#he's the symbol of peace and hope
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loadingbnha · 1 month ago
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THE MOMENT NAOMASA REALIZED THE EXTENT OF WHO ALL MIGHT ACTUALLY IS
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For refrence; a side by side comparison of how Naomasa knows All Might vs how Toshinori is when he actually lets loose
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skrunksthatwunk · 10 months ago
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thinking about how eiji's a pole vaulter and how ash talks about eiji "flying" and how eiji's associated with bird imagery and how eiji's free (unlike ash) and how eiji comes in on a plane and leaves on a plane and how ash cannot fly, ash cannot be free, how nyc is ash's prison, and how ash is the leopard who dies climbing the mountain, unable to live at such elevation, how he was trying to reach the sky and be free but was always stuck to the earth, how he chose to die instead of climbing back down, how he chose to die where he could see the sky and hope and freedom almost like a bird with eiji's letter right in front of him rather than letting everything go wrong and ruin it once again, how eiji's a failed pole vaulter anyway, how a bad fall ruined his career and grounded him (physically and emotionally), how it took flying to america and meeting ash and needing to save him and skip for him to try flying again, how he landed hard and harsh and still the thought of that escape compelled ash to protect eiji at all costs because if he could fly that means something to him, even if he doesn't think he can fly, how eiji is the manifestation of his hope and how when he breaks and asks eiji to stay with him a while he folds himself over his legs and weighs him down and traps him and grounds him, how ash fights like hell to keep eiji alive not because he thinks he can be like him (hopeful, flying, innocent), but because he makes him forget the gravity of his situation, and so he can see eiji fly again. how he wants to see him escape. how eiji is a bird and ash is a wildcat and how ash never once saw eiji as prey. how eiji never saw ash as a predator. how it is eiji's naivete that first endears ash to him, how it is his freedom and flight and removal from darkness and his ability to leave that darkness that really roots eiji in ash's blood as something essential to him keeping on living in this hell of nyc. how it is that distance from the violence and that hope for the future that ash chooses to surround himself in as he dies. how ash dies in a dream because he feels more than anything that he can't fly like eiji, that he can never leave. how his violence is a part of him and will be forever, how it weighs him down. how he wants to enjoy the view from the mountainside rather than looking up from the ground below. as if they can both fly. as if he is with him up there and not grounded. eye-to-eye with what he can't have, seeing eiji's homeland: the sky. how he dies trying to reach the top because he couldn't take retreating and trying again. how ash, tired and tired and tired and convinced it will go on forever if he crawls back down the mountain, chooses to close his life deluged in eiji, in eiji's insistence that they can fly together, in eiji's hope for him and for them, in eiji's beautiful dream. how ash dies without trying to realize that dream. how ash, in dying, destroys it.
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artsy-imogen · 9 months ago
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I wanted to quickly delve into the inspiration behind my Faust design before I post anymore art of him :D I’ll do my best to write out my thoughts, I’ll definitely ramble a lil haha
So for his outfit’s palette (the main ones I’ll go into being “teal” and “yellow”) I looked into a bunch of colours and the meaning behind them. Teal (from the info I found on it) represents morality and renewal, which for this au I believe complements his appearance as he’s changed himself for the better and has learned a lot from his past trauma and mistakes. The colour teal also represents logic, sympathy, calmness and enlightenment, which I believe would suit Faust a lot with his growth and self acceptance. The colour also has it’s negatives though, with privacy and apprehension, which again correlates to his tragic past.
For his tie it was a pretty simple addition. I wanted to add a splash of yellow to it which represents positivity, energy, joy, and his secure/warm personality :)
Moving onto his style. His fingerless gloves and brown vest were inspired by his scrapped strive design. The stitches decorating his coat and the leg of his pants represent him “putting himself back together again.”
The broken heart locket pinned to his chest symbolises him feeling alive and like his old self again, but it still has him carrying the burden of a damaged past. The “crack”symbolises that while he’s moved on and is in a better place, he won’t forget what he’s been through.
He still wears his paper bag, especially in combat, but he does walk around with it off, on occasions. It’s become a strange signature for him, how he’s both learned to accept himself and the lives he’s lived. He’s become a symbol of inspiration at the new hospital he works at, inspiring the hearts of many and gaining their trust.
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an1muuarts · 4 months ago
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the slayer and the voices as birbs:
the slayer - a silhouette of an owl, in an anthropomorphic form
hero - crow
cold - vulture
contrarian - mockingbird
opportunist - seagull
smitten - swan
skeptic - owl
hunted - finch
cheated - cuckoo pidgeon
stubborn - woodpecker
broken - dove
paranoid - starling
narrator - raven
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throwawayasoiafaccount · 7 months ago
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god tywin lannister deserved worse
just remembering elias death and i wanna puke and the way tywin talks about elia and what happened is so damn gross
but rip tommen and myrcella we all know what’s about to happen in the next book :/
the cycle of violence just keeps spinning and damn you tywin for beginning it
(i got a bit crazy in the tags 💀)
#rest in peace elia and rhaenys#i’m one of those crazy ppl who thinks jaqen h’ghar is aegon 💀#literally lost the teeny tiny amount of credibility i had#anyways i think doran’s in on it and i think rhaegar switched out asharas child for aegon paralleling the baby swap jon does#the pact made in braavos about viserys and dany marriages is a half truth half lie#and arianne being sent to faegon is simply doran testing his heir. if she messes up then whoever’s spying for doran will correct her#gerold dayne knows too much that’s why doran thinks he’s too dangerous#but this would make the dornish plot sooooo much more interesting and would show that no doran hasn’t been doing nothing#it would also automatically make the daynes more important#jaqen (aegon) was in kings landing to kill robert but got caught by varys. syrio was sent to find him. ned cleared out the black cells tho#saving aegon in the process. fun how we’re actually introduced to this character through lyanna starks mini me arya#aegon was able to kill robert with a boar tho so mission accomplished.#now he’s in old town trying to hatch his dragon egg. the stone beast taking flight in danys vision is aegon being symbolically depicted…#..as a spinx#i’m crazy delusional. but ppl who think faegon is actually aegon are even more delusional than me#plus the real aegon being alive fulfills the suns son part of quaithes warnings#i like this theory bc it makes the dorne plot more interesting and it explains whatever is going on with jaqen h’ghar cause he is sus#yes yes i know i’m delusional 💀 i just think it’d be a very interesting twist#kinda hoping no one sees this post at this point bc i know no one will take this theory well lol#i do think this theory can be supported by the text tho#and cerseis throw away line about ned stealing asharas baby would suddenly become peak foreshadowing#barristan comparign dany to ashara would also be peak foreshadowing bc ashara would take the place of gilly in this parallel and she was dis#dishonored by someone at harrenhall. likely aerys and then she turned to a stark probably brandon for comfort#tbh i think it was ashara who lied to brandon about what happened to lyanna. perhaps she was trying to mess with brandon’s wedding and#was trying to get back at rhaegar for humiliating elia at the tourney. i highly doubt it was baelish who lied to brandon cause brandon#has little reason to believe him and no reason to trust him. ashara tho? arthur daynes sister and elias lady in waiting? also his lover?#anyways varys the spider potentially stealing aegon away (if he did take a child it was the false aegon) is there to parallel the others#who ride ice spiders taking crasters sons. tbh i think it was aegon who decided he wanted to train as a faceless man so he could get revenge#on his own terms. and the sea lord of braavos at the time was in on it and helped aegon with his plans#the unveiling coming up is going to be a lot more important than arya just reclaiming her identity. yes im delusional lmao. rant over
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zeb-z · 8 months ago
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mfw I sacrifice my vision for knowledge of power. surely this isn’t a metaphor for anything
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angy-grrr · 5 months ago
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I really dont know what hori has planned for the next chapters n the evolution of the characters I talk about 99% -is himiko alive? if so, where is she? why the mystery surrounding her character? if she is dead, is that why ochako is acting like her old self?
Is ochako actually, genuinely doing good and happy? is her conclusion going to involve a love confession and end up with deku after all of that? did she lie to himiko? how is she copying with it all?
Is izuku thinking of leaving UA again? Will he get a new quirk? Will he get support as a quirkless hero? what is he thinking about? what about his feelings, why the mystery?
What about katsuki? why is he able to do so so much after dying? is his heart going to be okay? what will his future as a hero look like with heart problems and an explosive quirk? What does he feel for izuku, why does he get all the classic love interest tropes?
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depressedhatakekakashi · 2 years ago
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Me: *tries to talk about the ways the Shinobi system has changed and bettered*
Some random person: Urge but these things didn’t change and even though we know why they didn’t change (even though the reason’s are 100% bs i agree) it means NOTHING CHANGED EVEN THOUGH WE SEE CHANGES HAVE BEEN MADE WAYS THAT THEY COULD BE DONE WITHOUT CREATING PLOT HOLES AND TAKING AWAY THE NEW GEN STORY FROM KIDS
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willosword · 1 year ago
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this movie has actually broken into my house and smashed a barrel over my head killing me instantly. oh my god
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ismails · 3 months ago
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Please help me rebulid my Bakery
Vetted here by @90-ghost
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I'm Ismail Almughanni an entrepreneur from devastated Gaza trying his best to rebuild his Bakery 🍞🥐🥖
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On a quiet morning, the aroma of freshly baked bread filled the street, signaling the start of a new day at your small bakery, a place you took immense pride in. For years, this bakery had been a haven where people from all around would gather to enjoy the warm, delicious pastries and bread that you carefully crafted. It was a symbol of hard work, a beacon of hope, and a destination for anyone seeking a taste of comfort amidst life's challenges.
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But one day, in the blink of an eye, everything changed. The sounds of bombing began to shake the city, and it wasn’t long before the fires of war reached your neighborhood. There was no warning, no chance to escape or save what you could. Shells rained down on the district that housed your beloved bakery. You watched helplessly from a distance, unable to do anything.
Minutes passed like hours. When the noise finally subsided, and the thick smoke that blocked out the sun began to clear, you looked towards your cherished place. It was destroyed.
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The walls that once protected you and brought you closer to your customers had collapsed, and the oven where you had kindled the flames of hope had turned to ash. Everything was shattered, broken, as if that place had never been a sanctuary of peace and comfort.
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But the destruction wasn’t just physical. The pain in your heart was far greater than any material loss, a place filled with beautiful memories now reduced to rubble. The moments when you saw smiles on people’s faces as they savored your bread, the laughter that echoed through the bakery—those were now just memories, dissolving in the ashes of devastation.
