#he cries and generally whumps so well and i love him

[obae-me]

Hi, are you taking requests? I really like your one-shots, they really help me in learning how to write emotions. So, what about the Demon Brothers getting injured for some reason (either because Lucifer punished them, or they were attacked by some creature, got into a fight, etc.), and MC notices it, even with the Demons best attempt to hide it, and decide to take care of the injuries. At first the boys are embarrassed and reluctant to accept their help, but quickly gave up and let MC take care of them. 👉👈

Anon...this is a beautiful request. I love love love hurt/comfort, especially whump tropes like these. I will absolutely do this. 100% I will do this, no questions asked. 

Although I owe you an apology because...this is another instance of mine where I take things...way too far...I should’ve known when I was almost 6000 words deep and had only briefly gone over three brothers, that I was in over my head once again...so...this is a big one...really big...well maybe not that big by fic standards, I don’t really know what the average fic holds...Anyways, enjoy! 

Rest Easy. I’m Here.

Word Count: 16,038

Warnings: Blood, Broken Bones, Bruises, Vomiting, Cuts, Concussions, Injury, Medication Use. A lot of general hurt for this hurt/comfort. 

(Please pay no mind to the fact that all these little picture banners are cropped slightly different sizes, consistency was never my strong suit.)

As Always, Read Safely! Please Enjoy! 

“Someone get Asmo!” 

“Satan, look out!” 

“My lord, Mammon can't dodge forever. He’s running out of stamina.” 

“Beel, don’t be stupid! Don’t be a hero, ya idiot! Beel!” 

“Belphie, take him away!” 

“Levi!” 

“Diavolo…we’re becoming overwhelmed, you need to leave.” 

“Absolutely not.” 

“You are royalty, and as such, I have to – Diavolo, move!” 

“Lucifer!” 

“They’ve been gone for a while…” You put down your D.D.D., placing it in your lap, a sigh coming from your chest as you stared at the front door to the House of Lamentation. How long had you waited here now, a few hours? Nearly felt like days. Every taunting tick of the clock twisted a new knot in your stomach. You knew they could take care of themselves, obviously they could. Their Deadly Sin titles weren’t just for show. There was probably very little they couldn’t handle, especially when they were all together…but…then why were they still not home? The moon might be ever-constant, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t extremely late. It was beginning to stretch into the early hours of the day now. 

They all had been suddenly called to meet Diavolo, Lucifer’s phone ringing at dinner, the prince summoning them immediately. Plates half-empty, they left. Now their dinner had gone cold…and so had the House. You couldn’t help but worry. It wasn’t too often all of them were needed at once, leaving you alone in this large and quiet mansion. None of them had answered your messages either, something else that was rather uncommon. Levi surely had his phone on him at all times, and Lucifer was pretty swift in responding to you as well, and despite Mammon’s fervent denial, he always leapt at his phone whenever you messaged him. But no, nothing. Just silence…Even the nocturnal critters outside appeared to abandon you, unable to hear their nightly cries. 

As your head tilted back, resting against the wall of the entrance-hall, you nearly drifted off. You had been sitting there for quite a while after all. If you did fall asleep, it made time warp, only feeling like a second, or perhaps it had just been rather perfect timing. The doors swung open, cold night air rushing gusting inside, the wind outside whistling as seven demons stumbled into the house. You scrambled to your feet, almost dropping your D.D.D. you’d left in your lap. Luckily you managed to catch it, shoving it in your pocket. “Welcome back!” Suddenly, the tenseness in your shoulders seemed to lift, the lungs in your chest not as tight. You could breathe easy now. 

They all looked tired, but quickly grinned as they noticed you...well a few of them did at least…actually only two of them. The others stuck to the shadows. “We’re back!” Asmo raised his arms in celebration, sounding much like normal to you, and yet…something felt…off. Maybe he was just exhausted, they had been out for hours at this point. 

“Sorry...we…took so long,” Satan spoke up, speaking at a strangely slow pace. Levi, not even looking at you, scrambled up the stairs to his room before he could speak. The demon of Wrath held his arms behind his back, a stance he hardly ever took, using his body to block off your view of Envy. “We got…caught up…in Student Council work.” 

“You did not need to wait for us,” Lucifer tilted his head…but even he seemed to not look at you quite as directly as he usually did. There was an odd air about him, a look in his eyes like he just remembered something he had forgotten. “It is late for us all. Let’s…get…” His voice got quieter and softer with each word. It seemed as if he was losing the energy to even form words, his head drooping ever so slightly. “...Some rest. You as well,” he addressed you, using an arm to usher his other brothers in the direction towards their rooms, some of them lowering their head from you strangely, some of them supporting the others up the stairs. 

None of them said anything else, and before you could even appreciate them all being home…they were gone. 

You had hoped the next morning, at breakfast, that things would return to normal. After sleeping it off, certainly the weirdness you had felt in the air would dissipate. Unfortunately…that did not seem to be the case. Most of the brothers didn’t even show up to breakfast. The only ones to arrive were Beel, Asmo, and Satan. Everyone else was gone. Asmo, with a smile over his face, tried to assure you all was well. “They’re probably still sleeping! Last night was a long night after all!” 

You raised an eyebrow, a little offended that they were clearly keeping something from you, but more worried than anything. “None of you are wearing your uniforms today,” you noticed, jutting the end of your utensil towards Satan and his common clothes, finding it difficult to eat your morning meal. 

Beel, after shoving a plateful in his mouth, somehow more voracious than usual, licked his lips and nodded his head at you comfortingly. “Diavolo gave us the day off.” 

“You can still head to classes though,” Satan chimed in. You noticed he was only using one arm to eat breakfast today. It was an odd detail to notice, but one you spotted nonetheless as he struggled to cut this morning’s pancakes. He always used a knife and a fork like a proper person, always getting irritated when someone else like Mammon would wedge the fork back-and-forth, tearing off the pieces and shoving it into his mouth. Now Satan was doing the very thing he ridiculed others for. 

Suddenly settling your utensils down, you straightened your back. “I think I’ll stay home too.” 

Each of the brothers looked at each other, flickering secret messages between them with only their eyes. Satan shifted uncomfortably in his seat, subtly wincing as he shrugged his shoulders. The next thing he said was the final nail in the coffin. Hell had frozen over today apparently. Either that or something was terribly, dreadfully wrong. “I don’t think Lucifer would like that very much.” 

“You never care what Lucifer thinks!” You suddenly shouted, a sick feeling in your stomach, your insides doing flips with anxiety. “What’s wrong with you all?” 

Apparently you surprised them all with your outburst more than you intended to. Beel suddenly started coughing, bending over in his seat. You stood up quickly, afraid he had started to choke, but Asmo beat you, making it to his little brother’s side in a rush. “Breathe, Beel, breathe…Eat slower, you can’t handle going too fast right now.” You could hear the faint wheeze in Beel’s voice, the pain in his lungs obvious, his arms hugging his own body. And yet, they still wouldn’t tell you. Not even when it was so abhorrently obvious that something had happened last night. The brother’s voices sounded muffled to your ears now, the stress fogging your senses. You faintly recalled Satan going up to take Beel to his room, Asmo the only one left. The demon of Lust cleared up the plates, doing so hoping you wouldn’t notice the way he gripped the tops of the chairs, guiding himself back to the kitchen with a hand pressed against the wall, limping. 

You had intended to remain steadfast in your stubbornness. If they weren’t going to go to classes, why should you? After all, you had stayed up almost all night, restless with worry. However, any dreams you had of staying home were dashed as the haunting doorbell to the House rang. None of the brothers were likely to answer it, and if it was a package or something of that nature, someone should probably grab it for them. Although, you knew well in the back of your mind that hardly any mail was delivered this early in the day. The idea of a package was better than more bad-news, you figured. You shuffled your way out of the dining room, rather downtrodden, opening the front door without preparing yourself to look a little less depressed. 

“MC?” You weren’t expecting to hear your name spoken by a voice so familiar. Taking a few blinks, you brought yourself out of the little slump you were in. “Is everything alright?” Simeon frowned, taking another step closer to the entrance. 

You had to quickly grin, although you knew it came off rather weak. “Just didn’t sleep a lot last night. What are you doing here?” 

A little figure jumped out from behind Simeon, almost like it was meant to surprise you. “We’re here to go to RAD together!” Luke beamed. He seemed so pleased, absolutely beside himself with joy at even just this simple thing. How did he never realize why everyone called him cute? 

The third figure outside nodded, waving at you in greeting. “Imagine our surprise when, out of the blue, all of us receive a text from Lucifer of all people, telling us to bring you to RAD.” Solomon looked quite pleased with himself. Although, that only made you feel warier. So none of them knew what was going on either? 

Simeon was the only one who seemed to share your confusion. “It’s not everyday that he asks for favors.” 

“It didn’t seem like a favor to me,” Luke scowled, unfortunately coming off more like a pout than anything. He folded his arms. “It was practically an order.” 

“Regardless of the reason,” Solomon waved his hand through the air, moving away from the brothers as the topic at hand. “Are you all ready to go?” He looked at you with a glint in his eye. That feeling in your gut still remained, but was slightly lessened. At the very least, the members of Purgatory Hall were as they usually were. Any form of normality you could get was gladly accepted. You nodded, taking a step forward and shutting the door of the House behind you. 

Simeon outstretched a hand towards you, perhaps sensing that you were feeling a bit down. You took it, feeling the warmth in his palms spread over you like a comforting blanket. Was it angelic magic or just simply his presence that calmed you so? “Don’t worry,” the angel attempted to assuage your anxiety. “If it were something threatening, Diavolo would certainly tell you about it, wouldn’t he?” 

Based on his track record…not really. Not as quickly as you would like him to anyway. Mysteries and riddles and royal duty be damned. You’d have to talk to the prince. 

You were one second away from knocking on the door to the student council office before it opened for you. Barbatos welcomed you with a calming grin, lowering his head in a little respectful bow as you stepped into the room. “We’ve been expecting you.” As the door shut behind you, you felt your shoulder gently touched by the butler’s gloved hand. He wasn’t often one to express emotion, or perhaps you’d gotten to know him well enough to tell that the slight lift to his brows was one of sympathy. “I’ve already prepared some tea as well as Devarian Cream Eclairs.” In a blink, he was over by a little table, pulling a seat out for you as Diavolo remained seated on the other side, waving you over with a grin, although even from here you could notice that his usual dazzling and thrilled smile was subdued. 

“You knew I was coming?” You took a few tentative steps before settling yourself in the chair, your hands rubbing themselves anxiously in your lap. 

Diavolo was the one who spoke up this time, nodding a bit as the corners of his mouth tugged downwards. “If I know my student council, you probably have many questions regarding last night, don’t you?” 

Your mouth felt a bit dry, and so you picked up the little teacup, smelling the sweet aroma before taking a little sip. “They didn’t tell me anything…” The teacup made a gentle noise as it settled back down on the table. You turned your head up at the prince, a pleading look in your eyes. You may not have had a pact with him and he might’ve been royalty while you were just a human, but you were hoping that the person sitting in front of you was not just the Demon Lord but Diavolo, your, dare you say, friend. Surely, he would answer your honest question. “Will you tell me what happened?” 

There was a flicker of guilt in his eyes as he spoke, and while Barbatos was naturally quiet, there was an eerie sort of silence about him, one that was abnormally noticeable. Diavolo paused but then explained everything to you. Apparently, every few millennia, an ancient Devildom Beast rises from its deep hibernation to feast. Left unchecked, it can go on a rampage, causing needless destruction and chaos. It typically follows a very regular schedule, the brothers and Diavolo able to create a plan and barrier to keep the monster away from civilization. However, without any warning, it suddenly arose, centuries early. No one could figure out why, and deep in your soul you wondered if this was somehow your fault. Strange things always happened when you were around, after all. Although, you knew it was rather silly to blame yourself for something like this. “Without any preparation, we were all forced to subdue it ourselves…and refusing it to feed naturally made it quite aggressive. There were…casualties…Forgive me.” 

Barbatos finally took a breath, shuffling a little closer to the prince. “Young Master–” 

“I will take the blame for this,” Diavolo, despite the guilt, raised his head proudly. “It was under my orders that this happened. And it was because I was there that–” He cut himself off as the words caught in his throat, something the prince was not known for. He couldn’t seem to finish his statement, but you could connect the dots. Here he was, hardly a hair out of place like usual. He had been protected. You knew the others, especially Lucifer, would do whatever it took to keep Diavolo safe. Before you really knew you were doing it, your body urged itself out of your seat, wrapping your arms against Diavolo’s body. You heard Barbatos take a sharp intake of air before letting it out in a gentle sigh. Normally, such actions like these towards the prince would’ve been unheard of, perhaps punishable even. You didn’t often like to think you were being given special treatment, but in this case, you were glad you were able to do something like give Diavolo this little embrace. You felt him chuckle, the power of his lungs rattling your ribs. He took your arms and lowered them, the smile back on his face, although perhaps a bit embarrassed that someone such as he needed an action as common as a hug to make him feel better. “I was hoping you would come see me, seeing as I have a favor to ask of you.” 

“A favor?” 

With a little nod, he glanced at Barbatos who helped you back to your seat, the butler’s hand settled on the back of your neck for just a moment, his subtle version of a thank-you. The prince cleared his throat, looking at you seriously. “I’d like you to help care for the brothers till they are back in good health. Knowing them, they’ll hide away from any of us till they are back to normal. Lucifer might be Pride, but it seems as if the stubbornness runs through all their veins. But you…they have a soft spot for you, even Lucifer.” There was a flicker of jealousy behind Diavolo’s eyes. Yes, they were close, but Lucifer’s respect would always hinge that tiny social barrier between them. “Besides, they might heal quicker with you by their side, and that’s beneficial for everyone involved. I know…it might be a lot to ask, but would you be willing to do this for me?” 

You couldn’t help but chuckle a little. “After everything we’ve all already gone through, do you even need to ask?” How many times had you been the one to clean up a mess caused by some magical or mischievous misfortune? And almost always, you were the only one unaffected by it all, always waiting for the others to return to normal. “I had planned on doing that anyway.” 

He closed his eyes as he sighed. “I had a feeling, but I never like to assume. I’m glad, though... If there’s anything Barbatos and I can do to assist you, don’t hesitate to ask.” 

“There is one thing,” you brought up, making the prince raise an eyebrow. “Can Barbatos make me a portal home?” Learning all this information suddenly made you feel antsy, practically itching to be back in the House’s familiar halls. “I feel like I’ve already been away from them long enough. I want to be there for them now.” 

Out of everyone, you figured Asmo would be the least likely to turn you away. He loved being pampered, and he seemed perhaps the most normal of the bunch. Besides, he might be willing to shed some more light on what happened to the others…and the severity of their injuries. You tried not to let the silence of the house overwhelm you as you prepared a little tray to take to Asmo. You filled it with lots of helpful but adorable things. A little yogurt cup with glistening and juicy fruits, an herbal tea that Barbatos recommended that was a rosy pink, a little vial of Devildom Medicine that you put a few stickers on in an attempt to make it ‘aesthetic’, and a few other things you just grabbed since you had no idea what Asmo was going through. Tray settled against your hip, you knocked on Asmo’s door. 

There was silence for a moment, but then a whine on the other end. “Whaaat? I’m trying to recover as much as you all are too, you know! Don’t make me get up.” 

It was clear to you that he assumed you were one of his brothers. You suddenly showing up might not be as thrilling of a surprise as you had thought it would be. “I can come in if you’d like.” 

Clattering could be suddenly heard from inside, a whimper of pain was made before the door swung open vivaciously, Asmo, wearing a silky nightgown, was leaning against the doorframe with one leg tucked behind the other. “MC, hun! What’re you doing home?” His eyes flashed down to the tray you were carrying. His smile faded, his bottom lip jutting out in a small pout. “Ah…Who told you?” 

“Diavolo.” You snuck past him in his room, settling the tray on the end of his bed. “He didn’t tell me absolutely everything though.” You suddenly turned around a hand on your hip. “What’s wrong with you? Out with it?” I sound too much like Lucifer, you thought to yourself. 

Much like you were expecting, Asmo gave in almost instantly, his eyes turning glossy with tears. He shut the door and moved away from the doorframe, one of his feet curled away from the ground. As you looked at his left leg, you noticed that from the knee all the way down, Asmo’s skin was covered in bruises, the tone to his complexion a different blend of purple, yellow, black, and even red. It was swollen. “It hurts…” The little crack in his voice broke your heart. You came over to him, offering your support as he settled an arm around your shoulders. You helped him limp back into bed, fluffing up the pillows behind his neck. 

“Why didn’t any of you tell me?” You shook your head a bit, looking down with a mixture of concern and disappointment. 

“And have you look at me this way?” A tear slid from the corner of his eye. You unconsciously brushed it away, his face leaning into your touch. “Just look at it…it’s hideous! I never wanted you to ever see me this way…” 

“Asmo…injuries happen.” You traced little hearts into his shoulder before you stood, getting to work. Grabbing some throw pillows from various pieces of furniture, you brought them next to his injured leg. “Can you lift it?” With a wince, he grabbed at his left thigh, lifting up his leg enough for you to place the pillows under. With a little flourish, you covered him with a blanket. “I brought you medicine. Barbatos said this kind should help with the pain. I also made you a little snack. You need to be well fed and rested. Do you want me to grab you some ice-packs?” 

The ever-usual confident Asmo appeared a bit meek at the treatment. “Yes…please. I tried going back downstairs for them but…” 

“No more getting out of bed,” you demanded. “You’ll just make it worse.” With a few steps, you moved over to the nightstand, grabbing the tray and settling it right next to Asmo. One of your hands brushed Asmo’s hair from his face. “I’ll be right back.” Some pink flared in his cheeks at your stern orders, but he didn’t stop you from rushing downstairs to try to find something to ice his leg with. Unfortunately, if the House did have ice-packs, they weren’t in the freezer. So, desperate measures called for frozen vegetables. You found a little hand towel in the kitchen, wrapping the pack up in that before heading back upstairs. You were pleased to find that he was in the middle of eating his snack with a little grin on his face. 

“MC…you’re so precious,” he praised you, almost purring at the mere sight of you. “You’ll be my nurse till I’m all better, right?” It was his best attempt at sounding like usual, but even the flirtatiousness of it was muted. He simply sounded exhausted. He settled down the little bowl as his arms outstretched towards you, waiting for you to come over and hug him. You placed yourself against his hip on the bed, letting him wrap his arms around you. His nose settled against the base of your neck, practically absorbing your affection as additional sustenance. Who knows? Maybe it did work that way for demons. Maybe they quite literally sucked the life out of you. Maybe that’s why Diavolo seemed to think they’d heal faster with you around. Little parasites…You parted from him after a while, holding the cold pack in your hands. 

“I’m going to place this on you. Are you ready?” You waited till he nodded before you settled the weight on his injured leg, covering his ankle and the better part of his calf. He winced, but after a minute, seemed a bit more relieved. You took this moment to curl up at his side, stroking his hair, watching the more strained and exhausted lines in his face fade. “Will you tell me more about what happened? I want to take care of all of you the best that I can, but I can’t do that if I don’t know anything.” 

“It all happened so fast…” He tried to snuggle into you without moving too much. “We were all just fighting to calm it down, but I got knocked out of the air and…it trampled my leg. I don’t remember the last time I felt so much pain. But, even so, I think I got away the luckiest…” Your poor boys…You knew that…as a human, you would’ve been little to no help in such a situation like that anyway, but still, you felt a little guilty that you weren’t there in the moment to try to help them. “I don’t know what happened to everyone, it’s still all a blur. I blacked out for a bit…but I think Satan has a broken arm. Maybe he knows more than I do.” 

“Really?” Your gasp almost sounded breathless. “What do demons usually do for broken bones?” 

Asmo slowly shook his head. “We don’t need much. I’m sure he’s already got it wrapped up. It should only take a few days to go back to normal. He’s probably upset that he can’t read his books very well, though.” After talking for so long, he whined a bit, trying to pull you closer. “It’s so cold…” 

You moved your arm to shift the ice-pack to a different part of his injured leg, letting him hold you so he could absorb your body warmth. “You should take that medicine soon and then get some rest,” you encouraged. “Sleep is often the most important step to recovery.” Asmo simply made a little whine, vocalizing his disappointment but unable to disagree. At the risk of never being able to leave his room again, you planted a gentle kiss on his forehead. “I’ll have my D.D.D. on me, so if you need anything else, just call or message me.” You tucked the blanket tighter around him, guiding his arms away from you and down to the bed. Despite him usually distressing over his hair, he smiled when a few of your fingers brushed through the strands atop his head, his eyelids flickering, like even such a simple gesture was coaxing him to rest. “Meds then beds, Asmo,” you repeated once more, watching him blush at the childish-sounding mantra. You got to your feet, making sure the lights in the room were dim. “I’ll be back to check on you later…Feel better.” 

You watched him blow you a kiss before you left, heading in the direction of Satan’s room. 

Satan would be a risky one. You had no way of knowing if his injuries would keep him from being angry or if they would make him even angrier. Not to mention he’s not the most vulnerable of the brothers. He had already tried to hide his broken arm from you –although rather poorly. However, at breakfast, he did seem rather calm about everything. Even breaking character and telling you to go to classes just to keep Lucifer in a good mood. Definitely not like Satan. Which either meant Wrath’s injuries were bothering him so much, he couldn’t even be angry towards Lucifer…or…what if Lucifer had been hurt enough to…No. He didn’t seem that bad when he addressed you in the entrance hall. Lucifer had almost seemed normal. There was no way Satan would worry about his older brother over mild wounds. 

Ah, but thinking about this was keeping you from what you should actually be doing, which was action! You might’ve been stalling a little bit, worried that as soon as you knocked on Satan’s door, his demon form would rush through. Fortune favors the bold, you recited in your head, hoping it would work as a spell of sorts. You knocked on Satan’s door, only just now realizing that you didn’t prepare or bring anything with you like you had done for Asmo. Although, maybe it was for the best. If you had come in with armfuls of stuff you thought he would need, trying to fuss over him, it would probably irritate him. He’d just have to tell you what he needed himself. 

There was no answer. Should you head in yourself?...No, that might be a death sentence. Should you announce yourself? But then would he even open the door if he knew it was you? He’d probably just shout back ‘there’s nothing to worry about’ or even ‘do you think I’m incapable of taking care of myself’. So you knocked once more, remaining quiet, trying to strain your ears to see if you could hear even just the faintest of pages moving. Of course, just as you were pressing your ear up against the door, the entire thing rattled. Even the doorframe shuddered. “Go away!” 

Well…so much for your hopes of him not being angry. What did you really expect? His title was Wrath. You shuffled on your feet for a moment, lingering by the door. Knocking a third time might set him off…maybe you should say it was you right as you opened the door. Or maybe–

“I can still hear you!” The voice in his chest rumbled, a strong aura approaching rapidly from the other side. “I swear to Diavolo, whoever it is better be gone in five seconds before I teach you what it means to –” The door opened so violently, the air almost sucked you forward. 

You jumped back, already giving your apologies. “Don’t be mad! I came back home because I heard what happened, and I already checked on Asmo and he told me that you got hurt and that I should check on you, and –” 

“MC?” The aura of fury mostly faded, the door partially shutting again as you assumed Satan was trying to hide the injured arm behind the wood. “What’re you doing at home? We told you to go to classes!” 

“I said don’t be mad!” 

Satan took a deep breath, a little glare staring at you from through the crack in the open door. “You said that Asmo told you what happened?” Well, technically Diavolo was the first one to tell you, Asmo giving more details but…now was not the time to argue over semantics. “And he told you to come check on me?” You nodded, thinking naively that maybe Satan would be touched that his brother was concerned about him. Instead, a darkness clouded his eyes, the door opening once more, only this time, Satan stormed out, fully intent on marching down the hall, probably to give Asmo his personal feelings on the matter. 

Without thinking about it, you grabbed the back of his shirt, pulling on it with as much strength as a human could muster. “Stop! He’s hurt enough already! I just put him to bed! If you want someone to be mad at, be mad at me!” 

Satan’s feet stopped, of his own free will obviously, seeing as you were probably not impeding his progress as much as you were hoping. You stood your ground, although a little bit shakily, and your eyes finally noticed his arm. He, as you and Asmo both expected, had already treated it to the best of his abilities. It was wrapped in bandages that even you could tell were soaked in something magical, and it was resting in a makeshift sling he had seemingly made out of one of his pillowcases. It had several different adorable cats on it, which was a strange contrast to the furious look he was giving you. “First you scream at me to not be mad, and now you’re telling me to direct my wrath towards you instead of Asmo? Which is it?! Pick!” 

“I’d prefer neither, if I’m being honest!” You exclaimed, releasing his clothes so he could turn around fully, facing you. Your shoulders slumped a bit as you stared at his arm, your eyelids drooping in sorrow. “But it’s fine. Yell at me.” If this is what he needed… “Take your anger out on me!” If you could prevent the others from being hurt again…you’d do anything. “Whatever you need to feel better.” You lifted your head to stare him down only to lower it as soon as you felt a little bonk on your head. 

As soon as the side of his hand gently struck the top of your skull, he deflated. “Are you an entire idiot?” An exhausted sigh left his lungs, rubbing at his eyes before lowering his good arm. “Taking my anger out on you would leave you hurt or even worse. Don’t you know better than to provoke a demon? I thought we all taught you better than that.” 

You rubbed the part he had hit, although it had startled you more than hurt you. Squaring your shoulders, you changed your stance to one to make it look as though you had planned this to work all along. Wait…who was supposed to be scolding who? You came here to look after him, not the other way around! “And I thought maybe you all would trust me a bit more to actually tell me the truth rather than sneak around and skulk in your rooms!” As you both locked eyes, his gaze almost flickered away from you at that. Time to double down. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re just as much of an idiot.” Normally, statements like that would rile him up again, but you were, perhaps, riding on the fact that you knew he had a weakness for you. That, and the fact that you came up and wrapped your arms around his waist probably saved you from retaliation. “I might be an idiot, sure, but I’m not completely stupid.” Your head rested against his good shoulder. “I know when something feels off with you all. Did you really expect me to stand idly by as you all suffered?” 

His little huff disturbed a few strands of your hair. “I guess I was hoping it would take you a bit longer before you found out…We all underestimated you again, didn’t we?” 

