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januaryembrs · 4 months ago

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WHO'S AFRAID OF LITTLE OLD ME? | Spencer Reid x Prentiss!Reader [10]

description: the one with Cat Adams + the one where she tells him.

length: 13k

warnings: literally just watch 11x11, mention of vomit, blood, alcoholism. mention of pregnant wives??

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‘who’s afraid of little old me?

you should be,’

She remembered when she was little when she would wake up so early even the birds hadn’t uttered a morning chirp, her stomach grumbling because she usually hated the fancy stuff they had for dinner and ended up leaving it on her plate. She remembered thinking her mother would be no use, that Elizabeth would tell her to go straight back to bed, even if she whined and cried that she wanted breakfast, remembered thinking Louise, the au pair that usually took the morning shift, wouldn’t be in for another hour or so, and she certainly wasn’t tall enough to reach the cabinets yet.

Which left her with Emily.

Nineteen year old Emily, who was already in and out of the house with college, her hair a box dyed black, singed from all the crimping and hair spray. Emily, who liked to take her to the park even if she pretended she was too old, who played Barbies with her and helped her cut all their hair off probably because she figured that was better than her constant urge to do whacky things with her own locks. Emily, who had never wanted a little sister really until Elizabeth had brought home the carrier and suddenly she had never loved ten chubby fingers and toes so much.

She remembered waking Emily up, usually by pulling herself up onto her sister’s Mötley Crüe themed bedding and prodding at the girl’s shoulder until she stirred, how Emily would lead her down the long, ornate hallway into the kitchen, when the only sound in the house would be their bare feet padding along the cold tiles. How Emily would yank two bowls out of the cupboard, tipping a generous dose of coco pops in each of them, back when they were full of sugar and real chocolate, not the healthy crap they sold nowadays.

It would just be the two of them at the breakfast table, crunching on their spoons, five year old Bugsy no doubt dribbling the brown milk down her chin and pyjama top, but she was happy. Because she had her big sister.

She stared down at the dregs of cocoa that whirled into the white milk as the cereal sat there longer, because she was only picking at it really, and it had nothing to do with the fact she was almost certain they had changed the recipe since she was little.

“I was thinking,” She said after a moment or so, while Spencer pottered around the kitchen, fixing them both a pot of coffee that she usually was usually bouncing over to grab at this point in the morning. Except today she felt sluggish, lost in that maze of thoughts that only Spencer could really unpick, and the second she’d started speaking his head whipped over the counter to where she idly stirred her breakfast, “About what you said when Gideon… We could probably afford to start looking at buying a house soon, what with the mortgage rates dropping,”

She looked up at him hopefully, hoping he couldn’t sense the hesitation on her breath because he usually knew what she was thinking before she said anything, and for once she wished he didn’t have that crazy ability to read her mind, only to see him with a small if not saddened smile.

When Gideon had passed, Spencer had gotten in his head that they needed to leave the apartment, that if the Jason Gideon could have been caught unaware, then they weren’t safe either. Of course he hadn’t meant it, at least not entirely, but Gideon passing had spun the logic half of his brain that spouted the statistics that they were no more in danger now than they were before he’d gone, but still it was something he’d been thinking about. A house meant more space; more space meant they could stop tripping over each other's laundry, meant they could get the bigger shower they’d always talked about, maybe even a tub. A house meant the garden he knew he always wanted Niko and Sergio to have now they were grey around the whiskers and couldn’t run so fast.

“I think that’s a great idea,” Spencer said, picking up their mugs of steaming hot goodness and carefully stepping towards her, gently sliding the drink over to her as the liquid sloshed and threatened to dip over the edge, “Is there any place you want to look?”

He left his own mug in favour of circling his arms around her shoulders and pulling her in for a soft hug, her head falling beneath his chin where she sat on the barstool.

Kissing her hairline gently, she heard him inhale her shampoo scent, and she plonked her spoon back in the bowl to wrap her arms around his waist, squeezing herself into every crevice that they weren’t already touching.

“I don’t care,” She said, tilting her head to look up at him with love sick eyes, only to see him already besottedly gazing at her, and she guessed by the way his lips draw up at the corners that he didn’t realise he was still smiling, “Anywhere with you is good enough for me,”

He looked down at her in that way he usually did, expression soft and sweet and entranced, but she saw the traces of worry in his gaze, “You feeling okay? Today is going to be… hard,”

Bugsy’s expression faltered slightly, and she turned away to push her face into his stomach so he wouldn’t see the doubt lingering in her eyes. She nodded anyway, even though she knew he would catch her in the lie.

After Scratch, Hotch had ordered her to take three months off for a psych evaluation, had granted Spencer at least a month of holiday to watch over her because he knew Reid’s head would be all over the place with worry if he’d returned to work without her. It was like asking Garcia to leave her computers and fluffy pens at home; it just wouldn’t work.

By the time she was cleared to come back, despite the recurring nightmares of that day still eating away at her sleep, Hotch had set her up to work solely from the office, strictly no field work.

He liked to think it was for her own safety, for her own good since he saw the way she pounded coffee like it was juice while Spencer lingered around her with a worried stare. But if he had to be honest with himself, Hotch couldn’t get away from the things Scratch had made him see just as much as she couldn’t. He couldn’t escape seeing her throat slit like she was a lamb for slaughter, the life leaving her eyes as she faded away. And it was the thought of her carotid artery spraying over his boots that made him want to lock her up in bubble wrap and never let her go.

But that was feasible in their job, not really. So desk duty it was.

“You don’t have to go with us into the field, you can always stay with Hotch and Garcia,” He offered, stroking her hair behind her ear and tempting her to look back up at him with gentle fingertips under her chin, and when she saw the unease in the muddy hues, she squeezed him tighter, knowing the past five months had been just as hard on him.

“No, I want to,” She protested gently, her hands weaselling under his shirt and onto the warm, soft skin of his back, pawing at him like a cat trying to settle. “If you’re being made this woman’s number one target, I want to be there on stand by,”

And he couldn’t really argue. Because no matter what frame of mind he was in, even if it had been him captured and tortured, he would never let her go out as bait and not be there breathing down her neck.

He sighed, the urge to protest stuck in his throat and all he could think to do was bring his lips to hers gently in a soft kiss, because his resistance to her being put in the line of danger would only be futile.

She hummed into the kiss, his hands skirting over her back and she swore she would be content if the rest of her life was spent in Spencer’s arms, in the warm mornings at their kitchen table just the two of them, and the idea of that last part spun her stomach into turmoil all over again.

What if he freaked out? No, scratch that, he was definitely going to freak out. Spencer hated change, hated having things dropped on him, and Diana was already getting worse with the symptoms of Alzheimers she had begun presenting. He had more than enough on his plate as it was, and she knew she was the only thing that could keep his head from exploding with the worry, even if she was sometimes the cause of it. He’s always been a worrier, and part of her despised herself for the fact that he had shot out of bed every single night she’d been in the midst of a night terror, when the room spun and Peter Lewis seemed so real and so close and she woke up screaming. Because she’d brought him enough stress and trouble, and now she had an extra helping of it dished up and ready.

It wasn’t one of those things she could keep to herself, not even if she so desperately wanted to sit on it and mull it over for a few months. She needed to tell him soon.

Spencer looked down at her eyes, the way they’d glazed over slightly, and he wished he could crawl into the space where her thoughts bounced between one another if it meant he could figure out what had gotten her so twisted up the past few weeks. She hadn’t been herself entirely since Scratch, but she had been getting better. She’d started getting more sleep, seemed less jumpy when they were in the quiet of their apartment, and part of him thought maybe that was why she wanted to look at houses. A fresh start. And yet overnight, she’d had this guilty look in her eye like she was suddenly a million miles away, and he hated it. Bugsy had never been distant, which seemed odd to think considering she was burying her hands and face into him like she had no intention of letting him leave. But there was something in the depths of her brilliantly big mind that seemed to hold her tongue for her.

He kissed her again, hoping it was all in his head, hoping she wouldn’t keep things from him because it was them and they always told each other everything. Even if it was gross and weird and inappropriate, everything.

And he thought maybe it was because he was going on a date with another woman, using himself as live bait to flirt and charm and seduce an assassin in order to take her into custody without fuss. Yeah, that was probably it. He couldn’t say he would be all too pleased if it had been the other way around and he would be watching her ravish another man even if it was just for the job.

That was definitely it. There couldn’t be anything else.

“You know I love you,” He said as a statement, yet she nodded as though it was a question, and he kissed her again because he’d regretted not doing it a hundred times a day the second he’d seen her in that closet, regretted not seeing the fact she was more than likely uncomfortable with her boyfriend of two years wining and dining a murderer. “Whatever I say when I’m there with her, you know I love you, more than I could ever love anything else,”

He seemed so sincere, his eyes turning into that soft puppy like frown, and it only served to drive the knife in deeper as she nodded, her hands wrapping into his hair and pulling him down to kiss her again, this time just a little harder like his lips could wipe away the pit in her stomach. Because it was Spencer, and she was lying by omission, and god did she need him to know how much she loved him before things went wrong and they changed and-

“We have a little time right?” She said, his hands taking the hint as they pulled her to her feet gently, cereal long forgotten in a chocolate slush, and his hands reached down to cup her ass in the way he was more than used to doing now. Didn’t stop him from blushing however.

“Y-yeah we have time,” He said, and she barely let him finish his sentence before she’d claimed his mouth again, not that he was complaining. She looped her fingers through his belt buckle, stepping backwards with his guidance towards their bedroom, and he hummed through a moan when he felt her run the other hand through his already messy bedhead, tugging on the ends of his curls gently.

“Good,” She responded, with a drop of that natural Bugsy cheekiness he was used to, and the sound of it made him smile. Maybe it was just the job after all, “I think I need a demonstration on just how much you don’t mean whatever you need to say to her,”

He smirked, because she was more like herself than she had been in days, and god was she pretty when she smiled at him before they had sex, like she knew what was coming, like she knew what she did to him. He wouldn’t be surprised if she could hear his heart thumping in her ears just as clearly as he could.

“I think you’ll need multiple demonstrations,” He said, his fingers looping in between her buttons on her trousers and popping them apart softly because they’d done this before, rushed it so they weren’t late for work, and ended up ripping good jeans, “Gather multiple sets of data before you draw a conclusion,”

He kissed down her neck and her small laugh became a moan, “I think it’s pretty much the only way, Doctor Reid,”

He laughed, and she felt it against her pulse, the sound of it making her shiver as he shoved the door open with little remorse for the way it slammed into the wall. And she made a promise to herself that once they’d caught their UnSub, she would tell him, even if it meant all of this would change.

–

He arrived at the restaurant five minutes early, his suit steamed and neat, a single red rose in his hand. His skin was already crawling at the idea of flirting with another woman, but Spencer knew none of it was real, knew he was just doing his job. Still it didn’t diminish the desire to glance where Bugsy and Rossi were sat in a booth, because he’d seen her in that red dress a thousand times before, and yet it still made his jaw drop the second he saw her in it.

The brief had been black tie, something to fit in with the five star restaurant, and god had she delivered. He ought to have protested, told her that she was too distracting and maybe insisted she stayed in the office if she looked so striking, but then again she could have worn a bin bag for all he cared, he would still be fighting the urge to look over at her.

He chose the seat with Bugsy at his back as to eliminate his urge to stare at her, because Dave could keep her safe, the rest of his team could watch her, he had to trust that.

He lay the rose on the other side of the table, fiddling with the other parts of the cutlery to make sure everything looked perfect, even though in his mind he was thinking of all the things Bugsy would have been saying if she was his date tonight. She probably would have made a comment on his suit (she already had before they’d even stepped out the hotel, just as he’d given her arse a quick squeeze with cheeks even more crimson than her dress because she looked divine), probably would have offered to go to the in-and-out down the street instead because she never cared about splashing out on dates, just being with him was enough.

Adjusting his jacket a little, he waited, trying to keep his head far away from his girlfriend, although that was much easier said than done. He couldn’t remember what his brain was like before it was filled with thoughts of her.

The ring sat in his sock drawer, buried in one of his older pairs that he hoped she wouldn’t go after since he’d made the mistake of putting it in with his boxers and almost got caught within a day when she went to steal some ready for bed and he’d chided himself for the sloppy work. He knew he wanted to ask her, thought he might even bring her to a fancy place like this, maybe prepare a small speech that attempted to tell her how much she meant to him even though he knew there wasn’t enough words for such a thing. Would he hide it in the cake? No that would be cheesy, she found cheesy overdone. Would she even like it done in public? No, she would hate that, he would wait until they got home, maybe even try that thing she’d wanted to do in bed for a few weeks, and then when they were done-

“Spencer?” A woman appeared at the table, a woman who by all accounts was objectively pretty, yet he felt that small kick of victory when he recognised her from the FBI database.

Cat Adams. Assassin. Mastermind. UnSub.

“Cat?” He said with practised naivety, and this time he forced all thoughts of his loving girlfriend from his head like they were about to be tainted by the woman standing in front of him, “Hi,”

“Hi,” She replied, her grin too bright and sparkly for anyone to ever guess she was a killer though he supposed that was the point,

“Hello, it’s nice to finally-” He cut himself off when she leaned up to hug him, her face drawing closer to his suddenly and she looked like she was gearing up for a peck on the lips. Forward. Much more forward than he’d given her credit for, and his stomach flipped in discomfort as he leaned away, “Oh s-sorry, I have kind of a germ thing,” He excused, which wasn’t a total lie.

Also my girlfriend is sat ten feet away and I can already hear her clenching a fork ready to ball your eyes out like a melon, he wanted to say, though he kept his snark to himself.

“Oh, sorry,” Cat said, holding her hands up in surrender, and looking up at him with what he knew to be false innocence. But he played along, because the sooner they caught her, the sooner he could be done with the entire thing.

“I’m kinda weird with hugs,” He explained, his face boyish as he gestured her to take a seat, because at least then he could put some distance between them, “Please, sit down,”

She smiled dizzily, slipping her jacket off to reveal a blue dress that accentuated her pixie short hair, her collar bones that could cut glass, her small, sleek figure, and she adjusted her straps as an excuse to divert his attention to her breasts.

“That’s like the oldest trick in the book, get some new material, bitch,” Bugsy mumbled under her breath, drowning her venom in sparkling apple juice disguised as champagne from where they sat in a dark corner booth and Rossi chuckled, shaking his head.

“I wouldn’t worry about boy genius having a wandering eye, kid. Reid is more devout than my mother on Easter Sunday,” He said, picking at the starter they’d ordered as a way to seem busy. She hummed, diverting her attention into her chicken salad, making sure she wasn’t looking at the happy couple for too long as they talked awkwardly, “Do you think you could take her?”

“I know I could take her,” Bugsy responded in a clipped tone, and Rossi sniggered, and they heard Tara and Derek do the same down their earpieces.

“It was a joke,” Cat said, to something they hadn’t quite caught, though by the looks of it they were still just making small talk, “A bad joke,”

“No, no, it was funny,” Spencer said reassuringly, and he chuckled, though Bugsy knew off the bat it was fake because she loved making him laugh and it sounded nothing like that. They fell into an awkward silence and she could hear Spencer scrambling for things to talk about because if she walked away their lead to the other assassin went right with her.

“Can we start over? Hi, I’m Cat,” The woman said, fixing her skirt with a shy smile. She certainly didn’t seem like a killer, Bugsy thought, where she glanced at her in her peripheral. She certainly was pretty, spritely even. A little too eager to kiss a guy she just met.

“Hi, I’m Spencer,” He replied, in that nervous tone he usually got when she flustered him.

“Is it true you have three PHDs?” Cat asked with, well, cat-like eyes flicking between sly and seductive, and Bugsy could see how any man who wasn’t as smart as her boyfriend would fall for the act.

“Yes, that’s true. I do have three PHDs,”

“What’s your favourite book you read last year?” She pressed and Bugsy sipped her juice to stop herself from answering for him.

“I’ve honestly never read a book I haven’t loved,” He said, deflecting the subject, while his girlfriend smirked into her almost empty plate.

Demons by Fydor Dostoevsky, she corrected to herself because she knew he’d gone back to it more than a handful of times.

“Tell me about your wife,” Cat went in for the kill, her timid smile morphing into something wicked as she watched Spencer squirm.

And the second she’d said it something had reared its ugly head inside him. Because try as hard as he might, all he could think about was Bugsy’s face and that damn ring.

“If you don’t mind, I’d er…” He cleared his throat, wondering why it was so difficult to get through a single conversation when they’d ran through the plan a million times. He knew she would ask, and yet all he could do was get defensive thinking about Cat damn Adams setting her hands on the woman he wanted desperately to marry, “I’d rather not talk about her,”

“Might as well get it out in the open right? I mean, it’s why we’re here,” She said smugly, like that innocent bounce in her step had wiped right away, revealing the murderess underneath, “How long have you been married?”

“Four years,” He lied, though he thought back to JJ’s wedding that same amount of time ago and how beautiful she looked in her dress and her cast and how he’d wished it was theirs.

“When is she due to give birth?” Cat’s eyes narrowed at the man, pushing her hair behind her ear in a playful manner.

Bugsy stopped, licking her lips and hoping Rossi wasn’t watching her as she finished off the last of her sparkling juice, raising a hand to a passing waiter to order a second round.

“You having another one, Grandpa?” She said innocently, despite the stink eye he gave her and nodding to the non-alcoholic beer he’d ordered.

“Watch yourself,” He said as the waiter retreated, and she snickered into her meal, “Grandpa will knock you on your ass,”

“You would never, Hotch would hate that kind of paperwork,” She said setting her cutlery on the side of her plate to signal she was done, “HR would have a field day,”

“I wanna hear you say it,” The line crackled in their ear as Bugsy’s drink arrived at the table, and she couldn’t help but think the woman’s seductive voice could easily pass for a call girl. She chanced a quick look over at their table, her heart rate spiking when she saw the woman all but eye fucking Spencer with a bit of her lip, like the thrill of the chase was half the fun for her, and Bugsy felt the disgust settle in her stomach.

“To have her killed,” Spence replied, and she looked away then, the bitterness settling on her bottom lip in a sneer. She didn’t think for one second that Spencer would think the woman was alluring, it didn’t make him flirting any easier to watch.

The UnSub smiled wryly, looking down at his arm, “Let me see your ring,”

Spencer froze, holding his hand out hesitantly, the feeling of the gold band entirely alien on his finger even though he was trying to get used to it for the sake of the case. Cat’s hand shot out like a snake striking, holding his ring in between her perfectly manicured fingers, her eyes roving over the jewel.

“You know what that is?” She said with contempt, shaking her head, “A noose, only it doesn't kill you all at once it kills you slowly, day by day,”

And he couldn’t have disagreed more, in fact the only thing that was killing him was the fact he had been dumb enough to wait so long to propose to the woman he loved more than life itself.

Spencer Reid, dumb and in love.

“You ever feel that way?” She said, ripping him out of his thoughts, and he nodded wordlessly, sighing for effect.

“I feel that way all the time” Except his every day was spent wondering just how he ever got so lucky, how he managed to fall in love with the same woman who gave him apple cake when he couldn’t remember the last real meal he’d had because he was three months deep in an opioid addiction and having her look at him like he hung the damn cosmos.

“Take it off,” She ordered, and Spencer tried flashing her a surprised if not charmed smile, though his hackles were slightly raised, “As a sign of your commitment. To me,”

He bit his cheek, knowing better than to argue back if he was playing the part of the down beaten husband, and began twisting the gold ring off his wedding finger, handing it over to her expectant palm.

“If she sticks to the pattern, she’ll take him to a secondary location and then kill him.” JJ observed, sipping on her mocktail in her own fancy, ruffled dress, shooting Tara and Derek a look where they played the part of a sweet couple on a date.

“I’d like to see the bitch try,” Bugsy said through a wide fake smile, her face showing no symptoms of anger except the flash of teeth.

“Don’t worry sweetheart, we’re not letting it get that far,” Rossi added, and the two of them clinked their drinks together in a ringing chink, “Hotch, do you two have a visual?”

Penelope confirmed with a few taps of her keyboard, and Hotch nodded as Spencer confirmed with a small flick of his eyes he could hear the feed, ”Alright, all agents stand by. Dr Reid will give the green light, don’t move until we have it,”

“Twenty four carats?” Cat asked, twisting the ring in between her fingers with a smug grin like she already knew the answer.

“Yeah,” Spencer replied, looking down at the band and back up the soulless dark hues of the black widow woman.

“Twenty four k times… four years. Means this ring should be dinged and nicked, but,” She huffed, reaching into her purse under the table, and Bugsy damn near spat out her juice when she heard a gun load through the mic, “This sucker is brand new. You’re not married.”

