#but the shift from 'all effects fully nailed down' to 'tell me a story' is real

[honourablejester]

Honestly, this (the crafting, modifying and inventing rules) is one of the most exciting parts of BitD so far for me. The rituals were what first sparked for me, because the idea that I can just invent spooky magic rituals for my character is delightful, but the gadgets and alchemicals are also delightful. Both Whisper and Leech were the playbooks that first called to me, and this kind of thing is very much part of why.

Vague gadget ideas I’ve been dabbling with:

The obvious, goggles that let you see into the ghost field. No self-respecting Leech is going to leave that the preserve of Whispers and their spooky masks! There is nothing magic has wrought that science cannot equal! Potential details: will highlight ghosts in red if they’re feral?

On a similar theme of goggles, goggles that give you something like Dishonored’s Dark Vision power, the ability to see the presence of living people through walls (it works by sensing Plasm, obviously), basically giving you a sort of life-focused x-ray vision.

A palm-mounted device like a shock buzzer that acts as something of an inversion of the Lurk’s ‘Ghostly Veil’ ability: it temporarily forcefully shunts someone else into the ghost field, rendering them insubstantial, for those moments when you need someone to let go of you right now or you desperately need to not be fighting them. Might have unfortunate effects on the victim, which will undoubtedly invoke long-term consequences.

Higher level, but if we’re thinking weapons and we’re already in the realm of lightning, gaslamp fantasy, demon-slash-lifeforce powered weaponry … I mean, is it too much to ask for a death ray? Some sort of hideous little thing that forcefully rends someone’s ghost from their still-living body, or drains them of Plasm (and stores it as power, because then we could have a self-powering hand-held murder machine). How does that interact with the spirit bells of the crematorium? (This one’s obviously going to be a long clock and several interim stages to develop).

… I promise I’m not looking at the Leech playbook purely to play a monstrous Victorian-esque mad scientist? Honest, yer honour. But. Well. A life of crime probably would be necessary to fund and advance my research? And in my defence, the first thing the book itself suggests trying to invent is a flamethrower, so I don’t think a death ray is all that out of left field?

I do think fiction is the answer here, alongside building on things suggested or built from other abilities/items in Blades itself. What Dishonored power to you want to replicate? What crackpot silver age of comics device do you want to cobble together and power by demon blood in your semi-flooded underground lair (that you must perforce share with the rest of your crew, do try not to blow us all up or summon some sort of horrific demon on top of us, darling)? Do you want to rip off Stephen Strange and make an arcane amulet that allows you to rewind time a few seconds? How would you feel about a death ray?

This is a steampunk fantasy setting where electricity exists and is literally powered by demon blood, where ghosts can be captured in bottles and sold on the black market, and the light from the shattered sun has been replaced by fish bioengineered with life energy until they glow bright enough to grow plants. Go nuts. Play with life, death, lightning, magic, machinery, biology! Frankenstein your way to a hideous future funded and inspired by your life of crime!

(Or, you know. Be a little bit more practical and focus on simpler things like glass cutters and breaching charges and sonic grenades that can confuse and delay the deathseeker crows. Or a contact vapor that instantly erases the last, say, 30 seconds or so of someone’s memory. Or a watered-down version of Drift Oil that instead of making you float for an hour simply makes you lighter and more agile, as if you were operating in moon gravity. It takes all kinds, you know).

But yes, I do understand the difficulty. When I was homebrewing a class for Heart: The City Beneath, a similar fiction-focused ttrpg, I found myself trying to nail down the concrete limits of various abilities as if they were for a more mechanical system, before realising that Heart does not work like that. You can just say ‘if you succeed your roll, this ability turns you invisible until you’re out of the current situation’. It’s a genuine shift of mindset. You have to pull back out of stats and bonuses and durations and ranges, and just go ‘this lets you do [cool thing], tell me what that looks like in this situation’.

Have to say, one of the biggest hurdles in introducing one of my usual gaming groups to a system like Blades in the Dark is the idea that items don't have defined stats and are instead props to twist the fiction in interesting ways. It often feels like I'm using therapy speak on a very literally minded engineer.

Player: Alright, I've spent some downtime crafting, what can I make? Me: What would you like to make : ) ? Player: Like, is there a list? Me: Nope : ) , you're limited by your imagination and what we agree would be best for the story. Player: Well are there suggested guidelines for what an appropriate item would be? What Bonuses It can give me? Me: Items don't really give bonuses : ) , now how about you tell me what emotions finishing this project stirs in your character? Player: What was even the point of this? Also stop saying ": )" I don't know how you're doing that with your mouth.

Honestly it's a fascinating study in what assumptions ttrpgs make about the people playing them: Namely that a prospective BitD player has some personal skill or desire to act as a storyteller, and doesn't put much emphasis on the nitty-gritty of the rules.

[star--anon]

3 Times Wilbur Was A Lee + No That's It, That's The Post

Heyyyyyyy~! I left Tumblr for a little while, but don't worry! I'm back! And I've finally written the prompt that was sent to me over 2 months ago! Yay!

"Listen, I'm sorry, alright?" Tommy huffed out, resting his head on Wilbur's shoulder. "I didn't mean to! Honest! You're just being a big bitch about it!"

Wilbur didn't say anything back. He simply stared at the front door, waiting for Phil to come home with his fixed sweater.

While watching Tommy parade around the house in Wilbur's favorite orange sweater was, to some degree, amusing, it was not amusing when Tommy ripped the soft fabric. And although Phil had gone to get the sweater fixed, Wilbur was still incredibly upset with the seventeen-year-old idiot. He stuck a Post-It on Tommy's forehead with the words, "I am an idiot and Wilbur Soot does not talk to idiots," scrawled on the yellow paper in messy handwriting. He then resigned himself to the couch and waited for Phil to come home, ignoring Tommy's attempts at getting his attention.

It seemed like Tommy wasn't exactly on board with his idea, judging by the way he plopped himself next to Wilbur and began poking his shoulder, repeating, "...Answer me, answer me, answer me, answer me, answer me, answer me..."

It took every fiber of Wilbur's being to not whack Tommy on the back of his empty little head.

"...Answer me, answer me, answer me, answer me..."

The words, "Shut it", weighed heavily on Wilbur's tongue, and it took a massive effort to not let it slip from his lips. He had told himself that he would not talk to Tommy, and he was going to keep that promise.

"...Answer me, answer me, answer me, not gonna stop until you answer me, answer me, answer me..."

Gradually, as Wilbur remained unresponsive, Tommy's poking became quicker and more aggressive until he missed his mark. Instead of poking Wilbur's shoulder, he ended up poking his ribs. The older started and swallowed a squeak of surprise. He hoped that Tommy hadn't noticed, but that hope quickly sank when he saw him grin widely.

"I saw that jump, don't try and hide," said Tommy, poking his ribs again. As impassively as he could, Wilbur reached out and grabbed Tommy's wrists tightly. He never spoke a word and kept his eyes on the front door. He was trying to ignore the kid, after all. He squeezed Tommy's wrists and let go, hoping that the boy had gotten the message.

Don't poke me, he silently said.

Unfortunately, Tommy was never good at listening. The moment his hands were free, he immediately returned to poking at Wilbur's ribs, this time with renewed energy.

"Ahaha-!"

Wilbur cracked.

He dropped the ignoring act and squirmed away from Tommy. In his desperation, he made the mistake of falling off the couch and onto the ground, allowing Tommy to sit on top of him and poke him more.

"G-Gehehet ahahaway!"

"I knew it! I knew you were just ignoring me!"

"Tohohommy, gehehet ohoff!"

"Nah. I'm having a lot of fun."

"T-Tohohommy, Ihi'm seheherious!" Wilbur tried to flip over to throw Tommy off him, but he quickly abandoned the attempt when Tommy dug between his shoulder blades. "Juhuhust gehehet ohohoff! Plehehease!"

Although Wilbur's thin shirt was doing nothing to protect him from Tommy's poking, the blonde still decided to take it up a notch. He slipped a hand underneath the shirt and rapidly squeezed his ribcage. Wilbur just about shrieked, frantically and jerkily pushing at Tommy's chest. His arms flailed around; Wilbur was stuck between trying to push Tommy off him or covering up his red face to preserve what little dignity he could save. The younger grinned widely, easily grabbing Wilbur's hands and pinning them down high above his head.

"TOHOHOMMY, WAHAHAIT! I-IHI CAHAHAN'T BREHEHEATHE!" Wilbur was bluffing and Tommy knew it.

"Calm down, you're breathing just fine."

"GEHEHET OHOHOFF!"

"Awww, is this a bad spot?" Tommy made an exaggerated sad face. "This is a bad spot for you, huh? Your ribs are ticklish? Is that what this is? Hm?"

Wilbur whined at the teasing, turning a deep shade of red.

"TOHOHOMMY!" he complained. The squeezing and pokes to his ribs made it difficult to think, so he couldn't get out much more. Given the opportunity, he might have been able to formulate a proper and cohesive argument and rationalization to persuade Tommy into halting his petty actions.

He wasn't given the opportunity.

The laughing on his behalf and the tickling on Tommy's seemed to weaken Wilbur because he was finding it incredibly hard to do anything but lie there and take it. Take the digging nails between his ribs, the occasional raspberry on his ribs, the random squeezes and pokes and prods and wiggles and skitters and rubs on the bones and gently scratching...

"TOHOHOMMY! PLEHEHEASE, YOUHU'RE GOHOHOING TO KIHILL ME!"

"Calm down," scoffed Tommy. "I'm not going to kill you."

Still, he relented and stopped his attack, letting Wilbur (finally) take a breather.

"Are you okay?"

"Y-Yeheheah..."

"Cool."

"Cahahan youhu get ohohoff mehe?"

Tommy blinked. This was the first time in memory that Wilbur had asked for something — and politely too.

"Hm..." For a moment, Tommy considered it. Wilbur hadn't flipped him over and taken brutal revenge yet. He had asked nicely to be let up. It looked like he was sorry for ignoring Tommy. Well, then again, it only looked like he was sorry.

"Maybe if you apologize for ignoring," offered Tommy, "I'll let you up."

Wilbur glared at him. It was obvious he was trying to gain authority and control of the situation by activating his Big-Brother mode, but it was less effective when he was at Tommy's mercy.

"Fuhuhuck youhu," Wilbur snapped. "Let me up."

Tommy just shrugged. "Your funeral," he said, scribbling his fingers over Wilbur's ribs. The brunet screeched in laughter and immediately gave in.

"OHOHOKAY! OHOKAY IHI'M SOHOHORRY! SOHOHOHORRY!"

Huh. Well, that had worked out better than expected. Tommy made a mental note about Wilbur's ribs. What? It was valuable potential blackmail for later!

"Very sorry?"

"YEHES! V-VEHEHERY SOHOHORRY!"

"And you promise that you'll never ignore me ever again?"

"YOUHU SUHUHUCK!" Wilbur whined through his laughter.

"I don't hear you saying it~"

"NOHOT SAHAHAYING SHIHIT!"

"Don't think you have a choice here, Wil," Tommy murmured. Once more, he switched tactics, going from dancing his fingers around to digging in between each of Wilbur's ribs. Every once in a while, he'd blow a raspberry and smugly grin when he heard Wil shriek. "I think you better say it."

"IHIHI PROHOHOMISE IHI'LL-" Wilbur broke off with a high-pitched squeal as Tommy blew a raspberry on a particularly ticklish rib. "AHAHA-! NOHOHOT THEHEHERE!"

"Go on," coaxed Tommy. "Say "I'll never ignore you again, Tommy", and I'll let you up."

"DA-DAHAHAMN YOUHU!

"Say it!"

"IHIH'LL NEHEVER IGNORE YOUHU AHAHAGAIN, TO-TOHOHOMMY!" Wilbur managed to babble out.

Finally, finally, Tommy stopped. This time, with no intention of starting up again. "Really?"

"Yehes," Wilbur breathily replied. His chest rose and fell as he greedily sucked in some much-needed air. "I forgive you, okay? I'll stop ignoring. I don't think you're an idiot. I don't care about my sweater." At first, Tommy thought he was just saying it so Tommy wouldn't tickle him again. But that thought quickly left when Wilbur reluctantly grumbled out, "I love you. And I'm sorry."

"Awww! Thank you!"

"Now get the fuck off of me."

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*

"Y'know, Tommy had a lot of fun telling me about his own tickling story with you," Philza helpfully informed, shifting slightly to better access Wilbur's underarms. He noticed that kneading circles made Wil's laughter go high-pitched, so he made sure to knead as many circles as he could. "But honestly, I think I'm having more fun than he did."

"AHAHAHA! PH-PHIHIHIL! PHIHIL IHIHI CAHAHAN'T! PLEHEHEHEASE! IHI- EEP!"

Phil grinned at Wilbur's reaction. He blew another raspberry on his neck and got the same response: a short, high-pitched shriek.

"You what? What is it, Wilbur?"

Wilbur simply shook his head, laughing too hard to be able to form coherent words. Had he not been sitting in Phil's lap, his arms held up with one hand and his underarms being tortured by a hand and a wing while another wing was running over his ribs, he might have been able to form a proper word. Phil noticed this and decided to give the musician a small break.

"...h-hehehe," Wilbur softly giggled. The tickling had stopped, but he still jerked and flinched and laughed like there were still fingers and feathers on him. "M-Mehehahaha..."

"What?"

"...mehahaha..."

"A-Are you okay?" asked Philza, starting to get worried. He hadn't taken it too far, had he?

Finally, after his breathing calms down and enough air gets into Wilbur's lungs, he whispered, "...m-mehehercy..."

"What's that?"

"H-Hahahave mehercy, Phihil." Wilbur shook his head once more, his giggles beginning to start up again. He tugged at his wrists, which were still held high above his head, and rocked side to side, almost like he was trying to evade poking fingers. The only thing was that Phil wasn't doing anything. "Cahahan't tahake ihit..."

"I'm giving you a break right now," soothed Phil. "I'm not an asshole."

"Yehes you ahahare," Wilbur cheekily said.

"Hey," said Phil. He ran his nails over Wilbur's ribs, earning a loud shriek. "I would be careful if I were you," he warned. "Don't forget, I know two of your spots now, and I fully plan on abusing my knowledge."

Wilbur squirmed in the avian's lap, his light-hearted threat forcing a whine out of him. His cheeks only got redder when he finally processed something that Phil had said earlier.

"Did he really?" he meekly asked.

"Did who really what?"

"Did Tommy really tell you about tickling me?"

Philza barked out a laugh. "You think Tommy's the type of guy to offer help in unloading the groceries?"

Wilbur flushed, his cheeks now a deep crimson. "Guess not," he grumbled. He had thought it was weird that Tommy was suddenly so eager to do a task that nobody liked doing — unloading the groceries — but he had just assumed that Tommy felt awkward around Wilbur after tickling him. He hadn't thought that... Wilbur kicked his legs as best he could and whined loudly.

"I can't believe you just stood there and willingly listened to Tommy talk about how he... how he tortured me to earn my forgiveness," he huffed.

"Torture," Phil snorted. "He didn't torture you. You make it sound like he had a knife and was drawing blood. According to him, all he did was tickle your ribs."

"W-Well, my ribs are very ticklish!"

"I noticed," Phil remarked. He dragged a single finger up Wil's ribs and smirked when Wilbur burst into sweet lil' giggles. Feeling a little evil, he added, "You know, he also told me get flustered easily~"

This, of course, flustered Wilbur. He buried his head in the crook of his arm, trying — and failing miserably — to suppress a goofy smile.

Phil took it as an invitation to continue.

"He also told me your laugh was adorable."

"Did he really-

"He told me you get all giggly when someone lightly rubs your ribs."

"Wh-What-"

"And that you get really red when someone tickle you."

"I don't-"

"You do, actually," Phil noted, eyeing the brunet's red face.

"Look," he said, booping Wilbur on the nose, "even your nose is red."

"I-"

"You look good though," Phil reassured. "Cute and a little messy, but good."

"St-Stop cutting me off!" spluttered Wilbur. The fact that Phil hadn't let him go yet probably meant that he planned on tickling him more, and Phil's constant interrupting wasn't helping Wilbur ease his nerves.

Phil's eyes widened at his outburst. "Well, there's no need to shout at your old man," he murmured. "I was just curious, that's all."

"S-Sorry..."

Phil hummed again, and the two fell into a comfortable silence — although Wilbur's nerves still didn't ease. Just as he was about to be asked if he could be let go, Phil said, "Aight, break's over. Let's start."

"Wait, what're you- AH! PHIHIHIL! NOHOHOT AHAHAGAIN!"

Phil cooed softly, drilling his wings into Wilbur's underarms while silently counting his ribs with his free hand. "I think Tommy was right; your laugh is adorable."

"FUHUHUHUCK YOUHUHU!"

Phil frowned at the vulgar language. He tugged Wilbur's arms to the side a little and began blowing raspberries on his ribs. Just as Tommy had told him, Wilbur immediately shrieked.

"AHAHAHA! WAHAHAIT! SOHOHORRY! PLEHEHEHEASE, IHIHI'M SOHOHORRY!"

Phil noticed that vibrating his fingers deep into Wil's underarms made him laugh louder than when he blew raspberries on his ribs. "Hey, I think your armpits might be more ticklish than your ribs!"

"PHIHIHIL!" Wilbur whined. "YOUHUHU'RE SOHO MEHEHEHEAN!"

"Me? Mean?" Phil gasped in mock offense. He ran the tip of his wing over Wil's left underarm while drilling circles into his right. The harsh contrast between the two sides was driving Wilbur insane! "I'm hurt, Wilbur. I'm genuinely hurt."

"IHIHI'M SOHOHORRY NOHOW STOP TIHIHIHICKLING MEHE!"

"Lemme sleep on it."

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*

"No, that wouldn't work either," Wilbur dismissed. He leaned back in his chair (or some stairs, depending on how you wanna look at it) and gazed out the window, a half-amused smile tugging on his lips as he watched Tommy and Tubbo assemble and reassemble a large pyramid puzzle. To Technoblade, he said, "Think of something better."

"I'm trying!" Techno frustratedly snapped. "You've been rejecting every idea I've come up with! Plus, you haven't come up with a single idea yet!"

"Yeah, because good ideas take a long time to think of!"

Techno rolled his eyes. "Yeah? Good ideas take a long time to think of? Seriously? That's your excuse?"

"It's not an excuse! I'm trying to focus, but you're distracting me!"

"I'm helping."

From downstairs, Phil tiredly sighed, pouring himself a cup of coffee. Wilbur and Techno were arguing. Again.

"What else is new," he muttered under his breath before sipping his coffee.

Sometimes, the avian questioned his decision to introduce his adopted family to Technoblade. At times, it was good to have his friend around; he was always happy to have a helping hand in organizing the family. Techno was a good big brother.

There were, however, some problems. Even though Technoblade was over a thousand years old, Nether piglins tended to live for millions of years. By piglin standards, Techno was barely a toddler. His youth — and therefore inexperience — caused some (read: a lot) of chaos and unnecessary bickering around the house.

For example, it was Tommy's birthday, and Techno and Wilbur had been assigned to give him a gift. Phil had initially thought it would be a nice team/brother bonding moment, but it just ended up being another excuse for the two to argue.

"What if we made him a giant cobblestone tower?" suggested Techno. "I have enough. We could build it all the way to the height limit. It'd probably make Tommy happy; he likes cobblestone towers of powers."

"No."

The piglin blinked at Wilbur's bluntness. He waited for an explanation. When none came, he prompted, "...Because...?"

"I just don't like the idea," Wilbur replied.

Techno threw his hands up in wordless fury. "You are impossible to work with," he stated. "Absolutely impossible."

"Think of some good ideas and maybe I'll be easier to work with."

Finally, Technoblade snapped. Wilbur had been rejecting every single one of his ideas with no satisfying explanation. It was honestly starting to get to him.

Making sure Wilbur was still distracted by something outside the window, he slowly reached into his pocket and pulled out a book and quill. Flipping to page thirteen, he slowly trailed a finger down the paper, quickly reading all the bullets.

- A video where he's singing incredibly off-key - His secret drawer of photos of Sally - The one page in his diary where he talks about how amazing Tommy is - A video of him strumming an air-guitar like he's at a rock concert - That one time he accidentally encased himself in obsidian and I had to get him out - That time he started talking about how incredibly Tommy was before realizing I wasn't Philza

None of these help, Technoblade thought, slightly crestfallen. Usually, his book had all the blackmailing information necessary for any situation. But none of the bullets were helpful in this certain scenario. Eventually, he reached the final bullet on page thirteen, the page specifically dedicated to potential blackmail on Wilbur Soot.

- Ticklish ribs The words, "+underarms", had been hastily scrawled underneath.

Huh. Technoblade glanced up at Wilbur, who remained oblivious to his growing evil scheme.

"Alrighty then," the piglin sighed, standing up. "Villain arc time."

"Oh yeah?" Wilbur absent-mindedly murmured. "What're you gonna- AH!"

He yelped, caught off-guard, as Techno just about pounced on him and hauled him off his chair. He crashed into the piglin, sending them tumbling to the ground, each fighting for dominance. Though Techno was quite well-known for his strength and cunningness, Wilbur found it incredibly easy to wriggle his way out from his grasp.

Just as Wilbur had thought he had managed to get away, Techno "accidentally" hiked his shirt up and began squeezing at his ribcage. Wil immediately crumbled to the ground, feebly beating Techno's chest with a clenched fist.

"Ack! T-Tehehechno! Youhu cheheheater!"

"I win!" he triumphantly cried, flipping Wilbur onto back and settling down on his legs. Anytime Wil tried to resist, Techno would simply rub his top rib bones and watch (smugly) as Wilbur fell back down, giggling up a storm.

"Youhuhu cheheated!" Wilbur protested. "Thahat's not fahahair!"

"Hush," shushed Techno. Wilbur did not "hush". In fact, when Technoblade delved his fingers into his underarms, his laughter only grew louder. In mock exasperation, Techno snapped, "Pay attention, Wilbur, I'm showing you my really good idea."

"Thihihis ihis youhur idehea?!"

"It's good, isn't it?"

"Ihihit's ahabsolute shit!"

Techno's eyes widened.

"You take that back!" he demanded, not caring how childish he was being. It seemed like laughter truly was contagious, for Wilbur's loud cackling brought out a few chuckles from himself. Techno was glad that Phil had suggested for Tommy and Tubbo to go outside, because it would be very hard to explain why he, Technoblade, a deadly piglin who earned his title "Blood God", was currently sitting on top of a human and tickling him senseless, all the while wearing a large, goofy smirk.

"My ideas are great and you know it. Just admit it already."

"Fuhuhuck ohoff! Ihihi-" Whatever Wilbur was going to say was cut off by his own raucous laughter when Techno pushed his sweater up and blew a raspberry on his ribs (a trick he learned from Phil, who learned it from Tommy). "FUHUHUCK! WAHAHAIT! WAHAHAIT, TEHEHECHNO PLEASE! STOHOHOP!"

Technoblade did not stop. As a matter of fact, Wilbur's pleas only seemed to spur him on. Through slightly teary eyes, Wil weakly batted at Techno's shoulder as the pinkette blew raspberry after raspberry on his ribs. The hits didn't do much — Techno barely noticed — but it did throw him off a little when Wilbur missed his shoulder and whacked him in the face. Luckily, no one was hurt, but it made Techno flinch, and instead of blowing a raspberry on Wil's ribs, he blew one on his navel.

To which Wilbur screeched.

"NOHOHO! NONONONO! NO! PLEHEHEASE! NOHOHOHOT THEHEHERE! ANYWHERE BUHUT THEHERE!"

Technoblade grinned. He gave Wil's underarms a little break and moved to attack his tummy instead, skittering his fingers around the soft skin, occasionally dipping into his navel to lightly scratch around.

"Oh? Is this a new spot?" asked Techno. "Is your tum-tum ticklish? Is it? Is it so tick-tick-ticklish? Hm?"

"STOHOHOHOP!" Wilbur tried to demand. His squeaky cackles weren't really helping him make a point. He pursed his lips together and attempted to put on a mean, stony face. Techno dipped a thumb into his lil' button and vibrated it around, and his facade immediately crumbled. He squirmed underneath him, frantically trying to get free. "PLEHEHEASE! CAHAHAN'T TAHAKE IHIT!"

The piglin caught the strain in Wilbur's laughter and sympathized with him. He hadn't been tickled before, but Wilbur always tried to keep a strong, impassive reputation, and Technoblade doesn't know what he would do if somebody tickles him and reduced him to a red puddle of giggles.

"Alright, alright," he murmured, decided that Wilbur had had enough. "Just wanted to have my revenge for a little while. It gets annoying when someone keeps rejecting my brilliant ideas, y'know."

He slid off of Wilbur and walked back to his chair, where he had originally been sitting before he had gotten the random idea to tickle Wil. Before he could see what Techno was doing, the piglin quickly jotted down "+belly and navel" on page thirteen of his blackmailing book. He said nothing else — no apologies, no consolation, no explanation. Nothing. Zip. Zero. Nada. Goose eggs.

The moment Wilbur got enough air into his lungs and strength in his limbs, he staggered back onto his feet, face bright red and hair a mess. He ran a hand through his ruffled brown curls — like that would help — and sank into his chair, breathless.

"Ihi still thihink your ideas a-are shihit," he mumbled. He hugged himself around the stomach, ghost tickles still dancing on his sensitive skin. Technoblade glared at him. He had forgotten how annoying Wilbur was while he had been tickling him. He grabbed the first thing he could find — a marker — and pointed it at the brunet.

"I'll tickle you again if you're not careful," he threatened.

"I can take it," Wilbur arrogantly responded, eyeing the marker warily. His bluff was called, however, when Technoblade stood up and he squeaked. "AH! Sorry! Didn't mean it! I-I was just joking!"

Techno grinned. "You wanna admit that my ideas are good now?"

"No."

For a split second, Wilbur's stubbornness irritated the piglin. But then, after studying the marker in his hand, Techno's grin only widened, another equally wonderful idea popping into his head.

"Alright, I've got an idea I bet Tommy'll love," he said.

"And I bet it's shit."

Technoblade didn't say anything, simply grabbing Wilbur's wrists and raising them high above his head, which scared him.

"What're you doing?" he squeaked, voice high-pitched in terror. "D-Don't tickle me again! Please! I'm sorry!"

"Calm down," Techno soothed. "I'm not going to tickle you."

Wilbur relaxed a little. That is until Technoblade began pushing his sweater up, to which he shrieked, "What're you doing?!"

"I'm going to use this marker," was the pinkette's simple response.

"T-To do wha- EEP! Tehehechno! Nohohot ahagain!" whined Wil. "Plehease! Ihihi'm seherious, I cahahan't tahake it!"

"What? Seriously? You can't take a marker? Not even a marker?" teased Technoblade, more surprised than anything else.

"Ihihi'm tihihicklish!" the brunet defensively giggled.

"Well, that's good, because I won't tickle you all that much. Just stay still. I need to write something on your stomach. It'll be easier if you don't struggle."

"Ihihit tihihickles!"

"I know, but just stay still."

Wilbur tried — he really did! — but it was incredibly difficult to not laugh while Technoblade was writing something on his stomach with a black Sharpie. The soft tip of the marker was surprisingly good at tickling him, especially when it came close to the rim of his navel.

