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hrrtshape · 7 days ago

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coriolanus snow in my dr : a case study (???)

౨ৎ i know coryo now!!!!! not good for everyone else. like, biblically adjacent. i have stared into the abyss of his collarbones and nearly blacked out from sheer spiritual overload during lunch ! i had to physically restrain myself, clawed at my own wrist, bit my tongue, to stop myself from stamping thirteen hickeys across his aristocratic little throat like a feral creature marking its territory when i first him.

he is so real. more than real. beyond suzanne collins' ink, beyond the tragic orchestration of his future atrocities in other...universes. here, in the very exclusive, very avant-garde dimensional hotspot that is my better cr dr, he is not just coriolanus snow....future ceo heir. he is coryo. my coryo!!!!! and sometimes he slouches ⋆

　　　　　　　　　　 ⊹　︶︶　 ୨୧　︶︶　 ⊹

❛ backstory : his parents are old money, the kind that moves in silence because it has nothing to prove. no desperate new-rich ostentation, just power so entrenched in the social fabric that it seeps into his every gesture, his every breath. his mother, a socialite with a steel-trap memory and a tongue sharper than a guillotine, collects secrets like they’re baccarat crystal. his father...okay. actually. terrifying. the kind of man who bets entire fortunes like they’re poker chips, who calculates risk with a gambler’s intuition and a warlord’s ruthlessness. tigris wasn’t lying when she said his father held hate in his eyes. coryo learned young that money isn’t the prize. it’s the battlefield. also, his grandma’am owns an unfathomably chic flower boutique, the kind of place where orchids cost more than your rent.

　　　unconventional investigative journalism ! . . . ୨୧

◞ signature scent : bdk parfums’ gris charnel, the kind of fragrance that clings to cashmere like a well-kept secret. ink stains on silk shirts, warm cardamom, a whisper of bergamot before it settles into sandalwood and smoked tea. expensive, but not ostentatious. it lingers, it haunts. smells like the kind of man who leaves an open book on the nightstand, spine cracked just so.

◞ phone model (important!!!) : iphone purist, but it’s always the second-to-latest model. not out of financial constraint (please), but because he simply does not care about such pedestrian flexes. midnight black iphone 15, no case, the edges kissed by a few strategic scratches from careless, absentminded tosses onto marble countertops.

◞ handwriting : so precise it could be a forged renaissance manuscript. slanted, deliberate, almost ecclesiastical in its elegance. when rushed, it collapses into a series of esoteric glyphs that only he and his exhausted professors can decipher.

◞ academic (from a person who's definitely not biased) : always at the top, but never in a way that suggests effort. knowledge just seeps into his bones. writes entire essays in his head and transcribes them last minute. annotations in the margins oscillate between philosophical musings and sardonic commentary. highlighters are strictly monochrome, because colour-coding is for the weak.

◞ basketball quirks : moves like he’s solving an equation in real time. effortless shots, a preternatural understanding of angles and velocity. runs a hand through his hair before free throws, because of course he does. plays like it’s not even a game, but an elegant and calculated dismantling of his opponent.

◞ food (yes i stalked him...basically) : not a sugar fiend, but catches himself reaching for dark chocolate when he thinks no one’s watching. black coffee as a baseline, but if you hand him something absurdly sweet, he’ll wrinkle his nose and then consume it with the begrudging efficiency of a man fulfilling a contract. this is known. this is proven.

◞ musical taste : classical, but only the kind that sounds like a man going through it in a candlelit room. bach (the kind with an organ), tchaikovsky (the kind with a death wish). 2000s indie sleaze. interpol, the strokes, arctic monkeys. jazz. hans zimmer when he’s feeling grandiose. kanye, travis scott, 90s rap when he needs to remind himself he is, in fact, a menace.

◞ can solve a rubik’s cube in under two minutes but insists it’s a useless skill.

◞ always has a pen on him. you’ve stolen at least three.

◞ stands at a slight angle when talking, like he’s perpetually calculating the optimal way to exist in space.

◞ (before my shift so this is from a memory i got there) gave me his jacket in an offhanded way, like it was nothing. later, i caught him watching me wear it with something unreadable in his expression.

◞ knows how to play poker, and you will not beat him at it.

◞ never brags, but when he does something impressive, he looks at me like he’s waiting for me to say something. i just raise an eyebrow.

◞ drives a black aston martin vantage (i know this...because he drove me once. one hand on the wheel, the other resting on the gear shift, eyes flicking to the rearview mirror like he’s tracking something unseen. moan.)

◞ taps his pen against his lips when he’s thinking.

◞ looks obscenely good in knitwear. wool coats that make him look like a damn film protagonist.

◞ he doesn’t do hobbies; he does obsessions. he also does chess, poker, fencing. anything that requires strategy and the slow, tantalising art of victory. he's also in model UN. obviously.

◞ wears glasses sometimes. looks as hot as it sounds.

　　　physicality (moan!!!!) . . . ୨୧

◞ 6'3. an affront to reason, a structural hazard, a measurement that demands architectural consideration. the kind of height that turns even the tallest into something delicate by comparison.

◞ athletic, but not in an 'i woke up like this' way. this is intentional. muscle sculpted through discipline, through an almost monastic devotion to control. broad shoulders that make sweaters drape like they were sketched onto him. strong forearms, obviously. his back... indecently, needlessly, artfully carved.

◞ his hands...sigh...perpetually in his pockets, except when he leans in to murmur something just a fraction too close, fully aware of the effect. arms crossed when listening, jaw tightening when irritated (devastatingly attractive, i wanted to immortalise it).

◞ shoe size !!!!! likely 45 (us 12), possibly 46 (us 13). yes, i looked. for science.

◞ rolls up his sleeves with surgical precision, just enough to expose forearms that should require a warning label, yet feigns indifference.

◞ his hands are a problem. strong, elegant, unjust. fingers slightly calloused from basketball, fencing, lifting. YES, I TOOK NOTES.

　　　red flags that i'm way too prepared for . . . ୨୧

◞ pathological overachiever syndrome, but the toxic kind. the “i will seethe in silence if i score a 99 instead of 100” kind. the “i wrote a whole new essay because i found my first one merely excellent instead of transcendent” kind. the “if you beat me at chess i will lose sleep over it for weeks but mask it under a detached smirk” kind.

◞ emotional repression so severe it could be classified as a gothic affliction. you will never know what he’s actually thinking unless you study him like a victorian poet studies phrenology. his version of vulnerability is allowing you to witness a fraction of his turmoil through the clench of his jaw or the way he lingers just a little too long before walking away.

◞ never says “i’m sorry,” just reappears with a grand gesture like he’s starring in a cinematic reconciliation arc. (he is.) will quote poetry or latin at you instead of apologising. will scoff at grand romantic ideals but embodies one against his will.

◞ ego so finely constructed it could be displayed in the louvre. never gaudy, never loud, just a quiet, unshakable belief in his own superiority. not in a way that begs for external validation. no, he already knows. he doesn’t need you to tell him he’s exceptional, but oh, he does like it when you try to prove him wrong.

◞ has a god complex (freak matches freak), but a sexy one. not the loud, abrasive kind. no, his is an old-money god complex, the kind that sits in the corner of a candlelit room, flipping the pages of some antique tome, exuding the silent certainty that the world will always orbit him, whether you realise it or not.

◞ control issues so severe they could be submitted for psychological study. must be the one driving, must be the one deciding, must be the one orchestrating. lets you have your way when it amuses him, but only then. will convince you it was your choice all along.

　　　i , the cold war . . . ୨୧

lily-rose called it first: the cold war. and she was right. me, french-russian (yes, i’ve returned from shifting with improved french!!!) with an arsenal of toothy grins. him, american, arrogance lacquered over his intellect like a second skin. we’re both rich, both brilliant, both locked in a knowing, unbearable awareness of each other. the air crackles.

but it’s not just rivalry. never was. never could be.

when me and coryo stand too close, no one can tell if we’re about to argue or kiss. our verbal sparring sounds suspiciously like flirtation... because it is. because beneath the ego clashes and competitive theatrics, we are, devastatingly, undeniably, more allies than adversaries. we always sit together at lunch, insisting it’s because all our other friends do. but let’s be serious.

before all this, though, we were just kids. 10, maybe 9, maybe 8, whatever. he lived near me. i annoyed him on principle. it was schroeder and lucy, textbook. then i moved to paris. when i came back at 14, things weren’t the same. something brittle in the air. something unsaid.

　　　ii , the dynamic . . . ୨୧

smart vs. smart : we’re both intelligent. that’s a given. but he’s the type of smart that’s ice-cold, precise, a grandmaster orchestrating a hundred simultaneous chess games. and....... my intelligence is chaos and charm, the kind people underestimate right up until i win. he respects it. i weaponise it. it’s mathematics versus poetry. it’s yang and yin. it’s whatever we are, and it works. so well !!!!

arrogance vs. playfulness : he’s arrogance incarnate, but god, he can back it up. me? i’m unserious. i’m babyfaced. i laugh my way through everything, until suddenly i don’t. and then i win. which unravels him. which makes him question the foundations of reality. which is hilarious. (and no, he doesn’t let me win. i think.)

proximity that means too much : we always sit next to each other. always. in every class we share. no one believes it’s incidental. when we argue, it’s close-range, like neither of us is willing to cede even a millimetre of ground.

　　　iii , things that happened during my shift . . . ୨୧

◞ day one, i gave him a nosebleed. a necessary act of narrative tension.

◞ walking to class, his arm slung over my shoulder. unsanctioned contact. if i were a weaker woman, i would have perished on the spot.

◞ watched him play basketball. died immediately.

◞ accidental hand touch. suffered cardiac arrest.

◞ someone told us to get a room. we ignored it. violently.

　　　iv , what everyone sees vs. what's actually happening . . . ୨୧

what they see : two rivals, locked in constant combat, neither willing to surrender, neither willing to blink.

what’s actually happening : two idiots thinking about each other too much. best friends pretending not to be. two inevitable something-or-others, blind to the fact that they are careening towards each other like a greek tragedy.

ok goodbye i'm going back to my better cr now or else i'll die

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walkingstackofbooks · 2 months ago

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Frankly, there should have been some sort of required explanatory paperwork and consent forms in DBIP - besides Zimmerman contacting Julian's parents, it always bothers me that everything else Julian has to do seems to just come up as they're going, and honestly, I'm not sure Julian would have agreed if he'd been given any forewarning on what it would all include.

(I mean quite honestly he's barely enthusiastic about any of it, and I kind of feel that if he hadn't felt that he *had* to given Zimmerman had already showed up on the station and launched into the "chance of a lifetime" spiel, he might well have declined even if he could have opted out of the parents thing.)

But I digress. The point is, what if Dr Zimmermann did email Julian the forms to sign off on - just, while Julian was in the Dominion Camp. And the changeling impersonator simply deleted the email (well, emails plural) because it was irrelevant.

So then you've got Zimmerman getting impatient to start his project (it's bad enough he has to model it on someone else, let alone waiting for them to even grace him with a reply) until eventually he decides oh fuck it, I'll just forge his signature to send to my superiors, it's not like he's going to refuse once I've explained in person.

And then it just... never comes up. No-one asks and he certainly doesn't feel the need to ask why Bashir had ignored him (and maybe he does overhear something about camp 371, which means he's definitely not going to bring the missing email up) and then by time anyone might have thought to question his ethics, if Julian ever did mention that he'd explicitly asked for Zimmerman to avoid his parents or what have you, the whole enhancements thing will have come out and it would probably just seem like Julian was being, idk, petty, if he ever tried to bring it up to the powers-that-be. Not that I think he would. But you know, even if a friend did try to persuade him, I can't see that approach bearing fruit.

And ugh, I'm just so angry on his behalf, because while the way it worked out was probably actually better in the long run than him keeping his secret forever/it coming out in some way where that plea deal wasn't able to be made, I'd really like Zimmerman to have faced SOME repercussions more than just, y'know, not getting with Leeta. (Not to downplay the that Rom, my hero, made to this episode of course. Thanks, Rom, for your service. You had the greatest of timings)

#Julian Bashir #Doctor Zimmerman #Ds9 headcanon #Ds9 rant 😅#Genuinely this frustrates me so much #You can guess how much I loved the Zimmerman Voyager episodes...#Let him die miserably says I #Although in my imagined julian-transports-to-voy-oh-no series #(very imagined)#Seeing Julian interact with the EMH and later have to work out the cure for Zimmerman is some top tier content ngl #I mean not that it's even a question for him that he'd do it but yeah...#Anyway #Deep space nine #Wsb

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sergeantcowboy · 4 months ago

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I'm usually not one for making fandom ocs unless that oc is for a game where the mc is fully customizeable but honestly, the world and setting in bully is such an oc-able thing I had to do it. Also some of the other bully oc creators seem to be having fun and I wanna get in on that. Maybe I'm getting my hopes up but if you have a bully oc and you like my guy I would love to talk and maybe draw them together. 👀 👀

Template by @jimothy-hopkins

Some more fun facts

His real name is Simon but pretty much everyone knows him as Crow, even most of the teachers.

Dr. Crabblesnitch is the only one who only ever calls him Simon.

He doesn't even remember where the nickname came from exactly but it's just descriptive of his general nature.

He's a high school hustler (see tvtropes.org for more). He sells alcohol and cigarettes he smuggles on to school grounds to some of the older kids. He also deals with forged signatures and report cards and stolen test answers.

And for the right price you can also place a "special order" where he smuggles something specific for you.

Other than drugs.

His prices are usually pretty inconsisent and depend a lot on his mood and current financial situation.

He also charges rich students more and poor students less.

He's been asked to join the greasers but he deliberately avoids joining cliques because he doesn't want to get involved in the hierarchy. Says he's anti-system and wants to firmly stay outside of it.

He sells Mr. Galloway booze when he runs out of his stash during school hours and can't go to the store.

His A on english is genuine but his A+ might just be Mr. Galloway giving him some bonus points for their business dealings together.

Hates preppies with a passion. Will do business with them but the price will be high and he will be annoying about it.