“What was that, was that what I think it was?” Penelope’s stressed tone rushed through the ear piece, and the sound of it plus the smell of the chicken she’d just eaten made Bugsy’s stomach turn again.

Except this time she felt it coming up into her throat, the same way she’d found herself feeling queasy for a few days. Spencer had thought she had a stomach bug, had tried to get her to stay home with some mint tea, but this was more than the last few times. It was like her anxiety clenched her gut in a tight grip and twisted painfully, and she lurched forward, slapping a hand over her mouth.

“Kid?” Rossi said, his brows frowning at the expression on her face, and she immediately began untucking her napkin from her chest.

She needed to make it to the bathroom now, hoped on everything that the sudden movement didn’t distract where Cat held a gun to Spencer’s midriff beneath the table.

“What is she doing?” Morgan hissed into the mic, while Hotch and Penelope began barking protests.

“Oh, good lord, Bug, stay down, you don’t know what that psycho is going to do!” Penelope squealed, watching Bugsy rush out of the booth seat, a hand firmly over her lips, and Aaron brought a hand to his head, a splitting headache forming at the sight of the youngest agent rushing for the bathroom.

“Prentiss, what are you doing, you could blow your cover,” He snapped, though there was no anger there, and she could only switch her mic off for what was about to happen, knowing the team had much bigger things to worry about.

Bursting the doors open, she dived for the nearest stall and fell to her knees, head in the bowl before she could hock up her guts over the floor, and then came a horrid retching sound.

Spencer’s eyes widened at the table, hearing his team yelling out orders at the one person he couldn’t keep track of, and it took everything in him not to turn in his seat to investigate for himself what happened for her to flee the safety of the table, or go after her even. Because even if he wanted to, even if he needed nothing more than to make sure she was okay, he couldn’t move an inch. Not with the gun being pointed at all of his important organs by the experienced killer with a smile.

“Do you know why I’m so good at my job?” Cat asked in a sweet tone, her eyes cold and calculating as she cocked the gun beneath the seat.

“Because you kill without compunction or remorse,” Spencer bit, the flirty look in his expression long gone the second he’d heard the rest of his team calling for his girlfriend. He needed to keep his head, Bugsy was safe so long as she was far away from the woman pointing the gun at him. Having the weapon aiming for him he could deal with.

“That only gets a girl so far in life,” Cat agreed with a nod, her jaw setting in a hard clench, “No, it’s because I think through every possible outcome and then I plan accordingly,”

And Bugsy’s stomach seized hearing her voice so cold and viscous, and she would give anything to hear her partner flirting with that bitch of a woman if it meant she knew he was safe. She emptied her stomach again right as she heard their UnSub speak once more.

“You see, I didn’t walk into your trap. You walked into mine,”

And with that Bugsy gave another hurl.

–

“Spencer, why did you take time off from the FBI?” Cat insisted, her voice nails on a chalkboard, and he felt the apathy on his face flick into slight annoyance.

Bugsy. Because Bugsy had been ill, because she hadn’t been sleeping, because she hadn’t been herself for a few months, because his mom had gotten worse, because they needed him.

Spencer would take the bullet before he ever told her about Bugsy, because he knew for a woman who loved male attention, telling her about the girl he loved most in the world would only draw a big target on her back, and he would never dare to put her at risk. Never again.

Not a single hair on her head, he’d promised. Not even a scratch.

“You can ask me as many times as you want but I’m still not going to tell you,” He snipped, making sure to keep his face expressionless if he really wanted to sell the deal that she was a nobody to him.

Her mouth tightened in frustration, “Then you’re cheating, and I don’t like cheaters,”

“You don’t get everything you want just because you’re pointing a gun at me under the table.” He stated blankly, his team waiting on bated breath to see if they needed to send in their back up since JJ’s cover had already been blown. “You’re not the first killer to point a gun at me, you’re not even the first woman to point a gun at me. Sorry.”

Cat’s smile shifted into something akin to a snarl, and she leaned forward on her elbows, and Spencer matched her challenge with cool ease. “You’re really gonna take this all the way, aren’t you?”

And Spencer smiled wryly, because her composure was collapsing beneath her, “Yeah,”

“So am I,”

“Dave, go,” Hotch ordered, and Rossi drew his gun beneath a napkin, shuffling to his feet, “Prentiss, where the hell are you?”

And she knew she was wasting time, but her stomach had picked the worst time to flip. Perhaps it was the anxiety, or the pressure of a gun being pointed at her love, or maybe it was bad chicken. Either way her mouth felt like it was stuffed with cotton, her legs weak where she’d crouched on the floor, and she chided herself for not being able to pull it together when Spencer needed her.

And as if her nerves weren’t rattled enough, she heard Spencer’s mic mute out, and she knew then that the time for sticking her head in the bowl and screaming at herself to get up was over. Spencer was in trouble. Two of their agents' cover was blown. With Tara and Derek sitting the opposite end of the restaurant, he was alone if Cat Adams decided to pull that trigger.

Spitting the rancid taste from her mouth into the toilet, she reached up for the flush, wiping her mouth with a handful of toilet paper.

“Hotch,” She tuned in, and she heard the sighs of relief as he and Penelope seemed to both ease slightly at hearing her voice, “I’m back, how’s Rossi?”

“His cover’s blown, he’s heading out to find JJ,” Hotch responded, his heart rate in his throat the second he’d heard her sound through. He knew it would be unfair if he pulled her from field work for another three months, but the second she’d disappeared from their screens, he’d already began thinking of the excuse he could give if it meant he knew she was kept out of harm’s way, “Where are you, are you hurt?”

“No, no, just,” She cleared her throat, leaving the stall and heading for the sinks, “Bad chicken I guess,”

Taking a handful of cold water up to her mouth, she swilled the liquid around to try freshen herself up, sputtering it back into the sink and running the back of her hand over her lips.

“Do you need to get out of there?” Hotch asked, the concern thick in his tone, almost as clear as it was on his brow as he leaned in to Penelope’s monitor, “Lewis and Morgan have got eyes-”

“No, I’m not leaving him out there,” She protested, leaning over the sink with an exhausted huff, “I can’t head back to the table, she’ll know I was with Rossi,”

And as if she had spoken a plea to the universe, one of the waitresses waltzed through the bathroom door carrying glass cleaner and a bunch of fresh toilet paper under her arm, smiling sweetly at Bugsy who seemed like any other patron of their restaurant.

Her eyes snapped over the girl’s body, figuring she was about the same size, perhaps a tiny bit bigger than herself, she almost audibly heard the click of the idea and before she knew it she had reached out to grab the girl’s attention.

She just hoped it worked, because otherwise the scolding she was going to receive from Hotch wouldn’t be worth it in the slightest.

“Here’s what I’m gonna do, I’m gonna penalise you by adding ten minutes because I actually did learn something important.” Cat said with a smirk, her finger flicking over the clock on his phone as she prolonged the countdown, and Spencer squirmed where she shuffled closer to him, close enough that their knees were touching and he could feel where the toe of her heels were teasingly stroking up his calf, like threatening him and his team for information was getting her off. He felt filthy, like he’d need a dozen showers before he fell into his girlfriend’s arms, and part of him considered skipping the whole dinner and speech, asking her the second he saw her again if she would be his wife.

Because this, having another woman so close, was making him sick.

“Oh really? What’s that?” He snapped, his patience wearing thin as his lips pressed in a straight line.

“Your back up, I flushed them out,” She replied with a smirk, looking around the room with an arrogance Spencer wished he could wipe right off of her face, “It’s just me and you now,”

“Hi, how are we all doing this wonderful evening?” A chirpy voice came from the end of the table, slamming two menus down between them hard enough that their attention snapped to her immediately. Spencer felt his eyes morph into horror, though he fought hard to hide it, as he saw a familiar face, the same one that had been running through his mind since, well, forever. Her red dress was gone, replaced with a maroon shirt and a black pencil skirt, her hair tied back in a neat bun and she had a pen pushed behind her ear for good measure as she smiled at them tightly.

Bugsy had really done it this time.

“My name is Emily and I’ll be your waitress. Can I get you started with some drinks?”

–

“Prentiss, what in god’s name have you done?” Hotch barked, as she waltzed behind the bar, ignoring the looks from the barman that clearly had never seen her working there before.

“I’m making sure Spencer has back up if she decides to get trigger happy,” She bit back, snagging a pitcher of water from the fridge and two crystalline glasses, placing them on an upturned tray.

“And what happens if she gets trigger happy towards the waitress that won’t leave them alone?” Morgan snipped, shooting her a look where their table faced the long, walnut coloured bar that wrapped around the back of the establishment.

“Well then, I guess we pray there’s a doctor in the house that isn't Spencer,” She huffed, plastering a fake smile on her lips, and carefully shuffling the tray onto her palm, “You’re going to have to take me out yourselves if you think I’m leaving him there alone,”

And they huffed, Hotch running a hand through his hair. Because they knew she wasn’t kidding. God help the man who tried to stop Bugsy when she had her mind to something.

And with that resounding silence, she listened to Spencer’s mic, hoping to catch a foot in to the conversation.

“You should have seen right through me the moment you walked in, but you didn’t,” He said, and she didn’t need to take a glance at Cat’s face to know she was getting more than riled up. Why was she here? What happened to staying with Rossi where it was safe? It was her first day back in the field, what was she doing? He didn’t think he’d ever been so angry, though he knew if he scratched the surface of the feeling he’d find it was fear. And unfortunately for the woman sat opposite him, he’d stopped pulling his punches because of it. “You couldn’t. Because you can’t get to the man you really want to hurt, so you need to hurt every man who reminds you of him,”

Cat’s face flashed with what he could have sworn was hurt, before her eyes steeled back over and she shrugged nonchalantly, as if he hadn’t hit straight home, “That’s kind of boiler plate psychology, isn’t it? I’m just another girl with daddy issues,”

“You’d be surprised how many killers do what they do because of their parents,” He snapped back, because he couldn’t dare take his eyes from their UnSub, no matter how desperately his gut told him to check on Bugsy. “If it’s so boilerplate, let's test that theory. How hard did you look for him?”

Her mouth screwed up in bitterness, “Very hard,”

“And how disappointed were you when you realised you will never find him?” Spencer drove the knife in deeper, watching Cat’s resolve fade under his hateful stare, “You needed some other outlet for your rage and for a while this worked, but it also tripped you up,”

And Bugsy stopped, because Spencer always had a way of saying the exact right thing that made her brain tick into genius, like everything about him made her the best version of herself even if he didn’t mean to. That was what tripped her up. Her father.

“Hotch, it’s her dad,” She murmured, flashing a couple of customers an easy smile as she took the plates off their table, because Cat would catch on way too fast if she seemed to be the only person not be doing a job, “That’s what she wants, that’s her endgame,”

And there was only a single second between them, before Hotch caught up to that wonderfully big brain of hers, “Serial killers with an endgame will do anything to get to them, even if it means taking themselves down with it,”

“Why would I make you sit here for thirty minutes?” Cat’s voice crawled down her ear piece as she burst through the kitchen doors, dumping the plates at the pot wash and looking to where JJ and Rossi were talking with the manager.

“Because you’re stalling,” Spencer said, though he didn’t have that usual tone that told her he was sure of himself, and she knew from the direction it was going that something was missing. They’d missed something, otherwise they’d have Cat in cuffs by now.

“Then you don’t know me at all,” She hissed back, and Bugsy shook her nerves out through her fingers, peeking at where they were sat through the thin glass pane on the door, “Do you think I would show up here without an escape plan. Or is that just what another girl with daddy issues would do? Maybe if you hadn’t fallen victim to your own gender bias, and yes all men have gender bias, even you Dr Reid, you would have recognized that your entire strategy was based on one faulty detail. Can you see it?”

Spencer paused, his frown shifting on his face, “You’re not here alone,”

“And my partner? Less paranoid than you think,” She said, and by the sounds of it the smirk was back on her face, and Bugsy fought the sneer twitching at her lips.

“You planted a bomb in the building,” Came Spencer's response, the grave realisation setting all three agents into motion. JJ’s head whirled to where their youngest stood by the door, her eyes widening at her partner’s words.

And for a second she wanted to beg Bugsy to take cover outside, to get out while she still could, because it had been a miracle the last time a building had exploded around her and she’d only broken a few bones. JJ didn’t think she could stand to grieve her for good, not the girl who had already gone through so much for them. All because they had missed it.

But she knew better, knew Bugsy would fight tooth and nail to stay if Spencer was still in the building. Knew that that argument would only be futile, a waste of time, because the Prentiss girl was not leaving.

“We’ll go check it out, you stay put,” JJ ordered, drawing her gun to her side as Rossi did the same and Bugsy nodded, “Don’t do anything stupid, don’t draw attention to yourself, Spencer knows what he’s doing,”

And Bugsy paused before she answered, choosing to give them a slow nod because she already had a good idea of what her next move would be, and it absolutely did not involve staying put.

Like hell she would stay put while he was there.

With that, JJ and Rossi turned on their heel to head for the stairs leading underneath the building, and Bugsy picked the tray back up, right as Lewis burst through the revolving doors, a serious look on her primped face.

“We need to evacuate,” Tara said, and Bugsy nodded, flicking a look behind her to where the rest of the kitchen seemed to be waiting on their order, because the second JJ had flashed the FBI badge, they had frozen.

“You get the customers out safely, I’m going to buy us some time,” Bugsy said, and Tara watched her slip through into the restaurant, the tray pressed against her stomach.

This was stupid. Stupider than she’d ever been, but her thoughts struggled to make sense whenever Spencer was in trouble. And it was like she saw the splash of his brains against the table, the same way she’d seen it in Lewis’s house all on the ceiling, like she could see now just what his organs would look like when Adams shot him however many time in the abdomen.

She couldn’t think like that. They would be okay, they would figure it out together, they always did. They always managed to put their heads together when they were in trouble.

Being in danger together seemed like a much better bet than having to watch the love of her life killed in the middle of this damn restaurant because she hadn’t done anything. She wanted to do everything with him for the rest of her sorry life, and if that meant sitting at the nozzle end of a pistol with him, then so be it.

She just hoped he would forgive her quickly.

“All we want to do is-” She heard Spencer begin, the other waiters filtering out of the kitchen with shaken looks on their faces, as they carefully slipped their patrons the bill that had already paid off, asking them to leave calmly and quietly.

“Minimise collateral damage, I get it, I’m not mad,” Cat snapped back, rolling her eyes, “It’ll give me the cover I need to slip out. I just need to know it’s clear, so do me a favour and tell your boss that nobody leaves until its safe for me to do so,”

Spencer chewed his tongue. He couldn’t let her leave, not when they had her so close, not when they were pursuing Penelope, not when they were so close to catching the woman responsible for so many kills.

Spencer hated losing, he hated knowing that she was about to get away because he had been too wrapped up in his overwhelming thoughts to figure out her plan, too busy fretting over the two women who meant the most to him to think ten steps ahead like he usually did.

He’d been sloppy, even though he knew he should cut himself some slack. His fiancee, girlfriend, had been tortured, his mother facing a different kind of terror in her mind altogether. He hadn’t been thinking about work, he’d been thinking of the house they were going to buy with the picket fence and the porch swing and the mortgage, and the damn ring-

“Well?” Cat’s goading voice ripped him out of his reverie, and he huffed in defeat, “Spencer?”

“You can leave,” He murmured, the agitation scratching at his skin because he was struggling to think of a final card to play. He was usually so good at games, usually won every single one of them. But his head couldn’t settle when Bugsy wasn’t near, when he couldn’t make sure she was safe.

Cat shuffled out of the side of the booth, her eyes flicking across the restaurant for her contact, and Spencer had barely opened his mouth in protest before he watched the UnSub walk straight into a waitress, a false smile slipping on her face as to not raise alarm.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t watching where I was-” And yet his breath hitched when he spotted the hair he’d ran his fingers through just that morning yanked into a bun, the lips he could kiss for an entire lifetime curled in disdain, the body he worshipped refusing to move out of the way for the woman in a hurry.

And it seemed Cat only realised that the woman who had brought them water wasn’t a waitress at all, despite her plain face that had faded into the background, despite the fact Spencer hadn’t given her a second glance; Only when she heard a gun cocking behind the serving tray at her stomach did the fake smile drop from Cat Adams face.

Because she hadn’t flushed out Spencer’s back up. Not while Bugsy was still alive and breathing.

“Sit back down,” Bugsy growled, keeping her tone low but with enough bite that Cat’s eyes narrowed to hide the surprise.

“Well, well, seems I hadn’t planned for everything, I thought a pretty face like you would know better than to pull a gun on a woman with her finger on the big red button,” Cat said wryly, though Bugsy caught her eyeing up her chest as if to be checking for a bullet vest, “Move out the way, sweetheart. You don’t want this to get ugly,”

Spencer’s jaw flexed as he ground his teeth, though he kept his breathing even. What was she doing?

He didn’t care that he had no more power over her than anyone else on the team, he wanted to drag her out of the room himself if it meant she would stop throwing herself in the way of danger.

“Unfortunately, sweetheart, that’s not happening.” Bugsy snapped back, her expression melting into something rogue, something teasing as she leaned towards Cat with a challenge in her eyes. “You’re going to sit back down, and I’m going to show you exactly why you should have accounted for a pretty face like me,”

“You’re stalling,” Cat snickered, trying to push past the waitress, who wasn’t a waitress at all but an FBI agent, only for her hand to shoot out and grab her wrist, tossing the tray on the table.

Spencer felt his heart lurch into his throat as he saw both of them pull their guns to waist height, a blink and you’d miss it kind of movement, and it was like he’d seen the game set and matched then and there.

Bugsy wasn’t backing down. And neither was Cat.

“I make it a habit of knowing what kind of women are going on dates with my boyfriend,” Bugsy’s hand tightened around her wrist, watching the surprise flicker in the woman’s eyes, and she scoffed, “What? You really thought all that flirting and nervous glances were real?”

And the woman said nothing, her ego clearly a little hurt, though Bugsy was just sticking to the profile, and the profile said she revelled in male attention.

“Cat got your tongue?” Bugsy snipped through a grin, even if her chest was pounding at the feeling of the gun pointing at her abdomen, “Well, lucky for you I have a present for you. On the condition you sit back down and play my game,”

“You think I’m going to fall for that shit?” Cat seethed. It was one thing to outsmart a man, that was fair game, that was easy pickings for a woman like her. But a woman, a woman who seemed to love playing with her food as much as she did. That was different, “What is it, a reduced sentence? The good TV in my two by four cell? You can keep dreaming, I don’t want your worthless promises,”

“I’d hardly call your daddy dearest worthless,” Bugsy mused, and she watched Cat’s expression falter, “A dead beat drunk maybe, but worthless? A little harsh considering you waited so long to meet him,”

Cat paused, eyes flicking over the woman’s face for any signs of a lie, “You have my father?”

And Bugsy smirked, “Do I look like I’m bluffing?” But her face was set in stone, and Cat hated to admit she seemed too confident to be lying, “Why don’t you make this a little easier for everyone and sit back down. I’m not done with you yet,”

The murderess scowled, her shoulders straightening as she ripped her wrist out of Bugsy’s grip and retreated back to the booth.

And it was only then that Bugsy looked at Spencer, his eyes wide in a horrid mix of terror and rage, and it was a sight she swore she never wanted directed at her again. But she couldn’t leave him, he had to understand that. Because if all the bets were off, if all the cards were dealt, she knew he would need to be dragged screaming from the building before he left her to deal with a hostile UnSub alone.

And Spencer knew that too, of course he knew that. Yet it didn’t diminish the sickening worry bubbling up in his chest as the women sat down at the table, and their game had a playing field.

“So, I take it this is the darling wife you wanted killed,” Cat sneered, and Spencer didn’t dare take his eyes off the woman with the gun, even if Bugsy did have one pointed right back at her, “I don’t blame you, I’d want to be rid of her too,”

And they both knew it was a dig, a stab in the interest of getting them both riled up. But it wouldn’t go far. Because despite the anger Spencer felt dwindling in his chest, he always worked better with her. Like a puzzle piece in the tangle of his mind had clicked into place, and suddenly they were a team again, and she seemed more like herself than she had in months, an ease about the way she leaned back in the plush seat despite the fact her finger was resting on the trigger.

“Have you ever played Cat’s cradle?” Bugsy asked her, knocking her knee against his as if she’d heard his thoughts. They were together in this. Together. Even if the building went up in flames and bullets and the plan went to shit. Just the two of them, the way they’d always been.

And he felt himself ease back too, something akin to security shifting over him. They always were safer together.

Cat’s eyebrows raised as Bugsy dodged her comment, “What, do you want to braid my hair like sixth graders, too? What about it?”

