#dude I would have been SO pissed if my parents made me throw out my pieces 😭😭��� like 1 that’s my babies and 2 that’s fucking money!!!

[rosicheeks]

oh yes you were at court! i forgot that was at the start of that post lmao. i've been to court twice when i was super young for drinking underage and then smoking lool it was so boring and long and shit but thankfully you were just there for moral support, i hope it wasen't such a bad thing your friend had to deal with! I remember seeing you post about moving but i forget if it was TO or AWAY from your parents but that clears it up. I totally get you on that though, i'm living at home right now and i feel kind of similar about not feeling comfortable in your own home. Its a bit different for me, but similar enough. Hell my stepdad even sleeps in the living room too! hes always done that so ive always felt like i had to be on eggshells when night time hit. I used to sneak smoking in the backyard back in the day myself, i got caught once when i was in highschool he made me throw all my pieces out which sucked big time. ahhh i love that, art! you should totally show more stuff on here too, at least if you're comfortable and its not stuff you'd wanna sell, i would absolutely love to see any of it 🖤i've dabbled in writing poems and things i planned to make songs, although only recently. I've always wanted to be a musician but my attempts at learning guitar over the years have never ended up lasting long and i try to learn singing but i just dont really think i can. plus i was always afraid of self expression so i never wrote until a few years ago. i still do, because music is so important to me (which is why i did pick 🎤!) and it makes me so happy but yeah. i have 2 shows im headed to in a few months even so im so excited 🥰my day though has been so boring, i mostly played video games and watched youtube videos. watched another episode of a show i've been watching called Silo, which i absolutely love. im so surprised you had room in your tags still after myself lmao, but i do that same thing i always talk in the tags! also i'm giving you tons of hugs and kisses 😘🥰 - 🎤

Hi hi hi ☺️ how are you doing lovely? 🥰

[sunshineting]

⭐︎two sides of the same fucked up coin pt3⭐︎     pt1 pt2

toxic!eren x toxic!reader

word count- 2376

summary- eren sends a spicy voice note to you while you're broken up and your drunken self decides to send one back... and he eventually shows up on your doorstep once AGAIN 🤭

here’s pt 3! :D sorry it took so long LMAO dude an anon sent me the ask about this like literally so long ago omg I am so sorry 😭♡

minors DNI PLS

You’ve been broken up with Eren for a month now. You’d decided to call it quits one day and hadn’t looked back since. Of course, he had plenty to say about it; long text messages, emails, DMs, phone calls, he’d even written you a letter. It took a lot of willpower, but you eventually took yourself out of the equation. Your relationship was toxic, the two of you weren’t good together. Yes, he was so incredibly sexy and intoxicating, but he brought out some of the worst in you. You hated that you enjoyed arguing and fussing at him. You couldn’t even admit to yourself that you liked it when he pissed you off. It made you wonder if you were really the sweet girl you thought you were. 

You resort to sending almost everything he’d ever bought you to his parents’ house; you knew if you sent it to his place, he’d send it right back to you. All the jewelry, all the clothes, all the cute little trinkets he bought when he thought of you. A few specific gifts, you opt to keep. It would be incredibly awkward sending sex toys to his parents’ house. The printed pictures of you two have been stuffed in a shoe box, tucked away in the back of your closet. It hurt to look through everything and relive all your memories together, so you tried your best to just throw shit in boxes without looking. 

You’re curled up on your couch and on your fourth glass of wine when you hear your phone ding. Pausing the movie you were half paying attention to, you see a text from an unknown number. An audio message? Drunk and curious, you open it up and give it a listen. The audio is muffled at first, sounding like someone clumsily trying to record. After the initial rough noises, you hear slapping and what sounds like a woman moaning. What the hell? The slapping sounds continue, and you begin to recognize them as someone having sex. Before you have time to react, you hear a male voice. 

“Take this shit, baby,” the voice commands. There’s no way. You know that voice. Eren fucking Jaeger. You throw the phone to the other side of the couch with a yelp as if it burned you. Your mind races. Why would he send this? What is wrong with him? And… why do you find yourself missing the way he fucked you? Thoughts are whirling through your mind when–

“Fuck, Y/N,” Eren groans. Did he just…?

“That’s not my name, what the fuck?!” the woman who was just moaning exclaims. There’s some muffled noises of movement and the audio stops. You can’t even process your thoughts because your traitorous pussy is wet and needy now. 'Awww, he misses me', you think. 'No, don’t fall for it, bitch, you’re just drunk,' you shake your head. No way did Eren just send you a recording of him fucking someone and saying your name. And no way were you getting wet about it. You try to delude yourself into thinking that this was all a drunken fever dream, but you know the truth. You miss being manhandled and fucked by Eren. You felt jealousy pool and bubble inside you as you thought about him fucking some other bitch. You know you really don’t have a right to be jealous because you broke up with him. Yet, here you are. 

Another glass of wine later, you find yourself pinching your nipples and biting your lip. Eren’s audio undoubtedly turned you on. Fuck, you missed him. The way he caressed you, the way he squeezed you, the way he marked you. If you thought about it hard enough, you could practically feel his rough hands on you. One hand staying on your nipple, the other trails down, lightly dragging against your skin, all the way to your covered core. Slight goosebumps arise. 

Blaming it on the wine, you felt a bit bold. You shimmy your silk pajama shorts down and trace your slit up and down. Shit, you could feel your panties dampening already. You slip a hand into your panties and rub tiny circles around your clit. Inhibitions lowered, you reach your other hand out to grab your phone and press record. The wet, squishing sounds of your pussy fill the air as you swirl around your clit and dip a finger into your hole. Breathy sighs and whimpers escape your throat. 

Closing your eyes, you can imagine Eren; sexy, toxic Eren. His vibrant green eyes, his long hair, his hot mouth. Fuuccckkk, his mouth! Eren really was your best eater. You remember how slick he was with his tongue as you try to emulate it with your fingers. That flicking motion he did that always sent you over the edge just wasn’t the same with just your fingers. You whine in frustration. To try something different, you slide your middle and ring fingers in your pussy. That’s a little better. The squelching noises amp up as you pump your digits in and curl them up. You can feel yourself start to get close. Thinking of how he’d fingerfuck you and lick your clit at the same time, you feel yourself slicken even more. The thought of his thick, rough digits curling up in you, brushing against your spot. The thought of his quick tongue licking and suckling your achy, swollen clit. Your orgasm comes fast, hard, and loud. Your cream coats your fingers, which has been all but pushed out from the tight squeezing of your cunt. Your body shudders, waves wash over you as you ride your high. 

Out of breath, you reach a shaky hand to pick up your still recording cell phone. The audio is sent before you can even think about changing your mind. “Shit,” you laugh, drunk from your orgasm and the wine. With your muscles loosened and worn out, you feel sweet sleep calling your name. You drift off with your cell phone still in hand. 

Loud rapping on your door awakens you. 'What the hell…' you think. As you peel your eyes open from drunken slumber, you lick your dry lips. You had no clue what time it was or who the hell was knocking on your door. You quickly slip back on your silk pajamas and go to look through the peephole. Oh no. Who else would it have been other than the devil himself, Eren fucking Jaeger. With a groan, you find yourself unlocking the door. There he stood– tall, intense, and fucking sexy. And damned if it didn’t turn you on. You couldn’t let him know that though, you had your dignity to maintain. Before you can tell him off, the bastard swoops into you and engulfs your lips in his. That rough, demanding touch was what you'd longed for. Your fingers and toys could never replace this. Not even Rosequan, your rose toy. A wanton moan seeps its way from your lips. 

“I knew you missed me baby, I knew your little pussy missed Daddy’s touch,” Eren murmurs between kisses. You hadn’t even let this man all the way in yet and he’d already gotten you weak in the knees. You’re able to get out between breaths, “Cum— um, come inside.” 

He pulls away from you long enough for you to allow him in and close the door behind him. As you go to lock the door, Eren grips your hips from behind. Leaning down, he nibbles your ear and says, “You know how much I thought of you? Every time I fucked my fist, I pulled up a picture of you. I couldn’t even get you out of my head when I fucked that other girl. You’re infecting my fucking brain, baby.” He kisses down to your neck, nestling into a sensitive spot to suck on. 

Your moans nearly drown out the words you were able to squeeze out. “I hate yooouuu,” you whimper. 

“I know, baby, I know” is all he says. You can feel his hardness pressed against the top of your ass. God, you missed it. 

“Waitwaitwait,” you rush out breathlessly. With those words, Eren pulls himself off of you. You turn to face him. “What the hell are you doing here, Eren?” it comes out more bratty than you intended it to, but whatever. 

“You sent me that little audio, so I took that as an invite,” he chuckles, running his hand on the back of his neck. Seeing his smile made your heart flutter. Wait, audio? It comes rushing back to you, the erotic audio you’d forgotten about in your drunkenness. Heat floods your face. 

“Yeah, I did. So what? You were clearly thinking of me when you sent your little audio,” you say in an attempt to put on a brave face, “which– what the fuck, by the way?” You shoot him a stank face. 

“It’s from a while ago... and cause I was thinkin bout you,” he leans in, kissing the top of your head. “I never stopped thinking about you for real,” he murmurs, trailing kisses from your temples to your lips. Eren’s enticing lips pull you in; his hot tongue swiping along your bottom lip to gain entrance. Your lips part for him, your mouth soon being filled. He always tasted so good, like sweetmint. The heat from his hands light your skin on fire. 

“Fuck, you feel good,” you moan. Your hands scramble to unbutton his belt. With ease, Eren slips off your pajama shorts, letting your needy pussy breathe. ​​The belt finally off, you slide your hand down his pants. His girthy cock presses heavy into your palm. You hear a groan escape from him. You free his cock after stroking it through his underwear a few times. The smooth skin of his tip felt so nice and plump. Before you can do much, Eren picks you up and holds your back against the door with your legs wrapped around his waist. “Eren!” you squeak in surprise.

“There we go, I missed hearing you say my name,” he smirks. His smug face makes you bite his bottom lip. With his lip still between your teeth he says, “I missed your little crazy ass.” He resumes kissing you, quickly gaining the upper hand and biting your lip in return. Your pussy clenches at the slight pain. 

Holding you up with one arm, Eren uses his opposite hand to guide his cock to your weeping hole. He swipes once, twice then uses your juices to slip in. Your cunt stings at the stretch, but fuck it felt heavenly. Eren quickly bottoms out, filling you to the brim with his cock. “F u c k,” you gasp out. 

“Shit, baby, you’re made just for me. You feel that? That pussy knows who it belongs to,” he grunts, gripping your hips with both hands. Each thrust he gives you, you feel the cold door against your ass and back. You couldn’t be bothered to consider the noise your neighbors could be hearing. You cream around his length, coating every inch. Eren gives you thrust after relentless thrust, your poor pussy is taking such a beating.

Your pussy’s bully decides to carry you to your bedroom after momentarily slipping himself from your heat. Eren sets you on the bed while he goes to your bedside drawer. “I know you still have them,” he mutters while going through your shit. “They weren’t in the shit you sent back to my parent’s house and I know damn well you didn’t throw them away…” Your cock drunk brain doesn’t even really process his words. Before long, he finds what he was looking for and you hear a buzz. 

“Ereeennnn,” you whine. He says nothing and the next thing you know, your rose toy is placed perfectly on your swollen clit. You yelp. 

“I just wanna hear you make those pretty noises you made on the audio. You can do that for me, right?,” you all but hear the smirk in his voice. You buck your hips against the toy in his hand. Eren then slides himself back into you, the dual sensations making you feral. A pornographic moan rips out of you. It was just so much. His long, thick cock pounding into you mixed with the relentless vibrations against your clit– it was so overwhelming. Before you know it, an orgasm rips through your body, causing you to whine and tremble. Your cunt milks Eren’s cock for all it has. 

“Fuck!” Eren exclaims, not expecting you to cum so fast, your hot and gushy walls sucking him in. Ramming against your cervix, he fills you with his spend. His length twitches inside of you before softening. Eren leans down to kiss your forehead and all over your face. After you’ve both come down from your high, Eren pulls out of you. 

“You’re the bane of my existence,” you laugh breathlessly. You hear him laugh as well.

“Yeah, well, you’re the reason for mine,” he says with a slight smile.

“Shut up,” you mutter. He always had a way with words and that charming smile to make you fall for him again, but you had to stay strong this time. 

“I’m for real. I want us to work out. You mean a lot to me and I keep fucking up. So,” he shrugs, “Imma do better.”

You roll over to look into his emerald eyes. In them, you see everything the two of you had been through together. The good times as well as the bad. But you could tell something had changed, though. Maybe he’d done some growing up in the past month. Probably not. You couldn’t tell for sure. But at the very least, you could get some dick from him on occasion, you ponder. A moment of silence passes before you speak out loud again. “Listen, not enough time has passed for me to trust you again. We’re both fucked up and we both need to focus on ourselves, to be honest,” you pause, “but maybe we caan take things slow.”

Eren takes your words in for a moment. “Yeah. Slow works,” he says with a satisfied smile. “ I am the slow stroke king, after all.” 

[indecenthoney]

Five more minutes...

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

Don't you fucking hate it when someone wakes you up on your day off? The one time. One time you get to finally sleep in and throw all the worries of the world into the trash. Just for someone to ruin it. I mean I understand having to wake up because of an emergency or a meeting. But to be woken up, so I don't sleep the day away? Bullshit. It's the fucking summer. Can't I get-

"Five more minutes... Pleassssse... Ugh... I know... I know it's way past afternoon... I intended on sleeping in, on purpose... Listen... I've been working my ass off at college and my crappy ass job for monthsss... Now that I'm finally back home... I think I deserve a little more shut-eye... Now... Get out of my room... or you're going to regret it..."

After some deliberation, I finally decided to head home during the summer. It definitely beats working my life away and going straight back into classes. I couldn't fathom taking another year of torture. Not to mention, I would finally be able to eat some home-cooked meals, catch up with friends, and possibly hit up a few bars. If I'm lucky, I might even be able to hook up with someone during my stay. Although, I forgot to factor in one teeny tiny detail. The sole reason I ever left in the first place. The demon that resided in my neighborhood now pestering me over a couple minutes in bed. That demon, or well childhood friend of mine had always topped me in every single thing I had ever done. At some point, you can get sick of always being compared to. Now that I'm back in town, she has nothing better to do than to dote on me. Constantly breathing down my neck over every single thing that I do. I'm starting to think she gets some kind of sick kick from parading me around like some sort of dog.

"Ughhhhh... Shut upppppppp... Don't you have anything better to do? It's been years... Get a boyfriend or something... Like... what're you hanging around here for? My mom asked you to... What? Dude... Okay, listen... We're adults now... You don't have to listen to every request they make... My mom only keeps you around hoping we finally get along again... Year after year she has tried to get us to reconnect... And we both know it's not going to happen... No... There are no buts in this situation... Just let it go... You don't have to kiss my parent's ass just to prove you're better than me... They know that... I know that... and you know that... You always joined all the clubs I was in to prove a point... I gain literally nothing from being with you... You're better than me... I get it... Happy? Now leave... Good night..."

Looking back at it, I was ashamed to act so out of character. I guess it really got to me after seeing her face after so long. The breaking point was when she had the audacity to try and pull the blankets off of me. Blinded by anger, I pulled and wrestled her onto my bed. The both of us flailing around without a word. After some time, I was able to completely pin her down. Her shirt disheveled and raised high enough to see her breasts. The blankets draped over us like a fort we had once made as kids. Our exhausted breaths heating the enclosed space around us. My morning wood placed atop her short shorts twitching eagerly along her.

"Well... I'll let you go as soon as you stop flipping out... Yeah yeah... You're still as annoying as ever... Huh? Excuse me... I'm the one that should be pissed... Bothering me so early in the damn morning... What are you freaking about now? What? It's just morning wood... It happens... Fucking perv... Yeah, you... Why're you staring so much...? Hahahah... You think this is because of you? You give yourself too much credit... You could never turn me on... Then again... It's been quite a while since I had any action... And hole is a hole... Right? Aw... Don't wanna? But you promised to take care of me... No? And what're you gonna do about it? Push me off with those frail arms? Sure you can beat me in everything else but at the end of the day... I'm still bigger than you..."

The tip of my cock pitched a tent so effortlessly. Every whimper or sign of resistance urged me to tease her even further. And in turn, the silence grew louder knowing she had no other choice but to take it. It was supposed to be a little scare. Or so I thought. But seeing that she was finally put in her place brought out a different side of me. To top it all off, the overwhelming sensation brought upon the back of my head grinding against her needy cunt was just insatiable. Poking my tip against her opening only for pieces of cloth to divide me from theoretical heaven. It drove me crazy. Even if it was her. Even if she did annoy the living fuck out of me, I couldn't quite help myself. I would be lying if I didn't find her the least bit attractive.

"Hey now... Hush... Any louder and they'll hear us... What would my family think if they found you moaning like an absolute slut? Aww... And what're you gonna do about it? Tell? Thanks to you... I honestly have nothing to lose... They already see me as a failure... What's one more fuck up? Stop? Why? Is Little Miss Perfect getting wet? No? Then why don't we take these off? And have ourselves a little look... Not wet? Really? You promise? Then you have nothing to hide, do you? Well... A little too late for that... I'm not going to take the word of a liar... You heard me... Lying to my face... Right right... Sooooo this wet spot on your shorts is all my imagination, huh? Really? Then what's this? Hahaha... You're absolutely soaked... Fuck..."

Upon exposing her dirty little secret, she sought solace in the palms of her hands. Retreating as much as she could from my line of sight. Her bare cunt leaking and in full view, awaiting the endless ridicule that was to befall her. But to her surprise, there was no bullying. No jab. Nor sly compliment. Nothing. She peeked through spread fingers, only to find my lips pressed against hers. Soft kisses woven and sealed. Each one more welcoming than the last. And in time, her advances were all her own. Clinging so desperately to that addictive rhythm. Kiss. Lick. Suck. Mindlessly waltzing between each before falling victim to her own bliss. To her realization, I had long stopped my approach; watching her enjoy herself. She soon crumbled under her embarrassment.

"Having fun, are we? Hahahah... Hey hey... C'mon there's nothing to be embarrassed about... What's with the hostility? It's just a few kisses... Whatttt? I'm not saying anything... Me? A tease? Never.... Get off? Wowwwww... So rude... After all that eager kissing? You really are heartless... And here I thought we were finally hitting it off... Hahahah... C'mon bestie... What's five more minutes? Hm? Hahahah... God... It was just five minutes... You couldn't give me five... fucking... minutes.... Now look at you... Hahahah... Pathetic... You did this to yourself, hun... Now I'm gonna have you take responsibility for it..."

My body lined along hers; her sight fixed on the drip and drop of my my own saliva coating my member. A quick concoction of spit and juices. With pressed thighs, my cock fit so perfectly betwixt her. A constant, yet steady motion of thrusts, leading me to leak pre-cum in the process. And still, her eyes fixated on the comings and goings of my cock eagerly fucking her thighs. Her face tainted with shades of red. Hastening my rhythm. There sudden bursts of moans took place as the tip snagged along her clit. All due to the animalistic type of fucking that was prone to error. To thrust and fuck without remorse only to catch and chase that orgasm I so desperately needed.

"Look at us finally getting along... Who would've thought it'd take fucking your thighs for us to stop bickering? What's with the look? Shouldn't you be happy? You can finally be of some use... With thighs this soft, I might get addicted to using you... Mmph... Fuck... I'm so close... Hey... I want you to clean it up... You heard me... Open your mouth and let me shoot it in... We can't go downstairs with you covered in cum, can we? Unless that's what you're into... Hahahah... No? Fine fine... I guess I'll just stick it in... Save us the mess, right? You don't want that either? Well, you better make up your mind cause I'm close... Mm... Oh? Atta girl... Stick that tongue out... F-fuck... Mmph... Look at me... Yeah, I want you to fucking look at me... There we go... You ready? Yeah? Ughh... Fuck..."

A trail of cum ran down her tongue and through the valley of her breasts. Hesitant fingers glided down licking up each and every drop of me. An unknown side that came so naturally to this prim and proper girl. Despite her reserved demeanor, she would flawlessly complete such a degrading task. In awe, I wanted more of her. To see more of her. Yet we were suddenly interrupted by the thundering footsteps that seemed to be heading to my room. I quickly put on the clothes I had on the night before. Instructing her to stay hidden under the covers until the coast was clear.

"Just follow my lead, alright? Oh! Hey mom... We were just about to head down... I know I know... But we were talking and... we decided to start over again... I thought it was really sweet for her to get me in the morning... so I invited her to hang out with me during the summer... It's actually a good thing she was here cause I can't get outta bed even with an alarm... Right? Isn't she the sweetest? So responsible... So yeah... She's going to drop by every morning and wake me up... Mhm! Alright alright Mom... No need to get emotional... We're good now... Oh! Her? She was just feeling a little dizzy... I'm making her rest for a few before we head down... Yeah, I'll take care of her... Mhm mhm... Yeah... Okay! See you in few minutes... Hahahah... That was close... C'mon, get yourself cleaned up... I don't know about you but... I'm looking forward to tomorrow morning..."

And won't you look at that, this is starting to look like a very promising summer.

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

With much love,

Honey

[giyuulatte]

alright i finally finished the uncanny counter 2 and…

hmm

my thots and spoilers below

THIS IS ALL MY OPINION AND IM BLABBING AND IT IS YAP TIME

it’s 1am so i’m a lil coocoo

once again all MY OPINION if anyone sees this

honestly speaking this season was alright. it def did not compare to season one, which i was expecting. yet it wasn’t up to par with it either. it felt like too much and not enough at the same time so it kinda fell flat to me

in season one everything was connected and there were very clear motives. from the bullying, so mun’s parents, the evil spirits, ji chung shin himself, and the corrupt government. and chung shin’s backstory made me feel for him which is what made him a great antagonist imo. like i loved him

but hwang pil gwang (slick back), gelly (hongjoong variant LMFAOO), and wong (just wong tbh)….mmph

i can’t really remember the beginning it took me 2 months to finish it but, dude and his crew showed up outta nowhere and just started creating chaos for funsies???? now don’t get me wrong, i’m all for villainy for fun but i just couldn’t get into for some reason with them. it just feels like their characters weren’t fleshed out enough for me to actually like them no matter how fine they are bc the whole crew could get it

and then we move to ma ju seok my adoring and loving husband. now this was something i could get behind. him going on a rampage trying to get revenge for his wife and baby, having enough rage to summon an evil spirit on his own??? like that’s what i’m talking about!!! i felt for him and wanted him to succeed bc that con man was also annoying as shit. i really and truly wanted him dead bc he was the absolute worst jfc

if the story only focused on him, and getting his revenge and having to take him down. and only him. seeing how far his rage could take him and what would happen ON HIS OWN without any outside manipulation pil hwang *coughs* would have been a lil more interesting to me and i think i would have enjoyed it more. ik pil gwang wanted his power n shit BUT WHY. like give me a reason.

TO ME hwang pil gwang and his crew added absolutely nothing to this for me. and gelly betraying slick back and all that other stuff just felt unnecessary to me. gelly not being able to do anything and literally almost every single time the crew showed up, and bc pil gwang wouldn’t help her. GIRLY STAND UP AND HAVE SOME RESPECT YOU ARE A BADASS TF YOU DOIN???? GET OFF YA KNEES

AND ms chu’s newest child lim jae yeol….why was he there??? and be honest. what did he do for the plot other than give ms chu another child and show her backstory

and then do hwi, lawd my sweet piano man. WE WENT THROUGH ALL THAT JUST FOR HIM TO FORGET HA NA IN THE END I WAS SO PISSED bc once again. what tf did he add. i feel like he could have been good to ha na, genuinely. imagine getting dumped by ya not girlfriend after y’all done hung out together and have each other hiccup remedies, and then getting attacked by someone who finna rap they verse in bouncy i am so dead

i understand they were trying to idk, give their characters more depth but pls

mo tak punching so mun was NAWT on my 2023 kdrama bingo card. and he didn’t even apologize for it!!!! i understand he was angry and upset bc he thought lost his partner and so mun was doing a bit too much but i just feel like that was outta character for him to do…. and for him to not apologize for it was just, what???

and don’t get me started on jeok beong. i was um, expecting a lil bit more. yoo in soo is a FANTASTIC actor. if you told me he was gwi nam from aouad before hand i would have passed out. THAT MF RANGE IS INSANE!! but, but, jeok bong could have been more. i love him to death but he stayed the same person the entire time. granted towards the end he did start meshing with the group a bit better and throwing ideas out and stuff but i dunno bruh. i was feeling him and not feeling him at the same time.

the same goes for kang ki young. baby if you say that was myung seok from attorney woo i would have passed out pt2. like he did his thang bc i deadass hated his character even tho he was looking good as hell

the lack of so mun’s friends also bummed me out bc i really like them and they are an important part of his life. wanted to see more of those three together as well. my found family was not found with them this season

but the counters dynamic was still a++ like that’s real family. teasing ha na and do hwi, ha na having to save so mun while he was in a coma, then going to yung to ask why so mun leaving, jeok bong calling mun his brother just *wipes tear* magnificent

and why tf did mun have to lose his powers again. we did that shit in season one there was no need for that tbh

nothing to say about ms chu god bless.

nothing to say about jang mool god bless.

mun going over seas and seeing wi gen’s daughter like ENOUGH.

just…. too much, and yet not enough at the same time.

but i still very much enjoyed 8.5/10 BAYBEE

[bhonk]

style comic idea based on something that actually happened to me and my bsf #4 (but it's also kind of a fanfic atp and i might make it one):

It had been a few days since their kiss or rather repeated kisses and everything seemed to be back to normal, more or less. Stan had noticed Kyle became a little more awkward as of late but hasn't brought it up, partly because of Kyle's refusal to show vulnerability and partly because he thought he was just overthinking the situation.

