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carolperkinsexgirlfriend · 2 days ago

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can you see the stars in your dreams (and do they have a lot to say about me) - Part 17

Or: a secret Admirer AU

PART 1 || PART 2 || PART 3 || PART 4 || PART 5 || PART 6 || PART 7 || PART 8 || PART 9 || PART 10 || PART 11 || PART 1 || PART 13 || PART 14 || PART 15 || PART 16

Eddie’s back to school on Tuesday, black eye turning a mottled sort of green, lip scabbed over. From where he’s hemmed in by Robin and Chrissy, Steve watches Eddie catch a glimpse of him and bolt the other way.

Jeff sighs, lets go of his hold on Chrissy’s arm, and says, “sorry, Steve. I’m just gonna—” and then he points toward Eddie and follows after him without another word.

Steve’s gut clenches with guilt. He’d put that look on Eddie’s face, had caused the rift in his and Jeff’s friendship, had split the forming group up with his ridiculous crush. But Chrissy and Robin are still here, standing by his side.

“Are he and Jeff okay?” Steve asks, biting his lip as he glances at Chrissy.

“I think so,” she says, looking after her boyfriend. “They talked on the phone, but Jeff didn’t tell me what about.”

“Forget about them,” Robin replies, reaching out to take his hand even as it makes everyone around them stare. “Come on, Stevie, or we’ll be late to Ms. Clickity Clack’s class.”

Steve passes the rest of the day in a daze, the spot at his side a revolving cast of Chrissy, Robin, and Jeff, like they’d all talked behind his back and decided he couldn’t be trusted with being alone right now. Steve can’t blame them because as soon as he’s left unattended in his big empty house, he gets out his notebook and pen, and begins to write.

Eddie —

I’m sorry I never got to read your last letter, but it wasn’t for me anyways. Maybe none of them were, not really. And I’m sorry about that, even sorrier about how your pretty face got caught in the ceasefire. I’m just full of sorries I’m to scared to tell to your face—from the way you ran when you saw me in the hallway this morning, maybe you wouldn’t want me to anyway.

You’ve always been the brave one, so you must really want to not see me, huh? I hope you and Jeff are friends again. I’m sorry about that too, I’m the one who asked him not to tell you. I was afraid, but that’s no excuse.

I don’t know how to stop wanting to right write to you. I can’t turn off the part of me that still wants to know everything about you. There’s a whole in my heart, and I keep trying to find people to fill it, but I can never be in love with someone who loves me back. You know?

I’m sorry, Eddie. Maybe someday, I’ll get to say it to your face.

Sorry,

Steve

He closes the notebook on the damning words and shoves it into his nightstand so he doesn’t have to look at it. Sleep doesn’t come—the house is too quiet. He grabs the phone off his dresser and calls the only other person he knows whose parents trust them enough to have a phone in their bedroom.

“H’lo?” Robin mutters sleepily after finally picking up the phone six rings later.

She sounds tired—Steve’s sorry he woke her. “I wrote another letter,” he says.

That seems to perk her up instantly, as she hisses down the line, “Steven James Harrington.”

“Not my name, Robin Steven Bobbington,” he replies, talking right over her shrieked “well, that’s not mine!” to continue, “I’m not going to send it.”

“You better not,” she replies, and Steve can hear some rustling on her end, like she’s settling back down into her bed. He wishes, suddenly, that he was in there with her, clutching her hand as they fall asleep side by side. Instead, he lays down on his own bed and concentrates on the noises coming down the line.

“Is it stupid that I miss him?” he asks.

“Yeah, kinda.”

“Robin!”

She laughs, a quiet sleepy chuckle that warms him straight through. “I’m just saying! He’s been treating you like shit, Stevie.”

Steve sighs, burrowing down under his comforter and taking the phone with him. “He was different in the letters,” he whispers, like someone in his empty house might hear him otherwise. “Sweeter, you know?”

Robin sighs, “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, me too.”

There’s enough sorries to go around for all of them, apparently. They’re quiet for a while, Robin’s breathing keeping him company in his big, lonely bed with his big, lonely thoughts.

“I love you, Robbie,” he whispers. “You know that, right?”

He’s been saying it a lot lately, throwing the words around like they’ll connect this time and get him something real. And they had, with Chrissy, with Robin, hell, even with Jeff. Just, not with Eddie. Maybe someday, he’ll learn to be okay with that.

“Love you, too, Dingus,” Robin replies, like it’s easy.

He falls asleep that night to the sound of Robin’s quiet snoring.

***

Eddie thinks about it—obsessively, compulsively. He dreams about it, jerks off about it, fucking cries about it. He reads the letters, again, and again, and again, wishing desperately that he still had that first one. At school, he checks his locker obsessively, compulsively, hoping there’s another note in his locker—there never is.

“Dude, what’s your problem?” Gareth asks, an elbow into Eddie’s side.

“Ow, ribs!” Eddie cries, curling away from him and into Doug at their usual lunch table.

“Sorry!” Gareth replies, leaning away from him and raising his hands up like that’ll somehow prove he’s harmless.

Jeff snorts around his sandwich, “gotta be careful, Gare-bear. He’s precious cargo now.”

“Oh fuck off,” Eddie replies, rolling his eyes as the rest of Hellfire laugh around him.

“No, but seriously, dude,” Gareth asks, this time without the thrown elbow. “What’s up with you?”

Eddie looks across the cafeteria at Steve and Chrissy’s usual spots, still empty the way they have been for weeks. He worries, sometimes, that they’re not eating, and it’s his fault.

Hopefully, they’re just packing lunches from home and eating somewhere else (he’s been too afraid to check).

“Can’t tell you buddy,” Eddie replies, still looking at the empty spot like that’ll somehow make the duo appear. “I promised.”

Gareth, clearly having followed his line of sight, leans closer and asks in an unsubtle whisper, “but it’s about you know what?”

Doug sits on, oblivious, but Jeff snorts again and asks, “okay, you didn’t tell me jack shit, but you told the freshman?”

“Sophomore, jackass!” Gareth cries, before seeming to realize the implications of Jeff’s sentence. “You told Jeff?”

“I knew before you did,” Jeff says smugly, and Eddie’s starting to get pissed off about that again.

“How!”

“Jeff, dearest?” Eddie grits out. “Do you want me to punch you in the face?”

That shuts the table up catastrophically. But in the end, Jeff sighs and says, “I’m coming over after school,” and the rest of lunch is spent fielding Gareth’s indignant questions.

True to his word, Jeff climbs into Eddie’s passenger seat at the end of the day. Eddie doesn’t take them to the trailer, he just drives around, taking back roads round and round, restlessness making his fingers twitch in the gear shift.

Jeff’s the one who breaks the silence, in the end. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” he says, making Eddie flinch at the sudden noise. “Steve just seemed so scared, and Chrissy was crying so—”

“He was scared?” Eddie interrupts, stuck on the thought. He’d known that, before, but now that Eddie’s afraid, too, it hits like a punch to the chest.

“Of course he was,” Eddie replies to his own question. Suddenly unable to focus, Eddie pulls over to the side of the road. “I’m scared, too.”

Jeff sucks in a breath; Eddie doesn’t look away from his own knees.

“Yeah?”

Eddie bites his lip, knowing that Jeff will be able to read between the lines. “Yeah.” His eyes are watering, and Eddie swipes at them, embarrassed. “And I know we’re supposed to be talking about us, but I just—”

“No, hey,” Jeff replies. Eddie hears the sound of his seatbelt unbuckling, and the rustle of him shifting in his seat, and suddenly, Jeff’s hand is clasping Eddie’s shoulder, shaking him around just a little. “You’re my best friend—we’re fine, dude.”

Eddie swipes at his eyes again, “I think I want to ask him out, but what if I’m wrong?” Eddie asks, tracking Jeff’s expression out of the corner of his eye. “I don’t want to hurt him again.”

“So, what?” Jeff asks, voice deadpan. “You find out he likes you and suddenly he’s not just a jock anymore?”

Eddie looks down at his own knees, bracing for a hit he knows will never come. But, Eddie’s always been good at hurting himself, so he thinks about that yellow nail polish again, the enraptured look in Steve’s eyes during every D&D session, the way he’d glued himself to Robin Buckley, band nerd supreme’s side in recent weeks. The way he’d look at Eddie like he wasn’t the king of the freaks, like he was worth something.

“He was never just a jock,” Eddie murmurs. “I just never let myself think about it.”

Jeff mmmhmms him and Eddie knows him well enough to hear the doubt beneath the agreement.

“I was afraid, okay?” Eddie laments, scrunching his eyes closed tight until that makes his bruised eye ache too much. “You wouldn’t get it.”

At that, Jeff scoffs, and before Eddie can start up another tirade, he replies, “right, the black guy dating a white girl in Po-dunk, Indiana has no idea how scary it can be to make a move on the person you like.”

Okay, fair.

“You know what could happen if the wrong person finds out?” Jeff continues. “I’ll be lucky if they let me get out of town alive.”

“Okay, okay! I get it, sorry!” Eddie cries, throwing his hands up in defeat. And Jeff, being the asshole he is, just laughs at his discomfort. “How’s that going anyway?”

“With Chrissy?” Jeff asks, continuing when Eddie nods. “She’s great, man. I really, really like her.”

He’s smiling all goofy and in love. Eddie waits for the jealousy to hit; it never comes. Even as he’d flirted with her, there’d always been a disconnect for him between the letters and the girl. He knows why, now.

“I’m happy for you.”

Jeff aims that same goofy smile at him and punches his shoulder. “Thanks, man.”

Eddie wants to feel that way about someone. He wants to think of them and smile like he just can’t help himself. And with Steve Harrington of all people, maybe he can.

“If I ask Steve out, do you think he’ll still say yes?”

“Oh, for sure,” Jeff replies without hesitation before he turns to Eddie and eyes him up and down. “But are you sure you want to?”

Eddie bites back the defensive retort rising on his tongue, and grits out, “what do you mean?”

Jeff sighs and leans back in his chair. Eddie waits, three seconds from snapping as he stews in Jeff’s silence, hands clenched so hard against the steering wheel that it feels like one of his nails might pop clean off.

“Jeff–”

“No one’s ever liked you before!” Jeff cries, and it hits Eddie like a punch to the sternum. “And maybe it’s not fair of me to ask but, are you sure you even really like him?”

“What?” Eddie asks, his mind a record skipping against a bent needle. “What do you–”

“Eddie, man,” Jeff sighs, swiveling his head to finally look Eddie directly in the eyes. “Do you like Steve Harrington, or do you just like that he likes you?”

He drops the wheel, hands almost numb as he shakes them out, no longer able to meet Jeff’s eye.

How would anyone ever know that for sure? How can he know the origin of a feeling when it’s been there, simmering in the background of his brain, just waiting for him to wake up? How can he separate the feeling for a person and the person’s feeling for them?

That’s like asking him to unbraid his hair, let it fall back together, and still be able to tell which strands made up each component of the braid–it can’t be done.

But, “Gareth said I was obsessed with him,” Eddie replies, barely above a whisper. “Like, before I knew he wrote the letters?”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Eddie laughs, but it’s just like Steve said–it sounds different when he doesn’t think it’s funny. “And, he was right, you know? I was flirting with Chrissy, but I couldn’t stop thinking about him.”

Eddie runs a shaking hand through his hair and buries his face into his hands with a shudder. “He’s just–he’s Steve Harrington, right? Everyone knows everything about him, but then he just changes the script!” Eddie’s smiling now, manic, animated. “And I wanted to know everything.”

Eddie drops his hands to look over at Jeff, meeting his eyes once more. Jeff looks patient, ready, hopeful in a way he hadn’t before, so Eddie keeps talking.

“Like, Chrissy was flirting with you and he didn’t even seem to care, and the yellow nail polish, and he came to Hellfire, Jeff. Steve Harrington came and watched us play Dungeons and Dragons.”

“I know,” Jeff replies, grinning now, pearly whites all on full display.

“And when he came to band practice, he was just like, watching me, and I sort of wanted to die, but in a good way, you know?”

Jeff decidedly does not look like he knows, but he’s still grinning across at Eddie like he’s proud of him. Eddie’s kind of proud, too, that he’s managing to say all of this aloud. It feels somehow new and a long time coming at the same time.

“Okay, you can ask him out,” Jeff says, turning forward in his seat and buckling his seatbelt once more.

Eddie laughs. “Oh, because I needed your blessing?”

“Yeah,” Jeff replies, grinning as he turns back to Eddie, looking him up and down like he’s a slab of meat Jeff’s checking for its quality. “Maybe wait until you’re healed up, though. You look like one of those cardboard box kittens that I keep seeing on the news.”

“Shut up!” Eddie squawks, but he’s smiling, helplessly, hopefully.

Eddie Munson with a chance at love, who would’ve thought?

#koko's steddie secret admirer au #steddie #my fic #Jeff. the man that you are<3<3<3<3<3 #i am...SO excited for tomorrow's part. like. after struggling Hard with it. it might have been the most fun i had in writing for the fic

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osarina · 1 day ago

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ᡣ𐭩 WE WERE BORN SICK

FEATURING: dazai osamu

SUMMARY: that sinking feeling that's been looming over you both has finally come to fruition. truths are revealed, questions are answered, but one big one remains: is love enough for you and dazai's relationship to survive this?

AUTHOR'S NOTES: happy fridayyyyy, i can't believe we only have one chapter left of civzai, it's actually makin me emotional </3 this chapter was quite a doozy to write, and i hope it's equally a doozy to read HAHAH no no jkjk , i hope you enjoy. also do u guys want to add an arcane au to the dazaiverse .. ive been thinking heavily about it. comments & reblogs appreciated

GENERAL WARNINGS: fem!reader, port mafia executive!reader, civilian!dazai, dazai's struggles w suicide & sh, reader partakes in mafia business, dazai isn't dazai without a bit of obsessiveness and possessiveness (the possessiveness doesn't come til later but the obsessiveness starts from day 0).

CHAPTER SPECIFIC WARNINGS: hardly edited. angsty chapter. explicit depiction of suicide (past recollection of dazai), implications of past self-harm (dazai), very toxic thought processes at certain parts (dazai), past (and a bit of current) suicide ideation (dazai), manic behavior (reader).

SEE: WASTELAND, BABY! SERIES MASTERLIST

“I’ve been eager to meet you for quite a while. In all of the years I’ve known her, my little hime has never let something as trivial as a boy come between her and our work… I knew you must be special, but I never could’ve imagined just how special. I’m so pleasantly surprised.”

Dazai’s head throbs as he comes to his surroundings. He’s laying in an uncomfortable bed—a hospital bed, he thinks, he can smell the unfortunately familiar scent of antiseptic, but the walls aren’t the typical white he’s used to. He winces as he sits up, unable to recall where he is or what happened to him. Everything is too fuzzy, he remembers being with Fitzgerald, the car ride to the tea house, and-

And he remembers you.

He remembers you.

He lets out a shaky breath as he recalls the way you’d pulled him into your arms, cradling him close as soon as you got him back from Fitzgerald. God, he only got to be with you for what felt like a second. It wasn’t enough time. It wasn’t nearly enough time. You sent him off, he remembers—you sent him with two of your subordinates, the weretiger and that freaky little girl, and then…

“Shhh… Don’t speak. I want to get this done and over with.”

The gun to his back, Atsushi and Kyouka’s cries of shock, the baton to his head.

“No can do, weretiger. On orders from the boss.”

His mind tracks back to the words that had been spoken as he was teetering on the edge of consciousness, mouth going dry and eyes widening as he becomes acutely aware of the other person in the room with him. His gaze flicks up to where a vaguely familiar man sits at a desk watching him—straight chin-length black hair, inquisitive purple eyes, a long black coat, Dazai isn’t sure where he recalls this man from but he knows that they’ve met before.

“Who…” Dazai asks, voice wavering as pain shoots through his head with every little movement. “Who are you? Have we… met before?”

His wrist hurts. His mother’s nails dig into his skin so deep that it draws blood, and he doesn’t know what’s going on. He’d just been sleeping—is he still sleeping? He isn’t sure. He’s stumbling over his own feet trying to keep up with her, he keeps asking her what’s going on but she doesn’t answer him.

They turn a hall and his mother stops so suddenly that he slams right into her, nearly tripping over onto the ground. He doesn’t even regain his footing before his mother is pulling him back the way he came, he looks over his shoulder trying to figure out what caused his mother to panic so badly and he looks at—a man?

Who is that?

Why is he coming from grandfather’s room?

Is that-

Blood?

“Shuji! Shuji, don’t look back! Keep moving!”

Shuji? Who’s Shu-

“I think you know the answer to that already.” Dazai is startled out of the memory—was that a memory?—by the man’s voice. He sounds amused, and from the way that his eyes are glittering, Dazai can tell he’s finding great entertainment out of this situation. It pisses Dazai off. “Don’t you?”

“Tane-chan, you know you won’t be able to hide him forever. You’re just making this harder on yourself.”

Dazai’s breath catches. He shifts backward on the bed to press his back against the wall. Everything is wrong—the air is too cold, his bandages are itching, his head hurts, and he doesn’t know what’s going on. Who is Shuji? Why is he thinking of his mother after all of these years? And what… what was he remembering?

Memories of his youth have always been sparse and fleeting—he can vaguely recall the faces of his siblings, the anxiety he felt around his grandfather, the loneliness—but something like this… The panic on his mothers face, the pain in his wrist, the way she was dragging him around, the fear in her voice when she screamed at Dazai—was he Shuji? But then why—to not look back, to keep moving. He would remember something like that. That would be… crazy to forget, right?

What is going on?

“You’re Mori,” Dazai breathes out, clearing his throat. He hopes he doesn’t look as disconcerted as he feels, but he thinks he must. “You’re…”

The leader of the Port Mafia.

The closest thing you have to a father.