“Never forget that humans thrive on stubbornness and spite,” you reminded him with a little grin. You pulled apart from him and took his good hand. “Let’s get out of this cold hallway. You should be in bed.” A noise of mild surprise stuck in his throat as you tugged him back into his bedroom, shutting the door, carefully stepping over and around little piles of books to bring him back to his bed. He sat back down on his mattress, glaring daggers at a hardcover lying face up and open over his covers. With a swipe of his hand much like a cat, he batted it clean off his bed. Something in the back of your mind clicked. The knock at the door wasn’t what made him upset, was it? Asmo mentioned something like this, didn’t he? “Are you mad that you can’t turn the pages?” 

Heat suddenly flared up in his cheeks, almost growling. “It shouldn’t be that hard!” His broken arm was his dominant one…

“What happened to your e-book tablet? That should be fine for now, right?” 

“I lent it to Levi…” He settled back against his pillows, staring out the window. “But it’s fine, I don’t need it. Don’t bother him.” 

You looked out the window with him, wondering if there was something fascinating out there or if it was another excuse to not look you in the eyes. You sat down beside him on the bed, your forefinger resting on his good hand, tracing circles into his knuckles. You caught him trying to glance at you out of the corner of his eyes, gaze a bit softer than it had been. “Do you know what happened to the rest of your brothers? I remember Levi ran off before I could even get a good look at him.” 

Satan’s jaw tightened, a little bump forming in one of his cheeks as his tongue pressed against the side of his mouth, struggling to talk but luckily finally sharing some information. “Asmo’s knee got dislocated and has multiple fractures throughout his leg. We managed to fix it up mostly, but he still can’t walk on it very well. I remember trying to get to him, turning my back for just a second. Just one second. Then I think I was kicked. Next thing I remember, I was waking up far away from battle, my arm completely broken from the shoulder down. I returned to the fight when it was nearly over.” Against his own better judgment, he tried to shift his injured shoulder as if maybe it had healed in the little bit of time you had been with him. He winced, cursing a bit, squeezing his eyes shut till the sharp pain went away. As you rubbed his other good arm, you had to wonder to yourself if the brothers had had very many instances with pain like this. For humans, it wasn’t really rare to break a bone or dislocate something at all. What usually hurt you was nothing more than perhaps mild discomfort to these demons. So for them to feel this much pain… “We’re supposed to be your protectors…” Satan found your hand with his and gave it a squeeze. “For all of us to be put out of commission like this…” 

Your heart tugged at that. “Satan…” You stroked the side of his face with the back of your other hand, shaking your head a little. “Don’t be so dramatic. I don’t think any less of you. Not for any of you. Let me take care of all of you this time. I may not be super strong, or super fast, or insanely powerful…but I can do this at least. So please, don’t push me away. Let me help. Do you want me to go get your tablet from Levi’s room?” 

For a moment, he was speechless, slowly tilting his head towards your touch before closing his eyes completely. “If you would…yes, please.” 

“Then I’ll go do that,” you beamed. “Anything else you want me to get for you?” 

He shook his head, rubbing his cheek against your hand like his favorite felines till it was settled in your palm. “Not right now…but listen, Levi’s not…doing well. Please, be careful.” 

“What happened to him?” 

He straightened, obviously wanting more of your attention but turning serious. Sure, they all taunted and joked around with each other, fought with each other, said they couldn’t stand each other, as siblings are wont to do, but even Satan seemed upset when he spoke about his older brother, a special sort of worry swirling deep behind his eyes. Once he told you, you stood straight up, stomach churning. You gave Satan’s hand a kiss before dropping it, sprinting out of his room as fast as you could. 

Nothing prepared, no plan in your mind, you approached Levi’s room quickly. If what Satan had said was true…Satan wouldn’t lie about something like this. Which meant…Levi…You threw the door open, not even bothering to knock, which yeah, was kinda rude, but you couldn’t help it, you were riddled with concern. It was a good thing you did too, because he was doing worse than you had imagined. “Oh god…Levi…” You whispered, almost losing the strength in your voice at the shock. 

Unlike his other two brothers you’d visited so far, he seemed to have taken no steps to take care of himself from earlier. You could hardly blame him though, seeing him like this, clothes still filthy from the flight, covered in dirt and…blood. His blood. It was all over his face, matting his hair, coating his eyelids. His hands were also covered in it, clawing at his scalp, rolling around on the floor in pain, silently crying. Had he been this way for hours? And no one bothered to tell you? No one bothered to take care of him this way?! It hit you suddenly, that perhaps no one was here to help Levi because no one could. Were all the others this way?...Or were the ones you had yet to see even worse? 

Glancing at him was enough to figure out a list of what he needed. Sneaking back into Asmo’s room, you were at the very least pleased to see that the medicine bottle had a smidge less of its contents, meaning Asmo had taken some for the pain. This was what Levi needed now. You held onto it carefully, allowing yourself to look at Asmo’s sleeping face for only a split-second before leaving Lust to his beauty sleep. You dashed around the house in nearly a panic, gathering a few other things until your human arms couldn’t carry anything else. You returned to Levi’s bedroom, shutting the door behind you with your foot, nearly dropping all the items on the floor beside him, careful not to break any of the valuables. “Levi?” You spoke gently, voice filled with compassion and yet sorrow. You hated seeing him like this. You frowned as the demon continued to squirm, gasping, unable to focus on anything other than the unimaginable pain he was going through. You almost reached out to touch his head, but that would’ve been the worst idea right now seeing as how…his horns were gone. 

Heart breaking in pieces, you grabbed his wrists, trying to prevent him from causing any more damage to his head. Although his eyes were still closed, he reached out for you, gripping your clothes so tightly, he ripped holes in them with his fingers. “Help me…” He cried, not embarrassed at being caught this way, just desperate for some relief, for someone to care for him when he could not. 

“I am…I’m here,” you assured him, placing your arms under his, suddenly doing your best to slightly pick him up, dragging him over to his wall so you could prop him up against it. Somehow, you did this successfully, the adrenaline in you giving you strength you didn’t know you had. Fumbling with the medicine bottle, you poured the proper dosage into the cap. When Barbatos had given this to you, you almost laughed, ready to question why it was a liquid kind rather than in some capsule form. Now you answered your own question. Levi was hardly in a state well enough to consume this much, you didn’t want to imagine the kind of pain you would have put the both of you through if you had tried to get him to swallow a pill. Keeping him still with a hand against his face, you told him to open his mouth, dumping the medicine past his lips. 

Magically, it seemed to almost work as soon as he swallowed it. His twitching lessened, his breathing not as shallow. “MC?” He muttered your name weakly, trying to open his eyes, but finding that his dried blood had essentially sealed his eyes shut. It’s a good thing you brought a rag and a little bowl of clean warm water. 

“It’s me,” you confirmed, getting the rag wet and brushing it over his face, working on clearing up the eyelids, getting it off his eyelashes. Soon, his tears were no longer limited to slipping from the corners of his eyes. They dripped down his face, streaking down more grime as they did so. You were quick to wipe that all away, getting his face clean, trying to ignore the way he was rubbing his head against the wall. Although doing so seemed to bring him some relief, as long as he didn’t accidently touch the two bloody nubs just barely peeking above his blue-hair. After you’d cleaned his face, the medicine, your presence, and the steady motion against the cold wall had his crying stop completely. Now he simply seemed two steps away from passing out, and while you knew he desperately needed sleep after all that, you did hope you could get him fully clean before then. “Let’s try to get you to the shower, come on.” You took both his hands, leaning your full body weight back, persuading him up on his feet. 

A small wave of despair flooded over you from him as a little bit of his negative personality came through. “Gross…” He muttered, hardly having the energy in him to speak. “And dir…dirty…” He did get up eventually, almost falling forward, leaning a ton of his dead-weight on you instead. 

“I know, Levi, I know…We’re going to work on you getting clean. I’m going to need you to try to stand up though…or we’ll both fall…” Your legs were already shaking at the added pressure. Demons sure were heavy…He managed to find the strength to carry himself, holding your hand tightly as you led him through the doorway to his room. He kept wobbling, unbalanced on his own feet. Was he that exhausted or…was the sudden loss of horns on his head throwing off his entire natural stability? You tugged him away from the doorframe he was about to walk straight into, carefully and slowly leading him towards the House’s main bathroom. 

Despite being really out of it, he suddenly seemed to realize where you both were as soon as the bathroom door closed you both in. “I…I…I…” Was all he could stutter. You grabbed one of the bathroom’s chairs – an interior design choice you always questioned, but one you were grateful for now – and settled him in one, working to pull his dirty hoodie off, some of your fingers brushing over the blue scale-like details in his skin. Finally, this last act was enough to bring him almost fully to his senses. “Don’t!” He held onto his clothes while you had brought them nearly fully off, the fabric bunched up over his head, covering his face. “I…I can do it…I’ll be out– be out soon…” 

You allowed yourself to take a breath, thinking about the fact that you were essentially tearing off his clothes. Shaking your head, trying to gather yourself and your own senses, you agreed. “Okay…just remember no shampoo or anything, alright? I’ll bring you clean clothing and be right outside the door.” He didn’t exactly have the power to deny you, so he just agreed with a groan, pulling his hoodie off the rest of the way, letting it fall to the floor. Giving him his privacy, you left the room, turning back down the hall to gather Levi some clean clothes. You didn’t really know how to treat broken horns…Satan had briefly explained enough to assure you that they would grow back, it would just be extremely uncomfortable to say the least. You had to just hope that you were doing enough…and if you could help Asmo and Satan recover, they could probably help the others in ways you could not. One step at a time though. Folding up a set of clean and soft clothes, you hurried back to the bathroom, giving it a small knock. “Levi, I’m going to open up the door enough to put these inside, okay?” 

“F–Fine…” It was faint, but you heard it, opening the door just wide enough to settle the clothes on the floor before shutting it again, resting your forehead against the wood. There was silence other than the sound of rushing water. Then there was a little squeak as the showerhead turned off, a few stray drops striking the floor. You then heard him shuffling, moaning a little bit in pain as he worked to get himself dressed. As you finally took a step back from the door, it opened, Levi grasping on the door handle, his fresh clothes you’d brought him clinging to his still-soaking body. 

You sighed a bit and pointed to the chair that had remained in the place you’d left it. “Sit,” you demanded, careful not to let the magic of the pact work its way in your words. With how weak he was, you didn’t want to force his body to do anything. Levi looked at you with wide eyes before lowering his head, almost whimpering, sitting in the seat. You stepped inside, finding a soft towel, beginning to run it over his body. This was probably a useless gesture. The brothers had already explained to you that temperature, little things like staying wet, they weren’t that hazardous to demons. Yet, you couldn’t help but do it anyway, getting his arms and his legs, his neck. His hair still had a decent amount of dried blood in it, but you’d have to worry about that later. Even just touching his hairline almost had him flinch. “Okay,” you told him once you felt satisfied, going over one last spot with the towel as you cleared the water from dripping into his eyes. “Let’s get you to bed.” 

He had no complaints at that, letting you drag him back to his bedroom. It probably wasn’t needed, but you held onto his shoulders as you helped him hoist himself into his strange nest of a bed. He immediately curled up into it, a sigh leaving his chest as he finally seemed to have a reprieve from constant pain. You unfurled one of the blankets you’d brought from your room, the one he always seemed to tug away from you if he spent the night in your room. Pulling it over him, he finally looked up at you, eyes almost wavering with emotion as he gripped at the comforter. 

“Get lots of sleep. I’ll bring you food when you wake up as well as anything else you need.” You wished you could stroke his head, petting him softly. You’d have to resolve yourself to rubbing his arm instead. “Do you know if any of your other brothers really need my help right now?” You could only start to imagine what the others might be going through in silence. Levi suddenly looked frightened as he began to recall the others. He raised his head enough to speak clearly, a pleading sort of squeak in his voice. “B-Beel.” 

You steeled yourself as you approached the twin’s room. On one hand, this would be an opportunity to take care of two brothers at once. On the other hand, you knew you would suffer seeing the state the two youngest brothers were in. Levi had finally passed out as soon as he uttered his brother’s name, unable to stay awake any longer, so you had no idea what afflicted Gluttony and Sloth. Beel had shown up to breakfast at least. Yet, you had to wonder if any injury was enough to keep him away from food. He’d probably be hungry now…maybe you should’ve made him something. Best to check on them first though while you were here. 

At least you knew the twins were not as likely to turn you away as the others. Beel didn’t have that sort of stubbornness in him, and he was hardly embarrassed by anything. Belphie might initially be irritated, but he was the spoiled one. He would probably quickly change his feelings as soon as he knew you would do anything for him. A little sigh came out of you as you gathered yourself. A few of your knocks seemed to echo down the quiet halls. With these two, you announced yourself without hesitating, hoping to hear a voice on the other side. “Beel? Belphie? It’s me. Can I come in?” Nothing. Not too surprising actually. Perhaps they were both asleep? That would be a preferable scenario. “I’m coming in,” you warned, pausing for a few seconds before pushing the door open. 

The room was dark, a slight glow coming from the sun and moon decals behind the twin’s bed. It allowed you just enough light to keep from tripping on your own feet. The first thing you noticed was surprisingly Belphie’s bed. Empty. But not even just devoid of a demon, empty entirely. Pillows, blankets, stuffed cushions, even the sheets, all tugged off Sloth’s bed in what appeared to be a fit of frustration. Nothing was damaged but the mattress was bare, the nest Belphie usually slept in was in heaps on the ground. Luckily, Beel’s bed was not in the same state, a large lump under the covers, a few ginger tufts sticking out from the blanket’s hem. He usually snored, but it didn’t seem to be the case this time, which had you wondering if he was awake or not. He was, however, wheezing a little, each breath taken in shakily and painfully. You came over quietly, nervous about trying to tap him or shake him when you weren’t sure about the state he was in. So, you simply pulled down the comforter enough to see his face, rubbing the top of his head, assuming with imaginary crossed-fingers that he didn’t share Levi’s injuries. His eyebrows were scrunched in pain, but as soon as he felt your hand on his head, his eyes fluttered open. “MC?” 

“Hi, Beel,” you tried to grin, sitting next to him on the bed. “How’re you feeling?” 

“Huh?” His eyes closed again as he seemed to be thinking, humming once he came to a conclusion. “How did you know? I was told we weren’t supposed to tell you.” 

So this wasn’t some unanimous brotherly bond of secrecy? Which one of these stupid, pig-headed, prideful– ah, Lucifer told them all to hush, didn’t he? You’d have to give the eldest a scolding of your own later, even at the risk of your own health. It was what he deserved. However, that wasn’t your main concern at the moment. You nodded towards Beel. “Diavolo told me. So, I’ve been checking in on all of you. I’m here to take care of you. Anything you want– within reason –and I’ll get it for you.” 

Unlike his other siblings, Beel actually smiled. “I’m glad.” He tried to let out a relieved exhale, but only twitched in pain as soon as he tried. “Stuff like this doesn’t happen a lot. I’m sure some of them don’t know what to do…so I’m glad you’re here for them.” 

“I’m here for you too, you know,” you had to remind him. “Can you tell me what happened to you so I can help you?” 

Suddenly he frowned deeply, a sulking and guilty look crossing over his face. “I tried to help…but I ended up causing more problems for everyone…” He seemed one step away from crying, but managed not to, looking away from you instead. “Mammon was the distraction, but everyone could tell he was getting tired. I didn’t want him to get hurt so I…” He moaned a little as he took a breath to keep talking. “It ended up charging. I took the hit. I play Fangol, so I thought I could take it…but I…” He pushed the rest of the covers off him with one hand, the blankets folding up around his feet. You noticed that there were several little packets resting on his body. At least you discovered where the ice-packs were now. They appeared to all have melted though, deflated and warm. You’d have to put them back in the freezer. Beel pulled up part of his shirt, revealing the huge discolored bruises that covered his torso. He rested his hand beside him on the bed, trying to look at his own injuries with a little bit of confusion, like he wasn’t used to feeling this way. “Hurt my ribs,” he finally stated. “And it was all for nothing…my brothers all got hurt anyway…” 

“That’s not your fault, Beel.” With a kind hand, you turned his head towards you. “It’s not. You all did what you thought was best in the moment. You won’t start to feel better if you keep beating yourself up over it. Let yourself rest physically and mentally, okay?” You rubbed his head again, the gesture making him grin again. It was an act he mostly saw happen to his twin, so he was probably internally thrilled it was his turn this time. “Promise me you’ll rest.” 

“I’ll try…it’s hard though…I’m worried.” 

“About your brothers?” 

He slowly nodded. “Yeah…I know a lot of them got hurt pretty badly. Belphie seemed pretty restless earlier. I think that’s keeping me up too.” 

“So I take it you won’t be able to sleep till I take care of the rest of them?” 

Either he was taking this whole thing extra hard, or perhaps he heard the exhaustion that was beginning to creep into your voice. “Sorry…”

You tugged his shirt back down over his bruised body, picking up the multiple used-up ice packs that needed to be refrozen. “Don’t be, Beel. It’s nice that you care for your brothers that deeply. I’ve checked on Asmo, Satan, and Levi already. They’re on their first steps to recovery.” At that fact, a few lines of worry left Beel’s forehead. “I’ll put these in the kitchen for a little bit, make you a snack, and bring you some medicine, and then I’ll go take care of the rest of your siblings, okay?” 

At the mention of a snack, his stomach rumbled. “Please?” 

For a giant, muscular demon, he really could be adorable. “Of course. I’ll be right back, okay?” You tucked the covers around him for now, getting up to leave the room to finish up your new tasks. First off, the medicine you’d left in Levi’s room. You opened the door quietly, glad Levi was sleeping soundly. While you were here, you’d better find Satan’s tablet before Wrath got too impatient. Luckily, it was simply resting on Levi’s desk. Tucking that and the medicine under one arm, you left Levi to his dreams, rushing back down to Satan’s room. You were glad when knocking didn’t result in making him angry again. In fact, he didn’t respond at all. You were surprised to find Satan fast asleep when you took a peek inside his room. You couldn’t help but smile a bit at his peaceful face, setting down his tablet on his nightstand, leaving him to head to the kitchen. 

As you opened the kitchen door, you nearly walked into someone else. The demon blinked. “Beel? Oh…you’re not Beel.” 

“Belphie!” You were a bit comforted at the fact that he seemed to be walking around just fine. “What’re you doing in here? Shouldn’t you be resting?” 

“Looking for Beel…” He muttered, his eyes glazed over with pain and exhaustion, and yet despite that and being Sloth, he didn’t seem up for sleeping just yet. 

“He’s up in your room. He’s been there since breakfast…did you not notice him?” You walked around the demon for a moment, trying to multitask, putting the warm ice-packs in the freezer. You placed down the medicine on the counter, pulling out a few things to make and bring for Beel. Something easy to eat. 

“I don’t…remember…my head hurts…” Belphie lowered his head, looking away from the light in the room. 

He was acting a bit odd… “Come sit down for a minute,” you coaxed, coming over to take him by the shoulders, making him sit down at the kitchen island. “If your head hurts, take some medicine. Here.” Like you had done for Levi, you poured the medicine in the cap, holding it out for Belphie to take. Rather than taking it in his own hands, he parted his lips slightly, waiting for you to do it for him. Like you said earlier…spoiled. You couldn’t help but chuckle just a little bit as you gave him the medicine, turning your back to him to wash the cap again. Your humor was short-lived as you heard him rush out of his seat so fast, he knocked the chair over. “Belphie?” You turned just in time to watch him bend over a trash can, purging the medicine you’d just given him. Almost dropping what you’d had in your hand, you rushed over to his side, keeping him steady as he continued to be sick, a few coughs and cries between heaves. 

Once he was done, he fell to the ground, using the fabric of his sleeve to wipe off his lips, pressing his forehead against the cold floor. “What’s…wrong…with…me?” 

A headache, light sensitivity, restlessness…nausea…As you hurried to grab him a cup of water, you tried to connect the symptoms to something. Although, it’s not like you were a demon doctor or anything, how were you supposed to know for certain? You did have a guess though…You knelt beside him, grabbing his arm to pull him up upright just enough so he was sitting up against a cabinet. You tried getting him to hold the glass of water, but he kept batting you away. “Belphie…drink some. Here, take sips.” You supported the back of his head, making him drink in little doses before you felt satisfied. “I’m sorry for making you take the medicine when your stomach was upset…I had no idea.” You frowned, trying not to lecture yourself too harshly, gently placing the back of your hand on his forehead. 

At the touch, he collapsed forward, his arms wrapping around you, keeping you in a death-like grip. “So…tired…where’s Beel?” 

It would be bad if he fell asleep on you like this…You wouldn’t be able to leave…”I just told you…in your room. Did you hurt your head, Belphie?” Could demons get concussions? This seemed close to that, whatever it was. You rubbed his back at the risk of lulling him to sleep. 

“I…think so…” 

“Poor Belphie…” You couldn’t help but say aloud, letting him squeeze you a bit. “Let’s take you to bed. Can you stand up? I can’t carry you…” 

“Bed?...” 

“Yeah, in your room. A nice soft bed. I just need you to stand up for me…” After a bit of processing, he managed to stand…although he was still holding onto you, only shuffling his feet whenever you moved. His head rested in the crook of your neck, arms around your waist. He was making everything a lot harder…but if this is what he wanted…Placing a few snacks and the bottle of medicine on a tray, you somehow managed to hold onto it while having Belphie cling to you like his life depended on it. “Let’s go…” This would be an adventure. Each step you took towards the twins room, you felt more of Belphie’s strength leave him, leaning on you a little harder the further you got. By some miracle, you both made it, trying to not collapse to the floor while almost fully dragging Belphie around. 

As you opened the door, you noticed Beel brighten at the sight of you two, holding his sides as he sat up. You almost warned him against it, but if he was going to eat, better to do it upright. You weren’t sure if you’d be able to give a demon a Heimlich Maneuver if he started to choke. “Belphie! You found him.” 

Gritting your teeth a bit, you managed to pull the mentioned twin further into the room, settling the tray on Beel’s lap. “Yeah…he’s not doing so well…Can you take him off of me so I can make his bed?” 

Beel’s face fell a little bit, ignoring the snacks for now, grabbing both of Belphie’s arms, having to pry his twin off of you. You stretched a bit as soon as the weight left your shoulders. “Thanks…” Time to tackle this mess of a bed now…At least you knew Belphie wasn’t exactly picky when it came to his sleeping spots. Still, you wanted to do your best. You worked on finding the sheets first, tugging them over each of the corners. You heard the twins muttering to each other behind you, both of them trying to support each other in their own ways despite being injured. It warmed your heart, giving you a bit more energy to keep going. After the sheets were on, you threw all the cushions, letting them settle wherever they fell, spreading out the blankets and tucking back one of the corners. “Alright, Belphie, let’s tuck you in.” 

The youngest’s knees were on the floor, the top half of him resting on Beel’s bed, his body slowly slipping towards the ground. You came over behind him, hands on his sides, trying to pull him up and over to his bed. “I want…to stay…with Beel…” 

“I think it’s best if you stay in your own beds for now…” Although you were pretty tempted to do whatever he asked. Especially since he sounded so broken-hearted over leaving his twin despite only being a few feet away from him. “What if you hurt his ribs while trying to hug him? Or what if you accidentally hit your head against something since you’d be cramped trying to stay in the same bed? Once you both feel better, you can sleep wherever you want.” He didn’t really fight you, huddling up into a little ball on his bed once you’d guided him into it. You made sure only the softest of his pillows were placed under his head as you tucked several blankets around him, hoping he could sleep despite the pain he was in. 

“He looks worse than I remember…” Beel whispered from his own bed. 

“I think he must’ve hit his head pretty hard sometime during the fight,” you shared, trying to get Belphie to fall asleep by rubbing circles into his back over the blankets. “He was wandering around looking for you, and then threw up the medicine when I gave it to him. I’ll try to have him take some again after he sleeps. Maybe his stomach will settle by then.” 

Suddenly, Beel found it hard to eat his snacks, like he could feel his brother’s nausea as his own…or maybe he found it hard to enjoy himself while all his other siblings were suffering. He still managed to eat, just slowly, the two of you sitting in relative silence for a bit, observing Belphie as his eyelids struggled to stay open, finally shutting and remaining still. “MC?” Beel called your name softly, waving you over. You got up and approached him, an eyebrow raised. He surprised you as he took your face in his hands, pressing his forehead against yours. “You’re the best. I’m glad we have you looking after us…Thank you.” 

“You all can thank me by getting better as quickly as you can.” You kissed his cheek, pulling away from him with a hand settled on one of your hips. “Try to rest too if possible. Leave your brothers to me…and let me know if you or Belphie need anything.” 

“Okay,” he agreed, some worry leaving him now that his twin was back in the room, knowing that the others had you caring for them. He stifled a yawn, still unable to take deep breaths. “And MC?” He made sure to address you before you left the room. You looked over your shoulder at him. “Look after yourself too, okay? You already look tired.” 

You were…but you were far from being done…but, yes. You wouldn’t be much help if you got hurt from pushing yourself too hard. “I will, Beel. Don’t worry.” 

Only Mammon and Lucifer remained unchecked. Out of the two of them, you figured you’d save the most problematic for last…which meant you’d head to Mammon first. While Lucifer did have a special soft-spot for you, if he was hurt, it meant his Pride was doubly wounded. There was little chance he’d let you into his room. Maybe Mammon would have some idea on how to convince the eldest to let you in, and you could care for the second-born in the meantime. You were a bit worried though…Despite his grumblings, Lucifer always looked after his siblings. So why…when they needed it the most, was Lucifer nowhere to be found? He had sent that message to the members of Purgatory Hall to ensure you’d make it to RAD safely, and that was it. There had been no sign of him since then. Focus, you encouraged yourself, pacing in a little circle in front of Mammon’s door before channeling your inner Lucifer and knocking sternly. Silence. 

Somehow, despite having been met with similar disappointing responses several times today, Mammon’s missing voice sent a chill down your spine. There was no grumble, no yelp, no noise inside his room whatsoever. “Mammon?” You opened his door to spy inside. You were a quick jumble of conflicting emotions. The quietness was simply due to Mammon being completely absent from his room and not because he was so hurt he…For that you were grateful…and yet…where in the world was he?! If he was hurt, now was not the time to be out! You could only hope he was still inside the house…You’d have to go find him. 