Bugsy shrugged, reaching over with her free hand to the glass of water she’d set down for the two of them, “The way I see it, Cat, you have got those little paws caught in yarn and are scrambling to get out of it,” She chuckled, taking a quick sip, “Now, if we were to let you go, you’d end up walking out of here scot free, and who knows, might even blow up the whole building anyway. But, if we help you out of this little tangle you’ve got us all in, then maybe we cut a deal that doesn’t involve all of us going out in a ball of flames and champagne. Sounds good right?”

The woman’s lips pursed tightly, her head tilting in annoyance, “Alright. Get on with it, no one likes a show off. How did you find my father?”

Bugsy smirked, “Well that was pretty easy once you have access to the files we have. We traced your birth record to a Daniel Adams, who did in fact leave the country in 1987 but returned in 2012. Based on confidential records in rehabs and sober living houses, which in turn pointed us to flophouses and soup kitchens.”

The brunette’s eye twitched, like the girl had just spat in her face, which was what it felt like, and she felt the taste of her own medicine was just as sour as she’d always presumed.

“He couldn’t put twenty four hours together sober, sweetheart,” Bugsy summarised, shrugging her shoulders as if it was no big deal to her, just another bum on the street, “You can probably imagine our surprise to find that he lives here in DC,”

“Where?” Cat hissed, and Bugsy snickered, shaking her head and taking another sip of her water.

“I’m an agent, not a miracle worker. It wasn’t that simple,” She replied, boredly tracing her finger over the restaurants emblem they had printed on the napkin, “I found him on the street, showed him your picture and said I’d like to ask him some questions about his darling daughter,”

Cat’s lip pulled down in annoyance, her matt red lipstick smudging with her pout, “And?”

And perhaps Bugsy was being cruel. Perhaps she was playing into the profile that indicated Cat needed someone to match her wit and zeal if she was going to listen. Men, she could squash like bugs. Bugsy, ironically, not so much.

Perhaps she was thinking about how she’d reached into Spencer's pants to retrieve his gun, and wanted some of what she was saying to hurt.

“He didn’t even know he had a daughter,” Bugsy said simply, with a small shrug of her shoulders, and she watched the woman’s onyx brown eyes glisten with unshed tears as the realisation crashed on her, "Didn't really seem to care,"

“He-he didn’t remember me?” Cat asked, the tease that had been there half an hour ago wiped clear from her tone, and Bugsy shook her head.

“Nope,” She said, popping the last syllable, “Alcoholism really rocks your brain. Sorry, honey,”

Adams scoffed, shaking her head with venom, “You’re not sorry. Sorry is what people say when they don’t understand,”

And Bugsy’s brows raised, a bitter empathy flicking in her gaze. Quick, but not so quick that Cat didn’t catch it, and she shuffled in her seat.

“Oh,” Their UnSub paused, the trodden down look on her face rekindling with interest, “But you understand, don’t you? What, does your father like a good beer or ten, princess?”

Bugsy snickered emptily, “Ofcourse I understand,” She said, leaning over the table to hold the woman’s glare, because like hell would she back down just because Cat was treading on home ground, “I haven’t spoken to my father in five years. He picked the hot wife and holidays to Aruba over his little girl and he thought a new pony or two would make up for all the times he forgot Christmas. I can’t even remember the last time he sent me a birthday card on time, and yeah he was a bit of a mean bastard once he'd had a whiskey,” She shook her head with contempt, and she felt Spencer knock his knee against hers gently, but she only watched the viper woman with careful eyes. And to her shock, Cat seemed like she understood her, like she had some kind of respect for her telling the truth. “Don’t look so surprised. I’m very good at making sure old guys like that get what’s coming to them. Or is that just what another girl with daddy issues would do?”

Cat’s face seemed to shrivel in frustration when she heard her words repeated back to her, “Is that really why you came here today? To help me?” And Bugsy tilted her head, knowing their UnSub was running out of time, that her window of opportunity was closing with the patrons of the restaurant getting antsy to leave. “Do you know how many men have told me they want to help me?”

Letting her expression smooth into empathy, she leaned forward, her tone dropping into a hushed murmur, “That may well be true, sweetheart, but from where I’m sitting, I’m not a man,”

And Cat paused, something like regret drifting over her face, before she spoke again, “Do you want to know how that worked out for them?”

And with that, JJ and Rossi watched the C4 charge’s switch to green, indicating their line was live and ready to blow.

“Hotch, she just armed the bomb,”

Bugsy’s expression dropped an inch, the sight of it making Cat’s lips curl into a cheshire smile.

“You’re not the only one with a loyal partner, honey,”

But the Prentiss woman was quick on her heels, watching Morgan and Tara rise from their place at another booth, heading towards a woman sitting at the bar on her phone, and she forced her lips together to stop herself from looking too smug to cause suspicion.

“It seems so,” Bugsy agreed with a nod, handing her gun off to Spencer beneath the table.

If he was confused, he didn’t show it, probably because he trusted that big brain of hers with everything in him, even if he was mad enough he could feel the annoyance oozing from his hot cheekbones. Yet to the rest of the restaurant, Cat Adams, included she hadn’t moved an inch.

“But, there is one thing I can guarantee about this partner of yours,” She said, leaning over to pour herself another glass of water casually.

Cat hummed in content, “Oh, right? What’s that?”

And Bugsy smirked, barely raising the glass to her lips as Morgan pounced on the Bomber, ripping the phone out of her hands and causing the patrons around her to yelp, “She’s sure as shit not as clever as me and my husband,”

Cat’s head whirlled around to see her partner’s face slamming into the hard wood of the bar, Tara yanking the cuffs from her belt, and she barely had time to flick back to the two agents facing her before a pitcher of ice cold water was thrown in her eyes, her thick mascara running down her cheeks and blurring her vision. Spencer dove over the table and grabbed her gun from her grasp as Bugsy ripped her out of the booth with rough hands.

She threw her to the ground in the few seconds she was disorientated, her hands tightening around her wrists as make shift cuffs, and she saw Spencer hurrying to grab the real things from his pockets.

“That was a cheap shot, you’re a cheater, you said you’d play fair,” Cat barked, her cheeks pressing against the rough carpet as the agents cuffed her, ignoring her protests and shoves.

“Honey, this is me playing fair,” Bugsy snapped with a cruel smirk, “You threatened my friends, you stuck your hand in my boyfriend’s pants, and pointed a gun at him. Believe me I could have done so much worse,”

And with that Cat Adams was hauled off the ground by the two of them, as they led her out to the police van waiting outside the restaurant.

–

The doors pulled open, empty, and Cat’s face dropped, because her only silver lining on the entire outcome had been that she’d be able to meet the dead beat dad that ran out on her.

That agent’s face had been so genuine as she’d said it. It had seemed so real, and yet…

“You lied to me,” She said as Bugsy set her down on the bench, Spencer pulling another set of handcuffs from his belt and the two of them looked up at her, her lashes lining with disappointment.

“If it helps, we really did try to look for him.” Spencer said, his tone blunt because she had a crazed look in her eye he didn’t like one bit the second she stared at his girlfriend.

And even though she was the one in chains, heading for prison for a twenty year sentence at the minimum, she laughed. Cackled.

“It doesn't matter anyway, I still won,” She said, that venomous gaze turning to Spencer because she had learned atleast two thing in the time she’d been sat with the two agents that ruined her life.

One. Spencer’s mother had Alzheimers, that he hadn’t been lying about. That she was sure was too real to be a story he’d pulled out his ass.

Two. The girl wasn’t phased by insults or bites or cruel words directed towards her. Yet when it was at Spencer…

“How do you figure that one?” Bugsy said, her brow furrowing as she shook her head at the woman.

“In ten years, Mommy dearest won’t remember anyone’s name,” Bugsy’s head shot up at that, her lips curling into a snarl, and she forced her fingertips into her palm to stop herself from throwing a slap at the woman’s face, “But I’ll remember yours,”

Bugsy daren’t react, no matter if her chest boiled in anger at the woman’s callous words. Spencer had to give that information up, give a small bit of his soft underbelly to get the woman to trust him enough not to shoot.

And she couldn’t exactly blame him when he rose to his feet, darting out of the van with a clenched jaw, because the day had been an entire shit show, and she knew by the growl of annoyance he let out that their was a big conversation looming over her head, one she could only see ending in a fight.

It was just the two of them in the van, Cat entirely bound to her seat, and her painted lips had pulled into a grin the second he’d stormed off, her sleek eyes snapping to Bugsy who looked ready to slit her throat.

“Oh, come on Princess, it was tit for tat,” Cat shrugged as if she didn’t seem destroyed, “You took my dad from me, I guess I had to do the same for that hubby of yours,”

Bugsy looked down at her, swallowing her rage with a purse of her lips, feeling her breath rattle with unfiltered animosity.

“You’d make a shit profiler, for what it’s worth. What you profiled about him was all off,” She snarled, stepping away from the woman and looking down at her as if she was shit on the bottom of her shoe, “At least he’s going to make a better father than the bum who would rather sleep on concrete than know you,”

And with that she slammed the doors closed behind her, darting off on Spencer’s heel.

+1. The one where she tells him.

She saw his stress lines, the way the day’s events had weighed heavy on him. He sat on the sofa, his shoes thrown by the door after a tense drive home, and she'd found a space on the coffee table in front of him.

He was quiet, he had never been quiet with her, not in the years since they’d kissed that first time in her room. He wasn’t one for the silent treatment, she knew that much. Yet he was just that. Silent.

“Are you mad at me?” She asked, her voice that of a child as her brows scrunched together in worry. She felt the words bubbling in her throat, the thing she’d needed to tell him for a week gnawing at her tongue, crawling it’s way out, only she worried that after what she had done, he might just be ten times more annoyed at her throwing herself in the line of danger.

He stayed quiet for a moment, and she thought this might turn into their first real fight in the two and bit years they’d been together. Her skin went cold at the words that loomed over them, and she knew by the way he sighed alone he was pissed.

“You can’t do that,” He said, his voice a restrained bite, and he shook his head for good measure, “You can’t put yourself in the way of danger again, I can’t do that again, not after Scratch.”

Her throat closed up with tears, and she glanced at him, her fingers itching to take his warm hands in her own, her body begging to preen into him, have him kiss her and tell her he wasn’t mad, that he still loved her, that everything was okay. But he wouldn’t. Not because he didn’t feel any of that, of course he still loved her, but the wet that lined his lashes told her all she needed to know. That seeing what Scratch had done to her had scared him enough that even the idea of her coming close to a hostile UnSub with a loaded gun, that straying from the plan that was designed to keep everyone safe, had tipped him into a grey area that had him both wanting to hold her close and never let her go whilst yelling at her in that broken cadence to show her just how hurt he was.

“I’m sorry, I just-” She choked, her eyes becoming watery and pathetic and she hated crying during arguments, not wanting to look weak but that was exactly how she felt. Weak. Like she had no backbone to lean on because she knew she shouldn’t have intervened, but the snake-like woman undressing her boyfriend with her eyes while cocking a weapon at him had pushed her over the edge.

“Oh, you’re sorry, that makes it much better,” Spencer shook his head, furrowing his brows and it was only when he leaned forward that the salty hot tears dribbled down his cheek. “You- you can’t just do that, Bugsy, you know that right?”

She nodded, the words building in her trachea like word vomit, like she wanted to scream the confession at him that she should have given him the second she’d found out. “I know, I’m sorry,” She said again, her words entirely warbled with guilt because she’d never seen him so distraught, and she thought back to the horror that had spread on his face when she’d sat down.

“You can’t do that to me, sweetheart, do you understand?” His tone had shifted, something a little softer and he grabbed her hands tightly when her shoulders hunched together, and she leaned forward to try to hide her cries in her lap, sitting silently like a scolded child, “What were you thinking? You just got back into the field today, you could have been hurt, you could have gotten someone else hurt-”

“I know, I know, I’m sorry,” She sniffled, her expression truly guilty, because everything he was saying was exactly true, she could have gotten him shot. “I didn’t think, I wasn’t thinking, I just was worried that…” She trailed off, her heart rate spiking when the words almost slipped from her tongue. She couldn’t tell him, not like this.

“What?” Spencer pressed, because he didn’t like the look of whatever had just passed over her face, and she shook her head in denial, “Bug, tell me,”

“No, I can’t,” Her breath clogged in her chest, coming out in a shaky rattle, and it was then that he leaned forward even more, trying to dip his head down to catch her eye, "Not like this,"

“Please tell me,” He begged, his eyes still stinging where another wave of tears threatened to burst at the seam when she shook her head again, her chin pressing down into her chest because he hated this. He hated arguing with her. “I’m sorry I yelled, I didn’t mean to, honey, I just got- worried.”

“I know,” She said quietly through another sniffle, rubbing her cheek on her shoulder to dry it, “I know, I’m sorry I didn’t think it through I just,” She took a deep breath, because she knew she needed to tell him, knew there was no more running from it.

He lifted a palm to her cheek, his thumb skirting under her eyelashes, and he forced himself together because he could never stand to see her cry, not when it was partially his fault, “What?”

“I just can’t do this without you,” She murmured, her heart in her throat, and it only made it difficult to swallow. She chanced a look at Spencer, his eyes wet and red and worried as she continued, “I can’t be the one to tell this kid their dad died because I didn’t do anything,”

“What..” He started, his brows immediately falling into a frown as he looked at her. She swore she could hear every single contraction of her heart muscles in her ears, the blood rushing through her veins making it sound like waves crashing on a shore right in her eardrum.

“It’s still fixable,” She jumped in, before he could say anything, like she needed to justify immediately what she’d said, or even just talk to fill the silence because she hated not knowing what he was thinking, “It’s only five weeks along, I still have time to… fix it-”

“Five weeks- you-you’re pregnant?” Spencer’s eyes were wide, with horror or shock she had no idea, nor did she want to find out judging by the way he had turned pale, reading between the lines, “W-What- fix it? Is that what you want to do?”

She stopped, because he seemed to be keeping a lid on his emotions, trying his hardest to sound calm and somehow that made it all the more worse. Because she would rather him get angry, or get frustrated and tell her this was too soon, or tell her there was no way he was ready to be a father, because at least then the pressure of it wasn’t on her back to decide for both of them.

But he would never, and she didn’t know why she’d ever second guessed him. He wasn’t yelling, or turning away, or leaving her the second things got tough, because it was Spencer. And Spencer would never. Spencer gave her the choice of what she wanted to do.

She stopped, her lungs suddenly feeling just that bit tighter, as she shrugged pitifully, and she thought this was perhaps not the most ideal way to tell someone you’re pregnant, “I-I don’t know, I think…” She stopped, because what did she think? She’d been so wrapped up in worrying about what Spencer would think, worrying about his mom and her nightmares and Cat God Damn Adams that she hadn’t even let herself entertain the thought of a little them.

But if she said she didn’t like the idea of a little boy with Spencer’s hair and glasses and smile, if she said she couldn’t see the photo album his mom had handed her full of pictures of their kids butt naked and watering the flower beds, she would be a liar.

“I think… it would take a lot of work, I mean it’s a baby for christ sakes, Bugsy, of course it’ll take work,” He nodded slowly as she chided herself, but she felt his hands tighten on hers, and the tiny gesture gave her the encouragement she needed. She took another breath, that boy with brown curls and her eyes in a jedi costume flashing through her head, “But.. I think having a mini you is everything I could have ever wished for,”

His lip quivered for a minute, and she worried she’d said the wrong thing. And then…

He smiled, wider than she’d ever seen him, like she could count every single one of his teeth, and she copied him despite the way a frog leapt into her throat, and she saw his eyes line with a fresh set of tears.

“Really, we’re really doing this?” Spencer asked, quietly, like someone could hear them, or perhaps he couldn’t believe himself even as he said it. He thought his chest was about to explode, thought his heart could never love someone so much as he loved her, thought it would never beat the same way again as it had before he’d been told he was going to have a baby with the woman he’d been in love with for nearly nine years. She nodded, her shy smile turning into something happy, maybe even excited as he pulled her in for an achingly sweet kiss, his hands cupping her cheeks as he kissed her lips over and over and over again, ignoring the salt that trapped in her skin, and he realised then he had started crying just as much as she had. Two wailing saps sitting in their living room, happier than they’d ever dreamed they were allowed to be. “I love you, I love you, I love you more than anything, I was so stupid, I’m so sorry I shouted-”

She chuckled, shaking her head, and drawing him back in for a long, silencing kiss, “I was stupid, very stupid.” Bugsy said, the weight lifting off her chest like a dumbbell had been moved, and she could breath again. Because Spencer kissed her like he wanted to merge their bodies into one, like he didn’t care for breath anymore as long as he had her lips on his, and she couldn’t help think if that was what he thought of her too, “No more being stupid from either of us. Kid’s got to have at least one smart parent,“

He smiled, enough joy in his eyes to make her think she was handing him the universe. And yet that was exactly how he felt. Like everything he dreamt of as a kid, when he was in his room wishing his dad had stayed because sometimes looking after his mom was tough on a twelve year old, or when he’d held Henry for the first time and thought maybe he wouldn’t be terrible at it by the time it was his turn.

He looked at Bugsy, the idea of their kid growing inside her, about the size of a petit pois pea at five weeks, and Spencer damn near felt like he’d won the lottery.

And all thoughts of Cat Adams were gone from both of their minds, the viper woman she wished she had gotten a good right hook to when she’d had the chance entirely unimportant now.

Because they were going to be a family, more so than they already were. And Bugsy felt as though she couldn’t love Spencer any more than she already did, but she could love his baby more than she’d ever thought possible.

taglists:

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#spencer reid x reader #spencer reid imagine #criminal minds x reader #spencer reid fanfiction #matthew gray gubler x reader #i love bugsy & spence #spencer reid fanfic #dr spencer reid #spencer reid #criminal minds fic #criminal minds #matthew grey gubler x reader

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spider-stark · 11 days ago

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GREED IS GOD

Kaz Brekker x Reader

Summary - If Kaz Brekker insists on being a jerk to you, then why does he keep threatening the boys you like?

Warnings - fem!reader, toxic, subtle power dynamic, kaz being emotionally constipated, could deviate from canon, based more on book!kaz than show, !minors dni 18+!

Word Count - 2.2k

// masterlist // send me your thoughts // comments & reblogs appreciated! //

“You had no fucking right, Brekker!”

The words tear straight from your throat, rageful as you swing open the door to one of the Crow Club’s private gambling parlors. Inside, several heads snap to where you’re looming in the doorway. Some of them wear baffled looks, unsettled by the violence of your intrusion, while others look as if they’re holding in a cheeky laugh behind tight lips.

You’re not sure what they find so funny, whether it’s the prospect of Kaz Brekker getting his ass handed to him by a girl or something to your expense.

The grunts—about ten of them, in total—sit around a black poker table, the center of which is lavishly adorned with the striking silhouette of a crow, styled in sleek, bloody crimson. At its head is Dirtyhands himself, his elbows digging into the bolstered edge, leather-clad fingers pressed together in a stiff steeple.

His eyes slide to yours, cold and detached.

Your chest locks, lungs constricting around a breath.

“I assume you’ve all been introduced,” Kaz rasps, a terse nod in your direction, “to the Dregs dearest asset and resident instigator.”

There’s a snort or two, but no laughter. No one can ever tell when Kaz Brekker is making a joke, and as such, it’s best to never laugh at him.

In the main hall behind you, the Crow Club’s usual clamor seems to grow, low-lives and thugs barking over games of Blackjack and Craps. It’s loud and obnoxious, a rival to the incessant pounding in your head, your blood turned to an erratic rush in your ears.

It hits you this might’ve been a bad idea.

Then—like an idiot—you choose to double-down.

“You had no right.” The words catch in your teeth, serrated on the way out. You point at him. “You over-fucking-stepped, Brekker!”

It’s a domino effect, the low snicker of one grunt setting off the next until they’re all laughing at you, chortling like a bunch of rowdy pigs. Your fingers curl, rage smarting—but then there’s embarrassment, too, red hot as it crawls up your neck.

Why is it that a man's anger earns restraint, but a woman’s is entertainment?

Before you think to find the answer in the way Jesper would—by drawing the pistol at your hip and shooting a Saintsdamned hole in the ceiling—Kaz lifts a commanding hand.

“Shut up. All of you.”

Kaz doesn’t raise his voice. He doesn’t have to.

The grunts fall into a wary silence. Kaz’s glower drags around the table, marking each face. The men start shifting in their seats like the cushions have been set on fire, but they’re too afraid to stand up.

“Get out.”

Chairs screech back. Cheap boots scuff against polished floors, the grunts shuffling toward you in a disorganized heap. You suck in a breath, turning sideways to let them file out past you. They avoid your gaze—not because they’re scared of you, of course, but because Dirtyhands had already snapped their leash once tonight.

