#garbage truck fire

[crowboy-bebop]

exciting day today. went to a new grocery store for groceries. saw an on-fire garbage truck holding up traffic on the beltway. somebody honked at me because they turned down my street while i was backing out of my driveway and decided they didn't want to let me finish.

[nixetra]

they should invent a Car that runs me over in my house and home

[greenteacology]

met a new york celebrity last night (burning garbage can)

[larytello]

The funniest part of black friday for me is to look up toys and steam games I won't buy anyway :')

[petepark]

have i talked abt the au where marjorine finds pete sleeping in a ditch and is just like. oh! umm. you're gunna come home with me i think.

[babybluebex]

drink the honey | erik campbell x fem!reader

𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐘: in visiting your friends' bar, you happen to meet his older brother, aka the guy who pierced your ears forever ago. cue a lesson in grief and exactly what can be pierced and where, as well as a night you won't soon be forgetting. wc 9.7k (i am. so sorry.) title stolen from closer by nine inch nails. 𝐏𝐀𝐈𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆: erik campbell (final destination: bloodlines, 2025) x fem!reader 𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐒: semi-canon compliance (howard has gone to his great reward, the shop fire happened, but none of the death hitlist stuff), drinking, one single mention of jerry fuckin fenbury, mild descriptions of burn injuries/scars, lots of innuendos, smut (minors dni)(holy shit there's a lot here, bear with me yall): p in v, creampie city baby (but then mention of intention to use morning-after pill), oral (f!receiving), genital piercings (like... we all watched the same movie, we know what's going down), lots of teasing, hittin it from the back + spanking (i know yall saw what he did to that garbage truck), biting/hickies, one tiny quick slap to a cheek, panty thief erik, look-in-the-mirror type shenanigans, light choking, halfway decent aftercare considering the circumstances, nicknames such as: sweetheart, baby, babygirl, princess/prince 𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑'𝐒 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄: soooo like after a year-long writing hiatus, i am back. it's been. a lot. and as far as this fic goes, i cannot explain myself, i knew i needed erik carnally even before the garbage truck thing so like. idk, dick piercing goes brrrr. anyway. follow @babybluebex-writes to be notified whenever i post a new fic!

You had only seen him once before. He had been the guy at the sketchy tattoo shop downtown that had done your second lobe piercings, and he was totally fine. It hardly hurt, probably because he was able to distract you long enough for the needle to pierce your skin by getting you talking about your own job, and he was pretty good about reminding you how to clean the piercings and everything. You didn’t exactly remember his name— something with an E, or an A? It was a little while ago, and you had been a walk-in— but you acutely remember his big, blue eyes and the stink of cigarettes that lingered on the leather jacket he wore while piercing you. That, actually, was the same jacket he was wearing right now, sitting directly across the bar from you. 

He was by himself, bottle of Hice in hand, seemingly off in his own world as he gazed at the bartop. Every so often, every time the cute blond bartender passed by him, he would lift his head and give him a curt nod or a flick of his eyebrows, but he didn’t talk to anyone else or look in any one direction other than down. You were totally intrigued by him, even though he was not your usual type— as your friend beside you had joked as you walked into the bar earlier that night, maybe your “boyfriend” would be working, AKA Bobby, the cute blond bartender. Bobby was an absolute sweetheart, greeting you with a grin and asking how your night was every single time you came in, but he was a sweetie with everyone that walked into the bar, so, even though it wasn’t necessarily special treatment, it made you like him a whole lot. 

Speaking of your friend… You looked one way and the other, trying to catch sight of her, and you frowned mildly as you tugged your phone from your purse. Just as you suspected, she had texted you about ten minutes before, telling you that she had absconded to go smoke, which was code for “I’m going on an adventure and it’ll be your job in two hours to track me down and get me back home”. You sighed, clicking off your phone screen, and sucked down the last of your liquor from your plastic cup. 

“Lookin’ pretty glum there, friend,” a voice said, and you gazed up to see Bobby. There was a relative lull in the crowd, although the rap music playing over the speakers still shook the walls, and Bobby’s kind smile softened you. “What’s got you down?” 

“Ah, shit,” you chuckled. “Not sad or anything. Just tired.” 

“Tired?” Bobby repeated. “You want a vodka Redbull?”

You shook your head. “Just a long day at work,” you informed him. “Didn’t really even wanna come out, but Anna convinced me, and then immediately…” You trailed off, gesturing around you and the obvious lack of Anna. Even though you had never seen Bobby outside the bar, you had been going for years and knew him well, and Bobby had a good memory of the regulars, so he nodded, familiar with Anna’s disappearing act. “Probably one more of these, then close up my tab.” 

“You got it,” Bobby said. “Single or double?” 

You twisted your mouth as you thought about it. Obviously, you wanted a double, but a single would probably be better for you and your poor wallet. Bobby tilted his head towards you with a smile, almost as if to say C’mon, you know you wanna, and you sighed. “Just a single,” you told him. 

“Heard,” Bobby nodded. As he made your drink, you watched him walk to the opposite end of the bar and sharply say something to the brooding piercer, and he looked up from the bartop again to say something equally sharp back at him. A weary smile passed over his face, and he pulled at the glass bottle of beer. 

“Hey, so,” you started as Bobby handed you your cup. “Who’s that at the end you keep talking to?” 

Bobby scoffed. “Who’s asking?” he started, popping a small black cocktail straw in your drink. 

“He pierced my seconds for me a few months ago,” you explained. “Was thinking about getting my nose done, and wanted to go back to him, but I couldn’t remember his name.” A total lie; you liked your nose the way it was, with the appropriate number of holes. You just wanted to know more about him; he had a pull, like a magnet, and you needed more. 

“You let that motherfucker stick needles in you?” Bobby chuckled. “And you want more? Ill-advised.” 

“Okay, well, who is he?” you asked, a flash of fear running cold down your body. 

“Erik,” Bobby said, and your brain flashed with recognition. Erik; that’s right. Something with an E. 

“And it’s bad that Erik pierced my ears because…?” you asked. “Did he, like, get his license taken away or something?” 

“No, no,” Bobby sighed. “Ah, I shouldn’t talk shit about him. He’s my older brother, though, I can’t help it. Genetically predisposed to give him hell… Maybe not genetically, but y’know, half-genetically, or whatever…” 

Oh. Throughout the years, you could recall Bobby making passing mentions of his siblings— his older sister graduating college last year, his older brother flunking out of college prior to you ever meeting Bobby, his sister being “back in town”, his brother “traveling for work”, yada yada yada. “This the same brother that flunked outta college?” you asked, and Bobby laughed loudly. 

“Yes!” he wheezed. “Yep, that’s him! Fuck, how do you remember that?” 

“Because I’m a nice person, Bobby!” you smiled. “I remember things that people tell me!” 

“Shit, that’s funny,” Bobby said. “Yeah, one and the same. Went for one semester, decided he didn’t like it, grades went downhill, dropped out before they could boot him out… Probably for the best, honestly, he never really was into the whole ‘establishment’ thing. Think he only ever went there to get our mom off his back.” 

“Dad didn’t care?” you started, and a twinge flashed over Bobby’s face. 

“Well,” he started. “Not necessarily, but y’know… But Dad passed away about a year ago. It sorta sucked for all of us, obviously, and that’s when Ma got intense about… Well, everything. But he had been out of college for… Shit, more than ten years, and when Dad died, Erik just… I don’t know, he had a break or something. You find out, in the wake of your dad’s death, that your dad isn’t actually your dad and that your mom’s friend is actually your dad, and that fucks with you, so I get it, but he got super withdrawn from all of us after that. I mean, shit, this is the first time I’ve seen him in months.” 

“Wow,” you sighed. “That’s… Um…” 

“Sorry,” Bobby said, clearing his throat. “Airing out my half-brother’s dirty laundry, I shouldn’t have… I just worry about him, y’know? He’s my big bro. He used to be so… He lit up whatever room he walked into. He’d come over to grill for family barbecues and to play video games and just to, like, hang out, but ever since that fiasco last year, he’s just… Tattoo shop, his apartment, over and over. Getting him to even stop by tonight was like pulling teeth. Truly, I think he needs a girlfriend. Boyfriend. Cat. Whatever. Something to get him out of his head.”

The man across the bar certainly did not fit the shining description that Bobby gave of the old Erik. By now, he had his phone in his hand, lighting up his face, and the light glinted off a large silver ring hanging from his nose. You remembered the same jewelry from when you met him, and you absentmindedly tugged on your earlobe. “Well, shit,” you said finally. “First of all, sorry for all of that. My dad isn’t really in my life, so I can’t sympathize exactly, but… Y’know. Still sucks. I’m sorry about that. And additionally… Jesus Christ, Bobby, you need to learn to keep your mouth shut!” 

Bobby smiled. “You wanted to close your tab, right?” he asked, and you nodded. “Sure thing.” 

You handed Bobby your card, and your gaze drifted to Erik one more. Still on his phone, but now with furrowed eyebrows, concentrating on something. The POS system was right next to where Erik sat, and you watched Bobby say something to his brother as he ran your card. You couldn’t read lips, so you were at a loss as to the conversation, but you watched Erik roll his eyes and swig at his beer, saying something in response to Bobby. Bobby froze up for a single second, then said something that you could obviously tell was “Really?”, and Erik nodded. Bobby seemed like he was malfunctioning, still for a moment, then turning back to the computer, then back to Erik once more, repeating “Really?”

Erik was obviously annoyed, cocking his head towards his little brother, and he went into the pocket of his leather jacket, extracting his wallet and passing his card to Bobby. Bobby pushed your own card into his empty hand and poked at the computer for a moment, and he ran Erik’s card through the computer. In a second, the POS churned out a receipt, and Bobby shoved it towards his brother as he turned back towards you and came your way. “Um,” Bobby started, a red flush hitting his cheeks. “So, Erik picked up your tab for you.” 

“Huh?” you asked as Bobby slid you your card back. “Why?” 

“Couldn’t tell you,” Bobby shrugged. “Maybe he thinks you’re my friend or something… Well, I mean, you are, kinda, we’re friendly…”

“Or maybe,” you started. “He’s getting a move-on with that ‘girlfriend’ thing you mentioned.” 

“I don’t know about that,” Bobby mumbled. 

“Or, and consider this,” you began, sliding your card back into your purse and grabbing your drink as you edged yourself off the barstool. “I’m a pretty girl who just gets drinks bought for her from time to time.” 

“I mean, obviously,” Bobby said with a smile. “It’s just never my brother doing the buying.”

Erik looked up from his phone as you approached him, and your heart slammed up against your ribcage with anxiety. His hair, all shaggy and a little too long, hung in his eyes, and a careful smile touched at his mouth. “Saw you talking to Bobby,” he said. He shifted slightly, opening his body towards you and not solely at the bar, and you saw Bobby give a sort-of pained smile, almost a “What the fuck?!” type of face. “Figured you were one of his little girlfriends or something.” 

“No, not me,” you said. “I’m just a regular, nothing more.” 

“Ah, well,” Erik shrugged. “Bobby can use as many friends as he can get.” He cast a look at his brother, who swiftly threw up a double bird, and Erik rolled his eyes. “So, does my baby brother’s regular friend have a name?” 

“Yes,” you said, and a smile came across his face when you told him your name. He repeated it back to you, gentle and sweet, like he was committing it to memory. You liked the way he said your name, and the closer proximity allowed you to see his pink mouth, the skin of his lips a little dry and bitten. 

“That’s pretty,” he told you. “I’m Erik, if Bobby didn’t already tell you.” 

“I already knew,” you told him. A flash of confusion wiped across his face, and you put a hand up to your ear, almost as if you were showing them off. “You did my seconds a little while ago.” 

“Oh!” Erik laughed. “Well, shit, I did, didn’t I? I remember you now; I knew I’d seen your pretty face before.”

“God,” you chuckled. “Are you always such a flirt?”

“Not always,” Erik said. “Only when it can make my baby brother uncomfortable.” He gestured towards Bobby with the end of his beer bottle, and Bobby gave him another “What the fuck?” type look before rolling his eyes and going to serve other people at the bar, away from you and Erik. 

“Well, you’re certainly brothers, based on attitude alone,” you said, and watched as Erik hooked the toe of his boot in the barstool opposite him and tugged it out, giving you a place to sit. 

“What, the blindingly good looks didn’t give it away first?” Erik asked. 

“You two look nothing alike,” you told him. After a momentary beat, you added, “I like your look better than his.” 

“Oh yeah?” Erik asked. “You into the brooding, mysterious types?” 

You shrugged. “I could be,” you said. “I think it’s the whole, like, ‘tortured artist’ thing you’ve got going on.”

“So, that answer is yes, the brooding and mysterious type,” Erik nodded. “Tortured artists are, in my experience, inherently brooding and mysterious. Can’t claim the title if you aren’t.” 

“Damn, today I learned,” you replied, and Erik gave a little laugh. You examined his face as he looked to the side, towards Bobby, to flag him down for another beer; soft skin, a little pale with a rosy flush, rough facial hair that showed a little ginger in the blue neon signage behind the bar, with thick, dark eyelashes around his almond eyes, piercing blue. A silver ring inside his nose, to match the ones in his ears; it looked like a thicker metal than you thought piercings typically were. “So, here, you can teach me something else. How did you get your nose ring in?” 

“Like, how you pierce a septum?” Erik asked. 

“No, like, that’s way… I don’t know…” you started, already regretting the question, knowing your next choice of words. “Way bigger and thicker than my earrings. How?” Your face burned hot at having to look him in the eyes and say the phrase “big and thick” to him, but he either didn’t catch the unintentional innuendo or actively chose not to acknowledge it. 

“Oh, I see,” Erik nodded. “Yeah, so, it’s a little complicated, a lot of terminology and shit, but the short of it is that you gotta stretch it out. Like, it wasn’t this big when I first did it, I’ve had to size up the hole over the years so I could get bigger and thicker things in there.” 

You bit your bottom lip to hold in your laughter, and Erik scoffed. “Okay, that was too much eye contact on my part for saying all of that, that’s my bad,” he said and shook his head. “I could have said that way differently.” 

“I-It’s fine,” you told him. He exchanged the empty bottle for another one from his brother, and Bobby passed him the bent-up bottle cap, which he put into an inside pocket of his jacket. “I mean, I started it.” 

“That you did,” Erik said. “But, yeah, it’s a whole thing, sizing up, it takes a while.” 

“Neat,” you said. “I don’t know too much about, like, tattoos or piercings or whatever, that’s not really my style.”

“Well, I’m an open book,” Erik shrugged. “You got questions, I’ve got answers. And I won’t even charge ya for it.” He gave you a playful wink, and the heat returned to your face. 

“Cool,” you nodded. “Do you have any tattoos?” 

