#conference badges

[recognitionexpress]

[swankpalanquin]

got lost on the way to the business office and now everyone thinks i'm an idiot child :l

[jcmarchi]

One of Those “Onboarding” UIs, With Anchor Positioning

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/one-of-those-onboarding-uis-with-anchor-positioning/

One of Those ��Onboarding” UIs, With Anchor Positioning

Welcome to “Anchor Positioning 101” where we will be exploring this interesting new CSS feature. Our textbook for this class will be the extensive “Anchor Positioning Guide” that Juan Diego Rodriguez published here on CSS-Tricks.

I’m excited for this one. Some of you may remember when CSS-Tricks released the “Flexbox Layout Guide” or the “Grid Layout Guide” — I certainly do and still have them both bookmarked! I spend a lot of time flipping between tabs to make sure I have the right syntax in my “experimental” CodePens.

I’ve been experimenting with CSS anchor positioning like the “good old days” since Juan published his guide, so I figured it’d be fun to share some of the excitement, learn a bit, experiment, and of course: build stuff!

CSS Anchor Positioning introduction

Anchor positioning lets us attach — or “anchor” — one element to one or more other elements. More than that, it allows us to define how a “target” element (that’s what we call the element we’re attaching to an anchor element) is positioned next to the anchor-positioned element, including fallback positioning in the form of a new @position-try at-rule.

The most hand-wavy way to explain the benefits of anchor positioning is to think of it as a powerful enhancement to position: absolute; as it helps absolutely-positioned elements do what you expect. Don’t worry, we’ll see how this works as we go.

Anchor positioning is currently a W3C draft spec, so you know it’s fresh. It’s marked as “limited availability” in Baseline which at the time of writing means it is limited to Chromium-based browsers (versions 125+). That said, the considerate folks over at Oddbird have a polyfill available that’ll help out other browsers until they ship support.

This browser support data is from Caniuse, which has more detail. A number indicates that browser supports the feature at that version and up.

Desktop

Chrome Firefox IE Edge Safari 125 No No 125 No

Mobile / Tablet

Android Chrome Android Firefox Android iOS Safari 131 No 131 No

Oddbird contributes polyfills for many new CSS features and you (yes, you!) can support their work on Github or Open Collective!

Tab Atkins-Bittner, contributing author to the W3C draft spec on anchor positioning, spoke on the topic at CSS Day 2024. The full conference talk is available on YouTube:

Here at CSS-Tricks, Juan demonstrated how to mix and match anchor positioning with view-driven animations for an awesome floating notes effect:

Front-end friend Kevin Powell recently released a video demonstrating how “CSS Popover + Anchor Positioning is Magical”.

And finally, in the tradition of “making fun games to learn CSS,” Thomas Park released Anchoreum (a “Flexbox Froggy“-type game) to learn about CSS anchor positioning. Highly recommend checking this out to get the hang of the position-area property!

The homework

OK, now that we’re caught up on what CSS anchor positioning is and the excitement surrounding it, let’s talk about what it does. Tethering an element to another element? That has a lot of potential. Quite a few instances I can remember where I’ve had to fight with absolute positioning and z-index in order to get something positioned just right.

Let’s take a quick look at the basic syntax. First, we need two elements, an anchor-positioned element and the target element that will be tethered to it.

<!-- Anchor element --> <div id="anchor"> Anchor </div> <!-- Target element --> <div id="target"> Target </div>

We set an element as an anchor-positioned element by providing it with an anchor-name. This is a unique name of our choosing, however it needs the double-dash prefix, like CSS custom properties.

#anchor anchor-name: --anchor;

As for our target element, we’ll need to set position: absolute; on it as well as tell the element what anchor to tether to. We do that with a new CSS property, position-anchor using a value that matches the anchor-name of our anchor-positioned element.

#anchor anchor-name: --anchor; #target position: absolute; position-anchor: --anchor;

May not look like it yet, but now our two elements are attached. We can set the actual positioning on the target element by providing a position-area. To position our target element, position-area creates an invisible 3×3 grid over the anchor-positioned element. Using positioning keywords, we can designate where the target element appears near the anchor-positioned element.

#target position: absolute; position-anchor: --anchor; position-area: top center;

Now we see that our target element is anchored to the top-center of our anchor-positioned element!

Anchoring pseudo-elements

While playing with anchor positioning, I noticed you can anchor pseudo-elements, just the same as any other element.

#anchor anchor-name: --anchor; &::before content: "Target"; position: absolute; position-anchor: --anchor; left: anchor(center); bottom: anchor(center);

Might be useful for adding design flourishes to elements or adding functionality as some sort of indicator.

Moving anchors

Another quick experiment was to see if we can move anchors. And it turns out this is possible!

Notice the use of anchor() functions instead of position-area to position the target element.

#target position: absolute; position-anchor: --anchor-one; top: anchor(bottom); left: anchor(left);

CSS anchor functions are an alternate way to position target elements based on the computed values of the anchor-positioned element itself. Here we are setting the target element’s top property value to match the anchor-positioned element’s bottom value. Similarly, we can set the target’s left property value to match the anchor-positioned element’s left value.

Hovering over the container element swaps the position-anchor from --anchor-one to --anchor-two.

.container:hover #target position-anchor: --anchor-two;

We are also able to set a transition as we position the target using top and left, which makes it swap smoothly between anchors.

Extra experimental

Along with being the first to release CSS anchor-positioning, the Chrome dev team recently released new pseudo-selectors related to the <details> and <summary> elements. The ::details-content pseudo-selector allows you to style the “hidden” part of the <details> element.

With this information, I thought: “can I anchor it?” and sure enough, you can!

Again, this is definitely not ready for prime-time, but it’s always fun to experiment!

Practical examinations

Let’s take this a bit further and tackle more practical challenges using CSS anchor positioning. Please keep in mind that all these examples are Chrome-only at the time of writing!

Tooltips

One of the most straightforward use cases for CSS anchor positioning is possibly a tooltip. Makes a lot of sense: hover over an icon and a label floats nearby to explain what the icon does. I didn’t quite want to make yet another tutorial on how to make a tooltip and luckily for me, Zell Liew recently wrote an article on tooltip best practices, so we can focus purely on anchor positioning and refer to Zell’s work for the semantics.

Now, let’s check out one of these tooltips:

<!-- ... -->; <li class="toolbar-item">; <button type="button" id="inbox-tool" aria-labelledby="inbox-label" class="tool"> <svg id="inbox-tool-icon"> <!-- SVG icon code ... --> </svg> </button> <div id="inbox-label" role="tooltip"> <p>Inbox</p> </div> </li> <!-- ... -->

The HTML is structured in a way where the tooltip element is a sibling of our anchor-positioned <button>, notice how it has the [aria-labelledby] attribute set to match the tooltip’s [id]. The tooltip itself is a generic <div>, semantically enhanced to become a tooltip with the [role="tooltip"] attribute. We can also use [role="tooltip"] as a semantic selector to add common styles to tooltips, including the tooltip’s positioning relative to its anchor.

First, let’s turn our button into an anchored element by giving it an anchor-name. Next, we can set the target element’s position-anchor to match the anchor-name of the anchored element. By default, we can set the tooltip’s visibility to hidden, then using CSS sibling selectors, if the target element receives hover or focus-visible, we can then swap the visibility to visible.

/* Anchor-positioned Element */ #inbox-tool anchor-name: --inbox-tool; /* Target element */ [role="tooltip"]#inbox-label position-anchor: --inbox-tool /* Target positioning */ [role="tooltip"] position: absolute; position-area: end center; /* Hidden by default */ visibility: hidden; /* Visible when tool is hovered or receives focus */ .tool:hover + [role="tooltip"], .tool:focus-visible + [role="tooltip"] visibility: visible;

Ta-da! Here we have a working, CSS anchor-positioned tooltip!

As users of touch devices aren’t able to hover over elements, you may want to explore toggletips instead!

Floating disclosures

Disclosures are another common component pattern that might be a perfect use case for anchor positioning. Disclosures are typically a component where interacting with a toggle will open and close a corresponding element. Think of the good ol’ <detail>/<summary> HTML element duo, for example.

Currently, if you are looking to create a disclosure-like component which floats over other portions of your user interface, you might be in for some JavaScript, absolute positioning, and z-index related troubles. Soon enough though, we’ll be able to combine CSS anchor positioning with another newer platform feature [popover] to create some incredibly straightforward (and semantically accurate) floating disclosure elements.

The Popover API provides a non-modal way to elevate elements to the top-layer, while also baking in some great functionality, such as light dismissals.

Zell also has more information on popovers, dialogs, and modality!

One of the more common patterns you might consider as a “floating disclosure”-type component is a dropdown menu. Here is the HTML we’ll work with:

<nav> <button id="anchor">Toggle</button> <ul id="target"> <li><a href="#">Link 1</a></li> <li><a href="#">Link 2</a></li> <li><a href="#">Link 3</a></li> </ul> </nav>

We can set our target element, in this case the <ul>, to be our popover element by adding the [popover] attribute.

To control the popover, let’s add the attribute [popoveraction="toggle"] to enable the button as a toggle, and point the [popovertarget] attribute to the [id] of our target element.

<nav> <button id="anchor" popoveraction="toggle" popovertarget="target"> Toggle </button> <ul id="target" popover> <li><a href="#">Link 1</a></li> <li><a href="#">Link 2</a></li> <li><a href="#">Link 3</a></li> </ul> </nav>

No JavaScript is necessary, and now we have a toggle-able [popover] disclosure element! The problem is that it’s still not tethered to the anchor-positioned element, let’s fix that in our CSS.

First, as this is a popover, let’s add a small bit of styling to remove the intrinsic margin popovers receive by default from browsers.

ul[popover] margin: 0;

Let’s turn our button into an anchor-positioned element by providing it with an anchor-name:

ul[popover] margin: 0; #anchor anchor-name: --toggle;

As for our target element, we can attach it to the anchor-positioned element by setting its position to absolute and the position-anchor to our anchor-positioned element’s anchor-name:

ul[popover] margin: 0; #anchor anchor-name: --toggle; #target position: absolute; position-anchor: --toggle;

We can also adjust the target’s positioning near the anchor-positioned element with the position-area property, similar to what we did with our tooltip.

ul[popover] margin: 0; #anchor anchor-name: --toggle; #target position: absolute; position-anchor: --toggle; position-area: bottom; width: anchor-size(width);

You may notice another CSS anchor function in here, anchor-size()! We can set the target’s width to match the width of the anchor-positioned element by using anchor-size(width).

There is one more neat thing we can apply here, fallback positioning! Let’s consider that maybe this dropdown menu might sometimes be located at the bottom of the viewport, either from scrolling or some other reason. We don’t really want it to overflow or cause any extra scrolling, but instead, swap to an alternate location that is visible to the user.

Anchor positioning makes this possible with the postion-try-fallbacks property, a way to provide an alternate location for the target element to display near an anchor-positioned element.

#target position: absolute; position-anchor: --toggle; position-area: bottom; postion-try-fallbacks: top; width: anchor-size(width);

To keep things simple for our demo, we can add the opposite value of the value of the postion-area property: top.

Shopping cart component

We know how to make a tooltip and a disclosure element, now let’s build upon what we’ve learned so far and create a neat, interactive shopping cart component.

Let’s think about how we want to mark this up. First, we’ll need a button with a shopping cart icon:

<button id="shopping-cart-toggle"> <svg id="shopping-cart-icon" /> <!-- SVG icon code ... --> </svg> </button>

We can already reuse what we learned with our tooltip styles to provide a functioning label for this toggle. Let’s add the class .tool to the button, then include a tooltip as our label.

<!-- Toggle --> <button id="shopping-cart-toggle" aria-labelledby="shopping-cart-label" class="tool"> <svg id="shopping-cart-icon" /> <!-- SVG icon code ... --> </svg> </button> <!-- Tooltip --> <div id="shopping-cart-label" role="tooltip" class="tooltip"> <p>Shopping Cart</p> </div>

We’ll need to specify our <button> is an anchor-positioned element in CSS with an anchor-name, which we can also set as the tooltip’s position-anchor value to match.

button#shopping-cart-toggle anchor-name: --shopping-cart-toggle; [role="tooltip"]#shopping-cart-label position-anchor: --shopping-cart-toggle;

Now we should have a nice-looking tooltip labeling our shopping cart button!

But wait, we want this thing to do more than that! Let’s turn it into a disclosure component that reveals a list of items inside the user’s cart. As we are looking to have a floating user-interface with a few actions included, we should consider a <dialog> element. However, we don’t necessarily want to be blocking background content, so we can opt for a non-modal dialog using the[popover] attribute again!

