#but none of them has been abandoned

[chrkrose]

I’ve received some anons about r/WesterosTea and I’m here to inform them and anyone who is reading and hasn’t given up on it that… I’m updating it today 👀

[piko-power]

My Personal Headcanon On Why Amy's Love For Sonic Died Down Lately (and their dynamic)

When they were younger, Amy's love for Sonic was pretty extreme, and Sonic was, understandable, uncomfortable for the most part. He knows she means well, but that girl needs to calm down.

She can fight, but sometimes her hammer could only stun her enemies for a while. (It took her a long time to get rid of that robot that has been chasing her around Station Square.) She wasn't fully independent yet, even if she fought on her own a couple of times.

She often follows Sonic and his friends around. She is part of the team, but she was not a strong as she is now at the time yet.

She admires Sonic. A LOT. And Sonic knows that. Obviously, he could only run away from something like that, since he is NOT ready for that kind of thing, and whether Amy takes the hint or stop, she still loves him.

...BUT, I think things were slightly starting to change between her and Sonic after Lost World.

Remember this line?

You remember that? Okay, okay. Here's another totally unrelated question:

Before the events of Lost World, when was the last time Amy said "I love you" to Sonic out loud?

...YEP. 😈 (Unless I'm missing something, let me know lmao)

As more games and adventures come out, the characters get slightly older, and Amy is 12 to 13 now, and she is most certainly at that age where her body starts to change, but especially on how she views Sonic.

She knows she loves Sonic, but it was this moment during her change where she actually wanted to admit that she loves him.

I believe that Amy was all about sharing her affection to him not through confessions, but through obvious hints. Sonic totally got it, and there was no need to confess. Sonic knows she loves her.

...But she never said it. And she almost did, but she never did again for a while.

I think this was the moment in her life where, oh, God, she actually loves Sonic. SHE LOVES HIM, WHAT.

And she was looking back at all the times she had with Sonic that she can now see were unpleasant to Sonic (At least that's what she thinks) and that's probably why she isn't so expressive about her love to him than how she used to back then.

She wasn't sure what to do with this realization, and sets aside it for a while, and nearly stayed as her casual, peppy self... until the Eggman War happened.

During the 6 months of being with the Resistance, fighting Eggman's army all day and all night, all she can think of was Sonic.

She dreams that he still with not just her, but with her friends. She just wanted to see Sonic again, she just wants to be with her hero again.

But I'd like to think that she was also thinking about how she used to treat Sonic back when they were younger, how Sonic would almost always run away from her whenever she asks him out, or always look so uncomfortable whenever she gets so close to him.

Cringing at those memories big time, she wanted to change and hopefully when Sonic is okay and comes back, she can be better for him.

...Or will he still find her uncomfortable regardless? Would he even be happy to see her at all if he did survive?

But, hold on! She can't just give up her love for Sonic! He made her who she is today! A peppy, nature-loving, hammer-swinging, confident, brave... loud-mouth... annoying... Sonic obsessed... weak... pathetic... lonely little girl.

If she gives up on Sonic, it'll be like she gave up on the one hedgehog who saved her life. If she didn't she'll still be the same ol' Amy.

I also like to think she had parents a long while before she met Sonic, and was even expecting a little sister, but a robot invasion happened from where she was and attacked her parents and instead of trying to save them, after getting hurt, she ran away, hoping that they'll come back okay. But they never did.

She was all alone, and needed someone, a friend, a new family, someone who will hold her hand, anyone, to be there for her. But she was ignored by lots, and at that point, she's better off by herself, but still longed for company.

Eventually though, her tarot cards told her her future hero, and there might be hope after all. She encountered Sonic, held onto the belief of the cards tight, and the rest is history.

So, with that headcanon in mind, not only did Amy loose her parents that she didn't save because of her cowardliness (she was only so little at the time that happened) and also Sonic, who she thought will be her only hope, but now gone.

She doesn't even care if he did come back, he'd probably hate her now after everything she did to him, always talking about their "future wedding" or forcing him to go to Twinkle Park.

For the last few months of the war, it was nothing but Amy mentally beating herself up for either refusing to change or moving on, and they are both not fine choices.

She loves Sonic, but he does not love her, and she finally, finally realized it. And it's probably for the best if no body loved her at all.

But of course Sonic did survive and all of her worries wash away in an instant, she's just not expressive about her love for Sonic AT ALL now, since she's still worried about it but rather not mention it to Sonic because it doesn't matter.

If Sonic doesn't love her, then her feelings don't matter to him, and according to Amy herself, that is okay.

But also, I'd like to think that Sonic was thinking about his friends a lot up in the Death Egg for the past months, sometimes it's Tails (worried for his safety), sometimes it's Shadow (because he's wondering why he would join Eggman.) At some point, for a few days, Amy was in his mind the longest, and he felt bad about how he thought he was rude and pushy to her.

He wondered if she's not thinking about it too much, and if she is, will she give up on him? Yeah, he doesn't feel the same and still not looking for a relationship, but it's so strange but interesting how anyone could ever like someone like Sonic the Hedgehog. Amy was never afraid to show that, and she probably might be now.

He couldn't help but feel guilty. They were kids when she was like this, but he was so... arrogant at the time too. Not a lot happened at the time yet. He'd always have trouble expressing how much he value his friends, until he shattered the Paradox Prism. (I'd like to think Prime took place before Forces. It makes sense.)

She is such a sweet girl, and he probably made her believe that he didn't care for her. Just because he doesn't feel the same, that doesn't mean he hates her at all.

He wished he never ran away from Amy... Worrying for his little bro and wishing to be a good person for Amy was when Sonic cried in the Death Egg for the first and only time.

Frontiers, in my opinion, is kind of confirming their dynamic now. Sonic is a lot more sincere and kinder to Amy and she is not all hyperactive and lovey to Sonic. There is probably a real reason for this now.

They are both hiding their feelings from them, and they are both unaware of this. Amy, hiding her mental issues from Sonic, and Sonic, hiding his guilt away from Amy.

None of those things are important now. Sonic is with Amy and Amy is with Sonic. They are here with each other. They can be finally be better for each other now.

They don't care if they'll ever be something more when they get older. None of that matters anymore. They are here with each other. They can be finally be better for each other now.

Maybe someday they'll both talk about it, but for now, the present is important. They care about each other too much to think about it right now.

It's the kind of love that is unbreakable. It doesn't even have to be romantic. It's just love. Love is important for everyone, in any form. It's something Sonic and his friends need. And especially Sonic and Amy.

Amy Rose is the living embodiment of love, and without her, a lot would go downhill for Sonic and co. Heck, if it weren't for her, Shadow wouldn't have never remembered Maria's promise, which lead him to save the world with Sonic, before he temporarily disappeared from their lives for a while.

She is always there to lend a helping hand for anybody, even bad guys like Metal Sonic, and despite what she had been through, both in Forces and headcanon wise, she still fights back, even without her hammer.

She will pick you back up on your feet, reminding you that you are important and that you are loved, and that you should never give up. It's pretty much the words of encouragement she herself needed also...

She is still the happy, hyper, butt-kicking hedgehog we all know and love, but she still need someone to pick her back up on her feet after so long. Thankfully, she has her friends and her blue hero. The hero who made her who she is today.

I think Amy has no idea how important she thought she is, but Sonic does. Sonic knows fully well how important she is to a lot of people. It's about time he returns the favor to her. It's his turn to remind her how much a lot of people love her.

How much he loves her.

And I feel like The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog was the moment where their dynamic really shined, but also the starting point of their relationship not only healing, but also the next chapter of what's to come for them.

Everyone, friends old and new, gathered around for a special birthday. A birthday for the confident, unshakable, and radiant Amy Rose.

It was such a special moment in Amy's life. After years of chasing and following the people she look up to, she is part of the team, but most importantly, she is part of the family.

She is fully realized as someone more than just a fangirl, but someone strong, courageous, creative, kind and a big inspiration for others.

I feel like this moment here...

-is where Amy is eternally grateful to call her friends her family. A family she thought she'll never have again. She's not alone anymore, and as long as they're by her side, she'll never will be again.

Her chasing days are over. She's finally caught up to them. She's finally home.

And it's all thanks to Sonic.

If it weren't for him, she'd probably be alone forever. Her past moments with Sonic might be embarrassing to look back on for a while, but they are good memories regardless, because they involve him.

Sonic saved her life in more ways than one, and despite everything, he's grateful to have her too.

He cares about her. He really does... And in her eyes, that all she needed to know. As long as Sonic loves her in his own way, she'll be happy.

Amy hasn't given up on Sonic. As long as Amy always supports him, he'll be happy.

Maybe sometime in the future, they can talk about their problems, but that's a story for another time. At this point, they need to. Right now, they are happy. They are okay.

They are here for each other. They are finally better for each other now.

"You guys won't ever leave me, right?"

"Wouldn't dream of it."

[gu6chan]

the brief mention that 1.3 leonard could still be feeling some deep lingering grief over his brothers' deaths still never fails to fascinate me tbh like, does he think of the standards he must have lost since their passing and feel guilt? or does he see them in every child he abuses??? does he keep his grief to himself or does he find it a useful anecdote to what must be a countless number of families dealing with loss??? does the green dragon know? does he confide in it????? since leonard seems to be aware of what arioch lost to the union, just how aware is/was she in what HE lost???????? did they have a role in each other's loss? is THAT where their beef came from??????? im going to merge into a wall

[bibleofficial]

need you to know i genuinely enjoy your blog - part of what makes it great is that its clear that you go outside and party and fuck!! so many people in this website just don’t fuck 🤧

omg !!! ❤️❤️❤️ don’t replicate my sin u will go to hell

[toytulini]

act annoying on this post and ill block you ♡

everyone accusing black sails fans of Being Rude In The Notes owes me $10 for making me look in the notes (like. What. WHERE) and $10 more for subsequently making me witness the Stede fans also being unhinged petty assholes but it doesnt count when they do it, i guess?

at this point im saltier about Black Sails fans being repeatedly being called assholes but ofmd fans Not being called out for probably the same behavior or worse? and with what feels like very little. evidence? god damn

[aceofthegreenajah]

Thinking about Mountains of Mourning got me rereading it again for the millionth time. Every time I think, 'surely by now it has no hold of me? I know every turn it takes, can damn near recite parts of it.' And here I am, sobbing.

The story itself is beautiful, the language is gorgeous, but there is also something in the setting that speaks to me personally.

Our family farm is in a community smaller than silvy vale, and has been in the family for at least a couple of centuries. It's in the least populated and most backwater part of the country. And my country itself is small and insignificant, sparsely populated, mostly wilderness. In the eyes of some we may be backwater forest folk, tough as our land and just as stuck in our ways.

And I am a very tied-to-the-earth person. I am at home barefoot in the forest, fishing in the lakes, foraging in the swamps, working with animals, chopping wood. These forests are my forests, this land is my land. I was born on it and if I have to be buried, I want to be buried in it. I've never wanted to leave for better pastures. I've wished I could hold my home and my people up.

So though I cry for the beauty of the language and the message, and the grief of the plot, I also cry for the happy ending that Silvy Vale receives.

[curseofbreadbear]

there is something just so profoundly devastating to me about the way the animatronics are left to rot in ruin

[ninjagotohell]

I just read a whole wacky thread of people arguing which parent was bad Garmadon or Misako and I’m no longer scared of the Misako defenders

[ageless-aislynn]

Darn it, I ran out of time to post my WIP tonight and I won’t have time tomorrow but... Mark your calendars, frens: “Cupid’s Kiss” (Eobard/Caitlin, The Flash) chapters 3 and the epilogue in 4, coming to a screen near you on Monday, Feb 27, 2023.

Barry doesn’t look like he believes me. Well, Barry... I can’t blame you for that, lol. But I’ve legit got the draft of Chapter 3 up into AO3 at long last, which is my next-to-last step in posting it. This is where I try to catch typos, wrong words, etc. because sometimes seeing it as it’s going to look on AO3 helps those things to pop out. That’s a step we haven’t gotten to before now, so that’s hopeful at least!

This one has dragged on for so long, there might not be anybody left to read it. But that’s okay. I just want to know that I didn’t give up, even when I wanted to. Even when it hurt. I want to be able to look back and know that made it across the finish line.

“The Price” (Caitlin/Hunter, The Flash) has its first chapter very close to being done, and I’m hoping it will be the next to post. I also intend to finish “Guardian Angel” (Caitlin/Eobard, The Flash) in another 1 or 2 chapters or so.

“15 Minutes” (John/Reader, Halo) has some major stuff coming up, so I’m planning on sticking to it once it gets going again. “Recreation” (Kai/maleReader, Halo) will continue to weave in and out of “15 Minutes” as well, though will probably be pulling away a bit so that we’re not continually just being a third-party p.o.v. on something going on with John and his reader. 😉 Lastly, the Choose Your Own Spartan Adventure fic for Noble Team (Noble Team/Reader, Halo: Reach) is still in progress. Which isn’t probably a shock to anybody who’s noticed all of my Reach love as of late. I’m also going to do another GIFset or two for my Noble Team bbs because I love them so much.

