Your brows furrowed together and Jongho suppressed the need to even out the skin between them. “No, Mr. and Mrs. Choi explicitly said we had to be there until the very end of the event.”

Jongho leaned into his seat and spread his legs further apart until one of his knees touched your thigh. A chuckle void of amusement filled the passenger compartment and he sighed as if you said the joke of the century.

“I think you should relax a little, sweetheart. My parents should be grateful I’m attending in the first place.”

You pursed your lips to keep yourself from giving your input where it clearly wasn’t wished for. Jongho looked out of the window while you admired his side profile. Jongho was the epitome of a whiplash — you never knew when he’d shake you off like a poisonous insect or help you fly as if you were an injured ladybug. His nonchalance left a bitter tang on your tongue, the similar taste after downing a beer you knew you’d puke back up in a few hours, and the imaginary Jongho was crushed in the world you created in your brain.

The karma of thinking such thoughts was instantaneous as the skin beneath your soulmate mark flared to life. You wondered if Jongho experienced repercussions whenever he was treating you badly. The rest of the drive was done in silence safe for the newest global hits playing through the speakers. Four songs later and the limousine temporarily came to a stop before the entrance of a big building looking like something straight out of a movie. A red carpet was rolled out from the doors to the street where everyone’s ride was instructed to stop and let the guests out. Mr. Oh exited first and walked around the oblong vehicle as Jongho simultaneously fixed his suit although it was free of any imperfections.

“It’s showtime, baby.”

The door opened and Jongho stepped out, an array of flashes went off accompanied by the calls of his name — the photographers begging for a crumb of his attention. Jongho straightened his jacket, offered everyone a smile and quick wave before holding out his hand to face the dark heavens. That was your cue. No one really knew who you were outside of being Jongho’s girlfriend and even after you became public, they could find little to no information about you online. Thus, you didn’t expect the clicking of cameras and flashes to multiply in your presence. You grabbed Jongho’s hand per your agreement and stepped out with your exposed leg first then, when you fully exited the limousine — an upgrade from Jongho’s death trap of a motorcycle — you smoothly looped your arm through his and firecrackers erupted on your skin at the contact. You stood tall and got a couple of inches on him thanks to the heels, but he didn’t seem bothered by it and neither was the company otherwise you doubt they would’ve sent it in the first place.

Standing in the centre of attention wasn’t as nauseating as you originally thought it would be and whether you want to admit it or not, it was partially because of Jongho being there to anchor you. It wasn’t his forthe to whisper sweet words of encouragement, but he portrayed his support in other ways such as leading you through the overwhelming photographers, sneaking his arm around your waist and respectfully resting his palm above the curve of your hip. It helped that you rehearsed the events of the night from start to finish with Jongho and wouldn’t be in for a surprise. Taking advice from your favorite childhood movie, you put on the brightest smile of your career and moved along. The audience didn’t need to know you were finding comfort in the famous line from Madagascar.

The inside of the venue was prettier than any other interior you had ever laid eyes on. To be frank, it wasn’t anything exceptional, but the simplicity made it appear so. The main colors of the theme were creme white and beige, and were integrated into everything. The seats were plush chairs made out of velvet material in an ashy shade of beige while the tables were round with white marble tops. There was a path leading straight down the area and separating the room into two occupied with seats on both sides. On the other end of the pathway was a slightly elevated scene where the hosts of the event and guests would give their speeches, and use the smartboard to their liking. The ceiling was the most alluring sight though. Oblong light bulbs hung from the ceiling as sheer garment circled the light in waves. It gave a sense of elegance as well as coziness.

A waiter dressed in a simple black suit offered you champagne on a platter and while you didn’t wish to become drunk, you still needed some alcohol to get through the night, especially when you were going to meet some of Choi Clothes’ most trusted business partners. You both took a glass each and mingled around with Jongho’s arm still glued to you as if it belonged right above the swell of your hip. Not many words, if any at all, were exchanged as you mainly drank in the design of the place while simultaneously ignoring the stares and whispers of the remaining guests, all eyes glued to your forms fitting perfectly with one another like two lost pieces of a puzzle. They were all curious about the pretty lady beneath Jongho’s arm and how the reckless Choi managed to find a girl that would look past his bad habits and disrespectful personality. If only they knew.