Trying to remain quiet enough not to disturb the others attempting to rest, you sprinted through the house, checking every room you came across, playing this weird and stressful game of hide-and-seek you didn’t remember signing up for. Maybe the couches in the common room? No. The music room? Sadly not. The library? Not unless he had hidden himself amongst the books…Think, think! This was Mammon. If he wasn’t in his room, where would he be?...You closed your eyes, hands pressing against your temples as if you could squeeze the information into your brain. And then…an idea. Running back through the hall, you made your way down past the brother’s bedrooms and towards your own. He always did say your room was practically his own as well, seeing as how he was there so often. You had found your room empty when you grabbed the blanket for Levi, so it had almost slipped from your mind. But there was always the possibility Mammon had snuck in there while you were off helping the others. 

There it was…your door just ahead of you…opened by a crack when you had sworn you shut it completely when you’d left. He had to be there. Taking a moment to catch your breath, you padded slowly up to your bedroom, pushing the door open softly. Hair covering his face, breathing in little gasps, Mammon was resting at the end of your bed on his back, legs dangling off the mattress. You nearly jumped on your bed beside him, trying not to jostle him too much, touching the side of his face as you observed his split bottom lip. “H–hey,” he rasped, either having been awake the whole time or suddenly up at your touch. “You’re not–” His head tilted back as he groaned, biting his lip tightly, making the split in his lip worse, some of his blood dripping down his chin. 

“You’re hurting yourself,” you lightly scolded. “Don’t bite on your lip like that.” 

You could tell he attempted to look at you with annoyance, but it fell very short, looking like a beg instead. “Don’t…tell me what to do…” 

You had several things you wanted to say to that, most of them sarcastic, but you could tell he didn’t need that right now. “We should get you back to your room…” Running your fingers through his hair, you felt how cold his skin was…You wedged a hand under one of his shoulders, ready to help push him up, only to hear him shout in pain, his cry so sharp it rang in your ears. 

“Don’t move me!” He panted, cold sweat running down his forehead now in little beads, gulping down the pain. “Don’t…move me…” He repeated it, quieter this time. 

Hearing him like that forced tears to prick your eyes, but you didn’t dare let them fall. “Why’d you come in here then if you were hurt that bad?!” You couldn’t help but raise your voice a bit, the tone almost breaking in a little bit of panic. He looked worse for wear…beyond that, even.  

“Heh…” It was a mix between a whine and a chuckle. “I’m the stupid one…remember?” That appeared to be his only answer. He turned his head away from you and closed his eyes. “Just leave me here…yeah?” You wanted to do something, wanted to say something, but you suddenly found yourself at a loss. What should you do? What had happened to the troublesome Greed to make him like this? 

“Where?...” You finally spoke, voice a little strained. “Where are you hurt?...How badly?” He didn’t respond, and for a moment, you were worried he had blacked out. But then slowly, he reached for your hand, weakly holding it in his own. 

“Badly…” 

“Where?” You asked again. 

There was a wheeze as he tilted his head towards you again, the life draining from his face, blinking slowly. “Got me…right in the chest…’batos patched me up, but…hurts like hell…” He tried looking you in the eyes, but cast his gaze away quickly, probably embarrassed at the way he looked right now. ‘Not cool at all’, he would probably say under normal conditions. Gradually, despite his stubbornness, he lifted up his shirt. His chest was tightly bound in bandages, three large lines of blood bleeding out through the cloth. He’d been cut…or clawed at was probably the better term. Greed was selfish, ‘scummy’ most called him, and yet, he took a deep and painful breath, using up energy he didn’t really have to ask you a specific question. “How’re the others?” 

“I’ve been helping them as much as I can…” 

“Lucifer?” 

“I haven’t seen him yet...Is he bad?” 

He licked at his dry lips, swallowing some nervousness. “Don’t…tell him I told you…” His eyes looked around like he was worried his older brother might pop out of the walls. Once he figured he was safe enough, he sighed. “Idiot’s worse than I am.” 

The words struck you harshly, leaving you feeling almost numb. “Worse? He seemed almost fine when you all came home.” 

“That’s pride for ya…” 

Your head lowered, trying to ignore the worry pounding in your chest. One step at a time… One brother at a time…Now was not the time to sulk. “If we can’t get you to your room, let’s at least try to straighten you out…” 

“You’re askin’ a lot of me here…” It came off as a little bit of a joke, Mammon mentally preparing himself. “The Great…Mammon will move for ya…You might have to help a little though.” He gestured towards his feet, having you grab his ankles to swing him around vertically. Meanwhile, he dug his elbows into the mattress, pulling himself up to where your pillows were. Unlike before, he kept himself from shouting this time, probably to save some face. However, now his body was slightly trembling, pain wracking his body. 

“You did it,” you praised, tugging the remaining blankets out from under him so you could place them over his body. You pet his head, trying to dab away some of his sweat with the corner of the covers. “Good job…” You noticed your own hands were shaking. “...Hey…you’ll be okay, won’t you?” Finally, without your permission, you felt some tears slip from your eyes. “You’re not going to die on me, are you?”

The corner of his mouth twitched in a smile. “Nah…It’ll take a lot more…than some measly scratches…to do me in.” 

“Promise?...” 

He reached a hand up to brush away one of your tears, only to quickly lose the strength, his arm dropping limply to his sides. “I promise. I wouldn’t lie to ya. Give me a few days…and I’ll be right back on my feet.” You didn’t mean to doubt him, but you’d have to contact Diavolo to double check. Although, if Barbatos truly was the one to mend these wounds, you doubted he would’ve let Mammon go if he was in critical condition. 

“Barbatos gave me medicine for the pain. I’ll go get it for you, okay?” You ran your hand up and down his arm. “Do you want anything else?” 

 “Eh…if you’re askin’, some water would be nice.” 

“I can do that!” You didn’t mean to sound so enthusiastic, but if that’s all he wanted to feel better, you could do that easily. It made you feel a little less useless in this situation. “I’ll be right back!” Thank goodness the kitchen was right next door, although you left the medicine in the twin’s room…Maybe at this point, you should just have it strapped to you, since it seemed everyone needed some, making you run back for it all the time. At least it gave you an excuse to peek in on the twins again. Heading to the room first, you tip-toed in. Both twins were asleep. Now, you weren’t necessarily the prayerful type, but even you were tempted to slip in a little thank-you to the universe or whoever else might be listening. You grabbed the bottle of medicine once more and bolted back downstairs. In this situation, you would’ve been tempted to fill up the fanciest glass for Mammon, but if he could hardly move…a glass probably wouldn’t cut it…What did they have in here? You rummaged through the shelves and cupboards, looking for something that might be more useful than just a glass. Ah! One of Beel’s sports water bottles! It was one of those kinds where you hit a button and a little straw pops out. If only it wasn’t so large…oh well. Beggars can’t be choosers. You filled it up with filtered water, leaving enough empty space so if you were to tilt it, water wouldn’t come spilling out. Then you made your way back to Mammon, almost out of breath with as fast as you had been moving. You crawled up in bed on your knees, already in the process of pouring him some medicine. “Here…” You could only hope he wouldn’t be sick like Belphie. You helped him tilt his head up, pouring it into his mouth, watching him grimace. 

“Awful stuff…” Although, like for Levi, it started to take effect immediately. He took a moment to himself, breathing clearly, his body no longer shuddering. Then as the pain subsided, he started to realize just how dry his throat felt. “Water,” he demanded, a little bit of warmth coming to his cheeks…thank goodness. “Please,” he added. 

You handed him the water bottle and watched as he greedily chugged it down, almost emptying it entirely. “Easy!” You warned. “Don’t make yourself sick.” 

He gasped for air once he had gulped down enough, already looking worlds better than when you had found him, although he still was looking rough. “--’is the best water…ever had…” 

You sighed, releasing a ton of tension you’d been holding in your lungs. “It’s a good year…Vintage.” Not the best joke you’d ever made, a pretty terrible one actually, but one you shared nonetheless. Anything to break the tension. 

A breathy huff left his nostrils, the best he could manage for a laugh while his chest was in tatters. You suddenly felt his fingers weave through yours, holding your hand as he closed his eyes. “Thank you…” 

You brushed some of his hair away from his eyes, feeling the temperature in his skin begin to return to normal. “You’re welcome…Get some rest. Please don’t move rooms while I’m gone.” 

“I won’t…” He cracked one eye back open. “Gonna see Lucifer?” 

“I’ll…try. If he’s worse off than you are, I have no idea how he’ll let me even near him.” You rubbed your thumb comfortingly against Mammon’s, thinking as you frowned. These demons…You felt like your already shorter-in-comparison life-span was shrinking even further at the stress. 

Mammon hummed a little bit, releasing his hand so you could go, although you felt his hesitation. He didn’t want to let you go, but he knew he had to. “If he’s doin’ what I think he’s doin’, he’s in recovery mode right now. He’s shut himself down to heal as fast as he can to not disappoint Diavolo.” One of his fingers raised to point towards your door. “His door is probably locked, but I know Lucifer keeps an emergency Master Key somewhere in his office.” 

That sounded like a lot of work for something Lucifer would probably hate you for rather than be grateful. Intruding his office just to further intrude his bedroom after he locked it…If anyone knew what he was doing, it would be the eldest…Maybe you should leave him be. “Sounds pretty scheme-y.” Mammon almost looked wounded at that…joke not intended. “He’s the strongest out of everyone…He probably doesn’t need my help.” 

“MC…” Mammon pulled at the sleeve of your shirt, his eyes suddenly glaring at you with an unusual firmness. “Did ya not hear what I said? He’s shut down. If I can hardly move, there’s a good chance he can’t either. There’s no way he can take proper care of himself right now. ” He let go of you as he realized that he wasn’t exactly being clear. “Listen, he took a heavy hit for Diavolo. Got his wings messed up pretty badly. He was so stunned, he probably didn’t even know how badly he was hurt till he got home. If he’s not checking up on us, that means he’s unable to.” He went quiet for a moment, pressing his lips together, looking at the ceiling to your room like he was trying to sense something. Maybe he could. Maybe he had some sort of connection to Lucifer you hardly heard about, or maybe Mammon just could easily guess after having been around him for so long. “I hate to imagine it, but I have a bad feeling he’s completely unconscious.” 

“Damn Lucifer and his tenacity to keep things hidden!” Hissing to yourself under your breath, you went about Lucifer’s office like a little whirlwind. No cushion, no folder, no shelf was safe while you were on the hunt. You knew once he was better, you’d get a proper punishment from Lucifer for rummaging through his office, but you could cross that bridge when you came to it. Right now, there was a stubborn demon in desperate need of your help. Maybe you should’ve checked on him first. You knew something felt off about this whole situation. The little voices in the back of your head were trying to clue you in as soon as Satan expressed mild worry about the first-born. Yet, you had pushed those aside, because Lucifer was always so put-together. It was what choked Diavolo up during your little meeting. 

 “And it was because I was there that–” The prince had said. ‘Lucifer was wounded’, you could finally finish that statement with your own conclusion. You pounded your palms down on Lucifer’s desk, your head low, wishing that things were different. If you were smarter, you could’ve found the key by now. If you were stronger, you could simply break Lucifer’s door down by force. If you weren’t just a human…maybe you could’ve gone and fought with them. But then you would’ve gotten hurt too…you had to tell yourself. 

You sat in Lucifer’s office chair, imagining him lecturing you. ‘Pitying yourself over circumstances you have no control over is a waste of time and effort,’ he’d probably say. He would be right. Although since this was you thinking it, technically you were right. Getting frustrated wouldn’t get you anywhere. Since you were already in the process of thinking like Lucifer…where would he hide a key? Somewhere away from anything valuable for fear of Mammon finding it. So nothing near his records or anything he held dear. Being in or behind any books was probably a negative as well, just in case Satan came down to borrow some. Checking the cushions had perhaps been a waste of time, for if Belphie ever came in here to take a nap, he might knock it loose. Ugh, why did he always have to overcomplicate things? Wait…maybe that was it. Anyone who tried looking for the Master Key would probably try to think like he did, complexly. So maybe the trick was to think of this as simply as you could. Where would be a dumb place to hide something important like that? With a swift motion, you opened up one of his desk drawers, careful not to mess up the order of any important papers. Nothing. And while you did feel around for a fake bottom, you figured Lucifer’s brothers would be clever enough to check for that. Just…double-checking, following through with the ‘so-simple-it-hurts’ theory, you felt around with your hand pressed against the underside of the desk. This was probably another waste of time. The demon of Pride wouldn’t try hiding a key by just taping it under his…Your fingers brushed against cold metal. You nearly felt like screaming. With a firm tug, you pulled it free, twisting it between your fingers as you looked at it. Definitely looked like a master’s key. 

Giving yourself a few seconds to mentally settle, you took a deep breath. Then, not wasting any more time, you dashed from Lucifer’s office, scrambling through the House to make it to his bedroom. You knocked on his door simply to save your own skin. Lucifer was practically a lie-detector test. Later, if he was going to ask if you even attempted to knock first before breaking in, you could rest easy knowing you did...kinda. You nearly dropped the key trying to shove it in the proper slot, heart almost sinking when it didn’t turn as easily as you felt it should’ve. With a second, more firm try, the door clicked. You opened the door so hurriedly, you nearly stumbled inside. “Lucifer, I’m–” You had heard what Mammon told you, and yet somehow, despite being told directly that Lucifer was in a bad state, you had still half-expected to see him sitting up in bed by now, glaring at you with the fury of a thousand suns. Such was not the case. When would you learn that locked doors are locked for a reason? “--here…” You found yourself still finishing your announcement, 

The eldest was face-down on his bed, not even under the covers. One of his arms dangled from off the edge of his bed, hand still grasping a roll of bandages which had completely unrolled, trailing all the way off to the side. Black feathers rested in various places. Some on the floor, some over Lucifer’s unmoving body, some still fluttering down from his four unfurled wings. When Mammon had mentioned them being in bad shape, he wasn’t kidding. Each of his wings were held out, bent in ways they probably shouldn’t be, the feathers disturbed, the ones that were covered in blood were the ones that were doing him the favor of falling, like they were purging themselves of imperfections. Every so often, the silence would break with the sound of a snap. It sounded like someone was popping their fingers. It took you longer than it should to notice that Lucifer’s wings moved with that sound, albeit slightly. Was this…Were his bones fixing themselves that rapidly? In front of your eyes? You were a sickly sort of fascinated, although mostly sick. After a good few minutes had passed, you finally turned around, taking the master’s key and tucking it into your pocket, shutting the door so, at the very least, Lucifer had some semblance of the privacy he had hoped to keep. 

You walked closer to him, coming around the other side of the bed to see that his other hand was gripping his sheets tightly, his knuckles white the smallest hint of a tremble in his usually firm hand. It was probably unimaginably painful… Again, you had to stop and wonder what you as a human could do in this situation… You couldn’t heal him…but you could finish what he had started, since it appeared he blacked-out before he could finish. Starting with the more obvious details, you took the rolled out bandage and took it from his hand, picking it up off the floor. It would have to be disposed of now. You chucked it in a trash can, taking Lucifer’s hand that had held it and lifted it, resting his arm near his head. There was a little pause as you waited for that to wake him up. At this, he usually would’ve grabbed you, or at least turned his head at you. No. Nothing. Not even a change in his breathing. You were almost disappointed, but it was probably the best for you both if he stayed unconscious for now. Next, you took the shoes off his feet, tucking them neatly against the foot of his bed. You really tested how out of it he was after that by tugging his blanket out from under him, draping it over his legs 

Now what?...As you stood there, you noticed the bruising over his back, a few thin lines of dried blood suggesting that he had been clawed at too, only the flesh-wounds had already healed. He truly was powerful. Perhaps those ice-packs you’d put in the freezer were ready to be used again. Lucifer could use one. “I’ll be back,” you whispered, leaving him to his own devices for a little while as you headed down to the kitchen once more. 

As you opened the freezer, you prodded one of the ice-packs with your finger. Good enough. Gathering them into your arms, you noticed that you counted seven of them. Perfect. You stopped by Asmo’s first, going in the order you had taken care of them. He was still fast asleep. You removed the bag of frozen veggies you’d used as a last-ditch-effort, replacing it with a fresh ice-pack. Asmo moaned a little in his sleep, but did little more than that. Next was Satan, also resting, although it seemed he had woken up for at least a little while since you came in his room last, the tablet you’d left on his nightstand was now over his chest. Careful not to wake him up, you wrapped the ice-pack in a cloth before trying to tuck it in his sling, placing it over his arm. His eyebrows scrunched but that was all. Levi next. You guessed it, asleep. You settled his ice-pack on the top of his head. He tossed and turned a little at the disturbance, but didn’t open his eyes. You readjusted the pack as it began to slip from its place. Levi sighed aloud probably in relief. Now for the twins. 

The entire House was noiseless as its residents continued to slumber. They all looked comfortable, at least as comfortable as they could be. You yawned a bit. What time was it? Was it that late? Or was seeing all of the sins sleep making you tired? You carefully removed Beel’s blanket after you’d entered their room. He woke up at that. “I fell asleep?” 

You nodded, giving him a little grin. “Seems like it. Sorry to wake you up. I brought you one of these.” You handed him one of the remaining packs in your possession. 

“Thank you.” He settled it where the swelling seemed to be the worst, wincing. “Did you check on the others? Mammon? Lucifer?” When you nodded in silence, he seemed to take the message, although he already knew they weren’t doing great in the first place. He watched you head over to Belphie’s bed, observing you as you lifted Sloth’s head gently, letting him rest on the ice-pack like a little pillow. Belphie muttered something in his sleep, almost reaching out to grab your hand, but missing, his grasp holding tightly to his body-pillow instead. “Have you had time to rest yet?” Beel asked, voicing his concern with a little rumbling groan. 

“I will soon,” you assured him, coming back to ruffle the hair on his head. “I gotta finish looking after Lucifer.” 

He looked at you with such compassion. “When we feel better, I want to take us all out to eat.” 

“I can’t wait.” You pulled the blanket back over him, telling him to return to his rest before you left, circling back around to your room. Probably not the most efficient of paths, but the only one you could seem to follow. Mammon was out like a light, not even a twitch as you rested one of the packs in the middle of his chest. You noticed that the water bottle you brought for him was already completely empty. You’d refill it for him…and perhaps grab Lucifer one as well. “I’m back again,” you announced to the counters and cabinets. Did Beel even visit the kitchen this many times in one day?...Probably. You refilled Mammon’s container and pulled another identical one down for Lucifer. Thank goodness Beel got gifted so many of these for sports sponsorships. Water. Mammon. Dropped off. Back up to Lucifer. 

Once you got back to the eldest’s room, you rested for a second against his wall, taking a breather. “Every time something like this happens,” you spoke aloud, knowing Lucifer probably wasn’t listening, “I gain a new respect for you. Taking care of this many people is exhausting.” Placing the water on Lucifer’s nightstand, you sighed, wrapping this last final ice-pack in fabric to keep it from freezing his skin. Now you could stop thinking the word ‘ice-pack’ as it was starting to lose its meaning. Carefully, you approached Lucifer’s side, careful not to touch his outspread wings to place the bundle down along his spine. “Not even the cold will wake you, hm?” You tried looking down at his sleeping features, only to remember that he was completely face-down. “Can you even breathe like that? Honestly, when it comes down to it, you’re just as bad as the rest of your brothers.” Not even mild lectures worked, huh? You reached down, finding his chin, turning his head just enough so his face was partially exposed. His slightly parted lips seemed to breathe in the air a little easier. You brushed his hair away from his closed eyes. “There you go.” Your hand seemed to linger on the side of his face. He was so warm. Almost too warm. “Rest easier now.” Your thumb rubbed at his sharp cheekbone. “Your brothers, your worries, leave them with me.” You got away with pressing a kiss to his forehead. “Return when you are ready, and not a moment sooner, you hear me?...I’ll be back in the morning to check on you.” With that, you figured you had done what you could for the time being. You dropped your touch from him, quietly striding from his room, using the key to lock his door behind you. 

Hot…Why were you suddenly so unbelievably hot? You opened your eyes, trying to remember where you had last closed them. Ah, that was right, you had fallen asleep in the living room on one of the couches, not wanting to disturb Mammon’s sleep in your bed. Sure, you could’ve probably used greed’s own bed in return but…that didn’t feel right. However, when you fully opened your eyes, you were confused to find you were in your own room. Had you come here half-asleep or something? Or did… You raised your head, sitting up, or at least trying to sit up. Something, or someone was holding onto you. Actually, as your senses began to clear, multiple someone’s seemed to be keeping you in their grasp. Mammon was where you had left him on your bed, now to your left, holding your wrist in his hand. Belphie was to your direct right, clinging to your side. Beel was somehow right next to his twin, managing to fit himself on the small sliver of mattress that remained. Then there was Levi…curled up over all four of you, sleeping over the covers directly on your legs, wrapped up in the blanket you’d left for him. Satan was propped up against the wall at your feet, Wrath’s legs curled up to leave room for Asmo. The fifth and fourth-born were leaning against each other, keeping each other from falling over, a blanket loosely draped over the both of them. And then there was the eldest…seated in a chair beside the overstuffed bed, leaning forward to keep his back from touching the support of the seat, one of his arms outstretched, resting over both of the twins, his hand somehow managing to find yours in this mess of limbs. When they had gotten here, how they had gotten here, how you had ended up here, you had no clue. They were all asleep again though, still in the process of recovering. You had half a mind to wake all of them up, giving them a stern reminder on what it means to stay in bed! 

But no…you couldn’t do that. Not now. You’d let them have this moment, even if you were impossibly warm from all the body heat. Not that you could exactly break free from these demonic binds nor could you carry them back to their rooms. They had all probably come in one-by-one. You chuckled to yourself at the sheer ridiculousness of it, at all of them. “Sleep well, all of you,” you whispered. “Feel better soon.” 

[alldevilsarehere90]

May I request #2 and #18 with Daryl pretty please?

(Some Daryl whump if you’re feeling especially generous <3 )

Title: All I'm living for

Pairing: Daryl x female reader

Summary: Just when you finally got the man you wanted, another surprise could threaten your relationship, especially when a herd of walkers is almost at your door step.

Setting: Alexandria (between season 8 and 9)

Warnings: talk of pregnancy and motherhood, anxiety, crying, slightly suggestive, angst and fluff.

Word count: 4k

Prompts: "I'm pregnant ok, that's why I don't want to go on runs and that's why I've been avoiding you." "You can't be serious, that's suicide!"

A/N: I have never done hurt/comfort before, so I hope I've done it well. I did try to condense this one, only to end up making it longer haha. Enjoy!

The feeling of careful eyes on you, suspicious, narrowed and unwavering, and you knew just who they belonged to. Without even looking you knew, you knew he was trying to read you and you also knew you were not making it easy.

You and Daryl had shared a different kind of connection from the very first day you met, one so deep you were aware of the others presence before coming into view. The electricity that charged a room the two of you were in was undeniable. You'd had your time of pretending not to notice, that was…until terminus. You will never forget reuniting with him outside of their captive walls, the sheer relief to have him in front of you, holding him in your arms as he squeezed you in return. 

It was then you could no longer lie to yourself about how you felt. Lying to him, however, was surprisingly easy while you lived on the road, constantly moving from place to place, you hadn't had a moment to breathe let alone relax enough to think about it. 

Until Alexandria.

Then you spent too much time thinking. Overthinking. The timing was never right, or his mood never seemed to fit, or sometimes you just couldn't face the thought of rejection and losing his friendship in the process. 

Then came the saviours.

That's when everything changed, you no longer cared about being embarrassed or unrequited feelings. 

When he was captured by Negan you were filled with regret and it was all consuming. If only he'd known how I felt about him. If only I'd told him before this.

When he returned, he was a different person. It took a long while for him to open up to you and tell you his story. He needed time, that much was obvious but in this world we didn't have the luxury of that before something else needed our attention or our fight. 

You'd confessed one night, when you found him asleep in his basement room having a traumatic nightmare. His body jolted and his face contorted in pain, it hurt your heart in ways you couldn't even describe, in ways you didn't even think possible. He whispered your name and your hands were on him, gently stroking to rouse him from his horror.

He'd awoken with a start, eyes darting to all the dark corners in the room, reaching for his knife when he saw your silhouette.

"Daryl, it's just me." You said, hands up as you stepped into the moonlight seeping in through his small window.

His fright dissipated as he dropped the knife; clattering against the wooden floor. The tears in his eyes had you closing the space between you and wrapping him in your arms, he clung to you while he cried. 

That was the night you could no longer keep the words inside you.

His response had told you everything. He made love to you that night, drawing his name from your lips numerous times until the yellow of the sun streamed through his window. 

Since then, passionate kisses and delicate caresses only when you were alone, along with whispered words you'd only dreamt of…until a week ago.

You'd been off, that much was obvious to everyone in Alexandria. Knowing Daryl, he was probably obsessing over what he'd said or done to upset you, you could practically see it ticking over in his mind constantly and it killed you. Knowing it was you making him feel that way, knowing you were making him doubt himself, something he definitely didn't need any more help with but right now, you couldn't get out of your own anxiety; you couldn't see past it, as selfish as it was. 

The constant feeling of wading through mud, everything seemed harder and your mind felt slower than ever, you were drowning in it and nobody could pull you out of it. Especially Daryl and that was a first. He was the person you spoke to about everything but this…something this big and you couldn't bring yourself to tell him. 

Making the mistake of glancing over at the group discussing the herd of walkers travelling in this direction, only to meet his gaze and for a moment, you see a flash of hope in his eyes as he straightens up, rigid on his seat on the steps of the porch of your shared house.

Your body flinches but you force a smile as you look away again.

"Hey," a voice sounds behind you, making you jump.

Looking over your shoulder as you continue sharpening your knives, you're met with Aaron's sincere and concerned face. 

"Hey." You reply weakly, head down and focus back down on your task, relishing in the high pitched scratch the blade makes against your stone.

He slowly squats down next to you making avoiding his questioning gaze now impossible. "What's going on?"

You couldn't bring yourself to look at him, the tears pricked the corners of your eyes, making your vision blurred but you stayed attentive to your knives. "Nothing."

Sighing he placed a gentle hand on your leg, the notion a comfort you didn't want, knowing you would crumble right here in front of everyone. "You're not fooling me, I know you and I know when there's something troubling you," his thumb rubs small circles on your thigh, in his usual caring manner. "why don't you come over to my place and we can talk? And whatever it is, I'll be here to support you however I can." 

A lone tear fell onto your lap as you were careful to keep your eyes down. Aaron must have noticed as he gently took your hand in his and pulled you up discreetly, leading you towards his house. 