I hope there will be somebody out there who’s interested in something I have coming up 🤞😣🤞 but, truthfully, I just want to get these things done. Once completed, I’ll evaluate where I’m going to go from there. 🤷‍♀️

Thanks for reading this all, if you did. Thanks especially to those who liked or replied to my previous posts about all of this, even if the fics I’m talking about aren’t in your fandom and aren’t something you’ll read. Just having some encouragement... It’s meant a lot. I’ve been struggling a ridiculous amount over all of this and honestly just seeing a simple like helps me to feel like I’m not out here all alone, in pain for nothing at all. Even if I actually am. 🤷‍♀️

Love you, frens. I hope you’re having a good weekend. 🤗

[chococopudding]

e

[foone]

We keep finding space stations, and we don't know why yet.

Most are in orbit around planets, but plenty more are orbiting moons, stars, the odd black hole, or just floating in deep space.

Their age varies, some are so old that just getting close enough to dock makes them shatter like glass, others are so recently constructed that the lights are still on and the reactors are still fueled. All are empty of any life or robots smarter than a roomba.

The ones orbiting planets are orbiting dead worlds, or living worlds where nothing on them is smart enough to launch a space station.

The stations in deep space are weirder. The most information came from the one by Epsilon Eridani. A massive installation, it had docking rings for hundreds of vessels, all empty. It was in remarkable shape for how old it was (from the unrepaired micrometeorite impacts, we estimate it has been abandoned for about 3000 years), so we were able to access a lot of information from its main computer. We found the coordinates of several home planets, and visited them all. All were dead, empty, or in one case, simply missing. The star was still there, the other uninhabitable planets mentioned in the databanks were there, but their homeworld? Gone. No debris or expanding gas cloud, it's just missing.

And that's the thing: if we found space stations along with abandoned ruins of ground-based installations, that'd make sense. If we met dozens of living races, amongst a few empty satellites of long dead races, that'd also be expected. But this is all the evidence we're not alone in the universe we've found.

We've sent probes to over half the stars in this galaxy and visited hundreds in crewed spacecraft, but the empty space stations are the only evidence of alien life. Every planet is either a sterile husk, a gas giant, or a vibrant living world with nothing smarter than a giraffe living on it. Oh, there's strange life forms of every kind! But none of them seem sapient, certainly not sapient enough to build a space station.

Where is everyone? We've been asking that question since we first understood the Drake Equation and the Fermi paradox, but the question has taken on a new form as we've gone to the stars and found endless empty houses in the sky.

It's the difference between looking at an empty desert and walking through an abandoned city. In both cases, there's a silent emptiness, but in the latter case, it seems to contain a sinister element. This place is empty, but it shouldn't be. Something made it empty, and we haven't found out why yet.

We keep looking, and keep listening to the echoes of our own footsteps in the silent habitats.

[charlietheepicwriter7]

Despite Danny's best efforts, no matter how much time past, Amity Park refused to see Phantom as a hero.

Sure, there were pockets of support, particularly among teens, but most of the town blames Phantom for the property damage, saying if he didn't fight the ghosts then it wouldn't be so bad, to that time he got mind controlled by Freakshow and "attacked" the mayor. It wears him down. It wears Tucker and Sam down. Jazz can only try to support them all.

Then one day, a member of the Justice League visits. Someone minor, and kinda a jerk... maybe a Wonder Twin? Zan? Whatever. They don't investigate; they don't look deeper. They listen to the town folks and declare the ghost hunters, Red Huntress and the Fentons, to be the official heroes of the town.

Worse? Danny Phantom is officially considered a villain to the Justice League. Tuck hacks into the Watchtower and confirms that they have a file (a heavily inaccurate file) about how to defeat Phantom.

Danny doesn't think he can do this anymore.

A few weeks later, a young villain escapes into Amity and demands (begs) that Danny help them escape from the hero after them. No idea who, I can't find a lot of info on teen villains in DC, so let's fudge some ages and make it Kyd Wyckyd from the Teen Titans cartoon. Danny agrees, because to hell with the Justice Losers, and they defeat the hero, becoming friends in the process. Kyd confesses that they became a villain after being ostracized bc of how they look, and they've been trying to avoid villain organizations because HIVE was abusive, but it's really hard to be a villain alone bc of all the heroes.

Sam gets an idea. Tucker agrees with the idea. Jazz is just happy they'll end up making friends.

The next day, the Teen Villain Alliance is formed, ready to assist with any teenage illegal shenanigans their allies might get into.

Some notes:

It's created to be a healthier option for teen "villains" to connect with others and support each other.

It's more important that this is for Teens rather than Villains. They're tired of adult villains taking advantage of them. The TVA would rather ally with a teen vigilante than with an adult villain.

Again, no idea who the teen villains are, but Klarion is definitely here. He leaves the Light for the chaos of the TVA. Maybe Ember is there too?

Timeline wise, this is around when Tim is still Robin, but Damien has arrived at Wayne Manor.

This is because, when it comes time to try to infiltrate the TVA, they'll have a convenient child-assassin who has none of the monitors of a teen hero that Phantom immediately picks up on.

Damien, who at this point has been abandoned by his mother, dismissed and scolded by his father, and has had no success at carving his own place in the family, jumps at the chance. He is then surrounded by peers who don't insult him or try to change his behavior (too much; jazz is trying to help him find healthier methods of expressing himself). He... might not want to continue being a spy.

Danny, Sam, Tuck, and Jazz are the founding members.

Danny reinvents himself as the High Prince of the Infinite, Prince Phantom Dark. He got kingship from fighting Pariah Dark, but since he's still alive, he's only a prince. He steals the last name Dark as an intimidation tatic against those in the know; only Danny would have the balls to claim family with Pariah.

Sam works as a powerless villain, but she might no be powerless? Either way, Danny gives her a bunch of repurposed Fenton tech, and she buys the rest with her parents credit card. She does NOT care if that's traced back to the Mansons. She would choose something goth, maybe something spider related or even bat?

I love Pharaoh Tucker, so I think he should get magic powers? Since pharaohs of old were considered the balance between the real and the divine. He's still a tech guy, now he's a tech and magic guy.

Jazz isn't really a villain, more of a team mom who's planning on using everyone's psyche's as her thesis paper. You know what, that's her callsign, she's Psyche. Sometimes she flirts with Nightwing.

[soaps-mohawk]

Cherry Red, Crimson Blood

Chapter 37: The Silence

Summary: Tensions are at an all time high in the pack as an eerie silence settles over the cottage

Pairing: Poly 141 x reader

Word Count: 6,069 words

Warnings: Angst, heavy emotions, arguing, medical stuff, injuries, descriptions of pain, brief discussion about strangulation, so much crying, Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics, Alternate Universe, panic attack, PTSD, language

A/N: Uh yeah, this one did emotional damage. Prepare yourselves.

MASTERLIST | <- Previous | Next ->

They stand there watching like four knights in a tower guarding their kingdom. Their eyes are glued ahead, staring through the glass out into the backyard. They’re alert and watchful, eyes assessing and scanning for any threats. There are none except for your trembling legs. 

They stand there watching like four knights guarding their princess. None of them are brave enough to move, none of them dare break the moment. They can’t help but wonder what’s going on in your head, what drove you to push past the pain and exhaustion to shuffle your way outside. 

Panic bubbled in Kyle’s chest when he saw you shuffling your way across the living area. He’d nearly intervened when you stumbled, but John’s hand on his chest stopped him. You were in your own world, oblivious to everyone and everything as you shuffled determinedly toward the back door. They’d silently followed you, Johnny and Simon joining them when they descended the stairs. 

All you’ve done is stand out there. It feels like it’s been an hour, but it’s been less than five minutes. You’re frozen there, all except for the tremble of your legs and the subtle shake of your shoulders. 

You’re crying. 

It hurts his soul. It tears through his very chest as he watches you. He wants nothing more than to run out there and take you in his arms and soothe your tears. 

He can’t. 

He lost those privileges when they left you, when they betrayed you, when they abandoned you. It may have been John’s choice, but they were all complacent in it. None of them fought that decision, none of them questioned it. Would John have changed his mind if they did? Could they have avoided all of this if they had just questioned their alpha, their captain? 

Not all of it would have been unavoidable. 

You would have still been hurt. You would have still been traumatized. There was no guarantee Graves would have held off, even if they came for you in the first place. Things might have been worse. Graves might have gotten impulsive as soon as he realized the outcome of his own situation. 

Shepherd fucked him over too in the end. 

Things happened the way they did and they can’t change that. That’s what Christine keeps telling them. The past is the past and you can only work to build the future. 

It’s going to take a lot of work. 

“How long has she been out there?” Christine asks, stepping up next to them. 

“About four minutes.” Simon answers. 

“She shouldn’t be out there like that.” Christine goes to move to the door, but John stops her. 

“Let her have a moment.” He says, still staring out the window. “She needs it.” 

Christine lets out a quiet huff but she doesn’t move, turning her gaze out the sliding glass door as well. 

You continue to stand there, frozen like a statue. Time passes slowly, all of them captivated by the silent moment they’re witnessing. It’s almost hypnotic. The fading light, your figure standing there surrounded by grey skies and green earth like some sort of painting. 

Pain and bliss. 

That’s what he’d title it. He knows that’s what you must be feeling. Pain, visible and invisible from wounds that go far deeper than the flesh. Pain in its purest form as you stand there under heavy grey skies that echo the heaviness in your mind. The bliss echoes from John’s words, his reveal of your desire to see the ocean again, to stand on its shores and let its essence consume you.

It all makes sense now. No wonder you would cling to him the most, press your face into his neck and just breathe. His own briney scent was a gateway to what you desired in your landlocked position. How long had you been holding that desire in? Were you disappointed when you rolled up on their doorstep to find yourself still far away from the sea? You hid that desire from the knowledge that, as an omega, your wants and needs would always come last, in the knowledge that their jobs would come first and you would be at the mercy of that job. 

His eyes burn with tears as he stares at you. 

You begin to tremble more and more the longer you stand there, shifting on your feet. It breaks the haze they’ve all been frozen in, the five of them snapping back into reality. Christine is out the door before any of them can move, hurrying to your side. She wraps an arm around your back, careful not to touch your left arm as she steadies you. Kyle jumps into action automatically after her, hurrying to your new designated room to grab the wheelchair. With how much effort it took to walk out there, you won’t be walking back in. 

He wheels it out, holding it still as Christine maneuvers you into it. As much as he doesn’t want to, he turns, slipping back in the door as Christine wheels you towards the house. The four of them watch as she passes, time pausing as they stare at you. You don’t look up at them, don't acknowledge them at all. Your gaze is turned down in your lap, head lowered as you hunch, shoulders rounded.

Pain and exhaustion are weighing on you from your exertion as Christine takes you back to your room. How heavy the world must seem from the combined weight of your physical and mental injuries. The state of your mind would be one thing, but being stuck in a temporary handicapped state due to your physical injuries must be driving you nearly insane. There’s no getting away, no isolation. You can’t even walk fully unaided yet. 

There’s no freedom.  

All of them share a look in the heavy silence, understanding without even needing to say a word. 

The mug is burning his fingers but he can’t bring himself to care. His gaze is locked, mind focused elsewhere. He hasn’t moved in so long his joints are aching, but he can’t find it in himself to even shift his position.

“Drinking it black?” His fingers twitch as Kyle takes the seat next to him, his own mug of tea in his hands. It clunks as he sets it on the table before he lowers himself into the chair with a sigh. “That’s low even for you.” 

Simon lets out a grunt, eyes still focused out the sliding glass door. 

“She’s fine.” Kyle says, pulling out his phone. “The Doc won’t let anything happen to her.” 

“Don’t like that she’s out there alone.” Simon says, finally releasing the mug, squeezing his burning fingers into his palm. 

“Technically she’s not alone,” Kyle says, giving him a sideways glance. “We’ve been over this. We’re perfectly safe here.” 

“For now.” Simon lifts his mug to his lips, ignoring the burn of the tea on his tongue. He’s long become numb to that sort of pain.

“No one knows we’re here except Kate and my sister. Neither of them would say anything, no matter what.” Kyle turns his gaze back to the sliding glass door, to your figure huddled in the chair outside. “She’s where she needs to be right now.” 

Footsteps thud down the stairs, John letting out a groan as he reaches the bottom. He takes a moment to stretch before heading for the kettle in the kitchen. 

“Rough night, sir?” Kyle asks, taking a sip of his tea. 

“I’ve slept worse.” John grunts, grabbing a mug from the cupboard. 

Both of them had tossed and turned last night. Simon had listened to the occasional creak of the bed frame as they turned. He knows that’s what it was. They’re not ready yet. None of them are. Things are too fragile, too frayed. 

“Anyone thought about breakfast?” John asks. 

“Still some eggs left, and some bread. We need to make a store run soon.” Kyle says. 

“Today.” John says, pouring water into the mug. “A lot of things we need to pick up.” He turns to face Simon and Kyle, leaning against the cupboard. “Simon and I will go.” 

Simon shifts in his seat, his hand tightening around his mug again. “That’s not a good idea.” 

“What, you’re doubting our ability to watch the house?” Kyle says, turning to Simon. 

Simon glances at him, his eyes hard. “No, There should just be an alpha here at all times.” 

“Really? Because that sounds a lot like you don’t trust Johnny and I.�� Kyle says, getting angry. 

