#but anything that requires the slightest bit more and its just. i got fucking nothing

[toytulini]

wish my fucking brain worked

[yinses]

college au! headcanons

gojo satoru, geto suguru & nanami kento

rqst: college au for nanami, geto and gojo?

a/n: so i divided it into three categories to help keep my head straight. honestly almost straight kicked gojo out of college bc i couldn’t decide on a major for him. the jjk discord server is heaven sent for my sanity. ty everyone again 🌺

last time i should have to post these. hoping everything is fine now. 

gojo satoru

MAJOR

—he starts off undecided for a long time. the fact that he’s on scholarship allows him to be more flexible with his classes given that he’s not responsible for costs. he grew up with expectations from his family but university is suppose to be his opportunity to spread his own wings and grow from his experiences.

—so he tries a bit of everything- sciences, music and social studies- anything to prompt a spark. (took a business class once and made a point to sit next to nanami everyday just to annoy him) by his second year he’s getting as frustrated as his counselor because if he doesn’t decide soon he’ll be a potential 5th year senior.

—he’s overthinking it but gojo wants to invest in what he believes will make the most significant impact to his ability. his counselor takes those crumbs and runs with it.

—he gets steered towards political science and actually excels at it (that advisor gets a raise). surprises most of the class with his analytical skills because they thought he was just a pretty boy- surprise he’s beautiful and smart.

—develops a vested interest in governmental policies. might run for president one day idk. brings donuts to his early am class. doesn’t share.

SOCIAL

—he’s not the jock per say, but as the star athlete of the basketball team, the school likes to take advantage of his image to draw in sponsors.

—his face is plastered all over the auditorium whether they’re in season or not. sometimes it’s not even to promote basketball, gojo is pretty and they’re not afraid to use it. which also makes him one of the most recognizable faces on campus.

—due to his student athlete contract, he’s not allowed to sign autographs freely in the event they’re attempted to be sold as quick cash. but yikes, he can barely walk to class without someone stopping him for a picture. to the best of his ability he tries to laugh it off, poster boy image and all, but it gets pretty fucking old and annoying quickly. especially when it makes him late for his next lesson and the instructor shows no sympathy.

—his height didn’t only help him get into basketball, but its also convenient when it comes to shouldering politely through the student masses. his golden rule is don’t make eye contact. the busier the crowds the easier it is for him to pretend like he could’t possibly have heard them.

—gojo doesnt scout fraternities, fraternities scout him. but he’s not interested in the slightest. as an athlete he already gets into any social circle he wants without the additional effort. that and he doesnt think he could tolerate an alpha male trying to exert his dominance without barking back.

—loves to show up to parties but always arrives late enough to the point where they don’t think he’s coming. it helps him slip in when he wants too. he’s a connoisseur of all alcohol varieties and a master of beer bong. he’s not necessarily the life of the party but his presence is kind of hard to miss.

RELATIONSHIPS

—he gets too much attention to date casually. most potential suitors are in it more for the benefits they receive than him anyway. he’s got enough on his plate with career indecisiveness and games to try to pursue anything serious before third year.

—he’s not completely celibate though. he tries to keep the same partners as long as he can. not only to keep himself clean and safe but because he often goes into an agreement to keep it casual. sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. either way he gets coined as a ‘heartbreaker’ before the end of his freshman year. frankly the rumors obscure most of the truth and give him more freedom. people always expect that he’s with someone even when he’s not, which helps keep his invasive teammates off his back.

—gojo can easily graduate without securing something tangible but there is still a window for potential.

—you’re both his consistent classmate and occasional friends with benefits. its the former title that keeps bringing him back around. he cant exactly avoid you without subjecting himself to 8am classes. it helps that the sex is good too.

—he can text you an offer to study together for the next test and roll over after an hour and wreck you for the rest of the week. its hard to tell who gets addicted first but he does appreciate the way your skin looks when youre wearing his marks.

geto suguru

MAJOR

—he’s a STEM kid, particularly interested in bio-genetics to improve overall health. he believes that simply becoming a physician just keeps the issue at bay and his goal is to eradicate the problem at its source.

—since high school he’s been cataloging different programs across the country before deciding what he wanted and putting all his efforts into it. so it’s no surprise when he gets in.

—geto doesn’t need counselors but they’re required so he listens to them prattle on about using university as an opportunity to explore. this man came in with more college credits than most sophomores, he knows what he wants.

—always on-time to class and never misses an assignment. also that kid who goes above and beyond, even on the simple stuff. he rarely gets teased about it, not even behind his back. geto straight up scares some people even when he’s smiling.

—not afraid to correct teachers when they’re wrong. in fact he lives for it.

—he’s the one who graduated early and starts his master’s program before most of his age group declare their own majors.

SOCIAL

—he tends to frequent the same circles- handpicking his acquaintances out of class rosters, clubs and honor lists. he’s less in it for the friendship and more so to scout for potential research partners.

—met gojo in one of his science electives and literally carried him through the class. they somehow end up friends but only really hang out at each other’s places- bunch of chill movie nights and pizza.

—there is no interest in fraternities, but he does join university funded clubs that allow him to further his research. they give him unique access to labs, take him on trips to different conventions and have an alumni list a kilometer long for future collaborations.

—the man does not party but he will occasionally slip into quieter bars to ease some of his frustrations. he actually enjoys karaoke thursdays , not to sing for himself but the drunken antics of others bring him some amusement.

—smokes weed occasionally, but only his own product. it helps him relaxand fan out the stress. he never sells it but sometimes gojo nicks some of his stash. given that he gets drug tested often, geto doesn’t know how the athlete never gets caught.

RELATIONSHIPS

—not interested in seeking out relationships in the slightest. the man has a plan and he’s already married to it.

—he’s not completely immune to sexual advances though and occasionally splurges but none of the friends with benefits crap. he’ll hit it once and stay celibate for the rest of the year easily.

—you might be able to squeeze in as his fellow lab partner. remain invested in the work and not him and he’ll start noticing the little details of your company- the way you subtle perfume lingers on his lab coat hours after you’ve adorned for the day, how he knows you have to keep your hair up for safety precautions but he thinks about running his fingers through it daily and your mind, damn, he wonders what else you can come up with when he has you laid out on his sheets.

—if he’s interested, geto won’t hesitate to broach the topic. he’ll ask you out for coffee and when you try to bring up research he’ll be upfront about his attraction. ultimately if you start dating the two of you are an absolute unit- not that you weren’t before.

—you’re the one variable he didn’t plan for but he’s glad to have added you to the equation.

nanami kento

MAJOR

—he was made for the business world, brought by a CEO who raised him to inherit the company. administration major marketing minor.

—takes initiative in all his classes and is often coined as group leader for projects. mostly keeps to himself  and only speaks up when prompted or disagrees with something.

—he takes the earliest sessions possible because it means less people more often than not. doesn’t really care if its in the front, middle or back but always sits near the edge.

—doesn’t really want to but it looks good on his resume so he joins the marketing team where they present mock business plans for competitions. they win a lot. nanami honestly doesn’t care. but again it looks good.

—it only took him a brief summer internship to learn that he found nothing satisfying about board meetings and macro management.

—he decides to invest in law school to handle the company from a legal standpoint instead.

SOCIAL

— sort of like geto, only wants to make friends on a need be basis.

—he would rather keep to himself but knows the benefits of socializing so he interacts with his frequent classmates when he can- through study groups or car pooling to seminars.

—he does join a fraternity, its the same one his father did (and uncles, cousins, whatnot. its a generational thing). its geared towards bettering future leaders. they focus building resumes, charity events and run the organization like a proper business. nanami gets elected president by his third year and runs two terms.

—the only parties he attends are networking events- full of wine and fancy horderves. wine is plentiful but he’s always nursing a scotch on top of his headache. if one more person squeezes their stocks into a conversation he’s going to personally take down the whole market

—zero interest in college party life. spends some of his downtime at the campus theater watching old time movies and classic plays.

—he’s the coffee shop hoe. he wakes up early sometimes just to sit by the window and read some casual literature. has his own thermo that gives him free refills to cart to class. do not talk to this man before he’s had his caffeine.

RELATIONSHIP

—he probably has a high school sweetheart that he’s still clinging too, whether on the same campus or long distance. it helps him because he can’t really see himself pursuing a relationship while focusing on school.

—he’s been with you long enough that you understand his ambitions and won’t feel bested by them. the two of you have a system- starting the day off with sweet ‘good morning’ texts before class and ending the day with long conversations as you digest the last 12 hours.

—nanami is independent but he is thankful to have you to rely on when classes start to overwhelm him. the two of try to escape briefly for the weekend when you can. often going to near by reservations just to get off campus

—other times the two of you will cuddle close on your dorm bed, his long fingers combing through your hair while he reads over some notes for class.

—sometimes you have to be the one to tell him to take a break and to enjoy life while he can. even if that means dragging him the events and concerts hosted on campus. he resists at first but you can see the tension ebbing away as the night comes to a close.

—the two of you start living together in your senior year just because you can. he insists on buying a house. not only because he can afford it because it can be rented out after graduation. always the business man.

[gotnofucks]

Prometheus

Pairing: August Walker x Reader

Summary: You disappoint August and must make up for it.

Words: 2.3k

Warnings: Smut, dom/sub themes, language, 18+ ONLY

A/N: This is my entry for the Happy Hoelidays Challenge by @donutloverxo @stargazingfangirl18 and @navybrat817 . You guys are all fucking amazing and I adore you! I chose the prompt “Kissing under the mistletoe” but with a twist. And honestly, this whole fic is a mess. But I hope you’ll find something worthwhile here.

Masterlist

Our love story will not be found in romance books. People like him and I, we don’t exist in rose tinted pages with flowery scents. We are found within the darker pages of horror books, where our love is written with blood and pain, where it’s ghastly stunning in its dangerous beauty. But I promise you, it’s no less beautiful than the walks in a meadow or cuddles in the bed.

We bleed and cry, from eyes and heart. We drown each other deep and deeper still, only to pull back above the surface as we’re about to die. That gulp of air, that’s sweeter than any other, if simply because it’s the one that has us clinging to life.

I like to think that I am Prometheus, and he is my Eagle, sent by the gods to devour me day after day, letting me writhe under him. It’s pain beyond anything, but what most don’t understand is that I need that pain to feel alive. But what if one day Prometheus was left hanging alone, liver intact and no eagle to eat him out?

That would be torture.

I am being tortured.

The whip in his hand cracked on skin and I choked on a sob. The sharp swish of the whip parted the air again and crashed on the skin with precise intervals, creating a crisscross of welts like a painter does his design. The blue in his eyes was clouded by the deep, boiling waves of anger and disappointment.

I could take his anger, but never his disappointment.

His anger meant punishment, it meant retribution. His disappointment meant distance, it meant betrayal. And here I was, Prometheus who disappointed his eagle and now watched that beak bite on someone else’s liver.

She took his hits gracefully, only small whimpers escaping her as his whip landed on her bottom. They left marks on her skin, but they seared my heart. People say nothing hurts more than being punished this brutally. They know nothing. Nothing of the pain of watching someone else take your pain, your punishment. People don’t know the torture of being tied down and being made to watch your master pour his anger into someone else.

I closed my eyes at the scene, incapable of watching more. It was more than my heart could take. I had promised to take his love and his hate, his sweetness and his poison. And to have someone else cry under him, wear marks on her body that should have decorated me left me more broken than any of his toys would have done.

“Please sir” I begged, “No more.”

His eyes were on me the entire time, even as he had someone else at his mercy. He cocked his head to the side, looking at me naked and tied up, balancing on my knees. He came closer and lifted his booted leg to part my thighs with it, an unreadable look in his eyes.

“Melly, leave.” He ordered the other girl. She swiftly got up and left without a word, just happy to be of service when required. I raised my eyes to his, pleading, begging. His large hand traced the curve of my cheek before dropping to the collar on my neck, playing with the charm that dangled on the front.

AW’s Princess

“I should take this away” August said, and I jerked as if I had been electrocuted. I shook my head, hair falling away from the elastic that secured them. He couldn’t take away my collar. No, he simply couldn’t.

“Please, no sir. I am sorry.” I sobbed.

To me, this collar was a symbol of ownership. Of being claimed by August Walker, being his. I would never trade this for a wedding ring, for this was more sacred to me. It sat on my neck, over my pulse, beating with the blood that pumped under it and reminded me that every breath I take belongs to him. That I chose to surrender my life living at his feet.

“What are you sorry about, Princess?” He asked me. Before I could answer, he was walking away to pull from his drawer a bowl and his trusted vibrator, and the sight of it made my thighs tremble.

“I am sorry for lying to you sir.” I replied. He hummed, coming to kneel before me, placing the bowl between my parted thighs and opening me wide with two fingers. I gasped, mouth parted as he touched me most intimately, his fingers that easily pulled the trigger of a gun running gently along my spongy walls to create an explosion no less than a gun shot.

He followed every pant that fell from my mouth, observed every twitch that showed on my face and drank in the fluttering of my lashes. Whenever I would turn my face he would tut, forcing me to look at him.

“How did it feel when I hit Melly instead of you?” He asked me, and slowly started to insert the vibrator inside me. I sucked in a breath, wincing at the stretch before answering.

“It hurt sir, it hurt so much.” I whimpered, tears shining in my eyes before dropping to my cheeks.

August leans back once the vibrator is completely in me, my juices dripping out from around it. Cupping my face gently, he brushed a soft kiss on my forehead, like the brush of angel wings and the slightest nip of Death’s scythe at once.

“You hurt me too.” He whispered. The darkness in his eyes had me shivering, both from fear and arousal. Being with August felt like standing on a cliff, every moment terrified that a strong gust of wind would have me pummeling to the ground. But when one wants to fly, even falling becomes a kink. How long does the fall last, and when you do hit the ground, how good does it hurt?

It hurts like heaven.

“You will fill this bowl with your cream” He ordered, “You will drip into it, and as you do, you’ll tell me where you went wrong. Apologize to me like you mean it, give me a reason to have you at my feet.”

He started unbuttoning himself and with every new inch of him revealed to my hungry eyes, I dripped. I clenched around the vibrating toy inside me, moaning softly. This is how completely he owned me. The eagle was going away, and it was up to Prometheus to seduce him to come back, to convince him to eat that liver one more time, that the taste it worth it.

“I am sorry sir, I lied to you. I didn’t tell you where I was going.” I started. He continued undressing, languidly tossing aside his clothes to unveil the scarred flesh underneath. I could tell every battle he’d ever fought by tracing the hardened marks over his body. Sometimes when he would let me, I’d trace the scars of his heart too, feeling the hurt and loss that lingered in their ridges.

“Where did you tell me you were going, Princess?” He asked me, sitting naked in front of me on a chair. Easy, confident.

“To the movies with my friends.” I lowered my eyes, ashamed of myself for lying to a man who can see through anyone and anything.

“And where did you actually go?”

I bit my lip, knowing I had disappointed him. He required nothing from me but trust and honesty.

“To see my family.” I whispered.

He shook his head, a sneer curling under his mustache. His gaze bore into me with a force that had me gushing in the bowl and he scoffed. The control he had on my body without even touching it was almost embarrassing. He got up to stand in front of me, his hard length so near to my face if I poke my tongue out, I’d be able to lick him.

“Your family” He spat the word like it was poison. “Why don’t I like it when you go meet with them Princess?”

“Because only you’re allowed to hurt me sir.” I answered.

August was not a nice man, he was not someone you mess with. He got off on pain and terror, on instigating fear in those around him. But when it came to me, only he is allowed to hurt me. He will whip me and spank me, tie me and choke me, but woe betide anyone who so much as hurt a hair on my head. Which is why I didn’t tell him I was meeting my family.

Every meeting with them came out the same way. Me in tears after a shouting match. For someone who had never managed to quite fit in anywhere, my only solace was August’s arms. And those arms would pound anyone to pulp if I cried tears that were put in my eyes by anyone but him. Fucked up? Maybe.

“Why did you go?” He asked, brushing the tip of his cock on my face, smearing his cum and marking me. The natural musk of him filled my nose and I leaned forward to have a taste when he moved away, wagging a finger in warning.

“It was Christmas.” I pathetically said.

August smirks, his eyes falling on the bowl between my legs that had collected my slick. He exhaled, kneeling before me and pulling out the vibrator with a pop, instead replacing it with his fingers that had me struggling in my restraints.

“And you thought I wouldn’t celebrate Christmas with you?” He asked me and flicked his fingers on my hardened nub that had me cumming into the bowl. His name was like a chant on my lips and I begged him to set me free, to hold me again.

He took away the bowl and put it on the bedside table, coming back to finally release me from the ropes that bound me. Carefully picking me, he dropped me on the bed and smirked nastily.

“I even got us mistletoe. I was going to hang it on the door and surprise you with it, but since you’ve chosen to be a bitch today, I’ve found another place for it.” Saying this he pulled out a bundle of mistletoe and held it over his cock, looking expectantly at me.

“W-what?” I sputtered.

“You’re supposed to kiss it sweetheart” He mocked and came closer, slapping me across the face with his dick. I blinked at him before licking my lips and taking him in my mouth. His familiar taste and thickness made me feel at home, and I sucked and slurped, trying to show him how sorry I truly was.

His hand tangled in my hair and pulled me along, bobbing me up and down his length, one hand still dangling the mistletoe over my head. I relaxed my body, letting him guide me as he wanted. My love was my apology, and this was my repentance.

“I had planned a fun night with you” He snarked, sitting deep inside my throat, “I got you a fucking tree and presents. Thought we’d watch a movie. But all that romantic bullshit doesn’t work for us, does it?”

His pace increased as did my moans. I held onto his thick thighs that had more than once choked me. He may have all the power over me, but I reveled in that just the same.

“We don’t make love beside the fireplace darling, we burn ourselves in the fireplace, surrounded by the flames of passion and lust that run in you and me.”

His words heated me up and I doubled my efforts, taking him deeper and looking into his eyes, letting him speak to my soul as he owned my body. He tensed and twitched, warmth pooling in my mouth and down my throat and I smiled when he pulled away. My jaw ached a little, but pain was an old friend.

“That was quite a kiss” I said, and he chuckled, pushing me down to lie on my back.

“It’s not over by a long shot.” He said and taking the bowl with my cum he dripped my essence over my bare chest and belly. My skin broke out into gooseflesh as the cold liquid hit me but just as soon it was followed by the warmth of his tongue, sucking me, tasting me.

This is what being worshiped felt like. In chains and in pain, and yet the object of desire and love. When one slap meets your cheek, the following caress feels just that much softer.

August rolled on his back, smearing the rest of my cum over his own chest. I leaned over him, tongue gliding through his hair and veins, dipping into deep scars and damaged tissues. His voice rose in a crescendo, cock hardening again and as I licked, I climbed over him, aligning myself and bringing him home with one thrust.

“Fuck” He whispered, mouth meeting mine in a kiss, sinful and dirty. He kissed me like the Angel of Death serving me the elixir of life. I bounced on him, rode him like he was the stairwell that would take me to heaven. His smell, his taste, the feeling of his rippling flesh and the dominance in his eyes set fire to my veins. I clamped hard on him, sliding my damp body over his as I crashed and fell apart.

His hips kept pushing up, going hard enough as if trying to come out of the other end. Nails dug into the flesh of my thighs as he kept me steady over him, pumping into me until I felt him release inside. We fell into a tangle of limbs, a sheet lazily pulled over my bruised body. That was the thing with August, when he hurt me it left a mark on the outside, but never inside.

“I love you” He softly panted in the crook of my neck. I turned over and clung to him, pulling him close in my embrace. Prometheus needed his Eagle to feel alive, and the Eagle needed Prometheus to sustain. Neither is complete without the other.

“I love you too”

 Permanent Tags: @what-is-your-wish​ @shooting-star-love​ @stanmysoul​ @sweeterthanthis​ @muralskins​ @rayofdawnworld​ @just-one-ordinary-fangirl​ @donutloverxo​ @angrythingstarlight​ @rockyrogers​ @slothspaghettiwrites​ @nerdygirl8203​ @firebolt99 

Henry : @agniavateira​

[llemonteaa]

Your daily dose of angst

No one deserves to be second best. That’s something you learnt the hard way.

Pairings: Oikawa x f!reader & Iwaizumi x f!reader 

WC: 1,769

Warnings: swearing, angst (with a little dose of fluff at the end :)  

You always wondered, even to this day, why Oikawa had chosen you in the first place. When asked what his ideal type was, Oikawa would laugh and say, “Someone who makes me look greater than I already am of course,” Cue Iwaizumi smacking him in the head.

“Mean Iwa-Chan! Fine, my ideal type would preferably be someone with fair hair, an adorable smile and a lovely ass to rest my head on. Oh, and she must also love milkbread.”

None of those boxes would be ticked for you unfortunately. Your hair was jet black and curtained part of your face, which only added to your supposedly mean aura. Your resting face was somewhat frightening and your smile could be described as Kageyama’s Cheshire Cat grin. Not to mention your ass was almost as non existent as Oikawa’s (oops), and you much preferred pork buns to milkbread. 

Yet despite that, Oikawa had asked you out one humid Friday afternoon, exactly 7 months ago today. But you realised, maybe a bit too late, that a lot can happen in 7 months.

Oikawa of course, was infamous for having fangirls practically glued to his hip wherever he went. And dating you didn’t change that in the slightest. In fact, his fangirls, especially one in particular, seemed to go up and above their way to spend time with your boyfriend, even when you were inevitably stood by his side. 

“As I was saying-” you began.

“Oikawa! I was just hoping to bump into you!” someone swatted you aside, your vision now platinum curls.

Reni. She practically threw herself onto Oikawa, bending over slightly so that he’s have a clear view of the lace panties underneath her unbelieveably short skirt. 

“Oh hey Reni. What’s up?” Your boyfriend turned to face who you called his number one, entirely devoted, fangirl.

“So, about our History project, would it be too much trouble to ask for some help? I’ve been racking my brains trying to figure it all out, even sacrificing much required beauty sleep, but I’m still yet to make any progress. And seeing how you are quite the History whizz...”

“Of course Reni, you’re the first person who’s complimented me on my brains. When would you like to meet up?” It was almost a joke how YOUR boyfriend seemed to be spending more time with a girl who had nothing but the audacity, than his s/o herself. And History whizz your ass, everyone including Iwaizumi, who had overheard that particular part of the conversation as he passed and scoffed, knew that it would be a miracle if the teacher graded him on History at all. 

“If you could, now would be a great time.” Reni fluttered her eyelashes which reminded you of rather hairy caterpillars. 

“Well I’m not doing anything as of now, apart from talking to y/n, but I’m sure she wouldn’t mind. Right y/n?” Both pairs of eyes seemed to acknowledge you for the first time. You, the girlfriend, but at the same time you the thirdwheel, apparently. 

“Well in fact I do mind but...” you hadn’t even managed to get out before Reni used her large boobs to push you out of the way.

“You see Oikawa, y/n doesn’t mind at all. So come on now, my books are in my dorm.” 

And with that, she grabbed your boyfriend’s arm and dragged him down the hall in the direction of the girl’s dorms, Oikawa throwing a sheepish glance over his shoulder.

“We’ll resume our conversation in a bit y/n~” 

Yeah right. You’d probably forget what you were even talking to him about by the time he came back from the spawn of Satan’s hellhole. 

In the weeks that followed, you found every minute of your time alone with Oikawa accompanied by Reni. No matter where or what you were doing with your boyfriend, she always seemed to find an excuse to but it. And Oikawa was nevertheless, just as oblivious to Reni’s attempts to jump in his pants as he was to your blatant annoyance.

“But y/n you have to understand. Reni hurt her ankle yesterday during her cheerleading practise and being the kind friend I am, I had to help her make her way around school.” Your boyfriend attempted to reason with you, after you had pulled him behind the school gym where he was moments from entering. This was partially because you had desperately needed to confront him about how much time he seemed to be unnecessarily spending with Reni and also in an attempt to prevent the devil herself from seeking you guys, Oikawa specifically, out.

“No, I don’t have to understand. Reni dropped the sprained ankle act the moment she thought my back was turned. God you can be so blind sometimes.” You rubbed your eyes tiredly.

“y/n, now you’re just being unreasonable. You know I only ever spend time with Reni when she’s in need of my help. I’m simply doing what any decent friend would do.”

“Except she needs your help all the goddamn time. You could ask anyone, anyone, and they’ll tell you how Reni’s been crushing on you since way before we got together.”

“Yes, I know that, but she’s stopped liking me since I asked you out. y/n what’s so hard for you to understand?”

“Everything Oikawa, everything is so hard to understand. And yet I think you’re the one who doesn’t understand the most. Reni doesn’t ever need your help, she just wants it. And she wants it to the point where she’s willing to make up any crappy excuse to get alone with you. I’m starting to think you guys are the ones dating and I’m just the ‘friend’.”