<!-- Toggle --> <button id="shopping-cart-toggle" aria-labelledby="shopping-cart-label" class="tool" popovertarget="shopping-cart" popoveraction="toggle"> <svg id="shopping-cart-icon" /> <!-- SVG icon code ... --> </svg> </button> <!-- Tooltip --> <div id="shopping-cart-label" role="tooltip" class="tooltip"> <p>Shopping Cart</p> </div> <!-- Shopping Cart --> <dialog id="shopping-cart" popover> <!-- Shopping cart template... --> <button popovertarget="shopping-cart" popoveraction="close"> Dismiss Cart </button> </dialog>

To control the popover, we’ve added [popovertarget="shopping-cart"] and [popoveraction="toggle"] to our anchor-positioned element and included a second button within the <dialog> that can also be used to close the dialog with [popoveraction="close"].

To anchor the shopping cart <dialog> to the toggle, we can set position-anchor and position-area:

#shopping-cart position-anchor: --shopping-cart; position-area: end center;

At this point, we should take a moment to realize that we have tethered two elements to the same anchor!

We won’t stop there, though. There is one more enhancement we can make to really show how helpful anchor positioning can be: Let’s add a notification badge to the element to describe how many items are inside the cart.

Let’s place the badge inside of our anchor-positioned element this time.

<!-- Toggle --> <button id="shopping-cart-toggle" aria-labelledby="shopping-cart-label" class="tool" popovertarget="shopping-cart" popoveraction="toggle"> <svg id="shopping-cart-icon" /> <!-- SVG icon code ... --> </svg> <!-- Notification Badge --> <div id="shopping-cart-badge" class="notification-badge"> 1 </div> </button> <!-- ... -->

We can improve our tooltip to include verbiage about how many items are in the cart:

<!-- Tooltip --> <div id="shopping-cart-label" role="tooltip"> <p>Shopping Cart</p> <p>(1 item in cart)</p> </div>

Now the accessible name of our anchor-positioned element will be read as Shopping Cart (1 item in cart), which helps provide context to assistive technologies like screen readers.

Let’s tether this notification badge to the same anchor as our tooltip and shopping cart <dialog>, we can do this by setting the position-anchor property of the badge to --shopping-cart-toggle:

#shopping-cart-badge position: absolute; position-anchor: --shopping-cart-toggle;

Let’s look at positioning. We don’t want it below or next to the anchor, we want it overlapping, so we can use CSS anchor functions to position it based on the anchor-positioned element’s dimensions.

#shopping-cart-badge position: absolute; position-anchor: --shopping-cart-toggle; bottom: anchor(center); left: anchor(center);

Here we are setting the bottom and left of the target element to match the anchor’s center. This places it in the upper-right corner of the SVG icon!

Folks, this means we have three elements anchored now. Isn’t that fantastic?

Combining things

To put these anchor-positioned elements into perspective, I’ve combined all the techniques we’ve learned so far into a more familiar setting:

Disclosure components, dropdown menus, tooltips (and toggletips!), as well as notification badges all made much simpler using CSS anchor positioning!

Final project

As a final project for myself (and to bring this whole thing around full-circle), I decided to try to build a CSS anchor-positioned-based onboarding tool. I’ve previously attempted to build a tool like this at work, which I called “HandHoldJS” and it… well, it didn’t go so great. I managed to have a lot of the core functionality working using JavaScript, but it meant keeping track of quite a lot of positions and lots of weird things kept happening!

Let’s see if we can do better with CSS anchor positioning.

Feel free to check out the code on CodePen! I went down quite a rabbit hole on this one, so I’ll provide a bit of a high-level overview here.

<hand-hold> is a native custom element that works entirely in the light DOM. It sort of falls into the category of an HTML web component, as it is mostly based on enabling its inner HTML. You can specify tour stops to any element on the page by adding [data-tour-stop] attributes with values in the order you want the tour to occur.

Inside the <hand-hold> element contains a <button> to start the tour, a <dialog> element to contain the tour information, <section> elements to separate content between tour stops, a fieldset[data-handhold-navigation] element which holds navigation radio buttons, as well as another <button> to end the tour.

Each <section> element corresponds to a tour stop with a matching [data-handhold-content] attribute applied. Using JavaScript, <hand-hold> dynamically updates tour stops to be anchor-positioned elements, which the <dialog> can attach itself (there is a sneaky pseudo-element attached to the anchor to highlight the tour stop element!).

Although the <dialog> element is attached via CSS anchor positioning, it also moves within the DOM to appear next to the anchor-position element in the accessibility tree. The (well-meaning) intention here is to help provide more context to those who may be navigating via assistive devices by figuring out which element the dialog is referring to. Believe me, though, this thing is far from perfect as an accessible user experience.

Also, since the <dialog> moves throughout the DOM, unfortunately, a simple CSS transition would not suffice. Another modern browser feature to the rescue yet again, as we can pass a DOM manipulation function into a View Transition, making the transitions feel smoother!

There is still quite a lot to test with this, so I would not recommend using <hand-hold> in a production setting. If for no other reason than browser support is quite limited at the moment!

This is just an experiment to see what I could cook up using CSS anchor positioning, I’m excited for the potential!

Class dismissed!

After seeing what CSS anchor positioning is capable of, I have suspicions that it may change a lot of the ways we write CSS, similar to the introduction of flexbox or grid.

I’m excited to see what other user interface patterns can be accomplished with anchor positioning, and I’m even more excited to see what the community will do with it once it’s more broadly available!

[monstersholygrail]

New City, New Life

5k celebration 'Choose your own adventure' story

Dragon x fem!reader— hate fucking, rough sex, marking, fire breath play, restraints (tail)

Pt1 Pt2 Pt3

You stomp out of Minotaur Boss’ office in a blind rage. Your vision blurring with either anger or arousal, you’re not exactly sure. The sound of the door slamming open doesn’t attract any attention, your coworkers far too busy fucking to watch how hot you look when mad. But you can’t help but watch them, eyes drawn to the carefree way they drown in their pleasure. Caring more for satisfying themselves than continuing to work their job.

It was simply astonishing. They all hold a freedom you’ve never known. Not until yesterday when you got here, that is. The longer you stare the hotter your body grows, your pussy gushing with arousal. You feel your world spin, trying to accommodate to your new reality as you would have to accommodate a massive cock. Your thoughts quickly stray away from your mission, the arousal overtaking the anger brewing within you.

For a moment you seriously consider joining one of them. If this is your new life, who’s to say you shouldn’t take advantage of it? You bite your lip, slowing your pace as you walk past a pair of Cat Hybrids who look like they’re in heat.

No—

You can’t risk getting too distracted right now. You had to go confront your Dragon Headhunter and maybe, just maybe, you can blow some of this steam off on him. In whatever form that may take. With a deep inhale you try and clear some of the lust clouding your mind. You turn back toward the conference room, intent on going in, when you immediately bump into a man devouring someone like it’s his last meal.

A small yelp leaves you as you go flying back, not wanting to interrupt, but you quickly lose your footing and once again go tumbling to the ground. You briefly wonder if that sexy Secretary Bunny will catch you again. No! Focus! But then a pair of hands are on you and your heart, and your pussy, flutters.

The stranger’s hands quickly switch you around, causing you to plop firmly in his lap as you straddle him. A moan freely slips past your lips as you already feel his fully hard cock beneath you. As your head snaps up to look at your new rescuer your jaw drops, your eyes sweeping over his infuriatingly and impossibly perfect features.

But unlike everyone else you’ve met in this city… he appears perfectly human. That is until his eyes flicker, his pupils forming a small flame to reflect his burning desire. He wasn’t a human, he was a robot. No wonder he’s the most perfect specimen you’ve ever seen. You glance down, eyes trailing his form when you notice his IT badge. How ironic.

“Well, well, well. If it isn’t the main event falling right into my lap,” he purrs, voice smooth as silk as he leans in, brushing his nose along your jaw.

A small whine leaves you, his skin impossibly smooth against yours. Your eyes flutter and you hate how easily you melt against him. An IT Robot shouldn’t be so damn comfortable. You find yourself baring your neck to him, seeking more of his touch. His dark chuckle vibrates against your skin and you shiver, unintentionally grinding against him. Or was it on purpose? Fuck, you couldn’t even tell anymore.

“Technically you got me into your lap,” you sigh with bliss, your brain only growing fuzzier the longer you stay in his embrace.

It was like he knew exactly where and how to touch you. You were sure it was just from some strange programming he’s downloaded but who were you to question it? The IT Robot’s touch slips beneath your shirt and his large hands caress your curves reverently.

“And what else can I get you to do with me?” IT Robot’s voice rasps and curls into your ear as if putting you under a spell. A spell called his cock. He rolls his hips as he speaks, pressing his hard length roughly against your clothed clit.

“Nngh… N-nothing! I have to go, but damn I wish I didn’t,” you say through gritted teeth.

You force yourself out of his lap, your body vibrating and your cunt pulsing with need. You push the office chair he was sitting in away from you and he laughs. The chair stops as it bumps into another person but his eyes don’t stray from you.

“You’re always welcome, doll.”

It takes all the strength left in your tired and yet still somehow horny body to turn away from the sexy IT Robot but you do. You keep your eyes firmly trained on Conference room D, determined to see this through. Your Dragon Headhunter is the only one right now who deserves the impact of all your pent up emotions.

As you near the door, you stop short, surprised when it opens. For a second you wait with bated breath, wondering if maybe the Dragon Headhunter is looking for you too. You don’t even question the way your pussy floods with arousal. But your stomach drops as a Fae walks out of the conference room and sneaks off, not even seeing you staring after them.

Your fury returns tenfold to the point where you can’t even think straight. You rush for the door, barging in and smashing it closed behind you. The Dragon Headhunter jumps from the noise, lazily glancing over his shoulder at you. Your eyes automatically widen, a gasp leaving you as you finally see him in person. You’d video called dozens of times yet it all paled in comparison to seeing him face-to-face.

He was broad and painstakingly attractive. His scales glimmer in the sunlight that streaks in from the floor-to-ceiling windows. His suit fits tight against his chest, leaving nothing to the imagination of what lies beneath. The fabric clinging to his thick ass and strong thighs. A slow smirk forms on his lips. The sight has you shuddering where you stand and it only serves to make you more angry.

“Well, if it isn’t my newest treasure…”

Your eyes flash, focus returning back to his face. Just in time too to see the smug look painted across his face. You’re in front of him in an instant only to push him back. The creature barely even moves. He sways, although you know he only did it for your benefit.

“Where have you been? You have no idea what’s happened today?” you ask lowly, hands shaking from your anger. Sure, the dicks been great, but this wasn’t how you expected your new life to start.

It’s Dragon Headhunter’s turn to look you up and down, noting your disheveled appearance and lustful expression. It has his smirk growing somehow wider across his face. He crosses his arms, admiring what he’s done to you, what this city has turned you into.

“I believe I have an idea.”

The air grows thick between you and the Dragon Headhunter. You can barely breathe, only managing short shaky breaths as you stare each other down. Your skin burns under his gaze but you refuse to squirm and let him win.

“Of course you do. ‘Cause you fucking tricked me into coming here. Why?” You ask firmly, finally demanding answers from him. You won’t be leaving here without them. And you’ll do anything to get them.

You slowly walk up to him, trying your best to intimidate a beast such as him. But all you do is make yourself feel smaller as he towers over you. The height different has your pussy clenching around nothing. His nostrils immediately flare and you know he can smell how turned on you are. You cry out and push him back again with all your strength.

“Why?!” You demand with a ragged shout.

Without a single word, Dragon Headhunter swoops down and claims your lips in a searing kiss to shut you up. A low moan rumbles through your throat and the Dragon responds with one of his own. One that has you turning to mush in his arms. Your mouths clash together as they fight for dominance. The Dragon’s claws sink into the flesh of your wide hips and he whirls you around, pressing your ass into the conference room table.

Dragon Headhunter ravages you, his tongue swirling through your mouth as if trying to taste every last bit of you. He pushes against you harder and harder until he growls and lifts your plush frame up like it’s nothing and drops you easily on top of the table. You grunt and throw his arms off of you, forcing him to kiss at your pace. His claws sink into the wood and screech loudly as he drags them down, trying to resist grabbing at you again. But as you suck his tongue into your mouth he can’t take it any longer.

He pushes you all the way down on the table with as much as a small shove. You cry out as you go flying back, glaring at him. Dragon Headhunter starts furiously trying to shred off your clothes. You grunt and wrestle against him to get your clothes off without ruining them. He doesn’t bother, shredding his own clothes with a few swipes of his claws. You two glare at each other even as lust fills your gazes. He jerks your legs open to reveal your glistening folds and smoke leaves his snout with his huffs.

“This is where I fucked that pathetic little fae and now it’s where I’m gonna give you their sloppy seconds,” he snarls in your face and you grit your teeth. Your stomach churns with a jealous rage.

