#as mentioned in the previous ask I feel a bit more comfortable writing for different fandoms and throwing them under a “misc”
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mrpenguinpants · 23 days ago
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I love ur posts sm! Can you do kazuha, xiao and arlecchino (separately) w a reader who apologies a lot? (Hcs) Ty!!!!! If u dont want to it's fine :) also do you write for every character??? Because Ive checked ur rules but there wasnt a list (or I didnt looked very well...) Anyways, BYEEE :D
I'm just going to answer this early but yes, I write for every character except the children-looking characters (ex. Qiqi, Diona, Nahida, etc.) Even if it's platonic, it feels weird writing about a kid no matter how old they're supposed to be in game. That doesn't mean I won't include them, so if you want to use them as a plot device (like Klee with Albedo), I'm all for that. As long as your requested character is someone else, it's totally cool with me.
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kajibunny · 5 months ago
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⋆🌷🫧⋆。° intrusive thoughts 💭₊˚ෆ (hayato suo x reader)
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collab piece for amor's event, ORQUÍDEAS
PENSAMIENTOS INTRUSIVOS - yesterday, today, tomorrow; unwanted thoughts oftentimes linger through your mind. after rough experiences with love, he's more than ready to show you how much he loves you to make those intrusive thoughts fly away.
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✿ contains: very suggestive content (towards the end), mentions of previous toxic relationships, slight angst (with comfort), f!reader, suo being a hopeless romantic (fluff) ✿ a/n: first time joining an event (so honored to join, thank you amor!) and writing a full piece dedicated for suo ♡ for my suo girlies out there, ya'll are among the sweetest and nicest people! you deserve suo's unconditional love~ ✿ wc: 1.1k
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yesterday ─�� ✧
you've never known a guy as mature as suo. in fact, all you've ever known are rowdy immature guys who have no plans, no vision for the future, and no idea how to treat a woman right. 
however, suo is a pure contrast to all of them. at first glance, one would say he's an absolute gentleman. disciplined, extremely intelligent, perceptive, and not to mention handsome. truly the perfect package.
the only catch? he is too good to be true. suo is the most mysterious and enigmatic person you've ever met. it also didn't help that he has a reputation for being a tease and a bit of a liar. 
it's true that he has lied quite a lot, but never about his feelings for you. 
suo professed his love for you months ago, and had started courting you for quite some time now. he knew you wanted him as well, even though you refused to give in to him out of your own personal trust issues with men in the past, which made it difficult for you to believe him.
you didn't believe suo when he told you he could treat you right, like the empress that you are. 
you didn't believe suo when he said he'd give you the world, make you feel special like you deserve.  
you didn't believe suo when he said that things would be different with him. he says that he would love you with his whole heart, and take you up the staircase to adulthood, whatever that meant.
"prove it to me." you challenged, with no expectations in your thoughts, as flowery words only meant so little to you. 
his reply was steady, full of confidence. 
"of course, darling. for you, i'll do whatever it takes." 
he calls you his 'darling' like he means it, and looks at you like you were the most precious rare jewel in the world.
suo’s words were promising, but you knew better than to fall for mere promises. you had been let down one too many times before. if he wanted your trust, he would have to earn it.
actions spoke louder than words, so he would have to find a way to convince you. you've been through so much heartbreak and toxicity that you just found yourself so hesitant to let anyone else in. 
today ── ✧
they definitely didn't call suo a "master of negotiation" for nothing. 
he showed up to your home with a large bouquet of flowers, a mix of reds and purples, which perfectly complemented his burgundy toned hair.
"what's this for?" you ask, perplexed at him suddenly gifting you with such an eloquent set of flowers. they seemed like they cost a fortune too. the bouquet was wrapped in embossed paper and high quality silk ribbons, because suo wanted only the best for you.
"these orchids are a symbol of your elegance and beauty, these roses are a symbol of my passion and desire for you, and the heliotropes represent my everlasting devotion." suo explains, handing the flowers over to you.
he is obviously well-versed in flower language. could this man be any more perfect? 
a mixture of wonder and disbelief were reflected in your eyes. "for me?" you admire each beautiful fresh flower, softly running your fingertips through the petals. 
none of your past lovers had ever gotten you flowers before, and one of them even once forgot your birthday. so this was something totally new to you. 
"you told me to convince you, so here i am, trying to convince you." he smiled, his charming, captivating, signature suo smile. 
you blush at his gesture. "thank you suo, you really didn't have to, but that's very thoughtful of you." 
"do i get a kiss as a token of gratitude?" suo asks, a playful grin spreading across his face as he leans in slightly.
you roll your eyes, trying to suppress the smile tugging at your lips. "don’t push it, hayato." you reply.
suo’s eyes widen slightly, taken aback not only by the way you casually used his first name but also by the unexpected moment when you tiptoed and pressed a kiss to his cheek.
maybe suo really is a better negotiator than you thought. well, he certainly had his way of convincing you, that's for sure. 
tomorrow ── ✧
you weren't certain when you started to notice it, but the pain of heartache that had once felt so overwhelming now seemed like a fading shadow. gradually replaced by a quiet sense of peace, as if your heart was finally learning to heal and make room for something new, something better.
something like hayato suo. 
both of you were definitely ready to take the next step, imagining a future together. (maybe this was what he meant by the 'staircase to adulthood' that he kept talking about so much.)
he cherished you dearly, his kisses always so soft and gentle. he held you with tender fingers, like you were fine china. night after night, he lapped at you hungrily, like you were the sweetest tea he'd ever drank. in suo's bed the both of you lay, him basking in your beautiful afterglow. 
"you're so cute." he said, stroking your hair. "but you know what would make you even cuter? if i kiss you right now." 
"is kissing all you ever think about, hayato?" you sigh.
suo shrugs. "ever since i fell in love with you, yes, i believe it's all i ever think about."
"how did you end up falling for me, hm?" you nuzzle against his chest, hearing the faint sound of his heartbeat.
"i'm not sure, either. maybe you put some type of love potion in my tea?" he replies to you, his hand reaching for yours, intertwining your fingers with his. 
"stop, i did not, that seems more like something you would do, hayato!" you giggle, playfully giving him a light shove on the shoulder. 
he chuckles in response and leans in closer, his voice dropping to a whisper. "the ancient spirit in my eye says we should kiss now."
curious, you tilted your head and ask, "did it now? tell me, what's really under your eyepatch, anyway?" 
"darling, you already saw what's under my clothes and now you want to see what's under my eyepatch, too?" his gaze locks in with yours, a teasing glint present in suo's eye. 
before you could respond, he presses his lips against yours. afterwards, suo proceeded to place a kiss on your ring finger that is adorned with an antique promise ring. a matching set to his antique earrings, which he slid around your finger the moment you told him you were ready to accept his affections. 
you have suo totally and irrevocably wrapped around your finger, literally and figuratively. he has always promised himself to you since yesterday, today, tomorrow, and always.
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© kajibunny 2024 / all rights reserved
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buckys-little-belle · 10 months ago
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Hi!! I love your story’s and am always looking for little and daddy Bucky story’s!! I was wondering if you could do insecure reader who’s bigger. She has bigger thighs a bigger tummy and face. Could you do reader is scared to sit on buckys lap or for him to pick her up and carry her around the house. She’s too scared she’s heavy and will crush him and his legs. or that he will drop her because she’s too big. She also never cuddles and sleeps with him in his room always sleeping in her room after he puts her to bed because she’s scared about her breathing or how she sleeps.
Bucky gets her to tell him why and then comfort. Just fluff fluff fluff. If your not comfortable writing this I totally understand!!! If you do could you ad paci use? Thank you!!! Sorry for the rambling…
Strongest Man Alive
Bucky Barnes x Plus Sized!Little!Reader (She/Her Pronouns Used)
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Notes - This is not my best work, and has been in my drafts for MONTHS, it's something cute, and a little angsty at the beginning, but it does get super fluffy at the end. It's a little bit different than my usual writting style, so I apologize for that, but I do hope you like it and if not I'm so sorry! I hope I did this ask justice, and I hope everyone is having a good week!!! <3
Warnings - Talks of reader being self conscious for being 'bigger', kept very vague as she uses the words "heavy" and "squishy" to describe her body type instead of more concrete descriptions, the use of a pacifier is very brief as it's something I'm not used to writing, though I would be willing to continue, mentions of reader eating food "snacks" and "sandwich" though never specified, FLUFF at the end, but there is a moment of angst, I DON'T KNOW IF THIS IS A COHEARANT STORY, it's from the drafts and I gave it a once over and I think it's 'good enough' so I apologize if it's terrible <3
SFW - Please keep all interactions with this post, and this blog, SFW.
. ☾ . ☆ . ☽ . ☆ . ☾ . ☆ . ☽ . ☆ . ☾ . ☆ . ☽ .
Y/n often spent their time at the Avengers tower sitting, standing, lingering around Bucky Barnes. It wasn't on purpose, the man just seemed to be the other half of some magnet imbedded deep in Y/n's heart. He just had some ability to pull her towards him.
Maybe it was the way he cut her sandwiches into perfect triangles, or the way his hand always found hers when she got scared. Maybe it was the way he seemed to be reserved around anyone but her that made her feel so connected to him.
He never sulked but always seemed to walk around with a frown stuck on his face, only ever changing it to a smile when she walked by his office or stopped by his room.
As much as Y/n felt like she was pulled to him, Bucky felt it multiplied by 100. His hands always aching to hold hers, his chest always feeling heavy when he began to think about her needing something and him not being around to help her.
The whole tower knew about Y/n's regression. Wanda and Peter often joined in, hanging out in little space and colouring in books Tony had provided, watching whatever new animated movie had just come out and sleeping over in makeshift tents in the living room.
Often other Avengers would help supervise activities, Steve loved playing action fighters in the common areas, Nat loved cuddle puddle on the couch, and Thor was always ready for a park day. Bucky on the other hand liked to stay in the shadows, buying stickers for the group of littles, making them lunch and dropping it off.
Bucky only stuck around if Y/n asked him to hang out with her. "Bucky can you hold my hand?" She had asked him when at the park, he of course grabbed her hand and helped her up the jungle gym.
"Bucky can you open this please?" She had whispered during a movie, her baggie full of snacks too difficult to manage on her own. He opened the baggie and held it in his own grasp, handing her a piece of candy anytime she had finished the previous one.
"Bucky will you colour with me?" She had yelled her ask one day when he was passing by the kitchen, Y/n sat at the island with markers scattered across the marble. He silently sat down and diligently coloured the page she had given him, helping her chase markers that had fallen.
He knew she was comfortable asking for what she wanted, and he knew she wasn't afraid of him ... so, it made his chest tighten every time she asked him to grab something from the top shelf instead of asking to be lifted like Wanda and Peter often asked.
He also felt off every time a little would come running out of their room after a nightmare, rushing into someone's room for a cuddle, yet Y/n's door never opened and neither did his.
Bucky was sure it was his fault she didn't seek him out for cuddles, he thought he had done something wrong when she never asked for a hug. Was it his arm? Was she scared he would turn on her? He couldn't figure it out.
That is until he realised she never asked anyone for a cuddle, or a hug. Nat, Wanda, and Peter would be all comfy on the couch and Y/n would be sat on the chair, a small frown on her face yet she never tried to find a spot next to her friends. And when she scraped her knee on the playground she declined Thor's offer of a "healing" hug.
"Y/n?" His voice was quiet but direct as he called out into the playroom, Y/n sat on the softly coloured rug, her stuffed animals scattered about.
"Hi Bucky!" She smiled, her pacifier tumbling out of her mouth and onto the ground.
"Hi." He sat down across from her, quickly pocketing the fallen pacifier before sought out the, now, dirty thing. "What are you playing?" His hands brushed a stuffed teddy, Y/n tilting her head in confusion as she looked around her.
"'m just dressen 'm up." She smiled at him, grabbing a stuffed unicorn and brushing it's fur back into place, shuffling closer to Bucky as she gathered a few other stuffed animals.
The moment her knees hit his she shifted back, so Bucky shifted his towards her again. Like clockwork she moved and left a small gap between them. "Y/n?"
"Mhm." She looked back at him, her smile one he could easily read through.
"Am I scary?" He asked calmly, not once loosing eye contact as she shook her head 'no'. "Do I smell?" He asked, this time with a laugh.
"No!" She giggled.
"Then why do you run every time I touch you." Instead of answering she bowed her head, hands running over the stuffed animal anxiously. "Why don't you hug Wanda or Peter?" He was worried that all the questions would make her want to run, but as she huffed and leaned into his space slightly he continued. "I know Thor was pretty sad when you declined his hug the other day." That one wasn't a lie, the man had gone on a rant about how he thought he had done something wrong, how he was sure Y/n hated him.
"I jus', I don' want them t' be mad." She admitted, huffing at the end of her sentence. "'m jus', 'm heavy, an' squishy. Wanda and Pete aren't heavy an' squishy." She admitted, eyes locked on the wall, the stuffed unicorn held a little closer to her body.
"What do you mean Baby?" Bucky asked, confused as to what she was alluding to.
"It's harder t' pick me up." She finally looked back at him, tears beginning to gather along her waterline. "And cuddling wif me wouldn' be th' same." She shrugged, trying to play it off like she wasn't bothered by her own words.
The tightness in Bucky's chest didn't ease up with his answer, his worry only growing. He had hoped it was an easy thing to fix, yet knowing Y/n didn't hug her friends, or him, because she felt too big made him hurt. "Baby," He began, not giving Y/n a second to doubt him, he picked her up and sat her in his lap. "you aren't 'too heavy' to pick up." He hated how quickly she curled into his chest, how clear it was that she was missing human connection. "I'm the strongest man alive, and you saying that you're too heavy is going to bruise my ego a bit, Baby." They both laughed, a few of Y/n's tears hitting the fabric of Bucky's shirt.
"I thought Steve was th' strongest man alive?"
"I let him win when we arm wrestle." Bucky admitted, causing Y/n to break out into a fit of giggles.
"'m gonna tell him!" She stood up, bolting for the door.
"Oh no you don't!" Bucky ran after her, lifting her off her feet in the middle of the hallway, Y/n pausing with a gasp, bracing for the two of them to fall, yet laughing along with Bucky as jostled her around, threatening to take her new colouring page off the fridge if she told anyone his secret.
After a pinky promise and some juice Y/n began to trust Bucky a little bit more. She let him pick her up at the playground, and gave him a hug before bed every night. She still worried her hugs were 'bad', that maybe no one would want to hug her because she wasn't 'little' but Bucky never once complained, instead asking for hugs in the morning too.
It took her a while to truly trust that Bucky wasn't lying when he said his back didn't hurt after picking her up, but eventually she became comfortable enough to run and jump into his arms, something she had always dreamed of doing.
It wasn't until a month later that Bucky woke up at 4 am to the sound of Y/n's hurried footsteps rushing to his door. Light creeping in from the opened door she didn't close as she ran to his bed. The sound of soft cries and whispers of "Nightmare" filling the usually quiet space.
Instead of letting her think too much about how she 'should' be cuddling, Bucky just scooped her up and tucked her into his bed, letting her know he'd protect her, and her stuffed animal. He liked having her in his room, it made him feel at ease knowing she was close.
After a few months of staying in Bucky's room, Y/n began to get out of her shell a bit more, hugging Wanda and Peter, and eventually accepting Thor's 'healing' hugs. She finally joined in during the weekly cuddle puddle, laughing along side Nat and her friends as they all got cozy on the couch. And for the first time ever she let someone else, the second strongest man alive, Steve Rogers pick her up. A pride filled movement the man would never forget.
Even though it took her a little longer than everyone else to be comfortable hugging and snuggling, she was happy to finally be apart of the group in ways she wasn't before. Bucky, the man who still often stayed in the shadows, helping from a distance, couldn't help but feel a little lighter every time he saw his girl get over her worries, knowing if anything got to be 'too much' she'd come running to him.
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satoruzip · 3 months ago
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jjk men as your boyfriend <3
Satoru would be the type of boyfriend who spends a bunch of money on you. Every time you look at a piece of clothing, it’s in your closet the next day. You’ll mention something you wanted but couldn’t afford, and Satoru made sure you got it. You started feeling a bit bad at some point because he was buying you so many things. “Toru..this is really sweet, but I didn’t need all this. Maybe lay off on the gifts for a bit.” you’d snicker. “How longs a bit?” he would say smiling. Holidays were absolutely ridiculous. Even after begging Satoru to calm down with the crazy displays, he still spoiled the hell out of you. I think Toru would be more of a hugger and cuddler. He’s always latching on to you and slipping between your arms.
Nanami would be such a gentleman. Opening doors for you, zipping up your dresses, and helping you put on your shoes, even if you didn’t ask. He would take you out to fancy dinners, and when you weren’t feeling that, you two would sit on the balcony and eat a dish he prepared for you. He definitely pays most of the time but doesn’t mind if you decide you want to treat him. He’s so sweet and constantly makes sure you’re comfortable. “Those heels aren’t bothering you, honey?” “Are you sure you don’t want my jacket?” He’s just so perfect and is a wonderful boyfriend. Nanami loves kisses. Even a simple kiss to the forehead makes his day and he especially loves it when you kiss his cheek before he leaves for work.
A bit controversial, but I think Sukuna would be a good boyfriend…he’s a little crazy and very blunt, but I feel he can be sweet in his own way. Your favorite dishes are always prepared by Uraume for dinner, just as you like them. Sukuna is overprotective and views you as “his.” He constantly asks where you're going and why you’d do something without him. in public, he stands behind and glares at everyone who even looks remotely in your direction. He compliments you sometimes, too. “Why don’t you wear that dress every day?” “Your hair is different.” Very strange but so cute! I also feel like he would love holding your hand. He pretends he hates it, but loves the feeling of your hands in his.
a/n- sorry this is so late school is kicking my ass :( i’m so grateful for all the love on my previous works and hope you all enjoy this ! this was very fun to write so lmk if you guys want more. it’s a bit of a long one but i love it <3 requests are always open ^^
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generalsmemories · 1 year ago
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THE MILESTONE EVENT REQUEST (LOVE THE IDEA BTW):
Fluff sentences 6+8
AND ..!
Fluff scenario 2
WITH IL DAN HENG + GN! READER
Good luck (⁠。⁠•̀⁠ᴗ⁠-⁠)⁠✧
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Intertwined
✧ Imbibitor Lunae!Dan Heng x gn!reader
✧ prompts used: "you're so warm." "i hear you, but we really need to get up, love." + "youre going to get sick if you keep coddling me" "and you're just going to get worse if i don't..." + playing with their hair until they fall asleep || 1k event
✧ content: established relationship, fluff, humor, sick!fic, the reader is the one sick here, mentions of other characters (astral express family), personal headcanons for dan heng (literally only the fact that his blood runs cold)
✧ a/n: crank the fluff meter up cause everything i write about dan heng whether in his IL form or normal form is just fluff. thanks for joining the milestone event anon! i hope this was a comfortable read - not beta-read as well yeehaw.
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Dan Heng can feel an added weight on him - a weight that wasn't there the previous evening when he went to bed. He can also feels the unusual warmth of the hands splayed on his back. The sudden weight and difference in temperature on his normally cold skin makes him blink his eyes open.
The only sight he's greeted with however, is the top of your head as you rest on top of him. Your hands had wormed themselves underneath his shirt to seek solace against his cool skin - It's not unusual for you to sneak into the archives to sleep alongside him, mostly on the claim that he was the perfect temperature to hug since his body temperature was naturally cooler in his real form. However, his ears twitch a bit when he hears your low groan when he tries to maneuver the two of you around, Dan Heng stopping in his tracks to actually take a good look at you.
There's a slight flush to your face, and while you look relatively peaceful right now, your eyebrows furrow everytime he tries to move - snuggling closer to him whenever he tries to pry you away from his body. The action makes him let out a defeated sigh, bringing up a hand to gently brush the hair that's been sticking to your face due to sweat away before pressing his palm to your forehead.
The effect is almost immediate, the furrow in your brows receding from his cool touch - but Dan Heng's own eyebrows knit together in concern when he feels how hot you are. He retracts his hand while looking around the futon in search of his phone, but the twists and turn of his body eventually manage to wake you up, "... Dan Heng...?" you murmur, and the Vidyadhara stops in his tracks to focus his attention back on you, "Good morning, how are you feeling?" he asks in a low whisper, maneuvering his hand to rest on the back of your neck which makes you shiver from the difference in temperature.
"I could be better," you say with a laugh, dropping your head back down on his stomach after Dan Heng manage to wriggle you further down his body so he can at least sit up on the futon, "You're so warm, so I was able to sleep better," you utter, words muffled from having your face buried in his shirt.
"... Yeah, you're really sick," Dan Heng confirms once he hears the one comment about his temperature - because you out of everyone should know the fact that his body temperature ran colder than an average human, "But we need to get up, love. Or more specifically, I have to get up to grab something for that cold of yours," he tells you, gently prying your arms away from his waist so he can stand up, but you weakly try to wrap them back around him with a low whine, "No," you protest meekly, eyes still too hazy to comprehend what you're doing, but still firm in staying close to him.
"Don't act so stubborn now, I'm only going to be away for a couple of minutes at most," he reprimands you, already having wormed himself away from you and standing up, but you still manage to meekly grab at his tail before he can scurry off, "... Then take me with you..."
Yeah, that's not happening.
"... Fine I'm not going anywhere, just lay back down for now. You move more than this and you're just going to get worse," he reminds you, pushing you softly aside so that you can lay down on his futon properly, summoning his tail so it can wrap around your waist - a small giggle leaving your lips when the you're able to grab the end to hug, letting a sigh of relief at the cooling sensation against your own heated body.
It doesn't take long before you doze off again, which lets Dan Heng fish out his phone from underneath the pillow you're currently laying on and sending a message to the groupchat.
The Astral Express Family
[Dan Heng]
[Name] is sick and they won't let me out of their sights. Can anyone grab some medicine and come in here later with some food? There's also some medicine Bailu helped me make when I was visiting the Luofu in the medicine cabinet if someone could grab that as well - should help with general fevers.
[Himeko]
I'll ask Pom-Pom to make some congee, how are they doing?
[Dan Heng]
Could be better, they're just a bit out of right now. Some medicine and good rest should be enough.
The Vidyadhara puts the phone aside after informing everyone before leaning over to assess your condition. Your breathing is still shallow, and your temperature is still hot - but at least you're not waking up from sudden movements from him.
Dan Heng eventually settles himself down beside you, propping his elbow up to rest his cheek against his closed fist. His free hand coming up to brush through your hair to help you sleep better.
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There's a knock at the archives door around an hour later, and Dan Heng merely utters a quiet, "Come in," before the door slides open and Welt walks in with a sympathetic smile and a tray, "You've really become their cuddle pillow," he comments upon entering, placing the tray by the desk.
In the hour that he waited, you had woken up from your slumber and without a single word leaving your lips you had merely untangled yourself from his tail, gestured for Dan Heng to sit up before sitting on his lap, arms wormed around his waist with your face pressed against his neck.
"Can't say I'm surprised really, thanks for bringing the food in, Mr. Welt."
"Of course, text the groupchat if you need anything else, Pom-Pom would be ecstatic to help again - they haven't moved so fast in a while after all."
Dan Heng lets you sleep a bit longer before he brings a hand up to rub your back, ducking his head down to whisper into your ear, "[Name]? Wake up, try to get something to eat so you can drink some medicine, okay?" you groan in response, rubbing your face further into his neck, "... 'm not hungry," you utter.
"You are. And even if you're not, it's still best for you to eat something. Just a few bites and then you can go back to sleep, okay?" he coaxes, leaning away from you to cup your cheeks so he can look at you, "Come on, for your own sake?" he asks, leaning in to peck the corner of your mouth.
You're only able to get a couple of mouthfuls in before you twist your head away from the spoon, reaching for the medicine laid out before you and gulping it down before letting yourself fall down back on his futon.
It doesn't take you long before you turn over and reach your arms for him, wriggling your fingers to get him to lay down with you - and Dan Heng knows from experience that the more he denies you, the more you will try.
So he merely sighs, laying down before wrapping his arms around you - the content chuckle you let out makes him smile a bit, "You know you're going to get sick if you keep coddling me like this," you muse, and Dan Heng merely rolls his eyes at that comment, "And you're just going to get worse if I don't, so where do we go from there?" he utters back, to which you only make a sound of acknowledgement.
"Can Vidyadhara's even catch these sort of colds?" you ask, pushing yourself up from his hold to instead rest on the man himself, Dan Heng letting out a small grunt at the added weight, but his tail nonetheless worms itself back around your waist to keep you steadily on top of him.
"No, we don't," he confirms, and you give him a cheeky grin, "So I can still kiss you while running a high fever?" you question while leaning a bit closer and he merely raises his eyebrow at you.
"At least I know your fever is going down with how you're joking around like this," he comments, reaching a hand up to cup your head and gently pull you down towards him, giving you a small peck. Your eyes widen in surprise at the notion, and Dan Heng lets out a quiet laugh at your shocked face, "What? Didn't expect me to actually kiss you?"
"... To be honest, no. Not with how you like to keep things clean."
He huffs out a laugh, "I can make a few exemptions for you," he says, reaching a hand behind your head to pull you down to his chest, "Now go sleep. The sooner you get better, the less I have to worry."
"Mmm, thanks for taking care of me."
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naru and her struggle with ending drabbles hits again yeehaw.
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bratbarzal · 1 month ago
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On Your Side (NH13) / Chapter Ten
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Pairing: Nico Hischier x Fem!OC Poppy Jensen
WC: 22k (one day I'll write like a normal person)
Chapter Warnings: I'll highlight the important stuff first - poppy's part has a pretty heavy scene with mentions of stillbirth/miscarriage/child loss/birthing complications and genetic disorders. poppy is safe, cheeto is safe and it's a backstory thing so if you are triggered by mentions of those topics, it's technically skippable (you can message me and I'll write up an overview without the mentions in there so you're not missing out) and at the end of the first scene of her section, the beginning of it will be marked in red, and the end will have the usual divider. other than that, there are sprinklings of angst in here - mentions of anxiety around flying, self doubt, Poppy and Nico have their little family bubble kind of burst, a bit of hurt/comfort, long distance longing and it's otherwise generally fluffy. some sexual references but not smut. some EXCESSIVE declarations of love. like we get it. you're into each other.
Series Masterlist
Previous Part (Chapter Nine)
A/N: I wrote and rewrote so much of this I've kind of driven myself crazy i’m not sure if this chapter will be everyone’s cup of tea tbh but it’s important to the characters as I close this story up. I'd like to dedicate this to my HATERS (aka the anons I literally asked to trash talk me for motivation it actually did work lmao I love you) I know that quite a few people have found this story since the last chapter so thank you for all your lovely messages, and all the stuff you guys send to me in my inbox, or tag in your reblogs it means the world 2 me!! I honestly have seen so many nice things said about this fic and my writing over the past few weeks it really really makes me so happy I love you guys so much!! I feel like putting out the bonus chapter hopefully eases some of the tension from this one, but like I said, and like you can read in the extra chapter where Cheeto is born, she's safe, don't let my warnings put you off unless those things do trigger you!!
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Nico
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There are quite a few routines that Nico has fallen into with Poppy over the last couple weeks where they have been much closer. 
There’s mornings with Poppy, more often rushed than not after the two of them refuse to leave whichever bed they’re in, cuddling up under the covers and hitting snooze as many times as they possibly can before they really need to get up. 
There’s the beautiful dance they have mastered in the bathroom, brushing his teeth while Poppy does her skincare routine, jutting out his chin for her to put some moisturiser over the centre of his face and letting her rub it in with soft fingers.
There are routines in the evenings, where Nico usually gets home a lot later than Poppy, her key now on his keyring so he can let himself in whenever he needs to, finds her on the couch waiting for him, and brings her back something to eat, even if she’s eaten already that night.
And lunchtimes might be his favourite, making the most out of the times he’s at the arena, and not on the road, stopping by her office, the two of them going for walks now that the weather’s nice again, and trying all the different spots close by.
Returning to her office and going giddy with affection, pressing wanting kisses to her lips where he’s never had the pleasure of doing it so casually, before.
It’s how they’ve ended up where they are now, Poppy sat on the edge of her desk, legs spread for Nico to stand between as his mouth works eagerly at the skin of her delicate neck, drinking up the soft sounds she makes for him, quiet enough that only he will hear.
“We can’t do this,” she gasps at the feeling of teeth nipping, her ass scooting forward until it’s right on the sharp edge of the wood. “Not here.”
“We’ve ticked off every other spot,” he hums just beneath her jaw, nipping at the skin there teasingly until her body arches into the attention. “Your car,” he moves further down her neck, “My car,” and further, “Every single surface in both our apartments,”
“The dryer was fun,” she reminisces, her fingertips reaching out to clutch at his shirt.
“May as well cross your office off the bucket list.” He shrugs, smirking right against her ear where he mutters the words.
“Someone could walk in.”
“Even better.”
“Nico,” she whines as he remains unrelenting in his pursuits.
“Lucky them, getting to see you all pretty for me like this,” his hands press into either side of her thighs and push at the hem of her skirt until it bunches all the way up, parting her legs even further so he can step in between them. “Wanna touch every inch of you,”
“Thought you were doing that this morning,”
This morning, he breaks out into a dopey grin at even the thought.
All these years, he has thought he was living his dream, making a successful career out of his talent, playing in one of the greatest leagues on the planet - all that before he ever experienced co-existing with Poppy.
Coming home to her after a strenuous trip away, falling asleep with her in his arms, being woken at least 10 times in the night to her repositioning herself in her sleep, eyes drifting open in the morning and looking down to see her cheek smushed into his chest, hair matted into the small space left on his pillow, taking up half of his side of the bed, drooling onto his skin as soft snores still puff out from between her parted lips.
That’s his dream, now - to wake up like that every day for the rest of his life. 
And he had told her as much when she came to, shamefully wiping at the spit on his chest with the collar of his shirt that she was wearing, kissing and kissing at her despite her protests of morning breath and needing to pee. He had followed her into the bathroom, all privacy long thrown out of the window as he brushed his teeth while she relieved herself, and Poppy did the same, and it was at the bathroom counter where he had made his first efforts to stretch out their lazy morning together.
Hoisted up beside the sink, legs wrapped around his waist as he pressed minty kisses into her neck, nipping and sucking at her skin until she tugged at his hair and pulled him up to meet her lips. 
He had told her he could do this everyday, and had meant it. But the two of them had been in such a rush to do something while they had the time, that he hadn’t really dived deeper into the topic of it being an actual possibility.
Of the two of them actually living together. Of him giving her the key to his apartment he had cut for her, and proposing that the two of them get a head start on a nursery before he has to potentially leave for the World Championships in a week.
They then moved from the bathroom to the kitchen, from the kitchen back to bed, and then from bed to a late morning start in work, entirely too distracted for him to pick back up where his thoughts left off.
“Lost count of where I got up to, gonna have to start again.” He smirks into her skin.
“You’re crazy.”
“Your fault.” He mutters with lips pressed to her jaw, “This could technically be our last shot here, Poppy,” he leans back a little to get a good look at her, head thrown back in distracted pleasure like she isn’t the one trying to get him to calm down. “You’ll be on leave by the time we get back, who knows when the next time we’ll both be in your office is,”
“I do.” She chuckles, “In 3 hours when you think you miss me too much to function, again.”
“Hey, I was checking up on you,” he presses a kiss closer to her lips, “Couldn’t have you in here all alone, know how worked up you get after a little while without me, huh?”
“I get worked up?” She scoffs, gesturing to the hands splayed out beside her hips on her desk, “You literally can’t keep your hands to yourself,”
“Can you blame me? Look at you,” he hums, kissing at the space between where her mouth curves up at the corner and her cheeks puff into a smile. “Go crazy thinking about you.”
She places soft hands on either side of his face, taking a grip of his jaw and moving him in front of her. “You can’t sweet talk me into fucking you in my office, baby,” she tells him, unable to stop the fully-fledged smile that forms when he grins back. 
“Not even if I take my shirt off?”
The look she casts down his body makes him feel exposed, an electric tingle shooting down his spine - so much that he just wants to press into her to quell it, somewhat.
“Might be worth a shot,” she shrugs, hands shifting until fingertips dance at the sensitive skin on either side of his neck, tickling back into his hair as she grasps at it, just a little. “No promises, though.”
And it’s just as he leans back in to kiss her that a hard knock rattles the door to her office, the two of them shooting apart as if shocked by electric, Poppy shimmying off her desk until she’s standing, pulling her skirt back into place and smoothing down her hair. 
Nico takes a few steps to the side, putting a good few feet between them so their closeness doesn’t rouse suspicion when Poppy invites the intruder into the room. 
“Sorry to interrupt,” Josh says with a meek smile as he steps in and closes the door behind him, not at all perturbed by the presence of Nico and Poppy, and seemingly not sorry at all, “Something’s come up and I figured I should run it by you.”
“I’ll leave you to it,” Nico says, doing his best not to sigh or grumble at the fact he has been so rudely disrupted from his new favourite part of the day. 
“Actually,” Josh steps back to block the door, “It concerns you too.”