They had only seen each other in class since then and had behaved normally, at least to the public eye. Kyle's awkwardness and hesitance was throwing Stan off and, against his better judgement, he made the decision to drown his thoughts in alcohol, shutting them up even if temporarily. His parents were away so there would be no one to question the amount of vodka he drank.

The next morning his head was throbbing although he had expected it. Sharon invited him to breakfast but he felt his stomach churn at the idea of food. Despite this, he ate half his plate, not wanting his mother to catch on what happened. He pretended everything was fine, not even bothering to get some ibuprofen for his headache. He'd walk it off.

In class he was quiet. More so than usual. He didn't remember if he had texted anyone last night and checked his phone, just in case.

Stan: Heyeyy dudej look wahta i made (hey dude look what i made)

[insert photo of a badly drawn soda can]

Kyle: wow :)

Kyle: channeling your artistic skills i see :))

Stan: yeha

Kyle: are u ok?

Stan: hahaq yeah i amay haev had sa few beersa (haha yeah i may have had a few beers)

Stan felt as if he had been punched in the gut when he saw the little text that wrote "seen" at the bottom of the screen. Kyle hadn't replied after that. He was sitting at his desk, working way ahead of the class as he usually did.

Stan turned off his phone and looked out the window, hoping not to be talked to anymore, wanting nothing more than to disappear. Just then, his assigned desk mate, Butters, entered the classroom and quietly sat down after apologising for being late. Stan turned to him, probably looking a mess judging by how startled Butters got.

"Are you okay, Stan?" he worriedly asked, taking out his notebook.

"Yeah. I'm fine." Stan bitterly responded, immediately shutting Butters out. He was usually nicer to him, so Butters didn't push further, not wanting to piss him off more.

The break unfolded just the same, except for the part where Stan didn't speak much. Kyle walked up to his desk and asked how he was, but Stan refused to elaborate, only saying he had a headache. When he locked eyes with Kyle, he saw a concerned look on his face, one he hadn't seen in a long time. He felt a pit in his stomach, like he was going to throw up. He swallowed thickly and put his head back on his desk, fighting back the urge to slam his head against it.

Kyle walked him home. He'd did that since they kissed. It was strange but Stan couldn't say he was complaining. They used to do that before they drifted apart...

As they got to Stan's place, Kyle extended his hand for a fist bump, which Stan responded to, giving him a gentle bump.

"Could I also maybe have a hug?" Stan felt pathetic asking but he really needed one. Another punch in the gut when Kyle hesitated.

"...sure." He awkwardly shuffled forward, embracing Stan gently, him barely feeling the touch with all the layers he was wearing. He hugged Kyle back tightly, as if Kyle would run away if he didn't. Stan felt like he would.

They said their goodbyes and Stan went inside, grateful the house was empty. He sat on the floor in front of the door, feeling unable to move further. He couldn't put his finger on why Kyle was being so weird no matter how he looked at the situation.

A few hours later he decided to text him and ask him what was wrong. He wanted to create an elaborate text or even call him, make him feel just how worried he was for their friendship.

Stan: u good?

Stan: like idk

Stan: u've been weird

Stan cringed at himself after rereading the texts. Was that really the best he could muster? Kyle always knew how to talk to people, something Stab hoped to pick up as well from spending so much time with him. Unfortunately, he didn't. He threw his phone across the bed and curled up, wanting to sleep his problems off. Which he could. And he did.

this is turning into a diary damn

[quxxn0fhxarts]

Sonic Senior Year: 5. Slippy Slippy Lips

Photo Made with Bing AI

September 8th, 2014 10:01 AM

Blackbourne Manor, Ghost Hill, Mystic Heights

   Today was Sunday, so they had to return to their dorms by 5 PM tonight. Shadow had been trying his best to be a hospitable host. He also didn't want to scare Tails again. He liked the fox even though they weren't 'friends.' 

   The only Mobian Shadow hated in this world was Sonic. He was a prick, and his charming smile and good looks fooled everyone. "Hey..." Shadow said, and Tails looked up at him from the worktable.

   "Hey, what's up?" Tails asked if he was wearing an old shirt from Shadows, and he looked adorable in it. 

   "I'm... sorry for threatening you the other day. I just..." Shadow looked anywhere but Tails' eyes, "I don't like being coddled."

   "It's okay, but I am not going to apologize," Tails said, and Shadow looked at him, "What I said was true. It is okay to be afraid of something." Tails said, continuing to perfect his diagram. "Do you think I could come here with you next weekend too?"

   "Why?"

   "Because we need to spend time on this project... and I love your house, it is so beautiful," Tails said.

   "I would have bet 100 grand that you would have cried last night when the ghosts were groaning in your room," Shadow chuckled.

  "I did, but your house is still amazing. I would otherwise stay on campus if you say no," Tails shrugged.

   "You don't want to go home or to Son- one of your friend's houses?"

   "Nah... I don't want to be near my mom, and I don't like to burden my friend's parents." Tails sighed, "I... wouldn't want to be a burden on you to Shadow. It's just... this place feels so homey." Tails told him.

   Tails had always heard others call a certain place 'homey,' but he never understood it. The closest he had ever felt to it was Sonic's house, but Headmaster Longclaw doesn't like visitors much anymore. 

   Plus, Tails was still a little awkward around Silver, and he didn't think he could behave under the same roof as him. He was nearing his heat soon, and Tails hadn't made love in a month, so he was pretty backed up. 

   He thinks he can hold himself back with Shadow because he fears him. He didn't think Shadow would ever go for a fox like him... but he had never been so wrong.

   "Um... yeah, sure," Shadow nodded, "I might ask for alone time again, but you seem to respect that,"

   "Of course," Tails said, looking out the window to see storm clouds closing in. Do you think we should head in?"

   "No, if the storm comes in, I could use an excuse because the school is pretty serious about driving safety, so either way, I'll spend more time here," Shadow said, and he couldn't hold himself back from smiling. He never thought about it, but having someone appreciate his home just as much as he did was satisfying.

   "Are you smiling?" Tails smiled.

   "What? No, of course, I am not," Shadow quickly fixed his face.

   "Oh, come on! You're smiling, you're smiling," Tails giggled, jumping up and tapping Shadow's chest.

   "Tails, I will throw you into the dungeon if you tell anyone," Shadow chuckled.

   "You have a dungeon!" Tails gasped, grabbing his wrist, and Shadow rolled his eyes as the fox hyperactively yipped. "Show me, show me, show me!"

   "Miles Prower, don't you have some sliver of survival instincts?" Shadow smirked, and he heard Tails yelp as Tails miscalculated his jump. Knocking Shadow back onto his back, Tails straddling Shadow's waist.

   "S-Sorry," Tails said with wide eyes.

   "Seriously, Tails..." Shadow said, resting a hand on the small of Tail's back. The fox's ears perked up, his tails swayed, and Shadow put his hand down the length of them. "Do you not have any survival instincts," Shadow bared his fangs to him.

   "U... Um," Tails licked his lips, flustered by this. Shadow smirked, flirting with the fox. He was almost drooling—well, he was drooling from somewhere. Shadow looked down, feeling wetness on him.

   "Dude, are you pissing on me," Shadow snapped, and then the thick scent of Tails slick mixed with his wetness punched Shadow in the nostrils. 

   "Sorry!" Tails covered his face, but he couldn't himself stand up, "Shit... sorry, I can't move, please help me up," Tails said.

   "What is that... Is it piss?" Shadow asked, frozen as well. The wetness was sending orgasmic chills to Shadow's stomach. It felt ice cold, but at the same time, it felt intoxicatingly hot.

   "Isn't it obvious... I am an omega?" Tails mumbled. You said you had been with an omega before. Are you going to make me say it out loud?" He snapped.

   "Y-You're a what?" Shadow said with a gaping mouth. Tails peered through his fingers, and he saw the confusion on Shadow's face.

   "Shit... you were lying," Tails grumbled, rolling off of Shadow, trying to stand up, but his legs were jello. He lay on his back next to Shadow, looking up at the immaculate ceiling in shock. "I... think we should go back-"

   "Y-yeah," Shadow gulped, and they avoided eye contact, "Why did you... squirt on me?"

   "I didn't squirt. I can't help it. I am going into heat. Shut up!" Tails whined, covering his face and blushing again.

------- 7:29 PM

Building 23 Dorm A, Mobius City, Mystic Heights

   Silver ran into the dorm from the parking lot, getting to school from Nana's house. "Yo, Espio, are you here yet?" Silver asked, walking into the dorm, shaking off the wetness from the rain.

   "Hey man," Espio said from the kitchenette, putting some rice in the cooker, "Tails is in your bed," Espio said, and Silver widened his eyes. He walked over to see Tails curled up in his bed, "Is he asleep? He just got here,"

   "Yeah, he must have been pretty tired. He stayed the weekend at Shadow's house and was probably too scared to sleep."

   "I am not asleep, I am just resting my eyes," Tails mumbled, fluttering his eyes open, "I was worried about you... it's about to rain bad,"

   "I am here now," Silver smiled at the fox. I'm going to take a shower. Do you want to join?" Silver asked, and Tails nodded. "Espio, you want to join?" Silver said with a smirk, and the chameleon gulped. "Relax, I was just messing around," Silver said, holding his hand to Tails. C'mon," Silver gave Tails a look that made him weak in the knees.

   They walked into the bathroom, and Silver turned on the shower. Tails were obviously in heat. Silver gently pressed him against the wall and kissed him, "Do you know how worried I was about you all weekend? You could have at least texted me back..."

   "Ghost Hill doesn't have any service," Tail blushed, unable to look him in the eyes. He knew when Tails was bashful around him, he was holding something back.

   "Something happened?" Silver asked. He slowly got enraged, "What happened? I am going to kill him. What happened?"

   "He didn't do anything... I did," Tails said, his ears lying down. He looked up at Silver. "I was bouncing around, and I knocked him down. I fell on top of him, and he gave me a look and started petting me, so I started... er... slicking up," Tails said, and Silver covered his mouth, trying to stop laughing. "This isn't funny, Silver..." Tails said.

   "What did he do???"

   "He thought I peed on him... then I let it slip that I am an Omega," Tails said, crossing his arms and looking the other way, "Then he asked me why I squirted on him..."

   "Oh my god, that is so fucking funny," Silver laughed.

   "Silver... It's so embarrassing," Tails sniffled, and Silver immediately stopped to pull him into a kiss.

   "Remember the first time I made you squirt?" Silver asked, and Tails blushed, kissing Silver back. It was almost equally embarrassing. They were at the Archipelagos, and Tails was trying to wrestle Silver into giving him the last chocolate bar, and pretty much the same thing happened.

   "You didn't make me squirt then... Silver, you made me slick up..."

   "What's the difference?" Silver raised an eyebrow.

   "You're gonna have to find out," Tails yawned, driving Silver insane.

   "Show me how to make you squirt," Silver glared at him.

   "Well, that would be way too much work, and what would be the fun in that?" Tails smirked, walking into the shower. Silver now had a new goal. Please vote, comment, add this story to your library and read list, also share this story with a friend:)

AO3

Sonic: Senior Year - Chapter 5 - quxxnofhxarts - Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types [Archive of Our Own]

Wattpad

Sonic Senior Year - 18+ - 5. Slippy Slippy Lips - Wattpad

[blackfairy312]

What would their Mincraft houses look like? And what is their biggest fear? (Fnac3)

🔥answering more of theeeese heheeh

i actually had a minecraft house for Komi once but it's lost o an old computer that doesnt work anymore 😭 it was shaped after a Black Box from Evillious (her "heart") and had a few bedrooms upstairs for herself and her kids and a HUUUGE kitchen and a fancy bathroom and a greenhours and a nise backyard an then like, a secret evil basement . i wish i had pictures of it.

dawg if these assholes played Minecraft together it would probablt be a server Komi made and she only gave Antonio moderator permissions bc she doesnt trust the other two with that . Antonio woukd make a statue of Vinnie and set it on fire to piss Vincent off. Komi spends most of the time building and decorating things and organizing bc she likes being productive (or else she'll start doing crazy shit). like these assholes she works with would probably be too busy fucking around in the game to focus on what theyre doing so Komi would make one house for them all to live in and make rooms for them all . every time the guys come back to base they'll see Komi in the middle of putting a redstone contraption together and they'll drop styff off in chests and explore the base little bc there's new stuff Komi added and then they'll leave to fuck around again . AND SOMEHOW Komi will have full neatherite armor and shit . everyone like "DUDE how did you find the time for this?" meanwhile all Vincent Richard and Antonio have been doing have probably been like . Naming chickens "Bitch" and hangint them from trees to throw eggs at them and harassing villagers or hanging around the pillager mansion like idiots . every time they die they have to ask Antonio or Komi to /tp them to someone else so they can get their shit.

and biggest Fears ... i already said in another postbut Komi is afraid of getting attached to humans but like she always does that anyway. smeting about her immortality VS their mortality and how they're destined to die and she's destined to leave .i guess she copes with this by CLINGING onto the memories she makes with the humans she meets in the Multiverse . and taking some suveniors from each world. Actually she has the original Vinnie puppet ! she kept that .

Vincent's biggest fear is people finding out who he really is .. a Manipulator Mainsplainer Mansluaghter er . he doesnt want to lose everything he doesnt want to be a 'normal person' he WANTS TO BE SOMEBODY. his biggest fear is LOSING. thats probably why he cheats at hide & seek as Monster Vinnie in the final night.

Antonio's biggest fear is ending up like his dad . as he's been raising himself and his siblings and observing his parents he's made a mental note of his dad's behaviors and how he NEVER WANTS TO END UP LIKE HIM . you can think ofhis dad like Clay Puppington maybe ? idk i just saw a moral orel clip this morning and now im thinkin about that show again . NO SORRY I FORGOT ANTONIO IS A LOT LIKE KENNY MCCORMICK , his parents just arent crackheads they're alcholics . but Yeah Antonio is TRYING to get himself together but tbh Vincent being an awful boss is ADDING to Antonio's stress and its not good for his mental health at ALL. he was probably seeing a therapist and was going to AA meetings but then ONE DAY he got into a fight with Vincent backstage and he went home and spiraled again. undoing his progress. Ywah im projecting heavy.

Richard's biggest fear is probably something tamer than everyone elses . for now anyway he isnt really complex in my mind like the other Three are rn 😭😭😭😭 SERIOUSLY THE GAME GIVES ME NOTHING TO WORK WITH WHICH IS FINE B FNAC 3 HAS AMAZING STORY TELLING BUT IN THE CONTEXT OF ME TRYING TO EXPAND ON WHAT'S THERE I DONT HAVE MUCH FOR THE CAT ACTOR .

[cherrychapstiq]

WTF was that episode!? Did they have to break me?

In the beginning it was all rainbow and sunshine and poof.

Ray : Oh you fucked up.. I knew that his situation with Mew would have to come out, but I didn't expect it to be thrown into a fun cute little day. Also seriously? Happy birthday? Yeah.. "happy birthday Sand, I sleep with you because my best friend doesn't want me"

Sand : It's okay.. His poor heart is broken and I just want to give him a big hug. This guy can't catch a break, can he? He was so happy, and telling his mom that he and Ray might be more.. but here comes Boston. Also, his mom is fun and seems loving. But at the same time I can't help but wonder, was she ever a parent to him.. or did he have to be the parent for himself and her..

Mew : I can't with you. He really called Boston, out of all the people? Come on! Cheum should've been his person of contact.. at least he didn't call Ray. Also idk why, but I feel worried about him. Something's coming. And I don't mean another drama with Ray.

Top : I'm sorry I just don't like you. It's the way he carries himself. Also what was that look he gave Boston and Nick? Control over that face would be nice. Plus seriously? You had that big fucking bed and decided to sleep on that small couch? Disappointed but not surprised.

Nick : That glow up tho. Look at you baby boy. He really went "Boston you can have the best of both worlds". Master of cockblocking. But still so naive.. He saw how messy Boston is behind the scenes. And in this episode he was at the front line. Does he really think he can fix him?

Boston : YOU. MOTHERFUCKING. CUNT. I was pissed before. But hold my beer I will throw hands. Gosh how I hope someone will just kick his ass. What was the mf reason? First he embarrassed Sand, second he told about Ray's crush. And how proud he was with the whole "uh I have a video" like who asked? Seriously, what is wrong with him.

So.. yeah. Therapy, therapy for all.

I honestly don't know what to think about Sand's dad. Will he make a grand entrance? Or will he just stay as a "some dude". But I can't help but share my sick idea with you all.. Ekhem. What if Sands dad is also Ray's dad? 👀 honestly I think it's just my brain panicking and they'll go either "we don't show his dad bc it's not important"way OR his dad will be dad of either Top, Nick, Boston. I don't really believe they'd be so fucking evil to make him Mew or Ray's step brother.

I am broken. I can't believe they pieced me back together and made me believe in happiness just to fucking rip me apart 🫠What the fuck Jojo?

[writingwordsgayly]

"I didn't expect the fire hero to walk through the door with the water bucket!!!!" I say as I dodge a super powered punch, the article I read about the 'incident' simply said she is in good health but taking a week to reinvent her suit.

"I think her suit not being water proof might have been an..." Another dodge, this time a kick "oversight!!" It just makes her unable to use her powers, I went on a research deep dive after it happened.

"silence young villain! your petty pranks are not what brought this on" I put a table between us but he just jumps over it, my apartment is not built for combat, it barely counts as an apartment if I'm being honest, it's one room and a mini fridge, the bathroom and kitchen use the same utility sink, but it's hard to find rentals as the child of a supervillain.

"then why are you here dude? It's finals week and I got shit to do" if I flunk out my dad will make me become an intern for one of the other supervillains and honestly I got sick of all that in highschool.

"your father has made me look like a fool for the last time, and since he doesn't care to bring you to his mountain you must pay the price" I get a look at his face and recognize him, my father switched the pants if his suit with snap off pants and he flashed a news helicopter

"Woah dude! I had no part in that one honest, and it'd be un-heroic to kill an unrelated college kid wouldn't it?" He jumps at me again and I'm maybe starting to lose my Patience. I don't even pull that many pranks, just enough I have an excuse to attend a university in the hero's city

"you think I worry about the details? Your father must be stopped and this is simply the first step" he hasn't clued in yet his super speed doesn't seem to be giving him an advantage here, but when I block his punch with my hand without flinching he seems to register that his superpowers aren't doing much to me, I smile and try to remember the training grandpa gave me when I was a kid. I fake out my next dodge and clock him in the jaw, he falls like a bag of bricks and Im sure my downstairs neighbor is grabbing her broom to knock the ceiling, he tackles me and tries to pin me down, I kick him and he hits the ceiling, I hear the stomping of my upstairs neighbor and take Solace there will be witnesses before this has to get ugly, although the snow blowing in front the broken window does piss me off a little bit.

I hear people on the stairs and there's pounding on my door, I open my mouth to tell them it's unlocked but his hands wrap around my neck to silence me, I kick him again, but he's held in tight, I stand up and move toward the door, his feet squeaking as they drag on the floor, I twist the door knob pull a little bit before he throws me across the room into my glass end table, I look up to see old lady Edith standing there broom in hand, shocked to see the scene, my final sits have finished in the easle, with paint splatter across us and the room, It looks less light a fight and more Ike he attacked a civilian because of a personal grudge, he freezes when he notices their phones in hand as I act far More injured then I am, my performing arts professor would be so proud. I stagger to my feet and looking at my neighbors say, with just a little bit of blood dripping from my lip

"he attacked me while I was painting! Please call someone, I can barely move!"

My parents visit me in the hospital, a fist bump from both, I also got a written apology from the hero's agency, and he is put on probation, until the media dies down, my dad e-Transfers me double for my next allowance, still forwarding me his friends contact information if I want to pursue the family business. Edith brings me cookies once I'm home, grumbling about hero's these days

You are the kid of a supervillain who only plays pranks on heroes, and never does anything serious. One day though, a “hero” comes to kill you because of your supervillain parent.

[wuffzilla]

Had a "fake-out" nightmare that I wanna remember. It started as scary but failed big time by the end. Because my Brain either never intended to truly scare me, or it forgot that I love being a monster:

It started out on a chartered Bus trip with friends & family where we had to make a pit stop at my old Church for some reason. But when we arrived, the building had 3 GIANT car sized scratches that had scrapped away the brick outer layer to reveal some oozy green symbols beneath em. Which according to one of the dream NPCs was the mark of Beetlejuice (which I guess shouldve been my 1st hint this wasn't gonna be a "REAL" nightmare.)

So at this point, I strongly feel that going inside was a VERY BAD idea & that I would not have a Good Time™ at ALL. But one of my dream cousins grabbed my hand & dragged me inside following the others saying we HAVE to do this for ~whatever reasons~ & also the symbols show this isn't a SUPER powerful demon or anything so even tho this will SUCK it wont be SO bad. I think the reason was to save their kiddo & I think they were a Frankenstein of 3 cousins I actually have that also happen to be parents.

ANYWAY. Inside of my old Church now looks NOTHING like how it used to. Its some kinda dilapidated old timey warehouse. Everything is made of wood, is rotting, & the walls + roof are falling in everywhere. (Now that I think about it, it kinda reminded me of the inside of the buildings in the Old West town in Twilight Princess). Everyone disappears 1 by 1 including the cuz that drug me in there OF COURSE. Then some Demon in a suit appears dramatically all MUAHAHA etc you will now be cursed & serve as my monstrous guard FOREVER!! And he turns me into a HUGE 6-limbed multi-eyed werewolf thing.

Mr Demon, turning me into /THIS/ is not the punishment you seem to think it is. I am now puppy. I am THRILLED.

I barely have time to register how pleased I am when some other demon in a suit shows up. He also has a cursed guard, which is some Yakuza looking guy, also in a suit. The 2 demons sit at an office table to have a meeting & demand we battle as entertainment.

Yakuza dude starts talking shit & turns into a flaming were(?)-Kitsune. He's setting some of the old wooden crap on fire and throwing it at me. But since im huge its like he's throwing wadded up paper at me. Also the fires goes out as soon as they touch me.

Kit gets mad & turns invisible then starts setting things on fire that circle me as intimidation. But I could still easily slap all the flames out & it pissed him off that I knew where he was based on where new fires started. He didn't understand how I figured it out. Sir, you are running in a circle, Im just watching the front of a long lines of fires.

Kit is SO VERY pissed that I’m not scared of him. I'm starting to feel bad about it. But its like... Sir, you are also puppy. Also I’m like 5 times bigger than you. You are McStruggling to avoid my casual playful romping.

In his defense, it prolly wouldn't be so easy if not for my being so much bigger than him? I had a Birds Eye view of the area we were “fighting” in. I kinda felt like a Colossi looking down on & fighting Wander + Aggro.

The dream had long given up trying to pretend to be a nightmare by now & ended with the demons cracking up at their meeting table while drinking coffee, Kit fuming off to the side while giving me tips on being a guard beast, & me being excited at learning how to shift between my human & DOGE forms.

[favefandomimagines]

Oh (e.b.)

Summary: buck runs into his ex fling, taylor kelly, leaving you to feel like nothing but a second choice

AN: inspired by the winter finale of 911

You were a catch. You were smart, had a good job, beautiful. Guys were lining up to date you and yet the man you wanted to be with didn’t want you.