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As days went by, you tried to piece together the fragments, not just of the bakery but of yourself as well. You knew rebuilding wouldn’t be easy, and the wounds left by the war wouldn’t heal quickly. But you also knew that the hope you had infused into your bread would remain alive in your heart, even if the tables and chairs were destroyed, even if the bakery itself was gone.
The bakery may have been destroyed by war, but its spirit lives on in you, in everyone who tasted your bread, and in everyone who walked into that small place and found a slice of happiness.
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Here the pictures show Ismail doing his job as a baker, but in the harsh war, after he had a large bakery, he started baking and helping people in an old oven made of clay. His first and last concern was to help people.🌾🥐🥖
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Vetted here by @90-ghost
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lasplaga · 5 months ago
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❛ Tell me when to stop. ❜
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「𝔖」 It was an impossible request, & one he would refuse to answer. How could the wolf demand the sheep to halt it's advances, so close to being swallowed in it's open jaws? Osmund did not want Eloisa to retreat. Not until she was left imprisoned by his ribcage, the monster coughing up bloody bits of white wool. When it was HER TIME to be culled, of course --- lovingly guided to the sacrificial altar. After all, there was nothing more erotic & oppressive than the act of communal consumption, immortalized in the hollowed vessel of divinity.
For now, he was completely & utterly hers, wholly. As she was, with him. Intertwined by a bond of the flesh, unbreakable, a contract truly binding --- unlike that of a promise or marital ring, which FALSELY represent 'eternal love'.
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" 𝔑𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔯. 𝔑𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔯 𝔰𝔱𝔬𝔭. --- 𝔅𝔯𝔢𝔞𝔨 𝔪𝔢, 𝔦𝔣 𝔶𝔬𝔲 𝔪𝔲𝔰𝔱. ℑ 𝔴𝔦𝔩𝔩 𝔤𝔩𝔞𝔡𝔩𝔶 𝔰𝔲𝔣𝔣𝔢𝔯 𝔦𝔫 𝔱𝔥𝔢 𝔫𝔞𝔪𝔢 𝔬𝔣 𝔶𝔬𝔲𝔯 𝔩𝔬𝔳𝔢, 𝔞𝔰 𝔶𝔬𝔲 𝔥𝔞𝔳𝔢 𝔰𝔲𝔣𝔣𝔢𝔯𝔢𝔡, 𝔡𝔦𝔢𝔡 𝔦𝔫 𝔪𝔦𝔫𝔢. " & Osmund distinctively remembered the night of her rebirth, when what was pure was made IMPURE. The innocent defiled beyond recognition, a ritual that established a precedent of blind devotion for the ages. Corrupted to the length that she was no longer seen as a daughter of the church, but a woman ravished by The Devil, twisted into an UNHOLY DEMON. --- Only, the maid & priest knew the TRUE NATURE of their relationship, how it began, & that it was much more nuanced than a girl being tempted by the forbidden fruit. What doctrine denied that which was natural for her mind & body. " 𝔄𝔰 𝔴𝔢 𝔰𝔥𝔞𝔯𝔢 𝔞𝔟𝔲𝔫𝔡𝔞𝔫𝔱𝔩𝔶 𝔦𝔫 𝔰𝔲𝔣𝔣𝔢𝔯𝔦𝔫𝔤𝔰, 𝔰𝔬 𝔱𝔥𝔯𝔬𝔲𝔤𝔥 𝔗𝔥𝔢 ℌ𝔬𝔩𝔶 𝔅𝔬𝔡𝔶 𝔴𝔢 𝔰𝔥𝔞𝔯𝔢 𝔞𝔟𝔲𝔫𝔡𝔞𝔫𝔱𝔩𝔶 𝔦𝔫 𝔠𝔬𝔪𝔣𝔬𝔯𝔱, 𝔱𝔬𝔬. --- 𝔜𝔬𝔲𝔯 𝔭𝔞𝔦𝔫 𝔦𝔰 𝔪𝔶 𝔭𝔞𝔦𝔫, 𝔞𝔰 𝔴𝔢𝔩𝔩 𝔞𝔰 𝔭𝔩𝔢𝔞𝔰𝔲𝔯𝔢. "
THEY KNEW THIS, OF COURSE. But, destined to become a prophet, he would continue to reassure the self-assured. For in all walks of life, he was a teacher of the spiritual --- or in rare cases, an 𝔸𝕟𝕘𝕖𝕝 𝕠𝕗 𝕃𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥 ; Denounced as Lucifer. Despite being clouded with pride, WORSHIP WITH THE SELF, that would never stop him from easing her doubts with light kisses upon the hand, then fingers.
" 𝔇𝔬 𝔫𝔬𝔱 𝔣𝔯𝔢𝔱 𝔣𝔬𝔯 𝔪𝔢, 𝔪𝔶 𝔩𝔬𝔳𝔢, 𝔪𝔶 𝔭𝔯𝔢𝔠𝔦𝔬𝔲𝔰 𝔪𝔬𝔲𝔯𝔫𝔦𝔫𝔤 𝔡𝔬𝔳𝔢. --- 𝔊𝔬 𝔬𝔫. "
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huda-pls · 2 months ago
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Save What's Left of My Family in Gaza.
In the heart of Gaza, where daily life has become a constant challenge amidst the siege and continuous bombing, we experienced unforgettable moments, filled with love and hope despite the pain. This is my story, and the story of my family, which may not differ from hundreds of other families in Gaza, but it holds special memories that will forever be etched in our minds.
Yazan, my dear nephew, was always a symbol of courage and joy in our family. Since childhood, he loved to wear his elegant blue suit, always made sure his hair was neatly styled, and smiled at the world as if to tell us that tomorrow would be better. On the day of a family member's wedding, Yazan stood proudly beside us, radiating happiness, sharing his smiles with everyone, as if he knew that these moments would be among the last memories we would have of him. Just a few days later, in a merciless airstrike, we lost Yazan. He left us while dreaming of a tomorrow filled with peace and joy, leaving behind a void and indescribable pain.
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As for Suheir, my beloved niece, she is the sun that rises in our lives every day. Suheir is still with us, full of life and hope, dreaming of wearing her white dress on her special day and living a life filled with joy and success. Despite the harsh circumstances, Suheir carries the spirit of childhood and is the source of hope that we cling to amidst all this pain. Every time I see her, I feel that life still offers us a chance to witness its beauty and happiness.
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We lost Yazan, but we thank God that Suheir is still with us. She is a symbol of hope and resilience. Although life has become more difficult and harsh, I believe there is always light at the end of the tunnel. We have endured these bitter experiences together as a family, but we still carry in our hearts a passion for life, seeking safety and the opportunities that can grant us a new beginning.
For this reason, I have launched a fundraising campaign to help my family escape this harsh reality. My goal is to secure a better future for those of us who remain, especially the children who deserve to live their lives without fear of bombings and airstrikes. All I ask for is a chance to give them a future filled with peace and opportunities, far from wars and destruction.
With hope and faith, I ask everyone who reads these words to contribute to our cause. Together, we can build a better future for our children, keep Yazan's memory alive as a symbol of courage and hope, and continue to support Suheir so that she can live the life she dreams of, filled with safety and happiness.
Vetted by @gaza-evacuation-funds @nabulsi @irhabiya @bilal-salah0
Sorry for mention you
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sculptorofcrimson · 7 months ago
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The dildo of consequences rarely arrives lubed. 
Now not even in death can duty end…
Snowfields
Synopsis: A cold walk atop the mountain with Valdor.
Relations: Valdor x female Emperor shard
Warnings: Suicide attempt
This is relatively tame for what I write, and I wrote it in one sitting when I had roughly 20 minutes to spare. Ty for your time!
“Do you remember Ararat, my liege?”
No. No, she didn’t remember Ararat. She has never heard the name before. But she will. By the gods, she will. 
The air was cold. It rattled through her lungs when she tried to breathe. The white seemed to stretch forever, like malignant bones, the wind laid bare and rattling its screams. It would rise like a frosty howl around the two of them, wailing like a soldier who had lost a limb, weeping its cries for eternity. The cold bit at her, tore at her, the snow would have frozen mortal blood solid in mortal veins. Thunder grumbles in the distance. A crack of lightning splits the sky in half, purplish white against the ghoulish grey. 
His cloak was warm when he wrapped it around her. But his touch, without doubt, without even question, was unfathomably cold. Without even thinking of it, she had shrunk away.
Valdor’s grip had only tightened then. He fastened the clasp of the too-large cloak, the stench of incense and parchment wafting from the silk. A small smile, the emotionless movement perfected by a mind that could not actually smile, flashed briefly across his visage as he took her wrist, trapped it so effortlessly between his fingers and kissed the soft skin there.
“There was a Primarch once. A magnificent man. One that even I respected, in some regards.” Valdor led her, slowly and patiently, holding her up when she stumbled through the knee-high snow. The mountaintop seemed to rage against her. Well, too damn bad. She hated mountains, and she hated snow, and she was about to teach him a lesson out of spite. It was pure pettiness, but it was hers, it was one last plan she held to herself, one last wish she was certain was hers and not his, and if she was going to die, drowned limb by limb into the unseeing gold, she wished to at least pain him with it. 
How had it gone so wrong? How had angels of such glorious aurite turned into nightmares wrapped in gold and crimson? 
She yanked her arm away. Valdor let her go without struggle, simply rising back with a singular, elegant motion, as if he were a dancer performing a long-awaited waltz. When she stumbles over another snow-covered rock mere moments later, he was there, as if he had never left, one arm gently wrapped around her waist as he hauls her upright. This time, when she tries to pull away, his grip only tightens, as if he was defying the very storm itself.
“The snow reminds me of him. The Cataegis Primarch of the IVth legion. You watched us duel atop a mountain not so unlike this one, my liege, when the storm ended. It felt like the top of the world. We were in a deadlock when you appeared, your attention straying just for a moment to our fight. I snapped his wrist with a twisting motion, and slammed him into the ground hard enough to snap part of his spine. Your attention had departed by then, but it was enough. You still remember the frost, do you not?”
No. No. She didn’t. She couldn’t. Valdor’s hand, so gentle, so damnably gentle, placed itself under her chin. It stroked her hair, his gauntlets’ touch heavy yet tender, the jewels flashing dully through strands of hair that were quickly becoming darker, swallowed first by brown and then by black. He had not forbidden her to cut it. Out of spite, she had ordered him to cut it for her. 