Earnest is the only student he has completely banned from his little side business. He did deal him some dirty magazines at one point but then the guy asked him to do a panty raid one too many times.

Smokes like a chimney.

Generally likes Jimmy, he thinks they're alike because they both do stuff for people.

He also approves of Jimmy doing stuff for people out of kidness, but he also thinks that he should capitalize on it more. Especially when it comes to doing stuff for the preppies.

His mom used to be a maid for the Harringtons. Derby sometimes makes fun of him for it.

Gets called a f*ggot often but his response is always "that's mr. f*ggot to you"

#bully oc #bully scholarship edition #bully rockstar #bully game #original characters #original character #oc #artists on tumblr #rockstar games #bully fanart #bully canis canem edit #Crow #Crow introduction post #crow #crow intro post

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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 1 year ago

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Napoleonville [Chapter 9: Clarence House]

Series Summary: The year is 1988. The town is Napoleonville, Louisiana. You are a small business owner in need of some stress relief. Aemond is a stranger with a taste for domination. But as his secrets are revealed, this casual arrangement becomes something more volatile than either of you could have ever imagined.

Chapter Warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), dom/sub dynamics, smoking, drinking, drugs, Adventures with Aegon (ft. Sunfyre the Ferret), Willis Warning, infidelity, kids, parenthood, and no more hints for you, start reading!!!

Word Count: 8.9k.

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

Taglist: @marvelescvpe @toodlesxcuddles @era127 @at-a-rax-ia @0eessirk8 @arcielee @dd122004dd @humanpurposes @taredhunter @tinykryptonitewerewolf @partnerincrime0 @dr-aegon @persephonerinyes @namelesslosers @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics @daenysx @gemini-mama @chattylurker @moonlightfoxx @huramuna @britt-mf @myspotofcraziness @padfooteyes @targaryenbarbie @trifoliumviridi @joliettes @darkenchantress @florent1s @babyblue711 @minttea07 @libroparaiso @bluerskiees @herfantasyworldd @elizarbell @urmomsgirlfriend1 @fudge13 @strangersunghoon @wickedfrsgrl

Only 1 chapter left!!! 🥰🧁

He returns in an afternoon of inescapable golden sunlight, hot and muggy, bumble bees and ladybugs wheeling lazily above tall grass, cumulus clouds like tufts of cotton in a sky the color of Aemond’s eye. You hear him talking to Cadi—she’s out in the front yard making mud pies, earth for sugar and sprinkles of stray pelican feathers—and then the weight of his footsteps on the sinking, sloping porch. He opens the door, never locked, and walks through the living room into the kitchen. From behind, his arms circle around your waist; and you’ve missed him so much—dreaming of waves and storms, chains and blood—that you have nothing for him but softness, gentle smiles and a voice hushed with relief.

“How was Norway?” you ask as you roll out dough on the counter. You’re making a buttermilk pie.

“Fine,” Aemond says, resting his chin on your shoulder. But he sounds tired, low.

You turn around to look at him, raising your fingertips to his unscarred right cheek; he won’t tolerate you touching the left. You leave a dusting of flour across his skin like snow, which you have never seen in person and likely never will. The air conditioner is humming. The little pink Panasonic boombox is playing Africa by Toto. “Did something happen?”

“I just missed you.” Then he brightens. “But I was greeted by some very welcome news when I got back to the house this morning.” He’s wearing his neon teal duffle bag. He drops it to the floor and unzips it; inside you glimpse several Nintendo game cartridges, presumably for Cadi. And you think: I’m always here making things, he’s always bringing them from far away. Aemond takes two small dark blue booklets out of a pocket in the inner lining of the duffle bag and gives them to you. On the front of each is embossed in gold lettering, along with an emblem of a bald eagle: Passport, United States of America.

“…Aemond?!”

“There’s one for you and one for Cadi. I submitted the forms a month ago, but even with expedited processing it took this long. Ridiculous. What does the government do all day besides hunt down social programs to defund?”

“But…but…” You open one of the booklets. A photograph of your own face gazes back at you, serious and serene, taken against the white wall of your bedroom before you knew about Aemond being a Targaryen, or Christabel, or Amir’s exodus to San Franscisco, or the profound futility of everything, it seems. “How…?”

“I took the pictures, obviously. The rest was easy enough to find. You store birth certificates and social security cards the same place where you keep the business records that Amir showed me. Typically people have to go to a passport agency in person, but Criston and I have ways around that. Your signature might have been forged on the applications…but I suspect you won’t be filing any police reports.” Aemond grins, pleased with himself. “I wanted it to be a surprise.”

“It’s definitely surprising.” You stare down at the passports, amazed. “Aemond…this is a lot. But you already know that.”

“The whole time I was gone, I was wishing you could be there too. And now I can take you anywhere.”

Your heart is pounding, helpless childlike exhilaration. “Where are we going?”

“Clarence House in London.”

London: it’s another world, a distant planet, a constellation whose name you don’t know, the lost city of Atlantis.“Clarence House? Is that a hotel?”

“It’s a royal residence,” Aemond says, amused. “It’s officially the home of the Queen Mother, but the whole family goes to Balmoral in Scotland every summer, and while they’re gone they often rent out one wing to guests, not just anyone, trusted people like distant cousins or longtime, aristocratic friends. And the Targaryens…”

“You’re marrying Christabel, and she’s nobility. So you’re basically nobility now too.”

“Yes,” Aemond admits, a little guiltily, perhaps. “But you’re the person I’m inviting.”

“And Cadi.”

Now he’s genuinely puzzled. “Of course. We couldn’t leave her behind.”

Maybe I can handle this. Maybe I can make this work.

And you climb onto your tiptoes to circle your arms around the back of his neck, embracing him, thanking him, thinking: Christabel will have his ring, his last name, his family’s mansion, his acquiescent kiss at the altar of the Chapel of Saint Honoratus of Amiens…but I have what he’s made of, dreams, soul, bones in the abyss of an ocean of blood. Maybe that’s enough.

Maybe.

~~~~~~~~~~

First class, cheerful stewardesses, an array of magazines purchased from a gift shop in New Orleans International Airport: the National Enquirer and Food & Wine for you, The Face and Smithsonian for Aemond, and National Geographic Kids and Zoobooks for Cadi. The Zoobooks animal this month is the eagle, how quintessentially American. You are served antipasto Italiano, shrimp cocktail, Perrier, and champagne (Cadi gets a Shirley Temple) over the Atlantic Ocean. Aemond shows you and Cadi how to chew gum to pop your ears as the pressure builds to pain. When there is turbulence and he leans in close to tell you everything is fine, Aemond smells like Wrigley’s Doublemint, cologne, Marlboro cigarettes like the logo on his red and white jacket. You press your palm to the cool window, and clouds float by through the gaps between your fingers. The world is older than anything you could fathom; the world is brand new.

There is a black limousine waiting outside Terminal 3 of Heathrow Airport. The driver gets out to load the sparse luggage: Aemond’s teal duffle bag, a frayed and battered rolling suitcase that you borrowed from your mother, a Super Mario Bros. backpack that you found for Cadi at Kmart. Aemond doesn’t have much time to spare, only 4 days, practically a long weekend; but it feels like an eternity stretches out in front of you as the limousine zooms through the narrow, winding streets of downtown London, Starship’s We Built This City piping from the radio. You have never had more than a few uninterrupted hours with Aemond before. Now you will have a hundred.

The London air is cool, grey, misty; fresh rainwater bleeds into puddles, dark pools of mirrorlike reflections. With the windows rolled down and clean slate-colored air unfurling in your lungs, Aemond points to the landmarks you pass: Gunnersbury Park, Chiswick House and its gardens, cathedrals, museums, shopping districts, centuries-old cemeteries, stations of the London Underground, the River Thames, Hyde Park, the Ritz Hotel, Buckingham Palace, Saint James’ Palace, and at last Clarence House. It is a boxy white four-story townhouse with columns at the entranceway that remind you of the Targaryens’ estate on the shore of Lake Verret, the beautiful yet temporary home they call The Last Desire.

Aemond says that the entire first floor will be yours for the duration of your stay. There is the Lancaster Room, red and gold, and the Morning Room of creams and weak watery blue. There is the Library, the Dining Room, and the vibrantly pink Horse Corridor named for its ample equine paintings and sculptures; Cadi immediately proclaims this to be the best part of the house. She lingers in the hallway examining the art pieces as you and Aemond proceed to the Garden Room, which looks out upon a sea of lavender and shrubs meticulously shaped into a maze no higher than your waist. It has a golden harp and a grand piano, and a vast bed large enough for at least five people, in your estimation. I wonder if Aemond has ever tried that, you think distractedly. I wonder if there are temptations I can’t satisfy for him.

“You and Cadi can have this room,” Aemond says. He keeps wincing and bringing his hand up to the left side of his face; you doubt he’s even aware of it. “I’ll sleep on one of the couches.” Of course he will; Cadi thinks you’re just friends, and she’s aware he’s getting married to someone else. He knew exactly what it would mean when he bought a passport for her. “Queen Elizabeth and her husband Philip lived here before she ascended to the throne. They loved it so much that at first they refused to move to Buckingham Palace, which is the traditional residence of the reigning monarch. But their insolence was worn down. No one gets to break the rules.”

I shouldn’t be in this place, you keep thinking as you gaze around at the portraits on the wall, the stiff unnatural photographs of royals, the vases, the chandeliers, the fireplaces, the plush intricate rugs, the garden on the other side of the windows. People like me don’t belong here. “Aemond, are you alright?”

“It’s my eye,” he confesses with an uneasy, apologetic smirk. “Sometimes flights…the altitude changes…it aggravates the nerve damage. It’s like needles in my skull. But I’ll be okay.”

“You fly a lot for work, don’t you?” You hurt yourself for Viserys, in body and soul.

“I do,” he agrees. He unzips his duffle bag and produces a bottle of Percocet. “Why do you think I carry these around?”

“Take one,” you say. “Lie down, rest. Cadi and I can entertain ourselves for a few hours.”

He’s relieved, he’s grateful. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely. You can even borrow the bed.”

“Back between your sheets, huh?” Aemond says, in pain but smiling through it. He draws a semicircle from the part in your hair down to your chin, a weightless sweep of his fingertips like a kind breeze. “You are incurable. You can’t resist me.”

“I have my own scheme in mind.”

“Do you?”

“Yes.” You grab the front of his Marlboro jacket, appropriate for the overcast London weather. He belongs here, this house, this city, this way of life. He wasn’t made for the primordial heat of the swamplands. You fold into him, close enough to tease, to quicken his heartbeat and momentarily clear the wounded furrows from his brow. “I want my pillows to smell like you. I want to breathe you in all night. It’s how I sleep best.”

“I’ll try not to disappoint,” Aemond says, a little stunned; but he’s elated too. For a moment, you’ve distracted him from his suffering entirely. “I’ll roll around all over them. I will mar the bedding irrevocably, the Queen Mother will never invite me back.” And he watches as you leave, his gaze transfixed and meditative and—more than anything else—hopeful.

“Hey, honey,” you say when you find Cadi in the Horse Corridor, poking a 100-year-old oil painting that she is definitely not supposed to be touching. “Let’s go explore and grab some dinner. Aemond isn’t feeling great, but we’ll hang out with him later.”

“Is it his face?”

You are startled. She knows so much. “Yeah, actually, it is.”

“He showed me,” Cadi says casually, still peering up at the horse; and you remember the day when he took her out to the front yard after she said she wished you were more like her friends’ mothers. “He even let me touch it. Radical, right? It’s so gross, but super cool too.”

Aemond couldn’t stand for me to see how he was maimed, but he forced himself to endure it for Cadi. “What did he tell you?”

“That I should appreciate having a good mom, because not all parents treat their kids right. He said his dad let his eye get crushed. And he told me he’d bet $1 million that you’d snap someone’s neck if they hurt me like that.”

You reach out to skim your fingers through her dark disheveled hair, smiling faintly, fondly. Cadi doesn’t seem to mind. “He wasn’t wrong.”

“Can we get fish and chips?”

“Totally. I have 50 British pounds in my wallet, I assume that’s enough for dinner.”

“Wow! How much is 50 pounds in dollars?”

“I have no idea,” you say. “Let’s go spend them.”

~~~~~~~~~~

In the evenings, you, Cadi, and Aemond gather around the television in the Lancaster Room and help yourself to the extensive VHS collection stocked for guests. You let Cadi pick: Raiders Of The Lost Ark, The Terminator, Firestarter, the Karate Kid, Aliens. You make popcorn in the extravagant kitchen in the basement of Clarence House and the three of you devour bowlfuls of it as you giggle on the couch, engulfed with throw pillows and playfully kicking at each other beneath the blankets. One night at Cadi’s request you bake Betty Crocker’s Party Rainbow Chip cupcakes with mix purchased at a Tesco down the street; on another you make hot chocolate to sip from antique tea cups. Each day, Aemond has new destinations picked out to tour. You ride the Underground like true Londoners to the Hampton Court Palace, the British Museum, Westminster Abbey, the Natural History Museum, Big Ben, Trafalgar Square, Tower Bridge, the National Gallery, the Kew Gardens, Imperial College where Aemond received the petroleum engineering degree he never wanted.

As he shows you the classrooms where he attended lectures and seminars—you aren’t sure what the difference is, though you can sense that there is one—Aemond doesn’t talk about math or oil drilling. Instead, he tells you and Cadi about the people he learned about in the history classes he managed to slip into his exacting schedule like splinters into flesh: Sir Harold Gillies who pioneered plastic surgery in his treatment of World War I veterans, Phillis Wheatley who was enslaved as a child and became a renowned poet and abolitionist, Boudicca who led a rebellion against the Roman invaders and upon her defeat succumbed to some tragic, enigmatic doom. Aemond loves stories like this, you can see the light that sparks into the crystalline blue of his right eye. There is nothing he deems more heroic than people who took circumstances beyond their control and made something worthwhile out of them.