Nico frowns, glancing back towards Poppy, who’s swiping a thumb at her smudged lips and shrugging a little when she meets his eye.
“What’s up?” She asks.
“So, uhm,” he seems nervous, now, the bravado he had when stopping Nico from leaving disappearing as he swerves around him to put the little folder he is carrying on Poppy’s desk, “It seems like the fans have picked something up from an interview you did after practice today, Nico.”
Shit.
If PR are involved, it has to be something bad.
But he’d just talked about the mood in the locker room, if he remembers right? The morale amongst the team after their loss yesterday in Philly. He hadn’t cursed, hadn’t said anything offensive or troubling.
Maybe he’d pouted a little, been a little frustrated, but that’s to be expected of the position they’re all in, surely?
And why would Josh be running it by Poppy?
“Did I say something bad?”
“No, it’s not anything you said.”
Nico watches as Poppy takes the folder, slides it across her desk and opens it, and from what Nico can see from where he’s stood, it looks like a screenshot of a bunch of tweets.
Whatever they say, it seems like overkill to print them out. Couldn’t he have just pulled up twitter like a normal person?
“Oh.” Poppy frowns, and Nico finds his feet carrying him toward her just at the sight of the expression on her face as she reads down the page.
As he leans over her desk, he sees that they are tweets. The first being a video of the interview he had done after their morning skate today, and the second being a couple of screenshots - each picture zooming further and further into something in the background.
With the paper upside down, Nico can’t quite tell what that something is, but at least it isn’t something he said. 
That’s good, he thinks, right?
The confusion must be evident on his face, because once she’s looked up at him for any sort of reaction, Poppy turns the sheet around on the table, and Nico is able to zero in on exactly what the tweets are getting at, sinking into the seat on his side with bated breath.
In a crystal clear quality he didn’t even know the cameras brought into the locker room could deliver, he sees his copy of Poppy’s latest scan, sat front and centre on the shelf of his locker. 
Fuck.
His eyes skim over the rest of the tweets on the page, an influx of capital letters and exclamation points, the words barely registering in his brain until he gets to the bottom of the page.
Sentiments of ‘Nico is having a baby?’ line up against mentions of Talia, of the two of them still being together, of all the variations of shocked, mind-blown emojis.
His heart starts to hammer in his chest as he reaches for the next page, hoping there’s a tweet from someone with an ounce of sense on there.
But this page is worse. So much worse.
‘He’s with someone else. Served them at my work last week in NYC!’
And attached is a picture from when he and Poppy went to lunch with her parents.
If this whole situation didn’t flood his system with panic, he’d be able to admire just how cute the pictures are - Poppy sat beside him, looking up at him in adoration as he jokes with her father. It’s the kind of thing he doesn’t really get to see or notice when he’s not looking at her - just how infatuated she is with him. It makes his skin tingle and his chest feel warm in the best way. 
Their seats are so close that they’re practically pressed together, his hand disappearing under the table where he remembers it sat on her lap the entire meal, her fingers either tangled with his or tracing little shapes into his palm. 
‘She’s cute.’
‘Where do I know her from?
‘She works for the Devils! Seen her at a few events with the foundation!’
Nico takes a shaky breath as the rest of it unfolds in front of his eyes. 
Poppy’s name, her job, the about us section from the foundation website, her private social media pages with requests to follow, pictures where she’s in the background or smushed into a group shot. She didn’t sign up for this, he thinks, people having such little regard for her privacy online. 
His interview in the locker room had been an hour ago, maybe two, and all they had to go off was a single blurry screenshot of a scan picture. And now they have pictures of her, of the two of them together, of her parents. They know her name, her place of work, and on the very last page, when he reads, ‘She lives in my brother’s building’ he thinks his heart stops.
“You guys aren’t in trouble, or anything,” Josh reassures her, reaching out in Nico’s peripheral and placing a comforting hand on her shoulder that he really wants to shoo away. “I mean, everybody here knew, I wanted you to see everything so you can figure out how you want to handle it. Or if you want to handle it at all.”
“What do you mean?” Nico gulps, speaking mainly to divert Josh’s attention from her, to try gain back some semblance of control on the situation, himself.
“I mean, we don’t really get involved in personal stuff like this, but I could help you come up with something to say between yourselves?”
“Something to say?”
Maybe Nico has been ignorant, this whole time, to the possibility that this sort of thing could happen. It’s not like they’ve been hiding it, not really. They’re out in public a lot together - they go to the convenience store sometimes, they eat out, they grab breakfast at the same spot if neither of them have the energy to make it, themselves, waiting in the queue with Poppy perched beneath his arm and him pressing kisses to the crown of her head.
His relationship with her has never been something that he felt like he had to hide, or had to protect, not in that way, anyway. 
Especially compared to when he was with Talia. When her social media presence became catered to hinting at the two of them. Cut off shots of his arms on tables, wearing clothes he had just been seen in, posing in front of his car, in the family suite at the arena - and that had all been before he found out she had been sharing their private pictures with gossip accounts, too. 
Poppy doesn’t court attention like that. All her pictures with him or of him are hers, and hers alone. Printed out and put on her refrigerator or framed in her apartment. Or there’s maybe one or two that she rotates as her phone background, but he does the same with her so he can’t exactly complain about that.
It’s cute, he thinks, the small ways in which she tries to keep him close. 
He’s just been assuming the two of them would be on the same page about the whole thing, wanting to keep things as they were, just between them, but also not going to extra efforts to hide their relationship, to erase all essence of normality and routine they’ve managed to build.
Especially considering the fact that for so long, even they didn’t know what they were or what they would be.
He still doesn’t know, if he’s being completely honest.
Poppy isn’t a grand gesture kind of girl, he knows that. She likes things simple, likes things easy, and as much as he might want to tell everyone that she’s his girlfriend, they haven’t really had that conversation yet. And he’s trying to let her take the lead on the whole milestone thing. He doesn’t want to push her into something she’s still building herself up to in her head.
So what is he supposed to say?
“If you don’t say anything, they might continue to dig.”
“I don’t think there’s much left for them to find,” Poppy scoffs, speaking for the first time as she flicks back through the pages on her desk. “Maybe my social security number, or my dental records or something.”
Ok, she’s cracking jokes, he thinks, casting a concerned glance her way as she finally meets his eye over her desk. 
She doesn’t look angry that he’s catapulted them into this mess. Doesn’t look hurt or disappointed. She’s chewing on her bottom lip and her eyes are wide looking back at him as if she’s expecting him to say something. 
“Do we have to decide now?” Nico asks, despite knowing the answer.
The last game of the season is tomorrow. Home against the islanders. Leaving things to chance and having all eyes on him will only fuel the fires of online speculation. 
“I’ll leave you two to talk about it, if you want?”
Nico narrows his eyes at the hand that still rests on Poppy’s shoulder, patronisingly patting at the curve of it before she sends him a thankful, forced smile, and he has to bite his tongue when Josh does the same thing to him on his way out.
The silence that lingers following the click of the door to Poppy’s office is tense, elongated enough that Nico starts the feel the throbbing of his pulse in his ears. 
His eyes are cast down, but he can feel Poppy’s cautious gaze on him, can sense as she rises out from behind her desk and circles around to his side, perching herself on the edge, sat beside the damning evidence that has caused this mess.
“What are you thinking?” She asks, softly.
“I’m thinking I messed everything up.” He sighs, leaning into the chair with tension in ever muscle, back stiff, jaw clenched. “I’m so stupid, I forgot it would even be visible, I just like having it there, so I can see her all the time, I didn’t mean for this to happen, Poppy, I swear,”
“Hey, I know,” she consoles him, pushing straight off of her desk and standing in front of him, crouching to his level. “Our bubble was bound to burst eventually, Nico, it’s okay,”
“Maybe we can fix this,” he thinks out loud, “I know a guy, a hacker, he’s really good, he could probably do something,”
“He must be really good if he can turn back time, babe,” Poppy scoffs, and he straightens in the seat, adjusting his positioning and gesturing for her to sit on his lap, as awkward as it might be. “How the hell do you know a hacker, anyway, Mission Impossible?”
“His name’s Myles, he lives over in The Heights,” he hums in response, large hand cupping at her thigh to hold her in place, “Maybe he could get the pictures scrubbed from the internet, or something?”
“Is that what you want?”
“I just want to keep things the way they are,” he sighs, “I want our bubble back. I liked our bubble.”
Poppy smiles, soft and affectionate, and cards her fingers through his hair to push it back, nails scratching soothingly at his scalp. 
“I liked our bubble, too.” 
The two of them sit like that for a minute, thoughts racing between the two of them, but the tension slowly easing, the silence becoming a little more comfortable as they both take a moment to think about what it is they want to do. 
Poppy’s fingers stroke at the back of his neck and his stroke soothingly into her thigh.
“We don’t have to say anything, if you don’t want to,” She’s the first to speak, and Nico’s heart hammers at the sound of her voice, more than usual, at least. “We can just wait it out, it’s the last game of the season, these things just go away after a while, right?”
“I don’t want it to go away, Poppy.” He huffs. “I don’t want to hide you, or pretend you don’t exist, pretend we aren’t having a baby together, pretend we aren’t-,”
His fingers tighten in their grip on her flesh, and he lets out a heavy sigh, trying to refrain from laying his heart on the line in the possibility she might trample on it out of heightened emotion. 
“I can ignore it,” she says, “The stuff online, I don’t really use social media, they can say what they want about me, about us, it doesn’t really matter, right? They don’t know anything.”
“They know where you live, apparently.” He scoffs, and despite the voice in him telling him to reel it in, the voice that, for so long now, has been telling him to hand the reins over and let her guide him down whatever path she wants to be on, the next thing comes out without much thought behind it. “Maybe you should move in with me, my building is a lot safer.”
He had been wanting to ask her, anyway, right?
He has the key in the glove compartment of his car, ready for her to claim. They spend enough time at his place, it’s the same distance as hers from the arena. 
And the timing is almost perfect. He’ll have some time to move her in before he leaves for Europe. Have some time to get her settled before they’re separated, just for a bit. They can keep sharing these routines they’ve built so well, together.
She’ll have an all access pass to all the clothes she so often likes to lounge around in, and he’ll have an all access pass to her, to all the developments with Cheeto, to-
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
What?
In what world is it not a good idea?
“I don’t think we’re ready for that, yet.”
Not ready?
What about them isn’t ready?
“Poppy-,”
“I have a meeting in 5 minutes, I should really fix myself up.”
She pushes herself up from his lap, despite him pawing at her to stay, and rushes back to her own side of her desk, tucking her hair behind her ears as she tries to make herself look busy, avoiding the way in which he chases her gaze.
What the hell just happened?
“We need to talk about this, Mohn,”
“We will,” she reassures him, “Later, I promise. Dinner at Jesper and Nic's, yeah, with the team? I'll meet you at your place.”
His place.
No, he thinks, it should be our place.
His heart hammers in her chest as he watches her, tries to get a gauge on what on earth she’s thinking, why the hell she’s distancing herself after, I liked our bubble, too.
“Poppy,” he tries again, stepping and trying to convey something in his tone that might bring her on side, might make her reconsider. 
“I can’t be late, Nico,” she sighs, “I’ll come straight over after I finish work, okay?”
“Okay,” he sighs, shuffling over to the door with the weight of the world now on his shoulders. 
How the hell had he gone from the morning from heaven, to this?
Exiled from Poppy’s office and shot down like the thought of living with him turned her stomach. 
“Love you,” he offers as a goodbye, a hand on the door handle with his neck craned back to see her one more time, to meet her eyes and try and ingrain the sentiment to her memory.
“Yeah,” she smiles, tight and half-hearted. “Love you, too.”
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Nico can’t recall a time where he’s ever been this stressed in his life.
And that seems like an almighty feat considering the year he’s had, so far. All the stuff with the team, with losing their manager half way through the season, with injuries, and fights on the ice, with trying to organise his place in the national team. With Poppy, with her parents, with navigating their relationship, navigating the fact he’s going to become a father soon.
But no, 3 missed calls to his girlfriend-but-not-his-girlfriend-but-she’s-carrying-his-baby-and-he-wants-her-to-be-his-girlfriend’s phone and he’s literally having heart palpitations and breaking out into a cold sweat.
He’s pacing, for God’s sake, shoes tapping against the hard wood of his apartment as he waits for any sign of life.
They’re all going straight to voicemail, and beyond driving all the way back to the Rock and trying to retrace her steps, he doesn’t know what to do.
Despite where they had left things earlier, despite the way she stomped all over his hopes and dreams, she had told him she’d meet him here straight after work, and it’s been almost an hour since she was due to finish.
It’s 30 minutes from the arena, maximum.
He should have stuck around and given her a ride, he thinks. At least them he’d know where she was.
But then she’d feel smothered, a whiny voice rings through his head as he presses to dial her again, the same tone ringing straight through to her machine. She doesn’t want to live with you, she probably doesn’t want to be in a car with you, either.
“C’mon, Poppy, pick up,” he sighs, trying one more time, holding his breath as he presses his phone straight to his ear, wanting to throw it against the wall when the same thing happens, again. 
He can’t calm himself down. He hasn’t been able to all afternoon since he left The Rock, driving home without any music playing, coming up to his apartment and not being able to sit still for the past few hours.
She doesn’t want to live with him. She doesn’t think they’re ready.
Despite the fact that they’ve shared a bed every night, almost - aside for when he’s been on the road - for the past two weeks. Despite the fact that all he’s done since February is try to prove himself to her. 
Prove himself as a partner, first and foremost. There for every appointment, accommodating her every craving, her every need. 
He’s even learning to cook, for Christ’s sake, beyond pasta and breakfast food, and knows her breakfast order by heart. 
He’s tried replaying their entire conversation in his head, tried figuring out which part had soured her entirely to the idea, and all he has been coming up with is blanks.
And now, she’s blanking him. Now she’s saying love you with weak smiles that make his heart ache, and he doesn’t know what to do about it.
He’s pacing so much, stomping so hard, that he almost doesn’t hear the knock at his door, stopping in his tracks just to catch the end of it and shooting over so quick he almost stumbles and crashes to the floor.
Seeing her isn’t enough for the tension to drop from his body, not entirely, not yet - not even when she gives him a guilty smile and immediately goes in for a soft, sweet kiss against his bitten lips. 
“‘M’sorry,” she mutters into his mouth, “My phone died and I left my charger in your car.” She waves her blank phone screen in between them as if to prove her point, and Nico thinks back to getting in his car to come home, earlier, huffing and puffing about all the wires in the centre console and throwing them onto the passenger seat.
He kisses her back, almost in an unspoken apology for getting so worked up, not that she had any idea just how worked up he was getting, and hums, “It’s okay,” in response. “Are you okay?”
Are we okay? He wants to ask, but doesn’t.
She’s here, now. They have to be okay.
“Yeah,” she smiles, and he wants to take it at face value. She’s had a long day at work, she’s probably exhausted. Her smile isn’t half-assed or forced. She wouldn’t be here if she didn’t want to be. “The guy who’s covering my maternity is a board-certified yapper, Nico, God help you when you have to work with him. You’re gonna miss the hell outta me.”
“Won’t have to miss you, Mohn,” he chuckles, despite the fact that it isn’t entirely true. He wouldn’t have to miss her, if she lived with him, but the way she smiles back eases his worries, a little bit. 
There’s the summer to figure things out, he realises.
There’s no rush, and he keeps getting into the habit of thinking there is.
Baby steps.
She takes them with such ease that it really makes him look like an idiot, he thinks. 
“You ready to go? Do you need a drink or anything?”
“I think I’ll last the ten minutes it takes to get there,” she rolls her eyes fondly as she takes his hand in hers, and the two of them make their way down to the parking level.
Nico bites at his tongue the whole way to Jesper and Nicole’s place.
He’s trying his best to take whatever she’s willing to give him, and if ignoring the problem at hand is what she wants to do, then he’ll do it. He won’t ask her if she’s thought any more about things, despite her telling him earlier that they’d pick it back up. He won’t ask if she’s still willing to ignore all the outside noise.
Won’t ask her why she doesn’t think they’re ready to live together.
And he bites his tongue all night, really. 
It becomes easy to do so as the two of them sink into the familiarity of the team dynamic. Loud and boisterous, fun and carefree, like they haven’t got a game left tomorrow. Like they all aren’t going to have to sit and watch the playoffs play out, thinking what if, and why not me?
Like they all aren’t getting separated for the summer, scattered across the globe with the ever so slight chance they won’t be reunited again.
Not in this format, at least.
But Poppy’s hand holds his in her lap. Poppy rests her head on his shoulder as she listens to Timo tell her all about Switzerland, hyping her up for all the cool things they’re all going to get to do together, and her looking up at Nico with a beaming smile and eyes like twinkling stars.
Poppy stays glued to his side for the group picture Nicole insists on taking, sandwiched between Nico and Timo with the biggest, cheesiest grin on her face, and he thinks he’s probably looking at her as the camera flashes - meets Nicole’s eyes when she’s looking back at the photo and knows he isn’t looking into the lens. 
Poppy rests her free hand on her bump, strokes little shapes absentmindedly on it in a way that makes Nico’s heart soar with pride.
Poppy sinks into his side when he’s talking to Nicole’s brother, and who doesn’t flinch when Nico introduces her as, “Poppy, my girlfriend,” in a way that just rolls of the tongue with little to no thought behind it.
And Poppy doesn’t bring it up until they’re sat back down at the large, extended dining table, mostly deserted and the room a lot less rowdy now that a few of the guys have cleared out for an early night.
“I’m your girlfriend, now, huh?”
Shit.
“Sounded nicer than Baby Mama,” he chuckles, the laughter quickly dying down when he sees Poppy’s reaction to his words. It’s that same weak smile she had given in her office, earlier. Resigned and reluctant. “To be honest, I didn’t really know how to ask you about it.”
“Usually starts with will you and is followed by be my girlfriend?” She teases, turning into him a little more as he leans into her, opening herself up more to him than she has all night.
“Don’t you think we’re past that, though?” He smiles softly, thankful for the soft beaming light that returns to her eyes. “Girlfriend feels,”
He doesn’t want to say small.
He doesn’t want to say not enough.
He doesn’t want to say anything that might upset her enough to retreat again, but it’s what he means.
He can’t help it.
It just feels juvenile and insufficient.
She’s so much more than that.
And, because she’s Poppy, and because she can’t help but take the burden of having to say it away from him, she takes his hand in hers, thumb rubbing at the top. “I know what you mean.”
Thank God.
“I called Nia earlier, and she called you my boyfriend, and it sorta freaked me out a little.”
“Freaked you out?” He gulps, nerves settling in the pit of his stomach at the fact that taking the next step with him is freaking her out. 
“Yeah,” she sighs, “Like boyfriend seems,”
And she looks like she’s found herself stuck in the same rut he had been in, moments prior. Knowing what she means, but unable to voice it.
“Limited,” he realises, after a moment of consideration for the way he feels just when he looks at her. “Casual, even.”
“Yes!” She agrees, lips twisting into an approving smile. “That’s exactly it! You’re so much more than my boyfriend, Nico.” 
“So much more,” he hums, leaning in to press his lips straight to hers, trying to memorise how the shape of her smile feels against in the hopes that he can use it if he ever gets that stressed again. Can remember how easy she makes it to wriggle one of these out of her, to make her eyes gleam like they hold all the love in the world in her irises. “Like your husband,” he speaks the words into her mouth like speaking them into existence, drinking up the sound of her laughter when she pushes him away with fingers to his chest.
“Don’t push your luck, baby."
He comes to the conclusion that he was probably moving a little too quick, or a little too reckless earlier that day. He had told himself as much, before the fact, constantly trying to pull himself back and follow Poppy’s lead on things, because she does make life easy in a way he can never comprehend.
How he got from pacing the floors of his apartment in a panicked, sweaty, discombobulated mess mere hours ago to laid beside her in his bed, heart lulled back into a steady, comfortable rhythm, he doesn’t know.
Only the steady rhythm doesn’t make it through the night. Not when she’s clearly mulling something over beside him.
He had thought at first she was thinking so loud he could hear her blink, but when he had looked over, she was turned the other way, and her breaths were coming out in long, slow drawls - similar to those of when she is sleeping, so he had drifted back off.
And then the tossing and turning started. Huffs and puffs and mmphs that she couldn’t seem to control. Facing him, facing away, facing up.
And then she was up, trudging over to the bathroom with slumped shoulders, spending a minute in there before returning to the bed, and plonking herself down in it with little care for how he might be asleep.
Not that he was.
“It’s 3am, Poppy, why aren’t you asleep?”
“Not tired,” she huffs, arms crossing over her chest.
“You’re always tired,” he chuckles, easing his hand into the crook of her elbow and tugging to uncross them. He pulls until she’s sinking closer to him on the mattress, but her body is stiff with tension, and he just wants to ease the load. “Growing my baby is exhausting, remember?” He tries his hand at humour, but she just sighs, shuffling to get comfortable. “Poppy, talk to me.”
“I want to move in with you.” She blurts out, and he feels like he’s going to get whiplash from the flurry of emotions that passes through him.
Relief, gratitude, happiness, confusion.
“That’s what’s keeping you awake?” He asks, like the concept of her sat worrying about that when he’s the one who asked her in the first place is crazy. All this huffing and puffing and interrupted sleep, for what?
“Well, yeah,” she drags out like it’s obvious at all, “Because you asked me and I said no.”
“I remember, I was there,” he chuckles. “Did you change your mind?”
“No.”
“I don’t understand.”
He really doesn’t.
“I didn’t say no because I didn’t want to, Nico,” she almost snaps, her voice tired and her tone direct.
“Poppy,” he levels, “It’s 3am.”
“What are you, talking clock? I know the time! I’ve been staring at it for the past like 4 hours.”
Nico lets out a heavy exhale, sitting up in bed and trying to meet her eyes in the dark. “Why did you say no?”
“I said no because I thought you only asked me because it was something convenient for us to do.” She pouts, “And I want you to want to live with me because you love me, not because your building is more secure.”
“I do love you,” he frowns, like his infatuation with her isn’t the most painstakingly tangible thing in the world. “And I want you to be safe, and to be happy,” 
“Are you in love with me?”
“Is that not what I literally just said?”
“You said you love me,”
“And that’s not the same thing?”
“I don’t know, is it?”
Jesus Christ, he curses to himself, refraining from once again pointing out the time.
Is this a pregnancy thing, he wonders? Losing your mind like this in the middle of the night? Is this what all those dreams have accumulated to? Is this his fault?
“If you’re asking me if all those times I told you that I loved you, did I mean I was in love with you, then yes. I thought that was obvious.”
He’s been in love with her way longer than he feels like he can communicate at such an absurd hour, but he’ll do it if he has to. If tomorrow when they both leave for the arena, he can slip that key he has stashed away onto her keychain and can move on with his day without the stresses of earlier.
“Oh.”
“Was it not obvious?”
“I don’t know.”
“Poppy,”
“What?”
“Do I have to lay it out for you?”
“I mean, only if you want to.”
“It’s 3am.” He reminds her, one last time.
“It’s never too early for declarations of love, Nico.” Her lips twist, and his gut does in response, amusement evident even in the darkened room, eyes glistening with mirth as they meet his.
“I just told you, Mohn, I’ve declared my love over and over.”
“Maybe you should do it again.”
“I’m in love with you, Poppy,”
“With feeling,” she encourages him, shuffling closer until their legs tangle in his favourite way.
“Even when you’re annoying and you won’t let us sleep.”
“Declarations of love can’t include the word annoying, baby.”
Maybe she’s right. How can he be annoyed when she’s calling him pet names and looking at him like that? He’s so in love with her that he’d do anything.
“I’m in love with the way you press your freakishly cold feet between my legs and send my whole body into shock every morning.” He starts, shuffling himself until they’re in his favourite position, facing each other, limbs tangled, her bump pressing into his own stomach, and her hands splayed on his chest. “And when you try to make me breakfast but you for some reason can’t touch a bagel without burning it, and I leave the house every morning smelling like burnt toast.”
“I’m trying my best, there’s a really fine line between them being done and over-done.”
“Whatever you say. I love you when you’re grumpy and hormonal, and you get really specifically annoyed and nothing I do is right but you won’t tell me that so you just huff and puff like a child.”
“I had every right to huff and puff. You asked me to move in with you because your building is safer. That’s not romantic, Nico.” And despite his earlier stress and anxiety, all he can do looking back now is laugh. He’d been so caught up in the mantra of Poppy doesn’t like grand gestures that he hadn’t taken his own words into account. “Is there anything good you love about me?”
“I’ve loved you from the day I met you, Poppy, there’s plenty of good.” And when she raises a brow, urging him to continue, he chuckles, deep and hearty and in a way that wracks through him in delight. “I love how you’re kind, and you’re funny, sometimes I even think of you and laugh,”
She frowns, and Nico can see the argumentative cogs turning in her head. “Well, that’s not-,”
“How you have something to say about everything, even the way I’m baring my soul to you.” He grabs gently at either side of her face, only just smushing her cheeks teasingly before releasing the pressure and holding her in place. “I love how you’ve given a new purpose to my life. How it’s not just me and my job anymore, it’s us and our family, and I never feel like any of this is out of my control. I want you to move in because you’re like home to me, Poppy. I want to wake up every morning I can next to you, I want to finish a long day and end it with you. I want to lay awake half way across the world and think of you in our bed, in our apartment, and know that you’re safe, and nothing can get you here.
“I don’t know how I ever pushed these feelings down for so long, Mohn, because they consume me now. I’ll never get enough of you, of your pretty smile, or that really dorky, snorty laugh you do when you’re tired, or how you always put too much sugar in my coffee and now every time I taste something sweet I think of you.”
The smile she’s giving him might be his favourite, teary eyed and so wide he thinks it must ache in her cheeks. Her lips tremble slightly and her fingertips dig deliciously into his chest. 
“The thought of you being the mother of my child, of her having that dorky laugh, and your pretty sparkly eyes, and me never getting a second of peace between the two of you talking back to me, I feel like the luckiest guy in the entire world. Is that enough feeling for you?”
“Just about.” She whispers, leaning up to press her lips straight to his, cautious not to get too lost in it before he utters his response straight into her mouth.
“Great. Your turn.”
“It’s 3am, Nico,” she scoffs, rolling her eyes, playfully. “I love you too, Jeez, are you ever gonna let me sleep?”
“Are you in love with me?”
“I’m so in love with you, that if I weren’t already pregnant right now,” her voice is deeper as she moves closer to him, lips edging toward his ear until they press at the skin just below on his neck, whispering her next words, teasingly. “I’d so let you put a baby in me.”
Nico’s so relieved he doesn’t have neighbours he could possibly wake up with the laugh that comes out of him. A loud exclamation of joy that shines straight back to him through Poppy, a wide grin and shaking shoulders as she giggles back at him.
“That’s an outrageous thing to say considering we’ve only been together officially for,” he checks his watch over her shoulder, “Like 8 hours.”
“Yeah, well,” she shrugs, offering a wink he’s thankful to catch, “When you know, you know.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Ask me again.”
“Will you move in with me, Poppy?”
“Yes.”
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Moving Poppy into his apartment - their apartment - had been easier than Nico could have ever hoped. 
She had parted ways a little too easy with most of her furniture, under the sneaky compromise that keeping his stuff and moving into his building, meant that she was owed more closet space as some form of compensation. 
And Nico had figured that it was only a small sacrifice compared to what she was doing - giving up the last remaining scraps of her independence and leaving behind the beautiful home she had built for herself. The home where their relationship had began to flourish. The apartment where the wheels had been set in motion all those months ago for their baby girl to be brought into existence.
He’s sort of thankful her lease situation isn’t entirely sorted yet, with her moving out but still paying the rent until they can figure out what to do with all the stuff she’s leaving behind. Even he isn’t quite ready to say a proper goodbye.
But that’s a problem for when they get back at the end of summer.
A problem for him, at least, because he knows he won’t want her stressing about any of the technicalities at that point. 
It makes him less anxious to leave her, knowing she’s safe in their shared space, and has the benefits of Lionel being downstairs if she needs someone. 
Knowing that his initial worries for her safety ended up, thankfully, being an overreaction, entirely, after Nicole had posted her picture of the group to her public instagram, and the gossipers online had taken that as all the confirmation they needed and swiftly moved on.
Knowing that Poppy’s fully moved in, and they’ve had the luxury of properly co-existing, back in their perfect little bubble for just over a week before he has to leave.
Just over a week of shared mornings, stretched out to the fullest capacity, sometimes even into the early afternoon, the two of them only leaving bed for food and bathroom breaks. 
Late afternoons, when Poppy gets home from work, and curls up with Nico on the couch, him getting more comfortable cooking for her when she ends up falling asleep melted into the cushions, and wakes when her senses kick in and she can smell food being made without her. 
Evenings sat cross-legged on the floor, mapping out an idea for the nursery that will be going into Nico’s mostly-unused home office. Making the travel plans for Poppy to fly out and meet him once all her work back in Jersey is wrapped up, and his work with the national team is over. 
And nights spend curled up under the sheets, Nico promising to show her all the parts of his world that he’s been telling her about all these years.
It’s a life Nico gets a little too lost in, and before he knows it, before he can grasp just how much he loves what they’ve built here, already, it’s time to say goodbye to Poppy.
He tries to drag it out as much as he can.
He sets an earlier alarm, despite her grumbling protests, just so he can spend another 15 minutes with her in his arms.
He drives them both to the airport for her to drive back, spare hand holding hers over the centre console and squeezing in patterns of three every time they hit a red light. 
And he had followed Poppy’s advice, begrudgingly, arriving at the airport with plenty of time to spare, which meant he could take that little longer saying his goodbyes before he really had to go.
Goodbyes that Poppy made harder than he ever thought they could be.
“And I left my shampoo for you to use,” he mumbles into lips that continue to chase his, back starting to ache a little from leaning over the middle of the car but he couldn’t really care less.
“And if I run your water bill up high enough, would you come home to me to investigate?”
“Well, when you make it sound so tempting,” he kisses her, this time, before muttering, “Poppy, you’ve got to let me go.”
“But I just got you,” she pouts, chasing another kiss, “I don’t think we’ve done enough to catch up for all that time we wasted, I think we need to try out your backseat again, one more time for good measure. I promise you can leave straight after, no funny comments from me about it.”
“As nice as that sounds,” he chuckles, “Airport security scares me, I’m not getting into trouble with those guys because my girl is insatiable.”
“You’re boring,” she frowns.
“It’s 4 weeks.”
“That’s so long,” she huffs, still holding onto the front of his shirt.
“I know,” he kisses her again. "But then we have all summer together,” and again, “and by the time we get back here, we’re gonna be getting ready for baby girl to come,” and one more time for good measure. “Just 4 weeks. Maybe not even that,”
“4 weeks. My man has a medal to win.”
His chest swells at the thought of it, and he smiles, in a way that feels like might never fade. “That reminds me,” he jolts, reaching into his pocket for what he had stashed in there when clearing out his locker back at the arena the other week. He zips down the inner compartment and pulls out something that makes her gasp.
“You kept it?” She reaches out, taking the bracelet into a gentle gasp and looking at it with eyes that shine brighter than the jewels bezelled into it. 
“Of course I did,” he smirks as he takes it back to clasp it around her wrist, looking up into her eyes with a sly smirk spreading across his lips, “it was really fucking expensive.”
She swats hard at his chest, trying so hard to suppress an aching grin from taking over her pretty features. “Promise me you’ll look after yourself?”
“Of course, I have precious cargo,” she smiles, hand cradling the bottom of her growing belly, where his reaches out to join, settling his softened gaze on the roundness of it before looking back up at her. 
“You’re precious too, Mohn.” He whispers, and he can’t help himself, kissing her one final, passionate time before pressing his forehead to hers, closing his eyes and breathing her in as much as he can before he leaves. “I’ll see you soon.”
“I love you, Nico,” she whispers, words meant just for him, just to settle the growing ache in his bones that won’t be relieved until they’re reunited. 
“I love you too, Poppy.”
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Poppy
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Poppy has always loved having a space of her own. Ever since moving into her apartment, after having lived with Nia through college and a a little while after, she has relished having a place that is exclusively hers - where she doesn’t have to share responsibilities, doesn’t have to lay down boundaries, or protect what is hers, because everything is hers.
Her comfy Facebook Marketplace couch, that she had found for a steal and her and Nico - mostly Nico - had lugged all the way up to her apartment not long after she had moved in, and holds an abundance of memories, especially lately, that warm Poppy to her very core. Memories of being cuddled up with him, large hands rubbing soothing circles into her belly to try rouse any sort of premature movement in there, while he distracted her entirely from the Harry Potter movies he was supposed to be getting her invested in.
Her big cosy bed, with mountains of pillows Nico constantly grumbles at having to remove when he stays over, cloud-like heaps of blankets that she has to trap him in so that his legs stay under, and she can wrap hers around them before he manages to stick them out in the cold. 
Shelves lined with keepsakes and trinkets - which now includes little framed scan photos, a small pregnancy memory journal sent over by Nico’s mom, where the two of them have been writing little daily messages to their baby girl for her to read one day when she’s older.
