#how does he eat it through his helmet you ask? the same way he makes a four course meal and eats it while stranded on earth

[rubatato]

oh to be a small man in a big cupcake

[aesthetic-bbyg]

HI I LOVE UR WORKS could I pls request like a mean dom ex bf Luke Castellan x fem reader who just canNOT get over him 🙏 it’s ok tho cuz we can get under him instead 😍 (smutty ofcccc)

DON’T STOP ~ L. CASTELLAN

lowk based of this p link

ex!Luke Castellan x fem!reader

🎀🤍 - It’s been awkward around camp since you and Luke broke up, even worse since you miss him so much..

Oral!fem receiving , Luke being a meanie , teasing , rough&dom!Luke , squirting , sum fluff at the end

EVEN THOUGH HE WAS YOUR EX, AND HE broke things of with you, you couldn’t help but stare at every chance you got. When he was practicing sword fighting with another camper, or when your gazes met at the picnic benches during breakfast.

And Luke hated this. It made his blood boil, those sweet looks you sent him. The innocent doe look as your round eyes widened each time he finally gave in and stared back. The few seconds he actually managed to make eye contact with you he saw that desire that he was all too familiar with swirl in your irises. Then again, it made him chuckle each time you turned away from his strong gaze, shyness overtaking you.

Yet, it made him cocky, knowing he still had that power over you despite breaking things off. It made him want to get closer and see just how much you blushed at his presence. He wanted to feel the way your body stiffened when he touched you, before eventually melting with each gentle caress. It was sick, how much pleasure it brought him to think about messing with you. But, he also couldn’t deny that he had his own desires that needed to be fulfilled. So it wasn’t all that twisted because part of that want for you was because of his own lust and not just his ego.

Even now, as Luke stares at you from across the field, his helmet adorning blue whilst yours red, he could sense that same desire seep from your body. He wanted to soothe that ache he knew pooled under those leggings you were wearing. He took the opportunity as he snuck through the trees like an animal, and saw you, guarding a red flag stuck into the dirt.

If you could even call it guarding. Your back was turned to him, picking at the flowers by your feet, you sat atop of a tree stump nearly dying of boredom. Your helmet and sword had been discarded and rest on the grass next to you. You gasped, feelings sharp tip dig into your back.

“You never learn.” A familiar voice that sent chills down your spine echoed into your ears. “How many times did I tell you, never get distracted.”

“Many times.” You replied, voice weak and small. You slowly turned your head, peeking at him over your shoulder. Your eyes holding that same doe eye look as you stared up at him innocently. He removed the faux sword from your back, squatting down to reach your height. “Luke.”

He took your chin between his fingers and thumb, staring intensely into your eyes. “You’re a stupid girl, y/n.” He leaned his so close that his lips nearly brushed over yours, “But so irresistible.”

You gulped down thickly, “Lu..”

“You’re not gonna be eating dinner tonight, you’re going to stay in your cabin.” Luke demanded, not even asking you, but stating it like it was a fact of the future.

“But—“ You stumbled over your words pathetically, breathing heavily against his pink lips that were so close and yet so far. “Luke.”

“It’s an order.” He stood up, tone cold and harsh as he ripped the flag from the ground and began walking away.

“Hey!” It was the loudest your feeble voice had been the whole interaction, your hands reaching for the sword by your side as he paused. “The whole point of the this game is to not let the opposing team win the flag.”

Luke let out a mocking laugh, turning around to look at your like you were dumb. “What, and you’re gonna fight me for it?”

You knew you didn’t stand a chance against the greatest swordsman of all of Camp Half-Blood, and yet you still allowed the words to slip your mouth. “Yes.”

He shook his head, tossing the flag aside. “Fine.” He readied his sword, pointing at you threateningly, “Have it your way.”

“Yeah.” You mumbled, mimicking his actions and sucking in a deep breath. You truly couldn’t go against Luke even if you put all your might into it. You were a fool for even instigating a dual, and that same proclamation ended in you on your stomach, cheek digging into the grass with your sword knocked across the field. Luke held both your wrist behind your back, knees on either side of your hips as his hard on pressed against your backside.

“You’re a stupid girl.” He repeated his mean words from earlier, this time so close to your ear that his breath tickled the side of your face. His grip on your was getting painful, but it felt numb as he leaned down to press a soft kiss against your temple. “You’ll learn one day.”

He stood up, releasing you from his grip as he walked away, picking the flag up and disappearing into the trees. You’re team was going to give you so much shit for this.

THIS IS STUPID, Luke Castellan was your ex. What type of control does he have that you had to listen to him? You’d been pacing around the empty cabin during dinner time for five minutes.

“Aren’t you gonna eat, sister?” One of your siblings asked before leaving, watching you with curiosity as you laid under the covers.

“Not tonight, I feel a little sick.” You lied, even mustering up a fake whine as you gripped your stomach. “Go ahead, I’ll be fine.” And within a few moments, she was gone, and you waited and waited, which left you to pacing. “Fuck this.” You stomped towards the door, deciding that you shouldn’t listen to him, because who was he? Ordering you to do what he wanted.

“Where are you going?” Luke asked smugly as his gaze met yours when you opened the door. “I told you to stay here.”

You stepped back slowly, “I was going to eat.” Your voice had become stronger, but that didn’t mean that your mind felt anymore confident when confronting the son of Hermes.

He shut the door, following each step you took backwards by stepping forward, his smirk very clear, even in the dark atmosphere. “But I told you not go, to wait for me here.”

“Well, I’m not gonna listen to everything you say, Luke.” You stopped, feeling your legs collided again the side of one of the bunk beds. It was yours, and you could tell by the curtains you had Luke nail onto the top for extra privacy. “You’re not my boyfriend anymore.”

He let out another chuckle, something about your words had entertained him so much that he’d revealed his pearly canines. But in a split second it dropped, he hurled at you, pushing you against the bed and pining your arms above your head. You’d be lying if you said that this didn’t soak your panties almost immediately.

“I tell you do things, baby, ‘cause you don’t know how to do them yourself.” Luke whispered into your neck, planting sweet kisses along it’s curve and your shoulder. Then he began sucking, leaving bruises behind and then soothing them by licking gently against the purple skin. “Did I really fuck you so dumb that you just can’t comprehend when someone tells what to do.”

You sigh at his touch, “Stop calling me stupid, Luke.”

He huffed out a laugh, trailing further down your chest kissing at the tops of your tits that spilled out the white tank top you had on. “It’s what you are, I mean, you can hardly form a sentence when I just so much as look at you.”

You whine, “I can speak for myself.” You said in a whisper, tugging at the grip he had on your wrist.

He lifted his head from it’s spot in the valley of your tits. “Then tell me,” He took one hand, still restraining you with the other, “what do you want.” You went silent, brain going foggy as he inched a warm hand under your tank top, under your bra. “I said, what do you want me to do, stupid girl.”

You whined, “Fuck, I want you to eat me out.” Your tone was meant to come out a lot more stronger then it actually did, it nearly sounded like you were pleading.

“Aww, look at my girl, finally learning a new thing.” He cooed, letting go of your wrist and lifting his head from your chest. He caressed your face, eyes lowering down to your lips and inching closer just like how he did in the forest earlier. “I really meant it when I said your irresistible, baby.” He whispered, kissing your cheek, purposely avoiding your lips. “I‘ve missed your taste.”

“Then why have you been a dickhead and ignoring me since we broke up.” You muttered, bringing your now free hands to wonder up and down his toned arms. “You could’ve had me if you wanted me.”

He chuckled, “Trust me, I’ve been doing anything but ignoring.” He squeezed your hip, finally dipping his head to kiss you desperately. It was a messy and hot kiss, full of desire, clashing teeth, and tongue. Your hands had lifted to cup his face, eyes pressed shut as you took in this long awaited make out. Nothing could describe the lust that emitted from the kiss alone, how heavy the both of you inhaled through your nose, refusing to part your mouths and breath.

But it eventually had to come, Luke grew impatient and hungry as he was the first to pull away, dragging your hips to the edge of the bed roughly. He fell to his knees in a heartbeat, pulling off your shorts in one swift move and shoving your panties the side. He then folded your legs just enough so your whole cunt was exposed and openly glistening in the little bit of light that illuminated the cabin.

He nearly came just at the sight of it, leaning down to begin his feverish licking and sucking on your folds. You let out a surprised moan, not expecting him to dive into your pussy like a starved man. Your hand flew to his dark curls, the other gripping the pretty pink sheets you already knew were going to be ruined by the time he was finished.

After all, dinner time was a whole hour and thirty, giving him plenty of time to enjoy his meal without stop. Luke flicked his tongue in and out your hole teasingly before moving to suck on your clit loudly. The noises were disgusting, a sloppy combination of slurping and high pitched moans. He lightly shook his head against you, digging his features into you, his grip on your thighs tightening each time you attempted to push them down.

“Fuck, Luke, don’t stop, don’t stop!” You moaned, legs trembling at the way he worked his tongue against you. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” You nearly screamed, your grip on his curls painful but he didn’t even mind it. He didn’t even flinch as you began to leak milky cum from your cunt, he just continued to lick at your sensitive bud. You did everything in your power to try and get him away, pushing at his shoulders, gripping his arms, shoving away his face, letting out choked whines of surrender. “I can’t—“ Each feeble attempt in getting your point across was interrupted by your own moans and squeaks as he brushed over your overstimulated clit.

You’re pussy was probably a mess of spit, cum, and arousal mixing together, yet something about that was so addictive to Luke. It wasn’t like he didn’t hear your pleas, or that he was ignoring them, he truly couldn’t pull away. He was letting animalistic groans each times he swiped his tongue onto your pussy, letting the wetness fill his taste buds.

He couldn’t help it when he just pushed your legs closer to your chest whenever you squirmed and attempted to push the closed. He heard you whines and it only fed his own pleasure, his licks became quicker, more messy if that was even possible. He was out of breath and heaving, yet didn’t pull back for a second, he just kept stuffing his face back into your cunt. He noted the way you nearly screamed whenever he fucked his tongue into and rolled with it, repeating the motion as his nose stimulated your clit.

With that you were letting out the most pornographic moans he’d ever heard come from you. Your attempts to shove him away for noticeably more frantic and aggressive, you’re whines, despite being almost unintelligible, begged for him to stop. There was a overwhelmingly tight coil in your stomach that just felt different compared to your last orgasm, it went from your stomach and moved down in waves. Before you could let another push to his shoulder you threw your head back and gripped the sheets desperately. You heard a gentle squelch, very faint but it made your eyes widen in horror as you sat up at stared down at Luke.

He finally pulled away, wiping away at the wetness that dropped down his chin and onto his neck. He fell back on his knees, a drowsy smirk on his lips and heavy eyelids that stared back at you. You squirted, and all over his face at that. “Fuck.” Was all he could mutter, biting his lower lip as he stared at you. “That was..so fuckin’ hot, baby.”

You blushed, hiding your face in your hands as you groaned. “I made a mess.”

He leaned up, removing your hands and lightly pecking your lips. “A beautiful mess, baby.” He whispered, “I bet I can make it happen again.”

“No!” You squeezed your legs shut, shoving his shoulder as he laughed, gently caressing your thigh. “Dinner is almost over and you need to leave before anyone notices you were here in the first place.”

“I don’t care if they see me, they probably already heard you.” He stood up, making you notice the painful bulge that outline the cargo shorts he had on.

“Oh, fuck, Luke.” You whispered. He didn’t have to ask what you were referring to with your pitiful tone as you stared at his hardened dick without shame.

“Don’t worry about.” He reassured, digging into his pocket to pull out a picture. “I’ve got you to help me out later in the night.” With closer examination, you noticed that it was an old photo that he’d taken months before the breakup. You laid down on a bed, shirt lifted just enough to show your tits, legs spread open with a cock shoved in your cunt.

“You’re dirty.” You slapped his leg, but a sheepish smile betrayed any ounce of annoyance you were trying to display. You leaned down to grab your shorts, but before you put them back on you paused. You looked up at Luke, who wasn’t paying attention as he slipped the photo back into his side pocket, and then at your lap. You stood up and slipped out of your panties, balling them up and offering it to Luke like a present. “You can have ‘em, they’re ruined because of you anyway and it could be useful for helping you later.”

Luke let out a chuckle, not even blinking as he took them and shoved them into his pocket. “Thank you.” He took your waist, his hand trailing down to the plush cheeks of your ass and squeezing the flesh. He leaned into close of the night with a another hungry kiss, except he replaced the painful lust with love and devotion. He regretted ever letting you escape his arms, and knew that he wouldn’t do it again, no matter what. He kneeled down, picking up the shorts he’d discarded and lightly kiss your thigh, you stepped into them, watching with admiration as he dragged them back up.

“I love you.” You weren’t sure if maybe it was too soon to confidently say the words once more but part of you didn’t care.

Luke didn’t know either, but he definitely knew in his whole heart that he didn’t give a fuck. “I love you too.” You walked to the cabin door, feeling a pool of dread as he opened it and slowly let go of your hand. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” You nodded, giving him a smile before he was gone, the door shutting completely with a quiet click.

“Hey, Luke, where were ya?” You heard a fellow camper call out just moments after Luke’s exit. “Didn’t get some dinner before bed?”

“Nah, man, don’t worry.” Luke shrugged it off, he voice getting more faint the farther he went, but you definitely heard him say: “I already ate.”

Natti speaks !!: I actually ended up liking this way more than I thought so a big thank u to the person who sent this request in🫶🏼🫶🏼 Luke Castellan is js to fine and he needs to be stopped.

𓆩ꨄ︎𓆪

[hoshieeyewrinkles]

• Nct dream as bad boys falling in love with you. •

♡ Notes. Alt. When you are the good girl who fell in love with them.

♡ Cheesy as hell.

♡ stereotypical bad boy and good girl.

♡ Fluff. Fluff. Fluff.

♡ Reader is innocent and sometimes a dumbass

♡ Not requested [ requests are open tho. Pls go through my pinned post before requesting]

Mark

~ randomass bad boy

~ spots you during recess in the hallways.

~ could not stop thinking about you after that, your cute keychain hanging off your bag, the little giggles you let out with your looser friends as he calls them. All had him going crazy

~ waits in the same hallway everyday even though he doesn't have any classes there, only to glance at you.

~ grins like an idiot after you shyly smiled at him once.

~ "you are such a creep, mark." "shut up haechan"

~ he finally asked you out one day after some great encouragement from his friends ( haechan threatening him to ask you out or else he will) . Was nervous that you might get scared because of his eyebrow piercings and bad reputation.

~ was surprised that you accepted, looking at him with doe eyes and a cute grin. He fell harder before he could even process your reply.

~ his life improves because of you. Your pouts and little scoldings you give him for not wearing a helmet or coming late. It all made him change as he avoided everything bad to make you happy.

~ "I'm sorry angel, I didn't mean to come late. Don't be mad please" Screaming.

Renjun

~ certified tsundere

~ found you so annoying at first. Why did you have to finish all the work at time and be such a good girl?

~ and why the fuck did you have you have to walk around with your gaze down? Can't you look forward for fuck's sake?

~ everything you did kinda annoyed him at first and yet he couldn't understand why he made sure no one bullied you or laughed at you.

~ glares at anyone who looks at you for long time.

~ "she is so fucking annoying, walking around cutely with that stupid banana milk like tf" "renjun you are in love with her"

~ realises he has a crush on you. Panics. Gets more annoyed.

~ walks you home one day making you confused. Carries your books. Sits beside you in every class you guys share. Lends you his leather jacket when you are cold. Brings you banana milk everyday.

~ you're confused but you can't help but feel all giddy in your stomach when he acts like that. You give him a cupcake one day.

~ he stared at it the entire class. He is not gonna eat it. He'll preserve it forever.

~ you pecked his cheek one day to calm him down as he ruthlessly punched a boy after he made fun of you

~ pulls you into a kiss in front of everyone.

~ chuckles so sweetly when you blush. You take his bruised hands in yours worriedly all while he stares at you as if you are his entire world. (Which you are)

~ "No one's ever gonna hurt you, princess. I love you so fucking much."

Jeno

~ Bad boy next door

~ you are his neighbour. All he does is blast loud music with his friends creating ruckus in his backyard. His parents are always out of town.

~ you are the new girl who moved next door with your strict parents.

~ he watches you watering your plants everyday. Notices the little glances you threw at his way and how you stammer to reply when he waves hi at you with a lazy smirk on his face. "Whatcha looking at sweetheart?"

~ he finds so you so fucking adorable.

~ throws away his cigarettes whenever you catch him smoking, you don't mind but he doesn't want to scare you. So he tries to change his appearance, hides his tattoos and piercings.

~ frankly, he doesn't understand why tf he cares so much about what you think but he can't stop thinking about you. Especially after you gazed at him with the softest eyes when he came home bruised. Asking him to come inside your home so you can bandage him.

~ he knew you had very present and strict parents (something which he can't relate to) yet you still took the risk to call him in.

~ he straight up confesses to you one fine day when you were aiding his bruises (a little routine between you guys when your parents aren't home)

~ he climbs through your bedroom window even if your parents are present. He doesn't give two fucks. All he wants to do is see his angel. "I haven't seen you since yesterday princess, let me have a look please"

~ you accept his confession without hesitance and reassures him that you don't care about his appearance and he doesn't need to change himself.

~ he falls in love with you harder than ever, god forbid if jeno even sees a scratch on you. You're his little treasure, his everything. He will fight against the world for you, will jump in the fire for you.

~ "come on baby, don't scold your nono pls" a true Samoyed.

Haechan

~ resident's bad boy.

~ has the most gaze ever, looks like he is the scariest person alive but is actually a little tease.

~ don't think he doesn't throw punches tho, beats the shit out of people just for leaning on his bike.

~ spots you in the midnight carrying a tub of ice cream in your hand, walking out of the supermarket. Yeah he thought you were a dumbass to walk alone at midnight.

~ tries to ignore you but fails when he spots creepy looking guys following you. They start to corner you and haechan sighs before stepping in.

~ takes out his pocket knife and the guys starts sprinting away. Haechan turns back expecting you to look at him with fear but was surprised to find you staring at him with jaw open and flushed cheeks. "what the fuck are you? A damsel in distress?"

~ he kinda roasted you but you didn't care, shyly thanking him. He scoffs before asking you to hop on his motorcycle.

~ drops you home and asks your name. He chants your name in his mind after that.

~ you were pleasantly surprised to find him near the same supermarket the next day, turns out he has his little garage there. "What's up princess? wanted to see me again, yeah?"

~ after that he looks forward to your little meet ups. He lifts you up and puts you on his motorcycle seat while he fixes the engine. Mentally gushing at how cute you look with your little brain trying to understand what he is doing. "Yes this definitely looks like a donut princess"

~ lets you ramble about the books you read and even tries reading them so he can talk about more stuff with you.

~ confesses to you on a random thursday under scorching heat near his garage. Kisses you so passionately when you smile at him, not needing to hear any other words.

~ "Princess, you got some grease on your nose." Literally will do anything for you.

Jaemin

~ weirdass bad boy

~ sells weed and anyone can tell that he is a high mf all the time.

~ you were dared by your friends to buy weed. (They tricked you to buy it for them)

~ you nervously went near Jaemin who sells weed in the basement of some sus building.

~ he looked so scary at first glance but gave you the sweetest smile once he looked at you.

~ he knew you were too innocent and nice to buy this shit so he tried to talk you out. Finds you so adorable as you stammer to reply. Eventually you didn't buy because he convinced you. "Good girls don't do such things, sweetheart."

~ Jaemin later wondered why he didn't let you buy it when he could have gotten some good cash but something inside him just melted when he saw your big orbs.

~ after a few days you were pressurized again by your fakeass friends to go inside his basement while they waited outside. Jaemin was surprised to see you again but the disappointment on his face was real when you asked him for weed again.

~ he goes out of the basement and gives the deadliest glare at your friends who then proceeds to run away.

~ "what did I tell you last time princess?"

~ you became friends with him after that and he protects you all the time. Picks you up and drops you home. Makes sure no mf comes near you.

~ eventually he stopped doing all the shady shit, though he didn't change his shady appearance because duh he is a bad boy. He did it all for you cause you deserve a good person and even though he is not one, he will try his best to be one for you.

~ takes you to ice cream dates every weekend and one day you confess to him. He went quiet for a few moments before looking at you deep in the eyes and gave you the same sweet smile again.

~ is the most clingy and softest boyfriend ever. So protective and treats you as if you were made of glass.

~ "No doll, don't lift such heavy things. You will get hurt, go sit there and let me do it."

Chenle

~ didn't even know people considered him bad news. He thought everyone loved him.

~ he is a brat, does what he wants and gets what he wants. Frankly just enjoying his life in the most rebellious way as possible.

~ he does illegal car races and that's how he finds you there among all the rich brats, though you weren't one. You were just here to accompany your friends.

~ realises he never saw you here before. Comes over and tries to flirt with you but was surprised to see you acting all shy and nervous.

~ knows you weren't meant to be here "You shouldn't be here in places like this unless your family is influential enough. Let me drop you home cutie"

~ drops you home in his sports car and asks for your number.

~ at first he just wanted to flirt around with you but days went by and he couldn't stop thinking about your little nerd talks.

~ you were such a breath of fresh air in his life. He didn't even want to take you to his car races because it's full of shady people and you are his sweet angel who shouldn't be in the eyes of such people.

~ but after you gave him your puppy eyes, he just couldn't refuse "Alright princess, don't talk to anyone and just stay here with jisung."

~ comes to you after every race he wins and you confess to him.

~ "what do you mean? I thought you were already mine?" Asksksk he genuinely thought you guys were

~ kisses you passionately after every race he wins.

~ he never thought he would want to settle down in life but he can't stop thinking about you as his bride, you are his future and his final dream.

~ "Do you even realise how precious you are to me?"

Jisung

~ the most quietest and minds his own business type of guy.

~ you were the one who developed a crush on him first after seeing him in the hallways with his leather jacket on and a small smirk on his face while talking to his friends.

~ all he does is hang out with his little friend group and beats people who annoy him. he was very mysterious tho.

~ you pass by the same hallway everyday to see him. You were sure he didn't even know you existed but you were so wrong.

~ he noticed your shy glances and cute nature everyday. He just ignores you because he feels he is bad news for you.

~ yet he feels himself smiling at random times thinking about your pretty smile. "Fuck she is so cute"

~ realises he should stop and one day gives you the iciest glare making you think he finds you annoying.

~ so you stop passing by the same hallway and don't look at him anymore.