The night before the flight back to New Orleans, you’re staring at the crown molding of the Garden Room as Cadi snores softly from the other end of the massive bed and silvery moonlight covers the world. You can’t stop your thoughts from roiling like the North Sea; you can’t stop thinking about desks and chairs and books and clever blue-blooded girls jotting down in their notebooks not cake orders but mathematical equations or dates of conquest. When you breathe in the smoke and cologne Aemond left on your pillows, it tastes dark and forbidden. You climb out of the bed, roomy Bob Dylan t-shirt, pink cotton shorts, hair loose and wild, bare feet.

He is outside pacing around the sundial in the center of the garden, puffing on a Marlboro cigarette and pondering the full moon. “Can’t sleep?” Aemond asks, exhaling smoke as he glances over at you.

“You must think I’m stupid.”

“What?” He stops pacing. “Why?”

“Imperial College,” you say. “And the sorts of people who go to places like that. You must have known a lot of women who could recite Shakespear and name all the kings of England, all of Jupiter’s moons. Things I never learned. Things that I have no use for. I don’t write books or design machines or study the secrets of the universe. I bake cupcakes.”

“And they’re brilliant,” Aemond says, smiling. “I don’t think you’re stupid.”

“No?”

“No,” Aemond insists. “I think that if you’d been born where I was, you would have done far more with it.”

“Aemond…” You walk across the wet cobblestones to meet him by the sundial. It’s been raining again. The night air is chilly, foggy, painting you with goosebumps. “You still have time to become who you want to be.”

“No. I don’t.”

It’s coming from somewhere, distant but still audible, a parked car or a nearby building: Kyrie by Mr. Mister. Aemond chuckles, flicks the end of his cigarette into the lavender bushes—surely against the rules—and takes your hands in his.

“I remember this,” he says as he dances with you slowly, clumsily; you don’t know the steps. Still, you don’t want him to stop. “In your kitchen.”

He remembers everything. “Right before we went to Olive Garden for the first time.”

He sighs, pretending to be exasperated. “Of course that’s the part you committed to memory.”

“I’ve held onto a few other details too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Like how small the back seat of your Audi Quattro is.”

“A limousine would be far more comfortable. I should invest in one.”

You laugh as he twirls you and you trip over your own feet; he pulls you upright before you can fall to the slick cobblestones. And you think: This is real. No matter what happens between him and anyone else, what we have is safe and extraordinary and real.

“I’m glad you’re here, Cupcake,” Aemond murmurs through your hair, holding you without seeking more. “You and Cadi.”

You want him again, or you’re so close to wanting him that the line is less of a boundary than a quagmire, indistinct edges and quicksand that can drag you down to drown in it. “I never knew that this was possible. Thank you, Aemond.”

“It can be like this all the time.”

Not all the time, you think, knowing that there will always be Jade Dragon, the Targaryens, the stock market, the world, the past and the future, Christabel. But some of it.

Is that enough?

~~~~~~~~~~

Willis agreed to you and Aemond taking Cadi out of the country on one condition: that you return her to him the second you arrive back in Napoleonville. It’s late Tuesday afternoon when the plane’s wheels hit the runway and squeal to a halt. Aemond has left his red Audi in the Park-and-Ride lot. You collect the car and soar west on Route 10 into the red-gold horizon, chasing the setting sun.

“Daddy!” Cadi bellows when she throws open the front door of the Assumption Parish Sheriff’s Office, waving his gift bag excitedly. Inside is a refrigerator magnet, several packages of McVitie’s Digestives in different flavors, and a miniature red-coated Queen’s Guard to keep on his desk, perpetually covered with disorganized papers and crumbs from innumerable desserts. From her poster on the wall, Heather Locklear simpers at you. At the center of the dartboard, poor Tommy Lee is impaled in four different places.

“Comment ca va, cherie?!” Willis opens his arms to hug Cadi when she barrels into him. He guffaws, his eyes are shiny; he has missed her. “Ya had a real good time, I reckon?”

“It was totally tubular. But I’m glad I’m home now. Can I get a horse? His name is Patches and I love him.”

“Huh? What the hell ya need a horse for?” He peeks around Cadi to look at you, a curious blue gaze beneath the thick dark bangs of his mullet. “What’s she talkin’ ‘bout, sugar?”

Beside you, Aemond groans irritably. Then you hear a voice from one of the holding cells, almost always empty: “Hey, cake lady.”

“Aegon?!” you and Aemond say at once, and sure enough, when you check the last holding cell there he is: unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt, blue shorts, rainbow flip flops, hair like he’s been in a hurricane, a new eyebrow piercing.

Aemond asks Willis: “What did he do?”

Willis picks up a clipboard from his cluttered desk and begins reading. “Possession with intent to distribute cocaine—”

“I told you, I wasn’t distributing anything! It was for me!”

“Aegon, shut up,” Aemond pleads.

“Possession with intent to distribute marijuana, possession of drug paraphernalia, possession of methamphetamine less than 28 grams, operatin’ a vehicle while intoxicated, possession of MDMA, possession of alcoholic beverages in a motor vehicle, operatin’ a vehicle with a suspended license, resistin’ an officer…” Willis flips the page. “Speedin’, reckless drivin’, disturbin’ the peace while in an intoxicated condition, possession with intent to distribute Xanax, theft—”

“What the hell did you steal?!” Aemond demands.

“Burritos. I forgot my wallet at home.” Now Aegon is indignant. “But I saidI’d get them back! They didn’t need to call anybody about it!”

“Aegon, Taco Bell does not offer payment plans!”

“I can release him to ya, I guess,” Willis tells Aemond in a slow drawl.

“I really appreciate that. I’m so sorry about him, I’m absolutely mortified, I’ll pay whatever fines you want—”

“Wait, no,” Aegon says, panicked. His hands are gripped around the iron bars. “I don’t want to leave.”

Aemond stares at him. “You’re asking to stay in jail…?”

“I can’t go home. Stephanie’s there.”

“Of course she’s there. You knew she was flying in for the wedding.”

“Please let me stay here until she goes back to Monaco.”

“Definitely not. How’s everything else?”

“There’s something wrong with one of the Lake Verret rigs. Viserys mentioned a��a…I don’t remember, a dirt dump or something.”

“A mud pump?!”

“Yeah! That’s it. That’s what he said. It exploded.”

“Fuck,” Aemond hisses, then remembers that Cadi’s still there. She gives him a sly grin. You messed up, she means. Aemond looks to you, apologetic, disappointed. “I’m going to have to drop you off and then head straight home. There are messes to be mopped up.”

“No,” Aegon moans as Willis unlocks the holding cell and then wrestles him out of it when Aegon resists. “No, I’m a felon! I’m a danger to the public!”

“Don’t,” Aemond snaps, and this time his brother listens.

You say goodbye to Cadi—she barely notices—but as you go to follow Aemond and Aegon out of the Sheriff’s Office, she has a question. “Aemond?”

He stops. “Yeah, Cadi?”

“Can I go to the wedding?”

“Weddin’?!” Willis exclaims. “Already?!”

“Not mine,” you say.

“You really want to go?” Aemond asks Cadi with some reticence. But he seems to be considering it.

“Well, yeah. Mom said she and Amir are going. You’ll be there. Lots of cake will be there. And I’ve never been to a wedding before. I want to see what it’s like.”

Aemond turns to you, then to Willis, searching for permission. “It’s alright with me,” Willis says. “As long as someone there is keepin’ an eye on her.”

“It’s your choice,” you tell Cadi. “If you’re interested, I have no objections. But you have to be nice to Christabel.”

“Christabel?!” Willis says.

“That’s Aemond’s fiancée.” And there is a collective uncomfortable silence: Willis nodding slowly as he squints at you, Cadi chewing on her thumbnail, Aemond looking down at his Adidas sneakers, Aegon staring vacuously at the Heather Locklear poster on the wall.

With Aegon squeezed into the back seat, Aemond drops you off at the home Cadi calls the Fall-Down House. The new house hasn’t closed yet, but probably will in the next week. The adolescent gator is sunbathing in the last of the daylight in one corner of the yard; you can hear the pink Panasonic boombox inside playing Another One Bites The Dust.

“Ho, you’re back!” Amir cries, jubilant. He hugs you energetically, staining you with the flour on his hands; he’s been watching the bakery while you’ve been gone and keeping every cent of the profits in recognition of his labor, as agreed upon. “How was London?”

You give him his souvenir: a purple t-shirt with Princess Diana’s face on it. “Rainy. Wonderful.”

“Did you have any kinky sex in the royal grandma’s bed?”

“No,” you say, laughing. “But it was…I don’t know how to describe it. Calm. Normal. Easy. Like we could live that way forever.”

“So you’ve decided to be his Camilla.”

“Some moments I have. Other times I haven’t. But more and more, I just…” You try to decide what you mean. “The thought of giving him up feels impossible. And Christabel…they’re so distant with each other, so disconnected, so platonic. Their relationship doesn’t feel real. Maybe I can ignore it. Maybe this is the best I can hope for.”

Amir pushes his tortoiseshell glasses up the bridge of his nose and raises an eyebrow. “It might feel more real in three days.”

The rehearsal dinner is on Friday; the wedding is only 24 hours later.

~~~~~~~~~~

“You really should consider writing a cookbook, dear,” Alicent says from where she sits across from you. The dining room table is covered with flickering pink candles, bouquets of wildflowers, drinks garnished with cotton candy and Pop Rocks. Balloons bump against the ceilings, their long ribbons streaming down like the tentacles of a jellyfish. The stereo is thumping out Caught Up In You by 38 Special. Everything is pink and red: the colors of love. Yet just like at the engagement party, no one is talking about the couple getting married tomorrow. You could almost forget that there’s going to be a wedding. That makes it easier; and if denial is the terrain you live on now, so be it. That is far less agonizing than the alternative.

“Oh, no,” you demur, taking a sip of a cotton candy cocktail. You exchange a glance with Aemond, sitting several seats down from his mother. He is in a suit—black and white, fitted, faultless—and smiling, proud of you. “A book?! I couldn’t. Not in a million years.” I never even finished high school English.

“But all of my friends from home are captivated by your recipes, darling, and it would be so much easier if I could simply send them a copy of a cookbook rather than trying to describe every dish to them! Please consider it. Do you promise?”

“That I’ll think about it? Not too taxing a commitment. I suppose so.”

“Good,” Alicent chirps, then turns to whisper something to Criston, who drapes an arm briefly across her shoulders and gives her a reassuring little embrace. Amir is chatting with Aemond about San Franscisco. Christabel is talking to Helaena, who has been forced into a voluminous, magenta taffeta dress that she clearly despises; her chameleon Dreamfyre lurches around the table, occasionally stealing tastes of people’s food. Daeron, with Tessarion perched on the back of his chair, is trying to discuss something called seismic testing results with Viserys but getting ignored. Viserys is deep in conversation with Christabel’s father, the marquess, a large loud man whose booming voice drowns out everyone else. The two of them seem delighted, celebratory, very much in their own world. Their schemes have come at last to fruition. Christabel has several younger sisters in attendance—her bridesmaids—but no mother. You gather from pieces of dialogue you’ve overheard that her mother died when she was a child, a terrible and irreparable loss. Otto is so bored he’s flipping through a picture book about Kiribati. Aegon’s wife, Princess Stephanie of Monaco, is a headstrong, charismatic, and rather critical woman with short dark hair. She notifies Aegon each and every time he fails her, which happens frequently: You’re using the wrong fork. You missed a button on your shirt. You haven’t fucked me properly in over two years. You didn’t send flowers to my grandma’s funeral. This is evidently Aegon’s worst nightmare; he has disappeared upstairs in an effort to escape her.

Dinner is finished, and dessert has been brought by the servants. It turned out more like a crepe cake than a Napoleon cake—the layers of puff pastry didn’t want to fluff up as much as they should have—but no one seems to notice. This time, you and Amir knew the dress code expectations. You are both wearing black to fade into the backdrop like shadows, like distant memories. You are invited guests, but you are also locals, inferiors, recipients of charity.

“Where’s Aegon?” Helaena says. “He has to try this cake, it’s delicious! The cherry jam cuts the heaviness of the cream and pastry dough and makes it a perfect dessert for summer! And the color is delightful! It looks just like blood!”

“Where the hell is he?” Viserys demands, looking around, twisting in his chair. “It’s his brother’s rehearsal dinner, for Christ’s sake. One night of this importance and he can’t handle it? I swear to God, if he’s snorting or smoking anything up there I’ll have him committed to an institution—”

“I’ll find him,” you offer as you stand from the table. You have to visit the bathroom anyway, too many glitzy pink cocktails; two birds, one stone. You depart from the table and Aemond’s gaze follows you, a low heat that is building towards incineration, a baiting promise of dark euphoria that you can no longer pretend you don’t want desperately, defenselessly. Christabel gives you a sweet little wave. She is dripping in gold—dress, heels, jewelry—and seems happier tonight, more self-assured. Perhaps with the wedding so close, her trepidation concerning Aemond’s commitment has evaporated. Surely it is too late to call off the ceremony now. Tonight they feast, tomorrow they recite their vows, and then…

But no, you don’t think about the honeymoon. You will not allow yourself to. It can’t exist to you, and that is how you’ll survive this. Christabel will be in one universe, you in another, two timelines that never cross like something out of Star Trek. And the way she and Aemond interact is so impersonal, so untactile, that it is not so difficult to treat anything beyond chaste pecks on cheeks as an impossibility.

At the top of the staircase, Vhagar is lurking. She wags her long twiglike tail when she sees you and licks the knuckles of your left hand. You give her a pat on the head—and then several more when she whines as you try to leave—then at last she lopes off down the hallway.

Aegon is exactly where you’d assumed he’d be. He’s in his bedroom hunched over his computer and hammering furiously at the keyboard. There’s white powder on his fingers and in his thin mustache. On the screen, bizarrely, is what appears to be neon green grass and an ox-drawn wagon like the ones from the pioneer days. Sunfyre the ferret is stretched out across the bed napping, his angular face resting on his paws.

Aegon whirls around to face you. He is wearing a lime green satin suit but has forgotten to put on a shirt under it. “What? What? What do you want? I’m playing Oregon Trail. I have dysentery.”

“You have what…? Never mind, it’s not important. You need to come downstairs and eat some dessert. People are wondering where you are.”

