#free home assessment

[joyfuladorable]

Place a big stack of books to mend in front of me and I will be content for Hours…

[emergencyplumbingil]

Hose Bibs & Spigots.

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[frecht]

do you think ive studied enough <- most certainly has not studied enough

[amazinglyashy]

Hi hi I just found your blog like an hour ago and I’ve been scrolling and am obsessed with the way you write for the l&ds!! ❤️❤️ if you don’t mind I love a little angst and was wondering if you could write the boys reacting to MC showing up at their doorstep heavily injured from like a fight with a wanderer.

Oh my gosh thank you!!! And I don't mind at all, my friends make fun of me for how much I enjoy hurt/comfort and angst :'D Thank you for the request!

LaDS men react to you appearing on their doorstep, injured and bleeding

Xavier -

If you end up at his door, it's more than likely because your unconscious decided to hit the button for his floor rather than your own. You just wanted to get home, not bother anyone, but he's stood right there. Having just come home from grabbing a late night snack from a nearby convenience store, you stumbled out of the elevator right as he's unlocking his front door.

He drops his keys and his bag.

It's a good thing too, because your legs gave out right then, so it's much better for him to catch you if his arms are free.

He's calling your name, and while you're still conscious, you're not really processing anything anymore. You're in too much shock, and you've lost too much blood by now.

He'll get the door unlocked and rush you inside his apartment, setting you down on his couch as he runs for a first aid kit, calling the association for emergency services while he does so.

"You're going to be okay. I promise. Just continue to breathe, alright?"

Xavier doesn't know if he's saying that to comfort you or himself, but he also isn't stopping to think about it, as he rapidly administers first aid to your wounds to at least slow the bleeding until help can arrive.

It's three in the morning but he's wide awake sitting next to your bed at the hospital, something unnatural for someone so sleep deprived usually.

He can't bring himself to shut his eyes though.

It's not work the risk.

Not until you wake up first.

Zayne -

It's like his brain splits into two the moment that he sees you standing there.

One side is his medical knowledge rushing forward as he moves to catch you as your feet stumble beneath you, trying to impossibly assess the extent of the damage before even getting to see it all. It's the half that's taking you to his kitchen table, because it's the easiest workspace for him right now. The one that's pulling out his doctor's bag from the closet in the hall, and the first aid kit from the cupboard in the kitchen as he cuts your shirt open.

The other side?

Oh honey, his heart is breaking.

If you think there's a day at work where he doesn't pray to any existent or nonexistent god that he doesn't see you today, spread out on a gurney or operating table without warning due to your unconscious state, then you'd be painfully wrong.

It's amazing how well he works while panicking on the inside, his skilled hands patching your wounds after meticulous sterilization, any sutures needed placed perfectly even through your pained groans tugging at his heart.

He knows he needs to get you to the hospital, even though he's taken good care of you in his own home. But he needs to sink to the floor for a minute, his back dragging against the wall as he heaves a deep sigh. It's a heavy toll feeling the stick of the dried blood on his hands- your blood on his hands.

With all his knowledge, he knows you'll be okay. He knows he himself will be okay. But right now-

He's not.

Sylus -

The N109 zone is beyond dangerous, mostly due to the criminals and leeches lurking in the dark shadows, but there's also no shortage of Wanderers, including ones that have been genetically altered to be even worse than they normally were.

So when Sylus sees you stumbling at his doorstep, bloodied hand reaching for the knob as he glances at the camera feed, he's not sure he could say he's ever moved so fast in his life otherwise. "Sweetie-" He breathes, as he catches you, scooping you up and rushing you inside as quickly as he possibly can without aggravating your already extensive injuries.

Luke is already running for first aid, and Kieran is already contacting the doctor. Mephisto is shrieking in the hall as he follows Sylus to his bedroom, protesting the fact that Sylus had needed him for surveillance of a target today instead of watching you.

Sylus knows.

He knows this is his fault.

If he had had someone keeping an eye on you, this wouldn't have happened.

His eyes are glued to your barely conscious form in his arms, the guilt in the recesses of his heart digging deeper with every slather of red that painted your skin.

Sorry to say, you're going to have your work cut out for you when you wake up. It's going to take a lot of heavy lifting on your part to convince him that he's not at fault for what happened to you.

And you will be waking up.

Sylus will make sure of that.

Rafayel -

Don't make his nightmares a reality.

Not again.

He's catching you before you can even begin to sway, and he'll be lucky if he remembers to shut the door behind him, his body melding against yours as he picks you up and runs down to his car.

"No, no no no. You stay awake, cutie."

He's definitely breaking at least a dozen laws just trying to get you to Akso hospital as quickly as he can. His mind is racing as fast as his car is moving down the streets, wondering what could have happened to you, what he should be doing right now, if he should have administered first aid to you before taking off-

But he's there so fast, it would have been nearly identical on the clock regardless of him still choosing to rush you to the hospital, or run to get and administer first aid for you from within his home.

He's there until you wake up- wide awake no matter how long it takes. It could be minutes, hours, days- he can't sleep. The image of you dying before him- the image of you standing on his doorstep as well- etched on the back of his eyelids every time he tried to close his eyes.

He talks to you even when you're not awake, stroking your hand, your cheek, the side of your neck- trying to make sure you're as comfortable as he can make you.

When you wake up again, he has to hold himself back with everything in him from squeezing you too tightly. He doesn't want to burst your stitches or harm you, but his body and arms are all-encompassing on you as he hugs you firmly, his face buried in the crook of your neck.

He really doesn't need you to see him cry.

[euthymiya]

the delicate line between friends and lovers ft. alhaitham — in which the akademiya’s scribe and the bimarstan’s head nurse develop some serious feelings for each other in between hook ups. evidently, neither of them are very good at being able to communicate these feelings, though.

contains: 14.0k word count ; female reader ; explicit content—not suitable for minors ; fwb to lovers ; mutual pining ; banter and teasing ; angst with happy ending (this one goes out to all the girls who wonder if their fav would choose them: they would!) ; reader is the (very overworked) head nurse at the bimarstan ; mentions of blood and injuries (alhaitham) ; reader has insecurities ; jealousy ; dry humping—and kaveh being a major cockblock unfortunately ; alcohol drinking—4ggravate (minus alhaitham) appearance! ; clothed sex ; unprotected vaginal sex ; no prep ; creampie

the akademiya is well connected in its networks. meaning one thing: gossip travels fast. against his will, alhaitham learns far more about people than he wants to, details upon details that travel even through his soundproof earpieces at times. 

today, for example, he learns without meaning to that the akademiya has decreased the previously approved funding for the bimarstan. this piece of information is able to irritate him enough that he almost itches to demand for the title of acting grand sage once more. sumeru, a nation of free healthcare, couldn’t possibly hope to underfund one of the pillars of the citizens and their well-being. not unless someone who’s as incapable and underdeveloped in critical thinking as the last grand sage himself (before alhaitham, of course) was in office. 

he walks to the bimarstan, footsteps heavy in the dead quiet of the night as he trudges through the door of the hospital. you’re already there to greet him, eyeing the way the arm under his cloak is tense and curled under the fabric. 

“another eremite attack?” you murmur, walking towards an empty room as you gaze at him over your shoulder to follow.

he does so wordlessly, eyeing the tired, overworked, and disarrayed nurses along the hospital as he walks past them. 

you’re no different, he studies, watching as you stifle a yawn, taking in the darkened circles under your eyes as he sits on an examination table while you bring out the necessary supplies to clean his wound. 

the akademiya—no, sumeru was blooming under his lead. that much he was aware of. you’d said it yourself, too, the first time he came. 

oh, it’s you! we’re most grateful for your changes, acting grand sage, you’d smiled at him, they’ve really helped improve things here at the bimarstan.

he wasn’t expecting that. the only reason why he’d stopped at the hospital for care instead of going home was because he’d run out of bandages, nothing more. one look at you had all but changed that, the tilt of your lips as they smile spinning his world on its axis in a completely new direction. you tend to his cuts that night, and even though he’d told himself he wouldn’t, he returns after the next expedition. 

and the next. and the next. and then it becomes routine. 

for a while, alhaitham told himself he only came to the hospital for his wounds instead of patching himself up after long expeditions in the desert because it was nice to see how the bimarstan ran. it’s important for him to be aware of necessary changes that must be made as acting grand sage—however temporary the job may be, he has every intention of doing it properly. so he studies and assesses the functionality of the hospital and makes decisions accordingly. those things can only happen if he visits frequently. 

but then he starts to notice that his feet truly only carry him here on the nights you work. though you work often and late into the night, too. being head nurse requires as much, of course, but he notices all too quickly that he’s begun to memorize your schedule. 

slowly but surely, he resigns himself to fate. he comes for you. 

“it’s just a light graze,” he mumbles after some time, revealing the small gash on his arm under his cloak. your eyebrows crinkle in concern for a moment before you set off to work, methodically and expertly cleaning away at the dried blood and disinfecting the wound. 

he doesn’t talk for a while before he finally says, “you’re short-staffed.”

it’s a question presented as an observation—he has a habit of doing that, of speaking his mind and waiting for an explanation to follow. 

you sigh, bandaging his arm as you murmur, “people are quitting. it’s been hectic in here—and the funding cut doesn’t exactly allow for a pay that seems worth the grueling hours.”

you love your job. it’s the first thing alhaitham knows about you. you take it very seriously, scolding anyone, even the acting grand sage, about proper care and healthy habits. 

did you stitch these yourself? you’d gasped when you first noticed the scars on his chest, that’s dangerous! do you know the infections you could contract from an improperly tended wound?”

it’s not as amusing now to watch the other nurses listen awkwardly as you scold him. he’s back to being the scribe, no longer tied to the title of sage. the nurses aren’t as alarmed anymore by your lack of formality—although, he’s sure by now, they’re a bit used to it too. 

“and i assume you’re not resting properly?” he gives you a knowing look, reaching forward with his free hand and brushing a callused but gentle thumb under your bruised eyebags. 

you close your eyes at the fleeting touch, humming before giving him a guilty smile. 

“i can’t let things get out of hand here.”

“you should take your own advice,” he snorts, “what was it again? something about proper rest and sleep to ensure a healthy lifestyle?”

“if you’re here to throw my words back in my face, i recall also mentioning getting into less trouble,” you huff, momentarily glaring at his arm before meeting his eyes. “what happened to being more careful?”

“like i said,” he shrugs, hissing slightly when you press on his wound to prove your point, “it’s just a graze.”

you and alhaitham are, no doubt, an unexpected match—if you can call yourselves that, even. it’s a complicated relationship you share, you and the former grand sage turned scribe. 

you patch him up late at night one day, and he so chivalrously accompanies you on your walk home after your shift. that’s all it was supposed to be…but, well, things are never as simple as sticking to the original plan. 

you invite him in for drinks, he accepts, you clumsily trip on your rug, he catches you swiftly, and somehow, in the mix, both of your lips end up meeting in the most heated kiss you’ve ever shared with someone. clothes are easy enough to shed, and stumbling to your bedroom is hardly complicated, and in a far from ideal turn of events, you sleep with the akademiya’s scribe. 

multiple times, in fact. 

by now, his visits to the bimarstan to see you are as frequent as your visits to his house to see him. the only difference is that his visits tend to be for medical reasons, and yours are…personal to say the least. it’s, of course, as these arrangements tend to go, one that’s strictly physical. 

being physically involved with a patient is scandalous enough, but romantic involvement would be nothing short of unethical. and he’s not a very romantically inclined individual anyway, so not toeing the line of something more is easy enough for the both of you. 

still, you’re quite fond of him—he’s funny when he wants to be and a gentleman underneath the blunt responses and straightforward remarks. you like to consider him as a good friend. one who knows your body a bit too well than most friends should, but a good friend nonetheless. 

you look at him unimpressed as you finish tending to his wound, scoffing and rolling your eyes as you point out, “you’d call it a graze even if your arm was dangling off the bone.”

that gets a chuckle out of him, his head tilting up as he looks at you. if you weren’t in a hospital with your work attire, this would feel oddly domestic: cleaning tenderly at his wounds as he looks at you softly. 

you and alhaitham never toe the line of something more, but you do take steps dangerously close sometimes. 

“when do you finish your shift?” he asks, voice a low rumble. 

“now,” you grin, giving him a mock glare as you add, “you have me working past the clock.”

“let me walk you home, then.” he’d do it anyway, regardless of whether or not you accept. still, you never turn him away. 

“how kind of you,” you say sarcastically—you know better than he does what he means, what he wants, and you can’t exactly say you don’t want it yourself. 

“i can be rather giving when i want,” he shrugs. 

“oh, yes,” you snort, “quite the giver.” the grin he sends you is nothing short of fond. 

the line blurs a little like it’s been drawn in the sand, grains carried away by the wind and leaving the faintest trace of the border you draw. somehow, even though you shouldn’t, you step closer to it, just at the edge. 

but it’s never enough to cross it. 

“am i?” he muses, “i’m glad you think so.”

“you know, most people would believe you talk too little. but i think you talk too much.”

his cloak falls back in place over his arm as he stands, lips curled in a rare smile—well, rare to anyone other than you, that is. he walks out, and you follow.

it almost feels like you're getting closer and closer to stumbling past the line against your will every day. 

——————————

alhaitham knows your home well. well enough that he knows to drop his cloak in the basket you keep for laundry so you can wash away the blood soaked into the fabric for him. 

is it normal to do the laundry of your fuck buddy? you’re not even sure. it’s not like you’d ask anyone, anyway. 

but it doesn’t matter—not when his lips find yours before you can think about it too much. it’s a slow kiss. he’s good with his mouth in more ways than one—good at kissing, good at pleasing, and he’s even good at talking. he’s a linguist, anyway, so it only makes sense. 

“eager,” you murmur in between kisses, nipping at his lips as he shivers. “did you miss me that badly in the desert?”

“of course,” he rasps, gently guiding you to fall back against your bed, his hand cupping the back of your head like you’re fragile as glass, “eremites don’t have as enticing of a touch as you do.”

“maybe if you ask nicely, they’ll be less rough with you,” you wiggle your brows, giggling.

he clicks his teeth, angling your jaw to trail kisses along the slant of it as his hands travel to your hips, gently rubbing the bare skin of your hips under your shirt. you hum appreciatively, closing your eyes and sighing at the soothing feeling of his warm palms seeping heat into your skin. your fingers thread into his hair, tangling into the locks for some sort of means to hold on and ground yourself. 

it’s like warm drizzles of syrup, his touch sinking into you as you absorb his sweetness. 

“and why would i need that when this is far better?”

every word alhaitham alhaitham says is punctuated with the warmth of his lips pressed into your skin. it’s almost soothing—he feels calming. it doesn’t feel heated, not the passionate kind that kindles something carnal in you. 

it feels warm, the soft and gentle kind that makes everything feel a bit lighter. a bit cozier. something more homely in this house of yours. 

“mhm,” you hum, your fingers slowly slipping from his hair as they fall to his shoulders, barely holding him in place as your eyes remain shut. it’s soothing, everything about him. enough that you don’t even realize you’re dozing off until he chuckles. 

“did i bore you into sleep?” he pecks your cheek. 

“no,” you tug your eyelids apart, giving him a sheepish grin, “sorry, you’re just warm.”

“oh yeah?” he grins, amused. he’s climbing off of you, much to your dismay, making a soft whine run past your lips as your hands chase him. 

he’s quick to replace the lack of him, though, planting himself beside you as he pulls you into his chest. 

cuddling isn’t new for the two of you. usually, it’s a post-coital activity, though—you start to think alhaitham is just as bad at drawing a clear line in the sand as you. he’s gentle as he pulls your covers over you, pressing one more kiss to your head before he sighs and relaxes. 

“i’m not tired,” you protest weakly. 

“no, you’re not,” he agrees to satisfy you, eyeing your drooping eyes knowingly. “i am, though. it’s been a long trip.”

“right,” you nod, humming. “weak.”

he rolls his eyes, though fondly—you barely make out the action through your half lidded eyes as you glance at him one last look before your eyes force themselves shut. he’s warm, smells like that spicy hint of harra fruit in his cologne, and feels painfully safe when he lets you curl into his strong arm as it wraps around you. 

normal people don’t cuddle when they’re just fucking like this—you and alhaitham are anything but normal. it’s a mutual sort of agreement, though. you allow the small domestic tendencies to slip past the line, only to let the shore wash it away from the sand. 

it never stays for long, this feeling of intimacy. real intimacy, the kind that’s far more personal than seeing each other nude and feeling each other at your rawest. the kind where you both fall asleep beside each other, tangled, safe, warm, trusted. 

but you’re just friends. you think. you can’t afford to be anything more—alhaitham isn’t the sort of man to grant you something like that. you’re sure of that. he’s kind, good natured, even. but there’s not one romantically inclined bone in his body—you’ve seen it yourself. 

he’s rejected one too many brave women with her heart on her sleeve. never cruelly, but always definitively. 

sleep doesn’t let you think about it all for too long. you resign yourself to a peaceful slumber beside him, breath slowly evening out as he rubs the small of your back. 

and, when morning comes and you awaken, you don’t think about it for too long then, either. because he’s gone. because, of course, he wouldn’t stay—not when this is physical and nothing more.

you’re not disappointed, you think. you’re aware of the nature of things. and he’s a gentleman, as always, leaving you a note on your bedside. 

i had to file some reports from my expedition. i believe i’ll be needing my cloak back. 

you chuckle, shaking your head. it’s an invitation—bring me my cloak, and we’ll finish what we started. 

it’s how things are with you and alhaitham. you do his laundry with yours, he walks you home and forces you to rest, and sometimes, you happen to partake in some debauchery in the process. there’s nothing wrong with it. 

and even if your toes dance along the edge of the line, they always drag along to draw it sharper in the sand. 

——————————

coming to alhaitham’s house seems like second nature these days. he comes to you at night, and you come to him in the afternoon of your day off—luck would have it that yours happens to coincide with his. you knock three times and he opens as soon as your knuckles pull away from the cool surface of his door. it’s like he expects you, maybe even waits for you. 

you step in and let the door close behind you, grinning when he steps closer and cages you against the tight corner that is his front entrance. 

“i brought over your cloak,” you hold up the cloth, gesturing for him to move so you can put it on him. he looks at you incredulously, like you’re out of your mind. 

“why would i put it on now?” he asks in confusion. 

you tilt your head, raising an eyebrow, “you always wear one?”