It seemed to everyone around you that the two of you were meant to be but to Buck, it wasn’t that obvious. He didn’t see how you looked at him, didn’t hear how you talked about him. Clearly, he didn’t know how you felt about him.

So, you stuck it out. You put your feelings on the back burner and just decided to be his friend. If he wanted to be with you, he would.

But you couldn’t ignore the feeling in your chest when he told you he was having dinner with Taylor Kelly.

“We got to talking at that call and then Albert said him and Veronica were having dinner and I just, called and asked if she wanted to come.” Buck explained. “And she said yes?” You asked.

“Yeah, she seemed on board. Maybe this is the universe telling me something.” He said. “The universe? You’ve never believed in that stuff.” You told him. “But this is Buck 3.0. I’m all for a change.” Buck answered. “When is this dinner again?” You asked. “Wednesday at 6.” He said. 

“Oh.” You muttered quietly. Wednesday was your birthday. And it seemed that Buck was caught up in bettering himself and finding someone that he had completely forgotten about you. But you had enough trying to remind him and get him to see that you were right there the whole time. 

You swallowed the lump in your throat as you looked at the mug in your hands. “You okay?” He asked. “Uh, yeah. I think I’m gonna head home. I have a long shift tomorrow.” You said, rising from your seat.

“You just got here.” Buck pointed out. “Buck, I just, I gotta go.” You said in a more stern manner. He looked at you with furrowed eyebrows and watched you leave his apartment.

You let out a large sigh as you got in your car before the tears came.

How were you so unlucky that the guy you were head over heels for, wanted someone else? He wanted someone else so much, he forgot about her birthday. When you were right there through everything? You were there through Abby leaving, Ally breaking up with him, the lawsuit against the department, his parents, everything. And yet you were left on the back burner. 

You always put his feelings above your own, not because you felt like you should. But because you cared about him and if he was happy, you were happy. Though, the more you thought about it, the more you realized that he sometimes didn’t give you that same courtesy. 

Your day was like the day from hell. Everything that could go wrong in your line of work, went completely wrong. To make matters worse, you had lost one of your favorite patients. She had stage 3 leukemia but she never let that change her personality. 

She made going to the hospital after shifts worth while because at least you got to spend time with her. But the cancer was too aggressive for the chemo and she died in her sleep that night. You tried not to let losses get to you but she had been your patient since you started volunteering at the hospital. You were really hoping you’d see her remission but the universe had other plans. 

All you wanted to do was lay on the couch with Buck and just cry. You got in your car and dialed his number, getting a few rings before he picked up. “Hey, you!” He greeted you. “Hey, do you maybe want to come over later? I’ve had the worst day. I lost a patient and-” You started before he cut you off. 

“I’m sorry, Y/N, I can’t. I have a date tonight, trying to put myself back out there.” He said. “I can come over after.” He added. “No, forget it. It’s fine.” You said. “You sound upset.” Buck said. “I’m fine, Buck. Enjoy your date.” You replied before hanging up the phone. 

Since that evening, you had been avoiding Buck like the plague. On shifts, you wouldn’t talk to him. Sticking to Chimney and Hen like glue to avoid any conversation with Buck. 

You went so far to ask to ride in the ambulance to calls, rather than in the fire engine like usual. It wasn’t odd for you to be in the ambulance because you were an EMT but you usually rode with the rest of the team.

“Does anyone know why Y/N won’t ride with us anymore?” Buck asked his crew. “Are you that dumb?” Hen asked. “Hen,” Bobby started. “It’s because of you, dude.” Eddie answered. “Me? What did I do?” Buck questioned. “Well, you blow her off all the time, completely ignore her feelings and ditch her for dates and you’re so oblivious you can’t see that she’s totally in love with you.” Eddie explained. “When you were hurt in the hospital, she didn’t come to work for days because she didn’t want you the throw a clot. She had to work triple shifts just to make enough to pay her rent because of all the days she missed sitting with you. Did you ever thank her for that?” Bobby added. “Well, no, but-” He started. 

“And when she lost her favorite patient, Emily, did you ask her if she was okay?” Bobby asked. “I-I couldn’t I had a date. And she didn’t say it was Emily.” Buck said, trying to defend yourself. “If you don’t reciprocate her feelings, that’s fine. But she’s your best friend. And as her best friend, you are supposed to be there when she needs you. She shouldn’t have to explain herself.” Bobby concluded. “You also forgot her birthday.” Chimney added as they all got out of the engine. 

The rest of his shift, Buck tried getting you to talk to him. But it was always, ‘I’m busy, Buck’ or ‘Can’t talk, we’re working.’ He’d given up when he tried to stop you after a call and you had given him a look he had never seen before. 

The guilt was eating him alive. He was a terrible friend to you and he thought being with you was a pipe dream. Until Hen and Eddie told him you loved him. But regardless of your feelings for him, you had done so much for him and he didn’t realize it until you were gone. 

That night, Buck went over to Taylor’s to gain more perspective on what he could do to fix what he royally screwed up. 

“I don’t know what to do. She hasn’t talked to me in weeks. We’ve never gone this long without talking.” Buck explained to Taylor.

“Well, you did forget her birthday. And not give it a second thought that she was hurting over the loss of a patient.” She said. “That’s not helping.” He replied. “You asked for my help and I’m being honest. You really hurt her. She almost got evicted because she was so worried about you. The first person she wanted to be with after her friend died was you and you went on a date instead.” Taylor said. “I know. I tried to talk to her but she won’t answer any of my calls or texts. She won’t even look at me anymore.” Buck said. 

“You are so stupid sometimes.” Taylor laughed. “What?” Buck asked. “She has feelings for you. Why else would she get so upset? If she only saw you as a friend, you would be getting screamed at not avoided.” She explained.

“Everyone keeps saying that but there’s no way Y/N has feelings for me. She’s...perfect. Perfect doesn’t fall for damaged goods.” Buck rebutted. “Trust me, she loves you.” Taylor told him. “And do you love her?” She asked. “Of course I do. But being with her seemed like it was too good to happen so I tried to move on. I guess I tried so hard I ended up hurting her anyways.” Buck answered. 

“Then tell her. And do a whole lot of graveling while you’re at it.” Taylor said. 

Buck quickly left the apartment and got into his car driving like a bat out of hell. When he arrived at your apartment, he didn't even bother to park in the parking stall correctly, his main focus was just getting to you.

When he finally reached your door, he knocked on it rather harshly and heard the sound of your urgent footsteps coming to find out who it was.

"Buck? What are you doing here?" You asked. Buck couldn't even find the words to answer because he was more focused on what you were wearing.

You had on a formed fitting red dress, your hair was curled and flowing over your shoulders and you looked beautiful.

"Wh-Why are you dressed like that?" He stammered. "I have a date." You answered. "You have a date? With who?" Buck asked. "Emily's brother. We became close when Emily had chemo and after she died we kept in tough. Why are you here?" You questioned.

"Don't go on the date. Please, for the love of god, don't go on that date. Because I love you, Y/N. I was too stupid to see it until you weren't around anymore. And I was terrible to you. I was supposed to be your best friend and I was so worried about my own life I dnd't even ask you how you were doing and oh my god I missed your birthday." Buck rambled.

"Slow down, Buckley, and talk to me at a normal rate, please." You said.

Buck took a deep breath and looked at you intently. "I'm in love with you. I-I always have but being with you always seemed like a pipe dream because you're perfect. You have always been perfect and you know that I'm not." Buck explained.

"Exactly. I've seen you at your worst and I still love you but even as your best friend you never gave me the time of day. Missing my birthday to go to dinner with Taylor Kelly. Brushing me off after Emily died because you had a date." You laughed bitterly. "I have stood by you no matter what. But god forbid I need you once in a while." You added.

"And I am so sorry, Y/N. You have every right to be upset with me, I'm upset with me. I'm pissed off at myself because I didn't realize what I had until it was too late." Buck replied. "Evan, do you understand the situation you just put me in? I get to go on a date with a great guy, one who actually pays attention and then the man I've been in love with for years, shows up at my doorstep to tell me he loves me back." You started.

Buck's facial expression fell, fearing the worst and anticipating you telling him that you'd moved on and he was too late.

"And I have to call that guy and tell him that I can't make it. Because the person I actually want to be with is right here." You finished.

The light in Buck's eyes returned at your words, looking at you with a gentle smile.

"Really?" He asked. "Yes, really and please don't make me regret it. You've screwed up a lot lately, let's not add us to the list." You said. "So there's an us now?" Buck questioned. "I-If that's okay with you." You stuttered. "It's absolutely okay with me." Buck said with a smile.

"I guess I got all dressed up for nothing." You sighed, letting Buck inside your apartment.

Buck was quiet for a moment as he watched you take your heels off and your earrings, placing them on the table by the door. "Then let's not make it for nothing. Let me take you out on our first official date." He said.

"Besides, I need to see you in that dress more often." He added a smirk on his face. "Alright then, Buckley. Take me on a date. You have a lot to make up for." You smiled, offering him your hand.

Buck took your hand in his, happily, and held you steady as you put your shoes back on. “Trust me, Y/N, it’ll be the best date you’ve ever been on.” He said. 

In the moment, you laughed at his words but after the date had concluded and all was said and done, it had indeed been the best date you have ever been on. 

[h2bakugou]

🍀 hello! I have a suggestion

How would the class 1 a boys react to you both getting recognized in public as "the secret class 1 a couple?!" And seeing it on the news or social media, Before yous are dating. Hope this makes sense 💖

a/n: hi!! this is super cute! i decided to do a bunch of the boys from 1-a, i didn’t get to do all of them, but this is certainly a cute idea!!

headcanon: them reacting to news of being a couple before they’re actually a couple

key: (y/n) - your name / (f/n) - first name / (l/n) - last name / (e/c) - eye color / (h/c) - hair color / (y/q) - your quirk

warnings: fluff, swearing

;cut for length;

»»————-　★　————-««

katsuki bakugou

»»————-　★　————-««

It happens during a training battle with class 1-B. 

It’s just a little get together, the two classes joining for some competitive training.

You’re working with Bakugou since he tolerates you the most, which he would gladly chose you over Beavis and Butt-Head Kirishima and Kaminari.

He also has a crush on you but that’s a secret teehee.

You got one on him too so don’t act all innocent.

But of course, Monoma happens to be one of the members of the group you face off with.

He’s just messing with you, teasing you. Calling you pet names like Angel or Honey.

He’s doing it ‘cause it clearly pisses Bakugou off.

“I’m sorry, where are my manners, flirting with your significant other.” Monoma apologizes as he slaps Bakugou’s shoulder, activating his quirk.

“We’re not dating!?” You yell as you charge at the blonde that isn’t your crush.

“So you mean the entire class has been lying to me?” Monoma pouts.

After training, Bakugou asks you out, stating he’d been thinking of doing it sooner but he had been caught up with staying top of the class-

He was most certainly jealous.

»»————-　★　————-««

izuku midoriya

»»————-　★　————-««

HIS MOM. PLEASE. IT’S HIS MOM AND ALL MIGHT THAT ARE LIKE YOOO CONGRATS ON yOU TWO GETTING TOGETHER.

Like legit, Deku’s in some parent-teacher conference and All Might is like ‘many things are blossoming, such as young love.’

And his mom is just like ‘finally you and y/n got together, about damn time.’

And Deku’s just like ????? IM SORRY????////

Literally races over to you and is like

“They think we’re together-”

And you’re just like

“Well damn we should be” *lip bite*

Deku blushes but asks you out on the spot so he doesn’t have to explain to his mom that it wasn’t like that.

Lowkey he had the biggest crush on you and was just really nervous that you were too occupied with studies to even notice him.

His mom is so proud of him, probably throws him a party or something for your first official date- please i love her 

»»————-　★　————-««

shoto todoroki

»»————-　★　————-««

Tell me why I think this fool finds out about the whole ‘secret couple’ thing from Dabi-

It’s just so bad that it’s absolutely perfect.

Tell me that this crispy ass patchwork villain would not take every opportunity to tease Shoto.

“So you came here to fight me with your true love? Perhaps romance isn’t dead.”

Literally about to light his ass on fire and Shoto’s just frozen-yeah go on laugh I know you want too-and just stares at this dude like??? 

come again? pardon?

Deadass looks over at you and just raises an eyebrow.

“I think he thinks we’re a couple.” You fill in the blanks and Todoroki eventually nods.

“Well yes, they are indeed my true love, but I think this might be a bit extreme for a first date. Perhaps when we’re done beating your ass, I can take them out for dinner.”

chivalry isn’t dead *heart eye emojis*

»»————-　★　————-««

denki kaminari

»»————-　★　————-««

Honestly with the flirty comments you litter under each other’s social media posts, google probably be recommended y’all relationship stuff, those little heart lamp message things, matching necklaces, technology was dropping all the hints.

No but Kirishima probably just assumes you’re together when Kaminari brings you along to one of the mall trips they usually go on.

“Dude you finally asked them out, sick, took you long enough.” 

Cue red Kaminari. Man is a tomato. Like he just turns to you shaking throwing a thumbs up.

“Awe, you like me?” You give him a hug and kiss his cheek, shoving your hand in his.

“Yeah, totally, I mean who wouldn’t.” Kaminari is back to being smug, he’s got a pretty person’s hand in his own he is now taken JSFSJFJ

He will literally be in debt to Kirishima for getting the two of you together. Like he’s deadset on somehow repaying Kirishima.

»»————-　★　————-««

eijiro kirishima

»»————-　★　————-««

Two words. Katsuki Bakugou.

Kirishima is super sweet, like I just see him doing a bunch of really nice stuff for you, helping you carry things to your dorm, or like maybe doing your hair if you asked.

Bakugou is extremely observant and will just watch how y’all act but like he’s finally so tired of watching you act like a couple. He knows you two have to be a thing so why hasn’t Kirishima mentioned it.

WHY IS BKAUOGU MAD THAT KIRISHIMA IS LIKE NOT SAYING HE”S TAKEN DUDE FKSFKSJI JUST KNOW HE WOULD BE SJFSKFSJK

“We get it you’re together! Just cut the sappy shit already!” Bakugou snaps randomly one day because you’re just sitting in his lap because all the couch seats are taken.

Your cheeks burn and Kirishima’s face turns the same crimson color as his hair.

“Dude we’re-”

“Friends.” You finish, but there’s a hint of sadness.

“You certainly don’t act like. Fucking ask each other out already goddamn.”

Do what he boss says.

Kirishima brings you pretty flowers and asks you out, literally taking you on a date when you say yes, god he’s so sweet love him kiss kiss.

»»————-　★　————-««

tenya iida

»»————-　★　————-««

Honestly, I think Aizawa’s gonna just have to lecture Iida on social cues. ‘Cause Iida may seem like he’s just being a good class rep, but walking you to and from class, carrying your bag, and tucking hair behind your ear are most certainly beyond what classifies as ‘class rep behavior.’

A bunch of students from class 1-a are gonna be really suspicious, whispering around, making plans to try and catch it happening.

Sure enough, Iida’s carrying your bag as you walk back toward the dorm building, your pinkies just barely touching, before you finally heave a sigh and interlock yours with his.

Kaminari can’t hold in his excitement, congratulating the navy-haired class rep on scoring such a hottie.

“I’m confused, you’re congratulating me-”

“Because you finally asked (y/n) out!” Iida just turns red and stares at you.

“No no, I think you may have misinterpreted!”

“Really? On god? Just like that?” You pout, lowering your head.

“No! I...” 

Iida quite literally has to prove he likes you by kissing you in front of the class. Guess it’s not really a secret anymore.

»»————-　★　————-««

hanta sero

»»————-　★　————-««

Much like Kirishima, Bakugou and/or Kaminari and/or Kirishima play a big role in ‘exposing’ the two of you.

Late nights in each other’s dorm playing video games?

Wearing each other’s sweaters?

Picnics and walks together?

Yeah try convincing off-brand pikachu, red robin, and the fitness gram pacer test you’re not together.

the fitness gram pacer test bit sounded much better in my head but i didn’t really have any other funny nickname for bakugou other than johnny test which made about as much sense as the fitness gram pacer test.

“Yo we’re going to the mall!” Kaminari is the first to spill the plans for the weekend.

“Oh shoot alright-”

“I meant us. Don’t you have a date with (Y/n)?” Kaminari points to the rest of the group, excluding you and Sero who sat side by side, under a knitted blanket.

“Uhm, Kaminari we’re-”

“Oh no, I know you like them.” Kaminari leans in really close to Sero’s face before squishing his cheeks and turning him to face you.

“I’m so sorry.” Sero whispers to you.

You roll your eyes and lean over, planting a kiss on his cheek, earning a few cheers from Mina and Kaminari who pretty much played matchmaker.

Sero takes you out on a date when they plan to go to the mall, but it was really all a ruse to spy on you on your date.

»»————-　★　————-««

masterlist

[star-mum]

Good fucking morning to ME fellas

"if this were a real Criminal Minds episode, this would be the episode named after the reader" cant wait to get terribly hurt and maybe even tortured a little bit !!!

"reader being from Georgia" am weirdly excited about this (?)

alright, enough chit chat, lets solve a fucking crime

"Thursday, August 16th, 2007 - 3:39AM" im writing details down, this is a long one (obviously)

"The knife had felt so perfect in your hand" 👀 now was it a murder but not a crime ?

“You don’t have to treat me with kid gloves, Hotch" FLASH FOWARD FLASH FOWARD FLASH FOWARD

"The fact that he was still breathing" do i need to know the context to know I'm absolutely justified ? No, fuck you (Number 1 Elle Apologist)

“Reid, he specifically told us to sit this one out-” hiii Reid !!!

“What the hell is wrong with you?” : O hey ! rude !

"2:20AM" ohhh ????? (this is literally the CM format, like I can see the scenes playing out)

"that your parents used to own" fun phrasing, my arent dead right? like at least the "it" wasnt their death i think

"used to own" sounds like they sold it after It happened more than they died and the house went to someone else

when it FIRST happened????? alright, my parents could be dead but now the first time at least

(i also skipped the rest of cw to have the clearest mind while reading this)

"the other victims had been stabbed with" stabbed, not killed huh ?

I killed those women. I killed them!” AAAAH !

“He killed them because of me!” OHHH OKAY ALRIGHT, DAMN

okay if I dont ACTUALLY stab this dude, I'm gonna be so fucking pissed at Reid. Why are you yELLING AT ME ???? IM JUST A LITTLE GUY !!!!!!

“She’s the one you’re worried about? She’s a victim in all this.” YEAH !!!!

"the first time he attacked her, she fought back hard" sORRY I HAVE AN IMPECCABLE SURVIVEL INSTINCT ??? guess I'll just DIE (or worst) next time 🙄

"Rossi pointed out" Ariana what are you dOING HERE ???? (i forgot he shows up in s3)

"Tell me you like it!” literally anything I do here is fair and justified and no evidence couldn't possibly hold up in court

"This was a culling" everyone loOK AWAY, I HAVE TO GOOGLE SOMETHING

"the action of sending an inferior or surplus farm animal to be slaughtered" OOOOHHHHH DUDE !!!!

also i know it wasn't specified but born and raised in Georgia, we gotta have a southern accent and I will now read ALL OF READERS LINES as such

“It’s Miss L/N.” She said quietly. “I never married.” OH MY GOD !!!! AM I NOT ????? AM I NOT AN AGENT ????? AAAAAAAHHH WHAT ??? WHAT ????? (Worlds Dumbest Detective, you finally got here)

SUNNY WHEN I CATCH YOU SUNNY !!! YOU DID IT ON PURPOSE !!!! (or im just stupid)

"It was always the families" maybe a sister or cousin was attacked this time (?)

i need a moment that civilian reveal took a lot out of me

My daughter speaks very fondly of you.” OH THATS MY MOM !!!! OKAY !!! ALRIGHT (it's important to me that you know that I'm reading this right after waking up, so nothing stupid I say can be used against me)

What's in the fucking box? i swear to god

“I never smelled it on you back then.” so multiple times before we fought back effectively ?

“You made me a promise. No more. No more girls.” did we "agree" to what he wanted so he wouldn't hurt other girls ?

WAIT ! Now that my Senior Brain Moment has passed, I have thoughts™

if our mom "never married" did our parents live and bought a house together without a formal thing ??? or did she mean, never REmarried ? but still we go by that name? WHAT DOES THIS MEAN

(.... i dont wanna say Dan's my dad but... throwing it out there just in case)

"Feeling it suffocating you like a plastic bag" drifting through the wind ?

"You had left it sitting on the passenger’s seat of the car. Right beside your phone" fuuuuuck (see I'm not the only one, who's brain is foggy, it's fine)

did he take MY Car ? cause they could've checked if it were still in the parking lot and saw both my pHONE AND GUN ?????

"why would she go with him willingly, she had a gun" one Could think that yEAH

"With my frequent correspondence and all?" so those in the shoe box were letters ?

My car WAS THERE !!! Duuuude ???? just check my car !!!!

“No more girls" but this wasn't The promise, that would have to have been before

"state lines in order to get the FBI involved in this case" okay so he Was trying to get us back here

"Women who looked strangely like you" okay so he didn't kill anyone the first time ? (if he did his AMO is very different otherwise we would've noticed it sooner)

the profile also says he could've been previously incarcerated, so he probably did go to the jail after he attacked us, I find it hard to believe we wouldn't have been keeping tabs on his sentence, so he probably escaped (?) somehow unnoticed (?)

"thee decomposition of bodies on live body farms" we did What Now ?

I know I'm probably halfway through (or less even) but no Garcia ? 🥺 i need my girlie here, I love her sm

LORE DUMP !!! Thank you Morgan !! okay give me a minute

1999 - first victim

2001 - missing person

2001-2007 - ongoing murders (26 and counting)

ah shit i gotta math now, fuck okay hold on (if i have to suffer through this then so do you)

if it's 2007 and we went into the academy right after college (forensics is a 4 year program) so... we joined, at the EARLIEST (fbi school is 4 mONTHS ?????)

damn we joined the fbi at 22 ? damn that's crazy (suck it boy genius) (heart breaking news Reid also joined the bau at 22) (jokes on him I graduated HS when I was 17 so technically *I* joined the fbi at 21) (so suck it boy genius, for real this time)

all of this is pointless cause idk how old Reader is rn ....

fuuuuuuuuck

WAIT !! fucking brain blast motherfuckers !!! what if the hiatus isn't from being arrested ????? what if that was the time of whatever the "no more girls" promise was made ????

but are we that stupid to just completely ignore the timing ???? or maybe it's been so fucking repressed is more of a "I dont want to even CONSIDER it"

okay no, I have to figure this out. Im gonna use Reid as a "base" cause we can't be younger than him but I also don't think we're that much older (lets say 5 years is our max)

1999 - we could've been 10-15

2001 - 12-17 (i actually let out a gasp) OKAY I THINK I GOT IT !!!!!

what if we graduated High school in 2001 ???? doesn't school start in the fall ????? so if we graduated class of 2001 then we would've been going to college in the fall !!!!!

NEVER BACK DOWN NEVER WHAT ????? NEVER BACK DOWN NEVER WHAT ????? I cant believe the math actually got me somewhere holy shit

OKAY !!! FINAL THESIS (theres 70% of the fic left) SO !!!

the first murder happened in 99 (we were 16) when we first attacked (i assume after, to make us more compliant after we fought back) so we agreed to whatever he said as long as he didn't hurt anymore girls, a promised he kept...

UNTIL !!! 2001 when we went to college, I'm assuming we moved AWAY for college and thats why he kidnapped that girl i September, to make us come back to town

im still trying to decide if the attack we fought back to (the one Hotch mentions in the file) was the first or last attack, makes sense either way cause if it was the last maybe it was the first act of defiance before we moved away BUT reader also said he "liked us cause we fought back" so maybe it happened many times ? and only one got processed ??? still fuzzy on this on this one ngl

"I thought you could use some sustenance!” hey Ma !!!!

"No. You couldn’t risk her telling anyone" so we did realize the connections ?

"Ma? What are you doing here?” omg southern accent confirmed !!!! hihi 🫣

"It’s not like she did much of that when you were an actual baby" tell us more about that, actually *underlines "Dan = dad ????" on my notebook like 3 times*

"For once, I have no idea.” Spencer mumbled in return" fOr oNcE i hAvE n- sHUT UP

"a small plastic bag" dRIFITING TROUGH THE WIND ?????

also ewwww I hate it when they do thag, cunty and dramatic but gross nonetheless

"You are the stars hidden by clouds" *looks at the camera like they do in The Office* ex squeeze me?