You were closest with Aaron, second to Daryl, he was someone you trusted with your life but this wasn't just about you. How could you share this with him when you haven't spoken to the one person who needs to hear it the most?

As soon as your back’s turned to Daryl and the rest of your group, you swipe at the warm tear that escaped, leaving a wet trail down your cheek in its wake. 

Sitting in Aaron's house, leaning back into the couch and feeling yourself relax slightly from the familiar comfort, worry evident in his eyes as he took the seat opposite you. "What's going on?"

Chewing your bottom lip, debating where to even start, not sure you can even find the words to explain how you feel. You're more than aware of how you should feel rather than how you do and yet, here you are, unable to even understand this pit that has formed, weighted and heavy inside you.

"Is it Daryl? Did something happen between you two?" 

You swallow the nervous dry patch scratching away at the back of your throat. "You could say that," mumbling in response.

Leaning forward, arms resting on his knees, eager to hear what's on your mind. "Did you tell him how you feel?" 

You could see it, the excitement blooming under the surface that he was trying so hard to keep restrained and to put him out of his misery by nodding in response.

"And?" His eyes wide with eagerness, almost cartoon like and under any other circumstances you would have laughed. "Did he upset you?"

Letting out an amused sigh as the idea was ridiculous in itself. "No, far from it." 

He smiled, seeming satisfied and leaning back against the chair. "Didn't I tell you he had feelings for you? You two are made for eachother." 

He registered your watering eyes and immediately joined you on the sofa, taking both your hands in his, waiting patiently for you to continue.

You swallow the nerves you feel rising in your throat like bile, burning your insides as they creep upwards. 

"It's me, I'm messing things up, not Daryl." 

The tears fall freely now, unable to ebb the steady stream down your face. "He's amazing and I don't deserve him for how I'm making him feel right now."

He rubs your back softly as you speak through your sobs. Regaining some ounce of your control in order to choke out the words that made you want to vomit. "I–," your stomach lurched at the thought of even saying those words. "I–," you sat up straighter assessing the churning of your stomach. 

"I think I'm gonna be sick." Your hand went straight to your mouth as Aaron managed to hand you a bin before your breakfast came up and out of you, your stomach pulling, retching until there was nothing left to bring up.

You hadn't noticed you were alone until Aaron walked back in with some tissues and a glass of water, to which you down greedily, feeling a thirst like never before.

Kneeling down in front of you rubbing your arms, he looks you over. "Are you…are you pregnant?" 

You nod, gently pushing the bin with your foot, wanting it as far away from you as your leg could reach before it had a chance to turn your stomach again. 

"Have you told Daryl?"

There it was, the loaded question you couldn't face. Your eyes met his; guilt and desperation radiating from them, telling him the answer before you had a chance to speak.

"Why not?" He frowned, sliding closer to you, holding your knees. It wasn't lost on you how he knew you responded best to touch. It made you feel safe and that was what you needed to open up.

Shrugging, not really knowing yourself and painfully aware of the cop out response you were giving. "I'm scared."

"Listen, Daryl would be a great father and–," 

"I'm not scared of that." You almost scoff, the idea of him being anything other than that is absolutely preposterous. "I know he'd want this baby, and I know he'd be an amazing father." 

You stop, taking a shaky breath, pulling the courage from inside you to speak the truth, "I'm scared of bringing a baby into a world like this, of being terrified all the time that something will happen to it, of being so afraid if something happens to me or Daryl and where will that leave the baby. People die all the time now. Look at Glenn and Abraham, Sasha…Carl. What if we come across another group like the saviours. What if I can't protect this baby?" Another pause and when you next speak your voice comes out like a haunting whisper, "what if I'm an awful mother?" 

You can't help but stand, pacing across the room as thoughts race into your head. Some old offenders and new. Your hands find anchorage in your hair as if that will stop your head pounding with unanswered questions.

"How can I fight walkers off with a screaming baby? You can't, it just goes against everything nature is throwing at us right now. I don't want to go out on runs, I don't want to leave these walls because it's not safe enough, how am I supposed to be useful anymore?"

Your feet finally find pause as your eyes search Aaron's face, pleading for some kind of resolution of all your worries.

He takes a few tentative steps towards you. "And you're worried you'd be a bad mother?"

Taking both your hands in his, he gives them a gentle squeeze. "You're already protecting this baby, you're already being her mother."

That silenced your wild thoughts for a moment. Every decision you've made recently was putting this baby at the forefront of your mind, even if that meant letting others down, that didn't matter anymore, only the safety of your baby and yet, you've failed to realise that until now.

While you processed his words, something else stood out to you. "Her?" 

He smiled, "I can just picture Daryl as a girl dad, that's all." 

Your heart swelled in your chest, fit to burst at the image of Daryl holding a little mini you. A little girl with your hair and his eyes. The scene flickered behind your eyelids like a movie, him smiling down at her while holding her tiny body, making his hands seem even bigger. As a child, teaching her how to track and hunt but letting her put makeup on him or play dolls with her. Then, as a teenager, dealing with hormones and mood swings and trying to fiercely protect her from heartbreak. The image had excitement blooming inside you.

"Listen to me," Aaron grew serious again, "it's terrifying, I know. I'm scared for Gracie constantly and she's not even biologically mine. But when I come home to her and she's safe, that's all that matters."

Aaron had taken to fatherhood like a duck to water, even whilst grieving for the loss of his beloved…Eric. 

"And look at our family here," he continued, "…they are always there to help and support me since Eric…" he trailed off and your heart panged for the sadness in his eyes, forcing a smile he continued. "Look how you are with Gracie and Judith, you protect them so fiercely, I know there isn't anything you wouldn't do for them."

You'd die to keep them safe, without question, like many others in your family would too. The support system you were lucky enough to have was incredible.

Suddenly, you stood here feeling rather foolish. Here this man in front of you was raising a baby on his own after the tragic death of his partner and here you are with the man you've wanted for years, ready and willing in front of you, plus the gift of his baby but almost throwing it all away. And for what? Because you're scared. God, you wanted to slap yourself and tell yourself to grow up.

You have everything most people want in life and yet, you're over here crying and worrying about things that you can't really change, a world you have no choice but to make the best out of, instead of being with the man you love and sharing this happy news with him.

You had the opportunity to be a complete family unit, how many people in this world got the chance at that?

Aarons eyes locked with yours, his wide and full of meaning, "Whether you realise it or not, you're already a mother."

Those words made your heart pound violently in your chest with purpose and validation. 

He was right.

You felt a lot brighter about this unexpected pathway your life had now taken and ready for the next step of talking to Daryl.

With a freshly splashed face you returned to the house you shared with some of your family members, Daryl's eyes on you instantly, chewing his lip as he anxiously played with his pocket knife.

Rick glanced round at you, a solemn look on his face you'd come to know well.

 "Just the person I was waiting for," he put an arm around your shoulder as you joined them. "Listen, I need your help, we've got a herd coming our way, the biggest yet."

All previous positivity diminished hearing those words. You knew you would all have a part to play in keeping Alexandria safe, the cost was unavoidable but who would be the one to pay the most?

"We have a plan…" 

You looked up at him sensing what he wasn't yet saying, "but?"

A slight grimace contorted his face, "but, you're not gonna like it."

You couldn't help your eyes rolling, wishing he would just get to the point. The anticipation was too much to bear, especially with your stomach churning again, through nerves or nausea you weren't sure. "Spill it."

He informs you of his plan. He had men out there building barriers ready and hoping their faith in Rick wasn't misled. 

Who was staying behind to fight them off at the gate? Who was going outside the walls to try and keep them in formation- you apparently? And who was going to try and lure them away? You knew the answer to the latter before the words had left Rick's mouth. Anxiety and anger bubbling and ready to erupt at any moment.

"Daryl's got the bike, he's offered to lead them away, as many miles as he can get them before turning round and coming back." 

Your head shot over in his direction.

"You can't be serious, that's suicide!" Your voice was loud enough that it shocked even you. 

Daryl's eyes were on you, a hint of relief before he concealed them to his usual blank glare.

"Ain't nuthin I ain't done before." He mumbled.

"Why do you have to do it alone? What if something happens to the bike? With all of them following you?" You were tense, your body coiled ready to spring into protect mode for him.

His response to shrug infuriated you fiercely, lighting a fire in your belly, something that must have been obvious as Rick's arm around you dropped and he gave you some much needed space.

"Can I talk to you?" You directed at Daryl, sharply. "In private." 

You stormed up the stairs of the house, hearing his slow footsteps follow behind and stomped down to his basement room, less chance of being heard in there.

"So now you wanna talk to me, huh?" He says kicking the shut behind him. "This what I have to do, to get your attention?"

Guilt stabbed you in the gut, nausea rearing its ugly head again but you pushed it aside needing to be brave and needing to do the right thing.

"I'm sorry." You started with simply, a look of surprise flashed in his eyes as he took a step towards you. "I'm sorry I've been…off. I was too in my head and too scared to talk to you about it because once I did then it would be real."

He looked down at his feet, face hiding behind his messy bangs, nervously chewing his lip, a sight that made you want to grab him in your arms and never let him go. "If ya changed ya mind 'bout us, it's fine, I get it."

You froze, heart aching that that was his first conclusion, before closing the distance, cupping his face in your hands and forcing him to look at you. "My feelings for you will never change, Daryl Dixon, don't you dare suggest otherwise."

He nods timidly, fighting a small smile before his brow furrows. "Have I upset ya?"

Shaking your head. "No. You haven't done anything wrong." 

"Then why ain't yer spoke to me all week? Yer ain't been near me or wanted me near yer."

The tears pricked your eyes, feeling like the worst person in the world for making him feel this way. He did not deserve this, he was the last person to deserve to feel like that.

"I'm pregnant ok, that's why I don't want to go on runs and that's why I've been avoiding you." You blurted out quickly before you had the chance to be distracted or interrupted.

His eyes popped as his frame stood frozen, unwavering and silent.

"I was scared," you continued, attempting to ease the shock. "and I didn't know how to tell you. It's all happened so fast." You sighed, the weight of the world removing itself from your tired shoulders. "I'm sorry for making you feel like it was something you'd done."

His hands came up to either side of your face, gently holding you in place, thumbs softly stroking your cheeks. "Are yer sure?"

You nod, eyes moving back and forth between his, "I found a pregnancy test from one of the stores on our last run and did it as soon as I got back." 

Watching the light of sheer happiness in his gaze illuminate his entire face made you exasperated with yourself for neglecting to tell him this long. How could you ever not want this man?

His hands still cradling your face pulled you close and his mouth was on yours, gentle yet urgent, with one arm wound around your waist holding you close, bodies pressed up against each other.

You had missed his hands on you, the warmth he radiated and his body close to yours. Heart hammering wildly, drumming against your ribcage so hard you were sure it was trying to escape to join Daryl's as one.

Breaking away only to catch your breath, foreheads still touching, your hands found their way around his neck, keeping him as close to you as you could. 

"'m gonna be a dad." He said quietly, a heart wrenching smile stretching across his face, a rare sight that you bathed in when it was present.

"You're going to be the best daddy." 

You knew hearing that meant more to him than anything else due to his relationship with his own father. 

His eyes sparkled as his gaze clicked with yours again, the intensity of it making you weak in the knees.

"I love yer." 

Breathing hitching, heart fluttering hearing those words from him for the first time, even though you knew it, it had never been uttered out loud.

"Now, how are you gonna tell me something like that when we have urgent work to do," you stroked a finger down his face, relishing the way his body shivered in reaction, "and I can't make love to you exactly the way I want to." 

He kissed you again more fiercely, growling as his mouth explored yours like a starved wild man.

"I'm yours as soon as I'm back." He rasped.

Reality came crashing down on you then, hitting you like a ton of bricks, suffocating you under their weight. "You're not doing this alone. I mean it, this time."

He nodded. "Fine, but ya ain't coming. I need yer here, behind these walls, keeping our baby safe."

You're about to put up a fight but nod, knowing it's pointless to argue with him. Besides, he wouldn't be able to focus on his job if he was worrying about you.

You would do what you could behind these walls unless it was vital.

You both head out onto the porch with the others, while Daryl goes over to Rick you take a seat on the steps next to Rosita, who mouths, "you ok?" Nodding and smiling in return, you squeeze the hand she puts atop yours.

Watching as Daryl whispers to Rick, his eyes meet yours with a flash of surprise followed by warmth, before composing himself somewhat. Clasping Daryl's shoulder before pulling him into a quick hug and turning back to the group.

Rosita turns in your direction but you ignore it and keep your eyes on Rick.

"Alright, I need someone to take a car and help Daryl lead the walkers away?" Rick asked, turning back towards you all.

"I'll do it." Aaron's arm shoots up and instant relief washes through you. The two people you trust the most helping each other out there, you felt much more comfortable about the situation now and didn't feel as sick knowing they would be out there together.

Rick calls your name, regaining your attention. "You'll be here on the wall with Gabriel, you're the best shooters we have. Do what you can from here to hold our walls."

You nod in agreement, before everyone breaks away to start getting ready.

Daryl's by your side in an instant, arm winding around your waist and pulling you to him. Your arms make their way around his neck as you memorise his face, every line, scar and curve. 

"I'll be back soon, ok?" He says quietly.

"Make sure you are." Standing on your tiptoes you kiss him passionately, relishing the way he tastes against your mouth, not caring that your family were watching.

"I love you." You whisper against his lips.

His answering smile makes your stomach flutter as he gives you one last kiss on the forehead before heading over to his bike. 

"Stay safe." You call out, hands clasped tensilly together in front of you.

"Always." He replied, turning around to face you and walking backwards. "Make sure you stay safe!"

You lifted two fingers up and crossed them over each other, making that silent promise to him, one you would do your all to keep. 

A hand squeezed your shoulder and when you saw Aaron's face next to you another pang of sadness and anxiety pulled your heart strings. 

"Stay safe, and thank you for going with him." You whispered as he pulled you into a hug.

"We'll both be home soon." His gaze turned serious as he held you firmly in front of him, "be careful."

He heads off towards the car, returning your attention to Daryl, who's mounted his bike and whose eyes are already on you. His stare fierce and yet loving, the way that man was capable of conveying everything he needed to in just one look never failed to surprise you.

A lump the size of a golf ball sat in your throat as you watched him start the engine, giving one last look back at you before he begrudgingly lifts his foot off the ground and let the bike take him. You watch the wings on his back carry him off until the gate closes.

Your chest felt empty, a giant hole still beating but with nothing inside, until he returns, bringing your heart back with him.

[whump-mania]

Hey if you’re still taking requests, can you write Team finding Leader Whumpee who is absolutely broken and terrified while Whumper just generally acts creepy towards said Leader Whumpee?

(Decided to do this with my Dark Leader characters!)

(TW for creepiness, LIGHTLY implied noncon but NOT explicit, I’ll keep it under the cut in case, guns, kidnapping, eye whump, blood)

previous / next

“He’s not in the basement!” Felix called out, running up to meet the rest of the team.

“Well find him! Look harder!” Quinn shouted, barging through every door they could.

Vincent was missing. The person who’d taken him had left a note, leading them to the coordinates of the abandoned house they were searching through. It was an obvious trap, but they didn’t care. Vincent needed to be saved, and they could fight off whatever rag-tag team decided to mess with them.

Kari and Damien were breaking down a door that was locked while Ian tried to pick other locked doors. Quinn used all their energy to shove through closets and cabinets to find their leader.

“Hey! There’s an attic!” Felix shouted, and the group ran over immediately. Felix was right—there was an attic, and it was cracked slightly open.

Quinn pushed through the others and tried climbing it, but Damien held them back. “Behind us,” he warned. “I know you wanna get up there for him, but you’re still pretty new…He’d wanna protect you.”

Quinn huffed and let the rest of them go up first. They were upset, but Damien was right. They were faster than they were strong. They needed to play to their strengths.

The team made it up into the attic and Kari shined a flashlight to look around. Almost immediately, they heard a muffled cry. Quinn jumped up and dashed toward the noise. “Vincent?! Is that you?”

Finally, the flashlight landed on what they were looking for. It was Vincent—and he was in horrible shape. His face was littered with bruises and cuts, and since he’d been stripped down to shorts, many other bruises and injuries could be seen on his body. He was gagged and blindfolded, tied cruelly with barbed wire by his wrists and ankles. Whoever did this to him had also cut his hair. His then thick, shoulder-length hair was now short and messy above his ears. Something that had mattered so much to him was gone and ruined.

“Oh my god—Vincent!” Quinn fell to their knees and tried untying him, but the barbed wire made it difficult.

“Come on, help me!” They cried over their shoulder, but gasped when they realized why it was so silent. The light flicked on in the attic. Each one of their teammates had been apprehended by a guard, a gun to their head and a hand over their mouth. What sort of team had the bodies and resources for this?

“Hi, Quinn.”

Quinn immediately tensed. That voice. They never thought they’d ever hear it again. They turned their head to see one of the subjects of their nightmares. Arguably, the worse of the two.

Hunter.

“Did you miss me, babe?” Hunter chuckled and crouched down to Quinn’s level. When he reached to grip what was left of Vincent’s hair, Quinn shot their hand out to stop him, but Hunter quickly countered with a small hand gun to Vincent’s head.

“Careful.” Hunter grinned at how Quinn immediately backed off. He continued his motion and pulled Vincent up by his hair, causing the man to groan miserably.

Hunter pulled Vincent so his back was held against his chest. In one hand, he lazily pet Vincent’s ruined hair. In the other, he held the gun with a deceiving grip.

“L-Let him go,” Quinn said shakily, their fear betraying them. They couldn’t look Hunter in the eyes, still. Weren’t they over this? Why were they such a coward?

“God, listen to yourself. ‘Let him go!’ Fucking adorable,” Hunter mimicked, laughing and letting out a long sigh. “Haha…no, I’m not gonna do that, Quinn.” He moved his hand to caress Vincent’s face, loving how the other man flinched.

“Stop it,” Quinn choked. They didn’t want to see the looks on their teammates faces. This was happening because of them.

Hunter was only fueled by Quinn’s words. He held the gun against Vincent’s head and moved his hand even lower to graze his throat, squeezing it threateningly for a moment before beginning to move down to his chest.

“Hunter, please!” Quinn finally looked up to meet Hunter’s eyes. They were crying now. “Listen, I…I know you did this because of me, so what’s the deal?! Just get it over with!”

Hunter relished in the eye contact for a moment before relenting and moving his hand back up to the man’s hair. A tear slipped through Vincent’s blindfold.

“You know, Daniel’s birthday is this weekend,” Hunter started casually. “I thought you’d be the perfect gift, but…I knew your captors would never let you go, so…” He pressed the gun harder against Vincent’s head. “I took care of it!”

“They’re not my captors. They’re my team. My family. More than you or Daniel ever were,” Quinn snarled.

“Uh huh.” Hunter sighed boredly. “Anyways…I’m gonna give you a couple of choices,” he continued. He addressed the rest of the team as well as he spoke. “Option one: I give Vince here back to you, and in return, you give us Quinn. Plus, neither of us will bother each other again. We won’t be allies, but…we won’t be enemies.

“Option 2, of course, is we take all of you. Dismantle your team from the ground up. Use you all for free labor, or…” Hunter chuckled. “Something along those lines.”

“Take me,” Quinn said immediately, to the loud and muffled protests of their team. “Take me, I-I don’t care, just leave them alone.”

Hunter smiled. “Okay, one vote for Option 1.” He nodded at the guards holding the others. “What does everyone else think?”

“If you take Quinn, you take all of us!” Kari shouted, met with sounds of agreement from the others. Quinn turned around, shaking their head.

“No, please!”

“And what does the big strong leader think?” Hunter untied Vincent’s gag and blindfold. Quinn and the rest of the team gasped when the blindfold fell down. The black fabric had hidden the blood. One of Vincent’s eyes was gone.

“Take…take us all,” Vincent croaked. Quinn screamed in protest.

“And that’s five to one for Option 2!” Hunter exclaimed. “Men, you know what to do.” He smirked deviously and flicked the light off in the attic. Quinn heard four shouts of pain before they were knocked out themselves.

tag list: @tears-and-lilies @whumpasaurus101 @whmp @freefallingup13 @sadistgalore @firewheeesky @authorofemotion @whatwhumpcomments @wingedwhump @mammonsemptycreditcard @eilarchswhump @whumblrwork @ficklefuddle @mylifeisonthebookshelf @lizzydizzyyo @whump-cravings @whumpcreations

[missathlete31]

Someone In Your Corner

Summary: Hangman, struggling to deal with his nightmares after the mission, goes for a run in the California heat. When he gets himself into trouble he finds a surprising ally on his side.

Aka if Maverick is MavDad meet DaggerMom

Hey look, yet another Jake Seresin Whump/Angst fic….. also known as the only thing I know how to write lol! Enjoy!

Two week after the Uranium mission and Jake "Hangman" Seresin was struggling. The Navy had given them all a month's worth of leave, a ridiculously long time in Jake's opinion but extremely sought after for all the others. There was a mandatory week of debriefs and discussions, most of which Jake hovered in the back and only answered when he was addressed directly, but then they were free to go. The whole squadron seemed to have gotten plane tickets to head back home, the suicide mission making a lot of them place things in new perspective. Jake of course would rather perform ten suicide missions than even think about going home to Texas. Javy had invited him back to New Orleans with him and his family but Jake declined. He loved the Machados; he spent enough holidays over there to think of them as the closest thing he'd ever get to a real family, but he knew Javy was still shaken up from his G-Loc incident and the mission in general. He deserved a chance to decompress with his loved ones instead of trying to entertain Jake.

So Jake waved his best friend off at the airport on the third day after the start of their official leave and went back to the barracks to find a notice on his door. It seemed that the temporary living quarters they were supplied for training was being revoked now that everything was over. Jake had vaguely heard one of the others talking about it at the bar but he didn't realize it applied to those that weren't going home as well. He assumed he would be allowed to hang around base, maybe convince Admiral Simpson (or at least the more agreeable Admiral Bates) to let him jump into a few hops to keep his skills sharp. Those plans were scrapped though as both Admirals informed him in no uncertain terms that none of the Daggers would be allowed back in the air until they were given the all clear from both medical and psych. Jake was already cleared on the medical end but all psych evals were to be conducted after the team returned from leave. He wanted to push to get his moved up but Cyclone only gave him that un-amused look that he usually reserved for Maverick, and Jake figured it wasn't worth the fight (he was still on shaky ground for disobeying direct orders on the carrier that day- and for getting the rest of the flight crew to go along with him).

So now not only was Jake alone on North Island, he was also forced to find new housing. With no real other options, he checked into a random motel that was far from luxurious with its outdated decor and questionable activities for it's by the hour patrons. Jake found he didn't mind though as long as he used his own sheets. Also besides a few quick visitors a few doors down, Jake was virtually on his own in his section. This was a huge benefit for the blonde pilot as he found himself dealing with an added difficulty now that the mission was over: debilitating nightmares.

It was embarrassing for him to admit but Jake had always struggled with nightmares. As a child in an abusive household he was always so tense and on edge, especially at night after his father had had a couple of drinks in him, that he found his dreams were filled with running away from monsters that looked vaguely like his parents until he woke up screaming. After receiving punishments for waking anyone up with his pathetic cries, Jake learned to muffle his terror to much quieter levels, though the nightmares always held a grip on him for those formable years. As he got older and into his teen years, Jake's real world seemed to be worse than any dream ever could be and sadly that was what quashed his night terrors for a few years at least. When he left home and joined the Navy he felt freer than he ever had in the world and he finally learned what the term 'sleep like a baby' really meant.

It didn't last for long though because after his first confirmed kill, Jake's nightmares came back. He was forever dreaming of being back in his plane, sometimes shooting down the Bogey, other times the Bogey catching him first. He had nightmares where he shot his wingman down instead, his whole squadron condemning him for the action. Other times it would be his squad shot him down because they were protecting themselves from Hangman leaving them like his call-sign dictated. These dreams circled through Jake's sleep cycle for weeks until Javy caught on before he was sent to ship out again and noticed the dark bags under his best friend's eyes. Though Javy knew better than to push Jake towards any sort of professional therapy from the Navy that could ultimately keep him grounded, he did force his best friend to talk to him more about what was troubling him and to find healthy outlets for his anxiety, fear, and guilt. Jake's favorite method became running.

Jake already enjoyed running from when he was a kid and needed an escape at home so using it to relax from work stress as well came fairly easy. He took to jogging around bases in the morning, night or whenever he just felt a little overwhelmed. Javy would join him if he was able, though normally he cut out about half the miles while jokingly calling Jake a robot for being able to run so much. It was therapeutic and it worked, especially when he ran at night, as Jake felt his body become so tired he went off to sleep without any dreams at all.

But then this mission happened.

First it was Coyote's G-loc; the sounds of Maverick trying to stir his best friend back to consciousness before he crashed into a mountain staying with Jake even during waking hours. In dreams it was worse, Maverick never getting tone in time, Coyote's scream over the radio before he burned up in his jet. Jake would wake up each time with tears in his eyes and would struggle to not call his best friend right there and then. Jake also dreamed of the bird strike. Though he pretended to be indifferent, he really did care about Phoenix, she was one of his oldest friends, dating back to his Flight School days. That nightmarish day, after being so close to losing Javy, to then hear her and Bob forced to eject, it broke something in Jake. His dreams featured the two not ejecting in time, or sometimes different pilots were up there but with the same results. The worst nightmare was when Jake was in the air with them and he listened to Phoenix scream at him that because he left them hanging, the birds hit their plane instead of his. Both Bob and Phoenix's last words were wishing it was Jake instead. Maverick would share the sentiment on the radio as the two planes watched the other go down. When Jake woke from that particular dream, he usually felt so gutted all he could do was sit up in silence.

There were moments from the actual mission that attributed to his night terrors as well of course. First it was Dagger one going down, the others blaming Jake for not being good enough that Maverick had to take the spot of team leader to ensure the others survived and therefore sacrificed himself. Then he would hear Dagger Two going down and there was the guilt of having Bradshaw die after all the mean things Jake had said and done to him. But the worst was Jake's rescue of Maverick and Rooster. Jake couldn't count the times he would close his eyes (both awake and asleep) and see the damn missile that was headed right for that old F-14. He never told anyone outside of his debriefs with the Admirals but that missile was shot and deployed and not even seconds away from killing both Captain Mitchell and Bradshaw. He had had no time to spare.

