#even without drugs hes a strong man but hes usually not violent which is a good thing he could easily tear a person in two

[bojackhorsemanobviously]

threatens bojack in character beta bojack.. ughhhhateit but .. guess i had it coming

threatens diane in my ai rps on character beta

bojack you have choosen death

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"Let us now consider another trait of the average ex-convict which is of great significance. Without his knowledge or volition (except in extremely rare cases), he has the tendency to revert to previous states of living, or of development. In this connection it must be borne in mind that in prison the social, mental and emotional development of the criminal has been sharply arrested. As previously stated, the paucity of social, mental, sexual and emotional contacts prevents the young prisoner from achieving maturity, and prevents the further growth of even the older one. (The average prisoner of to-day is so young that it is wise, for the moment, to consider the problem from this point of view.) He comes out of prison, therefore, pretty much the same callow, immature person he was when he entered, with the additional handicap of having suffered a partial or total incapacitation or at least a weakening of his powers of adequate response to stimuli. Not only that, but in his raging hunger for the woman, he has inevitably raised her to a place of exaggerated importance in life: so much so that in the initial grip of his lust he is almost ready to grovel at her feet, helpless in the face of her power to appease his wild desire. Unable to face her unself-consciously, he is obliged to hide his passion behind a smirking mask of hypocrisy.

Worse yet, although he thinks of life and people as they were in the pre-prison years, the world and the persons in it have greatly changed. He finds, too, that he himself has greatly changed. For although he feels the same youthful needs and hungers, he finds himself unable to feel the same responses. He is overwhelmed by a sense of futility, of loss, of being out of touch with persons, events, life. It is partly a poignant nostalgia for the old days and an overwhelming regret for the lost years, the wasted mind and the unrecoverable wastes and losses of the prison years. He finds himself enswathed in layers of numbness caused by malnutrition and prison stupor.

He cannot feel anything except the most violent and exciting emotions or events or people. In his unconscious efforts to free his body and spirit of this coating of numbness (anhedonia, as Doctor Myerson calls it in his splendid paper on that subject), he will plunge himself and his friends into the most outrageously impossible situations (so strong is the unconscious urge to make his presence felt, to convince himself and his friends that he is actually alive). All of which helps to explain why it is that the average ex-convict, still in the clutch of prison stupor, seeks to pierce the anhedonic fog with artificial stimulations: drugs, fiery liquors, passionate women, the noisy, glittering gaiety of night clubs and speak-easies. To do this, of course, requires money. Usually penniless, but usually determined also to have the fling for which he has lusted so long, the average ex-convict may react in some of the following ways.

He may feel so cheated of the joys to which looked forward, so angry at the failure of life to compensate him for the ordeal of imprisonment, that he will turn like a hounded fox upon the environment which frustrates and badgers him and seek revenge at the point of a gun. I have heard any number of ex-convicts say (and they so nearly use the same words that it is practically a pattern):

"Listen! You know what prison is. You've been in the can yourself. You know what a man's up against when he comes out. I don't have to tell you. Well, here's the way it is. I went through hell for seven years. I hardly drew a comfortable breath the whole time I was there. I got lousy food, a stuffy cell, a rotten job where I couldn't even learn a trade, and had to take a lot of cheap crap from a lot of half-witted screws (guards) who wouldn't even dare to speak to me on the street, let alone try to bully me not out here, where it'd be man to man. All right. I went through all that torture. For what? For stealing a few lousy bucks from some rich bastard that's got as many dimes as Rockefeller. Even if it's wrong to steal everybody does it, judges and all; and what about guys like Sin- clair, who had Martin Littleton and a few million bucks to keep him from going to prison even if it's wrong to steal, that doesn't give the dirty bastards the right to keep me cooped up like a dog for seven years, half starved, never seeing a woman, never having a chance to live. Well, by Christ, I'm going to live now! And I don't give a good goddam where I get the money to pay for my fun only, somebody's going to pay, believe me. If any of them lousy screws had anything worth stealing, I'd certainly love to make them pay for it. But anyhow, I'm going to make up for those seven years. They ain't going to use me like a yellow dog for seven years and get away with it. No sir. They've had their laugh. Now I'll have mine at their expense and we'll see who laughs the loudest, or the longest, or the last."

He may break down completely out of sheer disappointment and a sense of the futility of all effort, and fall prey to a most fearful inferiority-martyr complex, taking flight into the prison stupor in which (consciously or unconsciously) he sought refuge during the prison years. I have seen such men: puling, whining, altogether weak and inadequate, their spirits broken by imprisonment and the inability to achieve readjustment. I have heard them say, "Jeeze, what can a guy do? They's no work, and a guy can't take a chance gettin' pinched under the Baumes Laws. If he's an ex-con they'll throw the whole book at him and bury him for life." Beaten, defeated by circumstances, these men are likely to become derelicts and drifters, eventually to land in institutions for habitual drunks, drug addicts, and other misfits who have to be supported by the long-suffering taxpayers.

Or he may become so egregiously dissatisfied with the new environment (which is uncomforting and embarrassing, which frustrates his desire for sexual pleasure and rich living) that he will commit crimes, even when he has a very sincere desire to reform, which are unconsciously motivated by a desire to return to the prison environment. This, at first glance, may seem incredible; but I am sure that a more careful consideration of it will reveal its fundamental truth. The ex-convict, let us say, finds himself unable to get work; he will not hit the bread lines; without money, he cannot keep up even the pretence of respectability which is necessary if he is to delude his immediate associates, who know nothing about his prison record.

This makes life dissatisfying, incomplete, humiliating. In the new world he has no place, no security, no reputation. What he seeks when unconsciously desiring to return to the prison environment is, not the hateful cell, not the stuffy shop, but the feeling of security, of safety, of freedom from the stress and strain of a life he finds too difficult. He seeks the old world to which he had become stuporously accustomed, in which he had a meager but definite place, a reputation, friends of his own kind, and those other things in life which help to bolster up the drooping ego.

The ex-convict, thus, is essentially the convalescent. Prison stupor, as I have tried to show in another chapter, is a very real and dangerous disease. Its deplorable after-effects - bodily and spiritual anemia and atrophy, anhedonia are not to be thrown off in a few weeks or months. In fact, I doubt if any man who has served even five years in prison will ever succeed in fully getting free of its griping clutch. The newly liberated prisoner, therefore, is like any patient just out of a hospital: he is weak and ineffectual a convalescent. He is able to go through the less complicated motions and gestures of living, but there is actually very little life and strength in his devitalized, desire-torn body. He is a hollow shell, a fuel-less engine. To revert to the original metaphor: the animal suddenly freed after long captivity will need a great deal of time and exercise before it recovers anything like the full use of its various faculties."

- Victor F. Nelson, Prison Days and Nights. Second edition. With an introduction by Abraham Myerson, M.D. Garden City: Garden City Publishing Co., 1936. p. 257-262.

[h3k3t]

𝐌𝐲 𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞

ɢɪꜰ ᴏᴡɴᴇʀ: @ᴅᴀᴍᴇʀᴏɴᴅᴊᴀʀɪɴ

ꜱᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ: ᴋᴏɴꜱʜᴜ ʜᴀꜱ ᴀ ɴᴇᴡ ᴍɪꜱꜱɪᴏɴ ꜰᴏʀ ᴊᴀᴋᴇ. ʜᴏᴡᴇᴠᴇʀ, ꜱᴏᴍᴇᴛʜɪɴɢ ᴀʟᴏɴɢ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴀʏ ᴅʀᴀᴡꜱ ᴛʜᴇ ᴀʟᴛᴇʀ'ꜱ ꜱɪɴɪꜱᴛᴇʀ ᴀᴛᴛᴇɴᴛɪᴏɴ. ᴘᴀɪʀɪɴɢ: ᴊᴀᴋᴇ ʟᴏᴄᴋʟᴇʏ x ꜰᴇᴍ! ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ ɢᴇɴʀᴇ: ᴅᴀʀᴋ ᴡᴏʀᴅꜱ: 2.5ᴋ ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢ/ᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ᴛᴀɢꜱ: ᴊᴀᴋᴇ ɢᴇᴛꜱ ᴄʀᴇᴇᴘʏ ᴛʜᴏᴜɢʜᴛꜱ, ᴊᴇᴀʟᴏᴜꜱ!ᴊᴀᴋᴇ, ꜱᴛᴇᴠᴇɴ ᴀɴᴅ ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ ᴡᴇʀᴇ ꜰʀɪᴇɴᴅꜱ ᴀɴᴅ ᴄᴏʟʟᴇᴀɢᴜᴇꜱ, ᴀꜰᴛᴇʀ ᴛʜᴇ ᴇᴠᴇɴᴛꜱ ᴏꜰ ᴍᴏᴏɴ ᴋɴɪɢʜᴛ ɴ / ᴀ: ᴇɴɢʟɪꜱʜ ɪꜱ ɴᴏᴛ ᴍʏ ɴᴀᴛɪᴠᴇ ʟᴀɴɢᴜᴀɢᴇ, ɪꜰ ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ᴀʀᴇ ɢʀᴀᴍᴍᴀᴛɪᴄᴀʟ ᴇʀʀᴏʀꜱ ʟᴇᴛ ᴍᴇ ᴋɴᴏᴡ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴀ ᴄᴏᴍᴍᴇɴᴛ

Since the world seems to have overcome the threat of Harrow and decided to continue undaunted the passage of time in a straight and linear way, following the goal of a half-line, the life of Marc Spector and Steven Grant (although it was not possible for the two realizing it) had begun, yes, a new narrative, but not linear, but cyclical.

After all, what could be expected, Konshu said, of such a troubled human being? In the end, no matter how much Marc Spector or Steven Grant learned each time from a new facet of their psyche as cracked as the surface of a mirror, there would always be a small, sharp shard of glass that would slip out of their attention and that in dangerous way, it would be left in that dark corner, free and off the leash.

Jake Lockley was basically this: a crazed and dangerously sharp splinter. A hound without a leash, which, however, greatly served the interests of the God of the Moon and of the night. Jake had always entered violently, but at the same time in silence, into the lives of the two alters, under their blind eyes and their clouded minds. Each new time that his being of him showed up in combat, he climbed without the slightest remorse every moral and pity obstacle, delimiting more and more the abysmal boundaries that existed between his limits and those of Marc and Steven; It didn't matter who got involved, it didn't matter if they were a woman or a man, if they were young or old, if Konshu was in charge, then it had to be done, without question. Jake probably knew perfectly well that it wasn't blind devotion to a God that pushed him to do what he did, of course not. The answer was more basic than one might think: he liked it. Feeling the channels of his veins seething with magma, the adrenaline throbbing out of the air, the excitement crawling every inch of his tanned skin, were the pleasant drug that pushed man to channel every primitive and animal instinct into the strength of his every punch, in every bullet fired and precisely aimed. He was better than them, he could in every border where the other two could not push themselves. He was audacity, he was the fist of revenge.

The third and mysterious alter had always remained in the shadows along the course of the other two adventures, but he had observed and learned as a good pupil how to take control of the body, so much so that he felt confident enough to think that he could concretely shape Steven and Marc's perception as a superlative artist molding a clay pot. And apparently it was. More or less.

Jake's eyes opened after what seemed like a strong jolt of magnitude had pervaded his body. His gaze lifted, studying his own reflection in the large mirror of an elegant and well-kept bathroom.

"Ugh, how the fuck does this pendejo dress?" he wondered to himself after taking a long, nervous sigh. There was no doubt that he had taken possession of the body after Steven. His classic bland librarian's attire, his dark curly hair falling to the side of his face, yes it was him. Konshu's silhouette did not take long to show itself in the reflection of that long and wide mirror, behind the man, who in the meantime had turned on the tap to rinse his face, in a possible attempt to give his face a less sleep-deprived aspect.

"The pyramid of Giza has been robbed, Jake Lockley" the God admitted in his usual solemn tone, while the man simply wiped his face which had assumed an almost apathetic and disinterested expression, even if his eyes they remained glued to the divine form reflected in the mirror. "Many ancient artifacts have been taken away, including the ushabti of some gods" Konshu continued, while Jake continued to fix himself. “I can feel one nearby in this museum. I want you to find it and bring it back to its place of origin” and seeing that from Jake's almost disinterested face there was no sign of an answer, the God pressed him with a: "Do I make myself clear, Jake Lockley?"

Jake would have sworn he saw Konshu's skull frowning in a pout and with the tone typical of a cheeky son, the man gave him a brief look and with a raised eyebrow replied: "Yeah, I got it".

"Good" concluded the divinity "I do not admit mistakes. It must not fall into the wrong hands, I do not want another Harrow running around the world" he recalled before disappearing into thin air as he had appeared before.

Jake let out another sigh, before turning his neck counterclockwise, letting each bone crack slowly. So he was in a museum, in fact that place seemed vaguely familiar in some way. Without lingering further in who knows what thoughts, the man found himself exiting the bathroom and crossing a small corridor he found himself in what was the historical museum where Steven worked before being abruptly fired for having "vandalized a bathroom". There were many people around that evening, many children ran around euphoric while their rather tired parents chased them and reminded them to have a minimum of decorum and not to touch the exhibits on display. Some tour guides passed by from time to time and Jake could recognize among many, the sexy and elegant figure of that woman he had asked for a date at a steakhouse in town long ago. Yeah, too bad that those two idiots had ruined everything and goodbye romantic evening and a good company in his bed.

"Steven?" a voice caught the attention of Jake, who did his best not to seem taken aback for a moment. He turned to the sweet, cordial voice, and when he recognized the figure behind him a thick eyebrow rose with a relaxed smile.

"Hey" he replied, the girl blinked her eyes in surprise for a moment, then smiled.

"Look at you, if I knew that being fired had this effect, I would have done it too long ago" she replied with a spontaneous giggle, before composing herself and cracking a somewhat shy expression.

Jake had a vague memory of that young woman, she was the only person with whom Steven really had long, cordial conversations when he worked at the gift-shop. Most likely he was certain that she was the only one who really remembered the name of that man so...anonymous. Jake took a moment to observe her better, it had been months since he last saw her, however he was convinced that something in her had changed. She seemed to have left her aura behind her as a sweet little girl just starting out on a permanent job after graduating, she seemed less awkward, but her radiant smile never seemed to fade for a second. Jake had never paid her so much attention in all honesty, sweet girls with a passion for archival dusty shits were Steven's favorite, not his, however...

"Apparently it looks like working has done you good" he replied smoothly, before slipping a hand into his pocket.

"Nonsense, I haven't changed that much" she replied, shaking her head shyly "Where did you go? It seemed that you had completely disappeared from London” she added, awkwardly disguising a slight concern. But Jake didn't let himself be so intimidated, he was a very good liar and apparently, with the right gestures and moves some women were really easy to calm down or distract.

“I traveled, you know, I needed fresh air” he replied vaguely. She nodded several times, decided not to test the waters too much and to settle for that slim answer.

“Okay, let's forgive you for not calling your work-friend for like 7 months. After all, Donna is the bad cop in here, right?" Donna, yeah, that nerve-wracking bitch...Jake had repeatedly wondered what had stopped him from taking control of the body in the previous months and hitting her over the head several times with the first gadget he had found in his hands.

"Oh I expect you'll be sweet to me" replied the man, tilting his head slightly to one side and giving her a sweet grin that hid a much darker and more disturbed soul under the friendly blanket.

“So what brings you here? Don't tell me you're only back in London because a new collection of artifacts has just been brought in” the tone of the young woman was ironic, but knowing her friend Steven, the answer she expected to hear was obvious: 'yes' .

"You read my mind, sweetheart" the girl's doe eyes blinked several times, once again signaling her sudden amazement. A shy laugh escaped from her mouth made up with a soft lipstick, her gaze broke away from Jake for a moment, perhaps because she was not used to maintaining such prolonged eye contact with Steven, and then returned to the figure of the man, throwing him a look as if she wasn't understanding who he was standing in front of her.

“You may have gotten more breezy and changed your accent from Camden Town to this weird latino accent… but in the end, deep inside you, you remained my Stevie” she replied shaking her head with a naive smile.

Something in Jake cracked, a strange jolt made the ground go out of sight for a few seconds under his feet, for a moment that lying rogue had found himself without an immediate answer. A myriad of conflicting sensations were pushing him as when he was intent on extirpating the life of Konshu's targets, but this time it was not something entirely ecstatic or pleasant. That phrase 'but in the end, deep inside you, you remained my Stevie' made him clench his jaw for a few seconds, while a tight knot formed in his heart, and suddenly the blood he pumped turned into a strange greenish poison. His muscles contracted briefly, while the beats accelerated, and his eyes took on a darker, more intimidating, more predatory aura. Your Stevie? Ah. Oh sweet girl, if only you had been even a little aware of who you really had in front of you. If only you had known what those hands would be capable of, how drenched in blood they were, how easily they could surround your smooth, soft neck and with a slight pressure make you lack oxygen and quickly turn you into a poor prey. who choked to be spared for some special reason. Your Stevie, mh? What stupid thought made you think that someone as insipid as Steven could be able to carry on a conversation as he was doing with you? What made you think that a shy and awkward man like Steven could even just call you 'sweetheart' or compliment you on how gorgeous you were that night? Why did you remain anchored to the past and old figure of that incapable Englishman? Why didn't you just focus on him? Only on Jake.

The silence that had been created in the meantime had also left her in suspense; In a remote point of her mind she had heard an alarm bell ringing. That look from him...it had grabbed her breath violently, making her lungs empty, just like the day her colleague was fired. She was in the video surveillance room after convincing Bek to show her what had happened and when she met Steven's gaze from the previous night staring at one of the surveillance cameras, she was absolutely certain that that person was by no means the loving and shy colleague she knew.

"Your Stevie?" he then asked, while one side of his mouth formed an amused smirk "And when was I ever yours?" the words were indeed very direct, strong and full of inner confidence, a swagger that Steven would never have been able to achieve.

"I-" all of a sudden the girl felt pervaded by a sense of discomfort, which she would not have been able to describe concretely. Her words struggled to come out, and suddenly she felt completely disarmed, disoriented and confused. It all seemed so surreal, he was surreal. "Sorry, maybe I didn’t mean-"

"Easy there, I was kidding" Jake's body seemed to come back relaxed, and he let out a slight laugh, while he looked at his colleague as if she were a little doe on the defensive "Just kidding" he repeated more calm, bringing the thick index and middle fingers of his right hand under the chin of the young woman, so that he could raise her sweet face (which in the meantime had lowered in slight shame) and make their eyes meet.

The man's eyes that previously looked like those of a wolf looking for prey, were now sweet and friendly and soft again, just like Steven's. He had never brought her so much attention, he had never dared to touch her in any way since they first met at work, but whether it caused her either pleasure or discomfort was something she was too confused at the moment to understand.

"You are so changed, Steven" the friend admitted with an innocent and spontaneous tone, as she felt those dark eye sockets almost swallowing her soul. Jake smiled, like when a person smiles at a silly question from a child.

"And is it bad?" he asked, almost taking pleasure in asking her such unusual and uncomfortable questions. Questions that it was impossible to sweeten the pill or turn around with words.

"I don't think so" she replied. He raised a curious eyebrow.

"You don’t think so?" he echoed almost laughing, and she imitated him with a light and a little shy laugh.

" I don't know, it's as if you were---another person" she finally admitted, and it was at that moment that Jake walked away from her with a satisfied smile, listening to her finally start breathing again as their faces moved away.

"Maybe we just need to get to know each other again, after all you have changed too" proposed the man putting both hands back into the pockets of his trousers and tilting his face slightly to one side, waiting for her answer.

"Yes. Yes, I guess you're right” she finally replied, nodding with a sweet smile, regaining her positive and radiant aura. After all, what harm would recover a lost friendship, right?

"Good. So how about showing me the new collection? I'm dying to see the new finds” In her eyes it seemed that Steven had regained his usual and contagious enthusiasm, even if it was now more contained. However, Jake had as usual got what he wanted, his mission goal and a new pastime to play with.

"Oh yes! Follow me, I'll show you everything. You will not believe it, they found ushabti perfectly preserved and intact in the pyramid of Giza!” she said, accompanying him to a wing of the museum. Jake then showed her a wide and satisfied smile.

"Yeah? Tell me more” he asked as the voices of both disappeared amid the hum of the crowd that filled the various halls and corridors.

[thephantomessoftheopera]

Notes on Gaston Leroux‘s „The Phantom of the Opera“ - Chapter 27: „End of the Ghost‘s Love Story“

Artwork by @flaviamarquesart

<< Previous chapter

“End of the Ghost’s Love Story” is the most powerful chapter in the novel, because it reveals the full extent of Erik’s love for Christine. It is also the one that makes the story truly extraordinary, because it redeems his character and lifts him above the level of a gothic villain, who is usually defeated and punished in the end. This is why he is generally considered a “Byronic Hero” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byronic_hero). The Byronic hero is a complex, often tragic form of romantic anti-hero who is generally more villain than traditional hero, but who has at least one redeeming quality (usually connected to love) which makes him a sympathetic figure despite his flaws and/or crimes. The character type was created by the English poet Lord Byron in his works such as “The Corsair” and “Don Juan”, and became extremely popular in the 19th century. Except for his looks, Erik fits that classic character type in almost all other aspects (highly intelligent, tortured, violent, ruthless, manipulative and driven by an all-consuming passion).

The chapter’s title also makes it clear that the whole thing is a love story at its core - everything in the novel happened because Erik fell in love with Christine. It is, and has always been, the story of Erik’s love - he is the one character we follow up until the end.