“Enough.” John says, setting his mug down on the table. “We keep fighting amongst ourselves, nothing is going to get better. Tensions are high, but none of this is about us. We have to keep our heads on straight for the sake of our pack, and our omega. Simon and I will go to town today. That’s final.” 

Kyle and Simon both lower their eyes to their mugs of tea as John takes a seat at the table. He is right. Fighting amongst themselves will only make things worse for you. You’re already struggling, and the bonds fraying further will only cause more damage, more stress for you. Their bonds with you are delicate enough. They can’t risk the bonds between themselves getting any thinner. They have to be strong for you. They have to be strong for each other. They have to be strong for the pack. The whole pack. 

It falls silent between the three of them as they sit there, sipping their tea. Johnny is the only one still in bed. He cried most of the night last night. He’s cried most of the night the last three nights. He’s probably shed more tears than you have. 

Simon feels stuck in the middle, like he’s being torn in two separate directions. He got up in the night to free himself from the sounds of Johnny crying just to hear your own quiet sobs through your closed door. Each broken sob had his heart splitting in half, the ache in his chest getting worse and worse. He was sure he was having a heart attack that first night, his chest compressing and squeezing, his hands going numb from how tense his body was. 

He wants to reach out and make it better, but he can’t bring himself to. Johnny will just shrug him off, and you won’t even look at him. Even John and Kyle are distant, gravitating further and further away. The gravitational field in the center of their pack continues to get bigger and bigger, forcing them further and further away from each other, and none of them know how to stop it. They’ve lost their point of equilibrium. They’re all spiraling further and further away. Eventually that gravitational field will dissipate and they’ll be left free-floating through space and time. 

They all turn to look as the sliding glass door opens and you crutch your way in. Dr. Keller is right behind you, closing the back door before guiding you back to your room, the blanket you had been draped in folded neatly over her arm. You’re moving better, even just in two days since their arrival. Steadier on your feet, walking better with the crutch. You even look a little better, more alive than you were when you arrived here. 

They all watch you walk to your room, but you don’t spare a glance their way. You haven’t looked at any of them in two days. You haven’t spoken a word to them, to anyone, in two days. 

Kyle gets up to make breakfast as soon as you’ve passed, broken from the spell as Dr. Keller gets you settled in your room. You’re almost hypnotic now, all of their gazes drawn to you as soon as you enter the room. They’re all thinking the same thing every time you pass. Maybe this will be the time you finally look at them, when you finally glance their way. What he wouldn’t give to have you smile at him, give him that cheeky little grin after sassing him. 

Little shit. 

His hand tightens around his mug again as guilt floods him. You’ve sunken into an empty shell because of them. They sucked the life right out of you. They dragged you into this and failed to do what they were supposed to do. Anger bubbles in him as he thinks back to that moment. He should have fought back. He should have used his position to change John’s mind, or forced him to change it. He should have stepped up for you. 

He’s not your alpha. 

He almost wishes he was. 

He stares down at the scabbed imprint of your teeth on his skin. He should pick up a bottle of ink in town, tattoo that mark on his skin forever as a reminder of both you and what he did to you. 

“How is she?” John asks when Dr. Keller enters the kitchen. Simon’s shoulders square as she passes him, having been so lost in his thoughts he hadn’t even noticed her enter. 

Bloody hell, he’s as bad as you.

“As good as she can be.” She sighs, grabbing a can of soup out of the cupboard. You won’t get the eggs and toast Kyle is making. Your diet consists of soup and only soup. 

“Hasn’t said anything still?” John asks, turning to look at her. 

“Not a word.” Dr. Keller shakes her head. “I’d be worried, if it wasn’t expected.” She pulls out a pot, opening the can before dumping the contents in. Chicken noodle. The staple soup in your diet. “Strangulation can be a hard thing to recover from.”

“I know.” Simon winces, taking a sip of his tea. 

The doctor gives him a sympathetic look. He doesn’t want it. “She had some mild damage done from it, which will take time to heal. And, everyone deals with trauma differently. Silence isn’t that unusual of a response.” She puts the pan on the hob, turning the heat on. “If I was worried, you would know.” 

“Thank you for looking after her.” John says, nodding at the doctor. “You didn't have to stay.”

“I made a promise.” She says, stirring the soup. “She's still my patient, even if the initiative was bogus. I still have a duty to perform as her doctor. Kate wouldn't have chosen me from the start if I was the type to just up and leave as soon as I found out my job wasn't actually real. I care about her a lot, and I want to help her get through this.”

“We all owe a lot to you.” John says. “We wouldn't have made it this far without you.”

“No,” The corner of her mouth twitches. “You probably wouldn't have.”

Christine lets out a quiet sigh as she steps into your room. You're in the chair by the window, your usual spot when it's too damp and cold to sit outside. 

It's dark in the room aside from the light coming through the window. It’s always dark in the room, except at night when you sleep with the bedside lamp on. She flips that lamp on, not wanting to blind you suddenly with the overhead light. You’ve been blinded by enough bright lights over the last week. Nearly a week and a half. It feels like so much time has passed, yet it still feels like yesterday when she was coming to in her office after being attacked and drugged. The terror she’d felt upon finding you missing still fills her stomach, and she finds herself getting up in the middle of the night to check and make sure you’re really there. 

She’s not the only one that does it. 

The paper bags in her arms crinkle as she carries them over to you, setting them on the other chair. Your gaze is far away, staring off at the grey, stormy sea in the distance. How fitting the weather is, both for you and the members of the pack. The tension between them is still palpable, all of them moving stiffly around each other. They’ve lost the natural fluidity of a pack comfortable in their bonds. They’re stuck, and they can’t, they won’t, heal until you do. They won’t allow themselves to until they know you’re willing to at least try. 

“John and Simon went to town and did some shopping. They picked up some things for you.” She says softly, breaking the heavy silence in the room. 

You don’t even turn to look at her. 

“More warm clothes.” She continues, looking in one bag. “As well as some boots.” She pulls a box out of another bag. “A nightlight, so you don’t have to keep using the lamp.” She looks in the third bag, the heaviest one of the three. “Another stuffed animal.” She says, pulling out a stuffed bear. It’s a nice thought, but she’s not sure you’ll even want to touch it. “And some books.” She says, pulling the stack out of the bottom of the bag. 

There’s three of them, ones not in the collection on the shelves in the living area. Some of your favorites. They’re trying, putting in efforts to try and make you as comfortable as possible in the only ways they can right now. She sets the books on the side table next to you, taking a long look at you as you sit there. 

You haven’t picked up a book in the two days they’ve been at the cottage, though she’s not surprised. You’ve been in and out of it, sleeping off the pain medicine, or sitting in a haze, mind far away from the cabin. She wonders where you are, where your mind is going. Out on the water? Out on the beach? Or maybe somewhere back in your memories where it’s safe. Receding back somewhere when life was easier and safer. 

Are you thinking of your mother? Are you imagining her here with you? 

Her heart hurts for you, being torn away from her at such a pivotal moment in your life. If she had the ability to find her she would. If she could track down your mother and bring her here for you she would. 

You begin to sniffle, almost as if you can somehow read her thoughts. The tears are falling, streaming down your cheeks again. She doesn't say anything, she doesn’t have to as she stands there beside you, gently stroking your hair. She’s seen many things in her time as an omega specialist. She’s had patients that have gone through things that would make even the most seasoned doctor’s stomach churn. She’s helped omegas that have been pushed to the brink of insanity, omegas pushed to the brink of death. Yet none of them have affected her the way you have. Maybe it’s because she’s never been quite so invested in an omega’s life before, never been quite so inserted into an omega’s reality. 

If she was a better doctor, she might have refused to stay here, keeping distance between herself and your pack. She’s gotten too close, pushed past the barrier of professionalism. If she was a better doctor, she’d distance herself, stick to the decorum and expectation of doctor/patient relationships. She knows omega specialists can get too close. She’d been warned over and over about how easy it is to invest too much into the lives and well beings of omegas. There’s a boundary that must be kept, both for the professional and for the sake of the omega. She won’t be around you forever. 

Eventually she’ll have to distance herself. She’ll have to go back to America, return to her practice. Now that the initiative is over, now that her job doesn’t even exist, she’s running on borrowed time. She’ll have to leave you at some point, close your case and move on. 

When is the question there. When will it be the right time? When will she decide you’ve healed enough to be graduated from her care? When will she be confident enough to break the bond that has formed between the two of you. 

Will she be able to? That’s the deeper question. 

Those are thoughts for a different day, she decides, pushing them aside. Instead she pulls you into her side, resting your head against her hip as she continues to stroke your hair. 

You look just about as happy to be at the table as they do. It's quiet in the room aside from the clanking of dishes in the kitchen and the occasional sizzle of food in a pan. Your gaze is in your lap, assuming your normal position of a drooping head and rounded shoulders. 

Your back and neck have to hurt from being in that position for so long. 

The only time you're not in those positions are when you're outside. Then your gaze is out at the sea in the distance. You sit there and stare, almost like a statue. You’d make for a good painting, seated still enough for long enough a skilled artist could make a masterpiece of it. 

He's surprised Johnny hasn't even sketched you like that yet. Perhaps if you can ever come to be more comfortable around them, you'll allow him to paint you. You’ll be taking up residence out there in that chair as often as you can. 

He’s not even sure rain or storm would deter you, if it wasn’t for Christine’s intervention. 

Kyle sets a plate of chicken on the table as Christine brings over your soup, setting it down in front of you. Always a bowl of steaming hot soup. How you’re existing off of mostly liquids is beyond him. Maybe that’s why you look so fragile and frail. 

“There you go,” Christine says as she sets a spoon down beside the bowl. Chicken and rice, a changeup from your normal chicken noodle. “I know you don’t want to, but you need to. You’re not going to feel better without food in your system.” 

You let out a quiet noise, just barely audible over the shuffling of bodies as they sit at the table. Simon is to your left, Kyle next to him, Christine and Johnny on the other side. He’s on the opposite end of the table, staring right at you. No wonder you don’t want to move from your hunched position. 

They keep their eyes off of you as they begin serving themselves. The food they’ve managed to make is decent with the help of their combined cooking skills. They’d had a long discussion about the intricacies of British food versus American food the first morning after their arrival. Christine advocated for more American-based dishes, with Johnny taking her side purely out of spite for the three Englishmen. 

John has caught Christine sneaking seasoning into the food every so often. He hasn’t said a word.

“Come on, eat up.” Christine says, gently nudging your hand where it rests over the spoon. 

Your face screws up in a grimace as you stare down at the steaming soup. It’s a breath before your fingers wrap around the spoon, lifting it to the bowl. Every movement feels practiced and calculated as he watches you sink the spoon into the bowl, just barely sinking below the surface to get just broth. He watches as you lift the spoon, holding it halfway to your mouth. There’s a subtle shake to your hand, not much but noticeable to him. You stare down at the spoon for a long moment before lifting it the rest of the way, quickly putting it in your mouth before your hand starts shaking too much. 

You grimace as you swallow, a quiet grunt leaving your lips. He can’t bring himself to look away as you sit there, taking in a couple deep breaths. He can’t bring himself to eat as you stare back down at the bowl, your fingers trembling around the spoon. 

Fuck. 

You sniffle as you sink the spoon into the bowl once more, the spoon shaking more now as you bring the second spoonful to your mouth. It’s like watching some kind of sick, twisted children’s windup toy as you feed yourself, following the pattern of spoon in soup, soup to mouth, pained grimace, quiet sob. It gets worse and worse with every bite, John barely able to stomach his own food as he watches you with every bite.

You stare down at a chunk of chicken on your spoon, a fearful look on your face. Your hand is shaking enough that soup is dripping off the bottom back into the bowl. Christine had cut the chunks up smaller, yet you stare down at it like it might jump off the spoon and bite you. 

Tears start rolling down your cheeks as you bring the spoon up to your lips, forcing it into your mouth. You chew and chew and chew, delaying the inevitable. The face you make as you swallow nearly breaks him. He lowers his gaze to his own plate, barely touched despite the fact he feels like they’ve been eating for a lifetime. 

“Take a break.” Christine says quietly, lowering your hand with the spoon back onto the table. 

None of them can bear to look at you. Johnny and Kyle are busy staring at their plates as they eat while Simon glares holes into his water glass. He’s watching you just as closely, he’s just not brave enough to stare at you so openly. 

The tears continue to fall as you start feeding yourself again, Christine watching you as your hand begins to shake more and more, the pain starting to get to you. John wants to reach out, to take the spoon and feed you himself, but he can’t. It’s destroying him inside, seeing you struggle so openly. Christine won’t intervene, she won’t do anything as she sits there. Rationally he knows why. You need to get used to feeding yourself again, you need to work past the pain and exhaustion to keep yourself going. 

His alpha is screaming. 

Your hand is nearly vibrating as you hold another spoonful up, this one full of rice and chicken. You let out a quiet sob as you stare at it. That’s going to hurt. He can nearly sense your pain, the agony you’re feeling. Your scent is like a cloud fogging up the air, sour with fear and pain. It’s sinking right into his brain, his alpha clawing at him to do something. You’re in such open distress in front of him but he can’t move. He’s frozen, staring at you in shock, unable to look away. 