Jongho’s situation wasn’t entirely a secret. Everyone knew he was somewhat of a problematic guy with another style of living that wasn’t fit to his parents’ standard. They didn’t feel all too proud waking up to multiple articles of Dispatch flaunting pictures taken of Jongho leaving clubs early in the morning surrounded by boys and girls of all kinds, certainly not the kind to be invited to exclusive fashion events and charities. Jongho hadn’t changed much over the years, if you recalled correctly. He would rarely be present during lectures. He was physically there, but his mind had transcended off to dreamland long before the lesson started. The one interest he had was soccer and even that ended shortly into his second year as he got with the wrong crowd. If someone needed him, he could be found smoking on the roof or behind the back of the school with a handful of students who also had successful parents.

It was sheer luck Jongho was an only child and that his parents were in need of a successor, otherwise he would’ve been kicked to the curb a long time ago. Apparently, the Chois grew sick of his careless behaviour and gave him an ultimatum — clean up his mess or not be signed as an heir to the company. Jongho defied them like always, until his credit card ran empty and he realized his parents wouldn’t relent. He came crawling back with his tail between his legs and agreed to their proposition. You never understood him or why he acted the way he did. He had everything, practically born with a silver spoon in his mouth and it amazed you that the universe decided to tie your souls to each other. Jongho certainly wasn’t the soulmate you expected and your meeting wasn’t anywhere near the romantic encounter your parents experienced.

“Let’s take a seat before the aunties swammer us,” he whispered in your ear and led you to a table with a gentle nudge to the small of your back.

The touch sent plausible tingles of electricity up your spine and the intensity never wavered even when he withdrew his hand to pull out your chair for you — a great play to showcase his inner gentleman. He took his righteous place on your right side, but immediately regretted it. His ploy of escaping the aunties proved to be futile as Mrs. Kang, a good business partner of Jongho’s paternal grandparents, butted into your table and plopped down on the vacant seat beside you despite her name not being on the list and began shooting invasive questions. The older lady wanted to know everything about you — your age, name, workplace, how you knew Jongho, who your soulmate was, if you and Jongho were soulmates. She pulled on the imaginary rubber band attached to Jongho’s wrist until it snapped and rebounded against his skin.

“Mrs. Kang, don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to.”

The chatter around the table quieted down at Jongho’s sharp reply and you acted quickly to ease the tension. You placed your hand over his and gave it a firm squeeze. The motion averted his attention from Mrs. Kang to your stern gaze. A silent conversation ensued between you.

“Stop.”

“She’s the one who started it.”

“I don’t care. It won’t look good for you or your parents.”

Jongho eventually gave in and leaned back in his chair. The sudden cold shoulder on his part was him telling you he wasn’t pleased with the outcome. Not like you cared. Yes, your part of the deal was to be his fake-girlfriend, but you couldn’t just let him do as he wished to the people around him as it would reflect a bad light on you too.

“Welcome everyone to the Fashion For Aid charity event aimed at assisting children in group homes! I want to express my sincere gratitude to everyone for attending on this fine evening…”

The host was a man in his late sixties with a head full of hair and face clean of any. You weren’t paying much attention to what he was saying as you weren’t well versed into the fashion world, but you did your best to at least look immersed in his speech. The man to your right wasn’t looking any more interested than you did and actually managed to sit through the first five minutes of the opening ceremony, until he got bored. After that, he played a game of what-could-Jongho-do-to-annoy-his-soulmate-in-the-fastest-way-possible? He did everything to get on your nerves — drumming his fingers against the edge of the table, staring at you then looking away when you met his gaze, loudly cracking his neck and fingers, and frequently checked his phone. The moment the host finished his lengthy speech and encouraged everyone to visit the table full of sweets and drinks placed on both sides of the room, Jongho jumped from his seat, hand already reaching into the inner pocket of his suit.

“If you’ll excuse me, a man’s gotta use the bathroom.”

“Jongho!” You hissed after him, but he either didn’t hear you or blatantly ignored you. As you moved to follow him, an inkling feeling telling you the bathroom was the last place he was headed for, a wrinkly hand landed on your thigh and successfully stopped you from going after him.

