#emetophobia warning for this next tag

[orbch]

“i love to project my chronic illnesses onto characters i like” i say, immediately after suffering due to my chronic illnesses

anyways logan has chronic migraines that causes extreme nausea yayyy

[myosotisa]

Chasm - e.m.

Eddie Munson x fem!Reader

‖  summary: You're a researcher working at one of the fault lines throughout Hawkins, studying the closed and dormant gates to an alternate dimension. While you're alone on site, one of the gates wakes up again.

‖  tags: horror. i cannot stress this enough. this is unsettling and creepy and angsty with slight sexual tension. in line with the content in the show. post season 4, canon compliant. emetophobia warning. dubcon kissing. forced consumption (writing it made me gag just warning you. but im also kind of a baby so). no y/n, she/her pronouns used. flayed!eddie infects you. open ended ending. also steve is there sometimes. there's a ton of background lore that is only vaguely explained lol

‖  word count: 8.3k ‖  read on AO3 ‖  the song ‖

None of the rifts have shown any activity in over a year. Months and months of dead readings and no signals. Just waiting.

So what's a girl supposed to do when your EMF meter spikes alone on site? Sit around and wait for a crew to suit up and march their way over to the fault you were at? No fucking way. No chance.

You report in about the sudden spike in gamma radiation and tell them you're going to find the source. The project lead tells you to stay put and wait for assistance, as expected.

Your radiation gear was already halfway on. Oops, sorry boss, didn't hear you.

Handheld voltage meter in one hand, audio recorder in the other, and a pocket full of glow sticks, you push out past the plastic tarps and into the humid night air of Indiana summer.

The readings bring you west, toward the condemned trailer park and the "start" of your fault line. You crack a glow stick and drop it every few feet, marking your path. When the reading jumps up, you make a '+' sign with two at the spot before continuing forward. It was hard to say without exact measurements, but it seemed to be increasing at equal intervals. Like frozen waves on the surface of water.

"I'm approaching the Forest Hills sign," you say into the receiver, your own voice the only sound in the night air. "Current readings are…" You bring the meter up, using the light hanging from your neck to read the display. "Approaching 70 mv/m of high frequency radiation, roughly 31016 Hz. The next… 'Layer', for lack of a better term, will most likely breach Safe EMF levels, not considering the potential protection of the suit."

Lowering the meter again when it gives a beep of warning, you tuck it under your arm and crack another glow stick, leaving a '+' at the boundary to the trailer park. "I'll probably need treatment when I get back to base – as long as I grab a reading from the source and get out quickly, there won't be lasting damage. You hear that, Dr. Pierce?" You say through an over-confident huff, readjusting your arms to keep moving forward. "I'm well aware of the risks and take responsibility for my own actions."

The park itself looks like a bad dream at night – trailers abandoned hastily with doors still hung open and belongings scattered along the ground. Between the sudden fault opening and the bureau rushing in, the existing residents had been given very little time and grace to move into temporary housing across town. And it looked every bit like an entire community of people had just up and disappeared.

The suit you were in didn’t exactly help coordination, so you moved slowly and carefully over and around discarded objects along the dirt. Clothing, kitchen utensils, a quilt, a stack of newspapers, a child's toy. All left untouched for over a year.

Clearing the corner of one of the empty trailers, you catch sight of something strange.

“The fault itself has looked normal up to this point, no activity. But I can see the source now. It’s… It appears to be glowing red, fading in and out in a constant cycle.” Approaching even slower than before, you watch intently as the glow grows and then retreats again. Like waves on the shore.

The meter gives another shrill alarm – making you jump nearly out of your skin as you swat at it with the recorder. “Jesus Christ!” It quiets with a sinking pitch in your hand. 

Before checking the reading, you quickly make another ‘+’ with glow sticks, digging them into the dirt a bit in an attempt to keep them from moving. Still down on one knee, you bring the meter up to your flashlight again.

“The meter is now reading 110 mv/m, same frequency. I’m roughly… 12 feet out from the source now. There’s a, uh, humming sound. Not sure if the recording is picking it up. And feeling pressure on my eardrums,” you explain into the device, eyes locked on the glow ahead. “I’ll continue to approach – see if I can get a closer reading. If it jumps above 150, I’ll fall back.”

Pushing to your feet again with a huff, you readjust your full load and press forward slowly. The closer you get to the source, you can see that the fault rapidly grows in size. The space between the edges looks large enough to fit a car as it rounds out at the end – a red pond in the ground.

“I can see the source clearer now. The glow is coming from within – there’s a…" You take a few steps closer, squinting to get a better look. "It appears to be an opaque membrane covering the space between. The glow is coming from behind it. Still cycling at an even rate, no change.”

The meter in your hand gives its shrillest warning yet, scaring you badly enough that it goes flying out of your hand; it hits the ground and flips closer to the edge. “Shit, fuck!”

You shuffle forward and drop down onto your shaky knees, grabbing for the meter as it continues to let out that grating alarm into the night air. Smacking it once more, the sound cuts off abruptly, giving you a chance to breathe.

Bringing it up to your flashlight, your eyes go wide as you lift the recorder again with your other trembling hand. “I’m nearly at the edge now, only a foot or so away  – EMF reading 187 mv/m. Rapid increase from the last point.”

Movement in your peripheral vision catches your attention, your head snapping toward it.

“There’s… What the fuck?" You pause, tempted to rub your eyes to make sure you're really seeing what you're seeing.

"There’s movement below the membrane. It… It’s just a shadow, I can’t tell what it is, but the movement is rapid and the… The humming is getting louder.” Your heart is pounding now, a cold sweat breaking out across your skin beneath the suit. 

“Going to retreat back to base,” you say, mostly attempting to reassure yourself as you slowly back away from the edge. “Final reading was 189 mv/m at 31016 Hz.”

There’s a crackle of static right before a thumb presses the pause button roughly, silencing the recorder in the center of the table.

“Is that all?” General Richard Highland asks, sounding impatient as he leans back in his conference chair. “That doesn’t tell us anything about what happened to her.”

“No, sir, there’s more.” Private Steve Harrington insists, inclining his head toward the dirty recorder he had delivered. He’s standing by the edge of the table at attention, hands clasped in front of him.  “The recording keeps going.”

Dr. Pierce leans forward from his seat, giving the General a stiff look as he presses the play button again.

There’s a few more moments of static before the woman’s voice fades back in, layered beneath the hum of attempted interference.

“I’m definitely gonna need that rad treatment, Dr. Pierce. My badge is that warning color, even beneath the suit,” she continues with a shaky laugh, the sound of plastic shuffling behind it. “Hopefully I don’t lose my hair or something, but that’s… What?” 

The table of scientists and military personnel sits in tense silence as her voice cuts out again. Half of them are on the edge of their seats, the others showing off a measured calm or disinterest. The general looks particularly annoyed and impatient, while Dr. Pierce looks almost like he wants to throw up.

“There’s… Something’s happening – I don’t–” 

An abrasive crackle echoes out into the room, loud enough to send nearly everyone into a wince, before the recording cuts back in with the sound of screaming. 

“WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT THING?! SHIT – I’ve gotta get–" A burst of interference sounds, followed by a metallic grating, like a ship groaning beneath the weight of the ocean.

Her panicked voice comes through, sounding further away than before. "FUCK! It – It’s got my ankle. Let go, you fucking piece of –! SHI–”

The recording cuts out to a buzzing hum.

No one moves for a few moments. Not until Private Harrington steps up to silence the recorder. “We found this recording, a lab issue EMF meter, and a broken flashlight at the edge of the fault." He explains, producing the other two items from the pack resting at his feet. "It was dormant when we got there – solid again.”

“So it just…” One of the other scientists starts, looking at Dr. Pierce uneasily.

“Dragged her through and went back to sleep.” Dr. Pierce confirms solemnly, his gaze locked on the dirty recorder.

“It’s never done this before?” A 2nd scientist, new to the project, asks. The others shake their heads. “So what do we do?”

All eyes turn to Dr. Pierce, who looks like he’s seen a ghost.

“We wait for it to wake up again.”

Wake up.

Come on, little lamb.

Wake up now.

Looks so peaceful.

But you’ve got to wake up.

…

WAKE UP.

There’s something wet on your face.

Feeling is slowly returning to your body, your eyes closed and too heavy to open. But there’s something dripping on your cheek – droplets running down toward your mouth. Sticking to your dry lips for a moment or two before falling off. You’re on the ground on your stomach, your cheek squished against something that feels like mud.

Your brain has yet to kick on fully as it tries to regain consciousness through a pounding ache, resonating with the throb of your left leg. It feels like you’re still wearing the rad suit, but the head piece is gone and it might be ripped in places – mud seeping in to touch your skin.

It’s almost like you’re sinking.

Eyelids fluttering open and you’re faced with a desaturated swamp. Like someone came through and sucked half the color out of it.

Lifting one arm is difficult, suctioned into the mud you’re laying in. Once you’ve freed it enough, you’re able to push off the sticky, wet sludge beneath you enough to roll over onto your back.

“Sucks, doesn’t it?”

You sit up with a start, your abdomen screaming in protest as your brain swims. Blinking through the blur in your eyes, you struggle to see anything at all in the dark – only momentarily granted sight by the flashes of red lightning overhead.

“Who’s there?” You call out into the dark, an attempt to sound brave, but your voice trembles as your eyes rapidly flit back and forth.

“Over here.”

The lightning flashes once more as you whip your head toward the voice – showing the silhouette of a man standing a few feet away. From what little you see, he’s tall and slender, head tilted to the side like he’s curious. There’s no chance you can see his face or anything else about him.

Until he’s in your face, crouched down right beside you – crossing the space and appearing in the span of a blink. It gives you a start, attempting to back up but getting caught up in the mud still suctioned to your lower half.

Your fear seems to bring a small smile to his face, plump lips tilting up at the corner. He looks so familiar… Long curly hair draped wetly over his shoulders, the sparse bangs across his forehead, and the soft turn of his nose. Curiosity gets the better of you as you lean in again slightly, squinting your eyes a bit more in the dark to see him better.

“I know you…” You insist softly, causing his eyebrows to raise slightly in surprise. “How do I know you?”

“No clue, because I’ve never met you in my life.” He replies, lips parting in a grin. “And I’m good with faces – ‘specially pretty ones.”

His response catches you off guard as your brain continues reeling and struggling to intake information, which is normally your forte. There’s a million questions on the tip of your tongue and you have no idea where to start.

“You’ll probably need to lose the suit if you want to get out of that shit,” he continues when you don’t respond, motioning to your stationary legs with a wave of his hand. And he’s probably right, with the way the mud beneath you is stuck tight to the shiny plastic. Your best hope is to try to use the suit as a stepping off point to get to stable ground.

“Where should I step once I pull out?” You ask, hoping he’ll understand your goal.

A blink and he’s gone again – another flash of red light placing his silhouette off to your left. “Think you can make it to here?” He responds, voice raised slightly and sounding like he’s teasing you or challenging you. It makes your competitive side flare up on instinct – a frustrated huff leaving your nose as you plan your escape.

Opening the front of the suit, you slip both arms out and let the upper half fall flat behind you. Pulling out both of your legs next, your butt sinks deeper into the ground, nearly sending you off balance as you quickly shift your weight forward onto your knees, using the suit as a stepping stone. It starts to sink, mud coming up over the edge and inching toward your knees, so you have to move fast.

Pushing to your feet makes it sink faster, wet sludge touching the side of your ankle just as you push off in a jump toward where the man was standing.

You land on the ankle that had been grasped by the tentacle, not realizing the throbbing meant it’d been twisted. It makes you cry out in pain and fall forward, directly into the man’s chest.

“Woah there!” He says in surprise, grasping onto your elbows to keep you sort of upright. Between the aching pain and the tears pressing at your eyes, you just barely manage to notice how cold and clammy he is – especially where his hands grip your bare biceps.

Rocketing back, you press your weight onto your good leg and put some distance between the two of you again, your dirty arms crossing over your tank top and smearing it with mud. “Sorry, my, uh, ankle…” You offer awkwardly, still not even sure who you’re talking to.

“Don’t worry about it, angel. You good?”

He actually sounds like he cares. Like he’s concerned for you. Who is he? 

“I’ll be fine,” you insist stubbornly, swallowing down the lump of tears in your throat. Free from your precarious situation, at least partially, you struggle to figure out what to address first. “How are you doing that? Like… Teleporting? Or are you just moving really fast?”

He chuckles softly, shaking his head. “What–,” he disappears in a blink and then you feel a burst of air on the back of your neck, making your hair stand on end, “this?”

You lurch forward before turning around to level him a glare. “Yes, that – don’t do that.”

His hands tuck into the front pockets of the leather jacket he’s wearing as he shrugs, looking quite pleased with himself. “Sorry, angel, didn’t mean to spook you.”

Then silence falls, both of you eyeing each other – you suspiciously and him curiously. The extended pause makes you think you aren’t going to be told how anytime soon.

A breeze kicks up, rustling the branches of the trees in the surrounding swampland and sending a shiver down your spine. Suit lost, you’re down to a tank top, jeans, and a pair of no slip shoes (which were required for people working in the field for some reason). You were dressed for the humid interior of the field site tent in summer and it appears that you have landed yourself in a place where that is not enough.

Taking advantage of the silence, you try to remember everything you can about your studies into the ‘gates’ from when they were open. Very little was known beside second hand accounts and old data – some of which may not even be accurate anymore given the nature of the fault lines. If there was anywhere to start, it would be trying to find the gate you’d been dragged through.

With any luck, you could go right back to your dimension.

But that didn’t account for him. The pale, wet, unsettling-yet-somehow-charming guy that was still staring right at you.

“How long have you been here? Do you know?” You question cautiously, not wanting to upset him in any way.

“That depends, what year is it?”

Your heart drops into your stomach, completely at odds with the continued grin on his face. It looks almost manic now – like every time he sets you off balance brings him great joy. Deciding you’d actually rather not know how long he’s been in here, you move on.

“Have you been alone this whole time? Or are there other people here?”

His grin spreads, like he’s in on a joke you’re not aware of. “I haven’t been alone, no.”

This piques your curiosity again, adjusting your weight on your good leg. “Do you have a community here? How many of you are there?”

“Why don’t you see for yourself?” He suggests, taking a step or two away from you, his hands still tucked into his pockets.

The idea is tempting, if only to learn more about what is going on here, but there’s something nagging at the back of your mind. Something you should be remembering. Something you’re missing. Plus, for all you know, this man does not have your best interests at heart.

“I should probably try to find the gate that brought me here,” you say, slightly regretfully. “See if I can cross back over.”

“Oh, right,” he responds, tapping his forehead with his palm like it should’ve been obvious. “Yeah, I can show you the way.”

This surprises you again, slight concern causing you to stand up straighter. “You can?”

“Sure thing, the closest one isn’t far,” he motions behind him with a tilt of his chin, taking another step back. “Come on.”

So you follow the strange man into the dark, limping after him on your twisted ankle. The mud starts to dry on your skin, hair, and clothing – crusting over and hardening in places. You pick at pieces as you walk, letting the chunks and flakes fall to the ground behind you. From what little you can see, there are vines everywhere along the ground, weaving between tree trunks and layering over each other in place. The man seems to step over them – and you can’t tell if it’s on purpose or a coincidence – but you make a habit of not touching the vines just in case.

It’s unsettlingly quiet here. Every once in a while you’ll hear what sounds like an animal – a howl, a chittering, the thump of feet on the earth. But they are few and far between, leaving mostly just the rush of wind through the trees and a sort of muffled silence, pressure on your ears.

Your paranoia kicks up as the quiet continues, suspiciously eyeing the back of your escort as he leads you forward. For all you knew, he wasn’t leading you anywhere near the gate. You have no reason to trust him beyond the fact that he helped you get out of the sludge you woke up in. He was in this dimension after all, clearly familiar with it. That had to be a red flag if anything, given what little you actually knew about it.

So much was classified beyond your reach – the bureau was very specific with what you were allowed to read and know and what you weren’t. Given the dormant nature of the fault lines, it hadn’t been necessary for you to learn too much about the dimension on the other side. Most of what you studied and knew was about the gates themselves.

Even with the bureau being as paranoid and obsessive as it was – a lowly field researcher getting dragged to the other side and needing to survive hadn’t seemed to be on their radar.

The pessimistic part of you not-so-helpfully supplies that was probably just because they weren't very interested in your survival at all. They’d probably prefer it if you died here. If anything, your exposure to the other side made you more of a liability.

Maybe one they could experiment on, if you got lucky and survived.

This train of thinking isn’t helping anything. You could worry about what your life would become if you made it out.

Walking up to the lifeless and solid gate turns that into a very tentative if.

“Looks like the door’s shut tight,” Eddie offers vaguely, rocking back and forth on his heels as you circle the hole in the ground, like seeing a new angle will change something about it.

The opening looks largely the same as the other side, in the center of the abandoned trailer park with the forest surrounding. Your arms are covered in goosebumps as the breeze hits harder in the open field, no longer buffered by trees on all sides. On the bright side, it is slightly better lit here and you can see your companion a bit clearer now.

“Do you know how these things work? Like how and why it opens and shuts?” You ask desperately, looking at him from the other side of the crevice.

The corner of his mouth tilts up minutely, his shoulders shrugging. “Yes and no.”

The scowl returns to your face, frustration mounting as another shiver of cold racks your body. “Are you intentionally being unhelpful? Or are you just an idiot?”

His lips part in a surprised ‘o’, his eyebrows raising like he’s impressed. “That hurts, angel. I’m no idiot, and I think I’ve been plenty helpful. After all… I could’ve just left you to drown out there. Or maybe led you into a trap. Or left you for the dogs.” He taunts, returning to a toothy grin. The question of if he has your well being in mind gets more and more clear with a resounding no.

A fearful jolt runs down your spine as you stare him down, trying not to let your fear show. Grappling tightly to your anger, you taunt back, “Oh yeah? Then why didn’t you?”

A blink and he’s gone.

Your entire body goes on alert, tensing for attack as your heart starts to pound against your ribs. Eyes searching the immediate area in front of you come up empty. He’s either behind you or far enough you can’t see him in the low light. You never got an answer as to whether he’s moving quickly or teleporting or exactly how far he can get in the time you blinked.

He’s either long gone or… Trying to surprise you.

As soon as you have the thought, the hair on the back of your neck stands up – like some kind of unconscious sense of danger.

You turn in a quick 180 and he’s right there. Only a foot away from you with a sadistic sort of smile on his face. Your breath catches in your chest as it feels like a fist grabs tightly to your heart, suddenly much more terrified of the man in front of you.

That appears to be the way he prefers it.

“I think we can help each other.”

You blink at him, muscles pulled taut and ready to bolt as you try to figure out what the fuck he’s doing and what the fuck he wants. “What?” You question, your voice coming out a bit breathy and scared.

“I said, I think we can help each other,” he repeats calmly. “You help me, and I can help you get back home.”

“Why– What– H–how could I possibly help you?” You sputter, trying not to sound as terrified and confused as you feel.

His grin turns cheeky again, slightly less unsettling than it was a moment ago. “It won’t take much, angel, scout’s honor.” He says as he lays a hand over his chest. “You help me, then you’re free to crawl right back over to the other side and continue your life.”

Disbelief and uncertainty nags at you as you fidget in your spot, wanting desperately to put some more distance between the two of you but nervous to offend him. “So you can open the gate? You just want something in return?”

He shakes his head emphatically, appearing to be genuine in his denial. “I can’t but I know who can. They opened it before you were brought over.”

“And they would open it again? Just because you asked?” You question suspiciously, studying his facial expression for a sign that he’s pulling your leg again.

“Let’s just say that me and them have similar goals and leave it at that.”

There are 100 more questions on the tip of your tongue, but with the potential of getting back to your own dimension on the table, you’re reluctant to press too hard. He seems to recognize the battle you’re fighting with yourself as he laughs to himself. “You know what they say about curiosity, angel.”

An annoyed exhale punches out of your nose. “And I assume in this case that I’m the cat.”

“Bingo!” He says happily, tapping the end of his nose with his index finger. “So what do you say?”

There is so much you want to say. So many questions you want to ask. So much more info you need. But beggars can’t be choosers, you suppose.

“What would I need to do?”

His smile goes sharp again. “So glad you asked. I’d just need a kiss.”

A beat of silence. Then your expression drops in disbelief and disappointment. “Please tell me you’re joking.”

“Dead serious,” he insists, laying his hand on his chest again as he regards you intently. “And it’s gotta be real – gotta kiss me like you mean it. None of those little pecks you give on the cheek.”

A strange swirl of intrigue and revulsion mixes together in your gut as you continue waiting for the punchline. The ‘just kidding, your face was priceless’. But it doesn’t come.

“Is this some kind of sick joke? Been so lonely out here that you have to twist the arm of a desperate girl just to get some–”

“Hey.” He interrupts, his tone intense and cold. It shuts you up immediately, though you can’t say why. “Don’t be mean, angel. This isn’t just me trying to take advantage of you. It has a real purpose.”

The dubious look you give him makes him crack another small smile. “Cross my heart and hope to die, I’m telling you the truth.”

“And am I allowed to know what this purpose is?”

He shakes his head again, displacing the curls draped over his shoulders that still appear to have not dried at all. “I’ll tell you when it’s done, how about that?” He offers, using your curiosity against you to try to sweeten the deal.

Really, it’s a no brainer. Sure, he’s a strange person that lives in an alternate dimension that has some strange abilities. Sure, you know next to nothing about him despite that itch in the back of your head telling you that you know him somehow. And sure, this could be a huge mistake. But having to kiss this admittedly-attractive dude just to get out of this nightmare dimension and get back home? The choice is simple.

Which only makes you more certain there’s a catch you aren’t seeing.

“Fine. If you swear I’ll be able to go home, then I’ll do it.”

His expression brightens excitedly, a sort of childlike joy appearing on his face. It’s different from any of the expressions you’ve seen on him so far – like genuine surprise. “You will?”

“Yeah, sure.” You reply, trying to brush it off as nothing. “Not like I have a lot of other options here.”

His excitement fades slightly, though he still looks pleased with the outcome. “Glad you made the right decision.”

An unsettling silence falls as the two of you study each other once more, now much closer than the last time. Fear and anticipation builds steadily as you find yourself glancing down at his lips – realizing you’re about to know what they feel like on your own.

“Do we, uh,” you pause to clear your throat as you awkwardly break the silence. “Do we do it now? Or… What?”

He takes a step closer, entering your personal space. His voice is lower, stickier, and richer when he responds. “Do you wanna do it now, angel?”

You suddenly feel like a fly stuck in a honey trap – eyes widening as you struggle between wanting to further close the distance and to run away from him. “Now’s as good a time as any, I suppose?” Though you meant it to be nonchalant, it comes out as a nervous question.

The uncertainty in your voice only seems to make the man crack another amused smile. “I suppose so,” he replies softly, gently teasing you as he gets even just a little bit closer. You can feel your heart pounding in your neck, constantly flipping back and forth between fear, interest, nerves, and embarrassment. Looking at you through slightly lowered eyelids, he leans in toward you. Close enough you can feel the exhale of his breath on your face.

“Kiss me like you mean it, angel.” He reminds you quietly, the tip of his nose nudging against yours as your eyelids flutter closed instinctively. “Don’t forget.”

Then his lips are pressing to yours. You make a small noise of surprise, both in that you weren’t sure if he was actually going to do it and because he’s so cold. But his lips are plush and soft as he places your lower lip between his own. As promised, you kiss him back, trying not to think about how strange it feels that he’s cold and the situation you’re in – focusing on the gentle pressure of him as he steps even closer and brings his hand up to cradle your jaw.

It’s gentle and sweet as you find yourself starting to forget the reality of it all. Your hands find the edges of his leather jacket, tugging him closer as he hums happily. His other hand finds your waist – cold through the thin fabric of your tank top.

Teeth nip lightly at your lower lip and you make another small noise of surprise, a flash of heat through your chest at the pleasant feeling. It distracts you further – not even questioning the adventurous flick of his tongue against your mouth. You part your lips on instinct; his hand flexing happily against your jaw as he tests the waters to run his tongue along yours.

You return the gesture, encouraging the touch as you breathe heavily through your nose. You’re running low on air and will need to part to breathe soon. You’re surprised to find that you aren’t really sure that you want to stop to do so.

He seems to recognize the impending need too; his lips pressing against yours more insistently, like he’s getting what he can before it ends. His tongue ventures past your lips one more time, pressing further than he had before. Is… Is his tongue longer than normal?

In the same moment that he pulls away from you, the hand on your jaw claps over your mouth to keep it shut. And there’s something in your mouth.

There’s something moving in your mouth.

You make a high pitched noise of panic as your eyes double in size, looking at him in terror while he holds you tightly to his front and keeps his hand firmly over your mouth. “Ah, ah, angel. You gotta swallow it.” He coos, his palm clammy and cold against your slick lips.

You shake your head as well as you can with his grip, making noises of protest as you struggle to keep the smooth, wiggling object from sliding down your throat. Your hands grab at his wrist and forearm, trying to pull him off, but his grip is too strong. Begging him with your eyes, sharp and stuttered breaths coming out of your nose as you hyperventilate, he just gives you a sad smile. “It’s not that bad, I promise. Just gotta swallow and it’ll be over – don’t make me plug your nose.”

Painful tears poke out of your eyes and start to descend down your cheeks, nails digging into his skin to try and get him off. It seems not to affect him at all, his other hand giving your waist a reassuring squeeze. “It’s okay, baby. It’s gonna be okay. This is it – you won’t have to do anything else. Come on, angel. You can do it. Just swallow for me.”

His words of encouragement make your head spin in confusion, panic mounting as the outcome seems inevitable. More tears pour down your cheeks as you choke on a sob, inadvertently allowing the object to slide down your throat. 

“There we go,” he sighs in relief, grip on your face loosening, “Good girl.”

Somehow he knew that you’d swallowed it because he releases you right as you start to cough roughly, stumbling away from him and bending forward. You can still feel the strange coating from the creature on your tongue and down your esophagus – thick and wrong as you cough and gag.

Get it out, get it out, get it out, GET IT OUT, GET IT OUT!!

“What was– How do I– I’ve gotta–” You stammer, stumbling over your words as you tremble wildly and gag, your body responding to your panic by wanting to reject the new contents of your stomach.

He appears right beside you again, gripping both of your wrists with his hands as he forces you upright. “Don’t throw it up.” His voice is a command, his expression intense. “If you throw it up, I’ll have to force feed you another one. And trust me, it’s way less fun the 2nd time.”

Tears continue to pour from your eyes as you rapidly shake your head. “What was– What is– Why are you doing this? What was that thing?”

“Calm down, angel, please calm down,” he begs, starting to look distressed himself. “It’s gonna be okay, I swear, it’s gonna be fine. You’re a part of something bigger now. It’s all going to be okay.”

You try to pull out of his grip on your wrists, alternating between yanking back and rushing forward to push him away. “What the fuck does that mean?! What have you done to me?!” You shout through your tears, white hot panic spreading through your body. “It’s not too late – I can still, I can still throw it up, I can…”

He drags you in, wrapping you up in a tight bear hug with your arms trapped between the two of you. He shushes you, standing steady against your weakening struggling against him. “Shhh, shh, it’s alright, angel. It’s okay. You’re gonna get to go home, okay? We’re gonna get to go home.”

“Sir, we’ve got activity.”

Dr. Pierce pushes out of his desk chair fast enough to make his head spin – lack of sleep and too much coffee weakening him beyond measure. He’s barely left the main building since you went missing.

Since you were dragged through.

There have been constant patrols of the fault line you disappeared into, hoping for any sign of it waking up again. It was on his order and against the wishes of General Highland. She’s a level 1 researcher. She knew the risks. It’s not worth the cost.

But you didn’t know the risks, not really. Pierce knows he didn’t do enough to prepare you, to warn you. He didn’t do enough to protect you.

This is his fault.

He’s not the only one buzzing with anticipation as he exits his darkened office; several other scientists and field agents are reacting to the news of activity with a rush. Not everyone will be allowed to go to the site, as it would be a madhouse, but several live cameras and other surveillance equipment have been set up in the area. At least a quarter of the bureau across the country will be intently watching whatever happens next.

Pierce says nothing as he makes his way for the garage and the people he passes know better than to approach him now. He can still feel their eyes – judgemental, curious, concerned. He’s felt their eyes for days.

There are several SUVs already prepared by the time he arrives, most already full of people who were approved to be on site in the case of reactivation. He recognizes the soldier standing by waiting for him as Private Steve Harrington, the same man who brought in the recorder originally. He’s one of the few people at the bureau with prior knowledge of the other dimension despite his low rank.

“Sir,” he greets with a respectful head dip, opening the backdoor of the SUV for Pierce as he approaches. Pierce returns the gesture before climbing into the backseat, sliding across the bench to the opposite side. Steve gets in after him, his bulky gear forcing him to sit far forward on the bucket seat as he slams the door closed behind him.

It only takes another minute or so before the caravan lurches and begins to move, following after the identical black SUV in front of it.

The walkie-talkie on Steve’s shoulder kicks to life quietly, a short and concise signal coming through that Pierce doesn’t understand. The exhausted scientist looks over curiously as Steve murmurs an, “Affirmative,” into the device before clicking it off.

“Any news from the fault?”

Steve glances over, surprised to be addressed, before he turns back to look out the front windshield. “Nothing yet, sir.”

Pierce keeps an eye on the soldier as they travel – watching with intrigue as the man continuously searches the vehicle’s surroundings, like he’s expecting an attack.

“You seem on edge, Steve.” He straightens in response, looking even more uncomfortable at being referred to by his first name. “Is it because the gate is active?”

A muscle in his jaw rolling with tension, Steve keeps his gaze firmly forward as he responds. “It doesn’t supply a good feeling, that’s for sure.”

“And yet you still volunteered for the theoretical strike team to go through?” Pierce wonders aloud, phrasing it like a question.

There’s a tense moment of silence before the private answers. “At least I already know what to expect on the other side.”

The two don’t interact again for the reminder of the drive.

The SUVs all pull into the vacant field beside the field tent in a line, the leader of the patrol team coming out to meet the first vehicle. Pierce watches General Highland step out of it and start to converse with the uniformed woman. By the time he makes it way over, he seems to be catching the tail end of the conversation.

“We have each unit spread out in even intervals along the fault; so far there has been no change since it first activated.”

“And they all have their protective equipment on, I presume?” Dr. Pierce cuts in, surprising the patrol leader and earning an annoyed look from General Highland.

“Yes sir,” she responds with a head nod. “I was just telling the general that they’re all outfitted with gear to protect them from the worst of the radiation, but it would still do good to regularly swap out the unit in the center, where the worst of it is.”

Pierce agrees with a stiff nod, not waiting to hear the general disagree before he turns to look back. As he expected, Private Harrington trailed him over, waiting a respectful distance away as to not eavesdrop. “Harrington.”

Steve turns at the call, jogging over to Pierce. “Sir.”

“Suit up. You’re coming with me to the source.”

“Yes sir.”

The pair of them push into the field tent, currently staffed with 15 more people than usual. There are researchers and scientists bent over displays and documenting readings, soldiers standing by with weapons, field agents watching over the researchers shoulders. Pierce walks past all of them, parting the way as he does, and starts to strip off his lab coat while pulling a radiation suit off the rack. Steve follows suit, removing a majority of his gear to reequip on top of the plastic suit.

The buzz of excited chatter is nearly grating on Pierce’s ears as he goes through the annoying process of putting on the PPE. But he misses it when it suddenly cuts off, directly after one of the researchers announces, “We’ve got a spike in activity!”

Pierce looks over at Steve, who is still clipping things to his belt again. “We’ve gotta move.”

“Yes sir,” Steve repeats once more, gathering the bare necessities in his arms to try to equip as they move. The pair of them push out the other side of the tent and set into a jog towards what used to be Forest Hills Trailer Park.

They pass a few pairs of outfitted people as they move – soldiers patrolling and scientists maintaining the monitoring equipment placed along the fault. None of them interact as the pair jogs past, heading for the end of the fault line. They can see a small group ahead – presumably gathered closer to where the spike in activity happened.

“Make some room!” Steve barks out as they approach, the gathered group moving further away from the fault line in response. Some look back to see who is coming while others keep their eyes locked on the glowing source beyond.

“Keep at least 10 feet back from the fault at all times,” Pierce orders the group as they pass. “Stay in pairs, don’t go off on your own. We have very little idea what we’re dealing with here, but we have reason to believe there are things that will try to drag you through the gate. If something comes out, fall back and call out. Don’t let your partner get grabbed.”

There is some murmuring in response, but no one openly disregards the order, starting to pair off as a few people move further back along the fault line. Pierce approaches a pair hunched over a meter near the source, keeping his eyes on the glowing red below. “What are we looking at?”

“It’s fluctuating slightly; was 116 mv/m at 31016 Hz at peak.” The researcher responds, keeping a close eye on the EMF before them. “Nothing close to the reported 189 mv/m. We might not be looking at full activation. Or maybe it’s building up, it’s hard to say.”

“Wait,” Steve cuts in, holding a hand out for the researcher to pause. “Do you hear that?”

They all fall silent, listening closely.

Then Pierce hears it – the hum from the recording. The one you were talking about hearing.

The scientist gives him a nod of agreement before looking back to the researcher. “Any sign of movement from the other side?”

“Not that we can tell from here,” the field agent answers for them. “We’ve been following the guidelines to stay back so it’s hard to catch anything from here.”

“Radio? Portable EMF?” Dr. Pierce asks, and the field agent presents both. He takes them and then looks back at Steve. “We’re moving up.”

Even behind the protection of the face shield, Pierce can see the tension in his expression. Regardless, the private still answers with a confident, “Yes sir.”

Keeping the meter within eyesight, the two push ahead, closer to the large opening at the source. Pierce watches it tick up with each step closer, crossing the 150 mark as they get within 5 feet of the edge. Looking out across the opening, the glowing membrane pulses and hums with energy, louder and louder as they approach.

There’s very little movement on the other side, but every once in a while Pierce catches a glimpse of a dark shadow moving beyond.

“Never gets any less unsettling to look at,” Steve murmurs beside him, shifting his weight between his feet as he keeps his eyes locked on the unbroken membrane.

“Dr. Pierce, we’ve got another spike!” The researcher calls from behind, voice sounding a bit concerned. “We’re edging 170 now.”

The humming increases steadily along with a slight vibration in the ground beneath their feet. Steve steps up beside Pierce, a hand out like he’s ready to drag him back from the edge, as Pierce stares into the membrane intensely.

Come on. Come on. Come back through. Just be alive. Come on. Please be alive.

A more defined shadow moves along the edge closest to the trailer and doesn’t pull back. “We’ve got movement!” Steve calls back, alerting the nearby units as Pierce’s hand flies out to hush him. They both watch with a certain level of horrified fascination as the shadow grows defined enough to make that section of the membrane appear black before it begins to tear.

A bare hand extends out of the membrane, blindly grasping for the nearby edge. Steve twitches forward, like he wants to go and help them, but Pierce holds him back wordlessly, leaving them both standing perfectly still as another hand appears and grabs onto the edge.

The person uses the grip on the edge to pull themselves through – a woman in a filthy tank top and jeans struggling to pull herself onto the flat ground. As soon as she is through, she quickly turns around on her knees and reaches back through the membrane.

You’re… You’re actually alive.

Several soldiers approach slowly with their rifles out, aiming at you as you take hold of someone else’s hand and start to pull them through. A pale man with long, messy hair appears from the other side, holding on tightly to you as you help him reorient to the change in perspective. “No way…” Steve whispers, standing frozen as he watches them start to sit up and look around.

“Dr. Pierce!” You call happily once you spot him, waving at him like you’re excited to see him. There’s a huge smile on your face, a stark contrast to your utterly disheveled appearance. “I made it! I’m back!”

The soldiers continue to keep their weapons trained on the newcomers, watching for some sign of aggression. You slowly get to your feet, offering your hand to your companion and helping him up too. Steve takes a few mindless steps towards them, Dr. Pierce no longer stopping him. “Eddie?” He calls uncertainly, like he can’t believe what he’s seeing. “Eddie, is that you?”

The man’s head perks up, looking in Steve’s direction. “Harrington?” He replies, sounding just as uncertain and confused. “Is that you in there?”

“Eddie, as in Eddie Munson?” Dr. Pierce asks Steve, still unmoving as he stares at you, seemingly unharmed.

“Yeah…” Steve breathes out, still looking stunned. “And he doesn’t look like he’s aged a day.”

You and Eddie start to walk over when a soldier barks at you to stay back, both of you nervously putting your hands up as you look between the armed soldiers, Steve, and Pierce.

“It’s me, Dr. Pierce. It’s really me.” You insist, looking at him pleadingly. “And this is Eddie, he helped me find my way back. He saved me.” You add, motioning to the man beside you. The two of you are close together; you stand slightly in front of Eddie, like you’re protecting him. Eddie just offers a sheepish smile and a shrug, like it was no big deal.

“Sir? What do we do?” One of the soldiers asks, glancing in Dr. Pierce’s direction.

The two of you look exhausted, dirty, hungry, but… Harmless. No worse for wear despite the time spent on the other side.

“Bring them in.” Pierce orders. “No excessive force. They’ve been through a lot.”

The soldiers nod, lowering their weapons and urging you both to come forward. You look particularly relieved, while Eddie appears mostly unphased by all of it.

“Thank god, I need a shower so badly.” You announce with a happy laugh, walking toward them as you shake your head and make a disgusted face. “No one smell me, I’m begging you.”

If anyone finds your behavior unsettling or strange, they don’t say so. Everyone mostly looks relieved it didn’t turn into some kind of fight. While there is something off about how you’re acting, Dr. Pierce can’t find it in himself to feel anything besides relief at your return.

Steve stands motionless and tense as Eddie approaches, looking every bit like he’s seen a ghost. There is no excitement, no relief, no… Trust. Like this is all a bad dream and he just wants to wake up.