"Whahat ahahare yohuu even dohohoing?" giggled Wilbur. He couldn't exactly read whatever Techno was writing. It's hard to read upside down.

"I'm writing "TICKLE HERE" all over your stomach. And don't look at me like that," Technoblade added when the other gaped at him. "I know you're ticklish on your stomach, but I'm willing to bet Tommy doesn't~"

"Youhu wouhuhuldn't!"

"I would, actually," Techno replied. "Plus, I bet Tommy would love it. Admit it, Wilbur, it's a good idea."

Although Wilbur would continue to insist that Techno's ideas were shit, Tommy actually found Techno's birthday gift for him incredibly entertaining and enjoyed it immensely.

("Come on Wilbur, it's very rude to not sing me happy birthday~" "Ihihi'm tryhyhyhying!" "Try harder! Try to stop laughing. It might help." "Youhuhu suhuck!" "I wouldn't say that if I were in your position~" "ACK! WAHAHAIT! IHIHI'M SOHOHORRY!" "Don't forget to try his navel too." "FUHUHUCK YOU BOHOTH!")

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧:･ﾟ*

I don't know why this prompt took me so long to do but I'm so fucking sorry Jesus Christ ᜊࡇᜊ

Also I'd just like to mention brag that the word count is 3,909 words.

-🌟

[sparkbeast20]

You’re my Treasure (Mammon X MC) Pt15 Final

The Blue Lotus petals (series)

As a fan of Beauty X Beast pairing, Showing your “true self” to Lover or (Monster Love) Tropes. I figure to make a (More Demonic Forms AU/head canon) story for each brothers. Heads up each brother’s Story is long as fuck. So, I’ll be posting them as parts and finishing one brother before moving on to the rest of them.

(spoiler for lesson 1-60)

Pt1 Pt2 Pt3 Pt4 Pt5 Pt6 Pt7 Pt8 Pt9 Pt10 Pt11 Pt12 Pt13 Pt14

Warning: Swearing, Demonic nature.

Previously

“Okay, now here’s the Plan” Satan start discussing about how to trap Lucifer and make sure that he and Mammon stay in one place and not make the same mistake as before.

“Why do I have to carry the two of ya” Mammon as Levi and Belphie are in his arms. While you are with Beel upfront and Satan with Asmo is behind of two, as Beel following Lucifer’s scent.

“Because your more bigger then Beel right” Levi answer him, and Mammon just groans at him.

“I didn’t realize how soft your feathers are Mammon, this could be great for pillow stuffing” as Belphie said it, he nuzzles his face on to Mammon’s arm. Hiding the fact that he misses his big brother.

“OI! Don’t get any idea!!” Belphie sleepy laugh at Mammon’s bash reply, which Belphie scoffs.

Beel track down Lucifer’s scent in the mountain’s valley near the woods where Mammon’s treasure cavern is, soon you all hear a shrike from the distant, to both Mammon and Satan displease with the latter which clench his fist so tight he dug his nails into the palm of his hand.

“Satan, are you okay…...your trembling” Asmo asks as he feel Satan shaking.

“It’s fine Asmo…... it’s just my instinct kicking in, maybe because we’re in his territory I start acting like this. Shit I didn’t expect this strong of a demonic presence, this ruin the plan entirely”

“So, what now?”

“Our best bet is y/n’s pact with Lucifer, pinning him down long enough for at least on of us cast a chain spell on him, then Mammon can make sure he doesn’t escape”

After minutes of flying, both Asmo and Beel to feel weak and unease, and Mammon sees it.

“Oi, what’s going on with you two”

“I don’t know…... its like my body is getting heavy” Beel can barely say it, he felt like something is causing his body to feel numb.

“I think…... I can’t go on” Asmo started to slowly decent down, as Satan tries to talk to him.

“Asmo! You need to~”

Suddenly both Asmo and Beel felt a surge through their body, they felt that their wings are getting heavier.

“Shit! I can’t move wings” Beel is trying his damnedest to keep flying, eventually he can’t take it anymore and decided to make an emergency landing in one of the path ways between the mountains, and Asmo followed suit with Mammon not far behind.

“Beel! Are you okay!” Belphie immediately rushes to his twin’s side as Asmo can barely stand, while the rest looks around to see where you guys landed.

“Mammon…...” you called out to him, with a worried tone in your voice, as if you felt someone or something is watching you.

“Stay right there, I’ll come to you” Mammon start walking towards you, when he stops and his feathers immediately stand upright, and his wings is spread out in a defensive way.

You quickly turned around to see a black griffin-like demon with six pair wings, a tail with seven peacock feathers on the tip end, familiar horns and eyes with the sclera ink black with crimson red eyes staring directly at you.

“Lucifer…...” you mutter under you’re breathe as your eyes start to shifted, scared of what’s is going to happen.

Lucifer shrikes, launches himself towards you, but Mammon leaps over you, and colliding with Lucifer. The two of them fall on the ground and quickly got up and take a defensive stance as they growl at each other.

“Lucifer! Snap out it. Your better than this. You know us, you know me!” but the only thing that Lucifer did was shrike at Mammon and rushes at him. But then.

“Lucifer. STAY!?!” Immediately Lucifer was pinned on the ground, and try to struggle out of the invisible force on his body down.

Mammon turns around to see you with one hand reaching out and your pact mark with Lucifer glow on the right side of your chest, but Mammon can see that you’re struggling to hold down Lucifer.

The others finally got up, then Satan start casting the spell while the others circle around the two older brothers.

“Lucifer!!” Asmo calls out to him only met with anger shrike, then Levi and Beel start walking close to the two.

Feeling surrounded and threaten by his brothers. Lucifer, let out an eerie shrike causing the other brothers halted in place as they can feel their body twitching uncontrollably as they feel an uncontrollable force making their body weak causing them to fall on their knees all expect Mammon who fought the effect of Lucifer’s shrike, as he makes his way to him.

He sees it in Lucifer’s eyes. Fear, panic and confusion in his eyes just remained when he was like this, not even fully changed yet, and he was terrified. But you were there with him before and after transformation to keep him company and you might know it, but you were his guide back to his sanity when he was lost in his own instinct, now you’re helping him with Lucifer’s own beast.

This time he’ll be the guide for his brother, now he towards over the avatar of pride subdue state, with the attend to remain him of the promise he made with him long ago.

“Lucifer” Mammon calls out to his brother with sincere and honest in his voice “I’ll still stand by you, Lucifer” He stop shrike, and look at Mammon with confusion in his eyes. “Remember what I said to you long ago, I never regret following you and never will we need you Lucifer."

Mammon, will not let this happen, losing him like this. not even in a fight.

But he didn't know that Lucifer can hear him and remember that night.

The night he took Mammon's advice, and that draw him back to his senses, as Mammon continue on.

"And if I have to beat that to your thick head to make you realize that we need you and how much you need me. I know you’ll never say it~”

“I do need you Mammon….” He’s eyes widen to hear Lucifer talk to him, even his like this “I…...I’m sorry…. for lying and…... everything”

He got to him. He knew that Lucifer can hear him.

Mammon chuckles to Lucifer’s apology, to think his never going to hear this from him once this all over.

Meanwhile Levi was the first one to get back on his feet, and witness what he always wanted. The two talking with out turning into an argument. With Mammon comforting Lucifer in his own way.

“Oi, you can’t say things like that here, what if Satan or Belphie hear ya” he getting through to him. “Lucifer, listen. We’re gonna stay in the cave until you get a hold of this. It’s too dangerous to go back home yet. Don’t worry I’m stay and help ya through this” he smiles with eyes at Lucifer.

“Your …... enjoying this aren’t you” even with the demonic voice, Mammon can tell that Lucifer sound tired. Maybe once there in the cave, he can tease his brother.

“y/n its okay, he’s calming down”

“Are you sure” he nodded in respond, so you lower you hand and sigh in relief. Then let the first and second be alone while check on the others.

Once the force of the pact was gone, Lucifer got up with his head hang low. Disappoint at himself for using the book, he thought it was necessary with Mammon’s state. He was wrong, then he looks up to see Mammon who is trouble maker, stepping up took charge, when he was gone. He might be mentally exhausted but he can clearly see how Mammon has grown.

Lucifer walk up to Mammon and lean his head on Mammon's Shoulder, and let out a satisfy squawk. Then he pat Lucifer on the head, just glad that his calming down

“Good to have ya back, brother”

Once he reaches the nest in the cavern, Lucifer flop in the center nest and immediately fell in sleep, while Mammon watch from the mouth of the cavern.

After making sure that Lucifer is fully asleep, he heads towards you and the rest of his brothers to entre way of the cave.

“How is he?” you ask as you walk over to him.

“he’s asleep, he would be tired after all of that flying after changing” he answering you, before puling you into hug and holding you tightly. “Make sure our room is clean, by the time we get back kay’” you hum in respond as you bury your face into him, and start sobbing. “Hey! Its not like I’ll be gone forever. It’ll be a week, or even least with Lucifer prideful head, keeping him in control.”

You look up to him with tears gathering in the corner of your eye. “I know, is just I couldn’t help to feel responsible to cause all of this” tears start fall, but Mammon use the back of his hand to wipe it off.

“y/n even if we didn’t go to the casino that night, I would have done everything to make sure your save and sound, you’re my treasure after all” you blush and hide your face in his feathery chest and he laughs at your action “Hahaha. Now who’s flustered now!”

“Shaddup”

“Oh my, your even talk like him. You really need this time to be apart” Asmo chipper in as he and Beel are getting ready to fly back to house.

“Come on normie! We can’t waste more time here anymore. I’ve missed three days’ worth of events and login~”

“Oi! You’re not going anywhere; you’re staying here with me and Lucifer.” Mammon cuts off Levi and quickly grab him by the helm of his jacket and drag him back.

“This so unfair!?! Why do I’ve to stay?”

“Welp we’re off” Satan grab hold on to Asmo, he and Beel with you and Belphie arm on each of his arm took off leaving a pleading Levi yelling to take him with you.

Once you all are far way from the cave Asmo flew closer to Beel, Satan start talking to you.

“Enjoy the next couple of days with no Lucifer, because once he and those two come home, expect your name to be written on the ceiling”

“Satan!” Asmo butts in “Lucifer wouldn’t do that to our little human, he might be cruel but he’s not that heartless”

Satan looks up to Asmo with a grin on his face, telling him that to eat his own words.

“I can’t believe you would do that to our human Lucifer!?! How could you!”

“Asmo, I will not hesitant to strung you up to, for giving a headache this early in the morning”

“So, Lucifer how’s it feels being back to chaos and piles of paper works”

“You two, better enjoy your freedom now. Because once Diavolo approve the use of the book. You’ll be first two are going to change and I’ll make sure of that”

After returning from that cave with Mammon and Levi, two days ago. Lucifer had been catching up with a week worth’s of reports, bills, and paper works.

Now Asmo is at his side nagging and Satan just being Satan, as he makes his way to staircase where him strung you up by the waist after finding out that it was you who drag Mammon at that Casino in the first place.

As he got there, he saw Beel looking up to where you are being hanged.

“Beel what are you~” he Immediately cuts himself off when he looks up to see that you were gone and the rope is cut. Satan and Asmo try not to laugh at the whole thing.

“Ah? Lucifer” he glances over to Beel who is holding a white feather in his hand. “I find this~”

“MAAAMOOON!”

At the roof of the house was you at Mammon arms just being at each other’s presences as you two heard Lucifer screaming his name.

“Looks like that our que to fly out of here”

“Where do we go?” as you ask Mammon lifted you up in his arms, and quickly shifted into his tame form.

“Where do ya want to go?”

You wrap your arms around his neck, lean in to kiss him on the cheek, then set you head on his shoulder.

“Anywhere, as long your there” he chuckles “ya got it, treasure” and take off, flying to the dark sky. Happy and content.

Fin

Note: I didn’t expect for this story to take this long.

[criminalmindzjunkie]

I Carry Your Heart With Me (Part One)

masterlist playlist

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Summary: Spencer and the reader are reunited for the first time in fifteen years. 

A/N: Very excited to get the ball rolling on this one. I hope you all enjoy it! Message me if you would like to be added to the taglist.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

Content Warnings: swearing

Word Count: 4.5k

“I cannot believe you talked me into this,” Damien mutters from the passenger seat, his icy blue eyes wide with fright. He pulls his gaze away just long enough to point at a lone cow grazing to the left of the road. “Look! That cow is just like… standing there. No fence around him or anything. What’s stopping him from stampeding into us the second we get out of this car?”

Damien sounds so genuinely horrified that you almost feel bad for laughing. Almost.

“I don’t think that’s going to be a problem, Dee. Besides, that cow didn’t even look up when we drove past. We’re not even on its radar.”

“Oh, yeah? Ever heard of a little thing called mad cow disease?” Damien persists, in typical dramatic flair. You roll your eyes at him and he curses underneath his breath. “You know, when I agreed to go with you to this wedding, I pictured something more akin to a five-star resort with a minibar and a heated pool. Not rogue livestock and shitty cellphone reception.”

“You didn’t agree to anything – you practically begged me to take you with me.”

Damien waves his hand, dismissive, his eyes still roaming over the pasture. “Because I wanted an excuse to take a week off work. This is not the controlled environment I expected.”  

“If you don’t quit complaining, I won’t hesitate to push you out of the car and leave you here with the cow,” you retort. In your periphery you’re able to make out Damien raising his middle finger to you. Rude.

You chuckle and fix your attention back on the dirt road. You’re driving almost painfully slowly, because the very idea of having to pay extra for damages to this already astronomically expensive rental car makes you feel nauseated. Despite your efforts, the car is covered entirely in dust. Its once pristine, white paint job has transformed into a muddy color.

There goes my deposit.

You shake your head at the thought. You had more pressing matters to concern yourself with; i.e., the fact that you were approximately five minutes away from coming face to face with the one person you swore you’d never speak to again. Two months seemed like ample time to prepare yourself in theory, but now that it is no longer some far-off thing, you know that your attempts at preparing yourself were in vain. With each day you crossed off the calendar leading to your departure date, your anxiety grew and grew until you worried your poor heart would give out under the stress. Getting onto the plane bound for Montana felt like the proverbial nail in the coffin, and a hefty dose of Dramamine was the only thing that kept you from spiraling as the plane ascended into the air. You slept through the entirety of the trip and, much to Damien’s chagrin, there is a sizeable puddle of drool on his left shoulder to prove it.

The lengthy nap helped. The tight band constricting your chest had loosened, and you pulled out onto the highway feeling refreshed and rejuvenated. You had Damien by your side and five vacation days to enjoy. Your best friend was getting married to the love of her life, and you were hellbent on standing by her side through it all. Spencer Reid can kiss your ass, as far as you are concerned. No way is he going to ruin this for you.

You are still very much clinging your take-no-shit mentality when you breach a hill and the ranch comes into view, effectively expelling every single positive thought from your head. Aforementioned anxiety reappears in full-force and you stomp down on the breaks.

“Fuck, I don’t think I can do this,” you squeak out, casting a look at Damien, whose eyes are trained on the sprawling expanse of the house ahead of you. “We can still turn around – no, we should turn around. There is no version of this that won’t end in me getting embarrassingly drunk and crying in front of everyone. I’m turning around.”

Damien’s hand on yours, strong and steady, is the only thing that keeps you from whipping the car around and retreating with your tail between your legs. His fingers pry your white knuckled grip off of the wheel slowly, his thumb rubbing reassuring circles across your skin. Its sweet and so overwhelmingly gentle that you’re a bit stunned. You glance at him in a silent question, as if to ask who are you, and what have you done with my friend?

He gets the message loud and clear, because of course he does. Damien fixes you with a smile, grip tightening on your hand.

“I’ve seen you hold your own against some of the biggest names in journalism on an almost daily basis – looking damn sexy while you do it, might I add,” Damien chuckles, and you can’t help but give a weak laugh of your own. Damien’s smile grows at this, and he continues, “If you can handle your business against those conniving pricks, I’ve no doubt that you can tough it out for this. You’re not the type of woman that lets some guy dictate what she does or doesn’t do. And you sure as hell aren’t the type of woman that would let some guy rob her of the opportunity to stand by her best friend on the most important day of her life. As the person who probably knows you better than anyone else on the planet, my opinion of you is pretty rock-solid, if I do say so myself. So, unless I’ve completely overestimated the extent of your badassery, I suggest you rethink that plan. What do you say?”

You avert your eyes and swallow against the lump in your throat.

“Spencer’s not just some guy. For a long time, I was convinced that he was the guy,” you whisper. The car is silent, save for the quiet crooning voice of George Michael flowing through the speakers. Damien squeezes your hand, prompting you to continue. You blink up at him with wet lashes, lips pulled into a sad smile. “Have you ever been in love?”

Damien shakes his head and rubs his thumb along the top of your hand. “I can’t say that I have, babe. Haven’t been that lucky.”

You let out a shaky breath and bring your other hand up to wipe at your eyes.

“Maybe you’re better off. I’ve only been in love once,” you gesture to your pitiful appearance and choke out a wet laugh. “Look where that got me. He fucking crushed me, and fifteen years later I’m still broken up about it. It’s pathetic.”

Damien frowns and shifts in his seat so that he’s fully facing you.

“I don’t want to hear you say that self-deprecating shit again. You were hurt by someone you gave your heart to, and I can only imagine how devastating that must feel. Being upset about seeing him again does not make you pathetic. The fact that you’re here, about to spend a week with the guy just so you can be there for Cassidy, is pretty damn admirable as far as I’m concerned.” Damien ends his monologue by pulling you into a tight hug, and you couldn’t be more thankful that he’d come with you. Not only was he a secret sweetheart, he also gave the very best hugs.

By the time he releases you, the tension in your chest has eased significantly. You nod once, and Damien’s rewards you with a smile.

“I am pretty cool, aren’t I?”

Damien snorts rather unattractively and rolls his eyes.

“I take back everything. You suck, and I don’t know why I bother with you, you narcissist.”

Now that the mood has lifted significantly, you reluctantly press your foot against the gas pedal.

“Too late. No takesies backsies,” you singsong. “You think I’m sexy and badass, and I’m never going to let you forget it.”

Damien mutters something undoubtably snarky underneath his breath, but it’s drowned out by the sound of gravel crunching underneath the tires. That, and the sound of your blood roaring in your ears as you inch further down the driveway.

The house, a beautiful log cabin with stone accents along the underside, is massive. Standing at two stories tall with a large wraparound porch and more than a dozen large windows, it’s a far cry from the modest little cabin in the mountains that Cassidy had made it out to be. Even Damien is slack jawed at the sight of it, sitting pretty against a back drop of rolling mountains, and you can’t help but feel a little smug.

“Still want to complain about that five-star resort?”

Damien shakes his head dazedly, “I retract my earlier complaint.”

All too soon, you roll to a stop and put the car in park. Several other cars are parked haphazardly in the grass around you, and that annoying voice inside your head wonders which one belongs to Spencer. It’s not that you care – you totally don’t – it’s just that you are kind of hoping that he hasn’t arrived yet. A few hours to acclimate to the environment before having to deal with him would be nice.

“You’ve got this, babe,” Damien murmurs. “And I’ll be with you the whole time, just in case you need a reminder.”

You flash Damien a nervous smile.

“You’re a really good friend, Dee. I’m really glad that you’re here,” you say, before narrowing your eyes at him. “If you tell anyone I said that, I’ll deny it.”

Damien snorts and pushes open the door.

“Get your sassy ass out of the car. I’m ready to mingle.”

As soon as you set foot on the porch, the front door flies open and a flash of curly red hair precedes a collision that nearly sends you flying back into the railing. Ecstatic squeals rip through the otherwise serene evening air and two boney arms envelop you into a tight hug.

“I cannot believe you’re actually here,” Cassidy laughs as she squeezes you tight. Her enthusiasm has you joining in, the two of you laughing happily and pulling back to examine one another. Cassidy places a sloppy kiss to both of your cheeks before throwing an arm over your shoulder. “I fully expected you to just blow off the whole thing, if I’m being honest.”

You cast at Damien, who’s watching on with an amused grin on his face.

“Believe me, she tried.”

Cassidy turns her attention to Damien and extends her free hand.

“I take it you’re the infamous Damien that I’ve been trading emails with?”

Your eyebrows scrunch together in confusion, “Wait, what? The two of you have been emailing?”

Damien accepts Cassidy’s hand and gives it a firm shake, all while smiling smugly.

“Yep. Me and Ms. Cassidy go way back.”

“I mean, that’s cool, I guess, but why?”

Cassidy and Damien share a look, both of them shrugging.

“Mainly to talk about you,” Cassidy admits, not even bothering to look apologetic. When you frown up at her she waves her hand dismissively at you. “All good things, I promise. Don’t worry your pretty little head about it.” Cassidy punctuates her words with a patronizing pat on your shoulder.

“I knew letting you two meet was a bad idea,” you grumble.

Cassidy simply drops her arms from its place on your shoulder in favor of tugging on your hand.

“Come on, sour puss. I want you to meet my husband. He’s a real sweetie – you’re gonna love him.”

A flash of white-hot panic shoots down your spine and you dig your heels into the floor.

“Wait,” you squeak out, eyes wide. “Is… Is he here yet?”

Cassidy’s eyes shine mischievously, briefly flitting up to Damien before returning to you.

“He is. And you’ll be happy to know that pictures do not do the Good Doctor any justice.”

Salt, meet wound.

“Don’t know why you’re telling me that,” you mutter.

“Denial is not just a river in Egypt, my friend,” Cassidy singsongs as she begins tugging you forward. For someone so tiny, she makes easy work of forcing you through the threshold.

The foyer is just as impressive as you expect it to be – beautiful cedar walls and a grand staircase that leads to the second floor. If you weren’t horribly on edge at the current moment, you would definitely comment on the fact that the foyer alone is probably larger than your entire apartment, but you’re too busy scanning the immediate area for tall skinny white guys with stupidly curly brown hair to comment on the grandiosity.

Cassidy leads the two of you to double doors to the right, and just as she’s about to push them open, the shrill ring of your cellphone offers you an out.

You slip your hand from Cassidy’s grip and give her a faux apologetic look.

“I should probably take this – it might be work.”

Damien narrows his eyes at you. “I thought you left your work phone at home.”

You ignore him and begin taking a few steps backwards, “Is there somewhere private I can go?”

An indiscernible look flashes across Cassidy’s face and then her lips pull up into a sugary sweet smile. “Follow the hallway to the very end. Leads to the back porch,” she says. “No need to rush. Take all the time you need!”

Okay, weird, you think to yourself, but the idea of putting off the inevitable for a few extra moments is too tempting to pass up, so you continue your retreat. You make it to the back door in record time and let out a relieved breath as you bring the phone to your ear.

“Hi, mom.”

“Hi, baby. I was just calling to make sure the two of you got there safely.”

You push open the back door and the breathtaking view of the ranch prompts you to take pause; sprawling fields and rolling hills as far as the eye can see, grazing livestock congregating near a lazy stream at the far end of the property, and several horses running across the expanse of the left field. It was wonderfully serene and vastly different from the bustling rat-race that was New York.

You smile to yourself when a loud moo rips through the otherwise quiet ranch. I could get used to this.

“Yeah, we made it,” you murmur into the receiver. “You would love this place, Mom. It’s probably the prettiest place I’ve ever been. I’ll send you a picture when I hang up.”

“How’s Cassidy? Still a little spit-fire, I assume?”

You lean against the railing and let out a snort, “Oh, absolutely. Don’t think that’ll ever change.”

“I’d hope not,” your mother hums. “How does Damien like the ranch?”

“He’s not exactly a fan of the livestock,” you chuckle. “Damien’s never even seen a real cow before. City boy through and through, that one.”

You and your mother share a laugh that dissolves into a comfortable silence. Comfortable, until the telltale clearing of your mother’s throat warns you of the impending inquisition.

“So,” your mother begins. “Are you going to tell me how it went, or are you going to leave an old woman wondering? “

You sigh and run a hand through your hair. “Fortunately, I have yet to run into him. I may or may not be hiding out on the back porch as we speak in an attempt to avoid just that.”

“Y/N,” your mother chastises. “Prolonging the inevitable isn’t going to make this any easier.”

“I know, I know. I’ll go in there soon. It’s just a lot, you know? I needed to take a breather, first.” Just until my hands stop shaking. Or until Cassidy comes hunting for me. Whichever comes first.

“I know, baby,” your mother coos. “I’m proud of you for trying. Just don’t drag things out, okay? You’ll only make yourself sick with nerves.” Unfortunately, that ship has sailed. The rolling in your stomach can attest to that.

           You laugh a humorless laugh, “I don’t know, Mom. You always like to remind me how stubborn I am. I’m sure if I put my mind to it, I can just avoid him for the entire week.”

           A tiny movement at the very corner of your vision and a loud creak makes you whip your head around, and what you see has your heart falling to your ass.

Spencer Reid, looking absolutely stunning in a pair of khaki dress pants and a white cable-knit sweater, sits in a porch swing with wide eyes and a book clutched tightly in his hands. Soft, caramel-colored curls frame his face and a five o’clock shadow runs the length of his jaw, adding a bit of grown-up flare to his otherwise boyish features.

He looks every bit as beautiful as he did on the day he broke your heart.

--

Spencer knows that he should have spoken up as soon as you walked onto the porch. It was immediately obvious that you hadn’t seen him, and he swears he’s one second away from clearing his throat and launching into the introduction he’d been planning for the last sixty days. But the words die on his tongue as he drinks in the sight of you.

You’re so close to him for the first time in years and it’s more than a little bit dizzying. And yeah, he’s used his very limited knowledge of how the internet works to Google you on more than one occasion, but the version of you leaning against the porch railing is a far cry from the pixelized one. A light breeze rolling through the air lifts your hair away from your face, and Spencer’s breath catches in his throat as he surveys every perfect inch, from the curl of your lashes to the smattering of freckles on your nose. He indulges himself, eyes settling on your cherry red lips, fascinated by the way they move as you talk on the phone. Spencer is intimately familiar with those lips – can recall the way they felt pressed against his own. The years spent apart have done nothing to dull the memories. He’s not entirely sure if that’s a good or a bad thing.

It amazes him how you’ve somehow managed to change a lot, but also not at all. You stand before him as an oxymoron personified, and it’s a lot for Spencer’s poor heart to take in. Your hair is a bit lighter than he remembers, as well as a little longer, but it still looks just as soft and he can recall with startling clarity how it felt when he used to run his fingers through it. You have a few more laugh lines than you did, as well as a scar on your left elbow that hadn’t been there before, but everything else about you is so painfully familiar that Spencer could almost pretend that no time had passed – that he still knows your body as well as he once did.

Spencer knows this isn’t true. Every seven years, the body resets; old cells destroyed and replaced with new ones. You’ve both spent enough time apart that your bodies have reset twice over. You’re as much of a stranger to him as he is to you.

Spencer positively abhors the thought.

The sound of your laughter pulls him from the depths of his mind, and while the laugh isn’t warm or inviting in the slightest, he relishes it. What was once one of his favorite sounds has existed in his head as only a memory for far too long. Hearing it in person is jarring in the best of ways.  

The euphoria he feels dies a horrible death when you speak again.