It’s Simon’s quick reflexes that save you, his hand darting out to flip the spoon onto the table before you drop it on yourself. It lands with a clang, startling all of them out of their ruminations as it hits the bowl of peas, splattering rice and chicken and broth across the tablecloth. Christine is on her feet almost immediately, checking you over for burns from any of it that might have landed on you. 

“You're okay.” Christine says, wiping your face with a napkin as you sob loudly, openly crying now. “It was a good try. Come on.” 

She helps you to your feet, grabbing your crutch before leading you back to your room. 

All four of them sit there in silence, still as statues as they process what they had just witnessed. 

“Fuck,” Kyle breaths, his eyes glued to the half-eaten chicken on his plate. 

Johnny starts to sniffle himself, his gaze locked on his own plate. Simon's eyes are on the spoon he'd flipped where it lays on the table. 

He had no idea just how bad things really were. He knew they were bad. 

He just didn't think they were this bad.

You’re sitting outside in that chair again. It’s a lovely morning, cold but the sun is rising up over the hills, casting a pink and orange glow across the sky. You look almost ethereal out there, even if he can only see the back of your head. Your eyes are cast out at the sea in the distance, where your gaze always seems to lie. 

His fingers itch in a desire to draw you, the art supplies Simon had picked up for him sitting unopened upstairs. It’s the first time he’s felt the desire to draw in weeks. Not since your heat when he’d sat there by your side, drawing to keep the thoughts away. The pictures are probably still up on his wall, the pieces he’d done to keep his own distress away. Had you laid there and stared at them after they left you? He can picture you laying there numbly, eyes glazed as you stare at them, picturing yourself far away. 

You don’t need his drawings now to imagine yourself far away. 

You’re still as a statue as you sit there, the thick blanket he’d picked up in Texas tucked around you. It warms his heart, even if he knows it was Christine who wrapped you up in it. The mug of tea beside you is still steaming in the cool air, untouched as it will remain until Christine eventually brings you back inside where you’ll recede to your room to sit in front of the large bay window to stare out at the sea. 

He wants to take you. 

He wants to load you up in the car and take you the short drive down the road to the beach. He wants to let you stand there in the sand, see the waves as they crash onto the shore. Hell, he’d let you walk into the water, let it soak your shoes and pants. Whatever you need to do, he’d let you do it. 

John would have his hide if he left with you like that. 

Simon would eat him alive. 

He won’t do that, though, mostly because he knows you wouldn’t be strong enough to make it down to the beach, nor stand there for a long period of time. Carrying you would be out of the question. You’d never let him that close. 

Instead he takes a gamble, getting as close as he dares as he slides open the door, stepping out into the cool morning. You don’t move, don’t even look up as he takes a seat in the chair next to you, the one Christine occupies when she’s out with you. He’d volunteered to watch you through the door to allow her some time to herself, something she hasn’t been getting much of. She’s been caring for you nearly 24/7, only getting breaks here and there while you sleep or nap, or on the rare occasion she trusts one of them to watch you. She never complains, but he knows she’s tired. Anyone would be after everything they’ve been through, after everything she’s had to see and experience over the last week and a half. 

It’s the least they can do, even if you won’t allow them to do more. They all wish they could. They wish they could ease some of your suffering, take some of the strain off of Christine’s shoulders. Kyle even went so far as to invite his sister to visit over for the weekend in hopes she might be able to lighten the load, and to see if you’ll allow her closer than you’re allowing them to get. 

He moves cautiously like he’s approaching a wild animal, not wanting to startle you and cause you more pain than you have been in. He can be a bull in a china shop, or he can be silent and deadly. He chooses something in the middle, making his footsteps just loud enough to be heard across the wooden planks of the porch, but he moves slowly enough he won’t startle you as he appears in your peripheral. 

Your gaze never leaves the horizon, focused and far away even as he takes a seat next to you. His mug of coffee is warm in his hands, fighting off the chill outside. It’s a natural response to the sudden temperature change after being inside in the warm house. He almost wishes he had his own blanket, but then again, he’s not sure he’ll be outside very long. 

He’s prepared for yelling, screaming, getting hit with your crutch as you tell him off, chasing him back inside. He’d almost prefer it over the eerie silence. He has to glance at you just to make sure you’re breathing, make sure the blanket is rising and falling over your chest. He follows your gaze out to the sea, sitting there silently as he gazes out at the dark blue water. Silence is hard for him. He can feel it throbbing in his ears, the ringing that fills his head when it’s quiet. He likes noise. He needs noise. 

He just wants to hear you speak again. 

He needs to hear you speak again. 

He wants to talk to you, he wants to say something, he wants to drop to his knees and beg forgiveness. He wants to feel your touch again, even if it’s just a brush of fingers across his hand. He wants to get something out of you, some kind of reaction. You’re an empty shell, a ghost of what you were. 

Tears fill his eyes as he stares out at the blue water. The silence is deafening as he sits there with you, still and quiet. 

He might as well be sitting alone. 

It’s the dead of night. The stars are out, or they would be if the clouds weren’t blocking them. It makes the world seem so much darker without their light. The fire is out, the curtains drawn closed. The only light is from the porch and the lights on the patio out back. The house is quiet, not even the hum of appliances filling the silence. 

Kyle’s breaths are quiet and even, finally asleep after laying awake for far too long. Their backs are turned towards each other, yet the double bed forces them close enough they can feel the warmth radiating from the other. It’s the only position they can sleep in, even if they’ve woken up cuddling a few times in the night. It’s almost as if their brains are subconsciously trying to force the bonds back, to force the healing. It’s as if their instincts are laughing at them for trying to deny what they want deep down. 

John lays there in the silence, his mind racing. He can’t sleep again for the fifth night in a row. He hasn’t been able to sleep since they left weeks ago on their mission to track down the missiles. No, it’s been longer than that. Not since you revealed the cameras to them. How long ago that seems now. How inconsequential it feels. If he knew back then what was going to happen, he would have changed a lot of things. 

You can’t undo what was done. You can only change what happens going forward. 

Things happened the way they happened. Now he has to make up for it. Now he has to prove himself not just as a capable alpha, but as a trustworthy human being. Your omega is screaming. He knows it. He had sensed it at dinner with your quiet sobs, the pain flooding your scent. He can still smell it, the sourness permeating his nostrils and sinking right into his brain. His alpha is still clawing at him angrily for just sitting there, for just letting it happen. 

Simon intervened. Simon saved you once again. 

He had barely comprehended the quick movement of Simon’s hand as he knocked the spoon out of your grip. He’d gotten soup on his hand, the droplets visible, yet he hadn’t moved as he sat there, letting it burn his skin. Better his than yours. He could almost hear Simon’s thoughts at that moment. 

What a good alpha Simon is. 

What a failure of an alpha John is. 

Your omega must be screaming in your mind, clawing at her cage. It’s almost like he can hear it rattling in his ears, reminding him of the pain he’s caused you. The pain brought on by his failures. 

Something is rattling in his ears, piercing through the silence. 

It is a scream. 

It’s your scream. 

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[yieldtotemptation]

CRASH ft. Wonyoung

wonyoung x male reader smut

11k words

When she wanted to be (and it was often), Jang Wonyoung could be a real fucking bitch.

If you were to ask her, she’d probably say the same about you.

And yet, that doesn’t stop her from calling you in the middle of the night, slurring about some shit with her manager, telling (not asking) you to come pick her up.

You’re inclined to recommend that she fuck off and find her own way home.

But of course, you don’t. (You never do).

-

“Sorry boys, my ride’s here!”

There’s a collective groan of disappointment that ripples through the crowd that’s formed up behind Wonyoung; each face falling one after another as they realise that ultimately none of them get to be the lucky suitor that takes her home.

Moths around a flame, unable to do anything but watch as she sashays through the neon haze towards your car. Hips sway with a drunken grace, a dangerously short skirt dances around her thighs, high heels strapped to her feet make her legs seem endless.

It’s a view, that’s for sure.

It probably makes the pain of rejection a little more bearable, makes them forget that they’re being abandoned on the sidewalk with all the rest of the has-beens and ‘who the fuck were you again?’

Her ‘co-workers’, technically. Some you recognise, most you don’t. But they’re all basically the same insecure douchebag in a different shade of overpriced streetwear.

You’d probably be doing the world a public service if you were to steer your car onto the pavement and run them all down.

It’s an idea you entertain a little. Doing it would really ruin her night.

That’d almost make it worth the dent it would put in your brand-new car.

Still, you can’t completely blame the gaggle of potential casualties, not really.

It’s Wonyoung.

Girls like her are the reason they invented the word ’idol’ in the first place, because calling her ’pretty’ or ’hot’ is like calling the Mona Lisa ‘a nice portrait’.

It doesn’t even begin to cover it.

Like the starlet she is, Wonyoung waits until she’s at your car to make her grand exit. A turn to her adorers and a final goodbye: a casual flick of her wrist, a sweet, flirty smile and a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it wink that’ll have them deep in their group chats ranting about how they definitely had a moment with the Jang Wonyoung.

You just roll your eyes. You’ve seen that wink a hundred times.

You know exactly how much it’s worth.

After all, it’s your car that she’s climbing into, slamming the door behind her like it’s her name on the registration; leaving behind her new fan club with nothing but their dicks in their hands and their heads swimming with fantasies of what totally could have happened.

You’re no better though, are you? The second she slides into the passenger seat, you’re judging the shortness of her skirt, eyes greedily tracing the length of her thighs, all the way up to a hint of lace that’s destined to be ruined later.

You’re not subtle. And in that outfit, she’s not either.

“What took you so long? I swear to God I’m going to punch the next guy that asks me ‘how much of a baddie I really am’.”

No thank yous, no pleasantries, not even a look in your direction.

To think that you used to be impressed by how quickly she could drop the act: gone is the sugary sweetness that she’d fooled those simps with back at the club; the pretty, airheaded, ‘lucky Vicky’. As fake and useless as the glasses resting on the bridge of her perfectly shaped nose.

Next to you is the real Wonyoung, the one that you’ve become intimately familiar with: intimidatingly smart, unfathomably hot, and all too aware of how dangerous a woman those two traits made her.

“Why is this car black? I thought I told you to get the red?”

You glare at her. The gall on this woman.

“What are you waiting for? Drive.”

Barely a minute in and she’s setting a personal best record for time taken to piss you off; impatiently kicking off her heels, tossing them over her shoulder and into the back seat (of again: your car, not hers).

You can be just as childish: you slam your foot down, pedal to the floor, wheels screeching, and you peel off into the night. The acceleration forces Wonyoung back into her seat, scrambling for her seat belt, yelling, “What the fuck?”

Now she’s looking at you. You’re casual, offering, “Oh, sorry, did I scare the passenger princess?”

“You’re an asshole.”

“Yeah, and you’re welcome,” you grumble, slowing to a more reasonable (legal) speed as you turn onto the highway. “Remind me, when was it that I started operating a taxi service for wasted idols?”

“Oh, I’m so sorry.” She rolls her eyes, puts her hands together, bows her head down low. Rich, coming from someone who’s never had to genuinely apologise for anything in her life. “Didn’t realise washed-up trainees had such precious schedules.”

It’s a low blow, her go-to insult for you. Nothing you’re not used to; it’s been years of this, after all.

Years of Wonyoung, the living reminder of your biggest failure, making your life her personal pet project. Years of her smugness, of her flaunting her success in your face, of her demanding more from you, demanding better.

Years of you pushing back, pushing her, and somehow always ending up in the same place, the same bed, the same tangled mess of sweat and spite.

To think it all started when you saw her across that shitty practice room and one of you (you forget who, though it was probably her) said the wrong thing at the wrong time, and it was pure hate at first sight.

“Couldn’t get literally anyone else? Don’t you have friends?” You throw the question out there, keeping your eyes on the road, and not down at her legs, crossing and uncrossing, teasing and taunting.  It’s a herculean task—she’s practically ninety percent leg anyway; so fucking easy to admire, so right wrapped around your waist.

“Trust me, I tried. None of the girls have their license, I definitely can’t call someone from the company, and the last time I tried to get a taxi the fucker recognised me and threatened to leak my address. So that leaves me with you,” Wonyoung sighs. “The last resort.”

“Wow, what an honour,” is your reply. You’re still not looking—not sneaking glances at her stomach, as she stretches in your passenger seat.

As an exercise, you pretend she doesn’t exist. Pretend that the hem of her shirt isn’t rising up, peeling back to grace you with a glimpse of her midriff, that waist, her abs tight and exerted after a night spent out on a dance floor.

It nearly works—for a second, you forget you’re supposed to be annoyed at her.

Right until Wonyoung laughs. Not that fake, high-pitched giggle that she knows you find so grating. No, this has an edge to it, a bite that she reserves just for you. “Don’t pretend like you weren’t waiting for me to call. Or were you in the middle of jerking it to my fancams again?”

There’s the memory, the one loss in territory you haven’t quite recovered from. (A reminder: be less blasé about what you choose to name your saved playlists.)

You fire back with, “Yujin’s actually, but nice try.”

“Whatever, pervert.” Your attempt at a riposte doesn’t work, it’s dismissed, leaving Wonyoung satisfied that she’s won this exchange.

As for her prize, she does what she always does—gets touchy with your property.