And she always thought that when it came to sharing her space, when it came to being in a relationship with someone, progressing to the point of living together, and having a home be theirs and not hers, she’d have wanted it to be somewhere that had been hers, first.
She never thought she would leave her apartment, never thought she’d haul her belongings a few blocks over, give up her couch, her bed, all the random pieces of furniture she had sourced over the years, pack up her trinkets and say goodbye to the last scrap of independence she would ever have with an all-too-ecstatic wave and immerse herself so wholeheartedly into someone else’s home.
But Nico had made it easy. He makes everything easy, Poppy has very quickly realised.
It’s all he has done since they found out she was pregnant. 
Any fears of feeling like an intruder never even had the chance to materialise in her thoughts before he was calling his place theirs, referencing their home like it had always been that way, like she was always destined to be a part of his life, like there’s more to that word for him than walls and belongings. 
He had told her as much all those weeks ago, wrapped up in his sheets in the early hours of the morning, when he had told her that she was like home to him. And she had thought the same - she still thinks the same, but being here without him, she still feels it, despite him being so far away for so long.
She doesn’t feel like a house-sitter, or something temporary.
She feels it in her new routine, in figuring out his appliances, in adjusting his thermostat and shower temperatures to her liking, in replacing some of the books on his shelves he most definitely has never read with her books, her trinkets, her pictures. Their pictures. 
It has become a stark contrast to all those months ago, when she had walked into this space with heavy feet, the weight of the world on her shoulders and the fear of rejection weighing on her heart - when she had taken note of the lack of warmth, or the personality she knew all too well. 
His kitchen shelves are now lined with books of recipes she can’t wait to cook for him when they are co-existing - when summer is over, and their baby is here, and their lives have officially begun. 
She tells him as much when he calls every night, usually when she’s making dinner, and he utters the same sentiments, his features softening into that dopey smile she loves so much when he comments about missing her cooking. He’s usually propped up against the utensil pot, watching intently as she flits around their kitchen, the drawers now memorised so she no longer has to ask him where a tin opener might be, and every time she looks over, he has this far away look in his eyes like he’s watching back a dream.
His call had come a little earlier, today, after she had sent over a voice note she had taken for him at her routine scan. It had been just long enough for him to listen to it before the tell-tale FaceTime ringtone had rung out from her pocket, just as she had been hauling her groceries down the hall to finally make it home after a long day at work.
“Did you send that by accident or is it a distress signal?”
Poppy smiles down at her phone as she makes it through the front door, heading straight for the kitchen and putting the bag of groceries on the counter.
“That’s out daughter’s heartbeat,” she chuckles, admiring the way he leans down onto whatever table he has her propped up on, heart thudding as she realises he’s still out in public, despite it being late where he is, not even able to wait until he gets back to the privacy of his room like normal to call her. “Strongest one this side of the Hudson, so I’ve been told.”
“Oh really?” He rests on his forearms and uses them to support his chin, his smile tired and exhaustion seemingly creeping into his bones. It’s been almost 3 weeks now since they have seen each other, and every night Poppy sees a difference in him - focus increased and motivation teetering. There isn’t long left, though, until she leaves Jersey. Until she heads straight for him and they finally get some time together with no other responsibilities than to be with each other. “You get any pictures?”
“Whoa, kinky,” she smirks when she sees him roll his eyes, heat creeping onto his cheeks, and she huffs out a slight sigh of disappointment when he runs a hand through his hair, and she can see the ear buds carrying her voice to him. She’d only slightly been hoping to embarrass him in public. She deserves the little pleasures, she thinks.
“Of our baby, Poppy,” he huffs, his annoyance entirely forced and the way she charms him evident in the glint in his eyes, even through a phone screen.
“Duh,” she rolls her eyes as her fingers swipe through her phone, looking for the pictures she already had primed to send over to him. 
“If you have any other pictures though, you can send them through. I'll be back in my room in 10 minutes.”
“Nice try,” she scoffs, waiting for the blue line to run the whole way across her screen as the pictures and videos start sending. “That second video, when she turns a little, you can see she has your nose, it’s so cute,” she sighs, dreamily, as she settles the phone back onto the counter, leaning down to watch his reactions as he receives them. She can feel warmth spread through her chest as she takes in the movement of his eyes, flickering across all there is to take in from the latest scan - the tiny developments since the last one, especially considering she had opted for the 3D scan despite how much she thought it might freak her out.
Seeing her baby girl all curled up, tiny hands supposedly waving, little features scrunched up in a mirror image of the man Poppy loves the most in the world - it had really set her emotions off that morning. She had to sit in her car for a good 20 minutes before work, sobbing into a snotty tissue and cursing the time difference for the fact that Nico was probably asleep, not wanting to disturb him just to call and worry him. 
“I think she looks like you,” he mutters, entirely hypnotised by the videos, lips stretched into a soft smile, dimples pushing into his cheeks, emphasising the fresh gash below his eye that she has actively been trying not to look too much at. “She’s so beautiful. Did you get copies?”
“Yeah, I’m gonna put them straight into my carry on so I don’t forget to bring them over. Got a copy for your mom, too.”
“She’ll love the nose thing.”
“It’s a cute nose,” Poppy hums, “A strong one, too, swear she’s like a sniffer dog in there, I’ve been craving mac and cheese all day since she smelled someone else’s lunch yesterday. Had to go buy a grater just so I can make some from scratch.”
“I don’t have a cheese grater?”
“Not that I could find,” Poppy frowns, having searched high and low in every cupboard and drawer when she got home last night, “Although neither of us should be surprised, Nico, you don’t even have a full set of pans,”
“Why would I need a full set? I only ever use one at a time.”
“You’re giving yourself too much credit, baby, we both know you live off of meal prep delivery.” She jokes, and he shakes his head in silent denial. “But don’t worry,” she picks her phone up and switches the camera to show him the pan set she had brought home with her yesterday, “I’m here to improve your life one pot at a time.”
“Is that how you’re spending your evening?” He asks, “Stocking our kitchen with new stuff?”
“That’s the plan for tomorrow, actually,” she smiles, picturing all the shopping she can do as she starts unpacking all the ingredients for her dinner, “My dad said he found a bunch of old baby clothes in their garage, he had a meeting this way today and is gonna bring them over for me to look at tonight.”
“Your baby clothes?”
“Yeah, I’m hoping, you should see the way they dressed OlI when he was a baby, like half of his genetic structure was colour-block Gymboree.”
“I have no idea what that means,” he frowns, adorably, eyes gleaming still with the beginnings of a fond smile.
“Trust me, you don’t want to, he looks like a clown in all his baby photos. Hideous.” She shudders as she focuses her attention back on the phone, catching a glimpse of Nico stifling a yawn and checking the time. He isn't usually out of his room at this time, usually getting settled in for the night, lounging in his bed so he gets to say goodnight to her. She doesn’t really want to keep him if he’s tired. “He should be here soon, so I’ll let you go get your beauty sleep.”
“Yeah, I need all the help I can get,” he chuckles, a finger wagging toward the cut on his cheek with a tired smile. “Text me before you sleep, so I can wake up to it?” She nods. “Love you, Poppy,” The casual manner in which he utters the words does little to quell the excitement they arouse.
“Love you too, Nico.”
Poppy feels lighter than air as she pads around the apartment after their call has ended, unpacking her groceries into the refrigerator, keeping out what she needs so that she can start cooking up her dinner - her grandmother’s mac and cheese, the secrets of her recipe finally bestowed upon her now that she has someone to make it for - her phone hooked up to his speaker system, filling the space with her favourite music in a way that already makes it feel like she has been there forever. 
She cuts up her cauliflower and puts it in a pan to steam before she gets to work making her sauce, grating an almost excessive amount of cheese and giving herself an almighty ache in her arm.
It isn’t too long before she gets a message from Lionel - him now texting her to alert her of any visitors coming up, the familiarity ironing out that last crease of imposter syndrome where she had feared she might have to run is by Nico, his concierge now treating her like a proper resident.
So when the knock at the door comes, she practically skips over, a giant smile pushing at her cheeks as she reaches to open it, only for it to drop at who’s on the other side. 
“Don’t look too excited to see me, Honey,” Poppy’s mom rolls her eyes as she pushes past her, trailing two large holdalls behind her as she steps into Nico’s apartment, dropping them just past the door before she stretches her arms dramatically. 
Poppy cranes her neck out of the open door to look for any sign of her dad, any sign of a buffer or safety net to fall into, because there’s no way in hell she’s going to have to suffer her mom’s presence on her own, right now. 
“Is dad bringing more bags up here, or something?”
“No, he got held up with a working dinner, I said I’d bring this stuff over.”
She watches her mother as she slowly steps further into the apartment, casting a judgemental eye around in a way that immediately gets Poppy’s back up, feeling protective of the space already, hesitant to close the door in an attempt to give the negative energy a way out.
She can’t keep it open forever, though, not when her mom seemingly has no plans to leave.
“Is that grandma’s mac and cheese?” She asks as she enters the kitchen, lifting the lid on the pot of steaming cauliflower.
“Yeah, she finally gave me the recipe for the sauce, and I’ve been craving it all week.”
“You’ll need to take that off the heat, soon, or it will be like mush at the bottom.”
Poppy’s eyes roll by instinct as she lets out a huff, stomping toward where her mother is stood and flicking the switch for the burners. “I know what I’m doing, I literally have a step-by-step,”
“You don’t have to turn everything into an argument, Poppy, I was just saying.” She steps away from the stove, narrowing her eyes at her daughter. “God forbid I try to help you.”
“You’re not trying to help, Mom, you’re hovering,” she scoffs, “Like you literally came over just to judge.”
“You’re so dramatic,” she scoffs, “I’m hardly judging, I’ve said one thing.”
Poppy bites her tongue from retorting, one thing too many, but something starts bubbling inside her, too strong for her to swallow down, this time.
She thinks it might be Nico’s doing, this new instinct to defend herself - defend herself to her mother, at least, because God knows she has no troubles doing it with anyone else. She had always thought she had a handle on her, could control herself, could throw quick jabs back to lessen the blow of scrutiny and shame that’s usually sent her way by her mother, but hearing how Nico had stood up to her dad, she realises she’s just been masking a problem this entire time. She’s never really stood up to her, never really let her know all the ways in which she’s been hurt by her mom’s judgements over the years, too scared to stick around for what might be the final blow, too scared of the impact, or that neither of them may ever recover from it. 
But it has to be better than this - than the constant holding of her breath in anticipation of it coming. It isn’t doing either of them any favours. There’s only so far her sarcasm will get her, now. 
“I swear you hate that I don’t rely on you,” she says, softly - not through trepidation or doubt, but because she doesn’t want this space to be one where voices are raised, where tears are brought to her eyes and lumps to her throat. “I’ve lived on my own for years, cooked for myself every day almost, and it’s like you can’t even fathom for a second I might not need or want your help.”
“I’m not arguing with you over macaroni, Poppy.”
“This isn’t about macaroni, it’s about you having an incessant need to make me feel like crap. It’s like you can’t stand that I can do things on my own.”
“Maybe I can’t.”
Well, there it is.
Poppy hadn’t been expecting it to take her aback quite like this, breath held, shoulders tensed, mouth agape. There’s a shrill, nagging voice that harps, I told you so, in her head, but it does little to help. She hadn’t really wanted to be right.
If she’s entirely honest, she wanted her mom to shut her down, again. To tell her she’s being stupid, to tell her she’s proud of her independence, and is just being catty because that’s who she is. That’s who she’s always been. 
“What?”
“Maybe you’re right. Maybe I can’t stand the way you behave. Maybe I loathe it,”
Her hand falls almost by instinct to cradle the curve of her bump, like she’s trying to lessen the impact, to not let the hurt she feels seep all the way to where her baby girl lays in her belly, peaceful and darling and blissfully unaware of the pain that can be inflicted by a mother’s sharp tongue.
“Maybe I wish for once in your life you’d be serious, and think about things before you just dive headfirst into situations you have no business being in. And subjecting a baby to them, nonetheless. God, Poppy, I’ve always known you to be impulsive but this,” her mother’s hand flops almost dismissively her way, hard eyes set straight on her stomach before twirling on the spot and gesturing around them, “And all this, you think you’re being independent? You’re being careless and selfish.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Not raising her voice goes straight out the window, “First of all I’m irresponsible for not living with Nico, and now I’ve moved in with him, I’m careless? Nothing I do will ever be enough for you, will it?”
“It’s not about me,”
“Yeah, right,”
“This is about your baby,”
“Don’t act like you care about my baby,” Poppy scoffs, “She’s not just another thing you can try to control. You don’t always know what’s best, Mom, and I don’t want my daughter feeling the way I feel around you, it isn’t good for any of us, so I’m gonna ask you one more time to stop.”
“Stop what? Trying to help you-,"
“You’re not helping! I don’t know how many more times I can say it! I don’t understand how I can try my best to get everything right and you just pick out all the flaws!” Here come the tears in her eyes, and the lump in her throat, too.
Of course it would have been her mother to burst her happy bubble, yet again.
“Because somebody has to open your eyes to the fact that this isn’t the dream you think it is, Poppy! Pregnancy, being a mother, it isn’t all sunshine and rainbows and handsome boyfriends who move you into their fancy apartments and promise you the world-,”
“Oh, here we go again,” Poppy fires back, “What is it then? I gave you lopsided breasts and thin hair so now you get to ruin my life?”
“Not you-,”
“Right, like you’d ever give golden boy Oliver this kind of grief,”
“Your sister.”
Poppy can feel a rush of blood to the head.
Her what?
She knows deep in her heart her mother would never do crack, but maybe she picked up something else at one of her luncheons. Maybe she accidentally stumbled into one of those botox parties and they injected a little too deep into her forehead. 
No, Poppy thinks, she can see frown lines, still.
“Her name was Primrose. Rosie. She was my first.”
There’s a steady, softer tone to her mom’s voice that Poppy hasn’t heard in years. An undertone of reminiscence and longing. Of love.
Her feet carry her by instinct, rounding past her mother and heading for the couch, patting the space beside her and meeting her mother’s eyes with a somewhat solemn gaze.
“She was from a relationship I had before your father and I got together. I was nineteen, and in college, and I had all these great things lined up for my future. I had this concrete plan, and there was nothing in the world that was gonna take me away from it. Build a career, build something for myself, and then start a family. But then I met a boy.”
It isn’t exactly how things had worked out for Poppy, but the outline seems the same. Career focused, strong minded, independent, and then, bam! Nico.
“His name was Charlie, he was an aspiring chef, working a bunch of jobs to get him through culinary school, he was a real grafter, that’s what your grandpa used to say. He was so charming, made me feel like the whole world revolved around me.” She smiles wistfully as she looks back on that time in her life, a softness to her that Poppy doesn’t quite recognise. One that’s already bringing those tears straight back to her eyes and that lump straight back to her throat. 
Charming, made her feel like the world revolved around her. Yeah, that’s a familiar outline, alright. 
“And you know how your grandparents are, they encouraged it, if anything. Grandma is always drawn in by the dreamers, she used to tell me all the time how good he was for me.”
The lump intensifies, her blood running cold at all the possibilities of where this could go.
“Everything was so perfect, until it wasn’t.”
He better not have hurt her, she thinks. She doesn’t care how old he may be now, or how pregnant is. She’ll find Chef Charlie and beat him black and blue.
“Rosie had Downs Syndrome, we found out around half way through the pregnancy.”
For as long as Poppy has been alive, her mother has worked with the Downs Syndrome Association, hosting galas and fundraising events every year - helping raise money through sponsorships to assist with education, and to support those affected as well as their families. It’s the one thing she’s always loved doing with her - seeing her so passionate and focused. And now she’s cursing herself for never wondering why - always taking that devotion to the cause and paying too much attention to her brother’s mouth in her ear, telling her not to look a gift horse in the mouth, not to question why her mom only ever lit up in that environment.
“That’s why you run the benefit.” It’s not really a question, at this point. A realisation, more than anything, the weight of it settling into her spine.
“It makes me feel closer to her.”
“What happened?”
“Charlie, he had all these plans for what our life was gonna be after he found out I was pregnant. He was going to work his way up in a restaurant, was gonna do everything he could to support us and build something for the three of us that was more than what he had growing up. My parents offered to support, but he was so set on being the provider. He made everything seem so perfect and so easy.”
Easy, like Nico, Poppy thinks. She had the same sentiment about him, earlier.
“Having a kid with special needs didn’t fit into this version of life he wanted to live, so he bowed out the first chance he got. I made it to 32 weeks on my own before she-,”
Of all the things she can say about her mom, Poppy doesn’t think she’s ever seen her choked up like this. It makes her blood run cold.
“After 28 weeks, a miscarriage is considered a stillbirth, you have to physically give birth, there isn’t another way, so they induce labour, and I didn’t want to take any time to think about it so I had them do it as soon as I found out. Your grandparents were on a cruise off the coast of Greece, and Charlie was nowhere to be found. I had to deliver a baby I knew was already gone, on my own, with nobody to hold my hand.”
Poppy takes a hold of it immediately, as if clasping her fingers around her mother’s now will make up for having no one around to do it back then, when she needed it the most.
“She was so beautiful, Poppy. She had this little button nose, she looked so delicate I didn’t want to touch her too much when they let me hold her, she was so tiny and fragile.”
Her scan earlier in the day had been 3D, a multidimensional view of her little girl’s features, little nose, pouty lips, tiny hands. To think about the size of her in context, around the size of a mango or a large tomato, she can’t fathom what it would be like to hold her in her hands. Despite only being 19 weeks along, the thought of it makes her heart thud rampant and uneasily in her chest.
“I had all these ideas of what she could do, and what she would be, and I never let go of those, even when she was diagnosed. I had prepared myself for what life with a special needs child could be, I’d read all the books, I’d gone to a support group at the local community centre, and I’d dreamed up this great life for her. And we just never got to live it. No amount of therapy of counselling can ever erase that version of your life from your head.”
Poppy thinks about all the dreams she has for her little girl, all the ideas she already has of what she might be, might look like, might act like. To never get to see that would break her entirely.
“Your dad helped me through it after. I knew him since we were younger, always knew he was an option, but he was safe, and I always pushed him to the side. But after Rosie, after Charlie, I didn’t really want to be a dreamer anymore, didn’t want to think up these idealistic scenarios that would never come to be. Going down my own path, with Charlie, with all of it, it took me somewhere too dark to ever fathom a way out. And then your father became my light.”
Her parents have never been the lovey-dovey kind of parents, the ones that would make their children yuck with PDA or sentimentality, but they’ve always been solid. Always on the same page, always showing up for each other.
She's always thought her mom was the backbone of the two. Her father is strong, that has never been in question, but her mother has always seemed unwavering in her resilience for life in a way her dad doesn't measure up.
“Getting through my pregnancy with Oli was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, but he was so easy. I never really got sick, all his scans were clear, his heartbeat strong, he moved all the time. His delivery was so quick it was like I sneezed him out.” That same wistful smile returns to her lips, and Poppy can feel the but coming a mile off, can sense her defences building back up at the impending jab, at the certain comparison where Oli always comes out on top. “And then you came.”
The you sounds more defeated than pointed. The smile drops, but not entirely, and tears begin to well in her mom’s eyes again.
“You never wanted to be where the doctor wanted you to be, you kept your legs crossed for so long every time we thought we were going in to find out your gender, we’d leave disappointed, and your dad ended up deciding we should just leave it until you were born to find out. Not do the extra tests. Let the cards fall where they may. You didn’t move that often, and I was always anxious something was happening to you.”
Cheeto’s been moving more, lately. Within the last couple of weeks, Poppy has started to feel it. Routinely, in fact, so she can’t imagine what it would be like to go days without it, now. She’d be the same, worrying all the time, thinking something was wrong - and that’s without ever having experienced any problems before. Having a previous loss looming over her head must have driven her mother crazy.
“It wasn’t until you came out after 12 hours, where they had to manually reposition you at one point when you were breached, and just as they decided they might cut me open, you started crowning. After all that trauma, you came out and you were a girl, and your dad was so happy, but I-,” Poppy sort of knows this part. Her father had been praying for a girl, had celebrated as if the Giants had won the Super Bowl. And all she knows of her mom is what she’s told her in the plainest words. She had pretty bad postnatal depression after Poppy was born. She was pretty much nursed by nannies, and Poppy had always just assumed that’s where the rift stemmed from. “I just remember sobbing. Your dad bonded with you straight away, but every time I looked at you, I thought of her. Of Rosie. They tried putting me on medication but it never really took this feeling away that something was off, and, looking back, when I found out I was having another daughter, I think I projected a lot of what I wanted for Rosie onto you. I was always planning to be her caretaker for as long as it took, so I probably tried to control you a little more than I did Oliver. And I understand that’s unfair, but bringing a girl into this world is more difficult. You have this responsibility to prepare her for the weight of it.”
Prepare her, control her, be her caretaker. She supposes they all link. It makes sense, trying to stamp this life she had dreamed up on Poppy because she never got to do it with her sister. She never stood a chance to try forge her own path, not really. Small failures in her mother’s care after that initial loss set the foundations for the rest of Poppy’s life - an ignorance to the pain she was struggling with, and belittling of her grief, resulted in someone clinging so desperately to her own control that she flattened her daughter with it. 
“No one ever prepared me, Poppy. I love your grandparents, but they didn’t set me up to handle what I went through. And despite everything that I tried to warn you of, despite everything I tried to mould you to be, all the ways I tried to protect you, all you ever wanted to do was defy me. All the time. All the way down to those scars on your knees from not wearing the pads on your bike.” Priscilla’s hand gestures to where Poppy’s legs rest between them, a reminiscent scoff falling from her lips. “I tried so hard to shield you from a life you just wanted to dive headfirst into, no helmet or anything. You never listened, you wouldn’t make a plan for your future, you attend a college doing a degree for something that isn’t a guaranteed career path. In fact, you deny having your hand held down a guaranteed path when your father offered you all those jobs. You move into a city on your own, into a high crime neighbourhood, into a job surrounded by boisterous men, and somehow you hold your own.”
There’s an underlying sense of pride that Poppy can feel now - for all the ways her mom wants to paint these things as faults or inconveniences, she also sees them as strengths.
Maybe a part of her has all a long. A version of herself from before life came at her full force, a version of her clinging to whatever surface she can find to hold on and prevail.
“And you fall in love with one of them, with a boy who isn’t safe. Who knocks on your door out of nowhere one day, and you tell me he’s there to whisk you away, and it takes me straight back to being nineteen again, to having a man who, despite making me feel like it revolved around me, turned my world upside down. So maybe I can’t stand to see you making the same mistakes, knowing what kind of pain it can cause.”
Poppy remembers the day her mom had met Nico for the first time. They had been getting ready for one of the fundraisers for the Downs Syndrome Association - her mom on edge all day, micromanaging everything Poppy did, and she had answered a knock at the door to see Nico on the other side. Her dislike of him had been brewing even before then. It isn’t even Nico she dislikes. It’s everything that he represents, crashing into her life at a time that things were resurfacing. It all makes sense, now. “That’s why you got so hell-bent on setting me up?”
“Nico seems like a good enough man, Poppy,” She doesn’t know the half of it, Poppy thinks. “And I see that he makes you happy, I’m not blind to what the two of you have, or have had for a while now. But his life, his career, it’s not a sure thing. He has a lot of pressure outside of your relationship, and he might not be the best bet for when things go wrong. I just wanted you to have something more stable.”
Poppy lets the words linger for a minute. To dwell on the situation as a whole - a lifetime of anguish between the two of them, and finally she knows the cause. 
She really wishes she could have a drink right about now. It would probably ease the tension a whole lot more, sharing a bottle of wine with her mom to really break bread. 
But the more she thinks, the more she’s sure of her response to all of it.
“I’d bet on him.”
There’s no use in telling her mom she’s sorry for what she went through. She hopes her presence is enough of an indication of that - that she’d never want to even think of her mother dealing with that kind of grief, alone. 25 years of control isn’t going to be resolved with one conversation, she knows that - knows her mom knows it, too. And it doesn’t entirely explain a lot of her other behaviours, either, so it probably isn’t going to be the only heart to heart they have. But all she can now do is explain herself. Tell her side of the story she’s trying to write for herself and hope her mom ends up too invested in the ending to close the book completely.
“I’d bet everything I have that he won’t let me down. And you might think that’s shortsighted, or naive, but I need it to be enough for you. What Nico and I have, it started off impulsive, and a little chaotic, and messy, but I promise you, it’s stable. We’ve both put a lot of work into what we have to make it safe, I really need you to trust me on that.” 
And Poppy isn’t saying it for argument’s sake. She isn’t trying to defend something she isn’t sure on, herself. Nico would never leave her when things get hard, he’s proven as much to her already. He’s taken the baby steps, he’s integrated her entirely into his life, into his family, into his home - and even disregarding all that, it isn’t in his character. He’s loyal, and supportive, and honest. He won’t let her down.
“I may be a little hard-headed, and defiant, and stubborn when it comes to what you want for me, Mom, but I would never be reckless when it comes to what’s best for my baby.”
“I understand what you’re saying, Poppy, but I thought Charlie was the best-,”
“Nico isn’t Charlie.”
She feels a little harsh to say it, but it’s the truth. Her mom can’t hold her own misfortunes over Poppy for the rest of her life, it isn’t fair.
“And as much as you might think I’m not prepared enough to come to that conclusion, that I don’t know until something happens, I know him. And I know myself. I’ve spent years trying to push these feelings that I have down and it’s done nothing but hurt me. If you gave him a chance, you’d have seen it for yourself, he doesn’t give up, not for anything.”
There’s another prolonged silence as her mom mulls on her thoughts, and Poppy can practically see the transition of emotions pass through her. Hesitation, doubt, confusion, deliberation, and then finally, acceptance. 
“Maybe when the two of you get back from your time in Europe, we can put that to the test.”
Poppy can feel her face drop, mouth agape, eyes widened, brows raised, but she can’t find it in her to care how dramatic she might look. Her mother, who would rather have her hands hammered or swallow nails than admit she may have been wrong, is willing to give her a real shot to prove herself to her.
“You’ll really give him a chance?”
“Let’s not be rash. Baby steps, darling,” her mom rolls her eyes playfully.
Poppy can’t quite believe the serendipity of the situation.
It had been in this exact spot, in this exact apartment, that those words had been uttered to her those few months ago. Hands held between her and Nico, and a promising glint in his eyes and certainty to his tone. 
And she feels the same optimism that she had back then.
She feels her face break out into an almost aching grin, tears welling at her eyes as she leans in to hug her mom, feeling the gentle rub of maternal comfort ease into her spine. 
She invites her mom to stay for dinner, the two of them working in tandem to make her grandmother’s mac and cheese, Poppy actually accepting her mother’s helping hand, and they eat together while Poppy catches her up on all the latest with her scans and tests, and all the ever developing symptoms of her pregnancy.
And as she burrows herself into her and Nico’s bed later in the night, body swallowed in sheets that smell of his detergent, surrounded by everything that reminds her of him, she just feels warm all over.
She thinks to herself that maybe this place is magic. Maybe he’s magic, healing a lifelong rift between her and her mother from over 4,000 miles away. 
And there’s no maybe about the fact that she can see forever with him. 
That, she’s sure of.
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Poppy has never had any issues when it comes to flying. 
Having being fortunate enough to have vacationed with her family every year up until she turned 16, and her parents stopped inviting her, she’s never been bothered by planes or airports or travel.
In fact, she quite likes the whole process. Packing everything meticulously into little cubes, organising those into co-ordinated cases pulled at either side of her body as she ambles through the terminal, mooching around the shops for little trinkets and stocking up on copious amounts of candy. Lounging around her gate until it’s time to board and settling it in, ears cushioned by thick headphones and a nice mellow playlist to calm the chaos of her day so far, or to set the mood for the flight ahead. She likes watching in-flight movies, even likes the gross in-flight meals, always food she’d never dream in a million years of eating outside of whatever tin can she’s residing in for the next few hours. She doesn’t even mind turbulence.
But she hasn’t travelled such a long distance in a few years.
And she has never done so whilst pregnant.
All the glamour of travelling overseas, along with all the small pleasures she has found over the years, is quickly outweighed by the fact she now has to wear compression socks. Now has to keep drinking water throughout the day, which means she has to keep peeing, keep walking around despite the muscles at the bottom of her back begging her to sit back down. 
And she had thought in the days leading up to her flight that she had been keeping a brave face on her daily calls with Nico, not letting her stress about the whole thing impact his mood, or his focus leading up to semifinals of the world championship, but she’s never been so thankful for someone’s stubborn perception than when she had opened her door the night before her flight to see his sister stood on the other side of it.
“Nina?” She asks, dumbfounded, before slender arms are thrown around her, rubbing gently at her back as she sways a little into the cuddle.
“Hey, travel buddy!”
“What’s going on, what are you doing here?” Poppy asks as she welcomes her in, heart jumping erratically at the sight of her. Nina was supposed to meet her on the other side of her flight, being her ride from the airport to the hotel while Nico would be in training, and she kind of feels like her nerves have manifested her into the apartment like some sort of thirst-induced mirage. 
“Nico was getting all antsy at the thought of you travelling alone, so I’m supposed to say we decided as a family for one of us to come out and travel with you, but the truth is I may or may not have been bribed.”
“What did he bribe you with?”
“Said you’d name your daughter after whoever came.” She smiles victoriously as she makes her way through the apartment with ease, throwing herself onto the couch, just beside where Poppy has two big open cases splayed out on the floor, almost fully packed. “I had to literally pull my mom out of a cab to beat her to the airport.”
“Sounds just like the kind of Hischier family dynamics I was promised, to be fair,” Poppy chuckles, joining her in the living room and perching herself on the floor beside her cases, carrying on with her previous task of organising that she had been preoccupied with before the mysterious knock at the door. “You’re just in time actually, I was about to order some food, I’ve cleared out the refrigerator so you can take your pic of what we get if you want!”
Nia had been around earlier in the afternoon, and had helped Poppy prep the apartment to be left empty for a few months, which included clearing out all the perishable food and hauling it down to the waste disposal  room because the bag wouldn’t fit down the chute, and neither of them wanted to be held responsible for clogging it up for the whole building. She had helped her figure out what to pack, as well as bring over some travel essentials she had picked up from CVS, creating a little kit for Poppy to take on the plane with her.
Face mist, hand sanitiser, an eye mask, ear plugs and intensive lip balm - a lifesaver considering the amount Poppy has been nervously chewing on her bottom lip for the past few days straight. 
And then she had left, in an emotional goodbye where Poppy had waited until Nia was in the elevator to burst into tears, distraught at the thought of not seeing her best friend for the next few months.
It isn’t the first time they’ve ever been apart this long, but Nia has been her rock throughout her pregnancy, and leaving her behind just as all the fun parts of the whole experience are starting to kick in feels sad. But with promises made to call as often as possible, and assurances that Nia will spend the next few months meticulously planning a welcome home-baby shower hybrid, the tears soon cleared up as Poppy distracted herself making sure she wasn’t forgetting anything. 
“Aren’t you craving anything?” Nina asks as she slips down onto the floor beside her, the two of them kneeling next to each other. 
“To be honest, I felt sick before you got here, so I hadn’t really thought about it.” Poppy shrugs. She had been planning to go to bed, try and sleep away her anxiety, but she doesn’t want to seem irresponsible, not to Nina. “There’s a really great Italian place not too far from here that delivers, though. And now that you mention cravings they do these little tubs of tiramisu and if I don’t get one before I leave it’s all I’ll think about for the next four months.”
“I’m sold, we could share if you’re not too hungry.”
“We’ll share pasta, I share dessert with no one.”
“That’s fair,” Nina chuckles as she helps Poppy push herself up, her bump becoming more of a hinderance to her usual habits with every day that passes.
She ambles over to the TV console where her phone had been discarded and works at ordering the two of them dinner through her PostMates app, agreeing to share some lasagne and get a tub of dessert each.
Nina helps her sort her cases until they’re ready to zip up, and agrees to do one final check of her bag she’ll be taking on the plane so she has a fresh set of eyes to suggest anything else she might need.
“You know your hotel room will have pillows, right?” Nina scoffs, pulling one of the pillows from Poppy’s bed out of the carry-on. “Why do you have one in your bag?”
“You’re gonna think I’m crazy.” Poppy sighs, collapsing onto the couch with a heavy sigh.
“You’re having a baby with my little brother, Poppy, that ship has already sailed.” She laughs, turning to look at Poppy with the same look Nico usually gives her, exasperated somewhat but entirely fond. It makes her miss him that much more. The same dark chocolate eyes, same dimpled smile. “Promise I won’t judge, girl talk is a safe space.”
Poppy smiles, fond in her own way.
She hasn’t spent much time alone with Nina. They’ve met a few times before, hung out with Nico, with his parents, with the team - at bars, restaurants, even the arena - and Poppy remembers a couple times where Nina and her had both uttered the same sentiment. It’s nice to have another girl around. 
“I haven’t washed his pillowcase since he left,” she admits, feeling her cheeks flush already, "And I just carry it around the apartment and sniff it sometimes when I miss him.” It only barely smells like him still, but it had gotten her through those first two weeks more than she’d like to admit, shuffling over to his side of the bed to breathe him in every morning like he’d only gone out for training, and would be back before she knew it.