“y/n you know that’s not true...”

“Do I know that? Do I? Because if I did, then I wouldn’t constantly need to be fighting for your attention knowing it’s always going to be a losing battle. Your there for Reni more than you’re there for me, and we’re the ones in a relationship. I’m not stopping you from seeing Reni because that would just be wrong on my behalf, but at least put some effort in Oikawa.”

“Put some effort in? Oh you must be fucking kidding me. You should be grateful I even asked you out in the first place instead of telling me to put some effort in. The difference between you and Reni is that she’s not a jealous and clingy bitch who can’t even handle her own partner from seeing his friends without kicking up a fight. I could easily dump you anyday y/n and yet I haven’t, so how about you put some effort in and stop being so fucking controlling.”

It seemed as if everything came to a standstill the moment those venomous words left his mouth. It made your eyes water and your heart clench, every syllable of ‘jealous’, every syllable of  ‘controlling’, stabbed your heart to the point you wondered if you’d ever be able to piece it back together. 

Yet through the darkness a tiny flicker of light fought its way through. And that tiny flicker of light is what reminded you that not a single bit of this stupid argument was your fault. Blinking a few times, you forced yourself to bite back your tears that threatened to tumble, before clenching your fists to the point your knuckles turned white, and glowered up at your soon to be ex boyfriend. 

“I lowered my fucking standards for you Tooru. Lowered my fucking standards to be with someone who only sees me as second best. Who’d rather let some  bitch with a skirt shorter than your hindsight to drag you around like a doll with no brains. All this time I could’ve been with someone who wouldn’t let their ‘friend’ control every minute of their life and completely disregard the fact that they were taken. Well lucky for you Tooru, Reni’s all yours now. She’s won, that bitch with the cockroach eyelashes has won. So now you can get the fuck out of my way because we’re over.” 

And with that you shoved your way past your ex, stuffing your hands into the pockets of your blazer, your hair framing your face now slick with fresh tears. 

It was his loss after all. His loss that he wasn’t able to decipher friendliness from flirtiness. Or maybe he didn’t want to. Maybe Oikawa knew ignoring his relationship status to spend time with someone who was quite blatantly ready to jump into his pants at any given opportunity was wrong. Maybe Oikawa knew he’d have you forever, he’d have you to come back to when everyone else left him for the same reason his last girlfriend did. Except this time he was wrong. He didn’t have you forever. And it was all his fault. 

Deep down he knew you had every right to shove past him, he knew you had every right to be furious with him, yet admitting that would’ve been the last thing he’d do. So instead Oikawa just scoffed before heading in the opposite direction that you had disappeared in, and into the gym. Completely oblivious to the fact that his best friend had just heard the entire event go down. 

2 months later

You giggled as you let your boyfriend Iwaizumi drag you along the school halls. Similar to how you used to watch her do to him. Except in this point in time, you could honestly care less about_ them._ Now you had found yourself a perfect boyfriend who saw you as nothing but the best. He’d see through any girl’s lame attempts to buy themselves alone time with him and would certainly cherish every moment spent together. Hajime knew just how easy it was to let someone slip through your fingers when you took advantage of them just being there, after seeing the exact situation enravel in front of his best friend only a couple months ago. 

“Babe are you even listening to me?” 

God was her voice annoying. 

“Babe.”

Oikawa sighed before finally glancing down at the girl who spent every second possible hanging off him like the school tie he wore. 

“Hm Reni.” He zoned out the moment she began rambling on about God knows what. Probably something to do with how he seemed to have gained more fangirls or whatever. But he didn’t care. The only thing he cared about was you. You, who was currently skipping along with his best friend, happier than you’d ever been with him. You who was never like this. Never like Reni who was jealous, clingy and so fucking controlling. 

Oh.

a/n: We all know that both Oikawa and Iwaizumi would be the best boyfriends ever despite Oikawa being a piece of shit in this.😌 

[showrunnerihardlyknowher]

You know how we have pet costumes? Give Jacob one, make him a cute space cowboy😈😈😈

WE'RE BACK BABY

Please enjoy this little ficlet (that was actually my 3rd attempt to write a fluffy ficlet for this universe because all the other ones kept becoming future chapters lmao)

--

“This is humiliating. I look like sheriff Woody or something.”

“Aw, I was thinking more like John Wayne Gacy, you know?”

“The...the clown serial killer…?”

Angie pursed her lips. “Wait, who was the cowboy guy in all the old movies? Like, before Clint Eastwood and whatever.”

“That’s John Wayne. Not John Wayne Gacy,” Jacob tugged at the sleeves of his costume and readjusted his cowhide vest. “And I don’t feel anywhere near as cool as him right now.”

She rolled her eyes and crinkled her nose. “That’s because you’re not cool. You’re a grown man playing dress up with a kindergartener.”

“So are you.”

Angie straightened her Native American headpiece and threw one of her braided pigtails behind her. “Yeah, but I know it’s stupid, so therefore I’m doing it ironically which makes me cool.”

Jacob sighed heavily but didn’t argue further, instead tugging his cowboy hat down further to shield his face that burned with embarrassment. Being forced into having playdates with his captor’s coworker was nothing new. He had spent plenty of time being Mibao’s sole playmate aboard the ship, doing the best he could to keep the six year girl entertained and not too psychologically damaged. Being the youngest in a sibling group of only boys, he was a bit rusty when it came to knowing anything about kids. Thankfully, Mibao was more than happy to take him by the hand and show up all the “fun” things she used to either do back home or what she would now do with her “kitty”.

Today’s game of choice was dress up. Every day felt like dress up when it came to the girl’s ever expanding wardrobe; she was always dressed in an obnoxiously puffy and sparkling princess dress fashioned with ribbons and bows galore and always with a matching crown. Fine, no big deal, he could slap a tiara on his head and call it a day, he’d worn worse at the few fraternity parties he attended during college. Nope, not good enough. Mibao had a very specific game she wanted to play which involved him wearing a cowboy costume of all things. A very realistic and detailed cowboy costume, assless chaps and spurs and all. Again, he could...handle it for the most part. The only thing that really bothered him about it was all the coos and giggles he received from both his and Mibao’s captors when he finally came out in his new outfit.

And he knew for a fact they took many, many pictures of him.

It didn’t end there, Mibao still had more requests. Angie needed to join in as well and she was required to be an “indian princess” to partake. Naturally, she was more than happy to agree if it meant getting a break from the absolute nightmare of a captor she had been saddled with. So, now Jacob had to deal with the fact that she would have to watch him play pretend in this ridiculous getup. He could never catch a break with her, it seemed, she always had to catch him when he was in the middle of doing something cringe worthy. She didn’t even look half as uncomfortable as him and she was literally wearing half as much clothing.

Or maybe that was exactly why she was so comfortable as she sauntered up to him, making a finger pistol to tip his hat away from his face. “Cheer up, partner,” she teased. “I think it makes you look cute.”

“I think it makes me look like Owen Wilson from the museum movie,” Jacob replied, hoping the shadow of the brim hid his reddening cheeks.

“Oh my God, you are a tiny little twink cowboy, huh?”

“I’d rather be the gladiator guy.”

“You wish you could pull off being the gladiator guy.”

A rebuttal was on the tip of his tongue when Mibao made her appearance from behind the monitor where she had been changing. This time instead of her usual princess attire, she was dressed...pretty much the same, only this time she had a tiny pair or iridescent fairy wings attached to the back. What a fairy had to do with cowboys and indians, he hadn’t the faintest idea. She stopped when she saw the two of them and stuck out her tongue in childish disgust.

“Eww, stop kissing!” She scolded. “You can kiss the princess later, Jake, it’s time to play!”

Jacob had never been more grateful in his life that the creatures idly watching them couldn’t understand English because he just might have died if they heard. He could feel the heat radiating from his nape to his cheeks, putting his hands up in defense like it could keep Angie away from him.

“Wh-no! We weren’t, we weren’t kissing, Reagan, w-we-!”

Angie only cackled, her amusement stemming more from Jacob’s panicked response than the actual accusation of giving him a kiss. “Yeah, cowboy, you can kiss me later.” She winked and nudged him with her elbow as she walked past to where Mibao was waiting.

He groaned, tugging the hat down as far as it would go even if that meant obscuring his vision somewhat. That was totally fine, he didn’t want to look at anyone right now and he did not want to be perceived either. The child was leading them back over to her designated play area scattered with art supplies and stuffed toys for where they’ll play their game of make believe. Angie was already sitting on her knees by the time he shuffled over and beckoned him with a sly smile to come take a seat on the ground next to her. Jacob obliged, but refused to give her the satisfaction of seeing his beet red face.

As soon as they were settled, Mibao immediately launched into the exposition of the scene they would be putting on, including their roles and superpowers (that only she had because she was a magical fairy queen). Jacob was only half listening; the kid usually forgot half of her own rules in the middle of playing anyways because she wanted to change the story and it wasn’t that hard to follow her game of make believe. Instead, he kept side-eying Angie, who was side-eying him back, and every time they made eye contact she would smile and bump his shoulder with hers.

This was going to be a long playdate.

--

The lab door slid open as Talan walked in, peeling off his bloodied gloves to dispose of them in Ylva’s waste bin. “I need my human back.”

“Aw, why? They’re all having a ball together!” Ylva frowned, gesturing to the miniature trio on her desk. Well, the smallest one and Talan’s pet seemed like they were having a good time, namely at the expense of the other human in a hat. They all seemed to stop at the interruption, his human fixing him with a sneer that he was tempted to match.

“What the fuck is it wearing?” He asked, ignoring all the little protests he got when he grabbed it and plucked the stupid looking feather thing of its head. “I thought you said it’s not nice to torment the humans.”

Edix scoffed at him, though his annoyance was more from Talan being in his general vicinity than anything. “It’s not torment. They were having fun.”

Talan did not look convinced in the slightest, his eyes sweeping over the pup who was pouting at him for taking away its playmate and the other who froze any time he breathed in its direction. Like owner, like pet, he assumed as it seemed to unconsciously inch closer to where Edix’s hand was resting for a better sense of security. Pathetic. At least his pet had a bit more self respect and wasn’t afraid to try and stab him in the hand with his own tools. Of course, it got a sharp flick to the stomach to knock it off, but he could appreciate the gumption.

Talan rolled his eyes. “Yeah, looks like a real party. So sad to have missed it.”

“Like you’ve ever been to a party to know what it looks like.”

“Says the one that only hangs out with plants.”

“Okay,” Ylva interjected, rising from her chair and scooping up her adorable little human. “You’re right, we should probably wrap this up, Mibao’s going to need a nap soon and she likes to fight her naps when she’s excited.”

That was all the excuse Talan needed to dip out without a formal goodbye, though it didn’t escape the corner of his eye how Edix’s human took a half step forward when he left, almost like it wanted to say something. Even if it did, he wouldn’t have cared. As quickly as he had intruded, Talan disappeared back down the main hall of the fauna department to return to his lab.

Edix stood up as well and tucked the data pad he had been keeping busy with under his arm to keep his hands free. He couldn’t help but smile at seeing how much closer his little pet was standing to him, even if it wasn’t by much, even though it was caused by Talan of all bastards. A win was a win in his book. The hand the human had been partly hiding behind curled easily around it to lift it up, immediately cradling it to his chest as usual. It squirmed for a moment but settled quick enough, a clear sign it was also ready to go back to the lab it was accustomed to. For a social species, the little one always seemed so drained after any playdate Ylva arranged for their pets. Fine by him, it usually meant his human was much more quiet and well behaved once it was back in the solitude of Edix’s company, making for an easier work day.

He used his finger to tilt back the wide brimmed hat it had been using to hide its sweet little face a majority of the playdate, earning him a surprised squeak. With the way its baby cheeks were turning an adorable shade of pink, Edix had a fairly good guess as to why it was trying to avoid everyone’s line of sight. Damn, he should have had Ylva take more pictures, this was way too cute for him. It reached up to quickly pull its shield back down and Edix let it with a laugh, cooing as he tugged at its little vest instead which only made it wriggle in distress. Overdramatic little thing.

“Can I keep this costume?” He asked as he followed behind Ylva who was preparing to put her own pup down for a nap. In reality, it meant she was going to have to play with it for at least another half an hour because, much like him, she was a sucker when it came to her human wanting to play. The difference being that Mibao wanted to do anything from coloring to singing to continuing its game of make believe while Edix’s pet always wanted to play chase.

Ylva smiled and shrugged. “Sure, I mean, it’s not like it’s going to fit the baby. It was printed for its measurements specifically, anyways.” Mibao was proving to be difficult in its refusal to relinquish the shiny wings Ylva had designed at its request, something that Ylva quickly made a game out of by setting her pup on the desk and letting it squeal and run while her hands chased after it. That would tire the kid out in no time. She looked back at his human and giggled. “I don’t think it likes it very much, though.”

Oh yeah, that was obvious from the get go, but it didn’t change the fact that it was way too precious for its own good in this type of outfit. Edix actually quite liked the contrast of the dark brown against its pale skin, even more given the fact that it matched the color of its doe eyes perfectly. It was much more appealing than that splotchy green jacket it was inexplicably attached to. He had a feeling it was going to try and strip out of this outfit as soon as it was back in Edix’s lab, provided he gave it its normal suit and jacket to change into. But...maybe he didn’t have to offer it its spare set of clothes right away. Maybe it would just have to hang around in its little boots and hat for a couple hours longer while he finished up his latest report that was just so important to get done. And maybe he would get constantly distracted by how cute it looked while it was definitely pouting at him for not taking off its costume that it took a little longer than usual to finish his work, which meant it spent even longer pouting under its hat.

Decisions, decisions.

Edix waved his hand dismissively. “It’ll learn to love it.”

“Oh, Eddie, don’t be mean to it,” Ylva laughed, not that seemed bothered by the idea of his pet keeping the outfit on for an extended period of time beyond the playdate. “But send pictures if you do.”

[dothwrites]

Cas using Enochian pick-up lines on oblivious Dean. Dean doesn't get them, Cas feels rejected each time, and Sammy is done with it all! Can I have that fic, pretty please?

ah, this has been sitting here for a WHILE, so i’m sorry that i’m trash 

lost in translation

---

It begins when Dean is pathetically trying to impress his crush. 

Or at least that would be Sam’s take, if Dean cared enough to ask him. 

Dean would rather say that it began with a simple misunderstanding, one which could happen to anyone. 

He doesn’t ask Cas’ opinion of the situation (and Cas would say that’s the whole crux of the problem). 

Whoever has the correct perspective, no one would argue about the beginning of the affair. It starts one afternoon when Dean is contemplating switching Sam’s creamer with buttermilk, just for a break in the monotony. Cas is with him in the library, his customary suit and coat exchanged for a hoodie and a comfortable looking pair of jeans which Dean suspects used to belong to him (there’s something vaguely familiar about that hole in the knee, and it wouldn’t be the first time Cas has pilfered his room for clothing; several of Dean’s shirts have ended up upon the angel’s body. Cas always seems perplexed when Dean calls him on his thievery, plucking at the shirt with faint confusion--Oh this? I found this down in the laundry room a few days ago and thought it looked familiar, do you want it back? And the question is phrased so forlornly that Dean can’t help but allow Cas to steal another article of clothing out from under his very nose.). Cas dresses down these days. And slouches. Right now, his chin is in danger of disappearing into his chest. The sight delights Dean. There for a while, he hadn’t been sure Cas was capable of relaxing.

It’s an overwhelmingly quiet afternoon. It’s nice, because Dean loves to spend time with Cas when there’s no imminent blood or monsters on their horizons, but it’s also boring. Dean sneaks a glance at Cas over the top of his book. Cas seems perfectly content to sit all day reading some godawful thick, leather bound tome. Dean finds himself less than content, but he doesn’t want to leave Cas. He sighs, shifting in his seat as he pretends to read. After a few more minutes, he sighs again, this time with a little more spite in the sound.

(Dean’s about three seconds away from kicking his feet and whining I’m bored, but Cas doesn’t need to know that.) 

Cas mutters under his breath. Dean recognizes the guttural syllables of Enochian, which is Cas’ go-to language for when he’s saying something hateful and he doesn’t want to get called out on it. Tough luck for him, though, because Dean’s heard one of those words enough to parse its meaning. 

“Did you just call me stupid?” he demands, slapping his book down on the arm of the chair. 

Castiel looks at him, his eyes wide with surprise. “You...understood that?” he asks. “You understand Enochian?”

Not in the slightest, is what Dean should say. He understands one word, and that’s only because Cas uses it enough as an insult that it managed to stick in his mind. But something that looks like fondness, and admiration, and other nice adjectives which Dean would like Cas to apply to him, shines at the edges of Cas’ eyes. So he rolls his eyes a little bit (the audacity of Cas! Asking him if he bothered to study something which was not strictly required!) and scoffs, “Uh, kind of hard not to at this point, you know, what with...” He waves his hand at Cas, hoping that the vagueness of the gesture will cover a multitude of sins. 

And really, he should come clean. If the past fifteen years have taught him anything, it’s that nothing good comes from lying to your nearest and dearest. But this is just a little white lie. Like when he was sixteen and he told Brandy Fletcher he could play a rocking drum solo, because he wanted to impress her and there was no way he would ever be called upon to perform such a task. This is just a little fib, made so that Cas doesn’t think he’s a fucking idiot. 

Plus, there’s something which looks horribly similar to gratitude shining in Cas’ eyes. The emotion brims over until those baby blues can hardly contain it, and Cas looks so goddamned happy. Dean’s not a monster. He’s not going to take that away from Cas just so he can come clean with a Gotcha! moment. 

Cas bites at his lower lip, looking uncommonly shy. Worry starts to stir in Dean’s gut, which is only compounded when Cas says something else in soft yet clear Enochian. As the new phrase doesn’t have the word stupid anywhere in it, Dean doesn’t have the slightest idea of what Cas is saying. The guilt squirming in his stomach gets worse when Cas looks at him, with gentle anticipation, as though he’s expecting a reply. Dean does what humans have been doing since the beginning of time when confronted with a language they don’t understand and smiles, wide and sunny, at Cas. Cas’ forehead creases but he returns the gesture. His eyes are still brimming over with emotion and the sight does something to Dean. 

Dean begins to suspect that he may have started something which he is not equipped to finish. 

---

After that, things get a little weird. Considering Dean’s general life, that’s saying something. 

Dean catches Cas looking at him more, like Cas is having a one-man staring contest with the side of his face. Cas staring at him is nothing to write home about, but his looks have gained new intensity. It makes Dean’s innards squirm with worry as well as something deeper. He’s not willing to examine that feeling any closer, though it is pleasant. 

As if the soulful looks weren’t bad enough, there’s also the thoughtful slant of Cas’ eyes to worry about. Every time he looks at Dean, he looks like he’s working himself up to something momentous. Since momentous decrees from Cas usually come hand in hand with world-ending events and revelations, Dean thinks he can forgiven for dodging Cas’ presence. 

It does him no good: the bunker, for all its space, is only so large in the end, and Cas was once a heavenly messenger who has the patience of millennia. Add that to the fact that Dean needs to eat at least twice a day, and the game of Cornering Dean becomes a game of cards, in which the deck is stacked firmly in Cas’ favor. 

Dean sneaks into the kitchen sometime between midnight and two am. If Sam caught him, then he would get a talking-to about the most appropriate times to eat, better digestive function, and the ravages of heartburn in a man his age, but it’s not his brother sitting at the table when Dean flicks on the light. 

It’s Cas, who blinks owlishly at him, before his face splits into his brightest smile. 

(Cas’ brightest smile is an awkward, crooked little thing. On a regular human being it would be considered unbecoming. On Cas, it’s a thing of glory.)

“Dean,” Cas greets him. Hearing his voice in that low, rough voice never fails to send a little shiver down his spine, and today is no different. “This is an odd time for a snack.” 

“Yeah,” Dean says, a little lamely. The shock of finding Cas in the kitchen has kind of killed his appetite, but it’s not like he can turn around and leave. “Just, you know, had a craving. Why were you here?” 

Cas looks around the kitchen, his mouth pursed. “I like it here. It’s peaceful.” 

Dean looks at him, waiting for the punchline. “You were sitting in the dark, dude.” 

“Oh. Well, I don’t need lights to see in the dark,” Cas says, as though the knowledge that his best friend has some freaky see in the dark cat eye nonsense going on with him isn’t the weirdest thing Dean’s heard all day. 

“Great.” Dean opens the fridge and pulls out a container at random. He spares one second to hope that Sam got rid of all the moldy food before he samples the contents. “Well, I think I’m going back to my room now.” 

He wants to get out of here, not so much because he doesn’t want to talk to Cas (he has no problem with late-night chats with Cas, it’s just that he would prefer such chats take place in his room, preferably in his bed, preferably while both participants were significantly less dressed), but because Cas is starting to get that look again, like he’s getting ready to drop an atomic bomb’s worth of shit on Dean in the middle of the kitchen. 

“Dean.” Cas stands up. He twists his fingers together before he realizes what he’s doing, and then places them flat against his thighs. He takes a deep breath. Before Dean can stop him, Cas opens his mouth. 

Low, rolling syllables flow through the kitchen, the harsh notations of Enochian softened by Cas’ voice. There’s a question in Cas’ eyes, and Dean would answer it, if he only knew what Cas was asking. 

The kitchen falls into silence. Dean gets the distinct impression that walking away is not the appropriate reaction. If only he knew what the appropriate reaction was. 

He settles for plastering a fake ass smile on his face and loosing a brittle laugh which threatens to shatter the lighting fixtures. The corners of his mouth hurt from the wideness of his smile, but not even the small twinge of pain can take away from the brief flash of hurt in Cas’ eyes. 

“Yeah. You bet.” Dean barely restrains himself from giving Cas a big thumbs up.

Cas’ face, if possible, turns even more disconsolate. Dean’s stomach twists at the sight. 

This would be the correct moment to confess. Cas, I don’t have the faintest idea what you said, but I’d really like it if you could say it again in English, so that I could maybe comment on it. Sorry I’m such a jackass. 

Dean does not confess. He reaches out and claps Cas on the shoulder, almost buckling Cas’ knees under the friendly contact. Dean almost stops, but he continues to his room, trying to erase the memory of Cas’ stricken face. 

---

It gets worse. 

Cas says something in Enochian to him the next morning, a tiny, hopeful smile darting across his face. Dean gives him a weak smile in return and tries not to focus on the longing, almost desperate tone of Cas’ voice. “Ok, Cas,” he says, when it becomes clear Cas is angling for something more than a smile that makes it look like he ate some bad tacos. 

Cas takes him by the wrist. This time the syllables which come out of his mouth are almost frantic. His eyes are wide and imploring, and his voice cracks on the last word. 

The truth, Dean. Tell him the truth. 

“Look, I’m sorry, Cas,” Dean says. Confronted by the weight of his failings and his inadequacies, he flees. All the while, he feels Cas’ eyes on his back. 

---

It gets worse. 

Cas continues to mutter Enochian at him, alternating between frustrated, hurt, mocking, and pleading inflections. Each time, Dean looks at him in a mixture of helplessness and shame. 

The last time Cas tries, there’s a faint snap and tingle of grace curling around the room. Dean can taste it in the air, ozone and electricity, before it makes the lamp closest to him spark and pop. “Great, now you’re killing the furniture,” comes out of his mouth before he can stop it. 

Cas recoils as though Dean reached out and slapped him. He says something else in Enochian, his voice small and defeated. He won’t even look at Dean. 

If Dean were a better person, he would come clean. He would apologize to Cas and beg his forgiveness. He would take Cas’ scorn and irritation and lump it in with the rest of the shit that’s gone wrong with his life, and they would move past this. 

Dean’s not a good person. Hell, he’s not even an okay person. He’s a piece of shit who got a hell of a lot luckier than he ever deserved, and Cas is just naive enough not to realize that. 

---

It gets worse. 

Sam walks into the library one afternoon with a dazed look on his face which means he’s just emerged from being caught deep in a book. He runs his hands through his hair and only then seems to realize that Dean and Cas are sitting at opposite ends of the library, deliberately ignoring each other. The tension in the room is thick enough to cut. 

“You guys okay?” he asks, glancing back and forth between them. 

“We’re good,” Dean says shortly, flipping a page of his book with unneeded aggression. 

Sam flicks his eyes towards Castiel. Cas looks over the top of his book, his eyebrows twisted in a scowl. He mutters something most definitely not English under his breath, staring at Dean. 

Sam chokes on nothing. 

“You all right there, Sammy?” Dean glances at Sam, only to see that his brother’s face is bright red. 

“Yeah, I’m great.” 