“Oh, yeah,” Erik nodded quickly. “Got more ink than skin at this point, I’m pretty sure.” With that, he shrugged off his jacket, leaving him in just the black t-shirt for some band that you didn’t know, with that weird scratchy font that metal bands usually used. You could hardly focus on the t-shirt, though; all along his now-exposed arms, he had different pieces of artwork, all varying sizes, some colorful and some not, none of them remotely similar. You felt your eyes widen as Erik held out his arms to you, and you examined the spiderwebs, serpents, and roses that he had embedded in his skin forever. “You can touch ‘em, if you want,” he offered, then winced. “I promise I’m not trying to say everything as obscenely as possible.”

“It’s fine,” you smiled. Gently, as if you were worried you’d hurt him, you brushed your fingers along the large spiderweb that encompassed the majority of his lower right arm. “I mean, it’s just skin. Skin is skin, ink or not.” 

“I know,” Erik said. “But that’s a sorta cheat code with people like me— let the cute girl touch your tattoos and she might give you her number. A high success rate, you’d be surprised.”

You gently turned his arm over to get a look at the softer, paler skin on the inside of his arm, and you sighed. In large script, the word DAD was inked in, along with a pale scar in the shape of a heart towards the end. “Oh,” Erik started. “So, the heart was, um, sorta an accident. Not sorta, it was an accident, but, like, I don’t know, it’s a long story. The night after my father died, I was closing up shop by myself, and some freak fire got started. Through a series of unfortunate events, I ended up on the floor, but a jewelry case had busted in the fire and I didn’t realize it, and my arm—” He made an exaggerated splat noise that made you giggle despite the horror of the story. “Landed straight on top of it. Worst pain I’ve ever been in that I didn’t enjoy.”

“Wow,” you mumbled. “I’m glad you’re alright… I remember last year, hearing from some friends that there was a fire there, but… And I’m sorry ‘bout your dad.” You only added the last part to try to banish the thoughts that his last remark had ignited, but he did nothing to mitigate it. 

“Yeah, it’s coming up on a full year,” Erik said. “And I was thinking about it recently, and I’m tired of… I don’t know. When he died, I felt like I lost a part of myself. I mean, he’s my dad, y’know, I kinda did lose a part of myself. But one day a few weeks ago, I looked down at the tat and the burn scar, and saw that everything had healed up as nice as possible, like nothing bad happened at all, and I figured that it was Pops, taking care of me one last time. I realized I was tired of being a sad little recluse, especially if he was going to make sure I was okay.”

There’s the explanation that Bobby was looking for on why Erik changed. And, it seemed, like the old Erik was starting to rise from the grave. “That’s a nice thought,” you told him. You let go of his arm and cleared your throat, going after a sip of your drink, and you added, “Do you have any more?” 

“Thoughts?” Erik joked, and you smiled. 

“No, tattoos,” you told him. “I’m assuming it’s not just your arms.”

“Oh,” Erik said, shaking his head. “Nah, got ‘em all over. You can sorta see this one…” He hooked a finger in the collar of his shirt and tugged slightly, showing off the corner of what looked vaguely like a bird’s wing— “And my stomach piece, and the bullshit on my sides… And more.”

You could tell he was fishing for you to ask what “more” meant, and you gave him a soft smile. You could read his energy as easily as a book, and the words that his soul and body gave to you were telling you some things that you’d rather hear his voice say and his lips move around. “More?” you repeated. His hands weren’t all full of ink, and you carefully let your finger trace the lines of his palm as you lowered your voice as quiet as you could. “My, my, Erik. That almost sounds like an invitation.” 

The hand of his that you weren’t tracing touched your knee, moving slowly to give you time to retreat if you wanted to. “An invitation to do what, exactly?” he asked, and you slotted your bottom lip between your teeth. “Oh, don’t you go getting shy on me now, baby. You’re almost there. All you gotta do is ask.” 

A shiver ran down your back at the sweet little name he bestowed upon you, and you battled it with venom. “What if I don’t wanna ask?” you countered. “What if I’m content just looking at the tattoos on your arms, and have no interest whatsoever at seeing what’s under— and inside— your pants?” 

Erik laughed the way that only incredibly hot guys could get away with, his lip between his teeth as his laughter rumbled low in his chest. “Who said anything about getting in my pants?” he asked. Moving slowly, once again giving you time to move if you so wanted, he got up from the stool he was sat on, instead leaning up on the bar on his elbow. He was taller standing than sitting, and having to look just so slightly upward made your mouth run dry. He wasn’t a big guy, but definitely not some twig, but the energy radiating from his chest made you feel so tiny in comparison. You didn’t hate it, though. Now, as close as you were, you could smell the mentholated smoke on him, and it made you dizzy. What the fuck was wrong with you? You had never been so unashamedly turned on by someone before. 

“I did,” you said boldly. 

“Now, that’s mixed signals,” Erik chuckled. “You don’t wanna see the tattoos or piercings I’ve got under my jeans, and yet you wanna get inside ‘em?”

You paused, replaying what he said in your head as your eyes widened, and quietly replied, “Piercings?” 

He smiled slow, biting the edge of his lip, looking like the cat who ate the canary. “It’s like I told you, babygirl,” he said. “All you gotta do is ask.”

He took a half-step closer to you, his hand landing on your waist, and he angled his head down so that his mouth was right next to your ear. To an innocent passerby, it could have looked like he was just talking to you so he wouldn’t have to shout over the music, but the words that spilled from his lips were anything but innocent: “If you knew how fucking hard I was right now, you wouldn’t be wasting any more time out here. You’d take me into the bathroom and lock the door, and you’d open your legs and let me stretch your pussy open and do whatever I want to you. Right?” You nodded quickly, your own hand reaching out and hooking a finger in his belt loop to draw him closer. His tongue slowly wet his bottom lip as he took in your reaction, and he added, “And I bet you’d just love to be split open on my cock, wouldn’t you? Take me in your mouth, in your sopping wet little cunt. I bet you’re such a slut that you’d let me… Nah, you wouldn’t let me, you would beg me… To cum inside you, breed that filthy little cunt of yours until you’re absolutely full of me.”

You nodded quickly and grunted out a meek “Mhm.” 

“You ever had a pierced cock before, baby?” Erik asked softly, almost turning sweet for a moment. But you knew it wasn’t sweetness; it was condescension, he was making fun of how mild-mannered you had turned. It only made the fire under your dress burn hotter. If he could have bent you over that bar that very second, you would have let him. But then his words sank into your skin— Sank maybe isn’t the right word. It hit you like a truck, slammed under your skin like all the ink on his body, needled in with a satisfied pain. Did he say pierced? 

“N-No,” you stammered. “I didn’t even know you could… That anyone would wanna…” 

“Oh, yeah,” he nodded. “You wanna know a secret?” You looked at him with widened eyes, nodding, and his big blues softened at your doe-in-headlights look. “Only just got it last year. You’ll be the first to know what it feels like.” 

“Oh my God,” you gasped. “I’m flattered.” 

“How ‘bout you go check out that bathroom?” he asked, and you nodded again. Your head was spinning at the notion, and Erik’s eyebrows creased for a moment. “If you don’t, that’s alright. Let me know if I’m coming on too strong, I can back off or fuck off completely, if you want.” 

“I like my men strong,” you told him, and you did. Forthright, assertive, commandeering; he was ticking all your boxes. “I was just thinking about it.”

“About what?” Erik asked. “I need words, sweetheart. I can’t do what you don’t tell me about. I’ll do anything for you. Just ask.” 

You cast your gaze to the side, to your forgotten drink and his beer, and you whispered, “How many of those have you had?” 

“That’s only my second one,” Erik told you. “I’m not drunk. Not even a little bit. And you?” 

“Just the one,” you said. “And this has been collecting melted ice since I came over. But you know that, you paid for them.” 

“Fuck, am I glad I did,” Erik smiled. “I wasn’t sure how else to get your attention. You were having such a good conversation with Bobby, I was almost worried the wrong Campbell brother might get a hold of you.” 

“Easy, tiger,” you told him. “You don’t have a hold of me yet.” 

Erik nodded slowly, the hand on your waist carefully sliding upwards to flatten against the small of your back, his pinkie edging oh-so-slightly under the waistband of your skirt. “M’getting there,” he told you. “I like to take my time, y’know?” 

“Slow and steady?” you asked. 

“Something like that,” Erik replied. Then, gently, a shift to a much softer side, he nestled his lips into your neck, just below your ear, and he gave it a gentle kiss. “Go to the bathroom, get all nice and ready for me while I finish up here. Can you do that, sweetheart?” 

You nodded. “Don’t keep me waiting too long,” you told him, squeezing his arm. 

In turn, his hand abandoned your leg and snatched your wrist. His grip wasn’t painfully tight, just enough to let you know that he meant business, and he said, “If I walk in there and catch you touching yourself, you’re gonna be in huge trouble. Okay? None of that shit, I’m the only one who makes you cum tonight.” Your eyes stuck on his mouth as he talked, the way his pink lips pulled and puckered as he talked, and that dizzy, hypnotized feeling came back. You wanted to kiss him, taste his mouth and tongue and feel his pretty lips against yours, but you were nearly certain that a quick fuck in the bathroom of a bar wasn’t exactly a “kiss” sort of situation. 

Luckily, Erik read your mind. His own eyes flicked down to look at your mouth, and he sighed softly. “Lemme…” he whispered, and he surged into you, pressing his lips to yours for just long enough for you to get a head full of his scent. If he had stayed put for one second more, you would have kissed him back (again, if he decided to spread you open on that bar right then and there, you would have let him without question, so a simple kiss felt relatively lowkey), and, as he pulled away, you felt like it was a painful parting. “Just wanted a little taste,” he told you, swiping his thumb along the corner of his bottom lip. “God, if your pussy tastes half as good as your mouth, I might have to really pick my battles ‘bout what I want to do to you.” 

As you departed towards the restroom, Erik sent a quick swat to your ass, and you bit your lip as you smiled at him. The restroom was towards the back, down a corridor about halfway until the room with the sign on the door, and you slowly opened it, expecting the resistance of someone in there shouting, but nothing came. A single-room situation, the counter for the sink painted shitty black with stickers for local bands and Sharpie graffiti littering the walls, and, thankfully, a functioning lock. You set your purse on the hook on the door, tugging out your phone to make sure Anna hadn’t texted you back, and you frowned at a new message from her. r u ok?? She had asked, sent less than 20 minutes ago. u haven’t come and found me and begged to go home yet!! :P

You quickly pecked out a message that was light on details, a simple got to talking to a friend, i’ll be done soon, and you turned towards the mirror, swiping at your lips with your finger to tidy up your lipstick. Erik didn’t seem all too concerned with the state of your makeup, but you still wanted it to look nice, and your concentration on cleaning up lipstick made you jump in shock when the doorknob to the bathroom started to jostle. You took a deep, steadying breath— you had never hooked up with a stranger in the bathroom before, and your chest felt full of nervous energy— and flipped the lock back on the door, then turned back to the mirror, trying to act unaffected and nonchalant. 

Erik was quiet as a ghost as he entered, deliberately shutting the door behind him and locking it once more, and he came to stand behind you, looking in the cracked and dirty mirror as well. You could trace his eyeline, though, and he was only looking at you as he moved his arms to brace against the counter, trapping you against his chest. He seemed almost contemplative as he tilted his head, shifting his eyeline to your neck and the sliver of shoulder coming out of the collar, and he pressed his mouth to your bit of shoulder. He left soft, slow kisses on your skin, traveling up to your neck, then pressing another kiss below your ear. “Did you do what I asked?” he whispered in your ear. “Got yourself ready for me?” 

“Not yet,” you admitted. “Was sorta hopin’ you’d do it for me.”

Quick as a flash, one of his hands was up off the counter, slithering around down your front to go up your skirt. His thick bicep pressed up against your body, pulling you closer into him, and you hummed with satisfaction as his big hand roughly cupped your pussy. He hadn’t done anything yet, hardly even touched you, really, but you were already wet, dampening your panties. “Fuck,” he groaned, pressing his cheek into your neck. “I can feel you, sweetheart, you’re soaked. Surely that can’t all be for me.” 

“Who else would it be for?” you asked, and a wicked smile crossed his face. 

Erik moved with confidence, like he had done it a thousand times, his fingers stroking the wetness of your panties with rough pressure, almost like he was threatening to penetrate you through the thin fabric. You realized he seemed to be mapping you out, memorizing the way you felt, and his fingers moved upwards just a bit to grind against your throbbing clit. A choked moan involuntarily left your lips, and he carefully nibbled at your soft neck. You had a feeling that he would have sank his teeth in if you would let him, and you hated to admit that you would have. Something about him made you feel dangerous for even knowing his name, and your blood felt like fire in your veins. 

“You want ‘em?” Erik asked.

You panted, pressing your ass back into him like some pathetic bitch in heat, and your heart skipped a beat at the feeling of him right against your ass, stiff inside his pants. You felt like you could have drooled as Erik laughed, rumbling low in his chest, and your voice came out as a high-pitched whine: “Want your cock, Erik, please!” 

“Oh, yeah?” he asked. “No prep, nothing? You like it when it hurts, huh? Fuck, what a woman…” He bit his bottom lip as he smiled and shook his head, seemingly impressed with you, and, as fast as lightning, his hand cracked against your ass, palm open, echoing around the tin bathroom. The sting and flame of pain made the headrush increase tenfold, and the burn of tears pricked at your eyes. You loved it, though. The dudes you fucked before were pretty easy and vanilla, and even though this wasn’t exactly the kinkiest hook-up to ever take place, even just spanking you was the most wild thing a guy had ever done. Something told you, though, that spanking and hitting it from the back (also something new for you) were part and parcel of Erik’s routine. 

His hand bunched up in the fabric of your panties, pulling it tight for just a moment, before inching it down your legs. He greedily took in the sight through the mirror as you dug your fingernails into your palms, and his free hand moved to grasp your chin, making you look in the mirror with him. “You see that?” he whispered, capturing the soft flesh of your ear in his teeth. You nodded quickly, whimpering, and the quietest growl purred at his throat. “What do you see? Tell me.” 

“I-I see…” you started, and you shuffled a bit to get your panties off completely. Erik balled them up in his fist and slipped them into the front pocket of his jeans, and your whole body pulsed and throbbed. “Am I gettin’ those back?” 

“Debatable,” Erik said swiftly, and he let go of your jaw to land a not-exactly gentle hit on your cheek before grabbing your face once more. “Eyes on the prize, sweetheart, tell me what you’re lookin’ at.”

“You,” you choked out. 

“Oh yeah?” he mused. “What am I doing?” 

