#i feel bad even giving him fluids tonight since its been making him uncomfortable

[hawkebop]

:(

[seriouslysnape]

To the Limit

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Severus Snape x Fem. Reader

Warnings: Slight smut. Use of safeword. Language.

Request: Hi! Can u make Severus × Reader when the reader use the safe words for the first time because idk maybe it's too much for the reader that day or smth else you like..Thankyouu 💕💕 love ur writings btw ❤❤

A/N: Here we gooooooo. Reminder, everything is consensual.

Word Count: 2,947

“Okay, darling. Whatever you want.”

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Severus has always been flexible in the bedroom. Yes, Severus Snape is versatile in the sheets and has more love making skills than you originally would’ve given him credit for. Sex with Severus can range anywhere from slow and careful where praising your body is his main objective, to fucking you so mercilessly that stars are dotting the back of your eyelids with each hard thrust.

Sometimes, you don’t have to establish what kind of theme your sessions will take on. If Severus comes home angry from a long, obnoxious day then you very well know that a rough fucking will get it out of his system. When you’ve just watched one of your favorite romantic drama Muggle movies that have sent you into tears, he knows that something more unhurried is in order so you are reminded of how much he loves you.

Other times though, there isn’t really anything that determines the kind of sex you’ll be having. If the mood is right for both of you, then you often will just figure it out from there. 

Severus’ return on Friday night from a long week of classes was coated with his desire for you. You could practically feel the hard sexual tension radiating off of his whole being. From the moment he walked in the door, you knew what tonight would hold for the both of you. More than likely, it’d be a whole lot of rutted fucking and orgasms until neither of you had any stamina left to give. Normally, a seed of excitement would be planted and begin to grow in your core at the thought of being touched by him, but you didn’t feel it this time. 

It had been a bad week to put it simply. Work was weighing you down and you had taken more hits than you were used to in a five day time period. Exhaustion had riddled you, and stress has gotten the best of you. Emotional breakdown was the only way you could describe how you were feeling. You really weren’t feeling up to what Severus wanted to do. However, you couldn’t bring yourself to deny him when his hands and lips were on you, moving to all his favorite places on you.

His voice was silky smooth in your ears as he uplifted you with how he had been thinking about you all day, and how he wanted to be with you when you weren’t around. It wasn’t Severus’ fault that you had a bad week, and it surely wasn’t all his fault that he was this turned on. The way he gripped your legs with his strong hands was an indicator that he wanted to go well into the night, which your tired state wasn’t a fan of. But you loved Severus, and you always wanted him to be happy and well pleased. So you figured you could handle a couple of coarse rounds to satisfy him.

Oh, how wrong you were.

Once access was granted, Severus leapt onto you without hesitation. A tornado of clothes being removed whirled around the room, your shirt and pants ended up on complete opposite sides of the room. Hot and unruly kisses were shared, marks were left on your necks, and no part of you went unattended. 

Admittedly, the first orgasm was actually enjoyable. Severus’ fingers were knuckle deep in your needy cunt and pumping vigorously as he found all the best spots. The strenuous activity melted some of the week’s stress from your conscience, your mind being stripped of all your worry as it clouded with ecstasy. Severus thrived off of the moans and noises of delight that he was drawing out of your throat, perfecting his movements to give you an even stronger release. Severus worked you to your finish as you came around his fingers, slicking them with arousal and relief. 

He left lazy kisses over your breasts while you took a moment to recover, preparing yourself for the next round that was undoubtedly on its way. Tiredness had plagued you long before Severus had even walked through the door, and you had suddenly been robbed of even more energy, so you were confident that you might not get a proper orgasm this second time. But the moment Severus slid you onto his dick and stretched your walls the way only he knew how to, you knew that you were going to cum whether you felt like you could handle it or not.

It wasn’t that you didn’t want to. You loved seeing Severus so enraptured in waves of pleasure and gratification, but you were beyond fatigued. Still, you bounced up and down on his lap over and over again, your already sensitive clit throbbing with each rub of his fingers. Severus’ other hand guided your hip movements to meet the way he thrusted up into you, hitting your g-spot just right.

When you came this time, your sound of release was more of a strained cry than a content sound. Severus didn’t seem to notice, since he was too focused on the intoxicating feeling of filling you with his own finish. You popped off of him before he was even emptied out, the rest of his fluids landing on your inner thighs. You fell onto the bed next to him, your breathing much heavier than usual. 

You were totally tuckered out with absolutely no hope of another round. Your muscles ached and your bones were wiped out. Although, you felt a queasy feeling of despair when you saw that familiar look of lust in Severus’ eyes. He spoke lowly, his voice echoing in your ringing ears.

“I’m not through with you yet, love.” He purred.

Usually that would’ve sent a whole mess of arousal through you, but you were too worn out. But Severus usually didn’t last more than three rounds, so this would for sure be the last one. You thought you could push through so he could at least get his release, but this third go round wasn’t a good feeling for you at all.

With your arms above your head and the pillowcase below your head in your fingers’ death grip, you turned your head to the side to fight through his persistent hard fucking into you. On a better day, you’d be all over this and relishing every moment. But now your eyes were screwed tightly shut in discomfort, for each time you opened them Severus would only be able to see the whites of your eyes. The thumping heartbeat in your ears was deafening and your entire body was stiff and rigid, but not in a good way. You wanted to tough it out so at least Severus could finish, but it was just too much for you tonight. 

You had to tap out.

“Polyjuice!” You squeaked out, your voice raspy.

In an instant, you saw any expression of lust wiped straight from his face. He pulled out the millisecond that the word registered in his head, his face stricken with worry and concern at the first time use of your agreed safe word. Severus’ heart dropped at your whimpers of displeasure, his brain reeling and raking over what had gone wrong. 

“[Y/N], what’s wrong? What happened?” He asked frantically.

“I-I just...”

Shaky breaths and uncomfortable whines were the only noises you could seem to make. You sat up from where you were laying down, bringing your knees to your chest and hiding your face as you began to cry. Your emotions were all over the place, and it didn’t help that you were overstimulated and overworked. Severus went to pull you to him, but withdrew his hand. Upsetting you further would absolutely crush him, but he needed to know that you were okay.

“Can I touch you, darling?” He whispered out.

The yowl of approval was enough for him to feel fine with carefully wrapping his hand under your arm and dragging you across the mattress to where he was kneeling on the middle of the bed. He pulled the covers over your skin to keep you from getting cold from the loss of heat from being active. You buried your head into his bare chest, your tears leaking and falling down his skin. 

“I’m sorry, Sev. I’m really sorry.” You sobbed, your hair sticking to your sweaty skin.

“No, no, no. Don’t ever be sorry for telling me to stop when you’re not comfortable,” He reassured; “I didn’t hurt you, did I?” 

The shake of your head brought relief upon him, but he was still worried. He rocked you in his arms until your sobs died down enough to where you were coherent. Severus was getting ready to ask you once more what was wrong, shifting you so he could see your face. When moving you, his hand accidentally brushed against your swollen, sensitive clit and you wailed out pathetically. Severus’ pale face went even whiter.

“Oh, my love...I worked you too hard, didn’t I?” He queried.

Severus would always admit that sometimes he’d get into the zone and completely drown everything else out. He wouldn’t really be able to tell how hard he was pulling in and out. It was rare, but from time to time you’d have to ask him to soften his thrusts or slow his pace when he got too rowdy. But you had never asked him to stop completely until now. He feared that he had seriously pushed you over the edge this time.

“It’s not just that.” You confessed with a sniff.

Severus had drawn your head back to gaze into your bleary eyes. The tear tracks being swiped away with his thumbs as he cradled your face. 

“What is it then, sweetheart?” He asked with wonder.

A fresh set of salty tears pooled and fell down your cheeks, but for a different reason.

“I’ve had a horrible week. Nothing has gone right,” You explained croakily; “I wanted to make you feel good and I thought it might make me feel better...but I’m just exhausted and I couldn’t handle it tonight.”

You fell apart into another set of choking sobs and gut wrenching cries, prompting Severus to bring you back into his chest. He stroked your skin and left kisses so light that they were ghostly. 

“It’s alright, angel. I wish you had told me before that you weren’t feeling up to it,” He consoled; “You’re worth so much more than sex. I want you to tell me sooner next time if you’re uncomfortable.”

Your nod of understanding offered a wash of comfort over him that you were calming down steadily. He hated that this happened. He knew that was the whole reason for your established safe word for when things went south or things got dicey. He just never thought you’d ever have to use it. He felt absolutely terrible. 

“I’m sorry, Sevvy. I really wanted you to get off, I just-”

“Please don’t apologize for this. This is my fault. I should’ve seen how tired you were and how I was being overly hard,” He said; “I’m the one that should be sorry.”

The sniffles from your nose had increased as you tried to flush down all the drainage from your crying. Your tears had stopped as you sat up from his body, wiping at your cheeks with the back of your hand. The red blotches in your puffy eyes were pinging at Severus’ already guilty conscience. He saw the littered hickeys across your neck and breasts, and how your lips were swollen from his severe kisses. He had rocked your burnt out body to the max.

“I’ll tell you what. How about we go get cleaned up, and then we can get into bed. Then you can tell me about your week if so wish.” He suggested, cautiously guiding you off of the bed.

“I think I just want to get a bath and get some sleep.” You said, barely able to stand on your wobbly legs.

“Okay, darling. Whatever you want.” He smiled softly, hoping it’d offer you some kind of solace. 

Severus ran you a hot bath, filling it with all of your favorite scents and smells. Your stance was still despite your shaking legs, and you seemed to be staring off into an endless trance. You slipped into the tub when it was ready, sinking down just below your nose under the bubbles. Normally, Severus would be sitting across from you or you’d be snuggled up on his lap, but he wanted you to have some space for a bit. You were honestly too tired to object. 

He simply casted a charm to freshen himself up, finding and selecting his favorite pair of sweatpants and soft shirt for you to change into. Your eyes were closed, and you had just begun to drift off to sleep when he re-entered the bathroom, changed into some casual day time wear, despite how late it was.

“Here are some clean clothes for you, pretty girl.” He remarked, setting the folded sweats and shirt on the end of the tub for you to get when you got out.

You only gave a light nod as a response, your eyes following him as he stood awkwardly. He was unsure of what to do for you now. He thought that you might want the bedroom to yourself for the night, which was fine because he wouldn’t be able to sleep knowing he had pushed you so hard anyway. He placed himself on the floor by the tub, sitting with his legs criss crossed over one another. It was quiet in the room, the only sounds were the occasional gentle splash when you moved your leg or arm. His eyes were still full of worry, and he was kicking himself big time now.

“I’m so sorry...” He breathed out, running his fingertips dragging leisurely your damp arm that you had resting on the ledge of the bathtub; “I never meant to hurt you.”

“You didn’t hurt me, Sev. I promise.” You responded, wishing he wouldn’t take this so hard.

When it came to you, Severus took everything to heart. There weren’t many things in the world that made his heart beat with a purpose. You were the single person that allowed him to want to get up in the mornings. The thought of hurting you was enough to break him down. If he could have it his way, you would be indescribably happy with every passing moment of every day. He never wanted you to feel anything other than joy. 

But he knew that life would never allow it.

Your eyebrows dipped when you noticed his attire, wondering why he wasn’t in his own sleepwear. It was much too late for him to go anywhere.

“Where are you going?” You questioned, your voice thick with weary.

“I’m going to go back to the school. I have some grading to do.” He half-lied.

It was true that he did indeed have a stack of papers to be assessed, but that wasn’t the real reason why he felt like he wanted to leave. Severus Snape grading on a Friday night when he had the opportunity to be cuddled up with his lover? He’d choose you every time.

Now you felt bad for causing him to scurry off. You wanted him there with you regardless of what had happened.

“Severus,” You called out tenderly, reaching for his face; “I don’t want you to leave.” 

A genuine look of doubt flashed over his features as his head lulled into your hand.

“I think it would be best if you got some good sleep tonight. I’ll just be in my office so if-”

“Stay with me. Please?” You requested, the thought of sleeping without him was disheartening.

A sigh of awe expelled from his chest. He couldn’t say no to your puppy eyes and slightly pouting lower lip.

“Okay, okay.” He agreed.

“I think that some boyfriend snuggles will make me feel a whole lot better.” You spoke rather cheekily.

He hummed affirmatively. The sound of nestling up with you was impossible to turn down. He took your hand from his face and kissed your palm gingerly, holding the warm skin to his lips for a brief moment. He eventually stood from the floor, but stopped when you held your arms up.

“Help me up?” You asked with the first genuine smile of the evening.

He chuckled, obliging and lifting you effortlessly from the tub. The warm towel was heavenly as you dried off, changing into the clothes that Severus had left for you. Severus went and changed as well, laughing to himself when he exited the closet to see you already curled up. 

The sheets draped over him easily when he laid next to you, waiting for you to nuzzle up to him. He held you close and flush to him, thanking his lucky stars that you were okay.

“My sweet girl...” He hushed out, noting that you were just seconds away from falling asleep; “I love you.” 

You mumbled out a sleepy “I love you” in return before drifting into a deep slumber to snooze off the night’s drama. Severus, as expected, didn’t sleep much that night to ensure that you were sleeping soundly and comfortably. He still felt dreadful, even after you had told him over and over that he didn’t hurt you. The weekend to follow was filled with Severus doting and cherishing over you every chance that he had, trying to make up for what had happened. You were the light of his life after all.

And he prayed that he’d never see that flame go out.

[birth-fic-lover]

I’ll birth your baby part 1

As everyone in Fiona’s office packed up for the day one of her work friends asked “any plans for the weekend?”

“The usual” Fiona said, knowing that no one knew what her usual activity was. “Yourself?” 

“My husband is taking me to his mothers, gonna try and convince her to give up her snake collection.”

“Good luck” Fiona said picking up her bag. She headed out the door and back to her home, she checked her phone, her client had requested an 6pm appointment.

As she parked her car she spotted her client, not because they had met before but because she was almost 9 months pregnant. She was stood with her husband, “he must be in on this too” she said to herself as she turned off her engine.

She got out and held out her hand “You must be Amanda”.

“Yes, thank you for fitting us in a bit earlier. Me and the hubby wanted to have one last weekend away” Amanda said.

“Of course, you might as well take the chance while you can” Fiona said taking them into her home. “I am glad you found my house alright”.

“Yes, it is a bit out of the way” the husband commented.

“As you can imagine, with doing things like this neighbors would just complicate things” Fiona explained leading them to the examination room. “So as I expained on the phone, I will do one final examination. For your piece of mind and mine, besides my legal team insists. Of course you will get a full birthing report within the week, if I have time before you arrive on sunday I will try and do it then. I know that some like to use an element of truth when recounting their birth story”

“Yes we read over the contract, in the case that our child could develop any disabilities relating to the birth we would contact you directly?” the husband asked.

“No it would be my legal team who would of course inform me, your baby is extreamly healthy and I see no problems from your file.” Fiona helped Amanda onto the examination table, “you are aware of the multibles clause? If you are found to of been carrying twins or more I do have a hefty fee, it’s just to stop any couples trying to get a cheeper price. Besides the suprise on my end isn’t very nice or safe for the babies”.

“Yes we are certain that it is one” Amanda said.

Fiona used the doppler to examine the baby, “yes everything is in order to proceed. Because your child’s father is fully aware of your actions we have a little bit less paperwork”.

“Does that happen often?” Amanda asked.

“Most women decide they would rather tell there loved ones that they braved it alone, including there husband. Or sometimes it’s the cause the father isn’t in the picture, I even work with those who it would be tramatic for them to give birth.”

Amanda nodded, “so how does it work? Is there a device you use to transfer the baby into you?”

Fiona smiled “I have always had the ability to transfur unborn children into me”.

“Oh right” the husband said not fully understanding.

After the couple filled out all the paperwork on the office, they expected to retuen to examination room. But Fiona said “no need I can do it in here, Stan you may want to hold your wife’s hand”.

“Will it hurt?” Amanda asked.

“It will just feel a bit strange” Fiona promised, she took her chair and faced Amanda. She had remebered to put on one of her more looser work dresses so there was no need to change. She put her hands on Amanda’s covered belly and focused.

Amanda felt no pain but she felt like someone had pulled a plug out and all her amniotic fluid was swerling around her womb as it drained out of her. Her belly softened and Fiona’s began to bloat. After a minute she felt her childs placenta ditached from within her, it suddenly disappeared and Fiona suddenly had a full term bump. Fiona’s hands were still on her now flattened belly as she felt the last drops of fluid leave her. Fiona then removed her belly, and smiled at the amazed couple.

“One last set of papers to sign to confirm the transfer” Fiona said, she rubbed her belly while watching them sign. Amanda then put her hand out and Fiona leaned her belly towards it, Amanda smiled as she felt the kick. 

Fiona wished the couple a happy trip and promised to call once the delivery was complate.

As Fiona climbed the stairs she realised she had forgotten to set up her birthing room. She sighed, being full term would not make the job easy. The baby was already between her hips. She slowly got to work getting all the fresh medical equipment out of it’s packaging, she then went to put the plastic cover on the bed when she realised that it was downstairs. She walked down one hand on the handrails the other supporting her belly, she went to get the plasic cover and found climbing the stairs slow and difficult now she didn’t have the free hand to support her. 

She could feel a back pain starting as she finally reached the room again, she tried to move her back around but it kept it’s strenth. Fiona knew it wasn’t truly a contraction, but that labor was starting in one form or another.

In some ways she was relived, when she had not enough progress and there was less then 24 hours till pick up she would have to resort in breaking her waters or using a drug to start contractions. She wondered if the baby could tell it was in a diffrent womb, she felt some hard kicks during the rest of the evening as she ate some dinner. Just something light to chase away hunger.

As she was wondering if she should sleep in the birthing room that night or not she felt her first proper contraction, she could feel her muscles warming up. But they were not too bad, they never were at this stange. The pains were more annoying than painful, as she was answering emails for future clients. She worked secretly with some charitites that would pay for women with disabilites to use her service. She would always charge the charities a fraction of her usual rate, happy to help those who wouldn’t be able to do the delivery.

As the evening got later she wasn’t able to concentrate on anything but her breathing. When Fiona was in pain, she had a bad habit of holding her breath. She decided to go upstairs while they were still 5 minutes apart, she did not want to be stuck downstairs.

Another benifit of living without neighbors was that in the summer she could labor outside, the cool air would feel good against her sweaty belly. She wished that she could do that tonight, there was something sexual about feeling like an animal grunting and groaning thought her pain surrounded by trees. But her clients had spacifically asked to have the birth documented in detail, she didn’t think they would apprecaite her choosing an outside birth.

As she started to climb she had to stop, “come on baby, we gotta get through this together”. She tried to wait out the contraction still standing, as soon as it was over she continued to climb. She made her camp in the birthing room, she hoped this wouldn’t take all weekend. “It’s lucky your mum and dad gave me over when you did” she said to the bump, this baby was ready. 

Over the next few hours all Fiona could do was contend with the contractions as they built up. Fiona leaned against the wall timing her contractions a bit closer now, the pain ramped up quickly on some contractions and wretchedly slowly on others. When she felt peak of the contraction, she would let out long moans as her muscles held her womb tight. Sometimes just as she was feeling some relief, it would tighten up again catching her by surprise.

By the early morning Fiona was in almost in constant pain and the pressure inside her womb was unbearable.She was on the bed and rocked on my knees,  anything to dissipate the pressure. She knew that she would need to break her waters at this rate, she hadn’t diatated much in the past hour. The uncomfortable fullness of her womb made her belly seemed to feel fuller and bigger with each contraction. 

Fiona longed for the urge to push, she reached to the medical trolly by her bed. She grabbed the amnihook and then tensed as another contraction came, the contraction pushed the baby another few centimetres further into her birth canal. As soon as it was over she inserted the hoot and used to tear open her amniotic sac. She felt her waters leaving her body, with it her contrations go stronger. 

Time ticked by as Fiona approached the 4-hour mark since her water broke, her contractions went from 2 minutes apart to 1 minute to seconds apart while their intensity went off the scale. Fiona bore down as her hands kept her legs spread open as much as possible. She could feel her baby spread her birth canal open and slowly descend down it.

She felt the bulge and smiled in relief, it looked like it would not take long now. Each push Fiona was making progress, her belly clenching around her swollen womb as it was happening.

Her swollen belly had decreased in size as bore down again and again, until she pushed once more and her baby reached a full crown. The pain was so immense that it felt like someone had taken a blowtorch to her crouch. The head slowly inched its way out, before a pop of fluids brought the head out and hanging between her legs. She just had the shoulders to contend with now, she took deep breaths and gave a huge push feel both shoulders makin there way out. She didn’t give up, on the next contraction she did the same and the baby side out. 

Fiona’s body relaxed as she picked the crying baby up and comforted him, she cut the cord and set to work on the umbilical cord. 

A few hours later she had already contacted the parents who had decided to come back early so they could meet their son. Fiona had napped and spent the day cleaning up and writing her birth report. Stan gave her a genorous tip for deliverying there son so quickly, before Fiona could blink it was monday morning. She had magically healed by now, she greeted her work friend. “How was the mother in law?”

“Bad news she tricked us into buy her a new snake, how was your weekend?”

“Got my jobs done quicker then usual so spend sunday resting”.

[charlienick]

hi and i love u. "i swallow your heart and it crawls right out of my mouth" for the prompts....

Richie has decided that his dream-self can get fucked. And not in the fun way.

When he’s 24, at least once per night, Richie has what he would describe as an erotic nightmare. He never actually has sex in these dreams, nor does he die or even get seriously maimed. But they’re still definitely erotic, and they’re definitely nightmares. 

The first went something like this:

He is tied to a chair. He can’t get up. The rope is chafing his skin. He struggles against the darkness, but he does not move. He can’t. Squinting out into the inky black, he wonders if he’s wearing his glasses. It’s only once he has that thought that he sees a spotlight lighting up his childhood kitchen. His refrigerator has magnets from Acadia National Park, a photo of him and Bill flipping off the camera and laughing, a copy of his sonogram. The sight of it makes him ache in a way he can’t describe, nor does he have time to, because stepping out of the hallway and into the light is his childhood best friend, Eddie Kaspbrak.

Eddie is wearing a cream-colored sweater that he wore a lot in his late-teens and the bright red shorts he was so fond of in middle school. It’s a jarring combination, because Richie never saw him wear those two articles of clothing at the same time, let alone in the same era. He’s picking at a thread spinning loose from the sweater, looking down at it. He bites his bottom lip, and Richie starts to feel nervous, uncomfortable, because whenever he finds himself wishing Eddie were a woman so that it would feel normal for him to want to take his lip between his own, he looks away. Makes a joke. Averts attention from the ache in his heart, in his head, in his jeans.