“I’m busy.”

“If you don’t make an appearance on your own, Viserys will come looking for you. Also there are some Cap’n Crunch treats I left on the kitchen counter that you might be interested in.”

“Consider me tempted. I’ll be down momentarily.”

“You better be,” you tell Aegon, then retrace your steps back to the kitchen. Amir and Christabel are both there getting cans of Pepsi from the fridge and making very cumbersome small talk…or perhaps only Amir thinks it is that much of a burden. Christabel is chattering blithely away about different types of wildflowers. He gives you a look like Oh thank God, an excuse to escape and wastes no time heading back to the dining room.

“Did you notice what’s playing now?” he asks you just before he vanishes, then points towards the stereo in the grand foyer. You listen; it’s Money For Nothing by Dire Straits. “You think they know this song is about class warfare?”

“You should tell them,” you joke.

“Yeah, if I want to end up on Unsolved Mysteries.” Then Amir is gone.

“How are you doing?” you ask Christabel to be polite. You open the refrigerator and start hunting for your own can of Pepsi. “Excited? Nervous? You seem a little more relaxed than the last time I saw you. Are the wedding jitters finally dissipating?”

“They are,” she says, and when you glance back at her she is wearing a bashful sort of smile. It’s not an expression you can read. You resume digging through the refrigerator for a can of Pepsi; Amir and Christabel might have taken the last ones.

“That’s good,” you say noncommittally, hoping she’ll leave. But Christabel doesn’t leave. She seems to have something she needs to say. Just as you spy a lone can of Pepsi at the very back of the refrigerator and lean in to grab it, she proceeds to unburden herself.

“Well, you know, I was so concerned about me and Aemond before. I had no conviction that he especially liked me, and we never had anything to talk about, and he was so dreadfully undemonstrative…I was just beside myself, truly. I didn’t know what to do. But I feel much better about everything now. Norway was so good for us.”

Norway?

You close the refrigerator, your ice-cold Pepsi can clutched in your hand. You’re going cold all over. Slowly, you turn towards Christabel, glittering in her gold dress.

Norway???

“He took you on the North Sea trip.” You hear the words, but it doesn’t feel like you’ve said them. They sound flat and dazed.

“It’s a bit of a secret,” Christabel says; and again, her smile has no cruelty or sharp awareness in it, but her cheeks are pink. She’s blushing. What does she have to be embarrassed about? “My father doesn’t know. He wouldn’t approve. But I just felt…I felt ready, you know? I’m sure you understand what I mean. You aren’t so clinical and aloof about everything. I had to know if Aemond and I really had something between us before we got married.”

“You felt…ready?” Ready for what? Ready for WHAT, Christabel?

“I asked Aemond to take me with him. I begged, actually.” She giggles. “I won’t try to be proud about it! And finally he said yes. We stayed at a lovely hotel in Bergen, and during the day he would have to fly by helicopter out to the rigs, but at night…”

You’re staring blankly at her. You can’t believe what you think she’s going to say. Surely it must be something else, anything else—

“It wasn’t my plan to ever be intimate with a man before marriage, but sometimes…things change. Minds change, circumstances change. And I knew I wanted it. And it went so well! Now what do I have to be nervous about? All the uncertainties are resolved. Now we just sign the paperwork and start our lives together.”

He took her to Norway.

He slept with her in Norway.

“I hope it was just as good for him,” Christabel muses, a compulsive sort of oversharing. But she has had a few cocktails and she thinks you’re nonjudgemental and there’s probably not a single other soul she feels she can be truthful with…so why not the girl who got knocked up at prom and had a baby at seventeen? Surely she’s in no position to judge. “It’ll be even better once we can…you know. When we’re officially trying for a baby and there’s no need to worry about any precautions. I want Aemond to enjoy himself as much as possible. I want to be a good wife to him.”

You feel dizzy; you feel violently ill. And now you see everything: Aemond kissing her with his mouth open and ravenous, his hands between her legs, his hips pressed to hers, peeling off her clothes and learning how to make her moan, make her wet, make her come, and you think of how careful he must have been with her, a girl with no past, no ex-husband, no childbirth that nearly killed her, no stretchmarks and no baggage, just a smooth pristine rivulet of flesh that was so pure and uncontaminated it was weightless, and you can hear—though you don’t want to, though it feels like it will kill you—how tender he was, how encouraging, not a dominant who drinks down fantasies like a vampire sustained by blood but just a man, and a man who has at last found a woman he doesn’t need to grab, bite, bruise, handcuff to a bedpost to feel satisfied with.

He took her to Norway and he never told me.

You are saying something, and Christabel is nodding appreciatively, accepting the sage wisdom of a tarnished life. Your words don’t matter. They are folktales and charms, the croaks of bullfrogs, the whispers of the wind through Spanish moss, the Morse code of ripples in the water of the bayou. You are a novelty and your counsel is a souvenir; one day when she is living in California or Argentina or Australia or Alaska or her ancestral castle back in the U.K., Christabel will tell Aemond’s children: Once I met a nice single mom from Napoleonville Louisiana, and she told me to follow my heart and not let anyone shame me for wanting to be close with my soon-to-be husband.

Vhagar trots into the kitchen and begins nudging her massive head against Christabel’s bare knees. “Hi, big girl!” Christabel coos as she pets the blue merle Great Dane, clearly accustomed to this. “Who’s a giant gorgeous girl? You are!”

What did I expect? I knew they were getting married. I knew they were going to sleep together.

Yes, you knew it, but you hadn’t felt it, and now you have.

I can’t do this, you realize. I thought I could but I can’t.

“Christabel?” Alicent is calling like a windchime. “Darling, there are just a few more things we have to discuss before tomorrow, will you come back to the table please?”

“On my way!” Christabel replies obediently, and she gives you a quick, impulsive hug before vanishing.

I’m going to be sick. I’m going to have a heart attack. I’m going to drop dead right in the middle of this fucking kitchen.

Leaving your can of Pepsi forgotten on the countertop, you escape to the living room and then out the French doors into the garden. You run past the pool all the way to the pond full of multicolored fish you once hadn’t known were koi. You drop to your knees, then lie down on the cold cobblestones, and when it hits you again—Aemond touching her, Aemond loving her—you rupture into sobs that are breathless and shuddering. You try to stifle the noise with your palms; you clasp them over your mouth and smother your wails. It feels like you’re being ripped apart; it feels like you’re in labor, but there is no end, no consolation of a new life, no point at which your body chooses whether you live or die. It is only a razored wheel that turns in you again and again and again, shredding muscle and splitting bones.

There is a hand on your shoulder; someone is patting it awkwardly. You look up to see Aegon standing there. “Sorry,” he says. “You look…not good.”

“I’m really not good. I’m fucking terrible.” Your face is soaked and stinging with tears, your voice is strangled.

“Do you want some coke?”

“No, Aegon.”

“Do you want a ride home?”

“From you? Yeah, for sure, getting impaled by a stop sign would be a great next move for me.”

“I’m totally fine to drive.”

“Can you just pull Amir aside without anyone else noticing and tell him to say his goodbyes and then meet me in the driveway, please? He drove me here. I need him to take me home.”

“Okay,” Aegon says, and then: “Thanks for the Cap’n Crunch Treats. Thanks for remembering something I like and caring enough to bring more. No one really does that around here.” And he’s gone before you can think of a reply.

To get to the driveway without going though the house, you climb over a 5-foot wrought iron fence swarmed with rosebushes and ivy, no easy feat in a black Kmart dress and matching ballet flats. You acquire a dozen shallow gashes on your hands and forearms, but make it to the Ford Escort just in time for Amir to meet you under the full, cloudless moon, tossing his car keys from one hand to the other.

“What did—?” Then he sees your face. He gasps, knowing how bad it is. He’s never seen you like this. He didn’t know it was possible for you to look like this. He unlocks the Ford Escort and joins you inside, turning the key in the ignition. “What the fuck did Aemond do to you?!”

“I have to go home. It’s over, it’s over, I can’t do this.”

Amir is spinning out of the driveway. “Did he hurt you, did he—?!”

“He fucked Christabel in Norway,” you say, sobbing uncontrollably. “And I know I have no right to be jealous, I know we don’t have a conventional relationship, I thought I could handle this but I can’t. I can’t stop picturing him with her, and hearing it, and I…I…I don’t understand why this hurts so goddamn bad.”

“Babe,” Amir says gently, a palm on your trembling thigh. “You’re in love with him. That’s why.”

“This is killing me,” you whisper. You’re shaking all over. You feel like you’re battling for every breath.

Your best friend—your only friend—is quiet for a long time. “Don’t go tomorrow,” Amir finally says. “You don’t need to see the wedding. You shouldn’t put yourself through that. I’ll go, I can handle the cake alone, especially if Cadi’s with me to help with carrying plates and stuff.”

You don’t say anything. You stare out the nightscape window and mop tears from your face with McDonald’s napkins you find in Amir’s glovebox.

“Did you hear me? I don’t think you should go to the wedding tomorrow.”

“I won’t,” you agree hoarsely. “I can’t watch them have my wedding.”

“Willis is dropping Cadi off in the morning, right? I’ll pick her and the cake up from your house and bring her back when it’s over. You can tell her whatever you want…you have another cake order to work on, you’re sick, you’re injured, your mom needs a ride to the doctor, whatever.”

“Okay,” you whimper.

“Hey, look at me.”

You do, sniffling, shivering, in agony.

“You don’t deserve this. You deserve better than this.”

I don’t think I do. I think if I did, it would have happened by now. But you know Amir will not accept this answer. “Okay,” you say again, trying to make yourself believe it.

In the gravel driveway of your sinking house, Amir asks if you want him to say. You tell him no, you want to be alone, you have to think, you have to plan. Really, you just don’t want anyone to see you this shattered. It’s humiliating, it’s like you’re an animal, like something less than human needing to licks its wounds in a dark place. You walk into the Fall-Down House and flip on the kitchen light, artificial yellow luminance. You don’t start the air conditioner. You don’t touch the Panasonic boombox. You stand there mindlessly in the sounds of the bayou: cicada screams, owl hoots, the far-away hissing of gators. The wedding cake is in the refrigerator, banana bread, cream cheese frosting, a kaleidoscope of wildflowers painted by Amir’s expert hand. He’s leaving. Aemond’s leaving. Everyone is leaving.

There are tires crunching on gravel in the driveway, there are footsteps on the sloping porch. He is able to yank the door open because you never lock it. He blows in like a storm that kills.

“What the hell happened?!” Aemond shouts. “Why did you leave?! You didn’t even have the decency to say goodbye to me—”

“You took her to Norway.”

Aemond’s face goes from furious to lost. “Why would she tell you that?”

Not That’s not true, not Let me explain, not It didn’t mean anything. Your stomach sinks, a basket full of stones. “Because she thinks I’m her friend.”

“It wasn’t…” Aemond sighs. “It was a last-minute thing, and it was her idea. She really, really wanted to go to Norway, and I figured…you know…what’s the difference between the wedding night and a few weeks before it? So yeah, it happened—”

“Oh God,” you whisper, starting to sob again.

“And then I came home to your house, to your doorstep, because I missed you the entire time. The entire time, every hour, every minute, and there are no exceptions, okay, are you listening to me? I took her to Norway because I had to. I took you and Cadi to Clarence House because I wanted to. What I do with her is a reflex, an obligation, I’m on autopilot, I’m thinking of you to get myself hard, I don’t know how else to express to you how completely different these situation are in every single goddamn way.”

“She said it was good,” you say huskily, tears snaking down your cheeks that are raw from trying to dab them dry.

“Of course it was good for her!” Aemond flings back. “I’ve had a lot of casual sex, I know how to make women come, it’s a math equation, it doesn’t mean we’re soulmates!”

“I know I have no claim to you, but I…” You gaze out the kitchen window, dark and still, nothing to see but stars and lighting bugs. “I can’t do this.”

Aemond asks, kindly now: “What do you want?”

I want to not have to beg you to choose me. “I want this to be over.”

“No,” he says, panicking. “No you don’t.”

“I do.”

“You’re going to give this up as soon as it gets painful? I’m not worth fighting for, what I can do for you and Cadi isn’t worth a little pain? Because I’m no stranger to it either. You think I’m not hurting, you think nothing ever keeps me awake at night?”

“You could leave your prison any time you want to. But instead you built a brand new one around me.”

“You don’t understand what the kind of responsibility I’m beholden to feels like.”

“Yeah, a town named after Napoleon is the right place for you,” you seethe, enraged. “You’ve felt so fucking small your whole life that now you’re starving for what it tastes like to be in control. But I can’t let you destroy me. I can’t let my daughter grow up watching me settle for less than I need from a man. She’ll learn to live the same way.”

“I can’t believe you’re doing this.”

“Aemond,” you say, and you wait until he looks at you. “Do you really want children?”

When he answers, his voice frayed and his right eye misty. “I love Cadi.”

“That’s not what I asked. Do you want children of your own with Christabel?”

“I have to,” he says, miserable.

“No,” you plead. “You cannot have a baby with that girl. You can’t, Aemond. You are going to ruin so many lives, not just your own.”

“I have to,” he says again.

“Then get out. Viserys owns you, and Viserys wouldn’t want you here. He would want you back at the mansion impregnating your child bride.”

“She’s a legal adult, she’s 19, and she wants me, she begs for me, I’m not twisting her arm—”

“Then go!” you roar, striking him hard, both palms to his chest. Aemond doesn’t budge. “Get out, go home, go have kids you won’t give a fuck about just like Viserys never cared about you. Go repeat the cycle all over again. I’m done. I can’t be a part of it.”

“I won’t be like him,” Aemond swears.

“You will be. You already are.” You shove him again, but still, Aemond doesn’t move. You know what he’s waiting for, you know the right word to say. But you can’t get it to launch from your lips; it catches in your throat like a blade through the windpipe. “Get out!”

Your fingers hook into the lapels of his black suit jacket and stay there; you can’t let go. You’re both breathing heavily; you can hear it, you can feel the heat in the air. You keep his jacket gripped in your hands, he can move no closer, no farther away. When he leans into you, you breathe in his smoke and cologne; when his hands cradle your face, you feel the benevolent power that once gave you peace.