The skin-to-skin contact of his rough fingers with your clit made you think you would cum from that alone. His middle fingers circled your bud, putting the perfect amount of pressure to have your legs shake, and you keened high in your throat, squirming to press your back fully against his front. You could feel his heartbeat against your shoulder blade, dampened through your clothes but still quick, fast— he was excited, nervous, on-the-edge-of-his-seat, like you, and then you remembered the secret he had told you. He had never had sex with his piercing before. He was probably as wigged out of his mind about it as you were. “Touchin’ me,” you gasped. “Touching my clit, making me feel so good.” 

“Good girl,” he whispered. His hand on your jaw slunk down, repositioning to grip your throat, and you watched his face tense as he faltered. “If I do something you don’t like, please tell me. Don’t be quiet just ‘cause I like it, okay? I wanna get my rocks off, sure, but, at the end of the day, I’m only satisfied if you are. So, if I’m too rough or say something weird or you wanna do something else, just say the word and I’ll do it.” 

“You’re okay,” you assured him. “I’ve, umm… Never done anything like this before.”

His hands jumped away from your body like your skin had burned him. “Like what?” he asked. “‘Like this’, what is ‘this’?” 

The ceasing of his rubbings on your clit made you sigh, and the shaking in your legs got worse. “The-the slapping,” you started, but a genuine laugh bubbled from your chest. “Looking in the mirror, choking, all of that, it’s new for me.” 

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I-I just assumed, that’s totally on me.”

“I never told you to stop,” you offered lightly, raising your eyes to look at him in the mirror. “I never said I didn’t like it. I mean, if you hadn’t stopped rubbing my clit, I probably would’ve cum.” 

Those big blue eyes of his blinked once with surprise, and he said, “Fuck. You were that close?” With your nod, Erik laughed. “Damn. Shame on me, sweetheart.” 

“I do think that I want you to fuck me from the front,” you told him, easily turning to face him. “I mean, I can’t very well watch your cock sink into me if you’re fucking me from the back, can I?” 

“Where have you been all my life?” Erik asked, all breathy like he couldn’t believe what you were saying to him, and you smiled. Your minds seemed to think the same thing at the same time, because his hands went under your ass to help you as you perched on the edge of the counter, opening your legs for him to see all the slick and wet he had left you with. His chest heaved as he drank in the sight of your pussy, his hands skimming up your thighs, and you reached out to grab at his belt buckle, undoing it with much more deft fingers than you were used to having. He let you get as far as pulling down his zipper before he dug his blunt nails into your soft skin, making that growling purr again. 

“I just need a taste of you,” he told you, and before your brain could catch up with what he meant, he was getting down on his knees and he was getting to work, licking a broad, fat stripe up your glistening cunt. The wet warmth of his tongue made a broken moan rip from your mouth, and your head tilted back as he landed a messy kiss on your hole, throbbing and clenching around nothing. “Just like I thought, sweetheart: sweet as candy. I oughta start calling you sugar, huh?” 

He shifted, standing back to his full height, and the fire in your veins grew hotter at the sight of his mouth, shining in the light with your wet. You reached out for him and drew him into a messy kiss, and you let out your first true, full-chested moan of the night as you let yourself sink fully into him, into his smell and taste and energy, and Erik’s hips bucked forward. “Fuck,” he hissed, and drew in a tight breath. “I knew it was sensitive, they told me it would be, but fuck me, that’s intense.” 

“What is?” you asked, chasing him back into another kiss. 

“My stupid dick,” Erik chuckled against your mouth. “Rubbing against my pants, it’s, like, holy shit. You’d think I’d never had my dick touched before, the way it feels.” 

You resumed the job that you had abandoned before as you kissed him, and his hands joined you to help tug down his jeans just enough to shove down the band of his boxers, his belt buckle jingling as it moved. He had a nice dick, decently long and deliciously thick— now you understood what his whole “stretching you out” thing was about, because oh my God— but you couldn’t focus on the whole thing for too long. Extending from his beautiful rosy tip was the silver metal ball, indicative of the end of a piercing, and your stomach pitched. That was going inside of you, and you had never thought something could be so arousing. Quickly, before he could push your hand away, you wrapped your fingers around his length, pulling on his bottom lip with your teeth as you stroked his cock. 

His cock jumped in your hand as he groaned, his eyebrows furrowing with the pleasure of it. “Fuck,” he gasped. “Holy shit, sweetheart, I think you’re gonna kill me if you make me wait any longer.” 

“We wouldn't want that,” you told him. You shuffled a bit, opening your legs wider for him, and his strong hands angled your legs to wrap around his waist. He was quick, obviously rather skilled with it, as he grasped his cock and guided it to your hole, pressing just the smallest bit in before he raised his eyes up to meet yours. A shiver ran down your back at the eye contact, and he seemed to notice the effect he had on you, because he put a hand on your face, keeping you from moving. 

“If it hurts,” he started. “Don’t tell me. Just scream for me.” 

Your breaths timed in tandem as he bullied his way inside you, going slowly to savor your tight resistance, and you gasped. His dick felt so good inside you, that funny little electrical charge working overtime with every bit he gave you, but the hard ball of the piercing in you nearly made tears fall. Not because it hurt— it didn’t; it was noticeable, of course, but you couldn’t pinpoint exactly why it felt so damn good, it just did. His cock was stiff and hard and hot, heated steel under warm velvet, and you cried out a wrecked little noise as he bottomed out, his thick balls nestled against your ass. 

Thankfully, you somehow managed to keep your head on straight and look at his face, and you saw a man possessed. His cheeks pink, his spit-slick rosebud mouth open, eyes squeezed shut and eyebrows pitched, messy hair falling over his forehead. God, the man was in heaven inside you, and his moan came as he opened his eyes. “Fuck,” he laughed. “Look at that— fits like a glove. A really tight, really… Really warm, super wet… Glove— Fuck.” He abandoned the joke almost immediately, instead moving to pull his hips back, his eyes greedily taking in the sight of himself. You watched as well, seeing his softest skin all slick and shiny with your wetness, and he pulled himself out fully, watching as your hole throbbed in his absence. 

“God,” you whined, a pit opening in your stomach. “Erik, baby, put it back in, please.”

“I like the way you say my name,” he told you. “You say it like… I don’t know. Like you love the way it tastes.”

“I do,” you told him. Your chest heaved as you waited for him to take pity on you, and he quickly shoved your shirt up your chest, exposing your tits and the pushup bra you had worn, and he gave a wolfish grin. 

“Good,” he said. “I’m so glad. Now, sweetheart, you said you wanted my cock back inside you?” 

“Yes!” you yelped. He leaned down and kissed the swell of your tits as you writhed, and you added, “Please, Erik, please, put your cock inside me again, I feel so empty without you in my pussy.” 

“Such a filthy fuckin’ mouth,” Erik smiled, and he shook his head. “Nah, Bobby wouldn’t have been able to handle you, you would’ve knocked him out, you’re too much for him.” 

“Y’know,” you started. “I came here tonight to see Bobby. My friend always jokes that he’s my boyfriend.” 

Erik’s eyebrows furrowed, this time in confusion. “Have you fucked him?” he asked with narrowed eyes. 

“No,” you told him quickly. “Just— I don’t know. Had a little crush on him, that’s all. It’s those blue eyes, makes it hard to keep a girl away. Same as you, actually.” 

“Past tense ‘had’ a crush on baby brother,” Erik repeated. “Not present tense?”

“Not as of… About half an hour ago,” you told him. “Found another somebody to focus on.” 

“Someone caught your attention over Bobby?” Erik laughed. “Whoever that guy is, he is one lucky bastard. I bet you’d let him lick your pussy, wouldn’t you?” He rolled his eyes at his own joke, and you giggled softly. 

“I’d even let him fuck me in this gross-ass bar bathroom,” you said. “If only he would shut his stupid mouth and put his dick back inside me.” 

Erik made a big show of closing his mouth, looking a little like a gaping fish, and you held back a snort of laughter. This time, you watched him, slapping your pussy with the head of his cock a few times, hearing the wet sound echo around the bathroom, and his dick twitched as he ran his thumb across his sensitive head, smearing his pearly pre-cum around. “Jesus,” he gasped. “Gotta quit doing that, s’gonna make me bust before I’ve even really fucked you.” 

You watched as he situated his pierced head back at your entrance, and you felt like all the breath in your chest got knocked out in one punch as he pushed inside, a little quicker and rougher than before. He didn’t waste time to start up a rhythm, wrinkling his nose as he gripped your hips and fucked you, and your arms circled around his neck, hiding in his shoulder and attempting to muffle your noises. It wasn’t quiet exactly in the bathroom, the music from the bar proper still very clearly audible, the walls still sorta rattling with the heavy bass, and you weren’t worried that anyone out there would hear you, but you were also hesitant to risk it. “D-Does anyone know?” you stammered. 

“Know what?” Erik asked. His belt rattled again as he snapped his hips forward into you, and you let out a wrecked moan into the dip of his neck. 

“That we’re in here together,” you said. “Th-That you’re fucking me within an inch of my life.” 

“I don’t think so,” Erik said. “Told Bobby I was heading back here, then was gonna split, but I don’t know if he saw you come back, so who knows what he knows. Why, are you worried your little boyfriend is gonna get jealous?” 

“No,” you told him with a shaky voice. He was so close to that spot inside you with every drag of his cock, and you could almost taste the incoming pop of electricity that would snap on your tongue when he did. 

“You want people to know I’m fucking you back here?” Erik asked. “Let the whole damn bar know that a pretty thing like you would let someone like me violate you? Damn, girl, you might be kinkier than me.” 

“Not likely,” you countered. “I mean, who here has the pierced genitals?” 

“Fair point,” Erik said. “Ya like it?” 

“I might never go back to regular dicks after this,” you chuckled, and Erik nodded in satisfaction. “But I don’t know if it’s the piercing, or if you’re just an absolute godlike fuck, even without that thing.” 

“Mix of both?” Erik offered. “I’m sure my sparkling personality has something to do with it too.” 

Before you could think of a snappy comeback, he fucked into you, and that electricity popped in your mouth as white flashed in your vision. “Fuck!” you squealed, tangling your fingers in his hair. “Erik, oh my God!” 

“Right there?” he asked, and you nodded quickly. His grip on your waist tightened, and you could almost feel the capillaries bursting under your skin to bruise up all tender by tomorrow morning as he fucked into that spot once more. Your whole body jostled with the feeling, and you squeezed your thighs hard around his body, urging him on. He was quick with it now, hammering into you and forcing out uh-uh-uh! moans from you, and you dug your fingernails into his scalp. He wasn’t quiet either, hissing in tight breaths and groaning as you throbbed around him, and a properly loud moan tumbled from his lips when your mouth attached to his neck, sucking at the sensitive pulse point. “Fuck, you gonna mark me up?” he panted, and you looked up at his face. His forehead under his hair was shiny with sweat, his eyes blown way the fuck out, lips bitten all red and raw— he was just about the most handsome guy you’d ever seen. 

“S’that so bad?” you asked, leaning back and biting at a different part of his skin. You intended to leave many bruises, in as many places as possible, and one of his strong hands lifted from your hip to cradle your head against his neck. Your tongue soothed the sting of your bites, and you could feel his throat and chest rumble as he pitched his head towards the ceiling and moaned. 

“Not at all,” he whispered. “‘Specially if you leave your pretty lipstick all over my neck.”

“Wanna leave it everywhere,” you told him. That telltale knot was tightening at the bottom of your tummy, and, based on his shaky breathing and the slow increase in volume, he didn’t have much longer left either. “E, baby,” you whispered, and he touched his forehead to yours, stealing a kiss to your mouth. “Wanna see us. Turn me around.” 

The brief few seconds where he pulled out of you felt like torture, but he guided you off the counter and around, back in the position you started with. You steadied yourself on your hands, and hardly had time to even think again before he was back inside you, anchoring on your hips. It was louder now too, the hits of his skin on yours coming faster with the angle shift, and his dick (and the associated piercing) rubbed against your tender spot with every single thrust. Your legs felt like jelly and you dug your nails into the countertop as you looked up to the mirror, and you jumped with shock. 

Who the absolute fuck were you looking at? By all accounts, the girl in the mirror was you— she had your eyes, your pretty face, the same outfit you wore. But her eyes were blown wide like she was rolling, her lipstick smeared across her face with her mascara gathered and running under her eyes. Her fingers moved when yours did, her chest heaved when yours did, she even moaned when you did. This was you; or, at least, this is what Erik did to you. You didn’t hate the fucked-out look on yourself. 

You cast your gaze to Erik in the mirror and found him studying your reflection as well, his bottom lip firmly between his teeth. He had pulled his shirt up with the position change, and your mouth watered at the collection of tattoos on his chest and stomach, the focal point being the large, dark skull in the middle of his torso. His stomach tensed and flexed as he fucked you, and you only managed to catch a momentary silver glint of nipple rings (what the fuck was with this guy?) before the knot in your stomach began to loosen, threatening the last shreds of your sanity. 

“Erik!” you squealed. Skillfully, he molded his front to your back and placed his arms over top of yours, threading your fingers together as he bit at your shoulder. 

“You gonna cum?” he asked, and you sobbed as his rhythm changed, from quick and hurried, to one hard slam after the other, a decidedly slower flow but all the more serving to get you to your end. “You gonna scream when you cream all over my cock?”

“Yes!” you cried. “Fuck, I’m so close, E, please!” 

“Aw, you poor thing,” he said, all condescending once more. “Little sweetheart, can’t take it anymore, huh?” One of his hands started to inch away from yours, and you knew exactly what he was on his way to do. 

You weren’t sure if his rough fingers actually made contact with your clit when you came. True to your word, you sobbed and moaned through your climax, drawn from so deep within your chest that it almost hurt, your head dropping forward as your whole body shook in the aftermath of the absolute assault on your nervous system. Erik’s strength was on full show now, because he used the little bit of it that he still had harnessed to keep you upright, his arm around your waist as he roughly buried himself up to the hilt in you, and it didn’t take long for you to feel the warmth of his cum inside you. You hadn’t even thought about a condom until right that second, when it was decidedly too late for one. 

And then it was quiet. Not completely, of course; his breathing was rattly and hard from exertion, and you were sniffling and whimpering, but it was much less noise than it had previously been. He cleared his throat and sniffed, and he carefully stood back to his full height with a sigh. “Goddamn…” he whispered. “You alright, sweetheart?” 

“M’good,” you whispered. “Just… Holy shit.” 

Erik chuckled raspily. “I know,” he said. “Think you can stand, or do you need me to hold onto ya?” 

“I can stand,” you assured him, and he slowly withdrew from you, earning himself one last, pathetic moan as his piercing rubbed against the spot inside you that felt raw and ultra-sensitive. The emptiness inside you was a strange feeling that you weren’t used to, and you tried to even out your breathing as he reached around you, grabbing at the stack of paper towels next to the sink. Before you really knew what was happening, he was on you again, turning you and lifting you back onto the counter, and you started, “Erik, I can’t, not again, give me a minute before—”

He shushed you, soft and gentle. “Not what I’m doing, sweetheart,” he told you, lifting your head up to look at him with a finger under your chin. He ran the tap against a few of the paper towels, soaking them with cold water, and he carefully wiped at your cheeks, trying to cool you down and help you settle. “There you go, that’s good, we’re calming down, we’re okay. What’s the shaking for? You alright, is it just the adrenaline? Or is something wrong?” 