~ he feels shit because he didn't mean to scare you. Asks for advice from his hyungs. They hollered and cheered because he finally developed a crush on someone. "Our jisung finally grew up awwww" "hyung please shut the fuck up"

~ he doesn't have a crush tho. He is straightass in love with you.

~ one day comes to you with a bouquet of roses and confesses in the most nervous tone ever.

~ your both faces were in the same colour as the roses. So cute omg

~ after that day you were known to be jisung's girl and everyone knew better than to mess with you.

~ you guys are the most cheesy and disgustingly cute couple. Often the target of his hyungs teasings. "I love you angel." "I could have lived my entire life without hearing those nicknames." "Haechan hyung please."

~ you tutor him sitting on his lap everyday while he nuzzles his face in your neck. "Stop kissing me ji"

~ "I'm sorry love, you are just so fucking adorable"

[That's it I have fed your guys delusions enough for today]

[sardonic-the-writer]

𝐌𝐞𝐫𝐜𝐬 𝐖𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐀 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐈𝐬 𝐇𝐞𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐂𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐎𝐧 𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐦 𝐖𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐈𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐞

↳ includes: scout, soldier, medic, and spy

↳ warnings: mentions of surgery and alcohol

↳ song: runaround sue—dion

masterlist | commissions | carrd

𝐒𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐭

• He’s such a doofus. It takes him at least a month to pick up on it

• The entire time you’re flirting or making moves on him, he’ll jokingly reciprocate it under the impression that you’re just joshing around

• It takes one of the other team members approaching him for the mercenary to realize what was actually going on

• “Son.” Engineer had sighed as he stood in the doorway to Scout’s very messy room, “You do realize they like you?”

• Scout’s very dismissive and red faced about it

• “What? Psh. Stop messing with me, Engie. Don't you have sentries to build or somethin’?”

• The second Engineer leaves, he’s practically tearing up his room in a tirade of emotions

• Overthinks the past few months with you way too much. Practically wears a spot into the floor from all the nervous pacing he does

• In the end, Scout confronts you to ask you out

• Tries to be formal, but we all saw how that turned out with Miss Pauling. Eventually just gives up on trying to be suave— and not succeeding —to blurt out what he’s thinking

• “So, uh, yeah. I’m not so. Er. Good at this sappy stuff, but there’s a Tom Jones museum I think we could go check out. Together.” Scout pauses, accent only getting thicker with worry, “Alone. Y’know?”

• Over the moon when you say yes. All nerves dissipate and are immediately replaced with a cross between a smug and relieved victory

• If you look close enough at his ears, they’re a little pink

𝐒𝐨𝐥𝐝𝐢𝐞𝐫

• If he hasn’t known you for long, Soldier will actually just chalk your actions up to being a communist spy

• A very exasperated Demoman had to get Miss Pauling to bring in heavily classified paperwork on you just to prove to him you weren’t a commie

• “Very well maggot! I’ll believe you— for now! Sleep with one eye open!” Soldier had barked, slamming down your file on the dining room table as a tired Pauling watched. You noted that the papers were upside down, and you doubt he even read them. Or that he could read

• He’s very blunt with everything. Words, actions, emotions, etc. Doesn’t understand why other people can’t just do the same. It would make conversation so much easier to him

• So he’s not oblivious to your attention per se. Just very curious, I suppose

• It takes maybe less than two weeks after the Communist Incident, as Demo had dubbed it, for him to corner you

• “Maggot! Do you find me attractive?” He demanded

• You’d been eating breakfast at the time, and almost choked to death on your laughter at the question

• “Short answer, yes.” You gasped through wheezy laughter, the volume only increasing at the frown on Soldiers face. “Follow up question; is that really how you just asked if I had a crush on you?”

• Nods and booms back that he thinks you’re also easy on the eyes. Proposes the idea of doing a training course with you sometime. Breaks out into a crooked grin when you accept

• “Excellent! I expect you up at oh five hundred for the course tomorrow!” He saluted you, which was Soldier equivalent to a bone crushing hug of respect

• You returned it, and missed the way his eyes crinkled with happiness behind the brim of his helmet

𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐜

• Always so consumed in his work that he probably just ends up finding out from Archemedies

• The birds had always been allowed to rest on your shoulder while he performed risqué experiments on you, acting as a distraction from the feeling of someone sifting around in your guts

• I guess the dove had picked up on one too many looks you’d tossed the ex-doctors way

• To this day, no one can understand how the two of them can communicate, but one thing leads to another and suddenly Medic is looming in your doorframe silently

• “What’s up, doc?” You’d greeted him with a Bug’s Bunny quote and a grin. Medics lips only twitched up slightly as he pushed his glasses back up the brim of his nose

• “A little bird told me zhat someone has a crush, ja?” He barreled right into the topic, leaving no room for you to prepare for the sudden accusation. Medics scrutinizing gaze didn’t miss the way your eyes glanced in the direction of his lab, no doubt silently cursing Archemedies

• “No need to fear, freund.” He unclasped his gloved hands from behind his back and approached you. “I simply am here to offer you a deal.”

• Turns out the deal was a chance talk over cheap beer in his office. Pretty rare, considering how much of his time Medic chose to dedicate to work

• “I’ll take it.” You shook his hand, briefly noting how large it seemed even when compared to you

• “Vunderbar, mein schatz.” Medic smiled gently, leaving you to wonder what he had just said

𝐒𝐩𝐲

• There is no hiding when it comes to this French fuck

• Spy immediately picks up on every glance. Every chance of avoided eye contact and unnecessary clearing of a throat

• Suddenly he seems to be a lot more talkative towards you than normal. Hanging out by your side at gatherings rather than a dark corner with cigarette smoke curling around his head

• Fleeting touches slowly begin to sprinkle themselves in between conversation. A hand on the shoulder here, and a brief touch to the pulse point there

• The first time he did the latter, he noticed how fast your heart was beating and couldn’t stop himself from letting out a slight chuckle

• If he was nicer, Spy would definitely take action and approach your first. In fact, sometimes he almost finds himself wanting to

• But the man knows how people work. If you truly wanted to pursue him, you would come around eventually. No point in making rash decisions. He was a patient man, after all

• A small part of his ego preened at the thought of making you work for it

• And come around you did eventually did

• Finds himself opening the door to his smoking room one late night only to be met with the image of a very frazzled looking you

• You rush out something about a date too fast for his ears to catch. Spy is simply too busy letting his eyes roam over your casual cloathing and slight fidgeting. The crooning of an old French record plays from behind him as he blinks down at you

• “Would you like to come in?” He finally sighs out, opening the door a little wider in the form of an invitation

• By the time you manage to get inside, you notice he already had a wine glass set out for you

[theexaltedbride]

Dead Island 2 Slayers X Reader Headcanons.

Amy:

-Always tries to make sure you eat right for a day of surviving the undead. Amy also likes to take the time to show you how to properly limber up and run so you don’t pull a muscle during an attack or a retreat from the undead.

-Amy isn’t afraid to let you touch her prosthetic leg, so long as you ask nicely and don’t tug on it.

-When things get tough, Amy has a thousand little pick-me-up phrases and feel good mottos she can give you that she’s said to herself many times.

-When fighting he undead Amy likes to hit and run, picking the zombies down one by one (Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee). But she will go all out if she spots you being cornered or pushed too hard by the swarm.

Bruno:

-Will always compliment your music choices even if he doesn’t actually like them, and is always the first one to suggest blaring music loudly when you find a working car and can drive around the zombies. His main choice seems to be some song called “Stay Alive’ which he was playing on his phone before the plane crash.

-Phone is now full of selfies with you, but only the ones that make you look good and got the right filters on, so everyone can see you as he sees you.

-Bruno is not the most gun savvy person and tends to shoot it gangsta style, if you can teach him the right way to use one (especially proper gun-safety) he will appreciate it, especially after the two of you start stacking Zeds left and right.

-Promises that once this is all over, you and him are gonna hit it big on the internet. He’s gonna make a song about you.

Carla:

-After swearing so much at the undead, or at dickish survivors, she decided to teach you Spanish, starting with every swear she knows and even some new ones. But when you are alone together, she will also teach you by whispering sweet (or even dirty) things in Spanish to you and telling you to translate it.

-Once punched out another survivor for getting too handsy with you, and afterwards will start teaching you how to properly fight with someone.

-Will always offer a comforting touch, even if she can be a little rough around the edges. Gives the best hugs out of the group, but don’t tell anyone.

-Is going to teach you to ride a motorcycle, so you can get the same rush as she does from her bike, but also so you can get away quickly if things go bad.

Dani:

-Will teach you how to drink like you mean it, but is willing to start with the weaksauce stuff if you are hesitant to drink during the apocalypse.

-Can play up her accent if you want, but it tends to happen when she gets very angry, to the point even she doesn’t know what she said.

-Is constantly trying to decide what kind of tattoos would look good on you, and promising you it doesn’t hurt.

-Promises you that if you both survive this, she’s gonna make you part of the Blood Faeries.

Jacob:

-Normally doesn’t like to put his cigars out for anyone, but will do so for you. If only because he wants to make a good impression.

-Loves clearing out, fancy, mansions in LA of zombies and turning them into a safehouse where you and him can have a great time together just eating the food, watching the movies and raiding anything there for some fun. Its important to keep a happy mindset during the apocalypse.

-When raiding for supplies, he will go out of his way to find things he knows you like and bring them back, which is slowly turning the both of you into loot goblins and packrats. You’re gonna need a bigger bag or storehouse for all the stuff you’ve picked up.

- Even when he’s feeling down, he forces himself to smile through it, but the smile becomes much more genuine when you are around.

Ryan:

-Genuinely afraid of all the undead overwhelming LA, but will put on a brave face so that you aren’t scared. Eventually he won’t have to fake it, and will genuinely be brave, especially with you around.

-You genuinely thought he was a real firefighter, until you noticed his helmet was a toy. He loves going over that story and sometimes sharing his craziest stories from his career as a male stripper.

-Wants to survive the apocalypse and show you off to his brother and boast about how badass you are for having survived alongside him.

-Will only pull out his old stripper dance moves when in a safezone, and only if he’s 110% sure no one will barge in.

All purpose Headcannons:

-They will love you regardless of if you are ‘Immune’/a ‘Numen’, or not. They care about you for who you are, not what you are. And if the other group of (evil?) Numen try to step between them and you, then those bastards have another thing coming.

-They tend to let you handle the radio calls when it involves civilians in danger, or them trying to sell their ‘Hero Services’ out to any survivors in LA.

-Movie Night back at Emma’s mansion is the highlight of the week now, with everyone voting over what movie to watch. There tends to be a trend of the longer movies being chosen, so that the group can forget about the chaos outside a little longer.

-The excitement you sometimes show when you nerd out over something is also a welcome distraction and has led to in depth nerdy debates even in the middle of fighting against swarms.

-The group is slowly turning Patton’s bunker into a second home/safehouse for survivors.

-None of them can decide on a group name for themselves.

-If the group encounters other survivors they feel are dangerous, they might start closing ranks around you subconciously to keep you safe.

-If you have loved ones outside of the Quarantine Zone, they will do their best to make sure they know you are okay and will be taking care of you.

-Someone is gonna make a scrapbook of all the selfies you’ve collectively taken around famous landmarks or memorable moments.

-They totally stopped to check in to see if your favorite actor/actress is still alive/safe.

-Sometimes you all just sit and watch the stars from the roof of Emma’s mansion, and its in these moments, together, safe, and united as a group, that you all truly feel alive.

[gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan]

Winds of Change

Prologue =-= Next

Author's note: Zeth's debut in Husbandry.

Warnings: None. Let me know if I need to add anything.

Summary: Zeth wanders Earth. Finds a Zoo and is stopped from eating at tasty creature in the Zoo.

Tagged: @barn-anon, @bleedingichorhearts, @c-u-c-koo-4-40k, @egrets-not-regrets, @kit-williams,

Tagged continued: @sleepyfan-blog, @whorety-k

Hunting for food on this planet was easy, the rivers and seas are full of all sorts of fun critters to eat. Same with the forests and deserts. All having something to consume, the base line humans are almost impressive in how bold they can be, coming up to a might Black Legionary and trying to shoo him away from scooping out some spikey sea creatures from a human-made pond.

He didn't understand the locals language verbal and written. He'd stumbled across this 'Zoo' whatever the fuck that was. And learned it contained people, lots, and lots, of base line humans, he's occasionally seen some fellow Marines, Chaos, Loyalist, and Renegade a lot. The human in uniform was definingly shouting at him as he been half way to grabbing the spiky sea creature that from the last time he'd tried it, it had been tasty.

He tilts his helmet down at the bold little human, still slowly trying to grab the spiky darkly colored sea creature when a voice rang out in High Gothic, "Do not pick up the sea creature. Step away from the human made ecosystem and come here."

"Why the fuck should I listen to you?" Zeth growls as he turns to face the person speaking High Gothic. Oh excellent an Ultramarine! They are so much fun to pester, they are such haughty, high handed bastards, but if you got them mad enough, they are fun in a scrap.

"Because this is a Zoo!" The Ultramarine says.

"Quick question," Zeth says, "What the Fuck is a Zoo?"

The Ultramarine stares at him and under his breath growls about Idiot Barbarian Cousins. Zeth scowled at him again, rude fucker ain't he? He snarled that at the Ultramarine who glared at him and explained in that annoyingly condescending way that Ultramarines get when they are in 'you fucking idiot Barbarian, how do you not know about something so civilized way. Which has him growling at the Loyalist Fucker some more.

"So… why can't I eat the spiny creature?" Zeth asks after listening to the Ultramarines frankly boring as fuck lecture on what a Zoo is and what it does.

"Because. The humans are keeping the spiny creatures here to study, and make more of them." The Ultramarine said through gritted teeth. "Where is the rest of your War band?"

"Fuck if I know. I woke up on this random as fuck planet and started seeing what fun was to be had." Zeth replies with a shrug, "Then found this… 'Zoo' thing and wandered about."

"Please tell me you haven't tried to eat anything else that is in an enclosure." The Ultramarine asked, well demanded.

The haughty, high handed fucker, while trying to pretend he's not pissed off, he can see one of the veins throbbing on the side of his neck that has Zeth grinning at the fucker in dark delight. "And why would I tell you if I have or haven't done that, Loyalist?"

The Ultramarine glares at him while sending a text-vox to someone, likely unimportant, "because if you have the humans will be upset."

"So?" Zeth asks, "I'm a Chaos Marine, I prefer it when the squisky base lines are upset."

"Because one way or another, if you have eaten anything you shouldn't, recompense will be taken from you." The Ultramarine replies.

"And why *the fuck would I allow that?" Zeth asks, tilting his head a little. He'd forgotten how fun it was to rile up Loyalists. Although, the uppity fucker has yet to try and attack him. He wonders why, and asks him that question. The Ultramarien visibly twitches, "I want to, but for … reasons that I'm not going in with you right now. I can't explain."

"ooh, how mysterious!" Zeth taunts, "You are a coward."

"That's enough of that," A Chaos-warped voice warbles out sternly.

Zeth turns to look at the- gaint fucker- of a Chaos Death Guard, in Apothecary armor patterning coming over and giving a firm look towards Zeth who huffs at him. "Why should I listen to you?!"

"Because, I am an Apothecary, a fellow Chaos Marine," Hura says plesantly, "And if you don't I will make things very unpleasant until you see the errors of your ways and properly apologize and make ammends."

Zeth huffs and puffs- and… actually. That sounded more than a little terrifying, as the Death Guard slowly stalked forwards towards him, having continued to move towards him the whole time. Nurglite- Chaos Marines could be patient horrifyingly so. They could also be very…. creative and awful in what the decide is 'adequate' for punishment and 'making amends' to the satisfaction of one could be… debt inducing in ways that are just not worth it. So as much as it chafes at his pride be backs off, which has Hura the Death Guard Apothecary give him a hum of approval. The Ultramarine has a conflicted look in his eyes.

"Hura, I am grateful that you were able to arrive so quickly and help deal with him." The Ultramarine says carefully to the Death Guard.

"I am always glad to help my brothers and cousins in need," Hura replies with a gracious nod. "Come littel Cousin, I am called Hura, what is your name?"

"I go by Zeth," He replies eyeing the Death Guard.

"Follow me and we will get you sorted out," Hura requests of him.

Zeth grumbles at him follows after the Death Guard with deliberately loud steps as he's told of The Rules, and what the consequences are for Fucking Around, you get to Find Out, and Find Out can be extremely unpleasant. Zeth tells the truth that he hadn't actually eaten any of the animals in the Zoo yet, as he hadn't been hungry enough, until he'd seen the spikey ocean critter. Hura informs the Ultramarine, who seems to be skeptical of the answer, but if he did lie, the humans would make a note of the missing animal if that was the case.

[changingplumbob]

Pancakes Household: Chapter 9, Part 4

This is Halloween, Halloween, Halloween

Bob: Costume time! Okay friends and fans, it’s time for our Halloween special, who wants to make a pumpkin pie with me?

From beside Bob the droid chirps to indicate that people are tuning in.

Bob: As you can see I have chosen to be a rebel pilot today. I’ll be keeping this on for the bake and my bake sale but something tells me the boss would not approve of me turning up to work in it. Okay let’s run through all our ingredients

The drone chirps while Bob begins preparations. Eliza’s suggestion to get the drone may have stemmed from a place of wanting the flashiest one but Bob appreciated having a set of eyes he could look at when he talked.

Bob: Ugh, kneading, not my favourite part after I’ve already done a workout but hey, that’s on me

He continues to narrate his baking, even getting the drone to read out a question or two that viewers have sent in about the recipe. In the end he pulls one excellent pumpkin pie out of the oven, a perfect Halloween treat.

Bob: Come one, come all to Bob’s Bars! We don’t just have our classic beloved lemon bars today, we have cake and cookies for the sweetness you want on Halloween. If you’re having all that sugar, may as well get full eating it!

The first few customers seem unimpressed with Bob’s selling today but when some new sims walk up to purchase suddenly decide maybe the baking isn’t so bad.

Fergus: Hey Onyx could you- woah! What are you

Onyx: A knight obviously. I see you’re going with the classic skeleton

Fergus: No point fixing what isn’t broke. But could you please help me with my bike? Dad’s busy with the sale and I don’t want to interrupt mother when she’s practicing her speech

Onyx: Sure, I can try. Hop on and I’ll try explain, remember I only just learnt how to ride before my birthday

Fergus: Oh yeah, that’s right

So Fergus wobbles his way around the yard with Onyx doing their best to provide guidance.

Bob: Alright folks, my shift will be starting soon. Who’s going to be customer of the day and buy the last lemon bar?

Harvey: Hello. Do you have bake sales often

Bob: Why yes I do sir

Harvey: How convenient! And do you get positive reviews

Bob: Indeed I do

Harvey: Well then person I’ve never met I would like to buy the last lemon bar

After Bob makes the sale Harvey tells everyone around him how good it is while Bob packs up. It’s good to have friends.

Eliza greets the first trick or treater and offers them some candy. The kid leaves happy and Ginger comes out of the house very confused.

Ginger: *whines* What’s going on

Eliza: Ginger sweetie it’s just me, it’s just mother. Here let me give you a brush

Ginger: *barks* you may not look like mother but you definitely smell the same

Then it’s dinner time for the Pancakes left at home.

Fergus: Dad left us roast! Awesome

Eliza: Onyx will you be able to eat in that helmet

Onyx: I could ask you the same question. But I won’t, because I’m a good kid who deserves a horse

Fergus: *laughs*

The trio chat and eat while Ginger looks on. Sure she has biscuits in her bowl but that looks like real meat on the table. Why won’t they feed her that?

Onyx takes care of the dishes and Fergus decides it’s time for Ginger to learn another trick, playing dead. Mustering his drama skills he does his best to show her what to do, but she remains skeptical of the exercise. Fergus keeps trying though and eventually Ginger catches on, rolling to the floor.

Fergus: You did it! Well done Ginger, we’re stars

*doorbell rings*

Eliza: Onyx could you get that one

Onyx: Sure mother

They open the door to the deck candy all prepared and are greeted by a teen girl dressed as a maid.

Zhafira: Trick or treat

Onyx: Uhh… what

Zhafira: *laughs* I mean for me

Onyx: Oh, right. Have some candy?

Zhafira: Why thank you

Onyx has just decided they should ask what high school the stranger attends when she turns and skips off down the drive.

Carson pops over to visit and become best friends with Onyx!

Onyx: Where’s your costume

Carson: I’m dressed as someone who doesn’t care about Halloween

Onyx: Your loss. Hey, have you seen a girl at school?

Carson: There are many girls at school

Onyx: I mean a specific one, she’s a brunette with a bob cut

Carson: You don’t know a name

Onyx: She left pretty quickly, but she was cute and I wondered why I hadn't noticed her before

Carson: People keep aging Onyx, so more teens. But sorry I don’t really find many people cute at our school so haven't noticed

Onyx: You said that last year. But if you know you’re bi you must have been attracted to someone once right

Carson: I mean, it’s going to sound stupid...

Onyx: You’re my best friend, sound as stupid as you like

Carson: I mean I’ll find a guy or girl pretty but my daydreams are usually romance filled instead of woohoo filled

Onyx: Huh. So are you like, anti-kissing

Carson: I don't know, growing up is confusing

Onyx: You’re telling me

Previous ... Next

[nahoney22]

Hi hello! First of all congrats on so many followers, your content is really good and well thought out! Now, can I drop a request for the 501st boys (or the Batchers if you'd prefer)? I'd love to see some headcanons on how would they'd react to a lover who enjoys to romance them on the regular <3 From bringing them breakfast in bed to thoughtful little gifts, wining 'n dining and even serenading them Remember to stay hydrated, and I hope your day/evening/night is pleasant :D

Romancing

501st boys X GN!Reader

Exactly what the request asks ♥️ thank you for the kind words too, anon. Same back to you. Sorry for the wait ♥️

warnings: none, fluff. Reader is Gender Neutral

Masterlist

Rex 🌹

When Rex first saw the first gift on the pillow of his bed in the barracks he is pleasently surprised. Of course he knew it was from his sweetheart - you - but he had never expected anyone to go out of their way to make a makeshift pampering set for him. “What’s all this then?” He mumbles with a smile.

He’s a little shy about it and after having a root through, he does hide it under his bunk incase the others go rooting through since you almost left cute on the bottles and containers such as reminders that he is loved, how handsome he is and how he deserves to have something look after him when you’re not around.

When he’s alone and has the time, he uses your gifts to keep him fresh, clean and tidy. All the while he is sending you pictures of him with the face and hair masks on that you got him.