Before you can snap back at him, Dragon Headhunter snaps his hips forward, impaling you on his massive cock with a solid stroke. Fire shoots from your core and burns through your entire body. A fierce scream echoes off the walls and your pussy spasms around his girth as your body tries to adjust to being split open on his cock.

But the Dragon barely lets you take a breath before he’s rearing back and snapping his hips back against yours. You groan lowly, actually thankful for all your previous lays today as they helped prepare you for this. Your pussy opens up for him, allowing him to drive in even deeper inside you with each movement. Letting your fury fuel you, jerk your hips, meeting his thrusts. The Dragon’s eyes roll back in his head.

“F-fuuuuck— augh— knew this fuckhole was gonna be good without even seeing it. Looked like a damn slut who’d take anything given to them,” he says darkly, his tongue slipping as he gets more and more lost in the pleasure of your cunt.

Your eyes narrow at him, no matter how good he’s making you feel. Each pump of his hips brushes along every nerve in your core and it sends you flying, your body shaking with unimaginable pleasure. Your sopping cunt sucks him back in with every thrust, needing him inside you despite everything.

Wanting to drive him to the brink of insanity, your hands snap out and sink in between his sensitive scales. The Dragon throws back his head and lets out a ferocious roar. Then he falls forward, elbows caging you in and rutting up into your perfect pussy.

“Tell me why you sold me on this job. Did you think I was right for it?” you ask lowly, your breaths mingling with your close vicinity. Needing to ask and know the truth.

Dragon Headhunter chuckles and your pussy flutters around him, making him groan. He leans in and bites down on your neck, marking you with the memory of this moment. Then he leans back enough to look in your eye to deliver the blow.

“Nah, I just wanted this sweet cunt,” he says breathlessly, his words so simple yet infuriating. You dig your nails into the flesh beneath his scales the Dragon groans in pain, his hips surging forward into your tight heat.

“Fuck you.”

Dragon Headhunters eyes burn brightly, finally matching the anger in your own gaze. He smirks wickedly, flashing his fangs at you in a clear threat.

“Gladly.”

His tail whips out, quickly wrapping around your wrists and pinning you to the table. With a growl that sends chills up your spine, the Dragon picks up his pace, fucking up into you with a stamina your poor human body can barely handle as it jerks up with every thrust. A loud mewl rips from your throat as his cock bullies into your cervix with each stroke. His eyes gleam devilishly as he watches how much of a mess he’s turning you into.

But it’s not enough. His free hand flies to your puffy little clit and rubs your bundle of nerves in time with his thrusts. Your jaw drops, all the sensations building up inside you have you nearly losing your mind.

You scream in relief a when you finally fall off the edge. Your body shaking, hips rising off the table with the force of your orgasm. For a moment you see white and you hear the Dragon roar once more as he follows right after you. And when you open your eyes you gasp to see fire shooting out from his throat, teasing you. The heat it emits just turns you on even more, prolonging an already intense climax.

It’s only once you finally come down from the high of a lifetime do you seem to gain common sense again. You huff, your anger still palpable but more half-hearted as you tear yourself away from him. You slide off the table, heading toward your discarded clothes, needing to get out of here.

“I’m leaving,” you announce, quickly sliding your clothes back on. Ignoring the way your combined release drips out of you and pools in your panties.

“You’re under contract, sweets,” Dragon Headhunter replies, his tone filled with amused arrogance.

You whip around to face him yet unable to reply. He’s right. You’re stuck here. But is it really that bad that you are?

Seeing your hesitance to reply, thoughts clearly spinning through your mind, Dragon Headhunter smirks and saunters up to you in all his naked glory. “Welcome to Free Use City. Embrace it.”

Leaving the conference room you think over what he said. This was your chance at a fresh start and you wanted to make the most of it. In a Free Use City you guess that meant fucking strangers. Truly embracing the city for what it was and what it offered. You could do that! In your office building alone there were hundreds of people to choose from. You look around the office, wondering if IT Robot’s offer was still on the table. He’s bound to know everything about pleasuring a human. Or perhaps you could find Bunny Secretary and see if you could throw yourself at him again. And well… there was always that Demon Guard you passed on the way in. You’re sure he could show a sinful time.

[fielddrive]

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[corpsekiller]

i have nothing to say for myself, this is just very self-indulgent. despite it all, i still hope you like it <3 though it isn't proof-read yet, so please be kind and ignore any typos!

PAIRING. pro hero!katsuki bakugou x genderneutral!reader (barista)

WARNINGS. language, mentions of blood and scars, katsuki is sorta an arrogant piece of shit

MASTERLIST

currently thinking about pro hero!Katsuki in his early 20s who refuses to fit into social norms — he shows up to press conferences dressed in sleek black clothing, the sleeves of his turtleneck rolled up to show off the tattoos covering his scarred arms, muscles tensing and flexing beneath his inked skin as he reaches for the water bottle his assistant placed next to the microphone.

Silver rings adorn his fingers — heavy jewelry that catches the flashing light of cameras snapping picture after picture with a dangerous glint that matches the sharp smirk that tugs at the corners of his mouth when a journalist asks a peculiarly intimate question about his love life. He barks out a laugh, low and rough, followed by a careless fuck off, that's none of ya business — a reply that causes her to blush and scramble back into her seat as the next reporter gathers the courage to speak up.

When he‘s off duty, Katsuki is seen walking down the busy streets of the city in ripped jeans and heavy combat boots still stained with the blood of the villain he fought mere hours ago, the black tank top he wears stretching across his broad back and clinging to his body in a way that leaves little to the imagination.

Each movement shifts the thin fabric just enough to reveal more of the intricate dark lines of ink that trace his arms, curling up from his wrists to wrap around his biceps, traveling along his shoulders and disappearing under silver chains dangling from his neck to sprawl across his back and up to wrap around his throat.

Blood still seeps from an open cut beneath his exposed collarbone and bruises blossom on the edge of his clenched jaw, tinging the bare skin of his face in deep purple and blue that causes passers-by to gasp in mere horror. Some of them point at him, others only whisper behind raised hands, gaping at him with a hint of fear and admiration.

He only gives them a knowing smirk — the wounds he unashamedly carries from the battle are nothing but a badge of honor to him.

There‘s something so unapologetically captivating about him — a certain kind of controlled violence in every step he takes, an intensity that dares anyone to approach and promises a challenge if they do.

People scramble out of his way without even realizing they‘ve done it. Katsuki deliberately continues his path down the crowded sidewalk, casually adjusting the flannel shirt tied low on his waist before he enters a small coffee shop around the corner and ignores the crowd of fans that follows him soon after, heading straight past the queue as if the entire place belongs to him.

Perhaps it does, judging by the star-struck gazes of every customer he walks by, letting him pass without a single complaint.

"Americano," he says bluntly, voice low and rough, letting his words sound more like a command than a simple coffee order. He doesn‘t tack on a please, merely pierces you with a sharp glare as if he expects you to immediately drop everything you‘ve been doing to make his order.

Of course, he's right.

For a moment, you only stare at him. His hair is tousled, ashen strands disheveled from his fight against another villain you‘ve watched on the news earlier, but now that he‘s standing right in front of you, so close that you can see the small scar that runs along his cheekbone, you notice that his body isn‘t only decorated with blank ink.

No, there are piercings, too many for you to count in this short span of time, but the sight alone causes your knees to buckle. There's a silver barbell going through his eyebrow and two studs glint along the side of his nose, but what catches your attention the most are the delicate rings that adorn his lips, catching the light just at the corners of his mouth that are now quirked up into a devilish smile.

"Uh, coming right up!" Your voice comes out a little shakier than you‘d like and you clear your throat, quickly dropping the task at hand to busy yourself with the espresso machine and make his coffee as fast as possible, because—

Well, it's Dynamight.

You can feel his eyes on you as you work and although you don‘t dare to look up, too focused on not messing up, you catch a glimpse of his reflection in the machine — the set of his jaw, the slight furrow of his brow and the way his piercings glint dangerously when he clicks his tongue in mild impatience.

He leans against the counter, tattooed arms flexing as he adjusts the rings on his fingers and runs a hand through his hair. The fangirls behind him squeal with excitement, screaming incoherent phrases at him that not even you can decipher, though he doesn‘t seem to pay much attention to them anyway. Instead, he‘s solely focused on his order and, briefly, on you.

After a few minutes, you finish up, managing to keep your hands steady as you place the cup in front of him.

"A-Americano... for you," you mumble, trying to keep your tone even as if your pulse isn‘t racing just from standing so close to him.

Katsuki’s gaze drops to the cup, then shifts back to you, something unreadable in his eyes as he lifts it to take a slow sip, watching you over the rim. For a second, you think you catch the faintest hint of a genuine smile on his pierced lips before he carelessly tosses a few bills on the counter — more than enough — and nods, turning to leave without another word, his attention back on the door and the crowd still clamoring for a piece of his time.

Katsuki is nearly out the door when he glances back and offers you a sharp grin, letting his tongue dart out to lick over his bottom lip as he lets his eyes wander over your figure with such intensity that you momentarily forget how to breathe until the coffee shop around you begins to spin from the lack of oxygen.

And just like that, he’s gone, leaving you with the faint scent of coffee and leather, and the lingering thrill of an encounter you know you won’t be forgetting anytime soon.

Taglist: @justwolosers

[magical-reid]

The rings we keep

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!FBI!Reader

Genre: fluff

Content warnings: none?

Word count: 1.6k

Summary: An FBI agent unexpectedly marries Spencer Reid in a Las Vegas hospital to fulfill his mother's wishes, leading to a complicated relationship built on convenience. As they work together on a dangerous murder case, their bond deepens, and Spencer's quiet heroism reveals that their accidental marriage might hold the potential for real love.

The badge clipped to your belt was as much a part of you as the Glock strapped to your hip. Being an FBI agent meant long hours, endless yellow tape, and the occasional brush with danger that left you rattled for days. But you loved it. You thrived in the chaos, the adrenaline, the chance to make a difference.

Still, nothing could have prepared you for the chaos of being married to Spencer Reid.

It wasn’t that he wasn’t kind or brilliant—he was both, in spades. Spencer was a walking encyclopedia with a heart that quietly held more compassion than most people knew. You hadn’t planned on marrying him, though, in fact, neither of you had planned on marrying anyone.

It had started two months ago, in a Las Vegas hospital room. Spencer’s mother, Diana, had been lucid that day—something you’d learned was both a gift and a curse. She had smiled at you as you sat next to Spencer, the three of you chatting about books, the weather, and old stories from her youth.

“You’re so good to him,” Diana had said suddenly, fixing her gaze on you.

You’d looked up, confused.

“She is,” Spencer had replied, his voice soft as he squeezed her hand.

“Marry her,” Diana had said, her words clear and direct. “Spencer, I want to see you happy. And I want to see you married before you have to leave.”

Leave. It had been a terrible misunderstanding, her mind tangling the threads of the past and present. But the plea in her voice had been real, and Spencer hadn’t been able to bear telling her no. He’d looked at you, something fragile and desperate in his eyes, and before you knew it, you’d agreed.

The walk-in chapel had been surreal. There was no big dress, no flowers—just a quick exchange of vows, a ring from a pawn shop, and Diana’s tearful smile as she watched from her seat. The moment had been oddly sweet, almost sacred.

And then the moment had passed.

─── ⋆���☆⋅⋆ ───

You’d both agreed to annul it later, but life got in the way. Between your cases and his, you barely had time to sleep, let alone complete the paperwork. Eventually, Spencer had suggested staying married, if only for the convenience.

“It’s easier,” he’d reasoned. “Legally, I mean. Besides, it’s not like it changes anything.”

And for two months, it hadn’t.

Today, though, felt different.

The case you were working on had taken a grim turn, and your unit chief had decided to call in the BAU. You hadn’t protested—it was a particularly brutal series of murders, and their expertise was invaluable. But when you stepped into the police station that morning and saw Penelope Garcia’s face light up like Christmas, you knew she’d snooped.

“Mrs. Reid!” she chirped, her voice barely contained.

You froze mid-step, narrowing your eyes at her. “Not here,” you hissed under your breath.

“Oh, don’t worry,” she whispered conspiratorially, winking. “My lips are sealed… mostly.”

Before you could respond, your unit chief waved you into the conference room. The BAU was already seated, their attention split between a whiteboard covered in crime scene photos and a map dotted with pins.

Spencer was there, of course, leaning forward with his elbows on the table. He didn’t look up when you entered, but his presence was enough to send a twinge of nervous energy through you.

Your unit chief cleared his throat. “Agent Reid, thanks for joining us. BAU, this is Agent Y/N Reid—she’s with our unit and will be helping coordinate the case on our end.”