You hadn’t even noticed the quivering that had started in your hands until he said something, and you frowned. “I’m alright,” you whispered. “Just… Oh my God.” 

He gave you a lopsided smile, then went to wipe down the sides of your mouth, cleaning up your makeup. “I know,” he said. “That was… I’ve never been like that before. I don’t know what happened to me. S’like I got inside you and, like, Hulked out or something. That was super fucked up, I’m sorry you had to see that.” 

You couldn’t help your laughter. “See that?” you repeated. “Erik, I’m the one you were fucking, I lived through that. Don’t know if I’ll be able to walk tomorrow, let alone out of here tonight.” 

Erik pouted at you. “Poor little princess,” he joked. “Need your prince to carry you into your Uber home?” 

“I don’t need saving,” you smiled. “But I might need your number.” 

Erik shared your smile, and he swooped in to land a kiss on your mouth. “See? I told you; we let cute girls touch our tattoos, and we get their numbers.”

When you woke up the next morning, in your own apartment, Anna already puking her hungover guts out in the bathroom, the first thing you thought about was Erik. You both managed to escape the bathroom unnoticed, even if you were walking like you had just ridden a bike across the country nonstop, and you found Anna out front, sharing a cigarette with some frat-dude-looking motherfucker. She hadn’t seen you and Erik together, so she didn’t try to pry into what you had been doing, but you caught Bobby’s eye, and he absolutely knew. Erik went back to his seat at the end of the bar, and you heard him ask his brother for a shot of tequila, and Bobby asked about what had happened just then, but Anna was whisking you away before you heard Erik’s response. It didn’t occur to you until you were already in the Uber home with a much-more-drunk-than-you Anna that you didn’t actually give Erik your phone number, and you could have hit yourself. How stupid did you have to be? Dude fucks you dumb and cums inside you, and you don’t even get his fucking number? What a fail.

Your whole body was sore and raw as you shifted in bed, grabbing at your phone tangled in your blankets. It was on 2% battery, having been forgotten the moment you got home, but it wasn’t the battery percentage that you were focused on. You had two texts, both about an hour old and from the same unsaved phone number, a local area code. The first text was a payment to you for $50, and the second said I’m an idiot. Get some breakfast and a Plan B. Take care of yourself. :)

Just as you were unlocking your phone to text Erik back, asking how exactly he got your phone number (probably Bobby), your phone vibrated with a third text; you could envision, for the past hour, him pacing around and debating whether to text you again. You had certainly done it before, and then promptly thrown your phone across the room when you finally hit send. So when will I get to see you again? 

You hit the call button, and the phone trilled for just a few seconds before the call picked up. Erik’s raspy voice, half-morning voice and half an obvious hangover from time spent at the bar after you left, said your name, as sweet as honey, like the first time he said it, but it wasn’t a question, like he was surprised you called. No, he was even and prepared, calm, cool, and collected. The memory of him last night, eyes blown out like he was on molly and his hair in his face, flashed in your mind’s eye, such a contrast from him right now, and you smiled. “If I sent you my address, would you come pick me up?” you asked. “We can get breakfast together, and you can see me again.” 

“Only if you also wanna see me,” Erik said. 

You could hear his smile from across the phone, and it made you smile even wider, like some lovesick teenager. “I would love nothing more.” 

[babyanimalses]

Learn Colors&Street Vehicles Names | Soccer Balls Color changing Vehicle...

[nsharks]

bleeding blue | apocalypse au

part twenty-five —other parts

pairing: Simon “Ghost” Riley x fem!reader words: 4k tags: death. blood. cannibalism mention. zombies of course. AFAB reader. single dad ghost. there will be sex but it isn’t here yet. slow burn!!! enemies to lovers. summary: After losing your companions, you run into a skull-masked man and his daughter. They are your last hope for survival.

A hand grips your shoulder. "We'll take care of them. Keep low and find a place for all of you to hide. Do not come out until we say."

His words blur together, but you manage to act accordingly, ignoring the pit in your stomach when he disappears around the truck. The concrete is covered in glass and rusted debris, so you keep low without letting your knees touch the ground and motion for the others to follow.

The closest place is an old café, the door closed with chains but the glass window shattered enough for you to crawl through. You pull the knife from your ankle as you move everyone behind the cash register, gripping the handle tight once you lean your back against it. The café is quiet. Still. No one else is here. You steady your breath. Staring at you are the double doors to the kitchen in the back, a thick waft of mold radiating, and behind you are tipped-over chairs and tables.

The noise outside has drifted. When you take a quick peek, you don't see anyone near the truck anymore. It is as if the three of them have followed whoever was shooting.

"Twix, I—"

You look back. Blue is holding her hand out, a shard of glass thrust in her palm.

Blood oozes.

You have no supplies on you, but you carefully pinch the glass between your thumb and forefinger. She bites her lip as it wriggles free, releasing another gush of blood. As if on cue, the kitchen doors burst open with ear-splintering screeches, and three Greys surge toward you.

Blue's bloodied hand reaches for her ankle knife as one tackles you, grinding your spine into the counter's edge. Two gunshots ring out over the snarling in your face. You thrust your arm against its throat, keeping the chomping jaws at bay, and with your other hand, stab the knife into its skull three times, until it whines like a dying animal.

When you shove the corpse to the tile floor, you see the two others on the ground. Blue is pulling her knife from one skull, and Ari has a gun in his hand.

"I only have one more bullet," he pants, double-checking the barrel.

"Someone could've heard the gunshots," Nereida whispers frantically.

"Then we find somewhere else to hide. Come on." Your eyes land on a graffitied door on the side wall. It leads into an alleyway that smells putrid. You motion for Ari to give you the gun as you lead the way, sandwiched between brick walls. You can still hear rounds firing from the street. They stutter in sync with your heartbeat.

You shove a rusted crate that blocks the path. You catch sight of movement, and something scurries between your boots. Blue squeaks and grips Ari's arm, your hand tightening on the gun—but it's only a raccoon.

"There."

You spot a sizable dumpster around the corner, where the narrow alley widens enough for cars to pass behind the buildings. Nereida helps you shove off the debris on top and heave open the lid. A thick waft of rot rises, along with a buzz of fruit flies. The dumpster is half-filled with blackened garbage and charred bones, but no Greys. You don't have time to find another spot as two male voices echo from down the alley.

"I heard it over here!"

"Let's check, come on."

Shit.

You lace your fingers for Blue to step on them. "Quick, get in."

Once the kids are inside, Nereida grabs the edge and hoists herself up. You glance back, stomach coiling as two shadows approach the corner. Quickly, you close the lid after her, scatter the debris back on top, and scurry behind a nearby crate, palm sweaty around the gun.

A fevered study of the shadows reveals two healthy, fit men. One bullet. Something in the second one's gait seems slightly off. You make a split-second decision, peek over the crate, and aim for the first man's chest, doubting your ability to land a headshot.

He falls dead with a thud and then you are launching blindly at the second man with your knife, but you fail to pierce flesh when a strong grip snatches your wrist. The man's rifle skids across the ground and your back is slammed against the wall, your skull colliding with the brick hard enough to make stars dance across your vision. A muscled forearm presses into your neck, effectively cutting off your air.

"Fucking bitch."

Even through the blood rushing between your ears, the growl in your face is—familiar.

You blink up at a man swallowed by a massive burn scar.

The tip of his nose is gone, with eyelashes and scalp burnt away, revealing poorly healed ripples of flesh.

One eyelid fails to open properly, the skin too scarred.

The recognition unfurls your eyes.

He presses harder. "I know you, don't I?" Anger cuts through his gaze. "Ah. That's right—a thief and a killer. You're full of surprises, sweetheart." The curl on his burnt lips makes you flinch, but there is nowhere to go. "I guess you found new friends."

"I guess—I guess you did... too..." Short gasps leave your mouth.

"Shut up," he growls. "I don't want to hear a word from a stuck-up bitch like you who thinks her tits and her cunt are worth more than my goddam face." He is yelling now, spit flying in your eyes. "Don't you dare look away from it! What, not proud of your handiwork?" He breathes hard and looks you over with a snigger. "Finding you is just my luck. I was going to go easy the first time, but now I think I'll kill you then enjoy you. How's that sound? Your corpse being passed around? Hope your cunt is as good when you're dead—"

White-hot anger ripples through your veins and you snarl before hurling a wad of saliva in his face, using the brief distraction to drive your knee into his groin. He staggers back enough for you to escape his hold and push away from the wall.

Gulps of air feel painful down your throat. You back away, readjusting the hold on your knife while he rubs his eyes furiously. 

"You're sick," you growl, voice hoarse and low. 

"And you're not, princess?"

"I'm not a goddamn rapist."

"You ruined my fucking face," he retorts, stalking you down the alley. At least you are drawing him away from their hiding place—you make an unnoticed glance at the dumpster to ensure no one else has approached, relieved to see the lid unmoved. When your eyes flick back to him, a sick curl twitches on his lips. "You're not innocent here. You're damned like everyone else. That ride of yours now has a shot tire, and that boat—" he chuckles, "—what? Thought you were gonna get out of this hell? We made sure to put a hole in that, too."

His words sink in. 

For a moment, horror grips you.

But you channel it through your veins as something useful—rage—and launch at him without abandon. He anticipates an attempt to stab his side again, so he blocks there, but instead, you reach for his marred face and claw the unhealed wounds, reopening them. He howls like an animal, stumbling back and cradling his cheek as blood seeps between his fingers. 

"I'm going to kill you, bitch—"

He blindly reaches for the rifle on the ground but you are quick to kick it away. You jump on him, this time bringing him to the concrete, which scrapes against your exposed skin as you wrestle to come out on top. But he is stronger. Heavier. For the second time you become pinned, he tries to dig his hands into your throat. The lack of oxygen threatens to turn the world black, but you slap a hand back on his face and rip off his scarred eyelid before it can.

He roars.

You spit in his face.

Your knife—you lost it in the midst.

As blood pours from his eye, you outstretch an arm and feel for the handle.

The leather is in your palm.

You stab his side.

You shove at his shoulder to get him off.

Then you pin him down, and plunge the knife over and over into every piece of him you find. Neck, chest, cheek, shoulder.

Again and again.

A slashed jugular. Ripped arteries.

Your vision is consumed by blood. You let yourself drown in it. Hot, thick—

Arms grab you by the waist and lift you into the air.

You attempt to wriggle free and dig your knife in them, but the person is quick to disarm you.

"Twix." 

A skull face stares down at you. Your bloodied fingers wrap around Ghost's shirt as you pant heavily. It's him. He's here. 

"Where are they?" he shouts over the ringing in your ears.

He sets you down, gripping your shoulders to steady you. It takes a moment to gather your senses, to comprehend his words. Your hands, shirt, and face are drenched in blood. Your head throbs with weight. Slowly, the world snaps back into focus. You glance around, spotting Kyle and Price standing behind him.

"There," you finally breathe out. "The dumpster. They're...they're in there. Safe. They're safe."

His eyes flick over the length of you, perhaps to ensure all of the blood is not yours, before the three of them thrash off the debris and lift the lid to the dumpster around the corner. They help out Nereida, Ari, and Blue. 

"Ghost." You try to swallow, but the pain hums with each attempt. His eyes snap to yours just as he checks over Blue. "He... They've shot a tire."

"I know. I've got a spare."

"The kayak, too. How are we—"

"We figure that out later. We need to leave." Price slings the rifle over his shoulder and grabs his wife by the arm. "Those fucks are going to be drawn straight to us now."

Blood. Right. 

You push through the ache in your head and run after them back to the truck. The absence of gunfire signifies everyone else has been taken care of, but just as predicted, a chorus of moans begins to filter through the buildings. From windows, underneath cars, and benches—Greys begin to crawl out. The faster ones are quickly shot by either Kyle's handgun or Ghost's rifle. Price helps everyone into the car and slams the door shut as Ghost and Kyle continue firing.

"Wipe yourself, quick. And change inside." Price throws a rag at you. Your backpack.

You get into the passenger seat, wiping your face and hair with a splash of water from Blue's canteen, then toss the stained rag out onto the street.

You don't care if anyone can see as you slip off your shirt, throwing it out the window, and slipping on a clean one.

Outside, Price and Kyle shoot away any Greys that approach as you suspect Ghost is changing the blown out tire, because you can't see him even in the side mirror. 

Within ten minutes, he flings open the door and takes seat behind the wheel. This time Price and Kyle hop in the truck bed with their guns as Ghost starts the ignition with a loud rumble, veering sharply back onto the road. 

Time has been stolen. It is high afternoon, the sky a clear blue even though the streets you leave behind in Halstead are tainted red.

Now the map is in your hands, but Ghost seems to know the way from here.

"How long can the spare go for?"

"Long enough." His words are clipped. "But the kayak we need to figure out."

"It can't be fixed, can it?"

His silence is your response.

Your mind races.

Minutes blur. Behind you, Nereida quietly helps wrap Blue's hand.

Colchester whirls by without obstructions, but you keep looking out the window and squinting, paranoid. You make it to the coast within an hour. The buildings turn into colorful, seafaring cottages and the streets turn to uneven cobblestone. Seashell chimes dance in store fronts that are plastered with old signs reading KEEP OUT IF INFECTED. Ghost makes a sharp right down a narrow street and parks the truck in front of a lone, blue cottage that seems remote enough to be safe. Even if the kayak was fine, you'd have to stop for the night in order to get out on the water at the start of morning.

A flock of oystercatchers scatters as the truck doors slam open and close. The air, thick with salt and spume, is cooler here, the breeze tugging at your tangled hair, where bits of dried blood still clings. The view of the sandy shore and rocky pier would be beautiful, if your mind weren't elsewhere, if the day hadn't been marked by panic.

Ghost circles around to look at the kayak. "How bad is it?"

"Bad," Price mutters.

He helps him pull it out. 

Blue and Ari sit on the steps to of the cottage's porch and listen in silence. 

Nereida watches from beside you, tucking a sweater on against the chill.

Ghost flips the kayak, revealing a bullet hole that goes through one end and out the other. Anger radiates from his tense shoulders. "Christ."

"We can't patch it like we did the raft, can we?" Kyle asks, bending on his knees to look at the damage.

Price raps his knuckles against the hollow sides. "No, it's hard plastic. It would need welding to fix holes like that."