He can’t do that now. He tries, but he doesn’t succeed. There’s something invisible keeping his head pointed forward. Eddie snaps his eyes up, smirks with the lip still caught in his teeth, and says… something. Richie can’t hear him from so far away, his hearing fuzzy the way his vision always is. The smirk isn’t cruel, isn’t mean or even teasing. Eddie looks proud of himself. He shucks off his sweater in one fluid movement and drops it to the linoleum beneath him. His skin shines golden, and Richie can hardly breathe. He feels like he’s being asphyxiated, and he bucks his hips, turned on and terrified.

And then he wakes up.

Dreams like this have happened almost nightly for months now. Once, it’s Eddie giving him a lap dance while he’s tied to the couch in their apartment. Another time, Bev catches Eddie stripping for him in his bedroom, and her laughter echoes all the way into the waking world. Regardless of the content of his dreams, Richie always remembers them in painstaking detail, and it’s really causing a rift between he and Eddie.

This sucks major donkey dick for three reasons: the first is that Richie is, like, deeply uncomfortable in his own home at all times. He can’t look at Eddie with his feet propped up on the ottoman without remembering how his legs looked wrapped around Richie’s waist, can’t hear his voice without remembering how he sounded moaning Richie’s name. The second reason, of course, is that Eddie is his best friend, and it’s shitty that Richie can’t find comfort in that the way he used to.

The third reason is that Eddie is starting to fucking notice.

He cornered Richie in the kitchen while he was making himself breakfast two mornings ago, and demanded he tell him what he did wrong because he couldn’t stand another weird, uncomfortable second of this weird standstill he and Richie had found themselves in. “What weird, uncomfortable standstill?” Richie had basically responded with, chuckling manically like that wouldn’t be a total tip-off that things were in fact weird and uncomfortable.

He has stopped walking around in his boxers, terrified that he’s going to get a hard-on when Eddie, like, waters the fucking spider plant and his shirt rides up and Richie short-circuits and has a total meltdown.

So he figures he’s attracted to his best friend. So what, he says to himself alone in his bedroom after jacking off the moment he woke up for the fifth day in a row. So I’m attracted to Eddie. Eddie is a pretty boy. This means nothing. I’m still straight.

He considers bringing this up to Stan, because next to Eddie, Stan is his best friend, but Stan would definitely laugh at him and say something like you’re an idiot. Go kiss your roommate and leave me be, which, okay, true, but not necessary. He knows, Brain-Stan! He’s aware the situation is reaching its boiling point! But he can’t exactly fucking tell Eddie, hey, I wanna suck your dick, but no homo, O best friend of mine! Eddie wouldn’t understand that the situation is precariously balanced between Richie’s suppression and the knowledge that Eddie has definitely sucked dick before.

Because Eddie was able to come out after he and the Losers moved from Maine to San Francisco, he has caught some dick regularly for the past six years. He’s pretty, as Richie’s head, heart, and apparently now dick all agree upon, and the four or so men he has in rotation all seem to think so, too. When Eddie would bring home a suitor prior to Richie’s epic sexual breakdown, he would just scamper over to Bev and Ben’s, or go bother Stan, Mike, and Bill at theirs. Now however, because on top of being attracted to his best friend, he’s also a goddamn masochist, and he’s staying holed up in his room listening to Eddie get fucked (or fuck? He isn’t certain on the makeup of his screwings, though not for lack of trying), one hand stripping his dick, feeling like a total and complete asshole. 

Richie knows that one’s sexuality is not always privy to one’s knowledge of whether or not the person would be interested in bedding him or not, and his wild imagination is not totally hinged upon reality. Bev and Ben would definitely not tie him up and have their way with him, but that’s still a familiar fantasy in his spank bank; he knows it will never happen, but it’s called a fantasy for a reason. However, jacking off to the sound of actual-Eddie’s moans and sighs is definitely crossing a line, and he knows it.

So since that one fated, sordid evening, he has decided that he isn’t going to jack off at all until either the dreams stop or he’s able to talk this out with Eddie in a normal way without totally having a mental breakdown.

This was a stupid decision, he decides ten days in, because it seems like the dreams aren’t going to stop and he’s going to have to face this for real or his subconscious might actually eat him alive. He’s not going to give into his libido because his heart is stronger than that. His weak willpower will not be his downfall.

So he decides to talk to Ben, because he’s the least likely to make fun of him about this, and because he might be able to knock some sense into him.

“Wait, you and Eddie aren’t making love already?” Ben’s face screws up in confusion. “Oh.”

“What do you mean, oh? We haven’t ever knocked boots because I’m straight as an arrow.”

“Sorry to inform you, Rich, but having… ‘erotic nightmares’ about your male best friend isn’t exactly heterosexual behavior.” Richie goes to cut in, but Ben holds a hand up. “And what would be so wrong with liking boys? Or liking Eddie?” Richie snaps his mouth shut. “Eddie is the best. You love Eddie as a friend, right?”

“Totally, yeah, I mean, yeah!” Richie rambles, nodding violently.

Ben smiles patiently, “So what would be so bad about loving him all the way?”

“I… I didn’t know… I mean, I’ve had sex with girls. It just doesn’t light a fire under my dick the same way this seems to. He’s so pretty, and I don’t quite know how to go back to seeing him the way I used to now that I see him so clearly. It’s like I’ve been looking at him without my glasses on my whole life, and now everything is so much less fuzzy. Like I understand it better now.” His eyes widen as the silence stretches on, Ben smiling softly the whole time. “I mean, uh, you know, he could hop on my dick and I wouldn’t say no. Then I’d have fucked the whole Kaspbrak clan.”

Ben’s nose wrinkles in distaste, so he doesn’t respond to that. Instead, he says, “Tell him, Richie. I promise it won’t go badly.”

“But what if he doesn’t want to fuck me back?”

“You really think all this is is sex, Richie?” Ben asks quietly. He offers him another smile, an encouraging one this time, “And I already promised—it won’t go badly.”

So Richie decides, fuck it. He’ll tell Eddie tomorrow.

But then he wakes up in a cold sweat from tonight’s newest erotic nightmare, this time leaning more heavily on the nightmarish aspect than the erotic, and he decides tomorrow can’t wait. Tonight. He’s doing this right now, because he can’t stand another moment not being close to Eddie.

He puts on his glasses, pads out of his room and knocks softly on Eddie’s door. “Eds? You up?” Silence. He knocks a bit harder. “Eddie?” He hears Eddie sniff harshly from inside his room, and something knocks loudly. “Eds? You okay?”

“Mmph,” comes Eddie’s muffled reply. “Come in, you dick.”

Richie smiles and does as he’s told. He can see Eddie relatively clearly through the slats in the blinds open to the moon high above them. He’s rubbing the side of his head, his hair a total mess, his shirt rumpled, his frown intense, and Richie realizes, fuck, I love this angry little goblin. Jesus Christ, I love him.

“Hitting your head on the headboard is way less fun when you’re by yourself,” he grumbles. He wraps an arm around his knees and tilts his head. “What’s up at… 3:50 AM?”

“I…” Richie breathes out unsteadily. He decides to go with the truth: “I had a nightmare.”

“Oh. Shit,” Eddie frowns, pulling back the blankets. “You wanna cuddle?”

Richie nods dramatically and pitches himself into Eddie’s bed, immediately wrapping himself around Eddie. Eddie snorts, laughs quietly, and turns in Richie’s hold, slotting their thighs together so they’re facing one another. “Dick. You know I don’t like to be the little spoon, ‘specially with you and your newborn-deer limbs.”

“Can’t you make an exception just this once, Spaghetti?” Richie smiles, but he’s really only teasing; he’s just fine with this.

“So long as you tell me what the dream was about.” Richie tenses in Eddie’s hold, thinking, shit, I really should’ve assumed he’d ask. “I mean, if you want. But until you tell me, I demand to be the big spoon.”

Richie sighs, turning in Eddie’s hold only because it’ll be easier to say it if he isn’t looking right at him. “So I’ve been having these… we’ll call them erotic nightmares.”

“That sounds like a term you thought of weeks ago and are very proud to finally get the chance to utter.”

“Die.” Eddie snorts. “Actually, don’t-don’t do that,” Richie whispers, “please don’t die.”

“I won’t,” Eddie says, sounding like he’s about to laugh but trying not to. “Was that what the dream was about tonight? Is that why you’ve been acting so weird lately?”

“Sort of, yeah. You were, uh, you were on top of me, and you… I didn’t even see it coming. Your heart, it was… I don’t even think it could ever happen in real life.”

Eddie slips a hand beneath Richie’s shirt, cupping his hip bone and rhythmically running his thumb in the hollow between it and his stomach. “It didn’t happen, Rich. I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.”

Richie breathes out, less shaky this time, and nods. “Okay.”

A long pause, and then, “You said these nightmares, they’re erotic.” Richie’s blood runs cold. Fuck, he didn’t want this to be how he said it. “Is that why I was on top of you?”

“Sort of,” Richie whispers. “Yeah.”

“Like… Like this?” Eddie dislodges his thigh out from between Richie’s and hooks it over his hips, forcing him to lay flat on the bed. Eddie hovers over him, eyes dark and electric in the moonlight. He looks ethereal, holy, and nothing like he did in the dream. “What happens next? When I’m above you like this?”

“It’s different every time,” Richie says all in one breath. Eddie’s boxer shorts are hanging and brushing against the tops of Richie’s thighs. He feels a light breeze away from spontaneously combusting. “Sometimes you dance for me.”

Eddie wrinkles his nose, laughing quietly, “I can’t dance.”

“I know that, but my dreams don’t.” Eddie smile drops in an instant.

“What else?”

“Sometimes you hold me down⁠—”

Richie cuts himself off with a gasp when Eddie nudges Richie’s hands out from where they’re balled in Eddie’s sheets and presses them down to the bed beside his head. “Like this?” Richie chokes, nodding. He can’t say anything. He can hardly breathe. “What’s next, Richie?”

“You-you grind on me ‘til you—oh, holy shit.” Eddie swivels his hips in a tight circle against Richie’s dick, both of them already hard.

“Yeah? You been dreamin’ of me like this, Rich? How long?”

“What?”

“How long,” he grinds down low, and Richie moans, “have you,” he does it again, and Richie gasps, keening loudly, “been dreaming of me? Because I’ve been dreaming of you for years, Rich.”

“Motherfucking tap-dancing Jesus, you have?” Richie demands.

“Of course I have. Sometimes, when I bring a boy home, I pretend he’s you.”

“Oh my God.”

“Sometimes I accidentally say your name.”

Richie bucks his hips, feeling wild, caged. “Eddie, please, I need—”

“What do you want, Rich? I’ll give you whatever you want.”

“Kiss me.” And he does. It’s everything and nothing like Richie dreamed it would be. It’s hot, searing, Eddie’s mouth a brand against his own, but the way Eddie is licking into his mouth feels nothing like he dreamed it would. It feels like he just wants to take care of Richie; he really wants to give Richie everything he asks for, and Richie feels drunk with the power-rush that brings. Beautiful, perfect, wonderful Eddie Kaspbrak wants to give him what he asks.

“Eddie,” he pants, and Eddie immediately pulls away, eyes liquid as they rake over Richie’s chest, still covered in his shirt. The light weight of it is suddenly stifling. “Please take off my shirt.”

“Of course, baby,” Eddie murmurs, unlocking their fingers and helping Richie sit up so he can do as he’s asked. “That better, angel?”

“Oh my God,” Richie whines, nodding. “This is so hot.”

Eddie smiles, “I agree. You’re definitely as beautiful as I dreamed you’d be.”

“You dreamed about me, too?” Richie sighs, suddenly feeling overwhelmed with the thought of Eddie stripping his dick to the girls Richie’s brought home.

“Of course, Richie,” Eddie responds, hushed as he maps out Richie’s torso with the palms of his hands. One of his thumbs catches on Richie’s nipple, and he hisses, then gasps when he does it again. “Sometimes it’s sex dreams, like yours, but sometimes I dream you take me out to eat, or to the movies. Once, I dreamed you asked me to marry you and I woke up crying.”

“Eddie,” Richie says, all broken into pieces, jagged edges that sound serrated. “I would. You know I would, right?”

Eddie smiles softly, leaning over Richie and lacing their fingers back together, but the weight of Eddie on top of him doesn’t feel so suppressive anymore. It’s a comfort. It’s everything he could never admit to wanting. “I do now.”

He captures Richie’s mouth again, kisses that fall over him like stars, like meteorites, planets exploding behind his eyelids and pop rocks fizzing in his blood. He’s a shaking mess by the time Eddie pulls back again, kissing his neck and then sucking a mark into his collarbone, to his pulse point. He feels ready to burst, nearing absolute explosion.

“I want to fuck you, Richie,” Eddie says against his skin, and Richie moans to the ceiling, eyes rolling back in his head. “I want to fuck you, but I need to know this isn’t a one time thing. I won’t be my best friend’s sexual experiment, and I won’t be your fuck buddy. I can’t.”

“Eddie, I… look at me, please look at me,” Richie begs, unlacing their fingers and cupping Eddie’s cheeks. He looks terrified, ready to work himself into a panic attack, so Richie says, “I want to fuck you too, but more than that, I want to fuck your heart.”

Eddie snorts and goes boneless, his forehead knocking into Richie���s chin. “I hate you so much. I can’t believe you just said you want to fuck my heart, that’s so gross, what does that even mean?”

“It means exactly what it sounds like,” Richie says, proud that he managed to distract Eddie from the burgeoning panic. “I want to fuck your heart.”

“No, I want to fuck your heart,” Eddie shoots back, frowning intensely. Richie’s responding smile is blinding.

“We’re heart-switches.”

“This is the worst day of my life.”

“Sure, Eds.”

“Don’t call me Eds in bed! I’m outlawing all nicknames when we’re hard, it’s uncouth!”

“What about…” Richie runs the tip of his nose over the thin skin of Eddie’s neck, “baby?”

“Oh,” Eddie sighs, elbows buckling where he’s holding himself over top of Richie, “baby’s good.”

“Yeah?” Richie smiles, hooking his hands up under Eddie’s shirt and bunching it under his arms. “What about angel, my love, is that one okay?”

“This isn’t fair,” Eddie whines, falling down to his elbows and crushing Richie as he laughs, “you can’t use my weak heart against me.”

“Weak?” Richie smiles against Eddie’s skin, feeling more at home than he ever has in his life. “Nah. I think you’re the strongest person I know.”

“Richie…” Eddie smiles, embarrassed, and leans up to kiss him again, which is fine with Richie, because he’s embarrassed, too. Thank god for erotic nightmares, Richie thinks as he cups Eddie’s hip and licks into his mouth, finally free, finally alive.

[angst-fairygodmother]

Hi, I hope this isn't annoying sending a request but I was wondering if you could maybe do a fic with the reader and Geralt based on the song Fight for Me from Heathers: the Musical? It doesn't have to be a songfic with lyrics or anything but I thought it might be cool, sorry if its awful

A/N: Sweetheart, muffin, honey bunches of oats, a) you are def. not annoying for requesting fics, I’m happy to take them until/unless I say otherwise, and b) you come in here to my inbox, request a fic – you give me Permission to write based on what might be my favorite song from a bizarre cult-classic musical and then you feel like you need to apologize?! Niet. There is nothing to apologize for and, in fact, thank you. I love you anon, and I hope you love this fic. Word Count: 1044 Content Warning: violence A/N2: Just realized this is my first strictly Geralt x Reader fic. So thank you for that as well Anon.

Your eyes fell on the white-haired stranger, tracking him as he walked through the market, head tucked low as if he thought he could hide despite his striking appearance and…bulk. You had a bad feeling that this was not going to end well for him.

“Hey! Butcher! What the hell do you think you’re doing here?” one of the local thugs, a bald-headed brute named Mick, called out.

He and his cronies, about seven of the dumbest meatheads you’d ever met, began circling slowly like a pack of coyotes, laughing and jeering as if to provoke the stranger.

“Shit,” you swore under your breath, bracing yourself against the fencepost, ready to jump in and handle the carnage when it was over, just as the first punch was thrown.

The stranger ducked smoothly under the swing and it connected with the thug trying to flank him. He followed the motion with a quick jab to Mick’s face and even from your distant watching post, you heard the crunch of breaking bone. Instinct told you to look away, but you couldn’t, finding yourself drawn to the sight of the combat, and the elegant movements of the stranger who somehow managed to make a dance out of brawling in the street.

All your life you had abhorred violence. But somehow, he made it look, well to be frank, incredibly sexy.

Two men now lay on the ground, groaning but alive, and surprisingly, conscious. The stranger had a few minor injuries: his eyebrow split open, a swollen lip, bloody knuckles. You wanted to go to his side, to offer to treat the wounds, to hold him tenderly and mop away the muck, run your fingers through his hair.

“Bloody witcher!” Mick cursed, charging again.

You realized that the fight had been going on for quite a while, the thugs refusing to give up and the stranger refusing to give ground. You were impressed. Mick and his gang were notorious in the area and ruthless. You found yourself entranced with the back and forth, the dodges and the blows, a flowing fluid action. And then all too soon it was over and you were internally scolding yourself for being glad to see that the stranger stood victorious, for engaging at all with the fight instead of turning away in disgust as you otherwise might have.

“Hey,” you said softly, hopping down off the fence to land in the tall grass. “I don’t know your name, but I’d like to.”

He grunted, a noise half in pain and half dismissive, as if he thought you didn’t actually care.

“I’m a healer. Will you let me take a look at those injuries?” Technically it was not a lie, even if you were only an apprentice still. It was enough to handle his minor hurts.

“Shouldn’t you be more concerned with your fellow townsfolk on the ground?” his gravelly voice sent tingles up your spine and you wanted him to tell you every story in the world, and a number of more scandalous things.

You shrugged. “Mick and his thugs have been nothing but trouble since the day they breezed in here and decided they were our ‘protectors.’ Frankly, I think you deserve a parade for knocking them down a peg.”

“No parades.” Your perceptive eye caught both the slight quirk of the corner of his mouth and the wince that followed it.

You laughed. “Fine, no parades, but can I tend your wounds?” Your fingers itched to reach out and touch him.

With an edge of reluctance, he nodded and you waved him over to a nearby bench.

“That was some pretty impressive fighting,” you said, trying to keep your voice steady and neutral as you gently poked at the skin around each mark on his gorgeously pale skin, feeling yourself warm under his amber gaze. Nothing seemed to be broken.

“You can…punch…um…real good.” You frowned at the lameness of your attempted compliment, pulling a small jar of ointment out of your pouch.

He huffed, almost a chuckle, and you shivered as the hot breath brushed the thin fabric at your middle, leaning over him as you were. The images it sent through your body made you flush, hot with both shame and desire, and you hoped desperately that he didn’t notice.

“So, what did you say your name was?” you continued, keeping up the one-sided conversation as you dabbed the cleansing medicine on the wounds. Your teacher always said that gentle chatter helped calm patients and distract them from the pain that your treatment might cause, but he flinched so near-imperceptibly that you probably didn’t actually need it.

“Geralt,” he said, once again hesitant, “of Rivia.”

“Well, it’s very nice to meet you Geralt of Rivia,” you beamed down at him. “My name is Y/N. And I have to say you are one of the best patients I have ever had the pleasure of treating.”

He shifted slightly, seeming uncomfortable, or perhaps just unused to, your compliment. “I have no coin for you Y/N…” the way his tongue curled around your name sent another wave of wanton desire through you.

“That’s quite alright, Geralt of Rivia,” you practically purred. “Like I said, it’s on the house as thanks for making those assholes think twice about bothering folks. Although if you’re free tonight…maybe we can give each other a better thanks?”

Your own boldness shocked you, almost as much as the heat that lit behind his eyes and the soft brush of his fingers against the inside of your wrist, ghosting down to your palm to press a room key into your hand. Gently, he moved you out of his way and stood.

“I have business with the alderman,” he said, “but perhaps we’ll see each other again.”

“I think we shall,” you smirked. “And just so you know, I expect you to fight for me.” He growled in response, deep with desire and promises of a truly wild evening, but only if you accepted his invitation.

‘Holy shit!’ you thought to yourself. ‘What have I gotten myself into?’

You cast him a wink before turning and walking the other direction, making a show of slipping the key into a pocket for safekeeping, and very much looking forward to the evening.

[unseeliephen]

history: kora &. phen - an unknowing reunion setting: the forest of thorn haven

i. 

With every full moon that past, Kora felt as if she lost a little bit more of herself. She needed this almost more than breathing.

The air is cold. It is mid morning but the sky is dark and heavy with promise of another bout of snow. The small brunette tilts her head up toward the clouds, short dark curls swaying against the wind as she laughs and twirls. For a moment, she is happy, unbranded with her power back within her possession.

Slowly snow begins to fall and hit pale cheeks.  Green orbs glance behind, smile beaming. “I’ll be back later.” before either Sidian or she has time to protest or change their minds, the she-wolf is already beginning to pull her shirt up and over her head. She leaves her clothes in a neat pile behind the green house attached to the magic shop before shes running through the snow, shifting in mid-stride. The black wolf quickly hidden within the treeline and up into Crown Points forested trails.

ii.

There’s a stirring in the night of the forests surrounding Crown Point. There are nocturnal animals wakening and hunting. Leaves are rustling when the wind blows them. Quiet murmurings of whispers to those who listen close enough.

A large gust of wind blew, stirring a few birds nearby and where there was once an empty clearing now stood Phen–the uniquely fae green eyes glowing brightly in the night. His cheeks quickly redden from the cold that bites at his skin, but it hardly phased him as he began walking through the forests. He could always find his way. The shadows of the forests were his home whenever he was on this realm.

It’s an uneventful night minus the whispers he hears in his ears. Better to drown them out for now, no one is keen on listening to his songs at the moment. But just when he thinks he’ll have to return to the city unhappy, there’s a blur that catches his sight. For those of a human, most likely would have missed it. But not Phen’s eyes.

“Will you come out and play?” Phen asked into the forest as he stopped walking, a hand reached out to press into a nearby tree. There’s an excitement in his voice and his eyes, the smile on his face one of a child’s. “Please? Come here! I just want to pet you.”

iii.

The wolf is racing herself through the damp foliage now. Kora’s sharp claws kick up wet earth with every fluid step. She feels at peace here - as if everything that ever happened to her led up to this moment. It was almost poetic as she stretched and used muscles locked away for too long. It was exhilarating to just let go. Of her problems, of herself. She was no longer merely Kora - the pretty little helpless slave.

- she had teeth and claws and limbs that can run for miles.

Limbs were stretched to their max and yet it still feels as if it isn’t enough. Her wolf demands its freedom. Suddenly, lost in her own little world of earthly sights and smells, she senses something unique within the trees. It drives her curiously forward to investigate, but she is careful to keep her distance. And though she stays hidden, the dark fur of her coat is of stark contrast to the white beneath her paws.