Castiel says something else in Enochian, sounding more forlorn than angry. Dean didn’t think it was possible for his brother’s eyes to get any wider. “Something you want to share with the rest of the class?” Dean asks. He keeps his eyes on Cas, but the question is meant for both of them. 

“I think you two should really talk,” Sam says, looking back and forth between him and Cas. “I think you’re both missing some information.” 

“What do you mean--” Dean pauses as the obvious answer comes to him. “Hold on. You can understand him?” 

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not in the room,” Castiel says, proving that he can speak English just damn fine when he wants to. Then, because Cas is an asshole whose main job is torturing Dean, he mutters something in Enochian. 

Sam snorts. 

If he didn’t know he would later regret it, Dean would put both of them in the ground. 

“Well, if you want someone to talk to you, then knock it off and speak English!” Dean snaps. “I’ve got no idea why you’re babbling on like that and looking like I kicked your puppy when I don’t answer.” 

Cas scowls, the full wrath of Heaven in his eyes. He starts what sounds like it will no doubt be a lengthy tirade (in Enochian of fucking course), before he’s interrupted by Sam. 

“Dean doesn’t understand Enochian, Cas!” he shouts. 

Two pairs of eyes snap to Sam. Dean’s are filled with furious betrayal, Cas’ with frustrated confusion. Sam ignores them both, rolling his own eyes to the ceiling. “Yeah, look, I’m sorry to cut in your drama or whatever, and I’m sure that you two could keep this up for another three weeks, but I value my sanity. Dean, nut up and tell Cas you don’t speak Enochian. Cas, stop running into a brick wall and tell him what you want. I mean, good God, it’s like I have to do everything around here myself!” 

Sam’s complaining never ceases as he peruses the shelves for the particular book he’s looking for. Both Dean and Cas are referred to multiple times as idiots, sometimes assholes, and once even idjits. Throughout his litany of abuse, Dean and Castiel refuse to look at each other, though Dean does feel a telltale prickling at the back of his neck several times. Every time he looks at Cas, however, the angel has his eyes firmly fixed on his book. 

Dean wonders if Cas would get more pissed if he told him his book was upside down. 

“You ever think about how much pain and agony you could save me if you two assholes would just talk to each other?” Sam finally snaps. Arms laden with books, he levels a fearsome glare at the both of them. “For homework, neither of you are coming out of this library until you’ve actually talked to each other like rational adults. And if you make any weird noises, I’m going to smother both of you in your sleep.” 

He stalks out of the library, leaving Cas and Dean alone once more. Cas looks up from his book, finally realizing it’s upside-down, while Dean puts down his own book. They stare at each other for a long moment, then speak at once. 

“Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t understand Enochian?” “What were you trying to say to me?” 

They stop. Dean swallows, gathers up all of his manly courage, and speaks. 

“So what were you trying to say to me? It must have been pretty exciting to get Sammy clutching his pearls.” 

Cas tilts his head. He considers Dean for a long moment before he crosses the space between them. Cas leans forward, putting his hands on the arms of Dean’s chair. The gesture boxes Dean in, a turn of events which Dean doesn’t struggle against. 

“Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t speak Enochian?” 

Pinned beneath Cas’ gaze, Dean squirms uncomfortably. Now that it’s just him and Cas, his deception seems childish. Would it really have been the end of the world if he’d told Cas he was too stupid and selfish to learn his language? It would have just been another disappointment in Cas’ life, but has it been worth these past few days of being at odds with Cas? 

Heat flushes along the bridge of Dean’s nose as he mutters, “I wanted you to think I was smart.” 

Damn super-angelic hearing. Cas doesn’t miss a beat, though his forehead creases. “You wanted...what? Dean, you are smart.” 

He says it so naturally, as though Dean doesn’t struggle over translations or speaking Latin or cross-referencing indexes or any of the thousand other things that seem to come naturally as breathing to Sam and Cas. “Yeah, sure, I’m a regular fucking genius,” Dean mumbles. 

“You’re capable of finding the problem with a faulty engine with a single look. You built your own EMF meter out of a spare Walkman. Despite your efforts to hide it, you’re very well-read, and you have an innate understanding of some fairly complicated mathematics. I’m not sure exactly what humans qualify as intelligent, but I feel as though all of those skills count.” 

Dean knows his whole face is red. Heat prickles along the tips of his ears and down his neck. “Jesus, Cas,” he mutters. Unable to withstand the force of those blue eyes, he darts his glance down towards the floor. “Most people don’t start sweet talking until the third date.” 

“Well, I’m an angel,” Castiel says, smugly, as though that solves every argument (not a bad strategy; that line’s worked for Cas for years. What else can you say after that?). 

“All right, I answered yours, now you answer mine. What were you trying to say to me?”

Amazingly, Cas’ cheeks color. 

“Come on, Cas,” Dean wheedles, when Cas doesn’t immediately answer. “I told you mine.” 

Cas looks off to the side. He actually shuffles his feet before he answers, “It was just a thought. I thought, maybe, we could...Never mind. It was stupid.” He looks back at Dean and rolls his eyes, showing how ridiculous he finds this whole trial. “I guess, roughly translated, it would amount of something like ‘If only he were as decisive as he is pretty, then there would be no problem’.” He forces a weak laugh. “I said it in the heat of the moment. I was frustrated.” 

Dean blinks in astonishment. Only one fact has managed to slip through the tangle of Cas’s words. “You think I’m pretty?” 

Castiel’s blush deepens. “Anyone who has eyes would think that,” he says, a little roughly. 

An automatic flush spreads across Dean’s cheeks, but he’s able to ignore that. He’s much more interested in what else Cas might have been telling him. “And what was something else you said?” 

Cas coughs. “’Your eyes are bright as the sunrise, yet they fail to see what is in front of them’,” he says. If possible, his already rough voice has deepened. 

“Another.” 

Cas doesn’t pretend coyness. “’You had my heart from the first time I saw your soul’,” he says, in a near whisper. 

Dean can’t hold himself back. He snatches Cas’ hoodie in his hands and drags Cas down to his level. Cas lets out a surprised grunt before he gracefully collapses atop Dean. He’s barely managed to balance himself on Dean’s lap before Dean’s lip are on his. 

Despite Dean’s rushed actions, the kiss is sweet and almost chaste. Cas’ lips are warm and chapped and utterly wonderful. At first, they’re stiff, but only for a second. Then Cas relaxes into the kiss, sighing happily as his hand cups Dean’s cheek. Cas’ stubble scratches against his chin. He’s going to bear the marks of Cas’ affection later, and he couldn’t be more thrilled about it. 

Cas parts from him, but not far. In fact, he’s close enough to Dean that when whispers a phrase in Enochian, his lips brush against Dean’s. 

A shiver of delight runs down Dean’s spine. Now that he knows the gist of what Cas was trying to say to him, Enochian fills him with illicit glee. “What did that mean?” 

Cas kisses him again, adding a cunning sweep of his tongue across the seam of Dean’s lips. “’Of all the stars in the heavens, you shine the brightest’,” he translates, resting his forehead against Dean’s. 

Heat floods through Dean once more. It’s everything he ever dreamed of hearing. It seems impossible that he could have it. There should be a rule against it. Dean Winchester doesn’t get what he wants. 

Except, apparently, Dean Winchester does get what he wants, as evidenced by his lapful of angel murmuring Enochian endearments into his ear. “Hey Cas?” Dean tilts his head to catch Cas’ eye. “When I first saw you, sparks flew. How would you say that in Enochian?” 

Cas thinks for a second before a smile spreads across his face. “I’ll teach you,” he promises, before he pulls Dean’s face towards him once more. 

(Sam’s warning about making weird noises makes a lot more sense now.)

[danjo-ao3]

Revelations

Pairing: Reaper/female Reader

Summary: You are an unfortunate soul who gets to know Reaper’s wrath, but things turn out quite differently from what one would assume.

Rating: 18+

Tags/Warnings: oneshot, choking, kind of breath-play, angst, masturbation

Word count: 4600

A/N: I had yet to write fem. reader with Reaper in this way and tbh I like it so much I just might continue this at some point. Anyway, enjoy~

***

One of the perks of working with Talon was the great pay at the end of the month, it really made for a comfortable life at a time at which the world was spiralling into chaos. And if you didn’t think too hard on what it was you did for a living, you could almost pretend like it was just another job like any other.

You distinctly remembered the day you signed the contract that forbade you to breathe a single word of the work you did for Talon to anybody. As cliché as it sounds, you needed the money and they promised a steady income. All in all you couldn’t complain.

“I’m surrounded by incompetent idiots!” The man in the middle of the room was seething, he grabbed a chair and threw it against the wall, leaving ugly tears in the wallpaper and bending one of the chair’s metal legs in the process. A hush fell over the room and its few inhabitants, your teammates stood still and nervous in the face of Reaper’s wrath.

Ah yes, the one downside to working here. Reaper was a man not known for his kindness or patience, if you worked with him you knew it was going to be a bad day. He usually operated alone, the only support he needed was someone to hack his way in for him. But some missions simply were too large scale for a single agent, just like the one you’d just finished an hour ago.

And now here you were in the debriefing room, Reaper yelling at various agents for the fuck up that happened.

You tried to melt into the shadows of the corner you were currently standing in, unwilling to take the blame for anything that had happened, you were just unfortunate enough to have gotten looped into this meeting even though all you’d done was some prior intel research work, you hadn’t even been a part of the team on the field.

“I’m done with this,” Reaper announced, his mask flitting over every individual red Talon helmet in front of him, “from now on I’ll operate alone again.”

You rolled your eyes under your helmet at his theatrics. Good, you thought, nobody wants to work with you anyway.

“You’re all getting a pay cut,” he growled and already moved to leave, but in your endless stupidity you just had to let your mouth speak before you knew any better.

“No!” You exclaimed, suddenly the center of attention in the room. Incredulous eyes were on you even though you couldn’t see any of the other agent’s faces. It was what you would have done, too. Hah, look at the idiot trying to object to Reaper, they were probably relieved that he would finally have someone to let all of his frustrations out on.

You tried to stand your ground, feet a shoulder width apart, head held high, but quivering as your heart started to beat frantically while you watched as Reaper stomped over to you. He was like a cloud of thunder rolling in towards a small city. Run, folks would say, get to cover. But there would be no escaping this particular thunderstorm.

With one final step he came to a stop in front of you, his massive frame accentuated by the light cream wallpaper behind him. He looked like the grim reaper himself, all that was missing was a scythe.

“What did you just say, agent?” Oh, he was pissed, you were so dead.

You swallowed around a very dry throat, your eyes glued to the empty eye sockets in his white skeletal mask, then tried to speak but it came out as a croak.

Reaper took a step closer to you, you only barely managed not to take one backward in fear.

“Speak up,” he barked, arms crossed in front of his chest.

“I just–you… I–” you stammered but were immediately interrupted by him.

“I asked you what you just said,” he hissed, and all the air left your lungs. He was going to make an example of you, wasn’t he?

You tried to straighten your spine and suppress the tremors currently running down your body.

“I… said ‘no’.” You tried to sound like you were sorry for being insubordinate, but it just came out as a whisper. What was he going to do with you now? The suspense left you shaking in your boots.

“You think you can say no to me?” The way Reaper’s voice had lowered made you nauseous, fear licked at your insides uncomfortably, but–what was this? Were you… blushing? The heat in your cheeks was startling you, what was happening?

“I’m–I’m sorry, sir.” You finally lowered your head in a sign of submission, hoping to appease him somewhat. It was just that you needed all the money you could get right now, most of the pay you got went straight to your sick brother who needed urgent care in one of the most prestigious–and expensive–hospitals in Zurich.

All of a sudden a clawed hand shot forward and grabbed you by the throat, pushing you into the wall behind and startling you so much you grasped at the hand holding you an inch from the ground. Reaper loomed over you, casting you both into shadow, you desperately tried to breathe through his choke hold but found it was becoming increasingly difficult.

He just stared at you with those dead eyes, features hidden from view just like yours at the moment.

“Everyone out,” he said, tone final and leaving no room for discussion–not that anyone was stupid enough to make the same mistake that you’d made. No one was going to save you anyway, Talon made sure that agents kept to themselves, operating in anonymity with the helmets agents were required to wear at all times.

From the corner of your eye you were able to see how everyone practically fled from the scene, not even sparing a last glance towards you, probably already arguing about who would get your stuff when you would be dead in like two minutes.

“Sir–” You tried to speak up but it was so hard to get enough air; you didn’t want to die, you couldn’t die–your brother would be doomed without your help.

“Tell me your name, agent.”

Oh fuck, he really meant business, huh?

You managed to whisper what he wanted to know, his hand on your throat squeezing just a little tighter in response.

The lack of oxygen in your blood was making you delirious, your heart was still frantically trying to keep you alive, darkness was creeping in at the edges of your vision, the man’s proximity confusing and terrifying and–arousing?

“Do you know what I’ll do with you now?”

Shit, when had he gotten so close? The blush on your cheeks deepened considerably, spreading further down to your chest. Why did he sound so ambiguous…

“You’re gonna kill me,” you gasped, trying to blink away the bright spots dancing in contrast to the shadows at the edge of your vision. A pathetic whimper escaped you at the pain of his claws digging into your skin, they were to be felt even through the padding of the armor you were wearing.

“You think I’ll let you off the hook so easily?” He pushed you even further up the wall, the pressure on your jaw and windpipe becoming unbearable.

“Please,” you breathed, pulling at his wrist in a futile attempt to get him off, but nothing was working. Contrary to his words he was killing you, you were convinced of it. As you rose up the wall, you thought that this was actually your very last moment, certain that Reaper was just toying with you.

Aside from the painful throbbing of a headache forming behind your eyes, there was still that persistent warmth spreading through your body. Up until now you’d had no idea that you could get turned on by being choked, but here you were, hanging onto life by a thread while a faceless mercenary was strangling you, and your body had no qualms about reminding you that you were yet very much alive. Thrilling, that was the right word for what it felt like to you. How fucked up was that?

The moment came, Reaper pushed into your personal space just a little more and his hand adjusted its grip just so, his claws brushing over your skin as it broke out in goosebumps and you were lost in a sea of pain and delirium, you forgot who it was currently pressing you against the wall of the bland debriefing room–and it had been so long since anyone touched you–that it forced a small moan from deep within you.

Immediately you stilled, a moment of clarity cleaving through your muddled senses, reminding you that this was not an appropriate response to being choked within an inch of your life by your team leader.

You watched in trepidation as his head, too close for comfort, tilted to the side just a little, felt his grip on you falter the slightest bit, as if your response had startled him just as much as it had you. And you weren’t surprised in the least. What the hell happened here?

To your great relief, he let you sink back down until your feet touched the floor again, alleviating some of the pain and discomfort in your upper body from straining against his hold so much.

Face hot from both arousal and humiliation, your visor started to fog up with the humidity of your hard breathing, making it hard to see through it, all the while hoping that maybe he decided to let you go after all. But he wasn’t moving away from you, nor was his hand leaving its place around your neck.

The vibration of his dark voice, modulated by that mask, shook you to the core as he hummed in thought and intrigue, the sensation going straight between your legs. You clenched your knees together to make it a little more bearable, hot arousal was making itself known in your core, pulsing in the rhythm of your heartbeat.

Damnit, why did this turn you on so much? A small sob was bubbling up in your chest, you didn’t want to enjoy how Reaper was treating you, but your body thought otherwise. He was still staring at you, his scrutiny was starting to become unbearably intense and mortifying, but oh how you enjoyed it.

“You like this,” he observed suddenly, and you wanted to die of shame at his comment, because it was true. Why, oh why was it true?

You tried to turn your head to the side, but he used his hand on your neck to keep you in position, you were no match for his sheer strength; it made you weak in the knees.

“You like being manhandled. A little… roughed up.” His voice had taken on a raspy, hoarse quality and it did nothing to soothe the fire that had started to burn through you. Images of him pushing you against the wall, clawing the clothes from your body bombarded you, of him just bending you over the big meeting table and having his way with you.

Another feeble moan left you as you rubbed your thighs together, trying to get some kind of friction against your core. But of course it didn’t help, you doubted anything could help right now but the things you wanted Reaper to do to you. At the same time you were way too afraid to voice these desires, sure that the mercenary would simply dismiss you, humiliating you even further. You were glad that the helmet hid your fierce blush and glassy eyes.

You watched him through your lashes, he was still looking at you in an expectant kind of way, was he waiting for you to confirm his theory, that you wanted to be ‘roughed up’ by him? Oh, he was so right, but no way in hell were you going to say it, not if you were still sane enough to bear in mind the consequences. What good would it do you, he’d probably laugh at your pathetic desire for something he would never give you in the first place. So you stayed silent on the face of his inquisitive stare.

Suddenly you were pressed against the wall again, but this time by both his hands on your shoulders, evidently he was done waiting now, the moment was gone.

Relief and disappointment warred within you, the latter leaving a sour taste in your mouth.

“Next time you object to my orders in front of the team you’ll face much worse,” Reaper spoke dark and dangerously, “got it?”

With a frantic nod you sagged against the wall when he finally released you.

Without another word he simply turned and left through the door, not even bothering to close it again.

As you stood there staring after him, you wondered what the hell had just happened and why that insistent throbbing in your nether regions didn’t seem to want to stop. Something was seriously wrong with you, it was a miracle that he had left you pretty much unscathed, aside from your hurt pride.

***

It was late in the night when you finally retired for the day, your joints ached and your muscles were sore from a long day of wearing your armor. You entered the communal showers alone, the only upside of staying up so late, you figured.

As you removed your armor, your thoughts wandered to Reaper and what he had done just a few hours ago. Goosebumps rose on your skin when the cool air of the changing room hit you, or was it the memory of being held by a strong hand around your neck? Probably a bit of both, you shouldn’t let what happened get to you so much, especially now that you’d had a little time to let your mind shift focus from the feelings and urges that the man had invoked.

A small shiver ran down your spine, goodness, you really had let yourself get carried away there, you needed to make sure it would never happen again. Best to stay as far away from Reaper as possible.

Curiously, you stepped in front of one of the mirrors hung above the sinks in the shower room, your eyes immediately landed on your neck and your mouth fell open in shock at the dark angry marks you found there. You touched your skin with two slightly shaking fingers, tilting your head and tracing the bruise from the front to the side where there were additional scratches left by sharp claws.

A small shuffling sound behind made you clutch your chest in fright and turn around, but there was nothing to be seen, you were still alone in the room. Must have been your frayed mind playing tricks.

With a deep breath you grabbed a towel and went into one of the shower stalls to turn on the water on the hottest setting. Mist was soon rising from the tiled floor where the water was disappearing down the drain, giving you the signal that it was finally warm enough.

When the hot water hit your shoulders you sighed in pleasure, the warmth always helped you relax and soothe your aches from a long work day, today was no different. As you closed your eyes to let the water run over your head as well, you let the serenity of the darkness and warmth hold you for just a moment.

Talon’s standard soaps, shampoos and shower gels had a very distinct marketed-for-men-smell, like they had only been chosen with the male part of the organization in mind. And unfortunately, as you started to soap yourself up, it started to have an effect on you; you were getting aroused again, just the thought of a man with you–it had been so long since you’d had any form of physical contact like that–you really yearned for someone’s touch.

With a small sigh you lathered up your chest, went up and over your breasts, enjoying the feel of the slippery bubbles against your wet skin and how nice it felt when you brushed over your nipples. Closing your eyes and pretending it was somebody else–some faceless Talon grunt–you went even further with one hand down your stomach, swirling a finger around your belly button and finally cleaned yourself between the legs.

Oh yes, this was nice. Pent up frustration from earlier brought you to full arousal in an instant, two fingers found your clit and the last thing on your mind was cleaning yourself. The hand that was still at your chest was going higher, first over your left and then your right shoulder before it caressed your neck.

It was like you’d touched an open wire; electricity ran through your entire body, connecting every nerve ending and lighting them on fire. Pure heat gathered in your abdomen, your fingers pressing into the bruises on your skin and feeding that electric current with a mixture of pleasure and pain. A small part of you was raising its voice in alarm but there would be another time and place to reflect upon what you were currently doing, right now you needed release–badly.

Slowly, the faceless Talon grunt in your mind started to change, his red mask was losing its color, revealing white bone surrounded by black leather flowing down into a long coat, his gloves became sharp talons gouging into your skin. Your fingernails were a poor imitation for the claws you remembered though, and you whimpered with want for the original.

Still, that orgasm you’d been working on was fast approaching, the sensations bombarding you as the water was running down your body, your hand wrapped around your own neck and you rubbed yourself fiercely between the legs.

Just as you leaned against the shower wall to completely let yourself go, there was this shuffling sound again, ripping you from the cusp of that climax and flooding you with adrenaline and fear of being caught masturbating in the shower. With wide eyes you tried to see through the mist that had accumulated during your shower, but it was nigh impossible to see further than a few feet in front of you.

Then you heard them, heavy steps were moving over the tiled floor, growing louder with every footfall.

Petrified, you stayed very still, your hands not moving from where you were still touching yourself, convinced that their position on your body would not be mistaken for what you were actually doing. This person would pass your shower stall and go about their business… right?

But you actually knew that this was not an agent going to take a shower at two in the morning, those footsteps could only belong to one person. The question was, what was he doing here?

Like a deer caught in the headlights, you didn’t move a muscle until Reaper stopped right in front of you, the dark, vague outline of his broad shoulders slowly cutting through the milky-white mist. You didn’t dare breathe as he came forward, one hand extending towards you, but ultimately landing on the shower controls. The water turned off and left you standing in deafening silence, leaving only the mist to keep you warm.

Shivering, you blinked through wet lashes at the mercenary towering above you, his hand still next to your arm on the shower wall, unmoving and menacing. His mask was staring at your face blankly until it turned downwards and landed on your hand still wrapped around your neck. As if his gaze burned you there, you dropped that hand and used your forearm to hide your chest from his view.

“So it was you,” he growled in his otherworldly raspy voice that was reverberating in the small shower stall around you, intimately close.

Right, he hadn’t seen your face in the briefing room, but the marks on your neck gave away that it had been indeed you whom he had strangled. And now he had found you, not only with your hand between your legs, but also with your other in mimicry of his fist around your throat.

Talk about awkward.

“S–Sir,” you stuttered, unsure of what was happening or his intention of cornering you in the shower in the early morning hours. You tried with all your might to suppress the urge to apologize, you’d already told him you were sorry for speaking out of turn earlier, there was no need to do it again. Also, it should have been him apologizing for surprising you like this, while you were naked in the shower, alone, helpless, vulnerable.

Again you shivered, the true extent of your circumstance beating you down like an oversized sledgehammer.

Had Reaper come to finish what he’d started, was he going to strangle you to death? Or–and you were really hopeful it was true–had he come because of how he had noticed how turned on you’d been and wanted to lend a hand?

There was only one way to find out.

Tentatively, and with shaking fingers, you resumed your ministrations on your clit, rubbing it in very small circles, trying to override the fear still lodged in your brain with the pleasure created by the friction, while staring back at Reaper through half-lidded eyes wet from the water.

Again his mask tilted down and down until he saw you working yourself up. Your pulse spiked when he took a small step towards you, his heavy boots stomping wetly against the ground and blocking the exit of the shower stall.

You barely managed to keep your eyes open, but they went wide again when you felt his gloved hand against your throat. This time it was even more intense without your armor in the way. Would it hurt you even more like this, without that protective barrier between your soft skin and his sharp talons?

You couldn’t help yourself and moaned quietly, feeling your own voice vibrate against his palm that was not yet pressing or squeezing, it was just resting there on your windpipe, a reminder that this was in fact real and happening.

The hand between your legs sped up a bit with arousal, Reaper’s presence driving you into a frenzy. There was just something about the danger he exuded, the threat of violence and death that short-circuited your brain and turned your body into goo. How he just held you, loosely, but with that unmistakable strength underneath that grip, it made you shiver in delight, wrung a small whimper from you.

Now if he just squeezed a little, made it hard to breathe–you needed to feel that lightheadedness, the darkness creeping in at the edges of your vision, to lay your life in his hands. You needed more.

“Please,” you whispered, barely audible, but you knew he’d heard when you finally felt that pressure on your throat, wringing another moan from you as you lay your head against the wall. A few spare drops of water ran down your face, you felt his gloved palm slicked up by the water on your skin, could smell the leather even over the shampoo you’d used.

Cold was creeping in around you know, it ghosted over your wet skin, leaving goosebumps wherever it touched, small shivers racked your body, your knees were shaking. But on the inside you were burning up, a blush had formed on your cheeks, the result of his proximity and just the fact that he was looking at you, while you were pleasuring yourself, no less. Goodness, you wanted him to fuck you so badly, it made you whine desperately, speed up your fingers against your clit, and your free hand hold onto the wall behind.