“Oh, honey, it is not worth stressing over him. Youngsters like that boy don’t change and he won’t do it even with a beautiful lady by his side.”

A bucket of water spilled over you and froze all forty-three muscles in your face. You somehow managed to force the corners of your mouth up and fake a smile, but the sincerity was not evident in your eyes.

“I, uhm, don’t want him to change. Really.” You added in the end as Mrs. Kang raised a brow in non-belief. “I like Jongho as he is and I don’t think he needs to change to fit in other people's crowded boxes.”

“If you say so, dear, but… if you’re interested, I have a nephew your age who would suit you much better than Mr. Choi.” She turned in her seat and scanned the crowd for said nephew. A fire lit beneath your chair as she began waving him over.

“Oh, Mrs. Kang, that's not necessary.” The reassuring words fell on deaf ears — literally — and although you weren’t too keen on lying, you already had one rich kid to look after. “I think I heard Jongho calling for me, I’ll be right back!”

Jongho was in fact not calling you over. Jongho was gone, disappeared into thin air and abandoned you in a room full of strangers. It would be a miracle if he hadn’t asked Mr. Oh to drive him someplace, leaving you to figure out your own ride home.

“Fucking hell, Jongho,” you muttered and weaved through the crowd of successful people and nepotism babies.

The venue was so packed with people you couldn’t even try searching for the bathrooms and opted to go back out again. The outside wasn’t void of people either, as some foreign faces stood socializing with each other, drinks in one hand and fat cigars squeezed between the pointer- and middle finger of their other hand. Not searching for more aunties or uncles to flag you down, you walked away from the people to a place that seemed vacant. Who would’ve known the universe was pulling on your red string and leading you in the direction of your soulmate. Turning the corner of the building, you stumbled over the view of Jongho crouched down behind a couple of taller bushes. Much like the other gentlemen, he too had a slim cigarette placed between his lips, dragging the poisonous smoke right into his lungs. You understood why out of all the places, he chose to smoke on the other side of the building. It was less prone to attract the paparazzi searching for something juicy to spread on social media.

Jongho didn’t kill the glowing stick as you appeared in his peripheral vision nor did he show a sign of acknowledging your sudden appearance. You didn’t go out of your way to chastise him for smoking in a public setting either, instead you took a stance beside him while he inhaled the last of the cancer-stick and looked straight ahead. It was already stuffy just standing there in silence, you didn’t need to stare at him with questions swimming in your eyes.

The warm sun of March was replaced by the round and bright moon, allowing a certain frost to the early spring breeze. You crossed your arms over your chest and caressed the exposed skin of your bicep with your thumb in a poor attempt at subduing the coldness. The dress was beautiful, but it certainly wasn’t made for such weather and you were questioning their professionalism as they didn’t give you a coat or any other outerwear. On the other hand, Jongho had been admiring you for the last couple of seconds since you took the place beside him and the sharp goosebumps littered on your body didn’t go unnoticed by him. He balanced the cigarette between his lips and slipped the suit jacket off himself. The rustle of clothes caught your attention and before you could realize what was happening, a newfound warmth wrapped around you followed by a mild fragrance of charcoal, pine needles and espresso.

“You don’t have to–”

“I’m not letting my date freeze her ass off.”

You tried ignoring the harsh squeeze of your heart and a pang of heat blossoming from the center of your chest, sprouting out to the rest of your body. This was just Jongho being kind, nothing more, nothing less. Yet your heart and soulmate mark thought otherwise. The stinging smell of his cigarette was a perfect distraction and your nose scrunched at the awful burn. Jongho needed all of three seconds to take one last drag of the stick, blow it away from your face and throw it to the ground, his expensive boot coming down to turn it to speckles of ash.

“I’m going back inside,” you announced after another minute of silence. “It won’t look good if both of us are missing.”

“Who cares what they think? They’ll always have something to say about me in the end so it doesn’t matter.”

“You don’t have to prove them right, you know?”