“and why would i dress when we’ll only be undressing in a short moment?” he quirks his own brow like it’s obvious—which, to be fair, alhaitham is not exactly wrong. but it doesn’t make you any less flustered when he says it. 

“you’re shameless,” you huff, looking away in embarrassment. he chuckles lowly, leaning down and trailing his nose along your collarbone, breathing in your perfume. 

“i think i’m more practical, is all,” he murmurs into your skin. you sigh, goosebumps traveling across your body at the fan of his breath against you. 

“if only people knew how unstiff the akademiya’s scribe can truly be,” you grin, finger tracing the sliver of skin showing from his chest window. “did you know i overheard a few patients discuss how bad you are at conversing?”

“i don’t get paid to partake in small talk,” he says, voice a low vibration as he shivers at your touch. “i have things to finish when i’m on the clock apart from socializing.”

“what, you’re that concerned when you have your lovely pay raise? i’m sure you could afford a few minutes,” you tease, making him roll his eyes. 

alhaitham certainly won’t admit it, but he finds a good amount of amusement from your quips—the small grin on his usually downturned lips tells you as much. 

“if you want me to spend my earnings on you, there are better ways to ask,” he shoots light-heartedly. 

“you’d accuse me of such shallow schemes?” you pout. “do you think me to be after your mora?”

his answer is instantaneous, coming in the form of a delicate kiss pressed to your lips as his hands grab your hips. your arms have a habit of their own, always wrapping around his neck before you can even comprehend the action, and just like always, you both end up a tangled pile of limbs that can’t even make it past the doorway, let alone the rest of the house. 

you like it this way, perhaps even love it. something about him being unable to wait the time it takes to walk to his room fills you up with a sense of glee. 

“being the scribe is a much simpler job than sage,” he mumbles between kisses, “there happens to be much more time for other things.”

“things like taking the head nurse against the door of your home?” 

“perhaps,” he smiles with a chuckle. 

who would’ve thought alhaitham could smile so painfully charming? just a few weeks ago, you had never seen him smile before at all, willing to bet that he’d never smiled a day after stepping into adulthood with that seriousness he holds so dearly. 

“i don’t have much time,” you hum in between kisses, fingers fiddling with the short hair at the nape of his neck. 

“we’ll make do, i’m sure,” he says through a breathy groan, already semi-hard as your thigh slots between his legs, rubbing against the forming tent in his pants. 

your head tilts up as his head buries into your neck, lips branding searing kisses into your skin. you wonder if this is what it feels like to be his, to be stamped with his affections one kiss at a time until no one else could hope to have you. your eyes flutter shut, sighing as he sucks attentively to your sweet spot. 

“don’t leave marks,” you scold, “i can’t show up to the bimarstan looking so scandalous.”

you’ve felt his lips against your skin enough times that you can tell them by heart. you don’t have to look to know they’re pouting against your neck—you can feel it against your skin. you giggle, cupping the back of his head as your fingers delicately thread through his hair. 

“i’m meant to hold back then?” he grumbles. it’s almost petulant, but he still softens the nipping against your skin, careful to leave no evidence of his existence against you, however disgruntled he might be. 

“don’t be so whiny,” you laugh. archons must have it out for you, though, because as soon as you say that, his hardened cock brushes against your crotch, making you whine at the friction. it’s something, but it’s hardly anything at all—the separation from the fabric makes everything not nearly enough. 

he seems to know it, too, because he pulls away, eyeing you with a certain gleam in his eyes that looks like a cross between smug and amused. 

“i’ll try,” he says smugly. you glare, but you’re cut off by the brush of his cock against that sensitive spot between your thighs once more, his hips grinding against you as you fall slack against the door. you can feel him rub against your clit, sending shockwaves along your spine as your back arches and you breathlessly moan his name. 

at first, he only does it to tease you, but after the first few rolls of his hips, it’s evident he can’t bring himself to stop. it’s not enough, not for either of you. the ache settling between your legs can’t be quelled with a few simple rolls of his hips with fabric separating you both from each other. but alhaitham’s sense of control seems to wash away with the tidal waves of pleasure, each thrust of his hips brushing his cock against your heat and leaving him panting into your shoulder. 

“m-more,” you plead, grabbing at his cape and fisting the material as you hold onto him tightly, “i need more—please.”

alhaitham, for all his composure and self-preservation, is simple to take apart when his throbbing cock is pressed against your cunt, rubbing against the length and building the pressure he so desperately needs. 

he doesn’t even seem to hear you, hot breath fanning against the crook of your neck as he buries his head and groans, hips sloppy and rough as they rut into you. you can feel the outline of his cock clearly even through his pants and yours, hot and undoubtedly hard. the bulge in his pants brushes against your clit through yours—and even if it’s nowhere close to feeling him inside of you, you can feel yourself just about to break. 

“sorry,” he gasps, “sorry—c-can’t stop. i-i’m c-close. so close.”

the last part comes out like a plead. it’s like he’s begging you to free him of this torment, like he needs you to make him fall over the edge because he can’t bring himself there. you think that might be the case, so you wrap your fingers around his hair and tug. 

he moans—maybe if you were feeling teasing, you’d call it a whine and watch his cheeks flush as he scowls. but there’s no chance for that. not when you’re both so close, so achingly close that you can just make out the twitch of his cock in his pants. 

and then the doorknob twists. 

a series of muffled curses can be heard through the other side of the door, and you both pause—rigid, tense, stiffly alert as your eyes widen. his head perks up from its place in your neck, staring at the doorknob in equal parts rage and equal parts confusion, like he blames it for cutting you both short of a much-needed, much-wanted orgasm. 

“oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!” you hear a voice groan exasperatedly through the door, “again?”

you’re completely lost. who could be trying to enter alhaitham’s house at this hour? 

the only hope you have for answers is, of course, alhaitham—one look at the recognition and irritation on his face, and you can piece together that it’s certainly no stranger. alhaitham, if his cold glare could freeze anything where it stands, could potentially risk turning sumeru into the next snezhnaya. his eyes are hardened, and his jaw is clenched as he breathes out a heavy sigh through his nose. 

“and you’re kidding me,” he mutters bitterly. “now?” 

“hey! i know you’re home! open this door and stop pretending like you can’t hear me,” the voice demands, tapping on the door with more conviction than the last time. 

you furrow your eyebrows and look at him expectantly; an explanation demanded through the crinkles of your forehead as you look at him in confusion. he pulls away, jaw still tight as he adjusts himself in his pants, trying his best to hide the still painful erection he sports. 

“my roommate,” he says quietly. deadly. 

you almost feel bad for the poor soul that must be waiting on the other side of the door, unaware of the pure wrath he must be about to face judging by the look on alhaitham’s face. 

you hear the voice again, “ugh! you’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you? you—”

“calm down,” alhaitham calls, unimpressed and unamused as he closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. he seems to hold it for a moment like he’s fighting the tension in his body, before he slumps and lets out another sigh. this time, it’s much more defeated as he gives you an apologetic look when his eyes open. 

you both adjust your appearances, erasing any trace of debauchery before you step aside and let him approach the door. 

the swing of the door opening is a rather aggressive one, and alhaitham stands taller and straighter than you’ve ever seen him, like he’s trying to tower over the figure that enters the house. 

you recognize him immediately. 

“oh!” you gasp in awe, “you’re that architect! the one who designed the palace of alcazarzaray!”

both men look equally as haunted by your statement. alhaitham’s eye all but twitches as he takes in the breathless admiration in your voice—you’re no doubt praising kaveh’s work. as for the latter…well, he looks like he might just about launch himself into the blade of an eremite willingly the first chance he gets. 

“wh-who are you?” kaveh demands, “and what are you doing here?”

“she’s obviously a guest of mine,” alhaitham shoots coolly, tone as condescending as ever. “have you lost all manners? that’s no way to greet a guest.”

“what did you say to me? i want to hear nothing of the sort from you—god knows your temper isn’t one to speak on my manners.” 

kaveh turns to you, taking one better look at you, squinting as he thinks for a moment before realization flashes across his features. he seems to recognize you—though most people in sumeru do know you quite well. the nurses at the bimarstan are limited, these days. 

“ah! you’re the head nurse from the bimarstan! you looked at my wrist,” he recalls. 

you smile, nodding as you gesture at his hand and ask kindly, “is it better now? i do hope it’s not as sore anymore. did you apply heat as i suggested? and i hope you’re taking ample rest in between sketches—architects are very prone to sore wrists as is, you know.”

alhaitham rolls his eyes at your lecture, grumbling, “as if he would follow anyone’s advice. he’s far too stubborn.”

“i’ll have you know that i followed her advice quite closely,” kaveh says pointedly. he turns to you, voice much softer as he smiles and adds, “and my wrist is much better, thank you.”

“of course,” you nod. and then you pause, staring between the two unsurely as you falter and ask, “but…i wasn’t aware you two were friends. alhaitham tells me you’re his roommate—he’s never mentioned you before today, though.”

they both glare at each other through the corners of their eyes. something tells you maybe friends was a bit of an exaggerated term. alhaitham makes no moves to speak, crossing his arms and staring expectantly at kaveh—the blonde scoffs, shaking his head with a scowl. 

“friends…is a generous word. we’re roommates,” he nods in confirmation, “i’ve…ran into some trouble for the time being, so i’m staying here for a bit. won’t be much long, however. i need a space less…suffocating.”

“and how well is that plan faring for you?” alhaitham’s words seem to poke at kaveh, riling the blonde up further as you watch the scene before you awkwardly. 

“you—” but before kaveh can finish whatever retaliation was on the cusp of his tongue, he pauses. it’s like all at once, the situation hits him before he’s staring between the two of you, instead. “hang on a moment. how do the both of you know each other? i didn’t know alhaitham was acquainted enough with the head nurse for her to pay a visit.”

“well,” you start, trailing off as you cough lightly, tensing as the question throws you off guard. “umm…alhaitham visits the bimarstan sometimes after his trips to the desert. so…”

so what? how would that explain your visit to his home? it’s not as though you become friendly with all your patients and drop them a visit—in fact, alhaitham is the only one you’ve ever done that for. and of course, it’s not just a visit that you’re doing here. but kaveh doesn’t need to know that. 

that would be quite the scandal—getting so intimate with a regular patient. and apart from that, you and alhaitham aren’t exactly in an ideal situation. what would you tell kaveh? that you come over just to hook up? it’s not exactly a rare occurrence to have a beneficial relationship with someone like this, but still…admitting it like that is a bit too shameless for your liking. 

and then there’s a much more complicated, much less easy-to-tackle problem, too. you’re not even sure if you can confidently say you don’t have feelings for the scribe. that’s not something you were counting on, ever. saying you only partake in intimate activities with no strings attached might just hit you too hard in the gut, even if it’s not exactly a lie. but admitting the words out loud isn’t something you’re prepared to do. 

almost like he senses your turmoil, alhaitham steps in, bless his soul. he almost looks a bit conflicted, studying you carefully. you don’t have time to dwell on it, though, before he speaks. 

“so she came to check on a wound she patched up,” he finishes for you, quick and easy and confident enough in his words that it makes up for your nerves. he quicks a fleeting glance at you before raising an eyebrow to kaveh. “i left in a hurry and didn’t really let her properly tend to it last time. not that it’s your business, of course. i’m perfectly within my rights to bring guests over to my house.”

“be careful,” kaveh glowers, “anymore attitude, and you’ll risk showing your guests your true colors if you’re not cautious. you wouldn’t want to make a bad impression on the same person who tends to your wounds, do you? that would be fatal.”

“you two are quite the duo,” you chuckle, shaking your head, “it seems alhaitham has finally met his match verbally. you truly don’t let him have the last say.”

alhaitham almost looks offended, looking at you in disbelief. “i am not outmatched by his—”

“if it’s not too much trouble,” kaveh laughs nervously, cutting alhaitham off with a sharp look, “could you keep this…uh arrangement of ours a secret? i don’t really want this getting around and such.”

“my lips are sealed,” you promise. kaveh perks up, relief sagging into his shoulders at that before he nods, giving you a friendly smile as he waves at you. 

“i’ll be off to finish a project, then. nice seeing you.”

as soon as he walks away and you’re certain the door to his room shuts, you let out a soft breath of relief. 

“that was close,” you whisper, “he could’ve figured it out.”

“right,” alhaitham says vaguely. he doesn’t say much else, arms still crossed as he stands there and looks at you—something about the way alhaitham stares at you is too uncomfortable for your liking. 

not because he looks at you weirdly or even inappropriately, but because it almost feels like he can pick apart every thought in your head just by his gaze alone. 

you shuffle on your feet before you give him a tight smile. 

“i should go—the patients are never-ending these days,” you chuckle nervously. 

“make sure you don’t overwork yourself,” he nods. 

you linger for a moment. you’re not sure why. it’s not as though you can expect him to give you a goodbye kiss—that would be preposterous. and far too wishful. 

so instead, you give him a small wave before turning towards the door—but he stops you before you can reach for the door handle, pulling you flush against him, your back to his chest. 

“will you come back tonight?” he whispers, voice low and husky as he presses his still-hard crotch against you. you shiver as he nips at your skin to get his point across. 

“what about kaveh?” you ask softly, biting your lip, unsure. the little voice in your head screams, who cares about kaveh?

“he’ll be dead asleep,” he snorts, “last night was the third all-nighter he pulled. there’s no chance he’ll make it past seven pm today.”

“you’re insatiable,” you tease, shaking your head as you snort. “do you know that?”

“i’ve never had a decline on your end,” he shoots back. 

“i have a shift later tonight,” you say apologetically, sighing as you think about the extra hours you’ll have to put in soon, “there aren’t enough people tonight without me.”

“you should really speak to someone about this funding cut,” he frowns, slumping against you, “it’s getting out of hand.” 

“no one listens.” your voice is so defeated, so uncharacteristically tired. you’re sure he notices it in a heartbeat—you notice it yourself. “but i’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

“sure,” is all he says. 

hesitantly, you pull away. his hands leave your hips reluctantly, too, like they’re most comfortable when they have you to house them. but neither of you say anything, simply nodding at each other as you look at him over your shoulder and exit through the door. 

the footsteps down his steps and away from his home are the heaviest ones you’ve taken all week. 

you decide you hate the sand. and that stupid line you both seem to have drawn.

——————————

it takes two failed attempts at fucking alhaitham to realize you’re not strictly only after the physical pleasure he brings. 

the first time, you weren’t even disappointed you didn’t get that far. it was only a disappointment that he was gone when you woke, and you realize it’s because the absence of him is why you’re even let down in the first place. the second time, you’re unhappy because you have to keep the nature of your relationship a secret—that’s a more complex problem. 

it’s secret because it has to be, because of how lewd it is by nature and how partially unprofessional it is. but you decide you also hate it to be a secret. no one knows that you see alhaitham bare and at his most vulnerable, and you can’t handle that anymore. especially when you watch a nurse flirt so poorly with him right before your eyes. 

“oh, it’s you, acting grand sage,” she giggles, “what can i do for you today?”

“i’ve actually returned to my previous position as scribe,” he corrects, entirely unaffected. 

“oh, is that so?” she gasps—you know it’s all for show. everyone is aware of his stepping down. “well, i, for one, think it’s a shame. you were so capable as a leader.”

alhaitham doesn’t like leading. for all he claims it’s because it’s too much trouble and far more work than he appreciates, you know that it’s also because the easiest way to never be swayed by power is to stay far away from it. he keeps himself grounded this way. he uses his smarts for only what’s necessary and only enough to quell his thirst for knowledge and never anything more. his principles are admirable.

and should the next grand sage also abuse such power like the last, he’ll step up from his humble position as scribe and fix the problem again—because that’s what he knows to do best. use his genius to solve issues as they arise, not control the situation entirely. 

of course, she wouldn’t know that. she doesn’t know anything about him. 

you fight back the roll of your eyes with the last shreds of self-preservation you have left. 

“the position wasn’t really for me,” he says plainly. “any idea where the head nurse might be? i have some business to discuss with her.”

it shouldn’t satisfy you as much as it does when she deflates at at his dismissal. but does—enough that you saunter up with a grin on your lips as you greet the two. 

“why hello. what business does the scribe have with little old me?” you hum. the nurse becomes background noise when your eyes meet his teal ones, staring at the small fleck of amber in his pupils while his piercing gaze rakes over your face as if to study you. 

you feel oddly seen under his stare—he’s seen you stripped and bare, at your most vulnerable under him. but somehow, you’ve never thought about it much in the moment like now. right now, he sees you with a clear mind, without the clouding haze of lust to fog his mind. right now, he can see you for every flaw and every imperfection, so up close. he can notice the way your fingers fiddle with themselves to calm your nerves. he can catch every nervous shuffle on your heels as you fight the urge to lean into him from the proximity. 

finally, you break out of your trance when the nurse clears her throat and mumbles, “i’ll uh..i’ll be off, then.”

he blinks at the same time as you, shaking his head slightly to bring himself back to the present as he clears his throat.

“can we speak somewhere more private?” he asks quietly. you don’t know if that’s a good thing or bad. but you nod nonetheless, leading him to an empty room as he follows. 

it’s a long, painstakingly dreadful walk. your mind is filled with too many possible scenarios that it’s a miracle your brain is even functioning properly. it should short circuit. what if he wants to end your arrangement? what if he’s aware of your slowly shifting feelings (if you can even call them that)? what if he’s found someone he’s interested in? what if his roommate has pieced together something, and now he needs to come up with a cover? 

the possibilities are endless, and they plague your mind so heavily that your lip is chewed raw by the time you enter the room and shut it behind him as he follows you in. 

“you wanted to talk?” you ask hesitantly. 

he doesn’t say anything—the only thing he does is press a folded piece of paper in your hands as you stare at him, confused. 

“open it,” he insists.

so you do. and reading over it makes you pause as you glance up at him in disbelief. the bimarstan funding—more than doubled. 

“what?” you breathe, in absolute awe, “how…how is this possible?”

“i’ve pulled a few strings,” he says plainly, shrugging. as always, he brushes off his actions as though he hasn’t just changed your entire job for the better. “it’s a nice perk of being an ex-sage.”

“you’ve used corruption just to help me?” your words are a playful jab—but there’s still an underlying question that you really do mean to ask. why go to such lengths for me? 

“it’s hardly corruption,” he grumbles, crossing his arms. the dust of red over the tips of his ears is the only thing that gives away the slightly flustered part of him, “i had a few favors owed to me, and the conditions here play an important role to everyone in sumeru. it was a simple correction to their terrible decision-making skills.”