‘How do I look?’ He will ask you through message.

‘Oh Captain, very handsome.’

And in his downtime, he also will go out and buy you stuff in return. He was lucky to have you.

Fives 💋

This man was already smitten with you so when he started finding love notes in his helmet, boots, weapon cases he was hook, line and sinker in love with you.

He was always one to romance you so to have it done back in return made his cheeks burn and heart pulse.

“So mesh’la, what’s with all these notes?” He asks once he has you back in his arms, holding up a little bit of flimsy that said he had the most enchanting eyes.

You shrug and smile warmly up at your man. “Just me expressing my fondness for you.” You smirk.

He cocks an eyebrow. “Oh yeah? How about you tell me to my face how fine you think my butt is?”

You pause and gave him an incredulous look. “I never wrote one like that!”

He rubs the back of his neck, chuckling. “Yeah I know… but I wish you did.”

Dogma 🎶

When he is sitting across from you, watching you pull out your musical instrument of choice, his face set on fire.

He was always reclusive when it came to relationships so when he finally mellowed out and made a move on you, he certainly was happy.

What he didn’t expect however was to come to your apartment and have you tell him that you wrote a song for him. He was a stuttering mess but after hearing what you had written, he had to hold his breath to stop him from crying truthfully.

He’s bashful. “T-thank you darling… but you didn’t need to do that for me.”

A crestfallen expression falls on your feature. “Oh, did you not like it?”

“Yes! Of course I did!” He is standing up quickly and walking towards you, taking your hands in his. “Just a very nice but unexpected gift. Thank you.” He is a little nervous incase he had upset you but seeing you smile for him makes him know he’s not in the doghouse.

Jesse ❤️

“Good morning, handsome.” Jesse rolls over onto his back, yawning as your soft voice roused him from his sleep.

Sitting up to look for you, he raises a curious brow to see you in the doorway to the bedroom with a tray in your hand. “I made you breakfast.”

He chuckles, sitting up straight so his back rested against the headboard. “I could’ve come to the table to eat it.”

“I know,” you shrug as you walk over, placing it over in his lap, “but breakfast in bed sounds good, no?”

He looks at the array of baked goods and his stomach growls in hunger just at the sight and smell. “Sounds perfect. Thank you baby.” How did he end up with someone as fantastic as you?

Hardcase 💃🏻

“Hardcase, look what I just won for you!” Sneaking away to be with his soulmate, the two of you went to a fair where you had a go at winning a special gift for your boyfriend.

He turns to you, lips wrapped around a delicious chocolatey treat as you bound over with a large stuffed tooka doll.

“For me? But you won it babes.” He laughs, finishing and swallowing his food as he slings a arm over you shoulder and draws you near, taking a hold of the doll.

“Yeah… I won it for you though. So you can have something to cuddle when I’m not there.” You grin up at him, cheesy smile on both of your faces. “Or is someone to embarrassed to be seen with a stuffed toy at the barracks.”

He rolls his eyes at your teasing tone, sticking his tongue out at you. “Nothing can embarrass me sweet cheeks. And if anyone tries to steal Dave I’ll kick their ass.”

“Really? Dave of all names?”

“It’s a good name. Oh, and thanks.” He places a kiss to your lips as the two of you continue your fun evening ahead. Oh how he loves romance.

Masterlist

tags: @nunanuggets @andyoufollowyourheart @littlefeatherr @kaitou2417 @eyecandyeoz @captxin-rex @cwarssimp @jesseeka @ashotofspotchka @oohyesplease @megafrost4 @theroguesully @equalityforcats @mustluvecho @misogirl828 @ladykatakuri @jambolska-grozdova @chxpsi @arctrooper69 @padawancat97 @rain-on-kamino @either-madness-or-brilliance @staycalmandhugaclone @ko-neko-san @echos-girlfriend @fiveshelmet @by-the-primes @tech-aficionado @grizabellasolo @therealnekomari @autumnleaves1991-blog @tech-depression-inventory @brynhildrmimi @greaser-wolf @lucyysthings @tinyreadersmur @agenteliix @myinnerwonderlandmind @rintheemolion @kaminocasey @hotpinkplastoid @the-good-shittt @s1st3r @buddee @taskfork-archive

[electrospherevaults]

Spare a Little Innocence

Excerpt from Maiden, sequel to Defiler.

[The Maidens of Wrethella have been fighting in another bloodied conflict in another corner of the galaxy. After the end of a prolonged siege that saw them lose a close comrade, the squad of Lady Analussa takes the time to lick their wounds. The two armies that fought against one another are doing the same.]

“That guy doesn’t look too good,” Analussa commented.

“HEY YOU!” Zenella shouted at the soldier, but he did not respond. He just remained sat by a steel crate that had remained intact, rubble at his feet, helmet on his laps, rifle laying against him and eyes that stared mindlessly down its barrel.

They long had forgotten how to blink.

“Shellshock,” Belissi commented. “Analussa, should we go-”

Tosanovva brushed against Belissi, prompting her to stop talking. She continued walking past her, her scoped rifle left behind, passed along to Jenivirre alongside her lit cig. Belissi, much like the rest of them, quieted down and observed.

Tosanovva sat by the soldier. She unwrapped a candy bar she had on her – a bit of chocolate and fruits and berries, all mushed together to such an extent you only got hints of flavour from a bit of everything with each bite. The exception was the oats. And there were a lot of oats. Nobody liked the oats, so she had found herself a small pocket of heaven she knew she could tap into that nobody else would bat an eye for. She extended this heaven of hers to him, taking his hand and opening it. He put the bar down on his palm.

“Eat.”

The soldier, a slight panic in his eyes, complied. He unwrapped the candy and brought his food to his face. He took the first bite.

“You need the respite, soldier.”

The soldier nodded again and again in a hurry, almost mechanically, by sheer brute force of discipline instilled into him. There was no room for doubt and hesitation in war after all – any seconds wasted and a bullet will remind you why. Tosanovva stayed by his side with each tiny bite, the mist from the rubble clearing with each gentle gust of wind that swept. The gunfire had long died down. Only the eerie peace of the aftermath remained by their sides.

“Dankebo,” the soldier mustered eventually once he was halfway through.

Tosanovva turned to look at him. “You’re from the north, aren’t you?”

The soldier nodded. “I am a Rotringer, ja.”

“Shouldn’t you be with the republicans instead of the centrals?

The soldier grasped onto his bar tighter. He almost smashed it. He took the bite, chomping down a larger chunk this time. His long stare returned, losing itself amidst a thousand yards up north from here. “My brother is.” He tried to bring his feet back to the ground, taking another tiny bite, letting the merciful mix of chocolate, berries and oats wash over him. “I hope I didn’t kill him today.”

He let the words hang out in the air, an air poisoned with smog and fire and rotting carcasses. Even if he did, there was no way one could tell. It was not the stench that got you, it was the way your nostrils accommodated the slaughter, and the realization of its normalization that did. On your first day of combat, the adrenaline does not let you recognize the mauled and the broken that fell besides you. On the second day, their bodies flood you with their miasma. On the third month, their memories do not register anymore.

“And if I did,” he finally said again, the bar depleted in his hands, “I hope it was a clean kill. I hope I did not make him suffer.”

“War rarely is a clean affair.” The soldier turned to look at the Maiden besides him. Her face did not look much younger than his – and she already bore more scars and stitches. Tosanovva pulled out two more of her candy bars from her pouch. She offered another to the soldier. He hesitated at first, but he ultimately grabbed it.

“If you do not mind, Maiden,” he asked a bit later, “what happened to your face?”

“Oh, this?” Tosanovva chuckled as she pointed to the stitch on her left cheek. “That’s my girlfriend’s handiwork. Cutest solarian nurse in the galaxy!”

The soldier smiled. “She must be very lucky indeed!”

“Oh you would be mistaken – I am the one in luck. Without her, this whole jaw would be gone.”

“Oh,” the soldier responded. He unwrapped the second bar quietly. He cut it in half, and shared it with her. She held it in her hands, and put on a bitter smile.

“War is rarely clean. Yet, we forge on, counting our blessings.” Tosanovva got up again. “Find some rest, find some friends. Your brother is in Wrethella’s hands now, soldier. So are you.”

The soldier nodded. He smiled again. Tosanovva returned the smile and turned to walk away.

“Thank you for the candy, Maiden!”

Tosanovva turned her head slightly, still smiling, and gave a welcoming nod. She then walked back over to her squad.

Whatever remained of it.

“Is your new boyfriend going to be alright?” Belissi asked, a playful smirk on her face. Tosanovva did not return the gesture.

“I killed his brother,” she answered coldly.

The squad stood still.

Smiles and teases and laughter died down. Belissi stepped back. “How can you be sure?” Yevletti asked instead.

“I saw him in my scopes. Same birthmark under the right eye. Squished lips. Long neck.” She extended her hand, and Jenivirre passed her the lit cig she was already smoking. She tried to bring it close to her lips, but she let it hang by her throat. Any closer, and her carotid would have gotten burnt. “That’s where I got him.”

Tosanovva put the cig on and puffed, letting a long billow of smoke come out of her lungs. She opened her eyes and tried to look for the sun. Only traces pierced through.

“Ouch.” Jenivirre commented as Tosanovva handed the cig back to her, exchanging it for the rifle she entrusted her with. “Nasty way to go.”

“Did you tell him?” Analussa queried, checking her equipment one final time. Tosanovva shook her head. “Good.”

“Why is this good? He is instilled with false hope now,” Zenella shot back.

“We were innocents once too, Lady Zenella,” Tosanovva responded, putting the rifle on her back. “It is good to spare ourselves a little innocence wherever we can.”

Zenella opened her mouth, and then closed it back. She traced her fingers against the metal mask that covered half her face. “You are right,” she said.

[mocha-gladiator]

Release the info dump doc of Typhon and Rhoda pleaaaaaaase

ok but you have been warned this is literally just a jumble of Notes and Ideas this is not a story and it is not polished At All this was intended for my eyes only but here u go

(Continuation of comic, starting where the last one left off)

"Have you tried eating?"

"Yes, for fomal events. I purge it afterwards, though. It...feels strange to me. I can't use the goods the way you do."

"Is there anything I can do?"

"I don't know. I've never heard of someone being sent here and living. Save for short missions."

"Well what did you do to upset your god? Maybe you can ask forgiveness."

"I...don't think that they will accept. I refused to attack during a guard assignment and one of my own was killed because of it. I'm a shield guy, not a warrior. I'd gotten by with it until then, but...I'm a pacifist. I'm useless to them."

--

Typhon gets weak after the third day and, thinking he's going to die, rhoda lays down beside him and holds him like a teddy bear, comforting him. The next morning he is nowhere to be seen and she assumes his kind will dissipate when dead, but he later wakes her with quite a fright, as he is now his full height and very excitable. This summons her bodyguard from outside her room.

Typhon's arms are on either side of the bed, on the floor, and yet he still hovers over her in an awkward position as the door opens.

The guard points his spear at typhon before rhoda can call him off. Typhon is more confused than anything at the threat. After things calm down, he takes the human's helmet off and pets his head.

"Lady Rhoda??"

"Typhon, stop. He doesn't like it."

"Oh."

Once he stops, he offers the helmet back, tiny in his massive palm.

Typhon sits on the bed and it creaks under the weight. The mattress flips up at either end, causing Rhoda to slide against his side making a wide-eyed expression. After a moment she notices how soft his feathers are. She explains who the guard is and gives his name. He is an attractive man without the helmet, which he has stowed under his arm for the moment. Typhon introduces himself.

"So we're in the same line of work," he says, much to everyone's confusion. He gives a strange salute. "Nice to meet you, [x]."

at this point, Rhoda can no longer stand it and reaches up to run her fingers through the soft down, causing typon to still and close his eyes. After a moment, he starts to emit a soft rumbling sound.

"YOU FUCKING PURR?"

Typhon's expression flashes surprise before responding. "I suppose so. Do you like it?"

"I...uhm...s-sure."

"Should I continue?"

"No."

--

"No matter where you are, I'll hear your call for me."

--

When there seems no other way out, rhoda asks typhon to attack, which he refuses at first. He finds a second way, to burn her binds. This looks like he is burning her too. It melts the binds and her clothes. his eyes and face are a frightening mask

after escape, he sits hunched on the grass, facing away from her. "My fire cannot hurt you," he says quietly, ashamed.

rhoda does not respond, instead asking for his cloak to clothe herself. Her words are emotionless after she puts it on, then commands him "Take me home." He does not show emotion save for a slightly crinkled brow as wetness streaks from his eyes and down his face as they fly.

later the next morning he is nowhere to be found. she goes outside and calls for him, knowing he can hear her. He arrives, but much smaller. A short human size.

--

is there a way to make typhon use his fire ? he would be mad if rhoda used it against his will, especially to attack.

--

After awhile, typhon will get stronger, horns grow, and potentially have blackish hands ? "I've been in this world too long." Worried about devilish appearance

--

would create a lot of tension if they had a big disagreement and were against each other for awhile. I don't know how Typhon would stay alive though. It would have to only be for a few days I guess.

Typhon could eventually break the need for care by becoming a god himself. Don't need to ask a god for care and forgiveness if you are one

--

his laurels grow from his head. they can be cut like hair.

[davnittbraes]

The Third Step - Chapter Twenty-One

Part of The World Is Light, Embodied.

Pairing: Din Djarin x F!Reader

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 4500

Warnings etc.: a lil bit of fluffy domesticity because I just can’t help it with these three, smutty smut smut, like hella descriptive, I’m blushing as I post this, Mando’s Fingering Skills™️ once again, squirting, oral sex (f AND m receiving 😏😏😌😌)

Notes: if anyone irl asks me, I have no idea who wrote this, please don’t look at me.

Mando’a translations at the end of the chapter.

Please check out the Series Masterlist page for more info.

Not even a full day in but you feel pretty confident that this is going to be the best vacation of your life. 

Even with the possibility of Imps searching this sector for you and the anxiety surrounding the mission to find the Jedi and other Mandalorians, it was so easy to slip into the simple activities of the day. 

Exploring the outskirts of the clearing with the kid, getting excited with him over the new bugs and pretty stones he found. Immersing yourself in the wild, untouched nature around you, breathing the fresh air deep and watching the play of the wind through the leaves, the arc of the slender tree branches in the forest.

Then settling into the quiet evening where you had started building out a set of Basic words to teach the kid on an old datapad while Mando did diagnostics on the ship and the kid followed him around like a tiny green shadow. 

Kriff. How far your life has come in a few short months. 

Wait, no -

Almost a year, now. 

You lean against the wall of the hold, idly rocking the hammock just the way the kid likes, watching him shift around to get comfortable, eyelids heavy. 

Almost a year, you’ve been with them.

Huh. 

Somehow, it feels like so much longer and so much less at the same time. 

The kid yawns, tiny teeth flashing in the dim light of the hold. He blinks once, twice, then finally succumbs to the pull of sleep, eyes closed and stuffed frog tucked under an arm. 

You count his breaths, the slight movement of his little chest as he drifts off. One minute passes, then the smallest of snores vibrates his little form.

Slowly, you stop rocking the hammock, watch him for signs of wakefulness. Nothing, just another soft snore.

Aaannddd gone. 

Stepping away from the bunk, you move about, quietly tidying up after the day. Boots on the ladder pull your attention, and you look up to watch Mando come into the hold, that warm, bright thing in your chest squeezing pleasantly at the sight of him. 

He moves toward the bunk, barely making a sound - pfassk, how does he do that - obviously knowing the lack of chatter means the kid is asleep, and pauses to watch the kid for a moment. Then carefully, he lifts a gloved hand to adjust the blanket under the kid’s chin, and keys the door closed. 

Dank farrik, they’re so ridiculously adorable. 

The helmet turns to look at you, a subtle flash of silver in the lights of the hold, and the warm, bright thing in your chest flutters, shifts, blooms into something with more heat. 

It’s an intuitive reaction, your body responding to the way he’s looking at you right now, broad shoulders set with determination, helmet tilting as his gaze takes you in. 

Assessing, contemplating. Planning. 

A tiny shiver runs down your spine. 

Is this what his quarries feel like, when they face him for the first time? As if he can see right through them, into everything they are, all their secrets and plans, with the absolute knowledge that he will make them obey?

Probably. 

But you doubt the next part is the same for them. 

He takes a step toward you, measured and precise, unhurried.

Your heartbeat skips, pulse quickening.

Another step, and another. Long legs eating up the distance between you. 

Flash of memory, the sensation of those strong thighs pressing yours open. 

A spark of arousal flares in your core. 

Your toes curl with the temptation to move toward him, but some curiosity holds you in place. 

What will he do when he reaches you?

A couple more steps, and you realize you’ve been idly counting them in your head, the barely heard sound of his boots hitting the durasteel floor. Maybe that’s what he’s doing, too, counting his steps - the intense focus in his frame could speak to that. 

Then he’s right there, in front of you, less than a pace away, silver and black and brown filling your vision as you drag your gaze up to the visor. 

He doesn’t say anything. Just looks at you, silent. Waiting. 

You raise an eyebrow, curiosity edging the heat of your arousal between your thighs. That’s fine, you don’t mind breaking the silence. 

“Seven, I think.” Kriff, your voice is already breathy with need. No wonder he always knows exactly what you’re thinking, if you’re affected by him this obviously. 

He shifts infinitesimally toward you. “Seven?”

Your fingers itch to reach out and touch him, pressing into the softness of your thighs where they rest at your sides. “That’s how many steps it took for you to get over here. I thought that’s what you were counting.”

The helmet straightens, contemplative tilt gone, replaced with a calm assurance. “Close. I was counting to ten.”

Pfassk, even through the modulator, the low rasp of his voice curls at the base of your spine, fuels the want already pulsing through your veins. “Why ten?”

“Focusing exercise. Learned it as a child, in training.” His tone shifts, like someone repeating words they’ve heard countless times before. “‘When feeling the urge to do something rash, count to ten and then ask yourself if you still want to do it.’ Prevents you from acting impulsively.”

Your focus is suddenly caught by the way the light glances off his breastplate, makes him seem that much broader. You remember how that armour feels under your palms, how the edge bites just so into your fingers when you grip it tight for leverage as you rolls your hips into his -

Mentally shaking yourself back to the conversation, you meet his unseen gaze. “Interesting. What was it you had the urge to do?”

“This.”

A whirlwind of movement and strong hands are gripping the backs of your thighs and you’re rising -

You throw your arms around those ridiculously broad shoulders, legs instinctively wrapping tight around his hips, clinging to his frame as your balance shifts and your feet leave the floor. 

His low chuckle mingles with your squeak of surprise, muffled by the sudden pounding of your heartbeat in your ears. 

Then he’s setting you on top of a stacked crate, hands moving to hold your waist steady as you settle. 

You pull back a bit to throw him a half-hearted glare of indignation. “Focusing exercise doesn’t seem to have worked.”

His fingers flex on your waist, gripping just enough to remind you of how easily they lifted you moments ago. “It worked. But I still wanted to do this after the count.”

The hint of arousal in his voice swirls into the growing heat between your thighs, stoking. “And what do you want to do now?”

A pause, a breath, tension stretching between the two of you. 

His hands leave your waist, one dragging down your hip to inch toward your inner thigh, the other gliding up your side to cup your jaw, leather of his glove smooth and warm. “I want to watch you come for me.”

Crikking hells. 

Your core clenches, arousal flaring bright. “Shouldn’t you count to ten first?”

His huff of laughter is full of something like amusement tinged with lust. 

Then he’s moving - away? What - 

Oh -

Arms circle your waist to pull you further onto the crate, flush against his broad chest. The chill of his armour sends a shiver down your spine that settles between your thighs, urges them to part in a silent plea for friction where you need it most. 

His hum of approval reverberates through your entire body. “You ready, tionas?”

“For what?” You watch as he pulls his gloves off, lets them fall away. Kriff, he has beautiful hands. You want to touch them, clasp them in your own, thread your fingers through his, feel those warm palms on your skin, all over you, those fingers inside you, all the time -

“To start counting.”

What? Right, counting, ok -

Those long, graceful fingers slip under the waistband of your leggings.

You stop breathing as calloused fingers smooth over your skin, moving slowly toward your already aching cunt. 

The helmet dips down, his voice right next to your ear. “One.”

His fingers slip through your slick folds - pfassk, how are you already this wet - and up to circle your clit. 

Little sparks of pleasure zip through your veins at the contact and you want more, need - 

Your back arches into his touch and his free arm bands around your waist, keeps you in place while his fingers pick up a steady rhythm, perfect pressure squeezing the air from your lungs in a tight moan. 

Crikking hells how is he so good at this - 

“Two.” His voice rasps in your ear again.  

Realization dawns, cloudy with arousal. 

He’s counting up. To ten. 

He’s going to make you come by then. 

Warmth spirals out from your core, across your hips, down your legs. Your hands reach up, find him over your shoulders, fingers curling into his flightsuit as your pleasure builds rapidly. “Oh pfassk yes that feels so good -“

His free hand cups a breast through your shirt, squeezing soft flesh, palm grinding over the peaked nipple. “Three.”

Pleasure shoots down your spine, bows your back as his fingers on your clit pick up speed, press just a little more. 

Your body shudders at the sudden rush of heat, cunt clenching with it. The hand on your breast shifts, fingers pluck at your nipple, cloth of your shirt adding delicious friction. 

A soft susurration flows through the modulator. “Breathe, cyar’ika. Four.”

He’s right, your lungs are tight, pleasure pushing air from them, clutching your chest. 

You take a deep breath, hearing it shake on the inhale. 

His fingers on your clit suddenly shift, slip down, press against your fluttering entrance. 

The air leaves your lungs in a rush, a moan twisting the end and fizzling out into frantic words with the thrust of his long, thick fingers into your pussy. “Yes yes yes please -“

He presses the flesh of his palm over your clit, a low groan filtering through the modulator as your walls clench around his fingers in response. “Five.”

His hand shifts just so and his fingers curl up and oh kriff -

Pleasure bursts at the pressure of his fingers against some spot inside you, blooming colour at the edges of your vision, dimming the brief flash of pain as your head falls back, knocks against his breastplate. 

The sound he makes is almost a growl, buzzing straight through your core. “Six.”

His fingertips flutter, his palm grinds over your throbbing clit and your orgasm is suddenly right there, tightening across your hips and thighs, bubbling low in your stomach. 