“I don’t know, Mom. You always like to remind me how stubborn I am. I’m sure if I put my mind to it, I can just avoid him for the entire week.”

Fucking ouch.

Spencer cringes hard, too hard, because the porch swing screeches out an angry creak and you whip around and holy shit, have your eyes always been that entrancing?

He watches as your entire body goes rigid, tensed as if you’re about to bolt. You blink hard, eyebrows drawn together to form an adorably bewildered expression as you assess him. Spencer hopes he doesn’t look too disheveled. He hadn’t even thought to freshen up after his trip, an oversight that he’s regretting terribly as your eyes flit over him.

Spencer isn’t sure why, but he stands up. Maybe it has something to do with feeling vulnerable. Maybe he just wants to close the distance. The two steps he takes towards you support the latter. He’s thankful that you don’t move away, but the blank expression on your face worries him.

The two of you stand five feet apart, but you feel worlds away. Spencer refrains from speaking for as long as he can stand, which is only about thirty seconds.

“Hi.”

Your lips part, and Spencer holds his breath.

“Hi.”

More silence. Spencer gulps.

“It’s good to see you,” he says, cautious. The last thing he wants to do is fuck up within the first five minutes. Unfortunately, his brain and his mouth seem to have some sort of disconnect, and Spencer continues against his better judgment. “It’s been a while.”

It’s been a while? That’s seriously the best I can come up with?

Spencer contemplates drowning himself in the nearby stream.

“It certainly has.”

“Five-thousand, five-hundred and seventeen days.” And roughly thirty-six and a half hours, but who’s counting?

Muted noises flow out of your phone speaker and you pull your eyes away from Spencer. He’s both relieved and devastated.

“Yeah, Mom, I’m fine. I just ran into someone. I’ll call you back later, okay?”

Spencer agonizes over the fact that he’s been reduced to someone while you and your mother exchange goodbyes. You’re smiling when you look up at him again, but Spencer’s seen what a genuine smile of yours looks like, and this isn’t it.

“I didn’t see you sitting there. My apologies.” Your formality makes the situation all the more excruciating.

Spencer lets out a nervous laugh, “I suppose avoiding me is out of the question now, huh?”

It’s hard to tell who’s more horrified by the words that tumble from his mouth, you or Spencer. A fierce flush spreads across your cheeks. It’s the first crack in your otherwise calm and collected exterior thus far and Spencer relishes in it. Maybe you’re not as unaffected by him as you seem.

“I… I’m sorry you had to hear that,” you stammer, blinking up at him with guilty eyes. “That wasn’t very kind of me.”

“Don’t worry about it. I can’t say that I’m undeserving of your anger,” Spencer whispers so quietly that he worries you don’t hear him over the gentle flow of the stream. The hardness that returns to your eyes lets him know that you heard every word.

You clear your throat, signaling your unwillingness to discuss that particularly painful topic. “You’re still partial to Cummings, I see.” You gesture to the book clutched tightly against his chest.

Now, it’s Spencer’s turn to blush. The book in his hands, tattered and worn from years of use, is incriminating. The two of you both know what lies just beneath the binding. The fact that Spencer has it with him now makes him think that he might as well be wearing a t-shirt that reads, I’M STILL NOT OVER YOU.

Spencer raises a hand to scratch at the back of his neck. “Oh, yeah. Old habits die hard, I guess.” His eyes scour your face for a sign of anything that might clue him in to you feeling the same way. A flicker of something dances across your face, but it’s gone so quickly that he can’t be sure if he imagined it. He forces a nervous smile. “If I remember correctly, he was your favorite.” It’s a shitty attempt at a joke.

You exhale a shaky breath and to his absolute horror, your lower lip begins to wobble. He wishes he could reach up and pluck his words from where they hang heavy in the air.

“Not anymore,” you murmur, and fuck if that doesn’t absolutely wreck him.

Spencer shouldn’t ask, but he can’t help himself. “Oh. Why not?”

He holds his breath, anxiously anticipating your next words. You seem to be battling with yourself, mouth opening and closing several times. Spencer is content to wait as long as it takes for you to answer, but the universe is much more impatient than he.

The door leading onto the porch swings open and out walks an honest to God Abercrombie and Fitch model. Or at least, a man who meets the qualifications and then some. Long, flowing blonde hair and a crisp white dress shirt makes Spencer’s unruly brown mop and dumpy sweater look pitiful in comparison. Spencer frowns.

“Sweetheart, you’ve been out here for like ten minutes,” the man chastises as he closes the distance between you and him. Spencer watches him wrap his arm around your shoulders and pull you to him like someone might watch a car wreck happen; with equal parts horror and morbid curiosity. “You can’t hide out forever.”

All traces of rigidity leave your body and you melt into the man’s side. It happens in such a way that screams familiarity, as if the pet name hadn’t already driven that point home. The awful, gut-wrenching realization slams home and Spencer has to fight to keep his knees from buckling.

“Uh, sorry,” you mumble, before nodding your head in Spencer’s direction. “Damien, this is Spencer Reid.”

The man’s – Damien’s - eyes go almost comically wide as they settle on Spencer’s dejected frame, before schooling into a cool indifference. He offers him a polite smile that’s a little tight around the edges, but doesn’t outstretch his hand.

“Ah, Spencer. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

Spencer swallows hard to keep himself from barking out a crazed laugh. He’s heard of me! That’s certainly something, considering the fact that no one thought it necessary to tell Spencer that you have a –

Spencer’s eyes dart down to your left hand. Thankfully, mercifully, your ring finger is bare.

“Uh, y-yeah. It’s nice to meet you.” The words burn as they roll off his tongue.

Damien nods at him before turning back to you. There’s an unmistakable fondness in the way he looks at you as he speaks. “Cassidy wants everyone back inside. They’re about to serve dinner.”

You smile up at him, not even casting a parting glance at Spencer before Damien leads you back inside. Spencer stands there long after the door closes behind the two of you.

The book feels heavy in his hands.

-

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taglist:  @is-this-even-important @evelyncade @usuck​ @m0rce1ddd​ @bauhousewife​ @whxt-to-write​ @spencerwaltergubler​ @lovesicksofi​ @idgafayiowf​ @shadyladyperfection​ @mercy-burning​ @sapphic-prentiss​ @itsmytimetoodream​  @m0rce1ddd​ @bauhousewife​ @whxt-to-write​ @spencerwaltergubler​  @enchantedcruelsummer​ @no-honey-no​ @inkstainedwritergirl​ @tnoh13​ @xxconfettiitsaparade​ @calm-and-doctor​ @muffin-cup​ @fortheloveofcriminalminds​ @arcticrory​ @holl2712​@themanwiththreephds @blameitonthenight21​ @stellabelle​ @me-a-hopeless-romantic​ @musicxlover97 @anightflower​ @andiebeaword​ @annesauriol​ @haylaansmi​ 

[team-free-will-you-idjits-67]

Ain’t My Fault

DESCRIPTION: Who knew dancing could changed everything forever? 

CHARACTERS: Dean Winchester, Reader

RELATIONSHIP: Dean Winchester x Reader

WARNINGS: SMUTTTTTT. Like, hella smut.

WORD COUNT: 1880

AUTHOR’S NOTE: HEYYO! This was a request from the lovely @rileynicole1967. She wanted me to write a one shot based off Zara Larsson’s song “Ain’t My Fault”. Well, it’s pretty dirty and based off the lyrics, thats exactly how it was meant to be. I did use lyrics from the song and they will be bolded within the story! I hope you enjoy it! 

MASTERLIST / DEAN WINCHESTER MASTERLIST

The boys had left, Sam to go see Eileen and Dean to go for a long supply run, so you dragged your small bluetooth stereo system out into the library. Your hips swayed along with the quick beat of a song you barely knew, the few drinks you’d had before this certainly helping your rhythm as you danced between tables. 

Halfway through the song, your glass of whiskey was empty. You continued dancing over towards the small rolling bar that Dean made sure was fully stocked with hard liquor. You bit your lip as you poured your whiskey, the amber liquid sloshed around in the glass partly from your dancing but also from the buzz that was building in your head. 

Soon enough, the song changed and Led Zeppelin’s ‘Communication Breakdown’ started playing. You fell easily into the familiar beat, closing your eyes as you roamed through the library, bumping into the tables as you danced. You sang every word, knowing it from your long night drives with the boys after hunts. You didn’t hear when Dean returned sooner than you expected. The music was too loud to hear the bunker door shut, Dean’s boots stomp against the metal stairs and him pulling out a chair from the map room table. 

You turned around, stopping mid motion when you saw Dean, feet propped up on the table and sipping a beer slowly. His eyes sparkled with mischief as he chuckled and said, “Oh c’mon sweetheart, don’t stop the show. I just got settled in to enjoy it.” 

You smirked with a soft blush raising to your cheeks, “Oh really, Winchester?” You began swaying your hips to the music again as you walked down the steps to the other side of the map room table. You set your glass down onto the lit up bench, and closed the short distance between Dean and yourself with sensual movements. You pushed his feet off the table and spread his legs to dance up close and personal to the eldest Winchester. You could see Dean gulp hard as his eyes fixed themselves to your face, “How are you liking this show?” 

His eyes trailed down your body, an action that normally would have embarrassed you but the whiskey clouded brain you currently had made you more confident in your decisions, “Oh, sweetheart. I’m enjoying it more than you would know.” He sat back in his seat, digesting the new side of you he was seeing. 

He shifted in his seat, moving his legs and accidentally tripping you. You fell into his lap and giggled, “You just made me trip, fall, and land on your lap.” 

Dean bit his lip softly and smiled, “See, you’re too irresistible to not be in my lap.” 

You repositioned yourself to face him and pushed your chest into his as you wrapped your arms around his neck, “Oh really, Winchester?” 

He eyed your lips, “Yeah, that’s for sure.” 

Crimson embarrassment quickly flooded to your cheeks as you debated giving in to the sexual tension that had been building between you two for months or ending this before it went too far. You looked down at his plump, luscious lips and decided, “Please don’t blame me for what ever happens next,” and dipped to connect your lips with his. 

You could tell he was surprised at first but soon his lips moved along with yours, getting hungrier for more the longer you kissed. You both grabbed at each other, pulling off layers of flannel before Dean wrapped his arms around your torso tightly and he stood up. You wrapped your legs around his waist as he walked through the bunker, feeling his erection grow with the increased pressure. 

He rounded the corner of his bedroom and kicked the door closed before throwing you on to his bed. You giggled as you bounced against the mattress but soon quieted as you saw Dean’s expression. His eyes were dark and shadowed with lust, his bottom lip was caught between his teeth as he inched his way towards you. 

Dean crawled up the bed and laid down beside you, caressing your cheek as his eyes darted between your y/e/c eyes and rosy, kiss swollen lips. It was almost like he was giving you the chance to back out, but with the effects of the whiskey fading, you realized you’d wanted this for awhile, you just never had the courage to give in to temptation. You pulled at his dark gray t-shirt, bringing him closer to you. Smiling, you looked at his lips and then leaned in. You melted into each other as you kissed, limbs entangled together, clothes grabbed and pulled, and soon enough you both laid in your underwear beside each other. 

You shifted, getting on top of Dean without breaking the kiss. Running your hands down his arms, you intertwined your fingers with his, pulling his hands above his head as your ground down onto his clothed member. Arousal pooled within your panties, soaking through the thin cotton as you continued your ministrations. 

Dean pulled his hands away from yours and wrapped them around you back. His fingers slipped around your bra band with ease and tugged at the clasps, undoing it quickly before removing it in one swift motion, all while never breaking your kiss. Your nipples hardened against the cool air now surrounding them, shifting Dean’s focus towards them as he felt them brush against his chest. 

His lips strayed from yours as he kissed down your neck to your chest. He took his time as he brushed his lips against your left breast before taking your nipple into his mouth softly. His tongue grazed against the soft, pink, bud as his fingers pulled at the opposite hardened peak. You arched your back from his touch, pushing your chest further into his face and hand. You ground your clothed core onto his erection once more, causing Dean to growl against you. Your smirk from his reaction quickly turned into a gasp as he nipped at your nipple and then flipped you onto your back. 

“You aren’t going to tease me anymore like that, babygirl.” He rutted himself against you with a smirk as you squirmed beneath him. “It’s your turn now.” 

You whimpered, “Oh c’mon Dean, I wasn’t teasing that bad.” 

He let out one, deep chuckle, “Doesn’t matter.” He made his way down your body, kissing your silky skin between every word, “What. You. Do. To. Me. Gets. Done. Twice. As. Bad. To. You,” before he settled between your legs. You squirmed, causing him to laugh quietly to himself, “Get ready, babygirl.” 

Dean kissed your thighs, giving attention to every paled scar, yellowing bruise, and bump from broken bones from hunting. Giving no attention to the area that you wanted him to. Arousal continued to pool and soak through your panties, which Dean soon noticed and bit his lip towards. “Damn, Y/N. Soaking already?” He ran a finger around the band of your panties with a smug grin, “I’ve barely touched you.” You shot daggers at him briefly for the comment but they went unnoticed. 

He slipped another finger through the waistband and slowly pulled your panties down your legs before throwing the wet fabric across the room, Dean’s focus followed your underwear until they landed on his desk. When his focus shifted back to you, he groaned when he saw your clit glistening below him. 

You blushed at his reaction and looked towards the ceiling to try and conceal your slight embarrassment, but Dean’s fingers grazing your slit made you look down towards him. He took his time, ignoring the arousal swollen bud that was in his face, tracing your entrance with his finger and gathering your slick on the tip. He turned his finger slowly, looking at the light bounce off his arousal covered finger. Plunging the finger into his mouth he closed his eyes and sighed, “Mmm, don’t you taste good.” 

You squirmed once again, “Dean, please.” 

He bit his lip as he looked up towards your face from between your legs, “Please what?” 

You growled in frustration. “You know what I wan-,” you cut yourself off with a gasp when Dean dipped his head and wrapped his lips around your clit. He sucked and licked at the nub slowly, as his fingers entered you lazily, both his mouth and fingers worked in unison to bring you towards your climax quickly.

You moaned beneath him, grabbing at the sheets as you felt the slow burn in your belly turn into a raging wildfire. “Dean,” you gasped out.

His mouth left your clit for a second so he could praise you, “That’s it. Be a good girl and cum for me, Y/N.” Dean’s lips wrapped around the bud once more as he worked his fingers slightly faster, waiting for you to come undone beneath him. 

“Fuck!” You moaned as you pulled at the sheets, your orgasm washing over you rapidly. Dean removed his fingers and swept his tongue through your slick, taking one last taste before he got off the bed to remove his boxers. You stifled a gasp as you watched his member bounce in the air from his waistband catching, the length and girth better than you imagined. 

He climbed back into the bed quickly and settled between your legs once more to line himself up with your entrance. His tongue peaked out between his teeth as he pushed into you slowly, both of you groaned until he was fully sheathed inside you, fitting perfectly. “Fuck,” he chuckled out. “Better than I imagined.” 

You giggled, “I could say the same to you.” 

Dean grinned and then began thrusting gradually falling into the perfect rhythm. The tip of his cock rubbed against your g-spot perfectly. Your fingers dug into his back, your nails leaving red trails down his bronzed skin, as another orgasm snuck up on you. You clenched around Dean as you came down from your high. Secondary waves washed over you, causing you to contract around him periodically, bringing him to his climax rapidly. His thrusts began to falter before he came with a grunt. 

He fell onto the bed at your side and pulled you towards him, kissing the top of your head as you shifted in his arms to lay your head against his chest. “Well,” he snickered, “That was something that I never thought would happen.” 

You buried your face into his chest with a giggle, “I told you not to blame me for what happened next.” 

He pulled away slightly and slid his hand beneath your chin to pull your face up to look towards his. “I would never blame you for this.” He looked into your eyes and placed a soft kiss to your lips, “This was something that I wanted, hell, I think we both wanted to happen for a while.” His eyes crinkled in the corners as a small smile crept onto his face before he pulled you into his chest, “This should have happened sooner.”

You sighed as you wrapped an arm around his waist, “It definitely should have.” 

It didn’t take long for you both to fall asleep within each other's arms for the first time of many to come. 

TAGLIST: 

FOREVER TAGS:

@emoryhemsworth , @nanie5 , @gabrielslittleangel, @alexwinchester23 , @witch-of-letters , @caswinchester2000 , @justawaywardwinchester , @thehufflepuffblog , @missihart23 , @spnfamily-alwayskeepfighting, @mogaruke, @supernaturalsammy01, @heyitscam99, @hobby27, @frozenhuntress67, @duskany, @mazie87 , @tumbler-tidbits , @mersuperwholocked-lowlife, @asfanfiction , @emilyshurley , @zephyrie , @ghostshadow1312 , @wholockmerlinlover, @singers-auto, @lokilove3112, @teddybeardoctorr, @sleepylunarwolf, @negans-lucille-tblr

DEAN/JENSEN X READER TAGS:

@xxtheoutsidersxx, @betsy-bradock, @adoptdontshoppets, @dean-winchesters-bacon , @jerkbitchidjitassbutt, @smoothdogsgirl

[logically-asexual]

Hold me like you mean it

summary:

Logan’s feelings for Virgil and the fact that now Virgil barely notices him are stopping him from getting any work done. Janus offers a way for Logan to cope, by disguising himself into Anxiety. but is this really what Logan needs? and what’s in it for Janus, anyway?

Alternatively, an angsty story about rejection, denial, and manipulation.

warnings: (for the whole fic) unrequited love, rejection, manipulation, unhealthy relationships, gaslighting, dependency, dubious consent and non consent for kissing, sad ending, depression (vaguely described), angst in general, nightmares, self harm. let me know what else i should add.

taglist: @gummibearbullet @chara-07 @the-sympathetic-villain @whatishappeningrightnow

Read on AO3

Chapter 7

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words: 1007

Janus’ room was as dark as usual. From where they stood, Logan could discern a bed, a nightstand, and the other Side with him, who was still looking at him with pity, and now had his palm resting on his cheek.

“I’m fine, Janus.” Logan tried, but the trembling of his voice and the tears building up in his eyes betrayed his intentions. Logan turned his face upwards, hoping to both prevent the tears from escaping and get out of the other’s hold. However, Janus quickly caught his head and pulled it back down with his other hand. Its thumb moved to press against the corner of his eye, coaxing the drops of fluid to fall. Logan winced from the pain, but relaxed slightly when the same thumb soothingly wiped the tears away.

“Tell me the truth.” It wasn’t a question.

Logan swallowed, and avoided Janus’ intense gaze. “You heard him. They don’t care about me. I made the greatest effort, tried the best I could, drawing upon all the knowledge I have about them, and I still made things worse. I always do. They don’t want me... Virgil doesn’t want me, and it’s my own fault.” He attempted to stop his voice from cracking again, but it was becoming harder with every word. “But I knew that already, and I got what I wanted, didn’t I? They never invite me in, but they listen when I speak. I have less work to do now, since Thomas gave up on following deadlines or a schedule, I don’t even have to try to participate in their games.” He began to feel the pain of his nails digging into his palms. “They don’t need more of me, I can spend my time on my own without dealing with the others’ antics. I wanted this. Isn’t that enough? Why isn’t it enough?!” He looked pleadingly into Janus’ eyes, blurred by the liquid in his.

“Because you’re stupid, dear.” The contrast of his words and the soft caressing on his cheek was confounding enough to stop his sobs. “We’ve been over this so many times. You don’t need them. You’re better than that, and you already have me.”

Logan exhaled, pondering what Janus said. He was right, he had helped him more than anyone else.

“If they don’t want to reciprocate your efforts, then why try?” Janus’ sweet voice almost made him dizzy. “If what you provide for Thomas without being there physically suffices, then why go out and exhaust yourself like this? It’s not fair to you.”

Logan sniffled, turning his head back again towards the ceiling. This time, Janus let go of it and moved his hands to his shoulders instead. He breathed shakily for a moment, letting the other’s words sink in. Then, he sniffled once more, and fell into his arms, crying freely against Janus’ shoulder.

He didn’t remember the last time he cried, not like this, but he was grateful to have Janus by his side now. Such a display of vulnerability was hard to bear, but he felt relieved nonetheless, and trusted Deceit to care for him.

Janus gently moved them to sit on the bed, with him leaning against the headboard and Logan still on his shoulder, and took his glasses from his face to set them on the nightstand. They stayed like that for a while, Janus petting his head as Logan let go all the tears he had been holding back.

Logan thought about the list of effects he had noted from Deceit's room. There, Janus could control lighting, sounds, his own appearance and voice to make disguises even more convincing than outside, and even the others’ movements, turning them to look where he wanted them to or stopping them from talking. But he couldn’t control Logan’s feelings. He knew. He knew this was all his own.

Eventually, his sobs died out, and he was able to breathe steady again, feeling too weak to move. When Janus noticed this, he cradled his face in his hands once again, and guided it to meet his gaze.

“You will be alright, sweetheart. As long as you’re here, you are safe.” He punctuated the statement with a cold kiss on Logan’s forehead.

After a pause, he shifted his position to get a little closer, and pressed his lips delicately to each of his cheeks. The cool touch was a strong contrast to the warmth of Logan’s face, but in his dazed state, he made no move to stop him. Another pause. Logan closed his eyes, letting the last teardrops fall as Janus finally sealed their mouths together.

Logan tiredly kissed back, the way he had learned throughout the past couple months, and barely flinched when he felt Deceit’s forked tongue lick his lips. Without thinking, he opened his mouth, and felt his mind fog as he let him continue.

Janus wasn’t wearing a disguise, he reminded himself of that, but he found that he didn’t care. It had been a while already that he had wanted Janus more than he wanted the original object of his attraction, seeing through his mask, no matter how convincing. Logan just hadn’t fully accepted it, but it was evident. He liked his sarcasm, his determination, his sweet words, the way he would gently take Logan’s glasses off and tell him he didn’t need them when he was with him. The real Virgil he had been pursuing was nothing like that.

He raised his hand to carefully brush his fingers against Deceit’s scales, the sensation just as eerie as it was comforting. Without breaking the contact, Janus pushed him slowly to lay back on the pillow and kept kissing him, stealing his breath with every movement of his tongue.

Logan couldn’t tell how much time had passed when Janus finally pulled away, but he was too drained of energy to mind. He opened his eyes, and was met with complete darkness, now only able to feel the bed underneath him. He took a deep breath and gave in to slumber.

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notes: i had been daydreaming what happens here for months and it's what inspired me to write the entire thing lol. i hope you guys like it.

also check out this little drawing i made of this chapter 👀

[subwalls]

Tales from the SMP Presents: The Pit

Another Tales, another Kingdom Hearts comparison post! “The Other Side” is a mix between the soundtrack The Other Promise and the cinematic “Another Side, Another Story” (both of which come from Kingdom Hearts, of course), which evokes a very specific KH character that... yeah. So let’s get into it.

Karl gets stabbed by the king’s new general and finds himself back in the Inbetween. A cool new logo pops up as we enter the Inbetween, which actually is a... very typical example of a Kingdom Hearts world logo / intro card / name card? I honestly don’t know what it’s called, it doesn’t have a name, it’s just a thing that happens every time the character enters a new world.

Castle Oblivion is just one (1) example, but if you just look up “Kingdom Hearts worlds” and scroll a bit, you’ll see what I’m talking about, haha. This doesn’t really change anything, it’s just another little wink and nod to the Kingdom Hearts series.

... Except, of course, the fact that there’s a title placard for this world implies the existence of other worlds. Which we eventually find out is, in fact, true. Fun! There’s a number of associations I could make based off the aesthetic of the logo (the castle reminds me of Radiant Garden, etc) but honestly they’re not worth much without more information.

So, the Inbetween is vividly aware of Karl’s straying from “the path”. It makes a huge attempt to still be pleasant and “nice” and whatever, but we can tell quite obviously that there’s an undercurrent of threat under all those pretty quartz blocks and smiles :]

Speaking of the :] smile, the reveal of Quackity’s previous lore stream actually doesn’t push me to think that it’s directly related to him in any way. It’s not impossible that c!Quackity achieved such heights as... becoming? The Inbetween? Because he’s got reason to be invested in Karl’s powers and keeping him in line. But it’s a reach or long-term thing at best, honestly, so I’m shelving the Quackity-smile association until further evidence appears.

(I could go bonkers and say that this is the culmination of c!Quackity’s ascension after ripping Information out of Dream or even XD, but that’s well into AU territory, so it’s all just shrug emojis for now.)

Which, of course, leads to the question of who that smile actually is associated with, and I think as clear an answer as we’re going to get is... The Inbetween itself. Clearly.

There’s a lot of meaning I could take from that; is it associated with Dream or XD then? Or maybe is it tapping into Karl’s memories of c!Dream doing the :) thing and it’s appropriating that for itself? Why? To intimidate Karl into obeying it?

Mayhaps. Mayhaps!

Anyway, Karl goes up to the tree, and as he approaches, the video feed distorts as the game abruptly switches to a higher-level shader like BSL or something.

Now, I haven’t confirmed it, but the way the audio shifts makes me think it suddenly started playing backwards, too. It’s just the way it sounds; it’s got that... sucking effect that’s pretty typical of musical tracks played backwards.

Karl swims down to the hidden room, which is very dark now. There is a book that tells him to go up the ladder for a surprise.

Also, by the way, I’m back on my wither rose pot association brainrot, because I can’t help but notice that there isn’t one here. There was one in the previous Inbetween segment, but it’s gone now. Now there’s a new book with the :] smiley, which of course should set the audience on edge, since we just saw the first book use it in a... mildly threatening manner.

We know that in Dream SMP it’s a pretty common thing to use redstone as blood. Other characters have used it in bits, some more seriously than others, and I think that’s what this room is trying to emulate.

If I had to guess, I’d... hm.

A part of me wants to say that the blood is probably from the different versions of Karl wandering around. Nobody’s going to notice if a few abruptly take a swerve to bleed themselves out in a room or something, right? But that carries a lot of implications, namely that of control so perfect it borders on possession. So either the Inbetween can control Karls, or it has some other agent capable of dragging something into this chamber to bleed it all over the room.

Neither of those options are particularly nice, I’ll admit!

There’s no Kingdom Hearts associations here, by the way. Due to being so closely tied with Disney, KH is deathly allergic to portraying blood in any way lmao. Not so many messages carved into the walls.

Or painted onto the walls with blood, if that’s what that is. Color correction gets a bit odd with shaders, so I’m not saying anything for certain; the closed books don’t look enchantment-purple, for example.

What does catch my eye are the torches, which will later be the flickering lights that guide Karl to the portal. The fact that they are here makes me think that this was definitely the scene of either a battle or some other conflict between the two sides to this story (haha, get it, Another Side, Another Story, because that’s a Thing in KH—), or at least proves that an influence from The Other Side was here at some point in time.

Karl quickly gets the fuck out of there, and when he swims back to the surface the shaders/music switch back to normal.

Oh, and for all you people who like to point fingers at anything vaguely false and scream “that’s gAsLiGhTiNg!!!1!!111″ about it, here’s an actual attempt at gaslighting. Note the language used here: “Your mind seems to be playing tricks on you :]”. It’s explicitly trying to convince him not to trust his own senses and mind. It’s saying, let me think for you. And that is a very dangerous thing.

Wither rose pot exists again, yay. Definitely a Inbetween voice, this book.

