#hangar bar

[katiechristiansen7916]

Disney Springs food crawl: From left, the nonalcoholic Diving Bell from Jock Lindsey’s Hangar Bar and the Salmon Run from Raglan Road.

[disneyremnants]

If you miss Pleasure Island's Adventurers Club, you may want to check out Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar! Hidden among the props are the goddess Babylonia, Samantha Sterling's passport, a freezer made by the "Yakoose" company, and a photo featuring multiple members of the club!

[greyofpta]

A night on the hangar.

[aviatrix-ash]

Might go play with the Flogger Jet at the museum this weekend >w>

Now that I got an A&P number, I can finally sign the plane's logbook c:

[j1mmyr]

More Disney Springs pics!

[whineandcheese24]

thinking about a universe where Buck never went to the basketball game, or at least never body-checked Eddie. Buck still has this weird feeling, but he goes home and he tries not to think about it, and he goes to work and he tries not to think about it, and Eddie tells him about the drinks he and Tommy grabbed after the game and he tries not to think too much about the twist in his gut or the shiver down his spine. but then he gets a call from Tommy asking if he was serious about those flying lessons, and Buck says yes before he even processes the question because all he hears is that he'll get to spend time with Tommy without anyone else there. he doesn't quite understand why but he knows that's what wants. So he and Tommy meet up at the hangar for a lesson, and one lesson turns into two turns into four turns into drinks after shifts and Tommy's karaoke bar trivia. And he and Tommy are friends now but that fluttery feeling in his stomach never quite goes away. One day Tommy offers to show him some muay thai moves and Buck doesn't think anything of it until Tommy is shirtless and sweaty and Buck loses focus long enough for Tommy to end up on top of him and Buck's face is burning up in a way he knows is from more than the workout but he doesn't know why. Buck goes home after that hot and bothered and really confused and maybe he just needs to start dating again. It has been a while since he and Natalia broke up, but he scrolls through a dating app for a half hour, and none of the women that show up are appealing so he goes to sleep unsatisfied, mind drifting to hard muscles and big arms and a crinkly smile that he doesn't remember in the morning. This goes on for a little while, where he hangs out with Tommy, and his stomach flutters in a way he can't explain. Until one day after flying lessons, Tommy comes up to his apartment, and Buck hands him a beer, and the two of them are sitting next to each other at the kitchen island just talking about life and work and flying, and the whole time Buck is hanging on Tommy's every word, looking directly in his eyes, ever so slightly tilting his head, moving his arm closer, scooting forward in his chair, and he doesn't even realize what he's doing except Tommy's voice is low and gravelly, and Buck's face is heating up again, and it's getting hard to keep looking at him so he goes to get another beer, and when he comes back Tommy is standing. And he's just a hair taller than Buck, but it's enough to make his breath catch in his throat. In this universe, when Tommy leans in, his fingers guiding Buck's chin up to his lips, he's slow and deliberate. In this universe, Buck kisses him back harder and hungrier, because even though he still wasn't sure what it was Tommy was making him feel, he can't say he's surprised this is where they ended up. In this universe, Tommy takes weeks to kiss him, but it's longer and hotter and doesn't just stop at a peck.

[tip-top-cloud-surfer]

Three Generations - Rooster

Pairing: Rooster / Fem!Reader (Wife!Reader)

Word Count: 2.2k

Warnings: Rooster is a Dad; Female Reader with No Name or Physical Description, No Y/N, Third Person POV; OC Bradshaw Kid without Physical Description (minus a reference to his smile being similar to Rooster's)

This work, all of my other works, and my entire blog are 18+ Only.

Summary: Rooster is married. Maverick found out when the paperwork got filed with the Navy, but he doesn’t have a chance to ask Rooster about it until after the mission

Master List

Sequel: A Day with Duckie

Maverick remembered the text that he received from Ice about four years prior to the mission.

The kid’s married.

Three little words that felt like bullets straight to Maverick’s heart. Bradley was married. Married. Maverick shouldn’t have been surprised, really. Bradley was more than old enough for marriage. Especially for a naval officer. But it still hurt, it still stung that he wasn’t there to see it.

Ice gave him Rooster’s wife’s name but he couldn’t find many photos of the two of them together. Rooster’s wife’s profiles were all set to private, but Maverick did find some photos posted by one of the bridesmaids. He printed them out and hung them up in his hangar, next to his old photos of Rooster. Even if he cried like a baby while he did it.

It wasn’t until after the mission, when they were sitting alone in their hospital room together, that Maverick had a chance to ask Rooster about his wife.

“You got married?” Maverick asked Rooster quietly.

Maverick gestured to his own left ring finger, which made Rooster fiddle with his gold band. Staring down at his wedding ring for a moment, Rooster tried to figure out how to respond properly to Maverick’s question. Nodding slowly, Rooster turned back to Maverick.

“Yeah, I did,” Rooster answered quietly.

“Congratulations,” Maverick replied softly.

“Thank you,” Rooster returned, fiddling with his ring again.

“How did you meet?”

“She was in the Navy. She worked in intelligence, though. We met through mutual friends and I asked her out. We went on a date to a karaoke bar and never looked back,” Rooster explained, smiling at the memories. “I asked her to marry me about two years after that.”

“And you’re happy?”

“Extremely,” Rooster replied without missing a beat. “Her and Kai, they’re my whole life.”

“Kai?” Maverick asked curiously.

Rooster, seemingly realizing his slip, shrunk a bit into himself. He looked nervous. Incredibly nervous. Fiddling with his wedding band again, Rooster slowly turned back to Maverick.

“Kai is my son.”

“You’re a dad?” Maverick asked, unable to stop the emotion from dripping into his tone.

Not only had Maverick missed Rooster’s wedding, but he also missed the birth of Rooster’s child, and all of the little milestones along the way. And that ache in his chest quietly intensified, though Maverick tried to not let it show.

“Yeah, I am.”

Rooster reached for his phone, pulled up a photo, and passed his phone over to Maverick. He grabbed Rooster’s phone and stared down at the photo. And Maverick would have been lying if he said that he didn’t get a little choked up at the sight of it.

Rooster and a woman that Maverick knew was Rooster’s wife were standing together with a little baby boy sandwiched between them. A little boy that had his father’s smile—albeit one with a few missing teeth—and a matching Hawaiian shirt. Rooster’s wife smiled widely at the camera with her cheek smushed against the top of her son’s head.

And Rooster looked happier in that photo than Maverick had seen him since before Carole passed, even though Rooster wasn’t looking in the direction of the camera. No, Rooster was far too busy smiling at his little family.

“Are they coming to see you?” Maverick asked, handing the phone back to Rooster.

“Yeah, uh, their flight lands tomorrow morning. Phoenix said that she would pick them up from the airport and bring them here,” Rooster explained, placing his phone aside. Rooster paused before turning back to Maverick. “And . . . can you . . . can you not mention the part about me defying a direct order and everything that happened afterwards?”

“I won’t,” Maverick promised, earning a thankful nod from Rooster. “But, at some point, Brad, I think that you should be honest with her about it. As much as you can, given the sensitive information, anyways. Not that I’m in any position to give anyone marriage advice but . . . you should be honest with your wife.”

“I will,” Rooster returned quietly. “It’s just that she gets really stressed when I’m in the hospital. I don’t want to overwhelm her.”

“Are you scared about her reaction?”

“A little bit,” Rooster admitted honestly.

Maverick chuckled, reminiscing about how Goose always looked when he was worried about telling Carole about whatever shenanigans they got into back in the day.

“I’m sure that you’ll be fine.”

~~~~~

Maverick and Rooster were discharged from the hospital the next day.

Phoenix, along with Rooster’s wife and Kai, were supposed to pick them up. Rooster spotted Phoenix’s car and walked after it. The passenger door flew open and Rooster’s wife. She walked around the car to see that Phoenix was helping Kai out of the back seat.

Kai slid out of Phoenix’s car and immediately perked up when he spotted his dad quickly making his way over. But knowing her son, Rooster’s wife snatched him by the back of his shirt before he could run out into the parking lot.

“You have to hold Mommy’s hand when you’re in the parking lot,” she reminded her son.

She looked up and down the road before leading Kai across it. But once Kai safely stepped up onto the sidewalk, she released his hand and let Kai run to Rooster.

“Daddy!” Kai yelled happily, running into Rooster’s waiting arms.

Bradley bent down and scooped Kai up. Holding Kai to his chest, Rooster pressed a kiss to Kai’s hair as he rocked his son back and forth in his arms. Almost like Rooster was trying to soothe himself with his son’s presence.

“I missed you so much, Kai.”

Rooster pressed another kiss to Kai’s head before turning to his wife. She looked like she was trying to hold it together and just barely managing it. But when she caught Rooster’s gaze, she let some more emotion show. Wordlessly, Rooster held out an arm to her and she immediately ran into his embrace, officially reuniting the family of three.

“I’m alright,” Rooster assured her, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “I’m okay.”

As Rooster reassured his wife and son that he was fine, Maverick walked around them to stand beside Phoenix. After his wife and Kai were soothed, Rooster turned to introduce them to Maverick.

“Guys, this is Maverick. Mav, this is my wife,” Rooster stated, wrapping his arm around his wife’s waist.

“The man who pulled your papers?” Rooster’s wife asked sharply. Maverick winced at her tone.

“We got past that,” Rooster assured his wife, which caused her to immediately relax.

“Well, it’s nice to finally meet you then,” she replied with a much warmer tone. Rooster’s wife walked over to give Maverick a proper hug that Maverick was happy to return. “And to put a face to the name after all the stories.”

“It’s nice to meet you as well,” Maverick replied, releasing Rooster’s wife.

“And this is my son, Kai,” Rooster added, bouncing his son lightly on his arm. Smiling at his son with complete and utter adoration, Rooster nudged him in the side. “Kai, this is Maverick.”

“Hi,” Maverick greeted Kai softly.

“Hi,” Kai returned shyly, resting his head on Rooster’s shoulder.

“Mav’s a pilot like me,” Rooster explained to his son, causing Kai to pick his head up again. “And he used to fly around with your Grandpa Goose.”

“Really?” Kai asked his dad, earning a nod from Rooster.

Kai stared over at Maverick with newfound curiosity and Maverick tried to not choke up at the clear similarities between Kai and Rooster. Kai wasn’t so much his dad’s twin, but he had that same expression and look in his eye that Maverick saw all the time on a younger Bradley. Offering a small encouraging smile to Kai, Maverick decided to approach.

“Yeah, your Grandpa Goose used to sit in my back seat,” Maverick replied, nodding along. “And he was the best at what he did.” Trying to not burst out into tears at the fact that he was talking about Goose while Baby Goose was holding Grandbaby Goose, Maverick managed a small smile. “Your grandpa’s callsign was Goose. Your dad’s is Rooster. What bird do you want as your callsign, Kai?”

“Mommy calls me ‘Duckie’,” Kai informed Maverick, ending his sentence with a giggle.

“Yes, because he’s impossible to pull out of the water once he’s in,” Rooster explained, shaking his head playfully at his son. “And he pretends that he can’t hear us.”

“No,” Kai giggled, clearly lying.

“He’s also a great liar,” Rooster quipped, tickling Kai’s stomach.

Kai squealed and pushed his dad’s hand away, but he couldn’t stop giggling. And Maverick tried to not burst out into tears again. Baby Goose had a baby. The little baby that he used to babysit and take for extra ice cream had a little baby of his own now.

God, Maverick was getting old.

~~~~~

After spending the day with the rest of the Dagger Squad, Maverick and the Bradshaw family of three retired to Maverick’s quaint residence in town. Rooster grew up in the house after Carole’s death and his old bedroom was perfectly preserved from that time.

It was only about a half an hour before Kai’s bedtime when Rooster approached Maverick in the kitchen.

“Can you watch Kai for a second?”

“Yeah, of course,” Maverick agreed, nodding along immediately. “But why? Where are you going?”

“I just thought that I should tell her,” Rooster explained, keeping his voice low. “There were too many close calls as it was with the rest of the Dagger Squad, so I need to tell her. About the mission and . . . my little stunt.”

“The couch is very comfortable,” Maverick joked, earning a tired sigh from Rooster. “You’ll be fine.”

“I hope so,” Rooster replied, straightening up.

Rooster thanked Maverick before the two rejoined Kai and Rooster’s wife out in the living room. Rooster managed to find an old Connect 4 game in the cabinet and his wife tried to teach Kai how to play. They were sitting around the coffee table with Kai studying the layout closely.

“Can I play with you, Kai?” Maverick asked, moving to sit down beside Kai.

“Yeah,” he mumbled, not taking his eye off of the board.

Maverick saw Rooster lean down to whisper something in his wife’s ear before she nodded. Turning to Kai, Rooster’s wife leaned over and tapped him on the shoulder, causing Kai to look up.

“Behave for Maverick, okay?”

“Okay, Mommy.”

Rooster and his wife got up and headed out of the room to talk. Kai turned to Maverick once his parents were out of sight.

“Why did they leave?”

“They just needed to talk about some things. Adult things. Nothing fun,” Maverick stated, causing Kai to nod with a slight pout. Maverick moved to take the seat that Rooster’s wife was sitting in and picked up a yellow piece. “Did you take a plane to get over here, Kai?”

“Yeah,” Kai stated, smiling up at Maverick.

“Do you like flying?”

“Yeah.”

“Has your dad ever taken you flying before?” Kai shook his head dramatically, causing Maverick to nod along. “You just fly with your mom then?”

“Yeah. Daddy gets scared,” Kai informed Maverick, leaning on the coffee table.

“Well, it’s a little scary when you’re a pilot and someone else is flying the plane,” Maverick replied, very well acquainted with the control freak tendencies that popped up when a naval aviator flew commercial. “And your daddy just wants to make sure that you and everyone else is safe.”

“Mommy tells him to relax,” Kai replied, emphasizing the word with a wave of his hand.

Kai must have seen his mom do that exact routine at least a thousand times because he seemed to know the part by heart. He had the expression, the wave of his hand, and the tone down perfectly. Maverick couldn’t help but laugh.

“Does he listen to her?” Maverick quipped, failing at hiding his amusement.

“Sometimes,” Kai answered with a giggle.

“Like you?”

“Yeah.”

Maverick was about to ask Kai another question when Rooster’s wife’s voice echoed around the house. The door to Rooster’s old bedroom did little to muffle the shock and sheer incredulousness of Rooster’s wife’s question.

“You did what!?”

“Have you ever seen the moon, Kai?” Maverick asked the toddler, quickly getting up to his feet.

“Yeah,” Kai replied as Maverick scooped him up into his arms.

“Well, looking again wouldn’t hurt,” Maverick reasoned, setting Kai on his hip. “And maybe we’ll even see a few stars too.”

“Oh-kay,” Kai agreed with a sigh, laying his head on Maverick’s shoulder.

“And where was your brain during all of this!?” Rooster’s wife snapped loudly.

“Yeah, let’s go look at the stars, Kai,” Maverick stated quickly, hurrying out the back door.

“Was that Mommy?” Kai asked, staring back at the house.

“No, I don’t think it was her.”

Sequel: A Day with Duckie

[tossawary]

It's funny to think about a scenario in which Luke manages to get Yoda off Dagobah and bring him back to the Rebellion. Maybe Obi-Wan left a message with R2 as a backup plan or something, so Luke got the message much earlier. Yoda is still too old and injured to fight, but he can train Luke while moving around as the Rebellion's new grandpa (and potentially reunite with characters like Ahsoka and Kanan and Cal and so on).

This AU is important to me because how it would look from an Outsider's POV:

"Uhhh, Luke," Han said. "What's that?"

"What's what?" Luke said, turning to look across the hangar bay. "Oh. That's Master Yoda. I went to Dagobah to get him, remember?"

Han studied the small, green, vaguely amphibious creature with long pointy ears and wisps of white hair, crouched underneath Luke's X-Wing and steadily eating its way though a bucket of... what the hell were those things? Eggs?