It’s disorienting, the intensity of it, the white-hot pleasure radiating from where his fingertips pulse against the walls of your cunt. “How - you - I can’t -“

“You can, just let it happen.” His voice is a murmur, gentle but firm as he pinches your nipple between his thumb and finger. “Seven.”

You’re breathing fast, trying to keep up with the heat running through your body. There’s a pressure building, pushing against his fingertips inside you, growing with every press and every grind of your clit and -

“Eight.”

He’s gonna do it he’s really gonna -

Sounds reach your awareness through the haze, your tiny mewls of desperation, his quiet moan of encouragement, the wet squelch of his fingers in your soaked cunt. 

The pressure is too much, not enough -

“Nine.”

Your hand claws at his, pulls it from your breast to clutch it tight - you’re floating, drifting, sinking -

His fingertips flick up hard and you crack -

“Ten.”

A rush of heat and wet and -

You crying out against the waves of pleasure that rip through your body, back curving over his hand still between your thighs, his fingers still flexing and pulling more and more from you -

You can hear it through the rush of blood in your ears, the slick sound of his fingers moving, a rapid beat that matches your own heart.

Then there’s the drop and you’re trembling and you’re falling but his hand is tight in yours and he’s got you, pulling you back to his chest, slipping his fingers from your still-pulsing cunt to splay his hand over your stomach and keep you there with him. 

A moment of quiet, just your heartbeat and the hum of the ship’s engines, the panting of your breath.

The warm weight of his hand on your stomach. 

The swirl of cool air over the damp fabric of your leggings. 

Oh. 

You’re wet. 

You’re very wet. 

Shifting your hips, you can feel the soaked fabric of your underwear - and leggings - cling to your skin. 

Crikking hells. 

Arousal flares hot and bright again, your cunt clenching with the realization of just how hard he had made you come. How he had used that razor-sharp focus to make you feel good with no consideration for his own pleasure. 

Determination clears the hazy afterglow from your thoughts. 

You want to do the same for him. 

He drifts his hand down your stomach, ghosts over the wet fabric between your thighs as he speaks, voice low and soft. “Hope these aren’t ruined, they look good on you.”

The compliment almost distracts you, skittering through the growing need in your chest. It takes some effort to get your muscles working again but you swing your legs around, pivoting on the crate to face him. 

His hands fall to your hips as you look up, meet the black visor’s gaze, let that growing need speak. “I want to suck your cock. Can I? Please?”

He goes still, only movement the sharp flex of his fingers digging into your thighs. Little sparks of pleasure spiral into your core at the sensation, but you stay focused, keep your gaze steady, open. 

Let him see how much you want him. 

A slight tremor runs through his frame, breaking the stillness.

He lifts a hand to cup your jaw, thumb brushing your bottom lip, voice ever-so-soft. “You really want that, mesh’la?”

You purposefully grip his wrist to hold his hand there, keeping your gaze on the black visor as you pull his thumb into your mouth, glide your tongue along its length. 

The sharp groan that filters through the modulator makes your pussy throb. 

Slowly, you pull back, let his thumb slip from between your lips with a final flick of your tongue. “Yes. I really want that.”

Your free hand slides down his front, cups the length of his cock through his flightsuit - pfassk, he’s already hard - and your mouth waters at the thought of him filling it. 

His fingers tighten on your jaw, bitten-off moan sifting through the modulator. “How… I can’t -“

“We can turn the lights off. Or leave them on, and I’ll cover my eyes with something.” You smile, squeeze his cock through the layers of fabric until he groans. “So you can watch.”

“Fuck.” His voice drops low, hips flex into your touch.

Sliding your hand firmly along his length, you nod, tilting your face further into his palm on your jaw. “I want to make you feel as good as you make me feel.”

His breath hitches, fingers twitch on your skin. 

For a moment you think he’s debating with himself, some silent argument pulling his thoughts inward, and hesitation starts to creep over that desperate desire to give him this - maybe he doesn’t want it, he had mentioned that he’d thought about it before but thinking about it and doing it are very different things -

Then he’s stepping back, hands on your waist easing you off the crate. “Then yes, tionas.”

Your heartbeat stutters in your chest, flare of anticipation swirling into need, and you move quickly, shifting until you’re facing him then dropping to your knees. 

The sound he makes, a long, low groan, sends a rush of arousal to your core. You look up at the black visor, resting your hands gently on his thighs, questioning. 

He sighs, brushing the swell of your cheek with the backs of his fingers. “I’m not going to last long if the sight of you on your knees in front of me almost makes me come.”

Your lips curve into a crooked smile, and you lean forward to press them over the fabric covering the hard length of his cock, holding his gaze. “Now you know what you do to me all the time.”

His cock twitches against your lips, his soft moan rumbling in his chest as the heat of your breath seeps into the layers of fabric and his fingers slide around the curve of your head to hold you there. 

The warm, bright thing in your chest squeezes so tight it hurts, seeing him like this, tall and broad above you, armour glowing in the light of the hold, faint tremor of restraint running through his frame as if he can barely control himself. 

Pfassk, he’s so beautiful. 

You want him so badly it hurts. 

A whimper pushes past your suddenly tight throat and you pull back just enough to speak. “Please, I need to taste you, gedet’ye.”

The tremor of restraint quivers through him, and he releases your head, tugs his cowl from his shoulders, movements sharp and deliberate as he tears a strip from its corner. 

He hands the loose cowl to you. “Kneel on this, cyar’ika.”

Always, always thinking of you. 

Tucking the bundled cloth beneath your knees, you shift until you’re comfortable, return your gaze to his. 

He holds the strip of fabric between his hands, and you smile in reassurance, closing your eyes as he pulls the fabric over them. It’s thick enough that you can’t see much, and when his fingers tie the ends in a knot behind your head the rest of your vision goes dark.

Your heart is racing, not with nervousness or anxiety - something to be said about that, considering the vulnerable position you’re in - but with anticipation. Excitement. 

Desire. 

His fingers run along the edge of the blindfold, gentle. “Ok?”

“Yes.” You don’t hesitate, leaning forward, silently begging. 

“I’ve… never done this before.”

You pause. Hesitation is thick in his voice, bordering on uncertainty. So unusual to hear, coming from him. 

But you get it. You had felt the same, with him barefaced between your legs and asking if he could taste you. 

Running your hands up his thighs to rest on his hips, you push as much confidence and reassurance into your voice as possible. “We can stop at any time, if you want. But as far as what needs to be done, just put your cock in my mouth and I’ll do the rest.”

A soft huff of laughter drifts down from above, and there’s a rustle of fabric that makes you bite your lip in expectation.

He speaks again, hesitance all but gone from his voice. “Mir’sheb.”

That makes you smile, tilt your face up toward the sound. “Then shut me up.”

His hand slides over your cheek, cups your jaw, thumb pressing into your bottom lip. “Open your mouth, cyar’ika.”

Oh pfassk -

The low rasp of his voice skitters over the coals of your arousal. 

You part your lips, let him guide your mouth open with his thumb, breath catching in your throat. 

Then there’s a press of warm, smooth skin over your bottom lip, a drop of bitter tang on your tongue, and crikking hells -

Your mouth closes over the head of his cock and a moan buzzes low in your chest as the thick weight of him rests on your tongue, the blunt tip presses against the roof of your mouth. 

His fingers slide around the back of your head, spasming. “Fuck, look at you, mesh’la, so good -“

He chokes off as you swirl your tongue over the head and shift forward, sink his cock deeper into your mouth. 

Pfassk, your senses are flooded with him, taste and scent filling your mouth, the trembling press of his hand on your head as he tries to hold back. 

But you don’t want that, you want him to lose himself in you. 

Pulling one hand from his hip, you curl your fingers around the base of his cock, stroking up as you pull back, letting the length of him drag along your tongue until only the tip rests between your closed lips. 

Something like a pained whine pushes through the modulator. Yes, that’s it, you want more of those sounds -

Flicking the flat of your tongue over the head of his cock, you bring your hand to your lips, let spit pool and leak under your curled fingers, then stroke down the length of his cock, firm, your lips still pressed to your hand in a wet seal that sucks another groan from him, a slew of Mandalorian words echoing off the walls of the hold. 

Yes more -

You start a rhythm, a steady glide, pull back and sink forward, fingers growing slick with spit, tongue laving over the head with each pass. His hips rock forward into the heat of your mouth every time you draw him in again, fingers on the back of your head flexing at each flick of your tongue. 

Instinct takes over and you fall into it, lose yourself in the beats of his moans and twitches of his cock in your mouth. You chase those sounds, seeking more, finding what pulls at his body to give him pleasure. 

Twist your bottom hand, thumb reaching down to brush over the soft sac there, that gives you a low moan. 

Stroke up the length to where your lips pull back to the tip, press your tongue flat against him, open-mouthed, that gives you a choked shudder. 

Down to dig your fingernails into the fabric over his abdomen, that gives you a restrained thrust that pushes him deep, grazing the back of your throat. 

That particular thrust pulls a moan from you, a rush of heat between your thighs, and you hum around his length, the sound mingling with the slick motion of your hand and mouth. 

He makes a strangled, desperate sound, free hand suddenly joining the other on the back of your head, and something primal thrills in your gut, shudders down your spine at the feeling of being held there, strong hands cupping your head with barely-held restraint as he loses himself in the hot, wet heat of your mouth.

His hips stutter forward, broken groan rumbling from the depths of his chest when you take the sharp movement in stride and let his cock slide in to the back of your tongue. “Gonna come -“

A desperate whine squeezes past the head of his cock - yes, you want it - and you pick up your pace, twisting your hand with each glide down his length. 

“Tionas -“

His breath is fast, uneven, urging you on. 

Yes yes yes give it to me -

He cries out, sharp, hips stuttering and fingertips digging into your scalp and his cock throbs on your tongue as his release floods your mouth.

You swallow it greedily, warm and slick down your throat, your fist and tongue working him through it, needing to take everything he gives you. 

Then his hands are easing you back, cupping your face, and there’s a soft clink of metal and he’s moving, shifting closer -

His lips capture yours, tongue lapping into your mouth and you’re searing hot, his moan rippling straight to your cunt as he tastes himself on you. 

Words mumble against your mouth. “So good, so good to me.”

And then he’s gone again and you’re suddenly cold, reaching for him, needing him close.

But he’s right there, hands pressing you down until your back is to the floor, your head cushioned on his cowl, and need pulses through your pussy as his fingers tug down the waistband of your leggings and underwear. 

His voice is raw with desperation. “Need you, mesh’la, need to taste you, feel you come on my tongue.”

Your hips arch to let him pull your leggings and underwear down your legs, shivering as skin still damp from your release is bared to the chill air of the hold. He doesn’t stop the take off your boots, just pulls your legs up over his shoulders, wedges himself between your thighs. 

His warm breath curls over your wet folds and you’re going to kriffing explode if he doesn’t -

He sucks your clit into the hot wet of his mouth and your entire body shudders at the wave of pleasure that tears through you. 

Your hand dives into his hair, fingers bury into those curls. “Oh pfassk yes -“

His tongue slips down between your folds and he growls as he laps the slick from your entrance, pushing inside before flicking up to your clit, pulling it back into his mouth and your thighs squeeze against the pleasure that coils deep in your core with each swirl of his tongue, each pull of his lips -

Your orgasm suddenly looms big and bright, pushing into the forefront with an intensity that shoves a moan from your chest. 

He groans long and low against the flutter of your cunt and sucks at your clit and -

You’re rooted to his tongue, warm silky wet heat that yanks you through hot bright pleasure and then release and you’re shivering, aftershocks rippling along your skin. 

His mouth softens and lips press delicately to your throbbing clit, guiding you back into yourself until you’re aching to feel him, the weight of him. 

You pull lightly at his hair and he shifts, lets you tug him up and over your body until his lips meet yours. 

It’s a sweet press of a kiss, until you flick your tongue out, some kind of curiosity rising through the fading haze of pleasure. 

Crikking hells you taste -

He groans into your mouth, his tongue gliding over yours, sharing the taste of you, and your heartbeat skitters in your chest as it blends with the lingering taste of his own release. 

Gently, you lap your combined pleasure from each other’s mouths, an intimate quiet lulling you into a sense of contentment. 

Pressing a kiss to his chin, still damp with your slick, you curl an arm around his shoulder, sift your fingers through his hair as your words murmur over his skin. “We taste good.”

He hums in agreement, slipping his tongue into your mouth once more before pulling back to nip at your bottom lip. “That we do, tionas.”

Your back twinges, shoulderblade pressing sharply into the durasteel floor, and you sigh in resignation. “And once again, we ended up on the floor.”

His chuckle dances over your cheek. “That we did, tionas.”

The warm bright thing in your chest pulses, flares, fills every vein at the sound of his laughter. 

You’ll take the backache later. Right now, you’re not going anywhere. 

*****

Mando’a translations

Tionas - question

Cyar’ika - sweetheart

Mesh’la - beautiful

Gedet’ye - please

Mir’sheb - smartass

***** Previous Chapter Next Chapter

[spookycrazyhatboxghost]

I wrote this not thinking of where it would fit but I’m thinking after The Tea Incident but before the chaos with Khal

Finishing the last dregs of the TipYipCurry soup he’d leftover from Primeday.

Xók surveyed his quarters as Syrih winds her black and white body around his boots in a last bid for attention that would end with him on the sofa trapped under a spoiled purring tooka.

Voice deeper first thing in the morning

“Syri—” The human admonished when predictably the round yellow eyes grew discontent with soft pets and she tore out in a sprint —knocking over something in the apartment.

With how clingy she acted one would probably never guess that Xók had found her on the street one night a year ago fighting with two creatures three times her size over meat scraps much to the entertainment of a group of drunkards outside the shadiest cantina.

“You fluffy willful girl— we go through this every time— if I don’t get paid we don’t eat. Now I’m going to see grandma. Guard the place well for me yeah?”

Last thing he does before leaving is put his wild hair up and away in a few complex braids; check his civilian clothes for tooka fur.

Dropping by the kitchens to check his schedule for the day. They gave him a hard time about “The Tea Incident” but he felt more betrayed that they’d made a credit betting pool out of his misery then the event itself.

Promising to be back within the hour to start his shift, the dark haired man prepares a tray laden with a few of his mother’s first meal favorites +enough caff for two.

With an enthusiastic bounce to his steps Xók heads deeper into the fortress; down to where it breathes

Down to the armory.

Knocking the metal at the heel of his boot on the first step in a specific pattern as he made his way down with the tray was their code.

The forge was warm and familiar; this one was bigger then the last one but it had all the same components I’ll be it finer material and proper ventilation.

The gold horned helmet turned to regard him; a small tilt softening the stance she held at the flame.

“—Xók’ika. You needn’t trouble yourself with feeding an old woman—I am but one of many”

“Buir it feels like I have not seen your face in weeks— I”

He crosses his arms after he sets the trey down on a big enough patch of bare counter space. “I simply wanted to make sure you ate. You neglect your own health for the sake of your work so often—“

The hiss of her removing her buy'ce made him stop.

Dark eyes and hair she passed down to him now grey at the temples, her stubborn nature too. His mother leveled him with a fond if exasperated look.

Voice softer without the amplifier. She brought him in close and touched their forheads together lightly.

“You are too good my son— even if you fuss worse then TipYip—“

Xók pulls back and does not pout—nope.

He was a grown man; Man’da forbid he still cares if his mother draws breath.

“Buir—“

He shoves some parts off of a chair with his boot and sits. Caf in hand, she kicks her feet up onto another chair ;mischief in her tone.

“Now what is this I hear about you being called to the Mandalo’rs chambers??”

The clear insinuation drives Xók to bury his reddened face in his hands.

“BUIR— that’s not what happened. Ohh those jerks — I brought him tea— as requested that’s it!”

“Oh is that all?— what I heard was far more sordid—”

The boy peaks through his fingers at her. Horrified and intrigued in equal measure.

“What…did you hear?” He asked, knowing full well palace gossip was outlandish and carried more salt then truth.

His mother smiles slowly; talking an even slower bite of one of the egg muffins she held in a napkin; and right when Xók thought to just leave she spoke.

“Well— no I shouldn’t repeat it. You are my son it’s vulgar—”

She laughs and sends him back up the stairs.

There is nothing lacking with your armor; the distress must be your own” His mother calls out to him; Buy'ce firmly in place.

/He does not have a crush—/

The ringing his ears does not lessen until he reaches the kitchen. The chaos of first meal starting up meaning that he was late—

Gritting his teeth the human tightened the apron strings with too much violence. “You’re puffed worse then a tooka with a crushed tail—what gives?”Inquired Qwil , his shift mate; a friendly Pau'an dispite appearances. Brows pinched Xók tries to smile. “M’fine—”

Trying to get into the swing of work mode Xók tries smoothing out his features as he swallows still too hot caff. The Pau'an shrugs and gets back to the omelet prep work. Xók busies himself with the meat prep; what people prefer raw—what can’t touch.

Etc.

Xók did his work; he took pride in what he could do with his own hands.

He was a capable fighter and he was his mother’s unofficial apprentice—- it all do that culminated in his kitchen work. Some would see it a wasted effort but you cannot eat Beskar nor sáciate with carnage.

When he wasn’t on guard or in the kitchen or assisting in the forge he liked sneaking into the library he’d found.

There was no sign forbidding him entry— the room wasn’t even trapped. So he’d spent hours there learning about the wider space.

Mandos were not a monolithic people. With any group you had your zealots and modernists.

He came here with his mother because she thought the change was coming. Someone who could restore Mandalore to glory.

Xók wasn’t one for blind faith; though he was plainly foolish enough -to think there was more to life then Beskar and bloodshed.

What that was he couldn’t really name but, who knows.

Mandalo’r Maul was definitely unlike anything or anyone the human had encountered; Lethally wielding the Man’da as easily if not more so then he did the Dark Saber.

The galaxy is vast and maybe the new Mandalo’r would pull them from the brink of stagnation.

[tehuti88-art]

10/21/22: r/SketchDaily theme, "Drawtober: Candlelit Coven." Two arts today.

Second: This week's character from my anthro WWII storyline is Elias Baswitz, a partisan/resistance fighter. There'll be more about him later in my art Tumblr and Toyhou.se.

TUMBLR EDIT: Elias Baswitz is a relatively minor character who plays a major role in absentia--via the fallout experienced by Private Godfrey Klemper--but doesn't actually appear in the story until after war's end. Therefore, I know practically nothing about his early or personal life short of his brief interaction with Klemper before Reborn (the second story arc chronologically, but the first in the weird order it's organized in) starts.

Baswitz is a German Jewish partisan fighting with an unidentified group out in the country--much of the same territory covered by 2nd Lt. Frieder Dasch's unit, which travels around fighting people like Baswitz (and Soviets, when they end up near the front). He ends up badly wounded when out on his own, and takes shelter in an old abandoned trench. With no way to contact his comrades, he starts to resign himself to dying out there alone. When he hears a noise and looks up to see a Wehrmacht soldier in a greatcoat and Stahlhelm standing above the trench looking down at him, though, he realizes he doesn't want to go out that easily. He raises his gun, but is too weak to aim or shoot. The soldier descends into the trench and disarms him, but then, to his surprise, starts tending to his wound rather than trying to kill him. He even offers his belt for Baswitz to bite on while he does so...well, more like just shoves it in his mouth (Baswitz thinks he's going to be suffocated at first) and orders him to bite, while he uses his knife to dig the bullet out of Baswitz's side and Baswitz tries praying because it hurts so much. The stranger then offers jerky (my autocorrect keeps changing that to "Jerry," how appropriate), making a mooing sound when he hesitates to take it. Baswitz sees the name stitched on his pack, KLEMPER, and says, "So you're Unteroffizier (Sergeant) Klemper?" Klemper hadn't been sure he could speak German until now. When Baswitz asks how he knew why he hesitated to take the Jerry (dammit, autocorrect, JERKY), Klemper says he heard him praying in Yiddish--"You know Yiddish?" Baswitz asks, to which Klemper replies, "I know the sound." (Klemper grew up poor in the countryside and had contact with various minority groups; in addition to knowing the sound of Yiddish, he can speak Polish.) He pushes up his oversized helmet then, and Baswitz reacts with astonishment, because his savior looks like he's barely more than a kid. (He's actually seventeen--but he's been in the army for four years already. So Baswitz's reaction is still justified.)

The two get to talking and knowing each other, albeit tentatively. Klemper is quite defensive and ill humored, not taking Baswitz's attempts at mildly insulting jokes and sarcasm very well; Baswitz can tell just from looking at him he's been through a lot. He's weirded out to find out Klemper has the odd habit of sleeping with his eyes open, and this, plus Klemper's frequently spacy attitude (not to mention his poor temper, and the fact that he barely eats), tips him off that he's on drugs--a common practice in the Wehrmacht, but still unnerving, especially in someone so young. Klemper stitches up Baswitz's wound and leaves the trench to steal food for him; when it starts raining, he even shields Baswitz with his coat. By now Baswitz is starting to have all kinds of indecent thoughts but he keeps them to himself, dismayed and embarrassed and not even sure the feelings would be reciprocated. Klemper leaves the trench again the next day (after again sleeping with his eyes open and creeping Baswitz out), but soon returns and cautions Baswitz to keep silent; Baswitz hears Klemper's own men calling for him. Klemper doesn't respond.

Baswitz stared at him as he took and let out a breath and dug in his pack. "They were looking for you...?" he whispered. "Why didn't you answer them?"

Klemper kept digging around, though it seemed more of a distraction than anything. "I can't be sure they won't kill you," he said finally, quietly.

Baswitz sank against the earthen wall, furrowing his brow. "That's kind of the point, isn't it? Otherwise what exactly are you fighting for?"

He jerked back further--Klemper abruptly surged toward him, finger jabbing, face twisted. "Not all of us!" he hissed. "Not all! Not all of us shove you on the trains! Not all of us release the gas! You know you sound just the same as the ones you're mocking every time you talk like that. Exactly the same! I'm f**king tired of you thinking I stick people in ovens every day for fun."

Baswitz sat still and listened to all this before relaxing again. The corner of his mouth twisted. "Not all, sure, but enough. How defensive you are all of a sudden, I know I touched a nerve and that means I'm not too far off. You do know you're the minority, ja? And it's as I said, what the f**k are you even fighting for if not for der Führer." He gestured at Klemper. "You have no armband but take a close look at your pretty little medal, it's got a swastika on it."