Just before you and Eddie pass the two of them, you flash another excited smile. “And not a moment too soon – I’m so thirsty.” You look over at Eddie, who nods in agreement, before you continue walking toward the field tent in the distance, flanked on either side by armed soldiers.

Eddie stops by Steve, giving him a tilted smile. “Hey Harrington, didn’t expect to see you here.”

“I could say the same to you,” Steve replies, his tone apprehensive and flat. If Eddie catches on, he doesn’t show it, just continuing to show that same smile – like he knows something you don’t.

“What can I say?” He offers with a shrug and a wink before he continues to trail after you and toward the growing crowd beyond. “It’s good to be back.”

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thanks for reading, please let me know if you liked it!!

[nataliesfirefly]

You and I Walk a Fragile Line - Farleigh Start x F!Reader - Part 4

a/n: hey everyone! i know it's been a while but the next part is finally here! not sure how many parts i want this to be bc i dont want to fill up the tag, still waiting to make an ao3 account haha- but anyways im getting a taglist started just of people who have shown interest in this series, if i put you on it and you don't want to be on it just let me know. and ofc if u want to be on it lmk! i also made a playlist if anyone wants to check that out :))

playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/60Kll9HCoQru14J18bT21C

series masterlist

word count: 3.9k

warnings: language, suggestive stuff?, alcohol, smoking, emetophobia

Things are extremely awkward with Felix. He’s too nice to kick you out of Saltburn, yet he’s too prideful to apologize, so you two are stuck dancing around each other with small talk and short interactions.

Things with Farleigh, on the other hand, are surprisingly good. You never would have expected how close you two became in the past few days. In fact, you can’t remember the last time he insulted you, at least not in a playful way. You must have bonded over your shared dislike for Felix at the moment.

But for some reason, you worry if you get too close, he might push you away.

Tonight was dinner with all of Sir James’s friends, and as the Cattons tend to call them, the Henry’s. The actual dinner was full of awkward conversations with people much older than you about the future of your life and what you were going to do after graduating college. You actually had no idea what your plan was or what you wanted to do with your life. You used to push all the questions away and blamed it on the fact that graduation was pretty far away. It only recently dawned on you that you would be graduating in about two years. 

After dinner, you sit in the dimly lit living room with Farleigh on the couch as everyone else participates in karaoke. You and Farleigh snicker at some of the guests’ performances, whispering things to each other as if you are judges of some competition.

Eventually, Farleigh sighs and stands to his feet. “I’m going to go smoke,” He tells you, putting his hands in his pockets. He turns and looks at you expectantly. You take it as his way of asking you to come with him, so you stand up and snatch the bottle of wine you were drinking off the coffee table.

You follow him up the stairs, down the long, dark hall and eventually into his bedroom. He shuts the door behind you and draws out the pack of cigarettes from his pocket and lights one. “At least open the window,” You walk over to the window and open it to let the smoke out.

“Oh, right. Cause you hate the smell so much.” He rolls his eyes at you as he exhales some smoke. “Weren’t you the one that asked me for one of these the other day?” He points the cigarette at you and you glance down shamefully.

“Yeah. I wasn’t at my best, okay?” You shake your head and slump down to the floor, leaning against the wall and stretching your legs out.

“Okay, sure, miss goody two shoes.” He chuckles and sits down next to you. You take a swig from the wine bottle and sigh, leaning your head back.

“So, Felix…” Farleigh trails off and looks over to you. You continue staring up at the ceiling. “Can we not talk about Felix right now,” You reply, closing your eyes. “We need to,” He says, nudging you.

“What is there to talk about?” You ask, turning to meet Farleigh’s gaze. He presses the cigarette to his lips and inhales. “You said it yourself, that he only hangs out with me out of pity.” 

As he breathes out, the smoke passes over your face but you don’t care. “And what’s your problem with him? It seems like you’ve been waiting for someone to turn on him so you could join in,” You continue, and his eyes tell you that you’ve just read him like a book.

He quickly recovers and remains expressionless. “You’re projecting,” Farleigh responds. “Then why have you been so nice to me?” You ask.

The room goes silent and you are stuck in a moment where time doesn’t pass, it’s just you and Farleigh. His usual cold and dark gaze is replaced by something softer, warmer. Something in the air shifts and you can feel some kind of tension rising.

But then he looks away, breaking eye contact. “Because Felix is just stupid sometimes,” He finally replies, nodding toward the bottle of wine you are holding. You hand it to him and your fingers brush against his.

He takes a drink. “I don’t think he ever had bad intentions. He’s just an idiot,” You consider this. Maybe he’s just extremely out of touch with reality like the rest of the Cattons.

There’s a pause as you think of something to change the subject to.

“So… How about that Sadie girl?” You ask, turning to him with a grin. He gives the wine back to you and you take a quick swig.

Elspeth is, for some reason, attempting to set Farleigh up with a daughter of one of James’s friends. Her name is Sadie, and she is very pretentious and fake, from what you can tell. You hadn’t spoken to her, but you watched from afar as she and Farleigh engaged in a conversation.

“She’s alright,” He shrugs and stands up to press the cigarette out on his ashtray. He sits back down next to you and sighs.

“She was like, hardcore flirting with you,” You chuckle and observe his exasperated expression. “Oh, I know.” He smirks smugly and you roll your eyes.

“That’s weird, usually you hook up with someone the moment they show interest in you,” You smile at the way he frowns slightly. “That’s not true,” He furrows his eyebrows and glances at you. “Okayyy,” You say sarcastically.

A while later, you are still upstairs with Farleigh, but you are now feeling the effects of all the alcohol you’ve consumed. You both had gone downstairs to steal more booze, and you ended up drinking almost all of it. Your whole body feels tingly and warm, and your brain is fuzzy.

You run a hand through your tousled hair and sigh, turning to check if Farleigh is as wasted as you. He seems slightly better off than you, but his dark eyes are half lidded and glossy.

“Do you ever miss Sasha?” He glances at you, seeming surprised at your random question. Sasha is Farleigh’s ex from Oxford, who he had endured a tumultuous and rollercoaster ride of a relationship with. You had met her once or twice, she seemed kind, but slightly possessive.

“Sasha?” Farleigh repeats her name and takes a moment to process it. It seems like memories are returning to him and replaying in his head.

“Sometimes. But not really. She was crazy,” He raised his eyebrows and stared straight ahead. “You guys broke up and got back together, like, ten times,” You giggle foolishly and he turns to look at you, slightly offended by your amusement.

“It was too hard to keep up with,” You sigh after your laughter subsides. 

“I didn’t know you were keeping up,” You make eye contact once again with Farleigh, and this time his gaze is more intense. You can’t tell if it’s one of his usual sarcastic comments or if there was an underlying meaning behind his tone. Your face burns red with the realization that you had been studying his relationship so closely. But, really, everyone in your friend group knew about Sasha and Farleigh’s dumpsterfire of a romance. Break up, random hook ups, they said they love each other, then they argued again.

“It’s just.. what friends do,” You reply, your speech slurred. “Friends keep up with each other’s relationships.” You shrug and wave your hand as if to dismiss the seriousness of it.

“You consider me a friend?” Farleigh chuckles, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Well, what if I do?” Your voice comes out softer than you intended. 

There’s another long moment of silence and prolonged eye contact between you two. The tension is so thick, you can feel it in the air and your heart pounds. It’s almost like you are waiting for who will make the next move. Your brain is all muddled and you can’t seem to think clearly.

Your eyes flicker down to his plush lips and you can’t tell if it’s the alcohol or not, but your instinct is to kiss him. You grab him by the face, a hand on either cheek, and pull him in, smashing your lips together sloppily. You pull away, shocked at yourself, dropping your hands into your lap as your lips hover over his.

You expect him to be disgusted and stand up and walk away, but there’s a slight pause before he is grabbing you and pulling you back in, kissing you almost aggressively. Like he’s been starved, like there’s not enough of you.

You squeak with surprise before you melt into him, softening as one of his hands travels down to your neck and the other settles on your waist. You both have to gasp for air in between sloppy kisses, but you don’t mind. Your heart races and your hands travel up into his hair, running your hands through his unruly dark curls. You find that you’ve been waiting so long to do that, to feel his hair in your hands.

He bites your lower lip and your eyebrows pinch together. “Sorry,” He mumbles, although his voice disappears into your mouth. You feel yourself losing balance and beginning to fall back onto the floor.

Before you know it, he’s on top of you, refusing to stop kissing you. It’s messy and you know you’re both drunk, but damn does it feel good. The tension feels like it’s being lifted off of you, and it’s relieving. You don’t know how long it will last but hell, you’re enjoying it. Both of his hands have moved to your hips and his fingers are pressing into you.

You feel his lips move from yours, moving down from your jaw to your neck. He’s kissing and sucking on your skin so passionately that you know you will have bruises tomorrow. You moan quietly and you hear him groan in response, his low voice vibrating against your neck.

You attempt to catch your breath as you suddenly feel something in your stomach, something unpleasant. Saliva begins to build in your mouth and it’s like you have an internal clock telling you how much time you have left before you absolutely hurl.

“Far-Farleigh,” You place your hands on his shoulders. You whimper and slightly push up on him. He glances up from your neck, staring up at you in confusion. You can’t deny that you enjoy viewing him from this angle, but you have other concerns at the moment.

“Gonna throw up,” You manage to get out before he’s rolling off of you, allowing you to get up. You clamber to your feet and scramble into the connecting bathroom, barely making it to your knees in front of the toilet before you throw up. 

You grip both sides of the toilet for support as you practically spill your guts, coughing loudly. You would have liked some help or something from Farleigh, but it seems like he has just left you here to deal with it yourself.

You groan and wipe your mouth, sitting up and staring straight ahead in some sort of daze. You eventually come to your senses and stand up, flushing the toilet. You feel dizzy so you grab onto the counter of the sink to not lose balance, catching your reflection in the mirror.

Your hair is very messy, and your mascara is slightly smudged around your eyes. Your cheeks are warm and rosy, but in an unflattering way. You look like a wreck. 

When you walk back into his room, he’s gone. You sigh in frustration and press a hand to your aching and pounding forehead. Somehow, you stumble back to your room and flop onto your bed. You managed to avoid the small number of guests left in the house, along with Venetia and Felix. You just want to get some sleep after the shitshow that just happened. And you know you’ll be paying for it in the morning. 

2 YEARS EARLIER

You, Felix, and some of your other friends were gathered at the pub on a Friday night. There was chatter and the smell of cigarette smoke all around you. Felix returned from the bar and handed you a tall glass of beer.

You were focused on Farleigh and the girl who sat on his lap. Her hands were all over him, and he seemed totally enamored with her. She had a short skirt on and her wrists were covered in bracelets. She was pretty, you had to admit.

“Who’s that?” You asked, glancing up at Felix and pointing to the two. “Oh, that’s Sasha.” He replied. “She’s obsessed with Farleigh. And from what I can tell,” Felix sat down, pulling his chair closer to yours, “He’s liking it.”

You chuckled and took a sip of your beer. “Good for him,” You said, shrugging. “Bet they’ve already fucked,” Felix remarked and you snapped your head towards him. “Ew, Felix. That’s none of your business.” You made a disgusted expression.

“What? Everybody shags around here, it’s no surprise,” He shrugged nonchalantly. “Except you,” He added, grinning and nudging you. You rolled your eyes and looked back towards Sasha and Farleigh.

You didn’t want to imagine them… doing that. But for some reason, your mind kept trying to paint a picture of it. You shook your head to clear your thoughts. 

You didn’t know why, but for some reason, you felt jealousy bubbling up inside of you. Why was it so easy for her to get what she wanted? You had liked a few men at Oxford, but you didn’t really even want a boyfriend or a commitment like that.

But as you watched Farleigh and Sasha’s hands intertwine, you felt envious.

“Hey, Felix, who was that guy you were going to introduce me to?” You asked, tapping your fingers against the table. “What? Oh, Joshua? I thought you said you didn’t want to meet him,” He replied. Felix was trying to set you up with one of his friends who seemed like a player. At this point, you didn’t care. It was like you were trying to prove that you could actually get a guy. Prove to who, though?

“I know. I changed my mind,” You said decidedly. “Well, he’s actually here tonight. Would you like me to go grab him?” Felix stood up and pointed towards the other side of the pub. You nodded. “Sure,”

You waited patiently and took a few swigs of beer for confidence. A minute later, Felix returned with a man who was a few inches shorter than him, with fluffy blonde hair and hazel eyes. Freckles were dusted across his nose and his skin was nicely tanned due to the warmer weather of spring. He looked sweet and innocent, but the rumors you had heard about him told you otherwise.

“Hello,” He greeted you, holding out his hand. You stood up to shake his hand, smiling as you introduced yourself. “Nice to meet you, I’m Joshua.” He grinned brightly and Felix seemed amused by the interaction.

“Hi, Joshua.” You tried to make a good first impression, although you weren’t good at this stuff. But it seemed like he was already interested, looking you up and down.

You both sat back down and began small talk about classes and life and friends. Felix left you two alone, but you’re not sure where he went. It was good, talking to someone new, but still a bit uncomfortable since you were so introverted. The conversation flowed nicely between the both of you.

You couldn’t help but feel like someone was watching you. You glanced up, seeing Farleigh’s cold gaze drilling into yours, flicking back and forth between you and Joshua. It was like he was waiting to see who would break eye contact first, and of course, it was you. Your gaze faltered down to the table and then back up to Joshua.

“You alright, love?” He asked, placing a hand on your thigh. You nodded and your face turned a shade of pink with embarrassment. “Sorry. Just thinking,”

“Hey, what do you say when we go back to my dorm? To just chill, relax, you know.” He tilted his head and you could already tell what he was implying. “Uh- Sure, yeah. Let’s go,” You smiled and stood up, grabbing your bag and walking past him toward the doors. He placed a hand on your lower back as you stepped by him.

You woke up the next morning unsure of where you were before memories of the night before came back to you. You were in Joshua’s bed, tangled up in the sheets, with your clothes off and scattered on the floor.

Your eyes widened as you realized you had lost your virginity to Joshua Brown. You sat up and scratched your head, not sure what to do next.

“Oh my God…” You whispered, looking down at Joshua, who was sleeping on his stomach, his face pressed against the pillow. It didn’t look like he was waking up anytime soon.

You stood up and winced as you realized you were a bit sore. You tried to be as quiet as possible as you picked your clothes up off the floor, hurriedly putting them back on.

Joshua stirred in his sleep and groaned, rolling over. You grimaced as you took your bag off of his desk chair, tip toeing to the door and opening it slowly.

You sighed with relief once you had closed his door behind you and you were safely out in the hallway. You know you probably looked like a wreck, but your main goal at the moment was to get back to your own dorm going unnoticed.

You heard your name being called, fairly close to you. You froze before turning to identify where it came from, and you swear your heart dropped to your ass. Farleigh was standing in the doorway of his room, which was conveniently right next door to Joshua’s, smirking at your frazzled state.

“You should work on keeping it down. I couldn’t sleep last night because I kept hearing you and Joshua.” He chuckled and you could feel your face heating up.

“Sorry,” You muttered, casting your glance downwards to the floor. 

“You finally got some after all,” He teased. “Can you shut up?” You groaned, facepalming and shaking your head. “Oh, I will if you can figure out how to,” He raised his eyebrows. “Was it really that good?” He questioned.

You considered the question. You didn’t really know if it was or not, you were just trying to be loud because you thought guys liked that. Were you satisfied by the end? No. But Joshua certainly was.

He seemed to notice your puzzled expression and he nodded. “Oh. So the rumors are true about him.” You tilted your head with curiosity. “What rumors?” You asked.

“Oh, you poor thing.” He cooed sarcastically. You narrowed your eyes at him and crossed your arms. “Well, you’d better get back to your place so you can study,” Farleigh mocked. “Make up for that time you lost last night, huh?”

“Can you just not tell anyone? Please?” You knew it was useless asking him not to tell. He had the biggest mouth in the whole class. He just snickered at your pleading and stepped back into his room and shut his door.

That night you hung out with Joshua in his dorm once more, but you told him you didn’t want to have sex again. He respected your decision, so you were just drinking some alcohol with him and making out occasionally.

“Yeah, I don’t really know what I’m going to do with an English degree. I just had to pick something.” He shrugged. You were talking about your futures after Oxford and what you were both majoring in.

“Hm. Well, there’s a lot you could do,” You replied, trying to reassure him, although you weren’t too sure yourself. “You could be-” Your sentence is cut short by a loud moan coming from the room next to you.

“Ah, shit. It’s Farleigh and Sasha again,” Joshua shook his head like it was a regular occurence. “They’re usually at it for a while,” He informed you. “Do you want to go somewhere else?”

Some odd, depraved part of you wanted to stay and listen. “No, that’s alright.” You shrugged. “Surely it can’t be that bad.”

The walls seemed paper thin. You swear you could hear every little noise, like the bed springs squeaking and the wanton sounds that came from Sasha. But then you heard something different. It was Farleigh, whimpering and moaning in a way that you couldn’t even believe what you were hearing. You didn’t know men could make sounds other than grunting during sex, let alone sounds like that.

“Oh fuck,” You heard him breathe heavily and Sasha was practically screaming at this point. 

“Damn. They’re really getting into it,” You whistled and raised your eyebrows. Joshua nodded. “I wish I was as good as people say he is,” Joshua looked down. “What?” You asked as you tried to ignore the continuous noises. He was really telling you to be quieter earlier today?

“Farleigh. People say he’s really good in bed,” Joshua explained. You were surprised that he was okay with discussing this with you. “Oh.” You chuckled nervously. You didn’t expect that, but for some reason it made sense. “Was I bad?” Joshua asked suddenly.

You froze at his question and wondered if you should tell him the truth. “I mean… I don’t really… know the difference, you know? It was my first time, remember?” You told him. He nodded but you could tell he seemed hurt and defeated.

“Right,” He awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck and you leaned back in your chair. You could say this was one of the most embarrassing moments of your life, having to listen to Farleigh fuck some girl while having an awkward conversation with the man you had a one night stand with.

The next day around noon, you were walking to a café near campus when you saw Farleigh walking ahead of you on the sidewalk of the cobblestone streets.

An idea popped into your head and you smiled mischievously, jogging to catch up with him. When you appeared at his side, he glanced down and made a face.

“Are you following me?” He asked, glaring at you as you fell into step next to him. “No. I just had a complaint,” You tried to hide the smile threatening your face. “What’s that?” He quirked an eyebrow.

“Me and Joshua were trying to have a nice conversation last night,” You started, and his playful expression immediately dropped. “Maybe try to keep it down next time, right?” You grinned and he stopped in his tracks.

“You were there last night?” He seemed annoyed and a little bit shocked. “Yeah.” You nodded and stopped next to him. “I mean, I couldn’t even hear my own thoughts,” You laughed to yourself and he narrowed his dark eyes at you.

“And it wasn’t even Sasha as much as it was you–” “Keep your mouth shut,” He ordered, and you knew you got a rise out of him. “Practice what you preach, that’s all I’m saying,” You waved and skipped along the sidewalk, leaving him standing there in shock.

taglist: @isla-finke-blog @ibimbogrl @drunkmysticsquirrel @alonia-olivia @novemilady @saltburnsworld

[the-raven-lady]

(Not) The Savior You Long For [Part 3]

[Masterlist] [My Ko-Fi]

Pairing: Night Lord (OC: Elias Rushorik) x serf!Reader [fem]

Song Inspiration: Nocturnal Me - Echo & The Bunnymen  [YouTube] [Spotify] “Do or die, what's done is done / True beauty lies on the blue horizon / Who or why? What's one is one / In pure disguise of vulgar sons / Oh, take me internally / Forever yours, nocturnal me.”

Warnings: Getting tattooed in detail (needles and pain), vomiting / emetophobia, illness and recovery, mentions of violence and gore, cannibalism, food (and lack thereof) talks, partially unreliable narrator?

Word Count: 3.3k

Author’s Note: Thank you everyone for being straight feral for this man. It makes writing for him far easier. Thank you @mothiir for keeping me company as I wrote and happy late birthday.

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3]

Tag List: @egrets-not-regrets @sleepyfan-blog @kit-williams @bleedingichorhearts @bispecsual 

@lemon-russ @moodymisty @dedios-of-the-word @pickpocketing-your-gender @historitor-bookshelf

The needle digging into your skin alternates between a carpet burn and the drag of a razor blade as the apothecary packs black pigment into your nape. Vibrations electrify your entire nervous system and tingle deep into your bones, sending all of your systems haywire. You lost the ability to hold yourself upright through the pain a long time ago, your master having simply pivoted and shoved you face-first into his bed when the iron grip around your neck wasn’t enough to silence your incessant whimpering. 

You ball your hands into fists and press them hard into your lap as an aggravated spinal nerve shoots lightning down your arm. The apothecary hisses in Nostraman, but the foreign words are lost to your pain-addled brain, too much blood whirring in your ears. The Contekar holding you steady digs his fingers into your jaw, the greater pain refocusing you and inadvertently soothing the ache in your clenched teeth. Your eyes blink open to his creased brow and tired eyes glaring at you in warning. You hadn’t even noticed the high pitched whimper leaving your throat with how focused you’d been trying to hold your breath, but it’s not a difficult leap in logic to realize that your tattoo artist was getting annoyed with the constant sound of a balloon leaking air.

The next time it happens is after you cry out from a stab to a particularly tender area above the spine, and both parties were substantially less polite about it. The apothecary lifts the needle from where it bore into you, and you don’t even have the time to catch your breath before someone kicks your chair and spins it round. The next thing you perceive is total darkness and the inability to take a full breath, as well as an immovable force preventing you from lifting your head back up. Your entire body tenses up as the needle once again makes contact and angry vibrations rattle down your spine.

Gentle wipes of a cold cloth against the entirety of your nape jarringly signaled the close of the session, temporarily calming the constant burn. What felt like an eternity had at most been three hours, but by the end your entire body was exhausted. You were dehydrated and nauseous, trembling from adrenaline and low blood sugar. Your limbs were torn between desperately needing to stretch out and being completely uncooperative. 

On legs of jelly, you slowly stagger up out of the chair and lift your face off of the bed, firmly planting your hands into the soft mattress to stabilize yourself. Moisture from where you had been crying stains the blanket and your cheeks. Disorienting static buzzes within your head.

The apothecary is packing up his cart, tossing used supplies into a bag on the side and putting the used needles in a rigid case with an occasional clink, clink. You squint as you notice a scarlet ink cup on the tabletop, not remembering when that had been poured despite trying to pay attention at first. The terminator and apothecary exchange quiet words in their native tongue before the apothecary pulls a tub of… something from one of the cart’s many drawers. The terminator accepts it with a scoff, shaking his head in annoyance, and puts the object next to his ornate armor. 

The back of your neck is lit up like a severe sunburn, curling around the edges of your traps and up behind your ears. Turning your head from side to side gives no glimpse of the new ink (but it does remind you of how stiff your body is). Whatever substance had been put on top of the tattoo is greasy and warm; you guess it must be there to protect the fresh wound.

The creak of the door opening and closing alerts you to the apothecary taking his leave, dragging the cart out behind him. The terminator gives the room a once over, then turns his black eyes to you. Your brain is too tired to react to the weight of his gaze at the moment, clouded by adrenal buzzing, and you feel the corners of your lips quirk up as you meet his stare. The slivers of white in the corners of his eyes make him look like an overgrown dog.

He huffs and looks away, sitting back against his table and grabbing the tub of whatever from earlier to read its label over. The way folds his arms over his broad chest conceals several of his larger chest ports, and you wonder why they’re placed along his body in each specific location. Questions for another day.

Curiosity gets the better of you, and you find yourself moving in the direction of the bathroom. Each step is messy and uncoordinated, feet dragging, but you manage to not fall over as you push yourself off of support of the bed. Getting tattooed so close to the head must be making your brain do spirals. Head warm and floaty, vision dreamlike and unfocused. Everything simultaneously feels better than it ever has and dreadfully wrong, but you can’t find it within you to care. The world has never been so ethereal.

You jump as you recognize the face in front of you. When had you gotten to the mirror?

Craning your neck to the side, you catch sight of the red and black artwork wrapping around your neck. Inflammation has set in over the entire area, an angry flush from head to chest. The thick black outline of a bat wing curves down from behind your ear to the top of your shoulder, packed with crimson. Red waves and spirals flow along its webbing in cascades. You turn fully to your side and drag the skin of your shoulder down to see the rest of it.

Subtlety was not considered for this design.

A skull sits between the bat wings along your spine, perfectly aligned with where the vertebra of your neck meet those of your back. Above the skull sits two symbols you don’t recognize: one in the shape of a cross, and another like a rotated ‘F’. You’ve seen similar script on some of the older Night Lord’s armor, but you never inquired about their meaning before. Whatever they are, they likely serve some function beyond purely aesthetic.

A sudden warmth overtakes you. Your hand slips from its perch on the oversized sink basin, and you nearly topple over, just barely catching yourself in time as a wave of vertigo washes over you. Alarms ring in your ears, tinnitus deafening everything around you. The grey tiled floor begins to swirl, churning tides at your feet that double and triple. Dull throbbing pounds from the inside of your skull. 

The only warning you get before the contents of your stomach paint the surface of the sink is a furious twist in your gut. You violently retch the remainder of your last meal, coughing and sputtering sour yellow chunks off of your tongue. 

You meet your own bloodshot eyes in the mirror as your legs begin to give out, clutching weakly at the sink to keep yourself upright. A sheen of sweat coats your face, cheeks flushed despite a sudden pallor to the rest of you. Each breath you take is labored and intense, diaphragm screaming at you for oxygen you can’t seem to get. 

What is happening–? You try to speak but the words won’t come out, tongue too large for your mouth. Am I dying–? 

The slam of the door is the only thing that reaches your fogged brain, and you sluggishly turn your head to meet it. Shadows crawl in from the opening like licks of dark smoke.

Everything tunnels around you, and a sharp sting of blinding white floods your vision.

Soft. The surface is soft, warm. 

You can’t remember the last time you’d felt so comfortable.

The heavy blanket around you anchors your sore body down, faux fur and minky sending little prickles up your arm as you brush your fingertips against the fabric. You must not be in your spot on the floor, unless your pillow had grown three sizes from the last time you checked. 

Honestly, you couldn’t tell if it did or not. A heavenly glow basks the room around you, hazing the edges of your vision. 

The tattoo had killed you— it must have, for why else would you be so at ease? This couldn’t be the Nightfall. 

An angel walks into your view, a vast colossus of perfection. Its form radiates with light, grey eyes dotting along its body in random locations that all seem to stare right at you. You’d dare call it beautiful. Gingerly, you reach a hand out towards it, hoping to share in its magnificence.

The afterlife wasn’t so unwelcoming after all.

Elias swears if you grab his leg one more time he’s going to tie you to the chair and leave you outside for the vermin. For the tenth time he swats away your hand, trapping it against the edge of the bed. He pushes away the blanket covering you to check over your weeping tattoo as the apothecary instructed. His eyes hone in on the subtle beating of your heart, capillaries expanding and contracting as lymph tries desperately to carry away the astartes blood in the ink. You haven’t died yet, which is a positive; it would reflect poorly on his abilities and reputation otherwise.

Your frail little body treats him like an infection. Elias had heard you vomit from the bathroom and surged in just in time to watch your head slam into the metal sink as you collapsed. There’s still a yellowing bruise on your cheek from where it had impacted, but the deep purples and reds have dissipated. He couldn’t remember a time when he was so delicate, even as a human. 

…however long ago it had been since then. The Night Haunter had only just been found by the Emperor and joined forces with the Imperium at the time Elias became a neophyte. 

You give a pathetic whine at his touch, and it grates him. It’s as if Apothecarion Rathal had tattooed the intelligence straight out of you, reducing you to a groveling ape and no more. Your skin was perpetually damp and perspiration soaked into the fine linens of his bed sheets, which made them reek of you (did you not understand how difficult it had been to acquire those?). You moan and hyperventilate in your sleep, demanding his attention away from the responsibilities you had shirked in your illness.

And now it was his responsibility to care for you? Absurd. Still, the human medicae would surely do no better than he could. It was bad enough that he can’t even use his own bed during this extended downtime because you’re in it.

It isn’t as if he hasn’t tried, but it’s difficult to focus on his own activities when every few minutes a sick human is trying to clutch onto you like a child in need of comforting. 

First, he had been attempting to clean off the plates of his armor while you were unable to do it for him. Elias sat over the edge of the bed to avoid getting any of the flakes on his expensive spread, when your needy little hands had snaked around his waist and pulled at him. “No,” he had scolded, pushing you off, but your foolishly feverish mind wouldn’t take that for an answer. You redoubled your efforts, forcing him to move to his far less comfortable chair to finish. 

Second was after a brutal training session. Elias had worked himself nearly to collapse, pushing the limits of his underfed body. He returned to his quarters drenched in sweat and exhausted, ignoring your sleeping form as he walked past you to take a much needed shower— he didn’t subscribe to the filth of the rest of the Eighth, taking more pride in his image and heritage than the lowly degenerates that had recently populated it. Dried and clean, he pushed you as far to the side as he could before taking up his spot in bed, sinking into the soft mattress with a sigh.

Only to wake up to you snuggling against him.

His back had begun to ache from the amount of half-sleep spent in his chair to accommodate for your needs. If you had been any less diligent at your job, Elias would have already disposed of you like the rest. 

The previous serfs he’d acquired had proven inadequate. Some would beg and cry to him for their freedom— freedom, as if he had not offered them a better life than they ever could have hoped for on this wretched ship. Others had damaged his armor or belongings, which infuriated him to no end. You at least seemed to know your place and understand the magnitude of the gifts he had given you, even if it had taken multiple days for you to use the pillow and sheet he provided for your floor spot at the foot of his bed.

He may not have kept you around at all if one of his useless younger brothers hadn’t been present in the armory he found you in. 

Elias had just returned from a six month long campaign on a noncompliant feudal world, utterly ravenous and annoyed. The fleet had stopped supplying rations to the squads weeks prior as ‘encouragement’ for them to finish their mission faster. The casualty rate had shot up as a result of the ration cuts, each Night Lord left to fend for themselves. The civilians and guardsmen stood no chance.

Elias had already never been given proper portioning for his body size to begin with, being larger than the majority of his legion by a substantial margin. He left most meals hungry, but he learned how to make up for it in his own ways. 

And there you had been, crying in the corner against a storage locker as his brother cornered you in while spewing ridiculous notions about gutting you. There had been two priorities on Elias’s mind at the time: have his armor refreshed so that he would stand out amongst his squad, and have his belly filled. How kind of his brother to so willingly volunteer for slaughter, getting in his way as he did. Elias had been craving such a protein-dense meal for ages.

You had done an admittedly excellent job cleaning his helmet as he ate. It brought him something akin to happiness that you were intelligent enough to shut up and just work, leaving him to his devices. He was almost grateful he wouldn’t have to devour you. The chances of finding a serf that didn’t question or cry about every little thing were slim.

Speaking since his lip had been torn a half-century ago brought Elias no short amount of annoyance. Sharp consonants like F’s, P’s, and S’s would catch on his lips, causing them to whistle and lisp. It was even worse in Gothic than his native dialect of Nostraman. Eloquent speeches and curt words were softened by the reality of their vocalizations, and over time Elias decided to speak only when necessary to avoid the stress.

He wasn’t ‘self-conscious’ about it. He doesn’t get self-conscious. That was only for the weak minded, and Elias is not weak.

The jar of antibiotic balm has gotten warm in his hand. Deftly unscrewing the lid and dropping it aside, he hooks a dollop onto his finger. The apothecary made it very clear that the tattoo had to be kept moisturized and coated to protect it and have it heal properly, and Elias wouldn’t settle for any imperfections in the design. He had overseen the entire process from start to finish to assure the outcome was as favorable to him as possible. The best tattoo artist, the finest supplies, the most reliable machine, everything. He wouldn’t skimp on the recovery process no matter how difficult you intended to make it.

The terminator kneels down on the bed and rolls your head to the side once more to apply the ointment, diligently spreading it over every exposed inch of the tattoo. The process would go so much more smoothly if you would stop nuzzling into the hand holding your head like a damned kitten. He needs to use both hands to lift the back of your collar up, but your complete inability to stay still and let him work stalls the process. 

An annoyed grunt leaves him, and he sits back to glare down at you. Your eyes are half-lidded and unintelligent when they meet his, and you give him another useless smile. Never learning your lesson, you lean forward to rest your head against his knee, letting out a deep exhale at the contact. It’s ridiculous, the basal creature you’ve become.

But it also puts you in the perfect position for Elias to finish his work. He supposes this is fine if it means you’ll cooperate with him, and he allows himself to relax. He’s only taking advantage of your weakness.

He hooks a finger into your shirt and pulls it away, working the balm down under the fabric to make sure the entirety of the tattoo is coated, rolling it an inch farther out than necessary in all directions in the event you smudge it. He relinquishes your collar and stares down at the runes between the wings. On a whim, he scoops up another small dollop of the salve and focuses more attention to the area. He would prefer his claim on you be clear if nothing else, and no part of the tattoo was more important than his name.

Content, the Night Lord pulls the blanket back over the area and reaches for the lid of the jar to close it.

“Thank you, my lord.”

He stops at your words, returning his gaze to where your cheek rests on his thigh. Your eyes are cloudy and red, pupils dilated so large they nearly envelop your iris. The look is almost pathetic, so reliant on him for your needs.

You have been since he chose to keep you. Unable to stand up to any of his brothers and most other serfs before. You could not find your own clothes, find regular sleep, or find consistent food. Elias had so generously made up for that, providing you new garments and a safe place to sleep, and you still tried to leave at first. Perhaps if you had just spoken up about your needs, he would have known you were hungry sooner. Taking the finer foods the Imperium provided to the remembrancers had been tantamount to stealing from children. No one dared stop him from entering their hall and commandeering what he saw fit to nourish you.

He has now sacrificed his bed for you, but at least it is visible how grateful you are for it. It stirs an odd fluttering in his hearts that makes him grimace.

“Elias.”

Your eyebrows knit together as your obtuse brain thinks loud enough to hear each cog within whir. Are you always so transparent?

“Pardon me, my lord?” you reply, unable to piece it together yourself. Perhaps he has given you too much credit.

With a sigh, he responds, shaking his head. “My name is Elias.”

A light enters your eyes for the first time in a week, a modicum of intelligence coming back to you. The adoring smile on your face widens to a full fledged grin as if you have just been given all of your dreams in life. It would be impossible for another human to look more reverential than you do in the moment, face pressed against him like you’re venerating a god.

If you could purr, Elias swears you would be.

If he still could, he might be too.

And here's the tattoo you got. Hope you like Night Lord Tribal!

They say bold will hold for a reason. Unfortunately for most serfs, it doesn't have to hold very long. I overlayed it on top of some skin tones so you guys had a better idea of what it looks like on the skin.

I debated doing the entire Fenty Beauty shade range but the time sink was high, so here are 18 common shades. If your skin tone isn't on it, feel free to send me a picture and I'll throw the transparent tattoo on top of it :)

[bamboozledbird]

IGNITE: A Teen Wolf S1 AU (Reader's Version) // Prev. / Chapter 2 / next.

Characters: Stiles Stilinski, fem!reader (You), Lydia Martin, Scott McCall, Allison Argent Pairing: Eventual Stiles x Reader, but man are we talking slow burn Word Count: 6.7k Warnings: Canon typical gore/violence, emetophobia, parental death (rip to your fake mom), descriptions of burning, depictions of depression (apathy, dissociation, 'numb little bug' vibes) Tags: Canon has been lovingly scrapped for parts, author is a chaotic bi and it shows, prolific overuse of the em dash, the slowest of burns i fear

Summary: You can always smell ash long after the fire is gone. Perhaps, that’s why you still can’t breathe without choking on the past. It’s been four years since your mom died. Four years since she burned alive. Four years since you didn’t. You survived, but they must have buried your heart with her because most days you feel like a shadow, some horrifically sad creature caught halfway between a ghost and a lamb for slaughter. 

You can’t scrub the bitter smell of hospital from your memories, not even with denial. Maybe, that’s why death and disease follows Stiles wherever he goes now. It’s been eight years since his mom died. Eight years since he didn’t. Eight years since he decided that he wouldn’t let anyone he loved die ever again. He survived, but Scott’s new-found abilities and the murky world they’ve been dragged into is making it pretty damn hard to keep his promise. 

Time never stops turning. The grief never dissipates. Children soldier on—but in a town where all the monsters under the bed are real and old family skeletons rattle in every closet, how long can two fragile, breakable humans survive? 

Maybe, the real question is how long will they want to? Chapter Summary: After an awkward encounter with Lydia Martin, Stiles realizes that his new acquaintance might be the perfect person to jumpstart his 15-year plan. You, on the other hand, aren't interested in discussing your ex-best friend; you're much more focused on the man who was attacked by the mysterious beast ravaging the town.

A/N: Thank you all so much for the support so far. So many of y'all have been so sweet :') Comments and reblogs are love.

Monday came, and you’d forgotten about Stiles Stilinski and his sweatshirt. In all fairness, you almost forgot your essay too. Lack of sleep, maybe, or perhaps lack of Wellbutrin—you’d also forgotten if you’d taken your pills before you left for school.

You crinkled your nearly empty can of Red Bull a few times and twisted the tab in circles until it snapped off. Nervous habit. You flicked the tab into a trashcan and squeezed the can until it crumpled in on itself. Okay, you’d definitely forgotten to take your pills. However, on your list of things to forget, homework outranked antidepressants by several places, so your day wasn’t off to the worst possible start in the world. Dr. Lin always said that you should spend at least five minutes every morning changing your ‘self-talk’ to ‘gratitude, not negatude’—she also said that consistently taking your meds was imperative to your mental health, but one out of two wasn’t so bad. See. Positive thinking; you were killing it. 

It was, however, pretty damn difficult to put a positive spin on a bloodied school bus cordoned off with yellow crime scene tape. 