Every night during the week of debriefs Jake would dream of being too late, of watching that missile kill his CO and his wingman in a fiery blaze as bright as the sun. Jake would be forced to call on the radio that he hadn’t reached them in time, would land on the carrier not to celebration and hugs but dirty looks and tears. One night the nightmare was so bad, felt so real, that Jake actually called Rooster just to hear his voice. The groggy other pilot thought it was some kind of joke and didn't respond incredibly kind but Jake hung up the phone with tears of relief in his eyes anyway. He would take a sarcastic Rooster over a dead one any day.

Last night Jake dreamed of the man he shot down. His second confirmed kill but it wasn't any easier. He dreamed of the man's family, his children growing up fatherless like Rooster did. A whole family lineage cursing him for taking away the man they loved most. When he woke up Jake only had a few seconds before he was puking in his toilet, no chance of falling back to sleep again. His count of hours slept in the week at a sickening level. He knew he should be worried, knew that he should address his problems with someone but everyone else was dealing and he didn’t understand how he couldn’t. He wasn’t one of the Daggers, he wasn’t the one completing the suicide course. He didn’t go into G-Loc or get hit with a bird strike. He wasn’t shot down and he wasn’t stuck behind enemy lines and scrambling to get home. Jake was just the spare; sure he had a lucky shot, but he did nothing more. He didn’t deserve to bother anyone with his lack of sleeping. He would get it sorted, just like he always did.

As the day progressed and Jake's lids got heavier he thought about his techniques to combat his nightmares in the past and looked for his running gear. He hoped to kill two birds with one stone, run enough to clear his mind but also to make himself so exhausted he would fall asleep right away. The pilot put on his sneakers and reached for headphones before heading out the door. He knew it was going to be hot but the minute he was outside he felt like a wall of humidity was surrounding him. It wasn't the ideal running conditions but Jake grew up in Texas where heat was a part of everyday life. He threw off his shirt knowing it would be soaked in a second and headed out.

—————————————————————————-

Penny Benjamin wiped another hand across her brow as she turned to another box. She knew she shouldn't have chosen Tuesday to do inventory especially when the weather forecasts all called for the height of the heat wave to hit, yet here she was sweating in the back rooms of the Hard Deck anyway. She wished Maverick was around to help, though he was abnormally chaotic in a tight setting, at least the man could have helped with the lifting. Pete however, had taken Bradley for a 'getting re-acquainted trip' aka a 'get our crap together' trip up in Northern California. Penny was so happy to see the two trying to make things right and she knew it meant the world to Pete.

It did leave her alone though and with all the other pilots of the squadron gone on leave and Amelia visiting her father, Penny hated the quiet. Even doing normal chores around the bar made her ache for the loud and boisterous group she had grown to love. She hoped they were at least all trying to heal like Maverick and Rooster. She wasn't given all the details from the mission but she knew there were a lot of close calls and that for everyone to return was lucky, bordering on miraculous. Penny felt lucky herself every time she got to see Pete's smile again.

As the morning progressed and the heat got too much Penny opted to go over some sales numbers and to save the inventory for later. Grabbing her books, she headed for her usual table outside, the umbrella giving only the most miniscule relief from the heat.

She looked up as she watched a man run on the beach. He looked vaguely familiar but it wasn't until he was a bit closer that Penny realized it was Hangman. She had been surprised this morning when she saw the man arrive at the beach to run. She had assumed Hangman like all the others had gone away for leave. Clearly this wasn’t the case as the pilot putt his ear pods in and started his jog just as she first opened up to do inventory. Penny glanced at her watch and saw it was close to an hour later then since she had first arrived, and yet Hangman was still running. A hint of worry bubbled in her stomach but she learned that Top Gun pilots tended to be work-out fanatics, Hangman no exception.

As the man neared, Penny raised her hand, "Hangman!" she called but she wasn't surprised when the man kept running, no doubt lost in his music and training. She watched him for a minute, not immune to admit that the sight of the muscular shirtless blonde running along the beach wasn't the worst thing she's laid her eyes on. She shook her head at her silliness and turned back to her sales book figuring she would chastise the man for ignoring her later when he came in for some beers tonight.

Thirty minutes later the same figured appeared for the third time since she sat outside and Penny's brow furrowed. She knew Hangman liked to run but this was getting a bit excessive. She was familiar with his two mile loop, she had walked it with Amelia many times herself, but never this many times, nor in this kind of heat. When she included the time she was in the basement, she knew Jake was running much more than was normal or healthy on a day like today. It was nearing noon, the heat for the day was at its worse and she had heard an air quality alert on the news this morning. Jake ran with no water bottle, no shirt and if she had to guess no sunscreen. He just ran, and ran, and ran.

Perhaps it was the mother in her or perhaps it was just the concern for a pilot she had grown to care about over the years, but Penny refused to let Hangman run past again without at least taking a little respite. She stood herself up from the table and headed towards the sand, waving a bit to not startle the runner. As she got closer she noticed Hangman's gait was off, he seemed to be listing to the side with each step. Her concern mounting, Penny hurried forward a little faster, her heart dropping when she noticed Jake had started to stagger. "Hangman you alright?" the barmaid hollered, but instead of a verbal response Jake fell to one knee. "Jake!" Penny called as she watched the blonde collapse complete to the ground. He landed face first in the sand and the older woman felt herself fall next to him, a gentle hand reaching for his shoulder to help roll him over.

The man lying before her looked so far from the Hangman she knew that Penny gasped. Jake's normally lively green eyes were closed, his skin pale and his breath raspy. She gently nudged his face, trying to stir some kind of reaction and felt her heart relax a fraction when Jake gave a low groan and took a wobbling hand to brush hers away.

"Hey Hangman you with me?" she tapped his cheek again, worry increasing when she felt how warm his body was and yet she didn't notice much sweat on his body. Familiar with signs of overheating but in no way a doctor, Penny looked back towards the Hard Deck and hoped to see someone around that could help her. Unfortunately it seemed they were alone. She turned back to the blonde and saw his eyes were still closed though his body seemed to want to move. “Jake honey, can you hear me?” she asked again.

“P-Penny?” Jake murmured and finally those green eyes were open if barely past slits. He seemed to take a good look at the woman leaning over him before all the rest of the color in Hangman’s face disappeared and he rolled over to his side. As he retched out what Penny disgustingly assumed was his breakfast, she tried to run a soothing hand over his back but again she faltered at how hot his body temperature seemed to be. She reached to pull him back to face her carefully, allowing his back to land back in a clean portion of sand before trying to meet his eyes, “Jake, you with me? Are you alright?”

“Y-yeah, yeah” he didn’t sound convincing, “’ll good.”

“I think you’re overheated, I need to get you inside.”

“No-“ he shook his head weakly, his voice low and gravelly, “-m fine…. Just-… just overdid it a bit. ”

Penny moved to brush back his damp hair from where it was plastered with sand to his forehead, “You really over did it, okay” she tried to give a reassuring smile but her concern was too great and it became more of a grimace, “you need to get out of this sun and get some water in you. You think you can stand?”

It didn’t look like Jake would be moving any time soon but when Penny gave him a small pull the pilot managed to follow the momentum enough to get himself standing. It wasn’t pretty and Hangman looked ready to puke again at least three different times, but he held it in and allowed Penny to throw his arm around her shoulders. The two took a moment to gain their balance before they started with small and slow steps all the way back to the Hard Deck.

The walk was long and tedious. With each step that they got closer Jake’s movements got sloppier and the weight Penny had to support seemed to double. When she finally got him inside, Penny deposited Jake to the nearest booth and ran for a cold water bottle and some towels. She ran them under the coldest water she could get and started to place them over Jake’s chest, his neck and his forehead. The man didn’t even flinch. “Keep those there” Penny ordered as she moved to grab more water bottles, “and take small sips of water.”

Jake tried to follow orders but when he moved his hands to open the bottle, they were shaking so bad he dropped it. He went to get his body to pick it up but instead he slid down to the floor, his back against the table’s leg. Penny heard the commotion and came running, finding the pilot out of it and on the floor of her bar. “Jesus Jake, I think we need to get you to the hospital” she told him, “This is way worse than over heating-“

“No” Jake shook his head, his eyes unfocused, “’m –ok-“

“Honey” she got him standing again, “no you’re not. Hang on, take a seat for a minute and let me get my keys. I have to lock up the basement and then I will take you.” She led him back towards the booths but didn’t wait for him to sit, instead running to her bag and car keys.

Meanwhile the blonde had teetered after her, following towards the bar and knocking over a stool followed by another, "shit” he cursed, “’m sorry. Y-you can just call m’ an uber" Jake slurred softly, now leaning heavily against the bar, “’t’s no bother.”

"Absolutely not, and I said to sit Jake" she ordered, manhandling him towards the booths, "sit before you collapse again."

"'M -fine-"

"No you're really not." Her eyes must have shown her anger and concern because Jake seemed to melt into the cushion of the seats. Penny gave a nod and then ran to lock up her basement door and lock the inventory room. When she got back to the bar she noticed Jake’s head was leaning down on the table. “Hangman?” she questioned, but the man didn’t stir, “Jake?” When she still got no answer, she hurried over and took one of the water bottles, emptying it over the man’s head in a frantic shake, “Lieutenant Seresin!” she yelled and was luckily awarded with a dazed Jake shaking his wet hair out in confusion. “-enny?” he murmured sleepily, “did it rain?”

“Something like that” Penny lied, moving to grab the man out of the booth once more and get him towards the exit, “now come on honey, we’re going to the hospital.”

“-Don’’ feel so g-good.”

“I know, but we’re going to get you all fixed up” she promised silently praying that she could deliver on such a statement. If she was honest with herself Jake’s condition was really starting to frighten her. He collapsed three times already, he threw up on the beach and his body temperature was frightening high. She had tried cold compresses but they didn’t seem to make a difference. He was incoherent and confused; his body a shaky and unstable mess when he was normally frighteningly in control.

They got to Penny’s car quickly; fortunately she parked in the closet spot this morning. She helped lay Jake out along the back seat, sparing a second to take a hand to his forehead where she still felt the heat radiating off his skin. She pursed her lips but didn’t say anything, instead starting her car and cranking the A/C, hoping that it would help cool the pilot down.

For the first few minutes of the ride, Jake stayed silent and if it weren’t for Penny looking towards him in the rear view mirror every few seconds she would have thought he was unconscious or worse. Instead she watched as the man took shallow wheezy breaths, praying they get to the hospital quickly so he could get real help.

After a few more minutes of silence, Penny heard what sounded like a throat clearing in the back seat. Jake’s voice sounded fractured when he finally spoke up, "'why-you helpin' me?" he whispered from the back, 'm a bad person. A bad person with no one left.”

"No you're not honey" Penny immediately argued back, watching as Hangman’s eyes closed and his face scrunched up in pain, "you're a good person. I know that and so do the others."

"Asshole to them.... always a jerk..."

"I think they've started to see all that for what it is.” And she really believed that. The Hangman that strutted around the Hard Deck all these years was a show, meant for entertainment and for keeping people at arm’s length. Penny, no stranger at pushing people away herself, could recognize the signs easily though she knew it took the others a while to see. “You earned your teammates’ trust” she continued with what she hoped sounded reassuring. Jake didn’t seem to react to the words though, so Penny tried to push a bit more remembering what Maverick had told her the night he returned after the boat docked, about how Jake had saved his life, “you showed them the true Jake Seresin during the mission. They see it now.”

“They all left, ‘m alone again.”

“You’re not alone sweetheart”

“I should be, ‘ve killed people” Jake announced next and in the driver’s seat Penny stilled. It’s not that she doesn’t know this fact, she’s heard Hangman address it before but hearing Jake speak the words so matter of factly while he himself was so broken, exhausted and barely conscious, Penny’s heart clenched. “You were just doing your job, Jake, it’s different.”

“No” he shook his head minutely, “’t’s not.” He sniffed back what sounded like a sob, “can’t sleep, just see it again and again… All my mistakes... all the early graves… all my fault.”

“Nothing was your fault Jake, you saved lives that day. You saved Maverick and Rooster-“

“see them die every night…. ‘m pathetic-“

“No you’re not, you’re so brave honey” she felt a tear fall down her cheek as Jake let out another raspy sob, “so, so brave.”

“’ can’t even sleep anymore” Jake moaned, “just wanna sleep-“

“We can get you help for that” she urged, “there are people that can help-“

“No one can ‘elp me” his head lulled to the side, “I…can’t be fixed.”

There was so much Penny wished to say, so much she wished to correct but before she got the chance she was pulling into the emergency driveway entrance of the hospital and screeching her brakes to a halt behind an empty ambulance. “Please!” Penny hollered from her window at the two paramedics heading out the exit doors. Both stopped and looked her way, “please I need help” she urged to them.

The two women hurried forward, following Penny’s directions to the back seat, “he’s in rough shape, can you help me get him inside?”

“I’ll get the backboard and gurney” the younger of the medics announced, running back to her rig. When she returned the three women were able to lift Jake up and onto it, the two medical professionals beginning to wheel him inside, Penny hot on their heels.

“Ma’am you can’t leave your car here” the security guard tried but Penny ignored it and just continued to follow the gurney wheeling Hangman further into the hospital. Getting a ticket was the least of her worries, even getting towed. All she cared about was making sure the blonde pilot in that bed got the care he needed.

She followed them through into the emergency room where Jake was taken into a corner make-shift room with curtains closing it off. A nurse started asking Penny questions about Jake’s age, medical history, and if he had any allergies. She tried to answer to the best of her abilities but the truth was she didn’t really know. Jake Seresin had been coming to the bar for years but Penny couldn’t even tell the hospital if he was allergic to peanuts yet alone any medication he was on; she just never bothered to get to know him that well. She vowed if they got through this debacle, she would find out, resolved to pester Jake with so many questions he would have no choice but to tell her everything. She looked forward to it with a spark of hope.

Suddenly an older man came forward from the other side of the curtain, ripping it open with an intern on his heels, “What do we have?” he asked, not looking away from his patient on the bed.

“32 year old white male, fading in and out of consciousness, feels excessively warm to the touch-“

The doctor sighed and put on his glasses, his thinning hair reflecting the light as he knelt down on his work stool, and started to lightly examine Jake’s face and chest, “what’s his name?”

When no one else replied Penny realized the question was addressed to her. She swallowed her nerves, “Lieutenant Jake Seresin” she told him.

“Navy?”

“A Navy pilot, yes.”

“Why did you bring him here, shouldn’t he be on base?”

Penny shrugged, realizing she never even thought about taking Jake back to North Island, her mind just drove them to the first hospital she could think of, “this was closer” she explained instead.

The doctor hummed but continued his examination, “okay Lieutenant can you hear me?” when the blonde gave no response, the doctor turned to one of the nurses, “get me a temperature reading now” he ordered.

“Right away Doctor” and the nurse hurried to get the thermometer.

“What happened to him?” the ER doctor asked, shining a pen light as he used a hand to hold open Jake’s eye lid.

“He collapsed on the beach,” Penny supplied dutifully, still watching with what felt like a heavy weight on her chest, “he had been running and I think he might have over heated-“

“In this heat, I’m not surprised. Order a toxicology report, I don’t like his pupil dilation.”

Penny felt her temper flare, “He wasn’t drinking” she shot back, “he’s exhausted.”

“Let’s take the family out of the room-“ the doctor also added, rolling his eyes to his staff. As a nurse went to remove her, Penny listened as another rattled off Jake’s temperature. The minute his nurse was done saying 105 degrees, the ER doctor began sprouting commands, his voice a lot more concerned and worried than it were not two minutes ago. Penny knew 105 was dangerous, even deadly, but seeing doctors and nurses run in frantically made the woman more scared than she could ever remember being in her life. A curtain was pulled and her view was gone, and Penny felt her heart stutter as she wondered if that was to be the last time she would ever see Jake again. What if he died? What if she was too late getting him help, waited too long in the bar locking up a damn inventory closet when she should have been calling an ambulance and getting the poor man help. Her legs buckled for a moment but the nurse at her side kept a strong hand on her arm that kept her standing. “Here we go” the nurse told her steering her to the nurses’ station, “Fran” she called and one nurse was replaced with a different one as Penny was handed off once more.

“Okay” the nurse named Fran began, an iPad in her hand and glasses on her kind face, “let’s begin. Patient’s name was what again?”

“Lieutenant Jake Seresin.”

“Age?”

“32.”

“Occupation?”

“Naval Pilot.”

She typed faster, then opened her mouth to ask more but Penny beat her too it, "please" she begged, "is he going to be alright?"

Fran seemed to scrutinize her for a moment, his brown eyes boring into Penny over her glasses, “What is your relation to him again?" she questioned.

Penny stuttered for a moment, but then found her confidence, "I'm- I'm his aunt” she declared daring someone to disagree. The nurse didn’t argue, just typed something on her iPad, “and your name?”

“Penny Benjamin.”

Fran nodded and motioned towards the waiting room, “okay Ms. Benjamin, take a seat and I’ll send a doctor to talk once he finishes his evaluations.”

"But can’t I go back in?“

“You’ve done everything you could for the Lieutenant; now leave it to the doctors.” Fran placed a comforting hand to her arm and squeezed gently, “your nephew is in good hands.”

“What if I didn’t do enough, I tried to put cold compresses, and the water, but he could even grip it properly and I never made him drink-“

“Shhh” the kind woman placated her, “I’ll let the doctors know. I’m sure they will put him on fluids right away, you just sit here.”

“T-Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, I’ll be back later.”

Penny watched her go, falling into the hard waiting room chair and taking her head into her hands. She wanted to scream in frustration and worry, but she knew that wouldn’t help Jake. Instead she closed her eyes and focused on her breathing.

A hand on her arm a few minutes later made her jump. She looked up; expecting a doctor or nurse but finding herself staring at the same security guard she had run past before. The man looked sheepish, clearly feeling guilty for startling her. Penny pulled her fingers through her long brown hair to try to look even a semblance of normal but the security guard didn’t seem to judge. “Ma’am” he began, “I’m sorry to bug you but I really need you to move your car, we got ambulances that need to unload in those spaces and you’re blocking them.”

She looked back at him, her face reddening in mortification; she had completely forgotten about the car she had left parked in the emergency entrance. “I’m so sorry, Sir, I was so panicked before-“

He shook off her apology, “believe me I’ve seen it a million times before. Just move it now and we can both pretend it didn’t happen. I know you got more important things to worry about.” He offered a hand to help her standing and Penny took it gratefully, rising from the chair and heading to the automatic doors leading outside.

Penny moved her car like directed and then took back her seat in the waiting room. She noticed others sitting around, none paying her much attention, everyone lost in their own worlds of worry and fear.

This was why she hated hospitals, especially waiting rooms. It was a place where time simultaneously stood still and yet rushed by. People waited in agony over people in actually agony. Some people were here for last goodbyes while others welcomed new lives into the world. It was a place of overstimulation and over emotion and yet Penny couldn’t imagine herself being anywhere else at the moment. She would wait here as long as it took until she knew Jake would be okay.

About an hour later, a tall man approached the nurse’s station and Penny watched as he was directed to her. "Ms Benjamin?" the dark haired doctor called dressed in scrubs, "my name is Doctor Rask,” he held out a hand for Penny to shake, her grip lacking from her fear, “I’m your nephew's doctor” he told her soothingly.

"Hi" Penny breathed out, trying to control her nerves, "how's Jake?" she asked after no preamble.

If he thought she was rude the doctor didn't comment, instead he went right into Jake's diagnosis. "Lieutenant Seresin has a severe case of hyperthermia, more specifically heat stroke. His body temperature was 105 when you brought him in and that was with the cooling methods you tried to do prior. With a body temp that high our biggest concern is always going to be organ failure."

Penny clutched her hands into fists; the feeling of her nails in her palms the only thing keeping her together. She focused on the slight pain as she struggled to find her voice, "did he-... is his organs... are they okay?"

"He is extremely lucky” the doctor explained, “We don't see any evidence of organ failure but we will monitor him closely for the next few hours to be sure."

"That's- that's good news."

Dr. Rask spared her a comforting look, "it is, especially with how overheated he was but he's not out of the woods yet. Lieutenant Seresin was also severely dehydrated and extremely exhausted. His fine motor skills were so impaired upon admission that the ER doctor ordered a toxicology report because he was convinced Lieutenant Seresin must have been drunk. He wasn't of course but the Lieutenant admitted to being unable to supply the last time he had a full night's sleep."

Penny sighed, "he just got back from a serious mission Doctor Rask, it affective him deeply-"

"I understand," the doctor cut in gently, "and believe me I'm sympathetic but I suggest he find someone to talk to about this. He is beyond normal exhaustion levels which is extremely dangerous, not only in his profession but in all matters of his life."

"I agree. I plan on reaching out to his CO to discuss this as well."

The doctor softened, "we can also recommend people for him to talk to if he didn't want to go through the Navy. My father served and I know firsthand how people can be hesitant to show weakness to their superiors. It’s dangerous and they end up denying themselves the opportunity to get proper help."

"Thank you, I worry about that as well but I can promise you I will personally make sure Jake gets the help he needs, even if I have to drag him myself."

"He's lucky to have you" Doctor Rask shared with a smile.

Penny shook her head, her eyes falling to the floor, “I don't know about that” she admitted softly.

"I do” the doctor told her kindly, “You saved his life getting him in here so quickly."

"So he will be okay?"

"Well like I said before his organs look undamaged which is the best news for his case. He is still on cooling pads right now as we try to lower his temperature safely. We also have him on multiple IVs to increase his fluids and nutrients."

It certainly didn’t sound like he was okay but Penny took the doctor’s calm attitude as a good sign. Still she would only feel better once she could see Jake with her own eyes, "Is he awake?" she asked ready to run to his room if she found out he was.

Doctor Rask shook his head, "we gave him a small sedative which I would normally be against but Lieutenant Seresin was very restless in the room from the over exhaustion. I feared he would tax himself further. It should wear off in a few hours but he will be exceptionally groggy. Do to the severity of the heat stroke and the strain on his body; I want to keep him overnight for observations."

"Can I see him?"

"I would prefer not if I'm honest” he managed a sympathetic look when he noticed her face fall. “It's important for him to stay resting. In his heightened state and with the weak sedation, any disruption could cause him to wake before he's ready and that's the last thing he needs. Rest is his best medication at this point."

"I understand" and she did, no matter how much it broke her heart to think of Jake waking up alone in the hospital.

"If you leave your info with the nurse, I'll call you personally when he wakes, or any other member of his family."

He doesn't think he has any family, Penny's mind automatically corrected but she didn't bother saying it out loud. Besides, she learned many years ago that family went far beyond blood no matter what the medical world said. "Thank you Doctor, for everything."

"My pleasure and make sure Lieutenant Seresin thanks you as well. Like I said before, you saved your nephew's life today Ms. Benjamin, a few more minutes out there and we would be having a very different conversation."

She shuddered but gave her thanks anyway before turning back to her waiting room seat. She knew she had hours to kill before Jake would be up and she could see him so Penny took out her phone and scrolled to Pete’s name. She knew she needed to call the man, knew that the minute he heard something was wrong with one of his pilots he would want to be informed and be there. She wondered for a moment if perhaps she was overstepping until she remember Jake’s sad words in the car. This was a man who thought he was alone in the world and even worse, he thought he deserved to be alone in the world. He thought of himself as a killer for doing his job and pathetic for not being to handle his emotions and his PTSD properly. His hyperthermia would be treated but Penny knew that Jake Seresin had a much longer road to recovery once he was discharged from the hospital. Penny knew that she, Maverick, Rooster and the rest of the Daggers would be there for him every step of the way. They were a family now and that’s what family does.

Her mind made up, Penny hit the call button and brought the phone up to her ear, ready to call on the reinforcements.

[five-rivers]

Checkerboard

Will add an AO3 link once the ddos attack is over. In the meantime, please enjoy this Gen Rex fic! It's whump. :)

Edit: AO3 Link!

.

One moment, Rex was breaking free of the control collar, as planned.  The next– 

Caesar hadn't realized that witch could move that fast.  

The fight was, in a word, brutal.  Rex was good, very good, even Caesar could see that, but against both an equal opponent and the relentless black pawns, even he had limits.  Especially when he was avoiding lethal blows.  It appeared he hadn't, quite, realized that the black pawns were robots.  

That was an oversight on Caesar's part, he'd admit.  He knew that Rex had the ability to detect nearby nanites, but he didn't know if that ability was behind the consciousness partition his parents had set up in the onboard AI, and even if it wasn't, well, having the ability to perceive something and understanding the information it gave you were two very different things.  Especially under stress.  

Black Knight crushed Rex's latest set of smack hands with a nanite-generated hammer, then tipped him over, wrapping him with her whip.  He hit the floor hard, but it was obvious he was going to break free momentarily, and possibly even counter with his own whip build, but Black Knight's hammer shifted into a sword, and she brought it down through Rex's shoulder.

"Stop!  Stop!  What are you doing?" demanded Caesar.  

The black pawns moved in, aiming at Rex from point blank range.

"Kill or control," said Black Knight.  "That's Providence's current protocol.  If we get your brother back under control, we can put ‘cure’ back on the table, but until then… What will it be?"  The ultimatum, because that's what it was, was delivered in the same falsely pleasant tone Black Knight gave all her orders in.  

Caesar clenched his jaw.  Some people might think he was cold and disconnected, that he lacked empathy, feelings, care for anything that wasn’t one of his experiments.  Dr. Holiday, for example, had, shortly after Rex’s disappearance, accused Caesar of being a psychopath.

Well.  Caesar knew there was something not quite right about him.  Never had felt like getting a diagnosis.  But he hadn’t cried over his parents’ deaths, and he hadn’t cried over Rex’s disappearance.  He certainly hadn’t gotten as emotional as Holiday, or even Six. 

But he did love his brother.  He knew that love was just the result of neural connections in the brain, coupled with certain chemical reactions, but that didn’t make it less real.  He wanted his brother to be healthy and happy.  That was love, yes?  

But for Rex to be healthy and happy, he also had to be alive.  

He met Rex’s eyes.  Rex, unlike Caesar, was emotional.  Caesar could easily read the pain, fury, and fear on Rex’s face.  Fear that quickly slid into terror as Rex realized what Caesar was going to do.

“Dr. Salazar, your decision.  You can stop stalling.  We neutralized the robot monkey, and even all the Numbers working together couldn’t break into this facility fast enough to keep me and my pawns from terminating this EVO.”

