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dumbkiri · 11 months

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𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕎𝕚𝕗𝕖 𝕠𝕗 𝔾𝕠𝕛𝕠 𝕊𝕒𝕥𝕠𝕣𝕦 『4.5』

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ꜰᴏᴜʀ, ᴘᴀʀᴛ ᴛᴡᴏ: ɪɴ ʜᴇʀ ᴇʏᴇꜱ

WARNING FROM LAST PART

[Name] is declared dead and all the students can think about was the audacity they had for not being with help. Gojo Satoru now hates mochi.

Alright this is the last part to chapter four. This part is literally 13 pages long. Oh my days, I went crazy with this one. Please ignore the mistakes. I don't have a beta reader!!

“Are you cryin’?”

Utahime looked up from the piece of rubble that was weighing heavily on her. “I’m not!” She shouted at the white haired male with an angry face.

Satoru smiled at her and looked back at Suguru whose cursed spirit engulfed a smaller one in its mouth. “Alright, the girls are saved! Can we please go now?”

Mei Mei sat on a giant piece of the destroyed house and asked, “You guys seem to be in a big rush. Mind telling me who's got you like this?” Though she was not staring at them, her question was directed at both the males who seemed to rush their techniques.

Satoru waved his hand and said casually, “Eh, nothing you gotta worry about.”

“Satoru is feeling antsy about [Name]’s solo mission to exercise a special grade.” Suguru tattled and he watched as his best friend gave him a silent death glare. Ah, Suguru couldn’t get enough of teasing Satoru’s little crush on their new friend.

“Oh, she’s moving up to a special grade already? Her blessed technique is quite fascinating.” Mei Mei offhandedly complimented, one leg going over the other.

“She’s just that great” Satoru praised with his hands on his hips, “She could do almost anything. We’re the perfect duo, me being untouchable and her getting rid of the curses perfectly.”

Suguru hummed and said, “We can’t go to her yet until we tell Masamichi that we finished helping Mei Mei and Utahime out.” To which his white haired friend pulled out his phone and dialed their teacher’s number.

“This is Satoru Gojo, we finished the mission! We are now going over to Earth-worm’s location! Uh-huh! Yup! Understood!”

Suguru watched with a smile on his face and a chuckle left his lips when he looked over at the girls saying, “Satoru really doesn’t understand his feelings for [Name], I’d say.”

Shoko was currently being devoured in Utahime’s arms and said, “Because of his giant ego. Satoru will never understand what a crush is until she confesses first.”

Utahime had let go of Shoko and put a hand under her chin, “Wait, you guys really think [Name] likes Gojo? There’s no way a pure hearted girl like her would fall for that guy!” Everyone looked at her pointed finger to see Satoru still talking on the phone.

“He might not see it until she’s in danger,” Mei Mei said with that relaxed smile on her face, “Gojo is just that kind of man. It needs to smack him in the face. He hasn’t experienced the loss of a friend yet, so he doesn’t see the importance of friendship or a crush.”

“You might be right,” Shoko hummed and took the lollipop out of her mouth, “But [Name] is good at what she does. She may lack confidence, but she’s very strong. She can heal herself, teleport, summon weapons, bubble objects and people up, actually attack and defend. She’s an all-around jujutsu sorcerer. I can understand why the Zen’in’s are proposing a marriage deal with her.”

Suguru looked at Shoko and was taken back by her information. “Wait, [Name] accepted the marriage proposal? Who is she getting married to?”

Utahime sweat dropped and stretched her muscles out with a nervous smile, “I take that back. I rather see little [Name] with Gojo than a Zen’in. A flower like her can’t grow in their disgusting soil. She’s not going to last!”

Shoko shook her head and patted Utahime’s head saying, “Ah, don’t worry. [Name] rejected the offer saying she isn’t old enough to be married yet. She has plenty of years to discuss marriage deals with the Elders when she’s older.” Shoko all said this as if she was confident that everything was fine.

But something didn’t sit right with Suguru.

“Alright, well I am getting hungry. Are you up for something sweet?” Mei Mei opened her eyes and looked at Satoru standing next to her with a grin on his face. He was always down for a little treat.

“Of course! I just finished telling Masamichi how easy this curse was handled! I’m craving some mochi now, I’ll make sure to get some extra for my earth-worm!” Satoru began striding over to the car while Suguru felt that pit in his stomach drop further.

“Actually I think we should head over to [Name]’s location.” He suggested firmly which made the group stand still looking at him with concern.

“Hmm, is everything okay, Suguru? You’re the first one to believe in [Name]’s strength,” Shoko tilted her head and swished the small lollipop in her mouth.

Suguru stuffed his hands into his pockets and walked towards them. Before he could get his answer out, Utahime’s stomach growled loudly and she bashfully shouted, “That was nothing! You all heard nothing!”

Everyone laughed and Suguru smiled with his eyes closed, his shoulders shrugging, “You’re right. Let’s get a bite before Utahime dies of starvation.”

“I’m not that hungry!”

Satoru watched his best friend closely and was going to question him about his urgency earlier, but it was washed away when everyone was deciding on a place to eat at. The car Satoru, Suguru and Shoko followed after Utahime’s and Mei Mei’s leading them to a cafe that was still relatively close to [Name]’s mission location.

They all chatted with each other and ate delicious food with laughter filled in the air. Shoko and Utahime were rambling about their interests while Mei Mei listened to them quietly, her relaxed smile still present. While Suguru and Satoru were chatting about the large amount of mochi Satoru ordered.

“She’s not going to finish all of that mochi, Satoru.” Suguru snickered.

“What? Of course not! I’m going to share it with her while we look at the stars together. She might be super tired after the mission, but mochi always gets her up!” Satoru shot back and began packing the mochi into a paper bag.

Suguru’s phone began to ring and he pulled it out to see Masamichi’s contact. He flipped the phone and answered it with a smile present on his face. “This is Suguru Geto.”

His eyes shot open and he abruptly stood from his seat, pushing the table a bit. The girls grabbed their drinks and one shouted at him.

“Hey, Geto! Watch where-” Utahime immediately shut her mouth seeing the look on Suguru’s face. His eyes were wide with shock and his free hand was clenched into a tight fist.

“Are you sure?” He asked over the phone and looked down at Satoru with a hidden pain. Suguru took a deep breath in and he fell back into his chair with a solemn expression. “Yes, I understand. We’ll be there soon.”

The call ended and Suguru let his face rest into his hands. Then he straightened out his back and looked at the girls purposefully ignoring the piercing blue eyes next to him. “Masamichi needs us to investigate the death of a student.”

“A student? Well who is it?” Shoko asked, the fear seeping into her racing heart. It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be. They were going to see her after this quick meal. They were going to help her out.

“Don’t you dare say her name.” Satoru threatened Suguru. His voice was harsh and deep. His bright blue eyes glaring daggers at Suguru.

The black haired male blinked and informed the group, dismissing the hollow warning from Satoru, “[Name] completed her mission only for her to die outside the veil. Her assigned assistant is missing and she was…” Suguru closed his eyes tightly and breathed out, “She was stabbed seven times, she bled out two hours ago. A local citizen found her body as he was jogging up the mountain. He called local authorities, but now everything is being covered by the school and council.”

Everyone was silent upon hearing the devastating news.

The wonderful taste in Satoru’s mouth from the mochi soured. His eyes glared at the table and he slipped his glasses off the bridge of his nose. He stood up from the table and looked at Shoko and Suguru telling them, “Let’s go. We wasted enough time here.”

Shoko stood up hurriedly and Suguru followed after him with a look of regret. Damn, if only he described that pit in his stomach. If only Suguru went after that dreaded feeling. [Name] was dead now, she had been for two hours. They could have found her. They could have helped her.

……

The drive up the mountain was long and silent. No one spoke a word to one another. The three of them were blaming themselves for their lack of urgency, strength and awareness.

The car stopped and bright lights lit up the crime scene. Satoru was the first one out of the car and his shades were back on his face hiding his anger and sadness. “I know this could be difficult, but Masamichi wants you to examine her body. He doesn’t trust the men sent over here.” Suguru spoke softly to the short haired girl and she nodded.

She got out of the car and closed the door behind her with trembling hands. Shoko watched Satoru walk past men with his head held high, his only goal to reach the girl that he promised he would help. She woke herself from the dip of reality and began to follow his footsteps.

Her brown eyes widened a bit seeing that [Name] was still laying in her spot of death. Her wounded back was facing her and one arm was outstretched like a call for help. [Name]’s uniform was scuffed and soaked in her blood.

Shoko was standing above [Name]’s body with relaxed breathing. She had to keep her cool and do her job. It was obvious Masamichi knew something was different today. There was a reason why Shoko was asked to look after her body.

She pulled out a pair of gloves from her pocket and put them on. Her hands were no longer shaking and she pulled [Name] forward to look at her back. She was stabbed five times here. Then she pushed her body back lightly. The dead girl laying on her back and her face looking up at the stars.

Shoko took note of her bloodied nose, but she didn’t see any visible harm done towards it. Her nose looked perfectly fine. Then her hands moved down toward her abdomen where she was stabbed two times. “I’m so sorry, [Name],” Shoko apologized quietly.

Her bloodied hands used two fingers to feel a pulse, but there was nothing left. The sign of life was nowhere to be found. “Fuck,” she whispered with an exhale. [Name] was really gone.

“If you’re done now, miss, I’ll be taking her.”

Shoko opened up her eyes and looked at the complete stranger that had a stretcher out for [Name]’s body. “W-who are you?” Shoko asked, scooting closer to [Name]’s body. This guy’s energy was raising red flags everywhere.

“I am the coroner specified to look after [L.Name] [Name]’s body. I let you look at her body, but now it’s my turn to do my job.”

Shoko shook her head and denied him, “No, she’s going back to Jujutsu Tech. Her body was to be closely examined there.”

The man sneered and pointed at the two men next to the stretcher, “Pick this body up and deliver it to the Zen’in’s now.” He wasn’t going to listen to a girl, she would be stupid enough to question authority. And he didn’t have time for it.

Shoko watched one man grab [Name]’s arms and the other her legs. To this, Shoko hugged [Name]’s cold body and shouted, “No, you can’t take her! She’s not yours or that cruel Zen’in she rejected rightfully!”

Her outburst caught the boys attention and Satoru was standing right behind the man directing all of this. He took his glasses off for the second time that day and warned the three men, “If you don’t let go of her body, I’ll make sure to stuff you three into one bag and send it to the Zen’in Household. I’ll even send them a card with a nice little message on it signed by Gojo Satoru.”

The two men holding [Name]’s limbs immediately let go and rushed away with mumbled apologies coming from their mouths. Shoko huffed and the man talking to her walked away with a scowl on his face. He would have to report this immediately to the Zen’in Head.

“Shoko, I can take her now.”

She looked up and saw Satoru staring at her with soft blue eyes. His clean hands were outstretched towards her to receive [Name]’s body. Shoko whispered ‘thanks’ and let Satoru pick up [Name]’s lifeless body. Her head was resting on Satoru’s shoulders and the rest of her body was held close to his chest.

Shoko noticed the tender look in his eyes, the way he looked at [Name] with a longing.

“Let’s go home.”

Shoko heard Satoru whisper gently to [Name] and Shoko felt deep remorse in her soul. If only they had listened to Suguru and went straight towards her location. If only, if only, if only, if-

“Hey.”

Shoko stood up and looked to her left to see Suguru clamp his hand onto her shoulder, “This is not our fault. [Name] knows that too, so let’s not push ourselves over the edge.”

Shoko nodded her head and wiped her eyes before the tears would fall. Suguru was right. The ones at fault were the murderers and she had an idea on who it was that killed her.

……

Satoru sat in the passenger seat with [Name]’s body in his arms. He held onto her cold body tightly afraid she was going to disappear in a puddle of petals. Her sticky blood had seeped into mind, reminding him of how much she went through.

It was a long and uncomfortable ride for the three students. Again none of them said a word to one another. Too afraid of what was going to be said or what wasn’t.

His blue eyes looked at every inch of her body. His six eyes examined her state and really confirmed that she had passed away. Her healing capabilities were beyond helping her.

“Satoru, we’re here.”

Satoru looked away from [Name]’s peaceful expression and looked to his right to see Suguru’s hands on the open car door. The white haired male stepped out and was greeted by their teacher, Nanami and Haibara.

Their grim expressions said everything Satoru needed to see. Everyone was just as heartbroken as he was for losing [Name]. His long legs took them up the steps of Jujutsu Tech with everyone following after them.

They all knew where Satoru was bringing [Name]’s body and no one was going to argue with the strongest. He was followed into the garden maze and he laid her body at the center where roses of all colors surrounded her body immediately.

He brushed a lock of hair out of her face and sadly smiled down at her peaceful look. She was so beautiful despite being covered in blood and dirt. [Name] looked so serene through it all. He could only imagine the pain she went through.

Yes, my child did go through a lot of pain.

Satoru looked up from his kneeling position and was just as astounded as his peers for staring at the spirit of a goddess. Nami was showing herself to meet humans, they weren’t so sure Nami was actually real. The sad look on Nami’s face confirmed to everyone that [Name] was really gone. But Satoru already knew that with his six eyes.

She begged for that monster to stop the pain. But like my own tormentor, he did not care. He stabbed my poor girl seven times as a lucky omen to his god.

Nami’s spirit kneeled in front of Satoru’s, both of them on either side of [Name]. Nami’s hands touched [Name]’s face and all the blood began to disappear within an instant.

“Did she…” Satoru swallowed the lump in his throat. He was afraid to hear the answer from the goddess if he asked his question. Did she call out for me?

Nami looked up from [Name]’s face and into the blue eyes of her child’s crush.

No, she didn't. Her mind was too busy with the pain and suffering. But she did think of you before she left. She thought of your blue eyes and white hair. Your smile and the sound you made when you laughed. And the thought of never seeing you again.

Satoru clenched his teeth and balled his hands up into fists. His anger was getting the best of him and he wanted to try bargaining with the goddess to save [Name], but he knew she wouldn't have wanted that. So he took the seedling out of his pocket and held it out to the goddess.

“Take this. For some reason, [Name]’s blessed energy was lingering on this.” Satoru grumbled.

Nami’s irises shook upon seeing the seedling in his palm. Then she looked at the humans behind Satoru who all held looks of gloom on their faces. Nami was going to let [Name]’s soul rest after the tragedy she went through. But the world needed her and it was obvious so did her friends, her new family.

Thank you, Gojo Satoru.

Nami swiped the seedling out of his palm and began singing a lullaby. Her voice was capturing everybody in a trance as she planted the seedling by the podium of her protected soul.

The bush grew with long vines and two balls of light danced around Nami’s feet. She grabbed the [f.color] ball of light and hugged it tightly. The music and her voice was so clear in their heads.

Then Nami walked over to [Name]’s body and pressed the ball of light into her chest where it disappeared into. A gentle smile was on Nami’s face, the singing voice fading softly as she said She won’t remember the tragic events of today. It’s best not to remind her.

Satoru looked from [Name]’s healing body to Nami, “Are you saying that she will be alright? That she’s-”

Nami laughed and nodded her head, It’s way too early for this precious soul to come home. But promise me that this time around you’ll protect her, Gojo Satoru?

Satoru nodded his head and said easily, “I promise.”

Nami’s soul and the other ball of light retreated away leaving the garden in complete darkness again with the full moon being the only source of light. Everyone crowded around [Name]’s body hearing the conversation between Nami and Satoru loud and clear.

A few minutes went by and Haibara looked around the circle with a nervous smile, “She’s supposed to wake up right?”

“Nami didn’t really specify when, idiot.” Nanami nudged Haibara away from his face with an open palm. This didn’t deter Haibara though as he crouched down by [Name]’s head and cupped his hands around his mouth.

“IT’S TIME TO WAKE UP, SLEEPY HEAD!”

“Haibara! You idiot, that’s not going to work!” Nanami scolded and whacked Haibara at the back of his head. The teenager laughed and shrugged his shoulders saying that it was worth a try.

Meanwhile the second years pondered about how long [Name] would take to keep sleeping. Shoko put her fingers on her wrist and sighed in relief, “Her heart is beating and her breathing is coming to. It looks like she’s just sleeping.”

“We’re lucky that we have a goddess on our side or else we could have lost [Name],” Suguru commented lightly, sitting down next to a quiet Satoru.

The white haired male agreed with a nod of his head. His hands combed through his hair and he laughed lightly, “We did lose her…for a while. I only brought her body here based on a feeling and that feeling was only because of the seedling. Her soul had transferred over to that seed.”

Before everyone could ask what he meant by that, [Name] woke up with a groan and yawn. Her body stretched out and everybody dodged her flying limbs. “Careful there, sleeping beauty!” Haibara shouted with an energetic laugh.

[Name] opened her eyes and looked at everyone strangely, “Alright who dragged me out here?” She sat up and couldn’t help, but notice the tears in Haibara’s and Shoko’s eyes. “Is everything- oomph!” She was enveloped in a giant hug by those two and she looked at the four with confusion.

“Don’t worry about them. It’s Shoko’s time of the month,” Suguru joked while Nanami nodded his head, “Yes, same for Haibara.”

[Name] released a laugh and hugged her friends back, “Geez, guys give me some space! I was only sleeping for a bit. Oh man, my back is so sore.” [Name] yawned into her hand and was let go from the hug.

Her eyes scanned her surroundings and asked, “Why are we in Nami’s Garden? This is a sacred place for the goddess. You can’t just bother her for a prank!” [Name] put the blame on Haibara immediately and pulled on his ear. In turn, Haibara laughed out loud and didn’t mind the small punishment from his classmate.

“Actually Satoru was setting up a nice star gazing night for you all and I gave him permission,” Masamichi said, walking out of the garden exit.

[Name] tilted her head and looked at Satoru for the first time since she came back to life, “Huh? Is that true Gojo-senpai?” Her innocence was going to be the death of him. The white haired male crossed his arms over his chest and mumbled, “Yeah.”

It was supposed to be just them two though. Back when she didn’t die though.

“What a great idea! Let’s go get snacks at the vending machine!” Haibara shouted and began dragging Nanami with him. He walked away with a cheesy smile on his face rubbing the heck out of his ear.

“Shoko, let’s go join them,” Suguru walked behind the duo and she followed quickly telling [Name] that they’ll be back with blankets and pillows as well.

“Hey Gojo-senpai, you seem off tonight. You’re very quiet,” [Name] observed and stood up from the bed of flowers that was shaped oddly around her body. She didn’t have time to dwell on it because her upperclassman sighed as he uncrossed his arms.

“Stop calling me Gojo-senpai and just call me Satoru. We’re almost the same age, you just enrolled a little too late into the school, okay?”

He sounded exasperated and this made [Name] stifle a laugh with her hand. “Ah, sorry. I didn’t know it bothered you that much, uh, Satoru.” A blush spread across her cheeks and she looked away from his vibrant blue eyes.

Satoru couldn’t believe he was actually doing this, but he already lost her. This wasn’t going to hurt him at all. So he walked up to her and enveloped her into a hug again, but this time she was warm. This time he turned his infinity off.

He wanted to feel all of her and she noticed it too.

“What did I do to earn you trust, Satoru? Your infinity is down for this hug of ours,” [Name] commented softly, her chin barely resting on his shoulder.

Satoru thought hard about his words and he pulled back to let his right hand caress her cheek, “Your energy is very inviting and I feel…safe around you.”

[Name] hummed with a cheeky smile, “That’s a lame excuse, Gojo-senpai.”

“Hey! What happened to calling me Satoru?” He pouted and his shoulders slumped.

“Maybe if you admit the truth, I’ll go back to calling you by your first name,” She teased.