The final chapter is narrated by Leroux again, but it draws on what the Persian supposedly told him when he went to visit him in his flat in the rue de Rivoli. When the Persian wakes up after losing consciousness in the water, he and Raoul are resting in the Louis-Philippe room, and Erik and Christine are taking care of them. Raoul has already woken up before the Persian, and is now asleep again.

The room itself astounds the Persian in how ordinary and old-fashioned it looks, and how much it contrasts with Erik’s general appearance (remember that the Persian had never been in Erik’s house before). Erik explains to him that the furniture once belonged to his mother, which explains why the style is so different from his bedroom, which is decidedly more „Erik“. The Persian also wonders why Christine, who is moving silently through the room and then sitting down beside the fireplace, ignores both Raoul and himself when tries to call her. The Persian believes that Christine is reading “The Imitation of Christ”, which is significant and which I will come back to a little later. The “opposites” theme is also present in this scene again, describing Erik’s figure as black and a demon, and Christine’s as white and an angel. The Persian finally falls asleep again.

When he wakes for the second time, Erik has already delivered him back to his flat according to the promise he made to “his wife”. The Persian immediately sends to find out what happened to Raoul, and learns that Raoul has disappeared and that Philippe’s body has been found on the shore of the lake under the opera house. The Persian has no doubt that Philippe was drowned by Erik (or “the siren”), and decides to denounce him to the police. However, his testimony is ridiculed, and he - like Raoul - is taken for a lunatic. The Persian then decides to write everything down and later hands his manuscript to Leroux (which is what we’ve been reading in these last chapters).

When he has finished writing his account down, Erik comes to visit him. He is clearly unwell and described as weak, leaning against the wall and “pale as a sheet”. The Persian accuses him of murdering Philippe and wants to know what happened to Raoul and Christine, whether they are dead or alive. Erik denies murdering Philippe, but the Persian doesn’t believe him. We don’t really know the truth though, so the “murder mystery” has no definite resolution and turns into more of a side note.

Erik tells the Persian that he is about to “die of love” for Christine. As I’ve mentioned before, I believe that the most likely physical cause of his death would really be the gunshot that Raoul fired at him, and a possible infection following that injury which would lead to his precarious state of health as seen in this chapter. This could metaphorically also be described as “dying of love” (because he wouldn’t have caught that bullet if he hadn’t been in love).

After turning the scorpion, Christine begged him to save Raoul, and she had already offered before to accept his proposal if he gave her the key to the torture chamber, but Erik did not care then, because he did not believe her. But when she swears to him that she will become his “living wife”, it‘s different as he finally sees in her eyes what he has been hoping to see - Christine’s genuine commitment. She means to go through with her promise and is accepting him as her husband at that moment - and this is why her commitment is powerful enough to break through to him.

According to their agreement, Erik takes the Persian aboveground, but since Raoul probably wouldn’t agree to leave, Erik drugs him and locks him up in the dungeon beneath the fifth cellar. Then he returns to Christine, who stands calmly waiting for him. Erik suddenly feels “shyer than a little child” as he approaches Christine, but she does not back away from him. He tenderly kisses her forehead and is overwhelmed with how good it feels to kiss her, as no woman has ever allowed him to, not even his mother. Christine even leans into his touch a little, and remains close to him after the kiss, „as if it were perfectly natural“.

Fear and disgust are very powerful, primal emotions, but Christine‘s feelings for Erik are strong enough to overcome both. Considering that no one, not even the Persian, was able to even look at Erik’s face without horror, I feel that Christine must have cared very deeply for him, as she allows his kiss without fear and without recoiling from him at all, even after everything he has put her through.

He falls at her feet and starts crying of happiness, and seeing his tears, Christine starts to cry as well. Erik tears off his mask so that he won’t lose any of her tears on his skin, and still Christine shows no sign of horror or disgust. And she doesn’t only allow him to touch her, but she also touches him of her own free will and takes his hand, saying “poor, unhappy Erik”. I feel that this is the moment when the full expanse of his life’s tragedy truly hits her. She is not only the first woman, but the first person in his entire life to treat him with tenderness and acceptance.

Gratitude and love for her overwhelm him and make him realize that he has forced her choice. He puts the gold wedding ring into her hand, setting her free and telling her that he knows she loves Raoul and that she is free to go and marry him whenever she pleases. He „calmly cuts his heart to pieces“ and puts her happiness before his own in this final expression of true love and sacrifice. For as damaged as he was, the ending proves that Erik truly loved Christine because his love is ultimately selfless. There is also no bitterness in his feelings towards Christine after she leaves - he has always loved her, and still continues to love her. He still feels protective of her: “I’d better not hear that anyone has touched a single hair on her head!” Christine gave him “all the happiness in the world”, and he is grateful to her for this gift. His love for her redeems him as a character and proves to be his moral compass - before, he considered himself “outside the human race” and therefore not bound by common moral values.

In the previous chapter, Christine is shown reading what the Persian believes to be “The Imitation of Christ”. I don’t think that is a coincidence, and I also believe that the name “Christine” was perhaps even chosen for her on purpose (she was originally named Pauline, according to Leroux’s manuscript). Christine becomes a “Christ figure” here in two ways: through her sacrifice, she saves the lives of Raoul, the Persian and everyone in the Opera. But she also offers acceptance and love to a sinner, an outcast who has been shunned by society - and this is an extremely powerful gesture. She possessed the strength necessary to see Erik as a human being, and that is what sets her apart from everyone else. Her love here transcends the realm of romantic love and becomes almost divine - all-encompassing, forgiving, healing.

Christine may superficially fit the traditional image of a “damsel in distress”, but the would-be hero who was coming to rescue her didn’t get very far, nor could he do anything to save her. The only hero who saved Christine was Christine herself - and she also saved everyone else: Raoul, the Persian, everyone in the Opera, and Erik. Both Christine and Erik show incredible bravery in this chapter: Christine‘s bravery shows in her truly accepting Erik as a man and in saving Raoul, and Erik‘s bravery consists in letting her go, relinquishing his one chance in his life of having everything he has ever dreamed of.

Erik then goes to free Raoul and brings him to Christine, where Raoul and Christine kiss. Christine swears to Erik that she will come back to bury him with the ring, and then she finally kisses him before they leave.

Seeing Erik weeping and overcome with emotion, the Persian no longer doubts him. Erik tells the Persian that when he feels he is close to dying, he will send the letters that Christine had left with him and a few of her personal objects to him, and that this would be the cue for the Persian to put an obituary notice in the newspaper so that Christine and Raoul would know. Interestingly, that entire arrangement hinged on Erik himself announcing his death without anyone confirming it, because he could only mail things to the Persian if he was still alive. This leaves a lot of blank space for the reader’s imagination, because who knows if he really died…? The Persian, at least, never saw him again, but announced three weeks later that “Erik is dead”.

Next chapter >>

[its-our-paris]

Adding on to the previous anon, it seems the problem a lot of people have is that he’s not the ‘perfect victim’ which is absolutely bullshit. Just because he said some gross stuff in private, abused drugs and drank alcohol, wasn’t completely meek or subservient or bent to her every whim without ever standing up to her, doesn’t mean he’s not a victim or that he doesn’t deserve justice. (See: people seeing the video of him yelling and slamming cabinets after learning his mother had died and his managers had stolen millions of his money or hearing that he punched a whiteboard and immediately going ‘see he’s a violent woman beater!’) and this applies to addicts too. It’s all ‘addiction is a disease, addicts need our support’ until they relapse or display self destructive behaviour or the recovery process isn’t 100% smooth sailing.

Her lawyers and a lot of people seem to hone in on his addiction and equate it with ‘abuser’ and that is extremely problematic. People who struggle with substance abuse aren’t necessarily abusers for fuck’s sake. And I know her lawyers keep beating this dead horse because they have close to nothing. He was self medicating with opiates since he experienced DV as a child and multiple people said his behaviour is largely the same no matter sober or under influence.

Obviously he has some unhealthy coping mechanisms and unresolved traumas that have influenced how he behaves and functions in life and in relationships. He did say he ‘married his (abusive) mother’. He’s conflict avoidant and likes to escape altercation which directly set her off bc her greatest fear is him leaving her and she equates him ‘splitting’ to him not caring about her or the relationship and ‘not fighting for her’ (she also experienced DV as a child). Not excusing her actions ofc, she’s a massive narcissistic manipulator like anon said but yeah this relationship is extremely toxic.

However so far from the info that’s been made public, Johnny Depp seems self aware and mostly harmful to himself and tries hard to not let his problems negatively affect other people in his life.

TLDR; no one needs to fit whomever’s ‘perfect victim’ profile to be listened to and believed. Victims are allowed to be flawed humans and still deserve our compassion and help.

Here's the thing. I'm really not going to argue that Johnny doesn't seem like a pretty difficult, traumatised person to begin with. He sure does, traumatic childhood to match and everything. And equally, Amber also clearly is not very okay in a lot of ways. Unfortunately, people who are struggling with past trauma are usually the ones more likely to fall into toxic relationships. Few people with a completely healthy, strong sense of self-worth and the ability to form secure bonds will find themselves in abusive relationships, will find themselves becoming abusive in relationships, etc.

However, like you say, just the fact that somebody has issues, that somebody is addicted to drugs or alcohol, does not automatically make that person an abuser.

The fact is that what I'm getting from the audios, is predominantly Johnny trying to get away from her, physically, and Amber escalating fights physically. That makes him the more self-aware, reasonable person here. "I will try to get myself away from you because a) I don't feel safe and b) I don't want to do something I will regret" is the most sane thing to do in a situation where your partner is becoming physically violent, especially in the case of a man who is aware he has the physical strength to hurt his female partner easily, if he wanted to. She just does come across - I mean some of the things she says even, apart from the physical assault, about him as a father and his children, as a parent, that's... that is low, you just do not - she comes across as somebody who provokes a lot. Somebody who tries to convince her partner that her version of events is true, and his is false, in spite of what he knows to be true (gaslighting, hello) a lot.

So, yes. Her image, on the outside, is far cleaner. He's kind of a messed up guy. Not a "perfect victim", likely not even always the victim at all in every fight they had. But this trial is about the fact that she ruined his reputation by depicting herself as 100% the victim, and as far as I'm seeing, that is not even remotely true.

[messwriting]

Written for The Smut Pile Collab: Mafia AU | MASTERLIST HERE.

SCARRED HANDS

Iwaizumi Hajime (Older) x Female Reader

Rating: E for explicit | Don’t read this if under eighteen.

Warnings:  Mafia AU related plot, including drugs. gun traffic and homicide. Violence. SERIOUS TALK ABOUT GAMBLING, ADDICTION, DEBT AND FAMILY ISSUES/FORGIVENESS. Hajime is older, about early forties while Reader is in her twenties, so: Age gap.  Slow-burn (I think?). Presence of an OC named Rei in a side-ship with Mattsun. In this first part there’s no smut.

Part One | Part Two (soon) Word count: 7.5k

Note: This is my second contribution to The Smut Pile Collab, hosted by the lovelies @present-mel​, @pleasantanathema​ and @linestrider​. Thank you so much Claudia, @thisisthehardestthing​​​, for beta-ing this and all your amazing comments who have made me scream so much i’m pretty sure my neighbors are wary for my sanity. There’s a side OC/Mattsun here that is my small gift to @mixedhell​​ for everything she has always done for me and for being such a great beta, friend and enabler. <3

I was trying to not break this in two parts, but as it seems my brain keeps hellbent on putting more plot in this, it has become unavoidable. Uh, enjoy? This is my excuse of a fic to just love Iwaizumi at any and all given opportunity! Second part in the works but with no release date yet. <3

Iwaizumi never wanted this life. 

He thinks about it while cleaning his bloody knuckles with a wet cloth, taking care to surround the parts where the skin had broken, scars over scars to the point that he practically did not know what was old and what was recent. The pain didn't bother him anymore, a constant in his life to the point that he barely registered the new injuries. That was the life of the second-in-command of the Seijoh Mafia.

He lived a poor childhood, violent teenage years. At the time, he didn’t have much choice in resorting to crime. It was easy, even; he was good with his hands, fast and built broad and strong since he was young. When his only and best friend told him he wanted to be the Boss, he’d almost laughed before seeing that familiar glint in his friend's eyes – that pure, fierce determination Oikawa had been practically born with– and, void of a dream for himself, he pledged himself to that of his only family.

“Take him to the back,” Hajime tells his trusted duo, who watched over him and the man they’ve been working for the past hour. Matsukawa nods shortly and puts out the cigarette he was smoking, still in half, on the nearest surface, before addressing the bloody man tied to a chair.

“What are you going to do now?” Hanamaki asks from the entrance threshold, not looking at him but rather to the night sky above them outside the deposit in the outskirts of the town. His joint is ending, sweet smoke blowing out and swirling up. 

“I’ll tell Oikawa,” Iwaizumi says like it was obvious. “He’s gonna have to be more careful with his companies.”

Hanamaki snorts while smiling. “Not that he’ll listen.”

Hajime shrugs, throwing the blood-stained rag back without a care for where it’ll land. “That’s his problem.” Then he sighs, looking up at the smoke from Hanamaki’s joint swirling around the wind. “The mole is ours.”

--

Iwaizumi has a special place, if he could call it that. 

He discovered the owner had died with consternation, when he went to the place at his usual time and found it, for what was probably the first time in more than a decade, closed. The diner operated until the ignoble hours of the night, which is why, since Iwaizumi was still a soldier, he used to spend the last hours of his day or the early hours of his mornings there, in what he’d call his little break in between work; his moment of calm even on the most eventful nights of his violent life.

Since he had risen the ranks rather quickly, the habit had given way to certain care with the frequency in which he visited the place, although the time had little variation and was always after two in the morning. 

It was the moment when the night calmed down, the clubs and parties booming, the restaurants that opened at early hours already closed; the brave few passers-by running to their safe places on empty streets while the cars running through the streets lessened by the minute. This was the time when night-shift policemen were already tired of both the events of their shift and the long worked hours, nodding off in their cars.

The diner was on a street just a few blocks away from the heaviest area of ​​the city, where clubs and parties continued until the bright hours of the morning; the drug traffic in these places had been feeding the old mafia veins for decades, since before Iwaizumi, and he was certain he would meet his end way before it did. 

The place was small, nothing much, two big windows beyond the door showing the old, almost vintage interior, careless by the owner who never paid much attention to the decorative aspect of the place. Twenty years ago, when Iwaizumi went from being a simple associate to a soldier, just beginning his life as a man, the place was busier, almost famous - and even then the nights were always the quietest shift, the time where degenerates inherited the city.

Iwaizumi didn't know exactly what had disappointed him so much when he found out that old Lou had gone for the better. Lou wasn't even the old man’s real name - he just adopted it once the name of the diner -- Lou’s Diner -- ended up merging with his in the daily life of being the business owner. Iwaizumi was a constant presence in the place enough to know that Lou, in fact, was the name of the old man's wife, who had died young.

In fact, Iwaizumi spent the days following the discovery of the man’s passing trying to figure out where the place would end - Lou had never said anything about family, but there was always the possibility that the business had been pledged in warrant of some debt and if not, there was the bank. The old man wasn’t exactly what you’d call an exemplary business manager.

A surprise came again when Iwaizumi drove past the place during the day and for the first time in three weeks, there was movement inside the diner - and his first thought is theft. 

It wouldn’t be surprising, considering both the neighborhood and the fact that with the place closed three weeks before, every thug in the street knows that everything is still there.

Iwa sighs, then makes a u-turn so he can park close to the alley on the diner’s corner. He’s surprised, but he realizes it is, in fact, not the case. Unless the young woman holding a broom and looking around as she rolls up the sleeves of a loose oversized T-shirt over normal jeans shorts were, somehow, a phenomenal smuggler.

Against his better judgment, Iwaizumi gets out of his BMW and steps carefully onto the sidewalk, checking his surroundings with practiced ease. The glass doors of the diner are wide open, sidewalk wet and leaking soapy water into the street. Iwa crosses through it with little care, pausing for a moment while the oblivious girl inside keeps brushing away.

“Hello,” Iwaizumi salutes from the wide open doors, perhaps to also let the place breathe some air after the days closed. You startle, the broom in your hand flying to the floor with a loud crash. 

“Holy fuck!” you yelp, turning around with both hands in front of your body. “Are you trying to kill me, dude?” 

Iwaizumi almost chuckles, the corners of his lips turning up. 

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.” He takes his hands out of his pockets, showing them in front of his body as a sign of peace. And it isn’t like he can’t easily kill you and anyone you may have inside with just them.

“Oh god. My heart,” you murmur, clenching your shirt over your chest while sucking in a few breaths. Your eyes finally come up to his. “Sorry, I think I was just too distracted.”

Hajime nods. He isn’t a man to say sorry twice. “I was just passing by and noticed the diner open. It’s been closed for some weeks, so I was just checking.”

“Oh, sure.” Your mouth opens in a small ‘o’, and Iwaizumi is surprised at how it got his attention. Pretty lips on an even prettier face. “Yeah… I’m reopening it this week. I just need to fix some things around here.”

Iwaizumi gives you a once over. Discreetly. He leans against the doorframe, curiosity winning him over.  “So, you bought it?”

“What?” you laugh, hand coming to wipe the sweat from your brow. “No. I inherited it."

Iwaizumi assumes that he was unable to hide his surprise by the way your lips move to form an amused smile.

“Ha, yes, most people have the same reaction as you.” You bend to grab the broom in the ground and Iwaizumi’s eyes tread for a second too long along the spanse of your body while you’re not looking. “Which is funny, and also tells a whole tale about the old man.”

“I suppose it does,” Iwaizumi nods once while speaking.

He looks over the place, sees the few changes being done; the paint cans on the ground, the boxes by the corner, the shelfs being replaced and the new color of the upholstered sofas. You in the middle of it all -- the new and the old. 

“I’ll leave you to your cleaning, then. It’s good to know the place isn’t closing.” 

Before you can say anything else, he’s already taking his leave. 

You turn around to thank him but Iwaizumi is already far down the sidewalk, not sparing a glance at you once his back is turned. Your head bends sideways almost involuntary, eyes threading the expanse of his broad back, clad in a beautiful light blue social shirt, rolled sleeves over bulging forearms, with black slacks and expensive looking shoes. While you hoped you didn’t stare before, now you are free to do so and wow, that is a beautiful male specimen if you ever saw one. 

Your first thought is that he didn’t belong in here -- the scenario of a beaten up street and a mildly abandoned diner, in the middle of the day on the foul part of the city. Then again, he looks rather at ease, familiarized, and it isn’t like you can know someone from just one look. 

If anything, a good looking man like that always comes with a catch.

“Hey,” your friend comes through the kitchen doors, looking pretty much like you, tired and sweaty after the morning deep cleaning. “What's going on here? I heard something but I was on the phone”

“Oh,” you say, then grin mischievously at her. “A hot piece of man just passed by asking about the diner.”

“No!” your friend almost cried, lips pressing together in a pout. “See! This is why I keep being single! I never get to see any hotties from the fucking kitchen.”

“Hey, not my fault you decided to be a cook.”

--

Iwaizumi tells himself he’s just checking on the place he likes.

It’s out of a weird misplaced sentimentality, he reasons. He’s been going there for years after all. He’s checking out the new owner, that’s it. The young woman who somehow inherited Lou’s bar. The pretty young woman who was redecorating and cleaning the place that probably didn’t get any love for the last fifteen years. And that’s what Iwaizumi is telling himself when he crosses the city at late hours of the night because the first thing he needs to know is if you’re stupid enough to actually open the place until the ungodly hours of mornings like the old man used to.

And, sure enough, you are. 

It’s past three in the morning when Iwaizumi parks on the other side of the street, but the regulars pour in like clockwork at the sight of the open diner -- old fellas, mostly, and some passersby who work at night. The whores, and the tired workers, all mingling the later it gets. Iwaizumi counts five clients, which is a busy night, and somehow he struggles to find security in your arrangement. 

It’s a weird feeling to have for someone -- worry -- and for all the constant preoccupation he has going on in his life with Oikawa, he’s sure he hasn't felt that particular brand of it in some time. 

For that same reason, Hajime turns around and leaves.

A week later and he’s back. 

This time it’s earlier in the night, just past midnight and the diner is empty save for three regulars he knows well enough. Iwaizumi hates to admit it, but he’s curious; Matsukawa told him that the place had been closing at four and reopening at eleven, with not exactly lots of clients, but with enough patrons to not be discouraged. 

But it was the fact that the man depicted the place as “nice” that got Iwaizumi interested.  Mattsun is not the kind to throw empty comments like those and there was a glint in this man's eyes that made him suspicious. If a small hint of jealousy sparks on Iwa’s chest, he says it’s for the place.

He signals for Makki to turn a curve so he can get off on the other side of the street and tells him to park somewhere out of sight. He doesn’t like to have the BMW close, working as a beacon; the fact Iwa already dares to have a routine place is trouble enough. 

“Bring me a coffee when you come back.” The strawberry blonde tells him while perching himself over the car window, driving off before Iwaizumi can give him a nasty stare. Iwa takes his time on the pavement directly across the diner, lighting a cigarette while moving to cross the street. 

The bell that rings when he crosses the door threshold surprises him for a moment, bringing the stares of everyone inside to him. Some of the old regulars nod his way, and Iwaizumi nods in return, a stiff greeting but one they grew used to in the years of sharing the space.