“Yeah, that’s weird.”
“You said no judging,” Poppy pouts.
“I lied.”
“I was gonna take it on the plane with me tomorrow.” Her flight is in the late afternoon, and she has no doubts around the fact that once her butt touches base into her designated seat, she’ll be out like a light. If it weren’t for her constant need to pee, and warnings to have intervals on her feet, she would hope to sleep the whole way through. What’s better than closing her eyes in one country and waking in another? The miles between her and Nico reduced to mere double-digits, she can’t wait for this heaviness on her chest to dissipate into nothing the second she’s breathing the same air as him. “Figured if I’m gonna be uncomfortable for 9 hours straight it might help.”
“So happy that you’re reuniting soon, because I think you’ve lost your mind,”
“Yeah,” Poppy sighs in agreement, because there’s really no use denying it, now. A month without him, longing to be with him, missing him in even the most mundane ways has well and truly sent her off the handle. Nia had told her as much, earlier, too. And Luke when she’d text him asking if he happens to see Nico in passing while he’s overseas to please send her pictures like a crazed stalker. “I thought I’d be better at this whole thing, but I miss him more than I ever have before.”
“That’s cute,” Nina smiles, sympathy glimmering in her dark irises as she tilts her head and watches the way Poppy’s own features shift.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“He has this thing whenever he talks about you, like his eyes get all animated and turn into hearts,” she smirks, “Yours do the same. It’s sweet.”
Poppy feels her mouth stretching, a deep smile tugging at each corner of her lips. “Cheeto kind of does the same thing, shuffles a little in my belly when she hears him.” She’s noticed it the last few days, slight movements whenever Nico calls, whenever his voice rings out from the confines of her phone and warms her entire body. And despite everything she reads online about how it isn’t possible for her baby to hear anything outside of her body yet, she doesn’t care. Maybe it’s a reaction to the way Poppy’s heart sings for him, instead. 
“Baby Nina, you mean?” Poppy rolls her eyes fondly as Nina settles beside her on the couch. “Are you sure she isn’t trying to shield herself from how sickening the two of you are?”
“Possibly,” Poppy’s lips twist, “I can’t believe I’m sat here whining about how much I miss him when it’s been a few weeks, you don’t get to see him for most of the year.”
“It’s different,” Nina places a comforting hand on Poppy’s arm, “You two are building a life together, as much as he’s my brother and I love him, my world doesn’t revolve around him like your world does.” Poppy nods, mulling that fact over in her head. “That came out sounding worse than I meant, I think-,”
“No, not at all,” she reassures her, shifting her arm to take her hand, “You’re right, it’s so weird being at this phase of my pregnancy and trying to wrap my mind around how everything is gonna work and him not being here, it’s a little like a mental block.”
Having her world revolve around him isn’t a bad thing, she doesn’t think. 
Telling the Poppy from a year ago that she’d be at peace with having her world revolve around any man would have had her throwing punches. Telling the girl who valued her independence like her hottest commodity - who barely liked to share her time, let alone her space, her day, her bed, with anybody else - that she would have moved in with her boyfriend, ready to start a family together and planning their final child-free summer over text threads would have been like telling her the moon was made out of cheese.
Ludicrous, but ever so slightly intriguing.
But it’s all so familiar now. All so right.
“One more day, Poppy,” Nina just so happens to echo the sentiment that Poppy has been telling herself all day. All week, all month, ever since that day outside the airport, counting down the days until this one, twisting the bracelet around her wrist nervously as if it’s a tether straight to him. “This time in 24 hours, we’ll be almost there.”
One more day, she repeats in her head, nodding with a smile to Nina and taking a deep breath.
She can do one more day.
Only one more day turns into almost two until Poppy is reunited with Nico.
She thinks she cursed herself, if she’s honest, whispering to her bump just before she had gone to sleep that night that they would be reunited with daddy before either of them knew it.
And then the travel day from hell occurred.
She thinks if she didn’t have Nina, she would have had an almighty breakdown - but every time she looked over and met those warm eyes, the tears in her own dissolved.
It had started with traffic on the way to the airport, a police incident on the skyway tripling the usual 20-minute travel time, and the only thing Poppy could find to be grateful for is that they had got an Uber instead of her driving, knowing her stress would have been tenfold if she was stopping and starting all the time. 
Lucky for her, she always allows for delays in her planning, and they made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare, check-in going without a hitch, thankfully, and still giving them time to peruse for snacks to keep Poppy’s cravings at bay for the 9 hour flight ahead.
Time that, in the end, didn’t matter, because their flight kept getting delayed. 
At first it was an hour, a problem with the initial departure of the inbound plane, and Poppy could deal with that. They were due to land in the early hours of the morning in Prague, anyway, so getting there an hour later didn’t really bother her. She had Nina for company, an abundance of snacks, and access to clean toilets in the airport lounge. She could have been trapped on the tin can, so all things considered an hour was too little of a delay for her to get worked up about.
That hour soon turned into two, which turned into three, and Poppy could feel her resolve dwindling as she watched the clock tick down. The first hour was more of an inconvenience than a problem. The second hour meant she probably wouldn’t make it to the hotel in time to spend some time in the room with Nico before he left, which was disheartening, but not entirely earth shattering. The third hour meant she wouldn’t get to see him at all before he left for the arena. 
Nina was trying her best to keep on top of Poppy’s nerves, but even the power of those glimmering Hischier brown eyes couldn’t outweigh a delayed flight and an irksome lack of communication from the airline. 
The only silver lining to the whole situation is the depth at which two people can bond when forced to just sit and wait together.
She learns more about Nina than Nico could ever tell her - about her career, her passions, her interests. Her love for volleyball, and various other sports, for travel, including her bucket list of countries to visit, and an already-planned itinerary of what she would want to do in each one. The two of them shared stories of their own travels over the years, gushing over secret spots they had both visited in the few spots they shared an interest in. Nina regaled Poppy with childhood stories of Nico, ones even her parents weren’t privy to - and it reinforces a lot of the things Poppy has learned herself about him over the years - of his love for learning, always wanting to educate himself, better himself. His love for trying new things, and how, despite being the youngest sibling, always encouraged his brother and sister to do the same. 
They talk about music, about movies and TV shows, fashion, podcasts, food, their differing experiences in college, and by the time it is finally time to board their flight - after replenishing their stock of snacks - their conversation carries on seamlessly until half the journey has passed, almost. 
Talking to Nina is easy. She’s friendly and charming, in a way Poppy is sure must run in their genes - hopes it does, and is passed down to her daughter like their brown eyes and dimpled smiles - and there isn’t a second of hesitance when it comes to her caring for Poppy like a little sister.
It’s the kind of sibling bond she has never really had before.
Her and Oli didn’t argue that much when they were kids, but their difference in age created an unmovable barrier between the two of them, and so they were never as close as the Hischier siblings appear to be.
It makes Poppy think of her mom, again. Think of Rosie, and the what-if of growing up with a big sister, herself. Would they have bonded over things like clothes and music? Would they have been each other’s shoulders to lean on? Knowing that it was ever a possibility makes her feel a lack that wasn’t there those couple of weeks ago, when she hadn’t ever known of her sister’s existence. 
And she knows it’s strange to hope that building a relationship with Nina might fulfil that - edging herself into whatever gap the Hischier family might leave for her might make up for this gap in her own heart that now she feels will never be filled again - but spending the day with her makes her long for something she never spared a thought to before now.
She looks after Poppy in the way a big sister would, too. Makes sure she’s getting up and walking around intermittently, makes sure whenever the beverage cart comes around, she’s ordering refreshments to make sure Poppy stays hydrated. She keeps a watchful eye on the WC when Poppy starts shifting in her seat, lets her know when the vacant sign lights up above the door so Poppy can amble over and relieve the growing pressure on her bladder from trying to constantly drink. 
And when Nina finally lets herself drift off, Poppy can’t help but stay awake, teary eyed, wondering how she ever got so lucky.
How she was lucky enough to have a partner like Nico, so in tune with her emotions that he sent his sister over to keep her company when she didn’t even know at that point it would be exactly what she needed. How she was lucky enough to have an extended family that cared enough about her to agree to it, to fight over the responsibility, as Nina had implied her and Katja had done. How she was lucky enough to get on so well with Nina, to talk to her almost non-stop for hours on end, to bond over their appreciation of so many things that stretches so far beyond their shared love of Nico. 
She gets so caught up in her appreciation that she eventually drifts off with a dopey smile on her face, the dimmed lights of the cabin soothing her to sleep for the rest of their flight, and she lets the contentment she feels seep into her bones so much that when they’re delayed another hour on the tarmac when they land, she doesn’t let it get to her. When she's stuck behind a group of pensioners who don't know how to operate the scanners at passport control, she withholds her huffs and puffs. When her bags are the last to come out on the luggage carousel, she refrains from complaining.
She’ll see him, soon. She might not get her hour alone in their hotel room. She might not get her kiss goodbye in the hotel lobby. She might not even, at this rate, catch the beginning of the game, despite it being the only thing the two of them have talked about for weeks - the possibility of the team making it to the finals in the world championships, to her getting to see him live out his dreams live in action. Between taking her bags to the hotel and travelling to the arena with Nico’s family, not yet accounting for the inevitability of further traffic on her way, because that's just her luck, she’s probably going to get there part way through the first period, and the optimistic part that remains within her tells her, at least she's getting to see him at all.
But she’s in the same country, now. When she gets out of this god forsaken airport, she’ll be breathing the same air, kind of. And the months, that turned to weeks, that turned to days, have now turned to hours. 
She can definitely do hours.
She can do anything for Nico.
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In all the lead up to Poppy flying out to Europe to meet Nico, the two of them had never really accounted for it turning out like this.
If she really thinks back on it, she thinks she was giddy, too caught up in the romance of it all, of the whirlwind nature of everything that unfolded - of flying overseas to be with him, of preparing to spend the summer together, surrounded by his family, in his favourite place on earth, of getting to watch him play again like the weight of the world isn’t on his shoulders.
The ending to the Devil’s season had been tough - and he would never show it, not to Poppy, not when the two of them were spending so much time together, but it had taken a toll on him. She knows Nico doesn’t back down. She had told her mom as much. Nico doesn’t fold to pressure. He builds himself back up, builds those around him back up like the true captain he is, and he never lets the outcome of a game get to him. 
For most of the season, there’s always the next game. Always room to improve, always a chance to claw things back in his favour. But those final few months, with playoff contention just slipping further and further out of his reach, his relationship with his own game had suffered a little.
She would watch him come home with a slump in his shoulders, eased away only by her gentle embrace. Would take notice of the way he would talk about work less, shifting the subject or speaking in phrases without much heart behind them.
And seeing the spring return to his step at the thought of playing in the world championships, of initially captaining his national team, had flooded her with pride, and with hope.
Every time the team progressed, their plans would change.
The first plan had been to meet him at home in Switzerland. She had work to wrap up, keeping her in Jersey, and he was going to get his apartment over there ready to fit the two of them for the inevitable future. And then the team kept progressing. Kept winning. And plans to fly out and stay with just him turned into plans to fly out and stay with the family, his opportunity to get things ready getting shorter and shorter the better they played.
And then rolled round the quarter finals. The semi finals only two days after, the day before she was set to fly out - and no matter what the result of that game was, she would be jetting off to Prague, instead.
And she hadn’t really said it to him, not wanting to jinx anything, but it was like she had known somewhere in her heart that he would make it all the way to the end.
It’s what Nico does. He fights tooth and nail to get to where he wants to be, and she knows, after the season the Devils had, that Nico wanted that gold medal more than anything. 
And when she had been sat on that plane, waiting on the tarmac for the delayed opportunity to disembark, and had decided at that point that there was nothing she wouldn’t or couldn’t do for the man she loved, she hadn’t entirely prepared herself for the possibility that anything could mean consoling him after such a heartbreaking loss.
She would like to think she’s good at comforting him, would like to think she’s mastered it over the years of knowing him. In those first years of their budding friendship, where she might have seen him after a few games, he might have dropped by her desk, or later her office, in the days after a game, she’d do her best to pick him back up. Some dumb jokes, a hug or two, eyes meeting and sticking in what she now remembers as a heated gaze until he would melt, would give a bashful smile and crack a joke back.
And that had progressed to him coming over to her apartment. To collapsing onto her couch with a heavy sigh and trying to blend himself into her routine, to erase the part of himself that hurt and cover it up with the part of himself she made feel better.
He picked up the same sort of habits when the two of them had fully reconciled, seeking solace in just her company, even if they weren’t properly together at that point. Comforted by fleeting touches, the holding of each other’s gaze, and all the soft, affirming words spoken between the two of them. And by the end of the season when they were together, it was by intimacy, the moments shared underneath her sheets that weren’t explicit, the bump of noses, the fluttering of lashes against cheeks, the soft whispers of unspoken worries that were trapped by a duvet pulled over their heads, their doubts not allowed to seep out into the blissful world they’re trying to create together.
But this kind of pain is a crease she fears can’t be ironed out by the simplicity of touch. Of kisses in the dark, of hands on hearts and legs intertwined.
When she hears the soft beep of his key card to his hotel room, listens for the heavy footsteps that carry him down the hall, and looks up to see the man she loves, defeated and remorseful, in front of her, her resolve shatters into a million pieces. 
For all the lows she has held his hand through, nothing compares to this moment. 
That night in the bar at the end of the season last year, where she had rested her head on his chest and heard the clunky beat of his broken heart, doesn’t even come close.
It’s the rattle of a shaky breath he lets out that has her own heart breaking, shooting up from where she had been perched, picking at her fingers nervously on the edge of the hotel bed, and launching herself at him.
She pulls her body straight into his, wrapping her arms around him in the hopes that such a small gesture could ever possibly convey the love she has for him.
She had thought seeing his sorrow blasted across the jumbotron earlier in the arena had hurt. She had thought their initial, rushed reunion after the game, where he had put on a brave face and told her he would meet her back in the room, the pressure of his kiss the only giveaway to his internal anguish, was bad. 
But this is so much worse.
Holding him as he chokes out a sob, the initial flimsy wrap of his arms around her turning into fingers clutching with a white knuckle grip at the shirt on her back, trying to conceal his pain through muscles that tense around her, restricting his shaking frame from giving his emotions away.
She holds him for as long as she feels like he needs to be held, until that tension eases a little, those shaky breaths even out, and his body starts to sway a little.
When their bodies part, she can’t bring herself to entirely leave his orbit, pressing kisses to wherever she can reach as he basks in her affections, eyes fluttering closed like he’s still trying to hide from her.
“I’m so sorry you didn’t get your dream, baby,” she hums into the corner of his mouth, leaning a little to press a gentle kiss to the scar forming deep into his cheek, his neck craning to make it easier for her to reach.
His eyes squeeze tighter, keeping the warmth of his irises from her softened gaze, and she’s too close to see the bob in his throat, but she does see the clench of his jaw, stress still present in every fibre of his being. She wants to be his relief, wants to be the one to make things okay, make things better, but even she knows sometimes that isn’t for the best.
He needs to let these emotions, as heavy as they are, pass through him. He shouldn’t have to cover them up just to make her more comfortable, make their time together more enjoyable. She has the rest of her life to enjoy him, if he’ll let her.
So she clutches at the shirt covering his chest and pulls him back toward the bed, sitting him down and perching herself beside him, a comforting hand on his lap and a shoulder ready for him to cry on, literally.
She doesn’t even have to prompt him, then, to open up - the nature of their relationship thus far prevailing in the way he sniffles, turns to her with knees knocking, and starts to fiddle with her fingers resting on his thigh.
“I feel like this was my last chance to prove something,” he starts, his voice hoarse and his posture folding, “This year has just been so rough, you know?”
Poppy nods, because she does know, even if he hasn’t explicitly said it before now. Nico wears his resilience like armour, but she sees him when he’s bare. When the clunky metal that protects him from everyone else is removed, and his vulnerabilities are exposed, only to her. She sees the heavy sighs, the slumped shoulders, the forced smiles. She sees discomfort, unease, exhaustion.
“We got hit by all those injuries, and we didn’t make the playoffs, and the boys were all so down, and I,” he lets out an elongated exhale, tongue swiping out to wet the corner of his mouth, “I feel like I’m not living up to what’s expected of me, or what I expect of myself.”
She rubs soothingly at his knuckles, biting her tongue to withhold from telling him that’s he’s everything and more, because it isn’t what he’s asking of her. 
“I just needed a win.” He chokes out, and as a tear slips from his watery eyes, Poppy reaches to catch it with her thumb, swiping at his skin. “I just needed to feel like I could achieve something like this before it slips away from me.”
“Where is it slipping away to?” Poppy frowns, letting her touch linger on his cheek. 
“We’re having a baby, Poppy,” he speaks through swollen lips, glassy eyes meeting her gaze in the dark of the room. “When she comes, my dreams are gonna be different. My priorities will be different, I owe it to the two of you to be better. You deserve better.”
“It’s not one thing or the other, Nico.”
“Isn’t it?” He asks, “I have to put you first-,”
“You already do.” 
“It won’t be enough when she comes, it’s not fair to either of you,”
“Says who?”
“Says everybody. Says Talia, says your mom, says me chasing this stupid medal and leaving you to travel half way across the world on your own while you’re 5 months pregnant only for me to lose-,”
“Stop it,” she commands him, firm, despite the growing ache in the back of her throat, both hands clasped on either side of his jaw and levelling him with a stern look. “You don’t have to give me any more of yourself to be enough, Nico. I wasn’t on my own, I had Nina, because you have this little section of your beautiful brain,” she taps on the side of his head to point it out, “That, despite being worked to the bone for almost 9 months straight without a real break, and despite all the chaos of us figuring everything out, and you chasing after your dreams, which are not stupid, by the way, saw straight through me trying to pretend I wasn’t completely losing my mind these past few days and sent your sister out just to make sure I wasn’t alone-,”
“You wouldn’t have been alone if I were th-,”
Poppy places her hand over his mouth, the rest of his sentence mumbled into her palm as she narrows her eyes at him. “I said stop, didn’t I?”
He nods, his shoulders sagging and his eyebrows doing all they can to express the emotion that she’s covering him from speaking through his lips.
He’s far too good for her, she thinks.
So good that she has struggled to put it into words, basking selfishly in his affections, bathing in their love so long that the water has gone cold by the time it’s his turn to sit in it.
She has felt it for as long as she can remember, this crippling adoration for him, this warm devotion that cushions the blow of everything else life tries to throw her way - but she hasn’t said it. Not clear enough, anyway, for him to not doubt it’s there.
Not in the way he had, all those weeks ago back in his bed - their bed - at 3am. He had poured his heart out to her, and she had drank it all up with nothing left to spare.
“You do all these things for me, you send your sister half way across the world just to circle straight back, you call my dad and my brother out, you shame my family into loving me more so that they can live up to the ways that you do it, and you don’t even understand how much of yourself you already give to me. I could sit here all night and not run out of ways to tell you how you make things better. Every part of my world that you touch, you make it good, you make me good. And a lot of that comes from who you are outside of our relationship.
“So I’d never want you to think you have to give any of the other stuff up to be enough for me. I fell in love with the parts of you that you give to the foundation, to the community and all the causes we help. I love the parts of you that you save just for the ice. I love the parts of you that you leave at the Rock, in the locker room with the guys, or in the parking lot when you stop and sign stuff for the fans waiting in the cold. And whatever parts of you are left to come home to me, or that you dedicate to me when you’re not home, God, Nico, I don’t think I’ll ever even be able to measure how loved you make me feel. I can’t wait for our daughter to feel that.”
His eyes are watering, and tears drop until they run their course down his cheeks, stopped by her fingers still clasped over his mouth, fingers she removes to hold his head again, the scratch of his grown out beard tickling at her palms, to hammer her point home.
“I know that this hurts right now. I know how hard you worked for this, how bad you wanted it, and it’s okay to have wanted it so bad that it kills you that you didn’t get it, but don’t let it take away what you mean to me. This isn’t your last chance to prove yourself, Nico, not to me, not to our baby, I promise you.”
Poppy knows how it feels to want to have achieved certain things before their little girl arrives. She’s worked herself up enough about it since finding out she was pregnant, but being a parent isn’t about who she was before. She’d realised that when she had sat down with her mom, when her dad had started making more of an effort. When the two of them had made promises to try, and it had glued together small parts of her heart that she thought could never be fixed.
All they can do is be the best version of themselves in the moment. When their daughter comes, it’s about who they are then, not what medals they won, or what trophies they lifted, or milestones they hit. They can still do those things with her there, and those moments will be all the sweeter for experiencing them with their daughter.
“Can I speak yet?” He whispers, dark eyes more intense than she thinks she’s ever seen them, staring right into the depths of her soul.
“No,” she replies, in the same hushed tone, “One more thing.”
She shoots over to where she had discarded her carry on, earlier, digging through to the bottom where a small leather box sits - where it has sat since the day Nico left Jersey all those weeks ago, and she had felt an impulse too strong to ignore to get him something after he had given her bracelet back.
When she goes back to stand before him, he parts his legs, and pats his thigh until she perches herself on it, careful not to drop all of her weight until a hand curls around her waist and holds her in place. 
“It’s a signet ring,” she smiles softly as she takes it out of the box, tugging his right hand closer and sliding it onto the finger beside his pinky. “They’re supposed to be a sign of family. Usually they’re engraved, but I thought we could figure that out later and go do it together.”
“You have one, too?” He asks, admiring the way it glints as he takes it in, the band thick and heavy below his knuckle, the perfect fit. 
“I will when my hands aren’t like blown up surgical gloves.”
And through teary eyes, for the first time all night since they have been reunited, a laugh bubbles up from the pit of his stomach, hearty and deep, eyes crinkling in the corners and cheeks dimpling into that beautiful smile she loves more than anything else in the world.
“Aren’t I supposed to be the one getting you a ring?”
God, she thinks, how could he ever possibly think he isn’t enough?
Melting her heart with such a question, accompanied with an ever-so-innocent glint in his eye.
She’s still holding onto his finger, twirling the ring around on it until it starts to tickle, starts to seemingly twitch with the need to hold her back.
“Only if you want to,” she shrugs, lips twisting as he raises his hand to cup her cheek, fingers swiping her hair behind her ear and the cool metal of the jewellery pressing to her warm skin.
“I do.” He promises before he kisses her, meaningful and deep, a whole month of longing wrapped up into the searing press of their lips.
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Poppy wakes the next morning to soft, continuous buzzing and a wash of light spread almost heavenly over the room. The space beside her is empty, but warm, the sheets crumpled as if only just vacated, and it’s as she starts to gain consciousness and make sense of her surroundings that she realises what the noise is.
“No, no, no, no, no!” She exclaims as she kicks the tangles sheets from her bare legs, them balling up in a messy pile as she shoots up off the bed and stumbles toward the bathroom. “Do you hate me or something?!”
“What are you talking about?” Nico chuckles deeply, the morning rasp to his voice not quite enough to distract her from the device he’s holding in his hand - the hand she had only just last night brandished with a ring, for God’s sake.
“I literally professed my undying love for you not even 12 hours ago, Nico, and this is how you repay me?”
“Maybe I’m testing the limits of the undying part,” he shrugs, amusement flickering across his stupidly beautiful eyes - and the part of Poppy that’s over the moon to see him smiling, is quickly shot down by the part of her that’s been waiting to get her hands on that bearded jaw for weeks.
“You’re testing my patience, is what you’re doing,” she scoffs, reaching to snatch the clippers from his grip. “I didn’t even get to have a turn!”
“What am I, a carnival ride?” He laughs heartily as he pulls them just out of her reach, her body stepping into his so that he can land his free hand on her hip and keep her close. “It had to go, Poppy, I looked like a caveman. Coach said we all have to clean up a little for today.”
“Your coach is a traitor,” she pouts, allowing him to crowd her back until the base of her spine bumps against the counter. “You’re my caveman. My gorgeous, sexy, caveman baby daddy who I’ve only got to see through a screen for four whole weeks, you can’t do this to me with no warning.”
“You wanna finish it off?” He asks, head tilting as he smirks down at her.
“It’s only fair I do,” she sighs, placing her hands on the counter and hoisting herself up onto it with a huff, parting her legs so that he can step between them. “Maybe I can salvage something,” she mutters, running delicate fingers over what remains, an untouched moustache and some growth left on his chin. “Can I give you a goatee?”
“Do your worst, Mohn, I’m at your mercy to defile.”
“You’re gonna regret that.”
“I’ll never regret anything where you’re concerned.”
Next Chapter
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remstrrs · 7 days ago
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Potential Rebel Robin -> S4 Parallel and (potentially) S5 Parallel
I feel like as a fandom, we don't really talk about the Rebel Robin book/podcast enough, especially about it's implications for the series in general, so i wanted to look at one specific scene that parallels a scene from s4, and that i think would be rlly cool if paralleled in s5:
{CC:
Robin : There's something wrong with me. There's something inside of me that's just, like, rotten, and there's nothing I can do to fix it.
Wait - Wait why are you stopping?
Mr. Hauser : Robin, look at me. There is nothing wrong with you.
Robin : You have to say that.
Mr. Hauser : No, I'm serious. Hey - hey, look me in the eye and trust what I'm saying, okay? There is nothing wrong with you. There is nothing rotten inside of you; you don't need to be fixed. }
For further context, Mr. Hauser is Robin's English teacher at Hawkins High in her sophomore year (podcast is set in winter of 1983) who she becomes very close with and, in this scene, is giving her a ride home.
This is episode four of the podcast, but in the final episode, Robin finds out that Mr. Hauser is a queer man who is secretly dating another man in Hawkins.
In aforementioned scene, Robin asks him if he's happy, and if living in Hawkins while queer is really worth it for him - to which he says yes, but reminds Robin that she doesn't have to make the same choice as him, saying, "There are places where you don't need the armor"
Now, firstly, I want to start by talking about how this scene between Robin and Mr. Hauser is a pretty close parallel to the scene in s4e08, where Jonathan is comforting Will after he watches the painting scene go down.
(Also, keep in mind that the Rebel Robin book was published in 2021, so it's writing coincided with the writing of s4)
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Jonathan knows that Will is queer, and heard Will mention that he felt like a mistake back in the van, so he tells him that he loves him and,
"There is nothing in this world, okay, absolutely nothing that will ever change that."
Although not a perfect parallel, I couldn't help but notice the word choice used and the repetition of 'nothing' in both examples. The overall exigence of these two scenes is almost a perfect match, too:
Mr. Hauser hears Robin call herself wrong and rotten, so he comforts her by telling her the exact opposite.
Jonathan hears Will call himself different and a mistake so he comforts him and tells him that he loves him no matter what.
Now.... how do I think something similar could play out in Season 5?
Alright, so there's been a lot of talk on Byler tumblr about having scenes with Mike, Will, and Robin together - or Robin mentoring either one of the boys - but personally, I'd like to see the scenes above paralleled in a Robin/Mike conversation over anything, and here's why.
Out of the two boys, Mike is the one who is most isolated from his queerness and what it entails. Whereas Will is possibly starting to come into his own and accept himself a little bit more with Jonathan as a stronger support system, and has known about his queerness, Mike is much more lost. Will has already had a heart-to-heart with Jonathan, and knows he isn't alone with his queerness.
In my opinion, it's inevitable that Mike will have a heart-to-heart with one of the adults/older teens in Season 5, and I honestly believe that it has to be Robin, Nancy, or (preferably) both.
In Season 5, Mike is a high school sophomore. He's very clearly insecure, and is probably seen as more weird or different because of his previous involvement with Hellfire. Likewise, in her book, Robin is also an insecure high school sophomore who is seen as an outsider/social outcast.
Plus, in Season 5, Robin closely parallels Mr. Hauser from the book:
They both have accepted and come to terms with their queerness, and came out to at least one person, and they both have partners of the opposite-sex while living in Hawkins (assuming that Rovickie is canon after the 1987 time skip, which i believe it probably will be.)
In my opinion, this sets up an almost perfect opportunity for a Robin/Mike moment where Mike either:
In relation to his queerness, talks about feeling wrong and rotten to Robin, who sympathizes with him (and potentially comes out to him) helping him know that he isn't alone or broken.
or
Mike finds out about Robin's queerness by accident, (which is Robin's case when finding out about Mr. Hauser's) and he asks her if she's happy in Hawkins, which gives her the opportunity to convey to Mike that his idea of a 'family' isn't the only one, and that there "are places where you don't need the armor" just as Mr. Hauser said.
I think the second would be especially impactful, because Mike grew up in a white-picket fence, nuclear, traditional, and conservative household (something that is actually openly criticized by Nancy and Jonathan in season 1). He sees his parents' loveless relationship (which is paralleled to Stancy and Milkvan) right in front of his eyes, and thinks that its the only way because it's all he's known. Robin could open his eyes to the possibility of something else, and this is what could make him realize his feelings for Will.
Also! We have confirmation of a potential Robin + Mike scene (or at least a scene where Finn and Maya are filming together) by none other than Shawn Levy himself (pic posted on his insta)
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If you don't know, Shawn Levy notoriously directed both of the scenes below, which show examples of Mike struggling with potential internalized homophobia during angsty fights with Will
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Also, based on Shawn Levy's reply to this person on twt, it's very likely we get a similar scene in St5:
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I think that another Byler fight could be the perfect lead-in to a heart-to-heart between Mike and Robin, too. Seeing the two boys fighting could lead her into asking Mike what's going on between them, which could then turn into a deeper conversation where Mike realizes exactly why his fights with Will are so different from his fights with anyone else.
This has gotten way too long and spiraled a bit out of control, and I need to actually write an essay for school now, so I'll leave it here.
Please let me know if you have anything to add or anything you agree or disagree with! I love theorizing with other people, too :)
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frownyalfred · 3 months ago
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You mentioned it briefly in an a previous ask and now im curious
To you, what's the difference between an alpha den and an omega nest? And why wouldn't an omega nest be in an alpha den?
I might be wrong, but generally in a/b/o fics they tend to be two discrete places that merge together upon mating, right? So an omega has their nest (usually a bed or room) and the alpha has their den (also usually a room, less focused on comfort, more of a territorial thing) and then once they mate/get married/move in together, the nest and den kind of merge into this dual entity. The nest-and-den. To the alpha character, it's their den; to the omega character, it's their nest. Sometimes they're actually two separate spaces, but usually I don't see that.
I mentioned in the other ask that I think making alphas to dens and omegas to nests is a bit of misnomer to me. Rather, I think omegas have nests as described (beds, rooms, places they go for symptom relief of heats and instincts, etc) and alphas are possessive of spaces that also happen to be the nest. It's not their space, it's the omega's space, but they're possessive of the things in it and the people in/nearby. They're possessive of the space and get twitchy if others aren't pack, but they don't have the same relationship with the nest that the omegas do. They'll ride their rut out in there and view it as theirs mid-rut, but the transfer of power doesn't magically happen just because of that. It doesn't become a den simply because an alpha rides out a rut in a nest. If that makes any sense?
But again, my whole a/b/o verse is an inversion of typical alpha dominance tropes, so the omegas owning and deciding rules on the nest/communal space definitely defies some traditional a/b/o writing on dens. This structure suggests that alphas and omegas use and define their spaces differently during ruts and heats, which I think is an interesting thing to explore since the den/nest duality traditionally suggests those spaces are similar and function equally, which we know they don't. And in my humble opinion, it's much more interesting to ask how and why those spaces are defined differently.
Like maybe an alpha in rut doesn't seek out a den, but some other kind of behavior. Maybe it's not a space thing, but a time thing, or a people thing. Behaviors. Traditional a/b/o suggests omegas return to nests for feelings of safety and security; in-rut alphas aren't looking to be safe and comforted. If we dip into biology, most animals in rut are out in the world trying to fuck, fight or both.
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heartsforvin · 8 months ago
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BROTHERLY LOVE
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needed something fluffy but angsty , cus i feel like all ive been writing is smut recently 🥲 hope you guys enjoy !!
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pairing: vinnie hacker x fem!sister!reader
warnings: cussing, bit of angst, mentions of anxiety / separation anxiety, use of nicknames (bubba, bug, etc), use of y/n, mentions of medication use, overall mainly fluffy sibling love
summary: the bond between you and your older brother is unmatched, attached at the hip, how will you react when he tells you he’s moving out?
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the bond between you and your older brother was unlike most brother/sister relationships. most siblings bicker and fight, but you and vinnie always got along.
sure you had your moments, but at the end of the day, you don’t know what you’d do without him.
vinnie, you, and reggie were inseparable, always hanging out together. your and reggie’s relationship was very different from you and vinnie’s.
maybe it was because the two of you were close in age, only being eighteen months apart. you didn’t know why it was so different, you loved your younger brother endlessly.
the age gap between you and vinnie was two years, so you weren’t sure why you and your older brother didn’t but heads like you and your younger brother did.
◛⑅·˚ ༘ ♡
you woke up to the noise of your brothers shouting across the hallway, right next to your bedroom door. groaning, you kicked off your blankets and opened up the door.
neither of them noticed you were standing in the doorway, the loud argument continued to unfold in front of you.
you didn’t care what they were fighting about, it was probably some video game anyways. it was way too early to be up on a saturday.
