#crowd maker office

[fangirl-dot-com]

Chapter 28 - Always Bet on Red and Navy

As promised you hungry demons. But I love you all! My midterms were absolutely awful and have kind of put me back in a mindset that I have desperately tried to break out of. So, writing this was a bit therapeutic because there aren't any teachers grading this. It's just you all who take everything with such love.

So please enjoy this!

Your eyes glimmered with the reflective lights as you walked through the turnstile. This year, a white body suit was not on your body and your neck was void of an iconic red scarf. But, each breath you took filled your lungs with familiar air. The small crowds of people, who showed up early for qualifying, chanted your name with each step you took. Your eyes were squinted into half crescents by your smile. To your left, Vito was typing things on his iPad, a Bluetooth speaker in his ear as he talked. 

His words were mumbled as the two of you kept walking to the garage. He looked heated as his voice began to raise. He walked right passed you and into your driver’s room. You guessed you wouldn’t be using it for a while. 

A yawn escaped your lips as you looked around. Max hadn’t arrived yet, along with mostly everyone that you normally talked to. Your eyes flittered across the paddock. A light shone from the Mercedes garage. A smirk rose on your lips. You hadn’t been able to talk to Lewis for a while and you missed the Brit. You grabbed your blanket and wrapped it around your shoulders. This was nothing like Singapore where you wished you could escape the heat. Here in Vegas, you wanted to escape the cold. 

You gingerly stepped into the lighted garage, feet barely making an echo. You knew where the back room was. A coffee sounded really good right now as you were fighting sleep. Your eyes widened at the sight of Lewis all bunched on a couch. You could tell that he was sound asleep, since his eyes were shut and his face looked so relaxed. You took a couple of steps and sat down next to him. When he didn’t move, you knew you were save. You watched as he shivered next to you, neck outstretched in a weird angle, resting on the back of the couch. His arms were wrapped around his torso

You lightly pouted at the sad sight. Thankfully, your blanket was big enough for two people. You lightly draped the cream colored fabric onto most of his body. You watched him unconsciously relax underneath the blanket. You quickly situated yourself next to him, and gently put your head on his shoulder. 

Lewis stirred at the new weight on his left side. His eyes barely opened as he tried to blink the sleep away. His face was met with blond hair and the smell of your vanilla shampoo. He now noticed the cream blanket on him and you cuddled up close. 

“Kid?” 

“Shhhhh, sleep now, questions later.” 

Lewis didn’t even have time to argue before he was being dragged back to sleep land. His arm rose up to lie behind your head, inevitably giving you more room under his arm. You scooched closer to the warmth of the 7-time world champion. 

Toto sighed as he walked out of his office. Everything was falling quickly. When Lewis mentioned that he wanted to initiate the escape clause in his contract, Toto thought that he was going to be retiring at the end of the season after another failed attempt at the world championship. He just wasn’t expecting his star to leave him for another team. The Austrian’s hand rubbed over his forehead. 

He didn’t want to think about that now. He could only focus on the next three races of the 2024. Vegas, Qatar, and Abu Dhabi was all he had left. Toto rounded the corner to the little kitchen station where their multiple coffee makers were. Nothing could beat Ferrari’s authentic Italian espresso, but hopefully a regular coffee pod could do. 

What Toto didn’t expect was for you to be snuggled up to Lewis on the couch that resided there. A sad smile made its way to his face. The two of you looked so innocent together, faces void of the usual wear and tear from the life that you lived. He quickly sent a text over to Christian to let him know where you were. His phone showed that they still had a few hours left before qualification started. The team principal just knew that you were going to win this weekend. Max had done a good job, trying to get the jump on you. But, when one’s name tops the P1 spot for all of the practices, there’s no choice in fighting it. 

You owned this track. 

A homecoming of sorts. 

Toto had barely payed any attention to you last year as you walked around in your sparkly outfit, following the reigning world champion. He knew of you. Just another name of a rookie trying to get into Formula 1. Looking back now, the Austrian wishes that he had done more to sign you. 

His phone softly dinged, and his eyes adjusted to the brightness of his screen. A text from Christian let him know that Max was on the way to come get you. Inside, he truly wished that you could have maybe been what you were to Max, to Lewis. But he lost out on you and he now lost out of Lewis. His days of complete domination were over.

Toto lightly stepped closer to the sofa and crouched down. His arm extended and lightly pushed on Lewis’s shoulder. The Briton’s eyes fluttered awake as he looked around, trying to get his bearings in order. Lewis’s eyes stopped on you, who was still sound asleep. Your eyes flitted behind your eyelids. 

“Should we wake her up?” Toto asked. “Max is coming to get her in a moment.” 

Lewis shook his head. 

“She’s dreaming.” 

A soft smile formed on his face as he watched you puff air and inhale harshly sometimes. You murmured gibberish, which the Mercedes pair had a hard time trying not to laugh. Footsteps announced someone else’s presence. The duo’s head jerked in the direction and watched as Max rounded the corner. 

Max froze at the sight of you snuggled into Lewis, your coveted blanket laying across yours and Lewis’s laps. 

“I’m quite jealous Lewis. She rarely shares the blanket.” 

Lewis’s eyebrow rose. “I just saw here sharing with Logan last race.” 

Max laughed softly, still not wanting to wake you up. 

“That was a different blanket. This is her Dior one. See the monogram? She doesn’t share that with anyone, not even me.” 

There was humor in the Dutchman’s voice as he explained. Max took a couple of steps before stooping down. He gently picked you up in his arms. You didn’t move a muscle as he adjusted you in his grasp. 

Lewis stood up and popped his joints. He took the blanket off his lap and layed it back over you. It draped weirdly across you and Max’s arms. It was silent as the three men watched you try to get closer to the warm that was Max Verstappen. 

“Well, I will get her back to the garage. You two have a good night.”

After Max said that, you talked a bit loudly. 

The Red Bull driver stopped in his tracks, wondering if Lewis and Toto heard. 

Lewis snorted. “Was that Dutch?’ 

The blond nodded as he looked down at you. There was a proud smile on his face. 

“I’ve been teaching her some words, but she always claims that it’s too hard. But here she is, sputtering out fluent sentences.” 

Toto asked, “What did she say.” 

“That’s the funny thing. She said something about a king. Must be a weird dream. She had a few weird ones the other night.” 

Lewis smirked up at him. “Care to share?” 

“No.” 

The three laughed a bit before Max bid goodbye, complaining that his arm was falling asleep. Max brought you back to his driver’s room and layed you down on his extra couch. There was a lot of time before qualifying, so he thought he would follow suit and try to get a nap in. His thoughts melted away as soon as his head hit the pillow. 

A few hours later, you and Max were woken up for qualifying. You scratched your head as you tried to remember some of the dreams you had last night. Max had told you that you were able to sputter out fluent Dutch, which then he got onto you for complaining about learning it when you were awake. Now he knew that you knew more than you were letting him know. 

Thankfully, there were no loose drain holes to rip up the floors of the cars. You had easily put your car in the P1 spot, certifying your claim on this track. 

Before the race, you were hunched together with Logan, Lando, and Oscar. Another one of your blankets was around everyone. Your cream Dior blanket would not have been big enough and you didn’t want it touching the dirty floor. On a small chair that sat in front of you, a computer played Cars 2. 

It felt so much like déjà vu while watching it. The movie took you back to your first free practice as a rookie last year, cuddling up with Logan and Oscar on a shared chair. At least this time, the four of you had upgraded to a sofa that was dragged to the outside pit lane. The officials were going over the circuit one last time, just to make sure that it was safe to drive. The chilly air would have raised goosebumps, but the four of you were in the race suits already. The scratchy fabric combined with the fireproofs really kept you insulated. This year, they brought back the Elvis suits. 

Max, Alex, Charles, and Carlos were standing off to the side, checking up on you four from time to time. 

“Anyone else feel like a parent watching them?” Alex questioned out loud, leading to many groans from the group. 

Max sighed, hands on his hips. “All the time. You know how many juice boxes I have to make sure I pack just in case? The answer is a lot.” 

Carlos watched Lando snuggle more into the blanket and into Oscar, still trying to warm up. The Aussie just rolled his eyes, but let him snuggle anyway. 

The Spaniard agreed. “Lando still has his little stuffed animal from a few years ago. Doesn’t leave or go anywhere without it.”

Alex nodded his head. “Oscar and Logan were both in my driver’s room the other day, looking so tired. Turns out, they weren’t sleeping because they watched a horror movie and were too scared to just go to bed. They’ve spent the last couple of nights in my room.” 

Charles shrugged. “Yeah mate, I don’t know. Y/n is just Y/n. She’s always acted like this, with Arthur.” 

Max rolled his eyes. “Surely she’s done something while being at Dams.” 

The Monegasque thought for a moment, before his eyes widened. 

“Ok, there was this one time that Arthur called me to their room. Dams gave them like no money and they often shared a hotel room if they could. And when I got there, they immediately through swim trunks at me. Apparently, they couldn’t go to the pool or water park without adult supervision. The worker there thought they were like younger than 18.” 

The group laughed after the story, making the other group of four turn their heads. 

“What do you think they’re talking about?” Lando questioned, eyes still on the movie. 

“Probably weird adult stuff. Like how one time Max showed up to Milton in his pajamas because he thought it was just a big debrief. No, it was actually a meeting with board members and sponsors.” 

Logan started to laugh loudly at the story, a bit too tired to contain the giggles. 

That made Alex look over again as he sighed. 

“I’m glad Williams kept him on. He was so sure that he was going to be booted after what happened in Qatar.” 

Max looked with sad eyes at the blond, who was currently in a you and Oscar sandwich. 

“Are they going to be renewing his contract after this?” 

Alex had a wicked grin on his face. “Mate, the kid gave Williams their first win since 2012. Of course they extended his contract.” 

Carlos jutted his head. “What about you mate.” 

The Thai shook his head as he lightly laughed. “Logan said he wouldn’t sign unless I got the same amount of years he did.” 

Charles’s eyes widened. “Congrats mate.” 

Logan had started to look over. “They must really be talking about adult stuff.” 

You carefully turned his head back to the movie. 

“Shhhhh, Lightning McQueen is on.” 

This year, you were able to actually finish the movie instead of having to promise that you’d finish it later. 

As you sat on the circuit, Mitch did a quick radio check. 

“Ok kid. You ready to win Vegas?” 

You shrugged in the car, even if she couldn’t see you. “I don’t know about win, but I will try my best. You know what Lego Batman says?” 

Mitch rolled her eyes lovingly. “What does he say?” 

“Always bet on black. But our colors aren’t black. So I’m changing the saying. Always bet on red and navy.” 

“And they are ready to go. I’ll keep you updated when you need it.” 

With that, Mitch let you be as you took off for the formation lap. You knew you had to keep the tyres warm. You watched in your mirrors as the cars behind you started to swerve right to left and then left to right. 

However, you were doing a more subtle approach as you constantly braked hard and then accelerated hard as well. It was a trick you picked up when watching Kimi do the same. 

Charles was a bit worried as he was swerving behind Max. 

“Are her tyres even warming up? Oh, never mind. She’s doing what Kimi always did.” 

It wasn’t long before all the cars were lined up, back in the starting positions. You watched out for the dust on the asphalt, knowing that it caused lots of troubles last year. The lights went off and you were drastically pulling ahead of the pack. 

A bit into the race, you watched as your wheels smoked white as you went around a corner. 

“Lock up in turn 3.” 

“Copy.” 

You hadn’t expected it to happen again, but it did. 

“Damn it. How much are we loosing on the corners?” you questioned, trying to get your car back under control. In the mirrors you saw how Charles and Max were slowly creeping back up to you. 

“Two tenths.” 

You sighed angrily. 

The two male drivers had caught up with you and now it was an all-out, three car battle for first. You were struggling to keep your position. You prayed and hoped that your tyres wouldn’t lock up again. But, they didn’t seem to work as they locked up again, letting Max and Charles fly past. You cursed under your breath. However, you had an idea. 

“Mitch, box for hards please.” 

“Are you sure?” 

You smirked under your helmet. “Always bet on red and navy.” 

You watched as the Red Bull and Ferrari kept going away as you pulled into the pits. If you’re breaks were going to lock up, then the stopping would cause more friction to go to the tyres. In the end, you hoped that the hard tyres would warm up quicker than if you just swerved or waited for them to warm by just driving. 

At the first corner, your breaks locked up once again. 

“How are the temperatures of the tyres?” 

“Heating up quickly.” 

The smirk returned to your face. 

“Perfect.”

You were still behind Charles and Max by the time that they had done their one pitstop. They had also gone out on hard tyres. Your car was still locking up, but you made up the time since your tyres were much more hot. 

It was the third to last lap when you finally made it to the males’ radars. 

“How the hell did she make it this close?” Charles asked, looking in his mirrors as you kept gaining. 

“Last we heard, she was locking up. Keep pushing.” 

The Monegasque saw white puff out of your brakes, yet you seemed to shake it off quickly.

The last lap finally came. 

You watched as your car was getting close to the two leaders. It was time for the all or nothing. 

“Kid, play it safe. Lock up happens on the last corner.”

“Gotta play something.” 

“Kid.” 

You shut the radio off. 

It was a “Never back down never what?” move time. 

You turn on DRS and got side by side with Charles and Max. The two were paying so much attention to each other that they didn’t see you slip by. 

If your brakes were to lock up, then you’d be sent into the barriers going 300+ k/m an hour. It would be deadly at this rate. Your heart started to pick up as you came closer to the corner. You had the outside racing line. You just had to get in front of Max and break as late as you could. 

You held your breath as you finally braked. 

Mitch watched with wide eyes at the pit wall. 

“What is she thinking?” Christian questioned, watching as you finally braked. 

Yet, your tyres never locked up. 

Mitch finally got what you were saying. 

“She had to win a bet.” 

You wanted to cheer as you came out in front of Max in the final chicane. Max, in his car, couldn’t believe it as you slipped past to cross the line in P1. 

You finally let out a deep exhale as the race completed. You pulled into Parc Ferme. You undid your steering wheel and got out. You raised your arms at the crowd before walking to your team. Helmet pats came from everyone as you made your rounds. 

A soft punch landed on your arm. You turned around to see Max, faux anger in his eyes.

“What were you thinking? Braking that late with lock ups? You should have retired the death trap.” 

You rolled your eyes as his over protectiveness. 

“Would you have retired the car?” 

The silence from the Dutchman was your answer. 

“I had to bet on something. We are in Vegas after all.” 

“Sure kid.” 

The limo was squished with you in the middle of Max and Charles. However, this year, the three of you got to Maxsplain, Leclerify, and Y/n-strate on the way to the anticlimactic fountain show during the interviews. 

Nico was the one conducting them this race. After Charles and Max gave their pieces it was your turn. You walked up to the spot with a bright smile, still feeling the high of yet another race win. Nico’s smile was a reflection of your own. 

“So, Y/n, how many race wins does this make for you.” 

“Three, I believe.” 

“Wow, so you’ve already passed Lewis’s record for points during a rookie season, how does that make you feel?” 

You thought for a moment. “Well, the points were definitely different back then, so I don’t know if it’s an good comparison. I know Lewis won four races his rookie year, but I’d be very happy with my three.” 

Nico hummed. “Your race was magnificent. Want to tell us a bit about it? Especially that last overtake.” 

“Well Nico,” you started, “my brakes weren’t being very lovely.” 

You heard snorts from behind you from Max and Charles.

“Lock ups are always tough. I asked my engineer if I could pit for hards because if there was enough friction between my brakes stopping the wheels and then the circuit, I could heat the tyres faster. And then I kind of just went for it on the last corner. I really thought that I would lock up again and go straight into the barriers.” 

The blond could only let out a strangled laugh at the thought you just full sending it without having any caution to your wellbeing. You made him glad that he retired in 2016 because he would not be able to keep a calm heart racing against rookies who only had a mindset to win. 

Max snuck up behind you. 

“I told her that it was stupid and that she should never do it again.” 

You could only pout. 

“Why?”  

“Maybe so I don’t have to plan a funeral?”  

“But Max, I put the fun in funeral.” 

"nO!"

redbullracing has posted

redbullracing always bet on red and navy - y/n l/n, 2024

liked by maxverstappen1, charles_leclerc, y/n_updates, and 1,382,309 others

y/n.nation THRID WIN THIRD WIN THIRD WIN

rookie&co the ride to the fountains with everything

leclerify_me ikr, now we have the big three: maxsplain, leclerify, and y/n-strate

box_box_express we need to call y/n the tyre whisperer along with Charles

red_bull_bros like who thinks to pit to hards and use the lock ups for benefit - she really is her own strategist

y/n.89 so glad I wasn't sprayed in the face, thank you Charlie

maxverstappen1 yeah...thanks Charlie 🙂 charles_leclerc yeah, I was aiming for your eyes, I want another win oscarpiastri GET IN LINE BEHIND THE ONES WHO HAVEN'T WON landonorris you good mate? oscarpiastri I'LL BE GOOD WHEN I GET MY OWN WIN y/n.89 chill shawty - it's coming 😌

formulala_delulu max and Charles >>>>>

author lestappen for ever formulala_delulu HUH?

mericanf1_fan wish Logan was on the podium for Vegas but I'll take p5 🦅

y/n.89 has posted

y/n.89 🪩 what happens in Vegas....

tagged: lilymehe and alexandrasaintmleux

liked by arthur_leclerc, lilymehe, carmenmmundt, and 1,462,923 others

y/n.nation we're not even going to talk about the third picture...

arthur_leclerc hot damn 😳

y/nxarthur bro is done hiding rookiesboyfriend FINALLY y/n.nation is he in vegas?? max&co HOLD UP

maxverstappen1 kid...

y/n.89 yes Max? maxverstappen1 want to pick up your phone? y/n.89 no. maxverstappen1 PICK UP YOUR PHONE lilymehe uh, y/n can't come to the phone right now, she'll get back to you in 3-19 business days lewishamilton I fear this is bahrain again max georgerussell63 I'M NOT EVEN THERE THIS TIME

box_box_nightmare the dress, the disco balls, the chapel, lily and alex - I fear that Vegas has taken our girl

charles_leclerc Alex, amore, please tell y/n to text Max back...I'm nervous that he's going to have an aneurism

alexandrasaintmleux Alex can't come to the phone right now, she'll get back to you in 3-19 business days charles_leclerc OH COME ON - ALEX YOU TRY NOW alex_albon I'm smarter than that (lily said that y/n is texting max now) y/n.89 snitch 😒

formula_gossip twitter is saying that y/n did NOT get married in Vegas but was picked up by a random couple to be a witness to the marriage

y/n_fan THAT WAS ME AND MY HUSBAND! leclercbros God has his favorites

formula_fan she's going to be MASSIVELY hung over tomorrow

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[pursuitseternal]

“Surprise me,” an update to “The Rogue You Were” for more NSFW Ascended Astarion romance…

Ascended Astarion x F!Reader | E | 5.5K Spice

Summary: A party, a massive affair and feast for all the powerful of Baldur’s Gate. But you crave only one thing on which to feed… your love and maker. With so many around you, you will have to be creative… find ways to… surprise him…

CW: Semi-public sex (twice), oral sex, vampiric sex on the ceiling, dom/sub undertones (the usual with Astarion), praise kink… oh and Astarion like it loud… even in semi-public.

Read on AO3 if you prefer

Continue for a scene that is full of surprises…

🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸

Your palace was full. Brimming with dignitaries, the wealthy, the powerful. Every single being with money or military might was in your palace. Guests of every race and class, as long as they had something that would be… beneficial… to your rule.

To that of your maker. He glides through the masses, his silken voice and frequent laughter piercing through the din intermittently. You have kept your distance, however, watching from your seat on the dais. Your padded, gilded chair beside an empty one, matching but more grand and opulent.

Thrones. Though no one calls them that quite yet.

“They will. In due time,” he had said, practically salivating into your mouth as he had held you on his lap, the first time he rested on that gold and crimson seat.

Now, you rest in your throne, elegant black gown draping around you, cut just revealing enough to enhance your curves, but not so much as to tempt anyone. For that would end in only one way, as Astarion had laughed darkly, mentioning it as you had slipped it on. It would end…murderously.

You can almost imagine him giggling to say, “And that does so spoil a dinner party…”

You grin, raising the edge of your golden goblet to your painted lips. The red liquid sloshes a bit. Wine, wine that is supposed to be heady and fragrant. The best Faerûn has to offer. But it meets your tongue with bitterness, filling your stomach with sour bile.

You hunger.

It’s clear, as time passes, you are not some spawn, there is more to your powers than even Astarion had thought possible. For the more power he gains, the more you seem to, too. Strength, agility, scent. You do not hunger blindly for the blood of thinking animals. Not some vague predator.

But each day, your hunger does gnaw at you. Hungry for only one being, one creature. Astarion, your lover, your master, your everything.

You can’t resist it, the need for him inside you, be it his blood coating your throat or his cock buried to his balls between your thighs. You keep trying to make pleasant conversation when you are approached, but it turns to a dismissive wave the moment you see him cutting through the crowds. Silver hair, flawless and unruly, eyes bright and crimson.

This gathering is most important, he had said… a sign that he was better than Cazador ever was. More fun. More powerful. More charming.

He certainly is. All that and more. But tonight, it seems he needs to convince himself as much as all of Baldur’s Gate. His smile is shallow, demure. His giggle is a bit too sharp, too shrill. Meant to call attention and prove how happy he is.