It didn’t matter.
The strands had grown back, with an unrelenting zeal, glossy and luxurious and flowing like ink over water. She was innocent once, she was mortal, she lived among men and walked amongst mortals, and she will never be again. She will never live again, and that truth was simply so jagged, so broken, so horrifyingly caught between her chest and her throat that it was as if something broke a little further every time she took a breath. Valdor had only quietly polished, brushed and glossed over her hair, his movements methodical and calculated, even when silent tears rolled their way down her cheeks, her vision blurred by the salt and the water but just visible enough to see the flakes of gold swirling in her pupils. Still clear enough to see herself die.
She had felt Valdor’s fingers through her hair then, braiding it carefully in an intricate style she had never seen before, but one that tugged at familiar roots she had never felt before. 
Her hair. Some mewling, broken part of her(was it her dream or His? Was there a difference anymore?) instinctively felt like it should be darker. Longer. Wreathed with gold, and weighed down by a crown. But it was her hair. It was her hair, once upon a time, and she had lost it strand by strand, inch by inch, as the gold swam up through her vision and blocked out her eyes.
A rock clattered over the side of the mountain, followed by dull, distant thunder. It jolted her back to her mind, to her body, to the world that she did not rule over and should have never ruled. 
Numbly, she felt herself shake her head. Valdor only raised an eyebrow, and adjusted the clasp.
“I remember the rock, my master.” Valdor was saying. His voice rose and fell like a litany, carefully retracing steps the Emperor had once guided him through, when He was a king and gods walked the earth. She felt so small against him, so tired, so far from the invincible god-warrior he had once served, but that was alright, He had returned to him, and he would shepherd Him, guide Him, protect Him, through this life and through this death till the last. “Even the rocks felt cold. It was black, and it glistened like oil whenever the sun shone. There were storms every day of that campaign, as if the heavens themselves were against us, as if the gods had conspired to strike you down, but yet you gave us the order to march. And the wind. You told me that you heard it screaming. Malcador jokingly asked that if you should live again, you would choose to enact Ararat during the summer instead, if only out of sheer annoyance from the wind.” Valdor’s smile was nothing more than a reflex. There was no humor in it, nor human emotion. “Do you remember it then, my master?”
The wind. Had it screamed then, as it screams now? Had it screamed, beneath the weight of the betrayal, wailing with the sheer horror of what it had taken? Did it scream, singing a threnody with the thunder, as the skies growl and hail shudders from overcast clouds ahead? She shivers underneath her layers. The finest climate suits had been prepared, coupled with the Custodian cloak over her shoulders, but she felt cold, so unspeakably cold that it was nearly painful. 
Oh Throne. She was cold, so cold. 
“Constantin?” she rasps. Her voice was not her own. It was rusty from disuse, and cracked, and weak, but yet some part of it resonated, it echoed like the tongue of a god, speaking through the plaintive shell of a mortal, just enough to hiss like a shadowy undertone. It should have been more sonorous, it should have been softer, it should have been the voice of a conqueror, it should have been the voice of a girl snatched away from her home by an angel and transformed into a god. It should have been hers, but it was His instead. She licks her lips and tries again. “Constantin.”
“Yes, my lord?” he was at her side(was he always so close?), the memory jarringly left unfinished. The hand once gently guiding her and became more insistent as he knelt down until they were eye to eye. 
“I don’t remember the mountain.” she replied flatly. Her voice was weaker than a whisper. She didn’t care. She knew he’d hear it anyway. And if he didn’t, she no longer cared enough to ensure he did. She no longer believed she had the strength to stomach that voice any longer. 
The cliff looked dizzyingly as she peered over the edge. She wondered if even a Custodian could survive a fall at such a height. 
“I don’t remember the snow, Constantin.”
“That is alright, my liege.” He was so sweet, so sickeningly sweet, so unerringly gentle. It made her want to claw at him, to crack him, to see what could finally burrow under that invincible flesh and make him howl. It made her wonder how the Emperor broke him to make him the man he had become, how deeply He must have laid His tongs in the forge of flesh and fire. 
She wondered what his screams would sound like, if he could scream at all.
“Do not trouble yourself, my liege. Your form is still young.” Of course, he could afford to wait. He had waited for ten thousand years, and he would gladly wait for ten thousand more. In that broken, delusional mind of his, it was only just, after all. He’d speak litanies of loyalty, roaring them over the screams of her brethren, he’d speak praises so numerous that they’d drown out the sobs of her family. “Your memories will return, when given due time. I can tell you about them. The preliminaries, the campaigns, the plans you undertook.”
Of course. They’d have to return. They must return. They will return, and He will live again, born out of this mortal shell under Valdor’s guidance. Valdor simply could not be, must not be, could not accept, could not live in a world where his liege has fallen forever. 
The snow was no longer biting her. It seemed to have been cowed, laid low beneath the vengeful eye of its rightful master. Even the storm seems to have settled, briefly, at least for now. For the eye of the King, the Emperor, the god-sorceror. 
It was so cruel, the revelation, the realization that welled up in her when she gazed dully back at him with listless eyes. The revelation that came for her, and not for him, for he would be nothing if not for his delusion. How quickly she understood the truth beneath why she had called him here, why she had suddenly finally accepted his offer to visit the mountain, when she had been delaying it, dreading it, putting it off for weeks upon months. 
The edge. 
The end. (And not the death).
She wondered if even a Custodes could survive a fall from this height. She wondered if it mattered anymore. 
The plan had been formulating itself for weeks now, brewing like boiled flesh in a cyst, nursing itself, grieving its wounds, growing stronger, gaining weight. First she had refused to eat, then to bathe, then to move at all, all the dreary, listless days crushed into the same monotony as brass as she had sat still upon a throne she did not want and stared off into oblivion, as he occasionally knelt by her and asked for her commands while she numbly stared off in the distance, her eyes a thousand yards away. Her gaze had been lost in a time beyond time, beyond memory itself, and not even dreams could steal her away. 
First it had only been how she stopped even trying to hide from him. She simply let him follow her, on her aimless, little walks aboard the massive ship that had become her only location. Then it had been how her tongue had stalled and she no longer even greeted the serfs that occasionally came by to deliver her food she did not eat, water she did not want, utensils she did not use, how she simply stared ahead, as reactive as a corpse, about as conscious to the world as the dead. Valdor had cared after her then, when even her memory had failed her, when she lay still and sullen like ash, the weight of the world upon broken shoulders, silent, painful tears trickling a cheerless trail from her eyes to her duvet. How he had lifted her up and cradled her to him, asking which stories she wished to hear, which glories she wished him to recount. Which memories that were not hers but soon will be, tales he regaled her of His conquests, of His victories and His lessons, His mantras drilled into her bones as they have been drilled into his.
She had left the world, bit by bit, husk by husk, until she felt as if she weighed no more than one of His eagles’ feathers did, frailly clinging onto the world with a whisper and a dream. It was as if she was sinking into some calm, clear, colorless water and feeling the waves close in above her, but there was no sensation of drowning, no voiceless cry in the deep. Simply the noiseless struggle in her own dreams, as she prepared herself for the final breath before oblivion. 
(Did she have the strength? Did it matter any longer, when he could overpower her no matter the answer?)
It was so beautiful, up here, at the edge of the sky. She could hear the storm breathing in the clouds. It was close enough that she could close her eyes, and dream of Ararat, listening to Valdor’s words. An end. An end, just like the Thunder Warriors He(and she?) slaughtered so long ago. The final unraveling. She didn’t want to die, but was she truly living? An immortality without life, without passion, without even joy itself, was that truly living when she was little more than a corpse, kept alive through obsession?
If the Emperor had loved them, He would have never created them at all. What merciful god would create such grotesque angels? 
If the Four were merciful, they would have sought Valdor, as they sought the Primarchs. They would have whisked him away, upon winds of change, tainted him with their mark, made sure He would never accept him as a servant again. They would have saved him, corrupted him, broken him, taught him what it felt like to dream, before the golden light shone again, and His dream took over his. 
But he was a servant, not a master. He was not a leader. He knelt, instead of ruling, and the Emperor had sunk in His claws so deep even the Four could not pry it out. And so he was His, forevermore.
He died ten thousand years ago. And somewhere, inside that twisted, broken Palace that was a mind, His dog was still waiting loyally at the door, waiting for Him to return. 
He was kneeling beside her now. She had never even heard him move. With infinite reverence, he cups her features, admiring the black strands falling over his gauntlets, the golden eyes - so broken, so gorgeous, so His - staring back at him.
“It was the end of the Unification Wars, my liege. And the start of your rule. The Imperium was born that day, your coronation happened atop that bloodstained snowfield, when Malcador held up that laurel, and crowned you King. How could you forget how I, the first of your Custodes, knelt first and rose last, when the ceremony ended?” 
So careful. So gentle as not to hurt her.
“Tell me about them.” a small, cruel smile had found its way onto her face. She was no longer looking at him, instead smiling serenely, blankly staring out upon the sky. The mountain truly was beautiful. It was such a shame this was where she would die. She should have felt something then. A sense of guilt, perhaps. A moment of horror for what she had become, for taking advantage of something so deeply broken into him that it was written into his very bones. Obedience was carved into his blood, seared into his marrow. He would know no other way but to obey. 
“The Unification Wars?” Valdor asks, the question poised so effortlessly, head tilted like a loyal dog, perfectly prepared to obey his master’s every word. 
It would be almost easier, she thought, if he had been a crueller man. Easier to break him, easier to hate him, easier to gaze upon that perfect, immaculate features and wonder what if he had lost those duels. If he had been taught to be mortal, what his screams would’ve sounded like, what sounds of pain he might wheeze out when his perfect, immaculate dancer’s grace falters and he learns, he learns the price for immortality. 
He was never meant to love. 
Not for the first time, she wonders if he can feel pain. If she’ll even care, if it’ll even matter. For a creature who loved no one but his master, would it even be a sin?A sin, to teach him what it meant to fear? To taste the copper tang of terror, to twist the knife in him as he had twisted the knife in her. And to die, exalted, knowing she would have hurt him, knowing she brought down a demigod. 
You can’t reason with a mad dog. You can’t plead with someone who knows they’re right. You can’t gaze into the eyes of Constantin Valdor and expect to see reason back, when his master was right in front of him and alive, so sickeningly alive he would rather kill than forget Him again.