“oh, haitham,” you chuckle. this time, the nickname really does make him flush more obviously, his eyes darting away to look off to the side as he clears his throat again. 

“well, that’s all,” he says stiffly, “i have to go home and…and make dinner. kaveh is of no help.”

“sure,” you beam, looking at him knowingly. you pause for a moment, contemplating before you cave and add, “and thank you. really.”

“it’s really nothing to look into,” he says awkwardly, “hopefully, now you can work fewer hours.” 

“the other nurses will also really appreciate it,” you say softly, “i’ll be sure to let them know—they’ll really have the hots for you this time,” you snort, making an indirect reference to earlier. he shivers, like the thought leaves him unnerved. 

“that one nurse of yours hasn’t left me alone since i stepped up as grand sage for that short while,” he grumbles, making you snort at the troubled look on his face. it shouldn’t make you feel as good as it does to see him so disgusted by the affections of someone else, but you’re only human. “doesn’t take a genius to figure out why.”

“oh c’mon, she’s sweet,” you tease. now that you know he’s uninterested, it’s fun to mess with him and get under his skin, giggling as you reach over and poke at his arm. 

“perhaps,” he shrugs, “but not very good at keeping her emotions in check. i’ve known her since my student days—i don’t think i could last one day with her lack of…composure.”

“what, you’re too above emotions?” you ask amused, “i would disagree. you’re a rather grumpy man, you know.”

“am i?” he fights back a grin, “i hardly noticed.”

“without your morning coffee, yes,” you quip. 

he laughs, shaking his head as he stares at you with something that looks oddly close to fondness in his eyes before he murmurs, “i do really need to make dinner. kaveh will truly whine my ear off if i don’t tonight.”

“have fun,” you pinch his cheek. he rolls his eyes, and with that, he nods to you and leaves, swiftly walking away and leaving you to yourself in the empty room with the slip of paper in your hands, a lovesick smile still on your face. 

you don’t even know where the line starts or where it ends anymore. all you know is that you’ve undoubtedly crossed it all on your own—and it might be the end of you, truly.

——————————

it takes one nice gesture from alhaitham to make you realize you’ve fallen hopelessly hard for him. before, every small action of intimacy was always just the two of you being friends, amicable and good-natured in between sex. 

now, you’re not sure you could spend a single minute next to him without wondering what it would feel like to do those things as a couple. 

sometimes, after sex, alhaitham likes to read. because it’s hard for him to sleep, and he doesn’t want to disturb you from your much-needed rest after a long day at the hospital. you don’t realize how reliant you’ve become on the sound of his pages flipping until you lay in bed alone, tossing and turning under your sheets as you try your hardest to sleep.

you can’t. not when all you think about is him. him, him, him. he’s all your mind drifts to nowadays. 

but you know alhaitham—better than a lot of people, in fact, seeing as you get to see parts of him that are otherwise… off-limits. being in a relationship is the last thing he wants, especially with you. otherwise, he’d have told you by now. you’re scared of a lot of things, scared to speak your mind, and tend to overthink too much for your own good. 

but alhaitham? he’s blunt and to the point. if he’d wanted something more with you, if the line had blurred and blurred for him until it risked being nonexistent like it did for you, he’d have said something. but he hasn’t—and neither can you. 

because you know as soon as you do, it’ll be over. the kind gestures, the gentle touches, the heated kisses, the nightly visits, all of it. gone with the wind as it blows the line in the sand away for good—not because he wants to cross it, but because it simply doesn’t need to exist anymore if he never speaks to you again. 

 alhaitham is not a romantically inclined guy. he’s good-looking enough that not just a handful of girls have tried their hand at confessing to him, and he’s always turned them down instantly. you’ve seen it, heard about it, know it to be true. and apart from that, are you both even that compatible?

sure, you get along great as is, but a relationship is much deeper than that. you’ve always appreciated how honest he was, how straightforward he put things. but relationships come with a lot more vulnerability and emotions than you’ve ever shown him. his bluntness will be too easy to mistake for casual cruelty when you’re in over your head. he’s quiet; he doesn’t appreciate too much interaction—would he even enjoy going on dates? what if you insisted on an evening out, and all he wanted to do was stay in and read? would he want to do all that stuff? everything you want seems like it would be something of a chore for him, something that makes him see you as a chore. 

he even said it himself the other day, calling that nurse too emotional for his liking. sure, it was an off-handed comment, but you’re one emotional day away from potentially being too much for him too. you couldn’t handle that. not when you like him so, so much. not when you want him so bad, you couldn’t handle him not wanting you just as badly. 

would he even want you that badly? logic tells you no—and logic is at the forefront of his mind at all times. your emotionally charged outlook on life would be a bleeding mess of color in his neutral, logically categorized approach. 

you’d be dooming yourself to loving a man who would hardly know what to do with your affections. 

so you do the only sound solution to this predicament of yours—you end things before he can do it himself. it’s inevitable, of course. whether it’s in a few weeks or months, eventually, alhaitham will grow bored of your casual fling. and he’ll end things, completely fine and normal while you fall apart at the seams. the best thing you can do for yourself is let things end on your own terms, and early on, too, before the feelings fester into something all too serious. 

it’s not as though you love him yet—things are still early on enough to make sense of them. 

or is it? some part of your mind asks viciously, are you sure you don’t love him? 

you push away the thought as quickly as it pops into your head. rolling your shoulders back, you straighten your posture, taking a deep breath before you knock on his door. 

he opens it instantly, smiling that small, ghost of a smile of his. you falter immediately. 

“hey,” he hums, swinging his door wider, “come in.”

“no, that’s okay,” you say stiffly, not meeting his eyes, “i…can’t today.”

“oh.” you hate that you can hear the frown in his voice and practically see the confused crinkle of his eyebrows. “did you want to talk about something, then?”

yes, you want to say. there’s a lot i want to talk about. 

there’s a lot you should talk about—and if you were keen on discussing this like an adult, you would lay it all out on the table. 

instead, you blurt out, “i think we should stop.”

he eyes you carefully, raising a questioning brow as he asks, “stop what?”

“this,” you point between the two of you, “whatever…whatever this is we’re doing.”

and just as you expected, his face is blank, so neutral and so hard to read you want to scream at him. yell at him for making you want him so bad when you can’t even tell if he’s even a fraction as crazy as you. does he want you? he certainly treats you well sometimes, but maybe that’s just because you get his dick wet and stitch up a few wounds here and there for him. does he actually even toss and turn and stay up thinking about you the way you think about him? 

the answer is probably no. you don’t even want to find out if you’re right or not. but he’s never made you believe he has, so you don’t entirely think you’re wrong in your assumptions. 

“and what are we doing?” he must be playing dumb, you think. 

“hooking up,” you hiss, “having sex. fucking. whatever you want to call it, alhaitham. we have to end it. now.”

“and what brought this on?” he crosses his arms. 

you want to ask him why he’s being so cruel, so intent on keeping you when you clearly can’t stay, when there are so many women who would throw themselves at him for a chance to get in bed with him if a physical partner is what he’s so hellbent on keeping. but you can’t be that for him any longer, not when your emotions are tired of being a jumbled mess that slowly but surely eat away at your decaying soul. 

“we…we’re just…it’s not—we just have to, okay? i don’t appreciate you treating me like i’m easy.”

“wha—when have i ever treated you as such?” he looks at you bewildered, getting defensive. 

“that’s not what i meant,” you pinch your nose, groaning as you try to process the words you want to say in your spinning head. everything is too much—the way he’s close, the way your body feels aflame from just standing near him, the way your eyes are involuntarily misting over. “this…this is just an easy arrangement, that’s all. for both of us. but i don’t want to be someone’s quick and easy hook-up for the sake of convenience. i need…i need something more from someone, so we should stop while we can so i can find myself that.”

there’s a minimal twitch of his jaw as he clenches and unclenches it, nodding slowly.

“you want something more, is that it?”

“w-well, yes—but that’s not what i entirely meant, so don’t read into it—”

“so how would ending this get you that, then?” he challenges. you hate that he makes you feel stupid, that he looks at you like you’re not thinking when that’s all you’ve been doing these last few…archons know how long. he’s plagued your mind for so much time you can’t even pinpoint for how long. 

“i want something more, but not from you,” you spit, slamming your hands to slap against your thighs in frustration, “that’s obviously why i’m ending it! must you always make everything difficult?”

he doesn’t speak, silently stunned a bit at your outburst. so you take a deep breath, willing yourself to calm down before you collect your thoughts better. 

“i just…i’m sorry, okay? i didn’t mean to yell at you like this is your fault. i…i can’t say i can get into bed with you anymore without wanting us to actually mean something to each other, and i know that’s not what you want—”

“who said that’s not what i want?” he interrupts, looking at you with the first hints of emotions all day. there’s a small etch of frustration building in the twitch of his brows as he continues, “you’ve just decided for me how i feel, and that’s a bit unfair, don’t you think?”

“you’ve never said anything about how you feel,” you shoot back.

“well, neither have you, but that doesn’t mean—”

“i may not have said it, but you’re telling me you never noticed? i do your laundry for you, for crying out loud, alhaitham! and you’ve never so much as dropped a hint!”

“i see,” he nods slowly, going back to the blank slate that is his face. still so infuriatingly neutral and unbothered by it all that you can’t help but lose it a little. 

how can he be so unbothered? how can he be so calm and collected when you feel like you might need to check yourself into the bimarstan yourself from the stress of it all? you’ve spent weeks, months in each other’s beds. familiarized yourselves with every part of each other’s bodies. he knows about that birthmark no one else sees, and you trace that mole on his left pec every night before you sleep. you’ve slowly but surely been dying to cross the threshold of just friends (with a few perks, of course), and here he is, nodding along as you tell him you want him, want more of him.

and he’s got nothing to say. because, for some reason, after months of feeling you, spending nights and days tucked away against you, he doesn’t seem to feel the same, so he doesn’t have much to offer you. how can he be so unbothered by your presence after months with you? is it really that easy not to be affected by you? 

some part of you lets go of the hold on your control as you snap, “and this is why we can’t have anything more.”

“why’s that?” he tilts his head, voice an uncharacteristic edge to it, “enlighten me.”

“because…because…because you’re you!”

finally, a flash of hurt crosses his face, making itself home in his eyes and forehead as it crinkles at your words. he studies you, quiet. unnervingly quiet that you almost wonder if you’re just deaf.

“are you trying to say there’s something wrong with me?” he presses, looking so lost that you almost feel guilty. 

not as much as you feel like you’re about to cry, though.

“yes,” you say without thinking—and the way hurt settles into his eyes more makes you scramble to reword things so you don’t sound like a total jerk, “i mean no! i mean…i mean you’re just you, and you and i won’t mix.”

“we won’t mix,” he repeats, blinking. “interesting—”

you can’t stop yourself from going on the tangent now that you’ve begun, spilling your every thought one by one as you cut him off, “you’re so quiet, and it’s unnerving, you know? you never speak a single thought on your mind, you’d rather just read than talk about your day. and everything you say is so painfully to the point—would it kill you to soften the blow sometimes? people don’t always need the cold, hard truth, okay? sometimes, saying what someone wants to hear can make all the difference. and…and…i don’t know, okay? i need someone who can work with my emotions without applying logic to everything, and that’s not you so…so we have to end things because it’s not fair to either of us. i want it to actually mean something with someone when i’m with them, and you don’t want someone to taint everything with their fragile feelings, so we need to go our separate ways. okay?”

you’re practically panting when you’re done speaking, and alhaitham is just standing, thinking, processing everything you’ve said in that painfully complex head of his. 

finally, he breaks the silence and says, “i didn’t know so many things about me bothered you.”

“they didn’t,” you sigh, “not until recently. i guess…i guess it just hit me how difficult it would be to get along in a proper relationship.”

“you know that because what? you think it?”

“i know it because i’m actually looking at things realistically,” you say exasperatedly, “just because we had sex for a few months doesn’t automatically mean we’re a compatible pair.”

“we haven’t really gotten to know much outside of sex to decide that,” he shakes his head, “i’m not understanding how you can so easily dismiss these feelings by deciding it won’t work—”

“look, alhaitham,” you cut him off, voice so uncharacteristically small, he pauses to look at you in shock, “i’ve been slowly losing it for weeks, okay? the last thing i need is for you to make things difficult for me. you’re a good guy, and i really, really wish things were different, but i just need more than what you can give me without completely changing yourself. neither of us should have to compromise anything about ourselves for things to work.”

“you don’t know if i’d be willing to give you what you need or not,” he says quietly, “maybe i wouldn’t be changing a thing.”

“then what about that girl?” you scoff, “the one you said was too emotional for you to handle? you think i’m just being crazy? you said it yourself, so what else should i believe?”

“her? she’s different—”

“why? because she’s not me? because she doesn’t let you in her bed? you’ll find my emotions just as burdensome as hers one day, and then what? we fall back on sex to keep the spark alive?”

something about him is defeated. shoulders slumped, eyes dim, and arms uncrossing to lay limply at his sides. he takes a deep breath before nodding, looking at you so intensely you almost feel frozen in place. 

“okay,” he whispers, “if this is what you want. that’s fine.”

his door closes, and your first tear slips. 

——————————

nine days. that’s how long it’s been without alhaitham. your mind tells you this is for the best, but your heart is practically on its knees, begging you to reconsider. 

a part of you wonders if you were being unfair like he said, judging him before you could properly give him a chance. the other part of you thinks it’s important not to let attachment cloud your better judgment. alhaitham is a good man; there’s no doubt about it. 

but is he a man good for you? that part is a difficult question to answer. protecting your heart seems like the safest option. still, you can’t help but miss him horrifically often. it doesn’t hit you how badly you’ve fallen for him until you don’t see him anymore. no more late nights at your place, no more afternoons at his, and no more routine bimarstan visits. 

your life has at least gotten a bit easier, though—more funding means more people to hire, and more people to hire means fewer grueling hours for you. though, when you really think about it, you owe this small win to the exact man who’s been plaguing your thoughts. 

you intend to drink your woes away, but it seems even in the tavern, you can’t escape him—well, not exactly him, but his roommate. but kaveh still reminds you of alhaitham, so the cleared head you hoped for is out of the question for the night.

the thing about kaveh, though, is that he’s loud. painfully so, and especially when he’s drunk. you could hear him from the other end of teyvat, you think—it’s hard to ignore him even if you want to. 

“he’s been insufferable lately,” kaveh huffs, “worse than usual. that awful temper of his needs to really get a check because i’m not sure how much more i can take.”

you didn’t know kaveh was friends with the general mahamatra—seeing cyno loosened up with a deck of tcg cards was not on your list of expectations for the night, but you can’t help but listen in when he adds, “his last few reports to me from his investigations were not up to his…usual work ethic, either. i’m not sure what’s up with him.”

“maybe he’s overworked,” tighnari suggests—you know him as a fellow amurta scholar, recognizing him from your student days. you hadn’t realized alhaitham was friends with such an interesting assortment of people—well, you don’t know if kaveh fits as a friend, but the other two seem like safe bets. 

“i don’t think so,” kaveh grumbles, “he’s hardly been sleeping. it’s not like he takes work home with him, you think he’d be the type? but he’s been drinking all the coffee—i actually work into the night. shouldn’t he at least leave some for me?”

“i wonder what’s up with him,” cyno hums thoughtfully, “he must really be brewing in his emotions.”

you snort at the poor pun, watching as the other two around him wince and groan. 

finally, kaveh sighs, rubbing his temple as he mumbles, “i don’t know. i’ve never seen him like this. i think it’s serious.”

that makes guilt pool in your gut, making you feel so full that even one sip of your drink feels like too much. you’ve lost all desire to drink your sorrows away—you couldn’t have possibly dampened someone like alhaitham so deeply, could you? he’s always been unaffected by things more than others, and you’d never imagined him to care that deeply about your relationship. if you could call it that, even. 

“what do you suppose has brought this on then?” tighnari’s ears twitch in worry, “he’s…not exactly the most emotionally available.”

well, at least you’re not alone in your beliefs. 

“i don’t know,” kaveh says quietly—and even if they claim not to be friends, you don’t think they hate each other a fraction as much as they let on because his voice seems to be twinged with clear worry himself as he adds, “his eyes have been red in the mornings. it can’t be something small.”

that’s all you can stomach to hear before you slam your glass down and swiftly make a beeline for the tavern’s exit. some part of you, weak and bound to alhaitham, is unable to listen any longer about his misery. the misery you caused. the misery you brought yourselves both because insecurities ebbed and flowed into the deepest crevices of your mind and rotted away at the reasonable parts. 

of course, you’re different. of course, there’s a chance things will go sour. of course, it won’t be easy. but isn’t that the case for every relationship? love was never meant to be a simple feat—otherwise, it would never be half as scary to take the fall. 

but you’ve been careful, too careful. so careful that you forgot to let yourself try and be happy, and so careful that you’ve stomped on someone’s feelings enough that his friends exchange their worries over drinks instead of having a good time with him. 

so you decide that enough is enough. if alhaitham isn’t meant to be yours, then celestia themselves will have to take him from you—because you’re not risking losing him a second time. 

not again.

——————————

contrary to popular belief, alhaitham has never been difficult to track down if you simply know where to look. he might be good at making himself scarce, but there’s only a handful of places he could be. the light of his home shining through the window tells you that your first guess is not very off.

you knock, silently staring at the tips of your shoes as he slowly opens the door.

“hey,” you murmur as soon as the door swings open. you haven’t even looked up yet, but you’re certain he has the same neutral expression on his face. but kaveh is right about one thing—his eyes are definitely a little red.

“hey,” he says quietly. 

it’s awkward for a moment. you don’t know what to say, and he doesn’t have any intentions to fill the silence. some time ago, that worried you. his quietness came across as an inability to keep up healthy communication. but now, you miss it—the quiet flip of his pages as he sat beside you, shoulder to shoulder and thigh to thigh. the way he let out a soft little breath when you lay on his chest, rubbing his palm slowly in circles against the small of your back. the soft, peaceful silence of his presence. 

you never appreciated it enough, the comfort of knowing you’re valued without having to say anything at all. 

“listen, i—”

“you don’t have to—”

you both stop, pausing when you speak at the same time. 

“go ahead,” you say instantly. 

he clears his throat, shaking his head as he swallows. “no,” he mumbles, ever the gentleman, “no, that’s okay. you go first.”

you think your nerves might just explode one by one if you have to wait any longer, so you don’t bother putting up much more of a fight, nodding before fiddling with your fingers as you take a deep breath. 

the words spill faster than you can process what you’re saying. a long, jumbled string of thoughts that rattle off your tongue like a dam finally breaking at the leaking crack. 