Just a few more seconds and you’d come, you knew it in your bones, in the way your hips were undulating and how the heel of your hand was now pressed against that bundle of nerves and how you’d slid those two fingers inside your hot core in search of that spot.

But still you needed more. You had Reaper here with you and you needed him to choke you, leave it up to him if he wanted you to live or die. Give away all control, wanting to know if he deemed you worthy of his mercy.

When had you become such a frantic mess?

Were you that desperate to die? Reaper wasn’t known for his kindness after all, the possibility of him just fucking killing you was very high. And this was what was turning you on so much you would have slid down the shower wall if it hadn’t been for Reaper holding you by the neck.

Freshly wet eyes were staring at the man before you–his cold, dead mask–you tried to blink away the stubborn tears flowing freely down your cheeks, hoping he would not notice them on your already wet face, while you were angry at your emotional response.

Angry and so turned on.

“Harder,” you gasped and immediately closed your eyes in bliss when he generously gave you what you craved so badly. A papercut fine scratch made your breath catch, one of his claws must have broken your skin.

It took only one more thrust of your fingers, one hard press against your clit and you came with a sob, your body going rigid for a few heartbeats before going completely slack in Reaper’s grip.

The pressure on your neck had abated somewhat, Reaper gave you the chance to catch some much needed air, and you sucked it in greedily, panting like a dog through a dry mouth.

Heat had spread through your entire body, the cool kiss of the air against your skin barely feasible to your blissed out senses. The only sensation you were aware of was Reaper’s hand, just holding fast enough to keep you on your feet.

Somehow you couldn’t look at him anymore, the reality of the situation slowly creeping along your conscious and making you aware of how fucked up it was what just happened. With the awareness came the awkwardness, the slow panic of self-conscious fear–the need to say something, to get away. But at the same time you were speechless, still incredulous that what happened actually happened.

With a final deep breath you closed your eyes and before you could open them again the presence of the man’s hand had disappeared, and when you did manage to look again, so had the rest of him. Just vanished into thin air.

There was no trace of Reaper at all, no sound of heavy footsteps or the swishing of his leather cloak, nothing.

As you used the wall for support to stabilize yourself, you risked a glance outside the shower stall, searching for any sign that he had been indeed in here. There was no way you’d only imagined it all, it had been way too real; cold fingertips felt along your neck where his hand had been only seconds ago, then reached up to wipe at your still wet eyes.

You were slowly going insane, that must have been it.

Wrapping a towel around your rapidly cooling body, you tip-toed into the changing room to dry off completely. As you passed the mirrors, you had to stop and stare for a moment–there was a very small cut on your neck now, the blood already dried, but as you scratched at it there was new red liquid oozing out.

So it hadn’t been your imagination after all.

Huh.

–end.

[wota-tenebrarum]

I’m always so irked by that old “MCU is military propaganda” take because you don’t even have to watch very closely to see how untrue it is Multiple characters leave the military/quit doing business with them at great personal cost because it doesn’t allow them to actually help anyone, the military getting its hands on certain technology is just about always framed as a bad thing, and the entire US Department of Defense is never portrayed as anything but an obstacle to doing actual good. This precedent was set IN THE FIRST MOVIE, and has continued through to the present. Like, just... Isaiah Bradley, guys. Isaiah Bradley. I think many of these people are just annoyed that there are multiple good characters who were, at one point, soldiers. And that’s not even necessarily on the MCU; the comics are mostly responsible for that. It’s an easy way to explain why a character has combat experience/speaks a different language/has traveled a lot, plus the Golden Age spanned two large-scale US military conflicts so military service was a relatable thing for a lot of readers when several classic characters were created. As for Tony’s vision of a “suit of armor around the world that might impact people’s freedoms”, it’s a huge leap to call that military apologetics or whatever. The context is pretty different, the idea is shown to be full of holes, and his attempt to enact it created ULTRON, of all things, which caused the destruction of a foreign city that the movies often hearken back to as a senseless tragedy. So I wouldn’t say that’s a great endorsement of US “peacekeeping” efforts, either. And no, Thanos does not mean Tony was supposed to be right all along, as it’s plainly obvious no earthly defense system could have stopped him. Tony is speaking out of fear and frustration when he brings the idea up again in Endgame; there’s nothing to suggest it would have helped in the slightest and that’s kind of the entire point of that bit of dialogue. Nobody has any media literacy anymore. I blame the overabundance of video essays, partially. Like, hey guys, guess what, there’s a good chance that early 20-something with an undergraduate finance degree who one day on a whim started making Youtube “deep dives” about 90s cartoons probably doesn’t actually have the skill set to be analyzing things critically with any real depth. It really doesn’t matter if their heart’s in the right place; good intentions aimed the wrong way are useless and just give ammunition to people with bad intentions. And just, idk, not everything is a conspiracy, guys. Oversight is far more common than outright malicious intent. Writing movies is hard. Go focus your efforts on real problems. As far as the MCU goes, it actually needs: - More prominent female characters (the goofy-but-well-intentioned “She’s got help” bit in Endgame required a few too many side characters) - More queer representation - More non-white representation - Less emphasis on America (though it’s not necessarily wrong to center your franchise on a particular region of the world) - Etc And it’s actually getting better at this stuff! Slowly. Far too slowly. But it’s happening and it’s always so exciting when those boundaries expand just a little more. Like, Moon Knight is a Jewish Latino dude and Ms. Marvel stars a Pakistani-American Muslim girl. Even if it was really, really on the nose, that kid asking Scarlet Scarab “are you an Egyptian superhero?” in the last episode of Moon Knight made me smile. And these are series, not just 2.5-ish hour movies! And the movies are getting batter at this, too! It’s all very encouraging. But military recruitment/apologetics?  Not supported by the text. Like, what the fuck?

[nurseofren]

Keeping Your Promise - Chapter 29 (NSFW-lite)

Read on AO3 | Read on Wattpad

Read chapter twenty-eight (NSFW)

Title: ASSISTANCE REQUIRED

Words: 5.6k

Summary: I am very uncomfortable with the vibe we have created in the studio Infirmary today...

Warnings: mentions of abuse, suicide

ST Rambles: So... I graduated nursing school. And will be taking my licensure exam next month and start working as well...

In my time away, other than the above mentioned accomplishments, I've been reading a lot of books and even went to see an internet friend just last weekend. Life got insane and I needed to focus on school, and I do appreciate the patience and enthusiasm.

I hope this was worth the wait. I hope the next part will be even more so ;)

[MASTERLIST] || BANNER // @elmidol

Fucking, fuck!

“I know in academy you were told to pierce the skin at a forty-five-degree angle, but it works a lot better if you-,”

“Go in at a fifteen-degree-angle, go parallel to the skin. I know,” you huffed, embarrassment burning your skin. “That’s not the issue. I do that. The issue is-,”

“That is the issue,” Silver corrected, interrupted. Your preceptor-for-all-intents-and-purposes crossed her arms and stared at you with hard, unyielding eyes. “You won’t listen to me,” she spat. “You are the issue.”

Calliope Silvren, or “Silver”, as she’d informed you upon meeting, was everything you were supposed to be. And you hated her for that fact, hated her for that and so much more.

She was intelligent and concise and respected, she knew everything and made sure you were aware that you didn’t. During the past eleven hours, not with so many words, Silver had made it clear that you were never supposed to be here to begin with, that hers was the name in the original provider candidate pool and you were nothing but a fluke, a nobody, nothing.

Compared to Silver, compared to Calliope fucking Silvren, who’d graduated valedictorian, who had star-white hair and golden skin, whose eyes were a harsh sea of frozen cerulean, whose legs were long and lips were full and head was high and posture was perfect – compared to the program’s prototype? What were you other than a fluke? A whim? Compared to her, how were you anything more than the fascination you’d been labeled as from the very start?

As you stared up at her, her height almost that of Kylo’s, and felt the wrath of that frozen sea that resided behind her glare, you couldn’t speak. Every word of defense left you, and your mouth dried and your chest hollowed. Because her words not only rippled through your head but echoed through the unit’s halls so every nurse and physician and maintenance worker had heard them. Heard her and how superior she was, heard how incompetent you were.

Silver knew what she’d done, could feel the eyes of her coworkers gawking at her scolding; you knew by the smallest quirk to her lip, the slightest tick in her platinum brow. She had you trapped and on display, and all you could do was stand here and take it. The Board was watching, and so was Hux – CB-7070 always shadowing ten paces behind – you had no choice but to remain neutral-faced and silent.

She spoke your name and it was beautiful, a voice like sugar even when it slithered and bit like venom, “We’ll pick up tomorrow. If you absolutely need me, I’ll be organizing my report sheets for the oncoming shift.” When no one was looking anymore, her eyes narrowed and she leaned in. “Busy yourself for the next hour.” A sneer slipped past the benevolent mask she wore. “Don’t need me.”

With a steel spine, she whipped past you, stalking off toward her task, the white of her hair streaking from your periphery. And there you were, clutching an IV starter kit – missing the needle, much like you’d missed the vein – trying your hardest to keep from showing any emotion whatsoever. Less people were gawking now that Silver had left, but you still felt eyes on you. Whatever lay in those lingering stares, pity or humor or apathy, it all burned you, reminded you how temporary you were. Not only in this place – the “Infirmary” as the staff referred to it – but in your life, as well.

Smoothing the skirt of your uniform, you cleared your throat and turned to do as you were instructed, catching CB-7070’s visor for a second before peering around the unit. She faced you, and even though you couldn’t see her face, you knew she may be the only one around who was on your side. The white of her helmet glinted as she gave a small nod in your periphery. Yeah, she wasn’t so bad, no matter who she’d report to the second you got back to the Consulate.

The Infirmary was a large unit, and, unlike any place you’d practiced in since graduation, it was efficiently staffed and stocked. Safe nurse-to-patient ratios, sufficient supplies, and an allocated provider available for any emergent orders or treatments. It was a surreal representation of the “hospital utopia” you’d heard of all throughout school.

But, aside from its apparent perfection, some characteristics of the unit confused you, but you didn’t ask about it because no one else seemed to think it was weird, and Silver didn’t exactly foster a great learning environment.

What struck you first was the Infirmary’s construction and layout. It was all glass, floor to ceiling windows that offered full views of each patient in their respective rooms. You’d watched the sun dance across the sky as the day went on, nothing hindering you from the beautiful view of the sea beyond the fanned-out city below. The only thing that offered a semblance of privacy for each patient was the wall-spanning mirror positioned in front of their beds. None of them saw each other, but it was still odd that there seemed to be no concern towards the errant lapse in privacy policy the design created.

At the center was the nurses’ station, large and circular, a skylight fixed right above. The staff used the lack of patient privacy to their advantage, peering above the counter to make sure their assignments were doing alright. Their assignments who were all under the age of twenty. Some much younger, just grasping at adolescence, others kissing young adulthood – those seemed much worse off, something darker rimmed their eyes, ghosted behind the lifeless face all of them wore.

It was a strange environment to be in, even more so due to how vague the progress notes were, history and physicals extremely short and never too in depth, especially when it concerned anything related to the patients’ family history or living situations. Something seemed off, something that tugged at you and made you yearn to break past the flat affect each patient met you with.

So many were here for a few hours and then gone the next, a constant influx of admissions and discharges. But, so strangely, there was never any patient education given, never any parents or guardians for the younger ones to go home to. They were always escorted from the unit by two “official personnel”. And watching their faces as Silver told them they were done with treatment and could leave, it killed you to see the faintest slash of fear quiver their bottom lips.

Beyond that, beyond seeing these younglings so fearful and defenseless, what clawed at your gut the most was that none of them had a name. They had no birthdate information, no address listed, no family contacts entered or even offered. They were all in the system only by the letters “FL” followed by a code of eight numbers. The nurses would refer to them by their room numbers to make it simpler, but none of them shared your concern for the lack of identity these patients were plagued with.

Yes, something seemed off, seemed wrong here. Something waswrong here, but you feared you would be gone before you ever knew what that was.

From the corner of your eye, you saw a tray left on an isolation cart next to a door. Heeding Silver’s command, you approached it, discarding the IV kit and feeling CB-7070’s focus catch your every step. You’d passed this door frequently, never seeing anyone approach it for longer than a few seconds at a time, assuming it was a closet for extra supplies or scanning machines. But the meal card on the tray indicated differently.

This was a patient’s room. The room number matched, there were no other doors labeled with it that you could see. No staff paid you any attention as you peered around. The only one watching was your white-armored shadow standing against a pane of glass.

Shrugging to yourself, feeling you couldn’t possibly get in trouble for delivering a patient’s food, you said over your shoulder to CB-7070, “I’m taking this in. I shouldn’t be long. Don’t follow me in here.” More to yourself, you sighed, “Even if I am the only one here concerned about privacy, I’d prefer not to violate anyone’s rights on my first day.”

CB-7070 nodded. “Affirmative,” her modulator croaked.

A swipe of your new badge gained you access past the door, a whoosh of air whipping through your skirt as it closed behind you. It was pitch dark, the only light coming from a holo-chart programmed into the wall. It appeared you were in an antechamber, those that often came with isolation patients, but there was nothing indicating this patient had any infection or ailment that necessitated a gown or mask.

The air was stale, like nothing and no one had stirred it in a few days, and the only glass visible was that of a window peering into the room beyond – or, it would be peering, were there not closed blinds on the other side of it.

You saw yourself in that darkened pane, clutching the tray to yourself, the first glimpse you caught of your face since the start of shift. Truthfully, you looked awful. Hair frizzed at your temples, a sheen of oil had gathered on your forehead, and exhaustion was evident in the puffy bags beneath your eyes.

But it was an earned appearance, no matter what Silver wanted you and everyone else to believe. Today you did your best and you interpreted and communicated abnormal findings, you assessed every patient without bias and documented everything you did. There were things you were unsure of, not having performed many skills while being assigned to Kylo, but you always asked for help, even though you realized it would be met with disgruntled aggravation after the first few times.

You had done everything right, understanding the consequences if you didn’t. As far as you were concerned, and even as much doubt as she’s caused you in the singular day you’ve known her, Silver was the problem. Not you.

And, not for nothing, the IV you missed earlier… not entirely your fault.

Kylo Ren picked the wrong day to Force-edge you. Or maybe it was you who really initiated the torture, but he’d been the one to follow through with his threat. Every hour had been memorable.

The first three had luckily occurred when you were away from patients but did earn you a few wary glances from the unit staff, your jaw set firm as you gave them a reassuring nod, hoping they couldn’t see how badly you were shaking as your cunt spasmed toward orgasm, but never got there.

There was something vicious in the rate at which he was forcing you toward the edge. Even though you couldn’t see or hear him, you felt like he was tormenting you with spite in mind rather than pleasure, like something you’d said or thought had angered him.

You didn’t have much time to consider that, though, as the hours went on and you’d begged the stars that the slick slipping from your center wouldn’t go past the hem of your dress. A few times you’d cursed the damned uniform, but quickly turned to cursing Kylo Ren for the ever-so-slightly too high hem. It’d surprised you that he never acted on those silent curses aimed at him, that it hadn’t earn you another hour riding the edge of pleasure while choking down the gasps and moans he’d surely intended to draw from you.

During lunch, you’d found a corner and ate alone, speaking to the wall and scorning Kylo under your breath, spitting empty threats, telling him to stop, to slow down. When that hadn’t worked and the Force picked up in pattern and pressure, nudging your clit just right, your hands had clamped around a plastic fork as you held on for dear life. He was nowhere near you and you’d almost cum four times over the course of your twenty-five-minute break. At that point, you’d considered begging him to let you cum, but part of you knew that would only lengthen his schemes.

Other times during shift, when Silver was rolling her eyes when you’d asked for her help, you’d felt the light, teasing lance of the Force trail along your neck. When you were priming tubing for a new admission, you’d felt the strange, unseen presence caress your ear like Kylo’s tongue might. And one hour, right after the previous had left you wondering if you’d be able to stand the next time you needed to – that hour where you’d traded your curses for pleading, traded the harshness you were spitting for the simple, hushed breaths you needed to outlast the never-ending torrent of pleasure he kept surging through you – the Force was kinder, something sentimental in the way it’d weighted your body like Kylo would, draped itself along your shoulders as sweat dried on your brow and the shaking of your legs settled.

A delicate, “Thank you,” had breathed over your lips when the Force – when Kylo’s teasing – seemed it would let up for the remainder of your shift.

But, of course, that peace had been temporary, a strategy to lapse your guard, to make you vulnerable when you’d most needed a clear mind and a steady hand. It had started with the gentle lulls you’d been left with, a stroking tendril swift over the column of your neck, the tourniquet tight to the patient’s arm as you poked their forearm in search of a vein. And when you informed Silver you’d found one, the Force deftly switched its attention to your pussy.

Silver had been scrutinizing you before, but when your shaking hand and short, shallow breaths appeared as fear instead of the pleasure they were born from, her brow had narrowed that much more. When you’d anchored the vein and aligned the needle – at her all-important fifteen-degree angle – your hand had shifted, jumped as your thighs tightened and you fought to trap a moan in your throat. It was an accident that the needle pierced the patient – and, worse, through the vein – at a greater angle, and it wrought you with emotion. Guilt for hurting the patient, shame for screwing up under Silver’s icy appraisal, and unyielding anger for Kylo Ren for causing your fuck up and not being able to explain that.

So here you were, taking the brunt of criticism and punishment for a mistake you wouldn’t have made had it not been for Kylo Ren, and studying your reflection in the scant light offered from the holo-chart of a patient you hadn’t known existed up until three minutes ago.

“Kylo,” you breathed, reaching for the second badge-scanner, “I can’t look bad here. The Board is watching. Hux is watching.” You glimpsed the radar fastened to your wrist, directing your tired eyes at Kylo’s indicator like he could feel your attention on him. “Give me this last hour and let me be good. Let me do well. Let me prove that I can to everyone who believes otherwise.”

A few seconds passed by as you waited for a reaction. Nothing came. The Force remained absent from you, and your shoulders dropped in relief. With a final glance at the chart, noting the patient’s identifier and checking it against the meal ticket, you swiped your badge and the entrance rushed open.

Darkness met you once more, but this darkness was heavier somehow. Not in the way untouched rooms are usually heavy – not with dust or grime – but a heaviness that clutched at your heart. It pressed into you, taunted you even as you remained a step outside the threshold. It was only shadows, unmoving and unremarkable darkness, but it clawed at you. It writhed at your feet and stirred your heart.

This was the darkness that lived behind each of those younglings’ eyes, but here it was concentrated, like this was the very source of it. Like this was its home.

“Hello?” you croaked, still not daring to pass into the shadow-thick room.

No answer, not even a stir. Nothing but that unyielding darkness.

You cleared your throat. “I, um, I have your dinner.” You took a small step forward. “Sorry for the wait… if there was one.”

More of the same. More of nothing.

A light switch entered your periphery with your next step, and you reached for it, but before you could flip it—

“If I wanted it on, do you think I’d be sitting in here like this?”

The voice was weak, small, but not that of a child. Not even that of an ill person, or an elderly one. It was male, though. Boyish, but not a boy’s. Somehow, the voice was young and old at the same time, as if the boy had lived long years already, and those years had worn him down.

The voice was a singular stream against the dark’s thick, silent wrath, and it was hollow, empty like the shadows before you should be. As the question ended, you found that it wasn’t bitterness or pain that lived in its tone, but rather a broken apathy, like whoever this was had cared and fought for so long but had ultimately lost in the end.

“Not that anyone here is really concerned about what I want,” came the voice again, an edge weighting its words.

Finally, you stepped completely into the room. You had to swallow a gasp when the entrance at your back locked shut. The tray jostled in your arms, but you succeeded at remaining upright.

With a sugary tone, you asked, “How will you eat if you can’t see your food?”

A huffed laugh, tired and bitter. “You should work on that nurse voice. Not very convincing.” A long, deep breath filled a few otherwise silent moments. “Send that tray back. Give it to someone who wants it.”

Without your “nurse voice”, you said, “Why did you order it—”

“—I didn’t. I never do. I’m being kept here, why would I want to sustain myself to make my stay that much longer?”

“Kept?” you whispered.

The longer you stood in place, the more your eyes adjusted. The room was still suffocated by the swamp of darkness, but there was some light after all. Scant, but there, a beam of the setting sun speared the room, and from what you had begun to make out of the body in front of you – a small form curled in the center of a bed – you found he was staring out of the broken blinds from which it came, like he was looking at something. Looking forsomething.

“Kept. Held prisoner. Restrained but not restrained because thatwould make this whole operation illegal, right? Whatever way you want to put it, I’ve made it obvious I don’t want to be here.” A long pause and a sad sigh. “Starvation is a better fate than most here, anyway.”

The more he spoke, the clearer it became that his voice wasn’t hollow, but burning with quiet fury. For what, you weren’t sure, but you realized this was the first patient who had spoken all day. And his tone, his words, only solidified the fact that there was something very, very wrong going on.

You walked closer to him, past the foot of his bed until you saw where the small slant of light was focused, what he continued to brokenly fawn over.

“What are you looking at?” you asked, leaning down so you could match your view with his.

He turned his head from the mostly covered window, the creak of light only possible through a bend in the blinds, and he looked at you, a flash of realization spreading through his features before he reined his expression into a void of dull emotion.

He stared at you as you stared at him, appraising you just the same. He was young, but it appeared as though his youth had been leeched from him. Long dark brunette curls framed his face and teased his shoulders, heavy with oil inherent of unkemptness. An immense sadness lived in the downturned state of his mouth, a contrasting anger set in the crease of his brow. And when you finally found his eyes, you restrained a shiver, as the deep hazel burned with that cleave of sun and struck you with the anvil of pain and desperation that lived in them.

He wasn’t alarmed at your proximity but confused. With a shaky voice, and something of a weak sneer biting at his mouth, he said, “You’re a sick, brutal cunt, you know that?”

“What? What do you—”

“What am I looking at? Do not patronize me!”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“Are you stupid or just cruel?”

“I’m not either, I—”

“You’re both!”

“I’m temporary! I don’t work here! I’ve been here for one shift! I’ve been on this planet for one day!”

Without missing a beat, but less heated and more restrained, the boy said, “Just stupid then.”

He continued to glare at you, but your eyes wandered back to the break in the blinds, and with narrowed eyes you found something that resembled a racing track. It was far out in the distance, but you knew that was what he had been focused on, sure of it by the way his demeanor shifted when you looked back down at him.

“Help me understand, then, if I am so stupid,” you whispered.

“You aren’t any different from the others, no matter if you’re temporary or not. Whatever that means, anyway.” The boy’s jaw set so firm you swore you heard it crack. “You don’t want to understand. If you did, if anyone cared so much, the Infirmary wouldn’t exist.”

“I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s going on.”

“Help me?” the boy barked. He considered you for a moment, sun and shadow warring across the hollows of his cheeks as he did. Those pained eyes narrowed a fraction. “Who are you? What does temporary mean?”

You leaned away from him, straightening your posture and setting his tray on a counter off to the side. You offered your name, just the first, and dragged an absent-minded finger over the embroidery of your uniform. “Temporary means…”

Perhaps it was his already non-existent trust in you, but you did not think that informing him of the real reason you were here – telling him that your license and life were on the line and you were here so the Board of Physicians would have ease in their decision to end your life or not – would do much to foster his confidence in you, you took a second to frame it in a way that would appeal to him.

Clearing your throat, you kept his stare and said, “Temporary means that I’m here for less than two weeks, and I have no loyalties to any staff here. Temporary means that I do care so much, and I do want to help because temporary also means that I’ve seen some weird shit today, and I don’t understand it.” The boy’s brows raised for a fragmented second, but you knew you’d gained at least a small portion of his respect, so you continued.

With a lowered voice and an unbreakable stare, you said, “Temporary means that I am on your side, and if you let me, if you help me to understand what is going on, I will help you as best as I can.”

The boy shifted, ringing a hand around his opposite wrist, toying with the identification band secured there. He never stopped looking into your eyes, and you knew he was searching for deceit, but the longer he stared, the more he came up short.

You offered him your hand, observing how he flinched away from it, but keeping it extended as he considered it for another few moments.

“I told you who I am. Will you tell me who you are?”

It seemed like the darkness that surrounded you was watching with bated breath, watching in awe as the boy’s gaze remained on your extended hand.

He swallowed, and ever so slowly, with a hesitation that struck through your heart, he lifted his hand and clasped it around yours. The light from the broken blinds coiled around your matched hands, and for the first time today, you felt hopeful. And no matter how dim and breathless it was, a flicker of that same hopefulness played through his eyes.

“I…” the boy hesitated, so you squeezed his hand and offered a reassuring nod. His shoulders relaxed with his next breath. “I am Quynnland. With a ‘Y’.”

“Quynnland,” you parroted, trying it out and letting his hand go. “Do you have any nicknames? Like Quynn? Quynnie?”