“He-ahhhh!”  Rex’s protest was cut off with a sideways jerk of Black Knights blade, ending with a high-pitched whine.  There was no blood - Rex, as a rule, didn’t bleed.  His nanites had instructions about that.  But even so…

“Alright, alright!” said Caesar.  “I’ll do it!  I’ll just.  This isn’t something I can do immediately.  I told you Rex’s nanites were different.”  He had.  Multiple times.  Some of those times were even after his six-years-in-fifteen-minutes trip.  

“I’d think it’d be a simple matter, considering you worked on him before.  And your control of the Omega-1 during your… reappearance.”

“I’d think,” said Caesar, retrieving a set of new control collars and checking their serial numbers, “you’d appreciate the difficulty, considering anything that could easily be done to Rex could easily be done to you.”  

Black Knight’s smile grew sharper, showing teeth.  “Careful.  Dr. Salazar.”

Caesar made sure his tablet computer was synchronized with the main control computer and walked towards Rex.  The pawns who weren’t aiming at him were now aiming at Caesar.  He held up the collars and his tablet.  “I’ve got to start somewhere, right?”

“Let him by,” said Black Knight in an almost magnanimous tone.  She had a lot of practice with that one.  

“Okay, mijo,” said Caesar, with false cheer, “let’s get started.”

“Don’t do thi–”

His protest was cut off as Black Knight changed the angle of her sword, enlarging the wound.  Rex gasp, breath hitching, and Caesar decided the best way to handle this was fast, like ripping off a bandaid.  He wrapped the first collar around Rex’s neck.  

Predictably, because Rex could be predictable, sometimes, (it was, Caesar thought, probably a result of many of his subconscious thought processes and actions being directed by nanite programs) the skin on his neck lit up with blue lines that crossed over onto the collar and took it apart.  

“Don’t–” said Caesar, quickly.  “Don’t.  There’s a reason I brought more than one, yes?”

“You have fifteen minutes.  My arm is getting tired.”

“Please, Rex, just… Let it happen.”

Rex bit his lower lip and glared up at him.  Caesar swallowed and checked his tablet, looked at what, exactly, Rex had done to the collar, and made a few adjustments.  He had to - he had to get this right.  

Despite the whip and despite the sword, Rex still tried to twitch away from the collar.  This time, Caesar could hear the activation tone of the nanites.  They’d intended to remove some of the audio cues after the nanites got out of the prototype phase, but since things had turned out the way they did, they’d never gotten around to it.  

He kept an eye on the tablet, watching the feedback and already making adjustments to the next collar.  When the second - or should he count it as the third? - one broke, it was ready to slide into place.  

And…  There!  He’d need some more changes.  Just a little more.  But this time… Yes!  He could stop Rex from breaking this one for long enough to get his foot in the door, at least.  And Rex was wearing out.  

He had limits.  And Caesar wasn’t exactly fighting fair.  

He snapped the next collar - hopefully the last one - into place.  The program, a construction command for the Omega-1, started running immediately, relaying its results to the tablet.  Caesar watched them anxiously, but he didn’t have much faith in that particular program as anything but a delaying tactic.  Rex’s self-programming capabilities had taken care of that particular backdoor within the first week of Caesar’s return.  

But the program he was loading up now was a bit different.  Simple, yes, there wasn’t time for anything complex, but hopefully effective, given Caesar’s special permissions and privileges in the nanite system.  

The second program worked like this: it sent a request for access to Rex’s code interface, tagged with Caesar’s administrator codes.  For various ethical and practical reasons (their parents didn’t quite trust Caesar not to use higher-level access for pranks) Caesar had never been given full, unimpeded access to Rex’s nanite programming.  But… the admin codes meant that he got a response.  A little popup that said nothing but ‘request denied.’  Rex also could accept the request, but, well…

Caesar looked at Rex, whose face was screwed up into an expression of pained but determined confusion.�� That just didn’t seem likely.  Even if the request was handled entirely behind the consciousness partition.  

The program didn’t just send one request, though.  It sent repeated requests.  As many as it could, on a code loop only a few lines long.  

The whirr of the nanites became more stressed as they worked on endless access requests.  The nanites were tiny, brilliant computers, but they were, in the end, still computers.  Computers (and everything, really), as a rule, generated heat when they were working.  They’d managed to break physics in so many ways working on the nanite project, but not that one.  

Rex began to sweat and pant as his body tried to regulate its internal temperature.  Every inhale hitched and every exhale was accompanied by a pained whine.  As a rule, Caesar didn’t experience empathy, didn’t feel with other people.  Probably a mirror neuron problem.  But this?  This hurt.  

He didn't want to do this.  

His tablet beeped.  

Their parents hadn’t trusted Caesar not to play pranks on his little brother, but they did trust him to look after Rex’s wellbeing in an emergency.  An emergency like a significantly elevated body temperature and a huge hole in his body.  

The popup now read, ‘access granted.’

The first thing Caesar did was make a new back door.  He was confident that this one, the one he used to get in just now, would be patched within a week.  Probably some limit on access-requests-per-minute, even for admins.  

Rex’s code was a mess.  Six years of unregulated self-modification would do that.  Few of the new programs were instantly understandable, even to Caesar.  Builds, wifi hacking tools, a series of ‘handshakes’ for various systems, dormant EVO-originating code, probably copied from people and animals he’d cured, active EVO code, from the same, a rather ingenious fix for a problem they’d never solved, back in the nanite project days.  But buried underneath all that was the original code for Rex’s nanites.  Even the Omega-1.  

He brought up the set of programs they’d written after the first time Rex had forgotten everything.  It was just a little something to help him recognize them, trust them, in case it happened again.  It was why it had been so easy to convince Rex to come with him, when they had met again.  

But family wasn’t the only thing on the list anymore.  Dr. Holiday, Six, Noah, and even Bobo were there, primarily identified through their nanite loci, rather than the facial, vocal, and code recognition that identified the Salazars.  Although, now that he looked, he could see that Rex had appended Caesar’s nanite locus to his ID data.  

He went to the part of the code that dictated how much and how the nanites could influence Rex’s thoughts about a given person, and changed a few variables and permissions.  He went back to the main list, added in Black Knight, and generated variables for her, too.  

There.  Rex was controlled.  Not, perhaps, the same way all the other EVOs were, but with the values Caesar had just assigned, saying ‘no’ to him or Black Knight would be given roughly the same avoidance priority as self harm, and just being around them should feel vaguely pleasant.  

Rex made a tiny noise of protest, but judging by how glazed over his eyes were, and how clammy his skin looked, Caesar doubted he was really aware of what Caesar had just done.  He would be, though.  

Caesar went back to the main list one more time, and told Rex’s nanites that Rafael and Violeta Salazar were dead.  The effect of this was immediate and far more dramatic.  Rex started sobbing.  

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”  He really was.  But this was the fastest way to get to the other thing he wanted.  The consciousness partition.  Without their parents, Caesar was now recognized as having the highest level of admin access.  

He… hesitated before he deleted it.  There were a vast number of reasons it existed.  The primary one being to keep ten-year-old Rex from accidentally deleting his liver, but also because the nanite project’s… well, Caesar’s… track record with AIs was not good, and even if this was more of an integrated intelligence, than an artificial one…

But Rex needed this.  For that matter, if Caesar’s original plan had worked, and Rex had escaped, and he got Providence to restart the project, and, and, and…  Eventually, the partition would have been removed anyway, was the point.  

He hit the button and moved on.  Medical options.  He brought up a list of prearranged medically-related voice commands - it was short, for emergency use only, in case Rex lost control of his nanites while he was ill.  He interdicted Rex’s builds, put them behind a voice authorization from a ‘person of trust’ and he desperately hoped Rex would figure out that particular loophole.  He told the nanites to take over Rex’s breathing reflex for the moment, because the way he was currently breathing had to be cutting him up on Black Knight’s sword.  He–

“That’s been fifteen minutes, Dr. Salazar.”

“Rex,” said Caesar, clearly, “go to sleep.”

Rex’s eyes fluttered closed.  

“There you go!” said Caesar, a horrible approximation of a smile on his face.  “All under control!”

"Dr. Donevsky," said Black Knight. 

Caesar flinched as the doctor approached from the side of the room.  He hadn't noticed anyone else come in.  

“It won’t be the same as with the other EVOs, his base programming is too different,” said Caesar, now anxious as Donevsky checked Rex’s pulse and reflexes.  “You won’t be able to– To puppet him around.  There are only a few voice commands he has to follow, but–”

Black Knight raised an eyebrow.  “That doesn’t sound like under control.”

“I’ve made him trust us,” said Caesar.  “Even more than he trusts Holiday or Six.  I’ve made it– You are familiar with Pavlov’s experiments with dogs, aren’t you?”  It wasn’t quite what was going on, but, honestly, he didn’t want to explain it to Black Knight.  

“He’s really asleep, ma’am,” said Donevsky, stepping back.  

“Hm,” said Black Knight.  She withdrew her builds.  “How long does this last for?”

“Eight hours,” said Caesar.  “That’s the recommended amount, after all!”

“Interesting.  We’ll give this a trial run.”

Other medical staff, who had been standing at the periphery of the room, came forward.  They heaved Rex up onto a gurney and started taking more measurements and readings.  Rex stayed entirely limp throughout, like a rag doll.  The doctors conferred over their results for a moment, then started to wheel him out of the room.  Caesar began to follow.  

Black Knight’s hand on his shoulder stopped him.  

“I think we have some things to discuss, before you join your brother,” she said.  

.

It wasn’t as if Rex had never been stabbed before.  He had.  Mostly by Van Kleiss and his stupid, stabby, sucky fingers.  It sucked, but he could deal with it.  Maybe with some complaining and a bit of encouragement from Dr. Holiday or Six, or some well-timed snark from Bobo, but he could deal with it.  

On the other hand, the stuff that stabbed him usually wasn’t this big and usually didn’t stay stabbed in him for this long.  Benefit of having the most awesome nanites on the planet was that he could safely ignore the whole ‘don’t remove the thing stabbing you or else you might bleed out’ thing…  Which he totally hadn’t discovered by ignoring Holiday when she said ‘don’t remove the thing stabbing you or else you might bleed out.’  Good times.  

What wasn’t a good time?  The fact that the literal backstabbing he was dealing with had come after a metaphorical backstabbing.  

(He was pretty sure that when people said siblings were a pain, they didn’t mean like this.)

The whole ‘tied up with a dozen guns pointed at him’ thing was bad, also.  But it was kind of…  Expectedly bad?  Like, it wasn’t anything too out of the ordinary for his life, except for the when and where of it.  But Caesar trying to mind control him?  That was just…   

Well.  It sucked.  What else was he supposed to say?  He didn’t know what to say, which was, maybe, why he wasn’t saying anything while Black Knight was giving Caesar some kind of psycho speech about why he needed to be controlled.  

He didn’t know why she was bothering with that, honestly.  Caesar had already decided to control him.  With that stupidly easy to break collar… that Caesar had to know wouldn’t work on him.

Ughhhhh sometimes he hated being the kind of person who gave others the benefit of the doubt.  

He looked up and glared at Caesar, hard enough to hide any trace of hope.  Not that he really kept a lot of hope as Caesar’s expression went from ‘blank’ to ‘resigned.’  

A bunch of words that Dr. Holiday thought he didn’t know went through his brain so fast they sounded like static.  Caesar was a weirdo and a space case most of the time, but he also knew Rex, and his nanites, better than anyone else.  Caesar had gotten him to build that freaky containment machine on remote control, sans collar.  Caesar could screw him over so freaking much.  

“Dr. Salazar, your decision.  You can stop stalling.  We neutralized the robot monkey, and even all the Numbers working together couldn’t break into this facility fast enough to keep me and my pawns from terminating this EVO.”

Robot monkey?  Did that mean Bobo wasn’t under control?  And he hated it when people talked over him like he was some kind of object.  “He-ahhhh!” 

Black Knight must have moved her sword by, like, a foot, because Rex’s entire arm and back lit up like they were on fire.  In the back of his mind there was something with the general shape and texture of the few times his nanites had talked to him directly.  Not that any information got through to Rex.  It was probably just them trying to tell him how stabbed he was, so no biggie.  He could figure that out on his own.  He had this whole biological system called pain and more pain, oh, and get this, yet more pain, to help him figure it out!  Wasn’t that wonderful?

“Alright, alright!” said Caesar.  “I’ll do it!  I’ll just.  This isn’t something I can do immediately.  I told you Rex’s nanites were different.”

Yeah, no kidding.  He was sure Providence’s new evil overlord knew nothing about that at all.  It wasn’t like Providence hadn’t been studying them since Rex first got here.  

Caesar strode across the room and out of Rex’s immediate line of sight.  His attempt to shift his position resulted in a heel being dug into his spine, the whip tightening to the point of crushing the air out of his lungs, and the sword being twisted so viciously his vision whited out for a second.  

“....could easily be done to Rex could easily be done to you.”  

Okay, maybe more than a second.

“Careful.  Dr. Salazar.”

Rex blinked hard, still trying to follow what was going on around him.  It could be done to Black Knight, too?  All of this?  The mind control thing?  Something else?

“I’ve got to start somewhere, right?”

“Let him by,” said Black Knight in an almost magnanimous tone.  The agents between Caesar and Rex parted.  

“Okay, mijo,” said Caesar, with obvious false cheer, “let’s get started.”

Rex tried to catch Caesar’s eyes.  If Caesar didn't want to do this, maybe Rex could convince him not to.  Sure, he wasn’t at the point of things where he’d rather die than be mind controlled - he wasn’t that noble, and he remembered the follow-up interviews from the Meechum incident - but seriously injured?  Imprisoned?  Those both sounded way better.  

“Don’t do thi–”

Black Knight wrenched her sword to one side, and Rex’s argument was lost to agony.  For a split second, he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, and when he could the collar was there.  He sent his nanites against it, first disabling the code that let it send messages to his nanites, then telling it to disassemble stuff.  

Not for the first time, Rex wondered why people didn’t make things more mechanical and less electronic.  If there wasn’t an electronic disassembly command, it would be way harder for him to do stuff like this.  

He wasn’t going to ask anyone that, though.  His life was hard enough as it was.  Case in point, his current situation (which was bad).

“Don’t–” said Caesar.  “Don’t.  There’s a reason I brought more than one, yes?”

What, was that some kind of threat?  Rex had heard better.  

“You have fifteen minutes.  My arm is getting tired.”

… or maybe he was talking to someone else.  Again.  

“Please, Rex, just… Let it happen.”

Like heck.  If Caesar and Black Knight were going to do this to him, he was going to make them work for it.  In the spirit of that - and not because he was scared - he tried to pull away when Caesar picked up the next collar and put it on.  Not that it did much good.  But it didn’t do Caesar any good, either, so there.  Ha.  

It had been harder, this time, though.  Not a lot harder, but enough to make him apprehensive.  

He really hoped Black Knight was wrong about that backup.  He didn’t think he’d be able to get out of this on his own, and he was liking his chances of holding out against mind control long term less and less.  

He broke the next collar, too.  That one had been hard, and Rex was starting to feel tired.  More tired.  His nanites were starting to protest being diverted from the giant gaping hole in his shoulder.  

But Caesar already had the next collar around Rex’s neck.  Rex told his nanites to take it apart, too, but… they were… busy?  He pushed through, overriding whatever was occupying them, and the collar fell off.  

Caesar put the next one on.  

For a second, Rex zoned out like he had when Caesar had been sending the Omega-1 instructions.  When he came back to himself, he felt hot.  

Well, he always felt hot.  He was hot.  Blisteringly good looking, even.  But he was physically hot right now.  Fever-level hot.  Best he could compare it to was when his nanites had been working overtime trying to counteract the chupacabra poison.  Except there was no chupacabra poison this time.  Probably.  What was Caesar doing to him? 

He closed his eyes, trying to focus on getting his nanites back under control.  There was a feeling like someone knocking, knocking, knocking on the back of his mind until the sound turned to jackhammer black noise.  It hurt, and he was rapidly approaching the temperatures where it was hard for him to think.  His skin felt slick and sticky, and he started to pant, even as the motion made Black Knight’s sword saw back and forth inside him.  

And then the building pressure against him disappeared all at once.  He didn’t exactly relax, but he did go limp, unable to maintain the state of tension from before.  He was going to pass out, soon, he could tell.  He hated passing out.  

With difficulty, he opened his eyes to glare blearily at Caesar.  He was hunched over his tablet, tapping away at the screen.  Traitor.  Backstabber.  Jerk.  It wasn’t as if Rex hadn’t been backstabbed by, like, everyone, except for Holiday, Bobo (except for really minor things), and Six (there had been that time with the Numbers, and the other thing with the memory loss, but, really, that was fine, water under the bridge and all), but family was supposed to be different.  You were supposed to be able to trust family.  Family wasn’t supposed to try to mind control you for creepy middle-aged women, which is why Rex had to trust that Caesar was doing this for a very good reason.  

Rex blinked slowly.  There was something wrong with that train of thought.  The people you…  Caesar wouldn’t mind control him just because.  Caesar had betrayed him– But Caesar wouldn’t do that.  Had Rex misunderstood something?  Somewhere?  Was he not working for Black Knight?  Except, Black Knight was a good person.  He knew that.  He trusted her.  Good people didn’t just mind control people for no reason.  Or stab people for no reason.  So, there had to be a reason.  But it was so hard to think of one.  

… Had he hurt someone?

A weak whine built in the back of his throat.  He didn’t remember hurting… But maybe he did?  He was so angry about the control collars, but Black Knight and Caesar said they were good, so…?  His thoughts felt so sticky and slow.  What had he been thinking about before?  Caesar and Black Knight had… They had been…?

He was hit with a wave of grief absolutely unlike anything he had ever experienced before.  Grief, like something he’d always had, something he’d held so close he couldn’t even see it, being ripped away from him without warning.  A piece of his world, just gone, and he didn’t even know what it was, just that he wanted it back, please, please, please.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

Rex was sorry, too.  He didn’t know what he had done, but he wanted this to stop.  

And then, something in the back of Rex’s mind opened up, and his thoughts stopped being anything like coherent.  He watched, more or less passively, as Caesar turned on emergency medical controls, put his builds on lock, and made the nanites actively regulate his breathing.  Which actually did help, a little.  Rex may have been hyperventilating.  

Black Knight and Caesar started talking, but Rex couldn’t follow anything they were saying at all.  It was okay for him to just… zone out a bit, right?  He could… obviously, they could take care of things…

“Rex,” said Caesar, dragging Rex’s attention back into the real world, if only for a moment, “go to sleep.”

.

To be continued. :)

[frouponical]

Hey Frou, it's me, Anon sent you a question about JW and alcohol *covers face* *shy*

First, let me thank you guys in this little fandom. Thank you everyone for all these contributions. They are the little joys in my day and I cherish them so much *hugs*

Next, I don't think you will use the associations from my rotten brain to create such a SO BEAUTIFUL work 😭 Thank you for your gift 😭 I love it! Why is this whump so beautiful? But Frou, you just made my illness worse. I saw you drawing that guy's hand, holding JW's ear between 2 fingers and stroking it!! Right there, panel 6, thumb in his mouth and index and middle finger stroking his ear! Ears are sensitive spots, you know! I want to kick that guy's ass and take his place, this is my pov!

Oh no *hugs head* I was wrong, my fault. That must be the detective's place.

So, how about this? The detective likes to caress JW's ears to see him shrink his neck slightly, wiggling comfortably in his lap. Like, petting a puppy. And chin too, stroking underneath JW's chin. Caress his head, his back, to hear him purr comfortably in a low voice. And JW will react just like a puppy (even better while they're doing hot stuff *hides behind pillow*). He will moan softly, close his eyes, kiss SC's cheek, lick the tip of his nose, rub, and gently bite SC's shoulder when SC overstimulates him, and lick the bite mark when SC pat his head. SC will ask "Are you a little puppy?" 🥺 JW is a Poolde puppy? Goldendoodle? Cockapoo? Pugs? Idk is generally a gentle-natured puppy. And SC? Definitely a Dobermann with a fierce appearance but loyal and caring. That's right, now I associate them with dogs *cries again*

I'm babbling again in your ask 😭 thank you so much for listening to me and sorry so much that I couldn't stop 😭 and sorry if there are any grammar or vocabulary errors that confuse you, English is not my first language.

#sorry little JW please don't come looking for me with a hammer

#i'm giving you a dobermann

Welcome back anon! It's an absolute pleasure to be able to contribute even just a little bit into the fandom. ヽ༼ಢ_ಢ༽ﾉ☂ so it brings me happiness to know you enjoy them as well! no no thanks to that rotten brain of yours, it rotted mine too and ended up drawing whatever that was. And will forever be evidence that would be held against me 😂😂Can't believe you actually noticed that! I had a little thought while drawing that they'd show faux tenderness in the middle of bullying and beating him up to catch him off guard and cause confusion. we'd both beat them all to have that chance but SC will beat us to it *pats your head* ANd OH my that's Steaming hawt 🫣🫣🤭 I've been holding back on drawing NSFW but this is so cutee.. maybe it's time 🫢 who wouldn't want to see SC caress JW! also maybe JW can be a Cairn Terrier! or something in the terrier breed 🤔 and the detective as a dobermann is so perfect! he even dresses like one hahaha I really appreciate you babbling in my asks! It takes me awhile to reply because words still don't come easy to me but your grammar is perfect, I understand it perfectly 😏😏

#us hiding from JW and his hammer EDIT: actually you know a cockapoo is actually perfect now that I've thought about it properly hmmm

[the-lark-ascending69]

your nancy wheeler whump is incredible, ty for the food

— sincerely, a nancy wheeler fan who is also a whump enjoyer

About this post, I think.

Omg anon hiii i'm so happy you liked it!! 🥰🥰 Nancy is such a whumpeable character, maybe because shes so broken inside already 💕 she's just a scared wet cat who needs to be wrapped up in a warm blanket.

A few headcanons for youuuu 💕💕

Robin's parents will be out of town for a few months (they're visiting family far away), so she has the house all to herself, and since the Wheelers are gone and Nancy has nowhere to go, that's where they take her.

Steve and Robin spend a long time looking for the Wheelers. They make a hundred phone calls a day but they keep hitting dead ends. The Wheelers left Hawkins shortly after Nancy was "confirmed" dead, and Mike quickly lost contact with his friends. Finding them has become impossibly difficult, and Steve and Robin worry that they'll never get to tell them Nancy is alive. Nancy misses them like crazy.

The party gets involved super quickly - Lucas, Dustin and Will, as well as the two new kids, Max and El. The boys all cry when they see Nancy, and to Nancy it feels like having siblings again, three new little brothers to try to fill in the space left by Mike and Holly. Max and El just want to help - they're excited to finally meet Nancy Wheeler, Mike's famous sister - he never shut up about her. He always talked about how smart and brave she was and how nothing has been the same since she died. Nancy was a bit surprised to know Mike said that about her, and it only makes her cry. She misses her brother so much.

Max in particular spends a lot of time with Nancy. She helps take care of her when Steve and Robin can't.

Will makes a lot of drawings for Nancy, and she keeps them all by her bedside. She particularly loves the one portraying her family - Mom, Mike, Holly, yes, even her dad.

Nancy experiences a lot of ugly withdrawal symptoms after having been on drugs so heavily for so long. Lots of vomiting and headaches.

Hopper gets involved in her case. She tells him everything, and he begins his investigation. He visits every now and then - it's in his nature. Up until two years ago, he was a father without daughter, and Nancy is a daughter without parents and a sister without siblings. It's only natural when El shows up at Robin's house to spend more and more time with Nancy, happy to have an older sister figure, even if she takes care of Nancy more than Nancy takes care of her. And it's only natural for Hopper to visit a few times a week to ask how she's doing and make sure all her needs are met.

Joyce is overjoyed to hear she's alive, and soon joins Steve and Robin in their search for the Wheeler's new number. She brings food whenever she can and instantly takes on a motherly role in Nancy's life. She agrees that it's best for Nancy to stay at Robin's for the time being, since Joyce and Jonathan spend a great deal of time at work and she'd be all alone for most of the time, but she plans on taking her to live with them when Richard and Melissa Buckley come back.

Jonathan awkwardly tries to help as well - he's often busy with work, but he stops by whenever possible to see if she needs anything. Nancy appreciates that.

Nancy hates appearing weak, but she's set off by the smallest thing - the party's boys hi-fiving each other reminds her of the way soldiers raised their hands to hit her. Steve's loud laughter reminds her of the way the general used to laugh when she cried. Out of the house, she's terrified of needles and hates getting blood tests or vaccines, and going to the dentist is paralyzing - the clattering of the instruments on the metal tray, the shapes of them so similar to the ones they used to rip her nails out, the horrible feeling of foreign objects in her mouth... she has two reactions to these things: she either freezes or she breaks. Freezing includes being almost completely non-verbal, trembling slightly but obeying every order. Breaking includes a lot of crying and panicking.

Her sleep schedule is all messed up - sometimes she can't sleep for more than three hours. Sometimes she blacks out for 18 hours straight. She can never seem to go to sleep and wake up at the same time every day, and she often suffers from nightmares.

She likes cuddling with either Steve or Robin, or even better, both of them. Sandwiched between the two of them, she almost feels like a little kid sleeping between her parents.

Robin really really really didn't like bathing Nancy, or helping her dress up. It feels like she's taking advantage of her. She feels the same when she shares a bed with her. Steve is the one to largely take care of Nancy when it comes to those things. They're still dating, technically, though at this point Nancy can't say she feels love for him. She clings to him because he's familiar, and he loves her, and he makes her feel safe. She appreciates him and cares deeply about him, but if she's honest with herself... she can't love him. She can't bring herself to say that to Steve, of course - after everything he's done for her, she just... tries so hard to convince herself she loves him in the way she's supposed to.

She actually quite enjoys Robin's company, and in part, she'd prefer it if it was her doing all of this for her. Robin can't bring herself to refuse when Nancy asks. They've slept together many times, Nancy cuddled into her chest. It makes Robin's heart ache, but she pushes those feelings down - creep, she thinks to herself. Freak. Pervert. Last thing Nancy needed was a person she trusted secretly lusting after her like a... like the dyke she was.