You didn’t get another answer after that and decided to take your leave. A warm hand circles around your wrist, their thumb grazing the covered soulmate mark and stopping you in your steps. You turned around, Jongho’s hand still on you but his eyes avoiding yours at all cost.

“...Wanna get out of here?” He eventually asked.

Another beat passed and you pressed your lips together. “We really shouldn’t, Jongho, besides it’s against the contract.”

A genuine laugh escaped him and he moved toward the opposite side of the event, rounding the corner you didn't appear from. “Screw the contract.”

You quickly followed his head, intrigued and worried at where he was headed. Perhaps you got worked up for nothing as a bunch of expensive cars as well as limousines were parked in neat rows, the moonlight reflecting off their polished hoods and trunks.

“Where are you going?” You hissed and bunched one end of your dress to not accidentally step on it and twist your ankle.

“Why don’t you find out?”

How you managed to find yourself in this situation was beyond you. Not once was it stated in the contract that you would need to use Jongho’s death trap as a form of transportation, yet there you were sitting on the back of his motorcycle as he zoomed through the street. It was a miracle he successfully managed to sneak it into the parking lot without having any of the guards or chaperons turning him down. Then again, it was Choi Jongho they were dealing with. What Jongho wanted, Jongho got. Your arms were tightly wrapped around his midsection and your eyes squeezed shut, almost believing the danger of the situation would disappear if you couldn’t see the blur of scenery whiz past you.

Jongho smirked at the feel of you squeezing him to death and he purposefully revved the bike to go faster just to hear your squeaks of fear slip beneath your helmet. He wasn’t even going half the speed he was used to, but he felt just a twinge of remorse for you. The motorcycle slowed down and eventually stopped before a red light.

“You can open your eyes now,” he spoke into the built-in bluetooth in his helmet and placed his hand on your intertwined ones, rubbing his thumb against your knuckles in a soothing motion. The whipping wind was quickly drying your hands and he was cursing himself for the pair of gloves he forgot on the edge of his bed.

You did as told, albeit opening one eye at a time just to make sure he wasn’t sugarcoating the situation. He wasn’t and for once you were happy about being wrong.

“How much more?” You asked, your throat dry and beginning for a sip of water.

“We’re almost there.” The traffic light switched to yellow. “Hold on tight now.”

It took an eternity — twenty minutes — until Jongho put the motorcycle in neutral and turned off the throttle as well as the ignition switch, and allowed the weight of the vehicle to lean on the kickstand. He took off his helmet and ran his fingers through his hair, messing up the gelled strands in the process and placed the helmet on the surface of the fuel tank. You slightly released your grip on him, but were still reluctant to move as you were afraid of somehow falling off the motorcycle or tipping the whole thing over and thus let your fingers hover over his sides. Jongho’s feet were planted on the ground for extra security and comfort, and threw a quick glance over his shoulder to see you sit stiff as a board. He turned away and brought his shoulders up to his ears as he quietly chuckled to himself. The helmet was still on your head and your cheeks mushed by the pillowy cushion inside, making you look like a chipmunk with its cheeks full of nuts.

“I thought you hated her?” He asked through his giggles.

“Huh?”

“The motorcycle. I thought you hated the motorcycle, besides can you let go off me now? Unless you like touching me–”

You didn’t need to hear more to fling your hands in the air. The abrupt motion almost caused you to fall back, hadn't you grabbed Jongho’s shoulders again. It was sheer luck that he was sturdy enough not to lean back from your harsh grip. He laughed again, a chuckle that brought his gummy smile into the moonlight. It was a sound you came to like and wouldn't mind hearing for the rest of your life. The admission caused your ears to burn with embarrassment, and you were grateful that the soulmate connection was limited to the scribbled name on your wrist, not giving your other half the ability to feel your emotions or hear your thoughts.

“Okay, go like this. Place this foot,” he patted the side of your left thigh, “on the ground and swing your other leg over the bike, then carefully step off. Hold onto me until you’re completely off so you don’t fall.”