“No one calls me Quynnie!” he roared. “Nobody calls me that except…” Quynnland shifted in bed, away from you, turning his face back toward that racing track. His bottom lip quivered, and he appeared as if you’d just lashed him with molten plasma.

“Quynnland,” you soothed, “nobody calls you that except who?”

He remained quiet, but he shuddered, and you saw the light glint off a stream that found its way down the slate of his cheek.

“I want to understand. I want to help you.” You swallowed against your throat, which had become markedly thicker since you last spoke. “Please, help me help you.”

Quynnland’s chin rose, his eyes fell shut, and he balled his hands into tight fists. He wasn’t angry, but in pain, and you knew from the sight of how broken he was that he’d been in pain for a long time now. Perhaps, it seemed, he had never known a day without it.

Just when you were about to speak, Quynnland coughed against a sob and whispered, “They won’t let me see him. He’s there on his own. He’s never been alone for this long.” A tight breath whipped into his chest. “They’re keeping me here so I age out. They’re keeping me away from him.”

“Who is he? What are you aging out of?” The more he offered, the more questions you thought of.

“I almost got us out this time,” he whispered. “I almost saved us both, but they caught me and dragged me away from him. He’s young, but that never stopped them before.” A wheeze of pain slipped from Quynnland’s lips. “They probably broke him just enough so he could still work.”

You didn’t know what to say to that, so you kept quiet.

After what seemed like an eternity, Quynnland spoke again. “My brother. That’s who gets to call me ‘Quynnie’. That’s who I tried to save, and that’s who is suffering because I failed.” He pushed an aggravated sound from his lungs. “The only way you can help me, is if you help him.”

“How do I do that?” you asked, watching as his fists relaxed at his sides.

Quynnland opened his eyes and bore the full weight of their pain into yours. He took a long breath and squared his jaw. “You get him away from the wardens, and then you get him out.”

“Where is he?” you asked, needing to know what that racing track he kept glancing toward was.

He went to answer, but a rush of motion sounded beyond his door, and just as quickly, the entrance to his room shot open. Quynnland ducked his head and balled his fists, and you turned to see that it was Silver who stood in his doorway. She wore an unfamiliar face, one of shock and terror, and you went to speak, but her hand whipped out and signaled that you would notbe saying a word until you left this room.

She stared at Quynnland a moment longer, surveying him like she’d never seen him before. “Eat your dinner. I won’t have you starving to death under my license, not now that this will be your last stay here.” Silver more so talked at him rather than directly to him, and her tone was hard and full of disgust.

It gave you another reason to hate her.

You wanted to reach out and take Quynnland’s hand, but Silver snapped at you before you could. “You,” she sneered. “Out. Now.”

The ice behind her eyes had seeped to her tongue, and her words froze the very blood in your veins. She watched you as you stepped around her and into the antechamber, and you glanced the final withering, aghast glare she shot at Quynnland as you did.

When you reached toward the door that opened to the hall, Silver caught your wrist just before your badge met it. She was eerily silent for a moment, and you swore she was practically shaking with rage, but then she settled herself and stared down at you with such concentrated antagonization that it knocked the breath right from your lungs.

“What made you think you could go into this room? I never went near this room with you today. Why would you be allowed to enter it alone?” She was seething, but she hid it behind something of a gnarled smile.

“There was a tray just sitting outside, unattended to. I figured I would find something to do and deliver it to the patient. No harm done.”

She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes on you. “Are you aware what this patient is here for?” she asked sweetly, but it came off as clear condescension.

Silver waited for you to answer, but you wouldn’t give her the satisfaction she wanted from humiliating you again. So you remained silent, and she sneered at you. “Exactly what I thought. So why would you interact with a patient you know nothing about? And did the double security not tip you off that you were somewhere you shouldn’t be?”

“Look, Silver,” you huffed, enjoying the disgust that smeared across her features as you said her name, “I saw a tray. I had nothing better to do. My badge had access to the room. I’ve done nothing wrong.”

She cast you an undying glare, and her eye twitched when she gave you a once-over. “This patient willfully tried to kill himself and his brother last week. Did he tell you that?”

Your heart blackened, and your ears rang with silence as she let her words sink in.

Silver was pleased with your shocked silence. She went on. “Oh, and did he tell you just how many times he’s tried to do this exact thing in the past?” You remained wordless, feeling betrayed for reasons you couldn’t understand. “No? Not even a guess? Well, he’s a unit regular, if that gives any indication.”

She waited again and was once more elated to be met with silence. “It’s the same story every time. The wardens say he takes his kid brother to the shore and plans on swimming out to the Falls and either drowning to death or dying from impact.”

You swallowed in vain, mouth drier than sand. A part of your knew you didn’t want the answer, but you still asked, “How old… how old is his brother?”

A sick, deathly smile creaked across her perfect face. “Of course, we don’t know exactly, but previous scans estimate that he’s no older than seven.”

Seven. A child. Quynnland had tried to kill his brother… had tried to kill himself and his kid brother…

“Next time, don’t poke around business you don’t understand,” Silver cut your panic short, her frigid tone icing your skin with gooseflesh. “Your shift is up.”

She shoved your shoulder on her way past, but before she could activate the door the room filled with bright red light, and a shrill alarm screamed through the ruby darkness.

It was your watch.

Endless, screeching notes sounded from your wrist. Your stomach dropped, and you couldn’t think for a moment, completely thrown back to that last hour on Starkiller Base.

Kylo was in trouble. Kylo was hurt. Kylo needed you and you weren’t there.

When you lifted your arm as your heart sank through the floor and you read the continuous scrawling message, your feet pounded the ground and carried you away from the unit to wherever he was, wherever your radar was guiding you.

All you could think of was him lying under you, his blood slipping along your skin, and his still, comatose body. And as you made your way to him, not seeing the world around you, hardly aware of CB-7070’s footfalls booming behind you, you kept rereading the message that raced along your watch’s screen, and as you turned corner after corner and fled down hundreds of steps and staircases, the simple, abbreviated message taunted you with the past.

ASSISTANCE REQUIRED ASSISTANCE REQUIRED ASSISTANCE REQUIRED

As it scrawled endlessly across the small screen, all you could think of was how this felt too familiar to the day Starkiller exploded. And the only thought that remained, the only one out of the thousand that flooded back from that day, was that you would fight for the future you’d realized you wanted then.

Only now did you admit the full truth of that thought: the only future you wanted was one where you could be with Kylo. The only future worth having, you realized, was the one where you would spend it with him.

So you ran toward your future. Just as you had run that day not so long ago, you ran toward Kylo Ren.

[daydream-believin]

The Never-Ending Roadtrip (campfire songspell)

Summary: (part 1) Reader has joined Douxie on the quest for Nari’s safety. He’ll need company won’t he?  - (part 3) camping and fun fun crush anxiety   (part 4)

Warnings: swearing, whole fish-eating, mention of blood, i’ve stopped proofreading shit

Word Count: 3678

a/n: don’t worry there’s no more haunted stuff after this. or missouri. Y/n doesn’t smoke she just feels the need to have a way to set fire to things on her person at all times. a pyromaniac, if you will. also they have been roommates this entire time i just forgot to mention it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Archie was not happy. He couldn’t believe that Douxie would just ditch him like this. It wasn’t like him. Watch the boat, Archie. We’ll be right back, Archie. That was seven hours ago. A rainstorm had come and gone even. He thought for sure that at least Y/n or Nari would have reminded the other two about his situation. But, no, here he was, soaked to the bone and still alone. In Missouri. In misery. As mad as he was though, he was equal parts worried. It wasn’t like Douxie to just forget about him. Something was wrong.

When he finally caught sight of the rest of the party returning to the ship, Arch breathed a sigh of relief. And then got ready to breath fire. Which he quickly put out, after seeing the looks on the kids’ faces once they got close enough. So something was wrong. They looked as if they’d seen a ghost.

“Are you three alright? What happened?”

“Nothing we didn’t survive. Look, we got the tent.” Douxie held up the box to show Archie. He just flicked his tail in response. “It’s already dark, so we’ll tell you all about it while we set up camp. Alright, Arch?”

Archie rolled his eyes. He still thought this camping thing Douxie was pushing was an awful idea. But he’d let his wizard familiar make his own mistakes. He’d been doing a lot of that lately, or, well, more like nine centuries. Tough love. Young wizards cannot learn until they blow up potions in their faces. And this was going to be one of those times. He’d give it till sunrise. Midnight, even. He’d make a bet with himself, if they give up before sunrise, he’d treat himself to some fresh salmon. If they stubbornly don’t give up until after, a can of tuna.

After taking the boat a way into the wooded area they were hiding in, and answering all Archie’s questions, they picked a good place to settle for the night. Or at least Nari did. Douxie and Y/n were still iffy about it. it wasn’t exactly camping spot nirvana, but Nari really took a liking to the spot and its aura or whatever. Eh, she just kind of sniffed the air and told Douxie to stop. She liked the abundance of plant life here. Lots of roots sticking up from the ground, and little berry bushes. Which was going to make for bad ground to bed down on. But that’s alright, they’ll just cushion it with extra blankets. Extra blankets that they did not have. Or even regular blankets. They had no blankets. Fuzzbuckets.

It was going to be ten degrees out later tonight. Well, Douxie guessed they’d have to go back to that ‘huddle together like penguins’ plan. Which wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, now that he’s thinking about it. Cuddling’s pretty nice. A flush spread across Douxie’s freckles. He’d get to embrace Y/n. Pretend like he couldn’t feel how soft her skin was. Pretend like he totally didn’t want to be holding her, but it was essential to their survival so he had to. Archie and Nari would be there too, snuggling with them, so he could pass it off as platonic. But would he want that. Wouldn’t it just hurt when they let go in the morning. After holding onto her for dear life all night, to just get up and act like nothing happened the next day. Would he recover from that? His blush deepened in color. No, they’ll just have to go make another trip to the store. A different store. Hopefully one that’s free of spirits this time.

But he didn’t need to spend time thinking about cuddling his crush. No, he had to set up camp. Y/n was already building the fire. She was half-way through, by the looks of it, and he was just standing here, staring into the tent instructions, blushing away and not comprehending a thing he had read. In fact, he couldn’t seem to read them now that he was focusing. Oh, look at that, they’ve been in Russian this entire time. His blush turned into an embarrassed one. Not only had he been staring off into space, he had been staring into something he couldn’t even pretend like he was reading. Lovely. He hoped no one noticed. Y/n had. Although, she had just assumed he could in fact read the Russian text and didn’t question it. Perks of being a mysterious immortal being. After barely skimming the instructions he could actually understand, Doux took the tent out of the box, to at least make it seem like he had definitely been reading this whole time and he did have the slightest idea of what he was doing.

Douxie checked back to the instructions, careful to make it look like he was just checking back over it, and not reading it for the first time. He added a head nod to make it convincing. Okay, so he needed to spread out the tent. He got down on his knees and rolled out the large bag of nylon in front of him. It took him a minute to get it to where there weren’t any folds and the shape looked right. As right as a saggy boneless tent could look. Alright, now for the poles. Douxie looked around him and found no poles. Where were the poles? Bleeding balroths, did he buy a tent without poles? Oh, no, it appears they were just still in the box. Ain’t that just the way.

Douxie got to work connecting the tent poles. Thankfully, they were connected by some sort of elastic and he didn’t have to figure out which went with which. He found the eyelets they were supposed to go in on the corners and slipped them in. it was a bit tricky, but he managed. He was glad to be able to have something to do with his hands to get his mind off Y/n. The universe did not let him avoid his thoughts for long, however, since now it was time to raise this bloody tent, which required two people, and Archie and Nari were nowhere to be seen. Of course. Y/n was glad to help him raise the tent. She was glad to hold it while he staked it to the ground. She was glad to do anything with Doux. He just felt guilty for asking.

Finally, their new home was up. For the night anyway. Curious, Y/n opened up the zipper door of the tent. It was small, but cozy nonetheless. She poked her head in to get a better look. Doux followed suit. She turned to him, to make some comment about it, but he didn’t hear a word she said. He was too focused on how her face was incredibly close to his face. Her lips, although in the middle of saying something to him, were right next to his. Could she notice he had been looking at her lips? He prayed she couldn’t notice him looking at her lips. She had. Y/n tilted her head in a gesture. She was asking him a question. Quick, response.

“HAAHAHha yes,,” Douxie panicked.

“Oh, ah, okay.” Y/n ducked back out of the tent. Oh Merlin, what did he just say to her.

***

Y/n spent a significant amount of time trying to light the fire, first with her shitty gas station cigarette lighter, then with some spark spells, when Archie came back and lit it with no problem. Damn dragons, always, breathing fire? He wasn’t around while she was struggling either so he couldn’t have helped her sooner. She was sure she had something to be irritated at him about though. He gets to sleep all day and he doesn’t have to pay bills or wear pants. Yeah, there it was. The smell of woodsmoke filled the air. It was fantastic. Y/n took a deep breath. The fire she had built wasn’t exactly a neat log cabin like she had been taught in girl scouts, but it’d work well enough to cook their dinner and keep them warm. Dinner, what were they even eating? Apparently, the answer to that question was trout that Arch caught in the river and some sort of root that Nari dug up. The roots were a bit strange, but Nari had insisted that they were delicious when roasted. Guess it was time to trust the veggie-lady and pray to the stars that they wouldn’t be spending this night poisoned.

The trout was great, although, whole. Y/n wasn’t sure how she felt about how it was looking at her while she ate it. Yeesh Archie, remove the heads? Don’t cats like to decapitate things? But it was a really good trout. Nice smoky flavor from the fire, seasoned with herbs that Nari picked. Douxie liked it, not seeming to mind the still intact head as much. He ate two. Y/n had no idea how he could fit two whole trout in his stomach but he did just that and ate some of Nari’s roasted tubers too. Speaking of which, they actually weren’t that bad. In fact, Y/n found herself eating quite a lot more of them than she expected. A quick google search revealed that they were something called a fairy spud. Y/n made a mental note to go look for some when she got home. If she got home. Maybe home would be different by the time they were safe from the Order. Maybe they’d make a new home. Of course, they’d have to since Douxie fucking burned down the apartment they shared along with their place of business. Her roommate could be a real dummy sometimes, but that was okay, it was entertaining. And cute. His recklessness was very cute. She’d even call it endearing.

The fire cracked loudly, scaring Y/n out of her revelry. Douxie had also jumped beside her. It was a very loud crack indeed. Archie looked smug. Y/n wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was pride for the trout that he had caught himself. Y/n wasn’t about to pretend to know what went on in an ancient cat-dragon’s head. And she had been taught not to meddle in the affairs of dragons, for she would be quite tasty baked into a blood pie.

She wasn’t sure what was hotter, the fire or her face. Y/n supposed that she was lucky for that fire, to blame on for her flushed cheeks. Douxie was not only sitting beside her, but right beside her. They were just sitting on the still-damp ground, there was plenty of space. He had said something about the smoke being too annoying over on the other side, but that didn’t mean he had to sit so close to her. Not that she didn’t want to be sitting right next to him. She’d focus on the fire, she loved fire. Just focus on the flickers and the popping and the smell. And she couldn’t stop thinking about him next to her. It was just, a little much right now. Too romantic. It was like Douxie and the fucking universe were conspiring to take her out. In both senses of the word. Stars, they were practically all alone out here, sitting by the fire, rubbing shoulders, and oh look at that, he’s got a guitar now.

Douxie had gotten a bit bored just staring into the fire, and desperately needed to distract himself from the fact that he just sat so close to Y/n. Why the hell would he do that. She had noticed, he just knew she had noticed. Time to salvage his pride. What better way to fix all those problems than with some good ol’ fashioned campfire songs? Luckily, he always had a great instrument with him now. Transfiguring his staff, he started to play. He’d stay away from the rock and roll for now since it was literally ten o’clock at night and they didn’t need any park rangers showing up. At first, he just played some classics with the volume turned down, then just practiced some riffs for a while, but once he noticed both Y/n and Nari get noticeably sleepy, he switched to a softer, sweeter melody. His fingers expertly plucked at the guitar strings, and also Y/n’s heartstrings in the process. It was such a beautiful lullaby he was playing. She wished she could hear him play it every night.

Nari was the first to head into the tent for the night. She curled up in one of the corners. Y/n would follow her, but Doux was still playing that lullaby, and she didn’t want to miss a note. It was like it was putting, well, a spell on her. She had a really hard time keeping her eyes open despite her will to keep listening to him, but Douxie picked up on it, stopping to her dismay.

“Come on, Love,” He scooped her up as if she were a child, “Let’s get you to bed,”

He carried her to the tent, but stopped dead in his tracks at the entrance. Fuzzbuckets, he forgot about the no-blanket problem. Archie was going to stay awake and keep the fire going through the night, so the cold was no longer a problem, but the ground was going to be hard and lumpy. Their backs were going to be incredibly sore in the morning. Great. He’d let Y/n use his chest as a pillow. No hidden motives here, it was just chivalry. Once they settled into a comfortable and totally not weird position, they began to enjoy a peaceful night sleep to the sounds of nature. Which lasted half an hour before the tent decided that was enough.

It kept shaking, as if someone or something was assaulting it. But whenever one of them got out to fend off the attacker, no one or thing was out there. And Archie was out there, watching it, and he reported nothing unusual. So, maybe the tent they bought from a haunted store was haunted. Who could have predicted that. Oh well, it’s not like it was that endangering, just annoying. They tried their best to ignore it.

But haunted tent did not like being ignored. That lovely woodsmoke smell shifted into, something strange, like, diet blood? The sickly smell of blood but lighter, gentler, and faint. As if the tent wanted to scare them but wasn’t really into it today. Again, not really that endangering as it was annoying so they elected to ignore that also. Nari didn’t seem to be on board with that decision however, and left to go lay by the fire with Archie. Douxie was acutely aware of the head resting on his chest. He was trying his best to control his heart rate and was failing. There was no way Y/n couldn’t feel it. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could do this. Lady Fortune smiled upon Doux. The tent abruptly collapsed in on them.

***

So plan B was to find an inn for the night. After making sure the fire was out, they headed off into town on foot. It was eerily empty, nothing but the occasional car passing through town, but they were in middle-of-nowhere Missouri. The lack of nightlife at could be excused. It was two in the morning; most townies weren’t out partying. The traffic lights reflected off the pavement. It was odd seeing the lights run with nothing there at the intersection, like they were directing invisible traffic. As if there were ghost cars. Maybe they should just get out of this town actually. And they would have, if they weren’t so exhausted that they felt like zombies. Absolutely knackered.

There were exactly three inns in this dinky little town. One that was very fancy, in which they couldn’t even afford to stay in a broom closet at, one that was run-down and cheap, but full, and the last one, their only available option, which was somehow even more run-down and sketchy than the other. Just looking at the outside of it, it was pretty obviously haunted. Or it could be that the people who worked there were really committed to Halloween decoration and got an early start this year. Yeah. The man at the front desk wasn’t exactly a friendly character either. All in all a bit dodgy. Y/n was getting quite antsy, and not only from the creepy vibe. This was the last-resort inn, and with the other one full, there was a good chance that this one might not have the most ideal rooms available. And she had read enough cheesy fanfiction in her life to know exactly where this was headed.

Sure enough, the gentlemen at the front desk informed them that the only room they had left was in fact that famous room with only one bed. She’d snort if this wasn’t killing her inside. She quickly put up a poker face. Douxie balked at the information, but they were desperate, so he quietly accepted his fate and took the room key. Lady Fortune could be kind of a bitch actually. The journey down the hall was awkward as hell. Nari wasn’t sure what was going on, but she didn’t like the atmosphere. She looked up at Y/n and took her hand. Y/n smiled down at the forest child. Nari didn’t return the smile.

They entered the room and took it all in. The first noticeable thing was the smell. Not blood this time thankfully, but stale dust and mothballs. They could work with mothballs. Nari wasn’t visibly repulsed by mothballs. The carpet was sticky. It’d be best not to think about why. There was that cursed full size bed. The only bed left and it’s not even a queen. Douxie and Y/n weren’t even going to be able to have any distance between them. Douxie took a deep breath. There was a shabby little dresser with a tv from the 70’s perched upon it. You know the ones with the rounded screens, big dials, and bunny ear antennas? Y/n wasn’t even going to try turning that on. She got the feeling whatever was on the local channels was not something she’d want to see. She’d not even check the news station for the weather report. Whatever stories were newsworthy in this town was not something she wished to know about either. There was a small armchair in the corner. The floral fabric was torn, revealing that it had been reupholstered recently. Nari took a liking to it and curled up for the night. Archie joined her and got comfortable. Doux cursed under his breath. He had been counting on Archie staying in the bed with them, to make it less awkward.

Y/n was sitting on the edge of the left side of the bed, dragging her fingers through her hair. Douxie put some protective wards around the door. He’d ward up the windows too, but there weren’t any. It added to the suffocating feeling in his chest. Y/n added some purification spells to keep out any less-physical surprise guests. Walking over to the chair, Doux took off his jacket and laid it over Nari and Arch. They looked cozy. He was glad someone would get a good rest out of this. He was sure Y/n would too. It was just him with this bloody problem. He’s the fool who caught feelings here. He must surely be mad. She finished combing out her hair and snuggled under the covers. Guess it’s time for him to get in too now. In the bed. Next to her. All domestic and such.

It only took but a few seconds before Y/n was out like a light. All that sleepiness and such. Despite being the sleep deprived one here, he was wide awake unlike her. The moment the receptionist had told him there was only one bed left, it was like he took a double shot of espresso. Nervous energy, straight into his veins. He normally wouldn’t sleep like this, stiff as a board on his back, but he wouldn’t dare move. They were so close. She still smelled like the fireside, a welcome change from the staleness of the air, yet still a reminder of just her close she was. It was so quiet in the room, all Douxie could hear was the faint blowing of the vent and the pounding of the drum in his own chest. And her breathing, Merlin, he could hear her breathing. It was so soft. He unconsciously synchronized his own breath to it. He wondered how she looked right now, all cozy and asleep. Surely, she looked adorable. Maybe her hair was in her face. Perhaps she was even drooling. He dared not look over to see.

Lady Fortune cackled. Y/n turned over in her sleep, and latched onto Douxie. Oh fuzzbuckets, bleeding balroths, by Merlin, Mordrax’s miracles, fuck. She wrapped her arms right around his chest and nuzzled into it. His face was fire engine red. Whatever chill left in the air was now gone. Her soft hair was tickling his face. She was obviously still asleep right now, and thought that she was cuddling a pillow, or stuffed animal, or, or whatever she cuddled. What was he supposed to do about this? What the hell was he supposed to do. Did he cuddle back? He wanted to cuddle back. He couldn’t cuddle back. He took a deep, calming breath. He should just try to get her off. After, several attempts however, he realized that wasn’t going to happen without waking her up. And he did not want to wake her. He accepted his fate once again tonight. He could feel both his willpower and consciousness fading. Might as well enjoy these last few moments while they lasted, too. It could quite possibly be the only time he’d ever get to fall asleep next to her. In her tender arms. Getting to not just listen to but also feel her breathe. Truly a bittersweet thing.

***

a/n 2: ha! here you go, not one but two glorious there’s only one bed moments. my rite of passage as a fanfic writer. stay tuned next time for oh my god they were roommates

[poliel]

Surprise Egg 10/13: They're Parasites

Filbo glanced up towards the mountain for the umpteenth time since Buddy had left town with Triffany and Eggabell. He’d already been worried but… could there be any worse place to be during a bad earthquake than on a snow-covered mountain? Probably there were a few places but not many. How far up it had the three of them been when it hit? At the top? Maybe already inside the stone doors and thus perhaps safe? An earthquake that big had to have caused an avalanche, right? So what if… No, worrying about them in general but especiallythat wasn’t helping so also for the umpteenth time, Filbo forced those thoughts out of his mind and looked away.

Having saved what had survived of Buddy’s extra store of sauces from the wreckage of the cabin – as well as his one surviving frog plushie – he turned and resumed his jog for the airship instead. Chandlo was working on fixing the hull and balloon of it while Snorpy worked on fixing engine. Everyone else had already settled into going back and forth loading the airship up with useful stuff found amongst the wreckage of the town. It didn’t feel like a lot or enough but…

“Filbo.”

He stopped turning to face Wambus as he approached.

“I’m ‘bout to head up the mountain to look for Triffy,” he continued, gesturing back towards it. “Since Buddy’s up there too I figured I might as well invite you along as well.”

Filbo would’ve loved to jump on that invitation but… “We can’t go up there. It’s too dangerous and they’re going to be trying to come back here to us. What happens if we go out and get in trouble and then they come back here and we’re not here. Then someone’s going to have to look for us and that’ll just be time wasted when we could be getting out of here. Plus we don’t know where exactly they are so if we have to search for them it should be as a party with a plan and… and a way to communicate with everyone back here.”