Would he even mourn this time? Did he even know what mourning felt like? She had an inkling that he did, however twisted it may be. Because, for him, the tale isn't over yet, the tale must not be over. His Emperor is not dead, it cannot be, he cannot be, in a world without the Emperor, it simply is not possible. Without Valdor, the Emperor could not lead His Custodes, but without Him, the Custodes could not live. 
“No.” she replies. “The mountain. Tell me of them.” The smile that stretched across her face felt nothing like her. It did not belong to this life. It was too old, too heavy, too sad and too cruel for a face that was once joyous and wide with mischief. She had an inkling of the words Valdor was about to say, the bitter, treacherous words she would weep to hear, and regret ever having forced him to speak. 
“The Thunder Warriors.” she murmured. She had closed her eyes again by then. The plan was formulating, inking itself together with the same mindlessness of crawling, squirming things beneath the earth. And she didn’t want to see what the ground would look like when she fell. She didn’t want to see what it felt like to die a second time. This was only a distraction, a charade, a pitiful illusion built by a mind almost broken. There was no one here but a madman, a broken girl, and the ghosts of the storm calling out its mournful rage overhead. 
“Tell me what became of them. Of that Primarch you spoke so highly of. And no lies.” she sighs, and the voice that whistles out of her is too old, too broken. She brushes his hand away. This time, he doesn’t even insist on remaining. “Tell me what happened on Ararat. I want to hear the truth from your lips.” 
If there had been anything left of her heart, she might have mourned for him. For what he had become, living not for himself but for another. Living His life for Him. And when He died, what could become of him? What could become of him except to endure? When he had slaughtered brothers, lovers, children upon the snowfields, betrayed loyalists and watched life fade from their eyes, all in the name of Him, what could be left of him if not to serve?
He served, and loyalty was its own reward. Loyalty, unyielding, unbreaking, even in death his duty would not end.
Valdor tilts his head like a confused dog. “What good will it do now?” 
She utters a dry, raspy laugh. It had no inflection within it, no actual human emotion. 
“I command you, Valdor.” she spoke. There was nothing behind it, nothing even when the command hurt him. It stirred nothing but a deep, dull ache and the brief knife of guilt, which was quickly surpassed by the lasting numbness that did not seem to leave her bones. “I command you to speak of them. On Ararat. What happened on Ararat?”
She turns from him, walking slowly, and without care. She needed to be on a ledge. Distantly, thunder shrieks, and the storm crashes down. Lightning briefly illuminates her features, skin half-tanned, black hair flowing and golden eyes peering through the brume, and in that radiant flare of lightning she looked positively divine, a half-god caught on earth, if not for the weary, haunted gaze of a hunted animal. Her shoulders were hunched, her movements withered, as if her bones could no longer support her weight. She walked without a singular care in the world, and Valdor trailed immediately afterwards. She knew to jump was no longer an option. Even the stormclouds seemed to mock her. It was foolish, so foolish, she knew. He could not let her die. He would move faster than she could even think, he could catch her, snatch her around her waist and carry her to a safe distance before she could even advance an inch towards the edge. 
She could not die here. He would not allow her to die.
And they both knew that.
Voicelessly, soundlessly, she gazes up upon the stormladen sky. Its grey dances across her golden irises, the stormwind playing with her hair. Thunder crashes, and she feels herself scream back, wordlessly, soundlessly, without even conscious thought. Dully, she knew she was raging, screaming, that her mind was seizing at the clouds and tearing at them, begging them to save her, but physically she made not even a single move. Her body was frozen, the snow pelting her shoulders, Valdor’s cloak swirling from the wind. She felt frozen, too. Her mind was no longer wreathed with such self-pity it once had, it was churning, clawing, raging like a caught rabbit in a trap, desperately wishing the ground would open up and swallow it whole, not as a kind of freedom, but as a final form of spite to the hunter.
Thunder crashes around the two of them. Neither of them move. The edge was close, so dizzyingly close that she could feel the wind gusting around her. Valdor was watching her closely, the same way a starved wolf may watch a weakened deer.
When Valdor finally speaks, unable to resist the bluntness of her command, his eyes were still distantly focused on the memories of Ararat. And his voice was passionlessly dull, carefully kept neutral and utterly without pity. 
“I slit his throat.” he confesses dully, flatly, without even a hint of inflection. “The Primarch. I slit his throat on Ararat, from ear to ear, then from ear to clavicle. I only stopped when I felt bone scraping against the edge of my knife.”
Surprisingly she laughed, and the sound was garbled, as grim and as dry as bones. “I suppose you killed him then?” she asked. One more step. One more step and she would be at the edge. He would not let her. He would move faster than the earth could drag her down anyways. But it did not matter. Slowly, incredulously, she could feel herself smiling. It was going to be alright. She could feel it in her bones, the static, the storm. Even the snow seemed to be on her side. For a moment, she felt like a god, standing at the top of the world, the conquered earth groveling beneath Him, knowing that even the elements would fall beneath His gaze. 
She could taste the ichor then, sweet and lifeless and pouring from the sky along with the snow, the charge in the sky and the thunder. The vengeance it held. The sheer rage, an echo of her own. She would rule them. She did not want to rule. She would rule, for one singular moment in her wretched life, she would rule, and she would hurt him, as he had hurt her. For the serfs he terrorized, for the Sisters he slaughtered, for the martyrs he first betrayed and then hung out to die. All in her name. All for her wishes. She no longer wished to wish. She no longer wished to reign. 
Let her abdicate the throne of skulls. Just once. Just once, she prayed. 
“No.” Valdor shook his head. He was already moving, one hand reaching out to grasp her arm and drag her back before she could approach the edge. “It would have been a kinder fate if he had died then. It would have been a kinder fate if-”
“-if you had granted him an honorable death.” she finished for him. She spoke softly, plaintively, as if this was a comfort. She had turned her face a little, just enough to see him, just enough to see his elegant features illuminated by the storm. To gaze upon him, one last time. The way he held himself, like a dancer, his lean features accentuated by the lightning as the thunderbolt carved the sky open and struck the ledge beside her. The way his auramite had shuddered from the lightning as he had, for the first time in her memory, stumbled, his gait not utterly perfect before the divine rage. The first word she had heard him say that was not perfectly calculated.
The lightning snaps the ledge like bone.
The surprised intake of breath she had uttered, a squeal that was nearly a gasp as the rock beneath her feet had caved in, and then crumbled as she had desperately hoped, the weathered stone no longer capable of supporting its own weight bending and breaking and shattering as the lightning arced through it, the smite separating the ledge like the same way Valdor had carved through that serf. That poor, poor serf who had slipped her a kiss upon her request. It was little more than a peck, that poor thing. And he hadn’t even been able to scream when Valdor separated his bones like paper. 
In a silent vow to him, in a wordless vow to them all, the corpses he laid so she could climb atop her throne, she promised she wouldn’t scream as she fell.
Grimly, lips drawn in a tight line, she only felt the distant thunder as she descended like a one-winged eagle, her face utterly expressionless, lightning briefly dancing sparks against her hair as if in reverence. 
Valdor’s cloak, still wrapped around her, its silk as crimson as spilled blood, unfurled around her as she fell.
Distantly, from somewhere beyond the mountaintop, thunder roared. 
~~~~
It was warm, when she finally awoke. She muttered something, tried to turn, and decided to burrow deeper against the warmth instead. There was a rumble, a purr-like sound, and the slow, drifting scent of incense as one titanic hand came up to rest against her hair. 
With careful reverence, it adjusted the master’s laurel. 
“Welcome back, by lord.” the voice purred. “You expressed quite the interest in the Cataegis Primarch.”
She groaned. Golden irises flickered back and forth, as if in distress, beneath her lids. Valdor’s other hand reached up to stroke through her hair, careful not to upset the laurel.  
“I had thought you would have recognized him, my lord. It was, after all, his grave that I showed you that night upon the mountain.”
He makes a long, slow chuckle, almost like amusement, if he had been capable of it. “I had expected you’ve greeted him already, my master. You were standing atop his bones.” 
Somewhere, distantly, thunder growled. And without even being conscious of it, she shivered, and tried to burrow closer to his warmth.  
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godjo · 4 months ago
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✮ — altar girl.
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hasn’t it been written that wherever the fire of evil blazes, a god will be there to douse it? but who saves the damned if a god kindled the fire?
tags — true form!sukuna x concubine/f!reader. 3k wc. explicit smut. dubcon at first (trust me in this one pls). exhibitionism. thigh riding. doggy style. manhandling. rough sex. womb fucking. humongous cock!sukuna (hello???). multiple orgasms. mindbreak. drool. cunnilingus bordering on tongue-fucking. orgasm denial once. he carries you. creampie. lots of cum. fuckton of religious symbolism. physical violence against the reader but not from sukuna. sukuna calls you brat like one time. minors, ageless, and blank blogs dni.
from hunter — not to be dramatic or whatever but i do feel like this fic took a huge chunk off of my sanity … the things i do for sukuna omg … if this flops i will officially retire from tumblr /j + also it's 3 am for me so i didn't proofread the last bits and i prolly got lazy ... ha ha ... ✮
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gods exist. 
the annals of history tell us so.
they exist in a way that no mortal can comprehend, for a god is more than a face. they leave their imprints not with their feet but with the rise and fall of dynasties, the ruination of empires, and the death of kings. they materialize as the birth of a deluge and they rise as the reason for war. it is not the body that proves their existence but the carnage they leave behind. 
they have manifested before human eyes through myriad guises, and once again incarnated in the flesh of ryomen sukuna. 
many have met their untimely demise at his hands; he walks the earth with their tormented souls at his feet. from village to village, their numbers increased until a procession of weeping thickened behind him. hundreds of graves mark the land since his advent, and yet the heavens remain deaf to the hysterical prayers for justice. only he can hear the prayers; only he laughs at them. 
they say he is a devil. you say he is a god. because only a god can saturate the earth with blood and emerge unpunished from such transgression. hasn’t it been written that wherever the fire of evil blazes, a god will be there to douse it? but who saves the damned if a god kindled the fire? 
ryomen sukuna, in a form of some twisted mockery, decides to act the part. and so like every famished god, he demands a sacrifice to satisfy his voracious appetite. you would think that a house of gold would placate his hunger for blood, but riches mean nothing to him. his appetite needs flesh and it is flesh he got. 