So, how does Dazai remember him from years ago? It doesn’t make sense. He couldn’t have been older than thirteen, maybe fourteen in that memory. What did he forget? When did he meet him? What’s going on? Dazai wants to scream, his mind is still slow from just waking up—he doesn’t even know how long he was unconscious, it couldn’t have been that long.

Mori’s smile widens as if Dazai just walked right into whatever trap that had been laid out for him, violet eyes flashing with a type of cruel amusement that makes Dazai sick to his stomach. Dazai has to circle back to remember what he just said, he needs to snap out of the daze he’s in. He needs to think. He made a mistake—Dazai made a mistake. He shouldn’t have admitted that he knew Mori. That was a mistake.

How does he fix it?

Can he fix it?

“You do know,” Mori says, like he didn’t actually expect Dazai to admit that he knew him. Like he’s pleasantly surprised. Again. Like Dazai just made things much easier for him. Shit. “Interesting.”

He’s going to use it against Dazai. Dazai knows it. He’s going to use it against him to hurt you. He remembers everything he’s learned about your relationship with Mori—how he pit you against that other girl, Yosano, to get results from you. And he already said it. He already said that Dazai is getting between you and your work, he’ll do the same thing here. He’ll pit you against him.

He’s going to tell you that Dazai knew who Mori was, and that Dazai is someone that he’s not—who is Shuji? Why doesn’t he remember his own name? Is that really his name? How does Mori know all of this? Who is Dazai?—and Dazai needs to be able to say something. He needs to be able to explain. How does he explain this when he doesn’t even know what’s going on? Dazai needs to remember; he needs to remember now, he needed to remember yesterday, because if he’s not the one to tell you this… If he can’t explain this…

This cannot be happening—it can’t. Right when he thought everything would be okay, when he would be with you. His throat starts to clog as anxiety clouds his head and weighs on his chest, a panic attack that he can’t afford right now. He needs to think, he needs to figure out what’s going on—Mori knows something about Dazai that he doesn’t know himself, and he’s going to use it against him to drive a wedge between the two of you. He’s going to tell you, and-

Dazai’s world feels woozy. Why can’t he remember? How does he know Mori? What was happening that night with his mother? He needs to snap out of this, needs to think, but he can’t even breathe. Fear—the mind killer.

“I don’t know what’s going on,” Dazai rasps, his voice is hoarse, and he feels sick, and he hates admitting that he doesn’t know what’s happening, but he needs Mori to believe it so that he doesn’t tell you something that’s not true. “I don’t know how I know you. I don’t-”

“You might believe that,” Mori says amused, “but will she?”

Dazai stares at Mori, his stomach churns violently and his vision swims as the answer becomes abundantly clear to him.

He doesn’t know.

———

The gun in your hand weighs heavily.

You hid it in the inside of your blazer to get up to the conference room. No weapons are allowed up past the thirty-fifth floor unless you’re one of the Boss’s hand-picked personal guards—even executives are forced to disarm themselves before going up, but security is much more lax for the upper echelon. Because you’re you—the hime, second-in-command, the Boss’s daughter—the guards outside of the elevator that goes directly to the top floor wave you past the metal detectors to go on up.

A mistake.

(Who is Tsushima Shuji? It can’t be Dazai. You know Dazai. Mori must be wrong.)

The smile on your face is bland and doesn’t meet your eyes as you walk down the hall to the conference room attached to Mori’s office. You greet the guards, and they don’t notice how off your demeanor is, too starstruck over the fact that they’re being acknowledged for once. They also don’t notice the way your hand is curled around the grip of your gun in your blazer.

A mistake.

(Mori is never wrong. Do you really know Dazai?)

When you reach the end of the hallway, you toss them one last brilliant smile. This one is a bit more genuine because you’ve realized that you’ve gotten through the top notch security of the upper levels of the Port Mafia headquarters without a hitch. That you’re one step closer to finishing this. They’re so blinded by the beauty of your smile that they don’t realize your teeth have sharpened into knives and the floral perfume you wear masks a putrid bloodlust.

A mistake.

(It’s always been odd, hasn’t it? The way he approached you. The way he was so insistent on pushing himself into your life. You always questioned it. There was a sinking feeling that something wasn’t as it seemed. Why didn’t you question it more?)

You keep your back turned as you slip into the room. You can feel four presences behind you—Kouyou, Piano Man, Chuuya, Ace. No Mori. No Dazai. That’s fine—you have something to take care of before they show up anyway. The conference room is soundproof; Mori designed it that way because he didn’t want the guards outside to overhear any discussion of sensitive topics. Even if he handpicked them for their loyalty, he understands that money can make the most devout man’s faith waver. Still, it’s not them rushing in that you’re worried about—it’s the people in the room with you rushing out, so you very carefully twist the nub of the lock and then reach up to fix the deadbolt. It won’t stop them, but it will slow them. You can feel their eyes on you as you make sure the door is locked, but none of them call you out for it or try to stop you.

A mistake.

(Mori always told you that the Tsushimas were like cockroaches. If they all weren’t killed, one would eventually return to reclaim their grandfather’s empire. There’d be a power struggle between the factions loyal to the new regime and the ones that still hid in the shadows believing that the Tsushima blood belonged at the head of the organization. Everything the two of you had built would crumble to ashes.)

You turn to make your way over to the conference table where the four of them are sitting. You haven’t decided how you want to go about this yet. You don’t know who all was aware of what Mori did, and because of that, you don’t know who needs to die. Treachery has always faced a death penalty—you don’t care if Mori ordered it, you don’t care that the Boss’s word is absolute, you have bled and breathed for the Port Mafia. You’ve sacrificed everything you’ve ever owned and wanted for the Port Mafia. You have made the Port Mafia into what it is today with your efforts abroad and at home—foreign governments, foreign criminal organizations, the Japanese government and other domestic mafias, all of them are just puppets that you pull the strings of to ensure the Port Mafia stays on top. Treachery against you will face the same penalty one would receive if they betrayed the Port Mafia, because you are the Port Mafia—Mori has made sure of that.

Chuuya and Piano Man share a look with one another as you approach the table. Neither of them say anything—is it confusion? Is it guilt? Did they know? Were you the only one unaware of the schemes going on around you? Were you the only one loyal? The only one you could trust?

Did they know?

(No one could ever love you without your ability at work influencing them. You’ve known that since the very beginning, but you were so quick to forget that when you discovered Dazai’s ability. You should have had more questions, you should have been more suspicious. Mori had been right from the very beginning. You were emotionally compromised. You were weak.)

Ace opens his mouth to speak.

A mistake.

“It was nice meeting your-”

Ace’s head hits the conference table with a hard thunk, his eyes wide and glassy, his mouth open around the words you didn’t let him finish speaking. Blood seeps from the bullet hole in his temple and pools around his head and the ground beneath his chair, staining the glass table and the white floors.

Instead of lowering your arm, you shift it so that the gun is pressed against Piano Man’s temple next. Chuuya says your name—it’s awful, something caught between a gasp of shock and confusion, he’s never said your name like that before. Like he doesn’t know what you’re doing. Like he doesn’t understand you. Like you’re something unfamiliar. Unrecognizable. You ignore him anyway, and the pangs that come along with it, and instead, you keep your gaze trained on Piano Man’s face.

He’s not as panicked as Chuuya, but you can tell that he’s just as caught off guard from the way his lips are twisted. He watches you carefully, waiting for you to say whatever you’re going to say—if you were going to pull the trigger, you would’ve done so immediately, he knows that. He’s always been good at reading you, better than even Chuuya sometimes.

“Did you know?”

Your voice is steadier than you expect it to be. Cold almost. Distant. You don’t recognize it yourself, you suppose it’s no wonder that Chuuya’s staring at you with such a foreign expression. You watch him just as carefully as he does you. He has a tell when he lies: he squints. Not an obvious squint, just the barest hint of his eyes squeezing shut like he’s calculating exactly what he wants to say, in what tone and with what fluctuation he wants to say it.

A subtle tell, but a tell nonetheless.

“No.”

He stares at you steadily as he says it. There’s no squint—he’s telling the truth. You don’t let out a breath of relief, but you certainly feel the weight off of your shoulders. You lower the gun, satisfied with his response, and then you walk over to where Chuuya is sitting.

You don’t raise the gun to his temple immediately. He looks up at you, you look down at him, a whole conversation is had in the silence between you, and eventually he lowers his lashes in resignation, telling you to do what needs to be done for you to feel more at ease.

He’s always put others before himself.

You lift the gun at the same time he lifts his gaze to meet yours. He could activate the Tainted Sorrow and end this before it starts, but he doesn’t—you know in your gut that if you pulled the trigger right now, he would accept the fate you delivered. Probably would take it as a better one than he deserved—it being at your hands rather than Arahabaki.

“Did you know?” you ask. The words taste bitter, rancid—they don’t belong there, Chuuya would never betray you, but you had to hear it from him.

Chuuya doesn’t have many tells when he lies—he’s a good actor, much better than people give him credit for. If he wanted to lie to you, he might be able to get away with it. But he won’t lie to you, not when he’s looking you in the eye.

“No,” he says, voice soft and raspy like he can’t believe he has to say it.

You let the gun drop to your side. It weighs heavier now—heavier than it did in the elevator, heavier than it did in the hallway leading to the room, heavier than it did when it was pressed against Piano Man’s head. You can hardly bear to keep holding it, but you’re not done yet.

Slowly, your gaze turns to Kouyou. Her expression is cold and unreadable, gaze pinned on you in the same way a lion stalks its prey through the tall grass… No, that’s not right. She stares at you with the same look in her eyes that a snake does when it’s curled in a corner, rattle shaking and hissing to try to scare off the predator that has it trapped.

“You knew,” you breathe out softly in disbelief. Your voice hardens and tightens as you repeat, “You knew!”

Before you can raise your gun—before you can pull the trigger four, five, six times, before you can riddle her body with holes because how dare she know, how dare she know and not tell you after what the previous boss did to her—the door that separates the conference room from Mori’s office opens, and your attention is drawn to the one person who caused all of this.

“Oh my,” Mori says airly, looking between you, Ace’s body, and Kouyou with an expression that is frustratingly amused. “I see you’ve been busy.”

You don’t even know what to say to that. You almost want to laugh. You think you do laugh, actually—someone does, and you think it’s you, because you feel yourself walking away, you lift your hands to your head to tug at your ears in frustration. Your vision is blurry—are you crying?

“You betrayed me,” you finally say, voice quieter than you intend, so you raise it as you repeat yourself. “You betrayed me. You. Of all people I never thought you would be the one to-”

You can’t even finish the sentence, your voice cracks over the words. It makes you feel sick, it makes you angry, it makes you want to crawl out of your skin, because how could he? To you? You don’t know why you’re so angry, why you’re so betrayed. Mori has always made it clear that his priority is the Port Mafia, but still, to do this to you. To do this to his-

To his what?

You’re not his daughter. You hate when people imply that you are, you hate being called hime, you hate being called ‘Miss Mori’, you hate when people give you respect because of your perceived relationship to him.

He’s the only father you’ve ever known. Almost every decision you’ve made has been with the motive of making him proud of you. When he seeks out your opinion specifically during meetings, your chest becomes warm with pride.

You don’t love him. How could you? Look at what you’ve become because of him.

Then why do you feel so betrayed? Why did you think he would be the last person to do something like this to you when you know the type of person he is? Why does your chest feel like it’s caving in? Like your heart’s been ripped right out of it? Why does this hurt as much—why does this hurt more than Dazai’s potential betrayal?

And he certainly doesn’t love you. He never would have done this if he did.

He’s killed people for disrespecting you—he hardly ever gets his own hands dirty, but he does when it’s you and your dignity on the line. He spends hours meticulously picking out birthday presents that he knows you’ll like. He gets sad when he invites you for lunch and you don’t join him, reminiscing about the days where you clung to the back of his coat.

He touches your shoulder, and your finger twitches on the trigger of the gun. You want to lift it, press it to his temple and pull the trigger just like you did to Ace, but you can’t. Your arm feels like lead, and when his hand slides down to your bicep to force you to turn around and face him so that your back is to the rest of the executives, you dutifully follow along.

His expression is unreadable as he looks down at you, violet eyes swimming with an emotion you’ve never seen in them before. He lifts his hand to wipe away one of the tears that had spilled over your cheeks with his knuckle, and then taps your cheek twice, chiding you silently.

Do not cry here, little hime. Not here.

“You have always been so dramatic,” Mori hums just loud enough for you to hear, but the words are fond, and the corners of his lip curl up as he looks down at you. “I would not betray you. Not ever, dear.”

You look at Ace pointedly in response and then back to Mori, the man sighs dramatically and gives you a disappointed look. The nerve, you think bitterly, narrowing your eyes on him as you wait for his explanation.

“I told you,” Mori says. “I did this to protect you. I wanted to get ahold of the boy-”

“Because you have some mistaken belief that he’s a Tsushima,” you interrupt coolly. “How did you even manage to come up with that ridiculous theory?”

Mori’s eyes flicker with something akin to interest, but shifts quickly into pity—you can’t tell if it’s genuine or mocking, and you don’t know which would be worse. He must be mistaken, he has to be. You don’t think you can handle the implications of if he isn’t, of what it might mean for you. For Dazai. Your whole relationship with him. How much was manufactured for him to get information about the Port Mafia? So he could get a foothold in the organization? Get in contact with the remaining loyalists to his family?

“Sit,” he tells you, guiding you over to the seat at the right of the head of the table. “I’ll explain everything, but first… Shuji-kun, why don’t you come out and join us?”

Your breath catches at Mori’s words, gaze twisting to the side over to the door that he’d come out of. You watch as the door creaks open, and the achingly familiar sight of his face finally comes into view. You’ve missed him—you’ve missed him, and you hate this. You should be back at your apartment with him, you should have him curled up in your arms, you should be listening to him complain about how long he was stuck with the Guild.

This shouldn’t be happening. You shouldn’t be sitting at the executive roundtable with Ace’s dead body a few feet away, and Dazai entering the room, questions of his identity, of whether or not he’s been using you for information and opportunity to take back his grandfather’s legacy.

You hoped that Dazai would enter the room angry, irritated by the kidnapping and the accusations, but you don’t think you’ve ever seen Dazai look like this before. He looks a mess, fidgeting, brown hair matted to his forehead, dark eyes wide and swirling with emotion. When he seeks you out, they’re pleading, imploring, like he already knows that whatever is about to be said is going to be bad for him.

He looks… frazzled. Nervous. Confused.

He looks guilty, and you know that Mori is telling the truth.

How much of this was a lie? All of it?

Your throat feels uncomfortably tight, gaze sliding from Dazai back to Mori.

“Tell me.”

Who are you, Dazai Osamu?

———

Despite his body being wracked with a strange sense of guilt, Dazai pushes open the door to enter the room where he assumes you’ll be waiting. You’re not the only one there sitting at the table—there’s five… no, four others—but Dazai can’t help the way he immediately seeks you out. He recognizes his mistake instantly. That highly unwelcome, and highly misplaced, guilt amplifies the moment his gaze meets yours and he sees how crushed you are by all of this. His face twists into something that he knows condemns himself more. and from the way you instantly look away from him, directing your full attention to Mori, he knows he has.

Now, you won’t meet his eyes at all.

Dazai sits stiffly across from you to the left of Mori. Nakahara Chuuya is on his opposite side, glaring holes into the side of Dazai’s head, but he can’t drag his gaze from you. He’s never seen you like this before—even back at the beach house when you’d been so close to breaking down under the weight of everything on your shoulders, you’d held yourself together as best you could.

You’re unraveling now; he can tell you’re still trying to hold yourself together, but it’s as good as trying to pick up water with your fists, your emotions spill out through the cracks carved into the walls you used to hide yourself behind. Mori hasn’t even begun talking, yet your breath is unsteady and your eyes are swimming with emotion; your fingers are still wrapped tight around the grip of your gun, and Dazai is very acutely aware of Ace’s dead body slouched over the table not even a few feet away.

And you won’t even meet his eyes.

Maybe it’s a good thing, he realizes, because Dazai isn’t sure what you might see if you do. You clearly didn’t like what you saw the first time. He just feels so guilty, and he doesn’t even know why he feels guilty because he’s not-he didn’t do any of what Mori implied. He didn’t use you, he didn’t know who you were before meeting you, it wasn’t all some scheme to try to take over the mafia. That’s ludicrous—he’s a literature student at YNU, not some gang lord. He just-

He loved you. Loves you. No ulterior motives. No strings attached.

“I said tell me,” you snap when Mori doesn’t immediately begin talking. “You love talking, so why are you holding back now? Tell me, or I’m leaving.”

Dazai feels a bit sick to his stomach when you say ‘I’ with no implication of taking him with you. He tries to get you to look at him again, silently pleading with you to just spare one glance in his direction, but you’re irritated now. He can see it in the way your fingers flex around the gun, knuckles whitening and finger twitching on the trigger—it’s pointed at the woman sitting next to you, who is very acutely aware of the fact from how stiff she is.

“Do you remember the night we took over the Port Mafia, dear?” Mori asks her, voice a low hum.

“What kind of question is that?” you answer tightly. Your lip curls up in irritation, Dazai can see you become more and more antsy and angry—he’s never seen you so out of control before. “Of course, I do.”

“And you, Shuji-kun?” Mori turns his attention to Dazai and he wants to spit in his face—his name is Dazai—but his voice fails him when he sees the way your face twists at the sound of the unfamiliar name. He stares at Mori instead, hating how amused the man becomes at his silence. “I’ll take that as a no, allow me to refresh you.”

“Eight years ago, a coup was staged against your grandfather’s regime,” Mori says, and Dazai feels like he’s being studied under a microscope. All eyes are on him now—even yours, but now, he can’t bring himself to look at you. He doesn’t know what he’ll find, and he’s scared it’s going to be something he doesn’t like. “Your grandfather was mad, killing civilians and mafiosos indiscriminately, something had to be done, and nobody was willing to do it, so we did.”