The understanding lingers in the air as you cross arms over your chest. "I'll stay behind, then," you speak up. Nails cutting your palms. You're damned like everyone else. Nereida looks at you with wide eyes, touching your arm. "If we can't fix it, then all we have is the raft and it only fits six. You guys take it in the morning and I will stay behind here—"

"No one is staying behind," Ghost grits fiercely. He gestures at the truck bed. "It doesn't even matter if we got rid of a person. The supplies have to fit, too. Even if we make it across, we're dead without the ammo and food."

Price trails his thumb over the hole in the plastic. "Two would have to stay behind in order for us to fit all the supplies." Your breath hitches as you watch him calmly stand up. "Or... two would have to swim."

"Swim?" you repeat. "You can't just swim it. I mean—it's open water."

"Nothing we haven't swam in before." Kyle leans against the side of the truck, crossing his arms. "But it's further across than the strait. Jesus, what is it? A 40, 50 kilometer swim?"

"Then we take turns," Price says. "Two of us at a time."

"I can take a turn," Nereida offers. "I used to swim in college. I mean, it can't be so bad if we go in intervals, and hold onto the raft."

You breathe deep, looking at the water that crashes upon the shore in the distance and then at Ghost, who is already staring at you. "I can take a turn, too."

"The three of us will start it off. If we need you two to cover, then you'll be ready to go. The kids stay in the raft."

You swallow. "It's not just about getting tired, we need plenty of water to drink. You can still get quickly dehydrated, and the temperature of the water—I mean, hypothermia can set in fast even it is warm."

"We load up on clean water tonight and have blankets and towels ready to go," Kyle says.

You glance back at Ghost. The rise and fall of his chest turns more steady as he nods his head in resignation.

"That's our only choice, then."

The evening is thick with silence.

No one has the energy for conversation, only exchanging brief requests or simple instructions. Starting a fire is risky even here, but you need clean water. A freshwater creek lies a few kilometers back, so Price and Ghost take the truck while the rest of you work on inflating the raft for tomorrow. Whatever happened between you and Kyle goes unspoken, both of you focused on the task at hand, taking turns pumping and checking the seams for anymore holes. When the two return, you help boil the water over a small wood-burning stove in the cottage, praying the smoke rising from the chimney isn’t too noticeable in the growing breeze as the sun sets.

The cottage is mostly bare, with only a dining table, a knocked-over chair, and a stripped bed frame in one of the rooms. The bathroom is quaint, its sea star wallpaper faded, and a warped mirror hangs above the sink. You stare at your reflection while the others lay out sleeping bags on the dusty floor, turning in early to conserve energy for the new plan to cross the channel. Ghost has taken first watch, sitting out on the porch with a rifle.

You listen to their soft murmurs outside the bathroom door as you work on getting out the rest of the blood in your hair. There is a red mark on your throat that is sore to the touch, and the back of your head still feels like someone has taken a hammer to it. Your eyes seem darker than the last time you saw them. You take another rag, wet it, and wipe it all over your skin. Then, you pad back out where the last lamp has been turned off and only moonlight through the boarded windows is left.

You slip into the empty sleeping bag next to Blue and stare at the ceiling. It is impossible to sleep—to even close your eyes for longer than a few seconds. Your heart refuses to even its pace, furiously pumping blood through your veins.

After an hour of lying still, the itch becomes intolerable. You slip silently from the sleeping bag, grab your backpack, and creep to the back door by the kitchen. It opens to a patch of overgrown grass. The cold air raises gooseflesh on your arms, but after emptying your bag, saving only the clothes, and tying it up on a branch, your blood runs hotter. Teeth gritted, you pound your fists into the makeshift punching bag, breathing hard through your nose to keep the noise to a minimum. 

You hit it until your lungs burn cold, and take a pause only to grab the backpack, close your eyes, and lean your forehead against it while breathing deeply. 

"I would say you can't sleep because you're excited for a swim tomorrow, but I know better."

His voice is just behind you, a rough murmur over the distant lapping sea.

You don't turn around. "I'm thrilled for it, actually."

A pause. Then, "Quite heroic of you. Offering to stay behind."

"I wasn't trying to be a hero. It just made the most sense."

You let out one last huff and then settle back into your stance, reopening your eyes to take another swing, but a hand on your wrist wretches you away. You glare up at him as he holds both of your closed fists, peering down at the raw, reddened knuckles.

You’re ready to argue—to tell him to leave you alone and let you hurt your own hands if you want to—but instead, he surprises you by letting go and stepping back. He chucks off his jacket and tosses it to the ground, unrivaled strength evident in the width of his bare, inked biceps. His feet widen, and his fists rise, silently beckoning you.

It’s been over a week since your last sparring session, but as soon as your fists are raised, the familiar rhythm takes over. He doesn’t hold back—not here, not ever. You abandon strategy, driven by the primal satisfaction of ramming your knuckles into his ribs. The adrenaline surge becomes the perfect distraction, each punch feeding your hunger for more. Your breath quickens, harsh and ragged, as you throw punch after punch. Most of your hits are deflected with effortless grace. He mirrors your every step, matching your intensity with his own.

He sweeps his leg out, sending you to your hands and knees. A growl escapes your lips as you spring back up.

He circles you like a vulture.

"I saw his face."

Cold sweat trickles down your bruised neck. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"It was burned. Well, what was left of it. You fucked him up more than necessary." He lowers his fists, eyes locking onto yours with an intense scrutiny. Your nostrils flare as you aim a swipe at his jaw, but he catches your forearm, yanking you close until your chest is pressed against his. With a firm grip on your chin, he tilts your face upward, forcing your narrowed gaze to meet his."You can't hide, Twix. Not from me."

"He was the one who almost raped me, is that what you want to hear?" You dig your free hand into his chest. "And I killed him."

The shade of his irises darkens. "You did what you had to do—what I knew you could do when I left you. You protected yourself and the others."

"I enjoyed it. I wanted to kill him, and I have never wanted that before." You swallow through your sore throat and feel a subtle tremor up your spine as the fresh images brandish your mind. "I wanted to feel his blood on my hands, and if you hadn't stopped me, I would've kept going."

"He deserved it ten times over. I would've done the same."

"And what do I deserve?"

His voice is harsh. "You deserve to cross the channel tomorrow, and keep going. It was life or death. He got death, and you got life."

"And how much longer do I get it? Until the next time people start attacking us? The next horde of Greys? Even if we make it there alive, it will never be a normal life. I can never be a normal person again. Never. I feel like...like there is something broken and rotten inside of me, a-and maybe it was always there, like you said. But only now can I truly feel it."

By the last word, your voice has quieted to a harsh whisper. You avoid the stare bearing down at you by turning your chin. You failed to realize how close your faces have become. Your gaze drifts to the arm still holding you, prominent veins trailing beneath the inked skin, and you swear you can see a pulse in them as fast as your own. Heated breaths pass between your bodies in silence before you look back up at him.

"You murdered someone, didn't you?" you breathe out. "Before shit happened. Outside of the military. Actual murder."

His jaw ticks. "Yes. I did."

The blunt admission doesn't surprise you, nor does it frighten you.

He lowers his face a bit, enough for his exhalation to leave gooseflesh across your cheeks. "Ask me if I enjoyed it. Go on."

"Did you?"

"Very much so."

You swallow hard. "I guess you haven't been normal for a long time."

"No. I guess not," he murmurs.

The air feels thick between you. He studies you intently, fingers uncomfortably tight around your wrist, when the tip of his masked nose nudges tentatively—experimentally—against yours. Your breath hitches at the top of your throat. Your fingers absentmindedly slip under the hem of his mask on their own accord, peeling it up his neck to reveal a stubbled, scarred chin and full, pink mouth.

He doesn't move to stop you.  

You study the sight before you—one you didn't see so close up even when he broke his nose.

Then—the last thin thread of sanity within you snaps. With a surge of abandon, you firmly close your lips over his.

Heat instantly spreads through your mouth, through your limbs, and down to your socked toes. It is enough to flood you with the raw need to taste more of it. Your hands lower to twist tightly in the fabric of his shirt, drawing him closer, and for a moment, those warm lips move slowly against yours. Then, he firmly presses on your shoulder and breaks away with a thin thread of saliva joining your mouths.

"Ghost." You pant raggedly, eyes darting across his face. Humiliation is ready to sink in at his rejection, but he growls under his breath and kisses you again—harder this time, drawing you in with a hand to your jaw.

It quickly turns into a clumsy, greedy mess of clanking teeth. One of your hands curls around the short hair at the nape of his neck. It is difficult to comprehend that it is his tongue, hot and demanding at the seam of your mouth, pushing in once you part it open. It is his hand moving from your jaw to your hair, fisting it to the point of pain, while his other grips your hip and backs you into the tree.

Your spine presses roughly against the bark. The heat and solidity of his chest against your breasts makes your mind go numb. You can't think about anything, not the day behind you or the one ahead, only feel. Blood courses through your veins with the same heat as when you fight him, but instead of growling in anger, you release a throaty sound of desperation, moving your hands to the backs of his shoulders and digging your nails into the flexed muscle. It encourages him to grind his hips against yours with a low groan, striking an unfamiliar wave of warmth between your legs.

You try to recreate the satisfying friction, greedily bucking into him, but it's difficult with the standing position. The mess of emotions inside you is impossible to sift through, but one certainty stands out: you need more of this, whatever it is.

You attempt to lift your legs and lock your ankles around him, biting his lip as a demand for him to help you, but his hand suddenly releases its hold on your hip and he rips away from your mouth, breathing hard through his bitten lips.

"That's enough," he says roughly, stepping away.

What?

It doesn't feel like even close to enough.

Before you can reach for him, he gives you his back and leaves you there, trying to regain your breath. 

[ipsen]

I’m so sorry for what I’m about to do.

Now this is a point of contention because I do want to put the question on the table: what IS Arima’s life dream? Is it really a world for ghouls? Is it really? He’s against V, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he cares about ghouls dying unnecessarily (because well, he kills ghouls unnecessarily).

So let’s look at the one thing he does “for ghouls”: his death.

Let’s see how his death affects everyone who knows him. They love his ass. Fura cries over him. Koori continues to idolize him, down to the point he evokes his name when fighting the Taxidermied Owl. Kaneki tries to emulate his idea of him as his successor (we all know how that turned out). Hirako and Squad 0 (a bunch of literal children) quit their fucking jobs because of him.

All of this because he martyrs himself. He wants to die so bad, and when he finally kills himself, he is loved by everyone. Sound familiar?

(re 53)

So yes it IS a stupid plan. It’s stupid to the point of being childish. But hey—

(re 43)

(re 21)

— I’m just musing.

Arima's plan was so stupid like the dude was completely unbeatable and instead of fighting V on his own with also unbeatable Eto he?? left his title and life dream to some guy that could barely touch him in combat??

The impact from having THE ghoul investigator teaming up with ghoul would have been soooo much more, for the humans especially, than whatever Kaneki had going on. Especially paired with the Takatsuki is a ghoul reveal and her new book release. As for the ghouls, all Arima had to do was. stop killing them.

And instead of that, he killed Shachi and gave Rize to V and then made Kaneki his successor like???

[shadyfestivalperfection]

Kill The Mirror~ Oneshot

Summery: After finding his wife Y/N and son Sebastian murdered, Bucky uncovers a horrifying truth—the killer is a version of himself. Desperate to save them, he turns to time travel, risking everything to undo the past.

Character: Bucky Barnes x f!reader

Warning: Emotional distress, Obsessive behavior tied to grief, death

||Main Masterlist|| ||Oneshot Masterlist||

Morning spilled through the windows like golden syrup, coating the hardwood floors in warm light. Outside, Brooklyn buzzed with life—the soft clang of garbage trucks, the faint bark of dogs being walked, the trill of a saxophone from a street corner below.

Inside Apartment 4C, the world was slower. Still. Safe.

Bucky Barnes stood at the stove, flipping pancakes like he was defusing a bomb. His brow furrowed in intense concentration, the corners of his lips twitching every time he missed the flip by a fraction of a second. He wore only grey sweatpants and a threadbare Stark Expo t-shirt that hung a little loose on his frame—the shirt had once belonged to Y/N, and he wore it often, as if it still smelled like her.

Behind him, Y/N leaned against the counter, sipping from a chipped mug that read World’s Okayest Mom. Her hair was pulled into a loose braid, and her eyes sparkled with a sleep-softened kind of joy.

“Bucky,” she said, drawing out the syllables, “you’re burning them again.”

“I’m not,” he said, too quickly. He jabbed at a pancake with the spatula, flipping it with more force than was probably necessary. “They’re just… extra crispy.”

“They look like they survived the Battle of New York,” she teased.

“You’re lucky I’m cute.”

“No, you’re lucky I’m cute,” she replied, setting her mug down. “Because a lesser woman would’ve called the fire department by now.”

He turned his head, smirking. “That’s why you married me. For my culinary prowess.”

“I married you because you cried watching that video of a baby goat wearing pajamas.”

Bucky chuckled, shoulders relaxing. “That goat was emotionally moving.”

“And I thought, ‘This man? This is the man who’s gonna kiss me before every mission, even if it’s just recon in Jersey.’”

He winced. “Okay, I forgot. Like, once.”

“Three times.”

“I was distracted.”

“Don’t make it four, Barnes,” she warned, walking up behind him and sliding her arms around his waist.

“I wouldn’t dare,” he said, voice low and honest.

They stood like that for a second—just breathing. Just being.

Then—

Thud.

Thud-thud-thud.

Little feet pounded against the hardwood. “Mama! Dada! I found my other sock!”

Sebastian skidded into the kitchen, a five-year-old blur of energy and chaos. His socks didn’t match, his hair looked like he’d slept in a tornado, and he dragged his worn-out stuffed panther by one leg.

“Victory!” Y/N crouched and scooped him up in a hug, peppering kisses across his face as he giggled.

“Dad, can I have a chocolate pancake?” Seb asked, turning to Bucky with pleading eyes.

“One chocolate chip pancake,” Bucky said firmly, pointing the spatula like a gavel. “That’s the rule.”

“Uncle Sam gives me two.”

Y/N arched a brow. “Soft. You’re soft.”

Before Bucky could mount a defense, there was a knock at the door.

“Speak of the devil,” he muttered, heading to answer it.

Sam Wilson stood in the hallway, holding a paper bag in one hand and a coffee tray in the other. “I brought bribes,” he announced. “Sugar for the kid, caffeine for the under-slept parents.”

“UNCLE SAM!” Seb launched himself at Sam’s leg like a missile, wrapping his arms around it.

“Hey, soldier,” Sam laughed, ruffling his hair. “I’m gonna miss you too, little man.”

He handed the bag to Y/N—her favorite danish inside, of course—and kissed her cheek. “You good?” he asked gently.

Y/N nodded, smiling faintly. “Seb and I have a whole weekend planned. Pancake lunches. Saturday cartoons. Finger-painting on the walls.”

Bucky groaned. “Please, not the walls again.”