“can you two please take your argument somewhere else?” you asked, pressing your palms into your eyes at the feeling of a headache already sprouting. 
both boys rolled their eyes and just walked away from your room. sighing, you walked back into your room to try and get at least a few more hours of sleep.
a few hours later the sun casting its way into your room had woken you up. checking your phone you saw it was a much reasonable hour to be awake other than earlier.
getting up, you had gotten dressed for the day before making your way downstairs to where you saw vinnie in the kitchen.
running up behind him, you jumped up onto his back and hugged him tightly.
“whatcha doin’, bug.” vinnie laughs as he feels the added weight on his body.
stopping what he’s doing, he cranes his head over his shoulder and looks at you as you smile at him.
“what are you doing today?” you ask, completely forgetting about his previous question.
vinnie thinks for a moment before responding. “nothin’ really, why what’s up?”
you untangle yourself from your older brother and land back on your feet, now being inches shorter than him.
“wanna do something with you is all.” you reply with a shrug to your shoulders.
vinnie chuckles as he nods his head, he turns around to finish up what he’s doing before turning his body around and facing you once more.
“how ‘bout this,” he starts, completely forgetting his manners and chewing his food while talking. “lemme finish this, shower and then we’ll get some ice cream and i’ll take you out to the skatepark, yeah?”
smiling wide, you hug your brother tightly before going up to your room to dress more comfortably for skateboarding.
vinnie took you to the skatepark every now and then, mainly when you weren’t busy with college classes.
since it was summer, classes were out and you were able to everything and anything you wanted.
you promised your parents you’d find a job during the summertime. you’ve had no luck yet but knew one would come eventually.
for now, you just hang out with your older brother. being in his streams, hanging out with him and his friends, and going to the skatepark together.
vinnie’s been teaching you how to skate since before you even learned how to ride a bike.
besides joining his streams with him from time to time, skating is your favorite thing to do with him.
you wished you bonded the way you do with vinnie towards reggie, but the two of you could never seem to get along for more than twenty minutes.
you hated how you bonded more with vinnie. you felt like a shitty sister for it. you’ve tried so many times to mend the bridge between you and your younger brother, but nothing seemed to work.
you stopped trying months ago, figuring this is how your relationship is going to be from now on.
◛⑅·˚ ༘ ♡
“one strawberry cone and one chocolate, please.” vinnie ordered as you stood next to him, subtly laughing as he ordered his ice cream.
the cashier took the money and gave change back before telling you both they’d be ready soon.
you and vinnie sat at a picnic table a few feet away, waiting for your ice cream.
“chocolate, really?” you laugh at your brother as he just playfully rolls his eyes at you.
“nothing wrong with chocolate,” he tells you. “what about you? who likes strawberry?” he asks.
you laugh and give him a sarcastic smile while flipping him off. moments later you hear your order being called out and you go to grab both ice cream cones.
once back at the table, you hand vinnie his ice cream. as the two of you start to eat the sweet treat, the topic of schooling comes up.
“how’s college goin’?” your older brother asks you.
you still lived at home while going to college, the whole dorm thing seemed interesting and fun, but you decided not to do it this year.
“good,” you reply before licking the side of the ice cream cone before it got all over your hand. “glad it’s over for now though, needed a break.”
vinnie smiles at you as the two of you continue to eat the ice cream. he’s so proud at how far you’ve come in life.
he remembers the anxious little girl who always clung to his side whenever the two of you went out together.
he was so happy and excited for you when you told him you were planning on going to college in the fall after your highschool graduation. he couldn’t have been more proud.
once the two of you are finished, vinnie grabs some napkins for the both of you to wipe your hands off with.
the two of you start heading back to the car in silence. as you glance at vinnie, you can obviously tell he’s got something on his mind but you don’t push the matter, not knowing if he wants to talk about it or not.
◛⑅·˚ ༘ ♡
“you’re doing a lot better than last time.” vinnie says as he ruffles your hair.
he took you to the skatepark and you couldn’t have been more happy, even if he had said hours ago he’d take you.
it’s been awhile since he had been able to take you, and you were glad you finally got this time together.
the thought of what vinnie is thinking of still hung in the back of your mind, but you tried to push past it and enjoy this time with him.
after awhile the two of you took a break and sat at the top of one of the ramps.
your head was on vinnie’s shoulder as he had his arm wrapped around your back.
“can i tell you somethin’?” the voice of your older brother broke the comfortable silence.
you lifted your head to look at him. “anything.” you said with a smile.
it took him a minute to reply. he wondered how you’d take this news he was about to share.
he knew for sure that you’d be so happy for him, but that it would also break you.
with a deep inhale, he quickly calmed his nerves and just said it out there in the open.
“i’m moving to LA.”
you looked at him wide eyed, not knowing if what he had just said was real. a million things started processing through your head.
vinnie saw your blank expression and pulled you back into him, your head on his shoulder as he rubbed your back.
it was silly, almost like you were overreacting. you couldn’t help it though.
“why.” is all you could say, too focused on trying not to cry over this.
vinnie sighed. “remember how i got into modeling but it never really got anywhere?” he asks.
you glance up at him and nod with a smile. “well,” he starts. “a modeling agency called me and said they’d love to hire me on, i’d just have to live out there.”
the world stopped for you. you’re happy for him, ecstatic even, but you don’t know what you’re gonna do without him.
you felt dumb for letting his life effect you like this. vinnie was his own person with his own life and responsibilities, of course he wasn’t going to be living with you forever.
maybe the fact he’s moving to a different state is what’s hitting you so hard. you didn’t know what for sure, all you knew was you’ll be okay again eventually.
“don’t cry bubba,” vinnie wipes your tear stained cheeks, kissing your forehead softly. “this is good, then you can visit me, and it’ll only be a few hours time difference.”
you smiled at how he was seeing the situation. you’re happy for him, but the separation anxiety you have towards him is what’s keeping you from wanting to say go for it.
“what am i gonna do without you?” you ask.
vinnie sighs, he knows he’s your number one supporter and he’d do anything for you. you just don’t know what you’d do when he’s not here.
“you have your college friends, right?” the blonde asks, you nod. “see, there you go. just found out what you’ll do while i’m gone.” he smiles.
you give him a small smile and his heart breaks. he hates seeing you so upset. he didn’t mean to upset you with this news, he thought you’d be happy for him.
“i’m happy for you, vinnie,” you say after moments of silence. “i’m just so worried how my anxiety will be, you’ve helped me through it the most.”
he nods. “i know, bug,” he hugs you tightly. “you’ve been doin’ good though. that doctor you see prescribed you meds right? you takin’ them?” he asks you.
you nod. “yeah they help. you help better though.” you reply.
vinnie smiles at you before hugging you again. he and you both knew this would be an adjustment for the both of you, but you’ll get through it.
as the sun starts to set, the two of you decide to pack up for the night and go home.
“hey you know what you can do now if someone in the house starts to piss you off?” vinnie asks as the two of you walk to his car.
you smile, already knowing what he’s about to say. “what’s that?” you ask.
“i’ll buy you a ticket out there so you can get away for awhile.” he says with a laugh.
you laugh with him and give him a hug. “i love you vin, thank you for everything you’ve done to help me.”
he smiles at you, expressing so much love for you. he knows you’ll be okay in the end, and he’s always one call away if you need anything.
“i love you more bubba. my number one supporter forever, right?”
you smile widely and nod, he ruffles your hair before the two of you get into the car.
you knew deep down you’d be okay, it just might take some time to get to that point.
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hi hi hi !! i’m sorry i’ve been so inactive, i was super busy this past weekend and im just so mentally exhausted i think LMAO
but i hope you all liked this !! its a bit different from what i usually write but i had this idea and decided to try it out !!
tags: @anqeliclust , @cosmicanakin , @forevergirlposts , @bernelflo , @visualbutterflysworld , @slvthrs , @venusblakes , @leqonsluv3r , @louloulemons-blog , @lovingsturniolo , @pepsicolapussy333 , @hallecarey1 , @0strawberrysorbet0 , @laylasbunbunny , @kriissy4gov , @kayleighh , @defnotayonna , @violet0182 , @st4rswrld
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stupidlittlespirit · 4 days ago
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Can you give me more examples of Alex disliking Ford? I’ve always kinda felt it, but I never really had much of a real grasp on it.
Okay so this is the part where I look crazy because I can't give you specific examples LMAO but I'll try to explain what I mean. It's more in what he doesn't say than what he does.
Alex doesn't ever come right out and state 'I hate Ford', but he implies his distaste for him through his treatment of him. The way he hasn't gone harder/more explicit on drawing lines about Ford's abuse, or talking about how Ford suffered terribly during the time he was alone, for example. The way he blames Ford inherently for a lot of stuff that Ford, while not blameless, isn't fully at fault for. It's little things, and I'll detail them below.
TW below: Abuse, discussions of victimhood and irl consequences.
He extends more sympathy to other characters whereas Ford is sort of an afterthought. I don't actually think Alex has fleshed Ford out very well in his own head. Remember when he said that he didn't even know that Bill was going to be the main villain? They were flying by the seat of their pants for a lot of the series and it's quite clear in some elements. Obviously, the series is wonderful, I love it, it's one of my favourite shows of all time and Alex is a true talent, but it's obvious which characters are more important to him. He favours Bill a lot, too, so when his disliking of Ford/being ambivalent about him meets his enjoyment of Bill, only one of those dogs is coming out of the fight alive and it ain't Ford.
I think Alex is a genuine talent, I admire his work and his writing. He seems lovely. But I do also think he lacks in skill when it comes to complex abuse depictions.
I see a running theme that he isn't very good at portraying it specifically via 'unlikeable' characters. I mentioned on a previous post that he did this with Pacifica until people expressed empathy with her, and then he decided to round her out. He stated that himself during an old interview; I can't source it but I remember it vividly because it flagged red in my head that he couldn't see she was just a product of her environment. She's a twelve year old girl, for god's sake, she isn't 'just a horrible person', it makes a person sound like Bill when they beef with kids like that lol.
Another thing is in TBoB, there's a really horrendous page where Ford is tortured. It is visceral and awful, and tbh I wish I'd have been able to ask Alex what his top 5 horror movies were when I saw his talk because the scene is very reminiscent of a lot of my fav horrors.
But anyway, it is literal torture and it is also communicating about how helpless Ford is. He's a victim and a 'weak one' at that. Nothing he can do will stop Bill's abuse, he's stupid for trying, he's pathetic, he deserves it.
Now, that is a take I see with Ford a lot. He deserves it. He's asking for it. And it's a really upsetting one. It's also a common narrative told by people who blame victims for the abuse they suffered.
Not once have I ever seen Alex defend Ford. Not once have I ever heard him say 'Ford didn't deserve this', 'Ford suffered as much as Stan'. Not once.
Considering that he said he took 'inspiration' from his friend's 'toxic' relationships (I also think this is a strange and slightly perverse thing to do btw), I would have thought he might feel more strongly about pushing away this narrative about victims deserving their treatment.
I, obviously, also don't know for sure that he did take inspo from friends; he could well be describing his own experiences and just not feel comfortable saying so because men do suffer a different kind of stigma around being abused. That's fine, he doesn't have to out himself or anything, that would be horrible. But it's just the way he reacts to fans and speaks about the victim (Ford) that makes me think he's a bit more removed from this specific experience than it being personal.
There are many types of abuse. Ford's experience is familial, relationship-wise (platonic, because nothing about his relationship with Bill is romantic in the most basic sense of the term, if anything you can liken that side of things to sexual abuse) and personal. Ford then abuses himself as a reaction to outside abuse. Not his fault, again, but it does happen and it's a common thing for victims to do. I did.
Ford does nothing but suffer.
I truly don't believe that if you loved and cared for your character, you would be willing to watch your audience tear them apart like that after they had already been through so much and were not actually a villain themselves.
Especially if you had, or knew other people who had, experience with that kind of abuse. He doesn't let it happen to Stan, he came down hard on people when they did it to Dipper, and to Mabel, too.
It would kill me to let my OCs be bastardised like that by an audience and I'd be damned if I did a disservice to victims everywhere over something like this.
I think his lack of care is displayed in his treatment of Ford, as opposed to him outright saying he doesn't like him.
I also understand that this analysis also comes from a deeply personal point of view and my own experience with this topic, too.
This is a TV show, it isn't real and I don't need to take it so seriously, but what I do take seriously is seeing the real world reactions of other people. That does hurt. It hurts to see someone who is (very inelegantly and heavy-handedly, btw) depicted as a victim of abuse be laughed at and made into a joke, or flipped on their head and made to be romanticised with their abuser just to make a ship happen.
Fiction doesn't need to be taken seriously except when the lines begin to blur over into real life. We know people are cruel to irl victims and we can see where these lines blur quite obviously.
I think abuse and uncomfortable topics should be depicted, but I also think that as a creator, if you use them, you have a HUGE responsibility to teach and guide your audience into understanding why these things are bad/what makes them so. You shouldn't make jokes about the topic or encourage other people to go off the rails with it.
You can't control people, of course you can't, but you can hold their hand a bit and show them towards the light. If they choose not to follow it then they're probably not bright enough to pick up what you're putting down and that's on them, but you have to try.
Maybe if I hadn't (and my friends and other victims hadn't) been subjected to exactly the same reaction, we wouldn't feel so strongly about this, but it really does feel like a kick in the teeth to see a large number of people behave so grotesquely about abuse.
And just as an aside: I am a victim, I have been/am an unlikeable one, but it does not mean that I deserved what I got and that goes the same for every other 'unlikeable' victim out there.
*deep breath* but other than that I'm totally normal about Ford and not at all mentally ill :)
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rise-my-angel · 1 year ago
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Heart of the Great Wolf
21 - A Bastard or The White Wolf
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Pairing: Jon Snow x F!Baratheon!Reader, Robb Stark x F!Baratheon!Reader (Past)
Length: 21.2k
Warnings: angst/hurt comfort, slight canon divergence, bloody and gory imagery, mention of animal death, child death, references to rape, descriptions of warfare, canon divergence
Notes: I know, okay? I had to be the one to write it, I know about the preposterous length. I'm sorry. Previous Chapter Here, Series Masterlist Here
You had never told your father about that day, even though for a long time it stuck out in your mind the more used to it you became. Always in the back of your head, but not only the violence that you had seen, it was the words with it. The first time was the one that frightened most, that was what you were told before and it seemed it was true, because the thing that never got easier was the answer that followed after it was all over.
You could look back through your stays in Winterfell but so often it landed back at a moment right at the start, even though everything else were the ones that impacted your life's course.
During your first stay in Winterfell, you had started to adjust within the month. It wasn’t being away from your father and mother which was the most difficult part to you, it was simply the difference in the day to day that was so odd. The Starks noticed it right away, that you were not used to being apart of a household that wasn’t so stern and rigid.
When you had woken up from your trio of days asleep and fever ridden, you didn’t remember right away that you had even arrived. Taking a few minutes to recall the fuzzy memory of being shown the castle and partially remembering meeting Lord and Lady Stark, before you vaguely recalled feeling terribly unwell by supper. Luwin had been checking up on you while Catelyn sent the boys away thinking that it might be better to ease you into things with a mother figure at your side.
She was wrong it turned out. You were almost uncomfortable and put off by how kind and gentle she was with you. Explaining in a soothing tone that you had been rather sick when you arrived and you had slept through most of it, the entire time you had been painfully quiet and stiff when she would try to run a hand over you comfortingly.
Only when you were up and about, you still were like that, but with everyone.
Would listen and stand by Lord Stark during the day but you really didn’t say much. Meals were when it stood out the most. Robb and Jon were ten at the time, and were as loud and rambunctious with each other at supper as they were outside in the training yard. They would try and include you all the time to talk and joke at the table, but you would look over hesitantly at the curious faces of Ned and Catelyn before giving the boys a shy smile and little else. It took a fortnight for everyone to understand that perhaps you had grown up in a bit more of a difficult family then they assumed. Then everyone had their own tactics at how to make you comfortable.
Catelyn’s was the most simple and emotionally effective. Easing you into the dynamics of a mother figure, knowing you were rather young in a far away place surrounded by strangers. It took some time for you to get used to her being around, prompting you with questions to open up, easing you into things like admitting that you think your mother loves you but she stopped spending time with you after she lost your first brother. Then she lost your second brother and father sent you away. You had thought it was you who did something wrong and this was a punishment.
Asking you as she stood behind you untangling the knots in your hair, “Does it feel like a punishment? Being here?” You shook your head no, before apologizing for moving at all and sitting more rigid then before.
Your voice was quiet, but that never really went away. “Not anymore. I like it here. There’s always people around and something to do, and I don’t have any friends on Dragonstone.”
For a while, she was the one who felt like your mother. And when you went back home, you had trouble getting used to your own again. Selyse was quiet as well, she loved you but was never very affectionate and neither was your father. Things between you both never really got any better after that. Then one day Catelyn started to pull away as well. Not knowing what prompted it yourself, but you were twelve and visiting Winterfell again, it was well past midnight, so your nameday had just passed.
You and Jon had snuck out when everyone was asleep. It had been his idea. All but sneaking into your room right before you fell asleep, tossing a cloak of his at you and dragging you out of bed. A short ride on horseback to a lake nearby, he was fourteen already and sometimes had to take the reins himself to bring out your more adventurous side. Saying he never got to spend time alone with his best friend anymore. And when you teased him, “So is that my gift, Snow? Being allowed to call you my best friend? I am so greatly honoured-” He hadn’t thought twice about hoisting you up and tossing you in the lake, him following soon after.
The next day, Catelyn was a little different. A little colder to Jon then normal, and a bit stern towards keeping you focused on your tasks. Not a clue that Catelyn had spotted you both coming back. Her putting a bit more of a wall up when she recognized the evidence of him having a crush. Clear as day to her when finally seeing how physically affectionate Jon was with you, when he thought you two were alone.
It wasn’t your fault, you were the only girl both eldest boys spent most of their time around in such a consistent manner, and Robb had mentioned to his mother that he told no one he liked you until confessing in that very moment. Ned had told Catelyn to leave them all be, saying that if Robb wanted to pursue something he would do it respectfully at his own pace. While keeping from her himself, that Jon's crush wasn't new, that Jon had been the one with feelings for you since he first damn well laid eyes on you, so stopping that crush was a solid impossibility.
You were younger then the boys as well. They were both over fourteen and you had only just turned twelve. It wouldn’t be for another two years until you bled for the first time, and another two years after that before you had a single romantic interaction in your life.
Yet still, none of those stood out in impact of your time in Winterfell.
The strange part though, was how it wasn’t Jon or Robb either. Of course as a child, you had no way of ever predicting the life which would spin itself around you all in painful manners of blood.
They had become some of the biggest aspects of your life, both boys deeply curious to get to know the Southern girl who had collapsed ill on her first day in their home. Robb boisterous and eager to lead a new friend into showing you the way Northerners did things. Jon was more quiet and preferred to be the one to help ease you into the more difficult parts of being in such a new place all alone.
Early on there was no distinction between the two. As close with one as the other. Robb would often find ways to get you both into trouble, and Jon would be the one to pull you into the shadows to keep from being caught in the first place. It had been strange for them when you left. Only eight you had no understanding of if this was a place you’d be allowed to go back too, and while they would be left with each other they knew you were going home to a more difficult family and no one to remind you to have fun once in a while.
Not that he told anyone, and of course Jon had naturally treasured every second with his brother, but he liked that you were both a kind of outcast. This wasn’t your home, and Catelyn wished it weren’t Jons but together you enjoyed the quiet and didn’t have to care about those things. Winterfell was a lot more lonely for him when you left, and when they learned the day you were coming back, Jon, almost twelve by then, could have cried. Only realizing in that moment did he think he would never see you again.
A common thread in Jon’s life with you it seemed.
But still, friendships, and love, and marriage. Blood, loss, death and a strange renew of life you still could recall one day so clearly you could hear him speaking to you.
A month your first stay in was when you encountered a deserter from the Night’s Watch. Despite Catelyn’s deep protests, Ned had told Ser Rodrick to get you ready to join them. “Lord Stannis did not send her here to be coddled, Cat. She won’t be this young forever. If it scares her, then she needs to learn to face those fears.”
You had been very quiet on the ride out. Ned had been accompanied by Ser Rodrick, Jory, and two others you hadn’t known the names of as you rode, following in the back beside Robb and Jon. Both whom had been through this before, in fact it was their third time.
Robb was a little less comforting, but he also knew that one day he would have to take over as Lord, and wanted to ensure he was as calm as his father was, taking most of his energy to keep himself collected. Jon watched you a little bit closer. You looked smaller then ever amongst them all in such a large clearing of land. It stuck out to Ned as well, bright eyes and stood shorter then even his boys.
But you came close. Didn’t shy away in the back by the horses, instead up close and still silent. Robb was off to the side, adjacent to his father as the guards brought the man forth. Your eyes narrowed as he rambled. Covered in grime and dirt he looked like what they described as wildlings but draped in black leathers. You couldn’t even remember what he had said, looking so intensely at the wooden platform he was knelt over and the dark stain under it from times before.
Pulling out Ice, a great sword of Valyrian steel and pointing the blade into the ground, Lord Stark leaned over it’s hilt and spoke quietly his sentence of death. Stepping up right beside you as he did so, Jon was close enough you could feel his warmth. Voice very quiet as he asked, “Is this your first time seeing something like this?”
You could only nod, looking at the bloody wood and the great size of Ice. He had leaned in more, voice quieter even to ensure it was only for you. “The first is the scariest, but it’s important you watch.”
He stood right by you as Lord Stark brought the sword down and in one seamless slice did the man’s head come off. Dropping to the ground as the blood behind in the place it once sat dripped profusely down. In the instant it severed, you didn't close your eyes, but you did flinch, not realizing you instantly grabbed Jon’s hand as your stomach dropped at the sight. Jon held it back right away.
Quietly muttering your name with comfort he told you, “It’s alright, you did good for your first time.”
Looking down you only then realized you had grabbed his hand and wide eyed dropped it taking a step back with a mumbling apology. Your own father had always told you it was important you stand on your own with those sorts of things, and you were embarrassed at likely annoying the black haired boy with your childishness.
As Lord Stark approached, Jon took his leave to join Robb by the horses. The man kneeling down to your level with a deep rumble in his voice that held none of the coldness lessons from your father always had. “Do you understand why I did it?”
He was taken in that moment by your wide eyes and small voice. Not yet knowing two daughters was in his future he felt both the pull of teaching you duty, and comforting a little girl. “He broke the law.”
Nodding, he leaned a bit more in. “He did, but the question was not why did he have to die, but why I must do it?” You shook your head an honest no.
It was those next few exchanges that stuck so heavily with you. Something you thought about for that entire ride back, all through your supper and there still as you later drifted off to sleep. “Many King’s and Lord’s have men who do this for them. But we see things differently here. We hold to the belief that the man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. If you would take a man’s life, you owe it to him to look into his eye’s and hear his final words. And if you cannot bear to do that, then perhaps the man doesn’t deserve to die.”
Biting your lip, you nodded but clearly something else was in your thoughts. He stayed knelt there waiting for you to feel ready to ask it. “Will I have to do it one day?”
Lord Stark ran a hand over your head, and gently down your hair. “I can’t say for sure if you will. You’re Lord Stannis’s only child which means if you have no brothers, his duties will fall onto you some day. And you will be the one having to make the hard decisions.”
He watched your eyes drift to the men cleaning up what remained of the blood and body before finding his eyes again. Clearly you were a small, sheltered girl hidden away on a grim island with what Ned knew for a fact was a not very affectionate father. Truth be told, if he could have simply kept you in Winterfell with his sons, he would have. “Is it supposed to feel so scary?”
The bit of fear was in your eyes, but you held it out of your person well. “Taking a life should never be done with pleasure. But even in fear you must never look away. A leader who hides behind paid executioners soon forgets what death is.”
You never told your father about that day, you didn’t want him to be angry and it worried you that meant you would never go back to the North again. But as you stood there that day so many years from that memory, it was something you hadn’t forgotten. That you couldn’t just look away because it scared you, even when you saw the fires and heard the chanting in your mind.
It had arrived in the early hours of morning with a short scribbled letter. “Bring me my bride, bastard. Bring me her and I will give you back your brother with his head still attached. Keep the whore from me any longer, you will watch my hounds fuck her bloody and feed you to them.” The one that sat in front of you though sent you back into the flames, and the chanting. The horror of a night and an image that made you so ill you dared never think of it.
But as in that box, sat the rotting, thick blooded head of a black direwolf you couldn’t stop yourself from seeing that true horror. You knew such a fate couldn’t happen again. Ramsay would put you through a torture getting his hands on you, but you couldn’t see another Stark strung up and mutilated, parts of his own wolf shoved onto what they cut off and parade it around like a spectacle. Not again.
It had come in the early hours of the morning, a chest of sorts that reeked so heavily it made the Glover’s suspicious in it’s contents. Now it sat open on the table for everyone around it to look at in their own horror. Or in Jon’s case, a rage blazing behind his eyes as they debated around him what coarse of action to take, interrupting the current train of arguing doubt with a frustrated, “What am I supposed to do then?”
Debate had begun on if it was a trap, if walking into it was wise, and if he was telling the truth. Back and forth about the kind of person Ramsay was, how much he would stick to his word when the truth was it was impossible to tell. He was erratic, and his thirst for cruelty meant he had no bounds to keep his person within. Little else would ever drive him but the ravings of a monster that even after everything you could not predict.
Galbert Glover tried with confidence, but it was not bought by any. “We gather more men, we rally the Houses you’ve reached out to and overwhelm their own.”
Running through your mind, there were only so many that you could get to before pushing the time too far. Jon on his own, agreed. “How long will that take? You think the Bolton’s are going to wait for us to be ready? If Ramsay knows where we are, their armies will too.”
“Where’d he even find him? You both standing there telling us he’s alive but where would he even have found the boy when no one else knew where he was?” None had been able to figure that out initially, at least with the resources available but if they had sent men out before to hunt the boys down once then they likely did it again when no word was spoken of the matter.
Robett Glover looked to his brother with a knowing glance before turning to you. “Not many of the Houses under them are there willingly and they don’t have enough men on their own to escape them, but there is one that would have reason to side against you.”
Your eyes slipped shut, bracing your palms on the table with a deep sigh knowing the answer was far easier to sniff out then one may figure. The last time any had seen Bran, he had said that Rickon was being taken east to hide and there were two houses to the east that would have had the ability to search for the boy. And between them, there was only one that had proven they had the audacity.
“Kill me and be cursed.”
He was right in the end. Robb’s end was a horror and now you continued to feel the ripples of how unstable the Karstark’s had become near the end of the war. Your voice was quiet as you glanced back up to the open chest. “Well, we executed his father. So it seems to be he’s decided to take it out on the only Stark they could get their hands on.”
Jon and Theon both remained in the dark, having no proximity to the events you were discussing. Galbert Glover shook his head. “Bunch of oathbreakers, they are.”
Closer to you, Maege Mormont tried seeking your attention but it was trained on the blood in front of you all. “If he’s fool enough to think this is vengeance for his father, someone should remind the boy how old those Lannisters were.”
The rain was so heavy that day, the sky grim and cloudy as so few stood in that clearing as Robb executed Rickard Karstark. The undeniable rage in his eyes only after it was done, holding off so heavily from showing those feelings to stay composed in front of his men. He understood the weight of the choice you both had made, and yet it seemed the Karstark’s still didn’t.
“It’s not about Rickon. It’s about me.” Jon’s eyes trained up to you in a sharp glare that you worked very hard to not look at. “He can’t blame Robb now that he’s gone, but I’m alive which means the Harald Karstark can take it out on me. And he knows sending me back there is vengeance enough.”
It was on the tip of your tongue, but you knew it would cause an argument. You knew too well in fact that Jon would not stand there and let you say it, not make that choice but there was nothing else that was fair. “Why would Roose Bolton allow any of this? He’s smarter then to send out this kind of threat.”
Theon had a point, he was far smarter then this. Smart enough neither his King or Queen suspected his treachery until it was deep in your stomach. But there was one more thing in that chest that you hadn’t brought up. The one thing that you didn’t want to look at more then the direwolf’s head and it was the same thing that gave you that sensation in your stomach.
A dagger had been stabbed in the edge of the chest, keeping the note visible in place. It sat in front of Jon currently, being the one to unthinkingly pull it out to read the letter for himself when you both had arrived in the hall. You wanted to throw up thinking about it, but you couldn’t stop looking at it and unlike many times before out slipped words you couldn’t prevent.
“Theon’s right. Roose is far smarter then to do any of this, but he only let it happen because he wasn’t there to stop Ramsay from sending this one.” The group following your eyes to not the note but the knife with blood dried. Most had thought it was the wolf’s blood on it. Technically, that was true, but it also was yours.
Jon standing a little straighter as he looked to you. A warning that you refused to look at in his eyes and your name slipping sternly from his mouth. “This isn’t about-”
“Except that it is. They don’t have Tywin Lannister lording over their rule. They wanted me to marry Ramsay knowing that if I gave him an heir, then they have something to back their claim. But without that...” You looked at everyone but him, you didn’t want him to so easily recognize the conclusions you were already drawing yourself towards. “Then Roose’s son with Walda Frey would inherit the North..and if I recall he didn’t exactly take too well to the news of her carrying a boy did he?”
Theon dropped his head, “No. He didn’t. As a matter of fact I think he just might have been angry over it.” The look you both shared was dreadfully morose.
Galbert Glover nodded. “Roose Bolton doesn’t give a damn about anyone that gets in his way. You were a valuable hostage and without you then he doesn’t care about finding a new wife for the boy. Wouldn’t put it past him to take away that legitimacy the second he found out about that letter he sent your way.” Gesturing across the table to Jon.
His own hands were clenched hard enough you could see the strains in his knuckles. “If it’s only him, and he gets you back, then he thinks he has the North.” You watched with a still expression, made of stone and trying not to show anything. “He has to have Rickon then. Knows there is no chance I’d hand you over until I could see my brother with my own eyes.”
Maege was strict in her tone, a scolding that was not often heard on her. “We aren’t handing her over period.” Jon met her eyes, offended that she thought he for a second had considered the idea as she caught on quick. “I meant no disrespect, but this isn’t a negotiation, it’s a fight. Just because nothing’s been done about it yet, doesn’t make you any less the King’s heir. And even if you take it, she’s no less the Queen we chose.”
Biting your tongue hard as your eyes slipped closed before reopening. You shook your head slightly with a low tone of warning in your throat. “Maege-”
Quick though, she turned to you with a point and a set wild in her eyes. “No, shut up.” Were it anyone else, they may not have gotten away with that. “Trading one hostage for another didn’t do us any damn good last time, and we aren’t willingly doing it now.”
“She’s right.” You didn’t look at him, you didn’t want to hear about whatever this was going to turn into, and knowing full well Jon was about to keep you all but sewn to his side to prevent you from leaving on your own to do this. “I’m not offering you up to him. If I’m willing to fight for you, I’m willing to fight him for my brother too. But if we do this, we have to do it now.”
Robett tired to protest, “They have horses, weapons, everything we don’t have but numbers. We march on Winterfell now and we’re asking to lose.”
A rise in his voice, flaring a temper you knew Jon was struggling to contain. “We don’t have time. I can’t spend the next few weeks gathering more then when Ramsay has my brother. What about when he sends us something else next time, and it’s whatever he’s chopped off of Rickon? Am I still supposed to wait it out and hope we have enough?”
Voice so clear in your ear, warm but roughed with a strain of frustration as you lived it once more.
“Father rots in a dungeon, how long before they take his head?”
Your own voice finally echoing the words floating in your mind. “Jon’s right. We need to meet with Ramsay, and we need to do it now.” Finding Jon’s eyes they softened a tad towards you. “We never made it to your father when we had the chance, and we had far more time then we do here. The longer we take, the more likely he’ll kill Rickon out of anger.”
Something needed to be said between you, but there was nothing that you would do here. Neither arguing with the other in front of people, and you both hated the possibility one was coming the second you two were alone. But for now, Jon looked at you with a quiet certainty before turning to the others. “We leave as soon as we can. Ramsay doesn’t have the numbers and that’s going to have to be enough for us. I’ll speak to Tormund, make sure the free folk understand what we're walking into.”
Both Glovers and Maege nodded, not questioning that they took orders from Jon in the same way that they had once done Robb. You could almost see the traces of a title on their tongues that Jon had not yet accepted.
Jon called your name as soon as you turned to leave with the rest. Pausing mid step and turning to look back at him, reading the demand you come over to him in his eyes. Glancing at Theon with a flicker of your eyes to the door, he got the message. Leave and shut it behind you.
Standing in the middle of the room hoping he would just say it, and not make you come over to him to hear it. Only Jon could play this game of waiting even longer then you could. Perhaps over a minute passed when you relented, turning to better look at him only to find his eyes trained on the direwolf’s head. Footsteps echoing in the empty room as you approached, closer to his side then you were before.