“We had to wipe out the whole family, and any loyalists. I was fourteen when I killed someone for the first time. She was a girl my age—the previous boss’s grandaughter…”

Dazai’s gaze drags over to you. You’re staring ahead now, gaze listless and expression eerily blank like you’re slowly starting to realize what this means. Dazai hasn’t come to terms with it yet, because if even a little of what Mori is saying is true then…

“We wiped out the whole bloodline and as many loyalists as we could,” Mori continues, “or we thought we did, at least. My dear hime was who I sent to kill the heirs, I trusted in her to make it quick and painless. We didn’t realize one of the grandchildren were missing until it was too late—he wasn’t in his bedroom, apparently liked to wander around at night because he couldn’t sleep. His mother was able to swoop in and get him out of the estate before our men took over the building… Tsushima Shuji, the youngest of the previous boss’s grandsons. Does this sound familiar yet, Shuji-kun?”

He has the best view of the night sky from an alcove on the fourth floor of the estate—his grandfather’s floor. It’s where he likes to go when he can’t sleep at night, and ever since his cousins and siblings started fighting over their grandfather’s legacy, that’s been just about every night: half because of fear now that things have started escalating to violence, half because he’s not even sure why he’s still here.

His knees are tucked tight to his chest, arms wrapped around them and head resting against the cool glass as he looks up at the stars. He hears a commotion happening somewhere downstairs, but there’s always a commotion happening at the estate, so he thinks nothing of it. He submerges himself in the darkness instead, letting his mind float away as he stares up at the sky—it’s the only time he’s able to relax, escape from the shadows of his own mind.

He’s not sure how long he sits there admiring the night, time passes immeasurably when he’s lost in the stars—he’s only snapped out of it when he hears feet slamming against the ground in his direction. He stiffens, eyes wide, wondering if another one of his cousins has finally turned to bloodshed as the way to inherit their grandfather’s legacy, but instead his mother turns the corner, her smooth face contorted in a type of panic he’s never seen on her before.

“Mothe…” he starts to say, confused, but he doesn’t even get a chance to finish the word, gasping as his mother grabs his wrist and yanks him off the cushioned seat in the alcove.

“Shuji, we have to go,” she gasps, “we need to get out of here. It’s not safe.”

He stumbles after his mother, struggling to keep up with her quick pace and longer legs. Her grip was painful, nails digging into the bandages around his wrists, right into the fresh wounds they covered. He grimaces in pain, breathing heavy as he follows his mother down the hall, assumingly toward the steps near his grandfather’s room.

“What’s going on?” he asks. “What about Bunji? Akane? T-”

His mother chokes over what sounds like a sob and his eyes widen—he’s never heard his mother cry before.

“There’s no time,” she chokes out, “we have to leave without them. We-”

They turn a hall, she skids to a stop and-

“It seems that it does… Allow me to continue then,” Mori hums, drawing Dazai out of the memory. He sounds unbearably amused, and Dazai would be angry if he wasn’t so shaken. He pulls his hands off of the table to rest them in his lap to hide the way his fingers are trembling. “Your mother was able to hide you from us for half a year, I warned her that she wouldn’t be able to for long and since she didn’t share your grandfather’s blood, promised to spare her life if she gave you up to us, but she refused. She tried to take you out of the Kanagawa Prefecture, but our men were catching up to her, and she took… drastic measures to ensure we couldn’t track you down. That I’m sure you remember.”

“Mother,” he whispered, staring up at the rope, her limp body, gaze trailing down to the kicked over chair. “Mother, I don’t… why did you…”

He takes a step closer. A step back. Another step closer. He reaches out, fingers brushing the white nightgown she’d worn the night before while getting him settled in bed, but he snatches them back instantly like he’d been burned, clutching his hand to his chest.

He’s not breathing, he realizes when his lungs start to burn. His eyes sting painfully, unable to draw his eyes away—unable to even blink—is it a nightmare? Is he hallucinating? She sways—sways like when she used to distract him when he was settling into a depressive episode by putting on music and forcing him to spin with her in the kitchen, sways like the wind chimes she keeps outside because the house doesn’t feel homely enough without him, sways-

“Shuji! Shuji, get away from there!” The voice that calls to him is familiar—Aunt Kiye? Why is she here? “God, I tried to get here earlier. Nee-san, forgive me.”

Aunt Kiye grabs his wrist, yanking him away from his mother, dragging him out of her bedroom and down the hall. His voice is hoarse as he screams, he doesn’t know what he’s screaming, if he’s even screaming anything intelligible. He doesn’t stop until he’s out of the house and she’s kneeling in front of him, shaking him out of his panic.

“Enough, Shuji! We have to go, we can’t stay here, they’ll be here soon,” Aunt Kiye shouts at him, expression twisted and eyes pooling with tears that she doesn’t let spill over. “We need to go, and we-we need to change your name, change everything. I promised I would hide you, I-”

“We can’t leave her there,” he argues, voice shrill. “I don’t understand, why did she do that? What did I do? It was my fault, It was my fault, wasn’t it? It-”

Aunt Kiye doesn’t answer his question. She looks bitter, angry, hateful. “We have no time. We have to leave,” she whispers, dragging him to the car despite his protests. She continues talking, more to herself than to him, but the words make his chest cave in. “I told her not to get involved with that family. Their blood is black, cursed. Everyone knows nothing good comes from associating with those people.”

His fault, he realizes, breath becoming thin and shallow. It’s his fault, his blood, his fault that his mother-

“Yes, quite the unfortunate scene we walked into,” Mori says dismissively. “She was smart for it though, she never would’ve survived a night with our sweet hime interrogating her. You should see what she did to that despicable journalist. Of course, she wasn’t as fine-tuned with her ability back then, but that would’ve been at your mother’s expense—her first few attempts at conditioning were quite… unfortunate for her test sub-”

“Enough,” you spit out, interrupting him. Dazai wants to believe that it’s because you can see how uncomfortable he’s getting, but he’s not even sure that you care. He’s not even sure you remember he’s in the room. “Get to the point. You think he’s the Tsushima kid we missed—that doesn’t prove shit. It doesn’t mean-”

You don’t finish what you’re going to say, but you do look at him, and Dazai’s breath catches when his gaze finally meets yours again. He can’t tell what you’re thinking—the expression on your face is entirely indecipherable, something caught between being accusatory and guilty. Dazai doesn’t know if he’s going to make it out of this room alive. Even if by some miracle, you decide to believe him, there’s a good chance that Mori will order his death anyway, and he’s not sure if you’ll pick him over the Port Mafia.

That being said, Dazai doesn’t even know if he wants to make it out of here alive. His brain is fogged with memories that he locked so deep within him that they never should’ve resurfaced—every time Mori speaks, Dazai’s recalling something new, something awful, something that proves that he’s every bit the freak people have always claimed him to be. Every bit as bad. Every bit as wrong. Not like other people. A monster whose mother killed herself because of him, a monster who's been cursed since the day he was born.

“... blood is black, cursed… nothing good comes from associating with those people.”

More than that, he doesn’t see how the two of you are going to be able to come back from this, and that scares him more than anything. You’re the only good thing left in his life, and he doesn’t think he’ll make it without you, but he doesn’t think that after all of this things are just going to work out. You killed his siblings. His cousins. And yeah, Dazai was never close to them—they thought he was too quiet, too strange, all of the things that the other students at school whispered, his family was the first to—but… they were still his family, and if Dazai had been in his room that night, he would’ve been just as dead at your hands as the rest of them.

You killed his family. You would have killed him. The Port Mafia is the reason his mother killed herself, the reason why he walked into her bedroom and saw her hanging from a fan. The Port Mafia is the reason his aunt hated him so much that she couldn’t even bear looking at him, the reason why he was left to die in Suribachi City.

Would you ever be able to get over the guilt of that? Would Dazai be able to accept it? You had a heavy hand in ruining his life, is it enough that you saved him years later? He doesn’t know, he’s hardly even processed it, he just knows that he has to cling to what little he has left, dig his nails in and not let go even if it makes you choke on guilt, even if it makes him sick with shame. He won’t let go.

“So impatient,” Mori sighs. “Your aunt hid you for almost another half a year, but she wasn’t able to move out of the Yokohama area. She did well though, I’ll give her that. We had our best trying to find you, but she was very careful. It was partially our own fault that we didn’t get our hands on you back then—some loyalists to your grandfather snuck under our radar, told her when we were closing in on the two of you. She got rid of you before we got to her… but we did get to her. Kouyou-kun was the one who handled her, if I recall it got quite… messy. I can’t imagine how it must feel knowing that your mother and aunt sacrificed themselves to protect you only for you to throw it all away in an arrogant attempt to reclaim your grandfather’s legacy.”

Dazai doesn’t even zero in on the last bit of what Mori says because he’s too busy trying to wrap his head around the rest of it. Aunt Kiye didn’t… die for him. Aunt Kiye hated him. He remembers that clear enough—he remembers how she could hardly stand to look at him, he remembers the way she was always so cold and rough with him, he remembers-

“You have to go, Osamu.” Aunt Kiye is shouting at him, and he’s sitting in the passenger seat of her car. He doesn’t move, he thinks maybe if he sits still enough, she won’t see him there and won’t make him leave. “Osamu, get out of the car and go, we don’t have time! They’ve found us.”

The name is still unfamiliar—he’s not used to it, and he doesn’t know if he likes it, but Aunt Kiye insists that Tsushima Shuji is dead and that name can never be uttered again. She gets mad when he doesn’t immediately answer to it, tells him not to let his mother’s death be in vain, and that’s usually enough to get him to stop being stubborn over it.

“Osamu, go!” She grabs his bicep hard to try to get his attention, but he flinches and squirms out of her grip, still not responding to her. He can’t remember the last time he’s spoken—he thinks maybe since they left the cabin that morning. “You-”

Aunt Kiye sounds angry now, but he can’t bring himself to look at her. It’s only when he hears her unbuckle and feels her start reaching over him that he starts to panic. He reaches up to grab her bicep, trying to stop her from grabbing the handle of the door to open it, but she’s stronger than him. He’s hardly been eating lately, and he’s never been particularly strong—he was always the smallest among his siblings.

It takes no effort for her to bat his hands away, pushing open the door and unbuckling his seatbelt. He struggles against her as she tries to push him out of the car, and she’s still speaking—shouting at him, begging him, he thinks she might be crying too, but he can’t even tell. His mind is fogged with panic and fear—he doesn’t want to be alone in Suribachi City, he doesn’t want to be alone at all. He wants to stay with Aunt Kiye even if she hates him because he doesn’t want to be alone.

Eventually, Aunt Kiye wins the fight—even with him fighting tooth and nail, she manages to push him out of the car. He hits the ground hard, gasping when he lands poorly on his elbow. He’s stunned for a moment by the shock and pain, and Aunt Kiye takes the chance to toss out a backpack from the back seat and close the door behind him, locking it quickly.

“No!” His voice is raspy from lack of use over the past few months. He scrambles to his feet and tries to pry the door open but can’t. Aunt Kiye won’t even look at him, she stares ahead as she switches the car into gear and he slams his hands against the window. “Aunt Kiye! Aunt Kiye, don’t leave me here! Don’t leave me here, please, I’ll be better, I’ll do better, just don’t-”

He stumbles back as she pulls the car away, falling when he trips over the backpack onto the asphalt, scraping up his hands and forearms. He’s not sure how long he sits there staring after where the car disappeared waiting for her to come back for him.

She doesn’t.

She didn’t die for him, Dazai thinks again, nails digging crescents into his palm. She didn’t die for him, she couldn’t have. Dazai won’t believe it. Aunt Kiye hated him, she abandoned him in Suribachi—none of this can be true. It can’t. His mother killed herself to be free of him, not to protect him; and Aunt Kiye abandoned him because she hated him, not to save him.

That’s the truth. It has to be. They couldn’t have died for him—for him. It doesn’t make any sense. He doesn’t want to remember all of this—he was better off thinking that they hated him, that they wanted to be free of him.

He can feel you looking at him now, but Dazai is back to being unable to look at you. He’s staring down at the glass table looking at his reflection, his eyes are wide and dark and far too black—he looks warped, inhuman almost. His expression is blank, none of the turmoil within him is reflected on it, and he doesn’t even understand why. He thinks it’s probably just making him seem more guilty.

“We figured she left you somewhere in Suribachi City, but we weren’t able to track you down,” Mori says flippantly. Dazai wants him to stop talking, but he has a sick feeling things are only going to get worse from here. “Not until you ended up with Oda Sakunosuke, at least, we…”

Dazai’s ears ring at his old friend’s name. Mori is still talking, but his words become a distant buzz. Everything starts coming back to him at once—his time alone in Suribachi City, the weeks he spent rationing the little food he had, getting the shit kicked out of him by some low rung gang who stole his mother’s ring from him. He remembers giving up, questioning the point of his own existence with a detached logic that left him with only one answer—there was no point to his existence, so he was as good dead as he was alive.

He remembers seeing on a sign that it was the eve of his fifteenth birthday, and he remembers dropping himself in the bay during a storm, hoping that the tide dragged him so far beneath the surface that he’d never see the light of day again.

He remembers waking up the next morning to an unfamiliar face at his bedside, brows knit in disapproval and lips turned down, and he distinctly remembers feeling put out by a stranger looking at him that way.

“What’s your name, kid?”

Dazai couldn’t remember anything but the name Aunt Kiye had drilled into him over and over again the past few months.

“Dazai Osamu.”

“Hm. Oda Sakunosuke. You got a family, Dazai?

Odasaku brought him in.

Odasaku saved him.

The doctors said he’d been dead for almost three minutes when Odasaku found him washed up on the beach—said his memory might return over time, but it might not—but Dazai didn’t even care, because Odasaku brought him in. He gave him a roof over his head, food to eat, and a reason to live. He sent him to school so he could feel like a normal kid his age. He played board games with him and didn’t even care when Dazai was a sore loser and quit mid-game when he realized he wouldn’t win. He humored Dazai when he faked being sick because he didn’t want to go to school. When Dazai was going through bad depressive episodes, Odasaku would sit with him silently and write his book so Dazai never felt alone. Odasaku introduced him to Ango and they were-

They were his friends.

Family, maybe.

They were all he had, and they were all he needed.

And then-

“We were the ones who killed him.”

Dazai’s gaze drags up from the table to focus on Mori. The man’s lips are curved into a cruel smile, his eyes are sharp, and Dazai is moving before he can stop himself. He lunges across the table, but Mori doesn’t even flinch because Nakahara Chuuya grabs the back of his shirt and yanks him back down into his seat.

“You-” Dazai spits, voice raspy and angry.

“Don’t look at me like that, we were trying to get to you,” Mori says casually as if the words don’t shatter Dazai’s entire world. “We would’ve loved to have Oda Sakunosuke amongst our ranks. His death was unfortunate. Collateral damage. He was an assassin for a long time—one of the best in the world. He was pretty much unkillable, his ability allowed him to see six seconds into the future. I never understood how our sniper managed to get him that day, but now I do. He saw you getting shot with his foresight and tried to pull you out of the way, but your ability is nullification, so when he touched you to save you, he damned himself. In those split seconds when he was pulling you to safety, he couldn’t see the future, and couldn’t see the bullets aimed for you that lodged into his chest instead.”

Dazai can’t do this anymore. He tries to push himself up to his feet but his legs are numb and uncooperative, and he can’t move his hands or arms. Mori’s lips part to continue speaking but Dazai can’t do this, he can’t hear anymore of this. He’d always known in his heart that Odasaku’s death was his fault even if he couldn’t remember much about his mother and Aunt Kiye and their desperate attempts to hide him from the Port Mafia. He’d known, but hearing it-hearing the confirmation, it’s too much for him.

Before Mori can say anything, Dazai is startled from his spiraling thoughts when you stand up so abruptly that your chair goes flying back. Your expression is haunted and you’re not looking at him again, but Dazai is glad for it, because he thinks he’s about to throw up.

“I… I need a minute. I just need a minute,” you say shakily before fleeing the room into Mori’s office so quickly that you almost trip over the chair you knocked over.

The room is silent in your wake, and after a few impossibly long moments, Mori stands to follow you into the other room. The three Port Mafia executives left in the room don’t say anything for a moment, and Dazai is just trying to breathe. He’s trying to breathe and process what Mori just said, but he’s failing miserably at it.

It’s the woman, Kouyou, who speaks first.

“She’s going to kill me for knowing about this,” she says simply, sparing a glance down at the dead body on her opposite side. “I’ve never seen her like this before. Even when Chuuya-kun went missing for a few days, this…”

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t have conspired against her,” Piano Man sings, looking entirely unperturbed. “I mean honestly, after what the previous boss did to you, I would’ve thought you’d be more sympathetic. Silly me to think you aren’t a cold-hearted bitch.”

Dazai tries to pay attention to what they’re saying, he tries to ground himself with the conversation happening so he can forget the feeling of Odasaku’s blood all over his hands, staining his clothes, smeared on his face. He tries to replace Mori’s echoing words with what they’re saying but he can’t.

“We were trying to get to you.”

“It has nothing to do with sympathy,” Kouyou snaps, but she does look ashamed. “It’s a security threat, it’s bigger than love. This boy could spell the end of everything we’ve built.”

“She won’t kill you, Ane-san,” Chuuya finally speaks up, his knuckles are tight around the armrest of the chair he’s sitting in. “I’ll talk to her, I just-”

“When he touched you to save you, he damned himself.”

“Chuuya-kun, she almost killed you,” Kouyou says so dryly that the words almost don’t even register to Dazai, but when they do, they’re the only thing that effectively draws him from his spiraling thoughts. He looks at Chuuya sharply to see if what Kouyou said was true, and his eyes widen when he only grimaces and looks down. “You and Piano Man. She didn’t even hesitate before pulling the trigger on Ace. She’s unstable right now, there’s no talking to her.”