Not that any remained that would have known him as a slave, a spawn. Those were all dead.

Now, Astarion, Ascendant Vampire Lord mingles as if he is running for office or brokering deals at the docks. In many ways, both are true. Only now, if he wills it, he can scramble up the walls, burst into black mist… but for now, you can see the traces of the 200 year old magistrate, manipulating and flattering everyone around him. A bending to his will, subtle but distinctive. Charming, and entirely… roguish.

You struggle to take another small sip of your wine, only to stick your tongue out in total disgust.

“Not to your liking, darling?” his voice whispers in your ear, even as you see him a hundred paces away. “The best wine money can buy this side of the sea, and you look like you swallowed sea water itself.”

“Astarion?” you whisper, eyes wide for any sign of a trick.

“No tricks, my treasure. Simply power,” he purrs in your ear. You stare at him, his head nodding as some tall Drow blathers on and on. His full attention bores into the speaker before. Until his eyes flicker at you, making you catch your breath. So intense, so wicked in his delight. “Well?” he pushes again. “The wine is… unsatisfactory? Ugh. I’ll have to have a word with the merchant… a word or a murder…”

“No,” you raise the cup to your lips, hiding the fact from prying eyes that you speak to the air as if you were insane. “It’s just that… I do not wish to feed on… wine, my love.”

“Darling…” he coos, attentive, placating, concerned, “my poor, thirsty, little consort, longing to feed from her master…”

“Yes,” you sigh, squirming on your chair ever so slightly. That catches his eyes again. “And…”

“Oh, my queen, one day I will fuck you on that throne for all to see,” his voice seems to caress beneath your chin, circling to your other ear. “But perhaps it is a bit soon for these ignorant fools.”

“Then when?” you moan into your goblet again, the thought of riding his cock, your bodies pressed against the gilt and crimson finery. Your mouth waters and your fangs itch. “When can I have you, my love?”

“When it is convenient for me… for us…” he hisses in your ear. “Not too long, I promise you.”

“Do not make me wait, Astarion, or maybe it’ll be more than your neck I’ll bite…”

“Promises, promises,” he bursts in a giggle. You can see his mouth smirking even as his eyes focus on others. “Don’t make any you don’t intend to keep, darling…”

“Oh, I won’t.” And just to prove your point, you down the rest of the foul tasting wine in two gulps, tossing the metal chalice to the floor beneath you. It clatters, but you can barely hear in the chaotic chorus of voices.

But he hears it. His head snaps up. Crimson eyes stare at you, disapproving.

His mouth opens, as if he is going to chastise you. His feet begin to weave his way through the masses, eyes locked on you. His goal. His prize. His destination.

He doesn’t even need to touch a soul to part the crowds around him. You can see the blaze in his eyes, the power throbbing between you, the need for him to show you that you must toe the line, to be wonderfully obedient, especially in front of all these people.

The bright clang of a gong reverberates loudly. The call for dinner. The banquet about to begin. You see Astarion draw himself straight, forcing that composure of refinement as he slides up the lower step of the dais. Pale fingers unfurl, reaching for your hand— your escort to the dinner, with a subtle smirk flitting around his lips. You extend your hand, feeling all eyes watching you as he bends his head to kiss you in greeting, his lips gently lingering on the back of your hand. His eyes flutter shut. As if, he too, savors the slight contact of your bodies. As if, he too, craves more.

He tugs you from your seat, your black gown flowing its train behind you as you make your way to the next room. You feel conspicuous, those observant eyes watching the way Astarion’s hand holds you close, the sweep of his thumb over the inside of your wrist.

You give him a devoted smile, one that flashes your own fangs at him. He stops you both at the entryway of the banquet hall, “Pucker up, my sweet. Make it look convincing.” His voice caresses your mind. “Even if your eyes tell me you’d like nothing better than to pin me down and make me bleed…”

You place a hand on the rich brocade of his jackets, fingers lacing into the collar to press into the soft silk of his shirt. His palm cups your cheek, cold to the touch, but on fire with his possessiveness. He claims your lips, and you feel it, taste his own hunger. His pride at having you, his consort, his queen, on display for all of Baldur’s Gate to see.

It lasts a minute, but in that moment, your eyes shut tight, leaving you with nothing but the pressure of his touch on your face and the working of his lips with yours. The intoxicating, heady dance you do each and every night, the one that always begins with this. The stealing of your breath and the tangle of your tongues.

He pulls away far quicker than you would have liked, careful not to let you nip or draw blood. Oh no. That would not do with so many people here. That smirk on his lips tells you he will keep you dangling for more, not forever. But enough to let you burn for him a little while. The veil of his power clearly tinting his view. That pulse of his presence covers your mind, sending you a vision… Thousands stand before him, where he is seated and crowned. Magnificent and powerful, eyes glowing in his triumph. All of Baldur’s Gate, Faerûn, the world. kneels at his throne, and he wants you kneeling too… between his thighs, his cock freed and pulsing in your hand as your head bobs and sucks over his length.

You snap out of it, watching as his brow raises slowly, his smirk deepening as he leads you into the now crowded and spinning banquet. The high table faces everyone from its perch at the end of the hall, covered in decadent red cloth and set with pieces of purest gold for dozens. Your nose fills with the heavy scents of wine and roasted meat, all manner of dishes slathered in spices and butter.

Your stomach turns but not in hunger. Not for that anyway.

Astarion stops short, the end of the high table before you, his hand resting on the back of a gilded chair. You frown, hurt and enraged. His seat, and yours by rights, are always to the center, presiding over the festivities. But now, he denies you even that. Seating you so far from him.

He tuts his tongue, scolding you even as his eyes skate down the dip if your cleavage. “Don’t give me that, pet, not in front of all these people. I need you to take this place, I need you to submit yourself tonight, to free up those seats near me that I might… continue our very important work.” His eyes glow, his hunger obvious only to you, his consort, his mate.

“And should I refuse?” you sling the dare, a look of pure demure adoration masking your face.

“Don’t make me bend you over my knee to reprimand you, darling… not in front of all… these… people…” he growls so quietly.

Your stomach is on fire with need, your mouth watering at the image and the desire it conjures. You can sense it does the same in Astarion, the growing bulge of his cock clear to your eye in those black velvet trousers of his.

You smile sweetly, lifting on your toes to whisper in his ear, a message for him alone, “I’ll make you pay for this, Astarion.”

“In what way, darling? Or are you going to… surprise me?” his voice is a caress, his hand lingering on yours as you center yourself before the chair.

Your folds ache, engorged and slick and so painful. It hurts your body to obey, to make yourself sit on that chair at the edge of the long table. You want to whine and whimper as you watch him walk away. To watch that magnificent profile cut through the crowd at such a distance. Smirk plastered on his lips. Eyes scanning the crowd, reveling in his court. Looking everywhere except for you.

Servants laden your plate with food, meats and sauces, the scent is rich enough to make anyone drool. Except for you. No. Your desired feast sits in the middle of the table, a dozen dignitaries between you. Other ladies try to make idle gossip around you, they giggle as they speak of handsome merchants, valiant warriors, speculating on the sizes of their weapons.

You fight the growl in your throat. Keeping one ear open, just in case they decide to speculate about your master. But from the way you clutch at the gold knife in your hand as you attempt to saw into the pieces of mutton on your plate, they undoubtedly know better.

No, you can only poke at the food on your plate, eyes devouring every movement of that silver haired head, every reach of his elegant, dramatic arm.

He’s hungry, you narrow your eyes to focus. Another reach of his arm as he spoons another serving on his plate. Enjoying the benefits of his ascendant abilities to taste and savor foods once more.

Must be nice, you sneer to yourself grabbing your goblet for more wine. Nice he can ignore the hunger he has for her to indulge in mortal foods, dismissing the raging erection you know is most certainly still straining in his breeches…

You smile. An idea… a little delicious revenge. One where you could serve it so easily, and savor it to sate your hunger.

You wait for the entertainment to begin, bards singing, the hall echoing with lutes and drums and dancing. Half the ladies near you leave to find themselves some dancing partners.

But even as the company at the high table thins a bit, you keep your gaze fixed on Astarion, on how he lounges back in his chair now, idlily chit-chatting and sipping his own wine.

Quickly, you slip to the ground, letting the cloth of the table drape to cover you, tucking the train of your gown around your hips. Your vampiric stealth comes in handy now, scuttling your way beneath as you avoid feet and legs, barely making out muffled conversations though the thick skirt and rhythmic beating of music.

You can smell him, his scent of bergamot barely covering the musk of his arousal. You stop at those bent knees and manly spread legs, clad in crushed black velvet breeches. You breathe in that fragrance of your lover, the bond of your powers grows taught as you nestle yourself between his thighs, careful not to touch him yet. Slowly, you take the pads of your fingers, tracing up the inside of his thighs.

Surpsied, he stiffens, the muscles of his legs clenching at the contact. One hand darts at you under the table, finding your face in his lap as he cradles your cheek.

He knows you. Invites you in. “You’re… still… full of surprises aren’t you, my love? Is this your idea of catching me off guard with revenge?” His voice caresses your mind as his thumb presses along your lower lip. “I’m positively delighted…” his hips cant forward, sliding those lower regions completely under the table. Always so thoughtful when it comes to his pleasure. And yours.

Your fingers trace over the rise of his arousal, feeling it twitch and pulse even beneath the soft velvet that encases him. You reach for the laces of his breeches, quickly, quietly freeing that engorged length. His hand still strokes into your hair, beckoning you to pay him the homage of your revenge.

But it is not for his cock alone you hunger. You take a single nail, scoring it into the crease of his thigh. You feel the rush of his blood, thick with his power, coating your fingers. You raise it quickly to your mouth and lick it clean. His hand clutches in your hair painfully hard. A warning, but one you ignore.

Your hands pull down the fabric of his trousers, your face burying in his lap. Tongue licking at the blood, letting even that little trickle coat your tongue and send an immediate bloom of need between your own thighs.

His hand tugs at your hair, trying to pry you off, but not so hard. Just a little resistance. A little fun. “Clumsy me and my nails, my love,” you whisper against his lap, letting your tongue lap at the blood one more time.

“You’ve had your revenge, darling, now give me what I’m owed for my troubles,” he purrs into your mind. His hand shifts the back of your head, centering you over his straining, twitching cock. You take him, slowly, teasing that blunt head with little laps of your tongue. You wish you had swallowed more, making all his blood fill you. But this will have to do.

You run your tongue up that seam on the underside of his length, working from base to silken tip, making him jut against your face. His other hand slides to join your worship, holding his cock, wrapping his fingers around himself as his grip on the back of your head works your insolent mouth towards that seeping head.

You take him, sucking as you bob forward and back, thankful that music is pounding and loud enough to cover the pops and slurps you make. You close your eyes, picturing all the times you have pleasured him, meeting that glassy, enamored stare of his crimson eyes down at you.

His own hand works to pleasure himself into the wet workings of your mouth, the clenching of his thighs on either side of your head goads you on, making you suck harder, faster. It is your own dance to the evocative music of the party. And you would have your partner no other way.

You feel the rumble of his voice through his belly, his words muffled, but the pattern of speech starts to falter. His hand around his shaft stills and grips harder, the only sign you get before he fills your throat with his seed. The bitter fluid sating your hunger, mingling with the sweet tingle of his powerful blood that still coats your tongue. You lap it, greedily, cleaning him so that not a drop will offend the pristine black of his trousers. He would never accuse you of being inconsiderate. Lustful? Perhaps. Willful? Most definitely. But you wouldn’t want your mate and master to traipse around with any offending stains to speak of your… vengeful indiscretion.

And he knows it. The way his fingers knot gently into the curls of your hair is gratitude enough.

For now.

There is still the matter of your own arousal and its required tending.

You slink your way back to your seat, letting his hands slip himself back into the band of his breeches. With perfect stealth, you slide yourself back into your chair. And all of that just as the drums beat their last and the music crescendos to its own climax. You grin, seeing him lean in his chair to watch you, eyes a glowing vermilion, his own tongue licking his mouth as you take your napkin to clean your sticky lips.

You see his fist clench on the table top, the only hint he is burning with need. His perfectly charming smile returns, he nods his head at those dignitaries around him, clapping his ivory hands slowly with the rest of the applause. You can almost hear him, his silken voice bidding for those around him to excuse him.

Then he raises from the table, still smiling. A smile that shows his teeth, but doesn’t reach his eyes, a smile that looks perfect but filled with sharpened ice. He extends his hand, gentlemanly, polite, all except that burning in his gaze. “Stand,” he orders to your mind. “My obedient love, it’s time to return the favor.”

You raise a brow, face bright with his attentions at last. “My love,” you purr, mimicking the way he speaks to perfection, as every lady near you looks with envy at the male from whose arm you now hang. They covet you, and you simper at them, still licking the bitter tang of his cum from your lips.

A wave of his hand, a merry order to continue to the bards, and Astarion begins to lead you down the edge of the great hall. Candles flicker, smoke and fragrant dishes still fill the air. To the casual eye, the host is but taking a moment in privacy with his love.

But to you, you know better. The way his hand grips at your waist, the way his eyes dip into that subtle cut of your neckline. You’ve made it impossible for him to keep that veneer of restrained refinement. And now, you will pay the price to the vampiric monster that lurks beneath.

Your belly clenches with excitement, your thighs so wet, they slip and squelch beneath yards of black fabric as you walk. Drenched from your own festering need. Soaked from your sucking.

“Proud of yourself, my love?” he taunts, as he grips harder on your body, tugging you into a servants corridor. The party still goes on just beyond the door frame, the music and voices just as boisterous as if you were in the room. “Delighted that I am at your mercy as all of Baldur’s Gate is now at mine?” His hands are everywhere on you, skating down your back, clawing at your throat, tussling in your hair. “Because… I am…” he breathes as he presses you against the stone wall behind you.

“You’re what?” You taunt, a toss of your head, jutting your chin up to meet the intensity behind his eyes.

“Proud of you,” his voice is no more than gravel in his throat. “And you shall be rewarded for your surprises.” His tongue runs over your neck, the pounding of your heart deafening your ears.

“Anything to please you, my love,” you breathe, barely more than a moan. “Now, I’ll take my reward…”

“In good time,” he speaks, his voice reverberating into the crook of your neck. “It is my turn to grant you your own surprise, darling…”

“Fucking me against the wall in sight of the servants would hardly be a surpise for any…”

Your words cease, the rush of his power overcoming you and stealing your breath. You gasp, wind rushing around you, your feet lifting off the ground as you fly. You look down, the tiles of the floor so far away, his body heavy on you, magic tingling around you, pressing you into the ceiling.

“Surprise, darling,” he whispers between your lips before taking them with his own. “I’ve been saving this trick just for you… for the right moment.”

Your world spins, the languorous rhythm of his caress grounds you, as does the little thrusts of his hips between your thighs. His hands ruck up your skirt, his magic floating to keep you pinned to perfectly. “Now…” he purrs, fingers grazing up against your bared thigh, straying over the curve of your mound, “for as quiet as you were pleasuring me, I expect you to turn the tables, darling. Let those mindless pions know how much pleasure I give you…”

Quicker than breath, his teeth sink into your neck, the rush of your blood coating his tongue sends you into bliss already. The bond between you thrums, your blood in his veins, and his in yours. His hand slithers into your folds, stroking you, relief finally flooding down your nerves as he touches you with such command, such knowledge. The carnal kind he has been most diligent to study.

Your hips buck, a strange surge of gravity fighting your body, his magic still pinning you all the harder to keep you in place. He laughs as he presses up from you, those eyes shining bright, observing as he licks his lips ever tweak of your face. His fingers still diligently slip into your cunt, widening it. Preparing you for him. You buck again, catching his nail on your clit, releasing a strangled cry from your throat you try to swallow.

“Tch,” he sucks his teeth with a rakish tilt of his head. “I told you to make some noise, darling…” Then he scratches at you again, the delicious edge of his nails scoring into your folds, clawing at your clit. And scream you do.

“Better,” he praises in his silken voice. “But you know better than to hold back from me, my treasure,” his voice rumbles into your own chest. His hand slips from your legs, wet fingers pressing in between your lips. You suck them clean of your own slick before he even can command you. The groan from his grinning mouth is reward and encouragement enough to continue. “You tortured me, you know, your mouth offering me worship as the riff raff prattled on. I never dreamed to be so worthy of a consort, a queen, as ravishing as you.”

His words alone make you come, let alone the way his hand now slinks into the cut of your dress, your breasts freed as he works them. Lips descend upon them the instant he sees their pale fullness, their straining nipples. And you give him a low throated groan of pleasure.

You are at his mercy, nowhere to go, only to lose yourself in the punishing reward he has in store for you. Pressed by his cold, unyielding body and pinned by his ever-increasing power. He begins to slink down your belly, you breath catching as the safety of his chest, his arms, his whole self leaves you splayed upside down on the ceiling to nestle between your legs.

“One greedy turn deserves another, my love,” he croons, fingers already returning to your folds to slicken them and spread them. “I have feasted already, but not on anything half as divine as you…”

Oh, that tongue, so silken and honeyed in his words, so incessant and demanding in your own honeyed cunt. Your hands reach for his head, those silver curls soft and stubborn as you grip him tight. Just like him.

You ride his licks, bucking on his fingers as they stoke deeper and deeper still. But it won’t satisfy. Not yet.

“Please,” you beg, reduced to a whimper. Words catching inaudible in your throat.

“What was that, darling? I can’t hear you….” He glances up for the smallest second. Enough to flash his crimson eyes at you with all the mischief and lust that drives you wild.

“Please, Astarion,” you whine louder. “Please, take me.”

But he only laughs into your mound, fangs scraping against your folds as he grins wide. “Come now, I expect better, my love,” he ends his silken chastisement with a run of his tongue up your whole seam.

“Argh,” you cry, “Astarion, please… I can’t anymore… pretty please….” Your begging pours from your lips, trying to pull his head over you, to bring him back, to satisfy the craving that rages to have him on you. And in you. “Fuck me, please….”

Instantly, he covers you, his hand pressing into your belly, the snap of leather laces unwinding.

“Better,” he purrs into your mouth, “keep up the good work, darling, and you’ll drip with my seed for the rest of this godsforsaken party.”

Then, he fills you to bursting, burying that long shaft of his deep into you with one stroke.

You mewl, hips rising to take him all. Your hands grip into his shoulders, pulling him tightly to you, as if you can’t get enough of him inside your body. His hunger burns as brightly, his mouth devouring you again, snapping shut on your lips and cutting his fangs into your kiss. Your blood tingles the tip of your tongue as it dances with his. His thrusts are deep, deliberately, ensuring you feel every inch of him dragging and pulling through your walls. Every thrust, every clench of his ass and every dip of his tongue is meant to drive you into oblivion with him. But it’s not enough. Not yet. Not after he left you burning for him for so long.

You clutch him in your thighs, digging the heels of your slippers into the backs of his legs. You feel him smiling wickedly, his thrusts picking up the pace until it is punishing, the loud slap of his flesh into yours is deafened only by the constant keening that comes from your throat. You writhe, you flutter. Back arching and thighs shaking for more. Always more.

He slows his pace, lifting from your body, eyes drinking in the glorious sight splayed beneath his body and wrapped around his cock. “Such beautiful sounds, better than the dribble the bards churn out,” he preens, eyes half veiled, his tongue licking the rest of your blood that trickles from the corner of your mouth. “But I think you can do better than that yet, my treasure…”

“You want them to know…” you growl, it is not a question. “Want them to…”

“Of course, darling. I want everyone to look at your beauty and know only I will ever bury myself up to my balls in you.” He flashes his teeth, taking you all the deeper until you feel him slam against the end of your channel. “And I want them to know that you, my dark…” he thrusts agonizingly slowly, “beautiful…” again, deeper this time, “treasured consort, are the only one I will ever take for my own.”

He pants, his silken praises weaving that web of bliss, riding you past the edge of your senses for that wall of climax. It tears through you, splitting you in two, into a million shattered, moaning pieces as you come.

You feel his body grow rigid in time with yours, his hips gyrating with irregular rhythm. His own voice a deafening growl above you, his lips sneering back, his eyes half-lidded as he watches your own waves of orgasm rend you apart.

He stills above you, your body weightless, limp. You groan to feel him pull that intoxicating fullness from your folds. Your world tilts on its axis, held by nothing but the iron embrace of his arms, your body floating back to the ground.

Feet resting on the floor. His cum dripping down your thighs. You steady yourself against him, and you feel his breath in your hair, a kiss on your temple. You shake, unable to move… to speak… to think straight. His hands fix you, slipping your breasts back inside the black of your dress, tugging your skits and flouncing them. His eyes scrutinize without mercy. Ensuring you look every bit his perfect, desirable consort before he tends to his own vanity.

“Very… good,” he comments, his praise warmed by the rasping honey of his voice. “No more surprises, then, my love. Not until I can bed you properly once this is all through.”

“May I?” You smirk, raising on your toes, as if to place a kiss on his smirking cheek.

He eyes you, looking down in lustful approval, cocking his head with that mischievous smirk twitching his lips. “You’re… not asking for a kiss, are you?”

“Close your eyes and find out…” you whisper, craning your neck closer as you lick your lips.

He laughs low and slowly, clutching you against him, the slight angle of his head brings that strong, pale column of his neck to brush your lips. And you bite, just enough to bring a mouthful of his blood to coat your tongue.