More wither rose book, this time in the, uh, grand entrance hall? The lobby? Yeah.

This book basically goes on a spiel about how the Inbetween is so great for Karl (a declaration, by the way, rather than a hope) and says that he is doubting himself or being less like himself, which is odd, because what he’s really doing is doubting the Inbetween and the path it has laid out for him. In a way, by questioning the Inbetween, Karl is being truer to himself than anything else.

The malicious way this place frames its words becomes more and more obvious with each passing page; it again reminds him that it’s a place to be “feel at ease”, which is super sketch that it has to tell him outright rather than actually being that place. It continues attempting to gaslight him, telling him that his imagination is getting away from him and that he can’t trust himself or anything else but this “path”.

I’ll get back to the “path” thing in a minute, but I really want to drive home that this is the truest instance of gaslighting we’ve ever had on the Dream SMP. Nothing has ever so clearly declared that it must be trusted over the victim’s own senses, practically infantilizing the victim’s concerns and trying to make them think that their worries are just flights of fancy. Please, please keep this in mind any time you want to accuse a character of gaslighting in the future; not all psychological abuse is a form of gaslighting. Sometimes it’s just... abuse. It’s not any more or less worse than gaslighting, it’s just different.

Anyway, about the “path” that the Inbetween is so obsessed with. No idea what the fuck that’s talking about.

In Kingdom Hearts, the only paths that are really of import are is a specific character’s “road to dawn” (redemption without fully yielding his edginess, essentially) or the “paths” that characters take to traverse between different worlds. I really don’t think the Inbetween has anything to do with either of them, but I’ll leave the options there if you want to peruse the possibilities.

What’s more likely, I think, is that this is a vaguely more subtle version of control/possession. The “path” is just “whatever the Inbetween wants you to do”.

Our next book is from the other side, and is plastered nonchalantly but boldly against the wall with no flower pot or anything.

Karl picks it up, puts it in his inventory (which probably indicates that he’s keeping this particular route close to his heart, rather than whatever the Inbetween is trying to make him do), and then the video stutters and he teleports back to the main entrance.

There’s a new book. It’s spooky as fuck, and hilariously hypocritical.

The tone shift is immediate, of course, aided by the abrupt change in background music since he got teleported back here. (I can’t quite nail it down; I assume it’s a slowed KH track like the others, but it doesn’t quite ring any bells for me.) The way the Inbetween speaks through these books has changed too, though; it addresses him by name without any attempt to cover up its intentions with flowery softness.

It does a cool fun thing where it says that it knows more than Karl, and knows what’s right, and then goes on to say that those visions shouldn’t dictate his opinion on the inbetween. (I’m keeping an eye on that lowercase, by the way. Not sure if it’s a typo or intentional, since it’s still one word, but.) As though he should trust the Inbetween’s opinions of itself rather than his own brain? A’ight. Sure, Jan.

Again it tries to tell him that it’s safe here. The lying is getting more transparent now.

He puts this book back, the previous book back, and runs after a double of himself until the shaders and music glitch again.

Fun thing about shaders is that they make dark areas... much, much darker. Especially since we saw that Karl’s got night vision (the effect, for cinematic purposes) on.

The music has a few notes that again sound as though they’re being played backwards.

The book on the tree in this courtyard does not come with its own little wither rose pot, and neither does it seem to come from the Inbetween, since it’s telling him some awful things about these other versions of himself.

It confirms a few things about the mystery other selves, namely that they’re definitely condemned to walk the castle forever, but it doesn’t really tell us why this happens or why the Inbetween (probably) wants this to happen. What’s the end goal?

We’re probably a bit early in the story to figure that out, but they’re questions worth keeping in mind as this storyline progresses.

Karl gets teleported back to the main lobby, which looks very dark and spooky, though in the transition we do see a glimpse of that portal. There are torches around the wither pot book pedestal, and the audio really kicks into high gear with the creepy notes and the visuals get stretched and glitch quite a bit as he opens the book.

Funnily enough, the audio kind of reminded me of some pokemon encounter music, but I think that’s just because I’ve got those notes wired into my brain from years of playing those games. Anyway! The book tells him this is not a warning, and that they’re gonna fucking come for him to make sure he sticks with their path.

“We”.

Who is “we”? Is the Inbetween a collective? Is the Inbetween just part of a different whole? Maybe it counts all the different Karls as a part of it.

Either way, it’s creepy and threatening. Karl starts running; the screen glitches and tells him to follow the torches, which at first I was kind of leery about trusting, but the next series of words helped clear up exactly what side those words are on.

Also, you’ll notice that some other text kinda skitters across the screen before the English, like it’s getting translated. I think it’s Galactic, which is something different from the thing that Ranboo uses for Ender? I think Ranboo uses the Alien language thing or something? I’m not 100% sure on that, feel free to correct me and I’ll fix this portion.

It certainly implies that the speaker isn’t communicating in the server equivalent of “common”, however. Not sure if they’re translating into English or if Karl inherently understands it and it’s translated into English for the audience’s convenience, but either way, the other speaker might be linked to something completely different.

Karl runs on with encouragement and creepy music until he finally arrives at the portal, which is not barred off like it was last time. Thanks, whoever’s responsible for that!

The music dies for this final book.

The Inbetween’s last-ditch attempt to make him stay. It calls him silly a couple of times, and smiles at the end with a :]

Problem is, we and Karl already know that staying with the Inbetween will keep him from his friends. And the voice tells him to leave for his friends.

Karl looks around at this place that calls itself his sanctuary, and makes his decision.

He arrives at The Other Side.

The music appears to be drawn from parts of either The Other Promise or Roxas’ Theme, both of which are heavily tied to the character known as Roxas. The version that Karl uses is slower and lower, the same as with the Dearly Beloved track he uses for his Inbetween segments.

Honestly, I’m not as certain on this as I could be, because I couldn’t find the exact variation on Youtube and there are parts that could just be Emotional rather than Roxas-related, I’m not sure. I’ll probably come back and fix this if it’s untrue.

EDIT: Yeah, uh, it’s Ven’s theme, not Roxas’, but the world itself is still heavily associated with Roxas in naming themes.

For now, I’m going off the assumption that the decision to make both the name and the theme of this world relevant to Roxas is purposeful, which means I’m... going to attempt to explain who Roxas is and what his story is.

Oh boy.

To grossly oversimplify the situation, Roxas is a “part” of Sora who develops his own sense of identity, is betrayed, gets coerced into murdering his best friend, gets kidnapped, gets memory wiped, and then—when he gets his memory back and realizes he super hates his captors—is convinced by those same captors to give up his existence because he “isn’t a real person” and if he lives then Sora will never wake up. So he “dies” and becomes a part of Sora again until later.

(Sora, by the way, is asleep due to the events in Castle Oblivion, which you might recognize as That Place I Keep Associating The Inbetween With.)

He’s also a fan favorite lmao. Take from that as you will, and, I don’t know, flip through his wiki page or something. Can’t guarantee it’s all understandable though.

My point to bringing Roxas up is that his arc... kind of parallels Karl’s. He did his job working for superiors he didn’t really understand in a white castle, with the higher-ups trying to control him, until he realized he was losing his friend/s to them. At that point, he defects. I think this is the point that Karl has reached, in his own storyline. He’s pulled away from the thing that’s made itself known to him, and now he’s wandering down something that hopefully isn’t as awful as the beast he’s just left behind.

Roxas also doesn’t get his happy ending for a long, long time.

Let’s hope Karl is different.

Off the top of my head, I can tell you that the mood this world creates is very reminiscent of some areas that the Kingdom Hearts games explore in 0.2 (yes, zero point two, that is the number of that game. This fucking series, man), specifically Castle Town, in which the player character has to smack a bunch of clock gears to make time go backwards in order to proceed, which is fun. But no exact inspirations come to mind the same way that Castle Oblivion did for the Inbetween.

Until we get a better look at the interiors, I’m going to gently claim that this build is more original and doesn’t take inspiration quite as directly from a Kingdom Hearts source, so there might not be an exact parallel. There isn’t a black castle in Kingdom Hearts that I can think of, honestly.

Also, I will say that I’m going to take this episode as confirmation that the wither roses are associated with the Inbetween and appear next to books that come from / are related to the Inbetween, especially since The Other Side associates itself with a completely different flower: the white tulip.

Anyway, The Other Side tells him he’s home, and that they’ll explore more soon.

This... eerily parallels the Inbetween, which told him that he’s safe, and has lots to explore.

I can’t say that I immediately trust The Other Side, but neither can I say that I inherently distrusted it the same way I did with the Inbetween. We’re going to have to wait and see how this place behaves in future episodes to get a good grasp of it. Who built these places? Are they alive, and writing the books, or is there a mastermind behind them? We still don’t have a lot of the answers, but that’s okay.

For now, I’m content to know that Karl is away from the more obvious perils of the Inbetween.

It could still be a trap, but for now, it’s a refuge.

[chalkrevelations]

Word of Honor Ep 6, and let’s talk a little about what’s canon, and what’s not, and about the particular slip-slidiness of the line between them on this show.

But first, due diligence: If you are NEW or JUST VISITING, this is a re-watch, so you’re going to find SPOILERS not just for this ep, but for the entire show. Scroll away and come back later if you haven’t seen all 36.5 eps and want to watch unspoiled. Also, heads-up, this got super long, because I had to talk about that stuff up there and then still talk about the ep. Hashtag long post (remorseful).

So, “canon,” as applied to fannish source material (in Western fandom, at least) traditionally has been considered the official stuff – the episode, the book, the comic, the movie – based on the religious definition of  “canon,” the collection of texts accepted as genuine and official within a religion. The word “fanon” – widely accepted fannish ideas – plays on this, as does the fandom concept of “word of God,” or things the Creators have said about the text but outside of it. Is it in the show as it aired or the book as it was printed? Canon. Is it not in the show as it aired or the book as it was printed? Not canon. (Apocrypha? Maybe. Anyway.) Generally, I think we’d say that things like material in the first draft of a script that doesn’t make it through revisions and onto the screen isn’t canon, even if you can get your hands on a copy of the first draft. The final product that airs is what’s canon. BUT this gets super slippery in something like WoH, in a way that’s exemplified in this episode. This ep is one of the places where people who can lip-read Chinese have spotted some significant dialogue changes between what the actors say on-screen and what lines have been dubbed in. (Everybody’s dubbed in cdramas, it’s just the thing that happens. You have your on-screen actors, and you have your voice actors. The ONLY person in The Untamed who did his own voice dubbing, for instance, was Ji Li, who played Nie Huaisang. All the other characters had voice actors dubbed in. In fact, the voice actor for Jiang Cheng in The Untamed is the voice actor for Wen Kexing in WoH.) One of the descriptions of WoH that I’ve heard is that this show was filmed as a bl and dubbed as a bromance. The thing is, nobody tried very hard to hide the shift. There are plenty of places that you can clearly see the actor’s mouths don’t match the dubbing, and they’re not artfully shot or edited to hide this. They’re fully on-screen, mouthing words that don’t match, right out in the open, almost like they want to you to pick up on it. Almost like it’s canon, because it’s right there on-screen, aired in the episode. In my first-watch reactions to Eps 36 and 37, I talked a lot about how the dubbing puts a layer of de-queered no-homo over what the on-screen actors are saying in these places, but if you can see what they’re actually saying and understand it, does that make it canon? What does it mean, both textually and meta-textually, if you can’t believe what you’re hearing – what you’re being told – because it contradicts what you’re seeing? How does that affect what we’re told about Our Protagonists and its “truth,” particularly in the final scenes? How much is the show deliberately working against censorship in this way? How much is it teaching us to look deeper than what we’re hearing on the surface?

Several people have talked about what’s actually being said by the on-screen actors in places where this happens, and I’m going to direct you to AvenueX on Youtube if you want a complete overview, because she’s reliable and has a good compilation that’s easy to find. She has a couple of videos called “Lip Reading for Sugar,” and the March 9, 2021, installment includes the Ep 6 incidences, the most significant of which are: At 3:05 in the ep, when WKX throws himself on Zhou Zishu’s back during the zombie Drug Men attack, calls him “mom,” asks ZZS to carry him, and tells “mom” that “your shoulder blades are the most beautiful.” Only no, Gong Jun didn’t say this, if you watch his mouth compared to the sound of the words. Instead of “niang” (mom), he says “Zhou Zishu.” Twice. “Zhou Zishu, carry me.” “Zhou Zishu, your shoulder blades are the most beautiful.” This is not only important because it emphasizes he’s gay for Zhou Zishu’s shoulder blades, but also because he’s fucking baked on Drunk Like A Dream incense when it happens, and later, ZZS will reveal that Drunk Like a Dream makes you see what you most desire, and he’ll confront WKX about how he “kept calling” someone’s name while he was under the influence of it. This makes no sense with the dubbing we get, because with “mom” dubbed over ZZS’s name here, WKX only calls Zhou Zishu’s real name once while he’s under the influence, at the end of ep 5. That is not kept calling. ANYWAY, once WKX clears his head and flies them away from the Drug Men, back to the a lakeside, there’s another disjunct at 5:05, when the dubbing has WKX tell ZZS not to play hero, that he doesn’t lose face if WKX helps him, and ZZS responds with something about your grandmother’s bear, which AvenueX tells me is a real Chinese idiom, although not for what. What Gong Jun and Zhang Zhehan appear to actually have said, though, is that WKX tells ZZS that this was just like a hero saving a beauty, with the implication that ZZS is the beauty, the damsel in distress, and ZZS respons that no, it’s like the beauty saving the hero, without a lick of concern that he’s the beauty, the damsel, in this scenario, just that he did all the work killing Drug Men and now this asshole is going to act like he’s the one who did the saving. At 31:24, dubbing has WKX telling ZZS that he’ll give ZZS whatever he wants if ZZS can get him some of the Drunk Like a Dream, but AvenueX tells me that he actually offers his body in exchange, in a way that implies marriage. And at 32:22, when ZZS asks WKX what he saw under the influence of the Drunk Like a Dream, the dubbing gives us some random story about baby WKX throwing a rat on his mother’s bed, while Gong Jun’s mouth seems to be saying something something about being in the bridal chamber with his beloved … so circling back to our first instance at 3:05, WKX using Zhou ZIshu’s name is now super-interesting, eh?

Another slip-slidey point of canon here is that there are two versions of this episode. The original version didn’t have the rabbit-washing scene. That was an extra that was inserted later into a Special Version ep when Youku reached 2 million subscribers. But the Special Version is now available on Youku’s channel (it’s the one I watched for this re-watch), AND it’s the regular version that’s on Netflix. So at 25:28, we now get this adorable little scene where ZZS and WKX are cleaning two rabbits in the lake before cooking them, and WKX splashes ZZS who pretends to be irritated before splashing WKX back and running away up the riverbank, chased by WKX. It’s flirty and playful and ALSO a foreshadowing of the flashback we’re going to see in a later ep, when they play together for an afternoon as children. Wasn’t canon before. Now it is.

Anyway, even with the (bad) dubbing that we get, this is a fantastic WenZhou ep. We open with them still being menaced by the zombies Drug Men, with a lot of swordwork by ZZS before he starts flagging because of his Nails Issue, whereupon WKX instantly sobers up, goes Evil Ghost Valley Master on Imposter Hanged Ghost who’s controlling the Drug Men, kills him with his Fan of Death, then scoops up ZZS and flies him off to a lake, where he attempts to tenderly check ZZS’s pulse and take care of his wounds before ZZS slaps away his hand like an offended maiden. WKX has to give him the qi smackdown in order to hold him still to :coff: pull down his robes and suck out the poison from the Drug Men scratches on the back of his shoulder. :hands: I remember the first time around, watching this with my mouth hanging open, demanding to know the heterosexual explanation for this. (Also, if you’re rummaging on Youtube, the Five Straight Guys Watching Word of Honor for this ep is not to be missed. They’re a little questionable in their reaction to the poison sucking, but before that, they’re a bunch of squeamish babies over using the dagger to further slice open the wounds to get to the poison, and it’s HILARIOUS. They can’t even look at the screen once the dagger comes out, hiding behind their hands. I love them, more and more as the eps go on, but they are WEAK compared to even the newbiest hurt/comfort fangirl.) There’s some more back and forth between WKX and ZZS about revealing their true selves to each other, no you, no YOU. WKX makes it clear that he knows there’s something really wrong with ZZS, and then they fight, set to romantic music, and ZZS ends up falling in the lake. I do the victory arms (  \o/  ) to myself where I’m sitting on the couch and startle one of the cats, because FINALLY we’re going to get rid of that execrable fake facial hair. ZZS fucks with WKX by staying underwater long enough that WKX panics and also dives in, we get some really cheap and awful underwater effects, and ZZS reveals his face! They end up back on the edge of the lake, drying their perfectly dry outer robes, while they sit around the fire together in their perfectly dry inner robes, but I am not going to complain because y’all. I CANNOT with how smug and pleased ZZS is for just a moment about WKX mooning over how pretty he is. Then he remembers to be an ill-tempered gremlin and pokes at WKX with a flaming stick, but I had to rewind four times just to catch that little moment of satisfaction about being admired again – it’s subtle and gorgeous and Zhang Zhehan is going to kill me with his face one of these days. ZZS demands dinner on this date, and fake-coughs pitifully to get WKX to go hunt something down, while he stays and does his delightful little thinky face as he pokes at the Soul Winding Box they got from Imposter Hanged Ghost. Then we get a shot of WKX looking at ZZS before he heads off to catch some rabbits that confirms he now knows he’s really Zhou Zishu, rather than Zhou Xu.

So, we’ll get back to the Ghost and the Box in a minute, but I do want to mention that this whole ep is layered through with mini-references and thematic stuff. Imposter Hanged Ghost rings his little bell to control his Drug Men, and remember that, we’ll see that again. WKX asks if ZZS came from the Healer’s Valley when ZZS offers him an antidote to the Drug Man poison; we learn later that WKX, himself, is the one who came from the Healer’s Valley. When ZZS gets the Soul Winding Box open and finds a piece of the Glazed Armor inside (Danyang’s, taken off of Ao Laizi by Ghost Valley before he was hung at the gate of Sanbai Manor), he gives it to WKX, tells him to throw it away if he doesn’t want it. WKX says he couldn’t possibly, and that he’ll wear it because it’s his first gift from A-Xu. Compare this to the way Xie’er will wear Awful Yifu’s Glazed Armor around his neck. We also see some of the thematic and referential stuff come up in conversations that form a repeated pattern in this ep of ZZS stressing what a bad and dangerous person he is: He scoffs at the idea he’s from Healer’s Valley, and asks if he looks like someone who practices medicine; WKX responds that he looked like a professional killer (true) who was cruel in the abandoned temple (presumably while escaping Mirror Lake) and frightening to a kind-hearted man like WKX who can’t even kill a chicken (particularly amusing given the prep for New Year’s dinner in a later ep, when WKX is the only one who CAN). At the lakeside and again after ZZS hightails it away from Sanbai Manor when they spot Han Ying there (HAN YING, my beloved), WKX asks if ZZS is a fugitive, what he’s hiding from, and says that he’ll protect him – by reason, because would he kill anyone unreasonably (omg, where to even begin? How many guys have you choked out at this point)? When they’re arguing about ZZS revealing his “true” face, ZZS warns that most people who’ve seen his real appearance are dead (probably true). WKX says he’s not afraid of death (not his own, at least, we’ll see that the thing he’s afraid of is ZZS’s death). ZZS warns WKX that he’s not only sharp-tongued, he’s ruthless (true). He tells WKX that he’s murdered many people (true) and set them on fire (not unlikely, frankly) and committed many crimes (true, in a way, although they were state-sanctioned, making them legal, if morally reprehensible). This is the ZZS who put the Nails in himself, who talks to himself about what a truly awful shixiong he is, who tells Prince Jin that he’s only good as a weapon. I like how we see this at the same time that we’re starting to see the side of him that’ll preen when someone thinks he’s pretty - this is a process, and it’s subtle, not as high-drama as WKX’s, but it’s there, nonetheless.

We also formally meet Xie Wang in this ep, artfully posed and playing his pipa among the bodies – old and new – of Zhao Coffin Home. He and Changing Ghost have a bit of a slapfight over whose fault it is that Imposter Hanged Ghost, who was actually Long-Tongued Ghost, got killed and got his (Danyang’s) Glazed Armor took by WKX, when Changing Ghost stole it from Ao Laizi, put it in the Soul Winding Box and gave it to Long-Tongued Ghost specifically to deliver it to Xie Wang. Xie Wang is super cool through all of this, and I think we get a sense of how deadly he is by the way Changing Ghost backs down. So, here’s what’s falling together: Some iteration of Ghost Valley is working with Xie Wang and the Scorpion Sect, giving the Scorpions access to the Soul Winding Threads, which we saw used at the Mirror Lake massacre and in the woods outside of Sanbai Manor to kill Yu Tianjie in the last ep. Via Xie Wang, Ghost Vally has access to use of the Drug Men, which we’ve seen at the Zhao Coffin Home (so far), although we haven’t yet been told (I think) how Xie Wang got access to the potions to create Drug Men (we also know ZZS read about Drug Men in a book somewhere, and got enough info to engineer an antidote to them). Xie Wang and the Scorpions have access to Drunk Like a Dream incense, which had to come from Prince Jin’s court, having been engineered by ZZS based on a much stronger formulation. Han Ying, from Tian Chuang in Prince Jin’s court, has been seen at Sanbai Manor, Zhao Jing’s place.

Meanwhile Chengling is doing poorly, with no appetite and getting bellowed at some more by Shen Shen, who would be the worst if only I didn’t know everything I know, which makes me cringe when Zhao Jing refers to Chengling as “my son, now.” NO. RUN, Goldbean. For some more thematic and referential stuff in this ep, WKX calls Chengling a “lonely chick with no one to rely on” and tsks over the fact that he’s “surrounded by hounds smarter than foxes” now that he’s under the care of the Five Lakes Alliance. This is clearly to manipulate ZZS into thinking Chengling is better off with ZZS, but it also sounds like an awfully apt description of Zhen Yan in Ghost Valley. I’m just sayin’.

[putas-in-suffering]

Take Me To The Moon

Pairing: EZ Reyes x Latina!OC (Original Character)

Rating: Explicit, NSFW 18+ older

Warnings: Language, lap dancing, grinding on EZ’s massive body, vague descriptions of sex, the real warning here is that EZ is getting a lap dance with a full on erection and he can’t do anything about it (the horror! 🤭)

Word Count: 3.4K

Summary: We’re taking a peek into the private room that Luna led EZ to. Did sparks fly? Or did EZ just end up getting exactly what he paid for?

A/N: Our sucias asked and we delivered! We got front row seats to the show Luna decided to put on for EZ. It’s got us jealous and ready to secure some clear heels for that stage because we want a man like EZ in our private room all day 😜! Annnnnnd, your putas have been feeling this Stripper-verse we created so guess who also gets more time to shine? Angel and his dancer girlfriend. We’ve got another part written and all we gotta say is: it goes down in the champagne room 🥂😏. We’ll be posting that within the next week. If you aren’t caught up on the newest gentlemen’s club of Santo Padre 🍒🍒, read here to see what all the fuss is about. And any music by The Weeknd has become the soundtrack for these fellas and their ladies, so indulge. Alright, you guys know the drill...enjoy and share with your fellow sucias! Feedback is the preferred drug for our addiction and greatly appreciated 💖💖

A/N part dos: Angel’s dancer girlfriend is reader insert, but to make it easier we’ve nicknamed her Candy/Dulce for story flow purposes.

Luna perked up at the sight of EZ in the booth, silently thanking Candy for the introduction. He was all thick muscle and soft eyes. A deadly combination in her opinion. It’d make her job easier. And it’d been a long time since she’d danced for someone she found remotely attractive.

She’d been ready to make her way to the politician’s corner, the section riddled with old white men with dirty pockets and even dirtier hands. They were a rowdy bunch, but they always gave cash away, sometimes five hundred dollars at a time. Santo Padre’s civil servants were hard at work spending taxpayers’ money at The Cherry Stem Gentlemen’s Club.

Candy had been dating Angel for a while now, a fact well-known amongst the girls. They all vied for the bikers’ attention, yearning to be in the spot Candy had carved out for herself. It was a nice setup and Luna had thought about asking her to introduce her to some of the guys, but she didn’t want to step on any toes. The women could be territorial and she wasn’t about to make an enemy out of Candy.

Thankfully, Candy had reached out and practically laid EZ in her palm. Luna had a sneaking suspicion it was more than a business proposition, but she wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Candy was a veteran and knew her way around the club, both with its customers and the dancers. Luna would take all the help she could get, especially since the other girls seemed dead-set on excluding her.

“Hi, EZ,” She’d greeted upon seeing him, her faux lashes batting seductively down at him.

He straightened, a cute smile on his face as he shifted in his seat. “Hi.”

She moved to sit in his lap, grateful that Angel and Candy were no longer watching. She admitted to herself that she was slightly nervous, wanting to make a good impression, both for profit and personal interests.

EZ opened his arms, letting her settle onto his firm thigh as he held her in place. He kept a hold of his beer in his other hand, taking a long pull when she crossed her legs.

The short sheer skirt she wore rode up, offering up more flesh for his viewing pleasure. Her breasts were pushed up and together in the slinky black bra she wore. The lingerie was decorated with fine flakes of silver crystals, giving off the illusion of a starry night sky. She preferred to wear black at the club. In an array of vibrant colors and neons, she stood out in the sleek ensembles she chose.

His eyes tried hard to stay on her face, but they predictably went to her cleavage every time her lungs expanded with a breath. She let her arm curve around his shoulders and scratch at the nape of his neck with her long nude nails.

“Are you comfortable?” She asked, her glossed lips pulling into a warm smile.

He nodded, his touch radiating throughout her body as he began running a finger up and down her hip. “Yeah, you?”

Luna couldn’t help it…she giggled. She was amused by his concern, enamored with the careful way he held her. It was a far cry from most of the riffraff that made its way into the club.

“Very.” She replied, brushing her nails over the back of his head. She was pleased to feel him shudder in response, his body telling a story entirely on its own.

“So,” She started, her free hand playing with the lapel of his kutte. “How long have you been a bad boy?”

He chuckled, licking his lips before he spoke. The action pulled an instant response from her body, her thighs clenching against each other as blood rushed to her lower half.

“Is that what I am?”

“You seem like it. Member of an MC. Doesn’t seem so innocent to me.” She explained as she fingered the patches on his leather, outlining the embroidered words with her nail.

“Looks can be deceiving.”

“What’d you do before the MC then?” She challenged, arching a brow as she waited for him to answer. She had a feeling there was more to his story...more she wanted to know.

He repeated the action that had made her pussy come to life, licking his full lips. He shook his head and laughed, understanding he’d been caught.

“Inmate at Stockton State Prison.”

Luna couldn’t control the way her body responded. It was if he’d said the most romantic thing possible. Her nipples hardened while her hips shifted, her ass seeking out some form of friction. She was practically preening for him, a primal urge suddenly wild within her.

EZ noticed too. Because his eyes caught every movement, every subtle action that said she was more than interested in his rap sheet.

“You like that?” He asked, voice low and dangerously close. His breath fanned across her skin, making her nipples pebble further against the fabric of her bra.

She nodded, biting her lip.