“But she didn’t,” Chuuya says tightly. “I’ll talk to her, but first…”

Chuuya looks at Dazai so suddenly that he almost wants to snap his head away and ignore him, but he can’t. The ginger studies Dazai so intensely that it makes him want to crawl out of his own skin.

“Did you know?” Chuuya asks, voice low. He’s angry, Dazai can tell from the way a dark red color starts to flicker around his hands, but he’s trying to keep it together. “Tell me. Did you know who she was and use her to get closer to the Mafia for revenge? I’ll spare her the pain of having to put a bullet through your fucking head and kill you myself right now. Did you know who she was and purposely-”

“No,” Dazai interrupts, voice hoarse. “No. I didn’t-I didn’t know.”

Chuuya stares at him for a few seconds, studying him like he doesn’t know if he actually believes him, but after what feels like an eternity, he finally shakes his head and looks away, rubbing his face with his hands.

“Fuck, this is such a mess,” Chuuya breathes out, voice strained. “Fuck. She-”

Chuuya doesn’t finish his sentence because the door to Mori’s office reopens and you step back into the room, Mori at your heels. Your eyes are red, but your expression is withdrawn now, void of the tumultuous emotions that had been raging across it just a few minutes before. You settle back in your seat. Your eyes flit over Dazai like he’s not even there before focusing on Mori.

Dazai suddenly has a bad feeling.

“I’m not quite sure how you escaped us after that,” Mori continues where he left off, and Dazai is so sick of the man’s voice that he almost wants to rip his own ears off. “Probably Sakaguchi-san from the SDUP, I recall him and Oda-san being close… but that brings us to the present, doesn’t it? Four years later, you stumble into our lovely hime… Come, dear, let me tell you my running theory, and you tell me how accurate I am, yeah?”

Mori is looking at you now, eyes glittering as he waits for your response. Dazai has his own serious issues with the man, but he thinks it’s sick the way he’s enjoying your clear discomfort and increasing distress. Your jaw tightens a bit, but you nod, signaling for Mori to speak. Dazai’s nails dig into his pants as he waits for Mori to continue. Neither of you look at him, and Dazai’s lips part to speak so he can preemptively deny whatever Mori is about to accuse him of, but he can’t push a single word out.

“Your first meeting with him wasn’t by chance. A cafe, maybe… a bar?” Mori offers, watching your face carefully for a reason. You look away at the second option, and the man’s lips curve up. “A bar, then. One you frequent, I bet. The one in Hodogaya-ku, perhaps? Your first meeting, but not Shuji-kun’s first time seeing you. Ui Koutarou—his journalism professor at YNU—wrote his first article implicating the Mori Corporation’s connection with the Port Mafia in February of this year, around a month before rising fourth year students register for classes. Shuji-kun, naturally, has been following anything related to the Port Mafia closely, so when he sees a class being offered in the fall by the same man who has been openly targeting the Port Mafia, he sees an opportunity and signs up for the class.”

No, Dazai tries to say. His lips form the word, but the sound doesn’t come from his lips. No. No, no, no, no. You look haunted suddenly, and Dazai remembers the argument he had with you during the government event in Tokyo. How cold and withdrawn you’d become. How when he confronted you next, you accused him of working with Ui Koutarou and blackmailing you for money. Mori is reigniting all of the initial fears you once had.

“Ui-san has had his sights set on you for quite a while, dear. You don’t need me to tell you that, you’re very well aware of the man’s hatred of you… When Shuji-kun started classes in the fall, Ui-san roped him into his plans, and you became his project. That wretched man had many documents on you. I had the Black Lizards raid his apartment after we captured him—most were harmless, detailing places you frequented and people seen around you, but when Shuji-kun became involved, he started using that information to manufacture meetings between you. I imagine that after you met him that first time, he started appearing around you rather regularly. Bump-ins at that cafe you like in Minami-ku, on the streets—he even started renting an apartment on property that we own after he realized the opportunity he had with Ui… he’s only been living there since the summer, you know?”

His last apartment wasn’t close enough to the school, Dazai wants to argue desperately. He’d been lucky that a cheap apartment opened up in Hodogaya-ku before the semester started—he’s been trying to get one since his first year. It has nothing to do with-

Dazai suddenly feels nauseous again, everything is spinning around him—he still hears Aunt Kiye screaming at him, he still hears the creaking of the rope his mother hung himself on, he still hears Mori’s confirming that Odasaku’s death was his fault. And now this, and you’re not looking at him again, and he’s not saying anything, why isn’t he saying anything? Why isn’t he denying this?

“He attached himself to you quickly, didn’t he?” Mori asks rhetorically. “Too quickly, I’m sure you had doubts—not even your ability makes people reliant on you as swift as he became. How long did it take for him to start prying for information? Trying to make you slip up and implicate yourself with the Mafia? Confess yourself as an ability user?”

The night of the earthquake when you showed up at his apartment, he remembers dizzily. He started pressing you on your political opinion because he remembered Ui saying that all of the criminal syndicates in Japan are going to do whatever it takes to prevent the military bill from passing. But he wasn’t… doing it to prove anything? He just wanted to know more about you, he was curious, he was finally putting the mystery that you are together. It wasn’t malicious—he just wanted to know you. That’s all it ever was, he’s only ever wanted to know you.

“When did you tell him about your ability? More about our organization? Around when the Guild started making their move in Yokohama, I’m sure. He never told you about his ability until his hand was forced. In fact, I’m willing to bet he lied and said he didn’t know he had one, but tell me, do you really think an assassin of the caliber of Oda Sakunosuke would not realize his ward had an ability that negated his own? That he wouldn’t be trained in how to use it… Most importantly, if all of this wasn’t a scheme of revenge—if he really did love you—then why did he never get rid of the flash drive that contained the proof that his journalism house published? The proof that got you thrown in prison?”

You’re crying.

Dazai’s throat swells when he sees the tears silently tracking over your cheeks. At once, he realizes that he’s never seen you cry before; he itches to reach over to you, to grab your hand or wipe away the tears. He doesn’t—partially because he doesn’t think he could move if he tried, but mostly because he knows that he’s the reason you’re crying.

He wants to assure you that none of this is true. He had nothing to do with the Guild—they kidnapped him for fuck’s sake. He didn’t know about his ability, he didn’t even know Odasaku was an assassin. And he was just… careless with the flash drive, and he shouldn’t have been, but there was always so much going on, and he was so new to having someone in his life that really loved him that he was quick to bask in it and forget everything else.

He doesn’t assure you of anything, instead he watches as Mori reaches out to do what Dazai wants to do. He brushes away your tears and turns your face to look at him, a disgustingly sympathetic look on his face.

“I know you were eager to believe that someone could love you without your ability at work influencing them, dear,” Mori murmurs, “but people like us will never find a love that pure. There will always be other factors at work sullying it—wealth, revenge, threats. You understand now what this was, don’t you?”

No, Dazai wants to scream at you. He does love you, this wasn’t some ridiculous revenge plot for family he hardly remembered until this meeting, that-

“I do.”

Dazai finally is able to make a noise when those two words leave your lips. It’s weak—something caught between a wheeze and a whimper that sounds too loud in the silent room. He feels eyes on him—Chuuya and Kouyou’s in particular. Not yours. You stare down at the table.

“Ogai-dono,” Kouyou clears her throat. “If I may… perhaps we could… send the boy away. Abroad. Ensure he never comes back to Japan so we don’t have to risk him coming back and disrupting things.”

“We could give him a seat at the table,” Chuuya interrupts, ignoring the wide-eyed look both Kouyou and Piano Man give him because of the radical idea. “We’re down an executive anyway. We tell people who he is, that he supports the new regime. It’s what you wanted to begin with, right, boss? You wanted one of the grandchildren to legitimize the passing of power. We could make it work.”

“It’s too risky.” Mori isn’t the one to speak, Piano Man is, but he doesn’t look happy to do it. “Maybe back then it could’ve worked, but the Port Mafia killed his friends and family, and hunted him down. Too much has happened, he’s an unpredictable variable that we can’t risk. We can’t trust that he’ll just accept it all, that he won’t work behind the scenes to take us down. Giving him any leverage in the organization is the last thing we should do, but what Kouyou-”

“Leave him alive and we risk everything we’ve built falling apart—a civil war igniting, Yokohama being caught in the crossfires and all of our foreign enemies crawling into the city to reap the benefits of our fall. It’s one life or hundreds—thousands, even,” Mori interrupts, voice cool. He turns his gaze onto you. “I trust you know what has to be done, dear.”

Your expression is resolved, a heavy emotion in your eyes that tells him your answer before you even speak. “Yeah, I know.”

You stand up, and Dazai knows that it’s over. When you look down at him, it’s with a type of apathy that makes his stomach twist—he’d rather hate than nothing. His lips part to speak but he pauses when you shake your head slightly, so subtly that he almost doesn’t even notice it.

“Get up,” you say flatly, and then glance at Chuuya. “Chuuya, will you…?”

“Yeah,” Chuuya replies without you even needing to finish the question. His voice is hoarse, he looks more than a little disturbed. “Yeah. Of course.”

Chuuya rises to his feet and then grabs Dazai’s bicep to pull him up to his feet too. Dazai doesn’t even have the heart to give him a dirty look in response, following along as he leads him out of the conference room and into the hallway.

For a split second, Dazai really believes that maybe you’re just trying to fool Mori, you made him think you were taking Dazai to have him killed so that you can get him out of here safely, but even once you’re out of the conference room without Mori’s eyes carefully watching you, you don’t look at him.

“Get one of the clean up crews up here,” you tell one of the guards waiting in the hall instead as you frown at your phone, typing out a quick text to someone. You pointedly ignore how alarmed they are by the offhand comment to click on the button to the elevator.

When you look back at the two of them, it’s not to look at Dazai—it’s to look at Chuuya. The two of you are having a conversation, Dazai can tell that much, and he thinks that maybe he should be putting in the effort to figure out what’s going on, what you have planned, but he’s just… tired. He’s not even sure if he cares what happens to him anymore, and he figures the worst case scenario is that he dies at your hands, and of all of the ways he could go, he thinks that would be the most preferable, because at least you would be the last thing he saw.

He doesn’t try to speak again until the three of you are in the elevator and the doors have closed.

“I-”

“Stop.”

Dazai is startled by the sharpness in your voice. He looks at you, but you’re still not looking at him, your lips are curved down as you stare at your phone, typing furiously. He glances up into the left corner of the elevator, noticing the cameras—maybe that’s why, he thinks a bit unsurely, deciding to stay quiet until out of the building.

When the elevator doors open, it’s Chuuya that urges him to keep walking by nudging his shoulder. You don’t touch him, don’t look at him. There’s nobody in the main entrance of the building, which Dazai thinks is a bit odd, but he bites back any comments he might have when he sees a black car waiting outside the building.

The doors to the building open at your approach, and Dazai inhales the crisp, fresh air greedily, not even having realized how stifled he’d felt in that room with Mori, you, and the other Port Mafia executives. He thinks maybe that you’ll sit in the backseat with him and he’ll finally be able to talk to you, but you don’t. You open the door to the passenger seat and sit there without even sparing him a glance.

Dazai’s throat starts to swell again, stopping in his tracks as he stares at where you disappeared behind the car door. Chuuya pushes him forward, not letting him linger for long—he opens the door to the backseat and pretty much manhandles Dazai into the car before taking a seat next to him.

He recognizes the person at the wheel—Albatross, your friend. He’s driven you and Dazai around before, every time Dazai gets in the car with him, he makes a sharp comment aimed to embarrass you in some manner. This time, he doesn’t even look at Dazai through the rearview mirror. He just puts the car in gear and starts driving.

A pit starts to form in Dazai’s stomach. Dazai tries to initiate conversation with you again now that you’re outside of the Port Mafia headquarters within closed quarters, nails scraping against his pants as he decides what he wants to say.

“I d-”

“Stop.”

When you cut him off now, Dazai’s stomach flips. He stares at the side of your face, trying to understand why you won’t even listen to him. You can’t actually believe what Mori was saying, you can’t. You were faking him out, tricking him into thinking you fell for it—you had to be, you have to be. You can’t possibly believe him.

“You won’t… even hear me out?” Dazai asks you quietly.

“There’s nothing left to say.”

Oh, Dazai thinks to himself, withdrawing. He stares at you for a moment before turning away stiffly, expression tight and strained as he stares out the window, watching the buildings pass by as they get closer and closer to the ports.

You believe it, he realizes dully. You believe that it was all just a scheme. You believe that everything was manufactured, that he used you for some fantastical revenge plan, that he never loved you. You believe it.

But it doesn’t make sense, he thinks desperately. He doesn’t understand how you’re not seeing through it, and if you are, why aren’t you at least giving him some hint? He should try to say something again—he knows that, but he finds himself unable to. He’s a smooth-talker, quick on his feet, but never when it comes to you—since the day he met you, he’s been fumbling over words awkwardly, but now it’s costing him everything. He finds ash in his mouth preventing him from salvaging anything he might’ve had with you.

Dig your nails in and cling, he reminds himself, but his nails have become rounded out and blunted from how long he was scratching at his pants and skin while remembering all those memories he locked away. He tries to dig his nails in and cling, but his voice fails him and his nails can’t even find purchase on your skin, you slip out of his hands as easily as an eel.

He’s going to lose you. He might’ve lost you already.

Dazai thinks that’s worse than the realization that he really might be about to die.

The car comes to a stop much quicker than Dazai had hoped, and he stiffens when you waste no time before getting out of the car. He makes no move to join you outside, and Chuuya sighs next to him.

“Get out,” Chuuya says flatly. When Dazai doesn’t budge again, Chuuya snaps, “Get out of the car-”

“-and go, we don’t have time! They’ve found us.”

Dazai draws his knees to his chest, breath becoming a bit labored as his aunt’s voice echoes in his ears. He doesn’t even realize that Chuuya has gotten out of the car until Dazai’s car door is pried open. For a split second, he confuses the executive with his aunt as he’s yanked out of the car—he’s fourteen again and being abandoned by the only person he has left, and he can just barely bite back the “don’t leave me here!” that almost spills from his lips as his knees hit the ground hard.

Dazai is instantly hit with a thick scent that makes him gag. It’s noxious, almost entirely unbearable, clogs his throat to the point he almost struggles to breathe—a blend of rot, acrid chemicals, and something he doesn’t recognize, but it’s sickeningly sweet. As he pushes himself to his feet, he notices you pass your gun over to Chuuya, but in that moment, Dazai is more concerned with figuring out where he is, and when he does, his stomach drops.

The dumping grounds by ports stretch endlessly under the heavy, overcast sky. Mounds of trash rose like grotesque hills patched with scraps of torn plastic and suspicious lumps that Dazai doesn’t have to get close to know what they are. The ground is uneven and treacherous—a mix of sticky mud and sharp shards of discarded glass and plastic, and pools of murky water shimmering with oil slicks.

It’s disgusting, and Dazai has a feeling it might be his final resting place.

He trails over to the side of the road and his gaze tracks down to the ground directly below him. It’s not a far drop, hardly a foot or two, and certainly less gross than some of the other parts of the area, but that’s a low bar to meet. He tears his eyes away from the scenery around him to look back at you, lips parted to speak but he doesn’t say anything.

You’re leaning against the front of the car, watching him with an expression that Dazai can’t describe. Sad, maybe, resigned. Chuuya is back in the car, from what Dazai can tell, he's still fiddling with your gun—he wonders if this is his way of letting the two of you say goodbye in private.

“I do love you,” Dazai says. His voice cracks over the words. “No ulterior motives. No schemes. I just loved you. Love you.”

You don’t say anything for a moment, eyes drawing from him somewhere over to the side like you’re looking for something, but after a moment, you look back at him, your face a little softer than it was before.

“I know,” you tell him quietly. “I know, Osamu.”

Dazai’s lips part to say something back—he doesn’t even know what he wants to say, because confusion fogs his mind. If you know, then why-

Why are you doing this?

He doesn’t get the chance to ask. The car door opens and Chuuya steps back out, he passes your gun back to you and Dazai sees you subtly slide something into his hand too, but he can’t tell what it is. You sigh as you look down at the gun before looking back up at him again, he holds his breath as you make your way closer to him.

His lashes flutter shut, expecting to feel the cool barrel of the gun against his forehead, but his breath hitches when he instead feels the familiar warmth of your hand cradling his cheek. Your fingertips are flaked with Ace’s dried blood, but Dazai still leans into your touch, eyes sliding back open to look at you.

Up close, your expression is twisted with regret and… is that fear? Dazai can’t tell, he doesn’t care, he’s more preoccupied with memorizing the image of you before he runs out of time to.

“Forgive me,” you whisper so faintly that Dazai almost doesn’t hear you.

“I do,” he replies just as softly.

Your face crumbles as you look away. You take a step away from him, and your hand drops down from his face. Dazai instantly mourns the loss. You let out a heavy, shaky breath, sparing one last look down at the gun in your hand, one to Chuuya who stands half a step behind you, and then you look at Dazai again.

“Forgive me,” you say again, this time as you lift the gun—your voice is raspy, breath uneven.

Your fingers tremble so violently that the whole gun is unsteady, but Dazai doesn’t even care to look at it, gaze focused on your face instead.

“I do,” Dazai repeats.

You pull the trigger.

#dazai x reader #dazai x you #bsd x reader #bsd x you #bungo stray dogs x reader #bungo stray dogs x you

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what-if-i-just-did · 3 days ago

Text

"Are you okay?"

I spoke softly, so as not to startle him. I'd come back to the room to find him sitting up, and I could almost feel his panic and confusion. Upon seeing me, he calmed down.