“Maybe this will answer your question” Satoru whispered and brought his face closer to hers. She could feel his breath fan across her lips before he dipped further in feeling her lips on top of his. [Name] couldn’t believe it.

Satoru was actually kissing her. THE Gojo Satoru was kissing her in Nami’s Garden. This definitely had to be a dream. So she took advantage of it. She pressed back with the same amount of enthusiasm which caused Satoru to chuckle lightheartedly in this kiss.

He pulled back with that beautiful look on his face, “Eager are we?”

“I’m just making sure it’s not a dream. It felt like I was sleeping for a long time, Satoru,” She whispered with a sad shine in her eyes.

Satoru quickly noticed this and he pulled her head into his chest, “No, no. You were fine all along.” He didn’t dare look into her tearful eyes, he couldn’t admit to her that she was dead for hours. He didn’t dare tell her of the monster that brutally murdered her. “Your body just needed that real good rest, you know? We all do at some point.”

[Name] didn’t question why he was acting this way. Why did he ignore the look in her eyes? All she knew was that the kiss was amazing and being in his arms felt safe, like she belonged for once. She hugged him back tightly and whispered, “Thank you, Satoru.”

She had no idea what she was thanking him for, but she felt the need.

Satoru rubbed his hand down her back and replied with, “Of course.” His eyes stared intently at the rose that glittered with a bright shine. It was like Nami was giving him approval of his slight confession. He closed his eyes and smiled, thanking Nami again for being the one to actually save [Name].

..........

SONGS THAT INSPIRED THIS CHAPTER

Isabella's Lullaby by Takahiro Obata

Just a Man by Jorge Rivera-Herrans

#x reader #manga imagine #anime imagine #x female reader #jjk gojo #gojo satoru x reader #gojo satoru imagine #gojo imagine #gojo x reader #gojo jjk #jjk imagine

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siriusleee · 1 year

Text

a better year

a/n: i linked this one to ao3 a week or so ago, but i figured i'd do it now i'm procrastinating the next chapter to adamantine chains lmao this is my take on the bookstore au tags: mentions of sex but nothing explicit, cursing, signs of ptsd, , original female character, retirement from the military, bookstore au 6.7k words summary: He takes her shoes off of her while she insists she can do that herself. He slips the right one off when the fireworks go off outside; the entire town is bathed in their light. "Midnight," she says as Simon rises up on one knee in front of her, ready to tell her goodbye and good night. She kisses him over the mask. She doesn't mention it the next day.

The official order rolled in on plain white paper, an unceremonious carrier of his future. He was the first to go: a sign that the team was being unraveled slowly. After all, they're not young men anymore.

"You'll receive your pension; it's enough that you shouldn't have to work again. And we've made sure that you have an official background. It's not much, but it's what we can do."

Laswell doesn't move her eyes from his, her fingers clutching a pen so hard her knuckles are white.

"It's for the best Simon," she says, setting the pen down carefully on her desk, "and if it makes you feel better: everyone will be released soon. I'm sorry."

He's not dumb; he knows these things only last so long. Forced retirement is something to be celebrated - celebrated that he lived long enough to have one, celebrated that his body isn't rotting in some foreign country, a home for worms. Celebrated that the 141 made it out mostly intact. Mostly together.

Johnny claps him on the back and promises that when Laswell brings him that paper when Johnny gets his own forced retirement, he'll come to find Simon.

Simon doesn't stay in England - he doesn't like the way the gray settles around him. He leaves the apartment Laswell set up for him untouched, a note for Johnny for where to find him.

He finds a small house to rent somewhere in the American Southwest, spitting distance of Alejandro's territory. It crosses his mind more than once to make the trip across the border, to see how Alejandro's doing; to see if Rudy is still scared of fantasmas .

But he isn't a fantasma anymore; he's just Simon Riley.

And it's just Simon Riley who paces the aisles of her bookstore, trying to find something to take his mind off of the fact that he is utterly and completely bored.

"This is the third time you've been here this month. I'm not putting you into debt am I?"

Her accent is different from everyone else's in town - still decidedly American, just not from here American. Simon ignores her, his eyes focused on the row of books in front of him. She sighs heavily, but drops it, leaving him behind to stock the end cap. Last week's murder mysteries replaced by this week's contemporary romances.

"I need to lock up you know - I can't stay here all night." She speaks as if it's not odd that Simon only comes in on Thursday nights - the only night of the week she stays open late to rearrange the end cap displays, to vacuum the floors to perfection.

"You haven't even cleaned the windows yet," Simon replies, pulling a fantasy book from the shelf: something about a world full of malicious fairies and a secret world beneath New York. It's something new.

"For your information, I did that before you got here," she says, pushing herself up from the floor with a groan. "And I have a life. I can't sit here all night and wait for you to pick a random book off the shelf."

"I never said you didn't."

Simon places the book as she dips behind the counter, a lukewarm cup of coffee left beside the cash register. She drinks from it, wincing at the taste as she rings the book up.

"That'll be seventeen forty-five."

Simon gives her a twenty and she breaks the change, counting out how many pennies he's supposed to have on her fingers.

"You going to be back next week?"

"Why?"

"I want to close early next Thursday; I need to know if my best customer is going to be here or not."

Simon doesn't speak as he takes the plastic bag from her hands. She waits for him, eyes never leaving his as she sips her coffee, waiting on him to answer.

"I can come by Friday instead."

"I'm closed Fridays."

"What about Wednesday?"

"I can stay late Wednesday."

He leaves her with just a crinkle of the plastic bag and the chime above the door.

***

He spends too much time at the gym ignoring Johnny's text messages. Johnny tells him Price was next - swearing that he was going to retire to the countryside where he can smoke his cigars in peace. Maybe find himself a nice girl to cook him dinner every now and then.

His fingers hover over the buttons, almost messaging Price to tell him congratulations. But Simon's not sure it really is.

He's alone at night; no one's in the gym at two in the morning. No one's there to watch the way he slams the weights down when he's done or hear the way he gasps for breath after lifting too heavy - the tear in his chest that never quite healed right burning him from the inside.

The walk home is quick; the stars shine brighter than anything he'd ever seen in England. The closest he ever got to seeing them like this was in the Middle East, but he hardly noticed the stars then. He wasn't expecting to be left looking up.

He sits in the shower at home. He can't stand the way the water hits his skin, but can't stand the idea of sitting in the water either. So he stays huddled in the corner of the bathtub, the water barely touching him.

Simon Riley thinks about death.

He thinks about what would happen if he died right now.

He thinks about what it's like to die twice.

***

The door is locked when he comes by Wednesday; he feels foolish standing there with his hand still pulling on the door, knowing it won't open beneath his touch. Foolish to think that she would-

Foolish when his heart ticks a beat as she comes around the corner. Foolish when he steps inside just a second after she unlocks the door.

"Sorry, my last employee must have locked the door on their way out. So did you like last week's book?"

"It was alright."

The silence is almost awkward as she locks the door behind him.

"Let me know when you're ready. I just made coffee in that pot behind the counter; you can have some if you want. I shouldn't drink it all myself."

She leaves him behind to disappear into the store room. He paces the aisles aimlessly, waiting for something to jump out at him. It's quiet tonight; the music that's usually playing softly over the speakers is absent. Simon can hear her through the storeroom wall moving boxes around, the sound of a box cutter piercing the quiet every so often.

She reappears, a box in her arms that she drops heavily onto the counter. Simon watches her over the bookshelf of non-fiction works as she pulls each book out, scans it into the computer, and stacks them on the counter

When the box is empty, she breaks it down and leaves it on the counter. She looks up, almost catching Simon staring at her. He ducks away, taking a book on the Korean War with him. At the counter, she can barely see him over the stack of books in front of her.

"Last week was fantasy and this week is the Korean War? You certainly have varied tastes."

Simon hands over the fifteen twenty-two he owes her, her hands linger in the distance between them.

"Do you have a job?"

"What?"

Simon's taken aback at her candor. I used to have a job he thinks, as he pockets his change.

"No, I don't."

"Do you want one? I need a weekend worker. It's just me on Saturdays and Sundays now my other guy quit to go to college. I can't pay you a ton, but I kind of get the feeling you don't need it."

He falters for a moment; that's all it takes. If he's being honest with himself, he misses taking orders, missing feeling useful to someone.

"I can do that."

"Can you start this Saturday?"

"I can do that."

She's locked the door behind him before he realizes they don't even know each other's names.

***

Her name's Billy.

"What's your name; I probably should have asked that before I hired you."

Simon doesn't answer, placing the box down slowly before he answers. It's odd, telling someone his name. His real name.

"It's Simon. Simon Riley."

She looks him over, elbows resting on the counter.

"What?"' He asks, uncomfortable under her x-ray analysis of him.

"Just didn't peg you for a Simon. You know with your general countenance; the mask and all that."

She doesn't ask why he has the mask on. Simon gets the feeling that she never will.

She works him like a dog; he's moving some of the shelves around when he thinks that this is probably the reason her last employee quit. It's like being ordered around by Price again, but this time his enemy is the dust. He doesn't stop moving until well after noon; sweat gathering in the small of his back. In her office, Billy is on the phone, yelling indistinctly at the person on the other line.

He doesn't have to watch her to know she's angry when she slams the phone down. He expects her to storm out of her office, to slam the door shut behind her. But she doesn't. When she comes out she's calm.

On Sunday she shows him how the books are organized, and she has him switch around the genres.

"Romance sells best during the spring, and mystery best in the fall and winter. So we need to pull the mystery books up to this front aisle and move the romance towards the back. These shelves roll so they're easier to move."

She's meticulous; Simon moves the same shelf four times before it's lined up exactly where she wants it. His constellation prize: cash wages handed to him at the end of the day.

"No paycheck?"

Her nails tap against the counter, the white paint chipped.

"I haven't processed your paperwork yet. I can take the money back if you want."

Simon pockets it.

They lock up together. It's warm outside, but she still tugs a hoodie over herself whenever she finishes, tucking her keys into the pocket.

It's a complete coincidence that they set off in the same direction.

Simon wants a cigarette; his fingers itch for the pack in his pocket. But she'd said earlier in the day that the smell was disgusting and she couldn't breathe whenever someone with cigarette smoke on them passed her by.

They split up two blocks away from the bookstore. She motions up to the upstairs apartment of a shitty duplex. It's not the kind of place he expected her to be in.

"This is me. I'll see you next Saturday right?"

"I'll be there."

"Good night Simon."

She doesn't wait for him to say anything; not that he would have known what to say. She's up the stairs and inside (she didn't unlock the door; he has to restrain himself from going upstairs to tell her to lock it next time) before he can think of anything to say.

He smokes a cigarette at the bottom of her stairs; watches the outline of her against the curtains in her window. A fat black cat peers down at him, peers down at the cherry of Simon's cigarette in the darkness. The street lamp is burnt out, the shadows dark. He stubs the cigarette out on the sole of his boot and throws the cigarette butt out in the street.

He's almost certain she'd chide him for that - the same way she did a kid who had the audacity to throw a cigarette down in front of her shop.

His apartment is extra cold when he gets home.

***

"Maybe Price has it right: a life in the countryside. A pretty girl to cook you a few meals. Maybe a dog to curl up at your feet," Johnny drones on the other end of the line. Simon doesn't answer, his focus on cutting the potatoes in front of him into meticulous cubes. Johnny doesn't need him to speak.

"What about you L.T.? What have you been up to?"

"I'm not a lieutenant anymore Johnny."

"You'll always be L.T. to me. And don't ignore the question."

Simon drops the potatoes into a pot, waiting on the answer to unstick from the back of his throat.

"Not much. I go to the gym a lot."

He doesn't tell Johnny how he has to break his gun down and put it back together three times each night before he can sleep.

"That it?"

"I'm working at a bookstore."

"A bookstore! A few months out and you're domesticated."

"Watch it, Johnny."

A pause.

"I have to go L.T.. Gaz is yelling at me."

Their goodbye is the silence that follows.

***

Billy's arguing with a customer when he arrives Saturday morning.

"Listen, dude, I don't care what price you want to pay. This is my business and I set the prices. If you don't like it, you're not being forced to come here."

The customer drops it when Simon steps behind the counter.

"I hate that guy," Billy tells him as she hands him a box cutter. "He comes in every week and tries to get me to lower my prices. It's a bookstore; I'm not getting rich off of this. I can't afford that. Anyway-"

She sweeps her hair behind her shoulders. Simon catches a hint of a tattoo behind her right ear and a glint of cold chain disappearing beneath her shirt.

"Finals are coming up for the local community college so I had two different study groups book the tables in here today. They're usually pretty good, we just have to make sure to keep the coffee pot refilled for them because they'll drink it dry. It's $5 if they want coffee - per person don't let them try to swindle us - but they can refill it as much as they want."

Her fingers tap against the counter. Her nails are blue this week.

"If they ask about selling us their textbooks, tell them to come back next week. I have a shipment of children's books coming in - you can sign for it if I'm busy. Do I need to show you how to use the cash register or can you figure it out?"

"I can figure it out."

"Ok. The code is 4532. For now, do you mind breaking down the boxes in the back room and taking them to the dumpster? It's hard for me to reach to open up the dumpster lid."

She doesn't wait for him to answer before she disappears into the back room.

This Saturday is busy.

Simon's about to snap at a kid who won't shut up about how the comic section is too small when Billy appears beside him.

"I'll take over here Simon. There's lunch in the back room."

He's thankful for her in that moment.

He's more thankful when the storeroom shuts behind him and locks. The table has a small bag with his name written on it. A sandwich from the deli across the street and a bottle of water inside.

There are no tomatoes on the sandwich.

Just like he always orders it.

***

He smokes a cigarette again outside her apartment. But this time he tucks the butt back into the pack. He'll throw it away at home.

***

"I want to put a coffee shop in here," Billy tells him when the store is slow. She traces the right side of the store with her fingers.

"And I want to open the shop up earlier and stay open later."

"Why don't you?" Simon asks without looking up from his task of the day: putting 'half-priced' stickers on books that aren't selling well.

"I'm not making enough money. I have just enough to pay you and my weekday employee and the overhead cost of this place, plus pay myself. There's not any extra coming in. The bank-," she pauses, red nails scraping at a piece of tape on the counter, "the bank is willing to give me a loan on the coffee shop stuff - the machines and all that - but I don't have the money for the renovations. My contractor told me he'd have to build the cabinets, open up the drywall and put an extension on our water pipe. A water filter needs to be installed. It's just - it's just a lot."

She slides the stack of books he's already put stickers on off of the counter and into her arms.

"Maybe next year."

***

The next time Johnny calls, Simon can hear the strain in his voice.

"It's my turn L.T.. Laswell said I failed the psychological and I can't stay."

"You going to keep good on your promise to come to be my annoying neighbor Johnny."

"Not yet. I want to go home to my mom for a little bit. Maybe next year L.T.."

"Next year's going to be a big year I guess," Simon says more to himself.

"What's that L.T.?"

"Nothing Johnny. We should be happy we made it out."

Simon knows Johnny's not happy: not happy he never received the rank he wanted, not happy he has to go back home and take care of his mom again.

"You're right L.T.. I'll call you again when I'm home. How's the bookstore thing?"

"It's going alright. Bye, Johnny."

"Bye."

In the silence after the call, Simon thinks he should get a cat. Something to make the apartment less quiet; something to give him purpose when he's there.

Something that won't crawl all over him at the end of the day.

***

He needs something to do with his hands.

That's what he tells Billy when she arrives at the store on Saturday morning and Simon's ripping up a portion of the carpet, a stack of flooring waiting to be installed.

"So you have to do it when I'll have customers here?"

"Tell them it's a new addition; they'll be alright."

"I'm not paying you extra for this."

"I didn't ask you to."

Billy looks at him, one foot tapping a sharp staccato muffled by the carpet.

"Fine."

She pauses for a moment, Simon's knife running down the carpet to separate it from the floor beneath. She picks up one of the pieces of flooring, turning it over in her hand.

"What is this?"

"It's vinyl. It's waterproof in case you spill something."

Billy drops the plank back onto the stack and leaves to unlock the front door.

Simon revels in the way his shoulders burn at the work, the way the rough concrete scratches his knuckles once everything is pulled off the floor and he has to start laying down the underflooring. He revels in the way his back cramps as he's bent over.

In the way he feels useful.

It takes him all day to get half the flooring down.

Billy doesn't speak to him about it, doesn't ask where he got the money from, or why he's suddenly doing free renovations on the place.

Simon knows she appreciates it by the way she drops down his lunch - no tomatoes, just a water to drink- beside him without expecting a thank you. By the way, she chides the little kids who come over to ask him a million and one questions, he doesn't know how to answer and brushes them away from him.

She catches him smoking in the back alley on his break. She's polite enough to turn back when she realizes he has his mask down and keeps her back turned to him.

"That shit's going to kill you."

"It can only hope."

Simon can tell she's giving him a withering look at him from her position half inside the doorway.

"If you come in smelling like that cancerous poison I'm not going to talk to you for the rest of the day."

He must smell because she doesn't speak to him for the rest of the day, not even saying goodbye when they depart at her apartment.

Simon hides the cigarettes in a drawer when he gets home.

***

It's Price that reaches out to him first, a quick phone call, a holdover from their days in the field.

"Are you holding up?"

Not "how are you holding up?", but "are you holding up?" The difference between three letters is so vast Simon doesn't know how to cross it.

"I'm doing fine."

"Johnny told me you've got a job?"

"Just something to keep me occupied."

"Is that all you've got?"

"What more do I need?"

The receiver is filled with the sound of Price inhaling a cigar; Simon can almost smell him through the receiver.

"You're not Ghost anymore Simon. It takes more than that to survive this."

Survive this . As if this is the most dangerous mission Simon's ever been on as if being forcibly retired has some sort of great mortality rate.

"Understood."

He listens to Price's dial tone for five minutes before he hangs up.

Maybe it does.

***

He paces the town at night. Once the gym doesn't become enough to wear him out, doesn't help his brain relax, he walks the streets.

He thinks more than once that someone is going to call the cops on him and report him for being suspicious.

But Simon Riley isn't Ghost anymore. Simon Riley is someone not worth noticing.

It's almost surprising how well the little town sleeps with the remnants of Ghost stalking through it; how now one seems to have any idea of what he was once - and still is - capable of.

He steals a lot of time sitting on people's steps, on the stoops of little houses, picking the petals off of the flowers in big pots, and lining up the shoes and toys that were left disarrayed in the chaos of the daytime. He wonders if someone is going to catch him on their security camera and name him the town freak, but no one does.

He keeps up at it enough that he can feel the shift in the air, feel winter creeping in. He notices it in the way more and more boots are left outside, by the plants with plastic coverings over them, protecting them.

He finds himself, more often than not, taking the long way around to stop at the bottom stairs of Billy's apartment. Most nights the lights are off, and the window open. He wants to tell her to stop doing that, to lock the window, but he doesn't know how to say it without giving away his nights. So instead he keeps watch, hands buried in his pockets as he counts the moths in the streetlights.

Sometimes though the lights are on and he can hear the sound of her house through the open window. Sometimes the cat peers down at him as if prepared to leap through the window screen at him - sometimes she grabs the cat, never looking down at Simon; more often than not the cat curls up in the windowsill without budging.

A few times he could hear her talking to someone, the conversation muffled from above. He wondered about who she could be talking to so late at night. Why she was up in the middle of the night to talk to someone?

He makes his way home as the town starts to wake up.

***

He moves once - to a tiny house in the middle of town, just enough to have a yard big enough to cross in two strides.

He tells Johnny it's because he was tired of the noises of the neighbors.

He tells Johnny it's because he's taken up woodworking and needs a spot for the tools.