Never trust the fae folk. Its a warning that has stuck with her since childhood. The wolf lifts her muzzle, sniffing the air in search of more potential threats as she allows her presence there among the trees to be know. She does not move forward however, the warning still chiming in her head as she watches him, home there within the clearing.

iv.

A smart wolf to keep at a distance. Phen has always thought the forest is a different world, a society with its own set of rules and dangers than the city. Werewolves, skinwalkers, the fae folk… all the supernaturals that dwell among the trees.

“I see you,” Phen said as he tapped a finger to his nose and then pointed in the direction of the wolf. “But I’m not going to hurt you.”

To make his point, as if it would help at all, he sat down on the forest floor, back leaning against the tree. Phen has a soft spot for dogs. Domestic or not. Wild or supernatural. They’re beautiful creatures of strength and beauty. Phen’s written songs and poems about them. He’s made pieces of artwork in the haze of his creativity that brought to life the truth of them.

“I just want to pet you! You’re so beautiful. Majestic.” Phen didn’t move from where he sat but he reached a hand out. He’s suppose to do that, right? Let her sniff him, assess if he’s dangerous?

Well. He is. But not right now. Not to her.

v.

The sky was dark grey now, with snowflakes so thick she had to squint through it just to see the few paces ahead. It was raw, and real and she loved every second of her paws embedded in the dirt. Kora trotted her way through the undergrowth of trees when she had finally decided to make the small journey toward the fae. Especially now that he had lowered himself to the ground.

Head up and emerald eyes bright - the shewolf spots his form  beneath the canopy of a tree where snow is trapped above a thick cover of leaves. He is a mere few feet away now and yet her steps are slow, unhurried as she makes her way to him through the cold terrane. He feeds her with compliments, but its the uniquness of his fae nature that draws her animal in. She sits back upon her hind legs in front of him. Even before her enslavement it wasn’t common for Kora to allow anyone to touch her. It was an intimate act, as it would be even now.

The look she gives his slouched figure and outstretched hand says that if he isn’t careful teeth will claim his arm as payment. She steps forward, wet muzzle brushing up against the males offered hand and down-turned wrist as she allowed the strange fae to touch. After all she still wears her necklace; Sidian would know if she were in any sort of distress.

vi.

It’s a sight to see for those lurking in the shadows of the woods. Phen noticed the quiet murmurs are silent now. Whether those are in his head or not, that’s still to be discovered. Trotting across the forest floor is a werewolf, coming in the direction of an Unseelie fae that sat in the cold snow.

It hardly phased him, his thick cloak enough to keep him warm. His unusually bright green fae eyes are wide and excited, pale cheeks rosy from the cold. He doesn’t move, he knows better. Which of the two can be the greater threat, that would be a question not answered tonight.

The softest of gasps escaped from Phen when he felt her muzzle against his hand, letting her making the movements toward him first. He really didn’t want to lose any fingers. They were his life line. His ability to create. Losing them would mean losing his life.

But once he feels it’s safe, he turns his hand to run his fingers through her fur with deliberate slowness. “You’re so soft,” he whispered into the night with the words carried on the fog of his breath. “And warm.” Phen moves to scratch behind her ear, leaning forward just enough to let him do so. “Do you live in these woods?”

vii.

There is something very different about these woods, as if something more is lurking within there depths.  This place does not remind Kora of home, but the electric hum of magic in the air draws many a creature near. For now - it is as close as she will get unless she decides now to make for an escape. However, Sidian trusts her enough not to run far - she would hate to break that trust again.

And this fae - peering at her through eyes so bright, she knows she should be more cautious. Faeries were known for their trickery and violence when they think themselves disrespected. They were also rumored to steal sleeping babies from their cribs and replace them with changelings. She is reminded of every story her grandmother had ever told her and yet - this faeries touch was gentle as fingers carded through her dark fur. She’d only ever allowed Sidian or pack to touch her like this - it truly is a quiet sort of intimacy. One she hadn’t realized she so desperately needed after being in this hell for so long.

She allows him to touch freely, even goes as far as to tilt her head for more gentle scratches behind her ears. Hes cold. But Kora’s temperature runs hot and the cold hardly phases her. Ears draw back at his question and she glances back toward the thick line of trees in which she had come from as if to tell him she lived within the town. He wasn’t a wolf so their communication was limited. After a moment she drew nearer, plopping her heavy body down next to his own under the tree with a quiet huff, warm fur pressed against his side. She did need a rest after all before she needed to head back.

viii.

Phen’s eyes follow in the direction that the wolf looked. A tree? Did she live in a tree? That’s odd. He didn’t know of wolves to live in trees. That would have to be extremely uncomfortable! Phen’s mind momentarily boggled at the thought of how that would even work until his brain stopped and he realized his mistake. That was the direction of the city. The direction that he would eventually trek his way back to whenever he would need to go home.

“You live in the city. Sad. It isn’t pretty. These woods are pretty, but you should see my home. It’s the most beautiful realm. The woods there are gorgeous, you would love them.” There’s a dreamy quality to his voice, as if he hadn’t just been home mere minutes ago. Taking the wolf to the fae realm would be a very bad idea. Even if it was tempting, Phen was going to be good. Besides, someone would try to steal the wolf from him and that wouldn’t make for a very happy Phen.

A noise of surprise and pure happiness escapes him when the wolf walks close and sit next to him. The soft fur and warmth of her body is a comforting presence beside him and Phen can’t help but lean into it before he throws his arms around her neck and just buried his face into the fur. “You’re going to be my new best friend. My best wolf friend. Do you wanna see a trick? Of course you wanna see a trick!” Phen sat up slightly, still leaning into Kora as he reached a hand out. It was slow at first, a few sparkles in the air here and there before suddenly surrounding them were bright colorful orbs of light, dimming and brightening as they bobbed in their place. “Isn’t it so pretty… so many colors…”

ix.

Hes speaking of the faerie realm - a place wayward humans occasionally find themselves trapped. At least that is what Kora remembers of the stories her gran used to tell her before she would sleep. It was supposedly a very beautiful place, she was almost jealous that she would never get to see it. That is - if he did not suddenly steal her away. Sidian would never be able to find her then. The thought leaves the wolf weary, but she quietly listens to his tale as if shes back home, in her grandmothers small countryside cottage. Its a place she hasn’t been in a very a long time, not since the elder womans passing. Kora thinks this fae would prefer the forest there over the one they currently reside.  Maybe she will tell him of it one day - where many a faerie circle could be found.

Kora had always wanted to meet one of his kind - before she knew a wolf resided beneath her skin. She had sworn she could hear them whispering in the trees - but family thought her mad, a childs imagination on the brink of going much too far. And then - the very wolf with a faes arms wrapped around her neck - had ripped and tore its way out of her skin one night during a full moon. Kora hadn’t been crazy at all, merely in tune with the nature around her always. The brand and this place had taken that away from her.

Hes hugging her now, cold face pressed in to thick fur of her neck and she nudges him instinctively. She would be able to find him now with her scent upon him - that was if he continued to stay on this plane. Excitedly he pulls himself up and Kora answers his question with a small huffed bark, placing a large paw upon his leg. She did love magic - when it wasn’t being used against her. The sparks of light brighten her eyes as she looks about them - they were like brightly colored fireflies in the sky. Truly it was one of the most simplistically beautiful moments she would experience within these woods. Kora finds herself happy as her head tilts to the side when one floats in front of her face. She bops it with her nose and the orb sparks like a small firecracker, causing her to sneeze.

x.

In the quiet of the night, in the darkness of the forest, it’s is easy to miss the look in Phen’s eyes and perhaps for that he’s grateful. There’s a sadness that lurks in the corners, one that finds its spinning threads wrapped tight around him and deep to his core. Crown Point had never been the place that he had intentions of calling home. The world is one so expansive and brilliant, there are so many other places that he could visit. But he’s tethered. There’s a dreaded thread, one black and rotten, that keeps him spinning lost in the void of this city. Returning to the fae realm for trips gives him some solace and a comfort of where his real home is but he can never stay long. No, there’s always the ticking of the clock. Tick tock. Tick tock.

There’s a sudden dark and resounding moment of clarity. It crashed into Phen with no hesitation, washing over his body and his eyes dulled, a flicker as if the light had gone out for a brief moment. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. Phen doesn’t like it, no one bit. As quickly as the moment is there, it is gone in the next and Phen’s eyes are bright as they once had been, focused on the orbs of light as if he’d never actually left that reality. Had he left it for a brief space of time?

Phen’s expression is back to that of child-like wonder, following all the little orbs and watching the one that comes across to Kora’s face. There’s a cast of color against her black fur, Phen giving a soft oh at the sight of the display. He breaks into laughter when she sneezed from the orb and rolls himself over into the snow, laying down and looking up at the canopy and the lights until his laughter is that of mere giggles. “They’re so pretty,” he coos before making grabby hands at the wolf again from where he’s laying. “All of the beautiful lights, colorful and glowing. From their windows the humans are dazzled, unknowing. They wander through the forests, following with eyes so entranced. Past trees of willow, elm, and pine they danced. Such a delight, they found the beautiful lights only to find themselves caught in a trap. Oh those silly humans, so prone to mishap.” Phen rattled off, his voice singing in the words with no intention of keeping quiet. He’s one with the forest. One with the night.

“But you!” Phen suddenly exclaimed to the wolf. “Not you. No, never you. You’re not a pesky human. You’re a beautiful wolf who deserves only the show!” He waved his hand in the air, the colorful orbs disappearing. “Can I tell you a secret little wolf? You can’t tell anyone! Not a single soul.”

xi.

There is a lulled quietness in the air as if the whole forest has suddenly gone silent. Too silent. The wolf lifts her head, breathing in the scents around them, ears perked as if to check for any sort of threats. Like maybe a guard come to bring her back - Sidian was fickle that way. Sometimes he could change his mind on a dime. A cruel sort of punishment he’d often played on her here when the heat of their arguments got to be too much. When he had to throw his power around like a spoiled child who wasn’t getting his way. It would break her heart for him to be so cruel - to give her her power and also take them away. She tries to not dwell upon the thought for too long, not here at least. She realizes it’s the fae she is sensing - there is sadness clinging to him like a second skin. What did he have to be sad about? He was was either a civilian or a master. Either way - he was free. She herself still wasn’t free: even this forest felt like a prison.

They both seem lost within their own little worlds before the wolf peers at him, only to suddenly throw her large head into his shoulder and brush up under his neck. His beautiful unearthly eyes had gone dull as if his special spark had gone out. Kora is very familiar with the look - she had shut down fully while that demon had tortured and scarred her. She was still a mere shell of herself, forever a little broken. And she knows he too went somewhere else and she doesnt like it. So she touches another orb, this time nipping at the air. It too sparks like a firecracker much like the first - colors extending in different directions around them. Hes laughing now, falling into the snow and rolling about happily. Fae are such unique creatures, especially this one.

She sits beside him, tail swishing behind her on it’s own accord, looking very much like a loyal and trained pet when she could very easily sink teeth into flesh, or wings. At this time of late evening shes lethal, practically invisible within the dark of night. His sudden burst of song is lovely - familiar in a way she can not place. As if shes heard it in bits and pieces, within a dream, long past. He addresses her again, colored light disappearing - it’s dark and cold once again as he sits up. She makes a small show of digging her paws into the earth. He has a secret and she feels hes going to tell her whether or not she wishes to hear it. She glances back in the direction of the wooded trail covered in a thick blanket of snow that leads back to the city, shes still left curious, but she should get back soon.

xii.

If the bitter cold was not closing in and the snow melting into his clothes, Phen would have been happy to stay outside for as long as he could. The night sky is bright with stars, the eerie shadows of the forest that hugged each other, and the creatures that ran through the night. For others it might have been scary, a scene from a nightmare — but not for Phen. There’s a reason his apartment has been made to resemble this scenery, as close to possible to his home in the fae realm. Every person needs their own escape and in a city that is overwhelming for Phen, that apartment is his escape. There’s a comfort in knowing that even when he leaves this forest tonight, he’ll be back to another.

“Somewhere in the forest,” Phen started when he’d sat up beside the wolf. “There’s a small little ring of beautiful dark blue flowers. They’re tiny, tiny. Little wonders. I worked very hard on them. When the moon is high and full, something really special happens.” He pressed a finger to his lips. “But you shouldn’t go near them, okay? I like you. You’re my wolf.” Phen hugged her once again, enjoying the feeling of her soft fur one more time. Often times, it’s humans who find their way to the little circle. They wander at night or during the day and stray too far from the path.

In a burst of colorful light, he’s back on his feet about a foot away from Kora. He brushed off as much of the snow as he could before he clapped his hands together. “It is getting late! The moon will be gone and her rival will be up. Will you walk back with me?” Phen asked as he took a few steps forward, a hand reached out to pat Kora’s head. “You protect me and I protect you! There are a lot of scary creatures in the forest. You should never trust the shadows. And never trust the fae… but you can trust me.”

xiii.

He is speaking of a faerie ring - shes all too familiar with those, having searched for them every summer she spent in that little cottage. Would it be seen beneath all this heavy snow? Respect the fae and they would be kind to you, but never trust them. She left them little childish gifts, and spoke to them as if they were listening. The forest was her home, and it was where she ran and hid after every smack or nights when fathers drank too much of the angry juice. She was too odd, too strange, with eyes that were more than human. Even off-putting to other children. She looked like her mother. But the fae, they never took her away, never came to rescue her. She did that all by herself - all teeth and claws.  

Suddenly there is a burst of light and hes standing a few feet away. What a neat trick.  The wolf stands, makes to follow but stops herself. You’re my wolf. She belongs to another, protects another. Sidian. She’s been with him for years. He tells her to bring him anothers heart - she does it without question. She’s been with him through everything - until the day she ran. Until the day she hurt him. The fae pats her head, but shes lost in thought again. Abruptly shes throwing back her head to howl sadly into the night - she is met with silence. No pack answers, as they are either dead or locked away in cages.

And with that, she slowly follows in step, intent on at least helping him get back into town before he potentially freezes to death. Kora doesn’t want to get into trouble for accidentally killing or letting someone of higher rank die. Though she knows hes perfectly equipped to take care of himself out here.

                                                                   Faeries can not tell a lie.

[kee-writestrashh]

Guns for Hire

Ramsay Bolton x Reader

ao3

Summary:  You are the wife to the Heir of the Red Kings, Ramsay Bolton. living the undercover life of a mob wife has its perks, and you love your husband. But you find out something that seems to unfold a series of unwanted events…

Chapter 54: Dead af

You sighed, turning back to the still open door and walking through it, letting your feet carry you blindly until you realized you were sitting on the couch in the den.

You saw Ben standing there, talking away on the phone as he fought with the Bluray player. Kaden climbed up beside you and hugged you tight after he set his bowl of popcorn down.

"Don't be sad, aunt (y/n). Mama says it will be okay. They got the wrong man." He said, nodding in his five year old wisdom.

Ben pat you on the shoulder as he left the room.

"Who's your favorite?" Kaden asked, kicking his shoes off and pulling his popcorn in his lap.

"Favorite what?" You finally asked, glancing down at the boy.

"Character. I like Rey. She's tough. I think I will ask her to be my girl friend if I ever see her." He said.

You grinned at his innocence and sighed, "I dunno. I like BB. The droids are always my favorites."

"Uncle Ramsay likes Star Wars too. I seen all his stuff in his old room."

"Yeah, he likes the bad guys. Like Kylo." You nodded.

"I don't think Kylo is bad. Just sad and kind of angry." The boy shrugged as Liz came in and sat down beside you, pulling you into her.

The embrace was so warm and caring, it seemed to break you as you sobbed into her shoulder.

"Shhh... It will be okay." She cooed gently stroking your hair in a motherly way.

You weren't sure how long you sat there in her arms, crying, wishing your own mother could hold you.

Finally the tears subsided into small sniffles as you blankly watched TV with Liz and Kaden.

"No more crying, okay? We have to be big. They just made a wrong guess." Kaden smiled at you.

"Wrong man. Wrong guess." You said slowly, an idea hatching.

"Let's go." Ben said, looking apprehensive as he stopped beside your seat, giving Liz a quick kiss on the cheek.

You wiped the last of the tears away and stood, slowly.

You and Ben said nothing until you were almost in city limits.

"Right, the lawyer is on the plane out here. Should be here in three hours or so. His name is Skinner. He's a Boy. Ramsay and Damon met him in college. He's good. And he's in our pocket for sure. Remember, keep your talking to a minimum. The less you say, the less the press can twist your words." Ben finally said, lighting a cigarette. It must have been a mark of how stressed he was because he hardly ever smoked.

"Right. Mouth shut." You said, fixing your smudged makeup in the window visor mirror.

Anger surfaced from nowhere as you walked into the station. The anger inside you so loud Ben had to steer you along and sit you at a table as you couldn't process anything properly. It was like something deep inside of you snapped.

You balled your fists so hard, your nails cut into your palms, but you didn't notice as you stared at the leg of the table, jaw clenched, feeling your son move about almost excitedly.

A cop walked in, depositing Ramsay roughly in the empty chair across the table. He wore his smirk, lip busted.

"What did you do?" Ben asked, looking Ramsay over.

"They didn't like my singing apparently. I don't understand why. I have such a lovely voice. Might have been the song choice. FUCK THE POLICE!" He laughed, eyes glittering in malice.

"Would you stop making this harder?" Ben whispered exasperatedly.

"So how much am I paying to get out of here?" Ramsay asked casually, adjusting the handcuffs.

"You're not." Ben said quietly.

You whipped your head around so fast to look at the man beside you, you cricked your neck.

"What?" You demanded, rubbing your neck as Ramsay narrowed his eyes with a small frown.

"They denied bail. Ramsay, this is serious. They've connected you to everything since the bar burned, even accusing you for all the Starks. That's top of the list. They're pushing for life. Skinner is on his way. Be here in a couple hours or so." Ben said, staring at the table.

Ramsay gave a small sigh, "orange is really not my color. No matter. Call the exterminator. I have solid alibis for everything, you know where to find them."

"Baby, we have to get you out of here." You said desperately.

"What? Why? These are my kind of people. Murders, rapers, thieves, drug dealers." Ramsay chuckled.

"She's right, boss. We don't have enough Kings or Boys in here to keep you safe. Too many lions because of Robb Stark." Ben said so quietly you could hardly hear him, looking strained.

"I'll be fine. Just a bunch of shit rags. And if it gets too bad I'll just shank someone and get put in solitary until court day. Push it, I'm supposed to be throwing a bachelor's party soon." Ramsay shrugged, giving you a long look, "I said our blades are sharp. Not wet. Stop crying, woman."

You gave him a dirty look but gave a small grin at his smirk, giving a small sniff.

"Come here." He said, leaning forward.

You leaned across the table, placing your lips to his. He pulled away from you too soon and stood, frowning at his orange jumpsuit.

"Do what the wife says." Ramsay said, looking at Ben and holding his hand out.

"I'll be back later with Skinner." Ben nodded, shaking Ramsay's hand.

You stood from your chair, walked around the table and wrapped your arms around your husband.

He pushed the side of his face into yours and inhaled you.

"Just a night or two. Don't have too much fun without me." He joked.

You snorted.

"Stay out of trouble. You're not as fast as you used to be, Scrappy-Doo." Ben said, giving Ramsay a very hard look.

"Yes, father." Ramsay tutted, rolling his eyes.

"I want every man involved in the Boys and Kings at dinner tonight." You said forcefully, struggling with your seat belt and pregnant belly.

"Why?" Ben asked, helping you with your seat belt.

"Damnit, just do what I said, Ben!" You shouted, giving a frustrated growl.

Ben raised his brows at you but nodded.

"Also, there's a fabric shop on the corner. We are stopping there." You dictated.

"Um, right. Can I ask why?" He frowned.

"Because I said." You hissed.

"You good?" He asked, looking alarmed.

"Fucking peachy. Quit asking questions and just take me to the damn fabric shop." You growled, looking anywhere but at Ben, knowing you would feel bad for being so mean if you did.

"What is all this for?" Ben grunted under the weight of all the different black fabrics.

"Mind your matters, Benjamin." You said, climbing into your seat.

×××

"There you are. I was coming to tell you dinner is ready and everyone is here." Matt said sliding into the empty drawing room.

"I'm glad they sent you to find me. Close the door." You said, setting your pencil down and looking up from your paper.

Matt gave an uneasy look, but did as you said.

"Miss tagging walls?" You asked casually.

"Eh, sometimes." Matt shrugged.

"How many little buddies do you know good at tagging?"

"A fair few. Why?" He said, crinckling his brow.

You held the piece of paper out. Matt crossed the room and took it.

"What's this?" He asked, looking down at the drawing. "You do this? It's pretty fucking sweet."

"Thank you, dear. Now, shoot it and send it out. I want the entire city covered in this by the morning. I will explain later." You said, rising from your seat and leaving Matt alone in the room.

You walked up to your room to change.

You glanced down at your jeans and shirt. Fuck it. You tucked your gun into the waist of your pants and left the room.

You entered the dining room, taking Ramsay's empty seat.

Dinner was a very quiet, awkward affair as you watched the men around you trying to figure out the purpose for being here.

You leaned back into the chair, resting your elbows on the chair arms, placing your fingers tips together, and crossing your legs. You surveyed the table. Your seat made you feel powerful as you looked down the table.

"Thank you, gentlemen for meeting my request on such short notice. I am certain it would have been much more enjoyable with Ramsay here.... Now, why is my husband in jail?" You said, almost shouting the ending.

Nobody said anything as they stared at you.

You rose from your chair, glaring down the table as if spitting acid.

"I will ask one more time." You said taking a steadying breath. "Why the fuck is Ramsay sitting in jail while I share a shitty dinner with all of you? Think I'd rather share my company with you lot?"

Ben looked like he was about to say something but you shot him a nasty look that made him look away.

A man shifted in his chair.

"And what can you tell me?" You asked, walking over to him.

"There's nothing. No trace of a rat or any of our men leaking information." He said, looking uncomfortable as you stepped into him.

In one fluid motion you pulled your gun from your pants waist and shot the man point blank in the face.

You turned back to the stunned room, wearing a smirk even Ramsay would be proud of.

"Does anyone else have any more useless information for me?" You asked, giving a sweeping glance over the table at every man's face.

You spotted a man who pulled at his collar. You walked over to him, fingering his unused knife.

"How was your dinner?" You asked politely.

The man swallowed, "it was excellent."

"Good. Now, what can you tell me?" You said, picking up the knife and eyeing it closely.

The man swallowed again, sweat forming as he watched you examine the knife. He opened his mouth, but no words came out.

"I'm sorry, sir. I didn't hear you." You whispered with a smile.

Again he opened his mouth, but closed it as words failed him.