“I’ve got a taste for bad boys.” She replied, just as low and just as close.

His fingers tangled in the ends of her long hair, his eyes watching her face closely as he took in her words. The moment was electric with tension and unexplored chemistry. It was a taste of what could be.

A moan permeated the air, both of them realizing simultaneously that the sound hadn’t come from either of their lips. They turned, seeing Angel and Candy in a heated embrace. Hands and lips clashed as the couple ignored everyone around them.

“Are they always like this?” Luna asked, eyes taking in the blatant display of affection.

“Yeah...in a few seconds they’ll probably start fucking.” EZ quipped.

She laughed at his joke, though the seriousness was apparent in his eyes. She decided to grasp at the moment, confident that he’d follow her wherever she led him.

“You wanna go somewhere else?” She whispered into his ear, letting her lips touch his flesh.

He turned and stared at her for a long moment. Long enough that she doubted her ability to persuade him. But soon enough he was nodding.

“Yeah.”

She smiled, standing with his help and leading him out of the section. They maneuvered through the winding path of tables and chairs to the dark purple hallway of the private rooms. There were black doors on each side, some open, some closed to indicate occupancy. She led him to the very last door on the right, seeing it was vacant.

He followed her closely, letting her pull him into the darkened room and shutting the door behind him. Music already echoed through the speakers. The haunting melody a perfect choice for the performance she had in mind.

She took his hand once again and directed him to the black leather couch, indicating she wanted him to sit. He did so, legs spreading wide as she stood between them.

“Are you nervous?” She asked, noticing the way he smoothed his hands over his denim-clad thighs.

“Nah...are you?” He joked, smiling when she laughed.

“Nope.” She said with a shake of her head.

She started off slow, her hands traveling over her body and syncing with the sensual beat of the song. She kept her eyes on him, though she found the task difficult. He was looking at her so intensely that she felt herself wanting to blush and cower. It was a rarity for her to be nervous with the patrons. He was an exception...in many ways.

She turned around and bent her upper body forward, dragging her skirt down to fully reveal the black thong she wore underneath. The skirt cleared her thighs and fell to the floor, her foot kicking the material away. She looked over her shoulder, flipping her hair so that she could see him. His gaze was centered on her ass, until he noticed her staring. She took the opportunity to bend nearly in half at the waist, almost revealing all of what the thin scrap of material barely concealed.

She took note of the way his hips shifted, the muscle in his jaw tightening. It turned her on to know the kind of effect she had on him. It was exhilarating...a rush like nothing she’d ever remembered feeling before.

Luna played with the waistband of her panties as she straightened, teasingly pulling them down to reveal bare flesh before she pulled them back up again. She could feel the heat of his gaze on her, feel it searing her skin with every touch of her hands and swivel of her hips. She reached for the clasp of her bra as she lowered her ass into his lap and brushed against his crotch, wanting to feel a hardness push back. He remained still though, unmoving as she circled her hips in an erotic rhythm.

She released the claps of her bra and let the material fall down her arms as she pressed into his chest, feeling the deep measured breaths against her back. She looked up at him, catching his eye as she drew her bra away and discarded it on the floor. She cupped her breasts and threw her head back. And for once she envisioned a customer’s hands on her...EZ’s hands on her.

“You okay?” She asked, biting her lip as she stood and turned to face him.

“Yeah.” He replied simply, clearly caught up in the moment.

Her hands traveled the same path they often did when she danced. They brushed her breasts, then trailed over her stomach and hips to graze against her clothed sex. This time though, she felt a burst of pleasure with every tantalizing action, let the desire reflecting in EZ’s eyes lead her.

She knelt down and made herself level with his lap, her eyes focused solely on his. Her nails ran up the length of his thighs, skimming the muscle and tracing the metal teeth of his zipper. His hips jerked slightly, caught off guard by the intimate touch.

“What’s EZ short for?” She asked, wanting to engage him in more than just the grinding of two bodies.

He licked his lips, watching her with hooded eyes as he widened his legs further.

“Ezekiel.” He supplied, humoring her sudden curiosity.

“I like it.”

She ran her hands up his chest, still propped between his knees in an explicit display of sexual innuendo. She moved her mouth to hover over his crotch, her lips barely touching the denim.

“How long were you locked up for, Ezekiel?”

“Eight years.”

“That’s a long time to go without a woman’s touch.” She mused, pressing her bare breasts into his lap.

“It is.”

“We’ve gotta get you reacquainted.” Luna teased, using his own tactic against him as she licked her lips.

He smirked, following the motion of her tongue. “I already have.”

She pouted, standing once again.

“You trying to make me jealous, baby?” She teased, reaching for his shoulders to steady herself as she straddled him. She felt dwarfed by his size, his sturdy form practically buzzing with power beneath her. The veins in his forearms called to her as she rubbed her body along his, feeling the gathering wetness pooling in her panties.

“Maybe. Is it working?”

“Maybe.” She said with a playful lilt, leaning in close to the amused smirk he wore. She pressed her naked chest against his clothed one, taking satisfaction in the way he bit his lip.

“Don’t be. I’m here.” He said, the conviction in his tone demanding she believe him.

She did.

Her hips brushed against the zipper of his jeans again and this time she felt a distinct firmness that hadn’t been there before. She noticed the way he clenched his fists at his sides, as if he was using every ounce of strength he possessed to not reach out and touch her. She respected his restraint, but she didn’t necessarily want it.

“You wanna touch me, don’t you baby?” She purred into his ear, hands running up the length of his arms and down to the tightened fists at his sides.

“Thought we weren’t supposed to.” He replied, voice now heavy with lust.

“You aren’t.” She pulled back to look him in the eye, letting him take in all of her as she sat astride him. “Doesn’t mean I don’t want you to.” She confessed, continuing to rock her hips along his.

EZ’s eyes shifted, her words triggering him in the most delicious way. He caught on to her hints, realizing she was doing more than performing for a customer. She was letting him experience her in a way no other client had before.

He seized on the moment.

“How do you want me to touch you? Show me.” He commanded roughly, using his chin to gesture to her body.

Luna smiled, excitement running through her veins as she lifted a hand to her neck and gripped it softly, showing him just what she wanted.

“Your hand here.”

“You like that?” He questioned, eyes zeroed in on the way her hand held her throat. It was as if he got lost in the picture she painted, already envisioning his calloused hands around her delicate neck, squeezing.

“Mmmm…” She hummed in response, closing her eyes as she applied pressure.

“What else?”

She released her throat and trailed her hands down and over her breasts, cupping them together as she encouraged her nipples into peaks.

“Just like that?” He asked, noticing the way she tugged at the sensitive flesh.

“Yes…” She moaned, feeling his hips rising for the first time to meet hers.

“Keep going.”

“Then I want you to touch me...” She trailed off, skimming her palms down her stomach, aiming for the juncture between her thighs. She stopped at the last minute, meeting his stare as she switched course. “Here.” She finished, reaching around and grabbing her ass.

The vein in his neck throbbed as she continued to provoke him. He swallowed when she played with the waistband of her panties again, pushing the fabric down just far enough that he could see bare skin along her pubic bone. She let the elastic snap back into place, her hands now cupping her pussy.

“This is where I want you to touch me the most.” She revealed, locking her dark eyes with his.

He bit his lip and she swore she could hear a growl reverberate through his chest.

“When?” He asked, testing the boundaries.

Instead of answering, she raised herself onto her knees and maneuvered herself so that she was now on all fours, his body beneath her. She angled her ass, arching her back and lowering her upper body onto the couch at his right. He was entranced by her motions, eyes transfixed on her ass as she wiggled her hips, causing the flesh to bounce.

“Whenever you want.” She purred, letting her ankles cross in the air. Her six-inch heels dangled from her feet, a show of hyper femininity and a weapon of seduction. The glossy black material reflected the purple and pink lights of the room, the thick heel a heavy weight on her feet.

Luna moved onto her back, draping herself across EZ’s lap. He looked down at her, her head propped on one thigh while the rest of her body was spread out across the other. She stretched like a feline as she nuzzled into his warmth, angling her breasts up and wordlessly pleading with him to look. And he did.

“Can I tell you a secret?” She asked, hips still swaying in time to the sultry tune that wafted through the air.

He nodded, signaling for her to continue.

“You’re pretty cute.”

He snickered.

“Thanks.” He said with a chuckle and he had the decency to look somewhat bashful. “You aren’t too bad yourself.”

She laughed, her hands running the length of her body as she soaked up the unadulterated yearning he rained down on her. She felt desired, beyond sexy at the way he visually devoured her. Not just lusted after, but wanted, in every way. It felt intoxicating. He made her want to break all the rules, some of which she already had. And there wasn’t a single ounce of regret to be found.

“I should hope so. Unless it’s not me that’s got you hard.” She teased, pushing against the prominent bulge in his jeans.

“It’s definitely you.”

“Good to know.” She quipped, easing herself up. She straddled him once again, addicted to the way he made her feel in that position. She could smell his cologne, the scent now stuck to her skin like errant specks of glitter. She hoped it never washed off.

“Time’s up?” He guessed, meeting her gaze.

She nodded, not wanting the moment to end, but she knew if she didn’t they’d end up crossing a line. One she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to cross. At least not so soon.

It was one thing to admit she wanted him. It was another to act on it. And while she’d let him know he could have her at any time, he didn’t seem ready to cash in on her words just yet either. They both seemed content to let the sexual tension of their private moment simmer, giving it a chance to boil over into carnal passion.

He reached into his back pocket, but she held a hand out to stop him.

“It’s on the house. Think of it as a gift for your newfound freedom.”

“I can’t let you do that.” He said with a shake of his head, pulling his wallet out anyway.

“It’s done.”

He pulled a crisp hundred from a wad of cash and handed it over to her, forcing it into her hand.

“Tip.”

She shook her head, shocked by the gesture. “It’s too much.”

“It’s done.” He stated, throwing her own words back at her. He wore a proud smile, pleased with himself as he stuffed his wallet back in his pocket.

“You’re not such a bad boy after all.” She teased with a wink as she got up and found her skirt and bra.

He stood, standing back while she slipped the clothing back on. She reached behind her to clasp the bra back in place, but he beat her to it, his touch gentle as he fastened it.

“Thanks.” She said over her shoulder, catching his eye.

“No problem.”

“Do you-,” She started, gesturing to his crotch. “You need a minute?”

He laughed, looking down as he shook his head. “Nah, I just gotta think about Gilly in a dress and I’m good.”

Luna joined in on the laughter as she reached for his hand and began to lead him out of the room. They took the same path they’d taken earlier to reach the section of outlaw bikers. Another dancer was on stage, her music upbeat and pulsing as she swung around the pole effortlessly. It was a captivating sight. The men seated around the stage took it in with both awe-struck faces and hard dicks.

They made it to the thin veil of curtains and Luna was just about to pull the fabric back when EZ tugged at her hand, halting her. She turned towards him, hand still clutched in his.

“Thanks, Luna,” He started, licking his lips once again and sealing her date with her vibrator that night. “For the dance.”

“You’re welcome, Ezekiel.” She beamed, shying under his praise.

“Is that your real name?” He asked, letting his own curiosity show.

“My middle name. Yessenia...that’s my real name.” She admitted, feeling his thumb begin to brush over the back of her hand.

“It’s beautiful.”

“Do you always make strippers blush?” She challenged with a grin, narrowing her eyes up at him playfully.

“Only the pretty ones.” He retorted with a wink.

“Charmer.”

“I’ve gotta be if I wanna see you again.”

Luna watched his face carefully, seeing nothing but truth as he flashed a boyish grin down at her. He towered over her, even with the heels. He surrounded her in every way possible and she was surprised by how much she liked that.

“Is that what you want?” She dared to ask.

“Yeah, it is.” He answered, a relaxed grin making its way onto his bearded lips. “And you? Is that what you want?” He repeated to her, stepping a fraction of an inch closer.

She waited a long moment before responding, enjoying watching him squirm as he anticipated her reply. She reached up and brushed a finger over his lips, feeling his breath hit her skin.

“Yeah, EZ...come and see me again.”

Sucia Tag List:

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[emerald-amidst-gold]

WIP Whenever

Thank you @dungeons-and-dragon-age for the tag! You got me at a good time because I got goodies~! >:D

Taking a break and playing Inquisition got the inspiration flowing again! So, I have some Solas and Mhairi bonding time! :D

I encountered the Dalish clan in the Exalted Plains, and this is what was born of it:

---

“Da’len,” Solas approached where Mhairi was sitting on the log by the fire, arms at his sides and brow furrowed with subconscious concern. “...have you seen Fane by chance?”

He was beginning to get worried. For the more he searched the Dalish encampment, as small as it was here, along the creek of Halin’sulahn, the less he saw any hide or hair of Fane. His dragon was by no means hard to spot, hair like new fallen snow upon black cliff side and very presence dominating, even if the man sought to make himself unnoticeable. Although, in this instance, Solas knew why Fane was possibly making himself scarce; memories. Painful, painful memories. However, that was why it was imperative that he find the dual being, to stop a spiral before it became a vortex.

The young woman had seemingly been repairing the segment of her robes that had unfortunately met the edge of a Freeman’s blade when Solas spotted her. He himself was giving the other clan’s members distance, so it had taken him a bit to locate the young woman, but it was for the best. He, too, had difficult memories of the Dalish, blades brandished for naught but truth, words hurled in every direction that sounded home to his folly, that spread the guilt like he did plaster and paint. So, it was best for everyone, Inner Circle and Dalish, if he kept his ‘delusional stories’ and ‘maddened opinions’ to himself. He was busy at present, anyway. His own discomfort meant little when he knew there was someone suffering worse than he.

Mhairi blinked, the movements of her hands pausing from where they were delicately weaving twine and thread. Icy blue eyes and a youthful face marked with the maroon of June turned upwards to him, abandoning repairs to regard him easily.

“Fane?”, Mhairi said his sought after’s name, her slightly darker brows drawing together as she tilted her head a bit. “He was with you, wasn’t he?”

Solas shook his head, dread growing within his heart. “No.”, he said simply, doing his to keep tone calm, professional as he kept the connection of eyes that began to melt, concern beginning to show in them. “I have not seen him since before sunset. I presumed he had been with you. Evidently, I was mistaken.”

Mhairi’s delicate features turned downwards, petites hands curling within pure white samite bordered with pink vestment. “...You haven’t seen him at all? Maybe with Cole? Sera?”, she asked, lilting voice shaking a bit with a panic born of the past and all it harmfully bore for the two soulful siblings.

Solas shook his head at each question, letting his expression soften a bit. He had not wished to alarm the young woman, but he saw now that he had been foolish to think his inquiry would have done anything but. Fane had spoken of Mhairi’s anxiety concerning abandonment, and Solas himself had seen such an acute episode when the man had been thought lost in the Fade during Adamant. He should have been more delicate in his delivery, more aware of his words and the effect they had.

Ill-suited as ever, Solas berated within the safety of his mind, releasing a quiet sigh through his nose as he gazed down as the now fidgeting woman. Nails were picking apart sewn thread, undoing work redone without thought, and a deeper frown etched itself upon normally bubbly features. Ice-colored orbs were staring pointedly at the article, but were hazy, distant, lost to the flow of putrid memories. Solas matched the deep frown with a small one of his own, taking a tentative step towards where Mhairi was seated to kneel down in front of her.

He had to fix what he had wrought--in many ways, but for now, he would focus on a light that echoed as much of the past as his unaccounted for dragon did.

“Mhairi,”, Solas called out to the slightly trembling woman, keeping his tone soft, guiding. “Ir abelas. My words were poorly chosen. I didn't mean to alarm you, to cause you to fear.” He managed a tiny smile when long locks of platinum shifted with the rising of a head, reconnection. “I am sure your brother is close by. I merely have not been able to deduce where he may have gone when in concern to the Dalish. That is all.”

Solas watched as the slight tremors in pale hands and lithe shoulders lessened. There was still a concerned frown upon pink lips and the tell-tale signs of dampness upon ice-blue, but he had succeeded in drawing a bright mind back from the edge. At least, he hoped he had. It was hard to tell with his dragon’s sister, even if she was far more open than her sibling. Perhaps her inherent bubbliness blinded him at times, made him believe there were no troubles to ponder, nightmares to banish. Everyone had a mask they used to protect themselves, and he was truly foolish to forget that simple truth.

“N-no, I’m--”, Mhairi tried to say, but released only a shuddering sigh. Fingers begin to pluck and pull at thread once more, but with more care, more awareness this time.

Solas kept a watchful eye on the Dalish woman, noting her breathing was shaky, but not quickening with encroaching panic. The tremors had not returned, but neither had full light to her eyes. The spiral was still swirling, then. He would have to choose his words carefully, and carefully he shall.

“Take your time, da’len.”, Solas encouraged, gingerly reaching out with his own hands to still the ones curling and clenching into purity. His skin flinched a tad when Mhairi’s did, but relaxed when she did so in turn. “Everything will be right where you left it. It will not disappear, vanish as if but a dream.”

A sharp, but quiet intake of breath had Solas freezing up a bit, fear gripping his heart like an owl's talons snatched up a mouse. Had he spoken out of turn again? He had not meant to--!

“Ma serannas, lethallan.”

Solas blinked, the guilt and dread of his mind stilling as he refocused on the woman in front of him. Ice and turquoise regarded him kindly, serenity in their deepest depths and a watery, but grateful smile played with plushness of flesh, curving like the softest of a halla’s horns. Maroon ink was lax, further serenity carved into the heart shaped visage before him. There was no ridicule, no scorn, no retribution in any of those features, and that weighty revelation had Solas sucking in a steadying breath of his own, quiet, but deep. 

How many people would he continue to witness staring at him with such...forgiveness before his own mask cracked from the blow? He did not deserve that release, that depth of understanding and emotion from Mhairi, from Fane, from anyone, and yet, it was there--pure as the snow white hair of his beloved, gold as the spirit that cascaded down...down…

...one of his people.

Solas let his eyelids droop, gingerly taking one of Mhairi’s hands into both of his own. That echoing appendage was joined by its counterpart, squeezing with both as they joined to soothe in tandem. That silent gesture of understanding had Solas closing his eyes fully, heart tight, soul weeping for him to speak, to divulge. Why was he suddenly so overcome with the want to do such?

She would not understand, Solas chided himself, attempting to ward away how his whole being yearned to greet another soul like his dragon’s, like his. She would react adversely. For myself, and for her, I must keep the truth hidden. Now is not the time nor place for such things. There will be much to tell her when the time is right, from myself and Fane. She does not need that burden, that crisis of faith, now. Even if--no.

Solas let out a soft sigh, carefully slipping his hands from the warmth of Mhairi’s own to place them back within his lap. He registered the look of gentle confusion in both delicate features and twinkling eyes, but he once again shoved away the inherent urge to explain. He had let himself falter, allowed his mind to splinter, and now he would repair it, shore up the foundation so it may weather any other storm that would come to pass.

He must find the one who would hold his bloodied hand with one of their own, but even that laced his heart with guilt-filled poison. How much more would he touch and destroy before he perished? Two lights, and they would find themselves extinguished if he continued to be selfish, but...he couldn’t help it, couldn’t fight the want to belong, to be accepted.

To coexist. How pitiful he was. How pitiful.

---

...You have no idea how hard I am resisting on making a female Fane to fully romance this wolf right now. I need to finish canon Fane first, but...HNNNNGH. I just want to analyze the hell out of how Solas changes with romanced Lavellan. *puts face on screen* He called Fane ‘lethallan’ the other day while I was playing, and I DIED AND SCREECHED. ...I always do. *slinks away*

Fun fact: At the beginning of my writing hobby, Solas and Mhairi were supposed to be romantically together! :D 

Tagging (if you wanna, you beautiful people! <3): @oxygenforthewicked @noire-pandora @little-lightning-lavellan @the-dreadful-canine @blueheaded

[poutyhannie]

word count: +4k 

warnings: fluff, angst, smut, college!fem reader, college!felix, romantic fantasy

** **

You gaze down at the materializing letters stretching across your palm till your elbow. It was a mixture of Korean and English. The Korean characters were few and far in between but were delicate and even while the English letters were long, messy, and leaned to the right.

I’ll need to turn in Prof Behl’s assignment when I go to class and then explain why I can’t go to the museum research trip.

Did I use all my meal swipes? Chris said he wanted to workout at 3…

These notes would often appear on your right arm, sometimes remaining like a tattoo for weeks or fading before you could even read it fully. These were the thoughts of a person whose soul matched your own. He was a college student who is majoring in English with focus on things like creative writing and poetry and you’ve gathered that ‘Chris’ was his roommate.

For as flowery his major was, the boy’s thoughts were surprisingly plain and boring. However, you were thankful for it. Your friend often had dark circles under her eyes. Her connection with her soul partner was being awake at the same time and you were sure her soul’s partner lived on the other side of the world with the opposite time zone. To be honest, you gleaned almost nothing from the notes. The boy probably didn’t know that his thoughts were being recorded on your arm, which you always kept covered with a sleeve. Neither did you know what connection he had with you. Did he feel the emotions you did? Were his dreams your memories? You’ve laid to waste these meaningless thoughts to focus on your life more, not his. There was little reason to go searching him out; if you truly were tied together by souls, fate could do the heavy lifting for you two.

Leaning back at your desk, you shake out your cramping hands. The graphic design project requires that you draw out the story board by hand rather than digitally and you never wished more to curse for it. The reason was, according to your Professor, head of the project you and your classmates are fighting to be a part of use physical copies in the preliminary section. Because you had started in traditional art, relatively it was easy to get back in the swing of things. Didn’t mean that your hand didn’t hurt like a bitch, though. You had everything riding you getting to participate in this project, you’d planned everything out with your counselor and had little attractive options if you didn’t get it, so you return to your drawing.

Your roommate swings open the door, causing you to jump and tug your sleeve on quickly. She throws her bag on her bed with no regards to the loud thump it emits. Her blonde hair rests on your paper when she leans over to look at your drawing. As always, she gushes at your talents and as always, you remind her that her microbiology major is much more impressive.

The night is a lot hotter than comfortable, especially with the tight sleeve you always relegate yourself to, even while sleeping. Ever since you caught your dad reading the thoughts on your arm when you slept, you sometimes go so far as to sleep on your stomach, with your right arm tucked under you. It was uncomfortable reading his thoughts, much less having someone else read them. Yeah, they weren’t always too juicy or detailed, but it still felt wrong to share something like this with anyone else.

“Even family?” You remember your dad asking to your rage. 

“Even family.” You hissed.

With a groan, you rise out of bed, your roommate looking up from her five inch thick textbook, illuminated by a soft, yellow dest lamp. Her watery eyes gaze up at you from behind her round glasses. “I’m going out. Can’t sleep.” You tell her.

The night breeze whispers through your hair as you sit on an empty bench in an empty courtyard near your dorms. It’s in time like these that you feel peace. When not a soul is around you and you can finally just sit with yourself. Slowly, you unwind the sleeve and are met with chaotic swirl of words. This happens when he dreams.

Worth, friends, others, internships, classes, empty, running, nothing, darkness.

Your heart pangs. He’s having nightmares again. Instinctively, you begin to wrap your arm up again, not wishing to invade him at his weakest point.

Though you don a mask of indifference towards the scrawl on your arm and effectively the boy around others, you can’t help but hurt for him. He seems swamped with so much to do and feels helpless. When you look down, the chilling sentence on your arm burns in your mind and heart.

I don’t think there’s anyone for me. All I see is black. Am I alone?

Two weeks later, they stay. No matter how many times you unwrap and rewrap your arm, those three sentences never leave. Others come and go, but from that night until now, they stay.  And the guilt of not pursuing this boy is eating you alive.

You always assumed he had a connection that allowed him to know of your existence. When you realize that he doesn’t, your passivity almost seems like a sin. How lonely it must be to be alone in a world where everyone has someone. Since then, you’ve been paying close attention to the scrawl on your arm, careful to gather as much info on him as you can decipher. Right now though, in class, you can’t.

Your Professor is announcing the chosen students of the project and you can’t really think about him now. 

“And the last student is Y/n.”

You heave out a sign of relief, making a note to thank you Professor. You’re sure she had a few good words to put in for you. “The students I just called will be working with other student in screenwriting. You guys need to pick five scripts you want to animate and the screenwriting students will choose their preferred artist.”

Walking into the classroom with another female peer by your side, you absentmindedly fidget with your sleeve. She walks boldly up to a male student, who’s dark blonde falls onto his freckled cheeks, sticking her hand out. “I’m Madeline,” you hear her say. His eyes snap up towards yours but he immediately looks back to Madeline as they exchange pleasantries.

Madeline is paired up with the freckled boy and you with a quiet, thoughtful boy named Seungmin. He tells you that he is friends with Felix, the freckled boy, so you combine tables and group up. Because this is a project done in your own time, you all choose to work together to bounce ideas off with each other though with how bubbly Madeline is, you wonder how much you guys will get done.

When the topic of soul partners comes up, you and Felix shift uncomfortably. Seungmin gets visions through the eyes of his partner and has seen her face, he tells you guys casually. 

How wonderful it must be to know who your soul is tied to, you think bitterly, a twinge of jealousy coursing through you.

Madeline’s green eyes shine as she starts, “I don’t know who they are, but I see colors that has to be tied to them.” She’s a romantic, giddy with excitement at the prospect. It’s so easy to live with just seeing colors; it’s pretty and inconsequential, much a contrast to the invasive cryptics on your arm.

When all your eyes turn to Felix, he purses his lips softly, only able to look down at the table. “I actually don’t know what my connection is. Maybe its unconsciousness because I can never fall asleep at nights,” he jokes, attempting to push the attention off of that topic.

A glossy nail taps Madeline’s pink lips as her dark lashes flutter, “I don’t think so. Insomnia isn’t usually paired with unconsciousness connection.”

Feigning disinterest, Felix shrugs, focusing back to the sketches, “Maybe it has something to do with my color blindness, I’m not sure. Doesn’t really matter,” he mutters, his voice deep and throaty. Madeline gasps, lightly slapping Felix’s arm. He raises an eyebrow at her. 

“Of course that has to be it!” She exclaims, “It’ll be a subcategory color connection, just like me! Maybe you’ll see colors when you see your partner or when some other unveiling instance occurs.”

She goes into depth about connections, her shoulders bouncing in excitement. Thankfully, this distracts them from asking you about your connection. As her movements and words quicken, the stale bitterness in your mouth consumes you. It’s immature, your distaste for anything about these connections. Just because you have a subjectively unfortunate connection definitely doesn’t mean you should shit on Madeline’s obvious interest in the subject. In fact, Felix and Seungmin seem to enjoy talking with her about it as she has extended knowledge about connections. 

However, while Seungmin’s tone that he asks his with questions are amused, his interest piqued, Felix is leaned forward in his chair, his eyes barely concealing desperation. Your heart pangs for him; he’s probably so lost. 

Seungmin and Madeline walk in front of you and Felix on the sidewalk, returning to the dorms. They’re in deep conversation about Seungmin’s connection and with Madeline’s knowledge and Seungmin’s intellect, they quickly and thankfully exclude you and Felix.

“I don’t wanna talk about connections,” you declare to him. A small smile spreads across Felix’s face and he nods knowingly. “What made you want to get into animation?” He asks, a pleasant and refreshing topic.