"That's your great Master Yoda?" Han said dubiously. He couldn't have helped it, so he didn't even try not to sound skeptical. "The one who's going to train you and Her Royal Highness in this... uh... penetrating life field magic?"

Those ragged brown blankets that it seemed to be wearing looked not unlike the dusty robes that Luke's old man had been shuffling around in, before getting killed back on the Death Star. Maybe.

"He's the wisest and most powerful Jedi Master alive," Luke said, like he was determined to be upbeat about it. "He's 900 years old. He said."

Han watched the creature dig around in the bucket some more, nearly sticking the entire upper half of its body inside. Its long ears wilted when it came up empty. It sat back with a loud, high-pitched harrumph and its wrinkled face scrunched up like a fruit rotting all at once.

"Yeah," Han said. "He looks it."

Luke shot him a betrayed look and Han just shrugged. He didn't have a problem with the kid and the princess finding some comfort in some hokey old religion. The kid's family had apparently been killed by troopers the day that Han had met him and Leia had watched her entire planet be destroyed, so whatever touchy-feely nonsense helped them deal with that helped.

But that didn't mean that Han wasn't going to call it like he saw it- "Uh, kid, is that your storage unit he's searching now?"

Luke groaned and put his head in his hands. "I left some ration bars in there, I think. I bet he can smell them."

This great Jedi Master was making a real mess of it. He threw one of Luke's things over his shoulder, where the tool hit R2-D2, and the small droid immediately let out a shocked series of beeps and chirps. The outraged blare when the droid traced the missile back to Yoda was even louder.

Han watched as the droid whirred briskly up to Yoda, then reached out with an extended grabber and yanked at the old Jedi's stick. Yoda shrieked in surprise. A tug-o-war started, which looked like it was going to have one or both of them falling over.

"Oh, no," Luke said.

People around the hangar bay were starting to stare. Han couldn't look away.

The droid released the wooden stick and Yoda let out a cry of triumph. Which turned into a yelp of pain, because R2-D2 had just zapped him with another extended tool, which crackled like a threat that the droid would do it again. Yoda's response was to smack the droid with his stick, repeatedly, grunting with the effort - and the loud clanging caught the attention of everyone who hadn't already been looking.

"You gonna, uh, you gonna do something about that?" Han said to the kid.

Luke sighed heavily, which definitely meant that this wasn't the first time something like this had happened. He stood up and waded into the mess, catching the stick with one hand and physically pushing the droid back with the other, ordering the old astromech and older Jedi Master to knock it off. He sounded just like a parent about to hand out some punishments.

R2-D2 beeped petulantly at Luke.

"I don't care who started it!" Luke said, his exasperation carrying. "This time or last time-! Ow!"

The great Jedi Master had just smacked Luke in the shin with that stick. Luke hopped on one foot for a few seconds, biting down on what probably would have been some nasty Huttese cursing. Yoda harrumphed again and then lurched back over towards his empty egg bucket.

R2-D2 made a sound that Han had, whether he liked it or not, already come to recognize meant: "I told you so."

"Oh, fuck off," Luke snapped.

Han threw back his head and laughed.

[roosterforme]

Covering the Classics Part 9 | Bob Floyd x OC

Summary: After Anna joins him for dinner, Bob knows he needs to accept that they really are just friends. Even though her kisses are perfection. Even though he's falling in love. But what's going to stop Anna when she realizes Bob's poems are very familiar to her?

Warnings: Fluff, angst, adult language, Bob in gray sweatpants, eventually 18+

Length: 5700 words

Pairing: Robert "Bob" Floyd x Female OC (this story is part of the Beer Boy/Sugar and Jake/Jessica universe)

Covering the Classics masterlist. Check my masterlist for more!

Bob couldn't imagine a world in which he'd go to this much trouble to make the perfect dinner for a woman who he was falling in love with, only to hear her say the words just friends. But apparently it was the world he was living in, because he spent days comparing recipes from both Bradley and Jake, hoping to make something that Anna would find irresistible.

"You should make my lasagna," Jake said for the tenth time at work on Friday morning.

Bradley snorted. "Great idea, as long as you never want to see her again. Make my homemade pasta," he told Bob. "I already gave you the recipe."

Bob just kept nodding and agreeing with whatever they said, hoping they'd eventually be quiet. Anna was coming over tonight, and he still didn't have a solid plan in mind beyond trying to convince her he'd be worth her time. That it was okay to be more than friends.

While the guys argued, Bob got himself ready to get in the air with Phoenix. He must have looked flustered, because she rubbed her thumb gently across the back of his hand when he stood next to her in the hangar. "You seem nervous. Are you still trying to figure out what to make for dinner?"

"Yeah," he replied quietly.

"Oh, Bob. She's not going to care what you make. It could be a grilled cheese sandwich."

"I always burn those," he said with a small smile. "I just feel like this is pointless. I invited her over anyway even though I know she just wants to be friends, but I'm still standing here hoping for more. I shouldn't be doing this, even if we did makeout in her office."

Nat sighed and asked, "Do you want my grandma's recipe for bruschetta chicken? You liked it when you tried it at her house last summer, and it's not that hard to make."

His eyes lit up. "Please." 

He'd only have a little bit of time to himself to prepare the meal and cook it before Anna came over, and he listened as Nat called her grandma and asked her to send it over. Before they were even called out of the hangar to start the day, he had a photo of the handwritten recipe in his phone.

"Nat, you're a lifesaver."

"Just save me some of the leftovers."

--------------------------

Friday was going so well for Anna, she almost forgot to be nervous about dinner. She met with the dean to discuss how her classes were going, and he even brought up the word tenure which sent her into a giddy spiral where she treated herself to a candy bar from the vending machine which she couldn't really afford. She carried it out to eat lunch in the quad with her friends along with her regular, uninspired sandwich and ginger ale.

She hadn't mentioned a word about going to Bob's house for dinner, but she was absolutely certain both ladies knew about it. She almost found it comical the way they were trying to get her to say something about it, but Jessica was clearly ready to boil over.

"Hi," Anna greeted, biting into her Snickers bar as she settled on the bench between them. Advanced Calculus casually offered her some carrots and hummus while Jessica's cheeks started to grow a furious shade of pink. 

"When were you going to tell us Bob invited you over for dinner tonight?" she exclaimed. 

Anna shrugged and said, "I was probably just going to tell you about it on Monday since it's nothing because we are just friends. It's only as exciting as it would be if I went over to your place for dinner."

"That's exciting, too!" Jessica said. "You should absolutely come over for dinner! But you're wrong, because it's not as exciting as Bob cooking dinner for you!"

"Jess. Chill out," came the voice from Anna's other side. "She'll learn soon enough that dinner cooked by one of the Top Gun boys is essentially a marriage proposal on a plate. A very sexy and delicious marriage proposal. You and he will be sleeping together in no time."

Anna chewed up the last bite of her Snickers and shook her head. "You're both wrong. Bob and I are just friends. The dinner means nothing, and we're not going to sleep together."

"Oh, please!" Jessica was back to practically shouting now. "If you think he's actually okay with all the making out, then you've lost your mind. He doesn't want it to be meaningless. He likes you."

Anna looked at her feet. "I know he does. I like him too."

"Then stop stringing him along! I don't understand what the problem is here, Anna."

She sat quietly now, no longer feeling so great as she picked at her sandwich.

"Hey, I know Jess sounds like an excitable terrier, but maybe you need a little tough love," Advanced Calculus said as she dipped a carrot into the hummus. "You can talk to us, you know. You can tell us what's wrong."

"Nothing's wrong," Anna whispered as her mind flooded with thoughts of Kevin and what he might be up to at the moment. 

Jess took a deep calming breath before she said, "There's just no good reason to put your dream man in the friend zone. And don't even try to lie and say Bob Floyd isn't perfection."

"He is," Anna whispered. Other than her infatuation with Sky Writing, Bob was the closest thing to a dream come true that she'd ever encountered before. But she did have her reasons, and she was too embarrassed to talk about it out loud. She was certain that Jess already knew her current financial state was in ruins, and it might be nice to have her friends understand where she was coming from, but she didn't want them to pity her. That was the last thing she needed right now. "You know what, I think I'm going to get ready for my next lecture."

She was on her feet and rushing away as her friends called after her, but she didn't stop walking until she reached her office. She was not going to cry over this, and she definitely didn't want to cancel on Bob. The only thing she could do to calm down was look at all of the books on her shelves, letting her gaze glide over the colorful spines. Then she read the note from Bob that was tucked in her copy of Papillon.

Freedom would feel like being so in love, you'd willingly let another person lock you to their side.

-------------------------------

Bob had a fully stocked kitchen filled with a nice set of pots and pans and sharp knives and anything else he could possibly want, but right now, it was like he'd never cooked anything before in his life. Nat's grandmother actually had atrocious handwriting, and he could barely make out the measurements in the photo he had to work with.

"Basil," he muttered to himself, grabbing the leafy greens from the cutting board and wondering why it looked like he was supposed to use three cups of them. "I didn't even buy that much!"

He took a deep breath and walked around his kitchen, trying to clear his head. Anna was going to grab an Uber. She would be arriving in about an hour with wine and dessert. He wanted to feed her the most delicious meal he could muster, but right now he was just looking at the chicken breast on the plate in front of him like he'd never seen food before.

And he just knew Jake and Bradley never had to work this hard for a woman in their lives. Jake could rely mostly on his looks if he wanted to, and Bradley was the luckiest person he knew, reuniting with the love of his life after ten years and getting married approximately a day later. "No," he whispered, "that's not fair to them." He knew he was wrong. He knew both of them worked to get where they ended up, and he shouldn't be putting himself down so much. 

He glared at the chicken and picked up a knife. "This is fine. No problem." He had to fudge some of the measurements which made no sense, and he'd suggest to Nat that maybe her grandmother should take an eye exam, but the recipe really wasn't too terribly hard. Soon he had the browned chicken in the oven, and he set to work on the bruschetta topping and started boiling some water for the pasta. He was just adding another tablespoon of balsamic vinegar to the tomatoes and basil when he heard Anna's beautiful laughter.

Bob nearly knocked the bowl to the floor in his haste to get to her. After grabbing a dish towel for his hands, he rushed toward his front door and saw her on his porch. She was wearing a little sundress that he'd seen her in before with her worn out denim jacket over it, and he froze a few feet inside his screen door just so he could look at her. She was juggling a shopping bag and a bottle of wine, and that's when he realized she was talking to Suzanne.

"Oh, no, I'm not in the Navy," she was saying as she tossed her beautiful, red hair over her shoulder. "I'm a professor at San Diego State University. My name's Anna."

She stretched her hand out, and then Bob heard Suzanne's voice. "I'm Suzanne, and that's my cat, Sylvester. I must say, I had no idea Robert got himself a girlfriend. And such a pretty one!"

He desperately wanted to interrupt their conversation before he could hear what Anna's response was going to be, but he just couldn't. She was standing there in the last rays of the setting sun, blushing as she said, "Bob and I are actually just friends. Just good friends."

There was a beat of silence before Suzanne laughed. "Have you seen him? And he's even sweeter than he is handsome!"

Anna was laughing nervously, and Bob's heart was pounding, but he opened the screen door to bail her out anyway. "Hey," he greeted as naturally as he could, and then Anna's apprehensive gaze met his. God, all he wanted to do was drag her inside, push her up against his living room wall and kiss until she realized he wasn't going to hurt her.

"Bob," she whispered, taking a small step in his direction. Her eyes were wide and perceptive, like she could read his every thought on his face. She cleared her throat and said, "I brought wine and some cookies."

Helpless to do much of anything else, he smiled at her. "Dinner's almost ready." Then he leaned further out the door and said, "Hi, Suzanne."

His next door neighbor looked delighted as she glanced between him and Anna. "I was just talking to your charming friend here, Robert. Cooking dinner for someone certainly sounds romantic to me."

Bob was gripping the door frame as he watched Anna's face fill with panic. Then she blurted out, "Why doesn't Suzanne join us?"

-------------------------------

The only thing Anna could think to do was sabotage the dinner she'd been looking forward to all week. She watched Bob's face fall slightly as he realized she invited his next door neighbor to join them for a very platonic dinner. And since Bob was the sweetest man Anna had ever met, he recovered immediately, turned to Suzanne and said, "You're more than welcome."

Ten minutes later, Bob was opening the bottle of cheap wine she'd brought while Anna watched the veins in his hands. He was graceful and lovely, and Suzanne was talking nonstop as he poured three glasses. She had nobody to blame but herself for inviting a third wheel along. The older woman was really more of a safety net. Someone to prevent Anna from kissing Bob. Someone to stop her from falling completely in love with him.

The whole house smelled amazing, and she knew this dinner was supposed to be just for her. She hadn't eaten a real meal like this, other than at the cookout, in months and months. The first bite of chicken, bruschetta and pasta was delicious enough that she moaned softly. Bob watched her take a second bite, and it was incredible. The third bite left her staring at him in wonder.

"You're the best cook in the world," Anna informed him, cutting across Suzanne talking about her cat. She didn't even care if she was being rude, the food was perfect. And it would have somehow been even better if the two of them were alone.

Bob blushed and took a sip of the wine that Anna wished was better than it was. "Thanks. Uh, it was a new recipe. I've never made it before tonight."

Suzanne took a bite and said, "Robert is an excellent cook and a real gentleman. He always makes sure I have groceries, and he picks up a little something for me if he gets dinner on his way home from work."

As Bob's cheeks grew redder, Anna's heart beat faster. "A real gentleman," she echoed, knowing he'd take care of anyone who needed something.

"Yes," Suzanne said. "You don't see many of them around. Never seen many myself."

Neither had Anna, and after she blew her life to bits, she'd probably never see one again. She listened to Bob and Suzanne talk about their favorite game shows, and she cleaned her plate before either of them had finished. All of the toast and sad sandwiches she'd been eating weren't really cutting it, and she knew that. She also didn't want to get another piece of chicken and seem like a mooch.

"Can I get you more?" Bob asked as he stood on the opposite side of the table in his worn jeans and snug white shirt. "There's plenty left."

Anna shook her head, but he reached for her plate anyway. While he was in the kitchen, Suzanne quickly finished eating and downed the rest of her wine. Softly, just for Anna to hear, she said, "He is a very nice man. I hope I see you around here in a less friendly capacity." Then she called out, "Robert? I need to go. I hear Sylvester outside bugging for food. Thanks for dinner, and enjoy your evening."

"Night, Suzanne," he replied, and the older woman bustled off without another word, leaving Anna alone with Bob when he returned with two plates refilled with food. "She's a character."

Anna laughed, but she could tell Bob was hesitant to say too much now. Probably because she'd dashed the mood in the first place. "I'm sorry I suggested she join us," she told him sincerely, shaking her head. "All week long, I'd been looking forward to talking about books with you." 

As she poked at her chicken, afraid of what he was going to say, he said, "Once you finish eating, I could show you my books. I don't have as many as you do, but maybe there's something you'd like to borrow in the mix. And then I'll drive you home."

"I can get an Uber," she insisted, taking another bite of the perfectly cooked dinner. 

"And I can just as easily drive you."

He was a gentleman. She wasn't going to leave here in an Uber no matter what she said. "Alright."

----------------------------

"You have books in every room!" Anna exclaimed as she walked around his house nibbling on a cookie. The wine she brought was kind of terrible, and so were the grocery store cookies, but Bob didn't mind. She ate two full plates of the dinner he cooked, and now that Suzanne was gone, she seemed more herself.

"I have a system," he insisted as she sat down on his living room floor to inspect a stack of paperbacks.

"I'm not buying it," she said, glancing at him over her shoulder.

"Try me. The living room is poetry. The extra bedroom is mysteries. The dining room is true crime."

"What's in your bedroom?" she asked, flipping through a collection by Robert Frost.