She grinned wickedly. “No promises.”

Sam sipped his coffee. “You sure you trust her alone with him? She’s the reason he tried to glue macaroni to the cat last month.”

“I heard that!” Y/N said, throwing a crumpled napkin at him.

They all laughed. It was easy. Natural. Like breathing.

But as Bucky turned to grab his duffel, the mood shifted—just slightly. Seb tugged on his pant leg.

“Dada? Are the bad guys super bad this time?”

Bucky knelt. “Yeah, but your old man’s tougher.”

“You’ll come back?”

“Always.” He cupped his son’s face. “There’s not a force on this planet that could keep me away.”

Seb hugged him fiercely, then scampered off to show Sam his newest crayon drawing—a lopsided family portrait with too many arms.

Y/N stood in the doorway as Bucky slung the duffel over his shoulder. They just looked at each other for a long moment.

“I hate this part,” she whispered.

“Me too,” he said, brushing his thumb across her cheek. “I’ll see you in three days.”

“Come home to me.”

“I swear it.”

He kissed her like he always did—slow, reverent, like it had to last forever.

He turned and walked away, not knowing that in doing so, he was leaving behind the last living memory he’d ever have of them

_____

The apartment door creaked open three days later.

“Y/N?” Bucky’s voice echoed through the silence. “Seb? I’m home!”

No reply.

No running footsteps. No laughter. No half-done drawing taped to the fridge.

Just quiet.

“Baby?” He set his bag down, panic slowly rising in his throat. His footsteps felt deafening.

Then he saw her.

Y/N was on the floor by the couch, crumpled awkwardly, blood pooled beneath her. One hand outstretched. Reaching.

Sebastian lay beside her. His face looked peaceful. Too peaceful.

“No,” Bucky breathed. He staggered forward, knees hitting the floor with a crack. “No, no, no—no.”

He pulled them into his arms, shaking, sobbing.

“Y/N, wake up. Wake up, baby, please—please. Don’t do this to me.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “You promised.”

His hands cradled Seb’s tiny body. “My boy. My sweet boy. Please…”

His screams were hoarse. Raw. The walls didn’t echo. They swallowed it.

____

Rain fell like grief from a grey sky.

Umbrellas dotted the cemetery like wilted flowers. Two caskets. One adult. One child.

The Avengers stood in rows, dressed in black. Heads bowed. Shoulders trembling.

Tony stepped up first. His voice was low, rough. “Y/N was brilliant. Fierce. She once rewrote a protocol mid-battle because mine sucked.” A shaky laugh. “She saved my ass. Constantly.”

He looked at Seb’s casket. “And that kid? He could’ve run Stark Industries one day. No doubt.”

Natasha took the mic next. “Y/N never looked at me like I was broken,” she said. “She saw past all of it. I loved her.”

Steve placed a photo at the base of the casket. “She saved Bucky. Gave him a life. A reason to hope again.”

Sam cleared his throat. “Bucky showed me pictures of Seb every damn day. He said watching him sleep was the best thing in the world. He loved them more than life.”

Bucky said nothing.

Didn’t move.

____

That night, Bucky opened the door to silence. The kind of silence that had teeth.

The panther plush lay on the floor. A toy truck. A sock.

He collapsed to his knees, the weight of it too much.

He clutched the stuffed animal and howled.

“I’m sorry. I was supposed to protect you.” His voice cracked. “I swore…”

Flashback –

They had sat in the hallway together, backs against the wall, holding the positive test between them.

“You’re gonna be a dad,” Y/N said, eyes glassy.

He looked terrified—and then radiant.

Bucky kissed her stomach that night and whispered, “No matter what happens… I’ll protect you both. I’ll die before I don’t.”

And in the stillness of their apartment, with her hand in his, he meant it.

Present-

Now, he lay curled on the floor, the toy pressed to his chest.

The clock ticked.

Time moved on.

But somewhere in the shadows of his shattered soul, a thought ignited.

What if there was a way to change this?

What if the mirror wasn’t broken?

Not yet.

The apartment was silent, save for the soft hum of the refrigerator and the distant sounds of the city that never truly slept. Bucky sat on the edge of the bed, his hands clasped together, staring at the floor as if it held the answers he so desperately sought.

“You’re up early,” came a familiar voice.

His head snapped up, and there she was—Y/N—standing in the doorway, bathed in the morning light. She wore his old t-shirt, the one that always looked better on her, and her hair was tousled from sleep.

“Couldn’t sleep,” he replied, his voice hoarse.

She walked over, sitting beside him. “Nightmares again?”

He nodded, unable to meet her gaze.

She reached out, placing a gentle hand on his cheek, turning his face toward hers. “I’m here,” she whispered.

He leaned into her touch, closing his eyes, savoring the warmth of her palm against his skin. “I miss you,” he murmured.

“I’m not going anywhere,” she said, leaning in.

Their lips met in a tender kiss, but as he opened his eyes, the warmth vanished. The room was empty. She was gone.

Bucky’s breath hitched, and he pressed his hands to his face, trying to hold onto the fleeting sensation. “Not again,” he whispered.

___

The skillet sizzled lowly as Bucky flipped pancakes with the ease of routine. The same brand of mix Y/N liked. The same spatula she used to swat at his shoulder when he got distracted. He moved through the kitchen on muscle memory alone—measuring, stirring, flipping—as if by obeying the rhythm of their mornings, he could summon them back.

The air smelled like sugar and warmth and something ghostly—nostalgia with an edge that cut.

He grabbed three plates. Three sets of silverware.

He placed a short stack on the first plate with extra syrup and a heap of strawberries—Sebastian’s favorite. On the second, he added two golden pancakes, light syrup, and a sprinkle of powdered sugar. Y/N always asked him not to go overboard, but she liked it when he did anyway. The third plate—his own—sat unfinished on the counter as he turned toward the hall.

“Y/N! Seb! Breakfast is ready!” he called, a slight lilt to his voice, like always.

No answer.

He waited. A moment. Two. Three.

Still nothing.

The smile he’d forced onto his lips began to tremble. “Come on, you two,” he called again, louder. “It’s getting cold.”

Still, the apartment remained quiet. The only sound was the ticking of the wall clock above the stove.

His chest tightened. “Sebastian,” he tried again, voice cracking. “Mama’s gonna be mad if you don’t come quick. And I made the chocolate chip ones. Just how you like.”

Silence.

His hand gripped the edge of the counter, knuckles white. “Y/N…”

Still nothing.

The facade collapsed.

His legs gave out beneath him as he dropped to the floor beside the kitchen table, his back pressed to the cabinets. His breathing turned ragged, and tears streamed down his cheeks before he realized he was crying. Not like before. Not silent and controlled. But guttural. Shaking. Shattering.

“I made breakfast,” he rasped, his voice broken. “I made breakfast, babe. Just like always. You’re supposed to come in, and he’s supposed to sit on my lap and steal my food and—and you’re supposed to smile and say I’m soft—”

He curled forward, gripping his hair. “Why the fuck did you leave me?” he gasped. “Why—why didn’t I come back faster? I was supposed to protect you.”

His sobs wracked his body, loud and choking. His metal hand clenched into a fist against the tile. Cold. Useless.

It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real.

The table still held their untouched plates. Crayons lay spilled on the floor beneath it, the same ones Sebastian had used to draw a crooked family portrait the week before. In the corner sat a stuffed panther with one ear chewed. The air still smelled like syrup and strawberries and the ghost of a life that no longer existed.

“I don’t know how to live without you,” Bucky whispered into the silence. “I don’t even know how to breathe.”

___

The nights bled into each other after that.

Sleep became a foreign country, one Bucky could no longer visit. The apartment lights stayed on deep into the early morning hours as he sat hunched over the living room coffee table, surrounded by files, photographs, and weapon fragments.

The Avengers had offered help. Sam. Natasha. Steve.

He declined them all.

He didn’t want condolences. He wanted answers.

Blood spatter patterns. Forensics. He memorized every angle, every smudge. He went back to the scene a dozen times. He stood in the exact spot their bodies had been found. Measured the distances. Noted the entry wounds.

But something about it—it wasn’t random.

It was precise.

Too precise.

That’s when he noticed the first clue.

A bullet casing wedged under the couch—one that hadn’t made it into the official evidence photos. He held it up under the light and froze.

7.62x39mm.

Russian.

His pulse quickened. He knew this casing. He’d used this ammunition before.

In his Winter Soldier days.

The next clue was a knife—wedged behind the radiator. Not left behind on purpose. Forgotten. But familiar.

He held it by the hilt. A black carbon-fiber grip. Double-edged. Issued to only one division he knew of.

He had killed with this blade before.

Every fiber of him recoiled.

“No,” he breathed, staring at the blade like it might speak. “No, it can’t be—”

The kills were clean. Instantaneous. A throat slit at the right angle. A child’s heart stabbed with precision that made his stomach turn.

This was a style he recognized like an old wound.

His own.

But not his.

His hands shook as he sat back, piecing it together with growing dread.

It was him.

A mirror.

___

“You look like hell,” Sam said over the comm.

Bucky didn’t respond.

“You’ve gone ghost on everyone. Don’t think we haven’t noticed.”

“I need more time,” Bucky muttered.

“Time for what?” Sam’s voice was sharp. “To drown yourself in guilt and caffeine?”

“I found something,” Bucky said slowly. “The killer… they used Hydra weapons. My weapons. Techniques only I know. Only I remember.”

Sam was silent for a beat. “You think it’s someone from your past?”

“I think it’s me.”

____

The wind clawed at Bucky’s coat as he stepped out of the cab onto Bleecker Street. The driver didn’t wait for a tip. Maybe it was the look in his eyes—hollow, sunken, a warzone behind them. Or maybe it was the way the sky above seemed too quiet, as if the world knew something unnatural was stirring.

He stared at the brass plaque mounted by the ornate front doors:

177A Bleecker Street.

The Sanctum Sanctorum.

He hadn’t been here since the Snap. Last time, it had been chaos—armies of the damned and sorcerers flinging eldritch fire. But now, it was quiet. Too quiet.

The doors opened before he could knock.

“Come in,” Doctor Stephen Strange called from within.

Bucky’s boots echoed against the marble floor as he stepped inside. The air smelled of ozone and ancient parchment, with a faint undercurrent of incense and something… otherworldly.

Doctor Strange stood in the main chamber, illuminated by the soft glow of levitating candles and swirling golden runes dancing through the air like fireflies.

He looked up from a floating tome, his face unreadable.

“I was expecting you,” Strange said.

Bucky swallowed. “How?”

“You’ve been clawing at the edges of time,” Strange replied, walking toward him. “Leaving a trail behind you like a bleeding wound. The universe noticed. So did I.”

Bucky’s throat felt dry. “I don’t care about the universe.”

Strange studied him. “But you care about your family.”

A silence passed between them, thick with unspoken pain.

“I want to go back,” Bucky said. His voice trembled. “I need to stop what happened. To them.”

“You’re talking about time travel,” Strange said slowly. “You’re not the first to want it. But time is not a revolving door.”

“I don’t care,” Bucky repeated. “I don’t care what it breaks. What it takes. I just want to stop this.”

Strange raised a hand, summoning a golden hourglass that rotated in mid-air. The sands within shimmered silver. “There are… ways. But they are costly. And uncertain.”

“I’ll pay anything.”

“That’s the problem,” Strange said, eyes narrowing. “You already have.”

Bucky said nothing.

Strange’s gaze softened—not with pity, but understanding. “I can give you four chances. That’s all the multiverse will allow. Four doors. Four branches. After that, the timeline becomes unstable. You’ll risk tearing a hole too wide to mend.”

“Four,” Bucky said, nodding. “Fine.”

Strange made a gesture, and the hourglass split into four glowing fragments, each hovering before Bucky like a burning ember.

“One chance to be too late. One chance to choose wrong. One chance to be powerless. And one… to face the real threat.”

“The real threat?” Bucky asked, eyebrows narrowing.

Strange didn’t answer directly. “You’ll know. Or you’ll fail.”

Bucky looked at the first fragment. The moment he reached for it, the world dissolved into light.

The world twisted.

Reality unraveled like smoke, and when it reassembled, Bucky was standing in a dim, familiar hallway.

The soft hum of fluorescent lighting overhead. Faint smells of stale coffee and old floor polish. Apartment 4C just ten feet away.

Home.

His heart pounded, blood rushing in his ears. The air was thick, slow, as if the world itself held its breath. He bolted toward the door.

“Y/N! Seb!”

No answer. Only the distant hum of a cartoon playing on the television inside.

Bucky fumbled with the keys—no, too slow. He rammed his shoulder into the door instead. It cracked off the hinges and slammed open.

And what he saw—

God.

“NO!”

Blood. So much blood.

Y/N was on the floor, her body twisted unnaturally, a crimson halo spreading beneath her head. Her eyes stared upward, empty. Her mouth was parted as if she had died mid-breath, mid-plea.

Beside her, their son—Sebastian—lay motionless, curled in on himself. One tiny hand still clutching his black stuffed panther.

Bucky dropped to his knees.

“Y/N—baby—no, no—please—” His voice cracked, broken glass in his throat.

His hands hovered uselessly, afraid to touch, to confirm what his soul already knew.

He pulled Seb into his lap, searching for any sign of life. Warmth. Breath. Anything.

Nothing.

“Sebby, c’mon,” he choked, rocking him gently. “It’s Daddy. C’mon, buddy—open your eyes.”

He kissed his forehead. It was cooling.

“Please. Please don’t do this to me…”

Flashback-

Laughter filled the apartment.

Bucky had just come in from grocery shopping, his left arm juggling three bags while Seb charged toward him like a rocket.

“DAD! We made muffins!”

Bucky laughed as Seb latched onto his leg. “Muffins? Without me?”

“You were slow,” Y/N called from the kitchen, her voice bright and teasing. “He insisted we add peanut butter. I tried to stop him.”

“They’re Panther Power Muffins,” Seb declared proudly, raising a chocolate-smeared wooden spoon like a sword.

Bucky stepped into the kitchen and pulled Y/N close with his flesh hand. She still had flour on her nose. He kissed it off.

“Panther Power Muffins, huh?”

“Wakandan-inspired,” Y/N said, grinning.

“By which she means: chocolate, banana, and chaos,” Bucky teased, making Seb giggle.

Y/N rolled her eyes. “The chaos is genetic. From your side.”

He kissed her again, softer now. “I’ll take credit for that.”

Seb shrieked in mock disgust. “EWWWWW!”

They spent the day inside. Bucky read to Seb from Where the Wild Things Are, doing all the voices. Y/N folded laundry and stole kisses every time he passed her. That night, they danced in the living room to some old Ella Fitzgerald vinyl, with Seb perched on Bucky’s shoulders.

They had no idea Death was already on its way.