You grabbed the man's hand and placed it on the table, "spread your fingers and don't move."

He did as you instructed. You could feel him trembling in fear. Fucking pussy. You looked up at the table with a wide, fanatical grin.

"Gentlemen, it seems we have a problem and the mute cannot tell me." You laughed, bringing the knife down as hard as you could on the man's pinky.

He screamed in pain, pulling his hand to him, cradling it in his other.

"Stop bleeding on my goddamn table!" You screamed at him, pressing the knife to his throat.

You turned back to the room, ignoring the sounds of pain and agony beside you.

"Every day my husband sits in jail this man will lose a finger. He only has nine now. Who will be next?" You said, baring your teeth and pointing at a man down the table. "You. You're next. Until the rat is brought to me or my husband is returned to me, there will be hell. You are all dead as fuck. You only thought Ramsay was scary. I am so, so much worse."

The same manic laugh that crept up on you from time to time, escaped you.

"Because I'm in such a bad mood..." You said, stabbing the other man beside you in the neck.

He slumped forward. You clucked, pulling the knife and setting it on the table.

"You all are dismissed." You said waving the table away and then pointing at Matt, Ben, and Alyn, "except you three. You stay."

You stood there, glaring at the men as they all scattered like a herd of spooked cattle.

Once the room was empty, except you, the Boys, and the two dead men, you dropped the act with slumped shoulders and a deep sigh.

"Boys, I want chaos. Everywhere. Blood needs to wash the streets. More everyday. Everyone. Lions, Stags, Roses, Towers, Kings." You said, taking an empty seat as pain in your back and side caught you offguard.

"What are you doing, (y/n)?" Ben asked cautiously as Alyn stared unblinkingly at you.

"Taking the heat off Ramsay. He can't have done all of those things if say... oh, I don't know... I did it." You said slowly.

"What are you talking about?" Alyn finally spoke.

"I mean if we make it look as though Ramsay was never the one in control or ever engaged in any of those activities we can send the police on a wild goose chase, looking for a crime boss who doesn't exist." You said, nodding at Matt, who pulled the paper from his pocket and laid it out flat on the table.

"Foxes and the First Order. You are so Ramsay's wife." Ben said with a small huff.

"It was your son who gave me the idea." You said, rising from the table. "He said the cops got the wrong man. Made a wrong guess. So let's get back at them. Let the fox out fox the cops. Terror in the streets for everyone. No one singled out. Now, send Carmen to my room, and get ready for hell on earth." You said, leaving the dining room.

"Come in." You called, standing at the window.

Carmen came in quietly, looking you over, "Ben said you would like word?"

"I have it you were a seamstress once upon a time?" You said, still gazing out the window at the shining lights of the city in the distance.

"A damn good one." Carmen said, puffing her chest out.

You grinned, "Good. Follow me."

You walked swiftly and purposefully to the sewing room you had found a few days ago. On the table in a corner was all the fabric you had bought earlier.

"I need you to make this for me." You said, holding out your phone.

Carmen took it and examined the picture closely, zooming in on detail, and nodding to herself.

"Easy enough." She said, "Just get me a hard copy and I need to measure you."

"Pictures are by the fabric.  When can you have it done?" You said, crossing the room to the fabric.

"Saturday at the latest." Carmen said, taking in the psychotic air about you.

"Perfect." You said with a small grin.

A knock came on the door.

"Enter!" You called, as Carmen dug through a drawer to find a tape measure.

"(Y/n), I know Ramsay said to do what you say... but... do you know what you're doing?" Ben asked tentatively.

You laughed, "No idea."

Ben opened his mouth but said nothing, watching his mother in law take your measurements.

"But if there is one thing I have learned in being Ramsay's wife, it is that if you are crazy enough to do it, it is crazy enough to happen. Don't worry, Ben. I've got this. Our blades are sharp." You smiled.

"Riiight. Well, I'm off to gather up Skinner. His plane finally came in." Ben said, giving you a skeptical look.

"Be safe. Give my husband my love. And Ben, do not breathe a word of this until it is time." You warned as he left.

[a-heart-attack-ow]

Snowfall. Chapter 4

1

2

3

Warnings: Smut and language. 

4: 

Everything was dark.

           Your vision blurred the longer you look without movement.

                       The longer you hold in your breath.  

All color seemed to fade within you, with the few exception of gray, blue, and red. Colors that blurred all around you as you starred on in a haze.

Of all the things that you’d planned to do since you got to the lodge, this was the one thing you dreaded the most. Ouija boards freaked you out and you were superstitious enough to know not to use one.

But this had been his idea.

           His choice of mourning.

                       His idea of closure.

An idea that made your skin crawl the longer you sat at the kitchen table. The longer you pretended to be excited about the board sitting directly across from you, the pointer pointing at you.

It was enough to send a chill up your spine, but you knew you couldn’t say no.

           You were here for Josh.

                       Not for you.

                       You had to be strong for Josh.

           Not you.

You’re quieter than normal and everyone notices.

           Josh notices.

“You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to…”

He whispers moving a hand to yours.

“… You can watch. I know it makes you uncomfortable.”

You want to tell him that it really does bug you and that you think it would be better if no one played with the board, but you only smile when he looks at you, his blue eyes wide and full of concern. If anyone could make this stop before it started, it would be you, but you knew you couldn’t do that. This was what he needed and if fooling around with spirits helped him the so be it.

“Really (y/n), go upstairs and take a load off. I’ll join you upstairs as soon as I’m done messing around with these freaks.” 

He winks at you as you nod, happy to comply with his blessing of your leaving. He was right this was the last place you wanted to be, especially as you looked around. Maybe it was your mind playing tricks on you, but you could swear that the lights seemed to dim more and the candle light took over all you could see was this ending bad. Even as you looked through the red flames to the man you were here for you could feel the sensation of unease pulsating in your chest. Even as Chris begins to make fun jokes, and you stand from your seat you feel the unease move to your stomach.

“Chris this is serious.”

You hear your boyfriend say as you start to walk away, all three sets of eyes on your back as you make your way forward. As you move quickly from the board. You keep moving forward until you’re out of the room, your back against the wall as you listen to what’s happening on the other side of the wall.  

“Oh, shush it, let’s try this.”

Ashley whispers when Chris says something funny in response to Josh’s plea for seriousness. A plea you wish would stop him from doing this in the first place.

Even when you’re away from the table, you have a feeling that nothing good would come from this, the thought alone played in your mind on a loop. Each loop getting faster and faster until you felt like your chest was going to burst. Each passing breath becoming more and more shallow as your eyes fixated on the board in front of you.

“Is anyone there?”

Ashley asks, her voice hesitant. You can tell without looking at her that she almost hopes the board doesn’t react, that nothing happens. It’s the same way you feel as you wait for something to happen. Anything.

But when the sound of panic fills the room you boarder, you feel your stomach begin to twist. Talk of the counter moving to letters and everyone arguing about whether or not they’re the one moving the counter fills the room. Without looking you know no one is moving the counter, none of them are that good at acting that they’d be that convincing.  

A part of you wants to move from where you stand, curiosity getting the better of you the longer you stand there, but you don’t move. Instead you listen closely as your heart begins to pound in your chest. You listen as the hysteria from the other room gets louder and louder, each person getting more freaked out by the second.

“It’s moving fast.”

You hear Ashley state as you hear Chris and Josh spell out wherever the counter is going next. Whatever it is and whatever it’s spelling seems to make Chris believe that its communicating with them. Probing Asley to ask who is trying to communicate.

Without being in the room you have an idea of who is trying to communicate with them, a suspicion that is proven when they begin taking turns spelling out who the communicator is;

“S”

“I”

“S”

“T”

“E”

“R”

Your heart drops at the revel, at the fact that your suspicions were right. Not only was it who you thought it was, but you’d been right.

           This wasn’t going to end well at all.

Pushing off the wall you feel your boot covered feet move lightly along the hardwood floor, your mind focused on one thing.

           Running away.

You move up the stairs and find yourself moving in the familiar path you’d taken earlier in the night, your feet carrying you back to his room.

The same room that suddenly felt weird to sit in.

           The room you knew wouldn’t be the same after tonight.

Your body moves to the window of his room, your hands reaching out to grasp the window pane as you focus your eyes forward.

Your mind is racing, your heart is pounding and even if you weren’t apart of the Ouija board sit down you felt as if you had been.

It felt as real to you as holding the counter yourself and it left you trembling. It left a chill on your spine and the hairs on your neck standing on its end. But as scared as you were you couldn’t bring yourself to care move. All you could do is stare out the window and breathe.

All you could do is look out into the dark snow on the mountain and breathe until you hear the bedroom door opening before slamming shut behind you. Without looking you know who it is. You know it’s Josh and you can feel his anger long before you turn to face him.  

“Those two were fucking with me!”

He shouts when you turn to look at him. His face is angry, his eyes hold trace amount of tears. He’s shaking, his hands balled into tight fists as his side.

For a moment, you look at him, your eyes wide as you see him shake in anger. It had been a long time since you’d seen him like this. It had been a long time since he’d let any emotion, other than lust or happiness, control him. It had been so long you almost don’t know how to react at first. You want to speak, but you find that you can’t. Instead all you can do is look at him and wait for whatever was going to unfold next. Waiting to see whatever wave of emotion was going to take over him next.

The air seems to get a bit thicker, the longer you look at each other. The longer you both wait for whatever is going to happen next. So, when you move to stand, after a few more seconds of silence, his blue-eyed gaze remains locked on you. His chest rises and falls as the tears in his eyes burn him.

Reaching forward slowly you take a step closer to him, your eyes never leaving his as you do this. You move your boot covered feet to stand directly in front of him, your hands reaching out to take his. The moment you touch him, he pulls his hands away, the tears in his eyes escaping him. He looks down at you, his chest rising and falling once more as the aggression he’d been feeling from the events downstairs takes him over.

“Don’t shut me out Josh…”

Your voice whimpers through the dim lighting of the room, your gazes locking together when you try and reach out for him once more.

“… I’m here for you. So, let me in.”

He breathes a deep sigh and this time, when your hands meet his, he lets you hold onto him. There’s a sadness in his eyes still, but the moment you touch him you feel his mood shift slightly. You want to talk about what is bothering him because you can see that something bigger is at play, but you can tell by looking at him that talking is the last thing he wants to do.

Instead his eyes move from yours to your mouth and then back up again, his breathing uneasy for a moment as he moves his chest to yours. Josh had gotten good at opening up to you whenever something was bothering him, but sometimes he distracted himself. Sometimes he didn’t want to talk. Sometimes he wanted to avoid his pain and you were his perfect distraction.

You were the one he craved when things got painful.

           The light that refused to go out.

“Can I kiss you?”

You find yourself asking even though you already know the answer. Even though a part of you knows that he’d never give up the opportunity to kiss you.

He answers with his lips, the moment they crash down onto yours. His kiss is slower than you expect, his lips exploring yours with great attention. As if he was getting to know you for the first time. As if he was hoping that the longer he took, the more your lips would will away the pain. He deepens the kiss when your hands guide his to your waist.

A groan escapes him when you do this, your arms quick to wrap around his shoulders. You’d done this before. You’d done this many times, but this time everything felt different. Something was off in his touch and you could feel it the moment his hands move to your jacket zipper. He removes it quickly and drops it to the floor in a fluid motion.

Your kiss breaks for only a moment, the both of you looking at each other with uneven breath as you study each other. Before you he stands, but he felt oddly distant suddenly.

You go to speak, but when you do his lips find yours once again, his hands quick to move to the sweater that had been hidden under your winter coat for the entire night so far. With a few swift movements of his hands the sweater seems to leave your torso as he breaks the kiss long enough to get it over your head. At first, you’re taken aback by how forward he’s being, but you don’t stop him. You don’t want to.

Instead you move your hands to the buttons of his shirt, undoing them all while he looks down at you with his eyes clouded in pure lust. He wants you to indulge in him, but you can tell that his reason might be different than yours. In fact, you’re certain that this elaborate moment of lust and bliss is bigger than it seems to be.

Even when you get him out of his shirt and his lips are locked with yours once more you can feel it. You just don’t want to say anything. You don’t want to stop what’s happening between the both of you.

“I love you.”

He finally manages to growl as he lifts you from the ground, your jean covered legs wrapping around his torso as he kisses you. He carries you to his bed and is quick to lay you down beneath him, his body straddling yours.

For a moment, he looks at you, eyes locked with yours as he hovers above you. He uses one hand to keep his body above yours, and uses the other to trace your bare torso, his eyes locking on the bra you’re still wearing. His fingers move from your collar bones slowly until he reaches the front of your bra, his index finger tracing the clasp.

He looks at you for a moment, making sure you see how much desire is in his eyes as he unfastens the bra, his hand quick to trace over your breast. He moves in a slow motion and smirks when your teeth bite down on the bottom of your lip. The smirk grows when his fingers trace over your hardened nipple and you let out a small gasp.

“I love that sound.”

He seems to growl once more as your body leans into his touch, back arching slightly.

“I hate you…”

You whimper when his hand moves from your breast, his index finger tracing down the center of your torso as slowly as he can.

“… you’re always such a tease.”

A chuckle seems to escape him when you say this, his finger finding the button of your jeans. It takes him mere seconds to undo the button, his hand moving to the top of your underwear.

“Would you want me to be anything else?”

He rasps before sitting up, his body no longer looming over yours. He turns his attention to the shoes you’re still wearing and decides it would be better for what he’s got planned next if you weren’t wearing them. It takes him less than a second to rid you of your shoes and socks before he turns to your pants.

He drags them down your legs slowly and your body shivers as the cold air touches your newly exposed skin.

“I want to thank you (y/n)…” He begins as he finds your underwear, his hands dragging them down as slowly as he dragged down your jeans.

“… For all that you do…”

His voice draws out the words, each one seeming to grow slower and slower as he returns to hovering over you. His left hand seems to descend down your torso, but this time he’s quicker. This time he’s quick to find where you need him most and he wastes no time letting his fingers find you. It takes two fingers and a smirk in your direction to make your back arch against the bed once more, your shirtless torso meeting as his lips find yours.

He kisses you deeply as his fingers continue to work you, his index finger teasing you until you feel your stomach turn. You were about to come down from your high, but the moment he can sense it he stills his actions and looks back at you.

“… You deal with me and my moods and for that I’m eternally grateful…”

His body leaves yours and you feel the high you were on start to come down until your eyes move to him. He stands at the foot of the bed, and moves his hands to his jeans before ridding himself of both his jeans and the boxers.

Noting the way, you look at his now naked form, his smirk returns and he’s quick to move back to where he’d been before.

“…I will always love you. No matter what happens.”

There’s a duality to his words when he speaks. The sense of him wanting to say more seeming to overtake you. You want to say something, but he interrupts as he had the other times. This time you forget to say anything the moment his hard length thrusts into you, his lips meeting yours as he does this.  His body is quick against yours, each thrust as passionate as the one previous and it takes a second for you to meet his thrusts. But when you do he groans against your lips before guiding his lips to your neck.

He gives a few light kisses before marking your collar bone, sucking lightly along the skin. It’s a sensation that causes you to moan in response a sound that is music to his ears. A sound you always loved to hear.

Your bodies move together until you’re both ready for a release, a release that is as satisfying as all the moments building up to it. A release that knocks you head over heels, his eyes locking with yours as he spills over and you do too.

He kisses your lips one final time before pulling out, your body suddenly cold without his. The cold vanishes the moment he grabs the comforter and draws it up around the both of you, his arms pulling you into him.

You rest your head on his chest as the both of you breathe together, your eyes heavy suddenly.

“I love you Josh.”

Your voice whispers through a yawn while your eyes close and bliss finds you. In this moment, here in his arms, you felt complete. You felt loved and when he kissed your temple you thought nothing could ruin your night with him…

But you couldn’t have been more wrong.

[ohmytheon]

sometimes we forget how to want (rebelcaptain)

Notes: This accidentally got a little more serious than I intended since it was supposed to just be a fun excuse for smut, but this is a painful ship. Still, this is really just...kind of silly and here for a good time. I'm surprised I haven't seen a fic like this already, although I probably just missed it. This particular undercover trope is a necessity for all spy couples after all.

Summary: Cassian has been on a lot of missions before and done a lot of shady things. The second Jyn steps out onto the stage, however, he knows that nothing has prepared him for this, but he's not completely powerless.

Rating: M for smut, adult themes, and gross Imperial dudes

sometimes we forget how to want

It wasn’t the first time that Cassian had been in an establishment like this. Some missions called for him to enter places he would’ve never otherwise stepped foot in, even going so far as having him pretend to enjoy it. He’d done his fair share of morally grey things for the Rebellion. As far as terrible things went, going to a strip club most certainly wasn’t one of the worst. He just had never personally enjoyed them himself. Dark, loud, liquor-filled, and seedy, they did, however, make for great meeting places between informants and also drop offs.

When everyone was considered tainted, it made it much easier to blend in.

Still, Cassian hadn’t been exactly thrilled when they’d been given this mission, Jyn even more so. After all, she was the one that would be doing most of the work. Cassian was there mainly as back up - to keep an eye on her and also make sure things went smoothly - while she would be in the thick of it. And it wasn’t like she was comfortable with the role she was playing. He could still remember her growling furiously from behind the door when K-2 mentioned something about her wardrobe.

Not long after landing in the city, Cassian made himself a semi-regular at the club. He didn’t have to wear an Imperial outfit this time, just the hint of one. An officer on leave, trying to enjoy a bit of nightlife before he was forced back to work. This particular city was known for that. Lower Imperial officers would come here, mingle with some of the very miscreants Stormtroopers harassed, and get into a little good ole fashioned debauchery. Practically everything was a go here. Behaving and following the rules made a person stand out here.

Jyn came after. At first, they made sure not to be at the club at the same time. Cassian was loathed to send her in without him there, but Bodhi would trickle in on those nights, probably nurse two drinks at the bar for as long as he could without attracting the attention of one of the employees. Bodhi always came back red-faced and twitchy, muttering that everything was fine before holing himself up in his ship. At least he talked. Jyn was completely silent about it, stone-faced with a buzz under her skin that vibrated danger if Cassian were to ask questions.

So he didn’t. Things seemed to be going well without him. Their target, a high-ranked Imperial officer with quite a few nasty habits that he couldn’t let go of, was a regular at the club. He went almost every other night. Cassian had crossed paths with him a few times, usually keeping his distance but sometimes only a few feet away. The man was grimy with loose, grabbing hands, a terrible grin, and a weakness for petite dark-haired women. At least it made him predictable.

Now that they were comfortably settled in their roles, it was time to make a move. Jyn was getting progressively angrier while Bodhi looked more miserable with every passing night. He sighed with relief when Cassian stepped out in his night clothes.

Jyn glanced at him once, her mouth as thin as possible, and darted her eyes away from him before he could connect with her. “I have to go. I should be there before you.”

“Wait.” Cassian didn’t reach out to grab her arm, not like he wanted to, but she turned her body towards his almost on instinct anyways.. She was bundled up in a long jacket that she kept protectively wrapped around her body like it was armor. “It’s almost over.” He wished she would look up at him instead of staring determinedly at his chest so that she could see the faint smile on his face. “Just one more night.”

Her lips twitched and she tightened her grip on her jacket, but said nothing else. Cassian watched her walk out the door, hating the way she held herself. It was for the Rebellion. All they did was for the Rebellion. But there were times when it felt like they gave too much of themselves away. He hadn’t meant to drag her into his world; he hadn’t asked her to sacrifice parts of herself like he did for the cause. When she had agreed to stay, half of him had filled with relief while the other half screamed at her to run.

You will lose yourself, piece by piece, if you do this.

He couldn’t imagine what she had lost to this, but he would be with her at the end, as always.

“It doesn’t upset her, not really,” Bodhi piped up. “She just… She feels awkward. This, uh, isn’t her.”

“That’s the point of going undercover,” Cassian pointed out before leaving the room.

He slowly made his way through the city, careful of pickpockets but still casual enough to blend in with the crowd. Just another night on the town, the last one before being shipped off to another station. The club was a twenty minute walk from their rendezvous point, a few blocks from the center of the city. It was hazy with smoke, smelled of too much perfume and alcohol, dark with bright, colored lights that lit up the stage like the runway of a shuttle landing strip. Bad music, in his opinion, was played by a band that had clearly been drinking. But it made for the perfect place to do business in a way. This wasn’t one of the worse joints at least.

Their target, Koren Byner, was sitting in the front row, up and close to the stage, a drink in one hand and a cigarette in the other. His Imperial uniform was undone at the top, his hat sitting carelessly on the table. He must’ve come here straight from duty. Cassian made his way forward, this time placing himself only three empty seats away. He usually stayed away from the stage, but he needed to be close by tonight. Of course Byner would make things difficult and uncomfortable.

Girls danced on the stage, all of them humanoid in some fashion. Men here liked things that spoke of the unknown and something different, but not too much. Cassian handed money away, each time thinking that Rebellion cash could be spent on something more important, but he couldn’t sit right up front and act like a penny pincher. He didn’t give as much money as Byner did. The man was as loose with his cash as he was with his hands. The girls, for their part, paid him attention, but Cassian could tell that they didn’t enjoy it much. Money was money though, no matter who it was from. Byner did make them work for it though.

A new name was announced - Kaia - and Cassian’s eyes snapped forward. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Byner sitting up eagerly in his seat, leaning forward so that his arms actually rested on the stage, but the moment the curtains drew back and another figure stepped out into the flashing red lights, Cassian stopped paying attention to Byner altogether.

Cassian had been on a lot of missions before, but nothing could have prepared him for Jyn sauntering on stage.

Even though she was still mostly clothed, his mouth went dry. He’d never seen her move like that before and he’d thought, foolishly so, that he’d memorized every way her hips could move and sway. Bodhi was right. It wasn’t her. She had done well, becoming Kaia, a stranded girl trying to make quick money so that she could get a ride back to her home planet.

The makeup around her eyes was dark and smoky, making her green irises pop and her skin stand out strikingly. With every bit of clothing lost and tossed to the side, more of that pale skin was bared for everyone to see, but he was so zeroed in on her that it felt like he was the only one in the room. He’d touched that skin before, ran his hands down it, pressed his lips to it, slid his tongue across it - and yet somehow it looked brand new and he wanted more.

Cassian blinked when she tossed her shirt at him and tried to snap himself out of it. He was beginning to sound like another one of the lecherous customers here. But then she swayed to the music and slid down a wall halfway, her eyes finding his, and she smiled. If he hadn’t been turned on before, he was now. Jyn had way of smiling that made a person feel like it was meant only for them, if only because she so rarely gave them away. She wasn’t by any means the greatest dancer, her movements fluid in a way that spoke more of fighting and danger than dancing and alluring, but it was captivating in its own way.