Baswitz did indeed touch a nerve, so Klemper haltingly tells how he ended up here--how his drunken father used to beat him and his mother, so badly once that Klemper, then only ten years old, got out the family rifle and shot him. His mother died a few years later; while Klemper was burying her, his house was burned down, so he went walking until he came across a group of soldiers recruiting people; he lied about his age, and was allowed in. He asks Baswitz how he ended up here and is obviously dismayed by the answer: "I have no family left. They all went on the trains." The two commiserate a little over how things came to be the way they are; but the conversation soon takes a turn.

Baswitz stretched his legs. "Well...as pleasant as your company is, I can think of several other ways I'd rather be spending my time, no offense. You?"

A blink. Klemper stared at him for a moment, then his eyes drifted. "I...don't know." When Baswitz raised an eyebrow he added, "I don't really know anything else. This is all there's ever been."

"There hasn't always been the war."

"Nein, I mean...just staying alive. I don't know anything other than this, this is just how it's always been."

His eyes went glassy and distant and he looked forward again. Baswitz bit the inside of his cheek; it was like Klemper had suddenly stepped out of the room.

Baswitz makes the mistake of touching Klemper's face, both to try to draw his attention back and to sympathize. That...doesn't go over well. Klemper backhands him hard enough to knock him over, yelling, "Schwuchtel!" He goes to the other side of the trench and pulls his pistol, snapping, "Put your hands on me again and I'll put a bullet in your other side." He and Baswitz then get stuck in a sort of standoff, keeping to opposite sides of the trench, Baswitz barely daring to move and Klemper keeping his gun drawn even when he throws more jerky at him to eat. Eventually, however, Baswitz starts swooning, succumbing to weird visions where Klemper calls him more vile names and even shoots him in the head yet he's still alive. Klemper notices this, checks his wound again, then leaves. Baswitz tries to sleep and ends up drowning in a flood of rainwater--only for Klemper to arrive, pull him out, and shove a pill in his mouth. It was another fever dream; Baswitz's wound has gotten infected, and Klemper went to steal penicillin to give him. He slips in and out of consciousness for what feels like weeks but is in fact just two days while Klemper keeps giving him penicillin until the fever breaks. Klemper also stole food, which Baswitz eats gratefully. Klemper hesitates before handing him a bottle of beer. Baswitz remembers Klemper's story about his father's drunkenness, and drinks only a little before setting the bottle aside. Klemper even gives him back his gun, and both apologize to each other, Klemper for calling Baswitz names and hitting him, Baswitz for touching Klemper. When Klemper tentatively asks if anyone else has ever called him names, the conversation again gets quite dark.

"I'm..." A long pause. "I'm sorry I called you that word."

"It's all right, kid. I've been called worse. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, honest."

Klemper sank into his coat a little, arms clasped around his knees. He had an odd expression, as if he wanted to say something yet dreaded the thought of doing so. "Called worse...?" he finally echoed. Baswitz sensed it wasn't quite the question he wished to ask, but answered anyway.

"A lot of it from your people, naturally. Any filthy word you can think of for Jew, I've been called it, and then some. I'm used to it."

"Anyone's ever called you anything else?"

Baswitz peered at him from the corner of his eye. "You mean anyone's ever called me Schwuchtel?" Klemper flinched just slightly. "Sure, kid. You're not the first and you won't be the last."

"So..." Klemper furrowed his brow. "You don't argue it?"

"When you get as old as I am you pick your battles. No point arguing against the truth."

Klemper said nothing to this, just turned to look toward the opposite side of the trench and sank further into his coat. Baswitz kept silent as well, sensing he would keep talking if allowed to do so yet might shut down at the slightest wrong word. "No one picks fights with you over it...?" he finally said, his voice barely audible.

"Some do, some don't," Baswitz said with a small shrug. "You learn who's your friend or not," he added. "Who's worth your time, who's not. So, there's that." When Klemper said nothing for a while, just stared across the trench, he pushed himself upright a bit so he didn't slouch as much. "It gets a bit easier as you get older, kid," he murmured, knowing now the reason for the questions; he'd suspected before, but now he was sure. "Someone give you trouble?" he asked when Klemper's head lowered a little. "Someone in your unit?"

Klemper shook his head. "Not like that." His stare drifted to the side and lingered; Baswitz followed it, yet saw nothing but the bottle sitting nearby half wrapped in cloth. He was about to offer it to him again when Klemper said quietly, "Rolf."

"Rolf? He give you trouble?"

Another shake. "He lived the other house over from us." Klemper's eyes glazed over and it was as if he stared through everything rather than at it. "My age. His eyes were green." Then, something Baswitz never would have expected--a smile slowly came to his face as he stared off into nothing, and Baswitz's heart ached a little on seeing it. "The most beautiful eyes in the world," he murmured. "I kissed him and he liked me," he added, and his smile grew.

Baswitz felt his own mouth twitch. It had been a lifetime but he still remembered that feeling. His own smile didn't get a chance to fully form, however, when Klemper's smile faded and then disappeared, his eyes growing glassier. A barely perceptible tremor passed through him.

"Papa saw it," he said, and those three words felt like Klemper's fist grinding into his wound again.

Klemper then relates how his father first beat him, then dragged him to his room, yelling, "Filthy little Schwuchtel. You want to be a little wife so bad? I'll teach you how much fun it is to be a little wife. Then you'll want to be a man." He had his beer bottle with him, and he used it on Klemper, saying, "Now you'll never forget it. Now you'll be a man." "I never forgot," Klemper adds. (This ends up being the incident where his father then started beating his mother, so he got the rifle and shot him.)

Baswitz is stunned and horrified by this story--finally understanding why Klemper kept looking at his own beer bottle, and why he'd truly hesitated to give it to him, he tosses it away. "Kid," he says, "that's not what it's supposed to be like. Not at all. And he never should have done that. No matter what you did." Klemper allows him to put his arm around his shoulders, and they fall asleep. The next morning things get a bit weird again, though; Baswitz notices Klemper taking something himself before giving him his penicillin, and learns that it's Pervitin, which Klemper and the others in his unit have been misinformed is a "supervitamin." Baswitz knows that it's actually methamphetamine, which helps explain Klemper's alternating aggressive and spacy behavior, and pleads with him to take it easy. Klemper ignores this, but spots the beer bottle Baswitz tossed away, and exclaims in an odd childish voice, "You spilled your beer. You want me to fetch you another one? I'll fetch you another one." He starts to leave, so Baswitz grabs his arm--and Klemper again pulls his gun and threatens him. It's only when Baswitz calls Klemper by his rank, Unteroffizier, rather than "kid," that he snaps out of it--he'd literally just regressed back to childhood for a moment. He's rather embarrassed and apologetic about this, and leaves to go fill their canteens with fresh water. Thing is, Klemper disappears for the rest of the day, and Baswitz starts freaking out.

His breath was just starting to catch with panic and dread, his eyes growing hot with unspilled tears, when he finally heard a small noise, so small he would never have heard it if he hadn't spent the entire day straining his ears for anything. His head popped up and he suppressed a gasp; something moved over the edge of the trench, then jumped or fell down into it with him. He nearly pulled back, hand clasping his gun, but the shadowy shape stood and he recognized Klemper's Stahlhelm and greatcoat. At least, he hoped that was Klemper; he couldn't see the face at all.

Taking a chance, he leaned forward abruptly. "Where were you?" he nearly yelled, his own voice cracking much as Klemper's had before. Klemper--or whoever this was--flinched back. Baswitz gestured wildly. "It's been all day! For water? Where did you go? I've been thinking someone got you! You were lying in a ditch somewhere! I thought maybe you weren't coming back!" His vision blurred and broke apart; feeling utterly foolish, yet still furious, he swept a hand across his eyes to clear them. "I thought you weren't coming back," he echoed himself, voice cracking again.

The Wehrmacht soldier said nothing, just stood there. For a moment Baswitz had a creeping feeling of dread that this wasn't Klemper at all, someone else had finally found him, until he moved slightly and something slid down his arm. Baswitz recognized Klemper's pack clearly now, and let out a breath. He took a couple of steps forward, reaching into the pack and pulling something out; Baswitz jerked back a little when something landed in his lap. He blinked a few times in confusion and picked up one of the objects; they were small and flat and rectangular and seemed to be wrapped in paper or foil. In the dim light he couldn't read anything but the word HERSHEY'S.

Yep--Klemper not only fetched water, but stole American candy for him, because "I wanted to bring back something nice." (Throughout the story, Klemper often shows affection or respect by giving people small items he's stolen or found. So...kinda like a crow, I guess?) He sits beside Baswitz as he eats, then lets him put his arm around his shoulders again and they sit in silence for a while. After night falls, Klemper kisses him, and Baswitz returns the gesture.

This is around where the scene I'm writing ends, I can't share the little bit I have left, mwehehehe.

Needless to say, though, Baswitz and Klemper grow quite close, and although they don't have much time left together in the trench--and they know this--they make the most of it. Baswitz is actually the first positive romantic relationship (aside from the kiss for Rolf) Klemper has ever had--I'm not sure if he tells Baswitz the rest, but the experience with his father isn't the only time he's gone through such a thing; considering himself unworthy of love or acceptance, nevertheless he desperately seeks it where he can, and this makes him an easy target. He was also victimized by the commanding officer of the unit he belonged to before Dasch's (this one was outright assault), and then by at least one or two other men he thought were interested in him but they were just interested in one thing. Baswitz is the only one who doesn't treat him like he's disposable, and actually respects his feelings, including apologizing for yelling when he was late and for touching his face without his permission. Klemper isn't used to men treating him like an equal (even the one other man who's treated him properly, Lt. Dasch, by necessity has to address him as a subordinate), so Baswitz's attention proves, at least for a little while, that he isn't the complete garbage he believes himself to be, he deserves better. Although the two of them are together for only a couple of weeks, this is one of the most meaningful interactions either of them has, and it leaves a lasting impression on them both.

Finally Baswitz's wound heals enough and he gathers enough strength that he can make it on his own, and they both reach the conclusion that their relationship is over. They knew it could never be permanent, though it's still painful. They try to figure out how to proceed--which includes explaining to their respective peers why they were absent for so long--and decide that sticking as close as possible to the truth is the best option. They come up with the cover story that Baswitz, although wounded, managed to coerce Klemper into tending to his injury and held him hostage at gunpoint; Klemper finally escaped him, and both then returned to their people. Klemper says this story isn't believable enough unless Baswitz took a shot at him as he fled, and insists that Baswitz indeed shoot him. While Baswitz is stammering and trying to think of something else he can do, Klemper pulls his pistol and shoots himself in the arm, again freaking him out. They share a final kiss, then Klemper climbs out of the trench and jogs off in the direction where they'd last spotted a Wehrmacht unit passing by; Baswitz climbs out and runs off in the opposite direction. He casts Klemper one last wistful glance before disappearing into the trees, and from the story.

Klemper comes across his unit, who are surprised to find him still alive. He tells his story and is brought to a field hospital for treatment...but then the story slowly starts to fall apart. I'm not sure how--I do know that neither Klemper nor Baswitz is to blame, they both stick to it, but somehow the truth comes out, and Klemper is left dealing with the consequences. The first and only positive relationship he's experienced leads to him getting investigated by the Wehrmacht and the Schutzstaffel for potential treason as well as breaking the laws on homosexuality and racial hygiene; being threatened with dischargement, imprisonment, and execution; and finally, getting demoted to Oberschütze (Private First Class) and losing the ability to be promoted again. He's left feeling incredibly bitter about this turn of events...but he never blames Baswitz. Over the rest of Klemper's relatively short life, Baswitz is the one man he never feels any resentment or doubt toward (even his final, "permanent" relationship, with Lt. Ratdog, starts out with much skepticism on his part--he repeatedly insists Ratdog will eventually leave him and not come back, until Ratdog proves himself--and there are further issues with Ratdog's fidelity and Klemper's drug use and trauma); the brief time he spent with Baswitz is the one time he can look back on without any spite or bitterness. At least until Ratdog proves he believes the same, Baswitz's insistence that Klemper means something, he's worthy of love, is the sole lifeline Klemper has to hold on to. And he really, really needs that lifeline, as he comes precariously close to stepping off the ledge more than once.

Klemper doesn't survive long past the end of the war. Ironically, it's just shortly AFTER the Third Reich falls, when he and Ratdog are walking through an open space, that he abruptly shoves Ratdog to the ground, saving him from a sniper's bullets--he points out where the shots came from and Ratdog fires back, killing a fellow German soldier. Ratdog is infuriated: "The war's over! I'm not even your enemy! Why are you still fighting?" But he's distracted from his angry fit when Klemper grasps hold of his sleeve and then slumps to the ground--he took the sniper's shot, himself. Ratdog carries him back to his home and removes the bullet; Klemper rallies and the two talk a bit, making cautious but hopeful plans for a life together now that the fighting is done. A happy life, with someone who loves him, isn't something Klemper ever imagined he would have. And...he never does. He dies in his sleep, bleeding out from the other wound he sustained, which both of them managed to overlook through all the blood. He dies happy, he dies loved and not alone, he dies knowing he made a difference and he matters; yet Ratdog is of course inconsolable. He buries Klemper beside the grave of his young son. Some time after he begins a relationship with Didrika, who also lost her lover Boris, though the two never fall in love with each other and the partnership is more to share their grief and stave off the loneliness than anything else.

A stranger passes not far from Ratdog's woodland cottage one day and spots the grave with its cross topped by a Stahlhelm; curious, he draws close to investigate. Upon tipping up the helmet he spots an Iron Cross hanging there as well, and then sees the name carved on the wooden cross: G KLEMPER. Stunned, he sits and stares at the grave for a while; before he leaves, wiping at his eyes, he places a pebble on the ground before it. The next few times he visits he does the same, until one day when he stands up there's a man pointing a rifle at his head. He demands to know why he's there and why he keeps dropping rocks on the grave. The stranger replies that this is a custom when visiting a loved one's grave--he knew Klemper once--and even though Klemper wasn't Jewish, still, it seemed like a suitable thing to do. The man with the rifle stares at him for a moment before slowly lowering the gun and saying, "Your name is Elias...?" "Elias Baswitz," the visitor confirms, confused--"Do I know you?" "Nein," Ratdog replies, "but Godfrey talked about you." After a few tentative words Ratdog invites Baswitz back to his house and they talk for a while, not just getting to know each other but getting to know Klemper better as well. "Every time an army unit passed by, I'd hide but look to see if he was with them," Baswitz says, "but he never was. I never saw him again after that. I thought I would go looking for him after the war...I thought for sure he would outlive me." The two part ways, Ratdog granting Baswitz permission to visit Klemper's grave when he wishes, though as he leaves again, Baswitz can't help but feel somehow that it's not enough. He and Ratdog will remember Klemper, but he feels like more people should.

Baswitz manages to locate Zierenwald (name tentative and from a West European town name generator!--apparently it loosely translates to "Ornamental Forest"?), a small town/village that Klemper visited with his unit back when he was still an Unteroffizier. They'd arrived just as another unit was preparing to burn the village to the ground, ostensibly to flush out partisans, in reality because they were just jerks who liked looting and burning places (including Klemper's own home). Klemper confronted the sergeant in charge of the other unit and although he slightly outranked him, Klemper still managed to threaten his unit into backing down, and managed to hold them off until Dasch and some others arrived. They searched the village and of course found no partisans. The other unit was verbally reprimanded and sent on their way; Klemper was later awarded the Iron Cross for his actions. Baswitz asks to speak with the village leaders about constructing a memorial for Klemper; they point out that they've placed his name over a wishing well in the square, and haven't forgotten him. When Baswitz suggests something more memorable--a statue--they're excited by the idea, and start brainstorming how to gather funds to purchase a small plot of land and commission a sculptor. Baswitz donates a sizable sum he's already saved and gathered himself, while the villagers scrape together the rest. They hire a sculptor, but there's an issue--he needs a good likeness of Klemper to work from, and none are known to still exist.

Help comes from a very unexpected source: Otto Himmel, an ex-Schutzstaffel officer. He actually played a pivotal role in keeping Klemper from being discharged from the army or executed; now, hearing about the need for a photo of Klemper, he asks if a drawing would do. It turns out Klemper and Ratdog once visited the headquarters of a Nazi medical project that Himmel's son, Kolten, was involved in; Klemper paused outside Kolten's cell, then gave him a small glass figurine he'd stolen. (Klemper obviously had a habit of making off with various things that weren't his.) After he left, Kolten, who has the temperament and mental age of a child but possesses an eidetic memory, drew a picture of Klemper standing outside his cell. Himmel diligently collects his son's artwork, and offers the drawing in place of a photograph. The sculptor is amazed by the realism and says it'll do perfectly.

Some time after, on a sunny spring day, the little parcel of land the village purchased is dedicated as a park in Klemper's name, and before the small crowd that's gathered, the statue, named "The Hero Of Zierenwald," is unveiled. The villagers murmur appreciatively and clap. "My drawing, Papa," Kolten says, and Himmel smiles proudly at him. "It looks just like him," Dasch murmurs; "he'd hate it," and chuckles softly while wiping his eyes. Ratdog and Baswitz remain mostly silent until the crowd disperses, then draw close to look the statue over. Eventually Ratdog bids Baswitz goodbye and he's left on his own, with only a few straggling village children laughing and running around in the distance. Klemper had been a child soldier, so Baswitz feels it's suitable that he watches over the children now. He looks at the inscription on the statue's base, beneath the title--"A brilliant spark which faded too soon"--and rubs the blur away from his eyes. Klemper had always wanted his life to mean something; Baswitz made sure it did.

[Elias Baswitz 2022 [‎Friday, ‎October ‎21, ‎2022, ‏‎3:10:27 AM]]

[cicada-candy]

screams im Certainly Awake Now asfdkgldlf

FUCK YEAH PUNCHIN' DEMONSSSS

"He readjusts his (the jaeger’s) grip on the deep gash in the demon’s hide and punches it again, and again. He’s fairly sure his eardrums will never be the same again from the deafening scream it makes when The Charger’s (his) fist connects with it’s ugly snout."

OHOHOHO WHAT A WAY TO OPEN AHSKDSSF

I sense an impending identity crisis in this kids future and i am Very Here For It.

"He’s looking at his dad – he knows it’s him in the other console, even with the helmet covering his face – and barks pull left, now!"

*muffled screaming*

“All systems functional. Minor damage to the right hand—” he bites down on ‘from all the damn punching’. His voice is all wrong, like he’s trying to put on an accent.

again. no notes just screaming.

"Oh yeah it’s dead. He doesn’t feel the intense satisfaction radiating from that sentence, but when he glances to the second console, it’s still just empty rigging. Give it a rest, would you?

Robbie must be going insane.

Well, what else is new."

oh hes Going Through it atm asjldlslkfgjd;o

"There’s a soft click in his comm link, then static. Good enough. He reaches to pluck it out of his ear, then turns to look at the second console – empty.

“What,” he asks, feeling faintly ridiculous, “the fuck was that.”"

finally realising that The Voice isnt. His Voice. im surprised hes keeping his shit broadly together at all ahjsdkah;

"Silence. He’s tempted to pull his helmet back on, to get back into the drift and dig into one of those flash-and-gone memories that can’t possibly be his. There is no way to hide that from mission control, though, and you can’t risk them knowing you’re losing the plot."

Hey Wazzappp :))))) Do You Have A Second Chainsaw? :))))))))

"There. If he pays attention – and he’s definitely paying attention now, even though every bone in his body feels like it’s on fire – it’s not him. Thorough the fight, he’s been more and more aware of it with every decision he made just before he had any way of knowing it was an option. The chain – he knew about the chain, he saw it’s containment unit on The Charger’s blueprints, he saw it in the old footage from when his dad was piloting – but he didn’t practice with it."

oops seems you cant Deny Deny Deny ur way outta this one kid ":]

"Maybe you have superpowers.

What are you?

Does it matter? We saved the day together."

I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS ONE >:Dc

"I don’t know how to fight like the rangers do. I don’t know how to account for water currents when charging at a fucking demon. You’ve been training day and night for weeks. Not enough! I shouldn’t know any of these things! I shouldn’t remember what dad looked like when he was drafted!"

YES oh my god youre so close, the Box Under The Floor Is Right There you just gotta poke it a little

"How do you– I am you. He barely saw Gabe for a year. And here they have a whole place set up for kids like him. They don’t need you to take him off their hands. They barely need you to be doing this. Show one crack, see how long until they find a less… troublesome test subject."

Hey Wazzappp :))))) Do You Have A Second Chainsaw? :))))))))

also Uh Oh Spaghetti-Os The Drift Works Both Ways.

"Robbie stares at the status displays for a long moment. Drift inactive, it says. He reaches for his comm link."

“Cho?” It takes a moment before his ping gets an acknowledgement. “I changed my mind. Get me out of here.”

I MEAN. YEAH FAIR.

i wanna punch eli in his stupid shit-eating grin so bad. which i imagine is The Point lmao

(both this and previous chaper on AO3 - we're getting into some of Eli's less charming personality traits here, so, yknow. Proceed at own risk.)

Ghost Rider Pacific Rim AU - internal monologue

It’s T plus twenty one and Robbie never wants to pilot a jaeger again.

He readjusts his (the jaeger’s) grip on the deep gash in the demon’s hide and punches it again, and again. He’s fairly sure his eardrums will never be the same again from the deafening scream it makes when The Charger’s (his) fist connects with it’s ugly snout. Logically, he knows the spray of corruption hitting the outer hull isn’t actually touching him, that it’s being immediately washed away by the ocean waves, but if it was up to him he’d be dropping the beast and backing away as quickly as he’s capable of.

Oh, get over yourself. He pulls his arm back, The Charger following suit less than a thought later, and throws the length of the chain that serves as The Charger’s primary melee weapon over the demon’s head. It wraps around its thick neck and Robbie has to dig The Charger’s feet into the ocean floor not to be dragged along when it bucks. This is the fun part!

He’s not having fun. He was supposed to be taking pot-shots at the beasties swimming ahead of the demon. He wasn’t supposed to even see actual combat. Captain Danvers told him to stay back. What the hell is wrong with him? Can you not just enjoy something for five goddamn minutes? Focus, it’s going for a bite—

Razorback roars and swerves left. It's not a conscious decision to raise his arm and bring the jaeger’s elbow down on its flat head, but the resounding crack feels extremely satisfying. Coyote Tango is right there to take over, grabbing the demon’s tail to fling it deeper into the ocean, the chain going taunt in his hands.

“Charger, stand clear,” he hears. Clear of what? Fuck that, you’ve got it. Reel it back! “Charger, move before you get hit!”