You look eager, eyebrows shooting up as if you’re not expecting to see him standing in the middle of the place like that. Then, your lips turn up into a smile and Iwaizumi almost misses the sentiment behind it. It’s been far too long since someone looks this pleased into seeing him anywhere. 

Well, with the exception of Oikawa. But that’s because he normally shows up to save the man’s stupid ass.

Iwaizumi walks over to his usual spot, in the back, by the window and sits on the newer looking red sofa. The scratched old table looks bright with new polishing. He notes the changes, appreciates them even: the cleaner looking designs despite the vintage diner ambience, the cream walls, the new smell of good food and well brewed coffee. 

The ground is clean for the first time in a few years, the glass windows and doors looking good and there’s an overall different air around the small place. It feels good. Iwaizumi isn’t used to it. You come close to him, no uniform but jeans and a loose white shirt with a black apron tied around your middle, a coffee pot in one hand and a cup in the other.

“Hello there. Good night -- or day, depending on how your life works.” Your smile is disconcerting. You signal with your head to the coffee. “Want some coffee?”

“Yes, thank you.”

“No worries.” You pour some for him and ask if he wants milk or cream, which he doesn’t. Iwaizumi likes his coffee black. “Can I bring the menu?”

It’s on the tip of his tongue to say no. But he’s curious about what you’re doing with the place, so he nods. Again, you smile while nodding and leaving, and Iwaizumi is baffled by your disposition to be nice at this hour. The old mas was more of a fuck-it kinda person, so it’s a small whishplash to have actual service in here.

Before you leave, however, you turn back and smile at him in what Hajime can only define as playfully. 

“Glad you finally decided to come in and give us a shot.” Your eyes are bright with mirth, proud of yourself for being so observant, and in the late hours of night he feels charged. “I promise you it’s not so bad.”

Oh, Hajime thinks as his face feels slightly warm, a twitch on his fingertips while he looks at your pretty face. This can’t be good.

You wait a bit. Seeing as the whole movement inside the diner changes with the small addition of one man at the corner table. You realise people haven’t sat on that table during the late nights, even when Iwaizumi had yet to even enter the place before.

So, you brace yourself with all the courage you’ve been mustering, and pretend to offer him a refill of coffee while walking over. You’ve been conjuring up theories for him since you saw him the first time, perched on the doors while you were cleaning, and it didn’t help that you kept seeing his car passing around the place for some time before he finally decided to come to the diner.

“Are you an old regular or something?” you ask while refilling his cup with hot, freshly brewed coffee. You’d lie if anyone asked if you did a whole new coffee pot just to find an opening to talk to him.

“Why do you ask?” His eyes are always so deep, the musky green color seemingly pulling you in, black irises eating you up. Your pulse quickens but you hold his eyes on yours even as your face grows warm.

“It’s just that you’re always here.” The words tumble out of your mouth quickly as you deposit the coffee pot on the table, looking at him almost eagerly. “Most of my regulars seem to know you and leave you alone. So I thought that maybe, you know, you may come here for the old times sake.”

He holds your eyes with his for a moment, then looks down to the cup of coffee while he brings it to his lips. 

“I guess you could say that.” 

It feels like a period. Like he isn’t much for small talk, so you pat the apron in front of you, pick up the coffee pot from the table and nod while looking back to the counter to mask your disappointment with such a short conversation.

“Hmm, got’cha.”

“So, the old man was your father?” His voice picks up a tone higher and you turn with big eyes to him. He looks quiet, observant while he looks up at you and somehow, without nothing to hold on, you decide you want to talk to him some more.

“No, I never knew my dad. The stupid man was my grandpa.” 

“Hm,” Iwaizumi nods, his eyes still on you. For some reason you can’t stand the silence, so you keep talking.

“He’d left the business for me and if I'm honest things were not going great where I was so,” you shrug. “I thought about giving this a shot.”

“And your mom?” His eyes on yours make you feel pressured and also lacking, your mouth working before your mind can really think. “She’s been dead since I was a kid.”

He blinks, surprised, and when he speaks he sounds so genuine you smile, “sorry to hear that.” 

“No problem. It’s life, right?” you ask rhetorically, an unwavering smile on your face and bright eyes despite the forlorn subject. Hajime’s chest does something weird at the sight, eyes moving down to the coffee mug by his hands.

Is it? Hajime doesn’t know. But he also hasn't had parents or any kind of family besides Oikawa and the trouble duo, so he nods, murmuring agreement. You leave him alone for the rest of the night, but not without getting his name and introducing yourself; and you do it mostly because you’re still unsure about the man. He’s quiet, mostly keeps to himself while drinking his coffee and sometimes ordering something he never finishes, but other than that, he doesn’t do much. Which, despite that, doesn’t change the fact he sticks out like a sore thumb in the middle of the place. 

His clothes are expensive even if they’re simple; his watch and rings glints under the diner lights, catching attention; and his eyes are like two black gunbarrels pointed straight at you in a face with a jawline sharp enough to cut. 

He makes you feel slightly unnerved and a whole lot interested. 

 Hajime wonders, as he exits the dinner and walks the short distance to where Makki has parked the car, if he has enough reasons to be worried about you. He enters the back of the expensive black BMW, gives the annoying blonde his promised coffee and nods so he can start driving. Iwaizumi settles on the backseat and turns to look at Hanamaki, eyeing him through the rearview mirror.

“Makki.” 

“Yes, Boss.” The answer comes immediately.

“Is this place in anyone's rotation?” Makki’s eyes thread to the mirror to look Hajime back.

“Old Lou’s dinner?”

“Yes.”

Makki’s brows furrow in thought while he seems to think it over. “I’m not sure, but I don’t think so.” His eyes lock on Hajime’s figure through the rearview mirror and Iwa counts the seconds until he asks, since his curiosity always wins. ”Why?”

“Check it for me.”  It’s the end of conversation, and Makki knows. He nods.

“‘kay, Iwa.”

Iwaizumi’s thoughts are brewing, his brows furrowing deeply while he thinks over the whole exchange from earlier.

In a short conversation of a few minutes, you already unsuspectingly told him that you had no family left, no one to miss you if you’re gone. From that he can infer the easy things -- that you probably live alone, seeing as he’s never seen a boyfriend in the restaurant or calling you while you’re working the counter; that you must either live in your grandpa’s house or a small apartment if you’re trying to make more money by renting the old man’s place; that you probably leave alone after closing the dinner -- and he got all that by an easy small talk over coffee. 

Iwa’s lips turn sour while he turns to watch over the streets late at night, the dangerous things that lie in the dark. He ignores that he, himself, is one of them. 

Yes, maybe he should check on you.

--

Iwaizumi observes with a frown while Oikawa waltzes inside his penthouse with his new friend. The woman is, much like all of Oikawa’s partners, beautiful. Luxurious hair and curves, all wrapped in an equally expensive package the color of bright fucking red. Tonight things are less busy in the place, with Iwaizumi and the duo in the living room, while Kunimi keeps watch on the door from his position bended over the counter. Like with everything in his life, the man looks bored and done at the same time.

“I have to give it to him, he does have taste.” Hanamaki points it out unemotionally, his eyes threading along the lady of the moment hanging off Oikawa’s arm. Mattsun looks up from his phone in time to catch a look, his arched brow doing an appearance.

“Yeah, but that’s not new.”

“The idiot blows through women as you do with joints.” Iwaizumi scoffs, twirling his cup of whisky and enjoys the moment to sip his drink. “Which is stupid, both of you.”

“Couldn’t hear your criticism over the sound of you downing that whisky.” Hanamaki pipes in and Mattsun laughs but quickly retrieves himself back to his phone once Iwaizumi gives both of them a nasty glare. 

On the other side of the room, Oikawa parts ways with his company, probably telling the woman to go somewhere inside his apartment while he handles business. His companion’s normally don’t ask much about what he does -- the less they know, the less they lie.

While Iwaizumi does understand the appeal of having someone to warm his bed at night like that, it just seems ridiculous to parade them around as Oikawa does; as if they’re a walking vitrine of his power and money, clad in so many brilliants, Hajime wonders if Oikawa can even see them through the shine.

Iwaizumi sighs when Oikawa finally moves in their direction, crossing his leg over his thigh as he stretches his back against the chair backrest. He drinks the rest of the whisky in one go.

 “I see you already treated yourself to some beverage, Iwa-chan.”

The ridiculous nickname stuck, even after all these years, no matter how many glares and curses Hajime threw his way– and Oikawa has seen Hajime kill men before. Still, the brunette stays unwavering in his teasing -- and Iwa has made arrangements to make sure no one but him feels free to use that denomination.

“Good whisky ain’t making me nicer, shittykawa.” There’s also the fact Iwaizumi maintains his mockery with his friend, even as most of the Mob now call him Boss. He supposes it’s good to have few good childhood memories, if one can.

“At least it makes you less grumpy.” 

Iwaizumi wonders if people would believe him if he told them the Boss pokes his tongue out and flops on the sofa then again, Oikawa’s charm is in being unwavering himself. When Oikawa crosses his leg over his knee and blinks feral, focused eyes over Iwaizumi, it’s easy to see the beast that brought him into the position as the chief in command of the Seijoh Mafia. “So, what did you have to tell me that couldn’t wait until tomorrow?”

“You’re being reckless,” Iwa starts, calm. “I’ve told you about being careful with your companion’s while I’m busy handling that subject.”

Oikawa pretends not to listen, falling back on his big chair without a care in the world. 

“She’s a friend!” His face turns smug, even while there’s a small whine in his voice. It’s a stark difference from the feral Oikawa Tooru that put fear in the hearts of every Mafia in the bordering neighborhoods where they acted and climbed the ranks so fast, he became the head of Seijoh mob while only closing in on his early thirties -- and that was ten years ago. Still, around Iwaizumi, Oikawa keeps being the same brat he ever was.

“You need to get laid, Iwa.” The brunette laughs a bit, pouring more whisky for both of them. “How long it’s been, huh? Two decades? That’s how long your frown has been etched onto your face.”

Makki and Mattsun try to hide their smiles, but it’s futile.

“Don’t worry about my love life.”

“Love life?” Now Oikawa laughs, hand smacking his knee in his amusement. “I’m talking fucking, Iwa. We don’t have time for love.”

“Another reason why you shouldn’t worry about what doesn’t pertain to you.”

“Ohh~” Iwaizumi hates that he saw the singsong coming, “such big words. Gosh, that must mean it’s been years without action down there.”

“Why the worry, Tooru?” Iwaizumi asks, voice turning deep, eyes threading over Oikawa’s face. That has happened -- and ended, but it didn’t mean the two men didn’t play around it sometimes.

“Is the sex you’ve been getting so bad, you’ve been worried about mine?” Iwa scoffs, drinks a full mouth of whisky and turns to look at Oikawa once again. 

“You look too old to be getting any action,” Oikawa mocks him, snickering behind his glass. “Look at those lines and wrinkles, oh gosh Iwa, we’re the same age, you’re making me look bad.”

“Shut up, trashykawa,” Iwaizumi grumbles. “I’m just going to tell you this time: fucking behave. I’m looking into the mole, but you need to watch your back.”

“I thought that was your job, though.”

“Makes it a bit fucking hard when you bring home a diferent friend every night. Babysitting a toddler would be easier than you.” Iwaizumi grumbles and scoffs, finishing his drink in one go. “I’m doing my job. Now listen to me so that I can do it well.”

Iwaizumi slams his glass on the wooden coffee table and stands, the sound loud but not enough to disturb the rest of the men around the place. Maddog does look at Iwaizumi as if thinking what’s the cause for his distress, but the man has learned long ago that Oikawa rattles on everyone's nerves at some point -- Iwa just happens to be ticked more than the rest, a consequence of being friends with the man, he assumes.

Iwa pats his slacks, re-doing the button on his suit and walks away, moving a hand in the air as a way to say goodbye to Oikawa. “Your friend is waiting for you.” 

Hanamaki and Matsukawa are behind him before he stops in front of the elevator doors, Kunimi not even looking up as the three of them leave. “Try not to be dead by the morning.”

“I’ll do my best~” Oikawa singsongs back, a carefree smile on his face. 

Mattsun is driving tonight and that means Hanamaki is speaking the whole time, going on about how the Karasuno Mob is growing, potentially able to slip between Seijoh and Shiratorizawa’s territory if they’re not careful. Iwaizumi listens, but doesn’t really offer anything to the discussion; he’s too caught up in his head, wondering about what he’s going to do with Oikawa and how he can flush out the mole as fast as possible until something catches his ear, every thought in his mind freezing at the mention of the diner neighborhood.

“What did you say?”

“Huh?” Makki stops, looking back through the seat. “Oh, some of ours have been talking about seeing Shiratorizawa around downtown territory.” Makki turns serious, and it happens so rarely that the moment his demeanor shifts, Iwaizumi actually grasps his worries by the simple difference in the air surrounding the blonde. “Johzenji too.”

Now, that’s worrisome. While Seijoh and Shiratorizawa have some shared business in downtown and somewhat of a truce on those places, Johzenji is way too far from its limits, crossing borders they know they should not. Iwaizumi catches sight of how his frown actually caves lines on his forehead and Oikawa’s snickers pops in his mind as if the male was right there, he scoffs but his look is serious.

They can’t leave it that way.

Hajime tells himself that the fact that your face pops in his mind and the thought of a territorial war a few blocks away from the Diner makes his hands constrict into fists, has nothing to do with how fast he decided he must handle it. 

But it gets a little less believable as he orders Matsukawa to keep an eye out on your street, like if it wasn’t clear that by your street -- he meant you.

--

You notice the man staying around.

Actually, you doubt anyone hasn’t noticed the tall man who likes to linger just a bit too much around your diner as if he’s your hired security guard or something. He’s taller than most people, broad and built enough for you to see it in the way his clothes cling to his form, and has this fixation with metal, because both his ears are pierced and his knuckles are always adorned with thick rings. He looks bad, and has a cigarette pending from his lips to crown the look. Which, of course, prompts half the women population who enjoy your diner to look. It probably doesn’t help that despite his aloof behavior he can be quite the charmer.

And you’re suspecting your cook and friend is falling for it.

“If you light that cigarette right now after I’ve just told you to leave and smoke outside, I swear to god I’ll use the fire extinguisher on you, Matsukawa-san.” You always chastise him out of the Dinner once he starts smoking, since Issei has no respect for the very big, very red “no smoking” sign you had to purchase just because of him. He grins at you from his high seat on the counter and lifts his hands in a sign of rendition.

“Okay, honey. I’ll drop it.” 

You eye him very sharply until his fingers finally close around his cigar and he takes it out the clasp of his lips. You watch until he pockets it again in his metal case. Then, you finally blink and nod, turning to enter inside your kitchen. You’ve made the mistake of trusting him before, letting him out of your sight once he signaled defeat when you reprimanded him, just to come out and find him smoking anyway. So, now, you take the extra precautions with him, reason why you open the door without warning to check on him, finding him calmly studying the menu. 

He eyes you and blinks, a big grin splitting his face. 

“I’ll behave,” he crosses a finger over his heart like a scout. ”Promise.” 

You snort, but turn around and enter the kitchen space, yelling at your friend the newest orders, to which she just yells back a fine.

You grab the done plates– buttermilk pancakes and swiss omelette with orange juice and black coffee– and push the door outside with your hip, while calmly balancing everything on your tray. 

It’s a quiet late-morning, most of the regulars have already left for work and you’re dealing with the unusual clients, just three if you count Mattsun.

Once you’re back at the counter, Matsukawa is signaling with the menu for you to come over. 

“So, what’s your order, Matsukawa-san?”

“First, I’d like you to drop the san, it makes me feels fucking old.” 

You tease him just the bit by giving him a pointed look with a very arched eyebrow. 

“Stop it,” he hisses at you, eyes narrowing. “Don’t you fuckin-”

“You are old,” you tell him, pleased with yourself when he hisses as if burned, making you sport a big smile while on it. He’s glaring at you. “See, this is how I feel when I catch you smoking once I tell you not to.”

His lopsided grin is a panty-dropper; too bad you’re thinking about how it would be if someone else grinned at you like that. “Valid.” 

The seconds tick by while you wait for Matsukawa to say his order but he just stares at you as if you’re slowly losing your mind. You sigh, resist the urge to facepalm but do press two fingers into the middle of your forehead in an upwards motion to help with the stress, to look at him again and smile. 

“Your order, Matsukawa-san?”

“Again with the -san? Let me make a deal with you. You call me Issei and I’ll never smoke inside again.”

You eye him suspiciously but ultimately decide it’s a nice deal. 

“Deal,” you say, while jutting your lips out to hide a smile, still looking for hints he may be lying. “And if I catch you smoking inside again I’ll start calling you Jiji.”

Issei’s eyes go large, eyebrows shooting up to his hairline until he coughs and sputters, “you wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me.”

The stare-down goes for a few seconds until you end it by saying, “I’ll get your regular,” and turning around to leave.

“This isn’t over!”

“Yeah, yeah, just behave.”

Once you’re in the kitchen, the clattering and noises are loud.

“You should chill a bit before you end up completely mutilating the pans, Rei. Half my money is in your kitchen.”

She throws you a nasty glare from across all the other way by her stove, doing God knows what but whatever it is smells heavenly.

“Do you believe the gall of this idiot outside?”

“Yep,” you chirp, but you eye her closely while she continues. You know her enough to know what’ll happen next.

“He had the fucking nerve to say my food was too salty.”

“Uh,” Escapes your lips, but you narrow your eyes at her, taking in the redness of her face, the way she looks overheated and the gesticulating arms while she walks around using too much strength while opening and closing the kitchen cabinets.

“SALTY!” She hollers to the emptiness of her kitchen, which pretty much makes it echo through the walls. You’re half certain you can hear Matsukawa chuckling outside. You wait for it, by now you know it’s coming. “I’ll show him what the fuck being too salty means.” She keeps going, cranky and beating the pans with that bit too much strength so that the clanks and tinkling sound loud even to you. You wait just a little bit more. “That handsome motherfucker, I’ll fucking deck him with my frying pan!”

And there it is.

You snicker just the tiniest bit, and put the order for his regular. She snatches it from your hand and points a paring knife at you.

“Don’t you dare say anything.” She does look fairly threatening, but the thing is that you’ve been on the other side of that knife one too many times to care now.

“Hey, if you like insufferable assholes, who am I to judge?”

“Fuck you.”

--

The movement is slow tonight, the cold weather with a drizzle makes your regulars stay home and the streets stay empty. It’s just a bit past midnight and you already know you’re closing early. Iwaizumi has been seated at his usual spot for a good twenty minutes already and, much like every other night, he’s just doing nothing -- looking over the street, reading the paper, sometimes a book or daring to look at his phone. Rei is still moving around in the kitchen and there’s only one other person in the diner -- an old man eating his soup calmly on the whole other side.

You feel restless; your eyes keep darting to him as if waiting to be caught, definitely not being the subtle person you hope to be, nothing catches your attention when Iwaizumi sits calmly by the window reading the paper and sipping on fresh coffee. Your eyes thread through his broad shoulders, poorly hidden under the fitted black social button up, rolled sleeves showing big, veiny forearms leading to strong, broad hands that seem even bigger when they engulf the coffee mug.

Hajime wears one ring, thick, black and a matching watch that probably costs as much as this whole place. You don’t need to see it to know his dark grey slacks are fitted; you’ve caught sight of it when he entered and you think there’ll be hell on earth before you forget how perfectly it hugs his frame, how delicious his ass is and how his waist is marked, beautifully, by the black belt. You thank the gods that he had already disposed of his suit jacket, or you’d be unable to survive so long.

 You’re probably drooling, so you tear your eyes from him to make yourself a hot cup of coffee and hope that you can pretend the flustered feeling in your insides is from the steaming caffeine quickening your heart. However, seeing as your eyes drag slowly back to him, you think that’s a lost battle. 

You drink a bit, breathe some more and decide to say fuck it. You’re not risking anything -- if he doesn’t want to talk, he can just say so. So you wash your hands, shed your apron and pick your coffee mug back up while walking to him. Before you even tread more than two steps, his deep, hard green eyes are already looking at you. They’re so impenetrable and focused, you wonder if he looks long enough, will he see your mind?

The thought makes your face heat up and you swallow the saliva pooling on your mouth before speaking,“mind if I sit?”

He nods no, but still answers, “go ahead.”

You slide on the seat in front of him, and for a second you regret your choice. Up close and with nowhere else to look, he’s even bigger -- his frame engulfs anything past his shoulders, his eyes demanding the sole focus of yours and you give it to him. But there’s a thought in your mind that helps you fight back the urge to let yourself slide and drown in the pool of deep green.

“So, I've been meaning to ask,” you tread carefully, knowing it’s a minefield ahead. You’ve been alone in this world with just your grandpa for a long time, and he was no saint. You’re no stranger to the fact that his diner has always been in mob-controlled territory. You’ve seen him bullied into paying back gambling loans too many times to not know how a bad man looks, and still, here you are, body warming and trembling just by the sight of what must be the baddest of them all.  “Were you friends with my grandpa or something?”

Iwaizumi looks at you, blinks and then hums a question, slightly furrowed brows his only sign of confusion. “Hm?”

“It’s just that I’ve noticed… that you seem like you’ve been taking care of this place… of me.” You speak while your eyes keep darting between his face and down, a warm feeling seeping from your eyes that makes his brain slow down, too caught up in watching you until he realizes he walked into a tricky question.