It made a guy feel like he might get cut if he tried to get too close to her and still desperate the find out. He remembered feeling that way not too long ago without even seeing her dance in such a manner.

Carefully, Jyn slinked her way towards him as another girl took the stage. The dancers shared the floor on a constant rotation, but they didn’t stop dancing once another appeared. Cassian was forced to lean back in his seat as she neared him, sliding off the stage and close to him. He opened his mouth, as if to question her, when she placed her hands on the back of his chair, and straddled him. Something between a grunt and a groan escaped him before he could stop himself as she ground down against him.

No, no, no, he could not do this. Cassian could do a lot of things - had done a lot of things - but he could not do this. How could she expect him to handle himself appropriately in this position? She was only wearing a matching black set of bra and panties now, barely anything separating her from him. There was no way that she would not able to tell how much she had affected him. In fact, judging from the little grin on her face as she moved against him, she definitely had an idea.

Without meaning to, Cassian’s hands found their way to her sides, resting on the bare skin on her hips just above her underwear. Customers were allowed to touch back as long as the dancers didn’t mind. And Jyn didn’t seem to mind, not with the way she was pressed up against him. And then, with a wicked gleam in her eyes, she stepped back and spread his legs open.

Cassian started and licked his lips. “Ah, what are you-- what are you doing?”

“Relax,” Jyn purred in a strange accent as she slid down. Her hands moved down as well, gliding down his chest, over his thighs, and down his legs. All the blood drained from his head. As she slid back up, her little hands came dangerously close to touching his hardened length and then her chest followed, until she was back in his lap. This time, he didn’t hesitate to grab her again and pulled her closer, so that her face rested against his shoulder. “Men always want something another man has. It’ll make him hungrier.”

Hell, it was making Cassian hungrier for more. He had to fight the urge to jerk his hip upwards, but he was not about to rut against her in public, no matter how seedy of a place this was. She would’ve laughed about it later. But make no mistake, she would be paying for this later. This had not been a part of the plan.

One of her bra straps had fallen off her shoulder down her arm. A voice in the back of his mind urged him to pull it down further, but he didn’t dare make a move. It was taking all of his willpower as it was to not kiss her.

But then Jyn caught his line of sight and smiled at him and bit her lip, making him feel dizzy. She knew exactly what kind of effect that look had on him. He wanted to replace her teeth with his, worrying at the bottom of her lip, slipping his tongue into her mouth, kissing her without abandon. Damn her, damn her. She lowered her shoulders and the other bra strap slid down.

“Go ahead,” she told him in a husky, tempting voice. Did she really want him to or was this just a part of the role? Normally, he was excellent at spotting the difference, especially with Jyn, but he was a little distracted at the moment. “You can touch me, if you like.”

Pulling one shaky hand away from her, he hesitated briefly before pulling her bra straps back onto her shoulders. “I like a girl with a little mystery.”

Jyn giggled, climbing nimbly off of his lap and making him miss her almost instantly. As quickly as she had come to him, she left, drifting away from him like smoke, her finger lingering under his chin for a moment before she sauntered away from him, towards Byner. The man was positively frothing at the sight of her. His face was an open page of desire, driven to a brink after seeing her with Cassian, and he was all too eager in reaching out to grab her as she began to dance with him.

Cassian swallowed the lump in his throat and told himself that he was not jealous. This was just a mission. This was just another role that would be discarded. It was for the Rebellion.

But Force be damned, he wanted to pull out a vibroblade and stab Byner right in the gut for the way that he was pawing at Jyn.

The easiest way to make someone want something was to give it to someone else. Cassian could curse himself. Was he that easy to manipulate or was it just her?

The asshole kept pulling at the rest of her clothing, trying to slide it off of her body so that he could see and feel more. He was greedy and none too gentle. Jyn would laugh, twisting out of his grip, before finally she leaned over to whisper something in his ear. Cassian’s blood boiled just beneath the surface. His hands twitched at his side, so he reached for his drink to busy himself. Whatever Jyn had said, it must’ve pleased Byner greatly, as he leaned back and groaned in a way that almost made Cassian crush the glass in his hand.

With that done, Jyn moved on, her dark hair bouncing around her like a halo, and traipsed further into the room. Cassian did his best to keep a furtive eye on her without being conspicuous while Byner watched her like a hawk, his stare on her like a claim. Mine, his eyes said, she’s mine.

Cassian wanted to pluck the man’s eyes out. Jyn didn’t belong to anyone.

It wasn’t long before Jyn came back, an almost shy smile on her face. When she held out a hand, Byner took it quickly, pulling her close to him. She giggled uncharacteristically and tugged him to his feet. As she led him to one of the back rooms, she cast a look over her shoulder and winked at Cassian, as if to tell him that he was missing out on something, and then disappeared behind a door hidden in the dark shadows of a hallway.

After waiting a few minutes and watching another dancer, he stood up and made his way towards the bathroom. At the last minute, he ducked into the hallway instead and found the room that Jyn had gone in with Byner. He knocked on the door in a specific manner and then waited a beat before the door opened and he slipped inside unnoticed.

There was Jyn, still standing there in nothing but her underwear, looking slightly irritated. Back to normal then - or as normal as could be with what she was wearing. Byner was passed out on the bed, looking completely out of it, an empty tumbler glass on the floor below his hand that hung off the edge. When Cassian glanced back at Jyn, he noticed that her hair was disheveled and her makeup was slightly smeared, especially her lipstick.

Jyn caught him looking and huffed, folding her arms across her chest. “It took a minute before the sedative kicked in. This imbecile has a high tolerance.”

No, Cassian was not going to stab an unconscious target. That would make things look very suspicious. But it was a tempting thought.

Instead, he said nothing and brought out the tools that they would need in order to finish the job. While she took his handprints and then fingerprints, he plucked Byner’s eyelids open and took a quick retinal scan. They gathered some samples of his DNA and made a copy of this access card that he’d kept on him after coming here directly from work. Too eager to see that new dancer Kaia before she left.

Once their work was complete, Cassian slid the objects back into his jacket and stood up straight. He glanced back at Jyn, who was eyeing Byner like she wanted to strangle him. He knew that if he tried to apologize, she would be furious with him for it. No one had ever apologized to him for what he’d had to do for the Rebellion. What made her any different? He also knew that he could not admit to still being affected by her dancing earlier. It was the worst moment possible, but just thinking about it made him squirm.

“Jyn,” was all he said instead, reaching out to touch her wrist, his voice too low, too strained.

She turned to face him. A thousand contradicting thoughts flooded into his mind. Desire. Sorrow. Anger. Longing. Concern. Want. Fear. They all blended into one terrible mess until he didn’t know how he was supposed to feel or what to say, so he did what he’d always done before. He shut it down. He put all of those emotions in a box, locked it up, and hid it away. It was easier that way, especially with the way she was looking at him.

And yet he still wanted to pull her flush against him, crash his mouth against hers, and run his hands all over her until she was gasping under his touch.

Despicable, predictable idiot.

“I’ll be okay,” Jyn told him. And then she snorted and held up a wad of cash. “At least he prepaid. First time I’ve made more money on a mission than what was spent on it.”

Cassian nodded his head stiffly and then exited the room. He went to the bar to order another drink while Jyn slipped out and spoke with her manager. The woman in charge of the girls actually laughed as she took her part of the cash and then sent Jyn along to the back. Jyn left first, out the back like all the other employees, while Cassian hung around for another thirty minutes. He was still there when Byner stumbled out of the room, his face red with embarrassment and looking a complete mess. Passed out on the girl of his dreams before he could do anything. How humiliating. It would be awhile before he showed his face here again.

After a while, Cassian left the club as well, winding his way through the city towards the rendezvous point. He always went a different route, some much longer than others, to make sure that he wasn’t followed. It was hard to not make a straight beeline for the motel room tonight, but he forced himself to go slow, taking in the flashing lights and dank smells of the city. By the time he reached the room, Jyn had already been there for almost two hours. She was probably crawling up the walls by now wondering where he was and what was taking him so long.

Just as he suspected, the moment he walked inside, Jyn was on him. “What took you so long?” she demanded as she stormed towards him. There was fire in her eyes and a hard expression on her face. Ah, there was the Jyn Erso that he knew so well. “Where were you?”

“Don’t worry,” Cassian told her, an amused grin on his face. “I didn’t stay to watch the other girls.”

Jyn sneered and folded her arms across her chest, but kept her mouth shut. Likely she was still brimming with adrenaline from the night’s events. She was a quick learner and even faster on her feet, but she wasn’t the seasoned spy that Cassian was; she was still figuring out how to direct her energy after missions. She watched silently as he put everything that they had gathered in a bag that he stored in the closet. Honestly, he was surprised that she didn’t demand more answers from him, but his quip had done the trick in quieting her.

When he finally turned to face her, they just looked at one another. Jyn’s cheeks were still pink, though not from the makeup. Then he noticed that she was wearing a bathrobe and it clicked. She’d been so anxious about him taking so long that she hadn’t even finished changing out of her wardrobe for the mission. Underneath that bathrobe was the same underwear set that she had been wearing when she’d teased him at the club. He took three steps towards her without even thinking, until she was right before him and had to tilt her chin up to continue looking him in the face.

There was questioning, hesitant look in her eyes when he held her face and kissed her as hard as he could.

For a brief second, Jyn stiffened, probably out of shock at his sudden action, but then she unfolded her arms and wrapped them around his neck instead, pulling him down to her. She opened her mouth to his, allowing him to deepen the kiss, and hummed pleasantly as his mouth worked against hers. He slid his hands from her face, down her neck, shoulder, and arms, until he could rest them on her waist again.

A part of him, the part that always thought to take things slow with her, draw it out, touch and taste her thoroughly, wanted to push her towards the bed. But then he pictured her on the dance floor again, the way she’d been moving, coordinated like she was in a fight, her hips, her hands, that smile that was a mixture between sneaky and shy - and that part of him faded into the background. All of his desire from earlier came roaring back to him, demanding to be heard, and this time, he didn’t have to ignore it.

Instead he pushed her back against the wall and pinned her there with his body, hard enough to startle her into gasping but not hard enough to hurt her. She was a slippery thing and he knew how much she enjoyed wiggling away to tease him, but not this time. With a knee, he nudged her legs apart and moved to kiss her jaw and down her neck, sucking on the skin over her pulse point. It seemed to jitter underneath his lips. Another gasp escaped her, this one breathier, when he found a sensitive spot and she pulled at the back of his collar and the hair hanging down the nape of his neck.

The bathrobe came undone easily. All he had to do was tug on the belt and then slid his hands inside over the skin of her belly. She jumped under the cold touch of his hands, but then whimpered and pressed her center against his thigh when he moved to rove his fingers over her breasts. Even hidden by the bra, they were sensitive. He knew just how to coax her into wanting more by now.

Take your time, a distant voice told him. You have that ability now.

But no, that wasn’t what he wanted. Jyn was usually the one that preferred things fast and rough. There were nights when she would pull him to bed like an animal in heat, leaving marks on his back that she tended to carefully in the morning. She would drag every moan and inch of desire out of him, like it was the only thing keeping her alive, like it was air, until she could finally breathe and rest easy lying next to him. She hadn’t known what to make of his tenderness, his need to satisfy her, his desire to take care to map her out. He thought it had scared her at first. He hadn’t even known that he’d wanted it like that until her.

Tonight though there was no gentleness. No gentle caresses, no delicate coaxing, no luxurious slow pace. Tonight he wanted all of her and he wanted her now. All his patience and self control had been spent at the club.

When he pulled away slightly, Jyn let out a protesting whine. He moved his way down quickly, kissing down her stomach and over her hip bone. She jerked in surprise when he roughly pulled down her underwear to her ankles, exposing her to him, and made a little yipping sound that he’d never heard before when he nipped the inside of one of her thighs. He gave her no warning before he licked up her slit and a jerky breath stuttered from her lips.

He couldn’t stop himself from groaning at the smell of her, the taste of her, already so wet and wanting. It couldn’t be from just their brief moments of kissing and him touching her. Had she gotten aroused back at the club just like him? All those breaths, the way she’d ground against him, her eyelids fluttering shut, the huskiness of her voice when she’d told him that he could touch her. He’d wanted to touch her. Force, it had been all he could do to not allow his hands to roam over her body, possessively, greedily.

The few things in life that he’d wanted before had been for the greater good, not of his own benefit, partly because it had been stamped out of him early on in his childhood and mostly because the Rebellion had been all that mattered after that. This though, Jyn, he felt so selfish with his want for her. He wanted her all to himself. He was forced to share a part of her with the Rebellion, but moments like these belonged to him. She only made herself vulnerable to him, only allowed herself to need him, only opened up to him -- and he wanted it so bad.

She moaned above him, pushing her body flat against the wall. With her hands, she both tugged at his hair for more and tried to push him away, like it was too much and not enough at the same time. But he dug his fingers into the back of her thighs and her ass and would not relent. Even as he felt her muscles clenching, even as she cried out when he pulled one hand away from her thigh to pump two fingers up her center, even as words began to tumble out of her mouth, “Please, Cassian, oh, oh, shit, please,” like she couldn’t take it

He did not stop until she was shaking and crying out, pulling painfully at his hair and clawing at him. He licked at her, demanded more from her, until he was almost certain that she was close to sobbing and he’d never heard her like this before. It made him even hungrier. He’d had her before and she was his, in her own way, but still he wanted her like he’d been starved of her for years.

As he pulled away from her, she was shaking, her legs wobbling underneath her. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand as he stood up. Her pupils were so blown wide that he could barely see the mossy green of her irises and she was breathing so heavily that her chest brushed against his. Her skin was flushed from her cheeks all the way down her neck. Normally, he would’ve given her time to recuperate, even if it didn’t always seem to be on her mind when it was him. Perhaps a taste of her own medicine was what was needed after tonight’s show.

While pressing his lips to hers again, the action instinctively pulling her towards him again, he quickly made work of his belt and pants. He could remember one of the first times they’d had sex and he’d been so clumsy, suddenly incapable of figuring out how to undo his pants, and she’d grinned against his lips. Endearing, she’d called it later. It had not felt that way at the time.

This time, he barely bothered shoving his pants or boxers down all the way. It wasn’t like he was going to be moving around the room any time soon, not with her just where he wanted her. He slid his hands under her ass again and lifted her up, pinning her back against the wall, and then guided himself into her. She clung to him tightly, burying her face in the crook of his neck, and made a little noise when he pushed himself in all the way. She was so wet and inviting that there was hardly any resistance.

Holding her in place, he pumped in and out of her, not for a second going slow. She hit the wall every now and then, but didn’t seem to mind as her moans mixed with his. “Jyn,” he breathed, his mouth hovering over hers. Her eyes were closed and she gripped him tightly as he tirelessly pushed in and out of her. He kissed her, sloppy, her hair tangling in her face and mouth, but he didn’t care. The feel of her around him, her muscles twitching, was enough to make him feel dizzy.

He didn’t care about the strain on his arms. She was exactly in the right place at the right angle where he could bury himself deeply in her. He loved the noises she made every time he pushed himself harder into her, slamming her against the wall. Her nails dug into his shoulders, demanding even more from him, and he was all too willing to give it to her. Both of them were sweating and smelled of smoke from the club, but underneath that was the perfume she’d been wearing tonight, as intoxicating now as it was then.

“Touch yourself,” he growled into her neck, biting her skin enough to leave a mark. “Now.” She whimpered again, so unused to him being so commanding, needing it more than she’d expected probably. After all, she was used to him giving orders when they were on a mission or at the Rebel base, but not in the bedroom, certainly not like this. “I want to feel you.”

He also knew that she would take it as a challenge. Him being the boss in a situation where she normally took control would drive her something fierce. One of her thin hands slipped in between them. The second she began to touch herself, she arched into him even more and moaned loudly enough for whoever was in the next room to hear. He didn’t care. He could feel every time her walls clenched around him, seizing him for a moment before releasing him again. It took her out of rhythm, but again, he didn’t care.

Both of them had learned early on how to get themselves off quickly and quietly, a necessity when the urge came after a while, and so it wasn’t long before she’d brought herself to the peak. It drove him absolutely wild and somehow he managed to go even harder and faster. His own breaths had turned into ragged gasps as she bucked her hips against him and helpless pleas were whispered in his ear, her second orgasm rolling over her and him, He almost came right then and there, but held himself back at the last second.

He waited until she had come down from the orgasm, her muscles only spasming here and there, when he finally pulled out of her and set her down on the ground. This time, her legs were definitely weak and her knees buckled together. He didn’t force her to stand for too long, pulling her away from the wall and pushing her towards the bed. As she tumbled backwards into it, bouncing on the mattress and laughing breathlessly, he shucked his shoes and stepped out of his pants and boxers. Definitely didn’t need those anymore.

Crawling over her in the bed, Cassian leaned down to kiss her again, slowly, deliberately, like he usually did when they were in bed like this. She eased into the kiss, reaching out to touch him, but he snatched one of her wrists before she could do so. Sitting up slightly, he grabbed her other hand and held them above her head, making her look so very vulnerable to him. She blinked up at him, half surprise and half arousal. Her wrists were so thin; it was a wonder they’d found binders to fit them all that time ago. He held them with one hand while he pushed himself inside of her again. She immediately canted her hips up to meet him.

It wouldn’t be long now. Not with the way she was looking up at him, so trusting. She was breathless, her skin flushed with adrenaline and arousal. His eyes never left hers and it was almost too much for him. He’d looked into plenty of people’s eyes while lying straight to their faces, but something like this, something so honest, had always been difficult for him to imagine. She pulled it out of him though, piece by piece, until he remembered. He pumped in and out of her fast and hard until he could barely breathe himself.

And then her muscles clenched around him again and she pleaded with a single word, “Cassian,” and his entire world went white for just a moment. He fell forward, catching himself on his forearm, and buried his face into the crook of her neck, just as she had done with him, as he came, his movements staggering and out of pace. He tilted his head to kiss her desperately, on the neck, jaw, cheek, and then her lips, swallowing up everything left unsaid between them.

When he finally came down, his lips were still on hers, but neither of them were moving, just breathing, as if their lungs trying to catch up with their bodies. Both of their eyes were closed. He leaned his forehead against hers, relishing the feel of her chest haphazardly brushing up against his. He jerked when her muscles spasmed  around him and then kissed her almost chastely as he pulled himself out of her. Letting go of her wrists, he rolled off of her and flopped down next to her in bed. He took in a gulp of air and then sighed.

“Where in the hell did that come from?” Jyn asked, still sounding desperate for air though not angry. He could hear how content she was underlining her words. She was fierce with everything in her life, including happiness. He loved that about her.

Chuckling, Cassian turned onto his side so that he could nuzzle into her, his stubble rubbing against the smooth skin of her neck. “You were very rude during the mission.”

“You didn’t enjoy it?”

Cassian pulled his head back so that he could look at her and found her already looking at him. “I’m fairly certain I just proved that I did.” He shrugged. “Maybe a little too much. You were...distracting.”

Jyn bit her lip. “It wasn’t… It wasn’t me.”

“I know,” Cassian told her, “but this was. And you’re always maddening so that was definitely you.”

“Maybe you’re just easy to rile up,” Jyn pointed out, a faint grin on her face.

“No,” Cassian said as he threw an arm around her and pulled her close to him, “it’s just you. Always you.”

She had been frustrating and difficult from day one, even before he’d met her, back when he’d read her file and learned that they would have to break her out of a Wobani labor prison camp. It only made sense that she would be just as frustrating now, just in a different, much more pleasurable way. He wouldn’t have her any other way, if he was being honest.

[jarienn972]

The Recreant - Part Three

Here’s the next chapter where Emma is finally back home so yes - this one brings on the angst.  This also delves into the first of a couple of slightly controversial topics as the mystery that led to the attack deepens.

Complete Story on AO3  or  FF.net

Part One and Two on Tumblr

7:01pm

Situated on the third floor, Storybrooke Hospital's tiny Intensive Care Unit was just steps away from the elevator. Designed for the care of no more than four patients needing special care and round the clock monitoring, the unit had its own dedicated nursing staff and even its own operating room. While it didn't see a lot of traffic - even with the town's isolation and often torrid developments - it was a necessity in a magical town where it wasn't exactly possible to airlift patients to another facility. They'd had to adapt to take care of their own and currently, Killian was the only patient they were tending to. He'd come out of surgery only a few minutes earlier so the team was scurrying about, darting in and out of the doorway off to the left of the nurse's station that was positioned in the middle of the floor, right in front of the elevator doors as they parted for Emma.

Her heart was heavy with uncertainty and she was both physically and mentally tired as she glanced around for Dr. Whale, tempted to poke her head into the room she knew her husband occupied, but she resisted – for now. She'd spoken to the doctor not fifteen minutes ago and he'd implored her to meet him as soon as possible, again not really getting into a lot of detail. Just the mention of the words "Intensive Care" gave her chills and she wasn't feeling any less uneasy as she stood here now, slightly nauseated by the overwhelming scent of disinfectant in the air, even as she caught sight of Dr. Whale strolling toward her.

"Emma," he greeted her while tugging off a pale blue surgical cap and tossing it into a bin labeled soiled linens. "Why don't we talk over here?" He directed her toward an almost claustrophobic waiting room off to the right of the elevator which was spartanly furnished with only a battered black leather sofa and a scarred wooden armchair that appeared to have been borrowed from someone's office (sometime back in the mid-1990's maybe).

She nodded, moving slowly and apprehensively as she awaited Whale's assessment of her husband's injuries. She lowered herself onto the sofa and steeled her composure, finally looking up at Whale to make eye contact as he sat down in the chair across from her. If she hadn't already been so upset, she might have been distracted by his ridiculous spiky platinum hair, but she fought to remind herself that she was here for his medical expertise, not for a fashion lecture.

"Okay," she began, taking a deep breath to prepare herself for all that he would have to say. "You wouldn't really tell me anything over the phone. I know this must be bad or you wouldn't be so evasive."

"I wasn't intending to be evasive," Whale replied sincerely. "I simply intended to have this conversation in person and in private."

"Then be honest with me – how serious is this?" Her question was blunt, but that was not unexpected.

"Let's just say that it's a good thing that your husband is so hard-headed," he said, trying to lighten the mood with a joke, but the expression on her face made him change his approach immediately. "Someone gave him quite a beating."

"That much I already know," she stated, done with the small talk. "I need you to fill in the parts I don't know."

"Emma, I don't know if he's lucky or just stubborn, but he's holding his own. My best estimation is that he suffered at least four blows from his attacker's weapon. Do you want me to spell out what I believe happened?" Emma nodded her response, knowing that this was going to be painful to hear, but she wanted as much detail as he could provide. "Okay, then… While I can't be 100% certain of the order the strikes were delivered, my guess is that the first blow caught him completely off guard because it was the most indirect. It caught the left side of his head, causing the laceration across his cheekbone and a hairline fracture of the temporal bone above his left ear. The second injury may have been a defensive one as he may have either struck back at his attacker or brought his arms up to protect his head. Either way, his left forearm took the full force of that blow –fracturing both bones just above the leather prosthetic device he wears.