"What are you building you old bastard?"

"Some cabinets."

"For what?"

"Mind your own business, Johnny."

It takes weeks to get them perfect. Eventually, though, they're good enough to put in the back of a rented truck.

He does it on a Friday when no one is around. He tells himself that it's easier that way, no one walking underfoot.

That night he lets himself admit - just for a moment as he sits on the shower floor - that he didn't want to see her face if she's disappointed by it.

***

She refuses to open the door for him the next day, opting to yell at him through the glass instead.

"You cannot keep making renovations to my store without asking me!"

"It's no big deal; open the door."

"No big deal: you put a floor down, you handbuild cabinets, and you broke into my store to install them!"

"You gave me a key."

"Not for that!"

It's a stalemate: Simon poised with his hand on the door handle, her hands tucked into the pocket of her jacket.

"I still have to do the plumbing."

She massages her eyes before leaning forward to turn the lock. Simon steps inside with the biting wind.

"You're fucking irritating, Simon Riley."

I know .

She makes him put up the Christmas tree - a fucking monstrosity that takes up the entire front window. It takes him all day to get the decorations to her standard; her yelling through the store at him to move something incrementally to the left or right.

Billy leans on the counter, shuffling through official-looking papers and refusing to look at Simon when he's finished.

"Thanks to you," she says, never looking up at him, "I have to start getting the paperwork processed to be able to serve food and drinks here."

"Is it difficult?"

"It's not easy."

Their conversation pauses just long enough for her to check out a customer. She turns back to Simon as soon as the door shuts.

"Why are you doing all this Simon?"

He doesn't answer, and he realizes as he stands there, hands folded behind his back and spine rigid that he needs to tell her something, but all he notices is the black ink mark on her cheek. She doesn't pressure him to answer, but she doesn't let her eyes leave him.

Simon breaks first, eyes cast down to the floor.

"Ok," Billy whispers under her breath, "you don't have to answer, but just let me know when you're going to do something else. Can you text me next time before you start?"

"I don't have your number."

She doesn't ask for his phone, instead, she tears a corner of a piece of paper off and scribbles her number on it. Her hands don't shake when she holds the paper out to Simon, but his shake when he takes it. Simon can tell Billy notices. He stuffs the paper into his pocket, pushing it past his keys and his phone.

"Hey, Simon," Billy chews on her lip.

"What?"

"Are you busy tomorrow night?"

***

Johnny's chatting his ear off, Simon's barely paying attention to him as he stares at the shirts thrown out on his bed.

"- L.T.? Simon?"

"What? Johnny, what?"

"Are you even listening?"

"No, Johnny. I'm not."

The static of Johnny's disapproval.

"What could be distracting you from my wonderful conversation?"

"I'm busy Johnny."

"With what?"

"Nothing Johnny. I just have somewhere to be later - I'm trying to get ready for dinner."

"Dinner? Like with someone else?"

Simon hangs up on him.

***

Simon wants to pretend that he doesn't have the path to her house memorized; doesn't have each step calculated to know when exactly to stand on the bottom step at 6:59 so that he can knock on her door right at 7. But he does, so he hovers on the bottom step for an extra minute.

She doesn't answer when he knocks; she yells through the door for him to come in. In his pocket his phone buzzes every few seconds, Johnny sends another message insisting that Simon tell him who he's eating dinner with. Simon thinks for a moment about blocking his number for the night.

Billy smiles at him from behind the counter, elbow-deep in bread dough. All at once, Simon feels overdressed taking in the large shirt covered in flour Billy's wearing.

"Hey. Sorry, dinner's going to be like 30 minutes later than I said. I couldn't get this shit to rise properly for like an hour."

"It's alright."

Billy must sense his apprehension because she jerks her head at a chair pulled up to the counter.

"Come sit down."

Simon appreciates the order. Billy rolls the dough out on the counter, measuring the thickness with her knuckle with a precision Simon would expect out of her. He has to keep himself from staring at her; instead, he analyzes the rest of the apartment.

He can see everything but the bedroom from his one spot; that door is firmly shut. It's clean but the type of clean houses have whenever someone new is coming over and everything is thrown into a closet. After a few minutes, Simon thinks he needs to speak.

"What are you making?"

"Rolls. I made - uh - what is the fancy word for it - beef bourgine?"

"Beef bourguignon?"

Billy smiles down at the dough as she cuts squares out.

"I'm glad one of us can say it - I can cook, I just can't speak French."

"Do you always cook like this?"

"Only on special occasions."

Special occasions .

It's awkward at first for Simon to sit there while she moves about the kitchen, putting the rolls in the oven and cleaning the counter; Billy doesn't speak much and Simon knows she doesn't feel the need to fill the silence either.

His phone buzzes again - under the counter he checks it.

Johnny:

don't leave me hanging lt tell me whos it is

"Your girlfriend?" Billy teases without turning to look at Simon from the other side of the kitchen.

"Not exactly," Simon says, muting the phone and shoving it back in his pocket.

"Do you have one?" Her voice is prying, but she doesn't look at Simon as she pulls bowls down from the cabinet.

"A girlfriend?"

"Yeah."

It bubbles inside him - just once - the urge to tell her about himself . He swallows it down.

"No."

"Not even back home?"

"Back home?"

She grins at him slyly, setting two glasses of water down in front of the two of them.

"Why do you think I have to keep paying you in cash? Your um….paperwork didn't exactly list you as being an employable American. And you have - you know - an accent."

Simon doesn't realize he's leaning toward her until his elbows hit the counter.

"No, not back home."

She seems satisfied by that answer - or she doesn't have time to ask anything else. Behind her the oven timer beeps and she turns to pull the rolls out. They're barely out of the oven whenever she ladles the stew into the bowls and pulls two rolls off one for each of them.

Pushing the bowl towards Simon she opens her mouth - Simon thinks she's going to ask something else but she just shakes her head.

"I'm going to eat over there, so you can eat too," she says passing him a fork.

"No cameras?"

"None you can see."

She retreats to the other side of the room and drops down on the couch so that she's facing away from him. Muffled behind a door to the right, Simon can hear her cat meow once.

They eat in silence; Simon knows she's only eating slowly to give him time to finish without her accidentally turning to see his face. He doesn't need it: he realizes he hasn't had a meal that hasn't consisted of a sandwich or some form of potatoes in weeks; he eats fast, slowing down just as he finishes to keep from embarrassing himself.

He sets the bowl down with enough dramatics that she can tell he's done without having to turn around. It's quiet again when she comes into the kitchen and takes his bowl to rinse it out in the sink. The sound of the water makes his skin crawl; it clashes with the domestic feeling of being taken care of.

She laughs quietly to herself as she dries her hands on her shirt, lifting it up just enough to expose the little shorts she has on underneath.

"Something funny?"

"Not really funny," she says, hands stilling in her shirt, "I don't know - it just - I - well it's about this time of dinner that guys usually try to take me to the bedroom. I was just thinking about how different this night would be with anyone else."

With anyone else .

That bothers him some.

"I don't suppose that's what you came here for," she grins at him as she speaks, resting her elbows on the counter. "Besides we don't even know each other."

"We work with each other every weekend," Simon retorts, not sure why he feels the need to prove her wrong.

"And we barely speak the entire time."

She points at him, her bright yellow nails glinting in the light.

"I've never seen you in anything other than long sleeves, even on the hottest day. You could have like fucking tentacles under there and I wouldn't know. And you don't even know anything about me."

For once, Simon doesn't think - he does.

He pushes his sleeves up slowly, each one nearly to his elbow. Billy leans forward, just enough to see the tattoo ink and scars that mar his forearms. Her fingers twitch against the countertop like she wants to reach out and touch him, but they stay still.

"Do you - do you only have tattoos on your arms?"

Simon reaches up to hook one finger in his collar and pulls it down just a half inch - just enough to show her the ink there.

"Your turn," Simon says, dropping his hand down. Under the counter, it lies fisted on his thigh.

"My turn?" Billy asks eyebrow cocked at him.

"Do you have any tattoos?"

She licks her lips once; Simon can see her thinking. After a pause she reaches down to grab the edge of her shirt - Simon's heart clenches. She lifts the hem up, just enough to show him the edge of a tattoo on her side, disappearing beneath her shorts and rising above where she lifted. She laughs a little as she drops the shirt.

"Is that all we need to know about each other?"

"It's a start."

***

He finally tells her he was in the military four Sundays after the first one. She'd told him at work she was too tired to cook and apologized, promising to make it up to him. So when he showed up at her door with a pizza and a promise that he was just dropping it off on his way home, he was surprised when she asked him to come in.

Each week they coaxed something new out of each other: a snippet about their families, about their travels. He loves Kentucky; she's from the East Coast. Her father died young. He's from England.

She's curled up in the recliner the cat on her stomach - they're watching something on television but they're both not really paying attention to it. So he blurts it out - a new confession in this weekly therapy.

"I was in the military."

"I guessed. The British Armed Forces?"

"The SAS."

She frowns and Simon stiffens.

"Is that like a unit or something?"

"Yeah."

This time she grins.

"Is that why you always lock my door behind you when you come in?"

"No. I do it because you never know who could come in when you're alone."

"You mean when you're not here."

Yes.

"No."

She rolls over, clutching the cat to her chest so as to not dump him on the floor until her feet hang over the arm and she can eyeball Simon across the room.

"I can shoot straight."

"Can you?"

***

She can. She takes him through the desert on Friday afternoon, bundled up against the cold. Out where they can target practice without anyone bothering them.

She hits every target.

***

"Christmas is this weekend."

"Yeah."

"So you know we're closed right? I'm not paying you time and a half."

A pause longer than he's used to.

"Are you doing anything for Christmas?"

"No."

"Do you want to come over?"

***

She makes Chinese on Christmas. A tradition she says because when she was younger the only places open were Chinese restaurants and her dad couldn't cook. They didn't have real dinners until she learned to cook herself, but it was always Chinese on Christmas.

The cat has a bell around its neck for the holiday and it latches onto Simon for the night. She wrinkles her nose at the cat and calls him a traitor. The cat doesn't seem to care.

"I didn't get you a present," she says, putting her bowl on the coffee table. From his spot in the kitchen, Simon speaks.

"I didn't get you one either."

"Well, you're slowly building me an entire coffee shop."

"That's not present."

"Well, it's not exactly in your job description either."

He leaves his half-eaten bowl on the counter to drop down on the couch. She's sideways in the armchair, shirt riding up and a bruise on her shin. She's back to white nails.

"I can make out with you for Christmas; other guys have liked that present."

Simon's heart nearly stops.

"Excuse me?"

"I'm just kidding Si."

Just kidding .

***

She begs and pleads with him to please go out to the bar with her for the new year. He doesn't have to drink, she says, she can drink enough for the both of them.

She does. She doesn't even make it until eleven.

He carries her home on his back. Her door is unlocked and wants to think about how dangerous that is, but all he can think about is her warm breath on his neck.

He drops her unceremoniously onto the couch - he thinks about carrying her to the bedroom, but that's one place the door has always been shut to.

He does take her shoes off of her while she insists she can do that herself. He slips the right one off when the fireworks go off outside; the entire town is bathed in their light.

"Midnight," she says as Simon rises up on one knee in front of her, ready to tell her goodbye and good night.

She kisses him over the mask.

She doesn't mention it the next day.

***

By summer, Simon has the entire cafe portion of the store finished. He's embarrassed when she hangs a sign over the area: 'Simon's Spot'.

"What?" She asks, peering down at him from the top of the ladder. "You built it."

***

He breaks during the summer. Billy calls him on a Tuesday, asking if he knows anything about air conditioning systems.

"You built the cafe, so I know you're handy."

He doesn't. But he can figure it out.

After hours the bookstore is sweltering. Billy has the blinds pulled down in a futile attempt to keep out some of the heat and the setting sun. Her shirt, already cropped short, clings to her with sweat when she unlocks the front door for Simon.

It takes him two hours but he figures it out. When it kicks on she looks up at him, one arm resting on his shoulder, and tells him he's her hero.

He makes it all the way to her apartment - the promise of something for dinner and a cold drink as for payment the ruse - before he does it.

It's dark inside, dark enough that when he locks the door behind him, he slips his mask off. She turns to ask him something - he doesn't hear it; he's too busy kissing her, pushing her back against the kitchen cabinet.

It's messy - the kissing - he can't remember the last time he kissed somebody like this - all teeth and tongue and need.

When they stumble into her room, he doesn't take his shirt off, and she doesn't ask why.

***

"Come visit me L.T.. Scotlands beautiful this time of year."

"I'll have to book two tickets Johnny; that's not cheap."

"Alright, you cheap bastard you can afford it."

#my fics #simon riley x reader #simon riley #simon ghost riley #simon riley x you #ghost cod x reader #cod x reader #cod fanfic #ghost cod

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ty-bayonet-betteridge · 10 months

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DISCLAIMER: THOUGH THIS POST INCLUDES SOME SPECULATION ON THE POST-WORM WORLD, OP HAS NOT READ WARD YET. DO NOT SPOIL ME OR I'LL EAT YOUR KNEES

Tattletale's story is so tragic because outwardly it LOOKS like a success story. Through her arc she gets brilliant insight after brilliant insight, helps bring down the man who was looming over her life, becomes internationally recognizable, plays a key role in reversing the end of the world, and when the dust settles ends up a wealthy and powerful criminal lord. She gets all the things that SHOULD define her ending as happy, but it's all hollow, because she doesn't ever get what she needed.

The other Undersiders got what they needed in the end. They all have their own tragedies, large and small, mostly large, but they have proper happy endings. Aisha finds her own identity, a way she can make a difference that she's happy with, separate from the people in her life but still carrying on their legacy - not only that, but she finds a family that properly celebrates her for her and that she can be a part of, with the Heartbroken. Alec DOES find someone who he can genuinely connect with, even if he dies before that connection is able to go anywhere. Brian sees Aisha healing and finding her own way in the world, and when he does die its the way he would have wanted - a brave fall in the middle of battle that makes him look larger than life. Lily and Sabah get eachother, and they get to distance themselves from the drama, and they get to make a difference for the people who were close to them. Taylor gets her father, and she gets Anne, and she knows that she isn't nothing anymore, that she has strengths, even if she doesn't know what that looks like in a non-superpowered context. Rachel gets a space where she can just exist, in the company of a few people she cares about and who put in the work to really get her. No more running or fighting for things larger than herself and her pack - just peace, or something that looks like it.

But Lisa? Despite it all, her emotional needs are left unfilled. She doesn't get to stop blaming herself - she's shouldering more guilt than ever, guilt over Taylor and Brian and Alec, over Gold Morning, on top of the guilt she never got away from over her brother. She doesn't find anyone she can be vulnerable too - she loses the person who she was closest to being able to rely on, and now has to pretend she's untouchable as this crime lord she's built herself into being. Even the one thing that she saw as her redeeming accomplishment - saving Taylor - even that comes apart in the end. And you see her in the Post-Worm world, and she's become this imposing information broker and gang leader, at the center of this web of power, and she acts like this is what she wanted, because she never learned another way to define success. The best models she got for what a happy ending "should" look like are her rich parents and Coil's plans to take over the city. So when she does get power, and money, and recognition, and influence, she acts like that's a good outcome, acts hard enough that she even convinces herself. But it's all so hollow, because she still hasn't realized that that isn't what she wanted, and she never will realize, because she hasn't trained herself to ask the hard questions, to really interrogate her own feelings. Her power actively disincentivizes it. So she'll keep being unhappy, and reaching for greater things, and wondering why she isn't satisfied with what she assumed was everything that success should look like.

#wormblr #parahumans #worm spoilers #lisa wilbourn #tattletale #worm meta #worm analysis

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lazybutsmexy · 2 years

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Bird hunting

Ghost x fem!reader x Soap

Chapter 9: Broken Cage

Ch. 8 <; Series Masterlist

Warnings: violence, blood and injury, character death.

Summary: Canary will make them pay for everything. All at once.

Do not read this work if you're under 18. This work contains mature and triggering themes.

Word count: 2800~

“Luke is taking too long.” Alan comments to no one in particular, his cup of coffee in front of him left untouched after the first few sips - it tasted like sewage water, truth be told.

Charlie simply hummed in acknowledgment as he munched down on some crackers he had found in his backpack - the only non-stale food in the cabin. He gulped them down with cold coffee, and Alan decided not to think too much about the state of his taste buds.

“He’s probably just avoiding the cops,” Charlie finally commented after a few silent minutes, “maybe there are blockades and shit.”

Alan said nothing, limiting himself to smoke his cigarette and watch out of the open cabin door towards the road. It was almost noon, and he had returned to the cabin hours ago. He had planned on getting some shut-eye once Luke had come back, but the hours passed with no news and he was growing antsy.

He knew that as far as Luke was concerned, the only thing the police could arrest him for was driving a stolen van. If that was the case, it would be only a matter of time until he received a call from the police station and he would have to present himself as his friend to bail him out, or as his lawyer and demand his release until a set court date. He had done it with Charlie a couple of times before, it would be a first for Luke.

A quiet grumble interrupted his musings, and both men looked at the direction it came from. Alan suddenly remembered that their cute little hostage hadn’t had anything to eat in almost two days, and he sighed. “...Right.” He took one cracker from the sleeve and stood up, stepping slowly towards her.

Canary froze up, inwardly cursing her stomach for being so impatient and calling their attention. She had been painstakingly rubbing the hilt of the knife against her bindings, keeping her wrist movements hidden from her captors with the rest of her body. She had managed to avoid detection so far, and it seemed as if her greatest traitor would be her own body. Her heartbeat was loud in her ears as Alan approached her, and she wormed away from him in an attempt to hide her little plan.

He stopped right before the bed, and showed her the cracker held between two fingers. “If you try to bite me, I’ll tear your teeth out one by one, understand?”

Canary gulped and nodded, knowing that her best chance of escaping would be by them letting down their guard. That would only happen if they didn’t see her as a danger, and the only way she could accomplish that, was to be obedient and submissive. Only until she got her damn restraints off, though.

Alan nodded and leaned down, pressing the cracker against her lips. She took it with her teeth as slowly as she could, trying her best not to touch his fingers with her lips. Alan smirked, releasing the cracker and stroking her cheek with his knuckles. “Good girl.”

She felt like lurching whatever remained in her empty stomach as she heard him - it definitely sounded much better when it was Simon saying it - but she ate the cracker in silence. It was a little humid, but it would do for now.

“If you behave,” Alan hummed, pulling away, and walking back to his seat, “you’ll get another one later.”

She now really wanted to bite his fingers off.

“I can think of something else for her to eat, though,” Charlie leered at her, licking his lips with a wolfish grin.

She narrowed her eyes. I dare you to try, see how my chompers work, she thought, but stayed silent as she swallowed the cracker. Canary had resumed her work on the ligatures as they were distracted, slowly grinding the knife against the bindings, which were giving away little by little. The more they loosened, the more she could feel the rope burn around her wrists. She kept her breathing steady, not looking away from the men as she worked.

Alan seemed to read her thoughts, though, as he cackled out loud. “You want to live the rest of your life with half a dick? Be my guest then.” Charlie simply shook his head, lighting a cigarette and clowning the smoke towards her.

“She won’t be able to if I dislocate her jaw, though,” he chuckled darkly, enjoying the mental image that his brain conjured, already feeling his blood pooling to his crotch.

“That’s for the buyer to decide, and you know that,” Alan scolded him, and put out the butt of his cig on the table. He checked his wrist watch and stood up with a grunt, patting down the front of his jacket. “I’m off to check if we got an answer from our buyer,” he walked to the door and sent Charlie a last warning, “I’m serious, if you do anything to her that can’t be covered with a band-aid, I’m going to kill you.”