OKAY, Im not gonna google it cause I'm sure if it IS an existing poem Boy Genius will just tells us in under 5 seconds BUT could be either an existing poem or a monologue from a play

if it were something the killer wrote to US previously, we would've known immediately (and she seemed genuinely surprised when seeing him again so....)

"You hated that the quote was distinctly familiar to you. You hated how you knew it" EEEEIIIIII

"You could still hear his voice in your head, and it made your bones quake." SO WE DO KNOW IT !!!! at this point girlie ... please just TALK TO SOMEONE

"It’s Jacqueline Simon Gunn.” (suck it boy genius pt2)

"That name sounds awful familiar to me - are you from Madison?” i love having a very obvious latino last name cause yEAH YOU'D RECOGNIZE THAT (rip to y'all smiths and browns out there i guess, but im ✨ different ✨)

like don't feel like doxxing myself (know how it is) but its the same level of "cliche" as Diaz or like Santos (id say Santiago but Santos is more ✨ brazilian ✨)

"last time I saw you, you was beat to a darn pulp" that gossipy bITCH !! also what a FUN and CONVERSATIONAL memory to bring up for no reason

"summer of ‘99" I've never been wrong a DAY IN MY LIFE !!!! Okay I think he killed that girl in retaliation then (right? it's gonna be?) cause we fought him when tried to attack us in 99

"But you were still his girl" this wording could very well be both from an obsessive "lover" OR a father figure SPECIALLY if Im remembering correctly that he said "because I Love You" and not " because Im In Love With You", I feel like he might actually be our father

AND !! the original profile was of a delusional man who believed he was dating his victims BUT reid said the profile was all wrong so... (also that comment about our mom not babying us when we Were Babies...) (I've connected the dots)

"Somewhere Above America" KSKSKSKS and I'd sure hope so

"Perhaps he’s feeling ignored" which he Is, just not in the way we think

"It’s Sense and Sensibility. Jane Austin.” he keeps using specific book quotes that we recognize... like he was reading bed time stories ... ????

"Well, at least we know our UnSub’s not a woman.” She remarked sharply" ... now why would you say that? ...

i LOOOOOVE that we're going back step by step, is so fucking fun (like if were getting the facts as they happened it'd still be good, obviously, but this way is just so ✨ literature ✨)

"back to her dorm at the University of South Carolina" are they All college girls ? 👀

"You had known at least two of them. You had gone to school with them" Sunny when I catch you

"Wheels up in thirty" BINGO !!!

"Well, you know, if you ever need a calm, cozy place to sleep, you can always give me a call" 🫣 say less "As long as you don’t mind Clooney licking at your toes in the mornin’.” i said "LESS"

"taking care of chores in the morning, participating in a midday nap, and then socializing in the evening and partaking in community events before sleeping again in the evening" *screams and cries" WHY WOULD YOU TELL ME SOMETHING I COULD NEVER HAVE !!!!

"Good morning, pretty girl" YAAAAAAYYYY !!!!!

"This arrived on the mailcart for you, postmarked from a few days ago" YOU'D USE MY FAVORITE GIRL TO DELIVER ME AWFUL TERRIBLE NO GOOD NEWS ??????

"Lover" uugghhhh fiiiiinuuhhhh guess he's not our father (I've had elected to ignore the age profiled cause fuck you, i make my own rules) (also I forgot abou that)

still tho my big brained math theory still stands

"Fate has sent us on such different paths" is that what they're calling the government's watch list now?

IS THIS THE BIG REVEAL ????? UUHHHH

"The first murder took place in August of ‘99.” after the first attack

"Are you saying that Lety is involved with this in some way?” well you came to that conclusion Very Fast JJ .....

"She was being stalked.” Reid declared quietly, sounding defeated. “She still is.” which *chuckles* begs the question and Im so sorry to bring this up again... wHY WERE YOU YELLING AT ME ?????

"woman" he says, as if I wasn't fucking 16

"Can you narrow it down to women in their twenties" 20s ??????? this hurts me, this wounds me deeply (WDYM 20s ???? I DID SO MUCH MATH FOR THIS !!!!)

"“He had a very brief stint in the FBI Academy. He was kicked out 2001" all my theories out the fucking window... "he followed her to the Academy?”

I didn't even stab this fucking asshole, why is everyone being such an asshole to me ????? sure i withheld pertinent information on an on going case but iM JUST A LITTLE GUY !!!!!

"Should the heart of a killer really live on inside someone else’s body?" this will be the worms in my brain for a while now, thank you for that

"That is how heavy a secret can become. It can make blood flow easier than ink" AAAAAAAAAAAHHH

okay this is so fucking long too oh my god, oKAY WOW !!!!!! Insane fucking plot, really good !!! i mentioned it already but I love that we went backwards with the information

i tried my bEST !!! to figure this one out and yet I didn't connect shit (in my mind I did tho, so that's okay !! )

this entire post resumed to a single image:

Figure It Out

A Criminal Minds Casefic

“All things are subject to interpretation. Whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.” -Friedrich Nietzsche 

Summary:

Since you joined the BAU, you have been keeping a terrible secret from the team.

When the team takes a case in your hometown - your festering secret comes to be known with a vengeance.

Fem!Reader x Gen!BAU Team (Platonic). General Casefic, modelled after a Criminal Minds episode. Angst, Mystery, Hurt and Comfort. Set during Criminal Minds Season 3.

Word Count: 18,000

Criminal Minds Masterlist | AO3 Link

Detailed Warnings and author's notes below the cut.

Warnings: this is a general casefic - there is no romantic pairings in this fic, it is more about the mystery of the case and how the reader character fits into it (if this were a real Criminal Minds episode, this would be the episode named after the reader) - with that being said, the main relationship focuses are between Emily and the reader and Spencer and the reader (because I am biased and I love them) but there isn’t any romantic threads or romantic tones, it is all platonic; the reader character uses she/her pronouns and is described as a woman, but I went out of my way to make sure that there is no descriptions of the readers looks or body type; there is use of Y/N and L/N (as in Last Name); mentions of the reader being from Georgia (because the case takes place in her hometown); smoking/cigarettes - mentions of the reader character smoking tobacco; mentions of the reader character being injured (severely in a past incident, and minor injuries during the course of the fic); mentions of vomit/mentions of the reader character throwing up; lots of warnings for general Criminal Minds topics; murder, killing, somewhat graphic descriptions of dead bodies, violence, guns/gun violence, mentions of rape and sexual violence, mentions of systematic violence towards women; there is no graphic depictions of rape/no rape scenes in the fic, but there is mentions of the event of rape happening to certain characters, references to rape culture, and the shame/guilt/self blame a rape victim feels; mentions of stalking/stalking behaviors - including the delusion mindset of a stalker, obsessiveness, sending someone unwanted letters, mentions of a ‘one sided’ relationship; mentions of trauma/PTSD; descriptions of symptoms of PTSD; themes surrounding the cycle of violence; I did kind of purposefully make the warnings a bit more vague than I usually do, because I really don’t want to spoil the plot of this fic. But as lot as you are okay with the maturity of all these themes, you should be okay with this fic!!

A/N: This is pretty much 100% inspired by the music video for Figure It Out by Royal Blood - which the fic is named after. I highly recommend watching the music video, because it is fucking art in my opinion, but I have taken such heavy inspiration from it in terms of the style, tone, and even storyline - so the music video kind of spoils this fic. So probably watch it after you read the fic lmao. I also feel like the instrumental version of the song goes very well with this fic. This fic is not at all typical and I am terrified that people won't like it, or that they won't 'get it'. But I am very proud of it, so I am going to put it out there and hope that people enjoy it. So - please enjoy!! I really love writing Criminal Minds casefics and coming up with the details of a case, and writing it in this style was so, so exciting and interesting for me, and I really do hope that you can enjoy reading it.

...

“All things are subject to interpretation. Whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.”

-Friedrich Nietzsche 

...

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Madison Police Department, Interrogation Room #1 - Madison, GA. 3:39AM.

The chilled air of the interrogation room only made the regret more palpable in your lungs. 

The hum of the fluorescents overhead made you feel like a bug about to be zapped - like your entire life was over and you would soon be resigned to a cage. 

You hated it, but you had to wonder what you would have done if you had ten more minutes. Ten more minutes before they had arrived, sirens screeching, lights flashing. Your mind kept replaying the moments over and over again. The knife had felt so perfect in your hand. 

Ten more minutes. 

“I just want to talk.” 

So caught up in your thoughts, your mind so foggy from the hectic night - you had almost forgotten that there was someone sitting in front of you. 

He looked so entirely stiff - wearing his cookie cutter suit and his carved-in scowl. He did nothing to shift your mood. 

“This is just a conversation. Nothing more.” 

He continued on, using a monotone, would-be soothing voice when you didn’t say anything. 

The metal chair felt stiffer underneath you, and you felt further suffocated within that small, concrete box. 

You felt inclined to call it an interrogation, but you wouldn’t be so quick to tell him that. It’s not like you were going to tell him what he wanted to hear. 

“You can smoke in here if that makes you feel more comfortable.” He added on, pushing something from the middle of the table toward you. 

A pack of cigarettes and a lighter. There was also an ashtray. A collection of things that someone had put there, knowing that you would be resigned to this tiny, tiny room. 

“You don’t have to treat me with kid gloves, Hotch.” You huffed, saying his name, using the same technique that he would likely be using on you. You could mirror him, get ahead on the mind games. “I’m not as crazy and detached from reality as you think I am.” 

Perhaps that was a false statement. You weren’t even sure how crazy he thought you were. Perhaps, that in itself made you detached from reality. You couldn’t be sure. 

Nonetheless, you took him up on the offer. You reached out and eagerly picked up the pack of smokes, ripping off the outer plastic before you took one out, shoving the tip between your lips and lighting it up. 

You took a heavy draw, and the nicotine throbbed through you. Seemingly adding to the headache you already had from the large gash on your forehead that they had hastily bandaged before bringing you in here, rather than relieving it. Still, you sucked on the cigarette like it was your only lifeline - taking a moment to tap some of the ash into the small ashtray while you stared at Hotch carefully. 

You wondered if you should really tell him all the gory details. 

“Just tell me what happened. Tell me your side of the story.” Hotch said, trying his best to sound warm and convincing. It didn’t work. “I’m just trying to figure it out. Just like you are.” 

Perhaps your biggest regret was that you were here, cooped up in this hole - and he was in the hospital somewhere, laying in a soft bed, being attended to by nurses, being comforted. The fact that he was still breathing - even with the assistance of a tube down his throat, and not in a body bag.

“You’ll never look at me the same if I do tell you.” You managed to find these words, and these words only. Ominous, almost threatening - more so than you intended. 

“I won’t.” He returned. Shallow, fallible. 

Suddenly, a crash from the hallway broke the tense silence that was brewing between the two of you. The door was thick, but it wasn’t enough to disguise the ruckus coming from outside. 

“No! No! You have to let me through! I have to be in there!” 

The voice was familiar, but that tone of desperation certainly was not. 

“Reid, he specifically told us to sit this one out-” 

“Sit this one out?!” Reid repeated the words back, his voice warping with pure shock, the inability to conceptualize such a thing. “You expect me to just sit out?” He scoffed. “If it wasn’t for me, two more people would be dead, and there wouldn’t even be a ‘this one’! Now let. Me. Through.” 

“Reid-” 

With all his bolstering stubbornness, he shoved past whoever had been trying to stop him, and as you took another heavy puff off your cigarette, the interrogation room door came flying open. 

Hotch stood up, rushing to block the door, but you smiled. Though you were numb from the day’s events - it was your natural instinct upon seeing him. 

“Reid-” Hotch choked out, trying to block the gangly man from even entering the room. 

“Good evening, Doctor Reid.” You greeted him gently. 

Upon seeing your reaction - so much more open and warm - Hotch allowed him in. This was the wedge that he needed to pry you open. Reid closed the door behind himself with an indigent huff and a glare toward his superior. 

Reid crossed his arms, hovering near the door as he turned his stiff-jawed glare toward you now. Your cigarette turned to a hot cherry in your hands - sucked to death already, and you stubbed it out in the tray before starting a new one. You knew chain-smoking was an even filthier habit than the occasional ciggy, but you had one hell of a day under your belt. If there was ever a time, it was now. 

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Reid asked, his voice stiff and oppositional. 

“Oh, so many things.” You said, your tone clever and unphased. Hotch let out a sigh as he sat back down in his chair. He was glad that you were talking openly now, at least. “Shall we go in alphabetical order, or start at my birth and work or way back from there?” 

Reid let out another nasal thick sound. Apparently, he wasn’t in the mood for banter. 

You were met with nothing but a stony wall of silence, and cold glares of disapproval. It almost made you feel guilty. Almost. 

“Let’s start with this,” Reid corrected you. “Why?” 

Truthfully, you couldn’t give him that answer. You didn’t think you would ever have enough time to conjure it up within yourself. 

“You’re the genius profiler, Doctor Reid.” You fired back coldly. “You tell me.” 

… 

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Abandoned Country House - Madison, GA. 2:20AM.

Prentiss led the team as they searched through the house. It was the only solid lead they had as to where you might be. It was a house that your parents used to own - a place of significance because you had lived there the summer when it first happened. 

“Clear!” 

She went through the living room, the kitchen, the entire first floor, leading the team with Reid at her side, guns drawn. 

“Clear!” 

As she crested the top of the stairs, she heard sobbing. 

It was distinct - something that tugged harshly on her heartstrings. 

Even though it was against protocol not to clear the rooms in order, she rushed toward it. Reid continued to flank her - obviously he had heard the noise too. 

Prentiss landed a sharp kick on the door’s handle, causing it to fling open. 

The picture on display in front of her almost caused her to drop her gun. 

Hotch had been right. 

You were on top of the man, straddling him. Both you and the man were badly beaten - but right off the bat, Prentiss could tell that he was far worse off. Clearly, you had bested him in the fight this time. 

The contents of the room strewn about; broken glass, busted furniture, the curtain rod torn down. It looked like the remnants of a bad WWE brawl. You were the picture of desperation - heavy, hot tears coming from your eyes, blood smearing down your face from a gash on your forehead as you stared down the man beneath you with fiery madness in your eyes. 

You had a knife to his throat. A large hunting knife - the same kind that all the other victims had been stabbed with. 

You had the tip of it poised to his throat, just barely touching his skin. If you put any amount of pressure on the blade - if you bared down, then you would slice right through his esophagus. It would take almost no effort from you at all to end his life. 

From what Prentiss could see, the man was unconscious. He was completely slack, his body still on the ground. He was bleeding from a small head wound. His life was entirely in your hands. He couldn’t fight back. 

Both your hands shook vigorously as you struggled with the warring inside of you, as you struggled with the weight of the confrontation with your life’s biggest monster. 

Though it went against everything inside of her, Emily kept her gun raised. She kept her arms stiff, keeping her gun pointed at you. As much as she detested that man, knowing what he had done - it was her job to shoot you if you tried to kill him. Right now, she hated that job. 

“Put the knife down!” Prentiss ordered sharply. 

You didn’t move. 

Naturally, Reid, in all of his softness and empathy, slackened his arms and holstered his gun before anyone could blink. 

“Come on, put it down.” She tried again. 

You ignored Prentiss entirely, your hands still shaking, making no moves to lift the knife away from the man’s throat. 

Reid moved to step into the room, and from his view at the top of the stairs, arms stiff and gun pointed in your general direction - Hotch called out to him. 

“Reid-!” He tried to warn Reid against doing this. Of course, he didn’t listen. 

Reid knelt down beside you, posturing in surrender with his arms. Of course, he wasn’t even on your radar at the moment. Your entire gaze, your entire focus was on the unconscious man underneath you - the true target of your agony. 

“Y/N,” Reid said your name calmly, trying to capture your attention. “You don’t have to do this.” 

You hesitated for a moment, and Prentiss worried that even his gentle voice wouldn’t be able to get through to you. 

“I have to.” You sobbed out. More heavy tears slid down your face, and you began to shake more visibly, shockwaves moving throughout your entire body. 

“You don’t have to.” Reid told you, his voice calming, gentle. “You - you can give me the knife, and then we can just… walk away. And then it all ends.” 

“It won’t just end!” You screamed out, your voice a curtling weep that bounced off the walls. 

It made Prentiss’ heart jump inside of her chest. If it wasn’t protocol, she would have dropped her gun and run over to comfort you with a hug. But she knew that you weren’t in the most stable place. You might have tried to stab her with the knife. 

“It can end.” Reid assured you calmly. “You just have to come with me. You just have to put the knife down and-” 

“I have to make it stop!” You screamed, trampling over his quiet voice. “I killed those women. I killed them!” 

“Prentiss!” Hotch edged in, warning her. 

If you didn’t move off of the unconscious man soon, then she would have to take you down. 

“Just give him a minute!” Prentiss fired back. She had faith in Reid. 

“We both know that’s not true.” Reid told you. “You didn’t kill them. You didn’t mean for this to happen-” 

“He killed them because of me!” You shouted, cutting him off. “We both know it’s my fault.” 

“It’s not.” Reid choked out. “Please don’t say that.” 

There was a gutting silence. 

“Please, just give me the knife.” 

At this point he was doing some pleading of his own - but your hands were unsteady and you still refused to look at him. 

You weren’t going to give up the fight that easily. 

… 

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Somewhere On The Country Backroads - Madison, GA. 2:11AM.

“I want two squad cars down the road, I want state police cutting off all the possible exits to the major highways.” Agent Hotchner was on the scene, doing what he did best - giving orders. “I want to cut off any chance of possible escape incase the suspect tries to flee-” 

“Hotch, do you really think that’s necessary?” Morgan asked. “We’ve got the house. Thermal cam’s got two bodies on the second floor. There’s nowhere to run from here. We’ve got spike strips on all the dirt roads. No car is getting past any of that. It should function as a hard extraction from here.” 

Hotch glared at Morgan as he fastened the straps on his bulletproof vest. The glare of the red and blue lights from the squad cars only made the deep frown lines on his face look firmer. 

“I am not taking any chances.” Hotch said. “We both know this is an incredibly delicate matter. We found one of the victims across state lines. We know this suspect has mobility. I’m not risking finding another body.” 

The air became tense as everyone realized what he meant by ‘another body’. 

“I want tactical swat to go in first-” Hotch began, and was quickly cut off by Morgan. 

“You’re sending in swat when there’s a hostage in there?” Morgan questioned harshly. 

“Even if we go in there blazing, showing force, she might not come in quietly.” Hotch explained.

“You’re serious?” Prentiss replied, hooking the wire of her earpiece around her ear in order to tuck the mic in. “She’s the one you’re worried about? She’s a victim in all this.” 

“You saw the incident report.” Hotch reminded her. “The amount of defensive wounds she had… the first time he attacked her, she fought back hard. She’s desperate, she’s feeling cornered, she-” 

“She’s terrified right now.” Prentiss pressed harshly. “She doesn’t need a bunch of men going in there waving guns in her face.” 

“She could sacrifice him.” Hotch theorized, further trying to prove his point. “This could be her chance to finally get justice. Finally getting rid of the man who’s tormented her for all these years.”

“So we have to bring them both in. Quietly.” Morgan said. “We can’t just go in there shooting. If your theory is correct, then she could use him as a human shield.” 

Hotch nodded. “Fine. No tactical swat. Prentiss, you take the lead.” 

“Yeah, and I’m taking Reid with me.” Prentiss told him sharply. “Somebody with a little compassion around here.” 

Prentiss nodded and scoffed, walking past Hotch, gently whispering ‘what the hell is wrong with you’ on her way to get in the car with Reid. 

… 

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Madison Police Department - Madison, GA. 1:45AM.

When JJ let out a harsh sigh, Emily turned to her, swiveling in the borrowed office chair with a creak. 

“What is it?” Emily asked. 

“Don’t you feel that?” JJ replied. Emily shrugged, waiting a moment for her to finish the thought. “That… overwhelming feeling of dread?” 

Of course, it was obvious. No leads. No breaks in the case. 

It was hopeless. 

“Come on, I thought you were the hopeful one.” Rossi pointed out, tossing his empty paper coffee cup into a nearby trash can. 

“How can I be hopeful when one of my best friends is caught up in all this?” JJ fired back. “If she-” 

Before she could finish that thought, Reid stormed in, capturing everyone’s attention. 

“Guys, I think we got the profile all wrong.” He announced, a look of worry knit into his features. “And - if I’m right, then I think I know where she is.” 

… 

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Abandoned Country House - Madison, GA. 1:45AM.

You knew that it was cruel, but you couldn’t help but to enjoy his groans of pain. 

There had been so many others - so many monsters to take down. So many men that you had gotten rid of without a second thought. Men you had put bullets in that didn’t mean as much to you as this. So many others you had easily forgotten about. But he had taunted your soul in a special way. And you knew that you were enjoying this too much. 

“Tell me you like it!” 

You screamed, taking another downward swing with the piece of wood - a leg broken off from the chair he had bound you to. He had been convinced that you wouldn’t break free. Laughable. He should have known better.  

When he didn’t respond, you took another swing. 

You could have stopped. You could have ended it. But you didn’t. 

“Come on, tell me you like it!” 

You screamed in his face, sputtering blood across him. At one point, he had punched you in the mouth. You weren’t exactly sure where the blood was coming from. You didn’t exactly care.

That would be your excuse.  

He had hit you too. You were battered. You were just a fragile woman, after all. 

“You’re a fuckin’ crazy bitch.” He coughed, sputtering out some blood himself. “I… I always liked that about you. It was one of the reasons I fell in love.” 

He grinned - bright red spread out across his teeth, and it gave you the intense desire to see those teeth missing. To make him swallow them. 

“You don’t love me.” You told him firmly. “You just get an adrenaline rush from being around me because I’m not afraid of you.” You explained. “Unlike the other whores, I fight.” 

While you were preoccupied with the words, he flipped onto his stomach and began crawling across the floor. 

He thought you were too stupid to notice, but he was inching his way toward the hunting knife that had been thrown out of his hand during the scuffle. It was a slow, sluggish crawl. You had broken a few of his ribs, his kneecap. It was nice to see him so slow. You had probably severely damaged his internal organs with how hard you had been beating him with the makeshift baton. 

It was worse than last time. You stood above him like a menace - watching and waiting. You hated that you knew you would take an odd kind of joy in removing his hope when you stole the knife from his grip. 

Just as he grazed his fingers across it, you brought another harsh swing down across his achilles tendon, causing him to scream out in pain. 

You still had a lot of strength left in you. He was tiring out. 

He was losing the game. 

“Come on baby, tell me how you like it.” You continued to mock him. “Tell me how good I am.” 

“Fuck you.” He moaned out. 

You felt satisfaction bloom inside of you - those were the words. 

He had finally given up hope. He had finally realized that maybe: he wasn’t going to beat you. Maybe he wasn’t above you on the playing field anymore. He was fucking around with a fellow predator, not toying with his prey.  

“Oh baby. You know I’m only doing this because I love you.” You said, repeating his own words back to him in a cruel mockery. 

That was when he realized: this wasn’t just a lover’s spat. This was a culling. 

… 

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Just Outside of Madison Police Department - Madison, GA. 1:04AM.

Reid needed some air. 

Working on the case so diligently, not coming up with any leads. It was intensely difficult. Letting the balmy summer Southern air flow over him, getting a good gulp of the fresh air into his lungs - it was a bit more awakening than drinking his sixth cup of coffee for that day. 

He was surprised when he rounded a corner, trying to go for a short walk to stretch his legs, and he saw a very recognizable face hovering near a gray Honda. 

“Mrs. L/N?” He posed, approaching her gently. “It’s late. What are you doing here?”

JJ had promised to call her if there were any updates. Reid didn’t want to disappoint her by telling her that there were none. 

“It’s Miss L/N.” She said quietly. “I never married.” 

Reid nodded at this. “My apologies.” 

She looked deeply troubled. 

Reid waited patiently for her to reply to his initial question - for her to tell him whatever was burdening her. If he was lucky, it could help with the case. It was always the families who could help put those final puzzle pieces into place. That was something Gideon taught him, so he took it as sacred advice. 

“You’re Doctor Reid, aren’t you?” She posed, stepping forward to approach him slightly - still stiff, still stand-off-ish. He easily understood why. He nodded in response. “My daughter speaks very fondly of you.” 

Reid cracked a small smile at this. 

His attention was then brought to a small box - a shoe box as she held it out to him. 

“I don’t mean to bother you at this late hour, but… you said to let you know if I thought of anything that might help you.” She reminded him. He nodded again. “And I - well, the reason I didn’t bring these up the first time… you can understand that I have a need to protect my daughter?” 