You lingered on the outskirts of the swarm of teenagers gawking behind the barricade that a few deputies were fruitlessly attempting to enforce. The back door of the bus was crumpled in the middle, wrenched open, and barely clinging to life with a lone intact hinge. More concerning, was the blood smeared across the yellow paint and the bloody handprints pressed against the windows. You peered through the mass of shoulders in front of you and cupped your hand over your eyes. There were four large gouges in the door and tears in the vinyl seats—claws: you realized. They were claw marks. 

Baffling. The entire scene was, in all sincerity, baffling. 

Awful, you quickly corrected yourself. The carnage was awful, first and foremost. It was awful, horrific, and totally tragic…but it was also bizarre. Animals, wild or not, generally didn’t hunt on school grounds; that honor was reserved for creepy super-seniors and perverse volleyball coaches. You chewed on your bottom lip and stewed. A bear seemed most likely, given the battering the bus took, but Beacon Hills was a long way from Los Padres. Mountain lions and coyotes, on the other hand, often strolled into small-town suburbia to snack on the occasional unaccompanied support animal. Still, you doubted they had the strength or dexterity to rip a steel door off of its hinges. 

The first warning bell rang, and it was especially shrill while you were lost in your own head. You managed to not flinch with a herculean effort and pushed through the remaining voyeurs towards the front doors. Stuffing your airpods into your ears, you turned up the volume on your phone until the bass vibrated all thoughts of coyotes, cougars, and bears out of your mind. Oh my. 

Positive: Ellie Rowsell’s ethereal vocals demanded your full and undivided attention. 

Negative: Ellie Rowsell’s ethereal vocals demanded your full and undivided attention. 

You grabbed your chemistry notecards, a few highlighters, and a fat stack of books from your locker just as an overly-cologned jackass shoved his equally pungent friend straight into your crowded arms.

Positive: You hadn’t gotten the chance to organize your notes by unit number before they scattered all over the floor. 

Negative: They were still scattered all over the floor.

Biting back a few choice expletives, you crouched down and gathered your notecards into a messy heap. You stretched across the scuffed tile for your highlighters; one brushed past your fingertips and rolled into the pointed toe of a sleek brown leather boot. You glanced up, apology ready, but your tongue went cottony when you locked eyes with Lydia Martin.

Lydia Martin was many things to many people, but you supposed the general consensus would be that she was the apex predator—regardless of what the bloodbath outside might lead a person to believe. Most students were consenting prey. Enthusiastically consenting, in fact. You understood the impulse. Knowing she could destroy you, that was the thing that made Lydia so undeniably captivating.

Lydia was…sublime. That was the only word for it. She was the duality of fear and attraction. She defined indefinable beauty—because she wasn’t just beautiful (anybody could be beautiful), Lydia was fiercely beautiful and, in the same breath, the grace of girlhood. She was…she suckerpunched Jordan Aadams in the third grade for making fun of your eyes without lifting a single manicured finger; that was the closest you could come to explaining the phenomenon Lydia Martin left in her wake.

Lydia’s thick red curls spilled over her shoulders as she looked down at the obstacle in her path. The angry pinch in her brows softened briefly once she made eye-contact with you, but she quickly corrected her slip and schooled her face into a blank expression. Returning her attention to her friend, Lydia’s heels clicked against the floor as she stepped over your copy of Metamorphosis and continued on with her conversation like it hadn’t ever stopped. Like you were just a mirage or a distorted oil-slick reflection—like you were a ghost who just wouldn’t fucking die already. You watched her go, forgetting to blink, until they reached Lydia’s locker on the other side of the hall.

Before she got extensions, Lydia liked to wear her hair in a French braid. Before she discovered full-coverage concealer, her freckles were golden against the fairness of her cheeks. Before everything fell apart, she was your best friend. 

In the end, it wasn’t a terribly dramatic thing. There wasn’t a melodramatic scene or an explosive fight; sometimes, you wondered if that would've been better. There was a certain kind of brutality to a slow, quiet death; one that lasted long after the hot water turned cold and shampoo stung your eyes. After the funeral, you could taste decay in your conversations, in your silences. The rot crawled listlessly—everything did back then—tauntingly sluggish. You saw the end coming weeks before you stopped speaking, and you didn’t even try to stop it. To be fair, Lydia didn’t either.

On the first day of seventh grade, Lydia had new friends; they all smelled like vanilla and owned matching couture purses. She’d always been magnetic, but evidently losing her only constant was her final quest before she transcended to godhood. You made her human; that must have been the problem. You were babies together. You were more than family. Now, you sat across from each other in a class you couldn’t bring yourself to care about, and you did not look at each other unless it was straight through.

You snatched the runaway highlighter and quickly sunk back against the wall, pressing into it like you could force your body through the cracks in the bricks or at the very least shed the sentimentality clinging to your skin. You darted your gaze across the hall and almost snorted when you saw the amount of people who’d flocked to Lydia’s side in the span of no more than thirty seconds. Lydia was unobtainable, unknowable—and yet ever so desirable. No one really knew her, so of course they all wanted to be her. 

Lydia only liked one of them, the new girl with shiny black hair and dark eyes; you could tell. Her top lip pursed ever so slightly when she was holding back a barbed comment and a violent eye roll. Usually, Lydia didn’t bother with niceties, but for whatever reason she’d decided her new persona should only intimidate peons with looks and confidence, never brains. It was a shame, really; her cave-dweller boyfriend desperately needed educating. 

You resisted the urge to look across the hall again and smoothed out the bent corner of a notecard until ‘alpha’ became ‘alpha particle’. A shadow fell over the pink-highlighted text, and you frowned. Glancing up, your frown cemented when you saw Stiles’s elven nose and remembered that you still had his sweatshirt wadded on your desk chair.

“Hey,” Stiles adjusted his grip on his backpack, “did your car make it home okay?”

You nodded and shut your locker with your elbow, bending with the wobbling tower of school supplies in your arms until it stabilized again.

“Cool.” He nodded a few times, mouth puckered like a duck, and scratched at the back of his neck, “So. You and Lydia, huh.”

You stared intently at your notes, “Is that a question?”

“No, it’s a statement.” He hooked his thumbs around his backpack straps and leaned back slightly, “And that episode of telepathic taekwondo was definitely a statement.” 

You glowered until ‘alpha decay’ and ‘helium-4 nucleus’ mushed together into an illegible pink blob, “I’ve got a statement for you—only two words actually.” 

“So it is a thing.” You could hear the smirk in his voice as he grabbed the books from under your arms.

You refused to feel grateful, even as you readjusted your grip on your cards and freed one of your hands, “Get lost, Stilinski.”

“That’s three words.” The smirk was deafening now.

The one-minute warning bell rang and a mass of students swarmed the hallway, effectively drowning out Stiles’s smugness with a sea of jock whooping and band geek trumpeting. You met his gaze and smiled, quick and sickly-sweet, before stepping around him, “Kindly. Choke.”

You ignored the sound of Stiles’s large footsteps following far too closely behind you. You wanted to be annoyed with him, but English was his first-period and he did have your books in his stupidly big hands. Instead of flipping him off, you focused your itching fingers on stacking cards and pencils on top of your desk until Stiles sat down in the seat next to you—without permission. You changed your mind; he was annoying. 

Stiles scooted the desk closer to yours with his feet, and the metal legs screeched against the linoleum flooring for you. “Was it like a ‘grew apart over the summer’ thing, or did some serious shit go down?”

You sighed heavily and lined your pencils and pens next to each other, first in order of length and then color, “Why do you care?”

His mouth remained open for a second, and then he shrugged a little too casually, “I’m a naturally inquisitive person.”

“You’re unnaturally irritating,” you grumbled, low in your throat, and scowled at your picked-apart cuticles like they had done you a particular disservice. 

Stiles huffed through his nose and threw his hands in the air, “Come on, I totally saved your ass Friday—very chivalrously too, might I add. I won’t even press charges for the theft.”

“Theft?” you finally turned around in your seat to face him at the accusation. 

Stiles nodded solemnly, “My sweatshirt. My most favorite sweatshirt of all the sweatshirts.”

Oh. You deflated a little; you’d forgotten about that pesky little detail again. You snatched your books off of his desk before your lives could become further entangled and replied flatly,  “I’ll overnight it.”

“No, I insist you keep it.” His smile was a little too crooked to be truly cocky,  “I’m a good guy like that.”

You tapped your pencil against your chin, eraser side up, and cocked your head to the side, “Isn’t it incredible how every self-proclaimed ‘good guy’ is exclusively terrible.”

Stiles’s face twisted into a petulant scowl as he collapsed against the back of his chair, and you were a little surprised that the desk managed to contain all of his gangly appendages without collapsing as well. “I like her, okay!” His exasperated confession carried to the next row of students, and Stiles melted into his seat when a jacked sophomore with no neck whistled lewdly behind you. Squeezing his eyes shut, Stiles lowered his voice, “Actually, I’m kind of in love with her if you want to be technical about it.”

“Oh.” You blinked and then laughed.

“Don’t laugh, asshole.” 

“Sorry,” you grinned, not sorry in the slightest, “it’s just…isn’t everyone?”

Stiles shook his head and sighed wistfully, “Not like I am.”

You turned to get a better look at him and didn’t mask the doubt in your eyes. He was wearing a brown flannel that was practically mewling for a good ironing and a red t-shirt with the silhouette of a spider embossed over his chest. Spider-Man’s emblem, obviously. If you had to hazard a guess, you’d say it was the Andrew Garfield version. Regardless, it was blatantly clear that Stiles’s homeplanet was lightyears away from Lydia’s.  

You folded your arms over your chest and leaned back against your seat, “Have you even talked to her?” 

“Technically…no,” Stiles dipped his head from side to side like a bobble head and then pressed his palms together, gesturing with them every so often to emphasize the most ridiculous words in his sentence, “but we have a deep, unspoken connection, mostly via sporadic eye-contact.”

You just looked at him, unamused and unimpressed.

Stiles held up his hands like a director and kicked his feet onto his desk, “It’s about the long-game.”

“Gross,” you pulled a face. You weren't sure if you were referring to the gray wad of gum stuck to the bottom of his shoe or the pride in his long-con. It was probably a bit of both.

“Are you gonna help a guy out or not?” Stiles nudged the leg of your desk with his sneaker—the gumless one, thankfully—and sent one of your pens careening towards the edge.

You caught it before it could hit the ground and glared at him. “Hate to break it to you, but I’m not an ‘in.’” You returned the pen to its rightful place between your pencil and purple highlighter: a perfect rainbow of neuroticism. You straightened your row of writing utensils again and swallowed shallowly, “I don’t even know her anymore.”

For the first time since Stiles had popped up in front of your locker like a chronic zit, understanding clicked in his eyes. Actually, he almost looked apologetic. Stiles sucked his bottom lip between his teeth and leaned forward onto his forearms, “So…what happened? Did you not make queen bee first-string?”

“No,” you bristled. After a long exhale, you crumpled in on yourself a little and mumbled, “Yes…kind of. I don’t know. I have my version; I’m sure she has hers.”

Stiles clasped his hands together and nodded sagely, “There are as many truths as there are people.”

Your brows scrunched, and your eyes went lidded as you flipped through your mental philosophy rolodex, “Camus?”

He shook his head and clicked his tongue against the back of his teeth, “Evangelion.” 

You were startled into a snorty chortle, “Obviously you’re a weeb.”

Stiles hid his amusement behind a slow roll of his eyes, “You’re at least 1/16 weeb if you know Evangelion is an anime.”

Before you could deny such blasphemy, you were distracted by the boy who usually sat next to you—Greg something, you were pretty sure—coming to a stop directly between you and Stiles. He lingered next to the side of his desk, breathing heavily through his mouth like some kind of sick prowler. 

Stiles glanced at him with a flat expression and then looked up again, brows shooting towards his hairline, when he didn’t leave, “Can I help you?” He jerked his head forward and shook it slightly, “Need a mint?”

Greg Something stared at him, red-rimmed eyes thoroughly glazed over, and you wondered if being faded at 7:45 in the morning was worth the tortuous five-hour wait until lunch. 

“No?” Stiles waved his hand in the air; Greg didn’t even blink. “Okay seeya.”

It took him roughly 30 seconds to comprehend what Stiles was saying, but eventually Greg shuffled towards one of the remaining empty seats in the middle of the classroom. 

“Thank you,” Stiles muttered before returning his attention to the side of your face.

You smirked slightly at your notebook, doodling a little bird with sharp talons along the margins of your notes on Kafka’s thoughts on absurdism—spoiler alert: the guy who wrote a book about a dude randomly transforming into a bug was a big fan of it. You added a long feathered tail to your bird and said, “It is his seat.”

Stiles scoffed and looked over his shoulder. You both watched Greg shove a handful of Cheeto Puffs into his mouth in slow-motion for a moment, and Stiles replied, “I think he’ll live.”

“Oh,” you shook your head a little, freshly bitten lips curling around the extended vowel, “I’m not worried about him.”

Stiles clicked his pen aggressively with his thumb and pressed his mouth together until his lips disappeared into a flat line. “If you would just answer my questions the first time, I wouldn’t have to keep asking them, so, for the love of god—” fortuitously for him, he was cut off by a loud scratchy buzz before you could succumb to your base instincts and throw an eraser into his flapping mouth. 

Principal Montoya’s voice crackled through the loudspeaker, “Attention students: I know that many of you are concerned about the…incident in the parking lot, but rest assured that the police have it well in hand. Classes will proceed as scheduled as they continue their investigation. Have a productive day, Cyclones.”

A resounding groan echoed throughout the classroom and into the hallway, followed by the hum of students breaking into various complaints. Mr. Lyman thwacked his pointer against the whiteboard, and the force of his swing sent the cartoonish hand on the end of the stick into rapid vibration—effectively shutting everyone up. The quiet was only disturbed by the rustle of zippers being unzipped and papers being smoothed when he instructed everyone to turn their essays in. 

You hastily wrote your name across the top of your paper and pointedly kept your eyes on the board when Stiles leaned across his desk. “Life’s short, y’know. One day you’re a traveling salesman, and the next you’re a grotesque, monstrous insect, wishing that you’d seized life when you had the opposable thumbs for it, so—”

“A man just died; have some class,” you interrupted him, voice dry as it was soft. Stiles might not care about getting in trouble, but you’d worked very hard to remain on a no-name basis with all your teachers. 

“We don’t know that he’s dead—or that he’s a he.”

“Oh yeah,” you jotted down the daily prompt in your notebook and muttered, “I’m sure the guy just decided to go home and sleep off the mauled limbs.”

“It could’ve been an animal,” Stiles huffed, bowing his head in submission when Mr. Lyman shot him a stern look from behind his desk. He continued with his hand over his mouth, muffling his words, “And they do run off to die alone.” 

You stared at him for a long moment. “That’s cats. Are you saying a bear ripped a bus apart for a cat.” 

“Well, if you say anything in that tone, it’s going to sound ridiculous,” Stiles muttered sullenly against his palm, and you were pretty sure that he was pouting behind it too.

You opened your mouth to reply and then squinted slightly when a boy with floppy hair skidded to a halt in front of you. His mouth was slightly agape as he looked back and forth between Stiles and Greg, who was now licking the nearly toxic orange dust off of his fingers. 

 “Sit, Scotty,” Stiles jerked his thumb towards the empty desk behind him. “Good boy.”

The boy, Scott you gathered, did not look amused, but he sat down behind Stiles anyway and leaned forward to whisper something in his ear. Stiles whipped around and responded in a hushed screech.

You were distracted from her eavesdropping when Lydia’s friend sat down next to Scott—directly behind you. Her jaw could cut glass. You dropped your chin onto your folded arms and refused to let yourself frown; the end result was a slightly constipated pout. It was just…Allison had just started going to Beacon Hills a few weeks ago, and she was already completely intertwined in Lydia’s life. 

Lydia was…prickly, so you were just surprised, that’s all, how easily Allison fit into her life. More palatable, you thought as you risked a peek over your shoulder; she must be more palatable than most. A terrible, ugly thing creeped over you, and you found yourself imagining Allison choking on her beautiful, silky black hair until her beautiful dark eyes popped out of her head. Just for a moment. A brief, awful, horrible moment—until you remembered it wasn’t Allison’s fault. 

“Hey.” You flinched when you felt a gentle tap on your shoulder.

You reluctantly shifted in your chair so that you could see Allison. You just looked at her for an uncomfortable moment, and Allison smiled awkwardly, “The tests.” You blinked and licked your dry lips, at a loss for words. Allison smiled again, a little nervous but still kind, “They're on your desk.”

“Oh,” you said dumbly and reached for the pile of papers on your desk that you’d missed during your lengthy period of dissociation. You kept one and then held out the rest to Allison, mumbling, “Sorry,” under your breath.

Allison looked at you for a moment, and you didn’t like the discerning look in her doe eyes. “It’s okay. I zone-out all the time.” 

You could see why Lydia liked her; she was nice, overly so. You felt that ugly feeling slip into your mouth again, bitterness coating your tongue, and you wished that Allison was catty or at very least a vapid twit who was either too stupid or too self-involved to notice other people—like the rest of Lydia’s circle. 

“I like your necklace.” Allison nodded a little towards the black chain around your neck. 

A heavy pendant rested just over your sternum; the maze etched into the stone had eroded in places, like it had been left out in acid rain for decades. You weren’t sure exactly what it was made of; your mother never said when she gave it to you, and you never asked. It didn’t matter much now. 

“Thanks,” you finally said, because that was what normal people did when they were complimented, and you were a normal person. Mostly. You swallowed thickly and bit down on the scab in the center of your bottom lip before adding, “I like your jacket.” You did. It was simple, unadorned by gaudy zippers and lapels like so many of the other leather jackets on campus. You would wear it yourself if you didn’t break into a sweat in any temperature warmer than tepid. 

Allison’s cheeks dimpled when she smiled, and you quashed the sigh rising in your throat. Her smile was magnificent. “Thanks. I wasn’t sure if I could pull it off, but my friend convinced me to—” Allison let out a little breathy laugh, “Sorry, you definitely don’t want to hear my jacket’s tragic backstory.”

You didn’t, not if it included hearing about Lydia’s fashion tips second-hand. Still, you scraped up a little smile, “As long as it doesn’t begin with a cow, you’re golden.”

Allison laughed and held up her hands, “It’s faux; I promise.”

“Ladies,” Mr. Lyman called from across the classroom, “I wasn’t aware that existentialism was so amusing.” You felt a dizzying heat crawl up your neck to your ears once you realized that the only noise in the room, other than Allison’s tinkly laughter, was the scratch of pencils on paper as students worked on their tests. 

“Sorry,” you mumbled at the same time, and Allison mouthed another ‘Sorry’ just for you before you turned around. Damn. You liked her. How incredibly inconvenient. You almost wished that Stiles was still pestering you so that you had a real reason to be upset—until you finally got a good look at the mid-term, more specifically at the thickness of it. You flipped through the lengthy test and looked at the ceiling briefly: Six essay questions? 

Positive: At least, you found a legitimate excuse to sulk. 

Negative: You felt a migraine coming on. 

Blessedly, whatever Scott had said to Stiles at the beginning of class was distracting enough to keep his, frankly obsessive, focus on him for the rest of first-period. You were even able to finish the final essay question without interruption—which was plenty difficult without being interrogated about your ex-best friend. You almost scoffed when you read the prompt: Whom do you sympathize with more, Gregor or his family? Who in their right mind would side with a pathetic parasite who couldn’t love anyone more than he hated himself? An uncomfortable, undeniable pang of melancholy sliced through your throat, and you were actually grateful for the distraction when the bell rang for second period and you had to pack up for chemistry. 

The impending chemistry midterm, however, was evidently a touch too distracting because you didn’t notice that you’d regained your lanky shadow until you were in Mr. Harris’s classroom and he stole the flashcard in your hand. Narrowing your eyes, you leaned across the lab table and rocked onto your tiptoes. Your outstretched arm shook as you struggled to even brush your fingers against the cardstock, “I haven’t talked to her in years. Lurk elsewhere.”

Stiles opened his mouth and then shut it again, head bobbing helplessly for a moment, “I was just going to ask you about…Gregor. That last question was a real piece of work, huh.”

You plucked the card out of his grasp while he was distracted by his social ineptitude, “Uh huh.” 

“Scout’s honor,” Stiles placed his hand over his chest and somehow made his big eyes rounder. His pink bottom lip jutted out ever-so slightly, but the quivering at the edges of his mouth gave him away. Sighing, he leaned his weight onto his palm: flat against the tabletop, fingers spread, and far too close to your own. He gestured erratically with his other hand, and you jerked back to avoid being smacked in the face. “Personally, I’m on Grete’s side. I mean, you can only take care of your werebug brother for so long without some kind of recognition before you snap.” Stiles shot a pointed look over his shoulder at his friend from first-period, and you thought the glare Scott returned was well-deserved. You could be biased, but probably not. 

“He was a little preoccupied by being, y’know, a bug.” You shuffled your notecards and frowned pensively at the question that ended up on top of the stack: What is the formula for Calcium acetate?  

“He could’ve said thank you in Morse code.” Stiles looked over your shoulder and added, “C4H6CaO4.”

You flipped the card over and pursed your lips. He was right. “I actually said the same thing,” you admitted begrudgingly as you grabbed the next flashcard from the pile. “Not the Morse code bit, that’s objectively insane. I did say that the best thing he did for her was die.”

“Damn.” Stiles’s forehead wrinkled as he let out a puff of air, “A little harsh.”

You picked at your raw cuticles and wished you could pull your bottom lip over your head. “It’s like you said,” you muttered as you folded your arms firmly over your chest, ducking your chin towards the divot in your breastbone, “she could only deal with his depressed bullshit for so long before she got on with her life and made new, sane, non-insect friends who actually go outside, and have fun at parties, and respond to texts.” You paused and remembered that you needed air to function when your lungs started to burn. Exhaling shallowly, you pressed your calves against the stool’s frigid legs until it hurt. Maybe, if you crushed your limbs together tightly enough, curled in on yourself closely enough, you could disappear. “And don’t, y’know, crawl on the ceiling and projectile vomit Exorcist style,” you finished weakly.

Stiles studied you for a moment, and it was like he could see every painfully tender spot inside you. You felt ants crawling underneath your skin and him seeing you, and you wanted to bolt before you came completely unstitched at the seams. “Well,” he trailed off for a moment, rubbing the back of his head, “in all fairness, being there…that’s kind of the deal when you’re friends—even if they turn into a disgusting bug.” You didn’t know that someone so caustic could sound so gentle, like ink running across paper.

“Siblings.” You swallowed and looked away from his unyielding gaze, but you still saw amber and understanding every time you blinked. “You mean siblings.”

“Sure.” Stiles smiled a little and slid his hands into the front pockets of his jeans, “Siblings.”

You swallowed again, couldn’t even manage a ‘see'ya’ or an eyeroll when he saluted you goodbye, and watched him saunter towards his seat next to Scott through your lashes with your bottom lip tucked between your teeth. You felt a little sick once you realized that you weren’t relieved by his absence. It was all you’d wanted at the beginning of his inquisition, and yet…you wanted him to sit next to you. The epiphany struck you right in the stomach, and you felt a bit like one of your dad’s rare butterflies—tissue paper wings pinned to paper, fervently yearning to fly away, even if it meant ripping yourself apart. 

Normally, you thoroughly enjoyed not having a lab partner. The class had an odd number of students, and Mr. Harris either hadn’t noticed or didn’t care that you never joined another pair during labs. It was a toss-up, considering he seemed to loathe his job as much as he loved devoting his undivided attention to mocking Stiles. Speak of the bifocal-ed Devil. 

“Mr. Stilinski,” the contempt in Mr. Harris’s voice was sickeningly viscous. You imagined mucus dripping from his thin lips; it helped quell some of the righteous anger in your gut. He continued, and now he was spitting up slugs and snot, “If that’s your idea of a hushed whisper, you might want to pull the headphones out every once in a while. I think you and Mr. McCall would benefit from a little distance, yes?”

“No–” Stiles’s jaw hung open as he shook his head violently. 

Mr. Harris silenced him with a glare, and your fingers curled into your palms as you watched the condescension gloss over his smirk when Stiles complied. Your jagged, bitten-down nails pinched your skin; you quickly flattened your hands on top of the table before you did something stupid like draw attention to yourself. It was none of your business, after all, and you had a test to prepare for. 

You stared at your notes, reread the same sentence over and over again without comprehending a single word, until you felt the uneasy sensation of someone sneaking up behind you.

“Hey,” Stiles sat down on the empty stool next to you and kicked at your shoe lightly under the table. You hummed in recognition and slid your textbook over to make room for his things. 

Stiles’s face scrunched as he flipped through his own notes. You couldn’t read most of it—not that you were looking; his hand-writing was just glaringly atrocious. Everything was smooshed together and most of the letters were partially incomplete, like his pencil couldn’t keep up with his brain. You looked back at your own notebook, at the meticulously symmetrical loops and compulsively straight lines, and the corner of your mouth curled into a brief smile. 

The quiet was nice, but you couldn’t shake the irritation sticking to your fingers. You tapped your pencil against your notebook a few times, bit down on the inside of your cheek, and then said, “He’s a dick.” You spoke quietly, but Stiles still flinched. The highlighter in his hand left a long yellow streak across his textbook, and you winced. Truthfully, you were equally startled that you’d voluntarily broken a perfect moment of silence. 

Stiles didn’t seem bothered by the new mark permanently defacing his book, most likely because a good portion of the glossy pages were already more yellow than they were white. He angled his chin towards you and smirked, “Are you legally allowed to call a teacher a dick? Y’know, as the resident teacher’s pet.” 

You grinned at your notes, “I have the utmost authority, actually.”

Stiles leaned forward onto his forearms and struggled to keep his mouth impassive, “Oh, yeah?”

A loud, grating squeal of metal on tile and an even louder yelp interrupted your reply. A girl near the front of the classroom shot up out of her seat, almost sending her stool toppling to the ground, and then bolted towards the window overlooking the parking lot, “I think they found something!” 

Mr. Harris quickly lost control of the classroom as the rest of the class surrounded her, practically pressing their stupefied faces against the glass to get a better look at what, or rather whom, the EMTs were wheeling out of the thicket of trees just beyond the school’s perimeter. You hesitated for a moment before joining the stragglers. Morbid fascination dwindled after you were confronted with the reality of it—you weren't in any rush to see another dead body. 

You weren't ever supposed to actually see the photos; they were strictly evidence for the potential arson investigation. The coroner didn’t even want your dad to see the body. There hadn’t been any point, after all; it was completely unidentifiable. At the time, you thought it would help. You thought peeking at the case file while the Sheriff was on the phone might remind you of some crucial detail, hidden in the depths of your blackout—and, well, you thought it might finally make it real. Maybe, if you saw the proof, you’d finally believe that your mom wasn’t coming back. 

You’d been wrong, of course. Seeing what was left of your mom, seeing her like…that, it’d just made you puke. Your whole body had trembled from the retching, and then you were paralyzed, held hostage by a glacial streak of terror. Sheriff Stilinski had been so terribly understanding about the whole thing, like it was nothing: vomit on his office floor, trembling hands invading his private files. He’d just wiped the corners of your mouth with a tissue and rubbed your upper back in slow circles, just like her your mom did when you were sick—which ultimately sent you into another round of dry-heaving. You never felt the temptation to look again. 

You let out a deep breath when you looked out the window and saw the man on the gurney twitch. His jacket and pants were black, and his shirt was charcoal gray, dark enough to hide any blood stains. The only injury you could make out was a large gash on his face; it was still bleeding sluggishly, leaving a sticky red trail from his jaw to his neck. Your grip on your forearms tightened as your stomach lurched. 

The paramedics began to load the gurney into the ambulance, and the man surged forward without a single warning. His screams were raw, like they’d been ripped from his throat along with the flesh on his cheek, and every single one of the students crowded against the windows recoiled from the wailing. You swallowed the bile burning your throat. It was like they were watching their own, personal horror movie and couldn’t decide if they were more exhilarated or horrified—just itching for the jump scare. 

You stumbled back towards the door and bumped into Stiles and Scott. Stiles gripped your arm gently until you regained your footing.

“That’s not a rabbit,” Scott said under his breath. He looked as queasy as you felt.

“Or a cat,” you added quietly.

“But he’s alive,” Stiles nudged Scott a little, “that’s good, right? Dead guys can’t do that.”

Scott still looked like he was going to hurl all over Stiles’s white Vans, and you felt a flutter of sympathy. The only thing worse than puking was doing it in front of other people. “You might want to take him somewhere,” you spoke softly to Stiles. “He looks like he’s going to pass out.”

“Yeah,” Stiles nodded a little and wrapped an arm around Scott’s rigid shoulders, “good call.” 

His eyes darted around the classroom: big, and brown, and frantic—like a lost fawn. You nodded towards the dark corner Mr. Harris was dissociating in, “I’ll cover for you.”

“Yeah?” Stiles smiled a little, but he looked weary down to his bones as he started shuffling Scott towards the door. 

“Yeah,” your smile was a bit wobbly at the edges, “but only ‘cause I get a sick thrill out of fucking with dicks.” 

Your weak attempt to ease some of the tension in the air was semi-successful; Scott was still staring into another dimension, but Stiles looked positively giddy at the prospect of such a perfect setup. “I have, just, so many thoughts on that, but I’ll save them for after Scott—” he gave Scott a long look and scratched the back of his buzzed head, “gets his blood sugar up.”

It was sweet, you thought as you watched Stiles guide Scott into the hallway, lying to spare Scott’s pride. You thought Stiles would be a better liar, but maybe that was the downfall of being raised by a police officer. It was either that or the general social impotence. Not that you had much room to talk; silence was your preferred method of social interaction. 

The classroom was far from silent now. Students were spread out across the room in little clumps. Some spoke in furious whispers. Others weren’t as discreet, and you could hear every single preposterous word that left their mouths. The amount of sophomores who didn’t know that the California grizzly bear went extinct almost a century ago was a very depressing glimpse into the public education system, but at least there were only two boys howling obnoxiously at a few giggling volleyball girls. Rolling your eyes, you pulled out your phone and typed ‘Beacon Hills bus attack’ into the search bar. 

You refreshed the webpage obsessively, all throughout chemistry and art class, until an article finally popped up on your screen at lunch. You bit into your slightly bruised apple and squinted at your phone, immensely grateful for the empty courtyard as you came across the grittier details. 

You always ate lunch outside; it was quieter without the echoes of gossip and laughter, and the heady scent of cut grass was far preferable to whatever monstrosity the cafeteria was serving that day. Today, the afternoon heat made the earthy warmth especially thick in the air. Normally, you loved that smell, the smell of summer. It reminded you of frenzied August afternoons, running through Lydia’s sprawling backyard and swinging into brisk lake water, but the smell was quickly becoming suffocating the more you read. 

The man who was attacked was a bus driver. He was smiling in the photo they’d chosen to include before pictures of the crime scene, like a warped ‘before and after’ ad. You dropped your half-eaten apple into your lunch sack and shoved it to the side when you got to the background bits. Garrison Myers had a family, a wife and two daughters; they were praying for his unlikely survival. Your throat hurt, and you wondered if there was an apple chunk lodged in your esophagus. Swallowing hard, you scrolled down to the police interview. The deputy they managed to get a quote from clearly knew next to nothing, though he did posit the possibility of a mountain lion attack. You rolled your eyes. Maybe on PCP. 

The only thing you were sure of was that whatever kind of beast ripped a woman in half and slashed a man to ribbons in the span of a week wasn’t going to stop. At least, not until it was killed.

[babyonboard]

Ultraviolence | part 1

Bradley Bradshaw x F!Reader x Jake Seresin

Summary: You and Bradley loved each other, and Jake was just your old friend from high school who you tried to pay no mind to. At least that's how it used to be.

Word Count: 9.7k (for one part? oops!)

Warnings/tags-18+ MDNI, infidelity, some alcohol abuse, emetophobia, talk of body image, so much cussing?? smut, oral, Bradley is so sexy but also a dick. Jake is a dick but also so sexy. Enemies to Lovers (ish), slowburn(ish)

You weren’t the only person who thought Jake Seresin was completely and fully infuriating. He was cocky, he had a loud mouth, his cologne was entirely too strong, he made everything about him, and, worst of all, he was insatiably alluring. You’ve known him since high school, which is about 8 years longer than you’ve known your husband Bradley. You could swear under oath that Jake’s ego grows every passing second. But truly, who could blame him? A blonde, tan skinned Texan with an old Hollywood smile. Wealthy parents and always top of his class. The only thing, the only person that has ever given him an ego check, was you. 

When you were 23, you moved into the apartment next to Bradley. At the time, he was just your insanely hot neighbor who also happened to be a navy aviator. To him, you were his sweet, absolute doll of a next-door-neighbor who smelled like vanilla when he passed you in the hallway and would never in a million years be interested in him. The two of you engaged in occasional small talk in the elevator, he helped you move your new desk up the stairs, and he asked you to feed his dog when he would leave for the weekend. Eventually he started inviting you over for wine after he got off work, his smile made you feel more tipsy than any moscato ever could. Before long, you were sleeping in his bed just as much as he would sleep in yours. You cooked him dinner after work, and he would bring you flowers on Saturdays. Bradley was so sweet in the beginning. He still had his class-clown charm, but he was warm and charismatic. Anybody would have fallen under his spell, and you were no exception. 

Bradley was so excited to bring you around his friends. You were funny and sexy as fuck, and he wanted to show you off. He brought you to the Hard Deck to meet them all for the first time. Well, meet them all except one for the first time. 

When your eyes fell on Jake Seresin, his unmistakable smile plastered on his face as he took a swig from his beer, your jaw fell open. “Is that Jake Seresin?” You gasped. Even though you asked it as a question, you knew the answer. That Texan with blonde hair and a visible attitude was undoubtedly Jake Seresin.

Bradley’s stomach dropped. “Oh god, you know hangman?” He could have gotten on his knees right there and prayed to god that you weren’t Jake’s ex girlfriend, or ex hookup, or ex anything at all. A part of him actually hoped that you hated him. 

Jake’s eyes scanned the bar, coming to a stop on you. His eyes widened and his brows furrowed, and a wide mouthed smile started to spread across his face. Y/N. Y/N from high school. You looked so different, but still exactly the same. He beelined for you, shaking his head as he approached. The warmth that your smile stirred up in his stomach was oh so familiar, the same warmth that Rooster felt everyday. 

“Y/N L/N” he chuckled. 

“Jake Seresin.” You laughed. 

“You two know each other?” Bradley interjected. 

“We went to high school together.” You said, setting your arm on Bradley’s shoulder. The feeling of your gentle hand on him calmed whatever possessive jealousy was coursing through his veins. 

Bradley was not jealous of Hangman. Nope, not at all. He didn’t care that the two of you knew each other 4 years ago, and he definitely didn’t care that Hangman bought you a drink “for old times sake.” It didn’t bother him that the man who proposed the most competition in the sky was now chatting up his girl, proposing a completely new type of competition. Not one bit.

“You jealous?” You approached Bradley from across the bar. He shook his head, unclenching his jaw. He grabbed you by your belt loop, beer in his other hand, and pulled you towards him. “Should I be?” He asked. Quiet, diluted venom laced his words. You dropped your act, he was actually mad. Realizing that it might not be as funny as you thought it was, you brought your hand up to his neck. 

He didn’t look you in the eyes, his gaze completely past your face and on the bar behind you. This upset him more than you realized. “I promise you it’s not like that. I’m with you.” He looked at you again. You used your grip on the back of his neck to pull his face towards you. “Plus he’s a dick.” A smile finally cracked on Bradleys face, and the two of you laughed. His hands slid down your back and onto your ass. He hoped Hangman was watching. 

“And…” He squeezed your ass “I’m the one who gets to fuck you every night.” 

Hangman was watching, not even by choice at this point, more so because he just could not tear his eyes away from how your ass looked in those jeans. But he didn’t actually care that you were Bradley’s. Sure, you were sexy as hell, and he liked giving Rooster a run for his money, but he wasn’t dead set on having you. At least not tonight.

Rooster took you home that night and he tore those jeans right off of you. He fucked you good, made you tell him you were his. And you did, you repeated it like a mantra. I’m yours Bradley. All yours, no one else's. 

From that point on you understood that there needed to be a boundary with Jake. You knew that since you and Bradley were together, you would see Jake a lot. Out at the bars, military balls, absolutely anything work related, but also socially because Bradley and Jake really were friends. You kept your distance from Jake when you saw him, only talking to him in groups and letting Bradley hang all over you when he was around. This, in turn, drove Jake crazy. Thinking back on his life, you were the only girl that he truly could not have. Back in high school he was never really that interested in you. You had mutual friends and saw each other at parties. He was in your prom group and he was your assigned lab partner in sophomore chemistry. You never particularly caught his eye, but he never caught yours either. He kicks himself now on the missed opportunity, but how was he supposed to know you would turn into the smokeshow you are now? It drove him up the fucking wall.

As time went on and Bradley and Jake got closer, it became more socially acceptable for you to talk to Jake. North Island was a small town, and while a lot of the aviators left to different bases, Bradley and Jake stayed. Maybe it was maturity, or maybe it was because he stopped caring, but Bradley didn’t pay any mind to you and Jake anymore. You were open to talk to him whenever you pleased, as long as you let Bradley come up and kiss your neck at some point in the conversation. Jake became your beer pong and darts partner, and the two of you were frequently laughing over old high school memories. He talked far too much about his high school football career and how great he was. Thinks he could’ve gone pro, but chose to be a military hero instead. Of course, Jake was still arrogant with unhealthy levels of confidence. He talked to you like you were in love with him and he knew it, which could not be further from the truth. 

One night in particular, at one of the many military award balls, you thought about re-establishing that boundary you used to have. Bradley looked so good in his dress whites, and you complimented him so well in your floor length, shimmery gold dress. Bradley had done exceptionally well that year, he was receiving praises all night from his fellow aviators and whatever military big-shots that chose him to win awards. While he was off accepting these gracious compliments, reasonably leaving you alone at the table, Jake approached you. He didn't say anything, he just pulled out the chair next to you and sat down. He also looked incredibly good in his dress whites, but in a different way than Bradley. You mentally scolded yourself when you thought about how good looking he was. He sighed next to you, neither of you acknowledging the other at first. Your gaze was on Bradley, who was graciously shaking someone's hand and laughing. You sipped your wine, finishing the whole glass. “You clean up nice.” He said, finally looking over at you. You could smell his cologne. It was musky and clean and it burned your nose.