“I haven’t always been the best at art,” you admit with a shrug. “No way!” Felix exclaims, his eyebrows raised, “Your work is so cool, though.” 

You laugh at the compliment, “Yeah, well it took me a while to get here and I didn’t want to throw away that work, so here I am. What about you? Why did you want to get into script writing?” 

Felix’s eyes soften and he stares off past the line of buildings, into the horizon. “I feel like I can see different things with words. Does that make sense?” He pauses, gathering his thoughts, “They open up worlds and ideas that I can’t experience and it makes me feel closer to normal. It makes me feel alive.” 

“Like, you can imagine how colors feel or look through words?”

He nods, looking back at you with a playful look, “That’s another reason why I like your work so much. The values are clear and I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything by not seeing color.” 

The genuine, heartfelt comment makes your heart warm and a smile spread across your face, “Yeah, I focus a lot on just greyscale because composition is the most important aspect to my art. Stuff like color theory, while important, it basically inconsequential if you can’t even tell what’s going on in the picture.” 

Felix’s voice quiets as he shoots a look up at Madeline’s back, “Yeah, I didn’t want to choose Madeline’s for that reason, but she really thought that the color use in my script would work in perfect tandem with her style and I really couldn’t tell whether she’s right or not,” he shrugs, his lips pulling into a line.

“Oh, totally,” you say quickly, not wishing to have Felix question his choice, “It makes total sense and in some instances color can tell more of a story than composition and values can. It was wise to team with her.” Maybe your intentions of reassuring Felix was too obvious because his eyes crinkle deeply when he gives you a big, knowing smile.

A week into your work and the very basic shapes for the animation is finished. Working with Seungmin is wonderful as he has a clear direction and even pictures he’s taken to show you what he envisions. Concentration pinches Felix’s eyebrows together and he and Madeline converse as you watch them from the other end of the table.

An hour or two pass and you stand up to stretch, announcing that you’re gonna take a bathroom break to which they agree is a wonderful idea. Coming out of the bathroom, you wrap up your sleeve, peeking to see what the ink says this time. The three words that you’re familiar with; that have been etched into your sink for weeks don’t make your heart stop, but the ones under it. 

Am I alone? She needs to add more clear composition so I can actually tell what’s going on. 

Your eyes snap up to the blond haired boy. That’s exactly what Felix told you a day ago.  Its him?

To your confusion, he now stares, awestruck at Madeline. There’s a sinking in your stomach but you can’t tell why. Gasping, his eyes widen as he takes her hands. “Madeline…I think,” he stumbles over his words, clearly flabbergasted. “I-I’m seeing color now, I think.” 

She squeals, squeezing his hands tightly, “When? Just now? What happened?” His dark eyes look dazes and he steps back. His eyes wander from the ground her hers and he whispers, “When I saw you.” Turning your back on them, you leave quickly, not wishing to intrude on Felix’s revelation. 

You resume your seat next to Seungmin, heaving a sigh. “What’s wrong?” His lips form a slight pout and his head tilts to the side. You shake your head, waving a hand, “Felix and Madeline are soul partners. He just found out.” From your peripheral, you see Seungmin smile widely.  You laugh to yourself, an embarrassed blush rising on your cheeks at your previous hasty conclusion.  You really are desperate for the person who matches your soul.  

“That’s great,” he taps your arm with his hand, hidden by his sweater’s sleeve, “Why do you look so bummed, though?” 

You purse your lips, “It just sucks to be a late bloomer. I don’t know who my partner is,” you tell him as the bitterness fills your mouth again. Seungmin nods firmly, his fingers tapping your arm again, “At least you know that you have one, though. Felix didn’t even know whether he was alone or not.” 

“Yeah,” you shrug, trying to ignore the gnawing guilt of your selfishness, “it just sucks.” 

“Of course but just give it time,” Seungmin advises, patting your shoulder softly.

You and Seungmin gaze blankly at Felix and Madeline as they both gush over each other. You can’t help but feel a pang of jealousy in your chest when Felix gingerly strokes her cheek.

Clapping, Seungmin returns to the story board, pointing at a slide, “I like the idea with this one, but if you’ll look here,” he pulls out a picture he took of a deep, dark green forest that just seems to dissolve into black, “I want the composition to be more dangerous. Like, the characters are being drawn into darkness and they won’t have any way to escape.” Nodding quickly, you add rough shading and lines to your preexisting work to cater to Seungmin’s request.

“Perfect,” he beams his toothy smile at you.

By the time the project is all but done, Felix and Madeline are attached at the hip or the hand or the face. You try not to watch them, jealousy foaming in your throat. Felix’s eyelashes flutter against his freckles and his lips are glossy as Madeline gently strokes his cheek, smiling softly. Such a romantic—it would make sense that her seeing colors would be paired with his past complete colorblindness. He gushes over her work and her use of color, his voice giddy with excitement at finally seeing color, finally being normal.

While your initial bitterness at their fortune has washed away into passivity, you can’t bring yourself to look at your arm like you used to. In a way, you’re foolishly upset at you partner for not giving you anymore clues that would lead you to him. It’s foolish because he doesn’t know you can read what’s on his mind.

You pick up your artist’s hand brace from your dorm bed and begin unwrapping your arm to put it on, barely sparing the black scrawl a glance.

Its not all black anymore. I can see it. I can see her.

Dread clenches your gut as your eyes travel down to the next single word.

Madeline.

There’s a buzzing white in your head as you fumble to get your shoes on, tripping out into the hallway, breaking into a sprint towards Madeline’s dorm, on the other side of the campus. Whirling confusing overcomes your mimd and you feel like you’re suffocating, the only goal is to find an answer. You don’t know when hints of this conclusion plagued your mind. Maybe it was that day, months ago at the bathroom. Maybe it was a deeper jealousy at seeing Felix kissing Madeline. It didn’t matter anymore, you frantically knocked at her door, out of breath and gasping.

Her green eyes are wide and her pink lips are swollen, she’s almost as out of breath as you are. She makes no move to hide Felix, who’s pulling on a shirt behind her shoulder. Nervousness pangs in your throat but you shove past her and shed your arm to Felix.

“Wh-what’s this, Y/n?” He asks, eyes bouncing off your arm to your face, uncomfortable with looking at something you’ve explained to him is so precious and private to you.

“Read it,” you beg, eyes flicking from his face to Madeline’s. She furrows her shapely eyebrows, gingerly taking your cold arm into her soft hands. At Madeline’s brazenness, Felix finds it in himself to look down at your arm.

Her grip is firm but you could rip away from it at any moment.

Madeline’s eyes are wild and horror fills them as she looks up at Felix. You try desperately to explain, “I-I don’t know what this means either, but that day that you first saw color, Felix, there were your exact words to me about your project on my arm.” 

He laughs to deflect how uncomfortable he feels, it comes out too harsh and grates against your neck, raising heat into your face. “Y/n I know you really wanna find your partner, but this is crazy. Don’t try to suggest stuff like this. Madeline and I are partners, everything has been perfect since that day for us.” 

He looks over to Madeline for reassurance, but she doesn’t meet his eyes. A soft, vulnerable look plagues her eyes as she looks up at you. Felix stutters, confused why she wouldn’t immediately agree with him. “Lix,” she inhales deeply, “for my connection, you know how I see colors? Those are actually s-supposed to go away when I meet my partner.” You realize the vulnerable look in her eyes was actually guilt.

“What?” His voice is a breath, like he’s been struck in the chest and is left gasping for air. “I was hoping that I wouldn’t have to meet them because I don’t want to loose my color—it’d be like dying for me and I’m really happy with you. Aren’t you happy with me too?” Felix’s lips hang open and his face is frowning in confusion, “So you’ve been using me when you knew I wasn’t yours?” Madeline’s eyes fill with guilty tears and she nods. As much as you can understand why she did what she did, anger and bitterness towards her, towards loosing so much time with Felix consumes you.

“Then you never deserved him,” you hiss, possessively retracting your arm into your body, hiding the words against your bosom.

You and Felix sit wordless on a bench in a park in a part of town you were unfamiliar with. 

“So it was you this entire time?” 

“I’m so sorry, Felix,” your voice cracks and you bite your lip to prevent it from trembling, “I really didn’t know for sure and I doubted what I knew because you just seemed so happy with her.” 

He scoffs loudly, running a hand through his silver hair, “Yeah and look what that amounted to.” 

Quietly, you respond, “It amounted to us realizing. That means something.” 

Felix exhales slowly, turning to face you, his eyes tired and sad, “Yeah, at least we realized now—” he stops abruptly, pausing to collect himself, “God, I was so stupid, just because I started seeing color one random day because she was in front of me?” He scoffs again, slouching into the bench. 

“It made sense though, you were both eager to get your partners and—” 

“But to leave you alone?” His voice is raw and soft, “I left you alone when you were right there.” Slowly, as if he were a hologram or mirage you couldn’t quite reach, you extend your hand to rest your hand on his warm cheek, almost shocked that he’s there. Unintentionally, he leans into your hand, closing his eyes gently. “We can begin now. Rather a late start than never. We have the rest of our lives to get it right.”

Felix buries his face into the crook of your shoulder, pressing firm, confident kisses and hot, stinging hickies into your neck. You run your hands up the bare expanse of his back and up to his hair. Flush spreads across your cheeks as he lifts himself up to gaze down at your bare chest but you don’t cover yourself up. You have nothing to hide. “Have you ever done this before?” You whisper to him. He shakes his head softly, leaning down to trail kisses from the base of your neck through the valley between your breasts. Lower, his kisses get wetter as he gets closer to your aching hotness. As if you’re made of paper, Felix gingerly spreads your legs. The cold air hitting your core causes you to flinch, but Felix’s warm palm presses slowly against you, calming the sensation into pleasure.

“May I?” 

You whine out a ‘yes’, groaning when his sinks a finger into your core. It sucks his finger in and Felix barely contains a moan at the sensation, imagining how you’d feel around him. Slowly, he begins to pump his single finger into you before adding another and scissoring deep. Curling his fingers, he brushes your sweet spot, causing you to gasp and arch your back. 

Smiling to himself, he continues to work at that spot until you’re gasping and moaning incessantly. He pulls out and you whine immediately but he positions himself above you, gazing down at you with adoration even while his impossibly hard dick pokes against you. “Hurry, Lixie, please do it,” you whine and he hushes you with a kiss, slowly sliding in and caressing his tongue against yours when you gasp. Your face is scrunched up at the unfamiliar stretch but Felix can’t help but smile down at you, endeared. His eyes are dark at the sensation of him dragging against your walls. When you begin to relax around him, you start whining again and he giggles, slowly beginning to thrust up into you. There’s nothing desperate or wanton about his movements against you. He’s being gentle, letting you feel him as his drags along your walls though it takes all his self control to not increase the pace. It’s deep and rhythmic, his hips against yours. He fills you up and groans as you seem to suck him up, your juices mixing with his precum.

“Baby, you’re so warm and so—mhg—tight,” he gasps against you, “Can I go faster?” 

“Yeah,” you’re breathless and rake your fingers across his back when he starts to do just that. He positions his hip in a way that has himself dragging across your sweet spot and you screaming with every thrust. He reaches down to rub your clit, stars and lights sparking across your vision as a burning coil begins wind in your gut. The groans and moans he lets out when you unintentionally clench around him paired with the way his movements quicken as he becomes desperate push you closer. “Y/n, I’m g-gonna cum,” he whispers, his eyelashes fluttering against your skin. “Me too, Lixie,” you gasp, running your hands over his body. 

“I love you.” Your high crashes over you, white pleasure electrifying you through your body as you feel Felix shoot into you. The burning pleasure overcomes your senses as he collapses next to you, his hair sticking to his forehead as he pants into your neck, smiling deeply in pure bliss. Euphoric, you tug him closer, pressing a kiss to the freckle on the tip of his nose, onto both his cheeks, and finally onto his warm, glossy lips.

“I love you too, Lixie.” He is yours and you are his. That’s how it was predestined and you both have fulfilled destiny.

[lesbian-peanut-writer]

Food and Fun

Ok, day 9 of Kinktober is here and I know I usually post before now but hey, I made it right? My stories will probably be getting posted around this time of day from now on, seems as I’m busy at the moment and have issues at home now... Anyways, I had a bit of fun writing for our girl Himiko and with that I give you the story.

~Lesbian Peanut

Word Count: 2397

Silence hung heavy in the air as you watched those gentle hands meticulously move around yours. Her eyes were cast down as she meticulously wrapped your hand with a bandage, hiding your bruised knuckles beneath the thin material. You could tell it was hard for her, that she was holding back whatever it was that was weighing heavy on her mind. Guilt had settled in your stomach; it wasn't like you had meant for her to see you like this and to have to deal with the aftermath.

"Himiko…" You were silenced as she shot you a warning glare, her usually bright eyes now holding a darkness to them.

"You could have died! Do you understand that, (Name)?" Himiko stated as she pulled the bandages tight around your hand and made you since from the force.

"I know…"

"I've waited a long time to meet you, do you have any idea how painful it would be for me to lose you now? To have to mourn your death for centuries to come!" She stressed as she pulled your hand up against her chest.

"I'm sorry."

"Then don't do it again!" She growled before grabbing your bicep roughly, her fingers digging into the deep gash there.

You winced violently as you tried to pull your arm free. Her nails were more like talons as she dug them deeper into your skin and you swore, they were almost touching your bone. You knew this was hard on her, seeing you so beat up but more than that; the smell of your blood. Being a vampire in love with a fragile human couldn't have been easy on Himiko, you couldn't imagine the restraint she would have to exercise on a daily basis. It became apparently clear to you that she really did love you, she had put up with so much of your shit over the years but she never tried to hurt you; let alone drink from you.

“Why do you do it?” Himiko’s voice was soft as she spoke, her hand loosening around your arm as she moved to pull your shirt off.

“Do what?” You inquired as a frown drew your brows together in confusion.

“Put your life at risk. You’re literally just a human, it doesn’t take much for your kind to die.” She shot back as she flicked her eyes over to the gash running along your bicep.

“It’s not like I wanted to be attacked, Himiko. Would you have rather I just stood back and let them kill me?” You watched as she shook her head instantly and her hands gripped your thighs firmly. “I was simply protecting myself and you.”

“I don’t need protecting…” Himiko whispered as she stood up, leaning in towards your face as she pressed her knee up between your legs. “I only need to protect you.”

Your eyes widened as Himiko dipped in closer to you, his lips pressing against yours firmly as she kissed you. It felt as though time had stopped as you kissed her back and suddenly you realised why things had changed so fast. Blood. Himiko wasn’t like other Vampires who would fall into a bloodlust frenzy, no; she was very much different. Blood had a very different effect on Himiko, the smell and sight of blood would turn her into a horny mess; something that could be quite fun for you. You sighed in content as she pushed you down, your back pressing into the bed before she straddled your hips. A moan passed between the two of you as she gripped your breasts, her nails pressing into your skin in just the right way.

Himiko smirked as she lifted her head, a growl building in her chest as she licked her lips clean of the blood she had gathered from your lips. The taste of your blood was phenomenal, she would never grow tired of being able to taste it but she was always careful not to do so too often. She flicked her eyes down to yours as she squeezed your breasts, the flesh giving way under her gentler touch. She loved the way your body would react to even the simplest of her touches, the way your breath hitched when she touched you in certain places. Himiko listened as you took a sharp breath, her hips moving against yours as she trailed a hand down over your stomach. The way your stomach caved under her nails was enthralling to her and it had a sense of pride rushing through her body. She flicked her eyes down to your pants before looking back up at you as she hooked her fingers into them teasingly.

“Let me love you, (Name).” Himiko breathed as she rolled her hips lazily.

You winced as her fingers brushed over a bruise on your hip, her fingers disappearing instantly as she tugged on your pants. A smile pulled at your lips as you looked up at her, enjoying the way her eyes shone and her smile stretched from ear to ear. You sat up cautiously, your hands snaking up under her top and pushing it up over her body. Her body gave a shudder as your fingers ghosted over her ribs before travelling higher. You balled her top in your fist as you pulled it over her head, throwing it to the floor before moving your hands behind her back.

“I won’t ever stop you from loving me, Himiko.” You whispered lovingly as you leaned in close, pulling her body against yours as you trailed kisses down along her neck.

Himiko shuddered and hummed above you as she rolled her hips and wriggled before getting off the bed. She kept her eyes locked with yours as she shimmied her skirt down over her hips before letting it hit the floor. Your legs spread for her as you undid your pants, rolling onto your back as you pulled them down along your legs. She growled low as she watched you throw your pants aside, noticing you had taken your panties off at the same time. Himiko stepped in between your legs, fisting your hair roughly as she pulled your head back. Hey eyes peered down into your own, a mix of emotions reflecting back at her as she tried to read you.

“Such an obedient girl and I didn’t even have to say anything this time.” She praised as she trailed a finger down along your jaw, her other hand pulling your head back further. “How easy it would be for me to take your blood right now but I don’t want that, I want you fucked out beneath me and screaming my name!”

Heat flooded your cheeks as you looked up into her eyes, a sense of need and desire overcoming your normal senses. You shifted your hands to her hips, pulling her in close to your body as you sunk your teeth into her stomach. The look of shock that flashed through her eyes momentarily was quickly replaced by a look of pure determination and desire. You moaned as she ripped your head back, letting go of your hair as she threw you back against the mattress. The giggle that slipped past your lips was something you had been hoping to contain and wished that you had. Himiko’s snarl from above you sent shivers down your spine and yet, your pussy clenched just from hearing it.

“You bite, I bite.” Himiko murmured sweetly before dipping down out of sight.

Your eyes widened as you moved to sit up instantly, a hand coming up to press against your stomach firmly and forced your body to stay against the bed. You moaned as Himiko’s fangs sunk into your inner thigh, her tongue swirling over your skin as she sucked on the sensitive spot. You curled your toes as you hooked your legs over her shoulders, your hand searching between your legs for her hair. Himiko’s jingle of a laugh made it to your ears moments before her tongue swiped along your folds.

She licked her lips as she flicked her eyes up to where she could see your breasts heaving with your breathing. Your blood was rolling down her chin as she licked at your folds, pushing her tongue into your pussy and drinking up your juices. As much as Himiko preferred tasting your blood, tasting your sex was just as good and sometimes even better. She knew how to make you cum without doing much to your body, all it took was for her to bite you in all the right places; saving that sweet spot for last.

Himiko growled as she moved her tongue against the walls of your pussy, relishing in the way they clamped down around her invaded tongue. Her hands clasped at your thighs, her claws digging into your delicate flesh without much effort. She closed her eyes, listening to your breathing as she greedily drank up all your juices; her own pussy quivering in need. Her mouth shifted higher along your folds, suckling your clitoris in between her lips before sucking it between her teeth. Your deep moan and sharp intake of breath were perfect as she rolled your clitoris between her teeth. She growled when your hips jerked up off the bed, her hands tightening around your thighs and forcing your hips back down.

You moaned as you sucked your bottom lip in between your teeth, chewing on it and arching your back. You knew how dangerous it was to have Himiko between your legs, it didn’t take much for her to make you cum. Now that she had pleasure coursing through your body, all it would take was for her fangs to pierce your skin and you’d be done for. You could feel blood rolling back along your thigh from where she had previously bitten you, her warning only now sinking in fully. You cried out as she sucked on your clitoris before letting it go and delving her tongue back into your pussy. Your walls clamped down around her prodding tongue, a moan leaving your lips as she found your g-spot. Himiko’s name fell from your lips as she rubbed her tongue against it, her nails sinking deeper into your thighs.

She could smell your arousal, the scent mixing with that of your blood and effectively making her feel drunk. Himiko moaned as she licked your walls roughly, her right hand relinquishing its hold on your thigh and slipping down between her legs. Her moans sounded between your legs as she licked and sucked at your heat, making sure to tease your clitoris every so often. The sounds of your whimpers from above, only served to make her hornier as she pumped her fingers into her pussy. God, what she would give to have you eat her out; to lick up all her juices until your pretty little face was covered in them. She smirked as she pulled her fingers from her pussy, knowing now that was exactly what she was going to make you do.

You whimpered as Himiko pulled her head back, the vision of her head rising up over your body sending butterflies to your stomach. Her eyes were locked with yours as she moved up close to your face, her knee pressing down on your right leg as she hovered over you. You frowned as she inched in closer, only to have a moan slip from your lips as she thrust three of her fingers deep into your pussy. You could feel her knuckles pressed up against your folds with each flick of her wrist, knowing that she was able to sink all three knuckles of her fingers into your dripping heat. You moaned, rolling your head back as her fingers moved at a relentless pace. It often terrified you to think of what Himiko’s stamina would be like had she been a guy and just how fucked out you would always be if she were to fuck you with her strap-on.

Himiko watched you closely as she moved her fingers at a blinding speed, pushing them deep into your clenching pussy before pulling them all the way back out. She knew how much you loved it when you did this to her and she felt proud when your hips jerked up in response to her splaying her fingers out fully inside of you. The way your breath caught in your throat and your heart stuttered away in your chest, she loved every little detail. She waited as she moved her fingers harshly, fucking your tight pussy and adding her fourth finger. Himiko loved the way you stretched around her fingers, the way your walls fluttered and squeezed as though begging her for more. Her eyes lit up as your head dropped right back, your eyes slipping shut as you gave in to the pleasure, she was giving you.

“Game over…” Himiko whispered before diving in towards your neck.

Your eyes shot open at her words, but it was all too late to do anything now. A scream was ripped from your throat as Himiko’s fangs sunk into your neck, piercing through your flesh and sending an instantly overwhelming wave of pleasure through your body. Your body jerked and spasmed as your orgasm forced its way through your system, your pussy clenching around her fingers desperately. That was it, that was how she punished you whenever you did something she didn’t like; mostly when you got hurt. She would build up your pleasure only to bring you undone all too soon by sinking her teeth into your neck. You loved her but god damn was she cruel when she wanted to be.

You flicked your eyes up to hers as she pulled away from your neck, watching as her tongue flicked out to lap up your blood from her lips. You panted as you moved a hand up to touch her bottom lip, catching a droplet that had managed to escape her tongue. “Was that necessary?”

“Yes.” Himiko said simply before sitting down against your stomach, her hands travelling up towards your breasts. “Now, you’re going to be a good girl and eat me out. I want to see your pretty little face covered in my juices after I cum on it.” Yeah, you were in for one hell of a night but you weren’t complaining.

[ears-awake-eyes-opened]

Effie turns 40

(Hayffie 💜🔥💥. NSFW. Sexual content and intensities at the threshold of midlife. Despite the title, this fic is primarily Haymitch-centric. The story, set about 7-8 years after Mockingjay, is part of a longer arc. Envisioning H & E’s character development is such a muse for me. Their voices were difficult for me to write in this one. I’m figuring them out as I go along. It’s a labor of love right now. Thank you for sharing the prompt — #13 below.)

***

Some decisions are calculated; you make them after they’ve turned over in your mind for hours, days, years even. Effie moving to 12 had been like that. Other decisions can’t even be called ‘decisions’ really. ‘Impulses’ would be more accurate.

Haymitch was generally not impulsive, unless alcohol clouded his judgement or blacked out all thought. There had been no alcohol the night before — on the eve of Effie’s 40th birthday, sobriety was part of their deal. And the whole thing was argueably the best sex he’d ever had with her or anyone else. Not that anyone was arguing the point.

Except something nagged at him — an impulse half-remembered, not because he’d been drunk, but because it had been hers — her impulse... maybe. And only as the sun came up did he give it thought.

“Don’t pull out...”

Her words turned over in his mind, belatedly.

During the night, the sheets had slipped to his side of the bed. If she woke just then, she’d accuse him of stealing the covers, which he likely did, since his sleep was fitful. A lock of hair coiled above her collarbone. He wasn’t sure how the ringlet stayed, given how many times he’d raked his fingers through her hair, pulled at it, dove inside it with that part of him that was into her far beyond the reach of his body.

He traced the curl with a fingertip then glanced down her breasts to her belly. Over a year ago there had been a baby there, for a while. He usually tried not to think about it. But the memory of its heartbeat nagged that morning along with the rest of Effie’s words.

“...Come inside me. It’ll be okay... It’ll be incredible.”

He didn’t hesitate. After pulling out all those months, staying in and feeling her clench around him as he spilled inside her had been so intoxicating that he didn’t even drink afterwards.

Before the pregnancy, Effie was fastidious about birth control. She set timers and took pills at precisely the same minute every day. After the miscarriage, she needed time to decide what to do since the pharmaceuticals had failed. And she felt like her body had failed.

Was she using something new? Did she get a shot or an implant? She hadn’t told him. Why hadn’t she told him?? Why hadn’t he asked her as she clutched his hips and reassured him and kept him in when he would have pulled out. Damn... just thinking about it made him want her exactly like that again.

He was planning to eat her out with breakfast. There was whipped cream in the fridge, and strawberries. He’d bought champagne, which she preferred to hard liquor. He’d drink it from the hollow of her stomach and let her do whatever she wanted to him, within reason. His girl would not be happy waking up 40, but he was planning to make her happy.

His thoughts mulled hot like spiced cider. And his mind wouldn’t let go of uncertainty or the memory of the heartbeat...gone. He didn’t want to go through that shit again.

He slid the covers over her, tucked the curl behind her ear, and waited impatiently for her to wake up.

***

Even with the curtains closed, the sun tormented Effie with reality. In that moment, 40 was the last thing she wanted to be. She rolled away from the window, pulled a blanket over her eyes, and tried falling back to sleep to no avail. She sighed in resignation.

Beneath the sheet, Haymitch caressed along the curve of her hip. His thoughts and emotions which had been rolling earlier were holding steady at the surface. This was her birthday. How long should he let her wake up before asking what he wanted to know?

She dropped the blanket from her eyes and opened them. As he stared into her, there was nothing playful about his expression, just unmistakable intensity. The feeling of a luminous bubble expanded in her chest and stretched along her midline to the juncture of her thighs.

She reached out and held his face in her palm. His jaw was still smooth with just a hint of stubble. She brushed her fingertips in the direction she knew the hair would grow. The familiar act flooded her with sensations of the night before, and she wanted his mouth on her.

She inched closer and nestled against him. Her lips plucked his once, and then again, sliding the tip of her tongue along the seam of his lips. He opened as she expected, and he sucked her in all at once. His teeth caught her lip, and the sting brought her nails digging into his back.

He groaned along her tongue as their bodies brushed, seeking a fit to burst the bubble, which he was feeling now too. Intensity built quickly. He had something to ask, but there wasn’t space now between them for thinking, just feeling.

She drew her leg up along his side, and she opened. He clutched her hips and slipped in slowly, but slow wasn’t enough — like when horses turn home, anticipating oats and cubes of sugar.

She pressed her calf to his ass, urging. A thrill rushed through her as he sank into the sweetest spot. “I’m gonna come fast, honey.” She let go of his mouth in order to say so. “I can feel it.”

His toes curled in the words. He was snug inside her, and she was so wet already. “Fuck, Effie. We just started.”

“I know.” She met him with upward thrusts, letting go of restraint and taking control in turn, drawing out her own pleasure. “Look at me.”

He met her gaze again and held it. Her fervor was catching. He gritted his teeth and matched her pace, holding back when she slowed. Then pushing home like the horses.