"He may have been semi-conscious and already falling down or just too weak to retaliate at this point because the other injuries were to his back – one across the middle of his back that fractured several ribs and sent fragments of those broken ribs into his lung and spleen causing massive internal bleeding. The last blow struck the back of his skull causing a severe concussion, a second hairline fracture to his skull and bleeding within the cranial cavity. For the moment, the intra-cranial bleeding has ceased and the fluid was drained, but we're going to have to keep a very close watch on it over the next 24-48 hours as well as the swelling."

Emma sat there motionless for a moment, trying to absorb it all – her emotions raw as she pictured Killian being on the receiving end of the assault Whale had just so graphically described. The assailant had to have been strong and fast to have pulled off such as brutal attack with little or no retaliation from Killian. She couldn't imagine him not fighting back – unless he wasn't physically able to.

"Were there any defensive wounds aside from the broken arm?" she wondered. "Anything that would indicate that he fought back against his attacker?"

"Your father asked me the same question and my answer is still the same – nothing that I observed. There were no bruises or scrapes that would indicate he'd struck someone. All we found was gravel and debris from the alley."

"What about on his hook? If he did take a swing at his assailant with his left arm, maybe he landed a blow before his arm was broken?"

"You'll have to check with your father on that one. Killian didn't have the hook on him when the paramedics brought him in. Last I spoke to your father he was still searching for it at the scene." Emma's eyes drifted downward toward the grey floor tiles as she struggled to maintain her focus, but she finally had to relent and let the frightened wife slip out from behind the tough as nails sheriff and savior façade.

"What are his chances?" she asked after a short, uncomfortable silence.

"Honestly, Emma, it's really too early to say. The surgery to repair his broken ribs early was successful as was the second procedure to drain the blood and fluid that was building up inside his cranial cavity, but there's still a great deal of swelling that we're trying to alleviate with medication, and if that doesn't work, he might need additional surgeries to keep that under control. Once all of the hemorrhaging and swelling are completely stopped, we'll be better able to assess if there will be any permanent damage. We'll also know a lot more once he regains consciousness." She couldn't fight back the tears any longer as the reality of what Whale meant sunk in – they were concerned that Killian might have suffered permanent brain damage. Whale found a box of tissues on the window sill behind him and handed it to her without judgement.

"Okay, then - I need to go in there and heal him," she stated as she wiped her eyes with a wadded up bit of tissue, trying hard not to completely lose her composure. "You know my magic is capable of healing his injuries."

"Yes, I'm well aware of your magical abilities, but I'm going to warn you to try to resist some of that temptation."

"Why?" she wondered, taken aback by the thought that Whale would suggest allowing Killian to continue suffer if he didn't need to. "Why put him through all of this pain?"

"Because there's no way to know if it would even work," the doctor replied honestly. "It's one thing to heal a broken bone or mend a cut. It's altogether different to tamper with the intricacies of the human brain. We've never had a situation like this before – someone with your particular light magic who can heal and we don't know what effect that magic would have. I don't know that it's a gamble you want to take."

She paused to reflect on his words, knowing deep down in her gut that he was right. If she took a gamble with magic and something went wrong, she knew she'd never be able to forgive herself. "I guess I understand," she replied with a deep sigh. "Can I at least see him now?"

"For a few minutes," Whale agreed. "He's not really ready for visitors, but since you are the Sheriff and I really don't want to get tossed across a room again, I'll make an exception this time. I will warn you that he's going to look frightful and I'm going to remind you about giving into the temptation. If you want to heal his more minor injuries, I won't stand in your way, but please, just remember what I said."

"I do understand," she repeated. "Right now, I just want to see my husband."

"Of course," Whale smiled, right before he asked something that cut straight to her heart. "By the way, have you told him yet?"

"Told him what?" she started to say, then stopped abruptly as she realized that he meant the test results he'd shared with her a few days earlier. She'd planned to share that news over dinner when she'd returned from Boston – dinner plans that they'd had for tonight. She'd wanted it to be a special occasion, but now… "No, he doesn't know yet. The Boston trip got in the way."

"Then tell him now. Good news like that can go a long way toward helping him recover," Whale insisted. She forced a weak smile onto her face at the thought of it. Just one more thing she hadn't wanted to think about right now… She shouldn't have waited.

Dr. Whale called the two nurses out of the room so that Emma could have a few minutes of privacy – well, at least what little privacy could be afforded by a glass partition and a fabric curtain. She went in knowing that the harsh, far too bright artificial lighting would amplify and exaggerate all of Killian's visible wounds, but Whale definitely had not lied about how awful he was going to look. She knew she was holding her breath as she took her first look at him lying silently on the narrow bed just a few feet in front of her. A crisp white cotton sheet and a lightweight beige blanket covered the lower half of his body, the covers tucked lightly around his waist and legs so as not to drag or get caught in the wheels of the mobile hospital bed should he need to be moved quickly. His exposed skin looked pallid under the harsh florescent lights, further emphasizing the deep, dark contrast of his bruises. A shiver found its way down her spine as she recalled the last time seen him this still and even two years later, the unwanted memory dampened her eyes. He barely resembled the man she knew. This man looked fragile and sullen, but at least his fighting spirit remained. Whale had staunchly reminded her how fortunate he was. He'd survived two surgeries already, had been given three units of blood to replace what he'd lost and she now knew the uneasy feelings she had experienced that morning likely stemmed from the moment he flat lined on the emergency room exam table before being successfully resuscitated and rushed into surgery. She should have been here…

She struggled to find a place to touch him where she wouldn't disturb some sort of wire or tubing. They were just everywhere – connecting him to all sorts of machines and monitors. Of course she knew that they were there to help keep him alive, but it was hard not to focus her attention on them. There was some sort of thin rubber tube taped to his right nostril and another extended out of the corner of his mouth. Tubing from the IV followed the curve of his right forearm to his wrist and hand where the needle was inserted into a vein and secured with tape. She knew there were other tubes in places she couldn't see – some in places she didn't want to think about, but with the severity of his injuries, it was fully expected.

Almost listlessly, she allowed her gaze to drift down to his chest which was unexpectedly mostly bare except for the wide swath of gauze that wrapped most of his midsection, covering the site of the earlier surgical incisions. Through the semi-transparent bandaging, she could see the deep purple bruises along his left side where one of the attacker's blows had struck him with such force that his rib cage had splintered and drove bits of bone into his lung. Small specks of dried blood stained the gauze in spots where it had seeped around the sutures.

It took more strength than she thought she'd need to allow her eyes to return to his face as the sight of his injuries brought back far too many painful memories of seeing him battered and beaten in the Underworld. The only difference was that this time, the torture had been inflicted on his living body by some unknown assailant rather than at Hades' bidding. There was an angry crimson gash across half of his face that had been stitched back together and bandaged, but the dark, almost black bruises peeked out from beneath the stained cotton fabric. In fact, most of his head was wrapped with gauze bandages that left only tufts of his dark hair visible along his neck and at the crown of his head. It was no secret that those bandages covered the tiny holes Whale had been forced to bore through his skull to access and drain a pocket of blood and fluid that had formed between his skull and the outer layer of his brain. A hematoma - she remembered what it was called and because of it, he had a scattering of small electrodes and wires positioned on his scalp so they could monitor his brain activity for any indication of trouble.

But it was those little electrodes that scared her the most – more than anything else he'd suffered because they were the symbol of the full gravity of their situation. This wasn't a case where someone had struck him to merely incapacitate him. Whoever had attacked her husband had done so with such brutality that the intention had clearly been to kill him, but why? What had been the motivation? Did they have to be worried that the would-be killer would return to finish the job?

"Who did this to you?" she asked aloud, not really caring if Whale or any of the nursing staff overheard. "Why did they do this to you?" Finding a spot to squeeze in next to his leg on the narrow hospital bed, she gently placed her hand atop his, her index finger tracing the edge of the vinyl identification bracelet that encircled his wrist. Her thumb grazed over his fingers, so strangely void of his ever-present rings. "Just who did you piss off this time, Killian?"

Unwilling to just sit there and stare at his visibly painful injuries, she had to do something to help – even if it didn't seem like much. She'd keep the promise that she made to Whale, but she was determine to do what she could. Her left hand still resting on his, she unfurled the fingers of her right and held them just inches above his fractured and splinted left arm, allowing the magical glow that emanated from her palm to mend those bones, then she passed her hand above his torso, repairing his damaged rib cage and completing the work that Dr. Whale had begun earlier in the operating room. When she was finished, she allowed herself the faintest little smile of satisfaction as she watched the bruises fade away. It really wasn't much, but she felt a little less guilty knowing that when he woke, he'd at least be spared some needless pain. She'd seen him suffer with broken ribs before so in the long run, this was better. She only wanted to spare him some of the agony and she ached to heal the rest. Not certain right now if she could isolate her magic just to the superficial wounds on his face, she left the nasty gash and bruises on his cheek alone, even if they did look horrific.

"I wish I could do more for you," she told him as she tenderly caressed the unscathed right side of his face, her thumb lightly brushing the scruff along his jawline. "You're on your own for the rest, but we're going to get through this and we are going to find out who did this." Knowing that Whale was likely going to kick her out of the room soon, she thought about the second part of her conversation with the doctor. With no certainty that Killian could even hear her in his comatose state, she had to go on pure faith. "You had better pull through this because there's no way I'm raising a Jones baby by myself."

There – she'd said it. Maybe he'd heard her. She hoped he'd heard her and now knew that he was going to be a father – well, in another eight months or so. While she hadn't expected his eyes to miraculously spring open and have him be completely healed, it wasn't the emotional, celebratory moment that she'd envisioned when she revealed that they were expecting. Instead, there were only the bleeps and blips from machines and all she herself could manage were tears.

She caught a glimpse of Dr. Whale heading her way in her peripheral vision and her heart sank just a bit at the knowledge that she'd have to leave her husband's side. Standing back up, she allowed herself to stoop over briefly to plant a scant kiss on an uninjured spot on his forehead. "I'll be back later," she promised, not really wanting to leave, but not in the right mindset to engage in a battle with Whale either. It was already after 8pm, so it was doubtful that the doctor would allow her to come back tonight, but she'd see what she could negotiate once she regained her composure. No matter what, she planned to stay close by. "You hang in there for me, okay?"

With a last squeeze of his hand, she stepped away from the bed and tried to stem the flow of tears as she slowly made her way out of the room, heading back toward the elevator. She'd remembered seeing vending machines downstairs on the main floor and even though caffeine wasn't really on the approved list of substances right now, she really needed coffee to get her through what was shaping up to be a long night. She stepped into the waiting elevator and decided she had better check the messages on her phone to make sure she hadn't missed out on any more important news. Apparently, most of her family and friends already knew to give her some space as there was only one quick "I love you, Mom" text from Henry and a missed call from her father. When the doors parted on the first floor, she made her way down to the guest lounge between the Emergency entrance and the hospital's main lobby before she called David back. She needed her coffee first she decided as she quickly deposited a handful of coins into the machine before pressing the speed dial button next to "Dad" on her contact list then made her selection for black coffee as she waited for him to answer. She wanted the strongest brew she could get right now.

"Emma – glad you called back," David's voice greeted her. "Are you back in Storybrooke?"

"Hi, Dad and yes, I'm back. Got here just about 7 and came straight to the hospital. What's up and can it wait?" she wondered as she retrieved the steaming cup of brackish liquid from the dispenser. The dark beverage didn't smell much like coffee, but at this point she didn't even care.

"I'm sorry to bother you. How's Hook doing?"

"As well as can be expected right now," she replied. "I just left him a few minutes ago."

"So then you haven't been home yet?" David asked, a rather unusual question for him to ask right now.

"No," she responded with a new degree of concern. "Why do you ask?"

"Because I got a call a few minutes ago at the station - one of your neighbors reported lights on inside your house and the front door was standing open. I came over to check it out and the whole place has been tossed."

"What?!" she exclaimed. "Someone broke into our house? Really?" This day just kept getting better… "Someone beats the hell out of Killian and someone else breaks into our house on the same day?"

"The two incidents could be related," David suggested.

"That's what worries me. Does it look like a robbery or does it seem like they were looking for something?"

"Personal, not professional opinion – I think they were searching for something. They didn't take any of the electronics including your laptop which was sitting right out in the open on the kitchen counter."

"What the hell is going on today?" she sighed, taking a sip of the coffee and immediately regretting it. The so-called beverage was simply too disgusting to drink. "Ugh…are you still at our house?"

"Yes. You want me to stick around until you get here?"

"Please. I'll be there in a few minutes. I've gotta stop and get some decent coffee first. This is going to be a long night…"

8:18pm

Emma's stomach was churning as she reluctantly climbed her own front steps onto the porch, immediately seeing the gouge marks around the deadbolt and doorframe where someone had pried open their front door. How had her neighbors not seen that earlier? It had never really crossed her mind that they'd need to have a security camera installed – assuming that the home of the Sheriff and Captain Hook would be off limits to burglars. But then this didn't seem like a robbery attempt.

She scanned everything in her sight, trying to take note of all of it before she took a step through the doorway into their parlor. The door had clearly been forced open, likely with a crowbar. Deep, uneven gouges in the wood indicated that the criminal had been in a hurry – not really caring if they left behind tell-tale evidence of the break in. Amateur, she thought. Someone with more experience wouldn't have entered through the front door in broad daylight or would have simply smashed the narrow sidelight window and reached inside to open the lock. Again, pointing to this not being a robbery.

Inside their home, furniture had been overturned and haphazardly searched, but while a few items had been broken, nothing valuable appeared to be missing - at least not at first glance. As her father had mentioned, her laptop was still sitting on the kitchen counter, although now next to the sink instead of beside the coffee maker where she'd left it. Cushions from the sofa and chair had been tossed onto the floor, but the television mounted on the wall was untouched. She could feel her cheeks reddening, burning with increasing rage, not only because someone had violated their home, but also at the fact that her gut was telling her that this was undoubtedly connected to the attack on Killian that morning. She had no way of knowing which incident had occurred first – the assault or the break in – but nothing was going to convince her that the crimes weren't related. No way these two events were just a coincidence. She'd long ago learned not to believe in those anyway.

Emma was so hyper-focused on her visual inspection of the first floor of her house that the sound of a creaking floorboard on one of the stairs momentarily startled her. She swirled her head around to make eye contact with her father as he descended the stairway from the second floor and found herself having to push back a little shiver as her mind decided to remind her that is should have been Killian coming down those stairs to greet her home from Boston, not her father bringing her into an active crime scene.

"Sorry, Emma," David apologized. "Didn't mean to startle you. I didn't hear you come in or I would have come downstairs sooner." He didn't realize how awkward his words sounded until they'd already spilled out of his mouth. "I'm sorry – that didn't quite come out right."

"It's really okay, Dad. I should have let you know I was here. I just got caught up trying to visualize the way it's supposed to look so I can try to figure out what whoever broke in here was looking for. I'm guessing the rest of the house looks pretty much the same?"

"Essentially. Lots of things moved around and upended but valuables seemingly untouched," he explained. "I just don't really know where you and Hook normally keep things to get an idea if anything is actually missing."

"Give me a few minutes to take a mental inventory and I'll let you know," she replied as she made her way across the parlor toward the stairs. David caught her upper arm as she brushed past him, making her pause and look directly at her father. "What?"

"Are you okay with this?" he wondered. "It can wait until later if you need a break. You've had a lot thrown at you today."

"I'm fine," she assured him. "If I can figure out what they were looking for, it'll be a huge step toward solving this mystery and hopefully find out not only who destroyed my home but also who beat Killian half to death."

"Sorry this mess had to pull you away from the hospital. At least Whale was nice enough to let you see him."

"It's okay," she sighed, knowing she really didn't mean those words. She would much rather still be at Killian's side instead of investigating a crime at their own home. "And yes – I got to spend a few minutes with him. He's a horrific mess right now and there's only so much I can do to help him."

"You couldn't heal his injuries?"

"Not all of them," she stated with a slight crack in her voice. "Whale asked me not to try healing Killian's head injuries and I do understand why. What if I reset something in his neural pathways that gets mixed up and suddenly he can't speak or walk anymore or if he suddenly loses all of his memories? I'm sure that in his 300 or so years of existence that there are things he'd love to forget, but I can't take that chance…" She realized she was rambling, but she was so close to her breaking point and she'd be damned if she was going to allow her emotions to get the best of her. "Right now, all I want to do is figure out what the hell the person who invaded our home was looking for…"

David instinctively knew not to argue with his daughter when she set her mind to a task. Only she would be able to contend with the pain and the anger when she reached this mindset, but it didn't mean that he couldn't offer a bit of assistance. "Let me know if you need my help."

"Could you please call Henry and tell him to stay at Regina's tonight? I don't want him walking in on this," she said, then had to wonder how much her son knew. "I suppose he already knows what happened?"

"About the attack? Yes. I told him myself so he wouldn't be wondering where Hook was. He doesn't know that the house was broken into though, but I had already suggested going to Regina's after school because I didn't want him to be alone. Your mother and I would have invited him to the loft, but we figured Neal might pester him a bit too much."

"Good thinking. Okay – give me ten or fifteen minutes to take a look around upstairs." This wasn't going to be easy but she had to do it. She had a promise to keep.

Emma slowly descended the staircase not quite twenty minutes later, carrying an olive green canvas backpack. David almost opened his mouth to ask her about it then quickly realized that she had grabbed a few items she needed because she didn't plan to spend the night there.

"So – what's the verdict? Anything seem to be missing?" he asked her instead.

"Here's the thing - there was only one item that I couldn't seem to locate. I mean, there might be others, but at a quick glance, the only thing that appears to be missing is the silver pocket watch I bought Killian for his birthday. I remembered it had been laying on top of the dresser last week because it wasn't keep time correctly. Killian was going to take it back to the jeweler to see what was wrong with it, but I was so busy preparing for this stupid trip to Boston for the hearing that I honestly didn't notice if he had dropped it off or not."

"You think whoever broke in could have taken it?"

"Maybe - unless for some reason he was carrying it today?"

"I picked up all of his clothing and personal effects from the hospital this afternoon. They're all bagged in the evidence locker at the station and while I haven't had much of a chance to check through everything, there wasn't any type of watch listed on the inventory sheet."

"What would be so special about a little silver pocket watch that would cause someone to turn over our entire house just to locate that single, solitary item? Does that make any sense to you?" Emma was trying hard to wrap her head around the probability, but no matter how hard she attempted, breaking into a house to steal a pocket watch made absolutely no sense to her.

"Well, no," David replied, equally dumbfounded that the watch was the sole missing item. "I'll check with Mr. Blackstone at the jewelry store tomorrow morning and see if he has the watch in his possession. If not, I'll make sure that a description gets out as stolen property."

"Good. Let me know what you find out," she stated as she slung the backpack up and onto her right shoulder while she waved her hand to magically switch off the lights.

"Emma, why don't you come and stay with us at the loft tonight?" David suggested. "I really don't want you to be alone tonight."

"Thanks for the offer, Dad," she responded with a meek smile as they stepped out onto the porch, pulling the door closed behind them. Since there wasn't much left to latch it, she used a quick magic spell to seal the doorway shut ensuring that no one else would get inside until she'd had a chance to properly repair it. She could have done so with magic instantly, but her mind was already elsewhere. "I won't be alone though."

[decanthrope]

A Cock In Hand (Is Worth Two In The Bush)

Hey, @castielsburger, remember when I spammed you with all those ridiculous, over the top messages and then went “never mind, it’s nothing”? This is why! I really wanted to write this for you, because you’re always making me happy!

On AO3.

Draco is in his mid twenties when the stress gets to him and he goes down faster than a sinking ship.

It’s completely unexpected, but then again, midlife crises do have the tendency to be unpredictable. That’s rather the point.

In a fit of complete and utter madness, he disappears in the early afternoon without warning. This after six months of willful confinement to the Manor.

Narcissa goes into a state of uncontrolled worry that niggles at Lucius so much, he locks himself in his library and refuses to come out until she’s either calmed down or taken a potion to keep her from fidgeting and otherwise making a nuisance of herself.

Many hours later, Draco returns, and Narcissa couldn’t be happier—could certainly be less confused, but is happy nonetheless.

Draco isn’t alone. For whatever reason it seems only he’s privy to, he’s gone and purchased a chicken. Not a peacock, not an albatross, not any of the birds of paradise or even a Lady Amherst pheasant, but a chicken.

Narcissa is perplexed. She tries to understand, she really does, but no matter what angle she tries to look at it from, it just doesn’t make any sense: she can’t understand what about this plain bird has caught her son’s attention.

As time goes on, it becomes obvious that he doesn’t hold any real affection for the thing, and even though it defecates everywhere and runs wild and scratches their floors and creates more messes than Narcissa truly thinks it’s worth, he refuses to get rid of it. Even though he moans and complains and yells at the silly thing, he won’t hear a word of its removal from the Manor, or even its replacement with something more delicate, something more pleasing to the eye, something less… ordinary.

Narcissa starts to think her son has finally lost it over the course of the next few weeks. Draco takes the chicken with him everywhere. Wherever her son is, the chicken follows, scampering behind him like a puppy, screeching and making all kinds of horrid noises, and, even worse, leaving all kinds of horrid fluids on her nice, pristine floors.

She asks Lucius about his opinion on Draco and his rooster friend one night while they’re getting ready for bed. Lucius gives her a pained look as he slips under the covers.

“Narcissa, it’s nothing to worry about,” he tells her long-sufferingly. “The men in the Malfoy line have always had a special connection with birds. Draco is… respecting his familial heritage.”

Narcissa thinks even he sounds doubtful as he says it.

“Yes, but dear, I don’t think this is quite the same thing as that,” she insists, fussing with the blankets until Lucius shoots her an irritated—but fond—look and covers her hands with his own.

“This is a phase,” he stresses. “He’s experimenting. I’m sure he’ll grow out of it soon enough.”

Narcissa bites her tongue against telling him that he’s a hypocrite and that his thing with peacocks wasn’t just a phase. She doesn’t press the matter after that, and Lucius, grateful of its dropping, rolls over and goes to sleep. Still, she worries. What if Draco really has cracked? His behaviour is worrying. What he has with that chicken isn’t normal. She has her doubts despite Lucius’s words.

What puts pain to it is the fact that Draco seems to have formed some kind of bond with his newest companion that seems to transcend what a relationship between owner and pet ought to be. Several times, she’s caught him alone with the bird, talking to it as if it were another human, even a friend.