She busies herself, fiddling with the touchscreen on your dashboard—’What the fuck is this playlist?’ and 'Why do you listen to this group? You know all those girls are absolute bitches, right?’.

“Stop that.” You reach over to slap her wrist before she starts getting too ambitious and messes with the temperature controls again.

"Hey!” Wonyoung yelps, recoiling, and then pauses. You turn to her, see her annoyingly flawless features scrunch up in disgust as she asks, “What’s that smell?”

You curse under your breath as you realise what’s coming. Wonyoung’s frustratingly sensitive when it comes to scents; she’s got a nose like a bloodhound—and a penchant for sticking it in the parts of your life she doesn’t belong.

She’s gone as far as 'gifting’ you every perfume you’ve owned, every body wash, every shampoo, even your fucking laundry detergent.

Just another way she’s tried to take over your life.

You give your own car a whiff, if only to see if this is just another case of Wonyoung being a brat.

It doesn’t smell bad at all.

In fact, it smells sweet. Too sweet.

“Ew, seriously, what is that? Is that you?”

You’re too slow—she’s got your forearm now. For someone that looks so delicate she’s got a grip like a vice. She brings your wrist up to her nose, sniffing, making her way higher up your arm.

“Let it go, Wonyoung.”

She’s not listening at all, unbuckling her seat belt, leaning over the console, pulling herself closer to you, pushing her body against yours. Whatever little respect Wonyoung had for your personal space is gone; her nose is on your neck, her breath hot against your skin.

“It smells like…” She pauses, getting even closer, taking a deep inhale as she tries to place the fragrance. “Why do you smell like a whore?”

Her voice is low, coloured with a barely noticeable slur. You can feel it: the powder keg about to explode, Wonyoung getting ready to go from zero to a hundred. So, you deflect, “Sure you’re not smelling yourself?”

“Fuck you, I don’t use that cheap shit,” she snaps. “You fucked someone tonight, didn’t you?”

You don’t reply. It’s not like you owe her one, anyway—she’s not your girlfriend, you’re not her boyfriend, you two are…

Rivals, mortal enemies, fuck-buddies, friends-with-benefits (except without the whole friendship part).

(Take your pick, call it whatever you want, or in Wonyoung’s case: don’t call it anything at all.)

“Who—who was it this time?” Wonyoung’s fingers tighten around your arm, and there’s that spark in her eyes.

Every chance she gets, she’ll insist she gives so few fucks about your personal life, but one mention of another woman and she’s diving right in the mud, for once not hiding the fact that she may actually give a shit about you.

It’s probably why you do it.

“Who’s the slut dumb enough to spread her legs for you?”

Now it’s your turn to avoid her gaze, to pretend that having her this close isn’t doing wild things to your heartrate. You make an unforced error: “None of your business.”

“So you did fuck someone.” Her hand moves down your arm, dragging her fake acrylics across your skin until they find purchase in your thigh, digging in hard enough to make you flinch. “You fucked someone I know didn’t you. Who…” She’s reading you, trying to find the answer somewhere in the stress lines of your face. “Hyewon. Yena. Yuri. I swear if it was fucking Eunbi, I’m going to—”

“Going to what?” You challenge. You know this game. You’ve played it before—every damn time she gets like this (and you know where it leads). “Going to lie to me about your own personal survival show back there?”

Wonyoung scoffs. It’s a throaty sound that seems almost foreign coming from her—too impolite, too uncouth for the elegant, refined image she’s painstakingly cultivated. But she makes it anyway, because she’s had a few too many drinks and you’re the only one who’s around to see her like this—raw, unfiltered. “Those losers? I’m not like you, bringing home every pair of tits that strokes your ego.”

“Good to know that I’m special then,” you smirk, but she’s not smiling back.

No, she’s just looking at you, in that annoying, Wonyoung way. It’s those big, doe eyes of hers that you’ve seen do so much damage before—make men bend over backwards, light themselves on fire just to get her to look their way. “You wish.”

You push on, push her just a little bit. “Drop the act, Wony. I wasn’t your last resort—I’m the only one you even considered. You needed your daddy—isn’t that what you were calling me before?”

“I never said that.”

“Wony—”

“And if I did, I’ll never say it again,” she declares, before emphasising. “Never. Again.”

But you know her better than that. You know her lies just as well as she knows yours; it’s in the quickness of her response, the defensiveness—the vulnerability.

“I doubt that,” you say, making the most of the tiny crack in Wonyoung’s armour. “I remember you screaming it. Had you cumming like a fountain—ruined a perfectly good set of sheets, you know?”

“You’re disgusting,” she hisses, but she’s got the same memories in her head—that same night, so similar to this one (so similar to every night before).

The fighting, the fucking, the endless cycle of pushing each other’s button until one of you snaps.

“And what about you? You got here awfully quick for two in the morning,” she says. Her hand’s still on your thigh, less nails, more fingertips now, tracing patterns through the denim of your jeans. “Couldn’t bear the thought of me with someone else, could you? Lie to me—tell me that you weren’t waiting to get your hands on me again.”

Your denial dies before it even makes it past your lips—your own body turns traitor on you, provoked by her hand rising higher. There’s a smile as Wonyoung finds what she was looking for, the proof in the stretching of your jeans, the outline of your cock begging for more of her attention.

“At least this part of you is honest,” she muses, fingers dancing around your growing stiffness.

You grit your teeth, doing your best to keep the car steady, managing to grind out, “Please. It’s like you said, any decent pair of tits does it for me. Even your tiny ones get the job done.”

Her hand freezes on your thigh—you’ve hit a nerve, hit that dark part of her that’s so desperate for validation. “You think you can replace me? Find someone else to fill your sad, lonely nights?”

She’s closer now, her breath against your neck, her fingers drumming a beat right over where the head of your cock is. It’s a heady feeling, one that you hate and crave all at once.

“Was she even good?”

You know what she’s really asking: Was she better than me?

And you know the answer: How could anyone be?

But you don’t say that. You don’t need to. Instead, you reply, “It’s not a competition.”

“Everything’s a competition.”

Wonyoung’s hand relaxes, nails retreating from your thigh, leaving you flustered and fighting against the constraints of your own jeans. She settles back into her seat, having done her damage.

And for a moment, silence reigns inside your car, allowing you to actually focus on the road. Not that it really matters, you know the route to her apartment by heart—you could drive it blindfolded if need be. It’s just a welcome distraction to avoid dealing with the state she’s left you in.

The quiet survives a beat, two, and then Wonyoung’s squirming, shifting in the passenger seat.

And then she does it again.

And again.

You should keep your eyes ahead—you need to keep your eyes ahead.

You know exactly what you’re going to find if you look over at her.

That’s the problem with you and Wonyoung. You know each other too well. Your likes, your dislikes. What gets you off. What makes you mad.

What drives you fucking wild.

And yet, because you’re a sucker for punishment, you still risk a glance, and see Wonyoung, leaning back in her seat, her hand sliding up her own thigh, so casually drifting up her soft, bare skin, higher and higher.

The skirt rises, inch by torturous inch, and it’s those panties—the same set that was around her ankles the last time you had her bent over your couch, swearing she’d hate you forever. The same set that’s probably already soaked, just waiting for you to rip them off again.

You have to tell her to stop, to keep her hands to herself, to not do this to you, not now. Not while you’re trying to keep you both on the fucking road. But your mouth is dry, and all you can manage is a choked, “Wonyoung—”

Her fingers have slid past the hem of her skirt, now playing with the lace that’s the only barrier between her and open air. She’s biting into the plumpness of her bottom lip, staring at you, expecting your full attention, even now. There’s no subtlety with her, there never is, it’s one of the few things Wonyoung’s bad at.

You swallow hard, finding your voice. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Making myself comfortable,” she says, a little breathy now, as her fingers slip under the lace. “You got a problem with it?”

There’s the flash of skin, a gasp as her fingers find purchase between her folds. She’s so wet that you can hear it—the slickness of her arousal, the quiet sound of fabric sliding against her skin.

You’re straining, gripping the steering wheel so hard it’s a miracle it doesn’t snap in two. Her hand’s dipping lower, her finger sliding inside herself; not deep, not yet, just teasing. Enough to make you want to pull over, to grab her and throw her on the hood of your car, to show her exactly why you’re the only she thinks about when she’s lonely and desperate.

But you don’t, despite the way your body is begging for you to do something, anything, to ease the ache in your cock.

Because if you stop, it’s over. You know how this ends—or rather, you know how she’ll want it to end. She’ll want you to apologise for even being in the proximity of another woman, she’ll want you to beg for her forgiveness so that she might bestow upon you the privilege of touching her again.

If you’re lucky, she just might let you. But only if you play her games.

So you drive faster.

You push the speed limit, weaving through the mostly empty streets.  You’re racing to a finish line, except all that’s waiting at the end of it is the taste of Wonyoung on your tongue, the feeling of her wrapped around you, the sweet victory of making her scream.

It’s hell—ignoring the sound of her pleasure, the wetness of her fingers working in and out of herself. There’s glimpses of her in the corner of your eye, she’s still watching you. She’s enjoying this, loving every second of it.

“What’s wrong?” She asks, oh-so-innocently, even though she doesn’t expect an answer—she just likes to hear her own voice. “Getting distracted? It’s a long, long way back to my place. No one can blame you if you need to give up and pull over.” 

Wonyoung’s getting bolder now, pulling her skirt up to her waist, parting her legs for you, so you can see her hand moving faster, her hips rising to meet her own touch. So you can hear her, hear the fucking sound of each stroke of her fingers inside her, punctuated each time by a wet slap of her palm against her cunt, reverberating through the car, taunting you.

“You want it, don’t you?” She throws the question out so casually, like of course it’s only natural for her to be fingering herself in your car, of course she should be doing everything in her power to make you want to drive into a fucking wall. “I can tell, you’re so desperate to touch me. Definitely going to die if you don’t fuck me soon. Maybe even right here, right now?”

Your foot slips and the car swerves a little—it’s not much, but it’s enough to let her know that you’re losing focus, that she’s winning.

“Careful,” she laughs. “You wouldn’t want to crash before we get to the fun part.”

“You can’t wait until we get back to your place?” You finally ask, the question burning in your throat.

“No. You need to be reminded that you’re-ah-mine,” comes Wonyoung’s answer. “You’re going to fuck me anyway, so why not-mmph-why not save us both the trouble and get started on my own?”

“You don’t own me, Wonyoung.”

To that, Wonyoung raises a carefully sculpted eyebrow.

It’s not even worth a proper reply. Without a word, Wonyoung reclines back into her seat and snaps open the buttons of her shirt, nonchalantly revealing the swell of her breasts, the darkened peaks of her nipples.

No bra—they’re just there. Right there, in your face—those tiny, round, perky tits that you’ve had in your hands, that you’ve had between your teeth, that you’ve covered with your cum more times than you can count.

She’s not shy about it—never has been—arching her back, pushing her breasts out even further. It’s the confidence from knowing every other idol (hell, every other woman in the world) would sell their soul to have a body like hers. So why the fuck not flaunt it?

“Somehow, I don’t think that’s true,” she says, reaching up to her chest. A palm finds her tits, pinching and rolling the sensitive nubs, making them nice and red and swollen for you.

She’s moving faster now, grinding down on her own hand, teeth sinking down into her bottom lip so deep you’re surprised she hasn’t drawn blood. Her breaths are getting shorter and shorter, she’s so close, she’s so fucking turned on, she’s so hot it hurts.

Her eyes remain fixed on you; seeing you struggle only makes her hotter, spurs her to circle her clit faster. She’s drinking you in—the tightness of your jaw, the way your eyes can’t decide whether to keep on the road or on her, the way you swallow, trying (and failing) to keep it together.

The worst part of it all is this wicked smile that’s settled on her lips; thoughts of wiping it off her face with your cock flash through your mind. She’s just so fucking smug about it, so sure of herself.

And maybe she should be.

“Admit it,” Wonyoung purrs. “Admit that you need me.”

“Why would I? You’re just a convenient hole to fill.” It’s not true, of course. You’ve never believed it; none of the hundred times you’ve said it to her before—and she’s never once been fooled.

Wonyoung is back in your ear, “You’re a bad liar.”

Her hand’s returned to your thigh, teasing closer and closer to where you really want it to be. You grunt a weak, “Wonyoung, if you think that’s going to work—”

But she doesn’t listen (she never does).

She reaches for the bulge in your pants, far too quick for you to stop her from wrapping her fingers around you, from taking a hold of you and squeezing.

“See?” She whispers, thick with satisfaction, feeling you throb in her grip. “You’re already about to burst. You can’t resist me. No one can.”

You’re not backing down. You’ve got your own pride to think of, after all. “Save it for your fan club.”

Wonyoung’s never been one to take no for an answer. Her hand moves with purpose, sliding over your zipper and giving it a forceful tug. The sound rings through the car, and it’s an out of body experience; it’s all in slow motion as she pulls out your hard, aching cock.

Fuck.

“Last chance to pull over.” Wonyoung takes a hold of you, fingers curling around your cock with a firm grip that leaves no room for doubt—she’s not letting go until she gets what she wants.  “Who knows what will happen if you keep driving like this. Wouldn’t want to ruin these expensive leather seats with your cum, now would we?”

“Not a fucking chance.”