Bob wanted to tell her that his bedroom was where he wrote his own poetry. And that they had begun to turn into a collection all about her. "Romance," he said.

She laughed softly, such a pretty sound. "I'm assuming you don't have any Vonnegut? No soul massacring, unhappy endings?"

"None," he promised. "You won't find any of those around here."

She was skimming a page as she muttered, "Good. I've had enough of that anyway." Then she stood and carried the Frost poems to another small pile on his coffee table. She rooted around and pulled out a volume by Walt Whitman before asking, "Could I borrow these two?"

Bob was admiring how perfect she looked in his house when she met his eyes with her pretty brown ones. "Of course," he said, dropping down onto the couch as he finished his own cookie. "Anything you want."

She stood and carried the books over to her purse before sitting down a few feet away from him. "What I want is to help you organize your books for real. Have you ever heard of a bookshelf before?"

"Never," he replied innocently. "What's that?"

She laughed and scooted a little closer. "You know those big, wooden things that were holding all the books when we met at that store in North Park? Remember that day?"

He knew she was just joking around, but as he memorized the pattern of her freckles, he said, "I will never forget that day."

Once again, Anna initiated the kiss, and once again, Bob was helpless to pump the brakes. She leaned in close with her hand on his knee and brushed her lips against his. It was so sweet, he was almost able to ask her to stop. Even though it felt too good, he was nearly able to tell her he couldn't do this. But being tortured was worth it. That was the worst part.

He let her do what she wanted, and her soft hands found their way to his face, knocking his glasses askew on their way into his hair. He wanted to touch her, but he was afraid he'd lose himself in these kisses that meant so much more to him than they did to her. He counted to ten slowly in his mind, savoring every touch and taste, letting Anna settle against his thigh. Then he broke the kiss, leaving her hovering there, surprise on her face.

She pressed her lips together, and turned her face toward his front door. "I'll never forget that day either."

He nodded as her hands fell away from his hair and his face, and he whispered, "Grab the books you want to borrow, and I'll drive you home."

----------------------------

"He's a gentleman," Anna groaned in her bed on the floor of her tiny apartment the following morning. It was Saturday, and she didn't have much she needed to accomplish today which would leave her plenty of time to think about the drive home in Bob's truck and the way he walked her to her door. She didn't kiss him again, but he always seemed to be close enough that she could feel his body heat in the chilly night air. Even now, when she grabbed at some strands of her hair, she swore she could still smell his fresh scent there.

She needed to get out. She grabbed her phone and took the longest walk imaginable. Her legs were burning by the time she stopped in a corner store for something to eat for lunch, but the sandwich was almost as bad as the ones she had been making for herself. Nothing would be as good as what Bob cooked, and he served it up last night like it was no big deal at all.

As Anna started the long walk back to her apartment, she groaned while she blasted her music. She had invited his elderly neighbor to join them for dinner, and then she had kissed him again. She was so embarrassing. She'd never been like this when she was in New Jersey, never doing the most mortifying things over and over. 

She didn't go home for a long time. She walked through an enormous park and looked at a fountain while she daydreamed about all of her unfinished manuscripts. When that started to hurt too much, she watched the storm clouds that were rolling in from the coast and thought it might be nice to get soaking wet. Then a few fat raindrops started to hit her face as she realized that she wouldn't be able to replace her phone if it got destroyed. 

"Damn it," she muttered, starting to run through the park under the cover of the trees. The sky was quickly getting darker as she tried to stay under awnings and overhangs as much as possible until she reached her apartment building. Her clothing was soaked, but her phone was still in working order when she ran inside, dripping all over the welcome mat in the small entryway.

She desperately wanted to cry, but that wouldn't solve anything, so she took a long shower instead. She washed and braided her hair, and then she painted her nails. When she finally picked up her phone again, she had a new message from Bob.

Bob Floyd: Taking your advice and buying one of those bookshelves? Was that what they were called? Which one do you think is better?

He had attached two screenshots of nice looking shelves from Ikea that she'd never be able to afford at the moment. She smiled as she typed back to him while she heated up a can of soup for dinner.

Yes, they are called bookshelves. Are you sure you know how to use them? I like the navy blue one better.

The flavorless chicken noodle soup went well with Anna's mood as she sat on the floor and watched a show on her phone. Part of her wanted to know what her friends were up to, but she didn't want to have to tell them about last night. She knew Bob and Jess would be going out to play Dungeons & Dragons soon anyway, but she dropped her spoon in the bowl when Bob wrote back again.

Bob Floyd: I think I'll pick it up tomorrow and make it my rainy Sunday project. Feel like helping me build it?

"Oh, Anna. Don't."

-------------------------------

Bob pulled up to Anna's building on Sunday afternoon after stopping to pick up the shelf. It had been pouring rain since last night, and he had to wrap his new furniture box in a tarp to protect it in the bed of his truck. But this would be a great way to spend the afternoon. He could make two cups of tea, and she could help him organize his books. They didn't need to kiss anymore. He would see to it that they didn't. He could handle this whole thing without issue.

He left his truck idling at the curb, and Anna came running outside like she'd been waiting for him. He grabbed his umbrella and met her halfway, shouting, "I was going to walk up and get you!" over the sound of the rain. She joined him under the umbrella, her denim jacket pretty wet as she shrugged.

"The rain's okay. It reminds me of New Jersey."

Once he opened the door and helped her scramble in, he ran around to the other side of the truck. He was barely able to find a dry spot on his shirt so he could wipe off his glasses, and when he yanked the hem up, he could feel Anna's eyes on his body. There was no sense in feeling self conscious about the way he looked now, because nothing else was going to happen. Last night had to be the end of that.

"You ready?" he asked, cranking the key in the ignition when she nodded. His wipers were going full speed as he drove her back to his house for the second visit in one weekend. "Thanks for helping with this. I kind of realized that having everything on one big shelf makes more sense. Especially if I keep borrowing books from you."

Her laugh was soft as she said, "If you don't borrow my books, then nobody will."

"Same goes for mine," he replied easily as he headed toward the beach. "But don't you dare dog ear my pages."

Now she laughed louder. "I read most of Whitman last night before I fell asleep, and there's nary a bent page in sight."

"That's what I like to hear." When he pulled up in front of his house, he handed her the umbrella and his keys. "Go ahead and let yourself in, and I'll unload the box."

She just gaped at him in response and asked, "Don't you need help carrying it?"

"Nah," he replied, popping his door open, "I can get it."

Bob struggled a little bit with the tarp before sliding the massive box closer to the edge of the truck tailgate. Every movement was made slower by the pounding rain in his face, but he managed to tip it into his arms. It was heavy, but not too bad, and his grip on the wet cardboard was good enough for him to get it inside the house. Anna was standing on the porch, holding open his screen door with the umbrella folded up at her feet, and he accidentally brushed against her with his arm as he maneuvered himself through the door.

"Sorry."

"It's okay," she said, her voice a little breathy as she let the screen door close and helped him prop the box against the wall. "This is massive."

"I guess now I can buy more books," he said with his hands on his hips while he dripped all over the place. "I'm going to get changed quickly, and then we can build the shelf and organize it, and then I'll make dinner."

Her eyes lit up. "You'll make dinner again?"

"Yeah. I was going to see if I can attempt a grilled cheese without burning it. I'll be right back." And then he headed upstairs to his bedroom where he had clean undershirts, some sweatpants and all of his favorite books.

---------------------------

Anna was halfway through unboxing and organizing the shelf pieces on the floor when Bob walked back downstairs. She'd removed her denim jacket, and her leggings and tank top were mostly dry, and she'd settled on the floor with the instruction book. "It looks like we'll need a screwdriver or a drill...." 

Her sentence tapered off when she looked up at Bob just casually standing there in one of his white shirts and a pair of gray sweatpants and neatly combed, damp hair. The ability to speak escaped her.

"I can grab my toolbox," he told her, adjusting the waistband of his sweatpants before disappearing toward the kitchen. She needed to lie down. She stretched out on the floor and stared at the ceiling as rain pelted the window next to her. 

"Oh my god," she whispered before biting down on her lip. She wanted him. She liked every damn thing about him, and then he had to look and smell and sound so good on top of it all. The Walt Whitman poems weren't the only thing she had read last night. Sky Writing's words from her favorite poems were also in her mind, and she couldn't shake them. Anna had just rolled into her side, staring at the instructions without actually seeing them, when he walked back in. 

"Are you okay?"

"Great," she said, voice raspy. She was in fact not great. She was the opposite of great. When Bob handed her the toolbox and said he was going to make two mugs of tea, she took the time to pull herself together. Sweaty palms glided along her leggings, and she read the instructions through. It seemed simple enough, and she had the hardware in order by the time Bob returned with two steaming mugs.

"Thanks," she whispered as he settled onto the floor next to her. She knew this was how good things would be if she could date Bob. Hot tea and homemade meals and someone around who loved books. "You're really sweet."

He didn't say anything as he sipped his tea, so Anna did the same. It was raining so hard, she couldn't tell if what she heard was thunder or not, but inside Bob's house, everything was warm and cozy. "Let's get started," he finally said, leaning in front of her to set his mug on the windowsill.

They spoke quietly, mostly about the shelf, while she handed him hardware and tools. Anna found herself distracted as she watched his hair dry and lighten in color as they worked together. Every bump of his muscular arm against hers felt intentional, but she couldn't tell for sure, and she was too afraid to ruin this friendship beyond repair. Especially after what her friends had told her at lunch on Friday.

"I need the screwdriver," he said, bumping her gently with his elbow as he held two perpendicular pieces of wood in place. 

"I can get it," she replied, finally refocused on the task before her. "I'll screw it in." She tried to reach in front of him, but he was too tall. When he moved his arms a little further apart, she popped up between them so she was standing between his body and the shelf. "I'll only take a second."

She could feel Bob's warm breath against her ear, and all he could think was that she would fit perfectly in his arms if he decided to just drop what he was holding and wrap them around her instead. "Take your time," he murmured, because of course his arms wouldn't get tired in this position. She fumbled the screw. His body was immaculate, and it was all she could think about as he exhaled and tickled her hair.

"I'm trying," she whispered, fumbling the screw again. Finally she had it in place, and Bob released the shelf, but he didn't move away from her.

"Think you can screw the last two in as well? Then we'll be done."

She nodded and decided to go slower, savor this tiny bit of intimacy and pretend he was hers. Then it was done.

"It looks good."

She barely had to turn to look at him over her shoulder. "It's a nice shelf. How do you want to arrange your books?"

He was still standing close as he said, "Poetry on the top? Since it's my favorite?"

"Yeah," she told him with a laugh. "Banish it to the top where nobody but you can reach it."

He cocked his head and leaned in closer. "Are you insulting the poetry or commenting on my height?"

"A bit of both," she replied right away. The living was darker now from the storm and from the time of day, but she could see his smile perfectly. 

"Come on, Anna. We both know you love the poetry. You borrowed two volumes the other day."

She only hummed in response before ducking away from him and reaching for a stack of his books. She handed them to him one at a time, commenting on them like she was giving each a bad review. "Oh, this one is too flowery. Too many words and no substance." She handed him another after he shelved the first one. "This author put all their best works at the beginning of the collection. The second half is terrible."

Bob chuckled as she picked up a book that she knew was a favorite of his. "Hey, you better watch what you say about that one."

She waved it in the air, unable to reach the top shelf, and he snatched it out of her hand. "I'm going to be brutally honest," she said softly, and Bob's hand rested on her back almost like a warning. "I loved it."

He smiled and let his fingers trail along her back as he nodded toward the stairs. "Want to help me tackle the mystery books in the extra bedroom?"

"Sure," she told him, leading the way to the steps. "But first, you have to tell me why you like poetry so much."

"What's not to like?" he replied as she started up. "All of the emotions are there. You're allowed to write about any combination of emotions that you're feeling at any given time. And I think that's pretty cool."

Anna's steps slowed a little as she considered his words. "Write?" she asked, turning to look back at him as he made his way up behind her. "Did you say write?"

"Uh. I did. Yeah."

Truly, she loved reading poetry, but she didn't have much of a knack for writing it. She didn't even think she was good enough for PoetsAmongUs. "What's something you've written?"

Bob laughed, and Anna stumbled on the top step as he said, "Just some amateur gibberish like, 'Devotion woven into every breath I take. Love that knows no boundaries, no end.' Nothing amazing."

She gripped the banister to keep herself upright, and then she spun and sat down hard on the top step. Suddenly she felt like she couldn't breathe. She knew those words intimately. She knew the whole fucking poem by heart. She knew everything else he had written as well, because she'd been reading his poetry for years.

"Bob," she croaked, and he rushed toward her, hands gentle on her ankle and leg.

"Are you okay? Did you twist it?"

"Bob," she gasped, reaching for the front of his undershirt and pulling him closer so he was focused on her face. "You're Sky Writing."

--------------------------

BOB IS SKY WRITING, ANNA. What the hell are you going to do now, babe? Please, make good choices. Thank you @beyondthesefourwalls

PART 10

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No Need To Ask

Chapter Twenty-Five - Why

The Norris' were a notorious crime family in the UK. One of many. With Norris, the head of the family, running operations with his son, Lando, they work to keep Y/N Norris, Norris' daughter protected. Life in a crime family wasn't something they wanted for her.

But with tension with one of the Spanish crime families rise, Norris and his now deceased wife come up with only one plan, offer their daughter to the Sainz's or risk an all out war.

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Carlos Sainz's pregnant wife sat in a room small enough to be considered a cell. It was incredibly dark inside of this cell, with the only source of light flickering overhead.

Y/N sat on the floor, her knees pulled to her chest. It had been three days and nobody had spoken to her. A faceless figure brought her food and water, but never spoke a word to her. She sat in that cell feeling grubby and grim.

Tears stained her cheeks, but she had long since stopped crying, with no tears left.

She was going to die in her. She and her baby were going to die.

On her fourth day in this grim cell, somebody approached. They walked over to Y/N, crouching down so that she could see him. The face she was met with was rugged and scarred, and at least fifty years old. He grinned a grim smile, his mouth missing a couple of teeth.

"Hello, Mrs Sainz," he said, his voice gruff, his accent British. He pressed his face to the bars of her cell and let out a laugh, a terrifying laugh.

She spat in his face. Her spit flew through the space between them, landing in his face.

His laughter halted for just a moment. But it started up just as soon as it had stopped and he wiped the spit away from his eyes. "And I thought you were supposed to be all meek and timid."

"A mothers instinct," Y/N said through a hiss.

His laugh got louder and he stood up straighter. Pulling out a camera he snapped a picture of Y/N as she scowled up at him. She was going to die in here, but she wasn't going down without a fight.

"Why are you doing this?" She asked him, her voice dry. "What have I done to deserve this?"

The man got back onto his knees in front of her. "Well, I suppose I can tell you. I will just be killing you anyway." Y/N's heart sank as he leaned against the wall opposite her. "I am owed a hell of a lot of money and you're going to help me get it."

She just stared at him, her mouth agape. "So, you kidnapped a pregnant woman, the pregnant wife of a mafia boss, because you want money?!" She cried. "My husband will find me. And he will kill you."

"Hang on now, pretty little thing." He had no right to call her that. If Carlos didn't kill this man, she certainly would. "You haven't heard the whole story."

A lump formed in her throat.

***

The feeling that settled over Carlos when he touched down in the Norris family private hangar was indescribable. Finally he'd be reunited with his wife, finally he'd be able to bring her home.

Carlos made his way to the Norris house, with Oscar in the passenger seat of the car. "I can't wait for her to see what we've done with the nursery," he said with a beaming smile. Oscar had never quite seen him grin like this. It was infectious, too.

It was maybe 6.30 in the morning when Carlos arrived at the Norris house. Lando wasn't awake yet and there had just been a change of shift of those watching over the house.

Carlos looked up at the window that he knew to be in Y/N's room. His wife, his pretty little wife. Soon she'd be by his side.