Robbie drops the chain in panic – move where? Before he can even begin figuring out the display screens, he’s already moving, pulled along in a wave of the grey-blue memory. He’s looking at his dad – he knows it’s him in the other console, even with the helmet covering his face – and barks pull left, now! The jaeger trips, its shoulder hitting the water before he manages – just – to right it. He has no idea what’s the protocol for collecting a jaeger from underwater, and by this point LOCCENT might just leave him there.

He did dodge a laser beam from Romeo Blue’s reactor cannon by a hair though. It hits Razorback directly in its open maw, its black blood spilling into the ocean like an oil slick. Show-stealers.

Fuck you, he thinks to himself. You’re not a hero, you don’t know what you’re doing and you shouldn’t. Be. Here.

Hey, the demon came at us! If the heroes were doing their job—

There it is. He can feel something shift in the drift, like a pebble in his boot rolling somewhere he can’t ignore it. It’s so much harder to chalk it up to exhaustion when he’s one hundred percent, absolutely sure that if he turned his head to look, he would see someone else in the empty console on his right.

Now that’s crazy talk. Go on, look. No one’s there.

I know!

“Charger, status report.”

He looks up from the water; Eden Assassin is grappling the demon in its dying throes, Coyote Tango reading to deliver the final blow. “Uh.” His eyes move to the status display of their own volition. If he can read it, can’t they? They’re checking you haven’t fried your brain, dumbass. Haven’t I? “All systems functional. Minor damage to the right hand—” he bites down on ‘from all the damn punching’. His voice is all wrong, like he’s trying to put on an accent.

There’s some crackling on the other end of the comm, as if the hardware itself could tell he was about to make a terrible joke. “Copy that. Try to find that chain before it winds up on a beach somewhere, huh?”

Razorback’s head sinks under the surface of the ocean. Is it dead? Oh God, it’s dead. Please be dead. Coyote Tango grabs it by the spike on the back of its head – it must be dead.

Oh yeah it’s dead. He doesn’t feel the intense satisfaction radiating from that sentence, but when he glances to the second console, it’s still just empty rigging. Give it a rest, would you?

Robbie must be going insane.

Well, what else is new.

It’s T plus twenty four, or rather T minus however long until the next predicted arrival.

Most rangers go up into the helicopters for extraction – with the drift shut down after the fight, nobody wants to spend six hours flying back to Hong Kong when a military aircraft can take you there in two – but Robbie decided to stay put.

“I can come down if you need help detaching,” Cho offers. Robbie didn’t realise until then he came along rather than staying behind on LOCCENT bridge.

“It’s fine,” he says after a moment to make sure it’s him speaking. Really? “Can you, uh, mute me?”

“Ah,” there is a pause. “Look, if you need to freak out—”

“Can you mute me or not?”

“Sure, sure. I’ll be back in half an hour to check on you, though.”

You don’t actually believe he won’t listen.

There’s a soft click in his comm link, then static. Good enough. He reaches to pluck it out of his ear, then turns to look at the second console – empty.

“What,” he asks, feeling faintly ridiculous, “the fuck was that.”

Silence. He’s tempted to pull his helmet back on, to get back into the drift and dig into one of those flash-and-gone memories that can’t possibly be his. There is no way to hide that from mission control, though, and you can’t risk them knowing you’re losing the plot.

There. If he pays attention – and he’s definitely paying attention now, even though every bone in his body feels like it’s on fire – it’s not him. Thorough the fight, he’s been more and more aware of it with every decision he made just before he had any way of knowing it was an option. The chain – he knew about the chain, he saw it’s containment unit on The Charger’s blueprints, he saw it in the old footage from when his dad was piloting – but he didn’t practice with it. Brooks was going to pull out some ropes in training after his first run. There is a perfectly functional extendable staff in the jaeger’s arm he was supposed to have used instead.

Maybe you have superpowers.

What are you?

Does it matter? We saved the day together.

Robbie remembers every questionnaire he’d filled out over the weeks. Do you, or have you in the past, heard someone speak despite being alone in the room? Something cold spills inside his stomach.

You’re jumping to conclusions. You’ve heard the doc, your brain drifts a little, that’s all.

I don’t know how to fight like the rangers do. I don’t know how to account for water currents when charging at a fucking demon. You’ve been training day and night for weeks. Not enough! I shouldn’t know any of these things! I shouldn’t remember what dad looked like when he was drafted!

No response. He concentrates on the sliver of presence he’s been feeling, but it’s like looking at one of those optical illusion pictures – the harder he tries, the less sense it makes.

He needs to– there must be someone he could ask. The head tech, Canelo, he said he was around ten years ago. And Ivanov–

Let me lay this out for you. He can’t help but glance to the empty console. Remember that time you were fifteen, and little Gabriel wouldn’t eat his fucking dinner?

Robbie freezes. It wasn’t about Gabe.

Of course not. Nobody cared how hungry you were, or how hard you worked to pay for it. You lose control, you get put away. Think this time it will be any different? Think the wonks in R&D care what happens to you if you don’t perform to specification?

How do you– I am you. He barely saw Gabe for a year. And here they have a whole place set up for kids like him. They don’t need you to take him off their hands. They barely need you to be doing this. Show one crack, see how long until they find a less… troublesome test subject.

Robbie stares at the status displays for a long moment. Drift inactive, it says. He reaches for his comm link.

“Cho?” It takes a moment before his ping gets an acknowledgement. “I changed my mind. Get me out of here.”

[miredinmiddleearth]

Rings of Power, Ep. 5 Review - Slowly Losing My Mind

I don’t know if I can keep going. This show has broken me. Here are my thoughts on episode five:

1. Harfoot explains about migrating from place to place, eating food they didn’t plant or nurture or stick around to care for. Gosh, can’t put my finger on why that sounds familiar...Almost like a certain company...

2. Creepy people in white from the trailer are finally here! For exactly thirty seconds and zero purpose.

3. Prediction: Adar (aka orc elf) is related to Gil-galad somehow. Same squiggle armor is worn by both.

4. Summary of my feelings on the middle of the episode: Don’t care. Don’t care. Sloppy. Boring. Dumb. I’d break these thoughts down by scene and characters, but that requires effort, and why should I put in any effort when the show doesn’t, either?

5. The guttural, exhausted noise I made when I realized they were going to have Galadriel spar with the Numenorean cadets. There’s time for this? Also, she steps in to “teach” the cadets how to kill an orc. I am not kidding when I say her lesson is...stab it. That’s it. Stab the orc. Brilliant advice, Galadriel. Really wouldn’t have thought of that. 

Then we proceed to watch a terribly choreographed, slow sword fight so Galadriel can look like she’s cool or something? Definitely doesn’t work.

6. Oh good, show that brags about feminism and championing women uses women as set dressing during the table scene. We can’t just have a table of men. We need women at the table. They need character names? Lines of dialogue? Nah. Just sit them at the table.

7. Just when you think the show couldn’t get any dumber, they hereby present to you - Mithril: An Amazon Original Origin Story. Featuring made up Silmaril lore, a balrog, an unnamed elf, a tree, and an accidental lightning strike.

8. Guys. It hurts. The Gil-galad conversation with Elrond goes to places that are too stupid for words. Contradictions galore, mixed up and messed up character motivations, and inventions that totally destroy whatever direction the world could go. Prepare for the stupid:

In this show, the process of elves dwindling has just begun. Why? Don’t ask questions. But boy oh boy, the solution. Apparently their goal is to get as much mithril as possible and “saturate” the elves. I AM NOT JOKING.

What are they going to do? Gather the elves into a circle and rub mithril on their skin? Go to a mithril spa? Shoot a laser beam through a mithril shard at a crowd of all the elves? WHY DOES MITHRIL NEED A BACKSTORY OR SUCH A PURPOSE? WHY IS IT SUDDENLY THE ROOT OF ELVEN IMMORTALITY AND SALVATION THEWERHUWIEFHBALHUIQZ GAH.

ALSO. Let’s remember that this show is largely about the fall of Numenor. In case you didn’t know, Numenor falls because its people grow so desperate for immortality that they seek it in Valinor, and are thus punished in the most extreme way possible. I guess they should have just mined some mithril!

9. Elrond makes a giant deal of not breaking his oath to Durin about keeping mithril a secret, as he should. Then he proceeds to give Celebrimbor the mithril shard and doesn’t count that as breaking his oath. How does this make sense?

10. Two ships get blown up (gosh, don’t get me started on the extreme lack of character motivations),  and Numenor has three ships left. Wait wait wait. Numenor. Greatest naval force ever. Island nation. Has five ships TOTAL? 

11. Emotional moment between Galadriel and Halbrand not earned. Blah blah blah. I’m terrible at leading. I’m annoying. Yeah we know. We see it literally in every scene you’re in.

12. Absolutely no idea why Elendil’s daughter is here or what she wants. 

13. The armor. Look, I don’t understand the choice to give a horse-y aesthetic to the Numenorean soldiers. Horse tails on helmets? For an island nation not known for their horses? Where would they get so much hair? Also, lol, those “nose guards.”

14. Where did Galadriel get the custom armor she wears at the end? She showed up on the island in rags. Are they implying Halbrand made it in, like, a week? Why do I keep asking for basic storytelling competency? Search me!

15. One brief positive: I could listen to Elendil’s delivery of “For Middle-earth” about five million times.

16. You’re telling me they’re bringing 500 men on those three little ships? And the preview for next week implies they’re bringing a whole cavalry of horses, too? Is there an iceberg worth of boat under the water?

Guess what. The episode ends in the same place they started the episode. Numenoreans are gearing up to go to middle earth. All the conflict got us back to where we started. What a great use of an hour to tell a story. I am so done. I don’t think I can do this again. If this is the last time I review, may I just say...

UGGHGHGHGHGGGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGGGGGHGHHHHGGHGHGHGH

[no-droids]

Out of a Trillion

gif credit: @bestintheparsec​

Part Fifteen of the Rough Day Series

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 12.6K

Warnings: uhhhh so there is a bit of SMUT in this one, not too much and I imagine if you’ve made it this far then that won’t be too big of a deal LMFAOOO uh some ANGST and my attempt at HURT/COMFORT and also violence/blood/injury description, so look out for that!

A/N: I started writing this before the season finale aired and I know we all want a bit of goodness and softness after it, but hopefully this will be okay!  I’ll start working on the next part tonight

***

Everything changes and yet somehow nothing does.  

From that point on, it’s like… like you’re both just suspended in this perpetual state of wondering, waiting for the other shoe to drop.  You know he said it’s up to you, but what the fuck?  Look whenever you want?  That’s way too much fucking pressure, he’s out of his mind.  You’re not equipped to handle that, who does he think you are?  Someone that can just… decide things?

And it’s not like you’re afraid of the commitment, or that you don’t want to look.  You do, but every single time a moment comes, it just never… feels right.  You don’t know what you’re waiting for, what feeling or meaning you’re expecting to magically present itself to you, but you can’t shake the idea that there should be more to it than just randomly deciding to open your eyes at some point, shouldn’t there?  Din said there was no ceremony, nothing fancy, and he gave you permission to look because he said he’s not allowed to ask outright, whatever that means.  It’s a standing offer because you guess he isn’t allowed to prompt it for some reason, but unfortunately, that leaves you in just about the shittiest position possible.  Now everything falls to you—initiation, execution, and consequence—and Maker knows you’ve never been that great making decisions under pressure.

But you do want to look.  Sort of.

Sort of.  Because… well, this probably won’t make that much sense, but you’re afraid.  Mostly for him.  What if he’s making a mistake?  It sounds stupid, but you’re afraid of what this means for him, the sheer perpetuity of this decision he’s now expecting you to make for the both of you.  This isn’t your creed, not yet, and you feel like there’s still so much to learn.  Not only about the Mandalorians and his culture, but about him.  To know is to love, and so you’ve taken to asking any nonsensical question you can think of whenever he’s around.  Though you weren’t expecting it at first, you’ve learned that he’ll always give you some sort of an answer.  Some of the highlights include:

“How old are you?”  (“I don’t know.  Probably mid-forties, but there’s no way to tell anymore.”)

“You don’t know your birthday?”  (No, I… think it was in the winter.”)

“What’s your last name?”  (“Djarin.”)

“Do you have any freckles?  Or moles, or birthmarks?”  (“No, none that I’ve ever noticed.”)

“Do you cut your own hair?”  (“Yes, but it’s been awhile.”)

“Do you have dimples?”  (“I don’t smile in mirrors.”)

“Are your earlobes attached or detached?”  (“What kind of question is that?”)

And so forth.

He also gives you so many fucking opportunities to look.  One right after the other.  You used to think Din was incredibly trusting with how often and voluntarily he decided to take his helmet off around you—he didn’t wait a single day once he first felt your hands on his skin to take it off in your presence.  You remember being blown away by his unexpected willingness to part with it after hearing so many tales of the Mandalorians from Kuill; stunned by the ever-present ability to just open your eyes at any moment and that’s all it would ever take.  One simple movement—life-altering, and so easy.

Now you find it nearly impossible, muscle memory just won’t allow it to happen naturally.  And yet somehow, avoiding it is like stepping around land mines.  He doesn’t trick you—he doesn’t set it up, he doesn’t surprise you or anything, but he’s… less careful.  When the kid is awake, Din acts normal—he walks around fully armored, he goes on hunts and returns a few days later with a quarry, teaches you more self-defense techniques in the cleared out hull while the kid watches and giggles at your pain from the safety of his floating crib.  But when the baby goes to sleep, he’s taken to lounging with the helmet off.  He only used to remove it to eat, sleep, or… do other things with you, but he never used to take it off just… because.  Now he does.  Now he’s less careful about darkness, less strict about how much light he allows to touch him.

Now he shares every single meal he can with you, sitting just off to the side so you’ll never see him on accident but providing the free exercise thereof should you ever decide to seek it out purposefully.  Now he interrupts you in the middle of your complaining about the bruises on your knuckles just to lift the rim of his helmet the slightest bit, lean down and give you a quick kiss, and then lower it back into position again before you can even catch a glimpse of the lips you only recognize by touch.  Now he keeps the light on when he goes to take a shower, he leaves the door cracked.

It’s starting to give you heart palpitations, you swear.  At one point, he lets you to see the entire back of his head and it nearly launches you into a fucking crisis.

It’s the middle of the night and he just got up from bed to use the restroom.  He’s quiet enough not to wake you on the way over, but then across the hull and with his back to you, Din flicks the light on in the small bathroom without closing the door.  Immediately rousing you after being so accustomed to the pitch blackness, you lift your head from the warmth of your shared pillow just enough to blearily make out the sight of him leaning a hand up against the wall and dropping his head down, and it takes you a second to realize that it’s actually him.

Soft, dark brown locks ending at his collar but somehow looking longer than you ever imagined when you’ve run your fingers through them.  Cascading in shaggy, natural curls—tall, broad shouldered and trim waisted, naked as the day he was born.  Your heart starts to squeeze in your chest and it just never stops, and for the second time in your life, you feel like he woke you up in the middle of the night just to show you one of the most beautiful things the universe ever decided to hide.  There are trillions of people in this galaxy and how many of them have ever seen a sight that would compare?  He’s just a man, you don’t think a single person would bat an eye.  But to you, he’s… his own monument.  Constructed in honor of everything dazzling that happens to lie just underneath something else.  A breathtaking view, even from this angle, that could only ever mean something to you.

Would you ever be able to know him?  No, that’s not phrased right.  What you mean is that… over the course of all your time together, you remember thinking that if he ever took his helmet off, he could walk right by you and you’d never be able to tell the difference.  He could be anybody.  There are trillions of people in this galaxy and how many of them have the same features?  Brown hair, brown eyes, sunkissed skin that only one person is allowed to kiss, not even the sun.  Would you ever be able to know him?

Staring at his back in the blissful silence of hyperspace and feeling like the Maker himself is letting you in on one of his proudest secrets, some wild thought suddenly occurs to you that… you think you would.  Somehow.

You can’t explain it and you’d never be able to prove it, but you feel like if you lined up every single person in this galaxy shoulder to shoulder, all however many trillions of them there are, then you could walk the entire length of it and somehow come to a stop right where he’s standing.  Every single time.  You feel like you could do it in the pitch black.  You could do it with your eyes closed.

And, he must just be so gorgeous.  Maybe not in a traditional sense (or maybe in one, you’d have no way of knowing), but mostly in just… the rawest sense imaginable.  Not like how symmetry and straight lines are gorgeous, but how a mountain is gorgeous.  Rocky, dangerous, steep, the product of constant conflict between two immovable sides.  He’s got scars littering his body, one of which you remember giving him yourself with a cauterizer on his lower back.  He holds himself like his shoulders could tell their own story if anyone ever asked them; built to endure, weighed down and made strong with a collection of burdens he chooses to strap to them, steel or otherwise.

You don’t want to close your eyes once Din slowly turns around to look at you, but it happens anyways and you’ve never been so disappointed in your own cowardice.

But then, in a way, it could just be your own self-preservation instincts taking over.  No matter how stunning and life changing the spectacle would be, why would anyone ever stare directly at a supernova?  For so long, you’ve told yourself that his face is something you shouldn’t ever see on principle, but in a way, you suppose it’s fair he put this decision on you because he always has, even from the very beginning.  He trusted you to keep your eyes closed for months on end and you never had a problem with it, so why is it so hard to open them now that he’s given you permission?

A couple weeks of that, and you start to worry that you’re unintentionally rejecting him.

It’s the last fucking thing you want, but how can you avoid it?  Din is… different, he notices.  He’s made a living off of finding things that inherently don’t want to be found—he knows all too well what secrecy looks and sounds like, he’s quick and observant and you don’t stand a single fucking chance against him in all the years of his practice.

But strangely, for as often as you feel like you can figure out what he’s thinking without ever seeing his face—realizing what his intentions are ahead of time and not feeling slighted when he phrases things a certain way or just chooses not to speak at all—you never truly realized how much that extended back to you.

He knows you, too.  He told you so.

For some reason, you didn’t even consider the possibility of it working just as well the other way around.  That you could choose to stay silent, and he’d know why.  You feel like the mystery of him just eclipses you in every single way that you don’t consider even yourself much of anything, much less something else to be contemplated and understood.  While you wouldn’t necessarily qualify the conflict as not being ready to commit, he seems more than willing to respect it regardless and nothing about the way he treats you or interacts with you changes.  Normally you’d say it’s like he forgot the whole thing ever happened, but it’s almost the exact opposite.  Like he was just naturally expecting it from you.

Are you truly so predictable, you wonder?  He said you’d say no.  Was he right?  You’re not saying no, you just… can’t remember the word for yes right now.  It’s right there on the tip of your tongue and the harder you work for it, the more frustrated you become with your own inability to find it.

But, instead of waiting, you think Din just decides to continue the conversation with the promise to come back to you when you finally figure it out.

Sometimes, especially when he’s gone, you find yourself thinking about what moment you’d choose, if you could.  Since you can never seem to find the right one naturally, how would it all go if you could construct everything yourself?  Where would it be?  Naboo?  No, that’s too cheesy.  One thing you and Din both have in common is your practicality, your respective propensities for wanting to tackle one thing at a time and not needing frills attached to something in order to find a deep connection to it, a personal value to it.  You weren’t even bothered when he didn’t claim you as a girlfriend to Peli, that’s how reasonable you used to be about labels.  Now you’re your own antithesis, trying to conjure meaning where there isn’t any just so you don’t feel like you’re the one who’s ripping it away.  You want this decision to feel as permanent as it is.  You want it to be a happy thing, something that happens when you’re both so in love that you can’t bear to have metal separating you any longer.

You think… you’ll just know it when the time comes.

***

“I have to leave,” comes Din’s hushed voice through the darkness, and even though it’s the first thing either of you have said in hours, it sounds frustrated.  Like it’s been bothering him for awhile and he’s just now finally telling you.  “I… fuck, I can’t stay here, I should’ve left a long time ago.”

You whine softly into the pitch black, turning your head into the pillow and curling your fingers into his hair.  “But it’s still so early…”

“It’s mid-afternoon,” he groans back, dropping his forehead down against your skin and breathing hot air along it.  “We’ve been parked here for hours, I don’t know how you can sleep so long.”

“I’m not sleeping,” you pout, before gently dragging your nails down his scalp and feeling his whole body shudder with it.  “Earlier I was.”

“Mhm,” he murmurs, leaning down to give you one last long, slow kiss.  You sigh when his tongue comes out and glides soft and hot against your lips, tightening your grip on his hair.

But soon he pulls away, lifting the covers from over his head and pushing up from between your spread legs.  “This one shouldn’t take long,” he gruffs, planting both palms next to your head and kissing you once more in the darkness, dipping his tongue into your mouth this time.  You moan softly and taste yourself on him, moving to wrap your arms around his broad shoulders, but he breaks the kiss and leans back before you can, preemptively avoiding the possibility of getting lost in it.  “I’ll be back around dawn.”

You’ve known it was coming for hours now, so you’re able to play it off way better this time around.  “Okay,” you breathe softly, dragging your palms up his bare chest as he lifts himself tall over your body.  The slight disappointment underneath is so masterfully hidden, you’re almost positive you’re going to get away with it.  “Be safe.  Please.”

But then… well.  Bounty hunter.

Din pauses for a moment like that in between your open legs, letting you slowly slide your hands down his ribs and over the lines of his stomach.  You wait for him to move, find his clothes so you can get around and make some food, wake the kid up from his nap in an hour or so.  Can’t stay in bed all day, no matter how much you wish you could.

Only, he still hasn’t moved and you start to become concerned.  “Din?”

But then he suddenly groans like he just can’t help it, grabbing both of your spread legs and easily lifting them up.  You make a sound of confusion as he maneuvers them until they’re pressed together and draped over one of his shoulders, and then his hips drop and push forward to slide himself thick and perfect into your blazing hot cunt.

Still drenched and swollen from cumming in his mouth so many times earlier, you gasp and he just groans louder, a ragged thing scraping out of his throat while you struggle through blind and unexpected euphoria to reach him.  But you can’t—Din hugs your legs tight to his chest and settles in just like this, turning his head to drag soft lips and a hot tongue over your ankle before he starts fucking you.  Right up against your g-spot, with your whole lower body in the way and preventing you from slowing him down.

You just have to clap both hands over your mouth just to keep quiet since you can’t reach him.  You feel his teeth sink into the meat of your calf, hips pistoning far beyond your reach and it feels so fucking good that you almost don’t hear his gritted words against your skin.

“I have to go,” he groans, repeating it over and over until his voice begins to pull tight and it just sounds like a plea.  “I have to go, I have to go, I h—have to… h-have to go, I have to, I have to, I have…”

*** 

When Din finally steps foot out of the ship, fumbling with his rifle and cursing quietly through the modulator, it’s the middle of the night some twelve hours later.