Wambus growled, low and deep, but it was probably just out of frustration and not actual anger at Filbo… hopefully. After a few seconds he let out a heavy, defeated sigh. “I hate it but… you’re right. We should focus on getting ready to get out of here first.”

Filbo nodded to hide his sigh of relief because he had no idea what he’d have done if Wambus had insisted on going with or without him. “If they’re not back by the time the airship is ready to leave, I’ll go with you to look for them along with whoever else wants to help us. But Triffany, Eggabell, and Buddy are some of the strongest grumps I know so I’m sure they’ll get back here probably long before we’re even ready to leave.” Because it was clearly going to take a while. “And they’ll bring Liz with them too I bet.”

“You’re awfully optimistic.”

“Yep! It’s the one thing I’m good at other than uh… messing stuff up. So it’s the only good thing I’m good at. Anyway uh… I got to go.” He turned and jogged up the hill and over to the airship.

After dropping his haul off with the other supplies, he went over to the engine which Snorpy was currently fixing. “I can uh… help with that. … Or at least should be able to, I think.”

Snorpy looked up from it to give him an understandably skeptical look. “You can?”

“Yeah. Uh… I got an airship license a while ago and while getting it I learned some basic repair stuff. I probably couldn’t uh… fix it all the way on my own or anything but I should be able to help.” Hopefully anyway.

“Hmm… very well. It’s more busted up than I thought anyway. It looks like someone rigged it to explode upon taking damage. So we’re lucky it was almost out of fuel when it did otherwise it would’ve been a lot worse.”

Surely it couldn’t actually have been rigged to explode. That was just Snorpy being Snorpy, right? … Well, it wasn’t worth dwelling on right now, fixing it was much more important. So Filbo settled down on the deck next to him. “What’s with the radio though?” he had to ask because Snorpy had set it up right next to himself and the light on it indicated it was on but… it was silent.

“It’s connected to the radio tracking device I planted on Buddy. It lets me listen to what’s going on around them.” Snorpy’s tone was casual and he didn’t even glance up from his work.

“You… planted a tracking device on Buddy? When?”

“Shortly before they convinced me to return to town.”

That was a while ago now. How often did he listen in? What all had he overheard? Did Buddy know about it? … All important questions for later. Right now though… “Can you talk to them through it? Or uh… have you heard anything from them yet?” Surely if either was the case he’d have told Filbo and everyone else by now, right? But then again it was Snorpy, he had a tendency to be weird about things sometimes so… it didn’t hurt to ask.

“I have not heard anything yet even though I’m still receiving a signal from it. My attempts to reach them have all failed as well. So either the receiver is damaged or they can’t respond.”

Filbo’s heart sank even though that didn’t have to mean anything. Snorpy had also said the receiver might be damaged. So… Buddy could still be all right. And probably was because if anyone could survive an earthquake and probably an avalanche too, it was them… right?

***

Buddy woke with a jolt as something cold and wet plopped onto their upturned face. Instinctively they shot up right, ready to spring if there was danger.

Which while there was no immediate threat… where the fuck were they? A cavern for sure. High above them was a hole clogged up with what looked and could only be snow – which was probably what had fallen on them, waking them. But… the walls, they were made of… food? A hallucination brought on by starvation? … No, Buddy didn’t feel the slightest bit hungry at the sight of any of it and the way they seemed to move, almost as if the walls were breathing, made them uneasy instead.

They were sitting a shallow puddle of pinkish water but it was clear the floor was made of food – or what looked like food – too. And of course it was also ‘breathing’. They could feel it rise and fall slightly underneath them, taking away any doubt about whether or not it was a hallucination. Ugh! What the fuck?

How had they even ended up here? … The avalanche! Had to be right, that was the last thing they remembered. And it would certainly explain why they felt like they’d been pummeled.

All right, strange unsettling surroundings or no, they needed to check if they had any real injuries. Carefully they moved every part of their body. All of it hurt but they were pretty sure nothing was broken. Next, they checked their camera, still hanging from around their neck. Its screen was cracked but… it turned on! Yes! Spending all that money on it was paying off once again, everyone who’d doubted and criticized them for spending so much could suck it.

Next, they carefully extricated their arms out of their backpack loops and pulled it around to their front. Unfortunately, all their bugsnax hunting equip was smashed to bits and barely hanging onto the hooks or gone entirely. But what about… they slid a paw into their pouch and… yeah, Sprout’s buggy ball was still in there. They pulled him out just to make sure and, yep there he was. They put him back before pulling the backpack on once more.

Now came the hard part; standing back up and finding a way out of here. Or finding Triffany and Eggabell, assuming they’d ended up down here too. Hopefully they had otherwise they were probably dead, right?

Using the nearby wall for support, Buddy carefully stood up. Even so though a wave a dizziness washed through them, blackness eating at the edges of their vision. Thankfully it passed after a several long seconds.

With a groan, they shook themself a little and looked up and around again. They were in a dead-end area, leaving them with only one tunnel to go down. So, keeping one paw on the wall even though it felt gross, to help steady themself, they started down it.

Quickly it became obvious that this was a whole cave system. With branching tunnels of various sizes, some leading to dead-ends, requiring Buddy to turn around, others seeming to go on for a while. Without any hint on if there even was a way out of here at all, let alone which direction it might be in, Buddy just kept going down any tunnel that wasn’t a dead end and didn’t taper off to be too narrow for them to easily fit. They were going in the general direction of uphill though which was either good or bad depending on if there was more likely to be an exit towards the top of the mountain or the bottom. Buddy didn’t know enough about how cave systems worked to even make an educated guess so they didn’t think too much about it – or anything else really – and just kept forcing themself onward.

~

Both the ground beneath them as well as the wall they were leaning on for support suddenly weren’t there anymore. They fell, landing on and sliding face first down a small incline. It was softer than normal ground and smooth but was still thoroughly unpleasant.

They lay stunned at the bottom of it for a few seconds before a sound of something came from somewhere above them. With soft growl they pushed themself back up, first to their paws and knees, then unsteadily to their feet.

Somehow they’d ended up in a large cavern. Bugsnax of various sorts gathered around and lined alcoves in the walls to either side. They all centered around what could only be the Queen of Bugsnax, as Wiggle would’ve declared it.

With a shiver of excitement, Buddy pulled their camera and snapped a photo of it. And then a few more as they inched closer. How dangerous was it though? Maybe they shouldn’t be…

“Ah so you’re Budlegard Fuzzypaw, the journalist, right?”

Buddy froze. It spoke and knew their name somehow! “Yep! Just call me Buddy though.” They zoomed their camera in on the Megamaki like neck and the grumpus shape they’d been a bit too distracted by the rest of the being to notice before now at the end of it. “How’d you know…” Wait was that…

***

“Lizbert!” Filbo said at the same time as Buddy over the radio because he’d recognize her voice anywhere. Hearing both their voices confirmed once and for all they were both okay! That was the best news Filbo had heard in what felt like forever. Now if only they could hear him but Buddy hadn’t responded to any of his and Snorpy’s attempts to reach them, indicating their receiver wasbroken. But being able to hear them and know they were both alive was more than enough for Filbo for now.

“Yep,” Lizbert said with what almost sounded like a sigh. She went on but…

“Yo, is that Lizbert on the radio?” Chandlo asked, his loud voice drowning her out as he stepped closer to the radio and Filbo and Snorpy kneeling it. Filbo was almost a little tempted to growl at him.

“Yes,” Snorpy answered. “Now hush please, we’re trying to listen. But tell the others, I suspect we might be about to get some important information.”

“Got it,” Chandlo said in a whisper and salute before backing away. It wasn’t long before everyone was gathered around to listen to Buddy’s conversation with Liz.

***

Buddy almost couldn’t believe they’d finally found Lizbert. Surely it had to be a starvation combined with sleep deprivation fever dream of sorts, right? Perhaps they were slowly suffocating under a mound of snow and this was just their mind taunting them with the goal they’d suffered so long searching for before it shut off.

Though did they even care if it was a dying dream? … Probably not as much as they should’ve. Regardless… “I need to interview you.”

“Are you joking?” She asked, her voice incredulous.

“I didn’t come all the way here for nothing.” Regardless of the danger, they’d been through far too much to get here; starvation, sleep deprivation, unknowingly carrying the egg and then birthing it alone in the middle of Sizzling Sands, all the various beatings, bruisings, and burns they’d taken from the aggressive bugsnax around the island and now they’d survived being run over by a dang avalanche too. Far, far too much for them to leave off here.

Liz sighed and opened her mouth to respond but before she could something behind Buddy drew her attention. The Megamaki tendril holding her grumpus form shifted upwards. “Triffany?”

Buddy turned to see that Triffany had indeed found her way in into the cavern. Awesome, she was still alive which meant Eggabell likely was too. Naturally she was looking around mystified with a dawning look of excitement on her face as she came closer. “Oh wow, this place is… Lizbert!? Is that really you?”

“Yeah. It’s me.”

“How did… Oh, hi Buddy!” She smiled as she reached them. “It’s great to see you’re okay. Or… still alive if nothing else. Anyway Lizbert! What is this place? Why are you…” She looked Lizbert up and down, “like that?”

“I don’t have time to explain. You two need to get out of here. I can…”

“Nuh-uh,” Buddy interrupted. “Interview first.”

“Are you serious?” She glared at them, visibly exasperated. The fact that she was currently inhabiting the body of a very large bugsnax would’ve made her annoyance with them rather intimidating if Buddy were still able to care about such things. But they didn’t so…

“I swear to every nonexistent god grumpkind has ever come up with, I’m not leaving this cursed island until you’ve answered my questions.” Or until they were physically dragged off it, fighting every step of the way, or until they were dead.

Liz growled but… “Fine. Make it fast.”

Quickly they pulled out their notebook and recorder. Taking as deep a breath they put on their calm and friendly interviewer face before pressing record.

***

“Uh… guys we got some pretty some pretty major problems.”

The undisguised note of fear in Beffica’s voice was pretty much the only thing that could’ve drawn Filbo’s attention away from the radio right then. He looked over to see she was pointing out past the bow of the ship and down towards town.

He was loathe to leave the radio even for a moment but… along with everyone else he stepped over to look out over the ship’s railing at the town below. … Bugsnax were swarming into town from all the entrances, slowed by the destruction the earthquake had caused but not by much.

“They’re parasites,” Liz’s voice came over the radio in response to Buddy’s question. “They get inside you and they... change you. Your body and your mind. They make you want them and before you know it... you become them.

“We need to get out of here right grumping now,” Cromdo shouted, breaking everyone’s paralysis.

“We can’t,” Beffica countered before Filbo could.

“Yeah,” Wambus agreed with a growl. “Triffy’s still out there.”

“So is Buddy, Eggabell, and Liz,” Filbo said. “We can’t leave without them.” He certainly refused to especially since this was Buddy’s airship.

Cromdo growled but before he could say anything though Snorpy cut in. “And I’m not done fixing the grumping engine yet!” He was already rushing back over to it.

“Don’t worry Snorp-dawg, we’ll hold them off!” Before he’d even finished speaking, Chandlo was off, giving everyone else little choice but to follow. Filbo would’ve too but…

“Watch the egg for me for a bit,” Beffica said as she pushed the egg into his paws.

“W-why me?”

She didn’t even look back at him as she answered. “Cause you’re helping Snorpy fix the engine.”

With a grimace, he shoved it into his pouch again instead of following everyone else off the boat. It did make sense though to have one of people not fighting off the bugsnax be the one to watch it. So… no use worrying about it, he had a job to do, or more like help with.

[alienisticxo]

X Angel - Chapter Two

Elon Musk x Reader

{Authors Note} Thanks to some encouragement on AO3 I will be continuing this strange little story. So if you happen to come across it, I hope you enjoy!

Warnings: An uncomfortable instance.

Bright white camera bulbs flashed in every direction, the shrill ringing of screams filling my ears until I couldn’t hear myself think anymore. I was blinded by the light that flooded with every rapid click, snapping away at my every move as I exited the Cybertruck I’d been driven in. I was already fashionably late to a discreet -or maybe not so, now- meeting set up by the head representatives of my record label, Astra Records. My manager had decided to tip off the media, and my publicist decided to make it an event without it exactly being one.

It was a complex task, staring into those brazen flashes without so much as a flinch, but that was what was required of me. That was my job and life’s mission for as long as I held the position I did. The ‘drugged out’ smile I was known for never faltered as the flawless chrome of my body reflected every photographer's shining glamor shot right back into their lenses. Despite being surrounded by personnel, security and otherwise, people still clawed and clamored their way forward in an attempt to invade my space as I walked toward the large building before me.

“{Y/N}, over here!” one yelled.

“Give us a wink, will ya?” yelled another.

“I’d fucking die for you!” a shriek made itself heard over everyone else in the roaring crowd.

I just smiled and continued to trek, my {H/C} hair drifting around my face and behind me. I concentrated on my gait, my posture, the way my expression felt as I stepped past my adoring audience.

One misstep and it’s all over, of course.

Occasionally I thought about what a strange thing fame was. People would die or kill for you, just to see you or speak to you. We were all the same, deep down. No matter the wiring or blood that ran under our skin, or chrome. The only ones who seemed to place others on pedestals for no true reason other than a little talent that thousands of others had and would never get the chance to share, were other lifeforms. What really made someone want to know me more than another being who can do the same things, maybe even better? The only difference between myself and someone who possessed the same talents was that no one except the other party’s close circle of friends and family knew of their capabilities. We did it to ourselves, really. If only everyone were looked at the same way.

My security guards pushed against me then, catching me off guard in a crucial moment that could’ve been dangerous for me in more ways than one. They were blocking a rogue fan who’d been dying to ‘feel me.’

I tensed up in the absolute slightest manner as I followed Jett, my manager, into the tall metallic building that was made up of glass, but reflected the entire city skyline on its exterior, catching the neon glow, Saturn and the twinkling stars above with it. Privacy was a must, of course. Being able to see out but not being able to see in was imminent for any corporation’s design. The large double doors that disappeared with a glitch as we approached, reappeared behind us as we stepped further into the lobby of Astra Records. The noise of the rowdy crowd just beyond the front steps of the building sounded as though it was sucked back outside and muffled, like someone had put a lid over the heaps of people screaming my name.

“You’d think they wouldn’t need those old school cameras anymore,” I commented, the exasperation in my voice clear as I relaxed a bit more from escaping the masses, disappearing deeper into the lobby until the sound was no longer audible at all.

“{Y/N}, how else are they going to send the pictures back to Earth?” Jett asked me, a hint of condescension in his tone before pausing.

“People sure are different here aren’t they? They worship you celebrities like gods, worse than little fangirls back on Earth.”

I stared ahead, continuing my trek to the teleportation pad without entertaining his thoughts.

“Fuck, I’m in the wrong business,” he continued in slight disbelief to himself. “Maybe I’ll figure out how to go chrome and become a star instead of managing all you shitheads,” he joked snidely, a nasty grin on his metal-grilled teeth as he turned his head over his shoulder to look at me.

Jett had come to X from Earth after having no luck finding any clients to manage once the great exodus of the rich and famous began. Places like Los Angeles, New York City, London and Tokyo had already been cut throat with the industry players. Once everything fell out, no one trusted a soul to handle their affairs anymore.

It wasn’t hard to see that Jett wasn’t exactly a clean cut looking person to begin with, either.

It was my luck I’d be stuck with him at Astra, but I knew in all aspects I was just that— lucky. I didn’t complain. How could I?

However, as he put it, he hitched a ride on the next flight out and got to work right away with the record label. It was just that easy, and he was just that good.

Sure.

“It doesn’t work like that,” I finally responded in a flat tone to his statement, my eyes scanning the confines of the space as we stood a few feet from the pad. Jett pulled the oversized and black-reflective shades from his eyes then, turning his body to look at me. He lecherously stepped closer before running his -what I assumed to be- warm fingers down the side of my cold cheek slowly, his eyes raking up and down my frame. My jaw clenched unbeknownst to him, and I kept my gaze straight ahead.

“You are a sweet design, I’ll give them that… If it weren’t for security on your ass all the time…”

His eyes moved to the front doors in the near distance behind me as my security team approached us from their previous position handling the crowd, and with that, he let out an abrupt howl, snapping his fingers against the palm of his hand and turning back to lead me upstairs with a cocky gait.

It was moments like that that made my stomach churn. I had to deal with the disgusting remarks and actions, to take them like a champ without even indicating that I acknowledged them at all.

If I did, it was my life on the line.

I was just glad that was the extent of it from him. Even more grateful that that was the extent of it from anyone.

With a silent exhale, and no outward show of disapproval, I swiftly followed behind him onto the teleportation device, ignoring everything he’d said like it simply never happened. With one quick scan of our bodies, as fast as I blinked my {E/C} eyes, we were standing outside of the boardroom I’d only seen twice before. Once to meet the representatives, and the last time to sign myself away to them. As my security team entered next, I searched my surroundings again. The whole floor, who’s exterior wall overlooked another angle of Drax City and a beautiful moon above it, felt familiar as I caught sight of the usual decor. It was dark save for the neon buzzed along the walls, palm trees that were coated in a glittery powder that grew on the leaves as per a new gardening experiment sat in pots in corners next to chrome coated lounge couches and translucent coffee tables. A muted holographic television screen played Astra’s channel on it against a wall, and I saw myself there, giving the last corrupt public service announcement that the Planet X Space Association worked with the label for so long and so hard to have me release to the masses. PXSA was our form of government and space flight. An odd combination, but one nonetheless. I didn’t necessarily believe in the things they forced me to read aloud; fill the heads of the unwise and naive with. But the check was nice, and I was in no position to decline their wishes.

The large area was cast in purple, blue and pink light as nostalgic pinball machines blinked from a short distance away, offering a “glimpse into the past.” Another client, brand new, sat on a couch and played a video game through the latest virtual reality headset, the images they saw being cast across another holographic screen while they waited. It was all very pretty, really, very modern and yet fantastical as I had remembered it from before. But despite the ethereal atmosphere, I still felt uneasy.

I had no idea who I was meeting and what I was meeting them for this time. No one ever seemed to feel the need to tell me much of anything when it came to business affairs. I was told where to go, I showed up on schedule or a little late, and I did what I had to do as I learned what that was upon arrival. The rest was simply code and programming to the people who ran my life; there was no room for error, and I had to learn fast and according to the individual's expectations of me-- or better. I followed Jett down the long purple hued hallway just off of the lounge area, his sleazy demeanor seeping from his pores as he stalked his way to another pair of double doors and stopped as it scanned his body. He looked back over his shoulder at me once more with a smirk before turning and walking through them dramatically, announcing my presence as though I were some prized show pony come to a town where nothing ever happened.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the one, the only, Drax City’s own, {Y/F/N}... {Y/L/N}!”

That was my cue.

He stepped aside, his hands reaching out and over to exhibit my presence once I made my way through the doors behind him and stopped in my tracks, my heels still seeming to echo through the large room. Holding my head up high -chin slightly in the air like the small, but statuesque figure I was- was expected from me. And as I held my position, I immediately noticed eleven pairs of eyes sitting around an iridescent boardroom table that were set on nothing other than me as they quickly and quietly gasped and gawked.

“Her figure, the quality,” one drew out.

“I didn’t expect her to be so… so lifelike, in person,” said another.

“Oh yeah, she’s a real beauty,” said Jett, stepping around me then, his hand tightening around the metallic surface of my waist before raking through my hair as though I were a child’s doll. “X hasn’t seen a model like this… Ever. She’s the most famous pop star on our planet— They can’t get enough, eat her up like candy. That’s why she doesn’t come cheap, boys.”

He patted my side then, making me feel like a used car being sold by a greaseball salesman.

That caught my attention, though. My head turned just a hair, but I caught myself before anyone could realize my reaction. I ground my teeth, trying to compose myself through the abrupt shock I was facing. Quickly fixating my line of sight on a neon lamp in the shape of a star that burned in the corner, I desperately attempted to hold my composure. My ears seemed to have failed me however, my thoughts taking front and center as the men briefly discussed things amongst themselves.

Are they going to sell me? To who? Why?

“Oh, we know all about her on Earth. That’s why we want her. We can imagine she’s a planetary treasure here on X, but she’s interplanetary. Labels, execs, people, would just kill to get their hands on her,” one man said, looking at me with a fever in his eye. I guessed he might’ve been the catalyst for my… purchase. The word tasted bitter on my tongue even as a mere thought.

“They’d listen to anything she tells them to do.”

Jett smirked, lifting a shoulder and asserting dominance in his own way.

“She goes to the highest bidder,” he responded blatantly. “And none of this ‘cash’ bullshit. She’s obviously makin’ us a lotta crypto. No one else can afford her. That’s why she’s still with us here at Astra.”

I allowed myself to slowly absorb the situation, then. Astra was trying to deal me away to Earth, the very place I’d almost died trying to escape, all for monetary gain. It wasn’t unheard of, stars being sent to Earth and even back again, but I was X’s golden girl. Or maybe chrome…

They needed me. More than they thought, I now realized. They couldn’t replace me.

Or maybe I was the one mistaken, maybe they could.

As my eyes scanned the area, I also noticed the nature of the collective individuals that sat before me. All in black and gray pressed suits, all male. They’d come here solely to make a deal, an offer Astra couldn’t refuse, and they weren’t leaving without a signed contract, empty pockets, and my life. Fight or flight kicked in, hitting me like a brick, but I couldn’t react. Everything was in slow motion, and it was killing me from the inside out, not being able to protest. It wasn’t in my nature, but I had to play ball now, and well.

One of the suited men stood up from a chair that floated behind the iridescent glazed table, which I now noticed held the reflection of the cityscape that could be seen through the windowed exterior wall as well. He walked over to me with a drilling stare, his stride confident and assertive.

“And this is 100% cybernetic?” He asked Jett, as though I weren’t even in the room.

“Yes,” he spat incredulously.

“What model is she? From who?”

The man stood before me, eyeing me from top to bottom. I wanted to scream.

“That’s the thing,” Jett began again, moving to lean against the table. “We don’t know. She was left at our doors with a letter to the CEO, like some orphaned child. Said she had no recollection of anything other than her programming. We’re lucky her programming was to be a singer,” he finished with a snide grin.

The man snorted then. The tale was unbelievable, sure, but they had no choice but to believe it. There was simply no other excuse for me. A.I. was common, but I was as human as they were going to get, at least for the foreseeable future. That alone made me quite the commodity, something to be revered by other corporations, enterprises and record labels who needed a workhorse without the demands of humans. People saw themselves in me, they felt they could relate, or become just like me someday. This kept them eating out of the palm of whoever’s hand I spoke for and persuaded them to.

Still, the way my mind worked was not the same way as other A.I. beings. I had real demands in order to work, not lifting a finger otherwise, and I made sure they learned this once it was too late— once they couldn’t let me go anymore.

Unless you had enough crypto, apparently.

The older man examined what he could of my body with no regard for my own thoughts on the matter, looking everywhere for any indication of a branding or a code. His brow furrowed when he found none.

“Who are you?” he asked me then, seeming quite perplexed.

“{Y/N},” I smiled. “Drax City’s very own.”

“Where are you from?”

“Planet X, sir. Made and programmed. It’d be an honor to work with you and your people,” I lied. “This city gets kind of boring when you’ve done it all,” I finished exasperatedly.

“Very realistic,” he commented to Jett, his eyes still studying my face. “A.I. just keeps getting better and better. This is incredible. She’s so… human.”

“Did you think we were fuckin’ lying to you? I’m sure you’ve seen her all over TV, she might as well be a person. She thinks, she feels. Hell, I think I’ve seen her cry before,” he said, taking an apple that sat untouched and forever ripe from a bowl on the table. “And she doesn’t even rust.”

They conversed between each other then, deciding my fate with nothing more than cryptocurrency hanging between us. I wasn’t listening anymore, maybe it was a coping mechanism. I just couldn’t wrap my mind around the notion that they would just sell me away to Earth. Maybe I just didn’t want to think they would. They used me for everything they did, advertisements, sold out shows, records— even virtual reality experiences. They made crypto over crypto, dollars upon dollars, thanks to cutting government deals as long as I told everyone to listen. I showed up to every event, knew everyone who was anyone, and then a few more people. If they needed something, I’d do it. If I needed something, they’d do it. That’s just how this worked.

Until now.

I was snapped out of my thoughts when a man standing near the corner closest to the window that I hadn’t noticed before, finally spoke up.

The lights from the city beyond cast a glow over his features, mixing with the neon that lit up the room itself. I knew exactly who he was the moment my attention turned to him, not only by his face, but by his deep voice as well.