"Yeah," he nodded, and it looked painful. "Just, I woke up and you weren't there, so.. "

I understood the problem instantly. I'd only gone to get water, but.. I would have reacted the same way, had it been him. Strange. Just days ago, I would not have hesitated to kill him. He would have easily done the same- nearly did, on a few occasions. Subconciously, my hand raised to the side of my throat, tracing an old scar. Very nearly.

Sitting down on the bed again, I could tell he was still looking at me. "Is something wrong?"

"No. Well... not beyond what We already know."

Right. We. Capital-W-we, like capital-U-us. Something that had happened in a single second that seemed to span a century. Mortal enemies to codependancy, a complete united front, within a second. We were lucky, We supposed. By myth and legend, the few that found what We did either came out with their sanity in fragmented shards, or did not come out at all.

Perhaps that's why We came out alive and sane- Well, sane... As close as could. One mind would shatter... but two would meld. Still incapable of grasping the... the magnitude, the insignificance, the severity of what We witnessed. Of what We know. But not catatonically so.

I sigh. We've spent the past few days in a hotel, avoiding Our respective teammates, mentors, minions, superiors... I know the exact look my mentor would give me if We even tried to explain this. How do We explain what happened to Us? How do We explain why there even is an Us, when We don't know Ourself? They would have his head most likely, or at least try to talk to me alone. But the difference, the line between me and him has thinned and blurred into infathomability. We don't know how, We can only guess at why. How could We convince them of it? The truth is We can't, and we know it. And his side.. has it's own complications. It's been days... We've been getting used to being Us, but We're running out of time.

"You're troubled."

Had it been anyone else, the observation would have startled me, seeing as how deep in thought I was. As it is, it's like he'd already been in my mind. Our mind. Days ago, my greatest enemy. Now, I don't believe he will ever be capable of even startling me again.

"We're running out of time. It's been a few days. They were aware of the risk in Our respective missions, but they will be expecting a result, and soon. Our corpses, or Our success. We need to decide what to do. We required the time to re-adjust, We still need more time, but... if We are not to do something soon, something to monitor or influence the consequences, then consequences will find Us, Our preferences and needs be damned."

He nodded. I didn't need more of an answer, anyways. He was already aware of everything I said. That's another thing, this.. near psychic bond. It wasn't like We could hear eachother's thoughts, it was more like.. like We had no need to. His body, his emotions, felt like an extension of what had originally been my own. We were still seperate and yet, connected. His feelings felt like an echo in my mind, his presence bringing me comfort despite feeling like my shadow. He was me, and more. He was still him. I was still me. But We were Us, and that was irreversible and incomprehensible.

Silently, we thought. Going through our options, sharing opinions, it required no words, no means of communication. Eventually We came to a conclusion. We would have to make sure that Our other halves weren't to be injured, that We weren't to be seperated, by either of Our previous sides. We didn't question those instincts, those needs. They had been instilled in Us the second we became Us, and it had left Us a scared, shivering mess as We clung to eachother, Ourself, for the first few hours. We had worked past that, had learnt to become seperate enough to operate independantly. Still, We stayed close.

It wasn't so much as that it hurt to be apart, as that it was massively unpleasant. Well, it hadn't hurt up until then, but We'd only been apart for short times and short distances since then- the bathroom, grabbing something, switching off the lights. It would not surprise Us if being further apart or for longer amounts of time would end up causing pain. We are One, after all.

Reassured, we both nodded. The lights had remained off, so there was no need to seperate Ourself. We slept in one bed, skin-to-skin, the closest We could get to physically being one. Social convention and strangers' assumptions were not something We were bothered by anymore. Although some leaned towards unpleasant accusations, We'd considered it an occupational hazard of almost always being in physical contact of some sort.

Sleep reached Us simultaniously, as it had ever since We became Us. It was a peaceful sleep, preparing for the day ahead.

Enemies who experience an inescapable horror together and can't imagine being without one another again

The one you hated just days before becomes the one you need curled against you to feel safe, the back of your neck now a hearth for his fiery breath while he sleeps. Flames that once terrified you have become a comfort, a barrier from evil that wishes for your shared demise.

#creative writing #writeblr #short story #original fiction

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luveline · 2 days ago

Note

hi again!! i saw you mention wanting to write for prince!steve, and i also saw that you write with dialogue prompts so i present to you:

A: “I’ll take care of you.”

B: “It’s rotten work.”

A: “Not to me. Not if it’s you.”

maybe the reader gets injured doing something for training, but it’s all up to you!! i’m sure we’ll love it regardless. kisses!!

thank you for requesting! —prince steve au. fem, 1.5k

Pain was familiar before you came to the palace. Small pains and big, all kinds of hurting, poverty-driven neglect leading to toothaches and back pain, twisted ankles walked on without choice, sore skin otherwise ignored. It didn’t matter if you got hurt as long as you lived.

Not in a dramatic sense. It didn’t feel dramatic at the time, only miserable. You go to work with a migraine because you can’t afford not to. You walk home in the dark because the mag-trams are getting too expensive. You break your holo, so you make do without one. You pick your head up to keep looking both ways and you get everywhere you need to go because you need to work, to get paid, to eat, to work.

That’s how it always was. So getting sick didn’t matter. An injury was temporary pain that your body would fix eventually, and if it didn’t, well, it’s cheaper to pull a tooth than pay to have it filled.

You were used to your sorry life, and then you met Steve. Tall, brown-haired, brown-eyed Steve. Looking at him sometimes is enough to make your whole body a void for things you used to complain about; you wake up across from him in the big bed and forget you can feel pain at all, if only because he’s already awake, waiting for you to open your eyes before he rests his hand on your cheek. You met him and your soul-mark glowed with a lacy, almost feathered light, your wrist braceleted with white colour that soon faded to mellow blue.

When you first meet your soulmate, the colours you make tend to shift. It takes time for your heart to decide if love is pink or orange or blue. It seems to have settled now —when Steve kisses you, your mark turns a Gaussian amber. When you kiss back, his mark turns light pink, like the lotus flowers he keeps in his private gardens.

Right now, your mark hums an angry red. It’s typical in its colour, and it’s common. Most people’s marks turn red when they’re hurting. Yours is a crimson so dark it looks black in the dim lighting, and it throbs in time with your pain like a vexing metronome. You’ll never be able to put it from your mind if the mark continues to remind you.

Steve is uncharacteristically quiet at your side. His own mark is lit in sympathy, mostly pink with his affection, but threaded in red like spider lily flowers blooming against his forearm.

He shifts beside you. It’s been more than a month since your wedding, and yet he’s careful with you. Almost shy, though he can be brash and cocky. You know intimately how sweet Steve can be when he’s in love.

It doesn’t make any sense.

“How’s the pain now?” he asks, his eyebrows pulled together at their starts.

“Not so bad.”

“Could you rate it on a scale? If zero was no pain at all, and ten were enough to warrant another dose of white willow bark?”

“What if I were at a five?” you ask.

“A half dose and a good kiss?”

You turn his way but flinch when it puts undue pressure on your leg, a stab of hot pain jumping from your fractured tibia to deep inside of your hips. Steve sees your wincing and presses your shoulder into the bed, leaning over you, a scolding he doesn’t give in the pinch of his eyebrows as he leans down to kiss you. It’s more caress than kiss, his hand cupping your cheek, his lips barely touching yours before he rests his nose at your brow. “Can you stay still?” he asks.

“Sorry.”

“Just don’t want you to hurt yourself again.”

He lifts his head. Holds your cheek for longer than you can work out why, dotting another soft kiss to your nose before slinking out of bed to find you some white willow bark tincture. It’s a potent pain reliever. You shouldn’t have too much of it. If you were still living your past life, you’d be chewing on ginger skins trying to limp your way back into work. There’d be no time to stop.

“Steve,” you say, watching him a small ways away at the table of your quarters. He turns to you. “I don’t really need anything else.”

“You said it’s hurting?” Steve pipettes the tincture into a cup of water. “You said a five, and you lie. Knowing you, it’s closer to an eight, you just don’t want to tell me.”

It might not be as extreme as an eight now, laying down and bandaged, but it hurts badly and a tincture would solve this. Still, you say, “It’s fine, I don’t need it.”

He brings the glass regardless and puts it on the nightstand. Your bed is yards too big for one person, even two, but when Steve sits next to you he leaves no room between you. He looks down at you fondly. Brown hair like down feather falls against his forehead.

“You’re going to be in pain for a long time.” He brings a hand to your cheek again. “It might sound tame, a plateau fracture, but that’s still a fracture. You know doctors say fracture when they mean broken, right? You broke your leg. It’s okay to want pain relief.”

“I knew that. I didn’t know you knew it.”

“Impolite.” He ducks down to look you in the eyes. You’re a little skewiff, straight to his sideways, but it gets a point across. He wants to kiss you while you’ve said something maddening. “I don’t see why you’re so insistent on pretending it hasn’t happened and that you’re fine. You got hurt, and you’ll stay hurt for a while. It might be weeks of bed and– and you need to be looked after. I don’t know why you’re so guilty about it.”

“I’m not guilty,” you deny guilty, turning your face to lean into his hand, rather than continue to face his imploring gaze. “I just… I’m not used to this. Before, if something went wrong, I couldn’t just lay down and wait to get better, and I surely wouldn’t be laying here with doctors and servants and the ladies in waiting all trying to make sure– It’s like it’s not my fault, and that doesn’t make any sense. I don’t want to be a burden on everyone. More than I already am,” you add, a bitter mumble nearly lost to his palm.

He makes a promise, then, turning your face to the light. “I’ll take care of you,” he says.

“It’s rotten work.”

Steve shakes his head gently. “Not to me. Not if it’s you.”

You press your tongue to your teeth, worried you’ll say something you’ll regret. You don’t want him to go. You want him to mean exactly what he says, to stay here and take care of you, and to enjoy doing it. Wouldn’t it be nice to be loved for love's sake?

Steve shuffles inward and encourages your head into his lap, thrusting pillows aside to take up station against your headboard. He frames your face, upside down, before both hands begin to run down your arms. A hug, in a way, as he twists his face to kiss the skin beside your eye. You squint at the proximity.

“You’re not a burden,” he says, hands climbing upwards now, warm and steady where they travel, “you’re my wife. My cherished wife, remember?”

His tone is silk.

“You… haven’t proved to be a wretched husband,” you confess.

“I did try. But loving you has been easy. It makes husbandry a gift.” He laughs at his grandiose and gives you a kiss that’s more familiar by your ear, his pleading, searching kisses, the kind he likes to press to all your softest junctures. “I wish you could understand that we’re marked for a reason. We were always meant to be together, and I couldn’t have asked for a better person to stand with me. I’m happy you’re here. I want to take care of you.”

Not if it’s you, he’d said.

You wonder if it might be okay to cry. He’s massaging your arms, still bent in half over you trying to kiss some belief in him into your forehead.

“It’ll be okay,” he murmurs between chaste, silent kisses, “really. You don’t have to pretend things don’t hurt you anymore.”

You feel strange, then, shivery and weak as you turn your face into his thigh. His hand slips behind your back to hold you.

“Can I convince you to drink this tincture now?” he asks, just above your ear.

“I love you,” you mumble.

He pauses his trailing hands. You squeeze your eyes closed, but he doesn’t pause for long enough to scare you. “I love you,” he says. “Since the day we met, I’ve loved you. I’ll take care of you.”

He is easy to believe.

#prince!steve au #steve harrington x reader #steve harrington x you #steve harrington x y/n #steve harrington #steve harrington fic #steve harrington blurb #steve harrington drabble #stranger things x reader #stranger things fic #steve harrington imagine #steve harrington fanfic #steve harrington fanfiction #stranger things

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runnning-outof-time · 2 days ago

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“You Came.” “You Called.” | Tommy Shelby x Reader

Request: yes by anonymous

Pairing: Tommy Shelby x fem!Solomons Sister!Reader

Summary: Tommy Shelby and (Y/N) Solomons despise each other…….or do they?

Warnings: language, slight sexual situations, weapons, threats

Word Count: 1304

A/N: I’m sorry this isn’t as long as the others have been. I need to get these requests finished and this is what I was able to come out with. I hope you’ll still enjoy! Also I’ve tried something a little different at the end - hopefully you’ll participate and not be too mad at me for it! :)

A/N 2: Oh and this is the story where the Solomons!Sister won the poll — I’m not sure if it’s angsty enough…I tried my best with it. Also I’m sorry if Alfie seems ooc here…it’s been a bit since I’ve written him and I’m rusty.

COMMENTS & REBLOGS ARE APPRECIATED! — I’D LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THOUGHT OF THE STORY!

comment/message me if you’d like to be tagged!

"You came," she sounded surprised.

"You called," his response was nonchalant.

"Yeah, but I didn't call you."

The story of Tommy Shelby and (Y/N) Solomons is a long, complicated one.

To give a quick summary: they first met the day that Tommy showed up at Alfie's 'bakery. She was the first to greet him and instantly was able to realize that there was more to his motives than what he was letting on.

She was cautious when dealing with him at first, but his charm soon enough chipped away that hesitant exterior she'd put up.

Neither could help but cross the line one late evening after a successful business dinner.

She thought that that would be the end of Tommy Shelby. But now he'd shown up at her door...when she was expecting her brother.

"Where's my brother?" (Y/N) asked, looking to either side of the doorway, hoping that Alfie would be close by.

He wasn't.

"He's busy," Tommy answered.

"So he sent you?" she asked, her brows furrowed.

"Not exactly," he shook his head.

"I'm not understanding what you're saying. Ollie told me that he'd take a note down for Alfie and that he'd inform him as soon as he became available." (Y/N) was confused now.

"I saw the note," he began, "took it upon myself to see what was needed to be discussed."

(Y/N)'s jaw just about dropped. "Tommy, why did you...would you, you shouldn't, you..."

"My name was on the note, love," he cut off her attempt to string words together.

"Just because it was on the note does not mean you were to be involved!" she couldn't stop her voice from raising, her eyes widening as she spoke. Now she was wondering how Ollie had phrased his note to Alfie. A few beats passed before a sigh escaped her lips. She ran a frustrated hand across her face before asking, "what...what did the note say?" Her thoughts had gotten the best of her.

"It said that you needed to speak about Shelby...had some information you wanted to be made known," he answered her, his eyes boring into hers. (Y/N) opened her mouth to say something but he didn't let her, taking a step inside, making her back up in the process. "What is it you wanted to tell him, hmm?"

His close proximity made her heartrate increase. She was quickly losing her ability to think. "Tommy, I..."

"What really was your goal last night, (Y/N)?" he asked her, his brows raising.

The willpower to keep her hands by her sides and not reach out to take hold of him was leaving (Y/N) by the second.

"I thought your intentions aligned with mine..." he trailed off, raising his hand so that he could run it down her jawline in a slow, teasing manner, "at least it seemed that way when you brought me back here."

Instead of dropping his hand when he reached her chin, he grasped it; taking it between his thumb and index finger so that he could raise her fleeing eyes to match his. This action made the breath get caught in (Y/N)'s throat, and every valid argument left her mind the second her eyes locked onto his icy blue ones. All hope was lost now.

"What are your intentions with me, (Y/N)?" he asked her.

"You know them, Tommy, I.." she couldn't quite string a thought together.

"Tell me."

"I.." she paused again, interally freaking out. Think of something, anything, (Y/N), come on! "I wanted to tell him about you...about us," she decided on telling him a lie, hoping that he would take it as the truth.

"Yeah?"

She couldn't decipher what he was truly thinking from his one word response. His widened eyes didn't help either, other than making her fall deeper into his trap with each second that passed. Now she was wracking her brain to think of ways to sell this.

The last thing she wanted to tell him was that she was going to sell him out...to tell Alfie what she felt his true intentions were.

"Yeah," she breathed, nodding her head as much as she could with his fingers still holding her chin. Sell it, (Y/N)!, her mind screamed before she raised her hands up to grip his lapels. All coherent thoughts flew out the window as she leaned in and kissed him.

This wasn't a loving kiss. It wasn't a slow one, unlike the ones they shared last night. She kissed him hard, hoping that the passion she put into it would be enough to get his mind off of the damn note and seal her lie for good.

His hold tightened on her chin, but he didn't break the kiss. In fact, his other hand moved from his side to her hip, where he began bunching up her skirt in order to make contact with her bare skin.

Success.

(Y/N) also became absorbed by the passion that they both were showing. It was hard not to given the fact that he was Tommy Shelby. The night they shared was one of the best she'd ever had. Conniving business man or not, she would remember it for the rest of her life.

"What in the bloody fucking hell is going on here?!"

What (Y/N) did not remember before getting sucked into this situation was to shut the door to her home.

Her eyes shot open and she became frantic, trying to break the kiss and move away from Tommy as quick as she could. "Alfie!" she shrieked, surprise clear on her face.

"Why're you fucking kissing my sister, mate?!" Alfie asked Tommy, speaking with a seething anger.

While (Y/N) was just about shaking from the shock of her brother showing up, Tommy didn't seem to be phased.

"Alfie he...he was just..."

"No," Alfie cut (Y/N) off, shaking his head and stopping her attempt to cover for the man now standing beside her, "I asked him not you. He knows family is off-fucking-limits, so I want him to answer me why."

Tommy said nothing. (Y/N) shrunk into herself more and more with each passing second. She'd never seen Alfie this angry.

"I said fucking answer me!" Alfie bellowed, drawing the revolver he had tucked into his waistband. He wasted no time in cocking it and holding it in Tommy's face.

Tommy still didn't move; didn't even flinch.

"You're going to fucking answer me," Alfie demanded, his voice low and menacing, "yeah, you're going to fucking answer me or it'll be your fucking brains blown out all over (Y/N)'s fucking foyer."

"Alfie, don't," (Y/N) begged her brother, reaching a shaky hand out in hopes that he would see it and lower his weapon.