Present-

Bucky held their bodies in silence. The tears wouldn’t stop. He had traveled through time, fought gods and monsters—and he couldn’t save the only two people who mattered.

His jaw clenched. His metal fist dug into the floor.

“I was so close,” he whispered. “So close.”

He leaned over and kissed Y/N’s forehead. Her hair was still soft.

“I’ll fix this,” he promised. “I swear it.”

The golden light began to pulse behind him.

The first fragment was spent.

Three doors remained.

Bucky staggered back into the Sanctum Sanctorum, eyes red-rimmed, clothes still stained with blood that no longer existed—at least, not in this moment of time. He barely felt his legs move beneath him.

Stephen Strange stood by a levitating table, arms folded, watching.

“You were too late,” the sorcerer said quietly.

Bucky didn’t speak. He couldn’t. His voice had dried up sometime between sobbing and screaming into the void.

“Three attempts left,” Strange said. “Each one risks more. The more you twist the branch, the louder the universe screams back.”

Bucky clenched his jaw. “Send me again.”

Strange gave a final, long look—almost pitying—and gestured.

The second golden shard lifted from the air and pressed itself into Bucky’s chest.

He vanished.

⸻

Day of the Murder – Five Hours Earlier

This time, Bucky appeared on the rooftop of the building across from their apartment.

The city buzzed below. Sirens in the distance, wind tugging at his jacket. Late afternoon sun dipped lazily behind buildings, casting the streets in long, golden shadows.

Bucky adjusted the scope on the sniper rifle he’d borrowed from a Hydra weapons cache—one he’d sworn he’d never touch again.

No mistakes this time.

No more being too late.

He scanned the street. Watched. Waited.

And then—movement.

A figure approached from the alley below. Hooded. Tall. Purposeful. Dark clothes. Head down.

Bucky’s heart began to race.

There you are.

He moved like he was gliding through air, descending the fire escape with practiced speed, never once taking his eyes off the target.

The hooded man paused just outside the building’s entrance.

Too calculated.

Too calm.

Bucky dropped down behind him, silent.

He struck.

One hand around the neck, the other driving a knee into the figure’s back. The man grunted and fought back, but Bucky twisted and slammed him into the alley wall. Hard.

The hood fell back.

Blood.

A broken nose.

Brown skin.

A familiar voice gasping, choked:

“Bucky—?! What the hell?!”

Bucky’s breath caught.

No.

Sam Wilson’s eyes were wide with pain and confusion. Blood poured from his nose. One of his wings, compacted into a backpack harness, was twisted at an odd angle.

“No—nonononono—” Bucky stammered, his grip loosening.

“I was just coming to check on you, man!” Sam wheezed, spitting blood. “Y/N texted me—you weren’t answering. What the hell is wrong with you?”

Bucky backed away, horror spreading like frost.

He looked toward the apartment.

No sound. No sirens.

But the knowing, soul-crushing ache hit him again.

He sprinted.

Three floors.

Bashed open the door with his shoulder.

And just like before—

The blood.

The stillness.

Y/N, lifeless.

Sebastian, eyes closed, small hand still clutching his stuffed panther.

Bucky collapsed again.

“No,” he whispered. “Not again.”

Footsteps echoed behind him. Sam stood in the doorway, one hand pressed to his nose, the other shaking with disbelief.

“Oh my God…”

Neither of them moved.

Neither of them knew how to breathe.

Flashback –

“Hey, tell me something,” Y/N said lazily as she lay on Bucky’s chest, their legs tangled on the couch.

“Hmm?”

“If I die before you,” she said softly, “you’ll promise me something?”

Bucky turned his head, brushing his nose against hers. “Don’t talk like that.”

“Just promise,” she said. “It’s not morbid. It’s real.”

He exhaled slowly. “Okay.”

“Promise you’ll never stop telling him stories. About me. About us. Even the dumb ones.”

Bucky smiled sadly. “Especially the dumb ones.”

Seb had toddled in then, blanket dragging behind him, thumb in his mouth.

“Up,” he mumbled.

Y/N pulled him between them. “Family sandwich,” she announced, wrapping them both in her arms.

Bucky remembered thinking:

This. This is everything.

Present-

He buried his face into his hands. Blood on his shirt. Sam’s blood. Seb’s blood. Y/N’s.

He had made the wrong choice.

Killed the wrong man.

And still—he had failed.

Behind him, the golden light bloomed again. The second shard, now drained, floated back into Strange’s hand.

⸻

Sam’s voice echoed in Bucky’s memory even as the Sanctum reassembled around him.

“You’re not well, man,” Sam had said. “You’re not thinking straight.”

No. He wasn’t.

But what else was he supposed to do?

Strange said nothing this time. Just extended his hand to the next fragment.

“You understand now,” the sorcerer said at last. “Being early doesn’t mean being right.”

Bucky’s fists clenched. “I’ll figure it out.”

“You have two chances left. You’re not just altering the past anymore—you’re straining yourself.”

“Good,” Bucky growled. “I want the pain.”

Strange nodded. “Then you’ll find it.”

And with that, the third door opened.

Golden threads of time wove through Bucky’s chest like lightning in reverse. His body tensed, pulled from one moment to another like a snapped rubber band.

And then—

Light.

Color.

Noise.

The present vanished again, and the world unfolded for the third time.

⸻

7 A.M. – The Day They Died

This time, he awoke in bed.

Warm.

Sheets tangled around his legs.

Soft morning light spilled through the bedroom curtains, dancing in streaks across the ceiling.

A small, solid weight pressed against his side—Sebastian. Curled between him and Y/N, drooling slightly on his shirt.

Y/N shifted beside them, eyes still closed, her fingers twitching in dreams.

Bucky froze.

They’re alive.

He didn’t move for a full minute. Just breathed them in. The scent of her shampoo. The warmth of Seb’s breath. The slow rise and fall of both their chests.

When he did move, it was slow—careful—like a soldier in a minefield. He kissed Y/N’s forehead. Then Seb’s.

This is the moment everything starts.

And he wouldn’t let go of it.

⸻

Morning Routine – 8:30 A.M.

Y/N was rinsing the dishes, humming Stevie Wonder under her breath. Bucky leaned in the doorway, silently counting their breaths. Every sound, every note—he absorbed it like a starving man.

“Why are you staring at me like that?” she asked, glancing over her shoulder.

He smiled faintly. “Just admiring the view.”

“Gross.” She winked. “But acceptable.”

Seb ran through the kitchen wearing his pajama pants on his head like a hat.

“I am Captain Panther, defender of muffins and cartoons!”

“God help us all,” Y/N muttered.

Bucky chuckled, but something inside him wouldn’t settle. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. The air buzzed—not with magic, but with wrongness.

Like a violin just slightly out of tune.

Y/N stopped mid-scrub, brow furrowing.

“You feel that?” she asked.

He straightened. “Feel what?”

She blinked, frowning. “I dunno. Weird déjà vu or something. Like… we’ve done this before. Exactly like this.”

Because we have, he thought.

“You okay?” he asked, stepping closer.

She nodded slowly, eyes unfocused. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

He kissed her. “Let me handle breakfast.”

“No complaints here, Chef Barnes.”

But that feeling lingered.

⸻

Afternoon – 2:17 P.M.

He stayed with them all day.

Everywhere they went—every room, every step. He kept one hand near a weapon. Monitored the windows. Traced the corners of the apartment with his eyes, over and over.

Y/N noticed.

“Okay, what’s going on?”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re acting like we’re in a bunker, Buck.”

He hesitated. Then: “Just… wanna keep you close.”

Her face softened. “We’re safe, baby.”

“You can’t know that.”

“I do know that,” she said, wrapping her arms around his waist. “You’re here.”

But even as she said it, she glanced out the window. A flicker of something—a shadow that shouldn’t have moved.

He followed her gaze.

Nothing there.

And still.

The feeling.

⸻

Evening – 7:00 P.M.

Dinner was quiet. Too quiet.

Y/N made spaghetti—Seb’s favorite. Bucky smiled and played along, but his mind ticked like a clock. Counting moments. Watching signs.

Seb giggled as he slurped a noodle. “Papa, look! I made a mess!”

Bucky nodded absently.

Something’s wrong. It’s too perfect.

And then it came.

A subtle hiss.

Not loud. Barely audible beneath the whir of the dishwasher.

Bucky froze.

Y/N looked up. “What’s that?”

He rose fast.

Metal arm flashing, he slammed open the utility cabinet.

Gas.

A hissing pipeline.

Not natural gas.

Hydra tech. Leaking odorless, colorless, nerve agent. Invisible death, slow and silent.

“Grab Seb!” he barked.

Y/N didn’t hesitate. She scooped Seb up.

“Out the fire escape—go!”

She turned, bolting. Bucky grabbed his knife, slashed the gas line, and tried to vent the pressure—but the leak was too far gone.

Then he heard it.

A cough.

Sebastian.

“No, no, no—”

He chased them to the hallway.

Y/N staggered. Dropped to her knees.

Seb’s stuffed panther fell from his hands.

“Y/N!” Bucky grabbed her.

Her face was pale, her lips turning blue.

“Buck—I can’t—” she gasped.

He caught Seb as he slumped forward.

“No—nonono—wake up—please—” he begged.

Their bodies were limp.

Silent.

The gas had gotten in sooner. Maybe earlier. Maybe hours ago. Maybe when the apartment was still laughing and filled with music.

He had been there. The whole day. And it hadn’t mattered.

The timeline doesn’t want them alive.

He screamed. A sound that tore his throat raw. He pounded the floor with his fists, cracked the walls with his rage.

And then—

The light found him again.

Golden.

Unforgiving.

___

He collapsed back into Strange’s chamber, gasping.

Sweat clung to his skin. His hands shook.

Strange looked up slowly. “I felt it. They changed tactics.”

“They?” Bucky snarled. “You mean me. Or whoever… whatever… did this.”

Strange frowned, brows furrowed. “No. I mean time.”

Bucky stood, trembling. “What the hell does that mean?”

“The timeline doesn’t like being corrected. It’s pushing back. What you saw—the gas—that was new. Different. This isn’t just a killer. It’s a branch collapsing in protest.”

Bucky’s eyes burned. “So I’m losing to fate now?”

“No,” Strange said carefully. “You’re losing to yourself.”

Bucky stared at the final fragment.

Only one left.

One last door.

Strange raised his hand. “If you open this one, there’s no going back. You could fracture your soul. Or worse—destroy the tether that binds you to this reality.”

“I don’t care,” Bucky said, stepping forward. “I’m already a ghost in this one.”

Strange’s eyes softened. “Then may you find what you’re looking for in the last mirror.”

The fragment glowed—

And time shattered one final time.

The golden light swallowed him one final time.

Unlike the others, this wasn’t a pull — it was a plunge. Cold. Hollow. It didn’t feel like slipping through time.

It felt like falling into himself.

Bucky landed on his knees in the darkness of the Sanctum’s antechamber. His palms scraped the stone floor. The air was too still. Too quiet.

His lungs filled slowly, like they had to relearn how to breathe in this version of the world.

This was it.

The final door.

No second chances now. No more fragments to catch him if he failed.

He rose.

This time, he knew exactly when the murders happened. And now, he knew who was coming.

Himself.

The Winter Soldier. Not a memory. Not a ghost. But a living, breathing variant from another timeline. One who never broke free.

One who still obeyed Hydra’s last order.

Eliminate the asset’s weaknesses.

⸻

11:52 PM – One Hour Before the Attack

Bucky arrived at the apartment early. Too early.

He moved through the space like a shadow — securing every door, every window. Checking every wall. Every vent. Every water pipe.

He stood in the dark for minutes at a time, listening.

Sebastian was asleep in his bed, clutching his panther plush. Y/N was in the bedroom, reading. Her voice echoed softly as she murmured words to herself.

God, he missed the sound of her voice.

He closed his eyes.

Just one more hour.

⸻

12:44 AM – The Lights Flicker

It started small.

A low hum beneath the floorboards.

Bucky opened his eyes. Everything slowed.

The bulb in the hallway buzzed — then popped.

A whisper of cold air brushed his neck.

He turned.

And saw himself.

Standing at the far end of the hallway, near the front door. The long hair. The blank eyes. The cold sneer etched into the face he once wore.

But this wasn’t just another assassin.

This version of the Winter Soldier wore no mask.

Only contempt.

“You’re late,” Bucky said, stepping between the variant and his family’s door.

The Soldier tilted his head. “You remembered. Good. Makes this easier.”

Bucky stepped forward. “You’re not getting past me.”

The Soldier gave a thin, humorless smirk. “You think you’ve changed. But I know you better than anyone. You still want to kill. You just wear better reasons now.”

“I want peace.”

“No,” the Soldier snapped. “You want absolution.”

His voice was darker than Bucky remembered. Not mechanical. Human. Too human.

“They were going to make you weak,” the Soldier said. “Just like they made me weak, once. Hydra corrected that mistake in my timeline.”

Bucky’s jaw tightened. “You’re not saving me. You’re killing what made me human.”

“They made you soft. Slow. You started smiling. Laughing. And look what happened. You failed them three times already.”

The Soldier stepped closer.

“You want me gone? Then stop me.”

They clashed like thunder.

Metal met metal — fists crashing, walls shattering. The air cracked with every strike.

The apartment trembled with the violence of it.

Bucky ducked a blade swipe and slammed his knee into the Soldier’s ribs. The variant spun and elbowed him across the jaw.

“You’re slow,” the Soldier taunted.

“I’m free,” Bucky growled.

They tumbled into the living room — furniture splintering beneath them. Bucky grabbed the Soldier’s arm and flung him into the wall, but the bastard rolled with it and landed on his feet like a wolf.

“I watched them die,” Bucky snarled, advancing. “I felt it. Again and again. And I swear to God—if you touch them—”

“I already did,” the Soldier sneered. “Three times. You just kept hitting rewind.”

Bucky roared, slamming into him.

They crashed into the kitchen. A knife block spilled. Both reached for blades.

Steel flashed.

Blood hit tile.

The Soldier’s knife slid across Bucky’s ribs — but Bucky’s metal fist caught him square in the jaw, sending him flying into the stove.

Glass cracked.

Smoke hissed.

Bucky grabbed him by the collar and slammed him down.

“This ends now,” Bucky rasped.

The Soldier laughed.

“Then do it. Kill me. You know you want to.”

Bucky raised the knife — hand trembling.

He’s right.

He could end it here. No more chasing. No more failure. Just silence.

But—

Seb’s laughter echoed faintly in his head. Y/N’s sleepy smile. The way they both looked at him like he deserved peace.

He dropped the knife.

“No,” he whispered. “That’s your way.”

He punched the Soldier unconscious — hard enough to make sure he stayed down.

Then Bucky stumbled to his feet.

And ran.

She was awake. Sebastian too — cradled in her arms, sleepy and scared.