When the last grunt skulks out, Kaz gives you an order, too.

“Close the door.”

And damn if your feet don’t obey, so used to blind obedience that you immediately step into the parlor and do as he bids, a palm pressed flat to the door's glossy-black paint, feeling it in your bones when it clicks shut.

The air shifts.

A lump forms in your throat. The sensation of a noose getting tighter, tighter—the persistent, strangling fear of a child who knows they’re about to be scolded, who's still innocent enough to wonder if maybe, just maybe, they can escape it by crawling under their bed, by keeping their back turned.

But you’re not a child. And this isn’t your fault.

You turn around.

“Do you know what keeps men in line?” Kaz asks, giving you no time to answer before he continues, “I’ll give you a hint. It’s not respect. Not loyalty, either. So what is it? What keeps a gang from going off the deep end, from turning order into chaos?”

You swallow. Try to feign nonchalance. “I don’t know, Brekker. The enduring power of friendship?”

Kaz doesn’t so much as blink.

“Fear,” he answers simply, firmly. “Fear keeps them in line. Fear of consequence, fear of uncertainty—” he leans slightly forward, gaze unnervingly intense—“fear of me. And do you know what jeopardizes that fear?”

Your skin feels tight. “Me?”

An irked, tight-lipped smile. “Exactly. You.”

Kaz relaxes back into his chair, and it strikes you how he almost looks like a fixture of the room—his dark, austere style blending seamlessly with the parlor’s imposing black-and-crimson decor. Or maybe that’s not right. Maybe it’s the other way around—the parlor, the Crow Club itself, exists merely as an extension of Kaz. It’s his blood woven into the crow’s silhouette, the blackness of his soul that paints the walls.

A tired, gloved hand combs through his slicked hair. Pink lips part with a sigh that feels purposeful. “So. Next time you want to act all big and make a fool of yourself, give me enough time to clear the room, hm? That way, I don’t have to deal with men getting it in their heads that they can talk back to me all because you do it without losing your tongue. Understood?”

You suck on a tooth, glancing off to one side. It takes a minute for words to find you, and when they finally do, they spill out in a frustrated heap. “Raske told me about Leon,” you tell him, more an accusation than a statement.

Images flash in your mind, the spattered freckles and gap-toothed smile of the dealer you’d gotten sweet with.

The dealer that, as of a few days ago, disappeared from the Crow Club without a trace.

“What,” you press, brows lifting expectantly, “you’re not even gonna say anything? Deny it, even?”

His expression is one of perfect neutrality. Still, the tiniest hint of satisfaction slinks into his tone. “I’m not sure why you’re so upset,” he tells you, almost patronizing. “Did Raske not tell you everything? I was quite gracious, all things considered. He even convinced me to let Leon keep his tongue.”

A scoff pushes from your lungs, frustration bubbling into childish fury. It takes all your restraint to keep from stomping your foot at him.

“You broke his hand, Kaz!”

He looks offended. “I broke both of his hands,” he corrects you, the distinction incredibly important. “Leon should consider himself lucky I didn’t take a finger for all the times he’s been caught skimming. So long as the bones heal, he should relearn his shuffle just fine.”

But you’re no fool. The bones won’t heal. Not properly.

Leon will never deal again. You’ll never see him. And Kaz…

Kaz wins.

“Leon isn’t a skimmer,” you defend, a bitter growl as you stomp for the poker table. You stop opposite him, palms pressed flat to the felt-top as you hold his stare. “And even if he was,” your voice cracks, “we both know that wasn’t your reason, Brekker.”

Kaz lifts his chin, the muscles in his shoulders tensing in a slight, barely perceptible shift. “Oh?”

You count on your fingers. “Leon. Junip. Teller.”

Each name tastes acidic in your mouth, cheeks burning with the memory of friends and almost-lovers, boys with nothing more than the misluck of smiling at you in a place where Dirtyhands could see.

“Kerrigan, Donni.” Your voice climbs, “Mikael, Alyn!”

How many have been punished? Made to pay for fallacies at the cost of shattered bone or cut-off digits? And why, why is it that anytime you seek happiness, Dirtyhands comes to tear it away?

“Do I need to keep going?” you finally spit. “Or have I painted well enough for you to get the picture, Brekker?”

He nods, dusting a speck of lint from his suit coat. “Oh, you’ve painted plenty well enough. This is becoming an epidemic, isn’t it? Parents giving their children such stupid names.” A harsh shadow flickers across his face. “Or was the point simply that you get around?”

The words land like a blow—and you falter with the impact.

Your stare drops, nails scraping against the felt-top. “This isn’t fair,” you mutter, head shaking.

“What isn’t?”

“This!”

It’s an exasperated breath, an explosion that wracks through your body. You shove back from the table. Kaz sits straight, a line between his brows.

“I do my job, Kaz!”

“As is expected.”

“I do more than my job!” you argue. “I do everything you ask!”

“Good.”

“I scale every rooftop, climb through every window, gather dirt on every fucking rat in this absolute sewer of a city!”

His head tilts, antagonizing, “As does Inej.”

You jab a finger to your chest. “I helped you steal a DeKappel!” you hiss, careful not to speak too loud of the one-hundred-thousand kruge painting you’d nabbed from Van Eck. “A fucking DeKappel, Kaz!”

A sigh slips from his nose. Two leather-clad fingers press to his temple, rubbing in circles as if to soothe some budding ache. “Could we speed this along?” he asks. “I’m a busy man, and dealing with Leon took precious time out of my–”

“Why?” Your voice is wretched, desperation lashing with every syllable. “Why is it never enough? Why can’t I have one, just one thing outside of my obligations to you? One thing to make me happy, one thing to-”

His hands brace the table, shoving to his feet so quickly the chair screeches from underneath him, clattering back onto the ground. “Because it makes you weak,” he snarls, low and threatening. “It distracts you.”

Bullshit. You audibly call bullshit.

Then something snaps.

Kaz slams a fist against the table, hard and loud enough to make you jolt. He won’t look at you. “Because,” he starts, pained as if the words have to slash and claw up his throat, “it distracts me.”

Everything.

Your wretched feelings, your childish fury, your anger for Leon.

It all fizzles into something static.

“It… what?”

“You heard me.”

You blink. Once. Twice.

A third time for good measure.

“Well—I did, but… Why?”

Kaz sucks a breath deep into his lungs. Low, to himself, he admits, “Because Inej was right.” Dark eyes look up. “I am selfish and violent. Hungry to the point I feel it in my bones. Greed is my god,” he rasps, wavering, “and you, you are my altar.”

Oh.

You take a step back, nearly stumbling over your own feet. “Sorry, I…” a breathy, humorless laugh. “What do you… what does that mean, exactly?”

Fucking hyperbole.

A gloved hand rakes through his hair. “That I want,” he starts, only to trail off.

But then the words settle. Become their own sentence.

“I want.” You’ve never heard Kaz this desperate. Never seen his eyes this soft, this hazy with apprehension. “It’s abhorrent and I’ve tried to stop, but I can’t. I can’t stop wanting,” a pause, a space left for the word he can’t quite form. You. You, you, you.

There’s a moment.

Silent consideration, internal debate.

Kaz is a monster, one part of you argues. He doesn’t think before he speaks, shatters the bones of any boy you bat eyes at.

Kaz is a shield, whispers the other. He’ll dismiss a room on your behalf, threaten the lives of any who might hurt you.

There’s a moment.

Then, all at once, there’s motion—glorius, frantic, thoughtless motion. The scuff of your boots across the floor; the shocked catch of his breath; the feel of stiff fabric bunched between your fingers, pulling him closer closer closer by his lapels, brow furrowing when his head turns to dodge your lips.

Gloved hands settle on your waist, the electrifying feel of cool leather brushing bare skin, shirt lifting as Kaz pushes you backwards, up onto the poker table.

“I can’t,” he struggles. But your legs tighten around his waist, core pressed to the growing bulge in his trousers, and hips seem to meet yours to the tempo of Oh, but I want to. Saints, I want to.

“I can’t,” it's a pant, a moan, his head shaking, dark eyes fluttering, “I can’t be what you deserve.”

“Then be what I want,” you beg, “be what I need.”

Your palms lay flat against his chest, slowly drifting up toward the smooth nape of his neck. Your fingertips barely graze the warmth of his skin before a leather-clad hand snaps from your waist, roughly taking hold of both your wrists.

“No,” he almost chokes, desire held back by fearful restraint. “Not yet.”

His grip loosens—trusting you to obey, to let him set the pace.

And he does.

Nimble fingers are already sliding your pistol from the holster at your hip, sliding it across the table before setting to work on your trousers, fiddling with the flimsy closures before tugging them down, bearing witness to the parts of you he’d only ever seen in dreams.

Not yet, you think, hot and desperate, cool leather grazing against sensitive skin. But eventually, inevitably.

Perhaps greed is your god, too.

a/n - yeah, idk guys? i guess i just can't write smut. the amount of times i walked up to my sister while writing this just to scream "I can't take Kaz Brekker's pants off" was alarming. alas, this exists now and maybe some of you will enjoy it! i'll give true smut another go at some point, probably will something shorter so i don't get distracted with other things lmao

anyways, would love to hear what you think (what works, what doesn't work, what you love, what you hate lmao) and thanks for reading!

#kaz brekker imagine #shadow and bone imagine #six of crows imagine #kaz brekker x fem!reader #kaz brekker x reader #six of crows x reader #six of crows fanfic #shadow and bone x reader #shadow and bone fanfic #s&b imagine #freddy carter imagine #kaz brekker x you #grishaverse imagine

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raz-writes-the-thing · 1 year ago

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Passing The Baton (Six of Crows One-Shot)

Kaz Brekker x Fem!Reader / requests are open and encouraged

Summary: To your knowledge, your crush on Kaz is unrequited. Apparently this is not the case.

CW: Kaz is dumb but we love him

SAB/SOC Tag List: (send an ask to be added to a tag list!)

___ ___ ___ ___ ___

Kaz ‘Dirtyhands’ Brekker. Bastard of The Barrel. Also- your unrequited love. Kaz had caught your eye just as he had caught everyone else’s. Everyone knew not to mess with the Dregs, and that was thanks to Kaz. Before he’d risen through the ranks of the club, the Dregs had been no one. Quite literally the dregs of society- and while, yes, that was where the name came from, it was quite the rise to fame as the Dregs started getting more and more popular, and more and more dangerous.

Even the Crow Club was starting to become a real pain in the other clubs’ asses.

But Kaz? He’d fascinated you well before any of this. You’d been working at the Crow Club as a serving girl since before Kaz arrived. Not long, mind, but long enough before that you got to experience both sides of the Dregs’ fortune.

Kaz hadn’t seemed to take much notice of you at first- and why would he? Weren’t you just another serving girl being groped by the drunk patrons? Anything to make a few Kruge. But he did take notice when you threatened to cut the balls off a patron when said patron got a little too handsy one day.

He’d taken you back into his office and thwacked his cane on the table hard enough to scratch the varnish and told you rather harshly to never do that again. To come to him next time there was an issue like that and he’d deal with it… discretely.

What that had meant was clear only to Kaz, and that was fine by you. But that was when your little crush had really taken off. What could you say? You liked a bad boy. Someone who could handle his own and Kaz could definitely handle his own. Cane or no.

Despite telling you off, Kaz had clearly taken note that you weren’t afraid to get your hands a little dirty either, something he had an appreciation and mutual respect for. And so you went from lowly serving girl to, well, still a serving girl, but a serving girl who also took jobs for Dirtyhands and worked with him to secure patronage for the club, and Kruge for his and your own pockets. And for Per Haskell’s pockets as well, you supposed. Lazy bastard.

But you longed for more.

You longed for Kaz’s touch, for his lips on your skin. You longed for his affections as much as you longed for his approval. It was a dangerous combination.

As far as you could tell, he did not feel the same way. But then again, would you have ever known otherwise? Kaz kept his cards close to his chest- as he should.

Today seemed different though. You’d barely made it back from a job and Kaz seemed… angry, to put it lightly. You had no idea why, though, considering you got what he wanted, and made it out alive, too. Win-win.

Inej may have had to save you, but that was beside the point.

“You need to be careful,” he said, mouth pursed angrily. “You can’t be making reckless choices and silly mistakes. This is The Barrel. I can’t afford mistakes.”

You met his harsh gaze head-on and shoved the ledger he’d asked for into his chest with vigour. Kaz didn’t even break the gaze between you, just reached with one gloved hand to take the ledger off you.

“I got what you wanted, didn’t I?”

A muscle in Kaz’s jaw twinged.

“That is not the point.”

You let out an exasperated scoff, removing your hand from his chest with another soft shove. Surprisingly, Kaz lets the action move him.

“Then what is the point?” You ask, frustration evident in your features.

“The point is- oh, for Saints’ sake,” he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “We could have lost you. I could have lost you.”

Your eyebrows practically disappeared into your hairline.

“You could have lost me…” you trail off, echoing his words, feeling them out for hidden meanings.

“You’re a good investment. I don’t like to lose investments.”

Oh. Okay. An investment. You should have known that that was all you were to him. That’s all you were ever going to be to Kaz no matter how much you wished differently. Ridiculous.

“Of course,” you reply, turning to walk away. “Your investment needs a dri-hey!”

Kaz’s gloved hand snatches at your forearm and yanks you back towards him. You re-balance yourself and glare at him, looking between the tight grip he has on your arm and his heated glare.

“Stop,” he says before forcing his features to soften. “I’m not one for feelings.” He practically shudders through the word. “You’re more than that. An investment, I mean.”

You stay quiet, not giving him anything to work with here, but you’re surprised he can’t hear the uptick in your heartbeat.

“Look,” his grip loosens. “I don’t want to lose you. Purely selfish reasons. Not because you’re an investment, but-” Kaz clears his throat and avoids eye contact. “I care for your wellbeing.”

It’s not an outright declaration of love, but it’s about as close to it as someone like Kaz would give. He’d bared his soul to you here. All the fractured, broken pieces of it. He’d bared his heart for you to treasure or smash into bitty little pieces.

You sucked in a breath.

“Are you saying you have feelings for me?”

Kaz grunts and lets go of your arm. You brush your fingers over where he’d just touched you.

“I suppose so, yes,” he said, eyes flitting to the door like he was thinking about making a run for it.

“Don’t suppose it would interest you to know I felt the same way, would it?”

And there it was. Passing the baton back to Kaz. Passing your heart in return for his. Now it was he who held the power to treasure or smash you into pieces.

Kaz finally met your gaze, and his lips ticked up into a small smirk.

“Oh, I knew that.”

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hyuckmov · 1 year ago

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haechan — settle down pt.3 (rockstar hyuck) | preview

wc: 904 words genre: angst, suggestive? | read part 1, part 2 a/n: life is crazy and scary, but this fic and interacting with u guys about it has been a constant and i'm so grateful for that :) motivating myself to keep going by posting this here, this is the opening to part 3 - the final part! let me know what u think!!! thank u for all the love <3

there was something wrong with haechan.

something's different. that's what jeno had said earlier, after the show. exhausted from sleepless nights, screaming fans making him feel nauseous, haechan barely paid attention to anything during his performances except for his own guitar. he hardly looked at the crowd, didn't acknowledge their pleas of his name, as if it wasn't one he recognised at all.

he'd started missing parties, and was barely there even if he showed — ignoring the way girls swarmed around him, wondering if he was playing a new game, one where they had to work harder to earn his attention, one that they never could seem to win.

but out of all of haechan's bad habits, this might be the worst of them – sitting in the living room past midnight, sipping down to the last dregs of his alcohol, waiting for the knock on his door.

it was late now — so late that the hours had bled into the next day. he hadn't seen you at the concert, not at the party, and despite telling himself not to dream, not to hope, he still carried enough desperation in him to stay up again.

he's relieved he did.

his hands shake as he opens the door. his hands falling to his sides as he drinks in the sight of you, letting you in.

"hi," you breathe, and you don't ask before you lean into him, soft lips brushing his plush ones.

he's at a loss for words, his tongue numb in his mouth, limbs still heavy from how tired he'd been all day. he lets you guide him to the couch, into the cushions. lets you straddle his hips, holding your body close to his with careful arms, as he meets your kisses gently.

something's different, but haechan's not the only one who's changed. on nights like these, it feels like all you do is take and take and take.

"i haven't seen you in a while," he murmurs. quietly, softly, the words almost getting lost in between kisses. immediately after he says the words, he slots his lips with yours firmly, as if afraid of what you would say if he let the space between you and him grow, his tongue stroking over yours.

"i've been busy." at the crestfallen look on his face, a small smile tugs at your lips, and you lean in to brush your lips with his. "why? did you miss me?"

"i did," he says, almost timid. "i missed you."

at this, you raise your eyebrows. "you could have had anyone else."

but he shakes his head. "i missed you," he repeats, hands mapping your skin, as if checking if you were really here, seeking the familiar way you fit into his palms, your slopes and your edges.

"i missed you too," you say, meaningfully, letting him pull you in. but when you push against him, body rocking into his and mouth open and wanting, the glow in your eyes tells him you're talking about something else entirely.

his mind races. the feeling of you against him wakes him up like nothing else, the way you touch him, your smell and your taste setting fire to all his senses. there's something sweet about your lips tonight, something he wants to savor on his tongue and drown in all at once.

he doesn't want to waste any of this, because this was the only thing you ever wanted to see him for, now — and that's what he reminds himself as he pulls you into his body, because finally, finally, your attention is all on him, an electric heat simmering over each fibre of his being, the feeling of your body too good to be true.

but it's been one too many nights he's waited, a weight on his chest and a drowsiness he can't shake overcoming him like a cloyingly sweet poison.

"i–" he's cut off by a shuddering inhale as your lips travel down to his neck, your hips grinding against him just right. "baby, i'm sorry," he tries again, his hands now gripping onto your waist, trying to steady you, even as he gives up. "i don't think i can take care of you tonight."

you still.

"don't go, please," he begs. "i'm sorry, it's been…it's been a long day and i…" he breaks off. the performance. the fight with the band. the fact that he'd been drinking for hours, the starless sky inky black outside his window, his fingers still stinging from plucking at guitar strings all night. "just give me a second," he stammers, burying his face in his hands, tugging at his features, before looking up at you with tired eyes. "i'll be fine in a minute, then we'll go to the bedroom, i just —"

your hands slide down the slope of his shoulders.

"don't go," he repeats, hands fumbling for yours as he brings them up to his lips, like a prayer. "i can take care of you, i promise. just…"

"donghyuck," you say, softly. again you smile, cupping his face in your palms. his round cheeks, plush lips, the slight flare of his nose. he almost goes cross-eyed staring at you, as you lean in close and kiss him again – this one different than the rest, close-lipped and chaste.

"hyuck, let me take care of you tonight, okay?"

caught in a riptide of his own longing, he lets go.

#haechan angst #fic: rockstar haechan #haechan smut #haechan x reader #haechan au #nct dream angst #nct dream smut #nct angst

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misc-obeyme · 10 months ago

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CC! I love this sweet little event idea. If Barbatos isn’t already snatched up, could we get Barbatos x MC with Cloudy? Your Barbatos is top tier 💕

Hello, Arvandus!!

Ahhh thank you I quite enjoy the way you write Barb too!! Our precious butler he makes me lose my mind lol. I considered a couple scenarios for this prompt, but I think it would've been straight fluff no matter how it had gone.

Thank you for participating!

COZY COMFORTS EVENT

GN!MC x Barbatos with prompt cloudy

Warnings: none!

Tea parties at the Demon Lord's Castle were always a highlight in your schedule. Any time you were invited, you made sure to arrive exactly on time. Sometimes there were others joining you and it was an occasion full of voices as well as tea and pastries. But sometimes, you found yourself alone with a demon who could command time and space.

It was easy to forget that Barbatos had such powers when he was sitting next to you, pouring you tea and asking you questions about your day. Even when it was just the two of you, being in his presence had become effortless. His gentle smile and steady voice filled you with contentment.

And yet today, as you sat beside him, you felt that there was something nagging at you. You couldn't put it into words, so you simply sipped your tea and nibbled at your pastries. You could feel Barbatos's eyes on you, though. Try as you might, you could never really hide anything from him. He was too observant.

And yet he was all patience, not asking you about it, but instead waiting for you to be ready to say something on your own.

You had finished your tea and you sat looking down at the empty teacup. There was a lull in the conversation and your mind wandered a little. The dregs of the tea leaves sat at the bottom of your cup, creating odd patterns of mushy greenery.

"Barbatos," you said. "Did you know that humans read tea leaves to predict the future?"