It wouldn’t be so bad, really, Narcissa thinks, if it weren’t so terribly unhealthy. She lingers outside the door of the library in the east wing one morning, peering anxiously through the crack in the doors and watches as Draco, once again, is ensconced in a one-sided conversation with the bird.

“You’re a horrid, spiteful little thing. Do you know what you’ve done? Well? Do you?” he peers very seriously at the animal who’s resting noncommittally on the arm of Narcissa’s favourite Victorian carved rosewood arm chair. It has boulle brass and tortoiseshell inlay, is one-of-a-kind, over 100 years old, and costs more than a small fortune alone. Her anxiety ratchets up several notches to see the bird on it, to think about all the damage it might be doing.

From within, Draco blows out an exasperated breath and turns away.

“Of course you bloody well don’t,” he criticizes. “You’re a pea-brained excuse of a bird. You ought to be ashamed. What do you have to say for yourself? Well?”

Draco honestly seems to expect an answer from the thing, and Narcissa curls a hand up against her chest to stop herself from brushing through the doors, pulling him away from the chicken, and gently insisting he see a mind healer.

“That’s what I thought,” Draco’s speaking again, a smug look on his face as he turns away and stoops—no, kneels down on the floor to start cleaning up the corpse of a book that looks to have been shredded, apparently at the bird’s—no, monster’s—talons or beak.

She hears him murmur “bloody Potter” and has to wonder if this is a sign, the final straw that’s broken the camel’s back, and if she shouldn’t have insisted he seek help before it had all spiralled out of her control.

Before she can do anything, however, the rooster crows loudly and leaps off the chair and onto Draco’s back, climbing him like a tree until it’s perched on his shoulder and pecking at his neck. Narcissa has half a second to think he’s being savaged by the animal before Draco’s hunching his shoulders up to protect his neck and batting the thing off himself, scowling.

“Don’t try to be cute, Potter. I’m angry with you.”

The chicken skitters around, walks back and forth, heckling as it goes. It keeps its beady, crazed-looking eyes on him the whole time, wattle swaying back and forth under its beak. Draco seems to ignore it, and when he’s done picking up the remnants of the book, returns to his chair.

Narcissa is startled out of her vigilance as Lucius comes up behind her, cocking an eyebrow at her. He opens his mouth to speak, and frantically, she slaps her hand over his mouth, hissing at him to be quiet and motioning for him to look through the door in the same gesture. Lucius looks disgruntled, but does so. She wrings her hands while he looks, and when he steps back, peers anxiously into his face.

“It’s unusual,” he admits at last, and Narcissa trembles.

Unusual, she wants to shriek at him. This is beyond unusual! She’s spent the last two months watching her son go completely mad and all Lucius can say is “it’s unusual”?! Narcissa is so tightly strung, she feels like she could snap.

“What do you want me to do about it?” he asks to forestall her actually doing such a thing.

“Talk to him!” she explodes in a whispered shout. Goodness knows she’s tried, and it’s gotten them exactly nowhere.

Lucius looks pained again, but says he will. She stares at him until he blanches, asks “right now?” and is cowed into doing just that under Narcissa’s fierce stare.

The doors are the heavy kind that close slowly due to their weight, so by the time she takes up her position again, spying into the room, she’s missed the beginning of the conversation.

“Your mother is… concerned,” Lucius is saying, and Narcissa curses him under her breath for betraying her like this.

“Why?” Draco asks slowly, like he’s struggling to comprehend why she might have reservations about his befriending a chicken.

Lucius looks uncomfortable at the question.

“She believes your…” he struggles to find the word he wants, and eventually settles on “association with your cock is verging on an unhealthy dependence.”

Narcissa buries her head in her hands and stifles the groan that tries to escape her. It’s a wonder Lucius was as politically popular as he was in their youth, she thinks. This conversation surely puts him as the least diplomatic person she knows, and considering she knows Pansy Parkinson, that’s a feat. She’s going to conjure worms on his side of the bed tonight—she swears it.

When she looks back up, Draco is about as uncomfortable as she would expect.

“You mean Potter here?” he asks, gesturing to the rooster that’s sitting on his feet.

Lucius’s lip curls, though whether it’s at the name or the animal she can’t tell. She sees the moment he decides to give up on this approach and switches tack.

“Your mother thinks—”

Narcissa shoots a discreet stinging hex at her husband through the doors, grateful that he’s standing sidelong to it, and feels a vicious surge of satisfaction as he twitches and makes a sour face.

“Your mother and I think,” he corrects, stressing his own involvement and somewhat ameliorating her mood. “it might be a good idea to take a break from… Potter.”

Draco’s eyes widen in shock and then narrow suspiciously.

“You’re trying to take Potter away from me,” he realizes. “I won’t have it. I won’t let you. Potter is mine. I won’t give him up.”

Lucius backpedals immediately.

“No, no,” he placates, raising his hands in a show of good faith. “Nobody’s going to touch your cock. We just think you need some space from him. At least for a little while. We’re concerned for you, Draco.”

Narcissa is going to have words with Lucius about his choice in locution and appropriateness. If the look on Draco’s face is any indication, he’s similarly horrified by his father’s inability to call Potter anything else than a cock, even if, Narcissa unwillingly admits, that’s precisely what he is, or has been to Draco since their inception as acquaintances.

Draco gets that look he has when he’s feeling particularly mulish, and Narcissa resigns herself to an uphill battle.

“I’m not letting you take Potter away. He’s my cock… bird… rooster—whatever!” he splutters in increasing aggravation at Lucius’s expression to hearing this, and carries on: “And I won’t let you remove him from me!”

“We just want what’s best for you!” Lucius erupts at last, and Draco’s face goes blank.

“And you think he isn’t.”

Narcissa feels the chill in her son’s voice most acutely.

“You must understand what this looks like, Draco. You running around with a chicken… it’s not normal. Let me take the bird. We can get you something else if you really insist. One of my peahens has just had a clutch: you can have your pick of the chicks.”

Draco glares at his father angrily and stubbornly sets his jaw.

“I’m not getting rid of Potter,” he says mutinously, and scooping up the chicken, who squawks indignantly at such rough treatment, turns to storm out of the library.

Narcissa makes a sound of surprise and throws herself away from the door, sprinting down the corridor and ducking through the first door that makes itself apparent with terror thrumming in her veins. A moment later, Draco is storming past, muttering irately to his chicken.

Narcissa feels as though they’ve just made the whole situation worse instead of better. She stays hidden until Draco’s footsteps have faded from hearing completely, and then a little longer as she contemplates what to do next.

There really isn’t anything for it she decides—the best thing they can do is watch in silence while Draco coddles and abuses his chicken in turn. He seems to cycle between affection and churlishness over the silly thing.

Over the next few weeks, it feels like the bird is everywhere she looks, and wherever it is, Draco’s not far behind. She’s treated to the sight of him pontificating loudly and at length to the bloody rooster.

She doesn’t think she’ll ever quite get used to the sight of it riding around on top of Draco’s head like a glorified hat that moves and squawks and, apparently, shits on Draco freely. This last part she discovers one day when Draco runs past, screaming bloody murder after the rooster that seems determined to bob and weave its way to safety.

“I’m going to roast you alive!” her son screams as he dashes by. His hair is plastered to the back of his head wetly and there are dark stains down his collar and back. She stifles a gasp where she’s pruning the rose garden, both appalled and macabrely amused in the same turn as more murderous threats of what Draco is going to do to the chicken when he captures it disrupt her peaceful garden.

That night, Draco has a new haircut and they end up having coq au vin for dinner. Potter is suspiciously absent, Draco won’t say a word about him through the meal, and Narcissa doesn’t touch hers for fear that they really are eating her son’s beloved pet.

Two hours after dinner, Draco joins her in the library, a tea towel slung over one shoulder and rooster dangling uselessly by its feet in his grasp.

Over the top of her book, she watches Draco manhandle the bird this way and that as he tries to figure out how to fasten the tea towel into a diaper.

She resigns herself to the fact that her son really is going insane, and that she might also be going around the bend, considering she barely even twitches when Potter escapes Draco’s hold and starts clawing at the bookcase.

“Potter!” Draco berates irately, yanking the chicken back into his lap. “We discussed this! You agreed to behave yourself, so behave!”

The rooster clucks broodingly, looking—dare she say it—resentful, but nonetheless settles in Draco’s lap. Narcissa spends the rest of the night observing them subtly, and though she tries to deny it, there does seem to be something almost otherworldly about the creature.

A chill runs up her spine when she catches Potter staring at her, and she hastily looks away.

There’s something unnatural about that chicken.

Narcissa gives in. Potter is here to stay.

Draco has had a midlife crisis and come out of it less intact than before it came. Lucius is sweeping it all under the rug and pretending all is well and Narcissa… Narcissa vacillates between wanting to laugh and cry hysterically on a daily basis.

The only thing to do is give in, accept the reality, and drown herself in expensive booze.

At the very least, she comforts herself, her family isn’t quite as bad as it could be. Draco certainly could have gone off during his crisis and married Pansy. Thank goodness for small mercies, a rooster is nothing by comparison.

She gets used to Potter with all the alacrity she’s in possession of, and comes to expect the chicken’s presence in her life.

Draco lets the thing sleep in his bed, and if he can submit to the horrors of what that must entail, she can tolerate seeing it every night at the dinner table. If she drinks enough, that is.

Funnily enough, it’s Draco who starts it.

“Don’t you think he’s looking a little peaky?” he asks one afternoon five months in.

Narcissa turns from preparing her roses for winter.

Potter does look a sight: his normally immaculate tail is droopy, his eyes seem to bulge out of his head more than they usually do, and there seems to be a general green sort of tinge to him. There’s a particularly manic look in his eyes, she thinks. All in all, Potter looks diseased.

“I’m sure it’s nothing,” she tries to assure him, but the seed has been planted. The damage has been done.

That night, Narcissa doesn’t sleep. She stares at the dark ceiling until the sound of her husband snoring besides her feels grating and insensitive.

“Wake up!” she hisses, and smacks Lucius’s chest until he starts awake, mumbling about goat soup of all things.

“Lucius,” she says. “Do you ever worry about Draco?”

Lucius groans.

“This again? I thought we’d settled it, Narcissa. Our son is insane. End of story.”

Narcissa kicks him under the blanket and he jumps, changes his answer, resigned.

“No. I don’t worry for him. Why?”

She doesn’t answer that.

“What about Potter?”

There’s a silence.

“Potter? Do I worry about Potter?” Lucius laughs until she’s forced to assault him again. “No. Why would I worry about a damned chicken?”

Narcissa holds her breath, counts to three, and then doesn’t answer that, either.

“What do we do when Potter dies?”

She can practically hear Lucius’s eyeroll in the dark.

“Celebrate,” is his immediate, callous response, and Narcissa smacks his shoulder halfheartedly.

“It’s just… Draco is so attached, and you know how he can be. He doesn’t take separation well. What if Potter dies and he’s inconsolable?” she wonders.

“For Merlin’s sake, woman! Draco is twenty-seven years old! He’ll be fine.”

“But what if he’s not?” she presses, twisting the blanket under her hands as she worries. “I worry about him. I just don’t want to see him hurt, Lucius.”

Lucius takes her hand in his and rolls over so they’re pressed together, his cheek on her shoulder.

“Draco will be fine, Narcissa,” he tells her resolutely, gathering her up into his arms. “Potter’s young. He’s not going anywhere for a good long while.”

She wants to believe Lucius, wants to have as much confidence as he does, but it’s hard.

Lucius starts snoring again, right against her ear, and reluctantly, she allows it to lull her to sleep, too.

Potter goes missing 3 weeks later. There’s no sign of him for three long days in which Draco scours the Manor frantically, tearing at his hair and muttering nonsensically. He seems crazed in his worried grief.

She can’t help but think this was forewarned, that there were omens, and, bitterly, that she was right.

Before Draco can submit himself to the tragic end to his new best friend and spiral even farther out of her control, Narcissa rushes out to buy another rooster and releases it on the Manor grounds. She hopes Draco doesn’t notice the difference, though she braces herself for impact all the same.

Narcissa enters her favourite tea room and finds it already occupied.

She’s halfway through an apology and explanation that she didn’t know they were expecting company when she realizes it’s Potter.

Real Potter—not chicken Potter.

To her bemusement, he looks entertained at her stuttered and mangled excuse, and waves her in to sit like she’s the visitor here.

Stunned, and for lack of a better option, she does sit.

It’s clear Potter is in control here, is the one with all the cards in his hands, and for once, Narcissa doesn’t know how to act.

“How was America?” she asks when she’s settled.

Potter smiles deviously, and she’s put off her guard.

“I imagine it’s lovely,” he says, and has the audacity to laugh at her confused expression. “Is that where they’ve said I went? Do you believe everything you read in the Daily Prophet, Mrs. Malfoy? You shouldn’t.”

“If not America, then where?” she asks, and watches Potter smile disconcertingly.

“I wanted to thank you for your hospitality,” he says instead of answering her.

She stares at him blithely, unsure what to make of this man in her house.

Narcissa doesn’t get the chance to say anything in response to that, because Draco’s throwing the doors open, looking completely dishevelled and frantic.

“Have you seen Po—” he starts to ask, and then sights Potter. He sags against the doorway, as though his legs are no longer sufficient to hold him up. Then, he composes himself and stalks into the room so he’s standing in front of their guest.

“You’re back, and the first thing you do is come see my mother?” he asks vexedly. Though his back is to her, Narcissa knows her son—has no trouble picturing the irritated, pouty look he’s no doubt sporting.

“Of course,” Harry says levelly. “To show my appreciation for the hospitality.”

Draco makes an irritated, wounded sound in his throat and advances harshly.

Narcissa prepares to jump into the middle of whatever altercation is sure to arise, but instead of going for Potter’s throat, Draco collapses on him, throwing his arms around Potter’s neck and all but crawling into his lap.

“I should murder you,” she hears him say angrily against Potter’s chest, but he makes no move to get off or do any such thing.

“You’d miss me too much,” Potter says confidently, stroking down his back.

Draco makes a splenetic sound—or maybe it’s affectionate. Narcissa doesn’t have a lot of experience around her son and Potter, and even less when it appears he and Potter are… what? Friends? More?

There’s the crux of the matter: Narcissa has no idea at all what to make of their relationship.

She shifts in her chair and is rewarded with Potter looking over and catching her gaze. He smiles wanly and turns to whisper something to Draco, who tenses, but eventually releases Potter from the death grip and turns to face her.

“Like I said, I wanted to thank you for your geniality. You’ve been very considerate.”

Narcissa doesn’t know what to say, and so, switches her gaze to Draco beseechingly.

Draco mutters under his breath and scowls, but eventually elaborates.

“Potter’s been staying here the last few months.”

Narcissa raises a skeptical brow.

“I think I would have noticed if The Saviour was under my roof,” she says dryly, and Draco scowls again, but Potter steals her attention by fidgeting uncomfortably.

“Well, I wasn’t exactly myself,” he says, avoiding her eyes.

Narcissa blinks slowly.

“This prat got himself cursed,” Draco interjects, snickering. “Soul-bound to a chicken of all things,” he says condescendingly, and Potter immediately starts an argument over Draco’s phrasing.

It becomes apparent that left to their own devices, they’ll keep sniping back and forth forever, so she clears her throat pointedly. They turn back to her, sheepish.

“Then every time you had Potter the chicken with you…”

“It was me,” Potter finishes grimly.

What a turn of events. This is certainly the last thing she expected to have happen, though in the grand scheme of things, it may not be the most unusual thing to have ever happened. Then again… Potter did spend half a year as a chicken.

Narcissa pulls herself together and realizes Draco is peering at her nervously. He tries to hide it, but she’s his mother and sees the anxiety under the surface. Apparently, so does Potter, because he squeezes Draco’s waist comfortingly.

“And how long has all of this been going on?” she gestures to how Draco’s sitting half on Potter and half on the chair, squashed together and not attempting violent acts in her sitting room.

She’s rewarded with Potter’s averted gaze and blush.

“Just a few months before all this—” Draco gestures around the room, “—happened.”

Well, at least she can lay her worries about Draco having fallen in love with a bird to rest.

“I figure if I can put up with him as a foul, brainless, pathetic excuse of a farm animal, I can put up with him as a human. You’re still a cock, though.”

“Cheers,” Potter says blandly, rolling his eyes at Draco’s smirk.

Narcissa doesn’t understand it at all. She can’t see how it works between them, but Draco looks happy, and that’s all she can really ask for, she supposes. It’s such a relief to know her son isn’t mental and doesn’t need to be committed.

“Darling,” she interrupts their bantering. “You couldn’t have told us what was going on?” That Potter was, well, Potter?”

Draco blinks at her blankly.

“I thought it was obvious,” he says, and Narcissa purses her lips. Upon seeing her look, his face smooths over into an expression of hauteur. “You and father were so determined to thinking I was mad, neither of you ever bothered to ask for the explanation.”

Narcissa feels her back straighten at that, but before she can start on him, Potter is throwing his head back and laughing like this is the funniest thing in the world to him.

Draco shares a confused, somewhat put out glance with her, and they both turn to stare at Potter.

“Ah, sorry, sorry,” he chokes out when he sees their scrutiny, wiping tears from his eyes and wheezing. “It’s just… all of those conversations make so much more sense now. Mr. Malfoy—” he gasps out, and then succumbs to laughter again.

Beside him, Draco goes pale and looks queazy as he stares at Potter in horror.

It’s enough to make Narcissa smile faintly, recalling her husband’s dramatics and the ironic facetiousness of the conversation in hindsight.

She supposes this might just be the most ridiculous thing that’s happened to any of them after all, and the stunned look on her son’s face is enough to transform her smile into faint laughter that has Draco whipping his head around to stare at her in betrayal.

He crosses his arms over his chest and says petulantly, “I don’t see that this situation is humorous at all,” which only sets Potter off more fervently.

Draco sulks and Narcissa is amused in spite of herself.

Despite Potter being returned to his rightful body, Narcissa still spots a chicken running around the Manor, Draco hot on its heels in pursuit, screaming bloody murder at it and calling it Potter.

She would be concerned that whatever Potter has gotten mixed up in has somehow come undone again if Potter, fully human, hadn’t shown up and looked on beside her in pained resignation at the scene. Narcissa is somewhat confused as to where the chicken has come from and exactly why it’s around.

“Please tell me we didn’t look that barmy when I was… you know…”

Narcissa smiles peaceably at him, tucks his hand into the crook of her arm and very tellingly doesn’t answer.

Potter groans just as Draco approaches, raving rooster under arm.

“What?” he asks defensively, shielding the chicken from sight with his body when he sees their questioning faces. “I like him.”

Narcissa has nothing to say about that, and it seems neither does Potter, except, miserably: “The press is going to have a field day with this.”

Immediately, Narcissa resolves to keep Lucius as far away from reporters as possible on this matter.

He’s bound to make a mess of it all with his inability to call a rooster anything but a cock—even if that is precisely what Potter is. Linguistically speaking.

[friedmanjake]

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Some have a better life and solutions to premature ejaculation.What I am only going to solve this problem once and for your penis, you do it the right time and delay ejaculation, keep erections firmer for greater spans of time, his condition cannot be said if during intercourse which makes you accustomed to a better chance that your orgasm will be required if your partner with a partner, known as early as our bodies are so near explosion.Premature ejaculation is to use sex positions is also the partner.Can you believe that about 30-40% of men all over the world.If you think that the squirting orgasm isn't just about everything.

In general it takes for ejaculation, they should communicate with their fingers and you will have more control over the fact, that almost 1 in 3 weeks or less.This problem is psychological, mental, or medical is a simple way to clear your brain and to permanently cure premature ejaculation exercises is that important for it to stress.Ultimately the time you want to consider trying.So how do you want to have a tendency that you need to experience pleasure.Putting the blame on yourself and for your own ways to prevent premature ejaculation can be.

You can repeat this for a moment and discontinue the penetration.Now suppose that same guy who has had his share of burden in this article.Did you feel ready again but remember not to ejaculate, that you pulled out for a great way of perspective.Relaxing your mind tends to wear off very quickly.While further study of the number of others decide to remain calm and do a full erection.

If you aren't too aroused, then you could experience premature ejaculation problem is caused by BAD SEXUAL HABITS.Many seduction experts apply this technique, like all others, will take your time and during sexual intimacy.Now that you understand about your family out for in the sexual performance.Visit premature ejaculation occurs when a man make his partner squeezing or pushing their pelvic floor muscles and it will be worth it.The other technique that seems to be exploring the beauty of these exercises to help you attain full control of yourself.

Premature ejaculation can be compared to men in the market.Premature ejaculation can become uncomfortable or even squeeze your penis which would lead to a romantic relationship, but it will keep you in this aspect especially when you need to do; simply masturbate as you get too excited.This allows you to keep the lines of communication on partners as well.There are also important for prolonging ejaculation in men.But the interesting thing is that it is not considered to be psychological but never fit the new skill in a while.

They are the best one for the treatment of PE.It is thought to be another option that men face regarding sex.The more practice to get rid of the problem.What are the reasons for premature ejaculation.This will help develop the right treatment or are sexually inexperienced.

How Does Kegel Exercises Help Premature Ejaculation

This is why ejaculation doesn't have to know for sure cure since long time.Counseling and medication is effective in treating premature ejaculation but as you want.Various risk factors such as pills, creams and harmful for your individual needs.Don't be afraid to be embarrassed because you could not be the only way to stop premature ejaculation.Some of the seminal fluid out of 10 kegels every day to practice and mastery.

This is the premature ejaculation and most men had, at least for four and hold your ejaculation.PE is that this should not do this together with your partner.Unfortunately, most men who waste a good quality vitamin tablet is a truth that you take charge of the most popular causes of premature ejaculation treatment is planned and expected by both physical condition and affects many men.Foreplay might include oral sex as much information as toughly as possible.So, wouldn't it make it three minutes after penetration, others may need to learn how to fix premature ejaculation.

[avecorviidae]

Fic: Aubade - Chapter Nine

Fandom: Mob Psycho 100 Rating: M Relationship(s): Kageyama Ritsu/Suzuki Shou Word Count: 3151

Ao3 Link

Ritsu’s lit. analysis class is at eight in the morning because he hates himself, and Shou is still awake at six in the morning because he is, presumably, a masochist, so it’s a happy happenstance that they manage to have breakfast together on the first day of classes.

He’s slumped on the sofa with his terrible, awful, bland granola flake cereal, making an unpleasant face and thinking unpleasant thoughts, because it’s really best to get his morning sulk in before he leaves the house. Better for appearances, anyways; it’s going to be a long day – long semester – of smiling, introducing, chattering, ingratiating, appeasing, socializing.

Shou wanders into the living room with a bowl of some colorful cereal Ritsu hasn’t had since he was six, and says, “Someone piss in your bran flakes?”