“Bucky?” she gasped. “There was—there was noise—and I—”

He reached them.

He dropped to his knees and pulled them both into his arms.

“You’re okay,” he choked. “You’re safe.”

Seb clung to him. Y/N wrapped her arms tight around his neck, trembling.

“I had a dream you were gone,” she whispered. “That you kept… leaving.”

Bucky’s chest cracked open.

“I did,” he said hoarsely. “But I’m here now. I swear, I’m here.”

Sebastian cried softly into his shirt. “Papa… the bad dream was real.”

“I know, baby,” Bucky murmured. “But we beat it. We beat it together.”

⸻

Hours later, back in the Sanctum, Strange examined the variant — now bound, silent, and unconscious in a containment ward of magic.

“You succeeded,” he told Bucky. “You severed the loop.”

Bucky stood silently, arms around Y/N and Seb. Both had followed him back. Both still shaken. But alive.

“What happens to him?” Bucky asked.

Strange’s gaze hardened. “He’ll be judged by a higher force than us. This version of you… is a fragment. An echo. But echoes still carry.”

Bucky nodded.

“And the timeline?” he asked.

Strange didn’t answer at first. Then:

“You forced a correction. It held. But time is… alive, James. It remembers what was taken from it.”

Y/N stepped closer, holding Bucky’s hand tighter. “What does that mean?”

Strange looked between them.

“It means the door is closed — for now. But something else may come looking.”

⸻

Back in their apartment, finally safe, finally still, Bucky tucked Seb into bed.

The little boy didn’t let go of his panther plush the whole night.

Y/N watched Bucky from the doorway.

“You look haunted,” she said gently.

“I saw myself,” he whispered.

“I know.”

She walked to him, took his hand, and placed it on her heart.

“You’re here. You saved us.”

He didn’t speak.

So she kissed his knuckles.

“Whatever comes next,” she said, “we face it together.”

He finally exhaled.

Held her.

Closed his eyes.

Outside, the night was still.

But far, far away — in the spaces between time — something watched the broken loop.

And smiled.

-the end……….(?)

[ambernotember]

wip wednesday

tagged by @bucktommyyendgame and @trombonechurchill

“I just—”

“—wanted to apologize, yeah, got it. Well, mission accomplished.” Evan picked up the forgotten garbage bag, turning away from Tommy to throw it in the dumpster.

Evan turned away from the dumpster to see Tommy still standing there, staring at him.

“You can go,” Evan said, inclining his head towards Tommy’s truck. “Apology said, no reason to stay here.”

“I— are you okay?”

“Am I okay?” Evan’s eyebrows went sky high. “Am I okay? What do you think?”

Tommy was, in one of the rare moments since he’d known Evan, speechless.

“Why would you even care anyways? You left. You're good at that.” Evan watched Tommy’s face as that landed. “Don’t worry about me. I just forgot, for a little while, a lesson I learned a long time ago. People leave. I’m not the person that anyone prioritizes. Not friends, not partners, not family. It’s fine though, I’m used to being alone.”

Tommy felt the bottom drop out of his stomach, felt like his skin was on fire, felt like gravity was about to give up on him. “Evan, that’s not true.”

“I know you think you know me better than I know myself, but you don’t. I know what people think of me, how they think about me.” His eyes narrowed. “I don’t need your pity or your concern. You should probably be gone before the rest of the team gets back.”

no pressure tagging @iphyslitterator @screamlet @geddyqueer @apollabarnes @emphasisonthehomo @setmeatopthepyre @zeraparker @readingisbetterthanfandom @alchemistc @beanarie @firehose118

[seat-safety-switch]

You've heard of range anxiety, of course. Lots of folks upset about how many miles their theoretical electric car can "do," when they haven't left their city for sixteen years. What my neighbours have to be worried about is strange anxiety, which is to say all the bullshit I stole when the abandoned Tesla factory's fence got cut by those raiders.

Back in the day, hot rodders used to build their cars out of leftover military gear. Once World War II was over, nobody wanted all these cool machines lying around, and the governments of the world had not yet invented China to send their garbage to. Belly tanks. Supply truck axles. Superchargers. All this glorious stuff was just free for the gettin', and gettin' the newly-minted middle class did, stuffing it into their weird shitboxes and then driving around with way too much power and too little understanding of mortality. So it is today.

You see, everything in the entire world has a lithium-ion battery in it. Vapes. Flashlights. Those boxes at the mall that shock people back to life who had a heart attack at the cost of grapes. And folks just chuck this stuff into a pile when something small happens: maybe they don't like the colour anymore, a thinner version came out, or it had a little tiny eenie-weenie baby fire. All those good batteries, these power-dense miracles that would have been science fiction a decade ago, just going to waste.

All this is to say when you see me blowing down the street in a hacked-up Model T, above three Tesla axles, with the rumble seat entirely stuffed with bodge-wired vape batteries, make sure to at least admire the amount of work that went into making all this garbage usable again. And, if it's not too much of a problem for you, please make sure to buy fire extinguishers that are electrical-safe. None of that hose shit anymore, please, it just spreads the flames. We're in the future.

[pr1ncessjo]

MDNI 18+ content ; fem!reader, violence, stalking, nudity, masturbation, wade being a perv but what else is new?

thinking about wade and clueless civilian!reader….

he watches her from the rooftops as she walks home late at night, clutching her purse closely to her chest, her heels clicking against the cement of the city streets late at night, every night, like clockwork; he's there.

he feels the bulge beneath his suit grow at the sight of her getting ready for bed. he stares unashamedly from the fire escape as she rids herself of her clothes, now only in a pair of frilly white lace panties and a conveniently (for him) see-through matching tank top.

he has her whereabouts memorized so he knows exactly where she is at any given moment. he watches who she talks to, who checks her out unbeknownst to her, who follows her as she blasts music through her earbuds and sips her overpriced, way-too-sugary coffee. lucky for her, wade's always there to make sure no one lays a hand atop her oblivious little head. even if that means the perpetrator 'accidentally' gets their throat slit fruit ninja-style in an alleyway or 'just so happens' to walk into a garbage truck compactor. anything to protect his little angel.

he nearly breaks through her window to offer a helping hand (pun intended) as she plays with herself relentlessly under the covers, biting her glossy lip, and letting whines and whimpers fill her room as loud as she wants because—after all, no one's around to hear her....

right?

taglist 𓉸ྀི @maneskinwh0re (lmk if you'd like to be added !!)

[romanceyourdemons]

sometimes you see something that is a poem for instance i saw black smoke turn to white smoke over the highway like a mid-american conclave and i came around the bend and found its source: firemen crawling over a garbage truck on fire

[doodlegirl1998]

You know what's really funny to me? The trope of Bakugou in canon being super talented at everything that he does. In canon it's supposed to be for laughs when he's good at random shit, but I don't understand how it's supposed to be funny when the funnier route would have been that this guy has dedicated himself to nothing else but being extremely good at fighting with his quirk and to be a hero that he's actually super ass at everything else. But I guess having a complex version of Bakugou where he learns that there's more to life than heroics and maybe is way less of a demon isn't something that would have been interesting. ALSO ALSO, genuinely I'm confused as to why people think Bakugou is super smart. Like I get that he was excelling at school and was taking mock UA tests and shit, blah blah blah, but:

A) I can totally see his marks getting doctered by Aldera

B) Passing the UA exam doesn't tell me shit about his intelligence, since people who are "dumber" (Kaminari and Ashido) than him also passed the same exam. Without even knowing the proper format of the test (keeping in mind it's also a standardized test) there's no real way to gauge how "intelligent" someone has to be to do well. Also there's a bunch of General-Ed students who passed that test so again, doesn't tell me much.

C) For all the praise that he receives, there's nothing really like "intelligent" or complex about the plans that Bakugou comes up with when people suck him off for being such a good tactician. He fully somehow thought he could overwhelm fucking ALL-MIGHT with his explosions alone, if he's such a good tactician why would he all of a sudden fuck this up? Also, his "counter" to Uraraka's plan was just do bigger explosions, so again, nothing to do with his actual intellect, it's just his quirk. Which brings me to,

D) Bakugou fully should have been taken out by Uraraka's plan. I get that she was tanking hits and he wasn't, but he suffers no backlash at all from unleashing his quirk all day, and is even able to fire off massive explosions no problem. I don't care what bullshit excuse Horikoshi or the fandom comes up with, unless Bakugou has a second quirk that makes him indestructible or lets him cancel out forces, those massive explosions would have shattered his arms and legs from the recoil. But nooooooo, Todoroki suffers from acute frosbite and Midoriya shatters himself when he uses OfA. But Bakugou? Ah well, sometimes we'll remember that he's running out of sweat or his wrists will hurt a little or sumthin.

E) Why is Bakugou (and I guess Kirishima by extension as well) more ripped and buff then Midoriya when canonically somehow managed to balance a fucking small pick up truck on the last pile of garbage that he stood on when he cleared the beach. Midoriya should be jacked and stacked like Jotaro fucking Kujo in part 3 and be an immovable object, yet some how Bakugou is shown to be physically stronger than him??? Midoriya should be casually lifting couches with the entire class sitting on it so he can vaccum underneath.

PS. I think it would've been exponentially better to have IZUKU be the one who is good and talented at random shit. Like the kid who didn't have the one thing that is required of all heroes (a quirk) and tries to overcompensate for his "uselessness" by being insanely talented and skilled at tons of different hobbies would have been an awesome angle, he's genius enough to pull it off. Not only would it give us more insight on his life before All Might, but it would also make Bakugou less of a Mary Sue (seriously, the narrative bends over backwards for him) and Izuku less of an untalented loser (again, the narrative loves shitting on him, sweet Jesus). Having Bakugou be terrible at everything besides heroics and Izuku being good at everything "besides heroics" might've made for an interesting character parallel that Hori insists on shoving down our throats for 400 chapters straight 😒

Hi @stormiclown 👋

💯. I completely agree with this.

Bakugou being ass at everything that doesn't involve his quirk would have been much funnier, and it would have made more sense narratively for the reasons you listed.

In a good story, that fact would have also forced Bakugou to grow and realise that in UA, he's no longer a big fish in a small pond - he's just one of many talented children.

As you rightfully pointed out, it would have made much more narrative sense for IZUKU to be the ripped one, to be the talented and intelligent one. He would have felt like he would have had to prove he wasn't useless growing up, so it would have made more sense for Izuku to have dozens of hidden (and developed - where did Izuku's quirk analysis go?!) talents.

Then, for Izuku to feel jarred by the amount of praise and appreciation he is getting now, he isn't "useless quirkless Deku" that he felt like he was at Aldera. Then for Izuku to flourish and grow as a result.

[redsrooftopprincess]

I seriously love how you write Raph your depiction of him is so aligned with mine. Practically perfect and it really inspires me to expand on my own headcanons of him. I also just really like your style of writing!

I want to know what Raph would be thinking, how he’d react, to his muscular, androgynous s/o wearing a red sundress with their back out and thigh muscles peeking through the fabric

- 🌠

I hope this is okay. Red is feeling sassy today. 😈

Christmas in August

Gn reader x Raphael

August in the city is a special kind of hell. Between the reflections on the buildings magnifying the heat, and the asphalt trapping it, street level was more or less unbearable.

You don't wear short dresses often, you've always been a little self conscious about your legs, but you've been working out recently, with the world's hottest coach, and you're feeling a bit more confident about your body lately.

You turn and admire yourself in the mirror. Not bad. A vintage low-backed halter dress, coming to just above mid thigh, in fire engine red. A lucky find while thrifting with April. You smirk wickedly, thinking about your boyfriend.

You have a shopping date with April in about an hour, and when you didn't find your wallet in your apartment, you had an excuse to torture your beloved.

Grabbing a pair of black retro sunglasses, and throwing on a pair of keds, you make your way out of your apartment and into the oven that has become New York City.

You thank any and every possible supernatural force that Donnie had finished fixing the elevator in the garage last weekend, grateful you dont have to traverse the sewers in this heat, and make your way to the lair.

You step out into the garage, the sounds of the resident mechanics at work echoing off the walls.

"I got it!"

"Do you?!"

"I got it! Just grab the damn jack!"

Raphael holds the front end of the garbage truck aloft, while Donatello reaches under to grab the jack that has slid underneath.

You walk past your boyfriend with a wave of your fingers on your way into the lair, knowing better than to interrupt the mechanics at work. Donnie nearly doesn't make it out alive when Raph drops the truck.

You can hear Donnie yelling at him as you walk into the lair, a smirk turning your lip. Exactly the reaction you were hoping for. You head toward the kitchen and grab a soda from the fridge.

He takes a few steps towards the kitchen with a wicked smile. You are here, and you are hot, and you all his (at least until you have to meet up with April). But he stops, just for a moment, replaying your entrance in his head. He takes a deep breath, shaking his head. There it was, that damn smirk as he dropped the truck. Okay, fine. You wanna play games? He'll play.

All day long, he acts as if nothing is different. Even when Mikey goes gaga over your dress, he only nods. "Of course they look good, they always look good."

When Leo nearly chokes on his coffee as you walk by and tells you how incredible you look, Raph walks by him to pick up his phone off the couch without a word.

He only comes close to breaking once.

You walk into the weighroom, pretty sure your wallet had fallen out of your bag yesterday. Crossing to the bench on the other side, you start looking around.

Spying it on the floor, you brace one hand on the bench, reaching over it with the other and fuck he almost takes you right there. Your dress rides high, giving him a full view of your thighs and just a little of your ass. He catches the black lace panties peeking out from between your legs and groans internally. You were hot before, let's be real, but you've been working out with him lately and it's paying dividends.

He licks his lips as you stand and his eyes trail up your spine, watching the way the muscles he helped you build move.

One deep breath and the mask is back in place before you turn around.

By the time you're ready to leave, you're trying not to show your disappointment. You were really hoping for *some* kind of reaction from your boyfriend. He almost feels bad for fucking with you. Almost.

He offers to walk you out, and he places his hand at the small of your back as you step into the elevator, deflated.

The moment the doors close, you're up against him with your back against his plastron and his thigh between your legs, braced against the door. His hand holds you against him just below your navel, and his head is buried in your shoulder.

"You really think you can show up wrapped up like a god damn Christmas present all for me and expect me not to unwrap you?" His breath pours over you like warm honey as his voice melts into your skin. "Baby, I'm just waiting till Christmas."

You can feel the rumble in his chest at your core, and he rolls his thigh forward, just to make his point, "I'll see you tonight," his voice drops into a growl you can feel inside your chest, "and don't you dare take that dress off."

The doors open, and he sets you down on wobbly legs, just outside the elevator. When you turn around to look at him as the doors are closing, the bastard is leaning against the back wall, arms crossed, looking you up and down and smirking like the devil he is. "Mmm-mm," he hums appreciatively, his voice laced with filthy promises, as the doors rattle closed.

.....

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