“i was wrong. for all the things i said, i mean. there’s nothing wrong with you, you know? you’re really kind, and you remember the little things, and you always keep your promises, and those are really nice things. and i don’t hate when you’re quiet, by the way. i used to think it bothered me, but i miss it, you know? just having you sit next to me and read and stuff. i guess…i guess i just never bothered trying to think about how to love you the way you needed because i was so busy worrying if you could love me the way i needed and…and i just fucked a lot of things up. i got in my head and made a lot of assumptions that weren’t fair and just…i got cold feet. and i’m sorry. and i love you—really, really love you. all of you. you don’t have to believe me or even say anything at all. i just needed you to know all that because you deserve to.”

he’s silent. you can’t tell whether from being stunned or from disinterest. both are fair, regardless—you think alhaitham could slam the door shut in your face, and you’d deserve it. but he doesn’t. because just as always, he’s your same, kind, gentle alhaitham underneath all of the blunt stoicism. 

“i lied,” you whisper, “i do want you to say something. anything.”

“i don’t know what you want me to say,” he stares at his feet, still looking as hurt as the day you left him. “you…you just assumed i wouldn’t be able to love you, is what i’m gathering.”

“i just thought…” you swallow thickly, tongue like sandpaper against your dry mouth, “i just thought we were too different.”

“i thought we got along well,” he shrugs, trying to pretend there isn’t as much hurt on his features as there is, “maybe i misread things.”

“no,” you shake your head desperately, “no, i overthought them, that’s all.”

“why did you leave me?” he asks hoarsely, “why couldn’t we have talked about things?”

you want to say because you were a coward, maybe even a hypocrite. you insisted he’d be too constipated emotionally to communicate properly with you, but all you’ve done was decide things for him and avoid the hard, heart-to-heart talk.

really, it’s because you were never brave enough to try and love alhaitham the way he would have loved you. the way he loves you. you were blind to see it—weren’t even willing to believe that he ever would. not until after you let him go and realized what you had. he’d walked you home, made sure you got proper rest, pulled strings, and used up favors just to make things better for you. and you missed all the signs, all because it was so easy to walk away, to label his blunt nature as causal cruelty, to confuse his quietness as disinterest, to assume his logic was the absence of emotion. you never gave him a chance because you were never brave enough to take the fall. 

but alhaitham was always ready to catch you, arms aching to wrap around your form and hold you. not because he wanted you to love him, but because all he’s ever wanted was to love you. 

you think that’s the difference between the two of you. you’ve always wanted to be loved, and he’s always wanted to love. you’ve always wanted to take and he’s always wanted to give. you’ve always wanted him to be enough, and he’s always wanted you to know you’re enough and more. 

it’s too much to tell him though, so you settle on cupping his cheeks and whispering, “because you scare me. the way you make me feel.”

“how do i make you feel?”

not too long ago, you’d think he was asking just to confirm what he already knows. now, you know he’s asking because he needs to hear the words for his own sake. just to be sure. just to ease the uncertainty in his own head. 

“you make me feel a lot of things, haitham,” you murmur, “you make me feel happy. appreciated. very pretty. capable. important. sometimes a little dumb,” you giggle as he frowns, squeezing his cheeks as you add, “but only because you’re so smart. i could list a few other things you make me feel, but…they’re not as proper.”

“i thought…just…d-did i do something?” he asks, voice hesitant. there’s a painful, awful squeeze in your heart at his words. but your heart is the last of your worries right now—it’s the least you can do, putting your feelings aside for his own, seeing as you’ve stomped all over his.

so, in an effort to show him that everything is okay, you smile—you’re sure it’s a pathetic, wobbly little thing, but you don’t have time to care. not when he’s right here, under your fingertips, and one possible moment away from slipping away. 

a watery chuckle escapes you as you whisper, “no. you didn’t do anything—it was me. but i’m not running away anymore…if you still want me, that is.” 

“you’re all i want,” he says instantly. “the only thing.”

“i know,” you breathe, “and you are all i want too.”

you kiss him. because he deserves to feel you choose him, to feel you close the gap and show him you’re here. your lips press gently against his, molding into them like two pieces of a puzzle—except you don’t think neither of you fit anywhere else but each other. incomplete without each other and unable to fit anywhere else. your thumb traces the soft, warm skin of his cheek, soothingly caressing it as if to let him know i’m here, and i’m not going anywhere. 

he stumbles back, and you follow him in, pressing against the door of his home just like those days ago before an unwelcomed interruption. this time, though, you think kaveh could freeze outside all you care—you’re not letting anything interrupt this moment. 

“i’ve been losing my mind for weeks too,” he mumbles in between gasps for air as you kiss, “just so you know. it wasn’t you alone.”

“that’s good to know,” you hum, grinning against his mouth. 

“and i thought i was giving signs,” he adds, “that’s why i went through the trouble to fix your schedule. so i could spend more time with you—i…i apologize if i wasn’t obvious with my intentions.”

“don’t be,” you say softly, “i’m the one who missed them. you did everything right.”

“did i?” he asks, unsure. 

you press your lips firmly against his when you hear the crack in his voice, as if sheer touch alone will express the way you feel. maybe it does, though—because he melts against you, letting out a soft moan as your hands travel to his broad chest, feeling the muscled and toned body he hardly hides under that skin-tight shirt. 

“i get scared easily,” you whisper, “will you be patient with me?”

“i’m not good at expressing my emotions,” he whispers back, “will you be patient with me too?”

“we can be patient together,” you hum, pecking his lips a few times as he chuckles softly. 

“good plan,” he nods, “sounds like it should work.”

“oh, thank you,” you wink playfully, pulling away to wrap your arms around his neck and press your forehead to his as you look at him cheekily, “i’m a bit of a genius.”

“that you are,” he nods, smiling in amusement. and he means it. you’re every bit smart and capable as he makes you feel—inadequacy was never something alhaitham made you feel; it was always something you brought onto yourself. you’re used to shifting the blame, you realize. it’s so easy to blame everything and everyone but yourself for the intrusive thoughts in your head. 

but they melt away tonight, one feathered kiss at a time, pressed to your jaw delicately by warm, familiar lips you’d know blind. 

“your friends are worried about you, you know. kaveh—”

“please do not mention kaveh’s name right now,” he groans, “i’ll hear all about your alarming story of my friends at the tavern, but right now, i only want to hear you say one name.”

“yours?” you wiggle your brows. 

“glad to know we’re on the same page,” he confirms, humming as your hands trail under his shirt, feeling the ridges of his built muscles. 

“i don’t want anymore casual sex,” you murmur, pouting, “it’s driving me mad.”

“okay,” he nods, shivering as your palms glide over his nipples as you pull his shirt up, exposing his chiseled abdomen for you to admire, “will girlfriend suffice?”

“girlfriend would be great,” you nod, beaming. 

“just so you’re aware, i am very concerned with the emotions of my girlfriend, however heavy they might be. i do still think, however, that nurse was on a…unique realm of her own, though,” he adds the last part with a pointed look.

“don’t mention other women when you just asked me to be your girlfriend,” you huff, “don’t forget who stitches you up. don’t get on my bad side.”

“my apologies,” he laughs. 

and then you’re back to kissing him, fervently and so desperately, you think this might be your last day on earth, making the most of it before you’ve breathed your last breath. alhaitham groans into your mouth, lets your hands wander all over him as you feel the tautness of his physique. 

it’s not the first time you’ve felt him, but it is the first time you can take all the time you want, memorizing him because he’s yours to keep locked away in your memory. 

“i love you,” you pant against his mouth, wet, hot kisses interrupting your sweet confession. 

“i,” he kisses your cheek, “love,” a kiss to your other cheek, “you,” a kiss to your nose, “too.”

this time, he leans down and kisses you right over your pulse point, right where your racing heart rate is beating erratically. you gasp when he bites and sucks at the flesh, making you whimper as your knees buckle. 

“how much?” you ask, pleading to know.

“enough to lose sleep,” he murmurs, “because my dreams were plagued with you. i couldn’t escape you in waking hours or in slumber. that’s how much you torment me. take over my body and mind. is that what you needed to hear?”

he’s a linguist—sometimes you forget that. perhaps he’s not so bad at saying what you need to hear, after all.

“maybe,” you hum, kissing his cheek, nibbling affectionately at the soft flesh, “you like me that much? how cute.”

“i’ll like you a lot more if you stop teasing,” he grunts, pressing his hot, searing erection against your thigh as your thumbs toy away at his nipples. you gasp when you feel him prod at you, feeling the heat even through the fabric that separates you. 

neither of you are patient enough to do this properly right now—but you have plenty of time for that. plenty of time to take it slow, explore each other, and map your bodies in ways you never dared to before. scared to cross that stupid, useless imaginary line you drew for no reason at all. you decide from here on out there are no more lines—just endless sand, your footprints next to his as you trek the path of lovers. 

you rub at his hardened cock through his pants, making him grunt before he grabs your hands and pins them over your head. 

“i said love you,” he says intensely, eyeing you with a carnal hunger you’ve never seen in him before, “but i didn’t say i’d be patient tonight.”

with that, his free hand tugs down both of your pants—his just enough to free his aching cock, and yours enough to expose your leaking cunt as he teases your clit with the blunt tip of his length. you whimper, bucking your hips into him, feeling the beads of precum spread along your heat as he shudders. 

“put it in,” you whine, clutching his shirt with tight fists. 

“you’re…not ready yet,” he insists, teeth grit as he gives his all to hold himself back from taking you just like you plead. 

but you’re stubborn—and alhaitham? he’s too weak to you to fight you when you are, doomed to give into any and every whim of yours.

“don’t care,” you shake your head, “don’t care, don’t care, don’t care. i just want you—please, please, please haitham.”

that’s all it takes for him to crack—slowly, so, so carefully, he nudges past your wet folds, inching his throbbing cock into you as you gasp at the stretch. this isn’t the first time he’s split you open—but it’s never something you get used to. the burning stretch still feels as new as the first time. he groans, low and breathless, as your walls clamp down on him as he slowly but surely intrudes into your cunt. 

“so tight,” he murmurs, voice filled with wonder—like this is the first time he’s ever felt you so raw. maybe it is. he’s never felt you as his, as yours. “does that feel good? do you feel me? what you do to me? and you thought i didn’t feel the same? like i didn’t purposely let blades slice my skin just for an excuse to come find you? feel your touch, watch you worry? just for a moment of your attention? surely, you can’t be so blind.”

his words make your head spin, making you throw it back as a soft escapes you when the last bit of his length slips in, filling you full and to the brim as he nudges at the most sensitive spots inside of you. he’s so deep; you think your lungs are filled with him, like every breath you take is filled with him, him, him. 

“yes,” you say through a shaky voice, “yes—so good, you feel so good. i want you, haitham. all of you.”

“you have all of me,” he kisses the words into your neck, “that’s not enough? you want more?”

“yes,” you plead, “more!”

he chuckles, smooth and low and so pretty, you feel an ache in your clit from the sound alone. “well, alright then. more it is—i could never dream of denying such a sweet wish.”

finally, he rolls his hips, all but pulling out completely before pressing back into you, dragging along every ridge of you, nudging his thick tip against the spongey, sensitive at the back of your walls. you’re slack against his door, held up by him and him alone as your body betrays you, unable to keep balance as he fucks into you the way he does. 

it’s been nine days without you. the way his hips snap so desperately into you, you’d think he’s a man thirsty, gone a year without rain in the deepest, more treacherous ruins in the desert. all you can do is cling to him, repeat the same mantra of haitham, haitham, haitham—more, please haitham.

he knows your body well. so, so well, he knows exactly how to toy with your clit, thumb finding the sensitive nub, enough pressure to make you whine with a jolt, but not enough to let you fall over the edge just yet—not until he allows it.

“i love you,” he punctuates with a roll of his hips, “repeat that. so i know you believe it. so i know you believe me.”

“p-please,” you gasp, tugging at his hair, “i…i need to c-cum—”

“say it,” he demands. 

“you love me—oh,” you cut yourself off with a sharp breath, his thumb abusing your clit in faster circles. 

“again,” he says firmly.

“you love me,” you whimper, “you…you love me. only me.”

“good,” he nods, groaning as you squeeze around him at the praise, “and don’t forget it. not for a second.”

“l-love you too,” you stutter, voice cracking as he rolls his hips unforgivingly, the friction making your mind fog with pure lust. “love you so, so much.”

that makes him inhale sharply, breath catching in his throat. his head falls to your neck, hot breath fanning against your skin as he moans lowly, hips sloppy and ungraceful in their pace but never failing in precision to angle right into your sweet spot. his thumb rolls circles into your clit, fast and desperate to send you over the edge so he can follow. 

and you do—you fall off the edge so fast, so hard, your nails dig blunt, raw crescent moons into his skin as you arch your back off the door and cry his name. luckily for alhaitham, his house is built conveniently enough that he has no close neighbors. no one to hear such filthy sounds right against the door for them to witness just by passing by. no one should be at this hour—but even if they were, you hardly could bring yourself to care. 

“c-cumming,” you wail, “cumming, haitham.”

“so beautiful,” he kisses the corner of your mouth, voice strained as he chases his own orgasm, “can’t…can’t believe you’re mine. mine.”

it’s like the realization that you’re his is what pushes him past the edge, his cock twitching with hot, thick ropes of cum into your abused cunt and painting the walls white as soon as he repeats the word mine. 

mine, mine, mine—he doesn’t stop repeating it even as he fucks himself into you and works himself through his high. you can feel the wet, messy trail of his cum and your slick leaking down your thighs, so filthy, so lewd, so devastatingly raw. 

“yours,” you confirm tiredly, kissing his head as he pants into your neck, muffled moans pressed against your skin as you soothe him while he falls apart against you. “all yours. not going anywhere, i promise. i promise.”

finally, he slumps against you, panting as he tries to catch his breath, sweaty and tired but never unsatisfied. 

“if you leave me again,” he quietly admits, “i think i’ll go mad.”

“then i won’t,” you say gently, stroking his sweaty locks. 

“i love you,” he reminds you once more, “do you believe me?”

“i do,” you nod, smiling like he’s handed you the sun, “and i love you too. do you believe me?”

“i do,” he hums, wrapping himself around you tighter. 

there’s a jiggle of the doorknob behind you, followed by an incoherent, slurred string of curses. alhaitham deflates against you, looking up at you tiredly. you throw your head back and laugh, gleeful, and so, so in love. 

“i’m tired of him,” he grumbles.

“let him off easy this once,” you brush back his hair, “it’s thanks to him that i came to see you tonight.”

“then i suppose just this once, i won’t leave him out to freeze,” he relents. 

you realize for a moment, alhaitham had never drawn the line in the first place. perhaps it was always just you, making rules in your head when all he ever did was want you from the start. he waited so patiently for you, so you cup his cheeks and pull him closer, giving him one more firm kiss as a reward for all you put him through. he pulls away, dazed as he stares at you with unfocused eyes. 

“i’ll give you another like that if you run me a warm bath,” you say cheekily. 

“do i get to join this bath,” he raises a brow, eyeing you in amusement as his hands rub soothingly into your hips. 

you pretend to think for a moment, mockingly tapping your chin in deep thought before you murmur, “okay, fine. but no funny business.”

“i wouldn’t dream of it—”

“hello?” kaveh’s slurred call interrupts, followed by rough knocking. 

“he can freeze,” alhaitham says bitterly.

“don’t you dare!” you gasp, fighting back a laugh as he looks at you miserably.

well…….what was supposed to be maybe 4-5k words at best has…..gotten quite out of hand LOL. 14k words later i present to you my official love letter to alhaitham. anyway i suppose this fic stems from sometimes wondering if i would be compatible with the characters i enjoy. but the question is not whether or not you’re compatible, but whether or not you’re willing to put in the work to make compatibility. and alhaitham would certainly do that. anyway!!! i hope you enjoyed. i’m not sure if many peiple will read this, but if you do, reblogs and comments are really appreciated! giving you all a hug and reminding you that your favs would 100% want you <3

[sciencebecameouraddiction]

prompt: who did this to you? tell me now.

summary: when you end up getting hurt while out, you make it back home, but just barely.

genre: angst, hurt/comfort

characters: alastor, lucifer

warnings: talk of fighting, abuse, broken bones and getting hurt, being stabbed. essentially you’re hurt and they respond to you being hurt. blood and medical care by the characters too.

alastor

you walked into the hotel, staggering in, barely able to keep yourself up. every breath your feeble body tried to drag in aggravated another part of your body, causing even slight breaths to feel like you were being punched again.

you grimaced as you found stability against the wall next to door, leaning against it, your head hitting the wall. you micro-adjusted yourself trying to find a spot where you could breathe, knowing if you didn’t you would pass out. you couldn't find that spot, and were near tears. you couldn’t breathe, everything hurt, your eye was swollen shut, and you didn’t know what else to do. you had to get to your room but the thought of walking up those stairs and then down the hallway to your room seemed more of a torture session then you just got through.

that’s when you heard the soft pattering of feet and you looked up to see wide eyes.

red eyes bore into yours as the momentary shock of seeing alastor stopped your brain from thinking about the mind numbing pain you were experiencing. you watched him tighten his grip on his cane as he slowly made his way over to you, like you were a wounded animal.

“can you walk?” he asked, sizing up your figure and waving the cane away.

“i’m not… sure. i… got here… okay…. but my rooms… far.” you muttered out, long pauses between words to catch your breath. he nods, a dark shadow passing over his face along with apprehension, before he shakes his head and approaches you holding out his hands.

“may i carry you?” he asks.

“what?” your shock at his question causing you to not fully register what he said.

“will you allow me to carry you up to the rooms. i’ll help you with whatever injuries you have there.” he says slow and careful.

“i don’t know if… you can carry… me.” you murmur. he smiles a bit more now.

“i’m stronger than i look.” he replies back easily. you wave your free hand at him, giving him consent to go ahead. he gently places his arm under your knees and in a swift movement your in his arms, your body searing as your injuries are jostled.

“fuck.” you moan out trying to breath. alastor stays still and waits until you’re breathing somewhat regularly. he then starts taking you up the stairs, heading the opposite direction from your room.

“my room…” you say pointing behind him.