Fuck. Think fast, Hajime. 

“We weren’t exactly friends. But he was a mean card player and he got a lot of money out of me.” Iwaizumi speaks fondly, which is probably the only thing indicating that he isn’t here for some wicked king of payback. You nod while your brows slide up.

“I’m sure you also took a lot of money from him.”

“If I was lucky,” he pauses, “I don’t like to bet. But it was nice to play against him, even without betting.”

“I’m surprised he wanted to play without betting.”

“Rare occasions.” Iwa muses with a small smile in the corner of his lips.

Iwaizumi looks at you again, that deep stare as if he’s trying to catch your soul intent. “What I mean with that is… He never talked about you. Or having a family, for that matter.”

“Well… it’s like you put it. He was a gambler. And before he got good, he was bad. We struggled a lot with his debt while I was growing up. Once I left the house and I was working and got into college... he called me, asking for money.  He knew I had a college fund -- small, but you know, enough to get by for a few years. I gave some of it to him and I told him that if he was going to call me for money, it’d be better if he didn’t call at all, so… our relationship was pretty strained this last few years.” 

Iwaizumi doesn’t know what to say. So he tests around something he hasn't used in a long time, “sorry.”

“It’s fine. I just couldn’t possibly deal with his debt on top of mine, you know. And it was his choice not to call me for other reasons, so.” You shrug your shoulders, eyes downcast for a moment. If Iwaizumi ever knew how to console someone, he’d forgotten it a long time ago, but he’ll swear on his gun and every god above that he wishes he was sensible enough now to offer any kind of words that can resemble solace. He doesn’t know what you find in his face that makes you do a funny face, nose wrinkling, while smiling.

“It’s ok, I don’t hate him, you know. I just... He’s dead and I can’t help but think these things are in the past. Which may be fucked up but I’ve made my choice not to go through life with these demons.”

Iwaizumi nods, solemn. He knows a thing or twelve about going through life with demons and he wishes that you didn’t have to bear this even for the smallest of seconds. It gnaws inside your being, and the places where their claws sink usually fester. But, he doesn’t even risk thinking about what it’d be like for him to live without them -- they’re the closest to penitence for a whole life of sin he’s ever gonna get.

Talking to Hajime makes hours fly by like minutes. 

He’s not very talkative himself, but he’s a great listener and he gives you fair, honest answers so you try to do the same. You ask him about the old man, what he’d been doing, and Hajime doesn’t even blink while saying that he kept gambling until his death; tells you how he’d been worried that the diner had been offered as collateral to some debt and would fall victim of your grandpa’s addiction even after his death. You tell him about life after college, how disheartening and anxious it was, how you’ve struggled without finding a job and hustled your way together with Rei. You tell him how you’ve felt good to win the Diner -- the new ideas and purpose, the excitement and how fun it was to think about life like this -- a business owner. 

The one thing Hajime doesn’t tell you about is his job, which you feel is answer enough; and when you ask him about the late nights at the Diner, his lips quirk up and your heart quickens, whole body warming at how he tells you the diner has a special place in his life and that he doesn’t likes to sleep, only crashing once the sun come out.

He stays with you as you bid Rei farewell and close the restaurant, walks you to his car and drives you to your house. His car doesn’t move until you make it safe inside and only when your face comes to the window, does it starts to move away.

-

[to be continued]

[dr-spencer-reids-queen]

Poison: Part One

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Reader

Word Count: ~1.8k

Warnings: canon violence, canon language, canon talk of death, methods of kill, fluff and angst

Author’s Note: I do not own anything from Criminal Minds. All credit goes to their respective owners. If there is any warnings that exceed the normal death/kills from the show, I will list them. If you’ve seen the show, then it’s the same level of angst unless otherwise stated.

Feedback is gold, and it’s the only currency I take

"What is food to one is to others bitter poison." - Lucretius

Cases involving children are never your strong suit. The last one with Billie Copeland was just so hard, you’re not sure if you can be involved in another one--that is until you learned what this case is really all about. Yes, there is a child involved, but the bigger picture has a much larger scale than children.

You have to remind yourself that you need to focus on the case and not on Spencer. It shouldn’t even be a hard thing to do, but something happened between you two when you took him to the bookstore right next to your apartment. After checking out a couple of books, and after Spencer had read virtually all of them, you decided it was kind of late and that you needed to get home. The store was closing very soon anyway, so Spencer opted to walk you home.

When you got to your door, he decided to give you a kiss on your cheek, but you moved your head at the last minute. He accidentally got the corner of your mouth, and that messed up his whole thing. Based on his reaction to your mouths almost touching, you know he can’t be that interested in you. If he were, then he would have just kissed you right there and then. Instead, he stuttered a goodbye and left.

You haven’t been able to stop thinking about him since. Does he like you? If so, then why won’t he just kiss you? If he doesn’t, then why does he agree to go on these dates with you. Whenever you two go out, you clearly state that this is a date, and he doesn’t say anything that dismisses that idea. Sometimes, you just wish you knew what was going on inside that big brain of his so you can dejumble it and tell him what the fuck is going on. You’d do it now, but you have a case that needs your full attention.

Apparently, a man and his son were driving down the road one night when the father pulled to the side of the road and got out. He walked into the woods, the son followed after him, and the father beat him almost to death. The son is in the hospital undergoing critical care while the father is in the psych ward. You’re not sure how it happened or why, but you know that it did. Hotch and Gideon got hold of the interrogation video sent over by the New Jersey Police Department.

Detective Hanover is the person who is going to be in charge and is also the person who you will be working with the entire time you’re in Jersey.

“State trooper took this before the paramedics showed up,” the detective says and shows Jack Fisher, the father of Eric Fisher, a picture of his unconscious body. “He's unconscious and has four broken bones. He's gonna be in the hospital for a month.”

“I didn't hurt my son,” Jack sighs.

“Do you remember removing the tire iron from the trunk?”

What, he used a tire iron? You gasp softly and put your hand to your mouth as you continue to watch.

“No! No!”

“What's the last thing you remember?”

“I picked Eric up from school on Friday, for the weekend. Who would do this?” he cries softly.

Hotch ends the video there and addresses the entire briefing room.

“This happened two days ago in Beechwood, New Jersey. Mr. Fisher had ingested LSD one afternoon and didn't come down until eighteen hours later.”

“The hospital reported six other patients who ingested LSD in the last twenty-four hours. The hospital called the CDC, then the CDC called us,” JJ finishes.

“So, a bunch of people got spiked. What makes it a BAU case?” Derek wonders.

“They each received ten to twenty times the normal dose.”

“That’s enough to kill a small child,” Spencer informs.

“Or cause a grown man to try and kill him with a tire iron apparently,” you sigh.

“Of the seven victims, there was one death and one coma. This is from the hospital's security footage the same night Fisher lost it,” JJ explains and uses the remote to put a different video on the screen.

It’s of the hospital that is in complete chaos. People are shouting, pushing, yelling, and apparently, having seizures. One man is on a stretcher, and he’s clearly on something. The doctors around him try to push past the madness of people to get him to a room while the nurses have their hands full of scared and angry patients. This wasn’t a spike or an overdose…

“These people didn’t get spiked. They were poisoned,” you reveal.

“Of the seven victims, Gail Norman was the only death. She was seventy-eight. She ran out into the middle of the road, and she was hit by a car. She was DOA,” JJ reveals on the plane ride over to New Jersey.

You’re sitting next to Spencer in one of the seats that are super cramped so that they can fit four of them in on either side of a small table. You’re sitting by the window, so essentially, Spencer is blocking you in. He’s not a big person, but because you have romantic feelings for him, it feels like a fucking trap.

“The other potentially fatal case is nine-year-old Brittany Canon. She fell out of a treehouse and fractured her skull. She's in a coma, but the doctors don't know if she's going to come out of it,” Hotch says.

“How do you wanna handle the press?” Gideon asks the liaison.

“We still don't know how these people even got dosed. I think it would be irresponsible to issue a warning without specifics. It'll just cause panic. I did notify the local PD, though, to be discreet.”

“How is it possible that none of these people knew how they got poisoned?” Derek wonders.

“None of them remembers anything about the day it happened,” you say and gesture, but your hand brushes up against Spencer’s leg.

You blush and mutter an apology, but he doesn’t say anything about it. He looks at you and blushes as well, but he is better at hiding it than you are.

“These people were so messed up; it's made it difficult for local PD to retrace the victim's steps.”

“So, we need to go on precedent. We know there are four types of poisoners who target multiple victims,” Gideon starts.

“There's the true believer--the political terrorist/religious cult. There's the extortionist--the product tamperer that holds the business hostage in exchange for money. The prankster--it’s usually a younger offender who doesn't mean any harm, and it's basically just a big practical joke to them. Then we have the avenger--someone with a personal vendetta who chooses poison as their weapon,” you explain the different types of offenders.

“We need to find out as quickly as possible which type he is. Because with the exception of the prankster, all these types commonly test their poison on a small scale before appearing at a larger attack.”

“Then, let's hope this one was just a prank,” Derek scoffs.

"I suggest we split up the victims and see if there's a pattern to the victimology,” Gideon suggests.

“Most of them are still in the hospital. I'll call local PD to meet us there,” Hotch confirms.

“I'll check the lab reports. Maybe there's a clue to the unsub's motive in the specific nature of the poison he used,” Spencer calls dibs.

“I can't imagine anybody could want this to happen.”

“If you don’t mind, I’ll head to the hospital with you. The kid may not be able to tell the doctor anything, but I certainly can. I’ll be able to see what really happened if his mother allows it.”

“Good,” Gideon nods once. “We need all the answers we can get.”

The hospital is buzzing with panic, fear, sadness, and grief. Many people are dying in this hospital, and to someone like you, you’re not sure you can be here for much longer. Hotch, Gideon, and the rest of the team don’t really understand how this all affects you. Normal people like the ones on your team see this hospital for what it is. They see people grieving and people crying, but they allow themselves to be separated from their emotions. They can walk into a loud crowd and tune out all the conversations and emotions without even thinking about it.

Not you. You’re completely different.

You walk into a crowd, and you’re overwhelmed by not only the physical sensation of people all around you, but your mind is also crowded. Your mind goes into overdrive as it inspects each person to make sure they are not a threat. To make sure that they are who they say they are. A normal person can see a kid walking down the street and not know they are kidnapped while you are able to determine that.

You walk into this hospital, and every single emotion of every single nurse, doctor, patient, and family member immediately go to your shoulders. Someone can be dying on the very top floor, and you’d feel how sad their family members are as they watch their beloved ones slip away. There could be someone in the next room receiving bad news, and it’ll be like you’re receiving the same news. It’s not fun living with your abilities, and you’ve caught yourself wishing it would all just end. However, you think about everyone you’ve saved, and it somehow all makes it okay.

“Detective Hanover, Beechwood PD,” the detective that was on the surveillance tape introduces himself to you, Gideon, and Hotch.

“Agent Hotchner, this is Agent Gideon and Agent Y/L/N.”

“Thanks for coming down on such short notice. The doctor said he may have permanent brain damage. I've never seen anything like this,” he sighs and looks at Eric, the little boy who was beaten by his own father.

“Well, let's hope we can help him.”

“Have you had a chance to review the victim's files?”

“We're especially interested in talking to the boy's father,” Gideon says.

“We'd like to get a sense of why he turned violent while the lab analyzes the specific nature of the LSD he was dosed with. we'd like to get our own sense: was it the drug itself or was there something else going on? Hopefully, that can give us a little bit of a window into the motive of the offender,” Hotch explains.

“He's in the psych ward.”

“Well, we'll keep it short,” Gideon replies.

“If you don’t mind, I’ll meet up with you two. I’m going to talk to the mother,” you offer, and Hotch just nods.

wanna be tagged? add yourself to this document! if your tag doesn’t work, find out why!

@averyhotchner @lets-be-gay-for-the-angel @fan-girl-97 @paulaern @inkstainedwritergirl @estrela-rogers @abitchforjay @kwbaby24 @redsalv20 @joonie-centric @spencerreid-mgg @sixpencespencee @boygenius-reid @reidemandweep @prophecyflame @happynekochan1​

[foilfreak]

Beauty and Her Beast: Chapter 5

WARNING PLZ READ BEFORE CONTINUING: This fic is rated NSFW and contains graphic depictions of things some people may find disturbing or alarming, including, but not limited to: violence, gore, unhealthy family relationships, Oedipus complexes, gratuitous amount of pornographic literature, ableist language, physical, mental, and emotional abuse, etc. If you are someone who does not enjoy fiction with these elements in them, then I suggest you refrain from reading this, because this fic will have all that, and probably a lot more. So, this is your first and final warning to turn around and go somewhere else if stuff like this just isn't your vibe, because from this point forward, your emotional wellbeing is in your own hands, and I will not be accepting blame if you disregarded my warnings and ended up reading something you didn't like. Idk why I feel compelled to write one of these despite this being Resident Evil fanfic, but I figured I'd cover my ass just in case.

(AO3 Link below)

This was a bad idea... no, actually, scratch that. This wasn’t just a bad idea...

‘THIS WAS A TERRIBLE IDEA’ Salvatore thought to himself, as he frantically hid beneath a large blue tarp covering a couple of old, rotting shipping crates, his body trembling uncontrollably and his shoulders heaving from the terrified and panicked state Salvatore had managed to work himself into.

Now, for those of you who may be wondering why Salvatore was currently hiding behind a bunch of crates like prey hiding from the hunter, despite being in the safety of his own reservoir-

“Hello?”

-that would be why.

Yes, the 2 days that Salvatore had been given to prepare for his gift’s arrival had come and gone faster than the disfigured man could have ever imagined. And while he’d done a marvelous job of cleaning up the reservoir to make it suitable for the beautiful young lady who’d now be calling this place ‘home’, what he hadn’t anticipated having to deal with was the full blown panic attack he got the second the villagers arrived to release her into his custody. Thankfully, his anxiety grew more manageable when one of the villagers explained that, due to Nadine’s tendency toward violent behavior, combined with her superhuman strength, Mother Miranda had gone ahead and given the young woman a nice heavy dose of sedative to keep her asleep throughout the journey to the reservoir, as well as for a couple of hours afterwards, too.

You know… just in case.

After the villagers finally left, Salvatore closed and locked the gate behind them before turning his attention to the large wooden coffin that, according to the men who’d carried it here, contained his long awaited gift from Mother Miranda.

Taking a few tentative steps forward, Salvatore takes the metal key the villagers had given him and slowly, but eagerly, unlocked and opened the wooden vessel, gasping in shock and awe as the sight of Nadine’s perfectly angelic face finally came into the light. He wasn’t sure how this was possible, but somehow the young woman looked even more perfect than the first time he saw her, the soft glow of the early morning sun reflecting off her blue scaly skin in a way that gives her a gorgeous, almost iridescent shine.

The continued nudeness of Nadine’s body, while mesmerizing to look at, did unfortunately make the act of keeping his hands to himself rather difficult, and Salvatore quickly found himself grappling with his inner demons as he contemplated reaching in and taking a quick feel, just a quick one, if only for the sake of finally figuring out what on earth her skin was made out of.

Was it smooth and silky to allow for rapid aquatic maneuverability, like that of an eel, or did her soft, feminine exterior hide a rougher, more textured sort of skin, like that of a shark or a whale?

Oh how Salvatore longed, with every fiber of his disgusting, twisted being, to reach inside that wooden carrier and run his hands over the mutant woman’s perfect little body, every atom in him aching to touch, hold, kiss, lick, bite, and devour every square millimeter of this gorgeous specimen, blurring and melting the lines of reality that once separated them until you couldn’t tell where beast ended and where beauty began.

But he refrained.

As much as Salvatore desperately wanted to give in to the primal desires of his still-human mind and mostly-human body, he instead decided to give the young woman some time to wake up first, guessing that she probably wouldn’t want some random stranger, much less one that looks like him, touching her without her permission. So with a deep breath, and a strong swallowing of his raging libido, Salvatore stepped away from the crate Nadine was sleeping in, pocketing the key in case Mother wanted it back later, before turning around and beginning to hobble back toward the lake to complete the few minor tasks he hadn’t managed to get to before the villagers arrived earlier.

It would be well into the afternoon, nearly evening by this point, before Salvatore heard so much as a peep from Nadine. Mother Miranda must not have been kidding when she said she’d given the young woman enough sedative to knock her out for hours. If it weren’t for the fact that she was still breathing, Salvatore might have thought her dead after this amount of time.

Unfortunately for Salvatore, it would appear as though Nadine taking ages to awaken from her drug induced slumber would be the least of the deformed man’s concerns, quickly overrun and forgotten about in the blind panic Salvatore went into once the young woman’s voice, soft and slightly high pitched, though a bit scratchy from lack of use, calls out from, presumably, the spot where Salvatore had left her by the front gate.

The heavenly tone bounces and echoes off the wood and water of the surrounding area, filling the reservoir with a song-like magic that made Salvatore’s knees buckle weakly in reverence, and his stomach want to turn itself inside out from complete and utter terror. Hit with the sudden realization that Salvatore was going to have to actually look at AND speak to Nadine now that she’d awoken, and at the same time no less, immediately sends the mutant man tumbling into a full blown panic, resulting in Salvatore locating the nearest solid structure, the tarp and crates in this case, and throwing himself underneath it, hoping and praying that if he remained quiet for long enough, Nadine would lose interest and go somewhere else-

“Hello? Is anyone here?”

-Unfortunately Salvatore wasn’t a man who had his hopes and prayers answered terribly often, and today seemed to be no different than usual.

Despite being given extra security due to the rapid approach of nightfall, Salvatore didn’t even dare breathe as the sound of footsteps passed by his hiding spot, his heart pounding uncontrollably in his chest as Nadine came within just inches of finding him. This is it, the jig is up, there was absolutely no doubt in Salvatore’s mind that Nadine was mere seconds away from pulling the tarp back to reveal his horrible and disgusting self, scrunched up into the tightest little ball between the narrow spaces of the crates.

Closing his teary eyes and accepting his fate, Salvatore merely sat and waited for the inevitable moment of shocked silence after the tarp had been lifted, followed by the sound of Nadine’s smooth and rich voice bursting his eardrums with a piercingly shrill and terrified shriek, as well the heavy booming of feet against wood as she ran away from him, disgusted, horrified, and appalled by so much as having to look at the monster that Salvatore was, much less do anything else.

“Ah man, I could have sworn I saw someone around here, earlier,” the low but feminine voice of Nadine said aloud, sounding quite dejected as she leaned against the blue tarp covering Salvatore’s hiding spot.

“Maybe they just went out to look for food, and will be back later?” Nadine says to herself, sounding more optimistic than before, though her hopefulness fades as quickly as it arrived when she continues with, “Then again… maybe the poor bastard caught a glimpse of me as I stumbled around and took off in terror at the sight of me. I suppose I can't really blame him… not with the way I look now, at least.”

Nadine pauses, trailing off for a moment as Salvatore remains rooted in his spot, hands clamped firmly over his mouth and nose to prevent any noise from escaping, despite the increasing burning sensation from his human lungs, which, despite their somewhat shaky ability to do their prescribed role ever since the cadou mutations screwed him up, still very much needed air going in and out of them if Salvatore wanted them to continue functioning at all.

The young woman remained in that spot leaning against the tarp-covered crates for a few more moments, not saying or doing anything as far as Salvatore could tell, before the sound of shuffling and more footsteps, softer and less hurried than the ones he’d heard earlier, caught his attention.

Silence persists for another moment, causing Salvatore to grow curious the longer he waits. And so, despite his earlier reservations, Salvatore can’t help but shift his position slightly so that he could peek through a narrow space between the wall of crates, just enough to give him a solid view of Nadine, who currently stood with her back to him just a few feet away from where the mutated man was hiding. Her gaze seemed transfixed on the lake’s surface, or perhaps it was less the water that held her gaze, but the reflection staring back at her from the mirror-like surface.

Even without seeing her face, Salvatore could tell that the young woman was afraid and in pain, and his heart wrenched agonizingly as he watched her beautiful form shrink in on itself. Her arms curled around her body defensively, as if trying to hide herself shamefully from any potential onlookers, while her torso slumped limply forward, shoulders shaking heavily as she sobbed quietly to herself in the ever growing darkness of evening time.

“Whatever, it’s not like it matters anyways,” the young woman sobs dejectedly after a while, pointlessly rubbing the tears from her face away, only for them to be quickly replaced as new ones fell. “Even if somebody did actually live here, it’s not like anyone would even want to help a disgusting abomination like me... much less have anything else to do with me.”

The sound of Nadine jumping off the dock and into the cold lake water below pales in comparison to the sound of Salvatore’s whole world turning itself upside down from beneath the large blue tarp under which he was hidden.

Disgusting abomination?

Nadine?

No. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, NO!

Of all the things Salvatore has ever heard in his entire life, this one has to be the most ridiculous thing by far.

Salvatore was a disgusting abomination, that much he was more than aware of and had long since accepted, as painful as it still was to admit from time to time. But Nadine… Why Nadine was quite easily the most beautiful woman he’s ever laid eyes on, save for perhaps Mother Miranda herself maybe, which was certainly a very high standard to be compared to in Salvatore’s book. While the young woman did indeed have several mutations that would make going back to her previous life almost impossible, that didn’t mean she was disgusting, or an abomination.

Not to Salvatore she wasn’t, at least.

The fact that the poor young woman thought this of herself sent a sharp, stabbing pain directly into his heart, practically tearing him apart from the inside out as he frantically thought of something, anything he could do to make the tiny woman feel better.