Attractive, tall, dark haired and with a presence that could command a room despite the quirkiness that he was often known for, it took everything in me to keep from going slackjawed and wide-eyed. His eccentricities were a staple of his personality, and enigmatic wasn't a word enough to describe him and the aura that surrounded him. Anyone would’ve recognized the man, no matter where they hailed from, and yet, his presence certainly caught me off guard. He was even better than the photos.

He was Elon Musk.

Elon was one of Earth’s most influential people, if not the most influential person. But on X, there was a mixed opinion of him that wasn’t exactly warranted. Though he had helped humans become an interplanetary species, among so many other things, as artificial intelligence became more prevalent, it began to turn on its creators. This caused quite a rift between the cyber world and the human world, lending more firepower behind the crime that had already begun to lace the streets due to the advancement that kept average people struggling to make ends meet and survive in the new world.

Elon was blamed for the downfall despite the warnings he’d cautioned the public with for years. It wasn’t until Neuralink was released to the public for use that humanity began to appreciate him again on a grander scale. He seemed to single handedly salvage humanity, curing medical issues that otherwise had no solution, allowing humans to live for much longer with far better quality of life. Of course, until Earth fell apart again.

Planet X, though, was built on technology; on futuristic ways of existing that he himself had paved the way for, thus causing its inhabitants to maintain far less respect for him. To Xians, futurism was par for the course. Elon wasn’t special there anymore. They ate advanced technology and cybernetics for breakfast, and spat it out into something better for lunch.

But to me, he was still a hero. Though we’d never so much as come close to each other, he had never let me down before. From electric vehicles to space travel, to underground tunnels and mock flamethrowers, his creative and profound mind was something I’d always admired from the moment I learned of his existence.

He had his share of blunders like much everyone else, but overall, I knew he was a decent man. No one had ever made it their life’s mission to help humanity on such a large scale with the capability he had, especially in some of the worst times of what we knew to be Earth’s existence. He valued helping humanity, and he was always honest about doing so. Elon Musk’s intelligence was beyond comprehension, in a way that made anyone want to sit down and pick his brain. And, well, he had a sense of humor on top of it all that made him feel more real than the idea of him even seemed.  

I wasn’t sure what to think of him on a personal level, most people had good things to say, others horror stories. I never thought about it too much or imagined him to be any kind of way, not wanting to tarnish any of the admiration I already had for him. I never expected to meet the man himself despite my position in the galaxy. I was a star, but he was far beyond me. Deep down though, I just hoped he was kind, nice; even if they say to never meet your heroes, because they’re usually quite the opposite.

It took every ounce of control to remain the composed little package they all expected me to be in the moment.

“I’d like to see her on my own,” he stated, every head in the room turning to face him as he did so.

[cambionverse]

envesseled (1 of 3): poker

HELLO >:)

so. as you may have noticed, the last time we posted anything about envesseled (the claire-centric, claire-pov fic intended to follow jesse's fic cambion and ben's fic only human) was in 2013. did we forget about it? did we cancel it? is the verse abandoned? no, no, and no. we had a lot of stuff to rewrite to get the verse in the right place for envesseled, and then we got busy, and THEN there was a pandemic. but it was never very far from our minds, and now it is FINALLY time for this to be the next thing we post.

most of the fans of this verse have been with us for a very long time. for being so patient, and so supportive, we decided to post not one, not two, but THREE scenes from the in-progress envesseled, for everyone to enjoy, but especially for the people who were readers when we posted the last one (again, in 2013, eight entire years ago). we aren't committing to a posting date yet, but we are ALL much closer to the end of this wait than the beginning.

this particular scene is only mildly spoilery and doesn't have any major content warnings to watch out for, aside from a mention of the ticking clock on claire's grace. it also introduces the minor character patrick, from spn episode 5.07, who has been on our cast page for some time; finally you can get some idea of what (small yet important) role he might play in this story. there are two more previews after this before the night is over - we hope you enjoy them.

---

Lucky for Claire, there's already a poker game in progress when she pushes the door of the pub open in a swirl of cold air. The man who wins the next hand looks younger than the others by far, though there's something about him that Claire can't quite place. He catches her eye across the bar and smiles around a toothpick as his compatriots grumble and wander away with their meager winnings.

"Room for one more?" says Claire, laying the sweetness on thick and her money on the table.

He waves a hand at the now-empty chairs. "I'm Patrick."

Surely he's faking that Irish accent; it's even more ridiculous than Jesse's Australia-Nebraska hybrid. And with the name Patrick, no less. "Amelia," Claire says, and pretends the accompanying flare of pain is only because she told a lie.

"Amelia," says Patrick, with an odd emphasis on the last two syllables. "You remind me of someone I once knew." He hands her a stack of poker chips and begins dealing out cards.

Claire leans forward so her braid falls over her shoulder and says, "How did you end up here, Patrick?"

He doesn't take the opportunity to look down her shirt, which is all the more irritating because she had half-hoped he wouldn't. "Luck," he says, snapping the k. He glances at his cards. "It's often on my side."

Lie. Claire doesn't often get such strong feedback from general statements like that, but this one burns. She ups her bet by more than she otherwise would have, careful to keep her voice neutral. "That must come in handy."

"Well, that is what we Irish are known for." He flips another chip onto the pile. "Ignoring the whole bit about the famines, of course. Pots of gold don't make very good eating."

Claire cracks a smile completely involuntarily, and brings a hand up much too late to hide it. Patrick quirks one eyebrow. His eyes stay on Claire's face for a long time, though, as his expression slides into something sadder.

She wouldn't, usually, but Claire asks, "Who was it?"

Patrick blinks, and the smirk is back in place like it never left. "Who was who, darling?"

"You said I reminded you of someone."

"She was a dancer." Patrick takes a chip from his considerable pile and spins it between two fingers. "Held herself like you do, especially when she was angry. Like if she didn't hold herself tight she'd float right up in the air."

Claire's muscles go even tenser when he says that, because he's not supposed to notice. "Raise," she says, dropping the chips in the pile.

Patrick exhales. "She wasn't much of a poker player." He puts his cards down, and slides them back into the deck before she can see them. "I fold."

Claire scoops the pile of chips toward her, stacking them carefully by value. Patrick's first bet this round was high, the highest he's played all game; why did he drop the bluff so fast? With this, plus the little extra hidden in her backpack, and if she's willing to eat vending machine food for breakfast—

The door opens, and a low hum starts up in the back of Claire's head. She knows who it is before Ben ever reaches the table.

"Claire!"

Patrick's eyes narrow the slightest margin. "Claire, is it?"

Fuck, and now she's been made, and he probably won't pay out and she'll have to sleep in a fucking snowbank because Ben Braeden can't keep his mouth shut. She opens her mouth the bare minimum required to say, "Leave."

She hears him settle harder on his feet but continues to stare at her cards. Patrick folded. She doesn't even have one pair.

"I know you don't forgive me yet," Ben says, and Claire breathes out hard. "But there's something Jesse and I need to—"

"I said leave, Ben," and she's turning to glare at him even though she wanted to play this cool. His cheeks are glowing red from being out in the cold, and a little behind him, far enough back to have a clear path to the door, Jesse's watching her too. When he sees Claire looking, his eyes drop to the floor.

"No, you don't get it," Ben begins, but Patrick interrupts.

"Is there a problem here?"

Ben seems to realize there are other people around, and he slides on his most affable grin. Claire can see how it's going to go, Ben charming everyone in a ten-foot radius, what a nice guy he is. Well, not if she gets there first.

"Yeah, there is," she says, savoring the lack of pain because it's true. "This asshole has been bothering me all night. I came here to get away from him."

"Oh, come on," says Ben, already rolling his eyes, but Claire said it loud enough that quite a few people heard her and some of them are starting to mutter. He notices, and ducks closer to her. "Look, Claire, can we just go?"

Patrick stands up. "I believe the lady asked you to leave."

Ben gives him a once-over. "Who are you?"

"Oh, I don't think you want to know the answer to that," says Patrick. His smile is not kind. "I suggest you be on your way."

Claire's not surprised to see Ben's jaw set at that. "Dude, this is so not your business," he says. "I know her, okay? We've been friends for years. I just want to talk to her."

Patrick bites a toothpick idly. "Think she can decide for herself who she wants to talk to."

Ben looks like he might be feeling stupid enough to throw a punch, but then Jesse is there at his side, one hand finding its way to the back of Ben's neck. Ben calms down instantly with Jesse touching him and Claire has been so, so painfully oblivious to never see this for what it was.

When Patrick notices Jesse his arms drop, and suddenly the air feels weird. "And who's your friend?"

"I'm nobody," says Jesse, though Claire would bet her pile of hypothetical money that his other hand is on the knife at his belt. "Just don't want to see this get out of hand."

Patrick looks at all three of them like links in a chain. "And did you not hear the lady's request, nobody?"

"Maybe you should stop talking for her, how 'bout," Ben retorts.

Claire appreciates the help, she supposes, but really what she wants is to be done with the displays of aggression and for everyone to leave her alone. "Go away, Ben," she says, and it comes out tired even to her own ears. He slumps a little deeper into Jesse's grip, and that's exactly the problem.

"Claire—"

"We're going," says Jesse, finally looking away from Patrick to catch Claire's eye again. He lowers his voice. "We'll be waiting outside."

"You'll be waiting a long time," Claire says, one parting shot for them to remember her by. "I do hope you two can find some way to occupy yourselves."

They both flinch, and Claire turns back to the table with bitter satisfaction in the back of her throat.

Patrick settles back into his seat, eyes still on the door. "You do have interesting friends."

"They're not my friends," says Claire. The lie burns like whiskey.

Patrick raises an eyebrow at her. "No? Then what are they?"

"We were playing," Claire says pointedly. When he doesn't move, she grabs the deck and starts to shuffle herself.

"I am playing," Patrick retorts. If he starts to go on about how you don't play the cards, you play the person, she might have to hit him herself. Instead he leans back and chews on his toothpick. "Let me see if I got it straight. You and Ben, you've been friends for a long time."

Claire places her bet, refusing to acknowledge that he's still talking. There's nothing impressive about repeating back what Ben let slip.

"And you're not one to make friends easily, are you, Amelia." She does look up at that, and Patrick, smirking, corrects himself. "Claire."

She deals the next card.

"So maybe you thought Ben was something special. But you didn't trust yourself with him. So you told him to wait."

"Raise," Claire says, and she doesn't even have that good a hand but she wants to clean him out. He won't stop fucking smiling.

"Some people would wait, you know," says Patrick. "Some people would wait a very long time."

Some while back Ben had told her, There is nobody else. Well. I'm nobody, Jesse said. Claire turns out her hand. "Triple sixes."

Patrick sighs. "You're letting me get to you, love. Can't play a good game if your mind's out that door." He tosses his cards onto the table in front of her. "Full house, and I'm guessing you could've used this cash. Quit while you've got any left." He drags the chips out of her reach.

Claire picks up his cards and the rest of the deck. "We're not done playing."

"All that ice isn't going to keep you safe forever." Patrick leans back. "Deal."

And because Claire is tired, and lost, and vindictive, she lets the cards slide through her hands with that special twist Ben taught her.

Patrick nudges a considerable pile of chips into the middle of the table. "Some free advice for you, love," he says, eyes dark. "Your life's too short to pretend you want nothing and no one to come near your heart."

Her grace flares up even before she can shape the words I don't. He doesn't know how right he is—Claire's life is looking very short indeed, these days, and nothing Ben or Jesse can do will put a stop to the invasive light eroding her body from the inside out. Her heart's probably toxic by now anyway.

Claire takes a deep breath and shows her cards, spades all in a row just like she planned. "Straight flush."

Patrick tosses his hand onto the table. "Four aces."

"What?" But there they are, even though Claire could've sworn she cut the ace of diamonds into the middle of the deck and buried the ace of hearts even further down. She locks her teeth as soon as the word escapes, but it's too late; his cold smile tells her he knows what she did.

"I don't like cheaters," says Patrick. He places a polished wooden box on the table and begins gathering the chips back into it, along with any chance she had of getting a hotel room tonight. "And you, of all people, ought to value honesty. Better luck next time, Amelia."

Claire clenches her jaw. She stands to leave—then Patrick catches her hand.

"I'm not doing this for you," he murmurs, and she feels the papery crinkle of fresh bills on her palm. She grips the money instinctively even as she draws back, other hand curling into a fist. No one at all is watching them. But Patrick just looks at her, an unsettling depth to his gaze. "You should tell him how you feel," he says, and releases her.

Claire pockets the money and bolts before he can change his mind.

[noonachronicles]

The End of the F**king World - Prologue

Byun Baekhyun X Reader

Word Count: 3.5k

Warnings: Language. Violent imagery if you squint. 

Genre: Apocalyptic/Alien Invasion AU. Slow Burn (ish?). One pining pup and one idiot in denial to eventual lovers.

A/N: Here goes nothing. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The atmosphere that morning when you stepped out of your apartment was strange. You could feel it immediately, before you’d even pulled the hood of your jacket over your head to avoid getting the light drizzle of rain on your hair and outfit. It wasn’t a bad feeling but it wasn’t good either, mostly it left you uneasy. As you made your way down the street towards the subway you tried not to think too much about it. It was probably just the gray overcast clouds and the rain. It wasn’t like an off vibe was uncommon for a rainy day.

You’d already made it a couple of blocks when you finally saw your train buddy, Taemin. He was leaning against a light pole rubbing his hands over his thick jacket to warm himself as he waited for you. After casual greeting the two of you made quick work of the next couple of blocks. As a distraction from the freezing cold drizzle you listened to him tell you all about how his weekend went. Finally reaching the subway entrance you headed down to the train platform. It took a few minutes of waiting for you to realize that there were only two other people standing down there with you. You thought to mention it.

“Something feels weird today.” Taemin said before you had the chance, eyeing the empty platform. “Or is it just me?”

“You’re weird everyday.” you joked, “But you’re right. Something’s definitely off today. Probably just the weather?”

“No.” he sighed, too distracted by thoughts to even appreciate your dig. “It’s something else.”

“Is it a holiday? There’s like no one here. Do I even need to be going to work today?” you asked, seriously curious about whether or not you’d even had to get out of your warm bed this morning.

“No birds.” he said under his breath.

“What?”

“On the street, there were no birds. Did you notice?” he asked as the train came to its screeching, metallic halt.  

You hadn’t noticed, but by the time you’d settled in the car Taemin had moved on. He pointed out an ad poster for the musical running at the theatre in midtown. Apparently his friend Jongin was a performer in the show and he was going to see it in the coming weeks. He asked if you wanted to accompany him and you told him you’d have to get back to him on it. By the time you’d reached your stop at midtown the conversation had moved on to something else entirely, as it often did. When you reached the top of the stairs you found it was raining harder than before so your goodbyes were brief, both of you promising to see the other for the same trip tomorrow. Then he headed towards downtown and you headed up.

There weren’t any birds, you realized on your walk. There were none of the usual noises of the city actually. No birds or other animals. Barely any traffic, which was incredibly strange even for how early in the day it was. In fact, the  streets were usually packed with cars whose drivers were trying to inch their way to work. And the trains should have been full of people attempting to do the same. The thought just made you uneasy all over again so you dropped it from your mind and just assumed the sound of the rain could have distracted anyone enough that they wouldn’t even notice the silence. Mostly because you didn’t want to believe you were that unobservant. Honestly, if Taemin hadn’t put the thought in your head in the first place you would have never realized it yourself.

It was just before six in the morning when you reached work. The doors were still locked when you’d arrived since the store didn’t open for another hour. You tapped incessantly on the glass as your exhausted best friend made her way over to let you in.

“Morning.” Seulgi muttered as she pulled the door open, she looked as tired as you felt.

“Good morning, beautiful.” You smiled as you pulled off your soaked coat and unraveled your scarf from your neck.

She groaned at your subtle sarcasm, “Coffee hasn’t set in yet. So kindly table any witty commentary.”

“Yes, darling.” You laughed and your eyes brightened as you found the coffee she’d brought for you.

“How was your date last night?” She asked, following you into the back where you’d gone to put your things away.

You shrugged as you locked your wooden locker, “I don’t know. We’ve been together five years now, at this point they’re all the same. Marco not coming in today?”

“No, he said his wife didn’t want him coming in today, whatever that meant. It’s just us all day.” then she waved off your attempt to distract her, “Siwon didn’t ask you anything...specific?”

“Was he supposed to?” you laughed before sipping your coffee. Seulgi just shrugged innocently, which you knew meant something, “What do you know?”

“You know me, I rarely knowing anything, especially what the fuck I’m talking about.” She shrugged again and hurried back out onto the main floor.

“Seulgi!” you shouted after her, “What do you know? You have to tell me! No secrets, it’s in the best friend's handbook!”

She bit her lip as she contemplated her options, of which she had none. She had to tell you. You watched her move over to the folder with the newest paid receipts. After rifling through for a minute she pulled one out and held it against her chest, “Tell nobody that I showed you this. Especially Siwon.”

You held out your hand, palm up, and she slapped the paper down onto it. After flipping the paper over you read over the order form and your eyes went wide and filled with tears. It was a receipt for an incredibly pricey diamond ring that just happened to be your size. On the signature line, in your boyfriend’s curve and swirl was his signature.  “Oh my god.”

“I know!” she said, grabbing your shoulders excitedly, “You’re totally getting engaged!”

-

Armenia was an upscale jewelry store, slated to be the next Harry Winstons. Seulgi had gotten a job there while the two of you were still in school and had helped you get a position afterwards. Though a career in the diamond trade had never been your dream, the money you made was far and beyond what other people you’d known in school were making. It got you invited to extravagant events, introduced you to the rich and famous, and was the perfect chance to spend everyday with your best friend playing with jewelry. It was similar to the way you played as a child except where all of your old jewelry was fake back then, there wasn’t a single ounce of plastic on the entire floor. For aesthetic purposes it was actually a strict company rule, even cleaning products had to be in glass or metal containers.  

After the thrill of your morning realization, it had been an uncharacteristically quiet day. Which you blamed once more on the rain. You weren’t complaining. Not entirely. It was just a little boring as the day would often drag when you had nothing to do. Between the two of you every square inch of glass casing had been wiped spotless, and every displayed piece of jewelry was cleaned to perfection. Finally, a little after noon, the door opened. You’d been slumped over one of the counters doodling on the back of a piece of receipt paper, but quickly perked up at the sound. Though your customer service smile dropped from your face when you caught sight of your guests.

“Oh, it’s just you two.” you said leaning back over the counter and went back to your doodles.

The Beagle Brothers. You weren’t sure why people called them the beagle brothers when you’d first heard the nickname. They weren’t even brothers. However they could have been conjoined the way they were always glued together, which is where you assumed the nickname came from. Chanyeol, tall and wiry, was one of the sweetest men you’d ever met in your life. He was incredibly funny, outrageously smart and insanely talented at anything he put the slightest effort into. He was Seulgi’s roommate and though she hadn’t confirmed with you yet, you were pretty sure they were hooking up. Though the way he spent time with his counterpart it could have been safe to assume they were the ones hooking up too.

Baekhyun was Chanyeol’s tag along best friend. Maybe that wasn’t entirely fair, he was more than that. Baekhyun was average in build and height. Though next to Chanyeol he always ended up looking like his little brother. He was cute, you guessed, like a puppy. It was possible that he had actual beagle DNA coursing through his veins with his constant need for attention and endless energy. He’d always been sweet and kind to you, though you’d watched him around other women and knew he could also be a horrible tease when he wanted to be.

He was a good friend to you, both of them were. They both worked about a block away at a prominent electronics company. As he did every afternoon Chanyeol had brought Seulgi her refresher coffee and lunch, which they took into the backroom. With the feel of lurking eyes on you, you looked up unsurprised to see two big, brown eyes staring back at you. Accompanied by an absurdly charming smile.

“Hey, Baek.”

Somehow his smile grew even larger at the greeting and he placed an iced coffee on the counter in front of you. “Hi.”

“You know just because he brings her coffee doesn’t mean you’re required to bring me anything.” you said even as you took your first sip. “Especially since she’s probably repaying him…”

“I do it because I want to.” he said and brought his other hand from behind his back to place a brown bag in front of you as well. You tried not to but you smiled as you opened the bag to the sandwich he’d brought too. “How has your day been?”

It always surprised you, how genuinely he asked you about your day. “Slow, long… a little weird honestly.”

“Totally agreed. It’s been weird all morning. The vibe is off.” he sighed, “I can’t figure it out.”

“No birds.” you said offhandedly, thinking about Taemin before taking a bite of your sandwich.

He gave a small thoughtful hum. “Or all that stuff on the news is freaking people out.”

“What stuff on the news?” you asked.

“We’ve been watching it at work all day.” he shrugged, “I’m sure Yeol is in there making Seulgi watch clips on youtube, he won’t shut up about it. He has all these theories.”

“What stuff, Baek? What happened?” You were half annoyed by his vagueness. Of course they’d been watching it all day, they had a hundred televisions set up over there, you had none. You weren’t even supposed to be on your phones at work.  

He pulled his phone from his pocket and pressed around for a minute before a female newcaster’s voice came through and he handed you the device.

“Major and sudden changes in atmospheric levels over twelve major cities around the world have left scientists scrambling for the last eighteen hours or so. It’s even said that air force units from the United States, Russia, Egypt, and Korea have been in heavy communication over the last few hours as more and more strange pictures are being uploaded to social media from those twelve cities.”

On the screen they were showing a montage of videos from snapchat and instagram, photographs from users on facebook and twitter. One was a group of what looked like high schoolers speaking Japanese, it was captioned as being at the Tokyo Skytree. The camera panned over the ground below. For a moment it just looked like it was overcast there as well, nothing strange, but as it moved back, showing more it was clear the shadow was only covering part of the city. It seemed like maybe there was something large in the sky blocking the sun from the ground. Whatever it was, it had to have been massive in size. As the camera moved up to the sky you waited expectantly to see what was there, but there was nothing. It was clear. Not even a single cloud was visible.      

“What the hell is that?” you whispered as it flashed to pictures from Paris, New York, Moscow, Seoul, and Cairo where the same thing seemed to be happening. Long, narrow shadows all leaving the same shape covering miles worth of city in darkness.

“They don’t know. All morning they were talking about it like it was some global warming effect, but as more of these videos and stuff kept coming in they’ve been talking about it like it’s an invasion.”

“What like aliens? Shut up, that’s insane.” you kept your eyes on his phone, shaking your head as another picture flashed, “Shit, that’s us, Baek...that’s our city.”

“That’s what I’m saying. I think that’s why the city is so dead compared to normal. People are in their buildings, people are at work. But anyone who doesn’t have to be in the city for some specific reason is avoiding it.” he said as he moved over to the window.

“Marco’s wife didn’t want him to come in today.”

He hummed as if in agreement, “A ton of people called out at our work too. It’s crazy.”

Leaving his phone on the counter you moved around and stood beside him at the window as you looked out. He was right. Normally you would look outside of the shop and see a swarm of bodies pushing each other around all trying to get somewhere. There were more people than you saw that morning, but not a lot. There were still people coming in and out of buildings, smoking cigarettes on the sidewalk, going for lunch at the bistro across the street.

However it was missing the horns honking from taxis frustrated about being stuck in traffic. The loud chatter of groups of friends just shopping around. There were no family’s snapping pictures for vacation photo albums. Looking to the sky you could see the rain clouds had dispersed and the sun was shining above but the ground still looked dark like it was covered by overcast. If you hadn’t just clearly seen the sun in the sky you might have thought it was near dusk.

As the two of you stood there you could hear a humming start in your ear. It was the kind of subtle buzz that people say means someone is thinking about you so of course you figured it was just your ears at first. As it grew louder, uncomfortably so, you looked over at Baekhyun. He was rubbing his own ears in discomfort. The sound became worse, almost piercing. You turned around to see Chanyeol and Seulgi come out of the back covering their ears.

“What’s happening?” Chanyeol shouted over the noise.

Shaking your head unknowingly, you turned to look back outside when a low rumble shook the ground beneath you. It felt like there had been a huge explosion and the blast moved through the city like a wave. When it reached you you’d been blown backwards to the floor. The glass in all of the jewelry cases trembled and  started to shatter around you. You could hear Seulgi screaming and you watched as Baekhyun threw himself over you. The glass windows of the shop were shaking but they were made of much thicker, tempered glass, and held through it. It took several minutes for everything to settle. Baekhyun stood up and helped you to your feet.

Chanyeol walked over to the window and looked out. “Oh... fuck me.”

The rest of you followed suit and went to look outside. Hoards of people were sprinting out of their office buildings, broken glass from skyscraper windows rained down on the street below, and the worst part was what was in the sky. Where there had been nothing just minutes ago was now what you’d could only describe as a spaceship. It was absolutely massive and hovering just over the city. You were honestly surprised it wasn’t hitting any of the taller buildings, it was so low to the earth. Baekhyun ran over to the counter and grabbed his phone and walked it back over to the three of you.