He knocked on the door and a very tired Norris pulled open the door. "Oh," he said upon seeing his brother in law, who appeared to be a lot more awake and coherent than he was.

Lando let Carlos into the house. "Do you want some coffee or something?" He asked, shutting the door behind Oscar as he walked in.

Those two greeted each other with a handshake. Carlos knew they were friends, but he didn't quite realise they were that close.

Carlos shook his head. "I'd just like to see my wife, please," he said, standing by the stairs.

Nodding his head, Lando began climbing the stairs. "I'll go and get her," he said, as if telling Carlos was an afterthought. God, he was tired. Unbelievably so.

Maybe ten minutes later Lando was making his way back down the stairs, running this time, his face as white as a sheet. "She's gone," he said quickly, definitely more awake this time.

Carlos was red with fury as he gripped Lando's pyjamas and held him up against the wall. "YOU SON OF A BITCH!" He roared. "SHE'S GONE AND IT'S BECAUSE OF YOU!"

What the two of them failed to notice was Oscar as he ran around the house, searching for his missing best friend. He searched her favourite spots, but she was nowhere to be seen. He checked through the whole house while Carlos screamed at Lando.

"Hey!" Oscar shouted as he walked back towards the two of them.

Carlos quickly dropped Lando. His hands were still balled up in a fist as he turned towards Oscar. "What?" He barked, his expression furious. There was a time where Oscar would have been terrified of him, but now he understood. He got why Carlos was as seething as he was.

"She's not in the house. What do we do now?"

But it was Lando who told them their grim reality. "We have to wait," he said. I can put my men on it, but there's nothing we can do until we have some sort of clue or something."

As uncomfortable as it was, the boys did just that. They waited.

***

"It was your mother who employed me originally," the man said, still wearing that grim smile. Y/N couldn't look at him, but she couldn't help but listen.

Her mother? Hire him? What would her mother want with a man like him?

But he was going to tell her just that. "There was somebody your mother wanted to get rid of, and it was my job to do just that."

"So, you're a hitman," Y/N said, but the man held his finger to his lips, effectively silencing her.

"Yes, I am a hitman. And your mother took out a hit on somebody. See, she was a part of the Mansell family as a young girl. The L/N's worked for the Mansells for years, but they never amounted to much. So, she wanted a bit of the high life. And she was going to do anything to get it.

"Norris had just had his first child and his power was raising. He was set to be the most powerful head of family in the United Kingdom. This, of course, was before we knew about Hamilton. Norris had a new baby and a wife he loved very much.

"Your mother knew what she needed to do. She needed to get rid of Norris's wife."

Y/N couldn't stop herself from gasping. Her mother wouldn't have somebody killed, would she? She had always been harsh, but she wasn't deadly. Her mother wasn't a killer.

"So, your mother hired me to take care of her little problem. I got rid of the first Mrs Norris, doing so in a way that made it took like an accident. That was my speciality, making things look like an accident. Norris never suspected a thing.

"He grieved tremendously. He was the head of family, he had an infant son and he had just lost his wife. Norris really struggled.

"So, your mother put herself in the right place at the right time. She caught Norris's eye and, three years later, you were born," he said. The smile he still wore made her shiver.

"I needed payment. It was a hell of a lot of money and I had done my part. Your mother owed me. Of course, all of her money was actually her husbands, and he didn't have a lot of it. She paid me in small instalments, but it wasn't enough. I am still owed close to a million.

"And then your mother died. She died and there was nobody to pay me. I watched you closely, you know. I watched you carefully. Where your father and brother tried their best to keep you a secret, I knew everything about you.

"I watched you the day Sainz and his boy had dinner with you. I followed you to Spain and watched your wedding. I watched through your window as Sainz's boy had his way with you on your first night of being married."

Tears sprang to her eyes. It wasn't something she wanted to be reminded of. That wasn't her Carlos, wasn't the man she was in love with.

"Your husband is a very wealthy man," said the man. "I realised that, through you, I could get the money I was owed. So, I hatched a plan. I got a team together and we raided every head of family, trying to get the information we need and opportunities for any more money.

"When we raided your husbands house, we were planning to take you. But we were stopped by fucking Sainz. He got in the way and gave you two time to escape. But we got what we needed and we got out. We knew we'd get to you another time.

"It was hard to locate your safehouse. But we followed that Australian boy and he led us right to you. But then your husband got you away. We spent two weeks looking for you, were about to give up hope, when Verstappen's son called your brother. Suddenly we knew where you were."

When Y/N let out a sob, the man stood up straighter and pulled out his camera. He pointed it right at his face and began talking. "Hello, Sainz. I believe I have something that belongs to you."

***

Carlos spent four days at the Norris house. But, to him, it might as well been four months.

On the fourth day, his phone buzzed.

Well, it had been buzzing on and off with the same thing since he'd first discovered Y/N was missing. Every notification he got was somebody saying that they hadn't found her. There had been a couple of times when he'd thrown his phone, he'd always managed to throw it at the sofa opposite.

This time, though, was different. This time the notification was from somebody he didn't know.

Carlos opened it, opened the video that had been sent to him.

It was hard to make out what he was seeing at first, the video too dark, the person not in focus. But then the person holding the camera adjusted it and the view of the person became clearer.

Carlos's eyes went wide.

"Hello, Sainz. I believe I have something that belongs to you."

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[empresskylo]

beneath the mask ✩ chapter 13 ⬅ch.12

➠𝐌𝐃𝐍𝐈; 𝟏𝟖+ 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐓; 𝐄𝐗𝐏𝐋𝐈𝐂𝐈𝐓 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐓 ➠SIMON "GHOST" RILEY X AFAB!READER ➠CHAPTER TAGS | nsfw. lil bit of 'dark' simon. wc 7.4k ➠AUTHOR'S NOTE | here we fucking go

𝐛𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐤 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 ✩ 𝐜𝐨𝐝 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 ✩ 𝐦𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

you tried your hardest to repress all of simon’s words to you from last night. the way he stopped you in the hallway, heightening all of your senses, dead set on telling you things he probably hadn’t told anyone in a long time… it was dangerous. it was leading you to believe he actually cared about you. that maybe this thing you fabricated between the two of you wasn’t all in your head after all. 

what did it mean if he was trying to let you in? 

you tried not to think back to the night at the bar, when simon had his fingers inside you. when he coaxed you to orgasm, his words melting in your ear, like he was just as desperate for you as you had become for him. 

and maybe he pushed you away because he didn't know how to let someone in that kind of way—and maybe what he was feeling scared him. then the image of the blonde woman he was talking to in the training room—him watching her attentively as she spoke—made you think of his fingers on her. it made your stomach twist into knots. you shut that thought down and instead tried to conjure the way he looked at you in the bar—when he said, i fuckin’ hate seeing you with other guys . well, apparently, you hated seeing him with other girls, too. 

a sudden flush warmed your cheeks as you strolled down the hall at base. except simon was a grown man—years older than you, even—so you weren’t going to put words in his mouth. if he wanted you to know how he felt, he’d tell you. you weren’t going to sit around and make things up in your head—playing around with all the what if’s.

and still, your mind wandered. it felt like you had no power in keeping him out of your mind and you hated it. you hated that you thought of him so often. you couldn’t help but think back to the other night in his room when he followed you into the bathroom and stared at you like he wanted to devour you whole. his body radiating so much heat, you felt yourself sweating standing before him. you remembered the way his lips twitched like he was dying to kiss you, acting like a starving man. 

your heart fluttered and you shook your head of your daydreams. you were off to find soap, who was hopefully in the training room, needing to feel confident in yourself again before you went on your next mission. and you needed him by your side to help you practice. 

it was weird how you had somehow weaseled your way into task force 141. you were swept away into the rush of combat, the adrenaline boost of being in the height of the action. sidelined with ghost, price, gaz, and soap. it not only made you swell with a bit of pride but made you nauseous at the thought of delving into something so crucial and vital. were you really cut out to be at the same level as these men?

you peered into the training room through the glass door and looked for soap. when you didn’t spot him, you used that as an excuse to hold off on your training exercises to go and seek him out… you couldn’t train alone … at least that’s what you told yourself. maybe you weren’t really ready to get back into the action and you were using this as an excuse to make yourself impertinent to the upcoming mission. maybe you’d get left behind. 

down at the motorpool—the large hangar where all the humvees and other military-grade vehicles were kept—you felt a cold breeze rustle through your hair through the open wall. you hustled down the metal stairs, scanning the large room, looking for a mohawked sergeant. 

your eyes perused a crowd of commotion and you maneuvered your way over to see what was going on. as you got closer, you realized it was a collective of new recruits. it was easy for it to slip your mind that a new wave of soldiers had been starting out this week. you hadn’t even thought to ask if that meant you’d be getting any new medics in the infirmary. 

they were likely getting lectured on safety protocols with all the tanks and militarized vehicles. bored with the swarm of newbies, you slid behind a humvee to go find soap, maybe he’d have some intel on divisions the recruits were being added to. 

a deep voice echoed behind you and made the hairs on your neck rise. you stopped in your tracks and peered around the vehicle, spotting a tall man with a skull balaclava on. ghost . 

you couldn’t help the nerves that filled your chest and stomach. were things going to be awkward with your next encounter? should you mention the intimate details he told you last night, or pretend like it never happened? 

as you pondered your unusual situation with your lieutenant, your heart stopped. ghost stood beside the blonde recruit you saw him with the other day in the gym. her hair was pulled back in a way that should be unflattering but somehow accentuated her beauty. she sported the same dull outfit as the rest of her peers and yet she wore it far better than you ever could. what made your eyes widen, however, was the way she looked up at ghost as another lieutenant was lecturing the group about something you tuned out, already accustomed to the military spiel. 

you watched in horror as she bumped him on the shoulder, laughing as she said something to him. why were you getting so jealous? simon wasn’t yours . if he wanted to flirt with the new recruit, he had every right—no matter how unethical, but that thought was just you being petty.

ghost looked down at her, hunched over slightly so his face was in line with hers, and mumbled something under his mask. your heart dropped at the proximity of their faces. 

you finally had enough, pissed at yourself for falling into a rabbit hole, thinking maybe he had grown to truly care about you. you turned back in your tracks and went to leave. ghost’s head snapped up at your abrupt movement, your boots on the hard ground echoing in the building at the lull in lecture. you refused to meet his eyes and raced back to the metal stairs and ran up them as fast as you could without falling. 

you’d find soap later. you didn’t want to see him right now. how could you let yourself get hurt by ghost again? johnny would think you so stupid—you said you were moving on, that it didn’t bother you anymore. but then, spotting him with another girl, it made you feel sick. 

you needed to get him out of your head for good. shouldn’t it be easy? he didn’t like you. he told you so himself. 

you hadn’t heard him coming, so when you made it back into the hallway, you yelped as two hands grabbed you and spun you around, pushing you up against the cement wall. 

the ugly fluorescent light stuttered, creating an eerie glow over ghost as he loomed above you, his hands still gripping your shoulders. 

“i can’t fuckin’ do this, anymore,” he growled out. the baritone of his voice sent a small wave of fear up your spine. you may have grown to like ghost, acquainted with his rough demeanor, but you couldn’t forget how intimidating he could truly be. 

you looked away from his gaze, your eyes watering. how stupid ghost must think you. to be incapable of a hookup—to be crying over him. he was a cold-hearted killer years older than you, and you really thought you stood a chance? he must think you beyond naive. maybe he’d finally get you kicked off his team—

he cut off your racing thoughts abruptly when he grabbed your chin and forced you to look up at him. you heard him sigh as you let your eyes meet his, a tear sliding down your cheeks. “i’m sorry,” you mumbled. 

“stop apologizing.” you thought back to one of your first conversations with ghost, when he had yelled at you for being so soft—for apologizing so freely. he told you to stop then, too. 

you could feel the warmth from his gloveless fingers as he held your chin in place, almost like he was worried you’d look away the second he let go. his eyes flickered to your lips, his thumb brushing over your bottom one with a gentle swipe. your lips parted at his touch before ghost dropped his hands back to his side. 

“m’not interested in her,” he said rather quietly. 

your eyes found his before dancing away and looking at your feet. you didn’t think you’ve ever felt so embarrassed before. getting jealous over your superior—who has made it clear he’s not interested—talking to another teammate?! “it’s fine,” you said shyly. “i’m sorry, you don’t have to explain yourself. i know that you—uhm—comforting me doesn’t mean we’re together. i don’t know why i—”

ghost’s hand on your chin cut you off for a second time. “look at me.”

you reluctantly did and he dropped his hand again, his fingers flexing. “m’not good for you.”

you blinked rapidly, tilting your head slightly. “what do you m—”

“for fuck’s sake,” he said a bit harshly. “you’re right. we’re not together . and yet i’ve already hurt ya more times than i’d like.” he had to bend his neck to look down at you as he spoke. he took a small step closer, entering your personal space in a way that made your head rush. “you deserve better than me. a better man.”

“ghost, i—”

“simon,” he corrected in a harsh, splitting tone. you felt your cheeks warm. simon shifted on his feet, his mask suddenly itchy and uncomfortable. “used t’like that callsign. reminded me of who i had become n’ why i was doin’ all this. but hearin’ you say m’name, my real name …” he cleared his throat. “reminded me of who i started out as. that m’human.” he paused. “i like hearin’ your voice say my name.”

your lips quirked up a little but quickly faded. simon watched your every movement, his heart racing just as it did on the battlefield. “i don’t understand.” your hands came up and ran through your hair. “i’m so confused. d-do you want me as a friend? or do want me to forget everything that’s happened between us and pretend like nothing happened between us? that’d probably be best, wouldn’t it?” you gave a strained laugh and simon’s eyes narrowed. “you’re my lieutenant and i'm just a medic.” you didn’t know if that last sentence was intended for you, or him. 

he wanted to tell you that you weren’t just a medic . he hated hearing the way you talked about yourself. 

you looked up at him with such fierce hope in your eyes, but he could see the sadness laced behind them. and all that sorrow had spurred from him. he caused that pain you were feeling. he was ruining you already. ruining such an innocent thing. that’s what he did, he was destructive. he tore things down. he should stop leading you on. he should hurt you so you’ll go back to hating him. so you can be just another one of his subordinates again. 

after a few beats of silence, you nodded. “okay,” you said softly, accepting that as his answer. your words were so faint that it hurt simon’s ears to hear your voice like that. 

this was it—the closure you needed. you developed a little crush. simon thought you attractive enough for one night of reprieve. you wanted more. he couldn’t give it to you. and he was telling you to move on from all the shit that happened between the two of you. to forget those nights he comforted you. to forget how much relief you felt when he was the first face you saw after being held hostage. 

you turned to walk away, your back to him. simon felt his heartache, a feeling he hadn’t felt in a long fucking time. shit , this was only going to hurt you and him. but he wasn’t a good man. he wasn’t a better man. or a man you deserved. he’d only ruin you. he shouldn’t let himself. but he never claimed to be a good man.

ghost yanked his mask from his face, shoving it in his pocket. it took him only a few strides to catch up to you. he grabbed your arm and spun you around so you collided with his chest. he was done bullshitting around. in this moment, he decided he didn’t care about how this would be a disaster. he’d worry about that later.

“ what —?” you started, surprised. 

then his lips were on yours. 

his arms wrapped around your waist, pulling you onto the tips of your toes as he kissed you deeper, starved for something only you could quench. 

you were hesitant before quickly matching his passion. your hands wrapped around his neck, encouraging his tall frame further down over you. you both stumbled as he backed you up against the wall of the abandoned hallway, his hands around your waist, forcing you into him.

he tasted like whiskey and mint and a little like something cataclysmic. something that would only hurt you with time. but you didn’t care. in that moment, the only thing you could think about was the way he felt against you. 

you had worked with ghost for over a month now, and you never imagined him as a romantic. you couldn’t picture him kissing a girlfriend or wife. or see him saying sweet nothings into his partner's ear. so with him filling all of your senses, his hands gently, but firmly, plastering you to him as he devoured you, the juxtaposition of it gave you butterflies. 

one of his hands escaped and slid up to cup your cheek, allowing him to deepen the kiss. you felt your breath get lost in your throat, his lips far more soft and warm than you would have imagined someone like his. 