Thinking back to when he’d watched her just moments ago, he remembers the way in which her arms and hands curled around herself as she sobbed, looking like they were attempting to cover as much exposed skin as physically possible. How Nadine could call herself an abomination when she looked like the picture perfect definition of beauty, Salvatore didn’t know, but what he did know was that women, at least the women he was used to, always enjoyed receiving pretty things with which they could cover and decorate themselves, like dresses and jewelry.

And luckily for Salvatore, he just so happens to know of a few places where he might be able to acquire both of those things.

With a quick peek from beneath the tarp before taking off, Salvatore quickly makes his way toward the exit gate, barely managing to close the gate behind him and pull his cloak over himself before sprinting, as much as his mangled body would allow anyways, down the snowy path that would lead him to the estates of the only two people Salvatore can think of to help him in this messy situation.

Hopefully Alcina and Donna won’t be terribly upset with him for stopping by unannounced.

[unicornblossom13]

Umbrella Academy OC:

Name: Sylvia Hargreeves

Gender: Female

Species: Human

Age: 30

Aliases: Number 7, Honey Badger

Portrayed by: Elizabeth Gillies

Biography:

Like the rest of her siblings, Sylvia was born on the 12th hour of the first day of October 1989 to mothers who had no previous signs of pregnancy. She was soon adopted by Sir Reginald Hargreeves and taken to the Umbrella Academy with the intention of training her and her siblings to save the world.

Appearance:

Sylvia is a beautiful woman who has blue-green eyes and long black hair that reaches to the middle of her back and has a single, rather large white streak in the middle of it. She is fairly tall with pale skin and an attractive, curvy figure.

In the first season, she wears a white crop tank top, which exposes her midriff, under a black leather jacket. She also wears black pants, combat boots, and fingerless gloves.

On her left ear is a golden chain earring that has a small, blue crystal dangling from it.

When she was young, Sylvia wore the Umbrella Academy’s girl uniform. Her hair was shorter, reaching to her shoulders, and was tied in two separate, low ponytails that rested over her shoulders.

Personality:

Out of all of her siblings, even has a child, Sylvia has always been the most mature, mentally and emotionally. After leaving the Umbrella Academy at eighteen, she attempts to get over all the harsh treatment done to her by Sir Reginald Hargreeves and to not dwell on the past. She is also quite a calm individual and does not let her emotions get the better of her all the time.

Though she can sometimes be annoyed with her siblings, she cares about them greatly and is very protective of them. Even after leaving the Academy, she always kept in contact with them to make sure they were doing well. She would also comfort her siblings after a particularly harsh experiment done by their adoptive father.

Though usually calm, Sylvia has a fierce temper when she gets angry and will lash out violently. When truly mad, she begins releasing a string of swears and has a habit of breaking things. She can also be very blunt with her words at times, being rather sassy and sarcastic.

Sylvia is very brave and, as a side effect of her powers, is utterly fearless, having never known fear of anyone or anything since she was born. She is also fiercely determined and will keep getting back up on her feet no matter how many times she is knocked down, even going so far as to literally fight someone to the death if she has to. She is willing to kill those who intend harm on her and family.

Sylvia is also highly intelligent, second only to Five. She can come up with clever ways to solve problems and is able to think on her feet. She prefers to think of a plan before charging head first into a bad situation.

She is very confident in herself and her powers, but she does struggle with the worries that she could one day end up alone without her siblings.

Powers and Abilities:

Powers:

Sylvia’s powers are based off the animal the Honey Badger.

Enhanced Strength: While not as strong as Luther, Sylvia has shown to be far stronger than the average human being.

Enhanced Speed: Sylvia is very quick on her feet, which, along with her agility, is very useful in battle.

Enhanced Senses: Sylvia has heightened senses of hearing and smelling.

Enhanced Durability: Sylvia has incredibly tough skin that can withstand numerous blows without causing her much pain. She is impervious to simple bullets and knife blades, but her main weak point is her head.

Claws: Sylvia can make her nails grow into longer and sharper claws, which are able to easily slice through a person’s skin.

Fangs: Sylvia can grow her canines to be sharp fangs and can deliver a powerful bite force.

Venom & Poison Immunity: Sylvia has shown to have an immunity to venom and poison. If either were to get into her system, rather than kill her, her body would go numb, or she would become unconscious, for a few hours. Even then, it would take a while for the venom and poison to take effect.

Abilities:

Expert Combatant: Sylvia is highly skilled in hand-to-hand combat and has shown she can take down even the toughest of opponents. She is also a ferocious fighter and never shows any mercy.

Genius-Level Intellect: Sylvia is very intelligent and is able to quickly understand rather complicated things, such as how Five turned from an old man to his thirteen year old self when he traveled through time.

Relationships:

Five Hargreeves:

Sylvia and Five have a very close relationship. Even when they were children, they would always spend a large amount of time together. Five considers Sylvia to be his intellectual equal and is the one he trusts the most out of all of their siblings, being the first person he told about the upcoming apocalypse and employs her help. He also cares about her tremendously, probably the most out out of all their siblings. Sylvia does not usually agree with most of Five’s brash methods, but she trust him a great deal and cares for him a lot. She was the most sadden by his disappearance into the future, and is the happiest to have him back when he returns.

It is hinted they have romantic feelings for each other.

Vanya Hargreeves:

Sylvia is close with Vanya has she never ignored her as they were growing up. She always tried to cheer her up when her sister was down when it was believed she wasn’t special like the rest of their family. Sylvia was also supportive in Vanya’s pursuit of being a violinist, and even when she wrote a book about their family life.

Klaus Hargreeves:

Sylvia and Klaus are very close with one another. She always comforted him whenever he went through the harsh way their adopted father tried to get him to use his powers, as well as always stick up for him. In the beginning, she is the only one of their siblings who believes that he can communicate with their deceased brother Ben. While she doesn’t condone his drug habit, Sylvia is always there for Klaus whenever he needs her, even letting him stay at her place from time to time.

Luther Hargreeves:

Sylvia and Luther are close, though she finds his loyalty to their adoptive father misplaced.

Diego Hargreeves:

Sylvia and Diego are close with each other, but they sometimes go at each other throats every now and then.

Allison Hargreeves:

Sylvia and Allison have a good relationship, but Sylvia has some issues with her sister using her powers unnecessarily.

Ben Hargreeves:

While they cannot properly interact with each other, Sylvia and Ben have a close relationship, even before he died. She was terribly distraught by his death, but becomes ecstatic when she learns that Klaus can communicate with him.

Sir Reginald Hargreeves:

Sylvia has shown to have some leftover resentment towards Reginald, mainly by how he treated her and her siblings in the past. She refused to get in contact with him after she left the Umbrella Academy, expect when it came to knowing about the wellness of the others. While she does go to his funeral, she is not particularly saddened by his death.

Trivia:

Sylvia wears contact lenses due to having poor eyesight, but she is seen wearing glasses every now and then.

She is a fan of honey-flavored food.

Sylvia owns a motorcycle, which is her main mode of transportation.

She hates it when people say her hair resembles a skunk because of the white streak. Diego once teased her about it and she retaliated by slamming his head down hard against the dinning room table. Since then, none of her siblings make fun of her about it.

Her earring was a gift from Five when they were younger.

After leaving the Umbrella Academy, she had the umbrella tattoo on her wrist covered with the tattoo of a honey badger.

[danielsharmanswife]

-A warm bath and a sandwich-

Ewan McGregor characters x reader

2nd month: Mark Renton x Fem! Reader. (Part 1)

Author's note: Hey, cuties!❤ How have you been? I hope you and your family are safe and sound. I just wanted to say that I'm quite happy about this chapter and I hope that you guys enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

As always, I want to remind you that English is not my first language, so I'm sorry if there are any grammar mistake.

Word count: 1,821

Warning: mention of drugs, swearing

Tag list: @rosionis @rebleforkicks @bluerose512 @space-no0dle @elizabeth-skywalker

Masterlist Letters Masterlist

You didn't feel any dizziness, or a white light, you didn't even feel yourself levitating. For a moment, you thought you were still with Catcher, but when you opened your eyes, you confirmed that you were no longer there with him. 

You were in a totally white room that was so bright it burned your eyes. It seemed unreal, a science fiction room, the kind without doors or windows. The only thing in the room was a high white table made of the same material as the walls and the floor. On that table were two objects: an envelope and the Barbara Novak book.

You were very puzzled but you approached the table and took the envelope, opening it and taking out the note that was inside.

 It said:

Good morning, (y / n)! I see that you have passed the month easely ! But don't think that things will continue to be so simple... This month is going to be very interesting!  We have to congratulate you. We've been watching you and you seem to know how to handle yourself! We knew you were the one! It's time for me to give you a hint about what to expect this month. But first I'm going to tell you what you will have to get for us. This object is ... a disco sign! Good luck and don't be discouraged..

Choose life!

You read the note several times to remember every detail of it and when you looked up, you heard a click.

Instantly, you were in a bedroom with the same layout as your room from the previous month but the furniture was more modern, from the late 80s. The old wooden floor creaked with every step you took and the walls, which were quite neglected and full of cracks, echoed violently due to the music coming from upstairs. It was very annoying, so you decided to go investigate where it came from. 

You left the apartment, but not before taking the keys that were on the door and went up the stairs that led to the upper floor. The music was coming from the red door at the end of the landing. You approached the door and rang the bell, no one opened the door, you rang again, but nobody showed up. Since no one seemed to hear the bell, you started knocking on the door, louder and louder. 

You were very surprised that no one came to complain about the noise or peeked out from the knocks you were giving against the door. Either no one lived on the other floors or they didn't care about the noise at all. You looked at your wristwatch, it was two a.m. Yes, definitely no one lived there. 

Curiosity got the better of you and you tried to think of a way to open that door. You decided to kick it. In movies it always worked, right? It couldn't be that difficult. 

It was a big mistake.

You took four steps away and ran to it, when your foot hit the door, it opened wide, making you fall into the apartment. Turns out the door wasn't locked in any way. 

On the floor, you turned over to be on your back and saw that the inside door was completely bricked up with wooden boards that were nailed to the door but didn’t reach the wall. Whoever was in there, if they didn't want to be disturbed, they weren't doing anything right. 

You got up off the ground and dusted off your clothes. Good thing you were alone.

When you recovered from such humiliation, you continued your way through the house looking for the origin of the music. You crossed a corridor, letting yourself be guided by the rumbling of the walls that was getting louder, letting you know that you were getting closer. You ended up in front of a big gray, neglected door and opened it without a second thought.

When you opened the door, a strong smell of cigarettes and something stronger filled your nose, causing you to take a step back. The floor was littered with syringes, vomit puddles, and other gadgets that you couldn't describe. 

In the middle of the room, there was a young guy, with shaved hair and a yellow shirt that was slightly small, revealing his torso. The boy was unconscious, face down, he hadn’t noticed your presence yet.

You went to open the only window in the room, to ventilate and turned off the radio. 

Mission accomplished.

As soon as the young man stopped listening to the dreadful music, he began to move, lazily and turned around, letting you see that it was Mark Renton himself.

"Put the music back on." he simply said. 

"It bothered me." you replied.

Mark, not recognizing the voice that had spoken to him, turned to you, puzzled. 

"Who the hell are you?"

"My name is (y / n) and ... I live downstairs. Your music bothered me and as the door was open, I had no choice but to enter."

The boy got up, he seemed dizzy. He cursed himself for not having closed the door properly. Trudging out of his thoughts, Renton fixed his gaze on you. 

"That's illegal. You know that, love?" 

"Yeah and you’re the one who’s high as fuck in a house that I bet that isn’t even yours with the music blaring at 2 a.m."

Mark fell silent and spoke after a few seconds.

"I'm Mark, by the way, but my friends call me Renton."

"Nice to meet you, I guess." you said. 

"Same here." 

You stayed a while observing the mess on the ground. 

"Are you alone?"

"You mean if I'm single? Because in that case, yes, I am." 

"No." You giggled. "I'm asking if there's anyone else in this house. I'm saying that because this place stinks and it's cold. I think you should go down to my apartment and take a hot bath. I'll make you something to eat so you wipe off the effects of whatever you have in your body."

Mark, who was still somewhat disoriented, accepted, although it was a strange proposal since you didn’t know each other at all.

"I'm not going to do anything to you" you said, trying to reassure him. "I just want to help you." 

You took the key that was in your pants pocket, showing it to him.

As you walked down the stairs, Mark asked you:

"This building isn’t safe. How is it that a girl like you lives in a place like this? Only families with a single salary live here and young people like me who come to ... you know .." 

"I’ll only be here for a while. I usually travel a lot due to my job... I couldn't afford a better flat either." 

You came downstairs and opened the door to your apartment, inviting him inside.

"This house is very nice, it doesn't look like a rental one. Seeing how bad this building is.." he said. 

"Even if a building is 'bad', as you say, it doesn’t mean that you can’t live well." you led him to the living room. "Stay here. I'm going to go get some towels so you can take a hot bath. It'll do you good, you'll see. In the meantime, I'll fix something to eat. What would you want?"

"A sandwich would be nice.."

You nodded and headed to the bathroom. That meeting had been super strange and you didn't quite understand how you had ended up in that situation. Right now you were preparing a hot bath for Mark Renton, who was right now lying on your couch trying not to puke up. You would never have imagined that this would be your first meeting. 

After preparing the bath, you returned to the living room and saw that the boy had sat up. 

"Are you okay?" You asked him.

"It's just the side effects, I'll be fine in a few hours."

You just nodded. You didn't think this was the time to ask anything more.

"The bathtub is ready. I have left the towels right next to it. You can stay as long as you want. If you need anything, I'll be in the kitchen." 

Without saying anything else, you left the room.

While you were making two sandwiches with the few ingredients you had, Renton went into the bathroom and began to undress. He looked at the reflection of his naked body in the mirror, analyzing all the scars on his arms. Those drugs weren't doing him any good but he couldn't do anything about it. 

With a long sigh, he staggered over to the tub and crept in carefully. The water was warm, not too hot, not too cold, at a perfect temperature. Mark relaxed and allowed his eyes to close. It felt good there, because of your strange kindness. You had suddenly appeared, offering him help, just what he needed. Maybe that was going to be his new beginning, his way of being able to swim to the surface. It had been too weird to just walk away with her, but no one had treated him like this for too long and he couldn't resist.

A knock on the door interrupted his thoughts. How long had it been?

"Mark? Is everything okay?" He heard your voice on the other side of the door "I just wanted to tell you that the sandwiches are ready. You can go out whenever you want. And I have brought you a somewhat baggy T-shirt and pants that you can use as pajamas. I’m going to leave them here at the door." 

"Thank you." He replied.

You smiled to yourself, put the clothes on the door, and went back to the kitchen. A short time later, you saw him walk in and told him to sit at the table. Renton, seeing the sandwich and the tea you made for him, practically lunged for it, like he hadn't eaten in years. You laughed a bit and sat across from him. 

After several seconds in silence, you decided to speak. 

"Mark .. Can I ask you a question?" The young man nodded as he admired the food in his hands "Why are you doing this to yourself?" He stopped looking at his plate to look at you. 

"You’re asking about the injections?" You nodded slightly "It's the life I've chosen. I couldn't fill the void that keeps me from sleeping at night and drugs are the only thing that keeps me aliv ... you know?" He went silent for a few seconds "But I want to change! I want to be totally clean and have a normal life." 

"If that's what you want .." you started to say "I can help you." 

The gaze of the boy in front of you lit up.

 "Would you do that?" 

"Of course!"

[rightsockjin]

Dirty dancing

Summary: Its Disco night and Hoseok was ready to get down with it. He’s not opposed to a partner dance either.

Rating: M

Genre:SMUT! fluffish....

Warnings: Public grinding, dirty dancing, thongs, strangers, sneaky sex. LONG AF HOPE. Public but not public sex. bets! Loud sex! Order and lack there of hehe. Riding. Semi nakedness. Drinking!!

Word count: 3,618

AN: Please enjoy this confusing little Drabble...

The music was blaring in the background. Lights of multiple colors shone in the dense darkness. You were sure that the AC was on, but you couldn’t feel it at all in the tangle of bodies writhing on the dance floor. Still, it wasn’t as packed as it could be but the close proximity of your body to one tall, handsome man was impeding any air flow to your slightly moist body.

When you had decided to come out to the 70s themed day at the club, you had originally thought you’d get in, get annoyed and leave within five minutes but as soon as you had walked in, he’d pulled you towards him and didn’t let go. Usually, you didn’t like when a guy did this kind of thing but as soon as your eyes met his, you realized you didn’t care.

The man was hot. With a capital H. He must have been there for a while because from what little you could see, he was already sweating. On top of that, he was throwing around some fancy dance moves that seemed straight out of a music video. For a couple of seconds, you hadn’t even moved as you watched him move fluidly to the music.

It was when he took your ring clad hands in his and pulled you flush into him that you’d jumped into motion. It was nice and slow at first. The typical 70s dances that patiently taught you on the spot had your heartbeat racing and not just because you were getting in a good workout.

Before you knew it, you were where you were now, with your ass plastered to his hips. Your sparkly dress that looked a little like a partially buttoned smart suit was riding up on your body. It was already short as it was and you hadn’t planned on doing something like this that night so your throbbing core was only separated from the front of his wide legged pants by the sexiest maroon colored thong you owned. The only one you owned really.

His hands were on your hips to help you grind down onto him. You were flush against his chest, your hand on his neck as he looked at you from the side. Around you, the atmosphere had completely changed with the suddenly sensual music. People were kissing all around you. Drinks were going around with the scantily clad waitresses.

The man in the red leather shirt, Hoseok, he had whispered in your ear at some point, was quick to scoop up a couple of brightly colored drinks letting you go. Reluctantly, you turned to face him. He held a cup out to you with a bright smile. His lips pulled upwards instead of to the sides like other people smiled. Almost like a heart.

You took the drink from his hand and watched as he shot the entire plastic cup. You took a tentative sip of the purple liquid. It was strong, but you threw caution to the wind and chugged it the way that Hoseok had. You felt it hit your throat, burning all the way down. Over the loudness of the melody behind you, the sound of his slightly high pitched giggle hit your ear drums.

He leaned in so he didn’t have to yell as loud, “I knew I liked you!”

You smiled up at him, subconsciously fixing one of your black thigh highs. He took the cup from your hands and set them on the next tray of drinks that came your way.

With a smirk he wrapped his arms around your waist, almost a little too low but far enough away that it seemed innocent. You kind of didn’t mind if he did dip a little lower if you were being honest with yourself. Throwing caution to the wind, you slipped your hands around his arms and pushed them down so they rested on the swell of your ass.

Hoseok’s eyes widened, but it wasn’t long before his shock gave way to amusement. In an instant, his grip tightened, your bodies were closer and his voice was in your ear.

“Didn’t pin you for being this kind of girl Sunshine,” he groaned. His voice was abundantly clear even though there was a lot of sound pollution.

“What else are you going to let me get away with tonight?” He asked, his lips brushed against your ear tenderly, like he was hesitating but you didn’t want him to hesitate. Adrenaline was pumping through your body like a drug. You wanted him to act. You wanted to be ravished. You wanted him to pound into with the same energy he had been dancing with all night.

“Ask and I might just give it to you,” you said back, letting your hands trail up his arms, to his shoulders and into his slightly damp hair. The strong scent of something citrusy and light musk hit your nose as you burrowed your head in his neck.

You felt him stiffen for a second before he nudged a leg between your own and used his hands to pull you onto his thigh.  He pushed you against the denim of his jeans making sure you could stay on your feet. Surprised, you held onto his head and shoulders and let him lead you in this all too intimate dance. For second, you worried that someone would say something to you but then you remembered where you were and the worry faded.

“How does that feel, sunshine? This okay?”

You groaned softly, in what you hoped was a sensual way for only him to hear. You let him move your butt up and down his incredibly muscular thigh. Without even trying, he was hitting your clit through your underwear. You should have been embarrassed but you weren’t. You were so turned on that you wouldn’t be surprised if you came undone in record time.

“More than,” you answered breathlessly as he pushed into your core in time with the beat of the music.

He groaned as you pulled at his hair. Like putty in your hands, he melted into your touch. His groan sent a shiver down your back.

You danced effortlessly, letting him dictate the speed and the intensity at which you grinded on his leg. Slowly, he built you closer and closer to the pleasure you knew so well. It was at that point, where it felt like in one more minute of his talented pace setting, that you realized you weren’t super fond of the idea of having an orgasm in front of a room full of strangers.

You tapped Hoseok on the shoulder to get his attention. It took two more taps and another particularly pleasurable push against your center for him to realize you were trying to get his notice.

“What’s up,” he asked, bringing his face within an inch of yours so that you could speak a little easier.

“Do you want to go back to my place or something like that?” You asked, your heart thumping painfully with the fear that he would reject you and you had completely misread the situation.

A wide and attractive grin pulled at his lips. He raised an eyebrow in question. You felt your cheeks grow red and instantly you opened your mouth to take back your suggestion but one of Hoseok’s hands came up and stopped you in your tracks by using a thumb to trace your lips.

“I have a better idea,” he groaned, taking you by the forearm and looking around. The music was still blaring and no one really seemed to notice you. He smirked in your direction, seemingly having found what he was looking for before he pulled you in the direction of the private section of the club which was usually reserved for the important people who visited so they too could have fun and not be harassed.