“i know. we’re going to my room. i have more first aid supplies then what charlie put in the rooms.” he replies easily, not breaking a sweat or even seeming out of breath. his door opens and he gently places you down on a chair near the opening to the forest. you try and find your breath again as alastor quietly darts off and comes back with a box of medical supplies.

he’s quiet as he examines you and asks permission to take off your shirt. he quickly assesses the damage to your ribs, your ankle and your face. checking your hands as well and glaring at the wounds on your knuckles. he starts with your ribs first, setting them and then wrapping them, forcing your posture straight. had you not been just trying to stay awake, you would have blushed at how gently his hands trailed your sides, piecing you back together. next he hands you a cold pack for your eye. you hold it up as he wraps your hand in gauze and ointment. you switch hands as he treats the other one.

“i don’t think your ankle is broken.” he says, “but at the least it’s sprained horribly.” he pulls out a stabilizer and gauze. “this will hurt.” you nod.

“do you worse.” you mutter, finally able to take deeper but still shallow breaths. he turns your foot to face up and your eyes widen as you scream.

“it’s okay. you’re okay.” he says, his eyes wide and worried.

“it hurts al. it hurts.” you cry, tears running down your face.

“i know. but let me finish up. it will feel better.” he assured you as he reaches up and wipes your tears away.

“go ahead.” you whisper. he quickly puts the stabilizer against your leg and then wraps it with gauze. tears running down your cheeks as you keep still and silent.

“it’s done.” he says leaning back as you sit in the chair feeling exhausted.

“thank you… alastor.” you voice no louder than a whisper but you know he hears you as he nods. he packs everything up and then moves you to the bed that magically appears in the room.

“i have a room al.” you say, sitting against the pillows.

“i know you do, but you can’t do anything in this condition. so you’ll stay here until i deem it okay for you to leave.” his tone leaving no room for argument and you nod. “now, who did this to you?”

your eyes widen as your head snaps up at him. gone was the man you saw before, replaced with what you knew as the radio demon. the shift happened almost instantaneously. “it was nothing alastor. i just… fucked up.” you say looking off to the side.

“i don’t take well with lying dear.” he says, his hand hovering over your ankle as a warning. you look at him disbelieving and he just tilts his head. almost as if he’s saying ‘try me’. you sigh.

“it was an ex of mine. he worked for vox and i left him before i came here. he was abusive and i had enough. but he found me and he knew i was at the hotel. said i couldn’t get away from him, and that we were meant to be. and when i tried to get away…” you motioned to yourself. you hoped your words came across as truthful and sincere. you internally sighed in relief as alastor nodded, and sent his shadow off. moments later husk appeared and alastor murmured something to him. you saw husk’s eyes widen as he looked at you and then alastor.

“i’ll take care of it.” husk said, his gaze steely as he left.

“relax my dear. you’re safe now and we’ll help you recover.” alastor said, as you moved to lay down, him taking up an arm chair by the bed and procuring a book from thin air. you closed your eyes as guilt consumed you. you had told alastor the truth but not the full truth.

you didn’t tell him that your ex mentioned that him “giving to you what was coming” was from vox and was to be a message to the radio demon. you knew that alastor would withdraw after that and that would hurt you more than any other physical pain anyone could put you through.

lucifer

you quickly shut the door to the house, leaning against it and taking a breath. you looked down to your abdomen and got a bit woozy seeing the blood spread across your white shirt.

“damn it.” you mutter, feeling a bit foggy from the blood loss. you shake your head trying to clear it. you knew that lucifer was home and you could only hold onto the hope that he didn't hear you come in. you were getting ready to make your way to the bathroom when lucifer popped in front of you.

“honey! you’re home!” he says, looking mostly at the papers in his hand as you straightened up much to the protest of your body, trying to seem like you had not been stabbed maybe 15 minutes ago.

“i- yup!” you responded, your voice tight as you tried to cover your wound with your hand. you moved your jacket over it so that it couldn’t be seen either. lucifer looked up at you as his eye squinted at you. 

“are you all right?” he asks, coming closer to you, his focus on those papers in his hand all but forgotten. 

“i-i’m fine, luce.” you smile, it not reaching your eyes though. you clear your throat, looking off the left, trying to figure out a way to stop him from really observing you. “i know you said you wanted to show me those new plans for the hotel, let’s go check them out!” you say, changing the subject. hoping that worked. you didn’t want to worry him, nor tell him why you were hurt.

“okay…” he says drawing out the word and then motioning for you to follow him. you start walking behind him, every footstep jostling you and causing your wound to bleed even more, when you reached the three stairs to his study. he crossed them easily but you stepped up on the one and gasped, feeling searing pain in your side. your hand coming out to hold the wall so you didn’t fall. your breath rushing in and out of you like you had ran a race, as your head swam, your body loosing more blood. you see the red substance drip from your hand and watch it fall to the floor, blending into the red carpet. you look up and see lucifer standing there, his eyes wide. 

“what the fuck happened?” he cries, going to you and lifting you up, your hand falling from your wound and your jacket falling back, showing the slice through your shirt. he quickly makes a portal and gets you to your shared room. he gently lays you down on the bed, and dashes off to get some gauze. you try to get off the bed not wanting to ruin the sheets. he comes back to you flailing, trying to get up and pushes you back down, looking at you like you had completely lost it.

“the sheets…” you murmur, coughing and wiping your hand away seeing blood. “oh no.” you whisper and his eyes widen. he throws the gauze away and places his hands on your stomach.

“why didn't you tell me immediately?" he cries, shaking his head looking distraught. "i’m going to heal you, just... stay still.” he says closing his eyes. you grab his hand with the strength you had, though you felt all the strength in your body seemingly being siphoned just by laying on the bed. he looks at you, his eyes wide.

“it hurts you.” you say. 

“don’t care.” he says, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. before you can argue again, his hands glow gold and you body starts stitching itself up, cell by cell, inch by inch. you can feel it all. you cry out as lucifer healing you seems to go on forever. the few minutes it takes seems like hours, as your mind swims through a sea of pain and exhaustion. finally the golden glow subsides and lucifer drops to his knees next to you. you grab his hand as he rests his head against you. both of you trying to recover. you can barely keep your eyes open feeling them closing. you drift off to a dreamless sleep, almost like your body forcing you to rest. 

when you wake next you sit up quickly, looking around the dark room trying to find lucifer. your breath coming in short pants as you can't see anything but the darkness in the room.

“luce?” you ask, your voice hoarse and then you look next to you. lucifer was sleeping close by you. you sigh out in relief as you lay back down and brush his hair back from his eyes, kissing his forehead. “you saved me, again.” you murmur, gently resting your hand on his cheek, resting your forehead against his. his eyes open slowly.

“i’ll always be there to do so.” he smiles and sits up. 

“i’m sorry i woke you up.” you said as he turned to you, drawing you to him and situating you to straddle his lap. clutching you close.

“i was so scared.” he whispered, not like he was asleep just a moment ago.

“i’m sorry.” you respond back. your head slotting in between his shoulder and neck. he lets you rest there for a moment and then pulls you back to look at you.

“who did this to you?” he asks, his eyes steely as he cupped your face gently. you shook your head not wanting to say. “darling, who did this?” he asked, the tone of his voice sharper and more impatient.

“i-“ tears start running down your face. “you’re going to be so upset… and i don’t want you to be. i don’t want.. you to pull away from me again. it’ll make you do that and i can’t bare that lucifer. i just-“ you start talking quickly, your breaths coming quick as you hold on to his shoulders, looking into his eyes even as tears pour from yours. lucifer’s eyes widen and his eyes are misty seeing how upset you are. 

“i won’t. i promise you. i won't pull away, regardless of what you tell me. but i need to know who did this to you. tell me. now.” lucifer says, his voice firm. 

“i-they were masked. they looked like sharks?” you phrased the last statement as a question. “they cornered me in an alley and said that i needed to take a message to lucifer. that they knew how to get to you, and they could use me to do that and you needed to give them what they asked for.” you said as you recounted the tale with your eyes closed. you opened them when you felt lucifer’s claws digging into your hips. you saw his eyes had turned red and his horns were fully out. 

“and they stabbed you?” he ground out. you nodded. "that was their message?" you nodded again.

"that if you didn't do what they asked, they would hurt me." you explain, realizing near the end of the explanation that it probably wasn't needed. his eyes darkened as you spoke, and he moved you gently onto your side of the bed. he took a deep breath as he got up. he gently petted your hair and helped you lay down, his horns no longer out, but his eyes bright red.

“where are you going?” you asked, already knowing the answer.

“out. i’ll be back all right. stay here and go to sleep, you need it. i’ll be right back.” he says, a steely resolve in his eyes, and a gentle smile on his face. you nodded as your eyes felt heavy and fell asleep before lucifer even reached the door to leave. he straightened his jacket and walked down the hall. he had important work to take care of as he created a portal and stepped through it.

[moondirti]

(first time doing a ask bare with me)

pretty please a continue of the house distribution thing. the fic where she does military housing to afford rent. just a continuation please 🙏🏽

feel free to skip if your mind is just blank with ideas for it x

simon riley / afab! reader • part one cw: dubcon, intoxication, spanking, wedgies, degradation, dacryphilia, very mild puppy play (mostly just pet names)

"Well, aren' you a sight."

Much like the lamplight, his voice is low. Mocking, almost. You'd think he were amused if it weren't for the dangerous way his eyes assess your sorry state, raking the lines of your bare legs to the way your dress wraps tight around your chest. It almost escapes you that he's maskless at first, so entranced by the glint of his pupils, the shadowed irises that pinch a deep, very primal nerve in you.

His lips curl into an uneven sneer, scar dissecting the bottom and running down to his chin. You wipe your nose with the heel of your hand, giving your best attempt at an apathetic shrug.

"I had fun."

"Did'ya now?" He laughs humourlessly. "Mus' have different ideas of fun, me and you. Can' see the fun in getting pissed out'f my mind, worryin' the people in your life by stayin' out s'late."

Spite flares, fear slinking back your throat to make room for the petulance that froths on your tongue like venom. It completely poisons his admission to the fact that he'd been worried, turns it into something pathetic and hypocritical. You storm closer. Wild. Angry.

"That's fucking rich coming from you. What is your idea of fun, then, Lieutenant? Tormenting women who open up their home to you? Walking in on them in the bathroom, pissing all over the fucking seat? Does it grant you satisfaction to make people so uncomfortable that they'd rather be anywhere but with you?"

His jaw tenses, a "careful, pet." grunted under his breath, but he makes no move to stop you. Just continues sitting on your couch, legs spread, simmering. Waiting for you to tire out.

"Shut the fuck up. Oh my god. Oh my god. I can hardly be at bloody peace in my own house anymore! You're- You're... A fucking nightmare, Riley! So excuse me if I went out and enjoyed myself when I haven't been able to do so in weeks!"

By the end of your little tirade, you're an even worse mess than you had been before. Flyaways stick to your sweaty temple, mascara rims your blown eyes. Your panting does nothing to calm the frantic race of your heart, which beats at your ribcage like doldrums to war. You can feel the effects of it everywhere; your pulse, hot and quick, at your eyebrow, your wrists, the arch of your foot.

Riley stands. Your lip trembles.

You're so close now that your gaze is level with his chest. Tall. You'd forgotten how tall he was. Or how wide. Or dangerous. His biceps – bare given his tight-fitted t-shirt, tree-trunk large and enough to crush watermelons – tense, and all-too-suddenly, you find your jaw clutched in a bruising grip. He jerks your head up so your eyes meet his.

"Simon." He mutters. "But you don't get to call me tha', or anything at all but Sir."

"Letmegomff–" You're rendered mute when his thumb and forefinger press your cheeks together, but that certainly doesn't stop you from whining.

"Y'wanna know my idea of a good time?" Purely rhetorical, of course. Aside from not being able to answer him, it doesn't matter what you want. There's a clear direction this seems to be heading towards – someplace where the hand pawing your ass continues lower, or where the length in his pants fits down your throat. Someplace not unwelcome by you, despite the way you thrash and cry in his arms. "It's putting foul things like you in their place."

He shucks your dress over your ass, the fabric bunching around your waist, and hooks a fist in the waistline of your soaked panties. Your mind is so foggy, influenced by shitty tequila and the subspace Simon bullies you into embracing, that you don't process the cause of your pain immediately. Don't correlate it to the way he pulls upward, your underwear bunching into a tight line that cleaves between your ass-cheeks and rubs abrasively against your poor clit. Don't– can't confront it until the force literally picks you up off the floor, toes barely touching the ground, held up by a wedgie and the grip around your jaw alone.

Tears spring to your lash line, tracing miserable treks down your cheeks. His thumb swipes what it can away, pushing the salty water into your mouth, and stays there while you lap at his calloused fingertips.

"There we go. Look at you, brainless mutt. Jus' need something on your cunt and something in your mouth to keep you quiet, hm? Happy to hang li'e this for hours, I bet."

Your muffled yell is met with another laugh, thumb pushing deeper into your mouth to shut you up.

"Shh, I know. Still need'ta be taught a lesson. I haven' forgotten." The stitches on your panties begin to tear, the rips loud and relieving, especially when you start to sag back down to the floor. Simon doesn't take it with any kind of urgency, though he cocks his head at the way you blink up at him, lashes fanning in rapid succession. An unspoken, desperate plea. "Was gonna hold out, get you sobered up for your punishment. But you're practically itchin' for it, aren' you?"

He puppets your head into an enthusiastic nod, which he meets with a faux huff.

"Course you are." The forbearing quality of his tone is promptly betrayed by the way you're manhandled over his lap. Pivoting one hand opposite to the other, he's able to sit on the couch and get you thrown over his thighs in a mere matter of seconds. "Normally I'd make y'count, but I figure you're too far gone for that. Jus' try to keep your wailing quiet."

Your underwear gives in with a final tug, ripping from the soaked gusset to become nothing but a flimsy piece of fabric around your hips. Simon swipes the tattered remains off your raised bottom, taking longer than necessary to smooth over the area. It's all the indication you need to what's coming – his rough palm teases the nerve endings below your softer skin, bringing them to frenzied life. Preparing them to hurt.

When he breaks away, you hold your breath.

The air behind you whistles as his hand comes down.

A sharp, resounding crack fractures the baited silence of the room. Your mouth flies open. Searing pain roars across your backside like wildfire, worsening every second it's exposed to open elements. Your scream is belated, thunder to the lightening, tearing from your throat only after the initial shock subsides.

A series of lighter blows land on alternating cheeks, two fingers returning to gag you through the onslaught. Unlike his thumb, these reach the very back of your tonsils, prompting wet gags as they fondle with your throat. Drool dribbles from the corners of your lips, slicking your chin with lipstick-tinted fluid.

"Fuckin' beautiful when you're not givin' an attitude, puppy. All stupid and submissive, cunt droolin' on my lap."

You groan, choke, then cry some more when his spanks grow incrementally harsher again. Gratefully, they're never in the same place twice. He beats the top of your thighs, your lower back, the sides of your hips. Your cheeks especially, which start to emit a steady kind of heat the longer he keeps it up.

Eventually, as a matter of coping, your brain starts to consider the cruel sting as pleasurable instead, sending little bolts of pleasure directly to your clit every time his hand comes down on your ass. It swells, fattening up with blood, pressing tighter against the steady mass of his thigh. Inadvertently, you start rutting against it to find more of the same relief, humping his leg like the dog he's making you out to be.

It doesn't escape his notice, of course.

His foot pushes one of your flailing ankles outward so that your legs are spread, pussy made vulnerable to his scrutiny. The next slap is thus aimed straight at your fluttering hole, slick doing nothing to affect his deadly precision. When it lands, it lands exactly where he meant for it to, and introduces you to a whole other degree of pain that has you seeing stars. You're openly bawling around his fingers now, vision so cloudy you can't tell light from dark.

"Didn' like tha', did you?"

"Nngh– nmmph!"

"There's more where it came from, pup. Best listen to everythin' I say from now on, then, 'less you wan' your little hole beat black 'n' blue."

Simon stresses his point by tracing the seam of your cunt, collecting the lubrication there to smear across the hotspot at the top. Presses into it. Grants you a little gratification, as if to say: and here's what you can have if you behave.

"You gonna be a good pet?"

This time, he withdraws his fingers from your maw. Expects a response, even though it takes you ages to recover from the lack of oxygen. You swallow the saliva pooling behind your teeth, inhaling ragged gasps that make your lungs ache.

He pinches your clit when you take too long. Lightly, but it's enough.

"Yes! Yes, s-sir. I'll be good."

[next]

[nandorisms]

cbd is so good for pain 🙏😊

[pathologicalreid]

Heyy dunno if this is something you’d consider writing but I just saw an edit of Spencer and it made me realize we don’t really go into how he essentially relapsed when he was drugged in Mexico and now I need to see this in writing I don’t necessarily have a prompt but something along the lines of just having a convo with him or comforting him? 🫶🏼

the ninth step | S.R.

spencer works to make amends after mexico, and he's starting with you

who? spencer reid x fem!reader category: angst; hurt/comfort content warnings: drug use, narcotics anonymous, spoilers for 2x15 "revelations", spoilers for 12x13 "spencer", substance use disorder, fiancee!reader, the ninth step is amends, a lot of crying, only a little proofread word count: 1.11k a/n: you say no prompt and i say free reign!!! i think about spencer in mexico all the time so thank you sooo much for this request!

The only time anyone could find Spencer Reid in a church was when he was in a meeting.

As usual, you waited out front on one of the benches, leaning your elbow on the iron armrest as you kept your notebook balanced on your thigh, scribbling notes down as you waited for Spencer to come out and meet you.

Members of his group left the church in staggered variations of people, some left together to get coffee after, some left alone, and one didn’t leave at all. A few of them acknowledged you as they passed, but no one mentioned your fiancé.

Once your car was the last one remaining in the parking lot, you slipped your notebook into your bag before hauling it over your shoulder and standing up. Wiping off the back of your jeans, you walked through the front doors, noting the way the stained-glass windows refracted the remaining sunlight on the linoleum floor.

Knowing the pathway, you walked over to the meeting room, a space reserved for youth groups, Sunday school, and Narcotics Anonymous meetings. With the space vacated, the only sound was the tapping of your shoes as you passed through the doorway, and just as you had assumed, Spencer was the only person remaining in the windowless room.

He didn’t move as you approached him, sticking your hands in your jeans pockets as you silently assessed the despondent look on his face. “How are you?” You asked softly, tilting your head to the side.