“have i been too lenient that you’d dare fight amongst yourselves when i’m not around?” his voice reverberates inside the room. low, guttural, and pregnant with malice. it is enough to scorch everyone’s lungs with tension. 
you want to run away from this nightmare. go back to the peaceful bliss of mundanity when sukuna is only a piece of horrifying tale used to frighten children and not an absolute being seated cross-legged mere inches away. you try transporting your mind back to the days before his pillaging, before your village succumbed to his authority. yet his pervasive presence obstructs all your pathetic attempts at nostalgia. 
“look at what you did to the poor girl.” two of his four hands sweep you from your position to his lap, parading you to the rest of tearful eyes looking at him with entreaty. 
and it stings— their eyes. you’re in the claw of a savage hound from hell, ready to be devoured, with only your hadajuban as protection. even in this pitiful state, they offer no sympathy. their tears are for themselves alone despite their cruelty being the reason for your shared plight.
selfish bitches. 
“was it jealousy that caused this infighting? have i not divided my attention to all of you equally?” sukuna continuously taunts, lacing his voice with poisonous prudence. he fools no one and that’s what urges him forward. everyone knows that his seemingly laidback attitude is plain derision. nonetheless, he tastes the lingering hope in each of your faces before dragging his teeth along such pathetic daydreams.
“y… you have, my lord,” one of the women answers, her voice betraying a noticeable stutter. “if you would permit me to speak, i can offer his lordship an explanation for what transpired in the courtyard.”
sukuna emits a languid sigh as he rests his cheek upon his fist. he runs a rough hand down your arm, triggering vibration in the pit of your stomach. his hand is as huge as your face, his fingers long enough to snap your neck with ease. despite the surge of terror, you fight the urge to retch.
after a moment of battling your dread, it’s repulsion that filled you afterwards. repulsion rising from the woman’s explanation for your wretched state. the rest of the women nod their heads along with her account of how you tripped on a slippery stone multiple times, causing your current injuries, as if you’re a toddler who cannot orient her legs properly. 
they will save themselves with falsehood. 
sukuna yawns after the woman’s narration. his set of eyes seeking you after in the silence. 
“this matter is of your stupidity, then? you’ve wasted my time, brat.” he dips his cadence in amusement and disgust. 
anger flares within you, filling your nose and ears with the bitter scent of hatred, yet its heat descended down your throat, dampening your ability to defend yourself. what is one against many? there are twenty concubines in this room and nineteen of them just sold you to your demise for unintentionally raising this trifle to the lord of the land.
all of this— all of this merely because they have immersed themselves in playing a game in which you’ve been excluded since your arrival. after all, you’re just another competition for sukuna’s attention. 
“have mercy, my lord,” you whisper, on the verge of losing your sentience. “i… i mean no disrespect. it’s… it’s stupid of me—”
sukuna drawls, “speak no more of your nonsense. i have heard enough.” 
distressed apologies race past your mouth, along with entreaties that he spares your life. but you should’ve known that a god won’t turn his back on the sacrifice of blood. 
thus, when his enormous body finally moves to encase your fragility, you close your eyes and with jittering teeth have accepted your fate. you wait for the final release of death, a snap or his fist through your heart, but none came. instead, at your feet lay your torn garments, casting your nakedness before the other concubines in a humiliating display. the crisp air blows against your nipples, causing them to pucker tight. the same air turns your blood gelid, your bones immovable. 
“now, let’s see what all the fuss is about.” from behind, sukuna gropes your breasts, swirling the tips of your nipples with his fingers. “i’ll kill anyone who looks away.” the warning is vehement, ripe with threat, that even mere insects won’t dare defy it. 
is this the ultimate act of worship? to be stripped of all your layers? to be eaten?
his lips latch onto the bareness of your neck, sharp teeth dragging across the skin. the silence is thick, saved for the sound of your uneven breathing and the rustling of fabric as the concubines shift uncomfortably on their seats. sukuna’s wet and unusually long tongue starts licking the base of your shoulder to the back of your ear, before placing his thick and robust thigh between your quivering legs. 
your exposed cunt sticks to his skin, pussy folds flapping open. with practiced ease, as if manipulating the strings of a marionette, he subtly guided your movements. he has your pulsing clit riding the ridges of his thigh as if gushing all over will save you from inevitable demise. 
“m… mhm!” no longer entirely in control of your own form, you turn and sway in a helpless dance to his hands’ command. a gasp tinged with surprise and undeniable pleasure, escapes your lips and echoes softly in the confines of the room. you feel the searing heat of the concubines’ gazes drilling into you, a tangible weight of disapproval and something more primal — a flicker of envious fascination.
“for a condemned woman, aren’t you loving this too much?” sukuna takes the reins to your body. with speed that has your heavy tits bouncing, he secures your waist and drags your slick pussy faster and more recklessly. 
pleasure, sharp and electric at first, surges through your core, blossoming outwards like a firework. your cunt clenches and unclenches involuntarily, a delicious tremor wracking your body. the world narrows, sound and sight fading at the edges as every nerve ending sings with a single, glorious purpose. slowly, the intensity ebbs to leave a pleasant afterglow that paints your limbs with a newfound weight.
you’re but a tiny speck compared to sukuna’s imposing body; a feeble creature under the jurisdiction of a god. 
possessive hands have found you in your fleeting refuge, scooping your lower body up like you weigh nothing. with the tip of his finger he traces the curve of your spine, pressing enough weight to flatten your stomach against the tatami mat. 
“even your back is filled with lacerations,” he points out brusquely.
sukuna’s hefty cock drops to the base of your spine, its puffed up cocktip lazily pulsing to leak his thick liquids of pre-ejaculate. it must’ve been a whole arm laying heavy against your spine, warm with a gluttonous desire to ram itself through the sloppy confines of your pussy. 
and you lay there, waiting for his teeth and his claws and his animalistic hunger to devour. he presses his chest to your back, filling your ears with promises that he’s going to feed on you, eat you down to the marrow of your bones— and you’ll love it. 
“look at them,” sukuna hisses as he tugs at your forehead, “i want you to look at them while i fuck you.”
with your flesh you’ve received him like some kind of communion from root to tip. he hammers your cunt with his cock, until the heat of his savage lust reaches the pit of your belly. you feel his warmth soiling your cervix and uterus with every vigorous thrust. 
“oh! m… mhm!”  completely overtaken by sukuna, your thighs can only twitch as he destroys your insides. 
“you’re soaking wet,” he groans in your ear, deliberately adjusting his pace so he can coat his thick girth all over with your creamy hole, “and so fucking tight.” 
sukuna grunts like a wounded animal each time his cocktip kisses the smooth spot of your womb. a sheen of sweat glazes his body, tattoos aglow in the lanterns, from manically fucking your cunt. he bares his fangs whenever you tighten around his shaft enfolded with prominent and proud veins. 
the once vibrant forms of the concubines, their faces alight with prurient interest, dissolve into a sea of indistinct shapes as fog descends upon your sight. you’ve been reduced to a babbling and drooling mess, unable to grasp the reality that you’re being mounted and fucked to madness before several witnesses.
sukuna extends his hand, searching for your abandoned clit during his primal need to turn your pussy to pulp. 
“there it is,” he breathes against your clammy cheek, satisfied at his discovery. 
“n… no! not there…!” you pant as the last thread of reason frays and snaps. 
a tempestuous force of pleasure sweeps through you, leaving behind a tremor that has shaken you to the core. around you, a kaleidoscope of colors and sensations spins until a guttural moan runs from your lips, delivered by the exquisite torment of rapture. your nails scrape desperately across the tatami mat, clinging at the remnants of spilled sanity. 
sukuna cackles at your desperation to find a moment’s reprieve. the roughened end of his fingers dip into your yielding flesh as he forcefully slams your pussy back to his cock.  
“you’re not going anywhere,” he pronounces frenziedly, his eyes blowing wide. sukuna’s desperation for release intensifies to the point where he’s blatantly manhandling you, brutalizing your cunt and his cock during the process of reaching zenith. flesh meets flesh, fervid thrusts after fervid thrusts, until he feels that familiar coil in his own stomach. 
sukuna plugs your abused cunt with inconceivable amounts of cum. his cock pulses wildly, shooting globules straight to your womb it’s almost physically possible to feel his viscous cum filling every crevice of your uterus. when he’s finally pulled out, ropy cum still links his raw cocktip to your pulsing pussy hole. despite such a mind-numbing culmination, sukuna’s cock refuses to yield. it springs up proudly, aching for another taste.  
“what a sight,” sukuna issues with cavernous and demonic utterance, pertaining to your body lying inert upon the tatami mat. he sweeps the sodden hair from his brow with a lordly air, his pride evident in the contemptuous curve of his lips. 
look at the state he’s reduced you to. his thick ejaculation pools around your lower body because your little pussy can’t hold all of him. with an indifferent shrug, sukuna lowers his formidable body to your level. and only when the malevolent glint in his eyes becomes apparent does the gravity of the situation dawn upon you.
he starts fucking your cunt with his tongue.
you grit your teeth in response as sukuna places your knees upon his shoulders, burying the slimy width of his tongue in your heated pussy. it’s no mere licking— he’s practically shoved his tongue up your gummy walls, toying with the warmth of his cum pooled in your poor cunt while simultaneously licking your puffed up clit. 
“o… oh! c… can’t— please, please!” drool seeps between your gritted cuspids after your hysterical plea.
pearlescent tears warm the corner of your eyes. your sensitivity from his rigorous fucking has not yet abated, but another swell of release approaches at a hand’s reach. down to your heart, the bundles of nerves and veins constrict painfully because it’s too much. you have nowhere else to put the pleasure— the imminent pinnacle will utterly ruin you.
i’m losing my mind
i’m losing my mind
i’m losing my mind—
when ecstasy is but a heartbeat away, sukuna withdraws, denying you the finality your body craves. as if saved from drowning, you suck in and grace your lungs with air only to be propelled back to the brink of delirium when he lifts you up from the floor like a breeze. 
with carnal ferocity, he seizes the meaty flesh of your haunches with two of his limbs, while the others secure your torso. there and there, sukuna slots his insatiable cock in your dribbling cunt; an act that he’s accomplished without effort because you’re so wet, he’s slid right in. 
everyone has witnessed sukuna’s cock abusing your tingling pussy; all can see how he bounces your tingling cunt along his stiff length without strain. 
“yes… squeeze my cock like the obedient girl you are,” he sibilates on your face, followed by a harsh chuckle. “you can’t hear me now, can you?”
the voice is a distant echo, barely perceptible to your waning senses. your body, devoid of strength, limps completely in sukuna’s embrace. he buries his face in the crooks of your damped neck, groaning and babbling as he ruts into your swollen pussy. 