You moan as you drink, the slight pressure of his hand woven into your hair, cradling you as you feed, it makes your body arch with need again. You can taste his pleasure, a rich bouquet of sated and unsated desire, a hint of obsession and love mingling with the rich blossom of his power. You feel it filling your body, tingling through the pit of your stomach and wetting your thighs again. Licking his wounds one more time, you hum, a sound of pleasure as his mouth descends on yours. His tongue caresses over every crevice of your mouth, consuming the drops of his blood, stealing them back with unquenchable hunger.

“You are delicious, every time,” he rasps into your mouth, “especially when your tongue tastes of… us.” His fingers grip your chin, tilting your face to look into his, the fog of your ecstacy beginning to clear as you stare into those pleasured, crimson eyes. “Hold your head high, my beautiful queen,” he purrs into your mouth. “Try not to smile too much as you struggle to walk from the sound fucking I just granted you…”

“Of course,” you dip a small curtesy, reaching for his proffered hand, “my king.”

His smile of approval, his whisper of “my love,” warms your belly more than his blood, more than his cum seeping down your thighs.

Music crescendos as you reenter, the crowd’s eyes flit away, the festivities still going strong, as he leads you towards the dancing.

He wants them all to see you, your mouth bloodied, his neck still wounded from your own feeding. He wants you to walk, unsteady and swaying your hips, hips he fucked, loudly and mercilessly for them all to hear.

His arms sweep around you as you move in patterned steps, lilting to the music. And even as all eyes gaze upon you, you don’t care. Can’t care. Not as long as that rakish smile and roguish stare is only on you.

🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸

Part 1: Welcome me…

Part 2: Cleanse me…

[avocado-writing]

For nightingale, aziraphale, and Crowley, could you write something with them going on holiday or honeymoon to a museum or historical site, and remembering old times together? Maybe they discover one of them in the background of a historic photo or they’re mentioned in a piece of writing or turn up in a painting or a statue? I just need more of those 3 so whatever you feel like, dealers choice <3

aziraphale x reader x crowley (good omens)

third chapter of this. kissing you on the lips anon for requesting it.

rated M for light smut.

1.5k words.

if you like what I do, here’s my ko-fi!

Your marriage is a quiet little affair.

It has to be, really. Can’t have a big crowd wondering how three people are able to all wed each other. It’s hard enough miracling the registrar to not notice anything out of the ordinary, let alone worrying about having a bunch of guests second-guessing the technical legality of the thing. 

Luckily, it all goes reasonably smoothly. The registry office isn’t busy on a Thursday afternoon, it doesn’t take long to get in and out. Yes, all three of you sign these documents, that’s absolutely fine. Congratulations and I hope you have a happy future together.

Rings on fingers, plain gold wedding bands binding the three of you to each other. Chaste, meaningful kisses and wide smiles.

Being married to them doesn’t feel any different, but then again you suppose it wouldn’t. You’ve been together for longer than any human has ever been alive. You were all practically married anyway, getting the paperwork done was just… the cherry on top.

“Well, now what do we do?” you ask, stepping out onto the busy London street. Aziraphale and Crowley take a moment to consider this question, as if they hadn’t really thought about it either.

“Lunch?” the angel says, just as the demon replies “bed?”

You laugh, and the three of you end up doing one and then the other.

Crowley kisses you both hard the moment that the bookshop door shuts, pausing only to flip the sign firmly to ‘very closed’. You trap Aziraphale between your bodies, knowing how much he loves to be showered with attention, and strip off as you retreat through the nonfiction section to the well-loved sofa in the break room.

It feels like there isn’t time to go upstairs. It’s time to consummate this marriage here, now. 

“Come on, angel,” you hum as Crowley sheathes himself inside him, making Aziraphale’s eyes roll in pleasure, “like Geoff wrote, ‘In wyfhode I wol use myn instrument as frely as my Makere hath it sent’.”

Despite the overstimulation as you sink down on him, Aziraphale laughs. Crowley cocks an eyebrow.

“What on earth are you going on about?”

“Inside joke, I suppose,” you reply wickedly, before silencing any further questioning with a kiss across Aziraphale’s shoulder.

When you’re done breaking in the marriage bed - after you finish breaking in the marriage couch and then the marriage kitchen counter - the three of you lie together, limbs tangled, the two of them feeling you breathe. 

“You know what we should do?” you eventually pipe up, lost between twisting your fingers in Aziraphale’s curls and running your hand up the length of Crowley’s thigh.

“Look, I’m happy to go again, just give me ten minutes,” Crowley murmurs. You almost get caught up in it as the angel plants a kiss on your bare shoulder, but snap yourself back to reality before they can delay your train of thought further.

“No! - I mean, yes, but also, we should go on a honeymoon.”

“Oh!” Aziraphale says, lighting up, “That’s a wonderful idea. I can’t remember the last time the three of us took a holiday together. One where we didn’t have to also do some work, anyway.”

“It was Stockholm, nineteen-seventy-five,” Crowley states without missing a beat. The two of you both look at him, and it clicks.

“Oh god, it was, wasn’t it?” you laugh. Of course. Was it that long ago?

“The Eurovision final! Goodness, how on earth did we forget?”

“Repressing painful memories?” the demon suggests. It was one of those trips he’d clearly not been very pleased about, but insisted his chaperoning was better than the alternative of letting you and Aziraphale run wild around Sweden.

“I can’t believe you had a perm for that whole decade,” you say to Crowley, who just groans and slings his arm over his face to hide.

“I thought it was very fetching,” Aziraphale reassures, squeezing his husband’s - husband’s! - hand. 

“Well, why don’t we go somewhere a bit closer to home?” you suggest. “Somewhere like, I don’t know, Edinburgh?”

“I like Edinburgh. Well, apart from one statue, but we don’t have to go and see it I suppose,” Aziraphale agrees. The two of you look over to Crowley. He lifts his arm just enough for you to see the sparkle in his yellow eyes.

You set off a couple of days later in the Bentley, boot packed up tight with suitcases (none Crowley’s, one belonging to you, the rest Aziraphale’s; he insisted he needed to bring at least twenty books ‘just in case’). With Crowley’s driving the eight hour journey takes about five, and soon you’re at your little bnb planning how you’re going to spend the week.

And it’s lovely. You do all the touristy things, the guided tours, the hidden gems, and slowly making your way around what feels like every pub in the city. You and Aziraphale eat a quite astonishing number of lunchtime finger sandwiches, and Crowley takes you out dancing to a little hole-in-the-wall joint he had a hand in founding a couple of decades ago. Your heart is full and you realise over and over again just how lucky you are to be able to spend your life with the two people you love most in this universe.

On the last day, you finally do the big one: Edinburgh Castle. You’ve been in there but only once, and that was a couple of hundred years ago. It’s changed but not as much as you thought: it’s nice to see the conservation work people are doing in old places like these. Saving little pieces of the past.

You’re walking through one of the little side corridors - a place you’re probably not meant to actually be on the tour, but one of your husbands has a way of making locked doors open and the other is very good at getting people to forgive you if you’re found going through them.

Up ahead they’re bickering. About what you can’t say. You’ve learnt to tune it out unless it’s about something actually important. Despite that you almost miss it, walk right past the bloody thing - but then you catch the flash of paint out of the corner of your eye and do a double-take.

Your mouth drops open.

“Oh my god. You two, come here and take a look at this!”

Aziraphale and Crowley halt their quibbles and double back to stand at your side. They’re both as shocked as you are.

“Oh,” Aziraphale gasps.

“Huh,” Crowley mutters.

“It’s us,” you state.

It is. An oil painting, ancient. The only description is a tiny plaque which sits beneath it in tiny lettering: a portrait of a gentleman and two ladies, c 1665. No more information is given, which is clearly why it’s been delegated to a back room rather than hung in somewhere more important.

But there’s no mistaking it: Aziraphale in his white jerkin and doublet, Crowley in a black dress with his hair down, and you in the middle. Dressed in rich colours, heavy jewellery hanging off you. Your lovers hold either one of your hands in theirs, the three of you looking out serenely towards the viewer.

“We commissioned this for your birthday in sixteen-sixty-five. Do you remember, Nightingale?”

You nod. Yes, you remember the two of them trying to surreptitiously get you to pose while someone caught your likeness in a sketch to transfer later to canvas. Portrait sittings were an exhausting thing and there was no way they were going to trick you into believing anything else was going on.

“I thought it was destroyed,” you whisper, gobsmacked. The three of you had lived in a little London townhouse around the time, when your relationship was still young. And yes, a birthday present it was: right before the great fire of London had broken out. You’d had to evacuate the city as quickly as you could, no time to save anything as unwieldy as a painting.

But clearly it hadn’t burned. Someone had saved it - or nicked it, more likely, before the blaze got to it - and now it ended up here. In this corridor. Where the three of you had just happened to trespass to find it.

“Miraculous,” Aziraphale breathes, and you can only agree.

“Should we try to get it back?” Crowley asks. “I’m sure there’s someone I can blackmail in this castle.”

“No. No, let’s leave it. I quite like it here. A little piece of us somewhere, preserved in time, you know? It’s lovely. Besides,” you turn to your husbands, “I get to have the two of you every day now.”

The three of you take a moment to let the idea soak in; and then you kiss in the quiet of the castle corridor. Happy. Looking forward to the future you’re now allowed to live.

“Now,” you announce after a beat, “I think we’d better get some lunch and then I’m going to go and graffiti that statue of Gabriel. You’re welcome to join me.”

“Oh absolutely,” says Crowley just as Aziraphale tuts “certainly not!”

You talk him round though, and by that evening, he’s doodled a moustache on the smug archangel’s marble face with a sharpie.

[sgiandubh]

Last minute Swifties

Contrary to what many thought and some posted, I do think the OL cast's Taylor Swift experience was a last minute promo idea, very much monitored by *** and Tall Ships. I was wrong about minder/security guy (still, eerie...) and I never have a problem publicly admitting it. But quite unlikely I am wrong about this one. And sorry for the length, but you know how I am when I am looking for something, right?

Let's unpack: cast thanked the 'organizers' (and minders, really) in very specific terms, leaving NO much doubt:

Louisa McCulloch. Remember this name, we shall meet her in one hot minute. So thank you Louisa and Maril for organizing this: ask yourselves why did Maril, who (as far as I know) is based in the US, have to come to Edinburgh just for the gig. Damage control, perhaps?

And Sophie S., with a remarkable choice of words:

'Thank you ***, TS and her team for making it happen'. In my book, this means a strong, common effort to secure the box last minute. Because 'making it happen' means exactly that: 'need to do everything you can to facilitate it'.

Clearly Skelton, who is a Swiftie in her own right, was particularly appreciative of the efforts it took to ensure everyone could attend the concert. If that were a long planned event, her enthusiasm would have been more temperate, I think. 'Adding more Swifties to the clan' - LOL, Sophie, you mean S and C had no idea of the lyrics and were unable to sing along with you, John Bell, Izzy and Co (I keep forgetting their names and I like them a lot, in the show)? People of my generation are already too damn old for Taylor S. And this different sort of music might be more of S's real preference: otherwise why post it in his stories, as if to say ' TS is a different thing altogether'?

James. A Manchester rock band, formed in 1982, popular in the Nineties. I see no lies: he was clear 'JAMMF is a Swiftie'. And we are, after all, Children of the Nineties, not TS's crowd. And yes, I knew S was into the same kind of music as I was, in the Nineties (he seems to have stayed put, right there, unlike me, LOL):

Anyways, back to the mysterious woman up and front on three pictures in a row, that got many speculating. Nope, that was not Wendy, the MUA and S's bestie:

Once...

... Twice...

... Three times a lady:

Her name is Louisa McCulloch, née Radcliffe and she is the one S thanked, along with Maril (see above). It was a bit hard finding her, because her IG account is private. But I found her alright on Facebook, and then LinkedIn (of course):

Based in Lockerbie, Scotland. 20 years experience as a media publicist:

Worked with *** and Tall Ships since Season 3, after a short stint as Head of Publicity at the Paramount Pictures London Office. Got promoted from Unit Publicist to Publicist during COVID, for Season 6. So yes, she is the one who made it happen, locally, on what I think was a quite short notice.

Attention successfully diverted. Impeccable timing and giving a younger crowd what it wants. Trying to capitalize on TS's huge Instagram fan base: 283 million followers (wow! I had no fucking idea she was so huge). A win-win situation for just about everyone and an elegant way out from sordid waters:

And it worked. Lost among the hundred of thousands of likes and comments, look who's jumping on the bandwagon:

Sharon Stone. With a Blue Check and her 3.9 million Instagram fanbase. A Nineties deity, need I remind you (this blogger spotted her during the Berlinale 2007, while I was going out for drinks, blissfully unaware we were all staying at The Adlon, LOL)?

They mutually follow each other on Insta, by the way. I wonder why *urv did not pounce on that one. I feel robbed, for once, of a wonderful fanfic.

[Later edit] Several comments take on this person without a proper justification. I am editing this post to remind you she is only responsible for the implementation (in Scotland) of decisions taken elsewhere (in the United States of America). She is NOT a decision maker and as Publicist, was probably responsible for the local implementation of a hasty decision to attend an event (secure VIP box at Murrayfield, sell content to the local press). The direct contact with TS's team was, very likely, Maril and upwards, in the hierarchy. In all fairness, she has nothing to do with a billboard spotted in Los Angeles, USA - nothing of the sort in Europe. I am all for taxing, but let's tax people who are really RESPONSIBLE: she is just a very well paid underling. Thank you all, I am sure you understand fairness can only add to our credibility as a group.

[dailyreverie]

Melt

Part of the Your Wish is my Command universe

A/N: This can be read as a stand alone without much context from the series, but knowing the backstory of this pairing is recommended to increase the yearning feeling of this blurb.

@flufftober - Day 24 [Melting emoji]

Pairing: Poe Dameron x Solo!reader

Word count: 625

Flufftober masterlist || SERIES MASTERLIST

Some days happen so fast that you don’t even have time to register what time it is, running from one place to another without notion of who’s in and who’s out, who’s leaving and who’s back. That is, until everyone is called to a briefing room to update on the latest discoveries, which means only one thing: Poe is back.

And you were not there to welcome him.

On those kinds of days, you rush to meet him in the room, instantly regretting missing the moment he came back. Scanning the place, you spot his tense back somewhere in the crowd and you can immediately tell he could dissolve into his seat from all the stress he’s still carrying from the mission; he’s there without so much of a pause to rest and breathe, still in his pilot suit without even unzipping the top off as he usually does, listening to Generals and Officers discussing next moves… when all he wants is a goddamn break.

You wonder if he chose that place to sit strategically - he probably did - because when you join him the person that’s sitting in front of you covers everyone from seeing you. You have to be sneaky still, because your mother is right there, her gaze flickering towards you in the middle of an explanation, and being who you both are, you know that eyes tend to fly over to you. Still, you can’t help but reach over and hold Poe’s hands. He’s clinging to himself, both of his hands intertwined with each other, and that’s how you hold them. It startles him a little, but after a couple of seconds he starts to melt - this time, though, he melts into your touch.

“I’m sorry, I lost track of time.” You whisper without even looking at him. You don’t expect a reply, not when he’s so tense, but you want him to know still. Ever so slowly, he unclasps his hands to hold yours in between his and takes the deep breath he so much needed. Slowly, his muscles begin to release some tension, you feel it even in his fingers and see it on his shoulders, dropping just an inch enough to let you know he’s letting go of the stress.

Poe distracts himself from the talk that’s going on at the front and lets himself look at you. Even if for a brief second, you meet his eyes too, and with that, he’s finally back. The smile you give to each other is one anyone else would miss, it comes with a squeeze to your hand and a silent thank you in his tired eyes.

“It’s okay, don’t worry.” His attention goes back to the front and so does yours. After a few seconds, he leans towards you to reveal a secret: “You are always here.” It’s your turn to melt into him, as much as you can without turning suspicious eyes to yourself. In this chaotic times of your lives, where Poe just came back from seeing Maker-knows-what in this mission, knowing that you are a constant in his life makes your heart feel full.

The meeting finally concludes and Poe stands, reluctantly releasing your hand. You both exchange a final, reassuring glance before rejoining the chaos of your daily lives, knowing that you are each other's safe place in a galaxy that so often feels like it's on the brink of falling apart. You know you will see him soon, that you’ll join him later in his quarters for yet another secret night, but you already miss him again anyway; in that moment as you exchange a glance across the room, the sparkle in Poe's eyes tells you he can’t wait to back in your arms too.

🚀✨🚀✨🚀✨🚀✨🚀✨🚀✨🚀✨🚀✨

Thanks for reading! Please reblog and comment if you enjoyed it!

[misshoneysplayhouse]

Wine Pon You| h.zoe

since the new episode has us hange fans in distress, i have to bless you all with this, i cant get them out of my head and ofc you know i'm higher than a horse dick rn so enjoy, i'm so glad i'm attracting more hange lovers to my page I love yall frl.

song list for this cuz.....babyyyyy my playlist did justice fa meeeee

Remember You- By Wiz Khalifa ft the Weeknd

Wine Pon You- By Doja Cat

Too Deep- dvsn

CW: dom!hange, thigh riding, oral(f!receiving) orgasm denial, backshots pet names (Princess, doll, pretty girl) spitting is mentioned dacryphilia, overstimulation, fingering, riding and just nasty talking in general, Hange is very vocal

The sounds of heels could be heard behind you, there were girls frantically running around, drenched in anticipation as the big news flooded through the locker room. You could be found in front of your vanity mirror, brushing the finishing touches and making sure your outfit was on just right.

Being a stripper wasn't exactly the life path you had set course for but the fast money became addicting, almost making close to 1 to 2,000 dollars a night, the endless drinks and hot ass people with pockets heavier than the smoke in the building, you couldn't stop now.

But tonight was big, Eren the club's owner had told the you all that the city's biggest bachelor Levi was gonna be in the building along with his whole entourage and that he needed the baddest heifers on the floor!

When he mentioned that, you instantly came to mind, you were a fan favorite in the club which caused a lot of drama to stir up in the lockerroom. That included the ugly stares, the pathetic attempts to steal and take from your money pile, and one thing you didn't play about was your money!

Getting up from the mirror you looked at the text Eren had sent saying to meet him in his office so you snuck your money bag behind it and switched your way up the stairs, hearing the teeth sucking and smart ass remarks from the other girls.

"There she is, my pretty little money maker.." He smiles, watching your body walk in, eyes flickering towards your chest.

"You called me up here for what? It better not be what I think it is." You spoke with a smile, rolling your eyes.

"No good luck kiss tonight, got it." He laughed. "But no, I just learned that Hange, the CEO of Zoe Productions is gonna be with Levi tonight and instead of putting your focus on him, I want you on Hange." He begins, pulling the blunt hanging on his ear to light it.

"Hange? I've never heard of them so they can't be that big." You joked.

"Oh but they are, so don't half ass, they aren't some old geezer- matter of fact, I'll let you see for your own eyes, they just pull up." He smirks, looking at his phone while smokes blows from his nose.

"Yeah, yeah i guess i'll be the judge of them." You chuckle, not taking a single word he said seriously.

He follows you out of his office while you turned one way and he went the other, there were already rumors of you and him fucking and messing around so you didn't want to be caught coming out of his office together to fuel the fire.

the music blasted throughout the building as yoou walked around, skimming the area to find the so called CEO so you could get a good idea on how to drain their pockets dry. The place was packed but you expected nothing less on a Friday night.

After spending a minute too long looking for them, you decided to rack up a few small lap dances in the meantime, you saw one of your coworkers heading towards a huge group of people but you couldn't make out the surprisingly tall figure.

That's when you felt an arm pull you away from the huge crowd, you recognized the cologne and sucked your teeth when you made eye contact with Eren.

"The hell you yanking me up like a toddler for?"

"I don't have time for the complaints, I need you on stage, Sasha sprained her ankle and all the girls are stuck on trying to get into Levi's section. You know how to make a show.." He pleaded.

"Hange will get a better look at you on stage, which will definitely make them call you to the champagne room, and that's the kinda money we need tonight." He went on.

You started to ponder for a slight second, finally agreeing to step on the stage, you weren't foreign to the stage since that's how you started out, you grew your fanbase from it so tonight wouldn't be any different.

I'm currently playing Remember You by Wiz Khalifa and The Weeknd, and umm..I just came everywhere..it'll definitely enhance this whole scene

"If i could have yall's attention,I have a beautiful woman coming out to peform and I want all eyes to the stage, she needs no introduction and hopefully she'll show me a thing or two tonight after this.." Connie starts in the mic, lowering the music.

"Coming to the stage, The devious Miss(S/N)!"

The music flooded your ears as Connie had the speakers in the building at max, the bass thudding through your chest and the lights dimmed to show a cool purple LED like light behind you, almost like the people were watching your shadow.

You started your set, slow and sinfully teasing the crowd by starting on the floor of the stage, you could feel a certain set of eyes on your body out of the hundreds of eyes on you. It felt hot, almost burning with pleasure and you wanted to find its source.

You hooked your leg around the pole, twirling around and climbing up to continue on with your set, spreading your legs wide as you spun around.

The feeling of the bills falling on your skin was like your own personal drug, and tonight you felt as if you were in a shower, yeah Fridays night were packed but this felt off. You dropped down from the pole into a split looking into the crowd, that's when you found the burning eyes staring a hole in you.

Hange.

Wearing a grey suit with the jacket hanging on their shoulders, a black wife beater with a single link gold chain hanging from their neck and a cigar between their slender fingers. You expected some old, 50 year old with a few strands of hair on their head, your mind scrambled up once your eyes connected with theirs.