“m’not good for you,” he mumbled between kisses. 

“i don’t care,” you said breathlessly. 

he pushed his body against yours in response, caging you in between him and the wall. you heard him groan in his throat. his hand slid against your skin where your shirt began to hike up, his fingertips leaving burn marks all over. 

he finally slowed, kissing you a few more times before actually pulling away. but his hands stayed locked around you. “don’t think i can handle losing you,” he said truthfully. 

your breath got lost the second you were able to look at his bare face. his rugged beauty made you want to weep. he was so gorgeous and you doubt he even knew it. 

“you won’t.”

he didn’t seem to like that answer. you didn't know that. but he did. he knew something was sure to come between the two of you, whether that was death or of his own destruction. 

his eyebrows furrowed as he studied you, his cheeks pinking and his lips swollen. before he had time to ruin this moment, you went onto the tips of your toes, feeling brazen as your hands clutched onto his jacket so you could kiss him again. your hands moved to wrap around his waist, softly scratching his back over his shirt. you heard him moan into the kiss and you subconsciously clenched your thighs. 

“ fuck ,” he mumbled against your lips, his slight stubble tickling you. “i want you so bad.”

your heart fluttered in your chest. your head was telling you to slow down—to stop and discuss things. to figure out what was happening between the two of you so you didn’t get burned again. 

but when you opened your lips to speak, all that came out was, “ prove it. ”

simon grunted, pulling back to look at you. if he was a smiling man, he would be grinning ear to ear. something wicked was spreading through him. “you don’t want a man like me,” he rasped.

“you don’t know what i want.”

he bent over and swept you up into his arms making you squeal. he clicked his tongue, “quiet, pet. don’t want the whole barracks to know, do ya?”

you shook your head, unable to speak for fear of stumbling over your words.

simon carried you swiftly back to his room, skillfully avoiding running into anyone, not even caring that he didn’t have his mask on. 

you made it to the confines of his room in record time. he was a man on a mission.

he kicked the door closed behind him and plopped you down onto your feet, his hand dragging against your body as he did. you swallowed hard, your hands gripping his jacket. 

you leaned into him tentatively, like you were asking permission. like you weren’t sure if he was going to push you away for being forward. that thought made simon angry, his hands tightening on you. 

he leaned over to meet your lips halfway. you moved in sync far slower than earlier, the two of you taking the time to soak in the moment. all of your worries about the upcoming mission, all of the things that kept you awake at night, were slowly sinking away. simon was absorbing it all. taking the pain so you could feel the relief.

and simon was never a kissing man. he didn’t really see the point. but he never wanted his lips to separate from yours. he felt your kiss all the way to his fucking toes.

he pushed you back so your knees hit his bed and you collapsed onto it. his hands rested on either side of your thighs on his mattress, his eyes burning holes through you. his eyelashes stood out, the blondeness of them stark against his charcoal face paint.

“m’not gonna be able t’stop once i start,” he said darkly. “so ya gotta tell me now if you don’t wanna do this.” 

he was holding himself back from wrecking you like he so desperately wanted. the number of times he had imagined this moment where he got you alone in his room, ready and willing, was sure to be astronomical by now. 

you gulped, his nose inches from yours as he waited for your answer. his fingers were begging to touch you, but he had to wait. he had to make sure you wanted this. that you wanted him like he wanted you.

“please. don’t stop,” you said, quietly.

simon growled low in his throat, his hands sliding up over your thighs. your lips parted as you watched him unbuckle your tactical pants. “lift your hips,” he commanded. you obliged and he heaved the clothing away from you, not in the right state of mind to take his time. he wanted you—no, he needed you—right this second. 

he tore your pants off of you along with your boots and then he was squeezing himself between your thighs, falling to the floor on his knees. 

“simon, what’re—“

his large hands hooked around your thighs and yanked you to the edge of the bed, putting your legs on his shoulders. you felt shy all of a sudden. taken aback. you didn’t quite think he was going to do this… 

“relax, pet,” he cooed, his warm lips meeting the soft skin of your upper thigh. you bit your lip as you watched him, his eyes never leaving yours. his eyes fluttered as he moved his lips on you. he kissed up to the apex of your thighs and then kissed you over your underwear. you gasped from the fiery contact. he chuckled, reveling in the way you were already panting before him.

he pushed your panties to the side and his lips were immediately on you, not wanting to tease you any longer purely because he couldn’t stand it. his mouth was on your core, kissing and sucking, his tongue dragging along you. your head fell back in pleasure, your hands finding his hair. 

he hummed against you, the obscene sounds his mouth was making rang in your ears.

he devoured you like a man who hadn’t eaten for days. and you were a buffet spread out for the taking. 

you felt his finger slide up and tease your entrance, his lips wrapping around your clit as he sucked gently. you groaned.

simon was getting frustrated with the cloth that limited his access, so he hooked your panties in his hand and yanked. you gasped as the fabric ripped and he tossed it to the ground. he spoke when he saw your mouth open, “i’ll buy you more.”

his lips were attacking you before you had the chance to even reply. 

simon slid one of his digits inside of you, slowly filling you up. “ oh my god ,” you moaned. 

he began to move his finger in and out of you while he worked your clit with his mouth. his free hand wrapped around your thigh and splayed over your stomach to keep you from moving, rooting you in place while he coaxed you closer to your orgasm.

without warning, he slid a second finger inside you, making you squeal. “you taste so fuckin’ good,” he mumbled to himself. he moved his fingers in and out of you and you fell back onto the bed, moaning at the way he was torturing you. “sound good, too.”

his fingers pumped inside you and he felt your walls squeezing him tight. “close?” he asked.

you nodded furiously, unable to speak a coherent word. he groaned against you like he was enjoying pleasuring you as much as you were.

then he slipped his fingers from you. you whined at the loss. “don’t worry, i’m gonna get you there. i just want you t’come on my tongue, baby,” he reassured. his mouth was on you again, his tongue darting in and out like his digits had been as if he was jealous of his own fingers. you didn’t even have time to process the pet name.

you fisted his bedsheets, your legs wrapping around him, your hips bucking up slightly. simon held you down as his mouth brought you to orgasm. you cried his name, “ ah –simon.” you tried to muffle the sound with your hand. 

simon let you ride out your high, his mouth never failing to move against you, bringing you to the brink of overstimulation. 

when you settled back down, completely out of breath, he came up and rested between your legs. “neva thought m’name could sound so good.” 

your face warmed, shy at his compliment. his mouth glistened with you and you had the urge to kiss him. he grinned, reading your face, and he brought his lips down and let you taste yourself.

it felt like you had a fever as you kissed him. you bucked your hips up into him without your permission and he groaned. you could feel his hard length straining in his pants, pushing against you.

“ jesus ,” he said breathlessly. 

your hands slid down his front and he turned to watch them as they trailed to his belt. before you could undo it he pushed back and stood up. he slid his jacket off, his eyes never breaking away from yours. next was his belt, the metal clinking something so sensual. then he pushed them down his legs, kicking off his boots too, and you could see how large he was in his tight boxers. you sat up, your legs hanging off the bed as you watched, entranced.

then he pulled his shirt from his body, exposing his toned chest. even though the lighting in his room wasn’t great, you could easily see all the scars that marred his torso, matching the ones that cut across his beautiful face, only managing to make him that much more haunting. he had a small smattering of hair on his chest that then trailed down beneath his boxers. your chest thrummed loudly in your ears.

your hands reached out and grabbed at his waistband, pulling him closer to you. even though you would never be strong enough to move him, he edged closer, letting you have your way. you looked up at him as your hand slid into his underwear, pulling him out. he groaned, his lips parting as you fisted him. you were still surprised with how bold you were acting. but the way his eyes had darkened, looking at you like a feral animal, gave you a confidence boost.

your eyes fluttered down and you marveled at him, a glistening of precum already pooling on his tip. and fucking hell, he was huge. you already knew he was from that drunken night, but being with him sober? you had no idea how he was going to fit inside you.

you stroked him a few times, prepared to bring your mouth down over him before he pushed you away. 

you looked up confused and his thumb brushed along your lower lip. “as much as i’d like t’feel your hand and mouth ‘round me. i won’t last.” he tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear. “and i need t’be inside you or it might kill me.” 

your heart raced at his dramatics. he grabbed you under your armpits and heaved you further back onto his bed. you sat and watched as he crawled up and over you. he pushed your legs apart to much of your resistance, suddenly feeling a wave of bashfulness. “don’t go shy on me now, pet.”

your stomach warmed as he bullied his way between your legs, settling himself on top of you like this was exactly where he belonged and you weren’t about to tell him otherwise. and he was far too heavy for you to move even if you tried. his hands were quick to find the hem of your shirt and tear it up over your head. he groaned as he looked at your chest. he seemed too impatient to properly unhook your bra so he simply tugged it down. your nipples hardened for him. and simon couldn’t stop himself, he leaned down and sucked on one of your tits, his other hand palming your other breast.

your back arched into him as his soft lips teased your nipple. his other hand kneaded your breast, making a chill ride up your spine. you helped him out and undid your bra, tossing it to the side. his tongue swirled around you and you finally broke. “simon, please . i need you.”

and if that wasn’t the most beautiful thing he’d ever heard in his sorry excuse of a life. 

he didn’t deserve to have you begging for him like that. but he didn’t care. he rose from your chest and gazed down at you, his hand running through your hair, admiring the glow your skin was emitting from the fevor. 

“you deserve to be fucked good n’ slow,” his words guttural. “but i need ya too fuckin’ badly, pet.”

you didn’t care about any of that. you wanted him to know he didn’t have to be gentle with you. you reached down between your bodies and gripped his cock in your hand, making his hips jerk forward. “then take me,” you whispered. 

“shit,” he cursed, his cock throbbing painfully against you. “don’t have a condom.” simon didn’t ever keep condoms in his room at base. he didn’t have a habit of sleeping with subordinates. when he slept with women, it was back home. 

you helped line him up with your entrance, your body heady with anticipation. he breathed your name. “it’s fine,” you urged.

“s’not. we shouldn’t—“

“simon, please.” you looked up at him through your lashes. a piece of you felt like if you two didn’t fuck right this second, it was never going to happen. and you wanted him more than you had ever wanted any other man in your life. 

“y’sure?” he knew he wasn’t going to say no when you asked him, looking so pretty sprawled beneath him. he wasn’t as strong as he thought. 

you nodded and slid your hands up to wrap around simon’s back as he took charge, taking his cock in his hand and pushing his tip into you without wasting time. 

you both groaned in sync. he edged into you ever so slowly. and even with your previous orgasm loosening you up to him, it was still a tight fit. you closed your eyes and took a deep breath. 

“m’i hurtin’ you?”

your eyes fluttered open to a concerned simon, his eyes darting between yours, trying to get a read on you. “y’gotta tell me if i’m hurtin’ ya.”

“you’re not hurting me,” you said, breathlessly. 

“hm, jus’ a bit too big for ya, then?” he rasped. he chuckled at the way you went shy at his words even though his cock was currently edging inside you—but it was his words that made you blush. “you can take it,” he cooed. 

he pushed into you further, and you mewled in your throat at the intrusion. your body tried to push him out, making simon groan into your neck. “so. fuckin’. tight,” he managed to get out. 

you buried your face in his neck while he was buried in your hair, both of you trying to compose yourselves as simon forced his way into you. “simon,” you groaned, making his hips jerk, sending his length further into you in a way that was almost painful.

“gotta stop sayin’ my name, princess. or i won’t be able to do this slowly,” he said through strained breaths.

princess . you felt your heart swoon at hearing something so devastatingly sweet coming out in his husky baritone. 

you nodded and his hand slid up and fisted your hair. 

it took another full minute for him to slowly push his way inside of you. your legs were wrapped around his waist, pressing against him as tightly as you could, bracing yourself for the small sharp spurts of pain. “m’sorry,” he muttered into your ear. he knew it hurt you. he could see it on your face that the way he stretched you out was uncomfortable. but bloody fucking hell , he couldn’t stop. 

“s’okay,” you slurred. 

your hips bucked up weakly when simon adjusted his position. you both groaned at the movement. your clit brushed against him, sending a bolt of pleasure through your core. “please. move, now.” 

he was big, and even with you so wet, he still teetered the line of being too large for you. but you could handle it. you just needed to get past this part so you could fully enjoy it. 

he held himself up on his arms and he slowly dragged his cock out of you, only going halfway, before pushing back into you with decent resistance. “ah,” you cried. 

“need me t’stop?” he asked you, though he prayed you’d say no. 

you shook your head and spoke a bit breathlessly. “no. keep going. please.” 

he furrowed his brows but did as you said. 

he pulled out halfway again before pushing back in. this time he groaned deep in his throat, the way your walls squeezed him was almost too much. 

he slowly pulled out again, except now he did all the way. and when he thrusted back into you, you yelped. he tried to restrain himself, but his mind was turning to mush. he began at a steady thrusting rhythm, trying to go slow, but on the brink of completely breaking and succumbing to his desires.

after a few strokes, your body adjusted and allowed him to move a little more easily. 

and it began to feel good. really good. you wondered if it would feel this good if simon was any other man. or if this was so mind-numbing because of how desperate you were for him.

simon grunted, repeatedly in your ear just as you imagined he would. he wasn’t usually very vocal in bed, didn’t see the need. he thought it was all just theatrics. but he couldn’t stop himself from letting sounds pour from his mouth. you felt that good.

“m’not gonna last— oh, fuck— long.”

your nails dug into his marred back, neither of you caring about how much pressure you were putting on him. to be honest, he didn’t even care if you drew blood—if anything, he might have preferred it. he wanted to know you were enjoying this just as ardently as he was. 

simon reached around him to grab one of your hands that currently had a death grip on his back and interlaced your fingers before pushing your interlocked hands onto the mattress. you squeezed his hand tightly, an orgasm brewing inside you.

“god,” you mewled, letting out little whimpers every time he bottomed out.

“sound s’pretty f’me, pet,” he said through gritted teeth.

his other hand reached down to your thigh and pulled your leg further up, hooking his hand behind your knee, so he could hit you deeper. you gasped at the position shift, his cock in as deep as it could possibly go. his hand held your thigh so tightly you worried he might leave bruises.

“i’m so close,” you babbled. your free hand slid to the back of his head, your fingers tangling in his short hair. he loved the way it felt.

simon looked down at you, marveling at how fast you were reaching your climax, just as he was. he liked the notion that he was doing this to you.

his makeup smudged down his face from the perspiration, his pale lashes standing out against the dark. your heart raced looking at him. he was gorgeous. he caught your gaze and leaned down to kiss your lips—something that surprised him. he wasn’t a romantic. he didn’t even really like kissing. yet he couldn’t help himself when it came to you. 

you clenched around him and his lips parted, gasping and breathing heavily against your mouth. his hand that was currently around your leg left to pay attention between your thighs. he began circling your clit with his fingers. “want you t’come for me,” he said lowly. 

you mewled, his lips still grazing yours as you both tried to breathe. you spasmed around him and he shut his eyes briefly at the sensation. “ fuck .”

as he felt himself about to release, he had the urge to be looking at you. he opened his eyes and used one hand to grab your chin, making your face look directly at him. “don’t look away,” he commanded. 

you nodded, his hand reaching back down between your thighs. your legs began to shake, your walls impossibly tight as they clenched repeatedly around him. “bloody hell,” he moaned. 

you felt so good, he didn’t want to pull out. he wanted to feel this forever. and as you climaxed, he reached his high, his sounds primal, growling and grunting at an increasing speed with each of his frantic thrusts. 

his fingers continued to rub against you even as he pulled his cock out of you. but he was a little too late. he came just inside your entrance, then emptied himself all over your lower stomach. 

you cried out his name as he panted, his fingers never faltering, his other hand still gripped tightly around yours. “simon,” you breathed in a pained breath. “stop, please. s’too much.”

he slowed his finger movements and then pulled away completely. he sat back to look down at you. his hand slipping from yours. you lay sprawled on his bed, your legs parted for him, his waist nestled between them. his come was dripping from your cunt, your chest rising in rapid beats. “fuckin’ hell,” he couldn’t help but praise. you were a work of art. and he was going to fucking ruin you. 

then something feral came over him. he leaned down, his hands grabbing the tops of your thighs, keeping your legs from touching one another, and his tongue came out, licking you like he had earlier. “ah! what’re you— oh my go d—doing?” you asked, exasperated. 