Nancy realizes she's not having a nice dream at the end of her first day after being rescued. She's drinking a cup of tea with Robin, talking about mindless things - Robin just wanted to make her feel comfortable and she supposed keeping it simple would be best, so she tells her about band and the time she passed out during a school play audition from the nerves. And Nancy looks down at her cup, feels its heat in her hands and the sweet taste in her mouth, and the soft texture of Robin's clean clothes on her skin. She hears the crickets outside, the creaking of the wooden floorboards when Robin paces, and it dawns to her that she is free. She suddenly breaks into tears, and Robin freaks out - calls Steve - and they both try her best to comfort her. Nancy hugs herself - she wants her mother and brother and little sister, it breaks her heart to know they left, that they thought her dead. But somehow, in Robin and Steve's arms, she feels warm. Safe, for the first time in years.

[anjumstar]

anjum’s bkdk recs 19

Ten more (complete) sfw bkdk fic recs. If you read any of these and enjoy them, lmk! And, more importantly, let the authors know with a comment! Plus, send me your recs, and maybe they’ll make the next list!

Legend

hyperlinked title by author | word count

Genre warning(s): where relevant Summary/review

💚🧡 = fave

Recs are under the cut, organized by word count, low to high.

51. Sheets by baku_bean | 2.1k

general A cute little pre-relationship fic with our boys. It’s short, sweet, and simple, but it suits them well.

52. X Marks the Spot by sobashouto (snowandfire) | 3.3k

fluff This feels like the fic that takes place just after the happy ending. And things are still happy! Bkdk have just started dating and Deku gives Baku the gift of some homemade Dynamight merch. The boys are silly and bad at this and them.

53. be loved by bonnia | 5.4k

fluff, hurt/comfort Baku has ptsd after Dabi kidnapped him in the forest training, and Deku helps him work through those struggles with physical touch. Not very angsty, yes very cute.

54. song on a policeman’s radio by ohwickedsoul | 6.6k

angst, drama warning: MCD This was an interesting mixed media fic! It’s an amalgam of article intros, tweets, and court reports. It’s a toughie, don’t miss that MCD tag (like I did, lol), but its unique style captures lots of relationships in a succinct way, and it feels very professional in terms of the court-speak, although, I’m certainly no expert!

55. What Was Missing by Randstad | 8.2k

general, fluff Bakugou gets hit with an honesty quirk, but he has some things he’s not quite ready to be honest about. Yet, being honest feels a bit better than he thought? Lovely prose and a good balance of Baku’s character. Definitely focused on him, but good moments from Deku too.

56. Not All Heroes Wear Capes by vulcanhighblood | 11k

pining, fluff Fake dating…kind of? Deku is suddenly a great subject of interest to the paparazzi and Baku intervenes in many ways and they start spending more time together. Baku is appropriately immature and selfish and selfless and Deku pushes back on and off against Baku’s behavior. It’s fluff that doesn’t just rot your teeth—there’s proper balance.

57. close but not quite by blossomshed | 13.9k

action/adventure, romance Okay, this one had extra special bonus good characterization. It had details from Katsuki that absolutely have canon basis, but that I so rarely see drawn on in fic, and I was floored. This is a classic “Deku gives Baku OFA via kissing” fic, featuring acespec!Katsuki trying to figure out what the heck kissing is about. So much explored in so little. Fantastic.

58. invincible by supercrunch | 20k

action/adventure warning: non-graphic human trafficking An interesting canon-divergence, here! The sludge villain never goes after Katsuki, so Izuku never goes to UA. And he falls into a pit of depression. With only a bit of parental nudging, Katsuki goes to help, and his idea? To start being vigilante partners together. I found it to be a compelling alternate view for them!

59. we will wait and wait in that space by roadtripwithlucifer | 22k 💚🧡

angst warning: MCD, manga spoilers ch367 Okay, only read this one if you’re ready for the real real hurt. Because know that it has an uplifting ending, it is not needless pain, but I, the robot of the bkdk fandom, cried real tears with this one. It twists the most beautiful knife and has some of the best Deku characterization to date. And such gorgeous love. It is worth the pain, but do not read in public!

60. Sink to Swim by cinnabee | 35.7k

angst warning: big torture, constant suffering for our boys. Remember what I said about the real real hurt? Yeah, that one was the big cry one, this one is the big tension, big whump one. As the warning says, this fic has very explicit, repeated torture in it, the game is basically that the boys have been teleported from UA into a torture maze that they’re trying to find their way out of. I, personally, loved the tension and the pacing, but it’s def not for everyone!

✨ Bonus! ✨

perfect by eggstasy | 2.7k

fluff No bkdk in this one, just Bakugou x 3. It’s Bakugou and his parents from when he’s born to when he develops his quirk and them just loving on him as a little baby, despite him still having some of those, hrm, lesser traits that he has as a teenager. So cute.

more recs can be found here 💚🧡

[void-occupation]

another thought I had about the hells winter thing when I was supposed to be paying attention in science lol-

the bayou is unaffected by hell's weather right? well what if because the more difference there is in the two temperatures, the harder it is to keep that up?

can you imagine him having that one safe space ripped from him? all while he's desperately trying to stay warm and just coping with cabin fever in general.

or the alternative:

when a particularly freezing night hits, angel pipes up with the idea of alastors bayou, and alastor has to deal with 6 (i forgot if pentious was dead in hidden hurts or not-) other demons in this one place that was supposed to be his safe space, and also the fact that keeping certain habits, secrets, and emotions hidden gets really REALLY hard when you have no alone time for god knows how long haha.

Hazbin Winter has been floating around my head like a mosquito, THERES TOO MANY POSSIBILITY'S !!

whump angst fluff and humour galore fr lmfao

I love this, and there's definitely a way to incorporate both ideas if you'll take a moment to imagine with me:

At first, things weren't too bad. It sucked and Alastor was cold all the time, but whatever. Then Angel had the bright idea of having everyone stay in Alastor's bayou on a particularly cold night which was also...fine. It was fine. However, one night turned into two, turned into a dozen, and suddenly, Alastor didn't have his own space anymore. That sucked because that meant he had no where he felt safe enough to let his guard down except Rosie's which was out of the question. He would have just shadow-traveled, except this was a Hell winter. and Hell winters were special in that they could be felt no matter what magic was being used unless it was angelic - which Alastor's was not. But it was fine. So what if he didn't have anywhere to decompress? That didn't matter. However, it did have repercussions.

As time wore on, Alastor became a lot more irritable and defensive. Stress built up to unbearable levels, and despite his usual insistence that he was above such things, he began taking little comments (that normally wouldn't have affected him very much) to heart, and letting them hurt his feelings which he of course never told anyone. Add on the fact that he was getting more and more exhausted as the days went by and that only made things worse. He started displaying some obvious nervous ticks from tugging on his hair, to picking at his hands/clothes, to fiddling with random objects, etc.. All of the stress only made the cold affect him more and that was the last thing he needed. It became harder and harder to use his magic and maintain preexisting spells as his body used all of its energy trying to stay warm - shivering constantly and burning calories he didn't have to spare since the stress made him unable to eat.

It all came to a head on one of the rare occasions he actually had his room to himself - everyone else was watching a movie in the lobby. He was curled in one of his chairs wrapped in blankets and shaking with cold despite the bayou's warmer temperature. He could only keep it so much warmer than the outside, and it had steadily gotten colder day by day as his magic weakened. He felt weaker than ever, and honestly wasn't sure if he'd be able to leave his chair. Suddenly, he felt alarmingly empty and he watched in pure horror as his beloved bayou - his only safe haven from his dealer's watchful eyes - faded from existence. He poured all of his strength into a last desperate attempt at saving it, but his best wasn't good enough and it disappeared. He let out a wretched cry and fell to the floor in a tangled heap, but since his room was on the top floor, no one heard. He'd used the last of his strength to try and save the bayou, so he couldn't even drag himself to a sitting position. He cried silent tears over the combined stress and terror caused by losing his last safe haven entirely and ended up passing out due to exhaustion.

Since the bayou was gone, so was the temperature control, and the room steadily plunged into freezing temperatures, hastened by a previously unknown draft from one of the windows. No one knew what happened until they went up to Alastor's room only for it to be colder than the rest of the hotel, and find the bayou gone and Alastor unconscious with frozen tear tracks on his face. They quickly brought him down to the lobby to be next to the fireplace, and the only reason he didn't lose his fingers to frostbite and his life to hypothermia was because of Lucifer's angelic magic. Technically he wouldn't have died permanently, but if he'd died, he either would have regenerated outside (which would lead to him freezing to death again and repeating the process indefinitely) or in the presence of some random sinner who might take a look at a disoriented Radio Demon and decide to make history by doing him in once and for all. Either way not good odds.

Needless to say, when he woke up, Alastor. Freaked. Out. I'm talking full mental breakdown, maybe a panic attack, maybe some frantic hair-tearing, maybe crying, I don't know. All I know is that it's bad. And who can blame him? As mentioned before, the bayou was his ONLY safe haven from his master's surveillance and now he was completely vulnerable to her watchful gaze. There was no where in Hell he could escape her besides his bayou, but he can't tell any of them that, even if he wanted to. Not only that, but he's pretty much completely defenseless. He's too weak to use his magic and all he has left at his defense are his teeth and claws, which means he now has to rely on the others for shelter, heat, and defense. This of course only makes his stress shoot up exponentially and everyone starts getting super concerned, but he straight-up can't tell them why he's so paranoid. Completely awful all around.

that's all I have for now, hope you enjoyed this word vomit. My computer powered off halfway through and deleted all of it and I wanted to cry, but it's done now lol

[keeper-of-all-the-random-things]

The Chain

Day 11 for @promptsforyourwhumpfic Two Weeks of Whump

CW: lady whump, male whumper, possessive whumper, chains. Please let me know if I missed anything.

#####

She was held by a single chain.  It was silver so thin it looked like a breath could shatter it.  But it sat heavy around her neck, resting against her collarbone.

She should be happy, he said.  She was lucky.  She got to dress up and go out and had the world at her feet … when he was with her.

She should be happy, he said.  There were some, he knew, who kept what was theirs hidden away, chained in the dark, only to emerge at their pleasure.  Wasn’t it kind of him to give her a chain so pretty, a leash so long?

She could pretend to be happy.  In public, when strangers said what a lovely couple they made.  In private, when he told her how well she did that day.

Alone, she cried.

At work, she raged.  He gave her staff (wasn’t that generous?), and she made what she could with this small power.  All the fear she felt, she cast off on her inferiors until one by one, they left.

See, he told her.  She should be happy.  He wanted her when no one else did.

So she pretended to be happy for him.

Alone, she cried.

The silver chain grew heavier.

[thebansacredbanned]

ok so I have managed to lose the original fic ask game post that @wishthefish tagged me in a couple of weeks ago bUT I did save this screenshot so I will just randomly talk about these fics for a bit (I am always happy to talk about my fics for a bit, this is an open invitation) SO

I know I've been through the wars

This is part of the greater Xuyao (yes Wen Xu and Meng Yao, no I'm not sorry, they're immensely shippable if you're not a coward) 'choose your own adventure' verse where I basically lose my mind and create diverging timelines in almost all of which Meng Yao suffers terribly bc Meng Yao whump is weirdly easy to write

The cyoa thread for this is 'Wen Xu dies as in canon and Wen Chao decides he wants Meng Yao for himself' -> 'Wen Chao dies as in canon, WRH continues to let everyone else abuse MY' -> 'NMJ conceals the way MY has been treated so no one knows'

All the titles from the greater Xuyao cyao fic come from the The Amazing Devil song "Battle Cries", which I chose mostly because there was a cool lyric for the first fic back when it was supposed to be a one-shot, but also loads of the lyrics from the song work really well

I picked "I know I've been through the wars" for this chapter because unlike in the alternate branch of this fic where everyone finds out, only MY (and NMJ, to a certain extent) have any idea of what exactly MY has been through. Which is good because his trauma isn't being gossiped about! But is also Bad because people who him to be happy (people = LXC) keep accidentally making things worse :3

which then my few beloved commenters were like 'this is so evil!' and i was like 'it's not even that bad' and they were like 'YES it IS', but angst is my default at this point for some reason so I didn't notice oops

At the end MY runs away from the banquet to hide. There's currently one sequel branch for this (NMJ goes to find him and is actually helpful for once (this is largely NHS' fault)). I have some plans for another branch (LXC goes to find him and continues to try to help without knowing the problem) but the way my brain was taking it was almost Too Dark for me so I haven't written it (yet). I might. Or I might be nice to MY for once and have LXC go and actually find out the problem. But then I'd be being nice so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

If it takes fighting a war for us to meet, it will have been worth it

This is. Nie Mingjue/Jin Zixun. I am sorry about this one

So when I wrote the first Xuyao installment I really wanted to write but my brain wasn't clicking so I put the sunshot generation into a random name picker, spun it a bunch of times, and decided Meng Yao and Wen Xu would be interesting (it was going to just be a creepy dark fic and then I wrote like three sentences and went oh. it's a love story. oops)

ANYWAY a few months later when I was bored I spun the wheel a bunch more times so now I have a Selection of rare pairs for whenever I feel like it

Mingxun was Not the one I was going to write first but here we are

Basically my initial thoughts were "jin zixun gets bullied into going to war by his cousin and then gets his gay awakening when he gets shouted at my nie mingjue" and yeah I guess that Happened

The title is a lyric from "Helpless" from Hamilton and was @nemainofthewater's fault/idea, which I thank her sincerely for because I hate titling things. I also think it's really funny

This was SUPPOSED to be a short crack one-shot but then wishthefish bullied/persuaded/encouraged to write more and it's annoyingly fun so now there are at least three chapters with the potential of more

Takes place within a mixture of show and book canons, whichever is funnier at any given moment

Really, if Jin Zixun is too busy being distracted by da-ge then no one is causing problems at the hunt and no one is getting murdered by out of control Wen Ning so like. This could very much solve all the problems

[rocohen20]

Stanger Things Recs- Fan Edits & Fan Art

In the past year or so I got into the Stranger Things' fandom. I thought it would be a fun way to have a never-ending compilation of fandom related content. I am on Tumblr and Youtube, so most of the content here are from said websites. My favourite character is Steve and as a result of it most of the following links will be more about the older kids and less about the little kids.

I hope you enjoy it!

Fan Edits

General

-I'm Just a Kid, by n0connections

As for a general edit for this show, this is a perfect edit. This show deals with literal kids trying to save the world, and with each passing season more and more kids get involved, and the seriousness of the situation grows. It isn't fun to talk and the trauma for the show runners, but the fans aren't afraid of it and have the different ways to

show and explore those traumas.

This video cotained only canon compliant segments. Combined with the song "I'm just a kid" who is filled with teenage angst and about how you are alone in the world. The song elevated and validated their experience.

On a more personal note, hearing this song was such a blast and nostalgic to me. And I still knew all the lyrics even though it's been a while.

-Tokyo Drift, by musicalchaos07

A fun compilation of the driving on the show along with an apropriate song.

-D&D, by kxsslikerealpeopledo

The voice clip is funny in itself, but the characterisation is on peak, especially Steve's.

-Treat, by mourntheantagonist

It's just funny and hilarious. I like the friendship dynamics it illudes to.

-Big Happy Family, by sailorbuckley

I just love videos who assign characters their part of a found family.

Steve Harrington & Dustin Henderson

-Hawkins' Hendringtons, by n0connection

Gilmore Girls AU, the opening credits. Every variation of Steve is actually Dustin's parent I eat right up.

Steve Harrington & Robin Buckley

-Besties, by rogueddie

The friendship between Steve and Robin is some of the best thing on the show. I love how they took a silly, borderline memable, song who fit perfectely with their dynamic.

My favourite part is how the line "Girls in bikiny are waiting for me" is accompanied Steve's little giggle before he tries to flirt in scoops ahoy.

-I'm Not Suicidale, by djohawke

This edit is like a primer for many of the well used headcanons for Steve. Personally I like to read the stories where Steve is suicidal and his fiends- especially Robin care about him. However, what I appreciate even more is Steve having suicide ideation. Him caring so much for the kids and his friends, that his own personal safety is dead last in his list.

Steve Harrington

-Nail, Hair, Hips, Hills, by thirdeye1234

This song is full of attitude just like Steve. It just fit.

-You're On Your Own Kid, by MockingJamie

This edit is a 4 season recap of Steve as a character and his arch. The song goes hand in hand with the character. Out of all the different "You're On Your Own Kid" edits, for all the different fandoms, this edit is by far the best. I've seen this video a million times. I've cried to it, and it made me feel so many different emotions. It also made me fall in love with the song (it was part of my most played songs of the year).

-Not Everything Has a Happy Ending, by rogueddie

A beautiful edit which shows all the angst and hardship Steve's been through in 4 seasons. A nice validation for all those fanfics about Steve's whump.

-Fantasy, by kat-writes

The song says it all, Steve is definetely a fictional crush and this edit portrays it spectacularly.

-Don't Trust Me, by gideoncharov

Something about the combination of the song with the images just sums "King Steve" perfectly. He is confident and he knows he is the hot shit.

-Demons, by MDR Productions

I think this edit and the song ties perfectly into "Mom Steve". Time and time again we see how he is readily to protect anyone he knows and love. Also it ties with all the tropes of "Steve Harrington has a dark past" such as "Steve Harrington has Bad Parents" or neglected Steve.

-Another One Bites the Dust, by Grable424

It's an incredible, fun, funky edit. The song is setting the perfect mood. But what really makes this edit so good is how she shows the contradictary in Steve as a character- the confident smooth guy, the clumsy unaware guy, the bortherline patheric guy, the protector physical guy.

-Style, by mendessip

A fun little Taylor Swift edit. I'm not gonna lie, every time I watch this edit I feel personally called out by the ending.

-1985, by Navi Fire-frost

Right of the bat I love the song choice, and she really did an excellent job with the editing to fit the words. I love how some lines are really on tune with the scenes- "His wife underwhelming cooking" along with the indignant look of Robin. "Some people really had to fight for survive and some people were white guys in 1985" along with Jonathan and Steve.

However the perfect lines were about how some people were living through the AIDS crisis and some people were Italian. Both of them goes perfectely with "Bisexual Steve Harrington" and "Italian Steve Harrington" respectfully.

Also the end of the song is just perfect. As someone whose father was 19 in 1985 and like Steve he is mostly dresses in polo shirts and the general style of Steve, I felt relatable. Also I thought it was fitting also for Joe Keery himself. In Kevin Pollak Chat Show he spoken about how Steve is reminding him of his dad, who was roughly the same age as Steve in the 80s and also dresses in a preppy style.

-The Innocence is Gone, by electricmunson

It's short but it's really explain perfectectly how season 4 unashamedly put Joe Keery like that. They knew exactly what they were doing and a lot of the fans can't complain.

-WAP, by rafescurtainbangz

I wouldn't mind to get a full edit to this song.

Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson

-Hellfire Band AU, by bachaboska

As a fake trailer it is edited so much like a real one. I love the editing and especially the choice of song.

-This boy is dangerous, by emsgoodthinkin

I love the song with the images the creator chose. It also ties with the type of stories where Steve was aware of Eddie's atraction for him, and not only that Steve is confident and have no problem to flirt right back. I love "Confident Bisexual Steve Harrington".

-Steddie as Canon, by eddielove

This edit is really good and shows a different version of season 4. There are a lot of fanfiction with the plot of Eddie entering the story earlier than season 4. A personal favourite take of mine is secretly dating Steddie, until the events of season 4 let the secret out to the rest of the party. The stories that goes hard into their shared senior year together are a really appreciated and fun to read.

-Head Over Hills, by eddielove

I just love the song, and the emotions of the song along with the peak 80's vibe of it. The softness of the song along with the editing is perfect and it once again ties to the secretly dating before season 4 angle.

-And your Best Friend Too, by emsgoodthinkin

The vibe and the clips just show off their attractiveness. But also it really give the vibes of all the threesome of Steve/Eddie and another character. I don't always read thressome fics of them, but some of them just hit. With the vibe of this video, it ties with the character who is attractive and is torn apart while needing to choose between Steve and Eddie. Every one has his own aspects they really love. Eventually after tearing themselves apart the boys put mercy on the charachter and tell them how they don't need to choose just one of them, they can have both.

-I want to Swoon You Baby, by windlass262

It's just adorable. The art is pretty and I love how flustered Steve get because he was never swooned before.

-Everybody Wants To Rule the World, by aexphr

It's a cute edit and change of the original scene. It's a pretty much sum the dynamics of this ship.

-But You Broke Mine, by unanuvola

I just love the nerative. It also fit with a lot of the fics where Steddie was a thing priar to season 4, they broke up and the events of season 4 bring them back together.

Tommy Hagan/Steve Harrington/Carrol Perkins/Nancy Wheeler

-Boys & Girls, by pr1nce-steve

I just adore the stories where they goes hard into the friendship of Tommy, Carol and Steve. Extra bonus if it include Tommy/Steve/Carol thing that Nancy abruptly stopped and that's why Tommy and Carol hated her so much. This edit is exactly about this scenerio.

Tommy Hagan & Steve Harrington & Billy Hargrove

-Something 'Bout You, by gayfiction

Steve has a face that people like to beat up.

Billy Hargrove

-What's In Your Head, by xPsychoLoveProdzx

This edit and the next both used the song Zombie but in different ways. The lyrics really fit with Billy's story and charachter. This edit follows the canon, but it makes you understand the charachter better. I love it when the chosen music dictated the nerative, and this is a fine example for it.

-Zombie, by GreyMagick

I really liked how it portrayed the continuation of the cycle of abuse. How Neil mistreats Billy, and Billy mistreat Max. The music inhances the massage by talking about how history is repeating itselfs

-Teen Idle, by queen-helaenas-pet-spider

This song is a lot about mental health and regrets about your teens. It fits with Billy really well, especially this part of the song. It just the perfect vibe for him.

-My Castle's Crumbling Down, by mourntheantagonist

This song, like many of Taylor Swift's songs put a vivid imagery in my head. If you're looking at the rest of my page, you would see primarily ice hockey related content. And this song is really really NHL coded. However, when it comes to the bridge it is the perfect Billy coded. The bridgeis literally about the silence before the storm. How despite how people made you to be the villain you are still standing tall and will make him take back their opinion. Which is exactly how Billy was at his last minutes. I watched this edit in loops many times.

-Comfortably Numb, by luckylocus

The song really fits with Billy being flayed by the mindflayer.

Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield

-I don't relate to You at All, by babylove176

It shows perfectedly the messy relationship between Billy and Max. The song fit seemlesly as well.

Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington

-Hairy Cam, by shieldofiron

I'm sorry, but I am too is so into the hairy chest of Joe Keery. He looked so hot in those scenes in season 4, and this video is an appreciation, as well as a Billy/Steve video dedicated to Steve's hairy chest.

-They Scream, by saberghatz

It's a fun spirited edit, with the soundtack of 'Dirty Dancing', what not to like.

-Billy Asking Steve Out, by fizzigigsimmer

It's a short, funny edit. Poor Eddie.

-Pants, by giurochedadomani

This Tik Tok and speech is hilarious on its own, and it really fits with Billy's and Steve rivalry and suposed sexual tention and homoeroticy.

-Billy Survives, by saberghatz

This is phanominal editing. It's looks like a legit trailer. I really liked the use of the songs, especially 'Climbing Up The Hill'. Also I'm a sucker for the line "Am I dreaming or is it you Harrington?"

-Shower Scene, by martianclown

I just love the Tommy bashing in that one.

-A Tough Year, by ickypuppi3

I just love this edit and it makes me want to read a whole 50k fic about Jason Carver pov about having to suffer the sexual tension and pining of two of the team stars.

-Grindr, by ickypuppi3

I just love this sound, and all of its form. Also it fits perfectedly with all the fics were Billy is a closeted gay man, and Steve is just oblivious to Billy's crush.

-Go to Bed, by mourntheantagonist

I love the stories and edits where Steve is the one with the say in the relationship with Billy. Billy loves every second of it.

-Stop Looking At Me, by clownwix

I love the art and the soundbite.

-Admit it, by clownwix

Once again, the art. And season 3 Steve is really is a treat.

-Whore, by mourntheantagonist

I love the soundbit and the accent of Dave Mitchel, along with the twist.

-Swear, by valtoon

It fits Billy's personality just right.

Murray Bowman

-Over This Teenage Dream, by findafihgt

I think it's a fun edit to characterize him. Also the song and the images remind me of the Altracation between Murray and Steve in chapter 25 of the incredible fic of Jackrabbit Underneath by Grey_Lark.

Fan Arts

General

-Camp Strangers, by tubesock86

I just love the art so much. It gives the vibes exactly right without spelling it. It also feel like a perfect AU for the show, while still keeping the same vibe. Also it really give me the vibes of "Fear Street, Part 2, 1978 (which coincidentally starring Sadie Sink). Especially with the camp counslers of the movie.

-Steve Plays DnD, by habken

It's a cute little comic. It also go well with all the fics and headcanons of Steve finally wore down enough to try playing DnD, and how most of the time it doesn't go smoothly.

-Steve's Clothes. by poisonyvs

I love the concept. Steve and Robin are the type of friends who wear each other clothes.

-It's Always Sunny in Hawkings, by tubesock86

I love when talented people recreate random photos for a different fandoms. Out of all the pictures to recreate out of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" this is the perfect picture.

-Corroded Coffin Album Cover, by artbean

-Corroded Coffin Second Album, by artbean

Those two links are an incredible, creative design of Corroded Coffins' Albums.

Steve Harrington

-Steve's Colage, by skepsis

It's a perfect, cute, colage of Steve.

-Bathroom Floor, by rilinhyl

I love the watercolor painting. It's soft but also not at the same time and I find myself wanting to look at it for a very long time.

-Crop Top, by steddicameraroll

I love the style of Steve on the show, and I think he looks really good in it, but we were robbed.

Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson

-Steve Harrington- Kinktober Latex, by dreaminginpencil

It's sexy, it latex, and it leave too little and too many for the imagination.

-Hockey Player Steve, by fernandesart

-Hockey Player Steve, Figure Skater Eddie, by fernandesart

Those two are a headcanon of the creator, Steve is a hockey player, Eddie is a figure skater. It goes perfectely with many of the romance hockey book, enemies-to-lovers (especially "Ice Breaker").

Also, the fact that Joe Keery played hockey growing up, and is a hockey fan is just perfect for this head canon.

-Stay, by vivalsky

It's just really really good. I love the details and how it paints a whole story. I love how Steve is wearing Eddie's vast but I love how he paired it with the short gym shorts- the perfect combination between the old and the new Steve.