You didn’t question or fight him on it. Your blood pumped through your veins like violent maroon rivers suited for rafting. The air was pressing up against you and suddenly, the clothing you were wearing felt too hot and heavy for the occasion.

It was only when Hoseok had led you behind the thick, heavy velvet curtains when the two body guards weren’t looking and it was safely shut behind you, that he turned to look at you once again. The hunger of something wild festered in his gaze as he took in your every curve. He looked positively starving. And you were his salvation.

You hadn’t really noticed until that moment that the lounge area was empty, which wasn’t typical of a night like that night. Usually, it was full or pre-booked. The sound had also been severely cut through by the heavy fabric that served as a barrier to you two and the rest of the club.

Cool air hit your burning skin. A small reprieve from the burning that had begun when Hoseok had pulled you into his arms but it was soon ripped from you when said man pulled you into his chest once again.

You placed a hand on his shoulder so you could steady yourself on your feet as his nose connected with yours. His bore into your own, smug, like you’d fallen right into his trap.

“What do you think sunshine?”

You licked your lips, suddenly feeling quite parched, though you weren’t sure if it was from the alcohol or the dancing or what.

“What if someone comes in?” You questioned, looking at the curtains.

“Or what if the body guards hear us?”

Hoseok laughed deep in his throat as if he had been waiting for you to ask those exact questions. With all the smugness and cockiness he could muster he winked.

“Better hurry up if we don’t want to risk it then huh?”

You felt your eyelids widen then as a thrill of fear ran through your nerves. You waited for him to make a move, not sure where to start or what to do but he seemed to be waiting for the same thing. It was when neither of you moved a single muscle that he pouted and took a step back.

“Well, I gave you the chance to be in charge, Y/N. You can’t say I didn’t try. You always were more of a sub anyway.”

And he pulled you over to the wide leather couch that rested against the farthest wall. He plopped himself down first, his legs spread wide, his erection ever so clear against the fabric of his pants.

“You have two choices sunshine,” he said unbuttoning and unzipping his pants, “Give me your panties and you can ride me, or,” he paused as he spilled his hand into his underwear and pulled out the unbelievably long member with his right hand, “you could keep them and suck me off. Take your pick.”

Instantly, you ripped your underwear off your figure, getting it caught here and there on your thicker than your realized boots before you unhooked them from your left heel and threw them at his chest. He caught them as they slid down his leather shirt with wide eyes. Almost like he really wasn’t expecting you to comply.

You didn’t give him much time to think or to realize what you had done. Instead, you trekked the two steps that stood between you and that delicious looking length and startled his spread legs. He balled the pair of panties in his hand and used the other to steady you in his lap. Your bare core grazed his very much at-attention member slightly. He gasped slightly and you clenched around nothing.

“I can’t wait to sink into you baby girl,” he said, reaching around you and tucking your underwear in his pocket.

“Then don’t,” you groaned, reaching between your bodies and taking his twitching member. He hissed as your slightly cooler than body temperature hand wrapped wound his shaft.

“You’re moving a little fast baby girl? Are you even wet enough-oh fuck.” You pushed his tip slightly into your lower lips, running it up and down, collecting your juices to prove that you were indeed turned on enough to drown his thirsty dick ten times over.

“What do you think?”

A strangled moan ripped from his throat. His eyes rolled into the back of his head. He let his hands travel up and under your legs and under the sequined dress. His hands cupped your ass and pulled you lower, to egg you on.

“Now who’s the one rushing Mr. Hoseok?” You asked, laughing as he glared at you through lust filled eyes.

“If you don’t-”

“Oh,” you interrupted with a bright smirk, “Is that the beginning of an order? Is someone ready to give up?”

Hoseok retreated like a dog with his tail between his legs. His eyes were wide and terrified. His hold on you tightened like he was scared you would just get up and leave.

“N-no! No orders, just going to suggest…”

“Seemed like a very forceful suggestion, Hobi baby,” you joked, tapping his cheek with a finger.

He cleared his throat and shook his head meekly, “I’m so sorry Sunshine. I swear it wasn’t an order. I just wanted to say that uh… if you don’t want to-to rush,” he spat, you could see the wheels in his head turning, “then, you can totally take all night if you need to.”

“All night?”

“All night,” he confirmed, seeming satisfied with his half assed excuse.

“That’s good because I plan on taking my time with you…” you pumped his shaft slowly, almost torturously so before adding a, “sir.”

If looks could kill, you would be six feet under in that moment. When you had made this bet with your boyfriend of two years you really hadn’t thought he would last. It was one thing to pretend he didn’t know you, it was another for him to not dom you. Sure, you knew he’d try because of how high the stakes were but he was lasting much longer than you had thought he would.

“Take your time,” he groaned and you ground down onto his tip as you gave a particularly hard tug.

“Luckily for you Hobi… I’m feeling generous,” then without further ado, you aligned him with your entrance and sank down. Hoseok was so long you could feel him in your guts. You were so lucky he knew how to use it and not just how to impale you on his end.

“Fuck you’re warm,” he sighed as you squeezed him between your velvet walls.

“You’re so long,” you gasped, starting to circle your hips on his hips. He was nestled against the special spot within you. With every circle of your hips, he hit the spot with a thrust of his hips.

“Keep doing that-”

“An order?”

“A warning,” he groaned as he thrust a little faster and you sped up your pace, “Damn it let- let me think for a second please.” He grabbed your hips and stopped you from moving. You rolled your eyes but let him hold you in place.

“If you keep doing that, this isn’t going to last very long.”

“Who said I wanted you to last, sir?” You chuckled, picking up your pace again. You made your walls contract against him. On his part, Hoseok had started to thrust into you with a bit more vigor. He had always had a soft spot for that nickname and while you didn’t use it often, when you did, it drove him mad.

You let go of his shoulders and pulled apart the top part of your dress so that your braless chest was exposed. Your nipples were so sensitive and red. They were practically begging for him to touch. But he took one look at them, clearly tempted and then ignored your perfectly sculpted breast. This was your punishment. This was his rebellion. You took his authority, and so he takes away one of the things you enjoyed most.

“You’re an ass,” you said.

He slapped your partially exposed ass with a giddy chuckle. “And you love it, Sunshine.”

He thrust faster and harder. His  pubic bone was grazing your overly sensitive clit pushing you closer and closer to the edge. This had been one of your best ideas. While you genuinely loved your boyfriend and he seemed to love you, your bedroom life was getting predictable. You needed to add some spice to it and his club had been the perfect place to seek it. The threat of being walked in on was all too real and while there was music playing, you could be heard if someone walked a little too closely to the private section. And you planned on screaming his name because it was rare when Hoseok let you make any noise. He preferred to have you gagged.

On a regular day, he might have stuffed your panties into your mouth to keep it shut while he fucked you heard from behind, but not today. Today, you were on top and you could scream and moan and-

“Fuck I’m close,” Hoseok half yelled.

“I’m getting there Hobi,” you moaned. The noise was strange to your own ears and you wondered if it was weird to him as well.

“Do that again,” he said after a moment of silence.

“Is that-”

“Yes damn it! That’s an order! Do that again.”

You would deal with that later. In that moment, all you were focused on was the relief you felt at being given permission to make noise. You gasped loudly as he pounded into you. His dick was coated in your essence and you moved effortlessly on him. Your legs were beginning to hurt but you didn’t care. This was building up to be one of the best orgasms you had ever had.

“That’s right. If I had known you sounded this delicious, I would have had you screaming my name instead of those gags.”

“Hoseok,” you moaned, letting him take control and falling into subspace without realizing. He was sweating from the amount of work it’s taking him to keep going at this angle but he seemed determined to see it through. He was hitting deeper than he had before and your walls encased him like he was made to fit inside of you.

“How close are you, Sunshine?”

“I’m-I’m really…”

“Come for me, Y/N. I’m about to-”

You moaned so loud you were sure that the men who were guarding the area must have heard you but you didn’t care a single bit. The orgasm made you twitch in his hold. You saw pure, hot white behind your eyelids.

Hot semen began to fill you shortly after. Still in the midst of your orgasm, Hoseok emptied himself into you. His dick twitched, matching your over sensitive body making it so much worse, or you supposed better.

After what felt like an eternity, your pleasure turned into oversensitivity. It was starting to get painful but Hoseok was still thrusting into you.

“Hobi, stop…”

“Just one more,” he begged and thrust into you one last time, before he stopped and let himself slump against your bear chest. You took a couple of minutes to catch your breath before you pushed his hair away from his forehead.

“You okay?” he asked breathlessly. As if he had finished a whole night of dancing.

“Perfect,” you assured, kissing him hard on the lips.

Hoseok smiled but it was swept off in a split second, “I lost didn’t I?”

You laughed obnoxiously, still a little high from your orgasm and the dopamine that was swarming your brain.

“Yeah Hobi baby… you definitely lost.”

Hoseok slumped against you again, burying his head between your breast, “Damn it! I was so convinced I could do it!”

“Come on,” you prodded, “it’s not that bad! It’s only for a week!”

Hoseok groaned, disgusted at the prospect of the week ahead. You on the other hand were ecstatic.

“How bad could it be? I promise I’ll go easy on you,” you said trying to pull him up to look you in the eyes but he wouldn’t budge.

“Don’t lie to me. I know you  can’t wait to boss me around for a whole week.”

You sighed. You couldn’t lie, you really were looking forward to telling him what to do for an entire seven days. You had a lot of chores to do and you had specifically left them undone the whole of the previous week so just so he would have some stuff to do, but you felt a tiny bit guilty.

“We can forget about the bet if you want Hobi,” you said, pushing your hand through his hair.

“No,” he disagreed, pulling his face out of your chest to look at you, “a bet is a bet. Just have mercy on me.”

You smiled at his distressed expression, very happy that he wasn’t shying away from what you guys had agreed upon nearly a fortnight before. It was going to be a fun week, maybe not for him.

“This is the last courtesy call for all guests of the Dynamite nightclub! We are closing in five minutes! Please come back tomorrow and we hope you had a dynamic night!”

Your eyes widened in surprise. Had you been at the club for that long?

“Looks like that’s our queue to leave?”

Hoseok raised an amuse eyebrow, “Sunshine, they said guests. I’m the owner and I…” he kissed the tops of your breast suggestively, “have plans for you that require the poles out in the main area.”

A dynamic night indeed.

[chayacat]

Devil’s Sweet Star (36)

Fandom: Dead by Daylight

Ghostface x Female Reader  

Rated M for Violence, Language and Smut  

***

Have you already seen an angry bull, charging at full speed, horn forward, ready to pick up the unfortunate one who will be on the road? Yes, I know, this question is a little strange but in the current context... it’s the order of the day. If you've watched one of these American police series at least once in your life, you know how interrogations take place... especially when they are muscular. After a while, the investigator loses patience and becomes a little upset. Well, let’s say that Danny is experiencing this scene and, fortunately for him, he’s not on the other side of the interrogation room. Because if Wilhelm has been able to remain patient so far... He’s currently like that famous angry bull. Without the horns.  

2 days after your... little tasteful evening with Ghostface, Danny found himself at the police station to attend the interrogation of Hoggins who, despite the media and police pressure, remained marble. How, that's the question. There is a lot of evidence that he’s a suspect, even though we know the truth about McKellan's murder. Danny's perfect plan was perfected even more thanks to this fool of rich man who was too stupid to stay in place. The photo, the interrogation of Devon, the phone calls... Everything incriminated him. And yet he remained serene as if all this was only a conspiracy and that he was the light of justice. Poor asshole. At least Danny didn't need to falsify any evidence. Hoggins brought them to him on a silver platter. Even if his "Jed" side regrets it a little, because he saw how much Wilhelm was involved in this case, he was eager to see the reaction of the latter when he’ll discover that from the beginning it was indeed, he, Ghostface, who had committed this crime. And that while he was going after Hoggins, other victims suffered this sad fate.

“I bet you 10 dollars that the boss will turn the table.” said one of the officers.

“I bet you 20 dollars and a restaurant that he will not.” responds another one.  

“What exactly is the point of anger?” asks Danny without looking away from the interrogation room.

“Let's say that we get to the critical stage and that any object in the room, including the table, can suddenly start flying.”

“Oh. Good.” Replied Danny, who feels the two officers look at him strangely.

On the other side, Hoggins did not move, his back straight, proud as usual. As if it was a bad dream and he was just going to wake up in bed. Wilhelm tried to remain calm, but in front of a man like him... it was complicated.

“Mr Hoggins, I don’t know if you realise what situation you are in. There is much, MUCH evidence against you. If you really have nothing to reproach yourself for, if you’re truly innocent, then cooperate.” said Wilhelm, trying to stay calm.  

“I can't help you more than that inspector. As I told you, all this is just lies and plots against me. Coming from whom, I don't know. I have always been an honest man and, although I admit that I had indeed ... had some unwelcome words towards Horace, he was a very good partner and a good friend.” responds Hoggins with a fake smile.  

“We have this photo, the testimony of the man who is on it, your phone records and the text message you exchanged! and you absolutely want to prove me wrong!? Stop taking me for a fool!”

“This man would be able to say anything for money or to have peace. I don’t deny the messages exchanged with Horace. As for the photo... it’s not evidence as it infringes on my privacy. I could file a complaint but I'm not to belittle myself to this kind of... stupidity.”

“The photo was taken in a legal framework, Mr. Hoggins. the journalist who took it was turned away at the entrance of your residence when he had come to write an article about you, long before the scandal broke. He had taken several photos of the place to illustrate his article. The prosecutor confirmed this to me. What about the car that was patrolling around McKellan's house a few days before his murder? We were able to find this vehicle and its owner, and he confirms that he was on the scene at YOUR request. And with the following terms: Watch me this scabby dog. Never leave his eyes. And take the opportunity to see how to enter, without being noticed.”

“... I don’t see what this man is talking about at all.” replied Hoggins with the same fake smile.  

Wilhelm inhaled loudly before leaving the room to join Danny and the two officers who were there. He entered the room by violently slamming the door, ready to destroy everything in his path. An image that made our beautiful murderer smile. Nothing makes him happier than to see Wilhelm on the brink of a nervous breakdown.

“I swear to you, that if it were not for the investigation, it would be a long time since I exploded his jaw against the table. Damn, I dream of being able to put this rotten man in jail. I can't get enough of his satisfying little smile, even you Olsen, you are more bearable and less annoying than him!” said Wilhelm trying to regain his calm.

“As you said to me, Hoggins is not a simple man. He’s a big fish. He knows how to play his pawns to win.” responds Danny before whispering to himself: “But he’s nothing than a kid compared to me. I’m a GOD in that category.”

“With everything we have on him he should talk! Even if it is to prove his innocence! But here, I don’t see how he could say that he is not involved in this case! it's all there! I... Damn, I need to hit on something. »

In a sense it was better for Danny that Hoggins defended himself. A man who confesses too quickly is not fun for him. No, Danny is a man who appreciates having strong opponents in front of him. And Hoggins is a prime opponent. Killing him is going to be a pure delight. 3 Days to wait... We will have to find something to deal with between now and then. Fortunately, some sad souls, drunk or drugged, hang out in the streets in the evening... Otherwise his life would be nothing but a mortal boredom.

And then at least... there's you. It's been two days since you and Danny officially lived together, something you celebrated of course. But something was wrong with you. As Jed, he pretended to ignore it, but in reality, he knew very well what you were thinking. He didn't stop thinking about it and he couldn't wait for one thing: to take his place again. How will you react? Several options are possible.

The most unlikely would be that you jump into his arms to kiss him, and just agree to live with a murderer, becoming his accomplice. That would be too good to be true. The second option would be fear and misunderstanding. Knowing that he lied to you all this time.... you would be despaired. But you’ll have no choice but to accept it, permanently tarnishing your relationship. Which will bother Danny a bit. And knowing you, the last possible option is that you fight him and notify the police. In this case he would have no choice but to kill you. It would break his heart, but his secret must remain so above all.  

Hoggins' interrogation lasted a few more minutes until his lawyer arrived. And we can say that he is as stupid as his client. Two head-to-slap for the price of one. He has every interest in not being there when Danny kills Hoggins. otherwise... Well, that will make two murders for the price of one. Christmas before time for our murderer. The two men leave the police station and Wilhelm turned the table in the interrogation room, making one of the officers win the bet. Danny left the interrogation room and crossed Hoggins' gaze in the distance, the latter smiling at him to provoke him. But Danny wasn't an idiot and responded in the same way.

“Hmph. Assholes.” Danny simply said.  

“Well Olsen... sorry for bothering you for that. But at least we are making progress. It may not be proven that it was Hoggins who paid the man who ransacked your girlfriend's coffee... But there is a lot of evidence to suspect him of McKellan's murder. It's a matter of time, I guess.” said Wilhelm.  

“Don't worry about that. He loses nothing to wait. You will eventually have him. His provocative little smile will soon fall. With that, I'll leave you. I still have work ahead of me. And an adorable girlfriend too. See you later, inspector.”

Danny left the police station to return to the apartment, still at work. The newspaper articles are not going to be written on their own. unfortunately. And in addition, he will be alone, given that you work at the café today. normally. He took the opportunity to do some shopping to fill the fridge, life for two, obviously the food goes down faster. Once he arrived, he put away the groceries, put down his belongings, took off his coat to end up in a tank top, and then walked to his office. And even there he locked it, from the inside. We never know in case you have the good idea to make him a surprise attack, when he clearly asked you not to enter this room.

He landed in front of his computer and began to write his articles, or even to finish others that he had already begun. Taking a break from time to time to rest his eyes, even with glasses you have to be careful. Drinking a sip of coffee, which was nothing compared to yours, he rereads what he had written so far. He was proud of it, proud of what he wrote, proud to see his work appreciated. Even if it is not his real name that is at the end of each article. Jed Olsen will always remain as a cover name... but in your eyes it will be Danny Johnson and nothing else. A name he can't wait to hear from you in your future... intimate evening.

He resumed writing his articles for a few more hours before stopping for today. He took off his glasses to rub his eyes and got up, taking his cup of coffee to wash it. He looked at his hunting board, including the photo of hoggins that he circled several times in red, then he left his office and locked it to avoid any intrusion on your part. It's not that he doesn't trust you but... Curiosity is sometimes too strong against reason.

“Well... Everything goes as planned... Hoggins even makes it easy for me. But I'm going to have to be careful. I feel like he wants to drag me along with him in his downfall. If I feel that it is too dangerous over the next 2 days... I wouldn't wait until the evening of the festival to kill him. Sorry honey, but I may have to speed things up.” said Danny to himself.  

Putting the news on TV, Danny started preparing the meal for tonight, when he got a call to say the least... singular. Wilhelm? But what did he want from him at this hour?

“Inspector? A problem?” he asks.

“Tell me Olsen... you lived well in Florida, didn't you? About 4/5 years ago? Does the name Nicolas Pheels tell you anything?” said Wilhelm.  

Danny's heart missed a beat. Obviously, he knew this name... It's the name of the man who destroyed Danny's life forever. The "doctor" who took care of Carla. But why and how did Wilhelm get this name?

“Olsen? Are you still there?”  

“Yeah. Yes, I know him. It was the doctor who took care of Carla until... until the end. Why?"

“My condolences. I did some research on Hoggins...  to learn a little more about this asshole. And it turns out that he lived in his second home in Florida and... he was visibly very friendly with this guy. From what I read, Hoggins financed the hospital run by Pheels. But some doctors said, in exchange for anonymity, that Hoggins was willing to fund a little more for each death. In order to pass this on to a material financial need. Of course... Pheels kept everything to himself.” replied Wilhelm.

“I knew it... What a son of a b**ch!” responds Danny.  

“This guy is dangerous Olsen... a real crazy one. So, pay close attention to you two, ok? He is not the type to be afraid of death.”

“Yes... I hope he will pay for what he has done. And believe me... he will pay dearly.”

Danny hung up, before hitting the worktop with force. Decidedly this little war with Hoggins has been going on for longer.... It's not just Pheels' fault... but also hoggins' fault if Carla had died. Pheels has already paid, Hoggins will pay double. 3 Days.... 3 small days... he couldn't wait. Suddenly he heard the front door open. And all his anger and frustration disappeared when he saw you enter, a cheerful smile on his lips. At least you had a better day than him.

“Hello Honey!” you said cheerfully.  

“Hi, Darling. How was your day?” Danny said with a little smile.  

“Darling? This is the first time I've heard you say that. Would I already be too old for you?”

“Ha ha, for me it's more of a form of politeness than anything else. And then it changes from Honey or Sweetheart, right?”

“Let us keep this expression for when we will be two old madmen in wheelchairs. And to answer your question... my day went very well. We are at the point on the cake for the festival, we are at the point on the festival anyway ... all we have to do is wait for the great event. And we had a lot of people at the café. What about you?”

Danny gently took you by the waist to stick you against him, burying his head in your neck. You hug him in return, rubbing his back to console him. He raised his head slightly, looking down at the front door, bad looking in his face. You know this look that could kill you without you being able to react... That's exactly what Danny looked... And if you weren't there, he would have made his smile the unhealthiest, the craziest of all the smiles he could make. But you are there so he has to stay in his role... All the way.

“So bad this day?” you ask even if you already know the answer.  

“No... let's say I just learned something... which I wish I had never known. I had my doubts... Now it's clear.”

And don't worry... You will also be in confidence.

And even you wouldn't dare to believe it.