“Your funeral,” she answers, her smile widening into a full-blown grin as she starts to move, stroking you, her hand gliding up and down your shaft with familiar ease. “Or ours, I guess.”

She’s not making it easy—there’s the slow, deliberate pumps, her thumb circling the head, her fingers teasing the sensitive skin. It’s so natural for her, so goddamn good. 

“Are you sure you can handle this?” Wonyoung’s question hangs in the air, joining the sound of her fist pumping your cock, the squish of her own fingers plunging in and out of her cunt. It’s a taunting metronome, the more you try to ignore her, the tighter she squeezes, the fastest she strokes you, the louder she moans in your ear. “Are you sure you can handle me?”

“I’ve done it before and I can do it again,” you grit out. “You’re going to be the one begging for it in the end. Like always.”

She huffs, and you’ve found your mark. “Oh, really? You think you’re so much better than me? You think you can just ignore me like that?”

“Better than you? Easily,” you answer. “You’re just a pretty face and a pair of legs that can’t keep itself shut.”

That makes her stroke you harder, tighter now, firmer, she’s trying to make this hurt. “Is that what you tell yourself?”

“What gives you the impression I even think about you at all?”

“Oh, I know it keeps you up at night—thinking about me, wondering if I’m thinking about you, wondering if any other slut can make you feel the way I do,” Wonyoung’s leaning on you, chin propped up on your shoulder, a devil in your ear. “You hate it, don’t you? You hate that it’s my cunt that you can’t get out of your head, that it’s my pretty lips that you need so badly around your cock.”

"Are you sure you’re not just projecting, Wony?” You ask, glancing down to her hand between her legs, her fingers deep in her folds, her cunt dripping with juices and making a small puddle beneath her. “Look at how wet you are at just the thought of having my cock back between your pretty lips again.”

“Fuck you.” Wonyoung’s panting, short harsh breaths. There’s no conviction in her voice, no denial to be found—this dance of spite and lust has her so fucking heated. All of it—the hate, the competition, the push and pull: it’s all just foreplay. “You’re nothing to me. Nothing but a back-up plan, a toy I play with when I’m bored.”

“Now who’s a bad liar.”

“Go fuck your—”

You don’t let her finish her insult. You’re tired of the back and forth, the games, the fucking power plays. You take your hand off the steering wheel, grabbing her by the hair, wrenching her head up to meet your eyes.

“What the fuck do you think you’re—” Wonyoung’s mistake is opening her mouth in protest—you push her face down onto your cock; not giving her a chance to argue, not giving her a chance to do anything but suck you dry like the skinny little slut she is.

She chokes, hacks a cough as you plunge your cock down her throat, her nose meeting your waist, and it nearly has you emptying into her mouth then and there.

Turns out, she’s right.

You do need this. Need to feel her perfect, pouty lips on you again, her teeth grazing against your skin, her tongue giving in and worshipping you like she’s never done with anyone else.

You keep a hand wrapped up in a fistful of her hair, but you don’t even need to hold her down—she doesn’t fight you, doesn’t even make the slightest noise of protest. No, she just takes it; never mind how much her eyes water, her mouth drools.

“Fuck,” you’re moaning before you can think better of it, and just like that, you’re conceding the smallest victory to her.

And it makes her smile around your cock.

You grunt in response; buck your hips, feed her your cock, make her gag (make her regret it).

You don’t ease up, because if there’s one thing you know about Wonyoung (one thing you know about fucking Wonyoung), it’s that the most insulting thing you can do to her is to take it easy on her.

Just fuck her face and behold the sight of Wonyoung taking your cock. God, her pretty lips wrapped around you, her throat bulging at your length, her teary eyes staring up at you with a mix of defiance and something that’s eerily close to adoration.

It almost makes you forget that you’re supposed to be driving, and it takes a honk from a car behind you and a smile and a curt nod from Wonyoung to remind you of the world rushing by outside.

You pull your eyes back to the road, both hands on the steering wheel to right the car back on track, barely escaping death by deepthroat.

Wonyoung laughs around your cock, a muffled sound that sends vibrations up your shaft. You try to ignore it, but she’s already seizing the opportunity, taking full advantage of the distraction to push down on her own accord, to take you deep—to start properly sucking.

You swerve again.

Her mouth is absolute heaven, pure and simple—she’s a fucking master at this. Your cock’s been in her mouth so many times before that she could probably write an instruction manual on exactly how to make you come unglued.

Too much all at once—you’re groaning now, unable to help it. She’s not even trying that hard; just taking your cock between her lips, sliding it all the way down her throat, a few gentle licks here, a swirl of her tongue there, but it’s more than enough. It’s what keeps you coming back. No one else feels like this—no one else has mapped out your cock like she has—every inch, every vein.

It’s the rhythm that she’s got down to a science: how fast to take you, how much pressure to apply, when to break from her pace to keep you teetering on the edge.

You can feel her eyes on you, scanning you for any sign of weakness—this is precisely where she wants to be. Like this was her decision—like everything leading up to this was part of some messed up strategy to provoke you, to make sure that your cock ended up in her mouth.

You don’t get a chance to dwell on that thought, not when Wonyoung’s teeth is at the base of your cock, her cheeks hollowed out, her tongue doing these little flicks that make your toes curl.

And there’s the question in her eyes: ’is that all you got?’.

Fuck it—risk taking your hand off the steering wheel, it belongs in her silky, dark hair. Make her eyes widen, make her take you deeper, kiss the back of her throat with the tip of your cock, force these divine fucking sounds.

The noises when she gags around you, when the spit is hacked up and drooled down your cock; she’s so sloppy, so filthy.  

And she takes it, takes all of it.

Push her down before pulling her up by the hair, choke her, gag her, have her slobber all over your cock, make her feel you.

Wonyoung takes and takes and takes.

It’s fucked up how you’re treating her (how she’s letting you treat her); she’s an idol for fucks sake. But that’s the last concern you have on your mind—all you can focus on is how fucking good it feels to do this to her, to have her fighting for air around your cock, fighting to keep her eyes on you as you fill them with tears.

Wonyoung’s not giving up though—she’s timing it, timing you. When to relax her throat to take you deep. When to suction her lips. Where to dart her tongue to find that sensitive spot along your shaft.

She’s battling back, in her own way, just as determined as you are to not lose this war of wills. But in the end, you’re the one in the driver’s seat.

“Mmmph,” she’s the one moaning now, moaning around your cock. Shivering in your lap, body jerking and trembling; you can tell her fingers are still buried in her cunt, playing with herself.

She’s so fucking shameless, so fucking pretty, even like this—cheeks flushed, makeup smeared, eyes watering.

You want to kiss her, but that would mean separating her lips from your cock. You want to tell her how much you hate her, but the words won’t come out—they’re stuck in your throat, lodged between your grinding teeth.

“Wait—fuck.” You realise you’ve missed your turn, a split second too late. You jerk the steering wheel, needing both hands as you pull a sharp U-turn. The tires squeal as you try to correct your error, Wonyoung’s mouth around your dick scrambling your brains.

She pulls her lips off from your cock with a hollow ‘pop’. “I thought you could handle me?”

You try to reply—try to form a single coherent thought—but the chance slips by as Wonyoung’s back on the offense, back throating your cock so quickly that your vision swims.

A deep breath is what you need to keep it together. You’re barely thinking straight, holding onto the steering wheel for dear life, doing everything you can to keep yourself from giving up (giving in to Wonyoung’s mouth).

But it’s hard. So fucking hard.

You’ve blown far past any normal speed limit, trying to keep from spinning out with every one of her enthusiastic bobs—it’s by some divine benevolence the car hasn’t completely flipped over by now.

Wonyoung’s relentless, her mouth’s a fucking black hole, sucking you in, stealing every thought from your mind until there’s nothing rattling around your skull but the feel of her wet, warm lips on your cock, and the obscene sounds of her fingers sawing in and out of her pussy, fucking herself.

You’re almost there, and Wonyoung knows it. You can feel it in the suction of her lips, in how hard she’s working you over. It’s the sweetest kind of torture—knowing that she’s got you right where she wants you, that she’s got you on the edge and you can’t do anything about it.

You’re not going to last much longer.

Neither is she.

So you drive. You drive like your life depends on it, because maybe it does. Maybe the only thing keeping you sane is the promise of your eventual release, of filling her mouth with her cum, of pulling her onto your lap and fucking her cunt raw until she screams your name.

“Come on, you can do it,” she’s taunting you now, lathering your cock with just her tongue, dragging it along your length, licking you all the way from your balls to your head. She’s giggling as she steals the pre-cum from your tip, the fucking bitch—like she’s got all the power in the world.

You can see her apartment building in the distance, a beacon of light in the darkness.

You’re almost there.

You reach for the garage remote, mashing the button as you get closer and closer (you’re going to break it). The gate sluggishly opens, and you make a sharp turn to swerve into the dimly lit building, not bothering to slow down.

You can’t, not when Wonyoung’s balancing your cock on her tongue, her hand now squeezing at your base, stroking so fast, so erratic, determined to have you cum in her mouth as soon as fucking possible.

“You’re going to cum for me, aren’t you?” she asks, expectantly. “Cover me in it, give me what I deserve—show me how much you need me.”

The car’s screeching to the closest parking space, the sound echoing through the garage, as you skid between parallel white lines.

You’re cumming before the car’s even completely stopped.

It’s explosive; a white-hot heat searing through your veins, a roar in your ears as you shower Wonyoung’s perfect face with ropes of cum. She’s still jerking you off with her hand, her mouth hovering around the head of your cock, slurping up every drop she can get.

“All mine,” she chants, greedy for it. You pulse in her hand, your cum spurting over her cheekbones, across her nose, painting over that tiny dark freckle above the corner of her mouth.

She doesn’t flinch, doesn’t even blink; she’s a statue, a goddess demanding her sacrifice. Her grip is ironclad, stroking you through your orgasm, not stopping until you’re drained, until your cock is twitching in her hand and there’s nothing left but a sticky mess plastered across her big, wide grin.

You feel the last of your orgasm pulse out of you, dripping down her dainty fingers. She licks her lips, smearing your cum across her cheek with her thumb before she sits up straight, basking in her victory.

“Fuck, Wonyoung,” you manage to get out, your chest heaving, your hand finally loosening its grip on the steering wheel.

“Mm-hmm,” she nods, not looking away from you, not breaking the eye contact that’s holding you in place. “I knew you couldn’t resist me.”

She’s not done yet—she still has to take her victory lap.

Wonyoung pulls herself off you, giving the tip of your cock a parting kiss as she sits back in her seat. She lifts her legs up—those endless stretches of porcelain skin—one after another, slow, dramatic, placing her bare feet on the dashboard.

Her skirt rides up, and with a stretch she drags her panties up her thighs, along her calves, and off her feet; the lace is soaked with her juices, leaving a trail of stickiness as she reveals herself to you.

The panties disappear somewhere into the backseat of your car, another spoil of war, and she spreads her legs wide, so wide, making sure you have a perfect view of her gleaming cunt. You can see her clit, peeking out from between her folds, and it’s all you can do to keep your hand from reaching over and taking over.

But this is her show, isn’t it? This is all for her, all about her getting off. And she’s fucking drowning in it—fingers in her cunt again almost immediately, so wet, so hot, so shameless in your car, so confident in her ability to get what she wants from you.

Her hips rock up and down, she’s fucking herself in front of you—for you. She’s daring you to look away, challenging you to deny how fucking hot she is.

You can’t.

“I’m going to cum now.” It’s a low hush, confident. “Watch me. Don’t move. Just fucking watch me.”

Wonyoung’s eyes are crystal clear, staring deep into you with the look of a girl who’s gotten everything she’s ever wanted in life. It’s that look she gets right before she shatters, and you know she’s there—right fucking there.

Her other hand reaches up, cradling your cheek, needing some connection, needing you to be with her. It’s not enough to just simply cum, she needs you to see it, to be a part of it in some twisted way.

“Just look at you,” Wonyoung says, like she’s not the one that’s covered in your cum, that’s not bucking her hips into her hand, working herself into a frenzy, like she’s trying to tear herself apart. “You can’t keep your eyes off me, can you?”

And she’s right—you hate her, you love her, you want to fuck her, you want to strangle her—it’s all a jumble of emotions in your head.

“That’s it—keep looking at me—don’t fucking take your eyes off me—fuck—yes—I’m going to—”

The only warning you get is a strangled gasp as Wonyoung cums, feeling it through her entire body, forcing her to keel over by just the force of it, making her fall into you.

Her hand on your cheek drags down to wrap around your neck, anchoring herself to you, pulling herself closer so she can smash her mouth against yours.

She’s kissing you, really kissing you, mouth open and hungry, all teeth and tongue, sloppy and wet. She’s marking her territory now, claiming you as she cums, and fuck, you can still taste yourself on her lips—salty and bitter.

Wonyoung’s hand is still working her clit, prolonging her bliss, and then she’s climbing on top of you, straddling you, grinding down on your half-hard cock as she rides out the last of her orgasm.

Her thighs are sticky with her juices, her skirt riding up so high that you can see the bare, plump skin of her ass, and you’re fighting the urge to just push it aside and plunge your cock inside her—

But she’s not giving you that satisfaction—not yet.