"I am quite familiar with that practice, yes," Barbatos said.

This surprised you into looking up at him. "Really?"

Barbatos smiled. "I have found myself quite curious about human methods of divination and of course reading tea leaves had a particular interest to me. Would you like me to read yours now?"

You blinked. "You know how to do it?"

"Indeed," Barbatos said. "Though I cannot vouch for the accuracy of it."

It was such a Barbatos thing to say, you handed over the teacup without quite realizing it.

Barbatos took it from you, his gloved fingers coming into contact with yours and lingering on purpose.

Then his eyes focused on the cup in his hands. He frowned slightly. "Hmm. Your leaves are quite difficult to decipher. This can happen when your future is meant to remain obscured. There are no distinct symbols to read, I'm afraid. I would interpret the general impression of it as 'cloudy.'"

"Cloudy?" you repeated, incredulous. "You're really telling me that my future is cloudy?"

Barbatos put your cup down on the table again and chuckled. "I apologize if that was not the prediction you were hoping for."

You folded your arms, pretending to be upset. "I mean, why couldn't the tea leaves have told me that there would be great happiness in my life or something?"

"Would it be enough if I simply said that there will be great happiness in your life?" Barbatos asked softly.

You dropped your hands into your lap and looked at him in confusion. "How do you know? Did you use your power?"

Barbatos took your hands and pressed a kiss to the back of each. He looked at you with a shining smile. "There is no reason to use my power to confirm something I already know to be true. You needn't worry, MC. I will see to your happiness."

Your heart began to race at the look in his eyes and you felt the blush creeping along your face.

You gripped his hands and pulled him forward into a proper kiss, overcome by the reality of what his words meant. Barbatos's arms wrapped around you and you knew that no matter what happened in your future, you could always count on that embrace.

cozy comforts | masterlist | Thank you for reading!

#obey me #obey me nightbringer #obey me shall we date #omnb #omswd #obey me barbatos #om barbatos #obey me barbatos x reader #om barbatos x reader #obey me barbatos x mc #om barbatos x mc #misc cozy comforts #misc writes

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mintmatcha · 1 year ago

Text

cw: femreader

I heard a song and thought of you.

The message has sat there, blinking back at him. The song is an hour behind him, but he could still feel the ending chords vibrating in the air, clinging to his skin and buzzing deep in his heart. Maybe, if he wasn't a couple beers deep, he could taste it too and maybe, just maybe, it would taste like you.

"I don't wanna tell you what to do," Mic is reading over his shoulder because, of course he is. The blonde is nursing his own drink with a miserable smile that Aizawa has come to know all too well. "But you either have to send the text or delete it."

Aizawa shoots him a glare. Both options are wrong. The last text either of you sent was months ago- nothing more than a cordial birthday greeting. The divorce ripped through the both of you, leaving nothing but crumbs and memories, but now that the dust has settled and the silence is deafening, he's left with these resonating feelings he cannot drop.

"Maybe it's time to move on."

"You're gonna tell me to move on when you -" The accusations die on Aizawa's lips before they can bear any venom. There's so much he could say; after Midnight's death, Hizashi slept on the ground, so the bed would be exactly how she left it. He owns bottles and bottles of her favorite perfume, so the house is always haunted by her memory.

Aizawa is no better. Your ring is in the soap dish next to the kitchen sink, exactly where you left it when you first said goodbye. He's afraid to move it, in case you come back looking for it one day.

The only difference between the two men is that you're still here, only a text away.

"I see the bubbles sometimes," Aizawa admits into the bottom of his glass, only the dregs left, "Those fuckin' typing ones? But she never sends shit."

When he drains what's left and lets the foam sink, uneven and unsteady, he feels a kinship with whats clinging to the sides of the glass. Is this what is left of you? Nothing but bubbles that he can only watch disappear?

"You never send anything either," Mic says. HIs glass is still nearly fully, barely even nursed.

"You're right."

"I'm always right" he replies too easily.

He thinks about it for a moment, and then, despite his better judgement, Aizawa does not press send.

Instead, in the middle of a crowded bar, he presses call.

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nelapanela94 · 2 years ago

Note

Hi Nela! Do you see post war! Levi falling for someone in Marley in spite of having lost Hanji (hardcore levihan fan here)? I feel the grief would have been a lot, but always hope for him to regain some hope 😔 hope you're ok!!

YES YES YES!!!

Levi was left with a void after the war, but he finds that sapling through the rubble that conveys his hope.

WC: 3k TW: Fluff, post war, self-loath from Levi.

The bearings in his head stuck with a shriek, reheating the engines of his system, and the emergency stop is nowhere to be found. Utter chaos. This is why he never went beyond a good morning and thank you, afraid that he’d turn into a stutter mess, and you end up thinking the war injured his brain as well. He scrapes the dregs in his brain as his last effort to string a sentence. Your question disarmed him; you sent him to war without any weapon, not even a knife.

His mouth opens and close, but he can’t ladle a single word.

“I asked if you wanted to go to the festival with me next Saturday.” You lean over the counter, expectant, glossy lips curved in a beguiling smile. A lock of hair falls over your forehead, and you brush it away, his gaze following your finger as it traces the curve of your ear. “So…” You tilt your head to the side, bat your lashes, moisten your lips.

Levi drinks every single detail.

He gulps, his hands tightening around the push rings. His heart bounces in his ribcage prodding for a way out. It is painful. Physically painful, indeed. The bandages constrict him, and his skin begins to itch. A shiver jolts down his spine, bristling the tiny hairs behind his neck.

Why?

Up to this point he convinced himself that he was cursed. That something was wrong with him, that happiness was out of his reach, that he didn’t deserve good things. Life itself taught him the harsh way that he needed to move cautiously; he raised walls around him. The war left a wound that after eight months still dehisces and burbles. A feeling of emptiness, a lack of purpose. After Hange’s death, inertia is what keeps him rolling.

And now, pretty you is here, before him, asking him out, a force that changes his direction and speed.

Why him? he wonders.

Sentenced to a wheelchair, chopped, and with angry stitches slithering across his face.

Him when there are other men, bolder and confident who tell jokes you laugh at, and brush off petals from your shoulder as an excuse to touch you.

His parted lips tremble; he blinks twice. “S-sure.”

“Great!” Your clap startles him. “I’ll be wearing a blue dress, wear something blue too.” You wink. “Before you ask, it is a date.”

A date.

The Kraft paper rustles as you wrap his weekly order of white lilies. You pull at the spool of jute cord, eye measure and cut. Levi gulps, tugging at the collar of his shirt as his gaze moves around the shop. Bright colors and cheerful displays. Silk arrangements, vibrant potted plants and eclectic giftware festoon the shelves.

How could someone so feisty and vivid settle her eyes on a dim, gray soul as his?

He presses his lips into a thin line, and takes a deep breath, inhaling the sweetness of greenery, soil, and petals. His eyes and yours lock. “Why did you ask me out?”

That dimpled smile brightens up your beautiful face. “Because time keeps ticking and I wasn’t willing to wait until you dare ask me.”

They must be either shaking their heads or laughing at him.

He sighs, and a meek smile dangles on his lips. You steer around the counter and hand him the bouquet. He pillows it on his lap and peels two banknotes from the thick wad in his wallet.

“Thanks,” he says. You and this place emanate a peace that dandles his turbulence.

You waltz behind the till. The cash drawer springs out, and humming a song, you slip the bills in and pluck his change.

“Thank you for your purchase, Captain Levi.” And he snorts as he puts the coins in the pocket of his shirt.

“Just Levi. Nobody calls me that anymore.”

“Some papers still do.” You tip the head to the side and squint, tapping a finger on your chin.

“What?”

“You look more handsome in person.”

“You’re just trying to get more points.” He lowers his gaze, shakes his head, then meets your eyes again.

“I’m Y/N, by the way.” You stretch your arm over the counter, and he reaches out for your hand.

Sparks burst in the air. It feels as if he dropped a match on a pile of tinder, setting your flower shop on fire.

If that was the effect of a handshake, what would be the devastation triggered by a kiss? Or when he and you…?

Yes, he agreed on a date with a girl whose name was a mystery. And yes, he’s already imagined things he can’t say aloud without you accusing him of being a pervert.

“Can I have my hand back?” You giggle, looking at your threaded hands. His eye snaps and his face singes with a hard blush. He let’s go of you, and spins around on his chair.

“Thanks for the flowers.” He mutters, hiding his gaze under the wing of his hat. Whatever spell you cast on him, he silently pleads for you to never break it.

You stride to the door and hold it open for him.

“You’re welcome,” you chime. “I’ll be ready at four.”

They say our brains are biologically programmed to remember painful memories better. It’s a way to protect ourselves, to remember something painful so we don’t repeat the same mistakes.

A defense mechanism.

They morph to fear, a fear that helps us survive; the same fear that keeps us from living.

The ringlets screech on the rod as he draws the curtains. The late afternoon light baths the at-home memorial he put together with the badges and bolo ties of his fallen comrades. It’s been keeping him occupied for the past three months after his release from the hospital, and like every Friday, he replaces the etiolated flowers with the new ones and feeds them with fresh water. There’s not much to do, not in his state, and there’s too much time to spare.

The house is large for a single person, but he can move freely on his chair.

He wheels back to the window with a jug of water and plastic cups, places the tray on the side table, and folds his arms over the sill. The match is about to start. Brats spill out of their houses, but the owner of the ball, the most important one, is always the last to arrive. The eldest measure the width of the goal boxes, yelling and wrangling as they settle the stones.

This is why he fought for. For kids to run after a ball, shouting and breaking windows around the neighborhood—hopefully not his—instead of slinging a gun over his shoulders.

He doesn’t grasp the rules yet, even if a team is leading by ten goals, the game is defined by the last. And there’s no referee, how do they tell when a fault is committed? No yellow or red cards.

They run, they kick, they tackle. From time to time, they come to his window to rehydrate.

“Thank you, Mr. Ackerman!”

He tugs a smile. If they go back to their places for water, their mothers won’t let them go out again. An implicit mom rule.

“You’re in a good mood today.” David tucks an elbow on the windowsill. He guzzles to the last drop and hands the cup back for a refill, wiping his mouth with the hem of his t-shirt. He’s thirteen with the brains of an adult. “The flower girl, did you ask her out and she said yes?”

Levi eyes him and frowns.

“She invited me to a festival next week.” Levi confesses as a tinge of red grazes his cheeks.

“I’d like to be so lucky and have a girl asking me out. I told you.” He waves a finger. “She liked you liked you.”

The ravenette crosses his arms and rolls the eyes. “Yes, you were right, now get off my window, brat.”

“Her favorite flowers are tulips,” The blue-eyed boy says, pulling a lopsided grin.

A black, thin eyebrow flashes up. “How do you know that?”

David shrugs. “You can get a lot of information just by asking.” he slips his hands under his armpits and lifts his chin. “You don’t have to thank me.”

Right. Ask first, then torture.

Levi grumbles and drops his pride. “What else do you know?”

Glass shatters, and the boys vamoose. In seconds they empty the street. David shared a little, but enough, and Levi closes the windows. If anyone asks, he saw nothing.

Levi gels his hair back, but a stubborn lock doesn’t want to stick, and he gives up. Clad in khaki slacks and a baby blue button up. He rolls the sleeves to the elbows and bend to tie the shoelaces.

The sun warms its realm at full splendor in a clear, cerulean blue sky. He sprays himself in his favorite fragrance and examines his reflection one last time. He heaves a sigh; there’s not much he can do anyway.

Levi’s never been a shallow person, but the remnants of war chiseled forever in his skin have squished his confidence.

Twenty tulips and a box of truffles filled with peanut butter ganache. He locks his front door and hits the streets, David, from across the street greets with a military salutation. Then, he hurls his thumbs skyward with approval.

The flower shop is in the neighborhood, a ten-minute wheelchair ride, two red lights, five zebra crossings.

Anticipation grows inside of him in form of tickles in his hands and chest as if someone has unleashed a swarm of bees inside him. With each turn of the wheels, that feeling builds up, flush that fans from his lower belly all the way to his face. A sensation new to him, both frightening and exciting; something that muddles his thoughts and soothes his soul.

He turns left at the last corner, and you’re standing before the shop, rocking on your heels, your hands clasp at the handle of your tote bag. You snap your face toward him and a wide smile spreads across your face. Levi swallows; his chest tightens as his heart sets into a sprint. Just like that, you turned a plain day into something truly extraordinary.

“Hey!” You wave a hand at him as he approaches. Your sundress flares down right above the knee, the skirt swelling when you spin.

“Hi.” He scrapes for something else to say. Is he supposed to shake your hand or…

His face heats up until the mercury breaks the glass when you lean and cheek-kiss him twice. “I like what you did to your hair.” You twirl the unmoored strand around your finger.

“You look beautiful.” Damn bees, he wishes he could wrench them out.

“You look good yourself.”

You beam when he hands you the bouquet of tulips. Flowers for the flower shop girl. “How did you know these are my favorite? Thank you!” A spark ignites in your eyes as you sniffle the box. “I’ll take these with us today.” You wiggle the chocolates into your bag. “Wait a minute while I put these in water.” You scramble inside the shop, and Levi’s gaze stumbles upon an empty storefront across the street, a white sign with red thick letters flashing “on sale.”

What if…

You twist the key in the padlock and tug at the chain, then turn to him. “Let’s go.”

“Where to?”

“The park.”

The main walkway is flanked by food stalls sizzling with fried food and grill meat, colorful awnings swaying in the breeze, the mouthwatering smells wafted around you, kindling your stomach. Through the throng, you push Levi’s chair, kids swishing past with helium balloons tethered to their wrists. The mere gurgling of water is refreshing as you reach the roundabout where the path branches, and you swerve to a meandering trail fringed with bushes and brambles studded with blackberries. Squirrels leap from tree to tree, using their own private highway. The concrete becomes gravel, not so friendly for the wheels, but Levi doesn’t complain. Finally, You find an empty patch on the meadow near the lake that glints in the sun like a shiny tin roof. “Is it ok here?”

“Yeah.” He pulls the brakes, and you strewn a checkered cloth in the shade of a red oak. People in large numbers come across, securing a good spot around the field for the jazz band. They lay out blankets too while kids scamper playing tag. On the stage, the staff jostle, setting and checking the instruments and lights.

“Let me help you,” you say as you fold the footplates. Levi uses his right leg for support as you slide your arms under his armpits, and with all your strength, you heave him. He’s too close you can smell the notes of sandalwood and vetiver gliding on his neck, but this is not the right moment for your knees to go weak. You clear your throat. “Put your arms around me.”

Levi hesitates for a second, afraid that his heart being too close to your chest, will give him away. He clings to you, and you slowly lower him to the ground. The grass blades prick his ass as he shuffles for a comfortable position.

Then you plonk next to him, one knee bent, and the other leg stretched, your hands flat on the cloth supporting your back. “You ok?”

He nods, and his lips curve in a half smile. “You’re pretty good at it.”

“Right after the war I volunteered at the hospital. They were short staff and desperate for any help. Since I can’t give an injection, my job was moving people around.”

“And then you opened the flower shop.”

“Yes and no,” you wistfully say. “The flower shop has been in the family for three generations, not the same one though. The city where I was born and raised burned to ashes. I couldn’t save them.” You look down, fiddling with the hem, tears swelling in your eyes. “I took everything I could from the safe box, moved here and re set my life about four months ago.” You sniff and meet his eyes again. “That’s the short story of my life. What about you? What is it like? The place you come from.”

And Levi talks unrestraint. He talks about his mother and Kenny, Farlan, Isabel, The Survey Corps, Erwin, Hange, the expeditions. You listen intently, interspersing here and there with questions, your hand aching to hold his. How can someone endure so much and survive? Tears prick in your eyes as you swallow the lump in your throat, and you can’t throttle the urge to hug him. You swoop on him, tears streaming down your face pampering the cotton weave of his shirt, and Levi melts, he melts in the warmth of your palliative embrace as your tears embody the amalgam of suffering he stored for years. The vanilla essence of your hair swaddles him like a veil. Levi closes his eyes and mutters, “Thank you.” Suddenly feeling that boulder cracking. “Thank you.” He strokes your back.

It’s alright.

“Do you fancy ice cream?” He asks as you pull away. You brush the tears away and nod. a winsome smile tilts the corners of your lips.

“I go get them. Which flavor?” You groan to your feet and smooth down your skirt.

“Lemon and vanilla.”

You gape, then a smile creases the corners of your eyes. “Isn’t it the best combination? Wait here, don’t move.” You warn with a finger and scuffle to the stalls.

With a smashed leg he wouldn’t drag himself past the tree bark.

He tears up tufts of grass and tosses them into the breeze. Live is too long to live it alone.

Your knees bump on the fabric and Levi takes his cone from your hand, licking the sides where the faint yellow was already bleeding.

And then you bite off the bottom and suck the melting cream. Levi eyes you, crimping his eyebrows.

“Please don’t look at me like that.” A chortle is caught in a cough as you plug the cone with a finger. Smiling, you sweep the tongue over your lips. “I know, it’s a bad habit.” And Levi tries your method too, regretting it immediately. It’s a messier way and he’s compelled to eat it all right away before the stickiness sprints down his hand.

“Shit!”

“It takes years of practice.” You quip and fumble in your bag for the wipies box. The last bite disappears in your mouth. You tear a dampened tissue and motion for his hands. The lamps buzz to life as the sun dips behind the buildings, sucking the color of the day. Levi watches as you swab him, caressing the tiny scars of old lame wounds. Your thumbs are soft like a rose petal on the flesh that’s only been exposed to the thorns. You toss the tissue away to later pick and dispose, but your hands don’t want to untangle from his.

This is not an infatuation; whatever it is, this feeling weaves slowly, steady, and solidly. Your mellow gaze traps his, magnets and metal, and the sounds around glazes to a silence. Your fingers reach for his face, skim those marks, trace the lines of his nose bridge and the arches of his brows. “I like you, Levi. I like you, like you. I wait every Friday for you to walk into my store.” The breath of your words graze his imploring lips.

His self-control hangs by a thread, and the look in your eyes deliberately pulls at the edges of it, fraying the strands.

“Y/N.” Your name comes out as both plea and warning as he leans closer, one hand finding its way to your waist. You move closer, though not close enough, and sweep the tip of your tongue over your lower lip. Your hands ambling along his neck, his shoulders and chest, his muscles quivering under your touch.

The evening is enlivened by the swirling and purling notes of the saxophone.

Your breath the same air. Your lips part slightly to coalesce with his.

Taglist: @stygianoir @lamees004 @svftackerman @apolloshaiku @luvjiro @roralore @mikakayyyy @lovolee3 @notgoodforlife @galactict3a @noctemys

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#Levi ackerman #levi ackerman x you #levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman/reader #levi ackerman/you #Levi ackerman attack on titan #levi aot #levi attack on titan #aot #attack on titan #snk #snk levi #aot Levi #Levi ackerman fic #Levi ackerman x y/n #Levi x you #Levi x reader

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jahayla-parker · 10 months ago

Text

Karma : Kaz Brekker x Reader Series

Part 7

For full warnings, descriptions, and other parts, see series masterlist here.

Y/n’s breath hitched as her eyes fell upon the scene playing out before her. Kaz was occupied with trying to fight The Darkling and two of his shadow creatures. Inej was supposed to have joined him, bringing backup! Y/n’s frustration dissipated as she found Inej and Jesper both fighting off hoards of shadow monsters. Either Kaz, or the others, had brought some more Dregs with them; but even they were not much help as The Darkling had formed an absurd amount of shadow creatures to fight for him this time. As y/n’s eyes scanned the scene to get a better understanding of the situation, she noticed that Kaz’s cane was broken in half and sitting far away from him. Her heart dropped to her stomach. Kaz had already been injured before coming here tonight, and now he’d seemingly lost his cane as well. Y/n reluctantly drifted her eyes back over to Kaz, afraid of what she’d find.

Y/n could tell Kaz was hurting, and his wound had clearly reopened. He was hiding his pain as usual, but she was far too familiar with the particular grimace that was currently gracing his face. Yet, he was still actively fighting off The Darkling’s creations. Y/n knew Kaz was operating off of pure anger-driven motivation.

As y/n focused in on the look in Kaz’s eyes, she knew what would happen if she didn’t act. The intense look in Kaz’s eyes belonged to Dirtyhands, not Kaz Brekker. He was determined to eradicate this threat to her no matter what the cost was. She couldn’t let him do that. He was out-powered right now and despite being as viciously strong as he is, attempting to do so right now would only end in his death. Y/n refused to let that happen. This was her fight.