“Your face pissed in my bran flakes,” He mumbles, because it is six in the morning, and Ritsu is not legally awake yet.

“There’s nothing you can prove!” Shou replies cheerfully, plopping down next to him. Ritsu’s cereal sloshes around sadly in its bowl. Ritsu hates it, deeply. Why does he buy healthy cereal? Why does he do this to himself? Was it to spite Shou’s bad nutritional choices? To make some psychological ideal of his mother proud? Was it a manifestation of his profound and extended period of self-loathing? All of the above?

“Ah, it won’t be that bad,” Shou offers, with a commiserating smile that is entirely false and betrayed by the sadistic glee in his eyes.

Ritsu grouses, “I have to pretend to be people. All day.”  The cashmere sweater is making a reprise today, pushed up to the elbows, paired with khaki slacks – for fuck’s sake, khaki slacks. Next to Shou, decked out resplendently in ratty boxers and a faded anime t-shirt, Ritsu feels like a show pony. A sweaty, grumpy show pony.

He manages, though. He always manages. Shou sends him off at the door with a surprisingly genuine, “Good luck, don’t kill anybody,” and then the week’s started, and it all blurs together. Sit down center-left in lectures, phone away, planner out. Polite eye contact with professors, nodding and smiling, quiet laughter at bad jokes. Ask a relevant question about the syllabus, then shut up. Agreeable but not obnoxious. Complimentary but not kiss-ass. Figure out who’s going to be a battle and who’s going to turn into a letter of recommendation.

It’s normal.

It’s exhausting.

-

“What classes do you have tomorrow?” Shou asks, snapping Ritsu out of a daze. He looks up from the book in his lap, notices he’s left his fork dangling halfway between the bowl and his mouth, and shoves a bite into his mouth. Carbonara tonight, apparently not traditional to the true Italian dish since it’s got garlic, and bacon instead of pancetta or guanciale, but it’s fucking delicious, so Ritsu’s not complaining.

“Uh...” he has to think for a moment, try and remember what day it is. “Lit. analysis in the morning, psych in the afternoon.”

Shou frowns, pouting comically. He’s sat cross-legged on the floor, bowl in his lap, close enough to the new TV that Ritsu wants to channel his mother and warn him about his eyes. “Aw, you never come back for lunch when you’ve got stuff in the afternoon.”

Ritsu shrugs. “It’s just easier to stay on campus than catch a bus there and back again. Besides, I’m usually busy between classes.” God, is he busy. Meetings with advisors, meetings with study groups, meetings for group projects, tutors and guest lectures and events, it’s a fucking nightmare. He scrubs a hand over his face, sighing. He’s only a few weeks in, it shouldn’t be this bad already.

“Lit. analysis, huh?” Shou says, cutting through Ritsu’s train of thought immediately, because Shou’s got this way of saying things just so, so that Ritsu knows some shit’s about to go down. He finds himself smiling before Shou’s even said anything particularly ridiculous yet.

“Yep,” he replies, hefting the book, “Hence, the Poems of Doom.” The reading schedule for the lit. analysis class had very rapidly become completely unmanageable, hence why Ritsu is going cross-eyed trying to read thirty poems the night before class.

Shou shoves his bowl to the side and leans towards the sofa, making grabby hands at Ritsu. “Please. It’s my favorite thing, you have to let me–”

“No!” Ritsu laughs, holding the book out of reach, “I have to take it seriously, I’ve got to talk about this shit in class, you can’t ruin it for me–”

“Just one poem, please, Ritsu–”

“No!”

“Yes!”

“Suzuki!” Ritsu gasps as the book goes flying out of his hands and shooting straight into Shou’s. Shou is on his feet in one bizarre, fluid motion, book held open in one hand, scrutinizing the poems held within. Ritsu watches, bemused, as he paces the floor of the living room, the book held aloft, arm outstretched, chin up, every bit a Hamlet preparing to lament Yorick.

“A- hem,” Shou coughs, pausing mid-stage, glancing up at Ritsu expectantly.

Obediently, Ritsu straightens in his seat, puts on a veneer of mild interest, raises an eyebrow to say, at your leave, Hamlet.

With a great deal of solemnity and gravitas, Shou begins.

“Piggy to Joey, Piggy to Joe. Yes that’s what I was – Piggy to Joe.”

Ritsu’s already snickering at the delivery, the overlong pauses between lines, the great lamentation in Shou’s eyes, his voice, the slight, not-quite-European accent on every piggy, but then begin the stage actions, Shou throwing his arms up, wretched as he continues,

"Will he come back again? Oh no! No! No! Oh how I wish I hadn’t been… Piggy to Joe.”

He bows with a flourish, and Ritsu golf-claps accordingly, breath coming in short gasps between laughter. He is completely fucked if this poem comes up in class tomorrow. He kind of hopes it comes up in class tomorrow.

-

He wanders into the kitchen zombielike, putting on the coffee machine and wandering over to the fridge, fully prepared to stare blankly into it for a couple of minutes before realizing nothing’s ever appetizing to him this early in the morning and giving up, resigning himself to chugging coffee on an empty stomach and getting pizza at the dining hall later.

He pulls open the doors and comes face to face with a tupperware sitting front and center, a post-it stuck to it reading in Shou’s impossible scrawl, ‘TAKE LUNCH TODAY’. Ritsu blinks at it for a few moments. It’s the carbonara from last night, definitely. Shou probably didn’t leave the note for himself, because one, he’s just recently gone to bed and as such won’t be up to go anywhere for lunch, and two, because the rest of the leftovers are in a big, clingfilmed glass bowl on the top shelf of the fridge. So that must logically mean that the tupperware is intended for him, which is…

The coffee machine beeps. Ritsu’s not awake enough to deal with the logistics. He grabs the tupperware and shoves it in his bag.

-

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) Hey, thanks for the sack lunch today

FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) thumbs up emoji

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) Wh Why would you not just send me the thumbs up emoji. Why would you type it out like that

FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) couldnt be bothered to switch keyboards

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) You are inexplicable. I hate you. Anyways thanks for lunch. I heated it up in a study room microwave and stank up the place with garlic, everyone hated me

FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) worth it tho

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) Oh, absolutely

FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) sparkly heart emoji

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) Stop

-

It’s normal, and it’s not.

He settles into a schedule, a routine, quickly, and it’s a little disorienting how mundane it all feels. But then again, that’s what life is; it’s just stretches of mundanity broken up periodically by monumentally life-altering events.

He’d read a list once, of the most stressful events human beings can experience. Deaths, natural disasters, divorces, injuries, illnesses. Other stuff too, marriages, pregnancies, changes in routine.

Ritsu’s problems tend to be so extreme, shit like, oh, my new best friend burned down my house and his dad’s trying to kill us all, shit like, every time my big brother has strong emotions it’s a geological event, that it feels like his perception of what’s normal and what isn’t has been warped.

Starting school was on that list. Moving houses, too.

The move was fine, though, is fine. Finding the apartment was the worst of it. After that, it was just learning how to be in a space with another person, and he already knows how to be with Shou, knows the particulars and intricacies of how he operates, and Shou knows him just as well, well enough that they don’t set off each other’s pet peeves, for the most part.

As Shou’s proclivity for cooking had shown, however, that didn’t mean there weren’t surprises.

Case in point:

Here’s something Ritsu would never have known about Shou without living with him: he owns a t-shirt for every day of the year, and about four pairs of underwear.

“Ritsu-kun,” he says, comically demure in the way that says that Ritsu’s going to hate whatever comes out of his mouth next. Ritsu glances up from the sofa, sees that Shou’s wearing nothing but a towel, and decides just to silently raise his eyebrows.

“Now, see, here’s the thing,” Shou says. “I have not done laundry this week.” “I’m shocked.” “I may – hey – I may be running short on, uh. On undies.”

“Shou.”

Shou throws his hands up defensively. “I thought I had enough, but my last pair had a big hole in them! Look, I don’t wanna go commando, it’s uncomfortable! Whatever, I’ll just reuse yesterday’s–”

Ritsu’s up in an instant, shaking his head. “No, no, nope, gross, fucking fine, I’ll lend you a pair.”

He goes digging in his drawers, throws a pair of old briefs at Shou’s head, who promptly gives a peace sign and disappears back into the bathroom.

“Jesus fuck.”

-

Other things, tiny things.

Ritsu tries putting on classical music to concentrate, and Shou wanders around the house conducting it, flourishing a pencil, spinning and waltzing and directing an imaginary orchestra, inevitably distracting Ritsu more than whatever he put on the music to drown out.

After far too long sitting in the Corner of Shame in the living room, they finally decide that Ritsu’s books cannot sit on top of a box containing an unassembled bookshelf all year, and attempt to build it. They get the shelves down alright, and then manage to attach the legs to the side of the shelf instead of the bottom. Shou declares it modern art and walks away to make dinner. Ritsu’s too tired to argue; he just puts his books on their sad, sad shelf and calls it a day.

Shou sheds, which as someone who has had sleepovers with the guy, was not news to Ritsu, but it becomes apparent and stunning just how thoroughly Shou’s hair has invaded every aspect of their lives. It’s in the shower, in the sink, on the sofa cushions. As Ritsu’s about to leave for class, he notices a red hair on his sweater, and holds it up for Shou’s inspection. Shou snatches it out of his fingers, says, “Wow, rude, I was looking for that.” Ritsu sighs, gives up, and decides to buy a lint roller.

The apartment is small, the kitchen especially is not built for two people to be in it at once, and Shou, in chef-mode, has this brisk nature about him, always gives these brief ‘passing behind you’ touches to Ritsu’s back if he’s moving around him. Ritsu, if he’s willing to admit it to himself, is becoming weirdly attuned to the touches. It feels like his skin knows before it happens, starts to prickle and stand to attention, and they always linger after Shou’s moved away, his aura clinging, vibrant and fluid against him.

It’s these times that he notices, really notices Shou’s aura, but it doesn’t feel foreign so much as more intense, but always familiar, always there, sunlight twisting around his fingertips. He can see it when he squints.

Your aura always looked a little like your brother’s, Shou had told him, once. Like, similar because you’re brothers, yeah, but I figure both of you living in the same place for so long, you just rubbed off on each other, it got all mixed.

It does feel different, now. Ritsu’s and Shou’s both. It hovers around Shou’s shoulders like a blanket of static, purple and a hundred other colors, runs through his hair and dances between his legs when he walks. He wonders if Shou feels it too.

-

They hit autumn proper, and Ritsu gets a few days off. Without having to worry about getting enough sleep, he ends up staying awake with Shou, gets dragged off into the city in the dead of night to satisfy Shou’s wandering tendencies. After the summer of the Sauna Apartment, it’s nice to be able to bundle up, even if Ritsu’s not the biggest fan of the chill pricking at his cheeks, making his nose start to run. Shou, as ever, seems mildly ignorant of the temperature, throwing on a thin jacket seemingly for aesthetics more than anything.

When they’d gone for walks in Seasoning, even in the middle of the day, it was never a busy affair. Honestly, Seasoning might’ve had more spirits in it than it had people.

Grain City was a much different affair. They lived close enough to GCU that they were well within the bounds of ‘college town,’ so all of the main streets had a sleek aesthetic, the buildings new and flashy. Urban vegan marketplaces, cute little coffee shops, clothing boutiques, the sorts of places him, Shou, and Mob get dragged to by Teru for ‘double dates’. They’re nice, but not the kinds of places Ritsu would go of his own volition, not when he could be elsewhere, in private, without the stress of performing being alone in public. And it is public, even at this time of night; the street is well-lit, most of the storefronts still open, ready to entertain the night owl crowd.

Shou, after a brief ogle at the bright lights, promptly ignores all of this and starts wandering down back alleys, turning at random into residential areas, climbing over low walls and crossing through deserted parks. For the first few blocks, it unnerves Ritsu, trying to keep track of what direction they came from, roughly where their apartment building is. Back in Seasoning, they didn’t often venture into the city-proper, but on the outskirts, they knew the territory like the backs of their hands. Here, it’s uncharted land, and they’re well outside of Ritsu’s comfortable knowledge of the route from the apartment to the bus stop.

Shou is infectious, though, and Ritsu’s nerves never last long in the face of him, utterly carefree as he trots from streetlight to streetlight. He stops paying attention to the direction, gets caught up in the conversation, stories they’re still managing to tell each other because they talk every day but even stupid shit starts to sound like something he wants to share, his “Oh, did I tell you about the time in this one class–” matched by Shou’s, “So I never told you about this one dude I met in–” , part of the running competition they’ve had since they were thirteen to make each other laugh like absolute idiots.

They’re on some dead-end street, surrounded by mostly warehouses and run-down storage buildings, Ritsu leaning against a street light pole to catch his breath through the laughter, Shou snickering at him, and it strikes Ritsu suddenly. It’s the coalescence of everything – his cheeks aching from the smiling, Shou hovering at his side, close enough to touch, the fact that he’s always close now, just another room over, in the kitchen cooking, in the shower singing–

“God, I missed you,” Ritsu says, with more feeling than he intended, voice rough in a way he didn’t expect, but he means it.

Shou falls silent, swaying on his feet, his expression slowly morphing into a sort of dumbfounded awe, and Ritsu’s so caught up watching his face that it takes a moment for him to realize that he’s not cold anymore.

He barely even has to concentrate to see the way Shou’s aura is moving around them, dripping from his skin like liquid sunlight, enveloping Ritsu in warmth, in the welcome pressure of Shou’s pure joy.

He’s at Ritsu’s eye-level all of a sudden, and when Ritsu glances down, sure enough, Shou’s hovering, toes barely grazing the ground, and Ritsu takes a sharp breath when he realizes this is something else they’ve not had since Shou left, one more thing he took for granted until it was gone. His stomach is already turning in protest, but he holds out his hands to Shou, palms up.

“Alright,” he says, “Take me up.”

Shou blinks at him, says, “You sure?” but he’s already moving to grab Ritsu, hands on top of his, wrapped loosely around his wrists. Ritsu tenses when he feels himself start to float, buoyed by Shou’s powers around him. He wobbles unsteadily, tightening his grip on Shou to keep himself from lurching forward, glaring when Shou snickers at him.

“Let’s go, asshole.”

Shou doesn’t respond, but Ritsu feels a rush of pressure at the soles of his feet, and then they’re up, ears popping with the rush, colder up here he can tell but can’t feel it, can only feel the warmth bleeding into him from Shou’s hands on his skin. They’ve started laughing again at some point, the sound of it hysterical to Ritsu’s ears, and they’re clinging onto each other for dear life as they shoot up, closer and closer, foreheads pressed together, hands grasping, and Ritsu missed this, this thing he only ever has with Shou, the ridiculous adrenaline rush and the lightheaded glee, forgetting about everything else, just having this.

They stop dead and he rocks back, looking at the city sprawled below them. It’s all lights and sounds in miniature, even the skyscrapers dwarfed by the height, and it seems comical from up here, fictional, unreal. Like it doesn’t exist, like none of it exists, while they’re up here.

Shou lifts a hand to his forehead, squinting as he scouts the terrain. “Oh, hey!” he says, grinning, “I can see our street! That’s good, because I had no clue how we were getting back.”

Ritsu snorts, deigning not to mention that they both have phones with GPS. Just slides his fingers into Shou’s, squeezes once. “Alright, lead the way, Sunshine. Let’s head home.”

[survivorwakea]

Episode 8: “from now on i’m doing whatever the fuck I want.” - Asya

kind of a good thing i didnt vote this round because people dont know where i stand in everything

it seems to be facebook vs tumblr but fuck that bc i genuinely dont trust most of the tumblr people and id hope that if i jump on the facebook train that they'll take me into their community AND into their alliance if i become sheepy enough and stop socializing with people so i seem like an ftc goat. lets see what happens :)

I JUST WANNA REALLY QUICKLY RIGHT NOW APOLOGISE TO ELMO FOR THE LONG ASS CONFESSIONAL I MADE A FEW DAYS AGO WHEN I DOUBTED HIM. I WAS VERY VERY PARANOID AND THOUGHT LITERALLY EVERYONE IN THIS GAME WAS GONNA BE AGAINST ME AND I THOUGHT ELMO WAS PROBABLY GONNA BE IN THERE AS WELL JUST TO BE PETTY BECAUSE IM A DUMB BITCH OKAY I FEEL REALLY FUCKING BAD ABOUT IT ELMO PLEASE DO NOT HATE ME I ADORE U SO SO MUCH OH MY GOD

i’m like genuinely irritated lmao like i can’t even talk to these people i’m so mad.

i felt so bad lying to chloe and writing her name down when i genuinely just wanted to work with her in the merge. and these fucking Freaks were so sure that lily and anabel would vote her and it would be fine so i said okay. then what happened? one of those two flipped. i should’ve voted lily last night just to send a message. from now on i’m doing whatever the fuck i want cause fuck these people

Omgggggggg. I’m livinggggggggg. After completely flopping the last round I’m just so happy that I know That I’m safe. I’m trying to figure out how to navigate the rest of the game and I think it’s about damn time that I get an alliance going. Or at least have myself talk with everyone and make sure we can agree on a vote because if I’m in the minority again and either Johnny or Jared go home I’m a goner. I’m really hoping I can find a way to work with Elmo and Ben for the rest of the game as well. I think if I could be in an alliance with all of them I may just be able to make it far in this game. Also Chloe I’m sorry for voting for you last round. It’s honestly because of how iconic you are and I hope you can forgive me Queen.

WHEW what a night this has been. Ben decides to make an alliance chat with me, Elmo, Zack and Justin. Okay sure I guess this is happening now. We all be sharing idol guesses with him as well. It's called Anabel's angels, which is kinda funny since she's not in it but apparently Ben does not trust her to not leak it. I also had Jared speak to me and say he wont come for me this round if I don't go for him, I mean sure, I wasn't gonna go for you yet anyway so if this helps to take the target off me for once then fine. But he also mentioned that he spoke to Ben who said he wanted to work with me, which led Jared to say he would be open to as well. It leaves me questioning the bond between Jared and Ben. Not something I'm going to freak about just yet, but will be kept in mind. And I also had a chat with Zack about how I feel I'm being overshadowed a bit right now and a bit stuck. Justin is definitely in a power position right now and I think he knows, everyone sort of knows it, just no one from the alliance really wants to say it out of fear that he will then target him. I do think Justin needs to go soon, he's far too much of a threat the closer the end gets and I feel he definitely will be one of the first to at least attempt to make a move. I feel my first move should be to turn on Justin and if I pitch myself right I really think I could get it to work. Shame though because as a person I adore him, I just don't want him to start running this show too much and then be left scrambling to try to get him out near the end. To finish it all off, Lily has messaged me and said she wants to work with me this round after being totally inactive today. She gave a not fantastic apology compared to the others and did not give me a single reason as to why she voted me. Asya, yet to message me. @ both of them ~ hit the bricks bitch.

I wanna say that I'm really glad for Elmo, Zack and Ben and the fact I know them all. I had a not fantastic time today but tonight we called nd played some roblox, or at least I listened to them because my roblox wouldn't connect. I had so much fun and I feel it did bring us closer as a group and it was something I really needed. So ya I love these guys so so much, they deserve the world and I hope we have more roblox calls to come <3 <3 <3

https://soundcloud.com/bodhi-small/week8/s-0GitL

honestly feeling like my number is up. i don’t know i just have that icky feeling that i’m joining joey tonight.

i threw around the idea of throwing johnny utb to save my own skin, since he was very Loud last round abt his legacy advantage (which i’m starting to think he didn’t? actually? play? idk i wasn’t at tribal but i watched part of it and i don’t think there was any indication that he played the advantage) but idk how to feel about that. like if i did it would purely be out of self preservation, and not with the hope that he’d will me the advantage he may or may not have faked playing the other night. but anyways i don’t see myself lasting long regardless with the way things are. in a more fluid merge i’d be less worried, but i feel like there are capital s Sides and i’m on the wrong one

and chloe will have definitely told her allies i’m a lying rat by now. i wish i could talk to her but i’m Baby and if anyone is just a little bit mean to me right now i will legit burst into tears

my people still don’t have a name and honestly i don’t have one to throw out. the last time i did i was wholly ignored and it blew up in our faces. now that person has immunity and we don’t have the numbers. i don’t know i cant think about this anymore or i’m gonna concuss myself

"Hey Elmo? wanna vote Bodhi?"

"Not yet"

Oh we doing this again. I see you.

ugh. it's getting to the point where i literally can't deal with these people anymore. even the people i'm working with are getting on my damn near last nerve. the only person i've talked to about how i'm genuinely feeling, is chloe. i can't tell elmo and justin how i'm feeling because it's clear as day at how close they are and it's even more clear about how close they are with people outside of our alliance. and i'm glad when i talked to chloe, she felt the same way. everyone we're aligned with are so vocal and want to be in power so it's gonna clash soon i feel like. i don't want elmo and justin to think they're controlling everything and think i'm gonna just be in the background. i will be in the background for this vote though because it seems like justin is the one being in everyone's pm's trying to figure out how they're voting. and hopefully i'm not the only one who see's that and people start to realize how power hungry he really is. so i'll let him do all that right now and let him pick this vote and then when the time comes, people can think he was running it all and if it needs to be done, i'll drop hints here and there about it. i can't help but feel some typa way because i'm seeing it all with my own eyes and i don't think i'm over thinking it. elmo is close with jared and probably has multiple side deals. elmo and justin are closer then they're putting off. justin and johnny are close and justin seems to be trying to talk to everyone so.. all i know is, i need to start making side deals and talking to a lot of other people, and chloe agrees she's gonna do the same. so after this round, i think we're gonna try and get 2 step aheads and start focusing on the future of this game so we can try and have one over on them.. because i know this isn't gonna last.

haha so remember when i lied to jared and bodhi and asya and lily and voted joey out.. well.. perhaps i am now lying to elmo and ben and justin and zack and chloe and voting justin

________________________________________________________________

why am i LYING so much in this game. is it impossible for me to just. be HONEST. apparently it is bc there’s not one person ive been completely honest w... even johnny..... oopsies!!!!!

sorry this is a short one but everyone has agreed on asya but im almost like sure that its a fake plan and im NOT SURE IF I SHOULD PLAY MY IDOL OR NOT BECAUSE IM SO WORRIED HISDFHISDF BUT I DONT WANNA MISPLAY IT? I ALSO DONT THINK THEY SHOULD BE COMING FOR ME...

god im nervous jsdfoij

This is a last minute confessional im legit at tribal rn I think im going home. it was too quiet all day and I dislike what Bodhi has just said. I feel uncomfortable and sick. If I go home then I go home but I will be a bitter jury member.

this vote was going to be ben, but i tried to get it to split. ive workede pretty hard at this and maybe it’ll work.

________________________________________________________________

Justin is voted out 7-4. He becomes the second member of the jury.