"She called for you," Tommy spoke, his voice level and stoic.

"She fucking what?" Alfie asked, his brows furrowing slightly, confused by why Tommy was saying this.

“She called your office. You weren’t around. But my name was on the note,” Tommy shared more details.

“And what does that have fucking anything to do with you fucking kissing my sister?!” Alfie’s anger had returned.

“It has everything to do with it,” Tommy was still level-headed. “You see, she was going to tell you about this, about us,” he then dropped the bomb, motioning between himself and (Y/N) to emphasize the point he was making.

“I can explain,” (Y/N) was quick to blurt out, her eyes trained on the gun in Alfie’s hand, which he’d - thankfully - lowered from being aimed at Tommy’s head.

She couldn’t read the look in her brother’s eyes. The seconds felt like hours as they passed. She stood frozen as Alfie rose the revolver again and…….

Ok I’m evil, I know but……..

Don’t fret, if the poll’s closed by the time you’re reading this, you’re still more than welcome (and I’d encourage you, actually) to share what you think would happen next!!

p.s….this story won’t be getting continued. I’m just curious as to what y’all think.

MASTERLIST

Tagged: @mystcldydrms @the-anxious-youth @cloudofdisney @look-at-the-soul @elenavampire21

@mrsalwayswrite @julkaamazing @evita-shelby @theshelbyslimited @peakyswritings

@just-a-blackhole @watercolorskyy @strayrockette @peakyduchesss @alexxavicry

@captivatedbycillianmurphy @yummycastiel @dark-academia-slut @mischievouslittlecreature @stevie75

@lyarr24 @signorellisantichrist @zablife @anotherblinder @cillmequick

@dandelionprints @letal-y-poetica @garrison-girl-08 @insanitybyanothername @depxiety

@justrainandcoffee @dragons-are-my-favorite @mrs-bond @cljordan-imperium @brummiereader

@red-riding-wood @everythingelseisextra @little-diable @thomashelbyswife @shaddixlife

@ryecosse @padfootdaredmetoo @novashelby

#tommy shelby #tommy shelby x reader #tommy shelby x y/n #tommy shelby x you #tommy shelby imagine #tommy shelby fanfic #tommy shelby fanfiction #peaky blinders #peaky blinders x reader #peaky blinders x y/n #peaky blinders x you #peaky blinders fanfic #peaky blinders fanfiction #fanfiction #fanfic

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unknownplane · 2 days ago

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The Court Jester Part 4

Yandere Batfam x GN Reader

Pt. 1, Pt. 2, Pt. 3

Waking up (Y/N)'s head felt fuzzy. Somehow, they felt constricted even though they could move. Looking around, they found themselves in a large room. The bed felt as if it was encasing them. They felt themselves looking for their weapon. Not being able to find it, they get up and start looking around the room.

The room was blank, as if it was a canvas waiting to be painted. It irritated them. 'Where the fuck am I? The last thing I can remember was... oh fuck. Dads gonna be soo pissed! I never got him his drink!'. (Y/N) frantically began looking for a way out realizing they were asked to get something for there dad. They went to the door and found it locked.

Just as they were going to open the other door in the room, the locked door burst open. Bruce Wayne flung himself into the room. "My baby! You're awake! God, what did that monster do to you?" Bruce questioned as he got closer to (Y/N). As soon as he got close enough (Y/N) tripped him and forced him into the ground. "Where am I?! The fuck have you done with my dad?!" (Y/N) yelled. "No need to be hostile kid. We just saved your ass." Jason stated walking into the room. Amused that Bruce had been caught off guard by your violence. Bruce suddenly got out of the hold as (Y/N)s attention shifted to Jason and held their hands behind their back. "You bitch! The fuck are you doing! Let me go!" (Y/N) screamed with struggling in his hold. "No (Y/N) went just got you back and we are going to help you get better." Bruce stated in a firm tone. "I don't need fixing you limp dick son of a bitch! My dad molded me in his image and I'm perfect because of that!" (Y/N) howled. "I think my dear sibling need some alone time." Jason said. Bruce nodded his head and let go of (Y/N) and left the room. "Just so you know (Y/N) because ,even though you are fucked, and I still love you the Joker is dead." Jason professed before he left the room and locked the door.

"No, he's lying. He can't die. He always comes back." (Y/N) whispered and unknowingly started crying. They began to grow themselves around the room, trying to find a way out, and ultimately broke an arm. It took an hour before it eventually healed. Their mental state making it more difficult to heal.

About an hour later, Damian entered the room with a change of clothes. He fought with his sibling for this opportunity to talk with (Y/N) and was going to take advantage of the situation. "Hello, sibling. I have brought you a change of clothes as the ones you are currently wearing are covering in blood and dirt. I hope we can get on better terms during your stay here." Damian spoke calmly, as if he was talking to a terrified animal. "Ah, if it isn't the other basterd child of Bruce Wayne. Tell me how does it feels to know that if your nepotism wasn't taken into account, you would be just another pawn in Al Ghuls game. Stupid and replacable." (Y/N) spoke in a knowing tone. No anger in sight, only a smirk on their face.

They have watched the batfamily for years. They knew all the ways to get under their skin and prod where it hurt most.

Damian's face fell into a look of shock. (Y/N)'s words hurt in a way he had not felt since he first came to the manor. He felt the fear of being useless and replaceable. He dropped the clothes and left the room with a mortified face as (Y/N) started to laugh manically.

After Damian left the room, the Joker seemed to appear before them. As if a god. "My dear child, I am dead now, but soon I will find someone to take over. And when that is over, I will find you, and we will make the bat regret taking you away from me. My darling child." The Joker claimed. (Y/N) find with joy began shaking their head rapidly in agreement. "Of course, dad! They'll never know what hit em!" (Y/N) said and started laughing.

-----------------‐-----------------------------

In the batcave

"Their mental capacity seems to be dwindling. They've begun hallucinating. The best course of action would be to start over. I would recommend you get in contact with Martain Manhunter." Tim told Bruce after watching you on the screen. Tim had been watching you since the moment you were brought home. There was something comforting about knowing exactly where you were at all times, no matter what. "Let's wait another day. We don't know what reproductions there might be for doing this to them. If it would even work. You saw what happened with their arm. Their healing ability could stop it from even working!" Stephanie argued, not wanting to lose anymore of you. A broken you was still a masterpiece in her eyes. It showed everyone your hardships and would be used as a reminder to them about how they affected you and your life. No matter how rough you were, you and she didn't want to lose you again. "We'll wait one more day. If they continue to break down like this, we will have no other choice." Bruce stated. "But for now, we will just have to wait and see"

-------------------------------------------------------

Hey guys, sorry for the wait. College has been kicking my ass and Comp has been making me not want to write anything. Hope you enjoy it! Remember, I am always looking for ways to improve.

@cooki3dough @asillysimp @kitty-from-daaaa-voidddd @redkarmakai @horror-lover-69 @bat1212 @wisefuncherryblossom @chericia @vannessa-boo @resident-cryptid @staarflower @sirenetheblogger @definitely-not-sammie @lovebug-apple

#yandere batfam #yandere x reader #gn reader #yandere #yandere batfam x reader #yandere dc #platonic yandere

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spitdrunken · 1 day ago

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Adami (Homicipher MC) x Reader, vaguely implied Scarletella x Reader (but don’t read it for that, lol, it’s very minor), lore and ending spoilers. Notes: Headcanon-heavy, post-maingame story, canon-typical horror themes, temporary character death, implied gore.

The Other World takes after its master.

That doesn’t mean their temperament becomes law in the ever-changing maze of rooms and hallways. It’s only a suggestion, a push that will transform certain inclinations into preferences. If one has desires strong enough in an opposite direction, they can still do whatever they want. But while Mr. Scarletella ruled and influenced the Other World, consent was a surprisingly important factor in the world’s dealings. Being told ‘no’ was enough to send away a good chunk of its inhabitants, though they might turn pushy or become disgruntled.

All of this related to the way Mr. Scarletella himself functioned as an apparition. He could only take someone’s soul, could only hurt someone, if they gave him their name. Agreement was key and this rippled into other aspects of the Other World.

But now, Adami is the one who, after having turned Mr. Scarletella into her servant, is the one most in control of the realm. The changes aren’t as noticeable at first. However, as she loses more and more of her humanity, more and more of her memories, she begins to act solely bashed on her whims, her violent impulses shining through on more than one occasion. She’s not violent all the time. There are moments, though, flashes of utter loss of contact with the world around her where she destroys everything in her path. All the while, her crimson companion only aids her.

In turn, the inhabitants of the Other World grow more volatile, too. They’ve gained the capacity to lie and a stronger inclination towards direct violence. Simply taking what they want becomes the norm, although it doesn’t mean that everyone acts in this manner. Mr. Crawling, who frequently accompanies Adami as well, is someone who remains mild-mannered in the vast majority of situations. Where they’d once been terrifying and unfamiliar to her, the monsters there now either listen to or avoid her like the plague. She never has to fear, can walk around without ever needing to hide. The Other World, once dangerous at every turn, has become her home.

To you, an unsuspecting human dragged in by her grief, all of these machinations and baselines of the past are of no consequence. When you first encounter Adami (Or ‘Ms. Crowbar’, as you call her) does not seem all that different from the other monsters you’ve encountered. She’s unnerving, but not exactly scary.

Ms. Crowbar wears a simple raincoat, suspiciously clean, with strands of silver hair poking past the hood pulled over her head. Gloves hide her hands, though her legs are blotchy in colour like one giant dark-tinged bruise. Her face is as white as the raincoat she’s wearing, an entirely unnatural shade. Her eyes are slightly too big for her face, her lips practically melting into the white of her face. More than anything, her appearance veers into the uncanny valley. And, of course, she’s always carrying her crowbar around with her, either held upright or dragged carelessly behind her, metal scraping over concrete and banging into every loose rock it can find.

During your first meetings, it’s perhaps Mr. Scarletella who puts you more on edge. His aura is definitely the more imposing one of the two. He towers over you, the deadest gaze you’ve ever seen pinning you into place. Absentmindedly, he smiles at nothing at all. That isn’t even mentioning the way he colours the whole world around him. It’s unlike anything you’ve seen before down here. The natural conclusion is that he must be someone especially powerful, a monster to look out for. But, as you quickly discover, he’s always looking at Ms. Crowbar. His eyes only move when she moves, his feet only take another step as soon as she does. He never reaches out without her command. Whether by choice or through force, he is entirely her puppet. She is the one you need to look out for.

As for how that first meeting went… Perhaps you’d been chased by something. What exactly it had been, you’d had no idea. It would’ve been too large of a risk to look over your shoulder when you were certainly running for your life. One moment, you had been in a quiet room. The next, the quick pounding of footsteps was catching up to you, and you’d dashed through door after door on pure survival instinct. With burning lungs and aching muscles, you’d slammed a door and shoved a lock into place. Resting your sweaty back against it, you slid down to your knees. If this isn’t enough to stop them, you’d be as good as dead. You can’t run anymore. You squeeze your eyes shut, cupping your hands over your mouth to muffle the noises of your desperate gasps for air. You await the worst, but nothing happens.

When you finally do open your eyes, that’s when you see the pair of them. Ms. Crowbar looks at you with an unreadable expression and a slight tilt of her head. Her crimson pupils seem to glow in the dark. Besides her, Mr. Scarletella, still and unmoving as a corpse. You have no idea what to think. She takes a step towards you. The first one is slow, though she speeds up afterwards. The woman leans forward and holds out her hand for you to take.

Maybe… She’s actually nice? Or, maybe, she’ll just bash your skull in with the crowbar she’s holding in her other hand. Either way, something about the whole situation makes your skin crawl. Her eyes narrow at your hesitation. She is already retracting her hand when you make up your mind, and grab it while forcing a wobbly smile on your features. You mumble out a ‘thank you’ with your parched throat. Her cold fingers intertwine with yours.

Ms. Crowbar pulls you up with a truly surprising amount of strength for her small stature. You’re yanked to your feet with such force that you’re practically lifted off the ground and barrel into her, eliciting a yelp from the woman. Without thinking, and in order to prevent yourself from falling, you wrap both of your arms around her, one of your legs hooked around hers. It’s like you’re clinging on to her for dear life. Well, not like. You are. Mr. Scarletella’s eyes are burning holes into the side of your head. The hairs at the back of your neck as static, rapidly increasing in volume, creeps at the edges of your hearing.

As you loosen your grip and move to pull away, sputtering out a long string of apologies in every language you can think of, she laughs. It’s a high-pitched giggle, the kind that’s straight out of a horror movie. Her crowbar falls to the ground with a clatter. In a flash, you’re pulled against her even tighter as she pulls you against her body, returning your ‘hug’. You swear you can hear your ribs creaking. Your eyes feel like they’re about to pop out of your head, and you can hardly breathe. The static quiets down. Even after patting her back a couple of times, she holds on for a good few seconds longer. You don’t know whether you should be uncomfortable or entirely relieved.

When she releases her grip on you, you drop back down to the floor. She’d held you so tightly your feet hadn’t been touching concrete anymore. Ms. Crowbar is still smiling. Her entire body sways slightly back and forth. The crowbar is back in her hand.

“Human cute,” she says, though you don’t have the knowledge to understand her garbled language yet. To you, it sounds like nonsense noise. “Me teach you language. Not lots. Little.” She’d grow bored and lose track of things before managing to teach you a lot, anyway.

Much like others had once done for her, she teaches you some basic vocabulary. To be completely honest, she lists everything slightly too fast for you to remember all of it once. Regardless, she teaches you the words for ‘you’ and ‘human’ and ‘me’, as well as pointing at the walls and the floor. After that, she plops down next to you and makes Mr. Scarletella act as, essentially, a mannequin for the next segment. In accordance with her commands, he’ll lower her his head, stick out an arm or a leg, or spread his fingers, all in order to teach you more of the language. His face contorts into all different kinds of expressions, too. The look in his eyes does not once change and he follows all of her instructions without any hesitation. Rather than just focusing on Ms. Crowbar, his eyes occasionally dart to you too as you copy and sound out the words.

It ends as quickly as it all started. She decided to help you on impulse, and it’s also on impulse that she leaves. Your head is left spinning with the new amount of knowledge you’ve been taught, though the prospect of wandering treacherous halls alone after having found some company is even worse. …You’ll try to look for an exit. What else can you do? Being able to make yourself understandable, limited as your means might be, is at least an improvement. You don’t see Ms. Crowbar often. Occasionally, she’ll pop up and you exchange a few words. You’re eager to show your improvement in the language, thanks to some others who did not immediately try to kill you.

(One time, you’d cracked open a door and peered in. Every entrance requires a degree of caution, you think. Ms. Crowbar and Mr. Scarletella had been there, their backs turned towards you. Her crowbar had been raised. Then, she lowered it and hit the crumpled mass on the floor in front of her again, and again, and again, and again. The sickening crunch of every impact made bile rise in your throat. Just as you’d let the door fall shut as quietly as possible, Mr. Scarletella had turned to face you. But they hadn’t followed.)

It takes a while for you to see her again, after that. Bit by bit you make progress through the confusing world, though sheer luck doesn’t seem capable of protecting you much longer. Eventually, you’re cornered, already mentally speaking your last words, when a familiar crimson sheen falls over the world around you. Ms. Crowbar’s weapon connects with the monster’s skull, and it falls to the side. Though the sound isn’t any less disgusting, you can’t help the relief that floods your body.

For a moment, she simply stares at you, red eyes slightly too wide and crowbar raised. The moment passes and she relaxes. She lowers the blood-stained weapon. “Hello,” she says, smiling at you once again. “Other attack. Me kill. Not attack me… Lots time.”

If there are any words in the Other World’s language you know how to say, it’s these. “Thank you!” You exclaim. The smile on your face is nowhere near as forced as when you’d first encountered her. Ms. Crowbar is unnerving. She’s violent, too, clearly. But that isn’t all she is. She’s never been anything but nice to you.

She opens her arms. It takes you second to register that she probably wants a hug. On still-trembling legs, you do exactly that. Ms. Crowbar hums happily before her crowbar taps on your back then drags down along your spine, leaving a trail of blood in its wake. You move to let her go, but she takes hold of your wrist.

“Me teach you language. Me teach you attack.” She turns her head around to look at Mr. Scarletella, ever the silent observer around you, and they exchange a wordless look. Then, she releases you.

A weapon materialises in your hands, appearing out of thin air. You don’t know what to call it. It’s long and blade-liked, allowing you to keep your distance while still being able to attack. Slowly, painfully slowly, Ms. Crowbar lifts her crowbar above her head and lowers it in your general direction. It clicks. As soon as you lift your blade up and block the movement with a dull clang, she grins. The words that pass her lips, although you don’t know what they mean, are spoken in a cloying, slightly demeaning, tone that indicates praise.

Rinse and repeat. Her movements grow faster and more varied as she tries to surprise you. It doesn’t take long before you can’t keep up at all anymore, though you’re eager to learn how to defend yourself even a little. You grow used to the weight of the weapon in your hand. Although you definitely have a few bruises blossoming on your skin, you don’t think you’re completely helpless, either.

(You don’t think either of them agree, though. You’re a cute little plaything to them, perhaps. At some point, Ms. Crowbar had pointed at Mr. Scarletella and ordered you to attack. You’d hesitated. His smile had widened, just a little. He’d disappeared and reappeared right in front of you. A clear invitation. …You hadn’t expected your blade to slice clean through him. The force of your swing sends you nearly topping to the ground and her laughter rings out in the empty room. Your face burns with embarrassment. The only thing that had prevented you from falling flat on your face had been Mr. Scarletella’s umbrella, its inflexible form hooking around you.)

Eventually, Ms. Crowbar grows bored of your training. While you’re panting, she isn’t winded at all. In front of your face, she holds up three fingers.