Her climax dies right on top of you—her hips rolling on her fingers, her body living and dying on the last embers of pleasure.

Finally, Wonyoung stops, collapsing against your chest, and you let out a deep sigh, feeling the weight of her body pressing down on you. She’s a mess, a fucking disaster, and you hold her tight, your arms around her impossibly tiny waist, your cock coming back to life between her thighs.

It’s intimate, almost kind of romantic in a way that’s entirely fucked up, considering, well everything. You’re both a mess of cum and sweat, panting against each other, intertwined together in the driver’s seat of your car, the garage lights flickering overhead like some kind of sick mood lighting.

Wonyoung laughs.

“You’re all sticky.” She leans back, taking her finger and swiping it across your cheek, coming away with a glistening strand of your own cum, a rope that must have strayed from her face and onto yours.

There’s a glint in her eyes, a dirty little idea, and before you can even react, she’s leaning in again, her tongue tracing the line of your jaw, collecting the rogue drops of you.

She rolls her hips down and over you as she does it, stirring your cock back to attention, because apparently she’s not done with you yet.

“You’re a fucking bitch, Wonyoung,” you reply, but there’s no venom behind it. You’re just stating a fact: the sky is blue, the sun rises in the east, and Wonyoung is a bitch.

It’s just the way she is.

You can feel her smirking against your neck, you can picture the look on her face—like she’s already won. It’s infuriating, really, and you’ve got to even the score.

“What are you going to do, take me upstairs and punish me?”

“No,” you say, the word sticking in your throat like it’s made of honey. “Not upstairs.”

“Here?” Wonyoung looks around your car, doing a terrible job of feigning shock (as if she doesn’t know what you’re about to do to her). Yes, she’s a horrendous actress, but it would take an Oscar worthy performance to mask the heat radiating from her thighs, her cunt dripping down onto your lap. “What makes you think I’d let you?”

“What makes you think you have a choice?”  

A press of a button has your seat sliding back, giving you just enough room to lift Wonyoung up, hoisting her above you like she’s a trophy you just won. Congratulations, here’s your Grand Prize—Wonyoung’s tight body, yours for the night (yours for every night).

She can’t do anything but be held by you, have her hips positioned, her cunt aligned with your cock—in your hands, at your mercy, under your control.

“Wait, wait—fuck—”

And then you slam into her.

“Daddy!”

That word. That filthy, devastating word is fucked out of her mouth, a gasping scream as you bury yourself deep into her.

You’d do anything to hear it again.

You don’t bother with gentleness or foreplay—this isn’t a romantic reunion after a long day apart. It’s your hands on her narrow hips; hers doing its best to brace herself on the roof of the car, the window, anywhere she can get a grip.

“Say it again,” you grunt, pulling her back down on you, so hard that she bounces back up, only to be met by another thrust.

“Fuck you,” she spits out, but she’s moaning with every thrust, tightening around you each time, her body betraying her words.

“Fuck you, who?” You’re laughing now, the sound thick and low in your throat as you watch her squirm in your grasp. “You’re going to need to be more specific than that, baby.”

“You know who,” she says, her eyes flying open, glaring at you as she catches her breath. “You always know who.”

“Then say it.”

“Fuck you, daddy.”

“That’s fucking right.”

Her legs are trembling around your waist as you drive into her, her nails digging into the threads of your shirt. She’s begging you for more—harder, faster, deeper—because that’s what she wants from you, that’s what she needs from you. It’s always been like this—no soft embraces, no tender kisses. Just more, more, more.

You wrap your hand around her throat, not enough to cut off her air, just enough to remind her who’s in charge, who’s giving it to her. You lean in, so close her eyes cross, and whisper in her ear, “This is all you’re good for, you know that?”

Wonyoung’s response is to tense her muscles, clench her cunt around you, buck her hips to slap her ass against your thighs. Another battleground in your endless fight for dominance. Fighting for control, trying to dictate the pace, to set the rhythm, to be the one doing the fucking and not the one getting fucked.

And fuck, she’s tight.

Her cunt, her waist, her body. God, it’s like she was built for this.

Designed to fit perfectly in the palm of your hand, to be filled by your cock, to have her skirt hiked up to her waist like a flag of surrender. You’ve got her right where you want her, where she’s always been, where she always will be.

“I fucking hate how good you are at this,” she gasps, the confession spilling from her lips.

You laugh, “I fucking hate you too.”

She’s kissing you again, fingers in your hair now, scraping the back of your scalp, as she rises and falls on your cock. Reflex has your hand tightening around her throat, feeling her pulse quicken beneath your thumb, making her choke out another ‘daddy’.

You’re fucking her like you hate her, like you’re trying to punish her for every sharp word and cold shoulder she’s ever thrown your way. And she’s taking it like she loves it, like she’s been waiting for this all night, all year, all her fucking life.

Wonyoung looks so fucking good, so perfect riding you like this, it’s starting to piss you off. Her hair’s framing her face in perfect waves, not a single strand out of place, even though you’ve had your hands all through it, your fingers tangled in it. Her makeup’s smudged—you can see the tracks of your cum on her cheek—but she wears it like a fucking badge of honour—and like all things, it looks good on her.

It’s like the universe took one look at her and said, ‘nah, she’s too pretty to let any of that shit ruin her.’

But you’ll try.

Keep going—keep fucking; each moan into your mouth, each push of her tongue against your own, each graze of her teeth against your skin—tells you you’re getting there.

Like you’re trying to fuck out all the spite and anger that’s been building up between you, like you can somehow purge it from your systems and just be left with the good parts.

(It’s never that simple.)

“Wonyoung—” you start, but she cuts you off.

“If I could just have your cock without the rest of you—without your stupid mouth, without that fucking look on your face—fuck yes, just like that—without all the bullshit and fighting—fuck, fuck, fuck—”

You don’t believe her, of course—you’re not just a cock to her, the same as she’s not just a pussy to you. But you let her have her fantasy, let her keep pretending she’s just using you for a good time.

“You’re such a bitch,” you murmur, making her chuckle in your ear, her teeth finding the sensitive skin of your lobe, biting down and making you hiss.

Wonyoung’s confession: “Only because it—gah—makes you fuck me harder.”

And it does—it makes you want to show her, prove yourself to her, make her feel it the next day and every day after. Fuck her until she’s nothing but a trembling, whimpering mess, until she’s begging for you to stop. Until she’s begging for you to never stop.

You’re both getting sloppier now, Wonyoung’s hips stuttering as you pound that spot deep inside her, the one that makes her see stars and scream your name, the car shaking with the force of your fucking.

It’s a badly-kept secret you’re keeping from the world outside—the car’s rocking, the lights inside are on, making no efforts to hide what the two of you are doing (doing to each other).

If anyone looks closely enough, if the security cameras in the garage get curious and zoom in, they’ll see your silhouettes; her body arching back, your hips thrusting up and into her.

They’ll see Jang Wonyoung, the princess of the industry, getting fucked in the front seat of a car like some common whore.

And she’s loving it. The danger, the thrill of being seen, the risk that anyone could walk by and hear her moan your name, her voice strained by your hand on her throat. It’s the fact that she’s letting you do this to her, that she’s letting you fuck her like this, even when she’s telling you she fucking hates it.

This moment—Wonyoung—right here, is what you live for.

You want to save it, to bottle it up and keep it with you forever. You want to remember how she feels, how she tastes, the fucking sounds she makes when she’s just about to cum. You want to replay this in your head every time you’re alone, every time you’re with someone else—because even though there might be someone else, they’ll never come fucking close to her.

And then you get an idea.

It’s a terrible idea, one that’ll surely end in disaster—like all the best ideas.

You hold down on Wonyoung’s hips, stopping her mid-thrust, and she’s whining, letting slip just how good you’re making her feel.

“What the fuck are you doing?” she snaps, taking short, sharp inhales, replenishing all the oxygen you’ve fucked out of her.

You ignore her, reaching for the dashboard camera that’s been silently facing outside, towards the wall of the garage. It’s been switched on the entire time, waiting to record the car crash inside—you and Wonyoung tearing each other apart.

Wonyoung’s scared. “Oh no, don’t you fucking—”

But she can’t stop you. You’re already spinning it around, pointing it directly at her cum-covered face, her sweat-drenched body.

“Smile for the camera, Wony.”

Her mouth opens, but she can’t muster the words. You’re fucking her again, the camera watching everything, capturing every moan, every slight quiver of her body. It’s a side of her nobody gets to see—the side you’re most familiar with.

Wonyoung at her most honest, when she’s undeniably yours.

Just her—getting used (using you)—and fuck, there’s nothing more worthy to be captured and preserved for all eternity.

Her eyes dart to the camera, then back to you, her mind racing a mile a minute. You can see the gears turning—she’s trying to figure out how to get out of this, how to win back some ground, but she’s lost.

You’ve got her, and she knows it.

You’re fucking her, and she has no choice but to follow—whether she likes it or not.

“Fine,” she says, the admission torn from her throat as you push back into her. “But if this leaks—if you ever show this to anyone, I’ll fucking kill you.”

You just laugh. “You really think so little of me? Like anyone would believe it anyway.”

And you mean it. You’re not that stupid. But the thought of having a permanent record of this moment, of Wonyoung, begging in high definition—it has you hooked.

You can’t help but add, “But we’ll always know it’s there, won’t we? Forever.”

Wonyoung narrows her brows at you, but she doesn’t protest anymore. Instead, she does the opposite. She starts to lean into it.

She tips her head back, arching her spine so that her tits are pushed up, giving the camera a picture-perfect shot of her body, her chest, the stiffness of her nipples—everything.

Jang Wonyoung—always the performer.

A free hand runs through her hair, flinging it back over her shoulder, and she starts to roll her whole body; fucking herself on you in a way that’s so deliberate, so fucking pornographic.

“God, I fucking hate this.” Wonyoung puts it on public record, eyes never leave yours as she performs for the camera—or for you, it’s hard to tell.

“What’s that, baby?” You tease. "You hate how good this feels?”

“I hate that it’s you,” she says, the words forced out between gasps. “I hate how fucking hot you are.”

“The feeling’s mutual.”

You’ll never understand it. How someone you despise so much, with every fibre of your being, can fit so perfectly around you, feel so downright incredible on top of you. It’s a cruel joke that the universe decided to play on you both.

But you play along, let her ride you like it’s her fucking birthright, lock you in some petty staring contest, keep your mind filled with nothing but the tightness of her cunt.

You’re both panting now, sweat slicking your skin, making it easier for her to slide up and down on your cock. Her small tits bounce with every movement, and you can’t help but reach out to grab one, pinch it hard, making her wince, making her gasp.

“Fuck—you should quit whatever the fuck you’re doing,” she says, trying her best to form complete sentences through the pain, the bliss. “Work for me.”

“And do what?”

“I don’t know.” Wonyoung looks down at you and you can see it on her face: the fucking slut is dead serious. “Manager, bodyguard, assistant. Whatever I can do to keep you close so you can fuck me like this whenever I want. If Yujin can have her drummer boy, it’s only fair that I get you.”

“Why the fuck would I want to spend all day waiting on you?”

She corrects you: “Spend all day inside of me.”

There’s your fantasy—mornings fucking Wonyoung in some hotel room, drinking all the juices from her pussy in the car on the way to work, having her suck your cock backstage at some concert, making her scream your name every night before going to sleep.

And then waking up and doing it all again.

There’s no hiding the smirk on your face. “Go fuck yourself, Wonyoung.”

Wonyoung mirrors your grin, that wild, cock-drunk look in her eyes. “Why would I do that when I have you?”

“No.” You’re pulling her close, holding her body tight to you, making her feel it. “You’re mine.”

That word again—'daddy’ on her lips, turning into a desperate cry as her thighs tense on either side of you, her hands locking behind your neck. She’s holding on tight, because you’re not giving her a choice, you’re not giving her anything but what she’s begging for.

You watch her face in the reflection of the car window—the way her mouth hangs open, the way her eyes flutter shut and then open again, searching for something, anything to keep her grounded.

"Fuck me like I’m yours,” Wonyoung pleads. “You own me? Then fucking treat me like you do. Treat me like I’m your fucking whore, daddy.”

It’s too much, all of it. Wonyoung: her face—those lips, her body—those fucking legs, her voice—the way she says your name, how she calls you daddy, like it’s a fucking curse. You’re so close to the edge now, so close to cumming again, cumming inside her. You can feel the beginnings of it, the tension coiling in your balls, the white creeping into your vision.

But she’s still talking—and so are you, you realise.

One of you cries out—holy shit—answered with a—so fucking good—followed by an exchange of—fuck yous—and—I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.

It keeps going, this fucking, this using, this hating—whatever this is.

“I fucking hate you—”

“Hate you too—”

“Hate how good your cunt feels—”

“Hate how big your cock is—”

“Hate how perfect you are—”

“Hate how much I want your fucking cum—”

“Fucking slut—"

“Daddy—”

“I’m going to—"

"Please!"

And that’s it.

It’s over—your cock pulsing deep inside her, Wonyoung’s cunt clamping down around you, and you’re cumming—together—tightening and writhing and calling each other every name under the sun, except maybe the one that actually matters.