“I’m just sitting,” he mumbled, it wouldn’t have been intelligible if you didn’t have years of practice understanding him and his mumbles. His old NA group had disbanded years ago, and you were glad to find this one close to your apartment.

Nodding understandingly, you took one more step closer to him, “Can I sit with you?”

Brown eyes flickered up at you just then as he seemingly considered your offer, “Yeah.”

Looking around, you hooked your ankle around the leg of an empty, gray folding chair and dragged it across the floor until it was next to Spencer.  Setting your bag on the floor, you took your seat.

For a while, you sat in silence. For a while, that was enough.

After a couple of minutes, your silence was broken when Spencer finally moved, pressing the heels of his palms to his eyes, and your chest ached when slowly, his shoulders started to shake.

Getting out of your chair, you crouched in front of him, keeping your hands resting on your knees as you looked up at him, “Can I get you anything?” You asked, keeping your voice level as emotion threatened to take over.

You had known that today wasn’t going to be a good day from the moment Spencer asked you to drive him to the meeting. He asked you to take him because he was afraid that he wouldn’t make it there on his own, and at the time, you hadn’t even dared to consider the implications of what that meant for him.

Spencer’s hands fell to his lap, and you eyed him carefully as he took a deep breath. His eyes were bloodshot and watery as he looked at you just as intently – there was a dam built between the two of you, and there had been since he came home.

Things had changed. That much was clear to you ever since he came home to you and said the word out loud. A word that had seemed foreign in your household until it became a reality. You continuously had to remind yourself that you weren’t in this situation because of a decision he had made, you were here before of a choice that someone else had made for him.

It churned your stomach to see him knocked back down to day one. Six months later, you were here, in this denominational building, silently pleading with him to say something to you.

Holding your breath, Spencer reached his hands out, taking both of yours in his, “I’m so sorry.”

Your shoulders drooped. We don’t have to do this here, you wanted to tell him, but that’s not what he needed right now. Gently, you squeezed his hands in a comforting gesture, “I know you are, baby.”

“We…” he whispered, “Our lives should look a lot different right now.” He said, moving a finger and tapping the engagement ring on your left hand.

A previously planned wedding day had come and gone, Spencer had been in Millburn, and you spent the day on the couch in Emily’s office.

Refusing to disconnect your hands, Spencer wiped his face on his arm, the motion bringing a minuscule smile to your face. “I shouldn’t have gone to Mexico. I should’ve been more honest with you about where I had been going and what I was doing, and I know that now.”

You looked up at him, maintaining eye contact with him. He was trying to make amends with you.

“I know that there’s no amount of apologizing or groveling that can fully make up for everything you’ve lost because of me, but for as long as you keep having me, I’ll spend all of my days trying to make up for all of this,” he lamented, keeping his clammy hands clasped around yours. “Actions speak louder than words, that’s true, especially with amends, and… I’m trying.”

Spencer followed the NA handbook to the very finest minutiae, he stayed away from anything that his substance use disorder could cling onto, and as his voice broke and tears made pathways on his cheeks, you wanted to tell him that you saw him. You noticed every effort he made, but all you could do was cry in time with him.

Disconnecting your hands, he reached out and wiped away your tears before cupping both of your cheeks in his hands, “I’m never going to stop trying for you, Y/N.”

Your lips parted as you wandered the depths of your mind for something adequate to tell him, but nothing came out.

“All of the sacrifices that you’ve made in the name of the life that I messed up, I see them all. I think about them all the time and if there’s ever anything you need from me, just tell me, okay?” He implored, lifting your chin and gently guiding you up, pulling you toward him until you were sat with your legs perpendicular on his lap.

You let loose a shaky sigh, leaning your head and settling it on his shoulder, “Thank you,” you whispered, closing your eyes as he wrapped his arms around your torso, keeping you close to him.

[la-galaxie-langblr]

COPINE AIDE-MOI

girl help

[solbaby7]

Calypso

pairing: azriel x reader

warning: swearing, mentions of being beaten, violence, murder, probably typos, based off a tiktok i saw (pretty sure this is based off a play or something along those lines)

summary: The sweetest member of the Inner Circle shows the Autumn Court the true extent of feminine rage.

—

“Something is wrong,” Azriel couldn’t stop pacing, heart thumping so hard in his chest he was sure there was an imprint beginning to etch its way onto his skin. A hand absently rubs at his chest, clothes feeling too tight and his brothers don’t miss the rigid raise of his wings. Shadows cloak his form, curling around his ears and tugging on his clothes in their own way of communicating the same thing he had. “Something is very, very wrong. She should be back by now.”

Rhysand try’s to remain reasonable—to regain control of the rapidly escalating situation but you were supposed to have been back nearly four hours ago.

At first, the High Lord had thought it was a good idea; that you’d be a pleasant change from Az’s domineering brood or Cassian’s incessant need to mouth off but the longer they waited the more Rhys considered that maybe he made the wrong call. “She’s gone on missions to Autumn alone many times before, Az.”

The shadowsinger nods in agreement but his stance doesn’t relax even a bit. “Sure but she’s never once been late getting back home. Never.” Saying the words seem to be confirmation enough, waiting one second—two before he’s retreating from Rhysand’s office and saying fuck it to any of the consequences that he would surely face if he got there and something had happened to you.

“Az,” Cass shouts from down the hall, bounding steps sounding against the polished floors as he falls in stride with him. “Just wait for one second.”

“If it was your mate, would you wait?”

“Of course not but we just need two minutes to assess the situation before just barging inside—this is Autumn we are talking about here.”

“I don’t care.”

Fingers rake through shoulder length hair, honey eyes clocking Azriel’s determined stride, the hard brow and strong set of his mouth. “I understand that but if it gets her killed—”

“Us waiting might get her killed,” Azriel snaps, nearly growling the words free; shadows stiffening at his shoulders in agitation. “I won’t risk it. I won’t lose her.”

There’s no room for fighting; not when Rhys and Cassian were too busy trying to keep up with Azriel’s brutal pace to cross the wards. Winnowing in a rush never did well on the stomach but the unease that churns in Azriel’s gut the moment they arrive at Autumns borders is anything but normal.

“This isn’t right,” Cassian insists, following behind with a watchful eye; every muscle in his body tense as awareness prickles to life. “Where are the guards? The hounds?” It’s too quiet, the sky too dark and yet Azriel continues on a path of his own making; following the pure string within to draw him back to his other half.

The spymaster rips through the trees, shoving aside offending branches with little regard for the noise being made. It works in his favor, stumbling at the right place at the wrong time judging by the frazzled guards and a High Lord soaked from the waist down. Complete silence fills the space; not even a bird chirps, no rustling of woodland creatures, no crackling cadence of crawling cicadas. “Where is she?” Azriel demands, voice dangerously low as he searched deeper within the bond; scrambling for further direction, desperate for the confirmation of your safety.

Beron Vanserra looks too smug, a devilish smirk crafting in the corner of his mouth. Auburn hair falls from its neat styling, clothes ruffled and Azriel knows he can’t be the only one who notices the petrified expressions plastered on the guards faces—the fact that none of them make a move to comment on Night Court breaching another’s borders without permission. “Where’s who?”

“You know who,” Rhysand says your name carefully, casually pressing forward until he stood before Azriel, serving as a barrier between a male withholding answers and another male willing to carve the world to pieces in order to obtain them. “Your meeting with her should’ve ended hours ago.”

“It never started,” Beron waves a hand dismissively, his clothes drying with the motion. Guards surround him, leaving a gap for visibility but their security is subdued; trembling with fear and eyes glistening with guilt. “She never arrived.”

Azriel’s grip tightens around the hilt of Truthteller, golden irises narrow to slits and his voice is but a hiss. “You’re lying.”

A brow raises, the overwhelming scent of whiskey and cinnamon muddled by sea salt and ocean spray; a confusing combination laced with a distress that did not belong to the High Lord of Autumn. “Do you have proof?”

Shadows creep up Azriel’s form, silently reminding its master of their presence and willingness to eliminate the threat no matter the outcome but before his lips can form words—an unnatural noise cuts through the air. The hairs on the back of his neck stands at attention, golden eyes surveilling every inch of dense foliage. “What was that?”

Its eerie and drawn out, almost like song but the melody held no comfort, no warmth.

“What did you do?” Azriel swallows thickly, shoulders uncomfortably tense as the humming continues, layered feminine voices piercing their ears like the sirens Cass always talked about around a crackling fire after too much to drink.

“I did nothing.” Beron shrugs, voice even and sure but the fear that settles behind his eyes isn’t equally well hidden. His body language betrays him, subconsciously shuffling closer to the readied guards that flank every side of their High Lord.

“Vanserra.” Your silhouette is barely noticeable when cloaked in the night and Azriel’s brow raises at the tears in your gown, the healing split of your lip—and where were your shoes?

Rhys calls your name, taking only a single step before Cassian’s iron grip curls around his arms, swiftly tugging him back and behind him. A general protecting the leader of his court as the scene before them became horribly apparent. “Impossible,” Beron whispers, not bothering to hide the disbelief—the horror. “You died.”

Azriel’s stance faulters, the stony expression unable to hide the unbridled pain that etches its way onto his features at the words.

But, you don’t seem phased.

In fact, you don’t seem much like yourself at all.

The soft glow of your light is replaced with a murky darkness; soiled by anger and the bubbling desire for vengeance and all of it is directed towards the copper haired male with a heart like coal and a soul filled to the brim with ash. “Get in the water.” You command.

“I am immune to your witchcraft, demon.” Beron scoffs your way, attempting to deflect the shake of his voice with the accusatory finger pointed to the High Lord of Night tucked safely behind his brothers. “Control your bitch or I will.”

Azriel pushes back the need to retaliate, golden eyes sliding from the male to the woman he loved; a woman who exuded unbridled feminine rage the longer you allowed such power to flow through you—power you always kept so bottled up, so contained. Soothed into submission by your kindness and grace, the love you shared with friend and stranger alike; all unleashed from the conclaves of their confinement. Az’s grip on Truthteller tightens and it’s a true test of will to tear his gaze away long enough to address Beron once more. “What did you do?”

The Autumn Courts High Lord goes still. The air seems to thin, the water bristling against the rocky shore; howling, shouting, demanding to rise—to bend at your will and follow out the revenge you seeked. “Tell them,” Your voice ebbs through the space between you, unnaturally controlled, unusually low and unbearably empty. “Tell them what you did to me and maybe I’ll show mercy.”

“I did nothing.”

A guard sucks in a shaky breath, sweat lacing his brow and it takes no more than a second before he’s released hold of his weapon and drops to the ground on his knees. “Forgive me.” He begs, hands pressed together as if he were praying. “I-I’m so sorry. So, so sorry.” Cassian regards Azriel with a sharp look, crimson Syphons brewing with power as every cell in his body screamed that something terrible was going to happen—that something terrible had happened and they were too late. Forced to stand by, frozen as you were molded into a woman they could hardly recognize. The pretty blue dress you’d left in is torn, ruined fabric sagging in ribbons, showing off collarbones covered in bruises shaped like fingerprints, in cuts that healed before their very eyes. Soaked hair hangs past your shoulders, dripping down your back as the wind whipped through what remained of your clothes. “I beg of you, please, have mercy.”

The apology does no good and before Cassian can work up a plan to get Rhysand as far away as possible, you’re already wrapping them in a dome of water so crystal clear it’s like glass; shielding them from your rage while providing a front row seat to the events long since forged in stone. “Rhys, can you get in her head?”

“I don’t have to,” Rhysand responds barely above a whisper, violet eyes so pale, pupils so pinpricked as the events were shoved at him at an upresendented speed. You, arriving as planned, joining the High Lord privately for dinner when the two sips of wine began to have your body feeling like a whole night of binging at Rita’s with the girls. The images project onto the other, Cass and Az watching with bated breath as they looked through your eyes, felt your disorientation, the fear, the disgust when hands roamed over your body. It took everything for Azriel not to break, to unleash horrors upon Beron Vanserra and every male involved as he watched you beg for them to let you go. Your shoes left in a hallway in your struggle, soft skin and prettily painted toes marred by the rough tugging, the crude remarks and sick promises to kill you quick.

Cassian’s stomach churns, food curdling from within when he feels you strain against the water, as they held you down and left you there long after your hands went limp.

They could feel the power within you, pumping back life into the tiny sliver of hope left, expelling the water from your lungs and replacing that beacon of light with something the High Lord of Autumn better understood. “Get in the water,” You say once more, stepping closer and the crashing waves seem to move with you, lapping at your bare feet, salving over aches and bruises.

“Or what?” He spits, struggling to grapple into whatever control he had left but his vile tone holds no weight in comparison to you and cold expression settling into your eyes.

“Or I’ll raise the tides so high, all of Autumn Court will die.” There’s no bite in your words, only pure promise; steps strong and filled with an uncapped power so strong it seemed to throb. The bustling waves behind you climb higher and higher, so high the skyline is blocked; so high that nothing else existed behind you but such torrential oceans filled with its creatures that thrashed and snapped their jaws to do as you pleased. “Say the words, Beron. Tell them what you did to me.” Azriel’s feels it before he sees it; the bubbling emotions, the swelling power inside of you coming to a head and begging to explode. “Say it!” You demand so furiously the same guard on his knees visibly flinches, thick streams of tears trailing down his aged face as his back bows in submission before their very eyes.

He sings like a canary, confessing to following their High Lords orders of sending the Night Court a message for foolishly in believing in peace. The male professes how one of the cooks were told to lace the wine to subdue her. He musters up the decency to spare the shadowsinger a pleading glance, spilling out useless apologies and promises to never do it again—how disgusted he felt harming a female; one who was so sweet and gentle but orders were orders.

No one speaks, the other guards eyes are as wide as saucers, mouths parted in utter shock as they await the repercussions of the confession; trembling like branches in the wind under the suffocating pressure of your power.

Beron doesn’t pay the sobbing male swathed in armor any mind. Instead, he’s trained on the fellow High Lord—borderline desperate in his command. “Control her. Please.”

“It’s all about control with you, isn’t it, Beron?” Each step closer has your nose curling in disgust, lip quirking in a snarl. “I should fix that.” Wind whistles around furiously, snatching through auburn hair and ripping the overly expensive cloak right from his shoulders. True terror sets root in cruel eyes and the hairs on the back of Beron’s neck raises; primal instincts warning him of impending danger—of inevitable doom. “I’ll make tidal waves so profound that both your wife and your sons will drown.”

“Seize her,” Beron spits, snapping out the words so fiercely that spittle shoots free but even his own protection detail realizes who’s really in control here and not one of them moves to appease the order. “Threatening a High Lord and his family is punishable by death.”

Birds screech their caws of great displeasure, wings fluttering furiously against the trees in such a frenzy that leaves fall free; taunting the end of one reign and the beginnings of another. You don’t feed into his poor attempts of deflecting, his words entering one ear and flying out the other. “You mistake my threats for bluff,” Swords clatter to the ground, Autumn soldiers sharply turning on the balls of their feet with full intent to run—to rush back to their wives and children for the false feeling of safety. You allow them a few strides as a kindness before unleashing the torrential downpour upon them; sweeping each one clean off their feet in their fancy armor. “You have lived more than enough.” Shades of deep red and burnt orange fight uselessly against the angry seas, rough tides swallowing up the soldiers garbled screams and washing them away.

Beron chokes on the salty water, legs pumping furiously against the current, his eyes burning and lungs filling with the catastrophic affects of your anger. “Stop!” His cheeks turn red, the veins in his neck straining against tanned skin and you find yourself fixating on the way his hands claw at his throat—fighting for the slightest gasp of oxygen.

“Did you stop when I begged?” The oceans cover land with ease, seeping past the borders with full intent to make good on your promises on destroying every inch of Autumn territory. “When I screamed for you to just please let me go?” Deep red shifts to an unusual shade of purple, water seeps from his nose and his eyes all but bulge out of the socket.

Choked noises sputter from Beron’s lips, an arm desperately clutching around the base of a tree to keep from being washed up. “I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not,” The water parts for you, allowing you a perfect path to the High Lord and you take your sweet time watching his struggle—his disarray. He looks so utterly boyish this way, his hair soaked over his forehead, lashes dark and clustered together under the force of ocean spray smacking at his cheeks like a million microscopic needles. “But, you will be.”

Eerie voices sing their song, layering over the other in a plethora of different pitches until Beron’s head snaps from side to side, eyes searching frantically for the source but he realizes too late.

Water wraiths and their siren sisters cut through the cool waters like a sword through the wind, their webbed fingers eager to grab at the deviant of a man responsible for savagely murdering countless of their brothers and sisters in cold blood just for sport. One of them pause, the features of her face rippling with the tide but there’s no mistaking the respectful nod of her head—one that you return.

You don’t linger to watch the rest, your anger fizzling out and all that’s left is the desire to go home and spend a whole week hidden in the sheets with your mate. If he’d still have you after all this. Bare feet trudge against the ground until you stand before your family, the barrier lowered. You can’t meet their eyes, the wounds too raw and their pity too palpable but the familiar comfort of cool shadows drape over you, evaluating and assessing before relaying their findings back to their master. “I—“

Azriel’s body collides with yours before the whole sentence can even form, strong arms wrapping you up and tugging you as close as he could. His hands go over every inch of you, muttering under his breath about how he’d never let you out of his sight again. “You’re okay,” His shoulders visibly relax, when he can’t find a hint of damage on you—not even a bruise. “Thank gods you’re okay.”

Your eyes slide past him, lips pursing as you prepared yourself for whatever came next. You’d killed a High Lord—there’s no chance anyone would just let that go. “Rhysand, I—“

“You didn’t do anything,” He swiftly cuts in, regarding you fondly even if his stomach swells with guilt at the thought of being the one who put you in harms way in the first place. “You’re safe and that’s all that matters.”

For now.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Company that makes millions spying on students will get to sue a whistleblower

Yesterday, the Court of Appeal for British Columbia handed down a jaw-droppingly stupid and terrible decision, rejecting the whistleblower Ian Linkletter’s claim that he was engaged in legitimate criticism when he linked to freely available materials from the ed-tech surveillance company Proctorio:

https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/ca/23/01/2023BCCA0160.htm

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/20/links-arent-performances/#free-ian-linkletter

It’s been a minute since Linkletter’s case arose, so I’ll give you a little recap here. Proctorio is a massive, wildly profitable ed-tech company that sells a surveillance tool to monitor students while they take high-stakes tests from home. The tool monitors the student’s computer and the student’s face, especially their eye-movements. It also allows instructors and other personnel to watch the students and even take control of their computer. This is called “remote invigilation.”