“Me attack. You run.” She tells you. But you haven’t been taught the word for ‘run’. Why would you assume that this would be any different than what you’ve been doing for a while now? Maybe she’s just telling you to prepare for a particularly strong blow. You ready yourself. When she’s only holding up a single finger, she smiles in a way that exposes teeth. “You want attack? I see. Funny.”

You didn’t stand a chance. You didn’t even see her hand drop to her side before her crowbar had effortlessly smashed into your skull, the world around you exploding into a maddening array of pure agony. Your body flies halfway across the room. Vaguely, you wonder how you’re still breathing. You can’t see anything out of your right eye. Something wet and warm slides down your neck. Ms. Crowbar stands over you, weapon raised. Static fills your ears as your vision flickers out.

As soon as you regain consciousness, you wish you’d never come to again. Your head is pounding, your vision is blurry. Your lips are cracked and your tongue is sticking to the roof of your mouth. Your arms ache. Dried blood covers the side of your face and neck. Your eyes are struggling to focus and, as soon as you get up, you nearly fall right back down again. Your skin looks blotchy. To put it simply, you feel and look like shit. You can’t even remember how you’ve ended up like this. But you grab your weapon, try to remember and trudge onwards. You can’t remember what you are moving towards.

It takes you a little while to stumble across Ms. Crowbar again, though you have no idea how long it’s exactly taken. Everything has become so… Difficult. You hate being here, hate being alone. You don’t know what’s going on anymore. You can hardly recall your own name, much less why seeing her is tying your stomach up in knots. Hasn’t she always been nice to you? When she opens her arms for you, as she usually does, your arms tremble when you return the hug and tears drip down your face. Over shoulder, you make eye-contact with Mr. Scarletella.

“Sad?” He asks, voice too even to sound truly concerned. But you don’t think you’ve ever heard him speak before. Ms. Crowbar wriggles against you, staring at your face for a moment as she catches sight of your tears. She extends her arm, hand dropping on the top of your head as she pets your hair. A little too roughly, for your liking. She leans forward, lips brushing against yours in a quick peck. With a short burst of static, Mr. Scarletella is leaning over the both of you, too. When he reaches out, you feel nothing touching you except for a vague tingling sensation.

“You weak. You cute.” Ms. Crowbar says, every word clearly and slowly enunciated as if she’s speaking to a child. You sniffle. “Me help you. You not worry.” Her cold hand closes around your wrist. “Go with, go with.” She tugs you along, deeper into the maze, her companion walking right besides you. You have no idea where you’re going. But, you suppose, when you were walking alone, you hadn’t either.

#homicipher #homicipher x reader #homicipher mc x reader #homicipher mc #adami adashino x reader #mr scarletella x reader

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sammyluvr · 2 days ago

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broken, fine for tonight — sam & dean winchester

cw : gn!winchester!reader, hurt/comfort, some angst, reader's the youngest sibling, injury/pain, nicknames (kid, bud, sweetheart), 1.3K words. requested !

summary : you break your ankle but your older brother's are convinced it's just a sprain and leave to finish up a hunt.

dean sounds all gruff and almost annoyed when he says you’ll have to stay in the motel while they take down this nest of vamps. “you’ll be no help with a jacked up ankle,” he grumbles, because it’d be easier with three than two. but his eyes are a little soft as they flick down to your injury and you know it’s just because he’s no good at dealing with being worried about you.

sam comes back from the bathroom, giving you a sympathetic smile as he sets another pair of pain pills on the bedside table next to your half empty plastic water bottle. “you’re good to take these in half an hour,” he says, “and we’ll grab you a proper brace on the way back, alright?”

you give him a tight smile, your breathing measured so it doesn’t come across as labored. “sure,” you agree, still fighting against the pain in your foot in order to appear as composed as you’re expected to be. when you twisted it earlier today, sam and dean brushed it off as a sprain and haven’t stopped to think otherwise since then.

dean had hauled you back up with strong hands and a comforting pat to your back. you’re alright, he insisted, ‘s just a little sprain, you’ve dealt with worse. he wasn’t trying to be dismissive, but you’ve felt a sprain before, and you’re sure that this is worse.

it must be a pretty bad sprain, sam said with a soft frown when you let out a pained gasp after trying to put just the slightest bit of pressure on it. he looped your other arm around his shoulders, and the two of them practically carried you back to the motel room. they set you down on the bed, and you know that sam normally would’ve checked your ankle with a bit more precision and care most days, but you’re all pretty sure that the vamps have caught on to you, which means the faster they get into the nest, the better. so he simply propped your foot up on all the spare pillows in the room with gentle hands, cringing each time the movement made you wince in pain. he wrapped it in an ace bandage, and you nearly cried out loud as he did. mind otherwise occupied, he’d just told you the pain would fade soon enough.

you think that somewhere in the back of their minds, both of your brothers know that you’re in enough pain to understand that this is worse than they want it to be. their concern is easy to read, but sometimes they hate the prospect of you being hurt so much that they’ll focus that energy onto a different problem until they have to face this one. so they’re out the door before you know it.

hopefully they’ll give you a longer look when they get back. you’d very much like to go to the hospital to get checked out and hopefully return to the motel with a cast and pair of crutches.

the pain only gets worse and the minutes just drag. time flows so slowly that you start to worry, just like you do every time they’re off on a hunt without you. if they’ve been gone this long, something must’ve gone wrong, right? you check the time and realize it’s been less than a full hour. the ibuprofen you took a bit ago does nothing to help.

your ankle hurts so badly that you’re teary and sniffly and even though no one’s here to witness it, you’re embarrassed by it nonetheless. but you might as well get the tears out of the way before they come back.

you’re convinced that it’s broken, and by the time the headlights of the impala shine through the half-closed blinds of the motel, you’re in too much of a haze to notice the door unlocking and the boys tramping into the room.

sam’s through the door first, and the second he lays eyes on you, he knows something’s not quite right. he says your name, soft of course, but still loud enough for you to hear. you don’t look over, and he drops his bag on the floor to rush over. dean immediately picks up on the tone of sam’s voice, following close behind.

sam’s big hand on your forehead rouses you. “hey. you with us sweetheart?” he murmurs, voice quiet and clearly concerned. your eyes flutter open and the only thing you can think to do when you register the worry on his face is give him a rueful smile.

“i think it’s broken,” you mumble, voice quiet and tired. you’re somehow numb and still hurting so much at the same time. dean gives a little scoff, more so out of affection than frustration, and rounds the bed to look at your ankle. you wince when he moves it, this time not bothering to hide just how much it really hurts.

“you think?” dean repeats back to you, “jesus, kid, why didn’t you say something before?”

“you didn’t give me a chance,” you retort, frowning deeply but too tired to actually sound upset. “you both said it was sprained.” before dean can make some comment about how it’s your ankle, not theirs so how would they know, sam intervenes.

“we’re sorry, bud,” he murmurs, “we should’ve paid you more attention.” you don’t see the pointed look he gives dean not to argue with you right now, or the way dean puts his hands up in frustration, then softens when he looks back at you. he knows that sam’s right, it’s not fair to get all snarky with you. he’s just fueled by worry and he forgets that his worry very easily turns to anger and irritability. dean’s not upset with you at all, but he is at himself for not noticing just how badly you were injured.

the way that he gently carries you to the back seat of the impala is his apology, plus the promise to find your favorite food after you get checked out from the hospital. sam sits in the back with you to keep you steady. steady and held. his hand holds your head softly, his other keeping your leg still as the car rumbles down along the road.

tonight, everything will be fine. your ankle will heal and once properly treated, it’s true that the pain will fade. sure, they won’t pay the medical bills with real credit cards and the doctor might be impressed or concerned, or both, by your pain tolerance. because this certainly isn’t the first time you’ve been cooped up in the back seat of the impala, hurting and maybe even a little scared while sam holds you and dean drives.

he always steals glances back at you through the rearview mirror, making eye contact with sam to be sure you’re awake and well. but he has to be the one driving because he feels like that’s the only thing he has control of when you’re like this. he just absolutely horrified by the thought that there might be a dark night on empty roads after a hunt or a nearly world-ending event where his can’t drive fast enough. what if, someday, you die in his car and your blood stains the leather, because how could he wipe your blood from the seats like that?

and sam’s the one who’ll be holding you, staunching your blood with his jacket, whispering assurances that you’ll be alright. he’s terrified by the thought that there might be a night where, in the backseat of this car, the place you all silently call home, you’ll die in his arms.

those are the sorts of things they think about. they know that you think about your own nightmares of them dying too. but in this life, the only thing you can do is tuck those thoughts away, somewhere deep and hidden, because tonight, everything will be fine.

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xo100 · 9 hours ago

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Hi there!! Could I ask Lando with a singer or a dancer reader?? They are already dating, but haven’t made it officially yet to the public. Lando surprises the reader by attending to the readers tour and fans are going feral about him being there, because it’s a “duo” they didn’t knew they needed. After the show he comes backstage to the reader and they make the relationship public with the pictures of them being backstage or something. Just really sweet and fluffy. Thank you❤️

A surprise in the spotlight - LN4

*:･ﾟ Summary/request: request by anon as you can read above this!

*:･ﾟ Word count: 781

*:･ﾟ A/N: hey loves! I just wanted to let you know that I have another blog called @norrisxwrites on this blog I will reblog your reblogs. I’ll reblog my posts and other posts! Go check it out if you want posting there soon! Enjoy the fic!

masterlist / community / request

౨ৎ

The stadium buzzed with the excitement only a sold-out concert could bring. The energy was palpable, like a living, breathing thing, as fans spilled into their seats with glowing bracelets and homemade signs. This was your tour, the biggest one yet, and it had been months of grueling rehearsals, endless interviews, and nights spent missing the man who’d somehow slipped into your life and turned it upside down.

That man, Lando Norris, Formula 1’s rising star and everyone’s favorite cheeky Brit, was supposed to be halfway across the world, prepping for the next Grand Prix. At least, that’s what he’d told you over FaceTime just two days ago.

But Lando had never been great at following the rules—especially when it came to staying away from you for too long.

It wasn’t until the third song of the set that whispers started spreading through the crowd. Something was happening near the back, a ripple of excitement weaving its way forward. The screens overhead briefly panned across the audience, and there he was, seated among the fans in a hoodie and cap pulled low but not low enough to fool anyone.

The stadium erupted.

“Is that Lando Norris?” someone screamed.

“He’s at her concert?” another gasped.

The internet moved faster than the speed of sound. Within moments, Twitter was ablaze with shaky screenshots and wild speculations.

-Are they dating?!- -This is the crossover I didn’t know I needed!- -Lando and Y/N??? MY HEART.-

Onstage, you were mid-chorus, but the sudden roar from the crowd was hard to ignore. Your eyes scanned the sea of people, your heart stuttering when you spotted him. Lando gave a small wave, his smile tugging at the edges of his mouth like he couldn’t quite contain it.

You fought the urge to break character, biting back a grin as you returned your focus to the performance. But your cheeks were warm, and the butterflies in your stomach were undeniable.

The show ended with an encore, the crowd’s energy lingering in the air as fans slowly filed out. You darted backstage, the adrenaline still coursing through your veins, only to stop short when you saw him leaning casually against the wall near your dressing room.

“Fancy meeting you here,” Lando said, his voice warm and teasing.

You couldn’t help it—you threw yourself into his arms, the scent of his cologne instantly grounding you. He caught you effortlessly, his laughter soft against your hair as he held you close.

“What are you doing here?” you asked, your words muffled against his chest.

“Surprising you,” he said simply, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Missed you too much. Figured it was time I crashed one of your shows.”

Your heart swelled. “You’re insane, you know that?”

“Only for you.”

He pulled back just enough to look at you, his hands still on your waist. “You were incredible out there. I mean, I knew you were good, but seeing you like this…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “You’re amazing, Y/N.”

The sincerity in his voice left you momentarily speechless, your cheeks heating under his gaze. “You’re not too bad yourself, Mr. Norris. Though I think you’ve caused a bit of a stir.”

Lando smirked, the corner of his mouth quirking up in that infuriatingly charming way. “Oh, I noticed. Your fans are relentless. Think I saw my name trending on Twitter halfway through the third song.”

“Serves you right,” you teased, but the warmth in your voice gave you away.

You didn’t plan to go public with your relationship that night, but when your manager walked in, phone in hand, and said, “We’ve got paparazzi swarming the back exit,” you knew it was inevitable.

Lando squeezed your hand, his touch steadying. “If you’re ready, I am.”

“You mean it?” you asked, your voice quieter now.

“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

He kissed your forehead, and in that moment, everything else faded away. The chaos, the cameras, the noise—it all felt distant, insignificant compared to him.

The two of you walked out together, hand in hand, the backstage photographer snapping candid shots that would be on every gossip site by morning. You didn’t care.

Later, in the car, Lando scrolled through the early posts. He turned his phone to you, showing a picture of the two of you backstage, mid-laugh, your fingers laced together.

“‘The duo we didn’t know we needed,’” he read aloud, chuckling. “Not bad, huh?”

You leaned against his shoulder, your smile soft. “Not bad at all.”

And as the city lights blurred past the windows, you couldn’t help but think that maybe, just maybe, this was only the beginning.

౨ৎ

*:･ﾟ Notes; thank you for reading, love’s! Hope you all enjoyed it! If there is something wrong or need to be edited, let me know! Also hey anon! If you read this, I hope that this is what you had in mind!

*:･ﾟtags; @spookbusters-jr

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c0n-fus3d · 12 hours ago

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𝚂𝚑𝚎 𝙻𝚒𝚔𝚎𝚜 𝙰 𝙱𝚘𝚢.

(Older!Powder x fem!reader)

I'm sorry but I finished ep 1 of act 3 and had to write this to get my emotions out about ekko and powder being a thing in an alternative reality bcz just RAHHHFHSHEHSHHS my gay ass is crying (no offense to the timebomb shippers, you do you!! If you like this that's cool💪💪) ENGLISH ISN'T MY NATIVE LANGUAGE, IF I MADE SOME SPELLING MISTAKES I'M SORRY ALSO SPOILERS FOR ACT 3!!

Warnings: uhhh just angst, mostly angst, this is for my girlies who might be feeling the same

༺ღ༒ ༺ღ༒ ༺ღ༒ ༒ღ༻

You've always liked Powder, every since you were kids, and still when you are teenagers.

Their was always something about her. The way she made the most creative inventions, the way she always seemed to have some sort of spark in her eyes. Her laugh, her hair, her eyes, it's hard for you to explain the feelings you have towards her.

You knew the way Vi's death was heavy on her, you could see that with the days, and soon years that came after. You we're always trying to be there to support her, make her feel a little better. You gave her space when she needed it, and we're there for her when she needed you the most.

And then there was Ekko.

You never hated Ekko, you 𝙙𝙤𝙣'𝙩 hate Ekko. he was a good guy, you got along with him. He was around Powder nearly just as much as you we're, maybe even a little more. When you were around Powder, he wouldn't take long to show up as well. You didn't mind.

But you couldn't deny that you we're jealous of him, of Ekko. The way he charmed his way into Powder's heart over the years. With his sketches, ideas, personality, kindness and understanding. You wanted what him and Powder had as if what you already had wasn't enough for you. You could see the way she looked at him, how 𝙝𝙚 looked at her the same way.

You often wished it was you instead of him. You try to forget about your jealousy, push it asside. You try to push your jealousy and selfishness asside, keep everything natural between you three. But it got harder and harder the more time went on.

Ekko has been acting strange recently, or at least that's what Powder told you. How he 'seems not to remember anything' and how he says these things about how in a dream her and Vi we're completely different. You noticed yourself too, how he was more around then usual. You assumed it was because of his project or whatever.

Now you find yourself here, on the dance floor in the last drop. Inventions around you everywhere as music and colorful lights fill the bar. You look into the crowd, trying to spot Powder. It took you a whole 5 minutes to finally spot her, but to no suprise, Ekko was there. On the dance floor, with her. Dancing together to the beat of the music like it was just the two of them. You tried to move your eyes away from the sight, let them be happy and together. But the jealousy ate you from the inside out, this all just left a bitter taste on your tongue. It all got so overwhelming so quickly, so you decide to leave the place before you explode and do something stupid.

So you decide to go out to Powder's little Hideout for now and go back once you've cooled down. You look at the massive invention across the room, stunned as fuck how they made this. You don't want to pay too much attention to it though, so you continue walking through the massive space before sitting down in front of the small memorial that Powder made for Vi.

You lighten the place up before just.. Sitting there. You sigh, looking at the picture sat on the desk. Vi always knew you had a thing for Powder, she always encouraged you to tell her how you felt. Whenever the situation was on your mind, you'd go here. You'd talk, like she was still there. Because to you, she was. To everyone, she still was. Now wasn't any different, you talked about what has been going on recently. With Ekko, Powder, and everything else.

"I just.. Don't know what to do, I know I'm supposed to be happy for them.. Ekko is a great guy, a-and if they become a thing, I'll be fine with it but.. Theirs this voice in the back of my mind that just doesn't seem to go away.." You groan, your head in your hands as you thought for a moment.

You knew you couldn't hide your feelings forever. If Powder wasn't going to feel the same way towards you, you might as well tell her what you've been feeling all this time. Just for an answer, a yes or a no. Anything. If she didn't feel anything as well then at least she'd know.

"I'll tell her, tonight. Like you always wanted me to do.. I'll.. I'll get this over with, okay? For you."

You found yourself walking back towards the last drop, but then you see Powder, going in the direction of what you knew to be the place where Vi always took her to. So you decided to follow.

If only you weren't blind enough to see Ekko walking along with her.

You climbed up to the place, heart racing in your chest as you tried to think about the things you could say. Your mind was running a million miles and you tried desperately to calm your nerves.

You we're finally gonna do it, you we're gonna tell her how you feel.

But just as you nearly reach the top, you see her. And Ekko.