Charlie watched him go with a snort, taking a long drag of his cig, “You’re no fun.”

The last thread of the rope snapped away at the same moment the door closed shut behind Alan, and Canary nearly cried in relief. She managed to stealthily pull the pieces of rope away from her wrists and hold the knife tightly in one hand. Her blood pounded through the bruises and into her hands, cramping the tips of her fingers, but she was well aware that she had no time to relax. Charlie had stood up from his chair.

He downed the last bit of his coffee and lit another cigarette, his eyes leisurely traveling from her chest to her feet. He took a step closer to the end of the bed, his eyes shifting to her face.

“I’ll be quick, I promise,” he grumbled with a smirk, fiddling with the cigarette and leaning in to hold her ankles with his free hand.

Canary kicked back half-heartedly and let out a small whimper while her eyes fixed on his openings, she needed to make him think she wanted to crawl away from him, that would make him lean in even closer. She was dangling the bait in front of him, and her hand clutched the knife, ready to swing at the smallest chance. “Try not to scream so much, okay? Alan is busy, after all.”

Charlie used his leg to press down on her thighs, unknowingly offering her a full view of his back. His free hand clutched her ankles while the hand holding the cigarette inched closer to her skin. He failed to see the shadow over his shoulder as the knife came down.

Canary was significantly weakened from her usual strength, due to the drugs, the hunger, the dehydration. But she still managed to dig the knife halfway into his back - more or less where his upper-lung should be. He let out a painful howl and tried to flinch away, but her hand clamped down on his upper arm and pulled out the knife, before forcing it down on his neck as fast as she could.

The thin muscle gave way to the steel and Canary pulled the knife out just as quickly as she stabbed it, and blood began spurting out in the same rhythm as his heartbeat. Charlie’s legs managed to pull him away from her only to tumble down onto the floor, taking the chair down with him.

Canary jumped on her feet, ignoring the stinging pain in her soles, and readied herself to attack again. Adrenaline pumped through her veins and fueled her with almost the same energy she felt in the battlefield. A sense of euphoria surrounded her when he looked up at her with a mixture of fear and rage, desperately trying to put pressure on the hole in his neck. He opened his mouth but only a gurgling sound came out, and she knew that he was starting to drown in his own blood.

Canary raised her hand holding the knife and took a deep breath, before smirking down at him. He was going to pay for everything, all at once.

~~~~~~

“Get in,” Luke did as was told, or attempted to, since his hands were still handcuffed behind his back. A strong hand pushed him into the car and he groaned in protest, before setting down in the middle of the backseat.

He allowed himself a moment to take a deep breath, until he realized he wouldn't be alone. The Sergeant with the mohawk and the Lieutenant with the skull mask climbed in and sat on his sides, their enormous bodies barely fitting in the back of the patrol car - and big weapons held between their legs. Suddenly the air in the back of the patrol was stuffy and he barely had room to breathe.

An officer sat behind the wheel and Hartford climbed in the passenger seat. “Where?” He simply asked, looking at Luke out of the corner of his eye.

“T-take the road around campus and cross the bridge,” Luke could barely let the words out of his mouth, feeling two pairs of eyes practically digging through his flesh, “then take the first turn to the right.”

The patrol car drove off, and Price’s jeep followed with him and Gaz inside.

~~~~~~

Alan stopped dead in his tracks as he was walking down the road. He knew he had heard a shout, but wasn’t sure of whether it was the girl or Charlie. He slowly turned around, weighing his options.

If it was the girl and Charlie lost it again and tried to ‘shut her up’, they would surely lose another product before he even got a sale confirmation. If it was Charlie, and the girl had managed to hurt him in some way, it meant that he would fight back - the girl was tied, drugged, and hungry; he was at an advantage and would certainly bust her head open. Again, lost product.

A third possibility crossed his mind, but he dismissed it quickly - it couldn’t be possible that she had managed to untie herself. Even if she did, he was still stronger than her, there was no way…

A few moments passed in silence before he began walking back to the cabin. Minutes passed when he finally reached the cabin and opened the door, his mouth instantly slackening in shock.

Charlie was on the floor with his limbs spread out, lying in a pool of his own blood, and their hostage was kneeling on top of him with her hand holding the knife that was still buried to the hilt in Charlie’s chest. She was disheveled, her clothes were covered in blood and her eyes shot up to meet Alan’s. He felt a shiver travel down his spine - her eyes were cold and deadly. His hand reached under his jacket where he hid his holster at the same moment she stood up.

Canary held the knife tightly in her hand and ran forward, nearly slipping on the blood with her bare feet, as she stormed to her enemy with a battle scream that nearly drowned the bang of the shot being fired.

~~~~~~

“Um… Take the road up north and drive on,” Luke gulped as he sat up straight. He had the feeling that if he relaxed just a little, he would die. However, both Soap and Ghost remained silent, simply watching out of the window and only occasionally sending Luke a glare, just to make sure he couldn’t try anything funny. They both knew that their presence in the car alone was enough to inhibit any fighting plan he could conjure up.

As the car turned right on the intersection, a few minutes passed before Hartford recognized the scenery and his heart dropped. A day prior, Melanie Kirk was shot and killed in that road, and the detective remembered exactly which tree had stopped her car. Now, he was traveling down that same road, with one of the men involved in her death, to rescue the woman she had tried to help.

He looked into the side view mirror and saw Ghost’s eyes on him. He seemed to be thinking the exact same thing as him.

They will pay for everything.

~~~~~~

The sound of the bed sheets ripping under the hilt of her knife was barely louder than her panting. Once Canary gathered enough strips of fabric, she took a large square of fabric and folded it several times to create a press, and held it against her open wound with a groan. The bullet had gone through and through, and although it passed dangerously close to her lung, she didn’t hear any whistling sounds coming out of her wound.

Canary wrapped her makeshift bandages around herself as tightly as she could, knowing that it would be only a matter of time until her blood started to stain the cloth even further. She couldn’t sit still, though. She knew that the third man had been out for a while, and he would be back at any minute now. She was now too injured to hold a fight with an uninjured man who was probably also armed, while she only had a knife.

Despite the risk of blood loss being too great, it was still a fighting chance that she wouldn’t have if she just stayed idle. If she made it to a road with more traffic, she would be able to find help.

As she walked out of the cabin, she was faced with a difficult decision: should she walk on the road, or should she sneakily walk through the forest? She would be able to flag down a vehicle easier if she walked on the road. However, she would also be easily found by the third man. Besides, he was supposed to get another vehicle, so she may not recognize the danger until it becomes too late.

The forest would definitely hide her from view from the road, but it would be hard to navigate in it without having been able to see the road when they got there. She glanced down at her newly acquired shoes, courtesy of Baldie’s corpse. They were a couple sizes too big, but they would help protect her feet from the terrain.

Her wound stung, and she looked up at the sky. It was past noon now, and the sun felt nice on her skin. The wind made her shiver - she would have at least 4 hours of sunlight before she was consumed by the dark. She needed to find help before then.

Canary took a deep breath and marched forward, decidedly walking into the forest, unaware of Alan’s eyes trained on her. He had somehow avoided death, and managed to get up as she left, his weapon still in his hand. He wheezed and coughed as the taste of iron filled his mouth at the effort, but his entire body was fueled by rage. Pure adrenaline pumped through his veins as he gripped his gun and staggered after her.

Straight into the woods.

A/N: Canary made Charlie into a cushion pin for his own knife.

Taglist: @died-in-a-field-of-flowers @rafaelacallinybbay @namenotimportant1373 @ragingbookdragon @zinfairy @scrumplump @speckel @omgitstatertot @fullmoon-94 @kalamataolivesssss @embers-of-alluring @warenai @frazie99 @kee-0-kee @littlezarp @scaredknight @tapioca-marzipan @kendahl757 @sweetybuzz25 @cumbersome-robes @carlyi @oyaoyaoyaoyaoyaoyaoyaoya @scarletbandit @twistytimesandthoughts @angelsquidd @ilovemoneyandcheese @sail-boat21

If you'd like to join the taglist, comment on the seriest masterlist - link at the top of this post :)

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bonefall · 1 year

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hiiii all my irl cats have pretty simple plant names so i translated them into clanmew hehe

sage: shubkiyyr (gray long leaf) (shorter version: shubiyyr)

coriander: hi’ishairuss (seed star leaf) (shorter version: hisharuss)

tansy: aweenowoponma (dandelion-color circle flower) (shorter version: aweenopoma)

ivy: kair (ivy)

Oh man, it's wild that I still have nothing for Tansy and Sage. Sage especially, like, I've talked about how BB!Brambleclaw rubs himself in that

Let's fix that! And while I'm at it, let's get all three types of sage and give a little intro to their medicinal uses.

Sage (Salvia nemorosa) = Meia This is NOT the species that you're used to in the guides. Salvia Officinalis is a garden herb, the cats DO NOT have access to that one! Bzzt! This one is mostly used for warding and spirituality. It's large, smelly, and can be used to treat wounds. But most interestingly, its worst enemy is slugs. Left unmanaged, they will gobble sage down to shoots, which is seen as a sign by Clan cats that the Dark Forest tries to destroy the very thing that can keep them away.

Rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus) = Meegrre ShadowClan's second favorite spice, and an HRT herb for transtom warriors. Though, you need to eat it in waaaay higher amounts than a ShadowClan soup to get those effects. Also used as a funeral herb when there's no sage to spare.

Clary (Salvia sclarea) = Ipyai An herb that ALL Clerics keep stocked. The oils of the seed are the best way to treat several eye irritations. A Cleric who does not keep a good stock of this has not been trained well on rare contingencies.

Tansy (Tanacetum vulgare) = Aumwee Manfern, Tansy, and Cedar are holding hands and kissing, and they're all gay and trans, and they're killing ALL of the bugs together. Salt has just recently joined the polycule and is the best killer of fleas and external parasites, but tansy remains the absolute king of treating intestinal worms. Like Rosemary, it also makes an excellent funeral herb for its strong smell and preservative abilities.

And lastly... Coriander.

So here's my rub with Coriander; it seems like it's mostly an escaped garden plant, and its natural range is the Mediterranean. Warm environments. I may rule that this isn't something they'd have access to, besides Coriander the Barn Cat.

BUT Coriander is in the carrot family, and more importantly, looks like a bajillion other carrot-relatives that grow naturally in this area. I'm talking pignut, parsley, fennel, hogweed, meadowsweet, cicely, angelica, chervil. All of them are clustered little umbels that Clan cats have a dedicated word for the shape of;

Cluster (Shape of flower, lots of small flowers in a vaguely umbella-shape) = Peske

At some point I would like to do a guide on these, specifically, and in my research I might learn more about coriander. But for now I will just leave your translation untouched.

#herbs #Clanmew

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thepaintedlady00 · 1 year

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Nightshade Chapter 17 Sneak Peek

🎂

Enjoy the peek y'all!

"Where is she?" I asked Prue as I slid into the seat across from her.

"Work." Prue glances around. "She should be off soon, though."

"Arcade again this year?"

"Hell yes!" Her enthusiasm was infectious as Will followed the conversation without a clue as to what we were talking about, but still, he got excited anyway. "It's her favorite place."

"Do we need to book it?"

"Already done."

I grinned, giving her a quick high-five. "You're a saint!"

Jake sat down next to me. "What are we talking about?"

"Quinn's birthday party. You wanna join the planning committee?"

He leaned forward with that mischievous grin of his. "Desperately."

"You can be in charge of the cake," I offered, relaxing back in the booth. It wasn't something I thought would be particularly challenging, especially considering how little Quinn cared about the cake, but the slight widening of Jake's eyes told me he considered it quite the task. "You don't have to."

"I can manage a dumb cake," he insisted with that deep-set scowl that was starting to grow on me.

"Quinn could care less about the cake," I continued. "She doesn't usually even eat it. It's more for everyone else."

Will's brows furrowed. "What does she eat then?"

"Candy apples!" Patrick proclaimed as he and Peter slid into the booth, shoving Jake into my side. "Nana makes 'em special for her every year."

Peter smiled fondly. "Nana makes sure everyone gets something special on their birthday."

"An angel, that woman," Patrick added lovingly. "Always makes me the best, booziest rum cake."

Will tapped Peter's shoulder, asking with a dumb grin. "What does she make you?"

Though it was a simple question, I could see Prue's eyes light up as she answered, "Jam. She takes Lena and Quinn berry picking and makes me my jam and a big plate of jam tarts."

Peter leaned back, closing his eyes slightly. "Can't wait for my batch of cookies this year."

"Same," I replied. "I won't have to try and smuggle them to you."

"What does she make you?" Jake asked, glancing at me as he took a drink of his beer.

Before I could answer, Patrick spoke, "The real question is, what doesn't she make on Lena's birthday?"

Jake turned to my brother with a chuckle. "Should've guessed Lena got the royal treatment."

"Lena's not special," Pat insisted. "She just gets a big party because that's when she got back."

"Got back from where?"

My brother's mouth shut. He scratched the back of his head, chuckling nervously as he talked over himself, trying to find something to say. Something that wasn't a lie, but that wasn't the truth either.

The truth. How was a person supposed to casually discuss how they narrowly escaped death at the hands of a rich and psychotic "ex" just a few days before turning sixteen? How could anything I said possibly explain the horrors every birthday previous to that had been filled with? The mixed emotions my birthday brought were a can of worms best left untouched, so I didn't meet Jake's curious eyes, instead letting my eyes lock onto Quinn as she emerged through the crowd. "There's the birthday girl!"

She welcomed the attention, not stopping until everyone had wished her a happy, almost birthday. "All this love and attention is good for my skin." She sat down next to Peter, smudging glitter onto his shirt. "What'd I miss?"

"Nothing," I said quickly. "Just discussing your birthday."

She clapped. "Let me guess! Prue already booked the arcade, and now you're trying to find people to dump cake and booze on?"

I rolled my eyes. "We all know I'm on booze duty."

"Til the day we die bitch." Quinn laughed. "So, who's the poor bastard on cake duty this year?" Narrowing her eyes, she pointed at Peter. "Kiwi?"

Peter rolled his eyes at her new nickname for him, a term almost everyone had adopted upon seeing the fuzz growing on his head. Secretly, Peter enjoyed it. The kiwi fuzz meant he could get his old hair back. "Nope."

Her finger turned toward Patrick, who nearly rolled out of the booth to avoid it. "Don't even try to curse me like that."

Quinn frowned, shifting her gaze to Jake, who gave her a shrug. She clicked her tongue. "Oh, you poor boy."

#fic: nightshade #sweetbitter fic #sweetbitter jake #jake sweetbitter #jake x oc #jake and lena #sweetbitter fanfiction #sweetbitter jake x oc #sweetbitter #sweet bitter

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painted-fanbird · 2 years

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Will I ever be normal about (we are) the fault line by @iguessyouregonnamissthepantyraid? Lol no. Today I’m writing a meta about Vlad’s dad from the fic, because every time he shows up when I reread I get FEELINGS.

I just,, imagine you’re Alexander. You haven’t spoken to your son for 20 years, and now he’s been presumed dead in outer space for just over a year. You know what he is, who he is, what he’s done. You never really had a good relationship but despite it all, you presumably still mourned him. Because that was your son, and you are his father, and you still love him.

Then you see the news, Vlad (or is it Plasmius now?) is back. Having kidnapped three teenagers from Illinois, from the same town that other ghost boy was snatched from by the government a week and a half prior. That opens a whole can of worms that’s probably best left untouched, so you don’t touch it.

Then he washes up on the beach, five minutes from the house in New Jersey he never visited you at, the three kidnapped teenagers in tow. You don’t know what to think, you know who he is and what he’s done, what he’s doing now, but the girl with the pistol looks like she might shoot you if you get closer, and he’s unconscious and not breathing, but with a pulse.

You preform CPR, his eyes flutter open long enough to recognize you before he passes out again. You offer to call the police, looking to each the teenagers in turn.

They all beg you not too.

So you load your son you haven’t spoken too in 20 years, your son who became a supervillain, your son you thought was lost in space,

And you take him home safe.

Because he’s still your son. And you are still his father.

#bird caws #danny phantom #alexander sigorov #I can and will tag fic characters you can’t stop me!!#:D #vlad plasmius #vlad masters #seriously this fic is so good I can’t stop rereading it #I really need to make an Ao3 account just to interact properly with this fic #it’s so good you guys #you gotta read it #I’d write a meta on Vlad’s half of these interactions #but the fic already did that!!!#and it’s brilliant!!!#I’m screaming crying going feral #you know how it goes

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onceuponalegendbg · 1 year

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Persona 5 Drabble (Beautiful Rose Has Thorns)

Attention, I'm putting up a trigger warning for this. It's nothing super descriptive or in depth but this will be dealing with feelings about stuff that happens during the Kamoshida arc. Slight mentions of life or death ideations and physical/sexual harrassment. I just wanted to let you all know. Of course if you've played the game then you know what I'm talking about.

Shiho always made fun of her for her lack of acting ability, but Ann likes to think she’s gotten pretty good at putting on a smile. After all, Shiho doesn’t know everything, and Ann doesn’t want her to. Everyone else may believe the rumors, and as much as that stings, it’s worth it in the end. It has to be. Because Ann’s only light in the world is her best friend. She’s the whole reason she plasters on all those smiles around Kamoshida.

Wires pull the corners of her lips up, and something inside her revolts. Every time he looks at her she wants to rub her skin until it bleeds. He’s not even seeing her, she knows. She’s just a pretty, little doll, something he wants to play with, something to possess. She’s not stupid. Not about this.

Just keep smiling, she tells herself. Shiho’s future depends on this. It’s a broken mantra in her head. A reflex more than an actual thought she conjures up at this point. But it keeps her moving, keeps her here. Keeps her from…

Because she loves Shiho, and Shiho deserves the world.

The rumors keep getting worse, and there’s always a new one waiting to be told just around the corner. Sure, sometimes she gets a break and someone else will be the subject of gossip. Others get a few lines of consideration circulated like the hottest news. But inevitably, it all circles back to her. The worst part is she’s starting to believe them.

She’s got Kamoshida eating out of the palm of her hand. She’s leading him on. She’s trying to keep all his attention. She gave him her number. She’s been spotted in his car. From the outside, she knows how this looks. After all, some of the rumors are true.

Maybe they’re right. Maybe this is all her fault. Maybe she deserves this.

And he keeps asking for more, of course he does. Because he can. He’s untouchable. He has all the control. So, he takes and takes and takes. Ann doesn’t know how much she can give before there’s nothing left, and even the strings holding her smile in place snap from being pulled too taunt.

It’s not all bad though, even now. Amidst the roar of their audience, sometimes there’s a moment of quiet, where it’s just her and Shiho. For just a moment, Ann can pretend that these moments are all that matter, that she doesn’t feel so, so tired. These moments have become so scarce. Precious. They’re all that’s holding Ann together.

Until April.

Ann’s felt like she’s been performing by herself for so long that it knocks her completely off balance when someone else comes up and takes their final bow before her.

Shiho stands on the edge of the roof.

Shiho lays on the grass below.

Something breaks. Something’s been broken. Ann doesn’t know what. Something. And she can’t even reconcile what it is until she hears Carmen’s voice.

There’s no more pretending now.

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

Staring down the pitiful creature before her, Ann feels flames licking at her skin.

It gets on its knees.

It begs.

It whimpers.

And it’s just not fair. The pathetic would-be demon is what caused all this heartache, all this despair. It drove Shiho to…

Carmen hovers behind her, waiting, flame at the ready in her palm.

This worthless little worm almost snuffed out all the light in Ann’s world.