I want him. I need him. Not forever, no, I understand that’s not possible. But just for right now.

You look up at him and Aemond kisses you, his lips and tongue claiming you like untouched land; he puts down roots, he slits the jugulars of trespassers.

Here. Now.

You drag him down with you. When you drop to the floor, you strike the back of your skull against the scuffed, sloping wood and bite back a yelp.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Aemond says, though it isn’t his fault; he reaches for your head and cushions it with his right hand. “Are you okay?”

“I’m okay.” You’re tearing open his white shirt; tiny translucent buttons go flying in every direction. Your palms glide over his chest, up to his throat, to his jaw, to knot in his hair. He reaches beneath your dress to slide off your panties, then buries his fingers between your legs. You moan helplessly, needfully, spreading your thighs wider for him. No man has ever been able to do this to you before: to make you forget everything, to make you feel—if only for a moment—beloved, worthy, chosen. He’s kissing you like he knows this is the last time. You’re touching the left side of his face and he doesn’t even notice, he won’t realize until later that there was a time when he was cured.

Aemond pulls his wallet out of the pocket of his suit pants, flips it open, and roots through it until he finds a condom. He starts to rip it open, moving with desperate speed, dire impatience.

“No, don’t,” you say. “Please don’t. I want all of you.” And I won’t get another chance.

He exhales in deep, ecstatic relief; he wants it too. You’re soaked, you’re ready, you’re aching for him like mending bones. He eases himself into you, gasping, and you are stunned by how good it feels already, how close you are, every rope of nerves and muscle glimmering with an opening heat that builds higher and higher, the reverse of a tornado finally touching down on earth. His hands are linked with yours and pinned to the floor above your head; he’s kissing you, he’s moaning into you, he thrusts deeper and harder when you beg him to do it.

Aemond untangles one hand from yours and reaches low to stroke you. Your fingers find his again and catch him, capture him, bring his hand back to the floor where it can be entwined with yours and his weight can hold it to the scraped wood. “I don’t need it, I’m close. Stay here. Stay with me.”

“I’m here,” he whispers, panting; and the friction of his body against yours overtakes you, and when you come it is blinding, bone-breaking, a whirlpool that traps you for what feels like over a minute, soaring highs punctuated by the illusion of fading over and over again until you think you can’t stand it, and only then does it end, Aemond collapsing on the floor beside you covered in your sweat and your wetness, you feeling the remnants of him bleeding down your bare thighs.

You drag yourself upright—muscles sore in your belly and back and thighs—and roll onto your knees so you can stagger to your feet. You tug on your panties so he doesn’t drip out of you onto the floor. Then you straighten the skirt of your black dress, turn on the little pink Panasonic boombox—it’s a U2 song, Where The Streets Have No Name—and begin washing a muffin tin that was left in the sink.

Aemond stands up and runs a hand through his hair, getting his bearings. He looks down at his pants and fixes his zipper and belt. He tries to close his shirt and then remembers you tore off the buttons. They lie scattered across the floor, useless.

As you scrub the muffin tin, you hear Aemond’s footsteps behind you. His palms begin at the small of your back and then skate around your waist to encircle you.

“Stop,” you tell him; and immediately his hands fall away. Aemond waits for you to say more, but you don’t. You don’t even look at him.

He walks to where the kitchen becomes the living room—you can tell by the creaks in the floor—and again, he waits. After a while he says: “I’ll call you when the new house is ready.”

“No. Have Criston handle it. I don’t ever want to talk to you again.”

“You get that I’m in love with you, right?” Aemond forces out, and when at last you turn to him there is the metallic glistening of tears on his right cheek. “I never feel this way about anyone. I don’t know how to handle it, I didn’t even know it was possible. But it’s true.”

“It’s not enough,” you say simply, and resume scrubbing the muffin tin.

He waits in silence, thirty seconds, a minute, two minutes. Then the door opens and shuts—like the jaws of a beast—and he’s gone.

#aemond targaryen x reader #aemond targaryen #aemond x you #aemond one eye #aemond x reader #aemond #aemond fanfiction #hotd aemond

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yall-batman-fanfic · 2 months ago

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The Crossroads | Damian Wayne/Robin & Batmom

Synopsis: Inspired by Batman & Robin #16, and I really want this possible ending for Damian Wayne in the Continuity.

It was the sound of the soft and barely heard knock on his door that pulled Damian from his reverie. Getting up from his bed, he opened the door, knowing it was the youngest member of their family, and he was right. A smile crept on his face as he saw two-year-old Valerie standing there with her infectious smile.

“Dami!” She held her hands out to him.

“Hi, Val,” He picked her up and let her play with his face.

But Valerie wasn’t the only one at the other side of the door. Damian saw Vivian leaning against the wall across his bedroom with her arms crossed over her chest and a smile on her face. With the way she was looking at him, he knew she wanted to talk to him. He had a feeling it was because she got a call from his school or maybe his father already told her about their last argument.

“Come in,” Damian told her. “And you don’t have to use Val as a conversation starter too. I’d gladly open the door for you, as long as Father isn’t with you.”

Vivian sighed and followed her youngest son inside. Closing the door after her, she removed her shoes to sit on his bed, cross legged, and had Valerie crawl towards her.

“What did Father tell you now?” Damian asked.

“A lot, but we can get to that later,” Vivian had Valerie standing and helped her walk to Damian. “I’ve been getting calls from your teachers at school, and the Headmaster too.”

Damian did not look fazed by it. So, he was right about it.

Vivian continued. “They said you’ve been skipping school.”

“Let me explain,” Damian started.

Vivian reached out to hold his hand, calming him down. “And then your father told me that you and him had a spat the other night and since then you both haven’t been talking. He said you were skipping patrols.”

Damian frowned. “He didn’t tell you why I wanted to skip one night of patrol?”

“He said you forged his signature so you can volunteer at the hospital,” Vivian broke any idea in his mind that Bruce was giving half-truths. “I know that you and him didn’t really talk about it, but this time. I just want to understand – I need to know, Damian. What’s wrong? What’s going on?”

Damian sighed. He pulled Valerie to him to sit on his lap and play with his hands as he thought about what to say. “I’ve been reading Thomas Wayne’s journals. He writes about sacred heart in there, and I went there. To check on Emma. The girl who was hurt. Dr. Bashar asked if I wanted to volunteer, and I… like you said, I forged Father’s signature on a form.”

Vivian adjusted herself to sit beside Damian and they both leaned back on the pillows, and had Valerie settle between them. But she still had an arm around Damian to keep him close to her.

“They scheduled me for that night I told Father that I’d be skipping patrol. It was by mistake. I was not planning to go, but… when he found out, I thought… instead of Arkham I could go there instead. He exaggerated – as usual – thinking that skipping one night of patrol would mean I was skipping all the same… or that I was quitting — but I’m not quitting… I don’t think.”

Vivian had Valerie move to her other side so she was beside Damian, the girl noticed and got on her feet to climb on her mother, but Damian saw her and took the toddler so she could sit on his lap again.

“Has the thought of quitting cross your mind?” Vivian asked.

He was silent for a time. “When Father was my age, he walked across the Earth to find himself, and you said that when you were my age, you gone through this stage where you had to find yourself. That’s where the occult thing started right?”

“Actually,” Vivian took a breath. “The occult thing was more of me grieving for my mother. She was a huge part of my life and when she died, she left a huge hole in me. It was like all this time, I had this warmth hugging me, keeping me safe, and then when she was gone, so did that warmth and I was left in a cold place. Alone, scared, vulnerable. I did all of that to find her, to make sense of this pain I was feeling. To numb myself.”

“I see.” Damian held her hand and rest his temple on her shoulder. Is that what it would feel like when she’s gone too? Damian thought. Will he feel empty when she finally passes? He wouldn’t admit it but Vivian has brought a warmth in his life, one that he never got from his own Mother or his Father – even when Bruce is trying to be an okay father.

“But I can say that my decision to go to Gotham University was my version to walk across the earth. Like a cheap version… one that needed a scholarship, a loan, and part-time jobs.” She laughed but Damian didn’t. It only pissed him off how his father would overlook the privilege he had growing up — to run away to travel and find himself, while people like Vivian (those not born in riches) had to make do with what they have and what opportunities present themselves.

Vivian continued, “My time in Gotham University gave me clarity. It was one of the times I was at my lowest point and the time I struggled to get back on my feet and get my life back together. It was also then I realized I love teaching… your father doesn’t know this but I also volunteered in some charities to teach kids how to read while I was studying. Not exactly the Wayne Foundation, but some other charities who needed an extra hand.”

“And that’s how you found your calling?” Damian asked.

“I guess. Sweetheart, I know it’s hard to figure out who you are, with you also have to be Robin, and then at this stage of your life… this is the time where you are supposed to find out who you want to be or who you’re meant to be. I told Dick that it’s okay to try something new and make a lot of mistakes… and I know that you never want to make mistakes, but it’s okay.

“And people your age are going around trying things, quitting on some, and trying another so they know what it was they want to do.”

Damian scoffed. “Like Father would ever let Robin do that.”

Vivian frowned. “I know… it’s either you’re in or you’re out in this business.”

“I want to keep helping people,” Damian stated, determined with that. “But I’m just not sure if I want to keep helping them this way. Having to wear a mask, patrols, the fighting… I know it’s crazy because I was created to be the ultimate weapon – created by Talia al Ghul with her and Batman’s DNA, raised and train by the League of Assassins and Ras al Ghul, trained by Batman to be Robin. I’m a weapon, my purpose is to keep fighting.”

“Is that so?” Vivian smiled. “You once said to Jon that he has no choice in the matter when the time comes he needs to be Superman, and the same goes for you when it’s time for Batman to pass the cowl… but that was a long time ago.”

Damian frowned at the memory. How he wanted the cowl for so long and now… he wasn’t sure about it.

Does he still want to be Batman?

“Damian,” Vivian sat up and had him follow her so they could talk face to face. She had him look at her and she said, “You are now at the crossroads of your life, and right now what I can see is you’re battling in the inside between the clear path that the people around you have forged for you to follow and the path that is unknown, filled with uncertainty, bumps, and an adventure you’d never know until you try.

“I won’t lie, this is going to be a hard choice for you to choose, and sometimes you’ll go back to the start and decide to take the other path, or the other, or the other. But know this, son, I will be here to help, to guide you, and support you,” she wiped the tears falling from his eyes. “And I will be there with you, at your side hold your hand until you see this through.

“There are no right or wrong answers to this, Damian. And I promise no one will ever be disappointed in whatever path you take. Okay? I am so proud of you, my boy. And though we started a little rough, I would go through all that again if it means having you here with me and you calling me ‘Mom’.”

Unable to hide his tears any more, Damian hugged Vivian and hid his face on her shoulder. “Thank you, Mom,” he sobbed.

“You are now at the crossroads, my boy. It’s going to be a hard journey, but I’ll be there for you. It would mean questioning a lot of things — there will be doubt, but always remember your family is here for you. Okay?” Vivian kissed the top of his head.

Damian nodded and kept holding his mother tight.

Valerie, who could see her brother was upset, got up and patted his cheek. “Dami,” she whimpered, tears building up. “No cry,” her voice cracked.

Damian turned to her, wiping his tears and bringing her to an embrace. “It’s okay, Val. I’m alright.”

“Hurt?” Valerie asked, tapping on his chest.

“No… not hurt,” he turned to his mother, smiling. “Relieved. I feel so much lighter now. Much lighter that I was before.”

Vivian wiped his tears that stained his cheek and pressed her forehead on his. “I love you, sweetheart. And so does your Father, okay?”

Damian chuckled. “I guess.”

“Abuu!” Valerie told him. It was I love you in her own way of saying.

“Come on, let’s get something from the kitchen. How does ice cream sound?” Vivian got up.

“I want chocolate,” said Damian, following her with Valerie in his arms.

“Okay,” Vivian had an arm around him as they walked down the hall. “Don’t worry about your father, I’ll talk to him. And give me the schedules you have in the hospital so we can talk about when Robin gets a break too.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

~ Far into the Future ~

Terry wouldn’t be surprised that everyone of Bruce Wayne’s children are skilled in martial arts, and knows a thing or two on stitching wounds. But who would have thought Bruce Wayne’s most bloodthirsty works at Sacred Heart Convalescent Home.

Normally it would be Valerie who stitches up his wounds, but for this one, she had to call for help to get this injury patched up. He knew it would be one of the Batkids, but he didn’t expect Damian Wayne to appear with a medical bag and a scowl on his face that was pointed at his father, who was standing there at Valerie’s side, watching them.

“There, all done,” Damian finished the stitch. “Normally, our mother would do some magic to finish the job completely, but with her dealing with things with the Endless at the moment, this would do,” he handed Terry some pain medication – two tablets – “Once a day,” he said firmly. “And knowing you won’t sit down and rest because you’re just as stubborn as the old man, make sure your movements are marginal so you don’t pop a stitch. If you do, call me — she’s still not that good at stitching. In fact, don't give her a scalpel. I remember her frog dissection project and it was horrifying.”

Valerie huffed at her brother and crossed her arms over her chest.

Seeing his sister’s reaction, Damian messed with her hair and said, “But I’d trust her to have your back on the field.”

“Val doesn’t go on the field,” Bruce said, sternly.

Damian sighed and said to his sister, “I better get going, I got surgery in a couple of hours.”

“Okay, need me to drive you there?” Valerie asked.

“No, I got it. Stay here and look after those two and tell Mom that I came by,” Damian hugged his sister and kissed her on the forehead. “I’ll see you around, Penny.”

Valerie smiled and hugged him back. “You too, Robin,” she whispered. “Love you!”

With Damian gone, Valerie had Terry move to the manor and settled him in one of the rooms up there. She left him for a moment to see her father, who she helped to his bed and his medication – since her mom wasn’t there at the moment – before coming back to him with a hot soup and bread.

“Damian said that you need to build up your strength,” she placed the tray beside him.