Wonyoung’s head falls back, losing control of her own body, the camera catching every glorious moment as she cums, her orgasm ripping through her in a scream that you feel in every inch of your body.

You kiss her—her tits, her neck, her jaw, her lips—claiming her, making sure she feels every drop of you. You hate her, you love her, you hate that you love her, you love that she needs you, you hate that you need her.

And all the while the camera keeps rolling, capturing your sweaty, heaving chests; capturing you filling her, spilling out of her, giving her the cum she so desperately pleaded for. It’s so much more intimate than any kiss, any love confession, any of that romantic shit she sings about.

But it’s not enough. It’s never enough.

It’s every twitch, every shiver, every little pulse of your release flooding her. How she tenses and clenches around you, soaks you with her wetness, drowns you in her tight, drenched heat.

And she keeps calling you it—whispering it—‘daddy’—over and over again, even as she’s coming down from the high, even as she’s gasping for air, even as she’s forcing her tongue into your mouth.

Wonyoung slumps against you, your cum dripping out of her and down your cock, staining the leather of your car seats. You can feel the stickiness of it, the mess you’ve made together. It makes you want to do it all over again.

To make her say it again, to make her scream it again.

“You’re so fucking mine,” you murmur against her neck, kissing her collarbone, tasting the salt of her sweat.

Wonyoung just nods, too exhausted to argue, too satisfied to care. Her hand finds yours, weaves your fingers together, and you hold onto her, tight. It’s sickeningly sweet, and yet, despite your best efforts, the insult, the quip to break the spell doesn’t come.

Because in the end, you don’t want to kill the moment—not when it’s so perfect.

You don’t want to ruin it with talk of the real world, with the harshness of the light that’ll be waiting outside the car door.

You stay there, parked in the garage of her apartment building, the headlights dimming down to black. The air is thick with the smell of sex and sweat, the taste of it lingering on your tongues. It’s a bubble you’re both loath to burst—because once it does, once it pops, you’re just Wonyoung and some guy she fucking hates again.

“Thank you, daddy.” Wonyoung’s breathing slows, her grip on you loosens. She’s drifting off, the stress of the night and the alcohol finally claiming her.

You don’t know how long you sit there, the two of you tangled together. It’s quiet except for the occasional hum from her, a cute little sound that she’s probably unaware she makes. It’s soothing, almost sweet.

But reality has a way of crashing in, doesn’t it?

You know you can’t stay here forever. You know you’ve got to get her upstairs before someone sees, before the cameras (the dangerous ones, the ones you don’t own) spot you. Before the rest of the world catches up.

You ease her off your cock, she whines, her eyes struggling open. “Take me home,” she mumbles, still not fully coherent.

“Already am, baby,” you reply, gently untangling her body from yours.

With a bit of effort, you manage to get her into an almost presentable state—straightening her skirt, buttoning her shirt, dabbing the cum that’s pooled between her thighs. She watches you as you do it, through a hazy gaze, still recovering from being fucked into oblivion.

It’s an act. Partly at least. A way to save face—pretend that it’s only the exhaustion, that she doesn’t really need you, doesn’t really want to be taken care of like this. Doesn’t want to nuzzle her head into your shoulder, or hug you tight, or have you kiss her on the forehead and tell her that you’ve got her.

Tomorrow she’ll yell at you for it, probably call you an overbearing asshole for treating her like a delicate flower. Make fun of you for going soft, for totally falling under her spell.

(And sometime even later, in a moment when she’s all quiet and feeling vulnerable, right after you’ve fucked each other and hated each other and ended up holding each other for the millionth time, Wonyoung will say:

“You’re the only one who can keep up with me.”

You’ll know what she means right away; you’ll kiss her again and you’ll answer:

“I know.”)

Because despite the fact that when she wanted to be (and it was often), Jang Wonyoung could be a real fucking bitch, you’re also kind of in love with her.

And, if you were to ask her, she’d probably the same about you.

[sunderwight]

Been thinking about the potential of a Luo Binghe transmigration fic where he has a similar experience to Shen Yuan's -- meaning, he transmigrates into a story that didn't originally have a "Luo Binghe", but rather a different character with a similar name, and Bingmei himself still has his canonical personality and broad strokes modern version of his backstory (i.e. abandoned, adopted, orphaned, struggling with the foster system, etc), whereas the character he transmigrates into has a different background and personality.

So, concept: Luo Binghe transmigrates into Su Binghe, the spoiled prince of the demon realms, son of Tianlang Jun and Su Xiyan and scum villain of the novel he read.

In said novel, Su Binghe was driven by a perpetual lack of satisfaction with things. He had almost everything handed to him on a silver platter, but none of it seemed to actually matter to him. His parents were powerful and loving, but also extremely busy and somewhat distant. His sibling relationships were soured by the fact that they were all basically raised separately by different groups of servants and expected to compete with one another for the supreme throne of the demon realms one day. The servants who raised him also had only limited authority over him, thanks to his rank, so he was encouraged to be self-centered and tyrannical from an early age because behaving that way helped him get whatever he wanted. Yet he felt ultimately purposeless and lonely, lacking any actual friends or companions.

Shen Yuan, the main character, was the third son of a wealthy noble house and was stolen by demons during a raid on his family's properties. He was rescued by Tianlang Jun's people, who officially disapprove of attacks on humans (special cases like Huan Hua Palace being an exception), but not before the rest of his family was killed or else sold off into less friendly territories. Shen Yuan himself was subsequently taken on as a ward of the emperor, as a sort of apology for the whole deal, and inserted into the somewhat younger Su Binghe's household as a companion and tutor to try and curb the prince's loneliness. The empress also took Shen Yuan on as a personal disciple, as the only person able to teach him human-style cultivation.

This worked about as well as anyone expected, which was to say that the spoiled prince treated his weakling human tutor like his own personal chew toy, blowing hot and cold, manipulating and mistreating, jealously resenting Shen Yuan's attention from his mother while also taking every opportunity to insert himself into the additional lessons as well.

Eventually the situation came to a head, with Shen Yuan lashing back after being pushed to the limits, and Su Binghe using the "attack" as an excuse to exile him in the midst of hostile demon territory. Thus began the protagonist's power-up montage segment, where he was forced to fight and survive, leveling up his skills until he came across Xiu Ya.

Xiu Ya was a legendary sword that had been wielded by an equally legendary human cultivator, an actual secret ancestor of Shen Yuan's, long ago. It was sealed away by a past Heavenly Demon emperor, after its wielder managed to use it to successfully kill one of their kind (a difficult feat). By sealing the blade deep within the demonic realms, the past emperors had assured themselves that no human cultivator would successfully venture so deep into their territories nor uncover its hiding place, and so they mostly warded it against other demons (who might want to return it to the humans in order to sabotage the Heavenly Demons). Thus, Shen Yuan successfully liberated the blade, and after winning a harrowing battle against an ancient evil (boss fight!) with it, he ascended to godhood.

But, even the heavens weren't merciful in this story, and Shen Yuan was tasked with using Xiu Ya to end the threat of the Heavenly Demon race once and for all before he could claim his rightful place among them. If he failed, his soul would be forfeit and Xiu Ya would shatter, eternally condemning the mortal plane to the tyranny of demonic rule.

Luo Binghe absolutely loved the character of Shen Yuan, even though his story was kind of trash, and he did not want to transmigrate into Su Binghe, especially not with a mandate hanging over his head that he had to one day cast his favorite protagonist out into the wilds, and then let him kill Binghe in order to fulfill a mandate from the heavens!

Featuring:

-Modern day culinary student Bingmei, absolutely revolutionizing food prep in the demon realms and desperately wishing he could change the genre to one of those slice-of-life cozy escapist novels instead.

-Bingmei being actually a thousand times sneakier and more self-aware than his predecessor, taking Su Binghe's absolutely pathetic attempts at politics and making it work for him instead (between the foster care system and the food service industry, Bingmei takes no prisoners).

-Su Binghe originally had a sprawling harem by the time Shen Yuan reunited with him. Luo Binghe wants nothing to do with it, so he has to just keep on dodging his parents attempts to set him up in political matches.

-Some of Shen Yuan's original household and family actually did survive, so Luo Binghe dedicates himself to rescuing the rest of them to try and farm points with the protagonist. This results in him retrieving Shen Yuan's brother, Shen Jiu (asshole rat bastard feral cat of a guy, Luo Binghe almost wishes he'd failed), Shen Yuan's personal companions the Liu siblings (terrible decision, Shen Yuan's always waxing poetically about how beautiful they are), Shen Yuan's younger sister Yingying (annoying but nice), Shen Jiu's situationship Yue Qi (there is something deeply wrong with that guy), and the son of the family's head servant, Shang Qinghua (weird rodent man, somehow has evil advisor vibes despite also looking sort of like the designated non-threatening one in an idol group).

-Bingmei identifies Mobei Jun as a fellow transmigrator pretty early on, when he absently whistles the notification sound for a smart phone and Mobei reaches for his pocket. Mobei Jun's approach to transmigrating is basically to say and do as little as possible. Bingmei subsequently doesn't find out that he is in fact the author of the original book until some time after the main plot has passed.

-Despite not wanting to, Bingmei is fully prepared to die in order to secure Shen Yuan's eventual destiny as a god. He only hopes he might go out cleanly and with more sympathy than the original goods got. Imagine his horror when Shen Yuan decides he's going to fight the gods instead of wiping out the Heavenly Demons.

[hedgehog-moss]

(There is blood pictured at the end of this post) (well, 1 drop) (don't worry it's mine, not some innocent creature's)

I found a dormouse in my kitchen today, just chilling on the ceiling above my head, watching me cook. Maybe even judging my cooking technique like Ratatouille. I only noticed its presence because there's a bunch of dried herbs hanging from the ceiling above the stove and at one point I heard a rustling, then a crunching noise.

It was eating my herbs.

As if they were a little snack I'd placed here for my dormouse friends. None of my other animals can walk on the ceiling, therefore any food that's near the ceiling must be an offering to the dormice. (I admit, that's sound logic.)

A dormouse family has been living in my walls since before I moved here—I should probably call it a dormouse dynasty, by now. Here's the first post I wrote about them, in 2019 ! The cats eat a lot of them (especially Morille, she loves dormice) but apparently not enough to make the key decision makers in this dormouse community decide that living in my house is more trouble than it's worth.

Every year when they hibernate and go quiet for eight months I have the renewed hope that this time the cats got rid of all of them, but the next spring they wake up and start scratching inside my walls in the middle of the night again. (Not only that's creepy, but it's so loud.)

Anyway, this dormouse, let's call him Alfred. I saw immediately which hole between two stones he'd crawled out of and the first thing I did was to stuff a salt shaker in there to block his escape route. Step 2 was to call for backup—I summoned Morille, and she came down from the living-room 2 seconds later (the cats know it's always good news when I call them to the kitchen while cooking.)

Alfred was panicking.

I grabbed a broom and started threatening him with it like an angry old woman in a cartoon. He tried to flee towards the ladder, but Morille was there. He tried to flee towards the door, but Morille was also there. He tried to hide on top of the fridge, and Morille happily lay siege to it, like my fridge was a Gallic oppidum on top of a hill and Morille was Caesar and his entire army.

Morille was having the time of her life.

But my kitchen door was ajar, and Alfred managed a heroic jump from the top of the fridge to the lintel, like a flying squirrel. He scurried out then grabbed hold of the climbing rose right above the door. When I got out and took this photo, he looked fairly stressed and pessimistic.

I didn't want him to climb the wall all the way to the eaves and go right back into my house, so I went back in to get my broom again, either to make him lose his grip and fall straight into Morille's gaping maw (sorry), or make him run away into the woods (inferior solution; they always find their way back, unless you take them very far away.)

(I used to trap dormice humanely then drive them 3km away to release them near the barn of a neighbour I disliked, but this neighbour has since moved. (Not because of my dormouse warfare, I swear.) There's also an abandoned house in the woods where I used to exile my prisoners, but after a while I started feeling silly driving around the countryside with dormice in the backseat, so I stopped trapping them (it really was a hassle) and just let the cats eat them.)

But Alfred is a combative and resourceful rodent. In the half-minute it took me to go back in and grab my broom, he laid a trap for me.

He ran along the stem of my climbing rose in such a way that his weight made it droop jussst enough to be now hanging at face level rather than above the door. So when I ran outside again with my broom, I was slapped in the face by a thorny rose plant. (For a minute I thought I was crying tears of blood, which seemed worrying, but it was just a scratch above my eye.) (I wish it could leave a tiny scar, so people will ask how I got it, and I will tell them about the mighty dormouse wielding a rose sword.)

I sent these pics to my brother hoping to get some sympathy, and he cropped & desaturated the one with the blood teardrop then sent it back with the comment "you look like an Evanescence song"

By this point I decided Alfred had won this battle. (Not the war, because it's almost autumn aka hibernation time so he probably found another gap between two stones and went right back inside. The war continues.) But this humble dormouse set a Saw trap to poke my eyes out the second I stepped outside my house and I respect that. I admire the way he used his environment to his advantage, and teamed up with my climbing rose to level the playing field (since I had teamed up with my cat first.) He has won the right to spend another winter inside my walls, curled up in my cosy wool insulation, dreaming of dried herbs, thwarted cats, and heroic skydiving from fridgetops.

Well played.