“Of course.” He affirmed. “It’s every parent’s natural instinct to protect their child.” 

She looked solemn at his words. 

“I had no idea that… that what happened to her could potentially be connected to these… these murders in any possible way.” She told him, shuddering as the word passed through her lips. “I was just trying to shield her, you have to understand.” 

She handed him the shoebox, and when he took it and lifted off the lid, it took him only a moment to understand. He would need to find a quiet place to fully inspect the contents, but it was all being pieced together in his mind now. 

“Thank you for bringing me this.” He told her quietly. 

“Doctor Reid, you have to promise me that you’ll bring my daughter home unharmed.” She said, tears coming to her eyes. “She’s a good girl. Please, just bring her home.” 

Unfortunately, he couldn’t promise her that. Not under the circumstances. 

“Ma’am… I will try my best. That is all I can promise you.” He told her. 

She nodded in quiet understanding before Reid turned and marched back inside. 

… 

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. Abandoned Country House - Madison, GA. 11:03PM.

The flint of the lighter flicking seemed to be the loudest thing in the room in that moment - even with the low hum of the eleven o’clock news playing in the background. 

It was so odd. Everything was exactly like you remembered it. Withered - but the same. 

Even the chair you were sitting in. The old wooden chair that had been lugged up from the kitchen, one that you used to sit in for hours and do homework - it was rickety, but somehow the same. 

You took a sharp drag off the cigarette after it was lit for you, continuing to listen to the feminine voice on the radio as the news played. 

“I’m Special Agent Jennifer Jareau, and I’m speaking on behalf of the Madison Police Department. Tonight, we are making an urgent appeal to the public for information. Earlier this evening, a woman went missing in the area of-” 

“I never took you for a smoker.” He said, his voice sharp and confident in the words. 

You tapped your cigarette into the ashtray with your free hand before raising it up to your lips to take another drag. Right now, the smoke heavy in your lungs was the only thing keeping you sane. 

“I never smelled it on you back then.” He added on when you didn’t respond to him. “Bitches who smoke always smell like dirtbags. You just… smelled nice.” 

“I didn’t smoke back then.” You quietly replied. 

He had driven you to take up the habit. 

You took another drag of your cigarette - you wanted to enjoy it. The longer you could drag it out, literally, the longer you could delay the inevitable. 

“-The suspect was last seen driving a blue and white, 1970s Ford truck. If you see the vehicle, please-” 

“They’re lookin’ for ya.” He said casually, nodding toward the radio. 

You wished they weren’t. 

You directed the conversation elsewhere. 

“Tell me how this is gonna end.” You urged him quietly, ashing your cigarette again. 

“You and I both know… this was only ever gonna end one way.” He told you, his voice irritably cocky. 

He had you now. He had won. 

“-We believe that this abduction is connected to a string of recent murders in the area. It is critical that if you have any information, you call our tip line at-” 

He rose from his spot then, and turned off the radio. 

The silence was gutting. 

He moved toward the door, but you abruptly caught his attention. 

“Remember,” You told him. “You made me a promise.” You said quietly. “No more. No more girls.” 

He chuckled at this. “Of course, darlin’. No more.” 

It felt like a lie. 

“But only because I love you.” He gave a filthy grin along with these words, and your insides shuddered. 

You knew that he wasn’t actually capable of love. You had known that from the moment you first laid eyes on him. 

You didn’t bother to muster any words in return. 

He crossed the room back toward you and leaned down, planting a kiss on your forehead. Your body stiffened, entirely stony toward it. It was selfish on his part - loving on you like a doll, rather than trying to bring you any comfort. 

He moved back to the door silently. 

You worried about what would happen the moment he went out the door. He turned to you just before he left. 

“Don’t run off now.” He said with a wink. Ego. Sarcasm. 

“Where am I gonna go, Dan?” You sighed. 

You lifted your tethered hand up to drive the point home, and the clink of handcuffs was now apparent in the otherwise silent room. 

He shut the door with a chuckle. You put out your cigarette in the ashtray, reaching for the loose spoke in the back of the chair. This was a chair that you used to sit in for hours while studying. That loose spoke used to bug you all the time. 

It came free after only a few tugs. 

… 

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. QuitTrip (Corner Store) - Madison, GA. 10:24PM.

The previously dark parking lot of the secluded, back country convenience store was now entirely lit up with red and blue. Four police cars had crowded into the area, surrounding the place where you had last been seen. 

Inside, under the harsh white fluorescent lights of the store, Hotchner and Prentiss were interviewing the store clerk - a young man who had supposedly been the last person to speak to you before the abduction. 

“So, you’re sure that you didn’t see anything?” Hotch pressed the young man - someone who seemed so entirely nervous under his harsh, unmoving gaze. 

“I swear, man, I didn’t see anything.” He said, his voice cracking slightly as he spoke. “She was parked in the back of the parking lot, and once you walk around the corner, there’s no way to see someone through the doors. It’s like - like a total blind spot, man.” 

“The UnSub had to have known that.” Hotch noted quietly, turning to Prentiss. “He approached her knowing that he wouldn’t be seen.” 

“Do you think he was waiting out there?” Prentiss wondered aloud. 

Then she turned back to the clerk. 

“Was there a man in here before she came in? He would have been in his 30s. Very cold, he wouldn’t have said anything. Just paid quietly and left. He might not have even bought anything - he might have just walked around, checking the blind spots. And if you asked him what he was looking for, he would have given you a glare rather than speaking. This man is not sociable. He’s very distant. He likely wouldn’t have looked you in the eye.” 

The clerk shook his head. 

“No, nobody like that.” He explained. “That lady - she was my first customer in, like, hours. She just bought her ciggies and left. And I thought it was weird cause she bought a lighter too. Most smokers already have a lighter on them.” 

“I didn’t know Y/N smoked.” Prentiss said quietly. 

“Me either.” Hotch confirmed. 

Hotch’s attention was captured by a screen behind the counter - surveillance feed, showing several different places inside the store. There was one camera just outside the door. If he wasn’t mistaken, that camera was pointed at that ‘blind spot’ in the parking lot. 

Without asking permission, he raised the partition and walked around the counter, his eyes hyper-focused on the screen. 

“Can you get me this footage from a few hours ago?” He prompted toward the clerk. “The view of the parking lot. We need to see what L/N did after she left the store.” 

The clerk nodded and began typing things onto the keyboard, and Hotch prompted him to stop when he saw you appear on the footage. Prentiss came around the counter as well, leaving the three of them crowded in close to the small screen as they watched the past version of you. 

You walked across the parking lot - toward your car, a cigarette hanging out of your mouth. You were making determined steps - until something stopped you. 

“The UnSub caught her attention.” Prentiss noted. 

Then - something entirely strange happened. While staring at the man off screen, you leaned against your car, and began ashing your cigarette, as if chatting idly with him. 

“He’s not using force.” Hotch thought aloud. “Do you think he’s got a gun trained on her?” 

“Maybe.” Prentiss hummed quietly. 

He was out of the frame, so it was only a guess. 

Then, after a few moments of this - you simply walked off. You walked in the direction he had been standing. 

“Did - did she just go with him willingly?” Prentiss gaped, entirely in shock. 

When she glanced over her shoulder, Hotch was gone. 

He stormed out into the parking lot, frantically gazing around. Prentiss followed him, chasing his chaotic energy. 

“Hotch!” She called out. “Hotch-!” 

“We need more camera angles! We need-” 

“Calm down.” She urged, grabbing him by the shoulders. 

“It just doesn’t make any sense.” He rasped. “Why would she go with him willingly? Why - why? Why would she?” He was frantic. “He must have threatened her. He must have-” 

They both didn’t want to think of the obvious. 

That you didn’t fear him. That - it hadn’t even been an abduction. 

“He must have threatened her.” Prentiss easily agreed. “She wouldn’t have gone with him otherwise.” 

They didn’t bring up the fact that you had a gun and plenty of training on how to use it. They didn’t bring up the fact that the profile said the UnSub couldn’t easily charm - he would have kidnapped you by force. 

Unless you were special. Unless he thought he could talk to you specifically for some reason. 

“Guys, what’s the news?” JJ asked, finally walking onto the scene. 

She hated the grave looks on Prentiss and Hotch’s faces. 

“I want you to put a press conference together.” Hotch said, straightening himself out and turning to her. “Make an appeal for witnesses. Tell them that there’s been a woman abducted in the area, but don’t tell them that L/N a Federal Agent. It could set the UnSub off if he believes that this abduction is being treated with a higher priority. If he feels a higher pressure from law enforcement, he might-” 

“Right.” JJ nodded. Hotch didn’t need to say the words in order for her to understand. “So: release her name and her photo, but act like she’s just a regular civilian?” 

Hotch nodded. “Exactly.” 

“If I get going now, I think I could still make the eleven o’clock news.” JJ said, rushing off with her cell pressed to her ear. 

“Let’s just hope that it brings Y/N home safely.” 

…

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. QuitTrip (Corner Store) - Madison, GA. 8:03PM.

You felt an odd amount of relief having nicotine in your system again. 

This was the first time you had smoked a cigarette in years. You had quit the habit shortly after you joined the FBI Academy when one of your advisers warned you that it might cause you to fail the fitness test. And you felt like you should just knock the habit, seeing as the only reason you had taken it up was because of… him. 

But - all of this was so triggering. Being back in your same small shitty town. Feeling it suffocating you like a plastic bag. 

The murders. 

You sucked on the cigarette for dear life as you walked back to your car, and just as you were about to get in - the windows of the car open, inviting in the sweet summer air, the keys still inside because you did feel an odd amount of trust in your hometown - something captured your attention. 

“Y/N.” 

Hearing your name in that voice made you freeze on the spot. The warm breeze felt like ice against your skin as you took your hand off the door handle, turning toward him. 

“You’re lookin’ gorgeous as ever, darlin’.” 

“You.” You ground out the word with as much disdain as possible, hot rage boiling in your blood as you looked at him. “I should have known it was you.” 

He let out a sharp chuckle - a sound that made your throat tighten up. He flicked his tongue out across his teeth, grinning his terrible Cheshire grin at you. 

A hand instinctively went for your gun, and your palm hit an empty section of your belt. He let out another sharp chuckle when his eyes followed yours, making the same realization that you did. 

You had left it sitting on the passenger’s seat of the car. Right beside your phone. 

You wondered if you could dive through the open window before he could get to you. When he made a posturing move, brushing his unbuttoned plaid shirt away and revealing the gun he had strapped to his belt underneath - you realized he would shoot you if you moved too quickly. 

You were stuck. 

“Of course it’s me, baby.” He said, casually replying to your earlier words. “You had to know that I did all this for you. For us.” 

Giving into your fate, you propped yourself against the side of the car - trying desperately to steady your wobbling legs without making it look like you were doing so. You tapped your cigarette, spilling some of the ash before you brought it to your lips once again. 

“I missed you like hell.” He told you with a snakeskin grin. 

“I didn’t miss you.” You bitterly fired back. “Not for a fucking second.” 

“Guess I made it difficult to miss me, huh?” He said, cocky as ever. “With my frequent correspondence and all?” 

“You know what I meant.” You fired back.

You glared at him sharply but didn’t say anything more, afraid that he would whip the gun out and shoot you. 

He sucked in a breath through his teeth, something that sounded utterly sarcastic. 

“Ooh, darlin’ that’s harsh.” He said. “That would almost hurt. If I didn’t know the truth.” 

You wanted to argue. You took in another large drag to help hold your tongue. You knew the results of arguing with him - it wasn’t worth it. 

“So… I think you know how this goes.” He announced. “You can come with me now. Or… I can go get another girl.” 

“No more girls.” You told him. “I’m here now. You won. Whatever business you have - it’s with me.” 

You stamped out your cigarette as you walked toward him, and your phone began to ring on the front seat as his truck rumbled to life and pulled out of the parking lot. 

… 

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. Madison Police Department - Madison, GA. 7:26PM.

“Hello! Everyone, listen up.” Hotch called everyone to attention as the local police continued to filter in, most of them standing around with cups of coffee in hand or notebooks out, ready to take notes. “We’re ready to give the profile.” 

“Yes, and please keep in mind that this is just a general set of guidelines describing the suspect.” Rossi said. “This is not a concrete list of things you should be looking for. A profile is more useful in the elimination of suspects, rather than the inclusion of them.” 

He then turned to Derek, who began reciting the profile that the team had put together so far. 

“This UnSub, or Unknown Subject, is most likely a white male in his thirties to forties.” Morgan explained. “He drives an American made vehicle, something large enough to conceal and transport victims, and something that has off-road capability in order to get to the more secluded areas where some of the bodies were found. So think trucks, heavy duty vans, anything with thick treads on the tires and a large payload. And his vehicle will most likely be in a more discreet color. This guy won’t be driving around in something flashy. He’ll be in something that blends into the background, like a beige or black truck.” 

“So what?” One of the local cops piped up. “We put out an APB for every single heavy duty black truck in the area? This is the south, do you have any idea how many people around here drive a truck? Especially ones driven by men in their forties.” 

“There’s more.” Hotch noted, looking toward you. 

“This UnSub likely believes that he is dating these women in some capacity before he kills them.” You explained. “He has left scraps of poetry at the scenes, pages of romance novels - several of the victims had wine in their stomachs or burns from candle wax on their skin. And it’s highly likely that he turns violent when the women reject his advances, or don’t live up to the fictionalized relationship he has made up about them in his mind.” 

“How does that help us?” Someone asked. 

“Well, it’s very likely that he frequents the same hunting grounds.” Rossi explained. “We encourage you to go to local bars, and nightclubs, even gyms or cafes and pass out the profile to women who fit this type.” He said, motioning toward the pictures of the other victims. “He will be on the hunt again soon, and he has a very narrow hunting ground, living in such a lowly populated area. So we might be able to catch him off guard if his potential victims have the profile as well.” 

“This man is romantic, but he’s not charming.” You added on. “He isn’t sociable. He’s very cocky, very self-centered. He believes that he is God’s gift to women, and he has a very fractured sense of reality in general. If women reject him in everyday interactions, he will get noticeably irritated, and even violent. So he will be remembered as an unpleasant person in most women’s stories.” 

“This UnSub most likely has an inside knowledge of law enforcement.” Reid stated. “But, because he has a very antisocial personality, he wouldn’t do well working with the public. We currently have our analyst combing through files of those who flunked out of the police academy or live in the area and are retired from the military in some capacity. We believe that he might have even been in prison for an unrelated crime or institutionalized at some point, giving him a close look at the inner workings of law enforcement, and also attributing to the large break between the first two crimes.” 

Reid took a breath, and then continued on. 

“He was knowledgeable enough to purposefully dump one of the bodies across state lines in order to get the FBI involved in this case, but it was just one of the bodies, and it was dumped in a very well trackied area where it would be found. So that leaves a heavy insistence that he was fed-up with the local police not giving his case enough attention or - simply not being smart enough to keep up with him.” He explained. 

“He is very cocky.” Prentiss added on. “Incredibly over-confident. He is a narcissist to his core, and he believes that he will never be caught unless he wants to be. He thinks that he has an intricate cat-and-mouse game with law enforcement, and he can go off the grid and disappear at any time that he wants.” 

“Well… isn’t that true?” One of the cops asked. “I mean, the guy’s been at it for years and we still haven’t caught him. There’s no DNA, no real leads.” 

Hotch hummed, nodding. And then he walked over to the evidence board and motioned to the pictures of the two most recent victims - barely recognizable compared to the shining, smiling photos their families had provided. 

“We believe that he’s decompensating.” Hotch explained. “He is growing more violent toward each victim, which means that he is getting more sloppy - eventually, he will go off-book. He will break his routine in some way, and that will be the moment he’ll give us something to catch him with.” 

“So… you’re just waiting for him to kill again so you can actually catch the guy?” Someone asked sharply. 

“No.” You easily replied. “We’re praying it doesn’t come to that.” 

“Thank you everyone.” Hotch said, clearing his throat, giving an unconscious signal for everyone to disperse. “That’ll be all for now.” 

Everyone easily fell under his authority, and meandered back to what they had been doing before, now armed with the profile and ready to distribute it to members of the public, to the potential victims. 

You had a harshly, sickly feeling in your stomach as you gathered some of your files. It was the same feeling that had been turning your guts into knots since you had arrived back in Madison for the first time in years. Your eye accidentally caught the evidence board - the tall, intimidating wall lined with the gruesome photos of all the women. 

Women who looked strangely like you. Same hair color, same skin tone, same body type. All of them horribly brutalized and left for dead. All of them terrorized, tortured right up until their last moments.  

“Hey.” 

JJ’s voice snapped you out of your swirling dark cloud of thoughts, drawing your eyes away from the evidence board with a gentle hand on your upper arm. You huffed out a harsh breath as you let her guide you, turning around to face the blonde woman as she stared you down with a distinct look of concern knit across her features. 

“Are you okay?” She asked. “I’ve never seen you like this.” 

She had a point. You had been doing this job for some time. You had gone to the FBI Academy straight out of college, after getting a degree in criminal forensics. And none of it ever bothered you. You had learned about the study of blood spatter and the decomposition of bodies on live body farms, and you never flinched. 

But this case - it was getting to you. 

It was likely the first time anybody on the team had ever seen you so disturbed. 

“I’m fine.” You lied, trying to shrug off her touch. 

“Come on.” JJ sighed in return. “I don’t need to be a profiler to figure out that was a big fat lie.” 

You rolled your eyes at this. 

“You’re so brilliant.” You let out a sigh of your own, and put down your files on the nearby conference room table. You stretched out your back, deciding that you would give her an inch, hoping that she wouldn’t take a mile. “I’m freaked out. So what? Doesn’t everybody have room for a bad day?” 

“Of course.” She nodded. “Of course, you can have a bad day.” Her lips pursed, and you knew there was more coming. “Is - is it anything more than that?” 

“I’m tired.” You lied again, hoping she wouldn’t call you out on it this time. “It’s been - what? More than twenty hours since we landed. For these guys it’s been years, searching for this bastard. I wanna catch him.” 

“We will.” JJ assured you, sounding rather dull in her declaration. 

“I’m gonna drive down the street and grab an energy drink or something.” You announced, grabbing your blazer off a nearby chair and putting it on. Not that you would need a jacket with the southern weather - but your cash and your keys were in the pockets. 

“I thought you quit Redbull.” She chuckled. 

“It’s been one of those days.” You replied, shaking your head as you walked out of the room. 

…

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. Madison Police Department - Madison, GA. 5:13PM.

“There’s still one thing that’s buggin’ the hell out of me.” Morgan announced as he walked back into the room with a fresh cup of coffee in hand. 

“That is?” You posed, looking up from the stack of personal files - potential suspects - that you were reading in order to engage him in the conversation. 

“What is with the two year hiatus from this guy?” He said, motioning to the board. 

The first victim had been abducted and killed all the way back in the summer of ‘99, but none of the other victims matched up until a missing person from September of 2001. And from there, the killings picked up in frequency - and the killer had taken over twenty six victims in and around Madison up until now. 

“It is weird.” You commented. “Usually after the first kill is when an UnSub is the most hungry for more. After that first taste for violence.” 

Morgan raised a brow at your strange choice of words and you shrugged it off. 

“Maybe he was hospitalized.” Reid said, appearing seemingly out of nowhere to make this comment, studying the board with his own intense expression. “Institutionalized? Maybe he was arrested for something completely unrelated, like - drugs, outstanding traffic violations?” 

“That’s helpful.” You sighed. 

“It could be.” Reid replied, sipping his own coffee. “I mean, we theorized that this UnSub has pre-existing knowledge of law enforcement - if he was in prison, maybe he was reading up on the law while he was in there? Who has closer knowledge of the law than ex-cons?” 

“Good point.” Morgan nodded. “I’ll call Garcia and have her widen the search.” 

“She is gonna love that.” You mumbled under your breath, already frustrated with the large pile of potential suspects you had to go through. 

Morgan took out his cell and walked into the other room, and you heard a distant ‘hey mama!’ as he chirped to Garcia on the other end. 

Then, you heard another voice that was all too familiar to you. 

“See, you’ve all just been working so hard, I thought you could use some sustenance!” 

It was your mother. 

You rushed out of your seat to find her in the middle of the bullpen, handing out muffins from a large basket that she had in her hand. 

It wasn’t entirely surprising to you, but it made your stomach sink. She was too much of a social butterfly for your liking. She knew about the last time you had been in this police station, she talked too much. No. You couldn’t risk her telling anyone. 

“See, that one’s blueberry, you like blueberry?” She was chatting idly, being her usual overly social self. 

“Yes, thank you so much Ms. L/N,” Prentiss smiled as your mother pushed more food into her hands. 

“Oh please, call me-” 

You knew that you must have looked like a storm, walking toward her with a scowl on your face. 

“Ma!” You barked, much harsher than you meant to, causing her to look up at you abruptly. “Ma? What are you doing here?” 

“Well see, you’ve been here all day, and you’ve been working so hard, so I made dinner for you and your friends,” She grinned, motioning toward a large tinfoil tray filled with mac and cheese that she had placed onto one of the desks next to a stack of paper plates and plastic forks. Naturally, a chunk of it was already missing. 

You wanted to scream when Reid walked over and began scooping out a portion for himself. 

“Ma, they’re not my friends, they’re my co-workers.” You said, exasperation ripe in your voice. 

You knew that this, too, ended up sounding much harsher than you had intended. As if you didn’t think of these people as friends. But you couldn’t stand the woman babying you. It’s not like she did much of that when you were an actual baby. 

“I’m an adult now, and-” You continued on, and she cut you off. 

“Oh yes, yes.” She nodded, reaching out to pinch your cheek in an utterly frustrating way. “Your co-workers.” 

“Please, Ma.” You sighed. “You can’t be here right now. This is a police station, not a bake sale.” 

“She can stay for a few minutes, can’t she?” Prentiss grinned, peeling the wrapper off her muffin. “We can take a break for dinner. I wanna hear some childhood stories about you.” 

Reid looked up eagerly at this, and you glared at both of them. 

“Oh, you should hear about the time she painted her face blue with the paint from-” Your mother began to tell a delightful embarrassing story, but you cut her off. 

“No.” You said sharply. “I’m sorry, but we have work to do. Important work. Once we actually catch the guy, I’ll bring everyone by the house for tea and cookies and you can show everyone my naked baby pictures, the whole nine yards. Just - not now.” 

You unceremoniously ripped the basket of muffins out of her hands and placed them on the desk beside the tray of mac and cheese, and she began to argue with you, calling you rude, telling you that she had raised you with better manners while you ushered her out the door. 

Prentiss and Reid exchanged a particular, concerned look as they watched you and your mother argue through the glass doors of the precinct. 

“Now what do you think that was all about?” Emily asked quietly. 

“For once, I have no idea.” Spencer mumbled in return. 

…

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. Georgia Highway 72 - Madison, GA. 1:32PM.

“This is new.” Morgan noted as the two of you walked away from the SVU, approaching the dumpsite where the latest victim’s body had been found. “This guy doesn’t usually dump bodies out in the open. You think he was in a rush?” 

The two of you had been sent to check it out while Hotch and Prentiss spoke to the family, and the others went over evidence from the many pre-existing cases at the station. 

“Not likely.” You replied. “Preliminary report says there’s still no DNA, no skid marks from his tires, no shoe prints. He’s not getting sloppy.” You felt a sickly wave of vomit splash up as you looked at the woman - her ankles sticking out of the tall grass just off the edge of the highway, where she had been left, entirely visible for anybody passing by to see. “This was a present. Like a fuckin’ cat leaving a dead mouse on the porch. He wanted us to find her. And he wanted us to find her quickly.” 

“I’ll tell you one thing,” Morgan noted, tentatively stepping into the grass and gently moving the long spokes of greenery back to get a better look at the victim. “He’s definitely escalating.” 

You crouched down to get a better look yourself, and you had to agree. 

Her face was almost entirely caved in, but it appeared to be from a series of blunt hits, and not from a singular swing with a heavy object. Between the pre-mortem swelling and the post-mortem rage, where he had continued to mutilate her even after her death, she was practically unrecognizable from the photo that her family had provided you with. The only reason the team had been able to confirm her identity for sure was that she had been reported missing, and she had been found wearing a unique custom charm bracelet that her parents could confirm belonged to her. 

You wished that you could guarantee they would never see her body in this state. 

“What’s that?” Morgan wondered aloud. 

You hummed back in confusion. 