“cleanin’ you up,” he said nonchalantly like this was the normal way men acted after sex instead of being repulsed by their own come, finding clarity after orgasming. 

you were so sensitive as he lapped at you, his tongue dancing over your clit and sucking at your labia gently at first. but then he went a little harder, on a new mission entirely. your legs squeezed around his head, caging him in, wanting to block the overwhelming sensation. you were starting to feel beyond overstimulated. 

“s-simon,” you stuttered, wanting him to stop, but not being able to get the words out. his tongue focused back on your clit, sucking and rubbing aggressively against you. and without even realizing it was possible, you orgasmed for a third time. you came around his mouth again as he ate you like you were the most delectable dessert he’d ever had. 

he let you ride out your high on his tongue before he pulled away and hovered over you. “ jesus ,” he groaned, looking at your messed-up hair and glowing face. 

his hand moved to brush against your lips, his thumb dragging over them before sliding to the side of your face and running through your hair. your eyes fluttered at the delicate touch. 

simon collapsed beside you, his chest rising and falling as rapidly as yours was, as if he, too, just came again. 

the realization crashed down on you as you looked over at him. he felt your gaze and he rolled his head on the bed to meet your eyes. 

“i-i can do casual,” you said, your face heating. he quirked a brow in question. “i can be casual. you don’t have to worry about my feelings. i—”

“is that what you think this is?”

your eyes had a hard time staying locked with his. “was i not supposed to think… i thought you wanted…” your hands twirled around once another in nerves. 

simon rolled to his side, his arm extending over you protectively and caged you in. “there has never been anything casual about us.” his eyes flickered to your lips. he sighed. “i don’t want casual.” as much as he fought his desires for you, they were never casual. 

did that mean he wanted nothing at all? was this it? did he reach his end goal? getting into your pants? and now he wanted nothing more from you.

“oh,” you said crestfallen and a little embarrassed. 

“i want more than that,” he said through a struggled breath, as if this was foreign for him to say—at it likely was—but more importantly, he knew he shouldn’t be saying it. 

“as in…” you started. his hand came out to brush against your cheek. fucking hell, you never thought he could be so gentle. your eyes dropped to the scar on his lip. 

“ as in ,” he continued, “i don’t know what the fuck i’m doing. i haven’t had a girlfriend since secondary school. and even that wasn’t serious.”

your eyes widened. “ girlfriend ?”

he rolled his eyes and fell back onto his pillow, running a hand through his hair. “i’m tellin’ you,” he said dragging out the words. “i want you to be mine . n’ only mine.” his voice got deeper all of a sudden thinking of the times he had thought you were with johnny. or when graves had complimented you and you smiled sweetly at him. he hated that jealous feeling he got. 

you waited a beat before sitting up completely. he watched you, his eyes focused. “are you going to ask me?”

he smirked, looking like a predator hunting its prey. “no.” he sat up too, grabbing his shirt from the floor and handing it to you to put on. “m’not askin’, pet. i’m tellin’ you. you’re mine.”

“and if i choose not to acknowledge that?” you were pushing him. while you liked the openness he was currently exuding, you also had something in your gut telling you he wasn’t good for you— look at his track record. how he’s treated you so far . 

“you’ll end up gettin’ me dishonorably discharged if y’do that.”

“how–”

“i’d have t’kill any man you let touch you.”

you laughed, but his face didn’t change. “you can’t be serious.”

“deadly.”

you should have had him grovel more for what he had said to you. for all the mean words. for the night in the bar when he told you you meant nothing to him. and now, all of a sudden, he thought he had claim over you. your lust was clogging your head, and now you were seeing clearly. 

“i don’t think that's fair.” you looked away from him, putting his shirt on and crawling out of his bed, looking for your pants. 

simon pulled his boxers back on and reached out to you before you could get too far. his calloused hand wrapped tightly around your wrist, stopping you in your tracks. if he decided to never let you go, you’d never be able to leave. you were nowhere near as strong as him. 

you turned slowly towards him. he sat on the edge of his bed, his eyes looking at his feet in thought, his arm extended to you. 

you took in a breath as you watched him, waiting for him to say or do something. “simon,” you finally said, softly.

he looked up at you, his usual cold demeanor covering his face, though it was almost more unsettling without his mask. “what d’you want from me?” 

you tilted your head. “what do i want from you?” 

he nodded, his hand still clutching yours. “i don’t know. i… i guess i never knew. you never really gave me time.” your free hand pulled at his shirt in nerves. “all i know, is i wanted you to like me. that’s how it started, at least,” you gave a mirthless, forced laugh. “and maybe i did develop a little crush,” you said, mimicking how he had said it. your cheeks grew hot, embarrassed to be saying this. you weren’t sure how words were embarrassing you when you just had his head between your legs, but that was beyond the point. “and then i thought you definitely hated me. probably thought i was a kiss-up. but at the bar… and you said…”

he sighed. “i know what i said.”

you rolled your eyes in an attempt to hold back the tears. “so, i don’t know what i want, simon. i didn’t think this,” you gestured between the two of you, “was going to amount to… this.”

simon jerked you towards him and you had no choice but to stumble into him. his hand released you and instead, both of them slid up your leg and rested on the sides of your thighs as you stood between his open legs. “m’sorry.”

you gave him a sideways smile.

“i didn’t wanna let anyone get too close. they always leave me in the end. thought pushin’ you away would do us both good.” he shook his head. “was wrong—which is new for me.” 

you giggled and he smiled, wiping your eyes before tears could fall. 

his grip on your legs tightened. “m’not good for you. i meant that. but i want you. and m’done pretendin’ like i don’t. m’not a good man. but you can decide f’yourself.”

your finger traced one of the scars on his cheeks. “so, you want to keep doing this?”

he nodded.

“and we’re to be… exclusive.”

“i wasn’t kiddin’ ‘bout killin’ any man that touches you.” 

you didn’t doubt it. “okay,” you said faintly.

his eyes flickered between yours. “okay,” he mirrored.

something strange settled in simon’s stomach. in all the ways without actually saying it, you were now his girlfriend. how you had gone from hating him to dating him, in less than an hour was beyond him. 

and he knew he was going to mess this up. he had always known he was never allowed to keep anything good in life. that’s a big reason he refused to act on his feelings towards you. it’s why he tried to get you to hate him after he relapsed at the bar. he didn’t deserve anything good.

nothing good can stay, at least not for simon.

and he would soon be right.  

chapter 14 ➡

[luxurychristmaspudding]

thinking about fwb!frankie smiling a little too bashfully at a pretty lady in a bar. thinking about you watching from the table, hand tightening and slipping against the cool wet of your glass.

too occupied with her, he's missing the way you frown, how your stomach drops and churns. how jealousy - something you promised each other you'd never feel - begins to swoop up through your legs and into your arms and up your throat. misses how pope has to snap his fingers in front of your eyes to get your attention, misses will's sharp look across the room to where frankie is standing. the whirring of understanding in his features, of pity.

he misses the quiet satisfaction you have of knowing that will is wrong - that you're not just friends, that you know what francisco morales feels like. in your mouth, between your legs, inside you, on top of you, behind you, below you. know what it's like to have him beg and plead, know the feeling of absolute power when he is on his knees in front of you.

you're cold when he comes back to the table. joking and laughing with the boys, clinging to benny's shoulder. the other man looks fucking delighted, and it makes frankie sick. you don't snort at his jokes, don't acknowledge his stories. and he's begging you, mind to mind, to look at him.

when you do, over the rim of your glass, your eyes are like stone.

you've always made him nervous. from the very first time you walked into the hangar and introduced yourself as the new rpa pilot, he'd known he was in trouble. fiercely intelligent, unflappable, capable, confident, terrifyingly beautiful, he was fucked from the start.

and here, now - retired, covered in scars, riddled with nightmares - he's nervous in a different way. worried about what that look means, something broiling crashing in his stomach as he watches you and benny.

he follows you home in his truck when you leave the bar. walks through your front door timidly, twists his cap in his hands on the welcome mat. flinches when you jerk your head at the stairs. can't look at you as you strip before him in your room, his gut twisting. is ordered not to look at you as you tie his wrists behind his back, knees pressed into the carpet.

he can only hear how wet you are as you sink your fingers into yourself on the edge of your bed. he tries desperately to separate the sounds from what you're telling him. how maybe he should have gone home with that other girl if he was so interested. how you saw how she made him laugh, how she touched his arm, how he blushed. but he knows better than to think you're jealous. knows better than to tell you how that wasn't what he wanted at all. how every time he looked at the table, waiting for a rescue, you were turned away. how he couldn't find your eyes, his lighthouse while he's lost at sea. how he can't think of anyone else, doesn't want anyone else, blushed because he felt so disgusted at the way she touched him, desired him.

you tell him to look at you when you're close. something confusing burning in your chest, the confession you'd made in a roundabout way. you don't know if he heard it for what it was, but it doesn't matter when you command him to shuffle forwards, when he buries his face in your cunt.

he eats you like a man starved. sloppy and focused, tongue hardened to a point against your clit as he sucks you up, swallows, moans. hot and wet and vulnerable, your hands buried in his hair. he makes you come like that, and then twice more, before he's almost in tears. so achingly hard against his zipper it's painful, so sorry for how he made you feel. ready for you to take him in your arms, for the facade to drop, for you to be you again. he's patient, he's good. he knows the rules, knows his limits just as well as you do. senses the end coming as you pull gently on his curls, tilting his head back, cooing at him with eyes warmer than magma. you swipe your thumb along his bottom lip, cradle his chin, his cheek in your hand. lean forwards to press a kind kiss to his forehead.

he wants wants wants.

wants his hands free, his dick free, wants to feel you on him. wants you.

so close he can taste it as you kneel beside him, pressing more kisses to his cheek, his jawbone, his temple, the corner of his lips. he holds his breath as your fingers work at his restraints, lungs clenching tight as you whisper in his ear -

'you gonna beg, baby?'

yes, yes, he will. he'll do anything for you.

'please -' he croaks, 'please, baby, let me touch y-'

there's a pounding on your front door downstairs. frankie knows from the way you freeze you're just as surprised as he is.

he whimpers as you rise, as you wrap your robe around yourself. moans against your mouth when you lean down to kiss him softly, tasting yourself on his skin.

'wait here for me, baby,' you murmur, 'let me go and see who it is.'

[ross-hollander]

I went down to...

...the hell for 'mech pilots, once. You get there walking down the lonely, beaten dirt trail, in the fog-shrouded forest, approaching a lookout post where the sentry sits. Uniform of an army you have never seen, viscera spilling out where his flesh rots through. He waves you in, tells you which hangar you have a slot at.

Just past the entrance is the first hangar, Limbo. For those who never did more than they needed to, never looked out for anyone except themselves, never repaid good with bad- or, in fact, with anything at all. They sit there in rows after rows, silent in their niches while technicians without eyes clamber over them. Sometimes, they say, the repairs are completed, and they wave the pilot on out of the hangar, back up the trail.

To the left is Lust, for the magpies, the looters. The ones who craved the metal that had been flesh and bone to others. There they are torn from their cockpits, hearts plucked out by those eyeless technicians, replaced with minute metal homonculi: piloted themselves in murderous clashes until flesh-shreds are all that remain.

To the right is Gluttony, for the over-prepared, the hoarders, the ammunition hogs. Their 'mechs stand beneath a flimsy stone ridge as an endless artillery barrage rains down on them. The terror of the instant death- in spite of all their armor, in spite of all they took for themselves -is constant.

When you walk past Lust you go to Greed, for the spray-and-prayers, for the overkillers sowing cities with missiles and stray shots. Here wait the fallen angels, colossal, purely alien 'mechs of ever-sweltering black metal, and the pilots toil heaving batteries and missiles and armor panels, all of crushing weight, to repair them. Some lie fallen under the burdens they were lugging, never able to arise.

When you walk past Gluttony you go to Wrath, for the cockpit stompers, the ones who shoot down ejecting enemies. They are chained in their seats, ejects disabled, glass barred over, and their reactors cook them in their own can as they howl and sizzle. They go deaf from the radios that share every damned soul's screams with every other.

When you walk past Limbo you go to Heresy, for the metal-breakers, the engine strainers, the ones who slaved their 'mechs to the extreme. Here they lie on tables, those eyeless technicians disassembling them, removing piece by piece and replacing it with metal, from digits to nerves to brain, until all that remains is mute, unmoving alloy.

When you walk past Heresy you go to Fraud, for the abusers of the flag of truce, the false colors or feigned surrenders. Although you can never walk past Fraud; their 'mechs stagger forwards, down that misty dirt road, until metal rusts, until servos give out, until limbs drop off, until they finally collapse, staring, stagnant, mindless, imprisoned in their cockpit, watching the rest of the damned keep heaving themselves on.

No person ever goes to the last hangar. The last hangar is not for the pilots, you see. The last hangar is for Treason. The frozen control systems. The faulty radar that failed to pick up an incoming strike. The eject that refused to work when it was most needed. The last hangar- or so I am told -is where metal goes to pay for its sins, and it is no sight for mortal eyes.

[garbinge]

EVERYTHING (2/?)

Bradley 'Rooster' Bradshaw x F!Reader // Word Count: 2.1k Summary: Part 2 to One in a Million. Your reminisce about your past while your brother walks you home from The Hard Deck, all while you figure out what your future holds. When you head to base the next day, you run into a new friend, a few times and you get familiar really quickly. Warnings: All my fics are 18+ regardless of content. Angst. Fluff. Mentions of parental death (both characters), mentions of reader being adopted, small mention of saying goodbye to a pet, no use of Y/N. Falling for someone, quickly. Insinuates at sexual situations between scenes. Reader is Mickey "Fanboy" Garcia's sister. Took some liberties like giving Rooster a tattoo lol. A/N: These two live in my brain rent free.

“How do you know Rooster?” Mickey was asking you as you strolled on the sidewalk. The sun had gone down, you were buzzed from the handful of beers you shared with Rooster, then Rooster and your brother, and then just your brother through the night. Your walk home was only minutes from the bar, but you both were taking your time walking. The sounds of the waves behind you, muffled by the bar patrons, by the cars driving by, tourists on bikes. It all felt like home and you wanted to soak in every second of it. 

“Apparently he’s my boyfriend.” With a chuckle you looked down and kicked a rock, passing it to your brother who stopped it with his foot as he also stopped in his steps. 

“Come again?” His eyebrows were raised, a mix of confusion and concern in his tone and also plastered on his face. 

“Relax. It’s a joke. I just met ‘em tonight. He saved me from some egotistical asshole.” 

“So you met Hangman.” A smile grew on his face and he tossed the rock back to you. It was something the two of you did growing up, finding something to do when there was nothing to do. 

“Man with a track record I see.” You tossed the rock a few more times yourself before passing it back to Mickey, all while you both kept walking home. “Bradley pretended to be my boyfriend, then when Hangman left, we just started talking.” You shrugged. 