“how come you’re still so fucking tight?”
hasn’t he prepared you for his sheer girth? hasn’t he stimulated your pussy enough to hug his cock smoothly and effortlessly? you’ve already coated his balls shiny with all the slick your cunt has produced, but sukuna’s chest tightens because you’re milking him with a viselike grip. 
yes, it is human that he’s even affected by this carnal desire. what more can he do? he feels faint with exultation merely by fucking you. 
sukuna pumps your pussy to the hilt with slow yet profound thrusts. he bares his teeth down the blade of your shoulder as the maelstrom of release engulfs him completely. battered by waves of ecstasy, he grunts with your flesh between his teeth, the rough sound reverberating deep from his belly.
you must’ve reached the peak with him— you absolutely cannot tell. the only thing that your puddled mind can grasp is the swirl of his potent cum in the pit of your womb and the endless pulse of your cunt as you struggle to accommodate his release. 
petrified and silent, the remaining concubines are as fixed in place as if struck by an immobilizing spell. yet they watch— they watch intently while sukuna’s cock throbs with white strings of cum dripping from your cunt hole down to his balls and thighs. a hefty amount pools beneath him, oozing from where the both of you are connected. 
the envy that consumed them is a silent, suffocating thing, a palpable presence thick enough to choke. this envy deepens as they witness the delicacy with which sukuna has placed your dormant body on his own tatami mat. they grit their teeth secretly, throwing every known curse your way. may your womb not bear the fruits of sukuna’s seed, they vehemently pray. 
for ryomen sukuna, it’s nothing but a moment’s weakness, a foreign string of unknown emotion that you’ve managed to evoke from him. and even though he’s beyond human grace, he’s wasted your body to his own satisfaction, it’s only right to touch you with his claws retracted.
“performance is over, my dearests,” sukuna announces while a smirk tugs at his lips. facing his concubines, he dons his fundoshi haphazardly that it barely covers what it means to hide. 
“w… what will become of her, my lord?” one dares to ask. 
a fleeting, imperious gaze from sukuna sweeps over you before ushering the women from the opulent chamber. “you shouldn’t worry yourselves about such trivial matters. she will meet her own reckoning by my hands.”
a wave of malicious satisfaction ripples through the group as they exchange covert nods. you’re already a dead woman. with poisonous glee, they bow before ryomen sukuna with their faces shaped in unbridled mirth. 
“make sure that my wives are accompanied home safely,” sukuna orders the nearest guards. he tastes their fear hanging heavy in the air just by being in his presence. oh, humans. 
as the group began to retreat, they cast over their shoulders a flurry of flirtatious farewells to the imposing sukuna. however, before they could vanish entirely from sight, his deep voice cut through their progress.
“guards, before i forgot…” sukuna displays a grotesque smile filled with malice. “kill them all. i want nineteen heads on my feet tomorrow.”
they say he is a devil. 
you say he is a god. 
and despite all the names, sukuna has found himself a place of worship, with you as his altar. 
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emilybeemartin · 1 year ago
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Next installment of Lord of the Rings AU: It's Fine, Everybody's Fine is Aragorn's coronation, at which Boromir W E E P S:
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I think in a circumstance where Boromir lives, or even just in interacting with Faramir in canon, Aragorn would be very aware of the optics of striding in out of the wilderness to take a throne that the line of stewards had been fighting and dying for in his absence (Thorongil cosplay aside). Cool thing is, in this AU, seeing the king's throne filled and experiencing Gondor at peace for the first time in living history is more than Boromir EVER hoped for.
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The day the White Tree sapling blooms, Aragorn wakes up Faramir and Boromir like a six-year-old on Christmas:
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And then there's that FIRST SUNRISE over the Mountains of Shadow, when day breaks over a defeated east that's clean and clear and Boromir WEEPS AGAIN because he NEVER THOUGHT he'd see such a thing and YES this is a THIRST TRAP why do you ASK
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Hell yeah I gave him a tattoo, it's the seven stars of Gondor plus a coastal rockrose that grows in sandy soils along the Mediterranean because I figure that's like Dol Amroth in honor of HIS MOM because I LOVE SYMBOLISM
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pastanest · 5 months ago
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Spencer Reid x she/her!reader
A/N: you’re used to me disappearing for months but I hope by now you can trust that I’ll always come back x
warnings: reader is a victim of misogyny (aren’t we all)
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In A World Of Boys
Doctor Spencer Reid. His name alone sends your heart thrumming as the elevator ascends, your shoes tapping against the metal ground with excitement and impatience in equal measure. It isn’t unusual for a case to have called the team in at the crack of dawn, but that was not something you ever imagined you’d actively look forward to. Then again, you couldn’t have counted on the sunrise casting a soft pink, almost heavenly glow to illuminate the office that seemed to converge around one man in particular the moment you saw him.
He approaches you with a warm smile, one mug held to his lips and another held in an outstretched hand, for you. Made just the way you liked it; not that you ever verbalized such details, someone’s eidetic memory just thought to pay attention to how you prepared your hot drinks until it was a task that could be taken off your hands entirely.
“Good morning.” Spencer greets you, a playful lilt in his voice at just how early this morning is.
“Morning, and cheers.” You share a light chuckle as you clink your mugs together in a gesture of soft comradery, your gazes locking as you take a simultaneous sip.
Such a thing is officially a symbol of trust, but the look in Spencer’s eyes is enough to hold you still if the ground was ripped out from beneath you. His curls are a little disheveled, as always, and his tie is as crooked as ever. Ruggedly handsome would be an accurate description, if you didn’t know Spencer better than that, know him to be so much gentler than such a roughened description. And your heart sings for him.
A tradition you’ve come to appreciate amongst the BAU during longer flights is sharing stories of their shared pasts. The tales are typically hilarious at the expense of one team member or another, but it is all in jest, and as the newest member of the team, you love hearing about their funniest moments from before you had known the people who have welcomed you so openly.
“Oh, we have to talk about the pool incident! What was her name, Spence?” JJ asks with a mischievous glint in her eye, the team’s attention pulled entirely to Spencer.
You can’t withhold the shocked expression on your face, you’ve not heard of any previous romantic encounters in Spencer’s life; this should be interesting.
“It was Lila, wasn’t it? C’mon, Spence, it’s been years, you can tell us now!” JJ presses, the rest of the team egging her on, but you stay quiet, your interest piqued to the extent that you can’t utter a word.
“Lila was an admirably strong woman, but as much as I hate to disappoint, there’s really nothing more to tell.” Spencer shrugs, smile unreadable.
In his former years, such a question would have flustered him, but not anymore. His answer is enough to fluster you, however. A man who doesn’t kiss and tell, and is so quietly firm in such a resolve, is one to keep in mind.
As if to make matters worse, Spencer then rises from his seat on the jet and strolls past you, making the effort to lean away from you - in case any sudden turbulence should unsteady him, he won’t risk even nudging you - on his journey to the galley. And the way he walks, the delicate trail of his cologne lingering in his wake when he passes your seat, it’s dizzying.
This is a moment that you know you will never forget, and you can’t help envying the fact that Spencer can so effortlessly recall every moment spent with you in the depths of eidetic memory. It’s almost ritualistic, how you lie in bed every night and replay your most treasured moments with Spencer, to send yourself to a peaceful sleep in which you hope to dream of him. Part of you wonders if he ever replays moments with you in his mind, with more clarity than you can ever hope to possess.
Little do you know, you are his favorite film.
On nights when insomnia strikes, you are the guaranteed remedy. When it is for you, Spencer’s eidetic memory is nothing short of a gift. He has a library dedicated to you, containing every look in your eyes, every micro-expression, every variation of your laugh, your smile, every word you have ever said in his presence. Sometimes, it takes him hours to decide which memory of you he’ll replay before he allows himself to sleep.
Neither of you are aware of how many nights you have spent lying awake in the same hours, focussing on the very same memories. While you absentmindedly play with the little flower charm on the necklace that Spencer bought you for your birthday, his gaze will drift to the special edition of Frankenstein that you bought him, for no reason other than it made you think of him. Of course, Spencer already had a copy, but the one from you lives on his bedside table. He had the edition completely memorized in a matter of minutes, but he has devoted more time to rereading that book than he has any other, because you gifted it to him. Sometimes, Spencer traces the spine and wonders where you’d held it before gifting it to him; if that will be as close as he ever comes to the blessing of one day holding your hand.
One of your most vivid memories with Spencer - and one that you frequently use to fall asleep with a smile on your face - first came to be during your second week working with the team. You didn’t know Spencer very well then, but you knew enough to be besotted by him; you knew that from the moment his eyes first met yours. A case required an undercover mission centered around you, as the only member of the team to fit the unsub’s type. While you could have handled the mission on your own, Spencer insisted that he be placed undercover inside the club you were set to enter, posing as a member of the public, to ensure you had immediate backup if you needed it. The undercover mission itself went without a hitch, though Spencer spent the duration of it trying his very best not to crush the glass he pretended to nurse in his hand as he watched the unsub flirt with you mercilessly, and without an ounce of respect. When the unsub was arrested and dragged out of the bar, you and Spencer followed, and he went to one of the government-issued vehicles to grab his FBI jacket for you while advising you to stand in the doorway and wait. He didn’t want you getting cold in your pretty dress, but that was a detail he kept to himself.
As you stood in the doorway, leaning against a wall with your arms crossed over your chest, the wind caught the thigh-high slit in your dress, exposing the skin of your thigh only momentarily, but it was enough for some sleazy, drunk middle-aged man to leer out you.
“Sexy lady!” He had called out to you in a slurred voice, opening his arms to you, beer bottle in hand.
And, as every woman has learnt to do, you gave him your best, tight lipped, polite smile.
“Thanks, but no thanks.” You answered as evenly as you could.
In an instant, the sleaze’s smirk was gone, replaced with an almost disgusted frown.
“Stupid slut.” He muttered, so quietly you almost didn’t hear him, but in the time it took for your eyes to widen, Spencer had pinned the man’s hands behind his back and sent the beer bottle shattering on the ground - collateral damage from shoving the sleaze into the nearest wall.
“You are under arrest for drunk and disorderly behaviour, as well as sexual harassment, and absolutely any other charge I can find when I dig up every morsel of your existence.” Spencer’s words were eerily quiet, but they were sharper than any you’d ever heard, dripping with a venom you didn’t imagine he was capable of possessing then.