Before you could wonder any further about what he meant, he reached out and gently pried open the victim’s mouth, fishing out a small piece of plastic that he had seen sticking out from the corner of her swollen, bruised lips. He had to fight to get it out of her stiff, death rigored body, but when he was able to - a small plastic bag came out of her mouth. 

A small plastic bag containing a piece of white paper. 

“What the hell?” Morgan mumbled quietly. 

Naturally, he opened the bag and took out the paper, and you looked on with nervous curiosity as he read what was on the note. 

“You are the stars hidden by clouds.” He read aloud. “I know you’re there even when I can’t see you. Your shine peeks out and reaches me in the depths of my soul. Tell me your arms are long enough to reach me across oceans. Tell me someday we will be together, somehow, some way. Tell me that this love we have can survive being together as well as we’ve survived being apart. Tell me we are more than the chasm of our divide.” 

Bile splashed up in your throat. 

You hated that the quote was distinctly familiar to you. You hated how you knew it. 

You could still hear his voice in your head, and it made your bones quake. 

“Hmm.” Morgan looked over the paper thoughtfully. “It’s another page ripped out of a book. Just like the other one. I’ll call Garcia and have her look it up, maybe-” 

“You don’t have to.” You said, hoping that your throat wasn’t too painfully constricted around your words. “It’s Jacqueline Simon Gunn.” 

Morgan easily saw the haunted look behind your eyes - the years old terror that you were having a much harder time suppressing now. 

Oddly enough, it was a feeling that he knew well. Perhaps that’s why he saw it in you so easily. 

“You alright?” He bothered to ask, even though he knew the answer was ‘no’. 

“I’m fine.” You lied. “We should bring this back to everyone else.” 

You rushed away from the crime scene like a bat out of hell, and even though he knew he should have pressed further - he let you. 

… 

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. Madison Police Department - Madison, GA. 10:08AM.

“Good morning, y’all.” 

The BAU was greeted by Chief Dalton, the Madison County Chief of Police, as you all filed into the small police department. 

“You can set up in the conference room over there, I hope we got y’all everything you need.” He said, flashing a warm, welcoming smile. 

“This looks fine, thank you.” JJ said, reaching out to shake his hand. “I’m Special Agent Jennifer Jareau, this is Doctor Spencer Reid,” She pointed to him, and he nodded in return - of course, rather than shaking hands. “This is Special Agent Emily Prentiss, Agent Rossi, and Agent L/N. Our Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner and Special Agent Morgan will be here later - they wanted to go and interview some of the families of the victims, get some more background information.” 

“L/N?” He motioned toward you, his eyes becoming fixated on you as you set down your bag and lifted one of the lids off the boxes to get a glance at some of the files. “That name sounds awful familiar to me - are you from Madison?” 

“Oh yes, I am,” You grinned at him, stepping forward and giving him a handshake, to which he grinned back widely. “I grew up here. This is actually my first time back in years.” 

“Well, welcome home.” He said. “I wish it was under better circumstances.” 

“Me too.” You easily agreed. 

You thought that would be the end of it, until: 

“You know I hardly recognized you. Such a pretty face, but the last time I saw you, you was beat to a darn pulp.” He remarked, giving a pained chuckle. 

Your stomach swelled with anxiety, and it felt like a pure balloon of concrete sitting inside of you. You felt all the eyes in the room on you - Rossi, JJ, Emily, Spencer - all of them staring you down as this man aired your dirty laundry like it was as casual as the weather report. 

“You came through here - what was it, the summer of ‘99? I’ll never forget that assault report. I’m surprised you can still see out of that right eye of yours, with the way-” 

“Coffee?” You cut him off when you managed to find your voice, rushing to change the subject and praying he would get the hint. “Where can I get a coffee around here? Long flight. And we’ve had an early morning. Long flight, going over the case.” 

You didn’t even realize you were tripping over your own words, repeating yourself in a rush to fill the air so he wouldn’t speak about the past anymore. 

“Oh, it’s right through there. In the break room.” He said, motioning vaguely behind him. 

“Would you mind showing me, please?” 

You knew it was cowardly, but you were now desperate to escape your colleagues, and wanted to drag the Chief away before he spilled anything else from his loose lips. 

He escorted you out of the room and it was only a mere moment before conversation ensued about the strange thing that had just happened. 

“Am I gonna be the first person to say ‘what the hell’?” Rossi asked, looking around to his teammates, who all had equally shocked and confused expressions. 

“It’s a small town. These people don’t exactly understand secrecy. Or tact.” JJ sighed. 

“Yeah, but why would Y/N keep that a secret from us?” Spencer asked, frowning. “If she was assaulted-” 

“Yeah, in the summer of ‘99.” Emily pressed. “That was a long time ago. Have you told everyone on the team every little detail about your life from ten years ago?” 

“Eight years.” Spencer easily corrected her. 

“Whatever.” Emily rolled her eyes. “We’re not here to profile her. We’re here to catch another scumbag and leave.” 

There seemed to be a resounding nod at this.

“If she wants to tell us about what happened, she will.” Rossi added on.  

… 

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. Outskirts of Madison - Madison, GA. 9:52AM.

“There’s my beautiful girl.” 

He had a perfect view of you through the scope of his gun. 

Of course, he would never hurt you. There was no bullet in that gun that was intended for you. This was just the perfect way to see you. Up close and personal. Just the way he liked it. 

This was the first time he had seen you in so long. You wore your makeup differently now - your hair was a bit different. But you were still his girl. 

“You’re gonna love the present I left for ya.” 

You spoke his language - violence. 

You wrote your life in blood, just like he did. 

You were perfect. His perfect girl. 

…

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. Inside the BAU Jet - Somewhere Above America. 7:12AM.

“So, the ME dates eight of these victims from within the last year alone?” Prentiss questioned, looking over some of the files on the table in front of her. 

“Well, it’s difficult to tell with the soil erosion and the heavy rain that the area had recently, but they are significantly less decomposed than the others.” JJ explained. 

“What I don’t understand,” Morgan noted. “Why would he give up his gig now? I mean, twenty four victims in a mass grave in the middle of the woods, and he leaves a twenty-fifth victim in the middle of the road, clearly intending for police to find it. With a damn note attached, giving up the exact coordinates of his mass dumpsite. Why?”

“It is strange.” Reid agreed. “Typically, whenever killers have contact with the police, it is to taunt them for their inability to get caught, believing that the police are stupid and they as killers are invincible.” He said. Naturally, this rolled into a rant as more facts came to mind about the subject. 

“Serial killer Dennis Rader, also known as the BTK killer, standing for Blind, Torture, Kill - he taunted police with letters over a period of three decades, between 1974 and 1991, each one that he sent to the local police simply saying ‘good luck hunting’.” Reid explained. “Occasionally, he would send them graphic descriptions of how he had posed the bodies at each crime scene. And he was only caught when a floppy disc he sent to a local television station was traced back to a computer that he had used at his church.” 

Reid laughed at this revelation, finding it amusing. With all eyes staring at him, he reached the realization that this wasn’t helpful to the case at hand - and then he easily clammed up. 

“So, this UnSub gives up the dumpsite because… he’s feeling remorseful? He wants to get caught?” Rossi theorized. 

“The level of violence across these recent victims has no indication of remorse.” You replied. “One of the bodies found at the dumpsite was missing over half her teeth, and had all ten of her fingers broken in multiple places. Seemingly pre-mortem.” 

There was a heavy silence at this. 

“Perhaps he’s feeling ignored,” Hotch posed. “He feels like his crimes aren’t being well covered by the media and he wants glory. He finally wants recognition for what he’s done.” 

“Well, wouldn’t he have sent some kind of manifesto or another letter to the police?” Morgan posed. “And it seems like the guy went through a whole lot of trouble for a long time, trying not to get caught. He buried them out in the woods, secluded. Wrapped them in plastic, scrubbed the bodies clean so there’s absolutely no DNA. Doesn’t seem like someone looking for glory to me.”  

“Not to mention that he wrote the coordinates for the dumpsite on the back of a page ripped out of a novel.” Rossi said, squinting down at one of the files - a close up forensic photo that had been sent over by the local police department. 

Prentiss held out her hand, and Rossi handed over the photo, and then she began reading the words off the page aloud. 

“-I wish, as well as everybody else, to be perfectly happy, but-” 

“-but, like everybody else, it must be in my own way.” You finished the quote before she could, the words flashing through your mind with a sickly twist in your gut. It was all too familiar to you, in the worst way. “It’s Sense and Sensibility. Jane Austin.” 

Everyone fixated on you with a strange gaze, wondering how you knew this off the top of your head. Especially when usually this would only be something that Reid would be able to recite so perfectly by heart. 

“Maybe he thinks that he’s romancing these women?” Prentiss theorized, trying to move on from the strange moment. 

“That’s plausible.” Hotch agreed. “When we land, Morgan and I will go interview some of the families. JJ, get us their contacts. I want to know if any of these women had problems with an ex boyfriend or even a bad date whom they rejected. It could be someone they once viewed as a potential romantic partner that went horribly wrong.” 

JJ nodded at this, going to look through her files for the information. 

“This level of torture - it’s likely a substitute for sexual gratification.” Morgan theorized, looking at the crime scene photos one again. “Maybe he is romancing these women, but in his mind, this is the ultimate form of romance? Having all of his conquests together in death - it’s a declaration of what a casanova he is. In his fractured world.” 

“It still doesn’t explain why he gave up the dumpsite to the police.” Prentiss argued. 

“Men like to brag about their sexual exploits.” Rossi said, nodding toward Morgan. “If these women are his conquests, in his mind, then he wants his manliness, his accomplishments, to be appreciated by other men.” 

Prentiss sharply rolled her eyes at this. 

“Well, at least we know our UnSub’s not a woman.” She remarked sharply. 

… 

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. BAU Offices (FBI Headquarters) - Quantico, Virginia. 6:15AM.

JJ stood at the front of the room, ready to present the newest case to everyone. 

“Last night, a body was discovered on the backroads of South Carolina, about five miles outside of the town of Delph. She was found naked, mutilated. Heavy bruising all over her body that insinuates the killer kept her and tortured her for days. Final cause of death appears to be blunt force trauma from multiple hits to the head, but she also had several shallow stab wounds across her body, seemingly from some kind of hunting knife with a rough blade.” 

JJ explained, beginning to present the case as she clicked the small remote, causing images of the crime scene to pop up on the large screen in the room. 

“The victim - now identified as Ashley Prembrooke, hadn’t even been reported missing. She left her parents house in Madison, Georgia, about three days ago to drive back to her dorm at the University of South Carolina. When she didn’t show up on time, her roommate assumed that she was staying at home for a few extra days. Her father has cancer, so she wanted to be there for him.” 

There seemed to be a particularly dark aura in the room at this news. 

“Did the killer know that she wouldn’t be reported missing, or did he just snatch her up by chance?” Morgan asked. 

“Her car was found abandoned at a rest stop a few miles from the border of Georgia.” JJ explained. “So… it seems to be random.” 

“Well, I hate to ask this,” Rossi said. “But why are we being called out for just one body?” 

“That’s the thing.” JJ sighed. 

She clicked the clicker again, and several close-up photos appeared. Photos of the victim’s mutilated body - among the harsh bruising on her torso, there was a piece of white paper, partially stained with blood. It had been folded and stapled into her flesh. 

“The victim was found with this page… stapled into her skin.” JJ said, clearly finding the words disturbing to speak aloud. “Written on the back, was a set of coordinates. Local police discovered that these coordinates lead to a random patch of woods, about ten miles outside of Madison, Georgia.” 

JJ queued more pictures onto the screen. It was those very woods - overturned dirt. And more than a dozen bodies, wrapped in plastic among the soil. 

“It was the site of a mass grave with twenty-four other victims - all women around the same age, with the most recent ones all having the same body type, the same hair color, same general makeup as Ashley Prembrooke.” 

“He has a type.” Hotch stated the obvious. 

“And for some reason, he tipped the police off to his hiding place.” JJ reminded them all. 

“Twenty four victims?” Prentiss questioned, clearly shocked by this number. 

“That’s what they’ve found so far. The decomposition on some of the bodies seems to go back as far as a decade, but it’s difficult to date them exactly.” JJ replied. 

“So… the guy is experienced, hasn’t been caught in years, and he hands over his honey pot to the cops? Is he trying to get caught? Is he feeling guilty?” Rossi posed. 

“No, not with that level of violence. There’s no remorse there.” Morgan replied. 

“He dumped Ashley Prembrooke over state lines. We could be looking at somebody with an incredibly wide hunting ground who gave up one of many dumpsites as a way to taunt police.” Hotch theorized. 

“That doesn’t seem to be the case.” JJ explained. “So far, eight of the most recent victims have been matched up with missing persons reports, all of them women from Madison. All within the last year alone. It seems like he targeted Ashley because she was from Madison - that’s his comfort zone.” 

When the pictures of the missing women - now confirmed dead, murdered violently, popped up on screen, your throat tightened. 

You had known at least two of them. You had gone to school with them. You had seen them cheer proudly at high school pep rallies - you had known them lively and bright. And now they were bones rotting in the soil, taken by some monster. 

Beyond that, there was an alarming trend. 

They looked like you. You couldn’t deny that. Same hair color, same body type, same skin tone. 

And they were from your hometown. 

Between this, and the letter, the morning was getting to be too much for you. You wanted to believe it was all a series of terrible coincidences, but… 

Looking across the roundtable at you, Reid was the only one who saw that sickly look come over your face. He was desperate to know what was troubling you. 

“Reid?” Hotch got his attention, finding it strange that the overly talkative man was quiet this morning. “You’ll work the geographical profile?” 

“Yes.” Reid nodded, finally taking his eyes off you. “It’s unusual for the killer to hunt wider than a five hundred mile radius from home. So it’s likely that he lives, works, and operates all within Madison.” 

“Good. We could be looking at a copy-cat who knew about the previous killer’s dumpsite, or… something else entirely. But we need to get on the ground there and find out.” Hotch said. “Wheels up in thirty.” 

Everyone dispersed from the table when Hotch finalized with this, and you found yourself much dizzier than you realized as you tried to stand. As everyone moved to their desks to gather their things, you moved to the counter to get a coffee - hoping to calm your nerves. 

“Y/N.” 

You nearly jumped out of your skin when Reid’s voice came from behind you - your own blood was pumping in your ears, and seemingly, he had snuck up behind you. But his usually quiet footsteps simply couldn’t be heard beyond the nagging thump of your own anxiety. 

“What?” You barked back, knowing it was far too harsh. 

“Are - are you alright?” He asked, hesitant to bother you with the question. 

“I’m fine.” You lied as you dumped the sugar packets into your cup, your shaking hands accidentally spilling some across the counter top. 

“Are you sure?” Reid pressed. 

You let out a heavy sigh and turned to face him, crossing your arms heavily over your chest. 

“What?” You said the word again, sternly, glaring at him. 

All he did was give you a soft, understanding expression in return. 

You hated it. 

You hated how he was so open - it was almost horrifying, how you could have easily told him what was bothering you. 

Sweet, accepting, understanding Reid. 

If you told him the truth, he probably would have told you some statistic that he found comforting. It would have been sweet, coming from him. But then, he would have been looking at you with those eyes all damn day, holding pity in his heart and not truly focusing on the work that needed to get done. 

“Can you look at the shit we see every single day and always be okay with it?” 

You easily made up an excuse, pretending you were rattled by the crime scene photos, even though this murder was no more graphic in nature than any other you had been subjected to seeing recently. 

“I’m human. So what?” 

Reid studied your face carefully. He saw guilt dancing in your eyes - the way you gently bit your lip was your tell for lying, that much he knew from playing many rounds of poker with you on the plane rides home. 

But he felt that simply nagging you more wouldn’t get the truth out of you. Not right now. 

“Okay.” He acquiesced. “I know it’s hard. If you ever need someone to talk to-” 

You stormed off, accidentally slamming into his shoulder on the way along in your haste to escape the conversion. Reid heavily eyed the cup of coffee that you had left cooling on the counter before he turned and left himself. 

… 

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007. BAU Offices (FBI Headquarters) - Quantico, Virginia. 6:04AM.

You walked into the bullpen with your bag on your arm, sipping a strong coffee in a travel mug you had brought from home. 

“You look tired.” Emily commented as you walked over to your desk. “Late night?” 

You moaned in reply, not yet ready to let go of nursing your coffee mug, taking a few more long gulps as you took the strap of your bag off your shoulder and slung it into your chair. 

“Last night, the fire alarm in my building went off at 3am.” You told her, finally surrendering the mug and putting it down on your desk. “I was out of bed in a panic, barely awake, went into the hallway to evacuate - and the sprinklers had gone off. So I ended up standing outside for more than an hour in my little jammies, soaking wet, and it turns out - some teenager from the third floor pulled the alarm because he was having an argument with his mom. He didn’t want to go to summer school.” 

“Yikes.” Derek commented. “Well, you know, if you ever need a calm, cozy place to sleep, you can always give me a call. And you can bring your little jammies.” He told you with a wink. You rolled your eyes, knowing that flirting was his default. “As long as you don’t mind Clooney licking at your toes in the mornin’.” 

That almost made it sound more appealing. You did love that dog. 

“You know, a study was done at the University of New Hampshire that concluded that twenty to thirty minute windows of sleep actually optimize the human brain for functionality the most.” Spencer added on, leaning back in his chair at his desk as he explained this. 

“The schedule of a ten to twelve hour work day, followed by an eight hour sleep period has only been instituted in society as a commonality since the industrial revolution. And it doesn’t actually flow with how the human brain has been optimized by evolution. Before that, most people optimized their lives around a wake-sleep period of three to four hours, taking care of chores in the morning, participating in a midday nap, and then socializing in the evening and partaking in community events before sleeping again in the evening. And most communities functioned around people sleeping and waking at vastly different times rather than everyone having one collective morning routine.” He concluded, giving you a smile. 

You found his rambling fascinating, but you found it ironic that you could barely process half of what he had said - because you were too tired. 

“Well, unfortunately we can’t all live in villages and pick berries for a living.” Emily remarked with a yawn. 

The conversation shifted when Penelope walked in, and gave you a bright smile. 

“Good morning, pretty girl.” She greeted you. 

“Mornin’, Penny G.” You replied.

“This arrived on the mailcart for you, postmarked from a few days ago, stamped express. I figured you’d want to have eyes on it as soon as possible.” She told you, handing you a very average looking white envelope. 

You weren’t sure why, but it invoked a strange feeling in your gut. 

The moment that you saw the handwriting on your front - the script that made up your name. 

The way he had written it. 

Bile rose up in your throat, and you forced yourself to swallow it back down. All eyes in the room immediately knew that something was wrong. 

“What is it?” Emily asked. 

“Nothing.” You quickly replied. 

You didn’t even want to open it, but bitter curiosity was eating at you. 

How the hell had he found your work address? He knew where you worked now? 

“I’m gonna - bathroom.” You mumbled an excuse as you rushed back out of the room again, practically fleeing toward the bathroom, leaving all eyes on your shadow. 

In particular, Spencer’s eyes followed you hard as you retreated. He wondered how a simple letter could upset you so much. 

You secluded yourself safely in a locked stall, your heart thumping in your chest as you began to tear into the letter. The envelope turned to sinew in your hands with your anxious inability to open it properly. In a few moments, you pulled out the piece of paper with a shaking hand, and dropped the shredded envelope onto the floor. 

You barely managed to read its contents through tearful eyes. 

Lover, 

Fate has sent us on such different paths, but I will be with you again soon. 

I still miss you every single day. I remember your smell. 

I know none of the men you have spent your recent years with can measure up to me, which is why I have set you on the path back to me. 

“I wish, as well as everybody else, to be perfectly happy; but like everybody else, it must be in my own way.” 

-Daniel 

Your chest caved in when you realized that there was something taped to the corner of the page. 

You recognized the piece of dark cloth in an instant. 

It was from that night. He had kept it. 

You couldn’t keep the bile down that time. You turned to the toilet and puked up a horrible swirl of black coffee and half a toaster waffle that you had scarfed down while getting dressed for work. 

When you had just barely caught your breath, you heard the door to the bathroom creak open. 

“Y/N?” Emily called out your name. “Are you in here?” 

You didn’t answer. 

Instead, you heaved a large glob of putrid spit into the toilet and wiped your mouth with the back of your hand. 

“Are you okay?” She asked, her voice now coming from right outside the stall you were in. 

“I’m fine.” You handed out that lie, not knowing how many times in the next day you were going to be saying it. 

“You don’t sound fine.” Emily told you. “I thought I heard you throwing up.” 

“Bad sushi.” You lied. “Stopped by the corner store on my way home. You know I never cook. Food poisoning is usually 50/50 with that kind of shit. Just another thing to add to my great night, right?” 

You let out a sour, sarcastic chuckle, but Emily didn’t follow suit. 

You knew that you would have to face her sooner or later, so you wiped your mouth again and then turned and unlocked the stall door. 

“I’ll be fine.” You told her, throwing her a very fake smile. 

“Yeah.” She said, tone flat, entirely disbelieving. “Would it have anything to do with that?” 

She motioned to the letter, which you had almost forgotten was crumbled up in your fist. 

“Can I see?” 

You didn’t even consider how suspicious it would be, but as her hand moved toward the paper, you ripped it up and tossed it into the toilet, grabbing the envelope up off the floor and tossing it into the mess of paper and vomit as well before you flushed it all down. 

“It’s nothing.” You grunted out, another very poor lie coming from your lips as you exited the stall and moved toward the sinks. “It’s garbage.” 

You turned on the tap and leaned down, taking in a mouthful of water to rinse out your mouth while she watched you with careful, piercing eyes. 

“It’s kind of pathetic that you’re trying so hard to bullshit me.” Emily remarked. “Not just because we’re both profilers, but because it’s so painfully obvious that something is wrong.” 

You swirled the water around your mouth, rinsing it out, and then spit into the sink before you turned the tap off. When you rose up to your full height, you caught Emily’s eye in the mirror - pitying. You hated it. 

It was that kind of pity that held you back from telling her the truth. 

She reached over to the dispenser and got you some of the paper towel, handing it to you as she spoke again. 

“You know you can tell me what’s bothering you, right?” She said, reaching up to put a gentle hand on your shoulder. 

There was a small, quiet moment - the words edged on your tongue. 

You truly considered just coming out with it. 

But then- 

A harsh knock on the door cut through the silence. 

“Y/N? Em?” JJ poked her head in through the door, clearly looking for the two of you. When she spotted you, she continued on. “I need everybody at the roundtable in five.” 

“Let’s get going.” You said, wiping your mouth and then crumpling the paper towel to toss it into the garbage can. 

… 

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Madison Police Department - Madison, GA. 1:45AM.

Reid stormed in, capturing everyone’s attention. 

After being given a shoebox full of strange letters by your mother, he had finally pieced it together. He finally realized the secret you had been hiding - the thing that put you right in this killer’s crosshairs. 

“Guys, I think we got the profile all wrong.” He announced, a look of worry knit into his features. “And - if I’m right, then I think I know where she is.” 

He motioned to something in his hands - it was a worn-out old shoebox, something that made everyone curious and confused. 

“What the hell is that?” Prentiss asked. 

“Come on.” Reid ushered everyone into the conference room, and once the whole team was gathered, he shut the door. 

He opened the box and spilled it into the middle of the table, revealing a flood of hand-written letters. JJ stood back in shock, Hotch observed carefully and silently as usual, and Rossi, Morgan, and Prentiss began to pick through them while Reid explained his revelation. 

“Y/N’s mother gave me these.” He explained. “All of them are addressed to Y/N, and from what I can see, they’re pretty much weekly, and they go back as far as 1999.” 

“When the first murder occurred.” Morgan easily pieced the two things together. 

“Not only that,” Reid added on. “The first murder took place in August of ‘99.” He said, pointing to the picture of the first known victim on the evidence board. “And I think the first letter, or one of the earliest, is from July of ‘99. At least.” 

“So - so she was having correspondence with the killer?” JJ questioned. “What? Was he in prison? Are you saying that Y/N is involved with this in some way?” 

“No-” Reid rushed to correct this assumption, and Morgan cut him off. 

“She was at Quantico when the latest victims were killed. Even if the guy has a partner, I really don’t take her as bein’ responsible for this.” He said. 

“Plus, these don’t exactly read as love letters.” Pretniss pointed out, her expression growing disturbed as she read what the killer had written from the letter in her hands. 

“-every day I dream of you, my love. I remember the way you felt underneath me - clawing for your life, desperate. I remember the way you screamed. Tasting your blood for the first time made me feel alive again. I hope the bruises meant as much to you as they did to me.” 