They were leaning back in the chair, legs spread apart like a slut and their hair in half up half down style. They push up their glasses with their middle finger, adjusting their sitting position by pushing their hips up, leaning forwards towards the stage.

You took this opportunity to "interact" with your fans, crawling towards them to get a better look at what you were dealing with. You've dealt with attractive customers before but this might need a bit more self control.

They had a scar on the left eye, slashing through their eye brow and pretty rings decorated on theirs fingers, you notice them pull out a big band of cash, pulling out a 100 dollar bill and slipping it in your bralette.

You bite your lip, taking the bill and sliding it down to put it on the side of your thong, they take another bill and place it on the other side watching your body move as you went to the other side. You couldn't linger for long or show too much favoritism, no matter how good they looked, your only mission was to tease them long enough to get them in the room.

Once you finished up the lights went back to black and you rushed backstage all the way to the locker room to change and freshen up, you wet up your bottoms on stage and because you knew it was a matter of time before Hange requested you.

You chose a green outfit this time with your breasts sitting out perfectly and the tallest heels you could walk in, heading back into the crowd.

Right on cue, Eren comes up to send you the back and usually you were quick to go ahead and get it over with but you hesitated for a second.

"Whatever happens in the champagne room stays in the champagne room" was the sign that hung over the hallway of the rooms, you could feel two heartbeats colliding with each other as you found the number of the room. You had to get yourself together, this was just another client, another business person to drain and nothing to get yourself worked up on.

But all of your common sense flew out of the window as you walked inside. They were standing tall, pouring two glasses of champagne and handing one to you as you closed the door.

"Thank you.." You said, following them as they called you over with one finger.

"I've heard so much about you..I needed to see for myself if all the talk was true.." They started as they patted their lap, signaling you to straddle them.

You obeyed as you took a sip from your glass, a small smirk forming in the corner of your lips.

"Funny enough, I haven't heard much about you, is that intentional?" You asked, pretending to adjust yourself as you felt a bulge right on your core, you mentally widened your eyes since you weren't expecting them to be this hard.

"For my line of work it is, from what the public knows I own a movie production studio, and that's all they need to know." They smirked, their thumb in the crease of your thighs and their fingers on your ass pushing your hips to slightly create friction

"So you do porn?" You said, adding everything together while still subconsciously bucking your hips a little faster, hoping they wouldn't notice but it looked a little too late.

"And I'm looking at my new project as we speak.." They smirked, finishing the glass with their eyes slowly fucking your body while pushing their hips up, making you gasp.

"I'm not doing anything I don't get paid for.." You spat, looking directly into their eyes, both of your faces just inches away.

"You don't have to worry about that, I'd personally pay you...you wouldn't be fucking anyone doll, you'd be fucking me...I want you to be my personal pornstar princess.." They spoke, their voice warm and hushed, sending a line of chills down your spine.

Biting your lip you moved your hips faster, with both of Hange's hands attached guiding you perfectly.

"Show me how nasty you really are.." They continued, placing kisses up and down the middle of your chest still keeping the eye contact while they slipped a nipple in their mouth.

You finally dropped the shy girl act and took Hange's hand off your hip, moving it exactly where you needed it to be, they slide the thin piece of fabric to the side, your sticky fluids dripping out of you as their finger eases it way inside, practically sucking it in.

"You talk too much.." You mumble, letting a few moans escape from your throat as they add another, curling their fingers and hitting your g-spot like they knew your body. A large groan followed next when their speed increased.

"You usually get this wet with all your clients?" They smugly ask, ignoring the smart remark, with their fingers speeding up purposely so you couldn't form a single sentence.

"I-I dont-"

"Shhh, shh princess, let your body talk for me." They teased, listening to the nasty squelching sounds coming from your soaked pussy, you could feel your stomach tighten up, and the palm of their hand rubbing your clit, you heard yourself whimper before covering your mouth with your hands.

You felt a bit embarrassed that you were so close from you both doing barely anything, but you couldn't care it felt too fucking good to hold back. Just as soon as you mentally let go, they pull out of you causing you to whine from the empty feeling.

"Why'd you stop? You knew I was cl-"

They shut you up by shoving their soaked fingers into your mouth, watching you suckle on them with strings of saliva forming on your lips.

"I knew you were close, only a nasty bitch like you can clamp down on my fingers like that..on your stomach for me." They spoke, palming themselves watching you arch your back on the elongated couch.

Being the nasty slut you were, you shook your ass in anticipation spreading your pussy lips and rubbing your swollen clit thinking you were finna get stuffed full of dick. Your whole body shivered as you felt the warm wetness from their tongue licking a stripe from your clit to your quivering cunt.

Their tongue easily sliding in between your folds, sucking you like they wanted to drain you entirely. Your eyes crossed when they spat on your pussy, watching it drip down, rubbing it in with their hand, sticking their thumb in and out of you just to tease.

"You like eating me like a bitch in heat?"

"Just as much as you like screaming like one.." They replied, wrapping their lips back in the same spot, flicking and swirling their tongue as their hands joined in, pumping in and out.

"Oh god, fuckkk...please! I'm cumming! I'm- HANGE!" You screamed out, your body shakes with your cunt squirting fluids all over the couch, not realizing you slipped up and said their name.

"Such a pretty mess you made..and I thought you didn't know too much about me.." Hange mocked, cleaning you up and slapping your thighs to keep you from squirming, you felt your stomach in multiple knots from the sensitivity. "Didn't take you to be a squirter.."

"Me either.." You mumbled, trying to get your head together. But Hange gave you no time for that. Gripping you by the back of your neck they pulled you up, turning your head around for a sloppy kiss.

You normally don't kiss clients but your head was so fogged up and full of them that those rules went out of the question, you'd just have to deal with the lecture later.

You felt them suck your face off in the most disrespectful way possible, sucking on your tongue and biting your lower lip. You couldn't help but moan in their mouth kindly returning the nasty favor.

By now you're completely naked, with them wearing nothing but the black wifebeater and grey dress pants that surely ended up on the floor next. You felt them pick you up, the coldness of a wall on your back and the tip of something poking at your throbbing cunt.

Your legs were in no shape to be fucked against the wall but Hange didn't want to hear a single complaint.

"I'll hold you together, doll, just fall apart in my hands for me..make those pretty sounds like you did before.." They your body whispered in your ear, holding your legs up with their tatted forearms like you were pure putty in their hands, thrusting into you.

You could feel yourself stretching out by the inch as they pound into you, their hair all disheveled with slight moans escaping their throat, feeling you clamp them like a vice.

"Why are you so fucking wet? This all for me doll, hm?" They growled, marking your neck with bruises and bites.

"It's all for you, it's all for you- fuck! Don't stop, please I swear i'm gonna cum all over this dick.."

"That's right princess, talk to me while i'm inside of you..tell me what you want.." Hange egged on.

"I want you to punish me, I wanna squirt all over you and make a fucking mess, Hange fuck me..pleasee." You pleaded, wrapping your legs around them with all the strength you could find, with tears prickling in the corners of your eyes, you were so fucking close.

Hange noticed the tears falling from your face and watched the mascara stain your face, kissing your stained cheeks with a toothy smirk.

"You look so fucking pretty like this..on your knees..hurry up." They panted, pulling out of you while you quickly got on the floor, they followed behind you, smacking your ass while you shook your hips to rub against them.

Pushing back inside, you both groan out with pleasure as Hange continues with the same pace as before, their hands pulling you in deeper.

"You feel so fucking good, s'good..i'm gonna cum all over that pretty face.." They grumbled, rutting into you.

"Please cum in me Hange, PLEASE! Fuck me just like that..just like that baby!" You groaned out, spreading yourself open so they could really hit your shit, you could feel them in the pit of your stomach, repeatedly hitting that spongy spot inside of you, that familiar feeling crept back in and crashed hard, with you letting out a loud scream.

"I'm not done just yet princess, give me one more pretty girl, please?" Hange cooed to you as they fucked you through the shivering orgasm, you swore you started to see stars.

"I know you can doll, just breathe for me." Hange went on, spitting on their hand and rubbing small circles on your clit. You whine from the sensitivity as your legs shake violently, the tears were flowing at this point but you couldn't help why you and your body wanted more.

"I want more of it...fuck..please cum inside of me Hange.." You begged once more, turning your hips up to push back without their help.

"Ouu shit, just like that princess..fuck me back then.." Hange swore, biting their lower lip as they lifted up their shirt, leaning back a bit to watch your ass move up and down on them and listening to your pussy squelch.

Hard smacks to your ass echoed in the room, as their voice escalated to a whimper as you picked up your pace, they finally let you take over and you wanted to pull all your tricks out to prove a point.

"Like that baby? This pussy sucking you dry? I want all of it Hange, give it to me please baby?" You teased, throwing your ass against them, feeling your own orgasm coming in close.

"I'm gonna cum all in this pussy baby, look at me- fuck just like that, you look so fucking good.." They babbled, watching you as you turned your neck to look back at them.

Their face was covered with the color red with a few strands stuck to their forehead, you could tell they were about to spray your insides white, this made you put your all into it, they gripped your hips hard forming crescent shaped indents deep into your skin, sporadically pounding inside of you, whimpering and moaning as you were bound to the ground, stuck in a euphoric state of pleasure.

"I'm cumming, I'M GONNA-" Was all you head before you felt ropes of warm cum fill you up in the nastiest way possible, you could feel them twitch inside of you as they still weren't finished, fucking the cum deeper into you.

Soon enough you creamed all over Hange only adding to the nasty mess they created not too long ago. They finally pulled out and watched as their cum spilled out of you, like an artist looking at a finished project.

You were mentally out of it, your legs gave out and you were on the floor with cum spilling out of your pussy and drool coming from your lips, bitch you were dickmatized.

"So..." They panted. "How do we tell Eren?"

Yallllllll, this is the nastiest thing my fingers have typed- this has been in my drafts for so long...but oh my fuck..i'm fucking pregnant....

[coffeeandbatboys]

AHHHHH CONGRATS ON 300! I know about 3 or 4 songs from your playlist and I, at first, was stuck between where my rosemary goes (i have suddenly blankets the first part of the title my dad would be unimpressed haha!) and my girl, but then! IN THE DEPTHS! I FOUND IT! Can't Take My Eyes Off You nd I'm going to ask for Rex or Fives! Whichever one works the best when you start writing it <3 @eternal-transcience

I'm gonna go with Rex because someone also requested Fives with this song (I'll tag you in it). You get the Gloria ver. and other can have Frankie Valli.

Warnings: Ahsoka and Jesse are a warning. Rex has a major crush on you. Ritzy Amidala Gala (hey that rhymes)

Can't Take My Eyes Off You (Rex x Fem!Reader)

Music sparkled through the air as Senators and military officers milled around the room, sharing war stories and talking politics.

One man stood out to you.

Captain Rex was dressed in a neat set of gray dress uniforms, stalking around the edge of the crowded room as if looking for someone. You nearly choked on your drink because maker, he'd never looked so put together before. You'd always found him attractive, even when you became friends, but damn, this was new.

Your heart pounded when he locked eyes on you. You could swear that his jaw fell open, but your thoughts were interrupted by someone speaking next to you.

Ahsoka called your name for a third time, waving an orange hand in front of your face. You snapped out of your trance and cleared your throat.

"Commander 'Soka! You look amazing!" You gasped. She wore a sparkling maroon dress, similar to the color of her Jedi clothing.

The togruta frowned and tilted her head to the side. "So do you." She narrowed her eyes suspiciously and followed where you'd been staring before they blew wide and she gasped.

"Oh force...you like him!"

"Be quiet!" You hissed, almost clapping a hand over her mouth. "Yes. No! Well…maybe?”

A terrifyingly mischievous smile crossed her face and she bounded off into the crowd. You knew she wouldn't do something to get you in trouble, but you didn't like where this was going.

-

A little while later you heard voices behind you, so you turned only to find Jesse practically hauling Rex towards the outdoor balcony and Ahsoka making a beeline for you.

You gave the commander an accusatory look, but she grabbed your arm anyways, dragging you around the swarm of people until you were on the same balcony.

"Good luck!" She whispered, then shoved you outside and shut the door. Dumbfounded you looked to see Rex standing in the corner.

“Sorry, about…that.” You said, turning to leave.

He caught your hand.

“Don’t go.” Rex murmured. “You…you look beautiful.”

You could feel heat rising to your cheeks.

“You look quite nice yourself.” You countered.

It was his turn to blush. “Thanks. Would you, ah, like to dance?”

You smiled. “Yeah.”

He placed a hand on your waist and took one of yours in his other, then swayed to the gentle melody flowing outside from the gala.

“I guess Jesse and Ahsoka wanted to play matchmaker tonight.” You blurted, unable to stop yourself.

Something, you couldn’t tell what, flickered on his face.

“I suppose it’s pretty unethical for…”

“—a communications officer to fall in love with her captain?” You finished.

“Yeah.” He sighed. “It doesn’t make it wrong, though.”

Hope swelled in your chest as he tilted his head forward. You hadn’t realized how close your lips were until the moment.

“Then why don’t we make it right?” You whispered right as his lips met yours.

The kiss wasn’t rough or needy. It was tender and slow; driven only by love. His arms tightened around you and pulled you closer. Butterflies swirled in your stomach.

A blissful smile graced his features when you pulled away.

“Do you think anyone would miss us if we continued this elsewhere?” You asked.

He took your hand once again as his smile grew.

“Lead the way, beautiful.”

[zorosleftshoe]

Hi, con you done when the r ader and Colby get into a reality bad fight and Colby actually slaps the reader and you make up what happens next cus you need your creative freedom ❤️

Love Lost - (c.b)

Pairing: Colby Brock x reader

Warnings: swearing, slight violence, pure angst

*I changed the slap to having something thrown because I don’t feel comfortable writing about Colby hitting our reader, I hope that’s okay*

The room fell silent as Colby’s words sat heavy amongst us. You wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for me. In some sense, he was right. When I met Colby I was just a sandwich maker in the low end of Los Angeles who was barely scraping by.

Even though his words held weight, my stomach churned at the thought of our friends witnessing this fight. True or not, it didn’t need to be discussed unless it was behind closed doors. Colby tapped his foot in anger as he studied every reaction in the room. Sam, shocked his best friend would cause such an unnecessary scene. Kat, sympathy oozed from her eyes as she looked back and forth between Colby and I. Nate, uncertain of how he should react to his two friends arguing. And Seth, who sat with his head down trying his best not to engage with either of us.

“Now you don’t want to talk? A minute ago I couldn’t get you to shut up.” His words were sharp as if they were intended to wound me to the worst extent.

“Colby.” Sam shot out warning him to take it easy. His feelings may be valid but I was still human and my heart was slowly starting to crack around the edges. “Ease up, man.” Colby shot daggers at him before jumping to his feet and pointing a finger at me as he looked at the blonde boy.

“No, Sam. She used my status to get that interview and she didn’t think to ask me beforehand?” Now he was looking at me. Rage burned behind his baby blues. “Were you afraid I’d say no? Afraid you couldn’t get it on your own so you had to use your boyfriend’s big name to get the job done? Tell me.”

“Colby-“ he immediately cut me off.

“Do you know how much shit I’ve dealt with throughout this relationship?” I scoff at the question before shrugging my shoulders in disconcern.

“I don’t know, Colby. Why don’t you fucking enlighten me? Because from where I’m standing, all I can see is your big ass ego. Yes, I name dropped you, because, the interviewer asked if you were my boyfriend. It wasn’t voluntary information. The woman had done her research before I even set foot into that office. Oh,” I pause pulling lightly on the Mayo stained work shirt I had been wearing. “I’m sorry I was trying to figure my shit out to do better for myself. I don’t want to make sandwiches my entire life and I definitely don’t want to only be labeled as Colby Brock’s girlfriend!” By now both of us were glaring at the other. Neither looking away or moving but just watching the others reaction to what was said.

“Yeah? Well from where I’m standing all I see is a charity case.” My face paled at the words as they left Colby’s lips. The room fell into an uncomfortable silence. No one knew what to say. Unsure of what would spark the next outbursts. After a moment, I nod at Colby and grab my phone from the table.

“Well this is one less charity case you have to worry about, Brock. You’ve paid your dues.” I turn away from the sympathetic looks and start to retreat from the all too crowded living room. Just as I’m about to pass through the doorframe leading to the kitchen of glass pass in front of my face and I hiss in pain as one connects with the apple of my cheekbone. The sound of shattering glass echos off the vanilla colored walls and for a moment I’m stunned unsure of what had happened.

“What the hell, Colby?” I hear before two arms grip my shoulders helping me maneuver away from the pile of glass now on the floor by my feet. The room erupted in chaos once I was sat safely on the couch next to Kat. Colby and Sam were shouting at each other while Nate and Kat both tried to check me over for any other surface injuries. Colby’s face had paled as he looked at his hand as if it had betrayed him.

“I, I don’t know what just happened.” Sam’s face was flushed red as anger radiated off of him.

“You threw a glass, Colby. You let your anger get the best of you.” My eyes met Colby’s and for the first time that night they held a softness behind them. Before he could say another word I rose to my feet and left the room as fast as my feet could carry me. Tears rolled down my cheeks as I packed a bag to last a few days unsure of whether we could come back from this.

[nerdanel01]

Dilemma

Emmrich Volkarin/F!Rook 5k+ wc | SFW, CW profane language (Johanna drops some f-bombs) EXCERPT: “Ah, yes, Emmrich. Come in. Close the door behind you.”

That had the alarms in his head ringing. What did Johanna have to say to him that she did not want anyone else in the Mourn Watch to overhear? His stomach flipped, terrified that she had ill news to share with him.

“Did you find something?” he asked, his voice both keen and fearful. “Is she—”

“No,” Johanna said, shaking her head, dragging the heels of her palms over her forehead as though she were trying to smooth away a budding migraine. Bitterly, she continued, “No, there is still no sign of her. It is like the Maker himself scooped her up in his hands and set her down half a continent away.” But then, with a frustrated sigh and a shake of her head, Johanna changed tact. “But I did not call you here to talk about her. I wanted to talk about you.”

“About me?”

“Yes, you.” Johanna put both her elbows on the desk, folding her hands together, and gave him an unbearable look of concern. “How are you, Emmrich?"

9:52 Dragon

He would have thought it impossible, but it was true: after all these years, so late in his life, Emmrich was still discovering new things about himself. Though he had never before felt himself inclined towards habitual self-loathing and self-punishment, he had found himself, over the last two years, developing a taste for such masochism. 

When, by chance, he had seen the promotional poster for The Elixir of Love displayed outside the opera house, he had made an immediate beeline for the box office. Not unaware of the pain it would cause him to sit through the performance—indeed, perhaps in anticipation of it—he impulsively bought out the whole box he had shared with Agnes during their first outing at the theatre so long ago. 

The music that had once felt so sweet and buoyant to him now tugged painfully at his heart. How utterly stupid he had been—nearly as foolish as Adina, the opera’s heroine, though she at least had realized her mistake before it was too late, before Nemorino was lost to her forever. He could not escape the memory of Agnes, her parted lips colored with red pigment as she had watched the opera, breathless. 

He leaned back into the shadows of the box so that no one else in the theatre would see his wet cheeks shining in the dim performance light. 

And, unable to bear even the first melancholy opening notes when Nemorino took the stage for his final aria, Emmrich stood up from his seat and made a discreet exit. 

‘What more need I look for? She loves me! Yes, she loves me, I see it, I see it.’

But instead of returning to the Necropolis he had waited on the opera house steps, trying to calm his eager, hopeful, thundering heart while he waited for the performance to conclude. As the audience began to stream out of the theatre, Emmrich stood, facing the lobby doors and scanning every face, just as he had scrutinized the audience from his box before the curtain rose on the production. There was no reason to believe Agnes was still in Nevarra City. Two years, they had been searching for her; the other Watchers, that they might officially and dishonorably discharge her from their ranks for her abandonment of her post; and Emmrich, that he might fall at her feet and beg her forgiveness. And as the crowd swelled, then thinned to a trickle—as the ushers began to snuff the theater lamps and lock the doors for the night—Emmrich should have acknowledged his defeat. 

Still, he held out an impossible hope. The crowd had been thick; the theatre packed. Emmrich made his way to the public gardens, and posted himself on a bench beneath the watchful gaze of Caspar Pentagahst, mere feet from where he had danced with Agnes over seven years ago. Where he should have kissed her, fully and deeply, had he not been a coward and a fool. If she were here, if she had been drawn back to the city, to the opera, might she retrace their steps, as Emmrich himself now did? An impossible hope. Still, Emmrich sat in the park through the night, tormented by ghosts and regrets, languishing in memories, until dawn cracked the sky. 

Though Emmrich had tried to hide it, losing Agnes had changed him. He was less ebullient than he had been, more withdrawn. Slower to make connections with the younger initiates that joined the ranks of the Mourn Watch. His work, to which he had always been devoted, took on the mania of obsession. When an unfortunate incident in the Necropolis had claimed Wilfred, he had virtually locked himself in his study. Only eating when Myrna brought him food from the dining hall and bullied him into forcing down a few bites; only sleeping in fitful starts in his armchair. He had emerged at last two and a half weeks later, unshaven, haggard, and over a full stone lighter, with Manfred—his most splendid creation yet—trailing sentiently behind him. Compared to his predecessors, Manfred was so complex, so alive, that he was a perfect proxy for genuine human contact. And rather than resting, rather than celebrating, and allowing himself a respite from his work, his success with Manfred had only thrown him deeper into it. 