I want to think that Steve invited Eddie to his house to "hang out", Eddie let himself in and trying to find Steve. When he went upstairs towards his room, the door is closed. He knocked on the door one, as a warning, before he let himself in. He walks in to the perfect image of Steve, wearing his old gym shorts. This pair is short, and with a the position of Steve's leg, there are some hidden gems being reveiled. When Eddie raises his eyes a bit he balatedely realize that Steve is wearing his Dio vast. Since what happened with Vecna Steve didn't return the vast, and Eddie couldn't complain.

I also really love the implication, without showing any sorts of nudity.

-Kissing, by litteleststarfighter

I just love the yellow sweater of Steve, and I love the expose skin between the two of them.

-Steddie, cigarettes, by boohonya

As I said earlier, I love when poeple recreating random pictures. I also love how in this specific picture it could be read as homo erotic or as a romantic, indirect kiss.

-Frat Bros, by unspecifiedfigure

Like I said, I love all the recreations of random bros photos.

-Beach, by snewok

Another recreation of a photo. I love the vibes of this, it fits great with all the "eddie is pining and super attracted to Steve" fics.

-By the Poll Side, by inflomora-art

I really love the colors and the position of the two of them. Steve's house is private so they would feel more comfortable to be intimate without the fear of uninvited eyes watching.

It's also remind me of chapter 4 of Step With Me Into Indecency, by wilting_aspen. I highly recommend this story.

-Bathroom Bar, by ah-jiing

A sexy, slightly smutty art. It reminds me of the story you can feel his heart, but you know he's mean , by oklahoma.

-Gym Class, by ahhrenata

I love it, I just love when people are reffering to the fact that they shared a senior year. Especially the juxtaposition between athlete Steve and two-times senior Eddie.

-Horro Camp, by littlestarfighter

This Camp AU is more on the realistic side. And I love how you can feel how unsure they are, even slightly scared.

Steve Harrington & Dunstin Henderson

-Steve+ Dustin- season 2, by fennethianell

They are just adorobale together, I really liked their bonding in season 2.

Steve Harrington & Robin Buckley

-Stobin Sharing a Bed, by kaspurrcat

They would 100% share a bed, so I love everything about it.

-Vampire Stobin, by sentient-trash

I love the vibes of the original painting, and how he took it and put his own twist in it. Also I love how he put Steve in the dress and Robin in the suit.

-Friendship Goals, by ioannushka

It's adorobale and exactly how I see their friendship in my mind.

Robin Buckley/Chrissy Cunninghum

-Buckingham, by glitterfang

I like watching and reading about the two of them. It's fun and the art is pretty.

Billy Hargrove

-Bily Playing Basketball, by aggressiveviking

I love the idea of him putting his curls in a tie. I know how annoying it can be all the hair in the way in the middle of the game.

-Female Billy, by valtoon

I love how she kept the aggresiveness and the dominant fitures of his face. I love the hair as well.

Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington

-Giving a Hand, by generalghosty

I love this scene, and especially this part.

-Hockey Bros, by akioukun

I love the Hockey AU. But especially I love how they seemed Buddy Buddy, but judging by Billy's face you can see the complicated emotions between the two of them.

Max Mayfield/Lucas Sinclair

-Lumax, by vampirade

It's such a happy, beutiful painting. I love seeing the contrast of the colors between them.

Will Byers

-Zombie Boy, by willnmike4l

I really liked the color scheme and the style.

I hope you enjoyed it. I'm working on part 2 with different espects of the fandom.

[stitch1830]

it's kantoph time!

i've been thinking,,,

toph going through a traumatic event and getting scared of loud noises to the point where she needs to take a break from work (because of the missions and etc)

she has a lot of nightmares and tries to hide it from kanto and he ends up believing that she's fine

so even though she's not well, she goes back to work, but then there's a day in the field with a lot of noises, she can't handle it and has a really bad panic attack

i imagine kanto running to help her and his heart breaking when he realises that she is not as fine as he thought she was

and then i also imagine toph during the panic attack sobbing telling kanto about the nightmares and how she hides her cries in the night and that she is really sorry for not telling him before and his like :((

Hi Anon! Thank you for the ask, and your patience! I love Kantoph asks (and asks in general), it just takes me a hot second to reply lol.

But yes! Kantoph whump let's go!

So if Toph had to take some time off, I feel like Kanto would constantly worry. He knows that she loves what she does, even the bad days. So the fact that she is stepping away for a moment means something's up, even if she says everything is fine.

So when she goes back to work, he tries to keep a close eye on her.

This particular day though, he wasn't right there to keep her ground her.

He sees her on the ground, her hands over her ears, and his heart drops to his stomach. He doesn't know what to do, but all he does is pull her into his arms, tell her that he's there with her, that she's okay—

When she confesses how bad everything's been for her, he tries not to break himself. He can't believe that the woman he loves has been hurting like this and he had no idea—

Kanto carries her home, ignoring all the shouts from the officers asking for orders, and he just sits on the couch with her and waits for her to tell him everything.

It takes some time, but eventually they learn what helps her heal, and they take each day at a time. Toph's so grateful to have Kanto by her side, and Kanto is just happy that he can help after feeling so useless the past few weeks. A part of him always worries that they'll go back to how things were before, but he tries to keep on top of the signs to make sure that it doesn't happen again...

Okay! That's what I have for this headcanon. Thank you so much for the ask, Anon! If you have any more questions or headcanons or AUs that you want to talk about, feel free to stop by! Always love a chat :)

Thanks again, and I hope you have a great day! :D

......

Send me asks about ATLA, LOK, or anything, really! :D

[set-phasers-to-whump]

sebastian 😢😢😢😢😢

[darkthingshappen]

Poster Child: Chapter 2

So, as some of you know, I held a poll for which of my stories would get a continuation. Far exceeding every other story, was the story about Connor and his Pet Lib parents. So, without further adieu, I'd like to introduce you all to Connor's family as they try to find their missing son. This will be a multi-chapter story, most of it from Connor's perspective.

Also, @ashintheairlikesnow is the creator of Karen Renford, who appears with her permission.

This story will contain noncon, but it will be clearly marked when it happens.

TW for this chapter: HEAVY use of ethnic slurs - Connor's handler is a racist bastard. Also, there is HEAVY and frank threats of future noncon.

General warnings for BBU and WRU - Institutionalized Slavery.

As always, I'd like to thank my amazing beta, @whumpcereal for always doing an amazing job and pushing for more detail and depth of my characters.

Tags List: @oddsconvert @sparrowsage @castielamigos-whump-side-blog

Connor Lightfoot could be a little shit.  He hoped his handler was figuring that out.  It had been two weeks since he’d first woken up in the horrible white room, though he didn’t actually know that. He just knew it had been a while. Long enough that his handlers were not impressed with him. He’d refused to cooperate.  It was another thing his parents had drilled into his head.  Don’t obey.  Don’t sign anything.  Don’t give in.  Don’t give up – keep fighting. 

And he had, but God, he was so tired and hungry and sore.  Everything fucking hurt.  He had no way of knowing how much weight he’d lost, but he could tell it was quite a bit.  His arms were thin, the muscled definition all but gone.  He’d been given water through a forced feeding tube.  It wasn’t that he would have refused the water, they just wanted to hurt him. 

He’d been force fed food as well, but only a handful of times.  Enough to keep him alive and that was it. 

It was getting harder though.  Connor was tired of being shocked, tired of everything about this place.  And fuck! He was tired of looking at nothing but white.  Damn it! 

He’d started to wonder what might happen if he cooperated and just pretended that he was broken?  Could he do that?  Connor knew the system was meant to be manipulative.  And one of the first things they would try to make him do would be to sign his life away.  He would not do that.  So, cooperating was out of the question. 

He wondered, though: since it was illegal for WRU to take or accept an application from a Native American, would his signature be legally binding?  Connor didn’t think so, but fuck if anyone around here cared. 

He thought back to one of those first few days.  They’d cut his fucking hair.  He’d cried, but it had been tears of fury.  Anger so bone-crushingly deep he didn’t know what to do other than cry hot, livid tears.  He’d raged and screamed and thrashed.  Now, instead of his long straight black hair, it was cropped short – just long enough to grab onto and drag him around, which they seemed to love doing. 

His long hair had been such a part of his proud Navajo identity.  He wore it well and loved the way he looked.  He loved the way it made him so visibly Native American.   There was no denying who he was, and he loved that.  Even if his last name was Lightfoot, which wasn’t actually Native American.  It was an English or some other European name, one that had filtered into his family through some weird adoption way back in the 1800’s on his dad’s side.  But it was his name.  His family.  And it made him no less Navajo.  Connor was proud of his family history.  

And now the fucking WRU were trying to steal it from him bit by bit.  If nothing changed, they would succeed.  But Connor was determined to not be a part of their success in turning him into one of their box boys.  He would not cooperate in becoming someone’s custom order, someone’s little Indian pet to be shown off at parties.  

Connor tried to flex his muscles from where he knelt on the floor.  If he changed positions, then they would shock him.  Most days when he was just done with their shit, he keeled over and let them shock him unconscious.  It sucked, but at least he got to sleep, and he decided when he was done being tortured. 

The door opened and his handler walked in.  

“Hey there, 787266.”

My name is Connor Lightfoot.  I grew up in Shiprock, New Mexico.  I am a member of the Navajo Nation.  My parents are Daniel and Kai Lightfoot. I am twenty years old.  I attend New Mexico State University.  Connor repeated this mantra every time they called him by his number.  I am not a number.  I am a person, not a pet.  I am a hostage, not a slave.  I am not a box boy.  I will not sign. 

When he did not acknowledge his handler, his collar jolted to life and he screamed into his muzzle.  God, he fucking hated it here. 

“I said, hey there, 787266.”

My name is Connor Lightfoot.  I grew up in Shiprock, New Mexico.  I am a member of the Navajo Nation.  My parents are Daniel and Kai Lightfoot.  I am twenty years old.  I attend New Mexico State University.  I am not a number.  I am a person, not a pet.  I am a hostage, not a slave.  I am not a box boy.  I will not sign…  No fuck off you stupid bastard.

Connor rocked back and forth where he lay on the floor. 

“This is exactly why you’re being transferred, 787266.”

That got his attention. He stopped rocking and looked up at his handler, eyebrows knit together with a question he couldn’t ask.

“So, you do understand us.”

Of course I understand you, you fucking dumbass.  Connor rolled his eyes and then writhed through another jolt of electricity. 

He was so weak and tired, he didn’t even try to move as the aftershocks rolled through him.  He simply glared at the handler, body twitching. 

“You’re being moved to a facility that still does things the… old school way.  It’s smaller and they only handle tough cases.  Your continued lack of cooperation and defiance won’t be tolerated.”

The handler gave him another shock of electricity, just because he could.  “You make me look bad, 787266.”

My name is Connor Lightfoot.  I grew up in Shiprock, New Mexico.  I am a member of the Navajo Nation.  My parents are Daniel and Kai Lightfoot.  I am twenty years old.  I attend New Mexico State University.  I am not a number.  I am a person, not a pet.  I am a hostage, not a slave.  I am not a box boy.  I will not sign. 

The handler came over to him and squatted next to Connor.  He ran the back of his fingers along Connor’s cheek as he spoke.  “It’s the drip for you, Indian boy.  All your defiance is going to be washed away in a drug induced haze.  You’ll cease to be you.  You’ll do as you're told.  You’ll sign your paperwork.  And then you’ll be turned into a good little cock-sucking fuck-toy like every other romantic pet out there.”

Connor’s eyes were wide with terror.  Nothing, absolutely nothing, terrified him more than the drip.  And if they’d known that, they probably could have broken him sooner.  He shook his head, entire body trembling at the thought of being wiped away. 

“Oooh, does that scare you?”

Connor didn’t answer, but he’s sure the handler can see his chest heaving and his breath coming in short, staccato gasps.  Yes.  Yes it scares him. 

“They’re gonna put a needle in your arm and pop that Injun rebelliousness right out of your head.  Doesn’t that sound great, little Brave?” 

Connor felt his cheeks heat up with fury over the slurs and mocking of his culture.  You’re an ass.  A fucking ignorant ass.  Backward piece of shit.  Connor’s eyes blazed with rage.

“Hang on to that rage, little Brave.  You have about two more days before it’s gone forever.  I wonder… can you get to the happy hunting grounds if you don’t even remember that you believed in them?”

The door opened and a second handler came in.  Connor was pulled back into a kneeling position and made to watch as they sat and ate their food.  It smelled amazing, and he was so damn hungry.  Fucking piping hot chicken enchiladas, and was that calabacitas? Bastards.  It was!  He could smell the corn and the squash.  Connor’s mouth watered. 

“Smell something you like, 787266?”  His handler stared at him with a villainous grin.  “I had this flown in special, just for you.  It’s a shame you’ll forget all about this in the next few days.”

Connor watched the two ignorant pigs eat the food until there was nothing left on the plates.  The whole white room was full of the smell of New Mexican cuisine.  They left their empty plates for him to stare at when they were done.  Connor was given nothing.  Again. 

For two days Connor saw no one.  Long hours passed kneeling and chained to the loop in the floor.  His stomach ached with hunger so much so that he was violently nauseated.  His tongue felt thick and heavy in his mouth, like it was swollen.  He had no energy at all.  And eventually, he could no longer kneel. 

When the door opened and three handlers came in with a force-feeding chair, Connor didn’t fight.  He was almost relieved.  They lifted him up and slammed his frail body into the chair.  The muzzle was taken off, but he was too weak to try and be a smart ass. 

“You’re leaving us today, 787266.  We wouldn’t want you passing out before they administer the drip at the new facility.”

Connor whimpered.  He didn’t want to be erased.  It was illegal.  They weren’t supposed to do it anymore.  They couldn’t do this to him!

Connor did nothing as his head was strapped into place and his mouth forced open.  He tried desperately not to cry as the feeding tube was jammed down his throat, but he was so weak and the tube was so uncomfortable.  His eyes watered, and then the tears wouldn’t stop. 

His handler patted his cheek.  “I told you on that first day here that you would sign, one way or another.  All the trainees sign.  You’re not special.  You’re just stubborn.  You think it was bad here, just wait until you’re at the new facility for troublesome cases and you don’t even know who you are.” 

Connor choked on a sob, his mind spinning.  My name is Connor Lightfoot.  I grew up in Shiprock, New Mexico.  I am a member of the Navajo Nation.  My parents are Daniel and Kai Lightfoot.  I attend New Mexico State University.  I am not a number.  I am a person, not a pet.  I am a hostage, not a slave.  I am not a box boy.  I will not sign.  My name is Connor Lightfoot.  I grew up in Shiprock, New Mexico.  I am a member of the Navajo Nation.  My parents are Daniel and Kai Lightfoot.  I attend New Mexico State University.  I am not a number.  I am a person not a pet.  I am a hostage, not a slave.  I am not a box boy.  I will not sign…

He didn’t know what else to do as he desperately tried to hold on to himself, to hope. 

Connor screamed around the tube in sheer terror when they came at him with a needle.  No!  Not yet!  I’m not ready!  I don’t wanna be wiped.  Please!  No! 

The handler laughed.  “You think one injection and done?  No, 787266.  No, it’s not that easy.  It takes days.  You’ll be whimpering and writhing while your mind shuts down.  And probably puking your guts out.  We haven’t done it at this facility for a while, but I remember.  It’s a sight to behold – to watch all the fight and personality drain out of someone.  I’ve already asked your new handler to take pictures and video every day so I can watch you disappear.”

The handler smiles as he pushes the needle into Connor’s neck.  “This is just going to stop any resistance you might give us.  Don’t worry, you won’t even lose consciousness.  You’ll be fully aware for the entirety of your transportation to the new facility.”  He chuckled.  “I say new.  It’s actually quite old.  It’s off the books now, listed as decommissioned.”  He patted Connor’s face.  “I’m sure you’re going to love it there.  And after you’ve been wiped and learned the basics, they're gonna ship you right back here for your romantic training.  So, this isn’t even goodbye.  I’ll see you again when you’re ready to learn how to properly fuck and suck.  You won’t remember me, but I’ll remember you.”

Tears rolled down Connor’s cheeks, but the meds had started to take effect.  He could feel everything.  But he couldn’t move.  The tube was yanked from his mouth and his throat burned where it had been.  His mouth was still dry.  Why couldn’t they have let him have a taste of water, instead of just pumping it into him?  Right!  Because they’re fucking bastards. 

A stretcher was brought into the room and Connor was lifted onto it.  He was strapped down and he didn’t miss the way his handler let his touch linger too long on his thigh, moving up slowly over his groin before securing his chest strap.  Connor wished the creep would try something in a fair fight.  He’d fucking tear his privates off.  But none of this was fair.  The system was stacked against him.  It’s why his parents were in hiding and monsters like the handler roamed free. 

The muzzle was secured back onto his face.  Hmmph.  At least I’ll get to see something other than this damn white room, Connor thought bitterly. 

FUCKERS!  They strapped a fucking blindfold over his eyes.  From white to black instantaneously.  Connor would have sobbed had he not been paralyzed. 

Connor heard his handler laughing.  “They always think they’ll get something other than a white room.  No such luck, Brave Little Injun.  The next thing you see will be the white room at your new facility.”  His handler kissed his forehead.  “Until you return, my little brave.”

Connor wanted to scream, to rage.  And he did, in his head.  But even he knew it was a show.  Connor Lightfoot wasn’t scared, he was terrified.

[iclaimedtobethebetterbard]

tropes and teasing

Fandom: Sanders Sides Characters: Logan, Virgil Rating: Teen & up Relationships: Analogical Warnings: Language, mention of smut (in the context of a character writing fic, not actual smut. fic-ception i guess lol) Word count: 1624

Read on AO3!

My writing masterpost

Starlight Universe masterpost

analogical week 2022 start - previous - here - next - masterpost

Summary: Logan did not intend for anyone to ever find this secret out. Oops.

Notes: Day 4 of @analogicalweek 2022! This is for the prompt “AU.” Takes place early in the first year of analogical’s marriage. also i don’t know anything about star trek so i apologize for inaccuracies lol

-

“God, I used to read so much Star Trek fanfiction as a teen,” Virgil said reminiscently, tipping his head back against the couch and reaching for another handful of popcorn.

“Really?” Logan said from his seat beside his husband on the couch, curious. “I wouldn’t have imagined you’d have been particularly into the show.”

“Oh, I mean, it was never my top fandom, but it was always kind of there, you know?” Virgil shrugged. “My mom really liked it, so she introduced it to me. I guess it was kind of a comfort fandom when I got older. Nostalgic, or whatever.”

“Ah,” Logan said. “I see. I discovered it in middle school.” He tilted his head to the side. “Oh, I think it must have been a special interest for a few years there.” He’d never made the connection before; it had been close to a year since he’d found out he was autistic, and little things about his life kept clicking into place every so often in light of this information. Star Trek evidently being a case in point.

“That does not surprise me even a little bit,” Virgil informed him fondly. “Nerd.”

Logan rolled his eyes. “Shut up,” he said, smiling.

“Make me,” Virgil teased.

Logan picked up a handful of popcorn and shoved it into his husband’s mouth, which sent them both into giggles, Virgil covering his mouth with his hand to avoid spewing popcorn all over the living room.

“Okay, I guess I should have seen that coming,” Virgil commented after a moment, swallowing the popcorn at last.

“Probably,” Logan agreed. “I like that you describe the show as comforting. That’s how I feel about it now, too.” His interest hadn’t been as strong in a few years, but it was still there, just softened down to a warm glowing core deep inside him.

“Yeah. I’d always search up the Spirk tag on AO3 when I was feeling down.” Virgil rolled his eyes. “Which, y’know, teen angst me did kind of a lot.”

Logan frowned, putting a hand on his husband’s arm.

“I’m okay, L.” Virgil took the hand and raised it to his lips. “Don’t worry.”

“I don’t like it when you are unhappy,” Logan said, still frowning.

“I know, babe.” Virgil cast him a comforting look. “I’m plenty happy now, okay? This is a great way to spend the evening. I’m good.”

“Okay,” Logan acquiesced after a moment, doing his best to wipe the frown off his face. “What kinds of fanfiction did you like to read?”

“About Star Trek?” Virgil asked. When Logan confirmed with a nod, his husband went on, “Well, I said Spirk already. Mostly that. Or else platonic stuff.” He grabbed the remote and paused the TV. “Sometimes I’d branch out into Daforge, if I wanted to spice things up with the Next Generation stuff, or a couple other things depending on what I was feeling. I went for lots of whump and hurt, with or without comfort. It was, like, cathartic, or whatever. But there was this one author I liked who did, like, more long-form, plot-heavy stuff. Which is the kind of stuff I usually would avoid, but I got into their stuff anyway because I read a oneshot they did once that was fantastic—Spock had to kill Kirk for some reason, I fucking cried, I loved it—and it got me to take a chance on their other stuff, and it was really good. Like, published novel levels of good. They were one of my favorites, even though most of their stuff wasn’t the kind of fic I usually read.”

“Fascinating,” Logan commented. “You’ll have to show me.”

“First of all, the fact you assume I still have all my old cringey fanfic accounts? Ouch.” Virgil seemed amused. “But accurate. Second, the assumption that I still remember enough details years later to find that fic?” He paused. “I mean, okay, again probably accurate. But come on. Leave me some shred of dignity, L.”

“I was not mocking you,” Logan protested.

“Oh, I know, babe. But it’s still funny.” Virgil took another handful of popcorn and munched it, considering. “Actually, I bet you would like their stuff,” he said thoughtfully. “It seems exactly up your alley, now that I think about it. There was this one really awesome long-ass multichapter piece they had, it was a college AU but it also had, like, a murder mystery going on that Kirk and Spock teamed up to solve, and there was this whole rivals-to-begrudging-allies-to-friends-to-lovers thing. All of it was super well researched, too, I think the author actually said they’d based it off some old crime case they learned about.”

Logan blinked several times and worked very hard on controlling his facial expression. “…Really?”

He must not have done as good a job at acting natural as he’d hoped, because Virgil squinted at him. “Uh, yeah. You good?”

“Fine,” Logan said quickly. “Just—uh—fascinated by the premise. Do you remember anything else about it?”

“I dunno. The smut chapters were really hot,” Virgil said, shrugging.

Logan choked on air. “Ah,” he said faintly. “Yes. Those. I see.”

Virgil snickered. “And those were also, like, excruciatingly well-researched. The author always linked a bunch of sources in the notes for the chapters, and had a whole long rant one time about safe sex in real life. It was weirdly wholesome, actually.”

“That’s—that’s great,” Logan managed.

Virgil paused, eyeing him sharply. “Babe, you’re acting really weird,” he said, frowning. “What’s up?”

“I—” Logan hesitated, reluctant to answer. “What was the author’s username? Do you remember? By any chance?”

“Uhh.” Virgil frowned, concentrating. “It was some kind of pun, I know that. A dirty one.” He snickered. “And a reference. It was clever.”

“Oh,” Logan said, his voice cracking. “Well. That’s—I see.”

“Hang on.” Virgil looked at him sharply. “Do you, like, know the fic I’m talking about?” He looked delighted. “You read fic when you were a teen?”

“I—well, in a manner of speaking, yes,” Logan hedged, his face burning hot all the way to the tips of his ears. He avoided his husband’s eyes.

There was another pause. Then a gasp. “Logan, you’re not saying you wrote it, are you?”

Logan hid his face in his hands. “Maybe?”

Virgil made a wordless noise of gleeful delight. “Holy shit,” he breathed. “Uh—shit, what was it called—the fic was, uh—oh, I’ve got it.” He snapped his fingers. “It was called Journey to Scarlet. I think it was a reference to a couple different things.”

Logan groaned. “Oh god. Yes.” He hiked his legs up onto the couch so he could curl into a ball. “I have so many regrets right now.”

“That was you?” Virgil pressed, delighted.

“Yes,” Logan admitted, muffled, into his crossed arms.

“Holy shit, this is like a fake tumblr post come true,” Virgil said, laughing uncontrollably. “This is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I fucking married my favorite fanfic author. This is the best day of my life.”

“I’m going to look up my login and delete it all,” Logan said into his arms, only half meaning it.

“Noo!” Virgil protested, laying a hand on his arm. “No, babe, it was really good, I swear. I bet it still gets hits, even.” He tugged at Logan, guiding him to curl up in Virgil’s arms and lay his head on his husband’s shoulder. “I’m not making fun of you. Promise. I really do think this is awesome and hilarious and great.”

“I never told anyone about my account on that site,” Logan mumbled into his neck. “I’d always delete my search history after going on it.”

“Aww.” Virgil pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I promise whatever embarrassed you about it, I did way worse shit than you did and read things much more eye-bleachingly shameful than you did. I fucking guarantee it. And I linked my profile on all my regular social media.”

“You what?” Logan gasped, startled out of his embarrassment in spite of himself.

“Yeah. I did lots of deeply cringey things that I regret letting people witness, with everything in me,” Virgil said, snickering. “But, like, it’s kind of funny now, I guess.” He pressed a kiss to Logan’s forehead. “I’m not judging you, hon. Promise.”

Logan made a face, though he did not doubt the veracity of his husband’s words. “Okay,” he agreed, tipping his face forward to hide in Virgil’s neck once again.

“Shh. There, there.” Virgil patted his head. “Poor thing,” he teased gently. “You wrote very good stories with very hot smut, oh no, however will you recover?” He sounded intensely amused by this entire situation.

“I wasn’t planning on anyone finding out about them!” Logan said with a somewhat pitiful whimper.

“Okay, babe,” Virgil soothed. “I won’t tell Remus. Promise.”

“Oh, god.” Logan shuddered at the thought. “Thank you.”

He could still hear a note of amusement in his husband’s voice. “Of course, babe.” Virgil lifted Logan’s face and pressed another kiss to his forehead. “Want to watch some more actual Star Trek until you feel better?” He gestured towards the TV, still paused midway through the episode they’d been on.

“Can you still hold me?” Logan asked in a small voice.

Virgil grinned, petting his hair. “Definitely.”

Logan relaxed somewhat, rearranging himself so he could lean on his husband and rest his head over Virgil’s heart. Virgil’s arms came up to cup firmly around him, fingers running through his hair and scratching his scalp as the episode began playing once again.

Logan had to admit, beginning to feel warm and safe and sleepy, that this was not a particularly terrible outcome to this situation.

-

Taglist (ask to be added/removed!): @just-a-little-anxious @theimprobabledreamersworld @the-sympathetic-villain @your-local-crackhead-gremlin @peruviandesertfox