Mickey nodded, he wasn’t the type to tell you what to do, not only because it wasn’t his style but also because he knew you wouldn’t listen. He just liked having the information, all the pieces to the puzzle, that’s how he always was. It was how he got the call sign Fanboy. He knew anything and everything about fighter pilots, about Top Gun, about F-18s and honestly any other plane in the naval aviation hangars. He learned from your father, but the interest to keep learning was all him. 

“How long you staying for?” Now he was kicking the rock back and forth with his feet before he bent down and picked it up, tossing up and down into his palm. 

“Not sure. I wrapped up my last article for The Post and now I’m focusing on the book.” 

“And home is where you can write the book.” Mickey understood, and if anything he would have done anything to help you out and support you, especially with this. “You still planning to write about Dad?” 

“Yea, but I don’t know. I might write more about my journey, you know? I’ve been thinking about a lot of it lately.” With a deep breath, you felt the alcohol starting to fade as the topic got a bit more serious between you two. 

“About being adopted?” He tossed the rock over so it was now your turn to catch it. 

“Yea, but also just all the resilience and love I’ve seen throughout my life.” You started to think through how you wanted to tell this story, was it fiction, was it a memoir, was it a mix of it all? “Our lives were so unique, you know?” 

“Oh trust me, I know.” He laughed as you both stepped in front of your house, turning to look at it as you stood in the driveway. 

Memories of you as kids in the front yard chasing each other with water guns, sitting in the driveway with two of your dogs standing guard over the three of you, your dad picking each one of you up and flying you through the yard. Images of your eldest brother climbing down the trellis as he snuck out to some party with some girl, your younger brother laying in his bed pretending to be him until he was back. One of your favorite memories was the block parties that were always held here, hundreds of military officers would show up, you’d get lost in the crowd but then found by a kicking rock from one of your brothers, or a dog guiding you through the crowds. They all weren’t good memories though, as you looked at the front door, you remember taking Shadow out for the last time, draping the blanket over him in the trunk wishing him to get better. The black town car pulling up on the street and the uniform men informing you of your father’s death. Leaving through that same door for the funeral, your brother in his own uniform, your youngest brother in a suit for probably the first and only time. Your mind flashed back to the first time you stood where you are now. A child services agent, helping you out of the car at 5 years old, your teddy bear in one hand and pretty empty backpack in the other as you stared at what was about to be your life, your father was the first one to come out and greet you. He had his uniform on and you remember being terrified, but he knelt down in front of you and smiled, offering you his hand to shake and it was like every fiber of fear vanished in seconds. 20 years later, you remember that same feeling of fear reentering your body when they said he had died.   

“Everytime I’m here it’s so…much.” 

Mickey let out a sigh, as he nodded in agreement. “It’s why I stay on base when I’m here. Only come here when I’m too lit to drive back.” 

“So every night?” You felt his hand reach up and push you slightly before you used his arm as a way to balance yourself and then brought yourself closer to him in a sideways hug. “I miss him.” 

“Me too.” He tossed his arm over your shoulder and rested his head over yours. 

____________

You should’ve seen if your brother could have brought you on base, now you were trying to search your bag for some credentials that could get you through the gates. You had plenty, being a writer and journalist you collected them like someone would stamps or coins. 

“Fuck.” You mumbled as you searched your bag coming up with event passes and useless press badges. “Really could’ve used that white house press pass right about now.” 

“Need help?” The familiar voice came up from behind you and startled you. 

“Was looking for my badge, trying to get on base.” 

“Badge?” Rooster was extending his hand to help bring you into a standing position, you had made the patch of grass right outside the gate your own bag search area. 

“Uhm, yea.” You were knocking grass off your clothes and grabbing the couple things on the ground before you looked up and realized who you were talking to. Part of you knew, even though you had only met him once but now you were really taking him in. He had on his flight suit, sunglasses perched on his nose and a large smile as he tried to understand what was going on. 

After tossing your bag over your shoulder, you exhaled and laughed. “I’m uh, journalist–a writer. I have press badges.” 

“What do you write?” His arms crossed curious to learn more about you. 

“A column in the post. It was called Life in Brief. It was sort of memoirs–briefings on people I’d meet traveling around the world.” 

“And now you’re going to write one about one of us.” Rooster was bending down and picking up your notebook which was still on the ground. 

As he handed it back to you, you smiled curtly to thank him before tossing it back in your bag, “I, uh, don’t write them anymore. My last one got printed a month ago, I’m working on something new.” 

“Something new, huh?” His arms were crossed and he separated his feet slightly as he questioned you. Moving his left hand up to push his sunglasses up the bridge of his nose, he waited for your reply. 

“Yep. Something new. But I don’t think I’ll be getting on base today. I meant to ask Mickey last night but I forgot and I don’t have my white house badge to get me through.” 

“White house badge? Fancy!” He called out as he grabbed your bag from your shoulder and started walking past the gate with it. “Hey Lance, bring a friend for free day, alright?” He pointed back to you. With a light jog, you were trying to catch up to him, stopping at the gate where the guard just buzzed you in and waved his hand for you to enter. 

When you thanked him, you continued to catch up to Rooster. “Bag please?” He had it raised above his head and lowered it at your words. “Thank you.” 

“Who's on your list to talk to?” He asked as you were looking around at the hangars around you, the buildings, it had been years since you set foot on this base. 

“Don’t have a list.” You answered, distracted by it all. 

“Mission without a plan. That’s like the first rule: all missions have plans, multiple plans if anything.” 

“I’m not really a girl with a mission, Rooster. Never have been.” It was then that your head bounced off his chest, he had turned around and stopped walking while you were looking around, causing you to have run into him. 

“Maybe I can help with that?” 

“Plan to be my ghostwriter, Rooster?” You rubbed your head where you ran into him. 

“Could be one of the plans.” He teased you, it was then that you saw Hondo starting to walk on the concrete out of one of the hangars. 

“Let’s keep that on the back burner, Bradley.” You tapped his chest as you started to take a couple steps towards Hondo. “Hey, uh, thanks for getting me in, I owe you!” You were now yelling as you said it, your hand pointing at him but your mind focused on catching the man who was best friends with your father. 

_________

Before you knew it the day was over and the stars had filled the sky. Ending your day of research, if you could even call it that,  on the beach was your way of trying to gather your thoughts. You were still trying to figure out what you were going to write, how you were going to write it. Spending the day talking to people you grew up with, friends of your father, being back in a groove of things you haven’t been in so long was giving you a lot of ideas, but nothing felt right. You had spent the last few years of your career writing about other people, their stories, their grief, their happiness, their accomplishments, their regrets. Writing about your father’s, your brother’s, this life, should have been just like that. 

“Talk to me, Dad.” You whispered as your toes dug into the sand and your head looked up to the sky. Searching for any sign of what to do. It felt like you were in a new chapter of your life, and this was one that had no ties to your previous one, which bothered you. It was the first time you were doing something that your dad wasn’t involved in. He had been there when you graduated college with your degree in journalism, started your internship which led to your column, but now, this was new. You felt alone. 

There was commotion behind you, you were sitting on the beach in front of The Hard Deck so it wasn’t unusual. But this time, unbeknownst to you the commotion was Rooster with a few of his friends. “Hey, I’ll catch up with you guys later.” He was tapping his friends backs and he caught you sitting on the beach, a smile growing on his face. Before he even knew it, he was heading over to you and plopping down next to you in the sand. “So you gonna tell me about this project you’re working on?” 

“That would require me actually knowing what the project is myself.” Your hands were wrapped around your knees. 

Rooster mimicked your position, but his arms resting on his knees versus being wrapped around them. “That what you’re doing out here, figuring it out?” 

“Thinking about figuring it out.” You corrected him with a smirk. 

“Maybe if you don’t think it’ll come to you.” He offered a suggestion, his shoulders and arms raising slightly as he said it, his mustache moving downward as he frowned. 

“Don’t think. Brilliant advice, Bradley.” 

“Do I still have more questions?” 

“Why?” You were wondering what he wanted to know. 

“Just wanna know more about you.” Another shrug came from his shoulders. 

Your lips curved at his sentence and you looked over at him, resting your head on your knees and the tops of your arms. “It’s a book.” 

He was about to question you, the words what’s a book were about to come back from his mouth when it hit him. 

“So there is a plan.”

“That’s all I got. Don’t think I’d call it a plan yet.” 

“I read some of your columns.” It was blunt coming out of his mouth, like he almost wasn’t in control of saying it or planned of saying it himself.

That got your attention, your eyes were glued on his waiting for him to continue that thought with something more. 

“Before I knew they were yours, I’d read them back when I was in the Academy, when we weren’t allowed to have phones, a lot of us started reading the papers every morning.” 

“It got published digitally, too.” You weren’t living under a rock to know that the papers were a dying form of journalism.

You were not expecting the next thing he said. “Snippets on instagram, too.” When you looked at him with wide eyes, he laughed. “I enjoyed them, followed The Post to keep up with them when I got my phone back. “The one about the painter from Times Square, that’s the one that I read first and remember. Where the guy started painting the rocks in Central Park they were all covered in sunlight and by the time he was finishing up they were all shadowy.” 

“He had to decide how he wanted to remember them.” You knew exactly which memoir he was talking about. “Travis.” You kept your head on your knees and closed your eyes. 

“It was really powerful stuff, the idea that even with the things we can’t control– time passing, the sun setting, we still have the power of choice.” 

“Why don’t you tell me about you, Bradley?” Your eyes opened and you looked into his eyes. 

“What do you wanna know?” He dropped his head down similarly to yours but in a bit of a teasing way. 

“Everything.” It was insane that you had known this man for barely two days and your conversation yesterday of getting to know each other was flirtatious and now it was borderline pining. 

______

The pining didn’t last long. You were now naked in bed with him. His arm was around your shoulder and resting on your back as you head laid on his bare chest. 

“Is this how you get the scoop on all your features?” He joked and pulled you back in closer to him when you pushed him away teasingly. 

“You barely told me anything. I specifically asked for everything.” Your hand started to play with the tattoo on his chest, outlining it with your finger. 

“Tribute for my dad.” He was looking at the ceiling as he said it, feeling your light touch outline the goose silhouette that was next to the F-18 fighter jet silhouette. 

You nodded, having figured so much. “Tell me about him.” 

“I was young when he passed. Don’t remember much.” It was obvious he was lying, but you weren’t going to pry or try and pull it out of him. And you didn’t need to because he was closing his eyes and shaking his head. “Sorry, reflex.” 

“You don’t have to share. I know how hard it can be thinking about them.” 

“He was funny, always knew how to lighten the mood. He played piano, pretty fucking good too.” He laughed almost like he still was shocked at the thought. “He loved my mom fiercely. Loved me fiercely.” 

You knew that well, your dad was the same exact way. “When did you decide you were going to enlist?” 

“I couldn’t tell you, it just was something that I feel like I always knew.” His fingers were caressing your collar bone. 

“Mickey was the same way.” You let out a chuckle remembering no time where your eldest brother wasn’t obsessed with aviation. 

“They don’t call him Fanboy for nothing.” Rooster was laughing along with you. “This your room?” He was looking around but there was a lack of personality in the space. 

“Yea.” You agreed with him.

“Whole lot of nothing.” His eyes looked over the bare walls, just the old light yellow paint on the walls, there were nail holes, furniture scuffs, but nothing besides the bed, sheets, dresser and walls. 

“I took it all down when my dad died.” 

“Does it feel lighter?” He was staring at the ceiling as the question was asked. 

You frowned and looked over at him. Feeling the shift in your position he looked back down at you and gave you a seeing smile. “I know what it’s like to live with the weight of their memory.” 

“Doesn’t feel lighter.” You settled back into the crook of his shoulder. 

“Damn.” It was whispered just above your head. “Was hoping this might’ve been the secret.” 

You let out a little chuckle. “You hungry?” Rolling over you went to grab your clothes to put them back on, all while Rooster let out a groan in complaint as you moved away from him. “Come on,” you threw his jeans over at him, “kitchen.” 

As you both moved down the stairs together, he saw the frames of your family on the wall and stopped when he saw some of your columns framed. 

“This is the Travis column.” He was stopped on the landing and you were already on the ground level. His face was turning in a smile as he pointed to the frame. 

“It was one of my dad’s favorites.” You remembered when he called you to tell you he was framing it and putting it on the wall, your eyes smiling at the memory. “Come on, Rooster. Let me cook you breakfast.” 

“It’s 10:30?” He questioned as he skipped down the steps to catch up to you. 

______

Sitting on the island, you stared at Rooster who was using his fork as a knife to cut a piece of the pancake off. “Good, right?” Your eyebrows raised and you went back to picking off your plate. 

“Phenomenal.” He spoke with his mouth full. 

“So what haven’t you told me, Rooster?” You picked up a few scrambled egg pieces and plopped them in your mouth. 

“Hmm, I’m a Cancer, my favorite color’s yellow, I play piano, I own a lot of movies–bootlegs to be honest, I guess you could say I’ve collected them over the years, my favorite food is Pho, but I’m strongly considering changing that to these pancakes.” His mouth was full as he spoke so his words were muffled but you understood them perfectly. “Your turn.” 

You gave him your zodiac sign, a few interesting skills of yours and then looked at him and gave him a new fact. “I think these have been some of the best days I’ve had in a really long time.” 

At that sentence he looked up from his plate and into your eyes. He was across from you, probably 3 feet away, standing, but leaning against the counter his leg crossed over the other. Within an instant he was pushing off the counter and taking two steps towards you until your face was cupped in his hands and he was placing a kiss on your lips. 

“Glad you agree.” You whispered when he pulled away from the kiss to catch his breath. 

“What else?” He asked you, his forehead on yours as he asked the question. “Ask away.” His voice was so soft if he wasn’t this close to you, you never would have heard him. 

“I think it’s your turn.” Whispering it back, your hand started playing with his button up shirt. 

“Tell me something I don’t know.” 

“I love watching antique roadshows.” 

He let out a bellow of a laugh, and brought you closer to him at the statement, placing a haste kiss to the side of your head in between chuckles. “What are you doing tomorrow?” 

“Are you asking me on a date, Bradley?” Your eyes squinted as you looked up at him. 

He started fumbling on his words, wondering if he got the vibe mixed up. Maybe this was a one time thing for you. For him, he liked you. He knew it was quick but on base situations like this were always quick. Time went by differently on base. 

Interrupting his thoughts, you spoke. “If it’s a date, I want flowers.” 

Relief fell on his face and he nodded in agreement. “Roses or lilies? 

“Sunflowers, yellow’s my favorite color, too.”

Part 3 Dividers by: @mikeykuns 🛫Top Gun Maverick Taglist:  @drabbles-mc @justreblogginfics @kmc1989 (let me know if you’d like to be added! I'm using my all writing taglist right now!) CHAPTER INDEX <- where you can find previous chapters to this fic!

[callsign-dexter]

My Brother's Wingman 18+

Request: Ok... I debated with myself, but... I'm gonna be a selfish bitch now and some idea in as a Bday present for me (even if its still coming on friday) and I hope you dont mind <3 

So I'd have MAJOR Rooster feels, you cant imagine! Thats why I thought about something with him, where she's Jake's sister and they have some kind of secret affair, as Bradley is slightly scared of what would happen if Jake finds out. Soo they sneak around for some time until one day you're both at Mavs hangar working on a plane (while he's gone with Penny and let's you over) and you get really turned on by Bradley being sweaty and covered in dirt, soo you somehow end up sleeping there together but later Jake comes there as he was looking for Bradley and catches you both, so you have to explain everything and Bradley fears the worst. Luckily Jakes cant do much against true love and finds his peace with it ? 

Omg does that makes sense? I'm also so so sorry it's gotten so long :O

Pairings: Bradley Bradshaw x Seresin!Navy SEAL!Reader, Jake Seresin x Navy SEAL!Twin Sister!Reader

Warnings: fluff, smut

A/N: Happy belated birthday to the anon that sent this in and I'm sorry that it is late. I hope you enjoy! Also @talesofreading and @imagine-all-the-fandoms prepare yourselves it gets steamy!