“The use of ‘I’ language denotes self importance - the author has a natural narcissistic personality disorder, but he pretends that it’s a fulfilling two-way relationship, when naturally it’s a fixation on someone who could never truly live up to his fantasies.” Reid explained. 

The room fell silent as the reality of it hit everyone. You were the target of someone truly dangerous. Someone who was going to kill you when you didn’t perform the fantasy that he had in mind for you. 

“She was being stalked.” Reid declared quietly, sounding defeated. “She still is.” 

“These killings aren’t someone having separate, individual fantasized relationships with each victim; this is about the killer repeating the same relationship over and over again, performing the same ritual killing in order to relive the same fantasy over again, projecting it onto different women of the same type.” Hotch said, coming to the realization as he stared at the different victims photos on the evidence board with a firm look on his face. “He’s been in love with the same woman in his mind for years, but nobody can live up to the real thing. That’s why he gave up the dump site. Because he wanted to lure her here. He wanted the FBI here, because he wanted to get L/N here.” 

“Okay, but the bigger question is: why L/N? What was the incident that got him fixated on her in the first place?” Rossi questioned, asking what was on everyone’s mind. 

JJ’s face was struck with horrible realization, and she ran to the door, ripping it open. She screamed the Chief’s name at the top of her lungs until she got the man’s attention, looking entirely crazed to everyone else in the station. Naturally, she didn’t care. He bustled over, scurrying toward her urgent voice, spilling coffee on himself in the process. 

“Chief.” JJ breathed out. “You said that Y/N came through the station, and she was beaten up the last time you saw her - when was that?” 

“Oh, I dunno?” He creased his brows with concentration, trying to remember. “About ‘98? ‘99?” 

“Did she file a report about the incident?” JJ asked. 

“Yeah.” The Chief replied. “It was a break-in. Poor thing. Summer vacation, her mother wasn’t home, off with the church on a retreat hittin’ the bingo halls up in Texas. She said that she never saw the attacker, though. He was wearin’ a ski-mask.” 

There was a silent exchange among the group that said they knew the truth - you had seen the attacker, you knew him. It’s why you had gone with him willingly this time. But you hadn’t told the police the truth back then because you had been too scared. 

“Can you get me that report?” JJ asked. 

After too many anxious minutes, the Chief came back with an old file in hand, and JJ snatched it out of his hands with a mumbled thank you before she shut the door in his face once again. She placed it down on the table among the mess of letters, and flipped it open. 

“Oh my god.” Emily gasped when she saw the photos inside. 

There was a spread of old polaroid photos, pinned to the sides of the file. They were almost too graphic for the team to look at - one showing the damage to your face; both of your eyes bruised, one of them entirely swollen shut. Scratches, deep gashes, harsh bruising all over your body. You were wearing a dark cotton tee shirt with patches ripped out of it - as if someone had been clawing at you and nearly ripped the clothing off your body to keep you from getting away. 

“This wasn’t a burglary.” Derek mumbled, frowning as he picked up one of the photos and inspected it closer. 

“Get Garcia on the line,” Hotch told JJ. 

She dialed the tech’s number on the conference hub, having to unbury the small bit of technology from some papers before she did it. It rang for a few moments before the woman on the other end picked up. 

“Where’s our girl?” Garcia asked anxiously, talking about you. “Is there any news? You’re calling because there’s good news, right?” 

“Babygirl,” Derek called out, trying to get her to focus, but she trampled right past this and continued to ramble on. 

“Please don’t tell me she’s dead!” Garcia shrieked on the other end. “Cause I can’t keep losing people! And I know it’s selfish to say that I can’t lose her, but she’s one of my best friends, and I’m gonna be a mess! And she promised to be the maid of honor and my wedding, and I know I’m not even engaged, and I don’t even have a boyfriend, but I need to have her around for big milestones in my life like that, she’s like the best person I know, and-” 

“Garcia, we need you.” Hotch told her firmly, cutting off her emotional ranting. 

“Right.” The tech replied, sucking in sharply, trying to catch her breath. There was some scraping in the background - the wheels of her chair on the floor as she scooted her chair into her desk. “What do you need? I’m here.” 

“I need you to look up reports of rape in and around Madison County between 1991 and 1999.” Hotch told her. 

“Rape?” Garcia replied, seemingly shocked by the topic and how it might relate to the case at hand - how it might relate to you. 

“Come on, babygirl.” Derek encouraged her. “Work your magic.” 

“Yeah. I got it.” She said hesitantly, and then there was the clacking of her keyboard as she worked. 

“Oh. Ugh.” 

“What is it?” Rossi was the first to ask. 

“There’s over five hundred cases.” Penelope told them, clearly disgusted by this number. 

“Can you narrow it down to women in their twenties? With similarities to the victims who have been targeted by the killer. Same hair type, same race, same body type.” Hotch told her. 

“Turning on the creep filter.” Garcia said, using her usual sense of humor that she turned on to shield herself. “That leaves us with… about twenty cases.” 

“Were any of them prosecuted?” Hotch asked. 

“Two of them.” Penelope replied. “A couple of sorority sisters from the University of Georgia were held at gunpoint and raped by a pizzaman in ‘95. He went to trial, got ten years. And he was paroled for good behavior in 2003. Yikes.” Emily rolled her eyes in agreement with his comment. “And shortly after his parole, he crashed his car into a tree in a drunk driving incident. Looks like he’s probably not your guy.” 

“What about the other eighteen cases?” Reid asked. 

“Um… no.” Garcia replied. “None of them went to court. A lot of these say that the victims were attacked by a stranger… that he broke in through the back door. Hold on.” 

“What?” Derek prompted her. 

“There is one here. Terry Driver. She said that she was raped, and she identified her rapist as someone she knew - Daniel Matthews. But he was never arrested because his brother gave him an ability for the night of the incident.” Garcia explained. 

“I bet that one was air-tight.” Rossi scoffed. 

“What type of injuries did the victims have?” Hotch asked. 

“Um… nothing major.” Penelope replied. Hotch frowned. “A black eye… a few scratches.” She hesitated. “Ligature marks… from being tied to their beds. God. That sounds like the most horrible night of your life, doesn’t it?” 

Hotch shook his head, sweeping a tense hand over his face. “He doesn’t fit the profile.” 

“Wait.” Reid swallowed thickly, staring at the photos of you that were sitting in the middle of the table. 

Battered. Bruised. Broken. 

“Some of the letters refer to him having an awakening. ‘An awakening in my soul. A bond through blood.’” He explained, naturally reciting the words from memory after having only read them once. 

“She fought back hard.” He held up one of the photos - one of your arm, showing deep, bloody scratches. Defensive wounds. “She found back so hard - he must have liked it. It-” 

“It gave him a taste for violence.” Prentiss finished off the thought, fear written all over her face. “She - she was the one who made him realize that he could use violence to replace sex completely. So he switched from rape to murder.” She came to the shocking realization aloud, her eyes flickering from the photo of you to all the photos scattered across the evidence board - all the victims he had practiced on in the wake of you. 

“Oh - oh my god.” Penelope gasped, having heard all of this over the intercom. “He’s gonna kill her? He’s gonna kill Y/N?” 

“Garcia, What can you get me on Matthews?” Hotch asked. 

“Um, right - Daniel Matthews…” There was more clacking of keys, and then Penelope replied. “He grew up in Madison. Looks like he went to the same high school as Y/N. He used to play football. He has a juvenile record for… vandalism, underage drinking. The usual. Oh…” 

“Oh?” JJ wondered aloud. 

“He had a very brief stint in the FBI Academy. He was kicked out 2001 when he was accused of sexually harassing fellow female applicants, and he was flagged on the psych eval as having a possible narcissistic personality disorder.” Garcia explained. 

“Bingo.” Rossi sighed. “That’s our UnSub.” 

“Oh my god. The hiatus.” Morgan said, his eyes fixated on the evidence board now. “‘99 was the year he attacked Y/N, when he first got a taste for it… and then… he followed her to the Academy?”

“And he resumed the killings when he got kicked out.” Rossi picked up on the thought. “When he couldn’t be in close contact with her anymore… he couldn’t get a high off of retraumatizing her, reliving that night in his mind, he needed to relive it through the other victims.” 

It all fit together now. 

It was a horrible puzzle, but it all fit together around you. 

“Reid, you said you might know where he took her?” Pretniss said, turning back to the very tired looking genius. 

“Yes,” Reid shoved aside the file with the graphic photos of you, and went shuffling through the letters for something. When he found it, he handed it over to Prentiss. “A lot of the earliest dated letters make reference to ‘our special place’. Or-” 

“-the bed I first made love to you in.” Prentiss read it off the page, clearly holding back vomit. 

JJ grabbed up the file with the report about the break-in, shoving aside the photos, looking for an address. “It’s here. I’ve got it.” 

“Okay, I want squad cars, tactical swat, I want spike strips on every road in or out of that place. I need everyone mobile in ten minutes.” Hotch ordered sharply, causing everyone to jump into action. 

…

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Abandoned Country House - Madison, GA. 2:20AM.

It should have felt like a victory to hold a knife to the throat of your rapist - someone who had been taunting you for years after the incident. 

But somehow, you still felt small. You still felt so chaotic and out of control. 

Both your hands shook vigorously as you struggled with the warring inside of you, as you struggled with the weight of confronting your life’s biggest monster. 

In the back of your mind, you were aware of the guns pointed at you. You would have liked to believe that because Emily was your friend - she wouldn’t shoot you. 

Part of you thought it would be worth it. To kill this man and take a bullet in the process. 

You just hoped that she would aim to wound and not to kill. 

“Put the knife down!” Emily ordered, her voice sounding muffled in your ears as blood thumped hard through you. “Come on, put it down.” 

“Reid-!” 

You heard his name being called out, and you saw a figure moving from the corner of your eye, but all you could focus on was the blade in your hand. The sight of a thick, unmarked neck, ripe for the taking in front of you. The idea that all you had to do was press down and slice through flesh - and then, this would all be over. 

No more torment. No more letters. No more taunting. 

“Y/N,” 

His soothing voice spoke your name, and you held a sob inside of your chest. 

You had grown so much of a life beyond this. Beyond him. He had tried to ruin you, he had tried to keep you in some little cage in some shitty town, and you had outgrown him. You had friends. You had people who loved you. 

But you still couldn’t escape him. 

“You don’t have to do this.” 

Your hand shook as you held the knife. 

“I have to.” You replied, unable to hold back your sobs. You barely noticed the tears coming out of your eyes - barely able to identify why your vision was blurring, why your face was suddenly wet. 

“You don’t have to.” Reid told you, his voice calming, gentle. “You - you can give me the knife, and then we can just… walk away. And then it all ends.” 

“It won’t just end!” You screamed out, your voice a curtling weep that bounced off the walls. 

If you let Daniel walk away from this, he would come for you again. He would. 

Or he would keep killing other women in your place. And you couldn’t let that happen. 

You couldn’t let your cowardice be the reason that so many women had died. You should have killed him the first time he had ever touched you. You should have been brave enough then. 

“It can end.” Reid assured you calmly. “You just have to come with me. You just have to put the knife down and-” 

It just sounded like noises in your ears at that point. 

Spencer just didn’t understand. 

“I have to make it stop!” You screamed, urgent to make him truly hear you. “I killed those women. I killed them!” 

“Prentiss!” A voice called her name, but it was so distant in your ears. 

“Just give him a minute!” Prentiss fired back. 

“He killed them because of me!” You shouted, cutting him off. “We both know it’s my fault.” 

“It’s not.” Reid choked out. “Please don’t say that.” 

There was a gutting silence. 

“Please, just give me the knife.” 

You couldn’t give up. 

You had come too far to let Daniel win now. 

“It was my fault. I know what happened. If I had just been a good little girl… if I had just laid there and taken it… it’s all my fault.” You quietly wept, your arms still shaking - muscles ripe with hesitation as you struggled with your grip on the knife. “I have to be the one to make it stop.” 

By violence it was done, and by violence it would be undone. 

You could be brave enough this time. You could be the one to end it. 

“No, no you don’t.” Reid told you. “You don’t have to do it alone. We can make it stop together. Just give me the knife. Please.” 

You had been alone your whole life. What was one more thing? 

Just press down. Something in your mind screamed. Slice his throat. End it. 

“Please, just look at me.” Spencer begged, his voice growing more desperate. “Please.” 

You didn’t look up at him. 

You knew that you couldn’t. 

If you took one look at those soft, pitying eyes, then the tiny bit of bravery you had gathered up would crack away. 

“Y/N, please.” Spencer continued. “I know why you think you have to do this. I know that his face is the one that’s been in all your nightmares since that night. I - I know you were all alone then, on the night that happened. You must have felt so alone.” 

You let out another sob at this. 

You had been so alone. 

“But you’re not alone now. You’re not alone now, okay?” 

Spencer’s gentle voice delivering the words made them feel so true. 

“We’re here with you now. I’m here with you. You don’t have to do this alone. You don’t have to fight by yourself anymore. You don’t have to be strong.” 

You heard a crack in his voice for the first time - his own tears. 

It wasn’t pity. 

It was genuine sadness for you, as he thought about what had happened to you. What had happened in this very bedroom all those years ago. 

“Spencer-” You choked out his name, and your body betrayed you. 

You finally collapsed, your hand dropping the knife, and Spencer reached out and grabbed you as you fell, helping to move your shuddering form away from the unconscious, horrible man as the others finally moved in. 

You heard more voices, more shouting - maybe Hotch giving orders. 

But all you felt was Spencer’s arms around you, creating a shield as he rubbed your back and gently hushed you, letting you sob as loudly as you needed to, giving you a kind of comfort that you had never felt on that horrible night. 

… 

Thursday, August 16th, 2007. Madison Police Department, Interrogation Room #1 - Madison, GA. 3:39AM.

The chilled air of the interrogation room only made the regret of it all more palpable in your lungs. 

Maybe Reid had saved you from yourself, or maybe he had caused you to make the biggest mistake of your life. 

You should have killed Daniel. 

You hated it, but you had to wonder what you would have done if you had ten more minutes. Ten more minutes before they had arrived, sirens screeching, lights flashing. Your mind kept replaying the moments over and over again. The knife had felt so perfect in your hand. You should have sliced his throat. 

Ten more minutes. 

The hum of the fluorescents overhead made you feel like a bug about to be zapped - like your entire life was over and you would be resigned to a cage. 

Daniel had been hauled away in an ambulance. He had been entirely unmoving. In ‘critical condition’. They would likely charge you with manslaughter if he didn’t recover - it wasn’t likely that he would. You had overheard Prentiss remark on the irony that he was an organ donor. Because you had beaten him so badly, but not killed him, it was likely that his comatose state would lead to his organs being donated, and saving more lives. 

It could be viewed as a beautiful thing. 

But you had to wonder if the poison he had in his veins was contagious. Should the heart of a killer really live on inside someone else’s body? 

“Let’s start with this,” Reid asked you sharply. “Why?” 

Truthfully, you couldn’t give him that answer. You didn’t think you would ever have enough time to conjure it up within yourself. 

“You’re the genius profiler, Doctor Reid.” You fired back coldly. “You tell me.” 

You let out another puff of your cigarette, and he frowned at you. 

“No.” He said. “No more bullshit. No more games.” 

You definitely were not used to this version of Reid. 

You were surprised that it had taken you almost killing someone to bring out his cold side. But you supposed that everyone had a line. And you had crossed his. 

“Why didn’t you tell us you had been raped?” He asked. “Why didn’t you tell us that the rapist lived in your hometown and was a viable suspect in all of this? Why didn’t you tell us that the letter you received the other morning was just one of many your rapist sent you over the years, stalking you, obsessing over you after-?” 

“Why?” You said, your voice scraping against the word harshly as you tossed it back at him, cutting off his ranting. 

He gave you an impatient expression as it hung in the air - eyes wide, pursing his lips. 

It caused you to flare with anger. 

You let the cigarette burn down to a hot cherry between your fingers, the harsh sting against your skin being the only thing keeping you from lunging across the table and strangling him. 

You stubbed it out in the ashtray before you answered him. 

“Why didn’t I want to suddenly announce to a group of my intellectual peers that I was raped?” You echoed back, more tears gathering in the corners of your eyes - you knew that you must have looked quite crazed, especially when Hotch stiffened, and Reid’s expression dropped. “You know, when I first came to the BAU, it was the only time in my life that I wasn’t viewed as a victim.” 

“Y/N-” Spencer said your name in that gentle tone again, but you weren’t having it this time. 

“My dad left us when I was only a year old. And everybody viewed my Mama as this fucking martyr because she raised me by herself. ‘Oh poor girl. She doesn’t have a daddy. Poor little girl, all alone. Her mama does such a good job.’” You said, ranting in a crazed tone. But the floodgates had opened, and you couldn’t stop it. “Nobody wanted to talk about how my Mama was off half the time, drinking at bars, out partying with friends. She got pregnant at sixteen and she didn't want to stop having a life. God forbid I get in the way of that. I took care of my damn self! I raised myself!” 

You knew you were screaming, but you couldn’t stop it. 

“L/N-” Hotch tried speaking to you in a firmer voice. 

But you couldn’t stop. 

“Daniel only broke into the house that night because he knew I would be alone.” Your voice warbled harshly on the word, and you hated it. 

You hated the look that Reid and Hotch were giving you. 

Pity. 

That look you had been trying to avoid for so long. 

“When I came here that night and made the police report, they all knew I was bullshiting. They knew that it wasn’t a fucking burglary.” You pressed on. “But none of them said anything! They didn’t care.” 

There was a tense moment. You swallowed thickly around your own tears, holding back sobs once again. 

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Spencer tried again, seeming to be personally stuck on this point. “I asked you if something was wrong. Why didn’t you tell me?” 

“That look in your eye.” You told him, entirely honest. “That look you have right now. I - I couldn’t stand the idea of you looking at me like that forever.” 

“Daniel approached you in the parking lot of the corner store.” Hotch stated calmly. “Why did you go with him willingly? Did he have a gun on you?” 

“He had a gun.” You told him. “He did have it pointed at me. But - I didn’t have mine. I didn’t like the odds.” 

Hotch nodded at this. 

“I didn’t want him to take another girl.” You added on. “I knew they were replacements. At that point, I realized what it was. I figured nobody else should have to die because of my mistake.” 

“Mistake?” Spencer echoed back quietly. 

“Not killing him the first time.” You said, knowing this was likely a bit too honest. “I should have killed him the first time he ever put his hands on me. I should have. I wanted him dead.” 

Tears leaked hot from your eyes at this, and Spencer’s eyes grew glassy - he blinked back his own. 

“You wanted him dead, but… did you want to kill him?” Hotch posed. 

“I don’t know.”

...

“That is how heavy a secret can become. It can make blood flow easier than ink.”

-Patrick Rothfuss

...

A/N: This is a oneshot, meant to function as an episode of Criminal Minds, so please respect it as such. Please do not ask for a sequel or a continuation, because there will not be one. If you are going to comment about the work, please comment about the body of what has been written. I highly appreciate reblogs and comments if you enjoyed it, and if you want to see more of what I have written for Criminal Minds, definitely check out my Criminal Minds masterlist.

[snelbz]

Life As We Know It {Chapter Seven}

Summary: After the sudden deaths of Nesta’s sister and Cassian’s best friend, they gain guardianship of their nephew, Nyx.

Based on Life As We Know It (2010) and a prompt sent in by anonymous for our Nessian fanfic contest. This is a modern au.

Instead of doing a tag list for this story, we have decided to have a set posting schedule. Chapters will be posted weekly on Mondays and Thursdays. Chapters will be posted on both my and Tara’s blogs! >> @tacmc.

Life As We Know It Masterlist

Shelby’s Masterlist

Tara’s Masterlist

Nesta was out with Elain, Mor, Emerie, Amren, and Gwen for the night.

She had no idea when she’d be home.

This meant one thing and one thing only.

It was Cassian’s first night alone with Nyx.

It was no different than being home alone with Nyx during the day, which Cassian had been a handful of times thus far. However, Nyx didn’t seem to need as much during the day.

Eat, sleep, play, repeat.

At night, he needed a dinner, a bath, his bottle, to be rocked, to be put down for the night…which was something he never liked doing. A daytime nap? He didn’t mind. Sleeping for nine hours? Apparently that thought just pissed him off.

Nesta was a pro at getting him to sleep for the night. Cassian had offered once to do it and failed miserably.

“Not tonight, little man,” Cassian said to Nyx as they sat at the dinner table together. “Tonight, you’re going to bed the first time for Uncle Cassian.”

Nyx looked at Cassian and giggled.

Cassian scoffed. “Don’t mock me.”

Dinner with Cassian meant Nyx got the good shit. No puréed green beans or mashed carrots tonight. After he’d polished off a small jar of the cinnamon apples, Nyx had eaten nearly half a tube of puréed sweet potato, and Cassian was eating his own food. He took a bite of supreme pizza and pointed at him, before holding up a single finger. “After this, we’re gonna take a bath, and you aren’t going to throw water everywhere or poop in the tub, got it?”

Nyx just banged his little hand on the tray of his high chair, causing more sweet potato to fly onto himself, grinning up at Cassian.

“Then one last bottle before bed, while I read you a story,” he said, holding up a second finger. “I’m sure there will be a diaper change in there somewhere, so please go easy on me, yeah?”

Nyx played in the mess of mixed food in front of him.

“And then you go to bed, so I can watch a movie and pass out myself, and boom. Nesta can’t say anything about my parenting anymore cause I managed to keep you alive for a whole night.”

Nyx blew a raspberry at him before he started babbling.

Cassian took that as agreement.

“Perfect,” Cassian said, ruffling Nyx’s dark hair as he shoved the rest of the pizza into his mouth with his other hand.

He got up to clear his plate, and by the time he went back to Nyx’s high chair, he had managed to make orange streaks in his black hair.

Courtesy of the sweet potatoes.

With a sigh, Cassian took the tray off the high chair and unbuckled Nyx, picking him up and carrying him toward the bath.

“You first, tray second,” Cassian said.

Nyx started patting his little potato covered hands on Cassian’s cheeks, giggling at the sound it made.

Cassian cringed at the way it felt. “Thanks for that.”

He filled the bathtub up, ensuring it wasn’t too hot, like Nesta had shown him, and got Nyx out of his messy clothes and into the tub. After he’d wiped his own face clean of sweet potato, he went to work on Nyx, who had somehow managed to get it on the back of his knees.

Twenty minutes and a full change of wet, soggy clothes later for Cassian, he was sitting in Nyx’s nursery, in the rocking chair in the corner, a book open in his lap.

“This would be a book your parents bought you,” he muttered, opening the front cover. After clearing his throat, he began, “The night sky of Velaris greeted all the townspeople, letting them know it was time to go to bed.” Nyx patted the page and babbled something incoherent. Cassian nodded. “Yeah, it’s a nice picture, isn’t it?” He went on reading the story, written by a local author, no doubt, and Cassian found himself snorting at some of the sentences, but Nyx was fully engaged.

By the time he had finished the book, Nyx was leaning back against him, fully relaxed in his pajamas.

Even Cassian let out a yawn.

“You know, the Velaris starlight was important to your parents,” Cassian said, rocking Nyx back and forth. “They fell in love on Starfall. At least, that’s what Rhys always said. He was in love with your mama long before that, but she started falling for him on Starfall.” Nyx’s dark lashes began to fall, his eyelids drooping. “That’s why they named you Nyx. In Greek, Nyx means night.”

Nyx’s hand gripped Cassian’s thumb. He looked down at the sight and chuckled, quietly.

The baby looked up at him then, with those big, blue eyes, eyes that were so blue, they looked violet in the dark. That dark hair that was starting to need a trim, falling into his eyes. Cassian blinked quickly, trying to keep the sudden tears from spilling over. “You look so much like your dad,” he whispered.

Nyx just continued to watch him, pacifier in his mouth, those eyes getting sleepier with every rock of the chair.

Swallowing harshly, Cass set the book down and resituated Nyx so he was laying against his chest. He gently rubbed his back, the way he saw Nesta do when he would get fussy.

“I miss your dad,” he said, softly. “I know you do, too, you’ve known him your whole life, but—. But so have I. And after twenty-eight years he’s just…gone.”

That dark head snuggled in closer against him, one of his little hands clutching Cassian’s t-shirt.

Cassian said nothing else. If he had, he wouldn’t have gotten them out clearly.

He rocked. He rocked and he rocked and he rocked until Nyx was snoring, softly. As carefully as he could, Cassian rose and laid Nyx down in his crib.