There was a moment of stunned silence. You saw Emily Prentiss glance at Spencer, her brow raised in mild amusement. Derek Morgan’s smirk was almost immediate, while JJ covered her mouth, clearly trying to hide her surprise.

“Reid?” Derek repeated his grin widening.

“Y/N Reid,” you said firmly, emphasizing your first name. “Yes. We’re married. No, it’s not relevant to the case.”

Penelope let out an audible squeal from the corner of the room, and you shot her a warning glare.

“It’s not relevant,” Spencer agreed, his voice calm but his ears slightly pink. “Can we move on?”

Derek chuckled but relented, turning his attention back to the board. “Alright, let’s get to it.”

The case was grim—a string of murders targeting young women who all bore a striking resemblance to one another. Blond hair, blue eyes, petite builds. They’d been abducted, held for days, then left posed in public spaces. The unsub was meticulous, methodical, and growing more confident with each kill.

By midday, the conference room was a storm of theories and strategies. Your units worked well together, bouncing ideas off one another as new leads emerged. But despite the progress, you couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched.

It wasn’t the unsub—though God knew you’d had stalkers in your line of work. No, this was different.

You looked up from your notes and caught Spencer’s gaze. He quickly looked away, pretending to focus on the map.

The weight in your chest grew heavier.

Spencer was your husband. Legally, at least. But in every other way, he was your coworker. He was brilliant and kind and occasionally maddening, but you didn’t know how to be his wife. Not really.

“Y/N?”

JJ’s voice broke through your thoughts. You blinked, realizing everyone was looking at you.

“Sorry, what?”

“I said, you and Reid should interview the victim’s roommate together. She might be more comfortable with a familiar face,” JJ said, glancing between you and Spencer.

You hesitated, but Spencer nodded. “Makes sense,” he said. “We’ll take my car.”

The drive was awkward.

Spencer fidgeted with the radio, flipping through stations before settling on classical. You stared out the window, trying to ignore the growing tension between you.

“You’ve been quiet,” he said finally.

“So have you.”

He sighed, glancing at you briefly before returning his eyes to the road. “Are you… okay? With everyone knowing, I mean.”

You frowned. “It’s not like we planned this, Spencer. Besides, it was bound to come out eventually.”

“I know. But I don’t want it to make things harder for you.”

You softened at his words. Despite his sometimes awkward demeanor, Spencer had a way of saying the right thing when it mattered most.

“It’s fine,” you said. “Really.”

He nodded, though he didn’t look convinced.

The interview went smoothly, though it yielded little new information. The roommate was distraught, her hands trembling as she recounted the last time she’d seen the victim. You kept your tone gentle, and your questions open-ended, but the answers all led to the same dead ends.

When you returned to the station, the atmosphere had shifted. Penelope was typing furiously at her laptop, muttering under her breath about search parameters. Emily and Derek were deep in conversation, while Hotch stood at the head of the table, his arms crossed.

“We have a lead,” he announced as you and Spencer entered. “The unsub’s car was spotted near a bus station downtown. Surveillance footage shows him leaving the scene shortly after the last victim was found.”

He gestured to the screen, where a grainy image of a man in a baseball cap appeared. His face was partially obscured, but something about his posture sent a chill down your spine.

“The station is less than a mile from here,” Hotch continued. “We need to move quickly.”

Your team sprang into action, splitting into smaller groups to cover more ground. Spencer was assigned to the tech team with Penelope, while you were paired with Emily and Derek to canvass the area.

As you searched the bus station, your instincts prickled. Something about the unsub felt personal—too calculated, too deliberate. You couldn’t shake the feeling that he was watching, waiting.

When your phone buzzed with a text from Spencer, your heart skipped a beat.

Be careful.

You texted back a quick You too before slipping the phone into your pocket.

Hours later, the unsub made his move.

It happened fast—too fast. You were alone, having split off from Emily and Derek to follow a potential lead. The unsub cornered you in an alley, his knife glinting in the dim light.

“Y/N,” he said, his voice eerily calm. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

Your blood ran cold. He knew your name.

“FBI,” you said, keeping your voice steady as you drew your weapon. “Drop the knife.”

He didn’t. Instead, he smiled—a slow, deliberate smile that made your stomach churn.

“You’re just like her,” he murmured. “So pretty. So perfect.”

Before you could respond, footsteps thundered behind you. The unsub’s smile faltered, and he turned to run, but not before Spencer tackled him to the ground.

The knife clattered to the pavement as Spencer wrestled him into submission. You moved quickly, cuffing the unsub as Spencer caught his breath.

“You okay?” he asked, his voice tight with concern.

You nodded, though your hands were shaking. “Yeah. Thanks to you.”

He offered a small smile, but his eyes lingered on you, searching for any sign of injury.

Back at the station, the unsub’s confession came easily. He’d been stalking his victims for months, studying their routines, their habits. He’d seen you on the news once, years ago, and decided you were his ideal type.

The realization made your skin crawl.

“You saved her life, pretty boy,” Derek said, clapping Spencer on the shoulder. “That’s what husbands are for, right?”

Spencer flushed, but his smile was genuine.

Later, as you packed up to leave, Spencer lingered by your side.

“You didn’t have to come after me,” you said softly.

“Yes, I did,” he replied without hesitation.

For the first time since your wedding day, you felt the weight of the ring on your finger. Maybe this marriage wasn’t as complicated as you thought.

Maybe, just maybe, it was exactly where you were meant to be.

Part 2

[coquelicoq]

me when im at the major industry event of the year & i run into my stupid former co-pi who really hurt my feelings lately when he got a new grant funded & didnt even shoot me an email abt it & on the lanyard around his neck hes wearing a badge w a fake name & on the line for affiliation is the name of one of my competitors instead of the lab we founded together & hes just standing like an idiot outside the main conference hall w two of my aforementioned competitors pretending like hes too interested in the poster presentations to make eye contact: hello esteemed colleague #1. esteemed colleague #2, so you've decided at last to grace us with your presence, i wonder what has changed? could you perhaps be interested in the keynote? esteemed colleague #1, it's so unlike your institution to sponsor the attendance of total unknowns, so this third person must be a true visionary. i'm always looking to expand my network. perhaps you could introduce us?

[harrisonarchive]

At the Sgt. Pepper press launch, May 19, 1967; photo by Pictorial Press Ltd./Alamy Stock Photo.

“On the lapel [of George’s maroon velvet jacket] was a badge from the New York Workshop Of Non Violence. Their emblem is a yellow submarine with what looked like daffodils spouting from it. ‘Naturally I’m opposed to all forms of war,’ said George seriously. ‘The idea of man killing man is terrible.’” - NME, May 25, 1967 Q: “Would any of you care to comment on any aspect of the war in Vietnam?” John Lennon: “We don't like it.” Q: "Could you elaborate any?" JL: “No. I've elaborated enough, you know. We just don't like it. We don't like war.” George Harrison: "It's, you know… it's just war is wrong, and it's obvious it's wrong. And that's all that needs to be said about it.” - New York City press conference, August 22, 1966 “We felt obviously that Vietnam was wrong — I think any war is wrong, for that matter — and in some of our lyrics we expressed those feelings and tried to be the counter-culture, to try and wake up as many people as we could to the fact that you don’t have to fight. You can call a halt to war and you can have a laugh and dress up silly and that’s what that period was all about: get your hair long, and grow a mustache, and paint your house psychedelic, and write songs. It was all part of our retaliation against the evil that was taking place and still is taking place.” - George Harrison, It Was Twenty Years Ago Today (1987)

[recognitionexpress]

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[tooclevertobehappy]

Hidden in plain sight Part.3

TRIGGER WARNING: Mention of injury, child abuse, lots of guilt

Mapi and Ingrid are led by the officer down the hospital corridor toward one of the conference rooms. They tightly hold each other’s hands, exchanging nervous glances as they walk. Mapi takes a few seconds to press a lingering kiss on Ingrid’s forehead, letting her know they are in this together. The angst that had settled in Ingrid’s stomach grows the further they go. She wishes she could have seen Clara before being dragged away, but now she and Mapi are told to sit and wait for someone to come talk to them.

They’ve been sitting for less than ten minutes when Alexia enters, being led in by the same officer. It’s clear from the confusion on her face that she doesn’t understand why they aren’t allowed to see Clara either.

The three of them sit in silence. Ingrid’s leg bounces incessantly, her nerves growing, until Mapi gently places her hand on her leg, slowly caressing it with her thumb in an attempt to calm her down. All the while, Mapi keeps an eye on the captain, who looks like she’s about to storm out and demand to see Clara. The way Alexia’s knuckles turn white from gripping the chair’s armrests is a clear indication of her mounting frustration.

A woman finally walks in, file in hand, followed by a doctor and the same police officer. They sit down with the group, briefly talking among themselves. All three players’ eyes are drawn to the woman’s badge, which shines under the overhead lamp. It reads: “Mrs. Armon Child Protective Services.”

Ingrid’s hand joins Mapi’s on her leg, holding on so tightly that Mapi wonders if she might bruise from the hold. They exchange glances. What had been a weird, concerning situation before has now escalated into something far worse.

Finally, the agent clears her throat, opens the file she’s holding, and begins to speak.

“Hi, thank you for waiting. We just had a few questions about Miss Arellano’s home life,” she says calmly, before being interrupted by Alexia.

“What do you mean, her home life? Why aren’t we allowed to see her?” Alexia demands, her voice rising with frustration.

The agent sighs before picking up a piece of paper from her file. “Miss Arellano was brought to this hospital following injuries sustained during training today at the Barcelona team stadium, is that correct?” she asks, waiting for them to confirm.

“She was unconscious when she was brought in. Our nurses changed her from her training attire into one of our hospital gowns to better assess her injuries. During the examination, they found unexpected contusions on her body—ones that don’t match up with the injuries she would have sustained during the accident or any other training,” the agent continues.

The doctor, who had remained silent until then, raised a hand, his gaze turning serious.

“Miss Arellano, presented with a head laceration and head contusion that we know was caused today during training.” He says.

The three players nod their head at this, they’d all been there and seen the accident themselves after all.

”We however found evidence of bruises on her ribs and back.” He adds looking at them one after the other, seemingly studying their reactions.

Ingrid’s hand leaves Mapi’s and comes up to cover her mouth as tears started to form in her eyes while Alexia’s sharp intake of breath can be heard throughout the room.

“Adding to this, scans confirmed she has three fractured ribs and small cuts on the base of her neck, small crescent moons that suggest she’s been forcefully held by someone.” He ends with, closing the small file he’d opened when he started listing the seemingly endless list of injuries.

Tears now fall freely from Ingrid’s eyes over her hand still covering her mouth, Mapi’s arm is now laying over Ingrid’s shoulders, holding her closer to her as she holds her own leg tightly to hide the way her hand shakes.

Miss Armon gives them a brief moment, to allow the information to sink in before adding “We are suspecting that this isn’t the first time something like this happened, counting the report made today by the hospital, Miss Arellano is the subject of three previous reports.”

“Reports?” Mapi asks, her voice shaky with the first hints of fear.

“Reports of suspected child abuse,” the agent clarifies. “Two came from her school, and one from a former coach. All three reports describe unusual bruises, which Miss Arellano tries to justify as clumsiness or falling, Miss Arellano it seems has been getting abused and covering it up for weeks, if not months, trying to make those injuries look accidental but the medical assessment is clear, she’s being abused.”

The room is still. No one speaks. The weight of the agent’s words presses on them, suffocating. Mapi watches as Ingrid’s hands tremble. Alexia stares at the floor, her breath shallow. Time stretches between them. They can’t undo this.

Alexia who had sat still for most of the conversation seems to deflate at this, she’d hoped that maybe this had been “it only happened once” situation, but there was no denying the truth, Clara had been suffering for months, hiding it from them, and she’d been absolutely clueless, her, the captain of the team, she had not seen it.

She can’t help but think that she’s failed at her job, and the weight of the realization seems to pull her down and she slowly bends over herself, one hand coming to grip her own hair the other one resting on her face as she tries to slow her breathing down.

Ingrid is left reeling by the sudden onslaught of information. It feels like her chest is tightening with every passing second, tears are clouding her vision, she tries to breathe normally, but she can’t help the hitches that come with every breath she takes. She had suspected something was wrong the day before, but hearing her worst fears confirmed in a matter of minutes sends her spiraling.

“I know this is a lot to process,” Miss Armon says, her voice softer now. “But Clara’s safety is our top priority. We can start to make a difference now that we know the truth.”

The agent looks at the three women. “Now, we must ask if you’ve noticed anything that might shed light on this matter—anything Clara may have said or done, or anything unusual you’ve noticed about her home life?”