The boys leave the Shadow’s fate to her. It’s them letting her take some control back. Here she is. Persona towering over all of them, fire dancing around its fingers. She could do it. She wouldn’t even feel bad about it. She wouldn’t lose any sleep over it.

But the thing in front of her doesn’t deserve something so merciful. It deserves to rot. Kamoshida deserves to live with the memories and be crushed by the guilt of his actions until he can barely breathe without sobbing at what he’s done.

Morgana calls her kind. He doesn’t understand. There’s nothing kind about how she feels right now.

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

Shiho opens her eyes. Ann cries.

For the first time since everything came crashing down, she sobs. Brown eyes look at her and Ann can’t breathe without choking on tears. Everything hits her all at once and she nearly falls to her knees outside Shiho’s room.

It’s everything. It’s relief and joy. It’s sorrow and grief. It’s the knowledge that Shiho’s alive. It’s the fact that she almost wasn’t. Ann feels it all, allows herself to feel it all now that she’s seen those beautiful eyes.

They both apologize to each other, for everything and nothing. All the things they should have said, could have done. They go around in circles blaming themselves before Shiho stops them, interlocking her fingers with Ann’s.

She smiles, small and tired but so full of love.

And for the first time in years, tears and all, Ann smiles back from the bottom of her heart.

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awellboiledicicle · 1 year

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[stumbles in with my pre-passover gummy bears]

GUYS FABLE/ELDEN RING AU THOUGHT

what if Theresa is able to see in other worlds because an outer god chose her and now she’s using the Spire like Marika used the Erd Tree, just in a far more contained and secretive manner?

What if The Tarnished of No Renown is the sibling of Logan and the hero of brightwall? Like long ago one of the Tarnished in Godfrey’s army settled in Albion--against all common sense-- and had kids with a Hero and it spiraled from there. Perhaps the weirdness of the Lands Between contributing to how weird the fourth type of hero is in general.

Imagine if they’d died on the same expedition where Logan faced the Crawler and the damage was just too great to be countered by Hero Blood. All they remember is cold and pain and laughter... followed by darkness. Then, decades later, they awake to the cave they died in. A glitter of gold worming its way from their palm to their chest. With it, an intense need to go somewhere, but where? Enter Theresa. They recognize her, of course they do-- Sparrow spoke of her often. The tone and impression of these talks varied, but she was still a common topic. Mostly good, though. Mostly. She tells them that death, it seems, is no longer their destiny. So she tells them that they must go on a journey, one even grander than their parent went on--far, far afield, beyond the wall of fog even the best cartographers were puzzled by.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Theresa teleports them to the Chapel of Anticipation with no further guidance than “Seek the Elden Ring” and imparting upon them a guild seal so they may grow in experience.

They get knocked out falling from the cliff and are sick of caves. Just deeply sick of them when they wake up later.

They assume Varre is a bandit and is just happy to not be instantly attacked. They assume everyone in the Lands Between is either insanely skilled or insanely brave for being outside. Melina chooses them because they seem rather impossibly determined.. and totally not using runes. When she lays a hand upon them, she can see the memories of thousands of beings interwoven into their very being. See the runes sitting untouched as their very soul plucks information from these slain spirits clinging to them and then... consumes it. Becomes stronger from it. She doesn’t know what they are, but she knows them not to be a tarnished. She chooses them regardless because she has... no other real option.

They do honestly, with complete confusion, ask Margit what the fuck he is while they’re fighting though. “You’re too big for a Hobbe, too thick to be a balvarine-- did your mum fuck a troll?” This does nothing to stop Margit’s dislike of them.

The Roundtable just assumes they’re tarnished and.... old. Or just sort of dim. Which is not true, their knowledge base is just.. Albion and Aurora centric. Some Samarkand and northern land info, but not much.

I imagine they wouldn’t wear armor and that would make everyone either impressed or deeply nervous.

Ooh Theresa could appear about midway through their quest to try swaying them to give the physical manifestation of the Ring to her upon quest completion. To ‘safeguard’ as she has the Spire. But Hero here has been learning and growing attached to this place and is reasonably sure the lands between would have some major, major bad news come if the ring physically left. “world in its influence collapsing” bad news. “Scarlet rot running rampant because the greater will isn’t keeping it in check” bad. But it could turn out she was pulling a Fable 3, turning them against everyone else so it would be easier to manipulate them so her outer god could take over. She could probably convince them that they would be countering the god of rot, appearing at a grace in Caelid and talking there. Melina stays hidden during Theresa’s invasions.

Ooh that could spur them trying to gather allies over just killing things, because then there’d be a structure to the land they’d inherit-- a net of influence to air recovery. A reason to apologize for calling Margit’s mother a trollfucker. Especially given they’d find out its Marika at some point and go “oh, well. uh. oops”

Oh no i’m drafting this in my head and it owns bones.

#au ideas #fable #elden ring #Elden Hero

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mandoalorian · 3 years

Text

Sinner [Dark!Din Djarin x F!Reader] *SMUT*

Summary: The Mandalorian has been attending confession for weeks now, with the sole intensive purpose to see you.

Rating: 18+ smut

Warnings: Dark!Din, implied age difference, religion kink (don’t come for me...), sex in a place of worship, smut: loss of virginity, mutual masturbation, dirty talk, degradation, unprotected p in v, cunningless, death mention, alcohol mention, brothel mention.

Word Count: 4000+

Masterlist

REBLOGS APPRECIATED!<3

He’d been coming to confess for about a year now. He’d gone off the rails when he lost the kid. You’d heard rumours about the Mandalorian — strong, fierce, brave... a warrior. You certainly wouldn’t have pinned him for a man of faith. You’d seen him a few times when you were shadowing your father in church. He was tall, broad shouldered, and only came during the dead of night, when the abbey was completely isolated.

“Hello,” you greeted him, your soft voice echoing throughout the chambers. Your crimson red heels clicked against the marble floor beneath you as you approached the masked figure. Curtseying politely and removing your hood, you couldn’t help but bat your eyelashes in the direction the Mandalorian. “It’s quite late. I was just closing for the night.” you admitted, biting down on your lower lip in hope that he’d understand.

“I thought places of worship aren’t supposed to close?” He countered quizzically, an air of amusement in his voice.

“You’re right, technically,” you hummed, picking at your nails as a wash of nerves flooded over you. “But my father is out of town and... I need to sleep.”

That’s where he recognised you from— you were the daughter of the Grand Bishop. He’d seen you before, doting around the abbey in your signature black gown and red robes. You were hard to miss, your beauty being beyond standards of measure. Yes, he knew you. He had noticed you watching him from the pillars above, when you thought nobody was looking. He noticed the way you’d deliberately brush past his body... desperate for just the slightest touch. He recognised your scent too; it was sweet like honey. And your ruby coloured lips. He’d dreamt of them plenty of times. It was really you.

“Where is he?” The Mandalorian asked after a beat of prolonged silence.

“He was requested by Senator Berenko to present evening mass on Naboo, for the Festival of Lights.” you explained, probably offering a little too much information.

“When will he be back?”

“Next week.”

“Well, I’ll be back then.”

No, you couldn’t just let him leave. You couldn’t just let him walk away from you. This was your chance. In a fluster, you extended your arm and pawed at his bicep. He froze under your touch, and you hoped that you hadn’t overstepped.

“Are— you’re here to confess. Aren’t you?” you asked him with a nervous gulp. Maker, why were you so nervous? The Mandalorian didn’t say anything, so you heeded to continue. “I’ve seen you come by before. I know you speak to my father usually but— I can do it. The confession, I mean. I’ve been shadowing my father for the past few months— training with him. I can do it. If... if you’d like me to.”

The Mandalorian took a moment to process your words. Maker; you were a sight to behold. Your eyes were starry and reflective of the galaxy he’d spent so long venturing. Your skin was soft and delicate. You were pure— untouched— holy. He was afraid the discussion of his sins might be a bit too much for you to handle.

Or maybe there was something more.

Maybe he was afraid that once he’d start opening up to you, he wouldn’t be able to stop. He wouldn’t be able to resist you.

“Aren’t you a little young?” The Mandalorian scoffed incredulously, bringing his leather gloved hand to his helmet, his thumb grazing the cloth between his chin and his neck. His rude manner didn’t surprise you at all, but yet, you kept a strong posture and held your head high.

“I’m old enough.” you declared, not ripping your gaze from him once. Even through the dark tinted visor of his helmet, it felt like you were looking into his eyes, staring deep into his soul.

So, he agreed. You told him to wait in the confession box by the altar. “I won’t be long, I just have to lock up and turn out the lights.”

As you walked down the aisle, you lit a match and ignited some candles. They were tall and made from beeswax, and the flicking amber flames provided barely enough light. But it had to be enough. It had to do. The wax dripped down the sculptures and chambersticks, pooling into swirls of hardening ivory.

The Mandalorian waited for you in the confession box, having already discarded the plates of his beskar armour. It was hard to wear, and heavy on his back, but he felt safe… here, with you. He had no reason to be still wearing it. No more fighting tonight, he hoped.

The image of you couldn’t escape his mind, no matter how hard he tried. Dirty thoughts — it was wrong of him. You were the Grand Bishop’s daughter for Heaven’s sake.

When you entered your side of the confession box, your full intention was to follow the ordinary strict protocol. There was no reason for distraction.

“State your name for the records,” you requested, shuffling around as you worked on getting comfortable in your chair.

“Din Djarin.”

Din Djarin. It was a beautiful name. Your mind immediately went to pairing his last name with your first name, and then you cursed yourself for the inappropriate thought.

“Din,” his name left your lips like the sweetest tasting honey. “Why are you here today? What would you like to confess?”

“I went to Corellia over the weekend,” he announced, his voice cold through the modulator. “The bad part— well, it’s all bad over there,” he corrected himself before continuing. “Got into some trouble gambling at Lady Proxima’s casino and a bunch of white worms surrounded me. So I killed them, all of them. I didn’t have to. But I did. I murdered them in cold blood.”

It was in that moment you learned how dangerous of a man The Mandalorian was. His beskar armour was just as cold as his heart.

“Wh— why did you kill them?” you asked timidly, almost afraid to know the answer.

“For the release. The adrenaline. The feeling of power. I can’t escape it. Have you ever killed?”

“N—no.”

Din scoffed incredulously. “Of course you haven’t.”

“What do you do after you kill?” you inquired, hoping to change the subject.

“Corellia has the best brothels… cheap too. I sought them out and look for a quick fuck.”

“Out of wedlock?” you pondered with a queasy frown.

Din laughed. “You’re asking if I’m married?”

He was right, it was a foolish question.

“Do you enjoy your time at the brothel? Or do you regret it soon after?” you wondered.

Another laugh— and Maker, he made you feel terrible. Were you really that bad at this?

“Yes, I enjoy myself. The girls there are pretty little things. Needy. Desperate. But— it’s not special, you know? It’s not… not exactly what I crave.”

“What do you crave?”

“To touch someone untouched. Pure. Holy…” the Mandalorian trailed off. “So, when I fuck the girls at the brothel, I tend to think of the Grand Bishop’s daughter.” He revealed, feeling his cock harden in the confines of his pants at the memory. You swallowed, a wave of heat immediately washing over you. You. He was thinking about you.

This was ridiculous. Was he messing with you? He had to have been messing with you. Sure, he’d seen you around before but neither of you had even held a conversation, prior to today. And he’d been thinking about you while he was sleeping with other women? You had to suck it up and remain professional, no matter how much it irked you. He was here to confess and you couldn’t let this become personal.

But it was so hard. Maker, why was it this hard? Was it because you’d thought about him too? Because you’d imagined his cock in place of your fingers, at night when everyone else is sleeping? You yearned to know more. You ached to know the details. Surely that was fair. He was speaking about you, after all.

You could already feel your panties begin to dampen with arousal. How could one man have such an effect on you? In your place of worship too. You wanted to punch him, kick him, take out all your anger on him. But most importantly, you wanted him. His touch. His hands on your body and his cock splitting you open. That’s what you wanted the most.

“What did— what did you think of?” You swallowed, anticipating the details. You were glad he couldn’t see how flustered and hot you were right now. It certainly wasn’t in the code for you to ask about details such as this but… surely one question would do no harm.

You could just about hear Din chuckle, from the other side of the wall, and it made your slick wet cunt clench around absolutely nothing. He was driving you feral. “I’d think about her ruby red lips and how they’d look wrapped around my cock. I’d imagine fucking her mouth, making her gag— wanting her to cry. I’d want to see the tears stream down her cheeks as I give her my all. And finally, I’d imagine her letting me cum down her throat.”

There was something about him talking about you, to you, in third person. Like you weren’t supposed to be there, listening. Like this information was not made for your ears.

Your panties were soaked at the thought. You couldn’t believe it. All this time, all these sessions of confession with your father, and it had only stirred him on more. He’d been going to confess, only to see you.

“Tell me, princess. How does that make you feel?”

Shit. He could not be serious right now. You placed your palm flat against the wall and took a deep breath. “Mando, you’re here to confess. Not me.”

You tried to shut out his words, but your body ached for him. Ached to feel him… touch him. You wanted him just as much as he wanted you — but it would be wrong. It would be so wrong.

Another chuckle. You hated when he did that. As if all of this was some kind of joke to him. Did he even know what he was doing to you? It was like torture.

“See, the Grand Bishop’s daughter… oh wow. She’s a vision. She dotes crimson red lips and she walks around as if she owns the place, her stiletto heels clicking against the floor. She’s bad, like the devil in disguise, and yet, I know her. She’s young and untouched. Her father will probably marry her off to some other minister in the outer-rim, ship her away for good. And she’ll be forced to deal with very mediocre sex for the rest of her life. Which is a shame, really, because she deserves better. You deserve better.”

“You have no idea who I am.” you spat out, feeling your cheeks burn with rage. How dare he make these assumptions about you and your family. This crude, older man with a tongue that could kill. How dare he.

You wanted to be mad at him so bad. He couldn’t possibly get away with this. But he was going to. Because what exactly could you do?

“She’ll never know how it feels to be stretched open by a real cock,” Din gritted out, dismissing your comment completely. “F—fuck.”

Din was palming himself through his pants, desperate for some kind of release. His sleuth, dirty words set a fire blazing in your core. You wanted it too. You wanted it so bad. You contemplated all the things you could do, all the actions and their consequences. You and the Mandalorian, both in the confession box. You couldn’t even see one another… the prolonged silence on your end prompted Din to get up and leave when he heard your honey velvet voice speak once more.

You had to say something.

“When the lights are out and everyone is asleep, I think about you,” you confessed, hating the way the croaky admission left your lips. You’d done it now. Din’s head snapped upwards to face the wall and oh how he wished he could see you right now. You were squirming around in your chair and when you heard the zipper of his pants become undone, you knew it was your queue to continue. “I touch myself. It’s hard to keep quiet… thinking about you. I imagine you touching me… running your gloved hands all over my body,” you bring your hand to your breast and give it a little squeeze. “I figure.. maybe you don’t take the gloves off. You praise me when you feel how wet I am, and I tell you that it’s all for you. I’m all yours. To use however you like. I want you to ruin me. Spoil me for any other man. Fuck me until I cant walk. Bite me, give me marks I have to hide during tomorrow’s mass.”

Din made a fist around his cock and began to pump as he listened to the dirty words that left your holy lips. His grunts and groans echoed throughout the box and went straight to your core. Oh how you wished you could see him right now. Peeling up the hem of your robe, you slid your fingers under the waistband of your panties and began to rub tight circles into your clit.

“You’re a virgin?” he asked, although it came out more so like a statement. Like he already knew the answer.

“Ye-yeah,” you whimpered, quickening your pace.

He was achingly stiff now, beads of milky white precum already dripping down his shaft.

“You want this?” He quizzed. “You want my cock right now? Think you deserve it?”

And in that moment, you made your decision.

Maybe this life that your father had given you, just wasn’t for you.

“Y-yes, oh God yes. I deserve it.”

A low and dark chuckle left Din’s lips. “You’ve been a child of God your whole life. But you want this, yes? You’ve been waiting for this?”

He was right. You had been waiting for this.

“P-please Din, please. Wreck me. Ruin me.”

“In the chapel too?” he laughed, rising to his feet. “You really are desperate. C’mon then.”

In a fluster, you practically fell out of your side of the confession box.

The Mandalorian stalked towards you with his cock in his hand, jerking himself off as he got nearer and nearer. His eyes didn’t leave you once and although you couldn’t see his face, you could only imagine the predatory glint in his eye. Maker he was huge, and thick, and you wondered how you’d ever be able to take him.

You weren’t used to this— Maker, you’d never done anything like this before. There was no way your fingers would ever be able to compare to the size of the Mandalorian.

“Are you sure you want this?” he grunted, releasing his cock and grabbing your throat, giving it an experimental squeeze. You nodded your head desperately and subconsciously licked your lower lip. “I must know. If I start, I won’t be able to stop. Do you want me to claim you?”

Just like Hades claimed Persephone? You shut the absent thought out of your mind and agreed to his proposition.

“I do.”

If it was so wrong, why did it feel so right? You had dreamt of this moment. How could you ever deny him?

He pinned you against the altar and tapped at your thigh, gesturing for you to open your legs up. His eyes dropped straight to your dripping core and he had to hold back a guttural moan.

Din wasted no time and rubbed his cock along your slick wet folds. For a second you were afraid he’d knock over the many burning candles that you had lit earlier in the evening, before your little confession session had begun. But, to no surprise of your own, the Mandalorian had extremely good coordination.

“Oh f-fuck, such a pretty little thing. So warm, bet— bet you feel so fucking good.” Din mumbled utterances of praise, his grip tightening around your wrists as he propped you up.

Every now and again the bulbous tip of his cock rubbed over your clit and the sensation practically sent you into orbit. You were touch starved, having never experienced intimacy like this with anyone before. “Do you want me to fuck you now, huh? Want me to fuck that pretty little cunt of yours?”

You whimpered a small ‘yes’ and Din chuckled darkly, tapping his cock against your cunt before sliding into you with one swift movement.

You let out a squeal, your fingernails digging into the muscles of his back as he seated deep inside you. Underneath his helmet, his perfect lips were parted into an ‘O’ shape as your fluttering walls clenched around him and made him feel like he was home.

“Fuck— so tight, so fucking tight. Just like I’d imagined.” He murmured, feeling like he was already seeing stars.

Din thrust upwards into you, the curve of his cock stretching you open and pulsating inside of you. His movements were rough and bruising, as his fingers dug into the soft flesh at your hips as he held onto you for support. Just like you’d requested, he was completely and utterly using you.

“How’s that?” his gasp rolled into an achingly long groan as his balls slapped against your cunt, creating the most obscene wet sounds.

It was uncomfortable at first. He wasn’t soft or gentle by any means, but you’d anticipated that. After just a few thrusts, the intrusive pain turned into bolts of pleasure that coursed through your veins. It clouded your vision like white noise— like what the red berry wine you’d drink during Sunday mass would do to your mind. Din grabbed at the thin cloth that covered your chest, and ripped it off, exposing your bare breasts to him. A sheen of glistening sweat glazed your skin like the most beautiful honey dew. The Mandalorian was tall and broad, and as he towered over you, he coated you in his dark shadow.

His large hands palmed at your breasts and you moaned at the sudden, unexpected contact. He continued thrusting, fucking you mercilessly. With every movement, he hit that sweet spot inside of you, and you knew he’d been doing this for a long time. He was definitely experienced.

He dropped his hand for your chest and lowered it to your clit, expertly moving his two fingers across your bundle of nerves. That feeling, combined with his thick cock, was enough to send you over the edge.