“Likewise.” You smiled softly at him. He looked at you like he needed to say something, like he was dying to. A smirk, or maybe a smile played on his lips. Your gaze rested on his mouth for a second, discerning between the two. “What?” You giggled to ease whatever tension was hanging between you.

“Nothing.” He continued his heavy gaze on you. “Just memories.” You wanted to roll your eyes, he is so cliche, but you decided to be nice. His blue eyes were hard to tear your eyes away from, but you did, and looked around to see Bradley, who was now talking to a girl who was one of his copilots. 

“If I remember correctly, that dress is the same color your prom dress was.” He gestured down at your golden dress, now dragging on the floor and stuck under your chair. 

You straightened your back. “Yeah. Yeah it is.”

He nodded with a smile. “I knew it.” Another moment passed, and you subconsciously looked back to where Bradley was, but you didn’t see him anymore. 

“Can I tell you a secret?” Jake leaned his arms against the white table cloth, bunching it up under his forearms as they slid a little closer to you. 

“Yes…” You tilted your head. His cologne was burning your nose and your eyes and lighting your skin on fire. Jake Seresin was beautiful to admire from afar, but now, he was up close. He was close to your face, close enough to touch, close enough that if you wanted to kiss him you could grab his face and do it. 

“I really liked you back in high school.” Whatever smile-smirk he had was spreading across his face. Like a wildfire, the smirk spread onto your lips too. 

“That’s not true.” You looked down, this moment sending you straight back into your 17 year old persona, shy and bashful. Maybe Jake was also taking on his 17 year old persona, or maybe he’s still the same charming and confident boy he’s always been. 

“It is.” He said. You didn’t know this, but he was lying. He was indifferent about you in high school, but he does wish he would have paid more attention to you back then. Maybe then he would be the guy with the girl in the gold dress, not Bradley.

“You never paid any attention to me in high school. And you always had a girlfriend.” You reached for your glass to give you something to do with your hands, even though it was empty.

“So? I remembered your prom dress, didn't I?” He did not, in fact, remember your prom dress. He had recently stalked your facebook. “You looked so gorgeous that night.”

You could do nothing but try and push away your smile. Jake Seresin was a hypnotic, poisonous virus that could work its way under any girl's skin, and once again, you were absolutely no exception.

“I mean, you looked almost as good as you look tonight.” He finally broke eye contact, a subconscious attempt to seem coy. 

Snapped out of the blue eyed trance, you shook your head. “Thank you, Jake.” You said. Clearing your throat, you wanted to change the subject, to get rid of this strange feeling in your stomach. "Where's your date? Jessica, right? Oh no, wait, Jessica was who you brought to the bar last weekend. Emma is your date tonight, right?" You weren't trying to embarrass him, it was more an attempt to figuratively slap him in the face for flirting with you.

A scoff broke through the laugh he let out. He couldn't deny these claims, they were obviously true. "I don't really know where she is." He looked around in a fake attempt to find her. "And I don't really care right now." He looked back at you, and you had to look away. It was entirely too much, his cologne, his dress whites, his eyes, and his flattery. It stirred up your stomach in a way you hadn’t felt in a long time. “I’m gonna go find Bradley.” You breathed out. You stumbled as you stood up and walked away. 

It wasn’t wrong, you weren’t doing anything. Jake complimented you and you talked about high school, what else is new? But for some reason, you couldn’t shake that guilty feeling out of your conscience, even when you found Bradley and he looked so hot and you forgot about every other man that existed while he fucked you that night, the dress that Jake loved oh so much bunched up around your waist. 

When you and Bradley got married, Jake was one of the groomsmen. He stood right by Bradley at the altar, he teared up at his vows. It was around this time that Jake started to treat you differently. He was nicer, gentler, and didn't treat you like a sexual venture. He still infuriated everyone else, but he was softer with you. He brushed off what he felt for you as a protectiveness. You were his best friend's wife, he knew you since you were 15. He knew a different side of you, and he felt the need to protect you. And he told himself that’s all it was. Even if it was something more, he would never act on it. He knew he would just have to settle for occasionally thinking you were hot when he saw you, and occasionally thinking about you while he had another girl underneath him, wondering if Rooster fucks you the way he would. The way you deserve. He knows he doesn’t.

You didn’t really get much time to talk to Jake on your wedding day, but to be honest, it never really crossed your mind. Not until you were at your way-to-expensive open bar, ordering another cocktail, and he came up behind you. “Hi there bride.” He said.

You turned to face him and the air leaving his lungs was almost audible. Oh my god did you look beautiful. Your hair pulled away from your face, a few strands hanging in your face from dancing. Glitter on your eyelids, your lips slightly puffy from so much kissing and singing and talking. And you smiled when you saw him.

“Jake!” You smiled. Yes, you were tipsy, but you would have been excited to see him regardless. You swung your arms around his neck and pulled him into a hug. Your perfume and his cologne mixed in the air around the two of you. He wrapped his arms around your torso and tucked his nose down on your shoulder. 

“You look gorgeous, Y/N.” He said against your ear. You closed your eyes and hummed. 

He felt like a sticky mouse trap that you couldn’t pull yourself away from. “Thank you.”

Whether it was subconscious or not, you forced yourself to break the hug and turn back to the bar to get your drink. All he could do was watch as you gave him a drunk wink and walked away.

Back in the real world, Bradley smiled when you came into view. “There she is!” He grabbed your hand and spun you around to the music. He sang to you and held you around the waist. The music was loud and your vision was slightly hazy and you were the happiest you had ever felt. Bradley kissed you every chance he got, calling you his wife even more than that. How could you, much less anyone not love this man? 

A cute little house on North Island, not far from the ocean. Two dogs, a newlywed couple, and lots of love to go around. That’s how it was for a year or so. You wouldn’t say picture perfect, because every family has its flaws, but it was perfect for you. Bradley would go to work, you would go to yours, and when you got home the two of you would eat dinner and watch a show together. Bradley loved getting home from a long day and fucking his wife good and long until he was scared the neighbors might hear. It was simple, but it was nice.

You simply cannot pinpoint the exact time things started to change. To be fair, you couldn’t expect things to go perfectly in your marriage for the rest of your life, but you wish they didn’t go the way this one was. He would come home from work later, say he already ate, and leave you eating by yourself at the kitchen table. He never wanted to shower with you anymore, which used to be his favorite activity. He didn’t fuck you as much, or as good as he used to. It was half-assed, almost like it was a chore. Missionary in bed a few times a week, and there were a couple of times where he didn’t finish, which left you embarrassed with a vulnerable pit in your stomach. You thought he was just getting bored, which people had warned you would happen, so you pulled out all the stops. You bought new fancy lingerie, you sent him absolutely filthy texts while he was at work, you wore no underwear and told him as you were leaving the house. All things that used to rile him up. And sometimes it worked. Sometimes he would get one of those texts at work, come home and see you on your bed in deep red lingerie, and he would crawl on top of you and all would be right in the world. But it always ended up fizzling back out into you wondering what in the hell you were doing wrong. You wanted nothing more in the world than to please him, and you couldn’t even do that. He still told you he loved you every day, and he still kissed you on the forehead before bed, but you couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.

Like any other person with a brain, the possibility of him cheating on you had come to mind several times. But you were always able to shake it off, he would never. Not Bradley, not your Bradley. 

On Bradleys 29th birthday, you threw him a party. All of his copilots were there, Phoenix even drove in from Seal Beach. Jake was there, of course, he only lived a few blocks away. He brought Bradley a birthday present and he brought you a bottle of wine. He said it was because he knew you worked so hard on the party, and you couldn't wipe a star struck slap happy smile from your face. You knew Bradley would be getting messy that night, he had always been a drinker, especially around these pilots that you considered family. When it was only 8pm and he was already slurring his words and stumbling into furniture and had sunglasses on inside, you caught him in the kitchen as he was pouring himself another screwdriver. 

“Hi baby.” You smiled, approaching him, an attempt to slow his drinking down. 

He didn’t look up at you as he continued pouring vodka into his cup. “Hi sweetheart.”

You walked over to him and set your hand on his back. “It’s early, why don’t you slow down a little. Maybe have some water or eat something, then pick up where you left off?”

He continued making his drink. “How about…” he set the bottle back on the counter and stumbled away from you “You leave me alone.” 

Immediately taken back, your eyebrows furrowed. “What?” Whether he was bored with you or not, that was completely and totally unlike Bradley to say.

“Get off my fuckin’ case.” His sunglasses slid down his nose. 

Javy stuck his head in the kitchen. “Rooster, beer pong, come on.” He said. One look at your face and his expression changed, figuring he must have walked in on something. “You good?” he asked. He must have saw your glistening eyes or maybe he heard your pounding heartbeat that you could feel so clearly in your ears. Bradley walked past you and towards Javy. “She’s fine. You know how girls are.” he mumbled, disappearing out of the kitchen. “Ol' ball and chains.” you heard him say down the hallway.

You could not stop your mouth from falling open. The boredom you could take. You could tolerate him not treating you the same way he used to, but where did this sudden resentment come from? You wanted to cry. You wanted to lay on the floor of your kitchen and curl up in a ball and cry because you threw such a nice party for your husband that you loved and the only thing he said to you all night was to leave him alone. But, you can’t cry. At least not right now. You walk back out into the party, faking a smile and finding a spot on your couch to sit. 

“Hey party girl.” Jake sat down next to you. 

“Hi Jake.” You smiled.

He tilted his head down and quirked his eyebrow. “What's the matter?”

You shook your head in surprise that your fake smile was not in fact working, narrowing your eyes back at him. “Nothing.”

“Come on…” He poked your side, causing you to squirm away from him. “What’s wrong?”

You sighed. “It's nothing. Just- I’ll tell you later.” you had no intentions of actually telling him later, you just wanted him to stop asking, stop seeing directly through you.

Why Jake could read you like an open book? You didn’t know, but he could. It felt like he could read your mind, which you prayed wasn’t true, because then someone other than yourself would know about the pit in your stomach, or between your legs, that you got when you were around him. 

You watched Bradley as he played beer pong, shouting and laughing and drinking. It made you smile, seeing him happy. It feels like it was just yesterday when you would’ve been right up there next to him, having fun with him. You wish you knew what changed.

“How’s your new job going?” Jake's deep voice shook you out of your trance. 

You looked over at him, slightly taken back. You did not expect a single person at this party to ask you a question about yourself tonight. They were always too busy talking about their latest aircraft or their latest achievements in the field. “It’s good…” your voice was raised over the music and the shouting of the party. “I’m surprised you remembered.”

He looked sarcastically offended. “What? How could I forget?” He wasn’t lying. He wasn’t going to admit that he had been reading online about you, looking a little too long at your headshot on the law firm's website. He read an article about you from a local news site, it was really about one of the lawyers at the law firm that you worked at, but you were mentioned as the paralegal. A small picture of you and the lawyer was fit in between paragraphs, and he would be embarrassed if anyone found out how many times he had looked at it. A feeling of pride swelled in his chest whenever he did. 

You looked down at your lap and smiled. He was pressed up against you on the living room couch, you could smell his beer and you could feel his thigh against yours. “Are you sure you’re okay?” He asked again, his voice merely a rumble beneath the music.

You nodded. “I’m fine.” Looking up at him, he gave you a look. A look he had probably given you in high school chemistry at some point when you answered a question with something that didn’t make sense. His blue eyes burned holes through your soul and you felt like all of your thoughts and secrets were floating through the air, being breathed in by him. “Its just…” you looked over at your husband, who was now chugging a drink out of a red solo cup, Javy and Mickey cheering him on as usual. “Bradley.” You wanted to continue, to tell him everything, but you didn’t want to start crying. 

Jake nodded in understanding. It pissed him off that Rooster was doing this to you. You didn’t deserve this. He didn’t know for sure what was going on, but everyone could sense that something had changed with Bradley in the past year. Jake thinks it's because he’s gotten a lot more cocky since their last mission, he thinks he's too good for the dagger squad now. Whatever it was, it was effecting you, and that was crossing a fucking line. 

You and Jake stayed like that on the couch for a while longer. You enjoyed his comfort and company, and he didn’t want to leave you here upset. In a desperate attempt to see you laugh, he tried to tell you a story from high school, involving your old best friend. It made you crack a smile, your warm soul glowing through your teeth and nearly blinding him. It made him feel better to see you smile, but he could not shake the anger he was feeling towards Bradley right now. He wished he could get up and walk over to Bradley, grab him by the shoulders, and yell at him that he doesn't even know how good he has it.

As you suspected, Bradley was entirely too drunk by 11. Like, laying on the floor of the bathroom drunk. While you were in the bathroom taking care of Bradley as he threw up, the party guests slowly made their drunk exits. Bob nearly had to drag Phoenix and Payback out your front door, not before wishing Bradley one last happy birthday and thanking you for throwing the party. Everyone else stumbled out to their ubers, leaving you basically alone on the cold bathroom floor, completely sober. 

You sat next to Bradley and rubbed his back while he was bent over the toilet. The main goal at this point was to get him upstairs to his bed. Once you presumed he was done, you patted his sweat covered hair. “How about we get you to bed, huh?” He nodded, his eyes closed.

It took some strength to help him up off of the floor, but this wasn’t your first rodeo. You held him up while you stumbled out of the bathroom and into the living room. You weren’t expecting to see Jake, but there he was. He was holding a trash bag and was picking up the cans and solo cups that were littered all over. Startled, you immediately felt bad. “You don’t have to do that Jake, seriously. You can go home, I’ll get it tomorrow.”

He looked up to see you holding Bradley up, his head hanging and barely coherent. “Oh, I don’t mind. It’ll only take me a minute, then I’ll be out of your hair.” You opened your mouth to protest, but he stopped you. “Really. It’s fine. Go put him to bed.” He was stern, almost demanding. You nodded and continued dragging Bradley to your bedroom. The stairs were the hardest part, it felt like you were lifting dead weight. You didn’t want to wrestle with changing his clothes, so you settled for getting his jeans off, leaving him in his shirt and boxers. You got him into bed, and pulled the covers up over him. When tucking him in, it was impossible for your heart to not swell, or maybe ache, in moments like this. 

He mumbled something, it didn’t even sound like english. “What’d you say baby?” You reached your hand up to push his hair off of his forehead. 

“I love you.” He said, crystal clear. It felt like some type of weight was lifted off of your heart, making your eyes soften. You continued to stroke his hair for a moment, basking in his words. 

“I love you too.” You said softly. He didn’t respond, didn’t even flinch. 

For a few moments, everything was okay. You and Bradley were married and happy and he loved you. You’re not sure how long you sat there petting his hair. Definitely a few minutes. The sound of Jake putting away the folding table downstairs made you get up. You pulled a trash can next to Bradley and took one last look at him. You weren’t sure if you should smile or cry. 

Back downstairs, Jake had made quick work of cleaning everything up. “Jake, you’re seriously a saint.” You breathed out. 

“Only for you” he said, pushing a chair back to its original spot. Not taking time to dwell on whatever that statement meant, you helped him move that last few pieces of furniture. 

“Okay. Dishes.” He said, walking past you into the kitchen. 

“Jake-” You followed after him “You can go home, you don’t have to help, there isn’t even that many-”

“It's okay. I want to help you.” He said, turning to you with a simple smile. You didn’t want to force him out of your house. In fact, you didn’t want him to leave. Music was still playing from the party, but it was much quieter now. It was yacht rock, Bradley’s favorite. 

Jake cleaned the dishes, you dried them and put them away. “You know,” He started, rinsing out the bowl he was holding. “I wish I had a girl in my life who threw me birthday parties and carried me around when I was drunk.”

You didn’t look up from the plate you were drying off. "You're telling me one of your many girls isn't dying to do something like this for you?"

He laughed softly, but shook his head. "That's not the same."

"Why not?" You crossed the kitchen to put away a cutting board.

"Because you guys are married. I wish I had a wife. Someone like you."

Maybe it was because something about Jake makes everyone feel vulnerable, but you felt like you could tell him all of your problems, like some type of truth serum was laced in his voice. “I don’t even think Bradley wishes he had that.”

You opened the cabinet to put the plate away while Jake looked at you. “Is everything okay with you two? I don’t want to pry or anything.” But the thing was, he did want to pry. He wanted to know everything about your relationship, he wants to know how often Rooster tells you he loves you, what he says to you when he fucks you, and everything in between. 

“Um…” You thought about how honest you should be. “I mean, everythings okay on my end. It’s just… I don’t know what’s going on with Bradley. I think he’s getting bored of me.”

“I don’t think that's possible.” Jake said, handing you a bowl, the water from his fingers dripping onto yours. “That can’t be right. Nobody could ever get bored of you.” 

You sighed and put the bowl in the cabinet in front of you. “Then I don’t know what’s going on. He’s more distant, not as talkative, he doesn’t-” You stopped yourself, unable to talk to Jake about your sex life with Bradley. Jake was your friend, but it felt wrong.

“He doesn’t what?” Jake asked. There were no more dishes to be washed, so he leaned his hands against the counter. Looking over at him was a mistake. He had a smug look on his face, the one he always wore. You swear it gives you goosebumps. It was clear that he knew what you were talking about. “He doesn’t fuck you the same anymore?”

Completely unable to break eye contact, you simply nodded. The sound of the sink running was the only thing breaking the silence between the two of you. “Does he fuck you at all?” He spoke slowly, raising his eyebrows slightly. 

“Yes. But not as often. And not the same.” You weren’t lying, you weren’t necessarily crossing a line, you weren’t doing anything wrong. That’s what you were telling yourself. 

Jake looked down, his hand coming up to rub his jawline, subconsciously drawing your attention to it. Tongue in his cheek, he nodded. “Huh. What a shame.” He looked back up at you, your cheeks hot and most likely getting red. “You don’t deserve that.”

All you could do was nod once again. The silence wasn’t awkward, but it was thick. It was hot and it filled your lungs. 

“Does he even make you cum anymore?” His words were heavy. Meticulous but outright impulsive. Like he had wanted to ask you that for so long, but the sentence finally fell out of his mouth without permission.

Your mouth suddenly felt dry, and you tried to swallow. Blood was rushing to your face and your ears and making your heart speed up. This conversation felt wrong. No, it was wrong. But your conscience was muffled by the sound of your heartbeat in your ears and the fluttering in your stomach. “No.” The word rolled off of your tongue and out of your mouth. 

He was standing so close to you and you thought that if he wanted to bend you over this counter right now, he could. “That must be…” His hand came up to your arm and his fingers trailed along your skin lightly. “So frustrating.”

Inexplicably, Bradleys face flashed in your mind, laying in your shared bed right above the two of you. You cleared your throat and looked down, grabbing the last plate that needed put away. Detaching his fingers from you, you reached up and put the plate in the cabinet. He looked down at the counter, then turned the sink off. The only sound was coming from the radio.

As if almost on cue to change the subject, as if that last interaction didn’t happen at all, Jake pointed to the speaker. “Oh! Duet time.” Jake smiled. 

“What?” You laughed. Then you heard the song “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart” playing on the radio. Before you had time to protest, Jake was already across the room, turning the speaker up. When he turned back to you, he started singing Elton John's part. He pointed to you when it got to the girls part, and you laughed. “No, Jake, I can’t.” You spoke over your part.

He furrowed his eyebrows and swayed over to you, he was not the best dancer, but you already knew this. He sang his part and reached out for your hands. You rolled your eyes, but couldn’t keep your laughter down. You gave him your hands and he pulled you into the middle of the kitchen. He danced around with you, and you sang when it got to your part. The goofiest smile sat on his face, it was so much different than his usual smug smile. The two of you sang and danced and spun around in the middle of your kitchen. And you laughed. You really, truly laughed. And that alone made Jake's heart swell.

By the end of the song, one of Jake's arms was around your waist, the other was holding your hand, swaying you to the music. As the song ended, you set your forehead against his shoulder, a way of surrendering. His shirt bunched up under your nose, and you had to fight the urge to turn your head against his neck and breathe in his cologne. His hand on the small of your back was gentle, almost like he was trying to not hurt you.

You lifted your head up and met his eyes. You could feel his heart beating under your hand and the skin on your waist burned under his fingers. “I’m scared that Bradley is cheating on me.” You blurted out before you had time to think about what you were saying. 

He exhaled, you felt the air on your face. Miraculously, he shook his head. “I don’t think he would do that.” His face was angled down at yours.

Nodding, you looked down. It made you feel better to hear it from someone else. Jake was still holding onto you, and your hand was still on his chest. “You can go now. Thank you for helping.” You said weakly, not meeting his eyes. You gave his hand a squeeze and ripped yourself away from him. 

The next week was completely normal. Bradley would kiss you goodbye without looking at you and then go to work, come home late and complain about being tired, then crash in bed immediately. You had sex once, it was on the couch on the one night he stayed up to watch a show with you. Friday morning was the same. You tried to chat him up while he waited for his coffee to brew, he just grumbled a response. No kiss this time, but that wasn’t totally unheard of. It was this same Friday when something abnormal happened. 

I need to talk to you.

It was a text from an unknown number showing up on your apple watch. You read it during a meeting, and spent the rest of the time not listening and trying to figure out who that text could be from. When you finally got the chance to look at your phone, you saw the previous texts you had with this person. A text from over a year ago told you what you wanted to know.

Hey. This is Jake. Rooster is really drunk. Can you come get him?

Completely ignoring your work now, your heart skipped and then dropped at the possibilities of why Jake was texting you.

Okay, is everything alright?

You checked your watch while waiting for a response. A quarter to five, you could leave now if you wanted to. 

Can you come by my house? Or can I call you soon?

All of the different possibilities raced through your mind. You couldn’t even think about the possibility of another woman right now.  But you focused on the fact that he did not confirm that everything was alright.

I can try and come by later. What is this about?

Okay let me know when you’re coming. It’s Bradley.

You knew it. Fuck, you knew it. Wasting no time, you packed up your things and left your office. The radio was too loud and too much as you made your way home, so you drove in silence. In a rare occurrence, Bradley’s range rover was in the driveway when you got home. Weird, you always got home first. 

What happened inside was nothing short of a bible level miracle. The first thing you saw when you opened the door was Bradley sitting on the couch, leaning on his knees like he was thinking. He whipped around at the sound of the door opening and he slapped a smile on his face. He stood up, grabbing a bouquet of flowers that had been laid next to him on the couch. 

“Hey baby.” He smiled, coming around the couch to greet you at the door. 

“Hi…” You couldn’t help the confusion that echoed in your greeting. He walked up and held the flowers out to you. You smiled, a polite smile, and took them from him. It felt abnormal, ingenuine, or something of that sort when he leaned in and kissed you.

“What’s this for?” You broke away from his lips. 

“Oh, nothing.” He waved his hand. “I just wanted to get my wife some flowers.”

You nodded. It felt good, really good, to get this attention from him. You wanted to play along, to pretend like this wasn’t weird, but a little voice in your head was screaming at you. A strange feeling settled in your stomach and left a weird taste in your mouth. 

“I was thinking,” He reached out and grabbed your free hand, pulling you over to the couch. “You want me to make my pasta for you, or do you wanna order something in? You choose.”

All you could do was stare at him. It was weird, this was the way you had been hoping and praying he would start treating you again for the last 4 months, but now that it's right in front of you, you couldn’t help but question it. “Pasta.” You said with a simple nod. 

By the time he was in the kitchen, 80s music playing while he started to prepare dinner, you still sat frozen in your spot on the couch. Jake's text message kept running through your head, you knew it had to be related to what’s going on. More than anything, you wanted to stay here, go hug Bradley from behind while he cooks, eat dinner with him, and let everything be normal again. But you couldn’t. 

“Hey, um I’ll be right back.” You knew you had about 30 minutes before he would be done cooking. 

“Where are you going?” he sounded alarmed, like he didn’t want you to step foot out of this house. 

The door was already open and you were already halfway out. “I have to um… go get gas.” The door shut behind you, giving no time for him to answer. 

It was about a 3 minute drive to Jake’s house, but you were about to make it in 1. The sound of tires screeching notified Jake that you were there. By the time he made it to the door, you were walking up his driveway. The look in his eyes was enough to make you sick. “What happened?” you asked breathlessly.

He said nothing, simply opening the door and motioning for you to come in. “Jake.” You said sternly. “What happened?” You repeated as you entered his house. This was not your first time in Jake's house, but it's the first time in a while. It smells like him but you don’t have time to dwell on that.

“Come sit.” He gestured to his living room. Jake has a dog, a big golden retriever, and she came up to sit by you on the couch. Eyes stinging, stomach churning, you put your face in your hands. “He’s cheating on me, isn’t he?” Your voice was muffled by your hands but Jake heard what you said and it made his jaw clench.

“Listen.” He sat next to you. 

“Oh my god.” You breathed out. You knew it. You called it. 

He sighed and gently reached for your wrist. He pulled your hand away from your face and into his lap. He held onto your hand and he took a deep breath. “When we were leaving today, I heard someone yelling in the parking lot. I only caught the tail end of it, but it was Bradley and some other girl. He was begging her for something, I don’t know what, and she was crying. She was yelling at him, and she said she didn’t know he had a wife. She kept saying ‘you’re married’ or ‘why didn’t you tell me’ and then she asked him if this was all a lie. He said no, but then he saw me, and he tried to get her to quiet down and get in his car, but she wouldn’t. I texted you right away. Right when I got in my car.”

It all made sense. Every piece of the Bradley Bradshaw puzzle fell into place, and you saw it so clearly. The boredness, the bad sex, the resentment, the getting home late, the flowers, the way he’s trying to make it all up to you now that things fell through with her. She must have threatened to tell you, or left him completely, and now he’s left with just you. He probably feels guilty, and wants to try and make it up to you. The first thought that ran through your mind was how could you have been so stupid. Jake held onto your shaky hands and you cried. You cried harder than you think you ever had. Wordlessly, he pulled you into him, and you cried into his shoulder. The only word you could get out between your sobs was “why.” 

So many thoughts ran through your mind. You wanted to know who this girl was. Was she pretty? Was she prettier than you? Was that the problem? Does she know Bradley the way you do? What was so wrong with you that he had to get someone else? 

How many times did Bradley fuck her and then come straight home and fuck you? That thought made you pull away from Jake, nearly pushing him off of you. “Y/N’ He reached for you and you stood up. Were there times where he thought about her while he fucked you? Was the sex with her so good that he couldn’t even finish when he was with you?

You shook your head and covered your mouth with the back of your hand. Calmly at first, you turned and walked down his hallway, your speed quickening with every step. Jake's footsteps echoed behind you, he was saying something but you couldn’t decipher it. The door to his bathroom hit the wall from how hard you pushed it open and you fell to your knees. You threw up, Jake appearing in the doorway as you did. Through all of this, you still found time to be embarrassed that he was seeing you like this, but he didn’t seem to mind. He knelt next to you and pulled your hair back away from your face. “It’s okay.” He whispered. 

When you were slightly calmed down, you set your forehead on your arm. Jake's large hand was rubbing up and down your back. “What do I do?” You said to the ground.

Jake cleared his throat. He thought the answer was clear, but maybe it wasn’t to you. “Do you want to stay with him?” He asked.

Your eyes squeezed shut at the thought of either option he was presenting. Leave Bradley, or stay with him and always know what he did. “I don’t know.” Your voice was strained. 

To Jake, this was a stupid answer. He thought you would say no, he thought that any person in their right mind would say no. “Oh.” His eyebrows furrowed. 

Before you made a decision, you knew you needed to talk to Bradley. Maybe this was a misunderstanding, maybe it was a mistake, maybe he’ll do everything in his power to earn your trust back, and then you’d have the old Bradley back. Reaching up to flush the toilet, you stood, Jake following suit.

“I need to go talk to him.” You said, walking past him out of the bathroom. He followed hot on your tail, trying to think of what to say. Once you reached the front door, you turned around to him. “Thank you for telling me.” He said nothing, only nodded. When you hugged him and his arms wrapped around you, you allowed your eyes to fall shut. You were lucky to have him. 

“If you don’t want to stay there tonight, I have a guest room.” He said into your hair. He felt you nod underneath him, then let you go. 

The car ride home was dead silent. You weren’t crying, you weren’t yelling, you weren’t listening to music. You felt nothing short of dead inside, like every good piece of your life just got pulled out from underneath you. Slowly, you pulled into the driveway. You wanted to sit in the car and not go inside, not find out the truth, but you knew that wasn’t an option. The reflection looking back at you in your rearview mirror did not look like you. It was scary. You wiped under your eyes and your mouth, then forced yourself to open the car door. Your legs were moving, but it was completely muscle memory, and you were surprised you hadn’t fallen to the ground yet. 

When you opened the front door, you tried to act normal. Music played through the house and you heard dishes clinking in the kitchen. Kicking your shoes off, you couldn’t ignore the two dogs that ran up to you. It made you want to cry even harder, the way they climbed on you when you bent down to pet them, like they could sense something was wrong. “Hey baby, you’re back.” You looked up and saw Bradley in the doorway to your kitchen. He was smiling, but for some reason, you almost felt better when you saw him. When you looked at him, you were reminded of the man he was on your wedding day, he gave you that same smile at the altar. It was the same smile you fell in love with, the same smile he had when he was merely just your neighbor when you were 23. “What’s wrong?” He asked immediately, his smile faltered slightly.

Looking back down at the dogs, you couldn't bring yourself to fight with him right now. You couldn’t let yourself lose him. “Nothing.” You shook your head. “I just had a hard day at work.”

“Oh, honey.” He walked towards you. This was by far the most attention you had gotten from him in months, and it was addicting. It is how you always wanted things to be, how you hoped and prayed they would end up. He pulled you into a hug and you could have melted into his arms. He hugged you, really hugged you. “I’m sorry you had a hard day.” He pulled back and brought his hands to your face. For some reason, for some weird, strange reason, you smiled. The feeling of his thumbs on your cheeks absolutely flooded your mind with memories, and it was enough to make you want to forget that he ever did anything wrong. Sure, there was a pit in your stomach and you were still unbelievably sad, but if this is how he’s gonna act from now on, you don’t want to leave. 

He kissed you and you were suddenly hyper aware that you had just thrown up less than 15 minutes ago. He leaned his forehead against yours and you were positive that he could feel the heat from your cheeks on his palms. “Dinners gonna be ready in like 5 minutes, okay?”

You nodded and he let you go. You turned towards the stairs and he was heading back to the kitchen, and he slapped your ass as you walked away, and you can’t believe it, but you laughed. When you got upstairs, you went into your bathroom and leaned against the counter. The shame that you felt for not standing up for yourself was intense. It weighed your heart down and made you dizzy. You almost couldn’t look at yourself in the mirror. You had to confront him about this, right? He would apologize and you would accept it and everything would be okay. But you couldn’t just not say anything. You met your own bloodshot eyes in the mirror. Aware of the taste of throw up in your mouth, you reached for your toothbrush. 

That night, you ate Bradleys criminally delicious pasta and the two of you sat at the table for almost an hour just talking after you were done eating. After that, he suggested you start that show that the two of you had been meaning to watch. He turned the fireplace on and cuddled up with you on the couch, your dogs occasionally trying to make their way in between the two of you. As the night went on, you thought about what he had done less and less. You didn’t let yourself think about whether he just fucked that girl or if they loved each other. You tried your hardest not to dwell on the fact that all of this attention was just his guilt manifesting into real life. 

When the episode ended, the two of you sat still in your spots on the couch. His hand was in your hair, and your arms were wrapped around him. You wondered what he was thinking about. You hoped it wasn’t her. 

He grabbed your chin and turned your face towards him. “I love you, you know that right?” He asked, his voice was low and gravely. You sighed, looking in his eyes. He didn’t deserve this, he didn’t deserve the love you were desperate to give him. “Yes.” you replied. “I love you too.”

He kissed you slowly. It reminded you of the way he used to kiss you when the two of you still lived in neighboring apartments. It was so passionate, you could feel it. You kissed him right back, basking in the feeling of being wanted by him. When he slipped his tongue in your mouth and you hiked your leg up higher against him, he broke away with a smile. He lifted you up off the couch and you squealed. “Bradley!” You laughed “Put me down.”

He laughed with you and carried you up the steps. Halfway to your bedroom, you gave up trying to squirm out of his strong grip. You wrapped your arms around his neck and he held you tighter. Once the door to your room was swung open and you were tossed onto the bed, Bradley crawled on top of you. He kissed you again, but it was a different type of kiss. It was rougher, insatiable. The kind that made your mind foggy and your core heat up. His body was hot on top of yours and it felt so good but it was so hard to enjoy. He wasted no time pulling your sweatpants down, sitting up to pull them over your feet and throw them off the bed. He pulled his shirt over his head and, no matter how hurt you were or how mad you were at him, you could not deny how fucking sexy he is. His skin was tan and he looked like he was glowing from the hallway light reflecting off of him. His rough hands wrapped around your thighs as he adjusted himself in front of you. This undoubtedly made you so excited. Your heartbeat sped up as his mustache scratched your thighs. He nipped at the skin on your leg, making you squirm. He looked absolutely gorgeous in between your legs. He looked up at you, his eyes dark and hooded. “You want me to be gentle or rough?” 

As much as you wanted him rough, your heart needed him gentle. “Can you be gentle?” 

“Of course I can, sweetheart.” He kissed the inside of your leg again. And gentle he was. He licked a slow stripe up your pussy, taking his sweet time. You couldn’t look away, and you had such a perfect view propped up on your elbows. When he started working on your clit, you had to drop your head back. He knew your body like the back of his hand. He knew what you liked, what you hated, how to make you squirm, how to make you cum in less than a minute. His dark curls were sticking to his forehead as he started to sweat. The grip on your thighs tightened, like he was pulling you closer. He was so far buried inside your pussy that his nose was going to be covered in your slick by the time he was done. He was stalling, you could tell. This was maybe his millionth time doing this, and he was giving you just enough to keep you on the edge, and he knew it. Even worse, he liked it.

“Please, Bradley.” You whined, letting your arms drop to your sides and falling onto your back. He shook his head into you, not relenting in the way he was licking you up, almost like he couldn't stop. You tried to grind into him, but his arms kept you in place. 

It was almost like he could not get enough of you, which would honestly make sense. You genuinely couldn't pinpoint the last time he had done this for you. Well, done it and actually tried.

One of his hands unwrapped from around your thigh, coming to push his fingers inside you. “Oh my god.” You groaned. Now that his mouth had full focus on your clit, and his fingers were stuck inside of you curling upward, both of you knew you were close. “Bradley, oh my fucking god.” 

His pace was steadily increasing, making your back arch completely off of the mattress. You could feel him smiling against you. Your orgasm all but crept up on you, starting off slow and then completely taking over your whole body. Eyes closed, your whole body pulsed, falling over you like warm water. 

Inexplicably, at your highest peak, Jake Seresin wearing his dress whites came into your mind. And it made you cum harder. When you came to and realized what the fuck you just did, your eyes popped open and your face heated up. You couldn’t help but slap your hand over your mouth. You just came from your husband eating you out, and you thought about his best friend.

Bradley crawled back on top of you and you pulled your hand away from your mouth. He said nothing and kissed you. You could feel him panting and his chest heaving, yours was too. “Was that good?” He said an inch from your mouth, giving you a soft peck after.

“Mhmmm” Was all you could get out. 

“Do you want more?” He said in between soft kisses. “Do you want me to fuck you?”

All you could do was nod. 

He fucked you slow and sweet. He kissed you a million times and told you he loved you even more than that. Afterwards, he fell asleep with his head on your chest and your hands in his hair. His head moved up and down with your breathing, like the sun set and rose for you. His arms were wrapped around your torso, so you could barely reach your phone when you heard it buzz. Straining, you picked it up off your nightstand. 

How’d it go?

The text made your stomach drop and subsequently knocked you back into reality. You can’t go on pretending like everything's okay because Jake knew. That girl is still out there, she knows. The man with his head on your chest knew. God knows who else knows about it. You turned your phone off and closed your eyes.

[joshfutturman]

'oh, memories, where'd you go?'

mini oneshot - mike schmidt receives a package in the mail. it's his younger brothers orange toy airplane. touching the plastic, he feels strangely connected to certain emotions, leaving michael confused and scared. (1k words) pairing - mike schmidt (five night's at freddy's) + gn reader (brief mention of reader) tags: (for a writing project im a part of, but thought you guys might like it too!) angst, all the angst, poor mike, pre-established relationship with reader (brief) tw: vomiting, emetophobia warning

.・。.・゜✭・. .・。.・゜✭・. .・。.・゜✭・.

things had been going pretty well for mike. well, about as well as they could be going in a dead-end job that meant he only just made rent every month. he actually felt. . . happy for the first time in a long time. he’d find himself smiling, abby would catch him and tease him. she was happy to have her big brother back, even if it was just in little glimpses. he had even started playing with her again.

so when mike heard a gentle rattle at the door, he perked up from the dining room and a small smile played at the corner of his lips - had you come to surprise him? he felt silly for assuming it was you, but who else could it possibly be?