Y/n clenched her hands tightly as she dared to glance at Aleksander. Her mouth instantly felt dry and her lungs empty. Yet, there was also this sensation of a fire burning deep inside her when she saw Kaz in her periphery. That’s what y/n needed to focus on. If she focused on The Darkling, her trauma would overtake her. But, if she focused on Kaz and getting him out of here alive, she could use the fighting skills she’d painstakingly earned over the years to fight back against The Darkling.

As such, y/n narrowed in on that fiery sensation. She closed her eyes very briefly as she inhaled deeply. This was her battle. Her enemy. Her chance to rewrite the story between her and the black-cloaked man before her. Her chance to keep her side of the street clean and not let her friends pay the price for what was her fight.

Y/n noticed the way Kaz clearly saw her as she began to approach.

Kaz had seen y/n long before The Darkling did, almost as if her presence called to him. He caught sight of her approaching and his full body became rigid. His eyes bore into The Darkling as he gauged whether it not he’d also noticed her presence. Realistically, neither one of them should’ve, given y/n was still off to the side and hadn’t made any noise. But Kaz still had, his peripheral vision narrowing in on her despite the blurriness he was currently experiencing. He always noticed when she was around. It was as if her presence signaled to him. Kaz decided to take advantage of the Darkling’s lack of awareness of y/n’s presence. He knew the man would not be expecting a sudden increase in motivation to Kaz’s resistance, which would work in Kaz’s favor. He clenched his jaw to stifle a groan as he slammed his own shoulder into the ground. He utilized the now-dislocated limb to slip out of The Darkling’s hold.

As the Darkling stared at Kaz with an almost horrified expression, Kaz limped quickly to the side as he moved to stand in front of y/n. “Get behind me,” Kaz growled. He carelessly slammed his shoulder against the corner of the empty storefront beside her in order to get the joint back in place.

Y/n winced at Kaz’s behavior. She shook her head. “I can do this,” she said timidly. Her hands shook and she was fighting to keep her eyes from becoming watery. But, she wasn’t going to let her friends get sucked into her mess. Unlike The Darkling, y/n wasn’t willing to accept to turn people into collateral in the course of this ongoing battle between them.

Kaz sharply turned to face y/n. His intense gaze focused on her facial expressions in an attempt to understand what was lying underneath her determined stance. He quickly realized she was upset that her statement had come out as weak as it had. But, Kaz was still impressed she’d even gotten this far. He knew the trembling girl from this morning wouldn’t have believed she was able to leave The Slat alone; much less be willing to fight her abuser head-on. “I know,” Kaz said. Even when y/n felt weak or was trembling with fear, he knew what she was truly capable of. The look in her eyes right now as she glared over at The Darkling was a testament to that. Nonetheless, Kaz also knew the fear that was surely running deep within her. “You don’t need to,” Kaz promised, still blocking her as he heard The Darkling start to approach.

“Yes I do,” y/n said. As she looked past Kaz, she saw Aleksander staring at her as he stormed forward. The look in his eyes took her back. She tightened her legs as she prepared for the oncoming fragmented memory that she felt start to flood her mind.

Y/n’s eyes flew open as she gasped profusely. Her lungs, throat, and nose were burning. Her mind was an absolute mess. It took an absurd amount of effort for her to lift her head up from where it was tucked into her chest. When she did, she gasped and subsequently choked on the water still in her mouth.

The look in Aleksander’s eyes was petrifying. His irises were an emotionless void of black, blending in with the hue of his pupils. The only visual sign of his emotional state was the fierce narrowing of his eyes as he stared at her. Due to the squinting of his blackened irises, the white of his sclera was barely showing.

Y/n instinctively recoiled her head away from The Darkling as she futilely squirmed in the hold his soldiers had on her. The water her head had been submerged in now poured down the rest of her body as it rolled off her saturated hair. Minimal water came out despite the fact she coughed violently. She watched fearfully as The Darkling moved closer and aggressively grabbed her face in his calloused hands. Although she shook from both the chilly winter air meeting her soaked frame and the terror in her, she didn’t close her eyes. She knew better than to turn or look away when The Darkling was involved. The appearance of his stare as he chided “You cannot run from your maker,” stuck with y/n ever since.

Y/N’s legs nearly buckled under her as her mind violently switched off of the flashback and back to the present moment. The look in The Darkling’s eyes today as he fought a smirk when approaching her, matched the one that had been burned in her mind ever since her first waterboarding punishment. His words from that day echoed tauntingly in her mind. She had to be done running. She’d made the mistake of trying to flee twice now.

Kaz observed y/n closely. He wanted to keep some distance to let her not feel smothered by his presence as she bravely confronted her past. Kaz was pissed she had snuck out of the hideout he’d established for her safety. But, he couldn’t discount the fact that he was impressed she’d been willing to come face-to-face with the General.

Y/n’s fears were far more than understandable given what Kaz knew she’d experienced at the hands of the man before them. While he’d only known part of the abuse The Darkling had inflicted on y/n, it was enough for Kaz to be overwhelmed by her strength right now. He wished he was able to fight his touch aversion as directly as y/n was able to fight her fear of The Darkling. Nonetheless, his close observation of her alerted him the moment her focus seemed to slip from reality. As such, Kaz inched closer to her frozen frame as he shot The Darkling a warning glare. Only a few seconds longer and Kaz would have to bypass her to keep the man away. He’d try to remain calm for now and give her a little longer to come back to her senses and decide how she wanted to respond.

When y/n blinked rapidly and got into a defensive stance, Kaz felt the tension in his chest lessen slightly. Yet, he didn’t leave her side. He’d let her proceed however she wished, wanting her to be able to exact her own karma if she desired. But he wasn’t going to part from her side for her safety. As strong as y/n was, Kaz refused to risk her traumatic memories overtaking her while she was vulnerable to The Darkling’s current presence before them.

Y/n felt Kaz’s presence beside her and straightened her back further. She could do this. She had to do this. She wouldn’t let Aleksander bring anyone else down into this mess. This was her responsibility.

As y/n pressed forward, Kaz protectively followed. One of her hands held the pistol from her boyfriend, the other held the end of a pruning knife. She watched as The Darkling brought his hands up and out to his sides; ready to summon. Y/n pinched the blade between the tips of her pointer and middle fingers before flicking it in his direction. A faint smirk formed as she watched the edge of the blade slide across one of his wrists. It was a small victory, but any chance to make The Darkling bleed felt oddly nice.

Before y/n’s blade had reached his skin, The Darkling had managed to summon more nichevo'ya. As he felt the cold metal split his wrist, he dismissively waved his hand towards Kaz. Then, he resumed his approach to his true target.

Y/n was confused as she watched the nichevo'ya fly past her. It wasn’t until she heard them swirling around behind her that she realized Aleksander’s actual intention. He hadn’t meant for the shadow creatures to attack her; he was using them to separate her from Kaz. She knew if she dared to look back, Kaz would scold her. So, she took a deep breath and marched forward. Each step y/n took was accompanied by the throwing of yet another blade. Throw. Step. Grab another blade. Throw. The rhythmic actions continued as she and The Darkling fought their way closer to each other.

Aleksander caught y/n's wrist and twisted it, sending her latest knife pummeling to the ground. “Do not make me hurt you,” he advised, his other hand grabbing onto the hair at the back of her head. He tsked as she raised the pistol in her free arm to his forehead. However, he hadn’t realized it was a distraction until it was too late.

Y/n aggressively brought her head down to her chest, subsequently raising the hold Aleksander had on her hair upwards and forwards. She ignored the aching pain in her scalp from the tugging as she bent her knees and spun her trapped wrist. Her actions allowed her to quickly pull herself back and free herself from The Darkling’s hold before he even realized that the placing of Kaz’s pistol to his temple wasn’t her actual move.

Y/n utilized the extra time from The Darkling’s delayed response to glance back at Kaz. Her eyes met his as he smirked at her win before his eyes signaled for her to turn back around. She complied and turned her sights back on Aleksander. A surge of pride buzzed in her thanks to Kaz's response to her outsmarting Aleksander. She stood with her legs slightly apart, non-dominant leg forward, knees unlocked, and torso twisted to increase her abdominal strength should she need to strike.

“This does not have to go down like this y/n,” The Darkling stated as he crept forward. “Surely you recall what I’m capable of,” he warned.

“That’s precisely why I’m not going back,” y/n retorted sharply.

“You were on my side once,” The Darkling reminded y/n. He smirked as she visibly flinched at the reminder. “It can be that way again,” he proposed. He needed her to come back. If he could convince her to return and help him, perhaps his shattered connection to Alina would remedy itself. When he’d used merzost in his most effective use of y/n, he inadvertently broke the tether he had formed to Alina’s mind. It was the cost of using such powerful energy. He’d needed to use it against y/n to strengthen himself. But he hadn’t predicted what it would cost him in the process.

“You tricked me,” y/n argued angrily. “You tricked all of us. None of us would’ve gone with you if we knew the true extent of which you’d go to!” She took a shaky step forward as she glared at The Darkling. “Most of us had no choice but to join the fight. But, we did so thinking we were doing what was best for Ravka, helping protect innocent Grisha children, but instead-“.

“Instead, what?!” The Darkling snapped. “That’s all I’ve ever done, what was needed to create a better world for Grisha,” he said, the softening of his eyes suggesting he thought he could talk his way into getting y/n to rejoin him.

“Instead,” y/n hissed, “you abused those under your command. You tried to make the Grisha a ruling authority while you murdered innocent civilians!”

The Darkling sighed in annoyance. “They weren’t innocent, they were Otkazat'sya, Grisha will never be safe-“.

“See! You want an eradication of everyone who isn’t Grisha, no one agreed to those terms, and when-“ y/n argued.

“Watch your wording there miss y/l/n, you are speaking falsely about-“ Aleksander scolded.

Y/n scoffed. “My bad,” she hissed sarcastically. “No one sane agreed to that. And when we tried to leave, we became prisoners.”

“I do apologize for that,” Aleksander sighed. “In my defense miss y/l/n, you were planning on alerting the Ravkan King of my plans for his bastard of a son’s birthday party, if I do recall,” he defended.

“You were going to murder him and his family!” Y/n exclaimed in disbelief.

“I did, I was successful despite your attempted treason,” The Darkling stated smugly.

“Treason? Is the King’s General slaughtering the King and his family not treason?!” Y/n asked rhetorically.

“You act as if the King had done you any favors,” Aleksander shook his head. “Meanwhile, I took you in when you were a weak little girl who barely knew how to use her powers, and I -

“What? Tortured me? Manipulated me? Starved me? Stole my powers? Shall I go on?!” y/n remarked in disgusted disbelief.

“You sacrificed your abilities for the greater-" Aleksander defended.

“I was strapped to a chair!” Y/n screeched. Her body shook as the scene played before her in her mind. “You-you…,” she mumbled, shakingly holding her blade at an angle as Aleksander stepped closer. She knew he was making headway toward her, but she couldn’t get the flashback to leave her mind enough for her to focus and fight back. She tossed dagger after dagger towards him, but they uncharacteristically kept missing.

Kaz had been fighting with the nichevo'ya as y/n and The Darkling exchanged both verbal and physical assaults. He’d meticulously but stealthily moved himself and the creatures forward until his foot landed beside one of y/n’s discarded blades. His eyes caught sight of the blades that left her trembling hands only to miss their target due to the lack of precision in her shaking throw. Y/n was trying, but she was still terrified.

Kaz knelt down as he wrestled with one of the shadow monsters and grabbed an abandoned blade from the ground. He thrust his palms and flicked his wrists upwards so the light from the nearby store would reflect off the blade. Kaz turned the blade back and forth in the shadows, watching as the nichevo'ya disintegrated. Now that nothing was in his way, he lurched forward and forcefully shoved The Darkling back. He faintly heard the sigh of relief that left y/n lips from where she was behind him at the newly increased distance between her and her tormentor.

Y/n blinked forcefully as she tried to clear her head. But with each strike exchanged between Kaz and Aleksander, she was brought back to fragments of her own fights against The Darkling. The children running futilely from his shadows as she was dragged along in chains. Zoya’s sympathetically remorseful expression as y/n was stripped of her powers. The excruciating pain that accompanied The Darkling using merzost to leech y/n of her ability. The darkness that flooded the room as he towered over her and taunted her as she lie motionless after having been cut free from the bounds around the chair.

When The Darkling had knocked Kaz down and began to tower over him, something in y/n snapped. She was not sure if was the fact he’d done the same to her and she was tired of living with the aftermath or if she was just that protective of Kaz despite knowing full well that Kaz could easily get up right now. Maybe it was both. Either way, y/n charged at The Darkling with her sword drawn.

The Darkling saw y/n’s movements and turned to her, away from Kaz. “I have an offer for you dear girl,” his voice called out as he quoted his now-late mother’s nickname for her.

The nickname and Baghra’s voice echoed viciously in y/n's head. So too did the image of what The Darkling had done to his own mother when she was caught trying to help y/n escape. “Go to hell,” she growled as she sliced his torso with her blade.

After a brief hiss of pain, The Darkling chuckled darkly. “I thought I was already there,” he taunted as he glanced around at their surroundings. “Although, I suppose this is the best you could find given your treason and lack of use now”.

Y/n ignored The Darkling’s taunts as she flashed the blade of her sword in the light to kill the nichevo'ya currently attacking Kaz.

Kaz stood back up and blinded the other shadow creatures on his way back to y/n.

However, The Darkling noticed y/n’s focus was on Kaz and not him. So, he turned on Kaz, hands raised. He looked back at Y/n as a large shadow figure formed around both sides of Kaz.

Kaz tried to fight the creature’s hold, but he was out of metal objects to shine. The now invincible figure wrapped around his neck, lifting him up from the ground. He tried to stifle his choking as to not alert y/n to his state.

Y/n breathed heavily from her nose as she tried to come up with a game plan. She attempted to angle her sword in the dim light of the store lamp as they’d been doing through the fight But this time it wasn’t enough due to the massive size of the creature suffocating Kaz. Upon seeing it wasn’t working, she instinctively tried to rush forward. However, The Darkling stopped her as he forcefully grabbed her scarred shoulder.

The nauseating feeling of Aleksander’s hand on her once again, in the exact place he’d left his all too visible mark years prior, made y/n freeze. She felt her heart drop to her stomach as he pulled her to him until she was pressed against his chest. Her breathing became frantic as his breath hit her face.

“Y/n,” The Darkling scolded in a soft tone. “You know what happens when you are disobedient,” he warned, a cruel glow in his eyes. He stepped back from her slightly as she dry heaved loudly. He removed his hands from her shoulder and stared down at her. “Now,” The Darkling chided, a pointed expression on his face, “what do you say to hearing out my generous offer?”

Y/n stumbled back from The Darkling now that she was free from his hold. She gazed over at Kaz with a shaky breath. Her eyes which were already full of tears, only increased at the sight of him hanging just above the ground. He was in desperate need of air. Because of her. This was all because of her. She looked around as her other friends continued to try to fight off the never-ending surge of nichevo'ya. She caused this. She brought them into this. But she could also end it.

Kaz shook his head stiffly, unable to move much in the grip the figure had on his neck. He shot y/n a knowing and almost pleading look. He knew her too well. He could read the thoughts in her eyes like a book. She couldn’t seriously be about to make this decision.

Y/n reluctantly turned her gaze away from Kaz and back to The Darkling. She had said she’d only consider going back if it came down to life or death. Particularly Kaz’s life or death as she’d rather herself be killed than forced to go back. But, she wasn’t willing to let Kaz make that sacrifice. Her chest felt empty and her mind heavy as she envisioned giving herself up. But, it would be to spare Kaz. He didn’t need to be a casualty in this fight. She couldn’t let Aleksander take anything else from her. As painful and traumatic as being removed of her Grisha abilities had been, the idea of Kaz -or her other friends- suffering at the hands of The Darkling was worse. As y/n stared at the villainous man before her, she felt like the younger version of herself; terrified, uncertain, and frustratingly weak.

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thegreatcaptainusopp · 6 months ago

Text

The Separation

Ao3 link

The Seer

Summary: After their encounter with Kuma, the Straw Hats have been catapulted off to various islands around the world. What do they do, and how do they react? Set right after The Seer, second in The Strength of Truth series

Chapter 1: Brook

“Oh my,” Brook says, scratching his head. “Now, how on earth have I gotten myself in this situation?”

The group around him blinks up at him, shocked.

“If I may ask,” Brook says, scrabbling for the dregs of his politeness. “Who are you? And how did I get here?”

One moment, he had been celebrating. One moment, he’d pulled out his violin, his crew around him, suffused in the thrill of victory and relief of survival. One moment, he’d put bow to string, drawn out the first note to the sounds of his name, and then—

And then everything around him had vanished, faces of his new family winking out of existence, and he’d been on his back, sailing through the sky for days and days and days without knowing why or how or where he was going…

Well. Brook has been through a lot in his (un)life. He’s seen too much and too little all at once. He’d experienced the very depths of human loneliness and come out the other side with his good nature firmly intact, grasped at hard even with bony hands.

This? This may have broken him. Time will tell.

He looks back at the group. They stand around him in a circle, dressed in identical black robes, hoods thrown over half-shadowed faces. Despite that, Brook can still see their gawking expressions, mouths open, eyes wide.

That doesn’t bode well for him.

He waits a few more beats, counting the rests, hoping they can provide him with information. When the silence stretches a little longer, he breaks it on the fourth bar, clearing his (non existent) throat. “Excuse me,” He tries again, letting a bit of his desperation leak through. “Does any of you, perhaps, know about how and why I got here? I was pulled away from my people quite suddenly, and I need to get back to them as soon as possible, I’m afraid.”

His gaze ticks around the crowd, landing on a young woman who holds eye contact. Her eyes widen at the look, then dart down to Brook’s feet.

He glances down himself, sees the smoking remains of a symbol of some kind. “Ah,” He says, looking back up at the crowd. “Did you summon me here, perhaps?”

At his words, the crowd seems to react as one.

They surge forward, hoods falling back from their heads as they fall to their knees in front of him, bowing low. They all start babbling as one, but Brook can pick out a very distinct word, repeated again and again..

Satan.

Ah. Brook thinks, a sense of dread rising up in his chest. This may prove to be very troublesome indeed.

Brook, in fact, had not been wrong.

After numerous attempts to get the truth out of the group (which, to Brook, seem like some sort of cult), he thinks he can surmise a few conclusive details:

1. They think he is Satan, or a demon of some sort. Brook can use this, perhaps. For now, he will neither confirm nor deny his situation.

2. The cult (for it is, in fact, a cult) want to use him in sort of revenge plot. They had reached out in desperation, want to save their friends and family from some sort of rival group. And, well…Brook can’t fault them for that. He really can’t.

3. They have no idea about where he was, nor do they know what has become of his crew. This detail is a little bit more concerning.

4. Most concerning of all, however, is the fact that he still doesn’t know how he got here.

The cult seems to believe that they have summoned him. He can’t rule that firmly out of the realm of possibility, but they also believe he is Satan, so he can’t say he has a lot of trust in their ability to get the facts straight.

So, of all the facts swirling around in his skull, this is the one that stands out to him most, begging to be resolved. Because if he knows how he got here, he might know how the others are doing. Not knowing might just kill him (again), it really would. Just when he had gotten them. He cannot lose them (again). He cannot.

He’s pulled out of his thoughts by the cult leader, who looks up at him hopefully. “Please,” the man begs. “Please. Can you help us? We will give you anything you want.”

Brook considers this.

“I want to go back,” He says, finally. “I will help you save your people. Then, you will help me leave. I have other responsibilities I must attend to.”

He doesn’t know where to even start. But, if he can somehow make his way back to Sabaody, he can begin to find his way back to his crew. He has no skin, but he feels cold without them.

The cult leader nods enthusiastically. “Of course!” He says. “I’m certain you have duties beyond the realm of the understanding of us mere mortals. We will send you on your way right away afterwards.”

“Erm, of course,” Brook says. For the first time since he landed, his fingers tighten over this violin. He lifts it up. “I believe this calls for some—”

Something flutters out of his violin, sinking gently to the ground.

He lowers the violin, a frown (unseen) growing over his face. “Hmm,” He hums, matching his tone to the rattling of his bones. “Now what could this be?”

He stoops suddenly, making the cult jump back in surprise. Brook scoops up the item from the ground, holding it carefully in his hands, then freezes.

He knows what this is. But how…

Brook peers closer at the Vivre Card. He knows what these are, but he has never owned one. And yet, here one is, on his person.

A chill runs down his spine. He disappears, then reappears on an unknown island, with a foolproof navigational tool on him? Either he is extremely lucky, or is falling into the world’s most obvious trap.

However, no matter what this could lead to, he has no choice but to follow. If it means even a chance of getting back to his crew, he will do whatever it takes.