“Oh yes, yes, yes,” you chanted his name like it was a prayer— and he felt powerful.

The Mandalorian grinned wolfishly under his helmet as he increased his speed. You were seeing stars and it felt like your whole body was trapped under a spell. His spell.

“I ca- oh I can’t, I’m close, I’m close,” you cried as he continued to rock his hips into yours.

You hugged his body into yours, wishing the pleasure would never end. With every twitch of his cock he watched you intently. He watched the way your body reacted to him, revelling in the way your face screwed up in heated pleasure. Din adored the way your brow knitted together and your mouth parted as the most angelic noises omitted from your plush lips.

“Have you ever felt so alive than you do right now, with me inside of you?” Din queried with a grunt.

“No,” you answered, shaking your head profusely. “Please don’t stop.”

Your orgasm ripped through you like a tornado and without warning, The Mandalorian split his seed deep inside of you, his salty cum roping your perfect walls as they gripped down around his cock. Now he had marked you for life.

Din returned to confession a week later when your father had returned from the Festival of Lights. There was no reason for you to see The Mandalorian anymore.

“Forgive me, Grand Bishop, for I have sinned yet again.” Din announced, his voice clear as daylight after discarding his beskar helmet. He ran a gloved hand over his face.

“Another kill?” your father inquired, but from the other side of the wall, Din could only smirk.

“I’ve met a woman. A holy woman. And she has consumed my every thought. When I think about her I feel more inclined to sin, over and over again.”

It was true. Your ruby red lips, high heels, thin robes… Din had become completely enraptured with you.

Your father spent a moment contemplating the Mandalorian’s words, finding that he was speaking a lot differently than ever before. Not as ruthless or dangerous— but almost genuine.

“Would you give your body to this holy woman, if she requested you do so?” The Grand Bishop asked, not realising he was speaking about you, his own daughter.

“I already have,” Din confessed, subconsciously licking a stripe over his lower lip, at the memory of your taste. “And I would do it again.”

-—-—-—♡—-—-—-

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cinnamonest · 3 years

Text

I've discussed slut Lumine and Consequences™ before and I've somewhat discussed slut Mona briefly before, and the imperative of Kokomi being nonconned but... Slut!Kokomi though. Let me tell you.

Her family name isn't enough to earn her that high ranking spot, maybe she could have been a high rank, but to be in her exact position she needed a bit more than that. And, well, it certainly... Wasn't her ah... Combat capabilities (or lack thereof) that people chose her for. No, no, Kokomi got to her position the classic way -- sucking and riding her way to the top.

Kokomi has a body count rivaling the most prolific of serial killers. Kokomi literally does not know how many guys she's fucked before, she lost count after a hundred or so. She has, at some point, slept with literally every man in the resistance, at least twice.

The older, more important dudes... eh, she can get what she wants, a lot of them will agree to anything when they're in that post-orgasm state, all zoned out and tired. But she doesn't like dealing with them too much, they're a little more clever, they know what she's doing, they see through her with ease. She can't have that. No, she much prefers using her tactics and strategies (you know, the ones for guys, not the ones for war) on the young, subordinate boys that make up the bulk of the movement.

A lot of the young boys that come into the resistance movement idolize her. So when she gives them the slightest bit of attention, they do anything she wants. They're too naive to realize that they're just one out of twenty or so current flings (all of them for practical goals, none out of actually liking them) she has going at any given time. She comes up to them with that sweet face and voice and they can barely even hear what she's saying, their horny teen boy brains are consumed with "!!!!" because!!! Her Excellency is talking! To him! Directly! She's looking at him!!!

They don't even stop to consider how dangerous the favor she's asking for is, not when she smiles and covers her mouth with her sleeve in that cute little gesture. No, they do it without a thought, bodies on autopilot in an adrenaline and testosterone high, weak in the knees and stumbling around in a spaced out haze as they replay the part where she said she'd have a reward for them and gave a little wink, over and over in their head.

They're still sputtering out love and praise and worship while she finally pulls them into her room and lays back, loops her legs around their waist while they fuck her, cups their sweet face and murmurs that they're so cute and sweet. What a handsome boy, she says, and pulls off that little girly giggle, the one she's practiced to perfection by now, the one that makes boys shiver when they hear it. It has the intended effect -- their soul practically leaves their body and they cum within seconds. Which is what she wants -- the sooner she gets this part over with the better, ugh... But that sentiment would never, ever show even in the slightest on her face or in her voice.

And they're so naive, they believe excuses. Well, she stopped coming to them so much because she's busy with her role. She'll come back to pay attention to him again eventually. And she truly will -- she kinda... Rotates. She only has so much time and pussy to go around, so she has to balance which boys get it this week to keep them in the palm of her hand where she likes them.

Those older dudes she originally wormed her way above, now don't dare challenge her. She has more or less an army of white knights ready to defend her viciously should she just shrink back, quiver her lip and sniffle a bit -- that's all it takes to get them to come rushing to her defense. She's untouchable. When she makes mistakes, her strategies result in failure, again, they rush to her defense. Even the best leaders make mistakes, right? It's not her fault.

The thing about her though is she goes to great effort to keep up the ~pure~ appeal. I mean, look at her. That cutesy demeanor and high voice. She goes to great lengths to present as a sweetheart, pure type. She doesn't outright lie, she just... Implies some non-truths. Says things like "oh, is this how you do it...?" as she pumps cocks and rides, acting as if it's something foreign to her and not a practiced specialty. Puts on wide shocked eyes and makes surprised little noises as if this is the first cock she's been fucked by in her life, and not the seventh one in the past 5 hours. Says "don't tell anyone about us..." and acts as if the reason is she doesn't want everyone to know she has a boy she fucks because it would cause a scandal if she was sleeping with someone... and not that the real reason is she doesn't want them finding out she's doing it for *all* of them.

When Kokomi steps away from the crowd or soldiers or guests and gets behind closed doors, her voice drops like 2 decibels, her face falls to a resting bitch face or a scowl. It's all an act, the cutesy princess appeal. It's a lot of effort, keeping it up all the time. She hides behind the door and pretends she's not there when some of the more desperate, oblivious boys come searching for her, calling out to her because they want more. She's mastered the art of making sure no one knows where she is, so she can get a moment of peace and quiet.

She needs to go to these lengths. She knows that the thread she clings to is a fragile one. That if they started actually using their brains, they might start thinking about how tiny and weak she is, how the only thing keeping her in power above them, the only thing allowing her to be where she is, is them themselves. They might get ideas. She can't have that. And gods forbid they find out the truth, and get mad, or turn on each other... Or gang up on her. The thought makes her shiver.

It would be such a shame if one of said extra-devoted worshippers happened to follow her... She knows some of them get a little creepy, so she always looks over her shoulder, but sometimes feels like there's... Eyes on her. She blows it off as paranoia. She's just a little paranoid because, well, it *would* be rather bad if someone were to follow her around and find out about her... Habits. But she reasons that none of them are quite that devoted.... Right...?

When her worst nightmare comes true and they do gang up on her, she doesn't do the humble thing, she doesn't bow her head and accept the consequences, no. She stammers and makes excuses, keeps up the sweet little act, tells them I'm sure there's a misunderstanding, let's just all calm down and talk together, okay? And puts on her sweet smile... But it's not working. They don't look happy. Her voice wavers and she stutters, she takes a few steps back before her back hits the wall. And she decides to bolt... but when she looks to her left and her right, she realizes she's already surrounded on all sides, and she's left to just slowly shrink back, quivering and her smile twitching, nervously questioning ah, you guys....? before she finally gets grabbed by the wrist and dragged away, squealing and pleading, but no amount of begging is going to help now.

#scheduled post #yan.txt #.ship

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poptod · 4 years

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Pull the Stars Out of the Sky (And Gift Them To Me), (Ahkmenrah x Reader)

Description: The new Pharaoh has a bit of an obsession problem.

Notes: i suppose this would technically be yandere but i really dont want to admit that i wrote yandere fanfiction about a childrens movie WC: 4.6k

He called himself a savior. His people called him a God. Thus he acted as a sort of savior God, decked in gold, more powerful than the kings of a hundred foreign lands. He kept his friends close as he had no enemies, those in power too afraid to stand up to his might.

It was not as though he was undeserving of this title––quite the opposite. He dug his country out of a dangerous recession that followed an invasion by the Hittites. He defended his status as Pharaoh against his tyrannical elder brother, who had attempted to claim his rightful place on the throne. He brought great prosperity to his people and maintained his image of regality, the untouchable air around him, as though the Gods truly did walk the earth in the form of him.

Here he was, the most powerful man to walk the earth, coddling you as his fingers ran through your hair.

The decisions that brought you to this moment were poorly thought out at best and downright shameful at worst. Your home in the southeast of Africa now lay what felt like eons behind you, hazy memories of chains and scuffing, bloodied feet whirling in your head. Even in your village you knew of him––not by name, of course––and had already grown to fear him. By the time you got out of your home village and began going market to market, you knew to stay clear of him at all costs. But his dirty soldiers were everywhere, and constant vigilance brought you back-breaking stress that had your steps faltering.

Your stumbling was what brought you here. Stumbling into prison, stumbling into a palace, stumbling into a King's chambers.

"Aren't you just gorgeous," he cooed softly, petting your head.

The rough, uneven pull of your breath was the only disturbance in the peaceful room, bathed in warm light and Egyptian paintings. Every nerve in your body screamed to get away, to worm yourself out of his touch, but with every attempt he just held you tighter.

"What's your name? You look hungry," he said, eyes scanning your panicked face. "Would you like something to eat?"

Punch him. Talking to you like a dog.

You shook the thought out of your head, but the Pharaoh took it as a nod of confirmation.

"We'll get you some food," he decided with a smile, separating from you long enough to stand and pull you up with him.

He did not part his hand from yours, instead leading you through the long, tall hallways and their arches that painted scenes from stories you didn't know. Your past excursions to Egypt had hailed no such royalty, nor did any of your other travels. Most of the time you stayed in hostels and taverns. The grandeur and sanctity of churches and temples were as close as you got to this, standing on the cusp of a garden that stretched further than you could see, the white alabaster pillars lining your vision.

"Come," he said, and you thought it best to try not to disobey him. "This is a food garden. You can eat anything you like."

It had been a while since you'd gotten a good meal. The last thing you ate was hardtack from a tavern about a six-hour walk down the river from here.

The Pharaoh followed closely behind as you moved forward, constantly looking over your shoulder as you scanned the different vines and bushes. It was the color that caught your eye––most of the plants along the Nile sported an olive-type green, dull and yellow-ish. Many of the leaves in this garden were a bright green, more so than moss and grass, lively and soft beneath your fingers.

Only after scanning the whole of the garden did you decide on what to eat. From blossoming flowers in the water that lined the walkway to the figs hung high on the trees, you chose plums sprouted fruitfully from a short tree.

You sat right where you stood as you began gnawing at the flesh, tangy juice dripping from your bite marks. After a moment of watching you the Pharaoh lowered himself to your height, earning a chary side glance from you.

"What is your name, lovely?" He asked again, much softer, as he once more began to pet your hair. Most other times you would've shaken the hand off, but most other times it wasn't Pharaohs touching you.

"Amoke," you said through a rough throat and full mouth. Your voice had remained unused since you stepped foot in jail, and it was only now that you were reintegrating its' use.

"Amoke," he repeated, nodding. "A western name. Is that where you're from?"

You nodded.

"Do you like it there?" He asked quietly.

You shrugged.

"I should like to keep you here, then," he murmured, gaze flickering to every feature on your face. You watched his interest closely.

What came to mind was that you didn't want to stay here––that you wanted to keep on the road, stay away from the permanent and escape the inevitable routine. You couldn't say that, though. Not to his face. With nothing on your mind but leaving him and his touch, you remained silent in the wake of his request.

The sun soon set behind the garden's walls, casting long shadows that consumed the both of you without fail. When the residual light of the sky began to fade, he took your hand, paying the stickiness no mind as he led you back into the palace.

"I shall keep you in my room," he said with a firm confidence in his tone that stewed in your empty chest. "If ever you need something, just tell me. I can give you anything you desire. During the day you should stay in my room as well––it's safer that way. I'll be able to keep you safe."

From what?

Fifteen years travelling the world on your own and now you're forced into a single room for your 'protection.'

"My name is Ahkmenrah, though most call me by my title. 'My King,' and such. You may call me what you wish. I don't mind," he said, a smile crossing his features as he opened the door set in front of you. His eye only tore from you for a second before his attention was back, scanning the way you stepped nearer to him and into the room.

The once-bright light of sunset had vanished in his bedroom, replaced by the eerie purple of a late dusk. Outside the balcony arches, the sky bore an ombre of plum and blush, reaching up into the dome where stars had already come to see the world.

"I know your name already," you murmured, staring out to the city. His eyes remained ever on you, burning the back of your neck. "I know you freed many of your slaves but kept worker camps in Kush. I know you intimidated every nation so severely you can do anything you want now. It's not like anyone will stop you."

"You're knowledgable," he said, taking a seat on the floor.

"Is that what's happening here?" You asked, but he didn't quite understand. At his confusion you sighed but continued. "Am I supposed to be intimidated enough by you that I will stay here of my own free will?"

He furrowed his brow, tilting his head ever so lightly to the left.

"You... don't want to stay here?"

"No. I have a life that I'd like to get back to." Much of it being avoiding you.

"I don't understand," he said after a beat of silence. "You want to leave? But – there is nothing in the world I cannot give you here. Any riches you want, yours. Any delicacies are yours."

Ahkmenrah collected things. Already it was clear enough to see––collect and retain an image that prevents any fight against him, collect the riches of the world to give to his people and himself, collect the respect of those around him, and collect you. He will share with you everything he has gained if only you join this ever-growing, ceaseless collection of belongings. There is nothing stranger than being offered to become a toy.

"I prefer to keep moving. Meet new people," you said.

"You'll be safe here," he said, reaching for your hand. You instinctively pulled your hand away, but a sudden poisonous glare overtook his eye, and your heart froze in its' place long enough for him to gracefully lead you to your knees.

With you now raised on your knees, he met your height, nuzzling your cheek with his nose.

"I don't need to be –"

"You will stay here," he said, his intensity thrumming in your nerves. Once again there was no thought more comforting than leaving this place.

He must've noticed the panicked look on your face, as his expression softened.

"Do you understand? Oh, lovely," he said in a hum, fawning over you as his touch overcrowded your senses. His nose rubbing up beneath your jaw as he nuzzled into you, his hand holding your hip tight as the other tangled in your hair. He took in your scent with deep appreciation. "Sweet darling.. pretty one."

His mumbles grew less coherent the longer he held you, dusk fading into midnight as the silence of crickets resounded in the distant flora. The tension in your chest never fell, leaving you exhausted with your stiff breaths, bags beneath your eyes begging you to fall asleep, even if it was in the possession of another.

From waking up in an underground prison to mistakenly entering a King's chambers, the day weighed heavy on your mind with little solace at the end. Still, the body has its' cravings that will never relent, and you fell asleep to the rhythm of his praising murmurs and stroking hands.

Even hours later you awoke to arms still twisted around you, keeping you pressed tight to the warmth of the Pharaoh's chest. Hunger bit at your stomach, acid burning around the empty walls in a sweet reminder of your recent diet. Two-ingredient crackers and two plums in the last two days. You supposed that you wouldn't have to worry much about that in the future, so long as you stayed in his graces. While you doubted he would withhold food from you as punishment, you wouldn't put it past him, as it was a common jail tactic in many cities.

Wandering had been your sin for many years before this moment, and it would continue to be so whether or not you gave into the urge. Being stuck in any place––even one so comfortable as this––itched at your skin, tugged at your motionless legs and pulled at your scattered fingers. Despite your original insistence that you should stay still, your foot began to gently bounce as your fingers fidgeted restlessly. Your eyes darted every which way.

"I see you're awake," he mumbled, voice barely there in the first dregs of morning. "Stay a little longer."

Not that you really had a choice. His legs were all tangled in yours and you could barely move.

For what seemed to be another hour and a half you lay there, wondering when he would wake again and finally release you. He couldn't keep you here forever––not sleeping with him, not in this palace. It was clear he would not willingly let you go, so in the meantime ideas stirred in your head, plotting out ways to escape without his knowledge.

A knock came from the door when rays of sunlight began to touch the bedroom floor, flooding in through the arches. You wriggled when you heard the sound, disturbing Ahkmenrah from his sleepiness, which at last led to the loosening of his grip. The moment he went lax you tore yourself away.

Breath finally returned to you, the long hours of night fading away as your chest heaved an even up and down. The blankets around you fell as the Pharaoh stood, making his way to the large doors, where he removed the lock to let in a lean servant.

"Good morning, my King," he said, his gaze naturally coming to you. He stared at you but addressed Ahk, his words concise and posture straight. "You have a meeting with the embalmers of Thebes this morning, on the false accusations. After that you have –"

"– to overlook the temple building in the markets, yes, I know. My memory isn't that bad," Ahkmenrah grumbled, sighing deeply as he rubbed his face with his hand.

"Apologies, I just..." the servant's eyes flickered to yours, "didn't know if you.. drank last night."

"Just a glass, Naguib," he said with a slight smile, one that fell once Naguib began to root through his wardrobe.

You watched from your spot on the floor; the glint of gold in the closet, the mirror perfectly reflecting the King's standing position. His reflection yawned, dreary eyes meeting yours with a gentle delight. Instantly your vision darted away.

"Amoke, this is Naguib," he said, and in that moment you forced yourself to turn back to him. He was smiling expectantly, the servant behind him waving a polite hello. You returned the wave and he appeared to be satisfied.

Naguib picked the King's clothes and donned them on him, from the lapis beaded collar to gold cuffs on every wrist and ankle. The cape that streamed from his shoulders was a light all its' own, as though Ahkmenrah wore the sun upon his back, the silk drifting in gentle waves towards the marble floor. Only the crown was more regal than that, but above all was the man himself. The sweet coos and fawning words of the previous evening had faded into a stone face, pride on his puffed chest, and cunning on his parted lips.

"I'm afraid I'll have to leave you here for the day," he said as he stared at his reflection, smoothing out the wrinkles in his sleeves and the unevenness of his necklace.

"But –"

"No," he interrupted you before you could truly start, voice dipping low as half-lidded eyes turned to you.

There was something about his stare––something about the way he looked at you, as though he knew every thought in your head. This must've been the look that, in part, earned him his reputation.

"Stay here, pet," he said in a softer voice, bending down to kiss your forehead.

His lips were warm and enviously soft on your skin, but you had little time to process it before his cape whipped behind him, leaving you alone in the room. Naguib had left with him and locked the door. Now the only sound to calm the incessant ringing in your ears was the incredibly distant murmurs of an early-morning market, filled with birdsong and calling voices attempting to sell their work.

Fumbling to stand, you padded with bare feet towards the open arches. From here you could see the Nile and the many temples sprouted up throughout the city, their towers marking themselves distinct from the houses cluttering the twisting streets. It wasn't all unlike the other cities you'd seen––a different architecture style, of course, but similar nonetheless.

The arches had no railings of any sort, so as you peered over the edge, you kept both hands on the pillar beside you. Right beneath the Pharaoh's room was a garden, smaller than the one you had visited the night before.

It wasn't too far down, either.

You darted back into the room, pulling the thin blankets off the bed and off the floor, tying the ends together with frantic hands. Even your breath hastened to match your heartbeat, speeding dangerously in your chest as apprehension filled you. There was no time to waste––you needed to escape now, before he came back, before you had to memorize his routine; before this became more than a two-day problem.