“Thanks, Val,” Terry was trembling when he tried to get the spoon, and he was having a hard time leaning down to get a sip, so Valerie took the tray and the spoon from him and shoved the spoonful of soup into his mouth. “Thanks,” he muttered at the violent way she did it. “So, Doctor Damian Wayne?”

“Yeah,” Valerie held out the spoon for him.

“He’s the youngest of the Robins, right?”

“Yup. The blood son of the Batman,” she chuckled at the memory on how her older brothers would tease Damian. “And the bloodthirsty.”

He knew it.

“So, how did he…”

“Suddenly become a doctor dedicated to saving lives?”

“Yeah.”

“He went through a lot… a lot of thinking, self-doubt, eventually he was at that time of his life where he needed to decide what he wants to do. How he wants to help people, and then he suddenly hung up the cape and the mask and went to Med School. Everyone was in shock when he said that he was quitting and that he wanted to study medicine.”

“How did Bruce take it?”

Valerie took a breath. “Hard but Mom was there to soften the blow. We’re proud of him, for what he’s doing. And though he’s a doctor, Damian Wayne still knows how to kick ass but not in a lethal way. But he’ll still dangle you over the building if you mess with him, his patients and his family.”

“Speaking from experience?” Terry joked.

“Let’s just say, he and the Robins and Batman hunted down a man who kidnapped me and he dangled someone over the railways to get information. And he was in Medical School at that time too.”

“Oh. And him and Bruce? Did something happen to them?” Terry asked, sensing the tension between he father and son earlier.

“Since he became a doctor, he didn’t like it when Batman recruits minors to do crime fighting.”

“Kind of hypocritical, don’t you think?”

Valerie shoved a spoon into his mouth. Terry made a mental note to not hire Valerie Pryor-Wayne as a personal nurse.

“He grew up and had a few realizations,” Val shrugged. “Nothing hypocritical about that. Finish this so I can head back and study the case, I also gotta look at some things we found at Midnite’s club too.”

Terry chuckled, “Yes, Ma’am.”

~*~

Sitting in his office, Damian prepared himself for his surgery by studying the charts of his patient over and over again. Trying to find the best way to do this efficiently and without complications.

The sudden presence in the room did not pull him from his concentration, but when she had a hand on his shoulder did he finally turn away from the charts and looked at the woman standing there.

“Mom,” He squeezed her hand and smiled at her. “Family dinner’s done?”

Vivian Pryro-Wayne has aged, just like her husband, her red hair now had streaks of white t. She had wrinkles on her face and neck, but was still as beautiful as she was when she was younger. And the look in her eyes and the smile on her face never changed whenever she is with her husband and her children.

“Yeah, it’s done,” Vivian sighed. “We had to settle some things with the stewards of Hell. And the case that Val and Terry are doing are a bit connected with the one we’re dealing with.”

“You and John?” Damian got up poured a glass of scotch for his mother.

“Yup.”

Damian sighed. “You gotta stop this, Mom. You’re not as young as you used to.”

“I know, I know, but unlike Batman, I don’t get to retire from this. As long as this power is with me, I have responsibilities to keep the balance of the cosmos… balanced.”

“Very articulate,” he teased.

Vivian laughed, then brought her son to an embrace.

“You should head home and rest, Mom.”

“I know, but I just want to see how you are.”

“I got surgery in a couple of hours… but I’m doing fine.”

Vivian smiled and kissed his cheek. “I know you are. I’m proud of you, Damian. Always remember that.”

Damian smiled and held his mother tight. “I know. Thank you, Mom.”

#batfam #batman x reader #batman #dc fanfic #fanfic #bruce wayne #batman fanfiction #dc universe #dc batman #dc comics

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tf2occontest · 13 days ago

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Navyman's Bane (Navy) VS Rico Black

(Full matchup list here)

Alright team, here's a recap: This is a contest to determine who amongst you will take the top of the leaderboards and be hired at TFI! Simply put, whoever gets the most votes gets to move on, and whoever doesn't... Well. They'll be put down swiftly and cleanly. :}

So, mann your stations, because here are your next contestants! Vote for your favorite mercenary who you want to win the TF2 OC Contest! - P

OC INFO UNDER THE CUT!

We highly encourage you to take a peek to make your decision!

Navyman's Bane (Navy)

@scoutbot

Image credit: @/scoutbot

navyman's bane is a magic sword puppeting a human corpse. they were forged during the golden age of piracy and immediately after enchanted by a wizard, granting them incredible magic power and sapience. though they were content to be wielded by humans for the first part of their existence, after getting stuck on a sinking ship, staying there for 200ish years diminishing their power by pushing away the sea, and then getting recovered and put in a museum that opinion rapidly changed.

being a demoknight for RED is the closest thing navy could find to the life they were used to in tf2's modern day. theyre certainly having fun, but sometimes they do mourn for the life they once had as something feared and respected, and not a pawn in a useless war. they love to tell (often embellished) tales of their time as a pirates sword and claim to have been wielded by just about every famous pirate and even spent time aboard the flying dutchman.

Rico Black

@blackblackheart

Image credit: @/mickmundane

Project BLAK Dossier: Rico Andrew Black

Somewhere in a dented file cabinet in an exploded base in the middle of the desert, a file that will never be found again.

(TW: Disturbing content)

—————————————————-

Name: Rico Andrew Black (Note- not true surname. True surname unknown.)

Designation: Sniper

Age At Time of Acquirement: 9

Current Age: 35

Height: 6'1’’

Weight: 125 lbs. (Note- attempts to get Rico to eat properly have met in failure. Have induced him to eat via command, does not help. Metabolism is normal. Possible bulimia/anorexia? May also be form of rebellion.)

Sexuality: Unknown (Note- Rico has not been witnessed engaging with other members of his team or other people in general in a flirtatious manner- lack of data.)

Respawn Chip?: Yes

Theater?: Yes

Aware?: No Yes- control revealed after rogue behavior, as punishment

Personality: Rico is a ‘wild child’. Mischievous and high-energy. Despite this, he has taken to his training well, and is proud-to-arrogant of his achievements and growing skill. UPDATE: Rico has grown hot-headed and rebellious. Seems to greatly enjoy sowing chaos and discord- believes himself untouchable. Arrogant, but takes little seriously but his skills. UPDATE: Upon revelation of his Theater sessions, Rico has grown sullen and detached. Melancholy has grown worse over time- swings between depressive and hateful attitudes. Has added alcohol to his vice of nicotine, drinks to excess. Attempted to steal from medical stores- stopped and reprimanded. Still functions as an asset despite this, though devoid of his previous relish.

Team BLAK asset status: ACTIVE

Signature- Dr. M. Lang, Medic

———————————————-

In a drawer in a desk in an office at Mann Co. Headquarters:

Employee File

Name: Rico Andrew Black

Date of Employment: TBA

Position: Gunman, Hunting Assistant

Notes: I found Rico at Helen’s damnable side project. After I singlehandedly destroyed Helen’s damnable side project WITH MY BARE FISTS, I asked him for a demonstration of his skills. Boy is a crack shot if I ever saw one! Offered him a job on the spot. He seemed overjoyed, as he should be! But then he seemed sad, which was the damnest thing. He said he wanted the job but could not accept it until something something soul searching something ‘getting his shit together’.

Gave him full base access, leave to fill in on needed mercenary spots, and provisions when requested. Have his word that he will take position. I am not sure how long ‘getting one’s shit together’ takes, but I do hope he won’t dally too long! There are animals that need shot and punched out by the fists of SAXTON HALE! and his trusty side gunman.

[This just got signed by SAXTON HALE!]

The Real Goods:

Name: Rico Andrew Black

Class: Sniper

Team: Unaffiliated/Freelance Stand-In

Age: 37

Rico was adopted at a young age from an Australian orphanage, to be used as part of a side project by the Administrator- an elite mercenary team, honed by intense training, genetic alteration, and mental control to eliminate Teams that Helen felt were too 'compromised'. Members of Team BLAK included similarly acquired orphans as well as members of the R&D Team, along with one unaltered 'control group' member with a suitable lack of morals and lust for murder.

Rico grew up about as well adjusted as you can expect someone raised to be an organic weapon to grow up- rebellious and arrogant as anyone who knows he can't be outshot, and in love with the concept and causation of chaos as anyone thrashing against a stifling environment their entire lives. These acts of rebellion were tolerated for a surprisingly long time, until one day. Rico still can't recall what that final straw was- all he remembers is the absolute fury on the face of Dr. Lang- Team Medic, Head of R&D Medical, and, on paper anyway, his adoptive father. As punishment for whatever that forgotten transgression was, Rico was shown his leash and chain- code words implanted in his mind to force him to obey commands given to him. He was also informed he would be kept on a tighter tether from then on.

If that was the only punishment meted out to the Sniper that day it would have been distressing enough. But there was something unintended that occured- Alexandre Coeurnoir, the Team Spy, had overheard everything, and wasn't about to let full control of another human being go to waste. From then on, Rico's life went from stifling to unbearable as he found himself at the mercy of Alexandre's every whim, unable to either tell anyone about what was happening or escape from it. He was helplessly bound in the web of a terrible spider and, as the Spy teased, there was no hope of rescue. No one would come to save him nor care enough to. Any attempts to run away was met with an eventual undeniable pull to return, and he was as blocked from taking a more permanent exit as he was from telling a soul about his torment. His only means of coping came from alcohol, nicotine, disassociation, and his one joy- his beloved motorcycle, Baby. He would ride into the desert for days at a time, denying the call as long as his shackled mind would allow, and pretend he was the apex predator he once fancied himself as.

And then…

With the other members of Team BLAK either dead or scattered to finally live their own lives, Rico has kept himself busy keeping his promise to Saxton Hale. He lives primarily at Sawmill, in a treehouse he found in the forest and has since made his own, only going indoors when winter makes it too cold to be outside at length. While solitude suits him, he has made a handful of friends and is slowly but surely learning the one thing he was never taught- how to be a human being.

#tf2occontest2024 #poll #round 2 #navyman's bane #rico black #scoutbot #blackblackheart

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hunted-moth · 7 months ago

Text

Just Like Him Chapter Five If Only We Were In France

Wordcount // 2k

Summary // Dr. Jenner feels as though it’s better if you stay locked in the basement of the CDC

Warning //Angst, Language, Death, Killing of Walkers, Typical TWD stuff really

OTHER STUFF//wow this really short lmao

A/N // LETSS GOOO last chapter. After this, I'm gonna take a small break from posting chapters. I'll be writing for season two, but I'm gonna write all the drafts and then post them when I'm done editing/proofing it lol

***: Major time Skip/scene change

*: small time skip/scene change

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was quiet and tense as you and Carl read a book on the couch in Lori's room. After the events from that morning, no one was really in the mood to talk. The only words Lori said were to Carl. Telling him to study and stuff. So to get your mind off everything, you decided to read a book on mushrooms and other stuff on forging.

While you were reading you heard a noise and saw Lori stand up and reach her hand up to the ceiling vents.

“Something wrong Mom?” Carl asked, you looked to her for answers as she turned to you both.

“It’s, uhh…nothing, the air just stopped working.” she looked around then a moment later the lights went out. You gathered your books and followed Lori as she poked her head out to ask others if they were experiencing the same thing.

Then from your view, you could see Jenner walking down the hall with his signature speed. Everyone started to bombard him with questions about what was going on and why the lights were out.

“Energy use is being prioritized” he answered the questions bluntly. Dale got a shocked look on his face at the answer

“Air isn't a priority, and lights?” he asked the man who didn't even blink an eye towards him

“It's not up to me, zone fine is shutting itself down” Then he disappeared behind a corner. You all quickly followed him as Daryl demanded answers from him. Daryl matched his speed and got in his face.

“Hey man I'm talking to you, what do you mean it's shutting itself down??” the more you walked the closer you got to the big room. You soon met up with Rick the others who went to look around.

“What's happening?” Rick demanded, but Jenner just flew past him. Throwing the explanation over his shoulder.

“The system is dropping all the nonessential uses of power. It’s designed to keep the computers running to the last possible second. That started as we approached the half-hour mark.” he checked his watch as he stopped “Right on schedule” and then continued walking.

He stopped, and everyone stared at him. All of them were scared and didn’t know what was gonna happen. You looked to Dale as he put his arm around you, shielding you. You saw Jenner bow his head and looked at the rest of you before he spoke again.

“It was the French” he spoke cooly and bluntly. You scrunched your eyebrows in confusion, what does the French have to do with this right now, you thought.

“They were the last ones to hold out as far as I know. While our people were bolting out the doors and committing suicide in the hallways, they stayed in the labs till the end” he took a breath “They thought they were close to a solution” he said sadly.

“What happened?” Jacqui asked his softy. You looked at him again.

“The same thing happening now.” he looked around “No power grid, the place ran out of juice” he threw his arms up like a madman “The whole world runs off fossil fuel, I mean how stupid is that!” Jenner looked to you all again.

Shane grew pissed as he stared down the scientist. “I'll tell you what” he began to walk towards the man, but Rick cut him off.

“To hell with it Shane, I don't even care” he turned to you three “Lori grab our things, the rest of you, grab your stuff, we’re getting out of here NOW!”

As you all began to leave a loud alarm filled your ears. You covered your ears as VI's voice came over the intercom.

“30 minutes to decantation” You looked to Lori and Rick confused then looked to the clock, and sure enough, the clock had thirty minutes remaining. During the confusion, you saw Jenner enter something and then you heard Rick yelling at everyone to hurry and grab their belongings. You ran after the metal door about the pass it when it shut on you.

You looked back to see Jenner talking to the computer monitor as everything sunk in. ‘he just locked us in here, were gonna die’ You wanted to cry but at that point, you felt nothing. This was supposed to be a safe haven, nothing was gonna go wrong, but it’s been all wrong since you got here.

But Shane attacked Lori and now the mad scientist just locked in here to die. Your attention was pulled away when you saw Darly run toward Jenner as he tried to hit him. But T-dog and Shane held him back.

Once Shane and T-dog got Daryl away from Jenner, Rick demanded that he open the doors, but Jenner kept saying that he doesn't control the doors, the computers do

“Can’t you override the doors? Please you have to do something” you begged the man as he looked back at you then Rick.