***

(It makes an insupportable heat in my house, what a hell. Fortunately, fans exist! I am in the process of developing my fanfic on Re8 village, just to have a coherent scenario. I would like to warn that it will be a kind of... of alternative universe where unfortunately the Winters will be a little or not present at all. But there will be Chris! Since some characters like Lady Dimistrescu were inspired by Count Dracula and Countess Bathory, I decided to go in this spirit. If you dreamed of a lycan Heisenberg, I'll give it to you! (At least I'll try... I am not promising anything.) I hope you’ll like this chapter like the others ones! Well, it's time for my brain to rest! Have a great weekend to you all!  See ya!)

[kureis-writing-hell]

Cleaning

First || Previous

Nao figures out that normal counsoling he was taught wasn't going to work woth Chisaki. He's changing his aproach. And Kai seems to do so as well. Prompt taken from this list.

In which Chisaki Kai goes through therapy!

When Nao came for his meeting with Chisaki he was stopped and told to wait. It worried him at first but then he was told that it was a cleaning day and he came while Chisaki’s cell was still undone. Not having much to do he went to the observation room, curious of how the process was executed in a prison like Tartarus. Having a permit and already being recognized by most of the guards, Nao entered the room.

And almost took a step back.

It wasn’t the fact that on one of the screens he could see an inmate being held down on long, metal rods. It wasn’t even the fact that he could see another inmate being stripped in their cell for god knows what reason. It was the fact that his patient, Chisaki, was cornered by two guards and looked detached while the third aggressively changed his sheets. Nao held back the urge to turn around and storm there, to yell at them for treating Chisaki like that. It took Nao over a month for the man to finally start opening, it was a huge progress and now Chisaki looked like he was going to shut down again.

"Nao! Hi!"

Nao flinched and looked at the guard that greeted him. He smiled at the other man and made a little wave of his hand.

"Hi. Sorry, I was told to wait."

"Yeah but they're finishing. I think you can go now." The guard waved at him and Nao nodded. Without a word he left the room.

If it wasn't for the confidentiality agreement the first thing Nao would do after leaving the Tartarus was spill everything he saw till now. The terrible treatment of the inmates, irregular meals, showers and how violent guards could be. How most of those people needed help from professionals, how broken and sick they were. Nao understood they were horrible criminals, he knew their cases from TV and couldn't fathom doing most of their crimes, yet he could see humans in them. Contrary to most of the guards here.

And most of the people outside - he reminded himself. Even if he broke the agreement and spoke about the inside of Tartarus he knew no one would really care. All they cared about was themselves and their safety. Understandable, but nonetheless annoying.

With a growing lump in his throat Nao went down the corridor, nodding to the guards that passed him. He forced his thoughts to think about Chisaki, how to approach him now. Nao was sure he's going to be difficult again.

A guard standing under Chisaki’s cell greeted him with a scowl. After a routine check of his belongings, the last one from plenty he got on the way here, Nao was let inside.

Chisaki was standing in the same corner that Nao saw him on the camera. He flinched when the door opened but didn’t do anything else.

“Hi, Chisaki.” Nao smiled at him.

The other, younger man took a moment to look up. Then he took another moment to recognize Nao and it was obvious. His wide eyes relaxed and he breathed visibly.

“How long…” he started but then trailed off.

“Two days, like always.” Nao kept smiling. He didn’t want Chisaki to notice his previous anger.

“There were… guards here.”

“Yeah, they just left. They changed your sheets.”

Chisaki looked at the bed, cringed and then visibly relaxed. He leaned heavily on the wall. He nodded at Nao and the hero took it as his cue to start their routine. With a huge relief.

“Do you want to talk about something today?” asked Nao when they were done, with Chisaki sitting under a wall. He readjusted the new sheet the way the former villain asked him to and was sitting on the bed.

And Chisaki made a pause. Normally he immediately answered, with a no. Normally Nao had to nudge him to have a simple conversation about his likes and dislikes and even that didn’t always work.

“I want to leave this place,” finally said Kai. “I want to see the boss. But I don’t, I don’t know how.”

Nao considered his hunched position, the way he didn’t look at him. Chisaki was a big man, muscular and for sure strong. They were probably the same height and Nao usually stuck out in the crowd in Japan himself. Yet right now that big, strong man looked small and lost.

“Do you understand why you are here in the first place?” asked the hero. They didn’t talk about this before and he wanted to know what Chisaki thinks about his situation. He needed to know where he should start.

“Of course!” There was a click in the walls and Chisaki stiffened. Nao waved at the camera to let the guards know he had the situation under control. After a moment he looked at Chisaki and the former villain continued, quieter. “I’m not an idiot, I know why I’m here.”

“I didn’t say you’re an idiot, you’re not,” agreed Nao. “But I still want you to tell me.”

Kai chewed on his lower lip not looking at Nao. He obviously thought hard about his answer for a bit. His jaw tensed, he licked over the bruise he made on his lower lip and Nao wondered why he struggled so much with the answer.

Then, he realized Chisaki could be thinking what Nao wanted to hear. He wanted to believe in the man, but at the same time he knew Chisaki just wanted to get out to see his former boss. And the word “manipulative” from his files became uncomfortably obvious for the hero. He still waited in silence.

“I- Because of… Eri. And the league.” Chisaki still didn’t look up at Nao.

Nao sighed and brushed his forearms, even though they were covered with his turtleneck. It was a tick he never managed to get rid of, a nervous one. This was going to be a difficult discussion.

“Can you elaborate on that? What do you mean it was because of Eri?”

Chisaki looked uncomfortable. To the point Nao wondered if he should change the topic. But before he could propose it Kai answered.

“If she didn’t run… that kid, no one would find out. Till now everything would be done, boss would be fine, my plan would work, my arms-” he looked at his stumps and cringed, shook his head and started brushing his shoulder against his chin. Nao quickly realized it was his mysophobia kicking in. “She just couldn’t sit down for a little bit longer to make it better for everyone.”

Nao wanted to bite his nail but the glove that he wore stopped him. Instead he brushed his chin and scratched his ear. He knew he’s not a good person to do this and couldn’t understand why Rei, his boss, wanted him to lead Chisaki so badly. He was still a newbie and Chisaki obviously had some real issues he didn’t know how to handle. Also Nao didn’t have the most… therapeutic approach. All he wanted to do after hearing shit like that was to stand up and shake Chisaki till he realized what he was saying. Rei always seemed so composed when dealing with criminals and he just couldn’t do the same, he was salty, hot headed and most of the time spoke without thinking.

He sighed, already hearing Rei’s scolding once he was going to call her at the end of the week.

“Is this what you really think?”

“...yes.”

“Let’s think about it then.” Nao’s smile got sharper, he heard his inner voice whispering to him to yes, tell this man everything, make him feel like shit. He shushed it away. “You experimented on your boss’ granddaughter while he was under coma, induced by you. You planned, no, you started to sell drugs that would greatly mess up the world. Not mentioning organized crime. Did that girl make you do all this stuff?”

For a long moment Chisaki was looking at Nao as if he didn’t recognize the hero. When Nao started questioning himself and scolding himself for his long tongue, the former villain spoke.

“She didn’t…” he said slowly. “But, but she couldn’t understand, she- This is bullshit!” Even Nao jumped at the sudden outburst. This time the clicking in the walls didn’t follow. “Why are you even talking about this?!”

“Why?” Nao sighed. “Because I want you to realize you won’t get anywhere with that attitude.” He watched how Chisaki’s anger shifts into despair. “This is not ‘helping prisoners get out of prison’ program, nor ‘make a wish’. It’s a redemption program, where you’re supposed to understand the mistakes you did, come out with a way to better yourself in the eyes of society and be able to live a normal life. I’m here to provide you help, not lead you by a hand.” Kai was biting his lip again, not looking at Nao. He looked shaken, angry in some way and depressed. Nao brushed his face, unhappy for yelling at his patient.

“This is why I was opposed to Rei’s decision to put me as your counselor. Your case angers me. You’re too proud and honestly, I’m surprised it took me so long to snap. But then we didn’t really talk about this before, right?” Nao laughed, to relieve his own tension, and noticed that Chisaki looked at him. “Anyway, I enjoyed meeting with you, I really did. You can be enjoyable, honestly, when you’re not like that.” He waved his hand in the direction of Chisaki. He wasn’t giving up, he didn’t want to give up. But he stepped over the line and assumed that was what he was supposed to do. “But it’s obviously not working. I’ll call Rei and tell her to send someone else. Unless you want to end this here-”

“No!” Kai jolted up, straightening his hunched position against the wall and cringing at his arms. He looked back at surprised Nao. “I don���t want anyone else and I don’t want you to stop coming. This is- you’re right. You know I decided on this only to get out of here, I need to see my boss. I don’t care about Eri, about what happens later to me I just, I need to apologize to him.”

Manipulative, full of himself, with anger issues and radical world views. Hopeless case. Nao had the words before his eyes. He didn’t have to know this beforehand to quickly realize it on his own. But, what he saw now, was a broken, desperate man in need of help. And he wanted to help him so badly. Not only to lessen his guilt against the old Shie Hassaikai boss. He wanted to find him a purpose to continue living.

He didn’t want to think about how much he could relate to Chisaki right now.

“Okay.”

“...okay?”

“If you don’t mind then sure. But it’s gonna work on different rules now.” Rei was going to kill him. “I’m not gonna be your nice therapist anymore. I’ll visit you as myself from now on.”

“Did you visit me as someone else before?”

“Yes and no,” chuckled Nao. “Let’s say… Nao is more professional and has a better approach. Nikodem is going to slap your head for saying dumb shit.”

“Ni...kodem?”

“That’s my real name. You can keep calling me Nao though, it’s shorter.”

Chisaki nodded, said Nao’s name again to himself and looked down. Nao tilted his head lightly.

“Why do you even want to come here?” he asked, not looking up.

“Because you asked me to.” Nao shrugged. “And, eh, Rei’s gonna kill me. I can relate to you. A little bit.”

“What?” Now Chisaki was the surprised one. He lifted his head.

“She got to me when I was in jail. I did some shit before, too. Looking at you right now… I can imagine myself if she didn’t get involved. Assuming I would still be alive.”

“In jail…” Kai blinked, frowned and looked to the side. “But you’re a hero now.”

“Sure, because I went through the redemption program. And it was different for me too, to be honest.” Nao scratched his chin but quickly shrugged. “It took me almost two years to be able to leave the jail.”

“What did you do?”

Nao blinked, finally catching Chisaki’s eyes, then smiled. He leaned back on the bed, supporting himself with his hands.

“You really want to know?” Oh, Rei was totally going to kill him.

“Yes.”

“Well.” Nao looked at a watch he had hidden under one of long sleeves. He still had some time till his hour with Chisaki passed. “This… is kind of a love story, to be honest.”

[0lshadyl0]

If it’s not too much, can you please do yandere Hawks, Mirio & Gang Orca hcs? Thank you.

since you didn’t specify the gender I will go with female pronouns, enjoy it~

and a free general headcanon for those three, they are breeders and want children, Breeding kink and mating kink is very strong whit this men

yandere Hawks headcanons

ok, let’s start by saying that Hawks is another delusional Yandere, and his case is more serious than that of any other Yandere, due to his past and genetic conditions he suffers from delusional disorder

He must have suffered from this disorder due to a large amount of stress he has had to live throughout his life to not have real control over it because it was discovered at an early age and forced to be a hero by his parents

or it could also be due to loneliness, as I had said before, being discovered at an early age not only brought stress, it also brought loneliness, since he was separated from his parents, at that time he loved them and couldn’t think of living his life apart from them,  and forced to train tirelessly until he achieved the great potential he has now to be a great hero

At least his mental disorder is not as serious as MIrio or All Might, but it is still a problem and if he becomes obsessed with you, believe me, unless you are smarter and more skilled than him, you are screwed

He is a very skilled and trained person, an expert manipulator under the facade of a carefree dude and distracted person, do not be fooled easily, he can pretend to be an idiot but he is anything but that  

He is obsessive and fast worker, it will not take long to know everything about you, from where you live, your likes and dislikes, what you eat and even what you usually wear, Hawks could calmly know what kind of underwear you wear every day

Cheerfully there are three points that he has in his favor, first, a great charisma that serves to deceive those around him and with that this urban giant pigeon is  accompanied by a horde of fans, which will make it easier to him to take you to public dates where he will make his proposals which you will accept due to public pressure (his fans)

two, despite being a Yandere he is very stable and, incredibly, he isn’t a jealous person, yet he is selfish so he would never share you in bed with someone else, he would let other people (friends, family, and strangers) see you, flatter you and share time, (you could get to have a more or less normal relationship with him) with you but you will never have sex with someone other than him

and three, he really wants you to fall in love with him as he has fallen in love with you, that is his main objective, to be loved and have a family, he comes from a poor and dysfunctional family that at the slightest chance of making money, practically they sold him to the hero committee so that he became one, regardless of asking him if he wanted to or not, good thing that he wanted to be a hero and not being like his dad, and now that he moved away from his toxic parents denying them money he seeks to have a new family, this time one in which there is love and not greed

He has no plans to kidnap you and the truth is he will not need it, you will go and live with him on your own, after all, it is almost impossible for you to notice who he really is since he is a good actor, but be careful, thanks to all the training and living conditions he has had he can be apathetic, to all those who are not you, and he is basically a psychopath, to kill and disappear people/bodies is not a problem, he does not worry about corrupting himself or becoming a villain as long as you love him

Yandere MirioTogata headcanons

if you came to think that Hawks was clingy Mirio is even worse

He can be twice as obsessive and he gets very anxious when he doesn’t know where you are, although he doesn’t show it much because he has an image to keep, he is a stalker, always knowing where you are and what you do, he must do it for his mental health

He likes to spy on you in his spare time, at the academy, when you train, when you eat in the cafeteria, when you go out for a walk, in your house and his favorites, when you sleep, shower or change your clothes

He is just leaving adolescence which means that he is quite hormonal and emotional, he cannot stop his feelings for you or his sexual desires towards you

his case of delusional disorder is a bit more serious than Hawks is not only Erotomanic (he thinks you’re in love with him) is also accompanied by hallucinations

In the evenings he dreams of you and in the day he has hallucinations of you, they are usually auditory but if it comes to the case that they do not see you in a long time (you went on vacation or visiting a family member for a period of time) he can have visual hallucinations of you where you seduce him 

As I said before, physical contact is crucial for him, either as your friend or as your boyfriend you will not have personal space

He is a manipulator but he is too emotional, so it is easier to make him feel bad or lie to him and get certain freedoms with it, he can’t stand to see you cry and he loves spoiling you

He likes to cook, it is acceptable with homemade food but his specialty is desserts, he loves to cook desserts of different types and give them to you every day, he always mentions that they have a secret ingredient, and you will think, it is love, no, it’s his own cum with shredded sleeping pills

From the day he decides that he is in love with you and that you will be his darling, it is the same day that your body belongs to him and every night he will enjoy it while you are in a deep sleep due to the drugs he puts in desserts

although it may not seem like it, he is very violent with people who hurt you or make you feel bad, and although he has a heart of gold which prevents him from killing people, he compensates it with torture, breaking bones is his specialty

Yandere Gang Orca headcanons

This man, this great man, is a possessive being without exaggeration, but he is quite an alpha male and his enormous size supports him

Kuugo wants more than anything to have you by his side, take care of you and give you the world, after all a happy darling is a happy marriage

Yes, I said marriage, he is one of those Yandere guys who seek to marry you, make you his sweet wife and have a lot of children

Despite his questionable appearance that is a little scary for children and women, if he is given the opportunity, he proves to be a romantic and passionate being, he is incredibly good at speaking and with his deep voice it is very easy to him seduce you

Orca is possessive and somewhat jealous, not that much but still, even though he won’t lock you anywhere, orca first will try to make you fall in love and make you his wife with your consent, he will use other tactics like kidnapping if you reject him

He likes to go shopping with you and pamper you, every weekend there will be trips to the mall to buy you new things, if you’re a nice darling you will be very spoiled, especially lingerie since he usually always destroys it when you two have sex

He is not the type of man you can fool or disobey, he is not Hawks or Mirio, he knows what he does and how to play his cards and has no other mental problem beyond the terrible obsession he has with you, Orca is mostly Animal instinct

it must have been something in your scent, your height, because I doubt that you will be taller than him, or the fact that from the first time you met him you showed no sign of being afraid of his appearance, whatever it was He chose you as his mate, there is no way to escape from him

in exchange for the previous two, he will be able to harm you, he is strong and likes discipline, and although his punishments are not physical, they are more of the psychological type, he likes to bite until he draws blood, he does it more than anything when seeks to reproduce with you mostly when his ruts strikes 

Oh yes, he is a stallion, a breeder, all his body and attitude shout daddy, in fact, the best advice I can give you if you get to be under the hands of this man is that you are to act sweet and obey, call him daddy, he will tell you clearly from the beginning what he wants from you and the best thing is that you give it to him or you will suffer a long time in a dark room

killing is not a problem for him, nor is it killing your family and friends if necessary, he can give you better friends to those you had (most likely they are other pro heroes) and a better family (in which you would meet the role of the mother), he is an orca, and remember that orcas are also called killer whales

‘the orcas will prey on almost any animal they find in the sea, in the air over the water or along the coastline. To hunt, killer whales use their massive teeth' and in his case, all those who try to get away from you will become their prey, he is the best to disappear bodies, after all, what better way to disappear a body than to eat it  

[defensefilms]

Defense Films Names His Top 5 Favorite Rappers

In All It’s Infinite Glory And Magnanimity, Defense Gives You His Top 5 Favorite Rappers. 

5. 50 Cent 

To this day, when you need a playlist for a MMA class and the group is hella diverse, you’re not really sure which way to go with it, pop in that 50. Can’t go wrong with Get Rich Or Die Trying (the original), or even that G-Unit Beg For Mercy.

That run from late 2002-2005/06 was unlike anything you’ll ever see again. That was a perfect situation where there was organic support from fans and there were people at a business level, mainly 50, that knew how to turn it into the wave that it became and industry has been trying to replicate this ever since.

While most people remember is the numerous scandals, beefs and controversies of that time but it was the music that moved the audience. For all the ways 50 Cent’s success mirrors ruthless American capitalism, his debut album is low key one of the most inspiring albums you’ll ever listen to. 

It’s a foxhole mentality on wax. It’s me-versus-you type thinking. It’s someone has to lose and I’ll be damned. It’s who ever has to get hit, is gonna get hit. 

See the first time I listened to it, it was about “In Da Club”, “Wanksta”, you know the more palatable records that got on radio and all that but the more I listened the more I realized, it was actually built on the backs of songs like “Patiently Waiting”, “Many Men”, “Back Down”, “Don’t Push Me” and “Gotta Make It To Heaven”. On one side it’s as motivational as you can think of but it’s not the wacky kind of naivé motivational talk because it’s willing to get it’s hands dirty and go in to much grittier ideas. 

Like his predecessors, 50 pulls off the trick of balancing easy-to-listen-to records on a foundation of graphic and aggressive songs.  

Recommended Songs: Maybe We Crazy, When It Rains It Pours

4. Jedi Mind Tricks

I’ll give you props if you know who these man are but they are legends. Point blank. Violent By Design will forever rank as one of the great group albums in hip-hop history.  Vinny Paz, Jus Allah and producer/DJ Stoupe The Enemy of Mankind, gave hip-hop a shockwave they weren’t ready for, especially back in 1999.

Hip-hop as a business wasn’t ready to market a group, whose themes were rooted in topics like government control, military warfare, covert control tactics, religion and psychological warfare. To have all that in one bundle wasn’t something that big time A&R’s were ready for. 

Had they started this group in 2010, they would have walked in to a business landscape that was far more suitable to who they were as an act and as MC’s. 

Even with that JMT still enjoyed a lot of notoriety and they definitely succeeded in establishing their following, despite the odds. 

While Violent By Design may serve as the magnum opus of their body of work, their run really starts in 1997 with the Psycho-Social, Biological & Electro-Magnetic Manipulation Of Human Kind. 

Yes guy, that’s an album title. You gotta think now, I was in high school the first time I heard this and I was very into conspiracy theories and nonsense, so this album hit me right between the eyes. The idea that someone could use the medium of hip-hop in this way was crazy and the album would have been more than 10 years old when I first heard it.

No, the hip-hop historians among us will argue that Wu-Tang were a better and more influential group and I’d tend to agree, I can also bust back and say, “these dudes took Wu-Tang’s formula and gave it a whole different edge.”

 I’ll break it to you like this, Wu-Tang gave the world swordsmanship and the first projectile weapons like bow and arrows, spears and the likes. Jedi Mind Tricks gave the world gun powder, advanced modern explosives and semi-automatics. You see what I mean?

Recommended Songs: Untitled, Retaliation Remix

3. Jay-Z

No top rappers list is complete without my man. The only reason he ain’t higher is because, I rate a rapper more highly if they’re in the prime of their musical abilities. If this were an all-time list he’d be way way higher. 

Beginning with Reasonable Doubt is really the only place to start when it comes to Jay. The production, the skits, the way every sentence was so tightly wound together, the word selection and sentence construction. It’s remembered as an album of hits because of tracks like “Cant Knock The Hustle”, ”Feelin It” and “Brooklyn’s Finest” but Reasonable Doubt was really defined by “Dead Presidents”, “D’evils”, “Politics As Usual” and “Can I Live”. 

The first batch of songs gave the album some relatability, as far as depicting club vibes and nightlife glamour because that second batch of songs were all built on darker themes like betrayal, jealousy, greed, blind ambition and deception. That combination of themes as well as the production to match each one is why that album will always rank high among a certain listenership. 