***

Steady…

Steady………

Fire.

—and… you blink as bark splinters.

Did you…?  You look down at the blaster in your hand and then back to the ginormous charred tree trunk for a few seconds, wondering if you’re just seeing shit.

No, it’s real.  You actually fucking did it.  You…

… hit the target.

All of a sudden, your ecstatic giggle echoes loudly throughout the foresty autumn wonderland around you, reds and oranges and yellows crunching under your feet while you start to dance.

“Hey!  See that, bug!?”  You call out, shoving the blaster into your waistband and shimmying up to your enthralled audience of one, who just so happens to be smiling as wide as you are as he’s scooped up into your arms.  “I hit the target, I hit the target,” you sing, beginning to sway the baby back and forth as he squeals, laughing while you bounce him.  “No demon powers necessary, little man!  I figured it out, I just have to use one hand instead of two.  You can retire now, you’re the right age for—”

A twig snaps in the distance somewhere to your left, and you quickly spin around while reaching for the blaster behind your back.

Except all you see is a blue Twi’lek standing out amongst all the fall foliage, his hands cuffed behind his back and stumbling a few steps at a time while a considerably taller suit of beskar shoves him forward.  You relax and immediately turn to look down at the ground, trying to bite your lip so you don’t smile too hard while they both approach.  You did it—finally, you did it, you’re on top of the fucking universe right now.

You wait for them to pass by and move up the open metal ramp to the carbonite chamber, but then Din apparently decides to pause when he’s directly behind you, yanking the quarry to a sudden halt.  

You know you should probably turn around to address them, but you can’t hide the happiness from your expression, it’s way too obvious.  Though, after a moment, you decide to shyly turn to face the two men while continuing to bounce the baby in your arms, hoping that his and your matching expressions of excitement aren’t too terribly inappropriate right now.

Din looks from you to the splintered bark on the tree, and then back to you again, before slowly tilting the helmet up in a way that feels… proud of you.

“Congratulations,” he finally says, and you can hear the genuine smile hidden in the modulated drawl.

“Thank you,” you beam up at him, feeling the blood rush to your cheeks.  “Was pretty awesome.”

“I’m sorry I missed it,” he tells you, and you don’t know why, but the tone of his voice makes you go so warm.  It’s not like he’s openly flirting with you, but coupled with your giddiness and sounding like that in front of a bounty he caught in record time, it just makes your heart fucking throb for him.

“It’s alright,” you murmur, shuffling your feet through the crunchy leaves below and trying to play it as cool as possible.  You have company.  “I’ll be able to do it again.”

“Let’s see it, then.”  He tips the helmet over at the tree, and you look between him and the unfamiliar quarry for a second, not used to Din just… ignoring their existence entirely for you.  It’s not like the Twi’lek has said anything or inserted himself into the situation at all, but still.  Din has one hand latched onto the cuffs behind his back to prevent him from booking it, but other than that, it’s like he’s pretending he’s not even there.

“Uh…”  You immediately feel yourself get nervous.  “I can… try.”

He nods one single time in silent encouragement, and you slowly turn to face the tree once more.  The kid stays cradled in your arm while you reach for the blaster in your waistband, removing it and using your longest finger to flick the safety off with a practiced fluidity.  Then, extending it out in front of you and taking advantage of your newfound strategy of only firing with one hand, you line up the sight and pull the trigger.

You wish you could say it hits.  It would be so fucking cool and impressive if you hit the target like that, wouldn’t it?  But it doesn’t hit.  It misses, like usual.  Miserably.  And then an amused snort comes from behind you.

“Right stormtrooper, you are—” you hear an unfamiliar accent begin to snark, but the rest of it turns into a garbled howl the second Din jerks his elbow back to slam it in his face.

You whip around just in time to see a cascade of blood pouring down blue lips and sharp teeth—holy fuck.  You gasp and take a step backwards with the kid, not horrified by the sudden display of violence (not after Din spent an hour teaching you how to do that, too) but not quite expecting it at that moment, either.  But then, well… that’s the second time he broke a quarry’s nose for addressing you with disrespect.  There was that other one he choked, you’re pretty sure—though you can’t remember exactly what initiated that.

Din yanks the bounty up the ramp without another word, leaving both you and the kid there to process while he shoves him through the hull and towards the carbonite chamber none too kindly.  However, by the time he seals the quarry to his fate and eventually makes his way back to you, you just… 

Fuck, you feel so stupid.

You shouldn’t even bother, what’s the point?  All that practice and nothing to show for it.  If you can’t even hit a stationary target with the pressure of others watching, what makes you think you’ll have any hope at all in a situation where you actually need to shoot?  Are they gonna stand still for you?  Are they gonna be as wide as a fucking treetrunk?  You’re horribly embarrassed, so downtrodden in the face of a cruel taunt that you don’t even want to look at Din when he steps in front of you.

“Hey, just try it again,” he says without delay, but the damage has already been done.  It’s not his fault, you’re just… not the kind of person who is meant to shoot a blaster, maybe.  

“Ah… it’s alright,” you look out and smile sadly at the line of trees surrounding you, wondering how it’s possible that you only managed to hit one of them this whole time.  You don’t see it, but Din quickly touches the tips of his fingers to the side of his helmet twice before you look back at him.  “I hit it earlier.  I did, I promise.  You can see the mark if you look.”

His glove reaches out to brush your hair back, so unbelievably gentle after using the same arm to shatter bone just a few minutes ago.  “I know you did.  It was a perfect shot, you hit dead center.  I see it.”

“I did it with one hand, that’s why I tried the thing,” you mumble stupidly, looking down at your feet.  Dumb.  Dumb.

A strand of your hair is tucked behind your ear.  “Wish I was here.”

You glance over at him, feeling your expression suddenly go soft with a wave of affection.  It stops all the harsh criticisms, halting your negativity in its tracks and replacing it with just… soft, abstract things.  Mostly just warm, nonsensical fluff, but one clear and resounding thought breaking through.  You wish he was here, too.

“Maybe I’ll get good at it eventually,” you sigh, slowly handing him the blaster with the barrel pointed down and away from both of you.  Din carefully takes it from you, tucking it away somewhere on his utility belt while you gaze out at the designated target and victorious char mark decorating it.  “Or hopefully just okay at it at some point.  I guess I just need to practice more, right?”

“That’s right,” he tells you warmly, catching your free wrist.  “Try using this one when you do.”  And then a lightweight piece of metal is gently pushed into your empty hand.

Your expression furrows while you quickly look down at it, and—

You go utterly still at the gift, not even knowing what to think.

The first thing that you notice is the craftsmanship.  Brilliant, structurally flawless, the perfect size to fit your hand.  You don’t recognize the specific kind of metal that was used—definitely not beskar—but you think it might be constructed from the same material as Din’s old armor.  Dull silver, but with reflective chrome filigree accents around the handle, trigger, and safety.  It’s uniquely constructed and unlike any weapon you’ve ever seen before—no hard lines or edges, just a soft fluidity to the design that’s so aesthetically pleasing, it doesn’t really even resemble a blaster at all.

You can feel the visor silently studying your reaction while you continue marveling, noticing something new every time you look.  The safety is towards the back of the chamber, just like he said it’d be.  The sight is electronic, and you examine the way it’s built directly into the barrel.

Are those extra magnets on the inside?  Is this able to micro-adjust the plasma release for the best shot?  Holy stars, it must have cost a fortune.

“Din, this is…” you can’t decide where you want to look—the gorgeous crafting, the custom design, or him.  Standing so close to you, not saying a word while you search for the right ones.  “It’s so beautiful, I…”

“Was made for you,” he murmurs.  “Had to be.”

You look back down at the blaster to stop your eyes from tearing up.  He didn’t have to do this.  This is so… sweet, such a lovely thing to do.  Don’t cry, don’t cry—

“What is this?” You ask breathlessly instead, rotating the gun until he can see the symbol branded on the handle.  You recognize that it’s his signet, but you never bothered to ask him what it’s called, you never saw it as your place.  It’s an animal of some sort, one with a giant spike attached to its skull, and you’re glad you’ve never come face to face with one.

“It’s a mudhorn,” he answers quietly.  “They’re… dangerous animals.  Fiercely protective, preferring solitude.  The kid saved me from one a few days after I met him.  It’s… the mark of my clan.”

How fitting, you think, and an honor.  Perfect for him, and a bone-deep reminder of your two favorite people in the galaxy on your hip wherever you go.

“Thank you,” you tell him, hoping the sincerity in your voice sounds anywhere close to how you feel.  You haven’t even had it in your hand for longer than a minute and it’s already your prized position, the most important thing you’ve ever called yours.

Din nods and takes a small step back.  “Now hit the target.”

Feeling invigorated and renewed in every single way, you keep the kid tucked firmly in one arm while raising your blaster with the other.  The safety clicks off and your back straightens, chin lifting until something about the angle feels… right.  The trigger moves easily under your fingertip, and there’s almost no kickback considering how light the weapon is.  What you’re not expecting is the pure white beam of plasma shooting out of the barrel—unlike any blaster you’ve ever seen before—but then the immediate sight of it hitting the tree dead center sends a roar of triumph through your ears.  Fuck yes.

“Look at that!”  Din calls out over the kid’s happy squeal, and there’s nothing you can do to stop your loud whoop of victory.  Even though you know it only hit with the addition of those extra magnets to correct your terrible aim, that still feels so good—you feel so fucking powerful and dangerous.  You glance over to Din with a wide smile, but then his arm extends out towards the trunk directly next to the one with charred bark.  “Hit that one.”

You automatically swing the blaster in that direction and shoot.  A few pieces of wood split on impact and send sharp bits flying as soon as the bright white beam collides with it.

“That one,” Din tells you, and then bark splinters a half second later.  “That one.”  Bark splinters.  “That one, that one, that one—” hit, hit, hit, white plasma flying through the air and bark splintering in rapid succession.

He stops and spins around, pointing to a tree at the very edge of the clearing.  “That one?”

It’s furthest away but the trunk’s diameter is enormous.  As you lift the blaster, you know you’re likely to get it easily with this sophisticated weapon, even across the considerable distance.  So instead, feeling like nothing at all can touch you right now and wanting to see how smart the aim mechanism is, you raise up a few degrees higher before pulling the trigger.  Pale plasma launches from the barrel, and then one of the tree’s most prominent branches comes creaking and crashing to the ground right where you split it.

You’re beaming by the time Din turns back to you, the most excited you’ve ever been with your own progress.  He holds there for a moment while you lower your blaster and wait for him to speak, both of you looking at each other and not moving, until suddenly you hear his voice coming back to you.

Hit the target and I’ll marry you.

One of Din’s hands slowly comes up to the edge of his helmet, but before you can even process the implication behind the gesture, you’re immediately looking down at the crunchy leaves under your feet and clearing your throat.

There’s a beat of silence where you stare down at the dead foliage and wonder why the fuck you just did that.  Right in front of him, right to his face, too startled at how quickly you were being confronted with the possibility that you responded in an equally startled way.  It was instinctual, automatic and entirely out of your control, but that doesn’t mean you don’t want to take it back.

But… you can’t take it back.  That’s the way things are, and after a few moments, you hear his boots begin to cross the distance to you.

“Come on,” Din murmurs gently through the modulator, carefully taking the blaster from your hand and clicking the safety back on again.  “We have to get going.  The fifth quarry is far.  Three day trip through hyperspace.”

He doesn’t sound upset or disappointed by your unintentional rejection, thank the Maker.  You want to explain yourself somehow, but it appears it isn’t necessary in the slightest.  His arm wraps around your lower back and he leads both you and the baby back up the open ramp of the Crest, squeezing you close enough to his side that you have to learn how to walk in a different way to stop yourself from tripping over his boots.

The helmet turns and presses to the top of your head while you focus on moving straight.  “Proud of you,” Din murmurs quietly, and your chest fills with enough air that you’d be worried about floating away if he wasn’t latched onto you so tightly.

He eventually releases you and walks over to the armory, pressing a button to unlock the doors while you hold the kid and watch him start to remove the multitude of weapons strapped to his body.

Maybe… maybe this isn’t the right time, but something brave surges up inside you.  After receiving the most precious gift imaginable from him, hitting all those targets and hearing him say that he’s proud of you, you’re buzzing with just enough energy that for better or worse, it makes you open your mouth and ask.

“Could I… come with you this time?”

Din nearly jerks upright and looks over at you immediately, but he takes a while in responding.  You hope he sees it in your eyes.  You hope he sees just how much you don’t want to be stuck here again when this is possibly the one time you’d be able to tag along.  It’s a bullshit quarry, one he could do in his sleep, and you’ve been getting increasingly restless while stuck on this ship.

When Din eventually does respond… well, judging from his shift in tone, you’re assuming he was just shocked at the question and didn’t take any of that time to actually consider his answer.

“No.”  Short.  Unfeeling, and not sorry about it in the slightest, before turning back to return the blasters you were using previously to the armory as if you said nothing at all.

Okay…  Um.  Not great, not what you wanted to hear, but maybe if you explain yourself better, he’ll listen.

“I just… I’m the only reason you have to get this quarry in the first place.”  Your voice is quiet, trying to let go of some of the concerns you’ve kept to yourself over the past two weeks.  Your fingers fiddle idly with the kid’s little woolen sack as he hangs out in your arms, wanting to plead your case but feeling slightly nervous now.  “You were out having a crazy expensive blaster made for me while I shook hands with Karga and agreed that you’d take more work for less pay.  I hate that I did that.”

“You had no choice,” Din mutters, turning around and striding past you while pressing a button on his vambrace to close the Crest’s ramp.  “My fault for being late.”  And… for as warm and comforting as his voice sounded earlier, it now just sounds… dismissive.  Aloof.  Half-listening, not really wanting to talk but forcing himself to.

“Well this time, I thought maybe… I might be able to help?  Maybe?”  Maker, you feel yourself going quieter the more he walks around the hull and ignores you.  “Karga said it was just a missing person, not even a criminal…”

“Karga says a lot of things,” he grunts with his back to you, voice completely monotone through the modulator.

Come on, speak up.  You’ve lacked a backbone for so long, you’ll never get what you want unless you say it out loud and let it be known.  You take a deep breath and straighten your shoulders, trying to put a little bit of spine into it.  “I can be useful.  I can fight now, I’ve been working on my—” 

“You think I’m telling you no because I don’t think you’re capable?”  He suddenly whips around, voice ringing sharp and challenging throughout the hull while you freeze.  You don’t move but everything about you suddenly feels like it shrinks.

“I-I didn’t—” But he cuts you off, taking a step forward.

“I know you can fight, a Mandalorian taught you how.  I know you’re useful, I know it’s just a missing person, and I know you hate it when I leave.”  He pins you with his eyes through the visor, his tone harder than you think you’ve ever heard it before.  “No.  Your job is to stay here, on this ship, with my son, where it is safe, and my job is to go get the quarry.  Quit asking.  I’m not telling you again.”

The baby makes a tiny little distressed sound in your arms and you blink a few times up at the cold metal, feeling all the good feelings from before just… drain out of you.

Okay, that’s fine.  Uh.  You… the cockpit is behind you, you’ll go up there and fly then.  No reason, just… he should get going.

“Okay, yeah,” you nod and tell the wall over his shoulder brace in immediate agreement, before abruptly spinning around and grabbing the ladder.  Din doesn’t move a single fucking muscle while you try to find your way up to the cockpit with the baby held to your chest and a dead stone sitting heavy inside of it, hoping your face doesn’t show the vulnerability you feel wanting to take over as you retreat.  Get to the cockpit first, get to the cockpit first, get to the—

“Sweet girl, I…” you barely hear murmured through the helmet from the floor, soft enough to sound slightly shocked, but you scramble into the cockpit and shut the door behind you before he can say anything else.

***

Silence didn't used to feel like this.

At first it was eerie, unnatural and stifling when you spent years in a wide open desert, wind swirling and dust pelting.  It suffocated you the first few times you jumped into hyperspace, a phenomena you read all about and considered mathematically fascinating before ever experiencing for yourself.  It was… foreign and strange, but you began to value it more and more as time passed.

Then, you started to get to know him and silence just became comforting.  Something you could bask in, knowing it was a comfort to him.  A choice he made because it just fit him best.  You felt safe in it, you felt like you didn’t have to be anything else but you.  You never had to break it just to avoid awkwardness, you became… closer to it, until you learned to fall in love with it.

But only when he was with you and it was his silence.  Not… everything else’s.  Now it’s haunting again.  Now the sheer lack of sound through hyperspace is a stranger to you, and the distortion of light surrounding the cockpit feels less about the sheer magnificence of manipulating space time and more about the fundamental disconnect it causes.  Gorgeous, but at its core, a severance.  Ripping the fabric of the universe apart, tearing a wound in it.

It’s been a few hours and nothing exceptional has happened since your conversation in the hull.  

You’ll admit that you’re a sensitive person, and because of that, you’ve always had a problem knowing if you were right or wrong when someone comes at you with a hard enough will.  You second-guess yourself, it’s one of your worst traits, and you feel like trying to squash that tendency without knowing the limit is partially to blame for why you’re holed up in this cockpit with the kid.  You’re quiet but in a different way from Din.  When he doesn’t speak, it’s because most of the time, he’s sure of himself and doesn’t need to.  When you don’t speak, it’s because most of the time, you’re insecure and don’t want to.

After being left alone with your thoughts for this long, you’re starting to realize that… he was right.  What were you thinking, wanting to tag along?  Wanting to hang out while he risks his life for this occupation, you probably sounded so fucking ignorant.  Maybe… maybe he didn’t have to say it like that, but his point is still very valid and you’re not sure if you’re really justified in hiding like this anymore.

The way he said… your job, though.  That still stings a bit.  This hasn’t felt like an actual job in a very long time.  Was that just an expression, or did he mean it literally?  You’re stuck on it, you’ve just been going over this for hours in your head, trying to figure out if you should be the one to apologize or not—or if this is just you overreacting from the start and no apologies will be necessary at all.

“Sorry you got stuck with me, kid,” you mutter sadly to the baby, watching him fiddle with his favorite metal ball in your lap.  He makes a little gurgle, purring in that weirdly adorable little way of his and it somehow feels like a reassurance directed to you that he’s just fine the way he is.

Maker, you haven’t heard anything from the hull in a fucking eternity; it’s like Din turned into a ghost, hasn’t even made a single footstep that you could hear since you last left him standing there.  You remember performing a quick flight check as soon as you got up here, lifting off as fast as you could and hoping the thrusters would rumble loud enough to cover your series of pitifully shallow sniffles at being yelled at unexpectedly by a very large and intimidating man, not really crying but not really able to breathe normal either.  The little monster was able to wiggle himself around in your lap as you were trying to punch in the correct coordinates for the fifth quarry with rapidly blinking, watery eyes, and then proceeded to give your belly the smallest hug you think you’ve ever been given and pretty much break your heart with it.

Lovely little boy, so sweet when he wants to be.  He’s sat with you this whole time, he even tried giving you his metal ball to play with but ultimately decided to keep it to himself when he realized you aren’t nearly as fascinated by it as he is.  You know it’s probably getting late for him, and you’ve been weighing the idea of handing him over to his father so he can at least get a good night’s sleep somewhere that isn’t your arms.  There’s no blankets in here, just your lap.

“I think I gotta go take you to your dad soon, tiny.  He’s probably missing you,” you tell him, trying to keep quiet enough that you won’t disturb Din in the hull.  There’s a good chance he’s already asleep.  “I think… he might still be mad at me.  Maybe you can give him the big eyes, soften him up a little?”

Right on cue, his enormous eyes start to droop closed, and you let out a tired sigh of exasperation.  That’s not gonna work, come on.  They gotta be open, booger.

You watch him slowly drift to sleep, his ears relaxing until they too start to droop, but when you try to take the ball from him and set it down on the console, his eyes immediately pop back open and the toy slips from your fingertips.  It levitates right back into his tiny hands as you watch, and then he closes his eyes once more while tightly cuddling the thing he loves most to his body.

Unbelievable.

He’s a child, and yet he’s…

“How are you so strong?”  You ask him, unable to even fathom.  “You’re the smallest, most helpless little thing I’ve ever seen and you’ve got such… strength.  You defy the universe for a piece of metal.”

He doesn’t hear you, you think he’s asleep again.  It’s just as well, you figure.  He needs to go sleep in his crib, it’s time.  You scoop him up and make sure the little ball stays tucked snugly in his arms, before finally standing up and stumbling over to the door on numb legs.

Only, when it slides open, you quickly stop short.

Because there, sitting on the floor and resting his helmet against the corner of this small little platform leading to the ladder, is the Mandalorian.

So much closer than you expected him to be.  So big, crammed into such a tiny place.  You didn’t hear his footsteps climbing the ladder, and you would’ve noticed it during the hours you’ve spent in the suffocatingly muted quiet of hyperspace.  He can be silent but not when absolutely nothing else exists and he’s got a thousand fucking pounds of steel weighing him down at any moment in time.  You took off almost immediately once you barricaded yourself inside the cockpit, so has he… did he follow you up in those last few seconds, right after you shut the door?  The ones when you were sniffling like a child and trying desperately to turn the thrusters on before you let the tears come?

His head lifts and his back straightens as you’re looking down at him with his sleeping son cradled in your arms, your eyes slightly redder than they should be.  You’re a mess and… he’s been here this whole time?

“Could you hear me in there?”  You whisper in sudden mortification, but Din just keeps gazing up at you through the impenetrable metal visor.  A complete mystery again.  Unreadable—he could be anyone.

When he doesn’t answer you, your heart twists with the possibility that he’s still upset with you, and you quickly turn to the ladder to figure out the best way to get down without jostling the baby.

“I’m sorry.”  His voice stops you dead in your tracks.  It’s so soft, nearly flipping in and out of the modulator from the lack of volume, the most cautious sounding thing you’ve ever heard coming through the filter.  “I… hurt your feelings.  I’m sorry.”

And…  Maker, if anybody else had said it.  If literally anybody else had said it, you know it would’ve sounded like the most sarcastic, dickish remark in such a delicate moment.  But, you also remember him telling you once that you were tenderhearted.  That the galaxy would never be as kind to you as you are to it.  This… comes out sounding like he’s trying to change that.

It comes out sounding like he’s trying to use his voice to hold you because he doesn’t think you want to be touched right now.  Like… like he’s doing everything he can to be as careful as possible here because you think he might be attempting to do something he’s never done before.  Apologize for saying something he didn’t mean.