Guards in their uniforms passed by outside, circling the palace with spears in their hands. You glanced out at them as you worked, trying to find the rhythm in their marching, and having little luck before you realized there were multiple groups passing by the arches at different times. A soft groan left you as you bit your lip in irritation. More things to calculate.

Although the ground didn't seem all too far away, it took a decent amount of time before the makeshift rope could reach the ground. Several hours of rearranging the types of knots and their placements finally wrought good results––the lowest blanket could now touch one of the trees near the garden's entrance, which you could use as a way down.

The sun had to be around midday, going by the shadows, and you assumed the Pharaoh would not be back to his bedroom until later in the evening. Before you could stay to see that time, you tied one end of your blanket rope to the arch's pillar and casted the length of it below you.

Hesitation caught you as you attempted to climb down, the sheer height of the building catching you off guard. What once seemed a short way was suddenly a means of death––not that it wasn't ever that before––and you could barely breathe with how tight your throat became. Your shaking hands gripped the cloth tight, sweating with the tension building in your muscles. Gentle breezes only accentuated your sweat, but it was not of import to you. All that remained on your mind in the overcrowding of fear was the need to escape, and thus you returned to your task, carefully scaling down the palace wall.

Nothing but silence dared make a sound in your thoughts as you climbed, breath evening further with every step you took downwards. The anxiousness only faded once you could see the individual leaves of the tree below you, and the design of the blanket stretched out on its limbs, crimson red and gold in the sunlight.

The moment you could reach you did so, clambering onto the thin branches in hopes of swinging towards the thicker ones. As you reached for the next branch, another hit your wrist, pain instantly shocking your left hand out of its' grip. Fortunately you caught yourself; just barely, and a second later you dropped to the ground with a huff.

You ran.

Without thought you ran, as fast as your feet could take you, as far as your lungs would allow. Air began to sting in your lungs, wind biting at the back of your open throat as you bounded through the halls, praying you wouldn't meet anyone on your way out.

The Pharaoh and his power was intimidating, no one could deny that, but your fears remained centralized in the idea of being known. You scarcely gave your name and hated living on in memory. Your own world was perfectly fine and you found no need to exist in anybody else's, no matter how much Ahkmenrah wanted you to.

But of course your stumbling would get you. As your thoughts were occupied, you paid little attention to the road in front of you, toppling over a railing you hadn't noticed yourself barreling towards. You tried to catch yourself with bulging eyes, but the ceiling was fading with mortifying speed. Bile filled your mouth as a sickness invaded your stomach.

Cool water splashed around you, soaking your clothes and skin alike as you sunk into the pool. Vines entangled you, the legs of lily pads separating in your wake, their flowers naught but silhouettes above you. A shadow appeared above you, but before you could make any decision it grabbed your upper arm and forced you out of the water.

"Ohh, dearest," sung a voice, accompanied by the close cradling of your body despite it being soaked. The sick feeling in your belly grew into a poison as recognition came to you. Your muscles tensed again in his grip, every nerve fighting against a fleeing instinct.

"My King, isn –"

"Quiet, Gyasi. My poor, sweet love... what are you doing here?" He asked, his hand coming up to stroke the hair away from your face. "I told you not to leave the room."

You shivered, leftover adrenaline sending shakes throughout your body. It left a tense silence where you would originally reply.

"You feel cold," he said, though you didn't feel at all cold. "Let's get you cleaned up, hm? I ought to do it anyway, since your clothes are a little torn."

He brought you to your feet, keeping an arm around you as he patiently led you away from the pond and those gathered there. Most everyone stared at you as you left, but you could barely notice, your vision blurred and hazy.

Steam filled your senses in the room he led you to, warm and scented with honey and lavender. Your eyes opened there, head raised to see the servant women working, stoking the fires and heating the water. Beside you, Ahk motioned to one of them, mumbling something in her ear that sent her out the door. Though curiosity did come to you, you kept silent in the unease of the Pharaoh's presence.

He had yet to accuse you of trying to escape, but it was only a matter of time. The rope in his room was still hung off the balcony. That fact kept you wary as much as it kept you jumpy, something Ahkmenrah unfortunately noticed.

By the hands on your shoulders he led you to a bath dug into the raised floor, the water inside steaming pleasantly with the scent of honey. Reluctantly you began to peel your clothes away, all too aware of his eye on you, memorizing how you stripped yourself down. As you dipped into the water, you attempted at removing the sick irritation you connected with him staring at you. It would happen quite a lot more (whether or not you wanted it to) before you could leave this place.

"Do you have any injuries?" He asked as he moved to sit beside you, his golden robes dirtying on the floor.

"I don't know," you said hoarsely.

"I'll have one of our physicians look over you. That was a long fall," he said, leaning forward to kiss your forehead again, before standing and leaving you to the care of the servants.

As promised, a physician visited you shortly, scanning over you while one of the women scrubbed at the dirt beneath your fingernails. The heat of the water calmed your muscles, untensing your anxious grips even as you were bombarded with questions.

By the time the servant women had dried and dressed you in new clothes, the Pharaoh had yet to return from whatever excursion he had left on. It didn't bother you, considering you didn't especially like being around him, but it did leave you wondering as you lazily watched the servants. Even if you wanted to leave you couldn't; you had no idea where in the palace you were, and there was a fair amount of guards wandering around outside the room. You bit at the inside of your cheek.

A good while later––far past the midday when you'd first fallen––he returned with singed clothes, ash covering his face. Your eyes widened at his appearance, and he was quick to notice your mild alarm.

"Incident at the, um, Bastet temple. One of the new priests really likes working with fire," he mumbled in a dazed voice, shaking his head as though he was trying to shake himself back into his body. "Are you alright?"

You nodded.

"Good. I've got most of the rest of the evening free, so let's get you back to my room, yes?"

It took quite a lot of self-control not to spit in his face, and much more willpower to slowly nod. He would accept no other answer and the suggestion of such would land you in unknown terrain.

He led you back down the hall, and each step you took burnt your regret into the ground beneath you. If one could identify the scent of fear, it'd be coming off you in floods, obvious in your panicked eyes and hastened breath. He would find the rope, and he would no doubt be angry. None of this would have happened if you had just watched where you were going.

Panic saturated your heart, functionally marinated it, as Ahkmenrah reached forward to open the door in the middle of the hallway. Every click of the latch had you flinching, till the door swung open and the light of late-afternoon hit your eyes.

The rope tied to the arch was inconspicuous, but the absence of nearly all the blankets in the room was not. Slowly the cogs in his brain sped up, and in each passing second you could see further recognition in him, till his eyes turned to the rope knotted around the pillar.

He said nothing––simply moved forward, glanced out and down the balcony, and turned back to you.

"You were trying to escape?" He asked you, nothing behind the tone of his voice, which might as well have been as bad as any anger he could've unleashed.

"I told you I could keep you safe here," he continued, and you, in your head, connected dots that suddenly appeared. He would never let you outside his room now––now that his point has been proven. "See what happens when you disobey?"

You blinked and he was standing in front of you, close enough that every inhale of his chest brushed against your shirt. At first you tried to step away, but he moved to cup your face, keeping you frozen in your spot. Your terrified eyes stared into his.

"The next time you try to leave here without me, I shall have to intervene myself, if you do not hurt yourself on your own as you so often do. Do you understand me?"

You nodded. There was nothing else you could do, not with your throat so tight you could barely swallow.

"I obviously cannot trust you," he said, his gaze flickering between your eyes.

He left you standing in the middle of the room as he went to one of his chests, pulling and unlocking the latch before the creak of hinges sounded in the room. You turned to watch in both interest and worry, patiently waiting for his reveal, before he turned back to you with rope in his hands.

As per usual, your first instinct was to bolt out the door. Your feet practically itched with the tension stored up in them, but you stayed perfectly still, terrified into submission as he pulled you forward. You almost stumbled, but before you could fully do so he pushed you onto his bed. Quickly you moved from your stomach to your back, creeping backwards on the bed as he drew nearer, the rope drawn taut between his hands. Kneeling on the bed with his head held high above yours, he was an opposite from the lovesick King you had first met.

He tied your wrists to the bedpost and you let him. He pulled the knots so tight and intricate there was no hope you could get out without breaking the rope, and you let him.

"I can keep you safe here," he murmured, lodged between your legs with his lips against your temple. Your heart stormed hell in your chest. "You will stay here. Any attempt on your behalf to leave and I will have to punish you. Understand?"

"Then I am a prisoner," you said, your voice hoarse and broken.

"You are what you make yourself," he said in a much more stern tone, looking down at you with knowing, wary eyes. "If it is a prisoner, then so be it. But you will be, throughout all actions and situations, mine."

"I..."

"You belong to me."

#ahkmenrah x reader #Ahkmenrah #Night at the Museum #rami malek #rami malek character #ahkmenrah x male reader #ahkmenrah x female reader

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darkacademicfrom2021 · 3 years

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The Dark Team (part 11)

<<Previous part Masterlist Next part>>

Warnings: Cookies and idiots. You might get diabetes.

N/A: I'm on a family trip right now so I'm being a little unactive but I'll do my best to be still updating on here. Thank you so much to everyone who reads and comments, you truly make me want to write twice as much.

The Dark Team: (Taglist: @lucywrites02, @louieboo87, @the-departed-potato, @jesuswasnotawhiteman, @idontknow296, @beksib, @spythoschei, @geekwritersworld, @whatafuckingdumbass, @mysticunicorn7 @shadowolf993 @toe-vind-ek-jou @joscelyn02, @t00-pi )

“Are you sure that’s how you should be sending those?”. His nosy ass telling you how to do your job in your midgardian electronics was just amazing, truly. “It would be faster for them if you send it with that link instead of…”.

“Listen, Mischief”, you interrupted his unnecessary corrections “I don’t tell you how to levitate, what about you don’t tell me how to do this?”.

“I don’t levitate”.

“Not the point. This is my deal. Besides, since when and how do you know how to handle midgardian tech?”.

“I… I’m bored”.

“Do I look like an entertainment to you right now?”.

“What do you mean right now? Are you planning on entertaining me later?”.

“I will choke you if you keep doing that”.

“Do you promise?”.

"Yes, my dear".

"Can't wait, then", he smirked. You rolled your eyes, about to answer something snappy, but the work was more important at the moment.

Your phone beeped, pulling you out of the very one sided discussion. You went back to your work in silence, getting your full focus and concentration on it. If it weren’t for Loki, you would’ve already done a thousand more other things. But, as a bug on the lenses, he was stuck to your side. It seemed like you were babysitting him.

Peter was staring at the roof from the couch. A pile of homework laid by his side, untouched, and his unlocked phone seemed to be waiting for him to make a call he didn’t want to. Loki observed him, unsure if it was a good idea to ask. You looked at his uncertainty from over your shoulder, and watched him finally give up on the idea of socially interacting with the kid, sitting down by your side on the big, big (and, exaggeratingly pointing out, big; yet he sat in the nearest chair from you) table.

The compound certainly was a boring place when uninhabited, and the sun was already teasing with coming down, making the common room’s lights turn brighter and warmer. Maybe it was automatic, maybe it was Friday. You couldn’t care less, for you were too distracted by Loki’s gaze on your work.

“Loki, for fuck’s sake, would you stop staring, my dearest?”, you asked, imitating his tone of voice, hoping it’d make it less aggressive and a bit more fun. He rolled his eyes and smirked, understanding your intentions. You sounded as tired of him as you were.

“I’m...”.

“Bored, I know. What about you go entertain Pete? He looks equally, if not more, bored as you. And you’re interfering with my work, which I do not appreciate very much”.

“How am I supposed to entertain him? I’m not a clown”, he argued, slightly offended but just wanting to make time and conversation. You sighed.

“Then why do you act like one?”.

“What is that supposed to mean? Is that a midgardian insult I’m not aware of, pancake?”.

“Stop calling me that, it’s not derogative”.

“It wasn’t intended to be deroga…”.

“I’d kill for some pancakes”, interrupted Peter, trying to pull you two out of your quarrels. “Or something sweet”.

“Oh, the kid got peckish. This is perfect; you can go get him something sweet and leave my workspace alone”, you said, patting his back with an exhausted grin.

He rolled his eyes, but walked down to the kitchen looking for whatever could satiate Peter. There wasn’t anything. One would think that a billionaire would have the fridge full of chocolates, wouldn’t you?, he thought, exhausted by the idea of having to actually leave the compound to get him something. Last time he tried to buy something in Midgard, he accidentally paid three salaries to the workers in the name of Stark. He was so embarrassed, he said it was on purpose and called it an act of mischief. But it was, in fact, pure and raw unawareness of midgardian’s use of money.

“What about we bake something, Mr. Loki?”, proposed Peter, with a flaming interest in seeing what those magic hands could do with food. You chuckled, pretty sure they could do nothing; he had been a prince for over a thousand years, when could he have learnt to bake by himself?

Loki lowered his gaze, confronted with both thoughts of his companions, and their respective expectations. Truth was, you were right. But he couldn't disappoint the kid like that, he had to at least try. Peter's eyes shone brighter than ever, and you wondered if Loki was actually enjoying his company. They looked fine. And, finally, you had some space to work without distractions.

“In normal circumstances I’d reject you, spider boy, but since y/n seems to be about to hang me by the neck on the tip of the tower, might as well do this”, he said, stealing a glance at you and smirking.

“It’s an honor you decide to spend your last moments baking with me, Mr. Loki”.

“Sure, let’s go, child”.

“I’m not a child”.

“Alright”.

And just like that, they left the working area and moved to the kitchen. Both rooms were connected by a huge glassless window and a counter, so you were able to peep in and make sure they didn’t actually burn down the compound (which was the only rule Tony had) and work peacefully at the same time.

After what seemed like an eternity, they still couldn’t accept they were failing miserably, and kept stirring the mix in a bowl. Flour formed clouds around them as Peter sneezed it away, and Loki’s hair had some cream on his (now not so) impeccable hair. Peter laughed at Loki’s commentary and poor baking skills, and Loki playfully mocked how his stickiness wasn’t helpful at all.

“Have you ever baked before, Mr. Loki?”.

“I haven’t but I’ve seen people bake, I figured I could imitate them”.

“Your mum, right? I used to bake with my aunt May a lot, but just now I realize maybe she was doing everything and I was eating the dough by her side”.

“That sounds more like it”, he chuckled. The mixing bowl trembled in his hand as he got distracted by the flying eggs coming at him, and it slipped out of him, smashing near half the mix onto the floor. “Oh, fuck”.

“It’s fine, we can use the one that’s left!”.

“Your positiveness astonishes me, spider boy”.

“Spider man”.

“Right, apologies”.

“We have already put in the flour, the sugar, the eggs, the milk… What else is in the recipe?”.

“I’m trying to remember, let me see”, he closed his eyes and muttered to himself “they used cinnamon, I think. And maybe butter? Yes, and chocolate chips”.

“Who?”.

“Ah, this recipe isn’t my mum’s. She didn’t bake either, you know, Queens don’t get their hands dirty” he laughed. “It was my companion’s”, he spat and suddenly realized what he had said. He lowered his head and sighed.

“Your companion?”, asked Peter. “As in partner? A spouse?”.

“Not spouse, just… you know, I’m just realizing I shouldn’t be talking to you about it”, he brushed it off, absolutely regretting it. Because Peter, unlike any other person, lacked filters.

So he would ask and ask and not realize where to stop. And at that point you could say Peter had become some sort of a weakness in Loki’s roughness. Peter was the softest, purest and better intentioned person he had ever met (or at least that’s how he saw him; of course, Loki had never seen him in action, fighting crime), and Loki was incapable of actually denying things to him. It didn’t matter how much Peter insisted on not being seen as a child, Loki was a thousand years older.

“No, please do. Now you’ve caught my attention”, he insisted, trying to clean some of the dough from the floor. Loki sighed, watching how the kid begged him to tell him more from his feet. “Please, Mr. Loki, I swear I won’t tell”.

“Well, my lover was the one who used to cook for us”, he explained as if he was telling someone else’s story. He clearly was trying to disengage his own emotions in order to tell them out loud. “And they’d usually bake some kick-ass cinnamon cookies”.

Peter had to grab the counter to steady himself from laughter, and you couldn’t help to snort at the conversation you were indiscreetly eavesdropping. Loki smiled.

“Then we have to replicate them, if they’re so kick-ass to make you say a midgardian expression”.

“We must, but I can’t remember quite well the next steps. It’s all sort of a blur now”.

“Can’t we ask them?”.

“No”, he said quickly. The air tensed, and untensed as fast as he realized. He especified again, trying to sound less affected by it “we can’t”.

“Oh”, Peter sounded so disappointed, Loki’s heart broke a little. “Are they dead?”.

“Oh my God, Pete, you can’t just ask…”, you intervened, trying to save Loki from further discomfort.

“It’s okay, they’re… well, they’re gone”, he said with a soft voice, raising his eyebrows as who tries to explain to a little kid why their fish is upside down, leaving to the imagination the typical trace of sadness that would follow. His eyes focused on the mixing bowl, reminiscing another time, another way. Eyes of someone who tries his best to never forget the little details from someone who’s not here anymore, because memories are all he has left. He immediately snapped out of his thoughts and tried to play it cool. “But guess who’s not gone? This dough on the floor. Let’s clean it up, kid”.

“Gone as in dead?”, insisted Peter, who had a very poor self control. You would’ve grabbed your face with eight hands if you could.

“Peter, don’t…”.

“Yes, they’re dead. Inside a coffin, rotting, getting eaten by worms. You know”, said Loki, this time jokingly, trying to scare off Peter. But it didn’t work, since Peter just kept asking about it. Loki was already too tired of having to take his brain yet again to places he didn’t want them to be.

“I’m really sorry, Mr. Loki. Must be very painful”. The empathy in his eyes gave Loki the hint that he was not only being sincere, but curious about Loki's life. Interested, engaged. Not just morbidly curious, but wanting to get to know him better. Unfortunately, Loki couldn’t allow that. He would have to get the mission done, not make any friends, and go back to Asgard as alone as he came. It was the deal, the price he had to pay, the invisible handcuffs, the imaginary rope tying around his neck. Tightly, tightly, tighter.

“It’s alright, it was long ago”.

“Was they Asgardian, like you?”.

“I’m not actually Asgardian. I was raised there, but I’m from Jotunheim”.

Loki managed to move the conversation further than his lover (which he regretted highly to have brought the subject in the first place), and Peter got more and more interested in confirming how many of his mythology stories were true or not. The kitchen was the warmest place in the whole compound, and something started to smell like burnt sugar.

“So you did actually make Sif, Thor’s wife, bald? And did he make you go get her a wig in Svárthelfeim?”, he asked at the speed of light, and Loki laughed.

“Lady Sif’s not actually Thor’s betrothed. And no, I didn’t make her bald”, he said, and then muttered “she just happened to have a very low quality shampoo”.

“Ah, the cookies!”, Peter turned off the stove and took them out carefully, as to not get burned (again).

Loki peeped through the window to check on you. Your head, laying tiredly over your hands, seemed to be about to give up on you out of exhaustion. You haven’t slept properly since the mission started, and you couldn’t get your head off work for a moment. He approached you from behind and left a fresh cup of coffee and a couple of warm cookies by your side. You smiled at him gently and thanked him. If it wasn’t him you were talking about, you could’ve swore he blushed.

You have gotten so tranquil after one simple gesture, you hoped to get all your nerves down before going to sleep. Maybe it wasn’t that bad to have been stuck with them in the compound. They seemed to be having a good time, and Loki had nothing on his mind more than to have a rest after such hectic days.

“How long until you finish there?”, he asked with a low voice, a raspy, almost groany voice, that made you want to shut your computer down and throw it out of the window. You didn’t, instead, you checked your clock.