With that being said, never make the mistake of thinking Jay or any man is perfect. There’s like a 3 album run where there’s moments of dope-ness but not a truly complete album. 

Still with that, songs like “Imaginary Player” and “Where I’m From” will rank among his best songs.

It’s only when you get to The Blueprint can you start to see Jay perfecting the art of crafting, whole, complete albums that bump from start to finish. The Blueprint was near perfection in this regard. “U Don’t Know”, “Heart Of The City” and “Momma Loves Me” will rank as his best efforts and yeah, I skipped a few.

The Black Album replicated the Blueprint’s listenability, while also dealing in topics that created an album that sounded very personal to Jay. 

All told, the best parts of his catalogue are so strong that there is no denying his place on my list.

Recommended Songs: Dead Presidents, I Love The Dough

2. Action Bronson

I cannot for the life of me fathom how this man doesn’t get the love but the real ones know. 

The mixtape download era (2010-2017 give or take), had many unlikely success stories. An overweight white guy, who grew up cooking in his parents deli/eatery, turned pro-chef then turned rapper, is beyond unlikely. Only the internet could allow this man to succeed and thank the hip-hop gods it did.

From 2012 to about 2018, Action was one of the only constants in my playlist. I still remember where I was the first time I heard “Brunch”. His catalogue starting with the Tommy Mas produced, Dr Lecter and boasting full collaborations albums along side Statik Selektah and the Alchemist, and of course the classic Blue Chips series. This man’s prime will be underrated. 

If you’re going to take one chapter of Bronson’s art and study it, it’s going to be Blue Chips 1 and 2. Both are thematically perfect without ever trying to be. Which is what allowed Party Supplies to make production choices that grabbed you from the jump. From the first time you hit play on the opening of Blue Chips 1, you’re hit with the sound of falling shards of glass and a violin sound that makes the opening song un-skippable. The songs themes are also a perfect introduction to the man himself. Debauchery, expensive taste, hedonism, revelry, unabashed pleasure-seeking, drug use and just enough self-depreciation that you felt you were along for the ride rather than just a fly on the wall, turning your nose in disgust. It was a perfect mixtape, at a time when mixtapes were at a crazy dumb high standard.

It’s not so much that a rapper made punchlines about food, that would be an over-simplification and really missing the trick. It’s that he made everything he said sound like the dopest thing ever and the most underrated trick about his music is that he made grown man rap without needing to be thuggin’. A rare feat. 

Bronson has since gone on to establish himself as a content creator/producer/food review guy but man, what he accomplished as a complete body of work is nothing short of astonishing.

Recommended Songs: Midget Cough, Bonzai

1. Headie One

So it’s late last year. I’m hanging with my boy Phil and Brown, we had just finished some content and Phil says “yo listen to this”. He proceeds to play Golden Boot and it hasn’t stopped bumping since. 

A UK rapper with a lyrical nous and wit that rivals even legends like Jay-Z, but rapping over trap and drill beats. What Headie One is doing is not the norm and I’m talking in terms of his lyrics, sentence construction, word selection, metaphors, he does it all and like all the greats, he makes it look easy. 

His collaboration with RV definitely helped mold him, with both the “Sticks and Stones” and “Drillers and Trappers” mixtapes giving you an idea of what Headie offers as a lyricist. He compliments RV’s brash, aggressive boasts with slightly less obvious but incredibly witty boasts of his own.

His discography though really starts to peak with 2018′s “The One”. That’s where Headie begins find a sweet spot between his lyrics, production and the themes of his songs. A mixtape like this can only exist via independent release because outside of the aforementioned “Golden Boot”, ain’t none of those songs getting any radio play especially in a country as “conservative” as England. Even in a genre saturated with gangsta/trap, “The One” stands out for what he accomplishes lyrically.

Headie would follow that by releasing “The One Two” in June of 2018 and he ascends even more in what he’s able to accomplish with the words.

 The track “Banter On Me” should be in an all-time list somewhere for being the wittiest track of all time. The song is literally just Headie finding new and innovative ways to boast, call out and bait his foes. Hip-hop/Rap has plenty of beef songs that weren’t really direct call outs to any known public figure but were still definitely taking shots at someone. 50 cent’s “Wanksta” and “Officer Down” are some examples of such songs I can think of. Those did not really have the kind of wit Headie displays here. The constant streams of alliterations, double meanings, puns, metaphors, inferences and innuendos is just astonishing. There’s a real mastery of language at play here. The song is a lesson in language, no textbooks. 

Headie has since released his debut album along with additional tracks for the delux version of the album. His debut studio release “Edna” does what studio releases are supposed to do. “Parle-Vouz Anglais” and “Aint It Different” will standout and are difinitely the most palatable songs as far as radio play. Those are the 2 songs I’d play for first time listeners. 

Recommended Songs: Hard To Believe, Dues, Zodiac

[secret-engima]

Drabble for Time Travel Twins verse

(because I have no impulse control and SOMEONE *eyes @rayearthdudette* reminded me about Titus and then my muses ran away with me. Enjoy!)

...

-They are 12 when Titus first comes to the Citadel. Romulus is more than ready to stab him, because he remembers Libertus telling him what happened, that the man became a traitor, and any threats to Regis are threats that need to be removed, but Remus is … conflicted. One on hand, yes, Titus is a danger. But when? Surely the man hadn’t always been a traitor. Captain had taught him … so much. Taken care of them before going cold and hard in those final days. Remus is … biased he supposes. Reluctant to arrange an “accident” for the man who meant so much to him at one point, especially when he shows no signs of treason right now.

-So they watch, aloof and quiet (which is not unexpected for them considering their … backstory, so no one really notices), trying to find evidence of treason or loyalty and are both disturbed when they realize that Titus Drautos is … he is loyal. He is angry and hurting, having just lost his home of Cavaugh outside Insomnia and it’s Wall, but he is not angry at Lucis. He is not bitter toward the king, but instead seems to respect Regis in a polite, impersonal sort of way. He treats both twins with respect and manners, not questioning their paranoid looks, the way Romulus keeps picking a fight, or how Remus has nicknamed him Captain with a feral sort of smile even though the man is a Crownsguard rookie with no real rank.

-Sometimes he even steps into situations unprompted on their behalf, and while Romulus is convinced it’s a ploy to gain trust, Remus sees the crease in the man’s forehead when he interjects himself in a situation (a dispute with the other guards, a reckless prank he can see about to go dangerously south rather than just hilariously sideways) and his gut whispers that Titus is sincere. But then, he trusted Captain before and look where that got him.

-They are 16 when Titus Drautos disappears on a mission outside Insomnia. If they hadn’t been keeping a constant eye on him (hadn’t been making up excuses to be around him so as to search for treasonous behavior, hadn’t been getting attached despite the memories screaming that it was a bad idea) then they would never have noticed. Titus was one man amid the entire Crownsguard, and as good at his job as he was, as personal his reason for joining the Guard (saved by Regis when their “father” personally led rescue efforts to Cavaugh in the wake of the destruction), one man is so very easy to miss. Titus was new, he didn’t have that many friends in the guard, and most of them were on other missions and duties themselves. So when Titus was assigned to a milk run outside the Wall with three others and two of them came back with a report of a daemonic ambush, everyone else just shrugged with regret and moved on. Hardly the first time they’d lost a rookie to the Night.

-Except.

-Except Romulus and Remus know that Titus couldn’t be dead. They had not altered the timeline in a way that would have made the man die, surely. If anything, Romulus’s constant sparring challenges would have made the man more capable and besides all that, somewhere deep inside Remus still clings to the image of his Captain before the betrayal. The strong, steady, unbreakable presence that kept so many of them from throwing themselves into fights they couldn’t win because they didn’t want to come back to empty houses and shattered Clans.

-Except Romulus and Remus know that at some point Titus Drautos becomes Glauca, the wielder of an experimental regenerating armor, and Romulus has personal experience with Niflheim and their predilection towards immoral science.

-They are smart enough to leave a note at least. One telling Regis that they’re going looking for Drautos and will be back in a few weeks. Hopefully. Then they run, putting as much distance as they can between themselves and Insomnia before Cor can catch up to them and drag them home.

-It takes them longer than expected. Romulus remembered a lot of things and a lot of missions, but Niflheim holds a lot of territory and they can only hit so many bases before they risk capture and discovery from either side.

-But they do have some ways to narrow it down, and the twins lost their qualms against “aggressive negotiations” to gain information a very long time ago.

….

-Titus doesn’t know how long he’s been there. Only that it’s been too long. Far too long.

-Long enough to know that no one is coming. He is alone. Forgotten. Abandoned.

-Just like his home when Mors pulled back the Wall, not even sparing a thought for the region of small towns and simple villages right on his doorstep that were no match for Niflheim’s military.

-Long enough that he’s stopped trying to fight it when they come into his cell and unshackle him from the wall to drag him off to the lab for another session. Another agony filled day of them pumping black sludge and liquid metal into his veins and watching him writhe on the table as it forces itself into shape around his skin and then slides back underneath when the scientists press certain buttons.

-He hates them. He  h a t e s  them.

-He’s starting to hate the Lucis Caelums more. For leaving him. Just like they left his family to burn, just like they left all of Lucis to burn.

-(And in the back of his mind he knows that’s not fair, that he should hate the people doing this to him not those who live safe and far away, but he is helpless against these scientists who keep him drugged and shackled, and it is so much easier to hate the things that he doesn’t have to be terrified of, so much easier to keep himself alive when his hate has a target he can imagine lashing out at rather than the ones who have long since gotten wise to his escape attempts and tricks and pin him down body and soul).

-Titus has been here too long and as he is dragged to the table and strapped down for the (tenth-hundreth-thousandth) time he knows that no one is coming.

-He doesn’t realize that the shaking of the world is not just another side effect of his mind struggling to cope with whatever the sludge and metal does to him until the scientists stop in the middle of their work and start looking around.

-One of them looks toward the door and orders an MT to go check what was going on. The unit leaves and the pain resumes.

-Until the intermittent shivering of the world turns into one long, prolonged shake. Like reality is a wet dog and the entire lab is a stubborn drop of water that won’t quite leave the fur coat. Somewhere to his right, the head scientist, a weedy man with black hair and a propensity to laugh in childish delight when Titus gets violent, yells something that sounds like “earthquake? Here? Impossible!”

-Titus loses time easily on the table, and he isn’t terribly surprised when he blinks his eyes open without memory of closing them and instinctively looks around to try to reorient himself in regards to time (to whether the session is almost over or if he still has a long way of torment to go)

-Why is his face wet.

-Why does the wetness taste like copper.

-Is he bleeding again? Did the liquid metal come out of his skin too fast and open large gashes again?

-A blink of lost time, a sluggish glance to the right.

-Had … had the weedy scientist man been pinned to the wall by a sword through his chest for long?

-Why were all the scientists screaming? He was the only one who did screaming during the sessions.

-Another blink and the screaming was quiet but the alarms were like nails in his ears, so loud he almost couldn’t hear the words being said to him by the person yanking the restrains off his arms, “-kay, Captain, we’re gonna get you out of here. Just hang on. You hear me, Captain?”

-…Captain?

-Only one person called him Captain.

-He lifted a hand toward the … person? Hallucination? and brushed his knuckles against a slender cheek, metal skittering in and out of his hand, reaching for the person-vision-thing with something like curiosity, “Re … mus?”

-Blue eyes, darker than their usual ice, as dark as the ocean or the King’s magic, filmed with tears. The hand that took his was scarred in familiar patterns, burns that were done by fire but branched jaggedly like lightning, “I’m here, Captain. I’m getting you out.” A glance to Titus’s other side and a tightening of the jaw, “We’re getting you out. Just hang on, okay?”

-Titus had to be dreaming. Or dying. Finally. The royal princes were very openly not fond of him, for all they had chosen to make him their preferred pestering target and training chew toy for the last 4 years. They were only 16 and this was a Niflheim military laboratory. No one was coming for him, especially not the princes.

-Titus did his best to hang on to Remus’s shoulder anyway as the much smaller teen have carried, half dragged him down torn up, smoking hallways. Ahead of him, silver gleamed, not like the liquid metal the scientists kept pumping in his veins (that he was probably dying of right now) but brighter. Purer.

-Romulus’s armiger had always been a thing of deadly beauty, especially when Titus wasn’t on the receiving end of it. It carved through the MT Units that tried to stop them with barely a thought, the dozens of swords the boy had obsessively collected swapping from the air to his hands and back in the space of blinks, defending or destroying by turns.

-Not a single Unit or bullet got anywhere near Titus and Remus.

-Something coiled around him, warm and painful, but a … good kind of painful. Not like the scientists and their tools. More like the burn of a hot shower against sore muscles.

-Not a bad thing to feel while he dreamed up a rescue scenario as he died.

-A blink that lasted too long, because when he opened his eyes again, he was lying on his back, being dragged through the grass on some kind of makeshift shield sled. The sky was above him, so open and vibrant he hadn’t realized he’d started to forget what colors other than black, silver, and white were until just then. He didn’t dare blink away the tears that started, because he didn’t want to miss this. This dream of rescue and freedom in his final moments.

-It was evening. If he craned his head, he could see smoke rising in the distance. The base that had held him nothing more than an empty shell.

-The vision of Remus was still talking from where he and Romulus were dragging Titus’s shield sled, “-a little longer. We’ll patch you up once we get to the Haven, okay? Just a little longer.”

-He blinked. Opened his eyes to pain.

-Pain-pain-pain-painpainPAINMAKEITSTOPPLEASE-

-“What’s wrong with him?”

-“I don’t know! He might- he might be going through withdrawals from whatever drugs the Nifs used?”

-“It’s been hours past that point and it started up just now, withdrawals have more warning than that-!” swearing, loud and by his ear as he writhed in burning white agony, “Is he seizing? Hold him down till I get an elixir!”

-“-not working I don’t know what’s wrong-”

-“-ven! It’s the Haven!”

-“What?”

-“Captain never went on Havens! No one knew why, and he always had a good excuse so no one really questioned it but-.”

-“Daemon blood, it’s got to be, they probably used it as a conduit for the armor. The Haven was trying to purify him-.”

-“He’s off the Haven now, why hasn’t it stopped?”

-“We interrupted the process, the suit isn’t complete and we probably just screwed up whatever counted for stable with it-.”

-PainpainpainpainpleasejustmakeitstopjustenditenditENDIT

-“-dare die, Captain! Don’t you dare die on me!”

-Please.

-Just.

-E n d   i t.

-Hand on his chest and on his neck it hurthurthurt-, “You don’t get to leave me behind!”

-Light.

-White hot light, brighter than the sun, brighter and more agonizing than anything in life before or after.

-Kids in front of him. Kids who thought they were adults, thought they were ready for war, thought they were ready for magic to reach inside and change them forever.

-His boys. His girls. His idiots.

-His Glaives.

-Blood and bandages, blades and crisp black uniforms edged in silver. “Appropriate,” laughed the shadow of the jungle and the storm on his heels and where did he know that voice from? Where did he know that shadow?

-Endless battlefields and unchanging training rooms, the flicker of braids in the corner of his eyes, meanings kept secret, meanings absorbed through exposure until the sight of pink made him cringe and the glimpse brown beads made his heart hurt in sympathy. A hundred faces come and gone, a dozen more that stayed-stayed-stayed. Brown eyes green eyes burning burning blue. Lips in a hundred different faces with a hundred different names, all of them looking at him and calling him the same thing in fondness-anger-respect-heartbreak-affection-trust.

-“Captain.”

-“Hey, Captain.”

-“Yo, Cap!”

-“For Hearth and Home, right Captain? As long as there is breath in my body, I follow that order.”

-A name on the tip of his tongue, a knowing that was fond and angry and regretful all at once. The glimpse of beads.

-Lightning branching scars made of purple fire.

-The pain stopped.

-Titus opened his eyes.

-And looked into burning burning blue, set in a face that was partially cracked open in branching lightning scars that bled purple fire, “Hey … Captain.”

-There was a name on Titus’s lips, and it wasn’t “Remus”, but for the life of him he couldn’t remember what that name was. At least not before the world went dark and he passed out from the relief of no longer being in pain.

-He woke up to the crackling of a campfire and a sprawling night sky over his head. For a moment he lay there in utter disbelief, not daring to move just in case he woke up back in the lab. Something shifted off to his right and a moment later a small, calloused hand rests on his forehead, “Awake for real this time, Drautos?”

-Titus stares, “…Prince Romulus?” The words cracked in his throat and when his coughing fit died down, the prince who shouldn’t be there handed him a canteen of water. Titus inhaled carefully several times after drinking, then looked up again. The prince was still there, “…How?”

-Prince Romulus sat back on his heels with a carefully blank expression, “You’re a hard man to find, Drautos. And a hard one to keep alive.”

-“I … what?”

-The Prince looked over his shoulder and Titus jerked internally when he spotted Prince Remus curled up asleep on a bedroll, exhaustion in every line of his teenage body, his branching scars far more vivid than usual.

-Purple fire spilling free of skin and blue, blue eyes and memories he can’t see-hear-touch-.

-“You … you came for me.” Titus whispered, unable to believe it, but also unable to disbelieve it. Why?

-Romulus grunted and evaded the implicit question in Titus’s words, “It took us longer than we thought to find you. Didn’t realize the Nifs had so many labs, let alone in Lucis. Then we got you out to a Haven and whatever they pumped in you decided to send you into some kind of violent fit.”

-Titus could remember that, dimly, and it made him feel sick just thinking of the black sludge and the liquid metal squirming under his skin-.

-Except he couldn’t feel it anymore.

-He pressed his hands over his arms, trying to find the feeling of foreign, painful metal inside him and instead felt … something else. Light. Twin suns of light hiding in his core, one that nipped and grumbled at his senses like a winter-chilled river that looked calm on the surface but raged quick and fast underneath, and another that crackled and sparked eagerly down his bones like lightning and the pounding of rain. Magic. Twin cores of magic, humming under his skin in place of the horrible, burning liquid metal the Nifs had constantly forced into his veins.

-…The princes’ magic?

-Romulus saw his look and turned his face away, “Remus burned the Starscourge and that … metal … out of your body with his magic but something needed to replace it. It had … carved you up inside and leaving those channels empty … would have been fatal.” Romulus glared at the night beyond the Haven, “I’m not explaining that well. But that’s what happened. Then he passed out.”

-Titus couldn’t untangle his emotions properly, they were too jumbled and strong do to more than rasp, “And … you?” Because there were two distinct magics inside him now, he could feel them.

-Romulus shook his head, stood up and prowled a few steps away to the campfire before sitting down again and admitting gruffly, “Remus wasn’t enough. After you were purified, you went into shock. I’d brought along ten phoenix downs just in case something happened…” The prince inhaled slowly, whispered more to the flames than Titus, “I ran out. You were still fading. So I dragged you back.”

-“Why?” Titus’s hands were shaking and he couldn’t get them to stop, couldn’t think about what the prince’s words made him feel because if he did he would break before he could get an answer and he needed to know. Needed to know why the two princes that had never acted particularly fond of him would race into the wilds, would risk their lives to free him, and then would … give him their magic.

-It wasn’t Romulus who answered, but a sluggish Remus, who slurred from his bedroll, “Cause you’re our Captain.” Remus blinked sleepily, yawned and finished, “Hearth and Home. ’S what matters most. Hearth is where you stay, Home’s the people in it. That’s you.” Blue eyes fluttered shut again before Titus could think of a response, but when he looked over at Romulus, the eldest prince was watching him solemnly.

-The prince tilted his chin in agreement with his twin, then added very softly, “We were afraid of you because you’re from Cavaugh. Our father already has to deal with enough bitterness and backlash over Mors’ reign, we didn’t know how you would react, being so close to the royal family that failed your town. But then you disappeared and … a prince takes care of his people. We can’t save everyone, we don’t have that kind of power. No one does. But that doesn’t mean we can’t try. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.” Then he shook his head, shifting to sit with his back to the fire and his sword on his shoulder, a soldier keeping watch even though there was no need on a Haven, “Go to sleep. You’ve been through a lot. We’ll call for pickup to Insomnia in the morning.”

-Titus lay back down very slowly, head spinning and limbs shaking, his entire world upended and shaky. Except for one thing. One realization, one burning vow, curling tight in his chest.

-These princes were his. They had come for him. When he’d lost all hope that anyone could come, they had. They had come and carried him to freedom, burned out the poison in his veins and given him each a piece of themselves to keep him alive when they had no obligation to do any such thing. No matter what he thought of Mors, or their father, for that …

-For that he would stand beside the throne without hesitation or doubt.

-He woke up the next afternoon to find that Remus had somehow migrated from his bedroll to Titus’s and was sleeping curled up under one arm, his magic tangling around Titus’s soul and keeping the nightmares at bay while Romulus, who had drifted over sometime in the night, dozed fitfully within arm’s reach away. When Titus stirred, Remus clung tighter to the tattered Crownsguard coat they had dressed him in at some point. Remus called him “Captain” the same way King Regis beckoned his Shield, (the same way a child called out to a trusted adult, and what had he ever done to earn that trust from two boys who were known to have been abused so badly by adults before), and Titus relaxed obediently into the teen’s hold.

-And he knew.

-He was theirs. Whatever they needed of him, whatever they wanted him to be to them, that’s what he would be. For them he would burn down the world if they only asked, and in their defense he would give anything.