After tossing the drunk misogynist into the back of one of the police cars still on the scene from your undercover mission, Spencer walked over to you and draped his FBI jacket over your shoulders, tugging it around you with a gentleness that completely juxtaposed what you had just witnessed.
“I’m sorry.” He’d said quietly, warranting a confused frown from you, that urged him to elaborate. “I’m sorry that you were treated in such an abhorrent way, and that you had to see me like that.”
Your frown melted into an adoring smile. “Spencer, you’ve got nothing to apologize for. Thank you for defending me from a man that I doubt realizes he even did anything wrong. While he might be the scum of the earth, you-” You gently poked his chest through his shirt, “-are a gentleman.”
Spencer had thought then that his heart couldn’t possibly soar higher than that, but oh, how wrong he had been.
Coincidentally, one of Spencer’s favorite memories of you is one you can recall very little of. It was the only occasion on which Spencer had politely declined the team’s invitation to a local bar for drinks in an evening. He had been rereading the copy of Frankenstein you’d bought him, comfortably nestled on his couch with a lingering smile as he sought pieces of you in between the lines of text, when his phone rang.
Seeing your name, Spencer picked up in a microsecond.
“(Y/N)? Is everything alright?” His mind was immediately reeling. Had something happened? Were you safe?
A sniffle came through the phone, and his heart shattered.
“Jus’ so lonely.” Your voice was slurred by the alcohol you’d consumed, but in the sweetest way. Your words did little to ease the anxiety swirling in Spencer’s mind, because every time he had seen you drink, you had been the giggliest mess he’d ever known; you had never been the stereotypical sad-drunk, as far as he knew.
“Lonely? Aren’t you at the bar with the team?” He questioned, because he could hear other voices in the background of the call and alarm bells were ringing. Had the rest of the team left? Or, worse, had you drunkenly wandered off somewhere and gotten lost? He was already putting his shoes on and grabbing a jacket.
“Yeah, but they’re not you.” There was an urgency and an aching sadness to your words, Spencer could hear it even through the distortion of a phone call, and your words stumped him. He blinked once, then twice, before replying.
“Well, no, they aren’t me.”
He felt that had been an obvious distinction, but perhaps you needed him to make that clear in your drunken state.
An equally dramatic and exasperated sigh came through the phone. “I know that, and that’s why I’m sad. I miss you!”
Spencer was out of his apartment door in record time, racing down the stairs until he reached the parking lot beneath his building.
“You miss me? Really?” He had asked you because he wanted to hear you say it again, he had to, the smile on his face growing exponentially.
“Lots.” Your voice broke on that one word, and it was enough for Spencer to risk several speeding tickets to reach you in a time he would never, ever tell you, because you’d lecture him about road safety. Perhaps someday he will tell you, just to hear you speak to him for a prolonged period of time, even if it’s a lecture at the expense of his reckless adoration.
By the time Spencer arrived at the bar, you were a blubbering mess in Rossi’s arms. It was only when you were transferred to Spencer’s arms that your drunk mind registered his presence, and the sheer joy on your face despite your tears was something he knew would be his only remaining memory if he lost everything else in some freak accident. Amidst your incoherent mumblings of compliments and praises towards Spencer - each and every one under lock and key in his heart ever since - he carried you back to his car and drove you home with your body wrapped almost entirely around his arm from where you sat in the passenger seat of his car. Once at your house, he carried you to the door bridal style, lowering you temporarily so that you could clumsily unlock your front door, before he picked you back up again and carried you inside, all the way to your bed. And there, he laid you down, slipped your shoes off, tucked you into bed, and wiped your face with your skincare products efficiently, from what you’d told him of your nightly routine. He fetched you a glass of water and sat you up to drink the whole thing, then refilled it and set it on your bedside table - in case you woke up thirsty in the night, or if you needed it first thing in the morning. Lying you back down, he left a little kiss on your forehead, and due to your eyes being closed, he assumed you were already falling asleep, until you reached for his hand when he tried to go.
“Stay.” You pleaded in a barely-conscious and far-from-sober tone.
Spencer smiled at you like you were the stars in the sky.
“Alright.” He almost whispered, taking a seat on the edge of your bed, while you laid under your covers, practically curled around where he sat.
With one of his hands on your shoulder, Spencer sat with you, spelling out words you’d never register on the back of your shoulder blade with his thumb and index finger.
So beautiful.
Everything.
To be yours.
And as his thumb curved the last letter “s” on the back of your hand, Spencer heard your breathing settle to a rate that told him you were dreaming. Very slowly, he tucked you under the bedcovers, stood himself up, and left, but not before leaving you with a message he intended for you to comprehend later. You had not consented to Spencer staying the night with you, and you were in no position to give that consent in your state, but you had asked him to stay, so he stayed until you wouldn’t know that he’d gone.
The next morning, you awoke to a little note on your bedside table that simply said:
Good morning, angel. Please drink some water and let me know you survived drinking enough alcohol to fill the Hoover Dam (not literally, that’s not biologically possible).
-Spencer x
It was enough to make you laugh, and despite your immediate pounding headache, you reached for your phone.
You: hahaha, very funny. thank you so much for last night, I’m sorry for the mess ❤️
And, to your accustomed surprise, Spencer started typing back immediately.
Spencer: I’m glad that you survived to enjoy my joke. You are always welcome, and you have nothing to apologize for.
You went to set your phone down on your bedside table again, when it lit up with another text.
Spencer: ❤️
Surviving the alcohol you consumed was nothing compared to the way you had to fight for your life upon receiving that.
That morning, when you were called into the office for a case, you’d expected to be greeted with an onslaught of teasing from your coworkers, but Spencer had enough time before you arrived to plead with the rest of the team not to embarrass you. Surprisingly, they had agreed, but on one condition: Spencer had to do something about his workplace crush, because the rest of the team were losing their patience with the tension between you. To save you the embarrassment, Spencer sacrificed his own dignity in agreeing to that, and it’s been hanging over his head ever since.
The clouds beneath the jet serve as an interesting background to your thoughts, your headphones blocking out any and all sound beyond your music. You are away in your own little world, save for the part of your brain that is acutely aware of your elbow touching Spencer’s with the only barrier being your jacket and his. Does he spend as much time dwelling on these things? Does he ever wonder, like you do, that this connection between you could amount to something else, something more, if either of you were willing to take the risk? The risk is, in itself, a great one. While the risks surrounding any love in general are an obvious factor, in your shared field of work, that is exacerbated. Neither of you can explicitly trust that you would be able to act professionally if the other was harmed in any way, and you could bear witness to any degree of harm against the other while in the field. If that wasn’t enough, should it not work out, you would have no choice but to leave your dream job to work and live elsewhere, uprooting the life you’ve built here in its entirety; while Spencer would stay with the family he has worked with for so many years, the building would never feel the same to him without you in it. Whoever took your desk after you, he would be unable to withhold a small amount of resentment towards - he would never act on it, but he would feel it. And the guilt of being with him having caused you to have to restart your life somewhere else? That is a weight he is terrified of carrying. So many have faced worse fates as a result of getting close to Spencer, but when it comes to you, he cannot think of any worse than that, or his chest will start to hurt.
Perhaps this case is the perfect opportunity, he wonders to himself while a female cop converses with him, barely occupying even half of Spencer’s brain as he focuses on thoughts of you.
“I think it’s great you guys have come down here to help us!” The local cop grins up at Spencer.
A case in Vegas, where he could use some time once the case is closed to show you some of his favorite places. You’d like that, he thinks.
“Thank you, we’re always happy to help when requested.” Spencer answers casually.
But from the little office you’re working in, you can see the way that local cop is ogling at Spencer, and you feel a twinge of jealousy. It was only a few minutes ago you were looking at the hazel in his eyes up close in the same way she currently is, but you like to think you’re a little less obvious than that. You are not.
“Some of these guys, you can tell they don’t know what they’re doing, but you definitely do, don’t you? I’ve heard the rest of your team calling you a genius!” The local cop babbles to Spencer, eyes like an animal in heat.
Perhaps a tour of the casino’s? But a certain card-counting ability resulting in a certain state-wide ban would make that somewhat difficult. That probably wouldn’t be a very good date. Would it be a date? Spencer wonders, before he shrugs, feeling a little awkward.
“I don’t believe intelligence can be accurately quantified given its diversity in both person and circumstance, but I appreciate your faith in the BAU, who I’d better get back to. Thanks.” With that, he steps away from the officer, thinking nothing of the conversation given that his focus had been elsewhere for the duration of it.
You, however, cannot let it go. To your detriment, you assume a seasoned profiler like Spencer can read flirtatious intent a mile off (his unreliable grasp on social cues begs to differ) and from a distance, it didn’t look to you that he outright rejected the advances of another woman (his unreliable grasp on social cues left him unaware there were even advances to reject), and that left you feeling…upset. You had thought your relationship with Spencer to be special, that he didn’t reject the warm, sweet tension between the two of you because he liked you, specifically, but if he didn’t reject the flirtations of another woman, are you just a more regular occurrence of what she offered him?
Little do you know, if Spencer heard your thoughts suggest he only merely “liked” you, he may very well go into cardiac arrest under the pressure of the weight to correct you, adamantly. There is not a string of words in his vocabulary to adequately describe what he feels for you, and to imply “like” conveys them is salt in the wound you cause in his heart for each day you’re not his.
Naturally, for the rest of the day you are accompanied by a cloud hanging over your head to consistently remind you of that very same fact - that you are not Spencer’s. It is hardly surprising you do everything in your power to avoid him, offering to assist every member of the team with whatever task they’re doing to take you out of his reach and prevent him from talking to you. Of course, you know he’ll notice, and you’ll apologize when you’ve recovered enough to not cry at the thought of him, but for tonight are destined to bury yourself in hotel bedcovers that you partially hope suffocate you into unconsciousness to save you further torment.
Most unfortunately for you, only an hour into your tears, there is a soft knock at your hotel room door. By now, you are beyond the point of being able to hide the extent to which you have already cried, so you formulate a number of excuses pertaining to allergies or hormones on your way to the door. All of those lies evaporate on opening your door to find Spencer standing there, looking down at you with pleading eyes that quite frankly make you want to launch yourself from your hotel room window.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, (Y/N), I just came by to-“ His eyes widen. “You’ve been crying.”