One day, after this had gone on for three months, Johanna had summoned him to her office. Emmrich had stood in her doorway, exhausted and listless from another late night in the study. “You wished to speak with me?”

Johanna looked up at him, set her spectacles down on her desk and rubbed wearily at her eyes. At the time the search for Agnes had still been fully active; the failure to find her was weighing on Johanna, though Emmrich could have told her months ago that she would not succeed in her pursuit. Perhaps, if Agnes had genuinely intended to betray the Mourn Watch by profiting from the sale of its secrets, there might have been a trail to follow. But Emmrich had been certain her only goal in departing the Mourn Watch had been to disappear entirely. 

“Ah, yes, Emmrich. Come in. Close the door behind you.”

That had the alarms in his head ringing. What did Johanna have to say to him that she did not want anyone else in the Mourn Watch to overhear? His stomach flipped, terrified that she had ill news to share with him.

“Did you find something?” he asked, his voice both keen and fearful. “Is she—”

“No,” Johanna said, shaking her head, dragging the heels of her palms over her forehead as though she were trying to smooth away a budding migraine. Bitterly, she continued, “No, there is still no sign of her. It is like the Maker himself scooped her up in his hands and set her down half a continent away.” But then, with a frustrated sigh and a shake of her head, Johanna changed tact. “But I did not call you here to talk about her. I wanted to talk about you.”

“About me?”

“Yes, you.” Johanna put both her elbows on the desk, folding her hands together, and gave him an unbearable look of concern. “How are you, Emmrich?"

“How am I?” he repeated, incredulous. Had she called him here to talk about his feelings? “I’m fine.”

Johanna hummed, looking at him skeptically. “Not sure I believe that, frankly. You have not been yourself, not since…” Johanna’s voice trailed off, reconsidering, but she did not need to say it. Not since Agnes left. Neither of them had spoken her name, and yet her ghost was just as present in the room, as material as the both of them. Johanna’s voice became gentler. “I thought perhaps you would like to take some time off. Visit your family’s estate in the countryside, before winter is upon us.”

Emmrich had not spent any real length of time with his family since he had joined the Mourn Watch. He did not think he would enjoy the curiosity and questions, the gossip his sudden reappearance after all this time would provoke. “You were thinking I could?” he asked, a barbed edge to his tone. He knew he was being surly; he could not help it. “Or you are insisting that I do?”

“Are you asking me if that’s an order?” Johanna asked, unable to hide her faint amusement. “Emmrich, I know you well enough by now to know that I could not force you to do anything you do not want to do yourself.” Again, an uncharacteristic edge of concern crept into her voice. “But I am worried about you. I’m not the only one.”

“Then leave me to my work,” Emmrich insisted. “It is what I am good at. What I am best at.” “Emmrich—”

He cut her off; he would say it more plainly, if he needed to. “It is the only time I do not feel utterly wretched,” he told her, emphatically. “It is the only time… the only time I am not thinking about it. When I am working. I need the work, Johanna. If I were to stop…”

If he were to stop, Emmrich feared it would break him. The agony he felt at her loss, at that terrible severance, was difficult enough to bear with the distraction of work. If he did not have his studies—if he were consigned to the Nevarran countryside for some tortuous, indefinite period, forced to politely sip tea with his sister and play lawn games and do nothing of interest or of use to anyone—the grief would open its jaws and swallow him whole. 

For a moment, Emmrich feared Johanna would fight him. Certainly she had never shied from a confrontation in the past. But something in his face must have convinced her, because finally, she nodded. 

“Very well,” she acquiesced. “But Emmrich—you are not alone. Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.” “You already have,” Emmrich told her, honestly. “You looked.” For different reasons, perhaps, than Emmrich’s, but they both wanted her to be found, and Johanna had done everything in her power to make it happen. “That she was so determined to vanish, that she left no trace… I do not hold you responsible for that.”

Without missing a beat, Johanna flung the question at him: “But you hold yourself responsible?”

Emmrich blinked at her, surprised she even had to ask. “Of course.” 

‘It was my fault, all of it, from beginning to end. If it were not for me, she never would have come here; if it were not for how I treated her, she never would have left.’

“Oh, Emmrich.” The pity and the compassion in her voice—two traits Johanna often kept in reserve—were devastating to him. She rose from behind her desk, circled around it to his side. In a rare display of intimacy and warmth, she lay her hand down on his shoulder, and gave it a gentle squeeze.

“If there is anything at all I can do—if you change your mind and want to take some time—please do not hesitate to let me know.”

That had been over a year ago. In the ensuing months, Emmrich had only retreated deeper into his work. He did resume taking his meals in the dining hall with the other Watchers, and made better efforts to keep himself as immaculately groomed as he had always been before. But these were hollow gestures, rituals performed out of the fear that if he did not improve, Johanna might change her mind and take things into her own hands, placing him on a forced leave of absence after all. At dinner, he no longer smiled or laughed as he once did. At night, when Myrna had left the study and returned to her own quarters, he sometimes found himself pulling out the special folio he had purchased for Agnes’ drawings, running his fingers over the fine linework and reminiscing. He felt himself becoming every bit as bitter and distant as his own father, and hated himself for it, but saw nothing he could do otherwise to stop it. To move through the world in any other way—to be present in it, to fully confront the totality of his loss and contend with it—would have been far too painful. 

Even his partnership with Myrna was strained. She had been one of his dearest friends in the Mourn Watch before they had been assigned to work together. Now, Emmrich suspected there was a part of her that resented him. After what had happened with Agnes, Emmrich had, perhaps, overcorrected. His partnership with Myrna he was determined to keep formal, clinical, professional; although he would also begrudgingly admit that it was anything but professional that Myrna was often forced to bring him food from the kitchens out of the fear that Emmrich was inadvertently starving himself. They shared the study, but even when Emmrich was just across the room from Myrna, he was worlds away, easily distracted, lost in rumination and self-recrimination. Even when the study was full—Emmrich, Myrna and Manfred altogether, working busily alongside one another—the room still felt empty, an essential warmth missing.

“Hello? Emmrich? Emmrich!”

With a start, Myrna’s voice pulled him out of his morose reverie. Across the study, from where they were working in tandem on some alchemical concoction, Myrna and Manfred were both staring at him; Manfred with concern, Myrna with no small amount of impatience. 

“Do you intend to answer that, or should I take your silence to mean that you expect myself or Manfred to do so on your behalf?”

‘Answer what…?’ Emmrich almost asked, but just then he heard Johanna’s voice, cast from the enchanted sending-stone set near the entrance of the study.

“Emmrich! Emmrich Volkarin! Are you going to answer me, or are you going to make me come down there myself?”

“Apologies, Myrna,” Emmrich answered, leaping up from his armchair and hastening to the crystal. “Lost in thought.”

He did not miss the soft, chididing, ‘as per usual’ that Myrna whispered under her breath, head bent conspiratorially with Manfred’s over their experiment. 

Stepping over to the doorway, Emmrich touched his fingers to the yellow facets of the carved stone, gleaming with prisms of magical energy as they transmitted Johanna’s voice.

“Yes, Johanna, I am here.”

“Excellent,” Johanna’s voice replied, unusually quick to forgive the sloth with which he’d answered her call. “Would you please join me in the public parlors, please? With all haste…!” And with that, the sending stone grew clouded.

“She’s in a remarkably good mood,” Myrna commented from across the room. She had not failed to notice the odd sweetness in Johanna’s voice, rare to begin with but rarer still in the last few weeks. Of late, the disturbances in the Necropolis had reached a fever pitch, exceeding even the danger that they had experienced when the Breach had opened in the South ten years prior. 

Emmrich had not missed it, either. “That cannot be a good thing,” he replied, with no small amount of trepidation. 

“Eager as she is, it will be worse if you keep her waiting,” Myrna added, which was all the impetus Emmrich needed to get on his way. 

But Johanna was not waiting for him in the public parlors. Curiously, she had posted herself up in the corridor leading in their direction. The past months had worn on her, aged her. Now, however—even from a distance—Emmrich could see that she was literally bouncing on the balls of her feet with excitement, her hand clasped briskly behind her back. The Mourn Watch insignia gleaming white upon her breastplate matched the glint of her teeth, revealed by the too-pleased grin on her face. 

Approaching her, he asked, “I thought you were going to meet me in the parlors?”

“Couldn’t resist.” Johanna’s grin widened. “You are not going to believe it. I didn’t believe it myself, when the docents came to tell me.”

“To tell you…?”

“Who was waiting for me,” Johanna replied, sweetly, “on the Necropolis steps.” 

Johanna gestured for Emmrich to follow her, turning and leading him down the corridors, to the public parlors the Mourn Watch staged to receive visitors. “You recall, of course, how the lower levels of the Necropolis have devolved into a quite literal den of horrors after the sky opened up and started spitting out demons a few months ago?”

“It is impossible to forget,” Emmrich answered, cagily. What did that have to do with the visitor they were on their way to greet? And why was Johanna in such high spirits about it? Johanna was his friend, and it was good to see her happy, but he did not like the smug look of satisfaction on her face one bit—

“Guess who just showed up offering to help us with that particular problem.”

Emmrich’s mouth and throat went dry. “Who?”

“Oh, I don’t know…” Johanna teased, giving an exaggerated, theatrical shrug. “Could it be, perhaps, one of the best Watchers I have ever had the pleasure of serving alongside? Perhaps even someone I proudly recruited myself?” Emmrich’s heart dropped into his stomach. ‘She cannot be saying—’ “Perhaps, someone you chased out of my guard over two years ago? But that would be crazy! What are the odds?”

The door to the public parlor was just coming into view around the curve of the hallway. From within, Emmrich could clearly hear a set of voices, raised in argument.

“Oooh,” Johanna said, furtively, “it sounds like the girls are fighting.”

“Johanna,” Emmrich said, fighting to keep his voice even, commanding. “Who is in there?”

Johanna only lifted an eyebrow at him, too self-satisfied, it seemed, to give him a straight answer. As they neared the entrance, the voices within the parlor became more distinct:

“…able to face the Elvhen God of Rebellion, but not your old boss?”

“…sounds like an appropriate division of labor! I brought you here, Lace. Now I’ll handle Fen’Harel, and you can deal with the Mourn Watch—”

Hot and cold all at once, mind blank and fuzzy, paralyzed with hope. Emmrich nearly tripped over his feet, forgetting how to walk, how to breathe as he reached for the doorknob. He knew that voice, he was sure of it—!

And if he had not been—if there was even the tiniest part of Emmrich that was not wholly confident of what he was about to find—it was not left to wonder long. Because as soon as she had thrown those words in response to whomever it was she was arguing with inside the parlor, Agnes had flung open the door.

Her eyes met his, and she froze like a stag, a prey animal trapped on the threshold between fight and flight. Emmrich could not think, could not breathe, possessed of but one beaming, brilliant thought: ‘It is her!’ Changed subtly by the two years she had been gone (the scar on her brow, the lines around her eyes) but still certainly Agnes, Agnes Gallatus, beloved , standing before him. He had given up hope. He had resigned himself to the belief that he would breathe his last with only the memory of her to comfort him. He wanted to laugh; he wanted to weep; he wanted to wrap his arms around her and draw her against him, press her body to his to be sure she was real. But the sight of her arrested him, elated him even as it threatened to asphyxiate him, and all he could do was stand dumbstruck before her, drinking in the sight of her.

It did not matter that she was unhappy to see him—and that was clear from a mere glance at her grey eyes. Irrelevant, too, that she had clearly been trying to sneak back out of the Necropolis and avoid this encounter entirely. All that mattered in that moment was that she was here, alive, in front of him. A gift he was certain he did not deserve. It felt so selfish to be happy, to be so pleased to see her here again. Perhaps he was just a selfish old man, after all. Emmrich fought the urge to fall to her feet, to wrap his arms around her calves so that she could not go until he finished debasing himself, begging for her forgiveness. 

So tight was the ache in his chest, so loud the pounding of his blood, he could barely draw the breath required to speak her name. "Agnes?"

Grief and shame pulled at her face. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, then favored him with a maddeningly neutral expression of defeat. 

“Hello, Volkarin.”

An uncomfortable silence fell between them, only to be interrupted by one of the visitors seated in the parlor beyond the doorway. 

“Whoa. Is it just me, or did the vibe in here get really weird all of a sudden?”

Over Agnes’ shoulder, Emmrich saw a red-headed dwarf deliver a chastening shove of her elbow to the tattooed elf beside her, hissing, “Bellara!”

Taking that as her cue, Johanna stepped around Emmrich, placing herself squarely between himself and Agnes in the doorway. Sickeningly sweet, she asked: “And no greeting for me, after all this time?”

At the sight of Johanna, Agnes’ face flushed red with shame. She dropped her eyes to the floor, acknowledged her with a respectful, dutiful dip of her head. “Hello, Commander Hezenkoss.”

“Watcher Gallatus!” Though her back was to him, Emmrich could tell from the tone of Johanna’s voice alone that she was favoring Agnes with the same smarmy grin she’d worn the whole journey down the hallway. “The prodigal daughter returns! I have to say, I was confident we had seen the last of you.” Pausing for dramatic effect, she then added, “I am going to be charitable, and assume we are not catching you thusly on the threshold because you were about to embark on yet another hasty departure.”

Johanna had her pegged; Agnes’ blush deepened, the distress on her face plain. “Of course not, Commander.”

“Don’t bullshit me, Gallatus,” Johanna told her, pleasantly. “Come. Let us sit.”

Agnes bowed her head once more, then backed into the room, retreating to the tufted red velvet sofa against the far wall. She sat at the leftmost edge, next to the Dalish elf—Bellara, Emmrich guessed. On Bellara’s opposite side sat the red-headed dwarf; Johanna dropped into the high back chair beside her, forcing Emmrich to assume the only remaining chair in the room—not two feet from where Agnes sat on the sofa, her posture painfully straight, looking like she was ready to bolt from the room at the first opportunity granted to her.

The parlor was dimly lit by a magnificent chandelier that hung from the center of the ceiling, an artwork of wrought iron and pink glass that cast the room in a warm, rosy glow. As was customary, tea had been set out on the table for the guests, but it looked like only Bellara had welcomed herself to it. The elf anxiously passed her eyes between Johanna, Agnes, and Emmrich, then back to Agnes again; the awkwardness between them must have been painfully obvious.

“Hello, Commander Hezenkoss,” she chirped at last, raising a hand to wave, attempting to dispel the tension by the power of her cheer alone. “I’m Bellara Lutara, and this is Lace Harding,” she said, gesturing to the dwarf at her side; then, waving at Agnes, she added, “And of course, you already know Rook. It’s a delight to meet you! I love all the cute little skulls on your tea cups.”

“Rook?” Johanna said, grinning with interest, turning her eyes from Bellara back to Agnes. “What an enigmatic little moniker! No wonder we couldn’t find you, no matter how we searched.” 

Not one to eschew decorum, however, she relieved Agnes at last of her scrutiny and turned back to Bellara. “It is a pleasure to meet you both, Bellara Lutara and Lace Harding. You have my deepest gratitude for whatever role you played in reuniting us with our dear Agnes once more.”

Bellara smiled back at Johanna, not quite in on the joke. “Oh, believe me, it took a lot of convincing—”

But Agnes’ hand closed over Bellara’s, squeezing firmly enough to turn her knuckles white, the unspoken directive in the gesture immediately obvious: ‘I am begging you to shut the fuck up . ’

Johanna’s grin only widened, to near cheshire-cat proportions. She leaned forward, pouring herself a cup of tea from the steaming kettle on the table. “The docent who admitted you told me the most fascinating rumor,” she said at last, her voice still in that pitch of near-sadistic sing-song delight. “That you have come looking for our help. That is, the help of the Mourn Watch Guard.”

“That’s not quite the whole story,” Lace said, shifting to sit on the edge of the couch, the better to meet Johanna’s gaze. “We aren’t here to hold our hands out, looking for charity. We want to help you, too. We’re a part of the Veilguard…”

Lace went on, but Emmrich was hardly paying any attention to their exchange. He could not help himself from stealing glances at Agnes—Rook?—out of the corner of his eye. She would not look at him—would not look at anyone. She had at last released Bellara’s hand and folded her own tightly in her lap, and she was staring at the floor, somewhere between her legs. Her legs! In all the years that he had known Agnes, Emmrich had never seen her wear anything but skirts. That she now wore trousers was the most shocking part of her transformation, far more so than the slight wrinkles in her face or the strands of white beginning to weave with the black of her hair. What had happened to her, in the two years that she had been gone? Had they reshaped her into a different person entirely?

“So let me make sure I am understanding correctly,” Johanna said at last, folding her arms over her chest as she leaned back in her chair, looking directly at Agnes. “You, Agnes Gallatus, want to help me? Assist me, even? A prospect which was apparently unbearable, unthinkable to you two years ago? Maker, how things can change in time.” Then, sliding her eyes to Emmrich (having not failed to notice, he was sure, how he had been unable to keep his eyes off of Agnes since he had seen her) she added, with just as much dry humor, “And yet how many things stay the same. Wouldn’t you agree, Emmrich?”

For the first time since they’d nearly collided in the doorway, Agnes glanced at him, however briefly. Emmrich only locked his eyes on Johanna, praying that Agnes had not also caught him staring. He shrugged, made only a vaguely tortured, noncommittal noise in response. 

Johanna turned back to the others. “Lace Harding, you do not know me, nor do you seem to be fully privy to the drama surrounding Watcher Gallatus’ dishonorable desertion from the Mourn Watch in the first place. So you do not understand the true depth of pleasure it would give me to tell you, Miss Lutara here, and your companion Rook to fuck right off and leave my city, and never return.” 

Bellara blanched at Johanna’s language. For a brief moment, Agnes looked almost hopeful. 

Then Johanna sighed, uncrossing her arms, leaning her elbows on the chair’s armrests and steepling her fingers. “That being said,” she continued, “I cannot deny that patrolling the Necropolis has been an absolute shit show for the last few months.” Johanna’s voice was sober, now, no teasing to be heard in it. “We have lost more Watchers to incidents in the Necropolis in three months than we have in three decades. Our ranks are thinning faster than we can replenish them by training new initiates. In short, we are in over our heads. I am many things, but I am not a fool; and no matter how spiteful I may be, I would not do something so foolish as to refuse help when it is freely offered and so desperately needed.”

“However,” Johanna said, lifting a hand to point up an emphatic finger (and here her voice took a turn for the sharper), “therein lies a dilemma. Because when it comes to you, Agnes Gallatus,” Johanna said, pinning Agnes under her gaze, “the trust has been broken. I am truly and utterly incapable of believing that you, or by extension your associates who are outsiders otherwise unknown to me, will conduct yourselves as instructed and keep me apprised of your progress. And yet, because of how completely fucked we are at the moment, and because of the unique position of leadership in which I find myself, I am truly and utterly incapable of carving out the time or the energy to keep a close eye on you myself.”

Emmrich’s heart had begun to pound against his ribs; he wondered if the rest of them could hear it, frantically beating like a dance drum. 

Agnes was staring at Johanna, her jaw set. He saw by the muscles in her cheeks and her neck that she was grinding her teeth. A strained edge to her voice when she asked, “How do you propose we resolve that dilemma, Commander?”

And at that, the smug note returned to Johanna’s voice. 

“Well, it just so happens I have a solution.” 

And she extended her hand, palm up, to gesture at Emmrich.

“Johanna—” Agnes began to protest.

“Do not,” Johanna said, with a light and deeply unamused laugh, “‘Johanna’ me. We are not friends; we are not even colleagues. You saw to that.” Johanna took a deep breath, regaining control of her composure. Quietly, evenly, she explained: “A long time ago, I recruited you to the Mourn Watch to keep an eye on Emmrich, to make sure he did not get himself into any sort of trouble he couldn’t get himself out of. Emmrich, it is now your chance to return the favor. Is that acceptable to you?”

Immediately it was clear to Emmrich that Johanna had planned this all along, from the moment she had called him down from the study by the sending crystal. That she thought herself terribly clever, pairing the two of them off, making them each other’s problem and no one else’s. As for what he thought of it himself, Emmrich could not say. He could barely wrap his head around the reality that Agnes was here, beside him; the idea of descending with her into the Necropolis again after all of this time was almost too much to fathom.

Taking care to use her new chosen name, Emmrich answered, “I am not confident it is acceptable to Rook.”

Without missing a beat, Johanna snapped right back, “Well Rook and her friends will have to stomach it, because those are the terms.” Then, with a malicious gleam in her eye, Johanna turned to Agnes. “Or if you prefer, I can call Watcher Rolf down here to accompany you instead…?”

For a minute Emmrich thought Agnes was actually considering it. She was not looking at him, but he could see the wheels turning in her head, just the same. Weighing the options. How deeply it cut him! The thought that even after two years, her anger with him was still so fresh that she would prefer the company of a man Emmrich knew well she found to be an intolerable dullard to having to spend even a moment longer with Emmrich himself. Emmrich was not a fool. He did not think for a minute that after all this time and everything he had done to obliterate the bond between them, that any part of Agnes still loved him. Perhaps it was bold of him to hope that she would tolerate him, even just for a few days. But what a blessing it would be! What a pleasure, to discover what sort of woman she had grown into while she had been away from him—even if the years had hardened her into someone who could never forgive him. He did not deserve it. Selfishly, holding his breath, still he hoped for it.