.・。.・゜✭・. .・。.・゜✭・. .・。.・゜✭・.

things had been going pretty well for mike. well, about as well as they could be going in a dead-end job that meant he only just made rent every month. he actually felt. . . happy for the first time in a long time. he’d find himself smiling, abby would catch him and tease him. she was happy to have her big brother back, even if it was just in little glimpses. he had even started playing with her again.

so when mike heard a gentle rattle at the door, he perked up from the dining room and a small smile played at the corner of his lips - had you come to surprise him? he felt silly for assuming it was you, but who else could it possibly be?

opening the door, he was greeted by not a person, but a smallish cardboard box at his feet. with all his recent uncharacteristic optimism of late, mike thought it a gift. picking it up, he brings it inside, setting it down on the dining room table with that same smile splayed on his lips.

carefully, he peeled back the tabs of the box and peered inwards. mountains of tissue paper obscured the object inside. tossing them over his shoulder, mikes smile quickly faded, his expression turning to one of pure horror.

inside the little inconspicuous box lay a little orange toy plane.

mike felt bile rising in his throat, an overwhelming urge to throw up overcame him. that was garretts plane. his little brother. it was his. or a replica, or something. with his heart jackhammering in his chest, michael felt his vision leave him and he falls back into one of the chairs next to the table.

every night for the last thirteen years he’d dreamed of the day garrett was taken from him, the day he failed as a brother, the last day he saw his little brother alive. he’d been playing with the orange plane when he was taken. mike had it tattooed on his wrist too, a simple linework piece. it had been a set of three, mike had a blue one and a red one was kept in their family cupboard for the next child. abby never got hers. mike couldn’t bring himself to give it to her.

so how was this here, in a box on his doorstep?

peering into the brown box, mike is confronted once more with the toy and waves of nausea lap inside his belly. what was this? a message? a threat? a joke? his hand reaches in hesitantly, gently lifting the plane.

for a split second when he makes contact with the plastic, mike almost wants his mom, to hide behind her - but the opportunity for that had long passed, dead and buried in the ground. a longing for his parents, either one, sparked in his chest causing tears to prick at the corners of his eyes. but his parents weren’t coming. they couldn’t come.

it felt as though he were a little boy again, desperately tugging at his mom's sleeve to be lifted, wanting to be as close as possible. or scrambling into his father's study to tell him he had a nightmare. but his breath hitches, his parents weren't here to comfort him about silly nightmares anymore.

fear wells up like a crashing roar of thunder in his limbs telling him to run, run anywhere, run so he can’t catch you. something was coming, looming. and no one was coming to save him.

big heaving breaths are pushed from his lungs, gripping the toy with so much force that the material begins to strain under the pressure making the plastic whine. that same sickly feeling returns. there’s something itching at the back of his throat, he wants to scream but he can’t. instead the fear grows, slowly at first like poison weaving it’s way through liquid before completely marring everything within its path.

mike wants to plead for this feeling to stop, to begin praying to a god he doesn’t believe in. he grips the plane tighter, shaking sobs rattling his body.

the anxiety builds. up. up. up. higher and higher. a ringing in his ears obscuring all sounds like it longs to be heard. it’s getting too much. it was already too much from the moment he laid eyes on that fucking thing.

it was like he needed to escape, but to where? where the fuck could mike go to escape? it always came back to this, didn’t it? he’d never be able to resolve any of it. garrett was gone. he wasn’t a step closer, not even an inch. was he just torturing himself every night? reliving his worst memory over and over in the hopes of catching a glimpse of something new, something long forgotten.

and the fear was too much. mike was scared. he was fucking terrified.

the dread bubbled to anger and without thinking, he threw the toy at the wall. a wing snaps as it hits the ground with a pitiful thud.

that same fear begins to dissipate, leaving only simmering rage and waves of upset. his eyes trail down to the broken pieces of his little brother's beloved plane. the nausea returns, fiercer than ever and mike runs to the bathroom.

throwing himself over the toilet, he vomits, body trembling and shaking. a thumping began at his temples, mouth dry, body impossibly hot, mind a scrambled mess.

as he hangs his head over the bowl pathetically, mike’s mind begins to clear slightly, though still clouded by his emotions. what did this mean? who would send this? who would even know to send this?

clenching his fists, he rises to his feet and stumbles against the wall. feeling like he’d just ran a marathon, he gives in to the sobs inching closer up his throat. michael hides his face, gripping at it like he was trying to rip away a mask. but when his eyes open to himself reflected in the mirror to his horror, he was still michael. there was no escaping his past. there was no escaping this or his slipping sanity.

mike turns off the bathroom light, not able to confront his own face in the mirror, and slips out of the bathroom towards his bedroom where he firmly closes the door.

alone.

[spatialwave]

𝐝𝐚𝐳𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐝. 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐟𝐢𝐯𝐞.

"𝐋-𝐈-𝐕-𝐈-𝐍'."

pairing: angus tully x fem!reader word count: 5.1k summary: you made your choice. what will come of the consequences? surely, only good things, right? all you know is one thing you learned from a wise man: you just gotta keep livin'. l-i-v-i-n'. warnings/tags: MDNI. angst, hurt/comfort, underage drinking and drug use, jealousy, love triangle, name-calling, physical fighting/abuse, emetophobia/mention of v*miting. notes: this is long over due! i've been so happy seeing people still liking the series and i hope this ending does it justice. i'm already missing them, and thinking of ways i could do a little spin-off. suggestions are welcome, hehe.

<- chapter four.

Fucking at the Moon Tower was an activity you could cross off your bucket list, a feat that was surprisingly easy to pull off for an area of land running rampant with drunken teens. It seemed as though luck was dealing your cards for the evening and things had all started to move forward smoothly.

The ordeal with Angus was a bittersweet feeling, of course. Being drunk didn’t mean that you completely lost all touch of your morals.

It just meant that the guilt wouldn’t bother you until it was all over, and you were laying in bed hungover, wondering why you couldn’t have mustered the strength to end things off with Benny before you settled on infidelity. Hell, even now you were the other woman, Angus’s promise of ending things with Elise didn’t make this any better.

The only fighting argument you had against your wrongdoings was the fact that neither you nor Benny had made things… ‘official’, but you sure acted like it. That had to account for something, and you knew very well that if he found out, he wouldn’t be happy.

Forcing the rising guilt back down into the pit of your stomach, you focused on the way the grass felt against the exposed skin on your back. Lifting a hand up to toy with your hair that was rather messy now and let your eyes focus up on the stars in the sky, which were mostly hidden by the light of the moon tower that lifted above the treeline. The sound of gentle breathing next to you kept you calm, shuffling in the grass while you saw Angus turning on his side out of your peripheral vision.

“So,” his voice was deep in his throat as he shifted up on his elbow, able to get a better angle of you, “are we going to do that again sometime?”

You had to fight the smile growing on your lips, twitching at the corners and daring to make you smile like a dork. Leave it to Angus Tully to be the one to keep you from getting lost in your head, and instead, in the here and now.

“No,” you were quick to react, lips spreading into that grin you’d been avoiding, “definitely a one time thing.”

“Ouch, you really are feisty,” he groaned, lifting a hand to his heart and clutching at his chest, his button-up no longer doing its job of keeping him covered, “you have a cold, cold heart.”

A laugh bubbled up from your throat, earning a returning smile from the curly-haired boy, “I don’t have a cold heart. I’ll have you know that I am actually a really good person.”

“Good people don’t have to say they’re good people,” Angus tilted his head, an absent hand reaching forward to tuck some hairs behind your ear.

“Looks like you’ve seen right through me,” you whisper, a shaky breath leaving your lips.

The act itself makes a fierce warmth grow on your cheeks, so warm it reaches the tips of your ears and over your chest. There’s nothing more you can say at this moment, only able to react to his touch and slightly nuzzle your cheek against his hand like a needy pet. 

You stared into those big, brown eyes of his and wondered how you got so lucky to meet a boy like him – even if it meant leaving your home. He was truly the only good thing about this town.

Maybe this was the start of something new. Something you both deserved.

Your lips opened to speak, but the sound of someone rushing near you both had startled you up and looking around. A younger boy, likely a freshman, darted past you both and towards a large bush, the sounds coming from him making your nose crinkle as he emptied his stomach. 

“Christ,” Angus grumbled, pulling away from you instead pulling you up to your feet, “who’s letting these kids drink their fucking brains out.”

Quickly, you both vacated the area until you were halfway between the puking boy and the party that had continued to go well into the night. Neither of you had noticed that your hands were held tight together until Angus had stepped ahead, and your feet remained planted in the taller grass. 

“We can’t tell anyone about what we just did,” the words fell from your lips quickly, eyes settled ahead on the crowds of people that you could see in the distance. All illuminated by headlights and the moon tower.

Benny was there somewhere. So was Elise.

Just like the boy hidden somewhere behind you both, you felt sick to your stomach as the regret coursed back through your veins without Angus able to fix it all for you with his touch. 

“Why would I tell anyone?” He retorted, dropping your hand and turning to face you, blocking your sight so you were forced to look up at him, “I’m not looking for problems… you’re not going to say anything are you?”

“...No.”

“That’s not very convincing.”

“God, Angus, what do you want me to say? You just cheated on your girlfriend,” you grumbled, the effects of alcohol and weed wearing thin, making this night feel a lot more real than you wanted it to.

This was supposed to be a night where you hoped you didn’t remember much of it, so drunk and high that you could completely let loose and kick off your last summer before senior year. You were more complicated than that, though, you came with nuances and emotions that you didn’t really understand just yet. You had so many wants and needs, and so many fears.

“I told you I was going to break up with her. You’re acting like I’m the only one who fucked up here, you know,” Angus’s voice was sharper, like it was at the moon tower when he chastised your relationship with Benny, “this was mutual.”

“That’s not what I meant–”

“Do you think me sleeping with you tonight was just for fun? Like I’m going to leave you in the dust and forget about what happened tomorrow morning?” He took a step forward as you took a step back, “I meant what I said. I really like you. Don’t make me overthink this.”

“It’s just,” you started, arms crossing over your chest, “fuck, we really should’ve waited, Angus. I feel like I’m going to be sick.”

A heavy sigh came from him, and you could tell he was fed up, but holding back.

“Yeah,” he eventually breathed, “you’re right, I get it. We… uh, really fucked up.”

You could see his mannerisms change, the sheepish look in his eyes when that very guilt you felt extended into him. But you were young and you were certain this wouldn’t be your last fuck up in your life. You’d get through it – eventually.

“I like you too,” you murmured, fingers twisting into the fabric of your halter top, “I guess we just gotta deal with everything if we want this to work.”

Angus nodded, a tiny smile on his lips that made you feel all sorts of funny, your cheeks warm and belly fluttering with waves of butterflies swirling in a vortex. It was making you feel sick all over again, but for good reasons this time.

“You should come with me in the morning,” he said, kicking a foot into the tall grass, “I’m going with Wooderson to buy Aerosmith tickets… It'll be a good time.”

You were complicated. Wanting to say no because you needed time to cut things off with Benny, and because your mother would freak out when your bed was still empty by morning, but instead you nodded your head without any hesitation.

You were just a teen girl, there were no rules on how you acted or felt.

“Yeah, okay,” you smiled, “maybe.”

“Maybe?” The boy matched your wicked grin, taking a few steps back from you and closer to the party, “I’ll see you later, then.”

You watched in awe as Angus spun on his heels and sauntered back to the party, leaving you in a state of uncertainty. There was much to think about, but his request reminded you of something important.

Life was short.

So, why the hell were you standing in the middle of the wooded forest listening to the sound of some poor boy getting sick when you could be back with your friends getting shitfaced and forgetting about everything that happened.

You pulled your feet forward and carried yourself back to the party, everyone now officially drunk or stoned out of their minds, your friends nowhere to be seen. The beer keg was your first stop, drinking one full cup in quick succession and pouring yourself another. 

The cool liquid poured down your throat and numbed your mind instantly, fingers tightening around the red solo cup as your empty stomach greeted the alcohol. You closed your eyes and guzzled down the remainder of the second beer, knowing that any more would likely put you in the same predicament after your argument with Angus.

Fingers crinkled the cup, and you tossed it to the ground, perking up and looking at your surroundings. There were an abundance of drunk teens, your eyes watching two girls take a tumble to the ground together and a boy sitting in the backseat of a convertible coughing his lungs out because of a particularly intense bong rip.

“Where the fuck is Kaye?” You sighed under your breath, eyes scanning the area and excusing yourself when two boys asked you to move away from the keg. With your bottom lip tucked between your teeth, you begin walking away in hopes to scout around the party for a familiar face.

Just as your eyes nestled on your friend, who was sitting on the back of Tony’s car, you felt someone shove themselves against you roughly – with intention.

“Buzz off,” you groaned, catching your footing before nearly crashing into the ground. 

Perking up, your eyes darted over to the other and saw none other than Darla standing there with eyes narrowed and cheeks flush with anger. A few paces behind was Elise, looking just as angry.

“You slut,” Darla hissed, taking taunting steps toward you and her voice loud enough to grab the attention of the two boys taking beer from the keg, “you must like stealing boys, huh? Stealing Benny from me, then trying so hard to get Angus’s attention and acting like you’re nothing but a saint,” her face twisted with fury as she spoke, “stupid bitch.”

You gasped loudly as Darla flung beer at you, the lukewarm liquid splashing against your chest and soaking your halter top. 

“I had no idea you and Benny were a thing!” You blurted quickly, always wondering why these things had to happen after you finished downing multiple beers, “and nothing’s happening with Angus… he’s just a friend.”

Both of your hands had lifted in defense, breath shaky as you watched Darla and Elise’s combined anger unfold in front of you. You were hoping that tonight would treat you with more grace than it could have, but karma was doing its work.

Darla’s lips curved into a sickening grin as she threw the red cup at you, as if pouring the beer wasn’t enough. “You think we’re stupid? Like we haven’t seen you flirting with him for the past few weeks? God…” she shook her head, an airy laugh of disbelief coming from her, “and you try to tell me that you had no idea Benny and I were a thing? I get that you’re new here, but you’d have to be really dumb to not know what’s going on around you.”

“Okay,” you said, trying to level with the girl that looked like she could pounce any moment, “maybe I didn’t do my research with others before spending time with Benny, but in my defense he didn’t tell me anything. I just… I figured he was single. You should be getting mad at him!”

“God, stop acting like you’re the victim here!” She laughed against and balled her fists together, and you knew then and there that there was nothing you could do to share your side of things. She was far too angry, and much too drunk, “You’re such a stuck up bitch, like every dumb prissy girl from the West Coast.”

Your eyes flickered over to Elise, who seemed to have some semblance of sobriety at the moment, but doing nothing to make this situation any better for you. When you settled your gaze back on the girl in front of you, you saw the anger boiling beneath the surface. She was starting to talk angry nonsense which you had no bite over.

You either needed to make one quick response to shut her down, or get the hell out of there.

“Darla–”

Before you could plead anymore in a last-ditch attempt to bury the hatchet and keep it from escalating, a flimsy hand met with your nose and pain shot through your head. Darla sucker-punched you, making a fool out of you. As you grabbed at your face, wincing loudly in pain and feeling blood drip down your nose, you heard the other girl yelping from the pain radiating in her hand. “What the fuck?” You roared, eyes wide and anger flowing through you. Not once had anyone ever disrespected you like this, and even though you wanted to lay down in a ball and cry the pain away, there was a rush of adrenaline keeping you afloat.

“Aw, look, she’s angry,” Darla laughed in your face, taking a step back, but you lunged. She wasn’t getting the satisfaction.

The two of you tumbled to the ground and hands began to tug at clothes and hair, shouts and yelps garnering the attention of anyone close. “Holy shit,” you heard Elise’s voice just barely because soon all you could hear were people yelling and cheering you on. Well, both of you. Two girls drunkenly fighting? It made for great party entertainment.

“You stupid bitch!” Darla squealed as you yanked on her hair, tugging her back to the ground after she tried standing up.

“You punched me first, asshole!” You yelled, unable to land any good hits on her and resorting to some lowly slaps and kicks. Finally, you managed to get on top of her, holding her down with her weight as you straddled her and she was doing her best to push you off, “Fuck you,” you spat at her, fist tightened as you punched.

But it never landed.

“Hey, break it up!” Kaye’s voice was loud, quieting down everyone who had been bystanders, watching and cheering. 

“Let me at her!” You growled, kicking your legs out as you were pulled back, watching as Elise and Shavonne pulled Darla away. Then, you saw Kaye to your left and realized it wasn’t her pulling you away from the fight; you glance over your shoulder and see Angus staring down at you, dragging you far from the scrap.

“Fuck you!” Darla snapped at you, stumbling on her feet and smoothing down her clothing that had gone askew from your wild hands that savagely attacked her, “You’re dead to us, Tully! Dead. Have that worn-in skank!”

“Easy now,” Shavonne’s voice could be heard.

“Are you okay?” Angus’s voice was loud in your ear and you could smell the beer on his lips he forced you to look his way, “Fuck. You’re going to be bruised tomorrow.”

“C’mon, let’s get her out of here,” Kaye jumped in, helping him pull you away.

Your eyes flickered around, seeing the crowd fizzling out and how Elise looked at you and Angus with a clenched jaw. She extended a middle finger out, and for some reason it sent a wave of relief through your body – was it over now? Would her and Darla finally give up on tormenting you? 

Angus and Kaye got you situated onto the back of his car, sitting atop the trunk, your legs dangling as the boy tended to your bloody nose and busted lip. The pain was rising now that the adrenaline was leaving your body, leaving you squirming under his touch as he used his sleeve to wipe the dried blood that coated your upper lip. Not only that, but your soaked halter top was making you terribly uncomfortable.

“I’m fine–”

“Not fine,” Angus cut you off, looking into your eyes.

“I’ll be fine,” you reiterated, looking rather sheepish, “she started it.”

“Yeah, I saw,” he smirked, tucking some of your hair behind your hair, “you gotta’ get better at fighting. That was bad.”

“Easier said than done. Are you going to teach me?” 

“Sure.”

The silence between you both is welcomed, and you hadn’t realized that Kaye left. Kegs were emptied dry, which meant everyone had begun to leave and go home or move onto an after party. You two stayed situated in your spot, though, unmoving as the cars around you filled with teens and roared into the night.

“I broke up with her,” Angus admitted, shrugging his shoulders, “I would have rather waited until tomorrow, but that’s not fair to either of you.”

You click your tongue knowingly, rolling your eyes playfully, “So, you’re the reason Darla came and unleashed her anger out on me, huh?”

“No, that’s because she bottles shit down until she’s hammered and she finally had the balls to confront you about it,” he smiled at you, lifting both hands to cup your cheeks, “you took it like a badass, though. I think you look hot.”

“Yeah, I feel so hot–”

You’re cut off by Angus’s lips pressing to yours, a gentle kiss that’s careful of your wounds. You wince in pain, pulling back and lifting a hand to the side of your lip that’s tender and a bit swollen.

“Shit, sorry,” he exhaled, pulling back from you.

“It’s okay,” you laughed, arms wrapping around his neck and instead pulling him into a tight hug, “thank you.”

“For what?” he asked, hands on your back and brushing his fingers along the exposed skin from your revealing halter top.

“For dealing with me,” you murmured, burying your face into his curly hair that clung around his ears, “I’ve been a mess tonight. Honest to god, I’m usually not this insane.”

A laugh bubbled up from his chest, the sound vibrating against your neck as he pressed a few soft kisses to your skin, “hm, it’s okay. I can deal with crazy.”

Both you and Angus found yourself unable to leave each other’s arms for a short while, as if making up for lost time between the two of you. Not even an hour later, and after a good makeout session in the back of his car and changing into one of his oversized band shirts, you found yourself in the middle of the football field, laying between Angus’s legs and your head pressed against his exposed stomach from the shirt that you’d unbuttoned earlier.

To your left was Jason and Shavonne, having made up for the night, and beside them was Slater, who was digging into a baggy of weed and rolling up a few fatties for the group to share.

Wooderson stood tall in front of everyone, reading from the pact that Angus still hadn’t signed.

“Not to indulge in any alcohol, drugs, sex after 12, or any other illegal activity,” he stepped toward everyone, who had started laughing. Angus groaned, sitting upright and reaching out for the paper with a grouchy look on his face, “found that in your glove compartment, man.”

“You know you’re the third person who’s given me this today? God,” he groaned, rolling it up and tucking it into his jean pocket.

“What’re you going to do?” You asked, looking up at him and bringing the cigarette to your lips that you two had been sharing.

“I don’t know,” Angus complained, wiping his face with his hands and looking between everyone, “I’ll probably just end up signing, I just don’t want to give in too easy, y’know?”

“Man,” Wooderson looked at him through half-lidded eyes, taking a hit of his joint and exhaling a large cloud of smoke, “that’s the same bullshit they tried to pull in my day. If it ain’t that piece of paper, some other choice they’re going to try and make for you. You gotta do what Angus Tully wants to do, man.”

You looked up at the curly-haired boy, admiring his features that illuminated from the large flood lights on the football field. You noticed the way he listened earnestly to Wooderson, who wasn’t known for great advice, but so far this was sound.

As he watched the older guy, his hand played absently with your hair, leaving you far-too relaxed and tired for someone who was planning on heading out to get tickets once the sun was fully risen above the horizon. There wasn’t much longer before it would be up.

“And let me tell you this. The older you do get, the more rules they’re gonna try to get you to follow. You just gotta keep livin’ man. L-I-V-I-N’.” He beamed, earning a few giggles from everyone around as he collapsed onto the ground next to Slater.

“If you’re gonna sign that paper, man, you should throw a little grass right in the middle, man. Roll it up, and sign the joint, man. That’s gonna tell ‘em something.” Slater spoke, eyes practically shut as his reddened eyes looked around at everyone sharing laughs at his words.

“You’d like that wouldn’t you, Slate?” You piped up, grinning from ear to ear.

“Yeah, man. The size you could get out of that paper would keep me high all day, man.”

“So what?” Jason broke into the conversation, head in Shavonne’s lap and eyes closed, “you gotta think about it. We’ve had a lot of really good times here, Tully.”

You sink a bit lower, able to tilt your head back and get a proper look at the boy you’d fallen in love with so deeply, smiling, “He’s not wrong. I mean, you’re, like, king of the school, you know? You get away with whatever you want, anyway.”

Angus let out a heavy exhale through his nostrils, leaning his head back as he slipped out from beneath you and rose to his feet. You pushed yourself up, eyes trailing him as you smoked the last of the cigarette and held the filter between your fingers.

“All I’m sayin’ is that if I ever start referring to these as the best years of my life, remind me to kill myself,” he grunted, car keys in one hand and ready to toss away that slip back into his glove compartment so he could forget about it.

Jason sighed, “Look, Tully, all I’m sayin’ is that I wanna look back and say, that I did it the best I could while I was stuck in this place, had as much fun as I could when I was stuck in this place,” he continued and you watched Angus, seeing how he paused in his steps and listened, back turned from everyone, “played as hard I could when I was stuck in this place, dogged as many chicks as I could when I was stuck in this place.”

Everyone laughed again, Shavonne mostly groaning as she shoved at Jason, “Yeah, right, Mr. Premature Ejaculation.”

As the couple to your left playfully fought each other, and Slater and Wooderson laughed at them, your eyes settled on Angus. He returned your gaze, staring at you with a small smile. A hand lifted and motioned for you to go to him, and you obediently listened, rising to your feet and sauntering his way.

“Do what you need to do, Tully,” you said to him, in a perfect buzzed state from the cigarette and joint you’d smoked. You lifted your hands, palms pressing against his chest and his hands wrapping around you loosely, “Don’t let anyone make that decision for you.”

Angus smiled down at you, needing to hear that. After a day of being told what to do by everyone, it was nice to know that you would have his back.

“Thanks,” he murmured, lowering his head to press a kiss to your lips. It was gentle, exactly what you needed. His hands lifted up to caress the sides of your neck, licking over your bottom lip and eager to make it heavier than it needed to be in front of your friends – you were already walking around with two visibly hickies on your neck from your rendezvous in the car before coming to the football field.

Just as you pulled from him, noses bumping together, bright, shining headlights startled everyone.

“Oh, shit, are those the cops?” Shavonne perked up.

“Hey, all of you! Get over here!” One of the cops called as he exited the car and slammed the door, waving you down, “Now!”

The group all listened, rather slowly of course. It wasn’t illegal to be on the football field, but it was illegal to be smoking weed. Slater sneakily tucked the bag into his pants, sulking behind everyone else who made their way to the fence.

It was embarrassing, the cops making you all line up like a bunch of criminals. Your back pressed against the chain link fence, wanting nothing more than to be at home in the comfort of your bed, preferably with Angus by your side. But no, the cops recognized Jason and Angus immediately and called the coach – and no one was to leave, even as the sun began to rise over the horizon.

“Tully. Smith.” The coach grumbled from his spot in the driver’s seat, having pulled up in his Jeep and staring you all down like he actually had some semblance of authority. It was laughable, especially to Angus, “Get your scrawny butts over here!”

“Morning, Coach,” Jason smiled, hands in his pockets as Angus lagged behind.

You and Shavonne, on the other hand, stood back and shared quiet laughs at the situation. It’s not like you could help it, when your body was minutes away from crashing into the deepest sleep of your life, it was hard not to find every little thing at least kind of hilarious.

“What’s going on?” He berated the two football players like an angry father.

“False alarm, Coach.” Angus said nonchalantly and you could tell that he was over the conversation already. All he wanted was to get to the city to buy Aerosmith tickets.

“Come here, Tully.” The coach beckoned and you couldn’t quite hear over the conversation, but the angry look on Angus’s face told everything you needed to know about  what was happening.

“How can you talk that way, huh?” Angus’s voice was loud as he took a step back from the vehicle, looking over his shoulder and at you for a brief moment before turning back around, “You don’t know any of them, what do you know about bad fucking influences? You think I’m some perfect angel?”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying. I’m willing to wipe the slate clean if you straighten up, stop hanging out with these hoodlums and sign the goddamn commitment.”

“Hoodlums?” You and Slater said together, both looking at Angus and the coach with half-lidded, red eyes.

Angus rubbed a hand over his mouth, letting out a breathy chuckle, “You know what coach,” he started, looking back at you again, a smile on his lips, “I gotta get going. Me and my loser friends, and girlfriend… Well, we’re gonna go get Aerosmith tickets. Can’t be fucking late. Top priority of the summer.”

It was a subtle mention, but the title of ‘girlfriend’ made your stomach swirl in all sorts of ways and you could see Shavonne’s devilish smirk in your peripheral vision.

Angus began making his way back over to you, but then he spun on his feet, looking back to Jason and coach, “Oh, coach,” he said, digging into his pocket and retracing his steps back to the Jeep, “I forgot,” he cleared his throat, crumpling the paper, “I might play ball, but I will never sign that.”

The taller boy tossed the paper right into his vehicle, jaw clenching and staring daggers at him before turning back around and heading your way, huffing as he let his anger dissipate and the coach sped away.

“Shit, man, that’s livin’!” Wooderson grinned, giving Angus’s hand a smack, “Now come on, I’m getting my third wind. Let’s get on the road.”

“You comin’ man?” Slater spoke up, looking at Angus, then to you, “You’re definitely coming.”

“Oh, I am?” You snorted, shoving Slater playfully as you walked next to Angus, your hand slipping into his almost perfectly, “What about you guys?” You shot a look over to Shavonne and Jason, the latter looking like he’s going to collapse any minute.

“No, I’m tired,” he mumbled, hardly able to open both eyes as Angus tossed his keys to Shavonne. The blond looked at Angus, smacking his lips a few times, “So, that’s that, huh?

Angus shrugged his shoulders, looking at his friend and giving him a couple pats on the shoulder, “I’ll see you later, man,” he told him, nodding and watching as Shavonne began dragging him over to Angus’s car.

You and Slater settled into the backseat of Wooderson’s car, passing a joint back and forth as wind rushed through the open windows and left your hair blowing wildly around. Angus would look back at you every so often, checking on you and shooting that charismatic smile of his as music blared loudly through the radio – Slow Ride by Foghat.

You know, things may not have gone the way you wanted them to go, but hell, it was better than a shitty night stuck at home. Your lip was busted, nose still throbbing, and you didn’t really have an answer to what was going on with you and Benny and it wracked you with guilt.

But you’re only seventeen, you’re meant to make fucking mistakes, lots of them – to learn from them. That’s the fun of life because if you hadn’t fucked up as much as you did, you wouldn’t have been with your favourite people, riding off to the city with the smell of weed and summer break tickling your nose.

Angus’s eyes met your own once again, those stupid, big brown eyes. You passed the joint over, grinning like a fool as he winked at you. 

There was nothing but the morning sun rising in the sky, great music and even better friends – and you knew summer was going to be full of everything you needed.

[the-whumpening]

The Pet Tiger, #10 [nsfwhump AU]

Prev | Masterpost | Next

CW: nsfwhump, emetophobia, drunk/hungover against will, choking till passing out, medical inaccuracies, GRAPHIC EXPLICIT NON-CON, explicit scene of and reference to r*pe and uncensored use of the word, victim blaming, dehumanization, gags, restraints, branding, treated as a pet/sex slave, violence and threats, pet whump, forced use of buttplug, forced (ruined?) orgasm, forced chastity device, blood, magic whump, AGAIN: DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT

(Another extremely long chapter, around 4.5k! This is EXTREMELY GRAPHIC. Please heed this warning: if you do not want to read a scene mostly focused on a detailed description of an assault, close this and move on. The next chapter won't be nearly as brutal but there will likely be similar chapters in the future, so I understand if anyone wants to drop off reading this series. No hard feelings! If I've missed tagging something important, please let me know so I can fix it.)

-

10: His

As the heavy doors of Ozmund’s chambers slam closed behind Ash, his knees thud to the hard wooden floor. His head spins—he’s not sure he’s ever been this drunk before, and certainly never so fast. He tries to steady himself on his hands and catch his breath, but Ozmund yanks him by his leash back to attention.

During the silent march away from the party, Ash had imagined Ozmund was fuming, just waiting to be alone before lashing out at him. But now, as he drunkenly dodges Ozmund’s scowl, it seems Ozmund has once again composed himself. He slips a finger through Ash’s collar and bends to meet his face, his breath cool on Ash’s flushed cheeks.

“She got you drunk, didn’t she? Stupid little cat,” he snarls, his low voice warping in the fun-house-mirror of Ash’s intoxicated brain. It takes all Ash’s concentration to nod, though the movement only makes his dizziness worse. Ozmund sighs through his nose and narrows his eyes. With a blink, they begin to glow a rich emerald green, and he jams his palm to Ash’s forehead.

Ash shivers and gasps; shock startles his system as if a bucket of ice-cold water was suddenly dumped over him. His drowsy eyes snap open, and he can suddenly think clearly and control his body once more—he’s immediately sober again. A spike of pain pierces his head, though, and his senses are quickly overwhelmed. Each lamp and candle flame burns his eyes; every slight rustle of his clothes and shift of his body pounds in his eardrums; Ozmund’s heavy fragrance stings his nose and swirls his stomach until—

He retches, spitting up wine-stained bile onto the polished floors.

Ozmund takes half a step back to avoid the mess, dropping Ash’s leash and muttering, “Pathetic.” He nudges Ash’s chest with his boot, pushing him off balance and forcing his gaze upward as he falls onto his back. “And I suppose you want me to clean you up, too, don’t you? Ungrateful beast.” With a wave of his hand, Ash’s sick disappears from the floor and his own face; even his mouth feels clean, though exceptionally dry.

Is this a hangover? Ash wonders as his head continues to throb. He’s never had a hangover before—he’d only ever seen Kane get them, but they’re such a lightweight that it takes very little to send them stumbling and slurring in the first place.

He doesn’t have time to linger on the thought; before he can right himself once more, Ozmund drops his shoe down on Ash’s chest. His heel grinds into Ash’s bruised ribs, pressing a breathless howl of pain out of his lungs.

“Quiet,” Ozmund commands, and Ash’s throat cinches closed against his will. He strains to breathe fully, silent whimpers gasping through his lips against the tightness in his throat and the pressure on his chest. “Three times tonight, you’ve failed to uphold your end of our bargain. Three times, you’ve disobeyed or humiliated me.” His foot shifts forward, sliding to lodge the toe of his boot beneath Ash’s chin and hovering just barely above his neck. “I gave you every opportunity to comply. I instructed you perfectly—I even let your poor manners slide earlier today. But clearly, you haven’t learned.”

Ozmund squeezes his fist. As he does, the thin collar around Ash’s neck shrinks tighter and tighter, nearly burrowing itself into his skin. His vision flickers, black flecks of blindness fluttering around his peripherals before blotting out entirely; his hearing, too, fades into a high-pitched ring, soon replaced only with silence. In the dark and silent void, all Ash can take in is the scent of boot polish and leather, before even that disappears as well.

As he slips into the dizzy embrace, an errant thought creeps into his mind: Am I . . . dead?

-

Ash reawakens with a coughing gasp. His arms and shoulders ache, but his hands catch with a metallic clinking when he tries to lower them.

He blinks against the blurriness in his vision and struggles uselessly to move. What—?

“Be still, pet.” Ozmund’s voice startles him, closer than he expects. “You’ll only hurt yourself if you struggle.”

Ash turns his head to the side, relieved to find the collar has once again loosened to its normal size. But as his eyes focus, that relief evaporates as quickly as it came. Finally, he can see his predicament and make sense of the aching in his limbs.

Ozmund stands beside him, securing a length of chain to the headboard of his bed—the same headboard Ash’s manacles have been looped around. Ash tries to feel his surroundings with his body, though every slight twist causes the thin chains to dig into his wrists. Beneath him is soft, plush bedding, propping his hips up in an obscene display. He clenches his legs to cover himself—even the scant, nearly-translucent loincloth is gone—but the chain Ozmund just lashed keeps them lifted and spread around the knee.

He kicks out with his lower legs, trying and failing to wrest himself free of the bindings; his efforts only return an ache in his muscles and dizzy pain in his head. Panic bubbles in his chest and escapes his throat in babbling whimpers. “N-no! No, Ozmund—please! Please!” Sobs shake his wrecked shoulders; his whole body trembles as Ozmund casually disrobes, ignoring his disjointed begging. “I tried! I-I tried to be good! I’m sorry—please don’t do this. Please!”

Ash’s desperation only seems to stoke Ozmund’s desire even further.

In another life—in some strange parallel world—Ash might have found Ozmund handsome. Much like Evius, Ozmund is tall and well-built, with refined elvish features and piercing eyes. His elegant, lithe form moves with perfect grace, his dark silky hair falling over his pale shoulder as he joins Ash on the bed. He settles beside Ash’s head and strokes Ash’s cheek with his long fingers.

“Sweet boy,” he croons, his fingertips dancing over Ash’s cheekbones. “Stupid boy.” He pulls his hand back and slaps Ash hard across the face, pinning his cheeks in his hand to keep his gaze. “As I said before, you disobeyed me. I’ve been lenient and kind to you so far—I know a brainless kitten like you needs more instruction than most. But I grow tired of waiting and tired of your insolence.”

Tears slip easily from Ash’s eyes. Between Ozmund’s fingers, he can only whisper a chant: “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please, please, please.”

Ozmund’s eyes narrow. “You won’t be truly repentant until you’re punished. For three infractions, that’s three punishments.” He directs Ash’s face forward to look at his own exposed and strung-up body. In his blind panic, Ash had barely registered what Ozmund had done; surrounding his cock is a snug metal cage, latched with a small padlock and secured behind his scrotum with a solid metal ring. “First, you rebuffed my gift of blissful forgetfulness. You begged me to let you be awake and alert. You could’ve had been so sweet and pliable tonight and forgotten all about those drunken fools—but you threw it away.” He palms Ash’s caged cock roughly, the heavy contraption tugging at his delicate skin. “So you forfeit your right to pleasure tonight, and every night until I decide you deserve it again.”

Ash whimpers, confused and frightened. He doesn’t want Ozmund’s pleasure; how could this cage be a punishment? Will it shrink or shock him like the collar?

He doesn’t get an answer from Ozmund. Instead, Ash’s head is turned again to face him.

“Second,” Ozmund continues, prodding his thumb into Ash’s mouth and working his jaw open, “you disobeyed and disrespected my guests. We had an agreement, little cat. Do you remember? Do you recall what would happen if you weren’t good for my guests?” His voice is harsh and hard; Ash squeezes his eyes shut against the renewed flow of tears.

“No,” he wails around Ozmund’s thumb—more a protest than a response. “Pleash!”

“You should learn to strike that word from your vocabulary, pet. But I’ll remind you one last time: I promised to be exactly as kind and gentle as you deserved. After tonight’s display”—he pinches Ash’s jaw and gives it a sharp shake—“I should think you don’t deserve it at all.”

Ash jerks his head away from Ozmund’s grasp, scrambling to speak before he’s subdued once more. “You can’t do this!” he yelps, the hoarseness in his voice giving way to desperation. “I am a human being, Ozmund—I am a person, just like you!”

An appeal to Ozmund’s humanity, or whatever may be left of it; Ash knows it’s probably futile, but he has to try. If Ozmund could only see how insane this all was, if only he could see Ash as something other than subhuman, an object to be used and molded to his desires . . . then surely he would make this all stop. Right? Ash holds his breath for a moment as he awaits Ozmund’s response.

For a second, Ozmund’s eyes seem to soften. He smooths Ash’s hair, gently brushing it behind his ear as he murmurs sympathetically, “Oh, Ash . . .” But as Ash traces his face for any hint of remorse—any shred of empathy—Ozmund instead clicks his tongue in disapproval. “I’m afraid you’re mistaken. You’re not a human—just look at yourself. Would a human have those silly little ears and tail? Would a human be passed around as a party favor? Would a human need restraints to stay human? No. But you do. You do, because you’re just a pathetic. Disobedient. Pet.” His hand on Ash’s hair cinches into a vice-like grip, and his sharp features morph once again into hungry malice. He jerks Ash’s head back by his hair, punctuating each word with stinging pain to Ash’s scalp. “And I am your Master. I can do whatever I want. Right now, I want you to suffer.”

Ash’s heart sinks deep into his gut. There’s nothing he can do to stop this—nothing he can do to make it less awful. Ozmund wants it, and it is so. His desire is law.

A faint, animalistic snarl slips from Ozmund’s hostile smile. “Now, you’re going to take my cock in your mouth and get it nice and wet. That and my cum will be your only lubrication tonight. Be grateful you even get this.”

A wall of protests scream in Ash’s mind, but he nods shakily against Ozmund’s grip on his hair. He sneaks a glance at Ozmund’s lap as he brings it closer to Ash’s lips; like before at the party, Ash convinces himself it will be better to know what to expect. And just like before, he’s wrong.