Mapi tightens her grip on Ingrid’s hand as she looks at Alexia, who is visibly devastated, she’d seen the Captain face hard situations before, always standing strong to help anyone on their team, but now she looks small curled in on herself as if it could protect her from the brutality of the information she’d been given.

She gently nudges Ingrid, silently inviting her to speak about what the two of them had discussed the day before.

“She was supposed to come to our house for dinner yesterday” says Ingrid, “She didn’t show up so I.. “she chokes up on her words, tears strangling her “So I went to her house, her dad answered the door, but he said she wasn’t there!” she adds the volume of her voice raising, her tone almost pleading with them.

Mapi’s now slowly but firmly caressing her back trying to ground her but also to remind her that she’s here by her side.

“I should have known! He smelled like liquor and the house was a mess! But he said she wasn’t there and I left.” Her eyes that were still filled with tears suddenly widened. “Oh my god.” her hand came back to cover her mouth. “I left! I left her there! With him!” Ingrid had tried to hold her sobs back till this exact moment when she realized that she’d left Clara with her abuser completely unchecked. She had seen the signs, the clues, heard the warning bells go off in her mind and yet. She’d left her there.

Ingrid’s breaths come in shallow gasps, as the weight of her realization crushes her, she can’t believe it.

Mapi’s chest tightens at the thought of Clara, alone in that house with him. The guilt in Ingrid’s eyes is almost too much for her to bear, and she feels a helpless knot in her stomach. What if this had been prevented? What if she could’ve seen the signs too?

“No no no no Amor, don’t do this to yourself” Mapi quickly grabs Ingrid’s face in her hands, trying to look into her eyes as she wipes her tears with her thumbs resting on her cheeks.

She pulls her in a tight embrace, holding her tightly, wishing she could protect her from the crushing guilt threatening to swallow here whole. “You couldn’t have known” she whispers, voice soft but firm.

Ingrid wants to believe her, she really does, but she can’t help but wonder how different the situation would be if she’d just paid attention to Clara, if she didn’t let her slip away, if only she'd intervened earlier, maybe all of this could have been avoided.

Mapi feels inadequate, she wants to reassure Ingrid and she can’t help but worry for Alexia that still hasn’t moved from the position she’s been in since the doctor listed all of Clara’s injuries, she wants to help both of them but can’t help but focus on her girlfriend, her caring and oh so sensitive girlfriend who seems to break down even more as the second pass, she can feel her body tensing and yet crumpling at the same time right underneath her fingertips.

She tries to pull her up and away from the guilt pit she seems to be falling into but she’s only mildly successful.

As Ingrid’s sobs slowly subside, Mapi still feels a tight knot in her chest, a growing worry that this moment, this pain, might not be something they can fix with words alone.

Miss Armon allowed them a few minutes to settle themselves before she spoke.

“By your own words, Mister Arellano was intoxicated when you came to check on Clara, is that correct?” she confirms, taking notes as she goes

Ingrid nods, her hand fidgeting with the hem of her shirt.

“Is there any other thing any of you can remember that could add to this?” she asks.

Alexia who had remained silent till now spoke up.

“She ran into me on the way to the field, I grabbed her so she wouldn’t fall and… she just looked in pain and I asked what was going on, but she said she was just tired, and we were almost running late.” She looks smaller than she ever has, guilt seems to be pulling her down more and more as she speaks. “I didn’t push her.” she says softly, her head still bowed down.

She takes a few slows breaths before looking up at the couple sitting next to her.

“I just don’t understand how we’ve all missed this. How I’ve missed it.” she says her voice shaky as she holds back her tears

The agent shakes her head.

“Abused children tend to hide their troubles very well” she tells them “The important thing is that we know. Now we can do something about it.”

They all sit in silence for a few seconds before the doctor clears his throat and breaks the silence, his voice professional but sympathetic.

“Miss Arellano has not woken up yet, but when she does we will assess the extent of her injuries to plan her recovery.” he says “When she’s ready we’ll conduct an interview to understand what’s happened. But right now we need to give her time, it’s likely she’s been hiding this for quite a while and we don’t know how she’ll react once the truth comes to light.”

“Would we be allowed to see her?” asks Mapi, she doesn’t allow herself to hope, no matter how desperate she is to check on Clara, she doesn’t want to give anyone false hopes if they are denied access to her.

The doctor looks at Miss Armon, who nods slightly, prompting the doctor grab his file and stand up “Yes, we had to ask those questions first, but if you wish to see her, I’ll take you to her room, however be aware that she’s still unconscious and that we don’t know when she’ll wake up, could be in an hour or tomorrow, okay?”

The three of them nod, shaking hands with Miss Armon and the police officer on auto-pilot before following the doctor out of the conference room and down corridors as they slowly walked closer to their young friend.

As they walked down the sterile corridors Mapi didn’t react as Ingrid grabbed her hand, she’d expected it, but to her surprise Alexia’s hand reached out, grabbing her free one tightly as though she needed to anchor herself too.

She’d raised her head looking at her, but Alexia refused to look at her, looking ahead the whole time her eyes fixed on the back of the doctor’s white coat.

So the three of them walked hand in hand, ignoring the looks thrown their way by patients, doctors and nurses alike that recognized them.

It felt like they’d walked for hours but could have only been minutes when the doctor finally stopped in front of a room, gently sliding the door open and stepping in.

Ingrid can’t help the gasp that comes out of her mouth as she sees Clara laying in the hospital bed, half her face covered in bandages and what wasn’t could only be discribed as a mix of purple and blue.

Alexia didn’t make a sound, but it was clear in the way her jaw tightened that she wasn’t left unaffected by the sight before her.

And Mapi? Well Mapi was trying to help everyone at once, she had to make sure Ingrid didn’t break down, that Alexia wouldn’t retreat behind her walls and try to deal with everything at once, she had to make sure Clara was okay and somehow also take care of herself as well.

Last night she wondered how they could help Clara.

Today she wasn’t sure any of them would be left standing to do just that.

[josephquinnswhore]

filling the missing pieces - Dave York x female reader

summary: when Dave’s wife leaves him and takes the kids, he finds a replacement, in you. But as the sheriff, he has to keep up the act of trying to find you.

word count: 1.7k

content warning: ⚠️ Dead dove do not eat⚠️ read warnings before reading!!! kidnapping, power play, manipulation, reader has stockholm syndrome, throat fucking, age gap reader mid twenties, mentions of starvation, sensory deprivation, abuse of power, being shackled, restraints, cum training, cumming in food, degrading, use of mama/angel/daddy, afab, reader is pregnant, Dave cums down readers throat. missing persons investigation. mouth spitting. face fucking, somnophilia, reader wears lingerie. dave is divorced and hates his wife…she took the kids. @sunshineispunk

My contribution for Dead Dove December 2024. @romana-after-dark

Part two.

He sits at his hardwood desk staring at the metallic tag with his name on it, the inside of his office is stuffy despite the chilled gust of the air conditioner blowing directly onto the back of his neck. The hairs stand upright at the sensation.

The papers in front of him are scattered, stacks of papers and documents he had to stifle through. From phone reports to anonymous tips. Reports of a possible sighting of a missing person; you.

The paper felt thick in his hands, the sheet of good quality paper was one your parents had mandated and paid for out of pocket.

He had your wanted flier memorised.

Mid twenties, height, age, weight, facial features, the length and colour of your hair. Even the date of your last official sighting.

Everyone knew what the chances were of you being found at all, let alone alive. Everyone knew, the first forty eight hours are critical to any missing persons investigation. This was no different, worse, if anything. A young, beautiful woman like you.. your disappearance couldn’t have led to anything good.

But it had been four months to the day.

Austin was a relatively quiet town, and Dave hadn’t ever seen a case like this, the last kidnapping was little over thirty years ago well before he joined the police force. As the sheriff, it was his responsibility to handle the case, worse off—the press. His first high profile case, and he was working his ass off, everyone could see just how devoted he was to the cause.

Even when everyone else had given up hope.

A knock rattles the blinds on the window of his door. “Come in.”

Another officer removed his hat, holding it to his chest to show respect as he swung the door open, hand still wrapped around the handle. “Sir, the press meeting is in five minutes.”

Every thought that Dave had about possibly fighting your case spiralled at the distraction. “Right.” He sighs wearily, taking his suit coat off the back of his chair and pulling his arms through it, straightening his collar. Taking a look at his sheriff's badge before he strolls out of the freezing climate of his personal office.

All eyes are on him, the camera is rolling live to thousands of folk, to whomever had access to a television. Your parents were giving up hope, the light in their eyes wisping away with each conference. They’d spent thousands of dollars on resources, conferences, fliers, private investigators, no one had heard or seen a thing about you since you disappeared.

Dave stands in front of the microphone, his rehearsed speech rolling off his tongue with a sense of empathy.

“We are pleading once again, for everyone to think of this young woman and her parents, the impact this is having on us all. We are asking any possible witnesses to step forward if you have seen or heard anything in regards to this case that might help us. We just want to bring this young woman home to her parents.”

The reporters are holding microphones toward him, arching their arms taut as far as they could. The flashes of pictures being taken make him squint.

A barrage of questions are being shouted at Dave.

“Do you know if the girl is alive?”

“Why are you wasting taxpayers money?”

“Is it true your wife left you?”

Dave knows he shouldn’t have said anything, he should’ve kept his head level and left with his right hand officer.

But he wasn’t going to let them speak about you like this.

Instead, his face reddens, a thick vein bulges out of his forehead. “I have been relentless in trying to find this girl! Sacrificed my own family, I have put my blood, sweat and tears into finding this girl,” he roared, the anger carried through the room. “What have you all done? Nothing. Nothing but pry and harass the parents that are suffering.”

There had been rumours of Dave being divorced, his two girls taken away due to the case. In the truth of the matter his wife filed for divorce well before you disappeared. And now it seemed the entire town knew.

“Now if you all don’t mind, I have work to do, the case isn’t going to solve itself.”

His footsteps are heavy, and the room was silent as he walked out of it. Perhaps it was a little too much for him to blow up like that.

But he had to convince them, everyone. The world. That he was a struggling father and husband first, a man who could sympathise with the parents and the young woman.

That he would stop at nothing until you return.

LATER THAT EVENING

The home he walks into isn’t one he feels comfortable in.

Not that he actually gave a fuck that his wife had walked out on him, but he missed his girls. His two daughters, the light of his life. Snuffed by a bitter wife who wanted to punish him by taking them away.

Using his own children to hurt him. Wench.

He learned the hard way, even as the sheriff of this town; that women were almost always ruled in favour of full custody of the children in the court.

He locks the door behind him, thoughts swirling bitterly around his mind as he takes off his suit coat and hangs it by the door.

But he knew there’s one thing that would always make him feel right at home.

Beelining for his bedroom, he leans against his work desk and pushes it agaisnt the wall, lifting the Persian rug that covered a trap door.

He takes the key out of his pocket, and opens the wooden door, climbing down the ladder into the basement.

“Angel?” He coos, the sound is barely registered through the soundproof walls.

As he jumps down, he turns the light on, and his eyes focus in on you.

Your eyes flit open as the light flicks on, sitting up as best you could with the heavy shackles on your wrists and feet.

“Dave?” You call out softly, lifting your hands to rub your tired eyes.

He approaches, kneeling beside the bed. “Don’t say anything, angel. I’m here to look after you.”

A quiet, doubtful whisper escapes your lips. “Do they miss me?”

His heart aches at your innocent question, the tears welling in your eyes. The desire to be needed.

But he squishes that hope down. “No, angel. They quit lookin’ for you. I told you they don't care ‘bout you, didn’t I?”

His hand trails down your cheek in a soft caress.. “but you know I care about you. Don’t you?”

You nod against his hand, and he believed you.

It had taken months to get you to this point, finally giving into him, after using many methods to wear you down.

Food restriction, starvation, degradation, sensory deprivation, chaining you up. He had even cum in your food for two weeks straight to train you to love the taste of him. Preparing you so that he could stuff himself in your mouth.

It had taken quiet than he thought it would to break you down, you don’t scream or cry anymore. Hadn’t for a while. In fact he could see that now; you return the loving gaze.

He prodes the key into your heavy shackles to unlock them, rubbing the small red rings around your wrists.

“Don’t want anythin’ happenin’ to my angel do I?” He utters to himself, bringing your wrists to his lips to kiss the ache away.

“You’re glowing, angel.” The praise against your skin makes you shiver. “Must be from daddy’s cum.”

He loved how you looked in your rose gold lingerie nightwear he’d brought for you.

“Thank you. I missed you today. Did a lot of reading. I’m grateful for the books.” He loved how confident you’d become since you’d been with him.

No more introverted girl across the street.

“Atta girl. It’s good to keep your mind busy.”