After waiting a moment to make sure he didn’t wake up, Cassian tiptoed out of the room and across the hall to his own bedroom.

He had just laid down and unlocked his phone when he heard crying.

Tossing his phone back on his pillow, Cassian was instantly up, hurrying back across the hall. Nyx’s feet were kicking, his arms waving wildly, perfectly unhappy.

“What’s going on?” Cassian asked, picking the baby up out of the crib and cradling him against his chest. “Huh? You were sleeping so nicely.”

He continued to cry, and no amount of bouncing or patting his back was seeming to work.

“Come on, dude,” he muttered, sitting back down in the rocker. He resumed the slow back and forth motion, praying it would soothe Nyx back into peaceful sleep. “We did the bath. We did the bottle. We did the book. This is when you go to sleep.”

He kept crying and Cassian just shushed him quietly, his hand resuming the gentle rubbing he had done before. It helped, but Nyx still sniffled. “I don’t know what to do,” he admitted. “I don’t know how to do any of this. I’m still scared I’m gonna do something to fuck up and I wouldn’t just be doing it to you, it’d be to Rhys, too.”

Nyx’s wailing returned, and Cassian tried to close his eyes and take deep breaths. It wasn’t working. With everything he tried, Nyx only cried more and more and more.

“Come on, buddy,” he begged. “It’s time for bed, alright? It’s time to calm down.” Nyx let out a cry so loud that Cassian nearly jumped, which only scared Nyx, making him cry louder.

Cassian tried changing his diaper, tried getting him to take his pacifier, but nothing helped. He continued to rock, continued to pat, continued to walk Nyx around his room, but nothing worked.

Nothing.

Defeated, Cassian laid Nyx back down in his crib. “Come on, bud. Come on.”

Nyx kept crying, and Cassian rubbed his temples, trying not to join his nephew in his agony.

“Shhhhhh,” Cassian began, leaning over the crib, patting Nyx’s stomach. “It’s time for bed, Nyx. It’s time for bed. If your parents were here right now, I’m sure you’d already be asleep. Shit, if Nesta were here, you’d already be asleep.” He shook his head. “It’s me, isn’t it?”

The baby replied by continuing to cry.

He swore quietly, and hurried across the hall grabbing his phone, dialing a number he’d unknowingly memorized. She answered on the second ring.

“Is everything okay?”

He couldn’t hear music and laughter in the background of the call, but heard how panicked her voice was. She must have stepped away from her friends. It only made him feel that much worse.

“I can’t get him to stop crying and go to sleep,” he admitted. “I don’t know what else to try.”

“You gave him his bottle?” She asked, and he nodded. Then audibly answered her. After that, she ticked off the checklist of things she usually went through. Every single one he’d already tried.

“It’s like it’s just me,” he said, trying to calm him down while he held the phone to his ear. He scooped him up into his arms and sat down in the rocking chair. “He hates me and won’t go to sleep.”

She was quiet for a minute. “You know that’s not true, Cassian. He loves you.”

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said, quietly, low enough that he wasn’t sure if the receiver could pick it up over Nyx’s wailing.

But it didn’t matter, because he heard footsteps hurrying up the stairs.

When Nesta rounded the corner, she wasn’t expecting to find Cassian looking defeated in the rocking chair. She pretended not to see the tears on his handsome face as she dropped her purse by the door of the nursery and took Nyx. She began to soothe him and tried to give him back his pacifier, but he wouldn’t take it.

“He’s cutting a new tooth,” Nesta said, carefully looking into his mouth, wide open thanks to a drawn out sob. “That’s all. He’s just uncomfortable, isn’t he?”

By the end of the sentence she was looking at Nyx, an over-exaggerated frown on her face.

She handed him back to Cassian and was downstairs and back with cooling, teething toy she’d pulled out of the freezer. He began to chew and gnaw on it the moment she handed it to him.

The crying quieted.

“There,” she said, smoothing his dark hair back from his forehead. “Better, yeah?”

Taking him from Cassian who hadn’t said a word since she walked in, she put him back into his crib and gently rubbed his belly. Within minutes, he was asleep again.

He murmured, “Thanks. You…didn’t have to end your night early for me.” He gestured toward the front door. “You can head back out. I can— I can handle it now.”

She shook her head. “I was on the way home. Turns out I wasn’t really in the going out mood.”

Cassian nodded, and said no more. He simply watched Nyx, his chest rising and falling. Nesta gave him a curt nod and walked out, back into the hall.

Cassian followed, shutting the nursery door quietly behind him.

“You did that so effortlessly.”

Nesta stopped and turned to face him near her bedroom, a brow raised. “Effortlessly?”

“I’ve been struggling for hours and you came in, and less than five minutes… He was out.” Cassian shook his head. “I’ve known him since the day he was born and I had no idea what he wanted.”

“He’s a baby, Cassian. He doesn’t even know what he wanted.”

“You knew,” he said, exasperated, exhausted.

She blinked, not expecting the tone of his voice to have sounded so…empty.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Nesta said, looking at him, willing him to meet her eyes. He didn’t look up.

“It’s not okay,” he said, and suddenly his words were sharp. “Rhys trusted me to take care of him but I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

She shook her head. “They trusted us, but they knew it wouldn’t be easy. We knew it wouldn’t be easy. We just have to take it day by day and-.”

“It’s not okay!” His words weren’t loud but they were panicked. “I have to provide for him and I can’t fucking do it if I don’t know what he needs.”

“Cassian-.”

“Why would they choose me?” He asked, his voice quiet. Tears filled his eyes. He hated himself for it. “I never even wanted kids! I have no idea what to do with a kid, Nesta. I don’t know what parents are supposed to do, what dads are supposed to do, I didn’t even fucking have one.”

Nesta remained quiet, afraid to speak, afraid to move. She had never seen Cassian like this.

She didn’t think anyone had ever seen Cassian like this.

“I don’t know what to do, I don’t know how to do this,” he repeated. “I can’t— I can’t do this.”

She knew her words would mean nothing, reassuring him that he wasn’t alone in this, that they would figure it out together. It wouldn’t help him, wouldn’t ease his mind or his heart. That heart that was still broken from the loss of his best friend, his brother. So she did something she never thought she’d do.

She closed the space between them and wrapped her arms around him.

Cassian didn’t move for a moment, he just let her slim arms wrap around his waist, not realizing that he was on the brink of losing it. He was fairly sure that right now, she was the only thing holding him together, both mentally and physically. But after a long minute, his own arms wrapped around her shoulder and he buried his face into the top of her hair. He didn’t care that his tears were soaking her hair, didn’t care that this was the woman he’d spent the past five years hating and avoiding like she was the damn plague.

He didn’t care that he was falling to pieces.

Standing in that hallway, with Nyx sleeping behind the closed bedroom door, Cassian wept, and he didn’t care who saw it.

[moronic-validity]

First Date (Kinda)- Billy Lenz

Note: Okay so like I patterned Billy’s speech after my own when I’m manic. I know it isn’t perfect to the character, but I wasn’t sure how else to do it...

There are also a lot of time jumps...

Warnings: uhhh interesting parenting choices, interesting life choices, threats of murder....accidental nearly 2k fic. 

The sorority moved out in a hurry after the murders and the school would not allow any students live there. The chances it would happen again were low, but not zero. Putting students back in that house would look bad.

The house went on the market fully furnished and your family got it for a steal, for cheaper than international tuition and four years of on campus housing. Their only rule for the house was that you paid the utilities and for any repairs, other than that, good luck in Canada.

Everything was fine for the first few months, classes went well enough. November came and went, and suddenly it was December. You knew the history of the house so you were a bit gun-shy to put up decorations.

Then the phone calls started.

Pretty piggy this, Billy that, something about your cunt mixed in. You rolled your eyes.

“Hey dude, I know the transcripts are like public info now or whatever, but please get some original content,” and with that, you hung up on him.

The next call was heavy breathing. Your eyes hit the back of your skull and you decided to pant into the phone as a reply before hanging up.

Call three was the one that got your attention. The caller was silent and you were near certain the line went dead.

“I’m going to kill you.”

You blinked a few times, processing the information. It wasn’t the fact he told you he was going to kill you with a level of certainty reserved for phrases like ‘2+2=4’. It was the fact that despite the phone damn near back on the receiver, you heard him loud and clear.

He was in the house.

You cursed yourself up and down for moving into the stupid house. You cursed yourself twice over for not checking all the locks.

You could’ve run, but you had drawn the conclusion that he was close enough to nix that. You also knew he was close enough to hear it if you tried calling the police, and you knew they wouldn’t make it in time anyway.  Instead you calmly picked up the phone and clicked redial then call.

A phone rang upstairs.

Billy wasn’t expecting his phone to ring. He stared at the Nokia in his hand. He called people; people didn’t call him.

Then it stopped ringing.

“Billy?” You asked cautiously, remembering his name from the earlier, expletive filled rant. You took his silence as confirmation, “Billy, I know you’re upstairs.”

Billy shuffled in place. He wasn’t used to this, not at all.

“Hey,” you said, snapping him back to the one-sided confirmation, “it’s colder than a witch’s tit in a brass bra, I have plenty of blankets down here. I’m going to put some of them on the stairs, then I’m going to make myself some adult hot chocolate. If you’re going to kill me, could you wait until I’m drunk?” You hung up the phone and, as you told Billy you would, placed a few thicker blankets on the stairs. You walked into the kitchen and filled a mug with water and popped it in the microwave.

You pulled out your phone and sent a few texts to your parents, wishing them a merry Christmas and letting them know that you regret not spending the money for a plane ticket home. You felt the tears well up. God, these were going to be your final words. Nothing overly profound, just a wish to be back in your childhood home.

The microwave beeped and you wiped the tears out of your eyes. You added the powdered hot chocolate mix and turned around to grab your bottle of vanilla vodka. You were met with a fairly lanky man standing a bit too close for comfort.

The only thing in the situation that brought you peace was that he couldn’t hurt you while his hands were occupied, focused on keeping your grey blanket wrapped around his shoulders.  

You two stared at each other for a moment or two before he broke the silence.

“Want some,” he nodded at the hot chocolate in your hands.

You stared at him a second longer before nodding.

“Want vodka in yours?” You asked. He shook his head no, like a dog trying to dry itself.

You filled a second mug with water and heated it up the same way you did yours. The second you had it in the microwave, you turned back to face the stranger at your table.

“So..” you started, watching him tap his foot, twiddle his thumbs, and periodically twitch, “are you still planning on killing me?”

“No no no, Bibibilly,” he took a deep breath and started over, “No, Billy isn’t goigoing to kill you.” He went back to paying attention to his thumbs.

You nodded slowly, unsure if you believed him or not. The microwave beeped and you took his mug out, quickly mixing him a normal hot chocolate. You pulled some whipped cream from the fridge and sprayed a generous amount onto his drink then placed it on the counter in front of him. You thought about it, decided to forgo the alcohol, and grant yourself a generous amount of whipped cream as well.

You turned back to him after fixing your drink, only to find him gone with your mug.

You knew you probably wouldn’t be sleeping, but for some reason, you also couldn’t bring yourself to call the cops. Your therapist was going to be thera-pissed when/if you told her.

Billy was perched at the top of the stairs, sipping the drink you made him. He wasn’t sure when he decided he wouldn’t kill you, but he wasn’t going to. He adjusted the blanket, your blanket, around his shoulders. He flipped open his phone and called you.

“Yes Billy?” you answered the phone.

He was breathing heavily into the phone, then mumbled a single word. Stairs. Then he hung up the phone.

You walked to the bottom of the stairs and saw where he had set down the now empty mug. You smiled to yourself.

Billy lived in your house for weeks. You only knew he was there when he would call you with single word requests. They ranged from requests for blankets to trying to bargain with you for hot chocolate.

Late January, you decided to set up a bedroom for your ‘roommate’. There were plenty of rooms and you didn’t want him getting sick in the attic and then giving it to you when you two did see each other.

Billy’s phone rang once before he picked it up.

“Come on downstairs,” you told him, not waiting for a response before hanging up.

He padded down the stairs, wearing one of your sweatshirts that you thought went missing out of the wash. He rounded the corner, down one of the hallways filled with rooms. That’s where he saw you, shifting foot to foot, clearly excited about something.

He looked into the room and saw the bed was made, a mug on the dresser, and a pillow -one he recognized from your own bed- laying at the head of this other one.

“It’s for you,” you explained, doing another grand sweeping motion. “I don’t want you sleeping in the attic anymore, it’s too cold up there, you’ll catch your death and give it to me.”  

Billy was frozen in place. He wasn’t sure how to process this one. He looked from the bed to you, then back to the bed, then locked his eyes on you again, trying to read your mind.

You tried to read the look on Billy’s face. He was squinting at you like he was trying to work all of this out. Then he latched onto you, hugging you tighter than was comfortable. You accepted his affection and wrapped your arms around him.

Once he let go, he started rambling through different expletives and went to explore his new room. You leaned against his door frame and watched.  

The rest of January went, Billy proved to actually be a solid roommate, often doing the dishes or sweeping when you were in class.

You came home in a horrible mood February 13th, it wasn’t like you had a partner to celebrate Valentine’s Day with, but it didn’t stop you from being pissed that you would be spending it alone with Netflix.

Whatever, it’s some commercial bullshit holiday to convince people to spend money for no good fucking reason.

As pissed as you were, you were careful not to slam and doors, well aware that it had a tendency to throw Billy into a spiral.

Billy watched you come in and he could feel the frustration radiating off of you.

You flashed him an unconvincing smile, then walked into your room and shut the door.

Billy did not like that one bit. He went into the kitchen and mirrored your motions from the night you two met, making hot chocolate with plenty of whipped cream. He carried the two mugs to your room and knocked on the door with his foot.

You opened the door and the first thing he noticed was that your eyes were red. You had been crying. Billy was always more used to loud and violent anger, but yours was quiet and you did your best to keep it to yourself. You turned around and sat cross-legged at the head of your bed, clutching a pillow.

He set the drinks down on the dresser and sat across from you on your bed, mirroring your position.

“is [y/n] okay?” he asked, probably louder than he meant to.

You sat silently before bursting into tears and rambling all of your problems to him. He sat and listened, fidgeting every few seconds, but that was more than normal for him.

He did his best to pay attention and he understood that it was less about being lonely and more about feeling alone.

He got up off the bed and brought you the drink he made and put the mug into your hands. You stopped talking and took a long drink of the now lukewarm hot chocolate.

He watched you drink intently, tapping the sides of his own mug.

“Thank you” you set the drink down on the cluttered table next to your bed and you leaned against him, resting your head on his hunched shoulder.

[bumblesimagines]

Green Thumb

Part 16

Request: Yes or No

This first half is for you anon! Excuse my inability to write drunk characters lmao

~

"What the hell are you doing?" You blinked, looking up at Tony. You stumbled back slightly, gaze flickering around the room.

"Uhm.." A small snort left you, holding onto the counter and raising the bottle of whiskey.

"This?" You answered, head tilting as you smiled widely. Tony raised his brows, eyeing you with a disapproving gaze.

"So what? You drink now?"

"Clint would know if I- Oh, fuck." You caught yourself before you could fall, a small laugh leaving you. "If I touched his beers."

"Barton's drinking too? What a great influence you have, kid." Tony frowned, shaking his head.

"This isn't my first time." You muttered, huffing softly as your eyes narrowed. Tony raised a brow, taking in a deep breath.

"Could've fooled me."

"Sam was pretty sneaky." You giggled softly, putting the bottle down before you could drop it. You didn't notice the way Tony flinched when you put it down a little too hard.

"Drinking isn't the answer to what you're feeling." Tony called, taking a step towards you. You scowled, shaking your head.

"You're a stupidly lucky bastard, Stark." You muttered, taking a step forward. Your hands quickly caught the island, ice covering the area you touched.

"Okay, kid, let's get you to bed before you set this place on fire." Tony said, reaching out towards you. You scoffed, smacking his hands away.

"Don't touch me, asshole." You snapped, hands heating up and turning the ice to water. Tony didn't want you to have an outburst and make a sinkhole swallow the facility.

"It's been two years. Two years since everyone just.. Poof! Gone! What did you lose, huh? A kid you barely knew? Your pride?" You raised your brows, staring at him. His face was fuzzy and the room was slightly spinning.

"What did you lose? Your parents were already dead, your bestie is alive, your wife is alive, you're expecting a kid! You lost nothing." You sneered, glaring at him with glossy eyes.

"Everyone I love is gone but you get to start a new life with Ms. Pans or whatever her fucking name is. You get to have a family while I have to live without mine.. Clint.. Clint doesn't even come home half the time!" Your brows lowered, body trembling as you tried fighting back tears.

"I think we should talk about something." Tony said softly. You scoffed, rolling your eyes and licking your lips.

"Yeah? What? Gonna tell me I'm immature again?" You asked, letting out a small fake laugh. You looked away from him when tears began to slip down your cheeks.

"Why do I keep losing everyone?" You sobbed, taking in short breaths. Tony's gaze softened, placing a hesitant hand on your shoulder.

"It's not your fault, (Y/N)." He said softly, frowning. Tony had never seen you vulnerable. You were usually snappy and feisty with him.

"I d-didn't try hard enough." You breathed out, a quiet whimper escaping you.

"All of us could've tried harder. All of us wish we did. Don't you think Thor feels the way way you do? He's just angry instead of sad. No clue where he flew off but.." Tony sighed, eyes shutting as he thought of things to say that wouldn't piss you off. You turned and stared at him for a moment before reaching out and grabbing the back of his head, leaning forward. Your lips met his though your mind didn't process that you were kissing a married man with a baby on the way. You pulled away from the stunned billionaire, patting his chest.

"You suck." You whispered, eyes becoming droopy before you collapsed. Tony quickly caught you before you could hit the ground, clearing his throat.

"Hey, F.R.I.D.A.Y? Could you contact Rhodey? I need some assistance." Tony dragged your body towards one of the couches nearby, laying you on your side in case you had to vomit. Tony stared down at you, taking in your flushed, tear stained cheeks. He raised a hand to his lips, gently touching them. He shook his head, looking down at his ring with a heavy sigh.

"What's up, Tony?" Rhodes asked, gaze immediately dropping onto you.

"Could I charge him for underage drinking?" Tony asked, looking at him. Rhodes shook his head, chuckling.

"He turned 23 last month. Sent him a birthday card and a small cactus plant." Rhodes told him, approaching the couch.

"How come I'm never told of his birthdays?"

"Cause he doesn't like you." Rhodes answered simply, grabbing your legs as Tony hooked his arms under your armpits. They got you to your old bedroom in the facility, thought it took them a while. Tony propped up a pillow under your head, placing a trash can beside the bed.

"What would a kid like him want on their birthday?" Tony asked, looking at Rhodes as he put his hands on his hips.

"His boyfriend back." Rhodes muttered. Tony blinked, turning his head to look at him with wide eyes.

"Boyfriend?"

"Yeah, Barnes. I found out when we went to Wakanda. They were all over each other. Never thought he'd have a thing for older guys but.. I gotta admit, Barnes is an attractive dude." Rhodes shrugged, gently bringing the covere up over your shoulders. He gently rubbed your shoulder, sighing.

"He's a good kid. I guess I gotta lock up whenever he comes over. I'm surprised he even still bothers being here. Thor's nowhere to be found, you're barely even here.. God knows where Clint is. He hasn't visited yet."

"I'm gonna retire." Tony announced, looking at Rhodes. Rhodes raised his brows, looking at him.

"I wanna give Morgan a good life. One where she sees her father every day." Tony explained. They both turned to you when they heard you groan and gag, throwing up into the trash can and almost falling off the bed.

"I'll go get him a water bottle and painkillers." Rhodes mumbled, turning around and leaving the room. Tony nodded, licking his lipd and sighing softly.

"Are you just gonna stand there?" You asked in hoarse voice, slowly getting up. You sluggishly walked towards the bathroom, washing your mouth.

"I wouldn't bother. You're probably gonna throw up-" Tony cringed, hearing you throw the toilet seat up and vomit again. Rhodes entered the room, placing the pill bottle down and glancing into the bathroom.

"Should I contact Clint?" Rhodes asked, looking at Tony.

"He can come here when he realizes his son isn't home." Tony replied, glancing at Rhodes before turning around and leaving the room. Rhodes nodded, walking towards the bathroom and placing a hand on the doorway.

"Need help?" He asked, head tilting. You shook your head, grabbing toilet paper and using it to blow your nose. Rhodes hummed, leaving the room as well. You pushed yourself off the floor, walking to the sink and washing your mouth again. Your throat burned and you could taste what you had for dinner. With a heavy sigh, you approached the bed, collapsing onto it. Your arms wrapped around one of the pillows, nuzzling into it. You turned your head when someone entered the room.

"Read this when you have a clear head." Tony said quietly, placing a file on the nightstand. You furrowed your brows, a frown tugging at your lips. You were tempted to look at the file but your body desperately needed sleep.

The next morning, you woke up with a raging headache. Your mind and body were still tired but you weren't sure if what you needed was sleep or actual therapy. You noticed the trash can you had thrown up in was gone as you pulled your legs over the edge of the bed. The yellow file caught your eye again. You sighed, deciding to use the bathroom before anything else. You picked up the pill bottle, taking two tablets and pushing them down with some water. You licked your lips, putting the water bottle down and taking a seat on the bed. You picked up the file, placing it on your lap. You stared at the writing on the front in sharpie.

(Y/N) BARTON

"Is this.. My file?" You blinked, flipping it open and seeing your picture in the top right corner followed by your information.

"Why would I need this?" You flipped to the next page, seeing a picture of an unknown woman.

Florine De Meyers (Could be a false name) is believed to be (Y/N) Bartons' aunt from his fathers side.

Your mouth went dry as you reread the sentence over and over again. After almost six to seven years with the Avengers, you had never been told about your family. It was always your parents being unknown yet here was a piece of information stating you had a relative. You closed the file, standing up and leaving the room. You made your way to Tonys' office, tossing the file on his desk. Tony looked up from the box in his hands, glancing between you and the file.

"What the hell is this?" You questioned, arms crossing. Tony carefully placed the box down, clearing his throat.

"Your file."

"Yeah, I know that, dipshit." You sneered, earning a pointed look from him. Tony sighed, picking the file up and going to the second page.

"You-"

"Shut up and sit down." Tony ordered. You glared at him, sitting down on one of the chairs.

"Florine De Meyers is a 47 year old woman from Lasne, Belgium. It's unknown if Florine De Meyers is her real name since not much is known about her. It's stated that she had a brother but no information came up about him. We, well more like F.R.I.D.A.Y, went through your blood test and searched for any relatives. She's the closest living relative you have." Tony said, putting the file down. Your leg bounced as you tried to stay calm, taking in soft deep breaths.

"So, all this time I could've been learning about my family? Why didn't you tell me sooner?! She might've been snapped away too!"

"Quite frankly, you seemed happy with Barton and his family. Plus, I forgot about it while trying to save the world a few times." Tony answered, picking up trophies and medals, putting them in the box.

"Does Clint know?" You asked softly.

"Nope. Romanoff doesn't know, Banner doesn't know, Thor doesn't know, Rogers... Well, as far as I know, he's unaware but he very well could." Tony shrugged, closed the box and taping it.

"She lives in Belgium?"

"That's what I said. Though, you might not be from Belgium. We think she's your fathers half sister. So, your father and her share a parent. It's why we had some difficulty finding anyone. Your parents made sure nobody could make any connections. Whether it was protect you or to protect themselves, we'll never know. Florine might know though. F.R.I.D.A.Y, what's the most recent security footage of Florine De Meyers?"

"Florine De Meyers was seen in a supermarket last thursday." F.R.I.D.A.Y answered, making a picture of a security footage appear. You stared at the picture, sighing softly.

"Where's Nat?" You asked.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y?"

"Contacting Agent Romanoff." You stood up, pulling the file towards yourself and looking down at the picture as Tony spoke with Natasha. Florine seemed to have a permanet frown on her face, eyes hard and icy.

"Romanoff is on her way. She can accompany you to Lanse." Tony said, watching you with a small frown.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner." You looked up at him in surprise. Tony was never one for apologies.

"I thought that if.. Your parents wanted to desperately protect you, I should respect their wishes and do the same. You're a big boy now. It's up to you to decide what you want to do now." Tony said, placing the box down and looking at you with a gentle gaze. You swallowed, nodding as you rubbed your arm.

"Uhm... I'm sorry for being a dick and insulting you." You apologized as well, choosing to ease the tension between you and Tony.

"What's up?" You turned to look at Natasha, picking up the file and closing it.

"I need a ride to Belgium."