Ozmund’s cock is long—much longer than his own—and thicker than his as well. Although he’s not quite as big as Evius, it’s still more than Ash has ever taken. The broad head presses against the tight line of Ash’s closed lips.

No! Nonononononono!

Ozmund’s fingers wrap locks of Ash’s hair into snug curls as he offers a last, growled warning. “Open up, pet, or it’s going in dry.”

As his head throbs and his heart squeezes painfully, Ash reluctantly opens his mouth, allowing Ozmund’s thickness to slip in.

“Mmn, that’s it,” Ozmund grunts. “Watch your teeth, little cat—don’t make me pull them out.”

He thrusts slowly in and out of Ash’s dry mouth, holding Ash’s hair to control his every movement. It doesn’t take long for his insistent length to press the back of Ash’s throat, blocking his airway and triggering heaving spasms as Ash gags.

I can’t, I can’t—!

Ash’s empty lungs burn; he gasps and coughs when Ozmund finally retreats from his throat.

“Not very wet, is it?” Ozmund traces his tip against Ash’s swollen lips. It’s true, though. He’s still quite dry, and Ash realizes what that means: if he doesn’t want to suffer, he has to work for it.

Ozmund wants him to be complicit in his own rape.

Lips warbling and throat tightening, Ash opens his mouth once more, working up as much saliva as he can and presenting his tongue. Ozmund smirks.

“Oh, look at you. Such a quick learner. Do you want another try? Is that it?” His voice and smile drop. “Beg for it, pet.”

Sobs crawl up Ash’s chest, swelling his sinuses and stinging his eyes with tears that refuse to overflow. He forces himself to contort his expression into some approximation of desire, his eyes wide and prey-like.

“Please,” he whispers, his voice catching in his throat. “Please let, let me try again . . . Master.”

Ozmund chuckles cruelly, loosing his grip on Ash’s hair to instead cradle his head. “See? Isn’t that easy? Doesn’t that feel right—begging for permission to serve me? Go ahead, pet. I’ll give you till the count of ten to drool over me as much as you’d like. And when you’re done, I’ll fuck you with your own juices.” He snickers sharply through his nose and readjusts, lining himself up with Ash’s mouth once again. “Maybe I’ll even add my own spit to your pitiful ass if you do well enough. Ready?”

Without waiting for Ash to reply, he shoves himself past Ash’s lips.

“One.”

Ash bobs his neck frantically, hollowing his cheeks and summoning as much saliva as his dry mouth will allow.

“Two.”

He sends the spit down his tongue, slavering along Ozmund’s length.

“Three.”

His tongue swirls and swishes. No thoughts can bubble to the surface of Ash’s foggy, aching mind.

“Four.”

He won’t allow it—he can’t. He can’t focus on how he wishes the weight on his tongue was someone else—

“Five.”

Ozmund enters Ash’s throat again; Ash’s panicked breaths come in humiliating snorts and gulps as both his nose and mouth are blocked.

“Six.”

His gag reflex twitches, but he’s held too firmly in place to fight it.

“Seven.”

It doesn’t matter—his tongue keeps working, and his lips push and pull with desperation.

“Eight.”

Allowed to move again, Ash’s jaw burns and his throat is raw.

“Nine.”

Still, he spreads his meager wetness and ignores the salty musk of Ozmund’s skin and dribbling pre-cum. He only hopes it’s enough—

“Ten. Off, pet.”

And then it’s over.

Ozmund pushes Ash’s head away from his lap, patting his cheek in some quasi-affectionate gesture. He strokes his stiff length as he moves from Ash’s side; Ash is both relieved and disgusted to hear the squelching wetness in his hand.

“Mm, what a view,” Ozmund purrs, kneeling between Ash’s suspended and splayed legs. “Such lovely little cheeks. If only they were bright red and bruised . . . Perhaps next time.” With his free hand, Ozmund pokes and tugs at the plug still firmly lodged in Ash’s tight ass.

Ash’s tail limply swishes to cover himself, but the fading magic only allows it to flick anxiously. Renewed panic seizes Ash’s will; in broken, tearful whispers, he continues his chant of, “please, please, please, please—”

Ozmund pulls the plug out, slowly fucking Ash in and out dryly with it. “’Please?’ You want it that badly? Well, then, I shouldn’t hear any complaining, should I?”

He tosses the plug aside and spits on Ash’s exposed asshole. And then, in one smooth motion, he sinks himself firmly into Ash.

Hot, fiery pain pierces Ash as Ozmund’s tip invades his body, pressing an anguished shriek from his chest.

Even with the plug having kept him loosened all day, Ozmund is still far too thick to go in so quickly, so unprepared, and so desperately unwanted. Each inch pushes deeper into Ash, stretching his tight ass to its breaking point; his head shoves past Ash’s defenses, grating like sandpaper past each ridge and ring until it slams into the bend of his colon. Pain radiates through Ash’s belly, and he struggles against his chains.

“No!” he screams hoarsely. “It-it hurts!”

He bucks his hips back, trying and failing to pull himself away from Ozmund’s firm presence inside him. Ozmund merely groans in response, almost laughing at Ash’s protests.

“Oh, please,” Ozmund grunts as he sinks Ash’s hips back down onto his cock, forcing more agonized wails with each thrust. “You’ve taken Evius; you can take me.”

Taken Evius? The most he’d taken of Evius was two of his nimble, slender fingers—nowhere near enough to fit Evius’ enormous cock, much less anyone else’s. Evius wanted to wait until he was sure Ash was ready and able to take him comfortably. He always said it wasn’t supposed to hurt; he said he wanted the first time to be special, and he’d take care of Ash.

“I-I-I,” Ash stammers through rising sobs, “I never have! He n-n-never . . . We didn’t—” Tears choke Ash’s voice before he can continue.

Ozmund stops his hard thrusts for a moment, a wicked grin spreading across his face. “No,” he gasps, his excitement barely contained. He looms over Ash, letting his hands wander and fondle Ash’s body as he teases him. “Am I the first to take this tight, exquisite little ass? Hm? You should’ve told me, darling. That makes tonight so much more special.”

He nearly pulls out of Ash, leaving only the faint curve of his tip inside. The emptiness almost brings tears of relief to Ash’s eyes. But before he has a moment to catch his shuddering breath, Ozmund slams back fully inside him even deeper than before.

“Now, forever and always, I will be your first,” he growls low in Ash’s ear. “You are mine now. Even if you should ever leave, your body will never forget how I molded it, how I trained it. Even if you return to Evius, you will only ever think of me while he’s deep inside of you. Isn’t that special, my love? You will never truly be apart from me.”

It’s not supposed to be like this. It’s not supposed to hurt like this. It’s not supposed to be against his will, trussed and tied like a butchered animal. It’s not supposed to wrench his heart into pieces. And it’s absolutely not supposed to be with Ozmund.

Ozmund resumes his relentless pace, scraping against Ash’s walls and colliding against his furthest reaches over and over again. It never stops hurting—it never gets easier to take. Even as Ash’s body stretches to accommodate the intrusion, he’s already so bruised and damaged that the slightest movement sends shockwaves of pain up his spine and forces whimpers and screams from his lungs.

If anything, the pain only worsens the longer Ozmund fucks him. What little moisture he was able to conjure has long dried up, replaced only with dribbles of his own blood and Ozmund’s pre-cum. His body chafes against Ozmund’s, sweat meeting sweat and skin meeting skin. Before long, the pain becomes overwhelming, and Ash can only let out broken, groaning sobs.

“Yes,” Ozmund purrs in response, “keep crying for me, pet. It makes you clench so—tight—!”

Ash wants to slip away, to let his mind wander to something—anything—other than what’s happening between his legs, but he can’t. The pain pulls him back to his body with every stroke, along with something he didn’t expect. As Ozmund sinks in and out of him with what must be practiced precision, he begins to feel a strange, familiar pressure.

His . . . prostrate? Is that what Evius called it? The tender gland in his ass swells against his will, rubbed and prodded by Ozmund’s cock. It coils tightly in his belly, forcing his own cock to stiffen against the hard metal of his cage. As it grows, the pieces all start to come together: he’s locked in. His cock will outpace the cage, pressing painfully against the tight entrapment until either he begs for mercy . . . or Ozmund forces an orgasm out of him by fucking his sensitive spot over and over.

Ash’s sobbing and begging begins anew; he doesn’t want this. He doesn’t want any of this. He doesn’t want Ozmund to make him cum. He doesn’t want this pain to continue. He doesn’t want this memory burned in his mind forever.

“Oh, is it too much, little cat? Are you getting hard from this?” Ozmund slows his rhythm slightly, still pressing perfectly into Ash. He won’t stop, not even for a second, and pressure continues to build in Ash’s body. “That’s too bad, pet. I’m not quite done.”

As Ozmund picks back up to a breathtaking speed, the coil finally snaps in Ash. He spasms and cries out, dribbles of milky liquid spilling from his strained cock. It doesn’t feel good—there’s no relief or pleasure, only a half-hearted physical reaction. At the same time, his ass becomes even more sensitive, and he wails from the overstimulation of Ozmund’s continued thrusts.

Ozmund laughs at his twitching, sensitive body, pounding harder to force rasping groans from Ash’s throat. Again, Ash tries to pull his hips away—to keep Ozmund’s insistent cock from grinding into that aching, throbbing gland—but Ozmund only sinks deeper to meet him.

“That’s it, pet. The more you struggle—ah, fuck—the better it feels.” He hisses, his movements quickly become jerky and frantic. “I wonder if males of your species can get pregnant; I suppose we’ll find out.”

He reaches out to slap Ash’s softening cock, then shoves the fingers of one hand deep down Ash’s throat.

“Suck them while I cum inside you, little cat,” he commands, his hips snapping brutally against Ash’s pelvis. Ash does as instructed, though his body still aches and tears still paint his cheeks.

Hot, thick seed spills unprotected into Ash.

Ozmund groans with feral delight as he softens within Ash and finally pulls out; the relief sends a shudder throughout Ash’s exhausted body. Coming down from his high, Ozmund scoops up a dab of his and Ash’s combined cum and fucks it back into Ash’s mouth.

“Now, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” he teases. “Looks like you enjoyed yourself after all, didn’t you?”

No, I didn’t! I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t. Ash whines beneath him, pleading with his eyes as he fights against the salty taste in his mouth—is it over? Is it finally over?

It’s only a moment before Ozmund collects himself; with a sigh, he smooths his hair with his free hand and resumes his graceful, domineering posture. He scowls in concentration, removing his fingers from Ash’s lips. “Before I forget, there’s one last thing—your third punishment.”

There’s more? Ash struggles against the chains as much as his worn out body will allow, the thin metal biting painfully into his flesh. He pleads and begs, but Ozmund ignores him, instead busying himself with something on the bedside table.

“Calm yourself, pet,” he chastises Ash. “I told you explicitly earlier: three transgressions, three punishments. You’ve only had two so far. Now, for the third: you allowed Lady Nandaar to violate my rules and try to claim my property. This punishment will ensure that never happens again.” He turns back to Ash, wielding a metal object he can’t quite make out. The smell is familiar, though—dangerously familiar. Something Ash knows on instinct he should avoid.

“It seems I must mark you as mine in a more ostentatious way, so there can be no doubt who owns you.” His hand hovers over Ash’s chest, the object finally coming into view. “Now, stay still.”

The silver stamp presses into Ash’s skin, singeing his hair and raising a puffy, red welt above his heart. He yelps and thrashes against the chains; with only a quick, firm touch, the metal brands him as if it were a hot iron. Ozmund, smug with satisfaction, returns the stamper and admires his handiwork.

“There it is,” he murmurs contentedly, stroking the bright pink flesh to follow its shape. A circle, then a zig-zag line within it: OZ. His personal emblem. “Isn’t that better? Don’t you feel good knowing you’ve taken all your punishments? Have you learned your lessons?”

Everything hurts. Ash’s body is sore and tired; not a single inch is without an ache or burn or pin-prick numbness. His eyes struggle to stay open, overflowing at all times with either tears or exhaustion. None of this feels good—least of which his broken, defeated mind.

He nods limply, his eyes stinging with tears both shed and unshed, begging to slip closed. Just let me sleep, he pleads internally. Put me back in the cage. Please.

Finally—finally?—Ozmund strokes Ash’s cheek. Gently. Tenderly. The touch makes Ash’s lip quiver uncontrollably; he leans into the kindness while it lasts, ignoring the shame screeching in his head.

“Yes, that’s a good boy.” Even with the condescending tone, Ash still melts at the praise. The punishments are done—he’s good again. He’ll get soft, pleasant touches again. Maybe he’ll even get real food again. Maybe—

Ash feels Ozmund’s renewed hardness against his leg, brushing up and down the curve of his ass. At the same time, Ozmund lifts Ash’s neck to his lips, sucking and biting greedily at the sensitive flesh.

“W-wait!” Ash whimpers. “I thought—I had all my punishments?”

The caressing hand on Ash’s cheek pulls back and slaps him, hard. “You’re not here to think, pet,” Ozmund replies darkly. “You’re here to be my plaything. Is it a punishment to serve your Master, or is it your purpose? If anything”—he grips Ash’s face tightly and forces him to meet his piercing glare—“you should consider it a privilege, especially now that the only interesting thing about you has worn off.”

With a snap of Ozmund’s fingers, the chains securing Ash shift and morph, tugging him onto his knees and pressing his ass high in the air. Ozmund settles behind him, lubricating himself with the remaining cum dripping from Ash’s hole. Ash tries in vain to use his tail to do something—anything—to push him away, but like Ozmund said . . . It’s gone. The magic has finally faded. And Ash, once again, suddenly feels very alone.

Ozmund holds Ash’s hips close to him, scratching his nails down Ash’s belly. “Did you really think one quick fuck would satisfy me? We’re not done until I say we’re done, little cat. But”—he lifts Ash’s head by his hair—“as fun as your sniveling and sobbing can be, I’m growing tired of hearing it.” Another swirl of magic, and he shoves a wad of fabric into Ash’s mouth, securing it in place with another strip tied behind his head. “Much better. Now I can fuck you in peace.”

By the time Ozmund finally finishes—several hours and loads later—Ash’s screams have long died behind the gag.

-

Taglist:

@scoundrelwithboba @corbytheking @lumpofsand @tired-human09 (I thought you might want to be tagged, lemme know if not and I'll remove you!)

-

A/N: I'm back babey! Well, hopefully. Still slogging through moving, but I have a bit more free time to write at the moment so hopefully I can start getting a chapter a week out again and gradually pick up from there. It's been . . . a lot lately. Thanks for being patient <3

[loveroftoomanyfandoms]

A Little Angel (Or Devil?) Chapter 2

Pairing: Matt Murdock x F!Reader

Story Summary: Matt and Reader, happily married at the end of Angel of God, my Guardian Dear, start the next chapter in their life together -- parenthood.

Warnings/Tags: Smut, Unprotected Sex (I mean obviously, Matt and Reader are trying for a baby), Pregnancy and all the fun stuff that comes with it (sarcastic), no graphic depiction of childbirth

Word Count: ~1600

A/N: Warning for folks with emetophobia for this chapter!

Tag List: @nommingonfood

Let me know if you'd like to be tagged!

Matt whistled cheerfully as he walked home from the office a few weeks later. He had just wrapped up a case for an affluent client which meant that the firm was going to be able to keep the lights on for another few months, Foggy had told him that he had finally asked Karen out on a date, and it was Thursday, which meant that he and Y/N would be spending the weekend breaking in the new living room furniture that would be arriving Saturday morning.

He walked up the steps to his and Y/N’s house and unlocked the door, frowning when he was greeted with silence. 

Normally on the days Y/N arrived home before Matt he would hear her getting started on dinner in the kitchen or at the very least moving around upstairs, but today there was no sound. 

Matt stepped further into the foyer, trying to remember if Y/N had told him that she had made plans with Jessica for after work. “Y/N? You home, angel?”

He tilted his head as he heard the slow, steady rhythm of Y/N’s heartbeat coming from the back of the house.

He headed down the hall towards the dining room. “Sweetheart?”

He paused as he reached the garden room and realized that Y/N was fast asleep on the couch.

He crept closer to her and knelt on the floor, gently brushing his hand across her forehead and frowning when she felt a bit warmer than usual. “Y/N? Angel?”

Y/N stirred and let out a soft sigh. “Matty?”

Matt nodded. “Yeah, sweetheart, it's me.”

“What time is it?”

“About 7:15.”

Y/N groaned and sat up. “Shit, I'm sorry, honey. I wasn't feeling well after I got home from work so I laid down in here for just a second. I must've fallen asleep. ”

Matt's brow furrowed at the weak sound of her voice. “You okay, angel?”

“Mm mmm.” Y/N sighed. “I feel drained. Hope I'm not coming down with something.”

Matt felt Y/N's forehead again. “You do feel a bit warm. Maybe you should take tomorrow off to rest.”

Y/N shook her head. "I can't, I have that --"

She suddenly cut herself off and jumped up, running through the dining room towards the first floor bathroom.

Matt winced at the sound of Y/N throwing up and followed, pausing at the doorway. “You okay, angel?”

Y/N groaned from where she was hunched over the toilet. “Maybe you're right. Maybe I should take tomorrow off to rest.”

Matt entered the bathroom and knelt down next to Y/N, reaching his hand out to rub her back soothingly. “I'm sorry you're not feeling well, sweetheart.”

“Ugh, this is the worst time for me to have to be sick. I'm supposed to be recording the audio version of our newsletter tomorrow morning, plus we're gearing up for the start of summer reading next week.”

Matt shook his head. “Your health is more important. Hopefully you'll be feeling better and can do the newsletter in a few days, otherwise I'm sure someone else can fill in. In the meantime you need rest.”

“Mmm.”

Matt went to the kitchen and filled a glass with some water before bringing it to Y/N. “Here, you need to stay hydrated if you're throwing up.”

Y/N hummed. “Thanks, Matty.” 

She took the glass from Matt and swished some water around in her mouth before spitting it into the toilet, then took a cautious sip. “Ugh.”

“Better?”

“Little bit. Thanks, honey.” Y/N took another sip of water. “Maybe I should sleep downstairs for a few days. I don't want to give you whatever this is I've got.”

Matt shook his head. “We've already been in extremely close contact so if whatever you have is contagious chances are I've already caught it. Luckily though, I've got a pretty strong immune system so if I haven't already gotten sick I'll probably be fine.”

He went to help Y/N up. “Besides, what kind of husband would I be if I didn't take care of my wife in her time of need? After all, our wedding vows did say ‘in sickness and in health’.”

Y/N leaned against him. “I love you, you know that?”

Matt planted a kiss on her forehead. “I love you too. Now, we're gonna get you in bed, then I'm gonna go get you some chicken soup.”

Y/N hummed. “Could I have some egg drop soup from the Chinese restaurant on the corner instead?”

Matt chuckled. “Of course, angel. I'll call in a delivery order for dinner, how about that?”

Y/N nodded against him. “Okay.”

Matt helped Y/N up the stairs to their bedroom and paused in their doorway. “Want to shower first?”

Y/N hummed. “Yeah, that might help.”

Matt nodded. “Okay, you go do that, I'll order our food.”

“Okay.”

Matt called in their delivery order while Y/N gathered her pajamas, then waited until she had headed into the bathroom before making a second call. 

“Mr. Murdock?” said the voice on the other end.

“Yeah, kid, it's me,” Matt replied. “Are you going to be patrolling tonight?”

“Yeah, I was planning on it. Why?”

“I was wondering if you could make a couple of passes around the Kitchen for me. Something came up so I'm staying in.”

“Everything okay?”

Matt winced as he heard Y/N throwing up again. “Yeah, it's just that my wife's not feeling well and I don't want to leave her home alone.”

“Oh, okay, it's no problem, Mr. Murdock, I can do that for you. And I hope Mrs. Murdock feels better soon.”

Matt nodded. “Thanks, Peter, I owe you one.”

“Okay, talk to you later!”

“Bye.”

Matt hung up then texted Foggy as the shower turned on. Working from home tomorrow. Y/N’s sick.

Oh no, was Foggy's reply. Hope she feels better soon. Let me know if you two need anything. 

Thanks. Will do.

He put his phone away and headed downstairs, the scent of Chinese food wafting towards him as their delivery order neared.

He grabbed two bottles of water out of the refrigerator, waited until the delivery person rang the doorbell, then accepted the order and took it upstairs, setting it on the dresser as Y/N walked out of the bathroom.

Matt turned towards her. “Feeling better?”

Y/N hummed. “I think so.”

Matt gave her a kiss, tasting the slightly minty flavor of toothpaste on Y/N’s lips. “You get settled in bed and I'll bring your soup to you, okay?”

“Okay.”

Matt set his takeout container on his nightstand along with one of the bottles of water before handing Y/N her soup. “Here you go, angel.”

Y/N gave an appreciative hum. “Thanks, sweetheart.”

Matt set the other bottle of water on Y/N’s nightstand along with an extra bottle of ginger ale he had added to their food order. “Here, I'm hoping the soup and ginger ale settle your stomach.”

He moved to his side of the bed to eat, keeping his attention on Y/N in case she got sick again.

Once Y/N was finished, he took her empty container. “Feeling ok so far?”

Y/N was quiet for a moment. “Yeah, it's staying down.”

Matt nodded. “Okay, good. Let me go take care of this stuff, I'll be right back.”

He ran downstairs, rinsing out their containers before placing them in the recycling bin.

He headed back upstairs, grabbing a clean pair of boxers from the dresser. “I'm gonna go grab a quick shower. Need anything?”

“Mm mmm.” Y/N shifted against the bedsheets as she settled in. “Tired.”

“Okay. Be right back.”

Matt hurried through showering and brushing his teeth then headed back into the bedroom, climbing into bed next to Y/N. 

He wrapped his arms around her and leaned back, pulling her to him. “Come here, sweetheart.”

Y/N snuggled up to him. “You aren't going out Daredeviling tonight?”

Matt shook his head. “No, not tonight. I asked Spiderman to keep an eye out for me in case anything pops up, and I also told Foggy I was working from home tomorrow. You're my number one priority, angel, I'm not going to leave you here alone when you're not feeling well.”

“Thank you, Matty.” Y/N nuzzled her nose into Matt's chest. “Mmm, you smell good.”

Matt chuckled and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Get some rest, okay? I'm not going anywhere.”

Y/N nodded. “Mmhmm.”

Matt gently stroked her hair until her breathing turned deep and even.

After she was asleep he slowly reached over and pulled his ear buds out of his nightstand drawer, then connected them to his phone so the noise wouldn't disturb Y/N.

Matt had sworn back when he and Y/N were kids that he would always do anything and everything he possibly could to take care of her when she wasn't feeling well. I'll always take care of you, Y/N, he had said the time Y/N had been ill with the flu when she was 14 and Matt had been 15. That's what best friends are for.

He opened the online ordering app for the grocers a couple of blocks over and ordered the ingredients for homemade chicken soup along with some peppermint herbal tea for delivery the following morning in case Y/N still wasn't feeling well.

He put his phone and earbuds away then settled in to sleep. He just hoped that Y/N felt better soon.

[myosotisa]

ceilings - s.h.

Steve Harrington x Reader, Chrissy Cunningham x Steve Harrington

‖  summary: 2 and a half years of your relationship with your best friend Steve.

‖  tags: cheating/infidelity, dubcon, sexual content. you're the one outside of the relationship. slight emetophobia warning. reader is described AFAB, no pronouns, no y/n. angst. hurt no comfort. it's a rough one folks, no happy endings here. please consume with caution.

‖  word count: 2k

The first time your best friend touches you is October 30th.

A few times a month you and your tight knit group of friends get together around a hand stained table and play board games. Those are your favorite nights – full of laughs and screaming and jokes and drinking. You count the days of your quiet, empty life between those evenings.

It's a Friday. You've had more to drink than you normally do. Steve, your best friend, is sitting next to you, your friends Jonathan and Nancy across the table. Eddie, the only other single person in your friend group, and Chrissy, Steve's girlfriend, are both not there.

When Steve gets up to refill his drink, you swing your legs up to rest on his chair, laughing to yourself. When he comes back, you expect him to throw your legs off with a fake scowl, maybe sit on your shins in retribution. Instead, he scoops a forearm under both your calves to lift them and settles them into his lap after he sits down.

You're stunned, but only for a moment. The 4 of you return to the game, your legs resting on Steve's thighs beneath the table.

Another drink later, you feel Steve's warm palm against your shin. It's a completely innocent touch, just resting on your skin. To you it feels strange, unfamiliar – you're touch starved and accept it as is.

The night goes on and Steve's hand starts to move. A subtle brush of his thumb turns into a gentle rub along your shin and keeps inching higher and higher. You're intoxicated, dizzy, struggling to keep up with what's going on as it progresses. And his touch feels good.

Jonathan excuses himself to stumble over to the bathroom so you, Steve, and Nancy pause the game to talk. Steve tucks the tip of his finger beneath the hem of your shorts and you can't help but look over at him in shock. He just smiles, same as always, and goes back to talking to Nancy. You face forward and try to get your fuzzy brain to figure out what's going on.

Am I just imagining this? You've known Steve for years and he's never shown any interest in you beyond playful flirting. He flirts with everyone. And he's with Chrissy: beautiful, blonde, skinny, perky. They say I love you daily and live in this apartment together.

But she's not here. And Steve's hand is brushing your clit over your shorts.

You don't stop him.

When Nancy and Jonathan say they are getting ready to call a ride, you get up too. Your head is spinning and you can't think straight. Steve looks a bit disappointed but doesn't stop you.

The next 2 times you all meet up to play games, Steve finds a way between your legs. Even when he's sober. Even when Chrissy is home. Under the table, around a corner, behind someone's back. He takes two fingers and drags them up and down your slit, over your clothes, and looks delighted when your breath catches in your throat.

You never stop him. Even when you're sober. Even when you go home hating yourself.

You tell yourself it's thrilling, the sneaking around. Rationalize how nice it is for someone to know everything about you, even the dark and dusty corners of your heart, and still desire you. One night he whispers how much he wants you, what he'd do if the two of you were alone. And you can't remember the last time you felt wanted. It's like a drug – a strong hit of Steve in a dark corner soothes the lonely ache inside your heart. Even when you go home alone and he gets into bed with her.

The first time he fucks you, she's asleep in the room next door. It's the middle of the night and he has his hand over your mouth, whispering that you need to be quiet so she doesn't hear you. It feels like you're being torn in two; feeling wanted and feeling alive as you do something you shouldn't, drowning in your guilt and shame at what the reality is.

He finishes inside you without even getting you close. You walk home alone with his cum sliding down the inside of your thigh.

A year goes by.

Every time is the last time, both of you say so. He complains of feeling like the guilt is crushing him. You try to offer solutions that he never accepts. You both talk about how wrong it is, how fucked up you both are. How it hardly even feels good or exciting anymore.

He pulls your pants down anyway, whispering that it's the last time.

It isn't.

It's October again and an unhelpful part of your brain tells you that it's a few days off from 1 year since it began. You are sitting at your desk at work and unlock your phone, pulling up Instagram. You scroll by a few posts when you spot his username.

It's like dropping an anchor through glass.

He proposed to her this weekend, the caption explains. The photo is Steve on one knee in front of Chrissy at the place they had their first date. You swipe and it's a selfie – Chrissy holding up a pretty little diamond on her slender finger and 100 watt smiles from both of them. The comment section is full of people congratulating them: how perfect they are together, how happy they look.

You run to the bathroom and lose your lunch.

That weekend after the games are put away, he stands in front of you, asking if he can fuck your mouth. His hand is so comforting on your jaw, his eyes so full of tenderness. You undo his pants yourself and part your lips like you have a hundred times before.

You go home unsatisfied and sob into your bedspread.

2 months later and he has a crisis. The worst day of his life. He's shaking, crying, panicking. But he doesn't go to her. He goes to you.

You hold him as he cries, comfort him, tell him everything is going to be okay. A bitter part of you can't stop thinking about all the times you walked home alone after getting him off, drowning in guilt and emptiness. Comforting yourself as you cried into your pillows. But you tell yourself this moment is important – he needs you, he wants you, he is choosing you. He feels like his world is ending and he knocks on your door.

3 weeks later and the moment means nothing. The cycle continues.

The first time you tell someone the whole story, from the very beginning, it doesn't go as you hoped. It's someone who doesn't know anyone involved, 3 steps removed from all of them. You are desperate to get it off your chest, beg for help from how it weighs you down day after day.

A part of you thought maybe they would understand. They would see why you do it, why you keep saying yes, why you don't put a stop to it. You hoped they would at least try to see you.

The only questions they ask are, "Does his fiance know? Are you going to tell her?" You don't know how to answer. And all you feel is judgement. The weight only gets heavier.

You never speak of it again. To anyone.

A few more months pass. Steve and Chrissy have another fight. He ends up in your bed. After coming inside you (again), and not asking if you came (again), you lay there and talk. He explains the fight, says they just keep fighting, that sometimes he dreads going home to her.

You tell him maybe this isn't working, maybe he should consider leaving her.

"You're only saying that because you want to be with me."

It hits like a punch to the gut. "Steve, you know everything about me. Do you really think I'd do that?"

He doesn't answer, but you know he understands. You'd never put yourself before him. He knows that. "She loves me… And I love her."

If you loved her, how could you do this to her for all this time? You want to scream.

If you loved her, why are you here in my bed?

Instead you listen to him make more and more excuses of why he stays with her. Despite his own betrayal, despite how shitty they treat each other, despite how wrong they are together.

I love you and it's killing me. You want to scream.

You never do. And he goes home to her the next morning.

You ignore his advances for the next 6 months.

It feels good. To set a boundary that way. To choose yourself. And eventually he stops trying, accepts it as it is. The two of you go back to being the same best friends you were before that October 2 years ago. It feels like growth, like you're finally doing something right.

Sure, you're lonely. And sometimes seeing him with her, knowing she still doesn't know, makes the guilt crawl back up your throat and threaten to choke you. But it gets easier.

Then you have a crisis. The worst day of your life. You're shaking, crying, panicking. And you don't have anyone to go to but him.

He buys you food, streams your favorite movie. He sits right next to you on his couch, a comforting arm around your shoulders, a warm touch you haven't felt in months. It's something that friends do. It's casual, normal.

But you feel so empty, so broken, so hopeless. You're so fucking alone. It feels like your world is ending. And when his hand strays too low, you are desperate to feel something different. Something else, even if it's worse. 

It's like a drug – and you relapse.

The cycle begins again.

A few more weeks go by. You get home from work and check your mailbox. There's a pristine white envelope with gold embellishments sitting on top of the normal junk mail. You flip it over and see your name in the perfect curve of Chrissy's handwriting.

A wedding invitation. Asking you to save the date. There's a handwritten note from her on the bottom next to the RSVP. "Don't bring a plus one if you can help it! There's someone coming I want you to meet and I really think you'll hit it off ;)"

You didn't think it was possible, but you hate yourself just a little bit more.

2 weeks later Steve shows up at your door. He walks in like he owns the place but stops short when he sees the invitation on your counter.

With a kitchen island's width of safety between the two of you, you finally ask. "Does she know?"

Steve's eyes meet yours. The flop of hair on his head moves as he shakes it in a 'no.'

"Are you really going to marry her without saying anything?"

He doesn't answer. Just stares.

Bile rises in your throat. The white envelope in his hand gives you the strength to ask the question you knew would destroy everything. "Just tell me this, Steve. Was all of this because of how you feel about me?" Your voice cracks, tears pushing at your eyes. "Or, if I had said no, would you just have gone and found someone else to fuck behind her back?"

There's a long stretch of silence. It feels more and more like a noose tightening around your neck as the seconds pass.

"I don't know."

A sob tears its way out of your throat, your hands grappling for the counter between you to stop from collapsing. Through your tears you see him falter and then try to reach for you, but you flinch away.

"Get out."

He actually has the gall to look shocked. "Come on, let's just talk about this."

"Steve." Your voice is liquid nitrogen and he freezes on contact. You've never spoken to him like this before and he doesn't know what to do. "Get. Out."

He whispers your name and it hits you like a slap, another sob tearing up your esophagus as you turn away. Eventually he stops hovering, collects his briefcase, puts his shoes back on. The door clicks shut behind him.

You collapse onto your kitchen floor and cry your fucking eyes out while he goes home to her.

They get married that spring.

thanks for reading.

[nowoyas]

Koi no Yokan 12: SCAT2 (nishinoya yuu/reader)

First - Prev - Next - M.list - Ao3

Summary: You have a headache.

Tags and warnings: very light emetophobia (mentions of nausea, one threat of vomiting, no graphic descriptions), blanket series warnings, themes of child neglect, loss of a parent, suggestions of child abuse

Words: ~4400

Q1. Can you tell me what happened?

Takeda is here, in front of you. It takes you too long to process him, too long to process Noya beside you, a hand on your shoulder. Longer to come up with an answer. What you settle on, and utterly fail to get your brain to communicate a single word of, is this:

Recently, the noise a volleyball makes when it hits the floor is one you've started to like. It's good. It's hollow. When the gym's quiet, it echoes. When it's noisy, it blends in seamlessly. Off a body, it's a duller sound, and you imagine that has to do with as much of the noise coming from the surface it impacts as it does the ball itself. Right now, the sound you're picturing, your most recent memory, is close to your ear. It's hollow. It echoes. You try to piece together what it was impacting off of, but it's hard to think, because your head fucking hurts.

It doesn't just hurt: it throbs; it pounds; it aches, and the more it aches the more you can't place why it aches, but you should know, shouldn't you? Weren't you there?

The thought pisses you off, and the madder you get, the more it throbs-pounds-aches-threatens to split in half entirely.

If you focus on the pinprick split where your consciousness is begging to fold over, you have the vaguest idea of walking into the gym with someone. Of shouting, of everyone around you, shouting shouting shouting they won't shut up—

Then, your Senpai there, crouching in front of you. Always there.

Oh. Crouching. If he's crouching, eye level, that puts you on the floor.

When you tug on the memory, you have to bite your lip something awful, but there's more there: someone—people—crying. Yachi, Hinata, both in tears as they stand behind your Senpai. Sawamura, yelling louder than you've ever heard him, ordering everyone to stop crowding her—you?—and pinching your skull like a dull pair of scissors.

Your scalp is too tight, a pair of jeans you should have known better than to try and squeeze into, the fabric straining more and more over the thighs and waist with every continued raised voice.

The millionth I'm sorry from Hinata's lips had you snapping, voice thick with tears as you begged for everyone to stop yelling. It's desperate. Pathetic. Not you at all.

Everything too loud, too bright, and you're not sure if it's you or the memory of you lurching with nausea and pressing the heels of your palms into your eyes in vain, desperate hopes of making it all stop stop stop—

Takeda repeats the question in a gentle voice. "[surname]-chan. Can you tell me what happened?"²¹

"Think I died," you manage to grit out. The words are there, the explanations, the details, but they're heavy and you're not sure you can lift them.

A nervous laugh. "Can you tell me anything else?"

You shake your head. Takeda looks to someone else—your Senpai, your Noya—for the answer. "What happened before I got here?"

His voice is too firm and too quiet when he answers. Angry and cold and so, so unlike him. You wish you could focus on the words long enough to catch what he has to say.

Takeda makes a note,²³ looks you over. Asks you some other question that doesn't matter—something about a pain in your neck, which you don't have, or if you do, you can't feel it over the fucking parasite trying to burst out from inside your skull.

Then—

"Alright. I need to ask you a few questions. [surname]-chan—"

Q2. Where are we?

Thinking about it isn't doing you any favors, but you can follow the logic for an easy enough answer. Takeda-sensei, Noya, your boys from the club—

"The," you start, then stop and lean over your knees. "The school. Right?"

That has to be it. Everyone's school people, except Noya, who's an always people, but everyone else is school people. Not even just school people. They're also—

"T-the gym."

Another nod, another note, an assurance that you're doing great. A hand on your shoulder, thumb rubbing soothing circles that seem to be the only thing keeping your soul in your body at this moment in time.

Q3. What time is it?

You're pretty sure you answered something. When you drag your eyes up to look at Takeda—squinting through lights too bright—his expression is worried. You suppose you might also have not actually said anything. It's getting hard to tell.

"How about the day? Can you tell me what day it is?"

"August," you blurt. "August fifth."

Beside you, Noya cringes. That must not be right, then.

Takeda rattles off a few more questions. You don't recall them, or your responses—maybe a balance test, maybe something with remembering a list of words. Just that, at the end of it, he gives you this worried look and speaks in that same gentle tone.

"[surname]-chan, I'm worried that you have a concussion. I'm going to call your parents to take you to the hospital, alright?"

Oh.

…oh.

Your eyes find Noya, distressed and pathetic. You're not sure what you're looking for from him. He gives it to you anyway.

"Shoot, that might be a problem," he says hurriedly. "She was telling me yesterday that her dad had a big business trip he was leaving for today. Something super important for work, right, [name]-san?"

You nod slowly.

"I think he's on a flight right now, actually. You're not gonna get him on the phone."

Takeda frowns. "That'll be a problem. Is she staying with anyone while he's away?"

"Not directly, but she's right down the street from me, and Okaa-san's pretty close with her dad. I can give you her number; she sort of keeps an eye on [name]-san whenever her dad has to go out of town."

It's a lie, probably, but at the very least, you don't have to corroborate a thing. If they make you speak one more sentence, you're throwing up right here and no one is stopping you.

"Thank you, Nishinoya-kun. I'll call your mom. Will you take [surname]-chan to sit outside for now?"

You let him help you up; let him guide you.

Outside, there are birds calling, and their voices, too, are far too loud.

~

Every time Nishinoya Rina's work phone rings with a call from the school, her lungs deflate like a stuck balloon. For a few brief years, it was easier to deal with: at least Yuu and Satsuki were at different schools. At least she knew which of her kids had caused an issue before she picked up the phone.

Statistically speaking, it'll be Satsuki. Yuu's usually the good one, barring those times his tempers or passions get out of hand. One of her friends—estranged now—had always told her how much more wild boys were, but as wild as Yuu is, Rina's never taken a phone call about him sending a classmate to the hospital. It's Satsuki who likes to fight, Satsuki who doesn't have incentive enough to keep her temper in check. It's also Satsuki who likes to fight her brother's fights for him—he's got volleyball, and her favorite sport is trying to get away with fights—and Satsuki who she's let think she doesn't know about every single one, because the poor girl needs an outlet and punishing her will make it worse.