His large thumb caresses your lips apart, and you open your mouth for him, poking your tongue out. A twisted smile stretches his lips wide, and he spits onto your tongue, forcing you to follow as he sticks his thumb down your throat.

“Such a good girl.” He praises, and you whine, sucking on his thumb softly, swirling your tongue around it to entice him, he lets out a low groan.

“Do you want more of me?” He purrs.

“Please, please, please,” you whimper softly, muffled by his thumb in your mouth. You’d grown so used to the feeling of his thickness stuffing your mouth, you felt empty without it. “Need you.”

He removes his moist thumb and pulls his thick, weeping cock out of his slacks. Both hands grip the back of your hair, forcing the leaking tip into your mouth.

“Open up, for me, angel.” He coaxed, and you obey. Mouth relaxing as it opens wide.

Sliding half of his length inside of your mouth, he throws his head back. Clenching his eyes shut.

He rams into your throat causing it to constrict and you to gag around him, jaw starting to ache as he uses you.

Hips pressing into you desperately, with each effort of bottoming out down your throat he can feel your nose against his public hair.

“Takin’ me so well, angel.” He praised, low and guttural. “Fuckin’ swallowin’ me.”

Tears are falling down your cheeks, snot and spit drooling down your face and his legs as he fucks into your throat.

The sight of you was enough for his heavy balls to constrict and fill his thick, warm load inside of your mouth, trickling down your throat gives you no choice but to swallow. He growls, fingers curling around your hair, impossibly shoving himself deeper into your throat.

His pants are heavy, thick as he pulls himself out of you. Wiping your tears away, he leans down to kiss your forehead.

“I love you,” you whisper hoarsely.

He hums against the warm, sticky skin of your cheek in approval. Nose pressed into your temple.

“I love you too, and my precious babies. You’re going to be the best mama ever, aren’t you?”

His hands trail down to your swollen stomach, where he prayed he had filled you with multiple babies.

You nod reverently, hands holding his own on top of your swollen stomach. No secret that you’re incredibly excited to be a mother. “I hope we have two. A boy and a girl. You’re gonna be the best dad to these babies.”

That makes Dave’s heart lurch inside of his chest. “Me too, angel.”

He knew he had chosen the right one and he wouldn’t ever share you with the world again.

[luveline]

Hello Jade! I have a request for hotch if that’s okay, I was thinking something like he’s dating sunshine!reader who goes to a police precinct with the team and the sheriff/deputy insults Hotch in front of her (maybe she’s not part of the BAU so he doesn’t realise she knows Hotch?) and she snaps and punches him/pushes him to the ground and afterwards she’s really quiet and refusing to tell anyone what happened cause she doesn’t want Hotch to hear that people were bad mouthing him. Everyone is confused cause she’s usually so bubbly and it’s disconcerting to see her so stern but she has to protect her man damnit 😤

(Ps I’m the anon who got confused about rules n you’re right I was looking under guidelines not requests 🤦🏼‍♀️ sorry!)

hi babe, thank you for your request! (and no worries at all, no sorry necessary!!)

—hotch is dumbfounded when you slap a deputy sheriff, but you have your heartfelt reasons. fem, 2k

You're not specifically BAU, but when Hotch calls, you answer. You don't look BAU either in your skirt with your blue laptop carry case; twice you're asked what you're doing in the precinct and if you need assistance, but eventually you get to the centre of the action upstairs, meandering through the detective's desks toward a conference room with a sticky-taped sign that says to knock before entering. 

"Hey, Spencer," you say, shouldering open the door. "They leave you behind?" 

Spencer turns away from his white board. "I'm more useful here right now. Did you bring the ethernet cable for Garcia?"

You put your laptop case on the table and pull out her desired cable. "Where is she?" It's hard-pressed for Penelope to be found anywhere away from her computer during case times. You must get twenty or more rejection emails a month from your fellow tech analysist. Sorry, working a case :'( 

"Bathroom. There's a kitchen if you need coffee. You have a badge?" 

You flash your visitor's badge at him. "Get you one?" 

"Four sugars. Thanks, L/N." 

You flash him a smile. The kitchen is back the way you came and to the right. It's nowhere near big enough for the workforce, three tables and one microwave next to a sink full of mugs. You smile at anyone who looks at you and beeline for a coffee pot. No one questions you. They must be used to outsiders invading their space this week. 

"Mean fucking guy." 

You tilt your head to the side, hand paused in their cup cabinet above the sink. You shouldn't be nosy, but they're not being very quiet, either.

"He has to be mean, I guess. That's a tight ship to run," says a second voice.

"I'd understand it if I thought they were getting somewhere. It's been four days, and between the string bean and his pushpin map and that tech girl who won't shut up? They're doomed. The boss is either too stubborn or too damn stupid to realise." 

You close the cabinet and turn around. 

"I fucking hate this shit. Ties in their suit jackets coming into our investigation and chasing the wrong leads. We could've had Miller in cuffs two days ago if Hotchner hadn't shut us down, two days ago! And now another kid is dead, and there's not a drop of remorse on him. He doesn't care about doing his job, he–" 

"He what?" you ask. Your heart is beating hard before you've so much as parted your lips, your hands trembling. You screw them into tight balls. 

"Excuse me?" 

Your opposition is a rough hewn man in a deputies badge, a cup of coffee held between two paws. He narrows thick salt and pepper brows at your question, his mouth screwed into a telling snarl. 

"You think Agent Hotchner doesn't care about his job? So why is he here? Why did he agree to take the case?" 

"Who the fuck are you?" 

You shake your head in annoyance and take the FBI badge from your little cross body bag. You toss it on the table, your beaming face looking up at him a juxtaposition to the glare you wear now. 

He stands up from his table. The lunch room hushes but the riot of precinct cacophony stays strong just outside of the door, a thrum that battles your roaring heart. You're so angry you can barely speak, and it'll only get worse. 

"I'm sorry you have to hear it from me, darling, I am, but your boss out there? Agent Hotchner?" The deputy scoffs. "He's a fool running blind. He turned away from the real issue here. He's a prideful, narcissistic idiot who's let the power of his paycheck get to his head, and as far as I'm concerned? So long as he stops us from arresting Jaden Miller? He's a murderer, too. The blood is on his hands." 

You know you're going to slap him from the moment he says 'murderer', but the knee to his crotch straight after is a surprise even to yourself. All you're thinking for one horrible white-hot moment is How can I hurt him? It's shameful, and you slam your knee up a second time anyhow. 

—

"You can tell me what happened now or later, but it's going to be much easier on you if you tell me now." 

Hotch hates this part. What he wouldn't give to have someone else here to reprimand you. He understands why Gideon left and he wouldn't want him back unwillingly, but Hotch thinks your nightly phone call may go over smoother tonight if it were Gideon standing in his place. Half the time Hotch finds he's uninterested in scolding you. It's why you stay firmly in your department and away from his bias in the BAU. He can't be optimal at his job while you're around. 

It's not limited to telling you off, of course. When you're near, he wants to act like it. He wants to take your hand, hold your arm, rub a palm between your shoulders. He wants to pull you into his lap, or pinch the soft lobe of your ear between his fingers to watch you shiver, blow warm air at the back of your neck to hear your laugh. This cold silence is his worst nightmare, but he can't cross the line. 

Well, he can't cross the line too much. 

In the privacy of a cordoned, borrowed office, Hotch can sit beside you. The blinds are closed, and his intimidation act wasn't getting him anywhere anyways. More flies with honey than vinegar. 

"I can't show favouritism here, do you understand? Especially when you're being physically violent against the deputy sheriff." Hotch watches the soft pillow of your bottom lip tremble in a private terror. "I know you wouldn't do this for no reason. I know. Give me a reason to take your side and I will." 

"I don't want to talk about it." 

"Did he say something inappropriate?" 

You don't answer.

"Did he?" Hotch can feel the anger he's been pushing down start to rise. When a woman like you, happy-go-lucky, pretty, and always smiling, turns to violence, it's not hard to picture why. He knows full well the horrible things a man can say to a woman. "Please, trust me to take care of this." 

"Hotch, I really don't want to talk about this. You can reprimand me, send me home." 

"No. Tell me what he said." 

You glare at him. Hotch finds with a heart-skipping hurt that it's the first time he's been on the receiving end of your disdain. "No. I don't want to." 

"And I don't want to send you home." He knows how he looks, stony-eyed and furrowed brow. He has to try hard to relax into a more neutral expression. "I won't. Not when I know you'd never hurt someone." 

"Well, I did." 

"We all do things we don't mean to in anger." 

In the quiet, he can hear Emily asking loud questions about what happened, and her almost comedic gasp as someone informs her of the situation. Morgan couldn't find the words to tell Hotch over the phone what happened, just told him to hurry back, and it was doubly difficult to get the story out of Spencer, who'd been the one responsible for standing in your way. 

"He called her a bitch," Spencer told him. "I didn't want to hold her back after that." 

The sheriff deputy has a good hundred pounds on you, so no matter what he called you, Hotch is glad you were pulled away. 

Hearing that you'd been called a bitch set his nerves aflame. When Spencer explained that this was said by a man on his knees after a swift jab to the crotch, Hotch was more confused. 

He follows a whim. He's biassed for sure, but he knows you're the most beautiful woman in any room that you walk into. It doesn't shock him that a high-ranking authority figure would take advantage of his position to make a pass at you. 

"You have nothing to be ashamed of," he says softly. "Whatever he said to you, I– I'm not supposed to support violence, but I understand if it got too much. Sexual harassment is unjustifiable, and I'll stand with you and your actions completely." 

"He didn't harass me, Aaron," you say, looking down at your knees. You're wearing dark stockings, pinching at the fabric distractedly. 

"Did he touch you?" 

"No, Aaron–" You sigh frustratedly. "I don't want to tell you what he said because it's not true." 

"He insulted you?" 

"He insulted you." You glance at him and then away. "I couldn't stand it." 

If there weren't cameras in the room he'd bundle you into his arms and kiss the slope of your cheek, because how is he supposed to handle this? You're hitting people when they talk bad about him now? 

Hotch doesn't need to ask to know it was bad. You're a well-meaning, well-adjusted person. You'd hardly hit somebody for calling Hotch a jerk. Something severe would've been said to have pushed you over the edge, but, to his detriment, Hotch has heard a thousand awful things about himself from a thousand different mouths, and he doesn't worry about what it was. 

"Alright. Listen to me carefully." Your shoulders stiffen. "I don't want you hurting people over me. I don't need you to defend me. I don't want you to fight my battles for me, and I certainly don't want you assaulting people on my behalf." 

Your lip again begins to tremble. "I'm sorry." 

"No. Don't be sorry." He covers your knee in his hand gently, ducking his head to meet your glassy eyes. He's gone about this the wrong way, upsetting you unnecessarily. He rushes to correct it. "I love that you want to defend me, I love that you did, and it isn't lost on me how much it means to have you at my side, but… You could have been seriously injured. Honey, picking on someone your own size is a double-sided coin. What if the deputy hit you back?" 

"I'm not afraid of getting hurt." 

He leans down more, imploring, desperate to be heard. "I'm afraid of you getting hurt. Me. I'm worried someone's going to hurt you when I'm not around." 

"He was saying all this stuff about you and it wasn't true–" 

"It's okay," he says, shaking his head slowly from one side to another. "It doesn't matter. I know what people like him think of me, and he's not in an easy position." He drops his voice to a murmur for your ears alone. "I'm not saying you should agree with him, I can't tell you that I like him much." 

You laugh weakly, the sound quickly melding to a sniffle. "I'm sorry, Aaron. I shouldn't have hit him. I don't know what came over me." 

"We get angry for the people we care about." 

He can't kiss you, really, not at work, but he can show you some heavy affection. It's a boundary crossed. Luckily, Hotch knows you won't report him. 

"Thank you for defending me. You can stay on the case if you promise not to do it again," he says, squeezing your smaller hand in his, drawing a lopsided heart with his thumb into the back of it. 

"I'll promise not to do it again if he promises to keep his stupid mouth closed," you mutter. 

"Is it wrong of me to like this version of you?" he says. 

You look him straight in the eye, your usual lightness restored, if dimmed just a touch. "I like all your versions, Agent Hotchner." 

"Good. Remind the version that's your boyfriend to treat you accordingly tonight. Okay?" 

You nod emphatically, both relieved and chastened. "Okay. Thanks, handsome." 

You look tired. Tonight, he'll kiss you like he means it, maybe a touch too rough but apparently you're a hard ass now who can handle it, and he'll hold you close even if he can't give you the attention you deserve until the case is done. He'll make sure you know how much he appreciates your protection, rub your back for hours just the way you like it while sleep fails. 

"You're welcome," he says. He has more to say but there's no more time to waste. There's still work to be done. 

It'll come easier with you at his side, he's sure. 