At last, ever so slightly, Agnes dipped her head in Johanna’s direction. 

“Thank you, Commander Hezenkoss. Watcher Volkarin will be an acceptable escort.”

[scotianostra]

July 13th 1900 saw the birth of Elizabeth “Bessie” Watson in Edinburgh.

Born just off the Grassmarket, at 11 The Vennel to Agnes Newton and Horatio Watson, Bessie did not take long to make her mark in the world, at the tender age of 9 she combined her two greatest loves: bagpiping and woman’s suffrage, the latter makes her arguably the youngest in Scotland, if not the world.

When she turned seven, Bessie’s aunt Margaret contracted tuberculosis – an incident which would change the youngster’s life forever. Margaret lived with the family, and Bessie’s parents, worried that she might fall ill to the contagious disease, encouraged her to take up the bagpipes in a bid to strengthen her weak lungs. Her first set of pipes was specially-produced according to her diminutive stature as she was too small to properly inflate an adult-sized bag. The half-sized set of pipes was purchased from Robertson’s pipe makers at 58 Grove Street. “I hurried home from school and carried it, in a brown paper parcel down to my (music) teacher”, Bessie recalled. As one of the very few female bagpipe players in the world at that time – not to mention one of the youngest – Bessie took to her new instrument with great enthusiasm.

Bessie had more than her bag pipe playing to make her worthy of a post here, while walking with her mother through the streets of Edinburgh, Scotland, Bessie stopped to look at the window of the Women’s Social and Political Union office. Bessie became excited about the idea of women receiving the right to vote, even though she wouldn’t be able to vote for many years.

Bessie realized that her talents could help promote votes for women. She would run from school each day to play her bagpipes outside of the Calton Jail in Edinburgh for fellow suffragettes in prison.

At the first suffrage pageant she performed at, she wore a sash with the words “Votes for Women” as she performed with her bagpipes. At the height of the suffragette movement, Bessie was playing at major demonstrations and parades for the Women’s Social and Political Union, including the famous procession through Edinburgh on 9th October 1909. On that day a large crowd watched as hundreds of banner-laden ladies, wearing the suffragist colours of purple, white and green, marched down Princes Street before congregating at Waverley Market for a rally led by Emmeline Pankhurst. Watson rode on a float beside a woman dressed as Isabella Duff, Countess of Buchan in her cage! Isabella is famed for crowning Robert the Bruce at Scone when he seized the Scottish crown, she was later captured with the Bruce family and held prisoner in a cage in the open air at Berwick for four years.

Back to oor Bessie, who just a ten year-old she travelled to London to play her bagpipes in a women’s march on June 17th, 1911. J ust a few weeks later, for George’s state visit to Edinburgh, Bessie, leading the 2nd Edinburgh Company of the Girl Guides, received recognition from the king himself as she raised her salute. Having secured regal acknowledgement in time for her 11th birthday, Scotland’s youngest female piper continued in her quest to support women’s rights, accompanying inmates bound for Holloway Prison to Waverley Station and playing the pipes as their trains departed.

For the part she played in Edinburgh’s historic women’s rights pageant of 1909, young Bessie received a special gift from one very prominent individual. Christabel Pankhurst (daughter of Emmeline) came to Edinburgh to address a meeting at the King’s Theatre and Bessie was invited to attend. During the evening she was presented with a brooch representing Queen Boadicea (Boudica) in her chariot, as a token of gratitude for her help in the pageant.

During WWI, Bessie was just a teenager and used her talents to make a difference in other ways. She began helping the Scots Guard to recruit army volunteers by playing her bagpipes

In 1926 Bessie moved with her parents to a new house on Clark Road, Trinity where she would remain for the rest of her days. Following her marriage to electrical contractor John Somerville at the end of the Second World War, Bessie devoted her life to teaching music and foreign languages. Former neighbours recall that, even into her late eighties, Bessie continued to play her bagpipes at 11am every morning. It was something she had always done.

Bessie died in 1992, two and a half weeks short of her 92nd birthday. Over the course of her long life she had experienced almost a century of social progression and upheaval, and had played her part in changing the world for the better.

A pictorial tribute was unveiled at The Vennel in Edinburgh on August 1st 2019 in memory of Bessie, the University of Edinburgh also have a lecture room named in her honour.

[deejadabbles]

hello there, Deeja!!! for the Halloween prompts, may I please request:

“I think someone’s watching us.” + 🎭 masquerade

with Fox or Jesse 💙💙

happy writing!!!

SEV! How did you know that I'm in love with the idea of Fox in a masquerade setting!? I kept getting more and more ideas for this one so I hope they all mesh well together 💙

Among the Hedge Maze (Fox x GN Reader)

Summary: You were desperate to find some alone time with Fox among the chaos of the ball. Hopefully, he gives chase. Rating: T (But Minors DNI) Word Count: 1,801 Warnings: Kissing, reader is GN but is called "vixen" once.

Edit: Here's a good song to listen to while reading Masterlist /// Tag List Sign Up  /// AO3

Lavish skirts rustled, wine glasses clinked, joyous laughter rang, all colliding with the strings and keys of the live band to create quite the spectacle of sounds. Yes, the grand hall of the senate was alive with celebration tonight. Masked patrons held gloved hands as they twirled about the dancefloor, an enchanting song topping off the scene to craft the perfect image of a fairy tale.

All you needed was your masked prince.

Not that he would ever abide by being called a prince, though you might get away with knight. You would have given anything to see the look on his face when you called him either, but alas, nearly two hours into the party and you had yet to see your beloved commander. There was still hope, though. He had been tasked with mingling tonight, after all, rather than his standard guard duty.

Yes, mingling. Fox was expected to be the face of the troops tonight, and raising money for his brothers was the only thing that could have gotten him to accept such a role without tossing himself out his office window.

It would have been amusing to watch him try his best to schmooze with the Coruscant elite, but you had spent the last two hours rubbing elbows of your own. As much as you loved the party you weren’t about to miss an opportunity to help the troopers.

Now though, now you were craving a break and, once you heard a whisper that the good commander had been pulled into a waltz by the flirtatious dowager Starfield, you decided it was more than time. 

You skirted the dance floor, knowing full well that the moment you entered the throng you would be pulled into dance after dance. Still, even given the crowd, you actually managed to spot your Fox. He was stiff as a board, that red and silver mask of his doing nothing to hide how out of his element he was. Dowager Starfield was comically shorter than Fox, practically being able to rest her head on his stomach as he pushed them through the crowd in the moves you had shown him barely more than a week ago.

Though, even out of his element, Fox was more than competent. Despite his stiffness, he moved in the dance just as well as anyone else, showing that the little classes you’d given him in your office weren’t wasted. Maker, was there anything this man couldn’t do?

His strategic side was showing too. You did not miss the way he stuck close to the edge of the dance floor for a quick escape.

Fox wasn’t the only one who could plan, though. Keeping your head high, you moved along the rim of the crowd, always staying where his eyes might spot you while you thought up a fun little game.

You noticed the moment he saw you. The way his eyes widened behind the mask, the way his shoulders lifted…and how he glanced down at the widow who was clinging to him like a prom date. Aw, he didn’t think you were jealous, did he? You flashed him your best smile and watched the very subtle way his back seemed to relax, just a bit.

Perfect timing, too, as the song was drawing to an enchanting end. Keeping your eyes on his, you tilted your head towards the open glass doors not far away, then started to walk towards them.

Confident that he saw and could find some excuse now that the dance was over, you stepped out into the enclosed courtyard.

One thing you loved about these parties was the chance to come here, to the well kept gardens where florals and fauna from all across the galaxy were cultivated. It was a breathtaking sight within this city. There were a couple of guests out on the veranda but, what looked completely deserted, was the small hedge maze at the center of the garden.

By the time you reached its entrance, you glanced over your shoulder and were delighted to see Fox rushing out of the double doors, head turning as he searched for you. The moment he spotted you, you blew him a kiss and darted into the maze.

Excitement filled your chest as you ran, especially when you heard the rustling of greenery behind you. In truth, it wasn’t much of an actual maze, but it was enough to give the tantalizing illusion of a chase. There wasn’t even a need to slow down, you knew he was probably right on your heel, right where you wanted him.

Unfortunately, the hidden little path ended too soon, and let out deep in the heart of the all but deserted garden. Crisp night air filled your lungs as you slowed to a stop and caught your breath. Oddly enough, now that you were still, you realized that you no longer heard Fox’s pursuing footsteps. You peered back into the corridor of hedges, confused. There was no way you had lost him-

Strong arms closed around your waist, pulling you back against a firm chest and causing you to gasp in surprise.

“Caught you, my little vixen,” a voice purred in your ear, which nearly caused your knees to go weak right there.

Instead, you turned your face towards his, finding that your lips were dangerously close. “Have you? Or was this all my grand scheme to finally get you alone?”

He hummed, as he lowered his lips to brush against your neck. “I think it’s both. And thank the maker, if I had to spend one more minute with them, I was ready to say there was a bomb threat in my office.”

You gasped theatrically, “And leave me here to deal with them all alone? How rude.”

“At least you’re used to this sort of thing,” he grumbled, “I was hoping the mask would help them overlook me- isn’t anonymity the whole point of these masquerade things?”

“It’s the illusion of anonymity.” Despite the hold he had on your waist, you turned within his arms so you could face him. 

Finally you could take in his appearance up close, the deep red silk with white lining the cuffs and accenting the lapels in swirling patterns. Not to mention the mask made of surprisingly delicate looking metal, whose striking design curved into ears that pierced his curls. Fox looked absolutely stunning.

You hummed playfully as you ran a finger over the red metal, “Of course, if you wanted to stay anonymous, you probably should have worn a less obvious mask, Fox.” Your hand moved to the back of his head and untied the silk strand that held up the animalistic accessory. “You need a mask with a little more mystique.” With your other hand you untied your own mask and, with a bit of maneuvering, managed to secure it on your lover’s handsome face. “There, now they definitely won’t recognize you!”

“Ha ha,” he said dryly, but there was the smallest hint of a smile on his lips. 

Then, his eyebrows lifted as he watched you put on his own fox mask. When you looked at him and batted your eyes playfully, you could have sworn you heard his breath hitch.

“Well, how do I look?”

Now his eyes were half lidded, and the arms around your waist tightened. “I think it suits you,” he said, voice low as he leaned in closer to you, “just like I think these colors suit you.” He ran his hand over the scarlet collar of your top, where your chest was exposed. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you wearing my colors,” he whispered, his warm breath touching your lips.

“Maybe I just like the color red,” was your breathless reply and your eyes fluttered shut right when his lips pressed against yours.

You moaned into the kiss, never tiring of the way he felt and tasted. Your arms wrapped around him to pull him closer, deepening the kiss as his lips moved against yours. One of Fox’s hands slid up from your hip, running along your spine until he could cup the back of your neck and press you harder against him.

Lips had just parted, letting his tongue slip in, when he paused. To your dismay he was pulling away the next second, scanning the nearby trees and bushes with narrow eyes.

“I think someone’s watching us,” he whispered to you.

Before you even had the chance to respond, Fox was bending to pick up a decent sized stone from the pebbled path and, with an expert flick of his wrist, sent it shooting like a bullet. Before it even had a chance to hit its target within the bushes, the greenery rustled frantically until two figures fell into view.

Despite their masks and even from this distance, you could tell who they were from the hair styles alone. Their training had them dodging that stone, but even still, Thorn and Hound were caught.

“What the hell do you two think you’re doing?” Fox said, arms crossing over his chest.

“We weren’t spying,” Hound assured.

“We just saw you run off and thought we should check on you,” Thorn added without missing a beat.

Fox’s tone took on that commander quality, “And that required you to hide in the bushes?”

“Well yeah, we were taking cover,” Thorn rolled his eyes.

“Optimum camouflage, you know,” Hounded nodded.

“So you two were waiting to…what?” Fox snapped, “Save me from taking a walk with the senator?”

“Walking?” came Hound’s snort.

“Since when do walks need that much tongue?” Thorn muttered.

“Inside. Both of you. Now!”

The dangerous tone may not have actually scared the two, but they at least had enough respect for Fox to turn and hightail it out of there at the order. By the time their footsteps were nothing but an echo in the night, Fox let out a long suffering sigh.

“I’m surrounded by idiots.”

You couldn’t help but laugh and pull him back into your embrace, “You know you love them.”

“I can love idiots,” he grumbled, before letting out another sigh and pressing his forehead to yours. “Sorry if they ruined the moment.”

“They didn’t ruin anything.” You pressed a light kiss to his lips. “Want to go back inside? I think you still owe me a dance.”

He let out a tired hum, “Hm, not inside.” Then, he took your hands and placed them on his shoulders. “We can dance here, just the two of us.”

As if all the social stresses of the day had caught up to him, Fox rested his forehead against your shoulder, taking comfort in the feel of you being so close.

"This is what I wanted all night," he whispered against your skin. "You and me, enjoying the night together."

And with that, he started swaying your bodies to a slow, intimate melody that only the two of you could hear.

Tag List: @sev-on-kamino @anxiouspineapple99 @starrylothcat @sinfulsalutations @commander-sunshine @dystopicjumpsuit @wolffegirlsunite @sunshinesdaydream @arcsimper5 @littlemissmanga @wings-and-beskar @clonemedickix @freesia-writes @idontgetanysleep @523rdrebel @moonlightwarriorqueen @briefartnaturewolf @kimiheartblade @littlemissbshine @funeralreunion @chubbyhedgehog @ladytano420 @trixie2023 @mssbridgerton @wizardofrozz @vithepotato @mythical-illustrator

[bit-b]

The Bakers and the Breakers

Once, there was a bakery nestled downtown in the big city. It's name was "Maker's Bakery".

For decades, almost a century, Maker's did the job of baking fresh bread for the citizens of the city. Everyone loved their bread. They would stop in every day to see what the bakers were cooking up. People near and far would travel to experience the quality of Maker's legendary bread. All-in-all, a staple of the city's history.

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

One day, a new bakery opened up directly next to Maker's. They went by the name of "Atria".

Atria was a trendy establishment that sold it's bread with the allure of it's new "Flash-Bread" technology. They could bake bread at 100x the speed of a normal bakery. They boasted that the quality matched that of traditional bread as well. And they sold their bread for slightly less than the bread at Maker's.

People from all over the city took a trip to Atria's. They NEEDED to try this new miracle of the modern era.

For a very small crowd of people, they agreed that Atria's bread was of impressive quality. The slightly smaller price was also enticing as well. These people began to make plans to make Atria their new bakery of choice.

For many others, they had various concerns with the quality of the bread. Some loaves seemed to have been overcooked. Others under-cooked. Some had concerning spots on them. There was one customer that found that her loaf was entirely hollow on the inside. And in general, the entire bakery had a slight... "off" smell.

The owner of Atria reassured these concerned customers that Atria is "a NEW establishment, and it will take some time to get the quirks ironed out of the 'Flash-Bread' machine." He promised that things would only get better from here.

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

A few months went by. Maker's Bakery began to see a small dip in customers. Concerning, but not unexpected. They had new competition, after all. They would just have to up their game and try some new things to get people to choose them over Atria.

And so they did. They experimented with new methods of preparing bread that would increase the quality, drop the time it took to bake, and make their bread stand out. This somewhat worked. Though it did little to improve their profits.

A few weeks later, the manager of Maker's noticed some interesting things.

Every time they would try a new bread recipe, Atria would have a VERY similar bread show up on their menu as well. In fact, Atria's bread seemed almost uncannily close to Maker's bread. It was slightly quirkier, but it was unquestionably taking inspiration from Maker's style.

This intrigued the manager. He wasn't sure what to make of this. Was he just being paranoid? Could it be that they both had the same good idea at the same time several times in a row? NO, of course not. It's just too much of a coincidence.

He's never seen Atria's owner visit Maker's. Atria's employees also hadn't stopped by, as far as the manager knew. Did Atria even HAVE employees? Because the manager had never seen a single employee in the last few months.

It was only a hunch. And a paranoid one at that. But the manager decided to take a VERY close look at their security footage.

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

The manager looked through a large amount of footage from previous nights to see if anything weird went down. What he found shook him to his core.

From the camera mounted in the back of the building, he saw a masked man sneak up to the back door and break in using a set of lock picks. The masked man proceeded to scurry in and head to the manager's office. He rummaged around in the manager's notes, and took pictures of all the newest recipes.

The manager was gobsmacked. How had NO ONE caught this before?

He had a strong suspicion of who this masked man was. However, he wanted to see it with his own eyes.

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

The next few nights, the manager camped out in his car across the street, around the exact same time as when the masked man had shown up before. On the third night of staking things out... there he was. The owner of Atria.

Atria's owner had exited out of the back of his bakery and quietly shuffled over to Maker's. On the short walk over, he took his mask out of his pocket and slipped it on. Seeing this, the manager got a devious idea.

"I wanna confront him head-on" thought the manager of Maker's. "I'll hide around the corner in the alley. When he sneaks out of Maker's and walks back to Atria, I'll jump out and catch him in the act."

The manager got out of his car and positioned himself in the alley, ready to spook Atria's owner out of his shoes.

As expected, Atria's owner exited Maker's and began walking back.

"HEY!!!" screamed the manager.

Atria's owner jumped in surprise. He then quickly ran back towards Atria and hopped back inside. Not wanting to lose his chance, the manager followed and quickly grabbed the backdoor before the owner could lock it behind him.

Atria's owner sped his way through the corridor to get away from Maker's manager. The manager followed close behind, not breaking nearly as much of a sweat as the owner was. The two of them made it into the kitchen.

"STOP RIGHT THE-" screamed Maker's manager. But he was stopped by the horror of what he was witnessing.

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

Inside this kitchen was not an oven. Not a stove. Not baking utensils. Not even a microwave oven.

It was... computers.

Computers with scanners, printers, fans going off at full blast. Technology that was far outside what most people could comprehend.

The screens were plastered with all manner of bread recipes. Some were familiar to the manager, as they were recipes from other competing bakeries across the state. There had to have been recipes from all over the nation in this system.

The manager noticed that one of the computer screens... had HIS recipe on it. The recipe for one of his loaves of bread. Specifically, last week's special. And sitting in the printer bed of that system... was bread. A copy of HIS bread. A copy that had several gross flaws in it, but a copy nonetheless.

"You- ....you ....clone bread here." the manager said.

"...yes. Yes I do." replied Atria's owner.

"...do you ...do you even have a staff here?" the manager asked.

"...no. " said the owner. "My cloning machine makes it so that I can operate here without any staff. That allows me to sell bread at a much cheaper cost."

"Not MUCH cheaper" joked the manager. "Your bread prices are, what, a few cents off from my prices? Not exactly a bargain. Plus, you got some nerve to sell bread THAT expensive when it isn't even real bread."

"A lot of people don't know the difference." replied the owner. "And hey, that leaves most of the profits for me and my company."

"Well, dream of those profits all you want. You won't have much profit after I get you arrested and sue the pants off of you!" yelled the manager.

"Oh come on." said the owner. "Is that really necessary? Do you really think you even have a case? I'm making faux bread based on some recipes. It's not like you're the ONLY person who gets to make bread. You're just being selfish."

"SELFISH?!" screamed the manager. "None of this is your work! It's the work of hundreds of other bakers around the country! Including ME!

I spent YEARS learning how to make bread! And then YOU come along, steal the recipes I'm experimenting with, shove it into your computer, and make a profit off of it?! And even if you were handing it out for FREE, you're still grifting me and undercutting my business! Have you ever actually baked bread even ONCE in your life?!"

"HEY!" yelled the owner. "I'll have you know that I know exactly how to make bread! I just don't have the skills and expertise to do it as fast as YOU can. My skills fall into the tech sector. And I choose to flex THAT. I don't think YOU would ever understand that."

"Everything you sell is fake!" said the manager. "It's all a bunch of dolled-up starch balls! Do you think you're really gonna get away with screwing over real bakeries with your trash?"

"I already am, buddy." the owner huffed. "Maybe you missed it, but the world's changing around you. This is the future. You can't stop innovation, no matter how hard you try. You either adapt, or die out.

Tell you what. I'm not a scumbag. And I want everyone to join me in my vision of NEW BREAD. So you're free to use my equipment any time you want. Take notes on it even. Build an exact copy of it in your bakery. I'm not selfish like YOU."

The manager looked at Atria's owner with a look of confusion, disgust, and rage. "Take notes. ....take notes on screwing over other businesses to suit your own? Tearing down other people so that YOU can benefit? Use equipment that's as nasty and soulless as a rotting corpse?"

"Hey, if you don't wanna innovate, that's fine." mocked the owner. "Just don't come crying to me when my industry blows passed you and makes normal bakeries obsolete.

OH, but if you wanna avoid becoming obsolete, might I recommend a new industry? I hear Italian restaurants are BIG nowadays. They got bread in them, so you'll probably feel right at home. And from what I've heard from tech experts, Italian dishes won't be clonable for at least another decade. Probably. Tech moves fast, so I might be off one or two years. But HEY, there's plenty of room for variety in Italian food. Should be a safer bet than a bakery."

The manager stared, dumbfounded. ".....you want me to stop baking bread... let your awful machines take it over... and move over to a food business that I REALLY don't care about? Spend another decade of my life perfecting a completely different culinary field? All to have your tech friends come crush that too?"

"Yeah!" said the owner. "Now you're getting it!"

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

AI SUCKS.