“What happens in twenty-eight minutes?! What happens!?” Rick demanded from Jenner but that pissed Jenner off as he went on a rant about the CDC. But he controlled himself as he sat down again and explained the protocol.

“In the event of a catastrophic power failure—in a terrorist attack, for example—H.I.T.s are deployed to prevent any organisms from getting out.” you looked at him confused and scared, Jenner signed and looked down as he had VI defined H.I.T.s

“high-impulse thermo baric fuel-air explosives consist of a two-stage aerosol ignition that produces a blast wave of significantly greater power and duration than any other known explosive except nuclear. The vacuum-pressure effect ignites the oxygen at between 5,000 degrees and 6,000 degrees and is useful when the greatest loss of life and damage to structures is desired” VI explained in its soulless robotic voice.

“It sets the air on fire, it's painless” Jenner tried to comfort everyone but it was drowned out by Carol and Sophia's cries of anguish. “An end to sorrow and grief-” Jenner was cut off by a smash of glass.

“OPEN THIS DAMN DOOR, NOW!” Daryl yelled making you jump as you looked back at the door now dripping with liquor.

Shane then rushed past you with an axe then Daryl somehow got an axe and they both started to hit the door but it did nothing, it barely left a scratch. A pit began in your stomach as they continued to hack at the door. Jenner kept spewing bullshit about how this was better. You wanted to ring his neck, because if you died, then your mother would have died for nothing.

“Can't make a dent,” Shane said with a deep breath, then Jenner sighed and pinched his nose.

“Those doors are meant to withstand a rocket blaster” That's when you felt Daryl rush past you with the axe held high.

“WELL YOUR HEAD AINT!” everybody rushed towards him and pulled him back as Jenner stepped back away from the scene. Something in Jenner must've snapped inside him as he stared at Rick.

“You wanted this, you said it was a matter of time before everybody you knew and loved was dead,” Jenner said cooly while looking Rick dead in the eye. Everyone was looking at Rick, with confusion, shock, and anger.

“What? You really said that after all your big talk?” Shane said in disbelief. Rick looked around before his eyes locked on Lori's confused and hurt face.

“I had to keep hope alive didn't I?” Rick looked around desperately. But Jenner just interjected again.

“There is no hope, there never was” You looked down solemnly.

“There’s always hope. Maybe it won’t be you, maybe not here but somebody somewhere-” Andrea cut Rick off, making her mind known.

“What part of ‘everything is gone’ do you not understand” Her tone sounded annoyed and done.

“Listen to your friend. She gets it. This is what takes us down. This is our extinction event.” Jenner reasoned that what he said was common sense. Like it was a known fact that humans would die because the dead were eating the living. You didn't like it, you balled your fist as your body went ridged and some tears leaked from your face.

You really couldn't believe this is where you would die, stuck underground with a whole bunch of people, and not surrounded by family when you were old and frail in a hospital. You couldn't even say goodbye to your brother, you couldn't see him anymore because your body would be nothing, not even dust.

You were pulled from your thought when you heard a gun cock, making you look up to see Shane also rushing Jenner. You were actually kinda hoping he would shoot him so that he could suffer in his last moments.

Rick tried to intervene Shane's path but Shane just pushed out of the way and aimed the shotgun.

“Out of the way, Rick! Stay out of my way! OPEN THAT DOOR OR I’M GONNA BLOW YOUR HEAD OFF. DO YOU HEAR ME?” he shouted in Jenner's face with the shotgun pointed at his head. Rick ran up to Shane and tried to pull him away again, trying to reason with him.

“Brother, brother, this is not the way you do this. We will never get out of here.” he stared into his eyes, Lori tried to convince him but he gave neither a reaction as he stared into Jenner's soul. You swear you saw Shane's finger twitch around the trigger before Rick spoke again.

“He dies, we all die” Shane looked at Rick then screamed and began to shoot the monitor screens behind Jennifer's head before Rick wrestled the gun out of Shane's hands. During the struggle, Shane began to fight back causing Rick to hit him with the butt of the gun, knocking Shane to the ground.

Rick lectures Shane while handing the gun to T-dog. He then composed himself and looked Jenner dead in the eyes.

“I think you’re lying” Jenner looked at him confused “You’re lying about there being no hope. If that were true, you’d have bolted with the rest or taken the easy way out. You didn’t. You chose the hard path. Why?” Rick got up in his face, looking into his soul.

“It doesn't matter” Jenner brushed it off and looked to the computer screen. But Rick didn't like that answer and questioned him again. Sometimes you forget he’s a cop.

“It does matter, it always matters. You stayed, and others ran, why?” Jenner was getting mad now. You could see the way his eyes and eyebrows narrowed causing his face to winkle in anger.

“Not because I wanted to. I made a promise.” he stood up and pointed to the screen, TS-19 still projected, “To her. My wife.” he said with so much restraint like he was willing himself to stay composed.

You felt pity for Jenner when he revealed the identity of the subject, just a smidge, you still wanted to leave the damn basement.

“She begged me to keep going as long as I could. How could I say no?” he said sadly. In the distance you could hear pounding on the door again, looking over your shoulder you saw Daryl trying and failing at breaking the door down.

“She was dying. It should’ve been me on that table. I wouldn’t have mattered to anybody. She was a loss to the world. Hell, she ran this place. I just worked here.” he took a breath and composed himself “In our field she was an Einstein. Me? I’m just… Edwin Jenner. She could’ve done something about this. Not me.” Jenner was a broken man on the inside, you could tell.

“Your wife didn’t have a choice. You do. That’s—that’s all we want—a choice, a chance.” Rick looked at the man earnestly.

“Let us keep trying! As long as we can” Lori pleaded with him. She locked eyes with him, her soft kind, and desperate eyes, then sighed and turned to the keypad again. You hear those femoral beeps again and jump up, grabbing your stuff, but what he said made you bold to the doors.

“I told you, everything topside is locked up” Then the door opened. Everyone was grabbing their stuff and running out. But when you looked back two people didn't follow.

Andrea and Jaqui.

You didn't have time to register why didn't follow because Daryl practically dragged you down the halls? You make it to the lobby. Glenn and T-dog went to try the doors but they wouldn't budge. Then Daryl and Shane went at the glass with axes, which didn't work either.

Everyone was freaking out and running, trying to figure out how to get out. Then you saw Shane load a shotgun and back away. When he fired the gun, all it did was cause a huge spider web crack. Then Carol walked up to Rick.

“I think I have something” You looked at her and saw the goddamn grenade in her hand “When I washed your uniform, I found this in your pocket” Rick took the weapon and everyone backed up to hide from the blast. You hid behind some stairwells and crouched down, covering your ears and bracing for the impact.

BOOM

You heard the sound of glass breaking and peeked out from behind the stairs and got up and and ran to the rest of the group, following them out as they ran. The once foul smell of the area didn't bother you, it reminded you that you were alive for another minute.

Walkers were limping towards your group but you paid no mind as Rick and Shane handled them. Your eyes were on the blue truck in front of you.

You ran with Daryl as you ran for the blue pickup. He was in the lead making sure there weren't any walkers. He reached the pick-up first and opened the door urging you inside.

“Comon hurry up!” he yelled at you. You jumped he pushed in the foot space area then got in himself. And just as soon as he did that, you heard the building blow. You covered your ears as you felt the truck sway from the blast. Daryl lay flat against the bench of the cab. When it was over you looked out the window to see nothing but fire and rubble.

“You okay?” he asked as he looked at the building. You nodded your head quietly.

“Ye-yeah, you?” you asked, not tearing your eyes away. All you got was “hpm” in response. Moments later you got out of the foot space and sat down on the seat. Daryl sat on the divers side and started the truck when the other vehicles started driving off.

Once a beacon of hope for your group, is now reduced to flames.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Next // Coming Soon

Previous // A mad Scientist Gave Us Pasta

Taglist // @your-shifting-gurl, @underrated-jellygirl,

// Masterlist //

#fanfic #twd #daryl dixon #x reader fanfiction #platonic reader #teen reader #daryl x teen reader #twd daryl #daryl fanfiction

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scotianostra · 2 months ago

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December 1761 saw the death of Alastair Ruadh MacDonnell, the government spy in the Jacobite camp known as "Pickle".

Born in around 1725, the eldest son of John Macdonell, chief of Glengarry. He was brought up as a Catholic and sent to France while still a boy, where he later became a captain in Lord John Drummond's Scots Royals regiment in 1743, when the French were planning to invade England under pretext of restoring the Stuarts, of which Jacobite clans like the Glengarry Macdonells were of course in favour.

While in France, he met Charles Edward Stuart (‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’), who had arrived from Rome to join the expedition, and stayed with him in Paris after the French abandoned the idea of an invasion. He visited Scotland early in 1745, in order to sound out political feeling there, but returned to France to warn that clan chiefs would support a rising only if backed by French money and arms. Unfortunately, by the time he reached France, Charles had sailed for Scotland to begin the 1745 Jacobite rising.

That autumn, Glengarry sailed with the Scots Royals to join the Jacobite army, but his ship was captured by the British navy off Deal and he was imprisoned in the Tower of London. On his release in 1747 he returned to Paris, where he lived in severe poverty, unable to obtain any financial help from either Charles Stuart or his father James (‘the Old Pretender’). On the death of Donald Cameron of Lochiel, who had become Colonel of the Scots-French Albany regiment in France after his escape from Scotland, Glengarry applied to succeed him in the command, but was turned down.

By the end of 1749 he was living in London, still extremely poor, and secretly trying to obtain permission to settle in Britain. A few months later, however, he reappeared, plainly now in possession of ample funds, and it is generally believed that he had somehow managed to steal some of the Loch Arkaig Treasure, gold sent from Spain to support the Jacobite rising in 1746, which had arrived too late to be of any use and had been concealed for the use of Jacobite supporters. Glengarry was accused of forging James Stuart’s signature to obtain this money.

In the 19th century, Scottish historian Andrew Lang was able to show that Glengarry was in fact a British agent, operating under the code name ‘Pickle’, and that he had been largely responsible for the betrayal of the Jacobite Elibank plot in 1752 and the subsequent capture and execution of Dr Archibald Cameron, Lochiel’s brother, in 1753.

The British government seems to have had Cameron executed on an old warrant instead of bringing him to trial in order to avoid exposing Glengarry. He continued to act as a spy until 1754, when his paymaster, Prime Minister Henry Pelham, died, and he succeeded as Glengarry chief on his father's death in September of the same year. He never married, and on his death in Glengarry in 1761 was succeeded as chief by his nephew Donald.

It is likely that he was recruited as a spy during his imprisonment in the Tower of London, and that he accepted the job due to his poverty and a sense of disillusionment with the Stuarts. He may also have had a grudge against the Camerons, as his brother had been killed accidentally by a Cameron clansman at the battle of Falkirk. He was never exposed during his lifetime and his role as a spy was only revealed by Andrew Lang 150 years later, after extensive resesearch.

#scotland #scottish #history #spy #jacobites #hanoverian #45 uprising

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poraphia · 1 year ago

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alright so

The reader has been involved in the East L’manburg mafia since they were 17-19 years old (shortly before they met Wilbur). They work as a forger of signatures and documents, since they have a steady hand and artistic inclination (can’t draw that well though. Only can copy handwriting. Go figure.). maybe they were in juvie, maybe they were in a group home (thinking about the book “allegedly”), but whatever their situation was, the mafia helped them pay themselves out of it and land a steady part time career as a laboratory assistant (plus some money to enroll in university). they keep most of the details about their life hidden from everyone, even Wilbur. The only thing he knows is that they were in some sort of a group home, but the details are obscure— and they took a while to tell him that, too. They didn’t want the syndicate doing a background check on them and revealing some details they’d rather stay hidden. Tl;dr: lots of trust issues.

But Wilbur is so sweet, and Philza and Techno are great people, so they stick around. They learn to juggle their life with the mafia and their life with the Soots. The reader is convinced they’ll be fine, they can keep digging this hole for themselves without meeting any consequences. But consequences DO come, and they come in the form of a completely accidental car accident on the readers way to work. They are rushed to the hospital (Wilbur gets a phone call and is beside himself with worry), and are told that although their dominant hand will be fine in the long run, it will never be able to work properly again. So they can write— but they can no longer forge signatures and handwriting like they used to. Therefore, they are now a liability to the mafia. of course the mafia finds out, and has a little “chat” with them. The reader returns home with a black eye and a busted lip, but promises Wilbur that they just tripped and fell down the stairs. He almost believes them.

And then there’s the Actual Accident. Maybe a building collapses, maybe there’s a gas leak and the readers apartment explodes. Either way, charred bodies are found in the building, and the reader is presumed dead. they aren’t actually dead, having out on an errand when the accident occurs. They go back to the scene immediately, wanting to tell Wilbur that they’re okay—- but spot some mafia members digging around in the rubble. The reader overhears the mafia members pronounce them dead, and watches them leave. with this sight comes a few key realizations: first, they no longer have a bounty over their head. Normally, the mafia would wait a couple weeks before killing a target, just to get them to lower their guard. Now, though, the reader is truly safe. Second: if they asked protection from the syndicate, the Soots could be endangered. Wilbur and co. might be able to protect them physically, but the mafia would do anything to get to their target. Including doing extensive research on this protecting them. If the reader hid behind the Syndicate, the mafia could discover the Syndicates true identities and pawn the info off to the heroes. it wouldn’t be the first time that the mafia bribed and involved itself with the heroes committee.

So the reader doesn’t come back. They let Wilbur (and the mafia) think they have died.

then they probably sneakily kill off the mafia members during their “missing and presumed dead” period idk

anyway idk how the reader explains this to siren after he calms down. probably in a dark room, sitting with their backs together, facing opposite walls.

siren also probably asks something like “were you about to LET me kill you back there?”

angst haha

ALRIGHT CRACKING MY KNUCKLES AFTER SLAVING OVER SCHOOL WORK LETS DO THIS

btw OOOHH MY GOD this was such a juicy backstory literally love it the idea that reader has their own secret life (much like a lot of the characters in tcfsv) and its a whole gritty, not so fun, twisted story of its own just MWAH

---

It's been four hours since Siren used his honey-tone voice.