[jcmarchi]

Catching Up on the WordPress 🚫 WP Engine Sitch

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/catching-up-on-the-wordpress-wp-engine-sitch/

Catching Up on the WordPress 🚫 WP Engine Sitch

Many of you — perhaps most of you — have been sitting on the sidelines while WordPress and WP Engine trade legal attacks on one another. It’s been widely covered as we watch it unfold in the open; ironically, in a sense.

These things can take twists and turns and it doesn’t help that this just so happens to be an emotionally charged topic in certain circles. WordPress is still the leading CMS after all these years and by a long shot. Many developers make their living in the WordPress ecosystem. All of those developers need hosting. WP Engine is still the leading WordPress-flavored host after many years. Many developers host their agencies there and use it to administrate their clients’ sites.

And I haven’t even gotten to the drama. That’s not really the point. The point is that there’s a bunch of heated words flying around and it can be difficult to know where they’re coming from, who they are aimed at, and most importantly, why they’re being said in the first place. So, I’m going to round up a few key voices contributing to the discussion for the sake of context and to help catch up.

Editor’s Note: Even though CSS-Tricks has no involvement with either company, I think it’s mentioning that Automattic was a looooooong time sponsor. This site was also once hosted by Flywheel, a company acquired by WP Engine before we moved to Cloudways following the DigitalOcean acquisition. Me? My personal site runs on WP Engine, but I’m not precious about it having only been there one year.

Prelude to a tweet

We had fair warning that something was coming up when WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg sent this out over X:

I know private equity and investors can be brutal (read the book Barbarians at the Gate). Please let me know if any employee faces firing or retaliation for speaking up about their company’s participation (or lack thereof) in WordPress. We’ll make sure it’s a big public deal and…

— Matt Mullenweg (@photomatt) September 19, 2024

There’s the ammo: Don’t let private equity bully you into speaking up against the company you work for when its contributions to WordPress are on the slim side of things.

Private equity. Lack of participation in the WordPress community. Making a big public deal of it. Remember these things because this is one day before…

WordCamp US 2024

Matt spoke at WordCamp US (WCUS) 2024 in Portland, OR, last week. September 20 to be exact. Making big, bold statements at WCUS isn’t a new thing for Matt, as many of us still have “Learn JavaScript deeply” tattooed on the brain from 2016.

Matt’s statements this year were less inspirational (instructional?) as they took direct aim at WP Engine as part of a presentation on the merits of open-source collaboration. You can watch and listen to where the first jab was thrown roughly around the 10:05 marker of the recording.

Let’s break down the deal. Matt begins by comparing the open-source contributions to WordPress from his company, Automattic, to those of WP Engine. These things are tracked on WordPress.org as part of a campaign called “Five for the Future” that’s designed to give organizations an influential seat at the table to form the future of WordPress in exchange for open-source contributions back to the WordPress project. Automattic has a page totaling its contributions. So does WP Engine.

Before Matt reveals the numbers, he goes out of his way to call out the fact that both Automattic and WP Engine are large players in the neighborhood of $500 million dollars. That’s the setup for Matt to demonstrate how relatively little WP Engine contributes to WordPress against Matt’s own company. Granted, I have absolutely no clue what factors into contributions, nor how the pages are administrated or updated. But here’s what they show…

Quite the discrepancy! I’d imagine Automattic dwarfs every other company that’s pledged to the campaign. Maybe it would be better to compare the contributions of another non-Automattic pledge that has a fairly strong reputation for participating in WordPress community. 10up is one of the companies that comes straight to my mind and they are showing up for 191 hours per week, or roughly five times WP Engine’s reported time. I get conflicting info on 10up’s revenue, valuation, and size, so maybe the comparison isn’t fair. Or maybe it is fair because 10up is certainly smaller than WP Engine, and no estimate I saw was even close to the $500 million mark.

Whatever the case, bottom line: Matt calls out WP Engine for its lack of effort on a very public stage — maybe the largest — in WordPress Land. He doesn’t stop there, going on to namecheck Silver Lake, a ginormous private equity firm bankrolling the company. The insinuation is clear: there’s plenty of money and resources, so pony up.

That’s bad enough for attendees to raise eyebrows, but it doesn’t end there. Matt encourages users and developers alike to vote with money by not purchasing hosting from WP Engine (11:31) and seems to suggest (23:05) that he’ll provide financial support to any WP Engine employees who lose their jobs from speaking up against their employer.

I think I can get behind the general idea that some companies need a little prodding to pull their weight to something like the Five for the Future campaign. Encouraging developers to pull their projects from a company and employees to jeopardize their careers? Eek.

“WP Engine is not WordPress”

This is when I believe things got noisy. It’s one thing to strong-arm a company (or its investors) into doing more for the community. But in a post on his personal blog the day after WCUS, Matt ups the ante alleging that “WP Engine isn’t WordPress.” You’d think this is part of the tough-guy stance he had from the stage, but his argument is much different in this post. Notice it’s about how WP Engine uses WordPress in its business rather than how much the company invests in it:

WordPress is a content management system, and the content is sacred. Every change you make to every page, every post, is tracked in a revision system, just like the Wikipedia. This means if you make a mistake, you can always undo it. It also means if you’re trying to figure out why something is on a page, you can see precisely the history and edits that led to it. These revisions are stored in our database. This is very important, it’s at the core of the user promise of protecting your data, and it’s why WordPress is architected and designed to never lose anything.

WP Engine turns this off. They disable revisions because it costs them more money to store the history of the changes in the database, and they don’t want to spend that to protect your content. It strikes to the very heart of what WordPress does, and they shatter it, the integrity of your content.

OK, gloves off. This is more personal. It’s no longer about community contributions but community trust and how WP Engine erodes trust by preventing WordPress users from accessing core WordPress features for their own profit.

Required reading

That’s where I’d like to end this, at least for now. Several days have elapsed since Matt’s blog post and there are many, many more words flying around from him, community members, other companies, and maybe even your Great Aunt. But if you’re looking for more signal than noise, I’ve rounded up a few choice selections that I feel contribute to the (heated) discussion.

Reddit: Matt Mullenweg needs to step down from WordPress.org leadership ASAP

Matt responds to the requisite calls for him to step down, starting with:

To be very clear, I was 100% cordial and polite to everyone at the booth, my message was:

* I know this isn’t about them, it’s happening several levels above, it’s even above their CEO, it’s coming from their owner, Silver Lake and particularly their board member Lee Wittlinger.

* Several people inside WP Engine have been anonymously leaking information to me about their bad behavior, and I wanted to let them know if they were caught or faced retaliation that I would support them in every way possible, including covering their salaries until they found a new job.

* That *if* we had to take down the WP Engine booth and ban WP Engine that evening, my colleague Chloé could print them all new personal badges if they still wanted to attend the conference personally, as they are community members, not just their company.

This was delivered calmly, and they said thank you, and their head of comms, Lauren Cox, who was there asked that they have time to regroup and discuss.

Automattic’s Actionable Misconduct Directed to WP Engine

WP Engine issues a cease and desist letter designed to stop Matt from disparaging them publicly. But hold up, because there’s another juicy claim in there:

In the days leading up to Mr. Mullenweg’s September 20th keynote address at the WordCamp US Convention, Automattic suddenly began demanding that WP Engine pay Automattic large sums of money, and if it didn’t, Automattic would wage a war against WP Engine.

And yes, they did issue it from their own site’s /wp-content directory. That’s easy to lose, so I’ve downloaded it to link it for posterity.

Open Source, Trademarks, and WP Engine

Just today, Matt published a cease and desist letter to the Auttomatic blog where he alleges that WP Engine’s commercial modifications to WordPress Core violate the WordPress trademark. Again, this has become about licensing, not contributions:

WP Engine’s business model is based on extensive and unauthorized use of these trademarks in ways that mislead consumers into believing that WP Engine is synonymous with WordPress. It’s not.

This is trademark abuse, not fair competition.

This is no longer WordPress vs. WP Engine. It’s more like Automattic vs. WP Engine. But with Matt’s name quite literally in the name Automattic, let’s be real and call this Matt Mullenweg vs. WP Engine.

WP Tavern coverage

WP Tavern is still the closest thing we have to an official WordPress news outlet. Nevermind that it’s funded and hired by Automattic (among others). I respect it, though I honestly have been less attentive to it since the team turned over earlier this year. It’s still a great spot to catch up on the post-event coverage:

There’s another more recent WP Tavern article I want to call out because it’s a huge development in this saga…

WP Engine Banned from Using WordPress.org Resources

Dang. This is the point of no return. It not only affects WP Engine proper, but the Flywheel hosting it also owns.

WordPress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from updating and installing plugins and themes via WP Admin. 

I was able to update plugins on my site as recently as yesterday, but let’s see as of this morning.

Aww, biscuits.

Maybe I can still see details about my installed plugins…

Double biscuits!

This is a bad, bad situation. I have thoughts about it and neither side looks good. Using real people with no dog in the fight to make a point is never gonna be a good look. Then again, both sides have valid points and I can see where they’re coming from. I just hate to see it come to a head like this.

[basketonthedoorstepofthefbi]

Safer to Kiss (part 2) - Spencer Reid x Fem!BAU!Reader

read part 1 here!

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!BAU!Reader

Word Count: 3236

Summary: the day after drunkenly kissing your best friend and coworker, Spencer Reid, the BAU catches a case. Lots of talking with other members of the team, general group dynamic chaos, and ✨Pining✨

Warnings: Mentions of alcohol, normal Criminal Minds violence, maybe some mild cursing? Mostly just pining teehee

A/N: thank you so much to everyone who interacted with part 1! I am so pumped about this lil series, and part 3 is already started 🙈 I love love LOVE hearing from you guys, it makes me so happy and inspired to continue writing. 🥹 also not my gif, all credit to the owner bc LOOK AT HIS LIL FACE

————

Spencer’s hands were on your hips. Spencer’s hands were on your hips. Suddenly the three glasses of wine and 2 glasses of champagne were null and void, because you felt completely sobered by the time your mouth pulled away from his. The reality of the situation hit you like a bus - you, in a drunken stupor, had stupidly, idiotically, irreversibly kissed your best friend. Right on the lips. There was no excusing it as a friendly peck on the cheek.

Your entire face felt hot as you pulled away, and as Spencer’s hands retracted to his own space. You felt wobbly - okay, maybe you hadn’t sobered up - and when you were once again leaning against the railing of the stairs on your apartment building’s stoop, you blinked a few times.

Spencer blinked a few times, too, as if to process what had just happened. He’d tasted like red wine, which you saw he’d only had one single glass of tonight, and spearmint gum. The combination reminded you of spring.

Your best friend tasted like spring.

Your eyes widened, buggy, as if they might pop out of your head, and you opened your mouth to say something, but no words came out.

Spencer spoke instead, with an earnest expression on his face. “Y/N-“

“Thanks for getting me home in one piece, okay, goodnight!” You rambled off, the words sliding off your tongue like they were on a luge, all blurring together into one, long megaword. You slid in behind the door and stumbled up to your unit before you could say another word.

You couldn’t believe yourself, replaying the moment on your stoop over and over as you locked the door, leaning against it and running your hand over your face. Spencer’s expression had been completely dumbfounded when you pulled away from the kiss. There was no doubt in your mind that he had been about to politely reject you, in that way that only he could do. I’m sorry, Y/N, but I think we’re better off as friends, he would say, simultaneously humiliating you and ripping your heart in half.

That’s why you’d cut him off, before he could say anything, before he could address the situation, before either of you had to acknowledge that it had actually happened.

You slept poorly that night, your anxiety getting the best of you. It was that look on Spencer’s face, how you just knew he was going to tell you in the kindest, most sensitive tone that he didn’t like that you kissed him. And your Nan’s voice ringing in your head - You’ll find someone someday, Button. You’ll be just as happy as your sister someday, Button.

You tossed and turned, and woke up with a violent hangover. All the coffee in the world was not enough to cure the aftershock of the night before.

Your stomach was in knots, a lethal combination of hangover ickies and irreversible mistake anxiety, and as you took a cab to work, you leaned your head against the seat behind you.

You flashed your badge to security and boarded the elevator to ride up to the sixth floor. The doors opened to reveal Penelope Garcia, clutching a stack of folders to her chest, waiting for you.

“Good morning, pumpkin,” Penelope flashed a smile, then grabbed you by the wrist, practically yanking you along behind her as she headed towards the conference room. Your head was pounding and while you loved Penelope with all your heart, in that moment, you wanted to throttle her. “You look horrible. We’ll discuss that later, and don’t even think about trying to internalize it and brush me off. I might not be a super magic genius psychic profiler, but I can tell when one of my love-bugs has had a wild night and I want details. Unfortunately for you, darling, you have a case. Hotch asked me to pull you directly into the conference room. Everyone’s waiting.”