Their kissing.

In front of your eyes.

Your heart dropped, hope that you knew was useless in the end shattered as you saw the image.

Wrong fucking timing. You stood there, frozen in time before quickly getting out of there. Trying to hold back the tears that we're threatening to fall.

She likes Ekko. She only likes Ekko. It was never you. Not in childhood, not in teenage years.

She likes a boy. That boy.

Your not that boy, and for now, you had to live with that.

You we're never going to being the one kissing her. It was always going to be him in the end.

#arcane x reader #Powder x reader #jinx x reader #arcane league of legends #arcane s2 #ekko arcane #powder arcane

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livbedum · 1 day ago

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i would love to learn more about maybank!reader being kidnapped by rafe like what happened? why’d he do it? when did it happen? how did his family react? did they know? how did jj and the pogues react?

GIVE ME A MINUTE

WE ARE SO FUCKING OVER!

ִֶָ 𓂃⊹ ִֶָ summary requested!

warnings 18+ minors dni , profanity , kidnapping / drugging , violence

rafe had the fucking cross. after all that you had gone through in the day with pope nearly dying , crashing kie’s dad’s truck , john b fighting a gator , finding out jj ran into your dad , you were tired. but the night wasn’t over until you got the cross back for pope.

your eyes stayed on sarah and john b , who were clearly having a moment after their somewhat breakup. “you seriously think now is the time to talk about this?” sarah whisper yelled at him , giving him a look that called him stupid.

before jj could stop you , you headed in her direction and yanked her with you. “we have things to do. come on,” you grunted , heading towards tannyhill. when the two of you were far enough away from the boys you looked at sarah with a small smile. “he really does love you. enough to make him stupid,” you chuckled , making your way to the truck.

“i know,” she sighed , peeking into the driver’s seat, “we gotta find the keys though,” she added , getting back to business.

you nodded , not seeing them in the truck like you were hoping. “looks like we have to go inside,” you grimaced , knowing rafe was in there , knowing he would not be happy to see you like he usually was.

sarah looked over her shoulder to the boys quickly updating them that, “we’re going inside! we’ll be right back!” before ushering you into the house with her close behind. you both kept a lookout before moving too far into the foyer. “okay , i have to go find wheezie really quick— she’ll help us distract rafe. you find the keys , okay?”

you watched sarah plot for a moment on the situation before nodding in agreement. “just be safe. don’t want rafe flipping out on you again,” you warned her , holding her hand before letting go and rushing away.

the first obvious place to check was rafe’s room. you had been there so many times , it was easy to avoid the creaks in the floor on the way to his bedroom door. you had been lucky not to see anyone yet. so , quietly your hand twisted at the golden knob before cracking the door open as slow as possible.

after the copious amount of times you snuck into tannyhill , you knew better than to let rafe’s old door creak when you opened it. as soon as the opening was wide enough for you to slip in , you did , closing the door softly behind you , shutting yourself inside.

and that’s when you heard the shower stop running , making you blood run cold. now was not the time to bump into rafe. not when the boys were outside , not when sarah was upstairs , and not while he had the cross you were absolutely trying to steal back from him. that wasn’t an option.

your eyes darted around the room you were so familiar with , catching a glimpse of the nightstand that had the keychain sitting on top of it. you could still hear rafe in his en suite bathroom , so you rushed to grab the keys. they clanked against the wooden stand , causing you to cringe at the disturbance of quiet. “shit,” you cursed as they slipped out of your hand and into the floor , making even more of a ruckus as the bathroom door opened wide.

there was nothing else to do in that moment other than freeze. caught like a deer in headlights , you looked up and saw rafe standing in the doorway , towel around his hips , chest heaving and already looking down at you. you were crouched down , actively reaching for the keys again.

“what are you doing here?” oh. he’s playing it safe. he raised his eyebrows at you as he bent over , slowly grabbing the keys from the floor. he stayed low , looking into your eyes for a moment before rising completely and taking the keys with him to his dresser.

you took a deep breath and stood up , trying to gauge how this was going to go. “sarah was complaining about missing something the other day , so i thought i could come by and grab it,” you lied , watching him as he got dressed, “heard you in the shower and stopped in while i could. missed you,” you added , stepping closer to rafe before reaching out and touching his damp back.

his skin twitched under the contact. “yeah?” he chuckled , turning around with a smile, “came in here just for me?”

“what else?” you asked , matching his smile as you leaned up to press a kiss into his cheek before retreating back a few feet.

“you’re not here because you know i have the cross?” rafe questioned , stepping forward , effectively forcing you back toward his bed, “not here to steal my fucking keys? and take off with the cross that i found!” he shouted , trapping you where you were pressed against the edge of his bed frame.

your eyes betrayed you , flashing a vulnerable fear in them when he yelled. “no , baby,” you shook your head quickly just like your voice, “no , of course not.”

“stop lying to me!” again , rafe’s voice practically rattled the window panes, “you shouldn’t have fucking come here , y/n! you’re so fucking stupid. should’ve just minded your business! constantly forcing my hand to do things i don’t want to do!” he continued getting dressed , throwing a jacket on.

“rafe , you’re scaring me,” you admitted , sinking into the mattress in an attempt to get away from him.

a low chuckle came from his throat as he turned and looked at you. “this isn’t my fault,” he started, “you—“

“rafe! can you come help me pack my bag?”

wheezie.

your chest deflated , finally able to catch a breath when rafe moved his eyes to the door where wheezie was bound to walk through in a moment. “here , baby. you can have the keys to the truck,” rafe smiled , tossing the keys at you before going to the door and stepping into the hallway before wheezie got to you both.

you caught the keys , pushing yourself up off the bed and rushing to the door. the knob giggled in your hand as you tried to open it , but the locked clicked into place on the other side. “have to do everything for you people,” rafe grumbled to his little sister before you could hear his footsteps getting quieter.

“fuck! fuck , fuck , fuck,” you grumbled , hand hitting at the door, “rafe , let me the fuck out right now!” you yelled , banging against the door even harder , keys still jingling in your hand.

“y/n?” sarah’s voice came out worried and rushed through the door, “y/n/n , are you in there?” her hand tapped against the wood on the other side of yours.

“sare? sarah , i can’t get out. you have to pick the lock or something,” you explained , turning to look for something on your side of the door to help.

“okay , it’s okay,” sarah assured you, “i got you.”

you could here some sort of rattling on her end , assuming she found something to jam inside the lock to get you out. “i got the keys!” you smiled with a sniffle , trying to look at the bright side , but you knew it wasn’t long until rafe returned to his room and caught sarah this time.

the lock clicked , sliding out of place before sarah pushed it open. “oh , my god!” she breathed out , yanking you in for a hug before you both ran out of the room, “gimme the keys , and let’s go.”

you tossed her the key chain , following her out of the house and back to the truck. “what’re you doing?” you whispered when sarah kept moving to the back.

“i wanna make sure it’s still in here,” sarah explained , fumbling with the keys before finding one that fit into the lock on the back door.

“okay , well hurry it up before rafe finds both of us,” you urged her , checking over your shoulder for any sign of him. as if your words triggered the reaction , the lock undid itself , and sarah pulled the door open before stopping. “what is it?”

you moved to take a look yourself only to freeze just like sarah did , keeping eye contact with the man you saw in the truck with rafe earlier. he laid lifeless on the ground next to the cross , eyes boring into your own. “what did he do?” you sighed , assuming rafe was the one who killed the man. who else would’ve?

“you guys really shouldn’t have done that.” it was rafe’s voice that came from behind you just before you felt his arms wrap around you and a sharp pinch in the side of your neck. his hands released you , letting you stumble away as your hand reached up to you neck.

“rafe?”

he didn’t bother looking at you , only dropping the now empty syringe to the ground and grabbing sarah. you could only watch as sarah struggled against her brother’s grip , feeling time slow and your heart beat much harder than it was before. “rafe , what are you doing?” she kicked at him , but it wasn’t a fair match.

the last thing you saw was rafe dragging sarah back inside before you stumbled back and tripped. your arms flew back , trying to catch your fall , but there you laid on the ground almost as lifeless as the man in the truck.

you don’t remember anything as you wake up , but the moment your eyes open , you know where you were. the way the mattress sank beneath and around you , the feel of the silk pillow case under your head. you were in rafe’s room. again.

you sat up quickly , looking around to see if sarah was locked in with you , but you were alone. throwing the comforter off of your body , you swung your legs off the edge of the bed. “rafe?” you spoke quietly but loud enough to where he would hear you if he was in the area, “babe? what’s going on?” you called out a little louder but sweeter when you didn’t get a response.

“rafe!” your voice was louder this time , a little angrier when you realized he had left you in the room alone. “rafe cameron , let me out of this room! help! wheezie? rose!” you roared , running to the door to try and open it. you shoved your body against the wood , trying to break it down as if that would ever happen. “rafe!” you called out again far weaker than before.

catching your breath , you moved back to the bed to stabilize yourself. your head was still fuzzy with whatever rafe shot you up with. you sat down , head hanging low as you tried to think everything through.

rafe gave you a shot.

he took sarah inside.

you woke up in his room.

you were alone.

sarah wasn’t with you.

you steadied yourself again before standing up from the bed , moving to the door the bang on it more. “sarah! sarah , where are you?” you shouted , the door muffling your cries, “sare?”

there wasn’t a response. only the quiet hum of the air conditioning filling the heavy space around you. you slid down against the door , falling to the floor in defeat. you couldn’t get out of rafe’s room by yourself last time ; sarah helped you , and where did that get her?

your eyes scanned the room , catching sight of the flowers you had brought rafe not that long ago as an apology for your last fight. you apologized to him , and this is what he does next?

pushing yourself up , you move to the fireplace and grab the vase before launching it at the bedroom door. that would cause concern if your yelling hadn’t already. “rafe , let me out of here before i keep going!” you screamed , grabbing the next thing you could grab and throwing it the same direction as the broken vase and flowers. “we are so fucking over!”

by the time rafe was ushered away from sarah in the basement , you had already destroyed half of his valuables. the laptop he had on his desk , photo frames of his family and even some of you , his cologne bottles in the bathroom , and all of his watches had been thrown across the room as well.

“what the fuck!” rafe barged into the room , slamming the door behind him as he took in the sight of the floor and you, “what the fuck are you doing?” he yelled , grabbing you by the shoulders, “what the actual fuck , y/n?”

“you drugged me!” you argued , shoving at his chest, “you drugged me , rafe! and locked me in your room!” you kept shoving , hitting at him before he had enough and grabbed you. his grip forced you into the bed face down as he held you in place.

“stop fucking yelling , and stop fucking shoving me,” he grunted in your ear , pushing your body down again to get his point across, “calm the fuck down and we’ll talk.”

“get off of me!” you cried , trying to fight him , but his weight alone was enough to keep you down.

“not until you calm down , baby,” he replied, “you keep making me do shit i don’t wanna do. how is this my fault?” he asked you , lifting up enough to let you take a completely breath.

you looked up at him from the bed , eyes wide and tear filled. “you— you killed that guy,” you muttered, “you killed that guy , and you’re going to kill me and sarah , right?” you couldn’t help but let the absolute worst thoughts bubble to the surface.

rafe heard the words you spoke despite being coughed out through your tears , and he softened entirely. “what?” he moved , letting you go and sitting down next to you , but your body couldn’t move. you were frozen on the bed , terrified of what would happen if you tried to run. the only movement you could make was flinching away when rafe’s hand came up to gently move the hair out of your face.

“i didn’t kill anyone.” he said it like a fact , when you knew it wasn’t. peterkin. he killed peterkin , but you knew better than to bring that up ever again. “well , at least not that guy,” he added with a soft laugh, “and i wouldn’t do that to you , y/n. i love you ; don’t you see? i’m doing this all for you!” your eyes followed his movements as he got on his knees by the bed and laid his head by yours to look you in the eye. “we’re going away. i got the cross and sarah and you. okay , we’re leaving tonight. i just gotta take care of some things , but in the meantime you and sarah are going to go with rose and wheezie to the wharf.”

you felt his hand crawl up your back , stopping on your neck and holding you down without any force— just a precaution. “i love you , and i’m sorry , but you gotta come with. cuz i gotta go , and i can’t leave without you,” he continued , and you nodded , going along with whatever he was saying , none of which you understood.

“okay,” you croaked , nodding again.

“just need you to go back to sleep for a bit , ‘kay?” he had tears in his own eyes. he hated seeing you look so afraid of him. that’s the last thing he wanted. he was doing this all for you. he convinced his dad to let you come with because he loved you so much he couldn’t live without you. and you looked at him with fear. “love you , princess,” he whispered , kissing your forehead before standing up and grabbing something from the nightstand you hadn’t seen before.

“wait , rafe. no , no , no. please—“ your pleas were cut off by rafe covering your mouth and inserting another needle into your skin.

“okay , john b , you need to get sarah. me and pope will just y/n/n,” jj planned , huddling up with his boys before they stormed the cameron castle. only before they could break , rafe came waltzing out of the house and into the truck once again before taking off.

pope didn’t hesitate to run after the truck , hiding in the blind spot to hop on the back. jj and john b scrambled in place , not knowing to go after pope or the girls in the house , but the brake lights disappearing made their decision for them. pope could handle his own.

“wait— b , look,” jj hit john b’s arm , pointing at the scene happening in the cameron’s driveway.

rose was busying herself with shoving you in the backseat of the car , not understanding why on earth you were tagging along , but not wanting to push rafe even further tonight. wheezie followed behind , struggling to move sarah’s drugged up body by herself.

as soon as you were properly buckled and locked away in the back , rose moved to help wheezie , lying about how you and sarah wasn’t feeling too good.

“okay , well we gotta get them,” john b stated , already running after the car that had started to pull out of the driveway.

the boys banged on the windows , begging wheezie to unlock the door or for one of you to wake up and do it yourself. Rose just sped off , leaving the boys behind.

“twinkie! get the twinkie! we gotta go!” jj shouted , sprinting off towards the van so they could follow rose’s car across the island.

if you didn’t feel like shit waking up in rafe’s room , you definitely did now. your entire body was sore , head spinning , and for some reason you felt like you were swaying even as you laid down. despite not knowing where you were exactly at this time , you could figure it out if you took a moment to.

the bobbing , the salt air , the horn in the distance.

you were on a fucking boat , but you didn’t get much time to stress about it before you heard people outside your door arguing.

“rafe , you drugged her. that is kidnapping! and you made me an accomplice! for a pogue? who even is this girl?!” rose , if you assumed correctly , was clearly on your side of the kidnapping , not so much for you but for her.

you could practically see rafe roll his eyes from this side of the door. “dad , you said she could come. she’s here. she’s coming.” if the circumstances had been different , your heart would’ve swelled with pride at the fact that rafe was standing up to ward , especially when it came to you.

“not like this , son!” ward’s voice powerful as ever argued.

wait— ward?

you pushed yourself up from the couch you were laid on and moved to the door , stumbling with the waves beneath the ship. cautiously , you turned the handle and surprisingly pushed through. “rafe?”

your voice was softer than the three that continued arguing , but it still pulled them out of their conversation. all eyes were on you instantly. rose was the first to speak up. “y/n , sweetie , why don’t you go lie back down? rafe said you hit your head earlier. you must need rest.” it all sounded sweet in theory , but you knew it was all a story and fake concern.

“my head feels fine,” you snipped quickly , looking to rafe again before moving your eyes to the undead, “was hoping you were actually blown up by that boat , ward.” as much as you hated rafe for what he had done to you in the past however many hours , your blood boiled at the sight of ward. you were there for rafe when he died ; you picked up the pieces ; you encouraged him to keep going. even before his fake death , you had to be there for rafe when ward flipped out on him. every. single. time.

ward only spared you a glance before pointing at rafe and muttering a “clean this shit up , boy,” before walking away with rose.

“why the fuck did you wake up with an attitude?” rafe cursed , ushering you back into the room you were just in.

you crossed your arms and stared at him indifferently. “maybe because you drugged me , rafe. again,” you stated like he was an idiot for asking , despite knowing he hated when people spoke to him like that. you didn’t exactly care about his feelings in the moment. “you have done a lot of things to me that are awful , rafe , but this— wow , this takes the cake.”

“i did what i had to do to get you here,” rafe groaned , stepping towards you with open hands. you backed away , instinctively. “oh , my fucking god! you’re so dramatic , y/n!”

“and you’re psychotic!” you quickly yelled back , hugging yourself with your arms as you kept your distance from him, “where’s sarah? i want sarah.”

rafe sighed , running a hand down is face. “she’s with our family right now. she doesn’t feel good.”

“i want to see her.”

“she’s busy,” rafe simply denied your request, “do you want a water , baby?” you flinched as tried to step closer to you again. “y/n , seriously , knock it off,” he grunted , getting more irritated by your lack of willingness to just fucking comply with what’s going on, “everything’s going to be fine. i have it all handled. i just needed to get you here.”

you shook your head , slowly crossing the room. “no. i don’t want to be here. i want to go home , rafe. i want to call jj. please,” you asked him , tears filling your eyes at the beginning of accepting that you were in a situation you most likely weren’t getting out of, “rafe , look at what you’ve done,” you started, “look what you did to me.”

rafe didn’t listen though. he turned his head , not wanting to see the truth. he got you here. that’s what mattered. “you can call jj when we dock,” he muttered , trying to reach his hand out to you again before dropping it to his side, “but you’re not leaving until then.”

“we are so fucking over , rafe.” it was said definitively.

and it was like you were living in a loop when rafe slipped out the door and closed it behind him , when you heard the sound of a lock being put in place , holding you in the room you woke up in. your eyes stared blankly at the red , painted metal before you fell back into the couch. “i’m so fucked.”

at least that’s what it felt like.

a/n holy shit this took a minute and it isn’t proofed or anything so ignore any typos

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