It's been four hours since Apollo found Siren hovering over the broken vigilante as blood dribbled from their lips and bruises brandished a fresh pink.

It's been four hours since Blade had to pin Siren down with Zehphyrus shielding (y/n) with his wings and Apollo healing various bruises scattered all over their body.

And most importantly, it's been four hours since Techno and Tommy threw them in Wil's rooms together and was told to talk it out, despite Wil's protest. He and (y/n) sat with their backs pressed together in the middle of his bedroom. (y/n) clutched what once was a rich hot chocolate, taking momentary sips between their words.

Wilbur sat there, rendered speechless as he listened to their pain-ridden words. It was a story not easily mumbled by them, and if anything, he was the first person to even hear what torture they had to go through.

Silent tears were streaming down (y/n)'s face, but they were determined to fight through their stutters and trembles.

"I-I know it was selfish." They whispered. Their hands wrapped tightly around the half empty mug. "T-That I should've called you to at least let you know I was safe but I--"

"Are they still alive?" Wilbur spoke gently, but his words, even without his siren voice, had so much power behind them. It sent a shiver up their spine.

"N-No. I killed them off before I even became a vigilante." They let out a dry chuckle, but nothing could soothe the thick tension in the room. It became quiet now. Only the humming of the a/c and the nocturnal crickets of the night filled the atmosphere.

Then, Wilbur spoke again.

"You," He paused as bit, almost as if registering his own words. "You almost let me kill you." He muttered almost breathlessly. (y/n) didn't speak. Instead, their silence said enough.

"Why?" He asked. "(y-y/n), don't you realize what I'm saying?!" Desperately he ran his fingers through his hair as attempt to soothe his own mania, but it was no use. (y/n) could feel his fidgeting as his back continued to brush against theirs. "Were you about to let me kill you back there?!"

Calmly, (y/n) placed their mug on the nearest surface, close enough where they could reach, before leaning back on Wil. His hyperventilating slowed, but his distressed fidgets maintained.

"Wil." They called out. He continued muttering to himself.

"Wil!" They exclaimed once again. Still, he ignored.

"WILBUR!"

his rocking stopped, but his head stayed buried between his knees. A moment of silence passed between them both, letting the crickets occupy their ears for just a few seconds.

Finally, (y/n) spoke up.

"I wouldn't have cared if you killed me." They said, leaning against his back. Their head rested against the back of his and they stared up at the ceiling.

"What..?" He muttered, his voice cracking.

"I wouldn't have cared. I wanted you to be happy-- not ruin your life. So if you saw that was the best judgement for me then.." They trailed off, letting their silence speak for themselves.

Carefully, Wilbur sat up before turning around to face them now. He placed a hand on their shoulder, making them turn around as well. Their features weren't exactly visible, but from how the moon defined little shadows on their face, he knew this was the lover he fell for long ago.

"I.." Looking at them as the moon shimmered in their eyes, his body was left breathless. His heart didn't have the courage to yell at them and prove his ego, but it also didn't have the strength to fight against their beauty either.

Gently, he placed a hand on their cheek, feeling the fresh tears but soft skin warming up his palm. (y/n), naturally, sunk into his touch, closing their eyes.

"Y-You've been through a lot." Wilbur softly muttered. (y/n) placed a hand over his, slightly nodding their head. "So I..-- and I mean-- it is pretty late." He was reluctant to his next choice of words, but nonetheless, he swallowed that huge lump in his throat.

"Why don't you stay over for the night?"

hi i do want to say that i worked on this four days ago and im really sorry for the delay and it may be a little rushed however @listenheresweaty literally did the carrying here im just kicking my feet and twirling my hair sooo YA ENJOY

#poraphiafanfics #siren x reader #wilbur soot #wilbur soot fanfiction #wilbur soot x reader #wilbur soot oneshots #wilbur soot x you #wilbur soot x y/n #siren wilbur soot #clinic!wilbur x reader #clinic!wilbur #wilbur x reader

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tinynerdz360 · 4 months ago

Text

Future Ghost Chapter 3

Flashback:

(Danny in the far frozen talking to a Doctor; a ghost Yeti named Doctor Bonechiller.)

Danny: So, Doc…... I have a question…. It’s something I’ve noticed…I don’t think I’ve been aging…I mean, I still look the same as I did last year. When will I get my growth spurt?

Doctor Bonechiller: Well, that’s a complex question. Ghosts don’t age like humans. We don’t change year to year like you, or well mortals do. We grow stronger with age, not weaker.

Danny: I know that….my worry is I’ll be stuck looking like a fourteen-year-old forever. Do ghosts ever age physically, or do they get stuck at the age they died?

Doctor Bonechiller: Hmmm…. yes and no. Different factors go into this. We don’t change with the years. We change with events, trauma, personality, wants, and desires. If you were a natural-born ghost child, a little younger, or even now, I’d say having a healthy parental or guardian bond would help with growing and changing.

Danny: Well, my parents are ghost hunters; I don’t know what they’d do….

Doctor Bonechiller: That may play a factor. A young ghost like yourself needs to feel safe to change. But wanting to grow will help as well, there are ghosts that never want to ‘grow’ up as you say.

Danny: Yeah, like Youngblood. I guess he’ll really stay young forever.

Doctor Bonechiller: Don’t look so glum; we’ll keep an eye on it. As a hybrid, your body might react completely differently from a human or a ghost. You are very young, only a year by ghost standards. You are a child; your body might just be finding that balance or even need years to change. As I said, multiple factors go into this, at least for us.

Danny: Jeeeezzzz that’s not comforting at all…...*sigh* thanks for help I guess….

Danny avoided Sick Bay at all costs, wary of being examined and discovered. He knew Dr. McCoy would want to do a full workup on the new ensign, as per Starfleet regulations. So, Danny hacked into the medical database, forging records indicating he had already undergone orientation examinations. Danny was lucky that Dr. Mccoy didn’t have to be the one to personally do the examination. Anyone on his staff could do it. So, it was just a matter of forging a digital signature.

He figured he’d be fine. Doctor Bonechiller said ghosts rarely get sick, and when they do, it’s not something humans can usually get, and he theorized as a halfa, the same would apply to him. In theory, anyway. The data on this was extremely limited. Danny brushed those thoughts aside; he’d be fine……. probably.

It was a risky gambit, but Danny's ghost abilities served him well, allowing him to merge his consciousness with the computer network and hack into the files he needed. He spoofed the system flawlessly, fabricating biometrics and test results that appeared normal for a human 18-year-old. Or at least what he thought was normal. His talents lay with machines and astronomy, not medicine. Well, besides the basic first aid and his experience fixing his own wounds. It probably would be fine; he’d just have to stay under the radar.

Danny jolted out of his thoughts as a large hand landed on his shoulder.

“You are alright there, kiddo? You’ve been staring at the same panel for a while.” Daryl McDonnell questioned, a concern tilted to his British accent.

Daryle McDonnell had taken Danny under his wing—quite frankly, the whole engineering department had. Danny was the youngest among their ranks, regardless of whether he was eighteen or not. There had been some speculation that the kid was lying. But his file checked out. It was not an easy thing to pull one over the ship's CMO. So those rumors died to jokes about his baby face appearance.

“I’m not a kid.” Grumbled Danny at his friend. The older man showed him a lot of patience during his first week aboard. Danny had struggled with completing basic tasks. Like completing reports, navigating the ship (often getting lost), and getting too wrapped up in awe of being in space or getting lost in his work tasks.

The other man patiently showed him how to write a good report and submit it, made sure he had access to the ship's policy and manual and even made him take breaks to eat or get off shift. Danny was so relieved that Daryle never questioned his lack of knowledge.

“haha….eh you’re the youngest one here, you get to be the kid. When you’re my age, you’ll get it.” Mcdonnell replied. Waving his hand to dismiss Danny’s annoyance.

“What when I’m 100?” Snarked Danny.

McDonnell mocked offense, grabbing his chest. “Careful, my old heart can’t take it.”

Danny ducked his head as he snickered. As a ghost, Danny had empathetic abilities, like the betazoids, but without the mindreading. He could feel the emotions of those around him. He couldn’t turn it off, and his core needed it. The emotions fed his ghostly side. The warm, affectionate fondness radiating from the lieutenant made him feel happy, his ghost side greedily absorbing the emotion and feeding it into his core.

McDonnell guided Danny away from the computer panel. “So, a few buddies of mine are having poker night in the mess hall. I’ve invited the other ensigns from the Prodigy program. You should come.” Mcdonnell offered. “I’m sure you know a few of them. I hear the prodigies are a tight-knit group back at the academy.”

“Pro…prodigy?” Danny mumbled in confusion. *Is he calling me smart? I guess I’m smart* Danny froze as he was hit with a wave of emotion. The Sharp sting of suspicion, skepticism, disbelief, and a smidge of concern. Danny looked back up at the forty-year-old man.

McDonnell gave Danny a strange look, side-eyeing him as he looked down at the shorter ensign. “You know. The Starfleet program, that allows minors into the academy. The one you would have had to have been in to be on the enterprise today? You’d have had to have joined at fourteen……or sixteen if you’re really smart. To get through the program?” McDonnell looked at Danny with a look of skepticism.

He eyed the scars on the ensign’s arms; his uniform sleeves were rolled up. He didn’t like how many scares the kid had or the Lichtenberg figure scares trailing up from the ensign's left hand all the way up his arm. It baffled him how he even managed to get a scar like that. While, yes very common for engineers to get a shock, lichtenberg figures should fade with time. Or why the ensign never got them removed with the help of modern medicine. Hell, sickbay could remove them with a dermal repair kit. Unless the kid was avoiding sickbay.

McDonnell watched as Danny stared at him in disbelief. He felt amused to see the kid gap at him like a fish, his mouth opening and closing as he processed this information and tried to answer.

While concerning the kid seemed to have no idea what he was talking about. His reaction only added to McDonnell's own theory. He suspected the kid had hacked his way in. The kid was smart, he’ll give him that, and he would have thrived in the prodigy program. But there were holes in the kid’s story, and he had so many gaps in his knowledge. McDonnell figured he came from some abusive home on a backwater colony and, in desperation, hacked his way in. But the kid was painfully bad at lying, and while he was a good kid who tried hard to please everyone, he could have come up with a better cover story. He might even be eighteen, like he says, but coming from a rough home would explain any growth delays.

Danny, meanwhile, was flabbergasted. *Omg, what do I do? I don’t know any of those other ensigns! Why am I so stupid? They let minors in! omg, omg, I’m so screwed. Oh god, oh god, does Daryl know? Great going, Fenton; how did I mess up this badly? * As Danny's mind raced and he panicked, he felt his chest tighten and his breaths coming in shorter and shorter. *Maybe I can still save this. Play it cool, Fenton, you can fix this. *

“DANNY!” Danny snapped out of his rushing thoughts at the shout of his name. At some point, McDonnell had guided him to a chair. He was grasping both of his shoulders, crouching down to look in his face. “Hey, you stopped breathing there. It's okay to take deep breaths; copy me. That’s right. It’s ok.”

Danny tried calming down, following McDonnell’s breathing pattern. He felt embarrassed and sacred.

“You’re looking paler than usual. How about I take you to Medbay?”

“NOO!” He pushed himself out of the chair, side-stepping McDonnell’s concerned hands. “I’m fine……I just got overwhelmed….”

“There’s something I need to tell you, Don.” Danny took a deep breath. Danny tried to ignore McDonnells's hopeful look as he gave him his undivided attention. “I…...I…...have social anxiety…..I was always a loner at the academy; I never really interacted with the others in the program…. The program I was…did go to. So, I just got overwhelmed there.” Danny stuttered out. *ha! NAILED it!*

McDonnell’s face morphed into a look of disappointment. Danny felt his face heat up; he could taste the disappointment coming off the other man. “uh huh…... Danny…..I hope you know you could tell me anything……or there’s others onboard you could talk to.”

“There's nothing to tell!” Danny hissed. He felt frustrated and had a creeping feeling of being trapped. He could not admit to one lie; one truth would lead to another and another until it unraveled into his most guarded secret. While the future seemed awesome and accepting of all walks of life. Danny could not shake the doubt and fear that they would still reject him. And he wasn’t stupid, humanity still had some biases. While humanity moved past most of its hate, people still had trouble accepting humans with extra abilities. Those with augmentations and those with psionic abilities. It was perfectly fine when it was an alien but a human. That was crossing the line. Danny could not handle a rejection right now; he was isolated enough.

McDonnell backed off, holding his hand up in front of him. “Ok, ok, there’s nothing to tell. I just thought you’d benefit from hanging out with your own age group.”

“What do you mean, my own age group,” Danny asks with a grumpy, suspicious glare. If he had to defend his age one more time, he swore to Clockwork, he’d lose it.

“I mean, these other ensigns are eighteen and seventeen. It’d be good for you.” McDonnell answered, choosing not to give him a hard time. He hoped one day the kid would confide in him or anyone really. He hated seeing how Danny flinch when someone raised their hands too quickly around him or how he would shy away in fear of them. He knew the kid was hiding stuff, probably stuff he shouldn’t, but cornering him would just make it worse.

Danny winced. “Fine, I’ll go.”

McDonnell gave him a big smile, reached out, and ruffled his hair, earning him a squawk from Danny. “Good, see you later tonight kiddo. Now go rest; you look paler than a ghost!”

Danny spluttered as McDonnell walked off. *HA! If only you knew. Oh, clockwork, how am I gonna survive tonight? * Danny dropped his head in his hands. He was so screwed. With a sigh, he headed to his quarters. He knew how he was going to spend his time, brushing up on current topics and what was popular. It would be just his luck if he couldn’t connect with this century’s teenagers. Hopefully his roommate was out, his room mate was the worst always giving him a hard time or questioning him. He could taste the sourness of his suspicion. One Walton Weston.

Chapter 4

#my writing #Danny fenton in space #danny fenton #danny phantom #star trek #star trek crossover #Danny in starfleet #crossover #fanfiction

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