“It’s so much,” she spoke of the feeling between them. Her nails played up his spine to the nape of his neck, then along his scalp. His shiver was a harbinger of what was coming. “It’s so much, Haymitch.”

His confession was quiet, tucked somewhere in between guttural sounds and a calloused thumb stroking her breast. “It’s everything.”

The admission, the gentle roughness, the flood of emotion lit her up. “Ohh, I can’t stop it.”

“Jesus. Why would you wanna stop it?” He said it to himself as much as to her.

Luminosity exploded. Her body quaked, milking the length of him. The force of creation swelled. For a moment she was the whole world — his girl. The whole goddamn world. He climaxed inside her without asking the question, without saying another word beyond their cries of pleasure and release. They broke open, glistening.

When her shaking stopped, there were tears on her cheeks. Her leg flopped back onto the bed. “Damn...” she whispered, “I’d be willing to turn 40 every day if each one can start like this.”

He wanted to linger inside her and kiss her tears and tell her how glad he was that she’d been born exactly WHEN she was so she could be exactly WHO she was — somebody who made him feel things he never thought he’d be feeling.

But the nagging uncertainty which had been holding steady on the surface boiled over, and he said none of that. Irritation crept into his voice.

“Damn it. You’re a fucking Siren.” His shift in tone was clear.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“That depends.” He looked into her eyes once more, assessing her critically. Then he rolled out of her before he’d fully softened.

“On what?” She turned to face him.

“What birth control are you using now?”

She hesitated. “It’s called being 40.”

“What?”

“I’m old now.”

His face was blank. “40 isn’t old, and it sure ain’t birth control.”

“Withdrawal isn’t 100% effective, and you’ve been doing that for a year with no babies.”

Haymitch sat up, trying to figure out what was happening. “Me pulling out is a hell of a lot more effective birth control than you being 40!”

She draped her arm across her eyes. Saying the truth was uncomfortable, especially with him upset. “My eggs are mummified.”

“Overnight?! You were on your period last week for christ sake! Your drama is gonna get us pregnant again. Is that what you want?!”

Everything got quiet. She uncovered her eyes and dropped her arm to her stomach. “You said ‘us.’ Why talk about US getting pregnant when it’s never going to happen?”

“It ALREADY happened, not even two years ago. And right now there are millions, maybe hundreds of millions, of my guys swimming inside you. It just takes one *non-mummified* egg, and we’re back where we were a year and a half ago. Is that where you want to be?!”

She paused before answering. The delay was long. Way too long, he thought. Her thumb caressed her stomach, just once, but he noticed.

“Effie, do you want a baby?!”

“...I don’t know. ...Maybe. I don’t know!”

“Maybe!? You don’t know!? Well, you might have just gotten one, and I didn’t even get a say!”

He was inches from her in their bed, and he wasn’t touching her. He was scowling as if she’d stabbed him in the back with his own knife.

“I didn’t force you to be with me just now — or last night! ‘IT’S EVERYTHING,’ you said. You JUST said that! What happened to THAT?”

“‘Don’t pull out,’ you said! ‘Come inside me,’ you said! ‘It’ll be okay — It’ll be INCREDIBLE,’ you said!!”

“It WAS incredible! Sex is always good between us but never quite like that. And it’s not because you shaved, or I waxed or I wore that awful pleated skirt. It’s something more. I felt it last night and again just now. Don’t tell me you didn’t feel it too because I KNOW you did!”

He leaped out of bed and stood naked in the middle of the room, fuming at her. Every muscle in his body was rigid. She wanted to touch him and soothe him and make him understand.

“Why do you have to be like this and ruin everything?!”

“You tricked me.”

“I did NOT! When have I EVER been deceitful?! You’re being unfair.”

He stormed into the bathroom and slammed the door.

As the water ran in the shower, Effie stayed in bed. Only when the room was quiet did she realize what she’d been doing. While they’d argued, she was clenching her pelvic floor, holding in those millions of sperm he’d mentioned. If I’m certain that I’m too old to have a baby, and if I don’t even know whether or not I would want to have one, then why am I doing this??

The only answers she could think of were that just maybe she wasn’t too old, and just maybe she knew more than she’d realized. Everything was jumbled, and she didn’t want to let go.

When Haymitch stepped out of the bathroom, he dressed in stony silence.

“We need to talk about this,” she said.

There were fresh tears on her cheeks, but they barely phased him. “I feel suffocated. I’ve gotta get out of here.”

“Fine. Walk away...” As he did, she tried to sound angry. “Walking away is what you always do!”

She steeled herself against the sound she knew was coming. When she heard the front door slam, she told herself, “At the end of the day, it’s my bed he’s crawling back into!” She tried to sound confident, but her voice wavered. Because she wasn’t confident — and she wasn’t angry. Not really.

She was confused, and she was sad. She was 40 — and so goddamn sad.

***

Getting out of the house wasn’t enough. Haymitch wanted out of his feelings, out of his thoughts, out of his body. Walking away wasn’t enough, so he ran — at least fifty yards, veering off the road through a field, thick with grasses and aging saplings. He steered clear of scattered houses and the voices of people. People were just waiting to screw him over and slit his throat. Oats and cubes of sugar were a fucking fantasy. He was running toward nothing, chasing his own breath.

When he couldn’t catch it, he stopped and reached into his coat for his flask. It wasn’t there. Shit. At least coins jingled in his pockets. He gathered them up, and counted out enough to buy a bottle. He set off again in the direction of the Hob, walking now since he’d lost steam for anything else. He’d have to face people after all.

The building was uncrowded for mid morning. Fragrances of food and coffee made his stomach protest its emptiness. He bought a bottle of whiskey and had enough cash left on him for a bowl of soup.

“Mornin’, boy,” Greasy Sae greeted him in the usual way, “You’re showin’ up here mighty early.” She glanced at the bottle tucked in the crook of his elbow. “You pickin’ up supplies for the party?”

Fuck. He’d forgotten. Peeta was hosting a surprise that afternoon, baking a big cake and everything for Effie. Haymitch had no idea who all had been invited. Damn near everyone in 12 knew her now, outgoing as she was. Hopefully Katniss had reined in the boy’s generosity, and they’d keep the gathering small. Though Haymitch didn’t want to deal with any of that shit now.

“Can I get you a cup of beef soup?” Sae asked when he hadn’t responded, “Just made it fresh this mornin’ with the real thing.”

“The party. Right...” he answered late.

Peeta had asked him to come up with some excuse to get Effie to their place early in the afternoon. ...I just heard the kids talking about curtains, maybe you should go over and help them out... Something like that ought to do. Until the fight that morning, he’d been looking forward to spending time with them. He’d been looking forward to everything.

“...Soup would be fine,” he answered after Sae had already ladeled some into an oversized cup.

“How’s that girl of yours?” She filled the silence as Haymitch counted out change. “Turnin’ 40 can be tough for a woman. We tend to feel age differently before we’ve got kids. Once there’s kids, we ain’t got time to feel old. Take a moment to even breathe, and they’ll run right over you.” She handed him the soup. “I know she lost one, and losin’ ‘em hurts. It’s real hard to lose your first. But I got hope for you.”

As he stood there with the cup warming his hands, facing Sae’s crinkled brown eyes and thin smile, he felt Effie’s words filling his gut... Why do you have to be like this and ruin everything?! The thought stole his appetite, but he drank the soup anyway in three gulps and handed the cup back to her. The food calmed his stomach. “Guess I was hungrier than I felt.”

“Feelin’s can fool us. A body can get so used to emptiness that we start feelin’ full from it. But emptiness ain’t gonna nourish you. ...Now, I got customers waitin’. Tell Effie I’m wishin’ her a happy birthday.”

“I’ll do that,” Haymitch said out of habit. He was going to have to talk to Effie eventually, but he wasn’t ready.

He left the Hob feeling like a hypocrite. He’d accused her of tricking him when he was all too eager to finish off sex inside her with nothing in between them — so eager he’d done it twice. And, damn it, he’d be lying to himself if he said he didn’t want to do it again.

He cracked open the bottle and tried to chase away regret about what he’d said to her. He followed the gravel road deeper into what used to be the Seam. Long ago it was home, but home changes. The only things that tied him to that stretch of land were memories and wounds long sealed by scars.

His open wounds were elsewhere now, like home was. Swallows of whiskey wrapped the wounds in a layer of gauze. He could think and feel through it, but the thoughts and feelings were hazy, like the mist that covers the meadow in the morning before it’s touched by the sun.

Ghosts of a sort came out of the mist and murmured their stories. He wasn’t sober enough to tell the voices to fuck off, and he wasn’t drunk enough to not hear them. So he listened through the haze, walking without a destination in mind.

***

The first voice — longing — came from the seashore. Skipping rocks and building sandcastles with Annie’s boy had flipped a switch in him. The kid had been his shadow. At the week’s end, the little guy reluctantly said goodbye with a bear hug and a sloppy kiss on Haymitch’s cheek. What might have been if Effie’s baby had lived and become a child? Their child. It would have been something in between a giant pain in the ass and a love big enough to eat him alive.

I’d be a fool to consider bringing a kid into this fucked up world on purpose, the second voice — reason — said. He was an alcoholic who drank to stay alive. He believed he had no business being anybody’s father. And Effie nearly had a seizure every time she stepped in a pile of goose shit. Babies crap all the time, and they puke all over the place. And sleep?... Forget about doing it because they don’t.

And sometimes they die. A third voice — grief — lamented. They fucking die, and I can’t do a damn thing about it.

That fateful morning last year when Effie was losing the baby, she’d roused him from sleep. The chill in her voice tugged his heart into his stomach. “Haymitch, something is VERY wrong.” Cramping had come on in her back and abdomen, and she was bleeding.

Adrenaline rushed to his limbs as if he was in the arena. He’d gone to call for the doctor, and when he returned, Effie was sitting in the dry bathtub, still in her nightie. A steady stream of blood trickled down the drain, and she was holding something reddish purple in the palm of her hand. It was the baby — no bigger than an apple. ...Its name had been pulled from the Reaping Ball before it even had a name.

“I’m sorry,” she kept telling the tiny thing. “I’m so sorry...” She looked at Haymitch as he wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and chest. Her eyes held no tears.

He wasn’t thinking about the baby just then. He was scared out of his mind about losing Effie. “The doc will be here real soon.” It was all he could say as he sat on the edge of the tub, kissing her forehead and stroking her hair. He must have said it as many times as she said “I’m sorry.”

The doctor’s arrival, exam, and treatment were all a blur.

“I know it seems like a lot of blood,” the doc said later, “But there are no signs of hemorrhaging or uterine abnormalities. I was able to remove the placenta. A miscarriage happens more rarely at this stage, but it’s not uncommon. I’m sorry, Effie — Haymitch. ...She appears to be developmentally normal for 15 weeks gestation. I wish could offer an explanation. Sometimes these things just happen. A miscarriage doesn’t necessarily negatively affect subsequent pregnancies. It may take several weeks to recover. When you feel ready, you can try again.”

“We weren’t trying.” Haymitch wasn’t sure why he’d felt the need to clarify.

“She?” Effie had heard the doctor say it, even if she took in nothing else. She had only let go of the baby long enough for the doc to examine it. Otherwise she held it against her chest.

“Gender can be difficult to determine this early, but the signs indicate a girl. An autopsy could confirm, and it might show the cause of the miscarriage. If you’d like—“

“No,” Effie insisted, “I can’t let you take her and cut her open. She’ll be staying here.”

That afternoon Haymitch dug a grave under the maple tree in the backyard. He made it a full six feet deep so the scavengers wouldn’t find her and pick her apart.

Effie wrapped the baby in a small blanket along with her umbilical cord and the pieces of placenta and laid her in a jewelry box. “She’s used to being inside me. She’d be cold in the ground without a blanket.”

The words had been madness. If he’d let himself think about it like that, then he wouldn’t have gotten through it. One of them had to stay sane. Burying the tiny girl was his first and last act of care for her. Shoveling all that dirt over her was like burying an axe in his gut.

I refuse to go through that shit again, the fourth voice spoke in a convergence — anger and fear. It had been the one yelling earlier, as he took the discomfort of his wounds out on Effie. Thinking about the baby was too much, and his body wasn’t even the one she’d lived inside all those weeks. ...Effie’s was.

His feet turned him around, and he headed back up the road. This time he knew where he was going.

***

At home in the yard, the geese barked at him about leaving them to forage for their own breakfasts. The grass was sparse due to lack of attention. Not wanting their hunger to be something else on his conscience, he scooped wheat into their water buckets and pellets into their feed bowls. As they ate, they quieted down and left him alone, which was just fine by him. He liked most of them better at a distance.

Grass didn’t grow under the maple tree. A dense network of roots kept other plants from taking hold. He’d dug through six feet of those roots, and he pictured them growing back now around the jewelry box. The little coffin wouldn’t drift underground whenever the rains came. The tree would hold it in place.

He sat with his back against the tree and took another drink of whiskey — just enough to try to restore the haze which had worn off, leaving him raw again. Mist filled his eyes. The memories coming up were vivid and close. He wiped his nose on his sleeve. He hadn’t cried about anything in so long that he’d forgotten the way tears clog a person’s head before slipping out. They slid down the back of his throat until he’d swallowed so many that he thought he might throw up.

Effie found him there. She shuffled her feet as she approached so she wouldn’t startle him. She sat on the ground, cross legged with her hands in her lap. In the moment, she didn’t care if the soil stained her skirt. In all the years she’d known Haymitch, she’d never seen him cry. She ached to touch him, but she was afraid he’d pull away, so she didn’t reach. He didn’t look at her, but he didn’t tell her to leave, and he didn’t leave either.

Long minutes passed before either of them spoke. In the silence, Effie was uneasy, but at least she wasn’t alone. He was right beside her. The geese wandered the grass, and a breeze was blowing through the maple leaves. The leaves brushed against each other, whispering things she could only imagine.

“We need to talk.” Choked up and hoarse, Haymitch sounded like a stranger.

“Yes, we do.”

He looked at her with swollen eyes. Hers were more pink than white. He was beating himself up inside for making her cry about this, especially today. “I don’t wanna fight,” he said. The battle raging between the voices in his head was all he could handle.

“I don’t want us to fight either. ...Not here. Not about this.” She glanced at the the baby’s grave. “I had no intention of tricking you about anything, especially this.”

“I know.” His swift acknowledgement surprised her. He reached for her hand and interlaced their fingers in her lap. “I didn’t mean to ruin your day.”

She held his hand as a lifeline. “It isn’t ruined.” She paused before saying it in order to keep from crying again.

“It’s not what I planned.”

“Things don’t always turn out the way we plan.” She hesitated before saying more. “...For a short time after I lost the baby, my breasts made milk. Did I ever tell you that?”

“I don’t think I was hearing much then.” He looked at her breasts, wondering what other details she’d faced alone. “I remember tracing veins there that I hadn’t seen before. ...Sometimes I watched your stomach while you were sleeping.” Sometimes I still do, he didn’t say.

“I never got to feel the baby moving inside me. She was always too small to feel. ...She had the prettiest hands. Long fingers for playing piano. Do you remember?”

He shook his head. He couldn’t remember her hands. He leaned his head back against the tree and closed his eyes. “I’m mixed up, Effie.”

She scooted closer and laid her head on his shoulder. “Oh, honey, I am too.”

He caressed her thumb with his, and she watched the maple leaves cast shadows over their entwined fingers.

***

Eventually the geese wandered over, honking for more handouts.

“Give them an inch, and they want a yard.”

“If they had an actual yard, they probably wouldn’t be so demanding.”

“Suddenly you’re the goose whisperer?”

“‘Goose’ and ‘whisper’ do not belong in the same sentence.”

“I’ll give you that.” He pulled her to her feet, and they went in the house.

Despite the bit of teasing, the solemn mood followed them inside. There was much more to say, but they were both saturated.

“Listen,” he told her, “I don’t know if you want to hear this, but in about an hour I’m supposed to tell you that the kids are talking about getting new curtains and maybe you ought to go over and help them out.”

“Is that the secret code for my surprise party?”

“Peeta is trying to be subtle.”

“That dear boy is anything but subtle. This morning he was decorating a two-tiered cake with the blinds open. They actually COULD use some curtains.”

“If you’re not up for the party, I’ll have them call it off. Peeta might have invited half the town. I don’t know.”

“Be with me awhile. Then I’ll be okay to go.”

Haymitch was unsettled by the realization that being with her ‘awhile’ might never again be enough. Having witnessed so much death, ‘forever’ had always been a subjective and fairly meaningless concept. But it was starting to feel like something other than an endless train of horror. It felt precious and terrifying in a different way.

Effie stepped into his arms as he opened them. He needed to be held as badly as he needed to be holding her. Needing somebody other than himself was dangerous. He was uneasy with it, but he didn’t let go.

“Are you hungry?” He spoke softly against her temple. “I screwed up what I had planned for you for breakfast. I wanted to make you — happy.”

“I ate a little. Maybe we can have your breakfast for dinner?”

Sex was a touchy subject just then, but he wasn’t going to tiptoe around it. “It was gonna be breakfast in bed, using our bodies as plates and glasses. ...Are you still interested?”

“That depends. Will I get to make you — happy — too?”

If he thought too much about her sucking whipped cream off his dick, then they’d never make it to the party. “It’s your birthday, sweetheart. You make the wishes. I wouldn’t turn down that offer.”

At the end of the day, it’s my bed he’s crawling back into. The understanding was as comforting as his arms around her. She didn’t know what ‘everything’ would be, but whatever it might be, she wanted it with him.

[bigbrotherlouis]

the bag of chips scene from 'i ate you up the day we first spoke' for the director's cut meme!

whoohoo i actually loved writing this scene and i’m so glad someone asked about it yeeee

(director’s cut meme)

everything eases back into normal. tk picks nolan up for practice, because nolan’s car is inexplicably always out of gas, (this is true, i read an article about it somewhere) and ties nolan’s ties for him on game days, and follows him into his living room to eat all the good snacks nolan hides on increasingly higher shelves.

“how did you even get those?” he asks when he comes out of the washroom and finds travis eating illegal all-dressed his mom had sent down in his last care package. he’s pretty sure they were hidden, like, on top of the cupboards this time. he literally had to throw them up there. (food, when you move countries, is a really big deal. i always want to keep the mutlicultural aspect of a lot of hockey players in mind, because i was a young multicutural person in the united states, and home foods is usually a good way to do it. all-dressed are pretty distinctly canadian, and my cousin gets her parents to send them to her in california, so i borrowed that from her. also i liked the image of TK climbing on the counters to try and get at a bag of chips.)

tk shrugs and crams a handful of chips into his mouth. “smart thinking.”

“those are mine.”

“i don’t see you eating them,” tk says smugly and nolan thinks about it for precisely point two seconds before he launches himself at the sofa. (no thoughts, head empty)

it’s a familiar ritual, this one. tk cackles, going limp so he can noodle off the cushions onto the floor, the bag still clamped in his hand. he scrabbles backwards until he’s out of reach of nolan’s admittedly long arms.

“sucks to suck, babe,” he gloats, except nolan is not emphatically giving up, those are his chips, and he’s not going to let his idiot of a best friend eat them all. tk grunts when nolan lands on his lower half, hard, and pins down his legs so he can’t escape. he sits on tk’s knees and ignores the yelling. (travis “has never shut up once in his life” konecny strikes again)

“mine,” he says savagely, snatching the bag out of his hands. tk huffs, shoving at his legs.

“it’s rude— not to— share— fuck, patty, what are you doing in the gym?”

“some of us don’t skip leg day.”

“yeah, well, some of us aren’t built like a fuckin’ ox,” tk complains, as if he’s not just as in shape as nolan is. “i can’t even fuckin’ pinch you because you’re wearing jeans.”

“now who’s the smart think—  fuck!” (not you, pat. not tk either but still not you.) he shouts, flinching and rubbing at his side. that pinch is definitely going to bruise. tk uses it as a distraction to roll them, nolan’s shoulders thudding painfully against the floor, and straddles nolan’s stomach with his thighs. there’s another struggle but tk gets hold of nolan’s arms, pins them under his knees so nolan’s fists are at his sides. he’s effectively trapped. (too many nolans but what do you do when writing m/m. also this isn’t specific to this scene, but especially in hockey with all its nicknames, i like to write people’s internal narrative with whatever name they probably think of themselves as. that’s why nolan isn’t pat/patty here, and why tk is usually not travis)

“still me,” tk says, grinning at him with undisguised glee. he works the chips free and sits up, putting his weight just under nolan’s ribs so all the breath gets knocked out of him for a second.

“fucker,” nolan hisses, trying and failing to wriggle his way out. “what the fuck, teeks?”

“that’s what you get for not growing up with brothers, bro. gotta fight to survive. survival skills.”

“bud, you don’t even know. sisters have nails and they’re not fucking afraid to use them,” nolan says, his best murder glare in effect. he probably still has the scars in some places. (i know i do) tk snorts.

“sorry, i don’t see you scratching me here,” he says.  

“let me go and i’ll scratch you up real good,” he threatens and then his brain catches up with his mouth, his face going red as he realises what he’s maybe implied. “uh.”

tk doesn’t take the obvious chirp, just raises an eyebrow. there’s a considering look on his face, one that makes nolan want to squirm more and it settles somewhere down deep in his stomach. (so i wrote this scene because i needed a turn for both of them, relationship-wise. iirc, there’s been a few places where tk’s interest might be noticeable, but nothing super concrete for pat or for the reader. meanwhile, on tk’s side, he needed clear signals that pat’s into him before he tries to tell him again.)

“uh,” he says again because his brain is just fucking offline and his arms are still locked under travis’ legs and travis burns hot because nolan can feel it against his skin, through his t-shirt, and this is all going to get incredibly, incredibly awkward in about three seconds. (unfortunately, i love a good run-on sentence to build tension) he’s pretty sure popping a boner because a teammate is sitting on you is, like, not something you can get away with by laughing.

tk shifts, sitting up the tiniest bit, and reaches out the hand that’s not currently occupied with the fuckin’ chips— probably all crushed to hell now, anyway (foreshadowing!! also strategic last mention here so we know that tk is still holding them, and then they aren’t mentioned until the shoe drops for optimal dramatic effect) — and brushes his fingers against nolan’s cheek. he traces the blush from his cheekbone carefully down his neck, pausing to thumb at his jaw, and then bumps his fingers against his collar, where it disappears down into his shirt. (i really liked building the tension here. also this is fully just projection bc i would love to touch patty’s blush once in my life)

“you’re glowing, pat,” he says, so soft, and it makes nolan go redder. he glowers at a spot by tk’s ear, unwilling to look him in the face and see whatever is written there. (would tk actually tell nolan he’s glowing? probably not, but fictionally it gives the reader a good picture of what nolan looks like to someone else. i didn’t want to overuse red-- which didn’t quite feel like a strong enough word-- or blush, so glowing it was.) tk hooks his index into the collar and there’s a moment when nolan thinks he’s going to pull it down, see if his blush goes all the way down his chest— it does, if he’s embarrassed enough. it’s fucking terrible— and he turns his head away, dragging in a breath through his nose. he’s, like, so incredibly fucked that he can’t even think about it without going dizzy. (you’ll probably see this a lot if you look for it in my writing, but i like to add in a “like” or something similarly bro-ish when things get particularly emotionally fraught, to keep it more realistic. also i think it’s funny. anyway, i like the contrast of tk not being able to take his eyes away from something he wanted and nolan not being able to look at it. characterisation, wahey!) it’s better to just not look.

of course, it’s the exact opposite of what tk wants.

“hey,” he says. “look at me.”

nolan refuses, a muscle ticking in his jaw. (this is hot to me idc) tk lets go of his collar to pull on his hair instead, just a little tug of a piece by his ear, and nolan can’t quite bite back the punched-out sound that he lets out. (also hot.)

“look at me,” tk says again, an edge to his voice, and nolan does. tk won’t stop until he does, he knows that well enough. (another look at their dynamic and how well they know each other) he lifts his chin, just a tiny bit, because he’s not going to do anything without a fight. tk’s hand tightens in his hair and it keeps him in place, nailed— ha— to the floor. (i write for the people whose brains make inappropriate jokes at the wrong moments) he couldn’t move if he wanted to, watches helplessly as tk leans down.

the hope in his chest is so thick, nolan thinks it might actually smother him, stop his heart. he’s breathing fast and shallow, almost on the verge of panting, and jesus fuck, isn’t that embarrassing. he’s so desperate, he could squirm with it and he briefly remembers travis months ago, writhing on his very rug and how much nolan wanted to help. he can smell snow again, sharp in the back of his nose. (this does the double work of calling back to an earlier scene-- ya girl loves a good callback-- and also building the anticipation some more. the snow reference reminds the reader that this is still a werewolf au, even in the midst of this. also, once when i was like fifteen, i read something about how to write kisses/romance and it talked about picking one or two aspects of the kiss to focus on-- breathing, hands, the feeling of someone’s mouth, etc. i still use that advice.)

tk shifts his weight and nolan has enough time to think holy fuck, is this happening? before travis fucking konecny upends the bag of all dressed-flavoured crumbs all over his face. (OKAY a lot going on here! it’s one of my favourite moments, really. first of all, here’s the resolution of all the chips talk! sure, i could’ve just abandoned them, but the subverting of expectations was a lot more fun and the story still wasn’t quite ready for them to kiss yet. second, this is tk chickening out. he had two choices and he chose violence. or, like, the buddies option, which is amusing to me because this is not buddies, boys. finally, the full name was necessary to convey nolan’s disappointment and anger, as was the full description of the chips. nolan is upset, and he’s going to notice these things, and that shows up in his internal narrative.)

“got ‘em,” he crows over nolan’s sputtering, letting himself get bucked off onto the floor. nolan wipes furiously at his face, all his feelings a confusing mix of horny and angry and confused, all with the thick overtone of humiliation.

“you’re a fucking dick,” he says and it’s flat, but tk is gloating too much to care. (he’s not, he’s trying to cover, but nolan’s too embarrassed to realise)

“you should’ve seen your face, pat.”

nolan glares daggers at the carpet, the chips spread out everywhere. it’s going to be a bitch to clean up. tk had better help. (makes sure the punch landed, and to give a final resolution.)

he leans against the sofa and waits for tk to tire himself out, listening to the laughter and trying not to get too angry or, like, cry. his neck feels hot, prickling uneasily. he rubs at it with his hand, startles when tk kicks him gently in the ankle. (in order for tk to not come out of this looking like an asshole, i needed him to make up his obliviousness by being observant in other times. and in order for tk to notice patty being mad, i needed to give patty actions that could be noticed, like not laughing along with the joke)

“sorry if i made you mad,” tk says quietly, all the giggles finally worked out of him. “you looked tense (no shit bud) and i thought it would make you laugh.”

it’s not tk’s fault nolan thought he was gonna, like, kiss him. (”like” again, to break up a too-honest moment) it was a dick move but tk doesn't have a cruel bone in his body, so: “it’s fine,” he mumbles and shrugs his shoulder. “it was funny.”

tk preens for a second. “i know.”

“you owe me a bag now.”