“If I’m fighting for him, I’m fighting for you too.” His hand tracing the edges of the chest before swallowing harshly and slamming it shut. Unable to stand the sight any longer, no doubt imagining a horror as you were. What if it was the other wolf’s head he sent next. Trying to say his name, he interrupted you as his face twisted in frustration.“Let’s say I give you up, trade you to Ramsay for Rickon, do you really think he’s going to hold up his end and not kill him and the rest of us anyways?”
Arms crossing in front of your chest you shrugged. “Isn’t it worth the risk.”
You wished he had more of an outburst. Slam his fist into the table, yell at you, get angry. Anything but the quiet and almost heartbroken look he gave you instead. “I’m not letting you kill yourself by sending you back to the man who made you want to do it in the first place. You’re not going anywhere.”
“We could end this war right now, boy.”
That’s what he had said. Standing bloody and tied up in front of you and Robb, looking him in the eye saying that it could be that easy. But Robb was smart enough to know that wasn’t the case, smart enough to know that beating Jaime Lannister in a final one on one wouldn’t stop the rest of the Lannisters from coming after them anyways.
“It would save a lot of our own men’s lives. We need numbers for more the just this, only here we have a chance to trade thousands for one.” Jon pushed off the table, turning away from you as he ran a hand over his mouth. Pacing mindlessly to the opposite end of the room as you stepped only a few feet closer. “Maybe this is what’s right.”
Turning to you, his eyes were glaring and his brows narrowed in anger. “And how would you know that?” Face only twisting a little downward at this words he continued to pace. “To you what’s right is always throwing yourself down first to make it easier for everyone else. When all it’s done is make you feel worthless. You mean something to other people.”
Moving to lean against the table, you crossed your arms fixing to a point on the floor that didn’t hold anything that mattered. Hearing him come around the other side of the table, ending up closer to your left. “Not more then your own family.”
You could feel him before you saw him come into the side of your vision, always giving off such a warm heat that you could melt within. Jon’s own arms crossed as he looked to nothing as you did. “Rickon’s my little brother, and I’m going to go get him. The same way I tried to go get you when I found out you were alive. You’ve been just as important to me since the day you stepped foot in Winterfell.”
It was a rainy night when Robb told you that story. One that had been withheld from you for so long to not make you uncomfortable. “Robb said you were the one who looked after me, when I was sick.”
Jon nodded, both of your hearts heavy but maybe that would be a feeling that never went away after losing him. “I did. Watching you for three days because your fever was so bad I was scared you’d die the minute I looked away, and I’m just as scared now. Scared if I leave you alone for too long, you’ll wind up dead again or leaving because you think loving you is a burden.”
Only able to see part of him from the side as you glanced, you sighed deeply without any ability to refute it. “I wasn’t trying to make you choose between us.”
So badly Jon wanted to reach out, run a hand along your hair and down your spine but touching you when you were this dispondant was too risky to do. Not knowing if you’d flinch away from it. But his eyes had slid up to watch you trying not to watch back. “I know.”
The quiet was almost something like comfortable for a moment before you pushed off the table. “We should get to work, if we leave at dawn maybe it’ll take us a few days. If it doesn’t start snowing again at least.”
Jon called your name one more time, pausing you in your steps but instead of waiting for what he wanted to say, you felt him come up behind you. Not quite pressed against your back, but close enough your senses felt overwhelmed by him. His hands ever so slowly reaching around, running gently along your waist until one hand reached where he knew the scar was, and felt a slight tremble in you. Leaning down to place a gentle kiss on your neck you exhaled with a shake.
Didn’t push more into you or let his hands grow with greed. Only making you feel weak in your stance as he so lightly pressed his lips up a path from your neck so he could rasp in your ear. “One of us needs to tell him before we leave.” Perhaps it seemed, a little greed slipped through, the hand tracing your scar moving with a more firm hold on your hip as he stood an inch closer. Making your eyes close at the feeling. “I can-”
You shook your head, dizzy from how close he still was to you. “It should come from me. I sided against him before, meaning I know what to expect in telling him I’m doing it again.”
Jon’s brows narrowed, unhappy at the prospect but he had Stannis had come to an agreement over you, one that he had yet to really explain himself on. But your safety was paramount, even against your own father. Though if he were being honest, it was less of an agreement and more of a thinly veiled threat. Not something to be proud of, but he refused to give any a chance to hurt you again. “Come find me when you’re done. Okay?”
He didn’t move his hands or step away when you nodded, sighing lightly you breathed out, “I will.” And only then did he let you go. The more you two let whatever this was grow, the more you both were realizing it was a little...a lot more intense then the love you shared in innocent times. Something that clouded you when you were close to him like a buzz from too much wine, that only burned hot in your veins for him.
But you had to shake it off. Afterall, it was a burning Stag that you were about to face and he would take far less kindly to things then Jon did hearing it for himself. The halls of Deepwood Motte echoed in your ears as you made your way through them, knowing that where you’d find your father would be away in his own camp, making plans for his own army that you knew wouldn’t include you. But he had to accept this. Had to accept he was striving towards a goal he could not reach.
The North wouldn’t have him, because the North had a King. And now the one they were waiting for certainly wasn’t going to come from an outsider. No one cared about them until it was strategically advantageous for them, and that was the problem. They chose Robb because he was one of them, he cared, and it was their livelihoods he fought for. And all of those traits were shining brightly in Jon no matter what he tried to dispute.
Deep in your mind, you knew there was still something left in your father that could make him a good King, but you needed him to grasp what he had scolded you for. He was going to have to accept a broken Kingdom, because the fight the North was in, was for each other, and for survival against threats beyond the Wall. They wouldn’t return willingly to the Seven Kingdoms, not when the cold in the air was only going to get worse.
Not when the North was going to be the first line up against what was coming. They couldn’t afford to kneel to fights that had nothing to do with them anymore. Fighting for Stannis Baratheon meant later fighting for whatever cause he pledged them too on his own. That willingness died the second Greatjon Umber pulled his sword out, and pointed it at Robb with a passionate deceleration.
“There sits the only King I mean to bend my knee to.”
But as you stepped outside, looking to the people all around it was hard to deny that even those who would not look to Jon as their King, he was still the leader they believed in.
“And how do you know know if he is telling the truth? Wouldn’t be hard to lie, the boy has done it before.” Your palm ran up to your forehead pressing harshly against it in frustration. Stannis calling your name to look at him, you let it drop down to your side once more turning back to look a him. “All I’m asking is how can you be sure.”
Your eyes painting over as you once more saw the bloody horror inside the chest with no doubt about whose it belonged to. “It was Rickon’s direwolf, Theon and Jon both knew what he looked like there is no mistaking it. Unless he caught a miracle and found the head of another black direwolf to send as a mocking.”
Your father watched you carefully, noting the agitation in your posture. Leaning back in his seat a small bit, he looked once more like there was no hope in your ask. There was hardly ever any, normally sending you off with a dismissal no matter what it was towards. “I don’t imagine he is going to give you up that easily, you’re heading to Winterfell for a battle.”
Neither confirming nor denying, you only positioned your hands at your hips one knee bending slightly trying to find the right string of words to place after one another. “First light of dawn, the men and the free folk all know to be ready. We push hard enough, we may be able to make it there in three days time.”
Straight to the point your father, “Neither of you have come asking for my help.” Your eyes only narrowing the very slightest of bits, at least fully aware at your father would catch it out of everyone. A remaining trait between you. The only ones who could still read the other like a book. “The wildlings came here to fight the same fight I was, what reasons would they have for not following now?”
Truth was that, he was just not a man they would believe in. You wanted to, truly you did. Those many years ago in King’s Landing as you and Ned Stark looked to each other as the only ones fighting for the right claim to the Iron Throne. But those days were long gone, and too much had happened to push it all back to that now. It was impossible.
“The only way you are willing to find allies is if they respect your rule. Your claim. Trying to do the right thing, but you’ve shown them no reason to believe in you.” Pausing, you let the air in your lungs tighten as it approached your mouth. “Jon doesn’t want them to kneel for him, they don’t need to, to have a leader they can rally around.”
Father and daughter both keeping your eyes as still as possible, letting him connect those dots all on his own. He reached it likely already, but he was a man who needed to stew on things before blurting out the first in his mind. “And why would anyone kneel for him?” The condescension of someone who figured it out but would make you say it.
That habit was a lot more endearing on Robb then it currently was on your father.
Head tilting to your feet, eyes closing as long as it took to inhale before you matched your father right in the eye. “All of the Northern high lords signed off on Robb’s will before...” Your heart still plummeted, that knife sitting on the table mocking you for how you could still see it’s final act. “It outlined his decrees of inheritance, including his line of succession. Who would take over after him.”
“The Northerners have yet to claim anyone as their King, only your the Queen that remains to them. You don’t see fit to take that role of leader for yourself?” It itched in the back of your mind, that he was testing you. Shireen was gone, meaning you were his last living child. Renly was gone and had no children of his own, and the only remaining Baratheon’s would be those surviving somewhere in these lands forced to call themselves a bastard.
Stannis was trying to gauge if you had any willingness to take the Iron Throne after him.
If you took the North, you might be open to taking the rest of them he likely figured. Only you shook your head. “No. Robb trusted me, we were at war and we worked together. But he was King. He was their leader. I am not the Queen who gets to rule on her own, after her King’s death.”
Robb spend no time ensuring you were supported and listened too, but his word was final no matter what and you wouldn’t have spent so much time on his will if it were to only survive through you. You inheriting the North was only a possibility if your son had lived. And even then, you would still be here, because someone would have to be King until little Ned was of age.
You weren’t Cersei. You were not going to just place your sons on into a Kingship no matter how old they were. That was a making of disaster. No matter what those around you may claim, children deserved to stay children. Tommen sat on the Iron Throne now but it was Cersei in charge. Gods, Tommen was what? Eight when you last saw him in Kings Landing?
You could hardly picture what he and Myrcella both would look like now. Myrcella would be verging on womanhood in some time. By her next name day she would be fifteen, Tommen thirteen. At those ages you were still carefree enough to run around the wolfswood with the Starks, stay up until you and Robb were caught trying to sneak wine out of the kitchens. Even if your son had lived, you wanted him to experience those things, live a childhood they deserved.
Stannis watched you lost in thought, were he a better father he would have found some way to assure you, comfort you through these struggles. But he wasn’t. From everything he had heard both from Winterfell and the months in Kings Landing, the man who acted more as a father to you then anyone was Ned Stark. “Who then?”
Inhaling a breath you just smacked your palms in defeat against your thighs as you dropped them from your hips. Looking at your father with a plain honesty. “Robb named Jon as his heir. To be King in the North after him.”
He may have seen it coming, but hearing the truth of it was another matter you suspected. His silence and cold stare hadn’t changed much at all but you could see the cogs turning behind his face. “And how many of these Houses know that he’s left the Night’s Watch for this cause?”
Running in your mind the list and picking out the few that was written off as to not cause disruption in the more loyal ranks to the Boltons. “Most. Save for House Karstark and a few smaller houses. Chopping Rickard Karstark’s head off seems to still be a sore spot for them, reaching out seemed like a risky idea but most others have gotten our calls. None will be able to get to Winterfell before we do, but we can’t risk Rickon’s life in hope’s of waiting for those brave enough to come.”
The silence in the tent was thick, a stifling air that could choke if either of you breathed it in. Once more you stood across from your father, at the side of a King that was not him and saying they will still not kneel anyone but their own King. None had called Jon King yet, but everyone was starting to feel it. The more in command he took, the more everyone saw their leader.
“You understand what this means right?”
Nodding, your face twisted into a harshness. “I do.” Looking to meet his eyes, you found no fear of what he would do this time. Nor did you think if he wanted to, did he have the courage now that he was forced to look you in the eye as he would do so. “I swore my life to the last King in the North, and I didn’t sign in agreement on the next only to betray him for the father I was ready to fight against.”
Looking down, his voice was a bit more rough and strained. “I’m not asking you to betray him. I’m asking if you understand this means I cannot fight with you. I don’t need another leader to follow or to run off alongside. I needed an ally in the North. If he is a King, he’s not an ally.”
“No, in your eyes he’s an adversary.”
As they flew back up to you, whatever was built between you two in the short time you had seen each other again was burning out right before your eyes. If he truly wanted to fight for the threat that matters, then this wouldn’t be so hard for him to accept. But he still was the same man as before. Still the man who stood across from you and Robb saying that he will destroy you.
Opening his mouth to speak, you shook your head. “I don’t have time for this. I left a Stark behind once and he lost his head for it. I’m not doing the same thing again for Rickon. With or without you, we leave at first light.”
Coming out into the cloudy sky, you sighed to yourself. Feeling a dizziness wash over you while you stood there. Once more letting your hand press firmly against your forehead as the pain increased as the racing agitation in your heart.
You had begged Renly not to declare himself King, told him to not break apart this family more then it already was becoming. Perhaps it was meaningless ask. House Baratheon already doomed to split apart and fight against one another in one manner or another. He told you to pick a side, to think about what family you were trying to keep together.
But the only family you had that felt like it, was Shireen. Now, only three of you were left, and everything between you all was without any love. The only family that remained to you were the ones fighting for each other. Not against.
Sitting by the free folk in a tense quiet, did he approach. The one person on the other side you knew without a doubt you were going to miss. Sitting beside you, both watching the camp in quiet as you both contemplated what to say. You gave him a break, starting first time time around. “I’m sorry to see you go, Ser Davos. It’s been a long time since I got to spend any time with you.”
His voice was a bit lighter then yours, not weighed down by onslaughts of problems one after the other that never ended. Just a few personal ones he kept close to his chest. “Easy for you to forget, but I’ve known you since you were a girl. Watched you go from a shy thing too afraid to make friends to a Queen in the North. You’ve done well for yourself.”
Leaning forward, your arms resting against your knees as your hands stayed clasped together. “It doesn’t feel like it.”
Positioning himself enough to still be within your vision, staying with his eyes outward to the same sights you were. “Hardly ever does. I tried to murder the red woman, got thrown in a dungeon by your father and next thing I knew he had renamed me Hand of the King. Success for people like us rarely comes at a pretty price.”
You hadn’t said anything, and you suspected he didn’t want to talk about it as much as you didn’t yours, but leaving him with nothing felt wrong. Not picking up that it was the same words as your father, only the emotion behind it was held back with an obvious weight that hurt more then you could pretend it didn’t. “I’m sorry about Matthos.”
Inhaling deeply beside you, there was a glad feeling that it was shared, but also one that knew how hard it would be to say anything further on it. “And I’m sorry about yours.”
Swallowing harsh, your eyes stung wishing they would let them fall. “It’s not anywhere near the same as your loss, but thank you. I take it my father told you?”
“He did. Wasn’t too happy about being kept in the dark, but I also think somewhere deep down he knew something like this was inevitable.” Nodding, your hands clasped together tightened around what it was holding, willing yourself to do it already. Give it up to someone who would keep it safe as he continued beside you. “Your mother isn’t pleased.”
“She rarely is.” Now that got a bit of a huffing laugh from Davos. Pulling only a tiny smirk from you in return. “She thought she lost me, then her husband, Shireen...but she always had a purpose beside him. Was loyal to him, and she should keep that. Give her something proper to hold onto.”
He was looking at you, but you not brave enough to look back. “And what about you? What belief now is keeping you going?”
Maybe you knew, maybe you didn’t but the answer felt strange to admit all the same. So you shrugged in response. “Only the gods know that now.” Fiddling with the bag you finally leaned back, turning partially to him. “I have something for you, before we leave.”
Gently, you opened your hands and moved them over to him. Taking him a good minute to open the small pouch to see, slowly as he knew what was in there, but having to be sure. Saying your name in protest you shook your head. “No, I want you to take her. She was like a daughter to you, and I know you’ll keep her safe.”
Holding it in his hand, he turned it around to look it all over as if it would show you anymore of her then the small bits. “Why not take her with you? She always wanted to go with you to visit Winterfell, after all.”
You shook your head, hoping to not hear the toxic words in your ear. “We’re walking into a battle with no idea if we can win it or not. If I die out there then she’s just lost to the ground. If Ramsay gets me back...I refuse to let any part of her be around him. Ever.” Finding his eyes proper, and as much ran through his in pain as yours tried to hide, but your voice broke all the same. “Take care of her for me.”
Moving to stand up abruptly, Davos followed suit calling your name. Looking back, you both found no ire for standing on different sides of this mess. Finding the other in a hug, he held you close as you found the sound of a father’s care in his voice. “You and Jon go reclaim your home, and I’ll bring her there to visit myself.”
Nodding you held tighter for a moment. Tired of leaving and losing things left to care about.
The closer you got to Winterfell the more everyone could tell there was something deeply wrong in the air. You had grown to be dead silent during the day, and the normally endearing brashness of the free folk only served to further worsen your head. The cold hardly feeling like it touched you anymore and only found itself further freezing soon as it reached your heart. Clouds were mostly grim, and even though in some places the snow wasn’t any more prominent then a sprinkling on the ground you found it’s once beauty to return to darkness.
It was that first snow storm that blew in not long after arriving in Winterfell. It was that which you would find yourself staring out into, the small pockets of quiet you were trusted to be by yourself with only to know it was because the only other option was death in the drastic drop below. The fear from the rush of how high up the one you and Theon had to make was minuscule in the grand image.
Only a few horses were within your ranks. Not nearly what would match Ramsay’s men. He had not the numbers, but the weapons and the strength. You only had so many, less then a hundred up against the many hundreds if not close to thousands in his. No doubt having taken the time to rip away your chances of finding enough on your own.
The free folk were fierce, and Jon was a great commander but you were walking into a bloodbath and you all knew it. The kind of bloodbath you desperately wished Jon would let you prevent. Maybe he would keep his word, if all he cared about was getting back what he lost, maybe you would be enough and Rickon could live without doubts.
But Jon still kept you close to his side in the journey. Refusing to allow you alone, and certainly not alone with a horse. You’d ride off the second you did and Jon knew it. If he wasn’t there it was Ghost, and if Ghost wasn’t there it was the large imposing form of Tormund who would no doubt just toss you back with no effort.
Let him take you, let him do whatever he wants and maybe this didn’t have to end the way it was going to. Whatever your odds were, you didn’t look at them with promise. Numbers didn’t mean anything, you knew that too well. For three years you had the least amount of numbers rallied behind Robb and he lead them to every victory. Ramsay wasn’t a commander, but he had the strength, and he certainly had the brutality.
The night before you would arrive at Winterfell was awful. You wanted to throw up, maybe scream while the entire time you saw the same in Theon. The nightmare of what you had escaped and now both of you were running right back up to the front door.
“Can I even trust you tomorrow to be on your own horse?” From watching the small fire where you sat away from many, Ghost only a few feet from your feet most of the evening, Jon seemed to have snuck up on you as your mind was too far away. Turning your upper body back and upwards to see him approaching you narrowed your eyes in confusion. Taking no time to sit down next to you as he elaborated. “When we meet with him. Can I trust you with your own horse that you won’t run, or am I putting you on the back of mine where I know you will stay put?”
You looked over at him with a sigh. “I think we both know the answer to that question.”
Exhaling deeply, Jon looked you over before learning to rest his head in his hands. A sinking in his posture as he contemplated the approach. Raising his head enough, he too only watched the flickering of flames in the mumbling quiet of the camp. “I shouldn’t be making you go, after everything he’s done to you, it feels cruel to ask you to come with me. But he needs to see you, see you by my side and not as if you’re some toy we’re fighting over.”
The sting behind your eyes hurt, the prospect of what on earth he was going to say tomorrow perhaps was what frightened you the most. What horror’s would he find to mock with, to taunt, to belittle and shove you back into the ground. What he was going to say about you to Jon?
You nodded, hands clasped in front of you as your head hung in the space between them with a shaking exhale. Your name slipping gently from his mouth, “How well are you going to take it, if I ask you not to fight.”
Your face twisting in a frustration, covering your face entirely in your palms. Trying to maintain a composure of how little you wanted to be here but how important it was that you not abandon him again. “Jon-”
Calling back with your name in the same dismissive tone, “Look at me.” Tearing your head up, you rolled your eyes over to meet his. Jon’s expression full of a love you couldn’t handle right now, and knowing in yours was fear and doubt. “I’m not trying to dismiss you, but if you’re out there how do I know you won’t do anything rash?”
“Like surrender to Ramsay?”
You held a half smirk, he didn’t. “Like surrendering to Ramsay.” Yourself trying to argue that you could still do that from the sidelines but the flashing of something dark in his eyes didn’t go away. “I have one chance tomorrow at settling this peacefully, and if it doesn’t I want you to promise me you won’t give yourself up just to end it.”
A dripping of sorrow was in yours that also sought to plead for him to understand you once last time, only the intensity that pushed the grey into something so dark it was as protective as it was possessive in a way. Looking at the other, none else existing in that camp you both could only hear the dancing of the flames. “I promise.”
No lies found in your eyes, Jon deflated a bit. Braving to run a hand gently over your hair that led to holding tenderly at you jaw. “I won’t ask you to stay out it, but when this turns into a battle I won’t have you out in front.” You opened your mouth and he only pulled you a little closer to his face, “No this isn’t up for debate. You want to be out there, I won’t stop you but you’re not going into the worst of it. I- I’m not going to be able to handle that.”
Your mouth parted slightly as your lungs sunk in your chest. Closing again as you mustered enough of the turmoil inside you to gently reach up, grasping at the wrist attached to the gloved hand at the side of your face. Both inhaling deeply at the feeling as you pushed past the material to run your thumb across his pulse, like you’d done with multiple Starks before it seemed. A reminder of life. Even after death, his ran strong.
“Why do you drive me so crazy?” Jon’s other hand moving to hold the other side, resting your forehead against his as he spoke, before sitting back up, and turning you by the waist to sit more back against his chest. Facing you both out to the fire once more, his hands resting at your waist now and the side of his head pressed into yours. “Feels sometimes as if living without you wasn’t real. Like we were never apart, how easy it was to fall back into it.”
Resting a little bit back, one of his hands slid across your stomach to pull you more upright against him comfortably. “We’ve never had to fall into it. Not really. It always existed between us, only we weren’t old enough to understand for a while.” His hand squeezed your waist more, but said nothing as you both looked just to the fires and ignored the distance that others may look over with. Ghost’s eyes peeled and sharp, as if to tell those to leave you both alone.
His voice was a low rasp in your ear that almost sent a shiver up your spine. “Speak for yourself. I’ve always known you’re the only thing I’ve ever wanted. And I’m not about to give you up to someone who hurt you the way he did.”
Heart pausing in a beat, you felt almost a jolt of something pass through your head at the sudden voices and feelings inside. But this time, you could feel and hear it was only Jon behind you, making that your mind’s focus to settle down. “I don’t know what he’s going to say to you tomorrow. He’ll want a reaction, he already knows me, and now he’s going to try and find the right ways to poke at you in just the worst spot.”
Jon hummed, the sound vibrating through your ears and shivering now down your arms this time. “I’ve handled being degraded all my life, I don’t care if he tries to rile me up. Only that it doesn’t hurt you to hear it.” He was watching you more from where he sat behind you, just tall enough that he could watch the troubled clench in your jaw but enough to your level that he could nudge your head with his, leaving a kiss in your hair.
“He’s said a lot of things. Most of it so bad I couldn’t even begin to know where to start..or if I even could.” His heart raced behind the leather armour, knowing the things Theon had told him and how sick it made him feel. A long quiet sat there, only the warmth of him behind and the fire in front keeping you steady. “You’re not allowed to die by the way.” Jon humming in question, “If I’m not allowed to surrender myself to Ramsay, you’re not allowed to die fighting him.”
The hand around your stomach slid across to grasp at your hand, encasing the far smaller one in his as he ran his thumb over your palm. Sighing out dramatically behind, “You come back to me a Queen and now you’re the one barking all the orders.” You breathed out a laugh, and in Jon a deeper one fell much more freely. Pulling your hand up to press a kiss to it before settling it back down on you. “And it’s cute that you think I’m going to listen.”
Turning ever so slightly to try and catch a glimpse of him, “You’re not King yet, Snow. Technically you are still supposed take orders from me.”
Your lungs shook as he pressed another kiss to your hair at the side of your head this time. “Naming you a Stark didn’t make you any stronger. You can try and order me around all you like, but I’m the one here whose strong enough to toss you over my shoulder.” Smiling in a blissful warmth you almost laughed.
“That’s probably true.” You thought of no reasonable explanation as to why you said it, but you did. And as soon as you put it out there you felt the heavens drop down and shine something on you that Jon hadn’t felt in too long. Or ever. “You’re father knew about us.”
Stilling like a stone statue in a second, you could feel the wide eyes behind you with the same that you had that day. Not letting it turn into something warped you continued, “I don’t know for how long, but he knew about us. Said that it didn’t feel good, watching as Robb got one final thing that had always been yours alone. Wondering how different things could have been if he made you a Stark in name, that then there wouldn’t have been anything keeping you from me.”
Jon was silent behind you, nowhere to hide from this one only sat in the others arms for as long as the dark remained above the skies. Choosing the path less full of heavy agony of many ways, Jon rested his head against you almost trying to hide away in your neck. “Would’ve been able to kiss you in public at least.”
Raising an eyebrow, you snapped back, “You don’t even do that now, Snow.”
A full laugh came from him that time, pulling from your neck as it rung in your ears at how little you were graced with the sound. Pulling you a bit more into his chest, his other arm leaving your waist to drape around your stomach, the one still holding your hand dragging up higher on your ribs. “It’s for your own good.” Asking how, he never let that smile leave but his voice was deep in your ear on purpose. “I’m not kissing you until I have you alone in a bed, because once I do you’re not leaving that bed for at least a week.”
That shiver across your whole body he definitely had to have felt. Breathing stuttering as you sighed out in a tensity that he could only have known from those intimate moments together these past weeks. A tiny indicator of amusement in your tone, trying to play it off. “What, are you going to chain me to it?”
Heart spinning in your chest as Jon so confidently whispered, “If you let me.” That one got more of a breathy laugh out of you and grin from him. “No? We’ll work up to it.” Kissing the side of your head once more as if in the private moment here, he was unable to keep away from you.
Neither of you said much more for a long time, you felt no need to. The peaceful quiet with Jon was always something you could count on bringing comfort. Just being near the other was good enough some times. In moments like this it felt like no time or changes have passed, only to feel in your heart that something deeply was different and there was no hiding the desire anymore. Or, Jon simply had found little care anymore in pretending as if it were otherwise.
“Do you ever wish we could go back to that night?” Your eyebrows raised in question, “Our last night together under the Weirwood.”
Truthfully, you hadn’t thought of that night in a long time. You didn’t want to. It was a night you thought was the last time you would truly see each other, and certainly didn’t feel good to think back on it in the worst of days. Biting your lip before shaking your head, you were quiet, almost a whisper just for him. “I don’t think so.” Jon asking why, you took a deep breathe and tried to lean your head back a little more against his in a sort of nuzzle. “Because that was a Jon who didn’t think he was worth enough, one who didn’t think he deserved anything good. Despite everything, the you I found again isn’t like that anymore. You’ve found purpose, you’ve found confidence. These people all look to you as their leader because of it. Going back means I want the Jon then. I loved you then too, but I’m proud of who you’ve become. I wouldn’t want you to lose that.”
You didn’t expect him to reply, and it was likely the most you had said in one go in a number of days now. Once more not a painful quiet, one that you could bask in forever. You wouldn’t want to go back to that night, that was true, but it did remind you of how easy it was to feel so close to him in complete silence. Like being around each other was enough to know what the other was feeling.
Speaking quietly into your ear, there was that hint of doubt, a dash of insecurity that was so much more prevalent in your years before. “You’ve always thought too highly of me.”
Shaking your head firmly, your free hand reached up to grasp his already covering your first hand near your ribs. “No, I haven’t. I’ve always known who you are, who you could be. You deserved the world back when everyone looked at you as nothing more then a bastard. But these people, the Northerners around us wouldn’t have rallied to your side if that was still all you were. You’ve always been so much more then that.”
You could hear him swallowing harshly, throwing down whatever emotions were spilling from them back to their depths. Waiting a good minute before finding the courage to speak again. “When did he tell you? My father, when did he tell you he knew about us?”
The smirk on your face was in no way able to be stopped. What a panic that man sent you into in the worst place possible. “About five minutes before he walked me out to marry Robb.” The stillness that erupted in his body had a burst of a giggle fly out. Catching Jon’s attention who rolled his eyes in a playful spark. “Almost sent me into an early grave.”
Huffing behind you, even through the pain there was something playful in such memories of Ned Stark, this man known for his stern Northern rule who also had a propensity of finding total amusement in his children’s embarrassment. “We have a way with words.” And those words in Jon’s mind always worth it to see that very laugh on your lips just like now. So rare anymore to see or hear it.
Leaning back finally, you rested against him more comfortably. “He would be proud of you, you know? Your father. He would be incredibly proud of the man you’ve become.”
“And I need you to know, I’m proud of you too- no shut up you don’t get a say in how I feel.” Knocking down your instant protests of that with such a genuine casualness that you couldn’t help but just laugh. It had been a long time since either you or Jon could just sit together, joke and laugh and feel like two normal lovers. But tomorrow you meet with Ramsay and the fear in your heart was great. But you knew, that even in fear you must not look away.
Maybe you hoped, you had at least one father in Ned Stark who might be genuinely proud of you.
The sight of Winterfell once more filled with dread instead of the once lifting feeling of relief. A place you once could only feel home, and yet all you could see looking at it anymore was a pitiful reminder of how far you’d fallen to. Snow having clear enough that there was a clearing of grey scattered around the clearing to the South.
Much like the last time, your group had arrived first. To his word the night before, Jon kept you on the back of his own horse. You had wished you were trustworthy enough to have your own, but you understood his misgivings over it. Jon knew too well that you would rather send yourself back into a hell instead of a fight. Ensure Rickon’s return for yours. But he didn’t trust you, and so you were kept with him.
Trying to keep it to minimal, you knew Jon was doing his best to present his side as the route to a more peaceful outcome rather then having so many men stand behind. On what horses you had, men of the Mormonts and Glovers followed as did a number of free folk. To your right sat Tormund as well, curious to your deathly silence and almost barley moving. Knowing the very second there was view of them something in your blood would freeze up and threaten to drown you then and there.
Not even the breeze of wind graced you, just a cold that stung through your skin. When they appeared, they seemed to be confident enough not to bring as many men. Perhaps ten at most from what you could see and sure enough, the person of Roose Bolton nowhere to be found within them. Just riding in the middle, a smug smirk from Ramsay himself as he approached.
Eyes looking between you both, as you felt Jon stiffen in front of you. His own gaze sharp and grey bleeding into a darker almost black colour at the sight.
Only men of the Boltons accompanied him, no other houses which may have pledged to his side joined the parlay and you couldn’t help but wonder why. Of course, as they stopped a few meters away from your own group, Ramsay’s pale blues found yours with a sickening pleasure you had known all to well.
Your lungs barley finding any movement within them, having too many times recalled what such a look would normally follow. It was that same look on his face now that he had that first night he came down to the dungeon of the Dreadfort all alone to begin a new nightmare.
Jon spent no energy on courtesies. No civility or neutral greeting as had been the day such a meeting occurred on the opposite end of your father. No, he had not the care to play Ramsay’s games.
Ramsay however always played. A tone of sincerity that was as fake as the air was cold as he looked past Jon to you. “My dear bride, you wound me. Running away only to return to me on the back of a another man’s horse? What would the people think of such behaviour?” His smugness turning to Jon himself, “Come bastard, you’ve brought my bride all this way, now give her to me where she belongs.”
Jon clutched the reigns on his horse a bit tighter in his fist, keeping a stoned expression trained on him without giving much away. “I’ve shown you her, now you show me my brother.”
Tsking at him, Ramsay never once gave up the ruse. It took much to break that joy of cruelty to something more angry and vicious. “Now, it doesn’t work that way does it? You don’t get to see little Rickon until I have her by my side again. This can be easy, bastard. Give me what belongs to me and I give back what belongs to you.”
Jon’s voice was rough, a louder tone to ensure all heard but tinted in a husk of anger. “She’s not your prisoner, and she’s certainly not your bride.”
Raising his eyebrows in a fake impress, your heart dropped realizing the things about to come out of his mouth as his eyes shined with a horrifying glee again looking to you. “My lovely bride, you wouldn’t have happened to play around with other men while you were gone were you? Running from where I’ve given you a home in a nice warm bed right into his, I’m hurt.” You couldn’t tell if you hated how he was trying to rile Jon up through you, or how in a sick way, he wasn’t really wrong.
“She isn’t a toy for you to throw around, and this isn’t your home, Ramsay. It’s mine.” A bit of a fallen expression painted over the man, possessive like the one in front of you but not in a way that was full of a care or love. Just a childish anger of wanting things to belong to him and no one else.
Finding his eyes once more, Ramsay found it in him to give a second’s patience for diplomacy. “It hasn’t been your home for some time, bastard. But I may forgive you for that if you just give me what I want. Hand me my bride, kneel before me, surrender your army, and proclaim me as Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North. You should be thanking me, I executed the man who murdered your brother, gave justice to how many times he stabbed a knife into my bride’s stomach there. Him and that fat wife of his won’t trouble us any longer.”