“You don’t have to,” you quickly tell him.  He’s not good with words and apologies are difficult enough to phrase for normal people, you don’t want him to fret over it if that’s what this is.  “It’s okay, I know you’re not… you don’t have to.  It was stupid of me to ask.”

“It wasn’t,” he instantly counters, his voice finally seeming to find the floor when it was just hovering before.  Not loud—still gentle, still making sure the kid doesn’t wake up and you’re not frightened away, but a bit more grounded this time.  “It wasn’t… what I wanted to hear, and I didn’t take it well.  Not stupid.”

“It was stupid,” you return amicably, looking down at your feet.  “That’s not my… job, like you said.”

Din suddenly hangs his helmet down to his chest, pressing his gloves to the part that curves over his forehead and rubbing it.  “Shit.  I didn’t mean—”

“You were right,” you acknowledge, having spent the past few hours coming to the understanding that it’s the hard truth and he just phrased it poorly.  “I’m not… built for it, I’d only get in your way.  I barely just managed to shoot stationary targets with a blaster today, and that’s only with that aim corrector built into the barrel.  I’m here to be helpful, not—”

“What are you saying?”  He suddenly lifts the beskar to study you, sounding genuinely confused.  “What aim corrector?”

That… makes you pause.

“The, uh…”  Now you’re confused.  “The one that adjusts the plasma release on the gun you gave me.”

He doesn’t move an inch or say a single thing to you in response and you awkwardly shuffle your feet for a second, everything so quiet that you can hear every little snore that goes in and out of the kid’s tiny button nose.

You blink at him after way too long of that, not knowing why he still hasn’t said anything.  “There’s an electronic sight and like a bazillion extra magnets packed into the barrel, Din, what else could—”

“Sweet girl, that’s… that’s for the Philithiorium,” Din breathes out, like he’s absolutely blown away by you right now.  “That gas is less stable than normal canisters, it takes more magnets to focus the white beam without overheating the metal.”

You stare at him, not truly processing.  He’s saying that… you made all those shots today without any help at all?  By yourself?

Your eyebrows furrow and you blink a few times, but then his slow, heavy sigh echoes throughout the metal walls with disappointment… and you don’t think it’s directed towards you.

“You’re just… always so unsure of yourself.”  He sounds genuinely distraught as his helmet tips down to look at the ground.  “I made that worse today.”

“It doesn’t matter,” you quickly shake your head, your chest already beginning to loosen slightly by just being around him, hearing his voice, seeing the metal glint under the fluorescent light overhead when he’s in such a vulnerable position on the floor.  “It’s okay, let’s just… pretend neither of us said anything at all, okay?”

“Is that what you really want?”  He asks you after a moment of quiet, and for some reason, you hear something in your mind tell you that his arms look so nice right now, don’t they?  You could fit right there, perfect and safe again.

“Yeah, it’s fine,” you smile at him, feeling a bit of the ache trapped inside you continue to work itself out little by little.  You’ll be back to normal soon, it’s fine.

“No, I mean… do you really want to come with me?”  Din asks you, the words sounding cautious.  Confused, like he truly never expected the proposition from you at all.  “Or… do you just not want me to go?”

Oof, what a fucking question.

Why would he ask this?  It’s not pointed; it’s the softest, gentlest inquiry you’ve ever been posed.  Maybe in other circumstances, you’d say that him leaving doesn’t have anything to do with it, but… you’re certain that internally, it absolutely does have at least something to do with it and he was just able to know it before you did.  Which is probably why his sharp words seemed all the more cutting earlier.  It hurt because he said the truth first, verbalized a very deep insecurity you’ve been trying to hide from him and threw it right in your face when shutting you down.

Though, if it worked differently and you were the one who had to be away while he stayed here, you’d like to think you’d handle it way better than how it is now.  At least you’d have a real mission to focus on, new things to see and experiences to have.  You just feel… confined sometimes.

You take a deep breath and figure you’ll use sitting down as an excuse to think for a second.  There’s practically no room but you find it in the back of the cockpit near the doorframe anyways, doing your best to keep the kid level while you slowly lower yourself to the ground near him.  Not touching him, but close.

“I just… I lived my whole life stuck in one spot, wanting to see the galaxy,” you finally admit to him, staring at his chestplate but seeing the helmet tilt slightly in your peripheral.  “Sometimes it’s just… hard to see the galaxy and still be stuck in one spot, I guess.”

“…You want an adventure,” Din proposes quietly, and though there’s not a single hint of mockery in his voice, you suddenly feel like it’s really fucking dumb when he phrases it like that.  What are you, an eight year old?  Wanting to go on an adventure, see things you’ve never seen without any concept for real life?  Credits?  Time?  Resources?

You shrug a shoulder to make it seem like it’s no big deal.  Why is he even entertaining this right now?  “It’s stupid, I kn—”

“Like on Naboo,” he goes on, ignoring your harsh self-criticism, not allowing you the ability to even get it out once he heard the first couple words.  “Going through the forest, seeing that waterfall.  Someplace to find for yourself.  Explore.  Experience.”

You… you want it so badly that you think your eyes might tear up just hearing the words coming out of his mouth when he says them like that.  Like he… just inherently understands.  He knows.

He knows you.  He’s not good with words and yet he found the single most succinct way to put what you thought was a complex yearning without even trying.  You can’t even answer him, he hit the target dead on and you’re left with nothing to say that wouldn’t just be a miserable lie.

“Okay,” Din says after a moment, giving you a small nod.

You’re lost now.  “…Okay?”

“You’re never going on a hunt with me,” he tells you very seriously, no room for arguing.  “Ever.  And not because you can’t handle it, understand?”  He inhales, quickly adding on to his response before you’re able to analyze it the way you want to.  “But if you want an adventure, then… I can try and find a way to give you one.”

Stars.  He’s… too kind.  You somehow feel like it’s more than you deserve.  You were honestly hoping to just shadow him on a hunt, watch him work and stay well out of the way when he needs you to.  Helping if you think you’d be of any help; an extra set of eyes and hands.  You would’ve been fine even if he didn’t apologize for raising his voice at you, he doesn’t have to do this for you.

“Thank you,” you say for the third time today, feeling like each one has somehow multiplied in sincerity.

“It can’t be right now,” he quickly tells you, apologetic but earnest about it.  “I have to find the quarry, and I’m supposed to meet with Karga again in a week.”

You never did let him know about the other part of the deal you made with Karga, you admit.  Four pucks, no hassling, no hard time constraints.  That’s what you shook on, but you just never found a way to bring it up to Din.  Especially since you’ve been so preoccupied with hiding your growing disappointment from him whenever he has to go.

“If…” you pause, wondering the best way to phrase this.  Yikes, this is a toughie.  “Um.  If Karga… I don’t know, hypothetically, if Karga decided to loosen the time constraints back to the way they were before the Corellian bounty, would you… still need to meet with him again in a week?”

You don’t think he even bothers shuffling through all those words.  “Say what you mean.  Please.”

“That was part of the deal I struck with him,” you quickly explain.  “You can hunt on your own timetable again and he’ll keep giving you four pucks like before, no more or less after this one extra quarry.  It’s like a… replacement of sorts, for the one I kept you from getting the time before.  If credits aren’t an issue, you can take more than a week.  But only if you want to, you don’t have to.  It’s just there and you should know, that’s all.”

He takes his time responding, lifting his helmet just the slightest bit in… surprise?  Maybe?

“You never told me you did that,” Din finally murmurs.

“Ah.  Well.”  You look down at the sleeping kid in your arms.  “I didn’t want you to think I was trying to… keep you here.”

It genuinely is a struggle for you, and you think he’s just now realizing that.  As much as you know he gets frustrated with you for always wanting him to be here when he physically can’t be, you think it’s only now that he’s truly realizing the lengths you go to in order to stomp that part of you down whenever you feel it threatening to come up.  You allowed him to leave every single time without telling him he could stay, knowing that all that was left for you was babysitting and target practice for days on end.

“Will you come over here?”  Din finally asks, and the tone of his voice just punches you in the chest.  So soft, so distressed from having you so close yet so far from him and just… full of a quiet hope, like he’s fully expecting you to say no.

“Will we fit?”  You whisper after a moment, even quieter.

He doesn’t answer, he just reaches for you.  You do your best to scoot over to him without waking the kid, and then Din pulls you the rest of the way once he has a grip.  You go right into his arms, laying sideways across his lap and supported by his steel embrace.

Oh, it’s not comfortable but you’ve also never been more fucking comfortable.  One of his knees lifts and allows you to rest your back against it without worrying about falling over sideways and down the ladder to the hull, thank the Maker.  The beskar pauldron over his shoulder digs into your cheek, but Din immediately pushes an arm up to nudge his helmet off and make it better for both of you.  Your face automatically fits into the crook of his neck while he sets the beskar on the bend of his knee, and then he silently cradles you while you do the same to his little boy… who does the same to his favorite metal ball.

“Ni tar’tayl su,” he murmurs into your hair, the one phrase in Mando’a you do recognize, especially with how beautiful and elegant it sounds rolling off his tongue.  “Forgive me.  Ni ceta.”

You sigh your contentment and melt into him, well aware that you’d still be more comfortable in bed.  But when you’re pressed hard against his chest like this and the baby is fast asleep in your arms, you get to feel both of them breathing.  Din’s right lung is probably bigger than the kid’s whole entire body, but you like the radically different cycles they go through.  You think you count six full breaths coming from the brown sack in your palms for every one of Din’s and two of yours.  It creates the most beautiful little symphony that sometimes gets a little off track, but always finds its way back around again.

“How do you say…”  You ask, feeling his hand slowly move down the curve of your spine, mindless and hypnotic.  It catches the edge of your shirt and goes underneath, and even though it’s not his bare hand and there’s no skin to skin, it still feels so good.  Not sexual or sensual even, just… a comfort to you.  “In Mando’a, how do you say… out of a trillion?”

Din’s breaths pause for just a second, his portion of the synchronized rhythm faltering.  Soon it starts back up, and his head turns to press his lips against your hair.

“I don’t think there’s a word for it,” he admits, gently brushing a thumb across the baby’s forehead while he snoozes.  “There could be, but I don’t know it.  I’d use… out of a million million millions.  Dayn alanyc bal alanyc bal alanyci.”

Your eyes begin to drift closed, exhausted from keeping them open after shedding a few tears earlier.  Your first fight and you’re already completely in love with him again after a handful of hours of sulking and one conversation.  How is that possible?  You’re normally a very forgiving person and it wouldn’t have taken much to make you feel better, you just never expected him to… actually want it from you that badly, care enough about it to get on the floor and ask.

Din doesn’t move the entire night through.  You assumed he’d make everyone get up at some point and move to the hull, but he doesn’t.  You fall asleep against his chest, comforted by the silence once again.

***

The next morning, Din quietly climbs into the cockpit while you’re humming in the shower.  You’re too busy basking in the indoor rainfall to feel the ship pull out of hyperspace, and then jump back into it a few moments after.

***

“How long do you think you’ll be this time?”  You ask two days later, sitting on the extended flattop of Din’s old cot and swinging your legs back and forth.  The baby is currently sitting on your lap and trying to roll the metal ball down your knee so you’ll kick it in the air, you think, because he keeps dropping it at different moments and forcing you to stop moving your legs to prevent accidentally denting a wall.  Every time the ball clatters to the floor, he makes a sad sound and it immediately lifts back up into his tiny hands for another try.

Heavy boots clang against the metal floor as Din drops down from the ladder, having just landed the Crest on the surface of whatever planet you’re on.  “I’m not leaving yet.”

“Oh…”  You blink, surprised.  “Okay.”

“I wanted to do some more training with you first, if that’s okay.  You can say no if you want, but maybe not,” Din drawls, striding over to the armory and opening it.  He carefully removes your blaster from the front shelf, speaking with his back to you.  “You’re going to run.”

“Um.”  You take a moment to glance around the enclosed hull, before turning to look back at him with your eyebrows raised.  “What, like… in place?”

Din sighs and closes the armory before leaning back against the doors, rubbing the face of the helmet in exasperation.  “From me, sweet girl.”

Your legs stop swinging, and the baby grumbles and slaps three fingers against your knee.  “What?”

“We’re on Sanctuary II,” he explains, turning to grab his black bag from one of the storage shelves.  He unzips it and reaches back into one of the larger pockets on his utility belt, before grabbing a handful of credits and stuffing them inside.  “It’s a moon, the New Republic occupied it years ago and made it a safe world for refugees and orphans of the Empire.  You’ll have your blaster, some credits, a communicator, and a day head start.  You’re going to run from me.  Show me how much you’ve learned.”

Is… he for real?

Right now?  You don’t even know how to respond, you’re too surprised.  Even when Din approaches and carefully trades the kid for your blaster, setting the bag down next to you on the metal bed, you still haven’t answered him.

“If you want?”  He asks after a moment, and you quickly jerk your head into a nod and jump off the raised platform, almost knocking into him with your sudden excitement.

“Okay!  Fuck yeah,” you grin, but Din shakes his head.

“Rules,” he says seriously, and you quickly do your best to frown, trying to compose your thrilled expression to match his tone.  “One.  This is a safe world, but things can always happen.  You have a blaster now, but it’s for emergencies only.  Do not shoot me with it.  Do you understand?”  You nod, but Din reaches forward to grab your elbow.  “Out loud, please.  For me.”

“I will not shoot you with this blaster,” you vow obediently, carefully cradling the precious firearm in your hands.

“Do not shoot me,” he repeats while pointing a leather finger at you.  “Do not… shoot at me.  Near me.  Around me.  No, just—don’t shoot.  Unless I am… very far away.  Okay?”

Well, he didn’t have to phrase it like that.  You frown, but acquiesce regardless.  “I will only resort to blastering if it’s an emergency and you are not around.”

He nods a thank you for putting it into better words.  “Second rule.  Since you don’t have a ship, I won’t either.  We’re on foot.  I don’t doubt you can hotwire a piece of junk to do what you need it to do, but I’d prefer it if you didn’t.  Good?”

Entirely accurate and entirely fair.  “Good.”

“Three,” he says.  “I’ll have the kid with me, which is both good and bad news for you.  Good news is he’ll slow me down, bad news is I can’t promise he won’t also try to intervene at some point if you’re serious about putting up a decent fight.  What I can promise is that I won’t encourage it.”

“Reassuring,” you nod.  “Also not really a rule.  Please continue.”

“Four.”  He pauses for a second.  “I think I’m wanted by the New Republic.”

You nearly jerk back.  “What?”

“I can’t confirm it and I’m not proud of it,” Din quickly tells you, probably the vaguest possible explanation he could provide.  “I’m only telling you so that you’ll know your advantage and find a way to exploit it.  I can’t be seen by any officers, or they might arrest me.”

Is he fucking serious?  “I don’t want you to be arrested, Din, I—”

“I won’t be,” he assures you.  “They owe me one, I just don’t want to cash in yet.  Trust me.”

You… do.  Insanely, and against every logical thought flittering through your head, you do.  If you were ever going to bet money that someone would be able to navigate a safe world on foot without being caught by the numerous officers scattered across the surface, then you’d put all your credits on Din Djarin.  It… also shouldn’t really surprise you at all that the people seeking his incarceration also owe him a favor, should it?  It actually sounds right on par for him.  “Okay.”

“Fifth, and this one is important, so listen up,” he continues gruffly.  “You check in with me tonight over the e-comm, alright?  I don’t care where you are or how safe this planet is, if you don’t check in, I’ll come find you before the sun rises.  Say you understand me.”

“I understand you,” you tell him, your heart beginning to pound in your chest at the reality of this actually happening.  “I’ll check in tonight.”

“And if,” he goes on, “by some miracle, you manage to make it more than a full day, you check in with me tomorrow night, too.  Say it.”

“I will check in with you every single night for the full five days it’ll take you to find me,” you assert, the adrenaline starting to make you brash and giddy.  

Din tilts his helmet at you sternly.  It is a very, very stern tilt.  “Okay.  New plan, forget everything I just said.”

Your expression furrows.  “What’s the new plan?”

“That is the new plan,” he says, dead serious.  “Us.  Not doing this.”

“Oh, come on,” you grin cheekily up at him, poking his chestplate.  “I’m just giving you some motivation to find me quicker, that’s all.”

Din stares down at you, and… yeesh.  Tough crowd.

“Tell you what,” he finally grunts, sounding incredibly unamused with your jesting.  “If you can last that long with only a day head start, I’ll let you come with me to collect the fifth quarry.  You can even cuff the bastard yourself.”

You know it’s just because he’s rightly confident in his own deadly skill, but hearing him propose the possibility still shoots a thrill down your spine.  “Oh ho, you are gonna regret saying that, shiny,” you beam up at him, starting to hop back and forth on each foot with excitement.

“But if I’m able to find you, you can’t ask me ever again,” he finishes shortly, and you immediately go still in front of him.

“What?”

“If I’m able to find you in five days, I don’t want to hear about you coming with me on a hunt and you can’t ever ask me not to go on one,” Din tells you, his voice rough and gravelly through the modulator.  Not mean or harsh, but firm.  “From now on, it’ll be off-limits.”

You… take a moment, not knowing if you should feel scolded or not.  When you don’t immediately say anything in response, he sighs and turns the helmet away from you.

“Leaving is hard enough as it is,” he mutters, looking at the ground.  “Hearing you ask… makes it impossible.”

You slowly lower your gaze to the floor as well, feeling your heart constrict tight in your chest.  There’s a real pull under his voice, telling you that information even though it sounds like he doesn’t really want to admit it out loud.  It… really is a struggle for him too, then.  You understand.

“Okay,” you nod.  There’s not a single part of you that actually thinks you’ll be able to stay hidden from him for five days while stuck on foot, so this is essentially a given.  You’re not thrilled about the idea, but you’re going to do your best to respect it nonetheless, especially if he cares enough to put off hunting and allow you this experience for yourself.  It’s a better compromise than you ever imagined, and you’ll do everything you can to hold up your side of the bargain.

Din clears his throat and straightens his spine, turning the visor until it faces you head on once more.  “Final rule.  I reserve the right to break any rule we just agreed to, or any fucking rule in this galaxy to keep you safe.  Good?”

Your cheeks flush with heat, your stomach suddenly filling with butterflies.  He doesn’t do that.  Din says what he says or he doesn’t say anything at all, there’s no… taking things back, he’s already breaking his own code.

“What happened to The Way says no take-backs?”  You ask quietly.

“This is my way,” he answers you.  Quick, not even taking a moment to think about it, before pulling out a fancy looking wristwatch thing and clipping it on you himself.  “This is your communicator.  It takes more power than the one you have now but it’ll reach a further distance.  I have one just like it, they’re locked into the same frequency and timesynced together, and the batteries need to be charged every three days.  If you make it that long, I’ll remind you.”  Din grabs the bag while you slide your arm into it, helping you hook it around your shoulder with one hand while he cradles the kid in his other.  Your heart is pounding now, pumping with adrenaline as he pulls you towards the middle of the hull and then wraps an arm around you.

“Hey,” he murmurs, pulling you tight to him and pressing the helmet to the crown of your head.  His voice is barely a whisper through the modulator.  “Gar darasuum.”  For an eternity.

You find some way to wrap your arms around him, even with your blaster in your hand and the kid hanging out in his dad’s other arm.

“Dayn alanyc, bal alanyc, bal alanyci,” you murmur dutifully against the beskar chestplate, knowing your accent is probably butchering the words but hoping they still carry the same sentiment.

And then you’re squeeeeeezed hard enough to get a little air out of you, before you’re let go and he turns around, pressing a button on his vambrace so the ramp begins to lower.

It’s bright outside but not too bright, and everything is warm and gentle and breezy, right in the middle of a lush plain.  You inhale the fresh air into your lungs, looking out across the wide open field, having no fucking clue this is where your day would be leading when you woke up this morning.  Oh Maker, it’s gorgeous here.  Not like Naboo, where every single thing is picturesque and fit for an e-card, but in a soft, understated kind of way.  The sky is a canvas of swirling pastel clouds, pale pinks and yellows and blues, and the communicator on your wrist lets you know that it’s just after noon here.

You take one single step down the ramp, before immediately stopping and turning around to bite your lip at him.

“How am I… how am I supposed to outrun you?”  You ask, already clueless.  “You’re too good, better than me at everything.”

“That’s not true,” Din reminds you sternly, grabbing your hand at your side.  “You already know who’s after you, that’s an advantage nobody else has ever had against me.  You know how I think.  I don’t know how, but sometimes it’s like you can…”  He slowly shakes his head.  “See me.  Through the metal.”

“But… but that works both ways,” you point out, breathless at hearing him say that but needing to focus right now.  “You know me, too—you’ll know exactly where I—”

He shakes his head again, but quickly this time.  “Remember what I told you a long time ago?  What your best weapon is?”

You… do not.  He told you so many things, and you’re assuming every single one of them is going to come into play during this endeavor if you want to outlast.  You’re going to have to think back and remember all of them individually, find the time to figure out your best plan of action based on the remarkably little you know about how he hunts.

“You’re smart, remember?”  Din murmurs, squeezing your fingers.  “Your mind works differently, it sees things in ways I’ll never be able to, not even with this helmet.  So…”  He shrugs a shoulder like it’s the simplest thing in the galaxy.  “Don’t try to outrun, okay?  Just try to outsmart.”

You give him a nod after a moment, still not really sure about it, before giving his hand one last squeeze in return and eventually letting go.  

Outsmart.  Outsmart him, use what you know about him to be the most elusive quarry he’s ever hunted down.

As you make your way down the ramp, you’re already thinking.  His helmet tracks footprints, that’s a thing you know.  You’ll have to find someone to trade shoes with, then—yours aren’t too beat up, maybe you can find a local who’d appreciate a better pair.  Are you going to a city?  Would there be one in walking distance?  The wilderness won’t work, you’ll be too exposed and it would make you an easy target for either him or wild animals.  The weather seems clear here though, and you don’t think you’ll need to worry about rain or snow, but if—

“Oh—but when you do see me,” Din decides to add when your feet finally touch the grass, and you pause once more to turn around and look at him.  He stays quiet for a second, studying you through the helmet for too long.  Like the anticipation is getting to him already.

You bite your lip back at him and adjust the bag on your shoulder, tummy swirling with nerves and excitement.  He tilts the visor up, gazing down at you from the hull with the kid tucked in his arms.

“Try to outrun,” he says gruffly, before turning back into the ship and letting the ramp slowly close behind him.