[ninebluehearts]

Hi can I request a agent whiskey/ jack Daniel x plus!size reader. So the reader is an agent and is working with everyone that is trying to take down the drug cartel the reader is an agent and is a badass at doing her work so maybe she is in love with jack maybe one day they introduce a new agent to the team she is a girl she is thin blond with pretty blue eyes let’s just say all the guy’s welcome her and so does the reader the reader notices jack flirting with the new agent so when they have to do a small mission to get more information about the drug cartel they have to go under cover at a club and the reader has to flirt with the target the rest they just pair up into 2 teams so they are gonna be in the club make sure nothing goes wrong because their target has back up maybe theres a little fighting when the reader wears a dress she gets insecure because she sees the new girl and her dress and how it fits perfectly on her so maybe the new agent and jack had to play as a fake couple for the mission but what the reader doesn’t know is that jack is in love with the reader so maybe when they are fighting the reader gets stabbed in the leg when they get back she gets checked out jack wouldn’t leave the reader side and the doctor said she should be fine while in the infirmary the reader confesses her love for jack maybe it could end with them dating.(this might be to long uhh you could write it if you want it’s fine will if you don’t)

Sure thing, my love!! I'm so sorry this took so long!!

Warnings: Violence, blood, etc. (no smut)

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

"You've gotta be kidding me.." You mumbled, staring at the group of men that were all huddled around the newest agent of Statesmen: Agent Malibu.

Malibu had honey blonde hair that practically glowed in the sunlight; the thick, wavy locks looked softer than a feather.

Which paired well with her deep, ocean blue eyes, the kind that you could swim in for hours, not even knowing you were drowning.

Even better, she had a perfect figure- she was thick where it mattered, like her thighs and hips, but her thin waist and long legs really completed the look.

It all made your stomach turn.

What made everything worse was that Agent Whiskey was in that crowd of men, supposedly 'welcoming her.'

Though you saw the grin he had- it was the same one he had given you when you first began working for Statesmen. Regrettably, you were engaged at the time, so you never did act on the obvious spark between you two.

Even when you broke things off with your ex, you never could find the right time- or gather enough courage- to ask him out. And now you were terrified that it was too late.

"I know! Isn't she perfect?" Your coworker, Agent Vodka, said, taking a long sip from his mug. "I don't know if I wanna fuck her or be her bestfriend."

You rolled your eyes, angerly placing your hands on your hips. "Aren't you gay? And married?"

"Me-ow, somebody's jealous." Vodka mumbled into his mug as he took another sip, quickly heading back towards his office to avoid your salty mood.

You shook your head, huffing out a sigh as you looked back at group of Agents. You managed to make eye contact with Whiskey, feeling the familiar burn in your cheeks when he smiled at you.

You gave him a small smile back, giggling when he tipped his hat at you. He always did stuff like that to make you laugh. No matter where you were or what you were doing, Whiskey always found a way to either make a silly face or flirt with you.

That's what made this all so confusing- the other agents were usually professional while working with you, so what made Whiskey different?

"Agent Amaretto!" Your boss, Agent Champagne, called out, motioning for you to come over to the group.

You hated suddenly having all of those eyes on you; especially hers.

You set your mug next to the coffee maker behind you, before awkwardly walking over to him, trying not to look at Malibu. "Yes sir?"

He motioned for the crowd of agents to get back to work, though Whiskey and Malibu stayed besides him. "Well, I assume you've met Agent Malibu?"

"Yes, sir."

"Wonderful! Well, the two of you will be accompanying Agent Whiskey on tonight's mission. Everything is already set up; Whiskey and Malibu, you'll be portraying Mr. and Mrs. Williams, a wealthy married couple from Spain. Amaretto, you'll be Mrs. Culpeper, a Russian widow. Everyone got it?" Champ asked, glancing between the three of you.

"Don't Whiskey and I usually play the married couple?" You tried to keep the attitude out of your tone, though you didn't think you were very successful considering the look that crossed Champ's face.

"Yes, but don't these two look better together? Look," Champ slung his arm around your shoulder, making you look at the 'couple.'

Your teeth grinded together, your nails digging into the palms of your hands as the green-eyed monster began to slip out of his facade.

"Ain't they just perfect together?" He asked, obviously proud of himself.

"You really think so?" Malibu asked, hugging Whiskey's arm as she looked up at him through her eyelashes; Whiskey winked at her in return, a sly smirk tugging on his lips.

"Well, I certainly have a lot to do to get ready then!" You pulled away from Champ before he could even notice that you were shaking with rage, your lips locked in a tight smile. "But do send me the files for tonight's mission."

And without another word, you quickly walked away from the group, holding your breath to keep the hot, salty tears at bay.

-

You spent the better part of your afternoon practicing a Russian accent and going over Mrs. Veronica Culpeper's profile, preparing for tonight's mission.

You reminded yourself to practice your breathing exercises, deciding to be an adult about the situation. You didn't have the right to be so possessive over Whiskey; you had your chance, and you blew it.

That's on you.

As you slipped on your short, silk black dress, you couldn't help but feel a slight sense of confidence. You didn't get to dress up often, so seeing yourself with a full face of make-up, your hair held back in your favorite clip, and wearing a dress that hugged your curves perfectly? How could you not feel absolutely gorgeous.

You took separate cars and left at different times than Whiskey and Malibu, not wanting to cause any suspicion.

Veronica had never met the Williams before, so at least it wasn't like you had to look at them together all night.

You slipped in your earpiece as you pulled up to the club, checking to make sure you were connected. "Whiskey, do you copy?"

"Yeah." He responded a moment later, whispering with that deep, gruff Southern accent that made you shiver.

"I copy too!" You heard Malibu say, her voice echoing as though she were in an empty room, like a bathroom.

You took a deep breath, composing yourself before exiting the car, greeting the valet with a thick, Russian accent as you dropped your keys into the palm of his hand.

As you entered the building, you couldn't help but glance around the room, looking for a familiar face.

"Hello there, I don't think we've met. Who are you?" A man asked from behind you, slight suspicion in his tone.

You turned, only to be met with the man of the night; Lucifer White, the leader of the biggest cartel ring in South America. The man you were all here to kill.

"I am Veronica Culpeper. I believe you knew my husband?"

"Ahh, yes! James! Oh, I do apologize for your loss. I'm sure you understand though, no?''

You blinked, trying to remember how Veronica's husband died. "Business is business."

Lucifer barked out a laugh, wrapping his arm around your shoulders. "A woman who understands how the business world works! I must have a drink with you!" He tried to pull you towards the bar, but you resisted.

Out of nowhere, five guards suddenly looked your way, not liking the disappointment look on their boss's face.

"I don't know.. Maybe I should walk around first? I just got here." You felt beads of sweat beginning to dampen your forehead, the panic burning in the pit of your belly.

"Are you kidding? That is the perfect time to get a drink! Come come!" He reached over and grabbed your hand, actually pulling you towards the bar now.

"Tell me, what is your choice of drink?" He shouted to you over the music, motioning for the bartender.

"I'll take your favorite." You said, throwing up your hands. "I feel adventurous tonight!" Your Russian accent was just as thick as his Spanish one.

Lucifer laughed, giving you a simple nod before speaking to the bartender in Spanish.

"So, what brings you here tonight? I figured you would be more than furious with me at the moment, no?"

And that's when it hit you; Lucifer killed Veronica's husband when an important deal went bad. James was supposedly working with the police, though there wasn't a lot of evidence to support that theory.

Even so, James was the first he killed when he discovered the undercover cops that were supposed to be buying his product.

Not even a minute later, the bartender gently set your drinks on the counter, giving you a nervous look as he prepared other customers. drinks.

"No. As I said. Business is business. My husband was weak." You said as you picked up your drink, raising it in the air. "To good business?"

Lucifer grinned, slamming his glass against yours. "To good business!" He began to chug his drink, watching you out of the corner of his eye to make sure you were drinking yours.

You raised the glass to your lips, preparing to take a sip, when suddenly it was ripped out of your hands. You looked up, watching as Whiskey tossed the glass back behind the bar, nearly missing the bartender's head.

"What is the meaning of this?!" Lucifer roared, standing to get in Whiskey's face. All of the guards in the surrounding area perked up, tightening their grips on their guns as they kept a very close eye on the situation.

"It was my mistake, really. I apologize. I thought she was someone else." Whiskey said, holding his hands in the air. You almost couldn't recognize him without his Southern accent.

You glanced around, catching a glimpse of Malibu, who was standing nearby to watch the situation unfold.

She wore a ruby red dress that hugged her waist perfectly, flaring out into a whirl of ruffles and glitter on the bottom. And even in a moment as tense as this, that familiar burn of insecurity began to creep into your mind.

"Who are you?" Lucifer demanded, gripping Whiskey's collar.

"Right! I'm David Miller, sir."

"Oh really? That's funny, because the David Miller I invited is currently in New Mexico. You see where I'm a little confused, no?"

"Jesus Chirst." Whiskey muttered, not even trying to hide his Southern accent anymore. He punched Lucifer in his jaw, sending both men to the ground.

That's when all hell broke loose.

Everything began to playout in slow motion- what seemed like dozens of men ran up from the first floor at the sight of a fight, trying to take on both Malibu and Whiskey.

You reached behind the bar and grabbed a bottle full of vodka. Storming over to one of the bigger guards who had his back turned, you tapped the back of his knee with your foot, smashing the bottle over his head once he dropped to his knees.

Holding onto the top of the shattered glass bottle, you stabbed an oncoming guard in the stomach with the broken glass, twisting the handle so the glass dug in deeper.

You felt someone grab you from behind, pressing a gun against the side of your head. "And to think I actually trusted you! I was going to make you mine." Lucifer snarled, the metallic smell of blood and alcohol wafting from his mouth.

"Awe, what a shame." You said, before slamming your head back into his face, causing him to stumble back as blood poured from the bridge of his nose.

"You bitch!" He cried out, holding his hand over his nose.

You turned, kicking your foot into his stomach so hard that he flew back into another guard, both of them falling to the ground.

Feeling something break on your shoe, you sucked in a breath, propping your foot up on a nearby barstool to see if you broke the heel.

In doing so, a guard took that as an opportunity, proceeding to jab his knife into the side of your thigh while you weren't paying attention.

You ripped your leg off of the chair, clenching your teeth together in agony as you ripped the knife from your thigh. "You fucker!" You screamed, hurling yourself at the man as though you were some kind of predator.

You all fought like hell for the next ten minutes, the war ending with a single gunshot to Lucifer's forehead.

You stood there panting, holding the gun in a vice-like grip. The familiar feeling of guilt swirled around in your stomach, making you lightheaded. You'd think that after eleven years of killing people, you'd be used to it by now.

Well, you'd be very wrong.

Whiskey and Malibu were by your side a moment later, Whiskey letting out a long whistle when he saw what you had done. "Bit of a hiccup, but I'd say that was a hell of a mission, huh?"

Malibu gave him a are you serious right now? look, gesturing to her torn, blood covered dress.

"Ah well, ya win some, ya loose some." Whiskey patted her on the back, suddenly going quiet when he saw the blood that rushed down the side of your leg, now pooling at your feet. "Please tell me that's someone else's."

You furrowed your brows together, glancing down to see the mess you unintentionally created. "Oh! Huh, I honestly forgot about that.."

Whiskey hurried to your side, looking up at you for permission when he grabbed the edge of your dress. Once you gave him the okay, he took one look at your stab wound and decided that you needed to go to the hospital.

"What? No, Jack, I'm fine! I'll just have Ginger look at it when we get back."

"Ginger is currently at home sleeping. Ya know who isn't? The doctors at the ER down the road. Now go get in the truck."

"I can drive myself-"

"Give Stacy your keys. She'll bring it back to the office for ya."

So now they were on first name basis?

The thought made you cringe, a sour look beginning to spread across your face. "I gave my keys to the valet."

"Got that?" Whiskey asked Malibu, nodding when she agreed. "Now, let's get you taken care of." He gently grabbed your arm, guiding you outside towards the parking lot.

-

"Let me get this straight," The doctor said, taking off his glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose. "You just fell on a knife?"

"Yup." You and Whiskey said in union, glancing at one another.

"And how exactly did you fall on a knife?"

You simply shrugged, tossing your hands up.

The doctor eyed you suspiciously, staring at Whiskey as though he did it. "Right.. Well, thankfully it's not very deep. You're going to need stiches and maybe some antibiotics, but you'll be fine. I'll be back in a moment to stitch you up, okay?"

"Thank you, doctor." Whiskey said, giving him a curt nod.

Once the doctor left, you let out a long sigh, beginning to pick at your nails. The only thing you could seem to think about was how Whiskey said Malibu's real name, no hesitation, no warning- he used it as though he'd known her for years.

Tears began to swell in your eyes, making you dig your nails into the palm of your hand to counteract them.

"Is the pain gettin' worse?" Whiskey asked, staring at your clenched fists.

Shit.

"I'm fine." You mumbled rather rudely, you'll admit.

Whiskey raised his brows, swaying his hip to the side. "Well what did I do?"

You rolled your eyes as you huffed out a sigh. "What are you talking about?"

"That! That right there. What's with the attitude?"

"I don't have an attitude, Jack."

"Bullshit. Are you still salty you ain't get to be my wife this time around?"

The lump in your throat began to swell, making it hard to swallow. "I was never salty in the first place. For fucks sake, can't you just wait in the waiting room? I'm a big girl, I can get a few stitches by myself."

Whiskey stared at you in awe. "Oh my god, you are!"

You turned your head so he couldn't see the heat that began to burn through your cheeks. "I'm not!"

"Listen Sugar, I'll make it clear to Champ that you're my number one girl from here on out, alright? I'm not sure how Stacy's gonna feel 'bout-"

"God, do you ever shut up?!" You cried out, finally looking at him with your tear-stained cheeks and wobbling lip. You couldn't hold back your jealousy any longer, hearing her name on his tongue for a second time making your body burn with pure rage.

Whiskey's smile quickly faded. He continued to stare at you as though he solved the worlds hardest puzzle. "Holy shit, you're jealous."

Your eyes went wide, your body suddenly dropping into fight or flight mode. "I don't need this." You jumped to your feet, ripping the curtain back before storming away from him.

"The hell you do!" Whiskey was hot on your tracks, grabbing your wrist once you were in arm's length.

Other patients that didn't have their curtains drawn began to stare at the scene; doctors looked at you both with suspicion.

"People are looking. Will you please just get back in there?"

"Are you going to shut up?"

Whiskey acted as though he locked his lips and threw away the key.

"Fine." You pulled your arm out of his grasp, walking back to the corner yourself.

Whiskey pulled the curtains back once you were both inside the makeshift room, stayed quiet like he promised. Though by the looks of it, his head was racing with thoughts.

You tried to sit on the edge of the bed, but the skin around your wound felt tight- as though your skin would rip if you moved too much. You sucked in a sharp breath, obviously struggling.

"Let me help-"

"Aren't you supposed to be staying quiet?"

Whiskey rolled his eyes. "Don't be a child. Seriously, let me-"

"I'm fine-"

Whiskey sighed, gripping your waist and lifting you onto the bed.

You sat there with a scowl, rubbing your sides. You hated being picked up. "Don't you ever do that again."

Whiskey stared at you for a while, his mouth agape. Not a moment later, he began to laugh- the kind of laugh that had him doubled over, holding his stomach.

"What?" You crossed your arms over your chest, wanting to know what was so funny.

"Ya know you're cute when you're mad?" He asked, sitting on the edge of the bed next to you.

You scoffed, turning your head away from him once again.

"it's true! You may be stubborn, but god damnit, you make up for it by bein' so adorable."

You turned to face him, your brows still furrowed together. "Why are you being so mean to me, Jack?"

"How am I being mean to you, sugar?" Whiskey cooed, brushing a strand of your hair behind your ear.

"By acting so nice to me all of the time! None of the other agent's treat me like this. They're usually professional- wanting to get a mission done as soon as possible. But you? You do stuff like this; taking me to the hospital yourself, buying me dinner, flirting with me.. Why?"

Whiskey shook his head, a shy smile tugging at his lips. "You really wanna know?"

"I wouldn't've asked if I didn't."

"True." Whiskey mumbled. He placed his hand on your cheek, guiding your face to his as he gently pressed your lips together.

You sat there frozen for the better part of the kiss, shocked that it was finally happening. Years of tension- of longing, hoping that he would someday feel the same finally poured out into one, single kiss.

And once you finally did kiss him back, your lips pressed against his with urgency, as though you were starving for his touch alone.

"Okay!" The doctor said, yanking back the curtain right as the two of you pulled away. "I hope I'm not interrupting, but are you ready to get started?"

"Not at all! Come on in."

"Great." The doctor and a nurse came in to set everything up for your stitches, not even realizing that they walked in on the best moment of your life.

You laid your head on Whiskey's shoulder, holding the edge of your dress back so the nurse could disinfect the area. "Can I spend the night at your place?" You asked, looking up at him through your eyelashes.

"Sure thing, sugar." Whiskey said with a laugh, pressing a gentle kiss to the top of your head.

Yeah, you were gonna be alright.

-

Hello! Thank you so much for reading!! Comments and reblogs are greatly appreciated :)

Taglist: @dino-fart

[jonogueira]

Herald's rest.