Glad for the gloves on your hands so you couldn’t dig your nails deep into your palms, trying to keep calm when all you felt was ill. Jon was equally as tense in his posture, you had been right. Murdered Roose Bolton and that way with you nothing would stand in his way of ruling the North alone.
He found once more, no amusement in Jon’s own response. Finding him to be difficult to manipulate with his words. “We both know why I’m not going to do that.”
“Come, bastard. You don’t have the horses, you don’t have the strength, and the only men at your side are a bunch of savages with no discipline. There’s no need for a battle, get off your horse, return my bride to me and kneel. I will even bring your brother to you myself, alive of course. I’m a man of mercy.”
So this was why he knew to keep you behind him. Your muscles all screaming at you to get off and just go to him, let this be over. If you did it willingly perhaps he wouldn’t even need to submit to him at all, your willingness would be enough. But Jon wouldn’t let you give yourself over, and you knew a strained feeling inside your heart was as close to gratefulness as you could get.
“You’re right. There’s no need for a battle. Thousands of men don’t need to die. Only one of us.” In a real trick of the gods, you suddenly realized too much what Jon was feeling before. Your heart raced almost too fast leaving you lightheaded. Your hands reaching barley forward so he could feel the slight pressure of your fingertips at his back. “Let’s end this the old way. You against me.”
Almost indescribably, did he lean back just the slightest. Even as Ramsay chuckled, you could sense Jon telling you to stay calm, let him handle it. Pale blue eyes narrowing slightly in a curiosity to him. “I keep hearing stories about you, bastard. The way the people in the North talk about you, you’re the greatest swordsman who ever walked. Maybe you are that good, maybe not. I don’t know if I’d beat you, but I know my army will.”
Voice not wavering for a second, strong as he sat tall atop his horse, Jon didn’t miss a beat. “Will your men want to fight for you when they hear you wouldn’t fight for them?”
A blaze in his eyes send a prickling shiver down your spine, one that you had seen in your more daring of moments. Before he had learned ways to shut you up. Scoffing with what you knew wasn’t a true security in his leadership he played himself off too casually.
“You’re good. Very good. I can see why my bride ran all the way to you. Needs a strong man with enough sense to knock her around. Not just anyone can handle a cunt like hers. Tell me, does she bleed and fight against you as she does with me?” You couldn’t see Jon’s eyes, but you would be willing to wager they were as black as could be if the strain in his shoulders were to go off of. “Do you fuck her like a wolf, bastard? She certainly takes it like one.”
Everyone on your side of the field was horribly uncomfortable. In a way, it sickeningly reminded you of that morning at the Twins. Having to stand in front of Walder Frey and let him look you over like a slab of meat and parade his disgusting interests in front of his family, your army, and Robb himself knowing that saying anything in your defence as he wanted was a mistake.
Jon felt the same, and your insides twisted at what he could possibly be imagining. “I offered you and your men a way out. But I’m not handing her over just for you to torture her more. I know the North as well as you do. Do you really think they will stay at your side after finding out what you’ve done? That they’ll still fight for you, if you murder Rickon?”
Whatever confidence Ramsay was boasting, didn’t seem as confident in the glare he gave Jon in return. More of an anger that was rarely wound up by another in his monster of a mind. “Have it your way. Come morning, we will find out. I hope your men are ready, I haven’t fed my hounds in seven days. They are dying to meet you. Of course, not before I keep you alive just long enough to watch me and my bride consummate our lovely marriage properly. You know as well as I do she's nice and broken in. But I am a generous man, so I'll even let you watch as my hounds give her all a turn before I kill you.”
Never to leave his guard down, Jon had everyone stay in their place as Ramsay so confidently turned to leave. Almost out of sight before you too, made your leave. Once the morning comes, you knew this same field would be drenched in blood, but you had to be ready this time. You’ve been in battle before, only never with such a risk of being on the losing side.
“If he was smart, he’d stay inside the walls of Winterfell and try to wait us out. But he won’t.” Nightfall had fallen upon your army, only a fair few of you still up and rerunning the plans again and again until it was ingrained in everyone’s minds. Charging into a bloodbath, too many scenarios played through your minds and every one had to be planned out no matter how minute.
Lord Glover looking at Jon with the kind of trust you’d seen in the man before, only directed towards another he’d eventually call King. “You don’t think he’d force us into a siege?”
Shaking his head no, voice low but no hesitation. “Most of his men are houses forced to fight for him. If he can make an example out of us, then he knows they won’t turn on him out of fear. He wants it to be a slaughter.”
Your eyes were narrowed, looking over everything laid out to the group almost without blinking, running along the edges where they could come from. Tormund leaning over more looking to Jon with a knowing. “It’s his horses that’s a problem. I know what mounted horses can do to an army. You and Stannis cut through us like piss through snow.”
Your eyes flickered up briefly, before turning back down. Tactic’s running through you head trying to find a solution that even sounded good before speaking up. Your head already hurt, trying to come back into this kind of world after being so drastically torn from it made it feel so much like your first battles all over again. Relying on the skill of others to push you into an idea that could even work.
The conversation around you continued as you leaned over the table silently, “They won’t be able to hit us from the sides.” Jon called your name causing your head to snap up with a bit more intensity in your eyes then perhaps you realized. “Are you with us?”
Gaze drifting to the side, you couldn’t help but recall those days in Riverrun. How full proof the plan was until one thing had taken it all apart, and ended it just before your father had breached the gates of King’s Landing. “They’ll charge at us trying to push us back, but maybe we need to do the same.” Only catching Jon’s eye you spoke with a hesitant pause hoping you made as much sense as the images in your mind. “How long would it take to breach the gate?”
A glint in his eye caught yours, something of an understanding as he answered, “If we have a proper clearing, maybe minutes.” He put the pieces together faster then you did, leaning back up as he looked to the others. “He’ll send his horses into a slaughter because he thinks it will push us back.” His voice trailing off with a lightness, looking at you with a plan the others hadn’t seen yet.
Nodding slowly, you looked to the outlaid plans once more. Finding a voice for the first time in a long time that awoken the memories of what used to be in Maege and Glover. “They’ll attempt to block our path closer, but if we can break that line we can push them right up to the gates. And if we get into the gates?”
“Then it’s over.” Maege finished for you, a proud look on her face. “I knew you were still in there somewhere.” You didn’t quite share the confidence. None of the battles Robb had one had been rushed into knowing a victory, handling every time with as much planning for failure as their was success.
Every time you would get to cocky about your own plans, was the same instances the Stark’s would all knock you into the dirt in the training yard. And Ramsay was confident. He has the advantage of Winterfell, and he has the horses but it also means he thinks there’s nothing for your men to stand up with. Jon had at some point come closer to your side, his tone rumbling in your chest from the proximity. “Ensure all the men out there knows my instructions are clear. I can’t have surprises from them tomorrow.”
Hardly having noticed Theon watching you closely, you also missed the glance between the two of them the former nodding towards you. It was almost an odd dynamic, between the four of you as teenagers it was usually split evenly of Theon and Robb, and Jon and yourself as the pairs. It was a bit odd for Jon, having missed war bringing you two together, and the trauma that bonded it for good
In ways, Theon knew you as well as Jon did. He hadn’t gone into detail so much about what Ramsay had done in specifics, but it was enough to paint the picture to Jon that day in Castle Black. It also was clear, Theon’s quiet was one thing but the fear in his own eyes trying to describe the things you had been through was another.
It wasn’t until you had told him that night in Deepwood Motte, did he learn that Theon would be dragged into the room to watch what Ramsay would do. And judging by how many marks were left on you that first night he truly came back, clearly there was so much worse happening. And it felt strange, knowing that it was Theon who knew it all best, not Jon. Theon had been the one to protect you, get you out of there and instead of returning to his family he betrayed Robb for? He stayed, knowing if Jon were vengeful enough he may have merely acted out Robb’s own execution order for him.
When you came to Winterfell shortly after you turned fourteen, Theon had already been there for about two years. Long enough to lose that initial fear of what may happen to him, and feel more at ease around him and Robb as friends of sorts. Then you showed up, and Jon could still recall how much red was painted over his eyes as he heard Theon remarking about “showing you what a man looks like.”
Robb had been as close to hitting him as Jon had. The two of you were always combative though, always bantering and joking. Many days he and Robb would have their own tasks when it was usually you and Theon whose jobs typically aligned with the other. If he used to feel jealous of what he saw as Robb getting their father’s true attention, it was Theon he was jealous of spending so much time with you day to day.
Standing there, seeing Theon’s eyes trained concerned as you tried desperately to only focus on what was right in front of you instead of the fear to come. It was that same feeling of jealousy in his gut, like no matter what he did Jon would never know you the way others did. Then again, he also wasn’t sure you knew yourself better then others did anymore.
Both men nodded at the other, at the very least, Theon had found himself working to trust your well being with him more freely. Theon could talk you down, but Jon was there to prevent it in the first place now. Most took their leave, save for Tormund.
Raising an eyebrow to him, the larger man asked with a doubtful amusement “Did you really think that cunt would fight you man to man?”
“We could end this war right now, boy. Save thousands of lives. You fight for the Starks, I fight for the Lannisters.”
The same offer, only given by the other side of the fight. Except Jaime was already a prisoner, and the battle already won. Jon next to you though, spoke deep as he glanced from Tormund to yourself. Eyes dark with far too much brewing behind them. “No. But I wanted to make him angry. I want him coming at us full tilt, no tricks waiting for us over the hill.” Turning to glance at you, he looked back to Tormund in finality. “We should all get some sleep.”
Both men nodding to the other, once a threatening dynamic built on lies turned into someone the other had found a deep trust in. “Make sure she does too,” Gesturing towards you, “Need you both sharp tomorrow.”
You hardly noticed it was only Jon left. A true battle oncoming, and sending good men into an undeniable slaughter. You could have been in the war tent garrisoned in Moat Cailin over four years ago and you might not have realized, the anxiety racing just the same.
Only brought back to the world when warmth enveloped your back and two arms came to stretch beside yours, keeping you caged between the table and Jon. A barley there hint of relaxing coming over you at the feeling, but little would make it go away. His voice was low, resting close to your ear almost humming in tone. “We’ve gone over everything as much as we can, nothing left to do but wait.”
Tilting your head barley to one side, but didn’t make any moves to look away. “I can hardly remember when I used to go into these things with any confidence.” Sighing behind you, Jon moved his hands to your hips, adjusting you a bit closer, standing a bit straighter against the wooden surface so he could more comfortably keep you close. “How the hell was I going to do any of this on my own?”
Hands holding your hips a bit tighter, voice lowering more to a rasp that could’ve made you shiver more then the cold air around you. “You were never going to do this on your own. The moment I realized you were alive, I knew ever letting you go was a mistake.” One hand running smoothly from hip to across your stomach and pulling you more back into him, your eyes fluttering shut at the sudden feeling.
Slowly, you let your hands reach up from the table and rest gently along the arm running around your front. “That day on the Kingsroad, I remember this..strange feeling. As if the second I turned from you something in me started screaming. Trying to tell me something was wrong. At the time, I thought that was just what heartbreak was supposed to feel like.” He nodded against the back of your head, prompting you to continue. “But then it kept coming back. Almost as if it were some sign that I was making the wrong choice, or was walking into a trap. I never felt something like that until we finally left, and it hasn’t been back since..since I’ve been back.”
Shivering in his arms as the hand across your stomach begun to stretch and trace along where your scar sat hidden under your layers. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you. All three of you.” Neither of you spoke about it, about what you had lost from that scar other then your life. You had no way of knowing what to even say to him about it, or anyone. You didn’t want too, but you still felt a sting building up quickly behind your eyes.
Trying to shake your head, shake the water from them too, “I’m sorry I didn’t make it to you fast enough to protect you.” Jon trying telling you it wasn’t your job, but you pushed past him. “No, Jon. It is. If you’re supposed to protect me, then I’m here to protect you. That’s what this is. You don’t get to do all the work by yourself.”
Another sigh, this one with enough strength that it was both exhausted yet purposely dramatic. “Did you drive Robb this mad with how stubborn you are?”
Shrugging lightly, you leaned back into him finally. “Sometimes.”
His hand traced along that small area a little firmer, as if wishing he could feel it from over it all. Insecurity once more seeped so lightly into his voice, asking in a whisper, “Can I ask? About him?” Pressing harder into that scar for a second to indicate which he meant.
Your head felt light, for a moment it wasn’t his hand there, it was that warmth pooling of blood that left your body shivering and pale. It wasn’t judgment in your tone, but for a moment you worried it came out as such. “You’ve never asked about him before..why?”
Stilling for a moment before exhaling deeply, the nerves not quite leaving him this time. “I was jealous. Most of my life I never thought too far ahead, life like mine didn’t have much to look forward to. We couldn’t even be together anywhere but completely alone, I knew marrying you was never going to happen. Then I saw you like that in my dream one day, and all I could think about was how jealous I was that it wasn’t mine.”
Biting your tongue, trying to keep the inevitable emotions at bay desperately. But he continued. “Then you and Robb died, and I felt like a horrible person for it. Spent all that time wishing it was mine, and then you lost both of them. After that I don’t think I even knew what to ask.”
You had thought it was Robb’s in that dream, and maybe it was, or maybe it was Jon’s you didn’t really know. That dream of a baby boy was so far away in another life that it was too foreign to remember properly. Yet, you found a smile. Something deep in there was the softness you shared with Robb over it. The only times you two had any happiness before it was all ripped away. “We had names picked out.”
Jon turned a bit to look over your shoulder, a hint of a smile on your face that you never had anymore when talking about Robb. His thumb now gently running across your stomach, not at all realizing it was just the same manner that Robb himself used to do when you were pregnant. “What were they?”
Looking to nothing for a moment, you found the same words you told Robb coming back. “Both you and Robb were named after your father’s closest companions. Jon Arryn named his son after Robert, but neither of them did the same for him. We left for war trying to save him, it seemed only fitting. We had at least two others planned as well. If our first boy was named after Ned, then any girl we had would’ve been Lyanna. And-” You paused, and for a moment Jon couldn’t quite tell why you almost seemed amusingly hesitant.
Squeezing your hip he prompted, “What?”
Holding a smirk back, you shrugged. “We uh...were fairly certain however that Catelyn was not going to appreciate what we thought of for our second son...”
If anything got a sigh along with an eye roll out of Jon, it was that. Letting his forehead rest against the back of your head, grumbling, “Seven hells...what was wrong with you two..” A small laugh burst from you, prompting Jon to tear himself from you and turn you around. Backing you against the table once more, his arms now reaching to encase you between them as well. A playful glint in his own eye, “Well, when we get to our second boy we’re sure as hell not naming him Jon.”
A flush ran through your skin, and a flustered smile you wished wasn’t running so obviously across your lips. The sheer ease in his eyes and grin on his face as he said it almost made your head spin. Trying to play yourself off as just coy and joking, “Well what did you have in mind then?”
Once more there was no hesitation or doubt. Just the somewhat, actually very intimidating aura of a man who knows exactly what he wants. Running a hand gently along your hair, “Robb would appreciate having one of your boys named after him a lot more then I would after me. It doesn’t have to be our second if you’re not ready. If I recall, I promised you eight.”
Your eyes widened, mouth parting in incredulity his audacity. A higher pitched protest trying not to laugh out of your mouth, “Excuse me, I clearly remember saying we should stop at three, but you made me agree on five, where's this eight coming from?”
Jon leaned forward, his breathe brushing across your skin as he ran the hand down to stroke gently at your jaw, before pressing a kiss to your forehead. “I’m older now. I want more.”
There wasn’t much sleep to be found that night. Not by your, not by many. A battle was one thing, but tomorrow was going to be more rough then the ones you remembered. What little you did, for the first time in a long time, you were so vividly haunted by that very thing. That very horror you couldn’t keep from. Only this time, you couldn’t even tell which Stark it was strung up like a puppet, a blend of direwolves morphing in front of you so jaggedly staked onto where their heads were.
Whatever Northerners were fighting on Ramsay’s side, you hoped they too recalled the inconceivable cruelty of what House Bolton helped create as the end of their own King. Maybe Jon was right, maybe you were wrong to think giving yourself up was an option. It would’ve have saved Robb from that fate, but maybe you just needed to force yourself into those fears. Get out in the mud and do what needs to be done. No one protected Robb from such an end, but you could protect the two brothers that were right in front of you.
But perhaps, two was too great of a number to be allowed to come true.
You knew what would happen as soon as you rode up. Most of your forces on foot, only a handful on what horses you had, most in lines of archers lined across the fields from one end to the other along where you dug out. Cutting off their ability to circle around you, as your archers stood tallest to pick off any oncoming men seeking to circle your forces. None of the Bolton army was seen as Jon rode up in the middle of his army to the front.
Standing atop it were only a few figures, one of which was Ramsay and the other to yours and Jons horror was Rickon. He was alive, but as soon as you saw the distance between, and the bow in Ramsay’s hand you looked to the men poised to flank to the free folk’s right. Eyes looking to Theon’s as you knew exactly what was about to happen.
All of you were deathly silent. Ramsay leaning to Rickon in a falseness that you knew the boy wouldn’t be able to tell. He was older then you last saw, almost eleven now and yet he looked far older then a boy his age had any purpose looking. Your place enough behind Jon, you knew he could hear you in the painful quiet that was surrounding everyone.
“He’s going to make him run...”
You didn’t elaborate, and the worst was that Jon knew too well exactly what you meant. This wasn’t an act of war, this was pure cruelty. You had spared a child’s life before, you had stood beside him as Robb executed his own men for murdering children even as hostages. This wasn’t an act of a commander, and it was why Ramsay couldn’t have Roose Bolton around to stop him.
If he was sure he was going to win this battle, he still had one last game to taunt with and you felt utterly sick. This was why Jon refused to let you even attempt your own surrender, he had enough foresight to know it wouldn’t be as simple as that and he was right. Only it was against the wrong person in your eyes.
As soon as Rickon ran, Jon took off. Riding towards his brother as all of you were forced to wait in a wide eyed horror. Arrows didn’t barrage Jon, no it was a far sicker game. Ramsay stood from his safe high top, and shot arrows down around Rickon desperately running to Jon. The first time they had seen each other in over four years and you knew Jon could see nothing else but how far he had to go to get his brother.
Only, Ramsay was toying with them both. It was almost enough to make you look away. So close to their brother, both almost managed to even grab the other’s hand. Only as soon as they barley could feel the other, a final arrow shot right into the boy, and hurled him face down to the ground.
Heart stopping, the sickening dizziness. Rickon laid there, and didn’t move and for a moment Jon could only look down at what he only just couldn’t reach.
And yet, that weight, that darkness, everything that had bore down on you for over a year. The blood and bright blue eyes of that night, the fire and chanting turned to torment and a nightmare only death was your wish from. It all didn’t quite ring clearly.
Something stirred in the sheer seconds you had to act. An instinct that had been buried so deep the last time it was awake, it was Robb’s side you were fighting at. And at his side, you knew what needed to be done, and so did you now. You knew better, because you knew exactly what Jon was about to do.
As soon as Jon beckoned his horse to ride straight forward, you found a voice. Quiet for so much of your life, and yet somewhere deep you found enough of that desperate Baratheon fury that would cause Robert to shout like no other man. “Prepare to charge,”
Jon rode more, and the arrows shot at him with more vigour then the toying of his brother. In an instant enough hit his horse, sending it stumbling down and Jon slamming to the ground with it. And it was then, there was no turning back.
He stood there alone as Ramsay commanded this men to charge, a terrifying onslaught of mounted horsemen all riding towards one lone man with but a sword at his side. “Men, go, protect your commander- now,”
The free folk were as terrifying from this view as it was for the men coming. A ferocious people, sided along good men you had known and fought with before. Your own on the horses you had at their backs following enough to cover.
The roaring from both sides only forced your lungs out harder in commanding their draws, each side knowing their strategy and yours trained on those in front of Jon himself.
There was no way to describe it. What kind of blood was shed in the middle of that chaos. Your own archers the only thing that was poised to keep the Bolton armies from circling around Jon’s forces but the carnage below was something new. Mounted horses, brutal fighting from both free folk and the men with a flayed men itched into their insignia, it built up before your eyes.
Desperate yourself to remember everything you’d been taught and yet nothing could prepare anyone for this. None. In a true twisted fashion, you were sure this was his plan. Bolton men in the brunt of the action, as Jon’s men had to navigate a chaos around them and the arrows barraging them from their own sides with sigils you indeed recognized. Ones that you had sent pleas to, and ones whose arrows were as focused on you as you were focused on your own men.
In the ensuing chaos, both sides of your own on horse back had to push forward, push the line of men towards the chaos because there was no other option. They wanted to keep you as far from the castle as they could and there was only losing if you were pushed back enough.
But what built, was horror. Two sides guarding the line all poised at either side of what they created and in the middle was a wall of dead. Piles trampling over the other and adding to the weight that you could barley see in. One that you could barley see Jon in, and in an instant you found a voice that almost shocked the man you called to as it did you. But you yelled over the chaos and he heard you. “Tormund-”
It was indescribable in those moments. So much around him that he could feel his lungs crushing under the pressure of it all and soaking his vision. If this was what hell felt like then Jon would lose himself inside of it. Barley managing to push back what was on top of him until enough was there to reach up to grab onto what he knew was dead. His own and their own but he had to drag himself from it.
Something, someone seemed to have the stance to yank him back to earth, and as soon as his feet touched solid ground and he felt the air once more through the blood and grime that soaked all who found trapped within it’s depths. He hardly felt anything but a shaking ferocity that threatened to tear him apart. It wasn’t until he was yanked by the arm, forced to look at Tormund urging him to stay in control. To not lose it.
Senses from a highest peak that radiated something he couldn’t describe as the man forced Jon to keep eye contact did he realize how far down did he need to be pulled back. Coming to earth did he realize that something was off, or maybe it was that it wasn’t so deafeningly loud.
The wall of the dead in the middle, on two sides were a mixture of Boltons, Umbers, and Karstarks all holding their own line, some men, Jon even recognized himself. Many, he knew had once fought by his brothers side and it only made him angrier.
Watched their King betrayed by the Boltons, and now watched as the same house murdered Ned Stark’s last trueborn son and all posed in a challenge. Begging his forces to charge them first and get picked off by them and the arrows behind them.
Only, Jon recognized the men flanking to the Bolton’s left and right as well. Houses that he and you had called to. Houses that now, weren’t watching the men their arrows were trained on. No way of knowing the silence between a fair few that spoke volumes.
The Northerners were sure that the other houses forced to fight would surrender when the tides turned, but it wasn’t quite that. Your eyes and Theon’s had found leaders in the horseback archers parallel to your own. And a wave washed through, looks you had shared with these men in plans of battle before. Hornwood’s, Manderly’s, Blackwood’s, Dustin’s, all men you knew and you realized it wasn’t surrender they chose.
Fight as you had no other option, and once a choice was to be made they made the one that you barley had a plan for. But it was there, it had to be. You didn’t spend three years at Robb’s side, not to know exactly the kind of men who followed him. Jon’s forces on foot slightly ahead of you, and the opposite arches aimed over just enough to hit them. Your own flanking each side, turning enough to see Theon recognizing as you saw. So it was the very last plan in the book you were to cook up, was it?
Jon stood soaked in blood, men all at his sides ready to cut through them as tensions arose and as the archers poised at them were commanded to start moving. He could hear you, from what he could tell almost just behind him by a good number of feet as you held the back lines harshly.
As children, Jon and Robb often found themselves climbing the highest towers, and shouting to each other from increasingly far distances. Their father had told them that the greatest of commanders could only do so much if no one on the battlefield could hear them. That a good commander knew how to yell, a lesson he knew he and Robb both had learned with success.
But then he heard you, and he got it. He knew why you refused to let him stick you off to the sides. He wanted to fight for you, but you would for him. And no matter how much having you there scared him, you’d keep going as long as it took to ensure he kept going. And your yell, had to be that of a commander right now. One that he had previously only heard stories of from his father, that Baratheon’s were the one house who had a true set of lungs when they wanted too.
“Nock,”
The faint sounds of men and horses shifting behind them as he stared down the ones holding the line from them, teeth gritting and heaving for as much air as he could.
“Draw,”
A yell he had never heard on you, but there was a confidence he only caught at the last second. That the men in front of them, were only ones that had denied their cause and pledged to the Boltons. Only those and the Bolton’s themselves. None else. The Northerns at their backs however, looked as if they were actually listening for orders from the voice yelling behind him, watching you with a nod as if- oh honestly Jon could’ve turned around and kissed you right then and there.
“Loose,” Your arrows all fired, and the second they reached the men blocking the path, did the archers behind the Boltons turn. And arrows flew in vast numbers into the remaining men all posed to charge.
Another set of arrows and Jon found his own voice to match. “With me, men. Break their line,”
Taken off guard, Jon and his own men found their strength once more, and found the shock and confusion of the Bolton’s being picked off by their own sides broke through. He couldn’t quite see ahead of him enough, but he also knew to trust your eyes to watch those from the leader who hadn’t touched a single second of battle, save for an innocent boy running for his life.
The Northerners turning to the side of their own, men who now fought at Jon’s side recognizing the leader they didn’t just need, the one they wanted. One that was as fierce as the brother before him.
In the turning of the tides, Ramsay stood almost baffled by what was happening. Realized that the only men fighting for him for the ones being picked off by the bastard. So he did what cowards do when faced with forces that could outdo them. He ran. Commanded his men and what was left to turn back.
Realizing what happened, you made a risky judgment call. One he would be likely mad at you for later but now was important. Because you weren’t leading these men. The free folk, the Northerners all turning to fight for Jon’s side as one.
In a stroke of, not quite luck, but trust in someone who once fought beside you, you commanded your own horse forward and it was Theon picking any off before you could reach him. Coming to his side as there were more of you then there were of them, Jon looked up to where you came towards him.
Barley a glance was needed and it was all spoken already. Ramsay didn’t have the men for a siege anymore, and they all knew it. Hauling himself up in front of you, grabbing the reigns for himself. Telling his men to follow, telling them “We’re going home,”
Ramsay wasn’t ready. He wasn’t the one to lead such vicious battles and he despised that his men knew it. He thought he had them. He thought he could do it that he only had a scrap of wildings to help. Only to have the irritating audacity of Harald Karstark the night before, telling him that if it was a wildling army led by Jon Snow, then they might be fucked. That he would know this place better then any of them could wish.
His own bloody men turned on him, Houses that had sworn to his side. Albeit through threat of force but his side none the less. He thought he had the bastard, and then..he didn’t. And now he knew there was only a matter of time before they broke those gates down and the instant they did he would only have seconds to find a plan.
“Archers to the walls.” Only they didn’t. Wide eyed and rageful he yelled louder, “Archers-”
His own men by his side telling him, “Our army’s gone, we can’t hold off a siege.” At least there was the satisfaction of knocking the mouth breather on his ass for that. But the men that remained, ones that weren’t soldiers of his own house? Oh it was bad. It was bad, because they stood down. They stood down, and the gates open.
There would be no siege because there weren't enough men willing anymore to die for Ramsay Bolton’s malicious temper. They had a King, a King his father murdered, and outside those gates was the King that without ever calling himself one, had led his men through a bloodbath as fiercely as their last.
As those gates opened, on either side taking sure control of the perimeter of the yard were a mix of free folk and Northerns together finally. But as Jon descended on the home he had once thought couldn’t ever be his again, all he saw was red.
A monstrous, pathetic man who preyed only on those too weak to fight back. All Jon could see was the vile thing that waited until Jon had just reached Rickon, before shooting the boy dead. All he could see was how horrifically scared he had seen Ramsay leave you and the fear in your eyes for too long tormented by him. He didn’t get here in time to kill Roose Bolton for Robb, but Ramsay was here when Rickon wasn't, and Jon felt an intensity in his blood like none other.
You followed not long after, you and the men beaten, covered in grime, blood mixes of yours and others as Jon was drenched, soaked in the massacre which tried to crush him in. And Ramsay, stood there almost entirely clean with a bow in his arms. Looking between Jon and you with the same condescension in his voice he always had. “You suggested one on one combat, didn’t you? I’ve reconsidered, fighting for my whore of a bride sounds like a wonderful idea.”
Men all standing back, as Jon walked forward with not an ounce of fear or doubt in his eyes. You could still see Jaime Lannister, tired up, bloody and beaten taunting Robb “ Swords, lances, teeth, nails choose your weapons. And let’s end this hear and now. ” But Robb was smart enough to know a trap when he saw one.
Ramsay wasn’t.
Step by step Jon threw his shield up, taking arrow after arrow all barley moving him back a single inch. All of you stood heaving from the fight to get to this point, as you watched Jon approach Ramsay without a care in the world over his attacks. The second he got close, Jon thrusted it forward by a blunt edge, smacking Ramsay in the head and sending him knocked to the ground.
And that didn’t stop until there was barley anything left to recognize outside the blood. It could only be described once more, as brutal. An anger and violence that was so destructively pulled to the surface that none stepped in to stop. Maybe you should have, but you found no strength left in you to do so.
You fought back against Ramsay too many times and he overpowered you with ease. But Jon was the one who overpowered him, and you couldn’t convince yourself it was wrong to stop. Luckily for you, however, Jon had more strength then physical.
Ramsay broken and bloody on the ground when he stopped. Jon’s voice a hissing rasp full of vitriol as he knelt over him. “I should kill you right here, let you die humiliated in front of your own men.” Tossing what was left of his hold on him to the ground, Jon stood up. Looking down to the man with exactly what you knew you had seen in him. “But I won’t. That’s not the kind of leader these people deserve, and it’s not the kind of man I am. For now, you can rot in the dungeons with the rest of your men.”
Taken back to Whispering Wood, some taking away what was left of the men on the other side, while the rest stood around you in cheers. But it wasn’t quite over. It was why you told him, why he needed to know before he got here. You were Robb’s Queen, they fought beside you. But you weren’t their leader, you never were. Only one here was the only person it could be.
Only this time, the man they would call to saw it coming. And he knew better then most, the cheers around him couldn’t last. You didn’t come all this way together just to fight this battle. Jon’s voice was loud as he stood in the middle of his people. “Men, you’ve fought with honour. Stood beside the free folk and fought together, my father used to say we find out true friends on the battlefield. And you’ve proven that today, but one victory does not make us conquerors.”
Multiple men stepped forward, Northern Lords who you had seen in this position before, had seen this look on their faces, but this time, as you stepped forward as well they knew that you still truly believed it too.
“Winter has come, and I promise you. There is a bigger enemy coming for us. One that won’t wait out the cold. They will bring the storm with them. Bury and burn the dead, and celebrate while you can, but this war is far from over.”
It was Lord Dustin who stepped forward first. “We all received a call from a Southerner calling himself King, but we refused. Some of us forced into allegiance with the men who murdered our King and our Queen, and yet by the gods grace she’s standing here in front of us because she understands better then we all did.”
Jon met your eyes, and you just once, begged the gods to let him accept what he deserves. Just once.
Another loud, impassioned voice that spoke over many with conviction. Only Maege had a bit more grace then that was of the Greatjon who spoke the declaration years before. “Bear Island knows no King but the King in the North, whose name is Stark. Robb Stark was the King we chose, but he didn’t need to make this one a Stark to follow after him. He named Jon Snow as King after him because Ned Stark’s blood runs through his veins all the same.”
More stepped forward, men who answered the call and those who didn’t all as Jon stood at the centre of all. The Manderly’s next, and you knew too well they realized at the last second what the true choice was, their eyes had found yours in those vital seconds before Jon broke the line, and turned to join. “Lady Mormont speaks true. Your brother came to us, chose you to succeed him, and it wasn’t until I realized I was on the wrong side of the battlefield did I remember that.”
Lord Blackwood stepped next. “My son died fighting for Robb Stark, the Young Wolf, and never once have I regretted standing beside him. And I won’t regret should I die in battle beside the brother he trusted, the brother he called King.”
Fighting against until the very last surrender as they opened the gates finally, it was indeed Smalljon Umber who had the courage to step forward just as he was the one who ordered the gates to be opened. “My father’s rotting in a Frey dungeon because he fought by Robb Stark’s side, and I dishonoured him, my King, and my house by pledging my men to the ones that killed him. A man can only admit when he’s wrong, and ask for forgiveness, if not mercy.”
Jon’s voice wasn’t as powerful as before, and he caught you in his eye, closer then before. Rough and scratched like the toll was long taken on it. “You sided with us in the moments it mattered most. There’s nothing to forgive.”
With as much admiration as he had that day years ago, Lord Glover was as confident now as he was then, this time your name in his words. “We’ve heard rumours, about your death, about his.” Gesturing to Jon, still as quiet and still as ever, like he was the stag about to be spooked for once. “And if the gods brought you back, maybe they wanted you to bring him back too. Without either of you, we wouldn’t have a Queen, or a King. House Glover has stood behind House Stark for thousands of years, and I will stand behind Jon Snow.”
Silence was met, as you approached him. Bloody and beaten beyond belief and yet you held no doubt in your eyes, or a nervous hesitation as you had shared with Robb before. Now was different, and you could only see a man that was exactly what you wished he himself had seen earlier.
Your voice nowhere near as loud as any of theirs, but you trusted these men to hear you. Even if your voice was only loud enough for Jon as you found his grey ones you missed for too long.