It’s not a question; Spencer knows you well enough to not need to doubt himself when he reads your physical tells.
“Yeah, don’t worry about it. Did you need something?” You brush off his concern, hoping to distract him with whatever his original reason for coming here was - it wouldn’t be the first time Spencer materialized in your presence to ask your opinion of something obscure or a social situation he was uncertain of because he felt comfortable enough to come to you about it, you just wanted to get this over with so that you could return to your crying pit.
“I- what? Don’t worry about it? You’ve been crying, of course I’ll worry about that! Extensively!” Spencer exclaims, his voice rising in pitch slightly with his distress, before he clears his throat. “I came by to check on you because your behavior today confused me, and it appears I was right to be concerned.” Seeing the apprehension on your face, Spencer is quick to amend the question he was going to ask. “If you’d prefer not to talk about it, I understand and won’t pressure you, but please don’t force yourself to suffer alone if you can help it. There’s nothing I’d rather listen to than you.”
The sincerity in Spencer’s words brings fresh tears to your eyes, and it’s physically painful to look away from him and stare at the doorframe.
“It’s nothing, Spencer, just getting in my head about things that-“ You begin, and in a moment that is completely unlike his usually overly-polite self, he interrupts you.
“Is it something I did?” He asks, his eyes widening with the same plea as before.
Spencer’s question surprises you so much that you hesitate to answer him, only for a second before your lips part again, but your delay is enough of an answer to him.
“(Y/N), please tell me I did so that I can fix this. I don’t understand- I’ve already gone over our every interaction over the past 48 hours, 30 times each, and I’m not smart enough to have been unable to determine a conclusion on my own. Please tell me.” Spencer begs, his voice hoarse with the weight of having hurt your feelings without ever intending to.
Knowing he isn’t going to forgive himself without an explanation and that he’ll see through any lie you give him now, you are left without a choice.
“That cop you spoke to today, was she flirting with you?” The words fall from your lips freely, and Spencer blinks.
Once, twice, then a third time.
“Which…female officer? In the past 8 hours I have spoken to three.” He asks so carefully, like he’s walking on glass.
You have to resist rolling your eyes, because you know Spencer isn’t being clueless on purpose, but it doesn’t ease your pain.
“Just after midday, the one who was looking up at you like you were the best thing she’d seen all day.” Now, you can’t resist rolling your eyes; an involuntary reaction that makes Spencer frown in confusion.
“The conversation consisted of her thanking us for assisting them with the case and enquiring as to whether I’m a genius- to which I said I don’t think intelligence can be accurately quantified, and that was it.” Spencer has never been more confused in his entire life. He feels there is something obvious staring him right in his face and he is mortified at being completely blind to it, but he is treading very carefully over this invisible minefield.
“She was flirting with you, Spencer, didn’t you see the way she was looking at you?” Trying to read his expression and only finding confusion is not helping.
“I wasn’t really looking at her.” Spencer answers truthfully, because his eyes had been glazed over as he thought of places he could show you while in Vegas, where posed the highest probability of a successful date, should you accept the offer he had every intention of presenting you with.
“You didn’t notice…” You murmur, your heart sinking in your chest.
You had been upset that Spencer hadn’t rejected the advances of another woman under the presumption he understood her advances, but if he truly did not when she was being so obvious, he most likely doesn’t notice yours, either. He hasn’t been reciprocating the energy you thought was between you for that reason, he’s just been continuing the conversation without a clue. A lump forms in your thought.
Meanwhile, Spencer is even more confused.
“I’m not certain I understand what the issue is. Was it the flirting? Or the fact I didn’t register it? Should I have?” He is lost and in desperate need of guidance. As soon as he knows what he’s done to upset you, he’ll beg on his knees for your forgiveness, but at this time he is still unable to determine the problem. If you had not realized he didn’t acknowledge the flirting until now, that couldn’t be the issue, but if the issue was simply that he’d been flirted with, you now knowing he wasn’t aware of it would have fixed that - so why do you look more upset? This just in: Doctor Spencer Reid loathes social cues.
“Do you notice when anyone flirts with you?” Answering his question with your own question is only sending him further into a spiral.
You are the only person he ever wishes would flirt with him, but Spencer is absolutely convinced you never would. If he answers “no” to your rephrased version of the same question you had just asked him, that appears to be the answer you are assuming to be true which is making you look sadder. He does not understand this at all.
“How do I answer that in a way that won’t upset you further…” Spencer frowns, focussing very hard on your every micro-expression, trying to use your face as a cheat sheet.
“I don’t think you can, Spencer. Thanks for coming to check on me. Goodnight.” You give him a weak smile and go to close your hotel room door, but Spencer places a palm against the door with an expression of alarm.
“Please-“ He starts, then stops himself when you meet his eyes, his tone softening. “Talk to me.”
You take a deep breath and decide to bite the bullet. What do you have to lose? Your heart’s already been hit with every weapon of mass destruction you can think of.
“I thought- I thought you knew there was- it wasn’t flirting, but there’s been something between us that I thought you knew as well as I did. Stupidly, I thought you were reciprocating it, but if you couldn’t tell that cop was flirting with you, there’s no way you knew…” Your weak smile wavers. “Like I said, just getting in my head over things. Doesn’t matter. You haven’t done anything wrong. Night-“
Once again unexpectedly, Spencer interrupts you, but this time for a very different reason.
“I need to sit down.”
It’s only then you realize how suddenly pale he’s become. Paler than you’ve ever seen him, in fact. Your eyes widen, and you grab Spencer’s forearms, guiding him into your hotel room and over to the armchair in the corner of the room, the door clicking shut behind you while Spencer stumbles with the most shell shocked look in his eyes.
“Spencer, what’s going on? Are you alright?” You ask him worriedly.
“Indeterminable.” Spencer answers in a distant voice.
“Okay, okay, uh-“ You flit from him to the sink in your hotel room to grab Spencer a glass of water, that you’re quick to bring to him. “Here.”
His eyes don’t even focus on you or the glass, but he takes it from your hand and gulps it down. Spencer makes the mistake of glancing at you mid-sip, and starts choking, resulting in you patting his back.
“Something between us…” He coughs out. “You said, something between us. What.”
Your eyebrows furrow, and your face feels hot.
“You know, mutual pining. Like in movies.” You feel very awkward having to explain that.
“Books, first.” Spencer corrects you quietly, his breathing finally steadying.
“Yeah, okay, books first.” You can’t help chuckling lightly and taking the empty glass back over to the sink, then returning to Spencer, but stopping in your tracks when you find him now standing instead of sitting in the armchair.
“A study has shown that on average it takes men 88 days to fall in love, while it takes women 134 days. Contrary to popular belief, I don’t believe every aspect of love can be reduced to facts and statistics, but in moments of self-doubt I fall back on what I know. I knew what I knew of how I felt about you on the day we met, but I waited 88 days to be certain, and then it was only logical I waited 134 days to give you the chance to develop even the vaguest pleasant feeling towards me.” He takes a breath. “It has only been 120 days; I had not yet decided how I was going to broach this topic with you, and the question remains as to whether I’ve waited long enough for you to be as certain as I am. If the answer is anything other than yes, I promise, I’ll wait as many days as it takes, even if it’s a number I can’t reach.” Spencer’s voice is that of a man swearing an oath he has no doubt he’ll live to honor in every sense, and you are certain your heart has stopped beating.
You stare at him with wide eyes, feeling like time has frozen around you, the only sounds being your breathing to fill the suffocating silence of your hotel room. A microexpression of terror flickers across Spencer’s face, and you are brought back to yourself in an instant.
“I wish you’d asked me 120 days ago.” You say breathlessly.
“I didn’t ask anything.” Yet, Spencer adds internally, his heart pounding.
“But you’re going to.” You clarify softly, and Spencer nods, so you nod back at him.
“Would…” Spencer clears his throat. “Would you allow me the honor of taking you on a date? With me? Together? Here? Or anywhere- anywhere we can realistically travel to, that is-“ As he rambles and gets ahead of himself, your expression of shock evolves into a smile, and it’s your turn to interrupt him.
“Yes. Anywhere, anytime. Yes.” You answer.
There’s a beat of silence as Spencer catches his breath.
“Now?” He dares to whisper, and you’re grinning, glancing between him, and the provisions of a TV, bed and phone that this hotel room provides.
“Would you be opposed to a first date of takeout and shitty hotel room cable?” You offer playfully.
A bashful smile curls at the corner of Spencer’s mouth as he smiles back at you.
“Anything with you.” He says, but is quick to amend his own words. “Provided it’s an entirely safe scenario, obviously.”
That makes you snicker. “Obviously.”
Spencer looks between you and the bed, nervous of how to proceed. You make the first move, taking a step towards the bed, and Spencer offers you his hand - somewhat needlessly, but if he ever misses an instant in which he can deliver a gentlemanly action upon you, he would suggest that’s the instant you shoot him dead - to assist you onto the mattress before he follows suit and sits down beside you, kicking off his shoes.
“I’m completely underdressed for our first date, sorry.” You joke, looking between your pajamas and Spencer’s suit.
“You’re beautiful.” Is all he says, his voice softer than you’ve ever heard it as he gazes down at you with the most gentle smile.
You reach for his hand, intertwining your fingers, and Spencer doesn’t hesitate to lift them to his lips to kiss each of your knuckles tenderly.
“Takeout?” He murmurs against your skin, and for a second you’re lost to the daze of his kisses that you wonder if he’s asking whether the act of them has taken you out (to which you’d answer with a resounding yes), but remembering the nature of your date, you nod wordlessly.
Spencer smirks against your knuckles.
“I meant, what kind of takeout?” He amends, and your face feels hot again.
“Anything at all.” Is all you can think to respond, because to be completely honest, you do not care what you eat tonight.
Spencer chuckles quietly at that, keeping his hand holding yours while his other hand reaches for the hotel room phone, to dial for reception and request their recommendations for the best local takeout places.
“What’s so funny?” You ask him, but you’re smiling regardless of not yet knowing, just seeing him laugh while his thumb caresses your knuckles.
“I was just thinking, ‘Anything at all’ is exactly what I’ve thought every time I’ve looked at you.” Spencer muses as he brings the phone to his ear.
Anything at all to make you smile again, anything at all from you, if you asked he’d anything at all for you.
And much like the last time, you don’t even realize he’s spelling out words against your skin with the caress of his thumb. This time, though, it’s just one phrase, repeated.
To be yours.
To be yours.
To be yours.
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