His instructions were easy to follow and you managed to get off without hurting yourself, him, or damaging his prized possession. The sound of water softly washing up against the sand reached your ears and it was only when you dismounted the motorcycle that you took in your surroundings. The view was nothing short of exceptional. You stood on the sidewalk with stairs leading straight down to the riverside area, giving you a perfect view of the river. It was slightly blurry and you couldn't quite figure out why. As your hand subconsciously reached up to rub your eyes, you accidentally brushed against the visor. Unsure how to remove the helmet without discomfort, you decided to simply slide the visor up instead.

The Mapo Bridge was even prettier at night, with its blue and purple lights twinkling beneath the dark sky. At least a hundred cars drove across the bridge in the few minutes since you arrived and the sound of their tires and whirring motors added a sense of tranquility to the setting. The prettiest of it all were the cherry blossoms slipping off the branches of the Prunus serrulata trees. The ground was covered in pink and white petals, and some even landed in your hair. It was magical.

It dawned on you just where Jongho had brought you — Yeouido Hangang Park. While you were busy taking in every little detail of the scenery, Jongho retrieved his keys from the ignition and stopped beside you. He buried them in the pockets of his pants to prevent you from noticing he was fidgeting with the keys, thus keeping his dignity intact. He couldn’t have you going around thinking you were the reason behind the butterflies fluttering in his stomach and whether that was true or not would stay with Jongho, and Jongho only.

“It’s beautiful,” you breathed out.

Jongho hummed in agreement, yet his eyes didn’t budge from your form. It didn’t matter that you wore stiletto heels with a designer dress, a suit jacket multiple sizes too big for you and a sports helmet on your head — you looked as beautiful as the first day he met you, all those years ago in high school. He cleared his throat and stepped in front of you, the pads of his fingers gently grazing the skin beneath your chin as he unclasped the straps of your helmet. The little click snapped your attention to his eyes full of focus that shifted from your chin up to your lips, and lastly your eyes. As if stuck in a trance unable to look away, you drowned in the warmest hue of brown molded out of the richest cacao beans in the world. Jongho slowly took hold of your helmet and began pushing it upwards, but with a gentleness you hadn’t witnessed before. He was so careful and the imagination of having your head ripped off your body didn’t come to life.

“Thank you,” you whispered as he successfully removed the gear.

“No worries… I’m sure my mom would have my head if I let a lady walk around in designer clothes with a cheap helmet on.”

Although his intentions weren’t to tickle your belly, the sound of your laughter spread a fervor through his body and shone light on the darkest parts in him. It was contagious and he found his own lips curling up, eyes cheesing and that angelic voice of his handing out gleeful melodies to the few people taking a late-night stroll in the park.

“Come on, let’s take a walk.” He held out his hand for you to take and you did without a second thought. “I meant your heels, but lucky for you I have two hands.”

You began withdrawing your hand, but Jongho had already laced your fingers together and refused to let go.

“You're unbelievable,” you muttered, pretending the heat of embarrassment wasn't attacking your cheeks.

“I could live with that.”

Jongho pulled you along toward the flight of stairs and patiently walked with you. It didn’t matter that it took five minutes to reach the bottom because he was with you every step of the way and if you said anything otherwise, Jongho would’ve argued the night was still young and that the five minutes were worth it as he got to spend them with you. He was lucky his parents chose a candidate who wasn’t insecure of themselves to the point they apologized for every minor inconvenience, because Jongho wasn’t sure how the sweet words would fit his unruly persona. The first three steps on the sand made you change your mind and you quickly removed the heels, flexing your stiff feet and releasing a breath of relief. The expensive pair of footwear were handed to Jongho who hooked his pointer- and middle finger in the heel counter while his other set of fingers were still braided with yours.

“It’s nice here,” you admitted and looked out on the river. The other side was covered with a bunch of buildings, much like the ones behind you, and looked like a scene straight out of a movie. Where the lights of the apartments, universities and hospitals took on the looks of the stars above.

“Mmmmm, it’s quiet and empty.”

“Do you come here a lot?”

Jongho pondered for a moment. “Sometimes… I can think easier when there aren’t a bunch of people breathing down my neck, plus the ride here helps me clear my head.”

“It’s overwhelming, right? I mean being in the spotlight constantly and having your every move watched from an early age, no?”

He shrugged. “It was at first, but… I stopped caring after a while and people stopped expecting things from me.”