In the time it takes for Rina to get the housewife at her register rung out, the phone has stopped ringing. The woman—Yanagi, a regular, stops in once a week or so for meat for the husband and kids—tuts softly at her expression. "Another call from the school, Nishinoya-san?"

Rina winces. She's never been good at this part of customer service—the endlessly bright, shining face that comes so naturally to most of the rest of her family. "Is it that easy to tell?"

"Satsuki-chan must still be making trouble. You know, if that girl had a strong father figure in her life, I bet she'd come around. Do you know Nakamura-san? I heard he's looking for a wife, and you're still young!"

Only two years younger than her, Rina wants to say, and her kids are doing much better without a father in their lives. Instead, she forces a well-practiced smile. The shop is built on regular customers, after all. "I've got my hands full with the teenagers, Yanagi-san," she replies as the phone begins to ring again. Still Karasuno High School on the caller ID. Still a problem with one of her kids. "I don't really have much time to think about a second husband. Not to mention, who'd be here to slice up pork for your kids if I'm running around with some Nakamura-san?"

Yanagi laughs, saunters towards the door. "If you ever change your mind, let me know and I'll get you his number! You'd better see what your daughter's done this time."

As the front bell rings, Rina snatches up the phone with force enough to break it.

"Hello?" she says, then cringes: her voice came out too harsh, too clipped. Yanagi put her in a bad mood. She needs to learn to control her voice better.

"Excuse me, is this Nishinoya-san? This is Takeda, from Karasuno High School."

"Yes, this is her speaking. Is this about Yuu, or Satsuki?"

"Well, actually, there was an incident during volleyball practice this afternoon, and—"

Oh. Oh shit. It's actually Yuu this time.

Not only is that an insane turn of events, it's deeply concerning.

"—[surname]-chan, one of our managers, was hit in the head with a volleyball and is showing signs of a concussion. Nishinoya-kun mentioned that you're neighbors, and her father is out of town, but that you'd been asked to keep an eye on her in case anything happened. I would strongly recommend that [surname]-chan be taken to the hospital, but without her father available, I'll have to defer to you…"

Rina is silent for a long moment. Part of it is the relief: Satsuki didn't get into any fights, and Yuu hasn't shoved any more members of the faculty in the halls. Another part: the concern, different from its initial form, but still very present.

No one mentioned a word to her about looking after anyone else's kids, but she knows the [surname] name. She's heard it—first in whispers, then spoken aloud from customers and neighbors after enough weeks had passed—all in the context of a hit-and-run incident, but she's certain the only family member she'd ever spoken to would be the mother, now dead. The father, she hasn't seen since then, and she's not quite sure she even knows what the daughter looks like.

In other words, the girl in question is a mixed-up kid who's lying about her father and needs to go to the hospital.

Rina's hands are already on the box of gloves as she comes to a response.

"Thank you for calling. I don't have any staff at the shop—please give me a moment to get everything closed down and I'll take her to the hospital. How is she doing?"

"She's very disoriented. I believe she's understanding everything I'm saying, but she doesn't seem to want to say much. From what Nishinoya-kun has told me, she's very sensitive to noise right now."

"I understand. I'll be there as soon as possible."

When she hangs up, she moves as fast as she can. The open sign is flipped; she scribbles out a sign to post on the door apologizing for the inconvenience. The meats of the day are moved to the walk-in cooler, things are wiped down with a speed she's grown proud of in the years since she took over the shop. She shoves the cash drawer into the safe, misses the apron hook, and as she locks the front door, she locks eyes with an approaching customer—old Mister Watanabe, pries too much and has known her since grade school.

"Oh, are you closing for the day already, Rina-chan? Early, isn't it?"

She flashes an apologetic smile. "I'm sorry. If you call the shop and leave a message, I'll have everything packed up for you bright and early tomorrow morning, Watanabe-san. There's been a family emergency."

~

Noya gets permission to stay with you. It takes one look of actual concern to get permission for it, and he doesn't even have to ask. Not that anyone needs a reason for someone to stay—you're only half-there, have to be cajoled into focusing long enough to hold conversation. He's pretty sure it's more from pain than anything—the way you wince when anyone speaks, the way you hold your head. You bury your face in his shoulder, not for comfort, but, it seems, to block out some of the light, and he holds you close in a vain attempt to soothe you.

He wasn't involved in the spike that took you out, but it's still his fault. Had he moved faster, he could have gotten in front of it, could have done some dashing move to prevent your shit from getting wrecked before afternoon practice can even really start.

His mom shows up in record time, talks to Takeda for a bit before all three of you pile into her car. Yachi brought him your bag and clothes from the changing room, so you should be all set to go, and she also promised to keep notes for you until you're back at school. No one has any illusions about that being this week.

Noya sits in the back seat with you while his mom drives. She lasts several minutes of silence before addressing the issue properly.

"So… [surname]-chan, was it?" she asks quietly. Takeda-sensei must have given her the memo about your being sensitive to noise. "You're Yuu's friend?"

You nod weakly. "I-I, um. Down the street?"

"She lives a few doors down from us," Noya translates. He meets her eyes in the rear-view mirror, silently pleading: don't bring up her family.

Mom listens. She's cool like that.

"Well, we'll get you brought to the hospital. How long is your father going to be away?"

"Don't remember."

"You can stay with us, then. Your Sensei is pretty certain you have a concussion, and if the one Kaede had is anything to go by, the doctors aren't going to want you to go home alone for your own sake. She had to spend a little while being monitored to make sure everything was alright."

You jerk, mouth snapping open to reply, only to cut off in a wince. Noya rubs your shoulder soothingly.

"I know, honey. It's not ideal, but I'm a mother, you know? I can't let you go home to an empty house with an injury like that. How are you going to eat and take care of yourself alone?"

You press your lips together firmly, more stray tears slipping down your cheeks. Noya digs out his handkerchief and offers it to you.

"Hurts," you whimper, and his heart breaks.

"I know. We're getting you taken care of, okay?" he murmurs to you, too soft for Mom to hear.

You nod.

The rest of the car ride is relatively quiet. After a bit, you rest your head on his shoulder, dabbing at your cheeks periodically with his handkerchief.

Mom raises an eyebrow when she spots it, but she doesn't say a word.

~

Yuu's… friend? Girlfriend? …is loud about her protests to the diagnosis, Rina notes after several hours at the hospital. Wordier than the car ride, clearly wants to just go home, but, well…

It's a yes to the concussion, and a no to going home without an observation period. They want to keep you overnight and well into tomorrow—24 hours of monitoring in total—which works out, because Rina's not letting you alone until you're actually cleared to return to some amount of activity, and there's a lot she left undone at the shop that she'll need to circle back around for, like prepping for Watanabe's order and cleaning more thoroughly. Or else, Dad might be up for taking over for a day or two while she watches you—she's not so sure about having him watch over you, but if he can take over the shop, she can stay home, and no one misses out on meat for the week. You're clearly upset about it, but Yuu whispered something to you which calmed you just enough to let Rina feel good leaving you for the night.

She'd taken Yuu home to sort out the mess in the kitchen, where she now sits, watching him pace around the table. Soba's taken up residence on top of the fridge, eyes tracking him as he goes. Between her and Soba, she's not sure the last time either of them saw him so upset.

"Yuu, honey, sit down," Rina says gently.

"Can't. She's gonna be alright, right?"

She nods. "That's why they're keeping her overnight. So she will be alright."

"Okay, but why do they think she needs to be watched so long?"

"It's normal for a concussion. You were too young to remember, but Kaede had to do the same thing."

"Nee-san did? How'd she get a concussion?"

Rina cringes. "It was… a rough time. Better that you don't remember."

His eyes harden in understanding, footsteps slowing to a stop.

Every day, it gets harder to address Yuu and Satsuki about their father. In theory, they're too young to remember much, and someday, she'll have to sit them down and tell them the story in full so they understand, but not here. Not now. Satsuki certainly remembers enough to be affected, and with the way Yuu looks at her now, he knows enough that they can save the conversation for another day. Some other time, maybe, when Yuu's girlfriend isn't laying in a hospital bed and when Yuu's not busy wearing a new path into the tile floor.

Not today.

He sits, and she stares him down. "So, tell me about your girlfriend."

"She's not my girlfriend," he says reflexively.

She raises an eyebrow. His shoulders drop a little.

"…yet. But I'm gonna marry her someday."

Rina laughs, shoulders dropping a bit. That's a bit more like her son. "Does she know that?"

"Of course! I've proposed to her almost a hundred times already. I really think she's coming around to the idea."

"I'd expect no different from you," she says with a good-natured sigh. "What's the real reason your teacher's calling me about her, and not her father?"

"I guess you know about what happened with her mom?"

She knows the rumors. It was all her customers wanted to talk about for weeks at the shop—such a tragedy, poor girl had to watch her mom die, the man didn't even stop—but she'd been busy that day, hadn't been home to see it happen.

She vaguely remembers coming home with groceries to see flashing lights on the street and panicking, thinking one of her kids had gotten caught up in something. Remembers the all-consuming guilt that had overtaken her at the thought that oh, good, all my kids are okay on hearing that a woman had died, that a girl almost her son's age had to watch it happen. "More or less. Her father's still around, right?"

"Not really. She just told me about it the other day. He comes home super late, barely even looks at her if he is home early enough to see her. She's been basically on her own this whole time."

"So he's not actually on a business trip."

"He isn't."

"So you lied to Takeda-sensei."

"Look, [name]-san is—she doesn't need to deal with trying to navigate the school asking questions about her dad while she's got a concussion, and I don't think she really wants it brought up. It took a lot just for her to mention it to me, and she really only did it because she thought I already knew. I'm not gonna turn around and immediately tell Sensei that her home life's screwed up. She''ll never trust me again like that. I'm not even sure she really trusts me now."

"So her father's neglecting her."

"She has, like, food and stuff. He gave her a debit card to use for groceries and all that. He just… won't talk to her. Won't spend any time around her. She's mostly managing the team to get out of the house because she doesn't want to come home, so I try to do what I can to keep her busy. She doesn't smile very much." He pauses. "She's really lonely."

Rina's heart cracks a little. It makes sense—she knows where else she's seen you. You come into the butcher shop sometimes, buy the cheapest meats not with a sense of desperation but with a look of guilt. You don't make conversation. You don't do much more than speak when spoken to, ask for the meat you're after, and smile a polite little smile that never seems to reach your eyes. Just a can I get a pound of this cut? and a thank you very much when everything's wrapped up and paid for. Once or twice, a how much of this do you think would be good for two people for a week? The split in your lip was new, but it hadn't been the first time you'd come into the shop with some kind of visible bruise or another.

"She's going to stay with us at least until the concussion starts clearing up. I'm not letting that girl go home without someone to take care of her. What does she like to eat?"

Yuu's brow furrows as he thinks it over. "She likes sweet things. I don't think she's very picky, either." A pause. A flash of realization. "She likes karaage, I think. And curry, but we just had that the other night. I think she's still eating the same batch. She might appreciate something different."

Rina smiles. "'We'?"

His cheeks are pink when he replies, "When we got back from the training camp. She made curry while telling me about her family, and I stayed for dinner. She's a really good cook."

"She sounds like a sweet girl. There's some things I need to handle before picking her up tomorrow; you can either come with me back to the shop to do prep for tomorrow, or you can stay here and make sure the guest futon is clean and dry for her. I don't think it's a good idea for you to be without a task right now, though."

He nods. He gets extra restless, sometimes, and somehow she gets the weird sense that if she leaves him without something to occupy him, she'll come back to the house on fire or receive a call that Yuu has broken into the hospital after visiting hours. "I think I'll stay here and make things ready for her."

"I'll make a list for you, then."

They sit down together like that for a bit, making a list—what to clean tonight, how to make her comfortable, who to ask to borrow what (Satsuki's clothes if she's not comfortable with Yuu's or sending someone to grab some from her place, Mei's shower stuff). Yuu's never been great keeping tasks straight in his head, never been the best at focusing, but that's why the list—whatever he gets done will be a help, and whatever he doesn't, they can tackle together when she's home from the shop. She'll talk to the girls tonight, talk to Dad when she can. Tomorrow, she'll take Yuu with her back to pick you up from the hospital, and it'll all work out somehow.

That's all it needs to do.

Footnotes

21. This chapter, and me not bringing an on-site school athletic trainer into the mix despite that not being an uncommon thing to have available at American schools (or else I worked with a very unique set of athletic trainers in a county that can employ athletic trainers at every high school but not a fucking French teacher), is dedicated to Jun Matsuno, whose master thesis²² I read in its entirety for exactly one line telling me whether or not Japanese high schools would also have an athletic trainer on campus to be brought in in case your club's manager fucking dies by volleyball. Everyone say thank you Jun Matsuno. I'm entirely positive that the goal you had in mind when writing your Master's thesis and approving it for public availability was for some Ao3 author to use it to write a very long fanfic about a less-popular Haikyuu character someday, so I am here to actualize that goal. Congrats on your Master's! I hope you're using it well, sir.

22. Jun Matsuno, "Perception of Athletic Training Services of Japanese Collegiate Student Athletes," Online Theses and Dissertations, 2013, https://encompass.eku.edu/etd/192.

23. I couldn't figure out a good way to stick this note on the chapter title, but he's filling out the Sports Concussion Assessment Tool. Haikyuu is set in 2012, so he's specifically using the SCAT 2nd edition (the SCAT2), based on my research to figure out what edition was in use at the time. The SCAT3 was introduced in 2013.²⁴ Some research on the subject seems to imply that the English-language concussion assessment tools is the same as the concussion assessment tools used in Japan, presumably after having been translated to Japanese.²⁵, ²⁶

24. Echemendia et al. "The Sport Concussion Assessment Tool 5th Edition (SCAT5): Background and rationale." British Journal of Sports Medicine 51 no. 11 (June 2017): 848/850. PubMed.

25. Suzuki et al. "Knowledge of, and Attitudes Toward, Concussion in Japanese Male Collegiate Athletes." Front Sports Act Living 4 (2022). PubMed Central.

26. Otomo et al. "Concussions in Japanese High School Rugby Players: Research on injuries, symptoms, and signs." British Journal of Sports Medicine. 52 (2017): 368-369.

Tags: @deeplightgarden @idonthaveanameideayet @dusstory @kazunish

[raelhbishop]

Cabaret of the Macabre

Filed under [M] for "macabre."

A collaboration between me and the magnificent @roadkill-frankenstein. The prose is mine, the art is theirs, the characters are ours. Consider it a "back-door pilot" for a setting of mine, of which he's a collaborator.

Capt. Grim Blackburn and Brennos Lobhadh belong to @roadkill-frankenstein.

Theoxenia Trismegistus and Mr. Manson belong to @raelhbishop.

Content warning: Depictions of PTSD and body dysmorphia; graphic depictions of death and stake-burning; body horror; mild emetophobia and hemophobia

❊

Two beaming yellow-on-red specks float about in the darkness. Aside from distant flickers of candles, they alone bring light to an all-encroaching darkness, like embers from a dying universe.

If one squints hard enough, one can see suggestions of a surroundings; the grain of stone, the glint of leather, the smudge of ashes, the subtle crevices of some much larger carving. In the dark, it's hard to tell truly where one thing ends and another begins.

An acrid, metallic smell singes the air.

The specks turn slightly, like two wispy marbles. A thin, bronzy outline of two circles and a line follow some inches ahead. Shuffling can be heard; glyphs, pages, come into view, given a subtle red tinge by the spheres.

Adjust the eye of your mind, and one can see something more to these specks…

❊

"Manson, are you positive this is your… friend's… address?"

"WE'RE NOT EVEN THERE YET, HOW CAN YOU ASSUME I'M WRONG?"

A sleek car moseys its way down increasingly decrepit roads. The tag on the back reads "D3MB0NZ”.

The streets reek of piss and, occasionally, some really poor quality ganja wafting from a balcony — a typical day in Miami. The hot sun glistens off the faces of our protagonists. Well, two of them.

Theo and Grim haven't been here for very long, only a few months at the most. In-between their work schedules, the two of them like to wander around Miami and make mental maps of what it holds. They've got it figured out: where all the vegetarian restaurants, liquor stores, and bars that host live music are.

These streets, however, seem foreign to them both. Mr. Manson has been driving for some time now, practically past the city's heart and into something overgrown.

Their ride comes to an end. He leaves the car confidently, leading the two past increasingly questionable buildings.

Grim adjusts his wide-brimmed straw hat. "…why are we going here again?"

"TO VISIT A GOOD FRIEND OF MINE." His voice is reminiscent of the roar of a car's engine.

"Brennos, right?"

Manson nods, audibly rustling. "YOU WILL LIKE HIM, TRUST ME. HE'S A PROPER GENTLEMAN. PLAYS A GOOD GAME OF POKER.”

The trio walk past a condemned building, boarded up, stucco walls crumbling. Mr. Manson stops at the next house, standing before a rotted door that looks minutes away from falling off its hinges entirely. He starts shuffling through his overly large ring of keys — the one thing, he laments, can't be upgraded.

Theo whispers to Grim. "I still don't know why he's our landlord."

"You know damn well why. He's the only one who would take us in."

"I dunno, dude. He still gives me the creeps."

"Come on, he's just undead, that's all. Like me."

"Well, yeah, but you've got flesh and bones and stuff. He's just… bones."

"AH, HERE IT IS."

Mr. Manson pulls out a literal skeleton key, the teeth resembling tiny ribs jutting out of an elongated phalange. At the key's base is a small crow-like skull.

He jabs it into the doorknob. Fighting a little, it eventually unlocks and glows the faintest bit. The eyes of the key light up a ruby red.

Adjusting his jacket and top hat, Manson opens the door and enters.

Theo grabs Grim's hand. They lock eyes, take a deep breath, and follow behind.

❊

A beam of light bursts through the darkness. Three figures emerge from it: the first, a top hat and Prussian blue coat clad figure, walking confident and cool. The second is straw-hatted, with hints of turquoise visible from underneath his yellow raincoat. He has only one arm. Close behind is a cowboy booted figure, sheepishly wearing a colorful hoodie with a smiling black cat on it.

As the door begins closing, the group find themselves in a corridor filled with other doors. They're all exquisitely carved — Mr. Manson notes they're made from solid ironwood — and are all identical except for a small symbol at the center of each. The door they just left bears a manatee engraved into it; a rose sits on the door to the left, and a fountain to the right.

Manson leads them to one end of the corridor, where a much larger door with a wolf-headed knocker greets them. He puts his skeletal finger to it; without even making contact, it knocks itself with a bark.

Startled, Theo leaps backwards, hitting a door with an eight-spoked wheel engraved into it. His hoodie gets knocked back, revealing two goat-like horns that curl behind and down below his equally hircine ears.

Grim sighs. He grabs Theo by the hand.

The door slowly opens, revealing more darkness inside. Manson continues, unperturbed. His shoes clack across the dark marble floor.

Following his lead, the two enter an even larger corridor. The simple wooden walls of the previous room have now been replaced with a dark stone. Pillars and alcoves have been periodically carved into them, covered in intricate detail that comes off as all-too sinister in the dim light.

The visitors peer into the alcoves as they walk past. Artefacts sit on pedestals in each one, lit by lanterns hoisted mere feet above. One holds a beige bejeweled cup, bearing the suture marks characteristic of a human skullcap. Another holds a preserved jar with a snake inside, a strange blend of the cobra and the moray eel. They pass by tusks from long-extinct wild cats, obsidian daggers, gold urns holding crystal spheres instead of ashes…

They walk by an intricate pocket watch with a mirror exposed; as the three walk past, only Theo's reflection appears.

Manson turns a corner. Theo bumps into a pedestal, showcasing a sizable ram's skull. He shudders.

They come to a still life; Theo and Grim stop to look.

"This painting gives me the creeps."

Grim nods. "It's very well done. I wonder if it has any deeper meaning."

Theo cocks his head. "Maybe you're right, dude… see the way the skull is in the forefront? Maybe it's supposed to represent how, like, death is everywhere. And all the stuff behind it is what you want to see." He points. "The books, the flute — a most excellent flute — the sword, the… weird little thingy you, like, put incense in or something…"

"What of the conch shell?"

Theo shrugs. "They're nice to look at? All the objects represent what we see in life, but the skull rules over them all."

They look at it quietly a little longer. An ever-so faint metallic smell begins to waft over.

"What do you think, dude?"

Grim shrugs. "Looks all the same to me… uh, Theo?"

He turns from the painting and is frozen in his tracks.

The two of them see the orbs in the distance. Floating. Ominously. The metallic odor grows stronger. They pinch each other to make sure this is all real, and slowly inch to the side.

Underneath the spheres, a line of frozen flames of red begin to emerge from the void. Both seem to be hovering in the distance. Eyeballing a nearby chandelier, Grim figures the orbs — the eyes, must be a good ten feet off the ground.

The eyes draw closer. The line becomes more defined, taller even, revealing the flames to be rows of sanguine teeth.

Grim feels for something on his left hip, but hears whimpers from his right. He grips Theo's arm to lessen his trembling.

"AH, BRENNOS! THERE YOU ARE!"

Manson walks past the duo, arms open.

A voice emerges from the lurking face. "Charles! Good to see you."

Stepping into the light, something emerges from the shadows.

A pink, slimy visage surrounds the eyes. It has the skull of a coyote, cleansed of all its flesh except for a thin film coating it. It sits atop a long, shaggy neck that freely hunches over. It’s composed of varying furs — suture marks can be seen patching them together.

The mysterious face seems to smile now, commanding a spindly and domineering body. Whatever other unspeakable things the body has inside it are concealed under rather refined clothes: a red dress shirt and pants, and a black collared vest with brass buttons down its left.

A book is clasped by the figure's massive wolf-like talons. They glisten wetly in the light.

Manson stands beside the ten-foot patchwork creature. The latter closes his book, bends his knees, and gives the skeleton a firm handshake.

"I'VE BROUGHT SOME CLIENTS ALONG WITH ME, I HOPE YOU DON'T MIND."

"Not at all."

"THAT ONE," he points to the figure in the straw hat, "IS ONE GRIM BLACKBURN, AND THE SHAKING SATYR HE'S CLUTCHING IS THEOXENIA TRISMEGISTUS."

"Ah, yes, you've told me about them. The ex-pirate and the aspiring musician." He approaches said musician. "I hear you prefer to go by 'Theo,' is that correct?"

Sputtering ensues.

"Ah, don't be so nervous, lad. Your horns don't bother me one bit."

Theo freezes.

"Would you all like a tour of my humble abode?"

"I THINK THAT WOULD BE IN ORDER."

Grim slowly nods his head.

"Splendiferous."

Brennos begins leading Mr. Manson down a left corridor, the others trailing behind. He begins a thorough discussion of the first item he sees — a shrunken head, hoisted to his right, said to hold the soul of the man it once belonged to.

Theo leans over towards Grim. "I think he's gonna kill me, dude."

"Not as long as I'm here."

He smiles at Grim, his lips quivering.

❊

Cacophony rebounds across the halls. Its source is a simple tea room, with Brennos and Manson chortling and patella-slapping. The two of them regale anecdotes of their "lives," happenings from centuries ago that lose some of their humor on the guests.

A fireplace roars in the background — the most light you'll find anywhere in the place. To the left lies a gallery, to the right a kitchen, and directly in front sits Brennos in his leathery armchair.

"You know, Charles, I could install one of these in your place."

Mr. Manson rattles.

"Really, it's no bother."

"THANKS, BUT NO. MY FLATSCREEN TV WORKS JUST FINE."

"Well, what about a cauldron?"

"SLOW COOKER."

"Magic orb?"

"DESKTOP COMPUTER."

"Oh, you make me feel like such a luddite sometimes!"

Grim fidgets with his coat. Theo stares into his empty teacup.

Brennos turns to the two. “So, tell me, how long have you two known each other?"

"About a year." Grim cautiously eyes his host.

"Good."

There's an awkward silence across the tea room. Brennos flashes a sanguine smile; Grim seems a little unnerved by it, so Brennos retracts. It's at this point Grim realizes Brennos hasn't moved his mouth at all — the words get beamed into his brain.

"Say, Charles, did you ever tell them about how we met?"

Before he can start, howling can be heard in the distance. Theo looks up from his teacup, eyes widened in concern.

"Ah, sounds like the tea's done." Brennos slowly rises to his full height. Theo starts bleating in panic — after trying to relax for the past ten minutes, he'd forgotten how tall his host was. Sitting to Theo's left, Grim taps him on the shoulder to get him to calm down. It doesn't work.

He moves his hand to his nape and quasi-massages his neck. The panicked bleating slows down; he breathes easier.

"YOU TWO HAVE AN INTERESTING RELATIONSHIP."

"Yes, but it's ours, and I'm glad to have it." Grim moves closer to Theo; the latter puts his head on the former's shoulder and bleats, this time happily.

Manson grins — not that he has much choice.

Brennos returns with the tea. He pours Theo and Grim cups. The former's hesitant at first, but messily takes a sip — less out of courtesy and more out of his love for herbal teas. It's quite a nice blend; the rest of the cup soon follows.

Grim notices the host pours himself a cup from a smaller kettle; he inquires.

"Oh, my friend, this is a drink for… very specific tastes. I'm certain if you tried it you'd regret it."

Grim highly doubts that — the man makes his cocktails with antifreeze, after all.

Manson and Brennos resume their recollections, some puns at the expense of a 'Governor Phips' here, wise-cracks about Puritan dogma there, and a passing mention about a Sikh vetala and a book club. Then Manson does an impression of some obscure minister that sends Brennos reeling.

As he laughs, a little spills from Brennos' cup. A crimson stain pools on the table.

Grim hovers over the spill.

Theo cocks his head. "…is that…?"

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry." Brennos pulls out a kerchief and wipes it up.

"Oh god." Theo puts a hand over his mouth.

"Down the hall, second door on your right."

He runs from the table.

Meanwhile, Grim hovers over Brennos' "tea"cup.

"I told you it was for specific tastes." He sips a little. "You look quite perturbed by it for a retired swashbuckler."

Grim stares at a painting opposite Brennos. "Have you ever seen the mountains outside Marrakesh?"

"In books, yes."

"You know how they transition from being a dried red on the bottom to pallid and snowcapped on the top?"

Brennos acknowledges.

"Every time I see… just any red, really… I'm reminded of those mountains.

"I'm reminded of seeing a pool of crimson, covering the hardened snow. Staining the jagged rocks. Draining the color from…” he winces “…skin. Taking with it, every last inch of warmth… flowing down to join the red rocks below.

"Even just seeing a crimson shirt hanging in a store makes me nauseous."

The void creature takes another sip. "Are you always so honest with gentlemen you've just met?"

"Not until lately." Grim sighs. "How do I put it…"

"YOUR BOY TOY HAS MADE YOU FEEL THINGS?"

Grim shoots Manson a glare that would make one's skin peel. It does what you would expect to someone with no skin.

"JUST A BIT OF HUMOR."

"You're not wrong, though." He resumes staring at the painting. He sighs. "I used to despise the undead, see them as affronts to the unyielding hand of God. And then, by a cruel twist of fate, I was forced to join them."

Putting his cup down, the sewn-together figure steeples his talons. "Do you know how Charles and I became what we are?"

"You just said it was some event in Massachusetts."

"Aye, but that's only part of the story. We used to be flesh and bone too. It was a rather… excuse me for a moment…"

Brennos turns to a cabinet behind him, rummaging through it. He pulls out a stone, clasps it in his hands, and concentrates. He seems to wince while doing so. When he opens his claw, the stone has been reduced to a glowing dust.

"An old trick from the Babylonians." He tosses the dust into the fire. "Observe."

Grim looks into the fireplace and watches its flames turn a vibrant green. It seems rather ordinary, all things considered… but he can't seem to look away from it-

In an instant, Grim sees a foreign vision in his head, a memory that is not his own, playing back as clear as crystal…

❊

Many people misconstrue what 'alchemy' is. It's not the search to turn lesser metals into gold; that's merely a side effect. The true goal of alchemy was mystical: to purify the self, to transmogrify oneself from an impure being of flesh and vice into a transcendent spirit.

To study the vibrations of the world, and pluck them with understanding, turning the universe into a perfect orchestra.

To alter one's own vibrations.

Witchcraft, traditionally, was seen as the innate ability to cause misfortune simply by willing it. Magic for malice, as it were.

But some, many who found themselves magically-inclined or curious — mystically inclined or curious — were targeted as "witches". The actions, the goals, the dreams — they didn't matter to the outsider; their strangeness was enough to warrant scapegoating.

The memory unfolds in a cramped house, wooden logs as its walls and a simple dirt floor. All manner of drawings and writings in scripts — Arabic, Latin shorthand, some bastard version of Greek — line the walls.

He sees a figure in the mirror — one covered with scars across its chest, scars it - he, knows to be from disgust, from a desire to become something different.

A body, a mind, a soul, torn from years of constant, minor degradation. Like a thousand arrows shot at the psyche. Insults from others; assaults from others; assaults from his own mind… and a growing desire to escape.

Today, there is no disgust. There's only excitement… a little fear, but eager anticipation overwhelms it.

A cloth covers a vaguely humanoid outline in another corner of the room.

The anticipation wells further. Various items line the desks here; crucibles and alembics, a bubbling cauldron, ashes, herbs familiar and exotic, not-so precious gems, animal skulls, talismans from within and without the New World…

He turns to see sigils inscribed into various loose-leaf pages and small discs. A wooden one sits forefront, destined to be an amulet.

Removing a rod from the fire of the cauldron, he burns a strange symbol into the disc, then submerges it in the cauldron.

He takes the amulet and… the memory gets blurry here, painful. When it returns, the amulet has been snapped in half; one half, he wears himself, the other, now placed onto the cloaked figure. Both seem to glow gently.

His excitement boils over — as does the cauldron. He takes a cupful from the cauldron, pipping hot, and drinks it, burning his throat in the process. He doesn't care. He takes another, and pours it into the cloaked figure.

Colors now seem more vibrant. He can feel his blood, his breath, his nerves — like winds, swirling about his body. He drinks more of the brew; the inner vision, the excitement grows stronger — blinding his awareness of what's unfolding outside.

The rituals that follow are a bit esoteric for most; still, the feeling of the winds becomes ever-present. They begin to coalesce in channels across the body.

It's exhilarating… it's chaotic… it's purifying…

He can feel a synergy, a connection, with a foreign channel mere feet away, as if a door is opening with a ruby red key.

Suddenly, his own door bursts down. A mob breaks in, armed with simple weapons, dressed in simpler clothes. The few that enter are baffled by the array of oddities. They utter prayers and complaints.

The strongest one of them grabs him by the shoulders, jostling his trance.

It's as if one's hand had been jarred in that very door. The connection splinters, shivers… the winds turn into typhoons around their channels… voices from before, from beyond, from within, are amplified a thousandfold. Dread rises from every pore.

He tries to fight back, thrashing his limbs, knocking his set to the floor. It's no use.

He gets dragged out by the mob. His vision is blurry, hazy, like a mirage. As he gets dragged further, he can see his house burning in the distance. He can make out a few faces in the crowd; most prominent, that of a buckle-hatted, mustached figure — a certain Charles Baldrick Manson III, Esquire, farmer and moral arbiter.

The connection still lingers. He tries desperately to re-enter the trance, to hold on to it for as long as possible. He feels sensations across his bodies ebb in-and-out. A soul cast between two homes, tethered to neither and longing for both…

Within moments, he now finds himself tied to a stake. A woman, a familiar voice, tries desperately to stop them, but it is of no use. She pleads before Manson; he is unperturbed.

He fades in-and-out of awareness, across bodies. He feels the other one grow warmer — a sign of progress?

He can barely hear the confident speech of the mob leaders as he tries to re-enter the trance. Suddenly, light begins to shine from below.

He thinks it's a good sign at first — the soul, finishing its migration!

He looks down — both bodies — to see that he's gravely wrong.

Flames pierce the skin like cuts from a red-hot sword. The smell of burning flesh is choked out only by the stench of the wood underneath.

Blood begins to boil underneath the skin. Joints bubble and explode. Bones can be heard crackling from the flames.

His body begins to feel numb all over, the pain unbearably dulling all his senses. He goes blind — either from the trauma, or from his eyes popping in their sockets.

The last thing he can see is the smiling face of Charles, taking a mirage-like transition into darkness. Swirling darkness, like the smoke of the flames.

There's a piercing ringing in the ears.

It slowly dampens as if it were going down a distant corridor, echoing as it departs.

The vision becomes filled with sparks.

The all-consuming pain slowly seeps, drains out. He can feel the winds withdraw from his body, heat coalescing, then dissolving from the heart…

Grim grips his chest, reflexively…

… pooling into something.

The vision gradually transforms, from the light of a moon-lit sky, to an ember-like reddish glow, to black voidness… finally, to a clear, blinding, calming light…

… it sits there for some time…

… he awakes to find himself in the ashes. Not on them, in them. He feels strangely free, fluid, like he could fly through mountains…

… and yet, he finds himself trapped in a black, bile-like form, pooled in and around what was once the stake.

It takes some time for his spirit to adapt to this liminal body — liminal being the loosest and yet closest fit term for what this is.

Two bead-like eyes form from the mental image of himself. The world no longer looks the same; ghosts and auras are now as clear as day, and the mundanities of life give way to the extraordinarities of the beyond.

Brennos' cool, cold, shadow-like body creeps its way out of the pile of smolders. It rolls itself into the direction of the town, to the direction of a certain manor, inhabited by a certain Mr. Manson…

❊

The memory ends. It felt like hours. It all flashes by in a minute's time.

"I had worked so long and hard to sculpt the perfect form, something I could feel confident in…" Brennos creaks, akin to a sigh. "I spent years learning to re-assemble myself, using what little magic I had left to survive."

Grim quietly, slowly nods.

"It took me some time to get to the form you see today. Most of the bodies and cadavers I tried to inhabit were failures from the start — too decayed, too weak, too small. I soon gave up on trying to become human again. Instead I built myself a body, the one you see before you now. One of flesh, fur, and bone. At first, I was disgusted by myself."

Grim says nothing.

He sips from his cup, teeth clacking ominously against it. "It took me some time to accept what I had become. And now, I've grown quite fond of this body of mine."

Grim still stares in the direction of the fireplace. Brennos creeps over; his cheeks seem wet with tears.

He extends a talon.

Grim turns.

"We all need help sometimes."

Grim grasps the claw. They do a quasi-handshake.

"Say, Charles and I have a little… coven, you might say, of undead friends that meet here. We're called the Cabaret. Would you like to join us?"

Grim looks down, thinking.

"There is no pressure to join, my good sir."

He thinks for a moment. "Well, only if I-" He turns in his chair. "Wait a second… my landlord is the man that killed you?"

"Indeed. I was quite miffed at the time. In a fit of rage, I went over to Manson while he slept, and put a hex on him. I spared his wife-"

"AND I MUST SAY, THANK YOU FOR SPARING HER."

"Why wouldn't I? She was the only one who stood up for me."

"VENGEANCE DOES STRANGE THINGS TO THE MIND."

"Very true. Regardless, that hex is what brought him to his current form as a walking skeleton."

Grim looks Brennos in the eyes. "The cycle of violence."

Brennos nods. "Ah, but how trivial it all looks in death." He points at Manson. "You accused me of witchcraft because I mentioned the possibility of rain, and it rained that day. You were correct, of course, but your reasons… quite absurd."

"TRUTH IS, I WAS JUST MAD BECAUSE I WAS PLANNING A PICNIC THAT DAY. OUR PASTRIES WERE RUINED."

"Ah, to put your fellow man to death over soggy pastries! How interesting those times were."

Manson hunches towards Brennos. "I'M AFRAID NOT MUCH HAS CHANGED IN THAT REGARD, TO THE MORTALS AT LEAST. QUITE SAD, REALLY."

"Yes, but at least the stake-burnings are metaphorical now instead of literal.”

"YOU SHOULD SEE WHAT THEY DO IN SUBSAHARAN AFRICA THESE DAYS. IT WOULD MAKE YOUR BILE-"

A metallic thud can be heard in the distance, followed by a yelp.

"Griiiim!"

Seconds later, Theo emerges from a corridor, a helmet from a Qing dynasty coat of armor rolling in behind him. He runs over to Grim, and buries his head into his shoulder. "I want to go home!"

He sobs profusely on the pirate's left side, tears trickling down his armless shoulder.

Grim looks over at his hosts. He turns back and puts a consolatory hand on Theo's shoulder.

The whimpers echo across the halls of the manor.

As the tears begin to lessen, Grim pats Theo on the shoulder, grabs him by the chin, and turns his head.

He sees Brennos there, taking on the posture of a plant that's begun wilting.

This ten-foot fleshwork creature, witch, daemon, whatever it is, seems… sad.

Theo gets the feeling that there's emotion there. Its mouth may be bony and menacing, and its eyes more like burnt embers than eyes, but it… he, seems just like him in a way.

He burrows his head back onto Grim to process.

Theo gets the sense that, somehow, Brennos is just as sad as him. He doesn't know it like Grim knows it, but he senses that somewhere, deep in those eyes, a mortal just like him once resided — still resides. A hopeful, excited — corrupted, mirror of himself.

"Alright, I understand. You two are free to leave." Brennos approaches a little. "But first — and, I must say, this is entirely your choice — I think I have something you might enjoy, Theo. Would you like to come see it?"

He sniffles. Picking his head off of Grim's shoulder, he grips his hand and looks him square in the eyes.

Grim nods slowly.

Theo turns and cautiously accepts, following behind Brennos and gripping Grim's hand.

They wind past corridors Brennos showed them prior — weapons, skulls, preserved viscera and the like — and enter one the group missed. It's filled with instruments; Theo is amazed by their diversity and age. He brightens up a little, pointing at the erhu and the mandolin and the qanun.