Brook tucks the card into a suit pocket for safekeeping. “Right!” He says again, patting his suit pocket twice. The cult members all flinch again, in unison. He lifts the violin to his chin. “This calls for some music!”

The cult leader raises a hand. “M-music, my lord of darkness?”

“Why, yes,” Brook says, playing a warm up arpeggio. “We’ll need music before go in there together, you know?”

He waits for a yohohoho, but finds that he can’t quite get it out.

“Together?” The leader replies, horrified. Brook doesn’t reply, taking a deep breath into his next song.

Things had gone hilariously off the rails, as they usually do. Brook really can’t complain, though. He has nobody to blame but himself.

It had seemed like a foolproof plan, at first. Get the cult to stand up for themselves and their loved ones, and then reorient their belief system to rely on themselves and their own actions. Why, they’d be so grateful to him, they’d let him go! Possibly provide him with a ship! The Longarm tribe would be so terrified of him, they would leave him alone and let him go. It was brilliant!

This was not what ended up happening, however.

Instead, Brook is sitting in a cage with the Longarms, who peer down at him with a mix of curiosity and trepidation. “We can sell it off,” One of them says, tapping at his chin. “We could probably make a killing off of it. It’s a very unique specimen.”

“Not at all,” Brook says, waving his arms. “I’m quite an average deceased individual, I’m afraid. Not worth much. I’ll just get out of your hair, and then maybe—”

“You can talk,” The enterprising Longarm interrupts him. “Which is very much not average. You’re staying here.”

Brook feels panic beat at his ribs like a drum. It’s out of rhythm, and gives him a headache. “But..”

“No buts,” The man snaps. He reaches in his belt, grabbing a sheaf of papers and tossing them in the cage. “Read this, maybe it’ll occupy your time, and your babble.”

Brook doesn’t reach out to take the paper. The bars of the cage feel like they’re closing in on him, and he doesn’t have the capability to be boxed in anymore. He doesn’t. He can’t.

The bars seem to dip further, things in his sight getting hazier. His breathing (breathing? He breathes?) stutters once, twice, then—

Luffy’s face springs into his mind, unbidden. The large smile, even in his imagination, is enough to calm him.

He shakes his head, hair bouncing, hat swiveling. “Pull yourself together, Brook!” He chastises himself. “Losing your head, at your age! You will never be alone again, he promised you that. You will see them again. Now, what are you going to do about it?”

He hears someone whisper “It’s talking to itself,” before he reaches out, grabbing the paper. May as well occupy himself for now, while he thinks of a plan. They’ll wait for him, if they’re still there. He knows they will.

He flips open the paper, grounding himself with the news. His eyes trip over the headlines…ah, it seems they’re reporting on the war already. Maybe he’ll get to see more details, ones he hadn’t witnessed in person…

He turns the page, considering, then pauses.

He blinks (without eyelids), and a smile (without lips) breaks out over his face.

Brook leaps up, lifting the paper aloft in excitement! “Yes!” He cackles, shaking it in the air, elation hitting him with a thump. “Of course! I knew it, I knew you were alright! Aye-aye, Captain! Aye-aye!” He takes a deep breath, then, laughs from the pit of his soul “Yohohohohohoho!”

He looks back down to see the crowd of Longarms staring at him in confusion.

“Oh, my new friends!” Brook says, twirling his newspaper back down. “What a wonderful day we find ourselves in! Meeting new people is always such a joyous thing, don’t you think?”

The Longarms continue to stare at him, baffled. Fear seems to creep into some of the scattered expressions.

Brook tears at the newspaper, carefully folding the scrap and tucking it in his pocket, next to the Vivre card. “Now,” Brook says, picking his violin off his belt, lifting the bow alongside it. “Who would like to hear some music?”

The Longarms continue to stare at him as he opens his mouth, finally completing the note that he had started all the way back in Sabaody.

Over the next few days, Brook plans.

Well. Plans and plays, thoughtfully fingering the notes as he gets his thoughts in order. Because, well. He has the time now, doesn’t he? He can sit and plan and consider what to do during this time, because it’ll be so long…Oh, well. He’s waited longer before, much longer.

The others…he doesn’t know if they’re together or not, but he hopes they don’t get even a whiff of the past loneliness that he’s experienced before. Some of them, all of them really, are still so young. And poor Usopp, who had recently had a huge change of circumstances, needs stability and support now more than ever…

Brook shakes his head again, plucking out some staccato notes. No need to fall into despair when it’s unnecessary! All he can do now is figure out what he can do in the meantime, how he can come back better, improved. What can he do, then? What skills does he have that most benefit the crew?

“Excuse me?” Brought out of his thoughts, he finished the phrase before putting his violin down, pinning the Longarm who had talked to him earlier with a look.

“Yes?” He asks, eyebrows raising (spiritually, yohohoho!). The sudden politeness is surprising, and more than a little suspicious.

“Well,” the Longarm says, shifting nervously. “We were speaking…the rest of us, and all. Do you…do you play much?”

Brook looks down at his violin. “As a matter of fact,” He says, feeling generous. “I do. My role in my crew is musician, and I take it very seriously and gratefully every day. Music is the soul of life, you know.”

The Longarm doesn’t seem moved by his words, but he seems interested. “Say,” He says, cocking his head to the side. His eyes sparkle with…something, some nebulous intention. “What kind do music do you play?”

Usopp flashes through his mind briefly, what music do you like? “I play everything,” Brook replies, “Everything you could possibly think of.”

“Hm,” The Longarm says, eyes sparkling again. “How are you with rock music?”

The Longarms plan seems to have changed on a dime. Brook learns that this group seems to be largely profit driven, following whatever road will take them to the most money. And, it seems, they have determined that he will be more profitable with them than away from them.

Nami would’ve been proud, he thinks.

The Longarm who’d been talking to, Sancrin, had declared his intention to become his manager and, in time, make him a star. “It’ll be an investment,” Sancrin had informed him through the bars of his cage. “You’ll need to work hard, especially at the start. But if we work together, I think this could be a very fruitful partnership. And with a very big payout by the end.”

Brook hadn’t had to think too hard about accepting. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, after all! And, he could use it to improve himself…he’s the ship’s musician, is he not? And so, he should improve his musical abilities.

He sticks out a bony hand through the bars. “Deal. We should discuss terms, though.”

An unsettling grin spreads over Sancrin’s face. He grasps Brook’s hand, giving it a solid shake. “That we will,” He says. “Welcome to the team.”

It takes them a few days, but they work out what Brook thinks is a fairly good deal.

Sure, they don’t let him out of his cage until it’s done, but that’s fine. He has the time, and it’s all fine now. He has a goal, and a direction, and an order to follow.

Then, he meets the team.

He has not one, not two, but three managers. Sancrin is head of his team, with final say on all matters. Eryu is head of styling, music, and his brand and marketing. Jiryu is in charge of the financial end: budget, logistics, and merchandise.

Well. Brook knows why they insisted upon a 70/30 split for profits now.

“Do we really need a team for this?” He asks, during their fourth official meeting. “I haven’t even released a single song yet.”

“We need to be prepared,” Sancrin says. “We’re going to hit the ground running. The minute we have the music, we’re going to market this heavily, and we’re going to do a tour to recoup the costs.”

“A tour?” Brook asks, baffled. “Already?”

Sancrin shrugs. “That’s what makes the most money with musical acts,” He says. “And it can be done. Ticket sales, merchandise? But we need to get started on this now. Can you have a set of songs done by the end of the week?”

“Yes,” Brook says, tuning into the music in his head. “Yes, I can.”

Eryu tells him they’re going to make him a rockstar.

Brook can’t argue that, nor can he contain his excitement at the prospect. It will take a lot of work, but this is the work he was made for. Finally putting the music is in head down on the page, making it a concrete oeuvre? It’s brilliant. He will return to his crew a more developed musician, and that’s all he can ask for.

However, there is more to becoming a rock star than the music, as he is quick to discover.

“Let’s talk about the image,” Sancrin says, and Brook wants to throw his head out of the window to escape the never ending conversation.

“Can’t hurt to go with the classics,” Eryu says, steepling his fingers together. “Leather jacket and pants, motorcycle, fire imagery. Plus, he’s a skeleton, so the aesthetics would fit perfectly.”

“It’s predictable, though,” Sancrin argues. “That’s what everyone’s expecting with a skeleton as the star. We need something new, something fresh.”

“Something cheap,” Jiryu pipes up.

Brook feels a headache begin to thunder through his skull. “Gentlemen,” He begins. “We won’t need much, really, just…”

“Anyway,” Sancrin says, interrupting. “We’ll need to decide on this first before we do any concept art, so this has to happen ASAP. Because…”

Brook tugs at his still meticulous afro. The din is giving him a headache, and he tugs and tugs and tugs until…

There’s a small cracking sound, and his Afro suddenly follow his hand, flopping with it to the other side of his head.

There’s a sudden silence, and Brook sees all three faces turn in his direction and stay there, eyes wide, mouths agape. There’s a sound like creaking hinges, and Brook realizes he’s holding…he’s holding part of his skull. He has opened his skull like a lid.

Brook eeps, swinging his head shut again in a panic. It clicks back into place, and he feels whole again. That was…that was…

Experimentally, he pulls at his head again. This time, it comes easier: the movement is smooth, with minimal creaking. And again, he’s holding his head open, skull exposed to the elements.

He looks at his audience, who are still staring at him with rapt attention. Well. Might as well take advantage of the fact that he finally has an audience.

Brook clears his throat. “I have a solution,” He says, voice echoing out from his open skull. “I don’t suppose you have any heart shaped sunglasses available, do you? And I had been considering a feather boa…”

A few weeks later, Brook wakes up.

Not literally. Brook had, of course, been doing his regular sleep (like the dead, of course…yohohoho) and waking up to the grind of his new and temporary career, as always.

No, instead, Brook had woken up to the reality of his situation. He’d been worrying over the bridge of one of his songs, going back-and-forth on whether or not to commit to the key change, before being struck with his revelation.

The string of his violin falls from nerveless (even more so than usual) fingers onto the sheets of music on the table while a concerning truth blunder its way into his mind:

This is not enough.

Because, frankly, it is not. He is the crew musician, yes. But being a better musician would not have stopped what had happened earlier. He doesn’t know how, or why, but he knows that improving his musicals skills would not have prevented his disappearance, nor whatever it is that had happened after that to bring him here. And, to make sure that it never happens again, he has to get better. Not just at music, but at…something, anything.

Better combat skills might suffice. He can work on his swordsmanship…he’s not the ship’s main swordsman, yes, but surely getting to improve would benefit the crew during battle…

There’s also the matter of his devil fruit.

Brook had been told, then witnessed, Luffy activating different gears of his devil fruit. He has seen Robin’s versatility in using hers, and Chopper’s ability to manipulate his transformations to serve his purposes.

If they can do it, why not him?

Surely there is more to it than this. He has immortality, yes. But there must be more to it than that. He has speed and a lightness on his feet, yes. But that is a matter of being dead, not of the devil fruit itself. Because, at the base of it all, his devil fruit did not affect his body, like it did for Luffy and Chopper and Robin.

No, Brook’s devil fruit affected his soul. His soul was what had lived, what had gone searching for his body after he had died. And that has to mean something, right?

His recent skull discovery has only made him more determined to actually try now, to embrace all of what he is. His crew needs it. He has to push himself, explore everything he can do.

And this means. Well. This means he’ll have to try to go back to that moment. The moment that he had died.

There’s almost nothing Brook wants to do less. What if it doesn’t work? What if it does work, and he gets stuck? What if it takes him decades to get back to himself again? He doesn’t have the time. He can’t do that again. His crew needs him.

He’s not going to kill himself, obviously. That would not be particularly helpful. But maybe…maybe he’d be able to figure out how to move out of his body on his own, without death.

Brook reaches down into himself. His reaches past the surface thoughts in his head, past the music still trailing around his head, past the physical sensations that echo around in his being, down and down and down until he hits…something.

He thinks be brave and then pulls, trying to coax the core of himself deep down up and out to the surface, scrabbling against the fear and natural response and his own soul trying to slot himself back where it belongs.

He keeps pulling and pulling and pulling and then…

And then something pops and he hears a jumble of bones collapse, and he’s not looking down at the table anymore. He’s looking down at himself, prone on the table, arm stretched and hand dangling over the side.

His (soul) mouth just about drops open. He’s done it. He’s done it.

Brook looks back down, and the memory of his reincarnation comes thundering back. Panicking, he moves (he can move!) and shoots back towards his body. His senses reorient and suddenly he’s staring down at the dark wood of the table again. He shoots up in place with a gasp, holding his hands out in from of him and moving each finger individually.

Everything’s working. He’s fine, it’s fine. He’s back.

Brook collapses back into his seat. It had worked. He had controlled his soul on command! Now, it may hav been too much now, but he can experiment with this, he can see—

“Hey,”

Brook’s soul nearly leaps back out of his bones at Sancrin’s entrance. The Longarm hesitates as he enters Brook’s space, frowning at him. “Are you staring off into the distance? We have a time crunch here!”

Brook shakes his head. “Yes,” He says. He declines to mention his breakthrough. “I’m almost done, there’s just a little tweak I have to make.”

“Well, make it,” Sancrin sits down across from him, tapping his fingers on the table. “And we still need your name. We can’t move forward without your stage name.”

“I told you I—”

“And I told you,” Sancrin interrupts. “We can’t use your name, or epithet. This is a rebrand. We need something new.”

Brook thinks about it for a second. “And you’re sure you’ll be able to get my name out to the entire world?”

Sancrin snorts. “That’s the whole point of this operation.”

Brook grins internally, as always. Perfect.

“Soul King.”

Sancrin frowns at him. “What?”

“My name,” Brook says. Maybe he can get out a message to his crew this time. “Soul King Brook. There you go. This way, we can use that crown too…”

It takes Brook two months to finish his album. It takes his team two weeks to get a distribution deal.

He can’t help but be impressed. They really had known what they were talking about when they had presented him with the deal.

They tell him to wait, and he does. He waits, he practices his music, and he trains.

Sometimes, he trains with the sword. He’s not the crew’s main swordsman, no, but he can’t let his skills get rusty either.

The Longarms are interested in his sword practice. In between bouts of fighting with distributors and getting deals, they sit in silence and watch him run through his fencing drills with the same interest and intensity that they show his music.

Brook is gratified with the attention. He sees his sword as an extension of his musicality: his sword fighting style is half dance, half technique, all deadly: it’s part of the performance that makes up the Brook-ness of himself, and he tends to overlook it more than he should.

A few weeks in, he sees the three of them in a huddle right outside his workspace. He ignores them, trying to focus on running though his exercises. He still doesn’t fully trust them, probably never well, so seeing all three of them scheming is enough to rattle his bones.

He soon hears them approach him, with Sancrin interrupting his set with a “Hey, Soul King!”

Brook stops, moving to sheath his sword. “What is it?” He asks, trying to hide his suspicions.

“Stop,” Sancrin says, pointing at Soul Solid. “Keep that out for a moment.”

Brook hesitates, but obliges. His bony fingers grip the sword tightly, but he keeps it in his hand, unsheathed.

Sancrin moves to Soul Solid, lifting it and eyeing it critically. “Good sword,” He comments. “We could use this as part of your brand, you know.”

“Good,” Brook says, jovial. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Sancrin eyes him suspiciously. “Hm,” He says, then “Needs sharpening, though. Give that over, and it’ll be sharper than the day it was given to you.”

Brook’s fingers tighten further. “It’s plenty sharp as is,” He comments. “Why, it’s so sharp, in fact, that—”

“Save it for the show,” Sancrin interrupts. He lets go of Soul Solid. “We’re well known for swords, you know. Look at any single one of our blades. They’re sharp. You’re representing us, so your sword needs to reflect that.”

Brook ponders this a moment. Their swords are sharp. And if he could give Soul Solid an upgrade, then, well…

“Fine,” Brook says. He keeps his hand on this sword. “I accept your generous offer. However, I would like to follow and see the process, if permitted. I do not wish to be parted from my sword, I’m afraid.”

Sancrin seems to wrestle with this for a moment. “Fine,” He concedes, gesturing for Brook to follow. “On the way, I have to run some ideas by you. What’s your limit when it comes to stage lightning, and do you overheat easily?”

Of course, sword fighting isn’t the only thing that Brook works on while he waits.

In the dead of the night, and in the quiet moments, he also works on his soul control.

At first, he starts by testing his range. It turns out he can go pretty far, so he spends some time wandering, exploring the immediate surroundings, and getting a good picture of the Longarms territory. He also finds out he can pass through objects with ease, which is also extremely useful.

Jiryu had told them that they would be leaving soon. Four months in, and his music had already already spread across the grand line, or so he’s told. He hopes it’s reached his crew, wherever they are. He hopes hearing him can bring them comfort.

He spends the time he has before setting sail again to anchor his body and allow his soul to wander further and further, testing his limits. He learns pretty quickly that his wandering soul is like his wandering body, and doesn’t come with a special or innate sense of direction. And so, he needs to pay attention or he could lose his body and that wouldn’t be good for anyone involved, would it?

Brook thinks it’s a good thing that Zoro had not eaten his devil fruit. If so, he probably never would’ve been able to find his way back to his body.

Regardless, this new development will surely be a useful one. This way, if he ever gets separated from the crew again, he can search for them whenever he likes. In the future, he’ll be able to find them again, and that’s all that matters.

He tries even now, sometimes. Sometimes, he feels himself begin to wander further than intended, trying to see if he can see a familiar face, before catching himself and feeling himself back in.

Six months in, and they’ve gathered enough funds to be able to officially start the tour. Brook bids farewell to the Longarm tribe and sets off with his three managers, a smile on his skull and a yohohoho playing in his heart. He’s one step closer now.

Sancrin, Eryu, and Jiryu tell him that they’re doing an official tour of the Grand Line. Minus the new world, of course. They simply don’t have the funds to insure a show in the new world. This suits Brook just fine…he doesn’t want to go there without his crew anyway.

Brook had always dreamed of being star, what musician child didn’t? But actually seeing it happen in front of him, walking up backstage to prepare for a performance and hearing the murmurs of thousands of people…fans, actual fans? Well. It’s enough to make even a nonexistent heart soar.

It also makes him think of another aspect of stardom. “Say,” He asks Sancrin, twirling his bow in his hands. “Would you say that there’s a lot of ladies out there in the crowd?”

Sancrin gives him glare. “Of course,” He says. “You’re a rock star, aren’t you?”

Brook lifts his bow high into the air. “Oh,” He says. “This is going to be fun!”

Nine months in, and Brook is a star.

His life consists of constant travel, stop after stop, with his free time being eaten up by practice with his music and his sword and his soul, still wandering, still testing, still searching.

Brook is exhausted. But it’s a good exhaustion, one that pushes at him and says do better get better be better. This is what he’s needed all along.

Still. Every night, he searches the crowds, hoping to see a familiar face. He never does, but he searches anyway.

When he finds one, it’s not at all what he expected.

They’re getting closer to Sabaody now, slowly but surely coming up to the destination of the tour’s final stop. Brook had made that part of the deal with his team, had insisted on it. They hadn’t put up too much of a fuss, which doesn’t bode well for him. He can only wait and see what that could lead to.

As such, he’s considerably more tense and also more excited as he heads into tonight’s concert. He does his usual pre-show “meditation” (aka, some soul wandering, examining the crowd) but he isn’t expecting anything. He takes great care to search though, coming closer than he’s ever dared, trying to find ways to stay as invisible as possible while still getting a good look…

He passes over a face, and pauses, right in the middle of a tree trunk. He slowly backs back up, trying to get a better view without being too conspicuous. It’s not someone he knows, but…the face, it’s familiar, it’s…

He flips through his memories, trying to place the face below him, and—

Ah.

An image floats up to the forefront of his mind: a wanted poster with a crazed grin and a feral stare, pinning the viewer with a look of disdain and violence.

He makes his way back to his body, sitting back up. Sancrin jumps in surprise. “Well,” He says. “That didn’t take you long this time.”

“Hm,” Brook says, considering. “I was thinking, Sancrin. I’ve heard tell that there’s a famous pirate out in the crowd today.”

He can practically feel Sancrin’s ears perk up. “Oh?”

“If you don’t mind,” Brook says. “Can you ask him to meet me backstage after the show? I so would like to speak with him.”

“Well…” Sancrin frowns, clearly thinking it through. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt at this stage. What, with you being dead already and all. Which pirate is it again?”

Brook taps a bony finger on his guitar. “Kid,” He says. “Captain Eustass Kid.”

Captain Kid is simultaneously exactly what Brook expected and not at all what Brook expected.