You hummed in understanding and let the gentle waves wash over the conversation. The curiosity you once carried with you concerning Jongho’s defying personality simmered down to nothing and you realized it wasn’t a topic you should venture in on just yet. Instead, you changed it to something less serious.

“You know, I didn’t think we’d see each other after high school, but look at us now. Holding hands beneath the stars… Are you perhaps starting to like me, Jjong?”

One end of Jongho's lips curled into a shit-eating grin and his tongue poked the inside of his cheek, and you couldn't tell if it was from the nickname or from bringing up old high school memories. Jongho’s walking slowed down until both feet were planted on the sand, not bugging despite you being half a step ahead of him. You looked over your shoulder to see what was the reason for stopping.

“I don’t know whether to be offended or flattered by the fact that you think I’m just now starting to like you.”

He shortened the distance between you, leaving barely any room for air to squeeze past your bodies. His thumb traced a never-ending circle across the back of your hand and your heels had long since dropped onto the sand, giving him the freedom to cradle the side of your face. Your breath hitched in your throat and your heart seemed to sprout a pair of angel wings, soaring in your chest at the contact of his skin on yours.

"To answer your question, soulmate, I’ve liked you since the day I saw you in that gymnasium." Jongho's eyes traveled over your face, giving each feature and detail equal attention, as if he wanted to memorize your beauty as though it were a cheat sheet for an exam. "You were dressed in that cute school uniform, your hair braided and kept out of your face, and you looked absolutely sick to your stomach. That’s when I knew our souls were made for each other. I didn’t even need to know your name or look at your wrist. I just knew."

The world went silent around you. The sloshing of water, the chorus of cute laughter and the moving vehicles were muffled sounds that didn’t reach your ears. A furious heat crawled up your back and neck, nipping at your cheeks until you were on the brink of burning up like a firework, but the rest of your body — your fingers, toes, nose and ears — were freezing cold. A massive star nearing the end of its life cycle suddenly exploded and your hearing came back. The air that had caught in your throat was let out as Jongho’s words settled in your mind.

“Jongho,” you lamely whispered in return.

The secret you had carried for years turned out not to be much of a secret after all, and the hundreds, thousands, of people you thought you were fooling day in and day out weren’t deserving of that title. Because the biggest fool out of them all was you.

“You knew all along?”

Jongho shrugged and tore his eyes from your dumbfounded expression down to your wrist. “It wasn’t hard to figure out.” His thumb slid up beneath your detachable sleeves, exposing the name you kept hidden for years. “I mean, it isn’t everyday I hear about a pretty girl with my name tattooed on her wrist and hers on mine.”

You didn’t know what to focus on first. The fact that he called you a pretty girl, his thumb caressing your soulmate mark or him knowing you were destined together since high school. Your tongue darted out to lick at your bottom lip and his eyes were quick to follow the brief movement. He swallowed thickly and forced them up again.

“I take it you knew too?”

You nodded in return. “When they called out your name in the assembly and I caught the side of your face.”

“I’m happy you didn’t approach me then,” he suddenly admitted and chuckled as your brows pinched together. “Fate brought us together in the end.”

“But we aren’t together-together.”

“Last time I checked, you pretty much signed a contract to date me.”

“Fake-date you.”

The tongue poking the inside of his cheek looked ten times more attractive beneath the moonlight, and you wanted nothing more than to run your hand through his hair and kiss that darned smirk off his face. Perhaps the soulmate bond went further than a name scribbled on the outer layer of your skin, because your wish wasn’t too far from Jongho’s. He, too, wanted to get a taste of your lips. To have some remnants of your lipstick smudge against his and guess the flavor of it — maybe strawberry or cherry, though he always took you for a coconut girl.

He rolled his eyes and nodded. “Okay, fake-date then… Better?”

Not in the least.

“Much better.”

“It’s not for me,” he quickly added.

“Why?”

Jongho inhaled a sharp intake of air and waited, playing the scene out in his mind and weighing out his options before puking his thoughts and feelings out in an almost vacant park. “Because… I want to do stuff with you. To hold your hand, take you out on dates, kiss you, hug you and just be with you like a real couple. I want to know that the look you have when you’re with me is real, that it isn’t just a job for you. I need to know that you want me as much as I want you.”