This is ghastly in just about every way. For starters, Proctorio’s facial monitoring software embeds the usual racist problems with machine-learning stuff, and struggles to recognize Black and brown faces. Black children sitting exams under Proctorio’s gimlet eye have reported that the only way to satisfy Proctorio’s digital phrenology system is to work with multiple high-powered lights shining directly in their faces.

A Proctorio session typically begins with a student being forced to pan a webcam around their test-taking room. During lockdown, this meant that students who shared a room — for example, with a parent who worked night-shifts — would have to invade their family’s privacy, and might be disqualified because they couldn’t afford a place large enough to have private room in which to take their tests.

Proctorio’s tools also punish students for engaging in normal test-taking activity. Do you stare off into space when you’re trying through a problem? Bzzzt. Do you read questions aloud to yourself under your breath when you’re trying to understand their meanings? Bzzzt. Do you have IBS and need to go to the toilet? Bzzzt. The canon of remote invigilation horror stories is filled with accounts of students being forced to defecate themselves, or vomit down their shirts without turning their heads (because looking away is an automatically flagged offense).

The tragedy is that all of this is in service to the pedagogically bankrupt practice of high-stakes testing. Few pedagogists believe that the kind of exam that Proctorio seeks to recreate in students’ homes has real assessment merit. As the old saying goes, “Tests measure your ability to take tests.” But Proctorio doesn’t even measure your ability to take a test — it measures your ability to take a test with three bright lights shining directly on your face. Or while you are covered in your own feces and vomit. While you stare rigidly at a screen. While your tired mother who just worked 16 hours in a covid ward stands outside the door to your apartment.

The lockdown could have been an opportunity to improve educational assessment. There is a rich panoply of techniques that educators can adopt that deliver a far better picture of students’ learning, and work well for remote as well as in-person education. Instead, companies like Proctorio made vast fortunes, most of it from publicly funded institutions, by encouraging a worse-than-useless, discriminatory practice:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/24/proctor-ology/#miseducation

Proctorio clearly knows that its racket is brittle. Like any disaster profiteer, Proctorio will struggle to survive after the crisis passes and we awaken from our collective nightmare and ask ourselves why we were stampeded into using its terrible products. The company went to war against its critics.

In 2020, Proctorio CEO Mike Olsen doxed a child who complained about his company’s software in a Reddit forum:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/07/01/bossware/#moral-exemplar

In 2021, the reviews for Proctorio’s Chrome plugin all mysteriously vanished. Needless to say, these reviews — from students forced to use Proctorio’s spyware — were brutal:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/09/04/hypervigilance/#radical-transparency

Proctorio claims that it protects “educational integrity,” but its actions suggest a company far more concerned about the integrity of its own profits:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/16/unauthorized-paper/#cheating-anticheat

One of the critics that Proctorio attacked is Ian Linkletter. In 2020, Linkletter was a Learning Technology Specialist at UBC’s Faculty of Education. His job was to assess and support ed-tech tools, including Proctorio. In the course of that work, Linkletter reviewed Proctorio’s training material for educators, which are a bonanza of mask-off materials that are palpably contemptuous of students, who are presumed to be cheaters.

At the time, a debate over remote invigilation tools was raging through Canadian education circles, with students, teachers and parents fiercely arguing the merits and downsides of making surveillance the linchpin of assessment. Linkletter waded into this debate, tweeting a series of sharp criticisms of Proctorio. In these tweets, Linkletter linked to Proctorio’s unlisted, but publicly available, Youtube videos.

A note of explanation: Youtube videos can be flagged as “unlisted,” which means they don’t show up in searches. They can also be flagged as “private,” which means you have to be on a list of authorized users to see them. Proctorio made its training videos unlisted, but they weren’t private — they were visible to anyone who had a link to them.

Proctorio sued Linkletter for this. They argued that he had breached a duty of confidentiality, and that linking to these videos was a copyright violation:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/10/17/proctorio-v-linkletter/#proctorio

This is a classic SLAPP — a “strategic litigation against public participation.” That’s when a deep-pocketed, thin-skinned bully, like Proctorio, uses the threat of a long court battle to force their critics into silence. They know they can’t win their case, but that’s not the victory they’re seeking. They don’t want to win the case, they want to win the argument, by silencing a critic who would otherwise be bankrupted by legal fees.

Getting SLAPPed is no fun. I’ve been there. Just this year, a billionaire financier tried to force me into silence by threatening me with a lawsuit. Thankfully, Ken “Popehat” White was on the case, and he reminded this billionaire’s counsel that California has a strong anti-SLAPP law, and if Ken had to defend me in court, he could get a fortune in fees from the bully after he prevailed:

https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1531684572479377409

British Columbia also has an anti-SLAPP law, but unlike California’s anti-SLAPP, the law is relatively new and untested. Still, Proctorio’s suit against Linkletter was such an obvious SLAPP that for many of us, it seemed likely that Linkletter would be able to defend himself from this American bully and its attempt to use Canada’s courts to silence a Canadian educator.

For Linkletter to use BC’s anti-SLAPP law, he would have to prove that he was weighing in on a matter of public interest, and that Proctorio’s copyright and confidentiality claims were nonsense, unlikely to prevail on their merits. If he could do that, he’d be able to get the case thrown out, without having to go through a lengthy, brutally expensive trial.

Incredibly, though, the lower court found against Linkletter. Naturally, Linkletter appealed. His “factotum” is a crystal clear document that sets out the serious errors of law and fact the lower court made:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aB1ztWDFr3MU6BsAMt6rWXOiXJ8sT3MY/view

But yesterday, the Court of Appeal upheld the lower court, repeating all of these gross errors and finding for Proctorio:

https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/ca/23/01/2023BCCA0160.htm

This judgment is grotesque. It makes a mockery of BC’s anti-SLAPP statute, to say nothing of Canadian copyright and confidentiality law. For starters, it finds that publishing a link can be a “performance” of a copyrighted work, which meant that when Linkletter linked to the world-viewable Youtube files that Proctorio had posted, he infringed on copyright.

This is a perverse, even surreal take on copyright. The court rejects Linkletter’s argument that even Youtube’s terms of service warned Proctorio that publishing world-viewable material on its site constituted permission for people to link to and watch that material.

But what about “fair dealing” (similar to fair use)? Linkletter argued that linking to a video that shows that Proctorio’s assurances to parents and students about its products’ benign nature were contradicted by the way it talked to educators was fair dealing. Fair dealing is a broad suite of limitations and exceptions to copyright for the purposes of commentary, criticism, study, satire, etc.

So even if linking is a copyright infringement (ugh, seriously?!), surely it’s fair dealing in this case. Proctorio was selling millions of dollars in software to public institutions, inflicting it on kids whose parents weren’t getting the whole story. Linkletter used Proctorio’s own words to rebut its assurances. What could be more fair dealing than that?

Not so fast, the appeals panel says: they say that Linkletter could have made his case just as well without linking to Proctorio’s materials. This is…bad. I mean, it’s also wrong, but it’s very bad, too. It’s wrong because an argument about what a company intends necessarily has to draw upon the company’s own statements. It’s absurd to say that Linkletter’s point would have been made equally well if he said “I disbelieve Proctorio’s public assurances because I’ve seen seekrit documents” as it was when he was able to link to those documents so that people could see them for themselves.

But it’s bad because it rips the heart out of the fair dealing exception for criticism. Publishing a link to a copyrighted work is the most minimal way to quote from it in a debate — Linkletter literally didn’t reproduce a single word, not a single letter, from Proctorio’s copyrighted works. If the court says, “Sure, you can quote from a work to criticize it, but only so much as you need to make your argument,” and then says, “But also, simply referencing a work without quoting it at all is taking too much,” then what reasonable person would ever try to rely on a fair dealing exemption for criticism?

Then there’s the confidentiality claim: in his submissions to the lower court and the appeals court, Linkletter pointed out that the “confidential” materials he’d linked to were available in many places online, and could be easily located with a Google search. Proctorio had uploaded these “confidential” materials to many sites — without flagging them as “unlisted” or “private.”

What’s more, the videos that Linkletter linked to were in found a “Help Center” that didn’t even have a terms-of-service condition that required confidentiality. How on Earth can materials that are publicly available all over the web be “confidential?”

Here, the court takes yet another bizarre turn in logic. They find that because a member of the public would have to “gather” the videos from “many sources,” that the collection of links was confidential, even if none of the links in the collection were confidential. Again, this is both wrong and bad.

Every investigator, every journalist, every critic, starts by looking in different places for information that can be combined to paint a coherent picture of what’s going on. This is the heart of “open source intelligence,” combing different sources for data points that shed light on one another.

The idea that “gathering” public information can breach confidentiality strikes directly at all investigative activity. Every day, every newspaper and news broadcast in Canada engages in this conduct. The appeals court has put them all in jeopardy with this terrible finding.

Finally, there’s the question of Proctorio’s security. Proctorio argued that by publishing links to its educator materials, Linkletter weakened the security of its products. That is, they claim that if students know how the invigilation tool works, it stops working. This is the very definition of “security through obscurity,” and it’s a practice that every serious infosec professional rejects. If Proctorio is telling the truth when it says that describing how its products work makes them stop working, then they make bad products that no one should pay money for.

The court absolutely flubs this one, too, accepting the claim of security through obscurity at face value. That’s a finding that flies in the face of all security research.

So what happens now? Well, Linkletter has lost his SLAPP claim, so nominally the case can proceed. Linkletter could appeal his case to Canada’s Supreme Court (about 7% of Supreme Court appeals of BC appeals court judgments get heard). Or Proctorio could drop the case. Or it could go to a full trial, where these outlandish ideas about copyright, confidentiality and information security would get a thorough — and blisteringly expensive — examination.

In Linkletter’s statement, he remains defiant and unwilling to give in to bullying, but says he’ll have to “carefully consider” his next step. That’s fair enough: there’s a lot on the line here:

https://linkletter.opened.ca/stand-against-proctorios-slapp-update-30/

Linkletter answers his supporters’ questions about how they can help with some excellent advice: “What I ask is for you to do what you can to protect students. Academic surveillance technology companies would like nothing more but for us all to shut up. Don’t let them silence you. Don’t let anyone or anything take away your human right to freedom of expression.”

Today (Apr 21), I’m speaking in Chicago at the Stigler Center’s Antitrust and Competition Conference. This weekend (Apr 22/23), I’m at the LA Times Festival of Books.

[Image ID: A girl working on a laptop. Her mouth has been taped shut. Glaring out of the laptop screen is the hostile red eye of HAL9000 from '2001: A Space Odyssey.' Behind them is a tattered, filthy, burned Canadian flag.]

Image: Ingo Bernhardt https://www.flickr.com/photos/spree2010/4930763550/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

Eleanor Vladinsky (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Canadian_flag_against_grey_sky.jpg

CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

[starvail]

you just lost the game

narumi gen / gn!spouse!reader

synopsis : he’s made a recent discovery that for some reason, when you're the one doing his gacha pulls, his account wins the 50/50, so of course he's gonna abuse your luck for all it's worth.

content : only crack, gender neutral reader, reader works in jakdf, jenshin = genshin btw, narumi should have his own warning, narumi and reader are married (to the chagrin of the defence force), brief mentions of gambling, brief mentions of divorce.

words : 1k

a/n : sorry if you expected longer lol, think of this as a lil warm up before we really get into this series. also apologies for the one day delay, i came home from a surprise bottomless brunch and ahahaha...... i think we all can imagine how that ended up....

part one of 'a cheers to our youth'

It’s not until the time reaches two-thirty in the afternoon do you think to yourself that maybe it will be another peaceful day in Japan.

That is until rapid thumping of footsteps can be heard making their way to the Operations Room before someone slams both of the doors open, almost hitting a few operators that were unfortunate enough to be going on their break.

It was Captain Narumi Gen of the First Division in all his... very sweaty glory.

Hair sticking to his forehead with sweat, he’s frantic in the way that he repeatedly yells for your name and demands where you are.

Something in the pit of your stomach is telling you that something is wrong. But for some reason, it’s not the familiarity of dread that twists your insides with foreboding.

Something is definitely up.

You make your presence known and stand in front of him, hands in your lab coat pockets as you watch Narumi gasp for air, his back hunched over and hands on knees. You look down at him with a side eye, there is no way that one of the top protectors of Japan is out of breath running from where you assume is his 'claimed room' in HQ to Operations.

He grabs your shoulders with the kind of desperation that makes something crawl up your spine. "Thank God you're here!"

Okay, maybe this idiot is actually being serious for once.

"Is there an emergency meeting that we need to attend?” You shift his weight so that he has his right arm slung around the back of your neck.

You're rubbing soothing circles up and down his spine and he shakes his head for a no. By now, the entire room is listening in on the conversation.

“A kaiju attack that our sensors haven't picked up? Infiltration of the base? What's the damage? C'mon, work with me here, Stupid."

"Even worse..."

Narumi finally lifts his head up to look at you, red eyes peaking through his black and silver bangs. Anticipation rises and someone in the room gulps loudly.

You hope that the General Commander has sent out a few platoons already to assess the problem.

Has a kaiju alarm been sent out already? Are the civilians going to be okay? Why is this dumbass not changing into his-

"This limited character in Jenshin is leaving in five minutes, I need you to do my pulls for me!"

Narumi pulls his phone out of his pocket and shoves it right in your face.

"...What?"

You smack his arm away so that you don't go cross-eyed and you can only stare at the screen in disbelief.

He flicks some of his hair back. "Y'see, thanks to my spectacular observation skills and analytic abilities..."

As per usual, you drown him out.

There is no way that this guy is being genuine right now.

There is no way he barged in here just to gamble, on company time, no less.

"...coincides with the times that you do my pulls..."

You look away from the screen to observe him.

Narumi is animatedly flapping his free arm around like those inflatable tube men outside car dealerships, while the other keeps the phone steady.

"...not a coincidence, therefore you, my dearest..."

You look back at the phone.

The game character is staring at you, hauntingly.

He's being dead serious.

"...extremely lucky!"

Your eye twitches and you grit your teeth. 'This guy sure does love listening to the sound of his own voice...'

Next thing you know, his phone finds its way to the palms of your hands, and him ushering for you to start.

Still too flabbergasted, too appalled, too dismayed to even comprehend what you were doing, your finger mindlessly presses a button that says '10x Draws', and a golden glow flashbangs your vision.

Is this what your life has come to now?

Being used, being taken advantage of, all for your luck?

Narumi takes the phone back and sends you a triumphant look, as if he didn't just send all personnel in the room into a crippling mental spiral a few seconds ago, and is quick to gaze admiringly at the new character displayed on his screen, as if hyper focused.

"Thanks, Babe. You're a real life saver, y'know?"

It infuriates you how he sounds giddy, but you don't say that aloud, deciding to stew in your internal displeasure.

You mirror his smile and Narumi stays none the wiser to the flashing images behind your eyes of the numerous ways you can dispose of his body.

"See, this is why it's so great being married to someone as lucky as you. Pfft, and those old geezers say marriage is hard." At that moment, as if some higher being wanted to personally laugh in your face, Narumi readjusts his grip on his device and his wedding band shines from reflected light coming from the control monitors .

Your own ring burns at the realisation: you're legally stuck with that for the foreseeable future.

s n a p .

("I'm not the only one that heard that, right?" "Did that sound come from the Head?" "Nah, I definitely heard something too." "If Captain doesn't leave now, Head is gonna force us to help them erase the evidence...")

"Anyways, imma bounce. Gotta grind out the rest of their weapon mats." He carelessly throws up a peace sign without so much as a glance at anybody else, let alone you, and the operations room stays quiet when their Captain leaves with a newfound skip to his step, whistling in tune with the game's music.

Everyone watches on as you take a few deep breaths and walk back to your control panel, landing harshly into your swivel chair with your brows furrowed and a frown that could rival the General Commander's.

Those close enough can hear your muttered curses, "I'll show him. 'Japan's Strongest Anti-Kaiju Combatant', to hell with that! I'll show how hard marriage can really be. 'Another peaceful day in Japan', I should have kept my damn mouth shut."

Your fingers type against the keyboard with a new-found aggression, and soon enough, documents are displayed on the big screen of your monitor. They read 'Divorce Application and Proceedings', in bold font.

'Good luck, Captain Narumi,' the operators all think in unison.

[ozzgin]

“Do you mean it in the sense that Reader goes through monster boyfriends and is quick to dump them for the next catch”

Yep. Just a vile reader who’s breaking hearts left and right. I think you’ll write it beautifully if you channel your evil side like when you play the sims! ☺️

-👘

Yandere! Monsters x Heartbreaker! Reader

You've always been a free spirit, unable to settle on a single partner. Even after being abruptly transported into a different dimension where you are the only human surrounded by monsters, this habit of yours has persisted. Except monsters, as you will see, are harder to discard than humans. They aren't as willing to accept rejection.

Content: female reader, reader is a player, monster smut

Ah, how troublesome. He won't stop calling. You lazily pick up the phone and look for the options to block the number, clicking your tongue in irritation. You'd specifically told him you're not interested in anything serious. "Who's calling?" The man shuffles under the sheets, still half-asleep. "No one." You respond curtly, glaring at the intruder. "It's morning already, by the way. When are you leaving?"

You slam the door shut before the overnight guest can bring up the classic "Will I see you again", and exhale theatrically in relief. Finally alone again. You look up and shake your fist menacingly, as if whichever entity governing this world is responsible for your bad luck. You've always been utterly indifferent towards committed relationships, and yet most fuck buddies end up head over heels for you, dragging themselves at your feet like pitiful beggars. Pathetic and a pain in the ass to deal with.

Well, someone must be up there, because your situation feels too much like a sassy answer to your complaint. You've just rushed out of your apartment a moment ago and last time you checked, the concierge office wasn't on a rocky hill covered in deep cracks erupting with lava, stretching out into the seemingly unending horizon. Where the hell are you? You turn on your heels, reaching for the door, only to find out - who would've expected? - that it's gone. Great. Your immediate explanation is that the guy you've mistakenly brought home last night must've slipped something in your drinks. All this for a sloppy, clumsy eating out.