Jake Seresin had a twin sister, you, that was almost a female version of him but could bring him down back to earth when he got too high and mighty. You both knew how to push each other’s buttons and you both did it out of love even if it seemed like you both were harsh to each other. You were a Navy SEAL and loved it, you really thought about becoming a pilot like your brother but you loved being on the ground more and plus you got to deal with guns and more combat.

You had been stationed at Naval Amphibious Base, in Coronado which was only 28 minutes away from where your brother was stationed now. Occasionally you would go down and visit him and go to a bar called The Hard Deck and have a few drinks with him and his new squad and you liked them all but one in particular caught your eye. When you saw him, he always had a Hawaiian shirt on with a white shirt underneath and form fitting jeans that hugged him everywhere and in all the right places, he also had this mustache that you could only imagine all the pleasure that it could bring you. It seemed like you had caught his eye too because he had been looking at you nonstop and you would only know this because you had been looking at him nonstop as well and throwing your signature Seresin smirk his way.

——————————————————————

You had just arrived at The Hard Deck after your brother practically begged you to come and you finally broke down and said yes. You had just gotten back from a deployment and were more than eager to blow off some steam. You walked into the bar and looked around to find it filled with civilians, aviators, and tag chasers. You hadn’t come in your uniform because you didn’t want to be in it any longer even though you absolutely loved being in it but not at this moment. You immediately saw the blond haired, cocky, and full of himself aviator that was your brother. You walked over to him and pulled the pool stick from his grasp and took the shot yourself and sunk the ball and you smirked as you came up. “Hello, sister.” He said and you turned around to him.

“Why hello there, little brother.” You said he rolled his eyes.

“By one minute.” He said but pulled you in a hug and then you pulled away and looked at everyone who was silent and stunned.

“Aren’t you gonna introduce your sister to us, Hangman?” A guy a Hawaiian shirt and a mustache said and when you said that he looked good, he really looked good enough that you wanted to pull him inside the bathroom and do him right then and there. He had yet taken his eyes off you and you and you didn’t mind at all.

“Rooster this is my twin sister-“ Jake began

“Older sister.” You said smirking and looking at him for a second and then your eyes were back on Bradley and again he rolled his eyes.

“By one minute. As I was saying this is my twin sister, Y/N ‘Bullseye’ Seresin. She’s a Navy SEAL and off limits to anyone.” He said and you rolled your eyes.

“Well Y/N it is a pleasure to finally meet you. I’m Bradley Bradshaw.” Bradley said and sent a smirk of his own. Everyone went around and introduced him themselves with their names and their callsigns. You also learned that he was your brother’s wingman.

“Bullseye. How did you get that name?” Bob asked and you smiled at him.

“It’s because I never miss my target that I’m aiming at.” You said and Bradley could’ve sworn he was falling more in love and that his jeans were becoming a little tight. “I’m gonna get something to drink. Anybody want anything?” You asked and they nodded and told you what they wanted as you were walking up to the bar Bradley stopped you by the wrist.

“I’ll help you.” He said and when you looked over to your brother, he had this look on his face but you just smirked and dismissed it and headed to the bar with Bradley. You arrived there and Bradley flagged down what looked like to be the owner. She walked over and smiled.

“I haven’t seen you around before. I’m Penny.” She said and smiled a sweet smile that reminded you of a mother.

“I’m Y/N Seresin I’m visiting my brother.” You said and smiled and she nodded letting you know that she knew him.

“Ahhh so you’re her. He’s told us a lot about you.” She said

“All good things. I hope.” You said and she nodded.

“What can I get you two?” She asked

“Another round for the group and whatever she is having.” He pointed to you.

“I’ll take what my idiotic brother is having and put it on his tab.” You said and she nodded and chuckled and got to work.

“So how long have you been a SEAL?” He asked you and you turned to look at him.

“For as long as Jake has been an aviator. We went into the academy together and then we split paths but still stayed in touch with each other.” You said and he nodded

“Have you always wanted to be in the Navy SEAL?” He asked and you nodded.

“Yea I have. Mostly to get under my parent’s skin but it really spoke to me.” You said and he nodded and about that time Penny came back with the drinks and then you walked back over to the group and they took their drinks. The rest of the night was filled with drinking and getting to know each other and getting the chance to knock Jake down a peg and embarrass the shit out of him which you did with a smirk. After the embarrass the shit of your brother came to an end and everyone went to their other activities you slipped outside to grab some fresh air and look out over the ocean. You weren’t out there long when you felt someone slide up next to you. You turned and looked at the person and saw that it was Bradley and you smiled.

“Needed a break?” He asked and you nodded

“Yea, it was getting a little hot in there.” You told him you both looked at each other for a minute and then you both were leaning in until your lips touched and the sparks flew. You pulled away when air was needed.

“I really like you.” He said and you smirked.

“I really like you too.” You said and then you both leaned back in and the rest was history.

——————————————————————

You and Bradley had been dating for 3 years and somehow managed to keep it a secret from your brother, and that was amazing because you were either there in San Diego on the weekends and would visit your brother or Bradley was at your place in Coronado. It had been your weekend to stay over at Bradley’s, he told you that he was going to be staying at Maverick’s, you had met him during your time visiting your brother and now boyfriend and you both really hit it off, hangar so he could work on a plane that he and Bradley had started to restore. You and Bradley have agreed to meet at his home and then he would drive to the hanger in his Bronco and grab some food on the way there. You both had just arrived at the hangar and after some making out you both got out and headed into the building it was late when you got there so you both figured you would eat and then he would work on the plane while you watched.

The next morning you both slept in but not for long because of your guys’ internal alarm clock and you both were up and heading out of the trailer. Bradley made you breakfast and as you both at cuddled up to each other you both enjoyed the comfort of each other. “Have you thought about telling my brother?” You asked him as you both had finished eating and you put your plates on the table in front of you.

“I’ve thought about it but scared about his reaction.” He said and you nodded “You?” He asked.

“I thought about it but I like keeping it a secret. He knows I’m seeing someone but he doesn’t know who and it’s driving him insane and I love it.” You said looking up at him and chuckled.

“I have to admit it is fun. He also knows I’m seeing someone but doesn’t know who.” He said and you chuckled. You both talked for a little bit and then you sat back and watched him work the plane and looked at the pictures and other things around the hangar. Every now and then you would look over and watch the muscles in Bradley’s back flex and it was slowly turning you on. He would occasionally turn around and look at you and you could see the dirt and grease smeared across his forehead and the sweat that was covering his forehead. You bit your lip as he turned back around and continued to work. You pressed your thighs together just thinking about him taking you right then and there all sweaty. It wasn’t long until you couldn’t take it anymore and slowly made your way to him and slid your hands up his back feeling his muscles work and then around his waist. He stopped what he was doing and turned his head where you captured his lips into a fiery passionate kiss, he brought his arms down and turned around dropping the tool he had in his hand neither of you caring. He brought his hands to your waist and slowly backed you up until you hit the shelf.

You looped your finger through his belt loops and tugged him closer enough to feel his erection through his form fitting jeans. He licked your bottom lip and you opened your mouth and his tongue slid into your mouth and your tongues battled for dominance until his won. You only pulled away when air was needed. Bradley’s pupils were blown with lust to the point where his irises weren’t visible. “You’re so sexy.” You said and that seemed to do something within him because he was attacking your neck in and you allowed him access he sucked and bit to the point you knew there was going to be hickeys. He trailed his hands down to the back of your thighs and patted them lightly signaling you to jump and you did so. This wasn’t the first time you both had sex together and each time you did so it felt like the first time and it was always so fiery and passionate but rough at the same time and you loved it and so did he.

Bradley walked towards the trailer and blindly opened it and then walked to the bed and then gently threw you onto you which made you squeal but then he climbed up and attacked your neck again which made you moan. “Bradley.” You moaned out and he slightly rubbed his clothed erection on your clothed core and you moaned again. He let up and smirked and you looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

“I love it when you moan my name.” He said and then he was quick to shed his clothing and then he helped you get rid of yours until both were naked in front of reach other “Absolutely beautiful.” He said and your thighs clenched together around nothing. He brought his hand up to your soaked core and ran a finger up and down your folds “So wet for me.” He said and you nodded and moaned.

“You’re the only one.” You said and moaned when he slipped a finger in and rubbed your clit at the same time. Once he felt like you were ready, he pulled out and you whimpered at the loss of contact. You didn’t have to wait long until you felt him slide his erect cock up and down and then you both moaned as he slid into you. Your hands went his shoulders and dug your blunt nails into his shoulder blades as he set a slow and steady space. He put all of his weight on his elbows and continued a slow and stead pace. “Faster.” You moaned out and he did as you asked and picked up his pace.

“So tight. Always so tight when I fuck into you.” He said and moaned out he hit all right places and knew exactly where to hit to find your g-spot and when he did you felt the rubber band in your stomach tighten.

“Bradley, so close.” You said and he nodded.

“Hang on baby.” He said as he picked up his pace he started to sweat more and you had started to sweat as well. His thrusting was starting to get sloppy. “I’m close, baby. Cum with me.” He said and then he changed his angle to thrust deeper in you and that what made you come undone and you came hard as he came painting your walls white. He stayed put catching his breath while you caught yours. He slowly slid out of you and then laid beside you.

“That was perfect. Just like all the other times.” You said and turned your head to him and kissed him.

“You’re perfect.” He spoke. Both of you laid there for a few minutes and cuddled until your stomach growled and you both laughed. “I’ll go and get some dinner started.” He said and you nodded and laid there basking in the after sex high. Once you felt like you could walk you got up and put on your jeans and his shirt. You joined him and watched him cook and when he was done, he handed you your plate and then he sat down beside you on the couch that Maverick put in not that long ago and you both ate dinner and then headed to bed. Bradley closed the hangar up making sure everything was secure and pulled The Bronco inside. The both of you headed inside of the trailer and headed to bed.

The next morning you woke up after Bradley and your hand went to his side but you felt it was empty but still warm this confused you but you didn’t have a long time to be confused because you heard what sounded like your brother’s voice.

“Hey, Rooster! Maverick told me you were going to be here.” The voice said

“What’s up?” Bradley asked

“I needed the plans for the new Top Gun class that’s coming in on Monday.” He said

“Yea, they’re in The Bronco. I was gonna work on them this weekend but got distracted.” He said and they both headed to the car and that is when you decided to make your presence known. You got up and luckily was still dressed and walked out of the trailer.

“Jake?” You asked and he turned around not expecting someone else to be there as you walked closer to him.

“Y/N/N?” He asked and then Bradley turned around wide eyed. “What are you doing here?” He asked and you didn’t speak but then he turned to Bradley and he had a look of a deer caught in headlights. Jake went back and forth from you to him and then he took in your clothing. “Is that Bradshaw’s shirt?” He asked and again he got no answer.

“Jake.” You began “We can explain.” You said and he nodded and then you looked at Bradley and walked over to him and stood next to him and Jake turned to look at you both. “We’ve been together for 3 years. We both had fallen in love with each other 3 years ago when I met you down at The Hard Deck.” You said expecting him to be mad and lash out as you leaned into Bradley and he put an arm around you but he didn’t.

“I’m not mad.” He said and you made a face of shock and so did Bradley.

“You’re not?” You asked and he shook his head.

“No. I’m surprised you kept it a secret this long but I can’t be mad at true love.” He said and both you and Bradley sighed in relief “Besides I had my suspicions especially since Rooster kept disappearing every other weekend up close to your base and when you came down here to supposedly see me.” He said with a smirk “I’m happy for the both of you and I’m happy it was Rooster that you had fallen in love with.” He said.

“That means so much to us.” Bradley said and you nodded.

“Now those plans.” Jake said and Bradley nodded and grabbed them and the three of you headed over to the table and couch and you sat quietly thinking as they worked. You smiled watching the two people you love work together and get along, any other boyfriend would’ve only lasted a week around Jake but he was just being protective of his twin sister. You were just happy to finally have someone that loved you just as equally and maybe a little bit more than your brother. You knew everything was going to be fine and nothing in the world could split you apart from the two men you loved and held so close to your heart.

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[novafire-is-thinking]

So I was wondering for a long time what would canonically happen if a human stayed inside a Cybertronian while they transformed. I came across two pages in IDW comics that mostly answered my question:

However, would this apply to all other Transformers or does it only apply to those with the same body type as Bumblebee or only Bumblebee? Does the alt mode have anything to do with this? Would the transforming noise be louder or muffled from the inside?

It definitely depends on the bot’s body type and alt mode. It probably depends on the show and continuity too.

Prime

In the second episode of Prime, Miko forgets to grab her guitar before hopping out of Bulkhead. It ends up somewhere in his “subspace”:

Notice how she says “back seat.”

In the IDW panels you sent, Bumblebee shifts his passengers to his back seat before transforming.

This tells me that, when a Cybertronian with a car mode is transforming from alt mode to root mode, people and items are probably safer and/or more comfortable if they’re in the back seat.

A couple of episodes later, it’s discovered that Miko tagged along without Bulkhead realizing it. Twice:

In the moments leading up to this part, Bulkhead is seen launching from the ground in alt mode and transforming to his root mode midair to grab onto a rocky cliff side. Miko was inside the entire time and survived, although she definitely suffered for it.

What about root mode to alt mode transformation? What would happen then?

Well, in season 3, Miko does what she does and ends up inside of Wheeljack’s subspace:

It’s never shown whether WJ first transformed to alt mode to let her hop in or if he just opened up his chest and dropped her in. My guess is the latter since, on the way out of the hangar to the ship, Magnus and Bulkhead weren’t far ahead of him when she asked if she could come. They probably would have noticed him switch to his alt mode, which neither Wheeljack nor Miko wanted.

The thing is, did he think before dropping Miko inside?

I doubt that he did, but these are the questions I would have:

Since combat might require split-second transformation, did he drop her in knowing she would survive an emergency transformation to his alt mode? (Unknown)

Did he tell her in which part of his subspace she’d be most comfortable in case he had to transform to his alt mode? (Probably not)

Was his plan to let her out in Magnus’ ship before going outside? (Maybe)

So, in TFP, The safety and comfort of a human inside a bot going from car mode to root mode is unknown.

Unfortunately, I have nothing I can go off of for fliers.

Rescue Bots

Several times throughout the series, the human members of the rescue team ride inside their partners’ chests when they switch to and from their alt modes. It’s safe and comfortable. They even get nice seats. lol

Barring the fact that this is a kids show which requires this feature, I wonder if the bots were able to choose this for their human partners or if they just made sure to scan alt modes with that particular type of subspace.

It would definitely be interesting to know if Cybertronians have the ability to choose which insides and kibble go where when first scanning an alt mode…

Anyway—

Rise of the Beasts + Bayverse films

RotB gave us a golden glimpse of Cybertronian transformation abilities.

Behold…one of my favorite parts of the movie:

Originally, I was going to use the AoE clip of Optimus scanning his new alt mode and transforming around his human passengers, but this clip works better. It’s an excellent display of what a Cybertronian body is capable of.

With more than a handful of distinct alt modes, Mirage appears to be a special case. I mean, the guy can literally separate pieces of his body to give to others and become an armored suit for a human.

Can all Cybertronians do that? I have no idea. When’s it my turn to be lovingly wrapped in living metal armor? Hm?

Looking at both AoE and RotB, Cybertronians appear to have the ability to move individual parts (within limits).

It would make sense if all bots could at least do what Mirage does in the above clip, if nothing more than that.

This is incredibly useful when transforming with human passengers.

Now, to answer your last question (finally):

The noise level inside a bot during transformation would depend on which parts are being moved and how much shifting is taking place. Cosmetic shifts would be muffled since they’re happening outside, but if parts surrounding the human(s) are being shifted, it’s going to be loud and clear to the passenger(s).

Movies are almost never a good way of determining realistic noise levels, but in the clip with Mirage and Noah, things don’t sound muffled at all.