“- over every city that has been under discussion today, have revealed themselves it seems. It remains unclear whether or not these ships are here with any sort of malicious intent. Military specialists have been trying to contact the ships but have received no return communication. We ask that viewers remain patient and cautious as we await further information and instruction from - Oh god, oh what are those?”

Looking over at the screen on his phone you could see where the news camera was zooming in on objects falling from the ship over one of the cities. Creatures, long creatures with gangly, scaly arms and legs. They had bulbous heads, four eyes, and teeth long and sharp that matched the claws on their hands and feet. Quickly you looked outside, whatever they were, they were falling out of the ship over your city as well. After several minutes of staring in shock you could hear the deafening sound of military aircraft speeding overhead and watched as they launched missiles towards the ship and shot bullets at the falling creatures.

“What do we do?” Seulgi asked in a clear panic, “Do we run?”

“Fuck that!” You screeched, “I’m not going out there with those things!”

“Y/n is right.” Baekhyun agreed, “We don’t know what we're dealing with, if we start running where would we even run to? Just-oh shit.”

All of you turned to look at what caught his attention. One of the fallen creatures had rounded the corner down the block and was attacking any and every human in its path. You let out a terrified cry as you watched the creature tear the head straight off a man like he was opening a bottle of soda. As fast as you could you ran towards the door and opened the panel with the emergency security switch. In an instant thick steel bars were dropping down in front of the windows. You could still see out to the street where three more creatures had gathered. Two of them had made their way to the front of the store and were clawing at the glass clicking and hissing as they tried to get in.

“Is there somewhere we can barricade ourselves?” Chanyeol asked, grabbing you by the sleeve, dragging your shocked and frozen form back and away from the window.

“T-the safe room.” Seulgi stuttered. “We can lock it from the inside. There’s screens for the security cameras so we can see what’s happening out here.”

Chanyeol grabbed Baekhyun by the shoulders, “What do we need? We don’t know how long we’ll be inside there. Quick! What would you put in your bunker?”

“Seriously?” you asked returning yourself to the conversation, “Are you talking about video games right now.”

“Uhh.” Baekhyun shook his head, “No, he’s right...this is good. Water, weapons, lights. Like flashlights, fire, whatever works. Something to connect us to the outside world so we know when it’s safe, the cameras should work for that.”

“We’re not going to have all of that!” you yelled, frustrated and terrified as several other creatures had joined the ones trying to get inside and the glass started to crack under the pressure.

“Water jugs by the back door. They use them for the machine in the breakroom.” Seulgi said and looked over at you, “Come on, think, you can do this.”

“Ohh, god....Marco keeps a gun in the office...and flashlights! There are flashlights in the desk drawer. Gina! Gina keeps food in her locker.” You said, your brain finally starting to process things again.

“Alright go! GO!” Chanyeol shouted and you all made your way to the back.

You took the office where you got the gun, flashlights and batteries. You even found an old battery operated radio on the back of the shelf before you went for the safe. Chanyeol and Baekhyun had carried the water jugs and Seulgi had raided every cabinet for food and other things you might need. She had just made her way into the safe room when you heard the shattering of the windows in the showroom. Seulgi wrapped her arms around you and both of you sat together on the ground as Chanyeol secured the door. When he turned around he looked over at Baekhyun.

“Does your phone have service?

Looking down at the screen he shook his head no. “Door’s probably too thick.”

“What do we do now?” you whispered as Seulgi trembled in your arms.

Chanyeol sat down and sighed, “I...have no fucking idea. I think all we can do now is wait.”

[the-insomniac-emporium]

Hey! I saw you were taking requests :3 would you mind writing (hcs, scenario, anything!) a thing where, shortly pre-OVW recall, McCree and his old teammate (f or neutral pronouns are fine but it’s up to u!!) accidentally meet again after he left without warning? Bonus points for “I thought u were dead/I was never gonna see you again” type stuff :p thanks! Sorry if this was confusing!

{This was, like, super fun to write? I did kinda flip part of the script, but it still fits what you asked for (hopefully). Minor warning for implied alcoholism though, oops. It can also be read as more of a “bars exist for brawls” than “alcohol is my coping method” though, so maybe that’s not as bad??? IDK, at least the ending feels cute.} {-J}

After the fall of Overwatch and its subdivisions, there were certain things that you had been forced to accept: Dozens of your friends and coworkers had died, you were out of a job, and everything you had worked so hard for had crumbled into oblivion. So yeah, shit, you ended up drinking away your pain more than once. At this point you weren’t even sure how many places you were banned from. Still, you held onto the pride that came from never starting any fights, instead waiting for some asshole to decide he wanted to rumble with an ex-Blackwatch agent. It was messy, dangerous, and only added to your nasty reputation.

Few organizations would even think of hiring you. Did that make your drinking worse, or did your drinking make the job search harder?... It wasn’t something you wanted to dwell on, especially considering how desperately you were trying to change things. Mercenary work hadn’t suited you for long, as all your clients were faceless, mysterious forces pulling strings from the shadows. How could you trust that they weren’t like Talon?... Or like Blackwatch had become? In the end you had been forced to slink back into the shadows, praying to whatever gods may be that you could still do some good for the world.

That was a couple years ago. You had changed your name, traded out your old gear for something less suspicious, and set yourself up along the halfway point of Route 66. The area was known for its problems with gangs, violence, and a general lack of government intervention. Sure, the road itself spanned across eight different states, but most of it had been in a state of disrepair for a few decades now. The Omnic Crisis was the final push that sealed the region’s fate. Or, at least, it had been. Some people still cared.

Like you. Why else would you be here, now, scanning the horizon, a beer in one hand, binoculars in the other? There certainly weren’t any good birdwatching spots nearby. Just a rundown gas station perfect for staging ambushes, an old school diner with shitty coffee, and a dusty, dirty crevice up high, wonderful for keeping an eye on it all. You didn’t like it up here, but it was the only discreet place to perform surveillance on the local miscreants. 

Apparently a new gang was starting to harass people in the area, despite the proximity to Deadlock turf, and were trying to sell “insurance”. Understandably, that really pissed you off. Sweet-talking one of the locals had gotten you insight on the gang’s general daily routine. Nothing too specific, unfortunately. Now all you had to do was wait for the scum to show up so you could pound them into the dirt.

Taking a quick swig from your beer, you settled in a little, preparing to wait for who knows how long….

    Dust flew into the air like a trail of smoke, blurring your vision but not deterring you in the slightest. You slipped around your target, barely avoiding his second kick, before slamming your elbow into the back of his head. Sure enough he went crashing down with a thud. More dirt was kicked up in the process. At least it made it a little harder for the gang members still outside to target you. Another quick dash landed you behind cover, where you could finally take a moment to breathe.

    “Damn it,” you grumbled, hearing yet another bullet whiz past your hiding spot. There were still four or five gunmen outside. Truthfully, that was the total number of people you had expected to find, not just the backup boys. Sure, you had prepared for unforeseen hiccups, but apparently not enough. In over your head, stuck sitting like a duck, reminded more and more of the old days. Shit, you missed your teammates. Normally Jesse or Genji would have saved your ass by now.

    You missed them. So much, in fact, that you were pretty sure you just heard Jesse’s signature “high noon” line. It almost made you feel like you were a bit more tipsy than you had thought. When the sound of a revolver firing reached your ears, you couldn’t help but wonder if you had actually died; if so, this was the weirdest form of afterlife known to mankind. Curiosity ended up getting the best of you. Crawling to the side, you made sure not to reveal any part of yourself to your enemy, working your way towards the building’s secondary entrance. That was still within the gang’s line of sight, but you hoped it was far enough to the side that they wouldn’t immediately notice you poking around the corner.

    Sure enough, nobody shot at you when you turned the corner. Someone did, however, raise a silver revolver in your direction. Air got caught in your lungs as you stared down that ever-so-familiar barrel. Relief started to flood your chest… until you realized that the gunman wasn’t wavering in his stance. Your gaze follows up his arm, to his face, and you suddenly wish you weren’t wearing this stupid goddamn mask.

    “Hold it, buddy, unless you want to end up like your compadres back there,” Jesse McCree drawls, tipping his head back towards the fallen gang members. Evidently he hadn’t seen you beating the crap out of the ones inside. Still, you raised your hands slowly, showing your lack of weapons. “There we go. Now, take off that there lil’ mask, nice and easy, alright?” You complied, of course, tossing it to the side before throwing a grin in Jesse’s direction. His reaction made you really, really wish you had brought a camera. The normally smooth and put-together cowboy is now slack jawed, a sense of wonder (and something else…?) in his eyes. Soon your name drops from his lips, whispered like a sacred prayer.

    “It’s good to see you too, Jesse,” you manage to reply, still grinning like a fool. Hardly a moment passes before the wind is suddenly knocked out of you. Jesse had holstered his gun, closed the distance between the two of you, and pulled you into a hug in a matter of just a couple seconds. The action catches you by surprise, now making you the one to choke on the words caught in your throat. Still, you manage to hug him back, leaning in to gently rest your head against his chest.

    “Goddamnit, who gave you the right to surprise me like this?” He asks after a few moments of silence, his voice on the edge of breaking. His grip was tight, like a man desperate to keep his sanity clutching onto a lifetime of coping methods. Words failed you, barely managing a confused noise, as you pulled back just enough to look him in the eyes. There was something you couldn’t comprehend in his gaze. Something you were missing, that required knowledge you didn’t have. Your head tipped to the side as you hoped for at least a little elaboration. Jesse seems to realize your cluelessness, and shakes his head with a bitter laugh. “I thought you were dead,” he murmurs, the words settling on his tongue with an all-too-familiar weight.

    Shit, you thought, eyes going wide for a moment. Thoughts raced through your head as you tried to process what he said, thinking back to what had happened after Blackwatch’s disbandment, wondering why he could possibly have thought that you were-

….

….

    Fuck.

    Yeah, that tracked. Going from constantly fighting in bars to fucking off to nowhere, changing your name, and turning to the vigilante lifestyle? No shit people thought you were dead. How had you ever thought that this was a good idea?... Sure, most of your old friends had done the same, scattering across the four winds without so much as a “lol bye” (or, you know, a proper farewell). However, that didn’t mean that there weren’t still people who cared, who you could have at least made the slightest effort to keep in touch with before disappearing. People like Jesse.

    “Now that you mention it, I realize I didn’t exactly leave much room for thinking anything else,” you replied, barely managing to speak through your embarrassment. A laugh tried to move past your teeth, even though you knew the timing was bad, but the sound died as soon as your gaze met Jesse’s.

    “That’s one hell of an understatement, old friend,” he said, hardly a trace of mirth to his name. Both of his arms were still around your frame, gently cradling you, as if a stiff breeze might sweep you away from him once more. You could feel his body shifting with every breath he took, slowly finding yourself matching the movements. One of Jesse’s hands moves to cup your cheek, fingers sliding so carefully that you almost didn’t feel it, but you lean it instinctively, finding your lips placing a whisper of a kiss against his wrist. “Darling,” he breathes, voice caught in his throat, blocked by joy and surprise alike.

    “I’m sorry for worrying you, Jesse. I swear I never meant to just vanish like that,” you plead, tears pricking the corner of your eyes. “Things were bad, and I… I just ran from that, I guess. But you didn’t deserve that, at all, and I swear to whatever passes for high heaven these days, if you give me a chance-....” Pulled in closer, you couldn’t help but squeak a little when Jesse plants a kiss on your forehead. One of his hands is rubbing gentle circles into your back. A reassurance, one you desperately needed. “I can make it up to you. We can do better this time, right?...”

    Jesse didn’t say anything, at least not at first, but the feeling of his hat settling down on your head gave you all the answers you’d ever need.

[onlytaylor]

That time during the Battle of Hogwarts when Draco almost died in the Room of Requirement but kissed Harry Potter instead

Draco Malfoy limps. He fucking drags his leg behind him, pushing forward and sacrificing every ounce of repituity while doing so.

It was the fucking snake. Nagini, the one who’d lived with them for months at Malfoy Manor. The one who the Dark Lord had fed numerous times in front of his followers, Draco chewing his cheek with silent opposition.

And now, it had bit him right in the arse. Just a bit lower in all technicality, but Draco didn’t care. He just wanted solace.

He hadn’t meant to show the slightest reluctance to the Dark Lord’s plan to invade the school. To “catch Potter once and for all” as soon as his presence had been identified. Forgive him- Draco loved Hogwarts. It was the only place he’d ever felt (and he’d kill you if you knew this) home. At school, he had his friends. He had games of exploding snap and good-willed jabs between housemates and witty banter. He had Potter to annihalate with sarcastic comebacks and the like. It all gave him fuel; a sense of purpose.

Now, that fuel had been ignited by dark magic and curses that set the turrets on fire. Creatures ran rampant, killing those in their wake. Some of the braver students had stuck around and threw counter-spells from behind posts and make-shift debris walls. In the midst of it all, Draco limps.

He pulls his leg to the Room of Requirement, where he knows Potter will be. He’s known him far too long to guess his motives. His plans were like clockwork, a rhythmic and predictable rouse. Or maybe, Draco was just that keen at sensing his thoughts and ideas.

He doesn’t have a lot of time; he’s figured that much out. Even if he manages to outrun Voldemort, the poison will still inevitably travel through his circulatory system. He’s already broken into a cold sweat as he approaches his destination.

Potter’s already there, rummaging through stacks of decade old-belongings that only the Room of Hidden Things would hold. He’s clearly searching for something.

“Malfoy.” He starts, pointing his wand at Draco’s chest. He’s alone, and the silence that ensues is almost unsettling. But this time, Draco doesn’t care.

He doesn’t care that he’s spent the last 7 years arguing with this boy. He doesn’t give a flying fuck that he’s on the dead end of his wand. He’s dying, and he doesn’t bother with small details.

He focuses instead on the vibrancy of his stare, the way his green eyes cut through him like no one else ever could. The soft patches of dirt that bespeckle his face and hands from battle. The beads of sweat that slowly trickle down the side of his neck, reflecting his urgency.

“I don’t have time for games right now!” He shouts, eyes darting around the room for his lost object while his wand remains steady. They then come to rest on his form, his bloody and pathetic lower half that trails lifelessly behind him.

“Wait, Malfoy- you’re- you’re hurt.”

Draco doesn’t respond. He tells himself his hard swallow is the effect of the snake venom, but he knows it’s a lie. It’s always been.

The caring tone to Potter’s voice, the way he lowers his wand and rushes to inspect him regardless of his mission is enough to push him over the edge. To ignite that same fire deep within his belly, blazing wild and free.

“What happened?” Potter is close, too close, and Draco finds it hard to catch his breath. That’s what happens when you’re dying, right?

“Fucking snake,” is all he manages to squeak, and suddenly he’s light headed. He slides downward to the floor, and Potter, against all odds, reaches to catch him.

Now they’re both on the ground, Draco panting and Potter pointing his wand at the wound. “Reinervate!” He commands, but nothing happens.

Again, louder. “Reinervate!”

“It’s fine, Potter. Don’t waste your time on me. You’ve got bigger fish to fry.” He smirks, and this is all too real. Potter’s caring for him. It’s nice and warm. Peaceful.

“Fuck, Malfoy, when did you become such a selfless git?” He’s smiling, and Draco chuckles. It’s a beautiful truce, winding and weaving Draco whole.

“When you decided to save the world, I guess.” Living Draco Malfoy would never be so vulnerable, allowing the sharp silence to fill the air between them. He’d scoff, or roll his eyes before running infinitely in the opposite direction. Dying Draco, however, was a fucking sap. He refused to deny himself what he’d been missing, buried upon layers of mistakes and bad decisions. Potter draws in a sharp inspiration before settling into Draco’s gaze.

“Why didn’t you tell them? Bellatrix- you knew it was me. You knew it was me, and you didn’t say anything...”

Draco laughs softly. “Because, you idiot, it was always you. Always fucking you. And I fucked up; I ruined my chance to be good. But you... you are what good aspires to be. And I hate that about you, I always have.” He pauses, grinning and shaking his head at his own stupidity. “But it’s what makes you Saint Potter, and you deserve every piece of it.”

Potter’s mouth drops into the finest of “O’s,” and Draco can’t help but stare at the plump crimson of his lower lip.

“Malfoy- Draco- what the fuck,” he whispers, and it’s not a question, but a foretelling. His voice is raspy; he swallows hard against a dry throat. His eyes are reflective pools of the past seven years, memories dancing across his irises as he realizes the implication of Draco’s words. He licks his lips, studying the boy before him. The boy that was wholesome and selfless and good despite all previous notion.

Before he can answer, Draco points upward. “Potter, look,” He states, his hazy vision landing on the most peculiar glint of sapphire. “It’s a diadem. Isn’t it pretty?”

“It’s a-“ Harry turns suddenly, whipping toward the direction of Draco’s gesture. Sure enough, there, propped against a dusty old mannequin atop a mound of antiquities, was exactly what he’d been looking for.

His face lights up, cheeks a rosy pink as they’re pulled taut. “Draco, you fucking prat, you found it! You-“

He jolts back to look at him, but his lids have come to a gentle close. His chest rises and falls in a shallow rhythm, and Harry notices the amount of blood that’s pooled around them.

“Draco, no! Fuck!” He glances around, desperate for some sort of answer, before deciding to cup Draco’s face in his hands.

“You can’t go and do this now, you wanker! Not when you just told me how you feel! Draco, please, please-“ he Grips for dear life, but Draco’s face is cool to the touch.

His stomach clenches. How has everything he’d known to be true flipped in just a matter of minutes? How did he end up here, begging his arch nemesis to be alive?

He runs a hand along the edge of Draco’s jaw, and he stirs a bit. His fingers glide lower, down the soft plane of his neck and collarbone. Draco shivers. Potter laughs.

“You like that, don’t you?” He smiles, playfully amused as he trails a path down Draco’s chest. The caress is heaven, and in his semiconscious state Draco feels whole. Green eyes flicker down to his lips, pale but smooth despite his current state. Harry knows this is it, and it’s all or nothing. There is no longer right and wrong; light or darkness. It’s only Draco, and himself, and everything that he’d thought he’d known to be true snowing gently in broken bits all around them.

He bites his lip, making a characteristically Harry decision- a rash, exuberant, intuition-driven thought that just feels right. And as he leans forward, closing the gap between them, he knows there’s no going back.

He’s going to get them out of here. Destroy the diadem. And- Goddamnit- Draco is going to get another chance.

Draco’s eyes fly open as Harry presses their lips into a soft embrace. It’s as if kissing fucking Harry Potter causes more of a shock to his system than the venom coursing through his veins, and suddenly he’s wide awake.

His hands are tingling; he’s nauseous; the room is spinning. And absolutely no part of that has to do with the injury to his leg.

Draco relaxes; allows himself to succumb to the warmth that spreads throughout his body. God, Nothing had ever felt like this before. If this was the type of reprieve that dying got him, then by golly-

Harry pulls away suddenly, and the absence is heavily vacant upon his lips. His stomach twinges as Harry snaps upward. It is all too evident that they are no longer alone.

“Potter! I fucking found you! You’re dead!” The voice belongs to Crabbe, and Draco is just coherent enough to make out his figure. He’s accompanied by Goyle, waving his wand about, attempting haphazardly to bring about some type of spell. Draco raises a weak hand to protest, but flames are already shooting from the tip of his wand toward a pile of rubbish beside them.

“Fu-fucking fiendfyre,” he whispers, and realization dawns on Harry as he realizes what Draco’s said. Crabbe wasn’t joking. They needed to get the diadem and get the fuck out of there.

In the nick of time, the door opens to reveal Weasley and Granger, who immediately hurl spells at Draco’s childhood friends. The robotic henchmen that he’s realized were no more loyal to him than his own father. They were blind, the lot of them, sightlessly following orders from the Dark Lord. Draco dodges, protecting his face from the fallout. Magic sparks the air, and an urgency radiates between all parties as Crabbe’s flames begin to violently spread.

Harry squeezes his hand before jetting forward, climbing the Mound of Things to retrieve the diadem. Crabbe and Goyle are distracted momentarily by the fire, which has formed the shape of a large serpent and seems to be forming ideas by its own volition.

Ron Weasley stares with his mouth open as the snake rears it’s head, and even Crabbe seems surprised at his own doing. Hermione, in a fit of logic, grasps his hand and pulls him from the direct path of the flames as the serpent strikes.

Harry’s tumbling, struggling to find hand-holds in the pile as things get heated. He’s almost to the diadem, and Draco is silently willing his thoughts to persuade his victory. He can hardly move, and in the midst of chaos he notices that his leg is tingling.

In the next moment, several things seem to happen simultaneously. Harry suddenly grabs the diadem. Ron and Hermione have summoned brooms and are hastily mounting their only means of escape. Crabbe and Goyle back away, terrified, as the snake turns on its master and slithers toward them. Draco observes it all, shaking slightly as his muscles contract involuntarily. His leg, it’s burning, and it’s as if the more the flames travel from object to object the more consuming the pain becomes.

Ron and Hermione are ascending rapidly toward Harry. The flames are climbing higher, ignited on old parchment rolls and other treasures from previous students. Harry is pulled onto Ron’s broomstick as he steers to the exit.

Harry screams objections, yelling at his friend to turn the broom around. Draco’s stomach lurches at the sentiment, but he knows it’s over for him.

The serpent’s attention is diverted to the trio as they halt and sharply turn backward. Weasley’s grumbling is barely audible above the high-pitched whine of the fire, and Draco begins to cough as smoke chokes the air.

The snake strikes, and a shower of flames lands around him. His leg, it’s on fire, it’s on fucking fire...

The pain intensifies. He’s going to pass out soon, he’s sure. His flesh is screaming, but all he can vocalize is a string of choked coughs. His throat is raw, but it’s nothing, nothing compared to the bite of that fucking snake...

He’s barely conscious, but he feels a tugging sensation on his limbs. And then he’s weightless, like he’s riding on air. The pain, it’s lessening. He must be close to death...

Harry. He thinks of that kiss, the one that forever erased the line between good and evil. How ironically it was the most alive he’d ever felt. And how if heaven was real, and if Draco Malfoy was lucky enough to end up there, he’d spend an eternity reveling in that one moment.

He allows his thoughts to consume him, until his leg is painless. He’s floating, flying... until he’s not.

He feels himself fall, tumbling forward, and then the slam of the floor against his chest brings him back to reality. His eyes flash open, miraculously, to find that he’s facing the entrance to the Room of Requirement. The door is closing, and there’s a serpent, and the room is engulfed in flames...

But as it seals shut, he’s left in the silence that he suddenly realizes is indicative of his safety. Next to him is Granger, pulling Ron to a standing position. On his other side is Harry, fucking Harry...

He’s lifting himself from the floor and begins running straight toward Draco, bruised and splattered with soot. Before he can open his mouth to speak, Harry’s arms are thrown around him.

“Your leg, Draco! How is it?” He pants, pulling away slightly to examine the wound.

But it’s vanished.

Draco’s mouth falls inexplicably, and he’s unable to make sense of anything that’s happened in the past ten minutes.

He gapes stupidly, breath heading as he grasps the fact that he’s suddenly fucking alive and his leg doesn’t hurt and there’s no bite. And Harry fucking Potter is still holding him, and it’s so much that he can’t handle it.

Overwhelmed with emotion, he stares at Potter, who’s a fucking light at the end of the incessant, winding tunnel that’s been his life the past few years. He becomes lost in the details of his face, cheeks flushed crimson with adventure and green eyes peering from behind glasses that were probably permanently crooked by now. He pulls his lip between his teeth as he too contemplates what happened.

“Fiendfyre.” Granger’s voice pierces the quiet confusion. “It’s a dark enough spell to destroy a horcrux. That’s why when you dropped the diadem, Harry, it disentigrated.”

“Oh my God, Hermione, Nagini is-“

“A horcrux.” She finished, and Draco glanced between them. Ron’s eyes were glazed over, and for the first time in his life Draco Malfoy felt he could relate. The logistics of it all quickly faded however as Harry’s eyes positively brightened.

“Draco, I don’t know fucking how, but when the fiendfyre caught your leg... it must have reversed the effects of the snake bite.” He’s smiling, a wide, wholesome grin, and Draco finally catches his breath.

“I’m- I’m not dying,” he declares, more to himself than anyone else, and Harry’s still beaming as he presses a continuation of their earlier kiss to his lips. It’s war, but in this brief moment, they’re fucking happy, and that’s all that matters.

“You know, I’m not dying, Hermione,” Ron tries with a helpless shrug, and she blushes before slapping his arm.

“Come on, boys,” she says determinedly to them all, “we’ve got a war to win.”