“Very soon, I’ll join you guys in a bit”.

#loki #loki fanfic #loki fic #loki headcanon #loki x reader #loki x y/n #loki x gender neutral reader #loki x avenger!reader #loki laufeyson #loki odinson #loki friggason #mcu loki #peter parker #y/n

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percival-c-mcleach · 3 years

Text

Haunted Not By Ghosts- a McLeach fic.

The atmosphere was as heavy and thick as smog, stuck in time. The house, the barn and the ramshackle sheds were worn down from years of neglect, the barn having been particularly hard hit by time, half of its body rotted and given way to mushrooms.

The house's exterior had once been blue, now stripped almost completely to its wood and brick, with speckles of paint the only indication of what it might had been. The windows were cracked, rusted with dust. Weeds had forced themselves up between the boards of the porch, nearly obscuring the wood. Hidden among the vegetation was a dog bowl, a bright firetruck red that had now faded to a dull pink in the blistering sun, the faintest of childish block writing had faded too much to be read.

Taking a shaky breath, McLeach surveyed his childhood home. For forty years, it had laid abandoned, but it felt just as forboding now as it did back then, if not worse. Anxiety roiled in the man's stomach as he forced himself up the sunken steps, feeling the wood groan beneath him.

Joanna followed her master's footsteps almost exactly, not trusting the structural integrity of the building. She watched as McLeach hesitated with the doorknob, as if it would suddenly come to life and bite him. He gave a gentle twist of the knob- no luck.

"Aw hell.." McLeach huffed, twisting the knob harder. He jiggled the door, but the ancient wood refused to give. He crouched to examine the old doggie door-one he used as his personal entrance to the house-but he was now too old and too round for such an endeavor. Joanna looked between him and the door, noticing his pointed look. She shook her head hurriedly-no way would she be able to fit through there, and she was not looking to get splinters in her sides. Letting loose a curse, McLeach kicked the door-and it popped open nearly effortlessly. Quickly shaking off his surprise, he shouldered the heavy oak the rest of the way open, coughing as a wave of musty air washed over them both.

Once natural sunlight fell over the place, McLeach felt his breath catch in his throat- sans a thick coating of dust, the hallway looked almost exactly as he remembered it being. It was as if the other three McLeaches hadn't left the house; most of the decor still hung in place, with the addition of cobwebs. The coat rack still held his father's old bag, four pairs of slippers lined up beneath the side table, waiting for owners who would never return.

The house felt haunted. Not in the way most people came to think of haunted houses, brimming with ghosts; haunted in the sense that you could feel everything that had happened in this place. The anxiety only grew stronger, the further the pair ventured in. The carpet had faded from direct sunlight, but the patches in the shade of the furniture still remained its dark green color. Dust rose in clouds as man and lizard ventured carefully down the hall, with Joanna trying her best to hold in her coughing.

The family portrait was still there, hanging above a boarded-up fireplace. McLeach didn't blame anyone for leaving it, it wasn't something you'd want to have in your house. The sepia-colored photograph was dust-covered, but the man could still feel the cold, hard glare of his father through it. He raised his hand to wipe away the dust. The first to emerge was his mother. Thin-faced and tired, with her dark hair pulled up in an untidy bun. In one arm she cradled the newly-born Casey in his thick wool blanket, the other dangled down, gently squeezing the hand of a seven-year-old Percival. He had been small back then, missing two of his front teeth and a head full of hair like his mother's, dark and messy. Rubbing away the rest of the dust, Mr. McLeach soon followed. Towering over his wife and children, not even the shadow from the brim of his hat could have hid the starkness of his unnaturally light eyes. His large hand had a rough grip on Percival's shoulder then, the man grimaced at the memory. He couldn't bring himself to look longer at his father than was necessary. Even in photographs, he seemed to be glaring directly at his eldest.

Feeling claws on his leg, McLeach glanced down to see Joanna attempting to raise herself higher, she wanted a view too. He scooped her up as one would a toddler, though with some difficulty given her hefty weight. "Ay, you know who that is?" McLeach smiled, pointing to his mother. Joanna tilted her head quizzically- the human woman looked very distinctively familiar, even though she knew they had never met. "That's your namesake," McLeach continued, "My mama, Joanna. I promised that I'd name my firstborn daughter after her...and well, you count, I guess." Joanna wasn't able to understand just how important that was, but she felt it was very, very important. She waggled her tail happily, inching her snout closer to the frame. She clearly recognized the young Percival, and let out a rasp that sounded much like a wheezing laugh. "Go ahead, you looked weird when you were a kid too." McLeach rolled his eyes. His arms had started to ache, and he set her back down. He continued down the hall, and froze for a brief moment when he came to the wall opposite the sitting room's entrance. Beneath a framed picture of Casey with his model airplane, a round hole was at shoulder-height, the impact having shredded and burnt the faded yellow wallpaper. "..Damn idiot didn't bother to get it fixed after I left, eh?" He scoffed, "You see this, Joanna? You can tell I didn't get my marksmanship from Pops. He couldn't hit the broad-side of a barn." A slightly alarmed chirrup arose from Joanna's throat as she realized what that hole was, but McLeach didn't seem bothered by it. He breezed past the bullet-hole and past the sitting room, after taking a quick glance inside and finding that the armchair and couch were overrun with a brackish mold.

The kitchen was small, and had once been cozy. The kitchen window had broken, and one of his mother's prized climbing rosebushes had wormed its way in, leaving a layer of generations of rotting petals over the linoleum. Nevertheless, the rosebush itself was thriving, its creamy white petals shining in the golden sunlight. Reaching out to touch, McLeach couldn't help but to pluck one of the roses off, holding it in his palm. He had forgotten how silky-soft the petals felt, and how sweet it smelled; he closed his eyes and inhaled, feeling a sharp pang in his middle. A sharp pang of an emotion he couldn't quite describe. It was happiness and sadness rolled into one, and it left an ache. The smell reminded him of sitting outside with his mother, tending to the rosebushes together; if a blossom had just fallen, his mother would pluck apart the petals and keep them in a jar, preserved in the icebox until she got around to making soap and hand-cream. McLeach opened his eyes. The strange emotion only grew. He dropped the rose onto the floor, to join the rest of the fallen flowers.

Joanna had gotten braver, and went ahead of the poacher. She still felt intimidated by the house; she seen that her owner was as well. It was odd, to see him so on edge in a place that was so familiar to him. Maybe if she showed she was brave, he'd feel better. Crawling up a set of stairs, she gazed down the dim hallway. Four doors, only one of them was left ajar. Curiosity got the better of her, and the goanna went to take a peek.

The bedroom looked as if its occupant had left in a hurry. She could still see old toys and picture books on the shelves, a small, rickety wooden bed with moth-eaten blankets neatly made, with a shapeless lump that at one point had been a teddy bear sitting atop the covers. The walls were wallpapered, though it was difficult to tell what color they had been, for it was now all a dull grey. The posters on the walls were faded yellow, with vague shapes of rubberhose cartoon characters etched onto them.

Hearing McLeach wheeze his way to the top of the stairs, Joanna looked over her shoulder, and sat outside the door until McLeach could join her. He leant in the doorway of his old bedroom, soaking in the scene. After what seemed like minutes, he finally walked into the room, slow and quiet.

The thing of interest for McLeach were the picture albums on one of his shelves. The ones left exposed to the sun were faded-but maybe these were saved. He grabbed on and flipped it open, feeling a large lump rise in his throat when he seen that they were untouched. Smelled a little mildewy, but were still visible. He choked down the lump, flipping through each page slowly, wanting to savor every picture. His baby brother in his bassinet, wearing a goofy-looking baby bonnet. Flip. Their old dog, Blueberry, sleeping on the rug in the sitting room, a chewbone lolling out of his mouth. Flip. A photo of his parents on their wedding day, both looking much younger and happier than he had ever remembered them seeing; Mr. McLeach had looked kinder then, gazing at his bride with all the love and adoration that a husband was supposed to have for his life partner. Flip. His childhood friend, Ruby, sitting with the nine-year-old Percy on the river's rocks, holding baby ducklings. Flip. Flip. Flip.

These were happy memories; why did his heart ache so much looking at them? He shouldn't feel like this, looking back on what were the happier years of his life. Flip. Flip.

Percival's heart sank to the bottom of his stomach.

Of course there had to be pictures of Mr. Wells in here; back then, the McLeaches considered him as good as family. A tall, scrawny, unassuming man with shoulder-length brown hair, who had kindly and selflessly looked after Joanna and the boys while Mr. McLeach was away in the army- a second father figure, the reliant one, one who wouldn't yell and scream at the smallest of slights. After spending the summer with Mr. Wells as a boy, Percival wished he had stayed home. At least his father didn't play mind games with him, and when he hurt him, it was out of rage, and not premeditated. Not passed off as accidents that were all Percival's own fault. Not passed off as something he deserved, for something he couldn't even recall doing. The picture seemed so innocent. Just a kindly man with the boy he called his honorary son, on the back of a old mule at the fair. Percival knew better; he knew that under his child self's sweater was a nasty deep bruise, a bruise that hurt for weeks. Mr. Wells had claimed it had been an accident, that he hadn't meant to swing the shovel so hard into him. It was Percival's fault, for sneaking up on him like that.

'You'll be hurting for a while, Percy..' He could still hear that soft voice, too soft to note any real remorse, 'You frightened me something awful...I guess we learned our lesson on sneaking up on people, didn't we?'

We. As if it was a lesson they both learnt. As if it wasn't just one of the many thinly-veiled excuses used to hurt him. As if he didn't do worse, as if he did not permanently scar him physically and mentally. As if he didn't one day stop giving his excuses, once Percival had gotten too old to fall for them. As if it was the both of them having a knife held to the soft skin of their throat. As if it were the both of them who had to endure a full day and night in the skinning shed, surrounded by the dead, staring eyes of hogs. As if it were the both of them who had to endure nightmares, long after the torment had stopped.

It had always been 'We'. Never a 'I'm sorry.' It was always 'You.'

He had been brave only once. Brave enough to go to his father for help. How foolish of Percival to believe that his father would have stood up for his son. He never did such a thing before. The entire ordeal had been Percival's fault-his fault for being too stubborn, too much of a brat. If he had behaved better, Wells wouldn't have resorted to harsher punishments-it had been his fault he was treated so poorly.

For once, Percival stood up for himself.

Mrs. McLeach had tried to deescalate the fight. Mr. McLeach found himself with a broken nose, as Percival helped Joanna off the floor and out of the room. He only heard the safety click off before he had dove down the hall, sprinting from the door and into the night. "DON'T YOU EVER COME HOME!" For forty years he stayed away.

The strangled scream had terrified Joanna spitless. The goanna had been nosing around underneath McLeach's old bed, when her master emitted a sound so animalistic, that for a moment she feared that a big-cat had been hiding somewhere in the room. She immediately balled herself against the corner as the photo album was flung into the desk hard enough to shatter the frail wooden handle. The lump was back in McLeach's throat again, tighter and more painful than before, forcing tears to swell and blur his vision. His breathing came in ragged gasps, trying to keep the deep pain in his middle from winning. He crouched where he had stood, clenching his hands so tight that he felt as though they may break. He shouldn't be getting upset over this. He shouldn't be getting this upset over a goddamn picture.

It had been forty years. Why does it still hurt so bad? Why does it still feel so fresh?

The sudden warm weight crawling onto his lap tore him back into the present. Joanna scrambled as far up on him as she could. Percival hugged her as tight as he could, until his heart rate slowed back to normal, until he could breathe without choking. "Thanks." His voice was barely more than a croak. He took his bandana to dry his eyes with, "I'm sorry..I just.." he couldn't explain what had happened. Joanna understood though. She gently headbutted his shoulder, before slithering off of him and towards the photo album, picking it up in her jaws. McLeach took it from her, holding it in his lap. He'd tear out the pictures he wanted to keep, and leave the rest to rot in this forsaken house. The sun had just started to set as they made their way back to the truck, parked in the barren field next to the rotting barn. McLeach didn't even bother to give the house one last look before they drove off. Maybe now hadn't been the right time to come back. Maybe there never would be a 'right time.' Eventually, something had to be done about the place. Maybe he'd torch that haunted house to the ground. A house haunted, not by ghosts.

#Disney #disney villains #percival mcleach #the rescuers down under #fanfic

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ragingbookdragon · 3 years

Text

A Moment Of Respite Between Struggles

Ted Kord x Reader One-Shot

Word Count: 1.3K Warnings: Explicit Language

Author's Note: BLUE BEETLE! BLUE BEETLE! BLUE BEETLE! Enjoy my fluff! -Thorne

**********************************************************************

She smiled politely at one of the security guards as she waltzed into Kord Industries, all the way to the front desk where she cocked her elbow on the counter and leaned over, greeting, “Hi—” her eyes drew along the young man’s ID badge. “Mark. Hi Mark!”

He glanced over the rim of his thick glasses smiling at her with a mixture of wonder and surprise. “Wow, you’re (Y/N) (L/N).”

“I am,” she responded, adding, “I’m also your boss’ girlfriend.” With a pout, she explained, “Thing is, we were supposed to meet for lunch, and he didn’t show. So that’s telling me he’s either stuck in a board meeting or he’s down in the labs tinkering around.” (Y/N) winked. “Think you can check where he is for me?”

Mark nodded. “Yes ma’am. Give me just a moment.” He went back to the monitor, clicking away. “It seems that there wasn’t a board meeting scheduled, so let me check the personal labs.” He thumbed an intercom button. “Mister Kord, sir? Are you in there?”

What? A cranky voice spouted from the piece, and she smiled sympathetically at poor Mark who looked so flustered.

“Uh, sir, your girl—uh, Miss (Y/N) is here.”

Oh…Oh no, what time is it?

“It’s a quarter to three, sir.”

Aw crap. I forgot about lunch. Scrambling sounded from the line. Tell her I’ll—

“I’ll meet you in your office, Ted.” (Y/N) interrupted and reached over, ending the call; she smiled at Mark. “And don’t worry about him—I’ll make sure he apologizes for being a jerk before we leave.”

Mark grinned. “Oh, it’s no trouble, ma’am. But, um—” he trailed off and she smiled, waiting for him to gather his thoughts, and he reached into his bag, pulling out a laminated photo. “I was going to attend your expo this Friday.” He placed the photo on the desk, one she recognized as her recent modeling set, and asked, “Would you sign this for me?”

“Absolutely!” (Y/N) flashed him a million-watt smile and pulled a sharpie from her bag, quickly writing a small note and her name in the corner. “Here you go,” she said, handing it back to him, and Mark stared at it like it was gold.

“Thank you, Miss (Y/N)!”

She waved as she walked to the elevators, disappearing inside, and riding all the way to Ted’s office. When she stepped out, he was there, bent on the sofa at an awkward angle, face down, with his left arm curled backwards over his head, the other holding a glass of amber liquid.

She tsked at him. “Day drinking, Ted Kord? What would the masses think?”

He snorted into the cushion. “I’m a billionaire. I’m allowed to day drink without being called an alcoholic.”

(Y/N) giggled and walked over, nudging him in the side as she tossed her bag on the coffee table. “Up. Come on, get up.”

“Don’t make me,” he groaned. “I already feel bad for missing lunch.”

“Then make it up to me by doing what I told you.” She shot back and with a grunt he set the glass down on the floor and pushed himself up, half-heartedly glaring at her; she pinched his nose. “Quit scowling. You’ll get wrinkles.”

(Y/N) wormed her way underneath him, letting her head rest against the arm of the sofa while Ted lowered himself back down, rather contently shimmying against her body.

She threaded her fingers in his light brown hair, scratching his scalp and asked, “What had you so wrapped up this afternoon, Teddy?”

He groaned low in his throat. “Some stupid piece of technology that Boos sent me.”

“Uh huh?” she encouraged.

“And he asked me to fix it, but the damn thing isn’t from this century and there’s so many wires and intricates, and you’d think that with the twenty-fifth century, they’d be able to compact everything, but nooooooo. And now I missed lunch and you’re upset, and I’m annoyed because I still can’t get the damned thing fixed and I’m sorry.”

She merely blinked and dragged her gaze from the ceiling to his head. “How’d you manage to do that much speaking in one breath?”

“I’m best friends with Booster Gold. You learn to talk fast when you’re with him.”

(Y/N) snorted. “That you do.” She sighed and Ted felt it in his chest.

“I’m sorry, babe. I didn’t even see the time.”

“I’m not upset, Teddy,” she murmured, squeezing his shoulder. “I’m more worried that you’re overworking yourself.”

“Not any more than usual.”

“See, that worries me.” (Y/N) inhaled deeply. “Alright, we’re going to try something new.”

“In here?” he flirted, and she slapped his arm.

“Mind out of the gutter, Ted.” She looked around. “Your office is secure, right?”

Ted reached down and fumbled with something in his pocket before making a triumphant noise and retorting, “We are now.”

(Y/N) smiled. “Good. We’ll need privacy for this.”

“Do I still need to get my mind out of the gutter?”

“Yes, you pervert.” She closed her eyes, feeling the power rushing through her veins and she quietly said, “Close your eyes, Teddy.” Her hand skimmed his face, feeling his lids close and she pressed a hand to his cheek. “Now open them.”

Ted cracked an eye open, then blinked repeatedly, wonder filling him as he gazed up at the ceiling of an old, abandoned cathedral, overtaken by nature. Vibrant green grass filled the room, vines curling around the pillars and arches, and the scent of flowers he’d never smelled or seen before, of colors so beautiful, blended along the ground in a wave of pigment.

Soft chirping soothed his ears and the sunlight peeked through the broken stained-glass windows, casting waves of red, orange, yellow, and pink along the ground and over his skin.

It was so calm. So peaceful. So quiet, and an emotion he’d not felt before welled in his chest, overwhelming him with such an intensity that tears filled his eyes.

“Do you like it?” He looked around, then down to his side, seeing (Y/N) sprawled out in a flowy white sundress, a carefree look on her serene face.

“Where are we?” he questioned. “What is this?”

“This is my place,” she replied, still closing her eyes. “I come here when I think I might be overwhelmed with my powers. It’s…my sanctuary.”

“Are we still in this universe or—?”

“We’re in my mind, Teddy.” (Y/N) murmured. “The one place my powers have no control over. The place of beauty still untouched by my telepathy.” She peeked beneath her lashes. “And now I’ve brought you here so you can be at peace with me for a while.”

Ted blinked away the tears and she tugged his shirt. “Lay down.”

He did as she commanded with little resistance, feeling the grass tickle his neck and ears as he laid beside her, his head brushing hers. “It’s beautiful here.”

“It is.” (Y/N) agreed. “I made this when I was being subjected to the experiments that gave me my abilities.” She sighed heavily. “A respite I could take in between horrors.”

“Is time passing by in the real world?”

“Slowly. Every moment here is much faster than those outside. All of this will happen within seconds out there.” (Y/N) turned her head, catching his gaze. “But since you’ve secured your office…why don’t we spend a few minutes here, hmm?” she smiled. “When it turns to night, you can see galaxies peek through the cracks.”

Ted let out the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding, relaxing into the grass, an arm curling around her and he nodded. “Yeah…I think that sounds like a great idea, (Y/N).” Her smile widened as she turned her body, resting on Ted’s shoulder and she felt his lips brush her head as he murmured, “Thank you.”

“Always my dear.”

#ted kord x reader imagine #ted kord x reader imagines #ted kord x reader #ted kord imagine #ted kord imagines #ted kord #blue beetle x reader imagine #blue beetle x reader imagines #blue beetle x reader #blue beetle imagines #blue beetle imagine #blue beetle #dc comics #dc imagines #dc imagine #dc

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