“i’ll buy you a family-sized pack. i’m sure they’ll ship it down here, amazon or ups or somethin’.” (patty’s attempting to be normal and tk is attempting to make amends.)

nolan nods and scratches at his face, tipping his head against the couch cushions. (little motions like him scratching his face aren’t super necessary for like plot or development, but it helps humanize characters and i like to add them in whenever i can, as long as it’s not overkill. they can also be helpful in pointing to emotional state without directly saying it.) it’s quiet for a few seconds, just the sound of them breathing heavier than usual, and it would be so normal. should be normal, by all counts, but nolan still kind of wants to crawl into a hole for while. wants to push tk out of the apartment and eat ice cream and google ‘how to stop a crush,’ like his sisters used to do when they were upset. he’s already googled it, a few days ago, and there was nothing but maybe someone’s offered good advice since then. (people make an impact on you, and family even more so, and i always like reminders of how close nolan seems to be with his sisters. also, it’s funny.)

tk flicks him on the wrist. (this is something that tk does consistently through the story, and even though it’s not super important to this scene, it establishes a behaviour in the larger story. that’s important too!)

“pat,” he says and it sounds it’s not the first time. nolan blinks.

“yeah?”

“i just asked you if you were hungry.”

“oh. uh. no, not really,” he answers truthfully. tk wrinkles his nose.

“do you, like, have anything in your fridge to eat?”

“mm, probably not.”

“typical,” tk mutters under his breath, as if he ever has anything regularly stocked besides protein powder and bacon. (protein rich foods that are easy to eat after a full moon, or after a workout) at least nolan has eggs pretty consistently. (also a protein rich food that’s less easy to eat after a full moon, but are easy to make when you aren’t a werewolf) “wanna go get sushi?”

nolan thinks about it. shoves his sweaty hair behind his ear and considers going out to their favourite place and pretending he’s not still fucking mortified. and, like, a little turned on. it makes him nauseous. (i get such physical reactions to emotional things that i write everyone into having them) 

“no,” he says. he’s not facing tk but he can still see him deflate, his shoulders hunching over. “i don’t— no.”

“okay. that’s… okay.”

“i think i’m getting a migraine,” lies nolan. “think i’m just gonna lay down.”

“do you need me to stay with you? keep you company?”

nolan’s shaking his head before tk even finishes the thought. “no, trav. i’m fine, i promise.” (the trav here works as a signal that something isn’t right! it’s why tk looks at him for so long in the next line.)

tk studies him for a long minute, his eyes searching the side of patty’s face presented to him. nolan keeps his expression as blank as possible and stares hard at his feet.

“text me if you need anything,” he says finally, the words coming out slow and gentle. it’s a lot to handle. “i’ll come back.”

“i know. i will.” he won’t, but that’s not for tk to know. he doesn’t move when tk goes out the door, squeezes his eyes shut when the door doesn’t slam into its frame, (tk’s taking care of him, still!) and decides to leave the pile of crumbs to deal with later. (the climax of this scene happened a while ago so this is another little reminder of what happened, just so it’s solidified in the reader’s head after the longish comedown. i end scenes a LOT like this-- two actions, and then a callback-- because they’re simple and effective, and usually sound great!)  /fin

ahh thank you so much for asking!! this was really fun to, like, process through and remember my logic for! i was actually really nervous writing this scene, because i knew the tension and the break had to be PERFECT for it to land right. but i do like how it turned out so at least there’s that. ily!!

[hawksmagnolia]

Never falter, Never fail

Drunk Drapple Prompt for @the-ss-horniest-book-club​ by @findingasimplepleasure​ / @nano--raptor​

Summary: Destroyer!Chris comes looking for the commander of his special ops team and finds far more than he expected.

Warnings: Mentions of violence (nothing major), tattoos

Word count: 1,844 (oops?)

“Can you tell me where I can find the Lieutenant?”

Behind you, several men snicker until they realize you’re glaring at them and they drop their eyes to the gear as they mumble apologies. 

The former undercover agent, Chris something, is standing there. His beard is still cut into the goatee but you notice it’s starting to fill out into a full beard. He’s no longer wearing persona that he’s been living but the tattoos haven’t quite faded yet and they peek out the bottoms of his polo shirt sleeve. You also think you spy the shadows of leftover ink on his wrist as well. 

Shit.

“Depends. Why do you want to know?” False bravado and snarling attitude to hide the shock.

He frowns at you, at your defensive tone and body language. “I just need to make sure he is clear on the details of this op.” 

He hasn’t recognized you yet. 

Thank fuck.

You shoot him a dark look before you look over your gun, checking the chamber and sliding it smoothly into the holster at the small of your back. He watches you, appraises you really. You’re dressed in your usual tactical uniform. Black boot, black pants and an olive green moisture wicking undershirt under a long sleeve button up. Your hair is hidden under a black baseball cap. 

You know he’s wondering what you’re doing on this team. Not many women willingly join a special ops team like this but not only are you on it, you lead it. You are the damned Lieutenant and you’ll deal with him later. Sticking your fingers in your mouth, you give a sharp whistle that his him wincing and your team snapping to attention.

“Team Three. I need you here, here and here. Split into pairs and do not let each other out of your sight. Period.” There is a crude but effective map drawn out on the white board. Pictures of certain areas are taped next their marker counterpart. Your nails are short, unpainted and your hands are scarred and calloused. You slide the button down off and toss it onto your gear bag.

You see his impossibly blue eyes focus on your arm, ignoring the armed men hustling out of the room. More likely, is that he’s staring at swaths of black ink that vanishes under your sleeve where it begins at the top of your shoulder and ends in the middle of your forearm. The Queen of Swords in all her glory adorns your flesh. Below that is Eagle, Anchor and Globe of the USMC but the globe has been turned into the crosshairs of a rifle. There is more ink under the black fingerless gloves. Gloves that your team bought you as a joke when you were elected their leader. Black leather but with fine, almost delicate stitching that forms the outline of every bone in the hand, ones that you wear every single time you get the call. The rest of the tattoos are hidden beneath your clothing except the three small black swallows at the bottom of your hairline.

There are questions on his face that you can’t be bothered to answer right now. You shrug into the heavy ballistics vest and pull the velcro tight.

“Team Two. I want you stacked up tight in this corridor between shipping containers. Nuts to butts gentlemen, hope you showered.”

The next six men peel off from the pack and are gone.

Only two men are left, so you point to the smaller one on the left. “I want you to cover the back doors from the sky.” You point to the man on the right. “I want you on the west exits. Trench it if you can. There are no windows on that side, just two big industrial doors. I’ll make sure spikes are out in case of vehicles.”

They nod and are out the back doors of the mobile command and vanish into the rapidly forming darkness. You’re about six miles east of the compound, far enough that any light is barely visible. You shut down the lights and start to exit when the agent grabs your arm.

“I asked you where the Lt is.” He says it as “Ell-tee”. You wonder briefly if he’s a veteran too.

You grab your night vision goggles and strap them to your head, leaving them on your forehead. You yank your arm from his grip and grab your rifle case.

“I am the fucking Lt. And I’m very clear on our goals, Agent.”

You nod your head at him and spin on your heel but not before you hear his voice. 

“You and I will talk after this.”

Well, fuck.

===============================

Sixteen hours later and you’re laying on flat on your back on top of a shipping container. You’d climb down yourself but you don’t want to risk any damage to your precious ‘Vera’, a Barrett M107 sniper rifle. You hadn’t thought to bring up the case because your mission’s timeline changed suddenly and you hadn’t bothered, focused on scrambling up four shipping containers for a better sightline. Things had gone sideways but in the end the good guys won and the bad guys went to prison.

There is a heavy thunk of metal on metal and you roll to your side to see Agent Chris kneeling in the ladder bucket of a fire truck. “Ready to come down or are you working on your tan?”

You flip him off as you crawl to your feet, cradling your rifle and make your way down.

“Transport will take you back to base.” He slides to the side to give you a chance to stagger onto the platform.

You nod, too tired and spent to form words. Your legs are like lead, too many hours spent on your belly first in the chill of the night which turned into a sweltering day. He catches your arm first and then your rifle. He lowers you to the ground and starts yelling for a medic.

When you open your eyes, the first thing you realize is that you’re soaked and so disoriented that briefly you think it’s raining. 

And then you realize you’re not alone and your back is pressed against a person. A person whose denim clad legs are on either side of your legs. Your vest is gone. Your weapon is gone.

A little stab of panic cracks your chest as you realize you’ve been stripped to underwear and undershirt. The shower is one of those overlarge ones, enough for you both to sprawl.

You groan and try to sit up and strong arms pull you back.

“Slow down trigger. You’re in my room.”

Him.

Agent Chris Something. 

“Your internal body temp was too high. Technically too high for life function according to the medics. Apparently you’re too goddamn stubborn to die. We had to cool you down.”

“Report.” You rasp.

He hands you a Gatorade. “Drink. Slowly.”

You force yourself not to gulp as he continues. “Zero casualties from your team. Couple of minor scrapes. You run a tight ship there Lt.”

“Thanks…I think. Who stripped me?”

“I did. How’s your head?”

You tilt your head side to side to test your equilibrium and then you feel his palm as he twists your hair off your neck and secures it with a band.

“Swallows?” He asks as his fingers linger there for just heartbeat too long. 

“Yeah.”

“How many do you have?”

“What? Tattoos?”

He shifts you long enough to adjust the water temp up a little bit.

“I..I’m not sure anymore.”

“A full sleeve and also your hip, strong ink work, bold designs. And then you have these little tiny swallows.” His lips barely graze the delicate flesh on your neck as his hand clamps down on your right hip.

“You know I know where all your ink is sweetheart. Why didn’t you tell me that night you were a Fed?”

“Same question could be said for you.”

“Why were you in my local bar nine days ago?” He runs a hand over your side, knowing full well  where he knows the words scrawl across your skin. 

“Intel.” You squirm and his thighs lock your hips. 

“You had my reports.”

“I prefer to have a first person view of the shitshow I send my team into.” You pull away and turn on him, kneeling on the tiled floor. “Sorry I’m not a super special agent but I’m damn good at what I do. And to be honest, I didn’t know who the hell you were and I didn’t trust you. Obviously, I was right, since I distracted the fuck out of you.”

He looks as exhausted as you feel, he’s soaked but still fully dressed. He holds up his hands in surrender. “I would have done the same thing. Just so you know? You’re the only thing that distracted me. Still are distracting me.”

You stare at each other for a couple of heartbeats before you jump into his lap. Your mouths clash together, opening to the other while your hands cup his face. 

“Wait.” He gasps which you promptly ignore, your mouth on his jaw, his neck.

“Sweetheart, no. Not until you’re completely recovered.” He grabs your face in his hands. “I’m not fucking you in a bathroom again. Tell me the story behind the ink.”

“Which one?” You struggle not to kiss him again. Must be the adrenaline dump. Must have been delayed because of your heat stroke. 

You’re a damn liar.

“All of them.”

“The swallows were first. Got them after my first deployment. To remind me.”

“There are three.” 

“We lost three.”

He nods, doesn’t push. He knows you’re not ready for that conversation. Still sitting on his legs, you peel your soaked shirt off and toss it aside.

“Ribs was right before my second deployment. I wanted to have that reminder.” You press his hand against the words.  “I will never falter and I will not fail.”  “Hurt like a bitch too.”

“Got back from deployment and I was fucked up in the head. Too young to have seen what I saw. So I got my spine done.”

He doesn’t have to look, he knows what it says. 

“Scars show us where we have been, they do not dictate where we are going.”

Moving his hand to your right hip, you leave it to linger over the stone tower and crescent moon that stain your skin. “Tarot card. The Tower. Represents everything I felt when I got out.” He doesn’t comment on the two puckered scars at two of the corners. 

You twist your arm so he gets a better look. “Queen of Swords. When I finally found myself again, I wanted to be independent, strong. It helped me patch myself back up and apply for the agency. I got this before my expert firearms test at Quantico. Eagle, Globe, Anchor…with my rifle sight in the globe to show how both of those pieces of me make one.”

“And your hands?” He asks softly. 

He takes both of your hands in his and kisses the ink across your skin at the base of your thumbs.

“Breathe.” Says the left.

“Hold.” Says the right.

“Just a reminder when I line up the shot.”

“How about you give me a shot?”

“What?”

“You’re incredible for reasons not related to a bathroom in a bar. I want a chance to lick every single one of those tattoos.”

“If that’s the case, wait until you see my piercings.”

Chris groans as you smile into his kiss.

@nano--raptor @cchellacat @eurynome827 @jobean12-blog @book-dragon-13 @aesthetical-bucky @marvelgirl7 @sallycanwait68 @buckys-broody-muffin @softpeachbarnes @godofplumsandthunder @azurika-writes @ikaris-whore @this-kitten-is-smitten @randomfandompenguin @littleredstarfish

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[d-criss-news]

Ryan Murphy’s (Kinda) True ‘Hollywood’ Story: 1940s Meets Gay Stars, Interracial Romance and (Gasp!) a Female Studio Chief

The prolific TV creator and Netflix unveil a revisionist take on the golden age of movies, showing how much (and how little) has shifted in entertainment and beyond: “'Hollywood’ can change the world.”

On an abnormally cold January evening, on the steps of Los Angeles’ Shrine Auditorium, history was being rewritten.

Two actors, one playing Rock Hudson, the other Hudson’s African American screenwriter boyfriend, Archie, were tucked inside a teal blue Packard Club Sedan, awaiting their cue. Outside, it was Oscar night, 1948, and despite warnings of grave backlash, the pair was prepared to step out as a couple for the first time.

Archie exited first, his eyes wide with trepidation, then Rock. In matching white tuxedos, they grabbed for each other’s hands and shuffled nervously down the red carpet.

The press box erupted in hisses, then boos.

“Are we doing the right thing?” Archie whispered.

“Absolutely we are,” Rock replied.

The two exchanged smiles, exhaled and made their way into the theater. Then they stopped and did it again. And again.

Ryan Murphy, the scene’s chief architect, was a few miles east, buried in one of his dozen other projects, but his fingerprints could be detected everywhere. The reimagining — part of his new Netflix anthology series, Hollywood — offers a world in which Hudson (played by Jake Picking) walked openly as a gay man, as opposed to the real-life heartthrob who remained closeted until his death from AIDS in the mid-1980s. Elsewhere in Murphy’s revision of history, an African American actress, played by Laura Harrier, is cast as the star of a major studio picture, written by Hudson’s black boyfriend (Jeremy Pope), helmed by a half-Asian director (Darren Criss) and greenlit by a female studio chief (Patti LuPone) and her gay head of production (Joe Mantello).

If Pose was Murphy’s effort to champion the marginalized, Hollywood’s his shot at imagining such marginalization was undone decades ago. The series, his first without his longtime collaborators at 20th Century Fox Television, drops in its entirety May 1, with a sprawling ensemble of real and fictional characters. It was supposed to feel timely, its period backdrop a reminder of how much and how little has changed in 70-plus years; now, landing in a world grappling with a global pandemic, its 1940s setting could be the escape so many are seeking.

“I’ve always been interested in this kind of buried history, and I wanted to create a universe where these icons got the endings that they deserved,” says Murphy, 55, who’s been waiting out the virus at his home in Los Angeles, with his husband and two young sons, who now require homeschooling. “It’s this beautiful fantasy, and in these times, it could be a sort of balm in some way.”

The Netflix executives who shelled out roughly $300 million for Murphy’s services in 2018 can only hope so. Already, they’ve had to cancel influencer screenings, scrap subway ads and punt on potential plans for a premiere benefit for the now hard-hit Motion Picture Television Fund, which houses several stars of the era in its L.A. retirement facility. As for the show itself, it’s certainly not the broad-sweeping, four-quadrant fare that Netflix is widely thought to prefer. The pilot episode alone features six sex scenes — a mix of gay and straight — and nearly all involve some sort of financial transaction. By episode three, which the show’s writers have nicknamed “night of a thousand dicks,” the characters have found their way to one of director George Cukor’s infamous pool parties.

Still, Netflix head of originals Cindy Holland says that Hollywood is exactly the kind of elevated, inclusive and ultimately hopeful programming that the company wants from Murphy, and the seven-episode limited series was fast-tracked as a result. “What I love,” she says, “is that Ryan is creating a world that he wants to will into existence.”

***

Murphy’s first inkling for Hollywood came over a celebratory dinner with Criss following their fruitful awards run for the Versace installment of American Crime Story. With rosé flowing, the two began discussing a next possible collaboration. Murphy wanted to do something young and hopeful; Criss proposed 1940s Hollywood. The 33-year-old actor had been fascinated by the lore surrounding characters like Scotty Bowers, the L.A. hustler who operated out of a gas station on Hollywood Boulevard, along with golden age stars like Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, and he was eager to explore the era with Murphy.

“There’s a blinking red light on it that says, ‘Ryan Murphy, Ryan Murphy,’ ” says Criss, “because it’s sexy, it’s fun, it’s glamorous, it’s dangerous and it has resonance now.”

Murphy didn’t disagree. As a student of Hollywood history, he’d already gone down the road with his FX series Feud, which centered its first season on Joan Crawford and Bette Davis. This would simply allow him to dig deeper on figures who’d long captured his attention, from Anna May Wong, the first Chinese American movie star, who was effectively run out of Hollywood, to Hattie McDaniel, the first African American to win an Oscar and not be allowed to sit with her cast in the theater. “I’m always moved by these characters who weren’t fully seen or didn’t get their moment,” says Murphy in an interview on the Paramount lot earlier this year, where he was directing Meryl Streep in The Prom, another Netflix production. At one point, he’d even toyed with the idea of doing a Biography-style anthology series with an episode devoted to each.  

Not long after that dinner, Criss was at a bachelor party when his phone rang. It was Murphy. “He says, 'Do you mind if I just do my thing on this?’ ” says Criss. “And I’m like, 'You’re Ryan fucking Murphy. Do whatever you want!’ ”

So, Murphy picked a collaborator, Ian Brennan, with whom he’d worked on Glee, Scream Queens and The Politician, and the two began quietly tossing around ideas. With the help of a few researchers, they landed on a story that revolved around a Bowers-esque service station, with a staff full of actors and directors looking to be stars. “It was super fun and sexy and salacious,” says Brennan, “but it was also about the #MeToo underbelly of 1940s Hollywood, which felt very, very contemporary.”

The men found it exhilarating to depict sex so explicitly and in every possible combination. “To be able to describe exactly what is happening is really, really cool,” says Brennan. And despite the appetite for such racy content varying dramatically around the globe, Netflix brass was passionate about its inclusion — a marked difference from his and Murphy’s experience on previous shows, where they fought tooth and nail over the mere mention of sexual terms. “I hope this isn’t speaking out of school,” he adds, “but the one thing [Netflix’s vp original series] Brian Wright said to me, was, like, 'Thumbs-up on the sex. If anything, dial that up.’”

From the Pose writers room, producer Janet Mock would see Murphy and Brennan huddled in a nearby room and wonder what the latest “secret Ryan Murphy project” was all about. At one point, Mock found herself pumping intel out of a writers’ assistant, who told her, “It’s a thing called Hollywood, it’s about this gas station.” Having seen the 2017 documentary Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood, she figured, “OK, there’s no place for me in that. I’ll continue with Pose.”

But that would soon change, beginning with an eye-opening discussion in the writers room about which of the ensemble’s contract players would be picked to star in the film at the center of Hollywood. The role was that of real-life actress Peg Entwistle, a blonde Brit who jumped to her death from the famed Hollywood sign. “At first, we were like, “Well, it can’t be the black girl [Harrier’s Camille], they wouldn’t have done it. …’ And then it was like, 'Well, wait a second, what if it actually was? What if Peg becomes Meg,’ ” says Brennan. One what-if led to another and then another, and before long they’d decided to go back in and start revising history — this time, with Mock as a credited writer.

Now, rather than use the series to, say, showcase the powerlessness of a studio head’s aging housewife, in this case LuPone’s Avis, they tweaked the story so that suddenly it explores what would happen if Avis gained control of her husband’s studio. It was the same for several others, including Rock Hudson, says Murphy’s co-creator. Instead of telling the tragic tale of a person forced to hide, they allowed themselves to explore what would happen if he refused to do so. “Once we began asking, 'What if?’ it became a different show,” says Brennan, with Mantello adding: “It became a fable of what could have been.”

With Netflix execs eager to get the series up on the service, Murphy began loading the cast with his usual mix of familiar names — from Jim Parsons, as Hudson’s real-life closeted agent Henry Wilson, to Rob Reiner, as the head of the fictional Ace Studios — and newer discoveries, like Samara Weaving (Ready or Not) as Reiner’s daughter, or Picking as Hudson and Pope as his fictional boyfriend. As with other recent ensembles, he listed all of them not in order of importance or seniority but rather alphabetically on the call sheet. The message was clear: “The star of the show is the show,” says Murphy. Still, initial hires Criss and David Corenswet, who’d made his debut on The Politician, were given executive producer credits, along with backend points on the series. (There’s already talk of a season two, which would pick up in the late 1960s, with many of the same actors in entirely new roles.)

At some point in the production process, Murphy found himself scaling back the graphic nature of the series, too — a byproduct of his own personal recalibration, he says, having spent so much of his pre-Netflix life fighting to show so much as a woman’s nipple. “When you’re finally free, you have this tendency to go full tilt boogie, but ultimately I became much more interested in the emotion of the characters, and, frankly, I became protective of them,” he explains, suggesting every episode had an X-rated version, an R-rated version and a PG version, and, to the delight of participants like Corenswet, who plays an actor-cum-sex worker, Murphy would almost always select the R one.

“I think Ryan realized as we were shooting that the best part of the sex was the romance — and that’s always great to hear as an actor, especially when it applies to your five-page sex scene with Patti LuPone,” says the 26-year-old Corenswet. LuPone, for her part, was just thrilled she was still asked to do a sex scene at age 71. “Finally!” she bellows, praising Murphy for having both the vision and the courage to take the risks he does: “Ryan’s fearless,” says the Tony winner, who also popped up in Pose, “and I’m so happy to be in his world." 

***

Long before Murphy was a household name, with a big fat Netflix deal to ostensibly take all the risks he wants, he was a frustrated former journalist fighting to change a system that wasn’t built for him. His own secret had been revealed at just 15, when his mother found a drawer full of love letters from his then-22-year-old boyfriend at their home in Indiana. Horrified, she and Murphy’s father threw their son into counseling, hoping he could be "fixed.”

A decade or two later, after his first career as an entertainment writer, Murphy carved out a place for himself in television, where he could exist comfortably as a gay man — so long as he didn’t try to write anyone like himself into scripts. “There were lots of words that they’d use to discriminate against you,” he says, “too flamboyant, too camp, too theatrical, and they were all code.”

By the mid-1990s, he’d joined forces with 10 or so other out or soon-to-be-out creatives, a group that included Nina Jacobson, Greg Berlanti and A Beautiful Mind’s Bruce Cohen. Giving themselves the name “Out There,” they’d meet in courtyards and living rooms to swap horror stories and try to plot a path forward. “We were young and didn’t have much money, but we had a lot of energy and a need to connect with and support each other as gay people working in a straight environment,” says Jacobson, who’d later collaborate with Murphy on American Crime Story and Pose. “And for a lot of us, it was, for the first time, that feeling of community.”

In time, Murphy, like the others, found a way to “monetize [his] pain.” His first creation, Popular, debuted in 1999, and other opportunities followed. Popular begat Nip/Tuck, Nip/Tuck begat Glee, and before he knew it, Murphy had moved from TV’s fringes to its red-hot center. As The New Yorker once wrote, “He changed; the industry changed; he changed the industry.” In early 2018, he signaled that power by signing a nine-figure deal, among the most lucrative in the medium’s history.

So it is perhaps fitting that Murphy’s first project wholly for and from the service includes a scene that trumpets what he calls “the thesis statement” of his career. It begins with Criss’ character, Raymond, being regaled by the story of Anna May Wong’s awe-inspiring screen test for the lead role in the 1937 adaptation of The Good Earth, a part that ultimately went to a far less deserving Caucasian actress. Suggesting it was one of the saddest stories Raymond had ever heard, a film executive played by Mantello responds:

“What’s so sad about it? The picture was a hit. [They] were right. You can’t open a picture with a Chinese lead or a colored one, a number of theaters won’t run it.”

Raymond: “But you said she deserved the part?”

Exec: “Yes, but the hard fact is, had she gotten it, the picture is not a hit.”

Raymond: “How do you know that? You never made the movie, so how do you know it’s not a hit?”

Criss’ character continues with a monologue that is so perfectly Murphy you can almost close your eyes and picture him saying it.  

“Sometimes I think folks in this town don’t really understand the power they have. Movies don’t just show us how the world is, they show us how the world can be. If we change the way that movies are made — you take a chance and you make a different kind of story, I think you can change the world.”

Criss himself would argue that Murphy already has. “His dial is always in extremes. So, if he’s doing Glee or Scream Queens or this, it’s at an 11, almost as a middle finger to reality,” says the actor. “It’s like he turned the dial over to say, 'This is how I’d like to see the world in my wildest dreams. Ain’t it fun?’ ”

In the past two years, since he moved his creative hub from 20th Century Fox TV, where he still maintains a considerable roster, Murphy been responsible for producing roughly 200 LGBTQ characters, many featured as leads. At least a third of his Hollywood cast is older than 70 (“Seventy is the new 40,” he teases), and nearly every project he launches is fronted by a woman — and that’s just in front of the camera. “If you see it, you can be it,” Murphy says often.

It’s a worldview that appeals to Netflix’s Holland, for whom he’s already prepped two films (Prom, The Boys in the Band), two docuseries (Circus of Books, Secret Love) and five seasons of inclusive television, including a Halston miniseries that, along with his 20th programs Pose, American Horror Story and American Crime Story, shut down care of COVID-19 in March. In the weeks since, when he isn’t toggling between Tiger King and MSNBC, Murphy’s kept busy writing two new decidedly hopeful series, each with the express purpose of providing viewers and himself an escape. “Ryan’s the rare creator who speaks to many audiences,” says Holland. “It’s not just gay people or straight people or older people or younger people, it’s really all people who are interested in the human condition.”

To date, Murphy claims he has yet to hear the word “no” from his Netflix bosses, though he’s definitely been nudged in certain directions. “They don’t want me to do small, niche things,” he says, acknowledging that not too long ago a project like Hollywood would have been deemed just that. “But they know how to market this,” he explains, noting that Netflix will push his latest series on viewers who also like love stories, young adult series and LGBTQ fare.

For those who worried the ultra-competitive producer would chafe in a system that doesn’t provide a public report card (aka ratings), he argues that that’s been liberating. Brennan backs him up, revealing how they received initial numbers for The Politician a week or two after it premiered late last summer and then another trove of data a month or so later; and though the latter could effectively game out how many people would watch the series over time, Brennan says, “We were sort of like, 'I don’t think that’s helpful.’ ”

Murphy takes it a step further, insisting he’s no longer interested in the old metrics, like how many people are watching or how many awards a series has generated. “All the things that people tell you will make you feel successful … I have those things, they don’t,” he says. What matters to him now is being able to tell stories that he wishes he or others could have seen. To that end, he can’t help but wonder what his own life would have been had he witnessed Rock Hudson walking the Oscars red carpet as an openly gay man — and though it’s too late to change his own experience, Murphy would like to be able to improve the experience of others. So, he took a chance and made a different kind of story. “Hollywood,” he says, “can change the world.”