“I have always wanted you,” you confessed shakily. “Before I even knew you, Jongho. There was nothing more I wanted than to find my soulmate and that hasn’t changed. Even when I did find you and lost you at the same time, that desire still lived within me. It still does… And when I found out you were the rich kid who needed a fake-girlfriend, it felt like the world was laughing in my face, but I realized it was giving me a second chance. Us a second chance.”

Now it was Jongho’s turn to look dumbfounded. You took his silence as a sign to continue.

“And all you had to do, Jjong, was ask. Even now. Just ask for what you want.”

The man stared at you as if heaven were beneath your fingertips, as if a single touch of your finger would bring him eternal peace and serenity. You were truly the most beautiful woman he had ever laid eyes on and no one else could compete with your beauty — even if they were sculpted by Aphrodite herself. Jongho was never a listener — always defying and doing as he pleased. Yet this one time, the one time, he would be darned if he didn’t.

“May I kiss you?”

“Please.”

The stars aligned as his lips gently pressed against yours. Jongho was right, you tasted like coconut and it had him craving for more, yet the fear of pushing you away was greater than his need. The fingers of your free hand tangled into the side of his shirt to steady your swirling mind, but did little for your erratically beating heart. Jongho wasn’t rough nor eager to ravage your mouth with his tongue, rather on the contrary. It was a soft and lingering kiss that tested the waters. You parted to inhale air before diving in for another kiss, this one a little more urgent and daring than the first, but equally sweet. Jongho’s tongue swiped at your bottom lip and you tilted your head sideways while allowing him access. Even now with his tongue exploring your mouth, the kiss didn’t change from intimate to hungry. A fire was set in your lungs that ached for oxygen and you were left with no choice but to break apart. Jongho rested his forehead against yours, noses brushing and heavy gasps for air fanning your faces.

“You drive me crazy,” he said between breaths.

“I’m not… doing anything.” You had to fight the smile threatening to dance across your lips. This was a whole new side to Jongho, a side you had never seen before but wouldn’t trade for the world.

“Precisely and you still make me lose my mind.”

The stubborn smile eventually broke through and Jongho huffed out a chuckle at the gleeful expression. I’m-not-doing-anything his ass. His thumb caressed the soft skin of your cheek once and twice, but froze in motion as you asked him a question.

“Did you really mean everything you said earlier? About the contract, I mean.”

“Yes,” he answered in a heartbeat. “If I could, I would terminate the contract, but keep this. Keep us.”

A beat passed and then another. Your thoughts were flying wild, narrowly avoiding each other and the explosion that would ensue.

“Let’s do it then,” you eventually said. That was the second bravest thing you had done in your life. The first would be signing the contract while running on four hours of sleep. “Let’s do it for real.”

Jongho gauged your expression, searching for any sign of uncertainty or regret. When he couldn’t find even a hint of either, he pressed his lips against yours. Affection, joy, and excitement poured into the kiss, and Jongho hoped you would feel at least half of it. Unbeknownst to the new couple, two people stood by Jongho’s motorcycle. The man wore a fancy black suit, while the woman’s dress elegantly hugged her curves as she stood effortlessly in her heels. A set of black sunglasses obscured their eyes, despite the fact that the sun had long since exchanged places with the moon. The pair seemed out of place in Yeouido Hangang Park surrounded by people dressed in casual clothing. Passersby noticed it too, shooting them strange looks, but neither of them cared. Their attention was fixed on the couple brought together by destiny.

“I knew she was the one for him,” the man proudly admitted and puffed out his chest.

The woman beside him scoffed. “Please, I was the one who found her Linkedin and recognized her name from Mr. Choi’s wrist.”

The pair gave them one last look before turning around and clambering back into the limousine, which drove them straight to the charity event. They had left the party in a hurry the moment they noticed the absence of the successor of Choi Clothes and his fake girlfriend — or should they say, his real girlfriend?

#feedback: pretend you love me #[☀️] my esther #ateez x reader #choi Jongho x reader #ateez #choi jongho #fanfiction #drabble #oneshot

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