The worry of being drugged vanishes quickly once the first creatures of the realm appear. Hard to believe anything on the market could cause such detailed hallucinations that can sniff and touch you: Some alligator-looking minions with eyes popping out of their backs slid out of a nearby crevice to investigate the newcomer. Ironically enough, they seem to be the ones shocked by your appearance. Once they've hesitantly assessed your presence, they scurry aside to discuss their findings. "What could it be?" You hear one mumble, completely baffled. For whatever reason you can understand their language, so you decide to speed up their detective work. "Ever heard of human?" You shout, with a hint of sarcasm in your voice. The beasts gasp in unison. "Nonsense! Straight out of a children's tale!"

Eventually, after a lot of confusion and pointed fingers, you manage to figure out your predicament. You've somehow landed in a world of monsters, where humans are more of a fictional, mythical existence. Thankfully they don't seem to consider your potential as food, though you're not sure if the sudden, massive ambush of creatures is any better. The alligator-like quadrupeds brought you to the nearest settlement and had to form a barrier to stop the curious beasts from almost trampling you in their frenzy to see "the human". You've garnered ridiculous amounts of attention, yet such reaction is to be expected; how often would an earthling wander into their world? It could very well be a lifetime singularity for many.

As the days pass and you become more accustomed to your fate, you begin to feel that familiar calling. It doesn't look like you'll be going home anytime soon and a lady has her needs. Additionally, whatever popularity you had back in the human world is a minuscule fraction of what you're currently experiencing here. In the eyes of the monsters, you're an exotic treat that cannot be refused. It shouldn't be too hard to find yourself a partner, or two. Or three. Who keeps count nowadays?

You remember stumbling upon a postcard print of "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife" at some museum shop. You immediately picked up the thick cardboard, eyeing the artwork in amusement. A woman enveloped in the limbs of two octopuses and very obviously enjoying herself. Who even came up with the pairing, you wondered at the time. Whatever the artist was thinking, you can certainly see his point now. The first one to receive your indecent proposal was an eldritch creature of sorts, something straight out of Lovecraft's lucid dreams. Dark, long tendrils sprawling out of an amorphous core - which you assume is its head based on the bulging, glistening orbs hungrily staring at you. Your whole body is throbbing under the tight hold of the slippery tentacles, wrapping around you in masterful intricacy. You could see the result featured in a bondage magazine, though you don't...can't ponder much on it given the fact you're, well, stuffed with monstrous appendages. You doubt any genital variation back home could compare. The monster is even polite enough to occasionally wipe away the continuous stream of drool spilling out of your whining mouth. Towards the end you barely have a voice anymore, throat sore from the loud moans and merciless constriction. Your muscles contract all at once, overwhelmed by the sensations. Whatever sensitive areas you might have are presently aching under the needy fondling of the creature.

Mind-blowing. The memory is enough to have you wet and squirming with desire. Even more so when you consider the other varieties of monsters ready to fuck you senseless. Soon enough you're surveying the neighborhood for the ideal suitors and thankfully you don't have to worry about making wrong choices, as there's always a next target. Thus the following weeks fill you with a particular kind of nostalgia (among other things and fluids), reminding you of the bed-hopping in the human realm. From werewolves drowning out your whimpers with their desperate howling, to hooved legs of hybrids violently thrusting into you until you're a dripping mess. "Look at me" is what one of the beasts demanded in a low growl, turning you on with its ragged voice and clawed hand encircling your frail neck. Although you had to ask it where exactly to look, given it was covered entirely in eyes.

You yawn and stare at the ceiling, reminiscing about the depraved fuckfest you're currently recovering from. You might've overdone it with the last one. Alas, you came enough times to make up for it. Just as you turn around to readjust the ice pack, you hear a loud thud coming from the entrance. You (carefully) sit up and rub your eyes, trying to focus on the shadow figure approaching your bed. It's one of the lizard monsters, swiftly slithering across the wall and landing over you with an angered expression. "Where the fuck is that dog?" it inquires with a hiss. "What? Who're you talking about?" you mumble, wildly confused. "The one that dared to touch you."

Oh, not this crap again. You almost roll your eyes. "You never said anything about us being together." Is your annoyed reply. "What? I thought it'd be obvious you belong to me!" You're about to question the strange logic, but your couple's quarrel is interrupted by the sound of shattered glass. The many-eyed monster crawls its way in with fluid, uncanny movements, releasing a deafening screech once it notices the lizard in your bed. "Off! Get off my human now!" is what it finally manages to verbalize in its fury. Okay, it seems to be the common belief. To clear off any shred of doubt remaining, the ceiling gives in and crumbles like putty under the weight of an enormous tentacle. You scream and cover your face from the bits of rubble flying everywhere, but you're quickly sheltered by another thick appendage looping itself around you, against the wrathful protests of the lizard. You did not anticipate the eldritch creature could expand to this gargantuan size.

For the first time since arriving here, you feel homesick. At least back home you could get rid of your annoying admirers with the slide of a button. Is there a larger scale alternative for cosmic blasphemies? You shake your fist (up? down? you can't tell in the darkness of the tentacle shield) towards the entity once more. Damn it, you've learned your lesson. Several steps must’ve been skipped before reaching a pack of angry, possessive monsters fighting over your ownership.

[navybrat817]

" Scraping their teeth over your neck to have a shiver of arousal run down your spine. "

With Bucky. 🥺

This probably didn't go the way anyone wants, nonnie, and I'm sorry!

Give Me a Name

Pairing: Mob!Bucky Barnes x Agent!Female Reader Summary: Someone put their hands on you and Bucky can't let it go. Word Count: Over 1.1k Warnings: Tension, threat of violence (not against reader), very minor injury, pet names, possessive behavior, Bucky Barnes (he's a warning, okay?). A/N: Because who doesn't want a mob boss obsessed with them? ❤️ Edit by the talented @nixakimbo. Not beta read and written on my phone, so any and all mistakes are my own. Please follow @navybrat817-sideblog for new fics and notifications. Comments, reblogs, feedback are loved and appreciated!

Today was a not-so-friendly reminder that mistakes in your job weren’t so easy to fix. You had been in pursuit of a target for weeks and finally managed to catch him. The rookie agent, however, didn’t secure the cuffs and the bastard managed to get a hard hit in when he broke free. The dizziness from the blow was enough to let him get away.

The rookie went after him, but you knew he wouldn’t catch him. You’d have to start all over with tracking him and you didn’t even get a chance to go home to lick your wounds. Not when Bucky’s men showed up and put you in a car.

You should’ve known they were close by.

“I can walk!” You argued minutes later when they brought you to the Barnes mansion. The mob boss had a few homes, but this one had been in the family for years. He had invited you here before, but never took you by force.

Until today.

The men carefully arranged you on a leather sofa in the den before one of them went to get their boss. He hadn’t left the room before the door flew open, the very man he went to find standing there with a look thunderous enough to kill. He snatched something out of one of his soldier’s hands before he went to you, no one daring to speak a word.

You held your breath as you glanced at Bucky. He had the sleeves of his black shirt rolled up as he assessed you, the veins in his arms popped out as he clenched his fists. He was built like a soldier with his massive frame, his life story told in the tattoos and scars that adorned his covered skin. The notorious crime lord more than earned his reputation and he promised he’d tell you his story himself one day.

Today wouldn’t be that day.

He brushed some of his long hair from his eyes before crouching down beside you. He didn’t take his eyes off you as he dabbed at your cheek with the cloth. He stopped when you winced, but you gave him a small smile to let him know he could continue. You didn’t expect tenderness from such a rough man, but you were different to him, weren’t you? You had been since the two of you crossed paths some time ago. Why?

What made you so special?

“Who did this to you?” He asked in a low voice. You could hear that he tried to keep the raging storm inside of him, but his icy eyes showed you everything. The growing fury was bound to come out. Who would he destroy in his path to sate the beast?

“Bucky. I’m fine,” you croaked as you tried to sit up more, but he stopped you from moving. “The guy got lucky and it isn’t anything I haven’t faced before. Just let me get back to work,” you said.

You noticed most of the men nearby avoided eye contact when you looked around. They had every reason to be afraid. James Buchanan Barnes was downright terrifying when crossed.

And crossing you was a worse offense in his eyes.

“Give me a name,” Bucky demanded, though he didn't raise his voice. “Tell me his fucking name so I can take care of it.”

“I can’t,” you whispered. If you did, he’d kill him. No, he’d torture him first. Likely for days on end before he begged for death. And you needed him alive.

That was your job.

Yet, you could never find it in yourself to bring Bucky in.

“Don’t make me shoot you.”

You froze at the cold tone before you realized Bucky didn’t direct that statement at you. One of his men standing feet away turned his head to the side because he got caught staring. You should’ve known better. Whatever cat and mouse game you and the mob boss were playing, it was for him to catch you in his trap, but never hurt you.

Not when he wanted to keep you.

“I’m sorry, boss,” the man promised, his tone wavering when Bucky reached for one of his pistols. “I-”

“‘Cause I’ll do it in a heartbeat and never look back if you glance at her again,” he promised. He was a man of his word. “Leave us. All of you. Now.”

“Bucky, it’s okay,” you assured him as they filed out. The men were dangerous, but you weren’t about to let him shoot the poor guy for looking your way.

“It isn't okay. Someone put their hands on you,” he nearly growled, the soft touch to your cheek a stark contrast to his voice. “You think I can let that go? I can’t. I won’t.”

You brought a hand up to tuck a few strands of his hair behind his ear. His eyes shut for a moment and grabbed your wrist before you could pull away. He dragged your fingers through the short beard along his jaw, like he was starved of your touch and needed more. You didn’t want to admit how much you wanted him.

Not when you belonged in different worlds.

“You don’t have to ‘avenge’ me, Bucky, because I’m not yours,” you said carefully. Were you telling him for his sake or yours? “Let it go. Please.”

The storm continued to rage in his eyes when he opened them and you wondered who would win the battle of the wills. You held your breath again when he moved close, the scent of his woodsy cologne making your head spin. Instead of brushing his lips against yours, he brought his mouth to your neck. Scraping his teeth over your pulse, you couldn’t stop the shiver of arousal that moved down your spine.

“You are mine, Kisa,” he whispered, giving your neck another nip as you tried not to whimper. “And I’m going to find out who did this whether you tell me or not. And I’m going to kill him.”

Your heart shouldn’t have raced faster at his declaration. “If I tell you, will you let me go home?”

“You are home,” he replied, pulling away and looking into your eyes so you could see how serious he was. “And I’d feel a lot better if you got some rest in my bedroom.”

You shuddered because you both knew you wouldn’t get a wink of rest if he took you to bed. And if you slept with him, there would be no turning back. “You can’t keep me prisoner here, Winter.”

The cold and ruthless man who only wanted you.

“You’re not my prisoner, Kisa,” he said, pressing his lips softly to your pained cheek. “But I’m never letting you go.”

He’d prove that to you.

I don't know about you lovelies, but I kind of love them. Love and thanks for reading! ❤️

Masterlist ⚓ Bucky Barnes Masterlist ⚓ Ko-Fi

[hoshigray]

hey there! what do you think would toji’s reaction be when he finds out that you like getting spanked? (your version of toji lives in my mind rent free)

Damn, noonie!! This one was enticing to write, I ain't gon' lie lol had to sacrifice sleep to see it through hahaha. Hope you enjoy it!! And tysmmmm ;w; it's nice to know that others like how I write for my man~~ ♡

Cw: dom!Toji x fem!reader - doggy style/backshot position - Daddy kink - impact play/spanking (obvi) - slight degradation (Toji calls you a whore) - clitoral play (pinches to the clit) - pet names (angel, baby, sweetie/sweetheart, mama) - praise - mentions of drool - unprotected sex but Toji doesn't shoot inside. Wc: 1.4k

The first time it happened was on accident.

You and Toji were sitting on the couch watching television— his favorite basketball team was on, and by the looks of it (and the older man's frustration ticking up by the second), the game wasn't going so well. The score was neck-and-neck; you could tell it was pushing your boyfriend to the edge.

Nervously, you pick up your glass to sip your beverage, only to find it completely empty. You get up from the couch and move past Toji. However, simultaneously, something happened on the program that caused the man to groan in vexation and throw his big hands out aggressively.

The back of his hand unexpectedly meets your ass, causing you to shriek and drop the glass. Toji hears the sound of glass shattering and stops watching the sport to assess what transpired. When he sees you rub your butt where the back of his palm bumped into, apologies enter the scene.

"Oh shit, sorry 'bout that, baby." He gets up to pull you away from the glass, but you forgive him knowing his actions weren't intentional.

The second time, though, was far from an accident.

Toji came home from grocery shopping and walked into the shared bedroom to see you lying on the bed, on the phone with your best friend talking about whatever. A quick smile is flashed his way before returning to your conversation while he removes his leather jacket and exchanges his outdoor clothes for something more comfortable.

When he's done changing, he looks at you, so glued to your device that you don't notice him observing. He notices how laid back you are, lying on your stomach with just an oversized sweatshirt — his sweatshirt — and your panty-covered bottom for his eyes to see.

Emerald eyes linger on your lower half, tracing the lacy material of your undergarment. A smirk sneaks through scarred lips while Toji silently moves towards you, raising his hand before it comes down on your ass. And it comes down hard.

Expected, you react to the sudden interruption. But this time, Toji doesn't hear a shriek leave your lips. No, no. To his ears, it sounded like something with a more pleasant intonation. A moan.

You freeze. He freezes. No one says anything until someone on the other side of your phone comments.

"Hey, is something wrong?" Your best friend has a worried tone in their voice. "Was that a moan just now? Oh, I swear to God, Y/n, you better not be having sex while on the phone—"

You quickly interject. "No, no, no! Sorry, it was just that...Toji!!" With anger plastered on your face, you glare at your boyfriend, who's undoubtedly the culprit of what happened a few seconds ago.

He doesn't explain himself as he straightens himself and exits the bedroom. Even as he escaped, his smug grin remained on his face. "My bad, kid." he laughed and closed the bedroom door.

Fast forward to the present, you and Toji are in the comfort of your shared bedroom. "Nnmph! Oh, fuck...Daddy, feels so goo—Ahhhnn!"

With your back arched and your butt raised, Toji fucks you doggy style. Your mouth is covered by the satin covers of the pillow, suppressing the ecstatic noises from your mouth. His hands are positioned on each side of your hips, stationing you to take in the ruts of his sex. You can feel every dent and vein of his cock scraping your insides, the delicious sensation corrupting your senses.

The man drills his dick deep within you, and the sounds of his pelvis slamming onto your butt fill the bedroom. Toji can't help but admire having you like this for him and him alone: exposing your sweat-covered back and your soft rear being pounded. It turns him on so fucking much. And don't get him started on your pussy. The way your inner walls clench around him every time the base of his cock kisses your southern lips? Oh, it fucks him up so much, using every fiber of his being to not come too quick.

"Hnngh! Fuck, Y/n..." He moans to you, grinding his hips on your butt for his length to further churn your insides. It has you gripping the sheets with a bitten lip. "Feel so good fr' me, mama."

Although, he can't help but notice something. Anytime he brushes his hand on your buttocks, a jolt comes from your body. Along with a quick grasp of your cunt around his cock.

It's been apparent for the past six minutes, yet only now is when it hits him: the accident and his little prank before directly connect to what's happening now. It hits him, and he can't fight the tiny smile that's starting to bloom.

Now, the third time has finally presented itself.

"Hey, sweetie." You moan at the pet name, and hums of pleasure seep out when Toji slows the pace of his thrusts. "Does my baby like to get spanked?

Suddenly, everything in the room feels like it's come to a halt, and your blood runs cold. "H-Huh?" You meekly question.

"Oh, I know you heard me." A chill trickles down your spine when you hear him snicker from behind, and a squeak exits your puffy lips when you feel a big hand slither up and down the cusp of your ass. "Go on. Tell Daddy how much you love to get y'r ass smacked by me, sweetheart."

You can't tell if the sweat on your forehead is from the heat or the anxious pool in your stomach. You try to rationalize. "N-Now, Toji. Let's not try any—Eeeyaaah!!!"

A harsh slap on your ass causes you to substitute your thoughts with a forced scream. Your cunt tightens around his cock in haste, and he hisses. His fingers dig deep into the stinging flesh, and you can only imagine the tiny crescents his nails are branding onto your delicate skin.

"Aaaaahhh, shit...Sorry, angel, I didn't quite catch that." Toji bends down to bite your shoulder, resulting in another choked cry filling the air. "What's my name again, Y/n?" His voice drops to a dangerous low octave that makes you shiver.

"Nnmmm...I'm sorry, Daddy," you purr under him.

He grins hard with his hand kneading your ass. "Y'r grippin' me hard every time I play with this ass." He smacks your asscheek again, tears prickle at the corner of your eyes, and you prove his point when your slit contracts around him again. "What do you want Daddy to do 'bout that?"

With heavy huffs, you try to regain some sense to formulate a proper response for the man dominating over you. Your face is hot with embarrassment coursing through your quivering body.

"I...I want—"

"Speak a lil louder, baby." Fingernails sink deep into the skin of your ass, and you jerk from the pain.

"Pleaseeee, Daddyyy," you know your whines only feed his ego, but that's what he wants. That's how you'll get what you're aching for. "Pleaseee, I want you to slap my ass...I want it so ba—Aaaaahhhh!!!"

And with that, Toji doesn't hold back. Fast ruts to your soaping slit are paired along with strikes to your butt, and there's no use in you trying to conceal the mewls flying out your mouth. Every harsh smack to your bottom forces your pussy to clamp around Toji's dick. The contrasts between the pleasurable commotion and the extreme hits of his hands are too intense for your brain to comprehend.

Toji, however, enjoys this type of change in rhythm. "Aiishhh, damn. Who woulda thought my baby liked gettin' their ass smacked, grippin' me like a dirty whore." Your asscheeks are now stinging and hot from his painful touch, your cunt clenching ahold of him as he bullies your body inside and out. "But—Oh, fuckin' shit...I fuckin' love this."

And you can't deny it either; despite you moaning out loud and having your body be used like a porn star, your arousal is at an all-time high. Tears and drool now fall from your pretty face and stain the satin pillow covers.

So much so that your orgasm hits you without your recollection when Toji snakes down a hand to pinch on your clit. The abrupt, cruel, yet exhilarating tweak to your sensitive bud topped it off, tipping you to experience your long-awaited climax.

Toji knows he'll follow suit when he feels the walls of your chasm flutter around his cock, taking out his member to shoot his load out. His essence paints your ass, striking down slowly to your back.

You two heave through the aftershocks, your body now sweaty and dirty with filth on your back and between your legs. The older man leans down to kiss your shoulders. "Did so good fr' me, mama. We outta do that more often."