Cullen, of course! And a meetcute! Make it fluffy, please 🥰 @isk4649

I hope I don't disappoint! Thank you for the prompt.

~~~~~~

The tavern was crowded, of course it was, the Inquisitor had just slain their very first dragon. Bull boasted about their victory with a tankard in hand while Dorian looked at the Qunari with death in his eyes… and not because he was a necromancer, of course not…. maybe it was because part of his mustache was slightly burned… who knew?

The singing and laughter filled the place. Ale spilled in the air. Tapping of dancing shoes and stomped toes followed by ouches and oofs, but most importantly the smiles on people’s faces. For a few hours, they would be able to forget the horrors waiting for them beyond the frozen mountains.

And there, with a worried frown and an excuse on his lips, entered the Commander. His armor ever present along with his tamed blonde curls. The stubble on his face telling everyone around how worried and busy he had been since the news reached Skyhold. His rumblings of danger and crazy heard in his wake. Beside him walked Varric. The dwarf had a smile splitting his face and, in his eyes, a softness he showed only for his deepest friends.

They walked to the counter and asked Cabot for a drink. As soon as the tankards touched the surface, Varric was gone, leaving Cullen alone—or so he thought.

In the middle of cursing the man, Cullen almost spit his ale when he noticed a person sitting beside him. A pair of kind eyes stared at him with awe and apprehension in them. He apologized for his words and offered a small smile as a peace offering, one that was accepted with a blush.

There was silence between them that dragged on for long seconds that felt like centuries. Clearing his throat, Cullen tried to start small talk but failed miserably. Maker. Trying to salvage the situation, he offered a drink and smiled at the small nod of confirmation.

Taking his gloves off and folding them in front of him, he waited for the drink to arrive. Both their hands reached for the tankard as soon as it was placed in front of them, and when Cullen’s big, strong hands circled the tankard, he felt the softness of skin under his palm, and electricity ran through his body. Turning his head to the side, he caught himself staring at teasing lips.

Once again, he cleared his throat. Maker. He was making a fool of himself. Again.

Changing his thought process, he decided to turn his body and focus on what mattered the most at that moment. From then on, they talked about everything and nothing. They laughed, exchanged tales, and had a great night. Little did he know Varric watched their interaction not from too far away with a pleased smile on his face. The dwarf had everything under control. Now, it was just a game of waiting.

As it always happens in this kind of situation, night became morning in a blur, and Cullen found himself lost for words when the sunlight filled the place and time to go back to the real world caught up to them.

“It was a surprisingly wonderful night.” He massaged his fingers. His eyes locked in the tankard in front of him. “I was wondering if you-” His words were cut short when a bunch of spies approached them, urging his companion to join them. A sad smile was all the answer he had, and he bid his farewell with an understanding but disappointed nod in the group's direction.

During the following days, Cullen watched the valley below, wondering where the group had gone. He entertained the thought of asking Leliana, but what good would that do?

Taking a deep breath and replacing the memory of a warm smile with the endless hours of work ahead, he went to his office, only to have his steps halted.

Halted because the warm smile was present again. Halted because a pair of the most beautiful kind eyes stared at him.

He halted because you were back.

And this time, there would be no stuttering nor apprehension.

“Would you like to have a drink?” The words left his lips laced in hope.

“I would love to.”

More one-shots!

Thank you for reading!

[captain039]

PART 3 Playing with fire

Alpha!Kylo Ren x omega!reader

Warnings: AOB, sexual, jealousy, slow burn, eventual smut, anger issues, swearing, harassment

Precious part <-

This is what he wears ⬇️

A voice came over the speaker for members of your department to report to the landing zone. You felt your blood go cold and glanced to your father who looked worried.

“I’m sorry I have to go” you whispered ending the call before he could speak. You grabbed your jacket and put it on before heading out to the hangar. You met up with Leo who had a layer of sweat on his forehead. You held his hand there for yourself and him, he held it tightly as you lined up behind another division. You kept your head down keeping your hands clasped in Leo’s. You held your breath as the ship opened with a hiss wondering why your group was chosen to be here, but then it looked like the whole ship was here. The supreme leader appeared black draped and cape behind him. His eyes were sharp and his posture tall. Maker he was handsome. You cursed the thought instantly as your eyes kept staring he stopped walking though and everyone held their breath. His eyes scanned the crowd and you froze his eyes landing on yours. His nose flared briefly before he sharply left to walk. You were holding Leo’s hand in a vice grip as the supreme leader finally left. You quickly ran to your room not wanting to deal with anything. You paced in your dorm heart pounding, what the hell just happened? His eyes had met yours right? Maybe he knew, he’d kill you, maker he was probably on the way to do so.

The supreme leader didn’t kill you, a few days past of you living in fear and heightened senses. You flinched at any crash or movement, Leo was overly worried and Brax kept giving you worried looks. By the third day you started to calm down after no appearance from the supreme leader. You messaged your family frequently, trying to make things right somehow though it would never work. Most nights you’d be crying on the holo with them, either your mum or sister would be angry, rightfully so, just you wished to see one smile. Your dad was hurt you knew he just offered you smiled and your grandma well she seemed to be slipping away like she wasn’t there.

You walked down the hall head down you were due for a delivery today, it better not be late. You walked down to your station your whole body tense, the hair on the back of your neck sticking up. You felt like you were being stalked, you snapped around seeing no one and took a breath. You turned around only to scream, you quickly placed a hand over your mouth seeing the supreme leader right in front of you.

“Do you greet your officers the same way?” He asked head tilted. Your mouth ran dry as you felt your cheeks heat up.

“No sir- supreme leader” you cursed yourself silently at your words as he chuckled lightly. You frowned at the noise and the odd happiness it brought you. Your eyes hadn’t left his face as you looked over the scar on his face. Your fingers twitched to trace over it and you quickly looked down in embarrassment. Maker his smell, he smelt powerful earthy scent mixed with citrus. You found yourself breathing it in and sighing, you felt a strange calmness and wanting before rationality kicked in. You began to shake again and forced thoughts out of your mind as you saw a worried Leo peeking out of your office door.

“Perhaps you should be more aware of surroundings next time” the supreme leader said and you flinched.

“Yes supreme leader” you nodded and he hummed and left, brushing by you. Your arm felt like it sparked and you quickly rushed to Leo. You hid in the room as he held your arms to stable you.

“What happened?!” He whisper yelled as Brax raised an eyebrow.

“What’s wrong?” Brax asked.

“She almost died!” Leo yelled and you shushed him.

“Calm down” Brax huffed at the beta.

“The supreme leader talked to her” he added and Brax stiffened.

“He smelt good” you whispered in a weird daze.

“What?!” Leo said.

“Huh?” You said dumbly and flushing.

“Maker kill me” he whined.

“Talk a breath Leo go sit down” Brax huffed and the beta sat down. Brax looked to you with a raised eyebrow as you went to your computer. You were in a weird trance your arm tingling from where he brushed against it, he put you in some strange trance.

The next too days had you even more on edge though your shipment was late, it was never late! Where the hell was it? You went to the delivery officer a pissed look on your face.

“Where the hell is my delivery!” You snapped handing your data pad to the officer. She scoffed at you and went over to the computer and ran it.

“Delayed” she said simply not caring. You felt your anger snap.

“Delayed why?” You pressed.

“Delayed end of story” she snapped back and you growled annoyed.

“I need that delivery now! It’s been two days get your troopers to do something!” You glared. She didn’t deserve it initially, but her attitude now made her deserve it.

“I won’t send anyone to do anything it’ll get here when it gets here” she rolled her eyes.

“No-“ before you were about to speak your mind you felt something behind you. The alpha in front of you shrank eyes wide in fear. The powerful scent from a couple of days came flooding your sense and you felt a calm rush through your body.

“Is there a reason for this uprise?” The supreme leader asked behind you.

“Supreme leader-“ the alpha in front of you stuttered.

“Speak now” he snapped to her and you shuddered.

“A delivery has been delayed supreme leader, I don’t know why” she said not daring to meet his eyes. You don’t know why you turned around and back up in respect.

“Find out why” he growled and she left with her tail between her legs. You kept looking at the ground hoping he’d just leave.

“Do you also keep your back to your superiors?” He questioned and you froze. You quickly turned around and kept your head in a bow and took a few steps back.

“Sorry supreme leader” you said. He wore a sharp black attire a gold chain connecting his cloak over his chest.

“Is there a reason this delivery is so important?” he questioned and you froze.

“Tech stuff supreme leader crucial for my faction” you lied and he tilted his head and hummed. He took a step closer and you felt your whole body tense. You could feel your neck straining to bare itself. He came closer into your space and your head tilted to the side. A satisfied hum left him and he leant down taking a deep breath, warm breath fanning your neck. Your whole body shuddered in delight, your eyes shut tightly. You felt his lips ghost over the scent glands on your neck.

“Supreme leader” someone spoke and he growled making you flinch and step away quickly. He turned around hand up ready to choke the poor storm trooper.

“What” the supreme leader snapped.

“I’m sorry supreme leader, you’re needed in the navigator room” he said. The supreme leader sighed hand going back to his side. His head turned slightly back to you, but didn’t look at you as he quickly left, the storm trooper behind him. Your heart dropped and you let go of the breath you were holding.

Next part ->

[helloescapist]

Bento Confessionals | Tamaki Amajiki

Word Count: 3395

Setting: Amajiki Tamaki x gn!reader; SFW; short, tsundere reader

Content Warning(s): cursing, mention of gore/blood/head wound

Summary: as a recovery quirk, it is your duty to care about the well being of your patients, t-that's all this is! You caring about a reoccuring patient, and wanting to minimize your own quirk inflicted symptoms. T-that's all! Y-yup! N-not because you like him, or anything!

[not my art, credit goes to the artist!]

Fingers threaded through rice, delicately rotating your wrist as the scowl met your brow. Idiot, you practically hissed.

Your cheeks burning as you told yourself to focus on the task at hand. This rice requires a thorough rinse, as well as rest time. Then, you would need to focus on preparing the rest of the bento. The mountain of ingredients undeniable for the amount of work ahead of you. You wouldn’t have to do this if he wasn’t so accident prone. The bend of your left arm tender as you filled the rice maker with practiced hands. Your family kitchen warm and glowing, your dad occasionally peeking in to check in on your progress, you had wanted to tell yourself that it was because you had received permission from Principal Nezu to spend the weekend at home. The U.A. dorm’s kitchens were adequate enough, but not for what you had in mind. No, the occupation hazard of your father as a renowned chef, his own quirk Hyperosmia garnishing him quite the crowd. The ability to sniff out potential hazardous materials ensured the highest quality, and even offered him the rare licensure to prepare puffer fish, awarded only to fugu chefs. It was clear success would be more likely here, under his direction. The best results within grasp, except... you wanted to tell yourself that he was just happy to see you, but there was a certain knowing smirk that your father quipped. The way his cheeks raised knowingly causing his eyes to squint with glee. Unable to escape his gaze. “You look so much like your mother right now,” he had teased with affection before you threatened him out of the kitchen. This is different! You flared, feeling your nostrils wiggle in annoyance, the heat reaching your cheeks as you glared down at your left arm.

The telling signs of bruising both old and new tender to the bend of your elbow. Small noticeable indentures piercing the flesh, revealing the frequency of needle usage. Yes, this was different. It wasn’t that. It was for you. Not him. Well, the food was for him, but the intention was to ward off any unnecessary blood loss. You repeated, the growing agitation rising in your features. The way your thoughts wandered to his last visit to Recovery Girl’s office.

His visits weren’t as often as they used to be. When you had first started U.A., his visits were practically daily. His anxiety giving way to open opportunities for well, a lot of blind sides if you were being honest, and the high competition of U.A. ensured that any adversary that faced him in sparing practiced seized the chance to raise their level. The very first time your paths had crossed was in your first year. Assigned to a different class, you had been in the middle of your own practice before Present Mic had burst into the practice grounds, screaming at your instructor, urging him for assistance. A recovery quirk, any recovery quirk would have done—Recovery Girl had been away from the school, and they needed someone just to stop the bleeding. Up your hand went, and the next thing you knew, he had snatched it and charged off to the nurse’s room, his rush leaving you without a clue of what was going on, or what to expect.

                The scene had been a lot more gruesome than you had imagined it would be. Blood meddled in indigo hued- hair. The gore of flesh marred unidentifiable lieson. The mess of spiky wayward hair making it difficult to locate the source of the bleeding. Gauze stuck at odd ends, a panicked attempt to slow the contusion. The wave of nausea that hit you, as the inflicted patient looked up at you with equally wide eyes. Red tipped elven ears and uncoordinated waves of his hands. Mumbling something about he wasn’t worth the trouble. He’s sorry. Don’t mind him, even attempting to squish his face into the corner of the bed to hide his face, his blood loss making him confused. His unaware of sense of his surroundings landing him falling forward into your chest. His skin felt clammy to the touch, pallor touching his already pale features, and his breathing was rapid. Struggled between murmured horrified whispers, anxiety? Agitation? Oh god, Hypovolemic Shock, you had told yourself. Present Mic stating that your job was to simply starve off the symptoms until the ambulance arrived to retrieve him for immediate care. Doing your best to thumb your way through his locks, he had begun to swat you away. The red of his ears horrified. If it had not been for a fellow classmate, a blonde that stood much taller than you with a sunny disposition holding him down, you would have never been able to find the source of his bleeding, but as soon as you had located it, you instructed Present Mic to raid Recovery Girl’s desk, an adventure none had dared to tread. A scalpel would have been ideal, or perhaps even a razor, but when he presented you with scissors meant to ease bandages off of students, you accepted that obviously, Recovery Girl hadn’t much need for blades in her office. She could simply smooch the wound away, and so, you accepted it. Expecting you to clear the clumsily gauze from his head, Present Mic had released a banshee wail as you dug the scissors into your arm. Biting back the agony as you flayed your arm, digging forth to produce a sizeable amount of blood. The inflicted patient having lost a sense of struggle, growing more and more unresponsive by the moment, the blood that held him looking up at you with his mouth dropped as he kept the boy from falling from the bed. The thought of potential blood pathogens hadn’t crossed your mind—despite how many times Recovery Girl had drilled it into your head. You simply ran on instinct, guided by adrenaline. Activating your quirk, Cascade. Utilizing the blood that you had garnished from self-inflicted laceration, and forcing your own blood onto his abrasion. You did your best to expedite the healing process.

                Yes, it had been some time since he had visited Recovery Girl’s office. In time, he had grown, well not more confident. Time had taught you that his horrified response to your assistance the first day you met was in fact, not agitation brought on by blood loss, but rather, a manifestation of his own anxiety. Rather, he had grown more capable of utilizing his quirk. Gathered the ability to respond, his reflexes had vastly grown, or perhaps he had managed to crawl out of his head enough to actually activate it appropriately—whatever the case, it had been some time since you had a visit from him. Which left you with a with a sense of melancholy. On one hand, you were relieved not to have to utilize your quirk as much (although there would always be the need, you had discovered that through blood donation, that your quirk remained active, and thus you were able to supply a reserve of quirk attained blood), but you felt almost... abandoned. You had gone from near daily visits in your first year, occasional drop ins in your second year, and now rare moments of passing in your third year. He had come a long way--- you both had, but why did you miss the struggle he put up. If anything, you should have especially been pleased to have been rid of him. Treating someone with such a low opinion of themselves was difficult, especially when they refuted the care, and yet, when he appeared in front of you, thankfully for a check in at Recovery Girl’s insistence. Shot, he had been shot? Gritted teeth as you cursed him out. His head bowed in apology, not bothering to argue. In fact, he had agreed that he had caused unnecessary stress to that of his Pro-Hero Fat Gum, and that of his companion, Red Riot. Especially for a wound that didn’t seem to exist (you had only realized after you had been far to willing to slice open your arm once again, next to the scar you had claimed at your first encounter, Recovery Girl smacking you  with her cane at your over eager response). The blush as she examined him, stethoscope pressed to his bare chest, as you adverted your eyes. Gah, why was this pissing you off so much. Doing your best to jot down the observations she had made on his chart, pencil pressed firmly in your hand. Watched his even breathing, bore witness that there had not been a single scrape across his delicate features. His sugilite eyes catching yours, widening, and quickly adverting. Passing his own blush to you, causing you to practically growl. What? WHAT? What was with that?? Y-You were only doing your job! H-how dare he act like you were- were doing something s-scandalous! D-Doesn’t he know that this is your job? Y-you do this every day… Shock spreading through your features as the pencil snapped between your fingers. Your shoulders dropping as Recovery Girl’s knowing giggle filled the room.

From his charts, you had learned that his quirk was activated by digestion. The DNA breakdown of what he consumed would become available for him to borrow for the duration it remained in his system. N-not that you had read his chart specifically, it was common practice to review them after each visit r-regardless of who the patient might have been. Which was how you had found yourself, agonizing over vast ingredients. Layers of unusual compounds at the ready, the opportunity to seize your father’s kitchen haven given you access to quality ingredients, and his unnecessary insistence on poking in when something had begun to smell too done. Braised oxtails simmering in soy, well apparently not enough soy sauce your father had murmured from the living room. “D-Damn it,” you hissed. T-this was only because the sports festival was near. Y-yup! That was it!

                “Watch your mouth,” your mother growled back, her temper only cooled by your father’s gentle reassurance as he whispered something in her ear.  A rare occasion, normally by now she would be pursuing you with a ladle. Instead, she merely scoffed at his words before waving herself away, decidedly stepping off on to the veranda to be rid of your cursing at boiling pots, flared at the gross way octopus tentacles wiggled under your fingers, and the resistance the clams had put up in response to your prodding.

If he’s just going to make comments like that, why doesn’t he just cook it himself, you had thought frustrated. The knowing response of a father who had cared for a stubborn child for all of your seventeen years warm at the kitchen entrance, his hand caught on the noren curtain. “It means more coming from the heart. You can do this,” he reassured. Comforting and knowing, as gentle as the hands that had guided you in the kitchen over the years, you fought back the burn on your cheeks. Y-You were only doing this to prevent yourself from suffering from another bout of anemia. N-no other reason, but damn it if you didn’t swat away your mother’s insistence to help. Her sighing saying that if you were really that frustrated, she wouldn’t tell your father--- nope. Her assistance hadn’t been born out of annoyance for the way your furrowed at the pots and pans before you, and admittedly, a trait you had received from her, but rather the late hour, but the rather familiarity from having once stood where you were so many decades before. A young girl in love with a boy who treasured food, and desperate to catch his attention, b-but this was different, you told yourself as you worked into the late hours. Layer by layer, your over eagerness to avoid anemia, strictly anemia as you packed a three-tiered bento to the best of your abilities. Mindful of the necessary rice, of the sushi you had delicately prepared, teriyaki flavored chicken feet, gyoza packed with a unique blend your father had recommended, kaarage with the hint of lemon, tender ikayaki with a delicate sauce composed of squid ink, blistered shishito peppers, and a variety of vegetable sides. Because somehow, once you started… it just didn’t seem enough. After all, this was your blood at steak, right? Right. Blissfully unaware of the exquisite meaning of the crane that decorated the top of the box, told yourself you would only rest your head for a moment before inevitably dozing off at the kitchen table.

“Ah, [F/N],” your mother sighed, “why is this child like this?” The warmth undeniable in her eyes as she glanced at you from the kitchen doorway. Your father pressed his forehead against her temple.

“Wonder why,” he had laughed warmly before setting himself to work. Carefully coating your shoulders in a spare blanket before carefully handling the bento as though it were glass. He wrapped it tenderly. Remembering the day he had been presented a bento, sneaking in a few slice of prepared variety of articianal jerkies he had crafted made from squid, clams, octopus, and even puffer fish. He had intended it to be a promotional item for his restaurant, but recalling the gusto you had demonstrated when you had burst into his restaurant, asking to utilize ingredients of a variety of properties. The way you had listened intently to the details about the ingredients, but even going so far as to question the properties of the sources they had been derived from, he was reminded of the child that had eagerly hung to his apron all those years ago. Shy, but determined, caring, but stubborn, yes. His little one had grown up so much, and this seemed so much more important than any promotional campaign, he had concluded as he folded it into the fabric of the bento.

You had little recollection of how you had fallen asleep at your family table. Bewilder to wake to hear your mother muttering about having a child who sleeps like this as she turned over a grilled fish. Tsking her tongue as she did so, Your eyes widened to the bento before you, already prepared for the day. “Oi, you,” your mother asserted, the slight annoyance in her voice, “You had better not be doing this at school. If you catch a cold, who will take care of you, hm?”

                “I-I don’t--,” you started, only to be interrupted by your father, sitting opposite of you at the table.

                The sip of his coffee, “your mother laid out your backup uniform. She made sure to iron it, and found your favorite accessory at the back of your drawer so you could loo---“.

                “OI!” Your mother practically bellowed. “You, hush” she jabbed chopsticks at your father. Ignoring the light chuckle, he released into his mug before turning her attention to you, “and You! Gyou look like a kuwazu nyobo. Do you have a mouth hidden under that mess of hair? Confessing like that, hm? Go brush!”

                “D-damn it! It’s not like that!” You retorted.

                The gentle tap of your father’s coffee cup against the table as he flipped through his culinary magazine, completely unbothered and unmoved by the morning commotion “you’ll be late.” The draw of your eyes to the kitchen clock before the horrifying realization that he was in fact correct jostling you forward. A flurry of clothes tossed about, discarding your casual clothes. Wiggling into your school uniform, tugging at the buttons of your collar. Hopping on one foot to secure your socks. You would have forgotten the bento if it were not for your mother chastising you at the door. Bidding her farewell before slamming the door behind you. Missing the exchange between your mother and father. One recounting how they lively the house feels when you are home, and the other asking if they’re prepared to hand you over to someone else. The small smile tucked at your father’s lips. “He’s a nice boy,” he whispered, to only himself. Recalling a customer who stopped by for jerky from time to time, a unique quirk to harness his meals.

Oh, you had fought yourself for some time. Thanks to your father’s insistent on time, you had THANKFULLY arrived before the masses. Securing enough time for an internal dialogue dispute between yourself. One part of you too petrified to leave the bento on his desk—what if it was the wrong desk? What if it was confused for a c-confession? I-It wasn’t like that! Before inevitably giving in, the rage of your embarrassment forcing you to slam down the bento. DAMN IT. The sudden realization you may have thrown the dishes together on accident, damn it damn it damn it. You hissed to yourself as you skyrocketed out of the classroom. Your own curiosity, well maybe sense of shame, drawing you back to the classroom door. Peeking as students filled in. Stating that you simply needed to see Haya to ask a question. Ducking from Haya’s view as she entered the classroom, realizing that you didn’t have the courage to fumble through some horrid excuse to your erratic behavior. On bent knees, peeking between the crack of the classroom door as you watched Amajiki Tamkai stare down at the bento. His eyebrows noticeably drawn as he wiped his head each and every way. The giggle of classmates witnessing his obscured behavior. Mirio grinning as he patted his friend’s back. Hado’s eyes sparkling, her joyful cheer obvious as she encouraged him to open it.

                “I-It must be a mistake,” he had muttered, considering scooting it to the desk next to him.

                Mirio shook his head, gleeful as he pulled at the fabric. “This is your desk, it’s for you!”

                “P-poison?” he whispered, tempted to settle for the corner of the classroom, but Mirio’s hand was firm at his shoulder. Poison, your mouth dropped. S-sure, your cooking skills required some fine tuning, but poison? W-What?

                Hado shook her head, “Ah, Tamaki, it’s not poison, silly! It’s a declaration of love!” The hearts practically dancing around her as your face dropped from where you snooped. N-no it wasn’t! Your heart pounding as the red of his cute elven ears began to burn. His eyes shifting nervously as Hado prodded his side, begging him to open it. The burn spreading form your cheeks to your ears before finding its mark down your neck.

                His fingers were trembling, fumbling with the fabric as Mirio and Hado leaned over his shoulder. Both enticed by their friend’s situation. The affection and pride clear on their faces as they glanced over the many offerings. The size of the bento clearly… too much. Y-yup too much. N-no! Not too much! This was your blood at stake after a-all. “I-I can’t eat all of this,” he muttered as his hand found his lips. His shoulders raised up. Your heart nothing more than a pounding in your ears.  A small smile drawing to your lips… a-adorable.

                Mirio thumbing through the various… jerkies? Dad, your hand cupping your own mouth now, unable to hear their interaction further. Tamaki’s shy expression growing and threatening to become a puddle. Warm and affectionate, c-clearly thinking it’s more than---

                “Hmm? Amajiki?” Haya stopped by his desk. Her red short hair tilted from view, Her skirt ruffled slightly as she quipped an eyebrow, her fingers pinching at the fabric beneath the bento curiously. Leaning forward to inspect it closer. The faint green gingham prints evident, and the little teddies that were scattered across the fabric having drawn her attention, “Isn’t this [L/N]’s?”

                OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. You thought with horror. Haya, that traitor! The undignified squeal you released, scattering backwards before landing on your bottom. Quick to snag your bag and hall ass towards the nurse’s room, your hide away. Leaving a tornado mess in your wake, flutter of papers, shaken windows, a real mess. As The Big Three watched your retreat. Amajiki’s eyes widen and mystified. Hado and Mirio stifling a laugh, and Haya, that traitor, stating plainly, “not exactly discreet.” Only when you had made it to the safety of the confines of the nurse’s room, did it occur to you… you would have to retrieve the bento at some point. Sliding yoru back down to the floor, hands capturing your eyes as you hid the blush from sight, and ignored Recovery Girl’s obvious concern. W-what was that? H-how is he so… CUTE?

                T-Tamaki had clearly misunderstood the s-situation! R-right? Just a m-misunderstanding...