Brennos then pulls out a dust-covered box from beside a pipe organ. His claws wrap neatly around it, brushing the dust off in one stroke.

"I remember hearing you liked music. Is that so?"

"I live for music."

"Good, very good. I've always admired a musician's heart. It's similar to a witch's heart, in a way."

Brennos lowers himself to Theo's height. "Charles has been telling me of all the strange new ways everyone listens to music. When I was born, you could only hear music by playing it yourself or hearing someone else. Before the phonograph or the cassette-disc player or what-have-you, we had this."

He puts the box in Theo's hands. It's wooden, fairly dense, is about the size of a paperback novel, and has a painting of a forest scene on it.

"Go ahead, open it. It won't bite."

Theo cautiously lifts open the top. As he does, it begins playing a gentle tune. He can see the machinery inside — a spinning copper disc with holes punched into it, and a braided metal rod that sticks halfway across its length, dipping up-and-down with the grooves of the disc.

It's so old, so simple, and yet so intricate.

"That's… Clair de Lune.”

"Good ear."

Something about the music box's tune strikes a chord with Theo. The high-pitched, metallic strumming seems to take him back to a time before he was born; nostalgia for a faceless face, a placeless place. He sees the tree he was born under, his name not yet carved in its side.

He feels a pressure build from the side of his eyes, growing stronger with each high-note.

Tears once more stream down his face.

He lets it loop two or three times, before gently closing the box.

"It's yours if you want it, friend. A gift."

He sniffles. "Thank you." He puts the box beside him, wipes his eyes, and looks at Brennos down his comically small glasses.

Theo slowly smiles. He chuckles. "Sorry, dude. I think I forgot to introduce myself." He puts his left fingers on his chest and extends his right hand outwards. "Theo."

Brennos nods. "Brennos Lobhadh, at your service." He extends a hand, as if to shake.

Theo extends his hand upwards.

They stand silent for a few seconds, before Charles approaches Brennos and hushedly explains what a high-five is.

Brennos shrugs and complies, slapping his massive claws against Theo's frail hand. The satyr winces, grips his wrist and grits his teeth, trying to conceal the pain twelve pounds of talons hurdling at his palm conveyed.

Brennos looks concerned.

The satyr smiles back. He sticks his tongue out, playfully. "Don't worry, the last dude that did that became my boyfriend."

❊

The wolf-knockered door opens once more; this time, Theo and Grim walk mirthfully out of it, saying goodbye to their hosts.

Manson and Brennos stand in the doorway, waving back.

"Oh, Grim!"

Grim turns. Brennos gestures conversationally.

"My offer still stands. To join us, I mean. Here at the Cabaret. I think you would make a welcome addition. We share our collections"

"Only if he can come along." Grim nods toward the satyr beside him.

Brennos puts an inquisitive talon on his face. "Well, he's not quite undead… rather the opposite, really…"

"That's my offer. Take it or leave it."

Brennos shrugs. "I suppose a little life wouldn't hurt."

Theo opens the door with a rose carved into it. He waves as the couple say their final goodbyes.

"WAIT, HOLD O-"

The two of them exit the room, entering a shaded pathway nestled beside a dilapidated corridor. Grim holds in his hand double, Theo nothing.

"Remind me never to take you to Vegas."

Theo chuckles. "Remind me to never take you to Macau."

"Think I'd drain their casinos dry?"

"I don't want to have to break you out of a Chinese prison."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Grim ducks walking past a… gargoyle?

"You're a cheat."

"I don't cheat!"

They turn a corner, Theo's hands motioning past a poster written in some strange language. "Come on, dude, you even cheat in Monopoly."

"I do not!"

"I dunno, I don't think 'accepting aid from the East India Company' is in the game rules."

"They're called house rules!"

"…Grim?"

A giant statue of a woman on horseback, flanked by two paladins, stands before Theo, with "TRANDAFIR SI APOSTOLII EI" carved into the stone it sits on.

"I don't think we went through the right door…" ❊

[gammagoop]

Random Acts of Kindness

Small Limited Life fic I wrote for fun ^_^

Featuring Grian and Etho, with other members mentioned (do not tag as ship)

Warnings: emetophobia, lots of anxiety, and talks of death

Words: 1,574

fic is under the cut ⬇️

“Do you want to enact the sword?”

Etho stood, above him, higher than him, in the dirt and ruins of wooden structures. They were almost unrecognizable, as if decades had rotted away the wood and weather had trampled the crops. Joel had tilled this same sweat-soaked soil just a few weeks prior.

Grian’s face lit up at this, seeming to react with real emotion for the first time since Joel had gone out. He dropped his own weapon onto the ground, not bothering to consider the danger of doing so in the tidal wave of emotion.

“YES! Yes! I want to enact the sword!” He clapped his hands together.

His world hit him like a train, like a surprise thunderstorm, his mind reeling as he grasped desperately onto this new semblance of an ally. Etho was close enough to his state. He still had Impulse, but Impulse wasn’t here.

“Oh my god!” His breath ran out of him in a huff, and he felt dizzy all of a sudden, heart pounding blood in his ears.

Etho laughed how he always did, jumping down heavily onto the dirt below and tucking his weapon— the titular sword— away as well. A sign of peace, of agreement.

Grian couldn’t help himself, he reached out and grabbed Etho’s hands, pulled them near his chest and squeezed them. Felt Etho’s blood running in his veins under his fingernails, how warm another body could be.

Etho squeezed back as if he didn’t know what to do. His eyes squinted a bit like an awkward smile.

“I— I—“ Grian was suddenly aware of a tremor through his body, making him feel nauseous. He stepped back shakily, panting, blood loud, releasing his ally’s hands.

“Oh, Etho, I— Don’t feel so good—“

He bent and lurched and vomited into the mud.

“Oh,” Etho said, surprised, unsure, “Are you okay? You’re not sick, are you? You can rest if…”

Grian lifted his head “No— I—“ He heaved a bit. “I’m fine. It… happens,”

“Anxiety?”

“Yeah, that would be it wouldn’t it,”

Etho’s eyes softened, and he fumbled through his inventory for a minute. He pulled out a flask of water, and outstretched an arm to offer it to Grian.

“Drink this, I filled it up with clean water around 30 minutes ago,”

Grian already had water, he thought, but took it anyway. He stumbled over to the end of the bridge, where the wood was, and sat down among the upturned roots of potatoes, legs feeling too tired to hold him anymore. He drank about a third of the flask in two large swigs, just to get the acrid taste out. Etho sat down next to him, more smoothly, and put a hand on his back.

“Don’t go too fast,” He warned.

Grian panted heavily. “Right, yeah, don’t wanna barf again,”

“Mhm…”

They sat like that for a minute. It was nighttime, the sky cloudy enough to obscure the moon.

Grian caught himself expecting to hear the footsteps of Skizz on Skynet below, or the shouting from the clockers, or an explosion somewhere, or Jimmy and Joel running back to the mansion with their hair sticking out and damp from sweat, a bit bloodied, Jimmy stumbling a bit, and looking for Grian.

But it was quieter than it ever had been, trees rustling in waves against the wind.

“…Do you miss your teammates?”

Etho asked, as if it wasn’t obvious. Grian laughed dryly.

“What gave you that idea?”

A pause.

“I think we all do,” Etho responded, unhelpfully.

��You still have Impulse,” Grian pointed out, “Pearl still has BigB and BigB has Pearl. Scott and Martyn are probably going to make it to the very end together— and the Clockers can all be a happy family together in the sky,”

He looked up, as if to see them there. They might be watching, he supposed. He wouldn’t put it past them— out of everyone left on the server, they probably wanted to look down on Grian and Etho the most. He wondered if Jimmy and Joel were watching too. He wondered if they were even still floating around this world, or if they’d long since moved on. It made him feel dizzy again so he tried not to wonder too much.

“Yeah…”

The air was stiff between them. Grian pulled his knees in to sit criss-cross. Etho seemed to be listening to the sounds of the night, the shuffling of the living things below. It was always hard for Grian to tell what Etho was thinking, and he figured that must be the case for everyone. Maybe that’s why Scar was afraid of him.

Grian wasn’t afraid of Etho, not really. He wasn’t any more afraid of Etho than he was of Tango or Martyn or anyone else on the server. But he did feel squirmy around him, like he wasn’t meant to be there. He felt like he had to prove himself to even stand in proximity to Etho— but Etho didn’t seem to want that. There was nuance in the way the other man tapped his pinkie finger against his knee. Maybe he wasn’t coming up with some mastermind scheme to reinvent the and-gate — maybe he was just trying to think of what to say.

Joel had been paired with Etho in the time prior to this one. Random chance, of course, but they’d seem to hit it off quite well. Joel was just better with people than Grian was— he was more casual, if he made a mistake he brushed it off and kept rolling forward. Maybe there was something to the whole positive self-talk thing.

Confidence. Grian recalled it now, Jimmy telling him about the encounter he and Joel had had with Skizz. The affirmations, Grian remembered his own well.

Skizz had hit the nail on the head with each one of them, probably the whole server if he had to guess. Joel was confident, and Jimmy was quick, and Grian was a leader, and Grian was alone. And Grian was alone. And his Jimmy and Joel were dead. Grian was alone.

Grian let out a sudden sob, and rubbed his eyes beneath his glasses.

“You haven’t really been alone before,” Etho murmured.

For all his generic comments before, Grian felt like Etho had looked right into his soul for that one.

“Guess I haven’t” Grian mumbled back.

Etho didn’t say anything for a bit as Grian cried, tears puffing up his eyes and cheeks, not really caring anymore about trying to quiet himself.

“I— I just,” his voice trembled, “I don’t know what to do with myself,”

He was snotty and red-faced now. He removed his glasses, “Can you hold these?” He handed them to Etho, who obliged, and pressed his palms to his wet eyes.

He sniffed, and coughed a bit.

“Etho, honestly I don’t know what I would have done if you didn’t remind me of this. I could’ve gone out— I would’ve gone out,”

“I don’t know, you’re pretty good at surviving,”

“No, like—“ Grian squeezed his hands into fists, feeling his fingernails dig little crescent divots into his raw and worn palms. He glanced down, and then away from Etho.

“I would have gone out on purpose,”

Etho was silent for a moment.

“Oh,”

Then,

“Can I ask why?”

Grian opened his mouth, but his brain didn’t produce any words for him to say. He made a small noise in the back of his throat, and coughed.

“I don’t know…”

He said, feeling small.

“I just… I was thinking, that whole time with Pearl and BigB, like… I felt like I didn’t really… belong? Anymore? That there wasn’t anyone out there for me, anyone to go home to, like all my relationships had become temporary. Like… I don’t know. Like there wasn’t really… a point…,”

He grimaced, shifting uncomfortably.

“It sounds really bad when I put it like that,”

Etho was quiet. God, he was always so quiet. Grian almost wanted to scream to drown out the silence. He swallowed thickly, hands fidgeting and pulling tufts of weeds from the dirt, digging his fingers into the soil.

“But you didn’t,” Etho finally spoke.

“No, I didn’t get to,”

Etho hummed, idly cleaning Grian’s glasses with the hem of his shirt. Grian hadn’t realized how dirty they’d gotten, dusty and smattered with grime.

“I guess… maybe it proves something, yeah? If you had, you wouldn’t be here now. I would have never, uh, reminded you. Proves there’s… there’s always gonna be more, out there for you to find…. to…. be with,”

“This, too, shall pass,” Grian murmured like a recollection.

“Uh, yeah,” Etho said.

He raised his hand and hesitated, before gingerly patting Grian on the shoulder.

Grian looked up at him, met his eyes. He leaned into the touch, and then into a hug. His wet cheeks stained Etho’s jacket, but new tears didn’t fall.

They parted, and Grian grunted, shaking himself out. Etho gave him his glasses back, and he smiled back at him in thanks.

They each stood, Etho smooth and Grian shaky.

He thought about Joel lightheartedly teasing him for being sappy, he thought about Jimmy asking him if he was okay. He thought about Etho, standing beside him, gloved palms hoisting Grian up from his cliff, and onto solid ground again.

“Thank you,” He said, “You really didn’t have to do that,”

Etho laughed, “What else was I going to do?”

[nine-of-words]

Out in the Cold (Part Two)

M Orc x M Troll (Hulder) Reader

PREVIOUS || STORY TAG || NEXT

Wordcount: 3473

Content Warnings: Emetophobia (Brief Mention of Vomiting)

I’ve been snowed in today, so it seems very fitting to post more of this story now :)

You’re not afraid to admit it; self control has never been your strong suit.

And in a way much reflective of your nature, you’ve completely lost steam. Relaxing as much as you can on the uncomfortable rock you’re sitting on, you fondly think back on the day you came here last winter, while chewing on more of your meager rations than you should. It’s hard not to feel nostalgic, even with the frankly pathetic way you ended up on the settlement’s doorstep.

They still took you in, even when they didn’t have to- and now you have a full year’s worth of memories of the orcs you’ve lived amongst.

…You suppose those memories will always be twinged with a more bittersweet quality, from now on. 

You’ll have to learn to live with it…

It’s not like you need them, anyway, you try to convince yourself. It’s gotten harder to do that now- after everything that’s happened- than when you first arrived, that’s for sure.

You're knocked from your thoughts by the reverberating sound of a hunting horn in the distance, carried even over all the ground you've covered because of the thick blanket of snow.

"Dammit-" You curse and scramble from your seat at once, then haphazardly shove your remaining travel provisions back into your pack.

Your daydreaming got out of hand, and now your headstart is spent. The orc hunting party will be on your tail any moment now, with strides much bigger than yours. You take off once again, footsteps nearly silent as you dash through the snowy woods.

Over the next few hours, your inescapable streak of bad luck rears its inevitable head. 

That tree looks familiar. And you’re pretty sure you've seen that configuration of rocks recently…

You brush it off as nerves, at first. You’re just getting into your own head. You know where you’re going- after all, you did have the brilliant foresight to pack a map and a compass, to combat your unfortunately lacking sense of direction.

…Until you come across a set of tracks in the snow.

There's no way they caught up already, let alone lapped me!

Taking a closer look, they're definitely from boots. Petite ones.

Not an orc’s, for sure. Who else would be out here? This isn’t good hunting weather… Out of curiosity, you line up your own boot next to one of the tracks.

…It’s a perfect match.

You… have managed to come across your own tracks in the snow.

Oh no. No, no, no- Not again-

You dig in your pack, looking for your compass and map.

…Which are not there.

A pit of despair knots in your stomach. You must’ve left it behind on the rock you were resting on earlier, after the sound of the horn spooked you.

Then it dawns on you - not only are you lost, you haven't even attempted to cover your tracks.

Your palm meets your forehead in irritation with yourself. You let out a long sigh, your fluffy tail swishing violently. 

This was supposed to be simple. You planned your exit strategy for weeks.

And yet you’ve already managed to screw it up this bad.

Why is it always like this?

Why are you always so unlucky?

The Spirits must really have it out for you…

LAST WINTER

“Here’s your package, granny.” You say in the most charming voice you can muster as you approach. “You look absolutely radiant today, I might add.”

Since you’re a newcomer to the tribe without skill in an applicable trade, for the last few weeks you’ve been here, you’ve been doing general odd-jobs. Some other orcs do this sort of work as well for various reasons, but it seems to be where everybody starts, outsiders included. You tend to favor the delivery jobs; you’ve always been quick, and they’re hard to mess up too badly.

“Oh stop, you’re such a sweetheart.” The elderly orc stops her work at the loom and stretches her leathery green hands out to take the bundle. She pauses when she sees the label, though, and immediately bursts out in raucous laughter.

“What’s the matter?” You ask, your soft, pointed ears flattening back against your head in dread.

“Hahah- Oh no, little one, that package is for the other Ghorza. Ghorza Gog-Burzog. The one that lives by the mill? It says right here…” She taps the text with her fingertip.

You swear internally as you make your way back across the entire settlement. Though the orcs here speak the universal tongue for the most part, all of their writing is in the Orcish alphabet, and while you’ve started to recognize some of it, you haven’t fully gotten the hang of reading it yet.

At least granny gave you a jar of her winter berry preserves to take home with you for your trouble.

This is not the first time this has happened today. What should’ve been a morning chore has taken you into the late afternoon. By the time the other Ghorza gets her package and you head back to the middle of the settlement, the sun is starting to paint the horizon with streaks of red, mocking you.

Maybe he’ll not be here and I can just… pick a quick, easy task from the board to finish before sundown. That way, I'll still make the job quota for today…

You cringe as you walk into the vestibule leading to the great hall, and are unable to miss Torg’s looming presence sitting in his attached office, the door propped wide open. You attempt to pass unnoticed by the open door, towards the job board posted right beside it, utilizing all of your skill in stealth trained over years of being an accomplished thief, to try to save yourself the misery.

Then he says your name, and you cringe, cursing internally before slinking back into view of the doorway.

It’s not that he’s rude or cruel to you, but he’s just so damn observant. You can barely do a task, it seems like, without him showing up to check on you. Half the time you’re surprised he’s not still watching you like a hawk while you sleep at night in your singles’ dormitory bunk- criticizing your method and ready to give terse advice on how to get better rest.

It’s like he’s just waiting for you to screw up. And when you do, because it is a question of when and not if- he’s right there to witness your incompetence and correct you.

“Where have you been?” Torg says gruffly, not looking up from the papers laid out in front of him. “It’s nearly evening.”

“There were… some complications.” You rub your neck.

“Got lost again, then?” If you didn’t know any better from his weary, disappointed tone, you could swear you see the edge of his lip twitch in amusement around his tusk.

“No!” You let out an exasperated sigh. "Simply a minor mix up. Don't you worry, I came back to take another job before the day's out. I’m not trying to slack."

"No need." He rises out of his chair, tidying up the papers a bit as he does. "I have a job you can help me with instead."

“What would that be?”

“Wort and I had kitchen duty for dinner tonight, but Wort sprained his ankle on a tree root earlier and can’t put weight on it for now. You will be joining me instead, so Cook doesn’t have to work on one of his nights off.”

“Er… I can’t say I have much experience cooking, but I’ll do my best.”

“Great. I’m sure you’ll do fine.”

It doesn’t take long before you’ve arrived in the kitchen, washed up and donned aprons. 

Yours, of course, hangs halfway down your stomach, because this apron is designed for Orcish proportions. 

“Here.” Torg shakes his head with a sigh, motioning for you to come to him. “Turn around. I’ll shorten it.”

You comply and turn your back to him, and you feel his hands start tying the neck strap into a knot at the midpoint.

You barely manage to keep from audibly gulping in fear. This man could squash you like a bug with minimal effort, and you’re showing him the bare nape of your neck, completely defenseless. You would be shuddering in fear, but his fingers are surprisingly gentle against your skin as they work the fabric into a knot.

It’s sickeningly anxiety-inducing and oddly intimate- and then it’s over just like that.

“There you go.” He nods, then ducks into the pantry. He returns in a few moments, coming over with a huge basket of various tubers and leafy greens under his arm.

“Since you said you don’t have much experience, we’re going to keep things simple: Winter Root Stew.” He places the basket down with a soft thump. “How comfortable are you with using a knife?”

“I know my way around one.” Sure, you’re more used to cutting purse strings with them and not vegetables… But he doesn’t need to know that, right?

“Good. You’re going to peel and cut these, and then put them in the cauldron. Greens get washed and then go in later. Easy. I’ll be cooking the game that the hunters brought in earlier, if you need help.”

Work goes surprisingly fast, and your deft hands are soon slinging cut root vegetables into the bubbling bone stock at a snappy pace. In fact, things go so smoothly that you are surprised you've managed to complete the task without any unlucky hiccups. 

When you've finished, you're drawn to the other side of the kitchen by the sound of sizzling fat and the scent and browning meat. Torg is there, tending to a large, open oven. 

"That smell is heavenly."

Torg grunts in agreement, strong arms working to stoke the burning logs underneath.

The food here has been surprisingly good, especially after having it conditioned into you growing up in a more civilized town that Orcish cuisine surely must all be grey slop. It's definitely heavier than standard faire, but you've found that it has its own rustic charm- with its rich flavors, game meat, and tendency towards rib-sticking density- that's begun to grow on you.

“Venison. A few late winter fowl as well."

"Damn, who doesn't love a man who can cook…?" You sigh. 

Torg is oddly silent for a moment before letting out a small chuff of a laugh, then promptly changing the subject.

"Did you season the stew yet?" He brushes off your flattery with a wry smile.

"Ah, no I have not. What should I use?"

"Mostly salt. But some basic herbs and spices will be good enough." He points out the jars on the shelf to use and dictates what quantities, slowly and deliberately, since you can't fully read their labels yet.

"Okay, got it."

You confidently return to the prep area, mentally repeating a mantra of the ingredients and their amounts. You manage to collect most of the bottles just based on your sharp memory, until you come across the last needed ingredient. Two apparently identical versions of the same bottle sit side by side, even the labels looking nearly identical.

Urgh, which one is the ground mustard seed? They look the same…

Maybe there’s two bottles of it?

You chew your lip in thought, looking at the script on the bottle labels. The squiggles might as well be chicken scratch to you.

You peek back at Torg. He’s completely engrossed in basting the meat, with his back turned to you. 

You don’t want to bother him. You want to stay on his good side to keep your cover and not get kicked out before you’ve finished your job. But strangely, you also are beginning to harbor a strong desire to prove that you’re competent.

…Wait, it’s definitely this one. I recognize that letter!

You take the cap off and take a whiff. The familiar, pungent, biting scent fills you with confidence.

Yep! That’s mustard alright!

Now, how much did he say again…?

You can’t recall. So, you unceremoniously dump an enormous amount of each seasoning into the cauldron.

The more flavor the better, right? Plus, this is a huge pot…!

When you’re done, you help Torg with a few other easy tasks while everything finishes cooking. By the time the stew has had enough time to boil and meld together for a while, Torg is pulling the meat out to rest before slicing. 

He walks over to the cauldron to taste a small spoonful of the liquid.

Why are you suddenly filled with anxiety? It’s just vegetable stew, and you’re not even a real cook… But you find yourself dangling on a ledge waiting for his reaction.

“Hmgh-” He winces slightly, one bottom eyelid twitching, but quickly covers it with a small, tusky smile. “A little over seasoned- but not bad at all.”

“Really?” Your voice perks up.

“Yes. You did a good job.”

“...Thanks.” You can’t stop yourself from beaming.

Why is a bit of simple praise over such a menial task making you feel so happy…? Sure, you don’t exactly get praised that often, but still… You don’t need it…

You’re just here to do a job, you remind yourself. Once you figure out where the artifact you’ve been sent here for is, it’s the simple matter of getting your hands on it and getting out cleanly.

You don’t need to care about approval from any of these brutes in the least…

“Well then, let’s get this stuff out to be served.” Torg grabs the handle of the cauldron with both hands, lifting the heavy wrought iron vessel with barely any exertion besides a rough grunt. You’re nearly caught up contemplating the easy show of raw physical strength, before Torg’s instruction snaps you back to attention. “Grab some of the bread baskets and follow me.”

You comply, and soon you’re set up methodically ladling hot stew out of the cauldron and into the waiting wooden bowls of hungry orcs queued in the grub line.

This is… almost kind of nice?

No one is looking at you with pitying looks as you make another mistake or struggle to complete a task. Just a nod, maybe an appreciative grunt or mono-syllabic expression of approval, before they move on.

You can’t help but feel a pleasant, calm focus, and a boost to your self-esteem as you work through the line, working to the sounds of the lively dining hall.

Unfortunately, the peaceful sense of accomplishment is tragically short lived.

Suddenly, the good cheer of mealtime is disrupted as a loud tremor of havoc winds through the dining hall. Wooden chairs and benches and tables scrape loudly, some overturning and falling to the floor, though that’s barely audible over all of the booming voices yelling.

You’ve not really witnessed any brawling yet, despite being told to expect it; that orcs are violent and dole out black eyes and rip off earlobes with their teeth like it’s nothing, over the smallest of disputes.

This doesn’t seem like a brawl, though.

Torg swiftly leaves the serving line, immediately parting the crowd to get to the heart of the issue. You watch as a few different orcs are dragged outside by others, into the snow.

“Nothing else served!” One of the other orcs on the serving line barks after convening with someone that’s run over to them from closer to the commotion. You let the ladle rest on the edge of the cauldron, a sinking feeling from your throat to the pit of your stomach.

That’s how you find yourself sitting on a stool in the kitchen hours later, your hands bound with scratchy cord and two gruff, irritated looking orc guards watching you closely. 

Not long after, the huge, seething Chieftain returns to interrogate you. 

“What kind of poison was it?!” He roars as he storms into the room with a bang, the door threatening to explode off the hinges behind him.

“P-Poison?!” You barely squeak out. You shield your face with your hands, if only to dampen the larger man’s thunderous volume. 

“Don’t play dumb! Everyone who had a serving of the stew you made fell violently ill within minutes!” He gestures widely towards the door to the dining hall.

“I didn’t poison anyone! I wouldn't- !”

Poison has never been your style…

“Then explain! ” He snarls, nostrils flaring and teeth fully bared in anger. “What did you put in that stew?!”

Despite the yelling, you feel strangely safe. You don’t think this is going to get physical. You’ve never seen Torg get violent with anyone, and if anything, he seems to be struggling to keep his loud, expressive rage reeled back.

Moreover, during the interrogations you’ve endured at the hands of other authority figures in the past… the beating usually would’ve already started a while ago, if it was going to happen.

“N-Nothing, except what you told me to!” You whimper, quickly rattling off the list of spices you memorized like an incantation. “Salt, Pepper, Paprika, Dill, Mustard Seed-“

Torg turns, and his eyes scour the shelves of spices as you list off items. His hand hovers above the bottle of mustard seed, and after a moment of thought, he grabs both it, and the bottle beside it.

He brings them over, presenting both of the bottles to you. You lower your hands slightly to look at them.

“Tell me,” He says your name grimly, and takes a deep breath before asking his next question, voice still dripping with barely restrained rage. “Which of these is mustard seed?”

“That one.” You point to the bottle you used with your bound hands.

His shoulder jerks as if he’s about to fling the bottle to smash against the wall, but he apparently resists the urge, setting the bottle on the counter instead and releasing his white-knuckled grip on the lid.

“This is not mustard seed. It is bellow-seed.” He says through gritted teeth.

“Bellow-seed?”

“A spice made from a plant in the mustard family. Not a poison.” A bit of relief is clear in his voice and body language despite the clear vestiges of rage still burning inside.  “But in large quantities, it is a powerful emetic.”

You look at him blankly.

“It makes you empty your stomach.” He speaks slowly, forcefully annunciating each word. “Violently.”

“Oh, I’m… I’m so sorry.” You say weakly. “I- They were just right next to each other and I couldn’t read the label, but it smelled like mustard, so-”

“If you were unsure, you should have asked! I was right there!” He growls, his large palm finds the side of his head in disdain. “I told you to ask for help.”

You don’t have an answer for that, besides your inflated sense of ego and wanting to avoid your own embarrassment. You simply sit there pitifully, soft feline ears swiveled back in shame.

After a few moments of you failing to come up with an answer or excuse, Torg pinches his glabella and lets out a long, exasperated sigh.

“...Did you do this on purpose?” He finally asks.

“No.” You look him directly in the eye and say with conviction.

Torg nods, then undoes the ropes holding your wrists together himself in tense silence.

“Is… everyone going to be okay?” You ask tentatively and rub the indentation on your wrist, the guilt of your mistake already eating at your conscience.

“You- go to tell Shaman-” He ignores your question and gives one of the guards orders, then the other. “And you, take him home. He stays there until morning, until his story is confirmed.”

You’re pulled to your feet, then lead back towards the dormitory. As you trudge through the snow, you can’t shake the feeling of guilt. It follows you all the way back to your dormitory, and weighs on your chest as you’re finally in bed for the night, tossing and turning.

What’s your punishment going to be? Surely, nothing good. And sure, your cover didn’t get blown yet, but they still might exile you for putting people in danger, and you wouldn’t be able to finish the job- 

What’s your guildmaster going to do when word gets back that you ruined the one chance to do the job? Fritz has never been the most understanding when it comes to failure.

You suppose you could just go on the run if you fail, but… you have a feeling that messing up such a big job will earn you a grudge, and he has a well-earned reputation for not letting those go. You doubt you’d get very far without the past coming back to haunt you.

You heave a sigh.

More importantly… What if you really hurt someone with your seasoning mishap? Usually the only one paying for your mistakes is you…

 You don’t sleep well that night.

>> ✨ MASTERLIST >> ☕ KO-FI

[stardustandash]

Last of the Febuwhump fics is here! Prompt is Killing in Self-Defense. Pre-Jedi Fallen Order & kinda dark, I hope u like it!!

Words: 2000

Tags: Blood, Hurt/Comfort, Whump, Emetophobia, Child Death

ao3 Link

Is It Justified?

The village is dusty, dirty, and silent. It feels lonely through the Force. Cal doesn’t like it. Every whisper of the wind, every creak of a door in its frame, puts Cal on edge. He drifts father and father behind his men. Twitch and Sunny are bickering back and forth in front, and Arson, Nix and Patch flanking them on parallel streets.  They were droid hunting after the big battle, or they were supposed to be. Cal suspected Master Tapal had assigned Cal and his squad this task since it was so far from the battlefield and gave them little opportunity to get into trouble. The village, though on a Separatist planet, had been abandoned before the battle started, and Cal didn’t know what use droids would have for it, aside from some cover. But it wasn’t as if they needed to stop for healing or rest. Any droids would be long gone back to the Separatist stronghold Master Tapal had gone to investigate.

Still, Cal can’t help but be on edge. There’s something he’s missing. His hand drifts towards the hilt of his lightsaber, the cool metal of the grip a comfort. At least he isn’t hanging off of Sunny’s arm on missions anymore. He’s twelve, almost thirteen. Too old to be scared by empty villages and the wind. Master Tapal had even said that he was thinking of letting him lead his squad on his own mission on the next campaign. If he got scared now, then he’d never get to prove himself.

The Force pulls at Cal. A stinging wrongness that adds to the unease. Neither Twitch or Sunny seem to feel the same as their blasters hang loose in their grips to the point that Cal should say something about attention or duty, but finds the words stuck in his throat and taken by the wind.

Cal feels the Force nudging him towards a narrow path between the houses. There’s something there. He glances ahead to Twitch and Sunny and debates whether he should say something. Even before the thought finishes forming his ears turn red with embarrassment. He can handle whatever it is. He has to. It’s probably just some kind of rodent or a pet left behind. He creeps towards the space, one hand on his lightsaber and halfway to unhooking it. There’s a small sound of something rustling or shifting and Cal swallows down his fear and jumps out of the space into the street beyond.

A girl stares back at him. She only comes up to his shoulder and her head is a mess of dirty blonde hair. A battered brown stuffed toy dangles from her hand, so ragged at this point Cal can’t tell what it is supposed to be. She looks up at him with fear in her eyes and Cal is so taken aback he almost ignores the warning in the Force.

The Force screams, and Cal turns with his lightsaber in hand to meet the threat. A man stands towering over him with a knife in hand. Cal doesn’t think, he just reacts. The green blade of his lightsaber appears on the other side of the man before Cal even realizes he’s run him through.

The girl screams. It’s wordless at first but it eventually forms into anword Cal can recognize: “Papa!”

Cal’s stomach drops. His lightsaber falls from his grasp. The man lets out one last, groaning breath as he collapses, still and unmoving.

The girl rushes to her father’s side with tears running down her face. Cal’s mind is both blank and chaotic. He steps forward, wanting to offer apologies or comfort or something to the girl. He’s so off guard he doesn’t see the glint of metal nor feel the warning through the Force. He only sees the girl’s face harden as she throws herself at him. She tackles him around the middle, and Cal is taken aback at the movement. She’s wrapped him in an odd sort of hug, except her fist is uncomfortably trapped between them. When she staggers back Cal can see the blood on her hands. Her father’s blood. Guilt settles uncomfortably in his stomach. He killed someone. He killed a girl’s father right in front of her. The guilt burns in his stomach. Cal presses a hand against it and tries to take a shaky step forward.

“I’m sorry,” says Cal, voice weak and wet. “I’m sorry.”

The girl raises her bloody fist and Cal sees the glint of metal. At the same time he becomes aware of the wetness on his fingers where they are pressed against his stomach. It takes his mind a minute to connect those two things. Cal’s knees go weak and he stumbles, not quite sure where he’s trying to go. It doesn’t matter, as he doesn’t get more than one shaky step before he’s falling to his hands and knees. Distantly he registers the sound of blaster fire and a soft thump just as his arms give out and he faceplants onto the dirt.

There’s the sound of duraplast boots running towards him and then there are hands flipping him over and Cal’s looking up at Sunny. His helmet is off, Commander Gamut would yell at him, but Cal is glad that can see Sunny’s face, even if it’s twisted in worry. The others stand around them with blasters ready. Arson has one hand on the side of his helmet and Cal can hear him faintly as he comms out.

“General, Commander Gamut. We have a situation in sector two-three-five. Commander Kestis is down, we need a medic immediately.”

Cal can’t hear the other side of the conversation, but he feels the clones around him tense.

“I don’t know if we have that kind of time, Sir,” says Arson in a tight voice.

“Don’t pay attention to them Cal, you’ll be fine,” says Sunny as he pats Cal’s face. “You didn’t get stabbed anywhere important, so you’ll last long enough to get medical attention.”

“Sunny, not helpful,” growls Twitch.

“What?”

Cal blinks. Sunny is getting a little blurry and his eyes slide past him as his neck goes limp. There are two unmoving lumps in his vision. One is small, with a smudge of blonde hair. The girl. Cal remembers the sound of blaster fire and a sick feeling rises in the back of his throat.

“Hey, hey, eyes on me, kid,” says Sunny. His hand cups Cal’s face and turns him away from the unmoving bodies.

“I got a stim,” offers Patch. “Won’t do much but it’ll keep him going until a medic can make it to us.”

“It won’t hurt,” says Nix.

There’s a pinch, then a cool sensation slides over Cal. Everything snaps into clarity and Cal’s thoughts start screaming as his stomach starts burning worse than anything he’s ever felt. He groans and tries to roll, but hands stop him. Twitch and Sunny are holding him, their hands burn against his cheeks and his stomach.

“Let me up,” Cal begs. “Let me up.”

“Not a chance, Commander,” says Twitch.

“The General and Gamut are on their way to our position,” adds Arson. “You just focus on staying alive for now.”

Cal feels the dampness in the corner of his eyes and tries to blink it away. His stomach is burning and all he wants is his room on the Brave, with his soft, non-regulation blanket and his stuffed tooka and the feeling of a thousand lives around him in the Force.

“Oh, you’re alright kid. Don’t worry. We’ll get you patched up in no time. And if not, well, it’s not like you’ll have to worry about it,” says Sunny as he thumbs a tear from Cal’s cheek.

“Not helping!” says a chorus of similar voices.

Cal almost smiles through the pain, but his eyes once again fall on the still bodies next to them. With the stim in his system Cal can see the blackened holes in the girl. Blaster bolts. They’d killed her. To save him, yes, but they killed her. Revulsion burns in his throat and his stomach heaves. Twitch barely manages to get Cal onto his side before he vomits up what rations he’d had for breakfast and a spattering of blood. He coughs, then gags again as the movement tears at the bloody hole in his stomach. Tears are streaming down his face in earnest now, whether from the pain or the sorrow at being the cause of two needless deaths, Cal can’t tell. The brief bout of clarity from the stim is wearing off and his thoughts are starting to go fuzzy around the edges again.

He can hear Twitch and Sunny murmuring platitudes to him but he can’t focus on the words. Everything is too much. Too loud, too painful, too sad. Even the hand rubbing his back feels like its grating his skin, yet he doesn’t want it to stop. The smell of bile burns in his nose from his own sick and Cal wiggles as far back as he can from it while trapped in place by the two clones.

Cal tries to collapse into himself, to try sinking into that meditative state where the world feels far away. What he probably does is pass out for a while as he comes back to reality with tears staining his face and a familiar comforting presence in the Force blocking out everything but the feeling of safety. Cal reaches out blindly until his hands feel the soft, worn fabric of Master Tapal’s robes and he clings to them with all the strength he has left. Master Tapal pulls him into his arms, and when Cal’s brain catches up to his body being maneuvered, he is held tight against his Master’s chest where he can hear his heartbeat and feel his Master’s support through the Force.

“It is faster if I take him to the medics than wait for them to arrive,” says Master Tapal. Cal feels the words rumbling through his chest rather than hearing them with his ears.

“Sir!” a chorus echoes around him.

Then they are moving. The motion doesn’t hurt or make Cal sick. Instead it soothes him like the rocking of a boat. He turns and tucks his head into Master Tapal’s chest. The guilt is still eating at his stomach, as if the knife pressed it into him and it’s spreading from the hole it left behind.

“Peace, Padawan,” Master Tapal murmurs.

“I killed them Master, and they didn’t have to die,” mumbles Cal. The words are no doubt muffled by the fact that Cal’s face is pressed into his Master’s robes and thick with emotion, but he knows Master Tapal understands anyway.

Master Tapal walks on silently for a minute. Cal frets internally in the silence. What if Master Tapal doesn’t want him anymore because of what he’s done. What if he’s done so much wrong he can’t be a Jedi anymore.

“They are dead because of you, yes,” says Master Tapal slowly. “They did not have to die, and their deaths are a tragedy. It is good that you feel this way. However, they attacked you, they hurt you. If it is a choice between you and them, I want you to pick you every time, Padawan. The only way to hold the line against the darkness is to be the line. If you die, the darkness wins.”

“Yes, Master.”

“I will give the same talk to your men as well. When you are better, we will also meditate on this topic.”

Cal nods against Master Tapal’s shoulder. The words haven’t done much to ease the sick feeling in his stomach, but he’s also too tired to focus much anymore. The arms holding him tighten around him and the swaying cadence of Master Tapal’s steps increases. He sinks into their warmth and the comfort offered. He doesn’t feel better about anything, but at least his Master is here, and Master Tapal always knows what to do.