Usually, when Penelope rambled on like that, you were able to keep up. In this weakened state, however, the words hit you like someone throwing putty against a wall, and it took a minute to process. You found yourself standing in front of the closed door of the conference room, with slackened posture and narrowed eyes. “Okay,” you managed to murmur before Penelope dragged you behind her, into the conference room.

You could feel the team’s eyes on you as you slumped into the empty seat. You avoided eye contact with everyone, especially Spencer, projecting to the room that you were not to be asked about your disheveled appearance and obvious headache. You spared a glance at Spencer. He looked perfect, as per freakin’ usual, with a purple button-up dress shirt and a dark tie over it. He sat up straight in his desk chair, as if last night hadn’t affected him in the slightest. You hated that.

Hotchner cleared his throat. “Let’s begin. Garcia?”

Penelope’s eyes lingered on you, fluttering from you to Spencer, and you watched as she seemed to resist the urge to say anything. “Ooookay,” she spoke, drawing the word out as she stood before the table. She used the TV remote to present the case’s info on the monitor. “We’ve got a local case today, my fine furry friends. Three men killed in three weeks,” you took a drink of the water in front of you as Penelope presented three driver’s license photos on the TV screen. “All bodies have been identified. Twenty-three-year-old Harvey Gibson, twenty-nine-year-old Kyle Moore, and twenty-eight-year-old Malcolm Greene. All three were found in alleys in downtown D.C, cause of death multiple stab wounds to the chest, stomach, and genitals.”

You choked on your water when you saw the last photo. Malcolm Greene, as in, Malcolm Greene, the guy you spoke to last night at the art gallery? You remembered spotting him from across the room, and thinking about how Spencer had said he’d gone on a date (albeit, an unsuccessful one) over the weekend, and you wanted to prove to yourself that you could be interested in other men. And then you’d gone over to Malcolm, spoke to him for an embarrassing two minutes and twelve seconds, and walked back to Spencer with a red face. And now he was dead?

Concerns about your relationship with your best friend aside, your eyes met Spencer’s across the conference table and the two of you seemed, for a moment, to fall back into your old dynamic, having a somewhat telepathic conversation with just your expressions.

That’s the guy…? Spencer seemed to say, his brows furrowed slightly.

A subtle bob of your head was how you responded. Yep, that’s him.

Spencer’s mouth formed a straight line, a mannerism that everyone around the table seemed to notice.

“Reid, Y/L/N, what’s going on?” Derek piped up, inclining his head to the side curiously. “Something you’d like to share with the class?”

Spencer’s mouth opened as if he were about to spill the beans, but he paused, seemingly deciding not to rattle off whatever he was going to say. Instead, he gestured to you.

“Spencer and I went to an art gallery after work last night,” you sighed, feeling your cheeks turn pink. “I may have… flirted, briefly, with Malcolm Greene.”

Derek let out a low whistle, and you saw Emily and JJ share an amused look. Rossi was even cracking a smirk.

Only Hotch remained as stoic as ever. “How long did you speak with him?” He asked.

“Two minutes, twelve seconds,” you and Spencer said simultaneously, and your eyes snapped to his across the table. You swallowed the lump in your throat and somehow felt your whole face turn even redder.

“Some smooth-talker you are,” Derek snickered, and you shot him a glare. Penelope, standing behind him, smacked his shoulder. “Did you get his digits that fast?”

“I don’t really see how that’s pertinent to the case,” you protested, sitting up straight and crossing your arms over your chest.

“It’s just like any other witness interview, Y/N,” Hotch reminded you calmly, shooting the rest of the team a warning glance. “Even the most minute detail could help.” He seemed to realize that you were humiliated, and that the rest of the team’s eyes on you were not helping the situation. “We can talk about it later,” he compromised.

“So, multiple stab wounds to the chest, stomach, and genitals, huh?” Rossi offered as a rough transition back to the topic at hand. Across the table, you heard Emily stifle a laugh.

“Yes, sir. All bodies were posed in a classic casket fashion, arms folded across their chests, eyes closed,” Penelope reported.

“Sign of remorse,” JJ noted, jotting it down on her pad of paper.

“Any cash missing from their wallets, or jewelry missing off their body?” Hotchner asked.

“No, sir, all wallets were found in the clothes of the victims, presumably where they had been kept untouched,” Penelope answered.

“So, not a robbery gone wrong,” Rossi concluded.

“The disposal of the bodies feels inconsistent with the cause of death,” Spencer pointed out, twirling his pen around his finger. His cadence was quick and pensive. “Multiple stab wounds to those particular areas of the body indicate intense rage at the time of the murder, disposing them in alleyways seems to be a choice of opportunity and convenience, but posing the bodies is a sign of remorse, like the UnSub suddenly realizes what he’s done and regrets it.”

“Do the victims have any friends or family in common?” You asked, crossing your ankles beneath the table.

“As far as my preliminary scans can tell, all three men were completely unrelated,” Penelope said. “The only common denominator is how they died and how their bodies were disposed of.”

“Not entirely,” Emily pointed out, standing up and using her pen as a pointer, gesturing to the three ID photos on the screen.

“Don’t these guys all look… strikingly similar?” Emily proposed. All men were white, with aquiline noses, dark hair, and dark eyes. “In fact, don’t they all look exactly like someone we know?”

You took in a sharp breath, just as Penelope let out a small gasp and Derek let out a soft chuckle. “They’re all pretty boys, like Pretty Boy,” Derek laughed.

“So our UnSub has a type,” JJ added.

Derek smirked. “The UnSub and Y/N both have a type.”

Your face turned bright red, and your jaw tensed. You felt Spencer’s eyes on you for a fleeting moment, and before you could say anything, Hotchner stepped in. “Let’s get going on this. Reid, JJ, and Morgan, I want you at the crime scene. Prentiss, Rossi, and Y/L/N, come with me to the local police precinct and interview family and friends. Garcia, too.”

There was an array of agreements murmured, and everyone began to disperse. You wanted to shake Derek by the shoulders for his little comment, especially after all the teasing you took when you realized the man you briefly spoke to last night was now dead.

You were on your way back to your desk when you felt a light touch on your elbow. When you saw it was Spencer, you bit the inside of your cheek. “Can we talk for a second?” He asked, and you shook your head.

Pointing pathetically to your desk, you responded, rather articulately, with, “The case…”

“Yeah, I know. The case. But, Y/N, we have to talk about last night,” Spencer said, looking down at you. Even though you were actually tall for a woman, Spencer still had at least four inches of height on you. Maybe five. “I mean, you just, like, escaped from me the first second that you could. Was it…?”

You furrowed your brows, confused as to what Spencer was trying to say. “Did you mean to kiss me?” He asked.

This was it. This was the out. He was giving it to you, whether he knew it or not. This was the opportunity to take it all back, to say it was a mistake. You could blame it on the wine, on your Nan’s phone call, on Malcolm - what was he gonna do, sell you out?

The chance to save your friendship with Spencer Reid was right there, and you stood there and you looked up at Spencer with your mouth open, words ready to spill out, when -

“Hey, Reid, you coming, man?”

Saved by the Morgan.

You saw Spencer’s jaw tighten, and he exhaled sharply. You were still frozen, unsure of what to say, of how to say it, so when Spencer simply frowned at you and then turned around to join Derek, you weren’t surprised.

You ran your hands over your face, still reeling, foggy from your hangover, thoroughly embarrassed from the entire situation.

“Y/N,” Rossi’s voice piped up, and you turned to see him with an arched brow. “C’mon, we gotta get going,” he gestured for you to follow him.

You sighed, your shoulders slumped, as you joined Rossi. You boarded the elevator with him, just the two of you, to head down to one of the Bureau’s black SUVs. “What’s going on with you?” Rossi asked, furrowing his brows.

In terms of group dynamics, David Rossi was like the team’s mother, in comparison to Hotchner, who was most certainly the patriarch of the BAU. You loved Rossi. He was kind, fairly level-headed, and he always stuck his neck out for the people he cared about. He also was pretty funny, and could make a killer lasagna. All those merits aside, you so did not want to talk about it.

“Not right now, Dave,” you shook your head, leaning against the wall of the elevator, running your palms down your thighs.

Rossi nodded understandingly, but you had an inkling he wasn’t about to just drop it. “I get it. Hungover, in a weird spot with Reid-“

“I’m not in a weird spot with Reid,” you corrected him, and Rossi smirked, knowing he had gotten you to crack. You shot him a (mostly) playful glare. “I had maybe a little too much to drink last night. And I maybe had, accidentally, perhaps…” you groaned, rolling your eyes at the idiocy of your actions the night before. “I kissed Spencer last night. It only lasted for, like, a minute, and right when it was over, I freaked out and went inside my apartment, and now things are just, like, weird between us. And I don’t know what to do.”

“Well, kiddo,” Rossi began, and you pursed your lips. He always hit you with a kiddo when he was about to tell you something you didn’t want to hear. “As a person who has been with many romantic partners-“

You feigned a gag.

Rossi just chuckled and continued. “I think you have to ask yourself - how do you want Spencer to react? Would you prefer to bury this and never speak of it again, or is this the catalyst you needed to finally tell him how you feel?”

You narrowed your eyes. “What do you mean, tell him how I feel?” You asked, playing dumb. Maybe Rossi was just grasping at straws.

“Oh, c’mon, kid, we’ve all seen how you look at each other. The only person who doesn’t know that you’re in love with Spencer is, well, Spencer.”

You felt your entire face flush. “You’re not serious,” you chuckled in disbelief.

Rossi looked at you and batted his eyelashes in a very feminine expression. The expression dropped and he said, “You make this lovestruck school girl expression at him at least once a day.”

“I do not!” You crossed your arms over your chest defensively, just as the elevator dinged, signaling your arrival to the Quantico lobby.

“Yeah, kid, you do. It’s pretty cute, actually. You’re like two lovesick puppies, chasing each other’s tails.”

“He does not think of me like that, Rossi,” you insisted indignantly, your voice taking a more hushed tone as the two of you walked at the same quick pace through the lobby, and outside towards the garage of Bureau vehicles.

The sun hit your face just as Rossi spoke again. “You’re such a good profiler, Y/N. How do you not see it?”

You decided not to dignify Rossi’s opinion with a response. Rather, you just shook your head and continued towards the garage to meet up with Prentiss and Garcia.

When you arrived at the police precinct, Garcia set up in the conference room, and you, Emily and Rossi each took turns interviewing the next of kin for the victims. You interviewed the mother of the first victim, Harvey Gibson.

An art student at Georgetown, steady boyfriend for three years he planned to propose to on Christmas, no criminal record, called his mother every other day. He was a good kid. Comforting his mother, walking her through all the questions the police had asked her three weeks ago — it was always a lot. But with your head already fuzzy and your mind on other Reid-related things, by the time you escorted Mrs. Gibson out of the police station and thanked her for her time, you felt heavy.

It didn’t help when the team reconvened about an hour later, sitting around a conference room at the local police station. You could tell Spencer’s eyes were floating to yours every so often, but you refused to meet them. You were working right now. You couldn’t let the revelation with Rossi distract you from your job.

Penelope took the lead, addressing the entire team. “So, our original thought of the three victims being unrelated actually has turned out to be incorrect,” she began. “Not only do all three of our victims look alike, but they all visited the same art gallery twenty-four hours prior to their murders.”

“Not the one we went to last night?” Spencer asked.

“No,” Penelope clarified. “From Emily’s discussion with Malcolm Greene’s brother, along with tracking the location of the other two victims’ cell phones prior to their deaths, we can determine that all three victims visited a different art gallery - The Restful Owl, just two blocks over from where you and Y/N went last night.”

“So, the victims all meet a certain physical description,” JJ recapped. “Brown hair, brown eyes, early-to-late twenties, and all visited The Restful Owl art gallery.”

“The gallery seems like a solid lead,” Hotch agreed. “All three victims were interested in art in some capacity - Harvey Gibson was studying art, Kyle Moore worked at an art museum, Malcolm Greene was a collector.”

“Perhaps the ruse the UnSub used was related to a particular piece or artist,” Spencer proposed, wrapping and unwrapping his fingers around his pen. “We should get the security tapes from each victim’s visit to the gallery, observe who they spoke to, how they reacted to specific pieces. Maybe the UnSub lured these men to the sites of their deaths by promising them a deal on a work, or something of the sort.”

“Good idea,” said Hotchner. “Prentiss, Morgan, follow up with the gallery. If there’s a specific person or piece all three victims stopped to interact with, I think our next step is pretty clear.”

“What’s that?” Penelope asked.

“We send in someone who just so happens to be exactly the UnSub’s type to the art gallery as bait,” Rossi concluded.

All eyes, including yours, moved across the table, landing on Spencer.