“Robb chose you because you deserved everything he had. He didn’t want to force you to become a Stark just to lead, because Stark or Snow, you’re his brother. He didn’t want you to be the King he was, he trusted the King you would be on your own.” A hint of a smile on your face as Jon’s gaze was trained intensely into yours as if needing to lighten the thick air between you in front of so many people. “Though being a Snow..I suppose would make you the White Wolf instead of the Young Wolf.”
Had Jon’s heart not been about to break through his chest and armour and sink him into the ground, he may have found it in himself to laugh. But as he looked to you, and then up to the men, he knew there was only one choice. The Free Folk wouldn’t kneel to him, but Jon didn’t want them too. They followed him as a leader, but it was the North that was his home who needed him as their King. And who would he be if he refused the call when Robb hadn’t, he thought.
Soaking in blood from a horror bloodbath he led them all to victory in, the Northerners around Jon graced him with the title he never thought he would’ve deserved. “The King in the North,” And as more joined, drawing their swords to swear, he looked to his people with an acceptance in his eyes.
It was different this time though, you didn’t make any pledge of loyalty because truly Jon had no gods forsaken reason to hear one from you. You both came back from death in ways not a soul other would understand, and that was enough.
He did though, in front of men, in a home, in a place he never would have dared only four years ago, find enough in himself to let go of that long insecurity. The last time it happened, you both were in Winterfell together, thought was the last time. Leaving the other may have been a mistake, it may not have been, but you were in front of him all the same.
That cold night of the feast he was kicked out of, both of you had looked around to ensure you were alone first. But this time, Jon let himself just not care, and in however long the men chose to chant and cheer, Jon pulled all the air out of you as he grabbed you, pulling you to him.
Almost spinning you in his arms as you both clung to the other in a tight yet tender embrace, as all the “King in the North” faded until only your breaths could be heard by the other.
For this very moment, it would have to do.
Splashing harsh against the rocky shores, the fleet all gathered around to see the immaculate castle that stood before them, stone dragons carved into their towers and the volcanic cliffs around it acted as an overpowering shadow. An image of fear to many, but they had only just arrived. They couldn’t leave now.
Some were familiar to the land, others weren’t at all but they all stepped ashore, and with little fight as could be given, the island was theirs. It wouldn’t last for long, not as a permanent home, but it was the closest thing to what was his blood family as one man could get for now.
Some called him Young Griff, but as he stepped onto the shores of Dragonstone, he knew he had to become what he was trained to be his whole life. Eventually all the Seven Kingdoms would know him by what he came here to be. Here to claim his rightful place on the Iron Throne, as would have belonged to his father befor
But Young Griff wasn’t here to be his father. Rhaegar died a prince, but Young Griff was his only living son. The rightful heir. He was here to be King.
For his true name was said to be Aegon Targaryean
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nocandnc · 2 months ago
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For the ship ask...
Could you do #2 for Kafmina? Pretty please?
Or 26, if you would be more comfortable asking that?
Hi there~
I actually answered 26 for KafMina already!!
(combined with OkoHoshi)
I generally don't mind answering more adult topics (thank you for considering my comfort though!) - you just aren't likely to find me writing/drawing anything extremely graphic. I'm a less is more kinda gal ^///^;;;
Spicy content is spicy content though, so answer under the cut!
2) Who is always horny and will have sex at any time, at any place and at any time?
I've mentioned this in previous Asks, but Kafka seems to be a very purehearted guy to me. He doesn't think about much other than being at Mina's side (romantically or otherwise), being the best officer he can be, and just enjoying life.
Also, I really like the idea that Kafka doesn't develop feelings for Mina until after joining the defense force. They grew up together and sure, she's important to him, but with a 5 year age difference I doubt he saw her in such a light from the start. It's not until they've spent years apart - until they've grown and changed and Kafka has been so far removed from Mina that when they finally reunite, he finds himself getting to know her not just as a friend and comrade but as woman too. It's all very foreign to him.
So overall, I don't imagine Kafka craves sex all that much... at least compared to Mina.
But Mina? Oh, Mina needs it.
She's been crushing on Kafka since high-school at the very least. Maybe she's even tried confessing with some terrible handmade chocolates on Valentine's Day, only for it to totally fly over Kafka's head. She could hit every target imaginable save for his heart.
Then they drifted apart and it all seemed hopeless. Mina is stuck stewing in her fears and regrets and an overwhelming sense of yearning.
She's been yearning for so long, wanting him to be with her. Fighting side-by-side is a dream they both shared, but she's had so many other dreams of him since then - ones she wouldn't dare describe aloud... not until they're alone in her office after hours one evening, leaving Kafka a little blindsided all things considered.
He's happy to oblige of course - he just needs a minute to process the idea. Ashiro Mina is a stunningly gorgeous woman who desires him carnally and, wait - they can just do it? Now?? Right on top of the paperwork???
That said, Mina is probably still a bit reserved when it comes to the any time, any place part of things. Her locked office is one thing, but Kafka would probably be more open-minded than she is when it comes to fooling around in suprising places. The thought just needs to enter his head first...
And therein lies Mina's suffering.
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vampsquerade · 2 years ago
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Hi! hope you have a good day! Can you do a poly "Ghost x male reader x Soap" (if you comfortable writing poly relationship) with slow burn, angst and fluff at the end?
Where Ghost and Soap already in a relationship until the reader came into their team The two male thought the reader wasn't talkative around people but few weeks later, things change at first Ghost seems interesting in the male skill using gun and how fast he can run and Soap like the male sense of humour.
Both of them thought it only a friendship type of things. Until the male save Ghost from the enemy on the battlefield and him laughing at Soap jokes. That when the two males known what happen to them, they weren't sure if M/n would comfortable in a relationship with them, so they start doing small things for him like making coffee or helping training,..
And M/n notice it, he even started to fall for the both of them. But he keep denying the things they did for him because he thought that what friend do. and M/n don't think he is ready for a new relationship, he wasn't sure he is good enough for them (the male got trauma from the previous relationships) (more angst please, I would like to suffer for a little bit)
(・∀・)
After a while, the three of them got into a mission together, everything went good until the male got shot. He thought he going to be de@d soon (only to find out that he only got shot at his leg) so M/n confessed how he feel about the two of them which got him embarrassed when Ghost mention it when they got back to the base.
(andddd I don't know what to do with the ending cause I'm ran out of idea. I would want to see how the treated each other when got into a relationship. Sorry about the grammar, English isn't my first language)
hello anon! thanks so much for your request, i’m sorry for having taken so long to get to it because i will be honest, i rewrote this 29 fucking times…anyway, thank you for being as descriptive as possible because that really helped me out. and it’s okay! if you would like, feel free to leave a request in your native language so it’s more comfortable for you, i can translate it easily!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Ghost x Male!Reader x Soap: One’s Company, and Two’s a Crowd
Trigger Warnings: angst wth a happy ending, DEAD DOVE: DO NOT EAT, gunshot wounds, past abusive relationships, relationship trauma, accidental confessions, reference of domestic violence
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Simon and Johnny had, despite their slight differences, found themselves in a relationship together. Behind closed doors, the relationship was as domestic as it could get with an angsty man who’s had the worst of the worst happen in his life and a golden retriever boyfriend whose purpose for his traumatized lover was to show him there is some good in this world. Though his biological family is gone, Simon’s found his place in the Task Force and SpecGru; and a new member was just about to join the family. You walked into the room where Simon and Johnny were sitting, and his eyes grew wide when he saw you do a double take once you saw them. “Hey—who the fuck are you? How the fuck’d you get in?” he asks, quickly standing up.
Johnny’s quick to do the same, grabbing Simon’s hand tightly to hold him back. “Easy, Simon—let’s give him a chance to explain himself,” he says. His ocean blue eyes are soft as he looks at you, meanwhile Simon’s dark brown eyes are glaring into you so hard you feel like you’ll suddenly feel the blade of an invisible knife ghost against your neck before digging into you. “I’m new around here, sorry. The main contractor was telling me to try and introduce myself to anyone who’s around,” you explain. Your voice is so soft and so gentle, despite your military build. You’ve even got your arms raised in the air as a form of surrender. Simon, still wary of you, walks over to you and begins to frisk you for weapons. Satisfied that he doesn’t find anything, Simon lets you lower your arms before walking back to Johnny.
“You should probably learn how to fucking knock,” he scolds, glaring at you hard still. “He doesn’t need to knock Bonnie, this is the common room,” Johnny says before shaking his head slightly. “Sorry about that—what’s yer name? I’m Johnny and this here is Ghost,” he asks in a more kind manner. “Ah, cool. Nice to meet you two, please call me Y/N whenever we’re not on a mission or anything,” you say, giving the two a more peaceful and gentle smile. “Y/N…very nice name, I’ll say. Glad to have you on our side, too. I’m sure all of us will make some real good memories now that you’re here,” Johnny says. You can’t help but smile, nodding your head a bit, “Can’t wait to see what the future holds for us—this is going to be really exciting. I’ll be out of your hair now, see you around,” you say.
The duo then watches you give them a little wave once you step back out of the common room. It makes Simon sigh deeply, looking back down at Johnny. “M’sorry, love. I didn’t mean to snap on the kid like that…you know how I am…” he apologizes. It makes Johnny laugh, leaning over and giving him a kiss on the cheek as he leads him back to the couch. “It’s okay, you’ll eventually warm up to him…I hope,” he says, wrapping his arms back around Simon. He does the same, holding onto Johnny once more and closing his eyes. “He seems…a bit promising, however. I’ll try my best to warm up to him…” Simon mumbles, nuzzling into Johnny’s chest. “Go at your own pace, alright?” Johnny reassures. Simon nods, sighing again as he closes his eyes. His lover’s embrace always seems to calm him for the better.
Time seems to fly, the more you spend time on base and out on missions, the more Simon and Johnny seem to notice you’re completely reserved to everyone else. The only time you ever speak is on missions, and even then, it’s only when you need to make call outs or call in a UAV. The two of them are impressed however, your ability to run and gun down enemies is something that they haven’t seen in quite some time. The way you carry yourself is with so much pride and a determination to do your job the best you could now that you’re in the big leagues, met only by the silence of someone who actively acknowledges just how good they are. It’s not arrogant or anything, as you tend to give everyone a thumbs up once you’re asked how you’re feeling before, during, and after a mission.
Outside the field, you’re even more isolated and really only hang around Johnny and Simon whenever they invite you to. You laugh at Johnny’s dumb jokes, picking up on some of his Scots and occasionally using it whenever the time is right. Johnny starts to feel drawn to you, and with your expertise in handling weaponry and staying cool in the field draws Simon closer to you too. It’s shocking, but it’s what draws the romantic duo closer to wanting to know you better. Johnny comes up with the idea to make you more comfortable, following Simon’s suggestion to get you closer to the two of them. It’s a big risk, he says, but Simon’s more than willing to make that risk for you.
You warm up to them both, talking more and more only when you’re with them. The prospect of potentially adding you to their relationship makes Johnny and Simon a bit excited. They begin to treat you nicely, waking you up whenever you’ve slept long enough, giving you coffee or tea if it’s too early in the morning, and treating you with a kindness you haven’t really felt in a long time. It almost feels…a little domestic. It’s a form of intimacy you didn’t even have in your last relationship, and in turn it makes you a bit wary. Still wanting to be friends with them, you just return the gestures whenever you can. Acts of service seems to be Johnny’s love language, and quality time seems to be Simon’s.
For you, it’s gift giving. You give them little trinkets and stuff you find—out in the field and in the cities you all travel to—showing them that you’re their friend and want them to know you appreciate them. It scares you, after a few months of doing this, as you eventually find yourself catching feelings for the both of them. It felt wrong, having such strong emotions for two men at the same time. It almost reminds you of your past relationship, except you were forced to share yourself with two different people who ended up forgetting you in the end. They’d exclude you and eventually started hurting you physically whenever you protested the relationship.
So once you wake up from a nightmare recounting that verg relationship while sleeping on the couch of the common room, Johnny and Simon are immediately alerted by this as they sit and talk seated at a table in the corner of the room. They see the cold sweat dripping off your forehead, your chest heaving slightly as you try to regain your breath and rush over. “Are you doing alright? What’s the matter?” Johnny asks, looking at you. “G-Get away…please…” you plead softly, shocking the duo slightly. “Bonnie, come on…we just want to help you…” Johnny says, reaching out for you. You crawl further back into the couch, as if scrambling to get away from them.
Simon, despite wearing his usual skull balaclava, is clearly distressed by your sudden behavior. “Do you…feel scared because of us…” he asks softly, trying to show his concern for you. Not a word comes out, however, a gentle nod of the head is the only answer given. “Do you feel comfortable enough to talk about it? We just want to understand…” Johnny says. You just remain silent, not even realizing that your body’s begun to tremble. “Please, let us understand…help us understand…” he continues to urge you. Feeling overwhelmed, you just push them away and quickly storm out of the common room.
The duo doesn’t move or go after you, opting to give you the space you clearly need right now. Weeks go by, and you’re sent back on another mission with Johnny and Simon. They could tell you’re still very much not willing to talk to them. The distance aches their hearts, as all they want to do is understand what’s hurting you. They don’t even realize that they’re the reason; you’d swiftly fallen in love with the two men, and you really don’t want to have a repeat of your previous relationship the more you fall. It hurt, and you didn’t want to see them hurt from it either. It’s distracting, especially on such an important mission like this. Suddenly, you can faintly hear your callsign being yelled.
“Liquid…”
“Liquid!”
“Liquid! Get the fuck down!”
You snap out of your thoughts once the disembodied voice yells at you, managing to hear a bullet whizz past your ear. Immediately you drop to the floor, clutching your TAQ-56 tightly in your hands. Not realizing the enemy’s become fully aware of your presence long before you started zoning out, the realization of three of you being pinned down where you were positioned really rang in your ears. Maybe it was just the bullet that whizzed past, or the thundering gunfire that surrounded you making your ears ring. Whatever it was, you forced yourself to wait for the enemies to call out to their own teammates when reloading to return fire.
The shootout lasts for a while and as a last ditch effort against the remaining 4 scattered enemies, one of them hurls an active frag grenade towards Simon. “Ghost, move!” you exclaim. Simon looks down and quickly moves back, firing at an enemy that appeared from the left of a different building. Running from your cover, fire is immediately opened on you as you grip the grenade and hurl it back to the one that threw it. A bullet pierces through you in an unknown area, pain immediately surging in your body as you fall to the floor. The grenade explodes on the enemy that tossed it, as well as his friend that happened to be unlucky enough to move forward. “Y/N! Streamin’ bloody Jesus!”
“I-I can’t go on anymore! Just know—I really love you guys!” you exclaim, not even paying attention where you had been shot at. Johnny comes out of his cover and fires at the remaining enemy before joining Simon at your side. Simon’s already removed your body armor and was in the middle of checking where the bullet hit you, and he seemed to have frozen in place at your confession. Johnny turns his attention to your leg before looking up at your face, “You uh…you’ll live, Liquid…you got shot in the meatier part of your calf,” he says a bit awkwardly. Instantaneously upon hearing you weren’t even dying, your heart dropped even further into the seemingly bottomless pit.
You just accidentally confessed.
The once talkative trio was now completely silent, being treated by medics and being moved to get further care for your gunshot wound. Simon and Johnny patiently wait to be allowed to see you and once they do, the tension in the room is just as heavy as it was back when you first joined the whole operation. “Y/N…we need to talk about what you said earlier,” Johnny urges gently. A deep sigh escapes you as you sit there in the infirmary cot. You’ve begun to play with the stitching to your jeans, huffing softly. “It was the heat of the moment…” you make an excuse for yourself, blaming it on the situation.
Simon raises his brow after, “You do know that that makes it all the more true. This isn’t something you can easily avoid,” he says, reminding you of the other side of the coin. Feeling defeated about this situation, your shoulders slump as you reluctantly look up at the couple. “Okay, fine—I’ve…I’ve had feelings for you two for quite some time but…ah…” You say, trailing off as different points come through your mind. Deciding to start on one, the look in your eyes becomes somber as the duo watches and patiently waits to hear what you have to say. “Can I first explain why I started pushing you guys away…?” you ask, hoping they’ll provide you a safe space to speak.
“‘Course ya can…go in and tell us, lad…we’re listening…” Johnny reassured you. Simon nods silently, waiting to understand why you began to act so distant in the first place. “Well…when my partner and I were dating, they decided to add another person to the mix…except, it was a blatant slap to the face,” you begin, feeling a bit overwhelmed as the story of your past relationship comes to light. Johnny and Simon both reach for your hands, gently holding onto and caressing them. They give you a moment to recollect yourself, clearly treating you much better than you had been treated. “It was only like that because it was basically a way for my partner to distance themselves and cheat on me.”
The last sentence makes Simon furious, and he squeezes at your hand a little tighter. You couldn’t help but keep going, “The two of them had degraded me and…sometimes they hit me…whenever I asked them to join or made a protest to the whole thing.” Johnny’s eyes, usually soft, looked immediately protective, “Oh bonnie…you didn’t deserve to be treated like rubbish like that. Is the ended relationship why you ended up joining the military, and eventually us?” he asks while reassuring you. A silent nod is your only response, as well as the quivers of pain and fear your body gives.
“I pushed myself away to keep myself from hurting like that again…from personal experience, I’ve become so afraid…” you say. Your own hands then hold onto Simon’s and Johnny’s a bit tighter, and they do the same. “We wouldn’t let that happen at all. Johnny and I here, well—the two of us have fallen in love with you at the same time. It’s completely understandable if you want to join or not,” Simon confesses, rubbing at the back of his still balaclava-covered head. “Promise we won’t ignore how you’re feeling…a relationship as big as ours relies heavily on trust so…” Johnny says, looking at Simon before you.
“Will you trust us?”
The question comes out of their mouths perfectly in sync, showing that giving you the move you’ve always deserved is something they both agreed on doing. A heavy and apprehensive silence filled the room, the 50/50 chance of you agreeing or not waiting to be flipped by a singular figurative scenario. “I’ll trust you…” eventually came out of your lips and confirmed your answer. Not even realizing they had been holding their breaths, Simon and Johnny sigh in relief. “Thank fucking God…” Simon says, putting a hand in his chest. Johnny chuckles as he leans forward and kisses your cheek.
“Best choice, Y/N…you’re going to be so loved…you’ve even got Simon all exasperated about this,” Johnny says, slightly joking with you. Simon grumbles, rolling his eyes as lifts his balaclava up before he leans forward and kisses your other cheek. “That’ll do…” he says, ruffling your sleeve a bit. “Thank you—I’m really hoping this could work out for us…” you mumble softly, kissing both Simon and Johnny’s cheeks. This was the staff of a new beginning, and the first step from healing what you’d experienced before. So much love was on its way to you, and you were just so happy.
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guplia · 4 months ago
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Hello anon! Thanks for the ask!
Okay! It's time for the second round of my fic recommendations! Once again I'm not including any wips.
"Tiny Troubles" by RavenKnight3035 (Archive of Our Own):
Original summary:
"Something's wrong with Cole, but he refuses to talk to anyone about it. Then, to make matters worse, a mysterious criminal attacks and the results are...interesting to say the least. "Cole! You're TINY!" Prepare for a big helping of fluff with a side of angst. :D"
This fic is about Cole, who becomes a little kid after something that goes wrong on a mission. And he's been acting strange before that too, so the ninja try to figure out what's wrong with him.
This takes place after season 2 (of the original series not Dragons Rising) but has technically become canon-divergent because of something that gets revealed in season 13, but it's a good read! There were hurt/comfort scenes I liked!
"Family" by Doctor_Discord (Archive of Our Own):
Original summary:
"Takes place like a month after Lloyd was magically aged. When Lloyd is kidnapped and used as leverage by Scales and the Serpentine, Garmadon is willing to do anything to get him back. Even kill. I am horrific at summaries but this is good I promise. Also posted on Wattpad under same Username"
So this is a canon-divergent fic with a lot of Lloyd angst! Garmadon teams up with the ninja to get him back from Scales.
There was a sequel that's also available on AO3 but it's been discontinued for five years and as far as I know the author is not into Ninjago anymore, but they said that anyone can write a continuation so there's that! But this fic is fully complete.
"Five Times Lloyd Was a Pain" by DietCokeIsLife (Archive of Our Own):
Original summary:
"And, the one time he wasn't. Takes place pre-Child's Play when Lloyd is still a kid. Very fluffy!"
So like I said in the previous post, I like how Lloyd and Kai's dynamic changes through the seasons, and how they hate each other at first. Well, here's Lloyd's relationships with everyone!
"Misunderstood" by Lilac_Lily234 (Archive of Our Own):
Original summary:
"Finally after this brat caused so much trouble Cole was pretty sure this kid was going to get scolded at by everyone and Sensei Wu, and sent back to whatever horrible mother let her kid run around to do such misdeeds as they had this kid cornered on the roof; Cole didn't expect what the kid would do next though, and it horrified him."
Again, a child Lloyd fic! This one goes in a different direction from what happens in episode four after Pythor betrays Lloyd.
It's a oneshot but omg I wish it had a second part (no pressure to the author if they end up reading this! Just expressing my feelings for this fic :D)
"Little Brother" by Nation_Ustria (Archive of Our Own):
Original summary:
"Finding out that the person you consider your little brother is also a (supposedly) terrible person that you've been taught to hate for years is a little bit hard to work through—especially when that person is in pain. Revealed Part 2 - Kai's POV"
So in my previous post I mentioned a tlnm fic titled "Revealed"-- this is basically the same story but from Kai's part of view! (That technically makes it a different story then, I guess.) I loved this one just as much as the first one!
There's still more but I'm too tired and busy to write about them rn-- but if anyone wants even more recommendations you can still ask me! It might take me a while to respond, though.
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moodymisty · 1 year ago
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Love your fics!!! You and imagine darksiders are my favorite writers😍
I have a small request for you. Could you write death/reader story where the reader is a beginner doctor and is trying to figure out the anatomy of a nephilim? Very curious human and a very grumpy death fluff! Thank youuu
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Author's Note: You mention little 'ol me alongside Imagine-darksiders? I'm going to sob; She was the reason I started trying to write for these silly little Nephilim after playing the games. I read CHWH so fast after completing ds2. Thank you for such kind words, and I hope you enjoy :3 Death is not a very good patient for examination, so you're mostly going by sight XD
Relationships: Death/Fem!Reader
Warnings: Some vague pining (mostly from Death lmao), Fluff, Medical references
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"Is curiosity to the point of annoyance common, for your kind?"
Death's words are slathered with sarcasm like grease over a freshly polished weapon, watching as you just shrug your shoulders at him.
"Depends on who you ask."
He doesn't respond; Though the cross of his arms and the fact that you feel like he's rolling his eyes at you gives enough away that he doesn't really need to. But it's not as if you can help being curious, leaning against the countertop that puts you opposite of Death. Nephilim are just so, different, that little passionate part of your brain finds itself itching for all the answers.
"I could always just ask Strife, if I'm bothering you."
You don't mean it sarcastically, shrugging your shoulders; If anything, the gunslinger would probably be quite eager to have a chat with you that didn't involve the elder Horseman looming over you like some sort of sentry.
The idea of you just ending this conversation going to Strife however seems to make him recoil, and bristle at the shoulders. You can't fathom why; If he's so irritated by you curiously prodding him like a bunch of med students around a donated cadaver, why is he so against you asking his more outgoing brother? You'd think he'd be eager to shove your eagerness in the direction of the most talkative Horsemen.
Well, if you aren't going to win either way, might as well get whatever you can out of him before he decides to finally brush you off.
"I just have to know; I noticed awhile back War has actual-" You bring your index fingers to your mouth, hooking them to form the pantomime of fangs. "Do all Nephilim have them?"
Death knows he should correct you to past tense, but he doesn't.
"Most, yes." You cock your head a bit into one shoulder and look up at him with an expression that erodes at him like waves hitting a cliff.
"Do you?" Death, watching your raised brows and expectant face, changes little from his cross armed stance.
"If you are asking me to remove the mask you should know well by now the answer is no." Death's hair, having actually been washed at some point in the past few weeks softly falls over his shoulders as he raises his head, pitch black strands brushing over his bare skin.
"Do you need to take it off to use your tongue?" Death takes one step to round the counter, and you quickly jump backwards with a nervous smile to maintain the same amount of distance.
"You are getting far too comfortable with that tone of yours." He points at you with a single finger before he gives up on the chance and returns to his previous position. Standing back upright, you smile at him and attempt to once again appease him away from reprimanding you any further.
"Ok, ok, one more question?"
Death, in all of his bite about your excessive comfort around him, doesn't refuse your request. He doesn't have to wait very long to hear it, thankfully.
"Can I see you hand?"
Death's eyebrows quirk behind his mask visible to you by the change his eye shape, but he doesn't retreat when you come closer. Gently you reach for the fingers of his right hand and he lets you grab them, pulling his hand upwards towards what is about your chest height.
You put your own hand against his palm, observing the sheer difference in size between the both of them. From this angle it's a bit hard for him to fully see, just barely catch glimpses of your skin pressing against his palm when he adjusts his hand.
"Wow, they're even bigger than Strife's..."
When did you hold his younger brother's hand?
He tries to ignore the unwelcome feeling bubbling up inside him with the feeling of your soft skin against his own, as your fingertips barely make it halfway up his own fingers. Your hand is so warm and gentle, as well as the fascinated smile on your face as you eagerly look at every possible angle. If it was this easy to entertain you, Death might not have been so apposed to it originally. The feeling of being the apple of your eye is nice, for a moment.
But he doesn't know how to respond- so he clams up, taking his hand away from yours and crossing both his arms back across his chest.
"Can you call your curiosity sated for now?"
Not really, but you don't think you're going to be able to get much more out of him for the time being. If anything you're counting your blessings you got this much out of him in the first place, considering how unreasonable Death is at times.
"Yeah, thanks for the help." He just makes a small hum in response.
"Don't make this a common occurrence; I won't be holding Despair still while you poke and prod at him as well."
Well animals aren't exactly your area of expertise, but that doesn't mean it wouldn't be interesting, to have a look... Death notices your visible perk in body posture and shakes his head. You can't help the curious part of your brain from working.
"Just keep your hands away from his mouth. I won't be returning your fingers."
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desceros · 8 months ago
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hello! so new writer here, I'm just starting out with writing x readers, but I'm having a bit of trouble. I saw in a previous post that when you are reading a fic marked x reader, you want it to actually be an x reader, and (as much as possible) not be an oc from the writer. And I agreed with that and want to try to make my reader self-insertable for everyone. the only problem is that I'm not sure how much I can have set opinions for them and have things up in the air. You've written a lot, so I was hoping you'd have some advice? If not that's totally fine. I appreciate you and your writing 🫶 hope you're having a good day!!
hmm well what i Specifically meant by that was when you have someone who has a fic that is written in the first person or third person with a named character who has a physical description, but they've tagged it as "reader-insert". to me, that's not a reader insert. that's an oc, and your fic is incorrectly tagged.
to me, a reader-insert fic is very specifically a fic in the second person without a name or physical description as much as possible. which isn't to say that oc fics are bad!! i write them myself in other fandoms. i just... don't really like reading oc fics for fandoms where my brain has decided This Is A Reader-Insert Fandom. Nod Nod.
so there is a delicate art to writing second-person fics with the intent of having it function as a reader-insert. the balance between giving enough flavor to have it be compelling vs so much that a reader can't comfortably put themselves in an insert-chan's shoes is actually a real passion of mine!! it's one that is kind of... something that you eventually get a Feel for after writing them for a while.
that said, here are some little tricks and whatnot so hopefully you can shortcut things a little. also, obvious warning since you're asking desceros dot com for writing advice, but this is a long post:
first, embrace the fact that you're going to exclude some people. no matter how bland and empty you make an insert-chan, you're going to exclude someone. and that's okay! if you try to cast Too wide a net, you're going to have a boring, bland insert-chan, and that's not going to make Anyone happy. still, there are a few things that i keep in mind since i want to appeal a broader audience: 1. try to be mindful of race coding, and avoid it. very specifically, describing hair (length, texture, care, etc.) and blushing or general discoloration of skin besides bruising are both something i avoid. i don't describe someone's night routine beyond, say, taking a shower, putting on lotion, and brushing teeth. this allows for black readers to more easily read your fics, which is something i'm particularly passionate about since i've had friends who feel excluded from the reader-insert community because they're black and that really makes me sad. 2. avoid describing favorite things, clothing, etc. little things that don't matter don't need to be described. does the reader need to know that your character is wearing a green sequin dress? or does it matter that they're wearing a pretty dress? 99 times out of 100, the latter suits the writing just fine and allows for a reader to picture what THEY think is a pretty dress. hell, unless i'm writing something that involves removing clothing, 9 times out of 10 i won't even mention what a reader is wearing, because it doesn't matter, and describing it gets in the way of someone's imagination. same thing with favorite foods, what someone is eating for breakfast. in symphony, viola-chan is famous for a baking cookies--but i don't specify what kind, and i won't. because my favorite cookie is different from someone else's, and the specifics don't matter. what matters is that they taste comforting, and everyone else likes them a lot, too. 3. avoid physical descriptions where possible. as i said before, i typically don't mention hair at all. instead of having someone run their hands through your hair, i have them stroke your nape. same basic touch, but one allows for short-haired readers or curly-haired readers to insert easily, one doesn't. i don't mention an insert-chan's size or height, other than a relative "you're shorter than donnie" or "leo's bicep is so much bigger than yours." i try to avoid weight-coding as much as possible so that fat readers can feel just as welcome as very skinny readers. that stuff just doesn't matter, and so cutting it out broadens how many people can read and feel represented.
4. keep unimportant details vague. for example, in a lot of my fics, the insert-chan has a family, but communication with them isn't mentioned. the status of the family or its makeup isn't important. a lot of writers will tell you to kill them off for convenience sake (which i do sometimes write inserts with dead families), but to me this is just lazy. you can have an insert-chan with a family. but instead of showing their relationship with the family, show how that relationship has shaped the insert-chan's personality. for example, in the latest fic i wrote, infinite singularity, the insert-chan's family is alive and well, but they're distant. not only does this mean, yay, i don't have to define what that family is--but it also allows me to show that piercing-chan avoids pain, emotional as well as physical. now i don't have to say you don't like pain. i can show it. and that always makes for more powerful writing.
so that's how you keep things broad. but there's a flip side to this, which is "how do i make an insert-chan compelling without any details?!" and the answer here is, well, add details!! which, hey, didn't we just say to eliminate details? to which i'd say, yes, Except for the Ones You Need.
1. give your insert-chan something they like to Do. whether this is a hobby or a career, this one has several functions in your story. one, it gives you something on which you can hinge characterization. for example, in my fic electromigration, that insert-chan likes camping. now i can have conversations about it, have an excuse for you to know how to do things camping-related, etc. it propels the plot forward. and two, it gives your insert-chan something interesting, which is the secret to a good character. you don't want to go too overboard on this, since again we don't want to overload the insert-chan with things that aren't helpful, but one, maybe two hobbies, or a job, makes them rounder and makes the fic more enjoyable to read.
2. give your insert-chan a personality dot dot dot carefully. now this one sounds weird. "don't i want to have a blank canvas onto which people can put themselves?" well, kind of, but really, no. that's how you get a bland character that's so boring no one wants to read your fics. and it doesn't even have to be a mild personality! in my fic goldilocks, that insert-chan has a Very strong personaity, such that i've even gotten requests for a chef-chan/reader fic. but because i've stripped away all of the other identifying things, it can still read as an insert-character without being an oc. that said, this is a tricky one. the more personality you give, the more people you alienate. but also, the less personality you give, the less interesting the fic. it's a delicate balance, and one you'll figure out eventually as you write more and read more.
3. give your insert-chan a story. this one is one that is more relevant for longer fics, but is still helpful to keep in mind for shorter fics. what i mean is, okay. you're writing a reader-insert. but for a moment, treat it like an oc. where did they come from? how did they get to new york? what personality arc do you want them to have over your plot? are they going to change, and if so, how? for this, let's look at my fic amaranthine. the history is vague enough that it doesn't impede a reader's imagination, but there are enough details that you Feel like there is a story that was happening before, and you've dropped in at this point to ride along with these people before you leave them to go on their way again. things like being best friends with raph after he found you drunkenly crying on the sidewalk. things like leo having known you and donnie were gonna be a mess when you got together. things like splinter always loving to drink tea with you. these are small details that make the world feel rich, but not so much that it's impossible for a reader to build their own narrative around it.
anyway, these are just some broad tips, and i hope you found them useful!! my main, tldr thing i'd say is just to write. it's going to take practice. writing in general is hard, writing something new is Really hard, writing something new and being picky about how you want it to come out is REALLY REALLY hard. so be kind to yourself, and remember that this is supposed to be fun. don't fret, don't get stressed, just take it cool. maybe write a few that you don't publish, just so you can get the voice under your fingers and take some of the pressure of Oh God People Are Going To Read This off your shoulders. i always do that when i enter a new fandom, and it's soooo helpful.
good luck, and let me know if you have any specific questions! :D
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