For one, he actually deigns to show up: Brook had anticipated a fight, had been a bit worried that he had committed some sort of offense, but…

But instead, Captain Kid saunters in after the show like he owns the place, all swagger and confidence and an air of being ready to snap into danger at any second. He’s trailed by another man in a blue and white mask and a shock of blond hair. Even though his face is hidden, Brook can practically sense the resigned expression that practically radiates from him.

That’ll be the first mate then. Excellent.

Brook, as his role as the host, speaks first. “Captain Kid,” He says, slowly rising to his feet. “How wonderful to see you attend one of my shows. You’ve made quite the name for yourself already.”

Kid practically preens at the words. “Sure,” He says, voice gruff and clearly attempting to maintain a cool exterior. “We’re on our way out, you know. To the New World. Why not catch one final performance before we go?”

“I’m honored,” Brook says, taking a seat on a rickety plastic chair near the back, carrying for them to do the same. “I hadn’t known my reputation had preceded me to this degree.”

Kid struggles to fit in the offered chair, but manages with a few awkward turns. “Rock is a dying art,” He responds. “Always good to keep it alive!”

Brook eyes (without eyes) Kid again, taking note of the fur, the nails, the headwear. He can certainly appreciate someone with a good sense of aesthetic.

The first mate sighs audibly. “Captain,” He says. “We’ve said our hellos. We’ve seen him. Let’s go.”

“Shut up Killer,” Kid says, and Brook tries not to let his knees knock. His name is Killer? “Anyway, there’s a reason I’ve accepted his invitation to talk.” And here, Kid pins him with a fiery glance. “You belong on that Straw Hat’s crew, don’t you?”

Ah. He had caught on quite quickly. “Yes indeed,” Brook says. “So, I believe my purposes in asking for this meeting are quite clear.”

Kid raises an eyebrow. “Of course,” He says. “Tell me, though.”

Doesn’t seem like he had known after all. “Well,” Brook says. “I’m not with them at the moment, but I’ll be meeting back with my crew somewhere down the line. I’d like to return to them with a formal notice of an alliance between our two crews, if possible.”

There’s a monetary pause before Kid throws his head back in a sharp bark of laughter. “And why should we do that?” He guffaws. “We’re after the same thing, you know. He and I. Why should two private captains chasing the same treasure form an alliance?”

“Excellent question,” Brook says, for that had indeed been one, and he really doesn’t have an answer for it. “I hear you’re both rookies. Would it not be beneficial to have someone in the same position as you as, if not a friendly face, at least a cordial one? There will be enough enemies in the New World as is without adding anyone from this side of the Grand Line too.”

“You think you’ll be—” Kid begins, voice rising, only to be interrupted by his first mate.

“Captain,” the first mate, Killer, cuts in. “Let’s hear him out,” Then, to Brook. “What would be in it for us? You’d only get in the way of our Captain’s goals.”

“Yeah!” Kid says, pointing at Killer. “What he said! Why should I do that?”

Brook shrugs. “It doesn’t have to be friendly,” He says. “Just…mutually beneficial. No shooting to kill, just the understanding that we both let each other go on our way unless there’s a direct challenge to the other captain’s goals.”

Kid looks back to Killer. “Why should I do that?” He repeats, eyebrows raising higher.

Oh, he’s just looking for an excuse now! Brook thinks, suddenly irate.

“Can’t hurt,” Killer muses. “One less person directly targeting us would be a help. It’s quite a tame agreement, all things considered.”

Kid suddenly guffaws again. “Fine,” He tells Brook. “Not like Straw Hat is going to be much of a threat anyway. Fine. Pass on the message to him, then…we won’t engage unless you get in our way.”

Brook grins wide on the inside. Won’t this be a nice welcome back present for the crew? “It’s a deal, then,” He says. “I’ll report this back to my captain. He’s honorable, he’ll keep his promises.”

“He better,” Kid grumbles. He makes to stand up. “That all?”

“No,” Brook says. “One more question. Have you ever heard of Haki?”

Kid snorts. “Heard of it?” He asks. “I’m a master of it.”

“In that case,” Brook says, patting at the sword in the sheath in his side. “If I may trouble you in asking you for a few pointers…how are your skills in Armament Haki?”

“Favor for favor,” Kid counters. “If I’m going to help you, I’ll need something in return.”

What could Brook possibly give—Ah.

“That’s fair,” Brook concedes. “How about this, then. I’ll give you and your crew another free concert right here, right now, in exchange for pointers. Free of charge.”

“Well,” Killer begins, before Lid jumps right back into the fray.

“Must have a high opinion of your music,” Kid begins, a gleam in his eye. “Exchanging my advice for something like that? Really?”

Brook has lived for too long to not recognize a bluff for what it is. “If that’s the case,” He begins. “Concert is off the table completely. How about—”

“Hey,” Kid interrupts. “Wait. You know what? I wanted some music. Play the set again, with a few extra thrown in. Then we’ll talk.”

“Pointers first,” Brook begins hopefully? “Concern last? That way you can drink til you pass out.”

“Was going to do that anyway,” Kid grumbles. “But fine. Now, just watch what I do—”

The tour goes by in flashes of color and sound and training and practice. Months pass in a blur, and then a year, and then he finds himself back on the ship, chugging along to the last stop of the tour. He’s parked at the front of ship, where he usually is when he’s not working, staring out at the water and hoping to catch sight of land.

Sabaody gets closer and closer, and Brook can practically taste it, feel the breeze of the archipelago in his curls. He glances back down at the card in his pocket, sees that it’s following the same direction that he’s going, that he has been going ever since the tour had begun.

He’s right. The card, whatever it may be for, is leading him towards Sabaody. And he knows in the depths of his wandering soul that his crew will be there too, waiting.

It’s all come to this now. He can plan a thousand things, come up with a thousand ways to ditch his increasingly shifty managers, think of a thousand greetings he can yell at his crew, dream up a thousand songs he can sing to them when he sees them again.

That’ll all come soon. But for now, Brook throws his arms out in the air, welcoming the sounds to the sea that drive the music in his heart, and laughs: “Yohohohoho!”

Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6

#one piece #op #speaks #brook #soul king brook #one piece fic #one piece fanfic #eustass kid #eustasscaptainkid #one piece eustass #eustass captain kidd

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she-posts-nerdy-stuff · 3 months ago

Text

Don’t Go Blindly Into The Dark

Summary:

To hide that he can't read, Jan Van Eck has been forcing his son to pretend he's blind since he was eight years old. Wylan is now attending Ketterdam University, and meeting Jesper Fahey may very well be about to change his life. But is he safe to tell Jesper the truth? And what will Jesper say if he does?

Jesper is struggling to weigh up his life in the Barrel and his life at the University of Ketterdam, and there's a good chance that his growing debt is about to make the decision for him. He hasn't attended class consecutively for months, but maybe that will change when his newest project includes partnering up with Wylan Van Eck. But can he really leave the Barrel behind him? And how long can he keep up the pretence of who he thinks Wylan wants him to be?

Meanwhile there is a darkness growing in Ketterdam, and it seems a killer may be stalking the streets of West Stave. An unknown evil is closing its jaws over the city, and it’s starting to feel like nowhere is safe.

Tags: @justalunaticfangirl @lunarthecorvus @i-need-help-this-is-my-obsession @devoted-people-hater

If anyone else would like to be tagged let me know :)

Content warnings for this chapter: trafficking references, implied sa references, discussions of death, violence, canon punishments that Inej received at the Menagerie, abuse, ptsd, flashbacks, threats, wounds and scars, fear of violence, implied racism, misogyny, imprisonment, implied murder references

AO3 link

Chapter 55 - Inej

Kaz had not, of course, deigned to inform Inej, when she said that she’d send Anika to the safehouse, that Anika was already occupied. She walked tightly out of his office, her mind trying to click through other ways of getting Jeluna safely out of Ketterdam if her contract could not be sourced. Maybe Kaz would do her the courtesy of a paid ticket and a fake name instead of forcing her to stow away, but even so Inej wasn’t convinced that Jeluna would make it through the journey alone, never mind whatever might be waiting for her on the other side of the True Sea. A country she hadn’t touched in 10 years, a homeland she was too afraid to breathe a word of language from - a harbour that connected to Ketterdam, that would be patrolled by slavers just like every other. But what else was she supposed to do for her?

Anika proved briefly difficult to track down; Inej eventually found her outside Layla’s door and clearly not in a particularly upbeat mood.

“Does he not want me to keep watching her?” she asked, jutting her chin towards the closed door behind her, “She’s still not asleep, Kaz said to stay with her all night,”

Inej grimaced. No wonder Anika looked so fed up.

“I’ll send someone else,” she sighed, trying to flick through potential options in the Dregs that wouldn’t scare the damn life out of Elodie and Jeluna if it proved necessary to go into the flat. She was coming up short, “Is Jade around?”

“Downstairs, I think. What’s going on at the safehouse? I thought it was empty,”

Inej raised an eyebrow.

“And that will remain the official standing. I’ll see you tomorrow,”

She walked away before Anika could get a chance to follow up, cringing slightly at the sound of Layla retching on the other side of the door. Why was Kaz having Anika watch her? Because he doesn’t trust anyone, ever, and he’s never going to.

Did he trust Inej?

He wants to finish me himself.

Then we’ll have to make sure he doesn’t get the chance.

No. Maybe. He might give the Wraith the closest thing to trust that he could - he believed her, he never once doubted that she would ignore whatever the Black Tips might offer her in exchange for crossing him - but he didn’t care, did he? He just didn’t want to lose a valuable asset. He probably wouldn’t even say valuable.

Then again, what had she been hoping for? She’d told him, he’d listened, she’d left. He was hardly going to offer her homespun comforts, was he?

I ain’t offering that bitch terms anymore.

Inej shuddered at the memory, at the sound of Riesen’s voice crackling in the air, or the ferocity with which he spat that word, like he wanted to drive it straight into her bones. She knew the word, of course, had heard it more than enough times spoken in Kerch, and a few in Ravkan. It always came with danger. It always made her pause. Yes, she’d heard that word plenty more than her fill. And yet she wasn’t even sure she knew a translation for it in Suli.

The first time she’d heard it she was a tiny little thing, too small to keep its recollection vivid in her head by now. It slipped like oil from the tongue of a Ravkan man as he argued with her mother at the edge of a Suli camp barely hours after they’d arrived; Inej was clinging to the leg of one her elder cousins, scared of this stranger and the anger with which he snarled the words of her second tongue, just barely daring to lean around from this safe, comforting leg to watch him in time to spot the sudden flush rising in her mother’s cheeks, the way the anger of her father and her uncles resounded as they stepped forwards to place their bodies between Mama and this interloper. Inej felt her cousin tense beneath her grip at that word but she had never heard it before then, did not recognise its shape, did not acknowledge that it was this word that had caused the change in her family’s demeanour. She just heard the shouting getting louder, saw her father pace towards this man as her mother reached out to catch his elbow from behind, and clenched her little toddler fist as tightly as she could manage around the edge of her cousin’s trousers. Barely a second of this fear had passed before he’d swooped down to cradle her in his arms, picking him up so she almost banged her chin against his shoulder.

“You’re flying, Inej,” he whispered in her ear, speaking Suli, playing their game of swaying her this way and that, clutched safe against his chest.

Inej could still see the argument over his shoulder, but she liked this game. She liked flying. She clapped her hands together behind his head, giggling as they swayed.

“Like swings!” she babbled, still clapping.

“That’s right,” he told her, as they reached the step to the door of her parent’s caravan, “You’re flying like we do on the swings,”

“Swing tonight?” she’d asked him, most probably through a stream of childish noises that were otherwise indiscernible as words.

“Hopefully,” they stepped inside and he whisked her up into the air to spin her about before pulling her back into his chest as she laughed, “As long as we can stay here,”

Inej had frowned as he set her down upon the bed.

“Stay here,” she said decisively, nodding her tiny head in confirmation, as though the question was of preference and not of safety.

“Fingers crossed,” he said, sitting down next to her and showing her his index and middle finger crossing over each other, “Can you cross your fingers, ‘Nej? Can you show me?”

Inej had giggled, twisting her tiny fingers messily over and around each other whilst she lifted her arms and flapped them about to show him. He beamed.

“Swing tonight!” she cried, crossing her fingers.

It felt like a promise to her; she was crossing her fingers as she said it, so it had to be something that would come true.

“Will you come watch us?” he asked, “If we swing tonight?”

Inej always watched them. She was the littlest, back then, since this was before her younger cousins came along, and would spend the shows held safely in the lap of whichever family member was not on stage at each given moment. She loved watching the shows, had already learned when to applaud and when it was more polite to keep quiet, had already learned and understood the pride of seeing Mama and Papa, her uncles and her aunts, her cousins, in their performance.

“Watch swings!” she’d cried excitedly, clapping her hands again as she thought of flying, “Watch the wire!”

“Which one’s your favourite?” her cousin asked, and the decisive reply came:

“Wire.” she tapped her chest, “Walk on wire,”

“You want to walk the wire?”

“I will,” she tapped her chest again, “I will walk on wire,”

He grinned, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and rocking them both gently from side to side.

“You’re going to be a great wire walker, Inej. The best,”

Inej clapped happily, rocking from side to side, picturing herself on the highwire and the world a very great distance beneath her. She had almost forgotten the argument outside.

There were a couple of instances of hearing it at home, in Ravkan, where Inej had been old enough that she could still recall them now, but not many. She’d long ago lost count of how many times she had heard it said in Kerch.

She heard it first from Tante Heleen, barely the second day after her arrival at the Menagerie. Inej had been left alone on the floor to tend to her wounds from Heleen’s fury at her having cried the night before - once she’d woken up, anyway; once she was done with the switch and the cane Heleen had choked Inej until she passed out. She’d awoken at the foot of the bed in the room that she could not call hers, a golden chain between her ankle and the wooden bedframe. Heleen wouldn’t unlock her until this evening, when she needed to prepare herself for the night, but that wouldn’t be for hours yet. The chain wasn’t long enough for Inej to even climb onto the mattress, not that she’d wanted to, so she had no choice but to stay curled up where she’d woken, her knees tucked beneath her chin and her arms wrapped around her shins, her eyes drifting to the barred window that seemed so very far above her head. She wanted to make herself as small as possible. She wanted to disappear.

The door opened earlier than she was expecting - the sun was still high in the slither of sky visible to Inej - and she felt panic rising in her bones. It happened quickly, in the space that it took for someone to open the door and step into Inej’s field of vision, the process of trying desperately to barter with emotions that would not listen to her, arguing her limbs into stillness and her face into passivity, for fear of only making everything worse. The door was closed far faster than it had opened, and a girl, maybe a year older than Inej, slammed her back against it. In spite of herself, Inej crawled the single step around the bedpost that she could manage, peering at the stranger with the finger pressed tightly against her pursed lips.

She wore a cloak over shoulders that her silks would have otherwise left bare, but the hood was turned down so Inej could not determine the shape of the animal ears sewn over it. Her own cloak - the cloak she wore, not hers - was somewhere in here, she knew, but she hadn’t been able to move and find it. She would have to be quick about gathering it to go downstairs when Heleen came to unlock her cuff. The girl’s skirt, which fell above her knees in the front but cascaded to her ankles behind, was dark orange, and the tight silk top that left very little to the imagination was mostly white, edged in the same colour as the skirt. The Fox, Inej realised, taking in the reddish orange of the cloak and the black lace stockings that swirled up the girl’s bare calves. Ravkan.

“Chto-?” Inej began, her voice soft and nervous, but the girl shook her head almost violently.

Inej leaned back, heart leaping into her throat, staring at her. What was she doing here? She shouldn't have come. She was going to get both of them hurt.

Inej pulled away, moving back out of view of the door, leaning her back against the side of the bed and staring back at the window. Maybe if she ignored her the girl would leave. Maybe if she ignored her, when the girl got caught Inej wouldn’t be punished as well. It seemed a pretty unlikely scenario. After a moment, and a small, cautious footstep, a tentative voice managed:

“Do you speak Kerch?”

Inej said nothing, did not even dare to look in the girl’s direction. This was her mistake, not Inej’s and she would not let herself be destroyed for it.

“Kei ryezich Kerch?” the girl tried again, “Kei ryezich Ravkayash? Na ryezich Suli,”

Do you speak Ravkan? I don’t speak Suli.

Inej was doing her best to ignore her, but she was also still a stubborn child from the Suli caravans who did not like being underestimated.

“I speak Ravkan,” she said, in the language, not looking up, “We all speak Ravkan,”

“And Kerch?”

“Some,”

When she finally gave in and tilted her head towards her invader, it was to see immense relief breaking across her face.

“Good,” she whispered, switching to Kerch, “Do not speak Ravkan. Do not speak Suli,”

Inej said nothing.

“I am Yana,”

Yana’s Kerch was slow and deliberate, halting in places, but with the little she knew of the language that was mostly what Inej needed to be able to follow a conversation. After a beat of silence that she knew Yana was waiting for her to fill with her own name, the Ravkan girl instead ventured:

“You have bruises,”

She tapped her neck very gently, and Inej lifted her own hand to feel the painful flesh around her throat. She supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised.

“She will bring a Healer, before tonight. I do not know when - we might not have long,”

Inej was tired. She was so, so tired. She wanted to sleep. She wanted to eat. She wanted to cry. But she would gladly have stayed on the floor, hungry and scared and tired, chained to the bedpost for days on end, if it meant that it was the only thing that would have to happen to her.

“Why?” asked Yana, not needing to specify what she meant.

Inej looked back out the window.

“I think… because I cried. I didn’t un… un-der-stand everything she said,”

“You need translations?” asked Yana, sitting down uninvited opposite Inej, “I can try to help,”

Inej leaned round the edge of the bed for a moment, eyes flicking over the door, then back to Yana. She found herself momentarily focusing on the girl’s black lace stockings. Inej’s own feet were bare, cold against the floorboards. Yana’s feet, she realised only when she’d been staring at her for long enough, were scarred beneath the stockings. She could see the marks between the swirling edges of the lace.

“We should have a little time, at least,” the girl assured her, “She is busy,”

There was a long, long silence.

“I’m Inej,”

Inej couldn’t remember the exact shape of every word that Tante Heleen had hissed into her ear but she repeated what she could of the words she hadn’t known, and Yana did her best to dutifully translate. And that was how Inej learned the Kerch translation for the word she’d first heard as a toddler, that she had heard a handful of times in Ravkan, that even now she was not sure she knew the translation for in Suli. Yana looked down, embarrassed or uncomfortable or both, and mumbled the word into her chest apologetically. Inej just nodded in silence; a vague memory of her mother, of a stranger, of flying in her cousin’s arms, that she couldn’t quite see clearly was tugging at her edges. She didn't want to see it - and yet, she desperately did. She wanted to sink into it, into being a child clinging to her elder cousin’s shoulder, and never climb back out.

She learned other things from Yana, too. New words. New things to be cautious of, new things to be afraid of. She learned what happened to the last Suli girl at the Menagerie - though she could tell Yana hadn’t meant to let it slip, everything implicit in her words had been quite obvious to Inej. She learned that Heleen never sent her buyers to the auctions that the rest of the children on the ship that brought Inej here were to be taken to; she had greased the right palms, made the right deals. The men who’d taken Inej took any Suli girl they found to Heleen for first picking, if she wanted her, and they’d do the same for any other vacancy she might need to fill. Apparently now she was looking for someone from the Southern Colonies; the Leopard cloak was empty. Inej learned these things and filed them away inside her head, gathering a catalogue of any information she could scrounge together. Over time she started gathering more, from other sources, until it had become a strange escape; a library in her mind, where she could wander freely between the shelves and peruse the books to her liking. All these little things, stored inside her head. She hadn’t realised they’d be what saved her life.

I can help you.

And that was how it started. Yana, sitting across from her on the waxy wooden floor. She’d managed to slip out before Heleen appeared, but it had been a close thing.

“Inej?”

Inej jolted as the shape of the Slat reformed itself around her, grey walls at her side and wonky floorboards beneath her leather-soled shoes.

“Inej?” Anika ventured again, a little nervously, “Are you okay?”

Inej blinked. It seemed she had only made it as far as turning the corner to the next set of stairs, and Anika was leaning around the wall with concern forming a little divot between her brows. Behind Anika, though Inej wasn’t sure the girl had noticed, Kaz was standing halfway down the steps that led to his office. Inej scowled.

“Send Jade to the safehouse,” she snapped, not entirely certain which one of them she was addressing, “That’s not my job,”

And with that, she turned sharply on her heel and marched away. Back to her room to be alone for as long as she could manage it. Back to her room to eat, to try to sleep, and to send up a prayer for poor, pretty Yana.

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